woundedgalaxy

2010-01-05T09:12:00.000-08:00

Honorable Mentionables

Orchestre Poly-Rythmo De Cotonou : Echos Hypnotiques : Analog Africa
Freddie Gibbs : midwestgangstaboxframecadillacmuzik : The Internet
Sic Alps / Magik Markers : Split 12" : Yik Yak
Failures : Failures : Youth Attack / Clean Plate
Gucci Mane : The Burrprint 3D : The Internet
Black To Comm : Alphabet 1968 : Type
Leron Carson : Red Lightbulb Theory '87-'88 : Sound Signature
Kowton : Stasis (G Mix) / Countryman : Keysound
Dry-Rot : Philistine : Parts Unknown
Leyland Kirby : Sadly, The Future Is No Longer What It Was : History Always Favours The Winners

2009-12-14T21:49:00.000-08:00

List

It's better than yours. I'm better than you. I'm better than you.

10. Yellow Tears : Don't Cry : Hospital Productions
9. Onna : Onna : Holy Mountain
8. Tetuzi Akiyama & Gul 3 : Nero's Expedition : Monotype Records
7. Oneohtrix Point Never : Rifts : No Fun Productions
6. Idea Fire Company : Beauty School : Ultra Eczema
5. Untold : Gonna Work Out Fine : Hemlock Recordings
4. Grass Widow : Grass Widow : Make A Mess Records
3. Orphan Fairytale : Ladybird Labyrinth : Ultra Eczema
2. Tyvek : Tyvek : Siltbreeze
1. Bill Orcutt : A New Way To Pay Old Debts : Palilalia

2009-09-25T18:51:00.000-07:00

Curse Go Back

Keith Hudson - Brand

The Dub companion to Rasta Communication. They didn't call him "The Dark Prince of Dub" for no reason, probly the same not reason they call me "The Dork Prince of Chub." Where there's smoke there's a Jamaican dude, I think the saying goes. Actually, this is real earthy, moody type stuff, and I think Joy Division were big fans, so there you go.

download

Tyvek / Cygnus - split 7"

This was about the only Tyvek thing I was real into up until they released their last full length, which is maybe the best thing I've heard this year. Still, for all its sputtering city sprawl, that one never quite gets as gonzoed as this one. Plus, Heath Llama and some other dude contribute their typical blorp to the b-side to complete the outward trajectory.

download

William S. Burroughs - Break Through In Grey Room

What's there to say? This one is a hodge-podge of tape work, field recordings and readings, and it manages to work remarkably well as an album. I mean, if you're a weirdo or whatever.

download

2009-09-13T13:58:00.000-07:00

Psychosis Sucks

Swell Maps - Wastrels and Whippersnappers

Early practice recordings and wotnot. If you listened to the Swell Maps' albums and wondered if they'd hit a saturation point of lo-fi haze and ramshackle weirdness/beauty, this collection has the answer. Actually, I don't think I should have to convince anyone to listen to more Swell Maps.

download

Psyche/BFC - Elements 1989-1990

Compiles two Carl Craig aliases that hit more of a late night sweet spot than his more exuberant shtuff. The synths here have an especially heavy-syrup, somnambulant type quality to them, and when they meet up with breaks on a track like Please Stand By, it easily rivals anything that Richard James has released.

download

Lärm - No One Can Be That Dumb

The ultimate wet cardboard sound. Lärm take Bathory-esque baffling production choices and combine them with a sub-Septic Death proto-Power Violence sound that's just willfully ugly in as many ways as possible. The guitar is so thinly recorded and dissonant, it just hovers over the rhythm section like noxious fumes. Holy shit, the solo on Chemical Suicide. The bass about a minute into Non-Conformity. This rules.

download

2009-09-06T10:42:00.000-07:00

Easy Listening

Fixin to try posting some em pee threes agin. Sharing is nice, plus it makes you feel good, and I love making myself feel good. *wink wink wink wink wink wink*

Crawl Unit : Stop Listening

Joe Colley's austere noise/drone/whatever project is certainly more dynamic and sonically varied than most of the harshbros out there. It's almost like a Dylan Nyoukis project in the way arranges completely decontextualized sound, like field recordings of artificial situations, but there's no intent to be weird or menacing or anything like that. I think Francisco Lopez wrote something about how Colley's music was expressive while remaining completely anonymous, which sounds about right to me.

download

Los Llamarada : Soundliketrains 2002-2004

This compiles tracks from a bunch of their early cdr releases, all of which are of a significantly lo-er fi than their SS Records releases. They actually get better and more confident with each release, but this is still some Great Guzz. My most favouritest band going.

download

Corrupted : Dios Injusto 7"
Corrupted : La Victima Es Tu Mismo 7"

The two best Corrupted releases that aren't Llenandose De Gusanos, in my ever estimable e-pinion. You can really hear the connection to Eyehategod and Crust/Power Violence in these earlier releases, which might help to explain why it was so disappointing that El Mundo Frio was some bland ass Post-Rock. Also, Corrupted don't get enough credit for how they wield feedback. It's as much a part of the progression of these songs as any other element, and by the time you get to the b side of Dios Injusto, it's nearly overwhelming.

download
download

2009-05-18T00:30:00.000-07:00

Wherever you go, you're trapped.

I was thinking I should just list some revelations, cause I've been listening to a lot of real good type music lately.

Iggy Pop - The Idiot: I'd been aware of this one for a while, for the obvious reasons, but I'd never bothered to listen to it, or any post Stooges Iggy for that matter. Bad call on my part. The best David Bowie album, and not just by a little.

Prince Jazzbo - Ital Corner: There's something about Jazzbo's voice. It's like Big Youth with a certain lilt. Less boisterous, less technically adept, but more of the You Know What. Weeping and Wailing is a great track. As far as your mossier Perry productions go, I'd say Ital Corner is second only to Heart of the Congos. But what do I know.

Los Llamarada - Take the Sky: Imagine a less affected Avarus infused with real Punk Rock type fury, or maybe a vibrant Dead C that actually got angry instead of just more forcibly forlorn. I don't know. This is really exciting music. Who the fuck would be listening to other things when they could be listening to Los Llamarada? You're wasting your life. Take it from an expert.

Polvo - Today's Active Lifestyles: I used to own Exploded Drawing. I always thought it was successfully interesting, which isn't exactly a compliment. The band just sounds so much more vital and effortless on this album, which is maybe a strange thing to say about tangles of guitar that often got mistaken for Math Rock, but this is kind of a breezy album. Addictive stuff.

Gasp - Drome Triler of Puzzle Zoo People: Another great find from Kick to Kill. I would've never been able to tell from their track on those Cry Now, Cry Later comps, but Gasp found some sweet spot between Philip Jeck, Sonic Youth circa Bad Moon Rising, and Dystopia. This album gets the balance nearly perfect, but the funny thing is, An Earwig's Guide to Travelling collects everything else they released, and it's almost as good. Just a perfect sensibility for the psychedelic.

Pretty interesting Die Kreuzen interview here. I don't know if Albini's take on major labels was fully formed at the time, but it's certainly amusing to see him quip about Merrill Lynch's financial exploits derailing the economy in 1986. Here's a funny picture that might've been relevant half a year ago.

2008-12-31T14:52:00.000-08:00

Humbuggery afoot

Well, we (I) did it. Another episode of "The Most Won-der-ful Time of the Year" has passed, this one relatively uneventful. I don't know if this is a sign of things actually getting better or me just getting better at building a bubble around myself. Actually, I do know. You probly do too.

But wait! Starting this January, I'll be starring in the indie darling film, "Back 2 Skewl 2: Tha Sickening." Actually, I'm writing, directing and starring in it, but these things always end up being collaborative pieces, so who the fuck knows. Don't ask me how I secured the funding, but stay tuned for details of how I fuck it all up. Hell, not to be some naive Pollyanna, but maybe I won't.

I haven't really been listening to a whole lot of new music this last year, but I have in the last month, probly cause I was thinking about "End ov Year '08: Tha List-ening," and there was mo' betta blues than I thought. I'd actually rank the new Dead C among my favourites. Like real gorgeous and whatnot. Like, say I get the itch to lay back and luxuriate in some languorous melancholy, it has a pretty good chance of getting the call up.

Blues Control put out a new 7" for them Sub Pop Singles that's well worth anyones 8 minutes, even mine, and I'm what's known as a "captain of apathy."

Hey, people seemed to really like Philip Jeck's Sand, which is disconcerting, cause I love Philip Jeck, and I didn't much care for it. I always thought that what elevated him above the rest of the Moody Vybez Krew was that the sounds that emerged out of his process were always distinct, something that can't be said for all the gobs of crumbling digitalia floating around out there, but most everything on Sand sounds indistinct and flange-y. I much preferred "Suite. Live in Liverpool," which sounds like his older stuff. Sorry, President-Elect Balack Obongo, change isn't always the answer.

What else? That Emeralds & Dilloway. Those U.S. Girls. Mala's Miracles 12". Mad Men. If you want to squeeze one last drop of joy out of the dried husk of the holiday season, gather the family 'round the monitor, get out yr hot chocolate and watch Torturing Democracy, and do it early so Poppa don't nod off.

2008-12-12T20:02:00.000-08:00

2008-11-25T16:14:00.000-08:00

You lose

I watched Kanye West perform his Love Lockdown single on Late Night with David Letterman last night. Upon completion of the performance, Mr. Letterman repeatedly exclaimed "Whoa buddy," indicating his intense enjoyment of said performance. I immediately leapt at my television, yelling, nay, screaming, "This man is a pretentious egomaniac!! Do you not understand the auto-tuner's context in modern popular music?! The barbarians are at the gates, old man!! THE BARBARIANS ARE AT THE GATES!!!!"

After I'd calmed myself down, I listened to Mr. West's new album, 808s & Heartbreak, and realized it's actually excellent. Welp, looks like I got owned.

2008-11-19T18:09:00.000-08:00

WHOA, WHAT A TERRIBLE FUCKING BLOG

It's going to take me ages to rebuild the ill will this shitpile used to garner, and that's assuming there'll be another update within a couple months of this one. I don't know why the idea of making my opinions coherent and in written form seems like such an ordeal, but it does. So I guess I'll see how that goes.

So what have I been listening to lately? Oh, glad I asked. That DJ /Rupture is back at it. Actually, he's always at it, you should listen to his show/read his blog, but he's got a new mix out. It's pretty own zone. Like, most of his mixes are really good, and have a bunch of brilliant/visceral/beautiful moments in them, but Minesweeper Suite and the new one, Uproot, aspire to a higher layer. This is the 'own zone' layer.

Wow, off to a great fucking start.

Anyways, it's a grower. The moments are subtle, revealing themselves over time. It's a mix about music, not any sort of overt culturasociopoliticanomical statement, which might seem like a strange think to say about a mix of music, but only if you'd never listened to DJ /Rupture.

Pink Reason released a live album somewhere on RapidShare. It's called Live and Joyless. I don't know where you get it now, but you should try to. Good recording, good backing band, vastly superior version of Borrowed Time to the currently available one.

Just found out about The Urinals. I sometimes worry about listening to too much music because I feel like I should still be able to discover bands like this when I'm like 40, but then I think "Wow, you gigantic polesmoker, you really think you know everything, don't you," and really put myself in my place. I'm like the Michelle Obama to my Barack Obama. Anyways, I'm sure if I make it to 40, I'll be a totally weird creep.

The Urinals are amazing. I would say they have a lot more in common with bands like The Fall or Swell Maps than any other bands from their 'scene,' but then I'd have to find a common thread between Black Flag, Angry Samoans, The Minutemen and Flipper, so that ain't happening.

I'll probly write about the new Fucked Up, Sex/Vid, The Hospitals and Shit & Shine at some point. I've actually been intending to write a big thing about Keith Hudson for a while, like even do some research and shit, so feel free to be amazed if that ever happens. Thanks Tut, Gramps, Choom Gang and Ray for all the good times.

L
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2008-06-27T04:53:00.000-07:00

Be hard to follow that one

2008-04-21T05:57:00.000-07:00

The Reviews Are In

"This post is likeable, and your blog is very interesting, congratulations :-). "
-some foreigner trying to self promote

"This article is fantastic; the information you show us is very interesting and is really good written. It’s just great!! "
-some other foreigner trying to self promote

So there.

2008-03-21T08:38:00.000-07:00

As is a regular tradition of mine, a couple albums that I wrote off after cursory listens have become favoured regulars when the hallowed hour(s) of (g)listenin draw(s) nigh.*
The first of these is the now ubiquitous Deepchord presents Echospace : The Coldest Season. Fortunately there's a press kit's worth of descriptors right there in the title, so that'll save us some time. Hard to pinpoint my initial reaction, but I remember thinking, "I guess it's wintery because everything's slathered in wooshy wind noises." In case it doesn't come across, I'll let you know that that particular internal monologue was slathered in dismissiveness. But this is neither hither nor thither, cause the point is that I'm dumb. It would take only one playthrough whilst applying the principles of "deep listening"** to be awed by the depth of this sound world. There are a great many meticulously arranged wooshy wind noises, and the dub techno backbone is an especially lush one. I decided to check out some Deepchord twelves, from back when it was a label and not just a presenter, and it's all lush, top quality stuff. Here's my listening recommendation: run a bath, light a candle, stick a finger up your ass.
The other one is Mammal's Lonesome Drifter. It only took me one sonic glimpse to feel like this mix of sounds and moods was aimed far too squarely at me, and, for whatever reason, not care for being pandered to like that. I should note that I never made it to Cremation, which is worth the price of admission all by its drifting lonesome.

Stuff:
Gandalf : S/T
FreeRice.com
The Walking Dead
Seijun Suzuki
The Goslings : Occasion
Nick Swardson : Party

*If you're wondering how a line like "hallowed hour(s) of (g)listenin" comes to be, it involves me rolling around with a physical pen and paper for about an hour, while scrawling out and scribbling over about five different references to my cock. I'm sure we can all agree: time well spent.
**As described in issue 243 of The Wire. No, not really.

2008-02-21T05:26:00.000-08:00

We Just Think We Better

I may've been prattling on about "the best" this n that as of late, but I really wish I'd gone with "my favourite" as the term of choice. "The best" is a term for those brosephs who want to fit everything into a homogenized canon, usually of only the most tooth achin-est of confections. The whole reason the question "Beatles or Stones?" ever existed was cause you were allowed to answer "the fuckin Stones."
Which reminds me, if one were to ask me "Psychedelic Horseshit or Times New Viking?" I'd answer "Sic fuckin Alps." I'm just sayin.
Now, if you'd asked me about Wolfgang Voigt's Gas project a couple months ago, I'd say he did that Pop album, which seems to be beloved by folks who like all that Pop Ambient fluff (oh, I've tried), but if you asked me now, I'd probly get all wide eyed and go off about his two previous albums, Zauberberg and Konigsforst, followed by some fruity nonsense about being lost at night in a German forest.
Also, Re-Up Gang's We Got it 4 Cheap Vol. 3. Something about dudes who've upwardly mobilized and yet never lost that chip on their shoulder makes me very happy, specially while I sit here with my fingers crossed, hoping that the first words in Obama's inaugural speech are "Y'all done fucked up now."

2007-12-19T02:47:00.000-08:00

Make Wit Da New Age Vybez, Ya Mook*

10. V/A : Soundboy Punishments : Skull Disco
09. Homostupids : 'The Intern' LP : Parts Unknown
08. Sick Llama : Born Again to Die : Hanson
07. Emeralds : Queen of Burbank vol. 2 : Editions Brokenresearch
06. Mala : Changes/Forgive 12" : Deep Medi Music
05. Pekos/Yoro Diallo : S/T : Yaala Yaala
04. Blues Control : Puff : Woodsist
03. Pink Reason : Cleaning the Mirror : Siltbreeze
02. Fucked Up : Year of the Pig 12" : What's Your Rupture
01. Burial : Untrue : Hyperdub

*What's a Mook? You're a Mook.

