THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Another badass slab of psychedelic hypno dirge space rock courtesy of local boys The Lumerians, who definitely have the druggy drone-y dirge dirgey thing down pat. If you dig the Wooden Shjips, Sleepy Sun, Cave, Moon Duo, and other practitioners of blown out drug rock mesmer, well then you're gonna love the Lumerians. Channeling Spacemen 3, mixing in some serious krautrock, adding heaping doses of spaced out FX, these guys lock into a groove and then ride it out, totally hypnotic, cyclical, trancelike. Reverb soaked guitars, murky distorted vox, washed out, looped bass, buried melodies, all blurred and smeared into lysergic drone rock that is totally captivating. Be sure to stick around for the B-side, a barely recognizable cover of the Osmonds' infamous killer jam "Crazy Horses", given a total hazy space drone dreamdrug makeover. So awesome.
Now we have just one question, WHERE'S THE FULL LENGTH?!?
Latest vinyl-only release from these SF psychedelic space rockers, whose sound has gradually grown funkier with each record, culminating in the recent Transmissions From Telos Vol. IV tape, which found the band aligning itself with Bitches Brew era Miles and Sextant era Hancock, not bad company at all for sure. And while that release, a tour only tape oddity that found the band experimenting in the studio, was twisted fun for sure, this new Horizon Structures 12" finds the band getting back down to business, this time the business of crafting four futuristic jams, equal part seventies jazz funk, eighties new wave, and some mutant strain of kosmische synth exploration. The sounds here definitely hew closely to the cover art, a 3-D rendering of some psychedelic tripped out spacescape, with the opening track a pulsing sprawl of buzzing synths, and laser beam bloops, spaced out and cinematic, and seriously poppy, maybe the poppiest thing we've heard from these guys, percolating swirling melodies, FX drenched vocals, a sort of space-y future pop, that culminates in a percussion heavy, wah guitar dowsed final freakout groove! The second track on the A side is a minimal new wave dirge, laced with all manner of percussion, and like the rest of the tracks here, with a sort of retro futuristic sheen.
The first track on the B side is the killer here, a groovy blast of sci-fi space funk, peppered with electric piano blurts, woozy basslines, wheezing keyboards, swirling synths, dense driving percussion, which then seems to get reworked on the second track, the same groove, but this time even groovier and funkier, wild freaked out drumming, chaotic synths, tripped out FX, all leading up to a dreamy kosmische synth finish. Cool.
Packaged with, according to the sticker on the front, "4D glasses for access to transdimensional viewing portal", which to these eyes seem more just like 3D glasses, but the cover looks AMAZING viewed through those specs, and if you DO wear them outside (with Lumerians blasting in your headphones, we'd imagine) they do seem to make things glimmer and sparkle, a secret glimpse of what lies beneath/beyond?
Local psychedelic space rockers Lumerians started life as a more straight ahead psych rock band, exploring much of the same territory as groups like Wooden Shjips, Sleepy Sun, Spacemen 3 and the like, trafficking in a sort of druggy spaced out mesmer with lots of FX, heck, on their first single they even did a killer (if nearly unrecognizable) cover of the Osmonds' unlikely proto-metal classic "Wild Horses". Over the course of a handful of full lengths and 12"s, the band began to move in a distinctly different direction than their psych/space rock peers, for one, they had a percussionist, in addition to a drummer, and for another, they definitely had a funk thing going on, subtle in the beginning, but becoming more and more evident, culminating in the recent Transmissions From Telos tape, which was full on Bitches Brew, and their most recent, Horizon Structures, which mixed that Bitches Brew sound with something more wildly sci-fi and psychedelic.
So we were kind of expecting them to keep moving in that direction, but on the opener here, it's a total spaced out, motorik kraut-psych slab of Hawkwind / Spacemen 3 mesmer, fuzzy cyclical riffing, propulsive drumming, swirls of FX, plenty of synth swirl, hazy laid back vox, minimal percussion, the sound slipping from washed out and woozy, to a bit darker and driving. However, the second track finds the group slipping right back into the psych-funk of the last few records, with a groovy, funky bassline, driven by some cool busy drumming, more of those washed out vox, some reverbed guitar shimmer, that impossible combo of space rock and psych-funk yielding something pretty awesome, sounding a bit like Hawkwind with a bit more groove, which is absolutely not a bad thing. There's some serious progginess going on to, as evidenced by the sudden shift, to what is essentially lead bass, the bass handling the main melody, the rest of the band soon falling in line, locked tight, before slipping right back into the psych-funk groove that started things off.
Lumerians are definitely tough to pin down, their sound constantly shifting, but always ending up somewhere cool, whether it's the Stereolab-ish electro-kraut of "The Bloom", that has a definite retro pop vibe going on as well, or the full on funkiness of "Koman Tong", which adds some weird processed guitar and vocodered vocals, and ends sounding like the theme song to some futuristic cop show, or the heady psychedelic mesmer of "Smokies Tangle", which definitely harkens back to the Lumerians of old, or finally, the Goblin-y closer, replete with sexy female spoken word vocals, which soon transforms into full on buzz drenched space psych hypno-rock, and eventually lands somewhere closer to a brooding, epic, cinematic future exotica. As always, so cool!
We got a very small handful of this, a super new, ultra limited, tour only tape from local psychedelic space prog aQ faves Lumerians, who for this single half hour track, recorded a handful of the instruments, then flipped the tape, playing back those instruments in reverse, and tracking the rest of the band to the backward sounds. And if that weren't cool enough (we're a sucker for backwards sounds), the B side is the A side in reverse, which makes the original tracks play properly, while the proper tracks/instruments from the A side are now reversed. Trippy! And seriously psychedelic.
Both sides a dizzying sprawl of minimal drone-psych drift, swooping backwards rhythms, soft synth swells, twisted swirling melodies, lush builds to gorgeous expanses of dense sonic swirl, noisy and abstract, droney and hypnotic, a bit industrial in places, streaks of black ambience drifting through field of electronic shimmer, grinding electronics wrapped around whirling FX squiggles, both sides, obviously quite similar, warped mirror images of each other, a two sided palindromic psychedelic freakout, both halves heady, and dizzyingly divine, total mind melting headphone bliss.
