Madlib is one prolific producer, one of our favorites actually, but there is something refreshing to hear his fine production techniques with a live jazz ensemble. Miles Away plays special tribute to all the cosmic jazz and groove we love from artists in the sixties and seventies, from John Coltrane and Pharoah Sanders, The Tribe's Phil Ranelin, Fred Walker, Roy Ayers, Larry Young, Woody Shaw, and Harry Whitaker amongst others. Basically, all of the cats who have inspired hip-hop over the last few decades. Lots of tribal percussion, piano, vibes and flutes in airy compositions that are as contemplative as they are grooving. Beautiful! Nicely packaged in a miniature lp style sleeve, too.
Brotzmann, Sharrock, Jackson and Laswell kick out the jams in Koln!
This isn't new or anything, but how the hell did we miss this?!? And more importantly, how could this not be the best band ever? Jimmy Flemion from the Frogs on guitar and vocals, Jimmy Chamberlin from the Smashing Pumpkins on drums, Kim Deal of the Pixies / the Breeders and last but not least, Skid Row's Sebastian Bach on lead vocals. Sounds like a mess, and it is. Kind of. But in a really good way. The Last Hard Men are all over the sonic map. From grungy metallic rock numbers, to percussive reworkings of show tunes ("I Enjoy Being A Girl"), to Alice Cooper covers ("School's Out"), to totally majestic, and totally great rock ballads, to Scorpions covers ("In Search Of The Peace Of Mind"), to retardedly simple Frogs-like singalongs, to weird band personality interviews, and everything in between. When we first heard this, we weren't exactly sure what to think, but the more we hear these songs, the more they seep into our brain at all hours of the day. Some awesomely atrocious cover art adds to the overall weirdness (and may account for us never having noticed it when it came out in 2001).
First there was Death Waltz, then Waxwork, and now One Way Static throws their bloodied and battered hat into the horror soundtrack vinyl reissue ring, with their reissue of David Hess's soundtrack to Wes Craven's depraved exploitation classic Last House On The Left. We listed this on last week's special horror soundtrack vinyl in-between list, but figured we'd list it proper again this week.
Composer David Hess has an interesting history, having recorded the original version of "All Shook Up", before Elvis Presley's version became a number one hit just a year later. But Hess ended up writing songs for Presley, as well as Pat Boone, eventually ending up an A&R man, before finally becoming an actor / writer / director, although for us, he'll always be the serial killer and gang leader in Wes Craven's Last House On The Left, although the strangest part of this whole story, and this soundtrack in particular, is that not only did Hess star in the movie, he also composed and performed all the music! Even stranger, is that the songs are folky and poppy, and weirdly catchy and upbeat, a strangely lovely contrast to the horrific images on screen, a legendarily stomach churning display of depravity and ultraviolence, much of it perpetrated by Hess himself!! There are moments of abstract experimentation, and weird studio FX, but for the most part, the score consists mostly of groovy seventies folk, fuzzed out psychedelia, strummy, sunshiney pop ballads, funky almost Blaxploitation sounding wah guitar workouts, and yeah, the occasional bit of synthy weirdness or brooding ambience.
The packaging is super swank as well, deluxe tip-on style gatefold jackets, with printed inner sleeves, no doubt Death Waltz fans (and Waxwork fans too) will dig big time! Note, this is also eventually coming out on as a limited edition digipack cd, with 4 bonus tracks. Both formats include extensive liner notes and photos.
You might recall The Last Of The Blacksmiths' fine self-titled debut back in 2006. Despite this Bay Area band's name, The Last Of The Blacksmiths prove they're in no danger of extinction. They've stood strong for over two years and now have a sophomore cdep under their belt. If you've a hankering for some slow creeping soulful Americana, Young Family Song is for you. The band's brooding bleary folk-rock melancholia will bring you down in the best possible way. Steeped in hard liquor and salty tears, these are songs of slurred speech and blurred vision that cast a heady spell that linger long after this short ep is over.
The hospitable Bay Area country/folk stable grows and grows. There's such an awesome sense of kinship among the artists (think of sorta 'six degrees of Jolie Holland' - yes, she does make an appearance here on viola!). Garrett Pierce and Matt Bauer, the band's pals and terrific singer/songwriters in their own right, brought this in recently on the band's behalf, and we're glad they did. This self-titled, self-released album is quite an impressive debut. The Last Of The Blacksmiths' Americana sound which vacillates between woe begone twang and roots rock groove has much in common with the likes of Jason Molina, Jay Farrar and Will Oldham. Fans of those artists should definitely sit up and take notice.
