austere - happenings

happenings

[ 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 | 2002 | 2001 | 2000 | 1999 | 1998 ]

01 Mar 2008 — Poloroid stopped making cameras last summer, although there's plenty to be found in thrift stores, but today they closed the plant and stopped producing film. Let's hope some Asian company picks up the business: a Poloroid photo is unpixelated with potentially infinite resolution (which is why it looks so weird, because we're used to pixelized photos, TV, and computer screens.) R.I.P. Poloroid Instant Film. Word now is they are licensing the technology and no less than Fuji Film is interested, so perhaps we'll happily remove this entry some day.

20 Feb 2008 — Born on this day in 1967 was Kurt (Kurdt) Cobain, lead singer and guitarist from Nirvana, who committed suicide in 1994 at the age of 27. It seems like only yesterday. May you have found peace, Mr. Cobain. We miss you.

10 Feb 2008 — Our newest CD, and our first release on the main Hypnos label, entitled Solyaris is now available. You can order it directly from the Hypnos Online Store. Much thanks to Lena & Mike for their support!

18 Jan 2008 2:13AM — This marks the official release of our new 10th anniversary box set called "The Sound of Silence I". More details coming forthwith.

15 Jan 2008 — Sadly, problems plague our Web site, and until we and/or our Web host or one of our friends can help, it will only be "halfway" working. We will correct it as soon as possible. Meanwhile, we hope to cull through this "news" section and clear out the cruft, irrevelevent and out-of-date entries. As always, wish us much luck.

01 Jan 2008 — As of this date, some of our Austere, all of our The Mystifying Oracle, and some of our Freq. Magnet releases are now available for ordering through CD Baby in digital as well as CD format, except for the long-form pieces. Most CDs are special packaging so we'd hope people would purchase the CDs despite how they're dying off, and sorry that we don't write twenty 3-minute pop songs per CD but that Just Ain't Our Thang.

23 Dec 2007 — Merry Festivus! A winter holiday solution. We will not make any promises about any releases by the group nor either side-project, unlike past years.

22 Dec 2007 — A track culled from the Freq. Magnet "Étoiles" sessions that did not fit on the final release due to time limitations has been released on the new Hypnos complication CD entitled "Sounds of a Universe Overheard" that has just been released.

13 Nov 2007 — Three years already passed since John Balance (nee Geoff Rush, aka Jhonn) himself passed.

15 Sep 2007 — Our track from The Ambient Collective's compilation called Ambient Collective: Space Collaboration (V1.0) has been reissued as part of a recent "best of": Ambient Collective: The Best Of: Volume One
Released: 15th September 2007. It can be downloaded for free here.

Although wethinks it not our best work by any means, but we were VERY happy with how it turned out, as we both felt it was the closest we could come to to making a track that actually sounded like "Big Bang Into Particle Acceleration" - you know, when the universe was born and all the constants and other physics stuff was defined... cheers to those who included us!

06 Aug 2007 — We've filled out and mailed the paperwork to officially trademark our catch-phrase "Thanks for Listening." We doubt it will pass muster, and it probably shouldn't, but given the way the U.S. intellectual property law system is completely failing, we may get it, and it's worth a try. Of course, we'll lose it if we don't defend it, which we don't plan on doing, but instead releasing it to the public via the Creative Common Licenses, in order to make sure that we can always use it lest someone else trademark it. A pre-emptive strike for freedom, as it were.

03 Aug 2007 — We've begun work on a special limited edition tenth anniversary release of compilation tracks, singles and rarities called "The Sound of Silence I: An 'Unnatural History' of Rare Austere Tracks." The release will be high definition MP3 tracks on a SanDisk flash card in an MP3 player, and each box will contain other goodies, including a uniquely recorded 78 RPM 5" lathe-cut record, each box containing a different part of the session involving an Arp 2600 and many analog chorus effects. More details as the project continues.

29 Jul 2007 — We're pleased, as always, to announce the release of a new CD, a project started in 2005 that has been slowly culminating to completion, as many of our releases have happened, such as fade. This release is called mirror, properly spelled "rirrom", since all the printing on the CD is reversed and has to be read in a mirror. The CD itself is made up of mirror-like reflective material, more or less a mirror itself, continuing the tradition both of lovingly hand-made releases as well as trying to push the limits of CD design & packaging, which has hit an all time low in the last decade in our opinions.

