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"I do not want to play music which sounds as if it comes from familiar instruments, music which is based on chord patterns, or music which fits nicely within any particular stereotyped tradition... What I want is the terrifying, the menacing, the cruel, the chaotic, the darkly exciting, the ecstatic, the irrational -- music that resounds between the cells and in the intergalactic voids..." --Slava Ranko
Ah, Finland! You never cease to amaze us with the wealth of intruding sounds that emerge from your arctic landscape; and you've once again provided us with somebody new to get excited about. While our obsession with Finnish music has been typically centered on the liminal psychedelia of Circle, Kemiallyset Ystavat, Avarus, and all things Fonal, we've also been quite taken by the frigid electronica that Pan Sonic has been making for many years now. Antti Rannisto comes from the same mold as Pan Sonic's Mika Vainio in sculpting a compelling post-techno electric field of phase-shifting throbs and sine-wave tones with impeccable precision. In many ways, Aaniesineita mirrors what Vainio did on his solo records Metri and Tulkinta. There really is not very much to Rannisto's work, often just a hyper-repetitive 4/4 pulse with subtle shifts of panning, EQ envelope manipulation, and phase shifting of tonal elements. According to Rannisto, it's all about rotation. That pretty much says it all.
Issue number 4 of this unique metal zine, or should we even call it a zine? It's more of a microzine, or a broadsheet, each short issue devoted to just one band and one band only. Written, edited, and published by John Mincemoyer, one half of the team behind the late great underground metal mag Oaken Throne, the idea behind Rape & Honey is to celebrate/investigate one crucial (and sometimes obscure) band, in DEPTH. Previously R&H has covered Weapon, Funeral Mist, and Razor Of Occam. Now for #4, they've turned their attentions to a particular AQ fave, up and coming sci-fi thrashers VEKTOR!!! Just read our rave reviews of Vektor's two (temporarily out of print, soon to be resurrected by Vektor's new label, Earache, we have on good authority) albums elsewhere on our site if you need to know why Mincemoyer might be so into this band. Or read this! Ideal either for Vektor fans who want to learn more about 'em, or for those who trust R&H to point 'em to cool bands they should check out (and trust US, you should check out Vektor).
So, you a lengthy interview with a very voluble David DiSanto, guitarist/vocalist of Vektor. Also there's a half-page acetate insert with Mincemoyer's review of Vektor's Outer Isolation album (why on acetate, we don't know, maybe for people who have an overhead projector). The interview is pretty thorough, informative, and (like Vektor) entertaining. It concludes with some interesting insight into what Vektor think about all the Voivod comparisons (unavoidable, considering their logo). And it's presented with a nice layout job by the guy from Gnaw Their Tongues, featuring lots of colorful vintage artwork from science fiction pulps, in keeping with Vektor's sci-fi obsession. 12 pages, packaged in a resealable plastic sleeve, accentuating the concept that R&H is for collectors, fans who value both music and the written word.
How much do we love Oaken Throne magazine? It is easily one of, if not THE, best metal magazines going. Considering how many we sell, you all must agree. But what's a writer to do when the magazine he writes for comes out so infrequently? Well start a new magazine of course. But if you're John Mincemoyer, one half of the team that produces Oaken Throne, you don't just start any old magazine, you come up with something weird, and cool, ad gorgeously designed, and pretty much unlike any other magazine you've ever seen, thus we have the first issue of Rape & Honey, and besides being named after one of the best Ministry records ever, it also just so happens to have a pretty odd concept. First off, it's a microzine, and is all of three (3) pages. Second of all, the entire thing is about ONE band. Just one. And it consists of ONE review, and ONE interview with said band. Cool. For the first issue, Mincemoyer focuses on blackened thrashers Razor Of Occam and their record Homage To Martyrs. We had never heard of Razor Of Occam, but it hardly matters, the review is great, the interview is super interesting, as much about philosophy and lyrical content as it is about music and metal, even more so, and of course, gorgeously laid out, an oversized cardstock gatefold, with a full color cover, inside there's a vellum envelope, with a letter and introduction from Mincemoyer, also a review of the RoO record, printed in full color on a mini transparency, all sealed up in a plastic bag. Cool stuff for sure. Definitely might hold you over until the next Oaken Throne, or at least the next Rape & Honey which will feature Funeral Mist!
Finally, a new issue of Rape & Honey, the miniature metal magazine, that has taken the place of the now deceased Oaken Throne, easily one of the best metal periodicals ever. But when OT was retired, John Mincemoyer, one half of the Oaken Throne editorial team, decided he still wanted to do printed zine, but with a twist, that twist being that each issue is focused on a single band. Lovingly laid out, gorgeously designed and printed, well written and extremely interesting, Rape & Honey is almost like lengthy articles pulled from a magazine and transformed into their own slime volume, and like many of our favorite mags, it almost doesn't matter who it's about, it's great reading, and more often than not, you'll be dying to hear the band after reading all about their history, their beliefs, and most importantly their music.