2007-11-05T10:49:00.000-08:00

I've no doubt that repeated listenings to Untrue are going to continue to reveal its depths to me, but I suppose I should run through some impressions to back up my claims of best-ness. Boomkat already hit on a lot of it, mainly the point about Burial, despite being one of, if not the, most notable Dubstep producers, has not been copied by anyone. Everybody just got the point and never bothered to try. It's resolutely outsider, but that mass appeal type of outsider. This becomes most clear to me on the moments in Untrue when all the gauze strips away. If you thought the thing that makes Burial's music distinct was all of the atmospheric white noise and billowing clouds of mournful melody, listen to it all peal back while the beats and bass throb in the dark. That's when it's at its most mutant and haunted. These are the moments where it becomes clear that Burial is far more than a "sound". The next time I hear someone say his music lacks substance, I'm gonna have to ask them what exactly substance is, and what music has it? The most apt comparison I can think of is like a really choice RZA production. It isn't strange in the Residents/Zappa school of, "We're being weird! Lookit! Hey, lookit! We're weird!" Just genuinely odd pop music. The best kind. And yes, it has that knife-edge of "cool"-ness about it, but, ultimately, that isn't the level that it speaks to you on. At least it shouldn't be, if you're really listening. Whoever he is, he's one-upped the faceless producer mytique by creating something that's welled up from deep inside of him, and now it's out in the world and speaking directly to something deep inside a lot of people. And maybe more than his music, but probly not, that's a fucking beautiful thing.

2007-10-23T02:06:00.000-07:00

Almost old news:
Mary Anne Hobbs played a 15 minute preview mix by Kode 9 of the new Burial album on her show last week. It's still available, but not for very long. If you're real sly-like, MP3s are starting to float around the usual channels. I ain't holdin noones hand.
It's pretty much the ultimate teaser: 17 tracks in 15 minutes. If you enjoy laying back in a Burial track as much as I do, the brevity hear would be near infuriating, if it weren't so goddamn exciting. If it all plays out like it is up in my head, slumping inna sophomore stylee is no issue. I think it's better. Than everything. Whatever your definition of "soulful" (whatever) sample based music, from Massive Attack to Theo Parrish to J Dilla to everything in between, Burial is better. The fuckin best.
Hey, Ms. Hobbs' hyperbole might be embarassing, but mine ain't far behind. Here's to enjoying shit to an embarassing extent.

2007-10-15T18:44:00.000-07:00

I could update more often, but would anybody really care if every once in a while I said, "Yes, all the new Siltbreeze releases are very good." Does anyone care what I think about Kanye West or Radiohead? I don't care what I think about Kanye West or Radiohead.

No, that's not true.

I really like the new Magik Markers. I don't think I've become some fanboy who'll just rubber stamp anything they do. I mean, I don't care for any of Pete Nolan's side projects. Yes, it's quite Sonic Youth-y, but it's like the Sonic Youth I'd like more things to be like, y'know?
I got really angry after reading that Stylus review, but I've got no interest in becoming some kind of meta critic critic. The lefty bloggers do it for the media, but that shit's actually important.

More Emeralds goodness on the Ledges CDR. Their trick bag is deep. Keep a-diggin, boyos.

Apart from Hyperdub and that Gatekeeper 12", I figure Dubstep's been in a minor drought, but Pinch and Burial are both dropping new full lengths real Sunni. Hopefully they're not Shiite. Haha, see what I did? Topical.

Mmm, that new Sunn O))) album is more of the same, except for the first track, Belurol Pusztit, which is something else, and pretty damn great.

Also:
Rhythm & Sound : S/T
Nurse With Wound : Spiral Insana
Corrupted : Vasana 7"
Corrupted : An Island Insane 7"
AMM : The Crypt
Cluster : Zuckerzeit
Your mom

2007-08-29T07:02:00.000-07:00

I's just 'Googling about' for info on the latest Yaala Yaala release, Daouda Dembele, and stumbled across Awesome Tapes From Africa, which should be re-named Fuckin Crazy Ass Tapes From Africa. Turns out it's not that much of a discovery, dudes hosting the WFMU Listener Hour this Saturday, but I ain't exactly Tony Wilson. (R.I.P.)
I'm not so down with some of the pop stuff, keeps pointing out just how much my young mind was poisoned by Graceland, but there's a wealth of stuff on here. Just download that Kandja Kouyate tape right now. Trust me. I know it gets said a lot, (Not by me, last time I said it was when I heard Slick Rick's Children's Story on six hits of acid.) but I really wouldn't mind if this tape just went on for forever. If everyone could just shut the fuck up for an hour out of the day while I listened to this, my mental state would probly be muchly improved.
Well, improved.

2007-08-26T05:39:00.000-07:00

'None of you understand. I'm not locked up in here with you. You're locked up in here with me.'

2007-08-20T14:34:00.000-07:00

"I'll tell you what's wrong with the youth of today: they don't know boredom. We didn't have a telly in our bedroom. We had to beg our parents to be able to watch TOTP or TOGWT. We used to listen to transistor radios under the sheets & listen to the same 10 records we had on poxy record players. We were so bored & frustrated that it gave us time to build up our determination & do something about it. Back then there was a real Establishment, men in suits & bowler hats, a genuine cultural divide. Now it's all blurred" Mark Perry, Open Up & Bleed Fanzine, 2000

Wow. The man's got my number. Far beyond "telly in the bedroom" tho.

Been reading Ed Brubaker's pretty wicked crime comic, the aptly named Criminal. Guy's taken on two of Marvel's flagships (Daredevil and Captain America) on the condition that he gets to do this title with absolute freedom, and he's taken the opportunity to put in an essay or round table on 'film noir' at the end of each issue. What a treasure trove of miserablism! Really, the only one so far that I'd seen or heard of was Touch of Evil. (Insert tired "Charlton Heston is a Mexican!" joke.... here.) But Allen Baron's ultra-obscure proto-Taxi Driver, Blast of Silence, Robert Altman's weirdo Raymond Chandler update, The Long Goodbye, and Mike Hodges' grim Michael Caine beatdown, Get Carter, have all been revelations, while John Boorman's Point Blank made an instant jump into my top ten. If Le Samourai is a dream and Get Carter is ugly reality, Point Blank is a fever dream, drifting and jolting between both until you don't know which is which. You get the feeling Lee Marvin's stone-carved protagonist doesn't know either, but he just stoically plows ahead.
So now that I've got my foot in the door, it's starting to open up. Like anything, you gotta know something to learn something. That's why I's been on a dub spree. Here's the mix:

lee 'scratch' perry : soul fire
dub specialist : taurus dub 2
the upsetters : ipa skank
johnny clarke and the aggrovators : a ruffer version
king tubby meets vivian jackson (yabby you) : jerusalem dub
jackie mittoo : ayatollah
glen brown : tel aviv drums
the upsetters : black panta
dub specialist : running dub
augustus pablo : king tubby meets rockers uptown
king tubby : a noisy place
lee perry & the upsetters : bush weed
dub specialist : in cold blood version
lee 'scratch' perry : give thanx to jah
the upsetters : dub organizer
dub specialist : chase them version
lee 'scratch' perry : city too hot

I might post this on Podomatic sometime, but you can get 90% of these tracks on Lee Perry's Dub Trip-tych, King Tubby's In Fine Style and the Studio One Dub comp. Dub Specialist is Clement Dodd's b-side alter ego, and if you ask me, badman don't get nuff respect pon de Dub ting-a-ling. Sorry. But, yeah, he does some pretty wacky shit, and he had some of the best rhythm tracks to work with. Take Running Dub, which features the catchiest hook here, while the vocal actually sounds like it's drowning, scrambling for air in a churning sea of reverb and delay. Tubby and Perry's 4 track collab, Blackboard Jungle, (part of the Trip-tych) is just retarded. Everything sensible gets pushed to the margins while madness rules the day in the vast middle space. Truly uneasy listening, har har har.
Geez, I don't know. What's to talk about. Lynch's Inland Empire is some deeply scary shit. Drag City's Yaala Yaala imprint is killing it. Fucked Up's Year of the Pig is the song of the year. Funkadelic's Free Your Mind And Your Ass Will Follow is the greatest thing ever. I'll just list stuff.

mala - lean forward/learn 12"
skream - sub island/pass the red stripe 12"
sick llama - born again to die
oxbow - the narcotic story
jandek - manhattan sunday
the fantastic voyage of goblin - the sweet sound of hell

2007-07-12T16:14:00.000-07:00

I'm Creative

2007-06-30T20:11:00.000-07:00

Last I heard from these Religious Knives (now I'm on some "pro" shit) folk was on some split with the Greh sonics. If memory serves, it sounded kinda like Excepter by way of Suicide, i.e. it sounded kinda like Excepter. In the flurry of side-projects and collabs, it was kinda like, "Oh neat, it isn't just Double Leopards drones with less people." But as of the now, shit is, as the young folk say, going off. First, No Fun re-released a batch from what I'll call the Nate Nelson (of Mouthus and Mid-Day Dong infame) erra on the Remains CD. Now drones, Eastern-y melodies, wasted vocals and hypno-rhythms are all increasingly familiar musical elements, but these proceedings are so laden with, to borrow a phrase, heavy atmosphere (I like to call it "bummer haze"), the spell is still cast as intended. Pungent is really the best word I can think of. While the White Rock stuff was great cause it effectively mixed Double Leopards and Mouthus' sounds, Religious Knives are remarkable cause they take the talents involved and do something different.
So now they've added Tom Carvallo on bass and are acting more and more like a "band" with "songs." The more I listen to Luck, the A-side off the new Heavy Tapes 12", the more it sounds about 12 bong hits removed from something off Springsteen's Nebraska or somesuch. Of course, the B-side is a drone rock meets No Wave whirlpool, so I don't know what the fuck. I've only heard but snippets from the Troubleman 12", but the A sounds like an even more formful blast of drone punk, while the B is pure psych-drift gorgeosity with Samara Lubelski a-sawin away. And this is all apprently a prelude to a new full length. Colour me excited. (And Badd.)

2007-06-26T15:17:00.000-07:00

The temptation to prattle on endlessly about contexts and ramifications is ever present, but I resist. There are too many ideas. We are choked with ideas. So what. Whoever molds reality best wins? Did you think you were gonna figure it out? Honestly? Goodness is there for the enjoying, so enjoy, cause the world doesn't stop. It wants you dead, but it doesn't have the balls to admit it.

Here's the new format. For this post.

-Box of Dub. This is not important because Soul Jazz invented Dubstep, but only because there are new tracks from Kode9 and Burial. Magnetic City ranks among my more favourite Kode9 tracks, partly cause it bops along without trying to reinvent the wheel, but mostly cause that synth he's been tooling around with is starting to burble and curl in rather lurvly ways. Combined with the Melodica, they form like Voltron, who then decides to dance a jig on Michael Bay's future grave.
Along with the Ghost Hardware E.P., Unite makes four new Burial tracks. He seems to be focusing more on vocals, and these tracks might not be as deep as his (already) classic shit, but they're still better than your haircut.

-Finally checked out The Wire. After I stopped trying to figure out how David Stubbs was involved, it made me totally forget that I hate all shows involving police or some form of policing. No, it's not the "best show ever," but after Season 1, I can honestly say I've never been more enamoured with faggot ass gangstas. Never.

-New Pig Destroyer, Phantom Limb. Not that I need another reason to clench up and madly sway about, but PD remain one of my favourites. There's probly nothing I can say in their favour that wouldn't reek of hyperbole. If you already love them, you know. They don't disappoint.

-Capicollo and Sourdough. It's all about the simple things. For now. It's actually all about getting blown, but, for now, it's all about the simple things.

2007-06-16T10:11:00.000-07:00

"If you can't quench my thirst / What you in my fridge for? / What you wanna live for?"*

If'n you're the slightest bit like me (sorry), you're probly saying something in the 'ol interminable internal monologue like, "What, I have to care about Emeralds now?!" Either that or some existential shite like, "How many Eggos is too many?" Well, firstly, I feel your pain. I think that's what we're doing here. I feel your pain, you feel my pain, we just hop on our keyboards and feel each other up, pain wise. Nextly, you don't have to do anything you don't want to. I just view this as a favour type deal, from Cleveland to me to you.
I think I've finally grown contented with the middle ground. I'm certainly growing fat, so why not fat and contented. I just think that if my head is gonna be pried open any further, it's not gonna be music that does it. Of course, my middle ground is probly someone's tuneless descent into the ninth circle. (I'm not bragging, what the fuck kind of brag would that be? I just understand that Blues Control and Excepter aren't a lot of peoples idea of "pretty melodic.") Still, I think I'm willing to actually dare anyone not to like Emeralds. I have faith in Emeralds, there's something to be found in their haunted expanses. The whole "Andrew Chalk with a beer can pipe** and a four track" vibe is the best argument for staying awake I've heard in a minute, and I'd tell you to jump all over "The Queen of Burbank (Part Two)" but I think 'sall gone. (This is getting ridiculous.) Still, the Hanson joint and "Dirt Weed Diaries (Vol. Two)" on Maim & Disfigure are just as easy to "big up."
Dude-ocracy doesn't work, some shit is just plain better. This is what makes life worth worthing.

cultchah:
Pissed Jeans : Hope For Men : Sub Pop
Blues Control : S/T : Holy Mountain
Burning Star Core : Operator Dead... Post Abandoned : No Quarter
Excepter : Self Destruction : Fusetron
Jerry's Kids : Is this My World? : X-Claim
V/A : Rumble in the Jungle : Soul Jazz
Frank Miller : The Dark Knight Strikes Again : DC

*from The Notorious B.I.G.'s unreleased "Pepsi Freestyle"
**Just break the ring on the opener and use it to poke the holes. You know this.

2007-06-03T19:11:00.000-07:00

I don't know why I still Google album reviews. I mean, I know who the people I enjoy reading reviews from are. (To the right. Cheggem oot.) I know I'll just get angry, but it's kinda fun, I guess.
Like, Pissed Jeans finally have a full length out on Sub Pop, so there's bound to be some interesting completely off-base opinions out there. Like the one guy who figured they must be total low lifes who start bar fights and steal change out of people's cars. And yeah, I understand that's meant as an amusing way to describe the Jeans' scummy sounds, but it's important to note that the guys behind those sounds are the nice, normal guys. The dude described would only get on stage to boogie about his "love rocket," and only as a shortcut to more pussy. This kind of audio squalor can only be vented out of people with fairly stable backgrounds. That dude doesn't keep anything held in, so nothing's gonna build to this point. If he sees a jogger, his thoughts don't move far beyond "You think you're better than me?" He doesn't see all his options and everything he's supposed to aspire to laid out before him, trying to crush him, trying to break his will.
But Pissed Jeans deserve to be on Sub Pop, cause they're one of the more talented bands around, they just choose to mine a seam of ugliness that a lot of people can't seem to fathom. And I'm not saying they're better than Flipper, but they are heavier than Flipper. They're heavier than Drunks With Guns. They're heavier than the entire AmRep catalogue wrapped in lead and dropped off the Empire State Building. Alright, I'm not saying they're heavier than Unsane, but they are better than Unsane. And even if you hear the riff on "Fantasy World" and think, "What is this, something off Meantime?" the vocal are what carries it. (I keep thinking he's saying "in my fancy world." I don't know why I find that so amusing.) So yeah, this isn't as solid a batch of tunes as Shallow, but it's different and it's great, so you can count me in.
Oh shit, and it's called Hope For Men. Kinda lika "Chicken Soup for the Fucked Up Soul."

