[ aquarius records — Rock Pop ]

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Nice title! And, oooh. It's a very nice recording too. This debut album by electro-acoustic glitchtronica artist Mark Templeton should appeal to fans of Paul Wirkus, Mitchell Akiyama, Guiseppi Ielasi and others working in the experimental-but-beautiful, lowercase field of painterly abstraction, processed instruments, delicate drone, and (last but not least) ambient melodies. Mark Templeton's use of guitar, accordion, vibraphone, cymbals and especially banjo have us most closely comparing this to Geoff Mullen's wonderful thrtysxtrllnmnfstns, as Templeton is similarly submersing the notes played acoustically into a warm, electric bath of creaking staticky stuff, accompanied by murmuring field recordings and chirping digital glitch, like the pleasant but disintegrated soundtrack to some grainy super 8 footage, barely heard beneath the whirr of the film projector itself. Sweet swells of sound throb and drift, fracture and coalesce. It's all very lovely and mysterious, gentle caresses for curious ears.

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We'd been hearing lots about this energetic San Francisco band but our ears had yet to be graced by them until now, and we like what we hear! Angular and melodic post-punk that's reminding us a lot of the crisp energy of the 90's D.C./Dischord scene (Jawbox, Q & Not U, Faraquet) as well as having some of the spunk and relentless uptempo demeanor as folks like Les Savy Fav, Black Eyes, or a less spazzy Mae Shi. We bet these guys are super fun to see live. The LP comes on clear vinyl with a coupon for a free digital download.

Here's what you gotta do. You have to ignore the legion of frat boys that bang their heads wildly to Tenacious D songs, and try to forget the overproduced debut album, and just clear your mind and succumb to the D. This shit is GODLIKE. Originally a sort of spinoff from the equally godlike Mr. Show, Tenacious D concerned the exploits of the greatest band in the world, and their continuing struggles at various open mic nights. As well as the occasional run ins with Sasquatch, Satan, cults, and crazed fans. All of you who only discovered Jack Black from his recent School Of Rock or hosting Saturday Night Live, NEED to see this, and understand why people knew he was destined to rock our fucking socks off. Disc one is titles 'For Fans' and features an entire live performance in London and is amazing, complete with JB battling a giant inflatable dragon with his mighty sword a la Dio, and plenty of onstage tantrums and bickering. Disc one also contains all 6 episodes which until now had been only available as nth generation dubs, and are so good, they'd be worth $20 all on their own. The episodes are a brilliant and hilarious mix of sketch comedy a la Mr. Show and live acoustic performances, and that's how these songs sound best, just two acoustic guitars, two amazing voices, and some of the best songs ever! If you haven't seen these you are in for a treat. Disc two is titled 'For Psycho Fans' and is pretty much just that. Features three very peurile and disgusting short films like Butt Baby and JB's BJ. You just have to see them. There's also some behind the scens in the studio footage and television appearances on MadTV, Crank Yankers and Late Night. But disc two also has their videos which are amazing. The Spike Jonez directed "Wonderboy", a Lord of the Rings style epic (as well as the making of), "Tribute" (as well as the making of) and the totally amazing "FHG (Fuck Her Gently)" animated video directed by the same guy who did Ren And Stimpy! Finally there's a documentary about life on the road with the D. Worth it for the episodes alone, but even more worth it with all that extra crap!!

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For those you who have somehow managed to not become completely obsessed with the 'D', let us bring you up to speed. A few years back there was an amazing sketch comedy show on HBO called Mr. Show. Completely hilarious and more importantly, unfettered by the So a few things have changed. Most noticeably, the D are no longer an acoustic duo. They are a full on rock band, with drums (courtesy of Dave Grohl of course) electric guitars and even strings! On first listen, it was kind of a bummer, since part of what made it so funny was that these two dorky fat guys were playing classic rock/metal on two acoustic guitars. But the flipside is that the D's unabashed love of seventies cheese metal and FM rock can be fully realised and becomes even more of a brilliant parody. Allan keeps telling us that if we lived in the dorms, we would hate this record. Probably true. It's stupid and silly and the songs are all about fucking and smoking and swearing. But we don't live in the dorms and hopefully we can appreciate this on a different level. Lots of the songs from the series are redone and revamped, and there's a handful of new songs as well as a lot of arguing and discussions about stuff like cock pushups. And the songs sound great. Super rocking, big riffs, stupidly catchy hooks, really heavy, great production, and the vocal harmonies are still intact and still perfect. So of course you should buy the record, but if you get hooked, you can find the tapes of the HBO series on EBAY and definitely go check out their video for 'Fuck Her Gently'. It's offensive enough to guarantee you won't be seeing it on MTV anytime soon. It's by John K. (of Ren and Stimpy infamy) and it's pretty amazing. You can watch it at http://www.spumco.com.

