[ aquarius records catalogue

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Showing results 451 through 500 of 3547.

Another killer calendar of classic blues artwork from original early twentieth century blues records. It's a series of calendars that as we mentioned in a review of a past year's calendar, some of us at aQ have hung on our kitchen walls for years now, and once you check one of these out, you'll understand why. Like the years before, 2013's installment is another doozy with some crazy, over the top artwork and loads of blues nerd trivia. Just check out the calendar's cover, "The Devil & God Meet At Church"!! And inside, "Pig Meat Blues", "Snatch It Back Blues", "Police Dog Blues" and more! Each month has lots of info about each release, as well as significant blues birthdays and other relevant dates, not to mention biographies, rare photos and death dates. And to top it all off, as always, there's also a cd, with the songs featured each month, as well as NINE bonus tracks, from folks like Charley Patton, Blind Blake, Memphis Minnie, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Buddie Boy Hawkins, Ardelle Bragg and more!

People might not use old fashioned calendars so much anymore (or cameras, or watches either), since most of us have a newfangled electronic one in our phone anyway, but the Classic Blues Artwork calendar is definitely worth having, jam packed with amazing original artwork from classic/rare/obscure blues records from the 1920's, not to mention tons of rare photos as well. C'mon, June features "Rattle Snake Groan", July reminds you "Your Enemies Can Not Harm You (But Watch Your Close Friend)", September is "She's A Long Tall Disconnected Mama" and March is all about the "Mean Black Cat Blues". Each month celebrating a different record, from Mother McCollum, "Papa" Charlie Jackson, Blind Lemon Jefferson, E.W. Clayborn The "Guitar Evangelist", Lueela Miller, the Mississippi Sheiks, Charlie Patton and more! And like most calendars that mark the various holidays, this one does too, but also includes all the important moments in blues history, birthdays, deaths, record releases, etc. And along with the calendar, there's also a compilation cd featuring classic songs and rarities from Charley Patton, Henry Thomas, Furry Lewis, Blind Blake, Mother McCollum, Tenderfoot Edwards, Blind Percy, Jim Thompkins and lots more!! So cool. We look forward to the new version of this calendar every year.

It's that time again! Almost the end of the year, and time for a new calendar! And yeah, we know, you don't wear a watch or have a camera cuz it's all on your phone, and sure, your phone has a calendar too. However, odds are, that the tiny calendar on your phone, as useful and smart as it may be, is not nearly as bad ass as the Classic Blues Artwork From The 1920's calendar, which has become a sort of institution around here. Like the last however many volumes, this new one is chock full of, as the title makes pretty clear, some killer artwork from rare blues records from the '20s, each month, some rare 78 cover, or vintage photo, whether it's the "Dry Bone Shuffle" by Blind Blake, or "You Got what I Want" by Chocolate Brown, "Shake That Thing" by the Mississippi Sheiks, or "Spoonful Blues" by Charley Patton. Or rare photos of The Famous Blue Jay Singers, Roosevelt Sykes, Cannon's Jug Stompers, Brother Son Bonds and Hammie Nixon, Memphis Minnie and Kansas Joe, and more more more! There are also liner noters with each month's artwork/photo, detailing the featured artist or record, along with historical dates of note, births, and deaths, and the like, all related to the blues. And if that weren't enough, and you've probably already guessed it's NOT, there's an accompanying cd compilation, with all 12 of the tracks from the calendar, from all the above mentioned artists and MORE, as well as twelve extra blues rarities, and those come with a booklet and tray card so you can stick them in a proper jewel case as well. Even sans calendar, the cd is a killer vintage blues comp, worth the price of admission alone, but all together, this is pretty much the perfect gift for the music nerd in your life, even if that music nerd is you.

Smithsonian continues their semi-low price sampler series with this collection of blues recordings from the label. Like the others in this series, this is a good introduction to the label's prolific catalog and includes tracks dating back to the forties and fifties and even includes a few more recent recordings. This collection brings together Delta, St. Louis, Southwest, and Chicago blues from such notables as: Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee, Big Bill Broonzy, Leadbelly, Son House, Reverend Gary Davis, Lightnin' Hopkins, Elizabeth Cotten, Champion Jack Dupree, Etta Baker, Roosevelt Sykes and much more. Includes extensive liner notes with bios on the performers as well as pertinent discographical information to facilitate the urge to delve deeper into the catalog. MPEG Download: BIG BILL BROONZY "Mule-Ridin' Blues" [/audio/broonzymuleridin.mp3] MPEG Stream: BIG BILL BROONZY "Mule-Ridin' Blues" [/audio/broonzymuleridin.m3u]

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This is the fifth such anthology of American roots music we've gotten in from Smithsonian Folkways (the previous being Classic Bluegrass, Mountain Songs, Blues and Old-Time music). Like the others, it is nicely priced, comes well documented and serves as a great introduction to American "folk" music. I know that can be a thorny term, but here it's used to describe the folksong revival here in the States that spanned some twenty years from the 40's through the 60's (and was oh so well parodied in A Mighty Wind). Included on this collection are both the rural artists who influenced the revival and many of the urban ones who were inspired by them. There are tracks here from Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Lead Belly, Paul Robeson, Doc Watson, Burl Ives, Phil Ochs, Elizabeth Cotten, Big Bill Broonzy and more.

