[ aquarius records catalogue

IMPORTANT (Please read to avoid confusion): Some items below may be tagged with a bold, red, all-caps OUT OF PRINT/UNAVAILABLE notice. This does NOT mean that all other items not so tagged are, in fact, in stock — or for that matter, in print and available, though there's a good chance they are. Some folks get confused on this point, and we can see why, so please read this for further clarification and other important before-you-order information. Unlike some mailorder websites, we don't have an electronic inventory system linked to our site, so you can't be sure of what we actually have or don't have in stock at any given moment without asking us — please email our mailorder department for availability status — or better yet, just go ahead and place your order using our shopping cart function and we'll get back to you with the status of each item. If you have general non-mailorder questions, email the store.

Showing results 1651 through 1700 of 3202.

Originally released as a tape in 2014, this killer mix of far out, experimental hip hop, heavily influenced by Riot Grrl and queercore, now gets new life on vinyl, thanks to Ormolycka. And it's a good fit alongside the rest of Ormolycka's damaged hip hop roster (Antwon, Death Grips, Lil Ugly Mane, Burqa Boyz, Narwhalz, Bromp Treb, Juiceboxx, Shed Dwellaz), the music being a dizzying collage of grimy synths, twisted loops, stuttering, fractured beats, lots of buzz and static. The vibe is sometimes a little Digital Hardcore, sometimes a bit Anticon, shades of cloud rap abound, but MB gets way more gritty and fucked up, a sort of avant-trap, and damn, if this was straight up instrumental, it would be THEE beats and breaks record to beat, but then add in MB's crazy flow, and it becomes some seriously head spinning, next level, WTF?-hop, that is like nothing you've ever heard. There are a handful of guests too, most notably, Bikini Kill's Kathleen Hanna, who does a sung/spoken thing over a seriously grimy, beat-heavy, distorto groove! Pressed on opaque, lavender vinyl!

MPEG stream: For The Homey's
MPEG stream: Cyber Dog
MPEG stream: A Minute With Cakes

Oh man are we excited about this. A massive double lp collection of all the various eps and singles and cassettes and limited releases from one of our favorite modern groups. Fans of Blank Dogs, and we know lots of aQ list readers are, will definitely need this. We thought we were good about collecting all the BD stuff, but there's tons of stuff here we've never seen, as well as plenty we could never get enough of to review on the website. This collection includes these titles: The First Two Weeks, The Doorbell Fire, Diana The Herald, The Fields, Waiting, In Here, Seconds, Yellow Mice Sleep, Two Months, Mirror Lights, Setting Fire To Your House, In A Web, Captured Tracks Vol. 1 and Leaves. Phew! Some of this stuff you may very well have, but we're guessing most of it you don't. A few of those we did review, In fact, we made The Fields our Record Of The Week we loved it so much, so for those not familiar with Blank Dogs, that review should serve as a pretty good introduction: Everyone at aQ is super open minded when it comes to music, we all love all kinds of sounds, but each of us definitely has our favorite, our specialties, whether it be black metal, or indie rock or drone or post rock or power pop or whatever. So when a band shows up that has *everybody* freaking out, that's usually a sign that said group is something special, and in those cases we definitely try to mark the occasion by making that group's album our Record Of The Week. Such is the case with Blank Dogs, or should we say Blank Dog singular as this is a one man operation, some cat named Mike Sniper who for the last few years has been practically gushing limited cd-r's and tapes and short run releases, most so limited that for most of us, this is our first real exposure to Sniper's gorgeous woozy lo-fi new wave, and new wave is really what this is, whereas a lot of the other Blank Dogs releases were super noisy and abrasive, this is hooky and catchy and jangly, total perfect gloom pop, albeit drenched in plenty of tape hiss and amp buzz. Equal parts The Cure and Joy Division, huge fuzzed out downer basslines, simple drum rhythms or programmed beats, all wreathed in thick swirls of murky effects, fuzzy clouds of bloop and bleep, synthesizers spewing squiggly melodies, or unfurling thick undulating ribbons of warm buzz, and then the vocals, deep and drowsy, weary and worn, a mournful croon, super emotional and darkly evocative, all of those parts stitched together into haphazard perfect pop gems. All gothy and gloomy, with irresistible hooks buried all over the place, the deep main croon balanced by weird processed almost falsettos, fucked up effects careening all over the place in the background, their sound sometimes like a sort of Interpol meets Magnetic Fields by way of Sebadoh, simple guitar jangle over woozy synths, and sweet sad boy vocals, elsewhere super rocking, with heavy guitars, and warm, almost heavy choruses, surrounded by plenty of lo-fi jangle and shimmer. Elsewhere wicked blown out buzzy bass lines, that would shame Interpol, Joy Division melodies strung between constellations of glistening effects, the vocals dripping with delay and reverb and distortion, and again, everything wrapped around wicked hooks. Moody new wave gloom crossed with weirdly ebullient downer doompop. Need more? Here's our review of Seconds, also included here: Picking right up where The Fields left off, all four tracks here are super immediate and lo-fi rockers with a damaged Joy Division feel and twisting, disjointed melodies that you can't help but get stick in your head. While the slick side of a dark romantic New York might be exemplified by Interpol, Blank Dogs represents the more seedy, fucked up and authentic underbelly of the Big Apple. While it's a tad less dark then past outings, these songs still kill. "Keeping All The Time" might just be our new favorite Blank Dogs song with its fuzzy synths, and live drums played by Ryan Naideau (Dustheads, Extremis). Or still more, here's the review for Diana The Herald: We aQuarians have been jonesin' for anything to do with Blank Dogs as of late, as they are one of those rare groups that EVERYONE at the store goes crazy for. The sound is murky, dark, more than a tad bit goth, and masterfully lo-fi, but at the end of the day, Blank Dogs are essentially a pop band, and a damn fine one at that. Since it took a while for them to enter our radar, we are getting to gleefully sift through an extensive catalog of eps and lps from the past few years while patiently waiting for the upcoming full length on In The Red. This ep, released back in 2007, but newly available, is certainly worth the price of admission for the two songs which open each side of the record, but the others are quite impressive as well. "Leaving The Light On" and "Scenes From A New Town" are certainly among the most beautiful, melancholy, and just plain weird Blank Dogs songs to date. Things are kept moving with a steady drum machine beat as the overall melodies are shaped by single note guitars and bass lines that give the songs the feeling of some surf rock/goth hybrid with surprisingly anthemic choruses. Coupled with a recording fidelity that sounds like a crackling transmission from some parallel reality, creepy analog synthesizers galore, and Blank Dogs' spectral vocals, you'd be forgiven if you assumed these recordings might have been recorded at any point within the last thirty years. That said, there is nothing retro about Blank Dogs, nor would you call them (or more appropriately, "him" at this point) "ahead of their time". Instead, the music seems to exist simply OUT of time, which is probably why we have found Blank Dogs so very striking. A typically stellar release from this eccentric, hyper prolific pop machine. But what about all the records we never reviewed? All pretty fantastic in fact, the older ones of course more raw and lo-fi, home brewed, but definitely displaying BD's rapidly developing pop chops, hooky and poppy but WAY tweaked and twisted, often sounding like a punk rock Joe Meek! We're pretty psyched cuz there's so much new stuff to discover and dig into, this collection the perfect balance of new sounds and old favorites, and for sure a perfect introduction for someone new to Blank Dogs. Way way way recommended.