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Tender oozed out of, naturally, SF's Tenderloin 'hood (all the way up to a studio in Petaluma) to record this lp, a nasty platter of ugly, metallic punk rock n' roll, with wild psych-shred soloing, rubbery basslines, and gruff, in-your-face, high-in-the-mix vocals. Gnarly & nasty, but also not un-groovy, Tender dwell in the same freaky, filthy gutter with such misanthropic bands as Pissed Jeans and Cuntz, to name a few. Vocally, we're reminded of Killdozer, or maybe even Rob Zombie from White Zombie. With a lot of psycho-sexual issues. You can get an idea of Tender's general sick attitude from the song titles: "Ugly People Fucking", "God Likes To Watch", "Jesus Rides The UFO"... just yr basic blasphemous sexually deviant drug-fueled good times. Classic boogying rock gone to a very dark place. Or as the cover sticker sez: "A non-stop string of obscenities coupling feverishly with skull and bones aliens and new age conspiracy pastiche". Yes, they have problems. But secretly seem to be having a lot of fun. Tender's lineup features such veteran musical miscreants as Ed the Creep from The FuckEmos and Whitey Sims from SST's The Leaving Trains, by the way. (Note to any preexisting Tender fans to avoid confusion: all of these songs previously appeared on a cd-r from couple years ago but now, in advance of a new album soon to be recorded, they've released their faves from that disc on vinyl.)

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So very "K Records"! One gal band Tender Forever is such a perfect fit on this Olympia, WA indie pop label. Melanie Valera makes her low-key sweet Casio-festooned pop on an assortment of keyboards, drum machines, a tattered acoustic guitar and drumkit and a bunch of other noisemakers from the kitchen cupboard (chopsticks, wooden spoon, rice, saucepan). Her softly emotive multilayered vocals meet at the crossroads of Sinead O'Connor, Mirah and Tegan & Sara. Folks around hear were reminded of The Blow and Mates Of State too!!

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Another honey pie melodious incarnation from Amelia Fletcher and crew. She's already strewn a bountiful sugar coated pop blossoms for many years in Marine Research, Heavenly and Talulah Gosh, but now along with her fellow MR bandmates John Stanley and Rob Pursey, she's veering away from the twee pop path that has been her trademark. They started this group last year with some self-imposed rules: 2-minute songs only, no touring. These rules were soon tossed in the trash. The first rule was broken when they were asked to play with Magnetic Fields in Dublin. Plus, they've got some songs that *gasp* are longer than 120 seconds. Nonetheless, things do sound a bit different this time around. For instance, they've added some electronics into the usual jangly guitar mix and recorded it all digitally. From one song to the next, the trio dons different musical jackets. Stylistically this is all over the damn place. There's a traditional Fletcher perky pop song ("Oh Katrina"), a thumpin' dance track that's right at home next to Stephin Merritt's Future Bible Heroes ("Face Of 73" - complete with Duran Duran "Girls On Film" camera shutter intro!), a raucous, crunchy guitar number ("Dyspraxic"), a slow romantic lovely ("Brown Eyes") and nine more. Nevertheless, at the heart of all of this is really delightful pop, and did we really expect anything less from Ms Amelia? I think not!

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Wayne Magruder's avant-rock resume includes current membership in Calla and previous work with Main as the touring drummer in 1996 and as the drummer for Bowery Electric's exceptional "Beat" album. His Tenecke solo project is considerably more angular than any of those aforementioned projects, but does share the over-arching methods of bridging midi-synchronized electronics to rock structures. With a swaggering drum machine crunch guiding the way for swampy guitar stabs and oblong basslines, Magruder crafts a stiff electro-funk somewhere in between '80s Tackhead and the beloved recombination found on Milk Cult's "Project M-13."

