[ aquarius records catalogue

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Showing results 2901 through 2950 of 3202.

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SORRY. We only got ten of these so if you want one act fast. Two mixes of one of our favorite tracks from 'Pressure', both souped up with some wild and chaotic old school drum and bass, huge fuzzed out synth lines and maniacal drum programming, with Rootsman's toasting chopped up and sprinkled throughout. Cool stuff.

Tape hiss, simple melodies, mechanical rhythms, dubby reverb... Nice! We're diggin' on the 16 tracks, 33 minutes�of blissful, bedroom-recorded Casio-dub instrumental music here, this cd-r being the second solo joint from Oakland's Adam Bugaj, a Pennsylvania transplant who played "lysergic barn rock" with underground psych acts Peacefeather and Clear Spots back in PA. Rather than rockin' out, though, this is lazy Sunday stoned music from the man, lo-fi DIY mesmerism, like a Jewelled Antler production of home-brewed Kompakt techno, shimmering with hiss and distortion. 'Tis spacey and mellow, sometimes subverted by sudden manual tape edits... Throw in a bit of Fahey folky guitar ramble here or there, and broken electronics that get accidentally cosmic and Cluster-like, with echoey keys, heartbeat drum machine pulses, minimal drones, fractured rhythms... Imagine, maybe, a more outsider version of Pantha Du Prince, recorded on, like, $15 worth of yard sale equipment and cheap cassette tapes. Yes it's pretty nice!

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All kids should be raised on psychedelic children's television shows! The world would be a way better, or at least way crazier place! The Bugaloos was the follow up show to Sid & Marty Krofft's other totally out there children's TV show HR Pufnstuf. Both shows were filled with psychedelic metaphors and totally infectious rainbow colored pop melodies. Kind of touted as the UK version of The Monkees, but of WAY more airy, trippy and psychedelic, the Bugaloos were a band of insects (cute interracial teens in tight clothes with cute little wings on their backs) who lived in Tranquility Forest, where they flew in the sky, battled the evil Benita Bizarre (played by Martha Raye) and spread their glorious pop, a heady concoction of lush string arrangements, candy coated harmonies and an overall Wizard Of Oz on acid vibe that made them a big hit, not just with the tots but with older folks too. We were so delighted that this was finally made available here in the states. There was a Japanese reissue a few years back but it was still hard to get and was quite pricey. Fans of The Free Design take note as this possesses that same kind of over the top poppy, happy and slightly warped cheerfulness. One listen and you can totally tell that there had to have been plenty of... um... well let's just say all sorts of mind altering goodies, involved in the creation of this far out show and the amazing and sweetly trippy pop soundtrack. Electric kool-aid for all the kiddies!!

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SORRY. Original motion picture soundtrack. This is excellent!

This time around Bugskull is just Portlander Sean Byrne with a coupla guests. The album, like Snakland before it, continues to develop the band's "Tomorrow Never Knows"-obsession (this is a good thing) with more synths and even some mellow almost-breakbeats that make us think Sean's been listening to music other than rock (also a good thing). Pop songs, layered and full, but not dense and definitely not too sweet.

Portland's indierock synthmasters strike again.

Bugskull records are always so pleasant. And since it's been three years since Sean Byrne's Portland-based project has released anything, this is a welcome record. Utilizing prettily chiming, repetitive organ lines, occasional metronomic drums, fuzzy wistful guitar, and woozy in 'n out synth phasings, they're like a Stereolab without the tension (or the constant pressure to innovate.) Thus the music is relaxed and seems to issue forth effortlessly. This is a very, very pretty album of easy, layered, warm blanketed layers. Sorta vintage-y sounding (old vocal snippets, record crackle, space-age whooshes) and very lulling. It won't blow you away and it ain't tryin' to; think, oh, Mouse on Mars or a simplified Harmonia if they were indie rock West Coasters and you're somewhere in the vicinity of Bugskull.

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Once you get past the cover (trust us, it'll take you a minute) which features a lovely young lady, holding a bag of oranges in her teeth, with the bag, her hair, and arms, perfectly positioned to keep the image, if not chaste, then at least sorta PG-13, but yeah, once you get past that, inside you'll find the latest from Minneapolis noiserockers Buildings, and within seconds of dropping the needle, you'll get a serious earful of classic old school AmRep style pigfuck heaviness. Albini sounding drum bombast, sharp edged guitars, slithery swaggery tempos, a guttural vocal bellow, which we know comes from one of the skinny dudes on the back cover, but sounds more like it should be coming from the mouth of a bearded monster man, breath stinking of raw meat, dead babies, dried blood, old cigarettes and lots and lots of booze. And for a singer, in this kind of band, that's most definitely meant as a serious compliment! The songs are dense, and driving, tangled and confusional at times, creepy and brooding one second, explosive and progged out and chaotic the next. Jesus Lizard is a HUGE influence (check out "Noxema Gurl", which is like Buildings' "Mouth Breather"!), as is pretty much the whole Amphetamine Roster, in fact if it was 1995, these guys would be touring with the Unsane and the Melvins and people would be losing their shit. But for those of you (like us) who LOVE this sound, and miss those days, Buildings bring it all back, their sound positioning themselves along the current crop of sludgey, noise rock heavies: Kowloon Walled City, Gay Witch Abortion, Multicult, Keelhaul, Hex Machine, Catalyst, Clockcleaner, Dead Meat, Rabbits, Seawhores, etc. Odds are if you dig any / all of those bands, these guys will hit the spot too. But to be fair, it's not just straight up old noise rock revisionism, no Buildings definitely make these songs and that sound their own, adding lots of weird textures, some slippery slide guitars, slowing things down throughout, often filling the songs with as much space as pound and crunch, deftly and subtly adding all sorts of hooks, vocal AND riff, so you may end up finding yourself humming some weird little melody, only later to remember it was a random Buildings riff, which is always a good sign. Heavy as hell, brooding, and hypnotic, dirgey and tranced out, mathy and moody and really fucking great. Includes a download coupon too! And on green vinyl while they last!

