We love super limited collectable releases as much as the next person, but it really does seem to be getting out of hand. Cd-r's, tapes, vinyl, limited to 1000, to 500, to 50, 33, even 12 in some cases. Sure it makes sense that there is a limited audience for a lot of music, so maybe 12 or 33 or 50 is enough, but once it's obvious that you've moved beyond such a limited fanbase, it's time to ramp it up. A band who routinely sells thousands of records, can not (or at least SHOULD not) release a record limited to 100 copies. All it does is piss off all the fans who love your music. And by the same token, bands who DO release ultra limited releases, well, when those releases begin to sell out in a matter of hours, or minutes, or if those releases end up on eBay the next day and sell for hundreds of bucks, well, then similarly, it's time to give up on the limited release. It's partially the listeners' fault, clamoring for ANYTHING limited, sometimes it seems like how limited something is, is vastly more important to folks than what it sounds like.
But why discuss this here, in a review of dynamic drone duo Natural Snow Buildings? Well, because these guys have LONG surpassed the point at which they should be doing pressings any smaller than 500, heck, any smaller than 1000. So far, every NSB record or NSB sideproject record we've gotten, has been so limited that A. We were not able to get as many as we wanted. B. They all were practically out of print by the time they landed at aQ, and worst of all, C. Loads of folks who wanted the music and could care less about collectability and were just big fans of the band ended up shit out of luck, and had to buy it on eBay for some crazy amount of money, if they wanted to hear it at all.
Shadow Kingdom is not as limited as many of the past NSB jams, but is still limited enough that we could only manage a smallish chunk, and it's yet to be determined if we can get more once these sell out, but we'll for sure try.
Which when you break it down is really a bummer, cuz music this good, sounds this dark and intense and incredible need to be heard by as many people as possible. Shadow Kingdom is at its core, a drone record, but NSB's take on the drone is so lush and expansive and epic, slow burning, but burning bright, effulgent and incendiary, guitars blurred into thick glimmering streaks, the various layers, pulse and throb and undulate, and those drones are shot through with flecks of folk, bits of twang, dreamy vocals, buzzing sitar, shimmering ambience, and those epic swaths of dronemusic are set amidst more song based sounds, the record slipping from nearly half hour walls of drone, to delicate fluttery folky ambience, to skittery sun dappled free folk, to washed out new age whir, to warm gauzy dream pop, all of those various permutations constantly drifting into one another, overlapping, intertwining, changing shape, melodies bleeding into other melodies, tones and chords drifting and whirling, it's all very otherworldly, and mesmerizing, meditative and so so so dreamy. A double cd is perfect for NSB, as they can indulge themselves, letting pop songs sprawl into disembodied hazy space-y anti-pop, allowing warm bits of forest folk, to blossom into ever expanding fields of flickering fluttery sonic shimmer. It's hard to listen to music this beautiful, and emotional, and exquisitely crafted, and imagine it only being heard by a handful of people. So yeah, another fantastic disc of drone folk loveliness from this French duo, grab one if you can, and c'mon guys, make as many copies as there are people who want to hear it, at the very least, someone should gather up all the out of print tapes and lps and cds and assemble a massive bargain priced boxset, for all the fans who missed out on so much music from a band they love. So gorgeous, and in case you hadn't figured it out by now, very, very, very limited.
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 two editions, one limited to 32 copies, another 19 copies, France's Natural Snow Buildings had arguably created their masterwork, a sprawling two and a half hour epic, that seemed destined to only be heard by those 51 people. But making more at that point was an impossibility, as each one was hand painted, painstakingly assembled, and the magic and mystery of The Dance Of The Moon And The Sun seemed to be lost forever. That is until now. Students Of Decay, spent months putting together this deluxe reissue, which again, was way too limited, with only 500 copies pressed, and is already sold out and out of print from the label. We have 25 copies, and that's all we'll ever have.
Some of you might remember the three way split The Snowbringer Cult, which featured the duo of Mehdi Ameziane and Solange Gularte, aka Natural Snow Buildings filling two discs with their folky drones and drone drenched folk, one disc a proper NSB release, the other split between each member's solo project, Isengrind and Twinsistermoon. The Dance Of The Moon And The Sun, while ostensibly credited to NSB, plays a bit like The Snowbringer Cult, as it covers all sorts of ground, from fluttery strum and croon, to deep buzzing drone, to drifty druggy spaciness, to motorik kraut jams, to sun dappled forest folk, and every possible stop in between. Makes sense really, as 150 minutes is a lot of sonic space to fill, and the two fill it to overflowing with a luxurious array of gorgeous sounds, from light and airy to dark and brooding, it really seems foolish to go into too much detail, as these will probably disappear in a matter of minutes, but for the uninitiated, it can't hurt to dig a little deeper.
The duo dip their toes in reverb drenched sixties female folk, quickly switching gears and unfurling a fifteen minute krautjam constructed from simple metallic percussion, and ominous buzzing drones, before immediately switching back for some ramshackle lo-fi bedroom strum and croon, and then slipping smoothly into a gorgeously blissed out slow motion space drone drift, all glimmering long tones and soft blurred shimmers. And the thing is, no matter what the sound, or what sort of sonic otherworld the duo are exploring, they manage to imbue the sound with innocence and wonder, while seeming to master it completely, and making it their very own. The dronemusic here is epic and understated and utterly divine, the folk and pop parts are gorgeous, catchy, intimate and emotional, and when the two collide, they create something else entirely, and the band are able to take it in any direction, a brief fragment, burning bright and then gone, or a stretched out sprawling epic, simple figures, subtle melodies, allowed to drift and blossom, the pop elements, and the folk elements, transformed into perfect parts of an even more perfect whole.
Packaged in a gorgeous fold over black white and yellow cardstock sleeve, adorned with the band's eye popping artwork, inside, a 6 panel black and white insert on thick paper, with liner notes, more wild images and liner notes from Time-Lag's head honcho Nemo.
Again, LIMITED TO 500 COPIES. ALREADY SOLD OUT AND OUT OF PRINT. THESE ARE THE LAST COPIES EVER!
