UPCOMING RELEASES:
Ateleia and Benjamin Curtis - Baghdad Batterie 12" released 20 May 2008 by Table of the Elements. More info here.
The Ateleia track Grasses is on the Impala Eardrums compilation which showcases a lot of great Radium/Table of the Elements artists. Released 20 May 2008.
RELEASES: Nightly, a 26 minute EP of all new material including a
collaboration with Benjamin Curtis, was released by Table of the
Elements on 11 September 2007. It is available on CD and as a
download via iTunes.
Press for Nightly:
"Half rhythmic and half beatless we're treated to dark drones, stunning manipulation and a couple of tracks that, frankly, are up there with the likes of Gas and William Basinski." - Smallfish, September 2007
Formal Sleep, the second Ateleia full length, released 23 January 2007 by Table of the Elements. The TotE press release:
Ateleia is Brooklyn resident James Elliott. His music combines crystalline pulse with submerged aquatic drones and subtle ghost melodies. It's not so much oceanic as it is tide pool - the churn of the tidal impulse captured in miniature and crawling with activity. Evoking the grand echo of My Bloody Valentine and the long standing tradition of psychedelic minimalism, but informed by contemporary electronic music, Formal Sleep is truly immersive. Featuring contributions by David Grubbs (Gastr del Sol), David Daniell (Rhys Chatham, Jonathan Kane), Jon Philpot (Presocratics, Bear In Heaven) and Sadek Bazaraa.
Press for Formal Sleep:
"Elliott’s music is quietly, hypnotically gorgeous. Formal Sleep follows through on the debut’s textural promise, with every digital grain flooded with light, the sensual properties of these perpetually flickering micro-melodies and buried, striated rhythms recalling the bright eyelid-movie patterning of Man Ray’s Emak Bakia film, where spiralling shapes reflect light in abstruse programs." - Jon Dale, Stylus Magazine, January 2007
"... this album will blow your mind... This isn’t your average electronic music... beneath the cyclic beat structures and fluttering electric piano is a mire of experimental noise and expert manipulation. Those of you who enjoyed Kompakt’s Pop Ambient series of releases will no doubt be intrigued by the blend of sound on offer here – this music is deep, sincere and very carefully measured. On the closing piece ‘Bridget Riley’ Elliott’s ideas finally slide together in perfect harmony and he turns in a piece that is a testament to his vision. As the gorgeous cascading harmonies reach a satisfying close, you can be safe in the knowledge that beauty is alive and well, no matter what they keep trying to tell us. A breathtaking piece of work - a massive recommendation." - Boomkat, February 2007
"There's always a satisfying bandwidth to Ateleia's music, with its middle-range sounds, like waves, coming crested with high-end foam and deep, low-end swell... His elegantly unfolded sounds have an unmistakably tidal impulse." - Sam Davies, The Wire No. 276
"As accomplished as the debut is, the follow-up presents a more mature vision and a broader range of stylistic contrasts, with tracks ranging between contemplative soundscapes and settings so propulsive they verge on techno, albeit of an obviously abstract kind... one easily succumbs to the psychedelic pull of Formal Sleep's hallucinogenic charms." - Ron Schepper, Textura, January 2007
"Hypnotic... The careful shape of Ateleia's formalist approach recalls Laika and Spiritualized, though Elliott clearly serves a louder, more aggressive muse." - Eric Waggoner, Magnet Magazine 75
Swimming Against The Moments, released by Antiopic, 4 November 2004.
Press for Swimming Against the Moments:
"Elliott's thrumming soundscapes approach the idea of song in a manner not unlike My Bloody Valentine's mid-song feedback deconstructions, keeping the form as suggestion while reveling in the more sensual aspects of sound. His textures are invariably rich and buzzing, filed with melodies scuffed by hard-disc imperfections and thick sheets of multihued distortion." - Joe Panzner, Grooves No. 016
"A massive record, definitely one of the more powerful experimental computer music albums I've heard in some time." - Keith Fullerton Whitman
"Elliott's gaseous compositions are austere but not forbidding, strung out but not aimless. Despite the music's bracing astringency and cerebral economy of approach, there's just enough textural warmth and serendipitous, fleeting beauty to sustain an emotional as well as an intellectual response... Quietly breathtaking." - Chris Sharp, The Wire No. 251
"Church-bell sonorities stretch impossibly, buzzing like distant hornets; insistent tones swarm like a Terry Riley mantra. Striking a middle ground between Fennesz and the austere minimalism of Dion Workman and Rosy Parlane, Elliott carves out a niche all his own." - Steve Smith, Time Out New York No. 476
