Ruptured

For Lebanese indie label Ruptured's 25th release, influential British guitarist MIKE COOPER collaborates with HIFIKLUB, a French instrumental ensemble from Toulon, for an impressive musical reading of Robert J. Flaherty's silent film 'Man of Aran'.

Since 2007, French quartet Hifiklub has been building a protean work that evolves through an impressive series of collaborations. The band's catalog is wide and far-reaching, and includes more than 130 collaborations with such renowned musicians as Lee Ranaldo, Alain Johannes, Jad Fair, Fatso Jetson, R. Stevie Moore, Barre Phillips, Jean-Marc Montera, Kramer, Ikue Mori, Alan Licht, and Nels Cline.

Their most recent album, 'E Lisboa', consists of collaborations with experimental musicians from Portugal and was released in January 2019.For the past 50 years Mike Cooper has been an international musical explorer, performing and recording, solo and in a number of inspired groupings and a variety of genres.

Initially a folk-blues guitarist and singer songwriter, his work has diversified to include improvised and electronic music, live music for silent films, radio art and sound installations. He is also a music journalist, writing features for magazines, particularly on Pacific music and musicians, a visual artist, film and video maker, collector of Hawaiian shirts and appears on more than 70 records to date.

In 2017, Hifiklub got in touch with Mike Cooper to record (and eventually perform) a live soundtrack to controversial filmmaker Robert J. Flaherty's silent movie 'Man of Aran'. Flaherty was an American filmmaker who directed and produced the first commercially successful feature-length documentary film, 'Nanook of the North', in 1922.

Following the success of this film, he continued the development of this new genre of narrative documentary with 'Moana' (1926), set in the South Seas, and 'Man of Aran' (1934), filmed in Ireland's Aran Islands. Flaherty is considered the "father" of both the documentary and the ethnographic film.

When devising the lyrics for his performance, Cooper dug into Irish writer John Millington Synge's book 'The Aran Islands', published in 1907. This book provided the initial inspiration for Flaherty's film. Cooper cut up texts from the book and sang them for the record, while relying on a different set of texts from the same source, for the live performance.

It was Cooper who contacted Lebanese indie label Ruptured for the release of the album; no stranger to the Lebanese experimental scene and its various key players, Cooper has already recorded 2 albums in Beirut, 'Radio Paradise' and 'Light On A Wall', released by Lebanese label Johnny Kafta's Kids Menu and Italian label Backwards, respectively.'Aran Stories' is released in a limited edition of 400 copies.

Snakeskin is an album of visionary electronic dream pop, shapeshifting above ambient and industrial undercurrents. It is moody, unsettling, luminous – the culmination of a decade of collaboration and friendship between Lebanese producer/musician/ engineer Fadi Tabbal and singer-songwriter Julia Sabra from Beirut-based indie trio Postcards.

The duo began working on Snakeskin in the aftermath of the August 2020 Beirut port explosion, which killed at least 218 people, injured 7,000, and left over 300,000 people homeless. Indeed, Julia's home was destroyed by the explosion and her partner and bandmate Pascal badly injured. The first song that they wrote together afterwards was 'Roots', which closes out the album and was composed for the Ruptured-curated series The Drone Sessions in the fall of 2020.

Snakeskin utilizes tape loops, synthesizers, vocals, and drum machines, combining Julia’s pop-inspired melodies and choral roots (an echo from her religious upbringing) with Fadi’s affinity for minimalism and musique concrète. The album seamlessly incorporates the melancholy electro-pop of 'All The Birds', the quiet menace of 'In Our Garden' (long-lost treasures, ancient lies / another buried paradise), and the beat-driven 'Signs'.

The title track sums up their frame of mind, beginning as a lullaby and evolving into a glittering tapestry of distortion and feedback. As the artists write, Snakeskin is a product of "the disappearance of life as we know it, and with it the decay of nature and living creatures. There is no rebirth, no renewal. It’s about what it means to feel at home in such a place."

Some tracks were also inspired by events happening in the surrounding region, such as the invasion of Armenia by Azerbaijan and the Palestinian uprising of May 2021 (Sheikh Jarrah) - both events shedding light on relationships to home and land across the wider region.

That such compelling art can emerge from unceasing tragedy may be the ultimate testament to human resilience and the pursuit of freedom and justice.

Tracklisting:
Side A
1. Still Life
2. All The Birds
3. Snakeskin
4. Past Tense
5. In Our Garden

Side B:
6. One By One
7. Signs
8. Roots

Munma grew out of the aftermath of Israel's 2006 bombardment of Lebanon when Nawfal decided to explore traditional Arabic harmonies and rhythms within a cutting-edge electro aesthetic.

The resulting albums combine a dark and often unsettling tone with a fragile beauty. "Previews and Premises" is no exception. Somewhat gentler than the accompanying live performance, Nawfal's latest album leaves room for reflection amid the unabashed beats and makes use of an intriguing array of samples.

The Arabic connection, for instance, is easier to discern in the recorded version. Amid the Doppler-effect drones and elastic bass tones of "Motion Sickness," it is possible to discern a lamenting voice. The opening number, "Soft Integration," positions a tremulous flute over a science-fiction array of bleeps and burps.

As in previous albums, Nawfal uses snatches of recorded speech. On "The Alchemist," an extended diatribe on musical aesthetics from a crisp-voiced gentleman is woven in and out of a prowling, moody beat and glitch-dominated electronic tones. There is still plenty of music for dancing to on the disc. "Ear Damage" combines a propulsive, punchy beat with drifting curtains of sound. "The Alchemist" uses a concatenation of beats that almost brings to mind the catchiness of last summer's German breakout act, Moderat.

