This live recording from the East Bay denizen Petit Mal (aka J. Kaiser) is much better once removed from the performance space in which it was recorded. Not that there's anything wrong with the Luggage Store per se, but that these dark subterranean rumbles, distance bits of radio transmission, and echoes persisting in a damp gloominess contradict the Luggage Store gallery's crisp white walls and huge windows overlooking San Francisco's Market Street. It's better to consider this performance some apocalyptic ritual recorded out in the industrial wastelands elsewhere in the Bay Area, maybe out near Suisun Bay where the US Navy sends its old World War II era ships to slowly leach their heavy metals into the water and soil.
As on many of Kaiser's projects (NF Orchest, French Radio, and his collaborations with Angela Hsu), the sounds are generated through a reel-to-reel tape, a shortwave radio, and his well-worn bicycle wheel which he plays with a violin bow, achieving similarly dissonant bellows that Organum produced through an ensemble of bowed cymbals. Kaiser's work is more Spartan than Organum's, though with these mournful tones which emit through the metallic shimmer, drone, and scrape, resonating really as if they were transmitting through the hull of one of those rusting ships in Suisun Bay. Limited as is always the case with Kaiser's series of 3" discs.
In recent weeks, Bay Area experimentalist Jim Kaiser offered us a couple of collaborative discs with violinist Angela Hsu; and now's he gotten around to releasing his own work under the moniker Petit Mal. As with his collaboration with Hsu, Kaiser's principle instruments for Petit Mal are the reel-to-reel tape machine and a collection of found metal. There had been a handful of obscurely published albums of mysterious drones and growling electronics that Kaiser issued as Petit Mal, but this is the first we've seen in quite a long time. Sensory Deprivation begins with a crawling rhythm of tape machine noise that seems to share a similar technique as Terry Riley's time lag accumulation devices, although Kaiser's roughly handled noises have the same brutalism as found in Wolf Eyes or Esplendor Geometrico. The next two tracks contain murky depressive drownings of sound, as if Kaiser's tape loops were pulled from the bottom of tar pit and forced through his machines, muck and all. Snippets of conversation pull away from the general torpor, with interjections of varispeed warbling and iron-clad screeches of bowed metal downcast in billowing clouds of sonic decay. Limited edition, of course!
Perhaps it's the most unlikely place to see a performance or an art installation, but the Chapel Of The Chimes in Oakland is a columbarium (an institution that houses cremated remains) that has developed a reputation for hosting artist's installations and sound art events within the dignified, if Byzantine architecture of the space. On the 2005 winter solstice, a handful of Bay Area sound artists performed at the Chapel Of The Chimes dedicated to the "friends in New Orleans," presumably in rememberance of Hurricane Katrina victims. Jim Kaiser (aka Petit Mal) was one of the participants at that winter solstice event, presenting a semi-improvised droned-out atmosphere to meander through the numerous rooms of the Chapel Of The Chimes. Using an array of bowed metals, broken electronics, and effects, Kaiser (who has also recorded extensively as French Radio and NFOrchest) accumulated a variety of fluttered vibrations and scraped tones into a spectral minimalism which parallels the eccentric drone extravangazas of the Taj Mahal Travellers and the obscurant British post-industrial ritualists Metgumbnerbone. Kaiser's drones manage a wraithlike quality without appearing ghastly or terrifying, rather they solemnly hang as a poignant if bleak rememberence to one of the great disasters witnessed by this generation.
This SF songstress (aka Jessica Peter) continues to make the sweetest of pop music that never topples overboard into the sugar bowl. Her graceful, bubbly piano and lovely voice draws the immediate attention. She can belt it out, or coo in a crystal clarity, or murmur out the merest whispery breath of a vocal. Check out the aching "You Are Perfect". Indeed unlike the dreamy airiness of her previous recordings, here she treads on somewhat darker terrain especially on the sumptuous instrumental interlude "Dark Woods". If you dig other awesome, crafty female singer/songwriters like Mirah or Mary Timony, take note!
Petracovich's We Are Wyoming finds Ms Jessica Peters exploring some different avenues -- for one thing she's given her piano playing more of the spotlight -- but none that bring that fine state in the album title to our minds. This is much more other worldly or at least other timely, perhaps harking back to some old tyme saloon or cabaret... but mind you, not one filled with rowdy drunken louts, women of ill repute and much broken glass. No, this sounds almost as if she hopped aboard a time machine that transported her back so that she could sneak into the place long after closing time to sing and play their rickety old piano all by her lonesome. An accompaniment of glistening electronic textural clouds and shuffly stuttery rhythms magically takes shape out of thin air to swirl around her breathy vocals and warm piano. Much more airy and haunting than her debut Blue Cotton Skin (which leaned more heavily on electronics a la Beth Orton or Massive Attack), this dreamy sophomore release really shows Peter's coming into her own as a songwriter and finding her own voice. So darn lovely!
Petracovich's lilting ethereal female vocals and languid blend of acoustic and electronic instrumentation is very reminiscent of folktronic princess Beth Orton, the off-kilter drama of Jane Siberry and the spritely pretty side of Solex. Definitely sounding as though they took some cues from Massive Attack's Mezzanine and Portishead's Dummy, the deep fluid bass lines ooze around the layers of programmed beats, processed vocals, acoustic guitar and chimey electronics. Quite nice!