From San Diego comes indie rock's next big thing, Last of the Juanitas. People have been talking about this band for ages. Talking about how amazing their shows are, their records are. And there's definitely something to talk about here. Noisey, sloppy, super heavy indie rock, somewhere between Don Caballero, June of 44, A Minor Forest, Shellac and The Fucking Champs. One of this new breed of indie rock bands that aren't afraid of their metal (but still too scared to just come right out and BE A FUCKING METAL BAND, but that you can discuss at length with Andee or Allan some other time).
People seem to get really worked up about this band, and it's kind of easy to see why. They're super heavy and noisy post rock with just enough metal to balance out the meandering noodly parts. Recorded loud and in your face, with drums all over the place, LOUD guitars and the vocals buried in the mix. Imagine Unwound, A Minor Forest, Bikini Kill and Shellac all mixed up with the results coming out sounding a little like the Oxes or Hella (or some other indie-metal combo) doing Le Tigre covers. Cool.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
"Now the paragraph on the back of the promotional copy of Secret Name that I've got would have us believe that '...it is best to describe Low's approach as essentialism -- allowing each musical gesture to make maximum impact.' For me, 'it is best' to light oneself on fire if the alternative involves having to read this sort of thing about a band as fine as Low." That's right, folks, issue #4 of Last Plane to Jakarta is hot off the presses and we've got the "North American exclusive", as John Darnielle likes to tell us. Mountain Goats is Darnielle's musical outlet, and Last Plane to Jakarta is his forum for writing about other peoples music. Here he ruminates on Low (by way of Gary Numan and Lou Reed), Grim Reaper, Amorphis, Pantychrist (Justin Bond, Bob Ostertag and Otomo Yoshihide), and Suede. While AQ certainly champions an eclectic body of music, Last Plane's table of contents contains such a motley selection of why-the-heck-is-he-writing-about-THAT-record records that it's a bit disconcerting -- UNTIL you read the witty, passionate essays. It doesn't really matter whether you like the records he champions or not because just reading about them is a true pleasure. Highly recommended!
Newest issue of John Darnielle's impossibly well-written music zine. It's quite fitting that all the essays are actually in the form of correspondence ("Letter to the Publicist at Touch and Go", "73 postcards to Prominent Surrealists, Most of Them Dead", etc), since Darnielle's writing style is so fucking personable, personal and appealing. Musical topics covered -- everything from
AQ is the only North American retail outlet for Last Plane to Jakarta. There's a website now, too, at http://www.lastplanetojakarta.com. All writing on the website is exclusive to it (the zine and website do not overlap) and new stuff appears every week. For those who can't get enough of Darnielle's writing, some reviews penned by Allan can also be found at the brand new website NeuMu (http://neumu.net), a smart new music website started by Michael Goldberg of Addicted to Noise fame. The reviews section is called 44.1mhz and some of his topics are Low/Dirty 3, Destroyer, Roto, The Band, Steven R. Smith, and Susperia. Enjoy! ----* ----* tUMULt New Release : ----*
A double-cd release of The Last Poets' first two albums! Their 1970 self-titled debut broke out and made its own scene, forging a way for hip hop with politically charged, African-American enlightenments in syncopated rhythm. Fans of Sun Ra will notice similarities in vocal stylings, emotion and lyrical content, though in The Last Poets this treatment is much more fierce and raw than mystical and cool. 1971's This Is Madness got them a spot on President Nixon's Counter-Intelligence Programming lists. These street poets' use of graphic language (including the 'N' word used, oh, about five million times) pounds out their frustrations in the racial and social state of the country and at the time helped to extend their messages to a broader audience by way of its pure and utter rawness. Nicely packaged in the albums' original artwork, these albums are fierce documents of the group's seminal contribution to that time and still stir up some of the same emotions today.
Some records are worth it for just one track. Even if the rest of the record is amazing. It's that one moment of sonic perfection, that almost renders the rest of the songs, and all of the other music, an afterthought.
