Gandhara Recordings

The Lickets @ The Story Happening

2010-04-01T09:29:00.000-07:00

This is a part of The Licket's first show in SF at The Story Happening, a music series put together by Mountainhood which in his own words "tells a continuous narrative ... The bands tell the story with songs. The Story is happening all around us, made of TV molecules, lives, lies, dreams, perceptions. The Story, in and of itself, is an idea that encapsulates all that's happening on the inner and outer plane, real and superreal, canny and uncanny: everything."

Shortly after this performance, The Lickets put together Gandhara Recordings to focus more on the temporality of events, as well as exploring sustainable materials. In contrast to our other project, International Corporation, which uses collage, filmmaking, and materials as means of exploration, very simple guidelines were set up to emphasize immediacy, the natural magic of performance, chance, and the mystery of sound in and of itself.

O.A.E. @ MacArthur B Arthur

2010-03-31T20:19:00.000-07:00

Though no audio was captured, OAE played at MacArthur B Arthur in Oakland; Kevin Clark's space for artists to congregate and play. The space has a 400 square foot gallery for visual art, a kitchen, windows to the street, and can host readings, performances, special events, and film screenings. Here's some sounds from OAE's last album:

Hazel/Napolean
Kwan Se Um Bosal
Fallen In Salt
Depression Glass
Wide Water

Left Photo by Jill Sanders
Top Photo by Caroline Favrot Lee

No One Conquered Wyoming @ Clawfoot House

2010-03-31T11:02:00.000-07:00

No One Conquered Wyoming played at this amazing space, Clawfoot House, a few days ago. Check it out it's inspiring and so is Ember's music. It's amazing how spaces like this can renew the way we think about music and sound.

"Little more than a year since Ember Schrag launched Clawfoot House as a performance venue in Lincoln’s Near South neighborhood, it has become one of the most vibrant, imaginative and prolific presenters of artists who work on the edge, in media ranging from bluegrass to classical and avant-garde music, and from dance to performance art and the visual arts." -Tom Ineck for The Berman Music Foundation

NO ONE CONQUERED WYOMING//CLAWFOOT HOUSE from wagner israel cilio iii on Vimeo.

Broken Deer Reviews

2010-01-15T02:55:00.001-08:00

There's a great review and interview with Broken Deer at Weird Canada, a really amazing site, covering in their own words music "often bearing the flag of the boundary pushing and unique sounds bubbling in Canada...that exist in every city, town, and hamlet."

http://weirdcanada.com/2010/01/review-broken-deer-our-small-going/
http://weirdcanada.com/2010/02/interview-broken-deer/

And here's one from Hero Hill

'09 or................. '06 I guess. When Lindsay Dobbin - aka Broken Deer - recorded Our Small Going, it was a DIY release that got some great press (and had different title), but when you are isolated from large urban centers and tucked away in Whitehorse, it's tough to build a fan base no matter how good the songs are.

Thankfully, good music will always eventually get heard, and with the support of the Gandhara project - they do amazing runs of 100, hoping that the unique sounds and cover art draw you in - you can pick up a copy of the reissue. Considering the songs were written and recorded in '06, they stand the critical test of time. The former Halifax based Dobbins could easily nestle into a lineup with Ghost Bees or countless other folkies from the North End, but her songs are more than just a cross section of the sounds of a scene.

Tape hiss, loops, delays and warbles give forgotten childhood memories a tender intimacy and surprisingly accessible feel, but it's her take on decay - not of society, but man-made objects that littered her families property - that make this record so enjoyable. Somehow she's able to give the slow, inevitable process of decomposition a touching human quality, without drifting into countless metaphors about death. I have no idea where the record was recorded but at the end of the day, it strikes me as the result of a woman sitting in a room, alone, playing music that comes from her soul.

