Folks who flipped over the recent copies of Techno Animal's Ghosts we dug up and listed a while back, are probably gonna flip over this too, a long lost remix ep from the group Ice, that like Techno Animal, featured both Kevin Martin of The Bug and Justin Broadrick of Godflesh, Jesu and lots and lots of other stuff. There was plenty of overlap between Techno Animal and Ice, both being sort of avant industrial hip hop /dub groups, the big difference was that Ice included sax (played here by both Martin and 16-17's Alex Buess!!), which gave it a sort of free jazz vibe, although that was balanced by Ice's overall lurching, lumbering industrial crunch.
On Code:Quarantine, two tracks from Ice's Under The Skin record get reworked, as does one from that awesome long out of print Isolationism compilations. "Juggernaut Kiss (Deaf, Dumb Blind)" is all nineties industrial thump and skitter, the beats dubbed WAY out, all tangled up in squiggles of distorted guitars, swinging wildly from speaker to speaker, thick low slung bass rumbles and thrums, sax squeals and skronks, the vocals are spoken or mumbled, the whole thing is a constant barrage of dizzying beats, twisted production, and staggering deconstructed beats, like some sort of Godflesh / 16-17 mash up, pulled apart and reassembled as something much more spaced out and skeletal. "The Dredger (Titanic)" is mostly beatless, long stretches of moaning horn and reverbed string buzz, loads of echo and delay, plenty of reverb, streaks of feedback, when the beats to come in, they're pretty abstract, shuffly and skittery, more about texture that rhythm, building to a skronky psychedelic freakout, before locking back into a more stripped down groove, as it slithers through billowing clouds of twisted FX and whirling fragmented melody.
Finally, "Implosion (Flying Machine)" gets WAY dubbed out, thick syrupy basslines under horns and vox and drums, that get slathered in effects and sent spinning, a looped tripped out cracked looking glass bit of free jazz industrial dubbiness, with some seriously killer long stretches of stripped down minimal skitter that makes up almost the whole second half of the song, various beats all space echo-ed and Lee Perry-ed, the motorik rhythm pounding and shuffling its way through occasional fields of crumbling distortion, insectoid buzz, and swirling psychedelic chaos.
WAY OUT OF PRINT. We got a small handful of these direct from the label, who discovered a small stash, so odds are these will be gone before you know it, so buy one now cheap, or pay way too much later for it on eBay...
The much hyped debut from these Danish teenagers finally gets a proper domestic release, and as we've mentioned in lots of reviews, we often find ourselves fighting that knee jerk reaction of hating stuff that just seems way to universally praised, hipster beloved bands gushed over by blogs, Pitchfork, reviewers, and all the rest, but as you've probably already surmised, the main reason for pointing out the above, is that, somehow, DESPITE all the hype, these guys are pretty ruling, a broody buzzy collection of darkly gothicky post punk that is equal parts frenetic crunch and low slung swagger, of murky moody jangle and tense tribal pound, the vocals buried in the mix and doused in echo, the guitars swinging from reverbed chime to gnarled atonal riffage, the drums wild and loose, the songs often veering from lumbering dirge to chaotic blast and back again, loads of strange sounds, twisted production, a sound that's garagey and low fidelity, but still thick and dense, and the songs, slow blossoming gems, that seem to get catchier with every listen. Heavily beholden to Joy Division no doubt, but perhaps equally (and maybe unknowingly, considering their ages) beholden to the darker side of Homestead Records and and the moodier more melodic noise rock side of back-in-the-day Touch And Go.
Babyfaced Danish dreamboats Iceage return for album number three, and we're happy to report that amidst all of the hype and hyperbole surrounding these dudes that this here is a seriously great record in its own right, not to mention one that's not content to simply sow the same seeds as their records past, but instead marks another leap forward for these Scandinavian scoundrels. Plowing Through The Fields Of Love immediately marks a more dramatic sound for this band. There's a heavier reliance on piano for a start, and there's a sort of looming specter of humid gothic Americana permeating the swaggering barroom (post)punk. Elias Ronnenfelt's off key caterwauling moans seep over the songs like drunken sermons from a derelict pulpit. Plaintive piano stabs drift over clattering stumbling drumming. Slinking serpentine rockabilly rhythms fall in and out of time like some dizzy drunkard's long walk home from the bar. But this record knows how to brood just as much as it knows how to lurch, and amidst the militaristic drum marches, stuttering guitars and clanking dilapidated saloon piano there are moments of gorgeous whiskey-soaked balladeering complete with soaring violins, stretched to their breaking point by stale dry bows. It's a sound that owes a a lot to Tender Prey-era Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds to be sure, but would also probably equally appeal to mourners of dearly departed local AQ faves Pleasure Forever. Fine company to be in for sure, and Iceage takes their place amongst these fellow squalid lovable lowlifes with the confidence of a man with an empty bourbon bottle, a three day old seersucker suit and not a thing to lose. Highly recommended!
Everybody here flipped for the debut release from these Danish jangle punks, 2011's New Brigade, a seriously kick ass record that we described thusly: a broody buzzy collection of darkly gothicky post punk that is equal parts frenetic crunch and low slung swagger, of murky moody jangle and tense tribal pound, the vocals buried in the mix and doused in echo, the guitars swinging from reverbed chime to gnarled atonal riffage, the drums wild and loose, the songs often veering from lumbering dirge to chaotic blast and back again, loads of strange sounds, twisted production, a sound that's garagey and low fidelity, but still thick and dense, and the songs, slow blossoming gems, that seem to get catchier with every listen.
