Another one of the Japrocksampler's Top 50 makes it to cd, this reissue via the same label who brought us Melting Glass Box a little while back. Unlike the more gentle folk-psych of MGB, power trio Gedo were counter-cultural hard rockers, beloved of bikers. As aficionados of both '70s heaviness and Japanese psych, we've been curious to hear 'em for a long time, never finding a complete album reissued until now. This, their 1973 debut, is a live record that finds 'em kicking out the jams in front of an appreciative festival audience, with all their clapping, cheering and laughter kept intact, none of it edited out. In fact, tracks 4 and 11 are ALL applause. How'd they get the crowd so excited? Well, Gedo mainly deal in an energetic brand of hectic hard rock action, with a few surprising mellow, melodic, melancholic detours (such as track 12, "Tender Betrayal"). They're sort of a Japanese mixture, maybe, of Steppenwolf and the Pink Fairies, some Eddie Cochran too, Gedo keeping it simple stupid, with a clear '50s rock n' roll lineage (which you can hear most overtly on the excellently-titled track "Rock 'n' Roll Stupid"). With big distorted riffs, raucous vocals, and even the sound of revving motorcycle engines (comprising the album's final track, as Gedo perhaps leaving the stage to go and recreate the cover of the first Flower Travellin Band album), this is proto-metal and/or proto-punk (we could imagine kids pogoing to a lot of this). Definitely "proto", as in raw.
Not understanding the Japanese language, let alone being a participant in the counterculture scene within which Gedo flourished, means you're not gonna "get" some of this. On the other hand, "getting" Gedo on such frantic tracks as "Scent" is not an issue!
This limited edition digipack reish comes with helpful liner notes in English, revealing that Gedo once upon a time not only jammed with members of Mountain and the New York Dolls, but also even played a concert with the cast of (the stage production of?) the Rocky Horror Picture Show!
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Atom Heart's life has taken him to Chile, where he's been doing his Senor Coconut and Atom and Tea Time things (tricked out salsa Kraftwerk covers, Latin glitch-rap). His life with Jesus is quite a different party -- with house grooves that shuffle alongside laptop clickery, plus requisite religious imagery.
Second record of silly tech-house madness from Mr. Atom Heart (aka Senor Coconut, Los Samplers, etc.). Like Matmos on speed, and even more so like Drew Daniels' The Soft Pink Truth. House rhythms and diva vocalisations are sliced, diced and restructured into a hiccuping tizzy.
Another flood of new tapes, all black and very mysterious, this one from the strangely named Geheimnis. Das Negras Montanhas begins with long drawn out drones and monk like chants before the band launches into its ultra lo-fi black metal buzz. The drums way down in the mix, never blasting really, just sort of pounding away, the guitars way up front, cycling through fuzzy black riffs, very hypnotic, the vocals buried in the mix, a sort of rumbling grumbling gurgle, the strangest part of this tape are the non-metal interludes, fading in and our fairly abruptly, the chanting, the sound of surf crashing, winds and insects, often fading out after only a few seconds, sometimes going on for minutes, eventually the black buzz returns, fading in and lurching into action, another midtempo lope through droning black forests and wide open expanses of bleak black soundscapes. The sound is hissy and lo-fi, but very motorik, sometimes almost sounding like a black metal Circle. Riffs repeating over and over, occasionally slipping into some strange upper register filigree before returning to its glorious black trudge.
Not to be confused with the German Geist, whose record we reviewed here a few years back, this Geist is from Israel, and this record, their full length debut, is a furious, tortured, sickening blast of hateful buzz drenched brutality, in fact the sheer blown out, super distorted buzziness ranks up there with groups like Wrath Of The Weak, who at one point we proclaimed as "THEE buzziest black metal band around". The guitar tone here is prickly and crunchy and wreathed in hiss, insectoid and gristly, the sort of guitar sound we can't ever get enough of, that swirling black buzz wrapped around buried blasting beats, harsh howling vox, and some soaring epic melodies, the band blasting along at light speed, only to slip into a woozy seasick dirge, the buzz seeming to ooze and expand, wrapping its inky tendrils around the warbly minor key melodies and the super creepy echoey ambience. And hell, that's just the first song.