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After a full length and a split with fellow math/noise rockers Hawks, we still can't seem to get enough of Minneapolis rockers Buildings, who deliver another blast of bass heavy AmRep style pigfuck noise rock radness, sinewy distorto guitars wrapped around thick buzzing bass, shards of shrieking feedback, and some serious drum pound, not to mention a killer hook and some fierce riffage, the Buildings track here might only be 2:41, but odds are you'll find yourself listening to it over and over. On the flipside, we're introduced to Made In Canada, who weirdly enough were actually made in France, and these guys do the whole brooding mathy noisy rock thing too, but there sound is more muted and restrained, reminding us a bit of Shellac, right down to the sung/spoken vox, and the dense tangle of bass buzz and dense drumming, but the bass here is way more thick and filthy, the sound a bit more blown out, but the band more than capable of whipping up some gnarled bass heavy riff rock that fans of all things mathy, noisy and heavy will no doubt dig big time. And they even manage to infuse some cool, delicate psychedelic parts into their mathy churn. Definitely wanna hear more from these guys... LIMITED TO 300 COPIES!!!!

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Built to Spill, the Idaho-based rock outfit beloved by the AQ-staff, here release another perfect album of the guitar-driven heartbreaking melodies that're unmistakably Built-to-Spillian. I like this album more than their previous records (except for the

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It goes without saying that within the indie rock circles this will sell a lot of copies, regardless of our praise of this record. But in feeling somewhat self-indulgent... As you all know Perfect From Now On was their major label debut. With a substantially larger budget for recording costs, Built To Spill seemed not really to know what to do with the money, resolving their situation by articulating a Sisyphian amount of energy into their complex almost psychedelic epic. In this contradiction of expending so much energy to make as little noise as possible, bleak metaphors of solar malevolence and mutinous friends devolved the perfect pop songs on There's Nothing Wrong With Love into a rare album that works so much more as a whole than as a conglomerate of its parts. Keep it Like a Secret finds Built to Spill far more comfortable within the studio. The lack of antagonism from the process of making the record has kept away the morose qualities of Perfect, yet Doug Martsch has crafted the album, again, as perfect unity. His predeliction for drawing metaphors to the sun continues, but in place of any malignancy, there is an ironic bent to the content... most notably seen in a pastiche of lyrical anthems from such dinosaur rockers as The Doors, The Rolling Stones, and other merchants of neo-romantic tripe. In other words, this record is pretty fucking good.

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Built To Spill's live album showcases pretty accurate performances of tracks from the last two major label albums as well as covers of Halo Benders, Love As Laughter, and Neil Young. It's a little scary how much Doug Martch can imitate Young's warbly voice and meandering guitar solos on the awesome and epic 20 minute "Cortez The Killer."

Unsurprisingly, major-label debut is nowhere near as good as previous album, There's Nothing Wrong with Love, but that's okay cos they're not TRYING to write pristine 3-minute pop gems anymore. Instead, BTS seems to be interested in out-epic-ing their 10" with Caustic Resin, and fans of that release will love this album. 3-sided vinyl in gatefold sleeve available through Up sometime in March.

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10 songs from their hard-to-find singles, etc. And one previously-unreleased cover of Daniel Johnston's "Some Things Last a Long Time" that is great.

Built To Spill manage to pack more memorable guitar licks and irresistible melodies into a single song than most bands manage in their whole career. There Is No Enemy, the latest from these long time aQ faves, is overflowing with that amazing and instantly recognizable Built To Spill sound: twangy, swirly, expansive and super rocking. Doug Marstch's voice is the perfect foil for his amazing indie rock guitar heroics, as it drifts, soars, howls and emotes. BTS are really a band who have not made a single bad record, they are in it for the long haul and they bring a presence to each of their records that manages to make each new outing unique and special. It's kind of awesome that they have never let their music be used in films (as far as we know), as it seems like it would be kind of like cheating for a filmmaker since Built To Spill's songs have such a filmic quality all on their their own. They tap into the human experience in such an honest and nuanced way, always blurring the lines of emotions and perspectives. their songs are never just happy, or sad, or angry, but instead, are a combination of all those things, sounds and songs rife with memories, disappointments, dreams, regrets and hope. It's crazy to think how so many of us have really grown up with Doug Marstch, discovering him in pre-BTS juggernaut Treepeople, and enjoying the genesis of Built To Spill together, when some of us were just teenagers, and later continuing to listen and get so much from the music of BTS all these years later. Martsch really is like the Neil Young of our generation, there is always a phrase, an epic guitar moment, a moving sentiment, a moment of true emotional intensity that sinks deep into your subconscious, in pretty much every Built To Spill song. There Is No Enemy only gets better, more complex and impactful as the album goes on. Some of the best songs are towards the end of the album, unlike so many other bands who cram their one or two great songs right in the front, and pack the rest with filler, Built To Spill continue to make a career out of crafting one great song after another. We've found ourselves listening to this from beginning to end on headphones as we go through our daily lives, moving from one destination to another, because as always Built To Spill really is the perfect soundtrack to our lives. And once again they've made a totally great record!

