ULTRADOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM. Or MEGADOOOOOOM. Whatever you want to call it, this is DOOM. Capital D. Lot's of o's. Lots of incredibly slow motion downtuned guitar sludge, pounding caveman drums, and a rumbling bowel churning low-end. This is the first recording we've been able to get enough of to list (we only have a handful of the out of print Moss / Bunkur split cd-r's left, email us if you want one) after a ton of super limited releases and demos. And if this doesn't hit the doom spot something good, then nothing will. Bunkur, Skepticism, Catacombs, Rigor Sardonicous, Esoteric, Planet Aids, Thergothon. And now Moss. The first track is a 15 minute slab of classic funereal doom. Soooooo sloooooow. Sooooooo heavy, crushing, pounding, chugging drone drenched sludge. Recorded live in 2004. The second track is taken from their long out of print split with Nadja, but here, the track is "fucked up and buried", and the result is a massive and abstract ambient soundscape, downtuned guitars are pushed way back into the distance, while in the foreground all sorts of rumble and crackle and what sounds like the burbling of a bong. A druggy, space-y ambient excursion through the massive decaying skeleton of what was once a doom metal beast.
Moss is joined by the brilliantly monickered Wolfmangler. Wolfmangler just happens to be the work of one Smolken who you might know as the man behind Dead Raven Choir! Weird but true. For all his Jewelled Antler folkiness, Smolken made no secret of his black metal obsession. As Wolfmangler, Smolken takes that love of metal and doom and tempers it with his love of folk and country, and the results are truly weird and wonderful. Best exemplified on the track "Survive" a doom-ed version of a Hank Williams Jr. song. Fuzzed out drone guitar, random percussion, weird rubbery bass lines, and growled raspy vocals. Like a black metal Souled American? Johnny Cash covering Skepticism. Something like that. The rest of the WM tracks are weird, slow motion, fuzz drone dirges, with strange barely there melodies, occasional guitar twang, and lots of ominous ambience!
Amazingly packaged in a vellum sleeve, printed in black on the outside, so the inside has a weird x-ray negative effect. Includes an insert for each band printed on thick vellum. SO NICE!
Limited to 500 copies. We got 50 of those and will not be able to get more! So act fast!
We've been trying forever to get copies of this Necks record, recorded live in Moscow in 2002, and only now have we managed to get enough to finally list. For those of you unfamiliar with the Necks, imagine a standard jazz trio, piano, drums and double bass, now imagine that group playing a jazz that is anything but standard. Extended pieces, usually cd length, sometimes longer, motifs repeated endlessly, while the instruments circle warily, slowly building, each player adding the tiniest hint of sound, a rumbling shimmering, shuffling jazz drone, that pulses and breathes, stretches and swells, rumbles and shimmers. This is jazz for the avant drone set for sure. Chris Abrahams' piano spits out dense clouds of chords and notes, a swirling melodic sprawl, underpinned by Lloyd Swanton's rumbling droning low end and Tony Buck's ultra restrained drumming, shuffling and skittering, kicking up little percussive squalls that drift lazily into the hypnotic haze of piano chords and double bass thrum. It's like all the parts in every jazz song ever -right before- the band kicks in to the tune, all stitched together into a massive never ending free jazz drone. Feldman plays Monk, or Birchville Cat Motel covering Mingus. Dark and dreamy and totally mesmerizing. Another one of those groups who we can imagine playing a single song FOREVER! And we'd just lay there soaking it in and loving it! Actually there was a rumor of a Necks show recently, where they supposedly performed for 24 hours straight! What we wouldn't do for that to come out as a 24 cd box set!
Packaged in a jewel case with a really nice printed vellum booklet.
Julien Neto creates velvety and gorgeous drone music that twitches with static-like prickles. Each track of Le Fumeur de Ciel envelopes the listener with an aching heaviness, the kind that originates from deep within your chest. Quite moving and very film score-ish. If you enjoyed Port-Royal's Flares album that we highlighted last list, you might also find Julien Neto's music ticklin' your fancy.
If Dengue Fever is an homage to the sort of band you might see in a clean well lit Cambodian bar, classy and melodic, with sweet pop vocals, then Neung Phak is a tribute to the sort of band you'd go to see around the corner from the nice clubs, down the alley, enter through the back, sitting in the gloom, in a cracked vinyl booth, letting the wild Southeast Asian pop rock wash your cares away. Neung Phak, aka Oakland's Monopause, have become masters of whatever SE Asian musics they decide to tackle be it Thai, Laotian, Vietnamese, Taiwanese, or Cambodian, made possible by the band's adept interpretations, but more importantly the band's vocalists Diana Hayes and Joi Po Dee, who are Thai and Laotian.
Side A is the title track, "Fucking USA", a vintage pop rock tune, big band arrangements, horns, fuzzy psychedelic guitars, with the only bit of vocals in English, being the shouted "Fucking USA!!" Catchy and fun, and so genuine sounding it sounds like it came straight off one of those Sublime Frequencies discs. We can imagine this will be a hit... overseas anyway.
The B side features two tracks recorded live for the radio, the first was immediately familiar, due in no small part to its frequent instore play, as it's a track from Neung Phak's full length, "Tui Tui Tui" with it's super catchy, totally recognizable chorus over a lush big band arrangement, with warm horns, understated guitars and shuffling drums. Originally performed by Yim Yamsupan, and quite possibly one of our favorite Southeast Asian pop songs EVER. The second track is a slowed down version of the title track, with the title changed to "Far King USA" for radio play, the whole thing a lugubrious, moody croon, with mournful piano, haunting vocals, somber and minor key.
Pressed on super thick vinyl and packaged in a thick full color sleeve, with hilarious (and perhaps problematic) cover art!
Limited to 300 copies.
Sublime Frequencies videographer Hisham Mayet strikes again! This time Hisham takes to the Sahel region of Niger to witness for ourselves a culture in resistance to environmental hazards (severe droughts) and extreme poverty, and a country that's at the cultural crossroads of Subsaharan Africa and the Middle East. Like all of Mayet's films there is no authoritative narrator to disrupt the flow, or otherwise direct our interests. Which isn't to say Mayet leaves us completely in the dark as concerns his motivations and whereabouts in shooting this footage. For that we are given ample liner notes detailing the film's unfolding in chronological order of events. The video begins in rural Dogondoutchi where Hisham documents the music of the Mawri people. Several performances are caught here of musicians playing a banjo like instrument which is simultaneously struck across the drum as it is strummed and plucked, turning the performer into a veritable one-man-band. Also taped are some amazing fiddle players using an array of instruments, each seemingly unique to its possessor. Across the river Niger, Mayet takes us to the village of Boubon to a cowry shell divination, a spirit posession ceremony, and a truly strange performance of sexual coming of age by the young girls of the village in which they taunt the boys with... Ahem! Rather "randy" dance moves. As the film progresses it moves further from acoustic / rural / animist Niger to urban / Christian / electric Niger. We're witnesses to a gospel revival meeting at a Pentacostal church combining both traditional instruments and percussion with electric bass and keyboards. Almost directly from there Mayet takes us to a dive bar to hear a beautiful pick-up band of electric guitar, bass, drums and percussion. The sound is almost like that of a punk rock Ali Farka Toure, if you can imagine that. And in the end we are taken to the compound of Bibi Ahmed to hear some very Nubian sounding trance rock, like a dronier version of Ali Hassan Kuban. Excellent!
This vinyl-only split 12" from Oneida and Plastic Crimewave Sound is pretty darn rulin'. Recorded during their Thank Your Parents session, Oneida's "Psychedelic Maze" is an eerie and homespun late-night jam which sparsely used ukuleles, hexoleles, a lute and homemade drums to conjure a sorta hokey but amazing self-conscious folk sound that's almost more Sun City Girls-ish than Oneida-y. PCS's side is a fuzz-soaked drone-rock opus. "End of Cloud" utilizes some production tricks, motorik drumming and various waves and blasts that creates a pulsing frenzy to which a very stoned person could "meditate".
