Portland, Oregon based Princess Sweepstakes self-deprecatingly describe themselves as "vaudevillian, amateur rock. Wirey and kind of annoying", but they're much better than that. Vaudevillian, yes, but they're closer to an amphetamine fed, punk rock reworking of the Thinking Fellers Union Local 282. They're all over the map, with heartfelt and playful proggyness that's neither stuffed shirt conservatory uptight, nor too full of its east coast expensive art school education either. Muppet vocals and farfisa organs weave in and out of catchy tunes and spazzy restlessness. Quite nice. Comes packaged with a very nicely hand silk-screend cover.
Dutch experimentalist "captures" and manipulates radio, and TV output organizing static into complex systems using live electronics and percussion.
By now, this debut from the duo of Tobin Prinz and Suzi Horn may have already gotten your attention... after all, they're on a hip label (DFA), they're English, and they play a, yes, danceable style of music that's both retro and very much "of the moment". Super stripped-down, DIY-sounding, arty post-punk that almost comes across as a parody of something from the '80s, more than just inspired by the era. It's slow, simple, sometimes maddeningly catchy music, effectively mixing minimal grooves and gloomy vibes -- for example, the track "Worker" with its doleful, repetitive bass line, and Tobin Prinz' total Mark E. Smith of The Fall derived vocals barking out all about how you're, unfortunately, "the worka". When Suzi Horn contributes vox, it's more of an X-ray Spex-ish yelp. Ultra-sparse production, angular guitars and various other nervous tics are also part of the Prinzhorn formula, including plenty of perplexing non-sequiturs in the lyrics dep't. We'll admit all this could possibly get a bit wearisome over the course of the 16 tracks on this album, but there are certainly some potential hits here (like "Worker" and "Crackerjack Docker") you may want to hear again and again... some of us at AQ were able to resist the Prinzhorn Dance School's calculated charms, but others ended up giving in and getting in to 'em. After all, if these tracks were from one of those Messthetics compilations (and you could be fooled into thinking so, maybe, if only they were more lo-fi) it's quite possible we'd be hailing them as lost classics.
-Where am I?
-In the Village.
-What do you want?
-Information.
-Whose side are you on?
-That would be telling. We want -- information.
-You won't get it.
-By hook or by crook, we will.
-Who are you?
-The new Number 2.
-Who is Number 1?
-You -- are Number 6.
-I am not a number -- I am a free man!
-[laughter]
In The Prisoner, the sixties James Bond superspy entertainment phenomenon is subverted into an enigmatic, psychedelic critique of the Cold War and modern mass society -- or something. The 1967 British TV series, starring Patrick McGooghan, has long been considered one of the most innovative and original TV shows ever, and enjoys quite a cult following today. Hence the release of this soundtrack disc, one of at least three planned.
This collection blasts off with Ron Granier's famous, dramatic theme, complete with thunder, the roar of motorcar, and the hiss of anesthetizing gas. It's one of the most famous tunes in spydom next to 007, Mission Impossible, and Secret Agent Man. The rest of the disc, taking music from the first three Prisoner epsiodes in order (Arrival, The Chimes Of Big Ben, and A. B. and C.) ranges from more jazzy suspenseful numbers to lovely lullabies to Strauss marches, and also contains many snippets of dialogue, including the classic bit quoted above (which many will remember from Iron Maiden's "The Prisoner"). Only some of the music here was composed and recorded especially for the series, with many selections coming from the Chappell Recorded Music Production Library. The Library music is often quite benign, reflecting the surface serenity of the Village, which after all is a very pleasant resort town -- albeit one from which you can't escape, and in which constant efforts are being made to break your will, if you're an obstinate fellow like Number 6. Suddenly the sixties library music, a 'genre' enjoying a hipster renaissance of late, takes on a sinster significance.
The Prisoner -- the cult '60s TV show that's really one of the best TV shows EVER, taking the spy genre into areas dealing symbolically with issues of free will and man's role in society -- now has spawned three volumes of soundtrack music on cd, proving that beyond the classic series theme song, the show also utilized a bunch of cool original compositions and library music pieces (their Prisoner titles and original library titles given here, so we know that "Spinning Car" from the show was originally a library track called "Psychedelia", for instance) as well, and all were important to the impact of the series. With snippets of dialogue from the show thrown in to additionally evoke the Prisoner's surreal world of paranoia and philosophy, these discs are going to be hard for fans to resist. We listed volume one recently (on AQL #154) -- so you can refer to that review, and your local video store, for further background on the Prisoner phenomenon.
File #2 features music and dialogue from the episodes Free For All, The General, Many Happy Returns, Dance of the Dead, Checkmate, Hammer Into Anvil, A Change Of Mind.
File #3 covers Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling, The Girl Who Was Death, Once Upon A Time, and the famously bizarre series conclusion Fall Out (though the Beatles' "All You Need Is Love", an integral part of the soundtrack to that episode, isn't included here -- but you know it pretty well anyway). Each volume also includes the main title theme, and a booklet with lots of photos and Prisoner related information.
The Prisoner -- the cult '60s TV show that's really one of the best TV shows EVER, taking the spy genre into areas dealing symbolically with issues of free will and man's role in society -- now has spawned three volumes of soundtrack music on cd, proving that beyond the classic series theme song, the show also utilized a bunch of cool original compositions and library music pieces (their Prisoner titles and original library titles given here, so we know that "Spinning Car" from the show was originally a library track called "Psychedelia", for instance) as well, and all were important to the impact of the series. With snippets of dialogue from the show thrown in to additionally evoke the Prisoner's surreal world of paranoia and philosophy, these discs are going to be hard for fans to resist. We listed volume one recently (on AQL #154) -- so you can refer to that review, and your local video store, for further background on the Prisoner phenomenon.
File #2 features music and dialogue from the episodes Free For All, The General, Many Happy Returns, Dance of the Dead, Checkmate, Hammer Into Anvil, A Change Of Mind.
File #3 covers Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling, The Girl Who Was Death, Once Upon A Time, and the famously bizarre series conclusion Fall Out (though the Beatles' "All You Need Is Love", an integral part of the soundtrack to that episode, isn't included here -- but you know it pretty well anyway). Each volume also includes the main title theme, and a booklet with lots of photos and Prisoner related information.
Remember the good old days? And by old days, we mean the nineties. When there were regular bands, who wrote real songs. Just sort of indie rock, punk rock, rock and roll, whatever? At the risk of sounding like old fogies, we miss those days now and then. The sort of college rock heyday. Soul Asylum (when they were awesome), the Replacements, Husker Du, Pavement, Skunk, Guided By Voices, the Grifters, the Swirlies, the Volcano Suns, the Lemonheads, you know exactly what we're talking about.
Regular old rock bands that write real songs and play guitars and basses and drums, are becoming more and more rare, amidst the dudes crouched on the floor with a garage sale of equipment, nerds hunched over laptops, scary guys in corpsepaint. As much as we love all that stuff, we sometimes miss a bunch of drunk dudes in jeans and t-shirts playing awesome catchy indie rock.
One of those bands was Prisonshake. They never hit it big, like some of their indie brethren, but they made a handful of kick ass records back in the day. We thought they were long gone, but all of a sudden here comes a brand new single, and man if it doesn't have us flashing back to those days, smoky dingy clubs, bands sweating up a storm on stage and just rocking out.