2007-05-23T23:04:00.000-07:00

It's far too easy for me to forget how many great rock bands Vancouver has. When you're getting bowled over by the likes of Prurient or Digital Mystikz, the appeal of largely trad music kinda falls by the wayside. Maybe I've just strayed too far from wandering puddle and junkie covered streets to drink cheap but oddly flavoured draft beer from places like The Astoria and Ms. T's(R.I.P.). Something about Black Mountain or Goatsblood or S.T.R.E.E.T.S. or Pride Tiger or Ladyhawk just sounds so right in a room with a couple yuppies, a bunch of closet fags, a few stray jocks and a handful of genuine, nice alcoholics. Plus, all the above (bands) make some of the most well crafted, passionately performed genre music around. And I know that's about as backhanded as compliments get, but what can I do.
Anyways, I've quietly enjoyed Ladyhawk's S/T album since it came out. Great songs, great lyrics, powerful rhythm section, all despite my personal reference points of Dinosaur Jr. and Neil Young being undermined by the band's professed love of Magnolia Electric Co. But I'm an ass, and as Paul F. Tompkins sez, it's best to judge in silence. So, real solid alb, albeit with strangeness and substance use/abuse kept too in check by far.
But, as I haven't been known to say, now is now, and a "beyond their years" world weariness and abrasion that I'd like to attribute to Vancouver living bleeds all over the Fight for Anarchy EP, the glorious bebearded shamble that it is. And seriously, if you only hear the gaffes, you've missed the point of Rock and Roll, and likely found a home at your American Apparel billboard slash webzine. And if all I can do is whine about how it's "been done", I've missed the point of music, and my savage soul deserves no such soothing. But if you want know whether Ladyhawk's newfound experimentalism is working (or if you don't, fuckface), just compare Anarchy's Red Teeth to its sprawling but ineffective album equivalent, Long 'Til The Morning. Definitely the right direction. Most definitely. Mayhaps even greater things to come, but I'll be a-swaying to this mess in the meanwhiles.

2007-05-10T12:08:00.000-07:00

"They seemed to have no more realization than the others that they were a lost tribe, that any kind of respect or appreciation for themselves had been squeezed out of them so thoroughly that they seemed to feel that their lives were as they should be. All they seemed to be concerned about was not getting beaten, having enough to eat, and somewhere to sleep. There weren't many nights that Kunta managed to fall asleep before lying awake burning with fury at the misery of his people. But they didn't even seem to know that they were miserable. So what busines was it of his if these people seemed to be satisfied with their pathetic lot? He lay feeling as if a little more of him was dying every day, that while any will to live was left to him, he should try to escape yet again, whatever the odds or consequences."

-from the liner notes to Tragedy's S/T (but originally from Alex Haley's Roots, I'm assuming)

Speaking of escape, Blues Control's Puff lp is straight bananas. Might be the most solidest capital T Trip since Beaches and Canyons. Yup. Dolman's comments about the ascendancy of Noise just being a part of an overall renaissance in Psychedelic music reminded me of some comments I read from Ben Chasny a while back. He said he started making music partially because he was tired of buying music that was supposedly deeply bent and tripped out, putting it on and being completely underwhelmed by its tameness, which largely reflected my own experience with finding new music. And that's become less and less of a problem as of late. Huzzah.

So Skull Disco is still batting a thousand on the "getting it right" front. They just put out their first CD release, Soundboy Punishments, and it's a two discer, one collecting their first five 12"s and the other an odds n odders. I think the common practice in the world of danceable musics is to put out a mixed CD, and this may be rockist, but I just like it like this, track after track, y'know. I mean, even if a track is supposed to be a throbbing hypnotic pulse, I'd still like to hear how it develops from start to finish. And Skull Disco tracks tend to hew much closer to "lissenin" music than most of the scene, in spite of the label heads known proclivity for throwing down. Really, it's one of the most rewardingly original sounds around, like some spacious, drum machine clattery, acid casualty, quote unquote ethnic beat sub-bass wasteland, and I would hope that a CD release helps them find their audience, cuz I heard they nearly packed it in after Vol. 5.

slow heaven in the oh seven (thus far):
Blues Control : Puff : Woodsist
Pink Reason : Cleaning the Mirror : Siltbreeze
V/A : Soundboy Punishments : Skull Disco
Burning Star Core : Blood Lightning 2007 : No Fun
Aaron Dilloway : Since He's Been Gone : Fag Tapes
Mala : Changes/Forgive : Deep Medi Musik
The Bug : Jah War (Loefah rmx) : Ninja Tune
Religious Knives : Remains : No Fun

2007-04-19T20:52:00.000-07:00

STEP BACK, REALISE, THEN BROCK WIDE

If anyone e-mailed me and hasn't heard back, my e-mail's up and running again. The reasons behind this are too embarassing to divulge.

So, uh, common sense tells me to leave Dubstep pontification to qualified folks like Martin Clark and Steve Goodman, but I've never allowed gross underqualification keep me from weighing in on anything before. Plus, it's pretty much all I'm listening to right now. I bin making some mixes, and I think I finally got it right on the third try:

pressure f/ warrior queen - money honey
loefah - horror show
mala - bury the bwoy
geiom f/ terrible shock - feel so bad
skynet - isolate
skream - i (loefah rmx)
appleblim - vansan
coki - officer
shackleton - you bring me down
massive music - find my way (kode9 rmx)
mala - forgive

I guess the natural temptation is to just load it up with DMZ, Hyperdub and Skull Disco product, and it appears I've nearly given in. And hardly a wubba wubba in sight.
Even though it's become the non-formulaic formula (xbeats + ybass + zspace = whatevs, I believe), the number of artists that actually treat it as such is still somewhat limited. But they tend to be the leaders and the scene tends to accept whatever they do, so I'm hardly shook. At least I tend not to be.
Listen to a Mala track. Sounds like roots music, but an entirely new form of roots music. There's a lot of familiar elements there: moody ambience, house-y sampled instruments and repetitive beats, but they form an intoxicatingly soulful whole. And when I say soulful, I don't mean schmaltzy and shitty, I mean they actually make you feel something. Forgive might be my favourite, and, reaching into my bag of lame, obvious electronic music references, I'd say the mood resembles something off Endtroducing.
I'd get into the qualities that make Loefah and Shackleton and Kode9 and Skream special, but I've written about three drafts rambling on about various Dubstep related topics, and this is the closest I've come to making a point clearly and efficiently, so I'll leave it at that.

Now that I've come into some cash I'm left with a bit of a dilemma. While I could certainly purchase a sizeable chunk of what I want, that'd require some seriously foolish allocation of funds. I'd like to acquire jah lion's share of the DMZ catalogue, but what's in print (which ain't much) works out to about $20 CDN a 12" after shipping and exchange. So I can get a pile of Dubstep twelves off Forced Exposure, but they won't satiate my hunger for Neverland and Goat Stare. And that's not even getting into other wants/needs like Blues Control's Puff LP or everything His Hero is Gone ever recorded. And Don Imus thinks he's got problems.

2007-03-26T15:16:00.000-07:00

Dear God,

It's me, David. What should I write about, God? Should I write about how I've been listening to a lot of Axolotl and remembering how much I liked that collab he/they did with Mouthus, and the one with Yellow Swans and Gerritt? Should I say Memory Theatre is like that Tim Hecker stuff but better cause it's more organical and less precise and shit? Huh? Or should I write an angsty diatribe detailing my daydream about re-enacting Pettibon's Police Story art on public transit?
Should I write about how I capitalise your name, like I would Santa Claus ot the Cookie Monster, and not something real like water or jock itch? Huh, God? Or maybe something about Blood Lightning, the new Burning Star Core, and how great it is, cause, like, it might be both his most varied and his most cohesive work? With a smokin live track at the end? Should I say I'm happy that it's a good mix of all the different stuff he does, and doesn't focus too much on gargling or whatever? (and then maybe put something in brackets afterwards like "of course, I listen to the 13th Floor Elevators and wish they'd can it with the fucking jug already, so don't listen to me?")
Or should I blow up and be all, "I hate writing without drugs. I'm done with this stupid blog. Go read Rettman or Dolman or Keenan or Lax, then you'll know what I'm gonna be into a full month in advance?" Could I say I heard the promo for El-P's I'll Sleep When You're Dead, and it's actually kinda really good, and not the Dan the Automator soggy biscuit its list of guest starz makes it look like? Should I say End to End Burners was the first 12" I bought and The Cold Vein is in my top ten albums of ever, and now dude goes and drops an emo-prog-hop masterpiece after I'd almost forgot about him? And no, God, I don't say masterpiece too much. I actually use it quite sparingly. Know it all.
Oh, God. Maybe I'm just being silly. It's nice that we can talk like this. I guess I'll catch you on the flip-flop, big guy,

Dave

p.s. I hope you get AIDS.

2007-02-26T14:39:00.000-08:00

When I'm not bum rushing the three o'clock showing of Norbit in my boxers, I listen to:

Aaron Dilloway : Since He's Been Gone c60 : Fag Tapes
At his best, Dillo's all about the garbage sounds presented in crystal clarity. And I'd say this is Dillo at his best. The A starts out with shifting cassette loops, kinda like an AM radio Philip Jeck, before things start getting run through the effects meat grinder. Then he just brings the goods, striking the perfect balance between repetition and, uh, not repetition. There's a part at the end of the first side where a Chan Marshall-esque vocal floats over some fuzzy-guzzy, somehow chopped to maintain the phrasing but cleave the words of all meaning. It's a brief glimpse of something. Something right midst a whole lotta wrong. A loving neck rub oasis midst a desert of copped feels. Then things twist ever so slightly and it all gets a bit deranged. Sound familiar?

Flower-Corsano Duo : The Radiant Mirror : Textile
I think I saw him referred to as Christ Corsano. That's it, sweet Rapture's a comin! Look for me, I'll be waving down at you all as I get Raptured up, grinnin like a sumbitch.
You can see the appeal. It's like the Christian version of, "They'll all be sorry when I kill myself." "Ha ha, fuckers!" WOOOOOOOOSSSHHHH.
In all serioosness, this is like the very peak of Marquee Moon, when you stand in your most magnificent air guitar pose and make little trilling noises like "beeyoo-beeyoo" and "wadaleep-wadaleep," but for 40 minutes.... ON ACID!!!!

Pink Reason : Cleaning the Mirror : Siltbreeze
But for the most part, things are kind of a drag. Am I right? I mean if you've got yourself set up with good food, good wine and good women, (or a popcorn bowl full of pills and a stack of Royal Trux cds) more power to ya, but I can't say I'm really a fan of the whole life thing, at least unmitigated. So Kevin DeBroux's here, and he's got a whole world of weeping willows and fog-shrouded moonlight for you to get all fetal in. Really, it's a whole world of achey sound, and it'll melt down your whole puffed up nothing shit. Make it all seem far, far away. Amazing. Beautiful. Dare I say perfect.
5 out of 5. Highest recommendation. All that.

2007-02-10T13:32:00.000-08:00

I'm currently in the thrall of two nostalgic obsession, and Google is doing nothing to help me with them. I guess they lack what's called "internet presence."
One's an anonymous Guided by Voices song. The first two GBV songs I ever heard were non-album free downloads off some long defunct website, one of which was a live version of "Wished I Was a Giant," while the other floored me. I listened to it over und over and never heard anything Pollard-penned that I liked as much, but all I can remember about it is that there might have been a lyric about a factory. It was bouncy, in a "Kicker of Elves" sort of way. Or not. I even looked through what was supposedly a list of every GBV song ever, in the hopes that some name would ring a bell, knowing full well what kind of haystack of futility random GBV song titles made. Something would catch my eye and I'd ponder it for a while and realise it was off Alien Lanes.
The other is a music video I saw on a Wedge Halloween special many years back. The Wedge is Muchmusic's "alt" show, which currently showcases Arctic Monkeys, White Stripes and electro videos, but was genuinely esoteric in the Sook-Yin Lee erra. This special was notable for two videos that genuinely creeped me out, one being the first time I saw the now ubiquitous "Come to Daddy" video, and the other which I'm almost certain was for a Third Eye Foundation song. It was at some sort of outdoor altar, but on a set (who does this anymore, apart from Guy Maddin? on location is boring.) with a few religious figures of vaguely Middle Eastern origin, maybe Jewish, but like an "old weird" Jewish, moving around at weird speeds or backwards or something. It's probly nowhere near as gone-zo as I recall, but there's nothing on YouTube, and actually no mention of any Third Eye Foundation music video on the internet, apart from short films Matt Elliott has soundtracked.
I kind of have a similar feeling to when I go shopping with a certain style of jacket or shoe in mind and can't find it anywhere. I'd like to advise the local business peoples that I have money which I'd gladly give to them, they just have to provide me with what I want. It always seems so clear cut. Except now I have no money and noone has any real reason to help me, apart from the possibility that this stuff might be good, but in reality will probly just give me a nostalgic half-mast for about five minutes. Whatever. Sorry for wasting your time.
Back's all good.

lissnins:
siege : drop dead
deep wound ep
sebadoh : the freed weed
dead c / hi god people split
aaron dilloway : since he's been gone
magik markers : the voldoror dance
his hero is gone : monuments to thieves
tragedy : vengeance
pan sonic : kulma
showers : live in rats eyes
death unit : infinite death
adolescents : s/t

2007-02-03T19:05:00.000-08:00

Holy dinah, I caught the dubstep bug, and I's coughin up blood, I yam. Big, clotted, mucusy chunks. But not really though. That was a while back.
Been listening to a lot, just don't have that much to say about it. That Milanese and Boxcutter stuff is good, just a bit busy for my lissening plays-ear. I'ma be more at ease spelunking in the bass caverns carved out by the likes of Digital Mystikz, Skream, Loefah... Croydon massive? That 2disc Vol. 4 of Tempa's Dubstep Allstars is more my can of beans. Of course, there'a a lot to be said for the twelves themselves. DMZ's Ancient Memories with Skream's remix on the flip is zzzzonked. And the Burial album just gets better with every listen. Nuff said.
So I've taken this dubstep state of mind as an opportunity to finally get into the Upsetter. And I've tried. I think AllMusicGuide steered me wrong for the 12,357th time and told me to check out Super Ape first. Like, everything's compilations, what's a good album from the guy, y'know? And Super Ape is kinda good, I guess. You have to understand, my notion of the legend, Lee 'Scratch' Perry, was that my love of sound would override my natural disposition towards disliking bouncy island music which makes it completely impossible for me to wallow in self pity. I mean, I wasn't expecting Sun Ra or anything, but maybe I kinda was, and apart fom the odd bongo sound having me bugged out, nothing on the album had me thinking he was a 'magician of sound,' at least no more than anyone in an analogue studio filled with pot smoke and crappy equipment. I guess it'd be a trip if you threw it on your Audi's factory installed stereo after you'd had enough Jr. Gong and Matisyahu, but I'd already moved on.
So I done my homework and I realised that the Perry era I most want to hear is probly the least documented. After much success with Studio1, Bob Marley, basically inventing reggae, and publicly falling out with many former associates, Perry was signed to Island Records, doing endless production work and reaping mucho international success and respect. At the same time, Island is rejecting the work he's most proud of, and the local criminal element start's wanting a piece, so he finds himself increasingly being either deceived or blatantly extorted. And then his studio burned down. These are the situations where the line between eccentric and batshit crazy starts getting real fuckin blurry. So, surprisingly enough, he didn't do any recording for a while, until some Dutchies passed him some equipment before pulling the plug and editing together The Return of Pipecock Jackxon. To make a Syd Barrett analogy, and why not, it's his Madcap Laughs. A bit thin and fragile compared to earlier doings, and marred by outside influences. And like The Madcap Laughs, it's brilliant. But listen back a couple of years to Roast Fish, Collie Weed and Corn Bread (rejected by island. so were a couple others. anyone know what they were?) and hear the technicolor wonder that was the Black Ark. Still a bit 'sunny side up' for me, but undeniably twisted. The backing vocals on 'Throw Some Water In' say it all. I like, I like, (i'm getting there) but fast forward just a wee bit to '79. The year of the fire, all the stresses in Perry's life at their abolute height, he records a track called 'City Too Hot,' and it has to be the most suffocatingly thick dub I've ever heard. If this was the first Perry I'd ever heard, he would've under-promised and over-delivered. So finally, I'm left wanting more. I've been listening through that Arkology 3disc, and I'm thinking about checking out a collection of singles off Perry's Black Art label, but if anyone can point me in the direction of just a few more primo '79 era Black Ark tracks, for the love of jah, hook a brother up.
And under the header of 'Personal Achievements & Genuine Afflictions,' I've managed to injure myself doing absolutely nothing. Pinched nerve in the lower back. Complete hobblement with short bursts of severe pain. And these T3s are disappointing. I thought I'd be drifting through Mario Bava films real gassy, all smiles and far off giggles. But really, they just make me relaxed enough to rub one out in a serious manner every now and again. Actually, that ain't so bad. Never mind.