A hellish new-wave circus. The Screamers meets the Butthole Surfers? No, it's not as good that would be, but Oakland's Phantom Limbs are pretty cool, with interesting and freakish vocals over carnival organ punk. Entertaining live too. With Jello Biafra's
San Francisco's Eric Haney is the man behind the powerdrone project Phantom Pains, which has been popping up in a few gritty warehouses around the Bay Area with a few cassettes under his belt as well. Obelisk is the first tape we've been able to check out, but it's definitely piqued our interested for more. The fuzzy droneshot of guitar/synth/pedals/whatever comes across at first like unkempt variations of the electroid-psychedelic smears of Grasslung or Pulse Emitter; but Phantom Pains stratifies such toneshift with a good chunk of muffled distortion and puretone feedback suspended above a deep and distant roar of jet-engine noise. Despite all of fuzz, hiss, and crunch, Obelisk is quite placid, glacial in movements in and out of the these chunks of activity that slide past each other like stealthy icebergs at midnight. Elsewhere, bell tones coagulate around tape noise into a glistening track not all that far from Peter Wright's guitar drones accelerating through the layers of murk, ash, and grit only to be engulfed by a gasping drone of flanging reverb and Maeror Tri industrialized shadow.
Monorail Trespassing continues to release amazing cassettes of unknown and obscure acts from the US underground of floorcore noise and gnarled drone, and this one from Phantom Pains is certainly one of their best.
It may look like a collaboration, but is actually a tribute.
Five years in the making, Illusion Is a Natural Condition brings together two of the finest noise artists the world has ever witnessed. Sure, Merzbow and Hijokaidan can hit you with their molten sounds of psychedelic excess; but San Francisco's Randy Yau and Switzerland's Dave Phillips achieve their tempestous recordings through a violent dichotomy between silence and sound. This sharp contrast effectively puts you on edge throughout the listening experience, as you never know when the next attack is going to arrive. In any given track, Yau and Phillips pack together recordings of their gutteral screams and dribbling gurgles of one of the actionists shoving something down his throat that just doesn't belong there. Occasionally, the sound of flies circle around the sickened vocalizations, as if investigating a hospital patient with a sucking chest wound. Pigs squeal. Demons roar. All of these sounds are compressed into track rarely longer than a minute, punctured by extended silences and ruptured by terse blasts of motorized noise and absurdly rendered ultra-violence that would bring joy (or is that pain?) to die-hard Wolf Eyes' fans. Recommended noise for those with a very strong stomach.
We've been in a constant state of glowing bliss ever since we first pressed play on this collection of beautiful psychedelic folk songs by Oakland's (by way of Canada) Phipps Pt. Glistening vocals drenched in sheets of intoxicating reverb melt perfectly into majestic guitar shimmer and subtle keyboard textures. We're reminded of one of our favorite UK psych folk artists Pantaleimon, as Lovage (aka Phipps Pt.) has the same kind of voice, all dreamy but with a distinctly dark disposition. It's easy to imagine Current 93 joining forces with Phipps. Pt., the sounds on Kiss melting in a haze dripping with endless warmth. This is such a rewarding and engulfing listen. We could go on and on about how much we love this, but we got the last 8 of these in existence, so chances are this will likely be gone before you've finished reading these words. We can't wait to hear what she does next!
Phoebes Dough is a new SF singer/songwriter duo and their debut cd-r release capture a lo-fi, coffeehouse intimacy. At times it's very K Records / Olympia, WA folk-pop-ish. Singer Dianne Epstein-Porter's vocals ring with a warble and lilt that recalls early 10,000 Maniacs' Natalie Merchant. With their barebones guitars, banjo, harmonica and "wicked tambourine" (their words, not ours!), she and husband Ken Porter weave eleven warm down to earth folksy tunes. They're sound is fleshed out by guest player Alex Baum on bass, drums, "a killer triangle and curious jokes" (again, their words!).
What I (Jim) remember so strongly about my experience a few years back selling dance singles for one of San Francisco's now defunct distributors was the emphasis upon (nay, necessity of) newness, novelty, and freshness. Yet, with the basic structure of techno having remained the same for 15 years -- the steadfast whump of a basskick countered by the taut simplicity of a sampled hi-hat with some melody and / or atmosphere thrown in for variety -- I have to wonder if it would be possible to tell the difference (and I mean not just trainspot, but critically differentiate) between the relatively underground cuts of, say, Dan Bell back in 1992 or a really early Ian Pooley single with the polite post-Detroit trax from current artists like Akufen or Jetone. While it's probably not his intention to pose such questions, this debut mix disc from Philip Sherburne -- San Francisco's answer to Simon Reynolds in many ways, intelligently discussing the successes and failures of dance music through his essays and articles for various magazines -- has at least sparked those questions for me. Could those Baby Ford or Robert Hood tracks been produced in 1993 instead of 2003? Well, maybe.
Fortunately, for those who don't care for any such musicological investigations of electronica (which should be most of you!), Sherburne's Picadub mix project works very well as an example of an elegantly composed blend of minimal techno, with cuts from the aforementioned Baby Ford, Robert Hood, and Akufen, plus Thomas Brinkmann, Pantytec, DJ Abstract, Tipper, Seiji, Quizz, Pan/tone, Villalobos, Iz & Diz, Lucien N. Luciano, and Dinky. Nothing fancy, just a nice steady beat... and that's all you can ask for minimal techno.
MPEG Download: BABY FORD "Messenger" [/audio/picababyfordmessenger.mp3]
MPEG Stream: BABY FORD "Messenger" [/audio/picababyfordmessenger.m3u]
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On the second outing of San Francisco's own pickPocket Ensemble, the group makes an adjustment to its lineup, replacing percussionist / trumpet player Eric Wayne with a full-time violinist, Lila Sklar. Lineups aside, the repertoire is much the same: exceedingly well written and executed Eastern European flavored instrumentals, with maybe a tad more klezmer spicing this time round, but still almost impossible to lump into any particular genre.