"Previews and Premises," is a compilation of Nawfal's work from the past four years. "Some of it was meant to appear on previous Munma releases," Nawfal explains in the sleeve notes, "but eventually kept aside for later inclusion." Perhaps made with a little less urgency than previous EPs,

"Previews and Premises" is nonetheless an absorbing listen, showcasing the range of Nawfal's vision. From the spacey dance tunes of "Bits and Dust" and "Explorer" to the eccentric electro of "Attention Disorder," "Previews and Premises" signals a notable talent in full command of his material. The Daily Star  
 
Tracklisting: 
1 Soft Integration
2 The Alchemist
3 Motion Sickness
4 Ear Damage
5 Explorer
6 Attention Disorder
7 It Came From Under The Sea
8 Bits And Dust

Release Date: 20/12/2024

On Ghadr, Sandy Chamoun, Anthony Sahyoun and Jad Atoui play with chaos. Built on group improvisation, surges of coruscating electronics and distortion meld with vocals that, while stemming from a background in classical Arabic singing, seek to reroute tradition. “We explore rhythmic structures that don’t have specific time signatures,” says Atoui about his and Sahyoun’s use of synthesis to embrace the tension between order and chaos.

“Sandy’s approach to singing isn’t necessarily very rigid either. We felt a common inspiration.” The album, whose title imperfectly translates to ‘Treachery’, began on a residency in Switzerland while the trio were touring Europe (Chamoun solo, Atoui and Sahyoun as their duo NP). It was later finished in their home city of Beirut. The five tracks are built on vibrant circuits of guitar and modular synthesis, the former often acting as a trigger for the latter’s volatile output.

Chamoun’s vocals blend her background in classical Arabic music with free-singing, using tradition as a foundation for exploration rather than standards to follow. Apart from “Hayawanon Ghader (treacherous animal)”, all the songs’ lyrics pull from the archive. Opener “Taha Layl” interprets a Bedouin folk song. “Bihali” is based on a tenth century poem by Abou Firas Al-Hamdani. “Al Moulatham” quotes an Instagram post by Yousef Al-Domouky about the war in Gaza.

“Al-Samaa” uses a text from contemporary Lebanese poet Paul Chaoul.“I’m working with my references, and with the music,” explains Chamoun. “It’s a playful place with my history and now.” About the album’s title, Chamoun explains: “On this planet, the only thing that’s happening now is treachery. It’s the headline of our days.” Terror in Gaza, its shockwaves through the Middle-East and its place in longer histories loom over the record.

However, while Ghadr reflects the present moment, it isn’t consumed by it. The trio agree the album reflects tenderness as much as anger. It’s audible in the effortless swings between abstract and soaring. The way Chamoun’s lyrics put ninth century odes to a bird and ancient Bedouin love songs next to personal reflections by Al-Domouky or Chaoul on real world tragedies.

Sonically and lyrically Ghadr is music of possibility and potential. The five tracks travel through unbounded terrain rather than along fixed paths. “I don’t like to pull the listener in one direction,” Chamoun continues. “You need to play with your imagination and not stick to one story and one meaning.” While the record reflects their state of mind as residents of Lebanon, and the uncertainty that entails, Sahyoun suggests they’re striving to reach beyond it. “We try to access parts of our subconscious and see what dimensions it has outside of what we’re witnessing day to day. When we play, there’s a rhythm between the three of us.

We feel each other sway,” Ghadr is the first release under the name Chamoun/Sahyoun/Atoui, but the trio’s connection is deeply rooted. Sahyoun and Chamoun are members of ecstatic rock collective Sanam. Atoui and Sahyoun’s explorations of synthesis, solo and as NP, are long-running. On Ghadr these histories form something new. A charged record which faces the world as it is while offering glimpses of something else. (Written by Daryl Worthington) Listen here – 

Tracklisting:
1. Taha Layl
2. Bihali
3. Al-Moulatham
4. Hayawanon Ghader
5. Al-Samaa wal Nabaat wal Ghaabaat wal Zaytoun wal Laymoun wal Lawz wal Tin

The Bunny Tylers is a duo from Lebanon whose core consists of two prominent musicians from the Beirut scene: singer-songwriter and guitarist Charbel Haber (Scrambled Eggs, Malayeen, Johnny Kafta's Anti-Vegetarian Orchestra) and multi-instrumentalist and producer Fadi Tabbal (The Incompetents, Under the Carpet, Safar).

The group is a natural amalgamation of the prolific career of the two long-time collaborators, fusing Haber's songwriting sensibility with Tabbal's technical and instrumental know-how and tying musical loose ends from both musicians'past work.

Initially formed to score Nadim Tabet and Karine Wehbe's video essay 'Summer '91', they continued working in film scoring, art installations and their own releases.

Their 2^nd album 'Chance Meetings', recorded with the help of Benoit de Villeneuve in Paris, sets Haber's bleak songs and sorrowful voice against a backdrop of beats and textures spawned from the pair's post-punk, ambient and drone roots.

The result is a drug-hazy polaroid of murder mysteries and misspent youth, the last remnants of a Film Noir set in abandoned Lebanese coastal resorts.

The album is due for release in January 2018 by Lebanese label Ruptured and Cargo Records.