Super limited 7" from legendary acid fried, psychedelic garage rock legend Michael Yonkers, whose Microminiature Love record is an all time AQ fave (read about it elsewhere on the AQ site and if you don't already own it, for god's sake BUY IT!!!). This two track 7" features a long lost classic from 1968 as well as a track recorded in 2004.
The A side is "The Big Balloon", featuring the Michael Yonkers Band recorded in 1968 and is a kick ass blast of rock-around-the-clock style classic rock and roll, but slightly skewed and tweaked and off kilter, with weird sounding guitars, Yonkers' distinctive vocals, as well as a super weird vocal / guitar breakdown that turns that classic rock and roll sound into some subtly damaged psychedelic rhythm and blues.
Normally, when faced with a classic song from an artist's peak, and a recently recorded tune, the newer track is typically a concession to the artist so he doesn't feel like no one cares any more, even though they don't, but this 7" is anything but. The B side, if anything is WAY weirder and heavier, featuring Yonkers on all the instruments, it's a slab of fucked up, damaged new wave metallic rock, with super blown out raw and distorted guitars, delivered in dense riffy squalls, over a sputtering drum machine, crazy vocals, this shit is amazing. Some impossible cross between the Residents, Devo and Flipper, but with a seriously new wave bent!! It's a whole lot weirder and more raw than his It's Only Yonkers record released a while back, so we know he's still got it. Here's to hoping there's a whole record of stuff like this just waiting to be unleashed!
Packaged in a super gorgeous silkscreened sleeve and of course, EXTREMELY LIMITED!
We just woke up. It's like 7am and we're pretty sleepy - but tomorrow's "list day" and there's still records to be reviewed... Let's see what effect this Michael Yonkers + GR lp will have on us.... woah! Better'n coffee... these two plug their electric guitars directly into your frontal lobes! With incessant, reverbed, choo-choo train rhythms on rattling percussion to make you get up and go. Alien distortodelic rock n' roll. Yowza.
Or, maybe, we're still asleep... 'cause we've GOTTA be dreaming. Is it really true that outsider underground guitar wranglers Michael Yonkers and Gregory Raimo team up on this lp? Yes indeed they do! Milwaukee's Yonkers is a big AQ fave best beloved for his 1969 proto-punk Microminiature Love album, and continues to kick out the jams 40 years later. Youthful French motorpsychoguitarist Gregory Raimo we also really dig, both in his badass band Gunslingers and for his krauty solo album GR & Full-Blown Expansion. That these two would collaborate actually makes perfect sense. A couple months of trans-Atlantic 4-track tape trading by these two resulted in the 9 songs on this record, that alternate between Yonkers and Raimo compositions, not that you can tell. Each added their own elements to each other's songs, frying 'em even further, as you can imagine when, besides mere guitars, the two are credited with such things as "drumming feedback" and "wall of noise".
We already alluded to the rattling perc, and pedal-mashed muzz of distortion that's ever-present. Perhaps redundantly, GR wrote a song entitled "Distortion, Blow My Mind!". Based on his Gallic ranting amidst gurgling geetar skree, we're of the opinion it already did! Meanwhile, Yonkers sounds as wearily Iggyish as ever on the gunked up garage of "Why Didn't", and kinda old-timey too, on the gospel-blues-punk (?) of "The News". And like that awesome GR&FBX disc, this lp mixes Bo Diddleyisms with hypnotic psych drone.
Whoa. Haven't even had breakfast yet, and we feel like we've already definitely gotten our daily dose and more of slashing distorted guitars and trance inducing rhythmic in the red blowouts. It's gonna be a good day.
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES.
It's funny comparing the two Michael Yonkers related releases we reviewed this list. "Funny" because they couldn't be more different from each other, and yet they both bear the distinct mark of the same man. While the Michael And The Mumbles release features cuts from Yonkers' innocent mid '60s garage days, Bleed Out, a 2004 collaboration with Chicago psych lords Plastic Crimewave Sound, heads into much darker, drugged out terrain. Bleed Out makes good on the monolithic psych jams that most of us aQuarians can't get enough of, and the results are dirty and tough, super rhythmic and charged with a swirling negative energy for maximum results. Much of this record is instrumental, but Yonkers' distinctive wail does surface from the murk now and again, and it fits perfectly with this kind of thing. Even still, it's a bit of a surprise just how heavy things turned out (we certainly aren't complaining!) and this stuff is definitely satisfying our hunger for stoner grooves in the same vein as the Heads, White Hills, and the like. Super recommended!
Man, Michael Yonkers sure has been on a roll as of late. Just a few lists back we had both his collaboration with Plastic Crimewave Sound and a collection of early pre-Microminiature Love recordings with his band the Mumbles. Even after 40+ years of making music, Yonkers still sounds vital, focused, and, to a certain degree, out for blood. At the risk of sounding like a bunch of bastards, we gotta say, this is hardly the kind of music you would expect from a man in his 60s. Though to be fair, his music has never sounded like what you would expect from ANYBODY in a lot of cases. Yonkers has by no means mellowed with age; in fact, his current work is aggressive and in tune with the times and hardly some watered down attempt to cash in on his ever-growing legend. But where so many others would fail, Yonkers pulls through and shows us how and why he has been such a force to be reckoned with since the long delayed reissue of Microminiature Love brought him to the attention of adventurous music fans throughout the globe. At the same time, Cold Town effortlessly puts today's garage rock hopefuls in their place, waaaaaaaaay far behind a master like Yonkers. His music obviously falls into the "rock" category, but there has always been a degree of experimentation and a desire to step beyond what is to be expected. The songs on Cold Town are tuneful yet noisy, catchy but with just the right amount of punkish aggression, and Yonkers' voice sounds pretty much as great and idiosyncratic as it always has. It no doubt helps that he has such a shit-hot band backing him up in the form of previous Yonkers collaborators the Blind Shake, who whip up five Yonkers-free tunes of their own on the second half of the album. The band is tight and heavy with a little bit of skronkiness thrown in, sure to appeal of fans of Rocket From The Crypt and pretty much anything else related to John Reis (including, of course, Hot Snakes, the Sultans, Drive Like Jehu, etc...).
