nuno canavarro PLUX QUBA

i was having a lot of trouble deciding on what to write for my first contribution to this blog. there's no need for me to add onto these obscure & unknown 45s cause i know that my co-conspirator will continue to unleash countless more. so as i prepared to sit down and write my first post i went to put on a record and gravitated toward the album you see above, much the same way i came into contact with this album in the first place. i first laid eyes on this curious & fascinating cover at End of an Ear here in Austin. i immediately picked it up and went over to their record player to preview it and now it resides permanently in my collection.

the basic story behind the record goes something like this: it was recorded in Portugal in 1988 and released on Ama Romanta, a small label run by Joao Peste (singer of Pop Dell'Arte). It was one of the label's dozen releases before folding, but more importantly was the first time anyone had heard anything of Nuno Canavarro since his time playing keyboards in Portugal's new wave stars Street Kids. from there the album remained in relative obscurity until Jim O'Rourke, Jan St. Werner (Mouse on Mars, Microstoria) & Carsten Schulz (C-Shulz) discovered this album while record shopping in Germany during a tour in 1991. then in 1998, O'Rourke started the label Moikai and re-released the album after being remixed and remastered by avant portugese guitarist Rafeal Toral.

as for the music itself, well if you're familiar with any of the artists listed above you'll notice how much of an impact it has made on all of them and so many more. this record basically sets the tone for almost all electronic music to follow. some of these songs sound like they were recorded last year (except this was in 1988!!!). the album flows from piercing, glitchy high frequency stabs (see Oval, Microstoria, etc) to warm analog synth washes (see Black Dice, Keith Fullerton Whitman, Emeralds, etc) and even into vocal cut-up montages (that many people reference Robert Ashley). as ghostly and glitchy as this album gets though it never leaves behind a warm, fuzzy, almost childlike simplicity and beauty. just play the song above and bask in it....it's heavy.