One of our very favorite metal bands returns with a new album, a domestic release for big-league metal label Roadrunner, which made us wonder if they'd somehow gone all nu-metal on us. Opeth as an Ozzfest band? Well, this is the slickest Opeth record yet, surely. And there's clean singing on here that does seem like it might be geared for (gasp) radio airplay...but, that singing is in the same song with total death metal growling. So it's really the same ol' Opeth we know and love. A well produced, super dynamic and atmospheric blend of death metal and progressive rock, with epic-length songs, ripping technical playing, and sensitive acoustic interludes. And a healthy dose of Mellotron and other keys, moreso even than in the past, as they've now made their keyboardist an official, permanent band member. It could be we're hearing a hint of nu-metal in some of the bouncier, stop start bits...but put that in the context of proggy baroque keyboards, and this is definitely not Slipknot or Korn, that's for sure. And if Opeth can turn what they do into "pop" music and get away with it, more power to 'em. Not that that's likely...
Is this eighth Opeth opus destined to be considered a classic like several of their earlier albums? Well, c'mon, it's undeniably tough for 'em to top what they've done in the past, regardless of how good this is! We are glad to have all the shades of Opeth back together on one album after the heavy disc/light disc dichotomy of their twin previous releases Deliverance and Damnation. And anyway, at this point we can't imagine any Opeth fan daring to not purchase, listen to, and (out of love or awe) worship this!
SF's Oranger continue to spread the love around, dishing out their generous offerings of sunbeam-bright tunes on a different label each time. Here, they've popped up on Eenie Meenie Records. Following up last year's 2cd Shutdown The Sun on Jackpine Records, New Comes And Goes' buoyant baker's dozen is once again sure to please Oranger's fans as well as those of fellow West Coast noise-poppers The Posies and Beulah. More polished, but still retaining a bit of the rough-around-the-edges, mischievous charm that characterised Shutdown and the album that came before it Quietvibrationland (released in 2000 on former Pavementer Scott Kannberg's label Amazing Grease). The album runs the gamut from bubblegum heights to more 'serious' mid-tempo downers, and we have to say that we do prefer the songs on which the band keep the mood upbeat and the energy high. That's when they shine the brightest (at least we think so). A side note: the album cover and font choice seem a little incongruous though, bringing to mind wee hours Euro dance punk festivities rather than a California beach-destined convertible on a scorchin' summer afternoon (which is what we associate this band's music with).
This is a no frills dvd with a simple offering. P.E. LIVE. In LONDON. 1987. Their first European tour! Extras are very spare here, mostly just an available voice over by Dr. Dre. This definitely makes a case for Flavor Flav. Without him, there's no way they would have had the mass appeal they enjoyed. Regardless, it's an awesome document of P.E.'s raw energy at this time, just about to release their classic, It Takes A Nation of Millions To Hold Us Back.
Last Visible Dog likes to come up with some "who's that?" artists to release on their label, that's for sure. Of course, if you're super-familiar with the catalogs of such equally underground and avant garde labels as Fringes, Public Eyesore and Fusetron perhaps you have heard of Italian guitarist/experimentalist Renato Rinaldi. We confess we hadn't. But spending the 40 minutes that the single track found on this Hoarse Frenzy disc lasts with the music of Rinaldi is a fine way to make his acquaintance! Spacious and pretty "outdoor" acoustic guitar improv is mixed with intriguing field recording textures, gentle singing, and the sounds of harmonium, unplugged electric guitar, piano, dulcimer, organ, and even harmonics played by a guesting string trio. It all comes together in a nicely flowing, rough-hewn suite as imagined and constructed by Rinaldi. Sounds like something you'd hear from the Jewelled Antler or Hapna labels. Quite lovely and droney and mysterious!
A new cd-r from yet another mysterious New Zealand noise drone outift, the only thing we know for sure is that one of the Invaders was also at one time one of the Double Leopards! And it sounds like it. Two twenty something minute tracks of murky lowend explorations, wide expanses of barely there thrum, distorted fuzz, simple random percussive clomps, amp buzz, random guitar twang and pluck, occasional mournful melodies, simple strumming, and lots of random sonic clutter, voices and footsteps, shuffling and flitting about. Sounds a bit like the Dead C setting up, or Birchville Cat Motel breaking down. Drifting and meandering, haunting and intimate, creepy and weirdly pretty.
SUPER LIMITED AS ALWAYS!! NOT SURE WE'LL BE ABLE TO GET MORE WHEN THESE ARE GONE!
Sanhedolin is the new name for the project that brought together two of the most exciting artists in the Tokyo underground prog-psych scene, AQ faves progcore duo Ruins and dark psych shaman Keiji Haino!! They did a cd on PSF under the name Knead three years ago (and also an LP on the French Fractal label). Now they've teamed up again, but because the Ruins have a new bass player, they've changed the name of this unit to Sanhedolin (though, the Ruins didn't change their name, so go figure). Anyway, this what you get when guitarist/vocalist Haino has the hyper-excitable rhythm section that is the Ruins backing him up. Incendiary improv action! Heavy-duty guitar/bass/drums interplay. And... flute?
Yep, oddly enough (but much to our approval) this album opens up with the lovely sound of the flute! Haino is not credited with playing flute on the sleeve, but it's got to be him. It's not until a track or so later that Haino unleashes his trademark searing electric guitar devastation. He also screams out some very anguished vocals, more soul-wrenching than those from any black metal throat. Haino's presence is key here (and like we said in our review of the Knead cd, although you can hear both the Ruins and Haino doing their respective, distinctive "things", the combination maybe makes it more of Haino's album than the Ruins -- it's like a really fierce Fushitsusha recording with an uncowed, caffinated rhythm section). And really, we like this better than a lot of other Ruins improv projects 'cause it's not just about the spazz-out bass/drums, the iron first of Haino's guitar playing is so STRONG that it keeps the Ruins in line, it's more purposeful I guess. Fans of either and/or both Ruins or Haino though should like this. And by the the way, new Ruins bass player Mitsuru Nasuno is just as nimble as any who've played with Ruins drummer/mastermind Yoshida Tatsuya before, as he'd better be!
For those of you who were hopin' for a new Senor Coconut album proper, well, you're just gonna have to keep on waiting 'cause while this cd certainly has many of the Coconut earmarks -- cheeky cover art, playful Latin booty beats, chirpy electronic melodies, kooky samples -- it's actually a compilation of tracks put together by Senor Coconut (aka Uwe Schmidt, aka Atom Heart). Nonetheless, it's pretty darn great and sure to please his fans (and fans of that recent Rio Baile Funk comp Essay also put out too) 'cause he's got really good taste and knows his stuff! This effervescent 17-track comp is a super duper delight. In particular, be sure to check out the tracks by Os Carrascos and Los Pibes Chorros, as well as the one by Senor Coconut himself. Recommended!
Okay 'new weird America' obsessives, drone nerds and limited vinyl fetishists... on your mark, get set, go! Vinyl only. Limited to 400 copies. Already sold out. We have the last 30 copies we could get. Features members of the Double Leopards and the Magic Markers. And to top it all off, it's actually also pretty darn great. Slowly drifting, warm murky ambience, the drone-y haze barely obscuring the moaning of distant feeding back guitars, simple atonal strumming, machine like creaks and simple muted percussion. All smeared into one fuzzy indistinct whole. Blurry guitars stretch into vast expanses of ambience and found sounds, eventually getting more active, scraping and squeaking, never enough to disrupt the droning dreaminess, while the original guitar seems to thicken and distort into a pulsing and throbbing slab of super thick drone. Nice!
