Jin Choi returns to Archipel to release his second 12″ in Archipel’s vinyl series entitled “Dig Your Own Out”. Just as masterful as his first Archipel 12″, Jin’s second coming is surrounded by an aura of warmth and is highly jazz influenced providing the birthing ground for his fervently smokey textures.

“Lost And Found” initiates with warm rhythms and a gentle chord pulse which grows into a sunny melody whose beams set alight slowly drifting chains of saccharine smoke. “Hurtlocker” features sultry acoustic guitar and piano melodies at its core which are woven tightly and hypnotically into an expertly stitched dance of subtle textures which wind about each other into the small hours of the morning.

“Dig Your Own Out” continues on a similar path with a gentle piano melody which is rhythmically set just so in an atmosphere of early morning mist and streams of heady rhythmic waves which are constantly in subtle states of change while they bring with them in tow an ardent series of gently warped textures.

The release was recently reviewed on UK’s The Guardian as Single of the Week.

Release Date: 10-5-2010

After his 2009 album on Archipel, we’re now proud for the return of Vincent Casanova and present to you his latest EP called “Bohemian Cybernetics”. Vincent’s EP is full of a particular bounce and hop which is totally irresistible. In “Enter The Shaolin” and “Locks Keys Levels” there is a very playful bounce which spring loads a wide

palette of juicy electrified textures and aural spaces which synchronously spring forth off of each other effortlessly and to great affect. “Her Eyes Are Portal” and “Feat Jordan Maxwell” take on a great warmth and charm and are made up of wonderfully winding spiral rhythms with gentle melodies dotted through out, wherein “Feat Jordan Maxwell” indeed does feature fragments of the researcher’s heady musings which are neatly woven into Casanova’s aural tapestry. “Malibu Eclipsed” and “The Fortnighters” are both extremely colourful and are woven of lushly textured melodies held tightly together by entrancing atmospheric rhythms which are filled with charm.

“Barberie Binaire” LP

Sul.a shine’s his warm light once again from within the arms of Archipel and brings us his stunningly beautiful fourth album entitled “Barberie Binaire“. Sul.a takes his already excellent production to another level here and reaches out into a distant binary star system, capturing its light and bringing it back for all to feel. So many styles are featured here and yet they all snuggle up and share with each other so well.

“Le Petit Piéton” and “Ta Bouche Ma Moitié” are both wonderfully warm and melodic within the frame of expertly faceted rhythms where the melodic elements shimmer and dance about in sync but at the same time frame themselves in their own right while “Écho” and “Ecchymose” fill a similar melodic and downbeat canvas but is more focused on an Autechrian type of rhythmic structure with fizzingly textured melodies which arch and wind their way fluidly about the rhythmic structures in a binary tango.

Pieces like “Soleil Blanc”, “Toujours Encore” and “Harmonique Dans la Tête” inflate a darker foil of broken beat oriented rhythmic structures constructed from a succulent palette of textures from which Sul.a’s heated melodic elements are hinged to mesmerizing effect. In a perfect ratio of inclusion also are more dancefloor oriented pieces such as “Aquacéphale” and “Barberie Binaire” (who was on Pheek’s latest Podcast and created a lot of compliments) which combine dark atmosphere with sultry and warm textures creating a magnificent contrast wrapped up in a glowing shawl of hypnosis. “La Modération” and “À Ciel Ouvert”, of which is in two complimentary parts, II without beats, take on a still dancefloor but much deeper and aquatic palette of aural tones which sweep up one’s mind and send it off into a beautifully frothy ocean of sky blue and summer drizzle kissed warmth.

Detroit’s Eric Johnston who has already brought Archipel a remix of Marc Neyen and an EP on Kalimari now brings us a superb four track 12″ entitled “Silly Girl”. This whole package is a highly rhythmic affair

which while darkly tinted remains very funky. “Stop Calling Me” is the most percussion oriented of the pieces and instantly sucks you into its very well thought out labyrinth of sky high rhythms which are layered just so and double dipped in liquid funk while “Labrador” strips things down a little more and wraps you in blankets of warm and rubbery groove. “Worth It” carries on with the perfect shuffle and utilizes a wonderful blend of warmth and funk which take hold of your mind and feet with an unrelenting grip while it ebbs and flows, building a heated story as it progresses. “Munted” could be three pieces in and of itself but blends them all expertly into one single solid storyline which takes you through mazes of juicy percussion and excellently placed, darkly hued, very deep chords which no doubt will cause many a spine to pleasantly arch.

Mark Thibideau should be a familiar name in your mental cache for his work on Sub Static and with his brother Matt as Repair. Without hesitation Archipel is pleased to bring you his newest work, a brilliant full length entitled “Left Behind” which features an excellent remix from fellow Torontonian Eric Downer.

The album as a whole is exceptionally well balanced, moving from more ambient textures through to dub influenced works and warm, bright, skeleton movers. Pieces such as “At Night” and “Writing the Story” are heavily warmed and dub tinted ambient scenes which play out smoothly and deeply as they wind their way inside your cortical neural designs while “Left Behind” and “Blurred” get you moving at just the right pace where dub influences shine through in masterful aurally painted and beautifully textured synths.

“The Hurt” and “Discovering Euphoria” bring things to a more funk infused level while retaining Thibideau’s trademark analog textures where each brushstroke has been set in exactly the right location in the colour soaked soundscape while “When It Comes” takes things in a more spheric and low end injected direction and creates a very deep and hypnotic mental environment while triggering a high degree of early morning physical contortion.

