[ aquarius records catalogue

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Showing results 651 through 700 of 4057.

With a lot of stuff on the AQ list, to us at least, the music often transcends its genre. And part of the fun of reviewing a record like that, is getting people who don't normally listen to that kind of music to check it out, and maybe even dig it. You know, some metal record that's so fucked up and damaged that it might appeal to folks into noise music or experimental music. Or some pop band that's so heavy and intense, that even metalheads might dig it. Well, with this, the long long long overdue reissue of the first and only record from San Francisco's very own Sea Hags, we're not even gonna bother. This isn't fucked up or noisy or experimental. It's heavy, groovy, glammy hard rock that totally kicks ass. And if you don't dig stuff like Aerosmith, Guns N' Roses, Hanoi Rocks and the like, then odds are you aren't gonna dig this. But if you do (and if you don't what the hell's wrong with you?!), and somehow you missed out on the greatest hard rock band to ever come out of SF, then for fuck's sake, pick this up NOW. Hailed back in the day as the next Guns N' Roses, and described by their manager thusly: "There's only so far you can go with three junkies and one alcoholic�", the Sea Hags were Bay Area rock heroes, who would hang out with Courtney Love, have Metallica's Kirk Hammett play lead on one of their tracks, almost get a song on the Sid And Nancy soundtrack after a tip from Love (who was fronting Faith No More at the time!), record with Mike Clink who produced Appetite For Destruction, kick their drummer out while recording, have the band nearly break up on tour after being busted for drugs, and (sadly) have one member die at age 26 of an heroin overdose a year after the band breaks up, but more importantly than all of that, record one of the best hard rock records of the nineties, and one of the greatest hard rock tracks EVER in the form of "Half The Way Valley". Just listen to the sound samples and you'll be sold. Filthy and dangerous, groovy and bluesy, glammy and heavy, and so crazy catchy, a pinch of the Stones, a bit of the Yardbirds, lots of Aerosmith, plenty of GN'R , all mixed up with their own unique take on sixties pop and seventies hard rock. Kick ass riffing, pounding drumming, boozy world weary vocals, and hooks galore. Not sure what else to say. Amongst the hard rockers around these parts, the reissue of the Sea Hags record was a HUGE deal. So much so, that had it not happened, Andee and Allan might have considered it for their fledgling eighties metal reissue label! Needless to say, this is essential listening for hard rockers. One of our favorite discs from the nineties. Finally reissued, and damn if it don't sound as kick ass as ever! As with all the Rock Candy reissues, the packaging and presentation are amazing. If only ALL reissues were this well done. Bonus tracks, tons of photos, extensive liner notes, interviews with bandleader Ron Yocom, as well as track by track notes and a band history.

MPEG stream: Half The Way Valley
MPEG stream: Doghouse

Where Are You is the first we've heard from local outfit Sea Knight, but it's a stunner, dreamy, and strummy, and psychedelic, moody and melancholic, the traditional guitar/bass/drums augmented by violin, which gives the sound a sweeping, epic and emotional vibe, not to mention the powerful vocals. All it takes is about two minutes of opener "Chasm", and you'll be sold, equal parts Pixies / Breeders pop smarts, and shoegaze-y Mazzy Star haze, simple steel string strum, chiming melody, a spidery guitar, the vocals dreamy and ethereal, the sound laid back and soft focus, slow building to something much more epic, maybe like a girl pop Godspeed if that makes any sense. It's definitely indie pop, but with a lush sonic palette, and a propensity for epicry that definitely makes Sea Knight something special. And is often the case, it took about 10 listens of the first track before we were able to dig any deeper. Which is always a good sign. The rest of the record holds up just as well, a perfect mix of folky strum, a little twang, classic old school indie rock, heavy on the nineties, with plenty of noisiness and unexpected mathiness mixed in, check out the sweetly melodic "Concrete", which blossoms into something much noise poppier, or the heavy droned out modern rock-ish "Crows Came And Spoke Of New Beginnings", with its smoldering buzzguitars, and haunting soaring vocals, again the Godspeed as indie pop band definitely comes into play, and apparently, as a live proposition, these songs all get a lot heavier and noiser, which is something we definitely wanna hear!

MPEG stream: Chasm
MPEG stream: Concrete
MPEG stream: Crows Came And Spoke Of New Beginnings

From the dynamics of Mogwai to the freefloating chemical-psychedelia of Spacemen 3's late-period organ pieces, Sea Monster presents the highlights of space-rock over the past decade.

Super catchy, southern tinged stoner rock from Canada. This is Sea of Green's second record and is a huge leap ahead of its predecessor. Great production (same guy who produced Deep Purple and Nazareth) and super catchy songs. Sounds a bit like Kyuss if

RealAudio clip: Annihilation
RealAudio clip: Come on Down

Sea of Tombs are a heavy psychedelic instrumental bass/drums/guitar trio from Chicago. They have some membership ties to Lake of Dracula, Jaks, and Clikitat Ikatowi, although that's kinda irrelevant to whether anyone would like this or not. What is relevant:

Debut ep from this Dutch atmospheric depressive black metal horde, named for an infamous forest in Japan infamous for its suicides, and like the recent double disc from long time aQ faves Happy Days, Sea Of Trees traffic in the same sort of lilting, sorrowful super melodic blackness, that sonically owes more to post rock and jangle pop really than black metal, the only real elements making this black metal, the buzz, although plenty of pop is rife with buzz, and the vocals, which are of the shrieking, hysterical, almost operatic bent, and it's those vocals, that may just relegate this to black metal fans. Which is a shame, cuz the music is gorgeous, lush acoustic guitars, swoonsome sad melodies, the arrangements simple, but hypnotic and heavy, the opening track slipping from folky and acoustic, to dirgey and doomy, to soaring and sorrowfully majestic, the guitars (of which there are THREE), unfurling melancholic laments over blurred crumbling distorted dirges, and then BAM, the band will explode into some serious buzzing, blasting black metal buzz, but even then, the sound remains impossibly melodic and miserable minor key, and then before too long, it shifts right back into a more midtempo pound, before finishing off in a squall of buzzy, shoegaze blackened pop. The vocals mostly shriek, but occasionally get super dramatic and crazily over the top, which somehow suits the sound. Fans of Lifelover, Happy Days of course, Urfaust and other similarly pop minded weirdo black metal outfits will dig big time. After a brief classical acoustic guitar interlude, the second proper track stumbles into action, a blurred, blackened dirge, much less poppy and melodic than the opener, but with plenty of classic metal-isms hidden among the shrieking dirgery, and when the track shifts gears a minute in, it does end up aligning itself closer to the dour poppiness of the opener, but here, the sound is distinctly darker and doomier, the guitars still epic and majestic, the classic metal vibe all but taking over in places, a whole record of tracks like this would have the true metal-heads worshipping at the altar of Sea Of Trees, but for now, we can revel in this brief bit of black pop / dirge doom / post-rock / black metal weirdness. Awesome packaging too, the disc itself a 3" embedded in a proper 5" cd sized plastic disc, the screen printing over the disc proper, but also designs printed on the clear portion of the disc. Quite striking!

