Oooh. Breathtaking stuff here for those who like their music to have a hazy, vague, mysterious aura, and to combine delicate indie-rock "pop" elements (moody vocals, slow-motion melody) with more experimental, fragmented structures and textures... It's the work of a four-piece outfit from Italy, who immerse their murky, mostly instrumental post-rock electro-acoustic playing in droney field recordings, blurring the boundaries, with tree frogs or crickets, and what sounds like hissing, escaping gasses, and other noises that require some imagination to describe playing an important role alongside more obvious instruments like guitars and drums and turntables. There's a definite Jewelled Antler feel, that sort of organic, wandering-in-the-woods, letting-our-ears-find-the-way songmaking process, but with more palpable tension, bringing in a bit of the percussive skitteriness of fellow Italians and Hapna labelmates Sinistri/Starfuckers. We can compare this with lots of other things we love: Radian meets Richard Youngs? Kemialliset Ysatvat teamed up with Tape? Blithe Sons, Larsen, Sigur Ros, Village Of Savoogna, Dean Roberts... we're reminded in ways of all of 'em.
A truly gorgeous album that has the potential to appeal to a lot of different tastes, finding the wonderfully, naturally imperfect intersection of song and improv and field recording drone. This being their second release (first for Hapna, who've released this in the Swedish label's usual nice slim-sleeve packaging), we're going to have to track down their previous one... just as soon as A Year Of The Aural Gauge Operation's sheer dreaminess lets go its hold on our thoughts.
28 pairs up the always lovely Ms Tujiko Noriko with Aoki Takamasa. Both are Japanese artists living in Paris, both are 28 years old (hence the title of the record). The pair initially met over 3 years ago at an event for the Cartier Foundation in Paris. Their collaboration, originally intended for just one song, worked out so well that they decided to work on a full length together, exchanging and sewing more sound bits with the loving attention of a precocious collage prodigy. A patchwork quilt of blissful, Morr-esque electronics, broken toy IDM, lilting, tender vocals, and gently textured raindrops-on-a-corrugated-roof beats. The album is silky and caressing, less jagged than Noriko's recent collaboration with Lawrence English. Reminiscent as well as Japanese chanteuse, Salyu's vocal pieces for the film, "All About Lily Chou-Chou."
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The big 4-0 for our pal Koji here. No, he hasn't turned 40 (far from it) but he's reached his fortieth cd release! We've been fans since way back when you could count Koji Asano albums on the fingers of one hand. And we're happy to say that he's kept up the quality all along, as anyone who picked up number 39, reviewed here not too long ago, knows. Rabbit Room Reservation Centre (Koji has a thing for rabbits, it seems) is a visit to the dronier side of Asano's ouvre, which is a nice place to be. There's three tracks, lasting 10, 23 and 24 minutes or so. They've got the sound of insects and/or appliances amplified and abstracted... but we can only guess how he actually made this music. His press release reads thusly: "new electro-acoustic works, infiltrating slowly while deeply resounding." That doesn't say a lot but it's accurate! Generally we think he likes to leave things to the imagination, a bit mysterious, cryptic... so we'll simply offer up that some of this gives us the vibe of a propeller-driven airplane droning over the Himayalas, that sort of loneliness in a vast space... even if this simply may be the processed sounds of appliances in Asano's apartment. Or a Rabbit Room Reservation Center, whatever that is!
Where the heck has Basinski been for the last 20 years? And what the heck has he been doing? And why has he suddenly resurfaced NOW with a ridiculous amount of lost music? It has all the makings of a fantastic musical mystery. Could be that Basinski is just a young guy, no older than you or me, and this whole reissue campaign is just a post modern art project, an invented persona, that most definitely mystifies and makes the music that much cooler? Or better yet, imagine someone just discovered this old box of tapes in an abandoned house, all labeled with the name Basinski, all dusty and mildewy, and has secretly been reissuing them as if he himself was this long lost Basinski. Those scenarios are almost more believable than the supposed -actual- story, that Basinski recorded tons and tons of loops, pieces for piano and tape, decades ago, and only recently, after 20 years of near silence decides to start releasing the tapes, many of them decayed and damaged. But ultimately, who really cares, the important thing is the music, and once again, Basinski's latest batch of unearthed sounds, long lost fragments, are dark and delicate and completely mesmerizing.
Gentle lush piano chords, simple and spare, hover ominously in dense fields of background noise, a slow, ominous churn of rumbling whirs and shimmering grey noise. The piano wanders alone through vast expanses of near silence, before the background noise begins to build bit by bit, like a brooding storm on the horizon, slowly enveloping the reverbed piano, the whole thing becoming a thick cloud of overtones and background noise, before the piano wanders from beneath the smears of grey and black, into yet another near-quiet expanse, and then the whole cycle begins again. Like a series of loops where each loop is 15 minutes long. So disorientingly hypnotic and utterly beautiful.
Here's a band that far outshone most of their contempories but somehow managed to slip through the cracks and become more known as a footnote of the bands that came after than the rock legends they truly were. Ever wonder where David Grubbs spent his time after Squirrelbait and before Gastr Del Sol? Ever wonder what Bundy Brown did before Tortoise? Ever wonder what John McEntire did before he was in Tortoise and the Sea & Cake and started producing Stereolab Records? Did you ever wonder what band featured members who would go on to play in bands like Slint, Evergreen, King Kong, The For Carnation and more? Well, if you did, the answer is a resounding BASTRO!
This live release was supposed to coincide with the two proper Bastro lps finally released together on a single cd, but there seems to be some weird legal hang up, presumably with Bastro's old label Homestead, but for now we have this glorious live record, from one of the most amazing bands of the late eighties / early nineties.
If you're already a fan, this record is Holy Grail type shit, all songs that were never recorded, caaptured live right before the band broke up. Some of these songs morphed into Gastr Del Sol songs, but a whole new record of never-before-heard Bastro songs should have your jaw around your ankles. And for those of you new to the whole Bastro experience, these songs will definitely whet your appetite for more.
Bastro are really hard to descibe, which could be why maybe they ended up going over a lot of people's heads. They incorporated lots of elements of other post hardcore / college rock bands but in perfectly obtuse, totally unlikely ways. You can hear bits and pieces of Jesus Lizard, Big Black, Rapeman, Scratch Acid, Drive Like Jehu and Don Caballero. They started out as a sort-of-industrial-noise rock band a la Big Black, turned into a pumelling noise rock combo, and eventually morphed into a dense, complex avant-math-rock outfit, which is where this live recording catches them, live in 1991, in Chicago and Germany. Super serpentine guitar lines, extended convoluted song structures, impossibly mathy drumming (resident AQ drummer Andee spent ages learning and then playing along to Bastro songs, and considered McEntire one of his favorite drummers back then) all in a dense tangle of fragmented pop, mathy post rock and obtuse musical chaos. So incredible. As much as we love the bands that came after, Bastro still hold a special place in our heart, their music somehow transcending the music of almost all of their contemporaries, melodic, heavy, bizarre, beautiful. We're dying for the reissue of the albums proper, but for now we'll just listen to Antlers, over and over and over and over and over.....
