Dirter Really glad to get a proper chance to listen to this again – disc rot, the scourge of so many early World Serpent gems (the un-initiated should see here) and barmy auction prices have totally scuppered my chances to get re-acquainted with its Frankensteined charms until now. Dirter, those bastions of the unusual, have done a sterling job of dragging A Sucked Orange back into the light […]
Album review
2412 posts
VCO VCO is a label that specialises in limited cassette-only releases. They have released tapes by Zombi, Majeure, Steve Moore and Jonas Reindhart, with most of these editions running between the 50 to 100 copies mark. This edition of music recorded in 1996 by Schickert has had a hundred copies made.* The album opens with “Morning,” tablas and percussion building a steady rhythm under an eastern-sounding guitar fugue […]
7th In a time when most CD albums stretch beyond the 60 minute mark, to receive an album with only two tracks that lasts a mere 32 minutes seems rather odd. But what we have to remember here is that this is not any ordinary 32 minutes, it is 32 minutes of Magma, which is the equivalent to 70 by a lot of other artists. From its opening […]
Ipecac A lot has been written and said about the importance of Isis, that rare breed of heavy band who not only garnered widespread critical acclaim in the metal world but also succeeded as a crossover act, appealing to fans of shoegaze, post-rock, avant-garde and beyond. This crossover appeal, combined with vocalist/guitarist Aaron Turner’s (now sadly soon-to-be defunct) label Hydra Head Industries introduced the more curious fan to […]
Young God When Michael Gira announced that he was reactivating Swans (not a reunion, remember?) it came as a bit of a surprise; albeit one that garnered some excitement. The album that followed showed that the band had fleshed out the folk trappings of Gira’s Angels of Light project; instilling some of Swans heaviness onto the Angels’ southern twang. Some people liked it, some didn’t, but it was […]
Trestle When James Johnston releases a solo album, it is really difficult to know what to expect. To my knowledge, this is his very first solo album. Being a bluesy rock star front man of Gallon Drunk, guitar hero in Lydia Lunch’s Big Sexy Noise, or session and live musician with The Bad Seeds is only one side of this multi-talented Englishman. Collaborating with Philippe Petit, and a […]
Exceptional This is evidence of time travel. Not in a good way. In the future, we’ll still be in thrall to the past, still looking back and longing. We’ll still be unable to understand the terrible now. We’ll read and re-read Simon Reynolds’s Retromania (really must get round to that; it’s on my Christmas List. The irony of not reading it yet is killing me) and we’ll use […]
Constellation I believe it was the great Neil Young who sang “…only Swans can break your arm” back in the dim and distant mists of musical history, and up until now he’s been right. No band other than Michael Gira‘s monolithic spacegod-baiting machine has ever had the capacity to damage limbs simply through sheer heftiness. But all that’s changed now with the arrival of the new Godspeed You! […]
Exotic Pylon Absolutely love the cover for this! A grinning turnip head with nasty teeth, pipe and wire glasses. A comedy shaman vibe which fits well with the jovial surrealism enclosed. Sharing a similarly damaged vibe to fellow Nordic maverick Goodiepal, the first track “Animal accompaniment is a cage they can fly out”‘ (well that’s what Google is telling me) is like some fairground attraction filled with weird […]
Leaf I am very sorry to say that I had not heard of Jherek Bischoff until quite recently, when he joined the marvellous musical collaboration that is Amanda Palmer and the Grand Theft Orchestra. And, to be honest, I hadn’t really registered until I got hold of Amanda Palmer’s Theatre is Evil just what an accomplished and multi-talented musician he is. So I did some digging (and by […]
Versatile OK, where do I begin? Well, for starters you are getting a different Zombie Zombie than was showcased on 2007’s A Land For Renegades and 2010’s …[post=zombie-zombie-play-john-carpenter text=”Plays John Carpenter”]. This time the set up seems more like a (dare I say it) concept album and although the band bring all their arsenal of sounds from their previous albums, this has a touch more progressive rock going […]
Bureau B This release oozes an interstellar optimism. Rhythmic entanglements and driven drums playing Tom and Jerry with the spacey medications, whilst battling guitars spar, silhouetted on a blazing urban skyline. “Ego” is quite an opener, filling the canvas in a metrical rainbow of dramatic sweeps and boredom quashing sub-currents, like a fuel-injected NEU! as shards of projectile are kicked back by the rat-a-tat-tat of snare bullets dispersing […]
Aurora Borealis Seirom‘s double-disc epic 1973 lifts off on CD1 (Strands Of Golden Light) with a raft of shoegaze chorale, a soaring surge of fuzz and gritty noise spreading into the realms of where those of a majestic frame of mind might wander, dallying a while in pastoral landscapes where the soothing sounds of synthesized orchestras wash languidly at the backbrain. But as Seirom is also none other […]
PNL Terrie Hessels of the Dutch anarcho-punk-improv orchestra The Ex has never stopped with his raw punk attitude, but rather collaborated with numerous people over the years to get inspiration from and absorbing all elements of all music, but continuing to being raw and unpolished. In meetings with the Norwegian hard-hitting avant-garde drummer, Paal Nilssen-Love, two souls of similar attitude meet, although from very different background. Being a […]
Rustblade This is like a spider’s web of sonic backgrounds, songs hanging to the sticky radials like cocooned insect, trapped meals in the spectral dust of some netherworld. The title may give it away, but this happily avoids any chain rattling cliché. “Throwing Things” is probably the only complete song here that bears the greatest Legendary Pink Dots hallmark. Although definitions between solo and band are often mercurially […]
Front & Follow This gives me the gargles. It reminds me a little of the tone behind James Ferraro’s Far Side Virtual (it doesn’t sound much like it at all) in that it’s like Roman Bezdyk has found himself unable to distance himself from the music he’s riffing on. This seems respectable, seems right, seems like these aural artefacts (I’m talking about library music, mostly) ought to have a […]
Ritual Productions This is the re-release of Bong’s self titled album. Originally released as vinyl only and in a limited edition, Ritual Productions have decided to put out the recording for the first time on CD, allowing the tracks the extra space that the vinyl would not allow. So you not only get extended versions of the original two tracks but also a bonus track called “Asleep” as […]
Bureau B This baby’s got kinetic candy aplenty, tearing up that flat ’80s graph paper, banishing machine rigidity in a blur of angles. Any inkling of metronomic dead flesh is given a dust kicking of sampledelics bolstered by live trumpets and fret slipping guitar, the momentum throwing your head in pleasing multiples, keeping the adrenaline churned up. “Automatic” is a great start, a Rubik’s cube of flashing colour, […]