2007-01-15T01:55:00.000-08:00

I'll never stop fucking up

So I's installed the iTuneage once again, cause I heard that Ricky Gervais had a podcast. Yes, I'm determined to find out about things at least six months after the fact. And then post them here like I'm doing some sort of service for anybody. I guess being a friendless recluse has its downside. I should probably venture out into the throngs of people yelling "hey faggot!" at me and find a kind-hearted lass who'll let me slip my hand down the front of her jeans. Then I won't be so far gone. I could call up an old friend and have something to talk about other than, "uh, I've been doing a podcast with suicidal themes." Maybe I'd fall asleep before six am.
But not tomorrow. Sometime, like, later this week. The basement don't judge me. The basement forgives all. Besides, I've got Blue Humans and Infest mp3s to download. I need to make angry posts on IMDB message boards and never check for responses because it's too emotionally taxing. People will know what I think about Nathan Barley. I need to tell people about how Dillo liked my last tape but never do anything about getting my new material released. I need to whine about my completely solvable personal problems on a blog that people barely tolerate as it is. I need to read Reggie Queequeg reviews and, 'midst the enjoyment, feel vaguely jealous of what a genuinely nice person he seems to be. I need to see if I can scrape any more resin out of the inside of my pipe. I mean, the ol' plate is full and teetering, yknow.
Anyways, it seems like the podcasts you download in iTunes can't be listened to on your computer, you have to put them on your iPod. What kind of ridiculous bullshit is that? It's on my hard drive, it's in fuckin iTunes. Just let me listen to it. It's three in the morning, I'm not looking around for that two-inch shuffle piece of garbage the phone company gave me. It's not like I want to save the antics for my mid-afternoon power jog. Just put Gervais' voice in my ears. Now! I mean, I could be wrong, but I tend to understand computers more than I understand life. Not that I understand computers all that well.
I have no aversion to pop, I just kinda know the drill. Like, where you listen to it every day for a week and then never again. Where's the mystery? So I can't tell you what I'll think about this Jay Reatard album a week from now, but it's mighty groovy for the now. Tightly written little tunes with lyrics about blood visions and everybody being dead. I'm not gonna act like I've heard the Reatards or the Lost Sounds before, but thisn's a goodn.
Speaking of Charles Brooker, go to the long defunct Tv Go Home. Fake tv listings by a completely bitter misanthrope. You'll like it. My personal fave:
7:55 This Is The Rest of Your Life
Disheartening existential drama in which a haunted figure wanders through the world's most barren landscape, pausing occasionally to deliberately crack themselves in the fucking eye with a rock.

& Youtubes!

2007-01-06T03:24:00.000-08:00

Here's a l'il review I wrote up for The Behyntha Times. They told me it was ridiculous to claim that Warhammer 48k was one of the greatest bands around, seeing as I hadn't even heard their latest release, and that I was an ass and should consider a career in construction. I told 'em I'd flog their hype beast if I ever got a goddamn promo copy, but it was made clear to me that if I wasn't willing to feign interest in Wolf Parade and dole out the odd tugjob, the wicheetah lineman was directing the gravy train elsewhere. Just not in so many words. Plus he kept going on about owning a nism, whatever the fuck that means. Douche. Anyways:

Warhammer 48k! Warhammer 48k! Warhammer 48k!
Warhammer 48k! Warhammer 48k! Warhammer 48k!
Warhammer 48k! Warhammer 48k! Warhammer 48k!

I was thinking about beefing up the word count with a couple more paragraphs, but I'm not compromising my art for the sake of commerce. It's totally a post-modern comment on reviews and how they're only good for reviewing things. Sorry, but it had to be said.
Seriously though, Warhammer 48k! If you like stoner rocking, indie rocking, noise rocking or just rocking in general, go get some. Wait, wait, no, let me try that again... git 'r done! Hahahahahahaha.

Here's more great albums from 2006 that I forgot.
White Magic : Dat Rosa Mel Apibus : Drag City
Violent Students : S/T : Parts Unknown
Om : Conference Of The Birds : Holy Mountain
Vampire Can't : Key Cutter : Load
The Dead C : Vain, Erudite and Stupid : BaDaBing
Graveyards : Unmarked Graves : editionbrokenresearch

Duh.

2006-12-22T16:11:00.000-08:00

Yeah, yeah, yeah! It's what I've all been waiting for:

My 2006 Top Ten!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

10. Harvey Milk : Special Wishes : Troubleman Unlimited
When a band like harvey Milk reforms, it's hard to know what to expect. The fuck am I saying, a band like... it's Harvey Milk. You don't know what to expect. My point being, you probly didn't expect anything as good as Special Wishes. While they called their ZZ Top detour (still good) The Pleaser, they should've saved that title for this one, cause it's the straight goods. No extended silences, no Tonight's the Night vocal breakdowns, no weirdo-prog meanderings, just condensed Harvey Milk. So while it might not be the soul-cleansing statement of, say, Courtesy and Good Will Towards Men, it's all you could ever ask for. Show some goddamn gratitude.

9. The Goslings : Grandeur Of Hair : Archive
In the vast wasteland that's emerged of "Melvins influenced" bands, it's kinda nice that there's still groups that can distinguish themselves. In fact, if you hadn't heard Between The Dead and read that this was mixed by James Plotkin, the words "doom" and "metal" probably wouldn't even cross your drug-addled mind. Maybe "Kevin Shields," "lost at sea" and "blown the fuck out." Holy/Unholy noise from beyond.

8. Chris Corsano : The Young Cricketer : Hot Cars Warp Records
If you've ever listened to something like Flaherty, Corsano and Yeh and wished you could hear Chris Corsano's beautiful struggle without blaring sax convulsions and gargling noises, a solo effort as worthy as this one might assure you that you're not just being a wuss. Rhythm and organic drones can be about as expressive as anything. And if you don't know, now you know.

7. Heather Leigh : Jailhouse Rock : Fag Tapes
Out from the sewer of ultra-limited tapes and cdrs, a number of releases spew forth that deserve a "proper" release that can be "heard" by "people." Of what I've heard, Fag Tapes has a number. Nate Young's Betrayor, for one. The "fascinating music recorded terribly" Super Street series should receive some sort of boxset treatment when all's said and done. And now, Heather Leigh's Jailhouse Rock. And though I'm not sure what, it's most definitely an apex of something. Fuck, you can just download it anyways. I won't tell.

6. Prurient : Pleasure Ground : Load
While their might've been a minor backlash against Dominick Fernow after the praise he garnered for last year's Black Vase, (or maybe just 'maniacal noise purity' in general) judging by his own output and that of his brilliant stor/label, Hospital Productions, he ain't concerned. In fact, with Load's re-release of his Pleasure Ground tape, (see) he's got four releases under his blackest of belts that I'd have no issue calling "masterful," and all for their own reasons. Hell, Pleasure Ground might be his most emotive recording yet. Definitely his most melodic.

5. Fucked Up : Hidden World : Jade Tree
While "state of rock" whines bore me to freakin tears, I've got to take issue with "pick your retro." You know, choose an era, get the most tasteful influences, collect critical kudos for your soulless appropriation. But every once in a while a band comes along that so clearly means it with every ounce of their being, comparison must just equal praise. And if Pink Eyes' vocals are garnering all the Negative Approach comparisons, the instrumental side is more like some aggro pop-punk, somewhere between the Buzzcocks, Bad Brains and Angry Samoans, with intos and outros that make you go "whu?" over n over. And if the lyrical contradictions on their 7"s could be deconstructed for hours, this doozy might just be a term paper. I guess punk's not dead.

4. MV/EE & the Bummer Road :
Mother of Thousands : Time Lag
Green Blues : Ecstatic Peace
Deep Space Circuit : Child Of Microtones
For all the idyllic wonder generated by his music and life, I've grown convinced that Matt Valentine is on a mission to kill all record collector scum. I mean, with the release schedule that he, Erika Elder and assorted henchmen maintain, both on their own Child Of Microtones label amd scattered others, they're throwing down a hefty gauntlet for anyone to try and keep up. And for every release that elicits a "you'd have to be fuckin high," it seems like there's three or four possessed of a truly world-beating beauty. 2006 has been exemplary. Mother of Thousands had everyone going, "okay, this is the MV/EE album," only to have Green Blues appear a few short months later. And now the Deep Space Circuit 2cdr has its own set of essential red-lit ragas. I mean, I guess you could take the approach of saying you don't really like them, but I don't know how or why. Wait, did that QBICO pic-disk come out this year? Ack! Uncle! Uncle!

3. Magik Markers : A Panegyric To The Things I Do Not Understand : Gulcher
I think the adage goes that if as much verbiage is spent trying to call you out as self-indulgent posers as is used praising your skull-splitting brilliance, you're probly doing something right. So can we agree that Panegyric is the thermometer? I don't care if you saw them and Elisa totally punched your cousin and you could've made that cdr with a rubber band, a delay pedal and your worst Patti Smith impression. If you listen to Panegyric's wonderfulricical journey and still wanna scream "don't believe the hype," you're more than entitled to your stupid opinion. Stupid.

2. Nmperign and Jason Lescalleet : Love Me Two Times : Intransitive
I don't know what your definition of accomplished is, but Greg Kelley and Bhob Rainey are both accomplished, most definitely. And Jason Lescalleet is on his way. And getting abunch of accomplished folk together and culling the best of 6 years of improv? That's a fucking accomplishment. It helps that they've all seemingly found one another's missing puzzle pieces. i guess it's a complimentary accomplishment, and it presents viable exit strategies for noise and improv. So they can soften your skull with a rubber mallet, but if the devil's in the details, this album's downright Satanic. All hail.

1. Warmer Milks : Radish On Light : Troubleman Unlimited
As fascinating as their many tape and cdr releases can be, when Warmer Milks, like, do their best, I don't think anyone's safe. Listen to their half-hour song, Penetration Initials, if you don't believe me. So when they soak up the sounds of Kentucky comrades like Eyes and Arms of Smoke and Hair Police and the darkest grooves and bleakest passages of more than one sizeable record collection, purging the tar from their souls like those dinos in Jurassic Park, you know you're going out like Wayne Knight. not drone rock, not black metal, not free folk, not jam band, not doom sludge, not nothing, just condensed Warmer Milks. Tell your friends.

Honorable Mentionees:

Wolf Eyes : River Slaughter : Hospital Productions
Solid as it is, I thought Human Animal was a step back from the bleak, wide-open spaces explored on these four sides. Phaze 4, strong as ever.

J Dilla :
Donuts : Stones Throw
The Shining : BBE
In a year where we're supposed to get excited about "good enough" from The Clipse, hip-hop's soulful genius took everyone to school from beyond the grave.

Sick Llama/Barf Thoth : anything
You pick th ebest out of a fistful of releases that are fairly uniform in their greatness/suckiness. Tried to pry some secrets outta Stoned Heath, but all he'd tell me was "Synth Tapes." Huh.

Doubled Yellow Swans : Global Clone : Pacrec
Poor Gabe and Pete. Seems like noone wants to hear their artistic statements. The most praise seems to go to collabs and collections of jamz like this one.Ah, they seem pretty well-adjusted, I'm sure they don't mind. Might be pretty wide open and droney, but it's also, in noise speak, a real cleaver to the taint.

Converge : No Heroes : Epitaph
In a genre that feeds on youthful passion and severe extremitude, there ain't much precedent for a band like Converge to still be putting out innovative, intense albums this late into their Korea. Who gives a fuck about precedent?

Clockcleaner : Nevermind : Reptilian
Just read about this in Doug Mosurak's list. Think he's right. Some music exists and some music needs to exist.

All albums in this list are available to order over the internets or purchase from a store. Or not.

2006-12-19T17:36:00.000-08:00

Heather Leigh : Jailhouse Rock : Fag Tapes

Goddamn, leave it to the pros. Cause that's what she is, y'know. I'm convinced. And I wasn't always. Heather Leigh Murray was just one of those names that would pop up in all the right places: playing with Charalambides, side projects up the hoo-ha, snugglin up to Dave Keenan. What'd I know? I certainly wasn't about to level an accusation at her, one way or another. (oop, peeps don't wanna hear about 'issues') I just followed my interests and figured if I ever crossed paths with something bearing her name alone, the proof would be in the proverbial pudding. And lordy lordy my, is it ever.
If some great rock floats in the air midst the mountains of Double Leopards, MV/EE and The Skaters, tis surely psychedelic Asgard, and Heather Leigh straddles its wind carved peaks and casts a howl out into the void. I mean, it's a fuckin trip, bud. And unlike, say, the aforementioned pair of felines, (quit it. just fucking quit it.) no sense of drifting aimlessness kills the kicks. However much she's improvised, these are side-long compositions, moving forwards with purpose and gaining power without simply gaining power, if that makes sense. I mean, it might be on a tape and everything, but there's certainly a lot more going on than just turning on the vacuum. The lady's a pro.

Been trying my hand at a podcast. Don't know why, it's nothing anybody couldn't do with a handful of CDs and a broadband connection. But I guess there's a certain mood that I'm not finding anywhere else. Plus it's not boring, so it's got that going for it. Maybe I'll hook up a mic and you can hear the voice of Black Bolt. Check it out. C'mon.
woundedgalaxy podcast

2006-11-24T11:03:00.000-08:00

mix:
muluqen mellesse - hedetch alu
sebadoh - total peace
the shadow ring - lindus hologram
longmont potion castle - collette clitatouchie
jandek - come through with a smile
vertical slit - populatia defrequentia
leonard cohen - the partisan
smegma - madness mambo
longmont potion castle - lesbian mummy
alemayehu eshete - tereditchewalehu
daniel johnston - despair came knocking
guided by voices - weedking

other lissenins:
prurient - fossil
pig destroyer - painter of dead girls
genghis tron - dead mountain mouth
glass organ - s/t
butthole surfers - live pcppep
albert ayler - love cry
burning star core - three sisters who share an eye
poison idea - feel the darkness
tjolgtjar - the tjolgtjarian mass
richard pryor - that nigger's crazy

2006-11-15T17:16:00.000-08:00

I'm posting an olde timey unpublished review because it points out a couple of issues I want to further discuss, and it points out a me with quite a bit more faith in humanity. Plus it ain't half bad:

V/A : Tibetan Buddhist rites from the monasteries of Bhutan : Sub Rosa
The drone, it swells and recedes. Lately, it’s been seeping more and more into the Western consciousness through the cracks in the sonic underground, flowing from the space jams of Double Leopards to the magnetic pull of doom-metal giants like Earth and Sunn 0))). It anchors the psych-folk wanderings of Six Organs of Admittance and propels the primal clatter of Avarus and Sunburned Hand of the Man into their bent head-space. This isn’t exactly a coincidence, just a bunch of different sound-heads tripping off in their own direction and coming to the same conclusion. See, as musical ideas come, the drone is pretty damn convincing, making its case in a singular, uncluttered fashion. At its best, the drone is the sonic glue that holds sounds together while threatening to overwhelm everything with its own massive power. But really its just the sound of our underground catching up with what avant garde-ists like Tony Conrad and La Monte Young were doing in the sixties, which, in turn, was influenced by a vast array of non-Western musics that have existed throughout history. This is why Sub Rosa’s reissue of John Levy’s 1971 recordings of Buddhist rites from the Bhutan region has come at the perfect time.
Separate from Tibet yet sharing many similarities with its variation on Buddhism, Bhutan became a haven for Buddhists when China began its occupation and suppression of Tibet and its culture in 1959. While the homogenizing onslaught of Westernization is handily eradicating indigenous cultures all over the world at an alarming (horrifying? despairing?) rate, Levy managed to capture the full radiance of this one with his Nagra tape recorder in 1971. And it is HEAVY. Using mass chanted vocals, long horns which measure from 9 to 12 feet and a vast arsenal of smaller horns and percussion instruments, the monks of these monasteries created an awe-inspiring sound that was meant to invoke the blessings of their gods. This isn’t some psychedelic traveler’s approximation of something ancient and holy, it just is, and it isn’t exotic pleasantries for world music tourists, it’s high dose skullfuck that could appeal equally to the doom-metal massive and the spiritual seekers, if their minds are open enough.
As lovely as they are, tunes are few and far between on this 2-disc set, emerging between the roaring, cathartic power drones that dominate. They’re definitely most prominent on the second disc, where a lute melody precedes serene chanting and a wandering monk (Manip) sings a poem praising his guru. Levy’s exhaustive yet enthusiastic liner notes help guide the listener through all this uncharted territory, although I wouldn’t blame anyone for thinking their academic nature detracted from the sheer kicks provided by these sounds. At one point, Levy wonders out loud whether our tendency to idealize a culture such as this is misleading, with the behavior of some monks leading him to believe that these people had just as much of a penchant for cruelty and abuse as the rest of humanity. Still, it’s minor when compared with his complaints against Chinese and Western cultures. It would be my own hope, however far-fetched, that his recordings would help us to find a way back into a culture less convinced of its own impending doom than our own.

