Gonggong 225088 (wa008)

Gonggong 225088 cover art (copyright 2024 Han-earl Park)
Gonggong 225088 (wa008) © 2024 Han-earl Park

Gonggong 225088 (wa008), the eponymous debut album from the trio of Han-earl Park (guitar), Yorgos Dimitriadis (percussion and electronics) and Camila Nebbia (saxophone) is out now on Waveform Alphabet!

I love what’s recorded (and sculpted) here as sound. There are behind-the-scenes stories about an impossible group emerging from the debris of lockdown and the tangles of inter-border bureaucracy (stories for another time). But also, to my ears as a listener, there’s something tricky and oblique about our music—an origami of fire music and improvisative mischief—knotted, folded-on-itself, and, at time, joyously vexed.

Yet, the feeling on-stage, it’s all near effortless ‘and then’s and ‘therefore’s; of effects and reactions, but also reframings and reflections and retroactions. We went, I think, to a lot of unexpected places in that one session.

So sit-back in your favorite sofa or beanbag, or, headphones ready, go for a wander and a walk, or maybe sit at the table with a good book, and enjoy the journey.

[Get the CD/download from Waveform Alphabet (Bandcamp)…]

CD: $15 plus shipping. Download: $10.

description

Fluid, pliable motion…. The synergy between them is electrifying….

— Corey Mwamba (Freeness, BBC Radio 3)

Blue-green iridescence
(Crunch and more scatter)
A vacuum of warning

The latest project from Korean-American guitarist, improviser and composer Han-earl Park, Gonggong 225088 is his trio with Argentinian saxophonist, composer and visual artist Camila Nebbia, and Greek drummer, improviser and sound artist Yorgos Dimitriadis. Based in Berlin, the group emerged, piece-by-piece, from the darkly hazy, collective dream of masks, remote work, and social distancing.

By turns light-as-a-feather, and heavy and prickly as a bucket of rusty nails, the music is of contradiction and ambiguity. Leaps into ’90s HatHut pastiche are followed by truckers-in-space-engine-rumbles; slow-crawls-from-the-swap of irony-free ‘bells’n’smells’ sound art followed by turns-turns-turns-on-a-dime mutant Free Funk. Gonggong 225088 find overlapping-through-time, All-You-Zombies guitar gestures; stompbox-assisted saxophone punk ventriloquisms; and hive-mind metallophone creatures that migrate across the stereo field.

Here be dragons.

It’s music that is simultaneously earnest and full of ironic glee; a spaghetti junction of noise held together by a deep love of connection, and a constantly shifting center of balance found only in ensemble play.

Recorded with skill and sensitivity by Rabih Beaini, mixed by Han-earl Park to place the listener within the ensemble, and mastered for presence’n’punch by Andrew Weathers, this eponymous debut album captures Park, Dimitriadis and Nebbia in live performance at Morphine Raum.

Recommended reading: China Miéville. “Covehithe.Three Moments of an Explosion: Stories (Pan Macmillan, 2015).

personnel

Han-earl Park (guitar), Yorgos Dimitriadis (percussion and electronics) and Camila Nebbia (saxophone).

track listing

Autopoiesis I (≥ 10:14), Autopoiesis II (≥ 4:29), Niche Shift I (16:09), Niche Shift II (≥ 4:45), Niche Shift III (4:35), Niche Shift IV (≥ 12:52), Autopoiesis III (3:26), Autopoiesis IV (≥ 5:03), Autopoiesis V (≥ 3:17), Autopoiesis VI (3:37). Total duration ≥ 70:14.

recording details

Music by Han-earl Park, Yorgos Dimitriadis and Camila Nebbia.

Recorded live December 4, 2023, Morphine Raum, Berlin.
Recorded by Rabih Beaini.
Mixed by Han-earl Park. Mastered by Andrew Weathers.

Video by Carina Khorkhordina. Video edited by Han-earl Park.

Design and artwork by Han-earl Park.

© 2024 Han-earl Park. ℗ 2024 Waveform Alphabet.

updates

05-23-24: released!
05-27-24: update with video playlist.

Gonggong 225088 on Freeness, BBC Radio 3

You can now listen again to Corey Mwamba’s Freeness on BBC Radio 3, and catch the extended preview of Gonggong 225088, my upcoming album with Yorgos Dimitriadis and Camila Nebbia. On the show, Corey described our music as having “fluid, pliable motion”:

And the synergy between them is electrifying…. So much intensity in that music. Even when the volume goes down the intensity is still there. [Listen to the rest…]

A big thanks to producer Silvia Malnati at Freeness, and big, big thanks to Corey for supporting our music, and supporting the broader communities of creative people.

