[ aquarius records — Compilation Split ]

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Showing results 2151 through 2200 of 3832.

The third compilation of eclectic electronica and noirish post-rock, conceptually linked as all are productions to films that never existed (definitely taking cues from Brian Eno and Barry Adamson). Artists include Rothko, Freeform, Susuma Yokota, Rob Ellis (Spleen, PJ Harvey), 310, Bass Communion, and more!

Back in February 2005, the eccentric, Anticon hip-hop outfit Subtle was on Interstate 80 in Iowa while touring the mid-west, when their van hit black ice and flipped over several times. The band members emerged from the wreckage bruised but unharmed, except for one: Dax Pierson had broken his neck. Since then, Dax has undergone extensive physical therapy; and while his insurance has covered his medical expenses (hooray for small businesses who give their employees health benefits!), there's plenty which his health insurance does not cover. As a result, there has been an international campaign to aid in Dax's recovery. Dax is a man who has touched many people's lives, inspiring them not only with his incredible musical talents but also with his generosity and jovial nature. For those who have lived in the Bay Area, tribute concerts for Dax have been occurring regularly throughout the spring and summer of 2005 often spear-headed by Anticon itself but also by many of the Dax's co-workers at Amoeba Records in Berkeley; and this compilation continues in these efforts. Curated by Amoeba's Andy Way and Jim Kaiser, the Irreplaceable Hand may speak more to their affinity for the oddball things that float through their experimental section, but this nonetheless speaks to the numerous people whose hearts have opened for Dax. Nurse With Wound, Matmos, Odd Nosdam, irr. app. (ext.), High Volture (aka Bruce Anderson of MX-80), Moe! Staiano, and Petit Mal are some of those who have contributed to the Irreplaceable Hand. A.C. Way opens the album with a track of nightmarish ambience with Lustmordian overtones and a persistently unnerving squiggle. High Volture quickly changes gears with a splatter of post-Derek Bailey improv. The always impressive irr. app. (ext.) offers a piece of bowed metal dissonance and drone bristling with post-surrealist aural fragments. Matmos' quirky collage of re-engineered vocal samples and Moe! Staiano's all-fists on the organ keyboard stand out as moments of comic relief against the rather dark atmosphere that this comp. As one could image, the highlight of the album is the Nurse With Wound track, as Stapleton moves from ominous drones similar to those heard on the Angry Eelectric Finger sessions and slowly introduces a pretty groovy breakbeat, perhaps an indication of how a NWW hip-hop record might sound. Of course we can't resist mentioning that there's of picture of Dax shot by Matt Waldron of irr. app. (ext.) while the two where shopping here at Aquarius! For information about Dax and his progress, please check out www.daxpierson.com.

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Another electronic music compilation featuring the usual suspects (and hometown favorites) Kid 606 and Lesser, plus Christoph de Babalon, Pisstank, Knifehandchop, and a dozen others. A loud, abrasive, and, well, *irritating* (like the label proudly proclaims)

RealAudio clip: What?Subjunctification?
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With a Designer's Republic deconstruction of archetectural symbols and texts as the cover art, this compilation has all of the trappings of looking like it should be on Warp. Musically, the aesthetics of the American label Schematic do not stray very far from the triumverate of the UK intelligensia of electronica: Warp, Skam, and Rephlex. 70's sci-fi / horror score ambience, post-electro breakbeats, and the non-household name factor of Phoenicia, Push Button Objects (who did just have a single for Skam), Richard Devine, Gliese, Metic, and David Kristian make this compilation quite an attractive collection.

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SORRY. First of three internal remix eps of Schematic artists by Schematic artists. While comparisons to Autechre's fractured electro crunch are inevitable, Freeform, Richie Devine, Takeshi Muto, and Phonecia add noirish horns to digital skitter, along with occasional 4/4 stomps, and odd reconstructed future jazz that could have originally found their way onto Herbie Hancock's Sextant.

**MISSISSIPPI RECORDS ALERT** **MISSISSIPPI RECORDS ALERT** **MISSISSIPPI RECORDS ALERT** It seems like most Mississippi Records obsessives are also fans of the Sun City Girls' Sublime Frequencies label, which makes perfect sense, they both seem to have a somewhat similar aesthetic, both focus on unheard gems, and curate some of the best compilations we've ever heard. Mississippi tends to focus on blues and country and gospel, while Sublime Frequencies looks further out, focusing on world music from Africa and Asia and beyond, but this record right here, the latest on Mississippi, might be the perfect Sublime Frequencies / Mississippi crossover, in fact, listening to this now, it's hard to believe it's not actually on Sublime Frequencies. A fantastic collection of recordings of guitar music from West Africa (Senegal and Mali) focusing on various bands who are essentially unknown outside of Africa, but are quite popular in their villages, and are called upon often to play parties, celebrations, political events, their sound most likely immediately recognizable to fans of Group Bombino, Tinariwen and Group Inerane, which we'd imagine most aQ customers are. That sound is a totally distinctive African folk music, captured live in various settings, houses, backyards, town squares, parties, you can hear people talking, birds chirping, kids laughing, random conversations, it all just adds to the sound, warm and inviting, emotional and so melodic, heavy on the acoustic guitars, lots of handclaps and foot stomps, the guitar playing is quite percussive too, a sort of low slung twang flecked desert blues, alternatingly moody and melancholy, effusive and festive, sometimes the sounds are distinctly Western, other times they're reminiscent of traditional African music, more often they're a hybrid of the two. Most of the groups here are made up of just acoustic guitars and vocals, but the sounds and songs they create are so lush and layered, so fantastically evocative, and just so totally beautiful. Fans of all things Sublime Frequencies and Mississippi will definitely dig this, and it's absolutely essential listening for folks who love those Sublime Frequencies' Guitars From Agadez records... The packaging is fantastic, super thick full color jacket, with a massive full color booklet, featuring tons of photos and liner notes, as well as plenty of history of the region and the musicians.