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REISSUED ON VINYL! For the first time we think since it originally came out in '94. Chances are that you know and love this album. If not, you probably just don't know it yet. As far as '90s indie rock goes, this is literally, completely, and wholly essential. Make friends with this record. It sounds exactly like a day dreamer's high school experience should. Catchy songs, breezy reminiscences, and more hooks than you can shake a stick at! Never heard it, lent it to a friend, or sold it during financially thin times in college... now's the time. Carpe indie!

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Listening to this reissue of that old aQ fond favorite Built To Spill's debut album from back in '93 just gives us the warm fuzzies. Aaaah, Martsch's unmistakable awesome vocals and guitar playing... it's nothing but the goodest of indie rock times while this record spins! How'd they keep everything so loose and casual, but nail us with such irresistible hooks?! This band raised the bar for all indie rockers who followed. This rocked then, and still rocks now! Where as Nothing Wrong With Love was jam packed with super concise, practically perfect pop songs, UAW sort of sprawls, the songs are looooooong, with extended instrumental passages and some seriously freaked out jams. Definitely reminiscent of Martsch's former band the Treepeople, with its warbly intertwined Neil Young meets J Mascis guitars. But even with all the jamming and freaking out, the perfect pop center of each song is never lost, obscured maybe, but they always swing back to the hook, and it's Built To Spill so you know those hooks can kill! Maybe our second (or third) favorite BTS record, but probably the weirdest and most rocking. WAY recommended.

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Forget anything you have maybe heard or read about this record. If it doesn't say how great, how supercharged, or how monumental it is, then whoever wrote it or said it doesn't know what the hell they're talking about! 5 years in the making and Doug Martsch and crew are back and better then ever. Starting with an 8-minute plus fist in the air opus that makes your heart start racing and your whole body bolt wide awake. While so many of their indie rock contemporaries have either broken up, burnt out, or become static recorders of nostalgic nothingness, Built to Spill prove that you can get older and better and wiser. Listening to this record over and over and over as I (Irwin) have, I've realized how wise Doug Marstch actually is about life and living. This is someone as in touch with his present moment as he was when he was 21. That's something that seems to be so lacking in most rock music. It's not rare for people to be really insightful and interesting and living in the moment when they are 22 and just coming of age but all so often as they get older they seem so out of touch and disconnected with what growing and learning and changing is all about. Martsch seems to have embraced all of that so well and this record is like the masterpiece of that maturity. Not the kind of "maturity" we talk about when people start making softer, safer records. This is the real kind of maturity. A group growing into themselves so perfectly. Guitars twisting and twirling and ringing so true. Melodies that build and bloom and take such nice form. While so many of the bands they helped influence (Modest Mouse, Death Cab For Cutie, etc.) have gone on to reach greater commercial success, you get the feeling that they could care less. It doesn't seem too far fetched to start thinking about Martsch as his generation's Neil Young. Timeless, iconoclastic, always stretching and exploring, even at the risk of failure. Martsch is someone who with their words and guitar makes you feel like you are being given the kind of jangly indie rock hug that you never want to end. Highly recommended!

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Mostly Doug Martsch with fellow Idahoans Caustic Resin, whose music aquarius-listmember Cory calls "meaty stoner music." Beautiful but heavier than previous Built To Spill, but you can't go wrong with songtitles like "When Not Being Stupid is Not Enough."

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SORRY. Wherein Built to Spill cover a Heavenly song ("By The Way"), and the ex-Heavenly people now known as Marine Research do a Built to Spill cover ("Sick & Wrong").

We first discovered this band on our favorite radio show, Radiolab (like a way nerdier, science focused, Negativland produced This American Life), Buke and Gass being a boy/girl duo who made a sort of chaotic ramshackle folk flecked noise pop on homemade instruments, pretty sure Buke was shorthand for a baritone ukulele and Gass is a weird guitar bass hybrid, but regardless, these two make a seriously big noise, crunchy jagged riffage, over simple percussion, usually just a bass drum boom, or a tambourine jangle, a sort of two man (woman) version of a one man band, each handling their stringed instruments, while pounding out the rhythm with their feet, then there's the homemade speakers and amplifiers, it all makes for a curious sight, and an even curiouser sound, a sort of wild and loose folky swampy blues / indie rock hybrid, the vocals powerful, the instruments surprisingly lush, the rhythms simple and hypnotic, the melodies all over the place, some weird Thinking Fellers / PJ Harvey / Sixteen Horsepower / Decemberists hybrid, a bit of a backwoods steampunk vibe too, but all filtered through a killer indie pop sense that makes every song here a dark unforgettable gem.

