South London's daydreaming guitar trio are back with a brand new offering of gorgeous electric guitar wash and hazy ambient epiphany, this time on everyone's favorite big time of the small time label, Type. I Could Not Love You More finds Rameses III perfecting their regal, monolithic sound, and we couldn't be more thrilled! Majestic chords and metallic shimmer rise from the blurring horizon, heart-wrenching melody and cinematic richness pour into the sky with a radiant ooze. Pastoral soundtracks stretched out and slowed down into time-lapsed images of rising tides and exploding stars, blissfully huge and epic while always grasping on to a forward moving narrative, through quiet grasslands of fingerpicked, Takoma style acoustic guitar to swelling waves of glistening tones that grow and radiate on the verge of feedback.
While even some of our favorite modern ambient music relies on layers and layers of digital processing, Rameses III maintains a certain acoustic integrity by layering strictly live instruments. Electric guitars, electric pianos, and mellotrons produce a warm, ethereal wash that brings an otherworldly depth to their sound, a depth that digital processing could never recreate.
Ghostly and melodic, mysterious and heavy, ambient and thoughtful, I Could Not Love You More is no doubt the trio's finest work and a perfect addition to the Type catalogue, highly recommended!
You know something is fishy when limited cd-r's start getting reissued as... LIMITED CD-R'S!!! What the heck?! Once makes sense, nothing wrong with a limited cd-r, but reissuing an out of print cd-r on cd-r AGAIN just makes us wonder why the heck it wasn't a real cd in the first place. Especially if it's so good that it requires multiple reissues. That said, at least we can be thankful that this gorgeous gem is still available at all. Originally released in 2004 on Campbell Kneale's Celebrate Psi Phenomenon label Jozepha is a practically perfect suite of songs, glistening and delicate, sweet and melancholy, steel string acoustic guitars, simple slide, even some subtle harmonica, lovely melodies drifting and intertwining, meandering lazily, soft sunlight filtered through the leaves and branches overhead, a cool breeze. A little bit country, a little bit pop, but mostly a totally timeless, dreamy instrumental journey with no particular destination, just floating along like big soft clouds, warm chords swirling like autumn leaves, simple melodies, dropping one note at a time, like raindrops on a sunny day. Quite possibly the sweetest, dreamiest, driftiest, swooniest record we've heard in ages. And frustratingly, this is again EXTREMELY LIMITED. Comes packaged quite smartly in an exquisitely embroidered sleeve!
First proper actual cd full length from this blissy UK free folk crew, after a clutch of (now out of print) cd-r's and a collaborative disc with the North Sea. Matanuska begins as a gloriously blissful late afternoon, sunshiney slab of fuzzy, buzzy, muted pop ambience, sparkling and glimmering, there are guitars, but they aren't plucked or strummed so much as spread like a thick glaze over the speakers. Within this gorgeous sun dappled soundfield, are tangled up bits of found sounds, distant ringing bells, rumbling thunder, as well as subtle layers of drone and shimmer adding mystery and depth to each track.
The rest of the record however is not so sunshiney, the mood is much more dark and shadowy, lit by moonlight, rumbles and whirs swirled into lush late night crawls, acoustic guitars draped over slow serene swells of sound, the buzz of steel strings muted and drawn out into simple shimmering ragas, the vibe is definitely sorrowful, melancholy, with minor key melodies drifting through intricate webs of abstract Appalachia, wheezing layered drones spread out like a late afternoon fog, amidst chirping birds and distant bits of conversation, a slowly shifting bit of minimal dreamdrone that brightens subtly as it works its way though the disc.
The record finishes up with the sun peeking out from behind the clouds, like that glorious first day of Spring, the birds once again singing, the shimmering sounds soaking up the sunlight, a drifting drone, warm and glowing, a hopeful dreamy sound that blossoms like a flower after a rainstorm, the hushed buzz growing fuzzier and fuzzier, almost like a fading memory. So nice.
As frustrating as superlimited cd-r's can be, you really can complain when faced with music this dark and mysteriously lovely. You can wish that someone would have the foresight to know when a record was amazing, and thus might press more than 130 copies, but again, we're happy that 130 more people get a chance to hear this record. The UK three piece known as Rameses III have been quietly laboring away for 5 or 6 years now, having released cd-r's on Celebrate Psi Phenomenon, 267 Lattajjaa and handful of others. Their sound is hushed, a whispery drone, disembodied guitars, the sounds of running water and bird calls, bowed strings, shimmering ambience, a slow melodic churn through dark mysteries and warm soft soundscapes. Parsimonia was originally released on Foxy Digitalis way back in 2004, this reissue adds some spiffy new artwork and like we said, gives 130 more people the chance to enjoy some gorgeous late night drone and shimmer. Which actually means 30 AQ customers as this is frustratingly already out of print and we took all the copies the label had left. The sound on Parsominia is just more of what we've come to love about Rameses III, soft subtle soundscapes cobbled together from natural sounds and delicately crafted drones, never better exemplified than on the title track, a nearly 12 minute track of warm melodic swells, broadcast across a spring meadow, birds chirp, families laugh and talk, the wind rustles the leaves, all the while a huge shimmery cloud of muted rumble and soft focused sonic swirl drifts dreamlike through the trees. The rest of Parsimonia is equally drifty and dreamy, incorporating chiming bells, gentle finger picked steel string guitar and mumbly murky feedback into sweet sweet swells of mystical and transcendental sound.
LIMITED TO 130 COPIES, OF WHICH WE GOT 30. IT'S ALREADY OUT OF PRINT SO ONCE THESE ARE GONE THEY ARE GONE FOR GOOD (or until some other cd-r label decides to press up 100 more, arghh!)
For some reason, we've never actually reviewed any records by UK doom/sludge combo Ramesses, a band featuring two former Electric Wizards, but who will remain most infamous around these parts for one of THEE most disastrous, and thus inadvertently brilliant and amazing, performances we have ever witnessed. It was an Electric Wizard show in fact, when the Ramesses guys were still members (we later joked that it could have been THAT show that was the beginning of the end for that incarnation of EW), a complete drug addled sonic meltdown, with a drummer barely able to play, until it was time to stop (when EW's guitarist Jus Osborn stormed off the stage), at which point said drummer chose to continue playing, all on his own. Woozy and warped and constantly on the verge of collapse, at the time it was sort of appalling, but in retrospect, that sort of complete chaos and demented sonic mayhem seems pretty appealing, and while we may not have reviewed any of the Ramesses records, the metalheads around here (at least some of them) do dig these guys a lot. They're like a murkier, muddier, less catchy, less epic, more sludgey, dirge-y Electric Wizard, which totally makes sense. Cut from the same cloth as the 'Wizard, but with less emphasis on Sabbathy riffage, hooks and melodies, and of course those wailing refrains, and more on grim abject atmosphere and pure doom-ic energy, which these guys, and this new record, has in spades.
The music is a churning downtuned crusty filthy ultra doom, the rhythms drag and creep, the melodies moan hauntingly, the vocals ooze from gurgly growl to keening plaintive wail, the songs lumbering doom metal trudges, that are often so low and sludgey, the guitars sound like they're melting, the sound weirdly muddy and lo-fi, crumbling distortion, all wreathed in a blackly psychedelic haze, some of the tracks all droney and tranced out, cyclical and hypnotic, while others are almost punk, in their blackened doom ferocity. Barring occasional forays in spidery melody and clean guitar drift, the majority of Possessed By The Rise Of Majik find these guys trawling the dankest recesses of the doom-ed underworld, spinning sticky black webs of dark and druggy, bleak and blackened dooooooooooom. Fans of Electric Wizard should definitely give these guys a try, but anyone into filthy, plodding, psychedelic slow and low heaviness, this is the shit. From the same label that brought us the last Bong!