The first issue focused on the relatively obscure black thrash outfit Razor Of Occam, issue two was all about aQ faves Funeral Mist, and now along comes #3, this time it's all about Weapon, whose Drakonian Paradigm record we raved about not too long back. Bangladesh via Canada, a killer mix of grim blackness and classic metal, with wild solos, loads of harmony guitars, actual melodies, weird production, extreme stereo panning, you can read our review on the aQ site, but you should also grab one of these and dig in. Besides all the interesting stuff in the article, the presentation is superb, this time it's up to 12 pages (not long before it becomes a proper magazine perhaps?), full color, with a super nice center spread, and as always, there are some inserts, a Rape & Honey postcard, and Ajna Offensive ad/insert, and a small printed transparency with Mincemoyer's review of Drakonian Paradigm!
If you read Terrorizer, and Decibel, and used to read Oaken Throne, then there's no reason you shouldn't be reading Rape & Honey!
Oaken Throne is dead. Sad but true, that beloved magazine chronicling all things black and grim, dark and sonically adventurous, has been laid to rest, a labor of love for sure, but it got to the point where no amount of love could sustain the amount of labor that went into producing each issue. So sad. We still have copies of the last few issues, so do grab them while you can, and while OT is gone, one half of the team behind OT, John Mincemoyer, is forging ahead with his own idiosyncratic magazine, Rape & Honey. Not so much a magazine as a broadsheet, it's a handful of pages, each issue focused on a single band, we still have a few copies of issue one, which was all about Razor Of Occam, but this second issue, expanded to nearly twice the size of number 1, might be of even more interest to most of the aQ faithful, being as its focus is on longtime aQ favs, the mighty Funeral Mist.
You can read our rants and ravings about Funeral Mist elsewhere on the aQ site, we gushed about pretty much every FM release, even going so far as to make Maranatha our Record Of The Week a while back. But Rape & Honey Takes you even deeper, incorporating interviews, background, history, reviews, musings, plus Mincemoyer is an excellent writer, and Funderal Mist are indeed fascinating subjects. 8 pages, 8 1/2" by 11", full color, plenty of illustrations, with two printed full color inserts, as well as a Mincemoyer penned Funeral Mist review printed on a cool colored transparency. A great read, and a killer object de' metal art, WAY recommended, to fans of the band of course, but also folks who read Terrorizer and Oakan Throne and Decibel and the like, plus it's super cheap! Skip a cup of coffee and read all about one of our favorite bands...
Steve Albini, post-Big Black. A classic.
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:D-Lem: is a documentation of the live performance Rapoon (aka Robin Storey) gave during the 1999 LFM Festival in Barcelona, and is the closest that he has come to sounding like :Zoviet France: since Storey left the anonymous collective. This dark looping hypnodrone with post-industrial clatter that could easily fit on :ZF:'s "Mohnomishce" or "Just An Illusion" (titles that highlight the best work from :ZF:, just so you know).
Even though it's been a decade since Robin Storey left the seminal post-industrial ensemble :Zoviet*France:, he hasn't really extended himself beyond his last few outings with :Z*F: (including "Just An Illusion" and possibly "Shouting At The Ground"). In
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An album previously available as download, now gets reissued with Robin Storey (aka Rapoon, ex-Zoviet France) revisiting and reshaping the album for cd. Known for his hypnotic productions through tape-loop technology and their digital equivalents, Storey produces some wonderfully dreamy ambient tracks many of which are dappled with a Terry Riley-esque piano minimalism that in turn gets washed out in deep currents of reverb and sonic decay. He also includes a very Zoviet France sounding track in "Dust Rattle" with a recording of a breathy flute that sounds like it was buried in the sand for decades with its haunted notes hovering above a static line of electrical hum, all draped with a gauzy atmosphere. Heartbeat rhythms, eerily manipulated tapes, and hand-percussive ritualism situate themselves amidst the looping ambience, all of which locates Disappeared Redux with the realm of the otherworldly.
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Robin Storey, founding member of :Zoviet*France: and sole proprietor of Rapoon, finds the source material for his mesmeric drone music in the tones emaneted from tablas, Egyptian reeds, digeridoos, and a plethora of ethnic instruments. From the dots of sound he pulls from the instruments, Storey (like his predecent work in :Z*F:) builds lulling compositions with hypnotic rhythmic patterns and rich textures of drifting sound. "Fires of the Borderlands" is one of his most somnambulant pieces and is quite good.
While the Essence Music press release doesn't make this proclamation, any self-respecting :zoviet*france: fan will be able to recognize the source material for Rapoon's From Shadow Sleep. Essentially this album is a remix of the source material taken from two of the finest :zoviet*france: recordings of all times -- the diptych centerpiece of "Ascend The Fall" and "Caught In The Square" found on the album Just An Illusion. That 1990 :zoviet*france: album was essentially a solo record by Robin Storey, who later split from :zoviet*france: rather acrimoniously and formed Rapoon, a project whose work has been fairly hit or miss.
