Aquarius Records closed in 2016. This site is an archive — a place to rediscover their extraordinary music recommendations. Nothing here is for sale.
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310Nothing To See Here(Desolat)cd$ 14.98
Simply subtitled "Short Stories by 310," "Nothing To See Here" lives up to its name as a series of short tracks culled from processed field recordings of waves crashing, creaking floors, crickets, Southern gospel call-and-response choirs, distant church
500 FT. OF PIPEDope Deal(Beard of Stars)cd$ 14.98
Detroit's 500 Ft. Of Pipe are another new band of hard-rockin' hopefuls in the crowded stoner rock arena, and they are better than most. What with their Motor City pedigree, they align more with Stooges-fans Monster Magnet than with Kyuss (Kyuss being the most
ADAMSON, BARRY + PAN SONICThe Hymn Of The Seventh Illusion(Kitchen Motors)cd$ 15.98
From its beginnings, the Icelandic arts organization Kitchen Motors has been pairing off interesting cross-platform artists who may not have otherwise had the opportunity to work together. "The Hymn Of The Seventh Illusion" was a commission by Kitchen Motors Compounding the collaborative spirit, Kitchen Motors employed The Hafler Trio (whose solo member Andrew McKensie now lives in Iceland) to remix "The Hymn Of The Seventh Illusion." As McKensie has been moving further away from the fictional research projects and more towards the electro-acoustic studies from Luigi Nono, The Hafler Trio is a perfect fit. This remix has stretched and abstracted the polyphony of the chorus into a very creepy extended drone collage. Very nice work!
AIRPLANES ARE BETTERPower(ReSTART)cd ep$ 5.98
Here is a new ep from this power pop trio of twenty year olds from El Paso Tx. They sound like emo boy rock, ala Slint (only harder) Drive Like Jehu or June of 44. You know what im talking about. three songs. Full sounding and driving with dual vocals.
AIRPORT 5 / GUIDED BY VOICESFading Captain Series #16: Selective Service(Luna Music)cd$ 12.98
Oh, those familiar voices and just as familiar chord changes of Bob Pollard and Tobin Sprout. In my opinion, the most successful tunes here are the more upbeat ones, the slower ones tend to somewhat trudge along. The title track I've fondly renamed "Hold Your
AMMFine(Matchless)cd$ 17.98
AMM emerged from the first generation of UK free jazz musicians in the mid-60s, taking the notion of spontaneous improvisation well beyond any of the kind of restrictions that would locate their music within the realms of jazz, minimalism, rock, or
ANTI-POP CONSORTIUMShopping Carts Crashing(Antipop Recordings)cd$ 25.00
Anti-Pop has been one of my favorite hip hop groups almost from the first time I heard them, melding an old school, deadpan sort-of tongue-tied De La Soul flow, over unlikely loops and strange samples, with bizarre and confusingly brilliant lyrics that
AOAEmotion Vacation(Psy-Harmonics)cd$ 16.98
AOA is a Boredoms related group featuring newest member E-da and bassist Hilah (formerly Hira). "Emotion Vacation", their second full length, was recorded in Melbourne, Australia by "deep house / industrial techno / trance" producer Ollie Olsen. Eye
AUBETimemind(Alchemy)cd$ 19.98
Wow! An exceptional release from Akifumi Nakajima aka Aube! While most recordings by this highly prolific artist utilize unique sound sources (water, fluorescent lamps, heartbeat, or most notoriously - an amplified Bible!), "Timemind" is a more rhythmic, one
BILLION DOLLAR BABIESComplete Battle Axe(NMC)3cd$ 29.00
A tasty three disc set from Billion Dollar Babies, the band comprised of three former Alice Cooper Band members who namd themselves after an Alice Cooper song and recorded just one album in 1977 -- Battle Axe. While disc one is the entire Battle Axe
BLIND GUARDIANAnd Then There Was Silence(Century Media)cd ep$ 8.98
It's not the long-awaited new full length album from these Tolkien-obsessed German heavy metallers, but it IS two new songs, one of 'em a bona fide epic clocking in at 14:07, and that's cause enough for rejoicing 'round these parts! We've been waiting for a
BORTHWICK HOLLAND FILLIERSHelene(Temporary Residence Ltd.)cd$ 12.98
When D.C. recording engineer / producer Trevor Kampfmann himself makes music, he goes by the moniker Trevor/hollAND. Dunno if you recall the Takako Minekawa remix record from a few years ago, but Trevor contributed what is in my opinion the best remix on it... Unfortunately it's only when trevor/hollAND lets loose with his musical interludes that the record gets going. Acoustic guitars mingle sweetly with chiming synths and stuttery percussive loops and cuts. He knows how pretty his material it is, and knows that in order tone down the sweetness it's better to situate his music within more experimental contexts. Trevor/hollAND and Borthwick are certainly talented, but this record is trying my patience. A disappointment from the usually trustworthy label Temporary Residence. Comes with a couple Borthwick polaroids and a foldout poster with the poem's text.
