FAO pie (or whomever): Khonnor - "Handwriting"

C

Codreanu

Guest
As you thought much of CFTPA and your tastes incline to the experimental, I thought to upload this album from Khonnor -- one of the outstanding releases from '04. This was recorded by a seventeen year old kid using only his pc, a guitar, and a cheap microphone from a 'Learn Japanese' boxset. I was utterly floored upon hearing this the first time, and have been pimping this record to all and sundry ever since; an absolute masterpiece.

01. Man from the Anthill
http://s10.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=1OZ2KOETVW6GE1RLW1QYAB6Y6Q

02. Daylight and Delight
http://s10.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=3LL9HFZQV1INT2YPJTOT0XAPH7

03. Megan's Present
http://s10.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=2FWJ463QAMVAN32DAL7KHCKD50

04. Dusty
http://s10.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=20OK0LK9EOUG21V0FCQ5UA7IO8

05. Crapstone
http://s10.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=1Z95D1J4FT3CE01EJULAF3PK83

06. Kill2
http://s10.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=3QX7R7RJ5338A3AE98J15B5NTZ

07. A Little Secret
http://s10.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=2OSZOHAFLZ8XK1FNE9C0PKODAC

08. An Ape is Loose
http://s19.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=09SPOFHG2M16U3S9C5YS2JXAPH

09. Phone Calls from You
http://s19.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=2BIBTMUJKFLBW35H28BUIE4OSZ

10. The Stoned Night
http://s19.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=2TZAVXCQIA8T41TL2NOKOF4GWR

11. Screen Love, Space, and the Time Man
http://s19.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=36AOXQ5UA1MVR0BW1FBXAV5TJP

12. I was Everything you Wanted until I Quit
http://s19.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=2XE9PKIPXXOQA1EIA73PV7P5YG

13. Tattletalent (Encore)
http://s19.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=3D3B4SH5IKLBA2Z9NT5ED75QGT

Cover art (front)
http://s19.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=15AU4QAY4ZTRG0X8JJ4VWNCACZ

"Static covers songs like snowdrifts, blurring shapes and hinting at
mysteries, on "Handwriting" (Type), the album Khonnor (a k a Connor
Kirby-Long) made when he was 17. Khonnor, now 18, lives in Vermont and
recorded most of the album in his bedroom with an old computer, a cheap
microphone, a guitar and an obsession with layers of sound. He's an
introvert and not exactly cheerful; as the album begins, he intones,
"Finally convinced myself that I'm not living/Existing is quite a problem."

The songs are slow, laconic meditations. They emerge out of hisses,
buzzes and rustles to reveal stately melodies and the few words Khonnor
wants to sing: often just a single verse, perhaps repeated, confessing
to dislocation and uncertainty in a tone of calm desolation. In "Megan's
Present," he sings: "Something makes me feel like I'm long gone."

Around Khonnor's voice and guitar, sounds don't so much appear as
accrete: echoes, wavery keyboard tones, a sputtering sampled drumbeat,
perhaps a ghostly counterpoint. Eventually his voice drifts out of
earshot, swallowed in the sonic haze like a figure receding in the
distance. Every so often, he shows his influences: the methodical
constructions of the Cure and New Order and the equally methodical
crackles and sputters of Fennesz.

But Khonnor already has his own kind of pensive determination, and
there's always just enough song in his soundscapes to make them sound
personal, not abstract. He sounds utterly alone on "Handwriting," and he
shows how magnificent solipsism can be."
 
Thanks very much for this! Listening to Phone Calls now. Khonnor rocks. I think it's great what people will do when they are, like you say, obsessed with what they are doing. It's nice to know there are people doing things like this. With this "lo-fi" stuff (do they still use that term?) sometimes there is a little bit of a kitsch factor, but this music seems completely honest and sincere.

Thanks
 
I just noticed that you put song 3 on twice and didn't put song 2. Both links go to Megan's Present.
thanks again.
 
> I just noticed that you put song 3 on twice and didn't put song 2. Both
> links go to Megan's Present.
> thanks again.

02. Daylight and Delight
http://s6.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=2J6S40PDB46FA0KM0M00CWAOK1
 
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