The latest release from aQ beloved label Time Released Sound, whose releases are as much art as music, an insane amount of time and energy put into the packaging for every release. This one comes from an artist called Plinth, whose strange and wondrous music is created using a collection of calliopes and Victorian music boxes, antique sound makers and wheezing creaking mechanisms from way back when. Sadly, we were unable to carry any of the super deluxe version, which in fact came in a fancy box with an actual music box, inside, those were $100 and super limited and sold out in a heartbeat. But as TRS sometimes does, they released the record in a more affordable version, so for those of us unable to plunk down $100 for a cd-r could still enjoy this dulcet sounds.
And dulcet they are, haunting and mysterious, chiming melodies are laid over the whir of strange machines, it's almost like the soundtrack to some strange mechanical workshop, a steam punk wonderland, where all the sounds are created via gears, and automatons, a Rube Goldberg like world of contraptions that create melodies, unfurling whirring textures, and the clicking and creaking of clockwork music boxes, the sound of the machines as much a part of the recordings as the music the machines are making. Dreamy and otherworldly, every song here like some old timey lullaby, broadcast via wireless from another dimensions, the sound of faded memories and lost childhoods, soundtracks to dreams and visions of what once was, bells and chimes, tinkling melodies, all wreathed in static and crackle, as if captured directly off the Victrola, or straight out of the music box, recorded onto a wax cylinder and played back by candlelight in the parlor. So lovely.
LIMITED TO 200 COPIES!
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Electronica nursery rhymes with ample Lego beats, Fisher Price melodies, theremin trills, and Perry & Kingsley wackiness.
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The debut single on Warp from this twee electronica outfit who had a few singles out on Wurtlizer Jukebox. Far more loungey and spacepop than "electronica."
Another disc that somehow slipped under our review radar, which we're only getting to now, even though it's been in the shop since the beginning of the year. James Plotkin should really need no introduction, nowadays he produces and masters pretty much every weird, dark, doomy, heavy, drone record, but has of course played in Khanate, Phantom Smasher, Flux, Romance, O.L.D. and more...
For his entry into Utech's Arc Series, Plotkin has crafted two extended dronescapes, the first recorded live in 2007, hushed and muted and darkly beautiful, deep blackened shimmers, soft rumbling swells, a low end sprawl that over the course of 40 minutes (!) sheds its glassy darkness and reveals a hissing whirring blur underneath, but even then, the sound is smoothed out, blurred, smeared, subtly melodic, not even really ominous as much as mysterious and hauntingly tranquil.
The second track, performed and recorded in 2006, is a whole different beast, a chopped up assemblage of malfunctioning electronics, swirls of glitch and buzz, fractured melodies, damaged streaks of FX, swirling metallic shimmer, dense clouds of collaged high end skree, deep whorls of tangled crunch and moaning bass tones, all tangled and mangled, twisted into uncomfortable shapes and shot through with shards of grinding high end, wrapped in gauzy layers of warm sepia toned whir. While not as simply beautiful as the first track, within the second lurks much melody and beauty, all tangled up with the constantly twisting and twisted buzz and crunch of Plotkin's blackened soundscaping.
Gorgeous packaging, metallic gold and black fold over sleeves, with striking photography by Max Aguillera-Hellweg. Probably super limited, we've had these for a while, we have a decent amount, but once we run out, not sure we can get more....
Another solo release (a reissue of a long out of print cd-r with a twenty+ minute bonus track!) from the mighty James Plotkin, member of Khanate, OLD and Phantomsmasher / Atomsmasher, as well as producer of all sort of dark and heavy music. For Kurtlanmak / Damascus, Plotkin used mostly guitar (along with drums, trumpet, and gongs), run through electronics and processed via laptop, to create two vast expanses of skitter and skip, rumble and whir, the first, a dark droney landscape of warbly backwards melodies, shimmery warm reverberations, deep cavernous dark ambience, shot through with ghostlike melodies and some steel string clang. The strings get chopped and processed into buzzing snarls that eventually get smeared into more dreamlike drones, with the guitars eventually emerging as a skipping hiccupping angular riffic rhythm, before winding down in a slippery swirl of acoustic guitar pick, strum and slide. The second track begins with a refrain of the first, a collage of backwards guitars that quickly dissipates into a super minimal low end drift, which gradually thickens into a warm glacial hum, densely layered and slowly shifting, before bursting into a cloud of glitches and electronic skitter, only to simmer down into a soft focus dreamstate, floating softly into the ether. An amazingly expressive, and deftly delicate solo sonic exploration from a man who has spent the last decade musically pummeling the crap out of us. An unexpected soft side that we've gotten brief glances at over the years, but now given the chance to luxuriate in Plotkin's dreamy dronescapes, without the fear of that impending pummel, this might just be our favorite Plotkin yet!
