Andy Abbott / ADRA Projects

*Fluxus artist Henry Flynt’s term for non-competitive, and non-commercial (art) activities … ‘Consider all of your doings, what you already do. Exclude the gratifying of physiological needs, physically harmful activities, and competitive activities. Concentrate on spontaneous self-amusement or play. That, is concentrate on everything you do because you like it, because you just like it as you do it.’ (1968)

David Birchall and Steve Malley are an experimental guitar duo playing ambient, drone, and free improvisation. David Birchall lives in Manchester. He has played improvised music across Europe and his work has been broadcast on BBC Radio 1, BBC Radio 3, BBC Radio 6 Music & SWR in Germany. He organises and co-curators the Curious Ear series for improvised music in Manchester.

Steve Malley is best known as the driving force of the power trio The Unit Ama. Malley’s solo work as The Horse Loom features beautiful, articulate guitar playing reminiscent of the 60’s folk revivalists such as Bert Jansch and Davey Graham but imbued with a legacy of New Wave and post-rock guitar bands. With his solo SA Malley project he explores the outer edges of the electric guitar via free improv techniques and collaborations.

Andy Abbott is an artist, musician and writer who lives in West Yorkshire, UK. For a long time Andy was synonymous with pummelling noise; playing guitar in celebrated Leeds bands such as the ferocious duo That Fucking Tank or the double-drumming psych outfit Nope. However, in recent years – under his solo moniker ADRA – he has been making minimalist abstract music, alongside more acoustic and ambient-leaning explorations.

In 2024 Andy released ‘Music For Psychiatric Wards (And Fluid Structures)’; a compilation of recordings inspired by his experiences as a creative practitioner performing ambient music in psychiatric wards across Yorkshire in 2023

Previous releases include tapes and vinyl for Bloxham Tapes, Reverb Worship and Folklore Tapes. He has collaborated with Alice Hubble, Aby Vulliamy and Dean McPhee; and shared tours and bills with Maurizio Abate and Above the Tree, Edgars Rubenis, Ex-Easter Island Head and Norway’s Soft Noise Ensemble.

Chicaloyoh
Chicaloyoh is the solo project of French musician Alice Dourlen. Through her career, Alice has had a fascinating trajectory, we dare to say one of the most fascinating of this decade; never staying too much in one territory she has explored ritualistic pyschedelicism, folk, experimental music, industrial, collaging, spoken word, minimal synth to the point that those tags have become meaningless. Never being generic always a true original, each phase sees her more and more in her own world. FFO: Grouper, Nico, Nurse With Wound, Catherine Ribeiro, Roberto di Simone.

Tracks of L’Inventaire des Disparitions have been recommended by The Quietus on their monthly Rockfort mix and by the Independent Music Podcast in UK.

“Chicoloyoh’s sound is incredibly unique, best described as darkly introspective. It’s a magical combination of minimalism (near-tribal drum beats, drones, and repetitive guitar lines) and chant-like vocals which are reminiscent of Nico.” (Soundrainreview)

“Her Nico(esque) dronals seemed to pierce the gloom beautifully, pinned to skuttering beats that reminded me of Danielle Dax in places, as those loose rhythmic folds hungrily ate into the ritualised delivery. […] Curling vocals seemed to haunt the battlements of each song like a screech-less Diamanda Galás. Fallen angels of French baptised in lush keyboards that wavered between pop, psych and something altogether more unquantifiable.” (Freq.org.uk)

“De Nico période The Marble Index à Catherine Ribeiro, Brigitte Fontaine ou Armande Altai, les étalons ne manquent pas pour situer la voix de la Normande Alice Dourlen dans le monde de la musique pop-et-plus-si-affinités. […] avec l’onirisme vicié des films de Kenneth Anger, l’érotisme terrorisant de Sade, l’esotérisme de carton pâte des maîtres mystificateurs Cagliostro, Aleister Crowley ou Helena Blavatsky” (Le Drone)

Barnabaie
Barnabaie puts his classical guitar through effects, adds fragments of tape recordings and adds some vocals here and there. The promise of a stroll along the riverbank with images flashing before the eyes. The sounds coil around themselves. The guitar can be heard and then appears clearly once we have agreed to lose ourselves in the sound textures manipulated by Barnabaie. The landscape has wandered.