MPEG stream: Now Signals
MPEG stream: Before The Hours
MPEG stream: The Other Way

We aQuarians have been jonesin' for anything to do with Blank Dogs as of late, as they are one of those rare groups that EVERYONE at the store goes crazy for. The sound is murky, dark, more than a tad bit goth, and masterfully lo-fi, but at the end of the day, Blank Dogs are essentially a pop band, and a damn fine one at that. Since it took a while for them to enter our radar, we are getting to gleefully sift through an extensive catalog of eps and lps from the past few years while patiently waiting for the upcoming full length on In The Red. This ep, released back in 2007, but newly available, is certainly worth the price of admission for the two songs which open each side of the record, but the others are quite impressive as well. "Leaving The Light On" and "Scenes From A New Town" are certainly among the most beautiful, melancholy, and just plain weird Blank Dogs songs to date. Things are kept moving with a steady drum machine beat as the overall melodies are shaped by single note guitars and bass lines that give the songs the feeling of some surf rock/goth hybrid with surprisingly anthemic choruses. Coupled with a recording fidelity that sounds like a crackling transmission from some parallel reality, creepy analog synthesizers galore, and Blank Dogs' spectral vocals, you'd be forgiven if you assumed these recordings might have been recorded at any point within the last thirty years. That said, there is nothing retro about Blank Dogs, nor would you call them (or more appropriately, "him" at this point) "ahead of their time". Instead, the music seems to exist simply OUT of time, which is probably why we have found Blank Dogs so very striking. A typically stellar release from this eccentric, hyper prolific pop machine.

Another batch of gloomy fuzz pop from one man Blank Dog Mike Sniper, and while the sound of Blank Dogs has varied quite a bit over the last handful of releases, from paisley punk pop to gloomy lo-fi garage pop to vintage sounding cold wave, but this latest somehow manages to fuse all those elements into what might be the catchiest poppiest BD record yet. With woozy low slung basslines, shimmery space-y synths, super lo-fi Casio drum beats, reverby surf guitars wrapped around more angular riffy crunch, and the vocals, so nice, multi tracked and lush, swoonsome and dreamy, the songs peppered with all sorts of super catchy melodies, synth, guitar, vocal, "Goes By" might be our favorite Blank Dogs jam yet, total old school power pop via eighties cold wave via lo-fi 4 track bedroom rock via the current wave of fuzzy lysergic garage pop, fuzzy, effervescent and catchy as all get out! Much of the rest of the record dials back the pop just a bit, and slips into something a bit more gloomy and new wave-y, the vocals languorous and weary, the synths and guitars buzzy and droney and minor key, wrapped around simple propulsive rhythms, and motorik synth pulses, but peppered throughout are moments of surprisingly poppy poppiness, "Northern Islands" for instance is total skeletal lo-fi dream pop, with super dramatic crooned vocals, and whispery guitar jangle and super stripped down rhythms, but even those bits of poppiness end up segueing into blown out Zombi/Majeure style synthscapes, or total eighties style electro pop, reminding us of the Fixx (who should totally get mentioned more often in reviews of the various new wave of new wave bands, just sayin') or Interpol style gloomwave... It's all over the map for sure, but then Blank Dogs designed this map, so all the tracks manage to hang together perfectly, and have somehow coalesced into a pretty fantastic collection of twisted lo-fi new wave gloom pop, that we can't seem to stop listening to.

MPEG stream: Goes By
MPEG stream: Collides
MPEG stream: Longlights
MPEG stream: Treelines

Back in 2007, Mike Sniper started recording again, after digging out the 4-track he had back in high school that he hadn't used in about a decade. Since then, Sniper has been on a tear with his one-man darkened fuzz-pop machine Blank Dogs, earning him a whole slew of invitations for records, singles, cassettes, and whatnot. Admittedly, we didn't catch wind of Blank Dogs until his amazing album The Fields arrived on our doorstep just in time for Christmas 2008. So we've dug up the On Two Sides LP, a vinyl only edition which Blank Dogs released on Troubleman earlier in 2008; and damn, if it isn't a fantastic album as well. On Two Sides may be more of a paisley punk pop record for Blank Dogs; but fear not, there's plenty of bouncy goth references to take us back to The Cure and Joy Division. Just think Head On The Door and Love Will Tear Us Apart as the pinnacles of conveying mopiness within a bouncy dark pop song. Sniper's spiky guitars are often coupled with springy basslines that really seem to hybridize Simon Gallup of The Cure and Peter Hook of Joy Division, as the bass often dictates the melody while the guitar lends to the atmosphere. In doing so, these songs enjoy a manic-depressive teen angst meets teen freedom vibe, but made all woozy as if buzzed from that first ever nicotine rush. Given all of the cheap electronics, tinny drum machines, trebly distortion, and overblown fuzz that are especially applied to the indecipherably garbled vocals, Blank Dogs also share plenty of that fucked-up demented pop genius that Ariel Pink and John Maus seem to have monopolized in recent years. Really fantastic stuff!

Latest mini lp from aQ faves Blank Dogs, the one man new wave noise pop retro revivalist project of Mike Sniper, who besides being the man behind the kick ass Captured Tracks label, also finds time to release record after record of lo-fi dour cold wave-y bedroom pop, and we're not complaining. Not one bit. On past discs, the new wave-ness was often more implied, a Joy Division bass line here, some croony gothy vocals there, but on the opening track on Phrases, it's like it could be some lost archival Vinyl On Demand reissue, all primitive synths, Kraftwerk rhythms, cold Teutonic melodies, sweeping synth oscillations, cheesy effects, guitar jangle, lurching off kilter arrangements, strange vocal harmonies, like a fractured outsider Cure / Depeche Mode hybrid, but with some Goblin / Carpenter overtones for sure. The second track, "Blurred Tonight" is even more Cure-ish, with cloying minor key melodies over warbly basslines, skittery rhythms, seasick synths, reverby guitars, and sweet main hook. "Racing Backwards" reminds us a bit of Ultravox, brooding balladic goth pop, slow stirring verses, and jittery angular bridges and choruses, everything phased and flanged, the synths squiggly, the vocals buried and murky, lots of softly tangled melodies, the recording gauzy and hazy making the whole track feel ghostlike. And finally, the record finishes with "End Of Summer", which doesn't veer to far from the other tracks, besides being a bit more aggressive, the synths are more buzzy, the rhythms more driving, the sound a bit more electro, way more electro and danceable, think Devo meets Human League, quirky and future funky, robotic but still super poppy and catchy. Brief for sure, and on the surface even more retro than past releases, but definitely an excellent addition to the already extensive Blank Dogs discography, and not a bad place to start for a first taste of BD's quirky retro new wave noise pop bliss.

It's pretty much Blank Dogs 24/7 in AQ-land as of late. We recently made their/his latest record,The Fields, Record Of The Week and it truly was one of those rare albums that every single one of us at the store had fallen deeply in love with. So we were more then thrilled to see this brand new 12" arrive with four more great tracks all recorded earlier this year. Picking right up where The Fields left off, all four tracks here are super immediate and lo-fi rockers with a damaged Joy Division feel and twisting, disjointed melodies that you can't help but get stick in your head. While the slick side of a dark romantic New York might be exemplified by Interpol, Blank Dogs represents the more seedy, fucked up and authentic underbelly of the Big Apple. While its a tad less dark then past outings, these songs still kill. "Keeping All The Time" might just be our new favorite Blank Dogs song with its fuzzy synths, and live drums played by Ryan Naideau (Dustheads, Extremis). We're so excited to finally get to see Blank Dogs live! They'll be playing in San Francisco later this month, we have no idea what the set up will be but as long as we get to hear these songs and all our favorite tracks from The Fields we have a feeling we'll be pretty damn happy.