Another welcome surprise from a guy who we just can't get enough of.
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An obscure late-sixties ahead-of-his-time visionary gets his due with this LP reissue. A while back, the Get Hip label released two songs by Michael Yonkers on a 7" and a compilation and that started the buzz. Yonker's stuff was like nothing anyone had heard back then (or even now, really): fucked up garage psych with dementedly genius lyrics and crazy acid-fried guitar. Now Destijl has released the whole LP, that was originally recorded in 1968 but then quickly shelved almost before it had a chance to be heard. Yonkers, a legendary Minneapolis-area figure, built his own effects pedals, cut his Fender Telecaster down to a plank, and played like no one else ever. I'm at a loss of words on how to describe this. It's sort of like a fusion of stripped down Black Sabbath, The Troggs, Pere Ubu, and The Cramps?? Or something like that. Definitely something to check out. Vinyl only.
Underground Minneapolis psych guitar legend Michael Yonkers has been a huge AQ fave ever since his long-lost 1969 album Microminiature Love was rescued from obscurity by the De Stijl and Sub Pop labels. In fact we were very happy to get to meet him when he stopped by the store to say hello one time when he was in town a few years ago. Super nice guy. And it's not just Microminature Love that we love -- the recordings he's released since the (re)discovery of Microminiature Love demonstrate that he's still got it -- IT being a uniquely twisted take on what garage rock should sound like. Utter timeless visionary genius.
Actually, the last thing we listed by Mr. Yonkers, just a few weeks back, was a reissue of another 1969 recording of his, the surprisingly folky Grimwood. Well this cd couldn't be much more different. First of all it's brand new (it came out first on vinyl a few months ago, we've maybe still got one of those LPs but they're otherwise gone), it's a full band recording (Yonkers having hooked up with some hard-hitting youngsters called The Blind Shake), and it's ROCK. Urgent and heavy and distorted. Totally stompin' outsider punk/psych, garage rock from a way fucked up garage. Definitely in the style of Microminiature Love.
Yonkers and The Blind Shake dole out their throbbing, reverb-laden rock in 14 brief blasts (mostly under three minutes, many under two), with song titles to match, often truncated, unfinished queries or statements: "Why Don't", "When Will We", "Don't I Get", "Here's What I'm"... what, what, what, what??? Yonkers' unhinged Iggyish vocals and sinuous squalls of guitar are ultimately the answer. Way cool.
Also look out for Circling The Drain, *another* new Yonkers album, cd version coming soon, vinyl perhaps still around to be found...
AQ fave, garage rock outsider singer/guitarist Michael Yonkers is baaaaack, with another whomping, stomping blast of his uniquely eccentric heavy duty distortodelic grunge, again in the company of relative youngsters, The Blind Shake, a quite suitable backing band for Yonkers at his most electric and energetic. Yonkers himself, as you probably know, is, like, in his 60s. And his magnum opus, Microminiature Love (so recommended!!! plz read our review if you haven't) dates from over 40 years ago. But you'd think it was just yesterday, the way the man kicks out the jams here. No surprise, he's wowed us on several other records in recent years, with The Blind Shake and Plastic Crimewave and GR and solo. So now, wow again. With his homemade geetar howl landing square on your skull, and his elder Iggyish yodel singing strong o'er it all, Yonkers RULES and so does this record, raw and direct, the Blind Shake shakin' it up with gusto behind him, the whole thing a throbbing good time, catchy and noisy and gnarly and blown out, with pounding drums and whooshing wind tunnel guitars n' effects... these songs n' sonics are the stuff that freeks for such bands as The Heads, High Rise, White Hills, and The Stooges should dig. Best punk-psych outing on our list this week fer sure, and would probably qualify as such almost any other week as well!
Includes a killer, updated take on their signature tune, the title track from a few albums back, "Carbohydrate Hydrocarbons", here called "Carbo Hydro".
add to cart [/images/addtocart.gif]/af4105.html Local music journalist and AQ pal Will York finally slaps on a wacky costume and steps up to the mic, releasing a debut solo album that confounds as much as it confuses. An interview, but in the form of a wildly imagined rock opera. Imagine a cross between Lester Bangs, David Fricke, Charlie Rose and early Burzum, and you'll have an idea of the interviewing skills at work here. Imagine a cross between Skullflower, John Fahey, Drop Dead and Merzbow and you'll get some idea of what this interview sounds like. It's that good. It's that heavy. The dialogue between these two individuals is so dense and fucked up. Dark and drone-y and caked in lo-fi tape hiss. Totally incomprehensible, yet completely catchy. Fucking essential.
Two songs that weren't included on Yorke's recent solo debut as well as an extended mix of Harrowdown Hill. The two non-album tracks are a bit more glitchy and dark then anything on the full length. Yorke/Radiohead enthusiasts will want this for sure. Nice late night Yorke treat for our vinyl collections.
The highly anticipated one has arrived, and hasn't disappointed! Not at all unsurprisingly Thom Yorke's solo album sounds more than a good deal like Radiohead. This is made even more so when the fact comes to light that a lot of the backing tracks were composed from recordings done by him and his fellow bandmates over the years. So... somewhat needless to say, yes, fans of Radiohead you will discover much to love about The Eraser. Simply imagine a totally stripped down but no less atmospheric Radiohead. The airiness provides more space for his unmistakable voice to drift about in its characteristic haunting expressiveness. With the vaporous electronics beneath him creating the ideal bed for his voice to soar over. And this is Yorke singing in his most emotive and compelling style minus the whining which was prevalent on lots of the first few Radiohead outings. Highlights include the fourth song "Black Swan" which suggests a nod to CAN and the sixth "Atoms For Peace" which finds Yorke looking forward with open eyes. So good.
We're all big time Radiohead fans, and thus were pretty into RH frontman Thom Yorke's Eraser record, what could very well have been a proper Radiohead record, but instead turned out a more electronic stripped down gem, lush and dark and dreamy, his voice drifting ethereally over all manner of drift and buzz and skitter.