Never been much for poetry, but this one was tough to resist. First you've got a big ol' book of poetry, most of it actually quite good, from young American poets, and all about love, as the title and subtitle suggest. Very few names were familiar, David Berman of the Silver Jews and Jeff Tweedy being the only two we immediately recognized, but then again we're not exactly plugged into the poetry scene, hip and young or otherwise. So besides a pretty cool book of poetry you've got a cd with exclusive tracks from VIC CHESNUTT, COCOROSIE, DOUNG MARTSCH (Bulit To Spill), MAGNOLIA ELECTRIC COMPANY (Songs:Ohia), NINA NASTASIA, RICHARD BUCKNER, RAY'S VAST BASEMENT, SILVER JEWS, MARK MULCAHY (Miracle Legion), JENNY TOOMEY, NANANG TATANG, NEW RADIANT STORM KING and more!!

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This historical document collects a handful of the sporadically released singles from the US based Isophlux label, which for better or for worse completely mirrors the tastes of the IDM on-line gossip/news list. The most curious thing about the Isophlux sound is that the latest singles have the most primitive sound, as if they are doing their best to mimic the early disjonted techno of Plaid or Global Communications, rather than the contemporary digital glitch manipulation which has been so prevalent. Still Autechrist/Aphex-ish algorithmic sequences and post-electro breaks dominate the IDM discourse for Isophlux. This compilation features tracks from Shad T. Scott, Greg Chin, L'Usine, Lexancaulpt, etc.

This comp was recorded by a variety of artists from 1950 to the present. The music ranges from traditional blues to mid 60's soul pop to the rad blues rock that made bands like The Gories, The White Stripes, Demolition Doll Rods, and Black Top what they are.

RealAudio clip: Smokestack Lightning
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It's a Mint Records family gathering of holiday sorts! This disc includes the five songs by Carolyn Mark, Duotang, David Carswell (who along with New Pornographer John Collins co-runs JC/DC Recording Studios) & Megan Barnes, the Evaporators and their offshoot Thee Snowglobe-lins originally released on the Team Mint Xmas Vol. 1 compilation that came out four years ago on 7" vinyl only. Adding to the festivities are eight more songs by country folks, diverse popsters and instrumental combos galore -- Ms Carolyn Mark (yes, she appears again!), Tennessee Twin, John Guliak (covering a Commander Cody song), the positively dreamy Young And Sexy, garage rawk party kings the Smugglers, the newwave-twangin' Buttless Chaps (covering a Johnny Cash song), the Ramblin' Ambassadors (members formerly of Huevos Rancheros), and Atomic 7 (ex-Shadowy Man From A Shadowy Planet Brian Connelly). Plus a bunch of the Vancouver based members of the abovementioned groups got together with members of Beans, Maow, The Gay and The Organ and beat the Brits to the punch with their new rendition of "Do They Know It's Christmas?" There's even a video clip included on the cd. But we wonder... being Canadian and all, why didn't they remake the Canadian counterpart from back then "Tears Are Not Enough"? Y'know the one with Bryan Adams, Anne Murray, Joni Mitchell, Gordon Lightfoot and Burton Cummings! Note: Keeping with the spirit of the original project, $3 from each cd sold will go to the Stephen Lewis Foundation, which was established by the U.N. Secretary-General's Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa.

MPEG stream: Santa Claus Likes Rich Kids Better
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Though he was most known for being the producer behind Justin Hinds & The Dominos and Burning Spear, Jack Ruby was quite a prolific roots reggae producer throughout the seventies and eighties. This compilation features a sampling of some of his best, including: Burning Spear, Big Youth, The Black Disciples, The Heptones, Justin Hinds & The Domninos, and more -- plus a large amount of unrealeased tracks.

Having travelled to Indonesia in 2008, the sound artist Jesse Paul Miller (who also does time as a member of the Factums and has dabbled on the recordings of A Frames, Climax Golden Twins, and the Sun City Girls) collected a wealth of amazing recordings of the various street musicians throughout Java. Given his proximity to Sublime Frequencies, we can't help wonder why this didn't get released through that increasingly venerable label. No matter, Miller offers a great mix of folk musics that express the vast cultural patchwork of Javanese music beyond the principle exports of gamelan and dangdut. That said, one of the first tracks that Miller presents is from a trio of street musicians on a homemade gamelan offering a spirited rhythmic backdrop for a trained monkey who was delighting a group of squealing children. Another track features a krontjong troupe serenading passengers at the train station with a double timed acoustic guitar strum set to a rather maudlin croon. One of the highlights of the album comes from another island Lompok, which is home to an ensemble called Sakhabad, who present an urgent folk number that could easily be one of those acoustic guitar tracks that the Sun City Girls would have appropriated on 330,003 Crossdressers From Beyond The Rig Veda. The vocalist even sounds a lot like Alan Bishop crossed with Jello Biafra (this is meant in the best possible way, mind you!). Miller concludes the album with a lengthy series of Islamic calls to worship, one from the break of dawn and another from the end of the day. There's only 50 of these in circulation, and they certainly won't last long.

Unless you are one lucky cool cat there is a pretty good chance you don't have any of the great Jamaican 45's from 1972-1978 on this amazing comp. All here on cd for the very first time. As the title suggests, this comp focuses on the awesome infusions of soul and funk into the Jamaican sound. This movement was of course heavily influenced by the trend in the US at the time, a glorious funk and soul explosion, but make no mistake, these tracks still retain the classic reggae/dub feel that Jamaica was beginning to export to the rest of the world on great labels like Capo, Jaywax and our long lost Jamaican twin Aquarius (who also had a rad looking record store in Jamaica at the time). Covers of folks like Earth Wind & Fire, Betty Wright and The JB's as well as original soul cookers from folks like The Heptones, Lee Pery and Cedric Brooks. As always the impeccable packaging by Soul Jazz makes this comp a total treat, with photos of the original 7" covers and super informative liner notes. Really nice!

