2011 has been a decidedly delectable year thus far in terms of psychedelic rock. And if Thrill Jockey has anything to do with it (and they most certainly do), the hits will keep on a-comin. March sees the arrival of Beyond The 4th Door, Eternal Tapestry's debut album on the label (we loved guitarist Dewey's album under the moniker Plankton Wat, In Magical Light - check what the fuss is about here). THe first thing you'll notice is the truncated track lengths - still long ('Time Winds Through A Glass, Clearly' is over 12 minutes long), but a departure from previous opuses. Yet dont be fooled - these songs havent been cut so much as condensed, distilling the swirling essence of what makes the Portland band great - long stretches of melodic guitar improvisations, dark brooding songs that slowly build and expand to allow in layers of light - into a tighter focus. Hence the five tracks meld into an orgiastic phalanx of surreal fluidity, culminating in an album that, at 43 minutes long, feels too short and yet eternal all the same.
Beyond The 4th Door is out on March 15 - you can pre-order it here. Eternal Tapestry are playing a few shows this week in the US along the East Coast with label-mates Arbouretum and the brilliant Endless Boogie, whilst also scoring the hometown support slot for Moon Duo on April 9. No news as to any global touring as yet - but we can surely hope...
I was just about to click post on this admittedly very short post, when I noticed something - this will be our 1, 000th post! Holy shit! But instead of changing it to be something profound, amusing or self-serving, I thought Id stick with this one.
Raised By Tigers are out of Denton, Texas. Their album Reunion Parts is equal parts dissonance, swooping guitars and recalcitrant pop. Lots of 90s indie rock. Its out next Monday. Get it? Got it? Good.
Oh yeah. I was abandoned as a child. Paul raised me as his own. He is a tiger...who channels Thom Yorke. Oh, the profound, amusing, self-serving humanity!
Illness brought out the manic Some Vegetable Waste earlier this month (see what we thought of it here). Now get your hazmat suits ready, as the Brighton noisemongers are about to launch into a Europe-wide viral campaign of mass destruction. This Monday (Feb 21st) they descend on an unsuspecting Old Blue Last, with P For Persia in tow. What's more, its free! This promises to be a stellar show, and as it equals no clams, there is no excuse for missing this! There's never been a better time to get infected...
Melbourne's UV Race brought out Homo last year in cassette form, as has been the craze for some time. The problem with that is only a few people got to hear how fucking awesome this band is, and unless you got to to see em live last year chances are you havent heard much of them. Their self-titled release on Aarght! Records and other bits and bobs aside, there is nothing to really get your grubby mitts on...until March 29th, when In The Red will be releasing Homo on vinyl. You can hear the influences of likeminded Aussie reprobates Eddy Current Suppression Ring in tracks like 'Girl In My Head' or 'Down Your Street' (ECSR guitarist Mikey Young is behind them in the recording and mixing process), whilst their sloppy proto-punk gives way to slow faux-folkster 'Always Late' and explodes into psychedelic malaise in the titular track. With the rise of scuzzy, dirty, weird rock in Australia at the moment (Blank Realm, Circle Pit, Naked On The Vague, Slug Guts), its an exciting vanguard to be a part of - but to be honest, UV Race dont give a shit where they are.
Sorry that the eighth installment of Hits From The Box is coming at you on a Monday rather than a Sunday. I try to do it on the Saturday, ready to drop on the Sunday, as, like God, I like to rest on the 7th day. But I pretty much rested on Saturday too - watched The Wire, worked on the novel and such - before hitting the beach on Sunday. Its the first time Ive been in the ocean for 18 months, and the first time in Australia in over 3 years. And Im all for slipping, slopping and slapping - very sun conscious, that's me - but I had one fundamental flaw in my reasoning - I have developed an impressive English tan. For a regularly pale guy as it is, this posed certain problems. So I may have used the sunscreen, but at the same rate as my weathered companions - hence getting back home unable to move in case my skin split. Still, I cant leave you hangin - so instead of the regular six pack, Ill give you a seventh band for free! Now, how to type this thing without touching any kind of surface...
1st cab off the ranks is UK based bedroom pop architect Rob Jones and his musical project The Voluntary Butler Scheme. He has had some considerable success since the release of his album last year, most notable touring the UK with Adam Green and having tracks featured on the likes of Grey's Anatomy (boo!), a Dell ad (hmmm....) and Countryfile (hell yeah!). He has also signed to US indie label Park The Van (home of Dr. Dog and The Pharmacy amongst others). He is prepping this little EP, The Chevreul, four tracks of songs as disparate as anything Jones has ever done - and damned addictive. He has also had opening track 'Do The Hand Jive' remixed by The Go! Team, which is always nice! The Chevreul EP is out March 18th.