Housed in a beautiful black-on-black digipack, this new solo disc from Jewelled Antler comrade Steven R. Smith is something else. By that we mean, it's really great -- and it's just a little bit different from what you've heard from him lately in the guise of his very popular ('round here anyway) Eastern European folk-influenced project Hala Strana. The one long track found on Crown Of Marches maybe really harks backs to his daze in the more amped up, spaced-out, krautrocky pre-Thuja combo Mirza. It's dreamy, droney, and heavily distorted. Playing an assortment of instruments (as is his wont) including "electric and baritone guitars, xaphoon, fretted hurdy gurdy, baritone psaltery, noah bells, organ, electric piano, bowed cymbals, tympani", Smith has crafted a billowing psych-scape that will embrace you in its darkness, a thickly ambient bliss-out of 40+ minutes duration, that ends with lonely horn (?) melodies surfacing amidst the somber, drifting electric muzz. Recommended! Crown Of Marches is a one-man effort that could / should appeal to fans of all sorts of droney bands such as Tarentel, Mogwai, SUNNO))), Godspeed You Black Emperor!, Labradford, Davis Redford Triad, Doktor Kettu, Kinski, Acid Mothers Temple, Bardo Pond... and of course Mirza, Thuja and Hala Strana.
Hurrah, some new Stereolab songs! The band sure seem to have turned over a new leaf where their limited edition collectibles are concerned -- re-endearing themselves with their legions of fans. Perhaps it's been spurred in part by the new partnership between the band's own label Duophonic and Too Pure? Dunno, but after years of frustratingly small run, insanely pricey special releases, they recently offered up the cool Oscillons From The Anti-Sun 3cd/1dvd box set, and have now released these three nicely priced, no frills 7" singles with two songs a piece. Each is a limited pressing of 1000.
This is the punchiest, krautiest pair of their new half dozen, but it's still super pretty. "Interlock" particularly stands out with its groovy bassline, staccato singing and chiming keyboard lines.
Hurrah, some new Stereolab songs! The band sure seem to have turned over a new leaf where their limited edition collectibles are concerned -- re-endearing themselves with their legions of fans. Perhaps it's been spurred in part by the new partnership between the band's own label Duophonic and Too Pure? Dunno, but after years of frustratingly small run, insanely pricey special releases, they recently offered up the cool Oscillons From The Anti-Sun 3cd/1dvd box set, and have now released these three nicely priced, no frills 7" singles with two songs a piece. Each is a limited pressing of 1000.
This one features a pair of very similar lulling numbers with breathy non-word vocalizing (cycles of ba-bas and aaahs) atop subdued drumming and understated instrumental backing that alternates between two notes. Some might call the two parts of Kyberneticka Babicka hypnotically cyclical while others might find them to be somewhat maddeningly repetitive. It definitely contrasts with the more pop-side of Stereolab featured on the other two records which feature prominent and abundant singing from Laetitia.
Hurrah, some new Stereolab songs! The band sure seem to have turned over a new leaf where their limited edition collectibles are concerned -- re-endearing themselves with their legions of fans. Perhaps it's been spurred in part by the new partnership between the band's own label Duophonic and Too Pure? Dunno, but after years of frustratingly small run, insanely pricey special releases, they recently offered up the cool Oscillons From The Anti-Sun 3cd/1dvd box set, and have now released these three nicely priced, no frills 7" singles with two songs a piece. Each is a limited pressing of 1000.
This one features a pair of dreamy pop songs on which Laetitia Sadier's lovely vocals are as captivating as ever. "Plastic Mile" swings along gracefully while "I Was A Sunny Rainphase" peps things up a bit, and its pulsing groove proves that they haven't lost their love for krautrock (specifically the sounds of Neu!) just yet.
For a while now, Matthew Bower's Sunroof! has been drifting further into a dreamy blissed out drone world, warm and rich and thick, hypnotic and otherworldly, which makes perfect sense as he has Skullflower to indulge his RAWK side, and the Hototogisu where he teams up with the Double Leopards Marcia Bassett for some good ol' NOIZE. So it was a bit of a pleasant surprise to throw on this new double disc and get knocked the fuck out by sheets of high end skree and walls of keening feedback. Not that we don't love the Sunroof! bliss, we do. And fear not, there's plenty of that here as well, but Silver Bear Mist definitely finds Bower returning to his old noisier outift Total for some sonic inspiration. In fact there's even some Skullflower-worthy riffing here as well. The sound is still definitely Sunroof!, but it sounds like Bower has decided to lump his many moods into one massive double disc of drone / bliss / noise / psych / freakout and we're loving it. Disc one starts with aforementioned knockout blast of processed feedback and squealing spaced out synths, before amping up into some full-on feeding back wall of guitar pummel. The rest of the record is a confusional trip through druggy effect-drenched psych-rock guitar workouts, to clangy clattery free noise, to ear shredding high end drone assembled from layers and layers of processed feedback and chordal whir. The disc finishes off with a 2o minute slow shifting single note drone. A pulsing streak of high end guitar stretched out across the whole twenty minutes, while various drones and overtones and other guitars slink and creep around the original tone, in a weirdly hypnotic tangled drone ballet.
Disc two is all over the map as well, opening with a psych rock jam that's so tinny and overblown it sounds like you're listening to Amon Duul 2 leaking out of the headphones of the guy behind you one the bus. The disc sort of mellows a bit after that into some more Sunroof!-ish territory although with those everpresent streaks of white hot guitar and lightning strike feedback. San Francisco's Skaters join the fray toward the end of disc 2, and it's the final three tracks that really seal the deal. First a noisy, angular guitar workout, with wailing abstract vocals battling sheets of feedback, then it's fourteen minutes of muted warbly four track folk wrapped in haze and a fuzzy ambience that makes it sound like an old dusty crackly 78, and finally, "Trampled Dawns" ends the proceedings with a totally majestic and epic workout, full of grand melodies and chiming bells, all wrapped in an ultrathick layer of grit and fuzz, sounding almost like a noiserock version of that song that always plays at the end of every teen movie when the boy finally gets the girl. As always, so amazing.
It's odd that Swords have made what is perhaps their most straightforward pop album to date on the Arena Rock label (home to Creeper Lagoon, Calla, Solex and more) -- very much along the lines of Death Cab For Cutie and Pinback, but maybe with Michael Stipe stepping in to sing a few tunes -- as opposed to their former label home, the very Pinback-smart-pop-minded Absolutely Kosher. Indeed it's remarkable how much of a stylistic transformation they've gone through, shedding nearly every proggish, boundary pushing element that used to punctuate and characterize their music. Nevertheless, they wear this new dreamy style with panache.
In the mood for some ultra pretty, straight-up heartstring pullers? Achingly sweet songstress Rosie Thomas has some to share with you. She follows closely in the footsteps of female singers such as Shawn Colvin or Sarah McLachlan and more recently Norah Jones or Laura Cantrell. In fact, many of the songs here are totally teen coming-of-age movie ready. Made us think of that McLachlan-sung tune "When She Loved Me" which accompanied the Jessie montage scene in Toy Story 2. Come to think of it, this would've also been perfect for the soundtrack to Sisterhood Of The Travelling Pants. If Songs Could Be Held certainly has the potential for very widespread appeal, but we guess it'll be embraced particularly by girls young and old.
By now, Finland must seem like one big musical forest, will small tribes of elfin music makers, sitting around fires, with home made instruments and beat up old guitars and primitive tape recorders, spending their days kicking out clattery, meandering free folk pagan jams, tribal and hypnotic. Venture a little further into the forest and you'll find Circle, harnessing the power of the sun to power their amps and keyboards, kicking out endless psychedelic drone rock jams. Chop your way through some dense underbrush, delve deeper into the woods, where there is less life and less light and it's a little dark and scary and you'll find Pharaoh Overlord, big hairy Yeti's, clubs in hand, making a sludgy racket around a huge funeral pyre, horrible blackened shapes dancing on the canopy overhead. But go no further, because there's a cave, with a mouth as black as pitch, where no one dare enters, for fear of the unholy racket emanating from within. For it's here you'll find the mysterious members of Tivol. Look closer and the cave sort of resembles a beat up old garage. But stand back and prepare yourself for the wild and wooly psychedelic freakouts spewing from the mouth of this cave / garage. Pounding trashcan drums, druggy, super affected space rock guitars, and howled banshee vocals, screeching and wailing. This is the scuzzy, fuzzy, sloppy, noisy soft white underbelly of the Finnish rock scene, and we LOVE IT. Like the unwanted lovechild of Guitar Wolf, Hawkwind and Liquorball, let loose in the woods, only to be raised by pot smoking, psych rockin' wolves. The ultimate pounding psychedelic garage space-sludge. Ah, Finland. Where else could it come from?
