[ aquarius records new arrivals

IMPORTANT (Please read to avoid confusion): Some items below may be tagged with a bold, red, all-caps OUT OF PRINT/UNAVAILABLE notice. This does NOT mean that all other items not so tagged are, in fact, in stock — or for that matter, in print and available, though there's a good chance they are. Some folks get confused on this point, and we can see why, so please read this for further clarification and other important before-you-order information. Unlike some mailorder websites, we don't have an electronic inventory system linked to our site, so you can't be sure of what we actually have or don't have in stock at any given moment without asking us — please email our mailorder department for availability status — or better yet, just go ahead and place your order using our shopping cart function and we'll get back to you with the status of each item. If you have general non-mailorder questions, email the store.

Showing results 51 through 100 of 128.

Hot off the heels of the recent domestic release of their smart fun & dorky in a good way debut, Coming On Strong, here are 3 new songs and the obligatory remixes of the title track. Over and Over is a really good catchy blast of electronic pop that recalls the early era of Depeche Mode, the full on dance mode of New Order and the seductive hooks of Goldfrapp. Fun stuff.

MPEG stream: Over and Over
MPEG stream: Plastic

The second full-length from Utah's blackened beast known collectively as Ibex Throne. The Zodiac, Lord Dying, Mictlan, Desecrator and Judas Drexor Arawn have reassembled as the blasting buzzing black metal juggernaut that is Ibex Throne. A musical blast of pestilence and pure hatred for all things. An utter loathing for all belief systems as well as a constant striving for the absolute eradication of all humanity. A furious blasting burst of black buzz, with occasional stretches of Xasthur-ish moodiness, minor key chords fingerpicked over sheets of white hot black brutality. For the most part this is blown out blackness, a furious fast fist full of metal, blast beats and guitar buzz, demonic shrieks and screaming feedback all twisted into big metal nails that will seal the coffin that keeps the corpse of humanity below ground. Ibex Throne offers no sympathy, just hateful, blasphemous, nihilistic anti-trend Black hatred Metal! Amazing cover art, full on high school binder rendering of winged demons eviscerating a naked woman on an upside down cross!

MPEG stream: Humanity Is Worthless
MPEG stream: Insidious Wrath

MPEG stream: Withstand The Fall Of Time
MPEG stream: Tragedies Blows At Horizon

Now available on vinyl for a limited time! Packaged in a gorgeous gatefold sleeve, with new photos and design. Here's what we had to say about the cd (not a lot, but believe us, it's quite possibly our very favorite Immortal record): Highly-regarded Black Metal band (weirdly enough, Steve Albini's favorite) unleash their latest frigid barrage, an amazingly trance-inducing, complex blur of drums, rasping howls and icicle guitars, stopping and starting but at never less than 100mph. Their best album yet (as of 1997) and certainly their most Morbid Angel.

Now available on vinyl for a limited time! Packaged in a gorgeous gatefold sleeve, with new photos and design. Here's what we had to say about the cd: The new Immortal has arrived. True members of the Norwegian black metal elite, Abbath (not as in "please take..."!) on guitars and Popeye vox, big ol' drummer Horgh, and new guy Iscariah on bass, (with the sidelined Demonaz still writing lyrics) come back atcha a year after their groundbreaking At The Heart of Winter, the disc that slowed down (a bit) the previously way FAAASSSTTT tempos characteristic of their speedy-demon classics Battles In The North and Blizzard Beasts and added more melody, more trad metal riffing, and mo' better production courtesy of Peter Tagtgren & his Abyss studio. Damned In Black follows the Winter blueprint, being kind of like a At The Heart of Winter Part II but without the amusing wanna-be WWF wrestler band photos that garnered so much attention/ridicule last time around. And while the title might suggest some sort of Satanic theme, the Immortal boys stick with their personal mythology of a frosty Northern dimension full of ice, wind, and cold. Immortal fans everywhere (even the ones here in San Francisco who got dissed by the band when they didn't show up to play and went to Mexico instead) should put on some mittens and enjoy this evil icecapade.

Now available on vinyl for a limited time! Packaged in a gorgeous gatefold sleeve, with new photos and design. We never listed the cd before (it came out before we did reviews, let alone black metal reviews) but fans should know it, and that's who'll be interested in Immortal vinyl anyway. This was their very first album from '92, so probably their rawest, but still all about the winter wonderland that Immortal devoted their career to mythologizing.

Now available on vinyl for a limited time! Packaged in a gorgeous gatefold sleeve, with new photos and design. We never listed the cd before (it came out before we did reviews, let alone black metal reviews) but fans should know it, and that's who'll be interested in Immortal vinyl anyway. This was their second album (from 1993) and is classic old school Norwegian black metal all the way. Grim and frosty!

The return of Immortal!!! These frosty warriors may have hung up their spiked gauntlets, but their legacy still looms large. Easily one of our favorite black metal hordes EVER, these records have been frustratingly tough to keep in stock over the years. Thankfully, they've all been reissued, in all their frostbitten black blurred glory! Finally, this, the final Immortal album, from 2002, gets the deluxe reissue treatment, now with a bonus DVD! From the cold frozen north (Norway) comes this, the very last (R.I.P.) cd from one of our favorite corpse-painted bands ever, Immortal. It's their seventh album but their first (and sadly last) for new, big-time label Nuclear Blast, so expectations were indeed high. And Sons Of Northern Darkness delivers, in fine Immortal fashion. It's got the unmistakable Popeye-gone-metal vocal stylings of guitarist Abbath, who rasps out the frostbitten fantasy lyrics penned by their former guitarist, the crippled Demonaz, all backed by a blizzard of drums from hefty skinbeater Horgh. Followers of Immortal's career know that they began as your basic, howling at the moon, primitive blasting black metal outfit. They quickly developed a reputation as the fastest band out there, reaching a peak of pure speed with the classic Battles In The North. Unable to top that, they did an album of Morbid Angel worship, the hectic Blizzard Beasts...and then Demonaz left the band, unable to play guitar due to "arm disease". Regrouping, Immortal shifted in a newly melodic, heavy-metal-riff oriented direction, releasing the brilliant At The Heart of Winter. Some old fans (Josh from The Fucking Champs, you know who you are) were disappointed that the songs wasn't as fast, and the production not as "necro" as before, but the drums still blazed and the better production (courtesy of Peter Tagtgren's Abyss Studio) combined with their improved song-craft made for a true masterpiece. They followed that up with At The Heart of Winter Part II (actual title: Damned In Black), and now here we are with what is essentially part three, Sons Of Northern Darkness. No, it doesn't top At The Heart of Winter but it's indeed more of the same quality Immortal, totally satisfying! While their blasting abilities are still incredible, this disc is perhaps at its best on the slower songs, like "Tyrants". Cold, cold stuff. There's even a song about Antarctica! The DVD captures an entire live show recorded in 2003 live at BB Kings Club in New York, filmed with a camcorder, this is raw and fuzzy footage, but the sound is good and there's plenty of corpepaint and windmilling hair, and that unmistakable Immortal frostbitten black metal blur. Immortal. Sometimes, there's nothing better.

MPEG stream: Sons Of Northern Darkness
MPEG stream: Tyrants

Montreal's The Unicorns return from the dead as Islands, a little sadder, and perhaps a little wiser. Their sound is more grown up and less lo-fi than the quirky rambunctious pop of The Unicorns, but just as eccentric and humorous as witnessed on such songs as "Don't call me Whitney, Bobby", and the bizarre indie hip-hop of "Where There's a Will, There's a Whalebone" featuring rhymes by Subtitle and Busdriver. More obsessed now with rebirth than death, the songs are longer, tighter and complex, full of hooks, melodies, and weird and innocent charm.

MPEG stream: Swans (Life After Death)
MPEG stream: Don't Call Me Whitney, Bobby

Last list we highlighted a newer album, entitled Itavalta, by this Finnish band, and now we've got their equally recommended debut, available on either cd or LP (with the vinyl lacking the bonus remix track found on the cd, though). This four-song (+ remix) debut of theirs is the real reason that Circle guitarist Janne Westerlund told us that Itavayla is the "boogie rock band" he plays in. On their second disc, they took off on some other tangents beyond the barroom boogie blues. But here, that's what it's all about, sort of. Not what you'd think, though, or maybe it is. Remember, these guys are from Finland (land of weirdness) and feature a member of Circle. And sound a lot like Circle as a result, although Janne joined Itavayla -after- this recording, so they didn't get the idea from him. Circle channeling ZZ Top, that is. And we're talking ZZ Top from the '80s on, after they embraced technology and got all computerized and robotic. Thus the progged up arsenal of Roland and Yamaha synthesizers listed here, the synth-drum sounds, and even the robot voices (on "Future Boogie"). And, the minimalist, cyclic structure of these loooong hypnotic tracks (in the Circle style that we love) of repetitive slide guitar riffs, shuffling drums and honking keys. The first track, "Black Diamond Express" appears to be built around a sampled voice (that guy can't be Finnish!) from an old time blues recording or something. Itavayla provide the backing, blending past and future both, which leads to the organ-riffed, electro-boogie overload of the next track, "Tesco". And on it goes, mesmerizing sci-fi, space age boogie blues from Finland, reaching a tranced-out peak with the 13+ minute "Jesus Kristus". So, crack open a cold Miller beer (or the Finnish equivalent, whatever that is) and kick back to these Circular, futuristic gutbucket grooves!! Seriously, Allan can't stop listening to it. Recommended.