True to the old adage: when Rapoon has been good, he's been very very good; but when he's been bad, he's horrid. From Shadows Sleep find Storey in top form, partially because the source material is so exquisite -- back from when he was dealing with convoluted tape loop machines, time-lag accumulators, and the best non-Dub use of delay pedals of all time. These aerated sounds tinged with metallic resonance cobble together swelling masses of hypnotic drift, underscored by a brooding atmosphere. Sonorous pings and aggregates of swirling tape hiss spackle Rapoon's mighty drone which ends up being both unsettling and transcendent at the same time. Given how many are dabbling in the fine art of grizzled dronescaping, the back catalogue of :zoviet*france: should be required listening. But given that nearly all of those recordings of alchemical ritualism are out of print (thanks to that unfortunate acrimony mentioned above), this Rapoon album is the next best thing. Very highly recommended.
The oversized beautiful first edition of Rapoon's "Navigating By Colour" features a dozen oversized postcards of Robin Storey's paintings (imagine Diebenkorn infused with a fictional tribal symbolism), but it's the sound which makes this album perhaps his best work since working with Zoviet France. Not nearly as tinted with pseudo-ethnic percussive elements as his other records, fragments of electronica (a particularly nice deconstruction of LTJ Bukem's archetypal "Amen" junglist break into something nothing not at all drum'n'bass-esque) and medieval chants join Storey's masterful useage of ever shifting dark passages of looping drones.
Robin Storey has always been a very prolific composer, certainly being the engine that pushed Zoviet France to produce so many titles in the '80s. When he left ZF in the early '90s, that work ethic continued on in his solo project Rapoon, which in many ways was a natural outgrowth of the tape-loop errata, the dark ritualism, the grim raga drones, and the ethnomusicological decenteredness of Zoviet France, although with some occasional, perhaps unwise, forays into contemporary electronica. The slippages, echoes, mirages, and reflections of sound through Storey's tape-loop and sampling contraptions have the potential for some truly inspired sidereal atmospherics, with the rhythms being almost inconsequential to the hypnosis that Storey could produce. As we mentioned, Storey has kept up an impressive work ethic over the years but the results have not always been as good as what he was able to do within the confines of Zoviet France. But when Storey is on, his stuff is fantastic; and this collection proves just how good he can be. The first disc on this collection culls from the numerous compilation tracks, oddities, seven inch singles, and outtakes that date to the best period for Rapoon right after his departure from ZF from 1993-1999, with the second disc being a super rare cd-r release from 1997 entitled Messianic Ghosts that was only issued in an edition of 50. As great as many of the compilation tracks are on the first disc, Messianic Ghosts is one of the highlights in his catalogue, drifting along a placid oceanic current somewhere in the North Atlantic while gazing up at the aurora borealis late at night with satellites raking across the summer night sky. The radiant mysteriousness to all of the hypnogogic patterns and echoes is offset by the warm dust of antiquated magnetic tape that collects within all of Storey's loops. Downright beautiful dronemuzik. Limited stock of this Polish import.
Here's the second volume of reissued rarities from the post-industrial mesmerist Rapoon, mined from the period of 2000 to 2003. At his best, Robin Storey finds himself entrenched in a confluence of tape loops, time-lag accumulation systems, and dub tricknology, which he developed in the early '80s through his work in the pioneering collective :zoviet*france: and continued with as a solo artist under the moniker Rapoon. Since his time in :zoviet*france:, he's often incorporated newer forms of technologies such as drum machines, soft-synth programming, and digital sampling processes. Admittedly, these explorations of newer technologies can appear stilted, in contrast with the fluid cascades from his analogue signal transmission. The bulk of Rapoon's research on Seeds In The Tide Volume 2 hedges toward an analogue sound, with only a few instances where the digital forms dominate the proceedings. The first disc is comprised of compilation tracks, almost all of which were originally released on obscure European compilations that probably didn't have much in the way of US distribution to begin with. The best track is probably the unpublished "Trace Area", which lilts across a liquid-uranium drone of nuclear-decayed sparkle with a plethora of ghostly-dub emissions from some unknown dimension via EVP. The diaphanous dub-ambient networks of echo patterns continue throughout the subterranean murk of "Ep Et Vee" and the quite pop-ambient blur of "Zoom Extract 2". The second disc is a live Rapoon set recorded back in 2000 in Vienna, which was originally a cassette released by Klanggalerie. Here, Storey glides through less of the ambient explorations and more of the rhythmic excursion that veers deep into a cybernetic electronica due to a remix that Rapoon did for the Clock DVA-esque project Black Faction. Super limited stock on this Polish import.
