Can't really tell you much about Etat Brut, other than the limited information provided by Sub Rosa. EB were an obscure industrial duo from Belgium operating between 1978 and 1983, with connections to the transgressive collective Club Moral and the Cabs-inspired Pseudo Code. Supposedly, both of the individuals in Etat Brut were named Phillipe and went on to become science teachers after leaving all of this junk, noise, and squalid rhythm behind. But that's all the information we could dig up, which is a bit disappointing, as we'd love to know more about these guys, we imagine Club Moral must have published something about the group in their Force Mental zine. Anyway, for those keen on the more brutal / guttural / abject side of industrial culture (e.g. TG's Second Annual Report, Factrix' Sheintot, or SPK's Leichenshrei), this is a very compelling document of primitive sound-demolition with an equally primitive approach to deconstructing music into its rawest elements - noise, rhythm, screams, more noise, and plenty of aggro / provocateur antics. The post-punk monochord basslines and drum machine anti-groove of "Homme Nus" is a compellingly bleak track of Frankensteinian proportions, where "Crash" conveys a dehumanized atmosphere through grim blorping electronics, musique concrete techniques, and cut-up dialogue that could very well allude to JG Ballard if only we understood French. Crumbling tape machinations, rhythms looped from shortwave radio beacons, fucked-up noise, and guttural vocalizations fill in the blanks, very prescient of what Atelecine is attempting to recreate nowadays and holding up very well against the better known projects we listed earlier.
The cd comes with two bonus tracks not found on the vinyl, btw.
Eternal is the band that eventually became Electric Wizard. In 1991, they were a crusty bunch of metalheads spitting out a blurry blast of Earache style industrial sludge, but a couple years later, with a new name, a new love of mind altering chemicals, and the discovery of the all important GROOVE, Eternal was born, and the sound on this never before released EP is only a hop skip and a drunken stumble from the sound of Electric Wizard. The doom and sludge is tempered here with a huge heaping pile of Hawkwindish swirling psychedelia and that oft purloined Sabbathy groove that pretty much defined Electric Wizard and the stoner rock movement that followed. Four tracks (one's a Sabbath cover!) including a sidelong track that would later become an Electric Wizard track.
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!
Fresh from the "Wizard's Convention" show/dvd release wherein they appeared alongside Boris, Green Machine and Church Of Misery, now Japanese stoner metal throwbacks Eternal Elysium have a new album out (import only) on the label that did that DVD, also home to those other bands. Eternal Elysium certainly fits right into such company, maybe coming closest to Boris and CoM at their most seventies n' psychedelic. Song titles like "Reefer Happiness" and "Twilight High" should give you some idea of their focus, stoner stuff somewhere between Sabbath and Soundgarden. They're fairly eclectic though, so you never know totally what to expect...acoustic interludes, spacey jams, riffy rockers, and more, from the tripped-out to the totally heavy. The album ends with the sprawling sixteen-minute-plus monster "Green Song", which some of you have already heard since it was used on that Jamnation disc we listed not long ago!
Here's the second Meteor City full-length from these Japanese stoner rockers. HEAVY, '70s influenced psychedelic metal drawing on Sabbath (of course), as well as Japanese bands of that era like Flower Travellin' Band. But Eternal Elysium aren't that simple to
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Easily a shoo-in for heavy metal/stoner rock album of the month! The long-awaited domestic debut by this cult Japanese band of longhaired 70's Black Sabbath freaks. Although they actually sound less like the Sabs than fellow Sabs-worshippers Trouble. Some other influences that come through the pot haze include the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal (this disc includes their cover of "Innocent Exile" from Meteor City's Iron Maiden tribute), '70s Japanese heavy psych bands like Blues Creation and Flower Travellin' Band, Thin Lizzy, Saint Vitus, Kyuss, and other heavies. Meaning, in addition to sheer psychedelic doom riffage (a la another Japanese band, Church of Misery) they really can write *songs* in the classic sense--one listen to, arguably, the album's highlight, "Easy Goin'" and you'll know. We didn't think they made 'em like that anymore. And stay tuned for the 'bonus track', an unlisted 15 minutes of improv hippie folk drone in the tradition of Japan's Taj Mahal Travellers. Very recommended indeed!!
When we ordered this Japanese import, we were like, a split release between Japanese psychedelic stoner/doom rockers Eternal Elysium and San Francisco's own metalcore two-piece Black Cobra? Gotta get that! When it showed up, we were surprised to discover that the entire Black Cobra half had exactly the same tracks as those found on their recent full-length Feather And Stone, which we've already reviewed and raved about. Whoops. So... some of you already have that. However, if you want to get it again, you'll also get 23 minutes of Eternal Elysium material that only appears here. More likely, this is a good call for those who haven't yet picked up the Black Cobra album and also like (or think they might like) EE. Or simply for EE fans who don't mind getting the Black Cobra stuff as well (why would you?) as a bonus. Even at the import price, it's still 2 for the price of 2 (or 1.5 more like it) on one handy disc, not too shabby of a deal, really. So, let's say somethin' about the music for those ignorant of EE and/or BC:
Eternal Elysium always has us a little confused. Strange band. Sometimes they're straight up Sabbath-meets-grunge complete with vocals hinting at Alice In Chains or Soundgarden... and then there's the NWOBHM influences... and the groovy retro-sixties stuff... that's all here, plus of course random weirdness like the brief track "Golden Seaweed", with sped-up chipmunk voices. They try hard to make a stoner drug thing you wouldn't understand, but certainly something that fans of Boris, Solar Anus, and Church Of Misery should check into, to rock out to.
As to the BC half, here's what we said about Feathers And Stone before: Two man heavy riff-machine Black Cobra return with another pummeling release... Picking up right where Bestial left off, Feather And Stone shreds from the start. Brutally punishing circular riffs, heavy as all hell doomy moments, throat ripping screams, and incredibly hard hitting and precise drums. The fact that this massive sound comes from two fellas is pretty damn amazing. The album has all kinds of peaks and valleys. Amidst the constant time signature shifting, and brain-burning riff heavitude, there are a couple of beautifully dark intros and outros thrown in, giving the album a very balanced feeling. But it's mostly just crushingly heavy and ripping. If you can imagine a heavier, much more misanthropic Karp, that's kind of what they remind us of. Feather And Stone is a must for anybody needing a little taste of thrashing triumphant, sometimes doomy and dark, sometimes fast and techy, but always heavy and punk as fuck ROCK music... For fans of Cavity, Karp, Floor, Torche, and things that kill shit! (Note though that unlike the domestic edition of the BC album, there's no cd-rom live footage included.)