They may be older and a bit less brash, but they still sound pretty great. A stumbling chaotic mix of all the above mentioned bands, lots of indie jangle, distorted crunch, angular riffing, even some handclaps, the vocals are not entirely tuneful, but suit the music. The A side has some wicked funny and snarky lyrics (it's called "The Cut Out Bin" after all) and a weird coda, a randomly recorded conversation and some backwards guitar. The flipside is all over the place, more of a collage than a song, bits of studio stuff, lo-fi live action, more backwards guitars, all tangled up into a stumbling indie blues jam.
The single comes with a bonus cd, including the tracks from the 7" as well as two extra numbers, a groovy, downtuned jangle rock jam, and a shorter poppier one, both instrumental, and both sounding like they could be unfinished tracks from the last proper Prisonshake record. We like!
We got a handful of the SUPER limited version, only 200 made, a blue vinyl 7" housed in a cardstock fold over obi instead of a sleeve, with the cd, and each one hand numbered.
Nocturnal Earthworm Stew? Ew. Well, perhaps the French title of this Canadian record will tempt your appetite: Bouillabaisse Nocturne Aux Vers De Terre. Sounds much tastier, eh? Actually as long as you have an appetite for unusual, analog-synth based, musique concrete fashioned psychedelia, you'll find this to your liking! Yes, that Hans Edler album isn't the only weird and wonderful, long lost '70s electronic music artifact that we've been digging here at AQ lately. Lucky us, we also just got in this reissue of an amazing 1976 album from one David Pritchard, a Canadian underground radio DJ who was so into the experimental electronic sounds coming out of Germany at the time (Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze, Kluster, Kraftwerk, and the like) that he started collecting the requisite equipment and began writing music that proved well worthy of his overseas influences. Seriously, this could be one of the best Krautrock rarities ever, if Pritchard were German not Canadian. His instrumental compositions feature both an array of analog synths (vintage machines cooler today than ever, the ARP 2600 and EMS AKS) and more conventional instrumentation (violin, guitar, drums, etc.) as well shortwave radio noise / samples and field recordings. All of which you'll hear, for instance, on the fifteen-minute album centerpiece "Thunderpeat", a true tour-de-force of headphone listening, as is the rest of this disc. Quite rhythmically soothing, but with challenging and unusual sonic textures, recalling everything from
Stockhausen to Eno to Dr. Who soundtracks to AQ-fave obscure krautrocker Gunter Schickert. Maybe because of the title, we had expected this to sound like some dark, scary proto-industrial thing, but instead it's remarkably pleasant, full of pretty little melodies -- including a synthesized version of "My Favorite Things". But although Pritchard was the first Canadian artist signed to Island Records, we can't imagine that Nocturnal Earthworm Stew ever hit the pop charts in Canada or anywhere else. It's just too weird and eerie and arcane. Despite how lovely his songwriting can be, this certainly does possess a hefty share of foreboding atmosphere, some of this (tracks like "Evil Orge Interlude / Satan's Seaside Walk" for instance) coming across like an ominous mixture of Tangerine Dream and Italian horror soundtrack masters Goblin. Not a bad thing! This cd reissue includes four bonus tracks and a thick booklet full of photos and informative text, including notes from Pritchard himself. Note to Canadian music nerds: this album also marks the recording debut of none other than Nash the Slash, who guests here on a couple tracks on violin.
Who loves Coldwave? We Do! And we just got a handful of these 7" from Russian synth duo Private Entertainment. If you liked the female sung side of Cold Cave, Nini Raviolette, or Gina X Performance, then you should check out the icy shimmer of this Soviet male/female duo. On one track, they even remind us of "Me and My Rhythm Box" from the Liquid Sky soundtrack! So good!
For the longest time, when people into heavy music asked us who the best band in SF was, we would generally say Burmese (of course), maybe Slough Feg, sometimes the Fucking Champs, if they said EVER, then it would be Weakling hands down (or, well, we could argue for hours). But over the last few years, more and more amazing heavy bands have been giving those other bands a run for best-heavy-band-in-the-city money, none moreso than boy-girl-boy doom-crush psych-sludge trio Prizehog, who over the course of the last couple years have become the sort of band that should be HUGE. Every Melvins Nerd and Harvey Milk obsessive out there, should WORSHIP these guys (and gal). It's definitely only a matter of time, their records kill, but live they DESTROY, their set at our South By Southwest showcase was a stunner, and they sort of stole the show, and it's not hard to see why, especially here, on Prizehog record number two (number three if you count their long out of print debut cd-r), which finds the band further honing their sound, still present are of course massive skull caving drum pound, churning downtuned guitar chug, percolating sci-fi synths, the Melvins / Harvey Milk still huge, but Prizehog seem to want to be both a psychedelic space sludge band, and some sort of sludge pop band, and it's that split personality, that makes this shit rule, every song a push and pull between all out freakout, and hook heavy crunch, and somehow, instead of opting for one or the other, they simply figure out a way to do both at once, weaving impossibly catchy melodies, hooks galore into blackened doom sludge dirges, and then stretching that shit out into droned out psychedelic heaviness. The vocals a deep dramatic croon, the keyboard unleashing all manner of textures and psychedelic sounds, everything tangled up with the group's progged out downtuned crush.
All three songs here are great, but the 11 minute closer might be THEE jam here, a brooding slow build, all super textured and psychedelic, with some haunting harmony vocals, and twisted FX over a churning chug, and some doomic pound, the group allowing for lots of space, letting notes ring out, and gradually decay before the next hit, stretching it way out, before exploding into some serious mathed out noise rock pummel, only to then blossom into some weirdly progged out epic majestic bombast, before devolving into a closing coda of dirgey drum creep and blown out guitar moan, before a final blast of mathy crunch.
Released on the legendary Gravity Records label, which makes Prizehog labelmates with groups like Mohinder, Heroin, Clikatat Ikatowi, Angel Hair, The Locust, Man Is The Bastard, Universal Order Of Armageddon, Unwound and more! Fuck Yeah!
We were heartbroken when our pals, the local weirdo boy-girl-boy doom crush psych sludge trio Prizehog, decided to leave San Francisco, but we understood - hell, SF is a harsh place to live these days if you're not rich, and ultimately, we weren't surprised to see Prizehog settling in Portland, a city arguably much more hospitable to struggling musicians and artists, but listening to the sonic results of this move, you'd think they were transported to some alien planet, transmitting this new record via some sort of futuristic technology. Cuz holy fuck, if this band was one of our favorites already, they somehow still managed to up the musical ante, taking everything we loved about them before, and making it, well, more. More heavy, more noisy, more psychedelic, more warped, more twisted, more confusional, more proggy, more what-the-fuck, and really just more ridiculously, mindblowingly next level doom-sludge genius. We may be prone to hyperbole, but it still feels like we might be understating just how goddamn good Re-Unvent The Whool really is.
Imagine a warped doom-prog, like some alternate universe metal Magma, processed vocodered vox, tangled up in churning spaced out riffage, underpinned by droning rumbles, and laced with twisted fragmented melodies, launching occasionally into full on sludge-pop creep, like some killer Torche jam spinning in slow motion, a gloriously glacial single digit rpm onslaught, that definitely makes the usual the Harvey Milk comparisons still pretty apt, but imagine HM if they were somehow slower, druggier, proggier and more totally and confusionally WTF. Songs explode some furious grinding metal, squalls of chugging riffage, barraged by machine gun drumming, all wrapped around the bellowed alien vox. But this is doom or sludge, or some twisted avant version, so songs inevitably slow down to a tarpit crawl, swirls of sparkling sci-fi FX surround the proceedings like glittery clouds of malevolent sonic fairy dust. And that's just one song in! And it only gets more gloriously fucked up and next level from there. It's hard to describe what's even going on, cuz some of the music here is literally so unlike anything else out there. These hairy weirdos are channeling some twisted alternate universe sonic garble, and transmuting it into fucking blown out, twisted genius ultra doom, noise pop, prog-sludge nirvana.
