By Cory Casciato
casciato@mscd.edu

   I love the Internet’s free-music scene, but it’s hard to dispute that most of it is ill-conceived, poorly executed and/or aggressively, obnoxiously awful. It does make finding those rare gems all the more precious, which is why I felt like I’d discovered King Solomon’s mine when I discovered the net label Observatory.
   Observatory is the free, online sub-label of Skylab Operations, an independent electronic label based in Vienna, Austria. It has 45 releases available for download, mostly four to six song EPs, from artists all over the world. Most of it seems to be experimental electronic, but there’s plenty of song-oriented electronic pop and at least one straight-up lo-fi indie rock release. I haven’t worked my way through more than a fraction of what the site offers, but five of the six releases I downloaded made it into my permanent collection—that’s a better ratio than most of what I buy.
   Here are the highlights of my first half-dozen forays into the best thing to happen to free music since broadband:
.Tape. – Sea-Scaping Monthly in 4 or 5 Movements
http://www.archive.org/details/os004
   This is a loopy, hypnotic exercise in cyclic variations and the joy of repetition. It’s full of oddball oscillations, sculpted noise and whirring, ticking percussion that manage to be warm, inviting and completely abstract, all at the same time. Sounds like an extraterrestrial music box or classical music for robots.
   Text Adventure – Fantastic Disaster
http://www.archive.org/details/os036
Wistful indie pop with electronic arrangements and acoustic guitars. In a perfect world, some of the Postal Service’s record-setting sales would have gone to these guys. Four great songs (including a Silver Jews cover) and a groovy electronic/noise intro piece make a nice introduction.
Tree Wave – Cabana EP
http://www.archive.org/details/os034
   Pop songs played on an Atari 2600, Commodore 64, an archaic 286 PC compatible and a dot matrix printer that have been reprogrammed as sound generators. Add a honey-throated female singer and stir well to create some of the strangest and most beautiful tones I’ve ever heard. Having owned or logged extensive hours on all of those “instruments” at one time or another, this release fascinates me on more levels than I can express.

More info, OGG Vorbis versions and a complete list of releases available from observatoryonline.org

Every week, Freeplay will cover the best free albums and EPs to be found on the World Wide Web