The Snowbringer Cult was a double cd originally released way back in 2008 on the Students of Decay label, and was the first proper cd release from French bedroom drone-psych-folk epic from Natural Snow Buildings, the boy/girl duo of Mehdi Amaziane and Solange Gularte, that double cd included a NSB full length, as well as an album from each of their solo projects, those being Isengrind and Twinsistermoon. That double cd is finally available again, but has also been reissued on vinyl for the first time, with each of the three parts being released separately as its own record.
Natural Snow Buildings have been a band since WAY back in 1999, toiling quietly WAY underground, and over the course of the last decade plus, have only really released a handful of records, and in the first 6 or 7 years, they only managed 4 cd-r's and two tapes, the total number of copies of all 6 of those releases hovering at about 250. That's insane! At the time we couldn't help wonder how a band with such a small catalog, that has reached so few ears, could generate so much fanboy freakout?! But that's precisely what happened. And thankfully, and perhaps surprisingly, in the case of NSB, and the two solo offshoots, the hype does not seem unwarranted. The freaking out more than merited. The music of Amaziane and Gularte is definitely something special, much more than the usual generic fx laden droned out abstract cd-r floor-core that seems to be constantly flooding the scene, this duo write actual songs, and create gorgeous soundscapes, they mix raga-like psyche with fluttery folk, deep drones with pristine pop, weaving it all together into something spectacular.
What happens when the two join forces, becoming Natural Snow Buildings? It would be way too easy to say that the sum equaled the parts, that if you took the sound of Isengrind and Twinsistermoon and combined them, it would equal the whole of NSB. There is certainly -some- truth to that, but it's not math, it's magic. Alchemy, musical sorcery, these are sounds not numbers, and thus are governed by forces far more magical and mysterious than physics or science. The two together join spirits, their natures become entwined, they draw from one another, each offering the other part of their soul, rendered in music. The results are truly divine. An assemblage of sounds, deftly woven into expansive shapes and hushed mystery, landscapes of drone and shimmer, of cinematic wonder and dark introspection. Some tracks are super abstract, layered near static drifts, longform movements that sonically evoke other lands, other times, the past long forgotten, the future not yet experienced, other tracks are wheezing sun dappled Appalachia, but turned inside out, the chords and notes seemingly drawn inward, toward the speakers, the vocals breathless and mournful, all laid atop a thick swirl of distorted riffage, other tracks are fragmented folk, all murky blurred piano, backwards guitars, heartsick melodies, wrapped in a thick gauzy production, smeared into snapshots glimpsed through eyes brimming with tears. Other tracks are space rock writ small, minimal dirges, drone jams, chanted vocals, strange stuttery percussion, and glorious buzzing guitars, culminating in the final track, which begins much like the others, all hazy and dreamlike, vocals ethereal, guitars spare and skeletal, until unexpectedly the band lock into some serious droned out space rock. A serious dark and druggy looped riff, a la Spacemen 3, Hawkwind, Loop, anchored by a simple pounding thudrock rhythm, driving intensely through swirling clouds of FX and warm whirring ambience, a seriously dense, propulsive krautjam, that just so happens to hide a soft drifting pop shimmer underneath, and while the track rocks with a surprising intensity, it's precisely what's underneath that turns the jam into something resplendent.
We always talk about how someday, with a record we know everybody is gonna want anyway, we're just gonna say "Here it is. A new Record by so and so. It's pretty great. You should buy it." Or something almost that succinct.
So here you go. French duo Natural Snow Buildings. A brand new tape, Super limited, like maybe 100 copies or something. We got about 30 of them. It's already out of print and unavailable almost everywhere. It's intense, majestic, epic and sort of heavy in a really mysterious way. Beautiful full color covers. It's really pretty great. You should buy it.
We got a tiny handful of these a few weeks back, the brand new record from this French psych folk drone duo, and we were happy to get even those, considering how criminally limited NSB releases usually are. Those flew out of here and we figured they were just gone for good. But lo and behold, a batch somehow made it across the sea to one of our distributors and we snatched up all the copies we could, although that wasn't really all that many, so if you're an NSB fanatic, best act fast.
And if you're not a fanatic, well, then why the hell not. This duo conjures up some of the most fantastic otherworldly psychedelia we've ever heard. Long tracks that ooze and sprawl and drift, folk songs blurred and smeared into ambient outer space shimmer, drones undulate beneath clouds of slow swirling melody, effects whir and thrum, meditative and tranquil and dreamily druggy, the songs slipping from that sort of untethered psych drift to something much more earthbound, a woozy forest folk, tangled steel strings, minimal percussion, but still wreathed in the same sort of spaced out haze that seems like at any moment could blossom into full on heart of the sun ambient abstraction, and often does.
The one thing we can say about NSB, is that their records all sound like they were cut from the same sonic cloth, a glorious, fantastical, psychedelically colored cloth sure, but the sound remains quite similar, as if each record is less like a proper new album, and more like the next movement in some multi part epic, which is fine with us, this must be part 10 or 11 by now, but the sound remains so hypnotic and enthralling. The perfect blend of dark witchy psych folk, and deep shimmering dronemusic, of swirling psychedelic new age and ritualistic foresty primitivism, sun dappled and dew scented, all the sounds prismatic and crystalline, whether floating weightlessly in a field of hushed minimal thrum, or roiling darkly in a cloud of reveberating low end, Natural Snow Buildings are masters at creating this other world, conjuring up a soundtrack to takes us there with them and as always, the results are utterly breathtaking, and fantastically captivating.
ALREADY SOLD OUT AT THE LABEL!! These could very well be the last copies we get...
