My Cat Is An Alien, the Italian duo of brothers Maurizio and Roberto Opalio, who recently graced the cover of UK new music mag the Wire, are crazy prolific, releasing an amazing number of cd-r's and limited vinyl releases over the years, and in addition, the duo definitely have a thing for collaboration, their discography rife with splits, the From The Earth To The Spheres series, which found the band partnering up with lots of aQ faves: Thuja, Thurston Moore, Jim O'Rourke, Jackie-O Motherfucker, Christian Marclay, among others, then there's this series, the first four of which we have here, originally released as super limited lps, each one housed with an actual original painting done by one of the brothers, but later re-released on cd, and finding the band once again sharing space with some pretty cool outfits: Text Of Light, Steve Roden, Keiji Haino and Mats Gustafsson. These are not however collaborations, instead, each artist took one side of the original lp, with MCIAA doing their thing on the other, the results pretty fantastic.
This one probably doesn't need much of a description at all, as fans of Japanese psych legend / guitar god Keiji Haino tend to be on the obsessive side, and c'mon, how can you resist and exclusive 21 minute track, with the very Haino-esque title: "Whither Goes It? / That Which Canst Not But Be Described / As My Prayer / Nowhere Held In Common / Lunatic, Unknowable". The answer is, you probably can't. Especially if you dig Haino at his most freaky, cuz this track, or series of tracks, finds Haino in full on Merzbow mode, unleashing a furious tripped out torrent of wild blown out sonic tangles, squalls of heavily processed psych weirdness, hard to say whether it's actually guitar, but if it is, Haino has twisted it into something else entirely, the sound super heavy and textured, rife with all manner of fragmented melodies, twisted effects, and crumbling weirdness, at least for the first 12 or 13 minutes, at which point, those sound all disappear, leaving just pounding drums, and Haino, howling maniacally, a strange psychedelic drum vocal dirge, that is soon surrounded by still more clouds of wild psychnoise and twisted effects, the strange FX wreathed drum plod dirge, pounding resolutely to the end of the track, with Haino down there somewhere ranting like some crazed shamen.
The My Cat Is An Alien track is downright tame by comparison, and when played in succession with the first two volumes in the series, and taking note of the similar song titles, reveals itself as a single massive multipart track spread out over these 4 discs, the track here starting off delicately, before quickly exploding into a woozy ambient haze, a thick fog of buzz and shimmer, beneath which chimes tinkle, vocals croon, percussion pounds, again with MCIAA seeming to look to Haino's side for inspiration, a strange shamanistic ritual, the high vocals blurring into the high end drones, creating a strangely hypnotic stretch of soaring Sunroof!-like ur-drone.
WE ONLY HAVE SEVEN COPIES OF THIS, and the label is now defunct, which means, we can not get more of these EVER!
MPEG Stream: MY CAT IS AN ALIEN "Everything Crashes Like Cosmic Debris" [/audio/cd3mciaaeve.m3u]
My Cat Is An Alien, the Italian duo of brothers Maurizio and Roberto Opalio, who recently graced the cover of UK new music mag the Wire, are crazy prolific, releasing an amazing number of cd-r's and limited vinyl releases over the years, and in addition, the duo definitely have a thing for collaboration, their discography rife with splits, the From The Earth To The Spheres series, which found the band partnering up with lots of aQ faves: Thuja, Thurston Moore, Jim O'Rourke, Jackie-O Motherfucker, Christian Marclay, among others, then there's this series, the first four of which we have here, originally released as super limited lps, each one housed with an actual original painting done by one of the brothers, but later re-released on cd, and finding the band once again sharing space with some pretty cool outfits: Text Of Light, Steve Roden, Keiji Haino and Mats Gustafsson. These are not however collaborations, instead, each artist took one side of the original lp, with MCIAA doing their thing on the other, the results pretty fantastic.
On volume four, My Cat Is An Alien continue their multi-part Cosmic Debris epic, unfurling another stretch of hazy vocal driven drift, bits of guitar twang submerged in a sea of looped shimmer, of minimal percussion, of high almost falsetto vocalizations, the sound ethereal and dreamlike, a cloud of twisted effects gradually surfacing and overtaking the sound, until finally, the track becomes a swirling cacophony of clatter and buzz and howl and skree, a dizzying chunk of blown out psychedelia for sure.
MCIAA teamed up with jazz legend Mats Gustafsson, whose track here, is gorgeously restrained, starting off with a hushed low end pulse, which is soon joined by more melodic pulsations, a blurred patchwork of electronic signals, low and high, a fantastically austere sprawl of Raster-Noton like rhythmic minimalism, which waits until the last 5 or 6 minutes to let loose, adding what could be processed horns, but could just as likely be a bank of home brewed effects, the original pulsing electronics now buried beneath a wildly psychedelic barrage of feedback and buzz, rumble and skree. So cool.
WE HAVE ONLY SEVEN COPIES OF THIS, and the label is now defunct, which means, we can not get more of these EVER!
Never managed to get any of these when it first came out, a split picture disc lp with Italian psych folk duo My Cat Is An Alien, and the oddly named Pestrepeller, a duo featuring none other than legendary artist Savage Pencil. The MCIAA side find the brothers Opalio at their noisiest, kicking up a serious din unlike anything we've heard from them, getting downright Merzbowian at times, sheets of high end lots of clatter and clank, there are occasional bits of tranquility amidst the chaos, with looped liquid effects and tangled up faux field recordings, processed vox, and all manner of warped shimmer, but those moments quickly blossom into another gout of blown out psychedelia.
