Someone at aQ commented recently, when they discovered there was a stoner doom / sludge outfit called Conan, that it was just too easy, too obvious. But we're not sure they realized this horde of UK stoner sludgelords play "caveman battle doom", and thus, what else could you call your, band really? Especially when it sounds exactly like what Conan evokes. Shirtless warriors, painted up for battle, marching in formations to destroy and decimate, personally, we add a sort of futuristic twist, so they're actually cyborg warriors, trudging across the scorched surfaces of alien planets, onward into battle, but onward very very very very slowly.
The sound of these battles, or at least the music these cyborg warriors march into battle to, is all downtuned riffery, knuckle dragging caveman drum plod, churning tarpit death march creep, lumbering, stumbling heaviness, slow and low that is most definitely the tempo, tranced out and droney, psychedelic for sure, like an even more zoned out Electric Wizard, the vocals though are a bit surprising, not metallic shrieking, or cookie monster gurgles, instead it's bellowed and a little operatic, a sort of epic croon, that reminds us a lot of Harvey Milk, and gives Conan a whole different vibe than their doom/sludge brethren, more musical in a way, but also just more strange, and strangely more epic. Some of the tracks crank up the tempo a bit, others get sort of mathy and noisy, some get sort of Sabbathy, adding a bit of stonery swing, and still others get super psychedelic, adding swirls of FX, but ultimately, and inevitably, the sound always settles back into a gloriously head nodding, gut churning, rib cage rattling, riffy plod. The song titles ("Gravity Chasm", "Altar Of Grief", "Horns For Teeth", "Crown Of Talons", "Foehammer", "Total Conquest") and the smoke shrouded demon warrior cover art just seals the deal.
Obviously, if you're gonna call your band Conan, your sound had better be pretty darn burly! And barbaric. Well, this UK doom outfit is definitely worthy of the name. Their music is not by, nor for, wimps. Slow, low, and loud = HEAVY. Even Arnold might have had trouble bench pressing these riffs! The plodding, shuddering distortion on display here is kinda like ultradoom in the vein of Moss or Bunkur, but not quite so slow, speeding up as necessary when the crushing riffs are really ready to go in for the kill. The production is amazing, as are the downtuned sounds these dudes get out of their guitars and amps, sooooooo bludgeoningly blown out. Conan's a guitar/bass/drums trio but sounds more like bass/bass/bass/bass/bass/bass/bass... oh yeah and drums which hold up their end of the heaviness equation just fine. Meanwhile, the vocals, when there are any, are a distant bellow, a high wailing, soaring over and staying out of the way of the massively occupied bass frequencies. They make us think of Yob for sure, but quite not so Geddy Lee, a bit more shout-y, so Harvey Milk would be another good comparison. For a lot of this, actually, not just the vocals. And the Melvins too, say one of their epic sludgeathons like "Charmicarmicat" or "Night Goat". And as long as we're namechecking other bands, how 'bout godheadSilo? Corrupted? Early Sleep (circa Volume One)? Yeah Conan is worthy of being cited amongst such legends. Again, they'd better be, with a name like Conan.
Originally released on limited vinyl last year by Throne over in Spain, sadly, we didn't get any of those. But now thanks to Aurora Borealis, we have it on compact disc, in a nice silver and black digipack. 4 songs, 33 minutes, infinite heaviness.
Kick ass doom / sludge split from these two UK outfits, and in the spirit of the split, we figured we oughta do a split review as well, so Allan will tackle Conan's half, and Andee's got the Slomatics half. Allan's up first...
I just know Andee's gonna write, like, a novel about Slomatics, and to do the mighty Conan justice, I should give them an equally lengthy writeup too. Or, on the other hand, maybe I should just keep my bit short. After all, there's really not much more to say about the barbaric doom-drone metal that Conan offers up here, than we already said in our review of their 2010 cd on Aurora Borealis, Horseback Battle Hammer. To wit, "Their music is not by, nor for, wimps. Slow, low, and loud = HEAVY. Even Arnold might have had trouble bench pressing these riffs! The plodding, shuddering distortion on display here is kinda like ultradoom in the vein of Moss or Bunkur, but not quite so slow, speeding up as necessary when the crushing riffs are really ready to go in for the kill." We went on to compare 'em to Yob, the Melvins, and Corrupted, among others, as well. These 3 new tracks are in the same vein what we'd heard before from Conan, meaning bass-heavy blown-out bludgeon, though there's a subtlety here we should note as well. Their first cut, "Older Than Earth", is a six+ minute miasmic trudge. That's followed by the brief, unexpected electronic interlude of "Obsidian Sword", and then the epic "Retaliator" rounds out Conan's contribution to this disc, being an eleven and a half minute creepy-crawl that melds Conan's brawniest rumble and howl with more atmospheric synth-sizzle, kinda reminding us of Thrones. Very cool.
Now for the Slomatics half, take it away Andee...
It's been two years since we last heard from UK slo-mo heavies Slomatics, who we discovered initially via an impending split with late great prog-sludge combo Like A Kind Of Matador (whose great full length on tUMULt is still available btw), and whose full length debut was a huge hit with the doomlords (and ladies) around these parts, their sound a heaving, churning morass of murky tarpit sludge, heavily beholden to Harvey Milk, Eyehategod, Bongzilla, the Melvins of course, even Electric Wizard, thick crumblingly distorted riffage, massive tectonic drum pound, laced with little bits of melody, short stretches of mellow drift, but for the most part all about the pound and pummel. We got another taste of the Slomatics' heaviosity on a split with Seelah, their sound slightly more rocking, and a wee bit poppier, but ultimately more of the glorious dirgey same. Which brings us to this brand new split, with another band of heavy aQ faves, Conan, and while much of that Slomatics sound is intact, something has definitely changed. There's definitely a slight pop edge, which did seem to be present on past outings, but here is much more openly on display, especially on the first track "Lose The Five", which peppers the thick Sabbathy riffage, with cool harmonized melodies, and buried hooks, with the song dangerously close to sludge-pop territory at times, definitely like a murkier, less poppier Torche (which weirdly is how we described one of the tracks on the Seelah split). There's also some seriously majestic Harvey Milk like moments too, that sort of creep anthemic epicness. "Black Blizzard" find the group ditching all of the above poppiness, for some pure grimey, filthy dirgery, reverbed vocals over death march downtuned trudge, but wait, strap those headphones on, and you'll hear all manner of melody buried in the murk and the mire, not to mention some super cool dynamic stop/starts, and a crazily blown out production that gives the sound a trippy washed out vibe. Finally, Slomatics finish off the split with "Mont Ventoux", which begins all abstract and psychedelic, cards-in-spokes skitter, over off-in-the-distance drumming, then some howled reverbed vox give way to another stretch of doomic churn, this time sounding weirdly dubbed out and a little bit industrial, a bit of a Godflesh vibe all tangled up with the bands more gnarled and grinding chug. So ruling! Still hard to fathom why these guys aren't in everyone's doom/sludge pantheon...
