A few clicks before reaching the one-hundredth release mark on the tote board, the label presented a showcase compilation and postcard set called Fogbound.
The small, not-for-profit English label Somehow Recordings is a small wonder. First and foremost, of course, I wonder how it manages to remain defiantly not-for-profit since 2010 and still maintain a heavy release schedule, out of which regularly emerges some of the best ambient and related style electronica you can imagine, and plenty you never could. The staff’s capacity for locating new talent is just short of remarkable. On top of that, a sister label, Twisted Tree Line, concurrently managed to put out some sixty releases until it was recently absorbed by its sibling.
A few clicks before reaching the one-hundredth release mark on the tote board, the label presented a showcase compilation and postcard set called Fogbound. Seven artists were given photos taken by label co-founder (with son Nico) Tim Brice or his right hand Julia Dewhirst—frost on tree branches, a fisherman silhouetted against a sky filled with muscular clouds, limp netting caught on barbed wire—upon which to reflect and riff.
Each has responded with an interpretation that is singular but folds easily into a coherent collection. Hakobune’s “Solstice” is the sun starting to warm the fog on a windshield, following the drops of water sliding downward. Porya Hatami’s cloudwatching has him floating on his back in a lake all alone, playing the piano on his tummy. Celer’s “Wind That Can’t Move Wire” is the most literal transcription of his selected photograph while being the most suggestively ominous of all the contributions. Darren Harper’s “Framed in Solitude” is ragged-edged and tactile, while Tomoyoshi Date brings a sacral harmonium drone into a plain domestic setting. Despite the solid title “Bronze,” Chihei Hatakeyama’s is the most sheer and cobwebby, while A Bleeding Star’s closer, based on the most obscured, abstract photo in the collection, is an obscured, abstract and frankly bewildering collage not for the faint-hearted.
Fogbound is available on Somehow.