MPEG stream: Aokigahara I
MPEG stream: Aokigahara III

Israeli band Churchill's, reviewed a few lists back, aren't the only vintage '60s act from the Middle East to get a reissue recently. We also just got this, from the somewhat more obscure Sea-Ders (aka The Cedars) of Beirut, Lebanon, who sound a bit like a Middle Eastern Monkees or something! There's 8 tracks here, apparently everything they ever recorded, all from singles circa 1966-'68. It's jangling and energetic, exotic East-meets-West psych pop beat action, a la lot of the Turkish stuff of the era we like so much, complete with ripping bouzouki, saz, and/or oud alongside electric guitar, and in fact a couple of their popular songs here were covered by Turkish artists, comped on that Turkish Delights collection we used to have. Any fan of Middle Eastern psych (or psych with Middle Eastern motifs) a la 3 Hur-el or The Devil's Anvil, should enjoy this. Liner notes provided by both Mike Stax, editor of Ugly Things magazine (which featured an interview with one of the former Sea-ders in issue #26), and also Lenny Helsing of Shingdig! magazine as well.

MPEG stream: For Your Information
MPEG stream: Thanks A Lot
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If your dream musical date would be with Postal Service and Pernice Brothers, well, the sweet sounds of Seabear come pretty darn close. Shufflin', soft and breezy pop tunes with shy boy lead vocals and angelic girly backing ones. Sure to please devotees of the Morr Music label, and anyone else whose ears need a snuggle!

MPEG stream: Good Morning Scarecrow
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Either you want this or you don't! Not much we're gonna be able to do to persuade you either way, once we explain the premise: yes, it's a Steven Seagal and Jean-Claude Van Damme split! This record collects together the audio from a whole bunch of movie trailers by those two iconic '80s action stars. On the Seagal side, you get the exciting advertisements for Above The Law, Fire Down Below, Glimmer Man, Hard To Kill, Marked For Death, On Deadly Ground, Out For Justice, Under Siege, and Under Siege 2. On Side Van Damme, enjoy the trailers for Bloodsport, Cyborg, Death Warrant, Double Impact, Double Team, Hard Target, Kickboxer, Lionheart, Nowhere To Run, The Quest, Sudden Death, and Universal Soldier. It's a limited edition of 150 copies, and we only were able to get, like, 4 of 'em, so act fast if you want one (why wouldn't you??). Great DJing fodder we're sure, or just to spin at home prior to a trip to the video rental store.

Band names are tough. Coming up with the right one, one that captures the sound, the idea, the meaning of the music you're making. Some start out stupid, Flaming Lips? But soon becomes so inseparable from the music, that the name virtually becomes the music. Some are so weird, they can't help but be brilliant, Fuck I'm Dead, Bathtub Shitter, and a whole host of others come to mind. When we first hear Pelican way back when, and were listening to the record, the name just didn't comput, it wasn't heavy or intense, it was just, a bird, but now we're sort of used to it, so Pelican does actually sound sort of intense, like the music. SO maybe the same thing will happen to Seagull, this one man band who's responsible for this here super limited one sided single. Weren't sure what to expect with a name like Seagull, the cover is appropriately black and white and cryptic, the name huge in a killer, almost unreadable olde English font.... Well, no matter what we were expecting from Seagull, it wasn't this, although we were pleasantly surprised. If one can use the word 'pleasant' to describe a disc of grinding growling low end and crumbling hissy noise. But for some of us, yeah, we can use the word pleasant. Although dirge-y and droney and gristly might all work a bit better. A single track, monochromatic and subtly shifting, strangely hypnotic but harsh in a not entirely harsh way. The sound is tough to describe, it sounds a bit like the run off of a record, when the needle slips onto the label and skids to the center of the turntable, a little like that, but mixed with the sounds of a roaring fire, industrial machinery, shifting tectonic plates, grinding glaciers, distant avalanches, or those weirdly fuzzed out spaces between stations on the radio, all sort of woven into one throbbing thick crumble, a garbled muted black noise, but the more you listen, the more melodies and strange textures reveal themselves, hidden rhythms, layers of sound overlapping and shifting slightly. this is definitely 'noise', but some strange almost 'soft' sort of noise...

Yeah! a new Seagull Screaming Kiss Her Kiss Her cd in our hands at last. Not really new (released in 2001), but finally here. This predominantly female band from Japan is so rad and the cds can be hard to come by. This record is more polished than No! No! No!, and a bit more tight and sassy. Whether that's good or bad is up to the beholder but this record is great. Tough guitar riffs, dynamic songs and smooth vocals. I've heard rumor that they are no longer an active band, sad if it's so cuz their songwriting is so strong and inventive, and with each record they develop their sound further and further.

RealAudio clip: Evolution
RealAudio clip: Lullaby
RealAudio clip: Sentimental Journey

Best band name ever? Well, I am having trouble thinking of a better one. This female led Japanese group has released several albums and assorted EPs; which are all sort of hard to obtain, so we up and contacted the band directly to get copies of No! No! No!, which was released in 2000 on Trattoria, Cornelius' label. This is very tight rock 'n roll that proudly wears its influences on its sleeve, cos they know it don't hurt the music none. Like a combination of the Runaways' wild abandon, the Breeders' precisely executed alt-rock, and just plain ole healthy rock energy, with vocals sung in English. Are you wary of all the hype the upcoming Breeders' album is getting? I am, cos y'know, 9 times out of 10, suspicious amounts of high-profile pre-release hype, means bad, bad record. Keep your expectations low on Kim Deal's deal and get this instead.

RealAudio clip: No Star
RealAudio clip: Red Dress
RealAudio clip: Do I Love You Enough?

SooYoung Park pens some of the most gorgeous quiet/loud songs of heartache and heartbreak. And this the third album from Chicago's Seam is no exception. Soaring, droning guitars blanket you as Mr. Park takes aim at your heart.

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SORRY. Wherein the Chicago indie rock stalwarts cover two of the most unlikely songs: "Heroes" and "Sukiyaki" (Taste of Honey, remember?)

Chicago's kings of indie rock have been doing this so long they can only further refine the genre. Slow buildups and melodic layers, murmured vocals, very pleasant.

One of two new releases on this week's list from the German doom metal label The Church Within, the other being by extremely Sabbath-styled San Francisco doomsters Orchid, this one is also significantly Sabbathy, although in much more of an original way. Their singer definitely sounds a lot like Ozzy, he's the guy from another (amazing) band with a new record we'll hopefully be reviewing soon, called Hour Of 13. Not sure how he ended up in Seamount, or how they work things regarding live performances, since he's American, living in Connecticut, but the rest of the band is in fact German, based in Bavaria. In any case, we like his vocals, which on opener "Out Of The Dark" gives Seamount not only a Sabbath vibe, but maybe more of a solo '80s Ozzy feel, a la Diary Of A Madman or Bark At The Moon! Meanwhile, as long as we're making comparisons, another band Seamount sometimes remind us of is Monster Magnet. Turns out the singer can do a good Wyndorf drawl too, check out the lumbering "Together Wear The Cross". And heck, Monster Magnet meets Ozzy sounds damn good to us! Stoner metal nirvana really. But it doesn't stop there, 'cause actually the songs we've mentioned are just the first two on the disc, over the course of this 13 track, 75 minute (!) album, Seamount touch upon plenty of other classic, doomic, metallic sounds, from The Obsessed (big time) to the NWOBHM, synthesizing all the above influences into something into what is indeed, all told, a signature "Seamount" sound, super heavy but also totally rockin', full of thick, catchy riffs, twin guitar power, tight playing, gloomy melody, some quiet moody parts, and other occasional surprises. This isn't their first album either, which now we want to hear! Impressive to say the least, as is the packaging, a nice gatefold miniature LP style sleeve, with lovely 28 page booklet, with evocative artwork to illustrate each and every one of the songs.