This split sure makes sense, these two bands belong together, and well deserve the super bad ass sci-fi, mysterious warrior, snail steed, dual mooned, skull mountain cover art!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
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Tim Green is a busy fellow. Among probably many other things he runs a recording studio, rocks out with his band The Fucking Champs, occasionally sits in with fellow Bay Area band Crime In Choir, and records in solo mode under the moniker Concentrick. His past Concentrick recordings have been often serene, occasionally krautrock rhythm'd electronic soundscapes that stand in stark, revealing contrast to his rock band endeavors. So we were surprised not only to hear some blissed out guitar work, but also to see a full band's worth of musicians make an appearance on his latest release Aluminum Lake. Then, we were even more thrown for a loop when the third track burst out of our speakers! On "White Bear" Green allows his 'Champs rock side to barge its way into his Concentrick zone with some nut-bustin' electric guitar riffage and bombastic drums. From there he, along with Jon Theodore (drums), Seth Lorinczi (bass), Lorraine Rath (flute), Jackie Perez-Gratz (cello) and Adria Otte (violin), roam freely through passages hewn from prog, metal, Kraut and pastoral inspirations. Who'd have thought we'd be describing Concentrick as being dark or propulsive or heavy? Not us! Those are words we'd normally reserve for the 'Champs. Not anymore! Seems Concentrick has become Green's catch-all for his various musical whims and moods. Quite cool nonetheless.
For almost ten years Tim Green, while living in Olympia, moving to & setting up Louder Studios here in SF, and wielding the guitar in The (Fucking) Champs, has quietly been making solo experimental electronic music. The three Concentrick albums are the fruit of those efforts. On the guitar, piano, Wurlitzer organ, plus an endless array of vintage synths (Micromoog, mellotron, Poly 61) and other quaint machines, he's constructed a quiet electronica album that issues forth unhurriedly and softly. Like Krautrock pioneers Cluster and Harmonia, or early Brian Eno circa Discreet Music, the sonic elements are invitingly simple -- rounded notes are held for many slow seconds, one imperceptibly dissolving into the next. The music exudes a sense of sustained drama without piling on layers or percussion (except in a few cases), or messing with the purity of the sounds of the vintage electronics, the added cello and the flutes. Very peaceful and serene. Practically new age... in a good way.
Solo project of Tim Green of The (Fucking) Champs. No, it's not metal. It's actually some really great drone music, kind of a multi-layered celestial grinding symphony, with interludes of tinkling clickery, hissing, stutter, etc. Quite varied and lovely, a good listen indeed. This cd is a reissue of Tim's 1996 cassette, although it sounds more like a reissue of a lost LP by some electronic krautrock experimentalist from the seventies.
Following up the recent re-worked cd re-issue of his 1996 cassette "Music For Tunnels" comes this new cd from Tim Green's Concentrick persona. Tim Green you may know as a member of The Fucking Champs, an ex-member of Nation of Ulysses, or as the producer/engineer to many of your favorite bands at his Louder Studios. With Concentrick he adds another line to his varied and impressive musical resume. Electronic pop musician? Where "Music For Tunnels" was all about the drone, this new disc is more about bubbling beats and melodic dreaminess. The '70s krautrock electronica influence is definitely still present, it's just that Concentrick has shifted focus from the placid soundscapes of Klaus Schulze and Tangerine Dream to the more rhythmic territory associated with Kraftwerk and late-'70s Cluster. But there's more: strings, sampled voices, frenzied percolating percussion, cinematic lushness...and you can definitely hear real drums and guitar on here, at parts it's like a band playing Aphex Twin music! (and at others, it's...just like Aphex Twin music, circa "The Richard D. James Album". Not a bad thing!) If you liked the lovely "techno" interludes on the first Champs cd, or always thought that the Champs could make a better Trans Am record than Trans Am, you'll want this! Highly recommended!
Concept Bureau is the name of this Bay Area project who generate a plethora of sounds using a machine they call The Identity Encoder. According to the liner notes the mysterious mechanism "translates personal facts and preferences into sound". These particular recordings were done just down the street from us at Artists' Television Access (ATA for short, it's a cool center for d.i.y. underground media works). The fourteen tracks of the fourteen participants range from soothing womb-y pulses and blips to a cavalcade of wind-up and squeak toys run amok. If you didn't know the story behind this release you could easily believe that these are some home recordings made by an old BBC Radiophonic engineer.
Limited to 50, packaged in hand-numbered, hand-sewn cardboard sleeves.
Gorgeous new full length from Gordon Ashworth (aka little brother of Casiotone For The Painfully Alone's Owen Ashworth), and like the previous Concern album, Truth And Distance (reissued on vinyl and reviewed elsewhere on this week's list!), Caesarian is another meticulously crafted series of looped and processed soundscapes, equal parts Philip Jeck, Tim Hecker and William Basinski, full of lush drones, crumbling decaying tapes, and hazy atmospherics, all assembled from a surprising array of acoustic instruments: piano, clarinet, banjo, sruti box, acoustic guitar, augmented with processed tapes and various reverbs, resulting in a sound that's both human and alien, organic and processed, beautiful and mysterious.
"Discrete Memorial" might be one of our favorite tracks yet from Ashworth, a strange loopscape of melancholy piano, mournful horns, all captured on a crumbling bit of tape, repeated into a mesmerizing refrain, but the various elements stuttering and glitching out, like some beautiful bit of sad pop, recorded on an old damaged tape, and played back on a malfunctioning tape player, gorgeously hypnotic, but similar to Basinski's recordings, much of the sound is derived from what surrounds the music, strange drop outs, bits of hiss, subtle squelches here and there, the tones and notes changing speed and pitch, it's all woven deftly into a warped and warbly, beautifully imperfect bit of looped droning melodic drift. The cool thing though is that by the end of the track, the sound has shed all of the imperfections, having grown gradually more lush and less lo-fi as the song progressed, eventually ending up a gorgeously swirling Lubomyr Melnyk like flurry of rich harmonics and warm melodies.
The rest of the record is equally moving, and sonically breathtaking, from the warm whirling swells and metallic buzz of "Mending", to the fractured murky folk drift and eventual psychedelic drone effulgence of "From Warmth And From Violence", to the glitchy almost Oval sounding shimmer of "Leaving Gold", and finally, the sprawling 34 minute "Immersed In Envy, Porous With Forgetfulness", which manages to somehow bring all of those various sounds together, insectoid buzz, hazy abstracted minimal shimmer, mysterious field recordings, washed out whirring organs, sunshiney dronepop drift, blurred hiss drenched ambience, all woven into a lovely, slow shifting expanse of lush minimal beauty.
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!!!
The final release from Concern, aka Gordon Ashworth (brother of Owen, he the man behind Casiotone For The Painfully Alone), which uses as its main sound source a folk instrument called the box harp, or lap harp, and the record opens with a gorgeous Reichian figure played on the harp, which becomes the foundation of the whole record, an homage of sorts to the African kora and the a a similar stringed instrument from Madagascar. The creation of the record is almost as compelling as the sounds themselves, with Ashworth using super primitive looping techniques involving cassettes and speakers and microphones and delays, but even more exciting, using cavernous parking garages and a sort of crude echo/delay, like a modern day Taj Mahal Travellers. The results speak for themselves though.
