para!helion - >3 (USA 1999)

Style: high altitude meditations

Featuring:
Dave - Trumpet, effects, percussion
Jeff - Electric Balilaika, effects
J.C. Thorne - percussion, loops, and acoustic bass
Chris & Co... additional percussion.

Improvised and recorded live to two track, Albuquerque, NM.
More information at http://penmallet.blogspot.com/

"Of all the music I have posted (...) at Pen & Mallet, the two ¡para!helion releases are the ones that I personally listen to the most often. I have always chalked that up to the fact that ¡para!helion's music was all improvised. None of the overlearning under a critical ear that goes into creating and perfecting composed songs goes into the creation of improvised music, so, for me, it feels easier to listen to the songs as music, rather than as a product of my ego. In other words, it's easier to let go and hear the songs as songs without being critical of my own performance or wishing I had one more take to move the song closer to the ideal version that I carry around in my head. (...) today we have 6 never released songs taken from the Midaq Alley and 3 Miles from Mecca sessions. At the time we put those two releases together, these didn't make the cut primarily due to non-musical issues like less-than-ideal microphone placement, or minor equipment failures. After 10 years not hearing these, I don't find that those issues hurt these tracks much at all, so I thought I would share them. -- Several of these tracks include additional players beyond the trio including ¡para!helion's original drummer, Chris (iirc) and a gang of percussionist he brought over for one or two of our night recording sessions. Track's one and two come from the very last ¡para!helion session, with Ghazna being the last song we ever recorded."

(Info from http://penmallet.blogspot.com)

para!helion - >3 (USA 1999)

(mp3-zip, 6 tracks, VBR, 42,9 MB, 43 min)

1) Chabolo

2) Ghazna

3) Bactra

4) Haraiva

5) Lampaka

6) Nagarahara

Get it here or here!

Also available in lossless Flac, Ogg Vorbis

as well as Mp3 from the internet archive.

AND DON'T FORGET TO CHECK OUT THE NEW REMIX PLAYGROUND.

YOU CAN CONTRIBUTE AND SEND ME SOME REMIXES!!!

NEW: REMIX PLAYGROUND - Seed 1: Throw it out there, not away (USA 2000)

It's funny - sometimes different people have the same idea at the same time...

Last year I remembered that I had some unfinished 4 track tapes lying around somewhere, and I always wanted to send them to a friend, so that he could work with them, remix them and add something new to them. He then would send them back to me, so that I could work on and send the new version of that thing back to him (or to any other musician). Of course this never happened... But the idea was there.

Then - also last year - torstn kauke sent me an email, in which he suggested to start some kind of

COLLECTIVE REMIX PLAYGROUND (my words)

on this blog: post some material that others could work with and then repost it here... and so on...

Some weeks later Brian Andrew Marek talked about the same thing and then - recently - J. C. Thorne (aka: icastico) made a comment and also supplied the raw material: the tracks that you'll find here: "Throw it out there not away", originally posted on his blog http://penmallet.blogspot.com/

So I guess, it's about time to just do it!!!
And so today I'll post the first "SEED" - the mentioned tracks by J . C. Thorne - and I ask every musician who reads this and who digs the idea to download them, add instruments, remix 'em, drive over them, eat them, sleep with them... or do anything else that he wants to do with or to them... and to send me the results - so that I can post it.
Of course you may as well start your own seed - or change the first seed in a way that noone will recognize it...

Should be funny, I guess!!!
These tracks here were recorded by the follow up to para!helion (see Midaq Alley and 3 Miles from Mecca).
The original story goes like this (as reported by J. C. Thorne):

"In the summer of 2000, after Jeff graduated and moved away from Albuquerque, Dave and I recruited our friend Jeff Gassaway to join us on bass for some late night improv sessions. (...) in the end none of the tracks manage to quite gel into cohesive units. Each have moments I like - there are plenty of interesting herky-jerky, odd time-signature grooves and Dave does some of his best trumpet work - but in the end the project really needed an additional player if it was going to work. I have kept these recordings intending to do some radical remixes and to recruit some additional players to lay overdubs on the resulting tracks. But, given that I haven't gotten around to that after almost 9 years, it seems unlikely that will ever happen. (...) there might be someone out there who could recognize the potential in these tracks and turn them into something. In that spirit, I am posting the raw tracks, flaws and all, as loop fodder for the remixologists out there that may find them useful. For listeners, I would advise dropping these into a random mix rather than treating them as an album. They work better that way.

Album: Throw it out there, not away
Style: Free improvisation - jazz meets math rock
Recorded live to 2 track DAT summer 2000.

Trumpet, effects - Dave
Bass - Jeff
Drum Kit - me = J . C. Thorne"

THE FIRST SEED ("Throw it out there, not away")
(mp3 zip, 7 tracks, 52 min, 119,6 MB, vbr)
Get it here or (in two parts) here and here!

para!helion - 3 Miles from Mecca (USA 1999)

"This is the first para!helion release that I (= John Thorne) played on (Dave & Jeff had released some earlier work with a different drummer). The bulk of these were recorded live at Mecca coffeehouse in Albuquerque to entertain the troops as Basement Films projected and archived a massive donation of educational films. We played with films projecting on every available piece of wall space. The first and last track were recorded in Dave's living room." (J. T.)

Released in very limited quantities in 1999

Style: Opium Den Ambiance
Players: Dave - Trumpet, effects; Jeff - Electric Balilaika, effects; John - African Kettle Drums, Dumbek, Clay Djemba

para!helion - 3 Miles from Mecca (USA 1999)
(mp3 zip, 7 tracks, 74 min, 168,6 MB, @320)
Get it here or (in two parts) here and here!

para!helion: Midaq Alley (USA 1999)

JOHN THORNE (aka: icastico) runs a blog by the name of Pen & Mallet, that "will share music that I have been involved in creating over the last 3 decades. I will only post out-of-print works that I had a direct hand in creating..."
The first two things he posted were from PARA!HELION. Here is "Midaq Alley", released in very limited quantities in 1999 and featuring: Dave - Trumpet, effects; Jeff - Electric Balilaika, effects; John - percussion, loops, and acoustic bass. All songs were improvised and recorded live to two track.

So what do we get? Hmmmm... Difficult... let's say: Imagine the late 60s (US) KALEIDOSCOPE jamming with the mid-seventies MILES DAVIS in an opium den in Egypt in the 90s... Middle Eastern influenced improvisations with a very cool trumpet to the front - how would ya call that? Ethnic jazz? Amateur fake exotica?
You may read a complete, very good review of "Midaq Alley" here.
Anyway, however one will call it - it's very good music! Quite trippy! Enjoy!

para!helion: Midaq Alley (USA 1999)
(mp3 zip, 12 tracks, 77 min, 143,8 MB, @320)
Get it here or (in two parts) here and here!