Softlight Kid are a Nottingham six-piece born out of the ashes of bands Six By Seven and Bent, that specialise in shoegaze explosions within a pop format. All the likely influences are there - Swervedriver, My Bloody Valentine, Rush, Spacemen 3 - and this is in full evidence in 'Haunting Me', the first track to be heard off their upcoming, as-yet-unnamed 2nd album. The Midlands must have this genre distilled, to be bought in every corner store. Its a great little track, and may just be enough to sate the appetite til the album is released. They will then be touring, and you can see them support The Joy Formidable at KOKO on 10th May. But to be honest, any band named after a brilliant Captain Beefheart album is worth checking out.
Little Blak Dress, a band out of Newcastle, Australia, have just released their debut EP, Hello Lady, for free - check out their website. You will also see they wear their influences on their sleeve (and all over their blog) - Rolling Stones (God I love 'Under My Thumb' - thanks for pushing me back to it guys!), The Cure, The Strokes, Phoenix... The new EP, produced by Ian Pritchett (The Beautiful Girls, Angus and Julia Stone, Cog), accentuates their mixture of nostalgic late 60s/early 70s rock with more modern, youthful pop rock, and the amalgam creates some hook-laden moments. Buy a physical copy of Hello Ladyhere.
I havent heard their Cassette EP (you can pick it up at their Bandcamp site), but if Morphine Makes You Comfortable, Oklahoma's Brother Gruesome's current 7", is any indication, these guys are a hell of a find. Describing themselves as The Cars meets Sebadoh, these two tracks emphasise the band's penchant for intense melodies and dark themes, whilst opting for an electrified sound that steeps their sound into a degenerative squalor. A-side 'Tubes' focus on the notion of hearing a loved one's final words echoing down a telephone line, whilst 'Needles' is a squalling meditation on the chemical side of dying, whilst also reflecting on an "interesting" stick-and-poke tattooing session, all capped by the great artwork depicting the complex balance between musical ambition and deteriorating health... Purchase Morphine Makes You Comfortable from We Are Nice People Records, and if you are in Austin for SXSW this March, dont miss Brother Gruesome.
Now for a forward-thinking throwback to new-old school rawk - meet Occult Detective Club. These young Texan upstarts revel in the spirit of 70s garage punk, and you cant deny the hefty shadow of The Ramones over the tracks on 2nd LP Crimes, all of which are great things. They are touring relentless all over the States in the upcoming months - check out the dates here - but if you cant catch em, you can pick up the album on Alive Naturalsound Records here.
Now we have Wreathes from the Bathetic Record stable, a Wisconsin duo who have carved out two slabs of haunted folk music. I have really fallen for the tribal psychedelic arcana sound of late (Sun City Girls, The Skull Defekts, Joan Of Arc), and Wreathes follow in this vein, albeit with a noticeably more acoustic approach with smatterings of electronic manipulations. It is the commanding presence of Nathaniel Ritter and Troy Schafer, their voices ever-locked in the soaring harmonies of the underworld, that make these two tracks truly captivating. You can pick up The Reigns/Full Turn, out on March 15th,here.
And finally, south-east England's Art Is Hard Records have their 3rd release prepped and ready to go, and its from Cardiff/Yeovil eccentric My Name Is Ian, equal parts Daniel Johnston, 90s college rock, and Casiotone. The folks over at Art Is Hard work hard at creating unique releases, and this one is no different - a three part cassette club, each cassette coming out on the 1st of each month, starting on March 1st. The releases are Computers Make Noise (for fans of Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, Lonely Ghosts, Former Ghosts, maybe other ghostly named bands?) with a bonus extra in the form of A Day In The Life, a handwritten and illustrated day in the life extract from Ian; Big Foot Where Have you Gone? (for fans of - Beach Fossils) - the bonus here being a signed ‘sexy people’ style photo; and finally the 3rd, as yet untitled EP (for fans of Yuck and The Wave Pictures). The bonus here is extra special - Ian has rescued 20 charity shop cassettes and as well as bringing the artwork up to date has also covered the song on the cassette exclusively for each Man Club member. To get these releases, you need to sign up, with the aim to put the fun of anticipation back into being a music fan at the bargain price of £12.79 including everything, even postage! Go here if you are interested - there are only 20 spots on the membership - its a very rad concept!!!
Last week's Hits From the Box saw us champion the lo-fi efforts of Plant Magic Man and his Julie Kirgo's Album record, less than ten minutes of echoing, archaic folk tape alchemy (see here - scroll down to the bottom). Supposedly recorded in 2008, it was an oddly effective release. Its less than a week then that I find another release dropped into the inbox, titled King's Parade - its more of the same, although with more fully formed songs on offer. I am still none the wiser as to who Plant Magic Man is - if someone can tell me more, please do so!
King's Parade is out on Irate Panda Boss, who put out the last release and are putting out the next four (?) before releasing Dogson: Recordings 2008-2010, which is music sampled from these releases...
I dont know, its doing my head in! But the music is good, so thats all for now...