Apparently these tracks were recorded live, and left mostly unaltered, to capture the raw fury and unrelenting abject misery of their sound, and it definitely worked. A cascade of in-the-red heaviness, that definitely headphones to truly appreciate it, impossibly lush buzzscapes, doomy swirling almost psychedelic dirges, all manner of haunting spectral sounds, voices, chordal swells, all woven into the bands super distorted blackbuzz crush. And sans those headphones, via just speakers, the sound borders on the Merzbow-ian, each song a swirling squall of face melting heaviness and hellish soul shearing buzz. But it's not all noisemetal punishment, these guys infuse their hellish howl with some gorgeous atmospherics, and some twisted downright catchiness, soaring and majestic one second, haunting and melancholic the next, not to mention some cool proggy almost Voivod-y angularity, and some dense washes of smeary shimmer. At times the sound does veer into something more lurching and lumbering, like the punishing death march of the final track, but the majority of Der Ungeist is spent blasting and buzzing through thick clouds of dense, black hole buzz. So awesome.
Geist are a German black metal horde that features the rhythm section of another BM band we reviewed a while back, Funeral Procession, and Geist, much like FP, offer up the same sort of classic Nordic sounding grim black buzz, right out of the gate, their cold atmospheric black metal reminding us of Satyricon, the production tight and slick, but the band have a definite flair for the ambience, creating dark creepy intros and outros, but unlike the usual wolves or wind or rain, it sounds like a seaside, or a harbor, the sound of lapping water, distant foghorns, deem rumbling tones, laid over what sound like field recordings, evoking some serious haunting dread before exploding in a frenzy of lurching super dynamic, mathy start / stop black blasting. Other tracks introduce what sounds like recordings from beneath the surface, a gurgling shimmer wrapped around rumbling pianos, and distant drones, again leading directly into some amazing blasting blackness, tight and heavy and epic, as much as we love raw and primitive and lo-fi, hearing a band this fast and furious sound this tight and heavy never gets old, and these guys DESTROY. Total depressive melodic black buzz majesty.
The record finishes off with a 16 minute sprawl of awesomely complex, gnarled, drone laced doomic black metal, that shifts from lurching crunch and stutter, to loping almost sea sick waltz, peppered with mysterious samples, totally intense and mysterious, eventually drifting into a soundscape of creaking ropes, plucked steel strings, the sound of waves and wind, a mournful seaside lament, the haunting sounds of sea and sky and storm.
Latest from this Seattle psychedelic horde, whose last tape was recommended to us by the late great Magdalena Solis, and like that first tape Beyond This Vessel is another collection of apocalyptic, ritualistic psychedelia, but UNlike that first tape, this time around, the sound is a lot more swampy and swaggery, in fact opener "On The Next Full Moon", sounds almost like a stripped/slowed down Stooges, or like some Stooges B-side being performed during the winter solstice by the campfire, guitars buzzing, simple tribal percussion, those drawled vocals, it's a lot more rock than anything on the last tape, but it works, and gives Geist more of a Woven Hand / Sixteen Horsepower vibe this time around, which is not a bad thing at all! The whole tape continues on in that vein, ditching much of the psychedelic shimmer, and abstract folkiness of the other tape in favor of a bloozy swampiness, not to say there isn't still a serious psych-folk vibe, there definitely is, when things slow down, we get a Comus vibe for sure, that same sort of demonic sonic malevolence, but invariably, the sound shifts to something more loping and lumbering, the drums much more driving, the guitars louder, the swampy swagger of some pagan psychedelic ritual. One track devolves into pure ambience, a soft noise drone-drift, laced with buried melodies, and that leads directly into the closer, which slows things down to a tarpit crawl, just acoustic guitar, and those drawled vocals, wrapped in a gauze of distorted guitar buzz, and blackened staticky noise, a gloriously demonic, abject doomfolk creep of a campfire ballad, haunting and ominous, and the perfect way to finish this ritual, and the song here most likely to conjure up whatever demons this sacred ensemble bow before.