Also includes two live Quicktime videos of Bastro live in Germany and Holland!!!
With his most recent album Guero which recalled his early Odelay funky finery, Sir Beck certainly gave the remixers lots of easy-goin' groovy stuff to work with, and the results from the likes of Air, El-P among others do complement and compliment the originals quite well. Don't be expecting anything here to blow your mind though, it all pretty much sticks to Remixing 101, but much like its source album, its own pleasingly sun'n'weed-baked laidback shufflin' funkiness just might grow on you.
The Believer never lets us down. What a totally and completely amazing magazine. Music, politics, lifestyle, most mags can barely get a grasp on one of those, but somehow the Believer manages to wrap them all up together into a totally readable, smart and funny, gorgeously laid out package. This month it's "The Visual Issue" which comes with a DVD. Hard to explain what some of the articles are about in just a few words, so we'll just reprint what's on the cover: hacking old Nintendos, tattoo fiction, John Barth on old beginnings, the Malaysian new wave cinema, a lush art insert curated by Eric Fischl, milk addiction and the birth of modernity, life masks of the famous and the dead and loads more. Also in keeping with the theme, there is also a dvd that features films by or about: Spike Jonze, Selma Blair, Miranda July, David O, Russell, Patton Oswalt, Hovercrafts and more. Plus killer Charles Burns cover art!!!
In case such a declaration matters in the grand scheme of things, The Ear That Was Sold To A Fish is my (Jim's) Record of The Year for 2005.
That said, there is a unique facet to Keith Berry's impressionistic masterpiece that I cannot fully enjoy. You see, I have a very limited sense of smell. I've always blamed it on my pyrotechnic stunts during my college days when I would light my paintings on fire; and as grandiosely stupid as this made me look, the sensorial failings of my nose is more the result of genetics than anything I could have done to it. So when I opened the box for the first time to Keith Berry's The Ear That Was Sold To A Fish, I got a small tingle as something perfumed and pleasant drifted from the contents of the box, which contained not only a CD and booklet but also a delicate pile of dyed flower petals. Those of you who are not sensorially damaged might be able to place the scent; but I simply cannot. Regardless, Berry (with the help of the fine folks at Crouton Records) engineered an amazing feat: an album with a fragrance.
For very obvious reasons, the smell-o-rama trick is not what attracts me to the record; it's the seductively restrained compositions for quiet flickerings, muffled rumbles, and whispered reverberations that truly captured my imagination. Berry defines his work through the teachings of Zen Buddhism and Sufi poetry, striving for an artform that could "unlock the mechanisms inside one's mind that leads to enlightenment." In doing so, Berry begins with a series of unremarkable sounds which fall somewhere in the hushed white noise territories, possibly including the sound of a gentle spring shower or the empty spaces on shortwave bands. He molds these hisses, crackles, and shadows into subtle repeating forms which do, in fact, lend themselves to any number of images, metaphors, and ideas. Given that he landed his debut album on Trente Oiseaux, Berry's work falls in the lowercase school of ephemeral electronics alongside Steve Roden and Bernhard Gunter; but there is an antiquated tactility to his albums which hint at the same temporal netherworld as heard in Philip Jeck's avant-turntable melodramas.
Given the packaging constraints, The Ear That Was Sold To A Fish is strictly limited to 300 copies.
Metal IS comin' back... that is, if bands like Bible Of The Devil have anything to say about it. And by "metal" we mean real, Priest/Maiden/NWOBHM inspired heavy metal. Glory days metal, like in the early '80s, before the glam MTV hair bands took over, and most of the non-posers forgot about melody and went underground into the cesspits of death and grind metal... And by "back" we mean, um, at least here at Aquarius we know we can sell some of these.
We first heard these guys when we brought in their last album, Tight Empire, on the advice of our pals Hammers Of Misfortune, who'd played with 'em in BOTD's hometown of Chicago. We liked it, but that disc was almost as "garage-rock" as it was metal, greasy and axe-kickin' but not, y'know, stuff from the gates of Valhalla. But now, bearing the statement-of-purpose title of Brutality - Majesty - Eternity, Bible Of The Devil have unleashed a true metal masterpiece! Bow down to their twin guitar attack, classic riffing, and sheer heavy metal exuberance. Should appeal to fans of some other bands we've recommended who are also in the business of old school metal revival: 3 Inches Of Blood, Early Man and Slough Feg, fer instance. In fact, BOTD toured with Slough Feg this summer -- I caught the show in Boston and it was a slayfest indeed, those two bands are well matched. True enough, with these twelve tracks, you can play spot the influence all album-long (just like with Early Man)... Thin Lizzy, Iron Maiden, Motley Crue, AC/DC. The guitar harmonies and epic songwriting owe a lot to Maiden and Lizzy (and Slough Feg?) while the vocals remind us of both Lemmy from Motorhead and Udo from Accept's gargle at times... But it's all wrapped up into something that isn't quite like any single one of their forebears. And is pretty darn killer.
So if you're into some over the top, denim and leather, flying V action ('specially if you're already a Slough Feg fan) you should definitely check out this new Bible Of The Devil disc!
Wow, Barbed Wire Maggots? Your filthiest black metal band would be proud of an album title like that. And this is from a record originally released back in 1983, the fourth long-player from what has become an outside/noise/skronk/free "jazz" institution, the one and only Borbetomagus! If you know Borbetomagus, you know what to expect: the frightening caterwaul of two saxophones and an electric guitar. Two long tracks (formerly vinyl sides) worth. Screeching and scratching and searing and sizzling. So it ain't black metal but it ain't easy listening either. No sirree. Imagine every "nasty" noise ever made by the horns of Coltrane or Ayler, times two, aided and abetted by a likeminded guitarist. Upset elephants and vaccum cleaners and rusty hinges and faulty connections have nothing on this. Unlike some of their later, even denser recordings, it's not always full-on cacophony but even the quieter, "jazzier" parts have a mood of menace, of impending mayhem. And if you've never heard Borbetomagus, but are curious, this cd reissue will provide a crash course in their brand of extreme improv. Not for everyone...