Pestrepeller take the opposite tack, reeling in their noise rock tendencies and unleashing a sidelong sprawl of rumbling drones, blurred guitar dirges, and softly psychedelic ambience. Opening with some thick SUNNO)))-like downtuned churn, wreathed in streaks of feedback, the sound quickly shits and transforms into an industrial thrum, rife with pulsing low end, lush swells of muted crunch and keening fragmented melodies, lots of hum and hiss, haunting and mysterious, an epic soundscape that manages to be musical on its own, but definitely has a distinctly cinematic vibe as well.
Comes in a heavy PVC sleeve sealed with a full color printed sticker. The picture disc features original full color MCIAA art on one side, Savage Pencil on the other. AND WE ONLY HAVE FOUR COPIES OF THIS, the label folded, these are the last copies we'll ever be able to get! If you order it, wouldn't hurt to list an alternate...
My Cat Is An Alien, the Italian duo of brothers Maurizio and Roberto Opalio, who recently graced the cover of UK new music mag the Wire, are crazy prolific, releasing an amazing number of cd-r's and limited vinyl releases over the years, and in addition, the duo definitely have a thing for collaboration, their discography rife with splits, the From The Earth To The Spheres series, which found the band partnering up with lots of aQ faves: Thuja, Thurston Moore, Jim O'Rourke, Jackie-O Motherfucker, Christian Marclay, among others, then there's this series, the first four of which we have here, originally released as super limited lps, each one housed with an actual original painting done by one of the brothers, but later re-released on cd, and finding the band once again sharing space with some pretty cool outfits: Text Of Light, Steve Roden, Keiji Haino and Mats Gustafsson. These are not however collaborations, instead, each artist took one side of the original lp, with MCIAA doing their thing on the other, the results pretty fantastic.
On volume two, My Cat Is An Alien seem to be composing with their 'collaborator' in mind, their sound definitely reminiscent of Steve Roden's minimal field recording / found sound / soundscaping in mind, at least initially, although MCIAA's take is much more raw and primitive, lots of creaks, and random room noise, mysterious about-to-crack vocalizing, the tinkling chiming of what sounds like a tiny xylophone, brief fragmented bits of melody, eventually blossoming into a swirling morass of groaning guitars, warm sweeps of melodic shimmer, plenty of murky industrial buzz, layered and droney, and again slipping into that sort of abstract trip out we can't get enough of, like Avarus meets No Neck Blues Band�
Steve Roden offers up two tracks, both as always hushed and lovely, the first a lengthy bit of minimal dronemusic, peppered with percussive thumps, and wreathed in short wave broadcasts, while the main drone, ebbs and flows, funereal and stately, a dark smoldering drift, that is gorgeously minimal and meditative. While the second, shorter track, finds Roden essentially playing guitar, a lovely bit of folky minimalism, the notes glistening, warm and lustrous, multiple melodies intertwined, unfurling gradually and dreamily, eventually joined by the buzz of a recorded voice, as if recorded on an old microcassette recorded, which soon pulls the guitar itself into that otherworld, the sound transformed into something tinny and barely there, as if it were some intercepted broadcast, delicate and mysterious.
WE ONLY HAVE SEVEN COPIES OF THIS, and the label is now defunct, which means, we can not get more of these EVER!
My Cat Is An Alien, the Italian duo of brothers Maurizio and Roberto Opalio, who recently graced the cover of UK new music mag the Wire, are crazy prolific, releasing an amazing number of cd-r's and limited vinyl releases over the years, and in addition, the duo definitely have a thing for collaboration, their discography rife with splits, the From The Earth To The Spheres series, which found the band partnering up with lots of aQ faves: Thuja, Thurston Moore, Jim O'Rourke, Jackie-O Motherfucker, Christian Marclay, among others, then there's this series, the first four of which we have here, originally released as super limited lps, each one housed with an actual original painting done by one of the brothers, but later re-released on cd, and finding the band once again sharing space with some pretty cool outfits: Text Of Light, Steve Roden, Keiji Haino and Mats Gustafsson. These are not however collaborations, instead, each artist took one side of the original lp, with MCIAA doing their thing on the other, the results pretty fantastic.
MCIAA offer up a sprawling bit of abstract primitivism, sounding like Avarus or Anaksimandros, lots of rhythmic clatter, instrumental haze, swirling heavily effected vocals, looped and sent spinning into a tripped out bit of foresty free folk weirdness, their are squalls of spacey FX, birdcall like trills, almost like some strange field recording, but the group layer and blur those sounds and build them into a strange Sunroof!-y sort of high end crystalline ur-drone, still shot through with murky muted melodies and tribal clatter.