Fun Fun Funeral.

fun fun funeral shares its sensitive and audacious pop-songs, bursting with vitality: playful drum machines, saturated synthesizer, high-pitched voice and playground ambiences invite us to a hallucinated pop ceremony. A blend of influences from across the Channel and the Atlantic, in the tradition of Micachu and Animal Collective.

Cambridge’s acclaimed psych-folk quintet Fuzzy Lights return with their fifth album ‘Fen Creatures’, set for release in November via Meadows. Following 2021’s critically lauded ‘Burials’, the band have created their most conceptually ambitious work to date – a meditation on environmental crisis that uses the folklore and history of East Anglia as a lens to examine humanity’s fractured relationship with the natural world.

Where ‘Burials’ explored personal trauma and environmental collapse, ‘Fen Creatures’ expands this vision into something far more sweeping and interconnected. The album operates across multiple historical timelines, from Iron Age hill forts to medieval plague houses, from Byron’s Romantic-era environmental warnings to the immediate threat of rising sea levels, creating a temporal tapestry that weaves ancient stories with contemporary concerns. “In the world we live, with the challenges of environmental devastation and change, it’s really important to reconnect to our history and the land around us,” explains vocalist Rachel Watkins. “We need to learn lessons from the past and try to live with the landscape rather than changing it to fit our needs. The album calls attention to environmental change while exploring how folklore ties to the landscape and our connection to our ancestors.”
Musically, the quintet, Rachel Watkins (vocals/violin), Xavier Watkins (guitar/electronics), Chris Rogers (guitar), Daniel Carney (bass), and Mark Blay (drums), have pushed deeper into experimental drone territories while maintaining the crystalline folk sensibilities that have become their signature. The result is their most atmospheric and immersive work to date, with vast sonic landscapes that mirror the fenland geography they’re documenting.

FEN CREATURES (2025)
“…pitched somewhere between Pentangle and Black Sabbath. Superb stuff.” UNCUT 9/10 (as well as “WE’RE NEW HERE” FEATURE)

“..the musical equivalent of Sandy Denny starring in Hammer Horror film Blood on Satan’s Claw.” MOJO ★★★★

“Spellbinding stuff. These are stories worth reading as well as hearing” SHINDIG ★★★★

“Sprawling, uneasy and rather compelling.”RNR ★★★★

BURIALS (2021)
MOJO ★★★★ | SHINDIG ★★★★ | FINANCIAL TIMES ★★★★ |TWIN FEATHERS (2010) |MOJO UNDERGROUND ALBUM OF THE MONTH ★★★★ | UNCUT ★★★★

Toby Hay

Toby Hay is a guitar player and composer. Fascinated by the connection between landscape and music, he is inspired by the landscapes of the Cambrian Mountains where he lives, and is interested in the connection between improvisation and composition. Toby has toured all over the UK & Ireland performing solo, or collaborating with other musicians. He is the founder of Cambrian Records.

“One of the finest guitarists of his generation.” — KLOF

“Magical work of vast melodic scope.” — RnR Magazine

“These instrumentals are propelled by a restless breeziness that carries them beyond the familiar landscapes of folk…. A shimmering beauty.” — Uncut

“…prolific mid-Wales musician Toby Hay with yet another gorgeous release by the skilful guitarist” — The Guardian

“New Music For The 12 String Guitar is a humble title for this magical work of vast melodic scope.” — RnR Magazine

“Humanity pours forth from every note on this rewarding collection. Images of dew-soaked countrysides emerge as the pastoral folk settings play, the guitarist gifted with an ability to evoke the soul-nourishing rapture of outdoor landscapes not yet despoiled by human intervention. Here’s hoping Hay never loses his ability to translate authentic experience into music of equivalent character.” — Textura

“Toby Hay is a master player and this album, his fourth, is a complete delight from his first raga like chord to its final notes of future promise.” — Fatea

“Each time I listen to these twelve tracks though I hear a new phrase, a different melody that suggests a different mood, an alternate vision. It’s a sound-shifting record in a very positive way and completely captures the excitement and revelation of genuinely new music being made.” — Caught by the River