Which is the case with this, the debut from The Last Shadow Puppets, a barely disguised homage to the orchestral pop of the legendary Scott Walker. Which is precisely why the opening track, "The Age Of The Understatement" is so irresistible. The strings, soaring and dramatic, the shuffling militaristic snares, the main hook, a swirling cinematic, almost Morricone-ish chunk of moody continental classic pop music. Fuck Amy Winehouse, these guys should be doing the theme to the new Bond movie. This is mysterious, stuff, evoking, cobblestone streets, tweed overcoat, wandering lonely villages hands in pockets, head down against the cold wind, everything steely grey, winter skies, brooding clouds, fleeting shadows, little corner cafes, a missed rendezvous. Even the video taps into that, a lonely ice skater, tanks trundling through some winter landscape, the natty band members looking all sixties and mod, in overcoats and turtlenecks, astride the tanks, amidst soldiers, neon, empty concert halls, long Soviet looking hallways, huge empty town squares. Which makes it even more surprising to find out that the Puppets are in fact, Arctic Monkeys lead singer Alex Turner, a guy from Simian Mobile Disco, the guy from Final Fantasy and a member of UK pop band the Rascals.
It's not just that track either, the whole record is subtly over the top but perfect, dark, shimmery, chunky and rocking here and there, but more sort of brooding and mysterious, channeling the same sort of pomp and drama of classic Walker while giving it a slight modern tweak. The vocals are obvious, Turner's twang is so distinct, and he doesn't do much to disguise it, singing exactly how he would (and did) in the Arctic Monkeys, but it works, even in this new sonic landscape.
And even with the opening track being that good, the rest of the record holds up pretty well, introducing horns, vibraphone, sizzling synths, and all sorts of subtle sonic mystery into their dark string laden pop. Some tracks are sunshine-y and jangley, but even then, they are infused with a certain amount of foreboding. The more rocking tracks are thick with buzzing synths, and propulsive drumming, but those too, never lose their cinematic moodiness. And the strings, arranged by Final Fantasy's Owen Pallett, who would have thought he had it in him, it's really the defining sound of the record, they soar and shimmer, shooting out high end streaks here, unfurling moaning cello like drones there, swirling into little climactic frenzies or drifting into lush minor key backdrops.
Every song is a like a little glimpse of some mysterious cold war spy movie, starring some dashing mystery man, rife with chase scenes, assassins, spies, murder, love, loss and betrayal, all set to The Last Shadow Puppets' pitch perfect chamber pop.
Not much is known about Last Step. Apparently it's the work of one guy in Canada who prefers to stay very anonymous, even when dealing with his label Planet Mu, as it's reported they don't even know who he is and when they've talked to him on the phone he uses a vocoder and has all royalty checks sent to him via the St. Bernadetta Synth Hospital. But then again, Last Step might be the work of Aaron Funk (aka Venetian Snares). Luckily, anonymity isn't the only intriguing thing about Last Step, as it's his use of vintage old-school analog equipment that has won us over. Think Wagon Christ, Giorgio Moroder & Afrika Bambaataa all locked in a room with their old gear and your start to get an idea of what kind of old-school flavored electronica Last Step is all about.
Why does Mr. Laswell anger me so? Well, while there is no question he is a very talented man, perhaps it is his shameless genre-bandwagon jumping and his insidious cashing in on other people's accomplishments that irks me. Yes, I think that's it.
It's Laswell. It's dub. It's his 3047th album this year, with 943 on the way. What more do you need to know.
Oh, come on, Bill. Ry Cooder already did this with the Buena Vista Social Club AND without watering down the beauty of indigenous Cuban musics with tepid 'dub' basslines and generic 'ambience'. This is musical imperialism at its worst.
The newest solo album by this shockingly prolific bass player/composer/ producer. The liner notes say this is a 'cd of black magic and spiritual passion.' It's more like a experimental record of studio fuckery involving multiple bass tracks and assorted Laswellisms.
Yet another drum & bass novice tries his hand. This time it's Mr Laswell with help from DJ Ninj (also heard on recent Derek Bailey album) and it is actually quite good (surprising given recent Laswell mediocrities).
Laswell's execllent drum 'n' bass "Oscillations" foray gets revamped by the likes of Vedic, Nico, Atom Heart (particularly great track, that one), Japan's Bisk, Belgium's DJ Grazhoppa, Endemic Void, Soul Static Sound, the ubiquitous Scanner, and even Ui.