Fans of Fennesz, Geoff Mullen, Hrvatski and other digital guitar wranglers should definitely check this out.
Packaged in a gorgeous textured fold over paper sleeve, printed with skulls and a barely visible gold filigree, wrapped in a gold metallic, printed obi.
LIMITED TO 1000 COPIES!
Back in 1994, Mr. Plotkin recorded a guitar track and handed it Brent Gutzeit (of TV Pow) in 1995. Mr. Gutzeit destroyed it with homemade instruments, a boom box, and a 4-track. The ensuing recordings were passed back and forth between the two over the past 4 years and finally ended up on Kranky! Solemn, spacious drones and dreamy passages of ambient noise.
KHANATE ALERT!! ULTRA LIMITED CD ALERT!! ARCHIVE RECORDS RELEASE ALERT!! THIS DISC IS ALREADY OUT OF PRINT SO THIS IS YOUR LAST CHANCE ALERT!!
By now you should definitely know the drill. Archive records, who in the past have released the triple live Boris cd (now out of print), the live LSD-March (also out of print), the Khanate live cd (you guessed it, out of print), the live Growing cd (this too, out of print) and a live Earth double cd that ended up being so limited we never even got any, now offers up this newest ultra limited gem. As far as we know, by the time you read this review, this disc too will be out of print and we'll have the last 40 or 50, so, needless to say, ACT FAST! But why should you care? Well, howabout the fact that everything Archive releases is beautifully packaged, this release being no exception? Or howabout the fact that if you don't get this from us now, it's off to eBay with you! OK, the main reason to pick this up is it's 50 percent of mighty doom sludge behemoth Khanate. Guitarist James Plotkin (who you also might remember from such past glories as OLD and Phantomsmasher / Atomsmasher) and his rhythmic partner in Khanate, drummer Tim Wyskida. But, don't expect any downtuned slow motion doom and gloom here. There are some sludgy moments, even one track that sounds like a single guitar track plucked from a Khanate song, but for the most part it's a lot more abstract, with Plotkin coaxing all sorts of sounds out of his guitar, from scaping angular riffing, to scarbbly percussive skitter to shrieking high end skree, to warm muted warble, and even one track of delicate moody drift. Wyskida is right there along side him, offering up subtle little shuffles, simple plodding thuds or wild octopoidal squalls, depending on the mood and what best will balance Plotkin's guitar action. Cool stuff whether you're into Khanaate or not.
Packaged as gorgeously as always, a three panel fold out, adorned with simple text and abstract blurry shark photos, the cd affixed to a small plastic nipple on one of the panels. Comes in red and blue, the color you get will be totally random.
And we hate to belabor the point, but this is VERY LIMITED and almost for sure already out of print!
The Holy Mountain label has been forging a new trajectory as of late into the kosmiche realms of new composition. We last reviewed M. Geddes Gendras' Modular synth solo debut, Test Leads, and following that we now have local San Francisco composer, Henry Plotnick, channeling the big three of minimalist composition, Terry Riley, Philip Glass, and Steve Reich, in his delightful debut release Fields, a composition in nine parts. Plotnick, using digital synthesizer and piano, begins with a piece built from simple repeating melodic phrases that bloom into interlocking repetitive and exploratory filigrees, sometimes with orchestral strings or tinkling bells and gamelan sounds, rising in terrifying intensity or diluting into gorgeous gaseous clouds of vapor. The whole collection exploring the boundaries and limits of a simplified strategy, but one done with an intuitive sense of play and structure that is both hypnotic and tantalizing.
An auspicious debut - oh, and did we mention that Plotnick is just 11 years old??
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Lucky for everybody these recordings have finally been issued in one package, the first 2 (of 3) excursions into some of the most fun, challenging, completely exciting & masterful recombinations of drum & bass, rap samples, and breezy synth melodies from that genius Plug (a.k.a. Luke Vibert, a.k.a. Wagonchrist). Highly recommended.
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This Boston band's latest album Without Number conjures visions of a more aggressive Lhasa or the more recent brooding parlour rock of Celebration. Sound good to you? It sure does to us! Plumerai take the traditional rock band assembly of smokily emotive female vocals, low-slung guitar, bass and drums, and plush it up with the mesmerizing addition of accordion and organ. A stormy, slinky affair that blows winding smoke rings into the candlelight.
From the depths of the Impulse label's more "psychsploitaton" side of jazz comes this exotic East-meets-West rarity from 1968. And if you dug Gabor Szabo's Jazz Raga, any of the John Berberian electric oud albums, the Indo-jazz of Joe Harriott, or the even more authentically "Indo" Indo-jazz of T.K. Ramamoorthy recently reissued by EM, this will be right up your alley.