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Wow! When we think of great soul funk and reggae we have to say that Canada isn't usually the first place that comes to mind -- but we also weren't so aware of the huge migration of Jamaican musicians to Toronto that took place in the late '60s/early '70s. Which explains a lot. How lucky Toronto was to have these infectious sounds to call their own during this special era. This ranks as one of the best soul/funk/reggae collections we've had in a long while. And it really is equal parts reggae, funk and soul with that original reggae sound that many of these artists adopted after leaning way more towards a more soul sound for many years. Recent comps we've been loving like Studio One Women showed how much of the vintage reggae sounds were so influenced by doo-wop and the heyday of American soul music. Jamaica to Toronto is filled with that same kind of raw catchy soul we just can't get enough of. If you've fallen for the Eccentric Soul series that we've also been digging, then this is for you. Killer songs and elaborate 36-page booklet included. Highly recommended!

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From the liner notes: "Recording a hit record is of course a major acheivement for any artiste, but while breaching the national music charts in your own country is one thing, repeating that success in others is quite another. Indeed, some of the most important recordings in Jamaica's musical history still remain relatively unknown anywhere outside its golden shores, and it is 50 such sides that make up this collection. All the recordings included on this set appeared on the annual top 25 chart for one of Jamaica's premiere radio stations, JBC, from 1960, up until its final year, 1973 - a fascinating period in the island's musical history. From Jamaican Blues, through the Ska and Rocksteady years, and finally, up until the more contemporary sounds of Reggae, this collection not only presents a wonderful opportunity to trace the development of Jamaican music during this golden age, but also to hear some of the most popular sounds of their day." Presented on three, chronologically arranged discs, this is a "best of" Jamaican music to top them all. Very highly recommended.

Do the names Vicki Anderson, Marva Whitney, and Lyn Collins mean anything to you?

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

SORRY. Heavy duty psych-jam bands Mainliner and Musica Transonic, Ruins drummer Yoshida solo, and the trancier sounds of Ohkami No Yikan and Toho Sara, all recorded live over two days for this European tour-inspired import disc. Every band pretty much features the same members (Nanjo of High Rise fame on bass, Yoshida on drums), and this is essential for any fan of the PSF "rock" sound. Amazing, killer, wow.

Another winner for the Nonesuch Explorer Series. Originally released in 1976, this entry focuses on the restrained yet dulcet tones of the shakuhachi, a five holed bamboo flute that has been used as an accompaniment for study and meditation in Japanese culture for well over a millennium. These five live performances by master flautist Kohachiro Miyata of the Ensemble Nipponia display a graceful yet glacial spareness that focus on subtle but revelatory moments of drama and tension rather than lyrical or melodic songforms. Akin to a philosophical reading of time moving through nature, like the sound of wind through reeds, or a ripple across a surface of water, this is music to slow our lives down and be ever blissfully aware of the eternal present moment in front of us.

MPEG stream: Shika No Tone
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Yet another entry in Relapse's Assault series, a cartographer's worst nightmare, mapping out the world according to sheer brutality, and vicious pummel. Instead of the smooth flowing lines of hills and valleys, there are the sharp crags of buzzing riffs and guttural growls. And instead of the smooth colorful shades of elevations, there is only the black of pure grinding evil. Past entries in this series have focused the Czech Republic, Holland, Brazil, Sweden and Poland, but it was only a matter of time before the scales tipped toward the land of the rising noise. Japan has an incredibly rich history of heavy music, from hard rock psych gods Flower Travellin' Band and Les Rallizes Denudes, to thrash metal legends S.O.B., to crustcore legends Gism to contemporary heavyweights like Boris and Corrupted. So of course there's gonna be a swirling pit of lesser knowns just waiting to crush skulls and kick ass with the big boys. So Relapse has hand picked their favorite four of those heavy hopefuls, and while we may not recognise any of these bands, they are pretty well known in Japan and in international underground crust circles. The first fourteen tracks come courtesy of Senseless Apocalypse, fastcore legends from Shizuoka, who spit out a venomous splatter of lightning fast grind and stuttering stop start dynamics. All the songs hover around the minute mark but are stuffed to the gills with buizzing riffs, pounding blast beats and more parts than most 4 minute songs. Muga are up next, but don't be fooled by the pretty acoustic guitar intro, as it soon devolves into crushing Neurosis style metallic fury, with soaring guitar melodies over sludgy riffs and a dual vocal attack (high and low). Next up are Realized, who tune their strings so low they're practically falling off their guitars, pouring out thick grunting death metal, with impossibly low grunted cookie monster vocals and blast beats buried under a suffocating layer of guitarrrgghhh. Finally, we have Swarrrm (yep, that's three r's) who take the grinding metal of the their Japanese Assault brethren and mix in some SST/Greg Ginn style guitar discordance, some Swedish style melody, and some bizarre almost ambient bass/vocal breakdowns. Maybe my favorite of the bunch. And just like with the other Assault comps, you'll more than likely find yourself wanting more by at least one of the bands, if not all of em!

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

SORRY. Ruins mastermind and Magaibutsu label owner Tatsuya Yoshida pressed up these cds to sell on the self-proclaimed "Japanese New Music Festival" European (and US) tour last year. The Festival line-up included the Ruins and two related bands: conceptual improv duo Akaten and a cappella vocal trio Zubizuva-X, as well as both Yoshida and Tsuyama Atsushi (of Omoide Hatoba, Acid Mothers Temple, etc. etc.) performing solo sets. This disc features tracks from all. Excellent stuff, of course.