“I say it is full of human warmth, but it is also tinged with wildness, and this I think is the beauty of Toby Hay, and of New Music For The 12 String Guitar in particular: he is able to convey multiple different emotions and represent multiple objects or landscapes, often simultaneously, and all with nothing more than a single instrument. This is the sign of a master musician at work, and Hay certainly fits that description. It is only two years since his debut and he is already one of the finest guitarists of his generation.” — Folk Radio

Holly Blackshaw

Never being much of a city girl, Holly was born and raised in and around Hull, East Yorkshire, but always found sanctuary in what wild she could in the warp lands. Holly grew in psych/rock/folk band Crooked Weather, where world wide travelling and touring ensued, before parting ways in 2020. During the pandemic Holly uprooted and moved to Radnorshire, Mid-Wales where she honed her sound as a solo artist and now, her first release is eagerly anticipated. Holly still holds all the places she’s set foot and settled close, carried by her lilting vocals and guitar playing.

“With a voice that comes around, at best, once in a generation, Holly Blackshaw is a crucible of sounds of both folk and psychedelia. She manages to produce music that breaks and follows tradition”
— Jeff Conklin, WFMU

“Gave me goosebumps all over my soul”
— Adam Walton, BBC Radio Wales

Dal:um – alongside peers Park Jiha, Jambinai and Leenalchi – are at the forefront of a new Korean music. The duo of Ha Suyean and Hwang Hyeyoung are virtuosos on two different types of traditional zithers, the gayageum and geomungo, and their music deftly navigates a plethora of contemporary influences: minimalism, experimental folk and abstract jazz. The sound of 21st century Seoul, where the boundaries of tradition are stretched and occasionally broken.

Coexistence is released on tak:til, Glitterbeat’s instrumental music imprint, and home to artists such as Brìghde Chaimbeul, Širom, Jon Hassell and Park Jiha.

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Something magical is happening on the South Korean music scene, and it isn’t K-Pop. Blow away the froth, and it is soon apparent that in the concert halls and clubs of Seoul and beyond, a febrile music scene is bubbling up. The Dal:um duo are at the forefront of new Korean music, bringing a questing, modernising energy to timeless traditions.

Ha Suyean and Hwang Hyeyoung grew up learning formal Korean gugak music, excelling on two different types of zithers: the gayageum and geomungo respectively. But these two young women soon became restless. Dal:um is the sound of 21st century Seoul, where the boundaries of tradition are stretched (and occasionally broken) to create something unique.
Dal:um translates as ‘to keep pursuing something’, a name which couldn’t be more apposite. Suyean and Hyeyoung garnered wide acclaim and toured around the world with their debut album, Similar and Different (Tak:til/Glitterbeat, 2021), and with their second album, Coexistence, they are taking another leap forward.

Similar and Different was the sound of two musicians pushing and pulling one another. In Coexistence they have become one: one with one another, one with the wider world around them, one with life itself. It is music that is deeply personal, but personal in the way that it absorbs the life that surrounds the pair, finding peace, fear, drama and – ultimately – hope.
Coexistence was forged at the tail end of the COVID pandemic. The duo, who first met as members of the Seoul Metropolitan Youth Traditional Music Ensemble, determined that this time round they would compose the whole album themselves. They took inspiration from the nature around them in Seoul, as well as from their tours in Europe, where long car journeys took them through natural landscapes that were strikingly different from home. “The pandemic made us realise how precious the things around us truly are,” they explain. “As we wrote, we contemplated the value of living alongside other living things. The question that arose was: how can we harmoniously coexist with the life surrounding us? We wanted to encapsulate these thoughts in our music.”

Recording in Seoul’s A&Tive Studio, Suyean and Hyeyoung resisted the temptation to add unnecessary bells and whistles to their music, sticking resolutely to the dynamic between their two instruments. Both the gayageum and the geomungo are made of long, rectangular blocks of Paulownia wood with strings strung across them. Each string is arched over a moveable wooden bridge at a different point along the length of the instrument. The 25-string gayageum is typically the more melodic and lyrical of the pair, lending itself to repeated undulating melodies. The geomungo is its more boisterous cousin. The bamboo-stick plectrum struck against its six thick strings produces the thrilling thwack and twang that is so distinctive in Korean music. Hyeyoung also brings a novel approach to the instrument by sawing at the strings with a bow, creating a scratchy wave of noise during the music’s most intense moments.

