Scintillating, alchemical kosmische; visionary, deep, and luminous; and beautifully sleeved, with gold foiling and silver ink.

Works In Metal fans out a set of acid treatments and finely sharpened blades — cutting, shaping, suspending form. Sounds are melted down and forged as if liquid metal.
The works are paired. Arc’s Blue Flame previews the smoking volatility at the album’s core. Echoes and resonance soften the dissonant, bright textures; all overlaid with Fofana’s signature, percussive kick drums. Welding drills into the discordant thrills and spills of metamorphosis. Sparks fly and the bittersweet arc of change unfolds.
Fofana discreetly folds in text, poetry, and field recordings, spooring their decomposition and recomposition with a prismatic point of view. The coupling Obscure Light (Decomposition) and Obscure Light (Recomposition) marks something new in his music. The pulse is brightly honed, cascading beyond the dancefloor, exultingly eluding musical genre.
Works in Metal is perhaps Fofana’s most narrative album. At its heart is the killer, extended Lure of the Fragment / So Another Sound Suggests Itself. Melodies circle in call-and-response patterns, balancing proximity and distance, signalling the inward gravity required to work with metal. A nested story-line, with birds flying in; an album within an album. Dredging up memories and associations, Fofana filters in selections from his sound-archives. Layered with synths, field recordings become instruments in their own right. The last three minutes proffer precious clarity — a memory, in miniature, flashed onto molten metal.

In 1943 Suzanne Césaire declared that ‘our surrealism will then supply them the leaven from their very depths. It will be time finally to transcend the sordid contemporary antinomies: Whites-Blacks, Europeans-Africans, civilized-savage: the powerful magic of the mahoulis will be recovered, drawn from the very wellsprings of life. Colonial idiocies will be purified by the welding arc’s blue flame. The mettle of our metal, our cutting edge of steel, our unique communions — all will be recovered’. Works in Metal is a tribute to her prophecy; its enactment, sculpted in sound.

The duo of Bill Orcutt — on four-string guitar — and drummer Tim Koffley.
‘Taking leads from James Blood Ulmer and Fred Frith’s Massacre, here is the link between the contemporaneous Thunders-esque punk of Orcutt’s Trash Monkeys and the mayhem of Harry Pussy…
‘Consider the closer Wattstock, where Koffley forms the bedrock for an extended Orcutt hotbox of instantly-composed harmolodics. And also God Are You There, It’s Me, Watt, where we can hear the spontaneous vocal bursts (the only vocals on the album) that would re-emerge on Orcutt’s early solo records…
‘An early, major piece of the unfolding and complex puzzle of Orcutt’s music. A foundation.’

Wow!

‘The BBC’s Third Programme aired four radio broadcasts between January 1964 and September 1965, collectively known as Inventions for Radio. Conceived by playwright Barry Bermange they consisted of the voices of the general public answering questions on four themes, one for each programme: dreams, the existence of God, life after death, and ageing. The Dreams, Amor Dei, The After-Life, The Evenings of Certain Lives. Delia Derbyshire was assigned by the Radiophonic Workshop to edit and add electronic music/ effects. The collaborative result is dreamlike and mesmerizing.’

Including one LP for each broadcast, and two further LPs of additional material, together with a twenty-page booklet, housed in a lidded box.

‘A mesmerizing blend of ambient, experimental, and electronic sounds. Each composition is an invitation to explore altered states of consciousness, with the music serving as a portal to uncharted territories of the mind. The album offers a glimpse into an inner world, where sound, inspiration, and introspection create a deeply moving and spiritually enriching musical journey.’

Excursions and meditations on an eighteenth century organ tuned to pure thirds, entailing a slightly harsh intonation exploited here to evoke the hostile climate of the Potenza valley during winter and autumn.
‘The sound of the organ with the register of the flute returns a particularly sweet and penetrating sound but, at the same time, a very complex timbre with intricate harmonic texture, given the numerous fluctuations and beats. The warm tones of the organ reflect the good and welcoming souls of the people who inhabit these lands. The absence of dynamics inside the instrument allows the listener to focus and understand the harmonic texture and timbral differences between the various notes more clearly.’
With trombone, trumpet, saxophone, and effects.