Some of us are still reeling from the mighty ass kicking delivered by Boris on their recent US tour. And before our ears have even stopped ringing, it's time for yet another new blast of ultra hyper space psych sludge rock n' roll in the form of Pink. Continuing to hone their rock chops, having shed their doom sludge past for the most part now, Boris continue to sound like some MC5 / Hendrix hybrid, albeit supercharged and drenched in LSD and lit on fire and launched into space. Big old fuzzy riffs, churning basslines, and wild spastic drumming underneath Wata's wailing sixties styled leads. You can almost imagine these strange Japanese rockers wandering into the Fillmore in the sixties, like some bell bottomed aliens and proceeding to melt the minds and eard drums of everyone in attendance. Pink starts off with some fuzzed out ultra distorted post rock (reminiscent of some of the stuff on Mabuta No Ura) wrapped in a spacy psychedelic haze, but then it's immediately back to the full on, overblown distorto RAWK that has become THE SOUND of Boris. This is easily their most lo-fi, most blown out recording yet, almost like Boris is channelling Guitar Wolf or something. The drums and cymbals sizzle as the needle goes into the red on almost every track, and the guitars are so drenched in distortion they become huge squirming smears of fuzz. A couple tracks harken back to the slow motion sludge of Flood or Amplifier Worship, and there is the dreamy ambient drift of the second to last track "My Machine", but those are just brief respites, time to catch your breath before hurling yourself back into the fray, an endless maelstrom of head banging, fist pumping, guitar smashing, drumset destroying, hair swirling, sweating, bouncing, pounding pummeling ROCK AND ROLL.
The packaging is amazing too, with a tray card that's transparent, with clear pink printing, and a booklet that is actually a three panel fold out perforated sheet of Boris Pink acid tabs (with one already missing, presumably already ingested!) wrapped in a thick pink transparent sleeve. Wow!
Be forewarned that Pink will also be available as an ultra limited double lp (due out next month), with a slightly different track listing so you Boris obsessives are once again have to get both!
The Ape Of Naples marks the end of an era for Coil, as the grand finale to a tumultuous career of psychotropic electronica, siddereal ambience, and post-industrial occultations. In November 2004, Jhonn Balance died as the result of an alcohol related accident. In the intervening months, his partner -- both creatively and romantically -- Peter Christopherson resurrected many of the tracks from the ill-fated Backwards sessions as well as unreleased recordings that date back to the beginning of Coil in 1982. It should be noted that Christopherson did not intend The Ape Of Naples to be lumped in with the Stolen and Contaminated series of rare and unreleased material; rather, he shaped the album to reflect his grief and melancholy.
The Backwards sessions were originally commissioned as a follow up to their seminal oblique dance album Love's Secret Domain, which emerged out of Coil's obsession with British acid house and rave culture. In fact, Trent Reznor had brought Coil to his New Orleans studio to record much of those sessions in hopes of releasing the album on his Nothing imprint. Unfortunately, more than a decade went by with only false starts and creative dead ends; and Backwards never emerged. While it's not all that clear if The Ape Of Naples is the album that Coil envisioned when they were making Backwards, The Ape Of Naples stands as a mighty triumph in the Coil pantheon of releases, ranking up there with Horse Rotovator and the aforementioned Love's Secret Domain.
What's so striking about The Ape Of Naples, especially in light of their recent albums of temporal minimalism, is their return to the song structure, and how Jhonn Balance could deliver his beautiful howlings with all of the poetry of Jean Genet. Throughout the album, Christopherson scores elegaic arrangements with an urgent interlocking for marimba and vibraphone, whose gasping repetition serves as a thematic link between all of the material both old and new. The album also features devilish marches of electronic arpeggiation laced with distant throbbing rhythms and Balance's omnipresent vocals, typified by such tracks as "Heaven's Blade" and the reprise of "Teenage Lightning" -- one of the highlight tracks from LSD. A tragically beautiful album through and through.
Look past the garish, whooah-I'm-trippin'-now psychedelic cover art of Dark Fog's Cosmic Tone and you'll find a quite moody and marvellous and, yes, psychedelic debut album from this Chicago-land band, who've loaded up on trippy guitar effects and super spaced-out vocals to produce this hypnotic 33 minute dose of stoner/psych shoegazer bliss. Some parts are hushed and mellow, others Deetroit drivin', chugging along with nods to Pink Floyd, Spacemen Three, and Hawkwind... we'd also compare these guys favorably to such contemporary comrades-in-arms as Pharaoh Overlord, Acid Mothers Temple, and Dead Meadow. It's heavy (in that "heavy, maaan" way that we differentiate from, like, doom metal heaviness, such as that practiced by labelmates Buried At Sea), with lot of fuzz and drone but definitely also has a lighter, melodic side that makes this swirling dark fog seem rather welcoming, more fragrant than miasmic, redolent of aromatic smoke and suffused with a gentle glow. Recommended.
Only recently did we finally get enough of these to list, and we've been trying since we listed Funeral Mist's more recent album, Salvation, WAY back on list #203. Even so, we only managed to get a handful so if when we run out be prepared to wait for us to get more.
For those of you whose black metal addled brains can barely remember all the way back to list #203 of last year, Funeral Mist's Salvation was quite possibly THE best black metal release of 2004, and one of our favorite BM records ever! Let's have a quick look at a bit of that review:
"It's been forever since we saw a record this beautiful and frightening looking, and so weird but utterly heavy sounding. This is definitely black metal. Appropriately buzzing and grim, with fuzzed out riffs and blasting rhythms and death rattle shrieks, but unlike most other black metal records, this is HEAVY. No, we mean H E A V Y."
And thus we went on and on about how unlike most black metal bands, where heaviness is sacrificed for speed and buzz, Funeral Mist manage to be fast and at the same time ultra heavy. Dense and completely pummeling. And beyond that, the songs are linked by and laced with bizarre suffocatingly intense ambient interludes, rife with unrecognizable samples, screams of terror, strange snippets of fifties orchestra music, thunder, lightning, droning rumble and smears of blacknoise, like the sound of hell, and Devilry is quite similar. In fact it might be even more intense, if that's possible. Devilry is from way back in 1998, and the sound is a little bit more raw, the production is a little bit more blown out, but the sound is very much the same, a frighteningly intense blast of Norwegian style black metal, with plenty of doomy melodic breakdowns, but the majority of Devilry is spent in full on blast mode, buzzed out guitars, impossibly heavy AND fast drumming, and super complex catchy songs. Hard to really put into words why this band kicks our asses so hard, their sound is just so visceral, and again SO HEAVY, the buzz is definitely still in full effect at all times, but the drums are hit so hard (there's even a sort of black metal drum solo!!) and the whole thing is just so LOUD and not at all lo-fi like so much of the black metal we love. A blackened upside down cross to the face, and we love it!
Also included is the Havoc Demo from 1996, which is a lot more lo-fi than Devilry, like a foetal version of what they would soon become, but even in their demo form, these songs leave practically all other BM in the dust, fuzzy and buzzy, tons of super bizarre affected vocals, strange production fuckery, killer riffs all tucked beneath Funeral Mist's warm black wings. SO FUCKING GREAT!!