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We were first turned on to this Seattle collective by our pals in psychedelic kosmische krautdrone combo Magdalena Solis. As much as we love MS, we figured a band THEY found worthy of recommending, would in fact be well worth checking out, and we (and they) were right. Geist & The Sacred Ensemble are from Seattle, and traffic in a sort of Eastern tinged psychedelic folk ritualism, spidery guitar melodies, minimal percussion, tinkling chimes, chanted vocals. But unlike many of their sonic brethren, who stop just shy of actual songwriting, instead subsisting on creating sprawling soundscapes, Geist often transform whatever abstract drift they've just conjured up into what sounds like some twisted strain of swampy apocalyptic folk, or some twisted psychedelic sea shanty. Just check out the opener "Awaken / The Gut", which begins like some abstract forest folk ritual, all blurred melodies, hushed percussion, chanted vox, only to blossom into a proper song, all woozy strum, druggy atmosphere, echo drenched melody, hauntingly crooned vox, the song sounded strangely familiar, until we realized it sorta sounded like a super slowed down, ultra psychedelic, dirgey and druggy reworking of the Gorillaz' "Clint Eastwood". Weird. More often than not, it's songs proper that these guys offer up, sometimes slipping into a bit of ambience, or some psychedelic drift, but otherwise weaving lush expanses of drug folk shimmer, or woozy, swampy psychedelic blues, check out "Grave Coins", with it's drunken swagger, and sonic snarl, we're guessing fans of King Dude, Woven Hand, Kiss The Anus, Nick Cave and the like will flip for these guys. The whole record bursts with mysterious psychedelia, gypsy folk, brooding campfire dirges, tracks like "In Search Of Fabled Lands" wraps snake charmer guitar melodies, around shuffling percussion, with swooping backwards chordal wheezes, all building to a more percussive, tribal psych dirge freakout, or there's "Fertilize", which is all stripped down blues, or "Circles", which is a lo-fi sprawl of tribal, junkyard swagger, crooned vox, over murky shimmer, and pounding percussion, or even "These Embers Need A Blowin", which sounds like New Model Army by way of Cop Shoot Cop if that makes any sense.
A fantastic collection of dark, brooding, bluesy, psychedelia, that's haunting and hypnotic and harrowing in equal measure.
Comes with a full color printed J-card and includes a download coupon as well.
An absolutely killer slab of ultra raw, filthy and primitive lo-fi murky black metal. Lots of crusty riffing, blasting drums buried in reverb and tape hiss, bizarre grunted vocal spew, guitars that buzz and warble, and go from insectoid shrillness to tarpit filthiness often in the same song, and loads of low end bassy throb and other bits of random lo-fi 4 track production weirdness that make this freaky and fucked up.
While on the surface this sounds like classic old school minimal buzz and blast black metal, stripped down and blown out, Bone Awl, Beherit, Von, Abruptum... The weird thing is, and maybe this is supposed to be a secret, but we're pretty sure that the man behind Geistus is in fact a former member of doomlords Yob! Hard to believe, but true! You won't hear that much Sabbathy sludge here although once in a while the songs slow down into a gorgeously doomy tarpit trudge, but it's never long before the band lurch back into action, and resume their harsh minimal pummel. So fucking great, the perfect balance of true kvlt blackness and slightly off kilter weirdness.
For fans of all things simple and sludgy and brutal and black and crusty and filthy and EVIL!!!!
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Been meaning to review this for a while now, kick ass split of distorto-electro from these two Chicago outfits, Windbreaker being the reason we were into this in the first place as that group includes members of aQ faves Lazer Crystal, and fans of that outfit's sound will find much to dig here, pulsing crunching beats, swirling kosmische synths, tangled melodies, there's an early eighties video game music vibe, but also some sort of alien dance party thing going on too, with the beats fractured and fucked up, and thick squalls of weirdo FX and dense swells of noisiness, the second Windbreaker track slipping more into Zombi / John Carpenter territory, with cheesy eighties synths and vocodered vocals, definitely channeling old VHS movie montages, groovy and funky, spaced out and cosmically psychedelic.
