Flow State

Cousin

Flow State — Fri, 09 Oct 2026 07:04:48 GMT

It’s Friday so we’re listening to something more upbeat. Today we’re listening to Cousin, an Australian electronic musician from Sydney. His first instrument was the recorder, which he was taught in primary school; that led to “the clarinet, then to the saxophone, bass guitar, and guitar, all with some casual tutelage on drums from his dad,” according to a Mixmag profile. He began to DJ and produce electronic music, and in his digital compositions he creates very naturalistic sounds and impressive acoustics. We’re playing two of his albums: Wake the Town from 2025 and HomeSoon from 2023. Also check out his 2025 set for The Lot Radio.

Wake the Town - Cousin (35m, no vocals)
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HomeSoon - Cousin (35m, no vocals)
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Have a ripper weekend.

Heathered Pearls (Interview)

Flow State — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 07:02:53 GMT

Today we’re listening to Heathered Pearls, a Polish-American electronic musician based in Brooklyn. He was born in Częstochowa and moved to Michigan with his parents as a kid, growing up in the Detroit exurbs. He gravitated toward beatless electronic music, but also found influences in the local Detroit scene – from which he highlights two memorable tracks below. Jakub Alexander started the project Heathered Pearls to collect ambient electronic music that are minimal in style, with focused attention on the details of the synth loops, their effects, and interplay. “When I make music,” he told us, “I think of it as the prettier side of the noise scene.” We’re first playing his new album, Window, which came out in March, followed by his 2012 LP, Loyal, which is more atmospheric. A conversation with Jakub follows the streaming links.

Window - Heathered Pearls (30m, no vocals)
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Loyal - Heathered Pearls (57m, no vocals)
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What’s your earliest memory of music?

Watching my mom and her friends up late at night listening to The Police’s Synchronicity through the cracked open door.

How were you first introduced to ambient music?

In the early mid-90s, Deep Forest, Enigma, and Orbital were probably the firestarters. I wanted more of the beatless moments, so I went down a few different avenues and found trance and local Detroit dub, which were enough subgenres, but they opened up a can of worms for me.

What early listening most influenced the direction of your sound?

For Heathered Pearls specifically, which was the aughts, so probably just what I have had listed for years on my Facebook in 2010: Gas, Casino Versus Japan, High Wolf, Dettinger, Maurizio, Markus Guentner, burger/ink, Lawrence, Kaito.

What acts / tracks in the Michigan scene inspired you the most and stick with you to this day?

This Juno track my friend Danny Scales played for me when we lived together.

And this Underground Resistance cut:

Both together, I think, marry the spectrum of music I make but come from different sides of the sound that comes from Michigan’s scene.

As Heathered Pearls, you’ve oscillated between ambient and more four-on-the-floor music. Tell us about that journey, and maybe some of the similarities or differences between those production modes.

I wish I could make music for the dance floor; when I make music, I think of it as the prettier side of the noise scene. If I were talented enough, I’d just make IDM. I’m not a piano player; I can’t strum a guitar, keep a beat on a drum kit, or have the balls to write lyrics, but if you leave me with your melody and let me affect it, then I feel at home.

You’ve also been on the other side of the table as an A&R. Tell us how you approached that job, how you assessed demos and such. Did that experience affect you as a musician at all?

Rarely do I sign a lot of the music that aligns with the lane of music that I make. I think I do my job really well because I can relate to everyone involved. I’ve made myself do the work that some people find boring or shitty, and I’ve seen enough outcomes in so many different scenarios in the last 30 years that it gives me more compassion than most. If it’s in the studio, before a show, over dinner, or just a phone call, I feel like I understand it better than most when people start asking the tougher questions. Listening to the music is the fun part.

What was your studio setup for Window? What instruments/gear/software did you use to make the record?

Reason and no samples. I know it’s not the prettiest answer or the answer that you might’ve wanted to read, but I try to push what the program comes with to make it my own.

How do you discover new music these days? Any recent notable finds?

YouTube still. I’ve recently been on a newer jazz kick, sitting on a lot of trip-hop I found over the last few years, and I like what the kids are doing with shoegaze.

Name an underrated artist from the past 50 years.

Casino Versus Japan

What are you working on next?

I’ve been dealing with dizziness for a couple years now, which has kind of shrunk my world a bit if anyone out there also battles with it. This sort of hinders the part of me that can make ambient music, since I find most sounds like what I wanna put out, but I’m feeling slightly better very recently. I hope to make a few more singles or an EP next year and then eventually another album which I’ve already sort of collected the influences which is a process that I love to do before making new music.

Akusmi

Flow State — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 07:03:32 GMT

Today we’re listening to Akusmi, a French composer and multi-instrumentalist based in London. He grew up in a musical household: his parents often brought back instruments from world travel, and he started playing classical guitar at age 7.1 He made recordings with field recordings as a teenager, moved to London to study jazz, and composed for film and TV.2 His first album as Akusmi was Fleeting Future, which came out in 2022. For last week’s Across the Horizon episode, Lara Somogyi selected the minimalist, slow-burn track “Concrescence” from it. But first we’re playing Akusmi’s latest album, Terra Incognita, which came out in July. On it, he plays 21 instruments in concert with tabla by Sarathy Korwar, ngoni by Dudù Kouate, and more.3

Terra Incognita - Akusmi (48m, choral vocals on the last track)
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Fleeting Future - Akusmi (43m, no vocals)
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Have a great Wednesday.