You might have second thoughts seeing the buttoned-down suit and tie wearing bass player Plummer seemingly taking the piss out of the sitar jazz craze of the mid-to-late Sixties, but this record's musical qualities far outweigh any trendy novelty or gimmicks. The opening track, "Journey to The East", is a groovy pop number with spoken singing (the only track with vocals) but the flute, tabla and sitar interplay is pretty far out. Things get further out on the sinewy free jazz of "Arc 294" and the quiet intensity of "Antares". Even covers like "The Look of Love" and The Byrds' "Lady Friend" have charms beyond what those songs normally have to offer. A cultish obscurity for years, it's awesome to see this one-off album reissued again!
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A very pleasant remix album of the Markus Schmickler-led German electronica-with-guitars outfit known as Pluramon (who just played a great gig here in San Francisco: live guitar, drums, and laptop, super heavy and trancey stuff). This has contributions from such indie and electronica stars as Matmos, Mogwai, Atom Heart, High Llamas, Sonic Youth's Lee Ranaldo, SND, FX Randomiz, and Japanese noiseician Merzbow (GORGEOUS 8-minute closing track). Tons of glitchy fuzzy clicks for those of us who love those textures, and lots of lulling mid-tempo melodies for those of us who are fans of the above groups and also of Boards of Canada, Mouse on Mars (who I coulda swore was on this album until I realized it was the SND track) and ambient-era Aphex Twin. Even if you're new to electronica, this is a perfect way to hear what these groups are about -- no obvious big beats to hit you over the head, just lovely stretched out prettiness. If you're already a fan of Pluramon's neo-krautrock computerized post-rock, be aware that this sounds more like a comp than a new Pluramon disc, but it's still a nice addition to their brief (two actual albums) discography. Recommended.
Markus Schmickler has enjoyed a long career of artistic reinventions, and his Pluramon project marks yet another with the highly acclaimed album Dreams Top Rock. Back in the early '90s, Schmickler began his musical career with a number of obscure electro-acoustic collaborations including Kontakta and Pol; but Schmickler's first major productions came with his first Pluramon record Pick Up Canyon, an album on which Schmickler worked with with Can's drummer extrordinaire Jaki Leibezeit. Outperforming much of the contemporary post-rock of the mid-90s (i.e. Tortoise, Stereolab, etc.), Pick Up Canyon brought an exceptional use of electronics to the always amazing clustered grooves of Leibezeit. Since then, Schmickler also released painterly electro-glitch collages as Wabi Sabi and an overlooked orchestral album that accurately reflected the ideas of such 20th Century avant-garde masters as Ligeti, Arvo Part, and Xenakis.
Schmickler's return to his Pluramon project finds him re-investing in the sublime beauty of shoegazer pop on Dreams Top Rock. As with Pick Up Canyon which hinged upon the percussive prowess of Jaki Leibezeit, Dreams Top Rock revolves around the ego of another. This time it's the David Lynch dream-girl Julee Cruise. Yes, there's plenty of My Bloody Valentine to go around; but to these ears, Dreams Top Rock is also a pastiche of A.R. Kane's very early singles dotted with melodies lifted from the Angelo Badalamenti songbook. Cruise's breathy vocalizations and hushed etherial whispers work incredibly well with Schmickler's adept reinterpretation of the shoegazer sound. Unlike Slowdive or My Bloody Valentine, Schmickler doesn't present himself as a brilliant songwriter. His songs are certainly better than most; but he tends to overwhelm the songs with his flawless production of that narcotized guitar sound.
Especially for anyone who bought the recent M83 record, Dreams Top Rock is an essential album. However, one non-music related complaint: Whose bright idea was it to put a sticker on the front of the digipak with the artist name and album title? I mean, sure, leave that info off the artwork, put a sticker on the cd case, or on the shrinkwrap. But if you decide to leave it off the artwork, then why would you put a sticker (that you can't peel off) directly on the cardboard of a digipack?! It makes no sense. GRRRR!!! ARGGHHH!!!
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For an album that definitely IS the missing link between Krautrock and Postrock, "Pick Up Canyon" has been horribly under-rated. Combining the studio skills of Markus Schmickler and the percussive talents of Jaki Liebzeit (drummer for Can) Pluramon's sound perfectly fuses electronic technology and well executed live instrumentation.
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Markus Schmickler's second album as Pluramon features ex-Can percussionist Jaki Leibezeit chugging away on all of the tracks for a propulsive / trance inducing album of prog-electronica. Certainly for fans of Kreidler and the recent Deutscher Funk compilation (which actually featured Pluramon).