It's weird to think about the world before the Internet. Little pockets of bands in out of the way places, producing wild and wonderful music, that outside of a few tape traders and cool record stores just didn't get heard. In some ways the advent of immediate world wide communication has been a wellspring of amazing music, since now, some kid who records in his bedroom in Finland, can now be heard by anyone in the world. Anywhere. Any time. The downside is of course the proliferation of bands whose material maybe didn't need worldwide exposure, music that was just fine where it was, in the bedroom or the basement. Thankfully this particular release is a definite example of the former. Australia has produced some killer rock over the years, from AC/DC to Radio Birdman to Lubricated Goat (one of Allan and Andee's favorites) to the Dirty Three to more obscure noiserock bands like Budd or the Dumb And The Ugly or Primitive Calculators. A few lists back we reviewed an awesome disc by the band Whitehorse, whose epic sludge-y, drone-y dirge definitely hit the Sunn 0))) / Earth / Corrupted / Khanate spot. The guys in Whitehorse suggested we check out another Aussie outift (also from Melbourne) a two guys and a gal trio called the Grey Daturas, who only a few weeks later just showed up in our store with a box full of cds, about to embark on their first US tour (some of the dates with Sunn 0))), see elsewhere on this list for tour dates). And while the Daturas are indeed heavy and droney, their sound is less slow motion sludge and more blown out fuzzy psych rock. A blurry druggy mix of Hawkwind, the Dead C, Comets On Fire, Residual Echoes, Dead Meadow and Bardo Pond. The Daturas' sound is all over the map, from churning, throbbing fuzzdrug churn, with squealing feedback and choppy uneven riffing, to drifting dreamy stripped down post rock, all careening wildly between thick swaths of super overdriven psych fuzz, and drenched in crumbly distortion and all manner of wah. When they kick out the jams, it's fierce and mesmerizing, pounding and relentless, with simple propulsive percussion and spaced out swirl. Often stretching out into head nodding Krautrock jams, spacious and hypnotic. When the storms calm and the band drifts off and just sort of meanders, we're reminded of Codeine and other like minded practitioners of drowsy, druggy slow core. Still noisy, but mellow and intense, brooding and subtly aggressive.
The Grey Daturas are all instrumental which as you probably know we tend to dig, since there's nothing like a bad singer to ruin a perfectly good band, but there's always the risk of bands with no vocalists to be really really boring. But because a lot of the Daturas' tunes are improvised, and the band is willing to take all kinds of musical chances (they often switch instruments, sometimes perform as a duo with no drummer, etc...) it never gets boring, instead it becomes the perfect mix of droning free rock, kick ass instrumental post rock, buzzing druggy psych and even occasional blasts of full on metal. Mix in some cool song titles: "The Hanging Man Is No Peacock", "Force Is A Weapon Of The Weak", as well as some oddly political song titles (but more sort of Sixties politics): "For Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale", "Night Of The Barricade: Paris 1968", a gorgeous washed out black, brown and grey cardboard sleeve, and a totally kick ass live show (they performed admirably with a handful of fill-in drummers here, even teaming up with art noise outfit the Yellow Swans for one show), and you've got one of our favorite new bands / releases. AND they're recording a new record right here in SF when they get back from tour...yay!
Fans of the late Bill Hicks will surely welcome this new dvd which features the first complete Hicks stand-up performance ever filmed -- the year was 1989, the place Austin, TX. In fact, you'll probably be well acquainted with most if not all of his material on Sane Man, but that said, there's still a bunch of bonus stuff that will surely pique the interest of even his most diehard fans (unseen footage, outtakes, etc). Keep in mind that, the sound and picture quality are far from pristine, but if you've seen the homespun VHS copies that have been circulating for years, you know that Hicks' fury and message burn right through the murk. If you've yet to familiarize yourself with this man's fierce, vitriolic wit and incredibly prescient and topical subject matter, you might wish to start your education with the Live - Satirist, Social Critic, Stand-Up Comedian dvd which we were raging about last year (please see our review, please see the dvd!), and then proceed to this. Nonetheless, truly amazing and empassioned.
We're always excited when a new disc from Ryoji Ikeda appears. As far as we're concerned, this Japanese electronic composer is the master of the "clicks and cuts", minimal-micro-sonic scene. And Dataplex is his latest masterpiece, a twenty-tracker with titles like "data.complex", "data.googolplex", "data.superhelix", "data.vertex". With each data dot shift, clinical little sounds that clearly come from a computer -- datastreams it would seem, that's the idea here -- are presented and then worked into rhythmically complex techno music. It's not exactly "dance" music though, but these carefully placed, computer-generated clicks and whirrs and glitches and high frequency pulses you could maybe THINK about dancing to... certainly they're something for your brain to marvel at, edging closer to seizure as the album progresses, though Ikeda gives some relief with a more ambient ten-minute track near the end of the album. It all starts off with sounds that are almost raw data, morphed into music as Ikeda, track by track, engineers more and more 'plexity into the disc, working with a purity of sound and at so microscopic of a scale that Ikeda and his music seemingly belong in the science laboratory. Yet, at the same time, he breathes a lot of life into these little bits of information, making them dance even if you don't. Recommended -- and don't let what's stickered to the cd tray scare you off: "Caution! This cd contains specific waveform data that performs a data-read test for optical drives. The last track will cause some cd players to experience playback errors, with no damage to equipment." We love warnings on cds like that!
Yes indeed, after his successful foray into orchestral instrumentation on 2002's Touch release Op., long time fans of Ikeda (like us) should be happy that he's still also forging ahead in the digital realm, Dataplex being a fine successor to such past Ikeda classics as +/- and Matrix.
When a record can suck you into its spell and keep you in its grasp from start to finish you know you have something special on your hands. We hope you got to hear the drugged out and seductive full length Berserker that Scott Mou & Noah Lennox (aka Panda Bear of Animal Collective fame) released in 2005 under the monicker Jane. Now we get the recording of the two's first recording session packaged in a fake out 7" sleeve... And wow! as much as we liked Berserker there is something even more seductive and spell inducing happening on these two 20+ minute space jams. Armed with lo-fi electronics, turntables and keyboards cultivating a sound that takes you in its grasp and lets you float atop the beautiful stoned wave that you find yourself never wanting to get off of. There is something so nice about hearing spacey sounds that aren't so glossed over and studio perfected. The perfect record for twilight filled with pink skies or the late late night when it's time to resign your body and mind and begin to melt away to a better blissed out place. We hear some similarities in strategy and sound to the repetitious drones of William Basinski, early Oval or even imagine a d.i.y Steve Reich coming home from a drugged out rave and wanting to wash the night away, making music in a garage with some beat up equipment with the controls set for the heart of the sky. So very nice!
The world of 'dreamy electronica' has been polluted by those better aimed at selling you a Volvo then actually taking you to a different state of being, but thankfully there are still talented and lucid minds like Jan Jelinek who actually does create music that makes your mind wander and washes away your moment in time. The sound is much warmer and organic sounding then the super click n' cut sounding Loop-finding-jazz-records he released a few years back. This time Jelinek seems to be going beyond creating an amazing surface sound (referred to as wallpaper in an earlier AQ review) and has created an album that actually seeps through walls and time and space and slowly melts into your ears. Highly Recommended!
