Cuneiform Record's Year in Review:
2014
– Our 30th Anniversary Year –
2014
– Our 30th Anniversary Year –
2014 was an extremely special year for Cuneiform Records. First, Cuneiform turned 30 in 2014 – an astonishingly long run for an indie record label specializing in avant-garde, boundary-defying music.
Second, 2014 was the year that we broke our own release record: Cuneiform released 20 albums of high-quality, genre-defiant music in 2014, the largest number of albums we’ve ever released in a single year!
We've assembled this list for those who may have missed something in our substantial 2014 output. For those of you who are still assembling your "Best Albums of 2014" lists, please keep our wonderful artists in mind.
Our 2014 releases range from: jazz / post-jazz / beyond genre (Anthony Pirog; Dylan Ryan/Sand; Raoul Bjorkenheim/Ecstasy; The Microscopic Septet; Led Bib; Ideal Bread; Joel Harrison; The Ed Palermo Big Band; Thumbscrew [Halvorson/Formanek/Fujiwara] ); to avant-rock / Rock in Opposition / electronic-ambient-noise (Richard Pinhas & Oren Ambarchi; Richard Pinhas & Yoshida Tatsuya; Mats/Morgan; Sonar; Jonathan Badger; Happy Family; and remastered reissues of the first two albums by Roger Trigaux’s Present). While most of these albums were released in CD and digital format, our 2014 releases also include some vinyl titles (Led Bib's The Good Egg; Rob Mazurek & Black Cube SP's Return the Tides; Jonathan Badger's Verse).
Here's the list of all 20 of our 2014 releases, divided into two parts: Jazz & Beyond, and Rock & Beyond:
JAZZ and BEYOND
 The Microscopic Septet Manhattan Moonrise Genre: Jazz Format: CD / Digital Release Date: May 27, 2014
Don’t tell the Microscopic Septet that there are no second acts in American life. Since roaring back into action in 2006 after a 14-year hiatus, the indefatigably creative ensemble has continued to evolve, burnishing and extending a well-earned reputation as one of the most consistently inventive bands of the 1980s. Reverently irreverent, insistently playful, unfussily virtuosic and unapologetically swinging, the band offers further evidence of its resurgence with Manhattan Moonrise, the Micros’ first project with newly composed originals in 25 years.
The strength of the Micros flows from the old-school virtue of consistency. Along with the co-founders, pianist Joel Forrester and soprano saxophonist Phillip Johnston, the seven-piece ensemble features largely the same cast of improvisers with which it emerged from Manhattan’s wild and wooly Downtown scene in 1980.  PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Let's Coolerate One" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official - cuneiform |
 Thumbscrew: Mary Halvorson, Michael Formanek, Tomas Fujiwara Thumbscrew Genre: Jazz Format: CD / Digital Release Date: January 21. 2014 While Michael Formanek (double bass), Tomas Fujiwara (drums) and Mary Halvorson (guitar) are all known for their prodigious capabilities as leaders/improvisers on the new jazz/new music scene, Thumbscrew is more of a composer’s vehicle. With each musician contributing tunes, Thumbscrew encompasses an array of textures and strategies, while maintaining a consistently open and transparent sound. Generating tremendous intensity without necessarily increasingly volume or density, Thumbscrew buzzes and crackles, burns and croons. It’s a collaboration that works beautifully, producing music greater than the sum of its parts. As DownBeat says: "...the bonds are already strong." PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Cheap Knock Off" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON - BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official - cuneiform |
 The Ed Palermo Big Band Oh No! Not Jazz!! Genre: Jazz / Big Band Format: 2xCD / Digital Release Date: February 4, 2014
Oh No! Not Jazz!! consists of two albums of musical performances. The first further explores Ed's distinctive, big band interpretations of the music of Frank Zappa and for the most part, he concentrates here on Frank's initial burst of creative works from original Mothers Of Invention era of 1966-1970. In addition, two notable pieces from later are performed here. One of Frank's most loved works, "Inca Roads," with a vocal by guest Napoleon Murphy Brock contrasts with one of his most 'notoriously difficult' works, "The Black Page #2." All of the performances and arrangements of these great pieces are fun, musically witty and masterful. The second album features Ed's own colorful compositions, which are here featured on a recording for the 1st time in over 25 years!