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Just a few bars into the first song of Knitting Needles & Bicycle Bells, we were struck with one of those "this sounds exactly like a band I remember from the '80s" feelings. But unlike most of the recent times we've felt that same decade's tingle in the back of our neck, Tenement Halls don't recall new wave synthesizers, arpeggiated basslines and moussed-up hairdo's. No, with their robust saloon-style piano playin' and mainman Chris Lopez's withery vocals, they're coming from an altogether different musical zone seemingly channelling the weather-beaten ghosts of The Waterboys. You almost expect them to break into "Whole Of The Moon". Quite a change of sound and direction for Lopez whom you might recognize from his days in the awesome Rock*A*Teens. Of course this earthy style of music can be tracked further back than the '80s, but The Waterboys just happen to be the most clear-cut point of reference. That said, we'd also guess that they might include XTC and David Bowie in their list o' influences.

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Hot damn! The amazing girl group inspired sounds just keep on coming, and Tennis are serving them up in such an irresistible fashion. We knew very little about this Colorado husband/wife outfit before Cape Dory came our way, but once it hit our ears we jumped aboard their timeless yet fresh approach to bringing rich harmony and hooks into driving, melodic songs that are so so catchy. Alaina Moore's vocals are truly the driving force that makes Tennis rise to the top of the recent wave of like-minded bands, her voice is beyond warm, seductive and engaging. If you've been swept up by groups like Best Coast, Dum Dum Girls, Vivian Girls, Aias, and Girls At Dawn, we promise you'll find Tennis to be your next fix. We are so addicted, and have a feeling we are going to be playing Tennis all year long! PS. we were tempted to go even more overboard with the tennis cliches, but we still say this is one ace of a record!

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We loooooooooove the spare and wistful dream pop of Tenniscoats (See, we can put as just as many "o's" in "love" as we do in 'doom'.). Although we must admit, it took us awhile to really get into Tan-Tan Therapy as this time around they collaborated with Swedish band Tape along with other Swedish musicians, resulting in a much broader and much more lush production but also with an even more somber and melancholy feel. The chamber pop instrumentation of horns, woodwinds, organ, cello, zither and glockenspiels along with some subtle electronic flourishes definitely provides richer textures, but we were kind of missing at first Saya and Takashi Ueno's more spare and naive side that comes closer to their Maher Shalal Hash Baz roots. But this release is definitely a grower, and one with each new listen we are loving it more and more.

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This ain't that new of a release - it came out in 2011 - but we hadn't yet reviewed it, and when we got some copies back in the other day, wondered, why the heck not? Haven't been able to stop listening to it lately, it's so dang electrifying and infectious. What we have here is a killer collection some of the best tracks recorded by one Takeshi Terauchi, who in the mid-'60s was known as Japan's "King Of The Electric Guitar". In fact, he may still be. We all know what instrumental surf music guitar sounds like, give it a Japanese twist and you have "Eleki" (what they called electric guitar music). The "Tsugaru" of the subtitle refers to traditional Japanese folk songs, which were also adapted to the '60s rock n' roll invasion. Badass guitarist Terauchi was a pioneer of the Eleki craze, building his own gear, playing to crowds of screaming young girls with his bands The Blue Jeans and The Bunnys. So just imagine a Japanese version of Link Wray and/or Dick Dale, all exciting, exotic surf twang and groovy fuzz. There's some achingly romantic, folk based melodic moments, and we like that, but the best parts are when Terauchi is ripping it up on his fretboard to surfy, psychedelic excess! FYI, they fit 25 tracks on the cd, and 14 on the vinyl.

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Got some "early heavy" freakdom for here for ya, Shadoks digging up and reissuing this 1970 album by a bluesy acid rock power trio from Denmark. If you're familiar with some other Danish heavy psych bands like Moses and Blues Addicts, these guys are in that grungy ballpark, all appearing on the same label originally. There's some stormin' tracks here all right, with plenty of Iommi-ish guitar moments, topped by some quite unhinged, strangled-sounding vocals in English. Not sure if we'd call this proto-metal or not, the fuzzy guitars are loud and wild enough, with some urgent riffing, but really it's more like a mix of raw garage punk with some more mellowed out hippie stuff too, definitely very much of its time and ultimately quite charming in a ramshackle way. This reissue's cd booklet includes cool old photos and show fliers, plus new liner notes by bassist/vocalist Joachim Ussing wherein he recalls the three days of extremely stoned recording sessions that produced this album, as well as the story of how in 1968 the band made it to the finals of a national pop group contest, in which in response to the "nice pop covers" played by their competitors, they instead unleashed a 15 minute psychedelic improv freakout on live radio. No, they didn't win...

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Kraut and dub flecked heavy rocking drone-groove psych rock from this Julian-Cope-approved Ohio combo. LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!