VERY VERY LIMITED. Most of these the band sold on tour, it's LIMITED TO 200 COPIES, each one hand numbered, we got a bunch, but unclear how many more we'll be able to get once these run out. If any!!
It's been a long time coming. After the tease of a 7" and a 12" ep, both tantalizingly KILLER, and a ton of incredible live shows, including a show stealing performance at the aQuarius records 40th anniversary party, comes this, the full length debut from SF psychedelic hypno drone psychedelic space rockers Lumerians, and it's just as good as we'd hoped and imagined. For those who've yet to hear these guys, have a look at this list of bands: Wooden Shjips, Hawkwind, Circle, Spacemen 3, Loop, Cave, Cloudland Canyon, The Heads, White Hills, Assemble Head In Sunburst Sound, 3 Leafs, Mugstar. Does that look anything like your record collection? Then odds are you've just found your new favorite band. And if there's any justice in the world, these guys will get the same sort of hype and adoration that Wooden Shjips do. Not necessarily because they sound the same, they definitely don't, but they both DO explore similar territory, spaced out buzzy, fuzzy droney psychedelic rock, but where the Shjips are minimal, Lumerians are maximal, with multiple keyboards, even a percussionist, their sound more lush and layered, similarly propulsive and driving, but maybe with more of a nod to Spacemen 3 and Hawkwind, creating super mesmerizing cyclical hypnorock epics. And these tracks are indeed epic, slow building, smoldering, hypnotic, totally trancelike but still super heavy and rocking.
Opener "Burning Mirrors" pretty much sums it up, loopy low slung bass, simple motorik drumming, crunchy super distorted fuzz guitars, and thick swaths of spacey keyboards, not to mention drawled laid back vox, all appropriately reverby and echoey, these guys traffic in the sort of sound, where every song, whether 5 minutes or nearly 10, sound like live, they could go on for 20, 30, even 40 minutes, druggy, lysergic, tripped out and psychedelic, head nodding, body moving drone rock bliss.
"Black Tusk" gets all sixties, the drums shuffly and busy, the keyboards crunchy and fuzzy, lots of percussion, the bass driving everything, swirly and psychedelic and minus the killer production, and the super distorted stuttery organ buzz could be some lost psych jam from back in the day. "XuluX" is another sprawling droned out jam, that gets seriously groovy, with all sorts of heavily effected guitars, and more crunchy organs, before blissing out into some seriously swoonsome keyboard driven psychedelic drift.
And so it goes, "Atlanta Brook" definitely conjures up the spirit of Spacemen 3, the vocals a dead ringer, the hazy warped buzz the perfect prescription, but Lumerians add their own twist, infusing it with some strange rhythmic bridges, and buzzing sitar melodies, before slipping back into a washed out almost Beatles-esque outro.
"Calalini Rises" might be the heaviest track, murky and muddy, the drums locked tight, tribal and propulsive, all the other instruments loose and chaotic, a constant sonic swirl, totally spaced out and abstract, definitely a song that could have stretched out for another couple hours. But one of our favorite jams might just have to be "Longwave" which sounds like Lumerians at the wrong speed (which we presume it must be), Neu! style, the band unfurl a droney dirgey spacerock jam, slowed to a crawl, the guitars even thicker and grungier than usual, the drums lumbering, but then the vocals come in, and they're perfectly melodic and dreamy, and drift over the undulating psychedelic murk below, culminating in a gorgeously tripped out second half, with lots of rumble and whir and buzz and drone and swirl and shimmer (but be warned vinyl folks, in order to fit the whole album on a single lp, they had to speed this song back up, shortening it quite a bit, everything is essentially the same, just the murky background music is a little less murky). So good.
Seriously. If any of the above bands are your cup of tea, try spiking that tea with some Lumerians, you won't be sorry. Easily, THEE space drone psychedelic hypno rock record of the year. Drop out, and dig in!
There's 2 brand new mind-spacer-outers on this week's list direct from UK psych specialists Cardinal Fuzz, one by the Dead Sea Apes, and this one from local faves the Lumerians! As you know, we love love love the Lumerians, we had 'em play at the AQ 40th birthday party, we made their first full-length a Record Of The Week, and this new one, a prequel we guess to their Transmissions From Telos Vol IV release, does not disappoint. Cardinal Fuzz is a great place for 'em, their motorik psychedelic electro-kraut fits right in. There's four long songs (37 minutes total) on this slab of vinyl, two per side, and damn if they won't free your mind, your ass following right along, like some sort of pulsating Can meets Herbie Hancock meets Circle meets Cave instrumental groove machine.
Opening track "Murder Dubbs" is a headnodding groover, super tight and controlled, with bits of flute flutter and bursts of wriggly synth. The groove gets mellower on the faux-ethno "Turiya", with fuzzy sorta thumb-piano sounds like Bebey or Konono, and electric organ a la Mammane Sani. On the flip, there's more krautrocky propulsion and delightful synth sizzle via "Hook For An Eye", before the record wraps up with the longest cut, the twelve and a half minute "Impossible Windows / Caballero Futuro", super spacious and pretty and hypnotic. Nice!!
LIMITED, of course! Cardinal Fuzz stuff is usually not long for this world...
It's been ages since we've heard from these local psychedelic space rockers, but it seems like a storm of new Lumerians activity is brewing, records, shows, touring, all starting with this, a brand new 12" which displays a side of the band that always seemed to be lurking just below the surface, but is now revealed for all the world to see. The A side of this 12" finds the band exploring a funkier sound, sounding at times like Bitches Brew era Miles Davis, or Sextant era Herbie Hancock, dense percussion, swirls of wah wah guitar, whirring organs, a little bit spacey, and a little dubby, but loose and free and indeed funky, the second track introduces more buzz, and adds some psychedelic freakout to the mix, getting downright proggy before finishing off the side with something much more drone out and soundtracky, swaddled in woozy fuzzy synths.
The flipside is a whole 'nother kind of beast, a dense buzzy churn, layered and thickly psychedelic, it's on the verge of collapsing into full on noise, but the band deftly corral the sounds into a blackened swirling dervish, that manages to sound like a proggier spacier SUNNO))) before blossoming into a tripped out krautfunk blowout, which in turn transforms into a long outro of creepy synths and scattered percussion, a spaced out cinematic sprawl that is at once haunting and harrowing, melodic and lovely. Great stuff as usual, can't wait for more, and to hear this stuff live!
