Get Lamped With The Strange Day Ravies

This post is two-fold. First of all Sydney gauzy four-piece Day Ravies brought out a cassette EP Under The Lamp on their own Strange Pursuits label. It is four tracks of extrapolated expansion, a divergence from the shimmering excellence of debut album Tussle while remaining true to the DR aesthetic they have effortlessly built over the years. 'Sleepwalk' has a laconic bent due to Sam Wilkinson's vocals, more deadpan and front of the mix than ever before, with a sudden drop into Slowdive fuzz that is exhilarating as it is bombastic. The crunchy distortion on the title track lends a heaving gravity to proceedings, while the whistling synth lines feel like the undercurrent of crossing radio stations, from another song from another era that eerily fits in the proceedings. The drum machine and oscillating effects that opens 'Perennial' is the biggest sidestep here, and again the stomach flip of new horizons being searched comes to the fore - culminating in what is a genre implosion that comes from no discernible decade, yet exists just the the hell of it. I imagine all four members of the band playing this from start to finish with goofy grins plastered on their dials. 'Prior Hour' is a sunny fadeout, a bustling yet bucolic saunter arm in arm into the sunset, quaffing red and feelin' fine.

The second piece of info is a little more cryptic. Day Ravies will be bringing out their second record in a few months time. A lot more detail to come out about that soon. Suffice to say we here at Sonic Masala HQ are VERY excited...

Ringo Deathstarr Go Terra Mauve-a

 

Keeping with the weak headings... Another pun on the band album title! WIN.

Seeing as I have never spoken to the Texan trio known as shoegaze upstarts Ringo Deathstarr, I don’t know what their thoughts are on the name. Naming a band something as tongue in cheek as Ringo Deathstarr can come back to bite a band (see Test Icicles, a name that founder Dev Hynes has forever since regretted, despite the band having been defunct for quite a few years now). Nevertheless these guys continue to make the “wall of noise, fringe in eyes, eyes on floor” aesthetic fun with latest release Mauve.

Mauve is a great follow on from their 2011 debut Colour Trip, and it sees the band consolidating their sound whilst continuing to inject it with cheeky nous and charm. It is lazy, perfunctory, and easy to continually draw comparisons to the 90s bands from across the pond that highlighted such a musical approach and delivery (The Guardian once wrote that “There is a direct line between My Bloody Valentine, the Jesus and Mary Chain and Ringo Deathstarr. And it stops at Slowdive Central” – vom…) – and it can be difficult to avoid such reflections and analyses based on a sound that so wholeheartedly indebted to their idols – but Mauve succeeds in offering a Ringo Deathstarr sound, even if it is a nuanced variation of a common sonic theme. As guitarist/vocalist Elliott Frazier has stated in the past, they write pop songs buried under a mountain of noise, but when songs like 'Rip' come into focus, you can see the melodies are far more transparent to the point of being at the forefront of the wall of distorted effects. Furthermore, 'Slack' actually punches a huge hole in the loudest, brawniest tracks in Colour Trip, albeit with its pants around its ankles and a dumb grin on its face; whilst 'Please Don't Kill Yourself' is a great pop song.

I think that whilst there are many shoegaze bands out here – and many of them are pretty damn good – there aren’t many that can infuse their own young, carefree personas into the squalling morass of noise like these guys can, and that is definitely a plus. A great album.

 

Mauve is out on Club AC30 - get it here.

Ringo Deathstarr – Please Don't Kill Yourself
Ringo Deathstarr - Rip

Miniature In Name Only

Christchurch born, Melbourne based duo Miniatures released their eponymous debut EP recently, and it's a great slice of discordant shoegaze disdain. Originally conceived as a solo project of Christchurch native Ché Walden, the group drifted through various directions and ensembles until a partnership with Dunedinite Annemarie Duff set things properly in motion. Steven Marr (from another great C/Church band, Ipswich) rounded out the bass playing duties on these four tracks, with an extensive bank of effect-laden (though personality-devoid) programmed tracks continue to serve in lieu of a drummer. The band namechecks Slowdive and the Cocteau Twins, and neither are that far off the mark. For a sound that spent so much time fermenting in the bedroom, Miniatures is proof that it is now more than ready for exposure to the masses.


You can grab Miniatures here from Trash Musik.

