Southern Lord It’s four years since God Luck and Good Speed came out and in those four years I have probably played it as much if not more than any other sludge album or any album for that matter with the possible exception of Harvey Milk.When I heard that Weedeater […]
Monthly archives: March 2011
14 posts
Northern-Spy At the risk of prematurely blowing my journalistic load, this is a great record. And that’s the bottom line for any review really. It’s not, perhaps, a record that fits with Rhy Chatham’s reputation for Glenn Branca-baiting massed guitar works. Outdoor Spell is nothing like 2005’s Crimson Grail, at […]
Drag City It’s easy to forget how dismal the nation felt when the early High Llamas albums appeared. Like an unwanted, puke-spattered drunk still hanging around at the morning-after clear-up of a party, the fag end of the (last) Tory government had clung on for years after Thatcher was driven […]
Architects of Harmonic Rooms and Records There’s something tantalisingly unreal about these direct to DAT solo twelve-string guitar compositions, recorded between 2000 and 2006. Capturing almost exclusively the twang, scrape and buzz of the strings, the instrument sounds almost disembodied, a shimmering, glistening, glassy surface with barely any hint of […]
Mute Woman when I’ve raised hell, there won’t be a star left untouched in your sky When my lighting crashes across that night No shadows of doubt or of turnin’ in that questioning little mind Just a burnin’ rekindled truth and one single agonizin’ blinding white light The greatest protest […]
Crammed Discs To borrow the imprecation that Debbie Harry once sang so passionately in 1978, “Picture this.” However, rather than a sky full of thunder, or for that matter Debs’ telephone number (wistful sigh…), try instead . For a finishing touch, decorate the neck and body of this Heath Robinson […]
Smalltown Supersound Top Auto road tests the latest model to roll off the production line at Helsinki’s Bleep Factory. First Impression Wow, this little baby can really move. Finland’s K-X-P have put together their first effort, and the time and effort pay off in no uncertain terms. Motoring along at […]
Karl/Aagoo/Nonclassical Classical music, for some, is burdened with various odd stigmas – that it’s somehow posh, academic or too expensive to watch live. In my experience none of these are true – I have the stub of an £8 ticket for a five hour Messiaen opera attended by a musically […]
Esoteric Six years after their surprise reunion, it still seems unreal to be listening to a new Van der Graaf Generator record. Stranger still, lowering the stylus onto A Grounding in Numbers instills the same rush of anticipation as when I ran round to David Hilton’s house back in April […]
Dekorder Alexander Rishaug is a sound artist, producer and musician from Oslo, Norway, and one of the original members of the improv-collective ARM with Are Mokkelbost and Arne Borgan. He has also collaborated with artists such as Lasse Marhaug, Ingar Zach, Martin Horntvedt, and remixed albums by Jazkamer and metal […]
Bureau B Hamburg’s Bureau B label are doing a great job of keeping the Kosmische blowtorch alight. Treating the legacy as a living heritage, they give equal precedence to lovingly presented reissues of lost classics and brand new releases by survivors of the scene and their spiritual offspring. Alongside brand […]
Aurora Borealis 12th February 1923, Cefalù, Sicily – Evening. Aleister – God I hate Mondays, they’re so dreary. Aud, why don’t you put something on the gramophone? Surely you must have brought some of the latest sounds with you from London? Raoul – Yes, great master, […]
The Borderline London 25 February 2011 “We are the survivors, the eternal survivors……” This phrase may have crossed Nik Turner and the rest of his Space Ritual cohorts minds at some points over the years. But here they are still playing some of the best darn space rock this side […]
Play Loud! Although this DVD was released in late 2010, the footage — shot at the second annual festival held in Scheer, southern Germany — dates from 2005. Scheer is a small provincial town that since the late 90s has been the headquarters of Faust (or rather one of the […]