repair me now

Colin Andrew Sheffield - Repair Me Now - 2018

New CD/digital download on Jason Lescalleet's label Glistening Examples
Thanks for utilizing photography by Matthew Swiezynski from the area of the Pacific Northwest

it was moving very slowly

new colin andrew sheffield album
available on mystery sea *
(contact*)

"it was just a faintly glinting speck of orange light that crept
erratically along the margin of the stream. it was moving very
slowly, for the tide was nearly at slack water."

- john metcalfe - tide-borne - 1925

till her breath warmed his face

tarrl lightowler

new review of colin andrew sheffield's signatures by jim haynes in the wire magazine, right next to giancarlo toniutti's stunning new cd qwalsamtimutkw?italuc'ik (and now he almost did make himself into hemlock needles, it is said) sound-field for rattle-harp

....there's plenty of preamble when it comes to this album from colin sheffield. this artist works reductively with appropriated material, and this is a label that is dedicated to works evoking avian life and their environment. signatures presents an opaque set of recordings through that conceptual lens in these four monochromatic tracks of suspended drone and din. the flattened layers of the first three tracks have the gravity of thick grey concrete, occasionally arcing into curved surfaces and bulging masses. while it's hard to categorise any of these sounds as birdlike, they are impressively physical renderings of a minimalist ethos. the album's finale "breath of day" is considerably lighter, with a sustained tone burst that resembles the church organs from touch's spire series. sheffield directs us toward heaven: and in casting our eyes upward, there's the chance we might spot a rare bird soaring in the sunlight.

other fine reviews:

hardformat
textura
bagatellen
just outside
vital weekly
tokafi

darkness moves:

- svarte greiner - penpals forever - digitalis limited - 2008
- svarte greiner - kappe - type - 2008
- svarte greiner - man bird dress - smtg limited - 2008
- elegi - sistereis - miasmah recordings - 2007
- elegi - verde - miasmah - 2009
- jacaszek - treny - miasmah - 2008
- mark peter wright - a quiet reverie - resonance fm - 2009
- andrew chalk (as ferial confine) - first, second, and third - siren records - 1986/2008
- john luther adams - in the white silence - new world records - 2003
- loren chasse - exfolia motors - unique ancient tavern - 2000
- loren chasse - fantasy apparition - s'agita recordings - 2002
- loren chasse (of) - quartz pond - jewelled antler - 2004
- loren chasse, phil mouldycliff, colin potter, keith rowe - debris field ambient wash - icr - 2006
- tim hecker - an imaginary country - kranky - 2009
- the hafler trio - how to slice a loaf of bread - phonometrography - 2003
- celer - tropical - mystery sea - 2008
- celer - cursory asperses - slow flow - 2008
- the jewelled antler library - porter records - 2008
- steve roden - ice - 2009
- steve roden - a slow moving boat - new plastic music - 2008
- machinefabriek - dauw - dekorder - 2008
- stephen vitiello - stephen vitiello with eighth blackbird - magic if 2008
- apm - sprint mill - icr - 2008
- alexander knaifel - blazhenstva - ecm - 2008

title from thomas hardy's tess of the d'urbervilles

signatures, in the regular edition, is now available

invisible birds is deeply honoured to release the very fine disc by mr. colin andrew sheffield entitled signatures, in the regular edition.

here, we have posted a nice review:

seattle’s colin andrew sheffield has been quietly destroying sound since the late 1990’s. beginning with 1998’s side one/side two, on his own elevator bath imprint – also home to recordings from adam pacione and rick reed, among others – he’s been utilizing man-made and “found” sounds in a continually sweeping effort to restructure what has come before him, with all genres and mediums up for grabs. his work has consanguinity with many dabblers in electro-acoustic and experimental music; an obsession with turning mechanical, digital, and everyday sounds into contemplative drones through concentrated layers of sustained recording, often with the occasional sprinkling of electrified emphatics to convey external impulse or to mark transition.

back in 2000, sheffield offered up his own music for surgery on the cassette-only, recycled music (rrrecords). while a collaborative effort, it marks an early instance of the conventions used in his music today: to literally disassemble into raw components a recording (tape, vinyl, microcassette, whathaveyou) and frankenstein it into music that can only be described as panoramic. it’s a wildly unique approach that incorporates scientific methods to meet an aesthetic end.

it is appropriate that his newest release would come in partnership with invisible birds, a concept label committed to expression using abstract sound and image inspired by… birds (actual and implied). such a focused model can’t be without well-considered artwork or presentation, and sheffield’s disc sure looks nice. his signatures is the second release in the young catalog (the first a dvd from film artist matthew swiezynski), and some detail is required to get at the music.

a sampler, multi-track recorder, and vinyl were used to capture bird-related and -specific sound for reconstruction into long-play. you likely won’t recognize a single source – short “clips” used are slowed to betray recognition and then layered in parallel and in series with some remarkable results. a sustained chord from a church organ is heard, but it’s really not. bell-like harmonics from an analog synthesizer likely originate from a whippoorwill. our only acquaintance is the occasional, muffled pop from cartridge-on-vinyl. signatures is fours tracks of this, the first and last in dreamy excess of twenty minutes, and they are worth the sit just to hear the nuances come and go. arise uses trebly, airy samples and some killer use of reverb to evoke distance. and surrender is another relatively short piece, and provides the only instance where the disc’s inspiration makes a faint, audible appearance, buried beneath thick textures.

while the disc is copyrighted for 2009, it is released this week, and after nearly a week of continued listening it has crept up as my dark horse for favorites this year. fittingly, i can find no better tribute to commemorate a tunesmith of the same fiber, who would be celebrating his 100th birthday – olivier messiaen.
~alan jones - bagatellen

the release is for sale here

(broken light) an early appearance heard in the evening

colin andrew sheffield - signatures special edition - invisible birds

in honour of olivier messiaen's 100 birthday

colin andrew sheffield's signatures due december 10th
in honour of olivier messiaen's 100th birthday

in collaboration with invisiblebirds.org, the art of memory is pleased to announce a new release by colin andrew sheffield

limited to an edition of 60 examples,
which includes a bonus 3 inch cd broken light, a booklet with abstracted photography by tarrl lightowler and text by richard inwards f.r.a.s, plus an original print from tarrl lightowler.
all encased in a lovely hand-made box.

(please reserve copies soon because nearly half are sold)

audio excerpt available here

blurred layers of sound

classic drone (number 1):

colin andrew sheffield, first thus, elevator bath, 2005

first thus: the first edition published in the present form. often used to denote a book that was published previously by a different publisher.

i'm not sure how i ever let this one escape me the past couple of years. i've always enjoyed colin's previous projects, which are also available on his own fine label, elevator bath.

colin sheffield's first thus (a term referencing a first edition book in its present form), is breathtaking, to put it simply - - -
first thus begins beautifully with a faint, stretched melody evolving into warm, blurred layers of sounds that subtly thicken, ebb and wash over each other.
somehow, amidst ghostly whirrs, there maintains a calmness to the work like delicately dispersed thunder dissolving and quietly billowing into the atmosphere. the cd gracefully returns to an evocative slowed melody, reminiscent of distant drifting voices in a motet...
it's one of the most delicately beautiful things I've heard.

*** come closer (excerpt)