Eric Downer takes his neural hands to “Writing the Story” and sculpts an extra deep and nothing short of funky rendition of the original. Downer retains the heavy warmth of the original and weaves it epically into a highly rhythmic affair spotted with a spectrum of rotational analog colours which is set to send your neural net ablaze with electricity.

Tracklisting:

1. Left Behind
2. Blurred
3. At Night
4. When It Comes
5. Writing The Story
6. Discovering Euphoria
7. Writing The Story (Eric Downer Remix)
8. The Hurt

More info:

http://www.archipel.cc
http://www.facebook.com/archipelmusique
http://twitter.com/archipelmusic
http://www.youtube.com/archipelmusic

[arch069] “Archipel’s 5th Anniversary Remix Contest, Various Artists EP” out now!

Archipel’s sixty-ninth digital installation is a special one. We’ve held a quiet remix contest and this release brings with it the top results. Somfay and Tom Ellis have provided the originals for the contest in question.  read more

[archpl019] “Echinodon EP’ by Stefny now out!

After releasing the excellent ‘Wormhole’ on Japan Excursion Joint 3, the most talented Stefny gives us her debut solo Archipel 12”, “Echinodon”, featuring remixes from Bruno Pronsato, Isomer Transition and a newly birthed project of Somfay’s called Flourish.  read more

[Arch057] Orbits Decaying by Isomer Transition now for free!

We know, we have been really behind in the updates of our releases for free and this is due to some technical problems mixed with discouragement. That combo does no good and now we decided to face 2010 with a lot of courage and to put all the releases that are due up. First at bat for this year is our friend RJ Valeo, aka Isomer Transition. That techno release is all about bouncing beats in pure rubbery thickness. Check it out now!

Note:

Every now and then, someone will come up and ask us why our free releases are encoded at 192kbps. The reason is, most the people who are interested in free music see it as evaluation or are quite fine with low-quality music. In case you didn’t know yet, making music costs something, takes loads of time and energy. If you love music, please invest a few dollars into supporting artists. Thank you!

It’s a tradition to wish everyone a happy new year and so, I’d like to also wish you a great musical year for 2010!

What is music in 2010? I wonder what people were imagining music would be by now, about 100 years ago. If you look behind in sci-fi movies from the 60′s, the music usually played for the future is something of arpeggiated old school synths with a few swooshes here and now. That was pretty accurate if you think about it. There is that kid of music, as well as drone ambient music with futuristic fx. The last thing our grand parents would have imagined for the future was music being for free. Right?

But that is so 2001!

It’s pretty crazy to say that 10 years ago, the best way to promote yourself was to give your music for free. You’d reach a bunch of music lovers that would be really excited by their findings and would be really feeling lucky too. Now, I’m not so sure. It seems the music has not much value anymore. Everyday you can find more (good and bad) music for free (legally or illegally) than you can listen to and I know so many people that have terabytes of music, most of it, listened a single time and then stocked. It sort of reminds me of those homeless people who walk with a grocery cart filled with suff…

That said, what’s left of music is not so clear. Selling the music seems to get more attention then giving it for free. We, at Archipel, believe in both method as an hybrid approach that we have been doing for a few years already. Perhaps this is where the role of a label is important as a moderator of music we believe in. We’re not going to change our approach; we’ll still release both digital and physical releases (CD, vinyl). The digital will still be for sale then for free.

I’m not sure about you, but I feel that we have more power by buying the stuff we believe in. It sends a direct message that you are supporting something. My local grocery store started to have a few organic products and myself, with others, started to buy as much as we could. Now they have a dedicated section for those products and we get more and more quality food. It’s the same with music. If you want more music like you enjoy it, you can support it. I’m going to start an anti-piracy discussion here, but one problem behind that is, it doesn’t give any message back to the artists. Perhaps this is why Facebook is having a lot of success with their fanpages, where people can directly reach their favorite artists?

We’ll be turning 5 years old in October by the way and that is great news!

What’s in the plans?

There was a lot of thinking of what should do for the next year. First off, there will be an evolutive artwork throughout the year. You’ll need to collect all artworks to get the full picture by december. Since it’s an important year, we finally decided to try to release artists that have been affiliated to us, so less new comers and more new material by friends.

Eric Johnston from Detroit will be releasing a new album with us along with his first vinyl. This is very exciting since Eric is crafting really heady, mental music just like we love it.

Hailing from Quebec city, our friend Sul.a was due for a return with us. He already has a few albums out and wonderful releases with us, so it’s more than a pleasure to see where he’ll take us next.

Then we have Jin Choi, Marc Neyen, Rudolf, Niederflur, Christian Dittmann that will make new awaited appearances. Many others as well, don’t worry!

The next vinyl release will be by Stefny with remixes of Bruno Pronsato, Isomer Transition and Flourish. Stay tuned for that one, it’s already making dancefloors move worldwide and we’re quite thrilled to introduce those tracks to you!

Til then, I personally wish you all the best! I hope that you will follow us this year and we can share a musical excursion that will be the soundtrack of your life.

Born and raised in A Coruna, Galicia (Spain). Suso Flores moved to U.K. in 2005 to study Sound Design, when he collected residencies at various venues in London. He has been kind enough to put together an exclusive Live PA for us. Enjoy!

If you haven’t seen it in your iTunes, you might want to register to the podcast (www.archipel.cc/podcast) or get it here