Gel Set bring it way down on their side, unfurling a sort of sexy sci-fi murk, all handclap rhythms, sultry ethereal vox, distant swirling synths, minimal pulsing rhythms, the vibe is definitely "love theme from outer space", the sound like it could be from some Italians Do It Better 12", dreamy and washed out, woozily hypnotic, the second track "U Lock In My Hand" is super stripped down and spacey, pure sexy pouter space slo-mo synth disco blissout dreamdrift with some surprisingly swaggery bad ass lyrics, delivered in a dreamy laid back chanteuse croon.
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The Giant Sand frontman has certainly traversed great expanses of musical terrain in his quarter century of music making -- getting to some pretty varied 'out-there' places often within a single album -- but 'Sno Angel Like You finds him at what just may be his most stable and consistent to date. That's not to say there aren't surprises. A strange swamp blues guitar interlude halfway through the album is a good indication of that! While some of this album definitely falls within the realm of his unmistakable dusky desert folk, he's also encorporated ample soul and gospel influences. The gospel according to Howe Gelb? Indeed, most of the songs follow in the tradition of such venerable artists such as Leonard Cohen whose near spoken word vocals are often backed by wonderful female backing chorus. On 'Sno Angel Like You, Gelb is backed up by the Canadian choir Voices Of Praise, and that's not the only connection this album has with our neighbors to the north. It was recorded in Ottawa, ON, and Gelb's current drummer is Jeremy Gara who also drums with a group of Canucks known as The Arcade Fire. Howe Gelb's never been one to seek 'cool points', but you gotta admit he scores plenty here intentionally or not. Seven new songs along with a few from his Giant Sand library and a few that were written by his Giant Sand bandmate the late Rainer Ptacek. Wonderful!
This is the second 'solo' record of dark, langorous desert soul from Giant Sand mainman Howe Gelb. As with the last Gelb solo record, it basically sounds like a super spare, stripped down Giant Sand record, which is definitely a good thing. Lazy and sparawling mini epics, with minimal piano, guitar and mumbled vocals and lots and lots of space. Fans of Calexico (obviously),
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From out of nowhere comes this wonderful new record from the leader of Giant Sand (who also spawned Calexico). This is dark, melancholy, stripped-down angular country. Really beautiful. Kind of like a less goofy Giant Sand. Highly recommended.
Howe Gelb has such a distinctive body of work, from Giant Sand, whose sound ranged from rollicking desert rock, to twangy country dirges, to his solo records, that also ran the gamut, sometimes quirky country, noisy rock, or dark ballads. In fact Gelb's last proper solo record, Hisser, was one of my (Andee) favorite records. That one was all dark and languid and delicately beautiful.
Melancholy, very pretty and sentimental. Lots of space and reverb, due in part to the fact that each song was recorded on a different, borrowed piano, in different locations. In fact, that's part of why it's so cool. Some of the pianos he uses are out of tune, or have completely dead keys, that add weird little dynamics to each piece. My only complaints are some spoken word bits, and that some of the tracks veer dangerously close to sounding like the theme from some soap opera, but overall, quite lovely.
- RealAudio clip: See
- RealAudio clip: You
This is the second piano-centric album from the ever-intriguing shape-shifting Mr. Howe Gelb, and we're more than delighted that he's chosen to share a little more of this side of his musical self. Among other guest players, he is once again joined by his Giant Sand/OP8 comrades Joey Burns and John Convertino of Calexico. Such great chemistry! Vocals are few and far between and when they do surface they are distant, hoarse and textural. Heavy melancholic horns are second in command to the piano. The woven somber, off-kilter atmospheres of haunted carnivals and smoky desert taverns place this branch of Gelb's body of work in closer company to Tom Waits.
You never know what to expect from Giant Sand's Howe Gelb, but if you are going to board his musical caravan, you gotta know you're in for quite a ride. Roaming the musical landscape freely, sometimes the unexpected turns he takes may leave you scratching your head. Definitely one to always follow his muse, and the results - although frequently quite puzzling - are seldom a disappointment. On the surface, many of the songs appear to be very "normal", skillfully executed smoky lounge or dinner jazz or desert twang, but allow the music to sink in a bit further and gradually those distinct Gelb nuances and eccentricities reveal themselves. They manifest as subtle details, a slightly tweaked vocal effect or texture creeping just under the surface. Like an image in a slightly distorted mirror, the music is ever-shifting (in style, tempo, instrumentation, mood), casting light into the shadows, twisting perceptions. Gelb's deeeep, sedated vocals only furthers the emotional and cerebral slip. Often very stream of consciousness, he veers off on tangents about Lou Reed (on "Felonious" and does a remarkably convincing Reed impression, we might add!), scoops lyrics from the song "Lean On Me" (on "B 4 U") and slips into an odd Hazlewood/Sinatra-esque mode (on "Torque"). Intriguing, inspiring and a listening pleasure.