Beginning with that rapid fire figure of notes played on the box harp, buzzing and percussive and darkly melodic, all over wheezing barely there chords, those opening harp notes soon disappear beneath a warm wash of lush layered shimmer, which we gradually realize is simply the same sounds, slowed down and blurred a bit, transforming them into something droney and dreamy, but the sound is constantly shifting, the opening flurry of notes surfacing now and again in different forms, all building to a lush dense dreamily blown out coda, all the while, the sounds constantly couched in a background of ambient sounds and field recordings, the crackle of fire, voices, footsteps, the clatter of dishes, the clinking of glasses, it all definitely adds a strange dimension to an already mysterious landscape of sound.
The B side continues right where the first side left off, the buzzing box harp notes now hazy and washed out and wreathed in a prismatic glimmer, lush, but super active, a roiling melodic swirl just under the surface, the sound mesmerizing and ever shifting, building gradually to a soft cacophony, before closing with a gorgeous sprawl of softly warbly mesmer, sounding like Philip Jeck spinning old recordings of box harps, everything dreamy and crackly and softly fading to black.
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES! In a super striking jacket, with teal foil metallic printing on black matte jackets.
This awesome 2009 cd release, now available on vinyl!! Here's what we said about it before:
One of several new releases on the always kick ass Digitalis label, this one from a one man band called Concern, that one man being Gordon Ashworth, little brother of Owen Ashworth of Casiotone For The Painfully Alone, as well as a member of the late great Peyote Calamity, a weird heavy outfit, who sadly never released a proper record, but neither of those bands necessarily hint at the sounds to be found here. Utilizing a vast collection of instruments and noise making devices, zither, lap harp, mbira, banjo, piano, clarinet, trombone, accordion, acoustic guitar and alto horn, Ashworth blurs all those various instruments into long streaks of hazy drone-y dreaminess. Three tracks, all long, all gorgeously lush and textured, strangely melodic and propulsive for a sound that tends toward a more static drift.
Opener "Truth And Distance" bristles with energy, a glowing warm shimmer, the edges growing ever sharper as the songs sprawls outward, from a hushed whisper to a mighty heart of the sun ur-drone, the sound raw and organic, the core a deep unwavering drone, but the sound is like a stream, carrying all manner of glitch and hum, stray bits of disembodied guitar, melodic fragments, eventually transforming into a strange abstract Appalachia, a soft swirling tangle of upper register buzz and and skittery processed tones, definitely some of the most divine drones we've heard.
The first track is well over half the total length of the record, but the second two tracks, while shorter, are just as beautiful and epic. "Young Birth" builds from hushed whir to almost symphonic sounding majesty, a warped otherworldly new age, all tranquil and blissed out, the various tones overlapping and intertwining before fading out in a soft flurry of crackle and hum. While the final track, "Heartsink", begins all raw and fuzzy and almost heavy with a Tim Hecker sort of vibe, only to shift gears, and allow the sound of the various instruments to become distinct and identifiable. Which in no way means the sound is any less dreamlike, soft shimmers of heavily reverbed piano drift weightlessly in an expanse of soft muted melodies, the overtones creating distant drone-y swells, the result a lovely abstract sort of classical chamber dronemusic, so so so nice.
Essential listening for the drone inclined, and any one into Tim Hecker, Aidan Baker, Fennesz, Belong and the like might just have a new favorite record.
One of several new releases on the always kick ass Digitalis label, this one from a one man band called Concern, that one man being Gordon Ashworth, little brother of Owen Ashworth of Casiotone For The Painfully Alone, as well as a member of the late great Peyote Calamity, a weird heavy outfit, who sadly never released a proper record, but neither of those bands necessarily hint at the sounds to be found here. Utilizing a vast collection of instruments and noise making devices, zither, lap harp, mbira, banjo, piano, clarinet, trombone, accordion, acoustic guitar and alto horn, Ashworth blurs all those various instruments into long streaks of hazy drone-y dreaminess. Three tracks, all long, all gorgeously lush and textured, strangely melodic and propulsive for a sound that tends toward a more static drift.
Opener "Truth And Distance" bristles with energy, a glowing warm shimmer, the edges growing ever sharper as the songs sprawls outward, from a hushed whisper to a mighty heart of the sun ur-drone, the sound raw and organic, the core a deep unwavering drone, but the sound is like a stream, carrying all manner of glitch and hum, stray bits of disembodied guitar, melodic fragments, eventually transforming into a strange abstract Appalachia, a soft swirling tangle of upper register buzz and and skittery processed tones, definitely some of the most divine drones we've heard.
The first track is well over half the total length of the record, but the second two tracks, while shorter, are just as beautiful and epic. "Young Birth" builds from hushed whir to almost symphonic sounding majesty, a warped otherworldly new age, all tranquil and blissed out, the various tones overlapping and intertwining before fading out in a soft flurry of crackle and hum. While the final track, "Heartsink", begins all raw and fuzzy and almost heavy with a Tim Hecker sort of vibe, only to shift gears, and allow the sound of the various instruments to become distinct and identifiable. Which in no way means the sound is any less dreamlike, soft shimmers of heavily reverbed piano drift weightlessly in an expanse of soft muted melodies, the overtones creating distant drone-y swells, the result a lovely abstract sort of classical chamber dronemusic, so so so nice.
Essential listening for the drone inclined, and any one into Tim Hecker, Aidan Baker, Fennesz, Belong and the like might just have a new favorite record.
Haunted goth-industrial synthscapes from the unlikely collaborative duo of Scott Moore of Limp Wrist and Dave Coen of Whitehorse. Future Gloom!
Church music? Yeah, sorta. The first (and title) track is real churchy all right with folky singing and organ... and of course it's called "Risen Savior". These guys (and gal) were indeed a Christian rock trio, from Kansas. But they did their thing in the late sixties / early seventies and thus thankfully (for our purposes) bring in some of the acid rock psych action of the era to their musical worship. With track two, "What Shall We Do?", the Concrete Rubber Band aren't quite as soft and innocuous, getting into some wilder, keyboard-driven garagey psych. Not that they turn into Iron Butterfly or anything -- though, their name seems to derive from a similar, psychedelic logic! Overall, this is really pleasant, with gentle and earnest male and female vocals dueting over guitar, percussion, and variety of keyboard instruments (organ, synth, electric piano/harpsichord). Standout tracks include the cultish "Wicked" with its burbling electronic intro, and the dreamy "Dreamers". If you're a fan of "Jesus freak" psych (a la The Search Party, The New Creation, and that Resurrection comp, to mention three things we've reviewed in that vein) then you might dig the CRB too. Yeah, we're all into black metal here at AQ, but sometimes bands that sing about God in a nice way we like too... all depends on the music!