On this installment, NYC outfit Text Of Light, featuring Lee Ranaldo of Sonic Youth, Alan Licht and others, counter with their own bit of clattery drift, theirs a bit more dense and abstract jazzy, like a supercharged, noisier Necks, the percussion wild and frantic, underneath heaving layers of buzz and thrum, and the occasional wailed vocal buried in the mix, the sound seeming to mellow out as the track progresses, dialing back the noise, replacing it with clouds of blurred feedback, and the occasional clatter of junkyard percussion, the sound very soundtracky, which makes sense, as if memory serves, this group was formed to do just that, accompany films with a new improvised score. Cool stuff. Sadly, WE ONLY HAVE SEVEN COPIES OF THIS, and the label is now defunct, which means, we can not get more of these EVER!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
It seems sort of weird to love My Dad Is Dad and not love Husker Du. The sound is similar, the voice is uncanny, even the melodies bear a striking resemblance to the 'Du. But there's something about Mark Edwards and his long running project that resonates in a way Husker Du never did for me. And the magic ingredient is... misery. Absolute, abject hopelessness. From the band name, to Edwards' impetus for starting the band, to the lyrics, it's all just so bleak and sad. But it's the sound, the song structure, the way the minor key jangle and strangely tangled guitar lines intertwine with Edwards' plaintive whine. It's almost like a Husker Du 45 at 33. The tempos rarely exceed a sort of shuffling lope, and more often than not songs trudge along head bowed hands in pockets, with a world weariness that is absolutely compelling. But even when the tempo does crank up, it's not so much 'fast' or 'punky' as it is a kind of careening out of control toward the inevitable fall, be it disappointment or death. This is most definitely indie rock, guitars jangle, bass throbs, drums crash and bang, but here, that usually sunshiney jangle, is rife with mournful miserablism, and each song a dark and doomy indie rock road map of broken promises, unfulfilled fantasies and dashed dreams.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
After a long wait comes one of Mark Edwards' best records in years!
Completing our library of cult filmmaker Jon Moritsugu's flicks he's self-released on dvd (at least as of June 2011... we're sure there'll be more to come, since he's currently working on a new film!) is this early one from 1989. It was Moritsugu's first feature length freakout! Shot on 16mm, this trashy, kitschy, ultra lo-fi, truly underground film features a fictitious female rock trio, but its cast also includes a real pig's head. Super DIY, super strange, garish and fun! With music from Bongwater, Halo Of Flies, Vomit Launch, and Gov't Issue.
And while we're diggin' '80s movies about awesome punk rawk girl groups, definitely also check out Ladies And Gentlemen, The Fabulous Stains. A film from 1981 which often gets mentioned in the same breath as this one by indie flick aficionados. Much to Cup's delight it also finally got released on dvd a couple years ago, and we've got it in stock now too!
Now in stock on compact disc, too! The first we'd heard from Australia's My Disco was on their split 7" with Young Widows, their track a killer slab of dour post punk noise rock, all lope and chug and minor key guitars, which is how Little Joy starts out, all clanging riffage, low slung bass, simple propulsive drumming, mantra like vocals, a bit like a dronier spacier Interpol maybe, their sound repetitive and cyclical, peppered with jagged shards of caustic guitar crunch. But it's on the second track, "Young", where the band's unique sound really gets to blossom, after another opening blast of minor key post rock, with cascading This Heat like guitars, and pounding motorik drumming, the band eventually slip into something way more rhythmic and sinewy and mesmerizing, sounding almost like a punk rock Necks, the band unfurling an epic sprawl of minimal hypnorock, the instrumentation super restrained, more about the rhythm, and the timbre, then the melody, the sound at once heavy, rhythmic and hypnotic, reminding us of a way more abstract Circle, locked tight, peppering the looped groove with little flurries of extra drumming, super subtle bits of melodic filligree, but for the most part holding the listener in thrall with their trancelike mastery of tension and NO release. Which is how the whole record plays out, a push and pull between more traditional sounding post punk jangle and clang, and totally mesmeringly minimal droned out repetition, either on their own would certainly be pleasing enough, but the two combined, create something much more that the sum of it's parts, the rare sort of record that should appeal as much to math rockers as post punkers, or to krautrockers as much as pop kids. So good.
The first we'd heard from Australia's My Disco was on their split 7" with Young Widows, their track a killer slab of dour post punk noise rock, all lope and chug and minor key guitars, which is how Little Joy starts out, all clanging riffage, low slung bass, simple propulsive drumming, mantra like vocals, a bit like a dronier spacier Interpol maybe, their sound repetitive and cyclical, peppered with jagged shards of caustic guitar crunch. But it's on the second track, "Young", where the band's unique sound really gets to blossom, after another opening blast of minor key post rock, with cascading This Heat like guitars, and pounding motorik drumming, the band eventually slip into something way more rhythmic and sinewy and mesmerizing, sounding almost like a punk rock Necks, the band unfurling an epic sprawl of minimal hypnorock, the instrumentation super restrained, more about the rhythm, and the timbre, then the melody, the sound at once heavy, rhythmic and hypnotic, reminding us of a way more abstract Circle, locked tight, peppering the looped groove with little flurries of extra drumming, super subtle bits of melodic filigree, but for the most part holding the listener in thrall with their trancelike mastery of tension and NO release. Which is how the whole record plays out, a push and pull between more traditional sounding post punk jangle and clang, and totally mesmeringly minimal droned out repetition, either on their own would certainly be pleasing enough, but the two combined, create something much more that the sum of it's parts, the rare sort of record that should appeal as much to math rockers as post punkers, or to krautrockers as much as pop kids. So good.
(Not just on vinyl, cds coming back in soon...)
I, Sadie, am reviewing this record as a devout fan of goth music and soundtracks, who is not that knowledgeable or interested in metal. The name My Dying Bride intrigued me, and I find that their music does too -- the songs are long and gloomy, with beautiful
British heavy gloom metallers return to their roots, abandoning their flirtations with '90s radio-friendly goth rock, and instead creating a great album of doom-death metal of the sort that made them famous in the first place.