Ramleh return with their first "rock" album in quite some time - their last release, 2009's Valediction, was a return to the Broken Flag era of harsh, smoldering drones. But Circular Time is rock music only in the most stripped down sense of the word. This is blown out, heavy psych that takes guitar-based rock to its logical conclusion, a whirlwind of total heaviness and obsession with englufment that has more in common with Skullflower than Hawkwind. That's not to say there aren't moments of musical serenity here - Gary Mundy has come a long way in knowing how to blend assault and restraint. A perfect fit for Crucial Blast and their brand of destructive heaviness!!
Not that long ago, Ramleh played their first ever shows in California, performing four sets in four nights, switching off between "rock" Ramleh, the blown out assault of newer releases like 2015's Circular Time, and "electronic" Ramleh, the classic Broken Flag style wall of sound for which they first were known. This 12" is in a way a taste of what attending both those shows was like (as several aQ staffers did, including Jim who opened for Ramleh's electronic set with a blistering set of his own).
On the A side, you get "Conquest Play" an abstract, throbbing, glacial movement that sounds equally good on 33 or 45 rpm. On the flip side, "Clockwork" is a more subdued assault, albeit with the same speaker-blowing decibel-porn that Ramleh always delivers. Both are fantastic additions to the Ramleh catalog. A limited release, restocks might take a while.
Most folks probably know Ramleh mostly for their connection to sonic contemporaries and brothers in noise Skullflower, both having emerged from the same scene and both having released records on the infamous Broken Flag label (run by Gary Mundy, the main man of Ramleh). But Ramleh was always its own unique beast, a constantly evolving sonic terror, beginning life as a power electronics combo, before blossoming into something more in line with what might be called noise rock. But the line that marked that shift was never clearly delineated, with elements of pre- and post- bleeding both ways, infusing the group's sound with strange elements that definitely made Ramleh stand out amongst their noisy contemporaries.
Hole In The Heart was originally released on Broken Flag as a super limited cassette, in 1987, and is here fleshed out with extra sounds culled from a cassette release called Nerve released the same year, and listening to this again now, we're reminded how ridiculously prescient the sound of Ramleh was, predicting sounds that are all the rage now, from glacial downtuned dirgery a la SUNNO))), to tripped out druggy ambient free noise (about a million floorcore bands), strange post industrial dirgescapes (Wolf Eyes?), to blown out industrial metallic crunch (about a million more bands), it's a sound that is definitely of its time, but also sounds like it could be some super limited microlabel cd-r release of today.
Opener "Bite The Bolster", is all slow smoldering drones, distant shimmer, processed ghostly vocals, lo-fi for sure but lush and strangely dramatic and lovely, leading straight into "Do Not Come Near" that does SUNNO))) better than SUNNO))) themselves twenty-odd years earlier, a heaving, grinding crumbling mass of gnarled buzz, laced with streaks of feedback, buried melodies, muted pulses, fractured almost-rhythms, some of it sounds downright dubby, albeit blown out and noise drenched, hypnotic and washed out and crushing.
Which is then followed by the epic 25 minute, 6 part "Redcap", a sprawling multi movement noise jam, which begins with a weird bleated doomic plod, only to explode into a squall of swirling whirling hiss and buzz, distorted vox, and wild tangled feedback, not that far removed from Our Love Will Destroy The World or Birchville Cat Motel. Loops, and haunting melodies, the track lurches and lumbers, slipping from all out assault, to dark stuttery drift and back again. Part three is a massive slowed down metallic dirge, processed vocals stretched out into a grinding drone, while the (surprisingly catchy) main riff pulses in the background, eventually splintering into angular loops, topped by a soaring super distorted psych guitar wail. The next part falls somewhere between Godflesh and Wolf Eyes, a crushing synth flecked distortion drenched plod, with billows of echoey vox, a motorik pulse at its core, doomy, but also sort of blissed out. A brief burst of twisted tweaked riffage and what wounds like pipe fights and broken glass, opens up into the final part, beginning with a churning muted loop, and shards of effected feedback, sounding a bit like an industrial WOLD, this muddy musicbox sort of looped melody happening way down in the mix, while a soft cacophony of high end and swooping distorted vox careen and collide in the space above, at first it sounds like a sort of abstract free noise freakout, but the vocals get more and more melodic, and the song takes a new shape a twisted bit of depressive noise pop, a bit like the Dead C, before blinking out.
"Spear Flowers" begins as a gnarled tangle of super distorted riffs, again weirdly melodic, swirling and collapsing inward, eventually transforming into a looped hypnotic drug jam, repeated mantra like vocals, crunching grinding electronics, buzz all over the place, loads of feedback, totally mesmerizing, and again, sounding like it could be from today.
"Hole In The Heart" is total in-the-red ramshackle pop infused noise rock, like a heavier, more lush Dead C, the main melody sweet and catchy, but slowed down and buried in hiss and buzz, lilting and dreamy for all its abject aggression. "Product Of Fear" is a gorgeous guitarscape, layered buzz, washed out glimmering warmth, humid and haunting, and really really pretty, which leads you softly into "Grazing On Fear 2" which is also pretty, in its own way", but is also a cacophonous blow out, twisted atonal organ, and churning distorted white noise, eventually lurching into a cool skipping, stuttery outro. And finally, the nearly 25 minute "True Religion", an expansive soundscape of processed guitars that again is strangely pretty, very much in the vein of Jesu or Nadja, the guitars blown way out, but the melody is lilting and melancholy, a sort of soft doom, but wrapped in muted crunch and crumbling buzz, before slipping into a strange fractured interlude, before emerging on the other side some sort of slow motion noise pop dirge, epic and triumphant, finishing off in an explosion of grinding white hot / black hole skree.
Absolutely essential for pretty much everybody, but specifically, folks into Nadja and Jesu and SUNNO))) and Wolf Eyes and Skullflower, and anybody who likes super heavy droned out noise, pop infused shoegaze industrial metal bliss out, and crushing power electronic dreamdronedirge. Reissue of the year so far, hands down.
Much has been written here about the recent work of Matthew Bower and his beautiful improv skree in Sunroof (paralleling the massive proliferation of likeminded acts Vibracathedral Orchestra and Birchville Cat Motel); but people often overlook the fact that he began making music in the early '80s as a part of the "Broken Flag" camp - a loose collective of British power electronics technicians and noise rockers, that recorded under the monikers Skullflower, Total, and Ramleh. While Bower was principally the 'figurehead' of the first two and fellow Broken Flag waver Gary Mundy took hold of Ramleh, most of the recording was done with a revolving door membership. Between Skullflower and Ramleh, the Broken Flag camp had produced a noxious arsenal of sludgy noise rock with grim guitar pyrotechnics, crashing upon pummelling rhythm sections, village-idiot basslines and thuggish percussive blasts. These days, the awe-inspiring Skullflower albums "Form Destroyer" and "Birthdeath" are virtually extinct (even, the CD compendium "Ruins" is impossible to find); but fortunately, the old Ramleh stuff is finally available again via this collection of singles. Hopefully this will help keep Broken Flag from dissappearing in the dustbins of musical history.
The formulas for Ramleh (and Skullflower for that matter) were incredibly simple: hammer out a basic rhythm as heavy and as loud as possible, then layer on the angriest and most dissonant blasts of post-Blue Cheer psychedelic freaks outs. Throughout the '80s, Ramleh and Skullflower were pigeonholed as a part of Industrial Culture -- due to their power electronics side projects and associations with Whitehouse; yet as "Too Many Miles" now indicates, this work has much more parallels with the explosive dirges of Neurosis or the incendiary stoner rock of Boris. Really fantastic stuff.
It should be noted that the British label Second Layer released a Skullflower album entitled Malediction only to be followed up by a Ramleh album with the title Valediction. Given the cross pollination of ideas / band members / history between these two seminal ensembles of drugged-out, bleakly rendered psychedelic noise / anti-rock, it's hard to read the similarities of these titles as a mere coincidence.