I was sent this double LP opus by experimental act Joan of Arc for my birthday, but I have only gotten around to listening to it now. The Chicago collective that hovers around the nucleus of Tim Kinsella has eschewed classification for years, endeavoring to pretty much do anything that came to mind rather than come up with a continuing rock aesthetic. On Oh Brother, Kinsella incorporated fourteen different musicians - including Zach Hill and Lichen's Rob Lowe - to create four 20-minute suites of sound with the intention of making four albums, but instead being interwoven to create a movie-length sonic journey into Kinsella's mind. Its hard to really say what this is - it's as much free jazz as it is motorik, ambient minimalism, Eastern drone or cacophonous noise. There are no limitations to where the music may go, its a cerebral free for all. Every second listening to this draws you further into the vortex of the unknown, until its fuses into your core being - an aural Akira. Its an astonishing achievement, if one that takes every mental fibre to get inside of.
Yep, King Of Limbs is out. Im going to reserve my comments til Paul is back in the house. Ive heard he is morphing into a Thom Yorke/Jarvis Cocker hybrid - Jarvis Yorker? Thom Cock? Anyway, he's loving it. So watch Garth Jennings' vid for 'Lotus Flower' below... Its a bloody great video. Although the moves aren't original - I pull those suckers after enough tequila shots with a pint chaser down at the Duke Of Lonsdale...
Halifax post rock band Kuato have released their second EP Winter - three mammoth tracks that showcase the burgeoning ferocity that is building within their core sonic dynamic. Their titles walk the tightrope between funny and ridiculous ('Pet Seminary', 'Schindler's Lisp', 'Anarchy In The Ukraine'), but wordplay aside, these tracks beautifully orchestrate the effectiveness of the quiet/loud mantra, Kuato adding a sonic brevity that their idols (Pelican, Rodan, Slint) wielded in emphatic fashion. I am particularly gripped by 'Schindler's Lisp', a track that rolls forward deceptively, like a tank, before letting fire on unsuspecting ears. There is an innate ferocity to these tracks without the preciseness of the likes of Pelican, and such rawness adds power necessary to drive this release to the top of the sonic pile. A worthy little release, this one. And a brilliant Total Recall reference too!
You can grab Winter and their earlier EP at their Bandcamp site.
Morning! Bring in the Saturday with this, a great video and song by artist Pedro Magina. He has released a cassette on Not Not Fun called Nineteen Hundred And Eighty Five - its pretty sweet.
I am growing to adore Blackest Rainbow more and more as each day passes. In the past little while they have brought to my attention the ace Gnod/A Middle Sex split EP plus the eloquent Black Eagle Child/Donato Epiro split - check those out here and here respectively. And they have plenty more where that came from - whilst I wait (and wait) on Paul's re-emergence, Ill delve into one of them.
Natural Snow Buildings are French duo Mehdi Ameziane and Solange Gularte, who over a bevy of releases have really demonstrated how droning, avant-garde post-rock can be masterfully done. It would appear that they are quite illustrious - with countless (usually in very limited release) CD-R's and cassettes, plus some epic album releases - the last album was a triple LP set, before that was Daughter Of Darkness which was spread over 5 full length cassettes! All I have though is their latest - Waves Of The Random Sea - and it is quite unlike anything I have heard before. I have had a lot of drone-oriented content this week - Winter Drones, The Skull Defects, Daughters Of The Sun - and they amazingly have their own unique sound. But what Natural Snow Buildings do is carve out tracks that are individualistic mini-albums in themselves. There is a kind of Gallic folk infused with field recordings and ingenious use of noise and the tropes of drone rock, all mashed up with a mixer slash purifier. Finished results is ambiance with a vast amount of spirit, verve and imagination. Im not really doing this album, or this band, justice. Suffice it to say that this album was impressive from the first listen, but was mindblowing on the second. More things come to light the more you listen to it, and in the way you listen to it - isnt it strange when different speakers/headphones accentuate different things? Add to that the amount of care and attention Solange puts into the art work, and that Blackest Rainbow puts into its releases, and this is one of the best releases of the year. What a hectic week!
Hey kiddly winks! Its Friday, which Im sure you are all thanking the dark lord of amber liquids for. I guess I am too - whilst not having a real job may have its perks, its no fun when everyone is in their dumb offices. SO let's bring in the weekend with something a lil special, shall we?
I mentioned that Sonic Youth's Steve Shelley has joined the fold of ace band Disappears. Well, they are already writing and recording stuff together - the first thing offered will be Live At Echo Canyon, which is a live album from Echo Canyon...Guess I didnt need to tell you that. Still, you MUST know this - one of the tracks is an unbelievable cover version of Suicide's 'Radiation'. I love the shit out of Disappears, even moreso now that Shelley is on board, and this song - well, Heyzeus wept.
Disappears were meant to be playing in London this Sunday - as they are touring France this month - but someone dropped the ball, so they are now playing Utrecht in the Netherlands that night. So now you will have to wait until the end of May before catching them in their new format at Borderline - still that is going to be one of the shows of the year, so start making up excuses to all and sundry to keep that date clean.