MPEG stream: Tesco
MPEG stream: Black Diamond Express

Jandek's always been a difficult proposition, with his atonal deconstructed blues, drastically out of tune guitars, howled and groaned harrowingly emotional vocals, definitely an acquired taste. So to imagine Jandek sounding EVEN MORE atonal, and off key, and detuned, and damaged, seem pretty much impossible. But that's precisely what has happened on What Else Does The Time Mean, the 46th Jandek, release and the 3rd of 2006! We were worried that Jandek's mystery would have faded with his recent shuffle into the spotlight (including several live shows), but if anything it's only made him more of an enigma. A handful of live performances and a higher profile than he's ever had in his entire career have done absolutely nothing to change his totally unique, totally fried haunting abstract blues stumble. If anything it's pushed it even further OUT. This record is totally damaged and incredibly difficult to listen to even by Jandek standards. The opening track is a 16 minute stoned stagger, a lugubrious drift through prickly steel string strum, accopanied by a slurred, sleepy sounding, stream of conciousness tone deaf mumble. The rest of the record follow essentially the same sonic blueprint, each tune a tiny tragedy, each one a creepy out of tune crawl through a drunken drowsy abstract blues-scape. This is definitely dark and emotional stuff, practically dripping with pathos, a seriously intense soul laid bare for sure, but the sound of pain and anguish is meant to be sharp, and jagged, sounds that help the listener feel that pain as if it was being inflicted upon them, which in a way it kind of is. What Else Does The Time Mean is a gloriously and fantastically uneasy listen, the sort of musical discomfort we've come to expect, and anticipate from quite possibly the saddest sounding man in the world!

MPEG stream: My Own Way
MPEG stream: Walk Over

Picking up where his last record left off, Swans founding member Jonathan Kane returns with two more foot stomping blues sizzling instrumentals which use a pedigreed technique of building repetition that makes these tracks sound somewhere between excellent bar rock/blues with a hint of his more intense past and works with Rhys Chatham. Much like recent instrumental outings by Tom Verlaine (not that this sounds like that at all) it's actually sometimes nice to hear someone who seems to have aged gracefully and is playing what they want, with nothing to prove, and with a new found ease and confidence that seems appropriate with their moment in time.

MPEG stream: BQE
MPEG stream: I Looked At The Sun

Friend OR... compiles the incidental music Alexander Kort composed and performed for a three act play titled FOE which was presented by the University of California - Berkeley's department of theater, dance and performance studies. Kort, who also performs with Bay Area groups such as Subtle and Themselves, loosely entwines multiple glacial string movements with the sounds of waves, sputtering rainfall and other mysterious effects and sources. The somber moan and creak of Kort's compositions on this cd bring to mind an antiquated ocean liner listing sleepily on a calm eve. Actually come to think of it this makes for a more spartan companion to Nurse With Wound's very nautical Salt Marie Celeste album. Hauntingly beautiful.

MPEG stream: The Dead Captain
MPEG stream: Dream Of The Two Islands

At first we weren't sure what to make of this band, with their awkward name, their super spare black and white artwork, their well crafted mystery, a seemingly complete lack of any sort of pertinent information, no photos, no real liner notes, no mention of individual band members. All very alluring most certainly. We had heard them described as "dreamy space rock... with a psychedelic metal twist" which definitely sounds good. And as some sort of heavy metal / new wave hybrid, which as good as -that- sounds, it most definitely seems like something that would work better in theory than in practice. In actuality, Lansing-Dreiden are neither of those, and end up being way more interesting than any of that would have led us to believe. Lansing-Dreiden are not just a band either, no, they're a sort of arts collective: musicians, sculptors, artists, writers, film makers, replete with the requisite gallery showings, Artforum writeups, film premiers and rock shows. The lines between each of these disciplines are so blurry they might as well not exist. Their vibe, both visually and sonically is warm and washed out, a gauzy soft focus shapshot of pop culture past, the sound on The Dividing Island is both dizzyingly bizarre and dreamily overwhelming, a pastiche of all sorts of disparate pop elements, loads of instantly recognizable hooks, sweet harmony vocals, squiggly synths, horns, soft whispery crooning, bi arena rock drums, jangling guitars, huge sheets of fuzzy reverb, hand claps, cheesy electronic drums, It's almost like it's 1985 and we're watching MTV in some alternate universe. This is definitely some sort of (old) new wave, no trace of metal to be found (well mostly, more on that in a minute), no space rock really either, although there is plenty of spaced out trippiness. But even with bits of spaciness, and some space rock swirl here and there, that stuff is just window dressing for L-D's passion, which seems to be cracked eighties pop. Lansing-Dreiden is some sort of weird musical time machine, skipping lazily from 1982 to 1985 to 1989 and back again. Where Ariel Pink took seventies AM radio, and turned it into his own disheveled, cracked demented pop vision, Lansing-Dreiden instead take eighties FM radio and classic eighties MTV and gives them their own warm and warped, precious and polished spin. Imagine a hip NY art rock band channeling everything you loved and loathed about ABC, Style Council, Talk Talk, Spandau Ballet, the Fixx, Kajagoogoo, Thompson Twins, Culture Club, Fun Boy Three, Naked Eyes, Psychedelic Furs, The Call, Modern English, etc. There are some moments where the band dips its toes into the more rollicking contemporary NY new wave redux sound of bands like Interpol and the Strokes, and there are stretches of moody near ambient post rock, but for the most part this is a dead ringer for some lost eighties 'classic'. Mix tapes, John Cusack, Say Anything, Breakfast Club, it's like our teenage years revisited, albeit with a slightly more twisted and sinister bent. There may seemingly be nary a trace of any metal on The Dividing Island, but best stick around for the final track, metallically titled "Dethroning The Optimyth", quite possibly the greatest (only) song ever to mix eighties MTV pop and crushing death metal! As much as we dig the rest of the record, we almost wish the whole record sounded like "Dethroning The Optimyth", although to be totally honest, the thought of a whole album of eighties pop death metal is almost too much to bear! Pounding double bass drumming, and chugging downtuned riffs collide with soft sweetly swoony pop, soaring synthesizers, airy breathless vocals, like laying on your bed, beneath your Kiss and Slayer posters, listening to your favorite metal record while your sister is in the next room BLASTING the soundtrack to the Breakfast Club through your thin walls. SO weird but SO COOL! Comes in a gorgeously designed black and white cardboard sleeve that opens like a gatefold, the inside a series of alternating black and white triangles, and then the gatefold opens again with two more triangular panels, one black and and one white, all very austere and mysterious looking.

MPEG stream: Dividing Island
MPEG stream: Cement To Stone
MPEG stream: A Line You Can Cross
MPEG stream: Dethroning The Optimyth

Last year we listed the cd reissue of an album called Growers Of Mushroom by England's Leaf Hound. Their Zeppish moves and overt druggy allusions have made that sole record of theirs from 1971 a sought-after classic for those into the stonery proto-metal of the era. The album's big hit (among connoisseurs of '70s heavy rock, if not in the singles charts of the day) was a hard-riffing song called "Freelance Fiend". So, here it is on vinyl, as re-recorded live in 2005 by the band's new lineup! That's right, and if you saw our review of that Growers Of Mushroom reissue, you'll remember that it included a brand new bonus track, meaning they were back in business. Original Leaf Hound vocalist Pete French, still in possession of wailin' pipes, hooked up with some youngsters to continue Leaf Hound's legacy in the present day. And as wary as we are of "reunions" (can you even call this that?), there's really no reason why Pete and the 'new' Leaf Hound shouldn't make music again, particularily with current '70s-sounding bands like Witchcraft to encourage them. "Freelance Fiend" remains a killer track, and on the flip there's that new song from the cd reish, "Too Many Rock 'n Roll Times", also recorded live and now pressed to wax. And it's a pretty decent addition to the Leaf Hound songbook, we have to say... now we're wondering if there's more to come? Maybe even a -second- Leaf Hound album? Apparently so. We can only imagine how excited Rise Above would be to get to release that, as doing this 7" was probably already a big thrill for them. Limited to 500 copies.