We may have mentioned it before, but it seems like Thrill Jockey is quickly establishing itself as an indie powerhouse. Not that they weren't already, but recently, they've been taking on band after amazing band, loads of aQ faves (heck, this week's Record Of The Week from Golden Void is also on TJ!), and broadening their scope to include, well, anything really, from the twisted experimental plunderphonic electronica of Matmos, to the brooding mesmer of Barn Owl, not to mention all the various strains of modern psychedelia, including a particularly virulent version practiced by long time aQ faves Eternal Tapestry, who in the past have been know to create records from hours of tapes, multiple jams melted down into one single slab of head heaviness, but apparently, A World Out Of Time finds the band going old school, and recording essentially live, single takes, the band locking into endless grooves, and blissed out kosmische freakouts. And all of the usual E-Tap radness is present, but there are definitely some surprises, like the 12+ minute opener, which is of course rife with thick whirls of drone and bleary shimmer, but is also laced with sax, and is driven primarily by some groovy classic rock guitar, it's like the Grateful Dead or the Allmann Brothers, but WAY more tripped out, imagine some obscure psych rock festival in the late sixties, early seventies, everyone, wasted and weary, and this is the band that goes on last, playing for HOURS, continuing to rock out as the sun begins to rise. It has that sort of wasted, endless psych vibe, and it definitely suits em, and of course it gets even more tripped out and drowsily squiggly near the end, although the end here feels pretty arbitrary, as if the track could have played on forever.
And weirdly, that retro vibe continues over the rest of the record, the sound slipping from dizzying mini-ragas, laced with bloopy electronics and loads of sitar like buzz, to full on fuzz rock proto metal, heart of the sun space rock, to loping tribal minimalism that sounds like No Neck Blues Band or Avarus, to straight up druggy psychedelic folk, replete with Donovan like vox, low end horn blurt, and swirling backwards fuzz guitar, and check out the purloined opening riff on "Apocalypse Troll"! There are some moments, where the band go for it, and deliver some blistering blown out heavy psych, and for the most part, the sound manages to not be that far removed from the Eternal Tapestry we know and love, but simply recasts it, the various influences brazenly displayed, old school Fillmore psychedelic classic rock transformed into modern space psych bliss!
While they last, the record is accompanied by a super limited cd-r, called Prometheus Rising, a killer collection of previously unheard/unreleased material handpicked by the band, ranging from droned out hypno-kraut grooves to full on wild psychedelic squall blowouts to hazy loping, brooding FX drenched drifts, to super spare kosmische ambience, even a couple blast of surprisingly rocking melodic fuzz-rock freakouts! We're the only store in the States to have this bonus cd-r, but they won't last long.
Rad! Eternal Tapestry, Portland's badass psych super-group, take a step back in time and offer up this heavy duty reissue of a 2007 classic, Altar of Grass. And wow, what a stony trip it is! On this cd-r we find the band jamming with their old bass player, Bob Jones, and without their newly added sax player, but needless to say, the boys still knew how to kick out a lysergic dose of head-trippy, fuzzed out amplifier destruction. Ooooozing walls of blasting fuzz guitar, head-nodding grooves covered in tar and filth, not too be missed by any fan of the group's whirlwind brand of in-the-red punk psych. These pacific North Westerners don't fool around, the riffs are heavy with a dash of Hawkwind flavor, the drums are relentless and thrashing, and its all woven together into a hypnotic wash that sounds more like three proto-metal bands jamming in the same room, very sweet. A nice document of the early E-Tap sound, a bit more free and loose then the newer stuff, but much more raw and spaced-the-heck out!�Really killer stuff, not sure how limited these are, but they ARE limited, and chances are we won't get more, so be quick!�On the same Greek label that brought us the killer black metal of Bohemian Grove also reviewed this list, by the way!
Latest from these Portland psych rockers, their first for new label Thrill jockey, which is where they now call home, alongside their pals, SF dronerockers Barn Owl.
For Beyond The 4th Door, these guys haven't really changed their MO all that much, but then as they say, why fix what ain't broke? The opener is a sprawling smoldering psychedelic drift, all minimal stripped down drums, effected guitar, processed vox, deep low end buzz, and helicopter like thrum, the sound twangy and sun baked, almost like they're taking a page from label mates Barn Owl, the same sort of deserty drift, but ET augment their drift with strange effects, whirring synths, culminating in a thick buzzing denouement, before slipping right back into a slowly fading outro.
That track bleeds right into the next, another chunk of psychedelic smolder, this time the guitars more distorted, a sound that reminds us of Flower Travellin' Band actually, like those wailing vox could swoop in at any second. Instead, the song unfurls, a mesmerizing chunk of hypo psychedelia, which again blurs right into the next track, a hazy slow burner, all tangled psych guitars, and shuffling skeletal rhythms, and finally on this one, the band get heavy (not crazy heavy, but heaviER), there's some sax here too, but it almost sounds just like another guitar, the band unleashing loose softly chaotic squalls of dueling guitars/sax, the whole thing hazy and druggy and pretty excellent, the sort of modern shit that should moss definitely appeal to all the Japrock obsessives who worship at the alter of Les Rallizes.
The record finishes with two sprawling epics, "Reflections In A Mirage", a droney, twangy, stretch of minimal, spacious shuffle, vocals return, to chant, and moan ominously, while the guitars warble and buzz, all tangled an spidery, draped over swirls of shimmery drone, the song never explodes or climaxes, which only makes it cooler, the instruments gradually blurring together and finally coalescing into a closing stretch of layered drone. The comes "Time Winds Through A Glass, Clearly", topping out at 12 minutes, beginning like some strange sort of country jam, loping low slung bass, and twangy reverbed guitars, soon sizzling clouds of cymbal shimmer drift overhead, the saxophone returns and skronks off in the distance, the song drifts and lopes and meanders, slowly picking up steam, but staying mostly restrained, until the last few minutes, where the band do let loose again, the drums pounding, the guitars distorted, wild streaks of psychedelic leads everywhere, a serious sonic squall, but only briefly, before things quickly settle back down and the track unwinds in a soft psychedelic haze. Great stuff. And refreshing that they managed to avoid the ubiquitous soft/loud, slow build, explosive ending thing that seems to be the way most bands do psychedelic space rock, instead, each song was a expansive sprawling epics that were both hypnotic and heavy, mesmerizing and mysterious�
Latest (vinyl-only) blast of psychedelic heaviness from these Portland space rockers, and much like the last record, the awesome Beyond The Fourth Door, Dawn In 2 Dimensions finds the band stretching way out, unfurling hazy, druggy, psych-drone epics, with pounding caveman drums anchoring clouds of white hot guitar squall, and horns too, the band don't even bother with the slow build or an intro or anything, they just launch right into "Wholeodrome" and start jamming, and we're immediately struck by how much fans of bands like White Hills and Carlton Melton and the Heads and all those outfits, should be flipping out over these guys as well, it's some fantastically heady stuff, heart of the sun sort of lysergic heaviness, rife with chanted vocals, lush layered riffing, and those tangled guitar melodies, a laid back psychedelic shredding drifting atop the groups churning spaciness. The opener is the perfect introduction, and surprisingly short at 4:33 considering it could have easily stretched out and filled up the whole side, and we're guessing live it probably does get even more blown/stretched out.