And all of that most definitely still applies, but the first thing we thought when we threw this on, and the opener "Ecstasy" kicked off, was, wow, these guys sound super drunk. And they really sort of do, at first, and somehow, even the instruments sound drunk, that track, and the whole record really, unfurls as a gloriously woozy blowout, all melting guitars, stumbling lurching rhythms, drawled slurred vocals, the production murky and muddy, the band launching into brief blasts of punky crunch, but quickly swinging right back into that opening murky lumbering dirginess. And the thing is, it all sounds SO GOOD, and somehow, that fuckedupness, combined with an obvious knack for pop songsmithery, makes it sound just as catchy as that first record. Check out "In Haze" which seems to channel the spirit of Husker Du through something way murkier, with a crazy catchy chorus, that keeps stumbling to a halt part way through, the melody just sort of petering out, before lurching right back into it, it sounds too fucked up and off kilter to be on purpose, but it obviously it is, the weird woozy tempo shift a huge part of what makes it so catchy. And then the follow up, "Morals", displays the other side of Iceage, their secret pop side, here sounding like a more punk Guided By Voices, and that GBV vibe pops up throughout, dramatic and hook heavy, but still fuzzy and murky and punky. We also hear some Arctic Monkeys buried in the mix here and there weirdly enough, almost as if someone were to clean this up, and washed off some of the murk, there just might be come crunchy pop hiding out in there somewhere, which is in fact probably the case. There's also a bit of the Fall, the singer's mumble mouthed vocals draped over churning angular guitars and loose woozy rhythm section.
On the surface, it's all post punky swagger, yowled vox, wild drumming, fuzzed out riffs, thick buzzing bass, and lots of these track are just that, seriously fierce blasts of churning punk rock energy, but the more you listen, the more these songs become much more than that, from the jangliest, to the fiercest and most frantic, they all begin to blossom into the sort of effortless poppiness that once woven into the aforementioned janglepunk crunch, is pretty much totally untouchable. A new store fave for sure!!
This, the 9th-or-so cd from guitarist Gentry Densley's Salt Lake City based musical collective Iceburn, comes packaged in a 6x8 manilla envelope containing the cd and also an eight-part essay discussing the band's evolution from their Victory-label
The recording itself documents a two-guitar + saxophone and percussion incarnation of the ever-shifting Iceburn lineup, recorded live to minidisc with "bass ghosts" overdubbed later by guest Adam Lane.
Ambient drone and itchy improv clatter collide with some really intense out-guitar demolition on this disc. As the liner notes suggest, fans of Rudolph Grey's Blue Humans (and other like minded heavy guitar skronk) will be pleased. Avant-hardcore-free improv done with passion, sincerity, dedication, and most importantly, inspiration.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
These guys are former Utah skateboard punk rock speed metallers who now explore an original improv sound with hints of Miles and Fripp. Guitars, sax, percussion, two contrabasses...
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
This time out, Utah's most adventurous (former-)skatemetal band performs instrumental jazz improvisations with two electric guitars, two contrabasses and drums...as always, great stuff, heavy and beautiful.
I (Allan) once came across this band in one of those encyclopedic psychedelic record collector reference works (Scented Gardens of the Mind, I think it was) and was intrigued by the description: an *Icelandic* hard rock band from 1971, comparable to Black
Gruesome/frosty looking logo, very metal-sounding name, morbid b&w cover art. looks like proto-metal... maybe even proto-BLACK-metal?! Icecross has intrigued us for years. Long ago, we read about 'em in one of those encyclopedic psychedelic record collector reference works (Scented Gardens Of The Mind, most likely) and were struck by the description. An ICELANDIC hard rock band from 1972, comparable to Black Sabbath, supposedly! Man we wanted to hear that. Certainly the scary album cover and song titles ("Jesus Freaks", "Nightmare", "Scared", "The End") suggested they played some sort of heavy, Satanic psych-metal. Of course, the book said the record was super rare and impossible to find. Oh the despair. Then, some years ago, a bootleg cd edition surfaced, and we got to hear it. Was it everything we were hoping for? Yes and no - no, it didn't sound much like Black Sabbath, not nearly as heavy as that, or metallic. But, yes, it was pretty darn cool, and weird. Once past the relatively normal first track "Wandering Around" (a standard bluesy boogie with lyrics about "looking for my baby"), then things get hella freaky. Icecross definitely deliver the dark and twisted psych, with songs full of sharp slashing tangles of dissonant guitar, total primal-prog power trio action, playing hard and fast on cuts like "Scared", with wailing psych leads. The vocals remind us a bit of the drama of Van Der Graaf Generator - or on downer-ballad "A Sad Man's Story", of uber-mopey krautrockers Paternoster. Lyrically, the anti-Christian "Jesus Freaks" stands out, with the line "They believe in Jesus, we believe in ourselves" - though the liner notes to this new, at long last legit cd release, indicate that one of the former members of the band did later become religious. This new edition also states the original lp was released in '73 by the way.
So, while not exactly an early Icelandic example of heavy metal as described in that reference book, these demented Viking hippies maybe do belong somewhere far back in the lineage of Scandinavian blackness, yeah.
Thanks to Vintage/Rockadrome for reissuing this, complete with a booklet full of vintage photos and firsthand accounts of the band's history. And, they're doing a vinyl version too, upcoming in a few months.
Originally released in 1975, this is one serious slab of mind blowing Japanese improvised kosmiche drone music, featuring legendary composer / performer Toshi Ichiyanagi (a student of John Cage who was once married to Yoko Ono!), Takehisa Kosugi, the mastermind behind one of our favorite bands ever, the Taj Mahal Travellers, here teamed up with Stockhausen percussionist Michael Ranta, for two extended free drone workouts.
The trio employ reverbed ring modulators, threaded vocals, melodicas, pianos, violins, gongs and Japanese biwas and shamisens, and weave an elaborate and lush tapestry of sound, one that is really not that far removed from Taj Mahal Travellers. Brooding, shimmering expanses of muted tones, of layered rumbles, dreamlike melodies, peppered with strange electronics, haunting and otherworldly, with a distinctly krautrock vibe, or krautdrone, all of the current practitioners of spaced out kraut inspired dronemusic, as good as they may be, can't even touch this.
