UPSTAIRS

AUTRE NE VEUT REVEALED!

2010-08-04T09:27:00.000-07:00

AUTRE NV "OMG" from OLDE ENGLISH SPELLING BEE on Vimeo.

NSFW video for "OMG" off the upcoming debut lp by Autre NV on OESB/Upstairs. Scheduled for a late August release - pre-order info coming soon.

Autre Ne Veut was also featured on the awesome Tri Angle Records Lindsay Lohan tribute mix last week - his version of "Bossy" is streaming below - and the whole compilation can be downloaded via Dis Magazine HERE.AUTRE NV "OMG" from OLDE ENGLISH SPELLING BEE on Vimeo.

U004 GEOFF MULLEN & KEITH FULLERTON WHITMAN - "NOVEMBER 28 2009"

2010-02-15T22:15:00.000-08:00

Geoff Mullen and Keith Fullerton Whitman welcome you to the new-domestic. The moving hallway is dotted with TIF frames and leads you to a center room location radiating with CMYK hum. This sonic-grand-tour was recorded live to glass, over one day in Providence, Rhode Island; a machine groove epic in movements that offers up total sonoronarrative immersion while kindling thoughts of Paul Verhoven-like industrial safehouses in which doomed plans are made. Coming from inside the walls of this micro-future, GM/KFW surge a permeating drive that shows lost footage and reveals forgotten locations, levels below. The CS-50/MT-68 combo-splices finally unveil the screen -- tomorrow into Gateway. The chimes from within lead you deeper and the screen behind you shuts off. The finale take on almost a dare I say Haruomi vibe; west meets east without overt crystallization of dialectic black helicopters and blurred out kanji. Nice and wide and deep stereo balance to boot. Seminal synth war/drama action from East coast legends that commit to the landing and stick it.

COMING TO FINE DISTROS //\ ONLY A CLICK AWAY **MARCH 2010

U005 INNERCITY - "IN FETAL AURA"

2010-02-15T22:12:00.000-08:00

Innercity is the brainchild of Belgium's Hans Dens, a wiz from the Dreamtime think tank who has been prodigiously translating his vision journeys to DAT since 2008... anyone familiar with 666 MINUTES AT BOTTOMS OF BLACK LAKES will understand IN FETAL AURA as a natural outgrowth of his process, refined via the destruction and adaptation of loop based bedroom concrete, kraut and new age towards an auditory dreamsystem language all his own. He's also the barron of nu school Bontempi BT series jammage; the Italian stepchildren of the Casio MT series, imbued with aliased, bit damaged refuse from a time when things were simpler. IN FETAL AURA is a trip; a moving picture of animate life in pre-semiotic states of development. Within that trip Innercity reflects biological diversity in spirit form, beautifully shifting from one amorpha to to the next via repetition and mutation, like spirits basking in the coptic glow of life before consciousness. Don't fear the path to amnesia; an infinite patch wipe.. the incomplete return.

COMING TO FINE DISTROS //\ ONLY A CLICK AWAY **MARCH 2010

U006 MANIC SHOOTER - "DOG MASTER TELEPORTATION"

2010-02-15T22:09:00.000-08:00

Manic Shooter's DMT is sonic weird hieroglyphs from combination Taos, New Mexico and Long Island; the hybrid of which mirrors the effect... bent clues will set you on a path while others are meant to deceive you. Powerlines whisper instructions in a non gendered voice. Mystical Hasid rapper vaporizedendlessly in interlocking dimensional mechanism. Remember this was during the initial Bush era, pre-dating 911 and thus Junior's eyeballs hadn't yet been upgraded to format terrestrial. Mirror plates in the eye cavity is how they found terrorists. Shooter was the first to command green missle control, similar to a Tartan warrior he refracted the beams himself and thus took the problem into his own hands. DMT is an in and out enhancement of this frightening time, as if the lingering confusion of a post-Inside Edition childhood had naturally spawned the devastated political mis-en-scene, building up to the 911 simulation telecast we witnessed while en route to Yusef Lateef's class when we got word of the attacks. This is also a historic document containing some of the first ever KGB MAN overdubs, as well as marking the first time in RIAA history that anyone has ever exclusively fucked with Prince of Darkness and Alphaville on a sampling level, but beyond recognition, musique concret style, plus a touch of cartoon Skinny Puppy meets Mike Patton isolated in a hotel room with a portastudio while on tour with Bungle in '97 vibes. I have recommended Trujillo to be committed to the Material Eye Institute for dog master evaluation. Enjoy it while you can and as Lou said, "watch out for worlds behind you."

COMING TO FINE DISTROS //\ ONLY A CLICK AWAY **MARCH 2010

Upstairs Edition 2: "Cyberia"

2010-01-08T18:34:00.000-08:00

AVATAR (2009, dir. James Cameron)

Winter's lament. That familiar feeling is back, and on its heels Upstairs returns next month with its second edition ☥CYBERIA☥ including discs from synth shadow syndicate Geoff Mullen & Keith Fullerton Whitman, avatar music for slooooow daaazed blue people from Belgium's Innercity, and last but not least Manic Shooter -- desperate music ie. s*t*r*u*g*g*l*e*c*o*r*e from long time Upstairs consiglieri Shaun Trujillo, whose debut record taps into the matrix via Taos Mountain and the Long Island sewage system, notoriously, irrepressibly, and with total disregard for alien and human life styles. THRILLED with this batch.