Holy shit! This is the crank call mother lode. By now if you don't immediately start to giggle at the mere mention of Longmont Potion Castle, you are truly missing out. This one man prank call juggernaut has spent almost the last 20 years torturing unsuspecting folks, shop keepers, Radio Shack employees, old ladies, testosterone fueled jerks and pretty much everybody else with his totally surreal, unbelievably hilarious phone calls. This box set collects EVERY Longmont recording ever, including a whole disc of unreleased stuff, as well as the long out of print and barely available VHS tape on DVD for the first time! You think the calls are crazy, you should see the havoc this man can wreak on a call in talk show. This is absolutely essential for any one onto bizarre recordings, found sounds, prank calls, all around weirdness. Included in this box set is LONGMONT POTION CASTLE (originally released in 1988), LONGMONT POTION CASTLE II (originally released in 1992), LONGMONT POTION CASTLE III (originally released in 1995), LONGMONT POTION CASTLE 4 (originally released in 2002), LATE EIGHTIES-VEIN (originally released in 2003), LONGMONT POTION CASTLE 5 (originally released in 2005), a bonus disc that includes a lot of the metal interludes that were cut when the original cassettes were transferred to cd, and the original LONGMONT POTION CASTLE VHS tape, now on DVD(-r) for the first time with tons of extra footage. Also includes a massive set of liner notes, with detailed track listings and the story behind each disc, as well as a custom LPC magnet. Each one personally signed by Mr. LPC himself! Here's some of our past raves about all things LPC: How can you not love a guy who gets off on torturing the clerks at radio shack and is obsessed with Tandy products?! A guy who spits out the most retarded and baffling products/names/etc: gugliata, voltor, leprechanjulius!! And on one disc, he continually harasses a foul mouthed cantakerous old man, but by the end of the disc, they become buddies, with the old man asking how the tape was going and LPC promising to send him a copy. FUCKING HEARTWARMING! How often do you get that on a crank call record?!!? Stupid and silly and once in a while totally inspired. This is still to this day constantly in the stereo on all of our road trips and so much Longmmont verbiage has become vernacular for us and all of our friends. Longmont Potion Castle is the master of deadpan confusional telephone terror. Mr. Longmont no longer practices his art, having hung up his phone (hee hee... sorry) several years ago. But we can still listen and laugh. This stuff never stops being funny. The cool thing about LPC, is he's not an asshole, and he doesn't necessarily set out to piss people off, even though it's obviously inevitable. And when he does get in a tough guy "I'll kick your ass" sort of verbal sparring match, his choice of threats are so ridiculous and nonsensical, you find yourself almost embarassed for him, like the little tiny kid who is oblivious to his mortality and insists on standing up to the bully and always gets his ass whupped. Then add in his obsession with squid meat and an amazing litany of bizarre items / objects / names / services he invokes or offers or pretends to be looking for: Spencer Zebra, Aqualamb, Chowder Julius, Wovenloaf, Frickey Weaver, Chimp Giraffe Loop (making us laugh just typing those!). Wow! It really is amazingly funny. And bizarre. I Easily the best, funniest, most bizarre series of crank calls ever. There's the always popular picking fights with strangers, but Mr. LPC does it so much better than most with his Steven Wright deadpan and his ridiculous non-sequiters. Constant references to deliveries of peacocks from Lithuania, offers of free manure, and an endless litany of nonsensical recommendations, bizarre suggestions, and problematic overtures, all delivered in that likeable guy-next-door deadpan. Always does raise the question WHY DON'T PEOPLE JUST HANG UP?!?! Lucky for us they don't. We also get a dose of Longmont's metal obsession with the occasional freaked out death metal interludes. So dumb and funny and brilliant. Be sure and keep your ears peeled for a truly distrubing call, that goes from funny to really fucking sad in a matter of minutes, between LPC, a depressed suicidal goth teen and his overbearing fucked up dad. Wow. these discs are full of magic moments like that, a few sad, lots of them just plain demented, but most of them so completely bust a gut hilarious!! So buy this or we'll start talkin' whip, and may even bring a tennis racket toyaleyup!!!

MPEG stream: Syop Playing Harmonica
MPEG stream: Goat
MPEG stream: Levi
MPEG stream: Peacock
MPEG stream: UPS Freakout 1
MPEG stream: Spencer Zebra
MPEG stream: Aqualamb
MPEG stream: Loud Tones

So fucked. Of course it is. It's freakin' LUGUBRUM. Allan and Andee's favorite black metal band ever, pretty much, almost. Well, at least when we're in the mood for REALLY WEIRD black metal from a bunch of Belgians who dress like farmers and eat carrots with their beloved beer. Weirdos these guys are for sure, but unlike some of the more "avant-garde" black metal acts such as Arcturus, Sigh, and Ulver (amazing as those acts are/have been) there's nothing so overtly, obviously calculated to be weird for weirdness sake from these guys. Lugubrum's insanity is more organic, but not inadvertent either like the maybe idiot savant status of Rethaf Ruo or Striborg. No, these geniuses strike a balance, and do utterly their own thing, norms and abnorms be damned. On this latest album (their sixth full-length cd), saxophones and clanking chains and droning loops of organ grinder music aren't merely eccentric elements added to a formula black metal base, but are fully integrated into the band's unique musical vision. Is it even black metal? What does that mean? What does it matter? Their seemingly scatological, "brown metal" lyrics are cryptic, beyond easy comprehension, and that might be just as well. "The Kiss On The Anus"? "At The Base Of Their Tail"? "We Slying Sucked Stolen Bread"? Don't ask. Submit instead to the music, rumbling along, vocals growling howling mad, Funhouse saxophone blowing crazily over and under the scuzzy, sloppy, necro riffery. Somehow they're THIS weird and outside of genre boundaries (employing banjos along with blastbeats) yet are accepted as being among the grimmest of the grim by the true, cult, elite, black metal diehards. They've got 'em scared. Even though they sound like Abruptum playing jazz, or Celtic Frost jamming with Residual Echoes, or Brainbombs covering Venom... They walk the fine, wavering line between intentional absurdity and deeply, confusingly meaningful art and we love 'em for it.

MPEG stream: Holy Fools Embodied
MPEG stream: Though Chained

Len Lye was a staple of the 50's and 60's art scene in Greenwich Village and a leading figure in the burgeoning field of kinetic art. He designed and built a series of large scale metal sculptures that not only moved, but also created sound. Just to look at, the sculptures are breathtaking, very sleek and modern, simple and stunning, large sheets of steel, strange little metallic antennae, long twisted metal strips, all hanging or spinning or vibrating. Like some alien machines, whose function can not be discerned. So mysterious and lovely. This disc is the first time the sounds of Lye's sculptures have been recorded and released commercially. And they are just as haunting and beautiful as the strange pieces of metal that produced them. The sounds are quite varied, depending on the piece, from reverberating pulses, like a struck spring, whirring metallic drones, the overtones shifting in pitch as the metal bends and twists, warm subterranean whirs, musicbox like melodies, simple subtle chimes, clattery clang and crash, subtle almost industrial rhythms, like a sprinkler or the blades on a helicopter, scraping metallic soundscapes, like a million little metal bugs rustling alongside one another, and then there's some full on spaced out swirl and hiss and shimmer like wires whipping in the wind, which sounds like Merzbow or Total, way too dense and weird to be the work of nothing but a big piece of metal, but it is. Magical, mysterious and pretty darn amazing.Ô Comes with a big book of linernotes, text about the performances / recordings as well as lovely photos of each of Lye's sculptures.

MPEG stream: Blade
MPEG stream: Universe
MPEG stream: Roundhead

We raved about Malcolm's most recent lp not too long ago, Swimming In It, a lovely disc of neo-Appalachian Fahey worship. More of that steel string swoon and twang we love so much. But it seems like Malcolm realized that maybe this whole modern Appalachia movement was getting a bit crowded, especially for someone with Malcolm's experimental tendencies, so he took his guitar, actually his guitars plural, and struck out on his own to make the singularly strange and absolutely lovely Hung. Released on fellow New Zealander Campbell Kneale's Celebrate Psi Phenomenon label, Hung is a series of solo simultaneously played multiple guitar performances. Did you get that? Multiple guitars, all played at once by the same player. No processing or effects, just a bunch of guitars. Some contact mic-ed, some with extra strings and springs and things, one at his side, one at his feet, one in his lap. And wow is this strange and beautiful. From the opening track of chiming twinkling melodies with the guitars somehow sounding just like bells, to the percussive pluck of "Drops" with the guitar sounding like a marimba, a spare and spacious slow motion meander, to the raga-like "The Bells" with one guitar offering up a sitar like buzz, one acting as a sort of scraping percussion, while the other shimmers and glistens. Other tracks sound like clangy and clanky mechanical music, others like washed out indie jangle and strum, while others are almost doomlike in their acoustic dirginess. There's even a Steve Lacy cover, totally and wonderfully transformed. Absolutely amazing, must be a wonder to see these pieces performed live too...