BRIAN JONESTOWN MASSACREBravery Repetition and Noise(Committee to Keep Music Evil)cd$ 14.98
The follow-up to last year's 6-song EP "Zero: Songs From The Album 'Bravery, Repetition And Noise'" (which it should be noted actually only contained 3 of the songs from this full length) and 1998's album-proper '"Strung Out In Heaven" finds Brian
BRUHIN, ANTONOrax / Rotomotor(Alga Marghen)cd$ 16.98
An archival release of '70s cassette-tape works by this odd Swiss sound artist, consisting of environmental sounds, ping-pong recording techniques, and other spatial / audio experimentation. Byram thinks most of this is the sound of good European arts funding gone to waste, except for the last piece, which is an absolute mindnumbing half-hour palindromic recitation of German On a side note: If you come into AQ fairly frequently you may have observed this customer we have that is always knocking shit off the counter. We want to say something to him but we're too embarrassed to confront his hamfistedness, so we're passive-aggressively mentioning it here, for 6000 people to enjoy. Well, said customer has acquired a young apprentice now, and one night the two of them came in together to polish up their anti-social skills. Anyway, the younger fella comes up to the counter to ask about this cd, if we have two of them -- cuz of course these guys must be peas in a pod -- so they can both get one. Well, turns out that the nicely sealed copies we showed 'em both had ever so slight dimples on the upper right hand corner (like a light impression made by a pointed object, so slight as to be practically invisible). Because of this, annoying apprentice desired the display copy instead. But if YOU can deal with the "invisible dimple", we've still got a couple copies.
BYRDS, THEThe Preflyte Sessions(Sundazed)2cd$ 27.00
In 1964 recording engineer Jim Dickson set down on tape the earliest incarnation of the Byrds, even, it seems, before they named themselves that -- they had also used the monikers Beefeaters and Jet Set (a Jet Set single is included here). This is what some The cd comes packaged in a slipcase with an excellent accompanying book of liner notes, many darling photos (those guys were like 20 years old, so young!), 2 nice postcards, discographical info, & comments from all the bandmembers, plus Pamela Des Barres, Domenic Priore, etc. Annoyingly, the LP version, while it is on 180 gm vinyl and features a nice gatefold sleeve for its two albums, only features 28 tracks. The cd version has 40! Huh? And while the 16 of the tracks on the cd version were previously unissued, only 9 from the LP version have never before seen the light. I never understand the logic with these things -- is Sundazed ripping off the LP buyers amongst us, or are they trying to tell us that the extra tracks on the cd version are kinda throwaways anyway? Sigh...
CAROL OF HARVESTs/t(Second Battle)cd$ 19.98
German progressive folk-psych with female vocals from 1978, originally a private press rarity now reissued on cd with some bonus live tracks (including a song called "Sweet Heroin", not too pastoral that).
CASIOTONE FOR THE PAINFULLY ALONEPocket Symphonies For the Lonesome Subway Cars(Tomlab)cd$ 15.98
AQ's sweetest pal Owen Ashworth moved from SF to lo-fi pop haven Portland, OR a short time ago. And we've dearly missed his quiet, but completely passionate enthusing over our mutual pop faves -- in particular, Young Marble Giants. The minimal, sweet music that
CHARLES ATLASFelt Cover(Static Caravan)cd$ 16.98
Local guy Charles Wyatt along with Matt Greenberg returns with a second Charles Atlas full length, this time released on the dependable Static Caravan label. Looped haunting guitar, lulling stereo-separated pulses, softly-uttered melodies, plus some
CHURCH STEPSCriticism(Flapping Jet / Dial)cd ep$ 9.98
Sounding a lot like indie rock fave Smog (if Bill Callahan would only keep up with the state of music today, instead of sounding more and more dated with each release), Church Steps cloak the most heartfelt sensitive-guy vocals in a shimmer of melancholy. Cover art by beloved local artist Jo Jackson.