Now on their fourth full length release, the Pickpocket Ensemble continue to pursue the Middle Eastern direction that they had begun to explore in their last outing If I Were A Highway (2003). The core lineup remains the same with frontman Rick Corrigan on accordion, Marguerite Ostrovski on violin, Tim Fox on guitar and assisted on a couple tracks by some additional clarinet and cello. Along with the increased concentration on pan-Mediterranean strains of music, the group has picked up a lot more confidence in their playing, taking more time to fully flesh out songs, with Corrigan, Ostrovski and Fox each taking turns with solos and building their counterpoint as they do. Further, more and more complex and interesting time signatures seem to be the order of the day on Fingerpainting In Red Wine. Interesting developments from an always interesting group.
After much too long an absence from the recording studio, San Francisco's own Pickpocket Ensemble returns with their third album and an apparently expanded line up. Listening to them on disc I still lament the loss of our beloved Radio Valencia where (how spoiled we were then) one could catch them live for free on regular basis. For those unfamiliar, the Pickpocket Ensemble play a wonderfully unselfconscious amalgamation of, for lack of a better term, folk music from around the world. The group is led by accordionist Rick Corrigan, who also writes the bulk of their material and filled out by violin, double bass, guitar and percussion. Along with both the Parisian and Eastern European influences that form the bedrock of the Pickpocket Ensemble, Corrigan has been further embracing the sounds of Klezmer music and in addition he seems to be delving into the realms of both Spanish and Nubian music. But parsing out specific influences with the Pickpocket Ensemble is a tricky thing as Corrigan's superb arrangements are knit so tightly it becomes difficult to separate the musical threads. The reason I suppose is because Corrigan and company choose to use their alembic to reinforce the commonalities of such diverse elements as much as they do to punctuate the differences. The result of course is just plain fine music that can only come from the Pickpocket Ensemble. Corrigan, an excellent accordion player, has always surrounded himself with great musicians and the recent additions of Marguerite Ostrovski on violin, Tim Fox on guitar and Will High on double bass are certainly no exceptions. Highly recommended!
Great local group that plays original numbers with an authentic Eastern European flavor. Accordion, trumpet, stand-up bass, snare drum & the occasional violin -- that's it.
We've long known that the veteran San Francisco acoustic group Pickpocket Ensemble never fail to deliver the goods, and their sixth cd reaffirms this. Those of you outside the Bay Area might already be familiar with them and this album from their airplay on NPR. It's sure to please old fans as well as attract plenty of new ones. Always rich in mood and atmosphere, they deftly meld inspirations and instrumentation from around the globe. Some are fleeting like single threads in their lustrous tapestry, while others (such as the Appalachian folk and Balkan gypsy influences) appear more solidly, forming artfully arranged patches of the PPE musical quilt. Along the mesmerizing way, they visit and revisit the twist and turns of jazz, flamenco, tango and chamber music. Equally at home in a sunny sidewalk cafe or a vivacious cabaret, Memory is a dark and sultry album that captures the flair and charm of a bygone era.
SF's pickPocket Ensemble follow up their fine fourth album Fingerpainting In Red Wine with Soul Cafe, an ep of seven songs drawn from an intimate live performance at a venue called Strings. As always Rick Corrigan and co. conjure somber, slinky atmospheres from their ensemble of violin, double bass, guitar, accordion, and percussion. Although we file their cds in the jazz section of aQ, their sound is far-reaching, stretching across genre and regional borders to incorporate elements of Klezmer, swing jazz, Balkan gypsy folk, classical chamber, Asian and African rhythms. Terrific!
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Buckethead and DJ Disk of the Invisbl Skratch Piklz.
Wow! Bay Area troubadour Mr. Garrett Pierce has continued to nurture and refine his songcraft in a big big way. All Masks blossoms and flourishes onwards from his previous two releases (a now out of print self-titled cdr from 2004 and the full length beauty Like A Moth which was released on Crossbill Records in 2006). Some of the songs on his latest album verge on the epic yet still maintain his intimate earthy heart. The core of his composed, yet at ease music is solidly rooted in the traditions of good ol' Americana, but this time he's incorporated some '60s pop styled gently rockin' sway (check out "Tonight"!) and gorgeous orchestral embellishments (as heard on the opening track "Your Feet In Wet Cement") to very tasteful good effect. He's fine lyricist too. From his pen flows richly evocative poetic phrases and fully realized story telling. Wonderful! Actually if you dug his fellow singer/songwriter friend Matt Bauer's last album The Island Moved In The Storm which also had a similar 'coming into one's own' feel this is very much for you (psst, Mr. Bauer makes a banjo and vocal guest appearance on one song)! Recommended!
Like A Moth, the follow-up to SF singer/songwriter Garret Pierce's debut, reveals fresh development and depth. He's made good on the promising-ness of his self-titled cd-r, honing his songcraft into something considerably more focused, as well as fleshing out his palette of instruments. Simply check out the easygoing confidence in "Northern Stare" and "The Fireworks Were Fish Exploding". It definitely makes for a lusher, more fully realized overall picture. Warm and comfortingly familiar.
There's lots of ways we find out about cool new bands. We finally listen to a promo that came in the mail, or a customer raves about them, or we read about 'em in a fanzine or on the internet, etc. etc. One of the best ways though, is to randomly see a band playing live that you've never heard of before, and be impressed. That's the deal with how we discovered local SF heavies Pigs.