Okay, so I (Cup) will admit that I didn't 'get' the name of this artist for a few days. Duh! Felt like a bit of a dimwit when it had to be explained to me. Ah well. The tracks on On Milk Beast's Lullaby (am I missing some clever wordplay there too???) sound nothing like their creator's namesake. Actually they give a more ample nod to electronic kingpins such as Aphex Twin, Mu-ziq and Autechre. M.K.J.O. aka lone technician Chris Doria has crafted an engaging debut album of driving drum'n'bass tracks contrasted with plenty of somber, creeping synth melodies.
Two discs worth of scruffy, rootsy, bluesy country-rock from a Louisville, KY band led by the young-Neil-Young vocal stylings of Jim James. Often slow and meandering, these recordings reverberate with an echo-y, cavernous, old hall feel. Very atmospheric,
Chapter One: The Sandworm Cometh is one of two new My Morning Jacket collections of previously unreleased early tracks and rarities. We think we should forewarn you, with just one in-store play under its belt, this cd has already triggered some very hot and cold responses... and it's all hinging on how folks feel about MMJ's cover versions. It's apparent from these recordings (many of them recorded on a four-track) that even early on the MMJ sound was characterized by a drenching of abandoned ballroom/cathedral-esque reverb applied to Jim James' unstable, yelp-moaned vocals and the band's warm rootsy twang. That's all fine 'n' dandy, but this compilation is filled with many off-the-cuff covers of songs such as "White Rabbit" and "Rocket Man". Their renditions sorta seem like a more unkempt and countrified Flaming Lips that left some eyebrows raised and others furrowed around here. While we certainly wouldn't question the band's love for the songs, we wonder if their versions actually do the ol' Elton and the 'Airplane a disservice. Unfortunately the line's pretty blurred these days between a band playing a 'different-genred' song out of sincere joy and love of that song and a band simply covering it to be clever/ironic/weird. It sorta seems like MMJ tend to lean towards the latter. Okay, now that I'm done railing against their covers, allow me to say that if you can sidestep those, uh, boobytraps (that is, unless you don't wanna!), you might discover the best moments on this cd are the ones in which the band lightens up on the reverb a bit and lets their own achingly lovely songs shine through (check out "Weeks Go By Like Days" and "When Will They Come").
My Morning Jacket's covers cavalcade continues on Chapter Two: Learning, the second of their two new collections of old rarities and previously unreleased tracks. And once again, if you can make your way through their '80s kick, you'll be rewarded with their own wonderful originals.
This time they take a whack at Berlin's "Take My Breath Away". It's sorta like if the Flaming Lips got really drunk and got the not-so-bright idea to churn out a soggy, atonal rendition of the theme from Top Gun. Then they plug away at the Pet Shop Boys' "West End Girls" followed by "Dream A Lil' Dream". Uh oh. On those songs, Jim James' droopy lilting voice is endearing for a little while, then it gradually verges on grating. Oddly, at some point late in the proceedings his voice shifts from sounding a lot like Wayne Coyne to sounding a lot like Will Oldham and the music follows suit. Once again, this release drew rather extreme feedback from those present while this was played in the store. Some folks groaned, some chuckled uncomfortably and some simply fell silent. Let's put it this way, if AQ was the Gong Show, we suspect the cover songs would've been gonged repeatedly already... and we think Jamie Farr, Arte Johnson and Jaye P. Morgan would probably agree. Much like on Chapter One, this compilation's high points are the band's own songs such as the thirteenth track "I Will Be There When You Die". Omigod, sooo fragile and heartbreakingly beautiful and well worth wading through MMJ's '80s selections to get to!
Here's a reissue of My Morning Jacket's Chocolate And Ice 6-song cdep! When it was originally released back in 2002, we had this to say...
Of the half dozen tracks, the standout is the unexpected 24-minute "Cobra". Although the rest of the songs do still retain My Morning Jacket's wonderful, shadowy, lonesome twang, this track is a refreshing change allowing the band to diverge from their usual path. With much less of a rootsy rock feel, it leans more heavily on a smoky blues guitar sound. From an almost funky groove, it dissolves into a lovely drone and returns to the more familiar somber country-folkish mood. Mainman Jim James subtly shifts his vocal delivery too, veering from his usual Neil Young-ish nasality to an almost Damo Suzuki (of Can) drowsy murmurred uttering. Quite effective. An added note, the items in the title made for a very cool textured cover image... although we'd bet someone was bummed that they spilled all that choco-syrup.
Is it just us, or have the smouldering coals been rather aggressively stoked in My Morning Jacket's ol' iron potbelly stove? From the get-go, their third full length It Still Moves pushs forth with much gusto. Still deeply enmeshed with the darkest yearnings and driven by an unyielding torment, Jim James and co's newest effort (and their first for RCA) draws together all the shining elements of Neil Young's folk-rock eccentricities, Uncle Tupelo's hybrid pop and country, and Tim Buckley's soaring impassioned vocals. It seems they've relinquished most of the slow, haunted atmospherics of past releases in favor of boot stompin' exorcisms of whiskey toting demons. And although we quite liked the former, gotta say, we just might prefer this new fiery My Morning Jacket. At any rate, this is a mighty good example of ass-kicking, fully fleshed out country rock.
Wow! Assuming that the My Morning Jacket production crew didn't do much doctoring up on the original live recordings (hey, it's not an uncommon procedure!), their rootsy pop rock orchestrations come across splendidly well from the stage, and likewise the ecstatic response from the audience. Regardless of possible post-recording tweaks and embellishments, this is an excellent sounding live concept album. It's a super pleasurable MMJ listening experience that, yes, does almost make you feel like you were there in person. Gaze at the back cover photo of the band performing on stage in a lush foresty setting, and you'll wish you really were.