Packaged in a super striking, heavy stock jacket, and pressed on milky, yellowish/off white vinyl. And yeah, totally LIMITED!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Well, it looks like the Wooden Shjips don't have the market cornered on sixties inspired drone drenched psychedelic drug rock after all. The Lumerians offer up their own take on modern psych with their debut ep, 5 songs, all of them looooong and gorgeously tripped out. Where as the Shjips seem to be channeling the Doors, the Lumerians take ? And The Mysterians, mix in some Fuzztones, and filter it through the sound of Spacemen 3 and Loop resulting in a mesmerizing, repetitive organ infused doped up hypnorock.
The second the opening track kicked in we were SOLD. Fuzzy blown organ, pounding simple drum beat, super sixties vibe, buzzy and trippy and druggy and totally divine. The vocals drawling over that relentless beat and that warm thick organ. Wooden Shjips fans will freak, and just might have found a new favorite local band.
The second track is just as cool, but way different, super minimal, almost jazzy, with muted percussion, subtle bass grooves, soft shimmery synths, very spacious (and space-y) and laid back, like a druggier more psychedelic Necks.
The B side is all slow lugubrious organ drenched crawl, shuffling drums, a wall of washed out buzz, with one track introducing some ethereal, blissed out female vocals, drifting weightless above the fuzzy groove, giving that track a serious shoegaze vibe.
Killer stuff. Super limited. Only 500 copies, each pressed on nice thick clear vinyl, housed in a plastic PVC jacket with a thick color cardstock insert, and comes with a code, so you can download MP3's for your iPod as well.
We had been eyeing this record for a while. They are called Lumsk after all. And their logo is the letters in Lumsk rendered as gnarled trees and roots, and the cover features a sketchy drawing of a long haired nordic warrior, hair blowing in the wind. The name of the album and the song titles are all in Norwegian too which is never a bad thing. At best it would be some amazingly weird black metal record, at worst some beer hoisting Viking sing along metal, either way, we'd probably be pretty into it. Well, when we finally cracked one open, it was neither of those things, and so much better than we could have hoped for. The simplest way to describe Lumsk is some strange mix of Hammers Of Misfortune, Enslaved, Scandinavian folk, and the Fucking Champs. Sounds weird. Sounds impossible actually, but that's definitely what it sounds like. Lots of complex instrumental riffing, lots of loping seasick Viking rhythms, along with simple drumming and loads of organs and keyboards, occasional violin and even a choir, but then there's the vocals, male and female, both proud and majestic, soaring and weaving, definitely reminiscent of Hammers Of Misfortune. My thumbnail review was originally "a more epic, Viking metal Hammers Of Misfortune", but on further listens there's just so much dense Carcass-y instrumental stuff going on under the surface, that it makes the soaring (almost renn-faire sounding at times) vocals sound almost alien in that context. It's a little bit power metal, a little bit folk metal, a little bit doom, a little bit prog, and yeah, a little medieval / rennaisance, but put it all together and not only does it not make sense, but it makes so little sense that it makes absolutely perfect sense. To us at least. Definitely NOT death metal or black metal, way more melodic than heavy, and downright pretty at times, but still plenty heavy enough to please all the discerning metalheads around here.
When we first heard Lumsk a few years back, it totally blew us away. Some really odd combination of Hammers Of Misfortune, Enslaved, Scandinavian folk and The Fucking Champs. Yep, you read that right.
And that is what it actually sounded like, lots of Viking riffery, some epic vocalizing, but also some serious metallic shredding, boy / girl harmonies, folky interludes, some medieval / renaissance faire filigree, some fuzzy synths, pretty weird, but pretty dang cool too.
So here's the follow up, and if anything, it's more of the same. But with a couple changes, much of the shredding is gone, and the folk element is more pronounced, but other than that, it's still some confusional combination of chugging riffage, fluttery female almost-operatic vocals, super dramatic male vocals, soaring strings, folky fiddle and a mess of over the top Viking metal chug.
A handful of the tracks are almost straight Scandinavian folk, the vocals lilting and delicate, the arrangements swooning and melancholy, and then just when you're all ensorcelled and entranced, the band will kick in with some over the top, downtuned chugging stein-hoisting metallic drinking song or some epic metal hoedown.
Definitely an acquired taste, but we can tell you that at least two people at aQ dig this band a LOT (bet you can't guess which ones).
Luna's new seven song collection contains a few odd moments. I along with a couple of customers were sort of startled to hear the first few strains of the Stones' "Waiting On A Friend" with Dean Wareham doin' the ooooh-ooohs. It was a bit... strange. Their version of "Neon Lights" begins with a plink-plonk sound that really made it seems like it was going to be a cover of Abba's "Honey Honey" rather than a Kraftwerk song. The song "Teenage Lightning" however is NOT a cover of Coil's splendid track from Love's Secret Domain, as far as we can tell it's a Wareham original. The rest of the songs are pure Luna bliss, and should please all of their faithful followers. Oh and also included on this cd is a video for "Lovedust"! One gripe though, what's with the half-assed matchbook style packaging? So poorly executed, it's shameful! Not only has that design been done so many times before, but it's been done quite close to perfection by bands like Fuck and Tsunami to name just two. Harumph!
What can we say about Luna "Live"? Dean Wareham has honed and polished every last inch of this band to a positively glowing sheen thus making this a very well-recorded, well-performed live album that in a sense is a 'best of' also. You almost can't tell that these are live - non-studio - performances except for the applause that ends each song. Many of the lovely Luna faves are here. "Tiger Lily", "Bonnie and Clyde", "Anesthesia" to name a few. From 1999/2000 performances in Washington, DC's 9:30 Club and NYC's Knitting Factory.
To be completely honest, we didn't have such high hopes for this new Luna album -- their last couple of albums were just too easy-listenin' smoooth for our liking -- but boy, were we in for a pleasant surprise. What's most striking about their new full length is that it has some of the punchiest Luna tunes in ages. For years and years Dean Wareham and Co. have consistently stuck to their same albeit achingly pretty formula, almost as though they were resting on their laurels to the point of becoming a diluted version of themselves. Happily this Rendezvous reveals a freshly rejuvenated band. Even the slower dreamy numbers have a spark to them that's been sorely missed. Occasionally they bear a striking resemblance to recent recordings by Yo La Tengo particularly when Ira sings. In case you're unfamiliar with YLT, rest assured that this is a good thing!
