The Bear & The Sea – Trees Like You

Trees Like You, clocking in at a sharpened and stirring 12 tracks, is The Bear and the Sea‘s debut full-length album. If you’re a start from the top kind of listener, you’ll join in at “My Fire Burns The Same”, a chirping, wind chime of an introduction into an earthy, blustering soundscape of pneumatic yet skintight gratification.

“Crystal Swords” will only surprise you a little bit with its pop and lock gusto, its sway/sway tap tap tap, because even in the whisper quiet spots, the Bear has you in motion.

These tracks are titled like the Galápagos Islands under the Northern Lights at a virtual reality party where hours later, you still find grains of sand between your toes. “Human Loop” hits an exotic yet square place in your gut that’ll have your freewheeling head doing figure 8s, and “Pink Route” warps itself around a guttural heartbeat while clacking away at something you want to hear again and again.

And just like that, in a mournful yet ritualistically tidal fashion, it’s over. While tricky to place in context, Trees Like You is a lot like its title, the leafy and fleshy stuff of our very existence – you need it in your lives.

Tags: Atomospheric, Audiovisual Record Label, bucolic, Colorcubic, EDM, Electronic Music, HIP HOP, nostalgic, Nueva Forma, Oregon, pdx, portland, the bear and the sea, trees like you

This entry was posted on Friday, February 15th, 2013 at 8:55 pm and is filed under Artists, Music, Releases. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Gouseion – Puisne

There exists a crunchy netherworld of whipping hips and closed eyes; there exists a shuddering whirlpool where hard living begs for a badly behaved soundtrack, where aggressive contraptions nag at the frayed edges of nature.

Puisne, Gouseion’s first release with Nueva Forma, doesn’t bother with the scenery of things. Like a noisy companion who likes things a certain way and operates as a remote soldier with one thing in mind, Gouseion comes from a place of inner quiet – but it’s bloody insane on the outside.

Pirony really sets the whole thing off with a windshield wiper powerhouse jam that’s as consistent and metrical as you like it. It all starts with the jagged chomp of the bass and spreads like an infection into the audio context. Three tracks later, Turing Test loosens the screws a bit and knocks it all down a few notches, but doesn’t let go of a thing.

All in all, there are sweet moments of slow recoil and deep breaths of nasty, pulverized darkness in here. Stagger reminds you that your heart’s still beating and that there is a way out, a way back into the fold where the familiar will always remind you that you’re human. Then it’s all popping circuits and touches of brutal melody from there until EOD (II) fades out into a dark and gentle reprieve.

We think Gouseion is trying to tell us that there’s something lesser yet totally scintillating behind the natural world – innocence be damned. Puisne hails weakness, both as a flaw and an openness, and we all need to hear what that sounds like every now and then – however it is we choose to hear it.

Tags: 8-bit, Album, chiptune, Colorcubic, electronic, Electronica, Gouseion, Nueva Forma, Puisne, Release

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 1st, 2012 at 2:22 am and is filed under Artists, Music, News, Releases. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Nueva Forma – Social Club: Volume 1

Nueva Forma – Social Club: Volume 1

Nueva Forma – Social Club: Volume 1

Yeah, cassette tapes are cool and charming and nostalgic and all that, but here at Nueva Forma, we’re all about the future. So we’re releasing a limited edition walnut wood-block USB compilation with a lose-proof matching magnetic cap and laser engraved logo.

Featuring artists such as: The Bear and The Sea, A Gap Between, IG88, Gouseion, Little Star Dweller, Dead Astronauts, Cars and Trains, The Great Mundane, Datahowler, Pinscape, Recue, and more, these babies not only look good, they sound even better.