Jim James' vocals are captivatingly on his trademark emotional brink, and the rest of the band deliver the delicious harmonies. The awesome rhythm section of Two-Tone Tommy and Patrick Hallahan keep many a toe tapping and head bobbing in the crowd. James and Carl Broemel's raw and full electric guitars raise the hairs on the back of your neck, while Bo Koster's keyboards and Broemel's saxophone meld it all together. Dare we say Okonokos surpasses any of the band's previous studio albums in both its breadth and vitality? Indeed we do! It finds the band making themselves right at home at the crossroads of Uncle Tupelo, Coldplay and Flaming Lips -- extending a welcoming hand to their broadest audience to date -- and that seems to be a fine place to be. Recommended!
On their latest, already very warmly received full length Z, My Morning Jacket have fallen even closer in line with the David Fridmann produced grand pop theatrics of groups such as Flaming Lips, Sparklehorse and Mercury Rev. Their sound has become more sumptuous and far less distinctly 'rock' or 'country' than on their past releases, almost as though they'd set a soft focus lens on the proceedings. Still very shadowy and deeply melancholic though. Although John Leckie and MMJ's mainman Jim James have done a fine job mixing and producing these ten songs, it's hard not to try imagining what they'd sound like with Fridmann in the producer's seat. Beautiful!
Four songs from My Morning Jacket and an almost ten minute long track by Songs: Ohia. The former includes a kinda dorky, messing-with-the-speed-control track called "The Year In Review" as well as a couple of numbers that fans of Sparklehorse might take a shine to - most notably the beautiful weeper "Come Closer". And as for Songs: Ohia's lengthy "Translation", it's completely on par with their recent efforts... that is, a brittle, lonely dolefulness that mainman Jason Molina has refined over his prolific career.
Not new, but we've been fans of this record for years and had never reviewed it, in part 'cause in recent years stuff on the Second Battle label has been notoriously difficult to stock consistently. But one of our suppliers just managed to score a batch of these so we saw our opportunity to write it up for those of you as yet uninitiated into the krautrock awesomeness of My Solid Ground. How awesome is that? Well, the very first track is called "Dirty Yellow Mist" and is over 13 minutes long, featuring a relentlessly repeating distorted guitar riff ceremonially intoning over and over and over as wordless female vocals, droning organ and tribal percussion build up around it. If you're like, "cool!" then this record is for you, it's as good as that sounds. This 1971 (aha, 1971! says Allan) album exemplifies druggy, downer spaced-out psych, being very reminiscent of Pink Floyd circa Meddle (another awesome album that we really should properly review some day!) and Amon Duul II -- along with other krautrockers like Siloah, Necronomicon, Agitation Free and early Guru Guru. And the Floyd feel isn't just 'cause of the cartoon pigs that adorn the cover art either. But there's also a side to the band that's more along the lines of garagey hard rock, with several Kinks-riffed attacks to shake your shack. As primitive heaviness goes, this is a classic. Hazy and weighty and often ominous (check out the mumbling vocals on "The Executioner"). Includes seven bonus tracks (the original 24 minute version of "Flash" not least among them), and comes packaged in a swank digipack.
Released on the same label that put out the Starfuckers compilation Ordine '91-'96, one of our Records Of The Week this week, this collection of eps from Italian/British shoegaze dreampop duo My Violent Ego couldn't be more far removed from the gnarled experimental noise rock of the Starfuckers. MVE instead traffic in heavily processed, washed out effects drenched shimmer, dreamy abstract pop drift, and hushed ethereal pop ambience. 4AD loosed from its more traditional song like structures, the sounds allowed to float freely, blurred clouds of tangled melody, hushed angelic voices, looped melodic mesmer stretched into dreamy droned out drifts of ephemeral dreampop, many of the tracks here mere fragments, but even in fragmented form, so breathlessly lovely.
We knew the name My Violent Ego was familiar, but we couldn't quite remember why, but then it came to us, they were one of the bands who accused black metallers Velvet Cacoon of plagiarism! Remember those rumors of an unreleased VC demo that supposedly consisted of mostly borrowed/stolen music made by other people? The Velvet Cacoon folks copped to it too, admitting to being a total fraud, but knowing VC, it's hard to tell whether they're ever being genuine or always taking the piss, but finally hearing MVE it's easy to hear why Velvet Cacoon might be tempted, slather on a little black buzz, and this stuff would make the most divine and dreamily druggy black metal bliss, the sounds already warm and fuzzy, woozy and washed out, even a bit witch housey, the arrangements looped and circular, slipping from fully realized jangle pop drift, to blurred and smeared impressionistic shoegaze ambience, often melding the two, into some of the dreamiest dreampop we've heard.
There's definitely an old school Eighties vibe, but the band infuse their jangly drift with enough experimentalism that many of these tracks sound more like something you might hear on Touch or Kompakt than 4AD, taking single riffs, or simple loops, and treating them, dousing them in effects, and stretching them out into hushed expanses of mesmeric shimmer. So so nice. And so so totally recommended.
Also on vinyl, not cheap, but it is a cool soundtrack...
