The end.

This has ended. I've been reading through old posts and the feeling is there but the grammar is not. Ween rule.

I have something to tell you.

The Polyps are the greatest band in the world at this very moment. It seems destined to fail for me. I stumble upon their (his) release of the minute (the perfect lp on Woodsist recs 'Ants on the Golden Cone') and fall in love...... subsequently falling in love with everything else they've released. Who knows? Maybe the anticipation will kill the next release for me.

I write this because today I recieved a cassette of their's called 'Isla & Emma'. As perfect release as can be. Melody and performance are at an absolute. Pure, unadulterated noise-pop. In Excelsis. Excelsia.

I never realised...

This blog is now over a year old. I started off with pure inspiration and then tailed off until November last year. Aah, November.


http://freemusicarchive.org/music/The_Polyps

http://negativeguestlistrecords.bandcamp.com/album/i-made-blood-better-lp

http://velcrowcodeel.bandcamp.com/album/velcro-ep

and more and more and more and more and more and more and more.

Ahhn Ever Can o' Bee Other Tan

Music. Life can get in the way of music. I have been away on holiday knowing that there is music awaiting my arrival home. Namely The Polyps and Shroud of Winter. Both very different, both very good. I ordered 'Flies of Winter' by The Polyps but recieved 'Twenty Colored Circles' instead.... I can't really complain, released before 'Ants on the Golden Cones' and a signifier of that release, the samples and found sounds that meld with (?)standard(?) acoustic songs have such an effect on me when the tape is playing. It is a perfect kind of music, not drone, not ambient.... it is human.
Let me start my little writ on Shroud of Winter's 'Solstice Eclipse' by stating that this is a "metal" album. Woah. It's been a while since I've listened to (let alone buy) a "metal" album. As opposed to some of the drone/doom records I have this is particularly intricate and structured.
I can't think. I can't think. I want to carry on writing these reviews but my brain is stuttering and starting... Needless to say I will come back and probably edit this. Or maybe write a completely different review.

Hot stash needs cooling off

A big box of new records arrived yesterday and I have been listening to them today with the sunshine streaming through an open window and becoming more and more drunk and lost within life and this music. Thank God for last Novemember...

Sad Horse - Eggy Tape [Eggy Records] - Trashy and thrashy punk rock played with a twisted sense of melody.

Trailblazer - S/T [Eggy Records] - I've got another Trailblazer cassette off Night People Records and I think this one is the better... Alan Vega-esque yelps and screams over ominous synth and drum machine work outs. side A is 'Killer jams', side B is 'Killerer jams'...

Mole House - S/T [Alberts Basement] - [I had to edit this review] I received the cassette cued up to start on side 2, I played it and a beautiful, hissy mess of a pop song came out of the speakers... it ended and nothing else happened... I turned the machine off believing that Mole House had released a one track cassette of "lo-fi pop rock perfection" (quoting the original review)... I have since conversed with the band through the interweb and discovered that if I cued up side 1 then more pop nuggets would emerge from my stereo! Wow...Lo-fi pop rock perfection... Mole House can do no wrong in my opinion when they produce such off-the-wall tracks. 'The Cave', a couple of versions of 'Melanie' ('I Don't Dare Try' on the latest Night People compilation album) and a couple of instrumentals all dubbed over a copy of Peabo Bryson's 'All My Love' album. Utterly unique and inspiring stuff. Someone... please... give this lot a tiny bit of cash to record an album.

Mole House - Hey Come My Way 7" [Quemada Records] - Again, classic pop rock sounds filtered through a unique take on playing, production, writing... everything. Fuck I wish I could see them live.

The Garbage and the Flowers - Stoned Rehearsal [Quemada Records] -Again, off-kilter lo-fi pop hooks. As the title suggests; an informal run through six tracks with banter, fluffed notes, ramshackle singing... one of the best records I've heard in a very long time.