We've been waiting a long time for this one. The follow up to Pluramon's 2003 outing Dream Top Rock, which is a classic AQ favorite at this point. These days Pluramon sound almost nothing like their earliest incarnation when Markus Scmickler was making somewhat abstract electronics with stunning results. But luckily Schmickler is one of those great musicians that changes his palette often but whose results always soar to great heights. This outing finds him exploring somewhat similar terrain as was found on Dream Top Rock, with Julee Cruise on board once again on several tracks with her blissed out and enigmatic vocals. With even more upfront and unadulterated pop in these tracks this has had us thinking lots of Mojave 3 and even the Broken Social Scene as well as My Bloody Valentine and Swervedriver. Such perfect shoegaze songs for the crisp cold days we've been having in San Francisco. The Monstrous Surplus is one of those great records that weaves itself into your subconscious with repeated listens. Minus one dud (we could have gone without the spoken vocal delivery of "Fresh Aufhebung") the album is pretty close to daydream pop perfection. We're pretty surprised that the last Pluramon release didn't make bigger waves as we think it was just as amazing as releases by folks like M83 and Mum which did get to a wider audience. In a year with a nice resurgence of shoegaze influenced records from folks like Ulrich Schnaus and Trembling Blue Stars we hope that Pluramon finally gets the wide appreciation and respect they so rightfully deserve!
Sticky sweet piano and voice ballads that fall somewhere between the lush pop harmonies of Sloan and the maturing 'post-rock' of all the Chicago bands (Gastr Del Sol, Tortoise, Pullman, etc...).
Ok, here's this list's special treat for all you proto-metal fans: a reissue of obscure, early '70s UK hard rockers Pluto! This digipack reissue isn't new, it came out a few years back but we missed it at the time - and in fact, as far as we know it's out of print (the whole Breathless label being now defunct), but we found a handful of these at one of our suppliers and grabbed 'em all. So, they won't be here for long, act fast if you want one.
Pluto's sole album was originally released in 1971 (yes, once again, 1971 completely blows our minds, good grief!) on Pye's progressive, "underground" Dawn label. But the type of progressive rock Pluto plays isn't, y'know, like Yes or Genesis, or Comus for that matter (whose First Utterance was also a '71 Dawn release). No flutes or tricky time signatures. They just play poppy, heavy rock and aren't afraid to boogie. This digipack reissue contains 13 tracks in all, 3 of 'em non-album bonus cuts from singles.
Bonus single track "I Really Want It" is possibly the star of the show, it's been comped several times, on Dawn anthologies and so forth, and for good reason, with suggestive lyrics that are well matched by the song's slow, stomping groove. But there's LOTS of good songs here, from cowbell knockin' fuzz rockers to some more melodic, ballady, even Beatlesy ones.
Recommended for folks into the likes of early Wishbone Ash, Orang-utan, Leaf Hound, Human Beast, Power Of Zeus, Three Man Army, Luv Machine, Bubble Puppy, and other vintage, semi-heavy obscurities.
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Latest slab of grinding destruction from these bay area thrashers. Wicked and heavy, pummelling fastcore. Complex and amazing. With Max from Spazz/What Happens Next on the skins. Awesome.
Shhh, a lil' sleepyhead is singing in his dreams while an assembly of musicboxes unwind their cascading chimes and melting drops from icicles fall upon harp strings... or so the first few tracks sound on the debut album from Denmark's Po. Need we say? Lovely! This solo artist (aka eighteen year old Daniel Porcelli) crafts softly glitchy electronic soundscapes that solidify into more melodically inclined numbers ("Ten One"). Very calming, this will surely help smooth any ruffled feathers at the end of a hectic day.
Psst, this is another of the uncommonly sumptuous array of releases from the young music label Dynamophone. As we mentioned earlier in the review of labelmates Balustrade Ensemble, they've only been around since mid-2006, but already have a bountiful catalog with many more on the way. Particularly if you've been recently enjoying the aquatic drone releases on the Mystery Sea label, you might wish to check out the seemingly likeminded, but more melodically inclined Dynamophone artists. An absolute treasure trove of shimmering and dewy listening delights. Delve in immediately (also see: Balustrade Ensemble, Disinterested, Halou, Pornopop, A Lily, Curium, and R/R Coseboom)!
Another gorgeous chunk of swirling drone drenched psychedelic drift from this crushworthy LA duo. We raved about their recent Island Diamonds cd reissue, while lamenting the relative dearth of Pocahaunted reviews on the aQ site. Well, here's another record to aid us in our quest to make things right.
Chains finds Pocahaunted blissing out big time, weaving hazy stretches of krautrocky avant drone pop, over four songs, two sides of vinyl, once again assisted by Mr. Bobb Bruno. The vocals chant-like and repetitive, the drums a simple propulsive plod buried in the mix, the guitars swirling and blurred, washed out and woozy, plenty of FX, delay, echo, a laid back druggy Velvet Underground style slowjam, dirgey and doomy, but weirdly folky too.