Features Nicky Skopelitis, Graham Haynes and Bill Buchen. Sitar and tablas intersect with dub bass, processed flugelhorn and traps; and without colliding, playfully whirl around each laying down a tapestry of deep grooves and bissed-out ambience.
"[This album] is a solid introduction to the Laswell sound and the Low label as a whole. For those unfamiliar with Las' work...A quick rundown is probably impossible; suffice to say his work with electronic music has largely dealt with lush, hyperrealistic environmental ambient and crisp, loping dub reggae. Silent Recoil brings these two elements into close proximity for its first two tracks, with echoey, slightly metallic drum loops and Laswell's seamless basslines pounding against dense, textures-deep tapestries of high res ambiance... This is groove music for home consumption; preferably quite loud and with few distractions. The third track, however, is a beast of an entirely different nature, and could almost carry the album even if the other two tracks were crap. An epic 25-plus minutes in length, "Undercurrent (Endless Light In The Nameless Land)" is the sort of chilly, richly-hued, dripping stalactite ambient that made Outer Dark and Outland such brilliant records. The elements are all familiar--nightmarish moans, field recordings, sparse synth passages, random bits of percussion--but as in all quality Laswell productions their combination here is novel, creating mood-based dynamics where perhaps melody or rhythm would be, bringing texture and a particular orientation toward sound to the forefront rather than the more easily grasped strategies of the album's first half-hour. Heads looking for pretty melodies or easily digested hooks won't find much of use hear, but then Laswell has never positioned himself as a particularly easy listen, and it would appear with Low (if Silent Recoil is any indication) that that, at least, hasn't changed." -- Loquacious Sean Cooper
A "reconstruction and mix translation" by Laswell, long awaited and hotly debated...and rumoured to be quickly pulled, due to some disputes over rights...
Drone-obsessive experiments from new music composers John Latartara and Khristain Weeks use repeating sonic figures from Tibetal bowls, string quartet, flute, and tape manipulation of differing lengths to create cyclical repetitions.
A new combo on Jeff Mangum's label Orange Twin Recordings. Much like their likeminded predecessors from the Mangum-led Elephant 6 music collective (Olivia Tremor Control and their many offshoots), Late BP Helium won't be pigeonholed into any single genre category. They've a sound that's very hard to pin down, cavorting in the carnivalesque, the horn skronkin' funky, the psychedelic, the experimental and the playfully poppy. Sometimes reminiscent of Lloyd Cole, OTC, The Jam and/or a Rachel's-y chamber string ensemble even. Is that diverse enough for you? If you dig music that doesn't linger in one place for longer than one song, the flighty Late BP Helium might be just the band for you.
Tantric no wave. If you can dig on the hypnotic and disturbing qualities of groups like Swans, or maybe a Godflesh with live drumming, you're getting close. Late Young isn't about one specific moment, the whole consumes itself. You've really got to enjoy the dark, suspended animation and become immersed within the dynamics of an aural onslaught. At the end, with a healthy session of reflection, you may feel closer to understanding, or coming to peace with what you've just experienced. It doesn't need any obvious, gimme hooks or sing-a-longs. It's more about creating an environment, teasing it up to it's maximum potential, then annihilating it. Picture Thom Wilson (who produced both TSOL and Christian Death) and New York no wave group Mars undergoing some animalistic transmogrification alongside His Hero Is Gone. Just fucking brutal, dark, repetitive, spiritual. This disc contains four tracks, each of which is an effects-soaked, fist full of mushroom nightmares. These particular recordings were born "out of sessions probing the helter skelter limits at the altar of guitar perversion, tom heavy foundation, and worship of holy reverb." It's also worth noting that this self-recorded and released collection contains one very attractive acetate insert. Late Young have also just obtained one brand new drummer, manifested here on Earth as Andrew of AQ's blackened, one-man favorite The Mausoleums. Let go, sit back, and be consumed.
Lateduster are a pleasingly lowkey, soothing local combo, and guess what? We've got not one, but two cds by them in stock - this right here is their new five song ep. Neither release veers too far from their path of mellowness, if anything, these newer tracks are a bit more active and at times tread on more solid ground than those that came before. Five Easy Pieces shows Lateduster shifting gears somewhat, trading in the soft washes and sparse twang of their self-titled debut for a more sinewy electric guitar sound and a definite overall jazzy feel.
