The Foundry

The Foundry was Michael Bentley’s serious-minded label from Berkeley, California, full of his own solo and collaborative electronica and ambient, along with more experimental recordings in the austere Sahko-Pan Sonic-Ryoji Ikeda style.

Initial discs were packaged in spray-painted card sleeves with a booklet insert, sealed with stickers, but later graduated to colour booklets and then full sleeves. The label ran to 26 releases, from 1997 to 2006, plus a further six minis on sub-label Archipelago; here are the first four, including a compilation of many of its early core artists.

eM Djinn, Foundry fou.01, 1997
“We live among spirits. Our world is filled with ghosts of our own making. They rise from our appliances, they dance along power lines, they sing in the radio and television waves.”

01. Heartbeat World (5:52)
02. Sneaker Squeak Spirit Breath (5:47)
03. Moorish Heroes of the Spanish Main (4:30)
04. Go Back to Sleep (4:42)
05. If on a Winter’s Night (5:31)
06. The Haze in Tropojope’s Caffé (4:57 )
07. Body Drone (4:54)
08. Ravelero Driver (On) (9:47)
09. Fanfare From Another Place (0:48)
10. Temple Ghost Simoom (5:01)
11. Lost Dances (5:28)
12. The End of a Thousand Years (4:57)
13. Joining Prayers (2:50)
14. Find The Human Heart (6:13)

Link | Discogs

Various Eclectronica, Foundry fou.02, 1997
“An anthology of movement between the classical and the ambient.”

01. Blithely Menace – Armand: a Theme for the Majestic (3:02)
02. Nathan Kreisberg – Tiny Circus 92:07)
03. M. Bentley – November (2:19)
04. Nathan Kreisberg – Der Leiermann (3:31)
05. M. Bentley – Melancholia (3:46)
06. The Apiary – Dreams of Ragnarok & Sisyphus (6:23)
07. Rhomb – Autmun in Her (7:28)
08. Rhomb – We Creep and We Change (8:52)
09. eM – Fanfare From… (0:53)
10. M. Bentley – Port Klang: First Impressions (2:27)
11. Melec – Crush (4:39)
12. Rhomb – Above the Earth (5:08)
13. M. Bentley – Flora (2:55)
14. M. Bentley – Ring, Edge (4:11)
15. M. Bentley – Wail and Waft (4:16)
16. M. Bentley – Deep Listen (6:45)

Link | Discogs

The Apiary Descent, Foundry fou.03, 1997
“Music which recalls the world of nature, the fear and the beauty.”

01. The First Darkness (7:56)
02. Duot: (a) Speaking In Tongues
03. (b) Water Garden
04. (c) Speaking Again (20:21)
05. Recalling The Other: (a) Out
06. (b) Away
07. (c) Return (21:20)
08. Dreams of Ragnarok and Sisyphus (6:15)
09. Repeat: (a) Instinct
10. (b) Intellect
11. (c) The Soul (17:33)

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Rhomb Hidden Topographies, Foundry fou.04, 1998
“A collection of pieces which are both quiet and spacious…”

01. Terminus (6:02)
02. Empty Roads (4:52)
03. Vacant Cities (3:16)
04. Darkened (4:30)
05. Glockengasse (4:30)
06. Ice Fields (4:22)
07. Synchronistic if at all (5:17)
08. Transmit Process Zen (4:21)
09. Man Knew (3:57)
10. Terminus (5:17)

Link | Discogs