Miniatures - Midwinter (Air)
Miniatures - Time Is

Friday Cover Up - Diving For Fossils With My Baby

A couple weeks ago my girlfriend asked (somewhat flippantly) why I don't talk about her on Sonic Masala. Well, apart from ruining my clear chances with Katy Goodman and Mia Clarke, the real reason is because it's all about the music. No one wants to hear about how we were listening to the latest Cannon record whilst driving to buy groceries, or how she is a minor fan of local grungers Sleepwalks, or how bizarre she found Amateur Childbirth, do they? Maybe I am being unfair. Maybe people would much prefer that to the crap I dole out willy nilly. But as strange as this may sound, much of our relationship hovers outside the realms of music. That is MY domain...MINE!

Ahem...

But then I heard this cover great retro guitar pop icon Beach Fossils did of the great shoegaze band Slowdive's 'Alison'. Beach Fossils bypass the shimmering guitar pop to embrace some shimmering noise whilst gazing at their shoelaces. Not only is Souvlaki one of the great shoegaze albums EVER, but the track is amazing and is emblazoned with my girlfriend's name. The song is part of AdHoc, a new "quarterly zine" that offers you a download of 50 previously unreleased tracks from supportive artists, if you're willing to donate $15 or more. Anyway, it's a great song. More importantly, though - you have been mentioned, Alison.




But I don't want to leave a Beach Fossils-affiliated post with out talking about the 7" they released through Captured Tracks a couple weeks ago. "Shallow" is the A-side, backed by another new one, "Lessons.

Beach Fossils - Shallow
Beach Fossils - Lessons

Take Iowa With Complete Control

Melbourne's Iowa have another tune for us, and this time around it doesn't reference SY or Dinosaur Jr insomuch as it resembles the shoegazers of early 90s England - think Adam Franklin covering Souvlaki. Its another ace tune, but it begs the question - with so many influences flying, how will Iowa piece it all into a coherent whole when it comes to a longplayer? Well, hopefully we will find out soon. Until then though, hand over the controls to these guys and enjoy...

Iowa - Complete Control

Say Farewell To Psychological Disorder - Through Dream

I once again have to apologise. Andrea Drongoski, Brian Winters, I am sorry. I received the EP for your band Folie Adieu about two months ago - the first such release I got since moving back to Australia - and because I was still moving in and such it has filtered down into the depths that is my musical listening pile.

Well, today I make amends! This self-titled EP by the Wichita duo contains four slices of languid shoegaze pop, as ambient as it is awash with sonic sheen. The influences of the likes of Spacemen 3 and Slowdive, even Jefferson Airplane. Its beautiful in its simplicity, and washes over you in such a fashion that its criminal that there are only four tracks on offer here. I certainly hope we hear more in the future - and I promise to be more punctual with my replies!

folie adieu is out now and can be bought here.

folie adieu - Sacrificial Anode

folie adieu - Ghost Dance

2010's Re-Discoveries...by Secret Knives

Ash Smith AKA Secret Knives has had a strong year, with a lot of coverage surrounding his great debut release Affection. I asked if he wanted to contribute a list to our little collective. He has already contributed to great Kiwi blog Einstein Music Journal (a very interesting list too I might add), so he wanted to go in a different direction...

"I generally find doing a top 5 of the year doesn't accurately reflect listening habits because I spend more time listening to things that were not released in 2010."

Top 5 musical "discoveries" of 2010:

1. Discovering Slowdive's Pygmalion
2. Rediscovering Weezer's Pinkerton
3. Discovering Slint's Spiderland
4. Rediscovering Arcade Fire's 'Broken Window' (from Keep The Car Running 7")
5. Discovering Cocteau Twin's Heaven or Las Vegas

5 albums I never stopped listening to:

1. MF DOOM - Is Viktor Vaughn Vaudeville Villain
2. Burial - Untrue
3. The Chameleons - What Does Anything Mean? Basically...
4. The Cure - Wish
5. Grouper - Dragging A Dead Deer Up A Hill

Thanks Secret Knives! And cos Im loving these albums myself (its your fault I cant get 'Miranda' or 'Heavy Water/ Id Rather Be Sleeping' out of my head!) - here's a Secret Knives Christmas mixtape!!!

Weezer - No Other One

Arcade Fire - Broken Window

Cocteau Twins - Cherry Coloured Funk

Slowdive - Miranda

Slint - Nosferatu Man

Burial - Archangel

The Cure - From The Edge Of The Deep Green Sea

MF DOOM - Vaudeville Villain

Grouper - Heavy Water/Id Rather Be Sleeping

The Chameleons - Nostalgia

And, as a final special treat, here is a remix of Secret Knives' 'Black Hole' by equally exciting NZ act Glass Vaults! Merry Christmas from the Land of the Long White Cloud!