Two new jams from this one man band, spearheading the current new wave of... umm, new wave. And we have to to say, lately, we're more and more convinced that if there is some sort of crown for dour new wave lo-fi noise pop king, it's gotta go to Mr. Blank Dogs, and this 7 inch only seals the deal. Strip away the fuzz and the hiss and the distortion and the crackle and you'd have some dangerously catchy pure pop. Fuck it, DON'T strip any of that stuff away and you STILL have some seriously perfect pop. The A side has a hook most bands would kill for, rendered here in buzzy brittle synths, lilting guitar melodies, cool distorted effected vox, and all sorts of warble and warp, easily the catchiest Blank Dogs track yet. The B side channels vintage Sebadoh style bedroom 4-track sad boy folk pop into something a little more poppy and new wave-y but still plenty murky and jangly and lo-fi, with sci-fi synths, rubbery bass and haunting multi tracked vocals, as well as another killer guitar part. Absolutely kick ass gloomy downer new wave doom pop that pretty much no other shitgazing bands have been able to touch...

Everyone at aQ is super open minded when it comes to music, we all love all kinds of sounds, but each of us definitely has our favorite, our specialties, whether it be black metal, or indie rock or drone or post rock or power pop or whatever. So when a record shows up that has *everybody* freaking out, that's usually a sign that said record is something special, and in those cases we definitely try to mark the occasion by making that record our Record Of The Week. Such is the case with The Fields by Blank Dogs, or should we say Blank Dog singular as this is a one man operation, some cat named Mike Sniper who for the last few years has been practically gushing limited cd-r's and tapes and short run releases, most so limited that for most of us, The Fields is our first real exposure to Sniper's gorgeous woozy lo-fi new wave, and new wave is really what this is, whereas a lot of the other Blank Dogs releases were super noisy and abrasive, The Fields is hooky and catchy and jangly, total perfect gloom pop, albeit drenched in plenty of tape hiss and amp buzz. Equal parts The Cure and Joy Division, huge fuzzed out downer basslines, simple drum rhythms or programmed beats, all wreathed in thick swirls of murky effects, fuzzy clouds of bloop and bleep, synthesizers spewing squiggly melodies, or unfurling thick undulating ribbons of warm buzz, and then the vocals, deep and drowsy, weary and worn, a mournful croon, super emotional and darkly evocative, all of those parts stitched together into haphazard perfect pop gems. It's a super short record, seven songs in twenty minutes, but it's darn near perfect, the opening bass line and drum part are total Cure worship, all gothy and gloomy, with an irresistible hook buried in the mix, the deep main croon balanced by a weird processed almost falsetto, fucked up effects careening all over the place in the background, smoothly segueing into "Now Signals" the indie mixtape hit of the year if there ever was one, a sort of Interpol meets Magnetic Fields by way of Sebadoh, a simple guitar jangle over woozy synths, and a sweet sad boy vocal, until it shifts gear into a killer super rocking, heavy guitar bridge, that slips into a warm, almost heavy chorus, before returning to that lo-fi jangle and shimmer of the verse. "Passing The Light" has a wicked blown out buzzy bass line, that would shame Interpol, the Joy Division melody strung between a constellation of glistening effects, the vocals dripping with delay and reverb and distortion, and again, all wrapped around a wicked hook. The last few tracks get almost frenetic, and mix in some classic pop era Eno into the moody new wave gloom, finishing things off with the weirdly ebullient "Spinning", that manages to glow and pulse with energy while retaining plenty of the rest of the record's glorious downer doompop vibe. Of course this is on Woodsist, which has been on a roll lately releasing one amazing gem after another: Crystal Stilts, Wavves, Pocahaunted, Meneguar, and now Blank Dogs!! Even though we're only a few weeks into 2009, there's no doubt this disc will find its way onto lots of folks year end lists!

MPEG stream: Now Signals
MPEG stream: Before The Hours
MPEG stream: The Other Way

Fuck YES! One of the most unstoppable and prolific projects in recent memory returns with full length #2... we think. Regardless, after a slew of limited run eps and singles, we were curious to see if Blank Dogs could handle the full length format as well as they - sorry, HE - did with the awesome On Two Sides lp a while back. It seems like some people were expecting Blank Dogs to crack under the pressure of increased exposure or in the face of a fiery hipster backlash. Well, we are happy to report that Under And Under more than ably delivers on all of the initial promise, another winner loaded with classic Blank Dogs and one of the most thrilling releases we have heard this year. It's pretty insane to think that someone could just keep churning this stuff out at such a rate with continually awesome results, but Blank Dogs sound as confident, or at least as melancholy, catchy, and propulsive as ever here. In terms of the actual sound, things haven't changed that much, which we consider a very good thing. The fidelity is maybe slightly higher, but just barely. The songs are a little tighter and more suited to a full length rather than an ep, making this one that will undoubtedly bring out more with repeated focused listens. But overall, this is just more of what we have loved since we came across Blank Dogs, with wandering bass lines, reverberated drum machines, super melodic single note guitar leads, and that awesome monotone voice all here in spades. In the end, Under And Under is a sure indicator that when it comes to actual songcraft, the man behind this project is clearly a cut above most others doing the lo-fi garage thing. It's pretty accurate to mention bands like Joy Division and the Cure when describing this, but the more poppy numbers seem to follow a more Buzzcocksian approach while the transitions to the anthemic choruses are just classic pop. Some of these songs sound like fractured love songs, all warbly with upbeat guitar leads and weird spooky keyboards. They may be for all we know, though lyrical clarity has never really been an issue for Blank Dogs, the voice de-emphasized within the throbbing lo-fi recording almost like another instrument itself. These songs provide a nice contrast to the more menacing numbers, like the acknowledged hit (around these parts anyway) "Setting Fire To Your House" with its ominous bass and distinctive organ lead. Lo-fi but dense, Blank Dogs still sound like a lost Factory Records band being transmitted from some far away galaxy, but the whole album exudes a beautiful dreaminess that just can't be denied. There appears to be no end in sight for Blank Dogs, and we aren't complaining one bit.

MPEG stream: No Compass
MPEG stream: L Machine
MPEG stream: Setting Fire To Your House
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THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

SORRY. A side "Waiting": super upbeat, very rocking, real drums, gang vocals, still the vocals way up in front. Again, Buzzcocksy... B side "Splitting": very frantic, jerky rhythm, creepy synth worming about, leading the melodic structure, guitar slashing about in the background. Devo gone garage? (Without the vocals.)

