Anyone reading this that has a copy of this month's Plan B mag - the one with No Age on the front - please do us a special big nice favour and either type up the review of Brave New Wales or scan it in or paint it in huge letters all over the grass at the local park and photograph the result and send it to us, please! We live miles from civilisation, and the nearest shop doesn't even get stock People's Friend, let alone indie music publications. A million thank yous.

Progress report on Brave New Wales (this was intended to be a PowerPoint presentation with pie charts, histograms and clip-art (I was thinking specifically of those black stick figures with sticks for noses, the ones that dance and stuff), but believe it or not I've got better things to do with my time).

Airplay so far:

Huw Stephens, BBC Radio Cymru
Eirwyn Llwyd Roberts : Beicio
Angharad Davies/Rhodri Davies : Live at St. Giles

Lisa Gwilym, BBC Radio Cymru
Carphology Collective : Moving A Pile Of Bricks... (to the left)

Adam Walton, BBC Radio Wales
Carphology Collective : Moving A Pile Of Bricks... (to the left)
Jim Knight, Fiona Owen & Gorwel Owen : Six Minutes
Y Phthwng : Cyfnos

Audition, Resonance FM
The 14th Century : Ei Thwyll a'i Hystryw
Angharad Davies/Rhodri Davies : Live at St. Giles
Chuch : Snorkel
Ian Watson/Mark Jolliffe : 3
Jacob Whittaker : Classic Mix 02
Simon Proffitt : The Ringing Rocks

Battle Flutes & Sideways Skulls, KUSF
WHITENOISESOUND : Sunset

Viva La Trance!, WJFF Radio Catskill
Chuch : Snorkel
Y Phthwng : Cyfnos

Reviews so far:

"...this is an excellent introduction to Wales and its musical undercurrent"
Frans De Waard, Vital Weekly. Read the whole review - including reference to everyone's favourite Dutch town, Nijmegen, in the Vital Weekly archive.

"Play the CDs through a decent sound system and make time for it, it deserves your full attention..."
Emma Louis, Snowdonia Nights Out Gazette. Read the whole review at Snogonline

Other stuff

An interview with Simon P about the compilation at Snogonline

If you want to walk into an actual shop in order to buy your copy, and see it and fondle it first before parting with your spending money rather than relying on newfangled digital technology to transmit virtual cash from your computer to ours, you can visit the following places:

Spillers Records, Cardiff: the oldest record shop in the entire universe.
Cob Records, Bangor: even if there were loads more record shops in the Bangor area, this would still be the best.
Sound 323, London: even though there are loads more record shops in the greater London area, this is still the best.
Aquarius, San Francisco: still the best.

Have you seen or heard reference to the compilation elsewhere? Is someone championing it/slating it unbeknownst to us? Leave a comment! We're greedy for more information.

Here it is, people, here it is:







BUY YOUR COPY NOW!

Check out the updated pages online for a full tracklist, a cool interactive map of Wales to show you where everyone's from, and - joy to the world - an exclusive web-only mp3 of the English-language version of Beautiful Screaming Lady's contribution to the compilation, Crwth (for Cass Meurig)

Artists' copies will be sent out in the next couple of days, pre-orders and recent purchases will be sent out after that.

Get them while they're still here, folks! Don't miss out...

Last few copies of the Brave New Wales 3CD box bonus disc are still available. Pre-order now to avoid disappointment!

The main triple-disc box comes in an edition of 1000, but the first 100 copies come with a bonus disc featuring an hour of extra music. Most of this is previously unreleased and exclusive to this compilation.

Yes. Believe your eyes. It's been 31 years in the making, but it's finally ready to PRE-ORDER:

3CD box set of the best of the Welsh underground. 4 hours of experimental music being made off the grid and under the radar.

Limited edition of 1000 - first 100 copies come with a free bonus disc featuring an hour of extra music.

Shipping early March 2008 - PRE-ORDER YOUR COPY NOW to avoid disappointment!

You want futuristic? You want experimental? You want your futuristic experimentalism to be FUN? Read on...

I'll be DJing at the exclusive launch party of The Comic Book Project this Saturday 15th September. The Comic Book is an exciting new publication featuring over 50 newly commissioned works from visual artists from Wales, England, Scotland and the US. It's cutting edge - subversive - dark - satirical - surreal - funny - all these things and more.

The really fun part is that the party is happening in SECOND LIFE. It's Wales' first ever Second Life art exhibition.

Get yourself an avatar, if you don't already, and teleport to the Movix Floating Gallery - a gallery, bar and nightclub in the sky. Party starts at 6pm BST.

Can't make it on Saturday? Come back on Sunday at 6pm for more of the same.

If you have no idea what I'm talking about but want to know more - see the Comic Book Second Life page.

Hopefully see some of you there - I'll be the old guy with the handlebar moustache manning the decks. BrianNylon Jenkins. Come on up and say hello!

Some of the worst music of modern times has arisen from The Charity Single - facile, lowest-common-denominator pop for the masses. Or worse, novelty records by 'comedians' that are marginally less funny than gangrene. We thought it was about time someone produced some challenging, uncompromising and uncommercial music for a good cause. The conceptual twist is that all the tracks on Crania Draft Massif are remixes, reworkings or covers of existing charity songs. We've taken songs intended to appeal to the greatest possible number of people and totally ruined them made them good.

The mp3s are free, but if you download anything we ask you to please consider making a donation, however little, to Cardiff & District Samaritans using the PayPal button below. Alternatively, you can send them a cheque (see their site for details) or buy something from their shop.
Please note that all money donated goes directly to Cardiff Samaritans (it's their PayPal button) and contributes directly to their running costs. No money comes to us or via us, we're donating our time and bandwidth because we're nice people. And all the artists have donated their time and skills because they're nice people, too.

fouriertransform.com/009

An afternoon of nice things:

For Barry Ray
John Chantler (Tenniscoats, Tujiko Noriko, Room40) + Carina Thorén's wonderful new project. '...an improv duo of sorts using fuzzy guitar loops, pots 'n pans percussion, broken keyboards and anything else they can get their hands on to rustle up some of the most beautiful psych-tinged dronescapes I've heard for ages' (so says Boomkat). New album out now on Room40.
More: atbob.co.uk

Traw/Dominic Lash
Contrabass + live sampling/processing. First meeting between laptop trio Traw and Oxford double-bass improviser Lash.
More: dominiclash.co.uk

Divine Coils
Sprawling, dense, hypno-improv dronesmithery
More: myspace/divinecoils

Beautiful Screaming Lady
Low frequencies + small objects

plus between-act nuisance from DJ Pile-Up

5-8pm, Sunday 26th August 2007
Port Mahon, St. Clements, Oxford
£5

I thought it'd be nice as a special treat to upload all 7 minutes of the title track from our first release - Aufgehoben's mighty, punishing epic slab of delicious vinyl ANNO FAUVE. Because we all need a bit of disorientating noise in our lives, don't we?