MPEG stream: Ghost From The Past
MPEG stream: Hung

For some reason, when we first threw this on, we had completely forgotten about the last Manes record we reviewed a while back, about which we wrote: "How did this exemplar of raw, primitive, droney black metal end up making melodic trip hop? And how did they get Ozzy Osbourne (or, in truth, his close sonic approximation) to handle the vocals??" I guess we had maybe blocked that record out, and were still expecting, apparently against all odds, a batch of raw buzzy grim primitive black metal. But now upon reflection, this new Manes doesn't seem quite as ridiculous. At least within the realms of Manes' strange sonic world. Following a similar metalhead-alienating career path as Ulver and Solefald, this Norwegain outfit has basically shrugged off any and all vestiges of their metal past (minus the occasional 'heavy' guitar). At first, having forgotten completely about Manes' stylistic shift, we were annoyed, and a bit bummed, but approaching this without any metallic expectations yields some strange pleasures, and we of all people certainly can't begrudge a band who wants to try some crazy fucked up shit, even if it's not exactly what we were hoping for. The first track, is oddly enough a 16 Horsepower cover! Manes converts the swampy revivalist blues of 16HP into some sort of dark cabaret, with wailing crooning, clean vocals, almost MTV style, over chiming U2 like guitars, it does get a little bit heavier, but not THAT heavy, very glossy like later Solefald. The rest of the record veers from glossy metallic sort-of-pop to techno remixes, the songs are loaded with lots of synths, a little like a lighter version of Marilyn Manson or Orgy with processed distorted guitars and industrial drum machine rhythms and those very Ozzy-like vocals. A few tracks sound like Blur (!) and one sounds distinctly like Erasure, or maybe Duran Duran with its cheesy eighties hard pop sound, affected vocals and drum machines, which makes sense when you check the liner notes, which mention the fact that the song in question is somewhat inspired by Duran Duran" which explains why it features little bits of DD songs sort of morphed into slightly more metallic industrial shapes. The three remixes range from blissy, glitchy trip hop groove, to a sort of blown out techno soundscape, like an instrumental Front 242, to the final track which is a slow shifting blast of white noise weirdness. A big ol' crazy mess of very un-metal weirdness, but it's got some strange appeal for sure. Fans of recent Ulver should definitely check this out...

MPEG stream: Cinder Alley
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San Francisco's darling electronic conceptualists Matmos have crafted an ambitious collection of audio portraits for their 6th full album, allowing their baroque sampling tricknology to articulate the metaphors in mapping out the complexities of each of the portraits. The collection of audio portraits represents the inspiration pantheon for Matmos, ranging from the ivory tower of academia to far reaches of underground culture. Hence, there's analytical philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, the scabrous feminist Valarie Solanas, New York house legend Larry Levan, Germs' frontman Darby Crash, homoerotic photographer James Bidgood, eccentric producer Joe Meek, gay chronicler Boyd McDonald, countercultural godfather William S. Burroughs, and noir-thriller novelist Patricia Highsmith. Matmos' work has always been a cavalcade of electro-acoustic stunts directed within a studied and adventurous reading of contemporary electronica tinged with comedic overtones, ranging from black humour to slapstick antics. The Rose Has Teeth In The Mouth Of A Beast is no different, romping through wah-wah splattered porno funk, mutant disco beats clipped with diva-house vocals, noirish concrete-collages, and tracks literally wrapped in semen stained sheets. As Matmos deconstructs and compresses the dense histories of each of their portrait subjects into the context of a six to ten minute electronica tracks, it's the details that Matmos amass that give each of their portraits such charm and pleasure. Very well done, indeed!

MPEG stream: Steam And Sequins For Larry Levan
MPEG stream: Semen Song For James Bidgood
MPEG stream: Solo Buttons For Joe Meek

Another blast of punk as fuck-ness from this Bay Area bastion of punk and DIY. This month, part two of the article Business And Punk Rock with contributions from the folks who run Fat Wreck Chords, Ebullition, Sound Idea, Razorcake, Give Praise and a bunch more, scene report: Poland with a list of loads of Polish bands, interviews with and articles about The Lawrence Arms, Imperial Leather, Magrudergrind, Boom Boom Kid (don't worry, we haven't heard of most of the bands featured in MRR either!), part two of the Vitamin X tour diary. tons and tons of columns, including one by former mailorder master Elliott, lots of letters, news, politics, book reviews, record reviews and MORE!

This is it! The one. The record that launched a MILLION other records. Half the bands we love and freak out about wouldn't even exist if it weren't for THIS RECORD. Or if they did, they sure as heck wouldn't sound the way they do. Sure there was Spiderland. And the theory that everyone who heard Spiderland started a band. And the Pixies. Same thing. And let's not forget Nirvana. Between Slint, Nirvana and the Pixies, the template for angsty loud/soft indie rock was pretty much defined FOREVER. Until Young Team that is. Mogwai most definitely owed a huge debt to the above mentioned big three, but there was just something special about Young Team. The ultimate brooding post rock stumble into massive epic metallic crush record we had ever heard. This is heavy, but oh so pretty, dark and romantic, but also creepy and seriously ominous sounding. SoftÔsuper blissed-out meandering almost-ambient soundscapes, dark brooding passages of near silence, eventually shattered into a million pieces by bursts of frenzied, rhythmic noise a la Godflesh, crushing and metallic and machinelike, but always ready to drift and fade back into soft swooning tranquility. But even the loud heavy parts areÔstrangely melodic and ridiculously catchy. This record is so fucking great. Even now, a decade after it was first released, and after we've heard about a million bands do their own versions of Young Team. Maybe the best way to really drive home how massive and amazing and incredibly influential this record is, would be to list a handful of bands who would probably not exist, at least not in their present forms, if it weren't for this record. No disrespect to any of these groups AT ALL (we love them every single one of them) but you gotta give credit where credit is due... the sons of Mogwai include Godspeed! You Black Emperor, Isis, Timeout Drawer, Snowblood, the Ocean, Magyar Posse, Gregor Samsa, Aereogramme, This Is Your Captain Speaking, Explosions In The Sky, Sigur Ros, Pelican, Mono, Grails, Tarentel, Jimmy Cake, Switchblade, Minsk, Conifer, Tides, Eden Maine, Rosetta, Red Sparrowes, Indian, Baroness, Cult Of Luna, Mouth Of The Architect and we could go on and on. So if you love any or all of the above mentioned bands, and how could you not, and you've somehow never heard Young Team, you are in for it in a big beautiful way! Now's your chance. Don't blow it. You will not be sorry. As for the rest of you, who for one reason or another just haven't listened to Young Team in years, lent it lost it or whatever, now is the time to revisit one of indie rock's most epochal releases, you just may very well have forgotten how devastatingly fantastic this record is! Finally available again (as an import), after being out of print in the State for years and years!!!

MPEG stream: Yes! I Am A Long Way From Home
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Hard to believe that there was a time when Monster Magnet were not goofy cartoon parodies of metallic space rock (and we mean that in a good way). We love their ridiculous lyrics, overblown I AM GOD themes, their obsession with hotrods and honies and loads and loads of drugs, and of course their sound, that Hawkwind on steroids super RAWK. But there was a time, when Monster Magnet were fucking scary. A drug drenched musical outerspace acid trip, a BAD trip, all blown out guitars, every pedal turned all the way up, amps to infinity, face behind a greasy mop of hair, house lights off, black lights on, one riff beaten to death and launched heavenward. This was that time. It was a satanic drug thing they used to say. And it sounds like it. Originally released in 1991, "Tab" is arguably the band's finest moment, 30 minutes of outerspace drug rock divinity. The ultimate slab of psychedelic downer drug rock. The first 6 or 7 minutes are a primitive Krautrocky jam, simple propulsive drum beat, wordless vocals, sparse instrumentation, before the drugs really kick in, then "Tab" becomes a supecharged Loop or Spacemen 3, all fuzzy guitars, and swirls of reverb and delay and every other effect under the sun. Over the course of the next 20 minutes the guitars get more freaked out, the vocals get distorted and delayed and shot into space, the effects take over completely until the band is barely audible under the dizzying sonic chaos. So blissfully divine. "25" is way more rocking, a pounding drum beat, and a ripping garage rock riff, vocals a super distorted smear of sound, again the whole thing drenched in space rock goo and blown out rawk madness. "Longhair" is a lazy laidback psychdrone groove, stoned and staggering, giving Kyuss a style and sound to rip off for sure. And the final track "Lord 13" is a shuffling spacerock raga, with shuffling percussion, hand drums, strummed acoustic guitar, all under that ubiquitous druggy haze. For this new reissue, they've tacked on a 7 minute live version of "Spine Of God". Murky and lo-fi, but appropriately druggy and spacey, with plenty of hilarious crowd conversations between folks who were oblivious to the fact that they were standing RIGHT next to the guy taping the show, but the mighty power of "Spine Of God" is untouchable, a slowly uncoiling dirge, that is somehow only enhanced by the dipshit telling his friend about some new tape he got. It's a satanic drug thing. You wouldn't understand.