The sixth album from Luna certainly sounds all warm and welcoming. And of course it's well-performed and well-recorded like any other Luna release - perhaps partly due this time to the presence of producer extraordinaire David Fridmann (Sparklehorse, Flaming
Finally released domestically, the long-awaited new Luna (long-awaited that is by those who haven't already bought the import that's been out for a year already!) includes a somewhat-questionable (but nice) cover of "Sweet Child O'Mine". Dean Wareham and co. don't break any new ground on this album, but instead continue to maintain their consistent wistful, melancholic songwriting style and lush melodic proficiency found on such past beauties as "Lunapark", "Bewitched", and "Penthouse".
Observing The Universe is the latest komsiche transmission from Greek synth wrangler and ambient alchemist Panos Alexiadis, aka Lunar Miasma, and is another gorgeous collection of spaced out synth drones and slow burn prismatic drift, operating in the same realm as folks like Expo 70, Oneohtrix Point Never, Emeralds and the like.
The intro track here is the real gem, a dark, brooding, thrum, rife with crackle and buried melodies, a slightly sinister soundtrack to some old light show that for some reason plays endlessly in some abandoned planetarium, the music of constantly shooting stars, every sonic streak here another contrail glowing against the inky blackness of spaces, simple Eno like melodies drifting outwards like ripples in some epic celestial pond. This woozy sprawl parked by what sounds like fragmented transmissions from the ether, the whole thing underpinned by deep rumbles, and thick swirls of blurred low end shimmer. We almost wish the whole tape was filled with an extended version of this track. But while the rest of the record is not nearly as dark, there's much to dig, the two part "Expanded Dimension" is all futuristic synth swirl, and prismatic cascades of analog melody, all hazy and dreamlike, and darkly cinematic, a blissed out sprawl of glistening crystalline sonic glimmer, culminating in the title track closer, which seems to merge the dark ominous thrum of the opener, with the glistening shimmer of the other tracks into the sort of dark, retro synth ambience, that will definitely appeal to fans of Carpenter, Zombi, Umberto, Majeure and the like, but unlike the driving pulsating krautiness and pulsing Euro-disco of those groups, LM's strain hovers much closer to a dreamlike cosmic new age.
No introductions necessary for Lydia Lunch and Roland S. Howard. These two had collaborated sporadically throughout the '80s, with an alliance between Lunch and The Birthday Party that resulted in an infernal split, live LP recorded in 1981, a near perfect single for 4AD of those two covering "Some Velvet Morning" in a round of comic-book horror / love-story genius, and the Honeymoon In Red album which is pretty much the best thing that Lydia Lunch has done outside the No Wave days. In 1991, they trekked from their respective dens of iniquity to Memphis, Tennessee with JG Thirlwell in tow to produce Shotgun Wedding. This album came after a number of years of spoken word performances and recordings for Lunch and right before Howard returned to the studio with These Immortal Souls to pen the masterful I'm Never Gonna Die Again album. With Howard recently dying of complications from a lifetime of heroin abuse, a flood of reissues seem to be in order. We can hope that Mute will do a proper reissue campaign for those two These Immortal Souls albums, as those were two of the forgotten gems in the wake of The Birthday Party's demise.
Nonetheless we have here Shotgun Wedding - a swampy, lugubrious album of druggy, shambolic blues rock with Lunch's caterwauling vocals dialing down the shrill assault and trying with degrees of success to sing along with Howard's world-weary guitar leads that are still the blueprint for a bleak, cowpunk transgression. There are a handful of covers on Shotgun Wedding, including Led Zeppelin's "In My Time Of Dying", the obscure (and unremarkable) "Burning Skulls" penned by Jeremy Gluck, and the one that really shines - a diabolically sassy cover of Alice Cooper's "Black Juju." Throughout the rest of the album, Howard's tunes are front and center, slinking and slithering through his guitar leads and Lunch spouting her sordid love songs mired more in sex and death than love. It has to be said that the album stumbles a bit from the first couple of tracks; but after that, Shotgun Wedding broods and sulks with the best of them. 1972 has also seen to including the aforementioned "Some Velvet Morning" cover at the end of the album immediately following the Alice Cooper one. Horror. Humor. Horror. Humor.
This is one of two new entries in the ongoing series of Suicide related 10" singles, celebrating Alan Vega's 70th birthday (despite the fact that he was born in 1948, a mere 60 years ago). Both sides feature versions of the horrific electro-thud masterpiece "Frankie Teardrop" from the classic eponymous record released back in 1977. The A-side is a new cover from like-minded misanthrope Lydia Lunch, screeching out the vocals on top of a monophunk electronic arpeggiation. It's certainly the best we've heard from Lydia Lunch in many, many, many years. The B-side is a demo version of "Frankie Teardrop," which finds Martin Rev's musical accompaniment for ominous, analog synths pretty much worked out, even in demo form, but Alan Vega's story about Frankie Teardrop himself hadn't quite evolved into a tragedy about an everyman whose life just sucks. Instead, Frankie is cast as a Vietnam vet / detective given a particularly unfortunate assignment. It's not as clinically articulated as on the proper album, but has more of a Philip K. Dick vibe going on. Limited to 1500 copies.
Two fine record reference works on the list this week, there's the Encyclopedia of Swedish Progressive Music (reviewed below), and this one, a tome devoted American private press musical weirdness from the psychedelic era; its subtitle is "Guide To Underground Sounds 1965-1982". And yes, it's an A-to-Z of bands, each release getting an opinionated write-up, sometimes from more than one reviewer, who don't always agree! Not just psych bands, but also folk-rock, hard rock, "incredibly strange music", sunshine pop, all sorts of stuff. As long as it's rare and obscure and has collectors salivating...
Here's a few of the bands included: Anonymous, BF Trike, Cromagnon, David Allen Coe, Euphoria, Francisco, Josephus, New Hobbits, Charles Mason, Peace Pipe, Ya Ho Wha 13... that's a very small fraction (hey I bet Fraction is in here... let's see, yep) of what you'll find. There's literally hundreds and of entries. Hours of browsing to be had.
