Elyria Sound
OM002 / VF459
Elyria Sound by Michael A. Muller
Ojas Music / The Vinyl Factory
08 May 2026
11 Tracks / 38 Minutes
Produced, Composed & Performed by Michael A. Muller
Analog Recording & Mixing by Jonathan Low—Brooklyn
Analog Mastering & Lacquer Cut by Frederic Stader—Köln
Cover Art by Dennis Foster
The second release from Ojas Music, Elyria Sound is a solo guitar album from Michael A. Muller, recorded to analog tape during a winter storm in Brooklyn in January 2026.
Where Muller’s previous work operated in darker, atmospheric territories, and 2024’s Mirror Music wove together 11 collaborators, Elyria Sound strips everything back to a single voice: one instrument, one room, one take. Each piece was captured live in single passes to a one-inch tape machine, the most direct path from fingertip to magnetic oxide.
The album title traces to 2018, when Muller began writing solo music while housesitting for a friend in Elyria Canyon in the East Los Angeles hills. The address became the name of his studio, and when he moved to LA shortly after, it became a way of life for the next six years. Elyria Sound is an intimate homage to his sensorial world of that time: the quality of light through a kitchen window. The lull of helicopters and sirens, the blurred glimmer of city lights stretching to the night horizon. Gravel, dust, lizards, birds. Clacking bamboo, white rose, jade, fig, and lemon. A dwelling. A resting place. The comfort of an exhale, and the looming awareness that nothing stays.
To create the record, Muller developed entirely new guitar tunings, forcing himself to relearn the instrument’s language from scratch. The result moves between lullaby and lament: spare, cyclical compositions where motifs recur at differing angles and tempos, variations on a central thread. One piece, “Arundel,” pays tribute to David Pajo (Papa M, Slint, Tortoise), a nod to the lineage of guitar music that values texture and patience over drama.
The cover artwork by Dennis Foster serves as a visual counterbalance to the music’s intended simplicity.
Recorded and mixed by the multi Grammy award-winning engineer Jonathan Low, the album was mastered to tape with lacquer cut in Germany by Frederic Stader. The release partners with The Vinyl Factory; plated and pressed at the former-EMI plant on the outskirts of London.
Elyria Sound is the second release from Ojas Music, the label founded by Muller and Devon Turnbull of Ojas, the Brooklyn-based audio and hi-fi company devoted to analog sound and deep listening. The label’s inaugural release, Unna (March 2026), paired Muller with Deaf Center’s Otto A. Totland for an album of dark ambiance and minimal piano.
The premiere of Elyria Sound will occur at a listening session at London’s 180 Studios on 9 May 2026, with a tour of fifteen concerts across Europe with Joep Beving to follow.
VINYL
Limited to 500, hand-numbered copies worldwide
33rpm on 180g heavyweight virgin black vinyl
Lacquer cut from original master tape on a Neumann VMS80 lathe
Pressed on the EMI1400 at The Vinyl Factory
Worldwide Orders (Ships immediately from London)
US Orders (via Bandcamp, US-only, ships mid-June)
Reel-To-Reel
Made to order, 1:1 Master Tape Transfer
1/4” 2-track RTM LPR90 Reel, 15 IPS, CCIR or NAB
Housed in a deluxe custom, hand-made box
Order (Ships worldwide from London)
1st Edition of 100
Full-color digipak
US Orders (via Bandcamp, US-only, Ships Mid-June)
Digital / Streaming
24-bit, 96kHz high-res direct transfers from the analog master tape
Amazon Music / Apple / Bandcamp / Qobuz / Spotify / Tidal / YouTube