So. World musics. However much I'd like to criticize audio tourists, I can't think of a genre, well, musical grouping, where it's laid more bare that I am one. I mean, I'll let the tastemakers tip me to goodness from round the globe, but I probably couldn't point out a gamelan if I heard or saw one. Maybe an oud, but it might just be a banjo. Leave it up to DJ /Rupture or Ethiopiques or Congotronics or Sublime Frequencies or whatever. They can figure all that jazz out. At least appreciation has evolved past that "Bollywood soundtracks are funny" garbage that was in vogue some years back. And maybe you can look down your nose at some Buena Vista Club Med asshat who wants a Mariachi band to follow him around while he drinks umbrella'd drinks and makes conference calls. They're the tourists, right?
I guess it makes sense. As experimental music embraces drones and non-Western melodies, world music starts to seem experimental. But really intuitive, almost as if they were traditions that had developed over time. And with singing, singing like you never heard. Singing that so deftly bares its soul, that expresses such a depth of experience it reminds me of those voices captured on pre-war blues music. And when I listen to that singing, so open to all its idiosyncracies, I think it's one of the greatest indicators of whatever that intangible is that our society has lost in this last century. It's why we need to step up the efforts to record the musics of all these cultures before they're completely wiped from the face of the earth. No punchline here kiddos.
Sublime Frequencies gets this. They put out world music releases that break all the world music rules. There's no academic backing, no extensively researched liner notes, no cut of royalties for the musicians. So they're just looting up the third world, right? Capturing the souls of these poor motherfuckers and whipping up cheaply put together releases to line their pockets. At least, that's what some erudite pud at The Wire would have you believe. And that's what he needs to believe, like some record-collecting Atticus Finch who needs to be convinced of his own benevolence before he can pull up the covers at night. The fact is that we're all compromised. We all try to do the best we can with our given circumstances. (Well, maybe the best of us try and do the best we can. The rest can choke.) No doubt those Sun City guys are shrewd businessmen (They'll sell you a copy of Torch of the Mystics right out of their own stash. Bit of a mark-up.), but many of these Sublime Frequencies releases seem like recordings that were made for their own benefit before they decided to be cool and share with the rest of us. Maybe that's a cop out, but I'd bet five times as many copies of Sublime Frequencies releases get downloaded as have been sold anyways. Artists are making music and people are hearing and enjoying it. Something about the circumstances under which they're recorded strikes me as more genuinely representative of our relationship with the third world anyways. Like a lot of those scenes in Herzog's Fata Morgana, just us looking at them and them looking at us, equally wary and fascinated.
So I just watched Jemaa El Fna: Morocco's Rendezvous of the Dead, a festival where musicians travel to some sort of fairground location to play their music and ply their wares. And there's some great looking backlit shots of steam rising off the gathered crowd in the night sky, but those performances are polluted by louder rhythms drifting in from the background. The performers seem frustrated, but you can't tell if its because of the distraction or because its being recorded. And then there's scenes that are pure magic, like the little fella who gets in the middle of a circle and gets real animated when the feeling overtakes him, maybe snatching a tambourine out of someone's hand and bashing the shit out of it. And the kids. There's the little girl who sings and dances and calls and responds, clearly loving the music, but she's also more acutely aware of the camera than anyone else in the film, constantly mugging for it. At one point, the cameraman catches a glimpse of a stunningly beautiful young woman and zooms in on her. She has the look of a teen whose uncle just got his hands on the acoustic guitar and wants everyone to gather round while he trys his hand at Freebird. "Like, are you sure we polished off the rum, cause I sure could use a drink." So while it's a pleasure to see these elders hoop and holler, clap their hands and mouth along to the words, there's that hint of loss there. I mean, what will the scene be when Hisham Mayet shows up with his camera ten years down the line? Ya dig? At least he caught this one.
Also, forget what I said before about Botch. We Are The Romans is a barn burner, and as good as any of Converge's pre-Jane Doe output. I'll even forgive my much loathed "clever song titles."
In fact, forget all kinds of things I said on this blog. Shit's embarassing. I'm nuts. Peace.

2006-11-12T18:49:00.000-08:00

Now, being a rowdy nerd in Math Honors 9, my two favourite things were The Offspring and Green Day. Yup, music video style. If it counts for anything, this is pre-"novelty rock" Offspring and pre-"concept video" Green Day. Anyways, my friend Dave, he would lend anyone who expressed an interest in "punk" a mixtape madefrom his brother's cd collection. So it made its way to me, and it was a lot of Epitaph and Fat Wreck Chords stuff, lots of NOFX, leaned strangely heavy on Dave's Total Chaos obsession, probly just so peeps would think he was xtra tuff, and it ended with a song called "Underachiever's March And Fight Song" by a band called "Archers of Loaf." And I's like, "Music like this exists?"
Soon after I'd borrowed a tape of The Speed of Cattle, which is odds n sods, Peel Sessions, demo versions of Icky Mettle hitz, and it's the first time I remember listening to an album on headphones and just getting gone. Like, I was in a room with the tv on and my mom putting together a jigsaw puzzle but I just was not there. Graceland didn't come close.
He never got that tape back, and i just lost it a couple of years ago. And hearing it now, I'm glad it was the one. ("I'm glad it was you baby.") Most of it's pretty lost in the 3 Ds: dissonance, delay and lo-fi damage, and it somehow manages to be one of their more worthwhile collections of songs. It's certainly as close as I was getting to a Siltbreeze release at the time. And unlike, say, Vee Vee, none of the rockers are stilted. Matter fact, the playing tends toward the inspired, maybe somewhere betwixt Royal Trux and Polvo, while following J. Mascis on his slack quest for glory n nirvana. Like a tar thick summer day in that town, that indie rock town. You know, it was really important, like an indie rock burg of renown. Steve Malkmus would stride down the avenue while fresh faced girls in cardigans would smile from windows, hands clasped together. It was really important. Something.
As far as the newest in new newness goes, I've been listening to Dream/Aktion Unit's Blood Shadow Rampage, Flaherty, Corsano & Yeh's A Rock in the Snow and Vampire Can't's Key Cutter. I could hit myself in the head with a coffee mug and try and think up new ways to say "Chris Corsano is a mystical genius," but I think it's been done. Me too guys, me too.

2006-11-04T15:35:00.000-08:00

What's with these born agains? Yeah, I know this is supposedly a music blog, but I don't write no journal, so I'ma keep venting right here. Whiny existentialism for everyone. Nobody's putting a gun to your head anyways.
But really though. Doug Stanhope has made the point that there ought to be a law against teaching religion before the age of 18, because "if they didn't put that shit in your head while it was still soft, you know you wouldn't be buying it." Which makes perfect sense, but these born agains, they get a l'il bit depressed, and alla sudden they done found Jebus. He has scooped them up in his scrawny hippy arms and enriched their little lives. You just gotta hear about it.
Ol' Youth Pastor Harms (get a haircut), he brought his new squeeze to Sundy School, and she was just filled up with the spirit (and nothing else I guess.) We managed to argue her down to admitting that if some tribesman in South America had had but one opportunity in his life to accept Christ and hadn't taken it, he was surely going to hell. Just bask in the love of our Lord.
Still, Harms, he blew my mind this one time. Talking about Lennon's Imagine, he said, "So basically he's saying 'if everyone in the world agreed with the way I think, there'd be no war.'" Yes! And Boomers think that shit is deep.
So then everyone was sitting around saying how much they loved God, and I was like "Really?" And then I was talking about how "I know everything in the Bible is true, but when you read it it just seems like stories." And then I got laid. And it all took way too long, but I'm not winning any awards for efficient use of life anyways.
I was just watching Amando de Ossorio's Tombs of the Blind Dead, and I'm pretty convinced that Nate Young's Betrayor is an homage to it's soundtrack (and a greasy dollop of smoky goodness to boot.) Plus there's this scene where the lesbian and the swarthy guy (read: Spaniard) go to identify their friend's body, and the morgue worker just stands there grinning at them like a creep before he tears the sheet back. Many yucks were had.
This is a pretty interesting Harry Pussy self-interview. Best part is the ending:

Bill: Ok, let me tell you about a dream that I have. It's a recurring dream that I've had throughout my life. And this will probably give some insight into the band. I have this dream that I'm being chased by a really large angry mob of people and I'm running away laughing.
Adris: That's it. That describes us perfectly. How do you feel about that dream though?
Bill: It's a good dream for me, cause I always wake up feeling really happy. Cause I don't get caught, I escape.
Adris: So you feel like you're getting away with something, when you're playing.
Bill: I feel like I'm just....getting away.

I've got two new tracks up on the space of me. (Whalley) Well, one new track and one chopped and screwed track from 5+ years ago. Get stoned.

2006-10-31T14:07:00.000-08:00

So I's been checkin out this new Jason Lescalleet on zee frickin great Celebrate Psi Phenomenon label(To The Teeth it's called.) Probly just so I can give that Nmperign collab, which is every bit as massive and stunning as everyone says it is, a bit of a rest. And I'm glad I did. You know, John Wiese is great and everything, and I've pried much enjoyment from various sides of his, but the likeliness that I'm gonna return to that kind of ADD assault on a regular basis is fairly slim. I'm not calling out the emperor's new clothes or anything. I mean, I think he's actually pointing out new directions in composition and everything, and he'll probably get his full due when all is said and done, but for now, it might be more suited to someone who talks on their cell phone while railing Meth and watching picture-in-picture tv. If I like a sound, I don't mind if it sticks around for a while.
So this Lescalleet side sounds like Wiese without all the choppy-choppy. Grey-scale noise, perfectly arranged and monstrously heavy, along with things I'm quite fond of, like dynamics and progression. And it seems like, with this deluge of "noise" diarrhea spewing forth from all these, well, assholes, and whatever that does to any notions of talent or ability, the ear of the behearder is what's important. And Lescalleet has a mighty fine ear. Indeed.

If that seemed uninspired, I'm really just posting as an excuse to put up YouTube crap. Clearly I'm putting my free time to good use. Sorry I didn't have the patience to find some A-1 backyard wrestling clips.

2006-10-26T23:02:00.000-07:00

Paranoia is kind of an amazing thing. Even if you're aware that you've got it, it's completely impossible to tell where it starts or ends, whether you're feeling its influence too accutely or not enough. It's like an Ouroborous, you can't tell if it's swallowing itself or creating itself. (if that's how it works. whatever.) I should note that at the age of 25, I'm tucking tail and making preparations to move into Mother's womb, I mean basement. And the timing might be just right. My continued existence seems very frustrating to people, and they're not afraid to vocalize it. I've grown convinced the neighbourhood crackheads are planning some sort of an attack on me, although I'm not sure whether they have a pipe-beating or gang rape in mind. So I guess what we've got here is a confluence of circumstances. Fine, you all win, I'm out. Like Ghost said, "I don't wanna see 2Pac." And if anyone says I stood down I'm gonna fucking find them. All I've learned from 5 years in this beautiful, god-forsaken city is: fuck Vancouver, fuck the upper middle class, fuck sunshine and fuck anyone who thinks they've got anything on you. Fuck everyone. Surrey what! Surrey what!
Anyways, who cares. You're only good for what you're good for, right? Maybe I'll find myself or some such nonsense. The tunes, brother, the tunes.
If obscure is on your agenda, you might just wanna hit that back button. Right now I'm jamming J Dilla's The Shining and Converge's No Heroes pretty heavily. What can I say, they make me happy.
My man Kutcorners at Beat Street tried to tip me to Slum Village's Fantastic Vol. 2 some years back, but I wasn't hearing nothing but El-Producto and Illmatic at the time, so Dilla and I didn't cross paths till that Jaylib thing, and then he went and died of Lupus. (first hip hop artist to die of natural causes? anyone? i fucking hate myself.) And I won't be able to weigh in on Donuts for five years at least. Certifiable genius works from hospital bed, trying to say as much as possible while he still can? Seem overwrought? I don't know, it's a humdinger.
So this Shining disc is the posthumous cash grab, right? You can see a big pile of em at the Virgin fucking Megastore, right next to some guy with a fauxhawk. Busta Rhymes is involved. And, like the best hip hop, the foul reek of commerce just doesn't stick. They've subverted it. It's the underdog, pay up. And maybe contributions by the likes of Common, Guilty Simpson and Black Thought are workmanlike, but workmen built this goddamn house, and it's Dilla's house anyways. Versatility and a shocking amount of talent at whatever he does, that's what's up. This one's impossibly lush and psychedelic. See, I've spent too much time talking about "issues" and now I'm burnt out on talking about "music." This is why modern life is hell, there's so many layers to peel back before you get anywhere near the core of anything.
Wah, wah, wah, boo hoo.
More is more, The Shining is amazing. I'll still like it a month from now.
And while it's for a completely different set of heads, the name Converge carries a similar amount of weight. In the liners to the When Forever Comes Crashing reissue, when Chris Gramlich says they were considered "too heavy," "too raw," "too dark," "too arty," "too hardcore," "too metal," "too extreme," you know that for whoever didn't get scared off, they might've meant just about everything.
I mean, Botch and Coalesce are limited, Isis and Neurosis are boring, Mastodon and Lamb of God are on a guitar tech's sweatshirt, Meshuggah and Opeth aren't even worth mentioning (oops), the best part of Today is the Day's back catalogue is out of print (OOPs) and Earache only released so many good albums, so thank sweet Christ for Converge. Four masterpieces of truly abrasive rage under their studded belts, I don't think I'd be breaking anyone's heart to say their best work is behind them. They're still more potent than anything. No Heroes is the first thing they've done that doesn't try to redefine the universe, so I guess it's formulaic, but what I'm saying is the formula is good. The driving, hint-of-Fugazi anthemics of Petitioning the Empty Sky meet the jagged crush of Jane Doe. They may have made concessions to the public on the fronts of high end damage and willful ugliness, and lines like "I wanna live / without the guilt we give / I wanna die / without this pain" don't hit anywhere near as hard as "With a gun in my mouth / I pray for the sunshine," but I don't doubt I'll listen to this 100 times at least.
Also, Tonight's the Night, Sympathy for Lady Vengeance, and Season 2 of Wonder Showzen. Canucks are 6-4-0-1. Keep hatin.