And while the label touts this as the band trying to capture the energy of their "blistering live shows", there's still plenty of super laid back stoned out psych, in fact "Bread Of Dreams" spends most of its nearly seven minutes in a dirgey effects heavy haze, only exploding into some fierce heaviness near the end, only to transform into a bit of pastoral acoustic folk, wrapped in some weirdly tweaked (and heavily panned) birdsong. "Marrow Of The Wand" offers up something similar, a bit more krautrocky and propulsive maybe, but still super laid back, and almost Grateful Dead sounding (albeit a much more spaced out and druggy version), that again does devolve into a wild psych squall freakout right at the very end.
It's the B side that really seems to display the band at their rawest and heaviest, a sidelong 3 part epic, that spends a good chunk brooding ominously, slowly building, all spidery melodies and stripped down rhythmic shuffle, before slipping into some Stooges-y swagger, some buzz drenched heavy rock crunch, the middle portion being downright headbangable, before the final kraut-psych stretch, that finds the band locking into a woozy mesmeric groove, that again, could probably go on forever, pounding through a cloud of swirling psychguitar, before finally stumbling to a halt.
Heavy psych heads and psychedelic space rockers should really already be hip to these guys, but if for some reason that's not the case, get his now, and clear a space on your shelf next to Wooden Shjips, Moon Duo, White Hills, Carlton Melton, etc...
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
So when the Eternal Tapestry guys ripped through town last month, they dropped off a few cdrs, needless to say, they were gone in no time. We even had to keep bugging them to send more down to the shop because so many of you loyal psych heads couldn't get enough of ETAP's cosmic fury!! Well, we are pleased to present the latest full length lp from Portland's heaviest psych sludge trio, Palace of The Night Skies! The good people at Three Lobed bring us this tripped out, fuzzed out psychedelic masterpiece, golden shimmering riffs plodding on into infinity, wailing fuzz from the depths of a swirling acid trip, all anchored to Earth by Jed Bindeman's (Heavy Winged) in the pocket, solid as rock drumming. Prism Light Traveler, Side A, kicks things off with a krauty, stoned-out riff, repetitive and hypnotic, Nick Bindeman (JOMF, Tunnels) and Dewey Mahood sacrifice their guitars at the psychedelic altar of kraut riffage. Layers of wailing feedback, endless washes of blaring tones burn a hole right through the speakers, the gates of infinity are opened and all trippers are welcome inside. Side B, titled The Hidden Void, begins with the slowest riff we've heard these guys unleash. Soooo slooow and trudging, like someone falling asleep while playing, kinda reminds us of listening to a Les Rallizes Denudes lp at half speed. Other layers of wailing guitar and distant drones slowly creep into the mix as the slow paced, stonerific trudge plods on. We love how heeeeavy and loud the record sounds, so raw and fucked up, just they type of low-fi warmth we love with our psych. Palace of The Night Skies is essential, especially for fans of Bong, Wooden Shjips, Parson Sound, Loop or anything remotely psychedelic. Limited to 730 copies, each lp comes with a cd (cd also includes one bonus track!) and is housed in a beautifully prinited, cosmic cover. Don't be left in the dust on this heavy-kraut gem!!
It's unreal how much awesome, trippy music is coming out of Portland these days. Either there's something funky in the water up there, or Portlanders just know how to keep it real. Real fucked up and tripped out that is. Either way, we couldn't be more happy about all the amazing things happening in Portland lately. And Eternal Tapestry is no exception. These dudes just rolled through town on a short West Coast tour, and they made sure to drop off a nice stack of goodies. This is their brand spankin' new tape on the Digitalis Ltd. label and we're super into it. Krauty, spaced-out, bluesy improv that hits hard. For those of you who don't know, Eternal Tapestry features the famed Bindeman brothers, Jed (Heavy Winged!) on drums and Nick (Jackie-o! and Tunnels) sharing guitar duties with Dewey Mahood. In the same vein as Parson Sound or Can, these guys have really nailed the art of weaving improv in and out of catchy riffs, really sweet. Sadly, this one's already sold out on the label's end and we only got 10 copies! So act now before it's too late!
So when these guys came into the shop to drop off their newest tour cd-r, we expected to hear more of the usual E-Tap free bluesy psych jamming. And psych-heads be assured there is a fine amount of freak-out guitar and hypnotic, driving drums here, but the Bindemen brothers and their third, Dewey Mahood have reached an all-time best with this one. They seem to have taken a more gritty and punk influenced direction here, instead of bluesy, the riffs are gritty and damaged in a Black Flag meets Wooden Shjips kinda way. Still very cosmic and sprawling, this shit is waaay darker and waaay more heavy then any other E-Tap stuff we've heard to date. There's even some totally unexpected riffs that are borderline stoner doom! Yes! With apathetic, mumbled Dead C type vocals over turning riffage that bleeds with feedback and gnarled fuuuuuzzzzzzz, we're really diggin' this new direction these dudes are headin' in, totally recommended!
Another slab of spaced out kosmiche kraut riffage from these psychedelic warlords, their sound all Loop-ed guitars, propulsive in the pocket drumming, buried weary vox, all manner of lysergic effects, hazy distorted all over the place, locked into mesmerizingly repetitive grooves, sounds good huh? Anyone into Wooden Shjips, White Hills, Spacemen 3, if you haven't discovered these guys, you need to turn in your garage rock space drone trip out card RIGHT NOW.
But it's not too late, grab one one of these, dim the lights, fire up the hookah, rev up the magic carpet, and let this shit send you straight into the heart of the sun.