May we add a quick "holy schmoly" - who would have thought that 2007 would see us releasing musick on two, count 'em, two of the coolest ambient labels out there, as well as being featured in yet another movie? And to think we were close to calling it quits a couple of years ago? Oh, we still are, never mind.

16 Jul 2007 — We have been lucky enough to convince the owner of one of our CD labels, Sound-O-Mat Recordings to partake a new project with us. Look forward soon to the release of "Process Musick for The Buddha" and the vastly superior "Zen Machine" powered by the "Loop-O-Mat". More details as things emerge.

12 May 2007 — Our latest CD and last in a series of three (we will avoid the "trilogy" word out of disdain for fantasy and sci-fi novels... and The Matrix for that matter) Process Musick pieces. This 60 minute piece is meant to promote creativity and active thinking, and has been released on the Hypnos Secret Sounds label. Available only from the Hypnos Online Store. Our upcoming Hypnos release "Solyaris" is on hold but hopefully will see the light of day before the end of 2007. In the meanwhile, we have other project and releases in store.

11 Apr 2007 — A new CD single on the Hypnos Secret Sounds label by Lena called "alchemy of fingers and dark" CDS has been released, and we have two demixes on it: one by Austere called "Alchemy (Gold Into Lead demix)" which is a demification of "alchemy of fingers and dark" track off her full-length Hypnos CD "Extended Gestures For Cello", and the other is a The Mystifying Oracle demixifunkation called "Mermers (Oh My! Oh Why? demix)" which takes wonderful solo cello and transmographies it into an odd, 5/16th time signnature glitchy-n-twitchy tongue-in-cheek track that does drop to 4/4 (four on the floor) about 33.33% of the way through the track. (P.S. To Critics and Reviewers: it's meant to be a joke, yeah? Sheesh.) Also has two great, lengthy remixes by M. Griffin himself. Highly recommended despite our two tracks.

01 Apr 2007 — It's official and no joke for April Fools: our next few CD releases will be on the Hypnos label: Pulse, our last "Process Musick" piece in a trio that are all Brainwave Encoded and meant for various mental states of mind (inducing or aiding-and-abetting them, due out in April 2007; and what we believe is one of our finest releases to date named Solarys, which consists of three complete improvised tracks taken from a weekend session which generated much great output, and are presented in their original forms, with very little editing or processing, but as close to us playing "live" as we're likely to ever do. It will be released likely late summer or autumn of 2007.

Great thanks go out to Mike & Lena at Hypnos not just for being such wonderful folks but for being willing to put out our material. We cannot thank them enough for their support and kindness.

28 Mar 2007 — We have released a new DVD for our collaboration with Stephen Phillips, of Dark Duck Records and the Drone Download Project fame, called "faded". The DVD contains the full hour-long piece (broken up into 10 DVD chapters based on changes in the music/graphics) and the computer-generated graphics are sync'ed to the musick, created by our good mate Wink at The Sound-O-Mat Studio.

This is an auto-play DVD without any menus, it simply starts with the opening credits, then plays the musick, and depending on your DVD player, should loop and start back at the credits and musick again, so it can be left on in the background. We have it available right now and it can also be purchased from Hypnos. The colours are based on the musick — who knew that drones were mostly deep blues and vibrant oranges? Reviews to date have been excellent and it is only US $9.99 and contains all the original musick from the CD of the same title.

10 Feb 2007 — The Austere side project known as Freq. Magnet ("freak magnet") is pleased to announce the release of a new CD, Étoiles du Couvercle. It is another all guitar-based CD, three tracks with the middle one being a very long, spacey ambient drone. A "tribute" of sorts to the always amazing Stars of the Lid, it has been receiving fantastic reviews since release.

It is currently available directly from us but better still is distributed and available from the Hypnos Online Store.