Natural Yogurt Band??? So many associations come to mind of what kind of band would name themselves that, but without hearing them, you probably wouldn't guess right off jazz, funk or soul. Or if you did, you might think they were of a hippie jam band mentality and not this amazingly tight British jazz combo mining the sounds of late sixties Verve label cool jazz stalwarts like Cal Tjader, Lalo Schifrin, Gary McFarland, and Jimmy Smith. Rife with psychedelic flutes, vibes and organs, Away With Melancholy takes us through a vibrant cinematic sound world propelled by funky Latin rhythms and kaleidescopic compositions. The band isn't merely aping their influences, but extracting their key ingredients and repurposing them into something modern. El Michaels Affair and Clutchy Hopkins may be covering similar territory, but not nearly with the amazing aplomb and spot-on musicianship these guys have. And if you like those groups, the artists mentioned above, that Spiritual Jazz compilation we reviewed a while back, or anything on the Stones Throw label, you should definitely check this out! And, by the way, we've got to say something about the packaging, the metallic silver gatefold mini-LP style sleeve that this cd comes in is eye-catchingly gorgeous, adorned with delicate purple op-art spirals. We had people asking about it in the store just 'cause of the cover! Nice job, Jazzman.
It's the return of the hard hitting British jazz duo with the really dumb name but the funkiest old school breaks augmented by organ, flutes and marimba. So how could we complain? Sounding like a revival of noirish jazz with occasional Latin tinges from the sixties and seventies, like the best of Creed Taylor's Verve label productions for Lalo Schifrin and Cal Tjader and a host of other cool cats, but with a futuristic twist of Moog-y delight. This new release doesn't change the formula so much from their last one as it expands upon it, including at the end of the the album proper, 18 or so additional "Biscuits" (sort of like J Dilla's "Donuts"), short sketches of organ and Moog squelches or drum breaks for you to sample and manipulate yourself. Cinematic and tightly knit, another score for the Now-Again label!
The self-titled album by this lengthily and peculiarly named* obscure early '80s band has been reissued by Vinyl On Demand. If we were taking the label's name at face value, we'd wonder who has been demanding this vinyl. Heh Heh, just kidding.
Anyways, The Naughtiest Girl Was A Monitor were a group from Sheffield whose music sounds like Human League tangled in a knot with David Bowie. Or if you're lookin' for a contemporary reference point, you might wanna imagine Ariel Pink going full-on new wave! Off-kilter, breezy tunes filled with analog synthesizers, drum machines and strings too! Limited pressing of 600!
*FYI: their name is actually the title of an Enid Blyton book!
Nice looking picture disc from Wolf Eyes cohorts and Hanson Records superstars Nautical Almanac. Lots of warbly, ultra processed vocals, brain shredding feedback, clinking and clattering random percussion, half formed melodies smashed to bits and scattered haphazardly all over the place, retardedly strummed guitars, damaged electronics blooping and buzzing and screeching, clumsy abstract rhythms, strange ambient drones, all mixed into a huge whirling, convusing, throbbing, pulsing, ear-hurting, gut-punching beautiful mess.
From reading the recent article in The Wire about this new Nautical Almanac record we weren't sure whether to expect some noisy free rock phenomenon, or a frustratingly average noise record. Sadly it's a little closer to the latter. Talk of "anti-knowledge" and "chance experiments" cannot disguise the fact that this is just a noise record. No different than that RRR cassette you ordered through the mail 10 years ago. Bragging about how one knows nothing about music and can't play any instruments and doesn't ever want to learn, is the sort of rhetoric that only works if the result somehow transcends the equation. But, unfortunately, this DOES in fact sound like two people who can't play and don't know what they're doing. A sloppy, noisy, chaotic mess. Ear piercing shrieks, super distorted howled vocal skree, kitchen sink clatter, and just all sorts of abrasive noxious noise. Could be impressive if the bar hadn't been set much higher by countless other noise records (even the earlier NA records had a bit more to offer). But as with any improvised music, it's hit or miss, that's part of the excitement and urgency. This just happens to sound a bit like a miss. One of those records that ineveitably has you scratching your head and wondering why YOU aren't in your basement making a horrible racket and getting written up in The Wire. Well, why aren't you!? Depending on how you answer that question, you might actually want to check this out.
Second LP from the mysterious Chicago duo (I think), who create destructive lo-fi electronics music. Not "electronic music", but modified Casios and Speak & Spells and cryptic tape manipulations assembled in a fucked up, nonlinear pastiche of ataxia. Such volatile eccentricities and an arhythmic approach unfortunately make not for a record that sounds great, but a record that has
For those of you patiently awaiting the newest opus from Russian black metallers Old Wainds, expected any day now, this might just hold you over. Two demos of ultra raw black buzz from Old Wainds offshoot Nav, fronted by OW drummer Izbor, available on cd for the first time. Nav's last record, the surprisingly polished and weirdly melodic The Wolf Sun, definitely rubbed a few people the wrong way, with a sound way more NWOBHM than black metal, not so much blasting and buzzing as riffing and rocking. Sure it was unexpected, but we dug it anyway. Maybe precisely because it was so awesomely confounding.
But this is something else entirely. Something more like the Nav (and the Old Wainds) we know and love. Imagine the first Nav, Halls Of Death, via Old Wainds' Wither Of The Wainds, and you'll get something very much like From Nav To Jav, the sound on these demos, originally released in 1996 / 1997 is raw raw raw, super lo-fi, chaotic and frenzied, the guitars are murky and muddy, the riffing surprisingly complex, but plenty blurry and washed out, the drums wild and splattery, the vocals a harsh demonic croak, with long swaths of fuzzy warbly keyboards, the recording in the red and ultra distorted, causing the songs to seemingly warp and crumble as they come careening out of the speakers. Sort of like the EEE un-black releases, the recording here is as much a part of the sound as the songs. A sound so saturated and fucked up, it almost sounds like Faxed Head, but still with that unmistakable Russian sound, so distinctive and evocative, hateful and harsh, shot through with a drone drenched buzz, killer riffing, everything completely fried and fractured and gloriously blown out.
Essential obviously for fans of all things Nav, Wainds, Russian and black, but maybe just as crucial for anyone into raw metallic chaos, and droney distorted buzz (lots of overlap there wethink), or heck, even if you just wished Faxed Head were deadly serious and way more heavy, then this is most definitely for you.