March will also see titles from Ed. 1 (Nonhorse, Flower Man, Radio Scenic Glow comp) back in circulation in limited quantities. Note that Upstairs is no longer taking individual orders. We encourage you to seek out copies from the artists themselves or fine distros around the world such as Volcanic Tongue, Mimaroglu, Aquarius, Art Into Life, Discriminate, Eclipse, and Tomentosa. Or if you are in the NYC area, you might try Academy Records and Other Music.

We are also proud to present our first show in a series of monthly Upstairs events at Coco 66 in Brooklyn, kicking it off on February 27th with a No Fun Acid record release show featuring Sun Araw, No Fun Acid, Oneohtrix Point Never and Human Teenager (mems. Infinity Window and Gary War).

KEEP FEELING FASCINATION / STAY READY / THINKING OF YOU.

Upstairs Edition 1: "Black Comedy / Ambiguation"

2009-08-28T03:34:00.000-07:00

We're pleased to present Upstairs' inaugural edition, titled "Black Comedy/Ambiguation"... the first pressing will be in editions of 50 per each title, with consecutive represses of 25 each. The CDRs feature color inserts and all-over black disques hand marked in metallic gold ink. All releases are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License. They are available via paypal, and priced at $8 USD, $9 CANADA, and $12 WORLD. Please email upstairsCDR@gmail.com with your order inquiry. Thanks!

Sincerely Yours,
Daniel & KGB Man

FLOWER MAN - "EXOTIC CAMEO"

Occasionally a synth record comes around that changes the game for me -- a while back it was my post facto discovery of Suzanne Ciani's Seven Waves -- a record that brought a level of emotionality to synth music that was rare in the Trancealot days of post-Berlin School new age.Exotic Cameo carries none of the genre-specific traits of Seven Waves, but the sincerity and natural weirdness that drives the record is much the same, putting it leagues above its contemporary brethren. If the current climate of out music here in the US feels decidedly post-noise, the overriding vibe polarizes new age kraut jams against lo fi pop -- the problem with a lot of it being the nostalgia redux factor tends more towards surfaces than substances. Enter Chris Bush aka Flower Man (also a member of Caboladies) who has constructed a bedroom synth classic with Exotic Cameo -- one that merges the lucid grey/bent melodicism of Bruce Haack, Claude Larson, and Enno Velthuys with a heavy dose of Radiophonic Workshop-style library record aerobics. The overall effect is that of a nightmare Jim Henson may have had one night -- scenario: spacing out at the townhouse with a glass of scotch on his knee/tube of ash between his fingers, listening to Nic Raicevic's Beyond The End, perhaps dreaming of an old flame or a pair of eyes. Nostalgic yes certainly, but conflated and made bleak in such a way that speaks directly from Flower Man's inner repository... a strange and dreary trip that takes the voyeur through a grayscale city of upside down salixi and softcore store fronts, only to roll credits with a haunting sonata that aptly offers no resolve. Flower Man is here.

NONHORSE - "SHADOW WORLD"

Nonhorse is G. Lucas Crane (also of Woods & Vanishing Voice) -- the anointed doors-ajar tape champ of 2009 whose mysterious pastiche decorates interior minds with an acutely virtuosic slather -- similar in vibe to hearing a 3rd gen dub of a Technics battle mix from across a Gregorian yoga studio courtyard in Second Life. Shadow World is an epic 45 minute slab of exorcism enacted upon dead field transmissions from a nuked America. Listen as Crane bushwacks through twisted metal, phantom greys and clusters of question marks that hang in the sky like polluted simulacra. As opposed to traditional characterizations of Satan as an individual being -- Crane envisions a Lucifercrum that is disguised holistically throughout the social fabric. Some lines you don't cross on purpose, it's just the environment generating variety where we'd rather there be predictability. It is in that demarcated zone where the sensuality of Shadow World makes itself most apparent. Using the barest array of items in his inventory, Crane swiftly reconciles scratch/warble riddims with pure American floorcore haunt in such a way that narration and ambiguity are forced on the listener at once, impulsively and with passion. Feel the zone between your ears -- search for a column to lean against if only for a moment before she whispers you the punchline, "power... power... power." It's not a safe place for searchers, but those that do will be compelled to search every room for answers.

RADIO SCENIC GLOW VOL. 1

What better way to inaugurate Upstairs than with a kickoff comp featuring and all-star cast of accomplices? Radio Scenic Glow Vol. 1 features Julian Lynch, Autre Ne Veut, Baggy Magnum, Alice Cohen, Stellar Om Source, No Fun Acid, Pulse Emitter, Nackt Insecten, Caboladies, Oneohtrix Point Never, Driphouse, Asha Sheshadri, Earth Station, Mechanick Preachers, Elfenbeinturm, Games, Africa Germany, and Gatekeeper. Like a bouquet of jams whose stems are entwined, the sum of Glow's parts is harmonious and yet manages to retain the no rules/no genres spirit of Upstairs. From deep zoners to proto techno jams, thruuuu bedroom synth pop and onto damaged themes for suspense/thrillers, this is pretty much everything I like about the scene at large, year 2009. All artists featured have been sent a powerpack of tiffs, docs and mp3s so if you miss out on the first edition, you might consider commissioning you favorite jammer for a one-of-a-kind...