Richard Youngs
Festival
1994

Table of the Elements
[Scandium] TOE-LP-21
Compact disc, obi

British multi-instrumentalist Richard Youngs's recordings are stylistically diverse, sonically wondrous and aesthetically unmatched. Breathtakingly intimate instrumentals share space with lovely, folksy vocal numbers and dense electronics. Sonic elements meet in conflict, or occasionally fall into a strange harmony, where beauty and dissonance coexist.

In this, his first solo CD, Richard fuses disparate instrumentation—homemade electronics, plaintive vocals, clock chimes and found objects—into a lengthy series of pealing, minimal compositions that owe more to the slowly evolving drones and repetitive themes of Advent than any of his subsequent works. Dense electronic squalls are juxtaposed against shimmering percussion, culminating in the marvelously hypnotic finale, "The Sea Is Madness.”

“Richard Youngs is no less than the grand-meister of contemporary British improv, spiritual son of Eddie Prevost and Maddy Prior; gentle manipulator of English hymn-notics and religious incantations; protege, challenger and radicaliser of folk, blues, rock, minimalism and improvisation; translator for the sea and the rain and the sky; ambassador to war and peace, to love and anguish, and poet-seducer of souls." —Melody Maker

Richard Youngs
Advent
1997

Table of the Elements
[Niobium] TOE-CD-41
Compact disc

Advent (1990) was the debut recording from Richard Youngs, originally released in a vinyl edition of 300. Folk, improvisation and minimalism unite in slowly evolving drones and splendid, repetitive themes. This first-ever CD version was digitally re-mastered from the original tapes.

“A three-part composition for piano, voice, and ultra-nasty oboe and electric guitar, Advent indicated signs of life in a genre long dormant in the 80s 'experimental' scene. It continues the tradition from [Terry Riley's] Reed Streams on down with gusto." —Alan Licht, Minimal Top Ten List, Halana

 
 

 

A Conduit for History Exploding in the Present Moment

TABLE OF THE ELEMENTS is a curatorial network and interdisciplinary platform, live-event presenter, and fine-arts publisher of print, audio, and film, lauded by Pitchfork Media as “a national treasure.” Since its origin as a record label in 1993, TotE has been dedicated to preserving, promoting, and promulgating works by international creators of experimental audio, electroacoustics, free-improvised performance, sonic sculpture, microtonality, and modern composition. The label’s 150-plus releases are a vital contemporary chronicle, a survey of meaningful eruptions across a broad horizon of sound and vision.  Each project demonstrates how a publishing concern might romp wild, unbridled from the carousel of convention.

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Tony Conrad: Completely In the Present
A Film by Tyler Hubby

"Hubby's film captures Conrad in all his facets ... broadly as a man determined to make 'abstract art funny, happy, energetic, joyful.' Conrad lived long enough to see his early recordings, barely or never released, get the reissue and the attention they deserve. ... [Completely In the Present] is a sharp, sweet, eloquent documentary about the merriest, most artistically expansive minimalist on record. His work and his life asserted the importance of listening for the sounds nobody else has heard."

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All contents ©1992–2025 Table of the Elements ®2025 Table of the Elements Ltd. All Rights Reserved. Related media from the Table of the Elements Archive published courtesy the estate of Tony Conrad.

Since 1993, Table of the Elements has staked its claim on a massive enterprise. It intends nothing less than to rewrite the history of American music in the second half of the 20th century -- and beyond. The label’s 150-plus releases are a vital contemporary chronicle, a survey of meaningful eruptions across a broad horizon of improvised, experimental, minimal and outsider sounds.

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