Botanist - Photosynthesis - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Feeling Today is Spencer Stephenson's debut under the Botany moniker. The culmination of years of assembling music, this EP, and his forthcoming full-length, flow with a transcendental radiance. Under the gauzy patina of decades-old samples, this Texan sound-sculptor masterfully merges the past and the present, the earthly and the infinite.

On 9 January 2026, conductor Shea Lolin presents Frisson, an exciting new album of music for woodwind orchestra and his third recording with the principal woodwind players of the Czech Philharmonic (Gramophone's Orchestra of the Year 2024). Frisson follows the of the ground-breaking Twisted Skyscape, the first album devoted entirely to new music for woodwind orchestra, and Chromosphere, which focused on contemporary repertoire.Frisson marks Shea Lolin's 20-year involvement with the woodwind orchestra and celebrates it's evolution from the early eighteenth-century genre of Harmoniemusik - formal ensemble music for pairs of winds - to it's modern form.The album features a superb programme of arrangements for woodwind orchestra by Shea Lolin, all originally commissioned by the Bloomsbury Woodwind Ensemble. He expands Franz Krommer's exquisite Octet - Partita in F Major, Op. 57, and Richard Strauss's youthful Serenade, Op. 7, creating a broader sonic landscape while maintaining their essence. Also included is Cécile Chaminade's beloved Concertino, Op. 107, arranged for woodwind orchestra and featuring young Glaswegian flautist Fiona Sweeney, who makes her debut with the Czech Philharmonic on this . Completing the album is More Gordian Knots by Guy Woolfenden OBE, a spirited reimagining of Purcell's music for The Gordian Knot Unty'd, written during Woolfenden's remarkable 40-year association with the Royal Shakespeare Company.

San Francisco post-black metal outfit BOTANIST and Los Angeles based electronic project THIEF the split-album InchCicatrix/Diamond BrushInch. Despite their stylistic differences, both bands have much in common. They were both conceived and are mostly recording as solo-projects run by a single mastermind. Both multi-instrumentalists recruit live members to put their music on the stage. Yet the connection between BOTANIST's Otrebor aka Roberto Martinelli and Dylan Neal from THIEF runs deeper Dylan Neal played hammered dulcimer in the post-black metal outfit and even after officially departing from BOTANIST, he has continued to contribute as a InchsilentInch member, for example by writing the dulcimer and bass parts for the album InchCollective The Shape of He to ComeInch. This personal connection between both bands is reflected in the material of this split-album. BOTANIST's InchCicatrixInch contains previously unreleased tracks from the recording sessions of their acclaimed full-length InchVI FloraInch (2014), which is also the record that Dylan toured on, when the band went to Europe and delivered their legendary performance at the Roadburn Festival in 2015. The botanical term 'cicatrix' refers to the scarring that shows on a plant after it has been damaged and the title track points towards the damage that mankind has inflicted at the global flora. While the backbone of THIEF's sound has been formed by manipulated sacred chant and choral samples, InchDiamond BrushInch prominently features live drums and electric guitars for the first time on one of their records. Thematically, Dylan explores a spiritual pursuit of awakening through the experience of transgression and suffering with allusions to Joyce, Salinger, Nabokov, and Mobb Deep. InchDiamond BrushInch is also intended as a companion to the third THIEF full-length, InchThe 16 Deaths of My MasterInch, which i