Gandhara Recordings: Autumn Equinox

2009-09-23T14:28:00.000-07:00

To celebrate the Autumn Equinox, the magical insanity that is Gandhara Recordings is happy! to announce that there are five Fine and Wondrous releases available, the first crop of music, after a long summer of planting these sonic seeds. Each a magical bean you may take with you to watch a musical vine grow as an endless invisible vine of sonic bliss and wonder! Each of the releases available on limited edition hand printed CDs (plus set your own price download) at http://www.gandhararecordings.org/dm. And also at emusic: http://www.emusic.com/profile/lists/showlist.html?lid=40005876 and iTunes: http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewIMix?id=333023309

About Gandhara Recordings:

Gandhara Recordings is a way to release strange and beautiful music. We did a few things that are kind of label-ish, like having a logo and having fun with names of old record labels (the name is inspired by Buddah Records from long ago, misspelling included) and slogans (the two part slogan is an homage to Verve), but we're really not a label. Much of the inspiration from the packaging came from City Light's Books Pocket Poets Series. The art and text on each of the recordings is almost completely artist driven, and each is released on CD in limited editions of 100, hand silk screened onto 100% Post Consumer Recycled Cardboard Jackets.

http://www.myspace.com/gandhararecordings

http://www.gandhararecordings.org/

Where to Recycle CDs?

2009-07-15T17:36:00.000-07:00

When we were trying to come up with a way to have the lightest footprint possible with packaging we inevitably thought about the compact discs themselves. Luckily there are things like The Compact Disc Recycling Center, which in their own words: "was founded in 2006 to provide consumers and companies education, awareness, and options for easy CD and DVD recycling. Their website offers a range of articles, research, products and member profiles of the growing number of supporters and members, to be applauded by the recycling conscious good people of the earth." They have CD recycling options for individuals and groups here.

Gandhara Box

2009-07-14T18:05:00.000-07:00

We made a display box for the Gandhara releases out of cardboard we salvaged and silk screened art. Cool! total cost of materials - paint = $0. Its coming together!!!!

Gandhara Store Open

2009-06-21T16:35:00.000-07:00

Gandhara Recordings store is open at http://www.gandhararecordings.org/dm. Each album is hand screen printed in limited edition quantities of 100. When you order you also get access to an instant mp3 download of the entire album in high quality 320 kbps. We're really excited to finally make these available and there are some great recordings on the site!

Salvagin' art supplies!

2009-06-19T12:30:00.000-07:00

Printing Begins!

2009-06-19T00:36:00.001-07:00

After chasing down a truck we finally had the screens we needed. They were so late we ended up starting to do our own exposures, but we were finally able to start! We plan to do five releases this weekend if we have time, but as seems to be the case, one band needed the discs immediately so we started printing with The Lickets: They Turned Our Desert Into Fire, and we finished up the screens for No One Conquered Wyoming, Broken Deer and OAE.

Its really great to see so much work finally falling into place. Here's some pics of today's process, which, is in all honesty still occurring!

No One Conquered, Wyoming Screen

Drying and Stamped!

The Lickets: They Turned Our Desert Into Fire

2009-06-15T22:10:00.000-07:00

Golden Destroyer who is to the timely afternoon drinks, says “you are who you are anyway.” To the bottom of the ocean, in the forest of the possibility, the best solution is there. Who awakens the green, the balance of time, and the peach trees of immortality await. Scorched earth, evacuations, echoes indicates the candles lying in the pink mountain sand. To the land of bliss, there is no worry. Responsibility is not born; pretend words have no meaning today. The Shadowland orchestra, in pursuit of lost time, plays drums of winter. At local temple open air festival, the goddess and computer cannot wait. Seed Patterns and Golden Destroyer of Classical Mechanic, please start at once by all means.

Using harmonium, strings, flute, rebab, sitar, voice and percussion, the Lickets make other-worldly and hypnotic music that can become transcendental and transportive.

