Chambers - Sigma Flare 1 EP

Chambers, a collaboration between Gabriel Saloman and Michael Red, debuts their EP Sigma Flare 1 October 2nd on Debacle Records. With a sound loosely described by the pair as “experimental dub,” derived by their mutual interest in the spacious hiss and tectonic bass of German outlet Rhythm & Sound, Chambers met for dusk-to-dawn exploratory recording and listening sessions in their home studios in downtown Vancouver and nearby Sunshine Coast. This mix of raw urban grime and sea-meets-mountain grandeur intuitively wove its way into the duo’s sound -- equal parts late night wanderings through abandoned streets and cold ocean waves crashing against stone.

The combination of these two musicians came about after what they consider a “dreamlike” introduction by their mutual friend Tusk (a fellow member with Michael of notorious bass-music collective, Lighta! Sound.) Gabriel Saloman is well known for his part in the seminal psych-noise duo Yellow Swans and has developed a strong reputation for his darkly cinematic solo recordings and intense live shows. In Chambers he plays guitar, tapes, and live analog processes, bringing elements of improvisation and noise that disrupt the mechanics of the group's sequences and patterns. Michael Red, who produces and performs sound system music under his own name and ambient-leaning music as Souns, is a well-respected Vancouver DJ. He uses a laptop with midi-controllers setup like a traditional dubwise mixing desk for Chambers, creating new "versions" on the spot and adding further processing to Saloman's signal.

Since their debut opening for Shackleton in 2012, Chambers has performed on bills with Kuedo, The Bug, Kangding Ray, and Kode9. On record their music enfolds ambient textures worthy of Eno or Gavin Bryars, and at the same time delivers propulsive, dub-influenced rhythms that emerge and disappear like phantoms, evoking contemporaries such as Deadbeat and Deepchord. This fall, thanks to Seattle's Debacle Records, a global audience will be able to discover for themselves what has until now been one of Vancouver's best kept secrets.

The debut release Sigma Flare 1, a three track EP, will be followed in the new year by Sigma Flare 2, an album length collection from the same sessions.

Xua - Mekong Moon LP

Mekong Moon is the debut LP from Xua, aka Joshua Lee Vineyard, of Portland, Oregon’s space funk outfit Swahili. The genesis of Mekong Moon came during a hiatus for Swahili, during which Vineyard traveled across Southeast Asia. Like some strange combination of Alan Lomax and Anthony Bourdain, the album is the first in a series of “aural slideshow” records combining his love of ‘70s synth techniques, sci-fi retrofutures, and the field recordings of his travels.

In Xua's own words: “As a child in the '80s, the talk of an emerging Asian economy, during the transition between analog and digital, taking over the world had stuck with me. What would a future world sound like if eastern culture emerged as the world's dominating power? What unheard radio transmissions would emerge?”   

The result is an album that references '70s synth albums -- not the Germanic Kosmiche of Tangerine Dream and Conrad Schnitzler, but instead the “fourth world” pop of Brian Eno, Jon Hassell, and Moebius & Plank stewing in the humidity of a Southeast Asian sunrise.

Golden Retriever - 2 LP Reissue

Golden Retriever 2, the second eponymous release from the Portland, OR duo of Matt Carlson and Jonathan Sielaff, gets its proper due as an LP on Debacle Records on June 16th 2015. This work of Golden Retriever, a pair who Redefine has called, "devout electronic musicians, in love with the lab, with the possibilities of sound, and of machines" is a documentation of jamming out the blueprint for their project, loose compositions that still demonstrate two masters of their craft. Originally out on Carlson's own label Bucket Factory as a very limited 100-copy CD-R release in 2010, Debacle is over the moon to present it in its idealized form, on vinyl -- premium white vinyl in a matte sleeve with spot gloss embellishments, to be exact.

Golden Retriever -- Matt Carlson on modular synthesizer and Jonathan Sielaff on bass clarinet and effects -- blurs the line between sounds created electronically and acoustically. The pair formed Golden Retriever in 2008 and began to develop a language informed by the practices of free improvisation as well as the tradition of American experimental electronic composers like Alvin Curran and David Behrman. Golden Retriever creates music that creatively challenging and structurally complex while remaining inviting and emotionally dynamic rather than adopting a confrontational stance toward the listener.

John Krausbauer - Blues for the Grave - Out 4/17/15

Blues for the Grave, due out April 17th on Debacle Records, is the next chapter in John Krausbauer's explorations of just intonation tuning and acoustic phenomena. The minimalist piece is a spiritually ecstatic catharsis, concocted with the art brutists, noiseniks, and microtonalists of the world in mind. It is a mind-melting drone undulating with voice and strings played the west coast master.

Debacle presents Blues for the Grave in CD format to keep the 30-minute scorcher as an uninterrupted piece, packaged in beautiful pro-pressed digipack CD. Digital download will also be available. 

John Krausbauer as a longtime resident of the west coast, landing in Los Angeles after periods in Oregon and the Bay. Blues for the Grave has pieces of each town within; it was conceptualized in Portland and recorded in San Francisco. His aim through solo work is to marry art brut aesthetics to high art conceptualist methodologies. John has also created in the groups Tecumseh, Trees, Aures, the Ecstatic Music Band, and most currently Lavender Menace.