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On the heels of their nicely priced sampler of Classic Bluegrass comes this collection of recordings of songs from the mountains of North Carolina, Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee. Bluegrass and folk musicians can all trace their influences back to the music of the Appalachian mountains and many of these genre's greats came from here. There's a good variety of styles represented here from the rough hewn rendition of "Omie Wise" by fiddle player and singer Doug Walin to the silky virtuosic guitar playing of Doc Watson and his son Merle on "Southbound". There's also the stunningly beautiful hymn singing of the Indian Bottom Association, Defeated Creek Church singing "I Am A Poor Pilgrim of Sorrow". It's that kind of choir singing that will just pierce your soul through the pores of your skin. Hazel Dickens and Alice Gerrard -- the grand dammes of bluegrass -- sing Coal Miner Blues, and much more. This compilation has it all, from grizzled old retired miners singing creepy archaic modal tunes to jazz and blues influenced slick flat-pickers. All the tracks, like every Smithsonian Folkways release, are dutifully annotated with well written notes and include catalog numbers for the original Folkways releases, should you wish to delve further.

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The fourth volume in SF's mid-priced "Classic" series. This time the label takes on the loosely connected genre of "Old Time" music. It's important here to stress the word *genre*, because while the moniker of Old Time can be applied to any number of early American string bands and solo musicians who's myriad styles and repertoires eventually found their way into the more recent genres of country, bluegrass, blues and folk -- as in the folk revival, it also can be applied to modern musicians who play in the old time style, like much of the musicians of the folk revival did in the sixties and still do to this day. Included on this disc are tracks (recorded between 1958 and 1998) both by the original artists who served as inspiration such as Doc Boggs, J.E. Mainer's Mountaineers, Roscoe Holcomb, Maybelle & Sara Carter, Doc Watson, Sam & Kirk McGee, Wade Ward, Etta Baker and Gordon Tanner (a.k.a. Gid Tanner & His Skillet Lickers) and the artists who most directly championed their music like The Iron Mountain String Band, The New Lost City Ramblers, Mike Seeger, The Old Reliable String Band, The Spare Change Boys and more. MPEG Download: LEE SEXTON "Pretty Polly" [/audio/leesextonpretty.mp3] MPEG Stream: LEE SEXTON "Pretty Polly" [/audio/leesextonpretty.m3u]

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Every once in a while something comes along that we KNOW we're gonna love, just from reading about it ahead of time. Here's a very good example, and now that we have heard it, we certainly DO love it. Heck, it pretty much had us with its subtitle - and also 'cause of the label it's on. From Jonny Trunk's ever reliable, nostalgic UK imprint specializing in all kinds of unusual vintage finds, comes this compilation of children's music - no, not music FOR children, but music BY children, made in British primary and secondary schools, as part of, well, classroom projects, between 1959 and 1981. All sourced from rare, mostly privately pressed vinyl (released by the schools themselves, for educational purposes or to commemorate an event), collected over the years by Trunk. The selections presented here encompass many, many sorts of the strange and the wonderful, brimming with youthful innocence and enthusiasm. There's lovely renditions of traditional folk songs, there's quaint classical pieces and instrumental improvisations, there's experimental stuff influenced by 20th century avant-garde composers like Stockhausen (via an enlightened teacher), there's an oddly amusing choral song about drunk driving, there's a cover of Art Garfunkel's "Bright Eyes" from the Watership Down soundtrack� Of the 25 tracks (19 on the vinyl), some of the standouts for sure are the creative efforts of a group/project called Sounds Of Silence, who contribute the track "Musique Concrete" among others, including the creepy "The Lyke-Wake Dirge". Also many of the folk/vocal numbers are quite gentle and quiet and lovely. Lots of charming tracks to treasure here, in other words. We imagine that Trunk had to sift through a lot of lesser material to find these gems. For sure for fans of the classic Langley Schools Music Project, as well those who liked a couple previous Trunk releases, namely Carl Orff & Gunild Keetman's Music For Children, and the album by Cults Percussion Ensemble. Naturally, the cd booklet and lp sleeve includes Trunk's informative liner notes and cover graphics from the original lps.