As is pretty obvious I have fallen head over heels in love with Eggy Records... they can do no wrong, from the music they release to their recommendations. And Australia! Wowzer... I never knew...

oh! for sweet everything (yellow moon on that night)

Christ. Over the past three days I've immersed myself in as much music as is humanly possible with two small children, an overdue essay, work and "actual adult life bullshit" (aka. liaising with builders/plasterers/plumbers etc)...... A couple of tapes arrived in the mail... Ryan Garbes '1965' and Dylan Ettinger 'Pattern Recursion'... t'old Garbes' effort isn't a patch on last years' 'Sweet Hassle' lp on Hello Sunshine Records. In the release blurb it was stated that the tape is made up of offcuts and unreleased trax from the sessions for said Hello Sunshine release (muso-y lexicon speak) and you can tell... nothing really holds the attention and it all seeps past rather blandly. Who knows? It might be a grower but at the length it is (15-20mins) it seems a little throwaway. 'Pattern Recursion' on the other hand is simply sublime... "...produced using solely square wave forms...."....nodding off to a jittering sea of tones and throbs. I have also had the pleasure of recieving the download code for Broken Water's Kickstarter project 'Seaside and Sedmikrask'; two long, hypnagogic pieces that are as heavy as they are 'musical'. They described them as 'jams'... Magic mushrooms played a part in their creation (the lp cover I recieved is a weird close up of mushroom gills) and the unhinged energy that pervades a psilocybin trip seeps through every note of this release. Chiming, droning, weaving and faltering... and laughing. Without a doubt 'Seaside and Sedmikrask' is one of the albums of the year. I have also recently been rockin' back to Felt 'Crumbling the Antiseptic Beauty', Radical Cemetery 'N.N.E' (wowzer), Fugazi 'The Argument', The Garbage and the Flowers 'Stoned Rehearsals', the Jim Carroll Band 'Catholic Boy', David McComb 'Love of Will' and Yo La Tengo 'The Sounds of the Sounds of Science'... amongst many, many others.... (Black Flag 'Nervous Breakdown' EP being another one to mention... Generally I can't really stand Black Flag but there's something about the five minute blast ((and it s a fucking BLAST)) of this EP that does something).... Gawd and Kwisst.... 'Love of Will' needs to be given a proper re-release, it is a truly underrated album. I downloaded it simply because I refuse to pay over £50 for a CD... I will be hard pressed to pay that for any record regardless of condition/issue/etc... The most I have every paid for an lp is £35 (including p&p) for Johnny Thunders 'Hurt Me'... Anyway, I am still awaiting the arrival of a Mole House cassette (Mole House cassette=guaranteed inspiration)... full reviews of some shit a-comin'... drunk and essay submitted (that's me!)...

come out to show dem

My head hurts. I have been swamped with study recently and have emerged from a three month or so depression with nothing but a blog and a muggy brain to show for it. I have been listening to The Beatles 'Good Night' today for the first time... I've owned 'The Beatles' for a long time now but never, ever listened to the penultimate song for some reason. Gosh, what a beauty it is... Unjustly maligned by everyone and their dog for being too saccharine? Too Ringo-y? I've been trying to write an essay to a looped soundtrack of 'Good Night' and it's not really working out too well... I'm on the internet writing this blog. Amongst the various travels through the inter-web I stumbled again upon the incredible (for a geekhead like me) video series 'What's In My Bag?' from Amoeba Records... I always return to it, re-watching the interviews again and again to remind myself of certain albums I need to check out and today I was pleasantly surprised by a recommendation from The Horrors (a band I'm not particularly fond of)... The lp in question is 'New Sounds in Electronic Music' featuring Steve Reich, Richard Maxfield and Pauline Oliveros... It's quite shocking to think it was released in 1966...