It seemed inevitable that some of the tracks would get remixed, and whattayaknow, soon there was indeed a serious of remix 12"s, and lo and behold, the remixes were almost better than the originals, the lineup of remixers featuring a who's who of aQ faves: Burial, The Bug, FourTet, The Field and more.
It's worth it for the Burial remix alone - murky and dark, the rhythms skittery and mechanical, plenty of distant whir and drone, thick squalls of buzzing dubstep bass. It has us wondering what that second Burial record would have sounded like had Yorke been picked to contribute all the vocals. Pretty amazing we'd guess. And yeah, while we can barely get ourselves to stop playing the Burial remix over and over, the rest of the disc is pretty excellent as well. Surgeon adds a thick glitchy house-y groove, and makes Yorke's mysterious humming the main melodic component. The Bug doesn't go all ragga like we expected, instead taking the 'hit' from that record, adding plenty of record crackle, and a super spare beat, rife with all sorts of old school filigree and lots of heavy crunchy bass. FourTet add all sorts of tribal rhythms, adding soft swoops of backwards melody, and a lush glimmering gauze over the whole song, letting the vocals soar WAY up top over the mix, the instrumental mix reminding us a bit of vintage Tortoise. The Field totally reinvent "Cymbal Rush" chopping it up into a gorgeous Oval like stuttery soft house, dizzying washed out and melodic, total Kompakt bliss, the original barely recognizable unless you know to listen for it, so good. Christian Vogel adds a heavy motorik beat, and a thick backdrop of processed chiming guitars, dipping the vocals in effects, the result very looped and lush and hypnotic. Modeselektor pull their track totally apart and reassemble it into a strange jagged stutterscape, glitchy and skittery, with warm fuzzy bass, super processed vocals, and some seriously twisted arrangements, quickly becoming another favorite mix. The Various remix finds the original chopped and looped, so it almost sounds like the signal is dropping out over and over, creating a woozy moody pulse, the melody fragmented and abstract. And finally, Christian Vogel has another go on the same track he remixed earlier, crafting a whole array of new beats, using just the barest bits of the original song for texture and melody, a killer choppy groove, with little flurries of glitchy skitter, bit for the most part, pretty minimal and hypnotic.
Definitely essential for the Burial mix, and The Field mix, but dig into all of these reimagined versions, and enjoy one of the very few remix records that is the perfect compliment to the original, as well being a fantastic record in its own right, one that just might be better than the original.
Scottish gent James Yorkston writes pretty, earthy, intelligent acoustic songs not unlike those of a rather subdued Robyn Hitchcock. Gently lulling and wistful, he and the Athletes' music is loosely woven from hushed vocals and strummed guitars, embellished by soft swells of piano, strings, and some very minimal percussion. An impressive debut.
Picture yourself in Mali, watching a ceremony unfold in front of you wherein a group of mysterious men dressed in mudcloth robes and jodhpurs gather behind a central figure playing a ngoni (a traditional African stringed instrument that looks and sounds like some stinging, buzzing, droning cross between a banjo, a lute and an oud), while another grinds out a rhythm on a nkerenye (a ridged metal cylinder that is scraped with a small metal rod). The men all carry huge, ancient, crude muskets which they fill with gunpowder by the goathorn-full as they snake through the crowd, firing balls of flaming powder and wadding into the air. The central figure begins to sing and the rest of the men fall in behind him - sometimes repeating lines, sometimes responding with a repeated chorus, sometimes simply adding a shout of praise or acknowledgment. The men are donsos, and they are the traditional hunters of Mali, living on the edge of society, shrouded in mystery, hunting animals and humans alike; the songs they sing are epic tales passed from generation to generation and are meant to inspire and energize the donsos before a hunt.
This is the scene into which the latest release on the Yaala Yaala label drops us, with this record from Yoro Sidibe, a donso who has released around 20 albums over the last 32 years. Like other Yaala Yaala releases, this is a raw and captivating aural snapshot of a world very unlike our own. The music is rough, droning and cyclical; the vocals are fevered, intense and powerful; and the combination of the two is thoroughly mesmerizing. This is a record full of dark and mysterious sounds that are unlikely to appear on a Putamayo compilation, recorded with every pop and distorted moment left untouched. This very likely one of the most hypnotic, evocative, and absolutely breathtaking records you'll find on this week's list. Essential.
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Ruins drummer Yoshida's third very strange solo album -- and when he does a solo album, it's really just him, drums, guitar, keyboard, voices, etc. (AND, he can play it all live, by himself.) This one starts off maybe kind of like This Heat trying to play the Simpsons theme, and just gets weirder.
Cool! A reissue of the long-out-of-print 1991 solo cd debut from Ruins drummer Tatsuya Yoshida, "Magaibutsu" (also the name of his own record label). Yoshida remixed it in 2001, and now there's six bonus tracks appended as well. And when Yoshida makes a solo album, it sure is: he's a one-man-band (literally, he can do most of this stuff live -- with headset microphone, drum kit, keyboard, and a guitar in his lap!) doing crazed compositions that are similar to Ruins fare but even more maniacal. Really. I (Allan) remember buying the original cd when it came out -- at the time I only had one Ruins cd, the magnificent "Stonehenge", and was eager to hear more from that (then) mysterious Japanese avant-rock bass and drums duo. I found "Magaibutsu" somewhere and bought it on the chance that it had something to do with the Ruins (nobody at the place where I bought it knew what it was, but the cover photo collage of, well, ruins, plus the cryptic song titles and Yoshida's at-the-time-unfamiliar-but-definitely-Japanese name made me think it might). When I got it home and put it on, the drums/keys/vocal onslaught of opening track "Joneoik" happily confirmed that it indeed had to be the work of the same crazed musical mastermind behind the Ruins. I was very pleased. And it remains probably one of the most weird and wonderful discs in my collection. Absolutely essential to all Ruins fans, if you don't have this already (or maybe even if you do, 'cause of the bonus tracks, which fit in well but maybe aren't essential in and of themselves), get this! Quirky and hectic songwriting a la Ruins, with of course Yoshida's incredible drumming and nonsensical vocal stylings. Despite the solo format, Yoshida uses a wider variety of instrumental textures than usually appear in Ruins songs -- there's quite a lot of his hockey-rink-sounding organ plinking out maddeningly repetitive and catchy riffs, plus astonishing multitracked vocals, scratchy guitar, and piano ivory tickling. So at points it's sparse and minimal, but at others super-dense and heavy. Magma was still a major influence (and Charles Hayward as well), along with what sounds like some faux-ethnic explorations in the vein of the Sun City Girls (especially notable on "Kasinuc"). Compared to Ruins, this is also more percussive and carnival-esque.