I (Allan) just moved into a new apartment here in the Mission, that's not too far from the Potrero del Sol skatepark. On one of the days I was moving stuff, I could hear live music coming from the direction of the park, where they do sometimes have outdoor shows. Sounded like yr basic punk rock, but then a band started playing that - as best I could tell from several blocks away - sounded much more metallic and interesting, with shredding guitar leads and chunky riffage and everything. And obviously very loud. So, needing a break from my moving tasks, I wandered over to the park posthaste to check out what was going on. When I got there, the band I'd heard was still playing, and they were GREAT. Super heavy, fairly hairy power trio (boy drummer, girl bassist, bearded dude guitarist / sometime vocalist) kicking out the jams big time, sorta like a scrappier, scuzzier Melvins, in their earliest, fastest, punkiest incarnation. Like, with some more Motorhead mixed in. I had a blast watching the rest of their set, totally into it, already wondering if they had any recordings I could get my hands on for Aquarius. Also wondering, just who the heck they were. Well both questions were soon answered when the drummer held up a garish purple, very DIY looking handscreened LP emblazoned with the name Pigs, saying they'd just put this record out. Better yet, moments later a friend of mine appeared, who it turned out was friends with band as well, and told me that he'd just been telling Pigs before they played that they should bring their album down to Aquarius. And so they did, a week or so later, not just the limited vinyl but also a cd version too.
Just like their live set, the album is a blast (of distortion, among other things). Sometimes slow and sludgy, equally often full of frenzied jamming, Illuminati House Party is pure metal-punk underground awesome, with more than a few nods to classic rock catchiness. Pigs traffic in Black Sabbathy riffs (most definitely in "Lurch"), their songs furthermore having plenty of rollicking swing to 'em a la both Sabbath and Sleep. The guitarist constantly peels off tangly, widdly leads like they're coming back into style. All the tracks here (11 of 'em) rule, from the sick-o smartassery of "Hard Lovin' Van", a song with gnarly Ginnish licks and hoarse, strangled vox that could almost be an old Tad tune (some of the lyrics: "let's go the lake, and feed the ducks...get in the van, take the candy"), to the even more punk "Population Control", to the wasted doom of "Hessian's Revenge" and sheer shred of "Surf's Up". And then there's the epic instrumental 3-part rifftastic "Taser Trilogy" wherein Pigs show off their Champsy chops, not to mention stoner sense of humor (and not for the first time on this record). Yeah, great stuff!
Is it possible to imagine an unholy hybrid of, um, Electric Wizard, Breadwinner, and, er, Pissed Jeans?? Pigs might be it. Soooo glad I was within earshot of the skatepark that day!
What a stunning debut! Pillars of Silence are a San Francisco band featuring members of Conspiracy of Beards and Brilliant Colors with an ensemble of talented friends who add nice touches throughout including Sean Smith, Jeffrey Luck Lucas and engineer Jesse Parsons, who worked the boards on other great San Francisco debuts by folks like Tussle, Pale Hoarse and Vetiver. But truth be told none of that matters so much, as it's the songs and music that Pillars of Silence have crafted on this debut that stand out so dramatically. These songs melt with such a satisfying and lasting warmth. Lush reverb, textured but never too busy instrumentation and such gorgeous vocals that come together to create songs that have that rare ability to feel both familiar and so totally new and refreshing. There are lots of comparisons to throw around, we hear the smoke and haziness of Mazzy Star and Opal, the crisp and truthful delivery of Smog and the lush and melancholic delivery of Moon Pix-era Cat Power. There are so many songs from this record that we already know will become staples of mixes we make for friends, crushes and true loves. Pillars Of Silence have earned themselves a place near Citay and Vetiver as another of San Francisco's finest songsmiths. Highly recommended! You best act fast on this one as they didn't press too many of them.
Long before there was the fuzzed out garage pop of The Oh Sees, and even before there was the sweat soaked bloody knuckled noise punk frenzy that was the late great Coachwhips, there was the bizarre costumed duo Pink And Brown. Pink being Mr. John Dwyer, wearing pink pants, a pink leotard like long sleeved shirt and a pink mask, partnered up with Brown, aka Jeff Rosenberg, who played in Tarentel, Lumen (with our very own Andee), and is currently in Lavender Diamond. As a guitar/drums duo, they whipped up brief blurts and blasts of angular guitar skronk, pounding drum damage, and megaphone vocal bleat, all wound up into tense noise rock freakouts, that when hearing this stuff from within a heaving mass of sweaty folks, sounded a bit like pure noise, but on record revealed a surprising mastery of melody, one that definitely foreshadowed what was to come for Dwyer.
This here double lp collection gathers up everything ever recorded by Pink And Brown, their Shame Fantasy II record, their split with Death Drug, and their Final Foods album available here on vinyl for the very first time.
Fans of Dwyer will no doubt dig, even though P&B's sound falls somewhere closer to groups like Lightning Bolt, and Landed, and other Providence art/noise rock outfits, P&B being Dwyer's first band after relocating to the Bay Area from Rhode Island. The band existed from 1997-2003 (yeah, there was some overlap with the Coachwhips), and again, Coachwhips fans who missed out on Pink And Brown, you're gonna flip (the sticker describes the contents of this comp thusly: "Everything you were too young to have actually seen back in the day"), this is the sort of urgent, energetic, freaked out, noise drenched sound that would send kids into heaving apoplectic, club destroying, moshpit freakouts, the shows back then would often end up with Pink and/or Brown on the floor, in the crowd, rolling around on the floor, their costumes torn and shredded, and in some cases (check out the insert) shedded completely, and that unhinged, feral energy is definitely captured pretty well on these jams, fierce, fucked up, near metallic in places, utterly chaotic in others, slipping easily from droned out noise rock, to mathy punk and back again. Having seen P&B a bunch of times, and gotten caught up in the pure fucked up energy of those live shows, we had sort of forgotten how good some of these songs were, even removed from the 'gimmick' and the live experience. Definitely recommended for fans of noisy, garagey, weirdness, and Black Dice, Lightning Bolt, Landed, Burmese, The Coachwhips, the Hospitals and all of the usual garagepunk suspects.
Super swank packaging, thick full color gatefold jacket, printed full color photo insert, and a download coupon to boot!