Hayden Pedigo - Five Steps

Five Steps is an impressive lesson in the snowball effect. Though the Texan, Hayden Pedigo, has rarely left his panhandle home of Amarillo and is barely of drinking age, his many influences are internationally renowned, some with careers spanning longer than Pedigo’s been alive--yet with his well of talent and tenacity, he’s now had the pleasure to work with several of them. Debacle Records is excited to be a part of this next chapter in Hayden’s musical career, presenting his full-length LP out October 28th.

As Hayden recalls: “I had an idea to make this album something entirely opposite of my debut album and attempt to make it a full blown acoustic/experimental album and collaborate with people who inspire me. I recorded all the music that summer and when I finished, I decided to start asking some of my heroes to add to the pieces I wrote for the album.” And, as he puts it, “The results where incredible.” Figuring maybe a few people would respond to his requests, Hayden reached out, coming back with the likes of Danny Paul Grody, German composer Steffen Basho-Junghans, and Tompkins Square alum, Mark Fosson and Nick Jonah Davis. The resulting A side is an expansion of his debut effort (Seven Years Too Late), one that alongside friends like Daniel Bachman and Kyle Fosburgh was hailed as ushering in a new generation of primitive Americana-style pickers by NPR’s Lars Gotrich.

“This kid barely looks 17, but definitely has the technique down and an unfocused, yet infectious approach.”

— Lars Gotrich, NPR

Emboldened by the response from his acoustic brethren, Hayden tested the waters with his experimental heroes, hoping to flesh out the surreal, REM cycle-sourced ideas he’d been developing using field recordings and electronics. Through happenstance and a flush of luck, Hayden found himself working with This Heat’s Charles Hayward, Robert Rich, and English multi-instrumentalist and improvisor Fred Frith on the four B Side tracks titled “Dream Theory Parts One-Four.” Hearing that Faust’s Werner “Zappi” Diermaier had contributed to “Part Three”, Acid Mothers Temple’s Kawabata Makoto asked to be a part of the action, contributing to the creeping track that creates an eerie atmosphere of the unknown which lurks in dark corners.

The result is an 11-track stunner, melding the worlds of rollicking, warm acoustic guitar compositions and dark, unsettling ambient experimentations. Each side could solidly stand on its own; however together they represent the precocious ideas of a small-town artist on the edge of breaking out. Next up for Hayden: Curating the revived Imaginational Anthem series for its seventh edition for Tompkins Square.

Physical Release Date - October 28th, 2014

Digital Release Date - November 4th, 2014

Side A

L’hannah feat. Mark Fosson

Across the Pond feat. Chuck Johnson

Be Thankful feat. Nick Jonah Davis (Digital Only)

Five Steps feat. Steffen Basho-Junghans

Stray feat. Danny Paul Grody

Ramble for Peter Walker

If I Could Go Back

Side B

Dream Theory Part One feat. Charles & Merlin Hayward

Dream Theory Part Two feat. Fred Frith

Dream Theory Part Three feat. Werner “Zappi” Diermaier & Kawabata Makoto

Dream Theory Part Four feat. Robert Rich

Garek Jon Druss - Music for the Celestial Din

Debacle Records is proud to announce Music For The Celestial Din, the latest offering from Garek Jon Druss. Best known for creating darker, dirge-style sounds as a member of Atriarch, Tecumseh, and most notably his project A Story of Rats, this new solo piece finds a different direction for the Seattle artist, with an intention to uplift and shift the mind into an expansive state. The LP will be available on September 30, as well as in digital formats on October 7th.

Side A is comprised of the track “The Celestial Din,” the studio recording of the audio component to a gallery installation held in the fall of 2013. Utilizing the frequencies 396HZ, 417HZ, and 528HZ based on their reputed human response, Druss has created “a sublimely keening drone that possesses an unsettling urgency, as if it's warning you of some momentous action on the horizon that demands your immediate and undivided attention” elucidates the Stranger’s Dave Segal. His non-traditional approach to score composition through the use of watercolor visual scores is displayed on the back cover of the LP.

Side A is comprised of the track “The Celestial Din,” the studio recording of the audio component to a gallery installation held in the fall of 2013. Utilizing the frequencies 396HZ, 417HZ, and 528HZ based on their reputed human response, Druss has created “a sublimely keening drone that possesses an unsettling urgency, as if it's warning you of some momentous action on the horizon that demands your immediate and undivided attention” elucidates the Stranger’s Dave Segal. His non-traditional approach to score composition through the use of watercolor visual scores is displayed on the back cover of the LP.

Side B features two remixes of the work. First, Pete Swanson turns in a paint-peeling variation that sits somewhere between his noise/drone work with Yellow Swans and the industrial pulses of his recent solo releases. A second remix, created by L.A.’s Ben Chisholm (co-producer to Chelsea Wolfe), has a sweeping soundtrack quality replacing the healing placidness of the original piece with a sense of existential yearning.

Druss, who is also a member of the performance ensemble Saint Genet, will be attending a residency in Vienna this Fall. He will be developing an ongoing series of listening programs that involve live performance, lecture, and meditative listening techniques. Previously he has performed at the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art in Toronto, The Henry Art Museum and On The Boards in Seattle, The Donau Festival in Krems Austria, and across the United States and Europe.