Unlike those other bands we mentioned, Eternal Tapestry is a bit more loose, on the verge of chaos, a drugged-out, raw as heck, punk kraut space rock, like locking Black Flag and Parson Sound in a basement full of wah and fuzz pedals and waiting for the destruction to begin. Their shit just keeps getting better and better. Invisible Landscapes picks up where their first Not Not Fun LP, Mystic Induction, left off, only this time the boys seem to have polished their sound. Don't get us wrong, E Tap still brings that raw, blown out tube amp destruction, but the trio seem more solid, more graceful about balancing their rawness with in the pocket rhythms and more clear cut song structures. The sound is a bit more unhinged and abstract, the songs slipping into some mathiness here and there, some free psych freakouts now and again, but always finding their way back to THE GROOVE.
It's Hawkwind worship of the highest order for sure, but filtered through a more modern drone-psych vibe. The A-side is absolute acid fried space jam bliss, any one into any of the above bands who lays their ears on this, will immediately have a new obsession. The flipside is much more soulful and laid back, the drumming super minimal, the guitars chiming and glistening, tons of wah wah (of course), killer hooks too, all over the place... Invisible Landscapes also touches on some new territory for the group, at times veering into a fast paced, hypnotic, machine-like plod, kind of like the Stooges covering a Suicide song, pretty damn sweet.�Nick Bindeman and Dewey Mahood send hazy vocals and blissed out guitar solos into the grey sky while Jed Bindeman pounds away on his kit like a lawless locomotive with his sights on the horizon. Heavy hitting, blistering psych-punk that will keep you head banging 'til the early morn, and then there's the closer, a total classic space pop ur-jam, dipped in fuzzy crunch and shoegaze shimmer. NICE!
Latest tripped out missive from these Northwestern psychedelic jammers, this latest their most epic yet, a sprawling double lp that finds the band expanding their already spacious sound into some sort of abstract drone-dub space jam. Most of the tracks clocking in at 10+ minutes (with three over 15!), the opener is a surprisingly brief bit of hazy, druggy minimalism, a serious dub vibe throughout, programmed rhythms, vocals washed out reverby but drifting further up in the mix than we remember from past ET outings (although on the last record we did compare them to both the Grateful Dead AND the Allman Brothers), but here, the opening jam quickly dissolves into a trippy swirl of abstract percussion and vocal drones, of wheezing organs and clouds of cymbal shimmer, an ultra abstract and extremely hypnotic avant raga / drone, that could easily have filled up the whole rest of the record. Instead the band settle into some darkly dreamlike hypno-rock mesmer, organ drenched motorik minimalism, the guitars eventually not so minimal, more restless and scrabbling above a field of layered tones and loping grooves. sometimes getting almost jazzy, hazy slow jams, that at times sound like some weird alien jazz-fusion, and at others, like pure kosmische bliss out (tracks like "Maidenhair Spleenwort" definitely drift into Spacemen 3 territory).
The second half of the record seems to shift gears dramatically, jettisoning much of the 'rock' elements, beginning with the glimmering harmonic guitar fields of "Lace Fern", a softly swirling cloudscape of Michael Rother like glittery, new age dreaminess, continuing on into the tangled trippiness of "Pale-Green Sedge", a roiling space-blues avant Appalachia of organ drones and slippery guitar melodies, which bleed directly into the 15+ minute closer "White Adder's Tongue", the first few minutes of which unfold in soft swells of wordless vox, softly proggy organs, pulsating drones, a minimal drumbeat slowly surfacing, the sounds coalescing into a very sixties sounding psych jam, which gradually grows more and more manic and unhinged, the main riff locked into some dizzying loop, reminding us of Terry Riley's tripped out tape experiment "You're No Good", but here presented in a much more raw, lo-fi, and psychedelically space rocking incarnation. Supposedly Wild Strawberries was recorded over some Phish Bootleg tapes, which whether true or not, makes us dig it even more.
While they last, both the cd and the lp version will include a bonus disc (a real cd, not a cd-r), featuring 40+ minutes of exclusive and unreleased material. Five more tracks of organ drenched bliss out, psychedelic shimmer, dubby droned out minimalism, fuzzy psych pop jangle and swoonsome space-kraut drift!
Recorded live in 2010 at South By Southwest, in Austin Texas, in a large empty TV studio and then broadcast on the radio, this psychedelic summit matched up long time pals Sun Araw (aka Cameron Stallones) and Eternal Tapestry for a single improvised performance, 45 minutes of dreamy psychedelic drift, spaced out krautrock, and full on freaked out heaviness! Presented here as played, without overdubs, the only edits being those that separate the jam into 4 tracks. The ET&SA band quickly settle into a lysergic drift, a whirling shimmery haze, laced with fluttery flute, cymbal shimmer, and spidery guitars, a slow build to some seriously explosive spacerock swirl, a chaotic cacophonous crescendo, before settling back down into another stretch of hushed drift, this time heavy on the whirring organ, and still laced with plenty of flute, a little bit jazzy, a lot free and drifty, leading directly into the second movement.
Movement two finds the band immediately locking into some krautpsych hypnorock, some saxophone audible for the first time, the multiple guitars all tangled up in constantly shifting harmonies, the sound mesmerizing and hypnotic, simultaneously ramping up, but also blissing out, vocals swoop in, wreathed in echo and delay, eventually everything fading out but the whirring synths, the shuffling drums, the sax, and some wailing vocals buried in the mix. The third movement is the shortest of the four, and is another slow build, but this time as the sound blossoms it also gradually grows more minimal, the arrangement more spacious and spare, the guitars and sax drifting in an expanse of shimmery thrum and muted horns, washed out and dreamlike.
Finally, the band unfurl the 14+ minute final movement, a swirling shimmering expanse of warm layered keyboards, subtle guitar shadings, and even more subtle sax, the bass offering up deep pulses, everything hazy and crystalline, the drums finally kick in and the band launch into a woozy lumbering space-drone groove, the guitars getting more crunchy, the effects thicker, never truly exploding, instead just cranked up a notch, letting the guitars howl and wail, a druggy dirgey chunk of psychedelic kraut-drone blooz. Nice.
Vinyl version includes a download coupon, fyi.
Ether's "Music For Air Raids" could easily be an open letter to Caspar Brotzmann, asking him to consider that Ether be the new backing band for his guitar pyrotechnics. This six piece ensemble fits all of the Caspar Brotzmann Massaker requirements -- big tribal rhythms, plodding basslines, interesting production tricks, and an overall masculinity that propels Ether's sound. A sound that's complete in itself, without the added Brotzmann guitar that we find ourselves fantasizing about.