Full length number two from these Aussie psychgarage hypno-dirge dronerockers, equal parts Velvet Underground, Spacemen 3, krautrock, garage pop and Japanese psych rock, all blurred and smeared into gloriously muddy and murky motorik garage psych minimalism. Originally released in a ridiculously limited edition of 52 copies, Deja What? is a sprawling, drugged out hallucinatory drift, the bass and drums simple and stripped down but solid and motorik, the guitars on the other hand, unhinged and loose, wild wah wah squalls all over the places, organs whir and pulse, the male vocals are drenched in reverb and echo, the female vox a hazy gauzy echo, the sound super saturated and in-the-red, warbly and warped and woozy, every track a super hypnotic heart of the sun dronepsych workout, some drifting into serious pop territories, while others headed in a way more wasted and drugged out direction, with most meeting somewhere right in the middle. Needless to say, this is the sort of 'good shit' that should most definitely appeal to fans of Wooden Shjips, Moon Duo, Loop, Lumerians, Heads, White Noise Sound and all sorts of similarly stoned drugpop spacerock... COMES WITH A DOWNLOAD CODE!

MPEG stream: Crystal Ball
MPEG stream: My Nativity
MPEG stream: Trained Creep

One of a whole handful of releases on the Negative Guest List label, a bunch of which we reviewed on last week's list. This one comes from Aussie garage psych combo Blank Realm, whose Deja What? lp was a big hit around here, and who released a one sided jukebox single on NGL a little while back. The A side here is an acoustic jam, and find this otherwise dour and dirgey outfit sounding uncharacteristically sunshiney, acoustic guitars, whirring organs, a little bit swaggery, but super poppy with a hooky chorus, and a distinctly nineties vibe, but really it's the B side that had us hooked, murky and woozy and reverby, whiney vox and some cool sitar like buzz, not to mention a little twang, definitely reminding us of old school Aussie post punk bands like the Scientists and the Celibate Rifles, finishing off with a rad psychedelic squall, all detuned and fantastically warped.

Latest slab of tripped out fuzzy garage punk from Down Under, and another dizzying blur of primal rhythmic thump, woozy synth swirl, distorto guitar crunch, the opening track "Acting Strange" might be our favorite (and most rocking) Blank Realm jam yet, with super distorted angular guitars, weird speaking-in-tongues vocals, tribal drum pound, and a super heavy blown out garage psych squall of a chorus, the song seeming to grow more unhinged by the minute, the sound more atonal and warped, like the sound was run through a funhouse mirror. So we were sort of expecting this to be the most noisy and psychedelic and rocking record yet, but the second track strips things way down, into a sort of Best Coast by way of Velvets sort of lazy reverb drenched jangle pop sprawl, driven by a sinewy bass line and super stripped down Mo Tucker style drumming. And then track number three sort of fuses the two, poppy jangle and garagey pound, woven into a sort of Sonic Youth sounding slab of garage psych. The rest of the record tends toward the druggy and stripped down, especially the fantastically murky psych ballad title track, woozy and wasted, but in between, the band deliver another rocker like the opener ("Pendulum Swing"), heavy on the synth with a definite new wave vibe, and the kick ass two part "The Crackle", the first part, distorted and dirgey, blown out bass buzz and snarly girl vox, atonal and a little bit synth wavey, while the second part, pours on the reverb and the drifty guitar shimmer, unfurling a super washed out, spacey sprawl of unhinged psychedelia. Another super recommended chunk of killer psychedelic spaced out garage pop weirdness, comes with a download coupon to boot!

MPEG stream: Acting Strange
MPEG stream: Cleaning Up My Mess
MPEG stream: The Crackle Pt. 2
MPEG stream: Go Easy

ALSO ON CD!! A brand new full length from these aQ beloved Aussie psychedelic garage rockers, and unlike the last few, which we described as sounding like a mix of the Velvet Underground, Spacemen 3, krautrock, garage pop and Japanese psych, these scruffy punks seemed to have polished up their sound, and what do you know, they actually clean up pretty nice. What was once murky, fuzzy, wild, and loose, primal and druggy, dirgey and tripped out, is now sorta jangly and fuzzy and downright poppy. But it totally suits them. A little bit glammy, a little bit power poppy, like some Flying Nun missing link, but roughed up just a bit, retaining a little of their previous scrappiness, but recast here in a whole new light. Opener "Back The The Flood" is some seriously hooky classic sounding pop, crunchy and fuzzy and jangly, rambunctious and a little loose, but also sorta sunshiney and feel good, swirling synths abound, the only hints of the old Blank Realm here is the slithery Joy Divisiony bassline, which rumbles ominously, beneath the otherwise fuzzpoppy surface. And while we expected to say something like, "fear not though, the rest of the record...", but really, if anything the record continues down that rosy pop path, follow up "Falling Down The Stairs" is even poppier and janglier, still a little bit twisted and off kilter, sounding even MORE like it could have come out on Flying Nun back in the day. And somehow, while getting poppier, it also gets sort of weirder and more unpredictable. "Bell Tower" is a woozy sort of slowcore ballad, with shimmery guitars, and fragmented angular melodies, warped crooned vocals, dreamily psychedelic and washed out, while "Bulldozer Love" is another dreamy pop jam, soft focus guitar, crooned vox, and some squelchy synths in the background. "Violet Delivery" trades in the drums for programmed beats, adds some bleeps and bloops, and stretches out into some hazy, glammy krautpop drift. And so it goes, from dreamy feedback flecked jangle, to fuzzy electro garage pop, but remaining solidly on this side of the druggy, droney, murky, muddy divide, almost essentially a whole new band/sound. Hints of the change popped up throughout the last record, but similar to the transformation recently by NY noise rockers the Men on their new record, it wasn't a change we were expecting, but it's one we're digging quite a bit.

MPEG stream: Back To The Flood
MPEG stream: Falling Down The Stairs
MPEG stream: Bell Tower
MPEG stream: Violet Delivery

Latest from this Australian psychedelic garage synth combo, and it comes in the form of a pricey, one sided (at 45rpm!) 7" single, and it's a cover! The first in a series of Negative Guest List jukebox singles (named for the Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments tune we assume), ostensibly, at least according to the sticker on the front, this single is for your jukebox, and the series is intended to get bands to pick covers, and in redoing the song, overcome the idea of simply 'covering' a song, and while the cost may be prohibitive for some, we can't think of a jukebox that would love to include this little doozy among its musical ranks. BR take on Alex Chilton's "Hey! Little Child" and totally make it their own, adding plenty of organ and synth to a pounding rhythm that drives the proceedings, that rhythm wreathed in pulsing synth melodies, beneath some tripped out echoey vocals, loads of reverb, warbling whirring organs, some killer riffing (it is a killer riff to begin with), some wild leads, the sound crunchy and fuzzy, with a freaked out psychedelic second half where things get wild and loose and noisy. Killer stuff.

This is how we like our indie pop. Raw and earnest, lush and hook filled, recorded on cassette tape then transferred to an old 8-track, the second album from Matt Adams expands on his debut from a couple years back that we dug big time. Now living in San Francisco after leaving Orange County, he has quickly become one of the finest songwriters in town. While he draws from greats like The Zombies, the Kinks and The Byrds, he manages to not sound like some nostalgic act. In fact there is a freshness and earnest quality to his songs that give them a very timeless feel. Kind of like Vetiver covering power poppers Zumpano. If anyone at Sub Pop is reading this, get the Blank Tapes on tour with The Shins, it will be a match made in pop heaven.

