Kria Brekkan is the current stage name for Kristín Anna Valtýsdóttir, former and founding member of the Icelandic avante-ambient band mum. She is also the wife of Avey Tare from Animal Collective, and they collaborated on the 2007 release Pullhair Rubeye.

Her intimate show at St. Mark’s tonight was certainly in a similar vein to her career output thus far. Yet as the focus was on Kri­a throughout, it was more personal and intense. She is a classically trained musician who is a superbly gifted piano player, with a unique sense of melody and time structure, and a boundless performance energy. Kri­a performed her set straight through without a break, and at the end of the set she looked up from the piano and seemed to be surprised that she was in a room full of people.

The recording is captured with all the inherent flaws of this performance room–namely surrounding noise and the limits of a small sound system. However, even with all the obstacles, this recording still provides an enjoyable listen of this unique artist.

Download the entire performance in FLAC [HERE].

Kria Brekkan
2007-09-09
St. Mark’s Church
New York, NY USA

Digital Master Recording
Neumann KM-150’s (AK-50 Hypercardiod Capsules) > Apogee Minime > digital coaxial > M-Audio Microtrack > flac

Many thanks to Kristin for permission to record.

Unfortunately, due to my unfamiliarity with the particular songs, and with the
proper place for track breaks (she played straight through), I have left the entire
set as one track.

Setlist
[Total Time 48:49]
01 Kria’s Set

As with all artists featured at this site, PLEASE SUPPORT this wonderful and unique artist and purchase her latest release.

Bjork began her 18-month worldwide tour in promotion of the new album Volta with a week of three concerts in three different venues in New York. The first night at Radio City was her first concert in the U.S. in almost four years, and with new material and an all new band, the result was the most restrained of the three NYC shows. Nevertheless, the concert was a triumphant return to the stage for Bjork, with several pleasant surprises in the setlist.

I recorded this concert from a prime location with pro-quality DPA microphones. However, in my rush to upload this concert to a bit torrent site within 3 hours of the end of the show, I did not perform any post-production work. The remaster posted below was the result of many hours of post-production work in Soundforge which improved the initial recording drastically. The volume levels were increased significantly and balanced, dozens of instances of close clapping or other audience noise were softened or removed, and the high-end peaks were accentuated through equalization.

This recording is dedicated to my friends in the Bjork Hub, the most reliable and dedicated fans of any artist anywhere.

This recording is in an indirect way responsible for the existence of the nyctaper website. Prior to the establishment of this site, I posted my masters on various bit torrent trackers, and in several instances my recordings were then compressed to low-quality mp3s and re-posted without any credit or attribution on bottom-feeder blogs.

In this case of this recording, the blogger not only failed to give credit, but also deleted my comments and insulted me when I sought credit. One of those insults ironically “suggested” that I create my own blog where I could host lossless downloads and pay the server fees. Eight days later, I did.

Download the complete performance in FLAC [HERE].

Bjork
2007-05-02
Radio City Music Hall
New York, NY USA

Digital Master Recording
Recorded from Front of Board Center
Orchestra Row PP, Seat 509

DPA 4021’s > Marantz PMD-660 (Oade BCM) > Soundforge (Remaster) > flac

Recorded and Produced and
Remastered by
nyctaper
2007-09-03

Setlist:
01 Earth Intruders*
02 Venus as a Boy
03 Aurora
04 I See Who You Are**
05 Oceania
06 Dull Flame of Desire***
07 All is Full of Love
08 The Pleasure is All Mine
09 Pagan Poetry
10 Jóga
11 Where is the Line
12 Army of Me
13 Innocence
14 Wanderlust
15 Pluto
Encores:
16 [encore break]
17 [band introductions]
18 Anchor Song
19 Declare Independence

*With Konono N°1
**With Min Xiao-Fen
***With Antony Hegarty

As with all artists featured at this site, PLEASE SUPPORT this wonderful and unique artist and visit her web page and purchase Volta:

The new Meat Puppets album Rise to Your Knees is a too-modest assessment of the current state of this band. The powerful performance at the Knitting Factory last night was a clear indication that this band has risen to heights that no rational fan could have anticipated after a decade of discord, drugs, death and detention. The 2007 version of the Meat Puppets is tight, engaged, and thoroughly enjoying the return to the spotlight.

The Knitting Factory has been one of the most innovative and superb venues for live music in New York for over two decades. The Leonard Street location continues to grow in stature, with a complete upgrade and overhaul of the facility nearly complete. They have also recently installed a state of the art recording system, which initially led to their reluctance to permit my open recording of this show. To the credit of this venue, the two highly professional and courteous managers discussed the situation with me, and ultimately permitted my recording after the Meat Puppets agreed. I was ultimately able to set up in a prime location next to the soundboard, with the assistance of the sound engineer.

As you will hear in the download featured below, the Knitting Factory engineer mixed this band to perfection. This recording is perhaps the best one ever offered at this site.

This recording is now available for download in FLAC and MP3 at Archive.org [HERE].

More about FLAC

Meat Puppets
2007-08-30
Knitting Factory
New York, NY USA

Digital Master Audience Recording
Recorded from Balcony Railing
Inside Soundboard Section
Dead Center approximately 30 feet
eye Level with PA stacks

Neumann KM-150’s (AK-50 Hypercardiod Capsules) > Apogee Minime >
digital coaxial > M-Audio Microtrack > flac

Premiere Download offered at
http://www.nyctaper.com
nyctaper@nyctaper.com

Recorded and Produced
by nyctaper
2007-08-31

Setlist:
[total time 1:33:37]
01 Sam
02 Touchdown King
03 Snow
04 Up On The Sun
05 Plateau
06 Look at the Rain
07 Lost
08 Working on a Building
09 The Whistling Song
10 Flaming Heart
11 My Baby’s Gone
12 Station
13 Box of Limes
14 Oh, Me
15 Comin’ Down
16 Never To Be Found
17 The Wind and the Rain
18 Severed Goddess Hand
19 Lake of Fire
Encores:
20 Climbing
21 Backwater

As with all artists featured at this site, PLEASE SUPPORT Meat Puppets and visit their web page, and purchase their new release :