Kraut and dub flecked heavy rocking drone-groove psych rock from this Ohio combo.

Indie cult flick fans, here's something to celebrate! It's the dvd release of Jon Moritsugu's wild'n'weird underground classic Terminal USA! Yep, his 1993 twisted, gritty ode to a most unconventional Asian American family has finally followed the slow but steady dvd birthings of his more recent films Scum Rock, Fame Whore, and Mod Fuck Explosion. What's possibly most bizarre about the film itself is that its creation was actually commissioned by PBS (yes, that meant a serious production budget for the usually shoestring Moritsugu!), was broadcast across the land in 1994-1995, and was screened at film fests around the globe. That and the film itself might not seem all that strange by today's standards, but need we say, it was a whole different world in the early '90s. This probably caused convulsions and conniptions in many unexpecting viewers. Totally raw, gnarly, and punk-as-fuck on PBS! Yow, keep your eyes peeled for appearances by Neil Hamburger and a bleach blonde haired Moritsugu! This dvd features the original cut as well as Moritsugu's director's cut which includes 14 additional minutes.

Another treasure trove of classic archival New Zealand underground jams from one of our favorites from back in the day, a band that, for NZ music nerds who might not have already known, also featured past and future members of Bailter Space, Pin Group, the Victor Dimisich Band, Scorched Earth Policy and others. And while the Terminals were always dark and buzzy, dense and driving, they also always had a bit of cabaret to them, in fact in our review of their Little Things record from 1995 (reissued on Last Visible Dog), we make comparisons to Antony & The Johnstons, Interpol, Nick Cave, the Swans. It definitely has that sort of vibe, for all the murky churn and wild psychedelic squalls, the songs themselves are sprawling and dramatic, slipping easily from moody pop bombast to noise drenched kraut-psych hypnorock, and dotted throughout this collection are some serious gems, in fact opener "The Deadly Tango" has a hook/chorus that KILLS, and we've had stuck in our heads since this first showed up. That track (along with some of the others) also has a bit of eighties LA vibe, a little Scream club gothic twang to it, sonically referencing bands like Kommunity FK or the Abecedarians. This collection gathers up rarities from the group's entire career, and vary both in fidelity, and in sonic scope, with some sounding like ultra rough boommbox recordings, others like well crafted studio concoctions, but they're all great, with even the muddies, murkiest jams somehow sounding epically brooding, check out "Witchdoctors" which sculpts wild streaks of chaotic noise into epic swells, and winds them around a minimal krautrock style pulse and hazy, psychedelic swaths of synth drone, or the stripped down swampy dirge of "Black Creek", laced with some strange electronic squelches, but which otherwise is some sort of dark troubadour moodiness, or "Medusa", which is all crumbling distortion, sounding a bit like the Terminals jamming with the Dead C, which the vocals soaring, gypsy folk like fiddle, and some seriously frenzied guitar freakout. So much fantastic stuff here. Dig into this compilation, and before long you'll find yourself needing to track down all their albums proper too. Which you should! You won't be sorry. Includes a download too!

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We've always loved the Terminals, one of the originators of the NZ sound that once was the specialty around aQuarius. Their early nineties albums were so fantastic, moody and dramatic, epic and dark, lo-fi, but sprawling and expansive. It's been a while since we revisited these guys, and this, their 3rd album, from 1995 just got reissued so we've been immersing ourselves once again, and holy shit does this stuff still sound fantastic. Wild buzzing distorted guitars, thick synths, dense driving drumming, but it's the vocals that seal the deal. We had sort of forgotten how over the top and dramatic they were. Like a punk rock, lo fi, rougher rawer Antony maybe? It's a wonder, without it, the music is swirling and chaotic, a sort of dark gothic pop, intense and emotional, slipping from woozy laid back drift to frenetic almost psychedelic freakout, but then mix in those vocals, and we're talking some nineties noise rock cabaret, some Antony, a little Michael Gira, a bit of Nick Cave, some hints of Paul Banks from Interpol, heck, listening to this again, we realize a whole bunch of new bands who have been mining the goth pop and new wave past owe a LOT to these guys, even if they don't realize it. Driving, moody, intense, infusing their more straightforward dour pop with the noise rock of their NZ brethren, creating a charged hybrid that smolders intensely, even at it's most minimal and mysterious, but which becomes evident when the band lets loose and explodes into freaked out blasts of grinding guitar and splattery drum chaos, only to reel it right back in and slip back into some brooding jangle or lurching clanging doom pop dirge. Includes two bonus tracks and liner notes from aQ customer and pal Jon Dale!