Tags: 57 Shadows, a gap between, Cars and Trains, chillwave, Colorcubic, datahowler, Dead Astronauts, Decibel Festival, EDM, Electronic Music, glo-fi, Gouseion, HIP HOP, iameb 57, IDM, IG88, Italo Disco, lapse, little star dweller, Masmod, Miroi, Night Heat, Nueva Forma, Péninsolar, Pinscape, recue, Social Club, the bear and the sea, The Cowardly Lion, The Great Mundane, Thoughtcloud, Volume 1, Witch-House, wndfrm

This entry was posted on Monday, October 29th, 2012 at 6:11 pm and is filed under Artists, Music, Releases. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Gouseion promotional video spot

Gouseion promotional video spot

Gouseion promotional video spot

So we’ve got some pretty exciting news to announce. Quite a lot of it, actually. Ultimately, for the remainder of this week, and next week, we’ll be unraveling the news for you all. For today, let’s start with the promotional video spot for the soon-to-be released album by our very own Gouseion, titled: Puisne. Produced by Colorcubic. Yay!

Tags: Adobe After Effects, AFX, C4D, Cellphone, Cinema 4D, Colorcubic, EDM, Electronic Music, Gouseion, IDM, Maxon, Motion Graphics, Nueva Forma, Puisne

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 11th, 2012 at 8:41 am and is filed under Artists, Music, Videos. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

iameb 57 - Delicate Glitch (EP)

A glitch at its most basic is an intrusion into expectation. Such is the world of iameb 57’s sophomore release for Nueva Forma, Delicate Glitch. At once hard and biting, soft and lush, dark and impenetrable, bucolic and bright, the five-track EP is as intricate as its name suggests. These are the stylings of Jimmy Batista, who works brilliantly in the world of contrast. At the core of each track is a head-bobbing mid-tempo dance pulse perfect for late night summer mixes; the pads are luscious, the bass tones warm and inviting. Built on this is a precise balance of urban static, post-digital glitch, and minimalist melody that holds a cracked mirror up to the cuts he produces.

As we expected from his music after the release of Tipsy Hax last August, iameb 57 has become an intriguing writer of melodies. His skeletal leads leave much to the imagination, a fair accomplishment considering the ability of digital artists to become omnipotent over-writers. Check out the emotive sparsity of the strings on “Thelpwe” to hear how much he can say with so little.

Batista in general has a more concise approach to style in this offering. Where Tipsy Hax was more sprawling as he explored every color and option of the IDM idiom, he is here dialing into a recipe of composing that suits him well. He has distilled himself into an intimidating potency on Delicate Glitch, and this twenty minutes of bliss bodes well for his followers.

You can purchase the album exclusively on Nueva Forma’s Bandcamp.

Tags: Album, bandcamp, Colorcubic, delicate glitch, electronic, Electronica, ep, glitch, iameb 57, IDM, jimmy batista, Music, Nueva Forma, Release, tipsy hax

This entry was posted on Monday, July 11th, 2011 at 9:58 pm and is filed under Artists, Music, News, Releases. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Monthly podcast: Nueva Forma Listening Pleasures

The sun is starting to make regular cameos here in Portland, which makes us look forward to summer an awful lot. Consider episode 15, then, a fast forward into our hotly-anticipated season, one that features an unreleased minimal techno track by Nueva Forma’s cloudburst, as well as a variety of other sweet, dancey tracks curated by Wolfe+585.

Podcast: Download (64 MB) 54:56

Tags: Acousmatic Pop, Anoraak, AOKI Takamasa, Cassie, Chromatics, Cloudburst, Colorcubic, dance, Electronic Music, Gouseion, Heartbreak, Kate Simko, La Roux, listening pleasures, Nueva Forma, reii, Sally Shapiro, Steffi, techno

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 7th, 2011 at 4:53 pm and is filed under Artists, Music, Podcasts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Monthly podcast: Nueva Forma Listening Pleasures

A Gap Between - Neon Signs

Blackbird Blackbird - Hawaii (The Bear and The Sea remix)

Episode 13, promised two days ago, arrives a wee bit late, but hopefully the lovely tunes will make up for our tardiness, and not to mention, the two awesome free tracks by A Gap Between and The Bear and The Sea. Things have been crazy here this month, albeit a productive kind of crazy, and that’s the way we like it, for the most part. It’s probably why Wolfe+585 opted for the kind of mix that one could most certainly relax to (and sometimes even dance to), all of which could be described as a sort of squishy, nostalgic bliss.

