A funny thing happened on the way to Friedrichschafen...

Some things happen by accident...others by incident...

Occasionally, there is no intention or intervention...and you just land where you land. Is it pre-determined? Hard to say...but the cards fell into a particularly fortunate pattern on a hot day in Bavaria last summer.

I met a fellow American (I think it's ok to say that) on a barge to Friedrichschafen. The occasion? The amazing first incarnation of the Vinyl On Demand Festival orchestrated by none other than Frank Maier (a prime example of a passionate and generous humane being). I handed the American a small piece of cardboard with some contact information printed thereon…

Needless to say...the festive-hall was a lifesaver for me personally and for many others in attendance. It turned out that my fellow American (unbeknownst to me) would later perform as one half of the legendary SPK at the aforementioned festival.

An additional American that I encountered, turned out to be the elusive Tim Theall...also an Atlanta resident for over 30 years…though we'd never met. Another fortunate occurrence. We'd been walking and talking in the same circle(s) for decades and had yet to converse. The time wasn’t right until this moment.

The result of these chance meetings on a dissecting table of a barge ride and a music festival was the birth of an excellent LP for all of the anxious music listeners of the world to see and hear. For sale now on this humble website.

To further entice your purchase..."If you act now"...you will receive a signed 12" x 24" (American dementians) full color (colour for R.O.W.) poster signed by none other than the composer of said vinyl masterpiece - the distinguished Mr. Robert Revell. Artwork by the talented and amazing artist/designer of graphics Mr. Tim The All referenced above.

The "tacit receptor observation nodule" in question is a loaded proposition. A plastic bullet...as "they" say. On the surface, a pleasantly unpleasant side long track rotating at 33 and one third revolutions per minute with all the individual parts exposed forthwith. Not to worry, the parts are soon re-united on the flip side with two tracks spinning at 45 rpms...comprised of the actual "composition” and a "reset" (or "re-mix" - but only the intense can dance without moving). An experiment in track separation anxiety and post traumatic song disclosure - you will fail to find a repeated passage or theme...thankfully you won't mind a bit.

Special thanks to Frank for making this release possible - as well as igniting many other connections and collusions with other like-minded folks around the world.

Now is the beginning of the "eye - A" revolution (eye created analog content).

See below

https://www.suitcaseaudiovisual.com/shop/north-lp

OUT NOW Magnetic Stripper “Scraping the Tapes” LP

Atlanta based Suitcase Audio/Visual returns after a decade long hiatus with an archival harsh noise vinyl only release.

“Scraping the Tapes” LP features the earliest recordings by multimedia artist James F. Ellis under his altered-ego/project alias Magnetic Stripper. Recorded in San Francisco 1995-1996, this is the second release Ellis has produced for the Suitcase label – following the “Extended Play-R” 7” EP from 2011.

Ellis began recording sound experiments in 1982/83 in Johnson City TN using Casio keyboards and DIY Radio Shack circuit boards. After a stint with experimental/electronic duo Absolute Ceiling, he moved on to Knoxville TN – continuing his sound and visual art and performing live with Serena Slab. After relocating to California to work in the innovative technology space, Ellis was developing immersive interactive digital art installations for the corporate space. Jim then began recording with the "Magnetic Stripper" - a reel-to-reel tape machine that shredded the Ferric Oxide off of the reel upon playback – thus the project title. In combing live tapes with modular synthesizers, Magnetic Stripper continues to perform numerous concerts in the Bay Area  – including events at The Lab, Portreo del Sol Noise Picnic and Noise Pancakes. During live performances, Magnetic Stripper appears in hand made costumes – reminiscent of a Jack Kirby interpretation of MF Doom. The live performances include mind-bending live digital video projections. Both the visual and sound have been recently enhanced with AI technology – taking the video and sound to new levels of distortion and surrealism.

As listeners engage with the LP and accompanying visuals, they are invited to traverse a soundscape that is both a reflection of its time and a harbinger of the noise as sound art’s evolving dialogue with technology.

This limited edition of 150 numbered copies includes a 2-sided foldout insert and a Magnetic Stripper badge.

To place your order, please email a4 at suitcaseaudiovisual.com and payment request can be sent via Venmo or Paypal. The price is $25 USD, plus First Class Domestic or  Tracked International Shipping. Or send an Inquiry on the Contact Form. Cheers

final A4 performance and "focus" reviews

January 23rd 2015 - the suitcase event at eyedrum (Atlanta GA) - a record release concert by FE<MALE FOU featuring opening acts Ex Black Natural (w/Graham Moore of Blossoming Noise), Stephen Fenton and Michael Payne. Prior to the Fe<Male Fou set, a bearded and rather well fed A4 took the stage for the last time. The final AllFours releases - “focus” on Vitrine and the upcoming retrospective ALL FOR NOTHING - were set for 2016 deployment. 

FOCUS (VT23) CASSETTE REVIEW by Allen Mozek

“Material readily accessible.”

