Assembled by hand, one copy at a time, in the White Pillar Workshop! A white 5" recordable disc, printed and duplicated via an Imation D20, held inside two pieces of hand-cut recycled brown cardstock bearing a 4x4" glossy full-color photographic print cover on the front and a custom text label on the back, within a clear cast-polypropylene sleeve with a flap.
Includes unlimited streaming of Woven
via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
WOVEN is a new Halifaxian landscape to explore, either intimately with headphones or physically with loudspeakers, followed like a tangential path from the ASTRAL SALONS sessions throughout the 2021 year. A triptych of pieces, not unlike previous issuances like A BLUE FUME, PACIFIC OPAL HEX or SNOW VESSEL, WOVEN offers three variations on a single approach, all while naming none as the definitive original work. In this way, the album is left open-ended to further investigation and production work, despite being published here as a finished product.
On a deeper level, the compositions presented on WOVEN are very much in a shared state between the Halifaxian and Milieu worlds, much in the same way SUN CAST deliberately blurred the boundaries between the two projects. WOVEN seeks to further indicate that any such boundaries between creative output are arbitrary and constructed, as the mind and tools utilized to create it are the same ones used to create the rest of the varied and colorful Milieu Music catalog (as ridiculous as that implication really is) - putting forth the notion that it is best to enjoy the shared space between ideas, rather than trying to keep fixed lines of trespass rigidly surrounding them.
WOVEN is literally and figuratively both Milieu and CH, and neither of them, although for ease of cataloguing, I've elected to use CH as the sole moniker on the label, as most of the shapes conveyed here resemble more techno and dub profiles when taken as a whole. Perhaps, in another where and when, WOVEN is a Milieu album, or a split title, or none of these. The peripheral considerations of what WOVEN attempts to do are interesting to think about, but ultimately, overshadowed by the recordings themselves.
Musically, WOVEN operates on a complex system of incommensurable sequencing work, made possible by digital audio workstations and extensive use of odd-numbered and incongruent polymeter, although it is my intent to also present these systems not as the entirety of WOVEN's listening experience, but rather, a foundation upon which new and distinct melodic passages may be explored, that rhythms and grooves elasticize and mutate over time, where a truly hypnotic soundfield of psychedelic audio events and textures can flourish in a completely accessible way. Polymeter has long been a standard and accepted method of composing for other genres of music, from jazz to metal to chamber music, but I myself have yet to find it so purposefully (and hopefully, eloquently) utilized in melody-driven electronic dance music. Perhaps I'm only now becoming aware of some other long-known aspect of composition work, and for that (as well as a whole host of other reasons), I am fully willing to admit to being a slow learner who has likely spent far too much time isolated from many different ideas that the artistic world and history have to offer.
Regardless of my feelings on the subject, and all technical and conceptual jargon set aside, it is my sincere hope that these pastures of sound that have enthralled my senses and excited my mind with more and more new ideas than I had when I began working, also manage to connect on either a topical and/or a subconscious level for you too. WOVEN is one of the rare instances in my constant method of working that makes me stop and listen a little more, before moving on to the next phase of satisfying my impulsive curiosities, and I am much more content with it now being a shared experience.
credits
released September 3, 2021
W/P by Brian Grainger. Recorded at White Pillar Workshop, Spring-Summer 2021. Mastered by The Analog Botanist. Painting by Anni Roenkae, used with gracious permission. Design and text by ABM&D with assistance from Atoll Intercom Systems. This is Milieu Music number MMD060. (c) + (p) 2021 Oscillog ASCAP. All lights observed.
Special thanks to AG, JW, JD for being my six extra eyes and ears while completing this album - you were needed and you are appreciated.
A spacious 2.5 hour soundtrack for Eufloria, an ambient strategy game currently available on Steam, Nintendo Switch and the Playstation Network. Coppice Halifax
A triple-album "beginner's guide" with 50 tracks selected from the first 10 years of Milieu releases. As apt a starting point as you're likely to find. Coppice Halifax
As always, I am in utter awe at the vastness of our musical universe, comprised of beautiful stars for our ever-listening ears. Let the gorgeous waves of this incredible album wash over you, perhaps taking you to another realm, out of space & time. One of the most pleasurable experiences I have had in a long while. Pip From The Forge