The next two tracks tread similar ground, dropping the drums at one point to get super abstract and shimmery, but before long they slip back into another murky echo drenched slow jam, rife with dubby rhythms and all manner of muted, blurred and smeared ambience.
The fourth track, and the one that gives the record its name, is a cover of Fleetwood Mac's "Chains", which took us a while to even recognize, the band twist it all up and pull it apart, and craft it into something that could very easily have been a Pocahaunted original, the melodies sprawl, the vocals are crooned and wailed, wreathed in reverb, the drums a soft skitter, the two vocal lines intertwining dramatically, turning the original, already a pretty intense song, into something much more brooding and dark, druggy and krauty. Awesome.
Cool color collage cover, xeroxed insert, and pressed on swirled yellow vinyl.
Considering the buzz surrounding this LA drone duo, it's really surprising that this is the first Pocahaunted release we've actually listed! Not to mention the tons of cd-rs, tapes and lps these gals have put out already! (Well maybe not so surprising - we did write a review of their Peyote Road LP on Woodsist, but never listed it 'cause we ran out and it went out of print too fast). In any case, we're super happy to include this genre bending slab of stoned drone-dub on this week's list.
Island Diamonds, a reissue of a sold-out lp released on Arbor (see?) with added bonus tracks, is the latest album from these psychedelic sorceresses. And with the help of producer (and experimental electronica artist in his own right) Bobb Bruno from Polar Goldie Cats, they've really cooked up something special here. Dueling swells of wordless vocal hypnosis, all under the wing of brooding, trance inducing drones. We're reminded of Valet, but with dubby drum machine beats. The perfect balance between pop aesthetics, DIY urban groove and ominous, obscure psychedelia. Definitely new territory for these ladies, and for us. The cd comes beautifully packaged in a colorful digipak adorned with pictures of the band and the usual Not Not Fun collagey goodness. Pressed in an edition of 500, you know these will be gone in no time. Oh, and in addition to the 2 bonus tracks, there's also a music video you can play on your computer, that looks very much like it was made on someone's computer too.
The return of the female dronenoise dynamic duo, often referred to as the Olsen Twins of noiserock (not sure if that's a dis, or if they came up with it themselves), it's unclear if the band ever actually broke up, but regardless, Make It Real marks the duo's first record in a while.
The most noticeable difference here are the vocals, and well, the songs too, dialed back for the most part is the hazy drugged out psychedelia of old, and in its place is something much more rock, more fuzzy and propulsive and less abstract and spacey. From the first song, it almost sounds classic rock, big echoey drums, heavily reverbed guitars, fuzzy garagey organ, and some full on sixties girl group style vocals, finding their new sound more aligned with groups like Dum Dum Girls, the Beets, Brilliant Colors, Vivian Girls, than with their more tripped out labelmates. The sound suits them for sure, and even in their early days, they still dabbled in this kind of hazy psych-pop, it's just more pronounced here. The druggy groove of the Doors is all over this record (or for a more contemporary reference, Wooden Shjips or the Moon Duo), but things also get more jagged and angular as Pocahaunted channel some old school eighties post punk.
Definitely cool, just be prepared for more song and less space, more rock and less drift, it for sure sounds like maybe the shift in sound was organic, the seeds sewn on past records blossoming here, born from a natural progression, from sound to song, making both the recorded, and the live Pocahaunted experience, much more rocking and danceable. Which is not at all a bad thing.
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Pocahaunted have become quite the household name these days, and rightly so. After releasing somewhere close to five LPs in a single year, the Olsen twins of drone, as they are so aptly nicknamed, show no signs of slowing down. And we can thank Troubleman for getting hip to these lady droners just in time to release their most promising effort yet. The duo teem up with the famed Bobb Bruno, as well as Cameron Stallones, a member of Magic Lantern and the man behind Sun Araw, to summon up a darkened slab of ceremonial drone that proves to be our favorite material from the band to date.
Imagine Popol Vuh getting tribal with Brast Burn, throw in a touch of the mysterious voodoo vibes of Valet's Blood is Clean, and you pretty much have this album. Less dubbed out and much more focused then their last lp Chains, Passage is ghostly and unsettling. We can't help but notice how much this outfit has matured over the last few records. Seems like they really laid down some solid ideas on this record. Voices calling from the deserted plains as the sky grows heavy with menacing clouds, the distant clanging of gongs and bells growing louder and louder as the dry earth begins to crack. The pair's signature vocals are deep and melancholic, trance inducing and hypnotic as they sulk in apocalyptic lament. But there is a kind of astral freak out vibe hidden in the dark grain woodwork here, with flaring organ licks and fuzzed/reverbed out electric guitar that fades in and disappears. At times it kinda sounds like some New Agers channeling a Native American ceremony, only to realize they've conjured up some angry force that swallows them whole. Slow building, contemplative and, dare was say, dooooomy, we're definitely into it. And this time around, the band takes a break from their usual collagey album art aesthetic and opted for the more refined look. With a simple, vintagey cover complete with stark pictures of the female droners looking quite dashing, we have to say we're really impressed with the whole package. Don't miss out on this incredibly impressive release! Completely and sincerely recommended!!