Very much like how all the black metal bands in the Ukraine seem to be made up of the same 5 or 10 people, just in different combinations, black metal bands in Russia also tend to revolve around the same 2 or 3 visionaries, along with whatever black legions they can enlist from their little scene to help shape their black musical world.
We recently reviewed the only currently available disc from Russian cult underground legends Old Wainds, who as we mentioned in that review, are THE grim cult horde of choice among the black metal elite. And almost appropriately, all of their records, minus the just reviewed demo disc, seem to be way more difficult to track down than they should be, and thus of course, are seriously big ticket items on eBay.
So here we have the group Nav, also known in Russian as HABb, a black metal band made up of 50 percent of Old Wainds, primarily the project of Old Wainds drummer Izbor, so as you might imagine, the sound does not wander far from Old Wainds' grim frosty buzz. Which is of course a good thing. The same sort of fuzzed out primitivism, a gloriously murky production. But Nav add plenty of their own unique style, everything is so strangely mixed, with loud LOUD drums and guitars that swirl into a nearly impenetrable blackened haze. Demonic vocals that go from buried way down in the mix to a blown out raspy roar often within the same song, and bits of chaotic rhythmic stumble and haunting ambient weirdness, complete with the thunderous sound of horses hooves.
And unlike the straight black buzz of Old Wainds, Nav sounds a slight bit more melodic, with much of the riffing displaying a classic metal vibe, as well as rhythms that vary from the old black stand-by, the blast beat, lurching lopes, galloping thrash, pounding doom, lots of fuzzed out midtempos, all twisted amidst some strange breakdowns, where the rhythms constantly shift and the riffs contort and morph into slightly different shapes, there are even some super demented LEADS! Still, all the while the band continues to forge a wholly unique pitch black path. Fans of all things dark and frosty and cult and grim would do well to bow before the black knights of Nav!
We haven't been able to track down the cd, but we do have the ULTRA LIMITED vinyl version. Gatefold sleeve. Limited to 300 copies!
Old Wainds. Maybe one of our favorite black metal bands ever. They're from Russia, and bands like Crebain and Leviathan and pretty much every metal band we know LOVE them. And while they're not fucked up and damaged and freaked out and fractured like much of the black metal we love, they manage to move us in a similarly strange way, by employing the usual black metal tropes, the buzz, the blast, the grim necro vocals, the furious riffing, but turning them into something emotional and dark and unique, which is a rarity in a genre that in many ways insists on uniformity, to remain grim and cvlt and true.
In our obsession we also discovered Nav, HABb in Russian, the project of former Old Wainds drummer Izbor, and featuring at least one other member of Old Wainds. Their sound was not all that far removed from the OW mothership, if anything they managed to sound a bit more chaotic and a lot more like classic eighties metal. More old school riffing and melodies, but that sound still somehow woven into OW's super distinctive black metal.
As we wait hopefully for word from Old Wainds, regarding the rumored new album (and while we wait for news about all of their other releases, none of which we've been able to track down for ages, sorry), we've got a brand new Nav record, 4 years on from their debut, and if anything, they've gone even more classic old school metal. So much so, that minus the vocals, and some extra grim buzz, one might be forgiven for thinking this was some unearthed blackthrash rarity from1988.
Just take the first song, starting with a lo-fi classic metal riff, that quickly ramps up to full strength, some noodly leads, a splatter of chaotic almost-blast beats, until the song lurches into a full on metal gallop, the riffing not black at all, instead totally timeless, with shouted background vocals, some woozy arpeggiated breakdowns, and then about halfway through some full on tweaked and trippy keyboards that ooze and warble and buzz and make the whole thing sound slightly maniacal. But soon the keyboards are replaced by some furious leads, until the end, when haunting swells fade in and out until the end.
And then just like that, we're hurled back into the melee, more speed metal riffing, pounding drumming, freaky spaced out keyboards, every song featuring long stretches where the band drops out and the guitarist just riffs all on his own, often 2 or 3 times per song! Plus there's even a track called "Old Wainds" which is a total slow doomy groove, almost a black metal ballad, with swooshes of synth, and a total eighties metal main riff, which does eventually give way to some buzzing blackness, but throughout the song they continue to return to the old school.
It's hard to imagine ANY metalhead that wouldn't dig this like crazy, the sound is huge and heavy, the riffs are crazy catchy, might not be black enough for some, but for what it lacks in blackness, it more than makes up for in true metal!
Described by some as a "Sunday morning Mogwai", this group is closer in style to some of the quieter Kranky releases. Soon-to-be-impossible-to-find import.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
The first outing for Navigator since their stunning Nostalgie album from last year is a remix single of their bleak and gritty 'rock' minimalism. Both Third Eye Foundation and Fulcrum Overhaul extend the 4-track / analogue grit to their breakbeat experiments. It's sorta hard to say which speed its to be played at, and it doesn't really matter as this is a fucking great single.
Though he was dubbed the "King of the Ukulele" and capitalized on that title throughout his career (touring extensively on the vaudeville circuit as a ukulele soloist), Bennie Nawahi was equally adept at guitar, steel guitar, mandolin and harmonica. In fact, it is his steel guitar playing that is a paramount focus on the 23 tracks found here. This cd is essentially a compilation of groups that featured Bennie as a musician or leader throughout the 20's and early 30's. Given the variety of ensembles presented here as well as Bennie's versatility with jazz, Hawaiian, ragtime, blues and country idioms the over-all tenor of this cd is of variegated unity. Recommended.
Everybody has this record - but do you? When's the last time you listened to it? It's a '70s hard rock classic and it's only five bucks now on cd, so... Time to crank!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
A krautrock album supposedly issued in the 70s in a tiny editions of, like, 50 copies or something. The Nazgul cd is from 1975 and features 4 long tracks of droning ambience that's easily as good as any current space rock outfit could put together; i.e. Magnog, Labradford or anything else on Kranky. Bonus weirdness: the bandmembers are named Frodo, Gandalf, and Pippin.