We can hear both instruments at their fullest on the opening number, ‘DOT’. A manifesto of sorts, it has the precision and urgency of morse code brought to life. In their words: “We were focussing on the ‘dot’ as a musical motif characteristic of string instruments. The expanding pattern of these dot motifs in both the gayageum and geomungo symbolises the continuous progress of Dal:um.”

Further into the album, ‘Dodry’, calls upon the duo’s musical education by incorporating elements of ‘Suyeonjangjigok’, a piece from Korea’s Joseon era that was used to pray for the longevity of the king. The title comes from dodry, the traditional Korean musical form that is similar to the repeat sign in Western music. In this piece Dal:um reflect on the daily routines which accumulate to shape who we are. With the strings ringing out in sustained notes, it is radical in its starkness and has the elegance of a Chopin nocturne.

The inspiration for another number on Coexistence is the work of English visual artist Cornelia Parker, whose fascination with opposites and transformations led to her mixing snake poison and its antidote with black and white inks. The interplay between the gayageum and geomungo on the track ‘Poison and Antidote’ finds the two musicians seemingly clawing at one another, then coming together to represent the writhing serpent itself. Equally evocative is the closing track, which was written in response to the television documentary My Octopus Teacher (Pippa Ehrlich & James Reed, 2020), which followed a diver in South Africa. ‘In the Deep’, reflects what the duo describe as a “beautiful yet fierce’ underwater ecosystem, the enquiring strings questioning humanity’s place in nature.”

Like the sea, on the surface this album stretches to the horizon with rippling, translucent patterns. The duo’s symbiotic connection and instrumental mastery is both awesome and strangely reassuring. Those who dive deeper will find that the album has a beautiful yet fierce ecosystem of its own. All life is to be found here. Near and far. Old and new. Fear. Hope. All… in coexistence.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2–j6gzKxmM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-KXzx96juvg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFR7q1RpWoo

— ADRA —

Andy Abbott is an artist, musician and writer who lives in West Yorkshire, UK. For a long time Andy was synonymous with pummelling noise; playing guitar in celebrated Leeds bands such as the ferocious duo That Fucking Tank or the double-drumming psych outfit Nope. However, in recent years – under his solo moniker ADRA – he has been making minimalist abstract music, alongside more acoustic and ambient-leaning explorations.

In 2024 Andy released ‘Music For Psychiatric Wards (And Fluid Structures)’; a compilation of recordings inspired by his experiences as a creative practitioner performing ambient music in psychiatric wards across Yorkshire in 2023

Previous releases include tapes and vinyl for Bloxham Tapes, Reverb Worship and Folklore Tapes. He has collaborated with Alice Hubble, Aby Vulliamy and Dean McPhee; and shared tours and bills with Maurizio Abate and Above the Tree, Edgars Rubenis, Ex-Easter Island Head and Norway’s Soft Noise Ensemble.

“a beautifully structured hour of ambient music; reflective and calm with endlessly unravelling layers.” – Uncut, 2024

“…a genre-defying album that is as fluid as its title would suggest. From the patter of the steel pan to the whirr and drone of the organ, what unfurls in between these two harbours is a deeply searching travelogue; at times water-like, at others light-filled as if in some kind of morning glow.” – The Quietus, 2024

‘a remarkably affecting series of tracks that vary quite wildly in terms of mood and instrumentation … I could listen to it for weeks.’ – Norman Records, 2024

“the album is reminiscent of composers like La Monte Young, Hans Otto or Arco Part, where the approach is to pick out a nuanced emotion and explore it fully. That said, there is also adventure in the album’s minimalism. It feels much like a meandering, richly-adorned Greg Foat composition, split out into its constituent parts, each given the chance to live and breathe independently of one another.” – Dirty Sunbeams, 2024