>Buy Album

The Lickets: Her Name Came On Arrows

2009-06-15T22:06:00.000-07:00

Broken Deer: Our Small Going

2009-06-01T23:47:00.001-07:00

Before leaving her childhood home, a little girl went by moonlight into the woods and buried all of her songs. She dug holes deep into the earth, carved words on birch bark, and slept at the edge of a living marsh until dawn. Then she was gone. Twenty years later she returned, wounded by the world out there, and began the unearthing process - a quest for what had been displaced, and needed to be found. Our Small Going is a document of what was left, set to the sky. Embedded in the movements of decay, the sounds are little truths of matter and hand - a tender history of breathing air into earth.

> Buy Album

No One Conquered, Wyoming

2009-06-01T23:45:00.000-07:00

During the reign of the ancient redwood giants, the solar body vega became one unto itself so that, solidly standing, she placed her daring head blazing open on the infinite sky. as the crystals confirmed it, the forest erupted into celebration and the lord loosened the tongues of the animals and they spoke crying: holy! holy! holy! and vega, burning and pressed up in darkness, looked and saw that it was good.

no one conquered, wyoming is the mystical humanist project of wagner israel cilio iii. guided by the minimalist concepts of bricolage, pastiche, and mythography, the project works to make music entirely from second-hand, re-appropriated, recycled, and liberated instruments while also drawing from american mythology and tradition. the idea of re-employing discarded objects and so-called obsolete forms doubles the project as a metaphor for conservation and resourcefulness to a generation of earth-dwellers poised on the edge of ecological and spiritual suicide. the end result is a carousel of images swirling in magic, mystery, and light.

>Buy Album

OAE: OAE

2009-06-01T23:31:00.000-07:00

OAE (Oakland Afternoon Ensemble) is a hazy wash of improvised texture; an expansive dive into deep space seen through a gauzy lo-fidelity lens. Electric hiss and reflected short bursts of noise jettison through strange frequencies, overtones and melodies performed on guitars, electronics and an ancient Arabic oud. Performed and recorded live by Bryan Hillebrandt and Derek Monypeny in afternoon sessions in Oakland, California. This is perfect music for your own afternoons, wherever you may be. Cover art by Randy Colosky.

>Buy Album

Why paper is such an important consideration.

2009-06-01T20:58:00.000-07:00

Gandhara is for fun, not facts, but you cant ignore things like this:

Forests store 50% of the world's terrestrial carbon. (In other words, they are awfully important "carbon sinks" that hold onto pollution that would otherwise lead to global warming.)
Half the world's forests have already been cleared or burned, and 80% of what's left has been seriously degraded.
42% of the industrial wood harvest is used to make paper.
The paper industry is the 4th largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions among United States manufacturing industries, and contributes 9% of the manufacturing sector's carbon emissions.
Paper accounts for 25% of landfill waste (and one third of municipal landfill waste).
Municipal landfills account for one third of human-related methane emissions (and methane is 23-times more potent a greenhouse gas than is carbon dioxide).
If the United States cut office paper use by just 10% it would prevent the emission of 1.6 million tons of greenhouse gases -- the equivalent of taking 280,000 cars off the road.
Compared to using virgin wood, paper made with 100% recycled content uses 44% less energy, produces 38% less greenhouse gas emissions, 41% less particulate emissions, 50% less wastewater, 49% less solid waste and -- of course -- 100% less wood.
In 2003, only 48.3% of office paper was recovered for recycling.
Recovered paper accounts for 37% of the U.S. pulp supply.
Printing and writing papers use the least amount of recycled content -- just 6%. Tissues use the most, at 45%, and newsprint is not far behind, at 32%.
Demand for recycled paper will exceed supply by 1.5 million tons of recycled pulp per year within 10 years.
While the paper industry invests in new recycled newsprint and paper packaging plants in the developing world, almost none of the new printing and writing paper mills use recycled content.
China, India and the rest of Asia are the fastest growing per-capita users of paper, but they still rank far behind Eastern Europe and Latin America (about 100 pounds per person per year), Australia (about 300 pounds per person per year) and Western Europe (more than 400 pounds per person per year).
The Forest Stewardship Council's certification of sustainable forestry practices is growing, with 50% of the paper product market share and 226 million acres accounted for. Advocates say the demand for recycled paper and sustainably harvested pulp from consumers, advertisers, magazine makers and other users of paper will yield the fastest reforms of the industry.