We're slowly working our way through the blackened back catalog of the mighty Supernal label. They've been responsible for some of our all time favorite black metal weirdness (Benighted Leams, Fleurety, Meads Of Asphodel) as well as some seriously intense grim blackness (Drudkh, Hate Forest) and all sorts of gorgeous ambient dronemusick as well (M87, Dark Ages, Fall Of The Grey Winged One).
Ethereal Woods falls somewhere between the first two. They are definitely bizarre, strange arrangements, weird production, seriously unique sound, but at the same time they definitely have a traditional black thrash going on in there as well.
Ethereal Woods are some sort of Eco-black metal band from the UK, their unique brand of buzzing loping blackened thrash is rife with "dreamy mysticism and sylvan sensibilities", which is also represented in their song titles, band name, lyrics and the legend across the back of the cd stating: "Ethereal Woods support the campaign to protect rural England!"
And what better way to do that than by unleashing a strange black musical concoction equal parts fuzzed out guitars, simple spacey riffing, mournful arpeggiated melodies, bizarre growled vocals way up in the mix and lots and lots of dizzying circus-y keyboards swirling and warbling and whirring. While they do occasionally bust out some series black blasts, they tend to sort of hover between doomy dirge and sort-of-groovy midtempos, sounding sometimes like a more blackened, more moody and miserable Khold. The rhythms have a sort of seasick waltz feel to them, very hypnotic, and while the guitars buzz blackly, more often they just sort of drone beneath dreamy sad sounding melodies, with the keyboards drifting like black clouds, giving the proceedings a strangely epic slant. Quite cool, and as you might expect from Supernal, pretty weird too...
We've always been pretty into Ethereal Woods and their twisted strain of eco-black metal. But regardless of their political agenda or lyrical themes, their root sound was something much more raw and immediate, a sort of blackened thrash, not super furious and fast, and not really super fucked up, more sort of pounding and loping and midtempo, but EW most definitely do have their specific peculiarities (are there any bands on Supernal who don't?), and that stuff is fully evident here.
"Approaching The Castle By Night" begins all moody and minor key, a sort of brooding intro before the band launch into some seriously heavy thrashing black metal. A bit chaotic, and fiercely furious, the drums wild and off kilter, the vocals weirdly sung / grunted, complete with a cool crunchy chugging breakdown, until the band whip out the synths and head heavenward with a stretch of swirling waltzy epic pomp, the drums suddenly a shuffle the guitars strumming beneath the soaring synths, and then back again, as if that was just some Mr. Hyde shit, it won't happen again. But oh it will. Again and again, and that's precisely what makes this record, and Ethereal Woods more than just some British black thrash outfit.
"Le Plesannz En Mary" begins with another surprisingly melodic intro, some post rocky blissy guitars over tangled tribal drumming, and then some super dramatic Goblin-y synths, before slipping back into something a bit more black metal. But even then the arrangements are fractured and not at all typical, a bit mathy, and a bit fucked up. Then there's "An Elizabethan Fantasy", that begins like some warped power pop jam, before settling into a more blackly dour groove, but never quite shedding that strange hooky intro. The drums here are especially strange, stuttery and hiccuppy and skittery. And once the song really gets rolling, there are all sorts of strange dynamic stops and starts, a really damaged sort of lurching post doom or something.
And so it goes for the rest of the record, plenty of weirdly poppy blackness, lots of warped keyboards, those gruff growly vocals draped over soaring epic guitars, and tangled up with strange stumbling drums, culminating in what might just be our favorite track, "Woodnymph", a sprawling 10 minute epic, whose main refrain is a ridiculously catchy ascending reach-for-the-heavens sort of majestic riff, paired with really abstract drumming, and a killer Sabbathy groove in-between, but that's only the beginning, over the next 10 minutes the track shifts from blissed out shoegazy doom, to lumbering crunchy chug, the total furious black thrash, and finally back to that awesome opening riff.
Way recommended, but only for those who like their black metal warped and twisted and poppy and pretty much not that black at all...
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We've never reviewed anything by Ethernet before, but now upon the release of ambient composer Tim Gray's third album under the moniker and second for the Kranky label, we wonder to ourselves why it took us so long. Opus 2 is cut from the same cloth as many ambient drone composers we've loved so much in the past: Aphex Twin, Tim Hecker, Gas, White Rainbow, Boards of Canada, etc. In fact it reminds us some of BoC's polygonal musical forms, but pulled apart under layers of the kind of warm propulsive chill often explored in the Kompakt label's Ambient Pop series. Largely composed in a process of self-hypnotic improvisation, the resulting pieces are culled of overtly compositional elements, so instead we hear layers of polished down melodic forms and rhythmic pulsations under a brilliant haze of wondrous sonic drift. Beginning gently with waves of airy exploratory melodies that soon become overwhelmed by an embryonic vastness of sound that is both pastoral and bleak, the sun-dappled vibrancy soon mired in weathered earthy textures and slow windswept turbulence that gradually darken in gorgeous decay. Quite lovely!
Anthony Di Franco is probably best known as a member of British noise rockers Ramleh, as well as the legendary Skullflower, playing on that band's seminal, industrial sludge records including Obsidian Shaking Codex, a bunch of impossible to find singles, and the universally revered IIIrd Gatekeeper. Di Franco also had a couple of other solo projects in Ax and Novatron, the latter has proven to be an awesome, if rarely heard slab of headrinsing, low-end noise, and Ax, holy shit, so punishingly good, c'mon someone, reissue those NOW!!!
Di Franco was also the man responsible for the power electronics noise project Ethnic Acid, which existed for a short two year period from 1986 to 1988 but managed eight cassettes during that time period. A couple of those tapes were self-released through Di Franco's own JFK imprint; and most importantly as a historical note, one of those cassettes was released by Broken Flag. It's most likely due to Di Franco's working relationship with Broken Flag's Gary Mundy, that he become one of the revolving members of Mundy's Ramleh. Outside of his better known bands, Di Franco's solo work has always been very worthwhile, and these early recordings of tape splatter and electronic bloodletting do not disappoint! Managing to be heavy and noisy and caustic, but also surprisingly listenable. As we've mentioned before in the past, we're not always that into full on noise / power electronics, we're way more into texture and timbre and dynamics, and thankfully, for every spurt of face melting crush found on Power-Works, there's a long stretch of rumbling drone, or strange stuttering collaged heaviness.