Just found we have five (5) copies of this Acid Mothers Temple related compilation, that we'd never listed on our site before. AMT members (and pillars of the Japanese psych/prog underground) Atsushi Tsuyama, Tatsuya Yoshida, and Kawabata Makoto show off their chops n' weirdness here, each one solo and also together in various combinations. There's 7 audio tracks here, recorded live, and also 7 more mp4 video clips you can watch on your computer (and which reveal how much these guys revel in their silliness). The cd starts off with some kind of broken-down freak-folk twang and psych shred from Atsushi Tsuyama, who sings a bit like Tom Waits transformed into a cartoon bear. Next, Kawabata Makoto contributes eight minutes of FX-laden outer space drone bliss. Chaos erupts with Yoshida's Ruins Alone track, a battle between his drum kit and video game zips and zaps it seems. Then, all three of these fellows sing in the comedic a cappella combo Zubi Zuva X, a crazed chorus that elicits much laughter from the audience - or perhaps that's part of their performance. Akaten (Atsushi + Yoshida) offer up what sounds like someone eating a meal, which turns into an improv session, and then devolves into echoed insanity... The track by Zoffy (Kawabata + Atsushi) is the most "rock" thing on here, so far, though of course also quite nutty. And then all three gentlemen, in the form of Acid Mothers SWR, wrap thing up with a display of their tight, mathy prog. Limited to 300 copies produced for a 2008 European tour. Apparently we've had 'em hidden away here since then! Better late than never to list these, grab 'em while you can, AMT fans...

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Sublime Frequencies and Mississippi Records may get all the world music hipster love, and it's not like they don't deserve it, but anyone into either label, or especially both, would do well to pay attention to a little label called World Arbiter who consistently release some of the most mysterious and amazing music we have ever heard. From gamelan, to sitar, to historic Chinese folk music, to minimal Moog music, to Buddhist chants, to Moroccan trance to this, the third volume in WA's series of 1941 recordings of legendary masters of the koto, a long 13 stringed zither, and the shamisen, a three stringed lute, performing various traditional vocal and theatrical pieces. The sounds here are mystical and magical, the recordings warm and fantastically scratchy, the koto tracks are spare and haunting, both the voices and the instruments producing such distinctive tones, the interplay subtle but so beautiful, like some lost Japanese blues, haunting, and achingly lovely, hushed and intimate, the vocals both male and female deeply moving, and perfectly matched to the spare instrumentation. The shamisen pieces are more percussive, the vocals too more urgent, these tracks sounding even more like old timey blues Japanese style, which is essentially what Japanese traditional folk music is, these tracks often accompanying dances and kabuki performances, with various types of percussion, not to mention fluttering flutes, and some very distinctive vocalizing. And like the koto tracks, wreathed in a warm old time crackle that only add to the wonderful mystery of these magical sounds. Recommended for fans of all the recent world music reissues, regardless of label, as well as are all of the other World Arbiter releases... Includes extensive liner notes in both English and Japanese.

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Fourth volume in World Arbiter's Traditional Japanese Music Series, this one focusing on the music of the shamisen, a three stringed Japanese style lute, an instrument that was integral to the development of Japanese music in the 17th century. There's much to be learned about the history of the instrument, and the various genres it helped bring about, and about this era in Japan, a particularly turbulent time, as well as the Kokusai Bunka Shinkokai, an organization formed to encourage cultural exchange between Japan and other countries, as well as helping preserve Japanese culture. The sound though is what's really fantastic here, the sound of the shamisen no doubt familiar to anyone acquainted with traditional Japanese music, the notes plucked dreamily, the sound very much like a banjo, the melodies relaxed and slowly unfurling, moody and melancholic, here accompanied by fantastic and emotional vocal performances, these old recordings wreathed in a lush layer of crackle and hum, the overall effect not that far removed from listening to old timey American music, or early rural blues, even the mood of the music tends toward the lament, mournful and dreamy, some also accompanied by percussion, or fluttering flute, a few even sung by children. Fantastic stuff, emotional, and intense, a sound both personal and intimate, but also inherently imbued with the tensions of the time, of life in the village and beyond, fans of Sublime Frequencies and other 'hip' world music labels, would do well to explore the World Arbiter label, whose releases are rife with musical riches.

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That's right, another Indonesian garage rock comp, but c'mon, how can you resist a record subtitled Indonesia Screaming Fuzz? One that promises "garage stomp, Indo-rock and beat surf"? You can't. Or at least we can't. Some of the names here will be familiar to long time readers of the aQ list. Groups whose albums have gotten the full on reissue treatment, like girl group Dara Puspita, and legendary Indo-garage rockers Koes Bersaudara (who show up again as Koes Plus), which should give you an idea of the sounds here, and while you might already own those tracks, odds are you probably don't have many jams from The Swallows, Females, Steps, Panber's, Mona Rita & The Kingstons, the Peels, Rolling Beats, Black Magic, Los Indonesios or Banjamin S. But we can promise, after listening to this you will wish you did. The Swallows transform the Kinks' "You Really Got Me" into their own chunk of surfy garage-y hypno rock, Rolling Beats take sweet bubblegum pop and wreath it in a haze of serious guitar fuzz, the Peels do their best Stones (which means they basically just swipe a song and sort of cover it), with some twangy distorted guitars and some sweet vocal harmonies, Los Indonesios sound a bit like an Indonesian Monks, big twangy guitars, and booming echo drenched vox, Females mix classic Indonesian sounds with fuzzy garagey grooves, and introduce some dreamy vox and handclap, and Steps do some Ventures style surf rock, but with buzzy synths and some distinctly Eastern sounding melodies, and so it goes. It's a sound we just can't get enough of, groovy, fuzzy, surfy, jangly, the sound so distinctive, and even the 'covers' reimagine the originals in new and spectacularly groovy ways. Needless to say (but we will anyway), fans of recent Record Of The Week Those Shocking, Shaking Days, will dig this big time, and if you liked other comps like Psych Funk Sa-Re-Ga! Psychedelic Funk Music In India 1976-1983 and Thai? Dai! - The Heavier Side Of The Luk Thung Underground, or if you loved those Dara Puspita and Koes Bersaudara reissues and wanted more, well, here you go...