The music is alive, a living thing, that the players breathe life into and guide, letting the sounds love and drift and fluctuate, creating something organic and expansive and breathtaking. The percussion adds a unique element, not really adding any propulsion, but instead, contributing texture, and a framework that the players often let collapse, before bringing it right back. The second track begins with a cool skeletal groove, all clank and clatter and thump, the space around the sounds as much a part of the overall sound, eventually slipping back into something more murky and subterranean sounding, the percussion switching to something more tabla-like, draped over an oozing sea of rumbles and growls, scrapes and whirrs.
This is one of those rare pieces of music that manages to be two things at once, a gorgeously dreamlike, relaxing bit of sonic ambience, but also something elaborate and dense, opening up the listener to dual experiences, drifting off on the surface, or strapping on the headphones, letting that extra weight carry you down into the swirling blackness at the heart of this recording.
Incredible. And essential. About the closest we'll ever get to a lost Taj Mahal Travellers record...
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When I first moved to San Francisco in the early nineties, I kept hearing about a band called the Icky Boyfriends. Can't remember exactly what I heard about them, but it did seem like, judging from how often people mentioned them, that they must be THE San Francisco band. And they kind of were, but in a way I wouldn't be able to properly appreciate for years. The Icky Boyfriends were a three piece, guitar drums and vocals, sloppy, sweaty, shitty, noisy, punk as fuck, but not PUNK ROCK punk, more sort of some chaotic dirge-y freaked out what the fuck kind of punk rock. They were an unholy collision of nerd rock and noise rock, fronted by Icky Jon, with his unruly white guy 'fro and thick black glasses, and his histrionic stage presence and that wailing caterwaul. Each song a two or three minute burst of simple slow sludgy riffing, fuzzed out garage rock crunch, pounding drums and that wild sort of sung, sort of spoken nasal wail, expounding on the public transit system, Mexican food, cops, flea baths, sex, meat, crappy jobs, the mission, Frank's Mom and all sorts of other bizarre randomness. Like some pop band that got confused, ended up in the Mission, got super wasted, then beaten up and left for dead, and then somehow ended up putting a record out on Siltbreeze. Damaged and demented and so fucked up. The whole thing culminating with the independent film I'm Not Fascinating, starring the Boyfriends, as well as loads of other Mission rock luminaries, in a demented, super low budget, slice of Super 8 weirdness. This double disc collects every little bit of recorded Boyfriends there ever was, lp, cassette, seven inches, compilation tracks, live recordings and even a bunch of unreleased stuff! Lots of liner notes too, photos, a history of the band from drummer Anthony Bedard, as well as a bizarre drug addled song by song play by play from Icky Jon.
It's tempting to simply focus on the fact that one of the monsters (or is it a demon?!) is wearing sweat socks on the cover illustration, but we were able to tear our eyes away long enough to pop the cd in our player! Although they go by cryptic band member aliases, we hope we're not blowing their cover too badly by saying that Icy Demons is lead by Need New Body drummer Chris Powell and Bablicon bassist Griffin Rodriquez. That said, while listening to this album it's easy to forget that you're hearing one group. There's so many unexpected twists and turns in the route they travel. It truly bears many of the eclectic, eccentric exploratory earmarks of a trippy Elephant Six Collective recording. Let your mind wander for a second and you'll find yourself somewhere completely different from where you (and the Icy Demons) were a moment ago. Indeed, these are not really 'songs' as much as they are interludes -- each one taking you to parts that seem fleetingly familiar. The group shapeshift from electronic soundscapists to jazz horns to chamber emsemble to choral assembly to who knows what? It all begins with a smoooshy gluey mass that melts into an organ melody atop ramshackle percussion, and that's only in the first few minutes of this album. Icy Demons roam as they please, and if you wanna ride their wagon you better hang on tight!
Awesome reissue of this late sixties beat gem. Didn't know too much about The Id, other than the guitar player was none other than Jerry Cole, one of the original Champs, who recorded "Tequila", as well as being a serious mover and shaker in the music industry having performed with and/or composed/arranged for Glenn Campbell, the Beach Boys, Merle Haggard, Steely Dan, James Taylor, Blood, Sweat And Tears, Aretha Franklin, Little Richard, Chicago, the Byrds, Greg Allman, the Righteous Brothers, Jerry Lee Lewis, Nelson Riddle, Henry Mancini, Kenny Rogers, Hank Williams Jr. and loads more. The rest of the band stack up pretty well too, with CV's heavy in music as well as movies and television.
None of which has anything to do with why this record is so weird and wonderful and totally kick ass. On first listen, the sound is what you might expect, a mix of the Beatles, the Beach Boys, the Monkees and especially the Monks. That sort of fuzzy psych pop, a shuffling beat, jangling guitars, harmony vocals and a lead singer with a sort of raspy croon, a bit like Alex Chilton in the Boxtops or Gary Burger of the Monks. But this is way more far out. Just check out the first track, "The Rake" a super tripped out psychedelic beat shuffle, with EXTREME stereo panning, heavily reverbed guitars, creepy whispered vocals, some strange falsetto harmonies, muted rhythmic breakdowns, very druggy and bizarre, but pretty seriously stomping as well. The record shifts gears back into more traditional psychfuzzpop, but only for a moment. What's that buzzing, it sounds like a... it is! Sitar. Fuck yeah, Cole also plays sitar, adding a gloriously buzzy Eastern drone element to lots of the tracks, pushing all of our Turkish Delights buttons. Guitar leads are replaced by slippery sitars and the whole thing sounds just that much more psychedelic. The highlight though is the ten minute "The Inner Sound Of The Id", an acid-soaked psychedelic freak out title track, drifting buzzing sitar, creeping spoken vocal incantations, simple martial drumming, everything wrapped in thick reverb, more extreme panning, so druggy and awesomely wigged out.