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SORRY.Peyote Road, Pocahaunted's second offering from the Woodsist/Fuck-It-Tapes camp compiles two funereal dirges, one from the studio, while the other is a vibey live cut from the bands spate of dates supporting Sonic Youth's rekindling of Daydream Nation last summer.
The former, "Divine Flesh," begins with a dirty and thick guitar phrase that is repeated sludgefully through the duration of the song. The guitar work is embellished with some spry bongo work, what sounds like a sitar ringing sympathetically on the periphery, and eventually the snaking and syllabic vocal meandering's of Amanda and Bethany, the band's two core members.
The B-side, "Heroic doses," is a more clouded, and less melodic affair, quite possibly a result of the live recording techniques employed. It comes across as a sort of subterranean fugue, with more circular dynamics, and less track separation. Peyote Road's pace is more contemplative than previous Pocahaunted releases and performances, erring on the side of mournfulness, and stopping well short of the ecstatic catharsis that put this LA band on the map this past year. This is not a bad thing however, as it lends a bit of space to the listener. Despite its density, there is a loamy and diffuse quality that makes what is ostensibly heavy music by virtue of its palette and repetition, somehow spacious and inhabitable. Call it the bearable lightness of Pocahaunted; eschewing black superlatives for a dark grey sonic tapestry. Further, as their name would indicate, there is an embedded playfulness in the bands approach that sets them apart from many other contemporary drone/psych outfits. The vocals, despite being darkly minor, have an oddly pre-pubescent bounce one might expect to hear coming from a 3rd grader discovering their goth proclivities, and we again mean that in a good way. Certainly anyone well familiar with the band will be exceedingly pleased with this offering, and anyone who has yet to tap into the Pocahaunted/Robedoor/NotNotFun locus would be doing themselves a favor by taking a dip in the pre-natal drone slurry that's been drifting up the coast for the last couple of years. It is special. Warning: already sold out at label and we only have exceedingly few, so sorry, be prepared to be disappointed...
Final missive of dreamy druggy psych rock from the briefly reinvigorated Pocahaunted. Formerly a duo, half of which left to start the sunshinier beach pop combo Best Coast, the other half of the duo expanded Pocahaunted to a five piece, featuring THREE female vocalists, this the only recorded evidence of that lineup, recorded right here in SF with Tim Green, the first of these two tracks begins woozy and washed out, throbbing low slung bass underpins shards of softly angular guitar, the drums are muted and minimal, it's really all about the vocals, the three voices constantly swooping and flitting, locking into strange harmonies before separating again, the vibe is dark and groovy, and while things start off dreamy, the sound quickly builds to something much more frenzied and frantic, the vocals beginning to yelp and howl, the drums following suit, becoming way busier, the result a warmly chaotic chunk of vocal driven post punk psychedelia.
The B side begins even more abstract and dreamy, just bass, skeletal guitar, simple drums, some cowbell, a little synth, and of course vocals, all very spare and spacious, loping and hypnotic, the bass locked into a hypnotic groove, allowing the guitars and vocals to float freely over the top, surprisingly lovely, and a sweet psychedelic swansong.
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The return of Lithuanian black metallers Poccolus! Well, not so much a return, as these guys split up a while back, but we're super psyched to hear more from these guys. Their Supernal label full length was a huge hit with the metalheads around here, gloriously thrashy keyboard drenched, post rock flecked Pagan blackness, originally released in 1996, but reissued a couple years ago. The tracks on Ragana date even further back than that, 1993 and 1994, with a couple live tracks tacked on as a bonus, originally released as a super limited cassette in 1997.
Here, Poccolus sound even more raw, and strangely more melodic. The guitars offering up classic metal sounding harmonies, locked in with the drums, pounding way down in the mix. Shades of Iron Maiden, and at least one of the tracks musically is a dead ringer for Slough Feg, that is until it slips into grim blackness, the bellowy reverb drenched croon, switching to harsh hellish shriek, but even then, the music continues to lope along all mournful and minor key, with plenty of keyboards, although here they're buried under the buzz and lo fidelity hiss. The opening track is so melancholy and catchy it's almost not even black metal. More like some gloomy gothy slightly blackened hard rock, but whatever it is, it's pretty excellent.