The record seems to blackly blossom in stop motion, flitting from near stasis, to frenzied crush and back again, tribal drumming avalanches over thick, coruscating chords, synths spitting out symphonies of klaxons and alarms, the backdrop for the unfurling of an impossibly downtuned, droned out slab of multiple o'd doooooooooom dreaminess, that manages the impossible feat of being crushingly, punishingly heavy, but also, kinda pretty too. Some seriously lovely 'oooooohs' will surface in the midst of a wild chaotic squall of churning blacktar throb, or a cascade of harmonics will rain down like shooting stars over a field of grinding, corrosive crunch, it's goddamn musical alchemy, the sort of musical magic almost no bands are capable of. And then out of fucking nowhere, Prizehog will get all twangy, offering up some sort of country doom, that sounds like it should be ridiculous, and it sort of is, but it's also just about the goddamn greatest thing you'll ever hear, like Earth, Barn Owl, Morricone, Scenic, all melted down, and spit out as a creepy massively metallic Wall Of Voodoo sort of campfire crush, sounds bizarre, and it totally is, but it's a bizarre brilliance that once again, should convince pretty much any doom lover with a penchant for sonic weirdness, that these three are the sludge saviors we've been waiting for, written about in some forbidden text, a fragment from the lost metallic scriptures, and Re-Unvent The Whool, their second coming, signalling some musical rapture, where we're all engulfed in fields of musical flames, but fuck, if this is what the end sounds like, and we can only hope it is, then we say bring it on, and what a way to go.
It's hard to know what else to say, other than repeat what we've always said, Prizehog should be adored, they should be worshipped the way Harvey Milk and Boris and the Melvins are, cuz maybe at one point, Prizehog were simply kids aping their heroes, aspiring to the sludge-y genius and twisted outsider metal of those other groups, but as hard as it may be for some folks to believe, Prizehog, might have outheavied, and outweirded, and outgeniused those masters, and become masters themselves, masters of fucking alien prog-doom, long haired, psych sludge, dirge-drone, damaged art pop. Fuck yeah.
Super striking, full color, eye popping, Wildildlife-worthy cover art, swank spot varnish printed jackets, and includes a download too...
After a tiny handful of way too limited cd-r releases, and an endless series of devastating live aktions (including a show stealing opening slot at our 2009 South By Southwest showcase), comes the long awaited full length from this SF boy-girl-boy doom-crush psych-sludge power trio, a sprawling five, track, 40 minute epic, that will definitely hit the spot for all of you hard and heavies that like it slow and low, and dig the likes of the Melvins, Harvey Milk, Boris and other slo-mo dirge merchants. But Prizehog infuse their low end assault with all manner of druggy psychedelia, warped doom pop and blurred blissed out slow-core, conjuring up a sound that pounds and pummels, drift and shimmers, grinds and churns, slipping effortlessly from bombastic Melvinsy howl and chug, to a super hooky heaviness, that reminds us of the warped Buttholes beholden noisepop of Prizehog pals Wildildlife, from a sort of bluesy, blissed out tarpit ZZ Top swing and swagger, to a dark and dolorous black hole heavy slowcore a la Codeine or True Widow, often all wound up into a single song.
Thought Nest begins with "Swayback", opening with a little bit of harmonica flecked blues fakeout, that quickly transforms into some seriously downtuned heavy doompsychblues churn, lurching and mathy and metallic, but laced with some subtle groove, the vocals a sort of worldless croon, the song pounding away before slipping into a woozy, washed ouy lysergic haze, a blurred starfield of chiming guitars and whirling layered melodies, before returning to a more swaggery, slithery lumbering crunch, only to finally blossom into a skull caving, knuckle dragging bit of slo-mo dirgery, all bellowed howls and keening high end tones, wrapped around a pummeling, drum heavy dirge-metal doom-pop workout, grinding its way through clouds of tripped out FX, and finishing off like it began with a bit of harmonica-y blissed out blues, before one final blast of churn and chug.
"Dunner" is up next, unfurling a stretch of tripped out shimmer, draped over garbled soft focus white noise, all hovering beneath clouds of cymbal sizzle, spidery guitar melodies, a druggy bit of drift, before a flurry of monstrous drumming drags with it a glorious psychedelic metallic cacophony, wild squalls of tangled guitars over intense double kick drumming, only to slip right back into something way more abstract, moody and murky, a sort of blackened slo-mo ballad, some simmering slowcore shimmer, bleary and blurred, almost like a more metallic, more drugged out True Widow, the sound dense, and layered, alternatingly smeared and shimmery, soaring and pop flecked, crusty and crunchy...
The oddly titled "Aykranoid" explodes with a chugging almost Eighties style metal riffing wrapped around some pounding black hole drum pummel, wild swooping and swirling effects, and some seriously twisted vox, the aforementioned vocal bellow, but here even MORE bellowy, drenched in effects and way up in the mix, spitting out mush mouthed stream of consciousness vokills, that add a weird psychedelic avant pop vibe to the otherwise more metallic backdrop, before again shifting into a slow slithery crawl, the sound epic and majestic, but still muddy and murky, warped and woozy.
"1865" is a bit more introspective, a slowly materializing smoldering bit of chordal guitardrone buzz, spread out into a gauzy hypnotic hypno-dirge, the beats spread way out, each chord allowed to ring out, and fade into something softer and more shadowy and nebulous, a contorted bit of dark dirge droniness, the sound shifting from crash and crunch, to muted thrum, all very trancelike and ritualistic, especially when the ghostly washed out vocals drift in, the sound transforming into a sort of crumbling, super distorted dream pop, again sounding more like a bastardized True Widow or Codeine, although here the sound grows ever more caustic and corrosive, but never without losing that moody pop vibe, just getting louder, and more dense, eventually locking into a more metallic bit of contorted churn, only to bliss out a bit, before a final stretch of lurching, pounding pop flecked pummel.
Finally, the record finishes off with "Ramsong", which begins in a cloud of grinding guitar noise, and swirls of chaotic buzz, a wild bit of droned out static psych, out of which emerges yet another gorgeous bit of low slung slowcore shimmer, dreamy and druggy and drifty, before exploding in a blast of seriously cruching metallic riffery, the drums a wild octopoidal pound, the vocals that weird Tom Waits / Buzz Osborne bellow, the sound nearly schizophrenic, flitting from pretty drift, to damaged dirge, rife with cool little gnarled guitar licks, streaks of feedback, layers of buried melody, a stuttering sprawl of strangely melodic heaviness, an expansive epic chugscape, that seems to grow more poppy as the song unwinds, and weirdly enough getting darker and more dense, while simultaneously seeming to space out, drifting into something more psychedelic abstract. The song finally begins to dissipate, the various elements loosed from structured song and allowed to float weightless, a darkly delirious night sky of loosely tangled melodies, of overlapping spectral voices, of washed out guitar buzz and deep low end rumbles, soft focus effects and dreamy druggy blissed out ambience.
Fucking SO RULING, gorgeous stuff for sure, crushing, hypnotic, heavy and heady, poppy and spacey, the sort of thing that should appeal to folks who dig the dooooom, or the druggy psychedelia, or the dirgey slowcore, or the warped pop, or the sludgey metal, and just might be your favorite new record if you dig ALL of those. Which we absolutely DO!!
Pressed on 180 gram vinyl and LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!!