And how about that - a Friday Cover Up ON A FRIDAY? Absurd...
One of the saddest pieces of news last year was that Ponytail had called it a day - for the time being. We have since seen guitarist Dustin Wong release a solo album that gathered some critical kudos. Well, we Ponytail fans can rejoice in the knowledge that we will at the very least get a new album out of them, even if they arent necessarily going to tour it. Do Whatever You Want All The Time was recorded before/during/after the breakup, and is being released April 12 by We Are Free. Below is a nice little mashup of the album song's
Those gritty Nottingham-based instrumental fuckers Alright The Captain are preparing to launch their debut LP SNIB through a slew of UK dates this month, starting off at The Unicorn in Camden tonight, where they'll be playing alongside a few other likeminded acts. This will be a very promising gig from a very underrated act - get along to see em in such a tiny and intimate venue on a drunken Friday night, you will not be disappointed.
I have loved London's Talvihorros (AKA Ben Chatwin) and his guitar compositions since hearing 'The Blue Cathedral' early last year, courtesy of the cool Bad Panda collective. Since then Ive kept in semi-regular contact with him to check up on how he has progressed. Seems quite a lot - whilst he may never complete his experiments with the physicalities of the guitar, he will still keep carving out stellar results such as this. It was released on the UK label Rural Colours' subscription only list - but now you can have at it below!
Chatwin also plays in a band, Inca Gold, who Ive also been made aware of due to Bad Panda, and who released their first EP on Monday. They delve in dream pop - a semi-accurate quote pegging them as "groove infused Liquid Liquid moments meets Morricone-esque atmospherics with hints of psychedelia." Well, anyway, they have a triptych of EPs in store this year, and are already in the studio recording the sequel to Inca Gold.
This is a funny one, as there are reference point for both Londoners and Brisbanites. As the man behind the sonic waterfall that is Winter Drones, Leon Dufficy has kept, and continues to keep, himself quite busy musically. Currently he is the guitarist of London dream popsters Still Corners, who are about to tour Sweden in anticipation for their debut SXSW shows in March. He has played with Keith Wood, otherwise known as Hush Arbors. He is a Brisbane ex-pat, first sharpening his sound with sonic miscreants Shuriken - one of the Sunshine State's most promising acts in the mid 00s (when not on mind altering substances...).
But Dufficy has forced another bow to his string. He brought out album Blood In The Coffin last year on small London label Sexbeat Records under the moniker Winter Drones. This title is apt, as the album does what it says on the tin - seven tracks of undulating drones that shimmer and shake in equal measures. The centrepiece is 'Stiff Wizard', a perfect showcase of Dufficy as a writer. As many artists have now flooded the market with their takes on ambient soundscapes, Winter Drones benefits enormously from the live aesthetic and manual manipulation of actual instruments. 'Stiff Wizard' starts with your basic fuzzed-out guitars that incrementally build up momentum. A simple electronic melody comes into play, and by the time the live percussion makes itself felt a new sonic realm has been entered. Fantastic stuff.
Blood In The Coffin may have only had a limited cassette release, but it is going to get the wider recognition it deserves as it has since been picked up by Pete Swanson (of Yellow Swans fame), remastered and put out through his Weird Forest stable. Only 250 pieces of wax have been made, mind. Still, that is a start - get it here.
Three bits of amazing news in the space of one day for lovers of music everywhere!
The first was the announcement that Brighton band Electrelane were calling an end to their hiatus and announcing some shows, one of which is Field Day. This is amazing news. I fell in love with them when I randomly bought 2005's Axes based on a written review, then fell in love with guitarist Mia Clarke when she rocked it in a Ramones T-shirt on a sweaty night in Brisbane the following year (and did a kick-ass guitar collaboration with Andy Moor of The Ex - she is my dream girl!). The all-girl four-piece have crafted an intricate middle ground of atmospheric instrumental rock and quirky indie pop (guided by Verity Susman's distinct vocals), one which has been devoid of any real quality since their departure.
So this news threaded immediately with the second tidbit - the first Field Day lineup announcement of 2011. Coming down on Victoria Park in August, the lineup features the aforementioned and celebrated Electrelane return, but also includes some doozies - Tortoise, Ariel Pink (possibly without Haunted Graffiti?), Actress, Oneohtrix Point Never, Twin Shadow, Omar Souleyman, John Cale, Hype Williams, Mark Kozelek, Gruff Rhys, Factory Floor...and that's just the beginning. Looks like one to put into the diary - or better yet, get your early bird tickets now for 35 clams! Do it!
Which leads me to the final piece of gooey goodness. Renowned recluse Jeff Mangum has been crawling out from under whatever nondescript rock he's been under to play some shows of recent times, including pieces from his seminal album In The Aeroplane Over The Sea under his non de plume Neutral Milk Hotel. If you havent heard this album, shame - it is one of the best albums ever made, without a question of a doubt. So the massive surprises continue as All Tomorrow's Parties announces that their next festival curator, for the end of the year at Butlins, Minehead, will be none other than Mr Mangum! With that confirmed, plus acts such as Superchunk and The Raincoats, with the latter confirming that they will play their self titled debut album in its entirety. Tickets for this bad boy go up on Friday at 9am (UK time) - get cracking on it!