15Questions

AllMusic

Bandcamp

Flow State Episode 346

Flow State — Tue, 06 Oct 2026 07:04:15 GMT

Today’s mix opens with a 2003 composition by William Basinski, followed by new music from marine eyes & Líom, Chihei Hatakeyama, and Midori Hirano. We play a track by Chris Remo from the video game Gone Home. There are some new instrumentals by Gollden, Julia Gjertsen & Nico Rosenberg. We play two tracks from two great new albums: Cyano by Emily A. Sprague and Another Helping of the Sweet Enoughs by… The Sweet Enoughs. There’s ambient electronic by H. Takahashi and Rival Consoles, followed by faster tracks at the end: ambient techno by Heathered Pearls and a disco-style bop by Shubostar. We hope you enjoy.

0:00:00 - William Basinski - Melancholia II

0:05:30 - marine eyes & Líom - natural light

0:08:49 - Chihei Hatakeyama - Unconscious Silence I

Midori Hirano (Interview)

Flow State — Mon, 05 Oct 2026 07:03:39 GMT

Today we’re listening to Midori Hirano, a Japanese composer and pianist based in Berlin. The last time we recommended her music was in 2021. She uses synth and piano to create electroacoustic pieces that reflect her classical training as well as interest in more experimental compositional techniques. Her latest record is a new score for The Juniper Tree, the 1990 film by Nietzchka Keene set in Iceland and starring Björk. Reflecting on the process of making the score, she told us, “I think this film has a lot of ambiguity showing different kinds of emotions and you can’t really define who is good or bad actually. And I think that electronic sounds are well suited to expressing subtle aspects of human psychology, while an acoustic instrument like the piano, the nature of the instrument can be quite strong, so I feel it can sometimes limit the kind of impression or feeling it creates.” We’re also revisiting her 2020 record, Invisible Island, whose piano pieces are complex and processed through a range of effects. A conversation with Midori follows the streaming links.

The Juniper Tree - Midori Hirano (39m, no vocals)
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Invisible Island - Midori Hirano (41m, no vocals)
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What’s your earliest memory of music?

When I was growing up in Japan in the ‘80s, it was still the bubble era, and there were many children around me who were taking piano lessons.

So whenever I went to play at neighbor’s house, I often heard someone playing the piano. But at the same time, my grandparents bought my brother and me a Super Famicom, which had just been released back then. I often played games like Super Mario with my brother and friends, and the music from those games gradually became embedded in my memory, without me even realizing it. So when I think back on it, both the sound of the piano and the sounds of video games are equally part of my earliest musical memories.

How did you get started with piano? What was the first piece that you learned that felt like a real accomplishment?

As I mentioned above, so many children around me were taking piano lessons when I was a child, so I just became interested in playing it as well. Even in my small hometown, there seemed to be someone giving piano lessons on almost every block in my neighbourhood at that time. But before I started playing piano when I was around six, we had a small pump organ at home, and I remember just playing around on it, making whatever sound I felt like.

I don’t really remember what the first piece I managed to play properly was, but I think it was probably one of those standard little pieces by Bach or Mozart.

What were the artists/albums that early on helped point you in the direction of your own sound?

When I started making electronic music in early 2000s, glitch and all kinds of experimental electronic music were thriving at the time. So I’m sure I was inspired by a lot of those music. But if I had to pick just one, it would have to be Tujiko Noriko’s Shojo Toshi, which was released on Mego. I found it very refreshing how freely field recordings, sampled sounds, and noise were arranged, yet somehow they all came together well as a pop song.

The Juniper Tree is an interesting blend of synth and piano. How do you think about using either instrument – does a musical idea occur to you along with the instrument, or do you tend to find the musical idea once at the instrument?

It really depends, but when speaking about producing the score for The Juniper Tree, I naturally came to the idea of using synthesizers for most of the score, and the piano should stay as occasional use, after watching the film. Because I think this film has a lot of ambiguity showing different kinds of emotions and you can’t really define who is good or bad actually. And I think that electronic sounds are well suited to expressing subtle aspects of human psychology, while an acoustic instrument like the piano, the nature of the instrument can be quite strong, so I feel it can sometimes limit the kind of impression or feeling it creates. So I kept the use of the piano to a minimum, using it instead at key points in the story, and I think it worked quite well.

What was your studio setup for Juniper Tree? What instruments/gear/software did you use to make the album?