MPEG stream: Out Of The Dark
MPEG stream: Together Wear The Cross
MPEG stream: Honey Flower
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This is the first full length from Sean Tillman, who you may remember from his sort of popular old band Calvin Crime. His solo stuff as Sean Na Na is a complete about face from Calvin Crime's arty punkiness. This is coy, clever Built To Spillian pop. He was on that split cd with Mary Lou Lord a few months back, and blew her away (granted no mean feat). Imagine a younger, more playful, whinier Built to Spill (the Dug Martsch comparisons are unavoidable, high reedy voiced, lonely, whiney boy rock (�Elisabeth)). Really cool.

Now available on vinyl! Berkeley based guitarist, Sean Smith, doesn't shake off the Fahey discipleship of his debut too easily on this sophomore effort, no matter how hard he tries. Yet still he brings a darker and more spontaneous impulse to his playing, allowing roughly exposed and muted fret tones to surface, showing he is not all about polish and that 's a welcome departure. More improvised than composed, Smith's cerebral guitar weaving is less bucolic sunshine this time around, taking us on a night time sojourn through a folkish nether world of threaded string picking and somber harmonic tonalities.

MPEG stream: Some Men Are Born Posthumously
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Record number two from this Seattle bliss out twee pop combo, and much like their debut, it's another killer collection of fuzzy guitars, simple stripped down drumming, shoegazey ethereal vox, and some seriously catchy songs. As we mentioned in our review of Go With Me, anyone into Dum Dum Girls, Best Coast, Pains Of Being Pure At Heart, or really any of the girl groups on Slumberland, Seapony will definitely hit the spot. Wistful, dreamily melancholy dream pop, but this time around, the band have roughed up the production a little, adding some grit and gristle, the guitars a little bit warbly and subtly woozy, the result makes for something just a bit more psychedelic. Just check out the opening track "Outside", which on the surface is pure jangly bliss, but listen close, and you'll hear distorted crumbling distortion, and the vocals somehow soft focus and hushed, but still in-the-red. "Tell Me So" is more smoothed out, but even there, the vocals are weirdly recorded, the drums seem to ping pong from speaker to speaker, all wound up in lush billows of warm strum and shimmery melody. The rest of the record unfolds similarly, the songs slipping easily from sixties girl group shuffle, to groovy garage rock pound, to dreamy shoegaze pop, to nineties retro indie rock, but all within the context of the group's dreamy soft focus dream pop sound.

MPEG stream: Outside
MPEG stream: Tell Me So
MPEG stream: What You Wanted

Debut from this Seattle trio, and damn if this maybe doesn't sound like it should have come out on Slumberland. In fact, it almost sounds like it could have come out on Slumberland way back in the day. Or maybe Spinart. A dreamy collection of jangly, stripped down classic twee pop, that most definitely references Black Tambourine, Tiger Trap, The Softies, Velocity Girl, Aislers Set, and the rest, and sounds right at home amongst the new wave of sonically similar popkids: Pains Of Being Pure At Heart, Best Coast, Brave Irene, Dum Dum Girls, Gold-Bears, Kids On A Crime Spree, Girls Names, Summer Cats and all the rest. Hazy reverby female vocals, sweet major key melodies, a little bit surfy, the rhythms simple and softly propulsive, total sixties girl group worship via K-records twee-pop, opener "Dreaming" is pretty irresistible, a perfect chunk of summery feel good dream pop, the rest of the record not far behind, washed out and hazy, shimmery and jangly, the vocals hushed and angelic, the guitars warm and crystalline, all wound up into some seriously soft focus, reverb soaked, summer sun, dream pop bliss.

MPEG stream: Dreaming
MPEG stream: I Never Would
MPEG stream: Blue Star

Black metal. Trombone. Makes more sense than you'd think. At least, it worked for Norwegian weirdos Beyond Dawn, although they don't sound all that black metal anymore. But Hungary's Sear Bliss makes the trombone/black metal connection and stays heavy and brutal and evil for sure. This latest Sear Bliss is the one that got Allan into the band (Andee was already a fan, but he's got a thing for trombones). Grim yet melodic, kinda like Immortal or old Satyricon, the songs on Glory And Perdition compel repeated listenings. Majestic, hypnotic, and as we said, heavy. A great black metal album. And not only is the cover painting cool, it visually suggests the use of trombone (which, we should stress, is not at all a major component of the band's sound, even though we're so excited that it's there at all).

MPEG stream: Birth Of Eternity
MPEG stream: Two Worlds Collide

This Hungarian black metal act is perhaps best known for their use of the trombone -- not your everyday metal instrument, right? Of course trombone alone isn't enough to sustain a career (this is their sixth album) nor our interest for that matter (though it helps), and so it's also clearly to Sear Bliss' benefit that they have mastered the dark art of composing thunderously heavy, melodic yet grim black metal songs. The tootin' trombone just makes 'em all the more grand and majestic. Lesser bands would rely entirely upon synthesized keyboard coloration to create such moods. And while Sear Bliss do use keyboards, they also have folks playing violin, flute, euphonium, trumpet, and of course trombone, as well as sundry ethnic instruments with which we're not familiar, presumably of Hungarian origin. The folk-tinged results are slickly impressive, definitely dramatic, orchestrally progressive, yet still iron-fistedly metallic (with gruff vocals, blazing drums, and badass guitar shred). The music of Sear Bliss bears comparison to the atmospheric Viking prog of Norway's Enslaved and the eccentric cinematic symphonics of Japan's Sigh -- two AQ faves. When we can say that about a band, and there's trombone too, well that's an automatic thumbs up!

MPEG stream: Blood On The Milky Way
MPEG stream: A Deathly Illusion
MPEG stream: Lost And Not Found

THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

SORRY. Fans of psychedelic sixties rock n' roll might be a little concerned about what they're getting when a peek at the album cover shows that two of the band members are men wearing clerical collars. Priests who rock? And these are no long-haired Jesus Freaks, either. The four men and one woman in this band look pretty straight. But, have no fear, their music is plenty far-out. This self-released 1968 album is the sole recorded legacy of The Search Party, a Christian folk-psych combo masterminded by the Reverend Nicholas Freund of Mount Saint Paul College in Waukesha, Wisconsin, but recorded at the San Francisco Theological Seminary's Montgomery Chapel (hence the title). They were definitely hip to the sixties West Coast vibe, with female vocals that remind us a bit of both Grace Slick and Linda Perhacs. Much of this is quite ethereal and haunting, full of organ drone-tones and dreamy, downer atmosphere. The album's centerpiece, the nine-minute "So Many Things Have Got Me Down" could be a lost acid-krautrock jam. The New Creation, the other lost 60s Christian rock reissue we reviewed here recently, have nothing on this! While The Search Party are at their best on the slower, moodier numbers, the more uptempo songs, though, go to some amazing extremes with over-the-top vocals and searing fuzz guitar (as in "You And I" which stands in stark contrast to the gentle, sombre sounds of much of the rest of the album). This Korean-import cd reissue comes packaged in one of those minature gatefold LP style sleeves, with lyrics and liner notes, which include the statement that "this album...is a demonstration of these five people's concern for you." Now how often do bands today say things like that? Bless' em.

