February 3, 2021 at 5:39 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment
Staffers: In the Pigeon Hole tape
Ryan McKeever is the frontman, guitarist, and songwriter of the Washington, DC-based
Staffers. The group play a scrappy but spirited brand of hook-heavy post-punk which at times brings to mind certain aspects of Country Teasers, Oh Sees, and poppier Siltbreeze and In the Red bands. Saxophone, pedal steel, and toy piano add some color to the fuzzy guitars, and tracks like “Fuck the Brixton” (an ode to a shitty bar) are full of character and swaggering charm. “Jeremy” is the soaring climax, but “Getting Thinner” is also an anxiety-riddled highlight. As nervy as the album gets, it all winds down with a bitter country lament, “Just Another Tuesday”.
February 2, 2021 at 8:10 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment
Keleketla!: Keleketla! Remixes
The Coldcut-assisted South African/British collective gets the
remix treatment, largely keeping the messages of freedom and independence intact while varying the rhythms. Machinedrum’s mix of “Papua Merdeka” preserves Benny Wenda’s plea for help from Indonesia’s genocidal takeover of Papua, while adding some atmospheric breakbeats. Adrian Sherwood’s On-U Sound works magic on “Freedom Groove”, dubbing the Watts Prophets’ scream for humanity’s freedom and making more room for Tony Allen’s righteous drumming, the Antibalas horns, and other elements. Detroit’s DJ Stingray turns the gqom heater “Future Toyi Toyi” into a deconstructed don’t-say-electro banger, actually coming closer to post-industrial. Skee Mask’s “Swift Gathering” is ambient drum’n’bass with precision-engineered but full-of-life breakbeats and lush, gorgeous textures. Doesn’t sound a think like the original, mind. Floyd Lavine adds a smidgen of acid to his Afro-house mix of “Papua Merdeka”, and Esa does both deep house and Afro-synth interpretations of “Shepherd Song”. Henrik Schwarz and Project Pablo also do some smooth work on the house side. Of the two versions of the Yugen Blakrok’s poetic showcase “Crystallise”, J Saul Kane’s is by far the most bugged out, truly wonky in the best way. Jungle Drummer’s “5&1” is another incredibly organic-sounding drum’n’bass track, and Mr Raoul K cools things down with the abstract, simmering “Broken Light”.
February 2, 2021 at 6:33 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment
AntiHamlet/Szdanik Tuuutiitak: split tape
Yet another absurdly limited tape from Psy-Fiction Recordings’ Alexey Nakhodkin, the first side is taken up by AntiHamlet’s “Electric Throne”, a vibrating buzz-drone which gradually gets sharper and noisier until it gains a sort of reverberating attack. Some interruptions trip it up a bit, but then it gets right back into its dirty fluctuations, while seeming basically lodged in place. It’s very monotonous and doesn’t go anywhere but I love it. Later on it seems to catch an electrical fire yet somehow resists getting totally singed and keeps fluttering, thrashing, and crackling. After a while, though, all that’s left is an intensely hissing signal that just can’t quite get extinguished, until it finally bips out at the end. On the other side, Szdanik Tuuutiitak’s “Transparent Alphabet” is a more lonesome organ drone that wavers in the moonlight and trudges in distortion, then gradually disassociates and becomes a ghost. After nearly disappearing, it switches to a more haunted drone, one that sounds more like captured souls.
February 1, 2021 at 10:58 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment
Szdanik Tttk/Mexika/A. Kustarnik/Vin Rar: split tape
Limited to 5 copies, this 90-minute tape showcases 4 different aliases of Psy-Fiction Recordings’ prolific owner, Alexey Nakhodkin. Szdanik Tuuutiitak (in slightly abbreviated form) starts this shindig off with what could be grainy loops of at least 5 calliopes playing at once, with faint melodies managing to poke their way out but nothing really changing apart from the tape speed at a few points. The Mexika piece starts out extremely minimal and sounds like a distant furnace that you think is either strangely humming out a melody or your brain’s playing tricks on you, then a louder, more distinct vibration buzzes in. Some more irritated screeching emerges, but then somehow this plunges into a bucket of blue fluid and glitches/freezes for a while. Eventually a swarm of harmonicas cut in, some whirring out with distortion, but generally revolving around the same beehive. Peridically it crumbles and mutes a bit, but then comes back slurrier than ever. At one point it feels like it’s basically been ground into dust, but it crawls back slightly before the side ends. A. Kustarnik, on the second side, is guitar-based, with wayward twangs and clangs splayed across a wasteland. Gradually it seems to lift away from the guitar-based source material, with more vibrations, distortions, and just a creeping ominousness. Like the end of the first side, it gets super smudged and cruddy by the end. After this is Vin Rar, maybe the artist’s most playful, minimal synth-esque project. Bubbly tones quickly whizzle around like a pinwheel, while a drum machine patiently drips away underneath. Like the rest of the tape, there’s periods where it seems like nothing is changing much, but it does get out of wack, getting brighter, less busy, slowing down, piling back in, etc. Even though it doesn’t really progress, it does seem stuck in the same fluttering moment of joy.
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