And if you're not sold already, check out the original liner notes, and tell us you don't need to check this out:
"The primitive rhythms brought back to popular music. Before Civilization reared its crew-cut head and the world stifled a yawn that has lasted a thousand years, man danced at frantic festivals until he fell down foaming at the mouth. Not any more. Why? Because the beat became ironed out, flattened, regularized. Now, for the FIRST TIME in the Western world since pagan gods were worshipped, the primitive rhythms have been brought back to popular music. A group of four young and talented musicians came together to create this musical madness, a kind of "asymmetrical-contrapuntal chromaticism." Non-experienced listeners would call it instant Delirium! Freud discovered the Id, and on this album it was set to music, it is the unshape of things to come." Asymmetrical-contrapuntal chromaticism? Hell yeah!
Includes extensive liner notes about each band member (sadly not much about the band itself), lots of photos and TEN bonus tracks!
Ida's new release has soft ethereal songs, in the same vein as their previous releases. It was recorded during the sessions for their previous disc, "Will You Find Me", yet it is somewhat darker and said to be much more personal to the band. This release has
For slowcore fans bemoaning the change in musical direction that their beloved Low has recently taken, you may seek some comfort in this new album from New York's Ida. They've not veered from their hushed, melancholic path at all. In fact they've refined it! Their male/female vocal combo is particularly in top form -- sooo dreamy. Even when they insert some guitar distortion, it's warm and unabrasive. Very nice!
It's no secret that Ida has long been compared to fellow slowcore greats Low. Darkly melancholic at times, but never too heavy, mind you. A bit softer hearted and sweeter sentimented. Album after album, these New Yorkers have unassumingly and almost shyly offered up their gentle pop songs. Nothing too frilly or fancy, just finely crafted hushed goodness that hugs every heart within earshot. Recommended!
Another subtle beauty from these slowcore veterans out of New York. While they've done a superb job of quality control over the years there have been a few outings that while not bad were somewhat forgettable, but such is not the case with this lovely ep! Sitting somewhere perfectly between the devastatingly sad side of Low and the head out of the window daydreams of Red House Painters these are seven songs we've been listening to over and over as we stare into space and let the world pass by, as we catch our breath and linger in the sweet breeze of these gorgeous songs. There's even a few really nice moments of twang and folk on this ep but it's their slow sad beauties that we love the most.
New York's Ida have been together since 1994, and in those years they've found themselves on a handful of record labels including Simple Machines, Capitol and most recently Tigerstyle. Apparently their brief stay with a major label afforded them a copious
Ida continue to make lovely music floating along in the Mazzy Star/Cowboy Junkies stream. This is an album of slow and quiet music created with numerous instruments of the stringed and keyboard variety -- the list of which is very similar to that of San Diego's wonderful Black Heart Procession: cello, melodica, viola, wurlitzer, accordion. The music itself is rich and lovely but nowhere near as dark or mournful as BHP. The list of guest players includes Warn Defever (His Name Is Alive), Tara Jane O'Neil (Rodan), Bernie Worrell (Funkadelic!) to name a few.
Upon a first listen of this album, you might be taken aback, this is certainly not the slow dreamy melancholia that we've come to know and love from Ida. But hang on a sec... There's a good reason for this different approach. This is no ordinary release -- You Are My Flower is a CHILDREN'S ALBUM! And a very pretty, down to earth one at that. Two members of that soft twang New York pop group, namely Elizabeth Mitchell and Daniel Littleton, present an acoustic country-tinged collection of childhood sing-songs including versions of old classics like "This Little Light Of Mine", "Shoo-Fly", "Jingle Bells" (!). Mitchell and Littleton sing sweetly and are backed by a pair of guitars, a wood flute (played by Warren Defever), some piano and shaker. All lovingly recorded by Defever (His Name Is Alive) at his home in Livonia, MI. Just shy of 25 minutes which is perfect for the tots' short attention spans.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Collaboration between, you guessed, the bands Ida and Retsin, with funny liner notes by Warren DeFever.
The cover of I Am The Fire depicts a lone figure crouched amidst a strange assemblage of equipment, several amps, a synthesizer, an old fashioned tape recorder, some sort of oscillator and a large square lamp illuminating the scene, while surrounding the figure and all the equipment is a light dusting of what appears to be leaves, quite evocative, and we'd like to think it's an actual photo of the creation of this disc, as the sounds here are definitely dimly lit, suffused with a mysterious glow, dark and intimate, haunting and abstract. A slow burning drone music, less minimal and more melodic, the opener sounds like Godspeed or Explosions In The Sky, stripped of drums, melted down and poured out into a slowly spreading pool of blackened sonic shimmer, the sound muted and softly distorted, smoldering with a strange urgency, more thick and warm than heavy, reminding us quite a bit of a less heavy Fear Falls Burning. The other tracks here definitely slip into more minimal territory, but even then, the sound is dense and organic sounding, tones and notes stretched way out and laid atop one another, alongside other sympathetic tones, unleashing clouds of rhythmic overtones and all manner of subtle colorations, drifting slow and low, glimmering dreamily, a prismatic soundfield of blacks and greys, beautifully blurred into soft focus suite of deep listening dronemusic.
RECORD STORE DAY 2015!!