Since the music was specifically composed to be performed live as a solo piece, the setup was quite minimal as listed below:

- Arturia MiniFreak

- Small modular setup - Mutable Instruments’ oscillator Plaits, Doepfer’s LFO A-145 and Morphagene by Make Noise

- Strymon Bigsky reverb pedal

- Acoustic piano

Around 60% of the album was made using only with MiniFreak, with 9-10 different presets. I altered their sound characteristics using the filters. For track 8 “Take Me With You,“ I used only Plaits as the sound source. I connected a sine-wave LFO to Plaits’ Level input and used the LFO’s dynamics and intervals to slowly evolve the timbre.

And at the beginning of the track 9 “Mother’s Path,“ I kept a piano phrase recorded with Morphagene looping, while using its granular capabilities to significantly transform the sound. All sounds from both modules were routed through the Bigsky.

To produce the album, I recorded everything in Abelton Live and made some subtle EQ adjustments there, while also adding a minimum amount of reverb using Valhalla plugins. As I was already happy with my initial compositions I’ve made for the premiere concert, I tried not to change them too much and instead focused more on mixing, especially with the last track “Forever In The Sky“ where I used Plugin Boutique’s Stereo Savage to expand and deepen the stereo panning.

What's it like composing for a film, versus creating your own original music?

When composing for a film, you usually have a director who often has certain musical ideas that you need to realize. But when creating your own music, you can do whatever you want, so this is obviously the main difference. But for me, sometimes having musical limitations or being asked to work within someone else’s ideas can actually help me find a new way of approaching things, both technically and creatively.

But the situation with The Juniper Tree was a little different from a usual scoring project, as the music was composed genuinely for live performance. I had complete creative freedom, while the music of course still needed to work well with the story. That was actually the only real limitation I had, and it gave me a lot of inspiration. I’m very thankful to VIERNULVIER for giving me this special opportunity.

How do you discover new music these days? Any recent notable finds?

I often discover new music while exploring Bandcamp or some random websites, or otherwise at concerts or record stores. The record I recently stumbled upon and bought is Helen Money’s Atomic. This album is already a couple of years old, but I’m happy I found it now, thanks to the shop Bis Aufs Messer in Berlin. I really enjoyed the beautiful, massive sound of her cello.

Name an underrated artist from the past 50 years.

I think everyone has a different idea of what makes someone underrated, but if I had to name one, I’d say Natalie Beridze. There’s always a real strength at the core of her sound, and at times, it also has a sense of spaciousness and warmth. I enjoy almost everything she makes.

What are you working on next?

Since I’m releasing two albums this year, and I’ve released quite a few albums and worked on several scoring projects over the past few years as well, I feel like I’d like to focus more on playing live as much as possible for a while, rather than making new music.

Shinichi Atobe

Flow State — Fri, 02 Oct 2026 07:05:46 GMT

It’s Friday so we’re listening to something more upbeat. Today we’re listening to Shinichi Atobe, a Japanese electronic musician from Saitama. We’ve recommended his music a few times before. He’s been making quality techno/house music, beasting in the underground since the start of the millennium. In a conversation with Tone Glow, he said, “I started making techno when I was 27. At the time, I was working as a security guard. I saved up money to buy a Prophet 600. I was listening to a variety of techno music.” We’re playing his latest album, Silent Way, which came out in March. It carries on his style of laid back techno, with drums keeping the pace and synths conveying his signature form of energized calm. We’re also playing Heat from 2018, which to our ears is his magnum opus.

Silent Way - Shinichi Atobe (67m, no vocals)
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Heat - Shinichi Atobe (59m, no vocals)
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Have a fantastic weekend.

TKB (Guest rec from Ryan Mandelbaum)

Flow State — Thu, 01 Oct 2026 07:03:02 GMT

Today we have a guest recommendation from , a writer and occasional DJ, whose newsletter is a valuable source of thoughtful curation and honest reflections on the world of experimental sound.

Today I’d like to shine a light on an artist who is, in my opinion, one of the most brilliant and overlooked minds currently operating in the world of ambient and experimental adjacent sound, someone I recommend whenever I am given the chance: Timothy K. Brown aka TKB.

Trying to describe TKB’s sound in terms of musical reference points is nearly impossible because, simply put, there is nothing out there quite like it. It is a sound that I’d best describe as elemental – as if he somehow discovered a method for recording the ancient music of the earth itself, the essential and imperceptible melody that vibrates through everyone and everything. TKB’s entire discography is well worth delving into, but his three most recent releases (each respectively finding their way to the very top of my year end lists) are all perfect launching points.

2025’s Relentless Ambience is an otherworldly and at times disorienting listen filled with some of the most unique textures I’ve ever heard. Jon Hassell, Zoviet France, and even the work of James Ferraro and Spencer Clarke are the closest comparisons I can think of, but again… TKB’s world is entirely his own. 888 — 890, released just a few months later on World of Knots, takes a much more rhythmic approach, its exoskeletal rhythmic patterns far removed from any sense human involvement, rather resembling those found in nature – the fluttering of moth wings, the whisper of wind through leaves, the mating call of crickets dancing in and out of phase with each other.