2006-10-19T19:18:00.000-07:00

I've been meaning to write about this for a while now, but it always seemed like such a grand discovery that it should be saved for a grandiose occasion. And this is no such occasion, but who really cares. Just say whatever you feel needs to be said and do the embarassment and second guessing later. Such is the beauty of the internet.
So I read Valerie Wilmer's As Serious As Your Life this while back. And it really is that serious, lots of writing on Sun Ra, Albert Ayler, Ornette Coleman, giving proper due to controversial figures whose presence has grown more towering over time. I don't know, I think I mentioned it was a while back. I don't remember much, but it was fascinating. I returned it to the library on time and everything.
There's a section on the AACM, which stands for something, and which I always used to confuse with the Art Ensemble of Chicago. They're members, so it ain't all that dumb.
I just got worried that I'd written NAACP, which could've seemed racist to someone. It's cool, I've got a black cousin. I'm a regular Atticus Finch.
The AACM also has Anthony Braxton for a member, and the book quotes him saying something to the effect of, "The musicians of the future will play boxes of their own design, which will emit swirling sounds with little regard for Western tonalities." Or something. Now, I was listening to plenty Dub Leps and Wolf Eyes at the time, so to say my mind was blown does little to convey my shock and awe. Dude wasn't prescient, he was goddamn prophetic. Seriously, did anyone else notice this? Did I imagine it? And that Victoriaville thing happened like a half year later. If I'd blogged it or written it down and mailed it to myself, it would've been time-stamped, and I could've called up Byron Coley and demanded he hand over his record collection. Or even just a copy of Clyma Est Mort.
Even Braxton hasn't tooted his own horn (hah!) on the quote, but clearly he's got some class. I could learn from the man.

p.s. Many thanks to anyone who's passed along kind words. I'm kind of a pussy, so the validation helps.

2006-10-11T13:52:00.000-07:00

Yes, I like these Warmers Milks. That Penetration Initials trimmed my whiskers a little while back, but you've read all about them, most likely, being the worldly men and women that we are. They're great. They don't seem to draw a line between the world of writing songs and making grand gestures and the world of jammin and gettin weird. Mikey T and cohorts will make a loose folk structure bleed atonal confusion, they'll rock a slow burning Sunburned Hand jam, they'll zone out on some Pelt drones, whatever. They've given themselves the freedom to play totally free or rein it in as much as they please. Stand up in your chairs!
Whatever ragged goddamn glory they've strung together, you can always sense the black clouds hanging in the distance. You know, kick at the darkness til it bleeds daylight and all that, until the darkness kicks back. Radish On Light finds them completely bottoming out in negative feelings and paranoid vibes, and it's an ugly little masterpiece. See, and this is why they disturb as much as they soothe, however deranged the Milks get, it's not as an attempt to project a certain aura or to cloak themselves in mystery, or even just to be trippy. It's a genuine, emotionally resonant expression of the things that claw away at your insides. And when I say bottoming out, I'm talking first Burzum depths. Almost Keiji Haino depths. Shit's fugly. I'm not even gonna try to describe the thing, somebody got their hands on some pretty Professional Tools and edited together one dark trip. Imagine the perfect Sunburned Hand album that Moloney and crew will never be able to make.
Third go around and the reviews are in from the neighbours. They don't like it. Looks like it's win-win for me. Right to the top of the heavy rotation pile*:

Warmer Milks - Radish On Light
Magik Markers - Don & Phil
Charalambides - Market Square
Richard Youngs - Advent
Harvey Milk - Courtesy And Good Will Toward Men
The Stooges - Funhouse
The Dead C - Vain, Erudite & Stupid
Wolf Eyes - Human Animal

*Heavy rotation pile not an actual, physical pile. I mean, I own most of these. Well, more than half

2006-10-08T13:04:00.000-07:00

Returned search results for search term air
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I used to be quite enamoured of "eat shit and die" as an elegant declaration of dislike, but lately I've grown quite sweet on "eat shit and fucking choke on it," cause then you get the image of shit in their mouth and them choking and them dying because there's shit lodged in their throat.

Who the fuck does a Soulseek search for "beat"?

2006-10-03T15:50:00.000-07:00

Things to remember while listening to The Goslings' Grandeur of Hair:
-you are lost at sea.
-the meaning of time seems to be decaying.
-you remember what momma said bout those sirens, but they coo so sweet.
-in your periphery, you could swear you saw a bug, but when you look there's nothing there.
-how bad can the afterlife be?
-jellyfish in the moonlight.
-oh, the jellyfish in the moonlight.
-the visions are tests. you have to see reality for what it truly is.
-god is a prick.
-another bug. still nothing there.
-coloured lights emanate from deep beneath you, drifting and pulsing, already a memory as you see them. they'll be gone for long periods of time, but when they return, the tears just roll down your face.
-maybe those sirens don't give second chances.
-she was in that dream. you were happy just to make out with her.
-you may never see daylight again, and the prospect doesn't seem to bother you.

2006-09-28T19:19:00.000-07:00

Harvey Milk : My Love Is Higher Than Your Assessment Of What My Love Could Be

The fine staff at Aquarius Records, they done gone did their best to spread the good word of Harvey Milk 'cross all the internets. And lo, I looked upon what they had did, and I was stoked.
You've heard the shit, right? Rules. Like, all time rules. Go to their Myspace, be their friend. It's got my favourite song of theirs, Silly And Small, which has apparently been redubbed Old Glory and thrown on their new album, but I ain't heard that yet. Looks like Courtesy And Good Will Towards Men has been reissued too. I know I told yall I ain't never going back to slangin rock, but ends gotta meet yall, Dave's gotta eat, and I gots ta listen to my Harvey Milk. O-tay.
While Courtesy... may go down as the stone classic, I'm here to say that My Love Is Higher Than Your Assessment Of What My Love Could Be is the unpolished gem, less harrowing but just as damaged. And now, cause I know you all been waiting, here's the part where I say the music sounds like a combination of different artists, in this case Neil Young, Mission of Burma and The Melvins, hopefully filling in the blanks for you as to what this really sounds like with minimal effort on my part. But Harvey Milk bring the maximal effort (smooth transition, you like it) And it seems like half of it is abrasive experimentation, like Gastr Del Sol gone all intense and Joe Prestonesque, with just as much wounded glory as the "normal" parts. Speaking of Joe Preston, Creston Spiers sings like Joe Preston going to primal scream therapy, a bruised and battered howl sounding out from deep inside. I heard that Joe Preston, in the grips of a mushroom trip, went out into the woods on a stormy NorthWest night, dug his own shallow grave and laid down in it. Apparently he stayed there for about a day (but probly just till the drugs wore off) until thinking "Fuck this," getting up and leaving. Joe motherfuckin Preston. But this be Creston motherfuckin Spiers. This interview with the original drummer might shed a bit of light:

"I think the sound came from the combination of Creston's classical music training and our different musical tastes. We wanted to be loud and heavy, but Creston brought a whole new element because he studied classical percussion, so the music became more orchestrated. I don't think any of us had any intentions to sound like we did, it just happened naturally."

So I guess we should all just thank the stars that these three got in a room and turned on amps. Listen to the album opener, A Small Turn of Human Kindness. Instruments yawn and clatter like some avant-jazz jammers, a synth melody floats around briefly, only to be briefly revisited in rock trio format about six minutes later, massive fills and detuned chords enter and exit according to some logic I can't decipher, and the album doesn't really spread roots until the next track, Women Dig It. Spiers launches a howl out into the void of plodding drums, and you realise you're listening to classic rock as envisioned by the noblest of savages. By the time The Anvil Will Drop rolls in with fragile falsetto and jazzy chordings, takes a bizarre orchestral detour and finishes with the most heart rending stretch of music I've heard in years, I know my new favourite band is here to stay. This isn't just music to appreciate, it speaks to some need deep inside of me. It tells me that things still matter.
Whoa, what happened, I kinda dazed off for a sec there. So yeah, Jim's Polish is the other highlight, but this album don't got a wasted second. Relapse, Troubleman Unlimited, Southern Lord, anyone, put this and every other moment of Harvey Milk back in print, if not for me then for the good of humanity.
And if you want still more epic amazingness to get misty to, cause you're okay with that, Warmer Milks' Penetration Initials is stunning red state blooze. They pull this half-hour doozy off with help from members of Eyes And Arms Of Smoke, Hair Police and other Kenturkeys, and I'm starting to see why they call it the heartland.
Lastly, if you wanna read a Magik Markers roundup the likes of which I could never muster, although I assume he gets paid by the word, go here. Alright, done.

2006-09-17T18:33:00.000-07:00

Being the massive tool that I am, I've been trying to draw connections between the fugly mind melt of bands like Violent Students, Air Conditioning, Lambsbread, Homostupids, Pissed Jeans and Blues Control for a while now, and I'm starting to see why "fuck genres" is the word on the street these days, but the one question I keeps asking my self is "Who takes lead?" Which one is the porridge that Goldie Locks chose? Which band is the drunken lout weaving around the overpass with a dented baseball bat, making sure he makes eye contact with everyone he passes, cause he wants them to SEE.
Thing is, it's probably gonna be whichever one you're listening to at the time. Right now, it's Lambsbread, and they're probably the closest to some magikally marked up art squall, but this one just reeks of thuggery. S'called Smelly Harbor and it makes me want to dock, cause you know it's the good kind of smelly. The band name could be a reggae reference, but by reggae reference I mean stoned, and by stoned I mean Sonny Sharrock and Abruptum getting electro-shock.
Next up, Violent Students. I know I've gotta mention Gibby Hanes and John Maloney, but the singer grunts out smoke trails in a manner all his own. As for the music, if you wanted to hear a jammier Brainbombs buried under an avalanche of psych-goo, here's your goddamn chance. You wouldn't pass up a good chance when it's staring you right in the face, would you? That'd be fucking stupid. Violent Students aren't stupid though, just violent. The music doesn't stop. There's no dynamic build or waft through space before this shit comes together, it just goes. And then, right at the end, they fuse the fucking Beverly Hills Cop soundtrack with Mr. Mister's "Broken Wings" and a drunk ape, just in case your sac wasn't bruised enough already.
In this company, Homostupids are pretty meat and potatoes, but the meat is human flesh and the potatoes are grenades. (What?) This The Glow EP is about four minutes of instant gratification, like real early Black Flag and real early Black Dice playing chicken in their tour vans. And then Kevin Bacon ends up looking like the hero, but just cause he got his fucking shoelace stuck. Still, the best scene is when Bacon first bumps into that other dude in the hallway. Shit gets a little tense and Bacon, aka Soul Sizzla, busts out "Do they sell men's clothes where you bought that hat?" He and dude face off for what seems like an eternity before cracking the inevitable simultaneous smiles and embracing as best friends forever.
Homostupids.

2006-09-14T13:07:00.000-07:00

What this fucking blog needs is some pictures, jazz it up a bit. Here's a bunch I stole whilst lurking around MySpace like a creep.

Actually, one of those is Reynols. The second one, I think.
Also, fuck what I said about songs last time. I've been listening to nothing but like Mouthus and Brutal Truth for so long, bring on the indie rock anthems! Archers of Loaf, Dinosaur Jr, Three Mile Pilot and Slint are the only bands ever. Seriously. Maybe The Fall.

2006-09-09T12:14:00.000-07:00

How's this for an afternoon of lissenin n grinnin (n pickin... my crack! Hah.)

The Magik Markers : For Sada Jane
The Dead C : perform Vain, Erudite and Stupid : Selected Works 1987-2005

In case you're wondering, the answer is 'real good.'
I'd been starting to think Magik Markers was like a garage band Fushitsusha, but here they pack the variety of four Haino projects on to one disc. Pete Nolan's Spectre Folk project definitely gets a nod, although placing this squarely in any camp is up to someone other than me, and if I could I'd tell them not to bother. It's definitely more house pet than wild beast. Whatever they do, the colouring has a healthy disregard for the lines in that way oh so dear to my heart, and I'm pretty sure Elisa is the scribbler. As with everything I've heard from the Markers as of late, it makes me think that something is really going on here. Looks like Arbitrary Signs has just popped out 3 new cdrs, but my couch is a futon, so I don't know where I'm gonna find the change.
And here's something that needed to be done: The Dead C's career retrospective is one of the best I've ever heard, but you tell me whether that has more to do with how well it's put together or that it it's the Dead fucking C. See, I didn't even know that the 2lp of Harsh 70s Reality was different from the cd, and now I know all kinds of things. I know that Max Harris was the name of an Australian poetry publisher who got hoaxed and printed poems by a couple of dudes who were mocking the style he loved. Oh, and he was a literary critic.
I read an interview with Bruce Russell, and he said that when the Dead C formed, it seemed like everyone around him thought that the ultimate aspiration was to make the perfect pop song, and he felt that was fine but there had to be more, and I thought "fucking exactly." And that's basically what I think whenever I listen to the Dead C. Fucking exactly. As a young'n I got deeply into things like early Pavement, and while the charm of the songs eventually faded, those sounds that bled through the edges, the lo-fi stumble and recorder grot, still seem to hold some eerie power. And the Dead C got that a long time before I did. Fuckin eh!
Oh, and here's what I wanted to say about Fag Tapes last time around, especially Barf Thoth: Think of driving through a scenic countryside and drifting dreamlike past some chemical mishap, what could've been a scattering of ponds turned all sorts of noxious colours, a cartoon horror. Think of mold growing inside your lungs. Think of your entire life receding into a spewing, hissing background noise, threatening to overtake you but pushed just far enough away. Like a lot of things, it's probably not that good for you, but it gets you through the day.

2006-08-18T15:24:00.000-07:00

So my home computing base is officially dead for the time being. The best anyone can expect is speed posts from the library. This means a couple of things: I probably won't have the sounds blasting my ears as I write of them, and I probably won't be under any kind of influence. See what kind of buzz I can maintain off fluorescent lighting and shitty coffee.
Got a package from Hanson a little while back:

Prurient : History of Aids CD
Pengo : The Cosmology of Broken Saints CDR
Sick Llama : Alien Facial 3 CS
Afternoon Penis : In the Evening CS
Super Street 8 : Nervous Downer
Barf Thoth : Peep Roky

Obviously I'm a little fixated on the Fag Tapes front these days, and Stoned Heath has yet to disappoint me, which, given the limitations of mail-order, is kind of a necessity. I know my instant-gratification buying habits (and living habits) are fundamentally flawed, but, as they say, what the fuck. This Super Street set is particularly nice, starting slow with some drifty lo-fi Jessica Rylan and finishing off with another monster by Odd Clouds, with plenty of squally goo and audio pain sandwiched in between. Barf Thoth is near perfect, and the puke green paint job on the cassette is the same. As for Prurient, this one nearly quenchs my masochistic thirst. Much of Vancouver's noise scene falls into line with current king Sam McKinlay, aka The Rita, and if you spend any time with the misanthropes on iheartnoise, most of them do too. It's called the WALL of noise, a solid, impenetrable jagged thrust that sets the perfect balance between calming and aggravating while I'm lifting boxes for eight hours of my day. Still, when set along side the likes of Dominick Fernow, I have a hard time calling it truly abrasive. If you're interested in some serious sonic punishment, I've found little that tops it. If anyone has, lemme know. Also, if anyone has a cure for my addiction to adjectives, they should let me know about that too. In a frank, tasteful and timely manner. Ack. Oh yeah, all the other stuff is great, too. Fucking library.

2006-05-25T03:43:00.000-07:00

If you're Canadian, I hope you know what Brave New Waves is. If you're from elsewhere, try the interweb. I was typing to someone about it and remembered that I'd heard Wolf Eyes for the first time on this late night program, being interviewed just after they'd played the DEMF, post Sub Pop deal but pre-Burned Mind. I was interested because of the Black Dice connection (Black Dice were good at the time). Dudes cracked me up, especially Olson's repeated references to being a "rat kid," and the music peeled my head back, like that Maxell commercial but with tentacles and shit. So I went to the BNW site, and turns out it's archived on there. Noice! One thing that stood out this time around was Patti Schmidt asking them why sub-underground noise was starting to get attention. They basically said that all these freaks had been doing what they were doing for a while, travelling amongst their own circles, and now they're actually starting to become quite good at the forms they've pioneered. The obvious example was Lightning Bolt. I think it's true, and all the young'ns they've inspired are coming into their own as well. Just wanted to say that. Hooray for music. Hooray for weirdoes. Hooray.

http://www.bravenewwaves.ca/bnmedia/index.shtml
Just scroll through the interviews. You can listen to the other ones too. If you want.