MPEG stream: In The Light
MPEG stream: Daydream

Following up last year's Teen Sounds, SF's Blanketship comes cruisin' along with more delightful aural collage adventures. This time things are a bit more drivin', maybe a bit darker and more aggressive. And unlike many of his past recordings which kept the listener constantly teetering off-kilter with their rapid fire juggling together of puzzle piece samples and mad rhythms, the nine tracks that comprise The Sound Of Fun Surrounds You has a few longer stretches that your ears and toes can catch a grasp of and groove along to for a few bars at least. But that's not to say this cd-r is without its fair share of surprise bursts and giggly bits, those come in spades on the Klangwunder half! Those eight tracks were composed with like-minded People Like Us on WFMU! Always a deliriously good time!

MPEG stream: Viva Butterfly
MPEG stream: The St. John River

Blanketship's second album starts off in a much more funky and trip-hop-y fashion than anything found on his previous cd Threeps, but it definitely doesn't stay put. This one-man band aka Jared Blum keeps things moving along, drawing from a plethora of inspirations and sound sources, but always keeping thoughts of pop in the back of his mind. Incorporating samples of psychedelia, jazz, earthen folk, field recordings, and world beat, he's pieced together each track on Summer Set, with some considerably more structured than others. Catchily groovy and playfully spirited.

MPEG stream: County Fare
MPEG stream: Fuzzy

We've delighted to the many eclectic eccentric musical personas of the gents behind Bay Area indie label Gigante Sound (Dominic Cramp and Jared Blum) -- Qulfus, Borful Tang, Vulcanus 68, and Blanketship to name a few. Here's the latest from the latter with Mr. Blum at the helm. Teen Sounds is a jumbled, tumbled baker's dozen aural hijinksin' collages. Very strange and strangely varied, each is possessed with its own ample dose of the absurd. Much more dense and stewy that any of the previous Blanketship releases which were more breezy and exotica tinged. Quite reminiscent of Negativland, The Residents or John Oswald's Plunderphonics!

MPEG stream: Teen Sounds
MPEG stream: Helpless Child

This new cd from SF's one man band Blanketship compiles three of his cd-r and cassette eps (hence the title, get it?) from the last couple of years. In chronological order, they are: L'Homme Invisible, Captain Assure, and Willow Bend. However, the tracks -- 25 in all -- have been jumbled together into an all new running order. It flows very well, making for a delightful full length. Maybe Cup's gone a little bit nutty, but she thought she heard lil' kitties mewing throughout this cd (particularly on the track "Dwarfism"). Then again maybe it was all due to the fact that just moments earlier we were listening to the plentiful meowing on the Cats & Kittens cd. Nonetheless, this is not a bad thing! The sounds, whether they are indeed meows or not, totally complemented the overall soft 'n' soothing atmosphere. On each track, Blanketship craftily arranges a soundscape of electronic melodies, sampled sounds, programmed rhythms among other things resulting in an airy collage. Sometimes a bit ghostly, sometimes a bit '60s British mystery movie-esque, sometimes a bit like a kranky ol' videogame, quite often playful and novel. Nice!

MPEG stream: Dwarfism
MPEG stream: Lackluster

Following up 2006's delightful Summer Set, Bay Area artist Blanketship returns with Music With A Message! This time he's got The Dollson Family Singers in tow for another aural collage of off-kilter, genre-jumpin' frolics. The one dozen hymns on Music With A Message chug along like a feel good wagon with a slightly wonky wheel rolling over hills and through towns with heads in the clouds, toes tapping and hugs aplenty. Sorta like Danielson Family taking Polyphonic Spree to Sunday School but not without a secret intoxicating visit to Bruce Haack and Perrey & Kingsley's exotica tiki lounge beforehand!

MPEG stream: Let Him Into Your Heart
MPEG stream: Reach Up In The Sky

Massive and gorgeous glacial drone exploration from these two Australian one man bands, combined to form, well... a two man band.�Black Widow is Rob MacManus from AQ faves the Grey Daturas, and he teams up with�Ben Andrews aka�Blarke Bayer who spends most of his time in�Aussie grinders Agents of Abhorrence. But if you just think Grey Daturas plus AoA, you definitely won't have imagined this. Some glorious bastardized blend of Taj Mahal Travellers organic drift and Lustmordian black ambience. Three long tracks, the first a slow burning sprawl, guitars grinding out long whorls of low end buzz, slowwly undulating, a sort of more subdued SUNNO))) sort of sound, streaked with bits of smeared feedback, and random bits of muted percussion, a gorgeously expansive bit of minimal whir that has everyone in the store totally entranced every time it plays. The second sounds like the guys exploring the inside of a piano, buzzing strings and struck tones, with those distinctly guts-of-a-keyboard overtones, shimmering clouds of tonal drift that occasionally coalesce into fleeting melodies, while elsewhere, the actual keys of the keyboard are struck to add a slightly out of tune counter point, making� the whole thing trippy and slightly off kilter. The final track is downright pretty, and almost Dirty Three style minor key dirge, strummed reverbed guitars shifting and drifting in an expanse of distant rumbles and bits of fuzz and tape hiss. Moody, minor key, melancholy and simply gorgeous.�

MPEG stream: Maria Of Puerto Montt
MPEG stream: Alone In Tierra Del Fuego

It's been a while since we've heard from Australia's Grey Daturas or any of the various related combos. It's only really because for a year or two, it was almost like they lived here. Constantly on tour, using SF as home base. We'd see them at shows, in the shop. And we haven't had much new besides the Neurot full length, but we do have a big order of Daturas and other goodies waiting to ship, so that'll take care of that. But for those who just can't wait, we have collab number two from Blarke Bayer and Black Widow (we might have one or two copies of the first one, see elsewhere on the site), BB being Ben Andrews of down under grind commando unit Agents of Abhorrence, and Black Widow being Rob MacManus from the Grey Daturas, and it's another set of three songs, clocking in at just less than a half hour, and is just as sonically varied (but slightly jazzier, more on that in a minute) as their first tete a tete. The opener is a skittery free jazz drift, little fragments of piano drifting in a black expanse, the drums chaotic and powerful, very free, shuffling subtly one second, exploding into frenzied fills the next, all the while a sax moans and bleats and skronks, its long tones laid over the proceedings like high end streaks, giving the track a weird free jazz drone vibe. The second track is more of a thick guitary drone, the drums relegated to mute throb and pulse, demarcating a slowly smoldering smear of shimmering strings, swirling feedback, abstract melodic fragments, some post rock lope, some Morricone-ish twang, some crackle and hiss, the drums lazy and laid back, some sort of doomed minimal slowcore drift. Quite lovely. Wouldn't mind a whole disc of this stuff. The duo finish off with a super minimal low end exploration, so minimal we hesitate to describe it as a drone, it's more like a collection of ambient sounds, the distant whir of a building's machinery, the sound of air circulating, the distant murmur of conversation, but take all that and blur it and mute it into a barely there ghost of sound, over which a series of electrical impulses are transmitted, glitch, crackle, super subtle electronic textures drifting above a music so subtle and minimal it could almost be the sound of your speakers humming. Intense and quite beautiful, but may require some high powered headphones to truly appreciate.