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SORRY. Following the awesome 'Modulations & Transformations' compilations, Mille Plateaux presents yet another veritable encyclopedia of electronica minimalism. A nice addendum to the 20' to 2000 series, 'Clicks & Cuts' features a handful of electronica technicians recontextualizing digital residue into a variety of melodic & rhythmic structures. While only a few of the tracks are exclusive to the compilation, it's still quite a handy collection. The artists include Wolfgang Voigt's All moniker, Thomas Brinkmann (recording under his dead sister's name and sampling Blixa Bargeld), Pan Sonic, Kit Clayton, Vladislav Delay, Goem, Pole, Panacea, Kid 606, Stillupsteypa, and more!

Jeff wins the endurance award for listening to all three discs back to back. The second volume of this appropriately titled compilation of miminal electronic technicians. With tracks from Kid 606, Vladislav Delay, SND, Frank Brettschneider, Thomas Brinkmann, Swayzak, Kit Clayton, Pan Sonic, Matmos and many more.

"The muse was in the mistakes," reads the press release for the third installment in Mille Plateaux's compendium of contemporary, glitched electronica; however, it has to be said that these "mistakes" -- hard disc rewrite errors, pinprick glitches, microsonic tears, etc. -- have come to define stylistic conceits of a very clean, posh deviation from the standard templates of techno, electro, and occasionally hip hop. True, there has been enough of an stylistic acceleration since the second Clicks & Cuts compilation from 2001 to warrant a new cross-section of glitched electronica; yet the trajectory has steered towards an ironic, self-reflexive position of pop iconography, complete with favoritism towards gimmicky hooks, disposable R&B vocals, and lite rhythms. Mille Plateaux claims that this sound follows Deleuzian models as a "bastard offspring of capitalist output." This may be true, but why does its current form sound more like the commonplace output of capitalism rather than its subversive antithesis (which is what Mille Plateaux has always implied about its purpose)? Nevertheless, the music -- if you can conveniently overlook the potential conceptual dilemmas -- is quite enjoyable and pleasant. As stated above, it reflects the genres of techno, electro, and hip hop through the glitch. Artists include SND, Frank Bretschneider, Andreas Tilliander, MRI, Bizz.Circuits, Claudia Bonarelli, Geeez 'N' Gosh, Alva Noto, Rob Acid, Luomo, Antonelli Electr., Mikael Stav�strand, Swayzak, Donnacha Costello & David Donohoe, Rechenzentrum, AGF, Tim Hecker, Dat Politics, Boris Polonski, Robin Judge, Ekkehard Ehlers, and Pomassl. Sometimes, you run the risk of ruining your own art by mashing together conceptual agendas and formal techniques that don't exactly fit.

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Collection of recordings made live at San Francisco's Clit Stop. 38 tracks from such notables as: Kit Clayton, Three Day Stubble, No Neck Blues Band, Deerhoof, Zeek Sheck, Rubber O Cement With Karla Lavay, Casiotone For The Painfully Alone, and much more.

Another nice dub collection mixed under the auspices of His Royal Majesty King Tubby and featuring musicians Sly & Robbie along with Aston Barrett, Carlton Barret, Carlton Davis, and Tony Chin. The original vocalists (Jr Byles, Augustus Pablo are all cut up nicely with classic fader and tape delay / spring reverb action.

Even if we weren't already aware that the early '70s output of the German record label Kuckuck was pretty darn cool, being a significant part of the whole incredible krautrock thing, we'd be eager to hear this new compilation, following as it does B-Music's other recent celebrations of labels like BYG in France (The BYG Deal comp) and Belter in Spain (the Absolute Belter comp), all of 'em awesome. This well-researched collection, part of the B-Music / Finders Keepers "krautsider music" series, is a tribute to the vision and dedication of the Kuckuck label's founder, Eckart Rahn (about whom several fascinating pages of the text and photo filled cd booklet are devoted). Presented with distinctive graphic style, Kuckuck's always adventurous and ever eclectic roster made records ranging from progressive pop to acid folk to out there kosmische electronics, in other words krautrock at its finest. There's nine bands represented across the 20 tracks here. You get, among others, the heavy blues rock of Armageddon, the proto-New Age bliss of AQ fave Deuter, Antiteater's soundtracks to Rainer Werner Fassbinder films, the brilliant minimalist hypnorock of Out Of Focus (another AQ fave), the Moog synthesizer experimentation of American composer Sam Spence, and proggy pop pioneers Ihre Kinder (plus various spinoffs), and more. Of the several artists we hadn't ever heard before, Sam Spence was particularly intriguing, especially since the liner notes explain that his Moogs were paid for by the National Football League, for whom he made film soundtracks! We'd be curious to hear more of his Kuckuck recordings based on the two tracks from him included here, which sound something like a more tripped out Perrey and/or Kingsley. Dunno why they didn't include some Murphy Blend, too, but it's a fine comp anyhow! Any Finders Keepers follower or krautrock fancier should be keen on this. Can't go too wrong with Kuckuck.

