A Journey Down The Well :::: blog

How Little Can Be The Orchestra review on Turkey's nation wide distributed newspaper

2011-12-17T16:37:00.003+02:00

Our latest EP "How Little Can Be The Orchestra" reviewed by Murat Beşer on the Turkey's nation wide distributed daily newspaper Cumhuriyet. Here is the English traslation:

ALBUMS ON DISPLAY
MURAT BEŞER

A Journey Down the Well
‘How Little Can be the Orchestra’
(Fluttery Records)

A Journey Down the Well has come out with their new EP “How Little Can be the Orchestra” recently in which modern music meets electronics in a modern expression that they have cultivated. This 20 minutes EP is a following work after the band’s “The Funeral Album” and “Sorry Monsters, I have to Grow” . A Journey Down the Well has been formated by Taner Torun in 2006 with his swedish friends Anna and Martin which continued as a band until the release of their first album. Unfortunatelly they have broke up as a reason of physically being in different countries. Now the new band member is the cellist İpek Zeynep Kadioglu. Although there is a pessimistic possession on the songs, still there is a great pastel tones one can hear that imitates all the goodness of life itself. Apart from the sounds of classical music instruments there are musical scenery that created by automobile voices, fans slogans and kitten voices mixed with sonic touch. This EP is a gathering of classical music’s deepness and punk music’s destructiveness. This logbook of music has been created by short expressive sentences in a mysterious, minimal and instrumental style.

Taner and İpek; they are the sympathetic version of grotesque fiction characters Gargantua and Pantagruel. They are contrast and also compatible as like poping out of a Goya’s painting or Poe’s writings. Peculiar and surprising in their musical forms, combination of contrasts in dialectics. Their music is emotional and bleak formed by neo-classic and dark ambient which hooks up Rachmaninov and Brian Eno.
Silent screams and elegant denials. This EP can only be identified by winter season and a warm red wine...

Guilty Forest reviews A Journey Down The Well

2011-11-20T17:29:00.002+02:00

Guilty Forest from Japan reviews A Journey Down The Well. Thanks for Akasaka Takahiro writing this review and thanks for my dear friend Jun Minowa for translating this review. (Also check his music projects Yawning and Gargle)

Link of the review in Japanese

Translation:

This is a good Modern Classical EP consisting of 4 songs that will embrace us with its tender sound.

Ambient electronic sound appears throughout the EP but it is as a whole composed of classical strings of melodies. The natural and soft sound brings us a sense of excitement and also offers us comfort. However, at the same time its sharpness mixed with the warmth makes this EP more attractive. The splendid atmosphere created by repeating strings of melodies is natural and strong. The shimmering sound reminds us of beautiful sceneries.

We can fully experience their good Modern Classical music on the first track “How” and the second track “Little”. The third track “Can Be” is an impressive ambient drone song with the stateliness of classical music in it. The fourth track “The Orchestra” is an ambient song which is creating a scenery of which as if we get lost in deep woods with repeating serene and turbulent melodies. The sampled animal calls create the atmosphere of the song in a good way, and the violin coming from the middle gives us an impression that talks diverse feelings. The particles of the shimmering sound which is like a scenery of quietly flowing water and falling drizzle really move us. The four-song EP is drawing a calm and stately story

This fantastic piece draws not only the gentleness and the softness but also the stateliness and the turbulence by adding ambient arrangement based on the lush colors of strings which represent diverse sceneries. This is a 4-song EP, but I’m totally enraptured by the classical and flowing wave of sound.
If you are interested, take a touch to this fantastic sound.

