For all the fucking around with tracklists and recording sessions and titles and whatnot that Kanye did in the lead up to his release of The Life of Waves (IDK whatevs), it’s refreshing to get some raw field recordings released without fuss or fluster and with a straightforward title that leaves you with no doubt as to what’s going on.
Here’s one: Sacred Flute Music From New Guinea: Madang / Windim Mabu.
This album will be released on April 15 via Stephen O’Malley’s Ideologic Organ imprint and is a double CD of (you guessed it) sacred flute music from (you guessed it) New Guinea. Recorded in 1976 by Ragnar Johnson and Jessica Meyer, the two discs were originally released as separate albums in 1979 and then as separate CDs in 1999, but now you can get your New Guinea sacred flute fix in one handy location.
If you come to this party expecting audacious rhymes about the woes of being a celebrity, you’re at the wrong party, because Sacred Flute Music From New Guinea: Madang / Windim Mabu is straight-up “recordings of men in the Madang region of Papua New Guinea
blowing sacred flutes to make the cries of spirits, pairs of long bamboo male and female flutes played for ceremonies in the coastal villages near the Ramu river, Ravoi flutes from Bak accompanied by two garamut (carved wooden slit gongs), Jarvan flutes from Awar accompanied by a shell rattle, Mo-mo resonating tubes recorded in the Finisterre Range, and more.”
Here’s “Mo Mo”:
Sacred Flute Music from New Guinea: Madang/Windim Mambu tracklist:
Disc 1: Sacred Flute:
01. Ravoi
02. Waudang
03. Jarvan
04. Mo-Mo
Disc 2: Windim Mambu:
01. Gomkail
02. Rumu
03. Buaraning
04. Tika
05. Noindeh
06. Taur
07. Kaidabang
08. Waudang 1
09. Waudang 2
10. Waudang 3
11. Gopu
12. Mo-Mo
More about: Ideologic Organ, Jessica Meyer, Ragnar Johnson, Stephen O'Malley