Originally released on vinyl in 1971 by the band themselves to sell at Christian bookstores, in an edition of 500.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Definitely walking a raucous and veering path to your ear... it's The Concretes. Decidedly Swedish and experimental. Okay, allow me to elaborate: quirky, strolling pop that takes many stylistic turns. Perhaps this is due to the fact that this group sometimes swells to include up to 18 members, with Horns, organ bits, sing song-y melodies. The vocals bring to mind those of Smack Dab (if you're unfamiliar with them, they were an odd little pop band with a precariously fragile female vocalist that released two albums on Homestead Records in the early '90s.) Fans of Stereo-Total should certainly check this out.
The Concretes have been blissing out indie pop fans for well over a decade but their steadily growing spiked big time over the past year. The Swedish dreamboats were drawn further into the limelight by former Concretes singer Victoria Bergsman's appearance on the omnipresent Peter Bjorn And John single "Young Folks". Yes, you heard correctly. Former! The PBJ guest vocalist who charmed everyone and brought attention to the Concretes has jumped ship in favor of a solo career. But fret not, despite the album's title, this is by no means a 'man overboard!' emergency. Although you're not going to be hearing Ms. Bergsman's sweet and distinctly quirky voice on any of these dozen songs, you will be hearing the just as sweet and distinctly quirky voice of Lisa Milberg. Her performance makes for not such a drastic transition after all. Slightly off kilter and bittersweet. Yes, if you like Peter Bjorn And John's Writer's Block, what are you waiting for? The soft serve dream whip sounds of Hey Trouble are like a more girlie counterpart.
Shadow Kingdom sure has become one of those labels, that whatever they put out, whether it be some rare '80s metal reissue by a band we've never heard of, or an equally unknown release by a brand new band, we know want to hear it, 'cause the label is definitely focused on the sort of obscure cult metal we love, usually doomy, often epic, quite classic and sometimes a bit eccentric. From lost NWOBHM treats like Wolfbane and Deep Switch to modern day doom like Garden Of Worm and Crowned In Earth, they've been bringing it.
So, listen up, here's another good one from 'em. A Painful Journey Into Nihil is the debut full-length from Chilean doomsters Condenados (which means "Doomed" in Spanish, we're not surprised to learn). Of course, we immediately thought of Procession, another doom trio from Chile that we happen to love (and who have a new album out we hope to be getting soon!), and that's not far off the mark. Both bands traffic in trudge, extruding glacially epic dark doom that sounds a bit like Swedish gods Candlemass, but even more bummed out and despairing, maybe 'cause Candlemass was actually a pretty successful band, while these guys are struggling away in the depths of South America...
The six sluggish songs on here, the first two sung in Spanish, the others in English, are straight up serious quality old school doom all right, heavily weighted with lumbering, fuzzed out riffs in ye olde Sabbathy style, but even sadder and slower, their grinding graced with deep, somber vocals (rising to a higher pitch at some choice moments), and some nicely gnarly guitar solos amidst the melody. And we're pleased to report that Condenados has thrown a little flute in here too, just to make the album even better (and proggier). Keyboards and samples are also used to atmospheric effect. But none of that wimps this out, at all, it's HEAVY, regally so. A track like "Centuries Of Darkness" sounds like a classic that true doom devotees should have already been (slowly) banging heads to for, well, centuries.
Highly recommended to fans of the likes of Candlemass, Warning, Reverend Bizarre, The Wizar'd, Procession... and something about "Welcome To My Grave" reminds us a bit of The Obsessed.
Yeah, when we heard this band's name, we were all "WTF?! What's Matador dishing up now?!" But then we took a closer look at the album's title (hmmm, Fuckbook sounds a lot like... Fakebook!) and the band photos on the back (hmmm, they look a wee bit familiar!), and we knew we were in the presence of our beloved old faves Ira, James and Georgia! Yup, Condo Fucks are a very thinly disguised Yo La Tengo tearing and tumbling though a raucous garagey setlist packed with messy covers of Beach Boys, Electric Eels, Flaming Groovies, Richard Hell, Slade, The Small Faces, and Troggs songs. Very very silly, sloppy and fun fun fun!
Comprised of three SF scene vets, Wendy Farina, Kurt Keppeler and Joshua Richardson, the group rumble, churn and jolt through eight brooding, dissonant songs. Each song is darkly catchy, built around a wall of buzzing, hissing analog synths and thick bass guitar through which the trio sneer, shout and spit out their vocals. Frantic and quite carnivalesque at times, and yes, very Fall and Sonic Youth influenced too. If you've enjoyed the very late 70s/early 80s-ish live-wire art-punk angularities from recent Bay Area bands like Erase Errata, Numbers or Phantom Limbs, Condor might be just the thing for you!
If you've dug the recent angular herky jerk sounds of Bay Area bands such as Numbers and Phantom Limbs... as well as Man Or Astroman?'s final two albums... or for that matter their forefathers Sonic Youth, The Fall and Gang Of Four, it might be time for you to check out this trio known as Condor! Their sophomore release Do It Everywhere is a whole lot tighter and a bit more melodic and poppy (hence the MOAM? comparison) than their 2003 debut full length A Big One, but still very propulsively punchy and dissonant with fitting Mark E. Smith-esque spoken/shouted/sung vocals, edgy guitar shards, thick analog synth splatters, throbbing chunks of bass, and uncluttered thumping drums. Cool!
The Conet Project, originally released in 1997, has attained near mythical status around here. Many folks associate The Conet Project inextricably with our store itself. Which makes sense. We championed the Conet Project relentlessly, everyone here is obsessed, most of us owning multiple copies, some of us incorporating sounds from The Conet Project into our own music, and The Conet Project still ranks as probably THEE best selling release ever at aQuarius. Even more remarkable for the fact that it's not really music at all, at least not in the typical sense, and it is and always has been pretty expensive, as a deluxe 4-cd set initially, and import to boot. In fact until it went out of print for the last time a few years back, we had sold close to one thousand copies, and that's just in our little store. We even used to have a big chart on the wall, where we kept track of the sales, and for a while, we were even taking Polaroids of people who bought the Conet Project to display in the store, a snapshot of them holding what we can only imagine would become their new favorite record (buyer #382: Mike Patton!). Which all leads to the question some of you may have, what the heck is The Conet Project, and why are we (and many of you) so obsessed with it? And so thrilled that it's finally available again?! Yes, available again and obviously a big time Record Of The Week.
Basically, the Conet Project is a now FIVE-cd compilation (more details on the new 2013 edition's additional fifth disc is down below, near the end of this long review!) of recordings of mysterious shortwave radio broadcasts, known as "numbers stations". These numbers stations are generally believed to be encrypted spy transmissions, but no concrete evidence has ever surfaced proving that supposition. However, no credible *alternate* explanation has ever been demonstrated, either. For years (ever since the start of the Cold War), amateur radio enthusiasts have come across these sinister signals, and they continue to this day, broadcast in many languages all over the world (the theory is that some are CIA, some are KBG, some are Mossad, etc).
In general, the transmissions consist of a deadpan voice (sometimes an old man, sometimes a young woman, etc.) reading a seemingly random, meaningless series of numbers over and over. Sometimes the broadcasts are preceded by a musical cue (the "Swedish Rhapsody" music box one being a favorite of ours), and sometimes the numbers are not conveyed by voice but by even more cryptic electronics (as with "The Buzzer", and other noisy, abstract stuff found mainly on disc four).