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The tracks on this disc were all recorded at the Paku Alaman palace in Yogyakarta under the direction of K.R.T. Wasitodipuro, who is the single most important musician/composer in Java and a veritable cultural treasure. The first thing those already familiar with Balinese gamelan will notice different in Javanese court gamelan is that it is much, for lack of a better word, mellower. Unlike the kinetic, explosive Gong Kebyar of Bali, Javanese court gamelan tends to move along at a much slower, even stately, pace. It is, in fact, at its slowest that a pieces opens up to its most complex and beautiful. The stratified layers of melodies can be absolutely stunning; each instrument, while performing its own unique part, is also completely subservient to the whole. The album, originally released as "Javanese Court Gamelan", was recorded in 1971 by Robert Brown. An added aesthetic importance to central Javanese gamelan is the need for the sound from the various instruments to blend together in the performance space. The gamelan is located in a building called a Pendopo. The structure is basically a pyramid shaped vaulted ceiling with no walls, the architecture of which causes the sounds to be reflected back upon the gamelan like a parabolic dish. On this recording, which was recorded in the Pendopo at Paku Alaman, you can not only hear the blending of the instruments as they're meant to be heard, but also the sounds of birds chirping in the courtyard just outside. Nice.

RealAudio clip: Gendhing Tedjanata
RealAudio clip: Gendhing Mandulpati

Originally released in 1977, the second volume of the (hopefully eventual) tetrad of Javanese Court Gamelan features music from the lesser of the two courts at Surakarta: the Mangkunegaran. Which is not to say that the court, or its musicians and dancers, lacked prestige. Of the two gamelan heard on this recording, one is not only considered to be the most beautiful in all of Java, but resides in the largest pendopo (pavilion in which gamelan is performed) on the island. While all gamelan are treated with the respect given a prince, the older of the two gamelan here Kyai Kanyut Mesem ("Sir Swept Away by a Smile") is exceptionally sacred (so sacred is one instrument that it is never even played). The music here is the height of refined Javanese court gamelan and the two long pieces which make up the meat of this disc are each stunning in their own ways. The 21 minute Gending Bonang Babar Layar is a piece often played to welcome important guests and on that is intended to set a "mood of distinguished silence" as much as "power and authority". Played entirely with what are generally the louder instruments and completely devoid of vocals, Babar Layar exudes an eerie austerity that is breath taking. The almost evil sounding main melody is slowly condensed and increases steadily in volume until the final section of the piece in which the pounding, heavy bronze melody instruments are brought into an elliptical, concentrated -- for lack of a better word -- summarization of what had been so delicately building up. For me (Byram), it's one of those songs that never fails to give me goose bumps. Unfortunately, space limitations prevent us from sampling enough to really do justice to the intensity of the suite as it progressively builds over its twenty minute duration. The other showcase on this disc is "Gending Ela-Ela Kalibeber" which takes the opposite approach sonically, with the softer instruments and vocals taking center stage and rendering the main melody almost inaudible. Also included are two shorter pieces, "Ketawang Puspawarna" and "Ayak-ayakan Kaloran". Highly recommended!

Like the first "Court Gamelan" disc, his collection of recordings comes from Yogyakarta, this time from the Kraton Ngayogyakarta Hadiningrat, the major court in Yogya. Originally the editor of the Court Gamelan series, Robert E. Brown, intended for their to be four albums altogether, with each disc representing one of the two courts of Yogya and and of Solo, but the fourth disc has yet to be released. This recording represents the Yogya style in its most "conservative" form as the greater court experienced much less influence from the Solonese style that the court at Paku Alaman (volume 1) did. The most striking difference between this and the previous is the very loud style of playing that is typical of classic Yogya gamelan. The tracks featured hear are divided into the pieces which feature the robust playing of the louder instruments -- large metallophones (bonang, demung and saron) -- and those that showcase the softer instruments -- rebab (two stringed fiddle), suling (flute), male and female singers, gender (metallophone with small, flat keys suspended with strings over resonators and played with padded mallets) and celampung (plucked zither). Basically the two forms are mutually exclusive given that the sheer volume of the combined loud instruments effectively drowns out any quieter instruments from being heard. The contrasting transitions between loud and soft sections can be stunning, as in "Gendhing Lung Gadhung". The piece begins with a raucous procession of loud instruments played so hard you can hear the keys buzzing as they vibrate against the pins that bind them to their wooden casings. Then, suddenly the loud instruments part like storm clouds to reveal the softer instruments and vocalists. The haunting melody sung by the vocal chorus of men and women is made eerier by the varying interpretations of their parts -- so that vocal entries and cadences are staggered. This disc presents a variety of traditional and ceremonial pieces associated specifically to this court and is appropriately book ended by a piece (Gendhing Prabu Mataram) which would accompany the sultan's entrance and one (Gendhing Tedhak Saking) for his departure. Also included a wonderful 26 minute suite (itself a reduction of a two hour event) for dance, Golek Lambangsari and two shorter pieces: "Gendhing Sumyar" and "Gendhing Rangu-rangu".

RealAudio clip: Gendhing Sumyar
RealAudio clip: Gendhing Rangu-rangu

Originally released in 1969, "The Jasmine Isle" is a collection of several short pieces for gamelan interspersed with one likewise brief piece of solo gender and two of solo gambang. Not the best in the series, this one is still interesting for its inclusion of the solo recordings from both the gender and gambang, which -- despite their being two of the more subtle and refined components within the gamelan are pretty much masked by the din of the other instruments on the other recordings of Javanese gamelan in this series. The Javanese gender, with its thin bronze keys suspended by strings over metal resonators and played with padded mallets, has a strikingly different sound than the Balinese variant. The attack of the sounding notes is so soft and the sustain so long that the instrument sounds almost like an early Italian pipe organ. Like the Balinese gender, the technique is very difficult and requires simultaneous playing and damping of the keys with the pads of both hands to reduce the overlapping of tones. The gambang is a wooden instrument much like a xylophone or marimba which is also played with a pair of padded mallets. On this recording, the two gambang pieces are solo variants of two pieces also played by the entire gamelan of this disc. The pieces for gamelan here are a mix of Sundanese (West Java), Solonese (Surakarta) and Yogyanese styles.