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Another really, er, uneventful double cd of slowjams for the electronica set from the popular LTJ Bukem. Rhodes organ tinkling, flute & sax jazz solos, and sensitive-boy synth pads over downtempo drum & bass/two step breaks.

Besides being so damn cool to look at, these see through cassettes are embedded with some of the most entrancing and drift worthy music ever, courtesy of Bulbs! Made for an art show at 381 Projects in Toronto with visual artist Tracy Maurice, Bulbs tapped into a much more dreamlike and effervescent sound then we've heard from them previously. Using drums, oscillator, Arp, guitar and a one string talker (!), the duo of Bulbs create some serious magical alchemy akin to early '70s Klaus Schulze and the inter-dimensional music of Iasos, if those sounds were floating underwater alongside exotic sea creatures and mystical aquatic plants. We've liked everything we've heard from Bulbs up to this point, including William Sabiston's great and sadly out of print Jyrk release as Ball Lightning and his contributions to recordings by Axolotl. But this just might be our favorite Bulbs recording yet. We get the feeling that Sabiston and the other half of Bulbs, Jon Almaraz, had lots of fantastical thoughts in their heads while recording Infirmary Of Dream, as this really taps into some magical landscapes, making us imagine what this duo could create if they were tapped to produce soundtracks for surreal nature films on some sort of alternate Discovery Channel. Imagine if Seefeel were stripped to its most minimal and merged with the most dreamy aspects of Popul Vuh. Only 50 of these were made and we only have a handful so you know what that means....

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Basic Channel. Jyrk. Free jazz. Put those things together and you've got an idea of what's in store with Light Ships, the band's first release on Pete Swanson's new label Freedom to Spend. Fellow noiseniks out there will definitely remember Swanson's old label Jyrk, but whereas that label seemed to revolve mostly around his Yellow Swans related releases, this seems more of a label proper. Getting back to the record at hand, Bulbs is a two man collaboration between former Axolotl member William Sabiston (some of you might have been lucky enough to get a copy of his super limited release under the name Ball Lightning) and John Almaraz, who left San Francisco earlier this year to embark on some backpacking across the globe. We checked out what a few people had to say about the record, and the one thing that keeps coming up is techno, techno, techno. Well, to be fair, there is a propulsive element to this record, which may be the only truly linear thing present. And yes, sometimes it is an electronic kick drum. Still, it seems that the greatest influences here are free jazz and African polyrhythms and syncopation. Those who checked out any of the recent Monopoly Child Star Searchers albums, then you're maybe understanding what we're talking about, though Light Ships features significantly higher production quality. Still, if this record is any indication as to what's in store for Freedom to Spend, then we're confident that we will be recommending a healthy dose of their bands and/or projects.

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Andee thinks this sounds like Cat Stevens...but that doesn't mean it's not lovely! Benumle Oynar Misin is a rare album from the early '70s by Turkish singer/songwriter Bulent Ortacgil, now available on cd. Recorded circa '73-'74, this is certainly a bit different from the other "Turkish Delights" we've been bringing you lately (Mogollar, Erkin Koray, 3 Hur-el, etc.) as you'll find no fuzzed-out guitars dueling with ouds and ikligs here. No, Bulent is all about mellow, melodic, placid, folk-rock with some bright and shiny horns livening up the proceedings on occasion. It's all sung in Turkish, but the songs should hold up even without any understanding of the lyrics. So nice. It has such a sensitive vibe that it may even appeal to fans of Belle & Sebastian.

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SORRY. '70s heavy rock from Poughkeepsie...rockin'.

"A Quarterly Journal of Post-Rock Cultural Pluralism". In other words, a xeroxed, stapled zine from the fevered rock crit mind of editor Byron Coley, continuing the column of reviews Coley & Thurston Moore did for Arthur magazine, Bull Tongue. But for this zine, a lot of other folks have been invited to chip in with reviews too. Yup, these 46 pages are ALL reviews, and not just of music, either. One guy reviews his own 52nd birthday! There's critiques (loosely put, like the birthday one, some are just excuses for amusing creative writing) of books, movies, live shows, restaurants, furniture, towns, all sorts of things. But of course plenty of crazy underground records and cds get covered too. Besides Byron and Thurston, the all-star cast of contributors includes: Joe Carducci, Alan Bishop, Sharon Cheslow, Dylan Nyoukis, Gary Panter, Bruce Russell, Chris Stigliano, Brian Turner, Naomi Yang, Lisa Carver, Mats Gustafsson, Marc Masters, Hisham Mayet, Phil McMullen, and a whole bunch of other cool cats. Oh, we should mention Steve Albini, his piece here being the first part of a two part review of a fancy restaurant in Chicago, but he doesn't even get to the restaurant in the first part, it's all about his attitude towards rich people, and also about a friend and former coworker of his who ended up founding Groupon. Interestin'. As is the whole issue, a good mix of the high and low, of serious cultural commentary and just for laffs stuff.