Latest from local label Time Released Sound comes in the form of this 3" cd from cellist/sound artist Guy Gelem, who crafts a lovely avant chamber music with just treated cello, swoonsome melodies drift over deep rumbling tones, and softly undulating layers, pulses and pulsations are molded into abstract pizzicato almost-rhythms, the sound pastoral, wistful and melancholic, dark loveliness that reminds us a bit of the late great Rachel's, with tracks ranging from dreamily propulsive and effervescent to more somber and funereal, the latter, unwinding as aching, brooding threnodies, laced with subtle sonic colors and constantly swirling atmospheres, often blossoming into the former. Beautiful stuff, and fans of other TRS releases will feel right at home!
LIMITED TO JUST 90 COPIES, and unlike other Time Released Sound releases, this one is ONLY available as a deluxe version, which as always, is super swank, a hand stamped mini-disc, housed in a star-punched, black felt covered sleeve, wrapped in a handworked super long, Japanese style obi, hand stamped of course, inside is a stamped insert made from vintage, hand notated sheet music, everything tied together with strands of Mongolian horsehair (!) and a handmade rubber tie down button made from a used bicycle tire tube (!!).
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Uri Geller, known for his telekinetic prowess that started to wreak havoc on the world's cutlery in the 1970s, may not be so well known for his musical output. And for good reason. He has created fervent admiration (Prince Charles, the Pope, President Clinton, Dustin Donaldson of I Am Spoonbender, Michael Jackson and George Harrison are all friends) with his charming persona and baffling mental abilities. Working with Del Newman (arranger for Paul Simon, Elton John, Paul McCartney) who composed half of the tracks and arranged, Geller's musical outing is nothing more than New Age poetry over sacharine 70s pop which recalls the Carpeters more than anything else. With Jim O'Rourke recent aesthetic mistake of "rediscovering" the 70s and the aural telekinesis of I Am Spoonbender, this may actually be more timely than you may think.
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While the photo in the liner notes of an elderly Gelmetti sporting new wave gear is worth the price of admission, the amazing shortwave radio experiments and dronology-through-musique-concrete certainly make this an excellent recording. While AQ has postulated when a remix album of Irdial Disc's triumphant Conet Project will be constructed, this will certainly keep us happy until then. Lots of academic liner notes in German and English.
Throughout the '80s and '90s, Michael Gendreau worked extensively in the East Bay avant-noise project Crawling With Tarts, often constructing surreal experiments with idiosyncratic pop-babble and tape collages of art-damaged noise. For Gendreau, the turntable became an ideal instrument for his explorations; and soon, he began working with the archaic technology of lathe cut, handcrafted vinyl. Often the results were bizarre, if sporadically successful recontextualizations of homemade instrumentation, radio noise, and anti-pop. Recently, it seems as though Gendreau has put Crawling With Tarts on an extended hiatus, due to his increasing attention into the field of vibrations diagnostics and consultation. This incredibly technical arena has lead him to researching the problems of acoustic noise vibrations upon highly sensitive pieces of optical equipment, which could present faulty analysis due to the tiny, but measurable effects of environmental noise (air condititioning ducts and heating vents in particular).
"55 Pas De La Ligne Au No. 3" finds Gendreau bridging his current activities of acoustic diagnostics with his once prolific avant-turntable collages. It appears that Gendreau has hooked up a number of accelerometers - technical devices used to detect, measure, and catalogue any number of vibrational frequencies - to a series of battered record players spinning his handmade vinyl. Gendreau's accelerometers are so sensitive, that they pick up, not only the interaction between the needle and the record in question, but also the muffled whir of the thick rubber band stretching between the motor and the turntable plate. The results found on "55 Pas De La Ligne Au No. 3" are astounding, with eerie mechanical drones, minute needle crackle, and the occasional, but always unnerving upsurge of quiet voices floating though the din like the EVP sounds from "The Ghost Orchid" of purported recordings from beyond the grave. This will probably become one of my (Jim's) favorite records of the year.