MPEG stream: Tab
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YESS!!! Ohmigod, ohmigod, ohmigod! Those are direct quotes from Allan the day he discovered, totally out of the blue, that this album had been reissued on cd by the Japanese label EM Records (same folks who put out the Symphony of the Birds reish reviewed elsewhere this list). Kerry and Andee were both in the office that day and can attest that Allan just about jumped out of his skin, his voice positively yelping with excitement. And now we're ALL going ohmigod, ohmigod too since the box from Japan that Allan ordered arrived and Moolah is among us. Ok, so what the heck is Moolah?? Well we're talking a super-obscure psychedelic/experimental Holy Grail album here. Allan only knew about it 'cause he'd heard some of it on a cd-r burn that our pal Loren Chasse had gotten from Jan Anderzen of Finland's Kemialliset Ystavat. Totally weird, damaged, krautrocky cosmic psych with electronic drones, haunting classical piano, and fucked up rhythms! According to Anderzen, it was an ultra rare LP from the '70s by a band called Moolah, entitled Woe Ye Demons Possessed. Wow. Allan found it hard to believe that was really true, and that it wasn't just something recorded by some genius Finnish forest freak friend of Anderzen's directly for the cd-r. But some diligent research revealed that the mysterious Moolah was indeed a band from New York who released an album on what was probably their own label, Druidstone (!), in 1974. But it was still pretty much unknown and almost utterly unobtainable. It didn't seem to have ever been reissued. And even our most '70s knowledgable psych-rock reissue supplier in Sweden hadn't heard of it at all. But we never lost hope. And now, thanks to the extremely strange and cool Japanese label EM Records, here at last we present to you Moolah on cd! We're still left in the dark about a lot of the details of this mysterious record's history (EM's sales info is mostly in Japanese) but from the album cover notes reproduced in the cd package we can tell you that the men behind Moolah were a duo named Walter Burns and Maurice Roberson, who recorded this, "their paranormal concertwork ...a cosmic rock relaxation creation" at a "secret studio in New York's Greenwich Village". There's also some amazing pagan poetry on the sleeve, here's a few lines: "Licking BLOOD Drinking TEARS Sacrificing LOVE on the Altar of Tomorrow Eating FRUITS of Stolen Vineyards With Withered Young Mouthes That Sing The OLD SONGS WHICH WERE FORBID". And the music is as amazing as what Allan remembered. Dreamy, beautiful ambience -and- disturbingly chaotic, claustrophobic sounds. Shimmery, murky, distorted, primitive... is it even rock music? For the day, about as far out as you could get. Indeed, ahead of its time. Such tracks as "Crystal Waters", "Terror Is Real" and "The Hatd Hit" are lo-fi jams full of dubby echo effects, indistinct voices intoning New Age ideas, crazy backwards percussion, and insectoid squiggles of electronics. And we think we heard a purring cat in there too. The question is: did the Moolah duo simply inhabit their own, messed-up, mystical little world (which seems likely, judging by those sleeve notes of theirs), or had these guys heard records by early Kraftwerk, Amon Duul, Kluster, and Neu!? We wonder. But either way, the krautrock scene's freakiest had nothing on Moolah. File with such rare, eccentric, outsider psych artifacts as the Cromagnon's Orgasm, Yahowha 13's Penetration, and Comus' First Utterance. What a find. If you like weird, lost, lovely, maybe a bit frightening music THIS IS FOR YOU.

MPEG stream: Crystal Waters
MPEG stream: Courage
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Babylon Springs is a short five song follow-up to John Darnielle's achingly beautiful Mountain Goats album The Sunset Tree. From the sounds of this EP Darnielle's on a roll, continuing his trademark deeply personal storytelling that lays bare his heart and his scars in an increasingly polished and produced setting. A definite highlight is the fourth song "Sometimes I Still Feel The Bruise" which could easily appeal to a much broader audience. Really really good!

MPEG stream: Ox Baker Triumphant
MPEG stream: Sometimes I Still Feel The Bruise

It's been so long since we could whole heartedly rave about a Kool Keith record. A LONG time. Since Dr. Octagon maybe? Yeah, okay, we sorta dug Sex Style, but we much prefer the sci fi alien what-the-fuck KK to the kinky pervert KK for sure. And while Mr. Nogatco is no Dr. Octagon, it's as close as we've gotten in a long long time, so we'll take what we can get. This is some more of that Kool Keith freaky conspiracy theory shit, something about aliens, secret autopsies, you know the sort of thing. There's even a live alien dissection at the end of the disc, after a blissed out ambient skitterscape, with Keith nimbly leaping lyrically all over the fucking place, there's a strange microcassette recording of Keith talking all sorts of weirdness about some alien bodies they found in the desert, talking about their gel-type blood and stuff. What a nut. And so good to have him back in full freaked out space cadet mode. And while the music isn't quite as dense and deliriously wacked as the Automator's Octagonal beatscapes, producer IZ Real does all right, managing some pretty ominous X-FIles worthy sonic swells, plenty of haunting creep and cinematic crawl, moaning horns, rumbling drones, heavy metal guitars, a dark and doomy late night, rain soaked, blood drenched, government conspiracy, invaders from Mars series of freaky sci fi hip hop instrumentals for Keith as Mr. Nogatco to freak out over, and freak out he does, a flurry of surreal non sequiturs delivered in a lazy stoned drawl, an outerspace pod people mad as fuck flow, tales of dark space, bionic fuses, space men, eBay, elevation power, kinetics, mass gasses, credit cards, galaxy waxers, astronauts, dictators, force fields, green hands, slushies, rocketships and bikinis, laser corps, sneakers, lightning bugs, bubblegum, galactic foes, Jolly Ranchers, black hearts, hot milk, laser beams and all the other things Mr. Nogatco is fighting for, or battling against, or using to create a subatomic lightspeed jetliner, or just plain making up, in order to get in the pants of some three legged two headed space princess that he's supposed to be rescuing. Phew. Or maybe he's just plain nuts...

MPEG stream: Bionic Fuse
MPEG stream: Night Flyer (Force Field)

This one is for the drone obsesses among you. Not the soft shimmery dronesters, although you softies might take a shine to this, no, this is a deeeeeeeeeeep dark doooomy drone, a massive 40+ minute single stretch of undulating organic rumble. Broken old Casio keyboards, found sounds, field recordings all woven into a huge rafter rattling, bass bin blowing, bone shaking, cranium cracking lowercase minimal dirge. Pulses and whirs, rumbles and growls, all rendered indistinct, painted black and folded in on themselves, a black hole, a thousand helicopters hovering in place, a hundred meters below the sea, two planets colliding, the shockwave traveling through the universe setting up sympathetic vibrations in every inanimate object in existence, until the whole galaxy is bombinating like a struck tuning fork. So awesome. LIMITED TO 110 COPIES. We managed to get the last 20 so once these are gone they are gone for good!

MPEG stream: Everybody Wants The Tide (excerpt)

OM....OM... OM . . . O M . . . . Their debut last year, Variations On A Theme, was heralded by many as the second coming of Sabbathy stoner/doom legends Sleep. No surprise, considering that Om consists of two thirds of Sleep, and pretty much sounds like two thirds of Sleep too. Same low-end bass (Al Cisneros), thundering drums (Chris Hakius), and druggy, chant-like vocals (Al again, stepping up to the mic). All that's missing is the guitar (Sleep guitarist Matt Pike is busy with High On Fire right now). We gave that album the thumbs up, won over by the psychedelic trance-like heaviness of their jams and their mantrically soothing yet (to us) unintentionally amusing singing, which made us giggle 'cause it just never let up, delivering endless deadpan lyrics of cosmic hippy nonsense in a zoned-out monotone. We don't want to say it was so bad it was good, 'cause it really wasn't bad, but there was some of that kind of bad/good alchemy going on. And we ended up lovin' it. And of course, the resemblance to old faves Sleep helped too. Now Al and Chris are back with the second Om opus. It's simultaneously a heckuva lot like their debut but even better somehow. Productionwise, yes. And also perhaps 'cause while the two-piece line-up on Variations sounded like Sleep without the guitar, and maybe (heck, definitely) would have been even better with a guitarist, now they've made that lack of guitar seem more the ways things should be, by getting more and more hushed and spacious and mimimal here, thereby making it seem like just bass and drums is enough, not like something's missing. They've made a virtue out of a necessity, realizing that by really adopting a "less is more" aesthetic they'd be playing to their strength. And it works. Listen to it straight through (you'll want to... it's two tracks, about 33 minutes) and you'll find it quite floatational, even without chemical assistance. This riff-repetitive spaceout drone dirge drug is all you need. And Al's lyrics remain occultic, obtuse and slightly absurd, giving this the effect of a hypnosis tape meant to help build your vocabulary (along with heightening your conciousness). He uses such everyday words as "clesiast", "epison", "aurican", "tunnement", and "agurate". It's heavy rock that requires a heavy dictionary to decipher! So if you liked the first OM, you'll love this. And if you weren't sure before, definitely check this one out. As with their first album, file with Sleep's Jerusalem, Electric Wizard's Supercoven, and UFOmammut's Godlike Snake. OM....OM... OM . . . O M . . . .

MPEG stream: At Giza
MPEG stream: Flight Of The Eagle

This one is a total mystery. Not sure where they're from (New Zealand we guess) or what their story is, other than the fact that it was released on Campbell Kneale's (Birchville Cat Motel) Celebrate Psi Phenomenon label, and that it is one seriously blown out punked up slab of garage-y scuzz and roll. Heavy and noisy, spastic and sludgy, when this was playing in the front of the store, Allan went up to see what black metal record was playing if that tells you anything. Filthy and crumbling ultra distorted guitars, boy girl vocals WAY down in the mix, riffs that go from paint peeling shred to gut churning rumble. Some ungodly hybrid of vintage Dead C, the Butthole Surfers, The Germs, Flipper, recent AQ faves the Violent Students, and recent Siltbreeze noisemakers Times New Viking. This is definitely punk as fuck, but wrapped in layer after layer of guitar grit and broken amp splatter, classic punk rock swallowed whole, chewed up and spit out in huge sludgy gobs of grrrrr and rrrroooaaar. Epic sludgescapes of pound and churn, showered with wild lightning bolts of squealing feedback. There seem to be pop songs in there somewhere, but don't even try to dig that deep, you'll just end up bruised and bloodied, or you'll lose a hand or an arm. Best to just lay back, close your eyes real tight, clamp your hands tight over your ears, let these noise rockers just back their ten ton punksludge steamroller right over you and pray you survive.