Time to tear some shit up with a postumous release from energetic SF/LA guitar, drums & costumes spazzers Pink (aka John Dwyer) & Brown (aka Jeff Rosenberg). At the beginning of the year, the duo took time off from being broken up to terrorize a basement full of San Francisco party-goers and do a bit of recording for this record (5 new songs), which also serves as a complete Pink & Brown discography, collecting the tracks from their Toyo Records "Final Foods" album and the vinyl-only Deathdrug split. 22 pummeling tracks of hyper noise rock antics, out of which exactly one exceeds three minutes. R.I.P Pink & Brown.
While the cd is a complete discography, the "Shame Fantasy II" LP offers up just the 5 new songs, a tasty vinyl package for those of you who already have Pink & Brown's previous recordings.
MPEG Download: "Black Pearl" [/audio/pinkandbrownblackpearl.mp3]
MPEG Stream: "Black Pearl" [/audio/pinkandbrownblackpearl.m3u]
Raucous, wild n' wooly noisy jazz jamming in collision with an equally noisy indie rock aesthetic... a heavy and freaky blowout with squealing horns, hard frenetic drumming, all manner of electric guitar and analog synth keyboard textures, droning violin, and sometimes some hoarse, throwaway vocals. It's all massively chaotic but, perhaps, carefully composed and even catchy at times. What the heck is this? It's Sam Coomes of Quasi getting his "jazz" on, sorta, in cahoots with a bunch of accomplished Bay Area improvisors -- Kyle Bruckmann, Gino Robair, Scott Rosenberg, and John Shiruba -- who, conversely, all take this as a chance to seriously rock out. The demented, diverse results sound something like Italy's Zu meeting up with Captain Beefheart in Tom Waits' junkyard. With both John Zorn and Melvins on the sidelines, getting drunk and cheering them on. It sounds like they're having that sort of fun. Kinda crazy and pretty darn cool.
Note: not to be confused with the similarly-named Pink MountainTOPS... that's a totally different band. We hear though that the two groups have been in correspondence and are even planning a split single maybe.
Note also: Pink Mountain will in fact be playing a show with Zu (and Citay) in SF pretty soon, Monday June 19th at the Bottom Of The Hill.
Oh my God, yes! Finally the collected recordings of San Francisco's punk sweethearts Pink Section have been released to broader appreciation. Named after the San Francisco Chronicle's pink entertainment guide, the quartet of drummer Carol Detweiler, singer Judy Gittlesohn (both of Inflatable Boy Clams and Longshoremen), singer/guitarist Matt Heckert (Survival Research Laboratories) and bassist /keyboardist Stephen Wymore existed on the margins even in San Francisco's 1979 underground scene. Forming at the San Francisco Art Institute and haunting venues like The Deaf Club on Valencia Street and Mabuhay Gardens in North Beach, gigging with bands like Tuxedo Moon and The Units, their self-taught musicianship and songs playing up the dark side of domesticity and consumerism into an infectious and oft-kilter new wave artiness. Angular rhythms and infectious hooks, and alternating male and female vocals put them directly on a par with bands like Suburban Lawns, Devo and The B-52s, even if they were barely known outside of San Francisco. While they never released a full length, this compilation collects their 7" single, their 12" ep, unreleased demos and live material, even a Yoko Ono cover of "Midsummer New York". So great!!!! Download card included.
The latest single from local label Valley King comes via Pins Of Light, a local outfit featuring members of
Dead And Gone, Triclops and Hightower, who deliver a seriously dense slab of progged out metallic gloom punk that winds sinewy riffage, around super frantic intricate drumming and some wild soaring vocals, the A side sounds a bit like Voivod via Pink Floyd, the arrangement dense and constantly shifting, with a killer main riff, and some surprisingly poppy moments, dense and tense, there's even a little stonery groove to the proceedings, definitely psychedelic, but a sort of gothy mathy metallic psychedelia that kills.
The flipside begins with a sky full of swirling psych guitars, before they're joined by some busy drumming and a proggy bassline, eventually erupting into some full on prog metal crush, but once the vocals come in, the song is transformed into a sort of part two of the A side, catchy, weirdly subversively poppy, but still heavy and proggy and metallic, the outro gets seriously blown out and psychedelic, the band locked into some serious space metal churn, before the vocals come in again, and the sound becomes some sort of twisted Voivod / Judas Priest / Hawkwind hybrid, which is most definitely a good thing.
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES. Killer spaceman skull cover art by Alan Forbes, each one signed and numbered, includes a printed insert, and a sticker too!
What starts off sounding like a malfunctioning music box possessed by Aphex Twin soon mutates into what one would imagine a pillow fight in a video arcade would like. Look out! Ms PacMan's got Super Mario in a half-nelson! San Francisco's Pippilina (aka Astrid Meeks) has been known to make her frisky lil' twinkie tunes utilizing among other things a Gameboy and a Korg Chaos Pad. And on
Pizza is either the best name or the worst name for a band, depending on what the band sounds like. From the cover art, we were expecting this to be another Dodos wannabe band, in which case, the name would be terrible! But we we're pleasantly surprised and thankful that this doesn't sound anything like that. Pizza is a local Mission district male / female duo that channel the cute lo-fi pop of early Deerhoof, Tenniscoats and Coconut with the homemade woozy hip-hop vibe of groups like Black Moth Super Rainbow and Why? These six songs (strangely without titles) over 17 minutes are some of the most endearingly refreshing and snarky weirdo pop we've heard in awhile. Thus making their name oddly fitting. Who can say no to pizza?