Our foreign language skills have always sucked; and as such, the bulk of this book from the exemplary (if bafflingly under documented) sound artist Michael Gendreau is completely lost on us. Gendreau is an acoustician by day and architectural rumbler by night; but this San Francisco denizen has long been an avid practitioner of the obscure literary form known as parataxis. Defined as the juxtaposition of various (often short and possibly disparate) clauses without any conjunctions or subordinating forms, the more obtuse forms of this type of literature became well developed first through Ezra Pound and expounded upon by Samuel Beckett. For many years now, Gendreau has been penning his thoughts in parataxis; and now the Swiss publishing house Rip On/Off has released a collection of his writings... but they've translated all his texts into French, meaning that we have no idea what this book is all about. Rip On/Off has also published writings from GX Jupitter-Larsen and Zbigniew Karkowski (also translated into French!), to give you an idea of what brilliantly daft ideas are abound in Switzerland.
BUT!!! There is a CD that accompanies the book, documenting a handful of unreleased recordings, some of which were culled from live presentations and others manipulated field recordings. Throughout these recordings, Gendreau is drawing heavily upon the tools of his trade as an acoustician, as he uses incredibly sensitive microphones and accelerometers to pick up the smallest of vibrations and textures. Unlike contact microphones which abstract and compress the sounds in a totally amazing way, Gendreau's gear is eerily clean... so that the rumble of truck against a huge metal door that he's recording would pick up all of the vibrations of the springs, the subtle creaking, and the deep deep deep resonant thrum of the metal itself.
Compositionally, Gendreau is one to lull the listener into sense of stasis (not really calm, as many of his rumbling drones are really heavy on the subharmonics) before rupturing that with elements of tactile noise and dissonant blasts. One can think more to the subaquatic ruminations of G*Park, the psychoactive landscapes of Luc Ferrari, and the classic collage techniques of The Hafler Trio. Many composers use raw field recordings, but few have the tools to really capture something as powerful as Gendreau... and even fewer have the savvy to make everything this brilliant. It's a very physical, architectural sound that Gendreau produces, even as those sounds speak to the molecular vibrations that could cause huge buildings to crack and crumble through forces unbeknownst to the original designer and to inhabitants within. Even if we can't grasp the weight of Gendreau's paratactic writings now translated into French, the sounds that Gendreau produces are certainly worth the price of admission alone!
It's been a while since we've heard any material from San Francisco sound researcher Michael Gendreau, althought he has certainly kept himself busy since his impeccable last release 55 Pas De La Ligne Au No. 3 which explored the innerworkings of old turntables. His day job as an acoustics technician takes him all over the world in order to analyse the low frequency impact of industrial machinery upon architectural structures and highly sensitive optical devices; the obvious benefit of this trade is that Gendreau's perception of the particular frequencies is incredibly refined. Gendreau put this skill into practice during the 2003 Activating The Medium Festival at SFMOMA where he found the resonant frequency of the McBean Theater and effectively rattled the entire building, much to the consternation of the head curators worried that their prized Philip Guston paintings might leap off the walls.
Vitoj is Gendreau's first album since that aforementioned 2002 release and features three distinctly different situations that Gendreau handles in very specific manners. The first piece is a real-time exploration of the micro-dynamics of air compressors. Amplified through the technical sensors he uses when studying infrasound vibrations, Gendreau's air compressor emits toxic hisses, metallic clanks, and electrical static that could easily be confused for the processed drones of the Hafler Trio or John Duncan. However, Gendreau does add a gleefully destructive side to his work, as he fully opens the valves of his air compressors on several occasions, unleashing a torrent of noise as dense and tumultous as Merzbow and Masonna. The second piece exhibits a much greater restraint to the point of rendering the buzzing whirls of a old Victrola to nearly inaudible levels. The final entry is a Lopezian field recording mutation of the din of an industrial landscape morphed into a nightmarish ambience. A mighty return for Mr. Gendreau!