His most recent release, Lo on the Ilm, is easily TKB’s most serene work yet. While it might be absent of the jittery and at times anxious sense of constant motion present in much of his work, it is nonetheless defined by the same sense of dark mystery, as if one is peering into the very deepest part of the night, and given access to its most forbidden secrets. Don’t let this description scare you off though – this is possibly the most beautiful album of the year, perfect to drift off to. A much needed corner of serenity in a constantly overstimulating world.

Relentless Ambience - TKB (73m, no vocals)
Bandcamp

888 — 980 - TKB (32m, no vocals)
Bandcamp

Lo on the Ilm - TKB (32m, no vocals)
Bandcamp

Have a great Thursday.

Across the Horizon Ep. 71: Lara Somogyi

Flow State — Wed, 30 Sep 2026 07:03:43 GMT

On today’s episode of Across the Horizon, host Bob Holmes of the band SUSS is joined by Lara Somogyi. Lara is a harpist and composer who recently released an album a [time] patterned on Mercury KX Records. They talk about her new music as well as the playlist of ambient music that she brought to the show, including Ólafur Arnalds, Clarice Jensen, Steve Reich, Koki Nakano, and much more.

For Flow State, we’re listening to two albums by Somogyi, whose music has appeared on many of our mixes and whom we featured last year. First up is the new record, a [time] patterned, on which she passes her harp through a medley of effects pedals.1 She says on the show, “I’ve been listening to a lot of music that shifts time for me, or makes me feel time physically. I started making the record because I was curious about time… I discovered I experience it through sensory markers rather than through numerical markers.” We’re also playing Désert from last year, a collaboration with Joshua Tree-born pianist Jean-Michel Blais. Included in our daily playlist for paying subscribers is her unmissable covers of “Running Up That Hill” and “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence,” among other selections.

a [time] patterned - Lara Somogyi (36m, no vocals)
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Désert - Lara Somogyi & Jean-Michel Blais (39m, no vocals)
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Have a great Wednesday.

Also check out her video with Reverb in which she demonstrates many of these effect pedals

Flow State Episode 345

Flow State — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 07:03:08 GMT

Today’s mix opens with a beautiful new track from Isik Kural, followed by new ambient by Maxime Denuc and elijah jamal asani. There are instrumentals by M. Sage and K. Leimer, and then a long new ambient piece by Windy & Carl (who have a new album out). There’s a saxophone-led instrumental by Cole Pulice and then a guitar-led slow burn jam by Time Wharp. We play a couple new low-key techno tracks by Mammo and Shinichi Atobe, followed by one of Patrick Cowley’s reissued HI-NRG pieces. The last two tracks are a triumphant piece by Akusmi and a sample that may be familiar. We hope you enjoy.

0:00:00 - Isik Kural - Motorcycles and Cherry Wind

0:02:45 - Maxime Denuc - Atlantis

0:09:04 - elijah jamal asani - thirtyonecircles /// soft shoulder(s) confluence near second mesa

Ryuichi Sakamoto

Flow State — Mon, 28 Sep 2026 07:03:05 GMT

Today we’re listening to Ryuichi Sakamoto, a Japanese composer and pianist from Tokyo. We’ve recommended him a few times before. The occasion for today’s rec is last week’s publication of of Sakamoto’s memoir, Music Sets You Free. The book is a twofer: it’s the English translations (by Sam Bett) of two autobiographical works by Sakamoto, the first from 2009 and the second from 2023, the year he passed away. We’re playing two piano records released around the time of those texts – 2009’s Playing the Piano and 2024’s Opus. Sakamoto studied piano intensively in elementary school and recalled being “shocked” by Debussy in junior high:

I was browsing through one of my uncle’s collections of records when I found Debussy’s String Quartet…. I snuck it home with me and played it on the stereo entertainment system, this huge thing built like a piece of furniture and covered up with lace. What I heard next was a total shock to me. This was different from any other music I’d heard before. Nothing like the Bach or Beethoven I liked. The second that I heard it, I was mesmerized. My affinity for Debussy was so strong that it blurred my sense of self. I started thinking of him, despite being dead for ages, as if his life and mine were one and the same. I thought I was the reincarnation of Debussy. It made me question where I lived and why I could speak Japanese. I even practiced the man’s signature, filling multiple notebook pages with his name.1

Playing the Piano - Ryuichi Sakamoto (58m, no vocals)
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Opus - Ryuichi Sakamoto (96m, no vocals)
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We wish you a great start to your week.

Music Sets You Free by Ryuichi Sakamoto, p. 34

Patrick Cowley

Flow State — Fri, 25 Sep 2026 07:03:22 GMT

It’s Friday so we’re listening to something more upbeat. Today we’re listening to Patrick Cowley, an American electronic musician from Buffalo, NY. Born in 1950, he grew up playing the drums in local bands and then moved to San Francisco when he was 21.1 He was fascinated by newfangled machines called synthesizers and in the City College learned to play Moogs and Buchlas. At clubs and bathhouses he heard Donna Summer, Giorgio Moroder, Kraftwerk, Tangerine Dream, and more.2 Across the ‘70s he developed his own style of synth-driven dance music, collaborating with the singer Sylvester on several hits. We’re playing two of Cowley’s solo records, which were released after he passed away of AIDS-related illness in 1982. Afternooners from 2017 collects instrumentals he recorded between 1979 and 1982 primarily for adult film soundtracks. Hard Ware, just released last year, collects ten tracks which in the words of the label are “sultry, psychedelic, sarcastic, and just a bit sleazy.”3

Afternooners - Patrick Cowley (69m, no vocals)
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Hard Ware - Patrick Cowley (55m, vocals on tracks 3, 4, 6 and 10)
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Have a wonderful weekend.