CIRCUS DEVILSRingworm Interiors(Fading Captain)cd$ 15.98
New project from Robert Pollard of Guided By Voices... and it's great, probably the best thing he's done in years. Thank goodness! We were afraid he'd lost it, y'know. The guy is so prolific that it's hard to keep up the enthusiasm when the quality of his (We also have the LP for 14.98, although this is probably limited.)
COACH WHIPSHands On The Controls(Black Apple)cd$ 11.98
Woo-hoo! Just in time for the week after Xmas -- you know, the week where you buy *yourself* some presents. And what nicer way than to give yourself the gift of John Dwyer. Yep, Rhode Island via SF scene fixture, daily AQ-visitor, roundly acknowledged wise
COILMoon Milk (In Four Phases): The Solstice And Equinox Singles Collected(Eskaton)2cd$ 15.98
During the past decade, Coil has undergone a drastic metamorphosis that began with the extravagantly dark electronica of "Love's Secret Domain" and continued up to the kosmische ambience of "Musick To Listen To In Dark Vol 2." With all of the albums since Coil intended to thematically correspond these songs' droning poetry to the solstices and equinoxes corresponding to when they were made. Mostly they center around a miasmic abstraction of spartan, dirge arrangements for a few instruments (cellos, church organs, spanish guitar), maintaining their solemn pursuit into sonic alchemy. For the most part, Coil's John Balance hushes his voice into mere whispers of his pagan recitations, which barely stand out of the lulling instrumentation, although "The White Rainbow" track from the Winter single stands out as a eulogaic song dominated by Balance's rich singing. The album works much better than as a collection of singles whose original release format seemed far too abrupt for the extended atmospheres that are common throughout the whole series. And to piss off everybody who bought the original series, Coil included a bonus live track.
CRACOW KLEZMER BANDThe Warriors(Tzadik)cd$ 15.98
Newest entry in the Radical Jewish Culture series released on John Zorn's imprint Tzadik. Based in Poland, this band is supposedly quite avant garde... but I'm not sure what's so "radical" about them. This is somber, melodic, minor-key instrumental Jewish traditional music played out on accordion, violin, clarinet, and double bass; and will most likely appeal to fans of Masada
CYLOBCut the Midrange, Drop The Bass(Rephlex)12"$ 8.98
Cylob's new three-track single has caused a bit of a stir here at AQ. Not 'cause of the title track, a catchy electronic pop-dance ditty a little safer than similar efforts from Aphex and Squarepusher ("My Red Hot Car" comes to mind, but this is less edgy, more
CYLOBMood Bells(Rephlex)cd$ 17.98
So Cylob are kind of a gimmicky band. Once in a while they come up with a great electro pop gem, like the (admittedly love-it-or-hate-it) sea shanty on their Cut the Midrange ep we review also in this list. But now they've bestowed this silly,
DASHBOARD CONFESSIONALSo Impossible ep(Vagrant Records)cd ep$ 10.98
Still no one from the Vagrant roster of artists has come even remotely close to the emo-power pop majesty of the Get Up Kids or their oddball side project Reggie And The Full Effect. With Dan Hoerner, formerly of Sunny Day Real Estate, Dashboard Confessional
DE LA SOULAOI:BIONIX(Tommy Boy)cd$ 17.98
The less said about this album the better. Unless you're saying, "It ain't no 3 Feet High and Rising."