2006-05-20T02:47:00.000-07:00

Wolf Eyes : River Slaughter : Hospital Productions
I get off work at eleven pm these days and usually get home some time around twelve. I think I've listened to this album every night after work this week. Rather than to comment on my largely eventless existence, I bring this up to highlight the true radness of these here four sides. See the river takes you away, and then you get slaughtered. It's like going down a waterslide until you spot the grinding saw that you're rapidly approaching, except over and over again. I don't know.
If you've seen them on tour with the kid or on the Live in a Boat dvd, you might remember that there were pretty vicious renditions of Burned Mind standards, along with spacious spook jams. If you liked those jams you'll like these slabs, and even if you didn't like those jams you might like these slabs, as this stuff sits well in the home environment, especially if you're staying up way too late and sweating in a vinyl chair.
After the Deranged cdr and the Prurient split, I was a little worried that they were settling for interesting rather than great, and then they drop this. Back in bleek, back in black. Hospital!!! I will accept donations of the Magik Markers one-sided lp, the Death Unit lp and any Prurient tapes. Really, I will.

2006-05-06T13:19:00.000-07:00

Avarus : Vesikansi : Secret Eye / Lal Lal Lal
Stoned dudes fucking around. Ever have someone ask you what your genre was? It always pissed me off. I liked to think I listened to music that surpassed its genre or completely disregarded it, but I think I've found mine. You see, the thing about stoned dudes fucking around is that they tend to forget about structure. There could be some excellent musicianship on display, but when all the borders start to blur and pure sound begins to spew forth, I'm right there. And Avarus are somewhere sort of off to the left.
I googled this album for reviews and all I found was some mail order thing saying they could never be psychedelic because they didn't know how to play their instruments. Well, from experience I can tell you that Avarus are one of the most psychedelic bands around, and they play their instruments like noone I've ever heard. They're a bunch of art-punks living out of Finnish dumpsters and they've found some way to devolve their playing into this primal stew, this swelling clang and clatter. Some of this stuff sounds a bit Sunburned Hand-y, but for my dollar it's Avarus. Sonic invention always abounds and the near constant droney haze binds it all together.
These are some nice long tracks. I thinks it's all from one live set. Tara Burke (Fursaxa) shows up for the last one and it's a doozy I tells ya. I like.

2006-04-21T03:19:00.000-07:00

So no more fucking mailorder till I get a P.O. box situation sorted out. Basically, my apartment building is shitty, (some) mail carriers are stupid, and I've been trying to get a package from Fusetron for months. It's got the Glass Organ tape on Tone Filth, Dead C's Trapdoor Fucking Exit, Blood Stereo's Live at Sonic Protest, and I think something else but I can't even fucking remember anymore. I'm sure it's all evaporated into the ether by now, it's been flown around the continent so much.
So now I'll just review a bunch of stuff I downloaded:
Yellow Swans : Psychic Secession
A new version of this should be out on Load by now, which is great, cause it's about as much of a trip as Live During War Crimes, but sounds a lot more like a statement. Their politics have aligned with their sound. No longer content to just let you know that they don't like George W. Bush, they're leading us all to their autonomous mental state. Get off our land!
After True Union's 20 minute journey, somebody sings, Bowie style, but don't ask me who. Inca Ore and Tom Carter are on here somewhere. Later on, some rhythms show up, sounding like a drum circle at a Nine Inch Nails concert, but really great. This one will floss the parts of your brain the other shit wasn't getting to.
Ex-Cocaine : Keep America Mellow
So this has Ramirez, who used to be in Universal Indians with Olson before he was in Wolf Eyes, but apparently those seshes were so smoked out neither of them remember, and he might've forgotten about this one too, but I won't. From pure delayed blues noodling to some smooth bongofied flange jams, makes me want to make breakfast any time of the day. Then Jandek and the Dead C show up and tweak my skull while killing my appetite. Maybe if I order a pizza I'll be hungry again by the time it gets here.
Air Conditioning : Weakness
Pissed Jeans : Shallow
And here I am, way the fuck behind on this whole Allentown thing. Sub Pop found out about Pissed Jeans before I did, and I just found out Black Eyes Peas' Fergie pissed her own jeans during a performance. She's totally our generation's GG Allin. Or maybe she's a mildly retarded plastic surgery disaster. Either way.
As for Sub Pop, we'll just pretend like they released nothing between Mudhoney's Superfuzz Bigmuff and whatever the Jeans throw their way. All the Flipper references are definitely warranted, plus other stuff I need to delve into, like Drunks with Guns and Halo of Flies. It's pure, squally, ugly grunt rock fun, and they do it well enough that my "retro annoyance" alarm doesn't seem to get set off. Well, maybe I just like these influences best. Check the piano at the end of Ugly Twin, classy.
Still, the real story here, and it ain't nowhere near as 'rags to riches,' is Air Conditioning. I would recommend Sightings check these guys out, and not whatever arch, airless shit they listened to prior to Arrived in Gold. Ugly jam rock completely BLOWN OUT by feedback, static, and whatever other sonic assault these boys can muster, and brother, these boys can muster. Like you can barely tune in the station, so you turn the volume way up, and it's dudes spewing neanderthal guzz in someone's basement with the dryer running and a few fans on. I don't know, can something be both highly psychedelic and incredibly sobering? Huzzah to finding ever worse ways to record things in this digital age. I'm willing to throw a lot of money into R&D for that.

2006-03-11T00:53:00.000-08:00

Mouthus : The Long Salt : Important
Mouthus start this new one off by letting you know that this isn't going be anywear near as controlled as their instant classic Troubleman album Slow Globes. It isn't a return to the caustic squall of Loam either, it's like they're just letting loose, unleashing every element of their sound in a full force gale. Like everything they do, it's essential, like some ritual from a fog world of unknown origins.
The drumming's at its most varied, settling into some pretty Krauty grooves while maintaining their shambling logic. It's possible to think that these guys could team any sound with their rhythms and it would be hypnotic, but it's their constantly unfurling haze of sound that defines them. Besides, their creation is so symbiotic, no one element can be separated out amidst the clouds. Just this time around it grows real fucking huge, like the mountains of psych last explored on Black Dice's Beaches and Canyons. Yeah, it's Beaches and Canyons as performed by the Dead C with the offspring of Rashied Ali and Jaki Liebezeit playing drums after huffing paint. It could happen. It should happen. It did happen. And I actually just wrote that. Huzzah to me.
Their cd-r release Told by the Water kicks some serious dust also, so here's a track. Kill city shit yall:
mouthus - told by the water track 2

2006-02-18T01:58:00.000-08:00

Mp3zzz 2 : Classik Metal
While dude at Aversionline has definitely been doing his part to disseminate mp3s from all over metal and hardcore's history and present, his encyclopedic knowledge of the genres has him championing all kinds of obscure stuff. I'll admit I'm coming to the game pretty late, but maybe my scant knowledge can help me shine a light on some more obvious picks. But don't worry, this'll be the only Metallica mp3 ever.

bathory - equimanthorn
From Under the Sign of the Black Mark. Quorthon was an early champion for a type of metal that didn't give a fuck about recording quality or "skill," just impassioned expression of dark, dark feelings. After others started following his lead, it got called Black Metal, and most of us are familiar with the chaos that ensued, but this vicious track is as good an example as I've heard. The solo at the end warms my noise lovin' heart.
metallica - for whom the bell tolls
That offer to remove any mp3s as requested extends to the RIAA too. In the mean time, this is about as good as it gets. Having first been exposed to Lars and co. through the "Black Album" (I slow danced to Enter Sandman in grade 7), I never cared too much about Metallica. My friend Tom got me heavily into Master of Puppets, but I was under the impression that that album was some sort of an anomaly. I think I read that from Thurston Moore somewhere(so he's been known to misguide).
Of course now they're just Napster hating corporate whores who everyone loves to heap disdain on. Amazing that they've finally lost sight that they built their name on tape-trading and sheer love of the metal. Many seem to share the opinion that it's too bad that it wasn't Lars that fell under the bus.
Ride the Lightning isn't lo-fi by any means, but it ain't no fuckin Bob Rock production either. Metallica went into the studio with the knowledge of how they WANTED to sound, and they made sure they sounded that way. Their pummeling chug delivered hooks the size of Everest. Hard to believe they were still looking for a vocalist with a King Diamond style high pitch wail at the time, Hetfield's gruff delivery was at it's best. Time mar-ches on! If you're wondering why Metallica never wrote songs as concise and powerful as their career trudged on, I'll give you two words: Cliff Burton. Dude's a deity.

2006-02-15T15:28:00.000-08:00

MP3zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Hey hey hey. Gots myself some webspace, there's gonna be mp3 posts now and again. If any artists or labels don't want these up here, e-mail me: dave23xyz at hotmail dot com. Yeah, that's the e-mail.

Also, check the bummer haze: whalley

the dead c - sky
The "cleaner" version from Harsh 70s Reality. The Dead C hit the same poetically blasted mainline that Sonic Youth used to.
wooden wand & the vanishing voice - effigies in dread
In the flurry of truly great WWVV material coming out these days, I'd hate to see this gem go unnoticed. One of their greatest melds of James Toth's song writing and the bands improvisational drift, it's probly my second favourite "song" of theirs, next to Counterfeit Kingdom.

2006-02-13T00:33:00.000-08:00

magik markers : a panegyric to the things i do not understand: gulcher
I think that lo-fi's lack of a fully defined sound has helped a lot of bands, like Avarus, taking diverse elements and forming them into a pulsing whole, a more organic sort of creation. After hearing albums like Burned Mind and Dog Jaw from Wolf Eyes, the Slam Section tape helps shine a different light on their sound, re-focusing on their primal brutality as a whole entity. Still, while trying to get a grip on a fairly difficult band whose entire catalogue seems to consist of clutches of poorly recorded live takes, it can be pretty frustrating.
All I'd heard from Magik Markers prior to this album definitely promised that all the praise being heaped upon them was warranted, but was exceedingly difficult to find a way into. The best seemed to be Thee Magik Marquers, which moved from thinly quiet tracks, mostly surviving on Elisa Ambrogio's vocals, to bracing free fire squalls. If you could surrender yourself and embrace the dynamic, the music's peaks were brilliantly overwhelming, but it was quite a commitment. But it's all changed with this one.
Now, every element of the Markers' sound is clear as day, and the clarity is blinding, my friend. Like Dominick Fernow's feedback on Black Vase, hearing every nuance of the free noise spewing out of Elisa's guitar does nothing but increase it's power, and with Leah Quimby's bass and Pete Nolan's drums audible in the mix, their power is fully realised(and so they formed like Voltron). This is no-wave spew ala Mars or Confusion is Sex era Sonic Youth bent through a psychedelic free jazz lens, yet somehow with roots in earlier rock. Even when, after laying down some searing guitar noise, everything opens up into whistling, jabbering, light feedback, and the barest of rhythms, it ain't no airless avant garde wank, and when the guitar starts blatting smears of sound again, it's no surprise. That might be the greatest strength of this album, getting to follow Magik Markers fractured improvisational logic in two side long pieces. Every time you think you're hearing a musical non-sequitur, they bring the fire and it acquits itself. Taken as a whole, it might crack your skull open wider than you expected.
Also, I though it was needlessly pretentious, but look up that p-word and the title is quite nice. Or maybe you just knew it already. I'm real impressed.
Also, the Wolf Eyes/Prurient split is pretty great. Wolf Eyes' The Terror Tank is mixed in a manner that seems annoying at first, but actually gives the effect of being in some sort of a tank while something really awful takes place outside. Weird. Prurient drops more of his eviscerating squall, a little bit lo-fi with sudden dynamics and field recordings thrown into the mix. Dude's the greatest.
Birchville Cat Motel's With Maples Ablaze is sorta disappointing. Molded by Campbell Kneale from a multitude of tape contributors, including Bastard Noise's John Weise, Kemialliset Ystavat's Jan Anderzen, The Dead C's Bruce Russell and Reynols, it's all whiz-bang neato, but lacks the singularity of my favourite Kneale pieces. But I guess that's the point. I think it's just more, er, polite than I'd hoped. Back to my BxC.

2006-02-08T14:08:00.000-08:00

Eclipse package
Got a package from Ed Hardy today:
Wolf Eyes : Slam Section cs : Fag Tapes
V/A : Super Street 5 - I Want You to Kill Me cs : Fag Tapes
Aaron Dilloway : Heavy cs : Heavy Tapes
Wolf Eyes / Prurient : The Warriors cd : Hospital Productions
Birchville Cat Motel : With Maples Ablaze cd : Scarcelight Recordings

Just listening to the tapes / recording to minidisc. I downloaded the Street Freaks comp a while back, and I've been jonesing for the Super Street comp ever since. Pengo! Twisted psych-noise with Steve Albini just jamming out some Velvets/Floyd madness. Well, not really, but it's power/psych/doom or something, so freak out already. The Odd Clouds opener is monstrous also, horn damage and power drones swelling into some scary shapes. Heard much ballyhoo bout Raven Strain, and I can't say it gripped me, but I just got the damn thing, right? Fag Tapes = crude, start to finish. The sounds, the recording, the packaging, it's some of the most convinvingly bent stuff going. The Wolf Eyes tape takes the Sub Pop supastarz and puts them back in the grimy, sweat-dripping, mildewed basement, where they belong (but really it's at some club.) Now I have to see if I can get my hands on Super Street 6. Graveyards, Dillo and Roxanne Jean Polise, yeeah.
Dillo's tape is the first Heavy Tape I've gotten my hands on, (tapes!!!) and I can see why they're so coveted. I've been peeping Maya Miller's art at the website for a while now, but to hold this psych gross-out in my hands is something else. The post Wolf Eyes travelogue blow-out is migh-tee nice, too. Scribble sounds hint at something lurking beneath, before getting caught in a loop and blind-sided by a hurricane. Then things really get started. Field recordings and power electronics meld into something else entirely, and it might be heavy, but it's a relaxing kind of heavy.
I'll probably post on the other two once they've been absorbed and vomited up. Shit, it's almost 3pm, I should probably make some breakfast.

2006-02-03T02:11:00.000-08:00

Ok, now I've really botched this whole year end list thing. Damn you blogpsot, why must you so cruelly track my past mistakes. Now I know how the Bush administration feels. Seriously, why should the public be aware of my flubs and thus hold me accountable for them? It's clearly not fair.
Ok, enough about how life isn't fair, I think the spot vacated on the list by Leviathan could potentially be filled by either Hair Police's Constantly Terrified or something by Burning Star Core, like The Very Heart of the World or Mes Soldats Stupides : 96-04.
In the wake of Wolf Eyes' Burned Mind, HP easily dodge also-ran status with a smoldering set of free rock drenched in overwhelming, putrid noise. This is another one of those definitive statement things: four tracks, each cleaving it's own chunk out of your skull, so once the blood hits your eyes, it's already too late. There was an article in Swingset where one of them, I think it was Connelly, said he liked the thought of someone picking up their album in the future and thinking it represented our time. It's an admirable intent, but somewhat flawed thinking. If our time really is as scary and ugly as Hair Police make it seem (and it could be), there won't be anyone in the future to hear it.
Burning Star Core is a name I'd been seeing around in all the right places, but never thought to take the dive before the recent massive review treatment in The Wire. I can't really get mad at myself, keeping up with the amount of artists that get praised in the name of the new weird whatever is fucking impossible (at least without broadband. Come back, broadband.), but C. Spencer Yeh's brainchild is so far up my alley, it's retarded. BxC makes me think of Birchville Cat Motel's immense drone vistas, except by way of Tony Conrad's harsh minimalism and American noise's free-for-all, so, like BCM, he can emit heart-rending beauty without anyone being able to call him a pussy. White hot nuggets of melody set amidst hail storms of noise, rough hewn and powerful, with several detours to a little town called Whatthefuck. Another relentless collaborator, he often plays with Hair Police's Robert Beatty and Trevor Tremaine as his backing band. Perhaps the true lesson of this top ten list is to make your scene as incestuous as possible. All these links, where does it end?
That's it, top twelve, but of the last two years. Make it top twenty. Everybody's in, music rules, fuck yeah.