A shiny new quartet is here in SF delivering buoyant, jangly guitar pop that initally seems quite straightforward. But wait! Plan To Pink are gonna keep you on your toes with their fair share of unexpected twists and turns in both tempo and style. They move confidently from rollicking feisty punk pop to almost-lullaby mellowness often within the span of one tune. Tandem singers Andria Alefhi and Jaime Borschuk keep right in pace, shifting their vocal delivery (often quite drastically) with grace and ease. Their vocals alternately bring to mind Throwing Muses and Helium. Add some xylophone, viola and a dash of cornet and clarinet for good measure. Voila! What a fine introduction! With production help from Peter Conheim (of Monopause, Negativland).
A light, dreamy and all too short record from these Bay Area honey-pie popsters. Me thinks these two songs -- "The Spring Project" and "Lemon Fresh" -- might tickle the fancy of pretty pop fans even more than the quartet's fine Debutante Ball cd from late last year! Super soft and sweet.
New disc from this local (track 7: "Lost On Valencia") instrumental surf rock combo. Solid stuff for the genre, groovy, catchy and reverby just like it should be, with a bit of a '60s psych vibe, and also some underlying menace -- you can understand why the
If you like The Strokes, this new SF group sound JUST LIKE THEM! The lead vocalist is a deadringer for Julian Casablancas. Slouchy sullen singing over hectic, jangly guitars.
MPEG Download: "If You Can Afford It" [/audio/pleasedifyoucanafford.mp3]
Combining beautiful harmonies and heartbreaking epic songs, this first effort from these local boys as Pleasure Forever (formerly Slaves), displays elements of the Doors if they were good and the sadder parts of great eighties rock, such as Swans or the Birthday Party. The recording itself is so complex and layered it's hard to believe this band is a 3-piece.
The Holy Mountain label has been forging a new trajectory as of late into the kosmiche realms of new composition. We last reviewed M. Geddes Gendras' Modular synth solo debut, Test Leads, and following that we now have local San Francisco composer, Henry Plotnick, channeling the big three of minimalist composition, Terry Riley, Philip Glass, and Steve Reich, in his delightful debut release Fields, a composition in nine parts. Plotnick, using digital synthesizer and piano, begins with a piece built from simple repeating melodic phrases that bloom into interlocking repetitive and exploratory filigrees, sometimes with orchestral strings or tinkling bells and gamelan sounds, rising in terrifying intensity or diluting into gorgeous gaseous clouds of vapor. The whole collection exploring the boundaries and limits of a simplified strategy, but one done with an intuitive sense of play and structure that is both hypnotic and tantalizing.
An auspicious debut - oh, and did we mention that Plotnick is just 11 years old??
Another rad new band to add to the legion of SF psychedelic garage rock outfits who have been kicking our asses. And if you need a hint as to what these guys sound like it, just notice that out of place 'y' in the title of the tape. Sorta like the 'j' in Wooden Shjips yeah? While Poor Sons don't really sound THAT much like WS, they definitely would be right at home on the same bill, the core of their sound a droned out garage psych, hypnotic and buzzy, the drums shuffling and propulsive, the big difference are the vocals, there seem to be two singers, both WAY up in the mix, their vocals doused in effects, echo and distortion, to the point that when both are singing, in cool unlikely harmony, they nearly drown out the band, and when the vocals fade, and the band ramp it up, like on the second half of opener "Cool Buzz", these guys let loose and tear it up, shredding and pounding, the bass driving, the guitars shooting sparks, while the rhythm section holds everything down, that lead break is the sort of part you want to go on for minutes instead of seconds.
The rest of the tape is just as ruling, the band definitely swimming in similar waters as their scenemates in Thee Oh Sees, a sort of distorted blown out ramshackle garage pop, swaggery and snarly, fuzzy and jangly, slipping from churning sweat soaked pound to moody psychedelic shamble and back again, with plenty of falsetto ooooh's and frantic drumming, meshing moody jangle pop with droney psych and making a sound that ends up their very own. Which is pretty tough in a field as crowded as the psychedelic garage rock scene, but these guys are positioned to give The Oh Sees a run for their money. We've yet to see these guys play out, but based just on the tape, we're guessing they kill live too. WAY recommended. Anyone into Thee Oh Sees, the Fresh & Onlys, Bare Wires, Mikal Cronin, Ty Segall and Blasted Canyons can now add Poor Sons to your list of favorite local bands.
"Hardcore is a place where upper-middle-class white kids take all the good pan handling spots away from the bums who really need them". So said the irreverent punk rock sage that is Joe Pop-O-Pie in his classic "The Words of Jamal -- The Rainbow Bridge Version". Along with the Butthole Surfers, the Pop-O-Pies were the perfect antidote for punks who were tiring of a stale, formulaic genre and a scene that took itself way too seriously. Started in 1981, the Pop-O-Pies were the brain child of New Jersey raised, 'Frisco' transplant Joe Callahan (A.K.A. Joe Pop-O-Pie). And for those who weren't there for the legendary first two years of its existence, the rumor is true, the Pop-O-Pies really did play only one song: "Truckin'". According to Joe the reason was because the band's lineup changed so often, there really wasn't much time to learn anything more. The end result however, was a band tailor made to piss off punks and hippies (or pseudo-radical youth culture) alike. Joe eventually found a competent, and consistent backing band in the form of none other than Faith No More and recorded the now out of print (and master tapes lost forever, sigh) "White EP" on 415 Records. But that, due to its nonexistent nature, is not the subject of this anthology. The bulk of the material here are the complete Joe's Second (also featuring Faith No More) and Joe's Third Records released in 1984 and 1986 on Subterranean Records -- at the height of punk rock's uber-hip, uber-tough, uber-serious "hardcore" era. If there's one thing that self righteous punks needed at that time, it was a good satirical slap in the face and Joe Pop-O-Pie was there to administer it. And administer he did, replete with well played, overindulgent Hendrix-esque guitar parts market tested to irritate the minimalist punk rock purists. To be fair (to the punks and Joe), that isn't all that the Pop-O-Pies satirize. Joe takes on the music industry ("Industrial Rap"), New York City ("I Love New York"), the Beatles ("I Am the Walrus"), bummed out guys ("Bummed-Out-Guy"), morons ("World-O-Morons"), the Grateful Dead ("Truckin' Slow Version" and "Sugar Magnolia") and much more and all throughout peppered with the unique punk rock salt-of-the-earth wisdom of Joe Pop-O-Pie. Not only does this anthology contain the Second and Third Records in their entirety, but also includes four additional tracks: two from Joe's 1993 comeback "The In Frisco Single" released on Amarillo and two previously unreleased tracks from the same recording session (featuring Mr. Bungle alumni Trey Spruance, Danny Heifetz and Dieselhed bassist Atom Ellis). Included with the disc is a three panel fold out featuring historical notes on the Pop-O-Pies, photos new and old and a brief account of an actual conversation overheard by Robert Mailer Anderson. And what's best is that, buying this, you don't have to worry about the artist getting screwed. Yes, that's right, Joe has come out of hiding himself to put this collection together in 100% true D.I.Y. fashion. So every dollar goes to Joe and not some A&R clown in some office building somewhere.