The good news about Valediction is that this in NO WAY resembles the regrettable 10" that Ramleh produced in 2009, even as this album is technically the first full album by Gary Mundy and Anthony DiFranco since 1997 (the Ramleh we made a Record Of The Week last time was a reissue of a couple '80s era cassettes). Valediction qualifies as a return to their power electronics aesthetic that they built around the likes of Whitehouse and helped promote through their Broken Flag label, originating back in the early '80s. Here, squalls of hiss, noise, distortion, and compressed low-end rumbles blast forth with a hurricane fury, exhibiting the same misanthropic disdain for humanity as found in the early recordings but coupled with an oozing psychedelic panache that could only emerge from the many years of exacting the heavy psych noise-rock of albums like Works III or Boeing. "Valediction VI" is much more a propulsive track, with a punk bassline chugging through a thick wall of churning distortion while Mundy issues a chanting vocal stream of indecipherable words through a guitar pickup (or maybe it's a megaphone, who really knows with how wonderfully shitty it sounds), ending with a searing chunk of Merzbow-like noise. Awesome.
Some of you may remember the Rammellzee track from the recent Anti NY compilation where he teamed up with NY legends Death Komet Krew. A dark and creepy slice of hip hop weirdness. And some of you may even remember the classic track "Beat Bop" recorded with Jean Michael Basquiat and K-Rob. One of the all time old school classics. Rammellzee was a serious player in the NYC B-boy / hip hop / graffiti scene. He was featured in the movie Wildstyle, worked with tons of folks (Fab 5 Freddie, Futura 2000, Phase 2 and more) and was one of the first graffiti artists to be taken seriously by the art world. But beyond his legendary status and past accomplishments, this is some really, really weird shit. Existing in his own universe, Gothic Futurism, along with life size muppets made out of trash, fur, junk and computers, and of course there's his futuristic skateboards, Rammellzee has taken his shit to the next level. Raw and wacked out, electo beats collide with classic hip hop, instantly recognizable samples are twisted into new shapes, found sound snippets are collaged with all sorts of squelches and drones and whirs, while Rammellzee delives his damaged demented lyrical flow in a gruff cookie monster / Oscar the Grouch growl, that occasionally morphs into an Anticon style whine. This craziness may sound classic, but it was all recorded over the last few years with help from the Death Komet Krew and a handful of likeminded hip-hop weirdos. So weird and so amazing. Everyone into Mush and Anticon and all that stuff needs to check this stuff out. My favorite new (old) hip hop record this year!
If you crank Rammer's oh-so-positively named 2nd full-length album (and the cd booklet specifically recommends that listeners "fucking crank it"), you'll hear some maniac shouting himself raw on such subjects as butchers, Russia, and radiation, above a metallic din of amps to 11 and drumming to 12. If you know what's what, you'll quickly suss out that these Canadian hessians are young guns with old school obsessions. The collection of '80s thrash metal cassettes used as a background graphic in the cd booklet is another tip off. Throw in influences from death metal and metalcore, and a steady liquid diet of Molsons, and you've got a headbanging force to be reckoned with, Toronto's Rammer definitely having graduated with honors from the votech program for raging retro metalology at that aforementioned old school. Likely classmates of theirs would include Skeletonwitch, Goathorn, Boulder, Defleshed, and Early Man, all of these bands having taken classes from teachers like Slayer, Destruction, and Nuclear Assault. Thus these 11 songs are fully strapped with vicious chugging riffage, sore-throat vox, intense drum battery and (their forte) ripping guitar solos from Rammer's two axe-meisters. Simple pleasures perhaps, but nothing to scoff at if you're metallically inclined! Weirdly, this band has got some sort of indie-cred (Blue Fog ain't a metal label) but don't worry, this isn't ironic hipster metal (unlike, perhaps, at least one of the bands mentioned above, no not Slayer). Or if it is, the "real metallers" might as well pack it in, they've been outclassed by supposed poseurs!!
But no band of poseurs could be so metal as to follow in the glorious tradition of writing a song with the same name as the band ("Rammer") AND making it be about some sort of totally rad, ravening murderous monster, another glorious tradition...
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Another candidate for best band name ever: S.T.R.E.E.T.S. which in case you didn't know, stands for Skating Totally Rules Everything Else Totally Sucks! Man. And then team those guys up with the also suitably named Rammer, and you've got a pretty decent all-Canadian skate rock vs. cock rock tag team battle! In a cool, nicely designed lime green sleeve.
No we're not kidding -- we love Rammstein! Here's the new album from these scary German industrial/metal dudes. Fire! Fire! It's surprising that they're as popular in this country as they are, considering that they sing in German. But I guess their theatrics and heavier-than-nu-metal are a universal language... Ridiculous but great.
How can you not love Rammstein? Huge metallic riffs. Pounding thunderous Teutonic rhythms. Uber-grandiose fist pumping anthems. Crystal clear perfect production. And let's not forget the live spectacle of flames and explosions and fireworks (and of course the infamous flame-throwing codpiece). They are the perfect blend of orchestral black metal bombast a la Cradle Of Filth / Dimmu Borgir and Laibach style Wagnerian industrial pomp. Plus when they lock into a groove, they sound strangely like Finnish hypno-rockers Circle. Which is ALWAYS a good thing. This is probably the best Rammstein record yet. The songs are heavy and catchy and weird and really really good. All of the above sonic elements are in full effect, with lots of that Circle-ish mesmer we can't get enough of, as well as a couple standout tracks, a really biting anti-America song that is sung in English, with lyrics that reference the Wonderbra (!) and Coca-Cola and explain that "This is not a love song, I don't sing my mother tongue", a track sung partially in Russian, as well as a really amazing track with killer female vocal counterpoint. Plus strings, a choir, a full orchestra, and of course vocalist Till Lindemann's instantly recognizable, totally menacing, low low low growl. So good. Another band who if you can get beyond the endless 'hype' and media bullshit, will totally and completely kick your ass.
We're all very sad that Joey Ramone died. But we're also sort of sad that this is the record that was left for us to remember him by. This whole package pulls shamelessly on the ol' heartstrings, the title "Don't Worry About Me", and the timing -- released
Tommy, Johnny, Joey, Dee Dee, and Marky. They lived to see themselves reach iconic status. Yet, through intense inter-personal strife impacted by the eclipsing success of the musical acts that followed in their footsteps, these guys seem to have barely enjoyed anything at all. This incredibly well-made rockumentary tells the story of four kids from Forest Hills, Queens who bonded over a mutual admiration of The Stooges and found a way out of their shitty home and school-life by playing music together. It follows their early career in the 70's as The Ramones, playing gnarly Bowery-bum ridden CBGB's alongside other new acts like Television, Talking Heads and Blondie to touring through Europe and Latin America with huge sold-out gigs. Success seemed to shine on them overseas solely, while in small shitty clubs across the US, they were boo'd, jeered, laughed at or the subject of thrown bottles and cans. Simultaneously, their record sales refused to escalate as they had hoped.
The Ramones were a musical force, however. Their songs were brutal, consice and earnest. Their sound was fast, fierce and fucking impenetrable - in the vein of garagey Americana pop punk. But God dammit, you already knew that! Well, you've probably forgotten how fucking GOOD they were. You'll see some pretty amazing live footage inside this over-two-hour film. Early live shows and incredibly endearing interviews with bandmembers (save Johnny) will regenerate anyone's adoration for these boys. Their story also emphasizes the emotions involved in being a Ramone. This is a tragic but important part of who they were. For instance, of the band's original personnel, Tommy (the only one to quit pretty early on), is the only one still alive.
Joey, Johnny, Dee Dee and Tommy created an inspirational legacy and this documentation does its absolute best to communicate to us their lives' work. It will award you with an awesome fight on stage, a re-telling of their experience with producer Phil Spector, priceless moments of Dee Dee's "other musical exploration", and... aw, c'mon, did you really think I'd tell you any more? I will tell you this and none more: extra features include bonus interview footage and among other things, the Marky Ramone Drum Technique! All you drummers out there will appreciate that little nugget.