This lp collects two long out of print cd-r releaese (one on 267 Lattajjaaa, one on Time-Lag) that were cleaned up a little (only a LITTLE) made louder and more in your face and then etched into a massive slab of wax with a sharp stick. Packaged in a gorgeous hand printed sleeve, courtesy of Rob Fisk and The Free Porcupine Society.
What do you get when you mix Wrest from Leviathan, Malefic from Xasthur, Hildolf from Draugar, Imperial from Krieg and Azentrius from Nachtmystium? Odds are by the end of that sentence, most of you black metal fans don't even care, you just want it whatever it is! Well, what IT is, is a long in the works collaboration dubbed Twilight, featuring the above mentioned black metal masters, all conspiring to produce the sickest, grimmest black metal ever. And Twilight certainly is both grim and sick, but the sound manages to be much more, veering dramatically from the various contributors' usual sound and sounds. The first track is a massive and thick, buzzy and blurry tarpit of swirling BM, that is so unbelievably dense at times that the vocals and guitars and drums almost merge into a single massive blackened drone, before random parts shift ever so slightly and are allowed to drift to the forefront before slipping back into the murky blackness. Layer after layer of downtuned riffing, insane blast beats and hellishly surreal super processed howling vocals (sounding almost like all five of them are singing simultaneously). Quite possibly one of the most frightening black metal tracks EVER. We were totally thrown for a loop though with track two, which starts off with a bizarre jaunty black metal jig, accompanied by grunted troll-like vocals, before splintering into more familiar buzz and drone territory. After that it's exactly what you would expect from a BM dream team like this, lots of midtempo Burzumic throb and buzzy BM drone, plenty of growled, howled, gurgled and shrieked vocals, completely amazing riffs, veering from echoing spacious doom to razor sharp blackthrash to weirdly melodic almost jangle, catchy melodies that reveal themselves slowly with each listen, and of course there's Wrest's amazing and super creative drumming holding it all together. The sticker on the front pretty much says it all: "As an entity, they have delivered a mammoth, blackened metallic statement. Bleak, cold, darkness within and beyond the void."
A super limited (only 100 copies!) dvd-r from film maker Paul Clipson with music by Tarentel's Jefre Cantu-Ledesma. The film is a beautifully abstract and paranoid impression of Southern California, filmed on grainy Super8, with lots of dizzyingly hypnotic footage of telephone wires, helicopters, cityscapes, gorgeously blurred out traffic lights and tail lights and street lights. There's late afternoon silhouettes, fuzzy smears of neon, rain drops on glass, cranes and docks, abstract streaks of passing cars and slick roadways, hillsides covered in windmills, the sun reflected on the sea, highways and green hills. So lovely. And haunting. As are the accompanying sounds created by Cantu-Ladesma, an ominous, buzzing, vocal drone, affected to the point that it still sounds organic, but not like a voice, more like streaks of sound, greys and blacks and browns, all smeared into blurred soundscapes of purr and whir and thrum, that perfectly compliment the shaky camera work, the grainy film stock, and the gorgeously and ominously mundane subject matter.
LIMITED TO ONLY 100 COPIES. WE ONLY GOT 20 COPIES SO ONCE THESE ARE GONE, THEY ARE GONE FOREVER.
Always thought this band was called The Usaisamonster, one word like that, but on the cover of this there's spaces between the words, The Usa Is A Monster. In interest of being consistent in our catalog, though, we're gonna continue to run 'em together. And either way, it's a damn good, unfortunately true, bold-statement kind of name, perfectly matched to the radical political attitudes expressed in the songs of this weird Brooklyn art-spazz-core-folk duo. We've been fans of these guys since they first brought us a bunch of self-released cd-rs and LPs some years back, and really really loved their previous Load release, 2003's Tasheyana Compost. The brand new Wohaw, which unleashes more of their rather unique blend of prog, punk and folk, has a similar appeal. It's a bit like a weird combination of Lightning Bolt and Robbie Basho! Herky jerky heaviness (with the 'Bolt's brand of bug zapper distortion) meets what could be traditional folk songs. Children's folk songs even. And there's a definite Native American Indian obsession/appropriation still going on here as well. This is the kind of band that uses big amps and a gizillion effects pedals, but also likes to take off their shirts to play flutes and hand drums (as pictured on one side of the folding cd-insert). Partway through, this album maybe loses some steam for us, going a bit too far in the acoustic-folk direction (something their singing ability can't quite support, to be honest). Suddenly it's campfire sounds and poetry, with nothing electric to be heard. But when they're doing the unique Usaisamonster hybridization of folk and noisecore that we prefer, this is fantastic. Definitely check this out if Lightning Bolt, Deerhoof, Amps For Christ, and/or Thrones are bands you're into, as something about this reminds us of all of them.
For those of you who've been keepin' track of the Ace Of Spades limited edition cd-r series of monthly live acoustic performances at Oakland's Mama Buzz Cafe by various Bay Area rootsy folksy musicians, here's the final release! It's a limited edition 'best of' compilation cd (not a cd-r), and it features a single track each from seventeen different artists including Rogue Wave, The Moore Brothers, Sean Hayes, Black Bear, Dave Gleason's Wasted Days, Alela Menig, The Lonely Hearts, Jason Webley, Paul Panamarenko, Mandrake, Black Bird Stitches, Laura Weinbach, Audio Out Send, Etienne De Rocher, Brian Glaze, Bart Davenport, and Paula Frazer.
And for extra warm fuzzies, it's a benefit cd with for the Little Kids Rock Foundation supporting children's music education.
All right! The fourth volume in the totally rad Cambodian Rocks series is here at last (perhaps the compilers at the Khmer Rocks label were sensing competition from the now three-volume Thai Beat A Go Go series?). Volume four puts Cambodian Rocks into the lead with some truly over the top late '60s/early '70s rock n' roll, exotic psych-beat that's just so wild, weird, n' wonderful. WOW is all you can say. The 19 tracks include such brilliantly-titled songs as "Oops...He's Mute", "No Shorts Lesson Learned", "Leftover Smile" and "I'm All Skinny" performed by an all-star cast of Cambodian Rockers: Ros Sereysothea, Sinn Sisamouth, Pan Ron, Yol Aularong, and Meas Samoun. Until the tragic, catastrophic Khmer Rouge takeover of the mid '70s brought the genocidal despot Pol Pot and his gang into power, Cambodia (or its urban center Phnom Penh anyway) apparently was a hip, swinging place where teenagers could groove to plenty of homegrown rock n' roll music, inspired by Western R&B, surf, and psych but with a distinctive Cambodian flavor. You can sure hear that in so many of the tracks here, in the sweet female voices backed by distorted guitar and wigged-out organ. There's some serious psych-fuzz being laid down, sometimes murky and lo-fi duo to its temporally/geographically distant origins but full of spirit and energy. So very recommended, as every entry in this series has been! By the way, the compliers have thoughtfully included English translations of the lyrics in the cd booklet.