Listen closely to all the recordings by Mark Gergis, and you'll discover a very interesting, subversive thread running through all of his work. Whether it be in his impeccable contributions to the Sublime Frequencies series (i.e. Choubi Choubi, Cambodian Cassette Archives, I Remember Syrai, Molam: Thai Country Groove From Isan), the gleeful recreation of Thai Pop in Neung Phak, or his media reclamation projects Mono Pause and Porest, Gergis delights in what mainstream American culture discounts as alien, invalid, or profane. On occasion, this delight has been tempered with a political animosity, as is most evident in Gergis' curatorial choices on the Choubi Choubi collection of Iraqi pop songs; but through his experiments in media sabotage through Mono Pause and his solo project Porest, Gergis' recontextualization is spiked with searing dissent. Mood Noose is the second outing for Gergis as Porest, and it's a bit of a detour from the Negativland / People Like Us like collages of his earlier work which relied so heavily on black humor in its juxtaposition of sound. Nevertheless, Gergis has constructed an impressive and wholly decentered album in Mood Noose. Opening with spy-thriller horns marching on top of crunchy electronic rhythms, Gergis presents Mood Noose as something of a splattered electronica album full of rewired circuits, hypersaturated granular synthesis, Geiger-counter pinpricks, and slabs of digi-noise. At times, the album seems more in keeping with the Dada-electronic works of Stilluppsteypa or even a fragmented version of some of Bruce Gilbert's solo projects. But these references don't hold much water by the end of the record, as the compositions take wildly divergent paths, as collages of barking dogs and warbled moans crash into Russian pop songs. The most disturbing segment to Mood Noose is the violent argument between a couple as read by two computerized voices, offering a dispassionate delivery of "ouch, Tom, you're hurting me." This is one of those records that will certainly haunt you well after you've stopped listening to it.
In the great tradition of Negativland, People Like Us, Tape Beatles, Evolution Control Committee and Stock, Hausen & Walkman comes Porest (a.k.a. Mark Gergis of Mono Pause). Porest dis-assembles the world, leaving no cultural and musical stone unturned, to create a twisted, irreverant, post-folk ethnography. We visit a psycho-sexual homicidal Austrian engaged in making "fist dumplings", reciting his quaint and surreal story a la Arlo Guthrie's "Alice's Restaurant". We're taken on a journey into a world where plastic sheep have been raised the same way for thousands of years, a world where Dan Fogelberg is an avant garde yodeller and where our heroes died for our syrup. Sprinkled throughout are instrumental numbers of equally dis-membered cultural origin, on par with Stock, Hausen & Walkman. Brew yourself a hot cup of Oolan tea, slam several shots of hard NyQuil and let Porest lead you on a journey through musical un-history.
Let it be known, that Tourroists! is a difficult record, and those with a stubborn lack of cultural objectivity will be wise to avoid this album. You have been warned!
Up until this album, Mark Gergis, the man behind Porest (as well as Mono Pause / Neung Phak), has been quietly mapping out his own course of ethnomusicology that hinges upon the complex layers of cultural perception between the US and the third world. Neung Phak stands as his Thai Pop ensemble, in which he exquisitely explores the particulars of SE Asian pop music complete with re-creations of radio dramas and the eccentric hybridizations of eastern and western idioms; he's also been responsible for some for some of the best collections from the Sublime Frequencies series (i.e. Choubi Choubi and Cambodian Cassette Archives). Porest is Gergis' media-manipulation project, and Tourrorists! will undoubtably go down as his most inflamatory and most provocative work. Tourrorists is a scathing political record that unabashedly takes on the themes of 9/11, Guantanamo, Arabic conspiracy theories about Israeli secret police (Mossad), and Christian missionaries. However, unlike the politically charged works of Negativland, Gergis refuses to center the album from a particular political or cultural institution (whether that be atheism, socialism, anarchism, etc.); instead, he challenges the listener to question his or her own politics and cultural perspective about any of the topics. Case in point, "Let's Roll" recontextualizes various media snippets from the 9/11 hearings as well as Jihadist rhetoric through computerized voices that emulate the inflection of an American woman, an American man, and an African-American man. There's something intrinsically disturbing about these dispassionate spoken texts, not to mention the wildly contradictory banter between these three characters. Similarly, Gergis collages a particularlly banal public service announcement into a matter of fact "Soilent Green is people!" declaration. Gergis also gives an English translation to the classic collaboration between Aaviko and Kabar on "Eye of the Leopard" originally sung by the only known escapee from Guantanamo. Alan Bishop from the Sun City Girls also makes a stunning cameo on the summery groove of "Hoyda." None of this speaks of the intricacy of Gergis' musical productions which run from mangled electronics, plenty post-SCG Syrian pop numbers, and canned bossanova rhythms; but, it's the ideological content that renders this album a pipe bomb. Tourrorists! is bound to piss you off or offend you in some way shape or form; and we mean that as a very high compliment.