“This is another solo project helmed by the Bradford based musician Andrew DR Abbott, whose work cartwheels through genres the way fat old men wish they could move through cheese. It is the first documentation of ADRA, and it’s quite a package … The music is improvised on a variety of instruments (from baritone guitar to ocarina), and the pieces are designed to inspire us to dream of a post-capitalist utopia. Since I do that all the time already, this is just the sort of thing I should be listening to. As should you. A great offering of the minimal as maximal.” – Byron Coley for The Wire, 2020

Bhajan Bhoy
Drawing from a deep well of psychedelia, Bhajan Bhoy further shifts the parameters of the genre with a beautiful and meditative set of tracks. Within this kaleidoscopic sonic universe, you will find raga-esque excursions, meditative Dream House drone, Laurel Canyon-recalling folk, electronic soundscapes and heavy guitar riffola (sometimes two chords are enough!). This is the sound of freedom! Imagine Pandit Pran Nath, Spacemen 3, Pauline Oliveros and Don Cherry drinking psilocybin tea and letting loose in a studio.

“a unique soundworld broad enough to encompass wild psych-noise guitar, dream-pop lullabies, and futuristic drones with thrilling results” / Mojo Magazine

“With BHAJAN BHOY, Saggar synthesizes all of the stylistic approaches he’s explored over the years, swirling them into an intoxicating musical blend, with an earthy spirituality. Even the project’s name reflects the dual aspects of Saggar’s upbringing coming together in harmony. In Hindi, a “bhajan” is a devotional song, sung in the mandir, or temple, while “bhoy” is a Scottish and Irish derivation for a young man. There’s a searching quality to Bhajan Bhoy, as if Saggar is still hunting for transcendence with each track, whether through an expansive drone, an orchestral facility on the piano, or an electronics-augmented raga that threatens to dip into noise” (Erick Bradshaw / writer and WFMU DJ).

—

Piró is the project of Alex, a musical individual from the fearsome city of extreme seasons and the cierzo wind, affectionately nicknamed Zaragoza.
A proud member of the city’s struggling DIY scene, he finds his voice in an oasis called Arrebato. His melodies navigate folk music with diverse roots, primarily driven by the guitar.

His songs narrate the disillusionment of politics, the joy of humanity, and the non-accidental nature of anxiety, all infused with a deep love for the instrument.

“A self-confessed lover of Richard Dawson and Richard Bishop… although really it’s only because they’re named Richard, and basically, he adores every Richard in the world.”

https://md-us.bandcamp.com/…/es-mejor-prevenir-que-causar

PIRÓ — Inter Sopena en ARREBATO – YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ja8bizHCfD8…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxXbzn4J9aI…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNcIQ2FbE6Y…

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Dean McPhee plays a Fender Telecaster through a valve amp and subwoofer with kick drum and effects, and he is influenced by Dub, Modal Jazz, British Folk, Underground Electronic Music and Psychedelic Rock. A self-taught musician with a fluid technique and an inventive approach to sound, his music is melodic, hypnotic and trance-inducing with a deep sense of space.

Dean has toured the UK and Europe and opened for artists such as Thurston Moore, The Magic Band, Acid Mothers Temple, Michael Chapman, Meg Baird, Michael Hurley, Josephine Foster, Emeralds, Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe, Charalambides and Wolf People. His music has received international radio play and has been acclaimed by the likes of MOJO Magazine, The Wire Magazine, Dusted, Louder than War, Uncut Magazine, Brainwashed and The Quietus.

“At any given time, there are always a handful of visionary guitarists who carve out their own compelling and distinctive niche, as well as many more who exhibit virtuosic technique or write consistently great songs. McPhee’s work checks off all three of those boxes, but his greatest moments reach another plane altogether where it feels like he is channeling something much deeper, more timeless, and almost supernatural”(Anthony D’Amico, Brainwashed)

“Set within an electric ancestry that includes Michael Karoli’s solos in Can, the hymnal rock of Popol Vuh’s Daniel Fichelscher and the sonic spaciousness of dub, as well as the emotional punch of John Martyn’s dawn-lit Echoplex epic, ‘Small Hours’.” (Frances Morgan, The Quietus)

“Definitely one of the leading contemporary guitar stylists in the UK, and in the world”(Steve Barker, BBC ‘On the Wire’)

ALULA DOWN (Kate Gathercole & Mark Waters) make music that is born of relationship, exploring connection with the land and with the magical and ordinariness of our human-being – treating the ecology of place as a point of communion.