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jeremiah

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The aptly titled Post-Mortem comes to us sadly after the demise of this short-lived but highly volatile group of Floridian grindcore mercenaries. A collection of demos (although that term betrays how good these recordings sound), this complete discography collection must now act as an epitaph for a band that burned furiously bright for but a short time! Post-Mortem is a flurry of blast beats, unhinged vokills and frantic riffing, equal parts grindcore and old school hardcore, and absolutely bursting at the seams with pent up energy and aggression. Press play and watch as the world speeds into a fast-motion whirlwind blur. Pro-printed cd-r limited to just 50 copies!

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Formed in NYC in 1977, the Terrorists were a punk infused reggae/ska band that predated the UK Two Tone movement by two years. Regularly playing such clubs as CBGBs, Max's Kansas City the Terrorists quickly became the darlings of NME and Melody Maker. The recordings here, which feature guest appearances from both Roland Alphonso and Lee Perry, sound a bit dated but may interest those

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Here's our kind of summertime readin': the July/August issue of the venerable British 'extreme' metal periodical Terrorizer. It's got Andee and Allan all in a tizzy 'cause it's "The PROG Issue"! That's right, a special issue devoted to the legacy of the much maligned (but beloved 'round here) '70s genre of progressive rock, as it manifests itself in the context of today's extreme metal scene. So there's features on bands like Opeth, Arcturus, Cave In, and Emperor, as well as the more traditional prog of Rush and Dream Theatre. Plus a history of the genre, a bunch of top tens of 70's prog (best and worst), etc. Terrorizer's revisionist take on prog notes that even punk mascot Johnny Rotten was a fan of Van Der Graaf Generator and Can. Non-prog content includes stories on The Great Deceiver, Mastodon (who ARE kinda prog), Soulfly, and Vader, along with the usual news and reviews. Prog on!

A tremendous cassette only release from the Terrors, an unknown project presumably based out of Los Angeles who offers up some totally desolate, bedroom recordings for cheap synths, guitar, voice, and -- because it's on Monorail Trespassing - snippets of noise. The first track has this creepy, nocturnal repeating motif of minor key melody that is trying to be a Rhodes keyboard but is probably something much more disposable, but that melody could be something easily found on a Labradford album or even a Bohren and Der Club of Gore track, but run through William Basinski's tape machinations. Ghostly splashes of droning guitar ebb and flow around that melodic passage, furthering the darkened gloom which settles around the track. This alone is worth the price of admission! The next track and a few fragmented moments on the other side feature vocals from the Terrors. It's a painfully lonely voice singing into a crappy microphone, which accentuates the melancholy vocal melody wrapped with plenty of tape hiss and an occasional downer strum on an acoustic guitar. These songs appear as a cross between Devendra and Grouper, as these roughly hewn takes on whatever was at hand with the pure emotion coming through the songs, cast in a hue that is profoundly depressed for the Terrors. The last track on this cassette ends with a arcing wash of white noise, that almost sounds like Terrors set up his recording under the flight path of LAX, just to get the rush of a plane taking off to conclude this track. It's a C-30 tape, and limited to 125 copies. Really great!

Finally! The debut full length from these Bay Area punks, after two kick ass singles, and we have to say the full length definitely fulfills the promise of those 7"s, the sound is essentially the same, if anything even more kick ass, big crunchy, fuzzy guitars, pounding drums, super melodic basslines way up in the mix, that totally drive the songs, and the super distinctive vocals, which had some of us thinking of the Smoking Popes, that sort of Morrissey style croon over buzzsaw punk pop. We mentioned the Undertones and the Buzzcocks in our review of the last seven inch, and it's hard not to hear that here as well, but listening to these tracks as an album, the sound really blossoms, and somehow the sound seems way more pop than punk with every listen, the songs just impossibly catchy, hooks galore, and unlike most records, that tend toward being front loaded, Killing Time, seems to just get better and better, catchier and catchier, with some of these tracks sounding like classic pop songs from years past, albeit with crunchier guitars, fuzzier bass and pounding-er drumming, occasionally wreathed in feedback too, even some cool boy/girl vocal interplay, and that's sort of what makes Terry Malts so good, that undeniable punk energy, but wedded to some of THEE best songs we've heard in ages. Haven't found ourselves listening to a record this much nonstop since the Veronica Falls record...