One of two Lateduster cds that we have in stock right now! This is officially their full length debut, but it's actually a collection of two new songs and six remastered ones which were originally released on two previous eps. Are we making things more confusing than necessary? Let's make things a bit more straightforward then and say that this Bay Area trio have made some lovely pastoral soundscapes - soothing lengthy ones that allow you to sink in for a good five to ten minutes. They done so by skillfully blending together drifting waves of spartan lanky guitars, programmed beats, gently grooving bass, shuffling percussion, and electronic hiss and sputter - locking in with each other for a spell, then dispersing into the mist. Very nice!
Newest offering from the still odd pairing of David Hidalgo and Louie Perez from Los Lobos and hotshot producers Tchad Blake and Mitchell Froom that resulted in their breathtaking 1994 debut. Dose continues in the same vein, but sacrifices song for sound, eschewing the more 'pop' sensiblities of the first record, in favor of a dark, sound effect laden, oddly produced barrio soundscape.
This amazing album was originally issued in 1997 but it sounds so incredibly fresh even today -- I readily admit that I didn't recognize its true brilliance until now. Most of the members of the now-famous Solesides crew pitched in on this self-titled debut statement from Latyrx (MCs Lateef and Lyrics Born), including DJ Shadow who produces four stunning tracks, Chief Xcel, and Blackalicious. The two MCs often let their rhymes flow forth right on top of each other, a cool textural effect is produced, as if the production efforts weren't interesting sounding enough -- overall you're hearing Mo'Wax-style groove, smart samples, and advanced apocalyptic scariness that today's El-P and Cannibal Ox have perfected. Recommended!
Ahh, Finland. We've said that before. Now perhaps people in Finland think about California the way we think about Finland. But of course they'd be wrong. We don't have any analog to Moomins trolling about in our forests. Whereas our fantasies about that far-off land are quite accurate. At least, judging by the ongoing gurgle of cd-rs and tapes and cds and such flowing from their fertile "free-folk" underground, from Kemialliset Ystavat to Avarus to Kiila. And recordings like Lau Nau's Kuutarha just make our fantasies of Finland more and more vivid and otherworldly. Lau Nau is Laura Naukkarinen and a few friends. She's a very lovely singer, a member of Kiila, Paivansade, and Anaksimandros. Here her melodic Finnish-language vocals are set to droneily folkish backing, making for quitely distorted lullabies. Finnophiles will agree that this could also definitely be compared to Islaja, but perhaps rawer, more broken down and abstract. And to make a Finland-California comparison, well, this could basically be a Finnish version of Jewelled Antler's Franciscan Hobbies, with Laura Naukkarien's vocals. So very very nice. (Hmm, which came first? Jewelled Antler or the these Finnish forest folk folks? Doesn't matter, it's the zeitgeist we guess!)
For some reason, we like to look at the list of instruments and non-instruments used on records like these, maybe you do to, so here goes: acoustic bass, bass recorder, five-stringed kantele, acoustic guitar, tenor recorder, violin, bamboo flute, colorful juice glasses, mortar, mandolin, witch laugh megaphone, baby's rattle, bike bells, banjo, cowbells, electric guitar, organ, willow whistle, tablas, percussion, cymbals, comb, beer cans, tamboura...
Lau Nau's Nukuu walks an incredibly fine line between the expansive forms and consistent density and texture of drone music, while also hiding within that density many structural shifts more akin to folk music. Watching her music vibrate between these two poles is the main attraction on this record, but remarkably, she finds an incredible amount of detail and freedom to explore between them. The songs often anchor in centrifugal clusters of tone and texture, looping and feasting on themselves, while occasionally a lyrical vocal passage, or a particularly noteworthy electronic or acoustic phrase will emerge to a more singular position in the mix. Other songs however, are less roiling and give the listener the opportunity to bask in the delicacy and winsome precision in Lau's voice, sometimes creaky and childlike, other times whispered and ghostly. Lau's decisions regarding the modalities and textures of her instrumentation, as well as the cadences of her lyrics, sung in Suomi, all reflect Finland's liminal position between the influences of Europe and Asia. That said, given her lo-fi recording approach at times, she can sound eerily similar to some of the '78s we've been graced with in the past year from Dust-to-Digital's Victrola Favorites and Black Mirror collections. The obvious comparisons to Islaja and Kuupuu, her collaborators in Hertta Lussu Assa, yields Lau a more innocent, gentle, and dare we say motherly distinction, as opposed to the bewitching dark humor of the other two. Without indulging her biography too much, it is worth noting Lau gave birth to a son in the interim since her last album. Apparently much of the record was written while her child was sleeping, and so too it is titled, "sleeps." Naturally it follows that there are a few lullabies in the mix, but there is also a keen sense of independence, as though these songs are about digesting much more than motherhood, a feet in itself. Like another Scandinavian luminary on this list, El Perro Del Mar, Lau butts up against an almost hymnal like intimacy at times, though her work is naturally more feral, and less controlled and crystalline. Fans of all things Finnish will obviously be pleased, but those who've enjoyed Natural Snow Buildings, acts from the Dronevolk compilation, and even Valet will also find themselves gently coaxed into a similar but challenging musical terrain. All told, atmospheric and entrancing, subtle and intelligent, composed and vulnerable, Nukuu comes highly recommended.