If a bearded, tie-dyed guy fiddling with the knobs and wires of some vintage synth is your idea of a good time, you're in luck. Here's another three (quite long, of course) tracks of space-out fantasia from the prolific Kawabata Makoto, leader of everyone's favorite band of hippie throwbacks, Acid Mothers Temple. Kawabata's music is just about Japan's number one export these days, isn't it?? Well c'mon, he's got rent to pay (or effects boxes to buy, or something). And as always, we're not complaining... ol' Kawabata can indulge his love for krauty cosmic electronics, as he does here, all the live long day and we'll forever be willing to lend an ear.
At 21, 19, and 34 minutes, roughly, these tracks have plenty of space to develop, and feature quietly creepy stretches of looping seagull static as well as utter sci-fi, videogame zappery, pretty much along the same lines as Space Machine, Masonna's similarly inspired analog synth side project. Good music to veg out to while starring at any remotely abstract pattern, with the last and longest (title) track being the most meditative, basically a central drone-tone and heartbeat-like pulse.
This is the 2nd full length by Tijuana-born electronic composer Fernando Corona aka Murcof. Loosely connected to the Nortec Collective and a major player in the creative art scene in Tijuana over the last several years, Murcof makes music rich with tension and melody. With a strong sense of the elements of both classical and electronic music and composition, he creates an inciting blend of contemporary composition and minimalist Mexican techno. In lesser hands that could be a cringy combination, but Murcof blends the two elements so naturally and with such rich skill that there is no doubt he is one of the great electronic composers of the 21st century. Highly recommended!
Those of you who flipped for Denver's recent insane and insanely packaged No One Is Coming To Help You deluxe screen printed lp (we have a few left!!) will most definitely want to miss out on this ULTRA limited triple 3" cd-r set of live and not live recordings. The first two discs were recorded while Denver and his 'Neck were on tour with the Dirty Three. The third disc is new studio stuff. For those of you unfamiliar with Nate Denver, imagine, every band you liked in high school, every comic book you have ever read, every fantasy movie you've ever seen featuring either dragons or wizards or both, some skateboards, a lot of heavy metal, death metal to be specific, some beautiful folk songs, spikes, elves, banjos, Nintendos and anything else you remember fondly on your convoluted path to where you are NOW, all chopped up and blended into an impossibly catchy, goofy, funny, pretty, heavy, folk metal ultraviolent goofball spazz rock mess. Denver is insanely adept at squashing all manner of unlikely sounds into a single performance, or even a single song, and make it sound perfect. Pretty songs are only pretty on the surface, but are actually subtly violent and evil and hateful and miserable, howling chaotic blasts of pummeling noise are somehow happy and joyful, filled with flowers and clouds and sunshine. Which goes a long way to explainging the charm of Nate Denver's Neck. This world where metal and folk, dragons and elves co-exist peacefully, is fun and funny, ironic but not intentionally, wild and ridiculous, but ultimately, heartfelt and insanely well crafted. Schizophrenic for sure, but in a gloriously satisfyingly demented sort of way!
Packaged in a little paper bag sealed with a giant brad, containing as well three hand screened inserts on thick textured paper. Nice!
In 2004, Steven Stapleton (aka Nurse With Wound) accepted an artist-in-residency invitation from the Lofoten International Art Festival curated by Rob Young and Anne Hilde-Neset of The Wire. So in the summer of 2004, Stapleton and his trusted engineer / collaborator Colin Potter made the trek up to the Norwegian fishing village of Svolvaer, with limited recording equipment and no musical instruments to produce a series of recording based on the environmental sounds of that tiny fishing village. Upon completing these recordings, the two then broadcast them upon the maritime radio channels at unannounced intervals, probably to the dismay of the Norwegian fisherman. Nurse With Wound made twenty-four such transmissions during their Norwegian sabbatical.
This double disc set marks the second set of recordings from those very fertile sessions. Stapleton admitted that there very little to gather in the Arctic expansiveness during the relative quiet of Norwegian summers; not surprisingly, emptiness is what Stapleton builds upon as the foundation for many of these recordings. Birds, surf, and a repeating radio ping appear to really be the only things that Stapleton and Potter appear to be able to work with; but they exhibit a masterful ability when transforming these sounds into ominous hypnotic drones and swirling atmospheres reflective of the more contemplative parts of Thunder Perfect Mind or the subtle minimalism of Soliloquy For Lilith. As on the first session, Shipwreck Radio Volume Two also features a curious metallic breakbeat number, reflecting Stapleton's ongoing obsession with hip hop, albeit filtered through his inimitable Surrealist gaze. Highly recommended.
Piano Overlord is a Prefuse 73 "low key 'side-project'" originally formulated by Mr. Herren as a means to pay back the Money Studies label for losing the pieces of a Diplo 7" he was intending to remix. This may be going out on a limb, but "Singles Collection" sounds a bit like Prefuse 73 done with a piano, also incorporating the more mellow elements of Savath & Savalas. Pleasant stuff. Cool milky beats, no rough edges. Womby and insular listening techno.
Several Poison Idea cd reissues recently hit the racks, and we rate this one the best (although they're all pretty darn good!).
Poison Idea is one of the few bands that comes immediately to mind when you think about what a good hardcore band was really all about. Manic pace, adept "sausage-finger" guitar playing, a tight rhythm section and a singer wailing over the top with lyrics so poetic and fucking deep it's actually worth reading the lyric sheet! Poison Idea was that band -- Portland's finest -- and on top of it all, you had two serious behemoth madmen drinking and bleeding and rocking in a hellbent frenzy.
With this 1987 release, War All the Time (yes, it's named after Bukowski, duh) the self-proclaimed "Kings of Punk" added extra power-pummel to the mix with the addition of Thee Slayer Hippy on drums and Vegetable Olsen on second guitar. This record still proves to be a timeless classic today as far as early hardcore/thrash/crossover goes. Lots of stop-and-start on a dime riffage, a million little cymbal splashes filling in the holes, Pig Champion moving those little chubby stubs up and down the fretboard at the speed of light (or maybe as fast as the malt liquor would allow on any given night!) and on top of it all Jerry A. mumbling / howling / screaming some seriously stoic shit in that immediately recognizable caterwaul, but you wouldn't know how serious unless you were reading along...
You're definitely not a real punk without this in your collection!
On the same Italian label that brought us that lovely Luciano Cilio disc in 2004, here's more import-expensive but totally worth it amazing archival material (in ultra-nice digipackaging to sweeten the deal) from the Italian '70s sonic art underground, specifically Roberto Laneri's Prima Materia vocal drone ensemble. This is some heavy stuff here -- and heavy can mean a lot of things, AQ list readers have come to realize. In this case, it's heavy the way that Tibetan Buddhist Rites From The Monasteries Of Bhutan double disc reissue we listed last year was heavy (so said our distro rep when we ordered this, and he was right!). And this mesmerizing, yogic drone-fest does have a monkish sound, being produced entirely by live human voices, gargling and moaning and droning. Though if you didn't know that, you might think it was in part electronic. It's the sound of wind and weariness, sorta spooky and haunted, wavering and weaving, building and building, with overtones galore, a howling of souls into the Universe. Like a bunch of Tibetan monks or Tuvan throat singers wordlessly saying woe is me... and we're pretty sure that one of 'em at least sounds a heckuva lot like Elmer Fudd!! Seriously, though, it's really good and intense and magical... if you're a trance/drone fan (maybe digging stuff like Grouper, that has a vocal component), you should listen to this!