By far, End Of The Century, The Story of The Ramones is not only an important addition to any rock collection, it's absolutely informative and inspirational to any musician and/or music-lover. But hey ho this baby's Region 1. ----* ----* In Stock, Not Yet Reviewed : ----* If you want to order one of these, just cut and paste the info into the comments area on the order form, or just email mailorder@aquariusrecords.org. AKIYAMA, MITCHELL "Small Explosions That Are Yours To Keep" (Sub Rosa) cd 14.98 AKIYAMA, TETUZI "Route 13 To the Gates of Hell" (DAT-3 / Fader) cd 19.98 AKIYAMA, TETUZI / TOSHIMARU NAKAMURA / OTOMO YOSHIHIDE / TAKU UNAMI "Compositions for Guitar Vol. 2" (A Bruit Secret) cd 17.98 AKRON / FAMILY "s/t" (Young God) cd 13.98 ALIAS "All Things Fixable" (Goodwithmoney) cd 14.98 ANDEREGG, BRENDON "Falling Air" (Psych-O-Path) cd 13.98 APOTHECARY HYMNS "Trowel and Era" (Locust) cd 14.98 ARCHITECTURE IN HELSINKI "In Case We Die" (Bar/None) cd 15.98 ATTACK, THE "The Complete Recordings From 1967-68" (Acme Gramophone) cd 15.98 AUBE "Chain[Re]Action" (Blossoming Noise) cd 14.98 AXOLOTL "Oranur" (Jyrk Collective) cd-r 5.98 AYLER, ALBERT "Live On The Riviera" (ESP-Disk) cd 14.98 BEANIE SIGEL "The B. Coming" (Roc-A-Fella) cd 14.98 BENT WIND "Sussex" (World Psychedelia) cd 17.98 BIZZY B "Science EP Volumes III + IV" (Planet Mu) cd 16.98 BLACK BONED ANGEL "Eternal Love" (Celebrate Psi Phenomenon) cd-r 14.98 BOOKS, THE "Lost And Safe" (Tomlab) cd 15.98 BRASIL AND THE GALLOWBROTHERS BAND "The Band Plays On, The Dunes Move On (Caught Me With My Eyes Closed)" (Last Visible Dog) cd 11.98 BRIGITTE & THE HANSEN EXPERIENCE "Frau Hansen Am Bass" (Psychedelic Pig) cd 15.98 BROTHERS OF THE OCCULT SISTERHOOD "Run From Your Honey Mind" (Celebrate Psi Phenomenon) cd-r 14.98 BUDD, HAROLD "Avalon Sutra" (Samadhisound) cd 17.98 CEPHALIC CARNAGE "Anomalies" (Relapse) cd 14.98 CHEVRON "Everything's Exactly The Same" (Planet Mu) cd 16.98 CLARINET THING "Agony Pipes And Misery Sticks" (C + P BC Records) cd 12.98 COH "0397post-pop" (Mego) 2cd 24.00 COLD BLEAK HEAT "It's Magnificent, But It Isn't War" (Family Vineyard) cd 14.98 COMBAT WOUNDED VETERAN "This Is Not An Erect, All-Red Neon Body" (No Idea) cd 13.98 COMETS ON FIRE / BURNING STAR CORE (Yik Yak) lp 14.98 CONCRETE RUBBER BAND "Risen Savior" (Radioactive) cd 17.98 CORROSION OF CONFORMITY "In The Arms Of God" (Sanctuary) cd 16.98 CRAIN "Speed" (Temporary Residence) cd/cd 14.98/14.98 DAEDELUS "Exquisite Corpse" (Mush) cd 14.98 DALE, JON "Son d'Or" (Rhizome) cd-r 7.98 DAREDIABLO "Twenty Paces" (Southern) cd 14.98 DEB PLAYERS "Umoja - Love and Unity" (Badda) cd 22.00 DEBRIS INC. "s/t" (Candlelight) cd 15.98 DIG! "A Film By Ondi Timoner" (Palm) dvd 27.00 DIZZEE RASCAL "Off 2 Work (#1)" (XL) cd single/12" 4.98/4.98 DIZZEE RASCAL "Off 2 Work (#2)" (XL) cd single 4.98 DUNGEN "s/t" (Subliminal Sounds) cd 16.98 EDAN "Beauty And The Beat" (Lewis Recordings) cd/lp 16.98/16.98 ERICKSON, ROKY "I Have Always Been Here Before" (Shout! Factory) 2cd 31.00 ET SANS "Par Noussss Touss Les Trous De Vos Cranes!" (Constellation) cd 14.98 EVOL "Magia Potagia" (Mego) cd 16.98 FANTOMAS "Suspended Animation" (Ipecac) cd 17.98 FIELD MICE, THE "For Keeps" (LTM) cd 17.98 FIELD MICE, THE "Skywriting" (LTM) 2cd 17.98 FIELD MICE, THE "Snowball" (LTM) cd 17.98 FOG "10th Avenue Freakout" (Lex) cd 15.98 FOSTER, JOSEPHINE "Hazel Eyes, I Will Lead You" (Locust) cd 14.98 FRANCISCO "Cosmic Beam Experience" (Radioactive) cd 17.98 GANG GANG DANCE "God's Money" (Social Registry) cd 14.98 GHOST "Metamorphosis" (Drag City) cd + dvd 17.98 GIRTH "Living In Truth" (Hector Stentor) cd 9.98 GRUBBS, DAVID & NIKOS VELIOTIS "The Harmless Dust" (Headz / Fader) cd 19.98 HALF-HANDED CLOUD "Thy Is A Word + Feet Need Lamps" (Asthmatic Kitty) cd 14.98 HALL, ARCH JR. "Wild Guitar!" (Norton Records) cd 14.98 HARMONIC 33 "Music For Film, Television & Radio Volume One" (Warp) cd 16.98 HAWK AND A HACKSAW, A "Darkness At Noon" (Leaf) cd 14.98 HYUN, SHIN JUNG & THE MEN "s/t" (World Psychedelia) cd 17.98 ISLAJA "Palaa Aurinkoon" (Fonal) cd 16.98 JACKIE-O MOTHERFUCKER / MY CAT IS AN ALIEN "split" (Very Friendly) cd 14.98 JAGA JAZZIST "What We Must / Spyderberg Sessions" (NinjaTune) 2cd 16.98 JANDEK "When I Took That Train" (Corwood) cd 8.98 KAMMERFLIMMER KOLLEKTIEF "Absencen" (Staubgold) cd/lp 15.98/14.98 KASABIAN "s/t" (RCA) cd 12.98 KILL THE VULTURES "s/t" (JIB) cd 14.98 KIRKEGAARD, JACOB "Eldfjall" (Touch) cd 15.98 KUTI, FELA "The Best Of Fela Kuti: Music Is The Weapon" (Wrasse) 2cd + dvd 33.00 KYLESA "To Walk A Middle Course" (Prosthetic) cd 11.98 L PIERRE "Touchpool" (Melodic) cd 14.98 LAST OF THE JUANITAS "In The Dirt" (Wantage) cd 13.98 LAVAGNINO, ANGELO "Gamma 1 Quadrilogy" (Dagored) cd 16.98 LOUIS XIV "The Best Little Secrets Are Kept" (Pineapple / Atlantic) cd ?14.98 MAGNOLIA THUNDERPUSSY "Starin' Down The Sun" (Mar Vista) cd 14.98 MARZURAAN "Solid State" (Traqueto) cd 14.98 MATHIEU, STEPHAN "The Sad Mac" (Headz / Fader) cd 19.98 MENCHE, DANIEL "Sirocco" (Important) cd 14.98 MERZBOW "Bariken" (Blossoming Noise) cd 14.98 MF DOOM "Live From Planet X" (Nature Sounds) cd 12.98 MIASMA & THE CAROUSEL OF HEADLESS HORSES "Perils" (Web of Mimicry) cd 14.98 MIKAMI, KAN "Bachi" (Abruit Secret) cd 17.98 MILTON, ANTONY "'Sirens' & 'And Where The Coloured Planes Are Rafts" (Last Visible Dog) cd 11.98 MOBY "Hotel" (V2) 2cd 16.98 MONTAG "Alone, Not Alone" (Gooom / Carpark) cd 14.98 MOUNTAINS "s/t" (Staartje) cd 14.98 MOUTHUS "s/t" (Psych-O-Path) cd 13.98 MR. DORGON "God Is Greatest" (Tzadik) cd 16.98 MU "Out Of Breach (Manchester's Revenge)" (Output) cd 16.98 OCS "3 & 4" (Narnack) 2cd 14.98 OKKERVIL RIVER "Black Sheep Boy" (Jagjaguar) cd 14.98 OS MUTANTES "Everything Is Possible!: The Best Of Os Mutantes" (Luaka Bop) cd 12.98 OSBOURNE, OZZY "Prince Of Darkness" (Epic) 4cd boxset 42.00 PARLOUR "Hives Fives" (Temporary Residence) cd ep 9.98 PLAIN RIDE "On The Flow" (Ektro) cd 14.98 PREFUSE 73 "Surrounded By Silence" (Warp) cd 15.98 PRINCE PO & RAEKWON "Bump Bump" (Lex) 12" 5.98 RITUAL STEEL "Blitz Invasion" (The Miskatonic Foundation) cd 14.98 RODEN, STEVE "Ear(th)" (Alyce de Roulet Williamson Gallery) cd 13.98 ROVA :: ORCHESTROVA "Electric Ascension" (Atavistic) cd 15.98 RUNEMAGICK "Envenom" (Aftermath) cd 14.98 SAN UL LIM "s/t" (World