Folks outside of San Francisco are probably unaware of the bitchin' underground rock scene going on here, and we're not talking about the experimental / drone / cd-r scene, that scene is happening too but those folks get way more press. We're talking about the bands, the rock bands, that play basements, play at Thrillhouse Records, a killer performance space / shop in the Mission, who release cd-r's too, but whose sound is more metal and sludge and rock than drone and drift and shimmer.
Wildildlife when they were here were part of that scene. So are Ovens, THE best pop band in the city (with a record coming out on tUMULt any day now), then there's Robocop III, who we've yet to hear, but like based entirely on their name. And then there's Prizehog, who have probably played with all those bands, but whose sound is all their own.
Their cd-r is 5 long songs, each one a slow building, brooding chunk of slow motion heaviness. It's metallic, but not really metal, heavy and sludgey and dark, but with weird bits of epicness and majesty mixed in. There's definitely a Harvey Milk thing going on, and we'd be WAY surprised if fans of that band didn't dig these guys as well. Not so say they're aping HM, more like they're sort of orbiting the same sonic black hole.
Plus Prizehog have a lot more spaciness going on, lots of swirl and shimmer, long drawn out stretches of dark drift, rumbling low end and ominous dronescapes, often sprawling into moody abstract slowcore drifts, peppered with synths, skeletal rhythms and blooping bleeping effects, that slowcore sometimes sounding almost like a blackened doom metal, before returning to their glacial downtuned pound, impossibly slow crawls through near static metal riffage, and squalls of drum splatter, and a howled guttural voice that sounds like it's gargling glass and spitting blood, the whole band a lumbering beast, lurching from chord to chord, note to note, occasionally pausing to rest beneath the glimmering starlight, before rising again to continue on its path of utter destruction.
Heavy, fucked up, freaked out, distorted and brutal, space-y and sometimes sorta pretty, bet these guys destroy live, but for now this chunk of filthy heaviness and sludgey crush will do just fine.
Full length number two from these Bellingham Washington psychedelic spacekraut hypno rockers, and as we mentioned in our review of their first cd-r, PRND features one of the members of late great weirdo ramshackle doom blues outfit The Reeks And The Wrecks, and while some of that ramshackle blues vibe does find its way into the new band, the sound is much more low fidelity, still loose and improvised sounding, but darker and more driving, rhythmic and spacey and droned out, and more along the lines of other modern krautrock revivalists like the Moon Duo.
In that same framework of slow burning extended jams, with wild squalls of blown out guitars, motorik skeletal rhythms, and long stretches of layered ambience, PRND make that sound even more abstract and tripped out, letting the guitars buzz and rumble and howl, often blurred into extended smears of almost SUNNO))) like glacial dirgery, but just as often, they dial back the buzz, and let the sounds shimmer and skitter and creep. Just take the sprawling opening track, which begins with a long stretch of blurred riffage, and woozy spidery melodies, a sort of slo-mo almost Barn Owl sounding twangscape, haunting and cinematic, the guitars in-the-red, but muted and shaped into dark swells, the sound eventually getting louder and louder until the guitar sounds seem to crumble, and the meters peg, and that blown out distortion becomes like another instrument, pulsing and throbbing, while the band weaves a dreamy psychedelic swirl underneath. It's not until about 7 minutes in that the drums first show up, and like the first record, the rhythm is some rinkydink Casio keyboard preset (or at least sounds like it) and is also super distorted, locked into a shuffling looping groove, that the band then wrap in wild squalls of heart-of-the-sun Hawkwind style soaring swirling guitar shreddery, loping and hypnotic and sorta heavy, which is sort of how we pictured the whole rest of the track to go, but then band switches gears again, shedding the wall of guitars, and leaving just that skittery rhythm, some wheezing keyboards, and little melodic fragments, and bits of twang and buzz, drifting in the surrounding space. There are strange reverbed sonar like chirps, moaning chordal hum, the song creeps and slithers dreamily before finally fading out.
And so goes the rest of the record, each of the tracks a dreamily propulsive skeletal rhythm, locked and looped, the band unfurling warm tangles of muted melody, and lush layers of buzz and hum, sometimes loping and meandering, other times churning and almost doomy, sounding glimmering and crystalline one second, murky and dirgey the next, always spacey and psychedelic, finally finishing off with a nearly ten minute abstract space jam, that is all sputtering rhythms, echo drenched organ stabs, stunted fragmented riffs, super abstract and almost ambient, and very very dubby. Killer stuff for sure. And like the first cd-r, absolutely recommended.
SUPER LIMITED, each one hand numbered, and gorgeously hand painted.
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This new trio was born out of the ashes of late great Bellingham combo Reeks And The Wrecks (whose record Knife Hits was released on Andee's tUMULt label, and whose lost first lp is reviewed elsewhere on this week's list) and trades in the Reeks's ramshackle doom blues for something way more psychedelic and krautrocky, spacey and hypnotic, in fact before we get lost in the gushing wordy description that's about to follow, we thought we might head off some of you 'skimmers', by saying that all you folks who dig Moon Duo, and other similarly stripped down modern psych/kraut combos, will most likely go nuts for these guys too.
Just check out the opening track, after a few minutes of abstract psych guitar drift, the a simple, skeletal, propulsive rhythm surfaces, and the band lock into a sort of post Spacemen 3 / Jesus And Mary Chain chunk of psychfuzzkrautrock that is totally mesmerizing and hypnotic. The rhythm is locked in, looped endlessly, pounding away, while above, the multiple stringed instruments, unfurl epic swaths of sound, wild spidery leads, fuzzy pop-like jangle, crunchy angular riffage, layered drones, a lush tangle of melodies and textures, the result totally divine. Drugged out and dreamy. And the rest of the record plays out in a similar fashion, that minimal machinelike beat driving sprawling expanses of psychkraut bliss, the sound shifting from blissed out and sun dappled to darker and driving, from ethereal and blown out to slithery and almost bluesy (which is when the Spacemen 3 comparison seems particularly apt), finally culminating in the gorgeously hazy slow burn ballad that finishes things off. We obviously love Reeks And The Wrecks, and love Frozen Cloak (another post-Reeks band, reviewed elsewhere on the aQ site, their sound blacker and buzzier, and we actually have it back in stock, just ask), so you can add PRND to the list of incredible Reeks-born Bellingham bands, that should be WAY more popular than they are. Easily one of our new faves...
SUPER LIMITED, each one hand numbered, and gorgeously hand painted.
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Just in case you were wondering, there IS a universe. A universe in which a band from Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley released a privately-pressed lp in 1975 containing some crazy sci-fi jazz fusion prog rock jams. You may not have heard that record yet, but you live in that universe, too. That band was called Probe 10, and that lp was called There Is A Universe.
Imagine an underground hippie space rock band, with plenty of acid rock guitar and fuzz bass, teaming up with a groovy trumpet playing jazz cat who wandered in from some '60s nightclub. It's like Herb Alpert, smoking a lot of herb (ha).
Usually when obscure private press reissues are billed as long lost psych/fuzz gems, especially when there's any sort of 'jazz' component, you have to be skeptical. But, in this case, it's actually pretty cool artifact. Super over the top with chops, and with the fuzz. The band, obsessed with the likes of Return To Forever, get busy with hectic tempo changes and rollercoaster song structures, brassy attacks, and flute too, lots of flute. And there's a big drum solo on here as well, part C of the five part suite "Invasion Of The Malladroids". Just ridiculous, really. And when they aren't conjuring jazzy sci-fi space battles with their instruments, they get all new agey, check out the babbling brook and spiritual spoken word on "To Improvise A Dream", and then there's the very first song, the title track, the only one with singing on it (courtesy guest vocalist Susan Rudelich), shrill and sweet at the same time, misleadingly melodic and hippified though, setting you up for a surprise as the band kicks into the first of the Malladroid invasion cuts immediately afterwards, some of the fuzziest, freakiest prog fusion absurdity we've ever heard.