In the wake of so many dreadfully digital concoctions of insipid ambient music from the mid to late '90s, a good Rapoon album was a breath of fresh air. The warmth of his analog processes, tape-loop and delay mechanics, and some good-old cassette grit thrown in for good measure was a gnostic beacon to the days of a post-industrial zeitgeist from a previous decade, or century, or millennium for that matter when it came to the best albums from Rapoon. Any sense of timeloss and historical displacement would be considered a victory for most artists; but for Robin Storey and his long-standing Rapoon project, that's been a common parlance from his work. The Fires Of The Borderlands may be Rapoon's best known album, as it was put out originally through the Relapse subsidiary Release back in 1998. It's long been out of print; and it also ranks as one of his better releases. Here, we've got the Polish 2cd reissue of that album, fleshed out with a remastering job from the original tapes and a bonus disc featuring an hour long performance on KFJC down in Silicon Valley.
The album is flush with slow-motion billowings, night-ocean tidal wash, and sibilant blurs, all crafted from Storey's refined use of tape-loops and delay pedals. There's nary a reference to anything infernal or hellish to the hypnogogic cascade of Rapoon despite the album's title. At times, Storey engorges his reverb-drenched loops into a galvanized thrum of drone portent equivalent to the bunker hermeticism of Maeror Tri. But as with most of Storey's work he transcends a gothic nihilism through his application of ghostly dub reflections that could harken to the echoes of some pneumatic lung wheezing in the corner or a derelict monk chanting to a long-forgotten deity. Beautiful stuff.
The live in the studio session is equally as good with Storey lining the wash with distant tribal rhythms and wooden flute gestures thrown in for good measure.
The amount of material that Robin Storey (aka Rapoon) has on the cutting room floor must be huge, even more so than William Basinski who continues to mine his trove of tape loops. Time-Loop Anomalies is another recontextualization of material, some of which was commissioned for several dance performances, with other tracks sprinkled from that pile of tape loops at his feet in an attempt to unify the tracks as a whole. While Storey's post-industrial looping methods are well used throughout the album, there are some truly anomalous moments such as the space-jazz synthesis of the Sputnik remix complete with sullen double-bass lines and Vangelis-like synthetic trumpet notes. The shortwave radio noise collage of "Hybrid Identities" also do away with the hypnotic patterning, but are more in keeping with the radioactive smoldering which haunted much of Rapoon's best work as well as Zoviet France. But of course, Storey is at his best when he sticks to what he does so well: the post-industrial ritualist miasma of disembodied sounds spiralling against its neighbors.
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"What Do You Suppose?" is a conceptual departure from the curatorial duties of Rapoon's Robin Storey (ex-Zoviet France) whose previous releases have been anthropological collections of looping drones culled from fictional non-Western cultures. Sampling heavily from a symposium on the nature of alien lifeforms, Rapoon's previous ambiguity has been anchored heavily in conspiracy theory, but retains his musical expertise in delay happy percussive drones.
Yet another depressing and doomy export from our beloved Finland. Man, these people must be so miserable. How else could a single nation produce so much depressing music? This time around it's the Rapture, who musically, bear an uncanny resemblance to AQ favorites Katatonia. And for those of you unfamiliar with that sound, it's a bit like a metal Cure; dark and droning, melodic and hypnotic, but heavy! The Rapture take their obvious Katatonia influence, and rough it up, adding screaming, shrieking, growling black metal vocals, instead of the more melodic Katatonia croon. Really fucking great.
Gloomy, gothy melodic metal from Finland's Rapture (not to be confused with NYC's The Rapture!), who are kind of a Katatonia clone band. Nothing wrong with that, though, you can't have too much doomy yet catchy Nordic misery wethinks. This is quite good. Compared to recent Katatonia, Rapture perhaps remain MORE "metal" (though both bands are quite heavy): Rapture's vocalist still does the RAWRRRAAHH death-metal growling thing along with some more melodic, clean singing, and you can hear some Metallica and In Flames in there along with that hypnotic Katatonia downer-groove and Cure vibe. (If, after reading this, you're wondering who the heck Katatonia are, please find their reviews on our website and check 'em out...once you've become a fan, come back for the Rapture cds!)
You probably don't need us telling you about The Rapture. But if you've been in hiding for the past few months, The Rapture's "Echoes" has been one of the most widely anticipated albums of the season. There has been an inordinant amount of hype surrounding this band and the DFA production team; and often that type of silliness doesn't really play that well here at Aquarius. So for us, the anticipation was out of a simple question which many other people have been asking as well: Is anything else on Echoes as good as that "House of Jealous Lovers" track? Honestly, no; but The Rapture trying to out-groove "House of Jealous Lovers" is like My Bloody Valentine trying to out-shoegaze "Soon." It's just not going to happen. And if that question is what you needed answered, we're happy to oblige.
