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Monthly Archives: April 2023

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Happy Birthday Infrasonic Press!

April 19, 2023 by infrasonicpress
News
Announcements, Sales

It’s our 4th birthday!

On April 19, 2019, we released our first record, Wooden Cities’ WORK. With that first release we set about on our mission to document music and art by adventurous composers, performers, bands, poets, and sound artists from the American Rust Belt. Since then, we’ve put out five more releases, including two collections of The Evolution of the Arm‘s Telepathic Music, Jeff Stadelman’s first album of beat-driven electronic music, and Wooden Cities’ followup to WORK, the quirkily absurdist PLAY.

Part of our mission has always been to advocate for fair pay for culture workers from all backgrounds. In 2021, the label joined thousands of music workers in signing on to the Union of Musicians and Allied Workers’ Justice at Spotify campaign. This spring, we have joined in solidarity with Bandcamp United in their efforts to unionize the internet’s de facto marketplace for independent music.

Last year, we launched the Infrasonic Series, a concert series based in our hometown of Erie, PA to connect touring experimental musicians with regional artists and help establish Erie as an important stop for adventurous musicians from across the country. This initiative received a StARTup grant from the Erie County Redevelopment Authority, ensuring that the next two years of concerts see performers receiving fair compensation for their artistic labor.

We’re grateful to everyone who has ever supported our artists, bought a release, attended a performance, or rocked a C-clamp sticker on their cello case or laptop. As a show of gratitude, we are offering everyone 40% off EVERYTHING in our Bandcamp store until 11:59pm UTC using the discount code:

bday_2023

Thanks for everything!

Wooden Cities Releases PLAY

April 1, 2023 by infrasonicpress
New Releases, News, Wooden Cities
Chamber Music, Sound Poetry, Wooden Cities

Four years after the release of their debut album, WORK, Buffalo-based new music collective Wooden Cities returns with their second release, PLAY. Embracing lighter, more whimsical subject matter than its predecessor, the album leans into the playful—and occasionally volatile—absurdity that regional audiences will know from the ensemble’s live performances.

The album is structured around four realizations from Baltimore composer Will Redman‘s graphic score magnum opus, Book. In these spirited interpretations, the musicians survey a range of textures from dense, sinewy counterpoint to threadbare pianissimos, while always taking advantage of the piece’s deeply-rooted expressive freedom.

The remainder of the album explores three lively sound poetry pieces, beginning with a riotous four-voice arrangement of Berlin Dadaist Kurt Schwitters’ Ribble Bobble Pimlico. The band ludicrously alternates between reassuring whispers and clamorous chants while articulating the titular nonsensical words in ever-sillier combinations. This vein of exploration continues on two pieces by members of the ensemble: trombonist Ethan Hayden’s setting of an excerpt of Gertrude Stein’s poem “In”, and violinist Evan Courtin’s setting of Marina Blitshteyn’s “Good Form,” the latter a darkly comic rendering of a discomfiting interior monologue.

PLAY is now available on Bandcamp and everywhere music is streamed.

Formed in 2011 as a structured improv orchestra, Wooden Cities has since garnered a reputation for their dynamic performances of both improvised and notated works of new and experimental music from a wide variety of composers. PLAY is the second in a trilogy of albums (WORK/PLAY/REST), with the third coming in 2024.

Recent Posts

  • New Release: Rust Belt Artists Against Genocide
  • Michael McNeill releases Barcode Poetry
  • Rust Belt Artists Against Genocide: Call for Works for Compilation & Zine
  • No Instructions in My Music: Brendan Fitzgerald Interviews Will Redman
  • Happy Birthday Infrasonic Press!

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