Psychedelia) cd 17.98 SECTION 25 "So Far" (LTM) dvd 32.00 SEHT "The Voice Of The Taniwha" (Last Visible Dog) cd 11.98 SHIFLET, MIKE "The City Is All In Your Head" (Celebrate Psi Phenomenon) cd-r 14.98 SMEGMA "Rumblings" (Hanson) cd 14.98 SNOW PATROL "The Trip" (Fiction) 2cd 28.00 STARZ "Attention Shoppers!" (Ryko) cd 12.98 STARZ "Coliseum Rock" (Ryko) cd 12.98 STARZ "s/t" (Ryko) cd 12.98 STARZ "Violation" (Ryko) cd 12.98 TAAKE "Doedskvad" (Karisma) cd 14.98 TAR BABIES "Face the Music / Respect Your Nightmares" (Lexicon Devil) cd 14.98 TARWATER "The Needle Was Travelling" (Morr Music) cd 16.98 TEMPLE OF BON MATIN "Infidel" (Spirit Of Orr) cd 14.98 TERRESTRIAL TONES "Blasted" (Psych-o-path) cd 13.98 THUNDERBIRDS ARE NOW! "Justamustache" (Frenchkiss) cd 14.98 TINDERSTICKS "Bareback: Nine Films By Martin Wallace" (Beggars Banquet) dvd 14.98 TOMOKAWA, KAZUKI "Itsuka, Toky Mite Ita" (PSF) cd 21.00 TOMOKAWA, KAZUKI "Pistol - Shibuya Apia Live" (PSF) dvd 26.00 TWEET "It's Me Again" (Goldmind) cd 16.98 V/A "Cold Heat: Heavy Funk Rarities 1968-1974 Vol. 1" (Now Again) cd/lp 14.98/16.98 WORKS, THE "s/t" (Subliminal Sounds) cd 16.98 ZORN, JOHN "Rituals" (Tzadik) cd 15.98 _______________________________________________________________________ ABOUT MAILORDER
While the debut Ramones album, gets much of the punk rock history glory, (as it should, cuz it really one of the greatest albums of all time!) we could still make a strong argument for Road To Ruin being our favorite Ramones album. Their fourth album, released in 1978, Road To Ruin is pretty much as good as pop music gets! Filled with classic Ramones blitzkrieg fast punk pop, as well as showing another side of themselves on their awesome cover of the Sonny & Cher classic "Needles & Pins". All we really have to say is that this is the album that inspired the Bad Brains to become a band, as they got their moniker from the song "Bad Brain". We love this record so much because besides the well known Ramones songs on here like "I Wanna Be Sedated", "I Wanted Everything", and "I Just Wanna Have Something To Do" there are so many awesome songs that somehow never end up on any of the many different Ramones best-of collections. While they really are a band who have been immortalized on so many of those collections, all their records deserve individual attention. They really just didn't slip up that much, or ever actually. Not one throwaway song on Road To Ruin, it all rules!
Awesome! Reissued in 2001, this cd features eight bonus tracks which include a bunch of demo versions for songs such as "Blitzkrieg Bop", "Judy Is A Punk", "I Don't Care" and "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend"!
Sonic Youth guitarist's solo tribute to earthworks artist Robert Smithson. Here's what El Bobo at Revolver Distro has to say about it: "Sonic Youth's left-minded, and soft-spoken lead guitarist continues to wield a big stick with a new solo outing of the highest sonic magnitude. First off is the title track, a 34-minute live recording from 1994 with after-the-fact wave-shaping and spectral improvement by Rafael Toral, followed by an instrumental 'Anagrama' type frolic with bandmates Steve Shelley and Thurston Moore. Also included are a couple of soundtrack excerpts, one from Notebook, and the other from one of Leah Singer's mind-smudging flicks (originally on '91's Guitarrorists comp.), and a John Lennon cover featuring the late Epic Soundtracks. As always it's a brilliant ride."
Another in Table Of The Elements' new series of one sided etched 12"s. A series focusing on the electric guitar. Last time we had Oren Ambarchi, this time we have Lee Ranaldo of Sonic Youth, who starts out his 12" sounding quite a bit like Sonic Youth in fact. Noisy crashing chords, chaotic and off kilter, over a super high pitched sonar like beep, weirdly hypnotic until it explodes into a full on psychedelic skreekout.
The second track begins with an amazing tripped out, warbly warped guitar groove, which gives way to a weird high end drone doused in fucked up effects, so woozy it almost makes you dizzy just listening, and reminds us a bit of a fucked up set of bagpipes.
The final track begins with an echo-y almost-industrial space-y surfy riff, that shifts suddenly in pitch, creating mysterious melodies, super haunting and hypnotic, but this track too soon gives way to a massive amp blowing, speaker melting chunk of freaked out Japanese style noise-psych. Whew.
Pressed on opaque swirled turquoise vinyl. One sided, the other side with a super bad ass etching by Savage Pencil, housed in a thick vinyl sleeve, and of course, as always LIMITED!
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Hypnogogic and stratospheric guitar noise/drones from Sonic Youth's guitarist who generates some pretty outstanding sounds similar to the ending tracks on "Daydream Nation" and recites his dystopic pseudo-Beat poetry over top. Lee employs such luminaries as Thurston Moore, Michael Morley (Dead C, Gate), and Epic Soundtracks.
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Acoustic folky stuff from one of the dudes from Pearls And Brass.
It had to happen. It probably already has happened actually, but we love the weird, and the random, and we figured you probably would too. This is a Japanese import, not sure exactly who the artist is, but it's 99 tracks, each a rich lustrous tone, some deep and bell like, some soft and sonorous, some high pitched like a sine wave. All you have to do is set your cd player on random and away we go. A soft, subtle ambient journey, that ends up sounding a bit like Morton Feldman's Rothko Chapel, only a bit though. It also sort of sounds like Tibetan bowls, or chiming bells, or soft ambient Japanese music (which I guess it is). Soft and lovely, and most importantly RANDOM. 99 seperate tones means the number of possible songs is an astronomical 9.33262154 x 10 to the 155th! And that's if you only let each tone play once... So even though the disc is actually only about 8 minutes long, set to shuffle it turns into 8 million billion trillion minutes! Or more!
Anyway, this seems to work best if you import the disc to iTunes, set to shuffle and with a decent crossfade, then just sit back and drift off, let the gorgeously soft and shimmery, sweet and serene ambience wash over you.