We're told that "the musicians of the group Prima Materia individually researched and developed unusual vocal techniques (originally used in Tantric rituals in North India, Mongolia and Tibet), based upon the use of overtones coupled with a special state of inner concentration, which was the essential condition for both the emission and control of long-sustained and complex vocal sounds. Their capacity to sustain a note for what seems an eternity, and then continue to provide endless variations generated a continuous and sustained drone of sound, in which the overtones are clearly perceived." We believe it.
The Tail Of The Tiger LP was originally released in 1977 as a private pressing by a small label run by Laneri, Alvin Curran and Giacinto Scelsi. Now, this digitally remastered cd reissue features the 33 minutes and 30 seconds of music from the original LP plus another 42 minutes of live performance recorded in Berlin in 1974 and Rome in 1976. And it's packaged not just with a booklet of liner notes but also 16 pages of "visual overtones", beautiful full color prints on tracing paper. Yup, nice! And it case you're still unsure, the blurb on the cover sticker contains high praise from none other than Terry Riley, who knows his drones.
Rainbow Ffolly? Sounds ffunny... maybe ffantastic! And it is, for what it is. For those who dig Sgt. Peppery British pop-psych from the '60s, what you've got here is a kaleidoscopic pop concoction whipped up in 1968 by some bright, Beatles-lovin' students who sent their demo in to Parlophone, hoping to score a record deal. The label ended up releasing their demo on vinyl just as it was, which is what we've got here, reissued on cd with a couple of bonus tracks. It's a bit like Yellow Submarine on a student budget, complete with bits of silly dialogue interspersed amidst the songs, but it has some fuzz bite to it as well. Definitely a colorful curiousity (and not just the cover) from a ffar-off but still ffabulous time, in the vein of the Beatles, Blossom Toes, Kaleidoscope, early Floyd...
Reverend Bizarre is so worshipful of their obvious influences (Sabbath, St. Vitus, Cathedral, Witchfinder General, Pentagram, Trouble, Sleep, Electric Wizard, etc.) that it might be easy to dismiss them as being just fans instead of the real thing... but we've got to say, there's something just so darn charming about how much these lads LOVE doom metal. It's infectious. And their songs are even ABOUT doom! Sloganeering for doom, that's their thing -- sing-along album opener "Doom Over The World" is a doom-lovers anthem basically. And they've chosen stage names guaranteed to amuse: Albert Witchfinder (vocals, bass), Peter Vicar (guitar), Earl of Void (drums). Yup, they've got some sort of extra-special, amateur fanboy appeal that makes you root for 'em. And they've worked so hard at living up to the standards of their heroes that they're not half bad, in fact, we're darn impressed. They come across like a hybrid of Saint Vitus and Cathedral, with dramatic, clean vocals definitely owing something to original Vitus singer Scott Reagers.
Their discs are always adorned with cryptic inscriptions like "Lohja Power" and "C.O.T.D" -- the latter standing for "Circle Of True Doom" something I think these guys invented, though I've seen it on other bands' cds. It also says "Apocalyptic Doom Metal" in big letters on the back cover of this one but when you first spin the disc, for the first few songs you'd think that "Party Time Doom Metal" or something like that would be a better motto since there's a definite headbanging catchiness to the first few tracks, the Rev. Bizarre boys rockin' out whilst dooming it up. As "into" doom and depression as they and their audience (you?) might be, the listener can't help but have their frown turned upside down when the band kicks into such rollicking, riffy, uptempo tunes as "The Devil Rides Out" and "Cromwell". It's heavy metal, and it's doom. But II: Crush The Insects ain't all fist-waving rockers. They do play slooooooow a lot of the time too. After the first three cuts, the album takes a turn into the realm of, well, apocalyptic doom metal, with track lengths in the double digits. Like the crawling epic "Slave Of Satan", which was apparently a number 2 HIT song in their native Finland!!! Hard to believe, as it's 13 and a half minutes long!! And that's the edited album cut, which is considerably shorter than the 21 minute single version!!! Torturously slow, anywhere else in the world it'd be a miracle if it made it into the Top 40 THOUSAND. The record continues in this vein, with some brief bursts of speed, through to the very last song, with the dumb/brilliant title of "Fucking Wizard".
"Good evening dancing America, and lovers of exciting dance music. We present Raymond Scott, extraordinary composer of modern music, and his Orchestra, featuring Nan Wynn. All this exciting music comes to you from the equally exciting Panther Room of the hotel Sherman's College Inn in downtown Chicago." So says the announcer on track one of this cd, introducing pianist/arranger/composer and nowadays cult figure (best known for the use of his music in Carl Stalling's classic Warner Brothers cartoon scores, and also for his later electronic experiments) Raymond Scott and his band in what was originally an exciting 1940 live radio broadcast. This disc sees Scott updating many of his classic, quirky Quintette compositions to the swingin' big band format of the forties. Female vocalists Nan Wynn and Dorothy Collins (later Scott's wife) sing on a couple of numbers, but mostly this is instrumental dance fare. The 24 cuts here are culled from studio and live radio performances circa 1940-1944, and are mostly jaunty and playful Scott-penned tunes, like "At An Arabian House Party", "Caterpiller Creep", "Eagle Beak", "An American In Russia", "The Lark Leaped In", and "Toonerville Trolley". Some of the non-Scott material includes a song by Rodgers and Hammerstein, and Scott's jazzed-up take on the traditional "Pop Goes The Weasel"! One for fans of Raymond Scott and/or oldsters among you... seriously, lots of nostalgic, energetic fun!
Songs of Green Pheasant is Duncan Sumpner, an artist and schoolteacher from Sheffield. This, his first release, is dreamy and drifting, primarily recorded on a 4-track cassette recorder in Duncan's isolated kitchen, old fashioned kettle tea on the stove, likely, everything as lo-fi as can be.
Snug and fragile, fuzzy and dreamlike. A bit like a folky Slowdive, Drowsy, or what Fat Cat might want from Glenn Donaldson as The Ivytree. Nostalgia slipped like sweet secret liqueur into a cup of Christmas-warm coffee. Influences run the gamut from Simon & Garfunkel to Jeweled Antler, with a little Galaxie 500 and Devendra-esque neo-acid folk brushed over for that rolling around in a magical forest sheen.