DEATH CAB FOR CUTIEThe Photo Album(Barsuk)cd$ 14.98
It's with a heavy heart that I bring you this report of the new Death Cab For Cutie record. I've listened to it several times now in the hopes that, like the last two albums, it would grow on me. Sadly, rather than grow, it has shrunk upon me like a pair of
DESAPARECIDOSThe Happiest Place On Earth(Saddle Creek)cd ep$ 6.98
...is where you'll find these quavery-voiced emo boys -- namely one Conor Oberst (aka the leader of Bright Eyes). Hear them practically hollering the words to get their message to you. Driving drumbeat, crunchy guitars, springy melodic hooks sorta like a
EHLERS, EKKEHARDPlays Cornelius Cardew(bottrop-boy)7"$ 8.98
Yet another volume in the slew of vinyl only releases by German electronic artist Ekkehard Ehlers (Autopoieses, Auch) in tribute to various artists musical and otherwise. "Plays Cornelius Cardew" is two brief sides of lovely layered soundscapes as only Ehlers can conjure. Sampled sounds are seamlessly woven into dense, textural tone poems highly reminiscent of Wolfgang Voigt, most
EISENBERG, JEWLIATrilectic(Tzadik)cd$ 15.98
It's Jewlia Eisenberg from the local Idiot-Flesh-related group Charming Hostess! Along with a few similarly angel-voiced men and women, Jewlia has constructed an album of intricate harmonies -- all of it a capella and just bell clear. Elements of Bulgarian
ELECTRIC COMPANYGreatest Hits(Tigerbeat6)cd$ 14.98
Brad Laner's Electric Company gets the remix treatment from many of his wonderfully talented friends: Kid 606, U-Ziq, Blectum From Blechdom, Pimmon, Phthalocyanine, Tom Recchion (y'know, from the LAFMS!), Leafcutter John, Frank Bretschneider, Geoff White,
ELLIS, HORTENSEHortense's Last Stand(Creole)cd$ 14.98
As a proud rocksteady collector, I'm a little embarrassed to say I never gave Hortense Ellis much time until we got this nice collection in recently. Hortense was the sister of the much-more-famous Alton Ellis, and she dueted with him on many tracks, as
ENSLAVEDMonumension(Osmose)cd$ 14.98
Ivar Bjornson, Grutle Kjellson, Dirge Rep and R. Kronheim are Enslaved. We mention them individually because they and their band deserve to be household names, at least among Aquarius customers. Enslaved are definitely one of our absolute favorite Norwegian Ok, enough hyperbole (for the moment). What's "Monumension" really like, and how *does* it compare exactly to "Mardraum"? Well, somebody had told us to expect that the new Enslaved would sound like Genesis, but that's definitely not the case. True, '70s prog rock a la Genesis (or, maybe more accurately, King Crimson and Van Der Graaf Generator) certainly flows in the blood of Grutle, Ivar and Co., along with the more ancient blood of their Norse ancestors. Opeth fans will hear the parallels. But are they truly warriors of modern prog? Not quite, as they are so much more. The first thing an Enslaved fan will notice is the surprising prevalence of death metal style vocals alongside the black metal rasps and Viking chants. Vocally, lyrically and musically, this is some seriously heavy stuff, and violent. But it all flows, sometimes into realms so tripped-out and Floyd-ishly psychedelic that you'll forget you're listening to "metal" at all. But then, the next song will start with a blood-quickening, bone-jarring riff to remind you. Like on "Mardraum", the band brilliantly weaves various metal/rock styles into pure Enslaved music, perhaps upping the "folk" aspect a bit (which balances those death metal elements nicely). There's even a bonus track by a related band called HOV (Trygve Mathiesen and a "tribal choir" which includes all the members of Enslaved) that's meant to evoke traditional Viking music -- although the band stresses that "Enslaved has never been about reproduction or literal interpretations. It is more of a quest for creating our own musical traditions and dimensions. The band is built upon the philosophy, magick and myths of the Vikings, not a desire to dress like they did during a historical period or to talk exactly like them. It is something deeper than a mere roleplay to please the outer eyes and ears." These efforts by Enslaved certainly have resulted in surreal, epic, timeless metal for the mind, body and soul. So yes, these rune-obsessed geniuses, mere youngsters wise beyond their years, have created another utter masterpiece. And it's not just me -- everyone I've discussed this record with agrees that it's amazing. Arrrgh -- my fanboy ramblings can't even begin to do it justice. Emperor, Satyricon, Ulver are all great Norwegian black metal bands that in various ways and to various degress have also branched out into the beyond, but Enslaved are something else again.