In addition to this "Acid Archive" of reviews, which include discographical info on both the original releases -and- (where applicable) reissues, there's some other special features to this volume. You'll find top tens and "fave raves" from the book's various contributors, also a buying guide for collectors on a budget, and a forward by Mike Stax of Ugly Things magazine -- and if you're a dedicated Ugly Things reader, you definitely want this book!!
15 years in the making, this is as authoritative and indispensable as it gets, when it comes to weird music from way back. It's not quite as deluxe as that Swedish Encyclopedia (and not as expensive, either), but still really nicely put together. Paperback, 11 3/4" x 8 1/4", 298 pages, three columns per page of text, lots of cool b&w graphics (album covers, record labels, promo photos). Trippy!!
Now available in a second edition, the out of print first one from a few years back fetching big money on eBay, but this one has tacked on 100 EXTRA PAGES of material!!! And the record cover pics inside are in color this time! Get one for your reference shelf, before they're gone....
Check this out, a tome devoted entirely to American private press musical weirdness from the psychedelic era; its subtitle is "Guide To Underground Sounds 1965-1982". And yes, it's an A-to-Z of bands, each release getting an opinionated write-up, sometimes from more than one reviewer, who don't always agree! Not just psych bands, but also folk-rock, hard rock, "incredibly strange music", sunshine pop, all sorts of stuff. As long as it's rare and obscure and has collectors salivating...
Here's a few of the bands included: Anonymous, BF Trike, Cromagnon, David Allen Coe, Euphoria, Francisco, Josephus, New Hobbits, Charles Mason, Peace Pipe, Ya Ho Wha 13... that's a very small fraction (hey I bet Fraction is in here... let's see, yep) of what you'll find. There's literally hundreds and of entries. Hours of browsing to be had.
In addition to this "Acid Archive" of reviews, which include discographical info on both the original releases -and- (where applicable) reissues, there's some other special features to this volume. You'll find top tens and "fave raves" from the book's various contributors, also a buying guide for collectors on a budget, and a forward by Mike Stax of Ugly Things magazine - and if you're a dedicated Ugly Things reader, you definitely want this book!!
15 years in the making, this is as authoritative and indispensable as it gets, when it comes to weird music from way back. The second edition is full color, with 400 pages packed with album covers, record labels, promo photos and more! Trippy!!
If it weren't for the lack of smug attitude and thankfully missing Chicks on Speed artwork, "Flourescent" could easily be mistaken for anything on Mego. This collaboration between Danish composer Rasmus Lunding and the increasingly active Australian sound artist Philip Samartzis is a fanciful, dynamic abstraction of digitized fragments culled from field recordings and purely digital granular synthesis. The two artists have built reputations on nearly opposing ends of the electro-acoustic spectrum, with Samartzis operating as an austere musique-concrete composer steeped in a post-Industrial tradition. On the other hand, Lunding has tinked with programmable Lego constructions in some of his compositions, lending to far more childlike readings than Samartzis' work. "Flourescent" - their first collaboration - brings Samartzis' technical prowess to those playful spaces which Lunding inhabits. Many of the sounds have the expressivity of the electronic improv that has been running amok in the European art / jazz circuits; however, Lunding and Samartzis tighten their grip on those electronic 'solos' by crafting the digital errata into terse melodic passages and occasionally structured patterns. The two composers top it all off with digitally treated interjections of indeterminant conversations, the screams of children at play, and Vietnamese temple songs.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Swedish composer's collection of 60s and 70s electronic music recorded in his home studio, that is, in his "Castle Frankenburg." Apparently better known for 70s synthesizer records about elves, this 4cd set contains beautiful, skittery soundscapes, fancy clickery and warbly madness. Recommended.
By now it should be no big surprise that we here at aQ are HUGE fans of Lungfish and its offshoots. In the last few years we've seen an array of solo releases from singer Dan Higgs, and to a lesser degree from guitarist Asa Osborne who records as Zomes. And though we love all that stuff, Lungfish is one of those bands, like say, Fugazi, where the diehard fans just can't comfortably accept the "extended hiatus" thing. And yeah, as indicated by the "1999" in the title, this is in fact an archival release of songs the band recorded prior to their Necrophones album, where six of these songs showed up in re-recorded form. But why would we complain about that? While Lungfish have only ever sounded like themselves, the turn of the century found their approach becoming increasingly psychedelic and more "out of time" sounding, and these recordings, rougher fidelity-wise than their proper albums but still clear and upfront, are essential listening for anyone who considers themselves a fan. The feel here is more like a live recording and it really reinforces what an awesome band Lungfish was/is. Higgs is in fine form as always with his mindblowing lyrics and singular vocal delivery while Osborne's trademark cyclical riffing carries these songs forward into new realms. The always killer rhythm section (longtime drummer Mitchell Feldstein and, on these recordings, bassist Nathan Bell) does what only Lungfish could do, with the bass sounding particularly huge here. And goddamn does this stuff rock. But not, ya know, like Kiss or Led Zep... just in that strange Lungfish way. Whatever the future holds (we're still keeping our fingers crossed), this disc surely hits the spot and comes with an unsurprising but wholehearted recommendation.
If you're already a fan of Lungfish, you're familiar with their style of song-craft: each track is sort of like one super heavy, distorted riff that's explored and repeated through propulsive, psychedelic rhythms. This formula is still in practice on Feral Hymns, their 11th (!) album, though they've reached a definite "moment"... Dare I gush, but to listen to this album is to be FULLY immersed in the depths of Lungfish.
This is their first album (since their very first) to be recorded outside of the Discord-related studio, Inner Ear. And we definitely think it was a good move!! Not only does it sound great for being engineered by Tim Green at his San Francisco-based Louder Studio, but the temporary homelessness of the band during this process gave their collective creative mind the ability to breathe, to see their songs from inside and out and to fully sculpt the album as a whole and turn it into a very tangible, albeit visceral, expression.
The Balitmore foursome completely deconstruct each song/"riff" down to its essential elements. Following this, they gracefully rebuild, creating impressively engaging, hypnotic tracks that share an incredibly powerful depth. Dan Higgs' rich, throaty vocals proudly wade through these tracks with a force we all know and love but that force is especially intense, often riled up into an enigmatic, abstracted fury.