MPEG stream: Fanny And Alexander

THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

SORRY. More amazing and freaked out noisy bliss from down under, this time a tag team match up between Black Widow, aka Rob MacManus from the Grey Daturas, and Blarke Bayer, Ben from Aussie grinders Agents Of Abhorrence, who have probably toured together a million times and played in tons of bands together, but this is the first recorded document we've seen of the two teaming up for some serious noisemaking. Although noisemaking might be misleading, as this is actually more drone-y and ambient than it is noisy. Thick washes of crumbling guitars move glacially over bits of percussive skitter, slivers of feedback surface here and there, some simple tribal thump, all nestled amidst lots of low end rumble. Imagine a much more subdued SUNNO))) and you might have a rough idea. But that's only the first track (of three). The second track sounds like someone playing the inside of a piano, lots of buzzing steel strings, scraping and haunting low end reverberations, someone is obviously on the outside of the piano too, pounding out simple creepy low end chords, the result is like some super abstract Argento soundtrack, moody, mysterious and intense, becoming more and more abstract and 'free' as the piece progresses, as if each player, on the inside AND outside of the piano are quickly pulling it apart into a pile of splintered wood and broken steel strings. The final track, the shortest of the three, is also the dreamiest, with a simple minor key guitar figure drifting in a wide open expanse of muted percussive swirls, and dense tangles of finger picked melodies, the whole thing sounding like the soundtrack to some experimental western, like if anyone ever dared remake Jodorowsky, it wouldn't be a long stretch to imagine this as the perfect music to accompany some of that gorgeously unsettling Jodorowsky imagery. Surprisingly subtle and really cool.

MPEG stream: Maria Of Puerto Montt
MPEG stream: Alone In Tierra Del Fuego

With a name like Blasphemous Crucifixion, you should know what to expect - raw, buzzing black metal with a nice suicidal feel to it. This one man (presumably) hate machine cranks things out in a highly noisy, atonal way with a pretty pronounced punk influence. In fact, this sounds a bit like some of the Russian black metal we dig so much (early Old Wainds, Nav, Meti Bhuvah), which is indeed a very good thing. While the songs on Crude Burial, expanded with some demo tracks from earlier years, sound like they were recorded in an air raid shelter during an actual air raid AND in a blizzard, you can plainly hear all the instruments creeping their way out of the mix like they are gasping for air, so it never gets too noisy to where this will be mistaken for some experimental artsy black metal. There's nothing too ornate about Blasphemous Crucifixion, nor does there need to be. This is some harsh, negative stuff, super primitive and free of all the progressive bullshit than can ruin so much black metal these days, and with song titles like "Urine-Soaked Tombstone", "Disgusting", and "Self-Inflicted", you should know whether or not this is your bag. We say hell yeah. Coming to us from the always right on Rusty Axe imprint.

MPEG stream: Urine-Soaked Tombstone
MPEG stream: Poisoned Water
MPEG stream: Broken Flower

THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY. Fuck yes. It had to happen. The mother of all grindcore bands has descended upon us and you have simply never in your life heard anything as monstrously bone-crushing as this. Featuring not one, not two, not three, but SEVEN separate vocalists, bellowing forth, respectively -- ultra gut-rumbling low, maniacally cat-butchering mostly low, illegally brutal low-mid, hardcore shout, slightly high yelp, catatonic maple screech, and tree-felling supersonic scream -- the almighty Blast Beast is augmented additionally by four distinct drummers, two of which do nothing but blast in tandem, virtually quadrupling standard drum speeds. One drummer is left doing fills and rolls incessantly while the last Batteronimus Maximus (supposedly his legal birth-name!) plays a 12-piece kit assembled entirely of bass drums, leaving the notion of double bass a thing of the past. In fact the liner notes of the record include certified testimony from the controversial Auditory Regulation Statutes and BPM Limitation Committee of Canada that an estimated 72 to 73 percent of the sound recorded on this release is physically too fast for the human ear to discern, registering only a piercing single note to people but deemed "highly unsuitable" for households including dogs or feathered pets. Still the few moments you can make out are fucking steam-rolling bulldozingly insane! Think Brutal Truth meets Discordance Axis meets Nile at Human Remains' practice space with the guys from Pig Destroyer, Cryptopsy, Morbid Angel and Mortician jamming along -- all at the same time! With a whopping 147 songs (eighteen minutes total) this release is simply too fucking brutal for words -- get this now!

MPEG stream: Fast
MPEG stream: Faster
MPEG stream: Even Faster
MPEG stream: Holy Shit, That's Fast

Copenhagen's rock scene in the early 1970s was so small and fertile that bands formed and reformed in various combinations of the same people. Case in point -- Blast Furnace came together in 1970, released a single great LP in 1971, and by 1972 3/4 of Blast Furnace had joined the band Culpepper's Orchard. It's kind of amazing that this record has been lost to all but the most die hard fans of Danish progressive rock, because it's so clearly great. The angst-filled (almost Faust-ish) vocals of Brit singer Tom McEwan take turns with super-expressive organ lines. And there are flutes eveywhere (which fills our flute obsessive Andee with joy). And the arrangements are really good, making the most of minor key melodies so that nothing need be overstated. There aren't extended wanky instrumental passages here, for a prog band Blast Furnace edited themselves so well, leaving us wanting more. And, in fact, there is more -- a non-album track intended as a single has also been included on this cd. The disc starts off as classic and firece seventies prog, with complex melodic passages and some instrumental spacy jamming, but as the record progresses, the record veers dramatically from mostly instrumental prog, to super dramatic, almost goofy (in a good way) balladeering. The vocalist's deep baritone waxes poetic on ridiculous and far out subject matters, like the plight of Toytown, or poor sad Bobo the Clown. Sounds silly, and it sort of is, but it's really really good. Reminds us a little of AQ faves Paternoster (although not nearly as insane) or some super melodramatic seventies singer songwriter. But the combination of heartfelt ballads and searing prog action make this a weird and great find. Windy's new favorite record.

RealAudio clip: Dr. Night
RealAudio clip: First and Last
RealAudio clip: Toytown

If you're a fan of the lo-fi pop stylings of Owen and his Casiotone For The Painfully Alone, check out his energetic, a bit more amped-up pals The Blast Rocks. Playfully messy, lo-fi punky pop fancied up with casio keyboards that also reminded me of the Rondelles-related Albuquerque combo Luxo Champ or Olympia party pop king Gene Defcon.

RealAudio clip: Joyce
RealAudio clip: My Boyfriend Is A Zombie

2nd Place is the follow ep to the previous Record Of The Week from these SF sci-fi synthprog garage poppers, and while there's nothing quite as freaked out and far out as THAT track from their debut, it is another kick ass collection of super catchy, garage pop new wave that we can't stop listening too. Opener "Get High" sounds like a much more raw and garage rock version of Interpol, the deep crooned vox and the main melody the main culprits, but BC add all sorts of swirling female background vox, and lots more jangle and crunch, and while most of the track is fuzzy garage pop, the chorus is such a killer blast of new wave radness, not to mention the synth melody at the end. This may be only six songs, but one song in and we're already thinking this might be our new favorite record. And thankfully the rest of the record does nothing to change our minds. "Liquid Fiend" is a blown out blast of garage wave jangle and crunch, with hooks galore, and a sound that's distorted and crumbly, but warm and lush at the same time. "Holy Geometry" channels classic power pop through BC's cracked crunch and wild buzz drenched jangle, and "Finken's Lament" might be the weirdest of the bunch, what sounds like programmed drums, stumbling and pounding over swirling synths and buzzing drones and frantic guitar strum and garbled vox, all blurred into a druggy psych-wave blowout. "Manson Eyes" is another slab of synth soaked jangle pop, and finally, "Glass On Your Pillow" finds BC doing their best Oh Sees, at least at fist, with pounding drums, and a big buzzy bluesy garage rock riff, but suddenly the whole song is swallowed up by a thick low end drone, all the sounds saturated and in the red, thos deep crooned vox come in, and it's total gloom pop bliss, with a killer catchy chorus that manages to be impossibly hooky while being about as blown out as possible, a glorious cacophonous hook, that pretty much explains just why we love these guys (and gal) so much. Includes a download coupon as well.