MPEG stream: We've Got TV
MPEG stream: Fire Down Below
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DOOM. As per AQ tradition, we should throw some extra 'O's in there just to indicate just how doomy this is -- DOOOOOOooooooooOOOM! Not to get sidetracked, but Doom might be the only musical genre that you can deliberately misspell to indicate extra enthusiasm for whatever example of said genre you're describing. RRRRap doesn't work. Nor would you say Woooorld Music. And adding extra 'o's to Pop is a just bad idea, unless you're talking about pop you don't like. But doom, being all about being slow and low, just gets doomier when you exaggerate the spelling into doooooooooooom. The point of all this? That the debut disc from Spanish doom band Orthodox, needs, like, exponential 'o's to really get at its doominess. Recently and rightly hailed as an Album Of The Month on Julian Cope's psychedelic drone/doom/druid rock lovin' website Head Heritage, Orthodox's Gran Poder ("Great Power") consists of three looong tracks of gloomy, glacial heaviness mixed with more chaotically rockin' parts, with one brief piano-laced interlude seperating tracks two and three. These crushing compositions are almost symphonically grand, an often exceedingly slow grind of eternally doomed drone like Earth or SUNNO))), sometimes speeding up to rock out psychedelically in the style of Argentina's Los Natas, graced with heavily tremelo-laden vocals or utterly spaced out ambience that make us think of Thrones and Yob. Throughout this sludgey stoner soundscape, you'll hear feedback wailing like lamenting lost souls, the rumbling drum battery either nervously dodging the lugubrous riffs as they fall from the sky, or pounding in unison with the guitar and bass, sounding like the gates of an abandoned ancient cavernous cathedral slamming shut... over and over again. We imported a whole bunch of these direct from the label in Spain because we're pretty sure that fans of the likes of Corrupted (who also sing in Spanish, after all) and Yob and Sleep and UFOmammut and all the other extra-o's deservin' dooooooOOOOoom bands that we love would want this! And if for some reason you need further convincing, please look up Julian Cope's review on his site, where he references Flower Travellin' Band's Satori and the Mediterranean paganistic roots of Catholic ritual and "Rumble" by Link Wray and much much more, his incredibly enthusiastic review almost a call to arms for doom fanatics... and he also includes cool pictures of the black-robed band members he took on a trip to their land!

MPEG stream: "Geryon's Throne
MPEG stream: "Geryon's Throne
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This instrumental space rock trio from Michigan has been smoking heaping bowlfuls of the same stuff Hawkwind used to burn up and is thus churning out some serious space rock with mighty results. Spacious and sweeping, chugging with propulsive groove, but without the quiet-loud dynamics of post-rock bands like Mogwai, nor the shoe-gazing drone burners of bands like Growing and Belong. More like a 120 mph road-trip through Death Valley at sunset and the acid just kicked in.

MPEG stream: SnakeFace
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Jack Rose may be the new John Fahey, the modern master of neo-Appalachia, his steel string skills unsurpassed,Ôbut he still calls Pelt home. Rose, lets his bandmates in Pelt, Patrick Best, Mikel Dimmick and Mike Gangloff take him away from his pick and twang and together they explore a slow motion soundscape of ghostlike ragas and endless drones. Dark dense landscapes of chiming bells, buzzing strings, and warm whispery whirs.ÔThe first track here is actually a Jack Rose song, and it sounds like it. Lilting mournful steel string guitar, with the other guys in Pelt swirling and swooshing, in, under, around and over Rose's guitar with an assortment of exotic instruments, harmonium, sruti box and singing bowls as well as gongs and flutes and fiddles. The rest of the disc is made up of the lengthy 3 part "Bestio Tergum Degero", a cavernous wash of rich overtones and metallic reverberations, huge swells of sound like metal waves on an iron sea, microscopic vibrations traveling lazily the length of a soft metal soundscape. Lush and hauntingly alien, a dark dreamy, slightly ominous drone drenched drift. As always, so nice!

MPEG stream: Calais To Dover
MPEG stream: Bestio Tergum Degero Pt. 1

We've been sitting on this one for a while, not sure why really 'cause we're some of the biggest Posies fans around! Well, co-Posie Jon Auer's solo album reminded us of just how much we love them, and gave a us a kick in the pants to show it. Apologies for our tardiness, fellas. Every Kind Of Light is a total return to stellar form for this Seattle pop duo. The combined forces of Auer and Ken Stringfellow are pretty damn hard to beat. Heart-melting vocal harmonies? You betcha. Sweetheart sentimental lyrics? Uh huh. Utterly infectious hooks? Hell yeah. So damn deliriously good! We could gush on, but why? Just get these songs into your ears, and hear for yourself. We command you... please. Psst, there's an even newer album on the horizon slated for the end of June. Can't wait!

MPEG stream: It's Great To Be Here Again!
MPEG stream: Conversations
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OK no matter how indie, underground, death metal, experimental, minimal techno you are you can't deny that at one point in time you dug Prince at at least one of his songs kicked your ass and made you shake it like crazy. Prince's 1999 was actually the very first record Andee bought with his own money! Some of us here are still darn proud of our pure love of Prince. An amazing musician and songwriter whose eccentric persona is what usually gets him attention these days insted of his music, but we still think he's got some juice left in his songwriting. 3121 is one of his stronger albums in recent years with definite nods to his prime past. Of course like most of his recent outings it's not great from start to finish but when he's "workin' up a black sweat" he's still pretty irresistible.

MPEG stream: 3121
MPEG stream: Black Sweat

It had to happen. It probably already has happened actually, but we love the weird, and the random, and we figured you probably would too. This is a Japanese import, not sure exactly who the artist is, but it's 99 tracks, each a rich lustrous tone, some deep and bell like, some soft and sonorous, some high pitched like a sine wave. All you have to do is set your cd player on random and away we go. A soft, subtle ambient journey, that ends up sounding a bit like Morton Feldman's Rothko Chapel, only a bit though. It also sort of sounds like Tibetan bowls, or chiming bells, or soft ambient Japanese music (which I guess it is). Soft and lovely, and most importantly RANDOM. 99 seperate tones means the number of possible songs is an astronomical 9.33262154 x 10 to the 155th! And that's if you only let each tone play once... So even though the disc is actually only about 8 minutes long, set to shuffle it turns into 8 million billion trillion minutes! Or more! Anyway, this seems to work best if you import the disc to iTunes, set to shuffle and with a decent crossfade, then just sit back and drift off, let the gorgeously soft and shimmery, sweet and serene ambience wash over you.

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Oh boy. A red-letter day at AQ when we got this in. You see, several years ago, we'd stocked an amazing "best of" collection called Echoes Aus Zeiten Der Grunen Reise by this krautrock artist, A.R. & Machines (turns out the A.R. stands for Achim Reichel) that in itself was a far out minimalist psychedelic electronic masterpiece years ahead of its time -- and it was just a "best of"! Everybody here loved it. It's been out of print for years, though, and we'd never come across any other reissues, until now! Hence our excitement about this, a double cd containing TWO of Reichel's albums in their entirety, Echo and A.R. IV. If you're familiar with that "best of" cd, you'll recognize a few of the songs, but transformed, extended and built upon -- like you're finally experiencing the entire complex film, not just the titillating preview. If you're not familiar with that "best of," then expect a hypnotic, meandering cream dream that any lover of Eno, Cluster, Can, Neu, Bo Hansson, Kraftwerk, and even Wendy Carlos Williams shouldn't miss. Completely groovy. 1972's Echo, which takes up the largest portion of the two cds, is the highlight here. Long before the re-issue, Julian Cope made it a record of the month on his website and it's not hard to see why. It's a meandering four part -- well, we wouldn't even say "piece," it's more like a realized world -- made up of journeying guitars and plodding percussion with the occasional wailing vocals in English that take it well into the stratosphere. At times low-key, at other times frenzied, but always with an intensity that moves it along steadily. By the time you get to the freakout vocal jam of that acts as the come down of Echo, you've been led through so many emotions and states of mind, that you're spent. Take a break between the two albums since A.R. IV (1973) is another, separate adventure -- still groovy and rhythmic, but a little funkier, a little louder and more focused -- like he's revisiting the territory he covered in Echo but he's more familiar with the place & can take you directly to all the cool places. Actually, this re-issue would have been a shoo-in for Record Of The Week if only we thought we could get more. But according to our supplier, the forty or so copies we have now might be the last we'll get, as this is apparently an all-too-limited reissue. Ah well. Get it while you can!