RealAudio clip: Pangkur (solo gender)
RealAudio clip: Bendrong
RealAudio clip: Bendrong (solo gambang)

BACK IN STOCK! We thought these Charly BYG/Actuel reissue cds were gone forever, but lo! here they are again. Dunno what's up, but get 'em while you can. This is one of the essentials in the series, a triple disc box set sampler which includes tracks from the other four BYG/Actuel reissues listed here (Sun Ra, Shepp, Don Cherry, and the Art Ensemble) as well as rare material by Sonny

Alright, you might be wondering who the heck is Jeff? Jeff Mangum? No. AQ's own Jeff Yarbrough? Nope. The man in question is German sound engineer Gerhard Nieckau. Yes, that's right his proper name isn't even Jeff. It's his nickname. Ah, such confusion! Anyways, Nieckau is noted as being the resolutely no-frills engineer behind Bossa 70 - capturing their jazz and bossanova sounds all raw and vibrant - but his musical pursuits extended far beyond that. He travelled extensively throughout Africa, Peru and Trinidad exploring and recording the regions' music. This compilation, subtitled 'Rough Beats From Peru & Trinidad 1972 - 1976', features superb eclectic recordings drawn from his personal collection from those excursions. Funk, jazz, calypso, afrobeat? It's all here and then some! Immensely powerful, inspiring music, and highly danceable too. Kudos once again to Crippled Disc for continuing their crusade to unearth the wondrously diverse sounds from around the globe.

RealAudio clip: Carapachaima
RealAudio clip: Black Man's Cry

Here's a refreshing collection of blues recordings produced by legendary keyboardist Jim Dickinson. It often seems that the best recordings of the blues and country come to us from crusty, decaying 78's lovingly cared for by obsessive collectors. Partly it's because the performers in the infancy of these genres had a certain amount of genuine inspiration, in contrast to the 1000th time someone plays the same blues progression with the now time worn cliche about being wronged by one's significant other. Another part of the equation is the circumstance under which the recordings were made. What someone plays, in one take, in their home or at their local bar than when surrounded by engineers and studio musicians and rehearsing a take 20 times before committing it to tape. Enter the Delta Experimental Project. For the first time, in what seems ages, a collection of recordings of great blues musicians recorded on the fly with -- in most cases -- minimal recording equipment and no second chances. Performers stop in mid refrain to talk about something that crossed their minds, or break out laughing (in earnest). In many tracks you can hear kids playing in the background, traffic rumbling and sundry other ambient noises usually aeseptically removed from studio recordings. Twelve great tracks ranging from barrel-house piano, gospel, fife and drum and more from the likes of Sleepy John Estes, Otha Turner, Mose Vinson, Johnnny Woods, Alec Teal & Butter Biscuit.

MPEG stream: Broke And Hungry
MPEG stream: Barrel House Blues / Cryin' Won't Make Me Stay

Besides being a totally astounding 'out-there' music maker himself, Joe Meek was also quite a whip-smart producer back in the '60s. This compilation gathers together the proof in the toe-tappin', finger-snappin' pudding. It dusts off twenty peppy, poppy cuts from long-gone (but now happily not forgotten) combos such as The Syndicats (check out their terrific organ-laden "What To Do"), The Puppets (there's a mean snarky boy vocal performance on Leiber & Stoller's "Poison Ivy"), Tony Dangerfield & The Thrills, The Blue Rondos and Bobby Rio & The Revelles. Includes lengthy liner notes and lots of photos of the bands' members and memorabilia from back in the day.

MPEG stream: What To Do
MPEG stream: Poison Ivy

There's really nothing 'freak folky' going on in this British folk compilation. The music here is all pretty traditional. And thus pretty fantastic. Think Incredible String Band, Steeleye Span, Comus, Richard Thompson (and Fairport Convention), Trees, C.O.B., Shirley Collins, or the Wickerman Soundtrack (there's actually a song called 'Wicker Man' by The Story). As much as we love us some freak folk, none of that stuff would exist it it weren't for the above mentioned bands. And the groups included on this comp, whose focus here is the fairly abstract 'dark folk', do a pretty amazing job of sifting through the various strains of classic British folk, and offering up their own subtle interpretations. And again, nothing shocking or even that experimental, just a new generation of musicians, paying tribute to the music that they grew up on, and that informed the music they make now. A handful of AQ faves are present, the Story, Far Black Furlong, Alphane Moon, Sharron Kraus, Martyn Bates, as are the A Lords, the Kitchen Cynics, Sol Invictus, and tons and tons of bands we had never heard of: The Horses Of The Gods, The Triple Tree, Pumajaw, English Heretic, The Anvil, Electronic Voice Phenomenon, The Purple Minds Of Lazeron, Quickthorn, Sand Snowman, Stormcrow, While Angels Watch, Xenis Emputae Traveling Band, Drohne and we could go on and on. Two discs of glorious, classic sounding 'dark folk.' From lilting shanties, to tense ominous dirges, to brooding apocalyptic folk, to buzzing ragas, to dreamy lullabyes, fluttering flutes, fiddles and bongos, steel string guitars and an incredible array of vocal styles, male and female, raspy and weathered, wispy and dreamlike, mournful and melancholy, soft and breathy, dark doleful melodies, rich harmonies, weaving a gorgeous landscape of a lost sonic Britannica. Amazing liner notes too, text on the source of the title, an introduction and explanation to the compilation, various short pieces on folk music and the history of folk music from a handful of the artists on the comp, concerning their songs, their groups and their musical journeys, lyrics, reproductions of old woodcuts and more. So fantastic. And absolutely essential listening for fans of freak folk, dark folk and seventies British folkmusic.