Just when you thought you'd heard everything, in comes Sublime Frequencies to fill in the gaps you never thought existed. How many CDs of Iraqi pop do you have in your collection? Until now we certainly didn't have any, let alone anything remotely traditional from Iraq. For a country that's so important to our war mongering presidential administration it's perhaps a little surprising that more interest hasn't been piqued about the culture of Iraq. But then again, everyone but W seems to understand that the real reasons for plundering this nation wasn't to "liberate" anyone. In fact, W would probably rather that no one even pay attention to any of this music, which has the awkward fortune to have been produced almost entirely (with the exception of three early 70's tracks) during the reign of Saddam Hussein and his Baathist regime ( tracks here range from 1980 on up to 2002!). In spite of his -- well deserved -- reputation as a cruel dictator, he was also an avid supporter of both education and the arts -- such are the complexities of life W would rather not acknowledge -- and for better or worse, kept the fabricated nation state as stable as it has ever been. Hussein promoted secular arts and music, starting cultural centers for both, and even dubbed singers the "eighth division" of the armed forces (his nation had seven military divisions) -- not to paint too rosy a picture of Donald Rumsfeld's former pal and business partner, who was also a sadistic tyrant after all. Compiled by Mark Gergis (I Remember Syria, Molam, Cambodian Cassette Archives), Choubi Choubi is a collection years in the making. Gergis scoured the earth for the source material on this disc, travelling through Syria, Europe and the Iraqi neighborhoods of Detroit, Michigan. The anthology starts off with a folk rock track from '70s Socialist singer Ja'afar Hassan, a song that could easily compete with the best psych tracks on Hava Narghile or Turkish Delights for the crown of Middle Eastern psych champ. But if you're expecting another psych compilation, you're going to be disappointed as Choubi Choubi is much more than that, way more. Most of the recordings on the album have no western instruments on them, nor hardly any western influence. These tracks rock out much harder with no electric instruments, but with huge string sections, pounding drums, and monstrous oud playing. Maybe it's also the super bluesy sounding (to the western ear) melodies, it's no wonder that it sounds so fresh and familiar to us. It really is weird, when I (Byram) first listened to this record I could have sworn there were more songs with electric guitars on it, but there aren't that many. It just sounds so fucking heavy, and rocks so hard that I remembered it as being a "rock" record. Really, really, really fucking great!
A complete about face for volume 2 in the Folk And Pop Music of Myanmar (Burma) series of discs. Remember that first one? The manic weirdness was unlike anything we'd heard, nor anything we've heard since. So it's striking that volume 2 is a disc we can at least put in terms we know. What's perhaps most ironic is that the recordings on Guitars Of The Golden Triangle come from a territory of Burma that, while roughly the size of New York State, has been almost completely un-explored by outsiders (Burmese or otherwise). The Golden Triangle (its proper name is the Shan State of Burma) is little known outside its own country, but it is the territory of smugglers, seperatist rebels and some extraordinary opium production. Since it is forbidden for foreigners to visit the Shan State, it's no surprise that its flourishing cottage industry of a music scene would be completely unknown to outsiders. How Mr. Bishop got these tracks is anyone's guess, but as we've seen before the Sublime Frequencies folks have their ways with picking up ripe fruit that others walk straight past. The 21 tracks here, recorded during the early seventies, range between heavy fuzzed out psych -- like something much more likely to have come out in the late sixties -- to sugary crooning pop -- much more akin to its decade. Little is known of most of the artists: for instance the most well represented here -- Saing Saing Maw -- is only known to have been a truck driver originally (shades of Elvis anyone?) and after striking his music career apparently returned to truck driving.
We just got this in earlier this week, and well, what do you want already? A review?? It's SIX count 'em SIX CDS!!! We can't listen to all of this and review it, nor do we need to. C'mon, just buy it. You know you want one. How can you not?? There's SEVEN HOURS AND 36 MINUTES of music on here from pretty much EVERYBODY that you love from the international drone / psych / folk scene, from the US and NZ and Finland and Japan and lots of other places. Here's just a partial list: Birchville Cat Motel, Avarus, Bardo Pond, Black Forest/Black Sea, Doktor Kettu, Steven R. Smith, Fursaxa, Peter Wright, Urdog, Seht, Uton, Loren Chasse/Of, Renato Rinaldi, Miminokoto, Matt De Gennaro, Geoff Mullen, Flies Inside The Sun, Up-Tight, Es, Wolfmangler, My Cat Is An Alien, One Inch Of Shadow, Keijo, Ashtray Navigations, Ben Reynolds, and a half-a-dozen more. GEEZUS. All kinds of haunting textures, space rock excursions, and free improv splurge. Of course, we'd love to provide you a detailed, multi-paragraph review where we discuss each track in depth and mention all the highlights, describe the variety, etc. etc. But that's crazy. We wouldn't get this listed until next year if we did that. And you want this NOW don't you? So, suffice to say that this is an amazing follow-up to the excellent, out-of-print "Invisible Pyramid" 2cd comp released a few years back by LVD. This time compiler Chris Moon, inspired by the classic triple LP comp Harmony of the Spheres released by Drunken Fish in 1996, encouraged the contributors to give him more material or longer tracks, in the 12-18 minute range. Perhaps later he saw this as a foolhardy decision when he realized the comp was going to take up six whole cds. But he did it anyway, and we can thank Chris for doing this, 'cause of course, most of these artists are all about the extended track length experience. These aren't bands that write three minute pop songs (although, some artists do provide suites of shorter tracks rather than one long one). They want to let loose and DRONE. And what's the use of a drone that gets cut short after a couple minutes? Exactly. So this comp avoids that problem, and is really a bargain at the price for so much music! Includes an appropriately thick booklet with liner notes, track info, and dedications to various extinct species.
Brain-melting musical chaos from Japan! Crazy voices, crashing instruments! According to the liner notes to this cd, "In 1997, 1999 and 2003, a set of performances aroused a storm of frenzy and shriek in Europe... and they will be back with even greater power. This time 3 musicians (Yoshida Tatsuya/Tsuyama Atsushi/Kawabata Makoto) form 7 units!! A capella, comic free form, progressive core, troubadour, cosmic psychedelic....... you'll be experiencing the essence of all kinds of extremes in the current new music scene in Japan on a single night. Never miss it." Or, you can experience those extremes on a single disc -- this one, that Yoshida released on his Magaibutsu label to promote the tour. These three fellows, members of such crucial underground Japanese bands as Ruins, Acid Mothers Temple, and Omoide Hatoba, perform here in various groupings: Akaten, Zubi Zuva X, Zoffy, Seikazoku, Acid Mothers Temple SWR, Ruins Alone, and Shrinp Wark. Some of those will already be familiar to followers of this creatively fertile and incestuous scene, but two are kinda new: Shrinp Wark (Yoshida and Kawabata's improvising tribute to This Heat) and the somewhat self-explanatory Ruins Alone (Yoshida solo, using his drum kit and a sampling bass to singlehandedly perform songs by Ruins as well as Koenjihyakkei and Korekyojinn! The Ruins Alone track here is an insane ADD medley that brings in the William Tell Overture among other things...). There's something here for all fans of everything from spaced-out psych to vocal acrobatics to noisy prog mayhem. AND, in addition to the seven audio tracks, this also includes seven live video clips viewable on your computer! Way cool. Packaged in a plastic sleeve, no jewel case.
Almost 30 years ago, Brian Eno caught wind of a bunch of nihilist musicians in New York's East Village, who were turning the punk revolution on its head in constructing a rock polyglot of mangled free-jazz, Theatre Artaud histrionics, sex-crime funk, and teeth-gnashing rage. Eno gathered together the four major projects from this scene -- The Contortions, DNA, Mars, and Teenage Jesus & The Jerks -- and brought them into the studio in order to document the messy dynamics of this short-lived community. The resulting compilation was the legendary No New York compilation. Depending on who you ask, these four bands on the No New York comp were the only bands to truly inherit the much ballyhooed No Wave throne, much to the chagrin of like-minded projects coming from other neighborhoods of New York City. For reasons that by now have long been forgotten, No New York has remained out of print for decades, thus attaining a mythological status not only for collectors but also for hundreds of art-rock bands who so badly wanted to wear the No Wave badge of honor.