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Latest from these Bay Area punks, and like the Barreracudas 7" reviewed elsewhere on this week's list, originally available as part of a subscription series, but now available individually. And like the Killing Time full length we dug so much, the A side is another gloriously distorted punk pop blowout, the sound super raw this time around, the guitar blown out and crumbling, the vocals, even more dramatic, again reminding us of the late great Smoking Popes, a Smiths like croon, over churning pounding fuzzpunk poppiness. The flipside finds the band taking on "over 21" by legendary SF jangle poppers, Henry's Dress, and gives it fantastic fuzzed out makeover.

A couple of years ago, San Francisco's Magic Bullets reinvented themselves as Terry Malts. The former owed their existence to The Housemartins and The Smiths, in an admirable rehash of sashaying / hipswaying UK mod-pop; but the latter embraced those all American punk icons, the Ramones (with Andee here at aQ positing Terry Malts as deadringers for the Smoking Popes). Snotty petulance, suburban boredom, slacker idiocy, oversexed / underfucked moodiness, and lyrics that seem to always start with "I don't wanna..." before issuing a cornflakes-n-beer statement of punk philosophizing. Vocalist Phillip Benson was the Morrissey impersonator in the Magic Bullets, and strains of that maudlin theatricality lilt throughout the three-chord, 1-2-3-ROCK, power-pop punk riffs that Terry Malts trade in. The bashed punk tunes are deliberately simple stomps that make no bones about referencing the iconic punk songbook (a bumbled bassline right out of The Damned here, a gloriously fuzzed out punk riff from any given Lookout! 7" circa 1993 there); and yeah, it's totally dumb. Shit, they even admit it in the feedback dusted ballad "Comfortably Dumb." You know exactly what you get with Terry Malts, and it's a hell of a lot of fun. Yup, the vinyl comes with a download code too!

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Bet you never thought you'd see Charles Manson on a Slumberland record. At least he's been made up with some blue eye shadow and some pink lipstick, and the record is pressed on pink vinyl. It's record number two from SF punk pop combo Terry Malts, who definitely find inspiration from classic punk combos like the Undertones and the Buzzcocks, but who make that sound their own, cranking up the echo and the reverb, adding some seriously muscly drumming, anchoring some fuzzed out guitar buzz and some thick low slung basslines, all shot through with little melodies, the band doing a fine job of balancing pop dreaminess with fierce punkiness. The A side would be a hit for sure if punk rock had 'hits', while the B side takes their sound and makes it even more distorted and murky, wreathing everything in swirls of feedback, finishing things off with a crazy catchy short sharp blast of pro-atheist punkiness.

Brand new split 7" from East Bay pop punks Terry Malts, whose two songs here are just as good as anything on their recent full length, two new blasts of fuzzy poppy punkiness, all crunchy fuzzy guitars, woozy basslines, hooks galore, some rad guitar freakouts and of course those vocals that continues to remind us of Morrissey, or maybe more accurately Morrisey-worshipping punks the Smoking Popes. Both tracks here kill, although the second might be our fave, the vocals taking on a distinctly echo drenched eighties vibe that perfectly suits TM's punky garage pop. Terry Malts share the split with a group called Dead Angle, who we'd never heard before, but who remind us a bit of Veronica Falls, which is a very good thing. Fuzzed guitar jangle, dreamy female vox, a bit lo-fi, with some seriously dirgey breakdowns rife with feedback, and of course hooks a plenty. The second track is all wiry riffs and kinetic rhythms, sounding more post punk than garage pop, but both tracks have us definitely wanting to hear more!