MPEG stream: The Wicker Man
MPEG stream: To Kill All Kings
MPEG stream: John Barleycorn Must Die
MPEG stream: The Resurrection Apprentice

Did you know that late, great BBC Radio 1 disc jockey John Peel's wife Sheila was also known as "The Pig"? We didn't know that... presumably it was an affectionate term of endearment, or described her appetite for old timey 78 rpm records, of which she and Peel had a large collection. This disc compiles a selection of John and Shelia's favorites in a "Beginner's Guide", featuring all sorts of fun, scratchy old treasures, 23 cuts in all, from piano rags to delta blues to music hall numbers, just anything interesting that Peel and The Pig discovered on vintage 78s. Amusing and charming to say the least! There's old fashioned novelty bits like Albert Whelan's "My Brother Makes The Noises For The Talkies" and Ronnie Ronalde's "The Yodelling Whistler"... Then there's the velvet vocal harmony, jumpin' jazz, dry comedy, and early rock n' roll too. And even a song in Cantonese by artists unknown. And lots more besides -- it's a mix as eclectic as it is interesting. But it all kinda goes together in some crazy way, a nice tribute to the shared taste in music (and humor) of The Pig and her famous husband. Such a shame he's no longer with us, and her. She provides extensive liner notes, by the way. We love how we can count on Trikont for cool stuff like this!

MPEG stream: Cast Iron Arm
MPEG stream: On A Steamer Coming Over
MPEG stream: Impressions Part 1 & 2

One of the things that made Johnny Cash such an amazing musician was his rich knowledge, appreciation and endless curiosity about music. This compilation traces his roots and in many ways it kind of feels like a mix tape Johnny would have made you if you were one of his friends. There is a common thread of strong story telling that Cash was always attracted to. Simplicity with soul. This collection brings together country legends like Hank Williams, Jimmie Rodgers and Ernest Tubb. The sounds of a young and so totally charismatic Roy Orbison, the powerful gospel singing of Sister Rosetta Tharpe, his would-be sister-in-law Anita Carter, Kris Kristofferson (who was a janitor at Columbia's Nashville studio's when he first met Johnny). The liner notes do a nice job of explaining the connection and influence of each track on Cash and his music. A really solid collection of old time songs that still sound totally fresh and raw.

MPEG stream: There Are Strange Things Happenin' Every Day
MPEG stream: You're My Baby
MPEG stream: Love's Ring Of Fire

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

SORRY. The debut release from Matt Wobensmith's (ex-Outpunk) new label! Digital Hardcore-style dancepunk featuring unlikely teamups: Christoph de Babalon and Team Dresch, Jack Acid & Chris Polaris, Kento Oiwa (of Olympia's ICU) with Behead the Prophet, and 680x0 with the Mukilteo Fairies. We are happy to see the punk and extreme e-music worlds teaming up, and to think it was yesterday that the "Maximum R&R" guys were buying the Atari Teenage Riot single from us... Queercorps is leading the way.

Compilation from trustworthy labels featuring Cujo, Amon Tobin (on no less than 6 tracks), Sureshot, Funki Porcini...

Jonny Greenwood has always been our favorite Radiohead member. Sure maybe Thom Yorke is a genius, but Greenwood is the unsung hero, his guitars and sound manipulations transforming Radiohead from run of the mill alternative rock band to one of the more innovative and captivating bands of the last decade. His solo score to the film Bodysong a few years ago showed the wide range of his music making abilities as well and was one of the first hints at his love of reggae with its subtle moments of glitched out dub electronics. Somehow, someway Trojan Records got in touch and decided to let him crack their vaults and put together a collection of his favorite tracks from their deep well of reggae gems. We gotta say he did some mighty fine selecting as this ranks as one of the nicer vintage reggae/dub collections we've had in the store in quite a while. With everyone from Lee 'Scratch' Perry, Delroy Wilson, Marcia Griffiths, The Heptones, Scotty, Scientist, and more... This does a great job at scratching the surface of how much amazing music came out of Jamaica during the fertile era of the 70's. While it might just be clever marketing to put his name on this as all he did was pick out the songs, if it turns on some Radiohead devotees to the richness of reggae's finest then we have no problem with that at all.

MPEG stream: I'm Still In Love
MPEG stream: Clean Race
MPEG stream: Flash Gordon Meets Luke Skywalker

Last year, local educational sound-arts organization 23five and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art co-presented a ten hour listening event/installation documenting the past 50 years of Japanese experimental music entitled "Ju-Jikan" (which translates as '10 hours' in Japanese). Curators Atau Tanaka, Ryoji Ikeda, and Shunichiro Okada described it not as a comprehensive taxonomy of Japanese experimentation, but simply sought "to trace the complex web of sonic style that constitutes the current Japenese musical landscape." Tanaka, who wrote the liner notes for the program, further explained that the curatorial choices were also guided by how the West perceives Japan and how Japan considers its own representation towards the West. This double cd compiles elements selected from that ten hour listening event at SFMOMA (the full ten hours would have required mp3 encoding and much in the way of complicated licensing arrangements!), focusing upon the more contemporary elements of experimental Japanese music. These sounds draw their connections through the recombinant power of electronic synthesis and the juxtaposition of disparate styles; which together have become a standard if elusively-defined musical vocabulary for Japanese music. "Ju-Jikan" features physically challenging noise from Merzbow, Masonna, Hanatarash (Eye from the Boredoms), Pain Jerk, and Tetsuo Furudate; 'anti-academic' reactionary modes of Yasunao Tone and Yuji Takahashi; purist minimalism of tonal austerity from Ryoji Ikeda, Otomo Yoshihide, and Nerve Net Noise; and delicate electrodrone work from Kazuo Uehara, Tamami Tono, and Kozo Inada. A really important collection indeed. We're told some tracks are previously released, some not, but it's hard to tell which -- chances are you'd have to be a really geeked-out collector to have many of these already, and even in that case you'd still want this for the rest. The cd booklet gives Tanaka's detailed notes on all styles covered, a graphic timeline of Japanese experimental sound genres, and a program for the full ten-hour event so you can see what you missed.