Vitrine is honored to present "focus", a much-needed retrospective of source tapes, raw material and test recordings from A4, the working title of interdisciplinary visionary and mail art linchpin Eric Blevins. The click of cartridge music. The atmospherics of space from room to room. Obnoxious voices. What at first registers as sensory drift builds to accumulative significance. Blevins helped pioneer the inclusive innovations of the mail art era both via collaborative work and later through his own imprint, the essential suitcase recordings. A dedication to a hands on method of manipulation via tape and printmaking during the form’s many fallow periods across the past twenty years positions his body of work, in 2016, as all the more revelatory. Vocal loops begin as satire, stammer towards sensual overload and cycle back to the feint of communication. “A victim of automation. We’re all getting used to letting the computers do our answering for -“ Tape cut. Blevins shares an infectious horizontal dissonance with Joke Lanz and Rudolf Eb.er’s Psychic Rally transmissions, as well as the magnetic reconfiguration of frequent collaborators TAC and Yeast Culture. focus draws on tapes stretching back to the eighties, blending obsessive loops, abstracted environmental recordings and absurd collusions of acoustic guitar, keyboard and malfunction. All Fours on Vitrine. Vitrine on All Fours. Limited to 100 copies. Sold out at source.

VITAL WEEKLY review by Frans De Waard

For a moment I thought someone sent me something new by the Dutch punk band by the same name (from the mid 80s), but I soon realized this A4 stands for All Fours, the musical project of Eric Blevins, which he apparently no longer maintains; the cover says 'allfours was eric h. blevins 1982-2015'. Earlier work was released by Blevins' own label Suitcase Recordings, with some long intervals. The forty minutes of music on 'focus' (no capitals) is a 'agglomeration of source tapes, raw material, rough drafts and false stops/starts recorded from 1982 to 1989' and it includes also some work he did as Absolute Ceiling, together with James Ellis (editors note: There is no material by Absolute Ceiling on this cassette. All sounds are by A4 - no collaborations here). There are no individual tracks to be noted on this release, and the whole thing is more a collection of snippets that run twenty minutes per side. While these are source tapes,raw sounds and such, one should not understand this as something of rapid editing of a few tapes stuck together. It's rather a minimalist take on musique concrete and sometimes it goes via the use of loops, which play for some time, almost making it into a 'piece', such as the opening of the B-side, which may be a bunch of field recordings. And sometimes I had the impression that sounds were used to cross-fade from one part to another, which worked quite well, I think. The whole tape works best if one takes this as one long, forty-minute sound collage of electronics, field recordings and editing, again, in the best tradition of musique concrete. 
If that was it for All Fours then this is a great farewell. (FdW)

new A4 cassette release

a collection of A4 archive material from the dusty vaults of suitcase will be released on VITRINE in February. the C40 cassette features source tapes, raw material and test recordings from 1982 to 1989 that were compiled and edited in October 2015. there will be a second (and final) A4 retrospective release forthcoming on suitcase later in 2016.

New review of "Sucker Mule" from Stomp & Stammer...

FE<MALE FOU “Sucker Mule’s Dreadful Murder” LP (Suitcase) Review by John Sewell

(Stomp & Stammer) February 2015

As Fe<Male Fou, Italian guitarist/noise artist/composer Filomena Rubino traffics in sonic textures that once would have been classified as industrial music – back when “industrial music” was more akin to musiq concrete: the sound of assembly lines, colliding freight trains and/or the shifting of tectonic plates.

So don’t be misled by my classification of Fe<Male Fou as industrial music. When I say “industrial”, I’m talking about the teeth gnashing jouissance of Test Department, Nurse With Wound and Throbbing Gristle – not the processed, cartoon metal-with-beats of Marilyn Manson and Nine Inch Nails. Or something.

Of course, all of this generic classification and reclassification is the talk of music nerds. And, baby, I’m one too. I digress.

Whether or not what you’ll hear on Fe<Male Fou’s “Sucker Mule’s Dreadful Murder” is music or noise per se, well, it doesn’t really even matter. None of the album’s six tracks are straightjacketed by conventional verse-chorus-verse structure. There is no narrative arc, no beginning or end per se – at least, not a conventional one. Sure, there are climaxes aplenty. But I wouldn’t say that any of the tracks really resolve. Well, if obliteration is your idea of resolution, then maybe.

The album’s six tracks more as affect than as sonic discourses unto themselves. The lyrics are buried among layer upon layer of dissonance, one among many elements among a multilayered collage of feedback that connotes dread, alienation, fear, or some kind of nastiness. This is to say that “Sucker Mule’s Dreadful Murder” is something you’ll feel – but won’t be able to put into words. (Hence, the challenge of writing this review.) Fe<Male Fou delivers the perfect soundtrack for a slow, one-way ride on a creaky elevator to hell.

Yes Rubino creates noise. The thing is, the noises she creates aren’t the result of some happy accident. Sure, there’s probably an element or two of happenstance among her architecture of drones. But for the most part Rubino is in total control. This woman really knows how to torture a guitar. And as we all know, a harsh mistress can lead the willing servant along a pathway to untold pleasures.

Fe<Male Fou’s label Suitcase, is a longstanding institution of America’s experimental/noise sub-underground. The mysterious Atlanta-based label has released piles of lovingly packaged musical curios in various formats over the years. Only the adventurous need apply. For a glimpse into this claustrophobic, terrifyingly opaque artistic netherworld, visit suitcaseaudiovisual.com. (John Sewell)