Subtle bump
I am a bit of a wreck today. Why? Not sleeping enough.
The kind of music that is soothing my addled brain? Subtle yet bumping (softly) songs like this one, by Mapstation. Mapstation is the rather prolific songwriter/producer Stefan Schneider, a member of To Rococo Rot, who also records under the name Music A.M., and who appears on Bell Orchestra's and September Collective's albums. Schneider, originally from Düsseldorf, Germany, floats between Berlin, Düsseldorf and London, and visited Valencia, Stockholm, Naples, and Milan in the process of writing and recording his new album, Distance Told Me Things To Be Said.
On the album, Schneider plays melodica and played most of the electronics, but it also features appearances by Annie Whitehead, on trombone, and Volker Bertelmann on piano, and on most of the tracks, Martin Brandlmayr (of Radian) played drums and percussion. The record was engineered by Bernd Jestram of Tarwater - all of this would seem to add up to an interesting little community of like-minded musicians working together, as well as some beautiful music - some of it more jazz than electronic, with a lot of background sounds and noises from the field recordings made in the cities I mention above.
Distance is released by Berlin's ~scape, run by Stefan Betke (aka Pole) - Schneider also has three other albums under the Mapstation moniker, all released by Staubgold, that are worth looking into. Oh, and If you go to the ~scape site, you can download another track, "Factory," which is not on the album, and if you're interested you can purchase the record from our friends at Forced Exposure.
I've got a couple of giveaways in the works for later on this week, one involving some super-rare vinyl, and the other for tickets to an awesome looking show on Friday night... I'll get back to you on those with info soon.