RealAudio clip: Trio For A Flute Player
RealAudio clip: d[0]
RealAudio clip: Composition For Two Guitars
RealAudio clip: 77up
RealAudio clip: Der Geist

Another amazing and mysterious and confusional release from Tesco, who almost single handedly are keeping modern industrial and post industrial music alive and kicking. They've brought us Der Blutharsch, Death In June, Anenzephalia, and now JUCHE. A compilation of modern industrial artists, weighing in on North Korea (!). What is Juche? Well Wikipedia describes it like this: "The Juche Idea is the official state ideology and state-sponsored religion of North Korea and the political system based on it. The doctrine is a component part of Kimilsungism, the North Korean term for Kim Il-sung's family regime. The core principle of the Juche ideology since the 1970s has been that "man is the master of everything and decides everything". Juche literally means "main body" or "subject"; it has also been translated in North Korean sources as "independent stand" and the "spirit of self-reliance"." Removed from the context of actual, totalitarian politics, Juche sounds kinda cool. Intense, brutal, simple. And certainly like some sort of industrial music manifesto. So it makes sense that these bands would have something to say about it. What exactly is up to you to decipher. From the music and the extensive art and text in the accompanying booklet. But for now we'll concern ourselves with the music� We were mostly excited by a brand new unreleased track from aQ faves Anenzephalia, whose past records were rife with the sort of intense, bleak, grim, blackened dronescapes we can never get enough of. The track here is still grim and dark, but more rhythmic, a crackling lo-fi glitchscape, a skeletal rhythm crafted from squelches and pops spread out over the drift below, a garbled alien melody, equal parts sine-wave and damaged sonar ping, eventually joined by a wavery insect like blackbuzz, and some distorted disembodied vocals, a looped snippet from a speech of some sort, the whole track subtly harrowing, and weirdly hypnotic. The Turbund Sturmwerk track is super creepy as well, a whispery shimmer of ambience, a strange looped vocal whir in the background, sweeping swell of distant distortion, soft smears of hiss, all beneath an urgent voice, an emotional speech of some sort, the song shifting gears part way through and morphing into a swirling dirge, of crumbling downtuned chords, throbbing low end buzz and extremely panned bursts of fuzz and hiss. The Grey Wolves offer up another chunk of grinding ambient creep, a rough, gritty textured wash of processed synths and strange looped distortion, melodies rendered in shards of feedback and fractured effects, a voice buried in the mix, urgent and ominous, peppered with bits of Bush, and some tangled blurred rhythms. Operation Cleansweep weigh in with a sinister stretch of drawn out tones, layered caustic rumbles, whirring machinelike drones, mysterious percussive thumps and creaks, all smeared into a dense throbbing buzz. The strangest track is probably Militia's, beginning with some spoken word, that slips into singing, in the background a slow building looped chunk of glimmering ambience. Soon an hypnotic looped synth melody swoops in, pulled from some lost Phillip Glass piece, accompanied by junkyard drums, all very mesmerizing and repetitive, a bit like gamelan, or some Steve Reich piece. A haunting slab of alien industrial world music. The rest of the tracks are just as weird and cool, dark and drone-y, Con-Dom, Genocide Organ, Ex-Order. In fact, much of this comp seems to fall more in line with experimental drone music, than traditional 'industrial' music, some of it reminding us of mellower more blissed out Prurient, with processed vocals, all manner of rumbling, pulsing low end, plenty of buzz and blurred murk, all of it dark and mysterious and fucking awesome. Packaged in an oversized A5 red textured cardstock booklet, the text and symbols on the cover letter pressed in embossed metallic gold, inside a full color booklet, with lyrics, images, photos, each band with their own page. And as it says on the back cover "Limited Edition of 15,000,000 copies", so better get yours now�

MPEG stream: Reunification
MPEG stream: A Kite Of Glass In A Blood Red Sky
MPEG stream: Work For NK

FM3's Buddha Machine should need no introduction to the avid customers of Aquarius Records; but for the sake of those who are not in the know, a Buddha Machine is a small handheld device which broadcasts a handful of chanting loops typically to be used for Buddhist meditation in various parts of China and South East Asia. When the Chinese electronica duo FM3 seized on the idea of fusing their own dreamy ambient loops within the framework of a Buddha Machine, it proved to be a huge success... well at least through a shop like Aquarius. FM3's Buddha Machine is a perfectly encapsulated device for these delicate and suitably plastic tones. So perfect is the FM3 Buddha Machine that the necessity for a remix album is highly suspect. Yet, Staubgold has decided to commission 15 tracks from across the gamut of adventurous music requesting that the Buddha Machine be used in someway shape or form. Even though such abrasive iconoclasts as Blixa Bargeld and SUNNO))) are present on the Jukebox Buddha, the listening experience is a mostly lighthearted affair of pixel-smeared tone float and daydream haziness. Es, Sun City Girls, Thomas Felhmann, Robert Henke, Mapstation, Gudrun Gut, Alog, Minit, Wang Fan, Kammerflimmer Kollektief, Adrian Sherwood / Doug Wimbish, and Aki Onda also contribute to the mix. Really cool.

MPEG stream: 3 Tieta Valojen Taa
MPEG stream: BP//Simple

"Tracks from the sound exhibition, organized by Roel Meelkop..." Contributions from Franz de Waard, Carsten Nicolai, Ryoji Ikeda, Peter Duimelinks, Francisco Lopez and Meelkop himself. Ultraminimal electronic music.