A furious blast of frenzied venomous pounding punk rock fury, nine songs, eleven minutes, these Tampa, Florida punks kick out the trebly lo-fi jams, seriously raw hardcore rife with corrosive blown out guitars, throat shredding vox, pounding chaotic drumming, short sharp bursts of caustic hateful sonic crush wreathed in plenty of amp buzz and tape hiss, think Siege, Crossed Out, SSD, Drop Dead and the like. Some hidden hooks and some hints of gloom, but for the most part this is just a fierce chunk of angry, pissed off, punk rock, fuck off energy that KILLS. Gorgeous packaging too. Punk rock record of the year (well last year anyway) hands down!
Elsewhere this list (and last) you'll find the SUNNO))) + Scott Walker collaboration, while this album is the 2nd effort to see half of the SUNNO))) duo teamed up with Japanese psych shaman Keiji Haino. We're hoping that this somehow means that we'll soon see a Scott Walker + Keiji Haino team-up, too... There's not too many degrees of separation left, c'mon!
But, that's not what this review is about. It's about the sophomore outing from the in-and-of-itself awesome Nazoranai trio, featuring guitarist/vocalist Haino, bassist Stephen O'Malley of SUNNO))), and on percussion, the ubiquitous Oren Ambarchi - who plays with Haino in another trio also well, with Jim O'Rourke instead of O'Malley. O'boy, these guys do like each other for dance partners, recall also that recently Ambarchi and O'Malley got together with Randall Dunn, too...
Anyway, we super duper dug the 1st Nazoranai, as did a lot of you, it's gone out of print (too bad if you missed it) but this is a fine follow-up, again allowing (as if there was any choice) Keiji Haino's musical personality/aesthetic to take the fore: ultra intense dark psychedelic out-rock improv, made all the darker and heavier by the presence of O'Malley, as you can imagine.
As usual with anything Haino related, the track titles are long and cryptic, starting with "You Should Look Closely Those Shattered Spells Never Attaining Embodiment As Prayer They Are Born Here Again" (whew!) and the tracks are long, too (that one approaches 19 minutes). All four cuts here are fairly heavy and harrowing, featuring plenty of grinding droning guitars (abetted by some synth played by Haino too). Ambarchi's drums skitter and shake, Haino offers up the gut wrenched vocal lamentations like nobody else, and O'Malley keeps the bottom end solidly way, way down in the abyss. The rapport these three possess is evident, and emotive, whether whilst bringing the freeform freakout action to a boil, or when they lock into more structured passages - as on the album's final cut and title track, another 19-minute epic, that rides a lurching, repetitive rhythm reminding us of some of Haino's legendary band Fushitsusha's 'rockier' moments. Needless to say, recommended to all with fearless ears, poetic hearts and/or sorrowful souls.
MPEG Stream: "You Should Look Closely Those Shattered Spells Never Attaining Embodiment As Prayer They Are Born Here Again" [/audio/nazoraniyoushould.m3u]
All right, if you were excited a few months back when we listed the Imikuzushi album by Keiji Haino, Oren Ambarchi, and Jim O'Rourke (that group's second release), we imagine you'll be equally chuffed about this: the debut from a quite similar trio consisting of Keiji Haino, Oren Ambarchi, and Stephen O'Malley! Yeah, the guy from a little band you may have heard of called SUNNO))). Also KTL and Khanate and a bunch of others. Suddenly, is Keiji Haino still the darkest lord in the room? Well, yeah. But O'Malley has some cred in the blackness-of-soul category, and his presence helps make this even heavier.
And as you should expect, much like with the Haino/Ambarchi/O'Rourke lineup, this grouping is also, again, pretty much Haino's show. Even though he's recently reactivated his seminal outrock power trio Fushitsusha (on the intense Hikari To Nazukeyo album, reviewed here not long ago), Haino seems happy to have other outlets for Fushitsusha-esque stuff, and this is one of 'em, his shamanistic self taking the lead on guitars, vocals and synth. With O'Malley on bass and Ambarchi on battery, he's being ably backed up by guys who, y'know, dig his trip. And since Ambarchi has experience playing with Haino already, and O'Malley for his part has previously collaborated with Ambarchi, they're definitely "on" here, even though Nazorani had only played together a couple times prior to this this particular recording, which documents a live performance in Paris, France November 2011, altogether improvised "real-time" music we assume.
There's 72 minutes of their harrowing music here, four tracks, all obviously titled by Haino, though they almost could be parodies of his typical titles� The set begins with "Feel The Ultimate Joy Towards The Resolve Of Pillar Being Shattered Within You Again And Again And Again", starting off with stretches of near-silence, pregnant with electricity, occasionally single chiming notes ringing out in the vast void from Haino's guitar, accompanied by sparse suspenseful skitter and pendulous plod too, from the percussion, while O'Malley's bass is a eerie, echoing, subtle shivering of low-end in the darkness. Haino's vocals, as always, are anguished, true cries from the heart, torn from the throat. O'Malley and Ambarchi have performed with Mayhem's Attila Csihar before, in Gravetemple, but even the "vokills" of that notorious black metal singer weren't as vokill as these! Let's put it this way, the AQ staffer writing this review is at this very moment suffering from a severe toothache (root canal pending) and Haino, whatever he's saying, seems to be expressing something even deeper and stronger than the merely physical pain that this reviewer is currently suffering�
And then, wow, we won't tell you at exactly what minute of this lengthy track the apocalpyse is unleashed, but eventually it is, Haino's amp suddenly the fount of epic floodwaters of cavern-carving distortodelic guitar volume. And it's sheer manna from above (or below?) for fans of Haino/Fushitsusha and any other out-there heavy duty guitar skree.
The album's other three cuts are constructed from similar sonics, ambient ominous battlefields that provide the gripping backdrop for Haino's moans and wails, via either voice or guitar, but make for good gripping listening in an of themselves, like for instance the many moody minutes of final cut "Not To Leave Everything To The Light Outside Of You But To Be Aware Of The Prayer 'What Do I Want To Do?' That Exists Inside You, And Let That Go Out Of You As A Light, Or Things Might Get Worse, No?" even before Haino's amp really gets warmed up�
Another awesome Haino showcase, featuring great work from all involved, released on an obviously honored O'Malley's Mego sub-label, Ideologic Organ, with (of course) gorgeous packaging & design.