Orilla Oscura is the latest solo record from Jon Porras, former aQ-er, and one half of dronedoom duo Barn Owl. It's Porras' second release this year (along with Black Mesa), but this one takes Porras's signature sound, all smoldering twang flecked drift, and haunting droned out mesmer, and applies it to something much more high concept, and the results are pretty fantastic.
Using old tapes as the basis of Orilla Obscura, Porras slowed down and manipulated the source tapes, adding effects and various textures, and then approached the compositions as if the guitar was a tool with which to explore these ghostly sounds, the haunting mysteries revealed by these old tapes, do in fact make the perfect background for Porras' haunting sonic ruminations, so much so that in many places it's difficult to tell what's guitar and what's tape, the various sounds bleeding into one another, long passages of somnambulant drift, give way to some soaring, almost shredding (at least the barn Owl / Porras version of shredding) distorted guitar blissout, lush distorted layers of guitar aimed heavenward, quickly drifting back to earth and settling into another sprawl of slo-mo soft psych drift. The tapes seem to provide texture as much as anything, adding plenty of hiss and hum, giving the sound a rough around the edges feel, and a mysterious warmth. Divine and dreamy, and beautifully ghostly.
To be fair, the sounds here are not hugely removed from Porras' other solo work, or as Elm, or even his work with Barn Owl, but it is a stunningly subtle progression, as he continues to push the boundaries of his own explorative guitar ambience, continuing to delve deeper into the dark and dusty corners of abstract psychedelia, and with each record further refining the sonic essence of shadow and light, rendered here in lush, sweeping epics of spectral guitardrone and heaving swells of warm chordal shimmer. So nice.
Housed in a super heavy full color gatefold jacket. Includes a download coupon as well!
Initially sold exclusively on the recent European Barn Owl tour, now finally available at aQ, here's Revisitor, a dvd-r of super 8 films and original music from one half of Barn Owl, former aQ-er Jon Porras, released on his own Dolores Press imprint. It's a hazy washed out collection of haunting grainy black and white images set to a score that is quite different than what we're used to hearing from Porras, in Barn Owl or solo, especially considering that there are no guitars here, all electronics and electronic sourced sounds. Long stretches of hazy grey ambience, of industrial whir and hushed minimal thrum, tons of space surrounding abstract swirls of whipping-wind shimmer and deep sonorous echo drenched pulses, blurred metallic layers slowly unfurling in clouds of soft focus effects, a series of minimal soundscapes that slip easily from rich and lustrous and lovely, to haunting and ominous, one second a gauzy softly psychedelic smear of dreamlike chords, the next, a rumbling sinister sprawl of low end blur peppered with strange percussion and some downright doomy sonic swells. The visuals are equally stunning, strange hooded figures performing strange rituals, rolling hills and the silhouette of trees against a slate sky, a stormy coastline, the crashing surf, the lens dappled with rain drops, the sunlight glistening on water, birds flitting through thick clouds, and plenty of more abstract images as well, strange lights, plenty of shadows, textures and mysterious moving abstract shapes, random reflections, impressionistic images of candles, and instruments, hands and hidden faces, all lost in deep fields of rich black.
Originally limited to just 30 copies, now available in a slightly less limited run, housed in a printed origami style sleeve, each disc hand stamped.
Both the Barn Owls have solo records on this week's list, elsewhere there's Evan Caminiti's new single on Trensmat, and then there's this, the long awaited new solo record from the other half of dronefolk duo Barn Owl, Jon Porras. We'd been hearing about this record for ages, Porras' long in the works heavy shoegaze record, but this is no MBV/Lovesliescrushing worship, nope instead, Undercurrent is a logical offshoot of the dark twang flecked drone and drift of Barn Owl, a bit less murky and more crystalline, prismatic, the opening track emerging from a cloud of swirling layered thrum, blossoming into something more more melodic than usual, spidery melodies, draped over a smoldering backdrop of rumble and drift, of hum and shimmer, the sounds a blurred chorale, building to a dreamdrone climax, epic and majestic and powerfully emotional.
The whole record reveals itself as a sort of hazy psychguitar gem, Porras deftly layering darkness and light, wreathing pop in shadow, infusing churning darkness with pop warmth, "Seascape" is a gauzy blisscape, but is underpinned by ominous roiling black sonic clouds, which build and build and eventually swallow the rest of the track, the drama in the melodies struggling to escape the pull of this black hole, haunting and ominous and so intense. "Shore" is another strange melding of hazy drift and rumbling blackened drone, only in this case, the blackness is driven back, revealing the warmth within, the song's second half unfurling all reverby and abstract, while that blackness whispers in the background.
The clean guitar sound is definitely reminiscent of Roy Montgomery, the same sort of softly effected shimmer, but it's that sound combined with the more dense and dark guitarscapes, that create Porras' distinctive Undercurrent, "Peering" another example, wreathing those soft smeared swells of sound with dark grinding slabs of blurred blackness, and roiling riffage. The record closes with "Gaze", a pulsing sprawl of washed out woozy guitarscapery, again a beautiful bit of atmospheric drift, disguising the darkness that lays beneath, but again, light triumphs over darkness, and the record unwinds with a stretch of super spare wide open ambience, the guitars letting lose tendrils of melodies, wrapping them in reverb and letting them float delicately in space, as they fall gently to earth. Eventually piling up into a gorgeously layered final soft squall of bleary and blissful psychedelic haze...
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!!
