Caligine, Li Jianhong & Zhu Xiaolong - Shiyun / Yuxuan

Caligne is the brainchild of Gabriele de Seta who is joined by a revolving collective of musicians who number approximately fifteen across his releases since around 2008.

This is a double 5" CDr set on Nothing Out There from this year. On this release, Caligne are joined by Chinese legends Li Jianhong & Zhu Xiaolong.

The first disc has Caligine alongside Li Jianhong (and you already know that I love Li Jianhong). It really is a beautiful piece of live recording...imagine Sunburned and NNCK with some gentle electronics...you're nearly there...and then the 20 minute final track expands and explodes into a different dimension...

The second disc has Caligne alongside Zhu Xiaolong. Zhu Xiaolong used to be the guitarist with Tongue. If you know his work from there then this will be a surprise. This live piece is Sir Richard Bishop sitting on a beach as the sun goes down. It's the vision of Derek Bailey with a slanted doff of the cap to Jean-Baptiste Reinhardt...the occasional voice in the background is Zhu Xiaolong's young son Yu Xuan by the way...so if you ever doubted that this was recorded live...

Nothing Out There is run by Constantin Dubois. He is one half of the magnificent Przewalski's Horses (alongside Aurélie Brouet). He also records as Draisine and you should check that out as well!

This masterpiece is still for sale and you can find it via the label site. Frankly you should just go and buy this now. Nothing Out There has the same creative aesthetic as the deeply missed aRCHIVE label which means that as much love goes into the packaging and the design as goes into the actual music.

Sometimes, blogging seems to be a competition to see how far you can piss into a strong wind. And then something takes your feet out from underneath you. This is one such thing. About three weeks ago, Gabriele just sent me this out of a blue clear sky. No ulterior motives on his part. No requests for promotion or anything like that. Just here it is, do you want to post it? I asked him to check it with Constantin before I considered posting it and he was equally happy with this going ahead.

I have been sitting on this for about three weeks. I would have posted it sooner but I just couldn't stop listening to it. I have to say that I am proud to be in a position to post such a wonderful thing!

[I forgot to mention that Gabriele also runs Monstres Par Excès.]

Shiyun

Yuxuan