Em Transe's New Episode

2011-11-16T18:59:00.002+02:00

A Journey Down The Well aired with Richard Skelton, Svarte Greiner, Jacaszek, Jasper TX on Em Transe. Have listen to this great episode of the show. Listen

Playlist:

1ª parte - Ricardo Mariano:

Alessio Ballerini - "Outro"
A Journey Down The Well - "Can Be"
Leonardo Rosado - "Unfinished Sympathy"
Alessio Ballerini - "Zeit Part One"
Richard Skelton - "Undertow"
Gustavo Santaolalla -"When Our Wings Are Cut, Can We Still Fly (Performed By Kronos Quartet)"
Christina Vantzou - "And Instantly Take Efect"
Svarte Greiner - "Final Sleep"

2ª parte - Ricardo Carvalho:
Jacaszek - "Dare Gale"
Leyland Kirby - "This is the Story of Paradise Lost"
Jasper TX - "Weight of Days"
Moss - "Moss"

Fluttery Records' Press Release

2011-11-01T00:08:00.003+02:00

A Journey Down The Well releases a new EP called "How Little Can Be The Orchestra"

A Journey Down The Well, the band known for creating extraordinary classical music pieces, has released a new EP; “How Little Can Be The Orchestra”

A Journey Down The Well has just released a new four song EP revealing their impulsive, unusual, minimalist approach to classical music . This is their first entirely instrumental release, as well as the first release of A Journey Down The Well as a duo. The EP is released by post-rock, ambient, modern classical based label, Fluttery Records. It can also be streamed free and purchased on the label website. http://flutteryrecords.com/flttry025.html

A Journey Down The Well was founded in 2006 by musicians from Turkey (Taner) and Sweden (Anna and Martin). In 2010, after releasing two albums (The Funeral Album - 2007 and Sorry Monsters, I Have To Grow – 2009) the Swedish wing left the band citing the difficulty in traveling between the two countries. Taner Torun (the only founding member remaining in the band as well as the owner of Fluttery Records) has moved the project to his hometown and partnered with Ipek Zeynep Kadioglu (cellist, Mimar Sinan Conservatory & Manchester University School of Music and Drama graduate).

The new compositions contains rich string pieces (“How”), beautiful piano-violin-cello arrangements (“Little”), ambient structures created through delay manipulations (“Can Be”) and processed cellos made to sound like a ship's foghorn (end of “The Orchestra”).

Taner Torun says “The EP is called How Little Can Be The Orchestra and we have reasons for this. First of all, we recorded it just two people and it explains about minimalist nature of our music. Also, there is still sadness but also a gleam of hope. All four songs are about how little things have importance and make people happy with their existence like birds, kittens, children and toy instruments.”

How Little Can Be Orchestra also contains various field recordings alongside the music. Cars pass by on the street and a little girl yells at them from the window (02), fans celebrate their victory (03), newborn kittens sing along with other animals and it becomes a choir (04). Torun says “They are not spices to make the compositions colorful. They are the core elements of the compositions just like piano, violin and cello.”

The album is highly recommended if you like modern classical music, ambient, Peter Broderick, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Biosphere, Goldmund, Olafur Arnalds, Nils Frahm, Anne Muller, Silver Mt. Zion, Helios, Alva Noto, Brian Eno, Max Richter, Balmorhea, Sigur Ros, Rafael Anton Irisarri, Vivaldi, Bach, Philip Glass and John Cage.

Fluttery Records is an independent record label focusing on Post-rock, Ambient, Experimental, Electronic, Modern Classical music. All label releases can be streamed free on the label website. The album is available on major music download stores like Itunes, Bandcamp and AmazonMP3. The CD can be purchased from the Fluttery Records website.

http://www.flutteryrecords.com/flttry025.html

New EP "How Little Can Be The Orchestra" has been released

2011-10-20T23:39:00.001+03:00

Yes, listen, read the infos, buy here. http://www.flutteryrecords.com/flttry025.html
Don't forget to share the link

2011-10-03T11:02:00.000+03:00

Here is the cover of our upcoming EP "How Little Can Be The Orchestra"

2011-10-01T00:47:00.002+03:00

Our new EP is coming soon! 20 October 2011, Fluttery Records.

A Journey Down The Well - Sugarman (Video)

2011-01-14T08:14:00.002+02:00

Stop-motion / animation video is directed by four talented director: André Schäfer,Volkan Çenberoğlu, Dirk Disch, Sabine Ehinger. Million thanks!