However if you look beyond that obvious question, and beyond the ridiculous hype of 'New York's best new band' and actually listen to the record, you might be surprised at how good it is. That said, The Rapture will never escape its influences, in particular Entertainment by Gang of Four, Metal Box by Public Image Limited, early A Certain Ratio, and The Cure. Why anybody would want to ape Robert Smith's nasal whine is beyond me, but The Rapture's singer Luke Jenner has done just that. There's even a direct citation of The Cure's "One Hundred Years" found on The Rapture's "Olio," where Jenner yelps the phrase "Over and over and over again," just as Smith does. It's a little painful, but the DFA production of this remade Rapture track which appeared on their Gravity debut many moons back is a powderkeg post-punk groove laced with plenty of uptempo rhythms. It's certainly strong enough to transcend the vocals and comes close to the cocaine frenzy of "House of Jealous Lovers." As a whole Echoes succeeds through its dynamics, at times suffocating the band's sound in the pressure cooker of jagged guitar scratches, Jenner's voice, and heart-racing rhythms (i.e. "Killing"), at others releasing Jenner's voice as a ghastly diva amidst tubular bells and beatific Chicago house grooves (i.e. "I Need Your Love"), and at others donning the vastly different art rock poses of The Birthday Party and Radiohead (i.e. "Heaven" and "Open Up Your Heart" respectively).
The Rapture is a true amalgam of all things cool at the moment, and the cynic in me wants to call this bullshit for that exact reason; but it's just too good to receive that damnation from me!
This single has been making DJs of all stripes cream their pants since it was released earlier this year. "House of Jealous Lovers" (as well as its Morgan Geist remix version, also on this DFA 12") has been showing up at house nights, electro clubs, and post-punk DJ sets by hipster british video artists. It's the kind of song that is equally irrisitable to art punkers, San Francisco disco divas, discriminating indie kids and Brooklyn fashion victims. No, that's absolutely not a criticism-- it's an illustration of how, like their best funk-punk predecessors, the Rapture bridge the gap between rock and dance music undergrounds. Basically, this single kicks all kinds of asses all over the dance floor, whether it be located in a sweaty club or in your bedroom.
Six song ep from these NYC scene up-n-comers. Disco punk!
It's okay to booty shake again, indie rockers -- The Rapture have jumped back onto the dance floor. And it's about time -- their spectacular Echoes came out a full three years ago when trucker hats were still cool. The Rapture took their time with Pieces of the People We Love for good reason -- it's a suprisingly well-thought out sound shift.
It's still very them -- that is to say, '80s -- but much less Gang of Four (which is sooo 2003) and much more Hacienda. The whole album brings to mind sweaty dancing in a tropical climate, asses bumping each other in tight white pants, heavy rouge and panama hats -- all kept in check with some post-punk guitar assaults.
The Rapture have a unique talent for making our least favorite instruments sound good -- on their past albums, it was the infamous cowbell and on this one, it's the saxophone, which infuses the single "Get Myself Into It" with the kind of groove that inspires group handclaps and choreographed ensemble dance steps. Songs like "The Devil," showcase Luke Jenner's sexy falsetto, which takes some new chances with Brian Ferry trills, "Hungry Like the Wolf" pants and Haircut 100 "ai yi yi"s.
Unlike some of their NY contemporaries, the Rapture have always seemed like they're just having fun. Their live shows are infectious -- sincere and enthusiastic -- and that definitely comes across on this album. Very recommended for your next dance party.
The Rapture has been one of the most hyped bands to emerge in the past couple of years, embodying everything that Vice magazine wants in a band: cocaine, disco grooves, more cocaine, punk snarl, and a little more cocaine for good measure. Yet with all of this hype, there's only been the "House Of Jealous Lovers" single (admittedly a triumphant blast of A Certain Ratio post-punk fused with the distilled perfection of 20 years of disco) and this split with the Juan Maclean. The Rapture's "Killing" is nowhere nearly as epic as "House Of Jealous Lovers," but is a nervously ethereal punked-out groove driven by a pretty catchy one-note bass line and the Luke Jenner's claustrophobic whine which uncannily mimics Robert Smith of The Cure.
As is the case for "Killing," The Juan Maclean's track benefits greatly from the production skills of The DFA in crafting an angular funk track that updates the Liquid Liquid / ESG model of stripped down grooves with a much punchier sound.
Ras G is a member of the LA based Flying Lotus crew, having contributed jams to FL's records, as well as releasing a ton of limited releases on his own label. So we were interested to hear this...
Trafficking in a J Dilla instrumental hip hop style, Ras G has crafted what is essentially his own Donuts, an instrumental beats and breaks record, most of the tracks hovering at about the one or two minute mark, and while the obvious hip hop headz probably already dig this stuff, or soon will, it seems to us like everyone who's been going nuts for stuff like Clams Casino, How To Dress Well, Balam Acab, Shlohmo and that sort of post-witch house slo-mo-soul might dig this too. Although it's definitely a bit more ADD than the usual WH blissed out atmospheric sprawl. But within these brief blasts, there's so much shit going on, video game sounds, clipped and looped vocal samples, dubbed out rhythms, so many cool unlikely samples, funky horns, lots of record crackle and warped and warbly melodies, he also seems to be strangely obsessed with that horn, the one that you always hear at sporting events (and was recently featured in a Drake / Eminem radio hit), all arranged meticulously into micro soul classics, bumpin' hip hop could have been hits, and throughout, there are some seriously sick beats, the vibe sorta groovy and laid back, like some old dusty record, discovered while crate digging in some alternate universe, and played back on some strange contraption that spins lps in your chopped and lowered ride. So rad!