DJMag

NPR

Bandcamp

Egberto Gismonti

Flow State — Thu, 24 Sep 2026 07:02:46 GMT

Today we’re listening to Egberto Gismonti, a Brazilian composer, guitarist, and pianist from Carmo. Born in 1947, he started studying piano at age six, going on to study at in Paris, where he was drawn especially to Ravel’s voicings.1 Returning to Brazil, he incorporated choro, a fast-paced and expressive traditional Brazilian style into his work. That meant learning the guitar, and amazingly he became virtuosic at a second instrument. In the 1970s he signed with ECM, the German jazz label, which went on to release about a dozen of his records. Solo from 1979 is, as the title suggests, a collection of solo performances on guitar and piano. Alma from 1986 is a collection of energetic piano performances, showcasing his signature blend of classical rigor and folk expression.

Solo - Egberto Gismonti (53m, no vocals)
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Alma - Egberto Gismonti (41m, no vocals)
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Have a great Thursday.

AllAboutJazz

Corntuth (Interview)

Flow State — Wed, 23 Sep 2026 07:03:13 GMT

Today we’re listening to Corntuth, an American ambient musician based in Brooklyn. His new record, The Nightingale Floor, is the 13th release from Flow State Records. We released three of his previous records: Music To Work To (2020), The Desert Is Paper Thin (2021), and Letters To My Robot Son (2022). He grew up playing guitar and piano, recording indie and folk rock songs with his brother, playing in bands and later gravitating toward ambient music via Brian Eno and Hiroshi Yoshimura. At the beginning of covid, he picked up a Yamaha DX7 which has been his go-to ambient instrument. The Nightingale Floor incorporates drum loops and field tape, the latter taken from a trip to Japan. The record is co-released by Aural Canyon, who are making it available on a limited edition cassette. We’re also revisiting The Desert Is Paper thin, an acoustic guitar-driven record in the ambient country style, featuring the late Pete Finney on pedal steel guitar. A conversation with Corntuth follows the streaming links.

The Nightingale Floor - Corntuth (36m, slight vocals on track 2)
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The Desert Is Paper Thin - Corntuth (40m, no vocals)
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What’s your earliest memory of music?

Probably my dad singing “Summertime Blues” by The Who. I remember when we were very young that he would sing that song. “There ain’t no cure for the summertime blues.” I’m sure that’s not actually the first experience I had of music, but that’s a really early one.

When I was a kid, I was obsessed with Bob Dylan because I had very curly hair and I had a toy guitar. Before I could really speak, I was struggling to say Bob Dylan’s name.

Was the toy guitar your first instrument?

Yeah, it was. I wanted to play the saxophone when I was a kid. I grew up near a store called Daddy’s Junky Music, and I remember going there and there was a dude with really long hair. He told my parents that he played the saxophone when he was really young and it had broken his fingers. He thought that I shouldn’t play the saxophone. So that led me to playing guitar and then piano.

I put the guitar away for a long time and focused on piano. I can’t really remember why. But I came back to guitar because my brother started playing it. I remember the first song he taught me to play was “Wooden Ships” by Jefferson Airplane.

What was your journey with piano?

My mom was a pianist and she was involved early on in my learning to play. I remember every Sunday in the fall we would listen to the George Winston record Autumn. I think we maybe had a couple other Windham Hill records, but it was really that George Winston record that I fell in love with. My whole family loved it. I associated it with the warmth of being inside when it’s cold and dark outside. A lot of the things I wanted to learn how to do on piano stemmed from that record.

I had a high school jazz band experience, like a lot of people do, that I was pretty serious about, and that expanded my sense of harmony. I was in rock bands and played keys and guitar and worked on songwriting through that. But I think the George Winston experience and that kind of music stuck with me.

Shout out to George Winston and Windham Hill Records.

Shout out to In Search of The Turtle’s Navel too, just an incredible record.

When did you start making your own music?

I started very young. Because I was so obsessed with Bob Dylan, I always wanted to write songs. I’m sure I had some half baked attempts when I was a toddler.

My parents had a PC. It was like a chunky old Dell that had a microphone, and I found a way to make that the recording device. It would get blown out really quickly because it was not meant for music or complicated mixing. So each layer exponentially increased the gain. But I would make songs on that that were kind of indie folk songs.

When I was in 8th grade, the Gorillaz’ album Demon Days came out, and I lived in Boston. The day it came out, for whatever reason, they were at Newbury Comics in Boston. I went with my best friend. We got in line a couple hours early, and for whatever reason, we were the first people they let in. Danger Mouse was there, Damon Albarn, and Jamie Hewlett. Albarn was a hero of mine. I said to him, “I want to be a musician. What do you recommend?” And Damon Albarn was like, “You should buy a tape recorder, like a four-track tape recorder, and just record something every single day.”

