Got a press release here, it came in today; “Sex Pistols announce 50 years of punk celebration shows” reads the headline. Gawd, we’ve got all that to face next year as well as everything else! Sponsored by TK Maxx no less; “TK Maxx Presents” says the headline and hey what would Vivienne say? We’re a long long way from the Kings Road now, mass produced clothes worn once, then sent back, end of lines sold of cheap, all that used underwear and one big milk-it-all Karaoke and ever get the feeling you’re being suckered or something like that. Whatever happened to that guy from Gallows anyway? Are you sure you don’t want to buy a Cynical Smile t-shirt?

Meanwhile, “Hello Organ zine! For your consideration is this latest release from the (whatever the band or the artist was called). Thank you for paying attention to one of my previous releases back in 2021. I dig your aesthetic and appreciate your eclectic approach to the arts”. And it takes you four years to say thanks and then only when you want something more from us? Join the queue, we’ll listen next week, right now we’re listening to these things here…

Matt Atkins & Chemiefaserwerk – Link to Stuff (eë editions) – Well it was the cover art on that lilac square, that and the fact that Matt Atkins usually does something a little more interesting than most sound art types tend to. Details are thin on the ground this time, as is the slow moving nature of the rather refined minimalist sound. What is there to say, other than I rather like the understated restrain and consideration of it all? Recorded in France and England in 2025. Stamp design: Matt Atkins, stamp cut: Marie Vermont. An edition of 30 so we’re told although 30 what it isn’t clear, a tape I guess? Here’s the Bandcamp page, go find out for yourself, what are these words worth?

Shall we stick some Storyteller art here? Cheap essential scenery? Nah, here’s something from the archives, ours rather than the TK Maxx shelves. I once saw the Pistols down the ‘undred club, preposterous tales, now then, now then.

“Blood on the Fairway is the fifth installment in the Storyteller saga. It tells a woeful tale of golf and extra-terrestrial cannibalism”.

Storyteller – Blood on The Fairway (Adaadat) – You get to a point where you do wonder why you do all this clapping with one hand stuff, crocheting a tapestry of reviews and the rest of it, all that snipping at those disrupted daffodils. Hey, I haven’t bothered talking to you or replying to you for years, but I got a new release and I want your attention right now so give give give without a moments thought. Exposed volcanoes? Surgery windows? Say bird, you haven’t seen my brother have you? Gallery 46 or whatever the number was, nah, go away, we’ve got no time for you but hey, here’s some spoken word and a doll with a face half burnt off in a place where you can find nowhere to get your hair cut. Now what do we have here? What next? A game of golf? Talking to you is like clapping with one hang or maybe a hand. Caught in a mosh? untrained untamed train of thought, spoken word on a tape on the fairway, difficult par four? Take a wedge? What is there to say? Ice lollies in late November and flies on eyes, well we know about that, a train, an absence of passengers? You only communicate when you want something out of us…

Storyteller is a Spoken word and electro-acoustic cassette collaboration between Bruce McClure “a descendant of Australian bush poet Banjo Paterson, the lyricist behind Waltzing Matilda” and sound artist Bjørn Hatleskog and what if there is an Amaryllis on the golf course? What is there to say about spoken word tapes other than to say go listen for yourself (but probably not while you’re riding the school bus), this is the jagged forest gift for us, I think that’s what they said? Find those golf balls, watch those beaks and the dayglo body parts, here it is should you be curious, I’m not going to tell you if you should be curious or not, we’ve got a trophy room somewhere from all the clapping with one hand awards. Candycrushed? Isle three? Cupcake? Nah, Aisle three, nay bother pal, of course we can stop everything and give you our time and space and when it all got too much and the fork lift driver lost the plot and…

Original Story written and read by Bruce McClure. Sound and design by Bjørn Hatleskog. Here’s the Bandcamp, go listen for yourself, I can’t think of anything I like when it comes to golf besides the snakes that hide in the holes.

Ypsmael & Diurnal Burdens – Estavelle (eë editions) – More of that minimalist sound art that is kind of soothing and does come in artwork that pleases. The visuals and the audio and the cups of tea go well together. Less once again is a positive more and once again, a touch more than most of the things kind of like this that pass by or come our way…

Ypsmael – electronics, feedback, amplified objects, field recordings, guitar, percussion. Diurnal Burdens – tape loops, synth, Koma Field Kit FX, sampler, pedals. Recorded 2024 – 2025 in Meersburg (DE) and Wigan (UK). Stamp design and cut: Marie Vermont (once again). An edition of 30. Here’s the Bandcamp

TK Maxx? Really? On with it all, press the self-destruct button and get on with it all. Ludicrous, never mind that, here’s comes a trio called Roboquarians…

Says here that “Kevin Shea and George Draguns first started playing together way back in the 1990s in Storm and Stress. They have maintained a friendship and musical relationship to the present day. Through Mr. Shea, Ayumi was folded into the duo’s baby man aesthetic and have been playing together since 2021(?). This trio has released Volumes 1 and 2 on the 577 label out of Brooklyn”. This trio being Roboquarians….