So our beloved Finnish singer, Lau Nau (also of Kiila, Paivansade, the Anaksimandros, Avarus, Maailma, and the trio Hertta Lussu Assa - basically most of Finland's underground foresty free folk scene), has moved far away from the drone prevalent on her previous releases, and drifted off into a more spare psych-folk scape. These songs really breathe. Lau's cool and airy vocals fall gently on the mostly piano, jouhikko (a traditional Finnish lyre), and drum arrangements like snow - all the while singing about darkness and death like she's Emily Dickinson. Of particular note is "Run, My Horsey, Run", which has a Gypsy folk influence. Lau's known for her eccentric and vast instrumentation, and this release is no disappointment in that regard. "Conqueror's Song" includes Lau's own beat-boxing (yeah, you read that right), and "Paperthin" credits someone on "seagulls". We're not sure how you play a seagull, but we enjoyed their appearance on this wistful, gloomy, and very pretty release!
Once again fans of Bjork, Lamb, and Portishead will find a kindred spirit in Berlin duo Laub who add their own experimental twists to those female fronted, melodramatic swansingers. Laub (comprised of Antye Greie-Fuchs and Jotka) produce sparse, crisp beats,
Maybe we've become a bit tired of the ubiquitous "obligatory remix album" but in this case Laub's particularly alien reinterpretation of the Portishead / Lamb school of electronica kinda makes us not mind. The surprise to this remix album is its continuity (which is almost always missing on all remix albums) despite having such a diverse cast of remixers as Coldcut, Pole, Richard Thomas, Schneider TM, Clifford Gilberto, Gonzales, Full Swing, Rechenzentrum, Mathias Schaffhauser, Phoneheads, and Blond.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Even more so than their previous album, Laub's electronica is the fusion of Lamb and Bjork. On Kitty-Yo, home to To Rococo Rot.
Slow, low, creeped out ambient experimental Teutonic jazz-noir dronescapes, with brush-stroked drums, sparse, placid piano and deep, deep bass� huh, hmm, remind you of anything? Bohren And Der Club Of Gore, perhaps?? For sure, this is for fans of Bohren And Der Club Of Gore!! Laube are another band, also German, trafficking in a similar, slow-moving style of darkness and drone, equally (or even more) ominous, sinister, and spare. If they hadn't ever heard Bohren before, it's a crazy coincidence. In any case, it's really great stuff, if you're into the Bohren brand of totally atmospheric, downbeat, jazz-tinged "heaviness". Three-piece Laube take that sound to, perhaps, a further extreme, even more stripped down, nodded off, and glacially paced - and, we don't think they never bring in any saxophone, as Bohren are sometimes wont to do, so the sax-adverse might prefer Laube for that reason alone!
The last track on disc one breaks the Bohren mold with some scattershot percussion and buried, distorted vocals (or voices, anyway); and there are some other differences to be found as well of course, but overall the inky black moodiness and less-is-more "doom jazz" aesthetic is very, very Bohren-esque. (Oh, and if YOU haven't heard Bohren, well, needless to say we recommend 'em.)
FYI, this double cd on Small Doses brings together Laube's two previously cassette-only releases, Ausmerzen and Schwach Gerkerbt, limited editions that came out on Justin "Expo 70" Wright's Sonic Mediations label, circa 2009 and 2013, respectively.