Everyone's a critic. Or at least, everyone who's anyone is a critic, and it seems appears in the pages of this new 2nd issue of Byron Coley's Bull Tongue Review! This quarterly fanzine takes off from the Bull Tongue column of record reviews that Coley and Thurston Moore did in Arthur Magazine, bringing in a ton of obscurely hip peeps to share their opinions about underground music, and a whole lot more, truly getting into oddly unlikely realms of "Post-Rock Cultural Pluralism". Contributors this issue include: Todd Abramson, Steve Albini (w/ part two of his entertainingly discursive 'restaurant review' from last time, yeah!), Alan Bishop, Bree, Rej T. Broth, Joe Carducci, Benoit Chaput, Sharon Cheslow, Byron Coley, Karen Constance, Nigel Cross, Chris D, Georganne Deen, Lili Dwight, Erika Elizabeth, Ray Farrell, Andrea Feldman, Eddie Flowers, Tom Givan, Tom Greenwood, Mats Gustafsson, Lisa Marie Jarlborn, Ira Kaplan, Maria Kozic, Matt Krefting, Tom Lax, Ted Lee, Heather Leigh, Donna Lethal, Owen Maercks, Marc Masters, Hisham Mayet, Phil McMullen, Richard Meltzer, Thurston Moore, Dylan Nyoukis, Gary Panter, Brigid Pearson, Charles Plymell, Tony Rettman, Joanne Robertson, Bruce Russell, Suzy Rust, Savage Pencil, John Sinclair, Chris Stigliano, Brian Turner, Tesco Vee, and Naomi Yang. Whew! To fit 'em all in, this new ish boasts almost twice as many pages (80) as the first one did, and correspondingly is priced a little higher (Kinko's ain't free!). Still a deal, if you want to keep up with these cool 'kids'.

You can't lick Bull Tongue when it comes to reviews (sorry). But it's true, this zine, excuse us, "Quarterly Journal of Post-Rock Cultural Pluralism" is nothin' but reviews, of all sort of interesting things - records, shows, film, restaurants, buildings, bike lanes...! And they're written by some extremely hip personages indeed, this issue featuring contributions from Alan Bishop, Sharon Cheslow, editor Byron Coley, Eddie Flowers, Michael Hurley, Mats Gustafsson, Ira Kaplan (the Yo La Tengo guitarist is the one who reviews the bike lane), Tom Lax, Samara Lubelski, Hisham Mayet, Gary Panter, Richard Meltzer (!!), Dylan Nyoukis, Savage Pencil, Naomi Yang, Brian Turner, Chris Stigliano, Thurston Moore, David Greenberger, and literally dozens more. 54 b&w pages, lots to delve into, both informative and amusing; grab one and you'll definitely get turned on to SOMETHING new and weird and interesting. What more would you want from a zine?

The esteemed Byron Coley's zine o' reviews ("A Quarterly Journal of Post-Rock Cultural Pluralism" to be precise) is back already with issue #4, 76 pages packed with opinions and observations from a who's-who of hip, about an absurd variety of interesting things, from Rowdy Roddy Piper to Farscape to Motley Crue live to Kobo Abe's novel Woman Of The Dunes to Igor Wakhevitch's album Hathor... there's even a review of the first 3 issues of Bull Tongue! Contributors include Alan Bishop, Thurston Moore, Mats Gustafsson, Michael Hurley, Ira Kaplan, Alan Licht, Sharon Cheslow, Bill Nace, Tom Lax, Savage Pencil, Brian Turner, Tesco Vee, Phil McMullen, Bruce Russell, and a ton of other folks.

It's great to see these first three essential Sandy Bull lps on Vanguard finally get reissued, as his influence has been felt more and more lately. You can hear Bull's pluralistic presence especially in Sir Richard Bishop, as Bull was among the first key guitar players, along with the UK's Davy Graham, to combine styles and ideas from Middle Eastern, classical, jazz, gospel, rhythm and blues, chamber music and Appalachian folk sources. Yet Bull wasn't a purist, often pushing and pulling these wide-ranging ideas across instruments both acoustic and electric in ways that searched for the interior truth of the material. These were best expressed in his side-long excursionary tracks called "Blends" accompanied by jazz drummer Billy Higgins. Sadly, Bull had a short-lived career plagued by drug problems and illness, but these records are solid proof of his pioneering role in the solo-guitar genre. There's even a documentary playing in San Francisco soon made by his daughter, K. C. Bull, that folks should definitely check out! E Pluribus Unum from 1968 is the most experimental of Bull's recordings and perhaps our favorite. Comprised of two side-long tracks, "No Deposit, No Return Blues" and "Electric Blend" this is Bull's full on electric raga record. Using electric guitar and oud through vibrant tremolo effects, as well as Middle Eastern percussion and finger cymbals, Bull explores some psychedelic Bo Diddley territory channeled through the exotic mystique of Hamza El Din. Similar in vein to what was performed in the recently released live recording from 1969, Still Valentine's Day, time has been good to this recording as it sounds like something far more contemporary than its original critics gave it credit for. Perhaps its abandonment of classical sources and acoustic instruments in favor of more populist and drug friendly musical territory turned the more academically-minded musical purists off. And those druggy influences DID send Bull on a path he was never to return from, only recording one more full album after this one. Yet this record, like no other, captured his furthest exhilarating push into the depths of his musical being before he lost himself for good. Highest recommendation!