Nicely packaged in a miniature lp sleeve, the cd booklet featuring personal liner notes from two of the band members, Jim McGee and Barry "Buzz" Bachman. Also, there's five unreleased bonus tracks on the cd (a vinyl version of this reissue is forthcoming too, btw).
A taster from the Probot cd being release early next year. Probot? That's Foo Fighter Dave Grohl's metal project, wherein he recruited his favorite metal singers of all time to perform songs he'd written for them, in the style of their bands. Yeah, it's not enough that Grohl was in Nirvana, and plays drums for Queens Of The Stone Age and Killing Joke, but now he's gonna live out his teenage dreams even further by teaming up with the likes of Cronos (Venom) and Wino (The Obsessed, Saint Vitus, Spirit Caravan) to get all metal on our asses! Well wouldn't you if you were him? I would. Anyway, here's his cuts with Cronos (side A) and Wino (side B), and they're fun, certainly not on par with what made these guys legends but still a good time. Definitely whets our appetites for the full-length, on which we'll get to hear from Lemmy, Snake, Mike Dean, Tom G. Warrior, Max Cavalera, Eric Wagner, King Diamond, and others. Neat-o. This seven-inch, btw, is limited to just 6,666 copies (really?) and sports art, logo, text by Away of Vovoid. NOW who's the coolest guy from Nirvana?
At last, the long-anticipated release of Probot -- Dave Grohl's teenage metalhead fanboy wet dream come true. Yep, before Grohl was famous as a Foo Fighter and former member of Nirvana, he was kid fully into hardcore and metal. So now he's gone and done something that just not enough rich and famous people seem to do -- he wrote a bunch of metal songs and then sent 'em to a dozen of his favorite metal vocalists for them to sing over! (Maybe he got the idea from the Iommi album he himself guested on a while back.) As a result, you could look at this as more of a compilation/tribute than an album by a band called Probot.
So, gimme the AQ-review on this you ask? Well, in short, it's definitely a cool concept, not necessarily a great album, but one that fans will definitely dig! We're talking fans of Mr. Grohl and/or the roster of singers: Cronos (Venom), Max Cavalera (Sepultura, now Soulfly), Lemmy (Motorhead), Mike Dean (Corrosion of Conformity), Kurt Bretcht (DRI), Lee Dorian (Cathedral and old Napalm Death), Wino (The Obsessed, etc.), Tom G. Warrior (Celtic Frost), Snake (Voivod), Eric Wagner (Trouble), and King Diamond (Mercyful Fate/his own self). Not a bad line-up, eh?
Each track sounds like a mixture of the Foo Fighters and a pastische of whatever band the singer was from. Among the best are the Lee Dorian doom epic "Ice Cold Man" and the one with Eric Wagner, "My Tortured Soul". That one might be the best on here 'cause although all the vocalists are cool, Wagner is one of the few who both has a rad voice and is also actually a REALLY GOOD singer and so is capable of adding his own vocal melody line and making the piece just that much more of a song. Almost everyone else is stuck singing along with the basic riff or rhythm, which Grohl kept fairly simple on account of how the singer was going to have to sing it sight unseen (and also because he's saving his songwriting oomph for the next Foo Fighters opus?).
Making this even more drool-worthy for true metal freaks, Away of Voivod did the cover art, and the packaging overall is top-notch, with photos of the singers (the one of Lee Dorian, looking all of 16 years old, is the cutest!), and the nice touch of little graphic symbols representing each singer's original band. Oh and one more thing: there's an unlisted bonus track featuring famous metal voice Jack Black of Tenacious D!! It's one of the best cuts too.
...Ok, since you asked, herewith follows the list of singers whom Andee and Allan would select for Probot vol. 2 (or for similar projects of their own when they get rich and famous):
Scott Reagers (St. Vitus), Abbath (Immortal), Paul Di'Anno (Iron Maiden), Gerrit Mutz (Sacred Steel), Dax Riggs (Acid Bath, etc.), Bobby Liebling (Pentagram), Eric Adams (Manowar), Jeff Walker (Carcass), Danie Powers (Powers Court), Joey Belladona (Anthrax), John Bush (Armored Saint/Anthrax), George Criston (Kick Axe), Paul Shortino (Rough Cutt), Claude (Smack, if he was still alive, of course), Mike Monroe (Hanoi Rocks) Ronnie James Dio (Elf, Rainbow, Black Sabbath, Dio), Phil Mogg (UFO), Steve Grimmett (Grim Reaper) and I imagine we could go on and on. Maybe ours will have to be a triple cd, or quadruple cd or....
Don't get us wrong, we like this record a lot, another classic example of what we love most from Slumberland records releases, beautifully distorted, fuzzy, reverbed girl-group jangle pop! But if it was ONLY Slumberland putting this music out right now (what we have perhaps-not-so-lovingly dubbed: THE NOW SOUND OF 2010) and not many, many other labels like In the Red, Captured Tracks, Sacred Bones, Castle Face, Fat Possum, and even Sub Pop and 4AD, then we might find it just a bit more special. But while we're just about to reach breaking point on this particular sound, our ears couldn't help but perk up on the opening bars of "Feel Sorry For Me" and figure out what was playing. Sort of an expanded take on Black Tambourine's shoe-gazing distorted gloss and the Dum Dum Girls' earnest disaffection, Procedure Club's debut is as catchy and infectious as both of them, if not quite as perfect.
Procer Veneficus is a one man master of deep drone and black buzz hailing from Santa Cruz of all places, and unlike other groups who weave their black ambience into and throughout their metal, Night, the man behind PV, chooses more often than not, to switch back and forth, creating alternating records of buzzing black metal, OR abstract ambience. Equally adept at both, each strain of PV's sound manages to hew close to the heart of the man, and the band and the sound.�
This long in the works double cd is the perfect encapsulation of that sound, capturing both sides, and laying them out side by side, two discs, in a homemade box, packaged with incense (he is from Santa Cruz after all) and a dried leaf, one a massive throbbing snarling smear of blurry blackened buzzing metal, the other, a slow crawl of ultra creepy and cavernous low end exploration. Both magnificent.
The ambient disc, titled Lunar Transit, with song titles like "Icelight Glitter" and "Dust From Frozen Seafloors" sounds just like the titles would lead you to believe. A dark slow motion trawl along the moonlit ocean floor, or the starlit barren surface of some alien planet, completely gorgeous expanses of�deep shimmering low end, simultaneously warm and enveloping, and slightly alien and frosty. Epic and massive and cavernous, but still intimate and darkly beautiful, tones that ebb and flow like some lunar tide, totally hypnotic and dreamlike, and just a little bit ominous. They even do a Dead Can Dance cover (!) but manage to transform it into something a bit blacker. Definitely some of the most amazing black ambience we've heard in ages. Think Lustmord,�Thomas Koner and the like, but with a bit more melody, and a bit more dramatic melancholia. So good.�
The metal disc, titled Duskworlds, and with titles like "Gloamlight" and "Beneath Horizonfire" and Frostwreath Moon", begins with a brief bit of ambient drift (that does surface briefly again here and there), but soon, it's a hailstorm of soft focus buzz. The amazing thing about the metal side of Procer Veneficus is just how warm it sounds, not brittle or harsh or chaotic, instead it's just warm and thick and dense, a continuous drone woven from thick sheets of blackened guitar, the vocals a distorted whisper, just another layer of shimmery black haze. There are drums and other things going on, but they become totally lost in the murk, in the gloriously fuzzy haze, it's like staring at the stars through swirling clouds of smoke, everything shifting and changing shape and color, the stars winking in and out, sparkling and glistening, or like some thick black tide washing over you, filling up your eyes and ears, drawing you further down, sucking you under, replacing your sense with a glorious never ending buzz...