Although we thought Love Is Love was their heaviest album at its release, Feral Hymns weighs in far heavier, not really in the quantity of its sound but quality of it. This is an album that is so pared down to its most essential and amazing elements that repeated listenings keep rewarding in different ways every time.
Now, Andee really loves their record Necrophones, and Love Is Love (their last) had some definite great moments, including the addictive opening title track, but on Feral Hymns, the thorough exploration into the 'guts' of each song and the album overall, and the slow and meticulously elegant sonic sculpting of the band as a whole, works so so well it totally blows us away. Amazing!!
Not sure what it is about this Lungfish record in particular, but whatever it is, it got Allan to come up to see what we were listening to. He thought it was some sixties/seventies psychedelic rock band! While there are definitely elements of that, heavy distorted riffs, propulsive rhythms, and Dan Higgs gorgeously rich and throaty vocals, unlike that stuff, Lungfish take those riffs and repeat them endlessly, no verse chorus verse crap, just one riff stretched into a droning hypnotic riffscape for Higgs to proseletyze over. Melodic and hypnotic and so fierce. In fact this might just be the 'heaviest' Lungfish record yet. Actually you should probably just own EVERY Lungfish record. But this is a pretty great one to start with!
Everyone should know by now that we're HUGE fans of the legendary Baltimore group Lungfish, not to mention their side projects - Zomes, Pupils, and of course all the solo releases from the band's one of a kind singer Daniel Higgs. Even though they're not technically broken up and hold the title of being the longest running Dischord band ever, we haven't heard so much as a note since 2005's Feral Hymns. And no, this isn't a new Lungfish album, but since Dischord has been going through their catalog and remastering their albums to meet today's standards, we figured "why not?" If there's anything the ol' aQ website could use, it's more Lungfish. It's interesting charting this band's career, as they've always channelled a cyclical sound that hasn't really changed too much except that its become more psychedelic and... shamanistic?... over the years. The one constant is that Lungfish have sounded only like Lungfish. Pass And Stow dates back from 1994, at a point where their punk roots were more prominent and they were definitely flirting with a sound that owed a debt to other great Dischord bands like Rites Of Spring, Ignition, Soul Side, and so on. Still, Lungfish stood out. Higgs could never be mistaken for anyone else and Osborne has got to be one of the most underrated guitar players ever. Serving as the perfect anchor are drummer Mitchell Feldstein and, on this release, bassist Jon Chriest. The no-nonsense Lungfish rhythm section may in fact be the band's secret weapon, because their restraint and super solid ability to push things forward are what make this band so uniquely HEAVY. Like, monolithically heavy, in a way other bands simply couldn't understand. Listening to this band now makes it even clearer how unique they were (and are), especially considering other sounds coming out in 1994. Damn we love this band.
Three former members of Spiritualized - Sean Cook, Mike Mooney and Damon Reece - regroup to form Lupine Howl. Brit rock imbued with a very similar swirling, space-y, psych sound, heavy soul influence and bombastic grandeur to that of their previous band,
Original music from the cable TV series of fishing shows. Excellent, minimalist stuff from the leader and saxophonist of the Lounge Lizards. Bonus: 2 "field recordings" of Tom Waits.
This is the debut release from these Finnish heavies, and is a crushing slab of gloriously abject doomsludge infused with plenty of old school slo-mo death metal crush, the label mentions bands like Coffins, Autopsy, Winter and Celtic Frost, and we're definitely feeling all of those, but we're also hearing plenty of Melvins (especially in the vocals) even some diSEMBOWELMENT, not to mention all those other modern death metal outfits like Disma, Vasaeleth, Vastum, Encoffination and the like. Lurk mix long stretches of droned out ambience, layered guitar buzz and effects drenched thrum, with bursts of churning chugging heaviness, pounding doomic sludge, the drums massive and pummeling, the vocals slipping from a growling guttural howl to a surprisingly melodic bellow (hence the Melvins comparison), there are some surprising melodies too, even some hooks, but they're less noticeable once they've been stretched way out and slowed way down. The songs often fracture into lurching lumbering stop/start workouts, or disappear in squalls of white noise, slipping into near-grooves, before splintering into something much more abstract and dirgey. The closer is the fastest of the bunch, but even then it's still basically a crawl, but when the drums and the riffs fall just right, and the band lock into a serious chunk of blackened chugging sludge, these guys become fucking monstrous, and that sort of sonic power and black hole metallic fury, should have all those other modern death metal outfits looking over their shoulders, and running for their lives.
For those of you who just skim the list or only read the first few sentences of reviews, let us get your attention real quick. Lurker Of Chalice, in case you didn't realize, is the work of one WREST, aka SF black metal overlord LEVIATHAN. Paying attention now? Good. let's proceed. Lurker Of Chalice has existed in one form or another for several years now, but outside a cassette or two this is the only recorded evidence and man will it blow your mind. Originally conceived as a less black metal, more experimental musical outlet (and possibly inspired by Leviathan / AQ faves Benighted Leams) Lurker Of Chalice is constructed from lots of black metal parts as might be expected, but lot of very un-black metal bits as well: arpeggiated post rock guitars, martial percussion, simple propulsive krautrock rhythms, swirling droning ambience, strange haunting vocals, obscure found sounds and samples, doomy slow motion dirges, reverb drenched, almost sun dappled melodies over creepy warbly soundscapes, warm thick keyboards, heavily strummed steel string guitars, rich throaty crooning, super overblown distorted guitars, all smeared into a warm fuzzed out, dreamy and melancholy, mostly midtempo blackened doomscape. Occasionally, Lurker blasts into full on black metal, like on the second track "Piercing Where They Might", but even in a BM context, things are beautifully way off kilter, rumbling bizarrely affected vocals, dizzying riffs that swirl and slither and make it impossible to focus, huge jangly guitars over miltaristic snare drums and warbly Michael Gira like vocals. So weird. But so perfect. Imagine Leviathan and Benighted Leams and the Swans and Ved Buens Ende, all somehow mixed into some darkly evolving, gothic tinged expanse of moody metallic melancholia. This is maybe the best sounding record Wrest has made which is saying a lot. And it's definitely the weirdest, and most certainly the saddest. The whole record is dripping with intense emotion, minor key and slowly stretching toward some bleak future of broken promise and crushed spirit. From slowly evolving, almost cinematic instrumentals to massive and majestic dirges to woozy effect drenched post rockisms to ultra bleak ballads to damaged black metal crush, Lurker Of Chalice evokes total and utter misery, a musical invocation to the lost and alone, wandering in search of hope, under the suffocating black cloak of night, crushed beneath a starless sky and adrift in a soulless universe, exposing every raw nerve and dark corner of Wrest's twisted musical soul. So fucking good!