Hell, whoops, ach eee double hockey sticks yeah! Or should we just say hallelujah!? This obscure Xtian '60s psych fave has just been officially reissued with loving care and TONS of extra, associated material. Here's what we said about The Search Party when we first encountered a reissue of it (a Korean import, at the time) some years ago: Fans of psychedelic sixties rock n' roll might be a little concerned about what they're getting when a peek at the album cover shows that two of the band members are men wearing clerical collars. Priests who rock? And these are no long-haired Jesus Freaks, either. The four men and one woman in this band look pretty straight. But, have no fear, their music is plenty far-out. This self-released 1968 album is the sole recorded legacy of The Search Party, a Christian folk-psych combo masterminded by the Reverend Nicholas Freund of Mount Saint Paul College in Waukesha, Wisconsin, but recorded at the San Francisco Theological Seminary's Montgomery Chapel (hence the title). They were definitely hip to the sixties West Coast vibe, with female vocals that remind us a bit of both Grace Slick and Linda Perhacs. Much of this is quite ethereal and haunting, full of organ drone-tones and dreamy, downer atmosphere. The album's centerpiece, the nine-minute "So Many Things Have Got Me Down" could be a lost acid-krautrock jam. While The Search Party are at their best on the slower, moodier numbers, the more uptempo songs, though, go to some amazing extremes with over-the-top vocals and searing fuzz guitar - as in "You And I" which stands in stark contrast to the gentle, somber sounds of much of the rest of the record, whose original liner notes include the statement that "this album...is a demonstration of these five people's concern for you." Now how often do bands today say things like that? Bless' em. The New Creation and the Concrete Rubber Band - a couple other lost '60s Christian rock reissues we reviewed here previously - have nothing on this! And not only do you get that wonderful album here, but Lion Productions have tacked on a whole extra disc. Turns out, prior to the formation of The Search Party, Nick Freund and The Search Party's guitarist/vocalist Peter Apps already had made music together in the St. Pius X Seminary Choir. As you can guess from the name, this group was rather more overtly religious, less secular sounding, 'though it was during this period that Freund attended a show at the Fillmore (featuring Cream, Quicksilver Messenger Service, and Janis Joplin!) and got turned on to the hipper sounds of the SF ballroom scene. The St. Pius X Seminary Choir released three albums: Sing Out With Joy To The Lord, Sing To The Lord A New Song, and Each One Heard In His Own Language About The Marvels Of God, the third of which appears in its entirety on this set's second cd, with selections from the other two spread across the balance of both discs as bonus tracks. While the St. Pius X Seminary Choir was different in style, being mostly more 'square', churchy choral music with some rock/pop influences, and definitely not in the same league as The Search Party, it's still cool to hear music from 'em, particularly the stuff on the Each One Heard In His Own Language album, which starts off with a quite freaky, possibly Stockhausen-influenced electronic noise / sound collage composition (!) and also includes what appears to be a version of "Twist And Shout" rewritten as part of "Mass For The Secular City"... Furthermore, this is packaged with a thick cd booklet full of liner notes (including reminiscences from both Freund and Apps), press clippings, photos, lyrics, etc., etc. Let's say it again, hallelujah!

MPEG stream: Speak To Me
MPEG stream: So Many Things Have Got Me Down
MPEG stream: The News Is You
MPEG stream: Pentacostal Sunday, Double Alleluia
MPEG stream: Get Together

We often get requests from Yoga Instructors and Massage Therapists for music suggestions for their practices that are ambient and relaxing, but not super cheesy as the stuff that is directly marketed to them. It's really not that easy. Sure someone like Anton Batagov, Lubomyr Melnyk, Pulse Emitter, Oneohtrix Point Never or the folks featured in the Kompakt Pop Ambient series might have some sounds that fit the bill, but there is often a certain level of distraction, emotive changes in tone, that take the listener out of their passive involvement and into active engagement and that doesn't always work in a bodywork kind of environment. Recently, local musician and Psychic Arts label head Matt Baldwin dropped by these cds for a friend of his who runs Jacknife records in LA, who released this double cd of ambient works by Miles Cooper Seaton, known to many folks as a founding member of experimental rock collective Akron/Family. Seaton has been working for the past few years on exploring an idea of music made for a specific function, whether it be Satie's concept of Furniture Music, or the ritual music of religious sects and cults, basically music that is free of individualized emotive narrative instead leaning towards a concept of pure universality and purpose. Functional Music. When we put on the first disc, or we should say first track, as each disc is just one long 35-40 minute track, we didn't know this was music designed with yoga in mind, though we could see it being used for that purpose, it didn't necessarily have the same kind of new age trappings that most yoga music always seems to have. But in fact, Seaton has been performing his solo music for large outdoor group yoga and visualization performances in various locations in Southern California and the Southwest for the past couple of years. "Echo" begins with a deep bassy meditative drone later met after some time with spacey synth high tones that cluster in loose buoyant formations and clanging resonant bells. Over time, the tones build and recede in subtle layers of sound much like the stratified layers of the geode that grace the cover of the album, moving ever farther outward. "Void" takes a deeper turn inward. Organ and synth drones combine in resonant overtones, eventually delving into an oceanic expanse that ebbs and flows in intensity as what sounds like bowed guitars begin to hover like approaching spacecraft ready to transport us to a higher plane. Incredibly cosmic, meditative and beautiful!

MPEG stream: Echo
MPEG stream: Void

Seawhores appears to be the work of a cast of thousands -- well there's like ten people credited as "writers and contributors" anyway. We're not sure who or what is at the core of this project, but we can tell you that Brian Chippendale (of Lightning Bolt) and Dale Crover (of the Melvins) both appear, amongst others, including ex-members of the Cows, on this album. And Seawhores definitely do display an affinity with the sort of noise-rock of those bands, particularily the mix of heaviosity and musical fuckery normally (abnormally?) practiced by the Melvins, and their former AmRep brethren as well. It's mostly instrumental with the notable exception of the (ironic we're pretty sure) hard rock radio friendly vocals that make/break the track "College Walls". They've gotta be ironic as we do sense a definite wiseassitude about this band, again in keeping with their Melvins meets Wolf Eyes noisedrone attack, a demented mix that incorporates rhythmic drum machine damage, gobs of distortion, soundtracky ambience, and more... For instance, the track "Sweaty Men, Attack" destroys the memory of its mock-country opening with pummelling industrial rock spazzcore. Elsewhere, you'll be treated to the extended eleven minute hissing howling horror soundscape of "Village Curse". All six tracks on this mysterious cd are intriguing. Very recommended to fans of Melvins, Mike Patton, Lightning Bolt, and suchlike gonzo avant-rock entertainment!!