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Why Is the Doctor Barking?" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: AMAZON - BANDCAMP WAYSIDE MUSIC - ITUNES (Palermo album only) ARTIST SITES: official - facebook - cuneiform |
 Raoul Björkenheim / eCsTaSy eCsTaSy Genre: Jazz / Electric-Jazz Format: CD / Digital Release Date: January 21. 2014
eCsTaSy is Raoul Björkenheim's new electric, ecstatic jazz band, which features some of the younger talents on the Finnish jazz scene. The group consists of Raoul, Pauli Lyytinen (saxophones), Jori Huhtala (contrabass) and Markku Ounaskari (drums) in a repertory of original compositions painting swirling polyrhythms with a free-tonal palette. With influences ranging from Korean and African music to contemporary chamber music, new jazz and free rock, eCsTaSy's mission is to elevate its audiences with their high energy and dedication to adventurous sound. The quartet explores an array of moods and textures, from brooding soundscapes and cinematic anthems to giddy grooves and meter-shifting steeplechases.
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"El Pueblo Unido" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official (eCsTaCy) - offcial (Bjorkenheim) - cuneiform |
 Ideal Bread Beating the Teens: Songs Of Steve Lacy Genre: Jazz / Avant-Jazz Format: 2xCD / Digital Release Date: May 13, 2014
With Beating the Teens, Ideal Bread’s leader and baritone saxophonist Josh Sinton decided to radically question and deconstruct the notion of a repertory band. The group has existed with only two rules: 1.) Ideal Bread would be a band in the traditional sense, the same members for every album and every show 2.) Ideal Bread would play exclusively the music of iconoclastic saxophonist-composer Steve Lacy. With Beating the Teens, Ideal Bread breaks new ground both for themselves and for the creative music world. The album poses questions for musicians (“What can we do next?”) and for the audience (“What is a repertory band?”). And while the answers are varied, the methods used to ask and potentially answer these questions make for fascinating and captivating music. Ideal Bread is Josh Sinton (bari sax), Kirk Knuffke (cornet), Tomas Fujiwara (drums) and Adam Hopkins (bass).
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Crops" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @Youtube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official (Josh Sinton) - facebook - cuneiform |
 Rob Mazurek and Black Cube SP Return the Tides: Ascension Suite and Holy Ghost Genre: Jazz / Avant-Jazz Format: CD / 2xLP / Digital Release Date: October 14, 2014
Sometimes there are no words. But music can speak volumes when life requires a response to the most profound and wrenching of losses, channeling the deepest feelings, expressing the ineffable and providing emotional and spiritual succor. For Rob Mazurek, the brilliant Chicago cornetist, composer and conceptualist improviser who has honed an international coterie of collaborators, the sudden and unexpected passing of his mother set him on a quest to honor her bountiful spirit and acknowledge her transition to another realm. Not surprisingly, he found exactly what he needed in São Paulo, Brazil. Working with five sonic explorers in Black Cube SP, a sextet that builds on the celebrated São Paulo Underground, he created Return the Tides: Ascension Suite and Holy Ghost, a startlingly cathartic and magisterial modern psychedelic spiritual that’s as riveting as it is ravishing.
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Return the Tides" [excerpt] stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official - cuneiform |
 Led Bib The People In Your Neighbourhood [studio album] Genre: Jazz / Rock / Progressive Jazz Format: CD / Digital Release Date: May 13, 2014
Founded 10 years ago by a preciously talented crew of London university students, Led Bib has become a European jazz sensation, tearing up major festivals across the continent, appearing regularly on the BBC, and earning a coveted Mercury Prize nomination. The avant-populist, funk-infused band is now set to lead a new British Invasion, bringing their potent blend of big beats and surging anthems to American shores with The People in Your Neighbourhood. In many ways, The People in Your Neighbourhood captures lightning in a bottle, distilling all the elements that have made Led Bib such a successful and influential outfit. Rather than coasting on their success, the band decided to dig deeper. Honed over the three years, the music is more charged than ever, marked by the dizzying swerves, roiling textures, and raw beauty that has earned the band such an avid following.