We mentioned this exciting collaborative release in last list's review of the Knead cd, and now we do indeed have a bunch of 'em in stock. Tatsuya Yoshida you know as the drummer for Japan's amazing Ruins, while Keiji Haino has for many years been the dark musical shaman of Tokyo with his out-rock group Fushitsusha. (He's also the cover star of this month's issue of The Wire, by chance.)
Unlike the Ruins + Haino summit known as Knead, "Until Water Grasps Flame" sees our heroes investigating a wider variety of sonic constructions, from spazzy jazz skronk to folkish improv.
Knead, by contrast, was pretty much a full-on noise rock blast a la Fushitsusha. There's some of that here ("At The Instant That One Thinks To Oneself 'No Way', What Percent Is Nostalgia?"), but lots more besides. Like Knead, this is rather more Haino's thing than Yoshida's (you can tell Haino named the songs, not Yoshida!), though fans of the Ruins man won't fail to recognize his stamp on the proceedings as well. But actually the few, more Yoshida-esqe tracks with lotsa drum clatter and jagged guitar found here aren't our faves anyway. What we're really digging about this disc are the songs that get into a weird zone of shimmering drone, sparse and ambient, using an array of intriguing ethnic instrumentation. It's dark improvised folk psychedelia that almost sounds like it belongs on the Kemialliest Ystavat disc reviewed elsewhere this list, until out of Yoshida's rolling percussion ambience emerges Haino's unmistakable anguished vocals.
Several of us here at AQ have been on what you might term a "Keiji Haino kick" of late, digging out our old PSF and Tokuma cds and re-acquainting our ears with his unique, deeply felt sounds. Sometimes harsh, sometimes gentle, always dark, emotive, and beautiful. The appearance of this cd has been but one of the many things to trigger our personal Haino renaissance. Perhaps hearing it will instill in you the same excitement. And Yoshida is of course another long-time AQ favorite, so it's cool that he and Haino have finally gotten together for these two full-length collaborations (this one, and Knead).
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Another literal warehouse find, from the same place where we found the (now all gone) Leningrad Blues Machine cds listed last time, and it's another one for you Japanophiles, being a compilation released in 1994 of tracks by various and sundry bands that Ruins mastermind drummer/vocalist Tatsuya Yoshida had played in, up 'til then. Since Yoshida was (& still is!) such a crucial part of the Japanese psych/prog/noise underground, the list of bands is kinda nuts. Here's the entire lineup: Ruins, YBO2, Dissecting Table, High Rise, ZOA, Torture Garden (John Zorn's Japanese version of Naked City, also featuring Eye Yamatsuka), Gerogerigegege, Vasilisk, Malinconia, Phaidia, Aburadako, Tairikuotoko vs. Sanmyakuonna, Koenjihyakkei, Zeni Geva, and one more we couldn't figure out the English name of, plus two solo tracks by Yoshida in one-man-band mode (including the very first track, home-recorded by Yoshida way back in '83). Wow. So as well as being a Yoshida collection, it's also pretty good sampler of the Japanese underground circa '83-'93.
Obviously, in many cases, these weren't all HIS projects, the way Ruins are. Yoshida's just such an amazing drummer, that lots of bands wanted him to play with them - even the infamous masturbating Gerogerigegege! Yoshida's mock-operatic vocal stylings also come into play upon occasion (and he plays bass in one band, instead of drums). Although as you might expect, technical prog stuff is a big element of this, the range of styles is surprising, and hard to define, it includes avant-punk, gothic cabaret music, screaming hardcore skronk, industrial noise, garage doom-psych, chaotic RIO funk, and alt-alt-alt-J-pop... We're pretty sure almost all the tracks are exclusive to this comp, almost all of 'em recorded live, not taken from albums. In many cases, they may be the only recorded documentation of Yoshida playing with a particular unit. The songs we did recognize (whether live or the actual studio versions) are all from pretty rare discs anyways. And of course this out of print cd itself is rare too. We checked online, and there's places selling used copies for around $50!! So, Ruins/Yoshida/Japanese music nerds, you'd best act fast! We only found a few... And yes, we'll keep digging at that warehouse and see what else interestin' we might get lucky and discover.
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The second improvisatory collaboration between these two, Yoshida being the drummer of Ruins, and Ron the guitarist for Oakland's Molecules.
Anticipation was high for this collaboration between Yoshimi (Boredoms, OOIOO, Flaming Lips guest) and Yuka Honda (Cibo Matto)... But unfortunately this turned out to be pretty much a total throwaway of a record, this sounds like Yuka and Yoshimi got set loose in an instrument store and just futzed around with the toys, like, y'know, playing the piano with two fingers and trying out the mikes, etc. With absolutely no actual songs to speak of, it's sometimes atmospheric and pretty, at times reaching towards Miles Davis style quiet cool, but no amount of sampled bird calls can make up for how tossed-off this album sounds. A complete disappointment, especially considering how much we like and respect their other work with their other projects, and a little insulting that they expect us to pay money for this album because it doesn't sound like they put any actual work into it.
MPEG Download: "La Donna Ni Demo Des Kinna" [/audio/yoshimiyuka.mp3]
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SKWEEE!!!!