Di Franco's pedigree should probably be enough to get most folks on board, and noiseniks were probably already anxiously awaiting this collection, but for the rest of you, definitely check this out, if you're not into noisemusic AT ALL, this might not be your thing, but anyone into dronemusic and dark ambience, and experimental tape music, this is some seriously powerful and varied stuff. From heaving digital crunch, to stuttering almost metallic sounding loops, to murky stumble and blackened rumble, to spaced out soundscapes of sine waves and looped classical music, to wild squalls of distorted sort-of-riffage, to whispered industrial whir, to smeared and blurred dronescapes, it's all pretty fantastic and heady stuff, especially for being 20 years old. And anyone who's been digging Skullflower's recent return to noisiness (Vile Veil, Malediction, The Paris Working, Desire For A Holy Warm, Pure Imperial Reform) will most likely find lots to love here, although in comparison to those discs, lots of this stuff is downright pretty!
The Ethnic Heritage Ensemble's jazz builds complexity from simplicity, diversifies through repetition, transcends time by emphasizing it. Their laser-like ability to set the rhythm button on infinite repeat creates a hypnosis similar to the mind-buzz of classical minimalists like Steve Reich and Terry Riley.
True desert blues! Originating from the never-ending dunes of the Sahara Desert, Etran Finatawa have been casting quite the entrancing spell on our ears with their second full length. While they do share many similarities with folks from their region like Tinariwen and Toumast they also have their own identity and places of departure. It's mostly their guitar sound and sense of melody that will have many comparing them to Tinariwen (which is an awesome thing in our book!). But we love how there are also moments on the record where their use of stripped down percussion, chanting call and response vocals and odilirou flute are used to perfection to help carve out a sound that is more of their own. And we have to mention how mesmerizing the soulful vocals that fill the record are, something that you almost take for granted as you listen, as it it so perfectly melds with the music. Another gem from the Sahara that will be in our ears and hearts for a long time to come!
We've loved everything we've heard from this great Saharan outfit, but with this latest outing they have definitely made their best record yet. With ex-members of all time aQ faves Tinariwen they exist in a similar sonic realm that sweeps us up in a desert trance, every single song on Tarkat Tajje is a stunner. One of those records that when you blast it loud there is no way not to get drawn in by the repetitive and hypnotizing guitars, polyphonic singing, call and response refrains, hand claps, heady percussion that drives all the songs with such a warm groove and steady pace, a sound that resonates with such beauty. For sure influenced strongly by Ali Farka Toure, EF continue to grow so much as a band and really deserve so much more attention and praise then they receive. This is an album that is as great as anything Tinariwen has released, in fact we think we might even be more in love with it then the last Tinariwen album which was pretty smoking in its own right. One of those records that doesn't need so much to be described, all you have to do is listen to the sound and the music speaks loud and clear for itself. So damn great!
Dylan Ettinger's New Age Outlaws lp was a big hit around here, a sprawling collection of retro futuristic psychedelic synthwave that we described as Expo 70 covering Zombi. On this follow up single, some of that stuff is still present, but Ettinger has definitely taken his sound in a new direction. The core sound is still a murky sort of retro cold wave, but it's the execution, and the constituent parts, primitive programmed beats, swirling soaring synths, and most notably, ethereal echo drenched vox that slip from falsetto to more dramatic croon and back again, there's even some melodica, which helps create the weirdly dubbed out vibe, the tangles of melody disappearing in a sea of deem thrum and blissed out beats, sounding a bit like Gary Numan at 16rpm.
The flipside begins with a stripped down rhythm, pulsing and throbbing within clouds of bleep and bloop, of buzz and glitch, a downtempo cold wave, muddy and smeary, the vocals buried this time around, reminding us of Tricky teaming up with some modern synth outfit, the results are dreamily druggy...
Originally released on cassette, this chunk of psychedelic atmospheric synth-fi futurism has been gussied up, the original tracks, remixed and/or re-recorded with more parts, more music, subtle alterations here and there, not so subtle changes as well, but since we missed out on the cassette completely, it hardly matters, and according to the label, this is indeed the definitive version.
So who the heck is Dylan Ettinger? We have no idea, but what we do know, is that New Age Outlaws is a fantastic collection of synth driven sc-fi new age/wave atmospherics. Fans of Majeure, Zombi, Umberto and similarly minded retro futurists will definitely dig.
Just check out the sprawling nearly 12 minute opener, "City Lights, City Streets", that ends up sounding like Expo 70 covering Zombi, droned out and mesmerizing, thick layered synths, slowly unfurling melodies, a simple robotic rhythm, bits of psychedelic wah guitar, thick swells of rumbling crumbling low end, a slow burning epic, that only really shifts gears _ of the way through, when some of the low end drops out leaving the high end to shimmer and soar and glisten, infused with some swirling minor key melodies, only to build to a Sunroof!-like climax, with synth melodies that sound weirdly like sun baked steel drums, everything hazy and washed out and gorgeously blissy.
The rest of the record explores similarly spacey and psychedelic territory, the sound raw and buzzy, "Rico's Pawn Shop" loops a strange stuttery bit of melody, beneath warm whirring chords, and some rubbery synth bass, that man loop never letting up, while the various other synths tangle and intertwine. "Gordon's Theme" is more mellow, more muted and minimal, but again, anchored to a simple synth loop that entrances while the various surrounding sounds paint in the rest of the picture, adding warm lustrous ambience, deep layered textures, a gorgeous hazy sonic drift.
Imagine James Ferraro trying his hand at this sort of Carpenter/Goblin style synth wave, primitive loops, strange hypnogogic melodies, not sleek and polished, more home brewed, which is precisely what makes New Age Outlaws so unique, so strange and so good.
LIMITED TO 490 COPIES!!
On the same label as the more spaced out free-form black jazz ambience of Hodag (reviewed elsewhere on this list), Ettrick on the surface seems like they must be a way more metal proposition, the record's called Infinite Horned Abomination for chrissakes! And their logo is of the spiky illegible classic metal style, but in fact, this is way more of a sputtery skronky free jazz, with wild horns and chaotic bursts of sputtering drum splatter. Each half of this duo handles both sax and drums, each player safely ensconced in their own channel, sometimes it's two horns, sometimes it's horn and drums, sometimes all drums, a dizzying barrage coming scattershot from both the left and right channels, as if there were some sort of free jazz monkeys screaming and beating their chests wildly in each channel, pelting the listener with sonic stones and hurling great handfuls of free jazz dung! Intense and aggressive and furiously freaked out. You might think you're tough, jazz sissy, and we're happy to let you have a go, but this stuff is dangerous, and sharp, and sort of scary, so stand back and let the more highly decorated free jazz warriors step forward, unless you're feeling particularly brave today...