Needless to say, hearing those amazing and baffling sounds collected on these cds is an unnerving experience. Not only does knowledge of the supposed purpose of these transmissions imbue them with a disturbing quality, but the repetition of the numbers combined with the background of shortwave radio static makes for a aurally hypnotic experience. If merely regarded as a piece of experimental ambient sound sculpture, The Conet Project would be a brilliant and affecting piece of work, yet with the added context of international intelligence and conspiracy theory, it becomes even more intriguing and creepy. Lots of information is included that provides a great deal of description of, and speculation about, The Conet Project. Which is possibly the most incredible, and weirdest, item of sound art/documentation that we've EVER had here at aQuarius. Mesmerizing, fascinating, unique, massive, scary, but sometimes even soothing. 100 percent recommended to the adventurous listener ('cause it's not for everyone!). And once you have it you'll understand why it had to be so many cds - being overwhelming is part of the obsessive allure of this Project. And it's not just us, The Conet Project has popped up in lots of unlikely places, most notably it was sampled on Wilco's breakthrough Yankee Hotel Foxtrot album, the title of which in fact comes from The Conet Project itself. Wilco were also famously sued by Irdial, the label who released it, and they lost! Some sounds from the Conet Project also popped up in that Tom Cruise movie Vanilla Sky, and over the years, we've heard it in various films and on various records, it shouldn't be surprising that so many weird music obsessives love The Conet Project.
Really, as we said, if there's one recording that seems to be most identified with aQuarius recOrds, or that at least we mention most often when trying to explain to people what it is that we're all about here, it's most definitely The Conet Project, and yeah, over the years there have been plenty of others, including Sounds of North American Frogs, Os Mutantes, Burzum's "Filosofem", Comus' "First Utterance", Boris, Circle, Philip Jeck, Village of Savoonga, and loads more since, many other records near and dear to our hearts (for instance, hearing the first Neutral Milk Hotel album always makes us nostalgic for the old 24th street store). But for some reason it's The Conet Project that really seems to sum it all up. It's all the things we really love: completely ridiculous (4, no, now 5 cds!), completely fucked (secret government spy transmissions), droning, weird. It's just so interesting and evocative on so many levels, both musical and totally non-musical, as a listening experience and also as a geopolitical cold war and beyond artifact. Definitely an all time perpetual aQ fave: Allan's got the whole thing on his iPod, so does Andee, he also owns multiple copies of the set, many of which found their way into his old band A Minor Forest's live performances, Jim has steadfastly maintained that this is the greatest record of all time, and who are we to argue? If it's not obvious, we all are a little bit obsessed.
And what this is all leading up to is that YES, finally after literally YEARS of being out of print and unavailable, The Conet Project, has been reissued AGAIN, but this time, with a WHOLE EXTRA DISC, with its own jewel case and booklet!! That's right, the new Conet Project is FIVE discs, not four, and if you're big Conet nerds like most of us, you might just have to buy a second (or even third!) copy. The new disc is not just another numbers station disc though, instead it's a collection of "noise stations", which essentially sound just like the numbers stations MINUS the numbers. So it's a series of gorgeous buzzes and strange hissing fields of blurred melody, lots of crunch and crackle, buried rhythms, whistling tones, strange textures, in fact, much of it is downright musical, so much so that we were musing, hmm, what if this new disc is in fact a hoax, a series of number/noise station like soundscapes created by some electronic musicians like Hrvatski? Naw... But there was in fact talk of a Conet remix project for years now, so it's not that far fetched, and in a way, if it WAS a hoax, it would be even cooler. But as far as we can tell, and according to our resident numbers stations / shortwave expert Jim, these are in fact that kind of weird alien sounds you can hear, tuned in to these mysterious stations. As much as we love the other four discs of The Conet Project, this new one is pretty exciting, and we have to say, definitely makes a case for buying it AGAIN! But for all the rest of you who have yet to discover the bizarre sonic mysteries of the Conet Project, there is no higher recommendation we can give, an all time unanimous aQ fave, our best selling record EVER. Sonically, and conceptually mind blowing. We never made it Record Of The Week before for some reason, but in our hearts, it has always been, and always will be, a perpetual aQ Record Of The Week!!! FOREVER.
BTW, this counts as a "box set" for shipping, it won't fit in the USPS flat rate box we use, so it'll have to go media mail or UPS if you're mailordering it domestically.
- MPEG stream: Swedish Rhapsody
- MPEG stream: 5 Dashes
- MPEG stream: Iran/Iraq Jamming Efficacy Testing
- MPEG stream: Magnetic Fields
- MPEG stream: Tyrolean Music Station
- MPEG stream: The Buzzer
- MPEG stream: "Data Bursts, 5.201kHz (USB And AM)
- MPEG stream: "Exotic Cipher, 6.215kHz/AM October 5th, 2008 19:27 GMT
- MPEG stream: "Descending Jammer, 7.969kHz/USB
- MPEG stream: "Drone, 17.964kHz
- MPEG stream: "Oscillating, 5.178kHz, March 12th, 1997
- MPEG stream: "348|10|13|36|19|21, 11.573kHz, 19:17 GMT
"A fucked up mix of Trouble and Watchtower" is how Arch Enemy/Spiritual Beggars guitarist Michael Amott characterizes North Carolina's Confessor, who were Earache labelmates with Amott back in his days in Carcass in the early '90s. That is indeed a very accurate and -- if you know who Trouble and Watchtower both are -- useful description of cult metal act Confessor's sound. Definitely one of the more idiosyncratic pioneers of absurdly technical metal. Not death, not doom, not grind, not thrash... but all of the above, somehow. Confessor's main ingredients are uber-insane drumming (Stephen Shelton is a god), complex song structures being navigated by two guitars and bass, and high-pitched love 'em or hate 'em vocals that seem to follow their own wailing logic, as if the singer isn't even listening to the same music as the rest of the band. Yet it works. Though perhaps not to everyone's taste. Well, after making one amazing album, 1991's Condemned, and an ep that included a Trouble cover, Confessor disappeared into even deeper obscurity, seemingly gone but not forgotten by hardcore fans of tech-metal madness (I recall our pal Josh Smith, formerly of The Fucking Champs, telling me that the Champs used to have a rule of ONLY listening to Confessor when on their way to play a show). Recently, Shelton re-surfaced in the band Loincloth, but even cooler than that, now Confessor themselves are back! Yes! This ep, with two new 2004-recorded songs (definitely in their old style of proggy doom mastery, with the vocals now somewhat deeper and grungier), is but a teaser for their upcoming comeback full-length entitled Unravelled due in September! This limited-edition ep itself we'd pretty much have to recommend to pre-existing Confessor fans of the dedicated variety since aside from the two new songs ("Sour Times" and, fittingly, "Hibernation") it includes a 1990 demo version of the title track to Condemned, a radio edit of "Sour Times" (why?) and such for-fans-only "enhanced cd" extras as a screen saver and archive of band photos. However, if you're a fan on the fence about spending $13 for basically two songs, be aware that this also includes five minutes or so of Quicktime video footage of them live 1996, which proves that the singer can hit those high notes even as he's jumping around on stage. Wicked!