Eno had deliberately engineered these recordings buried in grit and mud, hoping to reproduce the frenzy of the Velvet Underground; and even he admitted that these bands had made better sounding recordings for various other labels. Eno's strategies paid off in unifying each and every band through a anxious kineticism that each band would later take in different directions. Led by the spasmodic James Chance, the Contortions overdosed on James Brown's swagger in their sharp funk grooves bloodied by Chance's vocal phlegm and spittle. Teenage Jesus & The Jerks had a 16-year old Lydia Lunch at their helm, scraping air-raid sirens violently across her guitar and adding equally ear-splitting vocal shrieks on top of The Jerks' sweaty militant march. Mars may have been the most sonically adventurous of the four in their toxic psychosis that evolved from throbbing avant-punk riffage into narcoleptic improviation. For the No New York compilation, DNA was in their monstrous synth plod and guitar shard phase which sounds so intesne and so so good.
Shitty Japanese bootlegs of No New York have surfaced from time to time, sporting poor digital transfers of roughly handled vinyl, so it's nice to have this offically licensed Russian import which is quite nicely packaged and has much improved sound quality.
Now all Sublime Frequencies needs to release is an Iranian disc and we'll have big W's "axis of evil" covered. But seriously, of all the countries on the globe -- axis or no -- the biggest cultural blackout has to be North Korea. Assembled by Christiaan Virant from a variety of source material: shortwave radio intercepts, field recordings (recorded in stealth mode in North Korea) and CDs produced by the North Korean government. Virant recorded and or collected most of the tracks between 1995 and 1998, though some of the shortwave tracks were recorded in 2005. Listening to Radio Pyongyang it's hard not to imagine North Korea as being a big version of the Small World exibit at Disneyland. The my-way-or-the-highway solipsist cultural imagineering is something uncle Walt could certainly appreciate. As such, this album is stuffed with Soviet style choruses singing victorious sounding patriotic hymns supported by pounding polka-meets-house beats, and cheery children's choruses doing much the same. That shouldn't be much of a surprise, but there will be sudden breaks in the songs with eighties pop-rock power chords, think the Miami Vice theme, and then suddenly take a wide left into pastoral schmalzy pseudo-classical refrains (often with voice-overs extolling the greatness of the North Korean government and Kim Jong Il). We actually really really enjoyed this, but at the same time are glad we don't have to listen to this sort of stuff 24-7 like those poor folks in North Korea!
Balkan Gypsies refer to themselves as "Rom", derived from an Indian Word meaning "a man of low caste who gains his livelihood by singing and dancing." The artists on this album hail from Romania, Serbia, Bulgaria, Albania, and Greece and have drawn influence, according to the the booklet accompanying the cd, from sources as varied as "Spanish Flamenco to Django Reinhardt's French Gypsy swing to Turkish bellydance clubs." As such, there's a lot of variety throughout the album, reflecting the diversity within Rom culture. Very intriguing collection!
This little engine that could, really did! The Omaha, Nebraskan record label Saddle Creek started out humbly back in 1993 with a limited-to-100 cassette tape by a youngster called Conor. Now a dozen years later, Saddle Creek is still home to the now fully grown Mr. Oberst (aka Bright Eyes, duh!) as well as his diverse musical brethren The Faint, Azure Ray and Cursive, among others. This dvd features a documentary by filmmakers Jason Kulbel and Rob Walters about the label's first ten years of existence and the town's tight-knit music scene that they spearheaded. Filled with tons of rare footage, interviews, performances and some home movies too. Sure to make all the artists' fans positively giddily weak in the knees!
Vitalic is Pascal Arbez, a programmer from France. OK Cowboy, his newest full-length, sounds like the soundtrack for a movie based on a video game. Lots of soaring through 8-bit Tron-scapes, with electro-ish digitized new-New Wave vocals on some tracks. Throughout there runs a beat that will keep your head bouncing so much it sends your brain on holiday. Makes us want to throw on neon colored stretch pants and dance like drunk robots. Playful enough to be your friend but detached enough to still be le super cool. For fans of Electronicat and Daft Punk.
Another issue of the Wire, as always bringing us loads of weird and wonderful music. This time, Boards of Canada are on the cover. Invisible Jukebox with Warren Ellis of the Dirty Three, interviews with and articles about Jarboe, Birchville Cat Motel, Eliane Radigue, Alexander Tucker, and the usual maasive helping of record reviews, show reviews, book reviews and more!
Okay, so did we warn you a couple of lists ago or what about an imminent abundance of Wooden Wand releases?! It's already become pretty much impossible to fully digest one of their cds or lps before another one sprouts up, but don't get all stressed out trying to keep pace. That's not the way this music should be experienced. We recommend that you kick back, drift off, and take your own sweet time enjoying each serving of their delirious, obtuse folk stylings... heck, there'll be plenty more waiting for you when you're done. With the WW releases we've heard thus far, we've noticed a stylistic pattern -- their more traditionally shaped solitary folk songs contrasted with their hazy, meadering ensemble journeys. Buck Dharma falls in with the latter. It evokes a similar air of mysticism and mystery as Rever by AQ fave Larsen. They too seems deeply inspired by Michael Gira and Swans -- the female vocals in particular recall those of Jarboe -- but have chosen a more laidback meandering approach to their music. Along with the vocals, this WW release is distinguished by some Hendrix-y electric guitar noodling, gently clattering and rattling percussion. Of all the WW releases we've carried to date, it's definitely received the warmest response from the broadest spectrum of folks. Recommended!
Whoa, you won't be mistaking this cd for a super size t-shirt! No, this is a collaboration between Xiu Xiu and Larsen! An intriguing combination? That's putting it mildly. Think, the aural equivalent of a darkening storm cloud billowing forth with flashes of fork lightning, thunderous crashes and rumbles. An unstable atmosphere of eccentricity and melodrama. Although the overall mood is as heavy and disorienting as that of either groups' own releases, as the first track begins, you initially get the impression that there won't be as much of the emphasis on the overwrought vocals of Xiu Xiu's Jamie Stewart that we've come to expect from Xiu Xiu's own songs. The glitchily dynamic sixth song "Lipstick Fair" offers a bit of a light at the end of the tunnel, but then the next song, a strange cover of Adam Ant's "Prince Charming" pulls you back into the woe. No, he's not (and you're not) gonna get off so easy. Stewart seems to be singing from beneath a fortress of blankets afraid to see what's outside. The song swells to unveil another deeper male vocal, then it's almost as though the rest of the band members burst in, tearing the covers away from Stewart, exploding into a group chant/shriek atop cycles of clatterous percussion and plucked strings. Definitely one of the cd's high points. As in the song above, a few passages take on more traditional rock song formations, but they're soon scattered apart by seemingly random acts from crudely motor skilled limbs, only to settle into a more recognizably hypnotic, almost mystical and haunting tone. Here's hoping these two groups get together more often!
If you're at all like us, you're a fan of the Ya Ho Wha 13 records. Maybe you even have the giant God & Hair 13-cd box set! But even then, your knowledge of the true story of Ya Ho Wha (or Yahowha) is probably pretty fuzzy, unless you read Japanese ('cause that's what the booklet in the box set is written in). Chances are, even really big fans don't know much more than that the Yah Ho Wha 13 was a band that belonged to a '70s hippy religious commune (some would say, a "cult") known then as the Brotherhood Of The Source and now as the Source Family, that was based in California (and later, Hawaii), led by a fellow named Father Yod, who eventually perished in a hang-gliding accident. Pretty mysterious really. And if you're like us you're curious about the folks who made all that weird music. Well, now you can learn the rest of the story from this DVD documentary. And it's a long story -- about two and a half hours. Very entertaining though. In part 'cause the actual facts are so strange, in part 'cause the interviewees are really rather charming... and in part 'cause this was a student film project. The filmmaking isn't so much amateur or low budget as it is simply bizarre. It fits with the subject though!! The young filmmaker himself sometimes appears on-screen, hosting the proceedings. A lot of the time, he has the back of his head to the camera, superimposed Mystery Science Theatre 3000 style over whatever he's discussing. Weird. And he really tries to generate a "psychedelic" mood with the use of computer animations and the overlaying of multiple video images. It's a pretty darn trippy movie he's made. But once you're used to it, you'll be able to focus on what the former "Family" members are talking about in the interviews. You'll learn that Father Yod's real name was Jim Baker. And that supposedly he was an Olympic athlete and WWII hero. Well, that's what his former followers still think. Further viewing will reveal how Tarzan, salad dressing, Jodie Foster's dad, and the Egyptian pyramids, among many other things, all play parts in the story... And don't worry, in addition to the present-day interviews, this makes use of all sorts of vintage footage and photos, both "home movies" and what appears to be a local Los Angeles TV news feature on the Father Yod and his followers from back in the day.