2006-01-22T00:49:00.000-08:00

Holee sheeit, i just realized Tentacles of Whorror came out in 2004. I guess I could substitute the Lurker of Chalice album, although it would get demoted in rank. Really, 2004 had all the really strong metal releases, with Leviathan, Converge and Pig Destroyer delivering overwhelming efforts. 2005 is the year I delved into older metal, finding Bathory's Under the Sign of the Black Mark, Carcass's Symphonies of Sickness and Entombed's Left Hand Path. Guess I'll just hope 2006 delivers more of both.

2006-01-16T23:46:00.000-08:00

Top Ten of 2005
Ah, yes. Every music nerd waits all year long to make a top ten, some even jump the gun and get them published in December, but I waited, so j'know this is definitive:
10. Lightning Bolt : Hypermagic Mountain : Load
When it comes to LB, really all we want is more of the same, cause we've listened to the last one about a thousand times, and while it's not as good as Wonderful Rainbow, everything seems to be just that much more.
9. Excepter : Throne : Load
I've heard a bunch of John Fell Ryan and the gang's stuff, and its always gone from "interesting" and "promising" to "pretty damn good," but they dropped the fucking bomb on this one. Pure hypno-womb music.
8. Sunn O))) : Black One : Southern Lord
Totally O'Malley and Anderson's best yet. They've managed to bring an even bleaker sensibility to their blasted landscapes, tapping into black metal despair with the help of Wrest and Malefic. Finally got to see them live in 2005.
7. Double Leopards : Out of One, Through One, and to One : Eclipse
6. Mouthus : Slow Globes : Troubleman Unlimited
These practice space sharing space-heads represented the Brooklyn Zoo with a slew of top ten worthy releases this year, including their collaborative White Rock joints, but only the best of the best for my list. Retro posers need to fuck off, this is what psychedelia sounds like in the right now.
5. Leviathan : Tentacles of Whorror : Moribund
Yet another case of a prolific artist hurling a bounty of musical goodness out into the world, Leviathan is Wrest's flagship. Pure, vicious black metal drifts into haunted soundscapes and every point in between. If Bathory's Quorthon only knew what he was unleashing onto the world.
4. Kemialliset Ystavat : Kellari Juniversemi : Fonal / Beta-Lactam Ring
3. Avarus : Ruskea Timantti : Tumult
Both of these are re-releases, albeit of material that was largely unknown and almost impossible to find originally, they both feature Jan Anderzen as a leader and a member, respectively, and, once again, they are the best material of incredibly prolific artists. Actually, they're the best albums of the wealth of free-psych to recently explode out of Finland. Inspiringly primal and utterly other-worldly. Anything by either of these bands needs to be bought on sight.
2. Jack Rose : Kensington Blues : VHF
1. Prurient : Black Vase : Load
Topping the list are two definitive statements by artists for whom the word virtuosity almost seems like an understatement, and yet the sound and intent of these two albums could not be further apart. While Fahey and Basho inspired finger-picking seems to be achieving a renaissance in recent years, Rose is miles ahead of anyone, and this album is one of the greatest examples of a man fully expressing himself through his instrument since Coltrane ceased to walk the earth. Dominick Fernow's instrument of choice is mic feedback, and while that might sound limited, this act of self-immolation is the purest sound to emerge out of the East Coast post-everything whatever. Intensely cathartic and, at times, even beautiful, Fernow has combined eviscerating screams, thudding percussion and the sound of air being eaten alive in a completely new sound that seems so natural I might even need to use the word pure one more time. So fucking pure.

2005-11-29T01:16:00.000-08:00

Wolf Eyes & Double Leopards cs : Heavy Tapes
Nice slice from these underground noise all-stars. While everything grows and shifts organically, the sound itself is cold and mechanical, a hunk of technological waste, drifting ever deeper into endless space. Some of Wolf Eyes most zoned improv pulsates beneath Double Leopards' sheets of drone, and the result is both bleakly minimal and brilliantly psychedelic. When the time is right, the threat emerges and the proceedings gain an eery power. The floating detritus seems to be awake, like HAL's autistic brother, receiving transmissions long thought to be lost, decayed by age and distance. I heard from the mouth of Olson himself that these guys and gals wanna jam again, so let's hope this is just a taste of things to come, and maybe I can get myself a copy next time round. And on a related note...
Double Leopards : A Hole is True : Troubleman Unlimited
Upon listening to Double Leopards newest, I'm thinking it's the harsher more varied companion to Out of One, Through one and To One's subtle might. Might be their most overwhelming offering yet. Hoo-boy am I feeling this one.

2005-11-23T01:29:00.000-08:00

Mix
eyes and arms of smoke - pioneers of sleep
kemialliset ystavat - suurempi pieni palatsi / track 3
prurient - sorry robin
the germs - we must bleed
mouthus - this is my snow
the dead c - world
wooden wand & the vanishing voice - spear of destiny
sword heaven - we of the fucking mountains
neil campbell & decaer pinga - strobelights to boston / track 2
kemialliset ystavat - jewelled antler library #11 / track 2
vibracathedral orchestra, laukeaht lampaat, chris corsano and paul flaherty - when the world...
mv / ee - parasol meets the bag plague

some floating mist, some demented drift, some jarring skullfuck
pure smoke, i would hope
makes me want to start all over again

2005-10-21T00:06:00.000-07:00

Davenport : The Hands of Worm Heaven cdr : Time-Lag
Here's the highest compliment I can pay to Davenport: they're a bitch to write about. The only issue they really raise with me is "where can I get more?" This is churning primal drone fog ala Avarus or Sunburned Hand Of the Man with the ecstatic imperative of Vibracathedral Orchestra. In case you were wondering, I like it more than VO and less than SHOTM. I guess it's "difficult", with it's lightly edited 10+ minute jams and its skronky free-noise nature, but it isn't. It can get abrasive but there's no abrasion to it, shit just gets intense, like it should. I feel like saying ear-candy exists at all levels of music appreciation, but it sounds less and less like well-crafted product each time I hear it, and more like a plausible template, a punk rock ideal of eternal music that's within anyone's reach. They don't even have to be as "out" as Jan Anderzen and John Moloney's crews can get, they've just gotta be a little bit bent and a whole lot stoned.

2005-10-08T00:59:00.000-07:00

EYEHATEGOD Frontman In Jail; Band To Raise Money For Legal Defense Fund - Oct. 1, 2005 Legendary New Orleans sludge kings EYEHATEGOD have issued the following statement: "[EYEHATEGOD frontman] Mike Williams has been arrested, and is being held in Morgan City Jail, about an hour west of New Orleans. We won't elaborate on the details as a precautionary measure; if you'd like to know, write him (info below). he was on probation at the time of his arrest, so having a cop breathe in his general direction was a threat to his freedom. "As of [mid-September], Mike was in good spirits. Jimmy [Bower; EYEHATEGOD/SUPERJOINT RITUAL guitarist, DOWN drummer] was able to visit with him, and said he looked healthy, and most importantly, has a positive outlook and good sense of humor with regards to his situation. He did say they had no TV, so drop him a line; show your support when it counts the most. No magazines, CDs, stickers, etc... just letters. Keep in mind that his letters are screened, and this a small, Christian town (this is a major understatement). Please do not write anything that may affect his treatment as an inmate. We wanna keep his only connection to everyone wide open. "We will be releasing a two-CD set in order to raise money for his defense. One will be our set from Tokyo (three songs from this are featured on 'Preaching...'), and the other from our last tour. Both recordings sound great. We will release this on the band's 'label,' Press Pause Media/Cassettes, so that ALL of the money, excluding pressing costs, will go toward Mike's defense. Any help with distro, advertising would be greatly appreciated as we barely have enough $$$ to press this. We will try to have this out within a month. Contact Gary (ghawg@bellsouth.net) for anything related to this release. Seriously, your help will make a difference." Mike Williams' contact address: Morgan City Jail ATTN: Mike D. Williams (inmate) P.O. Box 1670 Morgan City, LA 70380 USA

2005-09-19T21:51:00.000-07:00

Eyehategod : In the Name of Suffering
Alright, the Melvins seem to be getting their due for seeding the current crop of sludge-metal bands, but there's another, a beast that's been lurking deep in the American South. Actually, and this is timely for no good reason, Louisiana. Whatever good times Bush used to partake in there, they probably weren't soundtracked by Eyehategod. It's the bleak, harrowing sounds of Corrupted and Khanate that trace a direct lineage to this here album. Eyehategod may still rule to this very minute, but they've never cooked up as vile a "fuck you" to our lord and saviour since.
Feedback. This is the key to the Eyehategod experience. Later on they reigned it in and even crafted droning soundscapes from it, but here it seems to just bleed everywhere, shrapnel bursting from sheer, forceful anguish. You might recognize it popping up in those early Black Dice 7"s, but here it fits perfectly with this Southern tarpit sludge. This is the sound of poverty, nihilism and substance abuse. It's that same pattern as Hip-Hop, the first album is just plain the most hungry. While Michael Williams' lyrics have not yet reached the Burroughsian heights of, say, Dopesick, they still reside in the same brilliantly tortured place. Reading the lyrics sheet is pretty much a separate pleasure from the music itself, as Williams' recorded vitriol is nearly indecipherable, and no song titles appear with the lyrics. Combined with his disturbing collage work, the packaging is nearly half the fun. Just a sample:
self abuse loves company
nobody talks to the drug prowling wolf
looks real sick in the sun
wind runs plays rains
time blows through windows

and:
hold me down
slavery is god and time is a weight
i watched you suffer
and you showed me the same

On Take as Needed for Pain he layed out the manifesto:
nine steps for terrorism
1. absorb conradiction
2.soak up distraction
3.kill your boss
4.be filthy of mind
5.reinstate illogical conversation
6.embrace negativism
7.baptise by addiction
8.preach vice
9.steal for worthlessness

The agenda is set with the first song, "depress," followed by EHG's heaviest riff (and greatest song title, and they had some great ones) "man is too ignorant to exist." "pigs" goes into a slow boil before erupting halfway through the song, while "godsong" features the vocal contributions of one Charles Manson. The faster parts of these songs have the punk rock fury of a stoned Black Flag, something that wasn't there on later albums, evolving into amphetamine driven southern rock. The cover's picture of some decrepit, moss-covered house is like a spook house take on a Jandek cover, speaking to a similar form of isolation and depression. While metal's getting a lot of attention these days, especially the progariffic wankery of Mastadon and the overblown chugalug of High on Fire(Surrounded by Thieves was awesome, who knew Steve Albini and Joe Preston wouldn't make them better), Eyehategod are the real deal. If you're at all into the blackened landscapes that Corrupted and Khanate summon, or if you just wanna hear one of the deadliest fucking albums ever, this is essential.

2005-09-18T00:30:00.000-07:00

listening pile:
hototogisu - ghosts from the sun
wolf eyes - deranged
godflesh - streetcleaner
the mv & ee medicine show - the suncatcher blossoms a nova and is so grateful it is no longer willing to dark the sun
avarus - ruskea timantti
excepter - throne
dreamed yellow swans
pelt - untitled
eyehategod - take as needed for pain
kemialliset ystavat - lumottu karkkipurkki (vapaa systeemi)
blood stereo - the trunk is flexed
jack rose - kensington blues
napalm death - scum
royal trux - twin infinitives

2005-09-11T15:21:00.000-07:00

Mouthus : Slow Globes : Troubleman Unlimited
Listen, I'm not going to tell you that I hate retro music. Traditional song forms still carry quite a bit of weight and it's always possible to fashion something personal and expressive from the vast smorgasbord of styles now available to us, but the more bands like Mouthus I discover, the less patience I have for it. See, you could point out various precedents for this duo's stoned noise-fog in the history of recorded music, and they would be some obscure ones in Mouthus' case, but really they're just echoes, dislocated fragments. This is what David Keenan would call "form-destroying": music that not only rejects traditional song forms, but handily makes the case that they're no longer necessary.
Mouthus use their skill at disorienting to entrance. The drumming and guitar playing hint at free jazz, and yet they loop in repeated patterns, drifting in a haze of moaned vocals and effects-pedal gauze. If you found any joy in Lynch's Elephant Man, a steam-obscured period piece from a time that never really existed, there will be something here for you. For me, it's like the sounds I've been waiting to hear are finally being created. With the intense feedback squall of Loam almost completely gone, Mouthus have revealed the pulsating organic beast at the core of what they do, while still creating a remarkably dense haze for only two people. The last track on side A even contains some majestic psych-rock guitar action, until the wheels fall off and the whole thing descends into a disjointed nightmare of steam blasts and moans. By the end of side B, you might think you'd stumbled into an Avarus jam, but Mouthus never let loose with that kind of abandon. Everything is tightly reigned in, each song is its own idea, and hypnosis is maintained with the simplest of means. These guys do this so well, so consistently, it's clear they've found some twisted form of zen transcendance amidst the darkness and fog. Which means there might be hope for me. Right?

2005-08-03T21:30:00.000-07:00

While black metal will forever be associated with the criminal hijinks of Burzum amd Mayhem in the early 90s, the musical legacy they and their corpse-painted peers left has been amassing an international following in the last decade. I'm not going to get into the "sell out" Cradle of Filth black metal vs. true black metal debate because it's boring, and like any other genre-fied form of music, the majority of black metal produced is paint by numbers and uninspired, made even more ridiculous by the increasingly cartoonish visual element. But fuck all that, the music produced by the likes of Burzum, Mayhem and Emperor was often experimental, atmosphere-laden and deeply expressive in its use of melody and impassioned wails from the blackened depths. A pretty diverse palette to work with, and it's still proven fertile for many, probably the best of whom is Leviathan's Wrest.
Quietly building a name for himself since 1998, releasing numerous cd-rs and tapes out of, uh, San Francisco, Wrest is starting to get some attention in a big way, and he deserves it. With Leviathan, Wrest has proven himself not only a master of his musical form, with brutal hate-laced guitar riffs, impressive drumming, and a truly advanced sense of composition, but a master of sound itself, conjuring damaged lo-fi ambience seemingly at will. And the bass is good, too. While songs go through multiple sections, they're often linked and overlapped by his singular take on eerie noise. Like the best black metal, it seems to give you a peek into the bleak, scarred psychic terrain of the artist. Check out Tentacles of Whorror, Wolf Eyes and Hair Police would kill to sound this spooked, and if not kill, maybe just hit themselves over the head with a mace. Apparently he's put out a limited LP of ambient expanses called A Silhouette in Splinters and he's also got a new project called Lurker of Chalice, which is out now on Total Holocaust and soon to be re-reeleased by Southern Lord. Likely this one isn't black metal at all, as Wrest slows things down with some crushing doom riffs, while shoegaze-y washes of melody create a dark stasis. With increasingly ornate drum fills and the repeated use of depressed dialogue samples instead of Wrest's abrasive wails, Chalice's overall mood seems closest to a particularly damaged take on DJ Shadow's "Endtroducing...". Hell, it might even go over big with the Pitchfork crowd (don't say I didn't warn you). In fact, Wrest is pretty much guaranteed underground stardom, as he, with fellow San Franciscan Xasthur (aka Malefic) are prominently featured on the upcoming Sunn O))) album, Black 1. With the title and guests, I'm gonna venture a guess that black metal might be a theme.