Ok, we figured it was about time we made YOU the Record Of The Week, after all, you've been such a loyal customer for such a long time, haven't you, so it seems like it would be a nice gesture...hahaha. No, the band is called You, and they're our latest krautrock love affair. When we got an advance copy of this disc a few weeks ago, we were immediately intrigued, just by the awesome cover art (is that a cosmic tuning fork?), brilliant basic band name, and also by the band photo (long haired guy in shades, new wavey dude in even bigger shades, stoned looking guy with 'stache) that struck us as looking so much like a hip new band from here and now (like, say, the Jonas Reinhardt fellas, with a Ripley from Wooden Shjips clone in there too) but upon closer inspection, we found it was indeed a reissue, brought to us by the excellent German label Bureau-B, known for their krautrock archaeology (Cluster/Moebius/Roedelius stuff especially) as well as for putting out newer albums from the scene, including the latest Kreidler.
Originally released in 1979, Electric Day was the first album from You (their other one, 1983's Time Code, has also been reissued, and is really just about as great, you'll find it highlighted elsewhere on this list - we came close to making 'em both Records Of The Week). On Electric Day, You consisted of synth mavens Udo Hanten and Albin Meskes along with guitarist Uli Weber and, on drums, under the alias Lhan Gopal for some reason, Harald Grosskopf (a name you might know if only 'cause his own, concurrently recorded Synthesist album was recently reissued on vinyl and highlighted here not long ago). Grosskopf had played drums with Klaus Schulze, and was in Manuel Gottsching's Ashra band at the time. Producer Conny Plank hooked him up with Hanten and Meskes, and we can hear here that they all got along famously, being "Berlin School" mates as it were.
Together on You's debut, this cosmic quartet unleashed much glorious spaced out, spooked out, futuro-zone synth shiver, with psych guitar tripping, electronic pulsations, and Grosskopf's tight percussion, no pussyfooting about it! Seriously, they really do sound quite a bit like Jonas Reinhardt (or rather, the other way around), and could also easily have been the template for a lot of other current bands we love doing the kosmic kraut/John Carpenter-y electronic rock thing, like Zombi, Majeure and Maserati, most definitely! So it's not just for completist krautrock collector types that we recommend this album, nope. And did you catch our Fripp/Eno reference? Others to cite in the "recommended if you like" realm: Heldon, Cloudland Canyon, Michael Rother, Sensations Fix, Moebius & Beerbohm, the previously mentioned Ashra, etc.
All instrumental ('cause in space no one can hear you scream), You's Electric Day begins with the title track, a busy burbling rhythm soon washed over with waves and waves of electronics, while remaining upbeat and snazzily sizzling. The 2nd track, the moodier "Magooba", gets darker and more intense, letting rip with zips and zaps and plenty of freaky guitar. Then the focus shifts back to the shuffling machine rhythms on "Son Of A True Star". That's followed by the two-part "Sequential Spectrums" which sees You setting the controls for deep dark outer space, drifting in shimmering, fizzing electronic ambience, having a bit of a Tangerine Dream, before the almost twelve minute long "Slow Go", the original album's penultimate track, kinda sums up all that came before into one epic journey, the beats tingling propulsively, waves of synth-sound building and building, in one big ecstatic celebration of "this kind of thing" for sure. But don't get too smiley and relaxed, 'cause You have a nervous-making finale in store, the jumpy, uber-distorted "Zero-Eighty-Four" being an active, sinister, suspenseful closer to the album proper...nice! And then, if you get the cd, that's followed by 4 bonus tracks (not on the vinyl, which is 180 gram however), totalling another 33 minutes of music! "E-Night" is blissful, but ultimately pretty heavy. "H.Rays Identity" features some strange sampled chanting amidst its electronic excess, while "Hallucination Engine" is sorta proto-ambient techno. And then "Yousless" sounds like it was written by/for R2D2 the Star Wars droid! All are quite worthwhile, and the whole disc is super solid stuff, making us wonder why we'd never heard about You before (that's why we love this job, the buried treasure out there seems endless, wow). This has gotta be the best unknown-to-us krautrock reissue since Riechmann's Wunderbar (also from Bureau B), at least.
There's really no other way for us to wind up this review other than saying, You rule!!
Bureau B reissued the first two albums by Berlin School synth groop You a couple years ago - 1979's Electric Day and 1983's Time Code - amazing artifacts of late period electronic krautrock, previously unknown to us, that we, and a lot of you, loved. We made Electric Day a Record Of The Week, in fact. Now Bureau B has gotten around to reissuing You's fourth album, Laserscape, from 1986 (skipping over 1984's Wonders From The Genetic Factory, but maybe they'll eventually do that one too).
The title doesn't lie - this music was in fact all recorded as the soundtrack to the large-scale, open air "laser performances" of an artist named Horst Baumann, events that we can only imagine were like a bigger version (with better music) of one of those trippy planetarium laser light shows - like the late lamented Laserium shows once held at the California Academy Of Sciences here in SF's Golden Gate Park (http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/S-F-Planetarium-Laser-Show-To-Fade-Into-2742326.php).
You's music for Baumann's Laserscape is suitably spectacular, spacey, dark, and droney. There's a lot of variety, though, in mood and flavor. There's synthetic beats on "Can You Tell Where I Am", a propulsive track that's totally something Emeralds or Umberto or Life Coach or Jonas Reinhardt or Steve Moore would be very happy with if they'd recorded. Elsewhere, You's cosmic electronics are accompanied by chamber string sounds, and even beautifully shredding classical guitar. There's Eastern-sounding moments, powerful cinematic build-ups, eerie drifty passages, and on "Travelling Hologram" a recurring choral "Ah-ah-ah" part that combines with the increasingly hectic and quirky rhythmic construction of the track to kinda remind us of, like, a computerized Magma, in a weird way. Very cool. Other tracks, more blissed out and melodic, remind us of the non-lame New Age music of Iasos. Man, we wish we could experience this with the laser visuals. But still it's good listening on its own, and you can close your eyes and try to imagine...
