Domenico De Clario, a visual artist currently living in Australia, was involved in a project called "the quiet in the land: everyday life, contemporary art and the shakers". where he lived in a Shaker village in Maine, by a lake, for a month, and while blindfolded, painted, wrote poems and played piano every day he was there. Apparently Burnt Friedman heard some of these recordings in a car and decided to release it (thank god someone did). another totally random find, what drew me to this random CD was first the breathtakingly gorgeous photography on the cover (funny it's of NYC and not the Shaker village though), and second the packaging looked like a Non-Place release.
knowing nothing about Domenico's other work, the music on this CD is of a very rare quality judged on its own merits. forever autumn, eternal dusk... the artist becomes a medium and these solo piano improvisations recorded at sunset gradually dissipate and dissolve with patient grace, like sunlight slowly dissapearing over the horizon. supposedly with no formal training what so ever, the playing is effortless, and the compositions feel like a direct sonic translation of a meditative inward journey.
an excerpt from text on the sleeve:
"... perceive architecture, city, continent or idea as a body,
dynamicised by its own internal energy-receiving and diffusing structure,
much like our bodies' energy-flows are regulated by the chakras. ...
in order to facilitate this proces I have sat blindfolded within each
body's centre from sunset to sunrise, through solstices, equinoxes,
equinoxes, eclipses and full-moons, all the while touoching the keys of a
piano. I believe that my own body and that of the piano might in this
context function as a receiver-transmitter, receiving/transmuting the
inaudible through my body and sub-sequently transmitting it as
keyboard-sound....
I sit blindfolded at the piano because it helps me to stay longer inside
each second; the paradox is that whilst so blindfolded I am able to "see"
more clearly than before, in this state the seeing becomes more important
than what ever can be seen, enabling one to reach deeper into the self
than any examination of form could ever acheive...
the resultant experience of "blind-listening" might remind us of the
paradox we encounter when, on being asked to describe the "inner" world,
we find it impossible to say what it is or how it is, nbut rather, on
looking at the evidence around us, all we can say is: "not-this".
I offer "not this" to you."
___________________
I'm not uploading it because this recording is not only still in print, but is also cheap if you get it used:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00006I9FQ/sr=1-1/qid=1147280190/ref=sr_1_1/104-4414952-1137540?%5Fencoding=UTF8
one of the most accessable and popular one in the wonderful series (up to 21 now I think). for those not familiar, the Ethiopian amalgamation of Arabic, American, and African cultures is difficult to describe... imagine if James Brown was Egyptian, jamming with some of the most bad ass musicians East of the River Nile. (no vocals on this particular volume) 
the language this improvising supergroup develops on their debut recording is at once precise, unpredictable, logical, dynamic, alarming, and absolutely breath-taking. scrapes, hisses, thuds, chimes, yelps, growls, crashes, drones, and wails -- we may have become familiar with these type of sounds in post-jazz improvised music, but very, very rarely are they so well put together, and with such impecable execution. forceful, fragile, tense and meditative, volumes can be said about the music on this disc but it may simply be a document of 4 extremely intellegent and able players tapping their individaul abilities and together making the most interesting experience possible. more than music which rearranges mental furniture, recordings like this will give you ideas for entirely new interior decorative plans for years to come. 
I would guess most of these recordings are from the 80s and 90s, but could be wrong. this like other compilations on Sublime Frequencies, have poor, if any, liner notes, and often include many "unknown" artists. probably because the songs are from cassete tapes found on the floor of some dude's car or in a box in the storage room of some restaurant - yet the varying sound quality do not hinder, and maybe even in some cases enhance, the irresistable magical charm of these tunes. 
and here is another fine studio album. I had uploaded the Still Valentines Day live in SF but deleted it because i listened again and it's really weak. i guess at that time his years of drug abuse had taken its toll and the recording is just him repetitively noodling through a phaser or something -- and i do not wish to waste your precious time and pod-space with it. 
part of the Rastor Noton "Static" series, which includes 4 installments and all packaged in the kind of electro-static bags used for computer components, this is some of the best digital dub / clicks n' cuts / post ambient / insert buzz-word here, there is. 
Domenico De Clario, a visual artist currently living in Australia, was involved in a project called "the quiet in the land: everyday life, contemporary art and the shakers". where he lived in a Shaker village in Maine, by a lake, for a month, and while blindfolded, painted, wrote poems and played piano every day he was there. Apparently Burnt Friedman heard some of these recordings in a car and decided to release it (thank god someone did). another totally random find, what drew me to this random CD was first the breathtakingly gorgeous photography on the cover (funny it's of NYC and not the Shaker village though), and second the packaging looked like a Non-Place release. 