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Better act fast on this one, super limited, as in ONLY SEVENTY COPIES, and it's a pretty killer sampling of some of the best SF bands around, all exclusive tracks, from a bunch of our favorites, and a whole bunch of bands we'd never heard of before. Barn Owl, Lucky Dragons, Tussle, Pale Hoarse, Ascended Master, Snowblink, Drumz and so many more. Two discs, nearly 2 hours, of spaced out drone, groovy abstract rhythms, dark swilring ambience, woozy drum machine driven lo-fi pop, pounding low slung post rock, and lots of stops in between. All of the tracks were recorded live in the Fall of 2007, during Drew Bennett's collaborative Clouds Carved The Mountains Installation / Sound Series at the Triple Base Gallery, here in SF. Beaufiul hand assembled and hand silkscreened cover, with a printed insert, of the seventy copies we only got a handful, so grab one quick before they're gone...

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SORRY. Another stunning collection of mid-'70s Afrofunk, culled from well-loved albums to impossibly rare 7"s and lost treasures. Raw, fiery, melodic, sheer exuberance in sound! From such countries as Lagos, Cameroun, Guadeloupe, South Africa, Nigeria. From famous musicians such as Hugh Masekela (his track is one of the most gorgeous pieces of sunshine I've ever heard), Roy Ayers (who toured with Fela for a spell), and the legendary percussionist Babatunde Olatunji, to lesser knowns such as Letta Mbulu (who caterwauled that amazing opener "What is Wrong with Groovin'" on the equally excellent "Ouelele" comp) and Max B. Recommended.

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North American compilation features contributions from Cannibal Ox, Them (featuring Dose One of cLOUDDEAD), Obscure Disorder (featuring Non-Phixion), Youngblood Brass Band (with Talib Kweli), MC Paul Barman (produced by Prince Paul!), bonus beats from turntable wiz A-Trak, and many more.

Something tells me that the Dutch experimental geniuses at Staalplaat wants this to be deemed an exotic album to be placed next to Martin Denny and Joe Meek. Well the first track - an odd big band arrangement of The KLF's "What Time Is Love" - may very well fit the bill, but the rest of the album features the Fluxus vocalizations of Jaap Blonk, the Icelandic minimalist weirdness from Stillupsteypa, the scraping noise of CoC Casper & Daniel Menche, and the digital bleeps of Pita & Mika Vainio (Mego / Sahko).

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SORRY.

Man, this is some gritty '70s funk. Or should I say gritt-ay? Really, the grit to the tracks is from the remastering transfer of these old songs but in spite of it, they're all totally listenable cause they are so so SO good. I mean, THESE ARE PURE FUNK SONGS: no cheese, no glamour, just amazing songwriting, awesome musicianship, great ideas, tons of soul, and just full-on soul n' funk jammin'. F'ing awesome! Contains rare and never-before-heard tracks by many artists including Carleen and The Groovers, Kashmere Stage Band, Soul Seven and Ebony Rhythm Band (their track "Drugs Ain't Cool" from their Soul Heart Transplant disc recently reissued by Now-Again), all of which were remastered from old 45's and aging master tapes. Packaged with a pretty extensive 28 page archival booklet, and the cd features a handful of bonus tracks. Now, we have to say that the first time we heard this it didn't make such a huge impression, but after a few listens we realized that this was a seriously amazing compilation of PURE funk and funky soul songs. We can't stress enough how awesome these tracks are. Give it a few listens and you'll see what we mean.

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Remixes of upteen million Ninja Tunes by (on the first disc) Coldcut & DJ Food, and (on the second disc) DJ Krush. Funki Porcini, DJ Vadim, London Funk Allstars, The Herbaliser, Luke Vibert, etc. etc. etc. rock these two continuous sixty minute mixes...a two hour breakbeat bonanza.