The good times continue at The Zoo tonight as Canadian psych warriors Black Mountain roll round with their delectable 70s dirges, lightened up by forays into folk and late 60s pop as seen to wonderful effect on last year's Wilderness Heart. Now I may be a bit of a purist here, but I was more than a little disappointed with the new album - mainly because Im a hardcore fan of their first two albums, and felt that the band's myriad other projects - such as Pink Mountaintops and Lightning Dust - were the perfect vehicles to travail down other musical avenues, thus leaving BM to do what it does best. However Im sure Ill be proven wrong tonight - that when songs like 'The Hair Song' are thrown in with the older material it will work wonders...
Almost as exciting is support act, Melbourne's The Night Terrors. This is the first of two stellar supports slots they have won so early in the year - next month they open for the almighty Hawkwind! Then to continue down the weird psych rabbit hole, they will travel to Berlin to be part of Polyhymnia Festival - headlined by Goblin! Jesus tittyfucking Christ.
Anyway, back to tonight's gig - it is going to be fantastic, a real visceral dirge of a blow out. Tix still available, so get on it.
Merrill Garbus AKA tUnE-yArDs is preparing to release her follow-up to 2009's great release BiRd BrAiNs. Its titled w h o k i l l, and the new single, 'Bizness' is off it. Its not a new track per se - it has been a live staple for almost two years now, and one of the live favourites - but its great to revisit it, and have it in physical form. Garbus is still on song here, so her new album will come with a fair bit of expectation around here on Planet Masala (see our live review from Cargo last year here).
(NB - I only found out today that Garbus was the lead vocalist and instrumentalist of Sister Suvi, who are sadly with us no more. A bit slow on the uptake there...)
Braden J McKenna (WYLD WYZRDZ) has just started up his own label called Inner Islands. Basically its a place for him and other like-minded chaps to produce musical pieces that hark back to nature and the inner journey. No sonic stone is left unturned.
The first of two latest releases is The Joy of Awakening, a contemplative suite of tracks that marries rainforest field recordings with finger picking guitar and shimmering dreams by Sean Conrad, going under the moniker Gkfoes Vjgoaf (and no, I have no idea how to pronounce it). Its a fairly dense piece, and feels more like a meditative experience rather than an actual album to listen to. As Conrad states, The Joy Of Awakening has come to be "about a journey that the listener goes on. Imagine your celestial body traveling and being taken by an unseeable tribe of spirits that are trying to help you see the true nature of things. They sing and play for you and lead you from day to night through the forest, the ocean, and up into the mountains to reach your final resting place in the temple".
River Spirit Dragon (comprised of Stag Hare, who alongside White Rainbow put out a great split LP last year; Gkfoes Vjgoaf; and WYLD WYZRDZ) on the other hand is a forty minute, two track, meandering opus, built up out of an initial droning foundation and allowed to float on the slipstreams of time and space. It is not as exciting as The Joy Of Awakening, but there is a definite sense of kindred spirit in what Inner Islands is attempting to achieve here. Later in the year the label will release LPs from all three of these spatial mavericks, adhering to that continual spiritual sojourn into the sonic Other...
Sweden's The Skull Defekts might finally get the recognition they deserve based on three points. The first is their new signing to perennially ace psych-oriented label Thrill Jockey (Boredoms, Pontiak, White Hills, Barn Owl, etc etc). The second is the addition of former Lungfish frontman Daniel Higgs, his plaintive vocals making a very affirmative imprint across all eight tracks on their latest LP, Peer Amid.
And the third point? That Peer Amid is goddamned amazing.
Which shouldnt be that much of a surprise to be honest, when looking at the pedigree of the band. Putting Higgs aside, The Skull Defekts have been involved in a myriad of Swedish experimental outfits that are all of high pedigree, including Kid Commando, Satan Power, Alvars Orkester, Oceans of Silver & Blood, 8 Days of Nothing and Cortex, plus collaborations with Pan Sonic.
But what might be a surprise is the pure addictiveness Peer Amid offers. The album offers an amalgam of the sounds they have developed over the past half-decade - dark-side-of-the-moon drones, noise-rock, and heavy not-quite-metal sludge - but with the further augmented electronics, cyclical percussive beats and Higgs' croon/incantations, this album beggars belief. At times Higgs moans and chants with a shadow of Layne Staley - random vocalist to envision, but there you go - and the technical mastery here never gets in the way of the effectiveness these songs have. They are still meandering beasts, wandering the sonic planes, shimmering, slinking, stalking - but oh so darkly beautiful. The title track is the most elliptical of giants, as what could be an explosive chugging rock tune implodes into a twitching noise fest, never letting you get your rocks off; 'Gospel Of The Skull' is a shamanistic totem dance as performed by a slowed down, early-era Earth; 'Fragrant Nimbus' is a churning Sonic Youth aping behemoth, before it shatters into a million shards of angular rhetoric and tightly coiled aggression. My favourite track though is 'In Majestic Drag', a tribal drumming masterclass coupled with cyclical sonic swirls, and stuttering guitars before a distorted dirge and Higgs' chants lift everything to another, darker level. Yet that drumming...fantastic. Higgs is barely present in this track to be honest, but his influence is still prevalent in the end result.