So I went back home and told my mom what he said. My mom often recounted this story of this time we’d met Hank Aaron the baseball player and he talked about practicing with a stick and a bottle cap. This is not at all how we grew up. But my mom thought it was a good principle (selectively enforced) that you should really prove you were serious about something before getting a bunch of gear for it.

But I came back from the Damon Albarn conversation saying, “Look, Damon Albarn says I need to get a proper tape recorder.” Later on I got a proper tape recorder as a like graduation present, a Fostex digital recorder that had multi-track and onboard effects. And I went crazy with that thing and recorded a ton, making music with my brother. Then more computer tools started coming out and they helped a lot.

What kinds of computer tools?

We definitely were using Logic. We started a lot more home recording: indie rock, indie folk tracks. We listened to a lot of Rolling Stones growing up and my brother’s a great guitarist, so there was some stuff in the vein of “Moonlight Mile” by the Stones.

I was using open tuning a lot, along the same lines as the George Winston stuff I mentioned. I was more eager to write songs than I was to get very technically gifted at an instrument. Open tunings are sort of a hack to make something that sounds good and interesting fast. If you really want to know how to use them, you obviously have to spend a lot of time studying that specific tuning. I backed into that over years of hacking my way through them.

What was the origin of the Corntuth project?

I knew this guy named Tony, who has an amazing synthesizer company called Analog Craftsman, that was based near where I grew up in Massachusetts. In the early days of the pandemic, Tony was moving to the West Coast, and he knew that I’d always loved this Yamaha DX7 that he had, this amazing synthesizer from 1983. He hit me up when he was moving and was like, “I’ll give you a really sweet deal on this, if you want to take it off my hands.” So I immediately jumped at that. He also threw in a Yamaha R100 reverb unit, which is an amazing old digital reverb from the ‘80s.

I’d also been a devoted Flow State reader for some time and through that I’d gotten into ambient music. I remember listening to Thursday Afternoon by Brian Eno while I was working at a boring job and feeling really weird in a way that I kind of enjoyed. I was listening to a lot of what was being recommended in Flow State. Also the Vampire Weekend record Father of the Bride had a song called “2021” which sampled a Haruomi Hosono composition for Muji. I loved the song but I really loved the sample, so I started listening to that a bunch. Those were the things that made me start thinking about what I could do with that synthesizer.

How did you approach Nightingale Floor differently from previous albums?

A few things are different on this record. I took a lot longer with it, first of all. Most of the Corntuth records are improvisations, I just improvise a ton and fiddle around with sounds and then I edit it into something that feels more composed. On this there are definitely improvisations, but it’s more carefully crafted. I wanted to experiment with found sounds and ambient field recordings. And also rhythms, like specifically drum loops.

So for the first time I did a lot of rooting around trying to find drum samples from old drum machines. And in one instance there’s a loop from a contemporary drummer, whom I love – feeb. I had spent a lot of time traveling and specifically had one pretty big trip to Japan, which is a major pilgrimage for anyone who loves ambient music. It was the rainy season, and I felt like I kept winding up in places that sounded really interesting to me. Then in one older building, I met a man who told me they had a nightingale floor – this old floor that sounds like a nightingale singing when you walk on it. In the process of trying to record what that floor sounded like – just stomping around on it, trying to make it sing – I felt like I was basically doing what I do with a synthesizer, which is just like banging at various instruments and seeing what comes out of them and then making a record out of it.

So I had this desire to combine these field tapes with more compositions. And introducing outside elements that were scaffolding the music, like with rhythm as well.

How did you approach incorporating the drums?

I would listen to a ton of samples and try to find ones that connected with me for some reason. Once I found those, I would create really long loops of them. Then start playing on top of them, letting a structure emerge. I wanted there to be – not the feeling of a live drummer, but of variation in the drums. I wanted to figure out how I could put a bunch of moments in the recordings that grab your attention without breaking a sort of peaceful flow.

One of the ways I was doing that in the record was finding little moments in the drum loops where I could process the drum differently with the time-based effects that actually changed what the pattern being played was. You can hear that most clearly on “Align.” I would do a phase of that and try and find these little pockets where it could morph, then go back and play more and sculpt around that.

And the instruments you used?

As always, the DX7. I used a lot of harmonica too on this record. There are some moments where I’m doing extreme vocal processing on my own voice. And there’s a little acoustic guitar. But yeah, otherwise it’s the DX7, drum loops, and field tape.

Were there any other albums that you were listening to while making this?

Haruomi Hosono, a lot of that. I was listening to Ernest Hood’s Neighborhoods, especially how he works with field tape. I really fell in love with Susumu Yokota and Synergetic Voice Orchestra in the process of making this. Then there’s always the classic people like Harold Budd and Brian Eno. I was listening to Wet Land a lot by Hiroshi Yoshimura too.

What are you working on next?