First off, anyone who bought the Minimal Wave Tapes compilation, another recent aQ Record Of The Week, is most definitely gonna want this too, another killer collection of, like the title says, Cold Waves and Minimal Electronics, a perfect part two, or companion, and fear not, the only overlap is one single band, who do appear on both comps, but with different tracks, so this is essentially an all new (old) collection of vintage coldwave dark synth sonics, which, if you're anything like us, and we're beginning to think you are, you can't get enough of. It's pretty strange how cold / dark / new / synth wave have made such a huge comeback, bands like the Cure, Depeche Mode, Human League, Front 242, Soft Cell, are now cited as huge influences on a new breed of dark synth driven combos. Also funny considering something similar happened 8 or 9 years ago, when a rash of bands were exploring similar territory: Adult., The Faint, Fischerspooner, Erase Errata, etc. But music is definitely cyclical, and as a new generation discovers the treasures of the past, they start bands mining that past, and revist that past via reissues. The most recent issue of the San Francisco Bay Guardian offers a mini primer on the difference between the various waves: darkwave was early industrial and goth rock, cold wave the French version of darkwave (as we first discovered on the amazing So Young But So Cold comp), Synth wave was like cold wave but more sparse and moody, and new wave, well everyone should know what that is by now. Lately, it seems most folks make little distinction between the various waves, instead lumping them all together as cold wave, or minimal wave or whatever, since regardless of the variations, they definitely all share a similar sound and vibe, and speaking for ourselves at least, it's a sound we dig big time. But then most of us never really stopped digging that stuff to begin with. Lots of former goths here for sure. And every time we discovered a band exploring the sounds we dug so much back in the day, we went way out of our way to gush about them big time, like one of our 2009 Records Of The Week, from Soror Dolorosa, a black metal side project that sounded like some lost Joy Division jam, or rare cold wave antiquity, and more recently records by groups like Blank Dogs, who may not have grown up listening to this music, but if they didn't then must have had a super hip older brother. But as was demonstrated on the Minimal Wave collection, there were tons of bands outside of the obvious above mentioned references, who were just as cool, if not cooler, the underground of a scene that for a while was very mainstream, on the Minimal Waves comp, it was Crash Course In Science, Tara Cross, Das Kabinette, Ohama, Das Ding, Martin Dupont, Deux, Bene Gessert, Turquoise Days, and others, a few of the more wave-informed folks here knew many of those bands, but to the rest of us, it was a revelation. So much amazing music, so many new groups. On this Cold Waves collection, it's Absolute Body Control, Ruth, The Neon Judgement, Stereo, The Vyllies, Days Of Sorrow, Land Of Giants, End Of Data, Eleven Pond, Ausgang Verboten, Nine Circles and more more more. And like before, a few groups we're familiar with, but a whole bunch of mysterious new names, all of which contribute killer tracks, and most definitely have us hankering for more from all of them. The obvious ones, Ruth of course, a long time aQ favorite, whose track here also appeared on the out of print So Young But So Cold, sort of Kraftwerk meets Gary Numan, Linear Movement, who also had a track on the Minimal Wave comp, whose track here is awesome, catchy and swirly, with super hypnotic synth melodies and awesome vocals, groovy bass and that clipped new wave drum machine rhythm, Absolute Body Control, who recently received the deluxe Vinyl On Demand boxset treatment, with some awesomely gothy gloom pop, in fact, this collection sounds WAY poppier than the Minimal Wave collection, so much so, that almost all of these bands sound like they should have been right up there with Depeche Mode and the Human League. Needless to say, this is another fantastic comp, with some incredible songs, and already has us hankering for volume 2! Nice thick gatefold sleeve, tons of liner notes, and pix, also comes with a download card. CD coming soon too... ----* ----* Highlights : ----*

Do you like run away drum machines? Dubby echo? Danceable DIY '80s underground electronics? Homebrewed minimal electro pop? The Vox Populi! anthology we made a Record Of The Week last year? All the many cool synthwave reissues on Dark Entries? Then please give THIS your attention, you won't be sorry. The Color Tapes label - later known as Color Discs for the vinyl editions - was the cottage industry of UK art-rock synthesist Gary Ramon, who with the music documented on this collection, sort of comes across like a new wave doppleganger of Cleaners From Venus. And there actually was a split cassette release between Cleaners From Venus and Ramon's band Modern Art (who later morphed into psychrockers Sun Dial) from 1986 or so. Here was a prolific songwriter of coldly sequenced and somewhat quirky minimal wave albums, mostly all of which were released on cassette with a small audience that radiated outward from the coastal village of Waltham, England. He, along with a loose collective, recorded in a handful of interchangeable projects - Modern Art, Mystery Plane, and WeR7 being three with the largest discographies, each with at least a dozen albums recorded in a six to eight year period. The former two projects later warranted vinyl anthologies from Vinyl On Demand; and it seems that the interest in this material blossomed from there. Ramon and his cohorts were a talented bunch, following the rabbit-hole of darkly minded electronica. Think Factory, Sheffield, Industrial Records, Depeche Mode, Soft Cell, and all of those Wire side-projects and you'll be able to triangulate the sound of Color Tapes. There was a knack for the pop-hook and the death-disco backbeat present this material that makes all of this material age very well. The opening track to the comp is from Berserk In The Hayfields, with its clamorous electro-bongo fills girded to a taut techno pulse sounds very prescient of the Belgian EBM scene some five or six years later. Live Of Angels and The Lord were two non-Ramon projects and both peddled in weird-science blorp and effects-happy guitars above spry programming. But the strongest material is through the streamlined step sequences and deft rhythms that showcase Ramon's engineering prowess. The vinyl edition of this is almost all gone and out of print (we only have a few), but please note there are two bonus tracks on the cd not found on the wax.