Peer Amid is an album that I held a mild interest in before I put it on - afterwards, nothing will ever be the same again. So far - favourite album of the year.
The Skull Defekts are touring the US March and April with likeminded droners Zomes. Whether you like your Lungfish, or experimental rock, or want to have your life's perceptions shifted, get to one of these shows. Europe and other parts of the world will have to wait - but hopefully not for long...
Those ethno-improv ethereal trippsters Sun City Girls wove a dense and intricate musical tapestry over the 26 years they were together, but out over 50 albums and myriad other types of releases before drummer Charles Gocher lost his battle with cancer in 2007. The Bishop brothers have banded together to release Gum Arabic, eleven tracks reaching as far back as 1983 to look at some of the more esoteric covers the band put to tape, and reinterpreting them. From the Morricone rumble of 'Sev Acher' to the Indian dirge of 'Helwa Shak' and the drunken psych blues ramblings of 'Night In Malta', their skewed jazz improvisational stylings permeated every noodle, strum, treble and beat. Hell - listen to 1988 track 'Esoterica of Abyssynia' and tell me that isnt a direct influence on Deerhoof! Whilst the Bishops have spread their wings to other ventures - notable Sir Richard's part in sludge instrumental supergroup Rangda -the legacy of Sun City Girls will always live on.
This week is a big one for The Zoo here in Brisbane - Caribou/Four Tet selling out last night, Black Mountain and The Night Terrors tomorrow, The Like on Friday, The Books on Saturday, Tricky on Sunday - fucking hell! And lets not forget tonight - the almighty Swervedriver will be running through their guitar frenzy overloaded shoegaze grunge masterpieces for all who turn up - which should include YOU! Tix are still available. There is some great support too - the perennial Giants Of Science (who have shown their love of the Oxford legends by covering their songs in the past) and young Brisbane shoegaze acolytes Loomer. It promises to be a great show, if their performance in 2009 at ATP's A Nightmare Before Christmas was any indication...
The Rock Of Travolta hail from Oxford, a place that along with Leeds has produced its fair share of post rock behemoths in the past. The quintet have been around for a while - their last LP, the critically well-received and John Peel endorsed Uluru, came out eight years ago back in 2003, and Radiohead personally chose them to support them after its release - and finally, after a self-imposed exile and a lineup change, they are ready to drop their newie, Fine Lines.
The band - Jennie Bates alternating between playing bass, keyboards and cello, Matt Spooner playing guitar, bass and keyboards, Dave Warrington on guitar, Joe Durow on drums and Jon Carter playing bass - have carved out nine songs of bombastic, meaty riffs, coupled with thunderous percussive beats and atmospherics due to electronic glitches and the majesty of strings. There are times that you feel it shouldn't work, especially on opener 'Rock By Numbers', but it invariably does - 'The Goddamn Remote' is one track that showcases all elements of TROT's repertoire. Yet their most complete piece is the closer 'Something's Wrong With The TV Generation' - a slow building track that follows in the tire tracks of Mono or Slint at their earliest and most beautifully brutal. Good stuff.
Fine Lines is out on Big Red Sky Records on March 14th. The Rock Of Travolta will be playing at Monto Water Rats March 9th - well worth checking out.
Minneapolis psych minimalists Daughters Of The Sun have released their third LP Ghosts With Chains on Not Not Fun. Its a great release, and perfectly suited to NNF's M.O. - that is, decidedly off the reservation. These seven tracks are sinewy beasts that writhe discontentedly, stirring up whirligigs of malaise and unease in equal measures, best captured on 'Bell Of The Barrier'. However there is much to enjoy here - the tribal drumming of 'Busted Realm', the reverb-weary vocals of 'Moontan', the inverted warbled sonics of cryogenic space that draws out the title track - its a woozy ride. And there's even a "single" in here with the three minute dreamer 'Endless'! This is one trip that is well worth the headache.
Its pretty obvious that when it comes to Planet Masala, the general opinion is that Sonic Youth can do no wrong. Even their more ill-conceived works are held up with esteem. So yeah, we are pretty biased there. Then there is our love of instrumental rock - yesterday's Mogwai post is a pretty good indicator of our standpoint. Nevertheless, SY's latest musical foray - creating the score for French thriller Simon Werner A Disparu (Lights Out is the English title) is an amazing feat in dark moody instrumental fare that everyone should own. EVERYONE. It is brooding, jagged, raw, and atmospheric - and is incessantly driven by Steve Shelley's motorik drumming. In short, its incredible.
