Stunned no. 107

summerTales / Knit Prism — c56 (Stunned no. 107) —out of stock—

Last year a rather strange tape by Sicilian group Armali Lari surfaced on Stunned (later re-issued on A Beard of Snails), and the response to it was a bit surprising considering it was a debut release. Simply, many of you wanted to hear even more of this unabashedly fun eye-tied weirdness. summerTales comes very near to fulfilling that wish, as it shares Armali Lari’s primary member Nicola Giunta, whose repertoire of effects will be familiar to fans of ‘Ma tu la pasta la vò?’. Here, Nicola is joined by sound artist Guido Broglio, and the two drive summerTales away from the free-electro-spazz of Armali Lari and closer toward head-nodding island dub loops and fractured melodies drifting in on ocean breeze. Not without its own challenging internal logic, it keeps a distinct levity that we’ve come to appreciate not only from Nicola’s work, but from the contemporary Italian improv underground in general. After this engrossing first side, we are greeted by Knit Prism, who needs little introduction for anyone keeping abreast with current cassette culture. The naturescape/ambient dreamchild of Canada’s Mike Pouw (proprietor of the House of Sun imprint), Knit Prism is a consistently refreshing project — poignant with its calming way of drawing in the carefree listener. It’s the kind of soundtrack we want handy for thawing by a fire after a hard day’s work, or for those lazy weekend sunrises we just don’t want to forget. Limited edition of 111 pro-dubbed & imprinted c56 tapes w/ double-sided jcard and insert.