So, if you're a fan of this cult metal band (most of whom could be also described as rabid), then the news that a cd has been released containing rare early demo versions of the songs from Confessor's 1991 Earache debut Condemned, demo tracks that actually sound heavier than the recordings that ended up on the album, and is accompanied by a bonus dvd disc of live footage, is all we really need to tell you, to get you to hit the "add to cart" button with excessive force. But maybe even folks who aren't (yet) Confessor fanatics should check this out. 'Cause we know a lot of you like technical / progressive / math metal, and also a lot of you like traditional epic Sabbath-styled DOOM, and for that matter a lot of you like plain ol' weirdness, and that's what Confessor's unique sound was all about, and they were unique, at the Venn diagram intersection of prog metal and doom metal, characterized by riffs inspired by Sabbath and, especially, Trouble, chaotically crazy, complex stop-start song structures and time changes out of the mathrock playbook, the INSANE drumming skillz of sticksman Steve Shelton (now in Loincloth), and high pitched vocals wailing disconsolately o'er it all, which might be the weirdest component of the whole Confessor calculation.
If that sounds good, we'd of course recommend getting the Condemned album itself, it's a classic - BUT it's out of print, and also the band thinks the guitar tone is better on these demos anyway.
There's eleven songs on the cd, including all the tracks from band's three demo cassettes circa 1988-1990, plus two cuts from comps and two live tracks from the era. The cd is also enhanced with live video of the band from a show '92. Then there's the limited dvd disc, which includes tons more archival live footage of the band over the years, including video from an outdoor performance at a waterpark that the guys from The Fucking Champs always loved to talk about. Yeah, Confessor, perfect for a sunny day of fun at the waterpark, people must have been into that.
The cd booklet boasts liner notes by Jeff Wagner, who wrote THE book on prog-metal (Mean Deviation: Four Decades Of Progressive Heavy Metal, published by Bazillion Points), plus lots of old photos, gig flyers and demo tape graphics.
So it's definitely a deluxe deal, for Confessor's rabid fans and maybe some new ones too.
Earlier this year, North Carolina tech/doom metal cult act Confessor emerged from "retirement" with an ep called Sour Times, the teaser to this here full-length -- the band's second ever album and first since 1991! We were pretty excited that Confessor was back, so we gave that ep a big write-up. Here's a bit of a recap of what we wrote for those that missed it:
"A fucked up mix of Trouble and Watchtower" is how Arch Enemy/Spiritual Beggars guitarist Michael Amott characterizes Confessor, who were Earache labelmates with Amott back in his days in Carcass in the early '90s. That is indeed a very accurate and -- if you know who Trouble and Watchtower both are -- useful description of cult metal act Confessor's sound. Definitely one of the more idiosyncratic pioneers of absurdly technical metal. Not death, not doom, not grind, not thrash... but all of the above, somehow. Confessor's main ingredients are uber-insane drumming (Stephen Shelton is a god), complex song structures being navigated by two guitars and bass, and high-pitched love 'em or hate 'em vocals that seem to follow their own wailing logic, as if the singer isn't even listening to the same music as the rest of the band. Yet it works. Though perhaps not to everyone's taste. Well, after making one amazing album, 1991's Condemned, and an ep that included a Trouble cover, Confessor disappeared into even deeper obscurity, seemingly gone but not forgotten by hardcore fans of tech-metal madness (I recall our pal Josh Smith, formerly of The Fucking Champs, telling me that the Champs used to have a rule of ONLY listening to Confessor when on their way to play a show). Recently, Shelton re-surfaced in the band Loincloth, but even cooler than that, now Confessor themselves are back! Yes!"
We went on to say that the new Confessor material as heard on the ep was definitely in their old style of proggy doom mastery, with the vocals now somewhat deeper and grungier. Unraveled pretty much follows suit, with two of the ep's tracks appearing again. The lugubrious tempos, downer riffs and sorrowful vocal wailings make this sound something like a mix of Solitude Aeturnus and Alice In Chains, but way more technical (with lots of "parts" and shifting rhythms). And the drumming is as godly as ever. The way this flows, we'd say maybe this will be a little bit easier on most folks' ears than some of their old stuff, and yet it's still unmistakably Confessor and definitely worthy of their cult status.
Chuck "Mistachuck" D and sometime Public Enemy cohort the formery-controversial Professor Griff team up with one Kyle Ice Jason to try and cash in on the whole rock/rap thing that's currently making cash registers hum at record stores everywhere (but here), stuff like Kid Rock and Limp Bizkit. Now, if anyone should be making a buck off the trend, Chuck D is deserving, since he pioneered it with PE's crossover touring and collaborations back in the day (Slayer on "She Watch Channel Zero", bringing the noise with Anthrax, etc.) BUT, that really doesn't matter if this record isn't that good, as people had told us. Now that we've had a chance to listen to it, well, it's certainly not the '70s Funkadelic styled funk-rock thing that we were told Chuck promised...nope, it's definitely more on the early '90s generic funkmetal tip. Er, so, if you still like Urban Dance Squad and Living Colour's harder moments, well, this isn't as good as that, but you might want to check it out. Otherwise, stay away. Chuck's stentorian voice still rules though -- too bad it's not being put to better use.
Not a new release, but we managed to get a few in stock for the moment, so we thought we'd list this. We got turned on to the Confusional Quartet (great name!) a while back because of a review our friend Tim Ellison wrote in his great 'zine Modern Rock
Whoa!!!! There is really no other way to begin a review of this mind blowing collection of carnival music from Eastern Cuba. The World Audio Foundation, an offshoot of the always awesome Soul Jazz label, seems to be on a tear lately as we are still listening to the Anchiskhati Choir (the only other release on the label so far, currently being repressed or something) all the time, although we have to say Conga De Los Hoyos takes it all to another level.
Take any preconceived notions of what you think carnival music from Cuba might sound like because this blasts into some other sonic plane as the music here pulsates with the raging sounds of the Chinese trumpet (?), along with over 50 percussionists playing everything from hubcaps to car brake drums to congas and more. This amazing and gorgeous cacophony has us thinking of some charged melding of the intense zorna sounds of Zadik Zecharia with the relentless momentum of Konono No.1, or maybe Pharoah Sanders and the Master Musicians of Joujuka taking to the streets to create the kind of wild street party we wish was happenin' on OUR street.
The fact that all these sounds come from the Los Hoyos neighborhood of Santiago, in a tradition that's been going strong since 1902 only makes this more mind boggling, and is another reminder that in almost every nook, corner and neighborhood of the world, people have found a way to use music to communicate in a way that's truly universal and in this case totally transcendent!
New, noirish disc with guest vocalist Mark Eitzel!