MPEG stream: Sweaty Men, Attack
MPEG stream: May Your Hands Wither

MPEG stream: Map In Hand Pt. 1
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We have no idea how Campbell Kneale, overlord of the mighty Celebrate Psi Phenomenon label, finds time to keep discovering so much amazing, unheard music. He plays in loads of bands, Black Boned Angel, Birchville Cat Motel, he plays shows, makes record after record after record, goes on tour, has a family, kids, maybe even a real job. It's a wonder he can even run a label at all. Especially one where most of the discs are hand made and assembled. We don't want to jinx it. Not sure what we would do if there was no Celebrate Psi Phenomenon. Miss out on a whole lot of kick ass music that's for sure. We've discovered so many amazing groups, lots of all time AQ faves too: Birchville Cat Motel obviously, Dialing In, 1/3 Octave Band, Peter Wright, Lugosi, Seht, MHFS, Black Boned Angel, Ming, Mrtyu, With Throats As Fine As Needles, Ming, Mirag and more. And we can now add Seaworthy to the list. This Australian combo sound just like their name would lead you to believe. Serrata is a blissful oceanic exploration, a swoonsome soundscape of distant drones and shimmering sonic surf, lapping waves of sound causing the listener to gently rock back and forth, like floating on your back in a clear tranquil ocean, delicate clouds drifting far above, your body at one with the rolling swells beneath. So serene and peaceful, soft focused and meditative, a dreamy droning meditation on the deep blue sea, a sonic sending off, eyes closed as you drift toward the horizon. Wow.

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Hurrah! This is the first solo album from the very talented Josh McKay of Macha. Have to say though that if you were expecting for this to sound all Macha-y, try again. You certainly won't be disappointed though. The rich craftsmanship that he's applied to his

RealAudio clip: The Day
RealAudio clip: The Ride Pt. 1

Wow! He sounds like Johnny Cash! OK, sometimes we compare things in reviews or note similarities but it's not often that we come across a record that sounds almost identical to another artist we love. Such is the case with this archival release of Kentucky country crooner Johnny Seay who recorded in the late '50s-early '60s and sounds EXACTLY like Johnny Cash. We swear every single time we play this someone asks which Johnny Cash record this is and often one of us working will wonder the same thing. Luckily Seay sounded like all the best parts of Cash. The deep rich baritone sung atop a perfect rockin roots country backdrop. Story has it, that when Mercury records head honcho Shelby Singleton got his ears on the Irish Cash soundalike he made some convenient changes to the pronunciation of Seay's last name. While it had always been pronounced Shay, Singelton started saying it like Sea, further confusing the worlds of Cash and Seay. Johnny C and Johnny Sea. And confusing it is as we can't emphasize enough how uncanny the resemblance is. Some of us even find ourselves leaning towards Johnny Seay, as this was playing the other day and Christine came up front and of course asked if this was a Johnny Cash record she never heard and when told the story she concluded that she might even like this Johnny more. For curious minds and Cash fans alike this is an essential listen!

MPEG stream: Blue Moon Of Kentucky
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As if you hadn't realized it by now, we're sort of crazy Sebadoh fanboys (and girls), we made the last two multiple disc reissues of classic Sebadoh records aQuarius Records Of The Week, and now that we're reviewing this one, we're not exactly sure why we didn't make this one a ROTW too, probably because Sebadoh reissue number three might have seemed a bit much, but fuck it, consider this an UNofficial record of the week, cuz while those other Sebadoh records are great, this one is too, in fact, in some ways it ranks as one of our favorites for several reasons. One, it's one of the heaviest and most rocking of the bunch, some new blood (at the time) seems to have reinvigorated the band. Two, Jason Lowenstein, who on the previous record Bubble & Scrape had finally stepped up and started writing songs that rivaled main man Lou Barlow's tunes, really hit his stride here, some of the best songs on Bakesale are his, and lots of tracks it's tough to tell if the song is Lou's or Jason's, and what might be THEE best Sebadoh song ever, is here, and yep, is penned by Jason. And finally, Bakesale is the last truly great, and classic sounding Sebadoh record, sure Harmacy and The Sebadoh are great, they're just not GREAT. This record is damn near perfect, just the right balance between classic Sebadoh sad boy angst, and seriously rocking crunch. First, let's talk about that bold claim about THEE best Sebadoh song, maybe that's a bit too bold, let's say one of , if not OUR FAVORITE. The oddly titled "Shit Soup", with its instantly memorable opening bass line, it's almost noise rock riffing, and it's super staccato arrangement, not to mention some killer lyrics, the song seesawing between hooky heavy pop, and weirdly distorted crunch, woozy folky drift and back again, just listen to the sound samples, if you're not blown away, well, hell, we're not sure there's any hope. But even if you don't love "Shit Soup" as much as us, Bakesale is seriously hit heavy, opener "License To Confuse" with it's fuzzy bass, angular guitar part, and droney shuffling chorus, a sub two minute killer, then there's "Careful" another Jason jam, with an awesome melodic bassline that seems to drive the whole song, a song that's tense and dramatic, moving and moody and totally rocking. There's "Magnet's Coil" which is classic Sebadoh, a little supercharged, but at its core, a bittersweet pop song wreathed in crunch and buzz, with some of Barlow's best lyrics and melodies. And let's not forget "Skull", another classic Barlow jam, strummy and jangly, heartfelt and sweetly melancholy, and some super sweet and subtle hooks. Howabout "Rebound"? Yep another CLASSIC, hooky, and fuzzy, with some awesome distorted riffage and more of Lowenstein's fuzzy bass, and a bridge as catchy as most bands' choruses, and then a chorus as catchy as 2 or 3 of most bands' choruses combined. "Drama Mine" is another heavy Jason tune, that balances hooks with crunch, further demonstrating that Bakesale was about as perfect a partnership as could be imagined between Barlow and Lowenstein. And those are just the highlights, highlights among other highlights. Hyperbole, we think not, one of the essential indie rock records of the nineties without a doubt. This reissue includes a whole mess of extra material (a bonus disc in the cd version, the vinyl inlcudes the bonus material, along with the album proper, as a download), which includes all the various b-sides and extra tracks from various 7"s and cdeps as well as a handful of Jason's demos. And here's where Barlow and company indulged their audio fuckery that figured so prominently on past records, opening with "MOR Backlash", a noisy collage of classic rock and garbled radio transmissions, but in true Sebadoh fashion it leads right into an achingly heartfelt 4 track acoustic version of "Not A Friend", and that's pretty much how the bonus disc plays out, balancing noisy experiments with alternate versions, acoustic home recorded demos, not to mention some unpolished gems, and one of our favorite Sebadoh B-sides, the awesomely titled brooder "Punching Myself In The Face Repeatedly, Publicly". Includes a massive booklet, with new liner notes from both Jason and Lou, as well as expanded artwork, photos, collages, and some cool early drafts of the iconic over art, featuring a photo of 1 year old naked Lou reaching into the toilet.

