***The Benoît Pioulard Listening Matter is the sixth kranky album from THOMAS MELUCH under the nom de plume BENOIT PIOULARD. It arrives on the 10th anniversary of his first LP Précis, and offers a rekindled focus on self-examination, as well as a return to vocal-based pop structures following the mostly instrumental Sonnet (2015). Recording for the Listening Matter began during a period of grief, turmoil and self-medication, and continued throughout two years of growth and healing. Reflections on vice (“Layette,” “Anchor as the Muse”), virtue (“Narcologue”) and death (“A mantle for Charon”) feature equally in this concise treatise aimed at the flawed-but-resilient core in us all. By coincidence this album was completed on the very day Meluch’s only brother died; accordingly, it’s dedicated to him and anyone seeking paths away from their demons. No Export to the EU / UK.
LP $19.00
10/14/2016
CD $14.00
10/14/2016
***CHECK STOCK!!! Received a 7.2 rating from Pitchfork. The sound of the fifth BENOIT PIOLARD full length is lush and verdant, a temperate rain forest of ear ecstasy that reflects the environment surrounding the artist. A mostly instrumental work, it is an adept melding of song and sound, melody and texture, the intangible and the palpable, that in an abstract sense recalls the more fractured and loose end of the ‘70s krautrock movement. (STREET DATE - 3/31/2015) "The basis of the album was a series of field recordings of tones and unintentional harmonies that I made in the summer & fall of 2013—whistling industrial air conditioners, bird songs, locust drones, washing machines—that I mimicked or interpreted on the guitar, making loops that developed into fuller compositions. Several of the pieces are recreations of harmony loops that I heard in a series of extraordinarily vivid dreams, and then woke up and recorded. A few pieces had lyrics and vocal parts that I ultimately removed; at a certain point the album became an exercise in restraint, so I strove to leave only what I felt absolutely essential. Unlike most of my previous recordings, there are no digital / software after-effects on the album; all sounds are from analog tape and / or my few guitar pedals."—Thomas Meluch (Benoit Pioulard)
LP $19.00
03/31/2015
CD $14.00
03/31/2015
***NOW AVAILABLE ON VINYL!!! Hymnal is the fourth kranky album by THOMAS MELUCH under his musical alias BENOIT PIOULARD, following Précis (2006), Temper (2008) and Lasted (2010). It was written and recorded throughout a year spent in southeastern England and on the European mainland, during which the ubiquity of religious iconography and grandiose cathedrals became an unexpected muse. Raised as a Catholic but never especially pious, Meluch drew on this aspect of social history as the basis for Hymnalʼs 12 chapters. He notes a particular preoccupation with the ways that faith offers a sense of solace and belonging in an existence that inherently provides none, framed in a context of tradition, ritual and the notion of the eternal. Themes aside, Hymnal contains some of Meluchʼs most expansive instrumental works (“Knell,” “Gospel”) and fully realized pop compositions (“Hawkeye,” “Reliquary,” “Margin”), making for a rich and dynamic long-playing arc. Also featured are string arrangements by kranky label mate FELIX and guitar work from ambient maestro KYLE BOBBY DUNN. NB: The albumʼs cover depicts the dessicated interior of a centuries-old tree on the estate of surrealist Edward James. (STREET DATE - 3/05/2013)
LP $19.00
03/05/2013
CD $14.00
03/05/2013
***CHECK STOCK!!! Received a 7.9 rating from Pitchfork. Lasted is the third album by THOMAS MELUCH under the alias BENOIT PIOULARD. Thomas has toured throughout North America and Europe since his last record, the process of which has had a marked impact on the development of these songs as lyrics and structures have been scrapped, tweaked and reworked in the live setting. As with previous albums it was recorded and mixed in domestic isolation, this time throughout the rainy season in his current home of Portland, Oregon. While the extent of the dreary climate’s influence on the results is left to the listener’s discretion, what is certain is that Thomas has a preternatural ability to weave disparate sound components into a cohesive sonic tapestry, mixing a varied palette of field recordings and percussive elements along with melancholy melodies to create songs that recall—and are akin to—vespers of long-buried memories.
LP $19.00
10/12/2010
CD $14.00
12/07/2010
***Précis is the first album from Michigan’s THOMAS MELUCH under his musical pseudonym BENOIT PIOULARD. Following a series of limited, handmade cassette and CDR releases for friends and family over the last several years, and the well-received Enge EP (Moodgadget 2005), Précis arose as a documentation of a coming to terms with impermanence, marked by analog residue and the imperfections of human influence. A multi-instrumentalist with an insatiable palette, Pioulard bases most of his songs on treated acoustic guitars and honeyed vocals, backed by carefully layered bells, bass, dulcimer, old tape samples, field recordings and myriad other sources. These sounds, though sculpted roughly into pop songs, have their own delicate patterns of ebb and flow, distortion and disappearance. From the sunny refrain of “Triggering Back” to the descent of nighttime chills on “Needle & Thread”, Précis sighs in time with the seasons. It's an album about him, her, and you; it's an exaltation of the ways these things end.
CD $14.00
10/16/2006