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SORRY. Volume two in the Lo recordings series (the amazing "United Mutations" was vol. 3). This equally fab comp features strange, adventurous, and largely successful collaborations between Luke Vibert, David Toop, Bedouin Ascent, Scanner, Luger, Funci Porcini, Pere Ubu's David Thomas, and more.

'Collision Course' is an awesome compendium of the confrontational hip-hop/electronica linking Public Enemy and Alec Empire in both militant posturing and penchant for noise. A good portion of the tracks are exclusive to compilation and include some of our favorite damaged beatmongers such as Sensational, Fever, Ice, Anti-Pop Consortium, DJ Scud / Nomex, Patric C, Bomb 20, and more! Compiled by Kevin Martin (Ice, God, Techno Animal, etc.) who is also responsible for the Macro Dub Infection series as well as the amazing Isolationist compilationn from a few years back.

An exciting anthology of clasic cuts from the Disco Fuentes label which was essentially the Motown records of Columbia. Hot and rare dance, soul and salsa tunes from the sixties and seventies will keep you burning that midnight oil for a good long time.

A concept album/compilation, trying to be some kind of co-op Sgt. Pepper's for the current indie-rock generation or something (its success in this endeavor is of course questionable, and some of the bands have certainly not contributed their absolute best

RealAudio clip: One Hand Tore the Side
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"The Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center was the first electronic music center to be established within the U.S. This selection, drawn from those seminal years from 1959 - 1973, is an excellent overview of the wide variations in musical style and aesthetic that was encouraged by the center's guiding spirit Vladimir Ussachevsky." With breathless electronic experiments by Bulent Arel, Charles Doage, Ilhan Mimaroglu, Ingram Marshall, Daria Semegen, and Alice Shields.

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SORRY. All pretty great early 1970s psychedelic rock music from Japan, ranging from the heavy blues (such as the almost-Sabbathy Blues Creation's "Atomic Bombs Away") to folky pop sounds (the lovely Yamauchi Tetsu) and plain weirdness (like Bread & Butter's ridiculous & manic version of "I Wanna Be Your Man"). Includes tracks from obsure hippy wonders like the Flower Travellin' Band, Far East Family Band, Mizutani Kimio, Cosmos Factory, April Fool, Narita Ken, and others, all from mosty not-as-yet-reissued albums. A nice smorgasbord of far-out trippiness to explore!

A great modern Christmas compilation on vinyl featuring a lot of great indie musicians and it's for charity too! Featuring Christmas-themed songs by Rob Crow, Quasi, Wooden Wand, The Music Tapes, Mike Watt, Terry Riley and a host of others. Proceeds got to Homeless Youth Resources, a mighty worthy cause this holiday season. So throw away that warped Bing Crosby record you drag out every year and buy this and help some kids out!

This is the third compilation from plunderphonic label Illegal Art. Where the first compilation ("Deconstructing Beck") featured artists using source material taken entirely from the music of Beck, and the second ("Extracted Celluloid") from film scores, this newest release takes radio and TV commercials to task. Maybe it's the nature of plunderphonia that makes the commercial such prime source material, or maybe it's that the artists on this disk just happened to be more succesful this time around, but this is far and away the best release from this label we've seen yet. Features tracks by Evolution Control Committee, Pimmon, Mr. Meridies, Big City Orchestra and much more.

Auckland, NZ label compilation includes tracks from AQ faves Lovely Midget and Bruce Russell among others.

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SORRY. Defining the Chain Reaction / Basic Channel sound to anyone not familiar with their specialized variant of techno is somewhat of a daunting task. Wholly self-referential. Intelligent in concept and execution, yet its functionality is located entirely within the physical. A perfection combination of Carl Craig's late-nite Detroit techno and Lee Perry production techniques of manipulation equalization and dubbing out tape hiss. With that said, an apt description has been offered unto us for the Chain Reaction sound: 'Heroin House.' Aside from that, this is a collection of some of the best singles to date from Scion, Erosion, Continuous Mode, Substance, Vainqueur, Pelon, Monolake, ridis, and Porter Rick's absolutely monolithic "Port of Transition".

Irony is the name of the game for the Noodles Foundation, the self-appointed "Stupidest Recording Organisation in the World." Judging from the monikers of some of the artists featured (like The Buttmasters and Anal Parade), it's likely that the members of

Why is it that 'tributes' inevitably involve straight-up mimicry and/or wacky genre switcheroos? That's the case with most of the renditions (by predominantly unfamiliar artists) on this Sonic Youth tribute. Fortunately there's a few notables who bring more to the table -- namely Steelpole Bathtub, Elf Power and Saicobab (aka Boredoms' Yoshimi).