Blackened, occultic, witchy musical melancholia is the order of the day from this Los Angeles trio, made up of two lovely ladies, playing bass and drums, usually clothed in flowing white dresses, and in between shaven headed, long bearded, skinny guitarist, usually seated in a chair. It makes for an odds spectacle, but the music is just as odd. They may have a metal pedigree, and a legion of metalheads as fans, but sonically, they hew toward a more post rock, slowcore, sort of like a gothic Galaxie 500, or Low with a bit more heft, however you parse their sound, or their look, we dig them a LOT. This special Record Store Day single offers up another slab of brooding mystery, acoustic guitars, pounding drums, gorgeous vocal harmonies, a black metal like main riff, but bookended by something much more moody and minimal. A haunting and harrowing gloom pop / downer folk / dream-dirge that only makes the B side somehow even much MORE haunting, like the A side slowed down and made even more minor and mournful, a slo-mo, doom-drift version of Billie Holiday's "Strange Fruit", which sounds like it could be an Ides original, the vocals spectral and ethereal, the instrumentation languid and lovely, yet exuding a seriously strange and sinister aura.
Again, this is a Record Store Day release, we only got a handful, and there's a very good chance, that once these are gone, they may be gone for good.
At the risk of repeating ourselves, there's a visual component to this witchy blackened trio, that is certainly worth mentioning again, and seems to tie directly into the strange occultic vibe of the music. Imagine two willowy women, both beautiful and with long black hair, each wearing what seems to be an old white wedding dress, one at the mic, the other behind the kit, while the guitar player, quite willowy himself, sits in a chair hunched over his guitars, the trio remaining mostly motionless, but evoking a strange sort of vibe, like some ancient ritual, enacted for hundreds of years in different permutations, this one being in the form of a musical trio, the medium now a sort of blackened dirgery. Not so much metal as slightly metallic, and as we mentioned in our review of Ides Of Gemini's debut, we found they seemed to have much more in common with Warpaint or Mazzy Star. But the opening of the first track definitely throws down a black metal gauntlet, unfurling a frenzied buzzing black metal riff, underneath which, the drums pound tribally, yet instead of exploding into some furious blast, the sound shifts into a sort of funereal march, all simple stumbling drums, doomy riffage, and then the vocals, mesmerizing and ethereal, but still powerful, the harmonies haunting, the sound blossoming like some blackened liturgical incantation, the overall effect quite mesmerizing.
The whole record's a series of ritualistic sonic spells, driven mostly by the vocals, but constantly underpinned by simple blackened droned out riffing and driven by the spare martial drumming.
All four of the tracks from the demo are re-recorded and presented here again, including our favorite, the utterly spellbinding "Resurrectionists", which is essentially a gorgeous slab of indie pop slowcore, with a killer main riff/melody, and an insanely catchy refrain/chorus, the sort of song that you'll find yourself returning to again and again, the new version (of this and the other three demo tracks) so much heavier, and so much more lush, wreathed in warm swaths of reverb and echo, as if these sonic rituals were being performed on a crumbling altar in some old stone cathedral, the listener hunched in an alcove, hidden by shadows, letting Ides Of Gemini's mournful musical lamentations wash over them...
A special Record Store Day release from this witchy blackened dreampsych trio, featuring rock scribe J. Bennett on guitar, along with Sera Timms (of Black Math Horsemen), and Kelly Johnston, on guitar and bass respectively, two willowy women, both of whom very much look the part of the witchy temptress, performing live hey both wear old white wedding dresses, looking like they stepped right out of some old daguerrotype, and who provide the haunting harmonies, which are definitely what make IoG so magical and mysterious sounding.
While their past records were laced with a bit of black buzz, the sound here is much more moody and minimal, the A side sounds a bit more like nineties slowcore filtered through a more modern shoegaze aesthetic, but even here, Bennett introduces some blackness, in the form of his slo-mo black metal riffing, which is transformed into something more hazy and washed out, a doomy drifty churn, the song slipping into some full on dirginess, a heaving, heavy, reverbed creep, the whole thing a little bit noisy, a little bit gothy, the vocals keeping the sound grounded, transforming what might otherwise be some minimal doominess, into something more ethereal and hauntingly trancendent, the plodding minimal drumming, adding a primal pulse to the blurry buzzy dreaminess. The B side gets even more dreamy, ditching all the buzz and plod, in favor of something more atmospheric, lilting minor key piano, wreathed in a gauzy sonic haze, seems to blur and drift, the vocals doused in echo and reverb float spectrally above, the whole thing a dreamlike sprawl of gothic slowcore ethereal dreampop soft-psych bliss, the vocals reminding us of Cheslea Wolfe or Zola Jesus, but set amidst a landscape much more cinematic and abstract. So gorgeous.
This was in fact a Record Store Day release, and thus was super limited, we did get a bunch, but once we sell out, these are probably gone for good.
The record comes in different colored sleeves, and multiple colors of vinyl, includes a nice printed insert with lyrics.
Serenades from the cemetery! Neurot bring us another melancholic, majestic missive from this LA based boy-girl-girl trio, who kind of sound like a metal Mazzy Star (but not metal enough for the internet's Encyclopaedia Metallum site it would seem, can never figure that out). Featuring Decibel columnist J. Bennett on guitar, Kelley Johnson-Gibson on drums, and Sera Timms on vocals & bass, this witchy groop toured the US last year opening for Ghost (!) and we wonder how that went, the Ides Of Gemini possibly fitting in with the vibe of Ghost, being both quite melodic and occultic, grandiose and gothic, but much more stripped down, slo-mo, and serious sounding... On Old World New Wave, we get nine new tracks of their funerary shoegaze, all doomy guitars, doomy drums, and doomy - but beautiful - female vocals, soaring over the plodding gloom below, like a depressed angel singing sweetly, sadly, intoning cryptic lyrics of love and sorrow. It draws you in, each song building up the moody atmosphere, this album definitely one meant to be played straight through, for totality of effect, a hypnotic one which should leave you with fists clenched, and weeping. Another sterling outing from this aQ fave outfit!