29 Jan 2007 — AMBiENT PiNG ALMOST LiVE Radio Show at 21:00 (9PM) EST.A live show of new, improvised material by Austere will be streamed on AMBiENT PiNG radio: AMBiENT PiNG Radio

The show will feature one long track which is in the process of post- production and will likely be available in a different form on our next CD release. The ALMOST LiVE MUSiC SERiES is an Internet radio show featuring exclusive, unreleased material by friends of Toronto's AMBiENT PiNG in the ambient, darkwave, chill and electronic communities. Information on the series can be found at their site.

The show initially will run on tonight Monday 29 Jan 2006 and be rebroadcast on Thursday 1 Feb. 2007 at 0:00 (12PM) EST and again on Saturday 3 Feb. 15:30 (3:30PM) EST.

11 Nov 2006 — Four of our releases: Convergence, fade, Remittance, and faded are now available in Canada through ping things, our northern neighbour's finest outlet for all things ambient and good. Tracks from Remittance are also in rotation on AMBiENT PiNG RADiO on Live365. Big ups to Rik for all his work and support in making this all happen.

10 Nov 2006 — While we retain full copyright to the names "Austere", "The Mystifying Oracle", and "Freq. Magnet", as well all sound recordings and titles (tracks and albums), we have opened use of our logos, images and any information on this site under license by the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License.

26 Oct 2006 — Blue Water Records has released "Organbient - Longform Ambient Compilation Vol. 1", a 17-hour DVD-ROM / downloadable MP3 release to benefit and support Stillstream Radio, the Internet's absolute top choice for streaming ambient music, including four "live" shows every week. Both the compilation and Stillstream come highly recommended. One of our long drone tracks is included.

06 Oct 2006 — Much needed & massive updates, fixed, and additions to our Reviews & Samples page.

01 Oct 2006 — A recently recorded "power drone" track called "Puissant" has been released as part of the series for the fourth year for Dark Duck Records' " Drone Download Project (DDP)". Downloading is free so go grab a copy and give a listen.

11 Sept 2006 — Our... it's painful to say... our, um... MySpace Page is now finished and ready for consumption. Thanks to several people who helped us out, you know who you are. MySpace is, quite frankly, a piece of shite compared to Tribes or even Friendster, but it seems like where everyone lives now, and it is nice that they have page dedicated to bands. Pages for The Mystifying Oracle, Freq. Magnet, and The Sound-O-Mat are also available.

21 Jul 2006 — The third year for Dark Duck Records' " The Drone Download Project - Year 3" is now available for sale as a CD.

11 Apr 2006 — The Mystifying Oracle has released a four track CD EP called "Kiffed" which is now available from CD Baby and samples can be found there.

15 Jan 2006 — The last 20 copies of Monodia have been assembled and once these sell out, it will go out-of-print forever. We also have only three copies of the first edition of Curio remaining, which is made with 20 carat gold foil covers, each hand-made and unique.

12 Jan 2006 — Mix-downs on a four or five track CDEP by The Mystifying Oracle are almost complete and the CD artwork has been finalized, but it may be a few weeks in post-production and mastering. The tracks are very different from Austere and even from the first 'Oracle CDEP.

14 Dec 2005 — The film "The Thin Horizon", written and directed by Michael Peters of Artifex Imagewerks, LLC in Forest Grove, Oregon, for which we composed and performed the was screened for the public on 14 December 2005 at the now defunct and sadly missed The Guild Theater on 9th Ave. in Portland, Oregon, U.S. R.I.P. The Guild.

19 Nov 2005 — We are pleased to announce the release of a track with The Ambient Collective's first FreeNetLabel release: "Space Collaboration".

Featuring 16 tracks of pure ambient delights ranging from glitch to uber chilled, symphonic to soundtrack, gritty to smooth and so on; the styles are unique are magically blend into one another. It can be downloaded with other Ambient Collective releases by starting here. Artists are Austere, Altus (aka Mike Carss), Bluejooz, DRT, Jujigen (Kevin Rees), Scott Turner (aka Not-Your-Average-Hippy), Chris Melchior, and Silvercord.

27 Aug 2005 — We are pleased to announce the release of an Austere side project known as "Freq. Magnet" called Principium Somniferum. It is another all guitar-based release, very floaty and ambient and not at all melancholy, and comes in an interesting "Zen" case on a purple CD.