Does anybody really care?
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Produced by Daniel Lanois.
This new release on Ektro, the debut from Lusiferiini Armosta (which means just what exactly??? we forgot to ask, though it sounds like something to do with Lucifer, doesn't it?) is yet another remarkable side project of the already quite prolific Finnish band Circle, featuring featuring Circle leader/bassist Jussi Lehtisalo (here playing guitar and singing) along with a rhythm section comprised of Circle's sound engineer Tuomas Laurila on drums, and Eetu Henttonen on bass. Well as you know we're really into Circle and all the various Circle related bands as well, so the more the merrier we say. And, unlike many recent Circle side projects, such as the Steel Mammoth highlighted last list, this ISN'T another entry in their own burgeoning "NWOFHM" movement (though you might guess otherwise from the t-shirts the trio are wearing in the cd booklet photos: Anvil, Motorhead, and Pharaoh Overlord). Nope, though it's plenty heavy and rockin', this isn't any sort of metal, instead Lusiferiini Armosta are a band inspired by '80s and '90s noise rock and punk, with influences ranging from Flipper to Scratch Acid to Drunks With Guns to the Strangulated Beatoffs to obscure Finnish bands we've never heard of before. They also cite both Pissed Jeans and Polvo, and we can hear those, as well.
The band describe themselves as having "one foot on the throbbing jugular of distorted Finnish rock, the other in the tumble dryer of the noise scene of 1980's New York", that works too. The vocals are all in Finnish (with lyrics printed in the cd booklet we can only puzzle over) and sometimes soar in that monkish chant way that Circle like to do, especially in their earlier days. The first track here, for instance, reminds us of older Circle (circa Meronia) mixed with the more angular attack of something like Lubricated Goat, perhaps. The nine cuts here are all pretty darn catchy, Jussi's singing deep and melodic (when not harsh and guttural), alongside chiming and choppy guitar riffs, poppy but powerful, the whole record heavily infused with feedback whine and chaotic psychedelic guitar soloing, the songs often building into noisy, shoegazing blowouts. We could draw comparisons to both Japan's White Heaven and New York's Television.
Imagine if Circle had somehow moved to NYC, in the '80s, jamming with Sonic Youth, hanging with Unsane, maybe eventually putting out records on AmRep or SST. That's Lusiferiini Armosta. Pretty f'n cool! Jussi & Co. never cease to amaze...
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Originally released in 2012, as three cassettes, each limited to just 99 copies, this sprawling collection of hauntological rhythmic black ambience / post industrial soundscapery is finally collected into one double lp set, slightly less limited than the tapes, but needless to say, these will probably disappear before too long. Like Lussuria's Ghost Entanglement lp we reviewed a while back, American Babylon is another stunning assemblage of hazy grey ambience, murky tribal rhythms, ominous low end thrum, a continually mutating landscape of slow shifting tectonic layers, heaving swells of chordal crumble, processed vocals, electronic shards, sinister pulsations and percolations, a world of burnt black gauzy grimness, assembled from fractured loops and woozily woven into epic stretches of cinematic creep and caustic electronic shimmer.
Most of the tracks evoke a deep dread, exploring some harsh sonic innerspace, where death and destruction are rendered as gauzy smears, minor key chordal streaks the bleed and ooze, occasionally tethered to lurching, lumbering rhythms, but just as often, loosed and set adrift, a sky filled with black clouds, a sea stained blood red. Here and there, strange samples surface from the murk and offer glimpses of the often obfuscated source material, allowing the listener to experience a world now dead and gone, in the form of these faded musical memories, while elsewhere, the music is simply a ghostlike impression of loss and sadness, hazy, washed out, indistinct, a swirling stretch of hushed thrum and found sound detritus, like The Caretaker, if he somehow survived the end of the world, and was left in some buried bunker, creating these slowly fading sketches of the world as it once was, pocked with slabs of ribcage rattling rumble, and churning low end throb, the whole thing culminating in the crushing emotional and sonic heft of the title track, which pairs a weird bit of video diary narration, with shimmery wraithlike ambience, all of which eventually is swallowed up by a final squall of blackened near metallic noise.
Debut lp of hauntological drift and cinematic electronic ambience from this mysterious outfit. A single epic exploration, split up over two sides, the sonic equivalent of exploring some strange old house blindfolded, according the the label, but to us it sound more like some sort of subterranean cavern, a seriously abject slice of Cold Meat ambient creep, a hazy hushed drift, lots of low end thrum and whirring shimmer, everything muted and washed out, strange reverbed drips, buried barely audible looped melodies, distant squalls of feedback, the occasional heavily effected pulse, buried rhythms, soft focus melodic swells, what sounds like a passing train off in the distance, this is definite headphone listening. Murky, sinister, blurry, muddy, haunting and disorienting. At one point a childlike music box melody drifts to the surface, but is quickly swallowed up by the final movement, a fantastic sprawl of gorgeous blurred Caretaker-esque crumble. So divinely creepy and harrowingly cinematic.
LIMITED TO 200 COPIES, with paste on covers and a nice printed insert on heavy cardstock.
First album proper from this shadowy purveyor of hauntological industrial ambience, after a handful of releases which were more like singles collections. Industriale Illuminato functions as a continuous songsuite, one that plays out like the soundtrack to some eerily romantic art film, or the score to a trip down the rabbit hole, or more accurately, some strange miix of the two. A mix of electronic and organic instruments, the sound lush, and cinematic, but also murky and mysterious, strange voices are looped into hiccuping rhythms, other voices seem to decay and crumble into the ether, while thick waves of rumbling thrum ebb and flow, synths swirl, clouds of cymbal shimmer sizzle and dissipate, clouds of blurred ambience drift lazily over a bleary, washed out landscape of bleak atmospheric sprawl. Beats surface throughout, conjuring a vibe similar to Boards Of Canada, but cast with a deathly pallor, the sounds and the beats more rough edged, the sounds oozing and bleeding, the needle pegged, and that in-the-red grit a part of the atmosphere. The vibe shifts constantly throughout, from churning industrial techno gloom, to creeping soundtrack shimmer, to straight up cinematic ambience, replete with what sound like field recordings (or clips from whatever imaginary movie it's from), while other tracks are tangled stretches of mangled beats, that seem to roil restlessly, as if trying to desperately untangle themselves. The majority of the record though is darkly serene, ominously tranquil, dreamlike bordering on nightmarish, rhythmic, and hypnotic, with some tracks slipping into downright beauty, albeit a sort of faded decaying beauty, a strangely lovely sinister sonic rot that seems to be slowly eating away at all of Industriale Illuminato, and transforming it into a fantastic collection of crumbling black hearted drone-gloom bliss.