In a lot of ways, this film is basically a case study in how to start and run a cult. In Jim Baker/Father Yod's case, the idea is to become an esoteric-wisdom-spouting father figure to a group of "lost" youths (it's helpful if there happens to be a whole hippie generation running around looking for spiritual enlightenment and belonging). And get them all working at your successful health-food restaurant, to make money to pay for Rolls Royces, mansions, and nice suits. And have amazing hair! (The sequence where one former Family member describes the colors and texture of Father Yod's hair is really intense!) For instance, would-be cult leaders probably are curious to know just how Father Yod wound up with so many attractive young "wives"? Well, he taught his flock that women were god-creatures, creative spirits who should be utterly liberated and free to choose their partners as they wished. If a man was chosen, he should accept the attentions of the woman gratefully, no matter what. Now, could Father Yod help it if many of the women in the Family chose him, leaving many of his male "children" without partners? No, he could not.
An interest in cults, gurus and sixties spirituality aside, despite the fact that the Ya Ho Wha 13's music (which you'll hear throughout the film) doesn't really get discussed much until about an hour and a half into the movie (and Djin Aquarian, the guitarist in the band, isn't talked to for some reason, though you can find a fascinating recent interview with him online here: http://www.nicepooperzine.com/interviews.html), this is still pretty much essential for any fan of Father Yod & Co.'s musical endeavors. We think you'll "hear" a lot more next time you spin one of their albums, after viewing this. ----* ----* In Stock, Not Yet Reviewed : ----* If you want to order one of these, just cut and paste the info into the comments area on the order form, or just email mailorder@aquariusrecords.org. 1 SPEED BIKE "Someone Told Me Life Gets Easier In Your 50's" (Broklyn Beats) cd 14.98 AKIYAMA, MITCHELL "Mort Aux Vaches" (Staalplaat) cd 21.00 AS MERCENARIAS "O Comeco Do Fim Do Mundo: Brasilian Post-Punk 1982-88" (Soul Jazz) cd/lp 21.00/24.00 ASANO, KOJI "Final Insurance Collection Vol. 2: 1992-1994" (Solstice) cd 14.98 ASANO, KOJI "Spring Estuary" (Solstice) cd 14.98 ATMOSPHERE "You Can't Imagine How Much Fun We're Having" (Rhymesayers) cd 15.98 BAD DUDES "s/t" (Brain Burger) cd 12.98 BADGERLORE "Stories For Owls" (Free Porcupine Society) cd 14.98 BAILEY, DEREK "Carpal Tunnel" (Tzadik) cd 15.98 BANNER, DAVID "Certified" (Universal) cd 14.98 BARDO POND / BUCK PACO "Bog / Pushed Out Into The Sun (split)" (Three Lobed) 12" 14.98 BASTRO "Antlers" (Drag City) cd 14.98 BATTLETORN "Evil Chains" (Mega Blade) cd 13.98 BLACKALICIOUS "The Craft" (Anti / Quannum) cd/lp 13.98/14.98 BLACKDEATH "Bottomless Armageddon" (ISO 666) cd 14.98 BLOC PARTY "Silent Alarm Remixed" (Vice) 2cd 15.98 BOATS, THE "We Made It For You" (Baked Goods) cd 16.98 BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE "s/t" (Arts & Crafts) cd 16.98 CAGE "Hell's Winter" (Definitive Jux) cd 16.98 CALLA "Collisions" (Beggars Banquet) cd/cd 13.98/10.98 CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST "OST" (Red Stream) cd 11.98 CAVE-IN "Perfect Pitch Black" (Hydra Head) cd 11.98 CHESSMACHINE "Live In Los Angeles" (Line) cd 14.98 CHEVREUIL "Sport" (Sickroom) cd 13.98 CIRCLE OF DEAD CHILDREN "Zero Comfort Margin" (Willowtip) cd 14.98 CIRCULUS "The Lick On The Tip Of An Envelope Yet To Be Sent" (Candlelight) cd 14.98 CLUSTER & ENO "s/t" (Water) cd 15.98 COBRA VERDE "Copycat Killers" (Scat) cd 14.98 COHEED AND CAMBRIA "Good Apollo I'm Burning Star IV Vol.I" (Sony / BMG) cd 16.98 COIL "...And The Ambulance Died In His Arms" (Threshold) cd 19.98 CROMAGNON "Orgasm" (Get Back) lp 15.98 DANDY WARHOLS "Odditorium" (Capitol) cd 17.98 DEADLY SNAKES, THE "Torcella" (In The Red) cd 13.98 DELAY, VLADISLAV "The Four Quarters" (Huume) cd 16.98 DESERT CITY SOUNDTRACK "Perfect Addiction" (Deep Elm) cd 14.98 DESTRUCTION "Inventor Of Evil" (Candlelight) cd 14.98 DETROIT COBRAS "Baby" (Bloodshot) cd 14.98 DIAMOND NIGHTS "Popsicle" (Kemado) cd 13.98 EDISON ELECTRIC BAND "Bless You Dr. Woodward" (Water) cd 15.98 FALL, THE "Fall Heads Roll" (Narnack) cd 14.98 FLAMIN' GROOVIES "Shake Some Action" (DBK Works) cd 16.98 FRAZER, PAULA "Leave The Sad Things Behind" (Birdman) cd 14.98 HORSE THE BAND "The Mechanical Hand" (Combat Records) cd 13.98 JOHN WILKES BOOZE "Telescopic Eyes Glance The Future Sick" (Kill Rock Stars) cd 14.98 JOSEPH "Stoned Age Man" (Radioactive) cd 17.98 KANTNER, PAUL / JEFFERSON STARSHIP "Blows Against The Empire" (RCA) cd 12.98 KEIJO "Palla, Blown From Here" (Digitalis) cd 14.98 KEIJO AND THE FREE PLAYERS (PseudoArcana) cd-r 13.98 LIGHTNING BOLT "Hypermagic Mountain" (Load) cd LIPPOK, ROBERT & BARBARA MORGENSTERN "Tesri" (Monika) cd 15.98 LOGH "A Sunset Panorama" (Hydra Head) cd 12.98 LOS NATAS "M�nchen Sessions" (Elektrohasch) cd 13.95 M83 "s/t" (Gooom) cd 16.98 MAGIC AUM GIGI "MMMM" (Sparkling Spare Wheel) lp 21.00 MERZBOW "Merzbuta" (Important) cd 14.98 MERZBOW "Senmaida" (Blossoming Noise) cd 14.98 MINISTRY "Rantology" (Sanctuary) cd 16.98 MV / EE & THE BUMMER ROAD "We Offer You Guru" (Child Of Microtones) cd 15.98 NADA SURF "The Weight Is A Gift" (Barsuk) 2cd 14.98 NERVE NET NOISE "Radio Life" (Staalplaat) cd 19.98 NIELLERADE FALIBILISTHORSTAR (N.F.H.) "Halrum" (SNSE) cd/lp 8.98/11.98 NUMAN, GARY "Living Ornaments '79" (Beggars Banquet) 2cd 10.98 NUMAN, GARY "Living Ornaments '80" (Beggars Banquet) 2cd 10.98 NUMAN, GARY "Living Ornaments '81" (Beggars Banquet) 2cd 10.98 NUMBERS "We're Animals" (Cali-Tex) cd 14.98 PAUL, SEAN "The Trinity" (VP) cd 17.98 RAM-ZET "Intra" (Candlelight) cd 14.98 REID, TERRY "Superlungs" (Astralwerks) cd 15.98 RIGOR SARDONICOUS "Apocalypsis Damnare" (Paragon) cd 13.98 RODEN, STEVE "Airforms" (Line) cd 14.98 SAFETY SCISSORS "Tainted Lunch" (Scape) cd 16.98 SANDERS, PHAROAH "Elevation" (Impulse) cd 11.98 SEA DONKEYS, THE "Volume One" (Abduction) lp 16.98 SHEAVY "Republic?" (Candlelight) cd 14.98 SIGUR ROS "Ba Ba Ti Ki Di Do" (Geffen) cd ep 11.98 SLOAN "Smeared" (Koch) cd 15.98 SLOAN "Twice Removed" (Koch) cd 15.98 SLOMO "The Creep" (Fuck Off & Di) cd-r 14.98 SONIC YOUTH "Goo - Deluxe Edition" (Geffen) 2cd/4lp 30.00/36.00 STELLASTARR "Harmonies For The Haunted" (RCA) cd 13.98 STOLTZ, KELLEY "Crockodials" (Beautiful Happiness) cd 9.98 STOOGES, THE "Fun House Deluxe" (Elektra) 2cd 21.00 