Local underground rapper's long-awaited full length with guest appearances by Dilated Peoples, DJ Babu of the Beat Junkies turntablists, etc. Produced and released by the Peanut Butter Wolf.
Always something interesting being dug up by those Alchemy archeologists! This archival release from a Kyoto-based band called Rasen Kaidan ("Spiral Staircase" I believe) is a very moody and lo-fi, contemporaneous Japanese take on the UK post-punk sound of the early early '80s, a la Joy Division, Comsat Angels, and The Fall, maybe. Also of note, this trio included guitarist Jojo Hiroshige, who was soon to form seminal Japanese noise act Hijokaidan (and also went on to found the Alchemy label).
What you'll hear from Rasen Kaidan here are recordings from two live performances, dating from 1979 and 1980. The 1979 tracks are more witchy and gloomy, with plodding bass and female vocals. The first cut from '79 actually makes us think of a sedated Bardo Pond slogging through a droned-out "Iron Man"! We're reminded of some old NZ stuff like Dadamah as well. The 1980 material makes a switch to male vocals, getting more into that post-punk thing, but still with a weird, almost mystical atmosphere. Murky, raw, psychedelic new wave art punk, yeah!!
Another disc we've been meaning to list for ages. The first release from Rashomon, the new project of Matt Thompson, former and founding member of UK prog combo Guapo. Rashomon incorporates much of what drove the music of Guapo, avant prog, psychedelic rock, soundtrack music, even metal into their sound.
But Thompson is approaching this new music from more of a filmic angle, the sounds much more cinematic, which should have been obvious from the name of the project, the record's title, and even the songs, each bearing the name of a classic film. Might be a bit pretentious in other hands, but this is the guy who founded Guapo, his prog cred is solid as a rock, as is his instrumental prowess, and it's obvious listening to these songs.
How the music here relates to the various films, is a bit tough for us to comment on since, we're embarrassed to say, we've seen only 2 of the 8 films referenced, but we're certainly excited to check the rest of them out now.
The opening track is a dark brooding convoluted space prog workout, channeling Goblin, as well as John Carpenter, into an intense creepscape, all minor key and darkly ominous, with long stretches of haunted house synth and wheezing harmoniums, the drums complex, skittering amidst a winding droneprog jam, heavy on the low-end and the tension building shimmer.
The second track is all smokey and jazzy, a minimal shuffle beneath some atonal scrabbly Derek Bailey like guitars, the track soon morphing into creepy sepia tone music box melodies.
Over the course of the rest of the record, as the tracks slip from film to film director to director, Bresson to Suzuki, Starewicz to Shindo, Branded To Kill, Lancelot Du Lac, Onibaba, The Mascot, the songs follow suit, shifting from mood to mood, sound to sound, soaring strings, ballroom jazz, bursts of acid fried synth blow outs, tribal almost African sounding drumming, gypsy folk violins, super intense spastic freaked out avant metal damage, deep shimmering drones, long stretches of creaking industrial ambience, haunting bagpipe like melodies, moody abstract drifts, gently strummed guitars clouds of cymbal shimmer, a constantly shifting world of sound, deep and layered, expansive and indeed, so cinematic.
Fans of Guapo will want this for sure, but anyone into far out soundtracks, experimental soundscapes or avant prog should definitely check this out as well.
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!!
Ooooh, in a perfect world if you were to look in the dictionary for "70s classic pop", you'd find a big photo of this band alongside their fellow '70s AM radio masters Bread and Electric Light Orchestra. Their heart-string pulling treasures such as "Go All The Way" and "Let's Pretend" recall the blissful pop orchestrations of the Beatles, Beach Boys and the Zombies. Actually we (Andee, Byram and Cup) noted that Eric Carmen's voice sorta resembles two Pauls' (very McCartney and less so Stanley), and come to think of it, their respective bands' personalities (i.e, Wings and Kiss) are definitely reflected in Raspberries music -- the glorious power pop sweetness and the ballsy power rock crunch. Raspberries' bright, often bubblegum-y hooks, swirling string arrangements and earnest multi-part vocal harmonies will totally appeal to your sappy soft side, leaving you weeping in a sunbeam. The liner notes include song-by-song commentary by the band members.
You might guess from the band name, the pink record cover, and the fact that it's on the Blackest Ever Black label, that this would be some sort of dark post industrial minimal techno, or avant hauntological house music, but in fact this is full length number two from NYC metalpunks Raspberry Bulbs, featuring He Who Crushes Teeth from aQ faves Bone Awl, and really, while Raspberry Bulbs is often touted as whole different sort of sonic beast, their sound is definitely cut from the same cloth as the raw black buzz and pound of Bone Awl. If anything, it's the sound of Bone Awl given a punk rock makeover, injected with a healthy does of poppiness too. Simple and stripped down, thick buzzy basslines, crunchy distorto guitars, practice space sounding drum pound, and some heavily effected vocal bellows, all wound up into a tense sort of post punk that is really not that far removed from more polished / popular groups like Iceage, Holograms or Lust For Youth. Albeit way more fucked up and fractured, noisy, chaotic, urgent and intense.