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"New Teles" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube MUSIC VIDEO: "New Teles" (official video) PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official - twitter - facebook - cuneiform |
 Led Bib The Good Egg [10th anniv. live album] Genre: Jazz / Rock / Progressive Jazz Format: LP / Digital Release Date: May 13, 2014
A thrilling limited edition vinyl-only release recorded mostly at London’s Vortex Jazz Club, The Good Egg, wass captured at the Vortex after a period of band inactivity in February 2013, the music is charged with the sense of discovery, as the musicians find new ways to play with density, space, stasis and motion.
“It felt great to be playing together again, and luckily one of the nights at the club was recorded,” Holub says. “When we got the tracks from the gig, we were all really pleased and that’s when I realized I wanted to do a live album and a studio album. It felt important for me to mark 10 years with the band in some sort of significant way, and it seemed this could be the perfect combination” PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Giant Bean" [excerpt] stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official - twitter - facebook - cuneiform |
 Anthony Pirog Palo Colorado Dream Genre: Jazz / Rock / Experimental Format: CD / Digital Release Date: October 14, 2014
Washington, D.C.’s thriving jazz and experimental music scenes wouldn’t be quite where they are today without Anthony Pirog. With fearsome chops and a keen ear for odd beauty, Pirog has helped expand the possibilities of jazz, rock and experimentalism in a city formerly known for its straight-ahead tradition. Palo Colorado Dream—recorded with the all-star trio of Michael Formanek on bass and Ches Smith on drums—is Pirog’s debut as a bandleader, and it marks the young innovator’s entrance onto the national stage. The album has an immersive depth and understated allure that hold the listener rapt. And they illustrate all the various realms of Pirog’s artistry: the spinning fantasy-scape of his loops and the hard-nosed technical power of his soloing, his patience with a slow build and his knack for moments of fierce catharsis.
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"The Great Northern" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube MUSIC VIDEO: "The New Electric" (official video) PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official - twitter - cuneiform |
 Joel Harrison Mother Stump Genre: Jazz / Americana / Blues-Rock Format: CD / Digital Release Date: May 13, 2014
For many years, guitarist Joel Harrison claimed he had no roots. Growing up in Washington D.C., a place whose identity and values are always in drift, Harrison was convinced he had to “go out into the world with a shovel and plant something of my own.” But as we often discover, time and distance have a way of putting things in perspective. Looking back, Harrison realized that D.C. was, in fact, a town whose musical gravity overpowered whatever ephemeral political and cultural winds might blow. Mother Stump highlights Harrison’s guitar playing over his composing on covers of Buddy Miller, Leonard Cohen, Al Kooper, Luther Vandross, Paul Motian, George Russell and more. Featuring: Michael Bates (bass), Jeremy ‘Bean’ Clemons (drums), Glenn Patscha (keyboards).
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"John The Revelator" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official - cuneiform |
 the cellar and point ambit Genre: Jazz / Classical / Chamber Garage / Chamber Rock Format: CD / Digital Release Date: October 14, 2014
the cellar and point is an adventurous 'garage chamber' band, developed and led by childhood friends Joseph Branciforte and Christopher Botta. They had long imagined a fluid synthesis of their wide-ranging interests: the detail of modern concert music, the improvisational sensibilities of downtown jazz and the emotional directness of rock, combined with the production values of hip-hop and electronica. Might it be possible to draw equally upon these influences, while transcending mere collage and to present it in the context of a working ensemble, not just a studio project? After 3 years spent composing and recruiting an impressive cross-section of talent from New York City's classical, jazz and new music scenes, ambit, the group's impressive debut album, is one answer to those questions.