It's great to see these first three essential Sandy Bull lps on Vanguard finally get reissued, as his influence has been felt more and more lately. You can hear Bull's pluralistic presence especially in Sir Richard Bishop, as Bull was among the first key guitar players, along with the UK's Davy Graham, to combine styles and ideas from Middle Eastern, classical, jazz, gospel, rhythm and blues, chamber music and Appalachian folk sources. Yet Bull wasn't a purist, often pushing and pulling these wide-ranging ideas across instruments both acoustic and electric in ways that searched for the interior truth of the material. These were best expressed in his side-long excursionary tracks called "Blends" accompanied by jazz drummer Billy Higgins. Sadly, Bull had a short-lived career plagued by drug problems and illness, but these records are solid proof of his pioneering role in the solo-guitar genre. There's even a documentary playing in San Francisco soon made by his daughter, K. C. Bull, that folks should definitely check out! Fantasias (for guitar and banjo) was originally released in 1963, a year before John Fahey's debut turn on uncanny Americana, Blind Joe Death. It's often stuffed in the drawer behind Fahey's dirty socks though, such as it is that over the years, Fahey has taken a larger chunk of real estate in the guitar soli zeitgeist. But if Bull were to be compared with anyone, his playing style is much more influenced by Pete Seeger. Banjo was Sandy's first instrument and it was with a banjo that he first made an impression on the public as a precocious college freshman. Bull freely admits Seeger as being a mentor of his, and his "Carmina Burana Fantasy" is certainly inspired by Seeger's arrangements of classical pieces that were included on his "Goofing Off Suite" LP (released in 1955). But influenced or no, Bull had his own unique style and both his original compositions and arrangements of existing works are as good as much of the works of either Fahey or Seeger. "Blend", the first track which takes up all of side one (22 minutes), is a beautiful Sudanese-esque duet between Sandy on an open tuned guitar with jazz drummer Billy Higgins accompanying. A track that would make the Sun City Girls blush, "Blend", alternates between dark and slow musings from Bull to intense repartee between Bull and Higgins. Higgins does an excellent job of filling in, and avoids breaking the aesthetic by playing sans snare. The remaining four tracks on the album are all solo banjo and or guitar. Along with the aforementioned "Carmina Burana Fantasy", Bull pulls off a nice overdubbed arrangement of English Renaissance composer William Byrd's "Non Nobis Domine" on guitar, a rousing rendition of Appalachian folk ballad "Little Maggie" on banjo and a final piece simply entitled "Gospel Tune" played on a tremelo laden electric guitar.

Reissue of Sandy Bull's first album, originally released in 1963. Often stuffed in the drawer behind John Fahey's dirty socks though, if he were to be compared with anyone, his playing style is much more influenced by Pete Seeger. Banjo was Sandy's first

RealAudio clip: Blend
RealAudio clip: Carmina Burana Fantasy

It's great to see these first three essential Sandy Bull lps on Vanguard finally get reissued, as his influence has been felt more and more lately. You can hear Bull's pluralistic presence especially in Sir Richard Bishop, as Bull was among the first key guitar players, along with the UK's Davy Graham, to combine styles and ideas from Middle Eastern, classical, jazz, gospel, rhythm and blues, chamber music and Appalachian folk sources. Yet Bull wasn't a purist, often pushing and pulling these wide-ranging ideas across instruments both acoustic and electric in ways that searched for the interior truth of the material. These were best expressed in his side-long excursionary tracks called "Blends" accompanied by jazz drummer Billy Higgins. Sadly, Bull had a short-lived career plagued by drug problems and illness, but these records are solid proof of his pioneering role in the solo-guitar genre. There's even a documentary playing in San Francisco soon made by his daughter, K. C. Bull, that folks should definitely check out! Inventions (for guitar, banjo, oud, electric guitar and electric bass) from 1965 is considered to be Bull's best record as it fully covers his wide-ranging tenacity in interpretation and composition. Beginning with "Blend II", another side-long composition accompanied by Billy Higgins, the playing is born of a dark mystique, carving out bits from free jazz melodic motifs, and early-American folk tunes to Lebanese music and North African popular songs. The interplay between Higgins and Bull is more complex than the first "Blend" on Fantasias, with Higgins' standing on his own as a performer rather than a mere accompaniment. Side one ends with a short electric version of Bach's "Gavotte No. 2", which is repeated in a longer acoustic form at the beginning of side 2. The interpretation of Luiz Bonfa's Brazilian classic, "Manha de Carnaval" shows Bull experimenting with multi-tracking as he plays acoustic guitar, bass and oud. Here, Bruce Langhorne and Hamza El Din display their guiding hands on Bull's playing as Langhorne taught Bull the song, and El Din, the oud itself. "Triple Ballade" is a piece by renaissance composer Guillaume de Machaut, a gothic chamber piece performed with guitar, banjo and oud, while the final piece is Chuck Berry's "Memphis, Tennesee" a tremelo-laden rocker with Billy Higgins again on drums that sets the stage for the full on raga blues of Bull's third record, E Pluribus Unum!