> Courtesy of the Environmental Paper Network

60 prints in 24 hours!

2009-05-30T15:39:00.000-07:00

Yesterday We made a batch of 60 OAE cds, its a ambient Eno/Fripp/Flying Saucer Attack type project...

We did a really textural dye the day before by rubbing tumeric and some other spices onto the post consumer cardboard, giving it a really cool distressed feel in addition to a kind of golden, yellow glow.

We had to work fast so the prints came out really expressive, with some over prints and individual marks from condensation, which ended up looking really cool. No single one is alike.

A little bit about Gandhara

2009-05-27T22:59:00.000-07:00

Gandhara Recordings is a way to release music. We did a few things that are kind of label-ish, like having a logo and having fun with names of old record labels (The name is inspired by Buddah Records from long ago, misspelling included) and slogans, (The two part slogan is an homage to Verve.) but we're really not a label. Much of the inspiration from the packaging came from City Light's Books Pocket Poets Series. We wanted to make a way to capture spontaneity and we needed a way to release music that was a bit less heavily conceptual, more about the sound recordings themselves and allowed for more flexibility. Music and art, at least the kind we make, kind of flows with life, and the way most records are released, even today, really doesn't allow that to happen as much as it should. The art and text on each of the recordings is almost completely artist driven, there's no marketing agency or PR. There's no one to point out to artists that we're crazy(we know we are!), or stop insane ideas from reaching full bloom.

We're completely artist run, and motivated by volunteerism and community, not profit. Hopefully this makes the entire experience more light-hearted and fun, plus the packaging ends up looking really really cool, and we drastically reduce the impact on the environment. We started this out as an investigation but after working with these materials for a couple of months now we wouldn't under any circumstances go back to using tree based paper for general everyday use. We'll post pics soon. Excited!

The Secret Life of Plants

2009-05-27T22:47:00.000-07:00

This documentary was not the motivation for Gandhara Recordings, but it's pretty amazing. Q: What do Stevie Wonder sing alongs, psychic plants and naked dance have in common? A:The Secret Life of Plants.

Some of our Papers and Materials

2009-05-27T21:46:00.000-07:00

Some of the best papers we found ended up being at http://www.ecopaper.com/ Most are completely tree-less. We also learned a lot about natural dyes initially from this resource: http://www.pioneerthinking.com/naturaldyes.html. There's a great company called Sustainable Group http://www.sustainablegroup.net/ that has a lot of great pre assembled post consumer paper and while we didnt use any Ecocern in Australia was really nice and helpful. http://www.ecocern.com/ . In addition there are a lot of green business in Berkeley including a number of lithographic printing presses and for flyers we've used Greener Printer. And there's also this amazing progam in the Mission in San Francisco that empowers youth through silk screening http://www.homeysf.org/ng.html. And you can get some great supplies and support local by getting silk screen supplies at Dharma Trading Company in San Rafael. Or the more industrial route at Midwest Sign. We're doing everything ourselves, but these are some great places to check out if you're thinking of silk screening or looking into sustainable materials.

Gandhara starting to open up

2009-05-27T21:42:00.000-07:00

Gandhara is just starting to open up. This is kind of the week we're beginning rip into reality, having spent the last few months off and on working on the project, which was mostly researching materials, working with techniques to make the releases, and the general pitfalls and acrobatic efforts that happen when you do something like this. It wasnt easy!!!! But it will be a cool experiment, no matter how long we do it. We're aiming to completely open up on the solstice. :)