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"white cylinder (a)" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @Youtube MUSIC VIDEO: "white cylinder (a)" (official video)' PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official - facebook - twitter - cuneiform |
 Dylan Ryan / Sand Circa Genre: Jazz / Electric Jazz / Rock Format: CD / Digital Release Date: September 30, 2014 PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Trees, Voices, Saturn" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube MUSIC VIDEO: "Trees, Voices, Saturn" (official video) PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official (Sand) - official (Dylan Ryan) facebook - cuneiform |
ROCK and BEYOND
 Present Triskaidekaphobie (remastered / expanded) Genre: Rock / Avant-Progressive / Chamber Rock Format: CD / Digital Release Date: February 4, 2014
After co-founding Univers Zero in 1974 and co-leading that group through their first two albums, guitarist and composer Roger Trigaux left Univers Zero in May, 1979, right after the completion of Heresie. His new ensemble, Present, was a more electric and a more compact ensemble. The band began rehearsals in 1979 and recorded their first album, Triskaidekaphobie (The Fear Of The Number 13) in January, 1980. The band began performing in the fall of 1980. Since Present only had about 35' of music written for the group, in their earliest days, the band also performed two 'covers' from Univers Zero's repertoire; "Dense" and "Vous Les Saurez En Temps Voulu". Recordings of these two covers, from a performance from 2/28/81 are included here as bonus tracks.
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Promenade Au Fond D'un Canal" [excerpt] stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official - cuneiform |
 Present Le Poison Qui Rend Fou (remastered / expanded) Genre: Rock / Avant-Progressive / Chamber Rock Format: 2xCD / Digital Release Date: February 4, 2014
Originally recorded in 1983, Present's Le Poison Qui Rend Fou (The Poison That Makes You Insane), the band's second and final album until their rebirth in the mid 90s, is a classic of complex, Rock In Opposition-style electric chamber rock.This reissue of Le Poison Qui Rend Fou includes the original album, newly transferred and remastered by the group's long-time engineer, Udi Koomran, and a 16 page booklet telling the story of the band and this album, with many never-before seen photos. Additionally, there is 25' of QuickTime movies of the group's final concert featuring bassist Christian Genet, from Livry-Gargan, France, 1/23/82, as well as a second disc that features the entire 80' concert from 1/23/82!
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Ersatz" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official - cuneiform |
SONAR Static Motion Genre: Rock / Avant-Prog / Experimental Format: CD / Digital Release Date: January 21. 2014 SONAR craft an intricate sound world in which mystery meets power on their Cuneiform debut, Static Motion. Sonar is a progressive, post-minimal band from Switzerland. Their name stands for SONic ARchitecture, a name which alludes to their intention of creating polymetric and highly structured avant-rock. Static Motion is Sonar fusing a rigorous minimal esthetic with the power of a rock band, every note and rhythm is precisely composed and performed, all of which are designed to move you from one rhythmic and / or harmonic tension to the next. Sonar is the last word in a rock band that works by building their music out of blocks consisting of slowly rising and unfolding musical tension and relief. PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Static Motion" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official - cuneiform |
 Richard Pinhas and Oren Ambarchi Tikkun Genre: Rock / Electronic / Experimental Music Format: CD/DVD / Digital Release Date: May 27, 2014 First there was Eric Clapton and Duane Allman on Derek and The Dominos’ 1970 classic Layla, then there was Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood with the Rolling Stones. Twin-lead guitar line-ups have long had a distinguished pedigree. But nothing we’ve heard to date matches the partnership of Richard Pinhas and Oren Ambarchi for sheer synapse-adjusting sonic adventurism. At the outer-ends of its timeline, the duo’s first collaborative album, Tikkun, recalibrates the beat-driven synth-and-sequencer loops of Pinhas’ pioneering 1970s’ electronic-rock band Heldon, melding them with a newer aesthetic informed by his post-2008 collaborations with Japanese noise auteur Merzbow. Tikkun is a staggeringly powerful work which contains three lengthy musical tracks that meld the heavy, synth-driven, sequencer beats of classic Heldon with the noisier aspects of Pinhas' work over the last decade. PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Washington, D.C. - T4V1" [excerpt] stream: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official (Pinhas) - official (Ambarchi) - cuneiform |