Right now I’m working on two film scores. One has been in progress for a long time, which is part of why I took some time off making records. That’s been really fun. I think it’s also part of why I wanted to work with field tape because it’s really fun to put music to a story, or try to tell a story with music. So I’m finishing up those two film scores, and then I have a site-specific project out in Wichita, Kansas, which I am making plans for in November. I’m really excited about that. I’m hoping to have something from that to share early next year.

Flow State Episode 344

Flow State — Tue, 22 Sep 2026 07:03:59 GMT

Today’s mix opens with new ambient music by Hayes Bradley, Asio Silver, and The Black Dog. We revisit a favorite from the Harold Budd compilation Budd Box and then some more new instrumentals by Midori Takada & Jakob Bro, Cephas Azariah, and Le Motel. There’s a track from the prolific Oren Ambarchi’s record from last year, Ghosted III, as well as an incredible 2014 folk track from the duo Hazelius Hedin. The pace gently picks up with Okonski, Colossus, and Professor Kazkaz. A new single from Greg Foat brings it to a close. We hope you enjoy.

0:00:00 - Hayes Bradley - Monday’s Children

0:02:51 - Asio Silver - Nights

0:06:02 - The Black Dog - Theme 1

Joel Noct Brinson

Flow State — Mon, 21 Sep 2026 07:04:23 GMT

Today we’re listening to Joel Noct Brinson, an American ambient musician based in Portland, Oregon. We discovered his music via ’s post on . Brinson started a practice of daily sketches on his Buchla Music Easel, a portable semi-modular analog synth originally created in 1973. His June LP, the politics of being, emerged from these daily sketches, the tracks recorded in one take each. “Not composed but revealed,” he wrote. The nine pieces are slow-moving ambient works, with a ghostly quality, not scary but pretty haunted. We’re also playing his EP Fawn from 2024, three-module one-takes, in a similar style.

the politics of being - Joel Noct Brinson (47m, no vocals)
Bandcamp / Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Tidal

Fawn - Joel Noct Brinson (24m, no vocals)
Bandcamp / Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Tidal

We wish you a great start to your week.

via Instagram

Professor Kazkaz

Flow State — Fri, 18 Sep 2026 07:04:40 GMT

It’s Friday so we’re listening to something slightly more upbeat. Today we’re listening to Professor Kazkaz, a collaboration between German electronic musicians Gregor Tresher and Marcus Schmahl. We found their LP, Algorhythms, via upsammy who named it her Perfect 10 record. “It’s mostly downtempo, IDM electronica. It’s very moody, murky, I think perfect for midnight drives on a long, windy road.” In our testing it also works at a desk. Released in 2007, Algorhythms is the duo’s only release. Like Boards of Canada, they pair emphatic drum loops with synth lines, whose optimism and wonder reflect the physics theme of the project. The tracks have names like “Quantum Dots” and “Ellipsometry” and “Zirconium.”

Algorhythms - Professor Kazkaz (71m, no vocals)
Spotify / Apple Music / ~~YouTube Music~~ / Amazon Music / Tidal

Have an amazing weekend.

Go Kurosawa (Guest rec by Sofie Birch)

Flow State — Thu, 17 Sep 2026 07:02:50 GMT

Today we have a guest recommendation from , a sound artist and composer, whose newsletter Ambient Abracadabra we highly recommend.

I randomly (or not at all) discovered Go Kurosawa's live set in KEXP, and fell totally in love with him and the music. I never watch these videos through (and definitely not twice), but I watched this and still watch it a lot. Somehow it inspires me so much to prepare for my Bivabippabualukka tour next year. I am used to mostly playing ambient solo sets, but this inspires me to explore band setups and playing differently. A couple of weeks after I started to watch this video, Go wrote me on instagram that he is a big fan of Bivabippabualukka, and we got mutually star struck! What a universe flow thing to experience! Check out his debut album Soft Shakes, packed with lo key psych rock trance spiritual flow beats.

Soft Shakes - Go Kurosawa (31m, some light vocals on half of the tracks)
Bandcamp / Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Tidal

Have a great Thursday.

Across the Horizon Ep. 70: Sarah Davachi (Pt. 2)

Flow State — Wed, 16 Sep 2026 07:03:59 GMT

On today’s episode of Across the Horizon, host Bob Holmes from the band SUSS finishes his conversation with Sarah Davachi from last week. Where the first part of their discussion focused on the titans of prog rock – Genesis, King Crimson, and Yes – this episode focuses on the fringes of the genre, including acts from Italy, Brazil, and Germany, as well as some of the solo ventures spawned by the bigger artists. And, finally, Bob gets to talk with Sarah about her latest minimalist masterpiece The Will of Tongues.

For Flow State, this is Davachi recommendation number nine for us. We’ve shared Will of Tongues twice now, her new album which you should really check out if you haven’t yet. We’re starting today with one of her earlier albums, Gave in Rest, from 2018. She studied Renaissance musicianship and church music, channeling those into compositions for synth and piano which linger on certain harmonics. We’re also playing Figures in Open Air from 2020, which has over two hours of live and alternate-take performances.