It is currently available directly from us or from CD Baby and samples can be found there and at the Freq. Magnet site.

21 Jul 2005 — Failed to mention our latest contribution to Dark Duck Records' " The Drone Download Project - Year 3", another guitar-only track called Wend which is a slightly different version than the one that appeared on our out-of-print release "Remission", slightly longer, different ending, and without samples. It can be downloaded for free for this year only in MP3 format.

08 Jul 2005 — Our new collaboration with Stephen Phillips, faded, a complete deconstruction and reassembly of our 2000 release fade, much more than just a remix by far, worked by Phillips with post-production by Austere and mastering at The Sound-O-Mat, is now available through Hypnos Online Store, Dark Duck Records, or through CD Baby while supplies last.

01 Jun 2005 — We are pleased to announce that our new release Eco is now available exclusively from the Hypnos Online Store.

Eco is a return to our roots, a Process Music piece ala Steve Reich, similiar in concept to our first release Convergence but with a different style and very different purpose: rather than to aid and encourage meditation, the new release was pain-stakingly composed, arranged, designed, and brainwave encoded to help enduce healthy and restful sleep patterns. It can be enjoyed as a minimalist composition, meditative piece, or also as an aid in sleeping for those who have difficulties finding true peace and rest. The trilogy ends with Pulse which was released in 2007.

15 May 2005 — Several of our tracks have been in rotation on two popular ambient streaming Web sites: StillStream and Sleepbot Environmental Broadcast. StillStream describes themselves thusly:

Welcome to StillStream, an ambient net radio station with a difference. Unlike many other stations, we are focused primarily on live, interactive radio programs, with living, breathing hosts who share their passion for deep music with you, the listener. And when a live show is not under way, our StillStream All Ambient feed plays a broad, fresh selection of superb tracks from some of the best ambient artists, to relax and recharge you.

Choose your preference to listen to the StillStream feed here.

The Sleepbot is a long-running, highly regarded ambient site/stream that's been around for many years, based out of Seattle. We've been heard on the Sleepbot Environmental Broadcast, which is designed to be musick to play while sleeping (the site even contains a test tone of the loudest volume so you can adjust the music accordingly.)

Listen to the Sleepbot Evironmental Broadcast here.

17 Apr 2005 — Convergence has been reissued as a production CD, complete with full-color CD artwork, new liner notes, a clear CD case, shrink-wrapped and bar-coded.

08 Jan 2005 — With about a dozen copies left of the limited edition of Curio remaining, we have started releasing copies of the second, unlimited edition.

26 Dec 2004 — Until midnight on 25 January 2005, "Full Cold Moon", a compilation of tribute tracks for Jhonn Balance and the musick of Coil, is available for free MP3 download from Dark Winter.

"Jhonn Balance was in an accident (which occured at home) on Nov 13th 2004. Despite the best efforts of the emergency services he did not regain consciousness, and died later that day. Coil was Jhonn and Jhonn was Coil, so for obvious reasons Coil cannot continue."

-- Threshold House

We have contributed a track titled "The Hills Are Alive" to this compilation, which can be downloaded as a entire album in one zip file or track by track. 36 artists total have contributed to this tribute. We hope you will all take the time to give a gander. Thanks for listening, and Rest In Peace Geoff/John/Jhonn.

25 Dec 2004 — We have broken down and added a photo gallery of various imagery and photography. Some are logos, album artwork and other examples of our packaging & design, others are art and live performance photos, and the last is artwork that others have given us, inspired by our musick, without doubt the kindest gift of all.

23 Dec 2004 — We are extremely pleased to announce the formal release of what we feel our finest work to date, Remittance is now available exclusively through Hypnos Online Order for a very reasonable price, considering the cost and packaging, wethinks.

13 Dec 2004 — We're happy to announce the release of Dark Duck Records' " The Drone Download Project MP3 CD - Year 2", an MP3 CD containing 198Kbs files of almost 7 hours of drone music, masterminded by Stephen Phillips, originator of the Dark Duck Drone Download Project. It contains one exclusive Austere guitar-only track called Tea-Totalled.