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Number XCVI (that's #97!) in the K Records International Pop Underground Singles Series. You may be wondering just what is this Olympia supergroup's mission? One word "PARTY!" Yup, bounce and bop to these four hyper-pop tunes 'til that cream soda goes right up yer nose. Features members of Tight Bros, Bikini Kill, Mocket and the Bangs.
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Now, I really don't wanna use the word "wacky" but the sleeve and liner notes to this record beg such a term. This self-proclaimed "Olympia's #1 Party Band!!!" boasts a line-up that includes Dr. Boogers, Coco Bozo, and Sabrina (the 30 year old witch). While that may produce groans from the party-pooper peanut gallery, don't let that dissuade you. If you're into the pop sounds of farfisa organ melodies and very boy vocals backed with girlie vocals, this is for you. Part of the Lookout! One Night Stand singles series.
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Hip hop remix. Rhythm = "Wait A Minute" (Ray J).
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Hip hop remix.
General Magic is the longstanding duo of Mego co-founders Andi Pieper and Ramon Bauer, who have embarked on "another mad digital journey through the circuits residing in both the Vienna and Berlin studios, as well as the Czech train in between." This is really more of digital fuck-up than a manipulation of digital fuck-ups. Not very inspired, but Mego-philes may find something of interest here.
General Music are from Sweden, but sound straight from Chicago, IL. A Euro-post rock improv assemblage with a rocketship full of squiggly synth sounds and reverbed-out guitars... emerging with music you might imagine if Lali Puna hooked up with The Sea And
A while back we reviewed the reissue of General Surgery's Necrology, which we joked was our favorite Carcass record, that Carcass never made, but it was only sort of a joke, cuz as nuts as the aQ metalheads are about Carcass, at least one of us (ok, it's Andee) likes Necrology as much as ANY of the Carcass records. Partially, because, as we mentioned in that review, as those Swedes attempted to make their very own Carcass record, they managed to create something that was both a ridiculous homage/rip off, and at the same time a slightly more twisted version of what they were shooting for, which in some weird way made Necrology sort of a more fucked up Carcass, which is not a bad thing at all. For all you Carcass loving metalheads who haven't checked out Necrology, do yourself a favor. For those of you, like us, who've already worn out your copy of Necrology, maybe more than once, this one is for you, a massive collection of B sides and compilation tracks, demos and unreleased jams and various songs from long out of print splits, not to mention a Carcass cover from a Carcass tribute, the ultimate irony, or is it? Regardless, this is some gut grinding metallic mayhem, total gorge grind bliss, utter Carcass worship, grinding metallic heaviness that kills.
We love reissues. We love discovering new music, or more accurately OLD music that we had somehow never heard before. But we also love the reissues that give us the opportunity to rave about records we love, and have loved for years, that for whatever reason, we never got to review on the aQ list. Which is the case with this sick chunk of sounds right here. The debut from Swedish gore grinders General Surgery, who did what any young band might do, and started a band with the intention of sounding EXACTLY like their favorite band, which in GS's case would be none other than the legendary Carcass. But where other bands might take that as a jumping off point, forging their own way, General Surgery seemed to do just the opposite, crafting a pitch perfect slab of grinding medical themed metallic heaviness that KILLS, and that sounds SOOO much like Carcass it's criminal, which it would be if it weren't so goddamn great. We often joke, always in the company of Carcass fans, that General Surgery's Necrology is the best Carcass record, mostly to get their goat, but there is a little truth to that too. Released the same year as Carcass' Necroticism (coincidence? we think not), Necrology is pitch perfect, in fact, opener "Ominous Lamentation" basically IS Carcass' "Genital Grinder", and from there on, it's pure Carcass style gore/grind goodness, check the song titles: "Slithering Maceration Of Ulcerous Facial Tissue", "The Succulent Aftermath Of A Subdural Haemorrhage", "Grotesque Laceration Of Mortified Flesh", the guitar tone, the riffs, the vokills, it's insane. BUT, and this really is a big but, for all of its Carcass aspirations, they aren't Carcass, so in attempting to be a band they are not, they manage, perhaps inadvertently, to make something weirdly sort of original, with a sound that does sound like Carcass, but is also in its own way, purely General Surgery. We know that doesn't make a whole lot of sense. But lots of bands start off emulating their favorite bands, but in trying to sound like that band, end up finding their own sound, it just so happens that General Surgery's own sound is like a slightly twisted version of their favorite band's sound. It really depends on your mindset, some aQ-ers love Carcass like crazy, and think this is sorta bullshit, but others, also love Carcass like crazy, but recognize this for what it is, the best Carcass record Carcass never made!