In fact, as we dig deeper, all the tracks here are barely black metal, although they're buzzy and heavy enough to keep metalheads' attention, the sound is much more raw and old school and classic sounding, the vocals are the blackest element, but even those shrieks and howls just as often revert to clean-ish croons. And it sound like this was mastered from a cassette, so it's all a little warped and warbly, giving it a haunting woozy off kilter vibe, which only adds to the band's unique sound. One track does actually get super grim and blasty, but that's after about 6 minutes of super minimal rumbling drones. The record closes with another strange only sort of black metal jam, lurching, mid tempo, the guitars warbly and minor key, the keyboard drifting like a haze in the background, the melodies getting more and more grand and epic, the band whipping their lo-fi stumble and buzz into something truly majestic sounding.
The live tracks are way more raw and fierce, lo-fi, but still plenty blown out and brutal, but even then, the weird melodicism of the proper tracks still creeps into the bands grim buzz. The Pagan element is also more present on these later tracks, the overall sound sitting somewhere right between the more polished Pagan crush of the full length, and the warped lo-fi classic metal of the demo tracks included here.
All hail the lords of Baltic black metal. Ummm... really? Yep, really. Poccolus are, according to Supernal, the best black metal band (and most likely the first!) ever to come out of Lithuania (out of, according to the Encyclopedia Metallium, a total of 96 Lithuanian BM bands). And who are we to argue, especially since we've actually only -ever- heard 2 other black metal bands from Lithuania.
Even so, Poccolus are awesome, and just the sort of gloriously twisted blackness we've come to expect from Supernal. Originally released on a tiny Korean label over a decade ago, this record now gets the wicked deluxe reissue treatment, complete with all new artwork, the booklet and tray card printed on cool leather-like textured paper, lyrics in both English and Lithuanian, remastered sound, and pressed on an extra fancy gold cd.
But what does it sound like? A gloriously buzzy black thrash to begin with, but laced with all sorts of unlikely musical randomness, bizarre epic swaths of grandioseÔkeyboard, lots of long stretches of weird post rocky folk with arpeggiated steel string guitar, loping rhythms and folky arrangements, thick washes of murky drone-y Burzumy buzz, strangely melodic, with bits of epic Viking melody, strange sound effects, big drums, thunder, lightning, and of course some insane vocals, that go from high pitched shriek to banshee like wail to monstrous growl to chant like moan, all over a constantly shifting black metal weirdscape of blackened wah guitar, droning drifting buzz, and thrashing percussive blast.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Australian band that combine Sabbathy doom metal riffs and death metal vocals, a bit like Cathedral. Distributed in the US by Andee's label tUMULt, and we're the first store to have it.
Elsewhere on the list you'll find the latest from freaky druggy noise rockers Burnt Hills, with their latest, Stoners Pot Palace. Another eyebrow singing blast of chaotic kraut flecked space rock garage stomp. But at least one member of Burnt Hills has a soft side, and they let it shine as Pog, a gorgeous rambling sonic sprawl of lo-fi murk and melody, sounding much more like some slab of foresty Finnish Folk than the work of one of the Burnt Hills. Employing a mighty (and mighty bizarre) arsenal of noisemakers including bongos, floor drum, triola, acoustic guitar, kiddie accordion, broken kiddie electric guitar, cello, piano, electric guitar, kick drum, electric mandolin, wah wah, giant metal tweezers, pocket rocket and a little big muff, all recorded on random old dusty tape decks boom boxes and dictaphones and it sounds like it. Everything warbly and murky, the production a muddy blur, rendering all the sounds soft and smeared and slightly out of focus, which only adds to the dreaminess vibe of Mitote.�
Strange wheezing melodies flutter and shimmer amidst streaks of foggy ambience, notes are wreathed in dusty halos of reverb and delay, it almost sounds like some strange calliope music transmitted via shortwave and broadcast through a tiny transistor radio. Strings moan and drift, pianos plink and plonk it expansive fields of murky shimmer, full on rock riffs are muted and smothered into strange rhythmic series of thumps, every sound Pog creates is lovingly wrapped in all manner of lo-fi detritus, warm swirls of tape hiss, thick sheets of blurry FX, rendering everything soft and billowy and effervescent. Definitely fans of Avarus and Anaksimandros and Kemialliset will dig this a bunch, as will most cd-r fanatics into lo fi murk and dreamy drone-y drift.
Packaged in handmade gatefold sleeves, with various artwork and photos affixed to the inside and outside, as well as a pop up flower on the inside, LIMITED TO 99 COPIES, each disc hand numbered, the cd-r's cool faux 'vinyl' discs complete with inner label.