All you really need to know about these Oakland sludge/doom merchants is what is being played, and what bands the various members hail from. So, howabout Graves At Sea, Brainoil and Pig Heart Transplant for a heavy low ended pedigree? And what exactly is employed to create this gloriously grim racket? "Overdriven string corrosion, ambient texture and documentation", "battering ram and subsonic transmissions", "low end frequency discharge, vocal disruption and auditory experimentation" and of course "battery acid, bellows and blasphemy". So yeah, you know where these crushers are coming from. Crushing, punishing doom infused sludge, laced with thick black drones and buzzing abject industrial ambience, all blurred into a massive heaving blackened brutal sonic beast.
Beginning with some sort of alien soundscape, until huge sheets of white noise take over, you're not sure if you hear the sounds of a guitar or maybe just overwhelming electronic wind-like sounds, all strange and buzzing and creepy.
Finally, weird little bits of abstract keyboard buzz and drift before the band kicks in. And WHAM, super heavy and sludgey, like black tar heroin, but also Eyehategod groovy; Khanate vokills that almost exude a black metal vibe. Lots of negative space to make things tense and uncomfortable. A second singer bellows in his best Neurosis voice, the perfect foil for the other more high pitched yowl, all tangled up with a cool. but weirdly sour guitar lick, giving the track a much more twisted vibe.
The record slips from crushing doom, to dense blackened rumble and back again, inserting angelic choral vocals, strange blurred electronics, super intense subsonic feedback, the bass thick and gritty and dirty, the sound here, when the band is rocking, is not at all that far removed from Burning Witch or Zoroaster, but the band pepper their sludgy crush with gorgeous black drone interludes, which makes this more of an EP, only one of epic doom-ic proportions, which renders it an EP that just so happens to stretch out to 50 minutes. Bad ass.
Cold wave / new wave / electro pop reissue label Medical Records seem to traffic in the extremely obscure, and it doesn't get more obscure than Laugh Clown Laugh, a UK duo who only ever released a single track! But that track, "Feel So Young", is a killer, a fantastic slab of super catchy synthpop, all skittery programmed rhythms, squelchy synths, lilting melodies, and dreamily crooned vox, the sound very reminiscent of early Depeche Mode and Human League, and that song opens up the proceedings here, and the record finishes with a dub version of the same song, which makes it even cooler. But in between, are 10 songs, previously unreleased, and never heard before now, all restored from the original master tapes, that had been in storage for nearly thirty years! And some of those songs are nearly as good as "Feel So Young", the dirgey, brooding "This Side Of Heaven" is maybe the darkest jam here, and is the sort of track some modern band could and should cover, the strangely titled "Track 14" is a killer chunk of instrumental synth wave, playful and weirdly psychedelic, while "Give It Back" almost sounds like a synthpop Devo, all herky jerky and new wave-y. "Aquarium" almost sounds like John Carpenter of Goblin gone new wave, and "One In The Bush" sounds like Depeche Mode's "Just Can't Get Enough" played by Perrey And Kingsley, and in between, are plenty of electro pop and synth pop gems.
Like all Medical Records releases, this is SUPER LIMITED, and fantastically packaged, a heavy full color sleeve, with a printed full color insert with liner notes, photos and lyrics, the vinyl heavy on 180 gram, and transparent orange!
They say (i.e, the band's own reference points): Radiohead, Tindersticks and Nick Drake. We thought: Talk Talk and Chris Isaak. What seems to be the common ground with all of these artists we've singled out is that regardless of genre and instrumentation each has crafted their own deeply emotive and richly evocative music. So what does this say about Laughingstock? Well, that they do indeed have a knack for making sleek dramatic songs. Multi-layered lilting, oft-melancholic male vocals, distant textural sounds (a rainstick perhaps?), atmospheric droning strings, languid chapman stick, acoustic and programmed percussion all come together to make for some ambitious, lushly intricate slightly mysterious songs.
Another mysterious transmission from some haunted forest deep in the wilds of Finland (featuring special guest, AQ fave Lau Nau). And it's everything we've come to love about our deep listening wanders through the deep dark woods. An abstract stroll through a barely there sound world, nothing but creaks and shuffles, breathing, footsteps, instrument buzz, electronic hum and random clatter. Eventually a wheezing horn makes it presence known, and is soon joined by chiming bells and muted percussion. Slowly, the sounds grow and build in volume and intensity, eventually coalescing into a massive Sunroof! like skree, replete with flurries of bells and percussion, swirling swooshing FX like wild stormy winds and mumbled distant drums. And that's just side 1. Side 2 skips around a bit from caveman freejazz with spazzy hand drums, muted percussion, grunted vocals and jazzy skronk, to an ambient symphony of creaking and keening high end very reminiscent of John Cale, to a weird buzzing raga like Eastern groove with the only discernible rhythm to be found, a droney stumbling stagger. Very cool.