Acquitted soul

New shit! Night People Records have some killer new cassettes out NOW!! Mole House (essential Australian "alt" rock 'n' pop http://soundcloud.com/mole-house/showers-and-rain), Ryan Garbes (wonky-drug-mash-rock http://www.myspace.com/rgarbes) and Lab Coast (what I imagine top ten pop to be like when I get into heaven/top ten pop in a truly perfect world http://mp3.imposemagazine.com/lab-coast-better-than-me.mp3).
Apart from the seemingly never ending stream of great music from Night People and Eggy I've been recently listening to a lot of Boredoms ('Super Roots 3' and 'Super Roots 7' being favourites) and rekindling a love affair with Butthole Surfers... Noisy rock and roll... ya just can't beat it.

Some ol' bastard tinkering with my life

I have many musical loves from the past. I read many books about musicians and bands from the past (my favourite 'music' books being 'Wonderland Avenue' and 'Lexicon Devil') and so when I buy the music (or re-buy the music.... all will be revealed shortly) I want to hear what the "people" of that time heard. I want to hear what the band produced at that time. It's the main reason I got the mono boxset of the Beatles remasters from a couple of years ago. They ("The Beatles") were actively involved in deciding what went where, how loud the organ was on that song... etc... so.... this musing has been brewing for a good few years... I bought four albums by The Doors because as a teenager I had sold them for cigarettes/weed/alcohol, along with most of my CD collection. Anyway, I got home and eagerly popped the debut album into the player and was bopping along.... happy.... memories coming and going.... new ones being formed... but something was weird...... I read the liner notes and discovered; the surviving band members (why did they have to survive?) had recorded new organ parts, dredged up out-take vocals, tweaked the EQ, found old guitar licks... etc... and, simply, added them to the old recordings.... FOR OUR PLEASURE.... BECAUSE THAT'S SOMETHING WE'D WANT.... BECAUSE THE ARTIST KNOWS BEST ALL OF THE TIME..... FUCK THAT! Needless to say I totally disagree with this kind of retroaction.... even if the artist was surpressed at the time (ie. 1966 "She gets waaargghhhh!...." and  2006 "She gets high!....") I want to hear what the kid in 1966 heard when they first took that record home and played it. It's one of the reasons why I have an aversion to bonus tracks being tacked on the end of reissued albums... they weren't there originally so just put them on a second CD (Rhino have perfected this with the recent Stooges re-issues)....... As the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan and the Beatles (to name the big three) attest; the album's perfect as it fucking was... it doesn't even need out-takes to make a reissue worthy (although the Stones' are kind of fucking me up with this one... I haven't bought the 'Exile on Main St' re-ish because I don't want to hear what Mick Jagger wants me to hear now... I want to hear what they played and recorded then... it's all about the time and moment and feeling and etc that the world was going through at that particular moment). Anyways, I really want to buy George Harrison's 'All Things Must Pass' and can't afford the original vinyl. The new CD is only £7 but it's been tweaked with in 2000 and has extra guitar licks and even vocals by his fucking son that have all been added... I just don't see a plastic-tit-wank in it as being any incentive to buy reissues. Especially on stone cold classics that don't need any kind of bloody tweaking.

Erik Gage.... Stinking, smoked out poet for this fucked up generation.

Rarely has a record struck me as being so full of personality as 'Stoner Romance' by Erik Gage. Recorded on a four-track in bedrooms and studios around New York, the wayward charm lies in the 'half-assed' vitality that pervades every inch of tape on this release. Funny, skewed, rockin', rappin'.... fuckin' high.

A wonderful cassette straight out of Eggy Records, run by Raf Spielman (The Polyps, The Golden Hours etc.), which has put out a couple of dozen cassettes over the past year or two; each of which is well worth checking out (not that I have any... I got Erik Gage's from his bandcamp page... although I did get The Polyps' 'Peixe/Fennel's Daughter' 7" which is another joy to behold)....