FALL, THEAre You Are Missing Winner(Cog Sinister)cd$ 21.00
Mark E. Smith sounds like a drunken Howard Cosell, as he continues down the sad path of self-parody. Unlike last year's exceptional "The Unutterable", this record confirms that, unless you're helplessly obsessed, you'll never need to buy a new Fall
FAT JOEJealous Ones Still Envy(Atlantic)cd$ 16.98
You need this record just for the single 'We Thuggin', maybe one of the best singles of the year, a wickedly catchy track of bouncing, party gangsta hip hop, with an insanely catchy R. Kelly chorus (and lucky you, there are two versions; the remix
FAUSTRavvivando Remix Maxi Single(Klangbad)cd ep$ 8.98
Soft Cell remixes Faust?? That's right, the legendary, eccentric krautrockers Faust hit the dancefloor with the help of Soft Cell's David Ball (and one Ingo Vauk as well). The track "Wir Brauchen Dich #6", taken from Faust's last (and quite excellent)
FELDMAN, MORTONString Quartet (II)(Hat Hut)4cd$ 34.00
FIGURINEThe Heartfelt(Monika)cd$ 16.98
This is the second full length release by this amazing trio which features a member of Dntel. Some of the sweetest electronic dance melodies are found right here on 'The Heartfelt'. Imagine the Pastels, Aphex Twin, New Order and Future Bible Heroes (the
FOUR TETPaws Remixes(Domino)12"$ 9.98
From Kieran Hebden of Fridge comes a remix ep ("Paws") from his latest album ("Pause") under the moniker of Four Tet. Four tracks, including remixes by Konshik, Manitoba, and Boom Bip (who makes the most unpalatable song from Pause, that "No More Mosquitoes" song, actually listenable.)
FREAK SCENE, THE / THE DEVIL'S ANVILPsychedelic Psoul / Hard Rock From The Middle East(Collectables)cd$ 15.98
In light of recent events, we figured that this reissue of "Hard Rock From the Middle East" would make a great choice for record of the week...no, we don't mean 'cause of the current war, we mean because of the popularity of the "Turkish Delights" and "Hava The cover art shows the band hangin' in the desert in front of the pyramids of Egypt -- but don't be fooled, they were actually mostly Arab-Americans, based in New York City. Still, their rock n' roll was as authentically "Middle Eastern" as their Turkish contemporaries. They could have held their own with the likes of Erkin Koray and Mogollar. Ok, now we'd better explain about this particular cd (pay attention, it gets kinda confusing): Sony's Collectables has reissued two long-out-of-print 1967 albums by two totally different bands on *one* disc. The bands are tenuously connected through the friendship of The Freak Scene's Rusty Evans and Felix Pappalardi of The Devil's Anvil, as the two had played together four years previous. Okay, so maybe it's a bit of a stretch putting these two albums together on one disc. Whatever. The real treasure here is The Devil's Anvil album. The Devil's Anvil got together in the happenin' mid sixties Greenwich Village scene, playing their Middle Eastern influenced music at folk cafes and rock clubs. Eventually they hooked up with classical musician-turned-rocker Felix Pappalardi (producer of Cream's "Disraeli Gears", later to play alongside Leslie West in Mountain). He began playing bass with the band and eventually scored the group a record deal. The resulting album was truly one-of-a-kind and would certainly made greater impact had it not been released on the very eve of the Arab-Israeli war in 1967. Thus, no New York radio stations would play it and unfortunately the album has remained an expensive collector's find until now. The rock contained herein is absolutely kick ass, with bluesy and impassioned Arabic vocals, electric (or at least amplified) oud, bouzouki, tamboura, durbeki as well as the usual rock suspects of (fuzz!) guitar, bass and drums. The majority of the tracks here are either rock arrangements of traditional Middle Eastern and Greek numbers or original compositions, but a couple are actually straight traditional numbers with no western instruments at all. Plus there's an excellent Middle Eastern-esque rock arangement of "Misirlou" that's perhaps the best version ever recorded, IMHO. And the record ends with a Devil's Anvil original that kinda reminds us of one of the Beatles' more Eastern-influenced tunes. This is about as good as it gets. Even if the Freak Scene album doesn't interest you at all, this cd is still worth buying for The Devil's Anvil alone. Very, very highly recommended! Nay, ESSENTIAL. (As for The Freak Scene -- you might guess from that band's name and album title, The Freak Scene were a bit of a psychedelic-era novelty, a studio project put together by producer/songwriter Evans for CBS Records. The record exploits all of the trippy tropes of the times, from Eastern-raga modes to LSD-inspired lyrics. It's no classic, but does include at least one truly great psych-pop track, the Nuggets-worthy "A Million Grains of Sand". The Freak Scene also indulges in dated but amusing free-form sound-collage experiments like "...When In The Course of Human Events (Draft Beer, Not Students)" which tries to make a statement about the whole sixties counterculture vibe. It's a mix of Pete Seeger, Laugh-In, an LSD party -- Vietnam-era pop culture hippie kitsch -- consider it a free bonus that comes with The Devil's Anvil album.)