Here's a lost classic "psycho-symphonic film score" brought to you by the same rare psych vinyl obsessed treasure-hunters (Finders Keepers and Delay 68) that brought us such gems as the Yamasuki Singers and Jean-Claude Vannier reissues, and the Prog Is Not A Four Letter Word, Folk Is Not A Four Letter Word and Welsh Rare Beat comps! This previously unreleased soundtrack to a UK thriller from 1972 starring Oliver Reed, Edward Woodward and Jill St. John was written, composed, arranged and produced by the late Stanley Myers, already an accomplished film composer in '72 though his breakthrough success came in 1978 with his score for The Deer Hunter. For years people have been trying to get their hands on a copy of the music he recorded for Sitting Target but try as they might they found nothing because there was no copy ever in print...until now. Finders Keepers got ahold of the original quarter inch reels to make this forward-thinking, sometimes fuzzed out, eclectic orchestral soundtrack available in stores for the first time. With ominous strings, spacey guitar, and groovy chase-scene tension, this is simply great stuff, the kind of sounds you know lots of good hip-hop/electronic producers would love to get their hands all over to sample. DJ Shadow may or may not have ever heard this before, but it sure sounds like something he'd have happily woven into Endtroducing someplace” we also keep thinking of the similarities in sound and style to the great David Axelrod retrospective we listed recently. Sitting Target was apparently the first British movie to be rated "R" and Myers was just the right man to make the seductive and suspense-inducing sounds to accompany it. Andy Votel's typically well-written and researched liner notes speak of how, in the musical career of Stanley Myers, the "Swinging Sixites" gave way to the "Sinister Seventies"” definitely exemplified by this moody, broody, but action-packed soundtrack! At only a little over twenty minutes we just wish there was more!
Here's a lost classic "psycho-symphonic film score" brought to you by the same rare psych vinyl obsessed treasure-hunters (Finders Keepers and Delay 68) that brought us such gems as the Yamasuki Singers and Jean-Claude Vannier reissues, and the Prog Is Not A Four Letter Word, Folk Is Not A Four Letter Word and Welsh Rare Beat comps! This previously unreleased soundtrack to a UK thriller from 1972 starring Oliver Reed, Edward Woodward and Jill St. John was written, composed, arranged and produced by the late Stanley Myers, already an accomplished film composer in '72 though his breakthrough success came in 1978 with his score for The Deer Hunter. For years people have been trying to get their hands on a copy of the music he recorded for Sitting Target but try as they might they found nothing because there was no copy ever in print...until now. Finders Keepers got ahold of the original quarter inch reels to make this forward-thinking, sometimes fuzzed out, eclectic orchestral soundtrack available in stores for the first time. With ominous strings, spacey guitar, and groovy chase-scene tension, this is simply great stuff, the kind of sounds you know lots of good hip-hop/electronic producers would love to get their hands all over to sample. DJ Shadow may or may not have ever heard this before, but it sure sounds like something he'd have happily woven into Endtroducing someplace” we also keep thinking of the similarities in sound and style to the great David Axelrod retrospective we listed recently. Sitting Target was apparently the first British movie to be rated "R" and Myers was just the right man to make the seductive and suspense-inducing sounds to accompany it. Andy Votel's typically well-written and researched liner notes speak of how, in the musical career of Stanley Myers, the "Swinging Sixites" gave way to the "Sinister Seventies"” definitely exemplified by this moody, broody, but action-packed soundtrack! At only a little over twenty minutes we just wish there was more!
Our buddy Myles has finally managed to get us some new music, after we sent him money months and months ago. Good thing too. We were getting ready to crack some skulls. His previous cd, which we had a while back, was a sort-of lo-fi, bedroom recorded, queer positive metal. All made with just cello, bass and drums. No guitar. Weird concept but it really worked. So Myles is back. The
Our buddy Myles and his "Of Destruction" band Tony and Audrey return with their first proper full length (still a cd-r but professionally printed). We raved about their first two cd-r's and this one is EVEN BETTER! Just drums, violin and bass, NO GUITARS! MoD whip up a wild and totally unique gypsy-stomp / grind metal / Ruins-ish rhythmic workout with growled gutteral black metal vocals, grinding distorted bass and wildy melodic violin. In the past we compared MoD to a mix of the Warlock Pinchers, Atom And His Package, Metallica, Emperor, and the Magnetic Fields. We also compared them to a more metal Amps For Christ, but as their sound progresses and they get tighter and better, their sound veers in a much more folky/gypsy direction, due mostly to the amazing violin parts, and the humor seems to have taken a back seat to the music, which is a GOOD thing. Think: a black metal Taraf De Haidouks, or Samla Mammas Manna playing selections from the Brutal Truth catalog! Really fucking great!
Myles of Destruction is a one man (well sometimes two man) band from Philadelphia, who play a sort of lo-fi, bedroom recorded, queer positive, metal. Sort of. Thanks to Brian Turner at WFMU for turning us on to this. Just vocals, bass, drum machine, and occasional cello (the sleeve exclaims: 'NO GUITARS USED ON THIS RECORDING') collide haphazardly to make a super aggressive, super bizarre, metallic, and ultra dorky weirdness. Think, maybe, Warlock Pinchers, Atom and his Package, Metallica, Emperor, and the Magnetic Fields...all at the same time. Cool and bizarre and decidedly fucked. Includes a 'metal' version of Cyndi Lauper's 'She Bop'. Now the Aquarius fantasy 'Monsters of Metal' festival would feature Metallica Drummer, Anton Maiden, Carnival in Coal, and Myles of Destruction!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
New Norwegian death/black metal band hyped as a cross between Morbid Angel and Emperor. Well, they're on Emperor's label and Samoth from Emperor is even quoted on the cover sticker as saying: "Myrkskog kicks ass!". How cool is that? They must have been stoked. And, Samoth tells no lie: Myrkskog are the real deal. Super intense shit!