Moments of the album make us think about peering at silhouettes of shy femme fatales through a peach & cyan scrim in a room full of hookah smoke. And it just started raining. Double rainbow oil slick sparkles on the pavement, and we're blaming Mr. Sumpner for creating rainy day music that can actually trigger a rainy day. Lovely.
Also, Sumpner is currently working on a side project with Adam Davenport from Vibracathedral Orchestra.
Can't wait!
Sometimes you need a great pop record. Not twee indie pop, not orchestral power pop. Juts pop. Perfect pop, and Teenage Fanclub are still kicking out the perfect pop jams even after all these years. In fact, this might just be their best since Bandwagonesque. A little bit Byrds, a little bit Big Star, plenty of jangly guitar, gorgeous harmony vocals, simple solid drumming, subtle but ridiculously infectious hooks, and perfect Perfect PERFECT songs. Catchy and hummable, rocking but laid back, just so goddamn good. One of our favorite pop records in forever!
'Tis more instrumental drifting drone from thee Tribes Of Neurot, in the "ambient outerspace backwards transmissions from the planet of feedback" genre. Meridian is a little bit harsh, a little bit lovely. We can imagine that if these guys weren't so well known (as an experimental side-project of the mighty metallers Neurosis), and if this was released as a limited edition cd-r in handmade packaging on some New Zealand label, there'd be dark drone fans in droves going gaga. But although they're not that obscure, they sound like it. Recognizable elements (piano, guitar, and what we're guessing is a bowed cymbal) and less-distinct sound sources (all manner of whooshing and whirring, and also something we know is not a purring cat, but must be some sort of electronic simulation) are all a part of these ten, interestingly varied tracks, several of which include some actual "music" moving in and out of the mix, amid the pulsing drones, spectral washes, and sun-arising synth-scapes. The only drawback is that this is perhaps a bit too "active" for those that like their drones purely as background, falling-asleep music.
Christian Renou and Troum are veterans of the post-industrial / avant-garde cassette culture from the '80s, as the members of German drone outfit Troum previously recorded as Maeror Tri while the French composer Renou produced countless cassettes as Brume back then. The two received a commission from Fario to join forces for their first collaboration, which they developed from the weighty themes of melancholia and death. Renou begins the album with a four part solo series entitled "Himmelweg" (Way To Heaven), stretching metallic chimes and musique concrete abstractions into ghostly melodic drones. As grey and rainy as Renou's compositions appear, Troum's expansive ambience on Dissolution is all the more grim, morose, and blackened. Their heavy ominous sounds of guitar, voice, and accordion cycle through doomy melodies erupting over atavistic percussive loops, expressing a far less optimistic outlook on life and death. On the two collaborative tracks with Renou, Troum remix and manipulate source material from Renou's "Himmelweg" tracks, imploding those dreamtime sounds with nightmarish rumblings and subterranean echoings. Troum conclude the album with the darkest track on the album, an extended, all-consuming drone-mantra whose gravity field slowly sucks everything into its monochromatic void. Bleak to say the least.
As you may know, Italy's UFOmammut are one of our absolute favorite psychedelic/doom/drone/dirge bands, up there with Electric Wizard and Yob and Boris. Both of their previous albums, Godlike Snake and Snailking, were Aquarius Records Of The Week in their day. This new album, Lucifer Songs, could quite possibly be a Record Of The Week too when we get the cd version -- well actually, we *did* get a cd version, but it was super fancy, screen printed and limited and we only were able to get a handful and they're all gone, sold out now, sorry. BUT don't worry, a regular cd edition is supposed to be pressed in February, and we'll definitely get a lot of those! And in the meantime, we DID get enough of this vinyl version to list... but act fast! Like the limited cd, it comes with a bonus DVD that won't be a part of the regular cd package.
Lucifer Songs (no beating about the bush with that title) is another multi-ton brick in the cosmic-heights reaching pyramidical temple these guys are building with each album, each heavy riff shifting the load like tens of thousands of the pharoah's slaves sweating and heaving in unison to get the job done. And sometimes they really push those slaves hard, the stoned riffery shifting into a higher gear. Though it often sounds more like the slaves couldn't handle the weight and the bricks are crashing down, massive and crushing... with some stretches of relatively calm drone ("Hypnotized", "Astdronaut") to let the dust settle. These five tracks of space-sludge nirvana are perhaps marred only by the over-use of sound samples, something in metal of which we've always been critics... remember our review of the first Mastodon album? If you're not Necroticism by Carcass, leave the samples alone...
And like we said, this handsome vinyl release comes with a DVD, featuring low-budget videos for three of the album's tracks as well as what they term "soundscape" abstract psychedelic visuals for all of 'em (including "Lucifer Song", which takes up all of side two of the LP but doesn't appear on the cd version, though of course it's here on the DVD and you can download it too) which is cool to have, though considering that UFOmammut is the sonic arm of the Malleus art collective (known for many a trippy album cover and rock show poster) we weren't quite as blown away by all of it as we thought we would be.
However, the DVD is well worth it not only for the many visuals that ARE cool but also for the music that plays when you're just looking at the menu (a snippet of "Lucifer Song"). If you have a DVD player that's hooked up to your stereo, put it in and just listen to it! We did... accidentally. You see, our store cd player is also a DVD player (though we have no TV monitor hooked up to it) and so when we got the cd in, we put in what we thought was the audio disc and spent about a half an hour listening to what we later realized was the DVD menu music! We were really in to how this creepy synth drone with plodding percussion just looped and faded out and back in again, like the UFOmammut guys were all stoned and just turning the volume knob up and down in the studio. Allan even came out from the back of the store to see what was playing. We kept waiting for it to fade out and then surprise us by launching into a brutal riff a la Corrupted or Boris but then Irwin figured out that we were just listening to the DVD menu music! Pretty cool though, we'll do it again...
Two discs filled with 55 post-punk new wave songs from the original 45's by the likes of The Cure, Billy Bragg, The Creatures, Sham 69, Elvis Costello, The Ruts, Joe Jackson, The Damned, The Tubes and lots more. If you still have all of these singles on vinyl you probably got yourself a nice little eBay cash cow on your hands. But if not this is a nice way to hear lots from the '77-'83 era of underground (at the time) rock which soon found it's way very much into the mainstream. Some of the best moments on this comp come from the artists who never really made their millions but left a legacy that still stands the test of time. Folks like Lene Lovich (Adult and Numbers should be paying her royalties) and we dare you to find any punk anthem more catchy and fist in the air effective then Sham 69's "If The Kids Are United." And of course some of the big names remind us why they became famous in the first place. Sometimes nostalgia can feel oh so good.
Man, is Andy Votel our favorite DJ/mix complier or what?? (With Garreth Goddard/Cherrystones running a close second.) Obviously, Votel's got the record collection we wish we had... or are working on, but he's got the original LPs and 45s and we've just got the cd reissues. Anyway, his love of '60s and '70s obscure, international prog/psych/folk/funk is right up our alley. The Votel comps we've listed include AQ Record Of The Week honoree Vertigo Mixed, the amazing Welsh Rare Beat disc, and the Folk Is Not A Four Letter Word collection. Now here's the follow-up to that one, eagerly awaited 'round these parts, Prog Is Not A Four Letter Word. And you know how we love prog!