Consisting of falsetto vocalists Cedric Myton and Roydel Johnson together with the Upsetters, the Congos released this amazing record in 1977, recorded at Lee Perry's Black Art studio. One of the best ever. Vinyl version is the deluxe edition with 2nd lp, "The Best Of The Rest", 11 Congos tracks from '79-'99, included.
Consisting of falsetto vocalists Cedric Myton and Roydel Johnson together with the Upsetters, the Congos released this amazing record in 1977, recorded at Lee Perry's Black Art studio. One of the best ever. Vinyl version is the deluxe edition with 2nd lp, "The Best Of The Rest", 11 Congos tracks from '79-'99, included.
Pure 12" perfection! Originally released back in 2003 we're super happy this has been finally repressed! Carl Craig had just the right touch on these edits of tracks from the amazing Congos album Heart Of The Congos. This is exactly what you want in a 12", jams to be played over and over and over, Craig piecing together the already potent elements from those amazing originals into a more minimal yet totally sizzling new sound. If you don't have that Congos record yet, this could be the perfect gateway to an amazing album and if you already love that record like we do, this manages to be respectful to the originals, while taking them in totally new directions. Carl Craig proves once again that when it comes to edits and remixes, no one does it better!
Cosmic psych-folk from the mountainous coastal regions of Chile. We originally got this in last year but only now have finally gotten enough to list. In the same vein as the acid acoustic vibes of Satwa and the solo outings of Satwa member Lulu Cortes from Brazil, Congregacion's sole LP from 1972 was the brainchild of Antonio Smith, a mystical figure whose progressive songwriting and hopeful lyrics earned the contempt of the Chilean military dictatorship and forced him to flee the country. Swathed in the natural sounds of birds and wind with dreamy acoustic textures, flutes, strings and gorgeous romantic harmonies, we can just imagine the band levitating on mountaintops as they commune with the universe. Viene is a masterpiece of Latin psych-folk. Recommended!
This all time aQ South American psych folk fave, available again, now on vinyl!!
A record we've listened to on so many roadtrips through windy terrain, sun soaked mountains, and pastoral horizons. The sole lp by this Chilean group, but what an absolute magical album they created. Much like his Tropicalia counterparts in Brazil like Caetano Veloso, and Gilberto Gil, the music and lyrics of Antonio Smith, the mastermind of Congregacion, made him a big enemy of the military dictatorship of his country. Ultimately he was forced to flee from Chile. Much like Veloso and Gil, he never let that oppressive regime take away his vision of beauty.
This record is swathed in the natural sounds of birds and wind, with dreamy acoustic textures, flutes, guitars, strings and such gorgeous romantic harmonies. The sounds on Viene ease out with such a soft glow. We can just imagine the band levitating on mountaintops as they commune with the universe. It's a record we're sure many modern day dreamy music makers like Devendra Banhart, Beach House, Samara Lubelski, and Jose Gonzalez either already cite as a major influence or should listen to asap. Simply stunning!
If we had to pick a favorite, out of all the post rock / math rock / post metal hordes, a sound we do admittedly dig a whole lot, and one we can't seem to get enough of, Maine's mighty Conifer would be right there at the top. Which is saying something, as up until this brand new full length, we'd only heard from them twice, their debut, and a split with Ocean. As compared to some of the other bands who have released 2, 3, 4 maybe more records in the same amount of time. The first Conifer disc was fresh when it came out, taking classic math rock and beefing it up with huge swells of Neurosis crush, but the thing with Conifer is that they never completely buried that post rock vibe, even at their most metallic, when they were slipping into full on doom territory, they hung on to those loping rhythms, those fractured melodies, and figured out a way to infuse those elements into the roiling heaviness. On the debut we were hearing Slint and Bastro and Seam as much and as often as Isis or Neurosis, probably even more so.
In that way, the sound of Conifer hasn't changed all that much, their sound is still rooted heavily in mathrock, the metal elements more adorning the postrock instead of the other way around. In fact more than ever, they sound like a nineties mathrock band supercharged and transported to the oughts. Even at their heaviest, they don't get HEAVY, as in metal heavy, they get louder, and more dynamic, more intense, the sound gets fuller and more expansive. And this time around the band we can't help but hear all over this record is Polvo. The guitar parts are all woozy and warbly and angular and sort of seasick, the opening track is the perfect example, it almost sounds like some metal band covering the opening track from Polvo's Cor Crane Secret, with its multiple parts, its liquid arrangements, the clean guitars, layered and indeed woozy, the drum part and the arrangements, loping and mathy and not a little bit groovy. We hate to go on and on about mathrock and Polvo, cuz it could all be a big ol' coincidence, but we doubt it. Every song on Crown Fire is mathy and melodic, sometimes locking into repeating figures for just a tad longer than would be comfortable for most bands, opening up and drifting through wide open spaces, all glimmering harmonics and shuffling rhythms, backwards guitars floating in a sea of muted soft drones, tripped out almost Pink Floyd action here and there, complete with space-y synths and fluttery flutes. "Into The Gauntlet" almost sounds like a heavier Codeine, a bit doomy, with a strange lurching arrangement beneath glistening sparkling chimes, and flurries of shuffling snare drum and floor tom. Hard to say what it is exactly,
as it should be with music, but regardless, this is definitely a new high for a genre that becomes more and more overpopulated every day. Whenever we find ourselves listening to one of these new post rock / metal hybrids, as much as we love metal, and we do, we find ourselves longing way more for the intricacies and arrangements and dynamics of the post rock side of the equation, it's too easy to just turn it up and let downtuned guitars chug, and Conifer prove that you can make a super heavy, super catchy, epic record, without even bothering with faux metal chug, which is something else for sure.
If that weren't enough, the record closes with the 13 minute title track, featuring Eugene from Oxbow on guest vocals (normally Conifer are instrumental). The result is pretty excellent, and finds the band, doing their best Oxbow, a sort of abstract bluesy groove, that over the course of the song gets a little bit mathier and more complex, while Eugene sing-talks, howls, mewls, wails, growls, shrieks, moans, The track is super spare until about halfway through where it dials up the metal, offering up being churning chords and pounding drummage to support Eugene's increasingly unhinged and manic vocals, the song building to a furious climax, before drifting out in a haze of whispered mutterings and fractured electronics. It's a pretty awesome track for sure, but for us, it somehow works better when taken almost as a separate record. The first 6 tracks are so perfect together, a brilliant 38 minute post-math-metallic-rock suite, which just so happens to come with an equally brilliant bonus single song, 13 minute ep, featuring Conifer backing up Oxbow's Eugene Robinson.
However you slice it, WAY recommended!
Bands have been naming themselves after all manner of objects and creatures since the beginning of rock and roll. Heavy bands tending toward the mighty, the fierce or at least the very large. All manner of monsters and demons, various tigers and lions and even some sea creatures have been represented. But the largest, most imposing objects in nature have been sadly neglected as a source for inspiration and band-naming. TREES. So we have Conifer to right that wrong. And in doing so, judging from this ferocious slab of indie rock / metal sludge hypno-pummel, you'd certainly be forgiven for thinking this particular tree could take on any of the rock demons and metallic beasties that came before.