This is ostensibly a walk through Jeruselem as recorded by Random Inc. (who was a member of Autopoeises) and then processed/altered/fucked with by himself and a handful of guests including Tim Hecker, Electric Birds, the Rip-Off Artist, Ultra-Red and more. The results are pretty fantastic. I've listened to almost nothing else for the last few nights. This falls somewhere between AQ faves Stefan Mathieu and Oval, sort of gritty, buzzy, and hypnotic dreamscapes, but much darker and more cinematic, partly because of the recorded snippets of life/people/music in Jerusalem, but also because of the musical choices made by the contributors. This is a really dreary, somber, hypnotic, droning affair, with lots of buzz and click and hum and skitter. And the artists gentle touch with the original sound sources results in some totally breathtaking moments. I haven't dug a record this much since Oval's Diskont. Great stuff.
Stephan Meissner is a mainstay of the Mille Plateaux clicks 'n cuts crew via his work in Autopoesies and his solo projects Random Industries and Random Inc. "Jerusalem" is his latest work, the resulti of four years of gathering and editting sound material, specifically related to the complex and often volatile relationship between Jews and Palestinians in Jerusalem. Meissner's
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Random Industries is the work of Sebastian Meissner (ex-Autopoieses). For "Selected Random Works," Meissner has constructed 99 very short digitally sharp pieces - mostly of crystalline glitches and stochastic / erratic rhythms, but others have incidental melodies that inconsequentially pass through soap operas. As you can probably guess, the idea is to set your cd player to random and let the machine construct new patterns each time you hear it. There are some post-digital / post-structuralist ideas mentioned in the liner notes about creating non-linear space and the subversion of interactivity through indeterminancy... all fine ideas, but ones that can not possibly be found on this disc. First of all, the random function of the cd player will simply collate the 99 pieces into different patterns... not reconstruct the fluidity of time. A cd player is not a time machine, no matter how many drugs you take. Second, all of the 99 pieces have a very similar timbre (quite charming and glistening), making it impossible to not listen to it as mere fragments of a larger whole. Pay no attention to the theoretical silliness, as this is a fine collection of powerbook glitch fuckery.
Post-punk technician and multi-instrumentalist Eric Random hailed from Manchester in the late '70s, having collaborated with Pete Shelley in The Tiller Boys (an experimental electronic project more akin to Shelley's Strange Men In Sheds With Spanners output); but Random's most enduring relationship was with Cabaret Voltaire, whose development from DIY horror-electronics into sensual proto-electronica and disjointed-funk pulled a number of artists in their influential wake, including the likes of Hula, Clock DVA, and Eric Random's various projects. The Bedlamites began in the early '80s, with Time Splice being the band's second album recorded and produced by Richard H. Kirk of Cabaret Voltaire in 1984, getting released on Double Vision that same year. The album veered in a number of directions including post-punk dub explorations, sitar-driven dervishes for electronic headiness, and subversive disco-pop laced with antiestablishment samples amidst the cybotron rhythm box workouts. The bulk of the album is instrumental, through Random has employed the talents of vocalist Lynne Walton, who adopted the ballsy stage name Stagger Lynne as a female counterpart to the murder ballad anti-hero Stagger Lee. Her icy, minimal wave vocals hold a commanding presence amidst the complex step-sequences and punchy, industrial-pop intervals; and had she been used more in the context of the band, she might be remembered alongside Danielle Dax and Anne Clark as an exemplary eccentric of British female pop singers. Perhaps Walton stepped outside the limelight due to the Bedlamites stepping into the role of being Nico's touring / backing ensemble from 1982-1988 right up to her untimely death. A very interesting footnote to one of the better reissues from the whole minimal wave rejuvenation. The Mad As Mankind single (also produced for Double Vision in 1984 by R.H. Kirk) is included as the bonus to the fully remastered Time Splice album.
What do sandpaper and spraypaint bring to mind? Abrasiveness? Graffiti? Woodwork? Well, this is definitely not the case with Randomnumber. Those particular materials are what adorns this cd. Squares of sandpaper of varied grit are the insert and traycard.
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Skweee!!! See our Museum of Future Sound review for more explanation...
Some "supergroups" ARE indeed super... some not so. (Zwan? The Firm?) But lately there's been some good ones. (Twilight, Shrinebuilder!) Here's another, Rangda, named after a Balinese child-eating deity... and with these guys, we weren't too worried about 'em not living up to expectations. Probably just telling you who they are will be enough for a lot of you to wanna pick this up (and we say, do it!): "Sir" Richard Bishop of the Sun City Girls, Ben Chasny of Six Organs Of Admittance, and Chris Corsano of heck lots of things. Geez, we'd probably be interested even if this turned out to be a recording of the three of them having conversation over lunch, or playing Rock Band together, or something equally ridiculous. But, even better, this instrumental guitar/guitar/drums trio does pretty much exactly what we'd want 'em to do on this recording, mixing far out free improv with gorgeous psychedelic daydream meanderings, making for a satisfying variety of moods (melodic, mayhemic, mesmerizing) across this disc's six tracks...
It opens with "Waldorf Hysteria", an all guns blazing, room-clearing furore, but that's just a 2 minute warm-up, and not what you get for the whole disc, never fear (though some would be happy with that, and they do return to these levels of "Hysteria" at times later on the album, though there's no more bad puns attached). Track two, "Bull Lore" shows some more restraint, it's a noirish, jazzish, ominously cinematic rumble, with martial drumming underpinning the unleashing of an electric guitar solo that's equal parts beauty and terror, worth the price of admission alone if you're into this sort of outward bound six-string wrangling (which you should be, if you're interested in this group at all, this definitely for fans of the likes of Sonny Sharrock and Nels Cline). Not quite sure if that's Bishop or Chasny or a tag-team approach, both men are quite capable of sublime soling, and reality-ripping distorted skree as well, we know. And, when the two of 'em want to amp it up and bash it out, drummer Corsano is right there with them. The sheer monomaniacal intensity of the very next noisy track, "First Family", attests to this. It sounds like Yoshi Wada sitting in on one of Masayuki Takayanagi's Mass Projections! But then that's followed by the wistful loveliness of "Sarcophagi", which itself is quite different from what comes next, the aptly titled "Serrated Edges", gettin' stop-start hectic and tangled like something Mick Barr might dig his talons into. And then, False Flag's finale "Plain Of Jars" brings things down again, for a 15 minute, slow-building epic of gentleness, with Bishop trinkling into the track some delicious piano plinkings... Leaving us wanting more, we hope Rangda is one of those supergroups that's a real group, and keeps on goin'. The way these three seemingly embrace spirituality and chaos together, sound-wise, seems like it must be a good thing for them as well as us. Definitely, their debut gets our recommendation, combining as it does so potently the SCGs' unfettered exoticism and the most Freely Agitated krauty bliss ever conjured by Six Organs, not to mention summoning storms as strong as any previously navigated by Corsano's drumkit.
Record number two from this psychedelic super group, and like we mentioned in our review of their debut, just knowing the players will get most people to flip out and buy it, sounds unheard. Those players being Sir Richard Bishop of the late great Sun City Girls, Ben Chasny of Six Organs Of Admittance and drummer extraordinaire Chris Corsano. And like that first one, this is another fantastic batch of instrumental improv psychedelia. The opening track has a main guitar part that immediately pushed all our Sun City Girls buttons, a little bit Eastern, a little exotic, the dueling guitars (no bass) unfurling intricate tangled melodies, while Corsano plays the most straight forwardly 'rock' on anything we've heard yet, but it sounds perfect, the song erupting into a wild squall of psychedelic freakout before slipping right back into it. Odds are most folks will only need to hear a minute or two of that first track and will be sold. But if for some crazy reason, that's not the case, there's seven more reasons to grab this. "The Vault" lets Corsano slip back into wild free jazz splatter, which Chansy and Bishop mirror perfectly with sweet melodic billows of soaring textural buzz, which only makes it that much more powerful, when the band slip into a softly psychedelic deserty lope, sounding like Earth or Barn Owl if they ROCKED.
