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Nathan Taylor

@sponge_bath

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Carrboro, NC :: admin @softer_recordings

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🚨ANNOUNCING🚨
Brief Being, CS, SFRC011
(Shipping Oct. 15, 2026)

When we consider New Age music and whatever it might mean in the present moment, we have to reckon with the fact that the lofty goals of its inception — e.g., vibrational up-shifts, awakening into the universal consciousness, cosmic unity, spiritual oneness, inner peace, etc. — have been largely unattainable for not only the vast majority of listeners, but also everyone. Rather than realizing the utopian ideals heralded by New Age music, we are all forced through the meat grinder of modernity, a maelstrom of anxiety, isolation, desperation, precarity, and brutality. The vibrational up-shift has revealed itself as an illusion leading to a very dark place. Any therapeutic benefit afforded by New Age music is obliterated by the horrific weight of the present.

Enter Brief Being, a four piece ensemble out of Greenville, North Carolina. They wield the gongs, bells, chimes, and rattles that have historically been used to produce the more improvisational iterations of this music. However, their eponymous first recording offers little to listeners who may expect solace or a therapeutic experience typically derived from the more saccharine New Age idioms. Instead, they give us sixty minutes of sparse instrumentation punctuated by intense, foreboding gong work, hypnotic hand drums, and portentous crescendos of alien resonance. A veiled sonic malevolence permeates this work, forcing the listener to surrender to an unknown force beckoning from the shadows of the future.

It is a New Age music that affirms the calamitous present rather than projecting itself upon some imagined utopia that has never and will never exist. If it does portend a future, there is no guarantee of something better. Only the thin assurance that the only way out is through.

We enter the unknown together.
—-———
Recorded at home on February 7–8 and May 31, 2026, in Greenville, North Carolina.

Instruments: bells, chimes, cymbals, drums, gongs, rattles, shakers, singing bowls, triangles, crystal pyramids, wave drums, dried grasses, leaves, and sticks

Caretakers: Justin, Nathan, Megan, Casey taken in Carrboro, North Carolina by @sponge_bath

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a month ago

🚨ANNOUNCING 🚨

Zach Rowden, LP, 𝘛𝘪𝘮𝘦 𝘜𝘯𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘥, 𝘏𝘶𝘦𝘴 𝘜𝘯𝘴𝘦𝘦𝘯, SFRC010 (shipping Oct. 15)

A tape loop repeating, posing mundane questions to the listener: “Am I different because you are different from one moment to the next; or, am I different because I am different from myself from one moment to the next?” It is hard to tell. The ebb and flow of difference and repetition always produces a psychedelic interrogation. Where were you when you first heard me? Who were you when you first heard me? Are you still there? Are you still the same person? Breathing in and out is sort of similar. Something we do continuously as a matter of survival. One breath is not so different from the next, but each breath is also a seemingly singular event, a repetition bleeding into its own repetition. Is listening any different? One sound bleeding into the next, as if beginnings and endings fail to matter. These cycles have always existed in one way or another. All points of discontinuity are an illusion hiding a fundamental continuity that is also always different from itself. Tape loop as metaphor for Being.

Zach Rowden’s (Tongue Depressor, Red Yellow Blue Green Black, Lead Mask, Wind Scour, Crazy Doberman, et al) 𝘛𝘪𝘮𝘦 𝘜𝘯𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘥, 𝘏𝘶𝘦𝘴 𝘜𝘯𝘴𝘦𝘦𝘯 gestures towards these abstractions. An album of repeating fits and starts; a broken machine of repetition and difference dissolving into infinity. Moments of beauty, imperfection, and vacuity, hanging together like old friends reconnecting after a few years of separation. The friends retell the same stories and jokes over and over; each time it hits a little different. Sometimes laughter. Sometimes tears. The embodiment of a locked groove. These recordings were generated by harnessing previously made recordings from Rowden’s archive or found scraps of other people’s old tapes. Recorded from 2024-2025, it marks a particularly scathing and uncanny period of Rowden’s life. Yet, it exhibits a supreme focus and patience, reflective of his continuous practice and refinement of magnetic tape manipulations.

———————

Tapes: Zach Rowden
Mastering: Nathan Taylor
Sleeve design: Alin Cincă taken in Carrboro, North Carolina by @sponge_bath

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a month ago

Nathan Taylor (@sponge_bath) on December 21, 2025 at Lump in Raleigh, NC. Full set on my YouTube — link in bio. #nathantaylormusic #experimentalmusic #ambientmusic #lumpgallery #chadwickarchives taken in LUMP gallery/projects by @sponge_bath

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a month ago

saturday august 1

an evening of abstract sound presented by enmossed and Softer Recordings to herald the album 𝑷𝒂𝒓𝒆𝒊𝒅𝒐𝒍𝒊𝒂* by Jake Muir

starts 8 PM at shadowbox studio (durham, nc) ~ $15 | NOTAFLOF

live:
Jake Muir (los angeles)
doris dana
Nathan Taylor

dj:
Glyn Maier
Karl Raymar [Secret Boyfriend]

*𝑷𝒂𝒓𝒆𝒊𝒅𝒐𝒍𝒊𝒂 LPs are slated to begin shipping July 15 ~ your patience is much appreciated as we've worked through a few printing issues taken in Shadowbox Studio by @sponge_bath

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4 months ago

Announcing Dave Public “Cladosporium Suite Parts I & II” CS, SFRC009. Available now at softer-recordings.org

Solace is sought by many. Unfortunately only a few can be accommodated. We are always trying to make sure that nothing is overlooked. Our efforts may be tireless, but ultimately they are feeble. Nothing ever means anything. The universe is a continual propulsion and retraction.