Perhaps needless to say, if you are already into those first two You albums, you'll dig this. It's decidedly darker, though, than Time Code, it feels to us. More of an ominous, Blade Runner vibe, as others have noted. Once again, thanks, Bureau B! (And please note, the cd version includes a 21+ minute live bonus track not on the vinyl.)
Ok, we'll assume you already just read our Record Of The Week review of You's newly reissued Electric Day album. That was this instrumental "Berlin School" of krautrock band's 1979 debut, followed up further into the Eighties by Time Code from '83. Great stuff, we like this one a lot too, you should get 'em both. And we're not just excited about these 'cause we're keen on obscure krautrock reissues (though we are). If You were a new band we'd be all over 'em too! And they really could be mistaken for a new, current band, as we alluded to in our Electric Day review. Where that one really really sounded like local fave SF synth groovers (and krautrock enthusiasts, of course) Jonas Reinhardt in their propulsive live formation, this one is even more electronic and atmospheric, some moments more like Oneothrix Point Never, Emeralds, and Arp, to cite some other modern comparisons. That's 'cause by '83, You had parted ways with guitarist Uli Weber and drummer Harald Grosskopf, and slimmed down to the founding synths and sequencers core duo of Udo Hanten and Albin Meskes. So it's even a bit more retro-futuristically Eighties computery/mechanical, with percolating robot rhythms and shimmering synths and some extra sci-fi bleepage... but, it's really not all THAT different than their earlier incarnation, Hanten and Meske's machines doing a fine job of filling in for the humans no longer in the band. There's nine tracks here (or 11 if you get the compact disc, it's got two excellent bonus cuts, about an extra 10 minutes), nicely varied, some songs more pretty and placid, others droning further into deep space than before. They can be quite melodic, for instance "Future/Past" is one of those lovely lovelies that makes us think of our favorite Cluster jams (with sequencer patterns calculated to send you into a blissed out trance, getting into proto-Aphex Twin territory). And then they also bring the John Carpenter style suspense film disco grooves on the likes of "Live Line", too. So, like Electric Day, super recommended!
You will like You, if you are at all like us.
A band that uses the X-Acto blade as much as the guitar, You Fantastic extends the musique concrete / punk fusions of This Heat. This Chicago trio melds mutant hardcore (which is not hard to imagine as You Fantastic member Darin Grey was in Dazzling Killmen when they were functioning), trumpet freakouts, and self-referential explications of the recording process of this album. Also for fans of Village of Savoonga. One of the best records to come out of Chicago in a very long time!
What a great band name! Are they named after the Hammers Of Misfortune song? We're pretty darn sure they are. And it's a fairly appropriate name too for this new release from Campbell Kneale's (Birchville Cat Motel) 'metal' label Battlecruiser. Imagine the mightiest, heaviest intro riff from the best NWOBHM song you've ever heard. Okay then repeat. And repeat again. And again. Now play that riff for 15 minutes straight. YES!!! TOTAL STEVE REICH DRONE METAL MESMER! Okay, so at about 13 minutes, introduce a crazy drum machine fill, all spastic toms and double kick, now repeat that loop. Over and over and over. Making the whole thing even weirder and off kilter, and somehow strangely more hypnotic. SUPER LIMITED. We only got 15 and will not be able to get more.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
One of a whole batch of new releases from UK psych label Cardinal Fuzz, this is the first we've heard from You're Smiling Now But We'll All Turn Into Demons, or Demons for short, a double lp reissue of a 2009 cd, a sprawling collection of fuzzed out hard-psych swagger, big fuzzed out riffs, wild drumming, laid back box, and of course plenty of swirling psychedelic shred. Unlike a lot of groups doing the whole space psych sound these days, Demons are less about spaced out drift and more about the ROCK. Think Blue Cheer or the Heads, a little Black Sabbath for sure, chugging, churning, riffy crunch, but still laced with plenty of psychedelic trip out, with some songs slipping into catchier almost groovy psych pop ("Nervous - Alive"), others getting downright grungy "2009"), and others still sounding near metallic and stonery and doomy (check out "Alpha And Omega").
Wah wah guitars galore, swirling FX, some Spacemen 3 like druggy drift, all wrapped around tranced out riffage, motorik hard rock drumming, and set amidst some short pop gems, as well as some epic wasted, drug doom stoner creep mega-jams ("Prismatic Reflections"). WAY recommended for all you retro-space-psych-hard-rock headz... but some reason we're one of the only stores in the US carrying Cardinal Fuzz stuff, and this stuff goes crazy quick, so grab one before they're gone.
LIMITED TO 350 COPIES!! Housed in a full color jacket with a printed insert, and NO download.
Okay, we admit that we cringed slightly at their chosen band name (again, what is it with Canadian -- or more specifically Vancouver -- band name choices?!), but their glorious pop tunes are pretty darn hard to resist. Really, unless you're a complete stone-hearted curmudgeon, Young & Sexy's second full length will have your spirits lifted in no time! Each song has been lovingly polished to a wonderful warm glow with delicious multi-part harmonies and lush instrumentation. The third song "Herculean Bellboy" is a definite highlight. Come to think of it, have ya noticed Canada's stronghold on the swoonsome pop these days?! AQ superfaves New Pornographers, Destroyer, Broken Social Scene, P:Ano, The Gay, Metric... and now Young & Sexy! You may have been lucky enough to see them on tour recently opening for their Mint Records brethren and fellow Vancouverites the New Pornographers. And actually, they're sort of like the mellow side of the NPs and Zumpano melded with the honeydrop girl group vocal sweetness of UK bands such as Broadcast, Belle & Sebastian or Camera Obscura. We sell at least one of these each time it's played in the store!
