To coincide with their recent summer tour, these two aQ faves offer up this awesome little split single, which really hardly needs a description, as at this point, both bands can seemingly pretty much do no wrong. That said, the first Woods song might be the best thing they've done, total classic sixties pop, which reminds us of the Kinks, and the Bee Gees, but a little bit quirkier and more psychedelic obviously, but it's just so warm and sunshiney and hooky, and the vocals sound better than they ever have, and the harmonies, so divine, cool weird drumming, catchy, but not traditionally so. One of those tracks we find ourselves listening to over and over and over. The second track is more of a trifle, a brief bit of bedroom folk, that sounds skeletal at first, but in its 1:40 manages to get weirdly lush and a little bit tripped out.
Kurt Vile kicks his side off with a brief 39 second opener, jaunty and a little bit silly, before getting into it proper, with some dark brooding moody folk, the first track hushed and intimate, just voice and guitar, some classic sounding folk, while the second track gets a little shoegazey, draping the acoustic guitar with some crumbling washed out haze and warbly organ, the perfect slab cloudy day dreamy folk drift. Awesome.
Probably crazy limited, we have a bunch, but not entirely sure we can get more when we sell out, so if you want one, don't dawdle.
This UK duo blew us away with their debut, as it quickly became a big time favorite at aQ, as its blend of shoegaze and electronica conjured up such a perfect dreamy and breezy state of sound. We've been anxious to hear how they would follow that phenomenal debut. We're so happy to report that Coracle demonstrates that Walls are no flash in the pan, as this album takes some of the ease and breeze of their debut but also injects a whole lot of fresh color and new ideas into the mix. More swirling melodies, more seamless transitions within songs, more radiant energy then we've experienced on almost any other album this year. But warmth is the main ingredient in Walls' sound, and really, it's what makes them so damn pleasurable to listen to. It really does feel like floating and surfing through Technicolor waves in a blissed out sonic sea. Some of us have already penned this in on our favorite albums of 2011 lists!
The lp version includes a cd version of the record as well.
Damn, we've been anxiously awaiting this 7" for quite a while now. When White Magic performed a magical instore earlier this year, she expected to have them then, but they never showed, and in fact, it's been almost two years since rumors began to circulate about the impending release of this mysterious single.
Being that its the first release that Mira Billotte (aka White Magic) has put out herself, and the fact that she's been on tour, and just moved to Los Angeles after a lifetime on the East Coast, it's totally understandable that this record was in limbo for so long. But some artists are well worth waiting for, and "White Widow" is one of the most raw and haunting songs yet from White Magic. We're reminded that Mira's old band Quixotic (check out their amazing two albums if you don't have them!) once covered Black Sabbath, and "White Widow" really does cast such a doomic and mysteriously mystical spell. The flip-side is an awesome and rocking cover of Jefferson Airplane's "White Rabbit", and since Billotte's entrancing vocals have often been compared to Grace Slick at her peak, it's a perfect match. This will for sure please big time White Magic fans, but we also think folks who may not have listened to WM much before but who dig bands like Dead Meadow, Bardo Pond, The Entrance Band, Bark Psychosis, and the like might just love this as well!
From the opening sounds of "Art Of Almost" it sounded as if we were about to experience another game-changing Wilco album, on par with the seminal Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. Its krauty electronics and crunchy synths sounding more like something on a new Radiohead record then what Wilco's been doing over their last couple albums. Turns out that the whole album doesn't totally follow in that direction, in fact there isn't one direction at all to this set of songs as Tweedy and company mix it up making for a Wilco album that really feels like a broad reflection of the sounds and styles the band has explored over the years.
Note: besides the limited edition deluxe double cd, there's also a regular single cd version, at $14.98. What's so deluxe about this? It's packaged in a sturdy slipcase, with a 52 page booklet, and the extra disc it comes with contains 4 bonus tracks. The vinyl version, meanwhile, comes in a thick gatefold and includes a cd version of the album as well (but not the bonus disc).
From the opening sounds of "Art Of Almost" it sounded as if we were about to experience another game-changing Wilco album, on par with the seminal Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. Its krauty electronics and crunchy synths sounding more like something on a new Radiohead record then what Wilco's been doing over their last couple albums. Turns out that the whole album doesn't totally follow in that direction, in fact there isn't one direction at all to this set of songs as Tweedy and company mix it up making for a Wilco album that really feels like a broad reflection of the sounds and styles the band has explored over the years.
Note: besides the limited edition deluxe double cd, there's also a regular single cd version, at $14.98. What's so deluxe about this? It's packaged in a sturdy slipcase, with a 52 page booklet, and the extra disc it comes with contains 4 bonus tracks. The vinyl version, meanwhile, comes in a thick gatefold and includes a cd version of the album as well (but not the bonus disc).