We were lucky enough to get a sneak peak at these new Neurot Recordings signees at the Bay Area premiere for the new Blood, Sweat + Vinyl documentary, all about independent record labels, focused on three of our favorites, Neurot, Hyrda Head and Constellation. To commemorate / celebrate, the screening was turned into a show, featuring one band representing each label, Evangelista for Constellation, Oxbow for Hydra Head and this trio Ides Of Gemini for Neurot. Since they didn't have a record out yet, we weren't sure what to expect, other than that metal scribe J Bennett played guitar, and when they took the stage, the shaved headed bushy bearded Bennet sat in a chair, hunched over his guitar, accompanied by two willowy women, both with long dark hair, both wearing what appeared to be white wedding gowns. The effect was striking, even more so when the fog machine came on and wreathed the band in smoke, and the sound was appropriately haunting and witchy, not so much metal as gloomy and ethereal, the drums simple and propulsive, the guitars washed out and warm, and the vocals, lush and layered, hazy and hypnotic, with lush swirling harmonies. The resulting sound reminded us of slowcore indie gloom outfit Warpaint, albeit a bit heavier, the sound being a bit more ritualistic, and the guitar occasionally (and quite suddenly) launching into full on black metal buzz, but instead of the rest of the music following suit, the brief buzzing blast soon dissipated leaving the song to return to its woozy mesmer. This is the kind of dark heaviness (or heavy darkness), that evokes Mazzy Star as much as The Devil's Blood or Blood Ceremony, if not moreso, the tracks here don't blast or pound or thrash, these or haunting funereal ruminations, witchy and otherworldly, hazy fuzz drenched dirges, a gauzy sort of ethereal doom, that is more mesmerizing than it is heavy, a blackened siren song that is utterly hypnotic, especially the last track, the main melody/hook stayed stuck in out head long after that show, and hearing these tracks again, that one especially, has us dying for a proper full length.
The cd is LIMITED TO 333 COPIES, packged in gorgeous metallic blue/silver sleeves, multiple printed panels, super swank, the tape is LIMITED TO 100 COPIES, each one hand numbered, the J-cards on the same sort of metallic paper, and includes a sticker!
A fantastic collection of rarities from this Chicago pop combo formed in the years of the British Invasion... and it definitely shows. Full of wonderful vocal harmonies and jangling guitars this is very much in the vein of the Hollies or the Kinks. All 18 tracks included here were recorded between 1965 and 1968.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Dave of Polvo, Chuck of Spatula, and Grant of Jimi Hendricks In-Experience play with eastern modal structures and melodies on all kinds of acoustic instruments like oud, saz, and dulcimer. Quite nice stuff in the faux-ethnomusicological genre (see also Can, Sun City Girls, Hochenkeit, Macha, etc.)
Personally, this is our first concentrated encounter with this Italian guitarist and electronic experimentalist, though a friend of ours speaks highly of his prior output. And it's on the Hapna label, generally a pretty good bet for goodness (they last brought us discs by Sinistri, Pita, and Stephan Mathieu among others). Though, in some rare instances Hapna stuff goes too far into the skronking, scrabbling, indulgent improv thing for our tastes. However, Ielasi's Gesine turns out to indeed be quite excellent and enjoyable. It's abstract and seemingly improv-involved, yes, but tastefully, gorgeously so, all sounds well-placed and possessed of strange beauty. The twang of strings, amidst droney static, mellow and mesmeric. It's like Hans Reichel gone onkyo, or John Fahey-on-Mego, to make two weird and probably unhelpful comparisons. Definitely something for fans of David Grubbs, Taku Sugimoto, and Dean Roberts, we'd venture. In fact, it turns out we have heard Ielasi before, as he played prepared guitar on Roberts' wonderful Be Mine Tonight album released on Kranky a few years back.
Unlike some guitarists, Ielasi doesn't feel obligated to play his instrument very much -- some tracks are purely electronic ambience, no notes being played. He says a lot with a little, over these six tracks/31 minutes 13 seconds. I first listened to this on a rainy day and was absolutely entranced. So very good, we'll definitely have to start paying closer attention to this guy and his electro-acoustic artistry.
We're pretty happy with the Swedish label Kning Disk lately. Their releases look lovely, and more importantly, always engage our ears. Here's a new one on Kning from the duo of Giuseppe Ielasi and Nicola Ratti. Italian experimental guitarist Ielasi is already a pleasant fixture in the AQ consciousness, entrancing us with the rainy-day moodiness of his quietly blissful releases on the Hapna label (see elsewhere on our site for reviews of those). Nicola Ratti we're not familiar with, but clearly he gets on well with Ielasi's usual sonic approach.
Bellows consists of seven untitled tracks of abstract beauty, a detailed dronescape created with guitar, percussion, turntable, and electronics. Thus... Crackle and glitch. Chime and shimmer. Gentle and mysterious. Offering seeming glimpses of song and melody amidst all the insectoid buzz, a dreamy reverie of looping loveliness and static-y texture.
Limited to just 450 copies, by the way...and of course we have far fewer than that on hand.
If Thousands are a duo from Duluth, Minnesota who abandoned their previous areas of musical and instrumental experience (voice and bass, respectively) in order to take a more "naive" approach to music making. The resulting instrumentation (moog, theremin, samplers, digital & analog loops, circuit benders, children's keyboards, shortwave, electric razor, "miscellaneous noise," as well as the more pedestrian guitar, drums, and vocals) is employed to create dreamy, cinematic, primarily instrumental (hushed vocals make an appearance or two) washes of sound not unlike Windy & Carl or Landing, evocative of the wide open landscapes around that famous national park for which the album is named. Appropriately, they have worked closely with experimental documentary filmmaker Travis Wilkerson, contributing the score to "An Injury To One," about the lynching of a Wobbly organizer in Butte, Montana. Also appropriate to the spare, lovely sound is Yellowstone's release on Chairkickers Music, the label run by Low's Alan Sparhawk, who also recorded the record in a church in Duluth. Like Low, If Thousands' icy sound incorporates roundabout Joy Division influences, with tribute paid via a cover (Isolation). Really nice stuff.