"Silver Nile" is the centerpiece here, at nearly 12 minutes, which spends its first few minutes drifting through an abstract field of spare notes and subtle percussion, the sounds droned out and almost raga like, the players gradually coalescing into another twang flecked meander, with an almost Morricone vibe, and they make it to almost nine minutes without deviating from their dark dolorous sonic brood, only finish off with a strangely Middle Eastern sounding coda, still droney and a little bit raga-y but much more jaunty and upbeat.
From there on out, it's looped and loping minimal hypnorock (sounding a bit like Circle) laced with some seriously shredding wah guitar freakouts, on more Middle Eastern style Sun City Girls sounding jams, peppered with blasts of droned out psychedelic free jazz freakouts, one bluesy hoedown, one killer stretch of math rock mesmer, and finally, a blast of churning, chugging, mathy, spaced out psychrock radness that ends WAY too soon after only three minutes. Whatever you think of these guys on their own, together, that have a seriously special chemistry, and while the label jokingly boasts that will be 'the instrumental album of the year', we'd have to say, they're probably not that far off!
Instrumental improv supergroup (in our realm, for sure) Rangda, featuring the six-string talents of Ben 'Six Organs' Chasny and Sir Richard Bishop of Sun City Girls infamy, accompanied by drum dervish Chris Corsano, are back with their third album (not counting a live 10" and split with The Dead C). This outing sees Rangda in the mood to have some fun, it would seem, with one randomly song named after Spiro Agnew (Google him, ye millennials) and the music here can get pretty jaunty too - Irwin says it made him feel like he was on a boat (?). Zippy instrumental toonage, with angular grooves and the expected type of esoteric shred that Chasny and Bishop can lay down, coming off a bit like Sun City Girls Lite, not a bad thing says anyone who, like us, has been revisiting the recently reissued Torch Of The Fucking Mystics. And, on the likes of "Hard Times Befall The Door-to-Door Glass Shard Salesman" and a couple other long-form burners, Randga delve into some moody noise-scaping as well, balancing out the zippy boaty-ness elsewhere. Heck, the nearly 20 minute epic "Mondays Are Free At The Hermetic Museum" that closes the album is the sort of tour-de-force only Rangda (or maybe the SCGs) could make seem easy. All in all, another winner from these weirdos, wowza!
**MISSISSIPPI RECORDS ALERT** **MISSISSIPPI RECORDS ALERT** **MISSISSIPPI RECORDS ALERT**
Yet another pre-Dead Moon band featuring Fred and Toody Cole, thanks to the kind folks at Mississippi. While the Range Rats shares some of its name with another Fred and Toody combo, The Rats, the sound is WAY different. Recorded in 1985, The Range Rats is the Cole's country band, or more accurately cowpunk. Very reminiscent of eighties LA groups like X or Tex And The Horseheads, The Range Rats had that punky twang, dueling boy girl vocals, galloping rhythms, rambunctious and punk rock, but plenty country and catchy.
Some tracks get all reverby and ballad-y like some lost sixties girl group, others are full on punk bluegrass raveups, and still others get all slithery and bluesy, but throughout it all, the twang is ever present, and the vocal interplay and harmonies are awesome, with some cool crunchy distorted guitars thrown into the mix, as well as some surprisingly sensitive, almost power pop sounding classic popsmithery. Never before released at all until now, and Mississippi did it up right, nice thick vinyl, super heavy deluxe jackets, the front adorned with all sorts of dimestore Western novels. Cool!
Another entry in the NEW WAVE OF FINNISH HEAVY METAL, aka NWOFHM, comes modern Finnish thrashers Ranger, who not unsurprisingly, don't sound modern at all, and in fact, even though the label describes them as thrash, a lot of the time, they almost sound more like classic eighties true metal, the title track opens with the sort of epic harmonized guitar majesty, you just don't hear anymore, and then the band launches into some ridiculously over the top drumming, a barrage of pick slides, and BAM, chugging riffage, blasting beats, soaring divebomb leads. At this point, the sound is definitely thrash, we're hearing lots of early Anthrax for sure, even a little Slayer too, but Ranger are way poppier, the grunted sung/spoken vox punctuated with wild falsetto wails, the eighties vibe is huge, the drums all reverbed and boomy, the song flitting from lightning fast punked out thrash, to chugging classic metal and back again, and then of course some wild soloing, dueling epic shreddery, for folks our age, this is like musical manna from heaven (or hell?). And as yet always, especially with Finnish bands, and from the Ektro camp in particular, we're faced with the nagging possibility, that these guys could be taking the piss. But really, even if they are, they're so good, it hardly even matters, total eighties heavy metal radness, that really sounds like it could be from back in the day. The serious metal majesty and fierce metallic fury balanced by plenty of hooks and some serious poppiness, as well as some serious goofiness (but then what great metal bands didn't have some of that? Venom anyone?). The vocal delivery is awesome and ridiculous, more spoken than sung, but delivered like a true metal warrior, you can almost imagine both his hands holding up the invisible oranges, and of course lots of trilled 'r's, and let's not forget the sound effects, like the revved car engine when the vocalist sings the line "V8 engine screams!!"
But fuck it, metalheads who treasure the golden age of metal (that's the eighties btw) and can't get enough of that sound, this is about as good, and ridiculous, and amazing as it gets. Especially what might be the most epic track here, the closer "Knights Of Darkness" (featuring the aforementioned revving engine sound effects), a galloping tour-de-force, with some amazing harmonized guitars, killer shredding leads, and a vocal performance, that had us once again, thinking it could be Mika from Circle in metal drag. So goddamn great. Death to all but metal!
You want a shock to your skull? You could slam your head into the wall, or hit it with a hammer... or, better yet (and more entertaining), just slap on this 7" by Finnish ragers RANGER, whose song "Shock Skull" is a ripping onslaught of underground thrash madness, in the style of '80s Slayer, Metallica and other masters of nasty speed metal Satan worship. Distorted guitars, pounding drums, shrieking vocals, widdly solos, yeeeaaaah!! It's a fine follow up to their Knights Of Darkness 12" from last year, again released on Ektro label's vinyl imprint Full Contact, so it's got the Circle seal of approval - though Ranger are as far as we know are a REAL metal band, not the more conceptual kind like the so many "NWOFHM" side projects of those Circle guys. The flipside, "Omen Of Doom", is another neckbreaker. All in all, seven inches of old school shreddin', slaying stuff with a ton of youthful energy to it.
Limited to 1000 copies, colored vinyl (500 blue and 500 green, they're sealed so we aren't sure what each one we have is).
First there was the NWOBHM, back in '79... The New Wave Of British Heavy Metal: Iron Maiden, Saxon, Angel Witch, Diamond Head, etc. Then, later, there was the NWOFHM... The New Wave Of FINNISH Heavy Metal, a tongue in cheek, self-proclaimed description for the metal-obsessed, but not in fact actually really quite "metal" output of Finnish hypnorock outfit Circle and their various offshoots. Flagship acts Circle and Pharaoh Overlord occasionally dabbled in the NWOFHM, mixing metal tropes into their space rock motoriks, while certain side projects like Steel Mammoth and Krypt Axeripper went full-on NWOFHM, 24-7. But still weren't really metal bands, not exactly - too much pop, and prog, and psych, and pure WTF? going on, also.
Ok, but then there's what we'll have to call NWOFHMBSFRTT: The New Wave Of Finnish Heavy Metal But Seriously For Real This Time. Youngsters from Finland, into ye olden metal of the '80s, not as a semi-ironic side project, but as their primary passion. And naturally, Circle & Co. have taken some of these true metal bands under their wing, putting out their stuff on their own label. Two of the best NWOFHMBSFRTT-er's we've got for you now, new releases from NWOBHM-styled throwbacks Lord Fist, and raging thrash maniacs Ranger!