LIMITED TO 100 COPIES!!! Each disc packaged in a cool hand screened cardboard sleeve.
Our friends in Finland are a prolific lot. From the label that just brought us that wonderful Magyar Posse album, comes another band, this time with some familiar faces -- it features members of Circle, Ektroverde, Pharaoh Overlord, Kirvasto and Keuhkot. Eturivi, however, have their own weird sound. Creaking, creepy stuff, with droning science fictional tool shop electronics and glitchy rhythms. Electric organ, rattling percussion, plinking guitars all make for a mysterious background to the equally mysterious voices you'll hear. This has what seems like a bit of a theatrical aspect, with dramatic vocals declaiming something in Finnish (we presume) over the junkyard folk music. It's kinda quiet (in a noisy way though), until the next to last track, "Lian Jaljilla", when chugging guitars kick in and Eturivi fully reveals their Circle lineage, dealing out distorted stabs of motorik spacerock. The prevalence of spoken foreign-language vocals might not make this as accessible as some of Jussi & co.'s other projects -- you do feel like you're missing something by not understanding the words -- but it's still one that lots of fans will want to add to their shelf-ful of Finnish weirdness.
MPEG Download: "Saavutus" [/audio/eturivisaavutus.mp3]
MPEG Stream: "Saavutus" [/audio/eturivisaavutus.m3u]
Another gorgeous mysterious little gem from Japanese label Spekk, who also released the Texture In Glass Tubes And Reed Organ reviewed elsewhere on this list. As we mentioned in that review as well, Spekk has staked out a nice little niche, a surprisingly varied one, including releases by free folk SF collective The Alps, a solo disc from Jefre Cantu of Tarentel, as well as a killer comp of electronic lullabies.
This disc by Yair Etziony, as the title might suggest, embraces mistakes and malfunctions, turning them into music both haunting and lovely. Even the track title point to some sort of assemblage of misfires: "Corrosion", "Broken", "Flawed", "Dirt" etc. but if you weren't aware of the genesis of these tracks, it's very unlikely you would assume they were borne of mistakes.
Instead, the sounds here are dark and brooding, muted and underwater sounding, hovering in some ghostly realm situated right in between the aquatic skipping cd-scapes of Oval, the glimmering gauzy shimmer of Pop Ambient, and the murky pulse of Chain Reaction. Most of the tracks shimmer dreamlike, some hushed and ephemeral, others more skittery and spidery, the various tracks peppered with bits of glitch and crackle. The prettier tracks remind us of a super tranquil Boards Of Canada, the darker tracks have a definite Oval via Chain Reaction vibe, with some parts splintering into super abstract dubbed out drift, others locking into looped motorik pulses, others still like some mysterious haunted house music, creepy and atmospheric, but always bleary eyed and softly blurred, layers of fuzz and whir wrapped around delicate melodies and barely there beats. Super nice.
Packaged in a cool, sleek oversized digipak style folder.
You might not recognize these two names, but you probably recognize the bands they call home, all big time AQ faves. Bryan Eubanks is the man behind GOD, whose last disc on Jyrk we raved about a while back, and J.P. Jenkins is a member of Portland outfit Ghosting (as well as the Portland Bike Ensemble).
Two sidelong tracks, both lovely, and neither are all that far removed from these guys' actual bands. Eubanks side is a never ending (well, almost) wall of grinding low level hum, a relentless buzz, warm and layered and slowly shifting, sounding like a lo-fi Phill Niblock, blissful and meditative, the sort of track that when it stops, your ears almost pop, so suddenly deprived of the drone that was filling them moments earlier. Sometimes the simplest sounds are the most pleasing, and this sort of fuzzy hum is the sort of thing we could listen to forever (and we listened to it with the record reverser, which we also sell, and it sounded even cooler backwards! But then again, what doesn't?!)
Jenkins side sounds like it could have come straight off a Ghosting record, which is not at all a bad thing. A cloudy expanse of simple finger picked guitar nestled amidst soft focus billows of reverberating metallic hum. Eventually the hum dissipates, and what's left is some haunting alien Appalachia, with various notes hurled skyward and stretched into long peals of moaning high end drift. So nice.
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES!! Each one stamped on the lp label, housed in hand assembled and hand screened sleeves with a printed insert, two different color sleeves: gold on black cover or blue on white.
If you ever wondered what the Vaselines might have sounded like, if they were a bit darker, and heavier and a little more shoegazey, well, look no further. Eugenius, the post Vaselines project of Eugene Kelly, briefly called Captain America before they were sued, and featuring members of Teenage Fanclub and BMX Bandits, is that band, taking the classic Glasgow pop sound and roughing it up a bit, adding a little Loop and Spacemen 3 and Swervedriver to the mix. Or according to Kelly it was actually Big Star, The Byrds and Neil Young And Crazy Horse, but same difference. Don't believe us? Go listen to "Flame On", then maybe "Oomalama", we'll wait...
What'd we tell you? Big fuzzed out heavy guitars, crashing drums, soaring choruses, wild psychedelic leads, all wrapped around classic Vaselines style pop, it might sound like a weird mix, but once you get into it, you kind of wish more bands sounded like that. And while some did attempt a similar melding of pop and power, in a distinctly NOT power pop fashion, these guys were just super special, due in a big way to Kelly's incredible songwriting. In fact it's pretty easy to imagine any of your favorite Vaselines tunes, redone Eugenius style, which is essentially what Eugenius was, a super charged grungier shoegazier Vaselines, and if that doesn't sound awesome, then go ahead and listen to those sound samples again, and if it still doesn't sound amazing, then we just give up.
Pretty much all the songs here are killer. "Flame On" might be our favorite, but "Breakfast" is jangly perfect pop, "One's Too Many" almost sounds like old punker Lemonheads, "Hot Dog" is a gorgeous string laden mix tape breakup jam if there ever was one, "Buttermilk" is fuzzy and distorted and catchy as hell and totally sounds like it could have / should have been a Vaselines tune, a bunch of the songs sound like Teenage Fanclub, which makes sense, but again, Kelly's songs are just magical. The music is incredible, but the lyrics too, funny, clever, sincere, goofy, this record still ranks up there as one of our all time pop faves. If you've never heard it you're in for a HUGE treat.
This reissue tacks on two old Captain America tracks, including a fantastic cover of Beat Happening's "Indian Summer", which sounds like it could be a Eugenius original, and there's also a bonus disc of acoustic radio sessions, which features stripped down versions of three Eugenius songs, two Vaselines songs, and "Indian Summer" again...