The album artwork is complete, and I’ve been working the last couple of weeks with engineer Andrew Weathers, and label mastermind David Menestres on the album masters. Gonggong 225088 will be out on Waveform Alphabet later this year. More soon!

Be first in-line to hear the new album! Please sign-up to my newsletter:

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Coming soon: Gonggong 225088

Gonggong 225088, an album of noisy, sweetly disquieting dreams by Han-earl Park, Yorgos Dimitriadis and Camila Nebbia will be will be released by Waveform Alphabet in 2024! Tune in to Freeness on BBC Radio 3 for a preview of the album. More soon!

Be first in-line to hear the new album! Please sign-up to my newsletter:

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Juno 3: Han-earl Park, Lara Jones and Pat Thomas (Newcastle and London)

This November: Juno 3 is performing in Newcastle (November 12) and London (November 13)!

Juno 3 is Han-earl Park (guitar), Lara Jones (saxophone and electronics) and Pat Thomas (electronics). Captivating, gripping and fascinating, Juno 3’s music is a particle sim of sounds which spelunks from derelict urban ravines to cybernetic rainforests, while catching auditory glimpses of crashing robotic waves, and strange telegraphic messages from space.

Nautiloid capsule tumbles
across field lines.
An impracticably agile,
graceful derailment.

As Corey Mwamba said on Freeness about our music, “wonderful energy, constant motion, and roiling in noise. And immense amount of grit and power.” I can honestly say this trio sounds like nothing out there.

See the performance diary for up-to-date info.

Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Community

Funded by Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Community.

Out now on Ramble Records

disc art (copyright 2023 Ramble Records)

Juno 3 (RAM-163CD) [details…]

Personnel: Han-earl Park (guitar), Lara Jones (saxophone and electronics) and Pat Thomas (electronics).

Track listing: Orbital Dusk I (6:04), Orbital Dusk II (4:20), Orbital Dusk III (2:29), Orbital Dusk IV (6:03), Diel Vertical Migration I (6:31), Diel Vertical Migration II (4:38), Diel Vertical Migration III (4:33), Diel Vertical Migration IV (7:36), Metastability (7:24). Total duration: 49:36.

© and ℗ 2023 Ramble Records.

Serenity on the edge breakdown and sounds of an 8-bit shower (reviews: Peculiar Velocities and Two+ Bagatelles)

Eris 136199: Peculiar Velocities

I am very proud and very grateful to find Peculiar Velocities, the latest album from Eris 136199, in the best-of lists of a Jazz Noise (which, elsewhere, described the music as “serenity on the edge of a breakdown”), and of Avant Music News. And no one is more surprised than I that a Kickstarter-only limited edition live album got on to a best-of-year list!

Elsewhere Corey Mwamba (Freeness, BBC Radio 3) describes “exquisite music-making” with musicians that “fuse and create this gorgeous glitchy stew together”, and, writing in Vital Weekly, Nick Roseblade describes Peculiar Velocities as an album in which “everything feels pushed as far is it can go”:

Like what rock music could, and possibly should, have sounded like it if musicians like Ornette Coleman became the norm. There is a freeness to the playing that is astounding, but there is also organisation. During sections, the guitars work together to give Sikora something tangible to stand on. When this happens ‘Eris 136199: Peculiar Velocities’ becomes something very special indeed. ‘Polytely I’ sees the guitars constantly churning to create vortex-esque soundscapes why Sikora’s light and airy saxophone wafts above it. Like stream on a freshly brewed tea. This is an album that reminds you of how good it is when musicians don’t care about the rules and just play. [Read the rest…]

And while Brady Gerber’s ‘7 For Seven’ finds a space in which “a nervous guitar fills an orange sky and empty beach”, and Takeshi Goda in JazzTokyo writes of velocities, perception, collisions, fusions, joy and brain-reforming experiences:

相手のプレイを意識して、コール&レスポンスで反応しながら音楽の流れを作るのは即興演奏のひとつのスタイルである。しかし彼らのアンサンブルの方法論は異なる。その場で適切と各自が判断する奏法・旋律・リズムを個人の責任で奏でることに専念して、3人のプレイが衝突と融合を繰り返すことで、結果的に予測不能なサウンドを生み出すことを信条としている。3つの異なる平行した自然のプロセスが同時に起こることで知覚される集団即興演奏は…

