{"title":"Harmonious Thelonious","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"cheapo-sounds","title":"Cheapo Sounds","description":"\u003cp\u003eA pivotal figure in Düsseldorf’s Salon Des Amateurs, Stefan Schwander has already amassed a remarkably rich musical repertoire. Through his Harmonious Thelonious project, he has spent the past dozen years exploring the worlds of Pan-African, South American and Middle Eastern rhythms in combination with a minimalistic electronic sound, distilling his very own groove from the point at which they converge. His new album - challengingly entitled \u003ci\u003eCheapo Sounds \u003c\/i\u003e- sees Schwander move away from tried and trusted recipes. This musical reorientation starts with the fundamental approach to production: the entire record was created using a single instrument - the Monomachine – which lends a very physical sound to the 10 tracks featured here. The polyrhythms of earlier works are no longer in the foreground, replaced by melodies and chords interwoven on a base frame of brittle, simplified beat constructs and rugged bass pulses. On closer inspection, this is, at times, a new vision of an old technique. There are still the old amps in Schwander‘s rehearsal room, along with a primitive rhythm box, a programmable drum machine and various synthesizers, including an MS-20. None of these made it onto \u003ci\u003eCheapo Sounds\u003c\/i\u003e and yet the idea with which these instruments are associated is written into the DNA of the album. When new wave superseded punk and the last throes of rockism, a new and particular spirit emerged, one which Stefan Schwander sought to capture on his new works. A new wave record informed by techno\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"No Label","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":50896087908683,"sku":"2004805","price":17.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"LP","offer_id":50896088138059,"sku":"2004806","price":30.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/Cheapo_Sounds_3adacd05_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1732664444"},{"product_id":"grumpy-pieces","title":"Grumpy Pieces","description":"\u003cp\u003eWith Grumpy Pieces, Düsseldorf-based musician Harmonious Thelonious, aka Stefan Schwander, returns with a work that precisely distills his long-standing sonic aesthetic while simultaneously visibly eroding it. Once again, Pan-African and Middle Eastern rhythmic concepts, minimalist repetition structures, and reduced electronic use combine to create a hypnotic sound—this time, however, rawer, drier, and more open to disruption than before. The eight tracks feel like they're under tension: melodies scrape across angular bass foundations, sharp snare hits slice through the structure, and despite the clear groove focus, a nervous crackle is ever-present. Grumpy Pieces reflects a present full of political and social friction—without explicit commentary, but with music that makes friction itself a means of expression. While side A begins relatively directly, side B increasingly opens itself to controlled disintegration, until the final track, \"Dissolving,\" programmatically embodies the title. The album was created in Schwander's Düsseldorf studio – intuitively, directly, without elaborate screen arrangements, closely interwoven with his trance-like, live-tested working method. Grumpy Pieces is not a break, but an intensification: a powerfully dense, physical, and simultaneously restless album that sharpens the characteristic signature of Harmonious Thelonious. Dance music with resistance – and bite.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Bureau B","offers":[{"title":"LP - Black","offer_id":56615844118859,"sku":"R9686-2059","price":29.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":56615845069131,"sku":"R9686-4881","price":16.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/05279231.jpg?v=1771934354"}],"url":"https:\/\/shop.roughtrade.com\/fr\/collections\/harmonious-thelonious.oembed","provider":"Rough Trade","version":"1.0","type":"link"}