10 Dec 2004 — We are pleased to announce that "Remission" has been retired, and is now out-of-print. Our re-issue re-release called "Remittance" will soon be available through the Hypnos Online Store. Those who have already purchased or received "Remission" are entitled to a free copy of our "Remission > Remittance" upgrade kit. Simply email us at austere@austere.org with your mailing address and we'll get a copy out as soon as we can.

13 Nov 2004 — John Balance (nee Geoff Rush, aka Jhonn) has passed away and Coil is no more.

25 Oct 2004 — We are deeply honored and flattered to announce that most of our releases, aside from some limited editions and those non-standard packaging, are now available exclusively through Hypnos Online Order. Thanks to Mike for his encouragement and support!

24 Feb 2003 — We're happy to announce the release of Dark Duck Records' The Drone Download Project MP3 CD - Year 1, an MP3 CD containing 198Kbs files of almost 8 hours of drone music, masterminded by Stephen Phillips, one of the maincontributors and the originator of the Dark Duck Drone Download Project.

The CD features two Austere guitar-only drone tracks: diapason, which was featured in the first year series, and an unreleased bonus track Whainer. We have a limited number of copies available for sale, please see our artifacts page.

Dec 2003 — 05 Jul 1999 — The Austere site at MP3.com is dead, R.I.P. Generated 12K downloads and probably USD $100 over the years.

09 Oct 2003 — Our latest release Remission has been reviewed by one of the finest online Ambient Webzines, Ambient.us.

09 Sep 2003 — The official release of our new CD Remission after a year of work and a month of wrangling with CD formating issues. While aesthetically similar, a departure from synths and sequencers in making a very personal, very droning, glistening, shimmering and meloncholy guitar-based album. Comes in a gatefold paper sleeve complete with a secret decoder ring and a special CDR that harkens to the fine days of old.

02 Jul 2003 — We've finally given in and added a biography page to our Web site, penned by Bill Binkleman of Wind & Wire fame.

01 Jul 2003 — Stephen Phillips of Dark Duck Records has accepted one of our new tracks, called diapason, for his Drone Download Project. We are flattered to be a part of his wonderful ongoing project.

04 Jan 2003 — A new Austere track Coruscate has been released as part of the Music for Sénces series.

03 May 2002 — A side project, The Mystifying Oracle, has been very active recently, seeking out that laid-back, spacey groove.

20 Jan 2002 — Some kind soul has contributed three of our albums, Convergence, distance, and Curio to Hyperreal's Top Ambient Albums. Thanks to the mysterious contributor, you've made us blush.

10 Mar 2001 — Two recent reviews of fade are available from eric prindle (formerly Ujamaa's Ambient Reviews, archived) and Dead Angel.

17 Nov 2000 — Started almost two years ago, our latest release Curio, is finally finished. The first edition is limited to 50 hand-assembled copies made with hand-printed papers, 14-caret gold leaf covers, and other surprises. Each one contains a mystery. There will also be a limited edition of 20 promo copies without special artwork. Much thanks and love to Mat for the inspiration, ideas, and gentle prompting.

06 Nov 2000 — A new review of fade is available on disquiet.com.

14 July 2000 — A four track EP release distance, our collab with the always ultra-brill In The Now is available through CD Baby or you can request a copy directly from us.

26 Jan 2000 — After a 3 month wait, Austere finally has an address:

Austere
Box 12283
Portland, Ore 97212-0283 USA, Earth

18 Jan 2000 — Dead Angel Ezine reviews both Convergence and Monodia in their collected reviews, original Issue #40. Excerpt on Convergence: Strongly recommended for those who think the entire ambient genre has drifted from its original intent and focus.

07 Jan 2000 — After many weeks spent trying unsuccessfully to put together a CD, four tracks that had fallen through the cracks or been left for later work come together into the new release fade, now available.

17 Nov 1999 — Both Convergence and Monodia are reviewed by Ujamaa's Ambient Experience.

30 Jul 1999 — Monodia is complete and available as an edition of 100 with hand-assembled artwork. Another track was added, bringing the length to almost 49 minutes. Mastering was finished the day before and artwork finalized earlier in the week.

18 Jan 1998 — Austere is officially formed after a holiday week of thrashing out details and agreements as to what exactly the project will and will not be.

happenings

Thanks for Listening.