olliethurley.co.uk

One of my favourite net labels for ambient/experimental musics is Phantom Channel. They work with guys like Konntinent, Sleeping Me, and EL Heath. Now I’ve had the absolute honour of being reviewed on their blog! You can read the blog here, or a transcript below. I must say, I find this really cool and am very grateful to Phantom Channel!

“Another little gem of a release found through my web travels, Ithaca Trio is the work of Leeds-based Ollie Thurley, a producer/composer and designer. Ithaca Trio is a collective in a loose sense of the word, live performances may feature anything from one to nine members.

‘Oxe‘ comprises just two tracks, but they’re rather wonderful with a rich tapestry of processed acoustics, bells, glitches, found sounds and harmonics taking on an almost Steve Reich-like quality. Pick of the two is ‘Josef, My Pain Is Your Pain‘, which floats gently by adding little textures and nuances quite brilliantly.

There’s two other self-releases available at Thurley’s webspace. The long experimental piece ‘Species 8472‘ takes an age to get going, but when it does it buries the listener in krautrock atmospherics reminding this reviewer of early Tangerine Dream in places.

‘In Which…‘, on the other hand, is more considered yet just as improvisational, with the best of these ambient soundscapes again highlighting the beautiful acoustics that set Ithaca’s music apart from the crowded ambient/drone soundscaping scene. That being said, if you’re going to start somewhere, then I can’t recommend the gorgeous ‘Oxe‘ highly enough. Fans of Fridge and Steve Reich will find much to enjoy.

Oxe”

Took delivery of a few new mics, leads, stand and interface this week. My production/engineering facilities are now equipped to record up to 8 in/out in a mobile rig now. Huzzah, should be adding another 8 channels soon, but for now I’m content.

Testing all gear this monday in anger, by recording ‘Sigmund Fucked His Mum’.

News:

Downloads:
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It’s been a long time owing mostly to coursework among other things. I’ve also been working on an ambinet-ish thing here.  It’s a drone type project, which with any luck will feature some actual music soon.  In the meantime, there is a free download on the new Releases page.  Enjoy.

On Thursday, I recorded a short session for an old High School friend, Brendan Bennett. Met up with him at the pub last week and we hatched a devious plan to record a few of his songs for an E.P.

Its just acoustic guitar and vocals, so we kept the set-up simple; a couple of backing vocals and sparse electric guitar. I think its going to turn out really, really nice. Started mixing tonight, I’m to-ing and fro-ing between reverbs. Since the instrumentation is so light, I want to be as careful as possible here, and get it just right.

Also, got some new Teas from Jing Tea this week. Some beautiful Greens, White, and Black teas, but tonight I was sipping on this beautiful little Blackcurrent & Hibiscus infusion. Just right for that acoustic guitar.