それはあたかも地球外の異境から到来した明滅する運動エネルギーによって脳外科手術を施されるような驚喜の頭脳改革体験である。 [Read the rest…]

And finally, Ken Shimamoto/The Stash Dauber writes about sounds that “slither and spatter like radio interference, shimmer like molten silver, or ring like a cymbal’s decay” music in which “the spirit of electricity becomes a living thing”:

The best type of musical conversation, abstract and oblique as it might be at times…. I’ve listened to this thing a half dozen times since I started writing yesterday, and am happy to have its company to help me get through what looks like it’s going to be a very tough winter… and the hopeful spring to follow. [Read the rest…]

[About this album…] [Get the CD/download (Bandcamp)…] [All reviews…]

CD: €11 minimum (‘name your price’) plus shipping.*†
Download: €8 minimum (‘name your price’).†

CD photo: Eris 136199: Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2020, Han-earl Park)CD photo: Eris 136199: Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2020, Han-earl Park)CD photo: Eris 136199: Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2020, Han-earl Park)CD photo: Eris 136199: Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2020, Han-earl Park)CD photo: Eris 136199: Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2020, Han-earl Park)

* Limited edition glass-mastered CD. CD includes additional material (liner notes, artwork, etc.) not included in the download version of the album.

† Both digital and physical purchases give you streaming via the free Bandcamp app, and option to download the recording in multiple formats including lossless.

Two+ Bagatelles

And one more thing: In his survey of solo guitar recordings, Paul Acquaro at Free Jazz reviews my recording released by, and in support of, The Vortex Jazz Club:

[Han-earl Park’s] playing was unusually expressive…. On Two+ Bagatelles, this same musical spirit that has stuck with me for so long, has been captured…. Melodies becoming almost like the sounds of an 8-bit shower. [Read the rest…]

[About this EP…] [Download (Bandcamp)…]

Available from The Vortex’s Bandcamp page, all purchases of Two+ Bagatelles go towards helping their continued work presenting the very best jazz, improvised, and experimental musics.

Peculiar Velocities (BAF002)

Peculiar Velocities cover art (copyright 2020 Han-earl Park)
Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) © 2020 Han-earl Park

November 17, 2020: Eris 136199’s latest album is out now (compact disc and digital download)! Eris 136199 is the chaotic snap’n’pop of Han-earl Park’s cyborg virtuosity, the symphonies of power and weight of Catherine Sikora’s tenor madness, and the heavy rock-ASMR experimentalism of Nick Didkovsky glitchy guitar.

Peculiar Velocities is Eris 136199’s first studio album, and captures the trio during their 2019 European tour; between the first date at The Vortex (London) and their performance at Jazz em Agosto (Lisbon).

[Get the CD/download (Bandcamp)…]

CD: €11 minimum (‘name your price’) plus shipping.*†
Download: €8 minimum (‘name your price’).†

CD photo: Eris 136199: Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2020, Han-earl Park)CD photo: Eris 136199: Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2020, Han-earl Park)CD photo: Eris 136199: Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2020, Han-earl Park)CD photo: Eris 136199: Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2020, Han-earl Park)CD photo: Eris 136199: Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork and photo copyright 2020, Han-earl Park)

* Limited edition glass-mastered CD. CD includes additional material (liner notes, artwork, etc.) not included in the download version of the album.

† Both digital and physical purchases give you streaming via the free Bandcamp app, and option to download the recording in multiple formats including lossless.

news and updates

February 20, 2024: Mixing noisy, pretty, gentle and disorderly peculiar music

https://soundcloud.com/hanearlpark/mix-engineer-works Wondering what mixing strategy could possibly work for your recording of noisy, pretty, gentle and disorderly peculiar music? Hit me up if your left-of-field recording is in need of some…

January 29, 2024: The unknowability of connection, and a little science fiction (Free Jazz: Sunday Interview)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jewNzu1KL1Q Violence and cruelty? Fantastical, twisted, dark, deeply affectionate humanism? Improvisation as embodiment and personification? Place, subjectivity and interiority? As part of the Free Jazz: Sunday Interview, in response to a…

[All articles on Peculiar Velocities (BAF002)…]

description

An uncomfortable joy, a can’t-be-reproduced-in-the-laboratory combination of rare elements, a new musical alloy, an ongoing experiment, the perfect distillation of uneasy listening.

— Dave Foxall (a Jazz Noise, Best of 2020)

それはあたかも地球外の異境から到来した明滅する運動エネルギーによって脳外科手術を施されるような驚喜の頭脳改革体験である。

— Takeshi Goda (JazzTokyo)

Gorgeous glitchy stew….