Tonight at Madame JoJo's, as the weekly behemoth that is White Heat rumbles up, we have taking the stage Guards, whose EP last year decidedly delicious. With strong links to SM favourites Cults, this should be a very good show to catch - and seeing its only 5 squid, everyone should do so - get your tix here! Ably supported by Reading trio Giant Steps, this will be a great way to start up your 2011 White Heat experiences. Later up this year there will be shows by the likes of Cults next Tuesday (the week after Guards? How...coincidental...), No Joy (1st March) and The Imbogodom (12th April). Matty's got it goin on...
A release that I am looking forward to is Wooden Shjips' Ripley Johnson's side project Moon Duo. Their last LP Escape was pretty stellar, so this newie, Mazes (out on Souterrain Transmissions or Sacred Bones on March 28th) promises to be something equally as special. And to work us up into a suitably slimy lather is the title track from the upcoming album below. This may be blasphemous, but Ive liked Moon Duo's take on psychedelia more than Wooden Shjips - although I love both acts - just because there seems to be a good deal more cohesion between Johnson and his partner Sanae Yamada.
If you are situated in the US, Moon due are doing a rather large string of shows through March and April - the rest of us will have to wait.
Portland, Oregon’s favourite psychedelic freak-folk noiseniks Akron/Family have carved out a very unconventional musical path since their self-titled debut. My first introduction to them was the track 'Running, Returning', which was on a Spunk Records EP sampler. Then when I went to purchase Akron/Family, I was perplexed by the plaintive ambiance that was spat back out at me. It wouldnt be until I heard 'The Rider (Dolphin Song)' from 2006's Meek Warrior, before I would quickly revisit the band and henceforth become a fan.
Nevertheless, there is a lot of frustration with Akron/Family, not half because they can be incredibly unconventional and obtuse. Still, their creative output is impressive, and some 6 years later, with segues into folk strumming, experimental glitches and sprawling bursts of guitar abandon, they have provided the world with their second self-titled release, with the ambiguous subheading The Cosmic Birth and Journey of Shinju TNT. Their record label, Dead Oceans, put out in their press release a bizarre notice that the first copies of this album arrived at their offices in a brown cardboard box with SHINJU TNT and AK DETROIT scrawled on it. From a short note and a video that arrived days later, it becomes "apparent" that the album was written in a cabin built on the side of Mt Meakan, an active volcano in Akan National Park on the island of Hokkaido, Japan. It was then recorded in an abandoned train station in Detroit, after a year out studying Bent Acid Punk Diamond fuzz and Underground Japanese noise cassettes, then chopped up their results into thousands of minute imperceptible samples interlaid with fuzzed-out rerecordings...
Whether you believe the elongated, secretive and surreal genesis of this album or not (also including leaking the album themselves in a looped, sampled and slowed down fashion so as to seriously confuse file-sharers worldwide), the end result is something that has managed to bridge all of the more out-there components of the Akron/Family aesthetic whilst making their best effort yet to bridge the mainstream with the obscure - and its this eclecticism that makes S/T II very nearly a resounding success.
Starting with ‘Silly Bears’, we are thrown into a joyous musical rocket ship that hurtles towards an ever-expanding sun – it is jubilant, infectious, and teetering on wanton self-destruction with its distorted effects, guitars and strange vocal harmonies (alongside lyrics about fun-loving bears). This is the best introduction to Akron/Family in general and S/T II in particular – there is verve, quirks, space and a pervading sense of silliness throughout. We have emotive atmospherics (‘Island’), Devendra Banhart via The Black Keys (‘So It Goes’), shoegaze via Vampire Weekend (‘Another Sky’), bizarre vowel harmonizing (‘A AAA O A WAY’) – and that’s only the first half of the record! You name it, its here – garage hoedowns, 60s elegiac pop, dream pop, blues rock… However, there are no pretensions here – Akron/Family are just ambitious and fit to bursting with musical ideas that they attempt to shoehorn into any given musical mould. It shouldn’t work, yet this menagerie does work in myriad ways. A flawed, yet fundamentally fun, release.
Akron/Family II: The Cosmic Birth And Journey Of Shinju TNT is out now.
Happy Valentine's! I hate this 'holiday' - what a pile of commercial bullshit - but I may just make 2011 an exception. There are quite a few lovely releases coming out today that would make for fine releases - Ringo Deathstarr's Colour Trip, PJ Harvey's Let England Shake, Bright Eyes, The Twilight Sisters, La Sera... But personally, if you wanted to melt my heart and get into my pants, you'd be coming round to my house brandishing the new Mogwai LP, Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will. The seventh studio album by the perennial instrumental rockers, it is one of the most anticipated releases of 2011.
So, how does it weigh up?
