drøne – mappa mundi

Voice of the People
Horizontal Direction
Telegraphy Beacon
Echo of Hope
Shannon Volmet

[drøne # drøne1]
Limited Edition CD (500 copies)
You can hear an extract here

Release date: 13th October 2017
Now available on Bandcamp

Cover image & font by Nico Van Hoen

This the first CD released by drøne, after two vinyl albums on Anna von Hausswolff’s label, Pomperipossa. In a 5” jacket with artwork and font by nico, who also provided the hand-written text for the vinyl artwork for the 2015 and 2016 releases, “Mappa Mundi” traces and describes audio surrounding and occupying the planet earth.

Workers toil in smithies, call signs and chants-at-prayer reveal attempts to order the chaos, which always remains one step ahead. Post-lapsarian for sure, but smoke signals and drums have morphed into the ‘bing bong’ of the attention-grabbing, mind-polluting PA system. The coded simplicity of the whistle (“Start!”) has evolved into a more deliberate attempt to control rather than inform by explicit, structured language. Announcements have become commands; signs bark orders. Thus ‘no’ becomes a powerful rejection, rather than merely a preference; and no-ers are more easily to spot… “You’re going the wrong way”! (To which the only sensitive and mature response is: “Good!”)

Call signs, IDs, audio sigils and signatures all combine to describe a polluted, confusing atmosphere which threatens to leave us powerless and bewildered. “Decipher the sounds and you win the game! First prize is, guess what? You get to take the audio poison! Congratulations! You’ve lost!”.

The first album, ‘reversing into the future’ drew this response from Lend Me Your Ears: “This thrilling piece – surely the most kinetic non-dancefloor record in an age”. Anna herself wrote of the follow up record, ‘a perfect blind’: “I love everything about this release. Such a great presentation and exciting project! And most important: the music is sublime.”

The Quietus wrote: “Last year’s distinctive debut from drøne was likened to a hurtling journey. It’s combination of field recordings, shortwave radio and modular synths possessed an excited, driving energy whose route was hitherto unexplored and destination unknowable. But with an expanded sound pool boasting instruments across the ages – from guitar, through pipe organ and strings to dulcimer and psaltery – its follow-up takes a sideways step into more cognizant, reflective pastures.”

drøne – a perfect blind

Side A back to the station
Side B cutting the screen

[Pomperipossa Records # PRLP3]
Limited Edition Vinyl (500 copies)
Release date: 22nd April 2017 [Record Store Day]
And afterwards available on Bandcamp (digital download only)

Cover image by Maria von Hausswolff
Cut by Jason @ Transition
Font by Nico

“I love everything about this release. Such a great presentation and exciting project! And most important: the music is sublime.” [Label boss Anna von Hausswolff]

oleg belyaev – baroque ‘cello
charlie campagna – ‘cello
paul haslinger – piano
philip jeck – pulse
bethan kellough – violin, viola
marie takahashi – baroque viola
anna von hausswolff – voices

baritone guitar & cymbals
dulcimer & psaltery
field recordings
lorenz cipher machine
1877 henry willis organ (union chapel)
short wave

Disruption between then and now/memory and presence, dulcimer, psaltery, ‘cellos, violas and violin embroider radio, static, stray voices and electronics… ‘a perfect blind’ is the second album by drøne (Mark Van Hoen & Mike Harding) with an array of guest artists, including label supremo Anna von Hausswolff, dreamer and composer Paul Haslinger, field recordist and sound designer Charlie Campagna and Touch artists Bethan Kellough & Philip Jeck. Strings by Seattle-based Marie Takahashi and Oleg Belyaev are also layered into this complex and perhaps more musical offering. Moving in all directions, ‘a perfect blind’ continues where ‘reversing into the future’ [pomperipossa records, 2016] left off.

‘a perfect blind’ was conceived and designed in Los Angeles with organ recordings from London (at Union Chapel), short wave radio, treated voices and other archaic sound sources.

A stunning front cover image by Maria von Hausswolff and miss-taken typography by Nico embrace this sense of dislocation; as the mediaeval language which enfolds our collapsing 19th Century institutions fails to find relevance, our sense of entrapment in the old is accompanied by an assault on the senses. The destabilising effect of “post-truth” adds to our sense of unbelonging, of being elsewhere, observers not participants.

‘a perfect blind’ is the term used for the best possible observation point where the viewer is unseen by the object of interest. Is this the best place to be? Memories which slowly fade away, also reverse back from the past shoving us into the future…

[Pomperipossa Records # PRLP2]
Limited Edition Vinyl + full length wav DL [42:45]
Release date: 16th April 2016

You can order your copy now

Cover image: Maria von Hausswolff
Cut by Jason @ Transition

Side A this strange life l ::: 19:53
Side B this strange life ll ::: 19:57

Pomperipossa Records, curated by Anna von Hausswolff, is delighted to announce the forthcoming release of the first album by drøne. Field recordings, short wave radio, modular synth all combine to form an enticing, arresting, moving journey of electrically-charged dissonance, drones and electronic melodies… Anna calls it “a jewel”.

“A very hot day in the hills above Los Angeles… only possible to work in the mornings because of the sweltering afternoon heat, so all a bit frantic, but with a kink in time. There is no wifi-controlled air conditioning; the car is electric-powered and charging up. It has barely rained for months, (if not years) and the hoses are working overtime. Its an analogue session; Mark’s modular synth set up is working furiously and overheating. We are pushing sounds through and seeing what works… and things gradually take shape. The forms seem to determine themselves; how much control do we have? How much do we want? Some peculiar things start to happen and the haze bends. Some of the sounds seem alive and are quick to reform as we struggle to contain them, like trying to stuff snakes into a bag. The sounds moan and sing, forming their own phonemes.”

For further information:
drone@field.nu | @dronefield
Released by Pomperipossa Records
Published by Field Music
pomperipossarecords.com
www.field.nu/drone