MPEG stream: I Dreamed I Dream
MPEG stream: Death Valley '69

You'd have to have been living under a rock for the last year to not know about Konono No1, but for those of you who have been, let's recap shall we? Konono No.1 formed over 20 years ago in Kinshasa (the capital of Zaire) and have been performing their own version of Bazombo trance music, incoporating into their sound, more out of necessity than any avant garde aspirations, home built amps and microphones, hand made instruments, all assembled from old car parts and batteries, pieces of wood and various found bits of scrap material. Performing in the city and thus forced to compete with the din of cars and people and city sound, they built their own PA and speaker system, making their sound much louder but also lending it a buzzing distorted sound that became as much a part of the music as the insturments themselves. The main instrument though, and the one which defines their sound, is an amplified likembe, a sort of thumb piano, which when run through the homemade pickups and ramshackle PA speakers buzz and distort and the melodies end up sounding like some strange sixties psych fuzz guitar. So those distorted melodies atop a wild festive bed of tribal percussion, hand drums, whistles, call and response vocals, it's like African highlife music but infused with all manner of, well like the title suggests BUZZ and RUMBLE. But it would be naive to think a band like Konono No.1 developed in a complete vacuum. And one would assume that the music scene in Kinshasa would at least in some ways be like any place else, with loads of bands, all playing together, swapping members, that sort of thing, and this record demonstrates that for sure. While Konono No.1 ended up being the worldwide ambassadors for the Kinshasa sound, they are most definitely just one of many groups creating an amazingly vibrant scene. In fact some of the groups on Congotronics 2 take some of our favorite parts of Konono's sound and take them even further! All of the bands on Congotronics 2 sound at least similar, employing the same basic song structure and same basic instrumentation. Cyclical repetitive rhythms, bells and hand drums locked in dense pulsing frameworks, loose but definitely the backbone of the music, the vocals are festive and wild, a single voice joined by a chorus. Each track is typically one part, maybe two, repeated and repeated with subtle variations, being as that it is an offspring of trance music, this hypnotic quality definitely defining all of these bands, a buzzing looped joyful noise, the sort of music that makes people want to dance and sway and move, eyes closed, getting lost in the mesmerizing repetition. All of the bands also seem to employ the electric likembe as well to different effect. Sobanza Mimanisia up the distortion, their thumb pianos practically growl, super percussive and blown-out, definitely the heaviest band of the bunch. Whereas the Kasai Allstars employ their likembes as a swirling delicate percussive background, not at all distorted, gentle, liliting and pretty, sounding the most like traditional high life music. The one way in which many of the bands differ from Konono is their use of guitars, the interplay between a distorted thumb piano and a distorted guitar can be beautifully dizzying. While all the bands are different, those differences are subtle enough that this could very well be a record by a single, albeit quite varied band, almost as if Konono No.1 decided to expand and explore a little for record number two. If you loved Congotronics, then this will for sure hit the spot, and actually the more we listen the more we think this might be even better than the first one. Konono No.1 have a SOUND, and that sound is amazing and beautiful and practically perfect, but they truly traffic in trance music, every song a subtle variation of the song before, almost like they have ONE hour long song that just happens to be split into parts, which we love, like most droning repetitive music, if there was a way to have each track last for six hours we would, but by the same token, one has to be in the right frame of mind to bliss out and trance out. So while this collection is still most definitely trancey, it's a bit more varied, with more instrumentation (one group even incorporates accordion!) and thus ends up being a bit more engaging, especially to the casual listener. And as if another disc of buzzing rumbling joyful trance music wasn't enough, there is also a DVD featuring live footage of 6 of the bands, including Konono (so for those of you who missed their recent visit to the US, here's your chance to see what you missed). Each band performs live, surrounded by throngs of families and children, often performing in houses, on street corners, people dancing, smiling, embracing, this is truly happy joyful music. And the footage is amazing, allowing us a glimpse not only of these amazing bands, their individually customized instrumentation, sardine cans, milk crates, springs, lengths of PVC pipe, hubcaps, film canisters, wooden boards, tin cans, thier costumed and face painted dancers, their dramatic introductions to performances, but also a look at the people, and the city, and the houses, and the streets of Kinshasa, and the culture that inspired such an amazing music.

MPEG stream: Kiwembo
MPEG stream: Soif Conjugale
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Holy moly! A handsome, hefty vinyl box set here from Crammed, and crammed it is with vinyl "Congotronics" treats, street jammin' bands from the Kinshasa scene. Here's what's in it exactly: AQ faves Konono No.1's Congotronics lp, the Congotronics 2/Buzz'n'Rumble From The Urb'n'Jungle compilation, Kasai All Stars' In The 7th Moon, The Chief Turned Into A Swimming Fish And Ate The Head Of His Enemy By Magic lp, Staff Benda Bilili's Tres Tres Fort lp, and Konono No.1's latest, Assume Crash Position on double vinyl (none of which we've seen available on wax separately yet except for Congotronics 1), plus a bonus 7" with exclusive tracks from Kansai Allstars, one of which is a collaboration with Akron/Family, believe it or not!! There's also a 12"x12" booklet of photos, and last but not least a special Congotronics 2Gb USB drive, containing nine video clips, as well as mp3s of all the tracks on all five of the albums in the box set! Wow. And all the lps are 180 gram vinyl. You can search elsewhere on our site for Konono if you want to learn more about the "Congotronics" sound and why they're such faves of ours, but we figure this box set is for folks who are already fans! We only have 1 in stock at the moment (of sending out this list), but if you want one, we'll get more next week when this one sells, so go ahead and order away!!