MPEG stream: Das Echo Der Gegenwart
MPEG stream: Vita

From the same UK label that brought us that great Hey Colossus album listed recently, here's something also really cool but VERY very different.... where Hey Colossus was brutally heavy and rhythmic, this band, Reigns, is so pleasantly pretty and placid. Utterly gorgeous, really, and mysterious. We're reminded of such artists as Stafraenn Hakon, Eluvium, Sonna, and Sigur Ros. It's that sort of gauzy, mellow, melodic post-rock, with songs constructed from gentle guitar and piano figures, operating in a zone of beautiful ambience, infused with indistinct electronic detritus. Swells of live percussion or electronic beats sometimes appear, too, but the mood remains blissful, if almost somber. But not really somber since there's a strange, very subtle sense of humor afoot, part of the weird conceptual framework that Reigns have invented for this album. Yes, it's a concept album! And a mostly-instrumental one at that, with no real singing to speak of, though you will occasionally hear voices drifting in the mix, including a computer voice (a la Radiohead) on the fourth track, "Translating". The concept? It's intentionally vague and sort of surreal, but first off we're told that this was supposedly "recorded on location by Reigns operatives A & B". The title We Lowered A Microphone Into The Ground, taken literally, provides an imaginary scheme for the album. Each track is assigned a depth, ranging from 23 meters to 1 mile. Thus, track 2: "Corners & The Straights (102 metres)". Or track 9: "The Fattest Goose Shall Be The Soonest To The Spit (1460 metres)". Inside the handsome digipack you'll find the "Original Site Transcript" giving notes on what was encountered at each depth by the two Reigns operatives. Some examples: "(102 metres) First subterranean voice. Operative B suffers small breakout of hives on ungloved hand." "(416 metres) Foul smelling miasma rises from hole. Surrounding grass visibly pales." "(1001 metres) Sudden rise in static. Recording levels unchanged. Operative B demands that A stop pinching at nape of B's neck. A denies any such activity." More events and phenomena, both mundane and peculiar, are documented. But this is all in the liner notes -- you'll hear the voices mentioned but otherwise this isn't at all meant to -sound- like any sort of static-y, subterranean field recording...it's just very lovely music. Pretty nifty, as most more ordinary post-rock efforts don't exhibit such imagination! We like.

MPEG stream: Buried Chandelier (416 metres)
MPEG stream: Pentecost (1001 metres)

Ah, nothing like a glacially slooooooooow blast of ultra mega doooooooooooooom to calm the nerves, at least that's the way it seems to work around the mail order department for the boys (and girls!) who work back in "the Tombs" of AQ. Rigor Sardonicous - one of our all-time favorite "apocalyptic doom" bands - sent a package recently containing their latest CD, "Risus Ex Mortuus" along with some stickers and a hat...we all fought over the hat a bit, but Andee doesn't like to mess up his "drummer hair" and Jason already sports a bitchin' Rigor Sardonicous glow-in-the-dark print T-shirt, so Allan scored the new lid. Besides, we see him wearing that hunter's orange/camo cap a bit too often lately and - where were we - oh yeah - Risus Ex Mortuus!!! Once again, Rigor Sardonicous is back, and on this CD we get a bunch of re-recorded versions of early tracks from long out-of-print releases, an unreleased track, and even a Kiss cover! You haven't heard "God Of Thunder" until you've heard it Rigor-ized, a thick syrupy sludge-y Sunn-y crawl, with the vocals belched out in impossible guttural grunts. The CD even somehow sports some beautiful "Rigor Sardonicous" Old English script printed on the UNDERSIDE of the CD - SICK !!! Also back again is the signature drum machine (who has occupied the throne since 1991) and the return of 'the most evil cymbal in the world', tha clanged-out trash can lid of a cymbal that we have been totally obsessed with and completely transfixed by since we first heard RS. It's like nothing you've ever heard in the realms of dark murky doomy sludge-pyre music (except on the other RS records obviously). It is back and better (and louder) than ever - way out in front where it constantly rears its ugly head again and again, crashing forth with a clanging clattery crash, before quickly fading back into the sludge. Sounds like Sunn 0))) playing Moss covers at the bottom of a giant sewer pipe while someone drops metal garbage cans from above... a strange kind of beautiful. Mr. drum machine also seems to be taking it up a notch rhythmically with more blast beats, faster and louder, while somehow not actually making the music sound any faster, just weirder and heavier. And there's no mistaking the downtuned, strings-so-slack-they-touch-the-floor, buzzed-out slow sludge rumbling roar coming from the guitar. Like the sound of low-flying aircraft "strumming" overhead power lines... And again those vocals, spread all over the proceedings like some viscous black paste, a subsonic curdle / gurgle that is hardly human. If you close your eyes, you can't help but picture some goo spewing giant lizard ready to consume you whole, or some creepy Hellraiser / Pinhead style hellbeast declaring your doooom. WE LOVE IT. The AQ dark lords, sit upon their throne of skulls, surrounded by fire and burning flesh, demons swooping through the murky skies, the earth trembling, the ground littered with the dead, gazing cooly at the scorched landscape that stretches forever in all directions, before looking to the sky and letting out a blood curdling cry of "MORE EVIL CYMBAL !!!" (The band claim that these are indeed actual cd's, although, we're pretty sure they're cd-r's, but who the hell cares, you can't go wrong for $10.98, and you can't print bitchin' olde English band logos on the playing side of a real cd... or can you?)

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MPEG stream: Rigor Sardonicous
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BACK IN PRINT! Hard to know what to write about this record. It's just so personal and lovely, dark and mysterious, and darn near perfect. Appalachian guitar stretched into droning, dense ragas, steel strings that go from delicate melody to prickly nests of intertangled notes and buzzing overtones. Always completely hypnotic even at its most fierce, and always intense and compelling, even at its most ethereal. Rose (also a member of drone rockers Pelt) has definitely become one of our favorite guitarists and record after record he never fails to blow us away.

MPEG stream: Black Pearls From The River
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Finally, after more than a year, Salt #7 sees the light of day!!! What's the big deal you ask? Well, if you'd been paying attention to the AQ list, you'd know that Salt and its one man staff Kevin somehow manages to kick the asses of all other alternative music mags around with just a beat up old borrowed PC and a photo copier. There's a serious dearth of killer underground music zines, especially ones that cover the sort of music we love, and especially ones that does it with such passion and humor, AND especially ones that are also obsessed with pro wrestling and are not afraid to stick a review of some big match right there between an article about Xasthur and an interview with Boris! As far as we know, there's only one magazine that fits the bill... SALT! So there, music snobs. This is easily our favorite magazine going now, and we still wish someone would just give Kevin a big ol' stack of money so he could start a real glossy magazine, it would totally destroy, equal parts Terrorizer, the Wire, Option, Buttrag, and whatever other weirdness he'd see fit to pack in there. This time around we've got an interview with Swedish metallic grind outfit Burst, unknown to us Ohio three piece rocking juggernaut Driver, an interview with Andy who runs the Riot Season label, a brief history of "Descent", a night of alternative metallic music and art in Leeds, that sounds so cool it makes us wish San Francisco was just a -little- bit closer to the UK, also a bunch of fliers from Descent, one man's alcohol fueled quest to travel across Europe to see SUNNO))), Boris, Circle and more, an interview with Bay Area black metal horde Draugar, an interview with the mighty Malefic of Xasthur, tons of record reviews, and of course a lengthy wrestling review of recent IWA events (as well as an interview with IWA rising star Josh Abercrombie) and finally an interview with Brody's Militia, a wicked thrashcore outfit from Ohio named for legendary wrestler Bruiser Brody. Phew. All hand assembled and photocopied. Lots of photos, and lots of illustrations courtesy of Kevin Salt himself. Here's hoping we don't have to wait a whole year for #8!!

Here's a lilting fuzzy pop debut from the young SF band who go by the moniker Send For Help. Despite their name, none is really needed here. They're doin' just dandy on their own. The foursome's crunch 'n' jangle guitars and soft emotive male vocals suggest that they're drawing ample influences from the likes of Pinback, Modest Mouse Built To Spill and Sonic Youth. Fits right in with the recent No Midnight album from another Bay Area band Birdmonster. Indie rock lives on right here in SF!

MPEG stream: Long Distance Goodbye
MPEG stream: Living In The Past

At last, a readily available cd collection of ultra kitschy, exotic grooviness from the late great Ananda Shankar, nephew of '60s counter-cultural phenom, sitar master Ravi Shankar. Ananda Shankar, a sitar player himself (he gave lessons to Jimi Hendrix, in fact) had his own, rather more cult recording career, beginning with a self-titled album released in the USA in 1970 that featured sitar and Moog laden instrumental versions of such contemporary rock n' roll tunes as "Jumpin' Jack Flash" and "Light My Fire". He went on to record many more albums in India, all of 'em featuring the funky, futuristic East-meets-West fusion of which he was a pioneer. Such tracks as "Dancing Drums" and "Streets Of Calcutta" (both included here) eventually became DJ staples with the rise of the "Asian Underground" club scene in the '90s (Talvin Singh, et. al.). Subtitled "the best of the EMI years", this 22-track, double cd anthology draws from seven different albums by Shankar, recorded for the EMI-owned Gramaphone Company Of India between 1975 and 1999, when Shankar unfortunately died of a heart attack at the age of 53. There's many gems here to tickle the fancy of anyone into Bollywood-style music. (And if you want to hear that 1970 debut album, it's at last been reissued domestically on cd by Collector's Choice, and is also in stock here at AQ.)