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Achtung! Here's another kool krautrock reissue brought to us by the Lion label, continuing their noble efforts in that area recently represented by reissues of Sergius Golowin, Guru Guru, and Emtidi. This is one that some of us here (well, Allan) had been looking forward to for a while - he'd been trying to find a copy of a previous, out of print, import only reissue of this album ever since hearing part of it on his own kraut/psych/prog radio show Klaus To The Edge (co-DJ Alison had played a track), so it's nice to have this new domestic reissue! The deal with Tetragon is that they performed a wonderfully proggy, mostly instrumental, technically accomplished style of krautrock, very much inspired by classical keyboards of British proto-prog act The Nice (Keith Emerson's band before ELP, dontcha know), as well as by Soft Machine, the electric jazz experiments of Miles Davis, and the heavier sort of psychedelic blues rock a la Cream. Originally a teenage three-piece (keys/bass/drums) named Trikolon, formed in 1967, in 1971 they added a guitarist and thus became Tetragon. Their keyboard dominated sound (Hammond organ, clavinet, piano) now had distorted wah wah guitar to increase its heft and complexity. That same year saw the release of Tetragon's sole album on their own label Soma, in an edition of just 400 copies, housed in a lovely green cover to match the ecologically "green" nature theme of the title. It's a virtuoso performance, particularly considering each track was recorded in just a few takes, with no overdubs! While some krautrock music we dig is all about drugged out primitivism, this is the sort of thing that benefits from the players' tasteful musicianship. The first track, "Fugue" sorta sets the tone for this melodically moody, yet grooving, album. It's 16 minutes long, and based on a piece by J.S. Bach (though we don't think Bach ever envisioned an electronically-effected drum solo, or wild acid rock guitar soloing!). Elsewhere on the album, Tetragon also adapt some of Gershwin's music from West Side Story (via jazz drummer Buddy Rich's arrangement, apparently) on the 13+ minute "A Short Story". But not every track here is long - there's the mere 19 second bizarre electronic outburst of "Jokus" to balance things out. This is another album to feed our fantasy of someday opening another store called "1971" that ONLY sells reissues of records originally released in 1971! Whaddya think? It could happen. Maybe we will change Aquarius to that format. As we've come to expect from Lion, this reissue is quite nicely done, with lengthy, informative liner notes and photos in the cd booklet, plus on the disc itself a significant bonus track, the live 14+ minute mega-jam "Doors In Between" from '72.

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We highlighted the Lion Productions reissue of Nature, the (until now) sole album from way-cool, keyboard-heavy, progged-out krautrock obscurities Tetragon, just a few weeks ago, and now here's ANOTHER, entirely unreleased album from the same band unearthed by krautrock specialists Garden Of Delights! If anything, this one's even more badass. Recorded live in the studio towards the end of 1971 (just a few months after Nature came out), these five tracks here meant for release on LP at the time, but that never happened, the efforts of Tetragon's four very talented musicians never getting the exposure they deserved back in they day (heck even the album that they did manage to get released was done in a VERY small pressing). Well it was 1971, so record buyers were presumably a bit overwhelmed. Still, Nature and now Stretch are worthy of being part of the class of '71, a year we consider one of the best ever in the history of recorded music - particularly of the psych/prog/kraut variety. Stretch is all-instrumental, the band members just goin' off, doin' their thing, which was virtuoso, jazz-fusion inflected prog influenced by Miles Davis, The Nice and ELP, various Canterbury bands... and especially here, British jazz-rock organist Brian Auger. There's lots of solo action, as well as much precision ensemble playing. With wild widdly Hammond organ jamming, acid rock fuzz guitar, a heavy backbeat, and tons of technical chops, this simply cooks. Of the 5 tracks on Stretch, which, um, stretch over 43 minutes, Tetragon do two covers: "Listen Here" by Eddie Harris and "Dragon Song" by John McLaughlin. Though perhaps as far as Tetragon were concerned, they were Brian Auger covers, 'cause their hero had previously done both of these songs on albums of his own, and Tetragon were inspired by his arrangements. The Eddie Harris one in particular is super funky but fuzzed, a heavy groove with drum solo breakdown, well actually everybody gets a solo. Of the three originals, "Snowstorm" is actually smokin' hot, "The Light" a laidback wah'd out groove, and "Hovering Stones" the most proggy and changeable, ranging from frantic keyboard runs in lockstep with martial drumming to more blissed-out solo sections. If you liked that Supersister reissue we recently highlighted, we'd imagine you'd be into this too. Likewise of course if you dug the other, original Tetragon disc! Garden Of Delights reissue cds are even more exhaustive than Lion's, this includes uber-detailed liner notes in both English and German, plus vintage photos, and even the cover art from every single recording that the members of Tetragon were ever later associated with, including jazz-rockers Passport and folksters Falkenstein.