Young & Sexy's debut album is markedly more eclectic than their second full length -- the current AQ recommended delight known as Life Through One Speaker -- and it aligns them more with many of the deeply Beatles inspired Elephant 6 Collective bands (Olivia Tremor Control, Ladybug Transistor, Beulah) as well as fellow Vancouverite Destroyer. Speaking of which, does it seem like bands from that city wear their hometown pride more prominently than others? We think so! Well, Young & Sexy are no exception. They make a number of sonic and lyrical references to their hometown in songs such as "The City You Live In Is Ugly". And they can't seem to stop themselves from including their band name in their lyrics (they've done so on both of their albums thus far). This time it's on the second song "Chikubi" which in itself is a funky oddity amid the rest of the lush, smart pop tunes! That said, this album is a luminous willowy pleasure, sure to cause much pop swooning. Recommended.
Prepare yourself, this could get kind of META. So Joe Pernice, looooongtime aQ fave (Scud Mountain Boys, Pernice Brothers, Big Tobacco, Chappaquiddick Skyline, etc.) will be publishing his first novel this year. In that novel, the narrator is in a band called The Young Accuser, THIS band. After the FICTIONAL narrator, leaves this, his FICTIONAL BAND, they record a FICTIONAL song and send it to the NON-FICTIONAL Sub Pop label. And like they say on the Sub Pop website: "This is the non-fiction version of that fictional single". Phew.
So basically, Joe Pernice and some pals cooked up this 3 song 7", ostensibly a record by the band from his novel, and heck, it's really awesome, BUT, not like anything you might expect from Mr. Pernice. The Young Accuser sound straight out of the eighties, a fuzzy power pop college rock, that reminds us of the Replacements, the Mice, and Guided By Voices BIG TIME. Super lo-fi production, distorted vocals (which are often a dead ringer for Bob Pollard), blown out bass, wild drumming way down in the mix, and some bad ass HOOKS, total rad eighties classic power pop indie rock. The B side is a bit more snarly, and even more lo-fi, culminating in the brief slip of a final song, the only track here that really sounds Pernice-y, with strummed clean electrinc guitar, Pernice's high plaintive croon, a gorgeous lo-fi ballad not that dissimilar to those Replacements tracks that were always tucked amidst the more rocking jams, "Answering Machine", "Skyway" and the like.
Cool stuff, with a totally bad ass vintage Sub Pop singles club sleeve. ----* ----* Compilations : ----*
Late 2003's Life Through One Speaker, the last album from this Vancouver pop combo was graced with one of Cup's favoritest songs of the year ("Herculean Bellboy" -- sooo good!), While we can't say yet if any of the songs on Panic When You Find It have reached that pinnacle of soaring pop splendidness, we can say that the album's still filled with plenty of well-crafted dreaminess to charm and sooth even the most frayed of nerves and the hardest of hearts. The band has gone through some line-up changes recently, but its core members singer Lucy Brain and main songwriter / guitarist Paul Pittman have ensured a smooth transition. For one thing, their characteristically strong interplay between heart-swelling boy / girl vocal harmonies and sparkling picked guitar lines remains fully intact. Unlike their past recordings though which took more meandering, restless routes, Panic When You Find It seems to calmly funnel all of their various influences together into a more singular, direct path. As a result, it is perhaps their most even-keeled and self-assured work to date. Lovely.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Young Bleed is one of rap-empire-builder Master P's many proteges, and possibly the best. Heavily layered, sing-song rap kind of in the Bone Thugs/Crucial Conflict style, with lots of amazing grunting and sampling (harpsichord, banjo...). Addictive.
At last a follow-up to one of our favorite rap albums of 1998. No longer on No Limit though, so Young Bleed has to do without the trademark "Unghh"'s of Master P. But his trademark southern drawl and his bayou backdrops of banjo, old piano, and swampy atmosphere
are in full effect.
Punk rockers Fucked Up were ultimately essentially a pop band, so it's no surprise that the various FU offshoots tend WAY toward the pop end of the sonic spectrum, as is the case with Young Governor, aka Ben Cook, who also plays in the Bitters (reviewed on a past aQ list), and who in Young Governor, lets his pop flag fly, big time, channelling classic Yellow Pills style power pop, think the Raspberries, Cheap Trick, Dwight Twilley Band, big jangly chords, soaring keening vox, huge hooks, big choruses, the production lo-fi and blown out, everything in-the-red, definitely reminds us of the retro-pop of Matthew Melton / Bare Wires, or like a way more lo-fi punk rock Tinted Windows. The B side slows things down a bit and dials back the crunch a little, adding sax and piano and getting almost ballady at points, but for the most part, all the tracks here sound like the could have been transported from the mid seventies, or dug up on some obscure power pop comp, which is most definitely a very good thing!
It's getting harder and harder to sort the "ironic rock" from the "non-ironic rock" as more and more of the swaggering stuff struts through the door of Aquarius every day. Whats the real rock deal and what's the joke band with seventies thrift store clothes? Does it even matter? Not really, if it rocks, right? Latest contender for the rock n roll reality check is Matador/XL signing Young Heart Attack from Austin Texas. There are, like, seven guys and gals in the band! Gives groupies some choice I suppose. They sure sound like a party band all right. Definitely trying to rip off AC/DC, though they sound more like they're ripping off Kix, but as if they've never actually heard Kix, only The Darkness (who are big YHA fans apparently). With Debbie Harry doing backing vocals. Now...is this a good thing or a bad thing? I kinda liked it. One weakness is that, unlike The Darkness, they don't really write super memorable, catchy songs...it's more about the attitude and the ingredients, the in-your-face, hey-we're-rockin' kinda vibe, not anything more lasting than that. And that's fine, while the record's playing. Plus they do seem like they'd be great live...catch 'em on tour with Peaches!
Young Marble Giants' true minimal masterpiece, Colossal Youth, receives yet another reissue. Whatta cause for celebration -- this is absolutely essential listening (and Cup and Windy don't use that word lightly, mind you)! This British trio's existence was ever so fleeting, and they only had one proper album, but what a leftfield classic it is. It sounds *totally unique*, like nothing before, and has made a huge impact in the many years since it was originally released in 1980. Seriously -- this is one of those classic albums that not only has influenced tons of musicians (Hole even covered "Credit in the Straight World", but don't hold that against YMG!) but is also great listening in and of itself. It ranks up there with, like, The Velvet's first record, Neu!, the Raincoats, Pere Ubu's Modern Dance, etc etc.