MPEG Stream: "Feel The Ultimate Joy Towards The Resolve Of Pillar Being Shattered Within You Again And Again And Again" [/audio/nazoranaifeel.m3u]
MPEG Stream: "Not A Joy To Come Closer But So-Called A Sacred Insanity Has Finally Appeared" [/audio/nazoranainotajoy.m3u]
Me'shell Ndegeocello's seventh album marks a surprising, bold departure from the familiar sounds of her past works. In fact, The Spirit Music Jamia is her least soul pop and least solo effort to date, leaning more heavily on jazz and collaborations (hence the inclusion of the word 'presents' in the title). Heck, this is a downright jazz album, and an impressive, languid one at that. She enlists the fine talents of Cassandra Wilson, Kenny Garrett, Oliver Lake, Jack DeJohnette, Don Byron, John Coltrane's son Oran among others. On the traycard, she lists her influences for this work as being Miles Davis, Kool Herc, Carl Sagan and Holy Scripture, and she also wittily notes that "these new compositions are suitable for free minds, open hearts and shaking behinds." That said, some fans might initially feel somewhat alienated from this Me'shell album -- she doesn't sing a note on any of the songs -- but those who do approach it with an open mind will surely find it to be a richly rewarding listen.
Listening to this obscure eighties chunk of electro pop new wave, you'd never guess this outfit hailed from Columbus, Ohio (and in fact the liner notes describe Near Paris as being the only synth pop band in Columbus, which is perhaps not all that surprising), sounding instead like they must hail from someplace like Sheffield in the UK. The fine folks at Medical Records have once again rescued a fantastic artifact of dark synth pop. The release compiles the group's only 12" alongside a handful of tracks from various cassettes and demos. And it's fantastic stuff, dark and moody and poppy, the sort of sound that most of the new Sacred Bones / Captured Tracks band are shooting for - just check out the opener "Visions", all handclap beats, pulsing synth bass, flurries of cascading synth melodies, robotic programmed rhythms, reverbed guitar shimmer, deep dramatic male vox tangled up with equally dramatic female vocals, there's a very Human League vibe, which definitely is a good comparison, as is Section 25, who the group occasionally played with. And there's lots of guitar, unlike many of the electro-pop and synth-pop groups of the era. On tracks like "Why Baby", Near Paris lace their moody synthscapes with chiming harmonics, some cool distorted spidery leads, heck there's even harmonica! At times the vibe is almost more eighties LA gloom pop, than UK synth pop, it's not hard to imagine Near Paris playing at the Scream in LA with a group like Red Temple Spirits, that same sort of gothiness infuses much of NP's sound, the reverby guitars and swirling moody atmospherics, but at its core, this is pulsing synthy new wave pop, flecked with just enough dark brooding energy to give it an edge over many similar sounding bands at the time. And some of the tracks here are SO catchy, it's a wonder Near Paris didn't find more success, "Visions" is a gloomy gem, that given the right exposure could have made these guys huge. We're guessing being the only synth pop band in Columbus Ohio might have been part of the problem.
LIMITED TO 650 COPIES!!! Pressed on 180 gram oxblood colored vinyl, and includes an insert with photos and liner notes.
Tricky, Tony Hall, and Martine.
Another batch of super limited and beautifully packaged cd-r's from Campbell Kneale's (Birchville Cat Motel) Celebrate Psi Phenomenon label. The finest in underground free noise / drone, culled mostly from New Zealand but all around the world as well. For those of you new to the CpsiP label, imagine classic Siltbreeze (Dead C, etc.) mixed with Jewelled Antler (Thuja, Blithe Sons etc.), dark and deep listening that sometimes verges on all out noise, but more often than not remains subtle experiments in avant drone and abstract sound. And when we say limited we mean LIMITED. Thes babies come in pressings of 30-80, out of which we get a whopping 10 copies!!
NZ "legend" Richard Neave finally lets his home recorded madness see the light of day. A wild concoction of atonal guitar scrabble, malfunctioning recording devices, tape hiss and drop out, squealing feedback, damaged Casio keyboards and whatever else was laying around. Sounds a bit like the guys in the Dead C shrunk down and forced to work inside a damged tape deck / clock radio, with a dying battery, desperately trying to keep things running smoothly. Or maybe Keiji Haino and Derek Bailey rolled up in a big wet carpet, being pummelled by broken synthesizers and pelted with blown out speakers. Wild and beautiful and noisy as hell.
Another new Nebula record. Definitely their best record although not a whole lot has changed. These ex-Fu Manchu folks play fuzzed out, drugged out, groovy stoner rock and play it well. And just because this is nothing new, doesn't mean it isn't still loads
This collects the two eps (duh, dos eps) from the preeminent fuzzed out stoner rock combo, Nebula. This includes their Meteor City ep and their split with Lowrider as well as 3 brand spanking new tracks. Overblown, super fuzz guitar, drawling lazy stonerboy vocals and big b i g B I G drums. Sounds as good as ever. Cruisng through the desert with the top down kind of lazy hazy summertime RAWK.
Attention, all you stoner-rock freaks (man, we need a new name for this stuff): ex-Fu Manchu (and better-than-Fu Manchu) dudes Nebula have a new album out. Maybe this is Sub Pop's way of veering back into "the new grunge"? Anyway, just from the cover shot of the band's equipment stacked out in a desert somewhere, this looks like it'll meet your rawk requirements.
Along with the gorgeous washed out ambient nature doom of Celestiial, and the epic outsider black metal mystery of the most recent Blood Of The Black Owl comes this, another new release on the cult Bindrune label, the first record from amazing one man band Nechochwen, a black metal act of sorts, whose intent is to explore Native American Indian heritage, through sound, but this is a strange hybridized exploration of Native American culture for sure.
