The Falling Rocket, by Stephan Mathieu

The Falling Rocket

by Stephan Mathieu

supported by

	/

Streaming + Download

Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

Purchasable with gift card

€5 EUR or more
Record/Vinyl + Digital Album

Includes unlimited streaming of The Falling Rocket via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

ships out within 5 days

edition of 500

€10 EUR or more
Full Digital Discography

89

releases

Get all 89 Dekorder releases available on Bandcamp and save 50%.

Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Coh Bâle, Alphabet 1968, EARTH, Nighturns, One or Several Tigers, MM∞XX Vol.1 & 2, Diode, Triode, Drag Acid #10, and 81 more. , and , .

Purchasable with gift card

€231 EUR or more (50% OFF)

1.	Lacaille 8760 10:10	buy track
2.	Keid 10:10	buy track
3.	Gliese 229 B 10:10	buy track
4.	55 Cancri 10:10	buy track
5.	Deneb 02:10	buy track
6.	IK Pegasi 08:10	buy track
7.	Teide 1 10:10	buy track
8.	Cha 110913 10:20	buy track
9.	Kepler-11 10:30	buy track

about

"The Falling Rocket" is Stephan Mathieu's first full-length album for Dekorder after releasing two highly-acclaimed 10" singles for the label in 2011 and 2009. It follows a series of recent collaborative works with Robert Hampson (in the reformed Main on Editions Mego), David Sylvain, Tashi Wada and the Smog songbook "Palimpsest" with Sylvain Chauveau on his own Schwebung imprint.

Here, Mathieu uses a similar setup as in Main, performing realtime arrangements on the Farfisa VIP 233 organ, mechanical gramophone, a Hohner Electronium and Radio, with the addition of Caro Mikalef's ebowed Phonoharp on one track. The recordings are densely layered into massive, seemingly liquid clusters of pure sound with the original instruments’ voices reduced to a vague afterglow. At times they're not unlike the overtone-rich Walls Of Sound of Glenn Branca and Phill Niblock, with ghost choirs appearing out of nowhere. Tracks like "Teide 1" are among the most roaring and brute pieces Mathieu has ever recorded but there's also an almost pastoral quietness in tracks like "Deneb" and the album as a whole is one of his most accomplished works. Even though Mathieu uses tone clusters rather than conventional melodies there's still a rich harmonic and hallucinatory quality inherent to his compositions. This is true cosmic music without the capital K.

The record comes in a beautiful gatefold jacket designed by Caro Mikalef of Argentinian Studio Cabina. Vinyl cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering, pressed at Pallas.

Stephan Mathieu is a self taught composer and performer of his own music, working in the fields of electroacoustics and abstract digitalia. His sound is largely based on early instruments, environmental sound and obsolete media, which are recorded and transformed by means of experimental microphony, re-editing techniques and software processes involving spectral analysis and convolution; it has been compared to the landscape paintings of Caspar David Friedrich, the work of Colorfield artists Mark Rothko, Barnett Newman and Ellsworth Kelly.
During the last decade Mathieu’s music has been released on 30 CDs and vinyl records, both solo and in collaboration with Akira Rabelais, Douglas Benford, Ekkehard Ehlers, Janek Schaefer, John Hudak and Taylor Deupree.

credits

released June 28, 2013

license

about

Dekorder Hamburg, Germany

Recommendations

contact / help

Contact Dekorder

Streaming and
Download help

Redeem code

Report this album or account

Dekorder recommends:

Jemh Circs
by Jemh Circs

A new Black To Comm related label and artist Dekorder
go to album

If you like The Falling Rocket, you may also like:

Nachtstücke
by Stephan Mathieu

supported by 19 fans who also own “The Falling Rocket”

Who would have imagined Federico Durand as an appearance here (Third Dream)? The collaboration is enchanting. Federico has a way with abstract but deceptively simple, nearly melodic single note patterns. That combined with Stephan’s multilayered drones…it just works at every level. Richard Erickson
go to album
Before Nostromo
by Stephan Mathieu

supported by 16 fans who also own “The Falling Rocket”

Of the Alien prequels, this is the only one I return to. Paul W. Rankin
go to album
Coh Bâle
by Marc Richter

Richter, also known as Black To Comm, gives his 2009 album "Alphabet 1968" a vibrant, experimental sequel. Bandcamp Album of the Day Jul 14, 2023
go to album
Holographic Dreamtime
by Khôra

Less a solo act than a one-man megalith, Khôra builds impressive experimental soundscapes from modular synths, flutes, harps, and more. Bandcamp New & Notable Feb 19, 2020
go to album
Another
by MAGAM

This international experimental collective carefully architects their haunting sound, generating immediate emotional impact. Bandcamp New & Notable Apr 30, 2019
go to album