FUNKSTORUNGVice Versa(!K7)cd$ 17.98
Just like Funkstorung's previous album "Additional Productions," Vice Versa is a collection of their remixes of other people's work. But unlike "Additional Production" this albums isn't terribly good. Since the majority of the remix offers that Funkstorung
FUSHITSUSHAOrigin's Hesitation(PSF)cd$ 23.00
Keiji Haino and his psychedelic power trio Fushitsusha have long made some of Japan's heaviest, darkest, most fucked up sounds. They're a legendary "free rock" outfit, up there with the Dead C, Skullflower and few others. They're a unique band that with this At their last San Francisco show a few years back, Haino and Fushitsusha's drummer had an "epsiode" that resulted in, upon his return to Japan, the drummer's retirement from music! Rather than drafting in a new drummer, Haino and bassist Ozawa decided to remain a duo, with Haino taking over the drumming duties. This is the first recording by this new, unusual, reduced Fushitsusha line-up. Unusual because Haino's monstrous wall-of-feedback guitar was probably the reason most people listen to the band in the first place. Well too bad, meet the new, stripped-down, guitarless Fushitsusha! Origin's Hesitation starts off with Haino in a maniacal percussion frenzy, as if he'd always wanted to be the drummer in Fushitsusha and is now just so excited to be behind the kit he can't help but try to play all the drums at once. But after the first track, he calms down a bit with the drumming, putting more of his energy into what must rank as some of his most dramatic, tortured vocals ever. And that's saying a lot. These cries and utterances are accompanied by sparse but deliberate drum and bass hits, using space and silence. Both Haino and Ozawa use live electronics to loop their instruments, but this is a lot more primitive sounding than most "sampler" utilizing music! You might have to already be a fan of Haino/Fushitsusha to get into this -- at least, it's probably not the place for novices to start. Very anguished, very abstract. The heavy guitar sounds that linked Fushitsusha's past work to the rock music of Blue Cheer or Crazy Horse are of course gone, but this is still "heavy" in an emotional sense. And certainly "fucked up." So, after reading all the above, you probably still want to know "is it any good?" Well, Andee of course hates it, as he does pretty much any release where Haino opens his mouth. Allan on the other hand thinks this is kinda cool, even though he does prefer Fushitsusha with guitar. But he likes contrary, counter-intuitive rock bands like US Maple and Starfuckers, which in some ways this echoes. Handsomely packaged, as always with PSF Fushitsusha releases, with cd and booklet in a black paper mini-gatefold sleeve. Smells good!
GUENTNER, MARKUSIn Moll(Kompakt)cd$ 16.98
Squelches and whirrs nestle in rolling hills of fuzzy dreamy drones as clicks and pops struggle for air beneath a downy blanket of suffocatingly gorgeous billowy clouds of synth wash. Sound good? It does. It's German electronica artist Markus Guentner's debut cd for the Kompakt label. For those of you who don't know, the Kompakt label has developed an almost timeless aesthetic, not unlike the 'heroin house' sound of Chain Reaction. The Kompakt sound is an application of the often invoked but rarely successful working model of 'ambient techno'. A good example of this sort of thing that AQ-customers probably know about ('cause we sell so many of 'em) is the Wolfgang Voigt project Gas. His minimalist techno releases (in particular the Gas album "Konigsforst") are some of the few electronica albums that all Aquarians can agree on and strongly endorse. In creating "In Moll," Markus Guentner has done more than his part to fill the void created by Voigt's unusual absence, with a disc that captures much of the feel we liked so much about the Gas records, a sort of dreamy melancholy that manages to be both wistful and hopeful, lonely and warm. Jeff thinks it has a real "change of seasons" vibe, that harkens, again, to Gas. And while the Gas comparison is surely accurate (if you haven't caught our drift already, let's state: fans of Gas should pick this up without a second thought!), Guenter does add his own flair to Voigt's signature sound though, creating a more varied and more dynamic soundscape than Voigt's pastoral hum and thump.