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Sebadoh's fourth "studio" album, Bubble and Scrape, is oddly overlooked, perhaps because of its explicitly transitional status.�Fans of the band's earlier output tend to gravitate toward the endearingly scattershot scrappiness and excess of III or the lo-fi confessionals of the first two records, while fans of the Bob Fay-era can turn to Bakesale to hear the band at their most polished, streamlined and direct with Lou Barlow's pop songwriting at its most masterful.� Bubble and Scrape falls somewhere in between the two, and what makes it so remarkable is that when you listen to it you can hear all the disparate strains of the band perfectly complementing and foiling each other at every turn.�On this record, moreso than perhaps any other in the band's catalog, Sebadoh really sounds like an actual band on every song rather than a strange vehicle for three songwriters whose styles are so different that it's hard to imagine what interest they actually had in playing with each other.� Honestly, can you think of another band that would follow up "Two Years Two Days" with "Telecosmic Alchemy?"�Can you even think of another band who would make a record with both those songs on it?� We can't either, and that's part of what makes Sebadoh so special to us and Bubble and Scrape such an important part of their catalog. Barlow's contributions to this record are some of his best work - tuneful, heart-wrenching, sappy, confessional and catchy as all get-go - but the ragged feel that Jason Lowenstein and Eric Gaffney bring to the performances keep them from becoming too saccharine or mechanical (arguably, the downfall of Sebadoh's later output).� Similarly, Gaffney's acid-damaged freak-outs perpetually throw a wrench in the works - just as you're being lulled into thinking that this band is all about sensitive indie croon, out comes "Elixir is Zog."�Bubble And Scrape is also the record where perpetual "third guy in the band," Jason Lowenstein really began to shine as a more than capable songwriter; in fact, "Sixteen," "Happily Divided," and "Sister" are far and away some of the strongest songs on the album.�Rather than coming off as wishy-washy in their unwillingness to as fully commit to a particular and identifiable style as his bandmates, Lowenstein's refusal to be as plaintively emotional as Barlow or as blatantly fucked up as Gaffney allows him to pick and choose elements of both and write some fantastic songs as a result. While the bonus tracks are a nice edition to this "deluxe" repackaging of the original, the core album still shines as a rough gem from an era where polish was still regarded as something of which to be wary.�Bob Weston's 'production' is as ramshackle as the band itself and complements the record perfectly - all the elements are audible in all their flawed, contradictory glory; thankfully, the remastering retains the spiky imperfections of the original mix.�Domino and Sub Pop have filled out the reissue with 16 additional cuts, most of which are demos of album songs.�"Reject" stands out as a solid b-side, and the home recorded version of "Soul and Fire" is perhaps the most interesting of the demos for the glimpse it gives into the evolution of the song. We here at aQ love this band, and listening to this reissue over the past few weeks has reminded us just how much we also love this record.�We have no idea why we let it slip into the cracks as the years following its release went by, but we guarantee that it won't happen again!�If you were a fan back in '93, this is as good a time as any to remind yourself why; if you're new to Sebadoh, this record displays everything that made this band so amazing; if you're the rare bird who's kept this record close to his or her heart for all these years, this reissue gives you a healthy dose of demos to keep your interest piqued.�Capricorn rising!� We're going to ride with the Flood tonight!

MPEG stream: Soul And Fire
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At this point, it's probably easier to think of the bands you used to love, who have NOT reformed, cuz this really seems like the age of reunions, not that we're complaining... Some of our favorite bands, alive and kicking, touring and making records again! What's not to love? And while everyone was freaking out about the resurrection of Dinosaur Jr, we couldn't help but think, even back when Beyond came out, Dinosaur's first record in a decade at the time, how amazing it would be if Lou Barlow reformed Sebadoh. We never stopped being a little kooky about that band, as much as we loved Dinosaur, Sebadoh always occupied a super special place in our hearts, in fact both reissues of The Freed Man and III we made Records Of The Week here, and heck, we probably should have done the same for Bakesale, so when Sebadoh actually started playing shows, we were giddy, and when this new record was announced, holy crap! So here it is, the first new record in 14 years, since 1999's The Sebadoh, and we're pleased to report, it really does sort of sound like it could have come out immediately after The Sebadoh, the sound is warm and familiar, jangly and fuzzy, dark and broody at times, goofy and irreverent at others, but Barlow still has a knack for crafting dark, emotional jangle pop, and his partner in crime Jason Lowenstein (aka Jake) continues, we can only assume, to add his own twisted sonic perspective to the proceedings. And like on past records, there are moments of willful sonic spikiness, and some sweetly schmaltzy sad boy loner folk wistfulness, and this time some countryish twang here and there, but most of Defend Yourself, is just crazy catchy, classic sounding indie rock jangle pop that manages to channel the spirit and sound of the nineties, into something that doesn't sound nearly as nostalgic as it could have... Both the cd and the lp have a swank diecut slipcover-ed packaging (though we are out of the cds at the moment, grrr).

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Lots of claims could be made for best indie rock record ever. Pavement's Slanted And Enchanted is an obvious choice. But there are tons of other contenders, records by Dinosaur Jr., Galaxie 500, Seam, Archers Of Loaf, the Pixies, the Breeders, Unrest, Slint, Yo La Tengo, Superchunk... But what about Sebadoh? Originally Lou Barlow's bedroom side project while he was playing bass in Dinosaur Jr., Sebadoh went from soft 4-track sad boy ruminations to full on rambunctious indie rock without losing Barlow's tender hearted, mopey moodiness. This record, III, is where they really clicked. To be totally honest, the first two are our absolute favorites (c'mon, somebody reissue The Freed Weed!!!) but until those are available again, we'll just have to cast our lot with III. Not entirely fair to compare them though. The first two Sebadoh records were just Lou, in his bedroom, singing and strumming, a ramshackle collection of sweet sad songs and freaked out tape experiments, where as by the time of III, Sebadoh was a real rock band, with not just two other band members, but two other songwriters, Eric Gaffney and Jason Lowenstein. Giving Sebadoh a distinctly schizophrenic sound, veering from introspective to noisy and annoying depending on whose song it was. Years before Conor Oberst ascended to the weepy, slouchy indie throne, Sebadoh's Lou Barlow was already the king of the lo-fi tearjerker. He ruled the roost of unabashed romantics in his rumpled threadbare cardigan, spectacles and tousled mop of hair. However, as III proved beyond a doubt, Sebadoh wasn't confined to lovey-dovey bedroom balladry, nope they could tear shit up a-plenty providing both cathartic heartbaring sadsack sweetness and blistering noise rawk for indie kids near and far. The copious liner notes are a bit confusing though. As far as we were concerned, Sebadoh WAS Lou Barlow, who was later joined by Eric and Jason. But the liner notes, especially Gaffney's, paint a quite different picture. Gaffney goes on and on about how it was basically his band and his songs. But a quick listen to the record (and a look at each member's subsequent sonic track record) reveals the truth, that Lou was still the quiet mastermind. Eric has some killer tracks for sure, and Jason's songs are wild and chaotic (this was before he would grow into a songwriter to rival Lou on later Sebadoh discs) but almost without exception the perfect pop gems here are penned by Lou. Just check out the opener "The Freed Pig", hard to imagine a more perfect indie rock song. Jangly and catchy, a little ramshackle, a teensy bit melancholy, but exuberant and hopeful. With a killer crunchy chorus. III is peppered with sweet soft acoustic numbers that sound like they were plucked from old Sebadoh cassettes. Each one sad and lovely, perfect mix tape material way back in 1991 (Yeesh, has it really been fifteen years?!), the prototype for EVERY home recorded bedroom record since. Jason contributes some Minutemen sounding instrumental jams ("Sickles & Hammers"), some slow motion druggy stoner jams ("Smoke A Bowl"), a killer twangy acoustic hoedown ("Black Haired Girl") and most of the really esoteric tunes. Eric offers up some lilting minor key jangle ("Violet Execution"), some super fuzzed out jangly tribal psych rock ("Limb By Limb") and the super lengthy bizarre drugged out psych jam "As The World Dies The Eyes Of God Grow Bigger". Between all of these musical flights of fancy, Lou gives us perfect pop song after perfect pop song, whether it's in the form of a whispered mumbly song fragment, or a glorious rocked out jangly jam. Somehow these disparate elements mesh perfectly into a totally rollicking chaotic indie rock masterpiece. A reissue of III on its own would definitely merit record of the week status, but there's a whole extra disc of singles and outtakes that make this absolutely essential. First up on the extras disc is "Gimme Indie Rock" a tongue in cheek slam on their more popular indie contemporaries, which inadvertently became a hit and somehow sounded like, but better than, all the bands it was poking fun at (check out the very Dinosaur-like leads!) Speaks volumes that a tossed off fuck around track can be this good. Next up is quite possibly the best Sebadoh song ever "Ride The Darker Wave" a loping groove, with a totally catchy guitar part and an instantly unforgettable melody. Heavy and sludgy but perfectly poppy. The rest of the disc is jam packed with outtakes and alternate versions, a whole bunch of Gaffney tracks, as good as anything on the record proper, as well as a few other Lou gems. Also, tacked on at the very end is "Showtape '91" a 12 minute experimental tape piece, the band used to play at shows before they came on stage. It features the band reading various reviews (positive and negative), repeating the various mispronunciations of the band name, all amidst a cacophonous soundscape of tape manipulation and guitar grind. Very annoying but very very funny. As befits a classic record like III, the packaging and reissue extras are amazing. Besides the wealth of extra and unreleased tracks, there are extensive liner notes from all three band members, tons of photos, and the whole thing is housed in a snazzy slipcase with the band name and album title embossed in metallic gold ink. We feel like we're 21 again!!!