http://erikgage.bandcamp.com/album/stoner-romance

http://www.gnartapesandshit.com/

http://eggymailorder.blogspot.com/

gggsongs good songs good albums good people

As I've said before recently I can't get enough of all this strange, off-the-wall, original contemporary music that seems to have cropped up in front of me out of nowhere. I've mentioned the likes of The Polyps and Broken Water, but today I am going to focus on Starving Weirdos as they have a new LP out shortly.... Having politely declined an e-mail interview I thought I just put this link up to a thoroughly good interview and history of the band:

http://www.musiquemachine.com/articles/articles_template.php?id=112

Now, to the more serious business.... their upcoming album 'Land Lines' which is up for pre-order on various reputable websites. Needless to say if you 've enjoyed their wild and varied output from the past then there is little to worry about, though with the core members staying the same the addition of female vocalists and an extra member or two has done nothing to diminish the power and originality of the group. If anything, 'In Our Way' the track they've put up as a taster, only shows a new side to their insanity. On a personal level I find it crazy that there's a band still out there that excites me with the thought of a new release and confounds my expectations with said release.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeNwnjZUboo

Anyway, buy their shit. 'The Path of Lightning' is one of the best albums of the past couple of decades and the 'B/P/M Series 1' LP is something very, very special.
Righto, I'm sure there arsehole is clean by now so let me bow out of this post with a link to another favourite at the moment; some noise pop in excelsis:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WkoMib9XGCk

Enjoy! And play everything fucking loud!

Zac Nelson 'Sound A Sleep Sound' and Tim Hecker 'Dropped Pianos' and 'Ravedeath, 1972' have been on a rotation recently... I'm going to send 'Dropped Pianos' to a friend mine and hopefully totally surprise him. Drunk. Too drunk to properly write or even copy something I wrote half-sober.

The Zac Nelson shizz:
http://soundcloud.com/experimedia/zac-nelson-sound-a-sleep-sound

Ambiance that makes me want a proper turntable in my bedroom.... drift away...

I hate the Vaccines...

...but their old label Marshall Teller has a penchant for putting out some pretty cool, trashy, dreamy rock at the minute. I bought the Total Slacker LP 'Trashin'' and at first really rated it but am now a little underwhelmed by it's constant stoner humour and reference to the nineties. Even the songs themselves have become tiresome, it's that kind of new but familiar sound you get from a band that reference so blatantly to the past.
I bought, because of the inclusion of Total Slacker, the split 7" between them and Weird Dreams. The Total Slacker numbers seem just like off-cuts from the album, nothing too special but the flip side; Weird Dreams... hmmmm.... 'Summer Black' is popping along, keeping me bopping along when suddenly... Bam!!... 'Joan' starts to play... You know why they chose this to close their side. Maybe it's because it's new to me but this song 'Joan' is just such a perfect melding of pop-pathos, classic rock and total sonic meltdown.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Ep5gdmvDXk

My friend recently caught them supporting Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks and his description was that they were "too dreamy" (a direct quote)...

Dip it after seventeen

Jazz. I used to hate it. Rock 'n' roll. I've always loved it.
Though rock 'n' roll in it's modern 'commodity' doesn't really sit well with me, there has always been something about a four four beat, guitar, bass and songs of love that has always done something for me. Buddy Holly.
On the other side of the coin, I love jazz. I love noise. I hear free-noise. PC Worship 'Godless Love' with it's acoustic timeless and timely strumming, electronic whistles and wails in the background could be nothing but free. I have another PC Worship tape that melds extreme noise to almost grunge-lite rock songs, always ending with an uneasy mix of violin or sax noise playing to close and open the side (they're cassettes I have... you remember them, kids!)...
I was trying to compare it to living in a suburban environment and having all these disparate influences baring down on you, influencing every sound you make... when it's probably just the bass player awaking late, too stoned to get up for his mid-morning alarm clock and someone with a saxophone turning up to band practice instead.