STOOGES, THE "Heavy Liquid" (Easy Action) 6cd 82.00 STOOGES, THE "Stooges" (Rhino) 2cd 21.00 TEENAGE FANCLUB "Man-Made" (Merge) cd 14.98 TELESCOPES "4" (Antenna) cd 16.98 TIA CARRERA "The November Session" (Australian Cattle God) cd 12.98 TIMES NEW VIKING "Dig Yourself" (Siltbreeze) cd 13.98 TRAFFIC SOUND "Yellow Sea Years" (Vampisoul) cd 21.00 TRIO MEDIAEVAL "Stella Maris" (ECM New Series) cd 16.98 TUCKER, ALEXANDER "Old Fog" (All Tomorrows Parties) cd 15.98 V/A "Croon-A-Roma" (All Score Media) cd 18.98 V/A "Dick Cavett Show - Rock Icons" (Shout! Factory) 3dvd 41.00 V/A "Disco Rallado" (Broklyn Beats) cd 9.98 V/A "Maan Matoset" (Pohjoisten Kukkaisten Aanet) cd 14.98 V/A "Marchenland: Musika Aus Den Defa-Marchenfilmen" (All Score Media) cd 18.98 V/A "Schoolhouse Funk II : Raw Business" (Cali-Tex) lp 26.00 V/A "Speaking My Mind: New Rubble Volume 2" (Past & Present) cd 17.98 V/A "Time Machine: A Vertigo Retrospective" (Vertigo) 3cd 38.00 V/A "Welsh Rare Beat" (Finders Keepers) cd/lp 21.00/21.00 VIRUS SYNDICATE "The Work Related Illness" (Planet Mu) cd 14.98 WEST, KANYE "Late Registration" (Roc-A-Fella) cd 16.98 WOLF PARADE "Apologies To The Queen Mary" (Sub Pop) cd/lp 13.98/12.98 WOODEN WAND AND THE VANISHING VOICE "Sunset Sleeves" (Weird Forest) lp 11.98 YOB "Elaborations Of Carbon" (12th Records) cd 13.98 YOUNG BLEED "Rise Thru Da Ranks" (West Coast Mafia) cd 16.98 YOUNG, NEIL "Prarie Wind" (Reprise) cd+dvd 24.00 _______________________________________________________________________ ABOUT MAILORDER
This has been a big year for Bay Area noise combos, with loads of releases, write ups, tours and much higher profiles in general for bands like the Skaters and the Yellow Swans. Oakland free noise duo, the Yellow Swans, also run their own label Jyrk, responsible for lots of AQ favorites recently, including the Yellow Swans / Grey Daturas 2 cd-r collaboration we listed not too long ago. This time around, Dove Yellow Swans (they often switch between different D-words reflecting the sound or mood of each particular record) have taken a handful of older releases and chopped 'em up, and re-assembled and re-worked them into an entirely new beast, forty seven minutes of sputtering, splattery, free noise, drone drenched, druggy and damaged, malfunctioning electronic chaos. However, unlike most noise outfits, the Yellow Swans know a thing or two about dynamics, and are quite adept at taking all sorts of horrible noises and weaving them into an entirely listenable, and often quite gorgeous whole. Drum machines spit out all sorts of random beats and sounds, stumbling and clattering and careening around your head like shotgun pellets, beneath a thick wash of shrieking feedback, sick sounding synths, super processed vocals, and distorted and dizzying guitars. A little bit Wolf Eyes, a little bit Sunroof!, a little bit Merzbow, but all twisted and tangled into it's own deliriously damaged Yellow Swan-ed shape.
Packaged in a cool oversized cardboard gatefold, with a bit of black felt to protect the disc. Cover art by Devendra Banhart. And as always, extremely limited!
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Yes! First the new Ilk, then appearing on the cover of Wire magazine, then this! It's a blessed, bountiful season for Richard Youngs fans. (Funny, to think that he used to do a record label called No Fans).
The Naive Shaman (such a perfect title for a Youngs album... heck that's the darn review) is of Ilk's ilk for sure, and in line with many of the avant garde UK singer/songwriter's most moving and beautiful releases of experimental folk for the Jagjaguwar label in the past. Utilizing a backing of burbling electronics (including stabbing shards of feedback, but it's really very pleasant though) Youngs' voice is on display here, multiple vocal lines layered and interwoven. The droning, looping mellowness of the music provides this Youngs 'chorus' a lovely space in which to emote.
Zoviet France formed in relative isolation in Newcastle, far removed from the rest of the UK industrial and art-punk communities. They furthered the mystery around their sonic abstractions by working in anonymity and by presenting their work in beautifully eccentric packaging (i.e. roofing shingles, aluminum foil, wood boxes, porcelain baked cassettes wrapped in radioactive feathers, etc.). The exact history of Zoviet France remains elusive, although a dramatic rift in the project occured in the middle '90s when founding member Robin Storey left Zoviet France to form his solo project Rapoon. Ben Ponton, one of the other founding members, continued on with Zoviet France, drifting away from Storey's signature looping technology and towards an alien isolationism tricked out with disembodied samples. While both Rapoon and the recent Zoviet France records have certainly had plenty of successes, none had matched the collaborative genius of Zoviet France during the Ponton / Storey days.
In a rare interview in the mid '80s, Ponton explained that Zoviet France would record hours of material and then sort it out at a later date. This brings us to Music For A Spaghetti Western which dates back to 1986, one of the most prolific periods for Zoviet France as they began recording numerous large scale projects including the 4-part series Charm, Ceremony, Chance, Prophesy which included two LPs and two cassette only material as well as the monumental Popular Soviet Songs and Youth Music (originally housed in the aforementioned porcelain packaging). Given the amount of material that Zoviet France had finished during that time, it's not surprising that a couple of things never got completed, such as Music For A Spagehtti Western. With many of the ZF recordings being splattered collections of short fragments anyway, the shards of hypnotic loops that comprise the ZF Spaghetti Western make sense in the greater context of the band.
As on those aforementioned albums, ZF explore the imagined ceremonial music for non-existant cultures bringing chiming strings, hand percussion, breathy flutes, and extended vocalizations to a dark kaleidoscope of tape loop machinations and multiple delay pedals. If this sounds similar to the work of Finland's Avarus or Kemialliset Ystavat, Zoviet France does share some of those aesthetics, expect for the undeniable fact that ZF are maybe even better at it. With almost their entire catalogue in limbo, any new recordings are a reason to rejoice, and recordings as beguiling as these are certainly most welcome indeed.