MPEG stream: Lufuala Ndonga
MPEG stream: Masikulu
MPEG stream: Sala Keba
MPEG stream: Moto Moindo
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This *excellent* hip hop comp was put together by Joseph Patel, one of the co-founders of the Solesides label, and also one of the guys responsible for the groundbreaking first volume of the Deep Concentration series released in 1997 that had Cut Chemist on it, plus Latyrx, Prince Paul etc. Patel is well aware of what's happening in our currently wank-heavy world where anyone and everyone claims to be a DJ; the press release reads: "The once spectacular potential of turntablists seems to have devolved into a theater of the mundane: turntable masturbation, scratching for scratching's sake. While DJs on the competitive circuit certainly flash their talents, song trumps sport any day." What he said! So what we have here is eleven quality tracks, most of them certainly qualifying as high points for their makers, as well as being exclusives. El-P (Def Jux / Cannibal Ox) opens the album with a crazily catchy instrumental featuring an ebullient booty-shakin' chord progression plus lots of warm 'n scratchy vinyl crackle. This track is going to make me buy his album. Further on, Anti-Pop Consortium's typically manic case of attention deficit disorder never sounded this great. Peanut Butter Wolf likewise contributes one of the best pieces I've ever heard from the guy, and Freestyle Fellowship's track is hilarious. Other participants include This Kid Named Miles (Breakestra), Omid, Recloose, Chief Xcel of Blackalicious, Z-Trip, legendary "Lessons"-creator Steinski, and more. There's a coupla duds, in my opinion, but all in all I'd say this is one of the best hip hop comps to come out of the underground in a long while.

RealAudio clip: Day After the Day After
RealAudio clip: Crab Lice
RealAudio clip: Vox Apostolica
RealAudio clip: Crazy

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

SORRY. The second compilation of remixes/collaborations/exquisite corpses/whatever from Lo Recordings. Mostly leftfield electronics sprinkled with avant-rock noodlings that feature Stereolab & Hairy Butter, Squarepusher & Richard Thomas, Persona & Warn Defever, Void & Twisted Science. The definite highlight is the gorgeous remix that Four Tet did of Rothko's "Rivers Become Oceans" (which appears to differ from the 12" remix earlier released, with the interlude of our favorite numbers station "Swedish Rhapsody"!).

Consider this to be the Cliff Notes for your Constellation Records class. Yes, this ten-song label sampler offers a glimpse of the varied artists' works previously released on the Montreal label (1997 through 2001). They are Do Make Say Think, Hangedup, Fly Pan Am, A Silver Mt. Zion, Sofa, Re:, Frankie Sparo, 1-Speed Bike, Sackville, and Exhaust. Label devotees, you probably already have all of the original releases from which these tracks came, but for those unfamiliar with the label or with the vibrant Montreal music community that extends far beyond the blanketing shadow of Godspeed You Black Emperor) this might be just the thing to get you hooked.

RealAudio clip: Here Comes The Future
RealAudio clip: The Landlord Is Dead

Two cds at a bargain price, it's death/grind label Relapse's 10 year anniversary "multi-death" compilation. Fifty-one tracks (!), including a handful of previously unreleased ones, from the whole Relapse roster, everyone from Nile to Neurosis, Amorphis to Agoraphobic Nosebleed, Dying Fetus to Dillinger Escape Plan. Certainly a cost-effective way of dabbling in the realms of death.

Originally released in 1967, this is the pinnacle of guitar soli talent from the Takoma label including John Fahey, Robbie Basho, Max Ochs, Bukka White and Harry Taussig. The original cover had a more hippie folk design, but we're glad 4 Men with Beards went for the cooler space age cover art of the 1968 repress, re-imagining the antiquated notion of acoustic guitar as a modern tool of forward thinking progression. John Fahey and Robbie Basho have the longest tracks with exploratory meditations that capture an array of bucolic moods. But the pair of tracks each by little known but highly influential folk figures Max Ochs (brother of Phil) and Harry Taussig create a beautiful flow with stirring slow build ragas and wistful childlike reverie. Poised between the old world and the new, is delta bluesman Bukka White with an amazing blues dirge that ties both sides together. A definitive collection for all Takoma / solo guitar fans!

[ aquarius records catalogue — V ]