Conifer sleepily trawl through the dark recesses of post rock, taking the languorous slow burning churn of bands like Slint or Seam Or Bastro, all dark and brooding, simple and insistent, and stretching the riffs and melodies into expansive stretches of moody melancholy, swathed in Pink Floydian swoosh and whirl, before dropping the bomb. Massive downtuned guitars explode, splitting post rock atoms into clumps of corrosive riffage, peppered with raspy howls and screeching banshee melodies, sometimes gaining momentum and becoming unstoppable exercises in epic doomy drone-metal ala Neurosis or Isis, sometimes becoming glacial explorations into slow motion doom a la Khanate, and other times employing distorted ghostly computer vocals and buzzing psychedelia into Butthole Surfers-like sonic freakouts. A lot of this does definitely sound like Isis, Neurosis, Pelican or Buried At Sea, which is obviously a good thing, but more often it sounds like a doom-sludge A Minor Forest or a post rock Boris or a very metal Slint. Which is an even better thing!
It's pretty hard to go wrong with two heavy hitters like Conifer and Ocean, and predictably, this split lp is about as right as it gets. It's been ages since we heard from Conifer, one of our favorites of the new breed of post rock / metal hybrids, due in no small part to the fact that they tend toward the mathy / post rock side of that sound. And if anything, on this latest track (yep, one sidelong epic) they seem to have jettisoned any sort of metal completely. Not to say it's not heavy, it most certainly is, it's just not really sludgy, or that metallic, and it suits them. Right out of the gate, they lock into a super intense, relentless propulsive krautrock groove, hypnotic, mathy, complex, unfurling a super mesmerizing jam. But things shift dramatically when the vocals kick in, the band lurch into serious Harvey Milk territory, which is a very good thing, a strange crooned vocal line over a strange convoluted rhythm. Catchy, melodic, and weirdly poppy.
But the last 10 minutes or so totally seal the deal (if it wasn't already), a super stripped down Southern style (?) kraut jam, looped riff, simple propulsive drumming, and some killer guitar harmonies that go from epic and soaring to weird and warbly, and it's all we can do to not use one of our three wishes to get that last part to go on until the end of time...
The flipside features Maine's Ocean, not to be confused with THE Ocean, these guys aren't so much a part of that post rock metal thing as they are glacial doom merchants, and here they offer up a sidelong slab of multiple o'd dooooom. Things start out as a super pretty slowcore crawl, before a black hole wall of guitars drop and it's still a slowcore crawl, just a massive crushing funeral dirge of a slowcore crawl! Plodding and epic, but still haunting and weirdly lovely, sounding a lot like a metallized Bohren & Der Club Of Gore, depressive and mournful, mysterious and haunting... The vocals are a hellish howl, the guitars grinding and buzzing, a lot of this actually sounds like some unearthed slab of nineties funeral doom, albeit with that Bohren-y prettiness mixed in.
Packaged in super swank Important Records style, this time a black and white printed sleeve inside a grey and orange silk screened vinyl outer jacket, giving it a cool sort of 3-D affect. And as you might have assumed, SUPER LIMITED, only 1000 copies...
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
One of the many incarnations of groups formed by the legendary Miguel Matamoros - who's lifetime output consists of almost 200 songs. The pairing here of Miguel's songwriting with the beautiful singing of Beny More is really a great one and possibly also a historic moment as well; as Miguel put it: "In 1945 we were contracted for Mexico and I took [Beny] along with me. He came really to be just my substitute in the vocal parts of the conjunto, but such was his ability that it cried out to be left alone so that he could perform on his own. That is to say, the conditions and situations were such that they provided him with the necessary impetus that transformed him into a star." The first eight tracks found here on this cd were recorded in Mexico City in 1945 during that engagement. The others tracks were recorded between 1946 and 1947. Besides Beny More, Conjunto Matamoros is backed up here by Ciro Rodriguez (2nd voice, maracas, claves), Rafael Cuelo (guitar, choir), Ramon Dorca (piano), Jose Macias & Jose Quintero (trumpets), Cristobal Mendive (bass), Agustin Gutierrez (bongos) and, of course, Miguel Matamoros (1st voice - tracks 9 to 17 - and guitar.)
How does Bobby Conn make his retro glam rock stylings so damn perky? On Homeland, he's joined by The Glass Gypsies (who're actually his usual cohorts Monika BouBou, John McEntire as well as Nick Macri, Sledd Colby Starck and the wonderfully named Pearly Sweets), and they more than keep pace with Conn's often erratic effervescent musical adventures. Still swaggerin' in the spirit of T-Rex or Sweet, and the funk 'n' soul of Ohio Players or Kool & The Gang, but with the inclusion of song lyrics in the liner notes this time around Conn's socio-political side is brought more into view. Perhaps his past writings were just as much so, but buried under the swirling glitz of typical Conn productions who could tell?! Ample doses of falsetto, fountains of electric violins (oh so E.L.O.!), Hammond and farfisa organs. Groovy!
Mr. Bobby Conn straps his glam pants on for another tripped-outta-yer-mind rock'n'roll extravaganza! King For A Day starts out on a rather somber samba-tinged tone, but it doesn't take long for Conn and co. to rev their engines and launch his rock opera into full gear. We personally prefer the songs that shoot rockets of glitter and flaming guitar noodles to the ones on which Conn slows things down to love-you-down ballad croonery (kinda reminds us somewhat unpleasantly of Tony Hadley of Spandau Ballet). Highlights include the adventure rock of "Sinking Ship" and the bright and buoyant Monkee-ish pop moment "Love Let Me Down". Woo hoo!
Bobby Conn took a year and a half to complete this third record and highly anticipated follow-up to 1998's amazing "Rise Up!". Unfortunately, Conn has decided to drop the apocalyptic / satanic glam rock persona which made his first two records so exciting
Four remixes and the original version from Mr. Conn's "The Golden Age". Detroit electro sensations Adult., Magas (that's Marlon Magas -- ex Couch / Lake Of Dracula, current booty bass electro technician and co-owner of Chicago's Weekend Records and Soap),
We can almost hear Bobby Conn shoutin' "Come on down!!!!" Much like the Price Is Right, Conn and his backing band The Glass Gypsies were recorded in front of a live studio audience for this release... and it certainly is lively! A glammy, glittery, groovy good time, but we wouldn't expect anything less from The Conn now, would we? Actually the over-lit photos on the cover could easily be mistaken for stills from the 1980 musical movie The Apple, and the music bears more than a striking resemblance too. An abundance of noodly guitar solos, falsetto, backing singers and it looks like there were costume changes too. Think a low budget, neighbourhood version of Queen, Electric Light Orchestra, P-Funk and the talent show scene in The Beaver Trilogy (the one with Crispin Glover, not Sean Penn). Super silly fun!
Note: this cd is enhanced with two trippy video clips of the show, but we have to lament, "why wasn't this a dvd!?!"
New album from somber bandleader and avant jazz pianist Graham Connah, together with the talents of Trevor Dunn, Elliot Humberto Kavee, Ben Goldberg, vocalist Jewlia Eisenberg, and others.