— Corey Mwamba (Freeness, BBC Radio 3)

[More reviews…]

Formed in New York in 2012, Eris 136199 is the chaotic-slamming one-person rhythm section of Han-earl Park (Sirene 1009), the deep melodic intelligence and big-tenor sound of Catherine Sikora (Clockwork Mercury), and the anthems of glitch, experimentalism and riffage of Nick Didkovsky (Doctor Nerve). Recorded during the trio’s 2019 European tour, Peculiar Velocities (BAF002) is Eris 136199’s third CD, and first studio album. The album is the follow-up to the eponymous Eris 136199 (BAF001, 2018) described as “like letting an insane brain surgeon in through your ear” (aJazzNoise, Best of 2018), and Anomic Aphasia (SLAMCD 559, 2015) which was described as “a beautiful noise” (KFJC 89.7 FM).

Surprises abound on this disc from the collision of three seemingly incompatible notions of time and rhythm in [the title track] ‘Peculiar Velocities’; to ‘Sleeping Dragon’ which insistently claims to be one thing but reveals itself to be something else; to the aural love letter to No Wave that is ‘D-Loop’….

Moments of absolute clarity, where two of us may deliberately hit exactly the same notes, are juxtaposed by equally comfortable bursts of raging chaos and easy silences.

— From the liner notes‡

Recorded with a lean, efficient boldness by Sean Woodlock, and mastered by Richard Scott, the album captures music that leaps from wispy, delicate webs to massive weather-beaten mountains. Recorded over just three hours in a single live room, Peculiar Velocities catches Eris 136199 between the first date of the tour at The Vortex (London) and their performance at Jazz em Agosto (Lisbon).

Eris 136199 (Jazz em Agosto, Lisbon, 08-11-19)
Photo © Jazz em Agosto / Petra Cvelbar

Insectoid ASMR glitches to powerful ballads of weight and light; gentle, languorous shimmers to startling No Wave noise; raspy double-guitar hockets to gutted, dismantled chorales.

Han-earl Park is the instigator and mastermind behind Eris 136199, as well as groups including Sirene 1009 with Dominic Lash, Mark Sanders and rit. (f.k.a. Caroline Pugh), and co-conspirator in projects with Richard Barrett and others. Park is the constructor of the machine improviser io 0.0.1 beta++, and of Metis 9, a playbook of improvisative tactics. He has performed with Wadada Leo Smith, Paul Dunmall, Evan Parker, Lol Coxhill, Josh Sinton, Louise Dam Eckardt Jensen, Ingrid Laubrock, Gino Robair, Tim Perkis, Andrew Drury, Pat Thomas and Franziska Schroeder. His ensembles have performed at festivals including Freedom of the City (London), Brilliant Corners (Belfast), ISIM (New York), CEAIT (Los Angeles) and Sonic Acts (Amsterdam).

Saxophonist, improviser and composer Catherine Sikora, known for her big sound and lyrical melodic work, works as a solo performer and with Eric Mingus, Enrique Haneine, Brian Chase, Han-earl Park, Ethan Winogrand, Christopher Culpo and Ross Hammond. In recent years Sikora has toured in Canada, the United States, Europe and Australia. She was a featured soloist in Eric Mingus’ radical reimagining of Tommy by the Who (Adelaide Festival 2015), and was artist in residence at the Centre Culturel Irlandais in Paris in 2014 and in 2020.

Guitarist, composer, and computer music programmer Nick Didkovsky has composed music for Kathleen Supové, ETHEL, Bang on a Can All-Stars, Meridian Arts Ensemble, New Century Players, ARTE Quartett, as part of the Fred Frith Guitar Quartet, and his own bands Doctor Nerve, Vomit Fist, Häßliche Luftmasken, and others. His compositions and guitar performances appear on more than 50 records. For over 30 years, his avant-metal big band Doctor Nerve has fueled Didkovsky’s intricate compositions with the energy of rock, punching holes through the walls between heavy metal, contemporary music, and improvisation, and performing at festivals including Moers, FIMAV, and the Whitney Museum’s ‘Whitney Live.’ With computer music pioneer Phil Burk, Didkovsky developed the computer music language Java Music Specification Language (JMSL).

