Sadly, “more than a year ago” feels like “yesterday” when it comes to the enforced and misguided shuttering of London’s legendary fabric nightclub. But luckily, an agreement was reached to reopen the club shortly thereafter, which fortunately meant a resumption of the musical spoils that fabric and its associated record label, Houndstooth, regularly brought to the international table.
Now, people of all nationalities now have the opportunity to enjoy club nights after first getting cavity-searched by a queue of curiously insistent council members; nor are their nights haunted with nightmares about a world in which the fabric and FABRICLIVE mix series’ aren’t still being released. Back before the question of fabric’s survival was answered to the relative satisfaction of all parties, compilations to #savefabric were released. But now that our outrage/depression has been assuaged, a compilation expressing the change in the mood/time seems to be in order, no??
Well, sort of! It turns out the sky is still falling, but this time in an unambiguously good way: courtesy of a just-announced compilation sponsored by Houndstooth called In Death’s Dream Kingdom. The name was taken from The Hollow Men, a poem by T.S. Eliot; and for this particular album, 25 different artists — many of whom had no formal affiliation with fabric or Houndstooth — were asked to consider the phrase or the entirety of the poem as they summoned their brand new tracks. Music from Pan Daijing, Gazelle Twin, Kangding Ray, and Roly Porter is thus unified by thematic darkness and dystopia. The resulting 25 tracks are currently being released one by one on Houndtooth’s Bandcamp — together with “further online texts” and some pretty damn T.S. Eliot-appropriate artwork by Jazz Szu-Ying Chen — but you can also pre-order “Limited Edition Fine Art Print & Music Files (mp3 or WAV)” bundle here, or the straight-up “Full 25 track bundle (also mp3 or WAV)” here, ahead of their January 26 street dates.
As you might well surmise from the title, there’s really nothing suuuper “danceable” about it…but it turns out, that’s pretty alright! We’ll take it! Or, more specifically: we’ll stream the tracks as they’re released down below and anxiously wait until January 26 for our own full descent into death’s spooky-ass nightmare lab.
In Death’s Dream Kingdom tracklisting:
01. Otto Lindholm - Cain
02. Pan Daijing - The Island Within
03. Lanark Artefax - Styx
04. Petit Singe - Komm Wieder Mit
05. Peder Mannerfelt - Post Sense Perspective
06. Tomoko Sauvage - In Some Brighter Sphere
07. Pye Corner Audio - Box In A Box
08. Sophia Loizou - Irregular Territories
09. Abul Mogard - Trembling With Tenderness
10. Par Grindvik - Speaking Their Minds
11. Koenraad Ecker - Rat’s Coat
12. Roly Porter - Without Form
13. Hodge - Sunlight On A Broken Column
14. Gazelle Twin - The Dream Ends
15. Shapednoise - Ghostly Metafiction
16. ASC - Tessellate
17. Batu - Zoo Hypothesis
18. We Will Fail - Carbon Trail
19. Peter Van Hoesen - 98 Lines
20. Spatial - Haunted Dance Hall
21. Yves De Mey - Solemn But Fading
22. Mindspan - Accept Things As They Are
23. Kangding Ray - Glacier
24. ZOV ZOV - Post Six
25. Ian William Craig - An End Of Rooms
More about: Abul Mogard, ASC, Batu, Gazelle Twin, Hodge, Ian William Craig, Kangding Ray, Koenraad Ecker, Lanark Artefax, Mindspan, Otto Lindholm, Pan Daijing, Par Grindvik, Peder Mannerfelt, Peter Van Hoesen, Petit Singe, Pye Corner Audio, Roly Porter, Shapednoise, Sophia Loizou, Spatial, Tomoko Sauvage, We Will Fail, Yves de Mey, ZOV ZOV