Gave in Rest - Sarah Davachi (43m, no vocals)
Bandcamp / Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Tidal

Figures in Open Air - Sarah Davachi (138m, no vocals)
Bandcamp / Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Tidal

Have a great Wednesday.

Flow State Ep. 343: Corntuth Premiere

Flow State — Tue, 15 Sep 2026 07:02:48 GMT

Today’s mix premieres the new Corntuth record, The Nightingale Floor, which comes out next week on Flow State Records and Aural Canyon. “I made this record after what felt like a very long series of journeys that took me away from making music for a while,” Corntuth wrote. “Here are the things I overheard, the sounds and feelings that caught my ear during the time. They built up until I realized they were one thing and ready to share. I’m so glad to be putting this out at last. “ The first 34 minutes is the new record in full, followed by a playlist of influences. The influences include Synergetic Voice Orchestra, Yoshiaki Ochi, Oscar Peterson, Ernest Hood, Sam Wilkes, Woo, Susumu Yokota, and more. We hope you enjoy.

0:00:00 - Corntuth - Kintoki Tunnel, i

0:02:29 - Corntuth - Phonebooth

0:07:26 - Corntuth - Nightingale Waltz

0:09:38 - Corntuth - Align

0:14:35 - Corntuth - Autoharp

0:17:40 - Corntuth - A-819

0:21:06 - Corntuth - Bitter Fish

0:24:28 - Corntuth - Big-Time Me

0:26:02 - Corntuth - Nightingale End of Summer

0:29:18 - Corntuth - Rainfrogs

0:31:08 - Corntuth - Kintoki Tunnel, ii

John Carroll Kirby (Interview)

Flow State — Mon, 14 Sep 2026 07:03:26 GMT

Today we’re listening to John Carroll Kirby, an American pianist and composer from Los Angeles. At age 12, he started taking piano lessons. “My mom told me I needed to do something other than school and video games,” he told us. “My best friend Michael did piano lessons, so I did it too.” He stuck with it, and studied jazz at USC, going on to record with Blood Orange, Solange, and Frank Ocean. Since we first recommended Kirby’s music back in 2020, he’s released two scores and four albums. Septet from 2021 was a standout – original, quirky compositions broadly in the jazz/funk vein. His latest record, Piano Works 2016-2026, just came out at the end of August. That one collects impromptu recordings made on pianos while touring. The pieces are delicate, intimate, but convey the tender and whimsical flavor that defines Kirby. A conversation with John follows the streaming links.

Piano Works 2016-2026 - John Carroll Kirby (44m, no vocals)
Bandcamp / Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Tidal

Septet - John Carroll Kirby (47m, no vocals)
Bandcamp / Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Tidal

What’s your earliest memory of music?

Driving to Kindergarten, we had Greatest Hits cassette tapes of The Beach Boys and the Irish Rovers. We listened to them on repeat. I remember “In My Room” made me feel weird and sad.

How did you get started on piano? What was the piano you learned on, and the first piece you learned that felt like a real accomplishment?

I got started on the piano at about age 12. My mom told me I needed to do something other than school and video games. My best friend Michael did piano lessons, so I did it too. Both my Grandmothers had yellow pianos which I inherited. One Grandma tried getting into music, she tried to learn Appalachian dulcimer and harp, and singing but quit when her teacher asked her if she was deaf ;/ My first teacher was named Roark Hunnicut. We would spend a lot of time talking about trippy concepts, he liked Doors of Perception by Aldous Huxley type stuff. Unconventionally the first tricky piece he taught me was the intro to “Riders on The Storm” by The Doors.

What were your first original recordings like? How did you make them?

My first recordings were cool, I wish I had them. I would use cassette handheld dictation recorders. They would sound distorted and compressed.

Which artists/albums pointed you in the direction of your own original sound?

My very first influences were Jimmy Smith, Ray Manzarek and Money Mark. I soon thereafter got into Herbie Hancock, Ahmad Jamal, Duke Ellington, and Fats Waller.

Piano Works 2016-2026 collects impromptu pieces on the road. Which sessions stick out in your memory the most?

A few stick out: “Cecilia 14” was recorded in London. I was on a white piano, there was a beautiful Ragdoll Cat that would come in the house and sit with me. “Rain Walking” was recorded in Rome on a very old and broken, but beautiful piano. I composed the piece around the pianos limitations (dead notes, out of tune notes, overly sustained notes).

“Empty Room” was recorded New Years Day, at my friend Tex Crick’s house in Wollongong Australia.

How do you discover new music these days? Any recent notable finds?

Still a lot through friends turning me onto stuff, IRL or on IG, and my own research on the internet. I saw an interview with Jim O’Rourke where he recommended Kyle Gann, Hyperchromatica. My friend Macca played One Half of Bent, “Ecstasy,” on his NTS show the other day.

Name an underrated artist from the past 50 years.

Egberto Gismonti

What are you working on next?

I have an album with my band that should come out next year. I’ve been writing a new album with Eddie Chacon. Can’t wait to share all this stuff :)