With eclectic musical roots, they make use of collage, improvisation and field recording. Their explorations of folk song and their own self written songs are underpinned with drone and textured soundscape. Recognising that many traditional / vernacular (‘folk’) songs illuminate dispossession and inequality, Alula Down explore these divisions between self and other.
They have been acclaimed by The Guardian ‘Folk Album of the Month’.

Kate & Mark live in Herefordshire and have played music together since they first met. Recent musical collaborations include work with multi-award winning author Max Porter, and playing with celebrated banjo player Jacken Elswyth on her album At Fargrounds. They also sing and play with psych-folk band Sproatly Smith, make improv noise with rushes/esp, and sing a-cappella with the Bushel Bag Carollers.

Part of The Weirdshire Society, they support local shows featuring folk, left-field and experimental live music from travelling musicians. Kate & Mark also run seasonal community folk song choirs in Herefordshire.

—

As ambient folk artist Black Brunswicker, Etta Helfrich creates rich ground for reflection with roaming instrumentals closely rooted in nature, casting a restful spell. The Bloomington, Indiana-born artist grew up in the Midwest and brings the sweeping plains of the landscape into their expansive guitar-led sound, drawing you closer to something primordial, vast, and earthy.

Accordingly bound up with a sense of adventure and wanderlust, much of Helfrich’s output has been shaped by the experience of travel (Helfrich is now based in Manchester, UK), from the small trips taken around her new UK home on Wanderers in the North (2020) and the pastel-hued snapshot of the Czech Republic on Age of Aristocracy (2019) to the daydreaming that propelled the 2020 lockdown release Wilder Paths.

Her 2024 full-length Been Around Here Before used DIY tape loops, field recordings, and washes of ambient guitar to map out the Midwest through a collection of mellowed-out, sun-glazed postcards. Recorded with local musicians from the Indiana-born artist’s new home in Manchester, England—including vocalist Emily Mercer—the LP revisits US road trips and natural beauty spots to build a summer scrapbook of her past, helping her to process present-day anxieties and find a quiet stillness through music.

Foundational math rock / post-metal / jazz-core band Dazzling Killmen have announced they have re-formed and will be performing live again starting in September of 2025.

Founding members, vocalist/guitarist Nick Sakes and drummer Blake Fleming will be playing together for the first time since disbanding 30 years ago. The two will be joined by bassist Evan Jagels and guitarist Ben Greenberg of the band Uniform.

Dazzling Killmen formed in the St. Louis area in 1990 and was composed of vocalist/guitarist Nick Sakes and jazz students – drummer Blake Fleming and bassist Darin Gray. The group issued four singles, a live cassette and two full-lengths before officially ending in 1995, with a majority of it released through the independent label SKiN GRAFT Records. Guitarist Tim Garrigan later joined the band after guesting on their “Medicine Me” single. The group would break up in the fall of 1995, prior to a planned tour of Japan with Jim O’Rourke, Melt-Banana, Space Streakings and Zeni Geva.

Sakes went on to play in the band Colossamite with future Deerhoof members Ed Rodriguez and John Dieterich. He is currently a member of the Minneapolis post-hardcore trio Upright Forms, who released their debut LP “Blurred Wires” last year. Fleming was the founding drummer of Laddio Bolocko and then The Mars Volta. He recently performed with Jagels in the band Shatter on Impact, as heard on SKiN GRAFT’s “Sounds To Make You Shudder!” Halloween compilation.

Taking influence from hardcore punk and jazz music, Dazzling Killmen has been noted by critics and peers as having influenced the genres that came to be known as math rock and post-metal. The band’s final album “Face of Collapse” was reissued in a deluxe, expanded edition in 2016 and again in 2022 in by SKiN GRAFT Records.

Live in 2025 video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wn36I8OTHP4