Roboquarians – Secular Fusionism – “These are some repurposed songs that Ayumi and Kevin salvaged after the demise of the Secular Fusionists. What a departure from the original tracks! Kevin is in his usual berserker mode of drumming and Ayumi brings her usual one of a kind use of effects on her saxophone. The attempted result is a “Song X” vibe (Orrnette Coleman’s 80’s masterpiece). Kevin and myself have been obsessed with that album for years. This is a bit of a departure for the Roboquarians-not the usual total free improvisation. This is also all recorded remotely and not live in the studio. Kevin did record all his tracks with John Epperly at Metropolitan Sound in Brooklyn, but George and Ayumi recorded in the comfort of their own home studio. The preferred Chunky Homestyle method”. And over here at 1am on a cold wet November in Hackney if we don’t share this today then by tomorrow morning another hundred e.mails will be waiting for us to get up and somewhere in 2029 if we’re all still here, yer man from Roboquarians will send us another email about “digging our aesthetic and appreciating our eclectic approach to the arts”.

The Roboquarians album is a rather interesting one, it does deserve a mention, I could be painting, but instead here I am typing about it, although I’m not really, I’m just sharing it and thinking about our aesthetic and our eclectic approach to the arts and all the thankless time it all takes, thankless until the time comes around for our attention to be needed again… Here’s yet another Bandcamp link and…

Shall we go on? Is there any rhyme or reason? Here’s comes the first album of the morning, well the first e.mail opened, the first of the pile already waiting….

Paul Beaudoin + Ümlaut – Cairn (Audiobulb) – “In Cairn, Düngfelder’s focus on atmosphere and perception meets Beaudoin’s concern with time and memory, creating a dialogue where each sound becomes a trace left for the other to follow.” And well, picking up where we left off, the morning after the night before. Almost but not quite ambient sketches, feelings, electronic smoothness, fourteen tracks that are all kind of going to sound the same. Same pace, same quiet polished texture, same set of colours, all very nice if that’s what you want, all very safe and comfortable and warm and cosy and floaty clouds of fluff and if that’s what you really want then fine I guess. Ultimately, nine pieces of music in to this album and I pretty much know where the next fade in is going to gently take us, same place as the last one, do I need to listen to the rest of it? I probably will just leave it harmlessly flowing until the end of it all and then I shall probably never ever listen to it again, I shall probably go make a second cup of tea of the day, eat the rest of that by now stale doughnut over there that I did toy with painting instead, I shall probably looking at the next set of e.mails while I consider this request to take part in some Christmas art show and then dismiss the invite and wonder why anyone would want to take part in a Christmas art show and they’re selling hippy wigs in TK Maxx now, or bondage trousers and are we there yet? “In Ümlaut’s (aka Jeff Düngfelder) work, textures rarely stop, they linger. Layers of field recordings and electronic atmospheres drift and fuse until motion becomes still”, but it is all the same texture, it all just lingers, its like waiting for a bus that never comes, each track like ground hog day, a nice day yes but you could go mindless in this utopia, and we don’t really like it here, there’s nothing for us to fear – “For Paul Beaudoin, sound unfolds like thought taking shape in time. His work traces the thresholds between hearing and remembering, where tones blur and stillness collapses into the echo of memory….”. It did start to fizz for a moment, about a minute in to Vestiges, the final four minute track or piece or whatever it is, the thing is, if the bus did come now would we want to get on it? Would we still be bothered? Would the bus take is to those dreams of golden shining towers, Of lazy days and thrilling hours, Fields of wonder, streets so fair, Of amber ships which sailed, through the air, Dreamed of steel and glass and wire, Of days of wine and nights of fire, Dreamt of dogs that talked like boys. Oh look, it is all very nice and polite and it isn’t you, it really is me and now my tea has gone cold and… Bandcamp

OdNu, Mi Cosa de Resistance and mRn – Southern Lands (Audiobulb) – See previous review (if indeed that’s what it was), only this a little more organic and adventurous and as ‘nice’ as the previous album was, kind of predictable really…

“The unpredictable and incredible sonic result of three inspirations, three experiences and three souls with one thing in common, the Southern Lands of the Argentinian scapes by the Rio de la Plata, where they grew up”.

And what else has landed this morning? Well here comes the ambient sound art side project from that bloke in Napalm Death, and here comes a press release for some band who are playing some big festival next Summer, and here comes some more spoken word and this page should probably be knocked on the head now, deleated, thrown in the bin along with the press release telling us that Sex Pistols and TK Maxx announce 50 years of punk celebration shows and the rest of it…