Even with that black metal lineage, and the basic sonic similarities, it's still curious that Raspberry Bulbs appeal so much to metalheads, these guys would be way more at home on a bill with the above bands than any proper black metal outfits, and we're guessing anyone into those groups, or Grave Babies, Rank/Xerox and the like, heck even Interpol or Cold Cave, will flip for these guys too. Fuzzed out noise-rock garage-gloom post-punk that swaggers and slithers, pounds and howls, revealing its surprisingly catchy side throughout, hooks surfacing from the din and lodging firmly, the brooding buzz punctuated by spidery leads and some surprisingly melodic moments. Even the yowly echo drenched vocals end up sounding more punk rock howl than black metal vokill, turning the whole thing into a strange blackened post punk pop that we're digging a whole lot.
Emaciated. Fractious. Toxic. Violent. Raspberry Bulbs is the blackened punk outfit that Marco del Rio conceived after dissolving the cult black metal duo Bone Awl in 2010 or thereabouts. The raw-nerve energy of Raspberry Bulbs is a continuation of Bone Awl's brand of D-beat primitivism, but with some downright catchy riffs and pop-hook chops replacing the black metal. Over three albums, Raspberry Bulbs has perfected that formula - one that could be cranked out on a single worn-torn guitar and knuckle-busting drum kit. Even as Raspberry Bulbs has swollen from a sole venture for del Rio to a formidable five-piece, the riffs have a crust-punk urgency that's completely in the moment and full of wild-eyed rage.
Raspberry Bulb's 2013 album Deformed Worship caught many people off guard, coming out on the boutique publishing house of paranoiac electronica, Blackest Ever Black. Despite the aesthetic differences, the malaise and the claustrophobia and the tension of Black Rain, Cut Hands, and Raime find easy parallels in the jackbooted punk stomp of Raspberry Bulbs. It also makes a hell of a lot of sense that Dominic Fernow / Prurient released the first (and dare we say, slightly undercooked) first album from Raspberry Bulbs. So there's the connection for you. Privacy picks up right where Deformed Worship left off as an antisocial, bad-seed punk brother to Christian Death's Only Theatre Of Pain, starving the skeletal riffs into a acid batteries of ravenous angst and eschewing the goth miserablism in favor of a throat-ripped snarl. The guitars sound like they've been strung with razor wire and hot-wired into Crime's pawn shop amps. With the multiplicity of guitarists, Raspberry Bulbs just sounds louder, snottier, and meaner. Fucking awesome, we gotta say.
The Ektro label does it again. Another rad reissue, this the debut album from legendary eighties NYC noise rockers Rat At Rat R, originally released in 1985 and pretty much impossible to find since. It somehow sounds right at home on Ektro, and even TWENTY SEVEN YEARS later, this stuff sounds so bad ass. Think Cop Shoot Cop, Circle X, Swans, Pussy Galore, Live Skull, Sonic Youth, these guys were born of that same scene, but their sound is definitely all their own. Gloomy and gothic, noisy and chaotic, the drumming INSANE, wild and splattery and relentless, the guitars angular and jagged, the bass thick and buzzy, the vocals a snarly dramatic croon, the band capable of switching from wild tribal noisy freakouts, to churning mathy noise rock crush, to an almost gloom pop, to seriously heavy almost metallic bombast, lots of the songs reminding us at times of the Wipers, or Comsat Angels, or other purveyors of gloomy rock, and of course all the other bands of the time these guys shared stages with (and probably drugs, or at least rehearsal spaces).
The gloomy gothy vibe definitely has a sort of death rock thing going on, reminding us also of the stuff that was going on around the same time on the other coast, the Scream club, Abecedarians, Kommunity FK, but a way heavier noiser version of that, lurching, lumbering, grinding heaviness, tribal drumming, clouds of feedback, strange percussion, tangled melodies, and actual songs, these were not just blasts of noisiness, Rat At Rat R definitely had a knack for dark brooding songcraft, the fact that they chose to render the resulting songs in wild squalls of noise rock pummel and swirly psychedelic gloomines, only made it that much cooler. Reissue contender of the year for SURE.
Sceptre Hole was our first exposure to the the awesomely named Rat Columns, aka David West, who has quite the Aussie garage rock resume, which includes stints as a touring guitarist for Total Control, he played in the late great unsung post punk weirdos Rank/Xerox, and has played with the guys from Taco Leg, among a whole bunch of others. So we were of course expecting Rat Columns to sound a little like that, sort of Total Control style garage punk, maybe with a hint of new waviness, but instead, the sound is much closer to a warped sort of lo-fi indie rock jangle/power pop, which on Sceptre Hole is made even cooler/better by the addition of Matt Bleyle, of aQ faves Violent Change and Sopors. And anyone whose been digging either of those outfits' recent records (or heck even SF pop geniuses the Ovens) will find a LOT to dig here.