 Richard Pinhas and Yoshida Tatsuya Welcome In The Void Genre: Rock / Electronic / Experimental Music Format: CD / Digital Release Date: May 27, 2014 Forget The Kills and The Black Keys, if you’re looking for a rock duo with a sound as big as the cosmos, try guitarist Richard Pinhas and drummer Yoshida Tatsuya. The revered bad-grandads of the French and Japanese experimental scenes have discographies stretching back decades, but Welcome In The Void is their first joint venture. A broiling mix of space-rock, electronic-rock and progressive-rock with a splash of noise, it shatters all expectations. With just two looped guitars, a drum kit and electronics, the duo creates a soundscape of both galactic proportion and infinite detail, its immensity humanized by Pinhas’ filigreed, often melody-driven playing. If you could hear the images captured by the Hubble telescope, they might sound like this. Think Wagner to the power of ten with a beat or Hawkwind with nuance. PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Part One - Intro" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official (Pinhas) - official (Tatsuya) - cuneiform |
 Mats/Morgan [schack tati] Genre: Rock / Fusion / Avant-Progressive Format: CD / Digital Release Date: May 27, 2014
The album [schack tati] isn't just another batch of tracks churned out in an assembly-line studio. If anything, it's part hothouse flower and part mythical beast, grown and nurtured in the magical greenhouse that is drummer Morgan Ägren's dream studio. "I moved to a house in the Swedish archipelago. Our garden had a little house in it, which I rebuilt as a studio," he explains. The tracks he and keyboardist Mats Öberg toiled over in that idyllic garden setting have an air of endless possibility to them. In the rarefied -- one might even dare to say magical – environment, where a blind keyboardist can beat a sighted drummer at chess (see the winningly quirky album cover), it's apparently also possible for the disparate stylistic strands of the band's sound to wind together with nary a tangle. It's hard to envision another set of circumstances under which [schack tati] could have come together.
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Rubber Sky" stream: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official (Morgan Ågren) - cuneiform |
 Jonathan Badger Verse Genre: Rock / Electronic / Experimental Format: CD / LP / Digital Release Date: September 30, 2014
When is a guitar not a guitar? When it's played by the inimitable Jonathan Badger. Not that he doesn't have a solid grounding in the six-string essentials -- Badger's been playing guitar since age 5, and has studied under none other than King Crimson mastermind Robert Fripp. But his astonishing approach to the guitar is so unlike anyone else's that he might almost as well be playing an entirely different instrument. On his stunning third studio album, Verse, Badger proves that if you want to make the kind of music no one's ever heard before, you've got to invent your own world from the ground up. Nourished by Baltimore’s vibrant experimental music scene, Badger has created an artistic universe that is technologically unprecedented, radically multidisciplinary, conceptually fascinating, and musically captivating. The music on Verse, says Badger, “flows in the post-rock and minimalist veins of contemporary music.”
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Nimbus" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: official - facebook - twitter - cuneiform |
 Happy Family Minimal Gods Genre: Rock / Avant-Prog Format: CD / Digital Release Date: September 30, 2014
Truly killer avant-garde rock bands—think Battles; think Zevious; Ahleuchatistas; Upsilon Acrux, Many Arms and Dysrhythmia;—all know the recipe for greatness: Two parts skill and discipline, one part inspired lunacy. On their third album, Minimal Gods, long-running Japanese instrumental quartet Happy Family seemingly take inspiration from these bands and more, as well as the 1970s Rock in Opposition movement, filter it all through their collective madness, and emerge with something utterly unique. These four ultra-talented players put their own wild spin on aggressive, instrumental rock over the course of 10 tracks, tossing metal, funk and even minimalism into the blender, and giving the results titles like “Cat Riding On Roomba.”
PROMOTIONAL TRACK:"Slide" stream/share: @SoundCloud / @Bandcamp / @YouTube PURCHASE LINKS: ITUNES - AMAZON BANDCAMP - WAYSIDE MUSIC ARTIST SITES: facebook - cuneiform |
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