Let The Rats Talk

I havent heard much from Flingco Sound System in the past six months, after being introduced to the great San Fran band Dead Meat, although I mentioned a few other delectable acts on their roster (read and listen here). One dude that got a bit of notice from us was A Story Of Rats, who comes from the 'northwest plateau of the United States'. Otherwise known as Garek Druss, A Story Of Rats' M.O. is crawling atmospherics, investigating polyphonic tones, repetition, and distorted field recordings. He has a few releases out, most notably the Sea Of Sand split LP he did with Pussygut (they have since renamed themselves Wolvserpent) out on Olde English Spelling Bee.

Relinquishment is a cassette tape manufactured by FSS in a limited edition of 100 copies. The two tracks on Relinquishment are extended, cavernous and gritty. "Composition ii" is heavy organ drone while the slurried tones of "Composition iii" features a contribution on guitar from Matthew Merris. Its a dark, disturbing ride into the belly of the vermin gods.

You can pre-order a copy of Relinquishment here.

A Story Of Rats - Composition ii (Excerpt)

And as a little aside - Dead Meat are playing a few US shows with Cheap Time and Idle Times in March. Well worth checking out!

They Don't Know Unless You Tell Them

FSS put out a nice lil sampler a little while back, titled They Dont Know Unless You Tell Them. Its a true showcase of what FSS has to offer, namely noise, ambient noise, static white noise, noise (insert type here)core and noisy rock. Bruce FSS loves his noise, what can I tell you! And so does Sonic Masala, so you'd be right in guessing that we love this sampler, introducing us to sprawling static specialists A Story Of Rats, the dark ambience of Interbellum, and the industrial roar of Grief No Absolution. However, as Ive already thrown my full backing behind Dead Meat (see here), there are more structurally 'mainstream' (EXTREMELY loose use of that term here though...) bands on display also. So here were my highlights, in a brief synopsis a la the Tough Love sampler review from the weekend...

No Anchor - I had to start with these guys. From my hometown of Brisbane, Australia, this three piece are raw and powerful - and are getting noticed. Having played with other Brissy underground brilliance merchants Turnpike, Dick Nasty and Del Toro, as well as doom maestros Grey Daturas, this month they support The Boredoms in their only stand-alone concert Down Under - well done boys.

Dead Meat - monikered along with about a million other bands, most of which suck serious arse, these San Fran miscreants are well and truly on my radar - we're trying to get them over to the UK, to seriously destroy. They are also doing their biggest support slot to date, propping up Scream later this month.

Wrnlrd - one of the most eclectic and prolific bands in black metal, Wrnlrd have released eighth (I think...could be higher) LP Myrmidon, and all standard and no-so-standard implements are applied - including banjo and fiddle. Their influences include Bathory...and the Shangri-las. Weird, yet darkly wonderful.

A Story Of Rats - another eclectic dude, who comes from the 'northwest plateau of the United States'. Has created some nice crawling atmospherics. Worth a look.

Interbellum - a producer and engineer by trade, what is created here is some dark and haunting ambient chamber music brilliance - is capable of some great compositions.

Grief No Absolution - incredibly dark noise drone a la Sunn O)))) and Earth - yet to me has more substance (although LOVED Sunn O))))'s last LP, loved it!), unrelenting, delves into the darkest of winter months and drags you even deeper.

Caves - a dirty black metal band from NYC that create actual innovative soundscapes of darkness. Im not a black metal fan, and Caves wont turn me on this fact - but they gave it their best shot, Satan bless 'em.

And here are a couple of tracks to give you the idea of what to expect. Flingco Sound System are giving this away over at their site, so go get it!

No Anchor - Wolves Bite And Disappear

Grief No Absolution - Befalling The End Of One's Own Harpoon

Wrnlrd - Mephitic Celebrator

Carnivores Know Best

I got an email from Bruce over at FFS (Flingco Sound System - started after he left Kranky Records a few years back) about some bands we might be interested in that he deals with. We get this kind of request quite a lot. As you can tell, we tend to sift through and pick what we like to listen to, then pass it on to you (except for maybe in Bad Panda Record's case - Ive gone a bit overboard this week - it should be called Bad Panda Week - but most of the music has been pretty stellar, and very eclectic...ahem, sooooo...) Whilst FFS have a lot of bands at their disposal, I was offered up a 7" sampler of San Fran via Miami's Dead Meat.

Its really fucking good.

Dead Meat's sound encapsulates the likes of Killdozer, Murder City Devils and a lighter (?) Jesus Lizard, but slowed down to a bluesy drawl and dragged the back of a pick up truck by a one-eyed alcoholic narcolept. There is something lazy and yet dangerously relentless in what coils at the heart of this beast. The name befits the band - it pulverises, rancifies and eviscerates, all in incremental stages...

Its also of no surprise that Surfer Blood have championed them earlier this year, not because they sound anything like Surfer Blood, but because they bear a striking resemblance to the dirge blues evillness that makes up their side project, Weird Wives. I wanted to put all Dead Meat songs on here, but I have to settle down and just a couple. I also tried to pick songs that arent floating about already so that you have a fresh ear to what these guys are going to bleed all over you. Hunt the 7" down, and you'll get a 9 track digital record of everything these boys have put to tape thus far. Deal, sold, gimme gimme gimme!

Oh, and make sure you check out their website - its amazing...

Dead Meat - Burger Bash
Dead Meat - Fuck Amsterdam