Heading into Postrock territory with a session from Labradford, recorded for John Peel at BBC Radio 1 on October 16, 1994.
Labradford is an American post-rock group founded in 1992 in Richmond, Virginia. They have released six full albums from 1993 to 2001. Though not disbanded, they have been on hiatus while members have been active with separate projects, including Mark Nelson’s project Pan American.
Founded in 1991, Labradford consists of bassist Robert Donne, guitarist and vocalist Mark Nelson, and keyboardist Carter Brown. Their music style is experimental ambient post-rock, although their first releases were much more related to dark drone rock.
After a début single in 1992, they were signed by Kranky who issued their début album Prazision LP in 1993. In 1999, they commenced their Festival of Drifting series, which featured appearances from Pole, Robin Guthrie, Matmos, Papa M, and Sigur Rós. They also toured during the same period of time with Godspeed You! Black Emperor.
Though occasionally incorporating vocal and rhythmic elements, the group rely most often on the drone aesthetic, mixing looping guitar effects and long keyboard passages with snippets of barely-audible voice and assorted found objects on records like 1994’s Prazision, 1995’s Stable Reference, 1996’s self-titled effort and 1997’s Mi Media Naranja. 1999 brought the release of a new album, E Luxo So, as well as a tour with Godspeed You Black Emperor! and their Festival Of Drifting series, which also featured appearances from Pole, Matmos and Papa M. The ultra-minimal Fixed::Context followed two years later.
Though the group has not officially disbanded, they have not released music since Fixed::Context in 2001. Following its release, the band members separately moved out of Richmond. Donne collaborated with Adam Wiltzie of Stars of the Lid in the project Aix Em Klemm, in addition to joining the groups Spokane and Gregor Samsa, while Nelson has recorded on Kranky under the name Pan American since 1998.
Tune out the world and enjoy.