MPEG stream: The Freed Pig
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As much as we all love Sebadoh, most of their records predate the aQuarius list, so other than the recent reissue of III, and this one right here, we have never been able to truly sing the praises of one�of our favorite indie rock bands of all time. They were one of the few bands who took indie rock and did whatever the fuck they wanted to with it.�Bakesale, Bubble And Scrape, Smash Your Head On The Punk Rock, Sebadoh Vs. Helmet, all over the map, but all distinctly Sebadoh. Much of it had to do with the genius popsmithery of Lou Barlow, ground zero for lonely sadboy bedroom folk. A one man lo-fi revolution. But much of it had to do with his choice in collaborators. Specifically, Eric Gaffney, Lou's perfect foil, personally, musically, in every way. Where Lou was introverted and shy, Eric was outspoken and spastic. Where Lou penned soft whispery ballads, Gaffney's songs were disjointed angular folk, or blasts of off kilter acoustic weirdness, together, the two forged the perfect balance between romantic longing and snotty punk rock rebellion. Never was this more evident than on their very first record, The Freed Man.� Back in the nineties, there was a disc called the Freed Weed (you might remember in our review of III, we pleaded for someone to re-release it) which was the cd version of a record called Weed Forestin', a record written and recorded entirely by Lou, jam packed with classic pop, including a handful of tracks that would be reworked later and turned into classic electric Sebadoh numbers. Well, to fill out the cd, they tacked on a handful of tracks from The Freed Man... The Freed Weed was our introduction to what would become the whole bedroom folk movement. We didn't know what the hell it was, other than it was like nothing we had ever heard, sad and intense, funny and fucked up, super personal and�intimate, with bursts of total what the fuck weirdness scattered throughout and some of the prettiest songs we had ever heard. And we were not looking� for soft folky sadness, we wanted heaviness and noisiness, but these songs were just too good to not fall in love with...�We played the shit�out of the Weed Forestin' side, the prettier Lou songs. but later, when we had played it to death, we dug deeper into the more difficult songs from the Freed Man, and discovered a whole new world of deliriously damaged fractured folk... So here we have the Freed Man in its entirety. With tons of extra songs, alternate versions, all culled from the original recordings... and it's just as amazing, as far out, as sweetly sorrowful as we remember.� The�Freed Man was the 'first' actual Sebadoh release, originally released in 1989, and in the early days, sold for 99 cents in local record stores. It was split pretty evenly between Lou's soft bedroom folk, and Eric's damaged whatthefuck lo-fi freakouts� and raggedy strum and croon, with tons of random shit mixed in, radio soundbites, old records, primitive tape recorder experiments, all sorts of weird found sounds scattered throughout. The sound now is quite familiar, every kid with an old beat up guitar and a 4 track has taken a stab at the whole lone bedroom troubadour thing, but at the time, this was seriously mindblowing,�murky hiss drenched acoustic guitar, gorgeously melancholy, with Lou's sadboy vocals, and lilting melodies, heartfelt, yet slightly tweaked lyrics, bursts of staticky chaos, cool weird tape loops... and the thing is, even after a million imitators, this STILL sounds special and fresh, and yeah, mind blowing. So much so that it's hard to pick out particular songs, the whole thing is so perfectly realized, it's almost like some insane lo-fi, bedroom folk DJ mix, the songs all flow into each other, stumbling over one another, woven together with random sound effects or manipulated tapes... Single songs don't get stuck in your head as much as whole suites, chunks of distinctly different songs that are so inexorably linked, they almost sound like multi part mini epics. Some of our favorite tracks though:�the all time classic emo indie boy anthem "Soulmate", with the legendary line "I'll probably have to have sex with a lot of girls before my soulmate reveals herself to me..." and a chorus to die for,�Gaffney doing his best Barlow�on "Level Anything", still sad and folky, but with way more buzz and off kilter melody, the�super distorted hiss drenched beauty that is Barlow's "Close Enough", Lou's�"True Hardcore"� with the spoken intro "this is a complete rip off of every other song i've ever done" which launches into a song that is anything but hardcore, instead a gorgeous slab of lush heavily strummed sadboy folk with a KILLER hook / chorus,�"Wrists" another gorgeous off kilter folk dirge from Eric, minor key and rife with lush guitars and killer melodies,�"Bolder" which hints at the pop genius that Barlow would blossom into, it's easy to imagine this track fully electrified and super rocking on some later Sebadoh record,�"Jealous Evil", yet another classic Barlow track, moody and miserable, with brooding guitars, and subtle but moving melodies, and some gorgeous vocal melodies,�same with "Pig" slow burning and melancholy,�"Punch In The Nose",�and an old track with Lou's sister accompanying him on trumpet, and the record finishes�off with a Doc Watson cover that ends up sounding like the Frogs which is a very good thing. It's a mess and a jumble, but it's just so goddamn immediate and personal, weird and wonderful.�Eric's songs sound like Lou's only doused in acid and pot and slightly -more- out of tune�but they are the perfect balance for Lou's earnestness... The Freed Man is in no way perfect, there are plenty of tracks that are noisy or fucked up and here and there plain embarrassing, but those only add to the record's charm, and tend to never last more than a minute. There's the super noisy cover of "Yellow Submarine" and the�super embarrassing "Lou Rap" complete with goofy childhood recordings, both of which we used to skip, but now, are too much a part of the whole to not enjoy as part of the bigger Sebadoh picture.� There are of course tons of extras, some awesome rarities, redone tracks from the Freed Weed, unreleased songs, tracks from the amazing and long out of print Magic Ribbons 7" boxset and a handful of splits and singles, includes liner notes by both Eric and Lou, each offering their own take on the early years of the band,�with lots of artwork from the original cassette and the Freed Weed cd. Like the recent reissue of Sebadoh III, The Freed Man is gorgeously packaged, with a huge booklet, tons of art, all housed in a swank slipcase, with the original cover reproduced, but with all the text in metallic silver...