Wow! Rare live document from one of the most enigmatic and legendary figures in the solo guitar scene. Recorded over two shows in 1969 at San Francisco's Matrix on the same bill as John Fahey (The Great Santa Barbara Oil Slick documents Fahey's performance on this night) and accompanied by free jazz percussionist, Billy Higgins. Using tape machines, oud, slide guitar and a new electric guitar and amp (apparently some of his equipment was stolen, so you can hear him fiddling with the new equipment, tweaking the settings), the pieces here are taken mostly from his 1968 album E Pluribus Unum, an electric departure from his earlier acoustic classical excursions, that was much derided by purists, but stands as one of Bull's most amazing recordings. Soaked in tremelo and reverb, the raga-ish blues he evokes here display a raw evocative power not captured on any of his studio recordings. The amazing pieces Bull performs on oud, an instrument he picked up after meeting Hamza el Din (whose Escalay: The Water Wheel is an AQ fave) show off Bull's singular gift for combining jazz, blues, middle eastern idioms and classical fantasias into new and unchartered territories.

MPEG stream: Electric Blend 1
MPEG stream: Improvisation for Oud 2
MPEG stream: Memphis, TN

An archival live release from multi-instrumentalist Sandy Bull is a welcome occurrence any day. After the great 1969 live recording release Still Valentine's Day on the Water label from a few years back where Bull opened for John Fahey, we knew his live sets held a charged electric power that wasn't always evident on his studio records. This set is from 1976 recorded at the Berkeley Community Theater where he opened for Leo Kottke. Like the 1969 date, Bull uses a tape machine to accompany himself for the bass parts, but also adds a Rhythm Ace drum machine (!) which gives the song a soft organic momentum. The Rhythm Ace, an early Japanese manufactured commercial drum machine has a soft percussive sound similar to most console organs of the time, and has been sought out for its natural sense of tempo and warm unobtrusive rhythms. He even demos the various settings to much delight. He opens with one of his oud improvisations, but the songs on this set have a more twangy Americana blues vibe. "Driftin", inspired by the Drifters, has a countrified slide guitar feel, while "Alligator Wrestler" is more swampy, the accompanied rhythm set through beautifully analog phasing and wah effects. He does sing on one song called "Love Is Forever", which has a wonderful charm even though he isn't that great of a singer. But it's the quality of the sound that makes this set so nice. Like the 1969 recording, he's a virtual one man band and how he sets up the pieces, the beautiful energy of his playing, the friendly banter and that warm tube amp sound makes this a satisfying morning or late evening listen.

The new AC/DC album, Black Ice, wasn't half bad. No, not their best since Back In Black like some folks were claiming, but pretty decent. We might even have reviewed it, had they not decided to sell it only at Wal-Mart! However, we will review the next best (or maybe better!) thing, the new album from Swedish retro-metallers Bullet. We really dug their full-length debut Heading For The Top back in 200X, and when we reviewed it we mentioned how much they sounded like AC/DC (also like Accept, Judas Priest...and, in our ears, Pharaoh Overlord's #4). Raspy Brian Johnson meets Udo Dirkschneider vocals, stick-in-your-head choruses, hard rockin' riffs, sly sexual innuendo. Nothin' fancy, just kick ass rock n' roll with an '80s metal fixation. And Bite The Bullet is no different. But just as you don't go looking to an AC/DC album for something new, you get exactly what you want/expect from Bullet! These AC/DC-ish doppelganger headbangers know how to rock it, thanks we assume to the benefits of the massive secret Swedish government program that channels billions of kroner into genetic/musical scientific research devoted to ensuring Sweden's supremacy when it comes to metal, as evinced by how many freakin' cool Swedish bands we're always reviewing. One beer-chuggin' track after another, Bullet keeping the party raging throughout all 11 songs on this disc, from "Roadking" to "Rock Us Tonight" to "Wheels Keep On Turning" (well, minus one instrumental interlude, "City Of Sins")... You can buy lots of great music from our store, this week or any, but for things that will really get you goin' when you crank the volume to the max, you can't do much better than Bullet. Do we need to tell you to bite it?

MPEG stream: Pay The Price
MPEG stream: Dusk Til Dawn

We were thinking, there's got to be a bunch of aQ customers who got that last Pharaoh Overlord album, the 'NWOFHM' biker metal meets krautrock masterpiece Pharaoh Overlord #4, and not only really liked it (we know plenty of you did!) but also maybe weren't already into the METAL side of the Pharaoh Overlord #4 equation and then realized, "Hey, these metal riffs are pretty cool! I like this stuff!" And want to hear MORE. Now, we can't really come up with another album quite like PO#4 but what we can suggest is a honest-to-god metal record with riffage along those lines. Not all super-repetitive and hypnotically extended the way PO do it, but still simply, irresistably headbangin', and almost equally high-concept, obsessed with leather, spikes, sex, bikes, and metal itself. Check out a sampling of song titles: "Midnight Riders (Riding Free)", "Raise Hell", "Turn It Up Loud", and "Bang Your Head" (compare with the likes of "Ridin'" and "Demons In The Rising Sun" on PO#4). We're thinkin' all this 'cause Heading For The Top, the debut album by Swedish metallers Bullet crossed our path right about the same time that PO#4 was in heavy rotation 'round here, and we were struck by certain similarities. Both bands are heavily influenced by '80s metal stalwarts AC/DC, Judas Priest, and Accept. In fact, the singer for Bullet's glass-gargling screech bears an uncanny resemblance to that of Accept's camo-clad frontman, Udo Dirkschneider. But we're getting ahead of ourselves. If you know who Udo is, we could just say, hey, Bullet have made a great, greasy living tribute to that brand of '80s earthdog party metal and leave it at that. Come get it, metallians! But that might not be the case with most of our customers, sad to say. So for this review, we're gonna continue working the Pharaoh Overlord angle. It's true, if you dug the riffs on PO#4 we probably don't need to tell you about the '80s metal bands you probably also should hear. But the band Bullet is doing this here (well, Sweden) and now, and unlike the classic metal bands mentioned above, could probably really use your cd-buying dollars for beer money -- and they deserve 'em just as much if not more than the Pharaoh Overlord dudes as far as delivering the goods metal-wise goes! As metal as PO#4 was, we wouldn't quite call it REAL metal. But Bullet sure is. Catchy, stripped down, ready to rumble rock n' roll METAL like it used to be. And if they sound 'too much' like AC/DC to you, well, so does AC/DC themselves every time out and that's still cool, so why not these guys too? Ok, enough. We just dug this album and are hoping a handful of you, PO fans or not, will dig it too. Just doing our heavy metal duty!