After an awesomely misleading opener, a creepy druggy dirge, all syrupy guitar buzz, slow drum plod and hushed haunted vocals, the record explodes into some serious kick ass poppiness, bashed drums, big jangle, lots of fuzz and buzz, hooks like crazy, the vocals a wispy croon, crunchy indie/power pop that's tough to beat. And again, we were sort of expecting the rest of the record to play out similarly, but there's lots of different sounds happening here. "Flowers" is more dour, a little bit Joy Division-y, with some weird arrangements, and cool gloomy chord progressions, "Nearsighted" too is a gorgeous slab of eighties beholden new wave pop, while "Dying Day" is super distorted shoegaze bliss out, all blurred buzz and buried vocals. There are plenty of experimental fragments, droney and darkly psychedelic, plenty of acoustic guitars too, all integrated seamlessly into a procession of CRAZY catchy power pop jams, and practically perfect blasts of fuzzy indie pop jangle. It definitely sounds like a record from the past, like this could maybe be some obscure reissue, but it's got a modern feel as well, and the music touches on so many of our favorite sounds, it's pretty tough to resist. But then why would you even try? A new favorite for sure. And absolutely recommended for fans of warped weirdo pop, and classic jangle and fuzz.
Includes a download code too!!
Album number two from this New York duo picks up right where their refreshing debut left off. Bringing all sorts of seemingly unrelated sounds and ideas perfectly together. The danceability of electronica, the organic emotion of guitars and the limitless possibilities of what can happen when you re-imagine different ways to create melody. With Classics they continue to create a world that makes you feel like you are some powerful character in a video game that you just want to play forever. There is something so endearing and instantly likable about this group. The way they make fun sounding music without being cheesy or gimmicky. The way they force you to use your imagination, it's almost impossible to hear these songs and not create elaborate shapes, colors and stories in your mind. Classics is the kind of record that can break through to even the most jaded hipster as well as hitting the spot for those who are always ready to have a good time. So fresh and fun!
New York's guitar/synth duo Ratatat hits us hard with another hefty dose of instrumental electronica, the follow up to 2006's summer jam Classics. Very similar to that album indeed. Not veering far from their usual sound, catchy synth and guitar melodies woven within a bright world of danceable sounds and beats, LP3 is a sure pleaser for any fans of radiant electronica. As familiar as LP3 sounds, there are glimpes of a more refined Ratatat here. Accoustic, steel-stringed intruments and eastern rythyms bring some spice to the album. Charming and vivid, you can't help but wonder if this is the music an arcade would make if it came to life after closing. These guys really conjure a nice balance between pop sensibility and musicianship. In a genre so heavily reliant on machines and buttons, they create a sound so organic and sincere.
Ever since they first hit the scene almost six years ago, Ratatat have consistently brought such a fun and refreshing sound to the table. Using guitars and electronics to make crunchy and catchy instrumental jams with nods to their love of hip-hop production and electronic dance music, yet all delivered in a very stripped down DIY fashion. Their forth album finds these Brooklyn boys sounding as great as ever, which makes sense, as much of this material was culled from the same sessions that produced their last record. It's cool how these guys have somehow created such a unique and instantly recognizable sound, as the moment you hear one of these songs you know without a doubt that it's Ratatat. The way they bring a left-of-center vibe to totally catchy almost top 40/hip-hop sounding beats, transforming them into the perfect jams to just blast crazy loud in the summertime. LP4 again shows off Ratatat's special ability to conjure totally catchy beats and melodies that flow with so much color and warmth. We love it.
The cover makes this look like it's gonna be some kinda indie-boys making rawk, sorta Strokes-y or maybe Champsy or something like that. But actually it's fairly mellow electronic music. Yawn.
**MISSISSIPPI RECORDS ALERT** **MISSISSIPPI RECORDS ALERT** **MISSISSIPPI RECORDS ALERT**
That's right, it's that time again, another killer blast from the past courtesy of everybody's new favorite all vinyl reissue label, Mississippi! This time it's record number two from Portland's new wave garage punk trio the Rats, maybe better known as the band of Fred and Toody Cole who would of course go on to form the much loved Dead Moon.
Intermittent Signals offers up more of the same synth laced punk rock garage rock stomp found on their s/t debut, maybe a wee bit tighter and more polished, but still heavy and snotty and snarly and swaggery, a definite old AC/DC vibe happening too, killer riffing, tons of hooks, wild drumming, Fred's drawled punk rock vox, Toody's more frenetic yelp, all crammed into short sharp blasts of hooky catchy punk rock power pop genius.
Original drummer Rod Rat guests on a couple tracks, he ended up committing suicide not long afterwards, drummer Sam Henry would go on to drum for the Wipers as well as Napalm Beach. Another essential slice of PDX punk rock history.
And as with all Mississippi releases, lovingly packaged, super thick jackets, nice heavy vinyl, and this one even includes a flyer advertising a pretty kick ass show, the Rats and The Fastbacks! Admission price: only TWO BUCKS!!!