MPEG stream: Get High
MPEG stream: Liquid Fiend
MPEG stream: Glass On Your Pillow

Ok, so they're called Blasted Canyons, the record is on John Dwyer's (Thee Oh Sees) Castle Face records, and has eye popping rainbow lazer psychedelic-smash cover art (courtesy Castle Face art dude William Keihn), one member of Blasted Canyons also does time in garage pop masters Bare Wires, so we were pretty much already sold, but then we threw it on, and well, we were definitely expecting some cool kick ass garage rock, but were totally unprepared for the tripped out psychedelic garage-prog synth-punk space-pop radness these guys and gal kick out. The first track, awesomely titled "The Artist Formerly Known As Satan", should pretty much seal the deal, huge bombastic crashing distorted chords, almost metal sounding, but more like a fuzzy space rock dirge, swirling effects-drenched boy girl vocal harmonies that turn it it into some sort of twisted pop, pounding drums, druggy and dreamy, but heavy and fuzzy and catchy as hell, and when the track shifts gears, and they launch into some buzzy distorto garage pop crunch, with echo-y vocals, and woozy sweetly melodic background vox, not to mention some wicked melodic hooks, it's a total head banging hip swinging sonic bliss out, and then bam, it's right into that strangely epic and bombastic garage pop dirge which leads to one final buzzy blast. Might just be our jam of the year so far. Fuzzed out swaggery lowslung Stooges-y stomp fused to power pop jangle and lo-fi space-synth-prog, so good we can barely bring ourselves to listen to the rest of the record, but once we did... The second track, "Blood On The Wall" is a synth driven chunk of angular garage-y new wave crunch, with a killer chorus, the howled distorto female vox and buzzing synth definitely reminding us of Black Bug, while "Consider Drowning" is a primo slab of surfy garage groove, with the vocals all deep and echoey reminding us of Crystal Stilts, but the chugging murky guitars, swirling spacey synth and pounding drums transforming it into something way more tripped out and primal. And so it goes, the whole record a wild ride through Oh Sees style sweat-soaked distorto-garage jangle pop, tripped out murkscapes of pulsing crumbling synths and pitch shifted vox, fuzzy classic post punk power pop laced with hazy oooh's and aaah's, noisy sci-fi-synth-wreathed punky pound, dirgey 4-tracked rhythmic experiments, wild, reverbed, feedback soaked girl group noise pop groove, twisted angular synth driven new wave, and finally finishing off with another bit of sonic weirdness, a perfect bookend for that opening blast of garage prog bombast, a swirling, dirgey, lysergic FX heavy synthswirl outro. So goddamn good. Record Of The Week for sure, but we're thinking maybe Record Of The Year too...! Vinyl-only for now, here's hoping they'll also press up some cds soon as well...

MPEG stream: The Artist Formerly Known As Satan
MPEG stream: Blood On The Wall
MPEG stream: Consider Drowning
MPEG stream: Death and a Half

THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

SORRY. *** COLLECTIBLE USED VINYL *** Media: VG+ -limited cream vinyl. looks solid! Sleeve: VG+ small bump in lower right corner, otherwise fine. Ok, so they're called Blasted Canyons, the record is on John Dwyer's (Thee Oh Sees) Castle Face records, and has eye popping rainbow lazer psychedelic-smash cover art (courtesy Castle Face art dude William Keihn), one member of Blasted Canyons used to be in garage pop masters Bare Wires, so we were pretty much already sold, but then we threw it on, and well, we were definitely expecting some cool kick ass garage rock, but were totally unprepared for the tripped out psychedelic garage-prog synth-punk space-pop radness these guys and gal kick out. The first track, awesomely titled "The Artist Formerly Known As Satan", should pretty much seal the deal, huge bombastic crashing distorted chords, almost metal sounding, but more like a fuzzy space rock dirge, swirling effects-drenched boy girl vocal harmonies that turn it it into some sort of twisted pop, pounding drums, druggy and dreamy, but heavy and fuzzy and catchy as hell, and when the track shifts gears, and they launch into some buzzy distorto garage pop crunch, with echo-y vocals, and woozy sweetly melodic background vox, not to mention some wicked melodic hooks, it's a total head banging hip swinging sonic bliss out, and then bam, it's right into that strangely epic and bombastic garage pop dirge which leads to one final buzzy blast. Might just be our jam of the year so far. Fuzzed out swaggery lowslung Stooges-y stomp fused to power pop jangle and lo-fi space-synth-prog, so good we can barely bring ourselves to listen to the rest of the record, but once we did... The second track, "Blood On The Wall" is a synth driven chunk of angular garage-y new wave crunch, with a killer chorus, the howled distorto female vox and buzzing synth definitely reminding us of Black Bug, while "Consider Drowning" is a primo slab of surfy garage groove, with the vocals all deep and echoey reminding us of Crystal Stilts, but the chugging murky guitars, swirling spacey synth and pounding drums transforming it into something way more tripped out and primal. And so it goes, the whole record a wild ride through Oh Sees style sweat-soaked distorto-garage jangle pop, tripped out murkscapes of pulsing crumbling synths and pitch shifted vox, fuzzy classic post punk power pop laced with hazy oooh's and aaah's, noisy sci-fi-synth-wreathed punky pound, dirgey 4-tracked rhythmic experiments, wild, reverbed, feedback soaked girl group noise pop groove, twisted angular synth driven new wave, and finally finishing off with another bit of sonic weirdness, a perfect bookend for that opening blast of garage prog bombast, a swirling, dirgey, lysergic FX heavy synthswirl outro. So goddamn good. Record Of The Week for sure, but we're thinking maybe Record Of The Year too...!

MPEG stream: The Artist Formerly Known As Satan
MPEG stream: Blood On The Wall
MPEG stream: Consider Drowning
MPEG stream: Death and a Half

We had never heard this Italian black metal band before, but based on the first few minutes of opener "All'ignato" we were expecting this to be a sort of Alcest / Amesoeurs kind of thing, indie jangle and minor key melancholia wreathed in back buzz, and hell, we're all for that, and when the heavy guitars kick in on that first track, we're in heaven, chugging, soaring, blissed out buzz, the melodies mournful, the vibe darkly depressive, the sound like a way heavier Katatonia, all that was left was to hear the vocals, and we were most definitely expecting a sort of deep dramatic croon, but these guys had other ideas, suddenly exploding into some epic, furious, blasting black buzz, frenzied and frantic, insectoid riffing over insane drumming, but that mournful minor key vibe dragged along for the ride, the combo super potent, hellish and heavy, grim and black, but still majestic and epic and emotional. The vocals a gruff demonic bellow, the overall effect classic second wave black metal, the production thick and bombastic, the arrangements almost symphonic, a bit proggy, with the songs slipping from classic metal gallop, to lumbering almost-doom, to fierce lightning speed blasts and back again. All the songs here are super varied, mixing a dark melodicism, with some serious grim black energy, the occasional keyboard adding dramatic chordal swirls, drifting beneath acoustic guitars, folky interludes giving way to pounding dirge-y buzzing melancholia, in turn giving way to spaced out loping clean guitar post metal meander, all chiming melodies, and woozy basslines, but the sound always seems to return to some variation of a furious blast black buzz, the band striking a delicate balance between its two sonic sides, ending up with a pretty potent combo, one that is definitely black and buzzy enough for the grim hordes, but with just enough melody and emotion to keep it from being just another cookie cutter black metal record. And we find ourselves digging it more and more with every listen.