HARVESTERHemat(Decibel)cd$ 15.98
Limited edition reissue of a rare Swedish psych rarity from the very late sixties (or very early seventies). Perhaps you read about or bought the Terry Riley-influenced Parson Sound double cd we raved about not long ago? Well, Harvester (after releasing
HIGH ON FIREArt of Self Defense(Tee Pee)lp + 7"$ 15.98
Stoner/doom heads, alert! The Man's Ruin-released cd of this album is now out of print (although, we stocked up right before the label went under, and still have a few copies). Now, however, there's vinyl! It comes complete with new (better) cover art courtesy of the Roger Dean of the stoner rock scene, Arik Moonhawk Roper, and a bonus 7" with two new tracks, including a cover of The Bay Area's slowest, heaviest, potsmokin'est doom metal combo Sleep (RIP) lives on in the form of ex-Sleep guitarist/vocalist Matt Pike's new band High On Fire. Sleep's last album, the infamous "Jerusalem", consisted of but one, super-long super-slow track. High On Fire speeds things up a bit (only a bit) but maintains the heaviness and the trademark Sleep sound. Right on.
HIROSHIGE, JOJOCrimson Voyage(Alchemy)cd$ 19.98
Japan's Alchemy Records has started releasing discs in a new cosmic-music-oriented series called "Inner Mind Music", and label boss Jojo Hiroshige's Crimson Voyage is one of the first offerings. With guitar, keyboards and percussion he creates some spacey
INCAPACITANTSRepo(Alchemy)cd$ 19.98
Alchemy Records digs into their vaults yet again to re-issue on cd a 1989 Alchemy LP by the notorious Japanese noise act Incapacitants. This makes for Incapacitants' eighth cd release on Alchemy! Wow, what a legacy of high-end skree, low-end rumble,
INFIDEL? / CASTRO!Case Studies In Bioentropy(n/a)cd$ 11.98
This is a very strange record. And you know that around here, for something to strike us as strange, it's gotta be really weird. A strange 'rock' record is a much more rare creature than just a strange record. I mean, at AQ we have been known to carry elephants My first inclination is to say O.L.D. meets Tool meets Fantomas meets Scanner meets Lustmord. But that doesn't quite capture it. There seems to be some sort of linear narrative, based on germs, or sickness or at least some sort of conspiracy. Dark rumbling drones and endlessly sustaining horror movie upper register skree underpin mumbled dialogue, panicked arguments whispered in a dark alleys, and computer voices offering plot exposition and ominous warnings. Then bursts of chugging distorted guitars, and spastic drumming (as well as computerized beats) explode through the thick curtain of gloomy drone bringing to mind the grinding rhythm of the Ruins. The record continues with monstrous slow core sludge splattered with fucked up noise and malfunctioning electronics that slowly mutates into a buzzing oversaturated electronic rhythm. And it just keeps getting weirder and weirder with dreamy gauzy nightmarescapes, huge pounding hyper distorted big beat electro, more confusing chopped and processed dialogue, repetitive and grinding almost-metal rhythms and the record ends with a totally crushing track of multi layered guitars, distorted and buzzing, squealing and pounding relentlessly as the story continues to its appropriately doomed ending. This record is so epic and intense, right down to the striking cover art: a close up painting of some sort of ocular surgery! Fans of any of the bands I mentioned above should definitely check this out as well as you 'dronologists' and even you jaded rockers. This record is definitely one of the best surprises of the year. An 'Operation Mindcrime' for the experimental set!
INTERNATIONAL HARVESTERSov Gott Rose-Marie(Silence)cd$ 14.98
The late sixties Swedish musical aggregation that was Parson Sound / International Harvester / Harvester / Trad, Gras Och Stenar (really all one evolving band) was basically an example of the genre we've decided to call "international krautrock". Like a Silence has added an incredible, lengthy (24 minute!) bonus track called "Skordetider" ("Harvest Times") that the band originally intended for an album B-side but never used. It's hypnotic, powerful jam that could have fit well on that Parson Sound release. In other words: wow! Additionally, this cd features extensive liner notes documenting the group's history (the same essay is also found in Silence's reissue of the Harvester album, but with different photos). Along with the Parson Sound double cd, this is definitely one of the reissues of the year for us.