This Ranger disc collects two previously vinyl-only releases we've reviewed before: their Shock Skull 7" and Knights Of Darkness 12", plus it's got a whole bunch of tracks taken from various earlier demos, too. Thus it's the complete arsenal of Ranger's skull splitting metal, thus far - though soon there will be a brand new Ranger full-length coming out on Spinefarm. So, here's a sampling of what we said about Ranger before with regards to those two vinyl releases, starting with Knights Of Darkness: The title track opens with the sort of epic harmonized guitar majesty, you just don't hear anymore, and then the band launches into some ridiculously over the top drumming, a barrage of pick slides, and BAM, chugging riffage, blasting beats, soaring divebomb leads. At this point, the sound is definitely thrash, we're hearing lots of early Anthrax for sure, even a little Slayer too, but Ranger are way poppier, the grunted sung/spoken vox punctuated with wild falsetto wails, the eighties vibe is huge, the drums all reverbed and boomy, the song flitting from lightning fast punked out thrash, to chugging classic metal and back again, and then of course some wild soloing, dueling epic shreddery, for folks our age, this is like musical manna from heaven (or hell?)� total eighties heavy metal radness, that really sounds like it could be from back in the day. The serious metal majesty and fierce metallic fury balanced by plenty of hooks and some serious poppiness, as well as some serious goofiness (but then what great metal bands didn't have some of that? Venom anyone?). The vocal delivery is awesome and ridiculous, more spoken than sung, but delivered like a true metal warrior, you can almost imagine both his hands holding up the invisible oranges, and of course lots of trilled 'r's, and let's not forget the sound effects, like the revved car engine when the vocalist sings the line "V8 engine screams!!"
Metalheads who treasure the golden age of metal (that's the '80s btw) and can't get enough of that sound, this is about as good, and ridiculous, and amazing as it gets. Especially what might be the most epic track here, "Knights Of Darkness" (featuring the aforementioned revving engine sound effects), a galloping tour-de-force, with some amazing harmonized guitars, killer shredding leads, and a vocal performance that had us thinking it could be Mika from Circle in metal drag. So goddamn great. Death to all but metal!
And then, about the two tracks from the Shock Skull 7" that open this disc: You want a shock to your skull? You could slam your head into the wall, or hit it with a hammer... or, better yet (and more entertaining), just slap on this 7" by Ranger, whose song "Shock Skull" is a ripping onslaught of underground thrash madness, in the style of '80s Slayer, Metallica and other masters of nasty speed metal Satan worship. Distorted guitars, pounding drums, shrieking vocals, widdly solos, yeeeaaaah!! The flipside, "Omen Of Doom", is another neckbreaker�
Plus, you get the Enter The Zone demo from 2009, the Metal Gear demo from 2012, the Touch Of Death demo from 2012, and the Combat Metal demo from 2013, nine tracks of stuff previously released only on cd-r or cassette - or not at all. And it all rips Ranger style too, rest assured. Let the headbanging commence!
Cd booklet includes liner notes, photos and credits. We learned from the notes that Ranger's original name was "Turbin"! If you get that, you're DEFINITELY gonna like Ranger.
(FYI, for more NWOFHMBSFRTT radness not released by Ektro, check out Speedtrap and Mausoleum Gate, we recently reviewed the latter.)
As many of the various lysergic pop weirdos and lo-fi audio alchemists move toward poppier and less fucked up sonic climes, it's nice to know we can count on Rangers, aka Joe Knight, to keep the warped alternate dimension FM radio druggy eighties retro pop whathefuck fire burning bright, this latest record another collection of glammy lo-fi pop that in some other world would/could/should have been all over classic rock radio in the future. The opener, in different hands, could very well have been a dreamy bit of blissy pop, if say Big Troubles in their current incarnation had a god, we can picture it all shimmery and crystalline, but here, it's raw, and fuzzy, murky and lo-fi, the sounds careening from speaker to speaker, the effects in-the-red, the sound crumbling and distorted, swaths of swirly synth drifting alongside the buried reverby croon, but all the noise and damaged 4-track malfunctioning can't disguises that Knight definitely knows his way around a pop song. But just so you don't get too comfortable, he follows it up with the 13 minute long ADD short attention span "Zeke's Dream", which does start out all James Ferraro style drug pop weirdness, but then it keeps getting weirder, swirling distorted vocals, the guitars getting crunchier, and then it's almost like someone switched the channel on the radio, the song transforming into more of a slow jam, this one peppered with strange sci-fi streaks, and blown out echoey vox, and then it happens again, and becomes a gloomy dirgey ballad, that sounds like it's melting inside the speakers, or Knight has 6 different people gradually detuning each string on his guitar, and then it happens again, the song becomes a John Carpenter synthscape, that morphs into a bit of krautrock style kosmische musik, but there are voices and electronic squiggles everywhere, but it's not over yet, some police sirens signal the shift to the final movement (?), a warped lounge-y bit of fuzzy groove, that ends in a gorgeous bit of psychedelic tangle. And we're only two songs into the record. But that gives you an idea of what's to come, more twisted druggy pop, more warped home brewed psychedelia, and whatever it is that is born of merging the two.
Most definitely recommended for fans of James Ferraro, Ariel Pink, John Maus, and all the other similarly warped lysergic pop alchemists out there...
Another chunk of weirdo lo-fi retro pop whatthefuck from the always amazing Olde English Spelling Bee label, this one from one man band Rangers, aka Joe Knight, whose sound takes the poppiest moments of James Ferraro, that sort of late night eighties cheesy soundtrack sound, and runs it through some Ariel Pink alien FM radio, mixes in a little Roxy Music, a little PiL, and what comes out sounds like some alternate universe, slightly off center angular, barely funky, retro MTV pop, all swirling synths, groovy rhythms, crooned vocals, melancholy melodies, all wrapped in old VHS tape haze, a blurred wayback machine, turning cable access shimmer, mirror balls and sports coats over T-shirts and overproduced videos into sound, a sound that falls squarely in the current hypnogogic camp, but lists WAY toward the avant yacht rock side of the sonic spectrum. Definitely twisted, a bit psychedelic, woozy and warped and warbly, while subtly subverting the sounds of our childhoods into a dreampop that manages to be weirdly transcendent, totally retro, and enthusiastically cheesy. Ariel Pink and John Maus fans will go nuts for this, as well as anyone who wishes they never threw away that box of videos in the garage, that had every single video from '82-'87, recorded off Night Flight, every morning after the parents went to bed.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
If you love Jackie Mittoo, you'll most certainly love Ernest Ranglin as well. Ernie is the guitar equivalent to Mittoo's laid back keyboard stylings. Impeccably-produced instrumental guitar work, somewhere between Martin Denny style lounge and rock steady. Excellent!
We'd been hearing about this record for ages, the guys in the Ovens and Violent Change constantly asking us if we'd heard these guys, and of course we HADN'T, cuz it seemed to be another one of those local SF underground post punk records that surfaced briefly and then disappeared, much like those Sopors records we were finally able to track down. But thankfully, this angular post punk / noise pop gem was rescued from obscurity from the fine folks at Blast First, and while we were a bit surprised that some weird super obscure band nobody had ever heard of would merit a big label reissue, once we finally got our ears on this stuff it was easy to see why, and then had us wondering how the hell this had slipped under the radar, and how had we missed these guys completely? Hell, they even did a split with aQ faves Grass Widow that flew right by us apparently.
Well it doesn't really matter now. What really matters now is that you all don't miss out this time around, cuz holy shit is this stuff killer. Dark, brooding, angular, crunchy and fuzzy, moody and broody but bristly and kinetic, catchy as fuck, but also raw and tense and urgent exactly the kind of stuff folks into Iceage and similarly hyped new post punk combos should be flipping their shit over. And thankfully will now have the chance. Noisy and intense, swaggery and frenetic, the guitars sharp and crunchy, swirling into wild squalls as often as locking into crunchy riffage or unleashing shards of gnarled noise, the drums and bass locked into tightly wound grooves, loping lazily one second, driving and punk as fuck the next, the vocals a snotty snarly feral yowl, nervous jittery energy harnessed into jangle pop shapes but run through with Wire-y slivers of melody, as good as we had hoped and then some!