Store List Update

2010-08-08T05:18:00.004+03:00

For "Sorry Monsters, I Have To Grow"
CD STORES
Kunaki, CD Universe, CDBaby, CD Connection, Amazon, CDandLP, GEMM, Google Produts, INandOut
(Best price: Kunaki - 10 USD)
Also available on thousands of music stores in USA, EU and rest of the world. Check the top-right bar in the Fluttery Records' website to buy from a local store in your country.

DIGITAL DOWNLOADS
iTunes, Bandcamp, AmazonMP3, Rhapsody, eMusic, ShockHound
(Best price : Bandcamp - 5.60 USD )

Thank you very much John

2010-05-06T18:17:00.004+03:00

Our latest album's ( Sorry Monsters, I Have To Grow ) cover and insert arts made by this artist. Ladies and Gentelman, his name is John Drescher, A gifted artist living in Canada.

John Drescher specializes in realism / surrealism drawings on various mediums created with pencil and graphite. Several of his works are in private collections across Canada.

Born in Vancouver, British Columbia, John continues to extend and refine elements of his artistic processes after twenty years of study and application.

To know more about him
Visit His Website
Visit his Facebook page

Thanks a lot John!

Two Beautiful Swans In A Dirty Lake

2010-03-03T23:42:00.002+02:00

That's what the robotic voice says in the beginning of the song

blog

2010-01-23T05:30:00.001+02:00

We gave a new look to our blog.
Hope you like it.

I Will Never Become, What I'm Afraid Of (Lyrics)

2010-01-18T11:44:00.000+02:00

Sorry Monsters, I Have To Grow - lyrics

2010-01-13T20:12:00.000+02:00

2010-01-13T00:44:00.003+02:00

Hi

This is Taner. I am the one responsible for the blog but I haven't posted for a long time. Sorry for that, I might be in the the middle of an emotional breakdown (sometimes? usually? regularly? :) Yes, about a love related painful stuff... Whatever, yesterday I was replying your happy new years e-mails. Josh asked where he could find the AJDTW lyrics. Here is one. When we finished recording Sorry Monsters I Have To Grow, we worked on the artworks, on booklet etc. Then we learned that the distributor had a space limitation for the artworks and they can not be used for that purpose. So here are lyrics. I will be posting them regularly. I promise...

NEW ALBUM HAS BEEN RELEASED

2009-01-07T01:22:00.003+02:00

Today is an important day in A Journey Down The Well's history!

Our new album Sorry Monsters, I Have To Grow has been released!

Also downloads available at AmazonMP3

Review by Music Musigs and Miscellani

2009-01-06T16:41:00.004+02:00

A JOURNEY DOWN THE WELL - Sorry Monsters, I Have To Grow
link of the review

The general tone and mood of a year can often be reflected in its music. If the first new record I’ve heard in 2009 is the soundtrack to the coming months, then I think I’ll just hide under my duvet until 2010 rolls along.

A Journey Down the Well are a trio of two Swedes and a Turk (Martin Bjelfvenstam, Anna Erneman and Taner Torun) who make music that fits the bag marked post-rock / neo-classical crossover, but who sound very little like most of the acts who share that increasingly overfull niche. There are no grandstanding displays of virtuosity, and no warm, lush and comforting pieces. This is music that is fairly sparse, and exceedingly bleak.

Sorry Monsters, I Have to Grow is an explicitly political album. As is often the case when writers use a language that is not their first, the lyrics often have a strange turn of phrase and an unintentional ambiguity that somehow works. The words on “Happy Bird Day”, for example, don’t read well, but fit the music. It’s a plea against intolerance and bigotry that is coupled with a desolate backing that seems to be resigned to that plea falling on deaf ears.

On the first two tracks, the trio are aided by the Strandvägen Choir whose mournful, phonetic phrasings make them sound more like a ragged band of refugees than a classical chorus. “Sugarman” is a jarring track. Its eerie cello figure and voice sound like the embodiment of human suffering. “They create a history out of lies and they call it future” is the age old, but still depressingly true, complaint that history is written by the winners and the powerful.