Let me tell you something first. Ive had this album for about a month now, as have a few of my friends, and I can tell you that this album has brought on a fairly lively amount of debate as to its quality. You cant get more divisive than the quotes 'transcendental' and 'utterly unimpressive'. But that has been the case here. Some of my friends feel that Hardcore... is a valid entry into the Mogwai canon and upholds their quality output and why they are still one of today's best bands, period. Other friends believe that Hardcore... is the proof in the pudding that Mogwai's latter releases have subscribed to the notion of diminishing returns, and that they should give up now. Others still maintain that Mogwai have never been relevant, are actually quite shit, and should go fuck off and die.
Hmmm...
SO, back to my thoughts. I think I should refer to my sister's thoughts as well as my own here. Both of us being avid Mogwai fans - we traveled to Luxembourg to see them in 2008 - we almost died when getting out hands on the LP. But both of us after the first listen we unimpressed. It felt a bit Mogwai by numbers. Both of us went away endeavouring to give it another listen.
And that second became a third, then a fourth...
This is the first time that Mogwai havent hit me from the onset since Rock Action, but whereas that album had some serious filler amongst its monumental tracks, this is a grower in the truest sense, and possibly their best full album listen since Happy Songs For Happy People. This cohesion is in no small part due to the production of one Paul Savage, he who worked with the Scots on their debut LP Young Team. The difference in this album, and what makes it a possible bridge into another chapter of Mogwai's evolution, is the blissed out tracks and the more hushed slow builds that exist here. When they do explode - whether it be the sustained attack of 'Rano Pano' or the sudden fit of rage that hits the latter half of 'You're Lionel Richie' - its more measured, more controlled. In the lighter moments, such as the evocative 'Letters To The Metro', the crystalline tinklings of 'Death Rays' or the funereal dirge of 'Too Raging For Cheers', the structure of the songs and the sounds placed therein are precise - and thats Mogwai in a nutshell. There are no accidents here. They are consummate performers, and continue to stretch themselves within and beyond the confines of the genre they invariably find themselves in.
I think it rather naive for people to say that the Glaswegians have delineated off their designated path, or that they should have done a Godspeed or a Slint and dissolved much earlier. For the band continue to push the instrumental envelope, to explore the myriad inflections within the sounds of light and dark, and to do it all with a healthy slice of humour to boot. So there isnt the nihilistic atom bomb that 'Like Herod' is, or the menacing beauty of 'Hunted By A Freak', or the spiralling splendour of 'New Paths To Helicon I' - but I feel they have pushed through that, taking those experiences and have molded something entirely new. Right, its not exactly original per se, but it is undeniably Mogwai - they are who they are, and never have they tried to be anyone else. Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will is on a par with The Hawk Is Howling in my opinion: an album that, whilst not changing the game, is at least upping the stakes. The album is out today on either the band's own Rock Action Records or Sub Pop. Its being streamed over at Rolling Stone too.
I went to my first stand alone gig on Friday night since arriving back in Brisbane - and already Ive been heavily impressed by a local act. Tiny Migrants opened up for Mark Sultan, and are a five piece that specialise in murky, scuzzy garage pop a la The Intelligence - they even did a great rendition of Christmas Island's 'Pre-Apocalyptic', which was pretty ace. The boy/girl vocal chants were good, as was the twin guitar attack - but I was most impressed by the driving bass that really propelled the band down the oil-slick runway to destruction. Their CD-R For Your Health is almost a carbon copy of their setlist, so its a nice lil keepsake, and an indicator that these guys are on the up and up.
I thought Id throw down two songs today - seeing as we havent had a Friday Cover Up for a few weeks, here's Tiny Migrants' Christmas Island cover, plus another track, 'Honeycomber'! Oowoohoo!
2011 has been a decidedly delectable year thus far in terms of psychedelic rock. And if Thrill Jockey has anything to do with it (and they most certainly do), the hits will keep on a-comin. March sees the arrival of Beyond The 4th Door, Eternal Tapestry's debut album on the label (we loved guitarist Dewey's album under the moniker Plankton Wat, In Magical Light - check what the fuss is about here). THe first thing you'll notice is the truncated track lengths - still long ('Time Winds Through A Glass, Clearly' is over 12 minutes long), but a departure from previous opuses. Yet dont be fooled - these songs havent been cut so much as condensed, distilling the swirling essence of what makes the Portland band great - long stretches of melodic guitar improvisations, dark brooding songs that slowly build and expand to allow in layers of light - into a tighter focus. Hence the five tracks meld into an orgiastic phalanx of surreal fluidity, culminating in an album that, at 43 minutes long, feels too short and yet eternal all the same.
Beyond The 4th Door is out on March 15 - you can pre-order it here. Eternal Tapestry are playing a few shows this week in the US along the East Coast with label-mates Arbouretum and the brilliant Endless Boogie, whilst also scoring the hometown support slot for Moon Duo on April 9. No news as to any global touring as yet - but we can surely hope...