Though, Votel's definition of "prog" or "progressive rock" is deliberately loosey-goosey. Indeed, he pretty much wants to leave out what most people would consider prog -- famous bands like Yes, ELP, King Crimson, Mike Oldfield, Genesis, and their imitators... Not that we were expecting any of those to appear here, but we thought maybe Gnidrolog or Osanna might show up, or Magma or Le Orme. However, Votel's agenda is about the grooves, with a helping of fuzz, and the exotic weirdness factor of foreign-language vocals and ethnic influences too... the sometimes pretentious intellectual/conceptual aspects of prog aren't what is being celebrated here, nor symphonics or narrative suites or virtuoso keyboard solos or caped outfits... though we're sure Votel digs all that too. But this is more about tracks that are freaky and avantgarde yet rhythmic and hooky enough to be a DJ's hidden weapon. What you get here is some really obscure stuff from around the globe that *might* be "prog" rock (it's certainly not "regular" rock!), dating from 1969-1978, more or less prog's heyday. Pretty much the most prog-identified band on here is Britain's Egg (who are even featured doing a classical styled piece, "Fugue In D Minor"). They're in the company of a crazy crew of artists from the Continent and further afield, some we've heard of and many we haven't. Among the names we know, there's Jean-Claude Vannier (with a track from the amazing L'Enfant Assassin Des Mouches recently reissued and reviewed here last year), Bran from Wales (who also appear, with a different track, on Welsh Rare Beat), Poland's Breakout (who also were on the Folk Is Not A Four Letter Word comp), Krautrock jazz fusion act Embryo, Korea's wonderful San Ul Lim, Baris Manco and 3 Hur-el from Turkey (the latter with one of the best Turkish psych tracks EVER, "Omur Bitter Yol Bimez" from their Hurel Arsivi album), and France's Phillipe Bescombes. But we confess we'd never heard of Italy's Picchio Dal Pozzo, Poland's fierce and fuzzy Czerwone Gitary, or Yugoslavia's Drugi Nacin before, among others on here that leave us wanting to hear, and know, more! There are fairly informative liner notes, though, which is always appreciated. And album covers too! Recommended, 'specially if you're already a fan of the several comps of Votel's that we alluded to above, and the Cherrystones Rocks one, and the best Love, Peace & Poetry volumes and so forth...
What a smokin' comp! Do you like your soul & funk nice and raw and sizzling? Then be ready to discover that from 1968-1980 in Michigan lived an amazing scene of d.i.y. soul artists releasing sometimes only one single but putting so much oozing flare and charisma to their true soul sounds it nearly sets your speakers on fire! Luv N' Haight has compiled 14 of these artists on this truly great collection of soul, funk and jazz rarities from Michigan over those dozen years. Tommy McGee, Manual B. Holcolm, Robert Jay, El Riot, etc. never became household names, but if their luck had been a little different and the break that never came their way did, there is no doubt they would have earned a spot in the same breath as Curtis Mayfield, James Brown, and Sly & The Family Stone. No weak tracks in the bunch, great in depth liner notes that tell the story of each track, no doubt this is one of the strongest soul reissue collections we've heard in a while.
NOW ON VINYL! With bonus 7"
What we said about the cd version on Soft Abuse (also still in stock btw):
The onslaught of Wooden Wand (And The Vanishing Hand) releases continues with this solo release from the group's ringleader Wooden Wand Jehovah. Generally more conventional sounding than the full band's recently reissued Xiao album, Harem Of The Sundrum & The Witness Figg does gets a bit more trippy as it progresses. He sings these nine hushed rustic folk songs in a gentle gruff voice. If you've dug the recently reissued Gary Higgins Red Hash cd, you might wanna check out Wooden Wand 'cause we played them back to back and we found that they segued beautifully. Recommended.
We normally don't make "now available on cd" releases Record Of The Week. But there are plenty of reasons to do just that with this one! First off, C'MON! It's LEVIATHAN and XASTHUR! On the same disc! Two of the most important, and musically creative black metal one-man-hordes in the new wave of west coast black metal (NWOWCBM?) teamed up for the ultimate NWOWCBM one two punch. Singlehandedly (doublehandedly?) putting USBM back on the black metal map, and completely redefining the genre, grim and brutal and black for sure, but also totally bizarre and avant and experimental. Plus even you folks who picked up the vinyl versions will need this, as there are 4 bonus tracks, three of them are from Xasthur, a brand new unreleased track, a rehearsal track from 2004, and a Katatonia cover! The other bonus track is Leviathan's amazing version of Judas Iscariot's "Where The Winter Beals Incessant"! But even without the bonus tracks, this clash of the black titans is totally essential, some of the most beautifully blackened and furiously fucked up black metal you are ever likely to hear. Xasthur from Southern California and Leviathan from right here in SF are blackened brothers, both exploring similar themes of hate and misery, darkness and death, but coming at 'em from completely different sonic angles. Xasthur is more about mood and atmosphere, with thick swaths of fuzzy riffery, galloping drums, rumbling bass and agonised howls of despair, all dense and dark and claustrophobic. Leviathan is much more technical and a lot weirder, but no less moody, with ultra complex and bizarrely arranged parts, insane drumming, buzzing riffery, and hints of doom and progrock mixed into his bleak and blackened metalscapes. ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL!!
It's been a seriously productive year for the Yellow Swans. Multiple cd-r releases, some 7"s, a Australian tour with pals the Grey Daturas, as well as loads of splits and collaaborations with folks like Axolotl and the Skaters as well as teaming up with the Daturas for a couple releases as well. Phew! But thankfully, there seems to be no end in sight. With all those releases, it's a bit surprising to realize the Yellow Swans only have one proper non cd-r release, and that one flew so far under tha radar we wouldn't have known about it at all had one not drifted through here used a while back. So here we have a brand new, shiny silver, actual cd, non-cd-r, blast of Yellow Swans nooooooooooize! Joined on a few of the tracks by fellow noisy folks Inca Ore, Gerritt and Christina Carter (of Charalambides), Psychic Secession is another gorgeous chunk of sweet sweet noise, equal parts glistening shimmer, crushing and jagged skree, skittery diembodied rhythms, haunting ghostly vocals, blistering sheets of distorted electronics, squealing feedback, chiming reverb drenched percussion, glistening delicate ambience, even some ultra processed psychedelic rock, all woven into a dense chaotic and surprisingly gorgeous whole!
This will be coming out in the states on Load Records, but not until way later in the year, so for now we got this Australian import version which comes in a super spiffy oversized cardboard sleeve and is a completely different (supposedly 'noisier') mix than the forthcoming Load version!