Next best thing to seeing the Stooges back in the day (let's see your hands...anyone...no one?) I guess would be to see 'em now, at one of their rare, raved-about reunion shows like this one in Detroit last year, headlining over Sonic Youth and the Von Bondies. And the next best thing to being at the show, is seeing it on your TV screen. Next best is next best is next best but still, this is Iggy and the Stooges we're talking about! Iggy's still got it, a wiggling wriggling rock star to the end, really more and more of a fascinating grotesque to watch the older he gets, while the Ashton brothers on guitar and drums prove that you don't have to have Iggy's physique to kick ass, even if you're old dudes. And Mike Watt is obviously having the time of his life, subbing for deceased bassist Dave Alexander. Funhouse saxophonist Steve Mackay shows up too. It's not gonna change your life, but it's a good show, you can even forgive them the one new song they play (otherwise it's only songs from the first two albums, nothing from Raw Power, which makes us wonder why this says Iggy & The Stooges on it not just The Stooges?). No fancy stage production or lights or anything, just a band playing songs they wrote 30 years ago and tearing it up. DVD extras include an entire in-store performance, just Iggy and the Ashtons, which demonstrates that even at a low-key show where he's sitting on a chair half the time, Iggy still has to take off his shirt before it's over. And there's Mike Watt's audio diary, and a bunch of Stooges stills from the pages of Creem magazine.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
A brief two song tape from AQ faves Ignatz, a gorgeous collection of dreamy sonics, created to celebrate the birth of his first child. The A side is classic Ignatz, at once gorgeous and shimmery, but aggressive and distorted, the focal point being the mysterious and�haunting wordless vocals, raw and overdriven, that eventually become more and more blurry and distorted until they simply become another layer in the textural smear of sound, tangled up�with the sing song guitar melodies, as the whole track�grows more and more intense and blown out until it's like a more metal Fennesz. The track finishes off with a surprising little coda,�a playful little jaunty fragment, a playful melody, over a super distorted Konono-like percussive backdrop.
The flipside, is a gorgeous laid back, soft focus blissed out ballad, the guitars drifting and whispery, the vocals an about to crack falsetto croon, all bathed in tape hiss and amp buzz, super spacious and intimate and so so pretty.�
Hand silkscreened sleeves and of course crazy limited...
We've long been fans of this outsider alien Appalachia folk troubadour, we've made at least one of his records an aQ Record Of The Week, and raved about most of the others, so when we recently were offered some new releases from the Kraak label, one of the titles we were most excited about was this vinyl collection, which gathers up a handful of tracks from various out of print cassettes, most of which were so limited we were never able to get them.
And like the records proper, the sounds here while rooted in a sort of psychedelic folk, definitely veer in all sorts of directions, sonically quite disparate at times, but somehow strangely cohesive. The random samplings here seem to have been assembled in a way that at least simulates a record proper, but even then, the sounds are still tripped out and fantastically erratic.
Angular electric guitars wrap themselves around a reverbed croon, moody funereal dirges laced with muted percussion give way to dark buzzing drones, which in turn give way to a chiming dronefolk shimmer, weirdly twisted and detuned, wreathed in buzz. Elsewhere lush forest folk transforms into a swampy sort of abstract blues, with crooned vox and a woozy warped production. Jangle meets strum, falsetto vox drift over tinkling vibes-like melodies, shuffling jazzy rhythms blossom into something more rocking and psychedelic. A brief bit of moaning buzzy dronemusic, a la Angus Maclise or Tony Conrad introduces a barrage of wild squiggly melodies draped over a woozy strum, wrapped in swirls of feedback and blurred into a raga like trip out and finally, the record finishes off with an ultra minimal, barely there Jandekian creep, some serious outsider folk, with haunting falsetto vocals drifting over hushed tendrils of melodies and lots of mysterious near silence.
Cool stuff, essential for fans, maybe not the best place to start for newbies, but if you have any/all of the other records and dig them as much as we do, this stuff too will hit the spot.
A super limited tape from these mysterious space folk drone devils. Past Ignatz recordings we had likened to some sort of Alien Smithsonian Folkways, a curious blend of disembodied Appalachian twang and murky lo-fi ambient dronemusic, and if anything this cassette missive from whatever sonic planet these freeks call home, only moves their muted twang further into the realms of some alien music. At its core, the sound is a strummed abstract folk, the vocals a buried blurry croon, the guitars, a rough twang and simple strum, that spends most of it's time struggling beneath a dense fog of crumbling distortion, thick drifts of tape hiss, and what sounds like malfunctioning effects pedals.
But what could be a mess, instead ends up sounding magical, a noisy swirl of blunted feedback, detuned melodies, processed vocals, all recorded onto a tenth generation cassette, all of the old music bleeding up through Ignatz's droney drift, hovering and drifting, floating and fluttering, sometimes building to Dead C like noise rock squalls, but always with some lilting melody or sweetly hushed croon right below the surface. The perfect mix of weirdo folk and chaotic drone drenched floor-core. Fans of folks like the Skaters, The Yellow Swans, as well as fringe folk weirdness will definitely dig. And if you've yet to delve into the other Ignatz releases, this will definitely go a long way to convincing you that you MUST.
Gorgeously handmade and outrageously limited. The tape has colored silkscreened labels pasted to both sides of the tape itself. Housed in one of those oversized plastic cassette cases, like language courses or self help tapes come in. A hand screened full color cover insert on the outside, inside two photocopied inserts and a unique miniature abstract painting. So cool.