Latest from this Euro synthwave/gloom pop combo, a three song 12", the new track "Chasing The Light", contains everything we loved about the last LFY full length, a buzzy, murky artpunk new wave creep, all pulsing synths and crooned, almost yowled vox, robotic beats fashioned into some sort of Eurodisco glooom/goth synth pop, swirling and psychedelic, a darkly droning electro-pop dirge. That track gets a reworking on the A side, which transforms the song into something a bit more murky and Skinny Puppy sounding, loads of echo and delay, the whole song seemingly being transmitted though a pillow, the beat more industrial, tranced out, droney and super hypnotic.
The flipside is a sidelong sprawl of gloomy, gothy electro, clubbed up just a bit, a more house-y beat driving the proceedings, but the whole thing still muddy and washed out, the various sounds buried beneath all manned of deathrock sonic grime, a gristle soaked electronic doomscape, that definitely reminds us of some of Dominick Fernow's projects, like Christian Cosmos or Vatican Shadow, which is most definitely NOT a bad thing!
We first heard Euro synthwave combo Lust For Youth on a witch house mixtape of all places, which sort of makes sense, as the sound of most modern minimal wave synth groups is really not that far removed from some witch house. What we heard was buzzy and murky and washed out and yeah, kind of witchy, but it definitely gave us a taste for these guys (now apparently just one guy), and this new full length definitely hits the spot, fusing classic synth driven eighties pop, modern retro minimal synth music, experimental noise, kosmische synthscapery, and pounding EDM beats into something we find ourselves listening to constantly, and something that every time it gets played in the store, someone comes up to see what's playing.
The bulk of the record is made up of buzzy, dark wave synth pop gems, the synths gloriously distorted, wrapped around lilting melodies, and driving rhythms, the vocals drenched in echo and draped over the top. Just check out "Behind Curtains" which adds some post punk swagger to the otherwise moody swirly synth poppiness. "It's You" sounds like deconstructed Depeche Mode, another sprawl of pulsating distorted synths, woozy warble melodies drifting in the background, a definite kraut-wave vibe, motorik and hypnotic, again those vocals, weary and heavily reverbed, soporific incantations over shadowy synth pop.
Then there are tracks like "We Planted A Seed", which mix in some crumbling distorted noise, and unfurl very retro-futuristic sounding Carpenter style eighties chase scene synthscapery, all tense and dark, and slightly sinister. But then right on the heels of a track like that, a track like "Champagne" swoops in, all old school electro pop, but still, just buzzy and dark enough to retain some sonic malevolence. Imagine Breakfast Club recast as some sort of seventies horror art flick, this stuff could definitely be the soundtrack (there's a bit of Goblin going on too needless to say).
But sonically this is most definitely dark synthwave, slipping into something a bit poppier on some tracks, but then something much darker on others, ultimately culminating in the shadowy kraut-wave groove of "We Got Lost" which even manages to channel a little Suicide into the equation, not to mention some eerie sampled screams of terror, before finishing off with the almost M83 sounding "Neon Lights Appear", those wasted vox, the only thing keeping the track from slipping into full blown synth-gaze territory.
We went a little crazy for the last Lust For Youth full length, Growing Seeds, having only just discovered the group via some random witch house mix, and while as we mentioned in that review, LFY are most certainly no witch house, they definitely share some of the sonic traits, swirling and psychedelic, murky and electronic, but LFY has a definite Euro EDM vibe, a post industrial new wave feel, that when fused to LFY's more witchy, moody atmospheric inclinations, the sound is transformed into something super cool, and weirdly warped. Check out opener "I Found Love", which begins with clouds of cricket chirp electronics, woozy synth melodies, sweeping chordal swells in the background, weird skittery rhythms surface, as does a weirdly reverbed loop of a woman laughing (sobbing? hard to tell), but as that loop is repeated, and a pounding pulsing beat swoops in, the swirls dark and minor key, the vocals proper a sort of shouted sloganeering, that weird sample becomes a bit more intense, the whole song brooding and mesmerizing. Rhythmic and groovy, swirled in shimmery psychedelic colorations, minimal and abstract, but darkly intense and a little bit sonically harrowing.
And while the rest of the record isn't nearly so dark, that shadowy something seems to run through the whole record. "It's You" sounds like it's gonna be some Depeche Mode style electro pop, and it sort of is, a thick warm main melody, soft billows of analog shimmer, a super hooky main melody, but then those vocals come in, mush mouthed and lazy, doused in reverb and effects, sucking the energy out and transforming this electro pop, into something creepier and darker and more menacing, the vocals sounding like they were plucked from an Iceage song and dropped into LFY's woozy electro swirl.
And that's definitely the vibe of the whole record, a cool. twisted juxtaposition between synthy electronic pop, pulsing rhythmic dance music, and crumbling distorted synths, those sneery washed out vocals, pulsing beats draped with billowy synth swirl, the sound just on the edge of distortion, everything blown out and in the red, also giving the record a more sonically intense vibe. Like DHR produced Depeche Mode maybe, but it's those vocals that really give the music it's sort of wasted nihilistic vibe, made even more pronounced when they're paired with super melodic synths, or almost groovy rhythms. Whatever it is, we dig it a lot, a gloomy, dystopian synth-kraut gloom pop darkwave that somehow fuses the abject future funk of Suicide to the blissed out sci-fi synth pop of M83 and comes up with THIS! Awesome!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Luster is a straight-forward indie rock trio from right here in the Bay Area. Their second album Besides And Other Rarities is high spirited and empassioned in a similar vein to early Sleater-Kinney. Check 'em out.