The cds are packaged in full color sleeves adorned with striking moonlit landscapes, also included is a full color postcard, image on one side, text on the other, a dried leaf, a pouch of incense (labeled: Unending Voluptuous Summer Eves), all on a downy bed of white cotton, packaged in a brown cardstock box, with a sticker affixed to the front.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Limited to 200 copies, each hand numbered, already out of print at the label. We only got a handful...
TWO brand new releases from this Santa Cruz psychedelic black metal one man band, one a haunting slab of oceanic dark ambience, the other a mesmerizing collection of drone drenched buzzing blackness.
Over the course of 10+ full lengths, Night, the man who is PV, has explored both sides of his sonic personality, the buzz of raw depressive melancholic black metal, and the drifting shimmer of ambient and dronemusic, often blending the two, into hazy blurs of blackened soundscapes and moody buzz and blast.
On Convoy (Pt.2) (we're pretty sure there wasn't a part one), Night offers up one of the more metal and aggressive releases we've heard from PV, there are still definitely moments of drift and shimmer, but this is definitely black metal, right off the bat, first few seconds, a frenzied blur of buzzing guitars and pounding programmed beats, with some insane inhuman, so processed they just sound like creepy machine like scrapes and rasps, the music looped and mesmerizing, the drums relentless and motorik, a mournful melody lurking within, the recording strange, wreathed in effects, reminding us quite a bit of the various EEE un-black metal projects, where the textures and timbres and the production are as much a part of the sound as the music itself, the black and the buzz fade away, leaving the drums to pound on, gradually changing shape until they too disappear, leaving just a keening high end drone, draped over deep rumbling low end tones, and haunting ghostly voices, before the blackness erupts once again, and that hissing metallic snake voice returns, and we're plunged back into more of that harrowing blackness.
And so it goes over the course of Convoy, doomy and dirgey and black and depressive and warm and fuzzy and washed out, the vocals that alien metallic rasp, the melodies languorous the drums solid and unswerving, very circular and meditative and entrancing, the whole record droney and dark. Once we get further into the record, the sound definitely sprawls and expands, from deep shimmery drifts of reverbed clean guitar and lilting moodiness, two mechanized strum and almost jazzy drumming, to swirling woozy shoegazey metallic whir, to dense soaring waves of epic blackness, not necessarily metal, but strangely heavy and dramatic, to near static almost looped sounding blackened grooves, to thick caustic almost abrasive black soundscapes, riddled with ominous thrum, brittle crackle, and more of that reverby moonlit guitar, but those bits all set within a landscape of harsh howling blackness, roaring smeared minor key buzz, roiling rhythmic crush, and swoonsome sorrowful melodies.
Latest bit of black mystery from this mysterious one man band from Santa Cruz, who constantly blurs the line between gorgeous black ambience, and blissed out buzzing blackness.
Deathwanderings finds PC in a contemplative mood, eschewing all buzz and blast, and instead offering up some hazy soft focus dronemusic, channeling folks like Andrew Chalk, Jonathan Coleclough, through his blackened sonic filter.
Most of the tracks here are reinterpretations of pieces by Chopin, Satie and Schubert, stretched and blurred and smeared into soft streaks, gauzy shadows, hushed whispers, the music of breezes and flowing streams, organic and fluid, each track a hazy outline, the actual sounds within fluttering and fleeting, transitory and barely there.
Weird to hear such gentle beauty and subtle sonics from someone capable of kicking up a serious black buzz, but this is fantastic, utterly understated, and completely mesmerizing.
Nothing else to say really, other than metalheads steer clear. This is for the drone obsessed out there, those fascinated with the mystery of and majesty of minimal murk, explorers looking to delve into the heart of the drone. This is it. Right here.
LIMITED TO 100 COPIES.
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Procer Veneficus are another band we've dug for a while, but are only now getting around to reviewing. A one man band from Santa Cruz of all places, PV, over the course of a handful of releases, has wandered between buzz drenched psychedelic black metal fuzzscapes a la Velvet Cacoon and dark lugubrious murky ambient acoustic folk, a gorgeous and bleak black soundworld, equally mysterious and hypnotic, whether in the form of tranquil drift or buzzing blast.
Ghostvoices is the former, all acoustic, just guitars, vocals, everything wreathed in a murky, muted black atmosphere. The vocals are hushed, like harsh ghoulish whispers, the sibilance drawn out into another layer of shimmering ambience. The acoustic guitars sound like they're playing slowed down black metal riffs, pulled apart until they more resemble some sort of hellish Appalachia. Or an incredibly sinister Loren Connors. Notes drift, often coalescing into swirling tendrils of dark drone, the background ambience is full of creaks and rumbles, haunting whirs and distant barely audible melodies, everything lit by the light of some black moon, greys fading to black, heavily shadowed and indistinct. It's almost like some acoustic black metal pop ambient record...
A perfect slab of dark and lonely, blackened, blissful late night drift...
A brand new, sprawling collection of celestial darkness and buzzing black ambient drift from this black metal / black ambient master. As we've mentioned in the past, more often than not, PV will dedicate a whole record to either side of his sonic personality, sometimes it's a disc of swirling and dense blackened black metal buzz, other times it's gorgeously bleak and minimal ambient dronemusic, but in both cases, the man behind Procer Veneficus is able to conjure up gorgeously sinister sounds and nightmarish atmospheres, be they buzz or drift, blast or shimmer.
How The Heather Moonlit Shivers, is, as the legend on the back of the record makes clear, "Dedicated to Her", and judging from the black sonic mystery within, the 'Her' in question either broke his heart, or is the object of a seriously grim obsession, or both. Extended stretches of layered black drift, Philip Jeck style crackly loopscapes, muted subterranean pulses, thick swaths of distorted crumble, processed ghostly vox, swirling soft focus effects, minor key steel string folk dirges, keening streaks of fragmented melody underpinning slowed down voices, haunting reverb drenched avant Appalachia gives way to abject post industrial black ambience, which gives way to dense clouds of low end bellow, laced with melancholic finger picked acoustic guitars.
Elsewhere thick walls of guitarbuzz dirge lumber and throb, but are infused with subtle bits of melody, transformed from brute force crush into something moody and soothing and beautiful, while spidery guitars wrap their tendrils around long stretches of layered voices and alien harmonies, while here and there, fragments of voice, or a bit of guitar, will be doused in reverb and echo and delay and sent spinning into the aether, creating a dizzying looped out dronescape.
The record closes with a 10+ minute interpretation of an Amber Asylum song, complete with strings, the strings along with languid steel string guitars, and swirling ambient background shimmer create a sort of droney, depressive otherworldly chamber music. There's also an Espers cover (a cover of a cover oddly enough), which is equally beautiful, but a bit more tripped out, a sort of druggy heavily effected space folk, but both covers fit perfectly amidst the equally evocative and hauntingly beautiful PV originals.
Folks who ONLY like the black metal side of Procer Veneficus, may be disappointed, but anyone into mysterious dark soundscapes, cinematic blackened drone music, and creepy sinister black folk, will be immediately and inexorably ensorcelled.