MPEG stream: Midnight Riders (Riding Free)
MPEG stream: Rock Steady

Our proto-metal pick of the week! Bullet were an early '70s UK power trio led by guitarist/vocalist John DuCann, previously a member of The Attack, Andromeda, and Atomic Rooster. A while back, when we reviewed a reissue of Atomic Rooster's classic Death Walks Behind You, we talked about DuCann, calling his post 'Rooster band Hard Stuff "one of proto-metal's best kept secrets", and guess what? The existence of these recordings by Hard Stuff precursor Bullet were an even bigger secret... After being booted from Atomic Rooster (despite having written several of that band's biggest hits), DuCann formed this new group, Bullet (briefly before that called Daemon), with a fellow former 'Rooster, drummer Paul Hammond, along with bass player John Gustafson (ex-Quatermass), who could sing and write as well. The idea, it seems, was to play music even harder and darker than Atomic Rooster did... and the results were some high energy, riffy, rippin' stuff indeed, with song titles like "Sinister Minister" and "Hell: Demonic Possession". Distorted, fuzzed out jams for sure, but with a pop side to 'em too. They soon changed their name (for legal reasons) to Hard Stuff, and produced two excellent albums full of heavy-duty "hairy funk", Bulletproof (1972) and Bolex Dementia ('73), before a near-fatal car accident on the German autobahn involving 2/3rds of the band ended their career prematurely. But it turns out that while they were still called Bullet, back in 1970-'71, they'd privately demoed this rough disc-ful of music, now properly released for the first time (sort of, see below) after resting for decades in DuCann's vaults. Since, currently, there don't appear to be any reissues of the Hard Stuff albums available to us, this is the next best thing. Now, if you already have yourself some Hard Stuff, you might not need this...but you'll probably want it. Many of the best songs did wind up being re-recorded by HS for their debut, but there's also lots of other cool jammy tracks on here where you get to hear DuCann really go off on his guitar, plus it's certainly rad to hear the raw early versions of catchy Hard Stuff staples like "No Witch At All". There's 17 tracks total (well, 15 really, as two of 'em, "Door Opens" and "Door Closes" are both but brief sound FX), that remind us of other proto-metal faves like Dust, James Gang ("Taken Alive" in particular), Stray, Leaf Hound, and Granicus... The cd booklet contains extensive liner notes, in the form of an interview DuCann himself, getting in depth into the whole Bullet/Hard Stuff story. Though he doesn't have a lot to say about Daemon, who at one point had a singer named Al Shaw who perhaps appears here too. And FYI, this same material was once previously reissued on cd (a bootleg?) under the Daemon name by the Kissing Spell label.

MPEG stream: No Witch At All
MPEG stream: The Orchestrator
MPEG stream: Time Gambler

AKA Bullet Proof Scratch Hamsters, this Bay Area "supergroup" is comprised of DJs Eddie Def (Skratch Piklz), Cue (Cue's Hip Hop Shop), Quest (Live Human), Marz, and MC Eddie K.

RealAudio clip: F%K-WIT-YER-BRAIN

The seven piece Bullfrog hail from Montreal and recently swept thru our town, bestowing just a few cds upon us. This is a 5-song 3" cd (their 2nd 3" cd). Not just a Kid Koala project at all, this band is really finding their sound and running with it, and Koala's turntables are just one part of the delightful equation. They play tone-perfect seventies sweet soul / Parliament-style

RealAudio clip: Slow Down
RealAudio clip: Reverse Psychology

Bullfrog hail from Montreal and have bestowed two little 3"cds upon AQ over the past year. And now here's their full length -- which contains tracks from the two 3" cds but also lots of new stuff never before heard. Not just a Kid Koala project at all, this band is really finding their sound and running with it, and Koala's turntables are just one part of the delightful equation. They play tone-perfect seventies sweet soul / Parliament-style funk (think "Can You Get to That" from Maggot Brain), complete with falsetto vocals and chiming bwang.bwang.bwang guitar. They also do a Sunday morning style of hip hop that's heavy on the SoCal-esque flowing vocals and wah guitar. Fans of Ozomatli, Jurassic 5, Antibalas -- this music is right up your alley. It's so good!

RealAudio clip: Ya Ya
RealAudio clip: Reverse Psychoogy
RealAudio clip: Slow Down
RealAudio clip: Reverse Psychology

[ aquarius records catalogue — B ]