There are moments when the generally oppressive atmosphere is lifted. “I Will Never Become What I’m Afraid Of” is a charmingly ragged ballad, and “Two Beautiful Swans in a Dirty Lake” is a richly beautiful violin / cello duet. It opens with a robotic evangelist (is there any other kind?) seeing Heaven in a vision of two swans on a dirty lake. Christians do have that cheesy tendency to proclaim as miracles anything that is out of the ordinary or unexpected, but the juxtaposition of beauty amongst filth is more a general metaphor of hope amongst despair.

The moments of hope, though, are fleeting. “New Abandoned Places on Earth” is a percussion-heavy epic instrumental that has echoes of post-punk acts like 23 Skidoo and Savage Republic. As the US-backed Israeli forces wreak havoc and death upon the civilians of Gaza, it’s a chillingly apt and timely piece of music.

Sorry Monsters, I Have to Grow has some parallels with recent albums by A Silver Mt Zion. But where the Canadians never let go of the hope for a better world, A Journey Down the Well seem to despair that nothing can change, and that the weak and defenceless will always be the victims of the powerful. Like Towering Inferno’s Kaddish, it’s not always an easy album to listen to, but nevertheless a brave and ambitious work that deserves to be heard.

New Music Video : I Will Never Become, What I'm Afraid Of

2009-01-03T20:33:00.003+02:00

A Journey Down The Well - I Will Never Become, What I'm Afraid Of from A Journey Down The Well on Vimeo

"I Will Never Become, What I'm Afraid Of" is one of the tracks express the feeling of A Journey Down The Well's second album: Sorry Monster, I Have To Grow. This is an anti-war album, it is also about resisting the forces which wants to oppress personality and trying to grow as a human being while leaving all the unnecessary fears behind.

Nick Hsu's stop-motion animations meet A Journey Down The Well's music and it gives birth to this video. The album contains this song is released by Fluttery Records.

Pre-orders Started

2008-12-24T22:57:00.005+02:00

PRE-ORDER FROM
CDBABY or KUNAKI

Track List & Release Date Info For The New Album

2008-12-06T20:06:00.006+02:00

Sorry Monsters, I Have To Grow
Release Date: 07 Jan 2009
© 2009 Fluttery Records

Tracklist:
1. Sugarman
2. Sorry Monsters, I Have To Grow
3. I Will Never Become, What I’m Afraid Of
4. Bush Horror Movie Soundtrack (Some People Will Never Listen To Music Again)
5. Two Beautiful Swans In A Dirty Lake
6. Happy Bird Day
7. New Abandoned Places On Earth

We sign to Fluttery Records

2008-11-23T18:47:00.003+02:00

Yes, some of the listeners already know. But let's announce it. We are a member of Fluttery Records family now. They are going to release our new album in January 2009. Also, it is an honour to be their first band they have released.

Please check their website and don't forget to add them to your myspace list.

Ritualizaton (Video Art - Contemporary Arts)

2008-10-30T19:03:00.007+02:00

Contemporary artist De Dargelos à Rosebud uses two tracks in her 2008 video art Ritualization: Dead Can Dance / Rainbow Voice and A Journey Down The Well / Why Do We Meet At Funerals. This is not a music video shown on television, but it is a visual art to be seen at art galleries. She films a Bulgarian ceremony being done at funerals, for the dead one to reach the light.

2008 - Aix-Mai

Our Website

2008-04-23T21:14:00.003+03:00

Thanks for all listeners who have contacted us via this blog. Today we announce our new website:

www.ajourneydownthewell.com

And we have made this blog, somewhere you can contribute to posts, shout in the shoutbox and check what's new.

Thanks to all our listeners and people who give a space to us on their websites, blogs and magazines. You proved that a band can reach listeners all over the world, without any promotions, any adds, even without a CD itself.

We really thank you for choosing us, and giving us a space in your life

See you soon!

New Video : Why Do We Always Meet At Funerals

2008-01-22T00:11:00.000+02:00

Dedicated to Hrant Dink who was killed in a racist murder

Why do they always kill innocent people? Why most people are always incredibly ignorant? Why the people who has never touch guns are always killed by bullets? And why do we always meet at funerals? This song is dedicated to you, Rest in peace Hrant!