Back in the early 80s, Points Of Friction emerged out of the longstanding friendship from a handful of art-school misfits attending the Los Angeles Pierce College, as a means of unorthodox experimentation with consumer electronics and cheap
Swiss "cracked everyday electronics" improvisers Voice Crack team up with avant-percussionist Gunter Muller and French turntablist Erik M, in the group Poire Z. This disc documents their live performances at recent new music festivals in Zurich and Wels. "Tense and vibrating improvised electronic / electroacoustic music." Yes. There's almost every sort of hiss, rumble, crackle, squiggle,
International experimental supergroup Poire_Z return with a third disc of improvisational electronic / electroacoustic music. Featured on "+" are three live documents in which the quartet -- featuring the Swiss experimentalists Voice Crack (Norbert Möslang
Ambient music can be a tricky proposition. At times, it can be beautiful and sublime through its ability to control an aural context (i.e. Jonathan Coleclough, Thomas Koner, Troum, etc.), yet at others, it can appear as the watered down version of some other form of music, where the strengths of that particular genre have been neutered as an homage to Brian Eno or Erik Satie. Such bland new-ageist tendencies have consistently appeared in electronica since the KLF officially fused ambient and techno with their pseudo-joke record "Chill Out" nearly a decade ago. Montreal knob twiddler Ghislain Poirier is the latest to fall into this aesthetic death trap. He has claimed allegiance to the masters of dub in King Tubby, Augustus Pablo, and the Basic Channel heroin house sound; but nothing of any substance from those influences has been translated into music. Instead, non-placed ethnic instrumentation aimlessly piddles through thin drones and an absence of anything remotely engaging. A truly boring album.
Andee made us put this one on here.
Several Poison Idea cd reissues recently hit the racks, and we rate this one the best (although they're all pretty darn good!).
Poison Idea is one of the few bands that comes immediately to mind when you think about what a good hardcore band was really all about. Manic pace, adept "sausage-finger" guitar playing, a tight rhythm section and a singer wailing over the top with lyrics so poetic and fucking deep it's actually worth reading the lyric sheet! Poison Idea was that band -- Portland's finest -- and on top of it all, you had two serious behemoth madmen drinking and bleeding and rocking in a hellbent frenzy.
With this 1987 release, War All the Time (yes, it's named after Bukowski, duh) the self-proclaimed "Kings of Punk" added extra power-pummel to the mix with the addition of Thee Slayer Hippy on drums and Vegetable Olsen on second guitar. This record still proves to be a timeless classic today as far as early hardcore/thrash/crossover goes. Lots of stop-and-start on a dime riffage, a million little cymbal splashes filling in the holes, Pig Champion moving those little chubby stubs up and down the fretboard at the speed of light (or maybe as fast as the malt liquor would allow on any given night!) and on top of it all Jerry A. mumbling / howling / screaming some seriously stoic shit in that immediately recognizable caterwaul, but you wouldn't know how serious unless you were reading along...
You're definitely not a real punk without this in your collection!
We were first turned on to Poison Ring by the guys in Sutekh Hexen, and managed to meet the man responsible on a recent trip to Seattle. We were initially not sure what to expect. The tape packaging, while beautiful, evokes something else entirely, something maybe more gothic, and Mr. Poison Ring himself is quite elven, in appearance and attire, but instead of some gothic renn faire flutter, we were treated to something much more intense, dark and atmospheric, a hazy, faded landscape of woozy soft focus murk and buried melodies, a sound that definitely had us thinking of Philip Jeck and The Caretaker and Tim Hecker. While it's impossible to tell exactly what's producing these ghostly sounds, it does sound like a handful of dusty old turntables, spinning lazily in some giant abandoned ballroom, a series of gauzy melodies, and slowed down samples, layered and woven into softly undulating blurs, melancholy and mournful, imbued with a introspective otherworldliness, the perfect haunting lullaby for nights beneath pitch black skies, devoid of stars, a gorgeously abject drift into some other/underworld, laced with moments both sinister and ominous, but those moments seem to always eventually unwind, the sound eventually and inevitably diffusing into another stretch of blessed out somnambulant ambience.
On some of the tracks, the source does seem to be obviously old records and broken down turntables, and yet, instead of taking away from the mystery, it simply adds more color and depth, often some sort of disembodied rhythm, reminding us again of Jeck, but also Strotter Inst, especially in the stretches anchored by electronic squelches and distorted pulses, like some alien, haunted house music, an industrial creep that manages to evoke a strange tension, while still remaining otherworldly and lovely. The flipside spends much of it's time lysergically loping through fields of murk and pitch shifted melody, an achingly wistful sprawl of dreamdirges and waking sonic feverdreams.
Housed in a beautiful handmade slipcover/sleeve, with a built in mini booklet, printed on vellum, each copy hand numbered, LIMITED TO 89 COPIES!!