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Ed Banger producer, Sebastian, really "revs" things up with this 12". The title track "Motor" is the epitome of rude! If you're tired of wimpy dance music and need something to put some hair on your chest, this is probably the biggest, hardest, grinding, pumping, and almost unbearable (in a good way) tune you could hope for. The jist of it is a sample of a motor revving faster and faster, chopped up, pitched in different ways, and arranged over some pretty sinister drum slappage. You'll either hate it or love it and we here at AQ are eating it up. The other 2 B-side tracks are definitely much more endurable and just as good if not better. "Momy" is actually more of a quintessential disco track compared to Sebastian's common production style, filled with strings, trills, and the normal choppery of course. "Army" sums everything up with Sebastian displaying his usual yet crafty beat trickery, throwing pounding drums mixed with more of that gritty, churning, distorted bass synth that we've always loved from him and the rest of the French Ed Banger family. Awesome!

High tension electronics and synth-punk nihilism abound from the mysterious Los Angeles producer Secam Kino. The gritty rhythmic sequences and spring-loaded programming here parallels the retro-industrial panache of productions from Youth Code, and the whole thing telescopes like some videodrome illusion flickering in time and space, whether that be Los Angeles 2016, Berlin 1981, or Chicago 1989. Secam Kino irradiates all of the sounds with transporter de-rezed / cathode ray tube fixation that also seems to find itself near Clock DVA's excursions into psychic / psychological disintegration through electronics. There are no barked lyrics and the sampled vocalizations present on Destined Ages are obtuse in their references, thus the specifics of the political / philosophical / conceptual aspects of those aforementioned icons are vacated by Secam Kino's cybernetic constructions. Nonetheless, a great tape from Chondritic! Limited to 100 copies spray-painted cassettes.

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A thoroughly anomymous proposition located somewhere in Los Angeles, Secam Kino mines the suitably obscure corners of industrial culture and synth-punk nihilism, picking over the choicer bits from such non-household names as Happiest Tapes On Earth, Trance Port Tapes, Cause & Effect, or any jackbooted label promoting dourly industrial electronics circa 1985. The templates for this sound were generated by the likes of SPK and TG, although many of the bands on those labels (and by extention, Secam Kino) have dropped any overtones to a rock/pop structure. No lyrics, no melodies. Just rhythm, noise, disease, and abjection. The tracks can roar with the fluttering wow of varispeed tapedecks lurching toward oblivion with densely packed tricklings from subterranean catacombs, and others lace simple drum-machine through cable-buzzed dischord, horror-score step sequences, and found tape dialogue of a psychosexual nature. The whole thing has the feel of the paranoiac tension of a nuclear command outpost devoid of inter-personnel communication and fraught with military prescribed amphetamines and sleepless delirium. While it sounds very little like Thought Broadcast, Secam Kino taps into a similar fetishization of a very particular sound long since lost to the annals of history. Super limited pressing with silkscreened covers and spray painted cassette shells, as with all of the Chondritic Sound tapes.

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An unusual and utterly unhinged black metal album from two of the members of Norway's Neetzach (whose debut cd we reviewed a couple lists ago), Vrangsinn and Dirge Rep. They call Secht "a musical piece of pure insanity". We'd agree, though some might take exception to the "musical" part. They go on to say that it was "composed under Satanic and Narcotic influence" which we do believe. Seriously though, this is certainly a cult concept: it's all one 37 minute track, starting off with drizzling rain-sounds and melancholic acoustic guitar, developing a disturbing, droning atmosphere with baby-like black metal mewlings before unleashing a full-on electric guitar and drums assault, building ever-heavier and more frenzied, with angular breakdowns and an overall extremely maniacal vibe. About twenty four minutes in, it returns to hissing ambience, a creeped-out chill-out in the forest before a final dose of chattering distortion ends the album. File with Abruptum, Mistigo Varggoth Darkestra, Caacrinolas, Rakhim, and whatever other semi-improvised, soundscapey, single-tracked, non-standard black metal you can think of... And making this even more crazed and cult, since the Secht duo are such scenesters they were able to enlist such friends/fiends as Gaahl (Gorgoroth), Nattefrost (Carpathian Forest), and Nocturno Culto (Darkthrone) amongst others to provide additional screams n' sounds!

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Dark Entries made their debut as a label several months ago with the awesome reissue of the Eleven Pond LP and with that single release we knew we were witnessing the birth of a an awesome reissue label, one with its heart set on finding obscure synth-pop and darkwave and and shining the spotlight on records that never got the love, attention or distribution they deserved the first time around. Second Decay were a German electronic-pop group who formed in the late 1980's dedicated to the sound of analog synthisizers, the album's back cover proudly remarks 'This album was produced without MIDI. It is dedicated to our beloved synthesizers.' And there is no doubt these guys had deep love for the sounds of synthesizers as they used them to craft very infectious, dark new wave with full on pop chops. While there have been tons of reissues and attention paid to the amazing music that was made in Germany in the 70's it's really cool to see someone digging up some of the gold in a post-Kraftwerk Germany as Second Decay have a sound that brings Neue Deutsche Welle to mind (e.g. Grauzone, Liaisons Dangereuses, etc.) and the more dark tinged blasts of electro-pop that folks like Depeche Mode and The Human League were making on their early records, or even early 80's Cabaret Voilatire, and of course you can tell they were WAY influenced by the mighty Kraftwerk. We also hear a cool similarity to the recently reissued Patrick Cowley & Jorge Socarras record Catholic, which kind of makes perfect sense as the man behind Dark Entries was instrumental in saving and preserving the cache of Cowley tapes from which that record was culled. With new bands like Cold Cave and Xeno & Oaklander grabbing our attention lately with their awesome updated version of that classic vintage synthwave sound, it's pretty rad and perfect timing to hear a lost classic from folks who were making that sound almost twenty years ago. Limited to just 500 copies all screen printed and with an amazing remastered sound thanks to the work of the legendary George Horn at Fantasy Studios. This will make you want to wear all black and dance all night. Minimal wave/gothpop at its best!

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[ aquarius records catalogue — S ]