MPEG stream: All'ignoto
MPEG stream: In Memoria
MPEG stream: Echi

Lately we've been raving a lot about some cool New Wave Of British Heavy Metal (NWOBHM) reissues. Ferinstance, there was Wolfbane a few weeks back, Jameson Raid last time, and this list we've got two: this one, Bleak House, and also Pagan Altar, below. And we're gonna tell you they're awesome. But, you might ask, what's the big deal about the NWOBHM anyway, why are we (and other discerning metal fans) so into it? Well, it's 'cause these NWOBHM bands, both the big-to-middling ones (Iron Maiden, Def Leppard, Samson, Angel Witch, Diamond Head, Grim Reaper, etc.) and the more obscure, like the ones we've been listing lately, had SONGS. In a lot of ways, the NWOBHM was the last hurrah of heavy metal as song-based rock music. Sure, it also laid the groundwork for a lot of other more extreme metal genres that took off in the '80s, speed metal and thrash (Metallica was all about the NWOBHM), black metal (Venom!), and even the extreme glam of LA hair metal, which had songs too, yeah, but often poofy pop ones, whereas NWOBHM was hard ROCK most definitely. Not to make too much of a point of it, but we feel a lot of these one-shot wonders from the NWOBHM, kids who made a killer 7" and were never heard from again, are the sort of thing that appeals to us in the same way '60s garage rock nuggets do, or early '70s proto-metal psych, or '77 punk, they're just damn good catchy rock n' roll songs, heavy ones, that you can't deny. And, like in the '60s, there were a LOT of great little bands writing now-forgotten gems. It was a real phenomenon, and that's why we get so stoked about the NWOBHM, ok? Anyway, that brings us to this, Bleak House, a band who released just two now-collectable 7" eps, Rainbow Warrior (1981) and Lions In Winter ('82). Those two account for seven of the 20 tracks here, the disc being rounded out with live tracks recorded in 1980. The band actually was formed as teenagers back in 1972, though, and these guys, like a lot of the NWOBHM stuff we've recently been reviewing, very much have a '70s, almost proto-metal vibe to 'em. Bleak House are perhaps best known for the very first track here, "Rainbow Warrior", which has a riff that may or may not have been ripped off by admitted NWOBHM fanatics Metallica in their song "Welcome Home (Sanitarium)" five years later, most likely inadvertently. Bleak House can't really complain, they've probably gotten more publicity over the years from that than anything. Great song, though, for which they deserve their due. And others here, such as "Isandhlwana" and "Down To Zero", are equally good. Classy, heavy, melodic, with memorable riffing and wailing, majestic vocals. And a haunted, vintage, British vibe to match their Dickensian appellation. Furthermore, there's some moments (like in "Flight Of The Salamander") that surprise with an almost anachronistic indie-rock jangle, or hint of such anyway. It's a shame they never got to make a proper full length album, but what we have here is quite worthwhile, with the extensive live material as more than just a bonus - it looks to be a complete show, and includes versions of only three of the songs from the 7"s, the rest having never been documented in the studio. While rough and distorted to some extent, it still sounds pretty good. And you gotta give their singer a lot of credit for really going for it, even when it seems like maybe he's just about tapped out. Turn it up, close your eyes, hoist a pint, bang your head, and you can pretend you're one of the punters at an actual NWOBHM gig back in the day. The jewel case comes with a Union Jack-adorned obi, and the cd booklet contains a band history as well as the original graphics from their 7"s, vintage color photos, and also reproductions of some old gig fliers. Note: Buried By Time And Dust also released this collection on 180 gram vinyl, we sold out of 'em already though, we might be able to get more but we'll see, you can ask if you're interested...

MPEG stream: Rainbow Warrior
MPEG stream: Isandhlwana
MPEG stream: "Nothing

Stunning new two track single from one half of, duh, Blectum From Blechdom. Fluttering, wondrous instumental synth lullabies that evoke the electronic work of Raymond Scott, the player piano compositions of Conlon Nancarrow, and even traces of Kurt Weill, but with a contemporary Schematic twist. Make sense? Remember a time in life when electronic synthesizers were accessible to the public and everyone had this crazy idea of what the year 2000 was going to be like? We were gonna live on the moon and live in capsules and wear spacesuits, we were preparing for the FUTURE! Well, I'm actually too young to remember, but these songs make me think about that kind of exhilarating bewilderment. Yeah, it's kinda like that...

Kevin Blechdom's latest album comes in the form of a frantic electronic-rock opera-style extravaganza. In contrast to her past recordings that frequently teetered into juvenile booby-joke, one-trick-pony territory (also a problem we've had with the music of Chicks On Speed whose label released this cd), this comes across as considerably more mature and composed... but no less kooky. Uhh, but we should let you know that breasts (her own) do make an appearance on this album's cover photo. Also on prominent display here... musically, is her startlingly broad stylistic spectrum. She delves robustly into diva drama, beefy rock, singy-songy pop, distorted funk, electro-kitsch and beyond. Finally, a Blechdom album with tracks that bear repeat listens, and with a number of compositions that are worthy of the critical acclaim that has been bestowed upon her in the past. That said, this is still something of an acquired taste. Check out the audio clips to see if your palate welcomes the camp-o-phonic sounds of Ms Blechdom.

MPEG stream: Coming
MPEG stream: Love You From The Heart

During the brief hiatus that was once thought to be the demise of Blectum From Blechdom, each member went on to craft their own, distinct personalities. While Blevin tucked herself away to assemble the epic sonic explorations of "Talon Slalom", Kevin took to small stages around the world, presenting her Kurt-Weill-meets-karaoke-diva-performance-artist-as-portrayed-by-Mary-Katherine-Gallagher-gone-completely-mad to the masses willing to endure that highly engaging, albeit cringeworthy affair. "I Love Presets", unlike the beautifully awe-inspiring solo material on the instrumental "The Inside Story" or "And The Tempo Of Doom" eps, focuses on Kevin's "pop star" potential, with emphasis on vocal delivery and lyrical "wit". Songs tend to be personal, as displayed in her heart-wrenching cover of Tina Turner's "Private Dancer" or her much-too-informative reminiscence of a former relationship in "Mr. Miguel". The highlights, musically, are in the Kurt Weill / carnivalesque "Shelley Sho'nuff" and Kevin's response to gearhounding know-it-alls in "Talkin' Tech". Also included is the current Blectum standard, "Interspecies Love". This is pure kitsch, novel for a few listens, but sadly tires much too quickly...

RealAudio clip: Interspecies Love
RealAudio clip: Shelley Sho'nuff

Kevin Blechdom (of acclaimed Oakland duo Blectum From Blechdom) busts out her first solo recording, nine short, laconic lullabies (one of which, "Shooshee", is a variation of a Blectum From Blechdom track) composed entirely with software programs written by

RealAudio clip: ready4love

[ aquarius records catalogue — B ]