A very hushed, metronome-sounding drum machine ticks out the tireless beat of each song like a friendly clock, and its neutral tone is also reflected in Alison Statton's girlish, earnest, not always pitch-perfect vocals as well as in the muted string strum of Stuart Moxham's electric guitar. Spartan, angular strikes from the same guitar punctuate this steady atmosphere as a frail organ does its wheezing, bleeting melodic best and Philip Moxham's rubbery bass line hesitantly bends and bounds. Minimal and no-frills, yes, but somehow there's so much more going on, and so much more expressed than its quietness belies. The songs are tiny and simple and total perfection. Powerful and totally f**king timeless and yes, very highly recommended.
(We believe this just might be the fourth edition. In the past, each time it's been pressed the track listing has increased, but not so with this Play It Again Sam America pressing. The song count remains at twenty five. Might be that there simply aren't any more recordings left in the vault to plunder. Not that we're complaining, we just wish a label would once and for all release it and be able to keep it available forever and ever and ever! Hopefully PIAS America is that label. Heck, we're truly fortunate to have as much YMG music as we do!)
Young Marble Giants' minimal masterpiece, Colossal Youth, receives yet another reissue (the fifth or sixth to date)! This one is extra super special because it's a three cd set which compiles ALL of their previously released music! So you not only get the fifteen songs that make up the Colossal Youth album, but also a five song Peel Session from 1980, six songs from their 1981 Testcard EP, three from the Final Day single, sixteen from their 2000 Salad Days album, and their first ever recorded appearance titled "Ode To Booker T" from the 1979 compilation Is The War Over?.
Needless to say, it's a cause for celebration! Absolutely essential listening. This UK trio's existence was ever so fleeting, and they only had one proper album, but what a leftfield classic it is. It sounds *totally unique*, like nothing before and pretty much nothing since. Amid the aggression and edginess of the post-punk movement, YMG emerged as a remarkably stark, understated and utterly engaging wonder. It has made an enormous impact in the many years since its original release in 1980. Seriously, this is one of those classic albums that has influenced tons of musicians (Hole even covered "Credit in the Straight World", but don't hold that against YMG!). It ranks up there with, like, The Velvet Underground's first record, Neu!, the Raincoats, Pere Ubu's Modern Dance, etc., etc.
Their music's simplicity is deceptive. A very hushed, metronome-sounding drum machine ticks out the tireless beat of each song like a friendly clock, and its neutral tone is also reflected in Alison Statton's girlish, earnest, not always pitch-perfect vocals as well as in the muted string strum of Stuart Moxham's electric guitar. Spartan, angular strikes from the same guitar punctuate this steady atmosphere as a frail organ does its wheezing, bleating melodic best and Philip Moxham's rubbery bass line hesitantly bends and bounds. Minimal and no-frills, yes, but somehow there's so much more going on, and so much more expressed than its quietness belies. The songs are tiny and simple and total perfection. Powerful and totally f**king timeless and yes, very highly recommended.
As we mentioned above, we believe this just might be the fifth or sixth edition, and we hope that it's kept available forever and ever and ever!
This live cd documents two Young Marble Giants' performances at the New York City venue The Hurrah way back in November, 1980. If that sounds familiar to all of you YMG fanatics, well, it's because this is basically the audio tracks from the dvd of the same name. Since the band was only in existence for a mere two years, and hence has a pretty short song repertoire there aren't really any surprises setlist-wise (nor any marked performance variances in the songs themselves), but of course who needs extra bells and whistles with songs this good? All the minimal pop greats are here: "Searching For Mr. Right", "Brand New Life", "Wurlitzer Jukebox", "Include Me Out", "Music For Evenings", "Credit In The Straight World"... Hell, yeah! Truly for diehard YMG completists.
What a treat, and 21 years after the fact, too! In the ensuing years since Young Marble Giants made their masterpiece "Colossal Youth", they've become cult favorites beloved by music fans of all stripes and styles (close to home, Windy, Owen of Casiotone for the Painfully Alone and Cup of I Am Spoonbender are big big fans). "Salad Days", recorded in 1979, is a perfect example of a 'home recording' done right. Featuring different versions of 11 songs from "Colossal Youth" PLUS four others, "Salad Days" preserves the immediacy and personalities evident in this performance of the group at such an early stage. It's easy to envision Stuart, Philip, and Alison huddled together on a worn couch playing such gems as "Brand New Life" or "N.I.T.A.". Alison's voice, especially, sounds like she's RIGHT THERE sitting next to you. This is a record you wish would never end.
A brand new solo incarnation from San Francisco based multi-instrumentalist Trevor Montgomery (Lazarus, Tarentel, The Drift), Young Moon evokes the romantic and wistful jangle pop of early eighties groups such as Durutti Column, The Lilac Time and Autumn Fair. Far from the downer croon of Lazarus, Montgomery employs a hazy autumnal shimmer of synths and guitars with vocal treatments pushed back in the mix in songs that explore love's gains as well as losses. At times Montgomery's vocals evoke early Springsteen with some obscure C86 band backing him, but this album is more than a culmination of influences and moods. It's a genuinely heartfelt and sincere approach to music making with some of Montgomery's best songwriting to date. A beautiful record to wake up to as our warm summers make way for the chill of the fall.
With their last record, "War Prayers" Young People showed that they were really coming into their own and moving beyond their obvious influences. With this new release they take an even greater leap forward. Stripping down their sound considerably and making a totally raw and engulfing album that injects a minimalist aesthetic into their pop songs with amazing results. By taking away some of the layers and some of their overly sprawling emotions of past outings, they have really found their sound, narrowing their target and hitting it dead on. Like Young Marble Giants or the hard to track down in the States No Sound Is Heard album by the UK group Klang, Young People have made a set of songs that might sound sparse on first listen but have so much richness hidden away inside. Any hints of their somewhat twangy past have been sublimated into their new more subtle sound and we are so loving where they've moved to. Sometimes less is so much more.
