A rather normal year

Kapotte Muziek, yesterday in Leverkusen

While I wouldn’t call 2023 the best year of my life, it’s also not the worst. Is ‘mediocre’ a word you attach to a year?

As much as I like to say I am always working on publishing new books, and some projects have been going on for years, I realised in May that no book was imminent for publication. Quick action was required, and I asked David Elliott if I could publish his six Neumusik fanzines in one book. I read those with my laptop a lot before and found it quite a drag. He said yes, and the book was published in late August to much acclaim.
One of the projects dragging on for years was Nul Nul, the fanzine I did before Vital (which I did before Vital Weekly; I have to repeat that until the end of my days, too). There are only four issues: cut and glue, all in Dutch. I decided to translate and concluded we used bizarre language in the 1980s. Mark Poysden and I worked on it for a long time, and then we chose the design to be the same as the original. And a CD, so there is finally a proper document of industrial music in The Netherlands and Belgium.
Alfred Boland and I worked this year on The Annual, the Korm Plastics yearbook/magazine, and 200 pages of articles under the flag of ‘everything you didn’t know you were interested in. ‘ A thing of true beauty. If we sell a few, we may repeat this in 2024. If not, we don’t. Oh, and the website got a fresh look, thanks to Bambi and Alfred Boland. Vital Weekly will get one later this week.

As for next year, I hope to expand the book business and publish the Broken Flag book and ‘True Enough, ‘ which is the first LP by The Hafler Trio. I am writing a book on Ron Lessard/RRRecords/Emil Beaulieau, and we have talked for about 30 or more hours. I have a lot of text. Because RRRecords (the store) exists 40 years in 2024, the book should be out in 2024. There are more books in the works! A thought in my mind is to lay Vital Weekly to a (temporary) rest and concentrate fully on publishing books.

I also released two CDs this year, much against the idea that I have a record label. De Muziekkamer’s Kamermuziek has been on my wish list for a CD reissue for ages, so I finally put my money where my mouth is. Later on, I found an old demo from Illusion Of Safety, which Daniel Burke reworked a bit, so I also decided to release that one on CD. That’s for me as a label. I think.

As much music as I did as Modelbau in 2020-2021, this year it was even less than in 2022. Early on, I recorded three 20-minute pieces, all connected, and two will end up on ‘Blackout’ LP, with photos from wartime Kyiv, and one is a 3″CDR for Maneki Neko. I released a cassette with my tape-delay experiments, and work is ongoing on a Modelbau CD with individual pieces, yet I managed to do two more 40-minute pieces. Still, I’d like to avoid becoming the Mike Oldfield of lo-fi ambient.

I didn’t travel to London to meet Steven Wilson, but I certainly will in 2024.

Hopefully, Edward Ka-spel and Peter Johan Nÿland will work some more together and even play a concert. Our Dynasti release was most certainly a highlight of this year.

In February, I visited Wouter Jaspers in Berlin, and we recorded new music, played two concerts together, plus one as Modelbau, and hung out. It was a weekend well spent. In November, I played the second Modelbau concert of this year in Münster, and I ranked that one as the best Modelbau concert ever.
Yesterday, Kapotte Muziek played for the first time in 12 years as a trio in Leverkusen, Germany, and it was an experience we thoroughly enjoyed. Hopefully, something we can repeat next year.

Yes, I read books, a lot of them, and yes, I saw movies, also a lot. No lists. Also, there are no particular great releases or reissues.

releases this year;

[Modelbau]
HONOURS (10″ lathe cut, Spalt-ung, edition of 21 copies)

[Modelbau]
KOPF AB (CDR, licht-ung, edition of 31 copies)

[Modelbau]
EXTRICATE (CD, Sublime Retreat SR 18, edition of 100 copies)

[Modelbau]
RRRECYCLED (cassette, RRRecycled)

[Modelbau]
INSOMNIAC’S DREAM (CDR or cassette, Aphelion Edition. both in an edition of 35)

[Shifts]
WHAT REMAINS (cassette, Grisaille 76, edition of 50 copies)

[Howard Stelzer]
various sounds on ‘Euclid Os A Dead Sponge (Suburban Observances Vol. 3) (CDR, Oxidation, CDROT129)

[Modelbau]
‘The Art Of Peace’ on Tomorrow Is Big Distance (Sentimental Productions sentiment 020)

[Modelbau]
‘My Memory Of What Happened, Is Not What Happened [A Reconstruction]’ on Struppig Mahlen (Licht-ung)

[Modelbau]
MARCH WIND (cassette, Grisaille 67, edition of 38 copies)

[Modelbau]
NIGHT ROUTE (cassette, Cosmic Winnetou CW60, edition of 50 copies)

[Modelbau]
SHADOW MEN (cassette, Anticipating Nowhere Records [anr2.03], edition of 20 copies)

[Dynasti]
QUANTUM PRIMITIV (CD, Klanggalerie GG437)

[Modelbau]
INLETS (CDR, Love Earth Music LEM 301)

[Modelbau]
split with Gerald Fiebig and William Rossi (cassette, Grubenweher Freiburg & Attenuation Circuit GFAC 1003, 50 copies)

[Kapotte Muziek]
Ars Forum, Yaroslavl 2008′ on Fertile Ground (cassette, Odmwa)

[Frans de Waard + Machinefabriek]
untitled track on ‘+’ (Machinefabriek)