Secret Knives - Black Hole (Glass Vaults remix)

Six Degrees of Deerhunter #1 - Lotus Plaza

Thursday night at Heaven the SM crew were witness to another electrifying set by Deerhunter. Headed by the ever affable music geek genius that is Bradford Cox, the band sonically swirled, shimmied and shellacked their way into everyone’s hearts. You can tell from Paul’s post this week that he is a Deerhunter tragic – well, after last night, so am I. (There will be a full gig review in the coming days).

So I thought Id hark back to February when I did a little experiment, connecting six bands vicariously through the amazingness that is Sonic Youth, one half of our blog moniker’s genesis. Six posts were barely enough, but it showed what amazing music Thurston and co. have their interests in. So this week Im doing one in dedication to the incendiary act that is Deerhunter.

First up? Rather than going for something more obvious, such as Cox’s solo gear as Atlas Sound, I wanted to showcase Lotus Plaza, guitarist Lockett Pundt’s “other” band (as mentioned fleetingly by Paul on Wednesday). Lotus Plaza’s only album to date, 2009’s The Floodlight Collective, got its title from the first band Pundt and longtime friend Cox were in. It got mixed reviews when it came out, but on further listens a number of things become apparent.

First of all, Deerhunter’s sound has Pundt’s fingerprints firmly smeared all over it; the shimmering wash of elevated shoegaze that has become emblematic for the band is nowhere to see on their first album Turn It Up Faggot, an album that clearly wore its heart on its sleeve (it was dedicated to original band member Justin Bosworth, who died in a skateboarding accident in 2004), was full of spark, angles and anger, and a good album in its own right – yet vastly different from everything that came next, which coincided with Pundt’s joining the group.

Secondly, with the current 12 months being dominated by lo-fi/no-fi recordings, scuzzed out jammers and Spector-influenced garage rock-slash-pop-slash-surf-slash-whatever bands, Lotus Plaza’s bedroom meanderings seems ripe for the plucking. Add that to the shoegaze slant that is permeating many new bands, is adding further layers to already existing and well established bands, and is a fresh breath of air in genre stalwarts (My Bloody Valentine, Swervedriver, Slowdive), then the slating some critics angled at Lotus Plaza just comes off as pretentious, bitter, fucktard arseholery.

But before I get all emotionally involved, I will say that The Floodlight Collective does suffer from its occasional similarities to its big brother, and there is a fluctuation between introversion and bombast, confidence and apprehension that halts the album from being something great. Nevertheless, it is very interesting listening, and does a nice ring-a-ring-a-rosie with Atlas Sounds’ Logos. Check it out.

NB - I think this is a highly underrated album, and I also believe it equals Logos as a highly successful step outside of Deerhunter's shadow - only Cox's name and big-name collaborators have allowed for Logos to get out in the ether more. There...Ive said it.

Lotus Plaza - A Threaded Needle

Lotus Plaza - Whiteout

Flying through the danger zone...

Brighton has been a melting pot of interesting noise influenced bands for over a decade now. Air Formation has been playing their brand of noisy introspective shoegaze for most of that time. Although they have been quiet of late, they have just released Nothing To Wish For (Nothing To Lose), a grandious affair that accentuates the band's embracing the stalwarts of their genre, such as My Bloody Valentine, Ride, Slowdive... lite "Stars & Knives", the light-heavy-light wall of sound aesthetics of opener "Three Years Past", or the soaring pomposity of "Outro".

They are playing the Half Moon on April 18, and are bound to be touring around summer, so immerse yourselves in Air Formation's aural beauty.

Air Formation - Stars & Knives
Air Formation - Three Years Pass

Thrush By Night

Thrushes are an indie shoegaze outfit out of Baltimore. They claim Phil Spector as their sonic god, they adhere to make rock music more beautiful. Their sonic dreamscapes are built up over skeletal song structures, augmented by reverb and an insistent bass, and enveloped by simple yet evocative vocals. They are on Birdnote Records, and admire bands of their ilk and influence - The Jesus and Mary Chain, Slowdive, My Bloody Valentine, Sonic Youth, and the Raveonettes just to name a few. Their second LP, Night Falls, is out very soon. Here is the title track. Expect them to be touring our way in the near future!

Thrushes - Night Falls