I was going to post this blog sooner but having seen this extra "review" scrawled in my own, drunken spidery hand (typos included) on the side of the previous writings I feel compelled to include them.... :

"This ain't no where near jazz this is noise. Pure simple noise punk with freedom many talk about but seldom act upon"

 

http://pcworship.bandcamp.com/

He had nubs at right angles

I sold an Epiphone Dot the other day for £140. I think I got a fair price, the local guitar emporium talked me out of selling it to them on the basis of their tax returns and I don't have any guitar-less rich friends who I could rip off. Anyway, the money has set me straight. Debts = nil. I now have a small stake that after the next pay day (too long away) will go towards a hot microphone. Or I could just splurge it all on bunch of vinyl from http://www.normanrecords.com/

The Polyps

Ants On The Golden Cone by The Polyps is acutally the best album of 2011. Sorry Ryan Garbes, but this shit just hits me where it hurts and I hurt so bad at the minute.

They promise them freedom, while they themselves are slaves of depravity - for a man is a slave to whatever has mastered him.

Wise words, from Peter there. I am a slave to the ungodly sounds of Rock 'N' Roll and right now I couldn't think of anything more ungodly than Starving Weirdos' 'The Path of Lightning'.

I own their 'B/P/M Series 1' LP and have been playing it loads recently, a total modernist take on piano music. Destruction as a form of creation. General tomfoolery in the studio. One side taken by one member of the group, the other taken by another to which they both add and twist the work of pianist Darius Brotman. Really haunting, enchanting stuff that I heartily recommend.

Now, 'The Path of Lighting'.... I'll readily admit I have downloaded it from some nefarious source and have been playing it to death. Four tracks of cacophonous atmospherics that make me see the full possibility in music making. I don't mean that in a derogatory way, these guys have a craft (the B-P-M Series 1' LP stands testify to that) but so many groups do noise and oddness for the sake of it whereas these guys are trying something new and interesting.    

I will be buying it, not only does it have the best album cover you'll ever see, it's also worth every red cent of the $20bux you'll spend on it musically. As I've said previously about a different band, when my pay day comes... so will there's.

My girlfriend hates my heroin (my record collection)

Over the past couple of weeks I have discovered a bunch of bands that have simply put my whole out look on music in a new light. As I've said before I never generally had much time for contemporary music, which  I'm going to lay a lot of the blame at the door of the NME, but the music I've discovered recently has just simply blown my mind.
Ryan Garbes and the Wet Hair group... drone rock supreme.
Tyvek.... Hardcore in excelsis
PC Worship... a big bag of free noise, grunge (as in real dirty, fuck ups) mixed with a pop sensibility
Broken Water... Guitar abuse like it should be.

I don't know, the list could go on. This year's been a happy year for me. I've got out of my pre-'94 rut and started enjoying new music again!! Anyway recommendations are heartily welcomed.

But....

Noisy trash like Tyvek, Johnny Thunders and Iggy & the Stooges pisses all over them (The Beatles)... A good pop song is a good pop song. It moves the masses, creates a sing-a-long and forms mass memories and emotion........ But the screaming and wailing of a less-than-quarter coherent Iggy Pop lolling around on a table with shards of glass sticking out of his chest is so much more of a thrill and musical epiphany than 'love, love, love, we all need love, love, love...'....


Take your kafkans and your friggin' joss-sticks and shove it. I want visceral experience. To quote the great Iggy Pop:


"Look, you're here to see me, and I can't go on until my dealer is here, and he's waiting to be paid, so give me some money so I can fix up, and then you'll get your show"

Iggy & the Stooges - Live at the Whiskey a Go Go (17/10/73):

http://www.mediafire.com/?uuu17j8sickmp3i

It's raw, recorded in someone's sweating armpit and exudes more power and attitude then the past three decades put together... I don't care if it's on headphones, car stereo or some shitty cassette deck from the eighties.... blast this and have your mind blown.... Whatever your view on drugs is, they aided in the creation of some of the most visceral, heart-felt, energetic music created. Like I've said before... I ain't golden and I ain't no fucking starchild...

After a brief discussion through the intraweb

It has been decided that The Beatles double A Side single 'Strawberry Fields Forever' and 'Penny Lane' is the greatest single ever released. Fuck Englebert Humperdink.