New audio at Compost and Height, and Mike Bullock

The fine web label Compost and Height has some new free audio from sundry figures, including recordings of beehives from Patrick Farmer, a live trio of PSF-vets Mike Shiflet and Brendan Murray (with Ben Owen), Mike Bullock, and more.

I don't typically like unprocessed field recordings (or at least not over the course of a whole album), especially with such a limited palette, but Farmer's album has been really engaging. There's a certain surface static dynamic, but with just enough variation and richness to remind me of good quiet electro-acoustic music. I find these bee sounds work very well in the classic sense of ambient music - I start to not even notice them but then have a start when a track ends. Really pleasurable and interesting stuff

Mike also kept a terrific blog during his stay at STEIM in Amsterdam (scroll down for those entries). He's got photos, some brief writings, and some great audio clips.