The new version of Necrology finds the disc getting a swank digipak packaging upgrade, as well as tacking on four bonus tracks, all alternate versions of tracks from the record proper, in a slightly more raw and noisy version.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Neat little tape + 3" cd-r package here from this local (Oakland, CA) noiserock unit, nice precise fascist-chic graphic design work too, everything color-coordinated in red and grey. The ep-length tape and cd-r have the same music - with one extra, epic-length bonus track on the cassette, actually, almost as long as the other songs put together. Generalissimo call it a "digital + analog value pack". On these 5 (or 6) songs, Generalissimo blast out raucous, slightly mathy, aggro-poppy grunge-punk, pounding away in a kind of '90s AmReppy style, a la stuff like Unsane maybe, with vocals that urgently shout more than sweetly croon, though there's a bit of both. The music's all chiming and churning, full of stops and starts, guitars spiraling into sharp shards sometimes, with rhythms to make you jump up and down. And then, on the tape anyway, a moody, post-rocky grand finale. Digging it!
Note: LIMITED to 69 copies only.
What an amazing time its been lately for anyone into 70's South American psych. For many of us here at AQ there was no region that delivered colorful psych-folk better then South America. Until recently so much of this amazing music remained unavailable but luckily the reissue craze has put the music of folks like Eduardo Mateo, Congregacion, Embrujo and Alceu Valenca into the limelight they all so deserve. A few lists back we gushed about the Columbian band Genesis and their great self titled record of breezy and mystical psych-folk-rock. Now we finally got our hands on another one, Yakta Mama which was originally released in 1975. And it's just as great if not even slightly more pleasing then that great self-titled offering.
These songs have truly stood the test of time, still glorious and lovely, letting us daydream in the subtle and majestic qualities of their melodies. In putting together these Genesis reissues, the Guerssen label found it impossible to track down any surviving members of the band. It's known that the leader and primary songwriter Humberto Monroy passed away many years ago after a heart attack, and while they for sure should have been one of the biggest names in all of Columbian music, most people there these days have no idea who they were. Here's hoping this reissue helps clue music lovers around the world into the simple beauty of a forgotten gem!
No, not that Genesis. In fact several bands around the world in the '70s were named Genesis. This is the Colombian group who may just be running away with the title of Our Favorite Genesis! Founded by Humberto Monroy who was in another AQ favorite South American psych outfit, The Speakers, this is some breezy and beautiful psych-folk-rock with tasteful use of flutes, acoustic, electric and 12-string guitar and warm melt-in-your-ears vocals. With a pep and playfulness that hints at Tropicalia but with a much more laid back and sensual disposition, falling somewhere between the colorful psych-pop of Madrid's Agamenon and the dreamy acid-folk of Chile's Congregacion. For those that speak Spanish, the lyrics are very smart and impassioned, praising the farmers, the environment, natives and the lower classes. This was their 2nd album, originally released in 1974 and so very well standing the test of time. Highly recommended!
We had this before and sold many, but it was always difficult to re-stock 'cause it was being sold by the Tuva Foundation themselves, not a record label. But sad we are no more, because it's just been re-issued on San Francisco-based "world music" label Six Degrees (home of DJ Cheb I Sabbah and Bebel Gilberto!). For those of you new to this, Genghis Blues is the soundtrack to the fabulous documentary movie (of the same name). Blind San Francisco blues musician Paul Pena travels to Tuva (Central Asia) to compete in their national throat-singing competition, a skill in which he is entirely self-taught! A funny, touching movie, and of course blessed with some great music. Lots of blues, lots of throat singing and even throat singing blues, plus some Cuban son-esque tracks.