So so so so so great!!!
A band with the complex rhythms and left-of-centre melodies with the post-rock/pseudo-jazz sound of Tortoise, and produced by Casey Rice no less.
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Guitarist Euroboy of Turbonegro (Sweden's most shockin' and punk rockin' cross between the MC5 and the Village People) steps out with a new band, playing a surprising combination of flared-trouser '70s retro-rawk and similarly '70s lava-lamp lounge kitsch. Way groovy and certainly unusual for Man's Ruin. An AQ party fave (well, that's projecting into a future AQ party scenario)!
We love how far and wide across the globe Dark Entries have been traveling to find us some of the best and most overlooked synth sounds of the early '80s. This time out they take us to Valencia, Spain in 1980 for the bright, DIY inspired synth pop of Europa. Originally released as a cassette, these songs now get their proper place on wax and goddamn is this a set of irresistible electro-pop perfection. Just goes to show that the UK wasn't the only place turning out amazing, catchy, synth pop bands, as this really stands at the same level of excellence as records by folks like Depeche Mode, OMD, and The Human League that were released around this time.
While most bands that surrounded them in Valencia were still trapped in over the top prog rock conventions, Europa took inspiration from punk and the burgeoning electronic scene and proved that you didn't need fancy, expensive equipment to make an awesome sounding record. They built their synths from scratch, and recorded this on a 4-track reel-to-reel, and it pretty much blows away what so many folks these days with so many more resources and endless plug-in's use when trying to capture this sort of sound. Some reissues are cooler in theory than in actual listening pleasure, but this one is all about pleasure! Anyone who loves great early synth-pop will want to jump on this right away. Viva Europa!
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Few can express utter gut wrenching, hand wringing torment while still embracing a melodic beauty like Carla Bozulich. Diamanda Galas and P.J. Harvey are the only others who immediately come to mind. Evangelista is her new project which also features members of A Silver Mt. Zion whose presence is definitely felt throughout. Their debut full length Hello, Voyager threaten to drown the listener in the overwhelming current of despairing bleakness and broken beauty. Some songs swagger in bluesy defiance, some plod on in a saturnine somnabulism, some assault with gritty dissonance ("Truth Is Dark Like Outer Space" which recalls the untethered drama of bands such as the sadly defunct Pleasure Forever), some sweep you up in a lush stringed devastation ("The Blue Room"). No sunlight reaches the deep recesses of this music, you get the sense that the voyager in the title will never come up for air. No happy endings here, Evangelista haunts long after the final gloomy notes have faded... awesome.
Prince of Truth, the follow-up to 2008's Hello, Voyager, walks a beautiful, cacophonous path. Carla Bozulich, the force behind Evangelista, is definitely one of a kind, or at least one of a very, very select few. She has assembled a group of excellent musicians that weave equal doses of melody and chaos around loose structures of songs without having them dissolve into utter randomness or pretentious noodling. Dominic Cramp on keys knows when to really take it up a notch and when to compliment others by adding just that little extra something; Tara Barnes, Carla's longtime low-end collaborator, is a rock on which to cling in choppy waters; Nels Cline on guitar needs no introduction; and the incomparable Ches Smith (of Xiu Xiu / Good for Cows / John Zorn) on drums... these are just a few of the amazing musicians on Prince of Truth.
The record opens with "The Slayer": two and a half minutes of noise introduce the listener to what is to come before Carla's vocals and a few cymbal washes add solidity to the mix. Cellos and what sounds like tape loops start off the second track, "Tremble Dragonfly," before they fade into a slow dirge held together by Carla's voice, some sleigh bells and strings. "Dragonfly" sounds like a really, really drugged out B-side off Tom Waits' Black Rider. What could be better?
Though the chaos is prepared to perfection, when the album gets a bit stripped down you can really tell that Evangelista is a rare gem indeed. "I Lay There in Front of Me Covered in Ice" is possibly the most melodic song on the record. Multiple vocal tracks ride high over an electric organ and minimal percussion, combining into something that makes us want to cry everytime we listen to it.
Carla Bozulich has been a staple of the underground music scene for a long time, and we have loved everything from the Geraldine Fibbers to Ethyl Meatplow to her latest incarnation as Evangelista. If you haven't discovered her genius yet, Prince of Truth is a perfect introduction.
Brand new single from the most recent record by Evans The Death, which we reviewed a little while back. The A side is obviously to be found on that record, so if you already have that, it's the bizarre B side that's the reason to pick this up. More on that in a sec. For everyone else, who may not yet have heard this noise pop combo, who are a bit heavier and crunchier than most outfits on Slumberland, low slung basslines, some serious distorted jangle, the A side here complete with a killer chorus and of course the super distinctive vocals, which you sort of have to hear. Definitely makes EtD a unique proposition. But yeah, check out the sample, and you might be as smitten as we were.
For folks who are already hip to EtD, the B side is a weird experiment, that sounds a bit like a sea shanty, super bass driven, but weirdly sing songy, with super bizarre vox, a strangled mewling for most of the track, but a second voice joins in and sounds a bit like a mumbling moaning pirate. Weird and pretty cool.
Super swank packaging with embossed / silver foil lettering.
Most Slumberland releases tend toward the washed out and dreamily jangly, sort of ethereal and dream poppy, so when we threw this on, we were kind of thrown for a loop by the opening track "Bo Diddley", with its serious crunch and punkish pound, and were immediately smitten by the oddly named Evans The Death. Noisy pop, a little bit heavy and rocking, gloriously distorted and fuzzed out, that surprise though was immediately trumped once the vocalist opened her mouth, and let loose with one of the coolest, strangest, most distinctive voices we've heard in ages. A sonorous croon that soars and wails flitting into an impossible falsetto at the drop of a hat, and somehow, once you get settled into EtD's sound, it's impossible to imagine any other vocalist fitting in. The cool thing, is even sans the vocals, the music is pretty epic, flitting from churning Pixies-ish pound, to bleary eyed shoegaze trip out, to garage-y fuzz pop, to classic power pop crunch, the arrangements are a little mathy, the melodies epic and catchy like crazy, the sound lush and layered and loud, and then the vocals come in, and it's impossible to resist. Heck, they even have a song called "A Small Child Punched Me In The Face", which might just be the catchiest song with the weirdest title EVER. Quickly becoming a new pop fave, and "Bo Diddley", definite contender for pop jam of the year...