Packaged in a super swank and thick matte finish gatefold jacket, pressed on thick red vinyl, LIMITED TO 406 COPIES, each one hand numbered.
TWO brand new releases from this Santa Cruz psychedelic black metal one man band, one a haunting slab of oceanic dark ambience, the other a mesmerizing collection of drone drenched buzzing blackness.
Over the course of 10+ full lengths, Night, the man who is PV, has explored both sides of his sonic personality, the buzz of raw depressive melancholic black metal, and the drifting shimmer of ambient and dronemusic, often blending the two, into hazy blurs of blackened soundscapes and moody buzz and blast.
Unlike the heavy buzz and blast of Convoy, Saltwater & Glassmoon is all ambient, a bit of a concept record about the sea, the sound meant to emulate a submerged orchestra, to evoke the epic undersea kingdom, and the mystery of the deep.
The whole first half of the opening track is built on the sounds of crashing surf, gradually layered with gentle tinkling chimes, whirring wind, subtle processing and effects, before finally, a shimmering moody low end melody emerges from the deep, haunting and sorrowful and slow motion, drifting like dark shapes just below the surface of the sea, truly haunting and mysterious, and quite beautiful. The follow up sounds like the first track, only with the hiss and buzz of the crashing waves stripped away, leaving just strange minor key drones and barely there melodies, lots of swirling low end, suspended in wide open expanses of distant rumbles, very minimal, but still deep and ominous.
Most of the rest of the record sounds like movements of that same piece, a slowly sprawling world deep dark dronemusic, pretty and delicate, but always with a slightly sinister edge, the only dramatic deviation being the nearly 12 minute "Amaranth And Liqueur", which lets that slow smoldering drift build and build into a glacial wall of muted low end, a black cloud of SUNN-like shimmer, before once again, dissipating, laving ghostly traces and barely there shadows.
Quite dark and lovely, minimal and moody, might be of more interest to the cd-r experimental drone crowd than the black metal massive, but as far as we're concerned recommended to both!
Hot on the heels of the recent double disc box set from Santa Cruz based black metal alchemist, comes this ultra limited cd-r of, as the liner notes describe it: "Music for summoning ghosts in the dead of night." And in case you're still not sure of what you're getting into, these tracks were recorded "after the clock struck twelve" and the liner notes also offer this sage warning "In the shadows you are followed by ghosts."
It all sounds strange and mysterious and creepy, but it all makes sense once you're familiar with the haunting and hushed sonic world of Procer Veneficus. His discs are evenly split between, blissed out shoegaze-y black metal buzz, and gorgeous smoldering, super minimal black ambience, sometimes both on the same disc, but just as often a whole disc dedicated to one or the other. The aforementioned box set, featured a disc of each, accompanied by some incense and dried leaves (he is from Santa Cruz after all).�
We won't go into too much detail on this one, as it was strictly limited to 100 copies, and we only got a handful, which will be gone in no time... Fans already know they need this, and probably haven't even bothered to read this far, instead clicking on the add to cart button and moving on, that's the sort of fanaticism this band elicits, the music is so emotional and personal, so spiritually charged, that once you're inducted into PV's sonic tribe, it's for life, and you find your self hunting for more of this soothing sonic balm, as well as the more abrasive blackened buzz, which is also in its own way quite soothing. The Cold Gloaming sounds like exactly that, the distant shimmer of cold wintery winds at dusk, the dark whisper of nightfall, a world teeming with life, lurking just out of sight, just out of earshot, a gorgeous expanse of warm whir and muted grinding guitars, echoing the the sound of the surf, the pull of the moon, the cycle of life and death, light and darkness. A dark midnight ritual, the nature of sound, a lost world of drone and drift, slowly fading away as the sky brightens and the darkness retreats. So totally gorgeous.�
And as we mentioned, LIMITED TO 100 COPIES. Each disc hand numbered. Packaged in a gorgeous full color sleeve...
This granular synthesis and dub recombination outfit recall, at their best, the Berlin axis of Pole, Porter Ricks, and the Chain Reaction sound of atomized electronica.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Number 17 / 18 in the series of Fat Cat split singles. Process works with the warm bubbling electronic dub variations of granular synthesis a la Pole or Kit Clayton with happy, summery results. Dat Politics (aka Tone Rec) sequences hypercompressed samples (along with hip-hop yelps, snares, simplistic turntable scratches and hi-hats) in ironic electronica / hip hop structures.
Eagerly awaited, at last it's now here, the new import disc from South American doom overlords Procession - and we say overlords without a doubt, even thought his is just the second cd from this crushing Chilean underground act, and in fact can be considered their debut album - since the one we highlighted previously, The Cult Of Disease, was technically an ep, with bonus tracks from an earlier demo. One of those demo tracks, to these ears already a doom classic, "The Road To The Gravegarden", reappears here, redone (with special guest guitar leads/harmonies courtesy of Peter Vicar, ex-Reverend Bizarre). The five new tracks are equally awesome, Procession trudging forth resolutely into eternal darkness, bearing aloft their hymns of glorious despair.
What we said before about Procession certainly applies to this album as well. It's magnificently heavy, the majestic, morose vocals and fuzz laden guitar work are world class (both provided by the same talented gentleman, obviously a doomed soul). Destroyers Of The Faith is possessed of such a serious, sorrowful, doom feel. All the songs except the intro are long (and slow!), but never dull, being both moody and moving. Procession may just be today's truest torchbearers of utter, epic doom, certainly they're way up there with The Wounded Kings, Lord Vicar, Black Oath, Griftegard, and fellow Chileans Condenados, among newer bands well versed in the old ways, carrying on the tradition of Candlemass (who are still at it as well), taking things to an emotionally effecting extreme... defending the (doom) faith, really, not destroying it. And incorporating some interesting, darkly psychedelic textures too, so that this might be the "epic doom metal" band fans of sludgier/artier fare like Cough and Orthodox could really get into as well. Join the procession, and doom on!
Are you feeling doomed? Play some Procession and you will! And you'll dig the doomed feeling too, if you're like us. Hailing from South America, Chile to be precise, this obscure trio dish out the ever-lovin' doom metal on this their debut full-length (technically, they call it an ep, 'cause three of its six songs are taken from an earlier demo tape, but it's 48 minutes long and works as one coherent album). The band's logo and the cover art may make this look like a black metal release, and IS quite dark and serious and Satanic, but it's definitely slo-mo true doom in the old school vein of Reverend Bizarre and The Gates Of Slumber and of course Saint Vitus and Black Sabbath, with lyrics about such abysmal subjects as plagues, gravegardens, and dying ancient empires. The inevitability of disease, death and decay, and loss of faith, are what Procession acknowledge and embrace. They do so sincerely, with much grace and majesty - and sheer heaviness, the guitars dragging you down with their lugubrious riffs and insalubrious tones. There's weird atmospheres, occasional uptempo surges, and no lack of morose melody. Freakin' EPIC. The band's guitarist/vocalist Felipe Plaza Kutzbach sings with all the grandiose power of classic Candlemass, but in a lower register, and with more of a rough, anguished edge. He's definitely Procession's biggest draw, both his vocals and guitar playing - not just churning riffage, there's also some really interestingly effected leads heard here, strangely psychedelic and melancholically beautiful, and his doomy talents are ably supported by the solid bass and drums. Procession (great name, by the way, we imagine doomed souls marching into the underworld, or cloaked monks in some ceremonial, uh, procession) prove themselves a force to be reckoned with. We've listed some excellent doom debuts lately, Garden Of Worm, Crowned In Earth, Griftegard, but THIS one is possibly the best. Certainly the troo doom minded here have been listening to this A LOT. And considering how much cool new music (doom and otherwise) we are inundated with here every week at AQ, that's saying something. Can't wait for the new one we hear is in the works...