Pressed on thick vinyl and packaged in a full color sleeve with killer yarn monster cover art!
Even with the endless barrage of reissues over the last decade, the music headz here at aQ are still so psyched when something shows up that none of us have heard, or even heard of, only to fall in love with it and wonder where the heck that record had been our whole life?!
Such is the case with this awesome and endearing set of '70s outsider jams from the singularly monikered Laurice, who apparently went on to have a big career and even hit the top of the charts in Canada with some dance-pop and smooth-jazz. But this collection is pre-Canada Laurice, when he was still living in the UK in the '70s and creating seriously infectious proto-punk (and proto-disco!) with a keen pop sensibility and a sweet girl-group like vibe. It seems like you can draw a pretty direct line from many of the early releases on Lookout! to the music of Laurice, which is equal part rock crunch, pop hooks and punk energy. There's doubt Pansy Division would freak the fuck out hearing these songs, and really, if anybody was down with Laurice, it would probably be them! It's not difficult to imagine everyone from The Cramps to B-52's being influenced by these songs, if in fact they ever actually heard them.
Turns out it wasn't just Jobriath who was out and proud in the 70's, cuz Laurice holds nothing back with songs like "He's My Guy" and several tracks like "Born To Serve", "Wild Sugar", and "Rock Hard" that directly reference gay S&M/leather culture. In fact, as much as we love Jobriath (which is a LOT), we find Laurice to be way more up our alley, with sound that at times is totally blown out, raw and fuzzy and would sound right at home right now on Burger records.
Lots of modern groups like Shannon & The Clams, Wand, and Hunx & His Punx also seem sonically (and spiritually) aligned with Laurice, whose tracks do seem like blueprints for the warped garage-pop those groups specialize in. If John Waters were ever to curate a Nuggets-like compilation there's no doubt any and all of the songs here would feature prominently. We could just imagine Divine, in full force, with these songs blasting on the soundtrack. Lots and lots of fun. Plus, the poppy proto-punk of "I'm Gonna Smash Your Face In" and the like is pretty classic even without any campy / gay angle to it.
"60s Italian Cinematic Science Fiction Classic Freaky Sounds" is the subtitle here, truly. Never heard of Angelo Lavagnino or his sci-fi Gamma 1 Quadrilogy before but now we'd love to see these four made-for-TV films, from circa '66-'67: I Diafanoidi Vengono Da Marte (which, the liner notes inform us, is referenced in an Allen Ginsburg poem, believe it or not!), I Criminali Della Galassi, Il Pianeta Errante, and La Morte Viene Dal Pianete Aytin. Films which were known in English, respectively, as War Of The Planets, Wild Wild Planet, War Between The Planets, and Snow Devils -- which, while not literal translations of the Italian titles, should still give you an idea of what sort of action must have been unfolding on the screen. Space operas and alien invasions, that sort of thing, super dramatic and colorful. Of the 31 tracks, almost 70 minutes here, there's a few cuts in the groovy "Easy Tempo" style, but mostly a lot of atmospheric, spooky tracks evoking bug-eyed sci-fi menace. Very cool indeed. Italian soundtracks from the '60s, that's rich ore to mine... and this collection represents a particularily good find.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Guitar/casio mayhem from 2 British freaks.
Bay Area Synthesist Hugo Paris releases his second tape after last year's stunning debut, Mystique Youth. Horizons has a more cosmic ambient feel employing a deep distance traveling quality in structured pieces that belie their improvisational origins. Employing elements of dub, drone, modular pulsations and a cinematic vibe that suggests a narrative arc through the tape, Paris allows his machines to inform his decisions as they run playfully through emotional landscapes of human and synthetic connection. Beautifully done!
For a limited time we have the deluxe package which comes housed in a beautiful black matte paper-constructed box with white obi and raised glow in the dark dot patterns. Both versions come with a download code. Recommended!
