'Ed Laurie evokes the feeling of calm before the storm. With haunting vocals and gentle, Spanish-inflected guitar, 'Meanwhile In The Park' is a dark and stormy affair. Like all great songwriters, Ed Laurie takes his influences and moulds them into something entirely new and unique. An artist of rare and exceptional talent' NIGEL WILLIAMSON, THE GUARDIAN, UK

Fabio Bonelli's side project, of Milaus.

The Versailles Sessions

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/10245-poste-y-telegrafi/
Italian guitarist Alessandro "Asso" Stefana has gall. For his solo debut, Poste e Telegrafi, Stefana treats his guitar like a quarter-piece of the puzzle. He collaborates with six people and avoids the guitar altogether on two of these seven tracks. He alternately employs the 1980s electronics artifact the omnichord, a "strings machine," various African percussion instruments, and vinyl loops to build intricate, subtly shaped substrates for his meticulous, twang-redolent guitar fantasies. Largely because it avoids the solo guitar record template, Poste e Telegrafi is one of the most striking works you'll hear from a young composer all year. His guitar playing is graceful and dexterous, his fluid phrases are precise without feeling stiff. The cast here includes guitar maverick Marc Ribot, Italian songwriter Marco Parente, and Brian Eno/Nick Cave collaborator Leo Abrahams. The ends of Stafana's phrases, though, are about not perfecting the right note, but, instead, letting the assumed resolution ... [read more]

Julia Kent (cello + pedals) + Barbara De Dominicis (voice + live electronics) + Davide Lonardi (video installation)

Live/Impro performance/project in progress for cello, electronics,voice & visuals Parallel-° 41is a small journey that we decided to embark on after a series of musical events experienced  together that go under the name of Intermittenze.(youtube.com/watch?v=eYzwNQKQKl8)
We aim  to realize some sessions of "spontaneous" recordings (audio/video) influenced by the environment in which they happen (Recording sessions can be "open" to a public but not necessarily and/or  can be followed or preceded by a live performance--in the vicinity of the chosen-place (but not necessarily....) We decided and tried to play completely free, an improvisation without any set parameters or compositional ideas but the unique influence of  the places that host us. We use  cello, pedals, voice, images, ... [read more]

2012 looks set to be a very busy year for Leaf and we're thrilled to announce that we've signed the Portland, Oregon-based duo AU. AU is Luke Wyland and Dana Valatka and their first release with us will be ‘Solid Gold’, taken from their forthcoming album, Both Lights. The single will be released on Jan 9, with the album to follow in March.

AU (pronounced ‘ay-you’) first came to our attention in 2009 with the brilliant Versions EP, but Both Lights is really the long-gestating follow-up to 2008’s Verbs album. In the interim Wyland has stripped his previously extensive band down to a two-piece, rewriting his own rulebook and honing the duo’s considerable talents. They’re quite capable of delivering astonishing, muscular live ... [read more]

Minneapolis based chamber-folk sextet Dark Dark Dark revel in the wonder that is around us always. On their breathtaking sophomore album Wild Go, the band has created a stirring reminder to seek out that magic. Their dramatic sound sets Nona Marie Invie’s soaring, haunting voice against age-old instrumentation that evokes the soundtrack to a beautiful film.
The 10-song collection is a marked evolution for the group, which began in 2006 as a collaboration between multi-instrumentalists and singers Nona Marie Invie and Marshall LaCount. These two inspired songwriters bring together disparate influences – including minimalism, New Orleans jazz, Americana, Eastern European folk, and pop – creating something altogether singular and absolutely epic. This diversity is their greatest strength. They use contrast - in texture, tone, and imagery - to build their own deeply-experienced world into the songs. For example, on the single "Daydreaming," Invie's warm voice and piano are supported by sparse and clean drums, a guitar with lush reverb, and cascades of dirty and distorted banjo, while an accordion wanders its way through harmonies.

For Wild Go, the group expanded the sound they captured on their ... [read more]

After years of playing cello with a myriad of artists and ensembles, Julia Kent retired to her Lower East Side apartment to make a solo record inspired by touring and the disjunctions of travel. Incorporating multitracked cello, omnichord, and field recordings from airports around the world, her "lovely, melancholy," compositions, full of "aching romanticism ... rich melodicism, and detailed arrangements," make up /Delay/, her solo debut, released by Shayo Records in Europe and Important Records in North America.

She has performed solo in Europe, the UK, New York, and Canada, using live looping and effects to create layers of melody and rhythm on the cello. Of her appearance at the Donau Festival in Austria, the Wire said: “Cellist Julia Kent's set, in which she sampled and played over herself, was a thing of miniature beauty.” Lucid Culture described a recent New York appearance as: "...riveting and frequently cinematic...moving from trippy, echoey and atmospheric to stark and haunting..."

TBA