MPEG stream: Dancing Drums
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Here's a short lil' three song introduction to this new Bay Area trio. This self-titled EP features gentle slouchy, slightly retro-pop sounding indie rock played out on the basics -- jangly electric guitar, solid bass and tumbling drums. Warm summery shades of Olympia, WA / K Records days past, old Sebadoh, or maybe imagine a lower-fi Sloan? Like what you hear? There'll be a full length comin' out soon, and rumor has it that it's gonna be produced by Mr. Greg 'Deerhoof' Saunier!

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It's been a struggle to figure out what to write about this record. It's a gorgeous moody slab of blissed out mathy post rock. We love that stuff. A lot. But it's really difficult to explain exactly why this record is somehow WAY more than just a post-rock record. It's maybe MORE, more moody, more mathy, more blissed out, but there's still some ineffable thing that turns Shora into a whole other proposition. Similar to the way that Fuehler and Turing Machine in the past took the sound of their post rock forefathers to whole new realms, Shora, breathe new life, breathe fire even, into what has become the sound du riguer of the indie underground. How exactly is a bit tougher to pin down. It's very repetitive, some riffs practically become loops, repeating over and over, inducing some serious mesmeric listening, each looped post-rock-scape is underpinned by dense but complex krautrocky rhythms, that occasionally explode into spikey tangles of free jazz mathrock octopoidal polyrhythms before settling back into dreamy head nodding grooves. The guitars are like chameleons, snakey smokey tendrils one second, huge jagged metallic shards the next, turning from bell like chimes into slinky slippery smears of sound all within a matter of seconds. Majestic, haunting, repetitive and completely fascinating. That's just the first three tracks too, 24 minutes of dense, layered, experimental instrumental rock music perfection. Then there's the very strange final track, which starts out as a soft focused dreamscape, all gauzy and shimmery, before out of the blue, down comees a blast of bizarre pounding Gary Glitter sounding glam rock stomp, right there in the middle of the song! The stomp quickly gives way to some organ drenched Goblin worship before slipping softly back into dark droney ambience. But that's not all, suddenly there are female vocals, and not wispy soft ones, no we're talking a throaty belt, more PJ Harvey than Grouper or Paavoharju, at first it's a little bit jarring, but after a few moments it makes perfect sense. But it only lasts a few moments. Which is maybe indicative of why this band is so great. Putting that much thought into a tiny part, and finding a vocalist, coming up with melodies, lyrics, all for the last minute or two of the last song on your record. Few bands would bother. Which is precisely the point wethinks. It's easy to tell that the same sort of meticulous preparation and deep thought went into every part of this record. But without sacrificing any of the passion or immediacy that makes music so vital. Which is a rare thing indeed.

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BACK IN PRINT, and re-listed for those whose funereal doom collections are lacking this crucial entry. Twenty-seven minutes of pure depression from the cold dark woods of Finland.Ô Skepticism are the masters of ultra doom. Their sound we once described as sitting in a stone church, surrounded by the warm sounds of an old pipe organ, while a doom metal band practices in the basement, their funereal crawl barely audible through the floor, the two sounds mixed into a slow slthery doomish creep. Here on theÔsequel to Skepticism's brilliant, black-metal-meets-Labradford "Stormcrowfleet" album, these doomic depressives up the production values without losing that distinctive sound. The 12 minute first track starts off with nothing but big booming drums, or actually drum singular, pounding out a simple funereal beat, something like 16 bpm, with chiming church bells and a thick organ drone threatening to drown the listener in a thick black pitch of misery and horror, with the occasional burst of downtuned guitar, only to have it quickly subside and slip back beneath the black drones. This is exactly what you would expect to hear in the underworld, a death march stretchingÔ off into infinity, fire pits on every side, demons wielding big drums stretched tight with human skin. So creepy and hauntingly beautiful. There's even some piano, adding an emotional depth not found in most ultra doom. Like a way heavier Low or a doom metal Codeine. The second track is more guitar heavy, with chords unfurled and allowed to slowly dissipate before the next one drops, there are vocals here too, monstrous chest rattling growls, that almost sound like another guitar, swirling keyboards, faux strings, very dramatic and cinematic. The final track, "Chorale" is epic and infused with a sort of pomp. Huge pipe organs unleash thick vibrant chords that whir and drone, the melodies are sort of festive, or at least as festive as doom can get, it's almost like one would expect to hear in the court of some king of the underworld, sitting at huge tables, watching a procession of doomed souls trudge wearily by. So totally intense. It's been a while since we revisited Skepticism, but we're reminded why there's not a doom band alive (or dead) who can touch the doomic might and glory of Skepticism!

MPEG stream: The March And The Stream
MPEG stream: Aether

Here's one epick, metallic seven-inch piece of plastic indeed, released by brothers-in-metal The Lord Weird Slough Feg and Bible Of The Devil, to commemorate their several tours together (including one upcoming this summer... as part of which both bands will be appearing together at the first annual "Alehorn Of Power" festival in BOTD's hometown of Chicago, IL, alongside Manilla Road and Gates Of Slumber, among others!). From San Francisco's Slough Feg, you get two songs on their side, a new one called "Poisoned Treasures" and a killer cover of "Shalala" by their Irish ancestors Thin Lizzy! Extremely rockin'. It's their first recording with new guitarist Angelo Tringali (of cult doom act Cold Mourning), who takes over from Hammers Of Misfortune's John Cobbett in Slough Feg's dual axe onslaught alongside Mike Scalzi. Meanwhile, on the flip, Bible Of The Devil take their twin flying V's into outer space with a tune called "Galactic Violator". Packaged with cool Masters of the Universe comic-booky cover art to boot, with a Galactus-dude on the BOTD's side of the split, mirrored by a horned barbarian guy on the Slough Feg side.

On their follow-up to 2004's Final Straw, these Scots do a remarkable job not only of distinguishing themselves from the rest of their Scottish brethren buddies (Belle & Sebastian, Arab Strap et al), but also of replicating the good ol' American college / alternative rock sound of the '90s a la Gin Blossoms, Goo Goo Dolls, etc. Seriously, it's uncanny. But this isn't necessarily a bad thing, is it? Many of you are well aware that a few of us here at AQ harbor a soft spot for this musical style -- which is also inextricably bound to a crush-like attachment to John Hughes teen movies -- and that soft spot has gradually transferred itself to this band. There's even a duet with Martha Wainwright ("Set The Fire To The Third Bar") which sounds eerily like one of the duets that Kate Bush did back then with Midge Ure or Peter Gabriel! Aw geez.

MPEG stream: Open Your Eyes
MPEG stream: Set The Fire To The Third Bar

Hot off the heels of their most recent reissue campaign come 2 brand new songs from Sonic Youth. These were two of the last recordings made in the band's Murray Street studio. Two Thurston sung tracks that recall the darker and angrier side of SY. These won't be on the new album Rather Ripped coming out this summer, so SY enthusiasts you know you gotta get this.

Aaah, first things first! Please note: DO NOT confuse this band with Andee's '70s pop-metal faves Starz (reissues to be reviewed on the next list). This is a situation where one letter can denote such a difference! I mean, heck, you only need to hear the first few strains of Set Yourself On Fire to realize this is a whole 'nother monster... a nice big fuzzy one carrying a giant bouquet of flowers rather than a spandex'n'denim-clad, axe-wieldin' one! If you like your pop music to be on the lush and pretty side but with a little bit of an edge to it, this new Stars album might be your new favorite... really! More often than not on their third full length, this Canadian band have captured that perfect balance of the bittersweet heartache, the chamber pop elegance, the infectious hook and the energetic punch. Their swirling orchestral arrangements and dreamy soft sensitive boy/girl vocals are fully entwined with the crunchy electric guitars, woozy keyboards and solid rhythm section. Now we're not trying to just lump all the smartie-pop Canadians together, but Stars do seem like the gentler, prettier cousin of the more obtuse and swaggering Arcade Fire (Young & Sexy and Metric also come to mind as like-minded Canucks). One marked detour is the tenth song "He Lied About Death" which -- with its effected spoken-sung male vocals, stuttery beats, swells of distortion and piano key strikes -- is oddly reminiscent of Nine Inch Nails' '90s hit "Closer". Nonetheless (that song included), we can say Set Yourself On Fire is comprised of a baker's dozen pop treasures that'll surely sweep fans of the Delgados, more recent Belle & Sebastian, and maybe Postal Service too right off their feet. Cup sez "HOORAY FOR STARS!"

MPEG stream: Your Ex-Lover Is Dead
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[ aquarius records new arrivals — issue 239 ]