Podcast: Download (62 MB) 53:24

Tags: a gap between, blackbird blackbird, Colorcubic, D-Fried, del dot, free, games, listening pleasures, memory tapes, mix, Nueva Forma, Péninsolar, persona la ave, Podcasts, recue, remix, stephen farris, the abbasi brothers, the bear and the sea, wild nothing, wolfe+585

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 26th, 2011 at 2:21 am and is filed under Artists, Music, Podcasts, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

KONTRAST event logo (click to enlarge)

KONTRAST event partners (click to enlarge)

Venue generously provided by Ziba (click to enlarge)

Ziba auditorium (click to enlarge)

Ziba auditorium (click to enlarge)

Ziba auditorium (click to enlarge)

Ziba auditorium (click to enlarge)

KONTRAST is a Nueva Forma curated, audio / visual electronic music event.

Location:
Ziba Auditorium
810 NW Marshall St. (corner of NW 9th & Marshall; side entrance)
Portland, OR 97209

Feb. 4, 2011: 7 PM – Midnight
Free; All Ages
Free snacks, beer, and wine provided

We see our mission with the concert series as three-fold. First and foremost, we would like to see creative electronic music move away from cramped clubs and into more eclectic and ornate settings where the artistry of the medium can be better explored and appreciated. We feel that Portland is an emerging experimental and creative hub in the art world and …are doing our part to expand the boundaries of electronic music, meaning not just what you hear but how you experience it.

Beyond this, we are a label of forward-thinking designers with an eye for greatness in the visual realm. We are therefore, along with our sister graphic design firm Colorcubic, looking for ways to best integrate this passion into the concert experience. We are currently lining up spaces with projection capabilities and seating that are conducive to the full a/v aesthetic experience.

Finally, but most importantly, we’ve seen a downward trend in the once ubiquitous nature of electronic music in Portland, Oregon. With Kontrast, we are hoping to make the genre once again more accessible by hosting (potentially) bi-annual events throughout the city. This first event will be hosted at Ziba design, in their auditorium, Friday, February 4th 2011

As the inaugural launch of this event, there will be no cover charge. There will also be food and drinks, but seating is limited to 175 people in the auditorium. There is additional space in the Ziba cafeteria, which holds an additional 100+ people. So please only RSVP if you’re serious about attending.

KONTRAST event partners:

• Colorcubic
• Behance
• Filter
• Umpqua
• DWR (Design Within Reach)
• Henry V
• Nueva Forma
• MacForce
• ThinkAV

KONTRAST venue:

• Ziba auditorium
  

KONTRAST event performing artists:

• etbonz (DJ set)
• cloudburst (live audio set)
• creta (live audio set)
• masmöd (live audio set)
• miori (VJ set)
• sleepyhead (live audio set)
• marcus fischer (live audio set)
• exit signs (pinscape) (live audio set)
• mark henrickson (VJ set)

[We'll be updating our list of performing artists and additional event partners throughout the week. Please check back regularly for more details.]

Tags: Audio / Visual electronic music event, auditorium, Cloudburst, Colorcubic, Creta, Design Within Reach, DWR, Electronic Music, Etbonz, Exit Signs, Filter, Henry V, Kontrast, Marcus Fischer, Mark Henrickson, Masmod, miori, Pinscape, sleepyhead, Umpqua Bank, Ziba, zibatorium

This entry was posted on Monday, January 10th, 2011 at 6:08 pm and is filed under Artists, Events, Music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Monthly podcast: Nueva Forma Listening Pleasures

Our tenth episode, curated by Wolfe+585, promises plenty of gorgeous sounds fit for fall. Creta (formerly known as White Car) debuts a brand new track from his forthcoming album (to be released this winter), and thrown into the mix are cuts by Miori and Lapse. All three tracks are available as free downloads (see download links below).

Podcast: Download (67.6MB) 57:43

Tags: baths, billie holiday, Colorcubic, data howler, hudson mohawke, jean jaques perrey, jega, junior boys, lapse, listening pleasures, luke vibert, miori, mount kimbie, Nueva Forma, otograph, pablo ribot, parov stelar, people press play, sun electric, wax tailor

This entry was posted on Monday, October 25th, 2010 at 11:20 am and is filed under Artists, Music, Podcasts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.