"Anachronistic Belgrade prog/psych record from 1979. Heavily influenced by Pink Floyd, Can Hawkwind and Herman Hesse."
Latest in this ongoing collaboration between two aQ faves, Neil Campbell from Astral Social Club, and French loopscaper High Wolf. Somehow this is the first of these collabs we've heard but it's pretty much just as good as we might have expected, fusing the looped psychedelic mesmer of High Wolf with ASC's latent dancefloor proclivities, as well as their blissed out astral ur-drones. It's a pretty potent combo for sure. Super tripped out and abstractly groovy, a pulsing heavily layered landscape of dizzying loops and shimmering drones, a sea of colliding sounds, that rather than sounding purely chaotic, ends up sounding dizzying and psychedelic, reminding us at times of Campbell Kneale's Our Love Will Destroy The World. So many layers and rhythms and melodies, constantly careening and transforming and fusing to each other, wrapped in squiggles of feedback and draped in stuttery effects, the multiple competing rhythms created by weirdly clipped loops, actual programmed beats and various sounds aligning into strange formations, often creating random rhythms, that disappear as quickly as they materialized. Spaced out grooves give way to murky drifts which in turn give way to chaotic swirls and back again.
The B side (both sides are single tracks) is more krautrocky, but a way abstract variant, pastoral, gauzy and hazy and softly noisy, all driven by an insistent yet barely there beat, submerged in the swirling shimmer, only to slowly build to a super distorted final blowout. Super cool.
As hard as it is to believe that there can still be a steady stream of amazing reissues of '70s psychedelia from all around the world (but there is!), we're equally amazed that the purveyors of '80s grim synth punk have also been re-emerging with increasing regularity and surprising quality. While the German collector's label Vinyl On Demand have been at the forefront of the '80s resurgence of cold, cold, cold post-punk (mostly of the Germanic variety), Acute has also uncovered some gems, offering us the Metal Urbain reissues as well as a handful of pre-symphonic Glenn Branca projects. Now Acute presents Ike Yard. Hailing from New York back in the early '80s, they were one of the few American bands to sign to Factory Records (the most notable other band being ESG). This collection of tracks from 1980 - 1982 culls all of the material from Ike Yard's one LP on Factory and an EP for Le Disque Du Crespuscule plus the requisite unreleased material. Initially, Ike Yard really does sound like Factory should be their home, easily paralleling the death disco prowess of Public Image Limited or Section 25. Their dour monochrome post-punk enjoys a spectral production quality which haunted all of the Martin Hannett produced Factory recordings. But gradually the Factory overtones disappear in lieu of an claustrophobic electronic sound which reminds us a lot like early Cabaret Voltaire, or rather what we wished CV would sound like given that CV hasn't really weathered all that well up very. Ike Yard though is another matter, as they seemed to really fight over whether to groove on a primal, sexual funk or to alienate their audience with their cold, electro-primitive detachment. Between the metallic synth arppegiations, drum machines struggling to work through the complex patterns, and the angular swatches of screeching guitar, there is Kenny Compton's chilling, zombified vocal delivery that really pushes Ike Yard deeper into the realms of urban malaise. A very cool reissue.
Long, long ago, we reviewed this band's complex second album, 1972's Ys, calling it "crazy '70s Italian prog" and remarking upon the band's "nutzoid sci-fi keyboard attack". A super rad record, we think. Same goes for Sirrio 2222, Il Balletto Di Bronzo's first album, from 1970, now reissued on cd, which is a bit different but equally cool. Proggy, sure, and sometimes also "nutzoid", but not quite so dark and intense as Ys, this one's more '60s flower power psych pop sounding, but super fuzzy, and often heavy like early Led Zep. Yep, proto-metal fans will like that there's lots of lumbering low-end (the wonderfully titled "Eh Eh Ah Ah" incorporates a fat, bluesy "Mississippi Queen" like riff, ferinstance), while prog weirdos will dig, uh, all the prog weirdness that pops up, amidst the pop. There are moments of over the top acid rock freakery, others of twee folk melody or romantic classical chamber-rock, and others of cowbell-knocking "hairy funk" groove. A baroque 'n' roll classic, really. Italians DO do it better, when it comes to '70s prog rockin'!
Every now and then we like to spring some crazy '70s Italian prog on y'all just to see who can take it. We're not just talking Goblin (though we love Goblin), or any of the more "mainstream" Italian prog acts of the period (PFM, Le Orme, Banco), who were cool but didn't go far beyond the Yes/Genesis/King Crimson template. We're talking weirder stuff like Museo Rosenbach, New Trolls, Osage Tribe, I Teoremi, and Area. We hope to soon have some copies of the cds by an amazing band called Osanna (possibly Allan and Andee's all time favorite prog band!!) but while we wait for those, we did manage to bring in a few of this, the 2nd album by another fave Italian group of ours called Il Balletto Di Bronzo. Sure, their nutzoid sci-fi keyboard attack will bring to mind ELP, but you'll also think of Magma (and their descendants Shub-Niggurath and Koenjihyakkei as well). Complex, powerful, heavy, precise yet darkly psychedelic, Ys (from 1972) is one of those timeless pieces of rock n' roll art that's definitely very '70s yet not entirely dated: you could imagine a Laddio Bollocko or Tarantula Hawk kicking out these jams, that is, except for the occasional operatic vocal chorus. This album's five long songs (plus a bonus track), with their acid guitar action, haunting female vocals, droning keyboards, martial drumming, baroque/classical motifs, and weird changes, are just about as good as over-the-top Italian prog can get, and that's pretty damn good. That is, if you are willing to get into it like we are. A top ten prog album (if Aquarius had a prog top ten, and please don't ask us for one, we'll be arguing for weeks).