With the new Myrmyr album we'll be briefer than we would like to be because it's incredibly good, but super limited. We have 10 copies and only 250 have been made, so we're not sure we can get more, so act fast! The stunning vinyl debut of these two former Mills College music grads, Marielle Jakobsons (Date Palms, Darwinsbitch) and Agnes Szelag, was recorded during a snowstorm on Shasta Mountain. We were smitten with their first release, The Amber Sea, and here on Fire Star, they have honed down their focus of post-classical orchestrations into a more finely textured array of nuance and mood. It's hard to tell who is doing what. It sometimes sounds like there are a dozen players performing, or it could be a lavish manipulation of tape loops and electronics, but the effect is quite beautiful. Starting out with plucked strings and bell tones that eventually melt feverishly into intense drones that smolder and swell revealing hidden passages of lush orchestrations that slip seamlessly in and out of the aural field. Four tracks of gorgeous mesmerizing beauty. Don't Hesitate!
Not to be confused with the field recordist Murmer or the improv-drone Murmur or even the dubstep Murmur, this Myrmyr hails from Oakland and features Marielle Jakobsons (aka Darwinsbitch) and Agnes Szelag. Together they present fragmented orchestrations of post-classical arrangements alongside minimalist avant-folk gestures and a restrained use of electronics. Strings of all sorts are central to Myrmyr, whether that be cello, violin, cymbalon, harp, or ukulele, as they compose elongated passages which billow out of a cinematic post-classical sensibility and blossom into occasional shanty arrangements which allude to Baltic folk traditions. In moving between the more academic aspects and more folk stylizations, Myrmyr also incorporate male and female vocals into their arrangements. The occasional use of clanking bells and playful clatter of objects does offer some parallels to a few of a more abstract elements of the Finnish freakfolk community, but more often than not, Myrmyr's studied compositions glide more towards the work of Hildur Gudnadottir and Max Richter, rather than Lau Nau. Very nicely done!
Not our favorite Current 93 related release ever, despite the presence of James Blackshaw here along with C93's David Tibet.
The latest from UK psych rock label Cardinal Fuzz, and the first we've heard from UK psych garage kosmonauts The Myrrors, who like many of their labelmates, deliver long, smoldering sprawls of hazy, distorted drift, and slow burn motorik space rock! All four of the tracks here are built from a simple bass and drums groove, some extremely slow, some with a little swagger, over which guitars swoop and soar, the sound occasionally so blown out and in the red (like on "Escape Attempt") that you can hear the it peak and crunch, only adding to the heady / heavy vibe, a little bit Spacemen 3 for sure, but via Hawkwind, no real proper 'songs' to speak of, just extreme, and extremely stoney-y jammage of the highest order. The first track may only clock in at 7 minutes, but it feels like it could have been 70, same with the 11+ minute follow up, slowly unwinding, epic wasted zoner psych that seems to billow ever outward, like some slow motion time lapse film of a sonic mushroom cloud, slowly and gradually enveloping everything in its path, we the listeners letting ourselves get sucked under. "Ascension" adds some organ, a whirring droned out shimmer, beneath clouds of cymbal sizzle and deconstructed riffage, when the sound coalesces into song, it's a drone-y dirge, a hazy, murky, moody plod, pulsing amidst streaks and shards of fuzz guitar and crumbling distortion, the organ giving it a sort of liturgical vibe, at least until the final track, an epic nearly 15 minute slow groove, that sounds a bit like Can crossed with the Velvet Underground, but then revved up, and doused in distortion. An endless psych sprawl, that is all low slung and a little bit murky and moody, and the sort of thing that we've taken to calling BVNKVRFVNK. Bunkurfunk. Bunker funk. Which obviously means WAY recommended!
As with all Cardinal Fuzz stuff, SUPER LIMITED, and while we likely can get more when we run out, they come from overseas, so it might take a couple weeks to restock...
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
A while back we reviewed a cd called Siamese Temple Ball. A truly mysterious disc, with very little in the way of liner notes or any information really, but a record that we all became a little obsessed with and thus listened to it NONstop. We sold tons of copies too.
Then recently, we get a new batch of records from the always amazing Mississippi Records, and one of the records is entitled simply Mysterious Thai LP. So of course we're intrigued. We throw it on, and lo and behold, it's the very same record. Siamese Temple Ball, now on vinyl.
Not sure how this happened, if it was random, or if as we posited back in the day, that maybe Siamese Temple Ball was not actually music from Thailand, but an incredibly well played homage by some Sun City Girls-like worshippers of Eastern musical tradition. Hardly matters, the music is fantastic, wild, emotional, dense, joyous and yes, very very mysterious.
The cd version featured a sticker that proclaimed in faux pidgen English: "Flight comes to Thailand in the Year of the Rat. Siamese Temple Ball provide the lilting soundtrack for a chemical journey. Schoolgirls dance bashfully for the expectant throng. Life continues at a comparatively slow pace away from the rigours of fierce sun-light." Which was then followed by the (label's) description: "In the tradition of Sun City Girls, Ya Ho Wha 13, The Spacious Mind, Taj Mahal Travellers, Mu, Word of Life, Group 1850, and Ghost, Siamese Temple Ball give maximum pleasure for thirsty brains."
Quite a roster of comparisons, the most fitting of which is definitely the Sun City Girls. So while we assume that this record was recorded by a group of precocious, dilettante, ethnomusicologist hipsters, we like to suspend our disbelief and imagine this to be a genuine Folkways-style field recording, as the recording certainly has a genuine field recording presence - a single stereo microphone in a good location. The music itself is a catchy and mesmerizing steady pulse of various and sundry percussion instruments (metal, wood, skin), hollers, yelps, and rococo melodic lines spun out by tinny electric guitars, xylophones, flutes and Khan (mouth organ.) And besides all that, it's really pretty great!