Suroh: Alien Hitchhiker (1996)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Produced and mixed by Dave Public using source material ripped directly from his personal VHS collection.

SFRC009, Home Listening Vol. IV, the fourth iteration of an ongoing mix series by Softer Recordings affiliates. This iteration is a ninety minute mixtape of VHS ephemera, spanning forgotten trash and transcendent, unheard sonic artifacts, ~1977 through the early 2000s. Beguiling, beautiful, and fabulously distasteful. taken in Carrboro, North Carolina by @sponge_bath

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4 months ago

Some shots from the recent Nathan Taylor / Verity Den show at Brillobox taken in brillobox by @sponge_bath

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6 months ago

Nathan Taylor “Life is but a Dream” CS (SFRC008) now shipping from softer recs HQ Bandcamp. Grab a copy before they are all given away on the upcoming tour with @verityden.

April 9: Winston-Salem, Phuzz Fest
April 10: Louisville, @bsidebutchertown
April 11: Bloomington, @wiuxfm
April 12: Chicago, @hideoutchicago
April 13: Ypsilanti, Ziggys
April 14: Cleveland, day off, chilling with @remko_nizbit and @trick_of_disaster
April 15: Pittsburgh, @brilloboxpgh
April 16: Philadelphia, @jerrysonfront
April 17: Richmond, @banditoslounge.rva taken in Carrboro, North Carolina by @sponge_bath

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6 months ago

hitting the road in april with our good chum @sponge_bath

4.9 - Winston-Salem - Phuzz Phest
4.10 - Louisville - @bsidebutchertown *
4.11 - Bloomington - Culture Shock @wiuxfm
4.12 - Chicago - @hideoutchicago *
4.13 - Ypsilanti - @ziggysypsi *
4.15 - Pittsburgh - @brilloboxpgh *
4.16 - Philadelphia - @jerrysonfront *
4.17 - Richmond - @banditoslounge.rva *

* with solo performances by Nathan Taylor

<tour poster by Annie @annievedd - printed by Mateo @myholidayscomplete >

can't wait to hang with you all 🔮 we'll have some new merch and the new instrumental LP that's coming out on 4.3 - see u by @sponge_bath

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7 months ago

🥂DJ GIG🥂

I am DJing selections from my modest collection of disco records from around the world. 8-12am, March 21. @theoldnorthbar Durham NC

this is a 💯 party for my friends to get loose

#stompers #chuggers #groovers #steamers taken in Durham, North Carolina by @sponge_bath

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7 months ago

Bringing it to Ypsi @ziggysypsi 4/13 ::

PAPER SLEEP @paper.sleep
VERITY DEN @verityden
DENO @d_e.n_o
NATHAN TAYLOR @sponge_bath

7:30 $5/$10 pwyc Photo shared by ⱽᵉʳⁱᵗʸ ᴰᵉⁿ on March 13, 2026 tagging @sponge_bath, @ziggysypsi, @d_e.n_o, and @paper.sleep. May be an image of ‎poster and ‎text that says '‎paper sleep Verity den ne deno nathan ب taylor no ziggy's Ypsilanti,MI MI APRIL 13th 2026 7:30‎'‎‎. by @sponge_bath

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7 months ago

Enjoy this perfect little low quality video of @danspartridge ripping it at @shadowbox_studio last Saturday. Copies of his LP “Die Singing Sage” still available at Softer HQ.

I love live music !!

📷 by @mbnah taken in Shadowbox Studio by @sponge_bath

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7 months ago

Announcing Nathan Taylor “Life is but a Dream” SFRC008, limited edition cassette. Available for preorder now via the softer recordings bandcamp. Shipping early April 2026. softer-recordings.org

Nathan Taylor’s debut under his given name, 𝘓𝘪𝘧𝘦 𝘐𝘴 𝘉𝘶𝘵 𝘈 𝘋𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘮, presents a hypnagogic atmosphere unfurling within the space spanning crepuscular phantoms to late-night reveries. Though the album’s title and eight extended tracks initially suggest a sleep-inducing stasis, its ultimate effect hearkens towards the primal, unsettling unknowability of the things that go bump in the night. Think sleep paralysis rather than bucolic visions of sheep jumping fences. Tracks are grounded by singular sonic sources - such as resonant bells, deep analog synthesizer sweeps, or a chorus of alto recorders - which float like faded liturgical etchings amidst field recordings, heavily modulated whispers, and disembodied voices.

𝘓𝘪𝘧𝘦 𝘐𝘴 𝘉𝘶𝘵 𝘈 𝘋𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘮 draws us into a peculiar zone where language, sound, and thought congeal into the uncanny, deftly balancing experiences of discomfort and the sublime. Lucid dreaming or unconscious living? There are no hard distinctions in an increasingly hallucinatory post-2020 information landscape, and Taylor presents an album perfectly suited for our time.

~Glyn Maier @enmossed taken in Carrboro, North Carolina by @sponge_bath

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7 months ago