Originally self released as an ultra-limited cd-r, The Ghost Of Orion, a dreamy slab of haunting spaced out isolationist sound from Dutch dark ambient explorer Procyon-X, gets a proper expanded releases by the fine folks at UK label Paradigms (one of two new Paradigms releases this time around, the other by AQ faves Gnaw Their Tongues, see elsewhere on this list).
Four tracks, clocking in at just under a half hour, each of these mini epics is super evocative, and could very well have drifted on forever. Long spiraling loops of abstract melody uncoiling in weightless slow motion, glimmering and glistening in the glow of distant stars, haunting transmissions from some far away alien civilization, intercepted and spread out like a mysterious sonic map. The sound is expansive and immense, deep resonant smears, wooshing synthesizers, glittering clouds of effects, in the distance, dark sonic swells, ominous and mesmerizing.
Minimal and skeletal dronemusic, with brief sections bordering on the lush, abstract and delicate, very much like drifting alone, surrounded by blackness, millions of miles from home. Total seventies ambient kraut worship for sure, with a bit of Goblin creepiness mixed in. Tangerine Dream, Ash Ra Tempel, Klaus Schulze, Neptune Towers, Heldon, Eno, you get the drift, but Procyon-X took that krauty ambience and launched it into the deepest regions of the cosmos, into another galaxy, these are the transmissions sent back hundreds of years later. Mysterious and beautiful.
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!! Housed in a white dvd case, with full color artwork and printed heavy paper insert.
On a European tour about ten years ago, a curious 7" was unearthed in a used record store. It had an amazing black and white cover, a painting of Golgotha, with the cross lost in a cloudy haze and surrounded by watercolored trees. The band was called Professor, their logo in splattery hand drawn Olde English. And the record was called The Academizer ep. One of the tracks was "Into The Auditorium". Suddenly thoughts of an evil black metal band made up entirely of doctoral scholars leapt to mind. Sort of the whole Carcass medical student thing, but with academia. This was just getting better and better. The record sat unplayed until returning to the States, where it finally made it onto the turntable. And holy shit! It was as good as the cover suggested it could be. A sloppy noisy blackened slab of Carcass worship. Blast beats and grinding guitars, howled gutteral vocals, and crushing heaviness. Over the course of the next decade, several more copies were discovered and hoarded like the treasure they were. Until a random series of circumstances led to tUMULt discovering the man behind Professor and the quest to make that amazing, out of print 7" available to a wider, turntable-less audience.
What happened, was that an unsolicited package was sent to tUMULt HQ, with some new music for the tUMULt overlord to check out, but the sender also included a cdr of his old bands. A cursory listen was blasted to an immediate halt, when the hauntingly familiar strains of Professor came screeching from the speakers. Oh shit. Is it possible? Could it be? And what do you know? The sender was none other than a real live living member of Professor. After much convincing and cajoling, he agreed to let tUMULt re-release the Academizer ep. And even now, a decade later, this shit is so good. Fierce and furious, stumbling and blasting drunkenly like a grinding blackened metallic juggernaut. Four tracks of crushing grind, pummelling crush and grinding pummel. Heavy and noisy and fucking great! Rumour was, that Professor was maybe a joke. But if that's true, this is some sick joke. Fans of Carcass, Drop Dead, grindcore, black metal, and all things heavy owe it to themselves to enter the auditorium, and bow before the Professor!! In the form of a 3" cd packaged in a mini jewel case.
We first laid our ears on New Jersey's, Professor Genius, on the great After Dark compilation that we're still playing on repeat even months after its release. This 12" features one of their tracks from that comp, "La Grotta", as well as two new songs on the 'b' side that we've been getting our robot disco on to. Think Tangerine Dream and Vangelis going out late night style with Jean-Michel Jarre and Patrick Cowley and you start to get an idea of what kind of lesson Professor Genius is teaching. Packaged in the great Italians Do It Better cut sleeve, this is wax that will keep you going late into the night. Hot!
A truly un-inspired work of mediocrity from Pat. Apparently Mr. Pat has never heard of off beats, syncopation, or any other rhythmmic device other than a mechanical, metronomic delivery of his tedious words. The album starts off with its 'hit' number "Still Ridin' Clean", in which Pat proclaims he's "still makin' cheese" while getting his dick sucked. I apologise to all our customers who *were* eating breakfast while reading this. Our man from the street himself, Allan Horrocks, informs us that "cheese" is the new lingo for money, or "dough". While that eases my mind slightly in regards to Pat's hygiene and sexual proclivities, the song still solicits its humorous effect on us when listening to it. But I swear Pat switches the first half of this phrase to "still eatin' cheese" a few times in the song. The suckers at Columbia Records who put this out were kind enough to include a FREE limited edition bonus disc for die hard Project Pat fans who buy their copies sooner rather than later.
It's the disc with hit single "Chickenhead"!
Or, translated from the Polish, the Magic Carpathians Project. If there's ever a Terrastock Festival held in Warsaw, this band should certainly headline. Well-done Eastern-European space-mantras.
Eco-hippie ethno-drone Polish ensemble otherwise known in English as the Magic Carpathians (formerly, Atman) play doleful, quirky, space-mantras with distinctive vocalizing, sometimes reminiscent of Brainticket. Their second album.
A record with so much kickass climactic energy, seems yr speakers're pulsating like living things --like the Replacements' video for "Bastards of Young!"-- Prolapse reminds us of The Fall crossed with Stereolab and Crass. One song, "Flex," is fifteen minutes yet still too short. Scheduled to take over the world after opening much of 1996 Stereolab tour.
Prolapse's latest offering finds the duets between Linda Steelyard and Scottish Mick far from the drunken shouting matches and domestic disputes of their previous albums. Rather the two have come to a rather melodic compromise (as the Sugarcubes did with Bjork and Einar) with a much moodier instrumentation dominated by PiL/Jah Wobble basslines.
If Arab Strap and Mogwai occupy the depressive end of Scottish mope rock, than Prolapse can claim the bittersweet band of the spectrum. The dueling male / female vocals come off as a beleaguered working class couple in mid-fight with a propulsive fusion of The Fall and My Bloody Valentine backing them up. An excellent album, their best yet!
Lovely! The entrance of The Prom is one of grand descending orchestral processions. Would make the perfect soundtrack to a '70s film of doomed romance and drama. Sumptuous chamber pop instrumentation with the piano leading the way. Beautiful, heartrending lyrical tales from the graceful pen of Mr. James Mendenhall - quite reminiscent of Elliott Smith and XTC's Andy Partridge. The third song's piano beginning really made me think of a Journey ballad (uh-oh!) until the vocals came in, then it felt much more in line with Quasi (whew, a good thing!). This album finds itself on Barsuk Records, home to the likeminded intelligent pop of John Vanderslice, The Long Winters and of course Death Cab For Cutie, but it fits just as comfortably in the finely crafted company of lush Brit bands like Doves or Coldplay. A very very impressive debut!
The Promise Ring and their increasingly lackluster indie pop have made Jade Tree a commercially successful venture. Sadly, it's much more interesting to attribute lame ass artschool rhetoric to the decidedly wrong colors (a title of 'Electric Pink' with a cover that is solid Mauve... boy that's conceptual.), than to ascribe adjectives beyond mediocre to this cdsingle.