The Mississippi lp version has all new artwork, even more mysterious than the cd, housed in a thick matte finish sleeve, with NO information at all, not even on the lp labels. We're not sure in what capacity, but it was apparently put out in conjunction with Exiled - also from Portland - another great record store. So recommended. And of course, probably WAY too limited...
Pleasurehorse is one Shawn Greenlee, rhythmic power electronics maestro with one previous disc on Vermiform as well as the excellent "Dropdead: Reconstructed" 12" on Load, currently on bass duties in the newly reformed Six Finger Satellite. Think Merzbow with beats. Mystery Brinkman aka Mr. Brinkman (duh) used to be in Providence duo Forcefield (remember their split 7" with
Yes, Mystic Forest indeed -- this French, one-man black metal act even has songs entitled "Eternal Myst", "Mysterious Flowers", and (the best one) "Theme Of The Squirrel", an instrumental! The sound of water burbling in a brook and birds twittering in the trees first greet the listener, before the filthy distortion kicks in. Make no mistake, this is a black metal, not new age record, with a full-on-fuzz attack that's worthy of Burzum. And, despite the drone quotient inherent to this style of black metal, Mystic Forest really ROCKS, urgently so, something we don't usually expect in this genre. Baroque keyboards, frantic drum programming, ragged gasping vox, and as we said, FUZZ. This 1999 release is the first of two albums from Mystic Forest, whose mastermind S. Kozak has also released a very similar sounding opus under the band name Eikenskaden (with even more ridiculous song titles, and equally great songs). So far, this is the only one of 'em we've been able to get in stock at Aquarius, but we're trying our best to bring in the other S. Kozak discs as well, 'cause we've become rabid converts to his brand of black metal weirdness.
Ah...romance. Candlelight, red wine, roses...and Mystic Forest's black metal? Fuzzed out, depressive guitars and keyboards, blasting drums, and rasping vocals. So romantic! Well, there's also sometimes a woman whispering (in French, of course, the language of romance and also 'cause Mystic Forest are from France) and the keyboards are a bit accordion-like and there's also some gentle, classical-sounding piano, all recumbent in a warm bed of distortion. And being slow to mid-tempo and minor key, this Romance is rather sad, as some romances are... It's like Burzum plus Katatonia plus the music in a French restaurant! As you might already know, here at Aquarius we heart Mystic Forest, along with the related (and marginally less romantic) band Eikenskaden, and so this "limited edition" fourth album from them has us swooning.
3rd and latest album from S. Kozak's Mystic Forest. If you liked their Green Hell album you'll like this. Mystic Forest is somewhat "happier" sounding than Kozak's Eikenskaden stuff, but really quite similar and thus totally wacked and excellent. See the review of Eikenskaden's The Last Danse (also on this list) for more about the Kozak sound. His classical influence is really pronounced here, not just an influence really as many of the songs are in fact "collaborations" between Kozak and Beethoven, Bach, Schubert, or Tchaikovsky! Dunno if those composers would have appreciated the violent drums and brutal distortion however. Or the gothy, fetishistic subject matter either, for that matter. But it works for us, along with the occasional French female vocals. Mystic Forest is a "Beauty and the Beast" kind of thing, and really really over the top with it too.
MPEG Download: "Tandis Que Les Arbres Regandent" [/audio/mystictandis.mp3]
This is John Zorn and "Yamantaka" Eye (Boredoms).
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
This "mystic crew" are an all-instrumental New Orleans Southern stoner rock supergroup of sorts, with members of the already incestous acts Eyehategod, Down, and Crowbar. Featuring good ol' '70s style Hammond organ, this is definitely more on the havin' fun psych-jam side of the stoner spectrum than the doom-death-dirge side. They take their New Orleans roots seriously, too, as much of this has a festive Mardi Gras vibe, kinda funky like they've been alternating Meters LPs with the Sabbath, Skynrd, and Floyd on their turntable. This disc is no stranger to mellowness, either, with some spacey moments when you can contemplate the Tibetan wisdom explained in the liner notes, before the jams get kicked out yet again in righteous fashion. Cool.
One of a handful of new releases from Small Doses, a micro-label that is quickly becoming one of our favorites, every disc both sonically and visually stunning.
This one is from a group/person called Mystified, the sound is a shimmering dark ambience, crafted from haunting drones and processed electronics. Mysterious metallic reverberations, soft industrial whir, abstract almost-melodies, insectoid buzz, smears of muted crackle, and crumbling distorted hiss, deep rumbles, reverbed percussion, thick squalls of slowed down grinding digital glitch, soft billowing clouds of gauzy low end smear, each track a single sound, or series of sounds, stretched and blurred into long streaks of gorgeous and ominous dark minimalism. Dreamy drones, soft focus blackened rituals, post industrial clatter, raga like buzz, expansive high end skree, all very subtle, haunting, mysterious and strangely pretty.
More super cool packaging, a thick printed card, with a printed textured diamond glued to the front, so one half of the diamond folds over and holds the cd in place. Each cd is hand numbered on the underside of the diamond, LIMITED TO 88 COPIES!
What could be better that one of our favorite raspy rappers, slooooowed way down and chopped all up. Pretty much nothing. So grab your cough syzurp and strap on those headphones and lean back and let go.