The return of Cascadian black metallers Wolves In The Throne Room, introduces us to their latest epic, Celestial Lineage, with a sound that continues to move well beyond the bounds of black metal. As it was the band never shied away from augmenting their furious Weakling-beholden buzz and frantic blasts with swaths of ethereal drift and dark hushed minimalism, but here, those non black metal elements play a much bigger role, and manage to take the sound to a whole other level, positioning those non-metallic sounds less as 'interludes' and more as fully realized elements that are woven deftly into the fabric of the songs and sound. The record even opens with a hazy bit of choral drift, all tinkling chimes, shimmery synths, stately piano, and ethereal vocals, that sound more seventies British folk than black metal. Then, instead of simply exploding into some black buzz, the riffs are introduced slowly, blending into the folky drift, transforming the 'intro' into a blackened chorale, allowing the folky flutter to fade, until finally the blackness descends, the sound impossibly lush and heavy, epic and expansive, the sound thick and more lush than ever, the riffing wild and tangled, the drums mathy and intricate, and then again, the band take this grim buzz and wreath it in soaring epic almost folky melodies, some gorgeous harmonized guitars, there are even some full on psychedelic leads, the song shifting from black churn to ephemeral shimmer and back again, even dipping into some majestic doomic dirgery, but somehow the varied parts all fit together perfectly.
After a bit of chanted field recording flecked ambience, sounding like some ancient forest ritual, the band slip right back into pure transcendental blackness, with another sprawl of epic soaring blasting buzz, but again, it manages to be lush and weirdly melodic, on the surface it's a roiling churning blackness, but somehow the sound is infused with a blurred warmth, a subtle melodic core, that elevates the sound beyond simple black buzz. The sound constantly confounding, the song splintering into wide open expanses of feedback drenched, tribal drum driven abstraction, then slipping into a sort of hazy post rocky drift, before finishing off in a blaze of frantic black ferocity, but even there, the sound is wrapped in thick soaring swirls of melody.
One of our favorite tracks might be "Woodland Cathedral" which sounds exactly like the title suggests, over a bed of what sounds like forest sounds, guitars hover and shimmer and soar, the rhythm is glacial and funeral, everything is wreathed in a patina of buzz and thrum, the sound super distorted and almost shoegazey, angelic female vocals drifting over the top, tangled into strange but lovely harmonies, a doomy choral bit of blackened loveliness, which leads directly into the final movement, two 10+ minutes epics, the first, another example of Wolves' mastery of melodic blackness, grinding black heaviness wedded to delicate folky flutter, with hints of post rock, a sound that while in the past was perhaps too obviously beholden to many, now seems to belong to no other, and finally, a sprawling buzz drenched black doomdirge that sounds like Nadja and Comus and Sunroof! and WITTR all blurred into one glorious blackbuzz ur-drone doom-bliss epic. So good.
Super swank packaging too, with some of the most gorgeous artwork/photography we've seen on a black metal record for sure. Vinyl version forthcoming as well.
If you've been diggin' the vintage Turkish psych/pop of the Erkin Koray and Cem Karaca discs we've highlighted recently, here's something else for you, quite similar though it's from a bit further to the East... The title they've chosen for this collection would do as a review of it, in a nutshell: "Hip '70s Afghan Beats!" Indeed. Amhad Zahir was a popular Afghan singer, and these tracks, culled from his prodigious discography, are rife with emotive deep voiced crooning, exotic folk flourishes, and East-meets-West stylings (electric wah wah guitar, and tabla too!).
The liner notes (which could have done with an extra round of copy-editing, we're afraid) provide a brief biography of Zahir, who tragically was assassinated in 1979, at the age of 33, by Afghanistan's communist regime, on account of his political beliefs. Before his death, though, he had become hugely popular, and nowadays is apparently still considered a legend, one of Afghanistan's biggest recording stars. Of course, to us ignorant Westerners, he's quite obscure. We can only trust that the unnamed compiler has indeed chosen the "best of" Zahir's output; these tracks sound good to us, anyway! Infectious, hypnotic, moody, with groovy horns, traditional melodies, and reverb-heavy rhythms, it's all quite enjoyable.
As we enter fall on our way to winter, we anxiously await some new records from some amazingly strong female forces of musical nature, records that will most certainly be by our side as the cold begins to overtake us. With both Bjork and Kate Bush releasing new albums in the upcoming weeks, it's so fitting Zola Jesus join that elite pantheon, as she's proven to be one of the newer generation's most singular and stunning artists. Taking ideas from goth, industrial and post-punk as launching points, yet making music that transcends any one genre, scene, or aesthetic. After two amazing ep's, including former aQ record of the week, Stridulum, Zola Jesus returns with her first full length in a few years. It's filled with an intensity and sense of purpose that makes so many other releases we dig just seem sort of frivolous and forgettable. Zola Jesus hits you in the gut with her music. There's no fluff, no excess fat, she gets right in there and twists, turns and reaches deep inside, extracting sounds and songs that grab you by the throat as they seduce and scare you at the same time.�
Conatus is like a continuous sonic pulsation, a field of sound waves that soothe and envelop, penetrating to the core of your soul and forcing you to look deep into the sound's clear vision of intensity, where it then has this magical ability to make you feel that you can finally face ghosts that have been haunting you and conquer the night no matter how cold and alone you may be. Simply stunning.