Beginning with classical guitar, tribal hand drums, ominous spoken word, streaks of keening high end guitar, wailed emotive wordless vox, it definitely sounds a bit Native American, until the band launch into some seriously blasting full on metal, thrashing blackened riffage, pounding drums, with flurries of double kick, growled gruff vokills, rife with sprawling arrangements and epic melodies. It's thematically focused on the tribes that dwelled in the Ohio River Valley nearly two millennia ago, not that you'd necessarily know that from just listening, but it definitely infuses the sound with a unique vibe, that you're unlikely to find in much music, let alone black metal. Acoustic guitars, simple loping drumming, and chantlike vocals, in fact much of the record is acoustic, darkly melancholic, lush and warm and hauntingly beautiful, with fluttery flutes, hand drums, sitar like steel string buzz, occasionally erupting into blasting blackness, or twisted bits of rhythmic churn, or plodding ambient doom, or creepy black ambient drone, masterfully exectued, an expansive, incredible exploration of history through blackened folk flecked sound. Like other those Bindrune releases, not quite like anything else.
Possibly named for an Incapacitants track from many moons ago, Necklacing is a collaborative project between the LA drone-plus-noise artists Matt Sullivan and William Hutson, the former working under the guise Earn and the latter as Rale. This is much more of a full-on noise project than what we've heard from either of them previously, as they're seeking the harness the power of various 'white noise generators.' It seems to us, that these generators include amplified tape hiss and shortwave radio static all blown out with overdriven gain and well-tempered distortion. No delicate introduction here, just a blast of a white noise that opens both tracks of this tape, and a plateau of noise is sustained throughout streaming into an thick low-end underbelly and topped with a very hectic stream of tactility. In their evenhanded application of the noise, Necklacing offer a perspective of clinical detachment, somewhat like the manifestations of tape noise on the brilliant, if long forgotten Reynols album Blank Tapes. The second side, which begins and ends just as the first, exhibits more from the shortwave, with rapid fire blips from utility signal transmissions bleeding through the agitated surface noise. Necklacing is an entirely different animal from the kaleidoscopic frenzy of Merzbow, the primal energy of Menche, and the psychological pressures of John Duncan. Very well done, and very limited. 100 copies altogether.
The Necks might be our favorite jazz group, most of their records/performances being single hour long pieces, always a lush, patient, slow build, all texture and mood, super dynamic, but in a way most bands can't pull off, just bass drums and piano, their sound dense and dark, doleful and lovely. The last few Necks records have found this minimal band getting a little maximal, their slow build eventually erupting into something dense and driving and almost psychedelic, as if in response to that, Open finds the group and their most hushed and abstract, with the first few minutes featuring a field of tinkling chimes, spare pointillist piano, and only the occasional flurry of bass notes, spacious and mesmeric, as we usually find ourselves saying about these guys, we would have been happy if there was no slow build at all, and the whole record was just this glistening, glimmering sprawl of abstract free jazz drift.
But there is a method to their madness, and at about the eight minute mark, the song shifts dramatically, an electronic pulse, some simple hi-hat rhythms, the occasional bass drum, and nothing else, weirdly hypnotic and barely there, the sound soon joined by a buzzing hum, a snare crack here, some bass thrum there, the sound blossoming into a sprawl of subtle tribal drumming, and more shimmering chimes, soon the piano comes back in, and the song begins to take a more jazz-like shape, albeit one that's still quite free and abstract, the lilting piano melody offsetting the busy drumming, the sound shifting again soon after, with a snare roll that sounds almost like radio static, the bass and low notes on the piano unfurling a dense rumble, those chimes tying everything together again, before settling into something much more tranquil and serene, only to return to that strange electronic pulse / hi-hat section, which slips from jazzy shimmer, to abstract free form almost-psychedelia, the snare locked into another roll, adding a buzzy thrum, the sound finally settling into some hushed, laid back jazziness, wreathed in a dreamy droned out shimmer, gradually fading to silence.
Recommended, as always!
We've gone cuckoo for the Australian trio The Necks, and this is the third album we're gonna enthuse over. More brilliance, in other words! Again, the Necks play a hard-to-categorize blend of jazz and rock that's "experimental" yet totally accessible, making use of insanely evocative piano, drums and bass in a hypnotically repetitive, circular, subtly shifting manner. It brings to mind everything from Philip Glass to Stars of the Lid to Miles Davis. That's right.
Aether begins as if it is finishing, with long minor key chords and shimmering cymbals that wait until fading from the audible before the next set s-l-o-w-l-y emerges. As with The Necks' relatively more active Hanging Garden album, they set down that evocative sonic foundation for a full twenty minutes before single piano notes sail out surprisingly, hesitatingly stating a melodic line. It's over an hour long and not for a second does it become boring -- despite its stillness there's a warmth, no chill. The piece's closing section (another healthy 20 minutes) is a muted flourish, with the cymbals unendingly shimmering, the piano notes echoing and repeating like the tide is coming in. This is the perfect and only soundtrack to a Sunrise. Amazing.
MPEG Download: "excerpt 1" [/audio/necksaether1.mp3]
MPEG Stream: "excerpt 1" [/audio/necksaether1.m3u]
All right, those of you who have still not taken the plunge into the glorious, jazzy drone-y world of Australia's The Necks, here's yet another chance, and a pretty low priced one at that! We finally managed to get a bunch of copies of Aquatic, a cd that we used to carry years ago and that has only now become available again. The Necks explore expansive soundscapes of almost static rhythms, Terry Riley-esque piano figures and a 'songwriting' style that leans more towards Steve Reich than Ornette Coleman. Shuffling snare and ride cymbal, piano and bass weave lush repetitive figures that mesmerise in their barely perceptible shifts resulting in a gorgeously meditative and almost transcendental sort-of-free-jazz. The core three piece is joined on Aquatic by a hurdy gurdy which adds to the overall droniness. Even the jazz hater at AQ is frequently caught listening to the Necks! What more do you need to know?! C'mon!