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Jason Kahn has come a long way, now a respected sound artists and minimalist composer, it's still a little hard to believe he played in bands like the Leaving Trains, Trotsky Icepick and the Universal Congress Of, and normally, this is where we would say, but actually you can hear much of those past groups in his new sound, but actually you can't. Not at all. Kahn's new work is world's removed, and we've come to love that stuff nearly as much as we love(d) the late great Leaving Trains. Which brings us to Tetras, a trio featuring Kahn, whose sound is a sprawling rhythmic abstraction that touches on everything from This Heat (especially This Heat!) to Aussie minimalist jazz combo the Necks, exploring the same sort of stretched out propulsive mesmer and textured dronescaping, each of the four side long tracks here a totally mesmerizing sprawl of layered buzz and deftly arranged melody, but with the rhythmic element really holding it all together. The songs, for as minimal and abstract as they are, not at all static, alive and full of energy, with a barely contained momentum, that makes the tracks seethe and thrum. The Necks vibe is huge, especially on the opener, which takes the cyclical slow build of that group and gives it a sort of avant / post industrial makeover, the drums a skittery shuffle, the bass loping and looping, all beneath layers of blurred organ chords, static wreathed melodies, and all manner of constantly shifting textures. The other three tracks follow suit, subtly altering the equation, part two is much more droned out and noisy, the clouds of hiss and static ebbing and flowing, over a buried jazzy shuffle, the bass bowed unfurling long moaning tones, everything wreathed in an insectoid buzz, the result hazy and hypnotic. Part three opens up with a wall of crumbling chaotic white noise, a squall of warped blown out psychedelia, which gives way to some hushed shimmer, which is soon overtaken by some weirdly gorgeous feedback drenched melodies and distorted dynamics which soon explode into some awesomely blown out jazziness that reminds us of Laddio Bolocko or the Psychic Paramount, but so in-the-red, the tones blossom and expand transforming the sound into some strange heavy psychedelia. And finally, part four finishes things off with something a bit more dialed back, a scattering of tribal drum splutter, more bowed strings, and moaning melodies, this time under weird digitally processed guitar skree and crumbling distorted drones, eventually slipping into something slightly more straight forwardly jazzy, which also eventually morphs into a weirdly abstract but druggily dreamy electronic noise drenched jazziness. Housed in a super thick, ultra deluxe, hand screened heavy cardboard jacket, and includes a download coupon as well.

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

SORRY. From the same Japanese label that brought us Bathtub Shitter (still the best band name ever!) comes Tetsuo, a band that has way more in common with Corrupted or Boris than their bathtub shitting labelmates. Sludgy and repetitive, heavy and crushing with lots of solid state feedback a la Eyehategod and loads of midtempo wall of guitar pummel a la Neurosis. One epic twenty minute track that goes from slow motion sludge to furious almost-death-metal to crusty grind to stoner groove and back again. Fans of any of the above mentioned bands definitely need this.

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SORRY. Kraftwerk songs "interpreted" on the piano, with extensive liner notes explaining Thaemlitz's approach. Quite beautiful, although the Kraftwerk component is not always immediately obvious. One of several now domestically-priced releases from the European electronica label of the moment, Mille Plateaux.

Expectations are set pretty high when your band is compared to This Heat, Swell Maps and The Ex, but for Baltimore math rockers Thank You, the comparison is pretty apt. Over the course of six songs and about 30 minutes, the band unfurl some seriously intricate and dense sonic workouts, forgoing traditional song structure, and instead trafficking in tension and release, repetition and texture, whipping up super repetitive cyclical jams, the guitars alternately jangly and crunchy, the vocals yelped and anthemic, the record opener sounding like a post punk no-wave take on Animal Collective, with long stretches of frantic drumming and swirling droned out guitar. The rest of the record spreads out, dipping into blissed out tribal psychedelia, motorik minimal krautrock, angular jagged punkish crunch and manic super intense mathiness. Chiming guitars swell and soar over avalanche like rhythms, laced with playful flurries of tinkling melodies, occasionally getting super abstract and dubbed out, just as often slipping into something more gnarled and chaotic, but when the vocals come in, all high and harmonious, the transform whatever is going on into some unlikely psychedelic pop. Crunchy indie rock explodes into something much more frenetic and frenzied, before slipping into a slithery buzz drenched bit of woozy swirl, only launch into some organ driven psychedelia, noisy and loose, and again the vocals grounding the sound, while the organs and drums do the best to drag everything heavenward, and finally, the record closes with maybe the poppiest of the bunch, the guitars and drums locked in a rollicking tumble beneath the soaring vox, again the Animal Collective comparisons are unavoidable, but those vocals coupled with a sound more angular and jagged and noisy, make this a sort of avant post punk psych pop, that should appeal to modern pop kids, as well as folks who lean more toward sounds with prefixes like post and kraut...

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

SORRY.