‡ Liner notes only available with the CD.

personnel

Han-earl Park (guitar), Catherine Sikora (saxophone), and Nick Didkovsky (guitar).

track listing

Ballad of Tensegrity I (≥ 5:12), Ballad of Tensegrity II (2:28), Peculiar Velocities I (3:46), Peculiar Velocities II (3:36), Sleeping Dragon (5:22), D-Loop I (≥ 6:16), D-Loop II (5:13), Polytely I (≥ 5:01), Polytely II: Breakdown (5:33), Anagnorisis I (2:09), Anagnorisis II (2:19). Total duration ≥ 46:54.

recording details

Music by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky.

Recorded August 9, 2019, Hackney Road Studios, London.
Recorded by Sean Woodlock. Mixed by Han-earl Park.

Mastered by Richard Scott.
Design and artwork by Han-earl Park.

Thanks to Sean and Richard; to Colin Webster, Ingrid Laubrock, Alex Hawkins, Charles Hayward and Melanie L Marshall; to Rui Neves, João Brilhante, Inês Nunes and everyone at Jazz em Agosto/Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation; Kathianne Hingwan, Kim Macari, Ali Ward and everyone at The Vortex; Matthew Nolan at Note Productions; Aoife Concannon, Adam Nolan, Kenneth Killeen and Caitríona O’Mahony at Improvised Music Company; to Lee Paterson; to Laurent Carrier and everyone at Colore; to Paul Acquaro of Free Jazz; Mike Borella of Avant Music News; Dave Foxall of aJazzNoise ; and Tim Owen of _____on Sound.


A big thanks to the backers of our Kickstarter project for their awe-inspiring generosity; helping bring this music to you! A massive thanks to Phillip A., Bruno Bissonnette, Mike Borella, Colin Cahill, Jeremy Clarke, Gary Couse, Nicholas Croft, Don Davis, Andrew Raffo Dewar, Tom Duff, Erik Ellestad, Lee Rice Epstein, Goldi, Owen Green, Rich Hollis, Martin Hoogeboom, Terry Kattleman, Gary W. Kennedy, Liam, Bartholomew R. Mallio, walt mattes, Andrew McKenzie, Rob Miller, Eric Mingus, John Minnock, david m morris, Neil, Matthew Nolan, Michael Rogers, Steffen Schindler, Ken Shimamoto, Craig Sines, j. sinton, Marte van der Loop, Tom Ward, Bernd Wimmer, aJazzNoise, and the Newcastle Festival of Jazz and Improvised Music, and to our anonymous backers.

© + ℗ 2020 Han-earl Park.

Also available with…

Eris 136199 (Peculiar Velocities) Hoodie

Eris 136199 (Peculiar Velocities) Hoodie (limited edition) [details…]

80% ringspun cotton, 20% polyester, 280gsm hoodie.

Unisex fit.
S, M, L, XL, XXL.

100% for the perfect noise-night-out.
Celebrate your love of skonkin’ improvised goodness by wearing the noisily official Eris hoodie.

Also from Eris 136199

Cover of ‘Eris 136199’ (BAF001) by Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora and Nick Didkovsky (artwork copyright 2018, Han-earl Park)

Eris 136199 (BAF001) [details…]

Personnel: Han-earl Park (guitar), Catherine Sikora (saxophone) and Nick Didkovsky (guitar).

Track listing: Therianthropy I (≥ 3:43), Therianthropy II (8:56), Therianthropy III (3:55), Therianthropy IV (6:30), Adaptive Radiation I (6:44), Adaptive Radiation II (8:48), Adaptive Radiation III (5:54), Universal Greebly (10:58), Hypnagogia I (8:03), Hypnagogia II (4:45). Total duration ≥ 68:25.

© + ℗ 2018 Han-earl Park.

CD cover of ‘Anomic Aphasia’ (SLAMCD 559) with Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora, Nick Didkovsky and Josh Sinton (artwork copyright 2015, Han-earl Park)

Anomic Aphasia (SLAMCD 559) [details…]

Personnel: Han-earl Park (guitar), Catherine Sikora (tenor and soprano saxophones), Nick Didkovsky (guitar; tracks 1 and 5), and Josh Sinton (baritone saxophone and bass clarinet; tracks 2–4).

Track listing: Monopod (27:19), Pleonasm (Metis 9) (17:08), Flying Rods (Metis 9) (7:41), Hydraphon (7:34), StopCock (10:54). Total duration: 70:33.

© 2015 Han-earl Park. ℗ 2015 SLAM Productions.

updates

11-17-20: released!
12-04-20: added the hoodie.
06-26-22: small updates including review quotes.