MPEG Download: "Aquatic 1" [/audio/necksaquatic1.mp3]
MPEG Stream: "Aquatic 1" [/audio/necksaquatic1.m3u]
Windy's off in Vietnam and unable to contribute to our review of this, but she did leave the following simple and to the point note: "I LOVE this album."
We all do actually. Even jazz-phobic Jim has been caught blissing out to The Necks! And everyone we know seems to have at least one record by Australia's Necks, but why didn't any of them tell me how fricking great this stuff is?!?!? This is a new 4 cd set featuring 4 separate hour-long performances, and once you're familiar with their sound, you'll understand that 4 hours, in hour long chunks, is the perfect way to experience The Necks. It's sort of jazz but not exactly. Sort of 20th century classical, but not exactly. Imagine Charlemagne Palestine or Steve Reich composing for a jazz combo and you might be getting close. Or a more lively Bohren and Der Club of Gore, maybe, at times. Hypnotic shuffling jazz rhythms, skittery high hat and ride cymbals, build a skeletal foundation for throbbing monochromatic bass and chiming, cyclical piano. Repetitive, blissed out and totally hypnotic. Drummer Tony Buck we used to know from Peril and Kletka Red amongst other projects, but now we'll consider The Necks his primary claim to fame. Recommended.
The Necks are one of those rare bands that we could literally listen to forever. Their sound is just so perfectly hypnotic and so well suited to extended listening. If they invented a new format, where a band could release say, a 24 hour long song, the Necks are the first band we would think of. In fact they actually have played a 24 hour show. We keep hoping it will get released, although the epic scope might be lost split up over 24 discs.
This here is the Necks 13th release in about 20 years. And for a band to stay true to their sound for that long, while remaining viable and listenable and exciting is testament to the Necks' unbelievable skill. For those new to the Necks, imagine a three piece jazz ensemble, bass, drums and piano (although, on Chemist, for the first time ever, guitar is introduced, played, oddly enough by drummer Tony Buck), who specialize in extended longform pieces. Ultra minimal, slowly shifting epics, a single riff, a single motif, repeated and looped and subtly colored over the span of ten minutes, 30 minutes, 60 minutes even 24 hours. Totally mesmerizing and hypnotic.
Chemist is the most rocking Necks record we can remember. At least the opening 20 minute track. The groove is much more upfront, driving, propulsive, like a stripped down jazzed up Can or Faust. Loping, groovy, mesmeric, small flurries of piano drift and flutter over a super solid bass and drums groove. In fact, this almost sounds like a jazzier version of Finnish drone rockers Circle. The same sort of endless riffing and perfectly propulsive rhythm. The second track is much more spare and straight up jazzy, a soft shimmery shuffle, the final track while not quite as aggressive as the opener, does have a similarly relentless rhythm that turns the jazzy drift into something almost 'rocking'. Hard to say this is our favorite Necks record, as we pretty much love them all, but this is definitely the most aggressive and thus pushes a different set of buttons. Necks fans obviously need this. But some of you Circle / Salvatore fans who are up for something a little more dark and jazzy and moody might just dig this A LOT.
Here at Aquarius, you might say that 2003 could have been called The Year Of The Necks. Sure, that sounds a bit funny, but what we mean is that this year is when everybody here either discovered or re-discovered this amazing band. We gave rave reviews to four of their older records, after falling in love with a four-cd live box of theirs back in December of last year. And judging from sales, a lot of you have gotten acquainted with The Necks this year as well, and liked 'em. This Aussie trio of piano (and/or organ), bass, and drums can't be easily catagorized: they're not exactly jazz, not ambient, not rock, not post-rock, not electronica...but they are some of the above, and more. Less too, 'cause what they do is so understated, and so specifically Necks.
So, what better way is there to celebrate The Year Of The Necks 'round these parts than to revel in the release of this brand new Necks opus, Drive By? And it's definitely the equal of any of The Necks' prodigious output, doing all the things we now expect from them...creating a mesmerizing, hypnotic musical trance-state over a lengthy playing time (in this case, one track, 60 minutes and seventeen gorgeous seconds long). Drive By is a pulsating wonder, steadily building over an hour, the drums becoming more active and restless but always "on", underpinning the constant throb of the bass. Drive By is bejewelled with bright tinkling piano, electronic effects, and other sonic elements, including what sound like crickets joining in around the 11 minute mark. 45+ minutes later, The Necks are still in the groove, channelling ancient rhythm into their extremely modern format. I'm beginning to think that the compact disc is too limiting for these guys. They need a DVD-audio release, so we can hear 'em play for seven hours straight!
So, what comparisons can we stretch to make? Some sort of NPR-ized Circle? A prettified Bohren? Steve Reich meets Miles Davis? Ah, hell with that. It's The Year Of The Necks. No comparisons necessary. Just check 'em out.
Toiling in relative obscurity since 1987, The Necks are an Australian trio who play a hard-to-categorize blend of jazz and rock that's "experimental" yet totally accessible. Hanging Garden (from 1999, but new to me!) is more active than their stunning four-disc set, titled Athenaeum, Homebush, Quay & Raab, which we recently reviewed. The Athenaeum portion of that set, in particular, I found to be quite reminiscent of Keith Jarrett's wintry bare compositions. On Hanging Garden, however, while still making use of their customary piano, drums and bass in a hypnotically repetitive, circular, subtly shifting manner, The Necks colors its palette with a heavy dose of Miles Davis circa his electric fusion mid 1970s phase. The electric organ has an undeniable groove to it, backed up by the throbbing bass, and the drums are positively manic -- shimmering, tinkling and adding texture in a marvelously understated manner. They make you wait over 20 minutes for the stately, elegant piano to kick in with its *gorgeous* melodic theme, but until it comes on you didn't even know you were waiting for it because the sonic foundation they laid is already so satisfying. You've *got* to hear this record. It goes on for one hour and, I (Windy) guarantee, you just don't get tired of it. Yep, that's how good this is.
MPEG Download: "Hanging Garden excerpt 1" [/audio/neckshanging1.mp3]
MPEG Stream: "Hanging Garden excerpt 1" [/audio/neckshanging1.m3u]
