The Answer Is In The Beat

Günter Schickert: Überfällig (Sky Records, 1979/reissued Bureau B, 2012) + Samtvogel (self-released, 1974/reissued Important Records, 2013)

December 1, 2013 at 8:40 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

So one of my new year’s resolutions for 2013 was to buy more Krautrock vinyl, because there’s so many reissue labels putting out vintage Krautrock on vinyl and I just want to collect as much as I can because so much of it is incredible. Other than all the Neu! albums and a few other things, I didn’t get around to buying that much this year, but once I finally get around to listening to everything I got this year (and, uh, last year) that’s just been sitting around my room, I’ll try and get some more. But one of the main reasons I wanted to get really into this music was because I heard someone on WFMU play Günter Schickert’s “Puls” when this reissue of Überfällig came out, and I just had to hear more. Just a really stunning web of minimalist guitars and drums, which sounds precise and sequenced but it’s not electronic at all. Effortlessly hypnotic, doesn’t seem nearly as long as its 15 minute runtime. “In Der Zeit” is a much more down-to-earth slow acoustic folk song with rushing water sounds, but “Apricot Brandy II” and “Wanderer” return to the panned, precise guitar and drums of “Puls”, but not as fast and forward, more of a slow-burning rhythm, with lots of rim-clicking sounds. Both sound kind of lost and desperate in some ways, with “Apricot Brandy” possibly being in a drunken haze, and “Wanderer” lost and worried. The album ends as it begins with dripping and splashing water sounds.

Earlier this year, Important Records reissued Schickert’s 1974 debut Samtvogel on CD for the first time ever. The album was originally self-released, then issued by Brain a few times, reissued by Spanish label Wah Wah Supersonic Sounds in 2010, and is now finally available domestically on CD. The first version of “Apricot Brandy” seems like an embryonic version of its sequel, not really settling into a rhythm, just consisting of rippling guitar and vocals. The remaining two tracks on the album are expansive suites of guitar looping and vocals, creating furious clusters and patterns with mountains of echo and delay, and forging hypnotic rhythms without the use of any percussive instruments. This year a Russian label also released a private session Schickert did with Klaus Schulze in 1975, which already seems super limited and hard to find. Bureau B also just reissued his 1983 cassette Kinder In Der Wildnis on CD and vinyl, so I’m sure I’ll get around to buying that at some point. But Schickert seems like somewhat of an unheralded visionary, I’m glad a bunch of his recordings are getting out there and reissued.

Merzbow: Samidara (Placenta Recordings, 2013)

December 1, 2013 at 7:36 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

In honor of Jay Watson’s birthday, here is my attempt to review the Merzbow record he released this year. It’s on “piss yellow” vinyl, but there’s also a cassette release. I never get tired of Merzbow’s music, and this album is a pretty good example of why. Noisy and chaotic and unrelenting, but there’s so much going on. There’s squeaking rhythmic patterns suggesting decaying rhythms, there’s guitar noise feedback, there’s crushed distorted drums. The second side has some sort of mutated funk guitar and fast-forward blastbeat rhythms and tape manipulations. Seriously, the drums on side 2, oh my god.

Robert Alberg: Acoustically CDr (self-released, 2012)

December 1, 2013 at 1:13 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

For the past couple years, WCBN has occasionally received homemade CDr’s by this man, most of which don’t seem to actually play in our CD players. Sometimes they seem to have been burned as data discs, and most of the time the discs themselves are really scratchy and have pasted-on labels, and won’t play all the way. We’ve received 3 copies of this particular disc so far, only one of which we’ve been able to play, which we made a copy of for preservation. This copy that I’m reviewing seems to stop working after the first 3 tracks. It’s just as well, considering how similar the songs are. They’re all around 3 minutes, all features Alberg’s nasal vocals croaking in the right channel and distorted close-miked acoustic guitar plucking in the left. The songs all seem to be abstract narratives about nature (titles include “Echo Rock”, “Down River”, “Rainbow Falls”, “Rip Current”). Nothing much left to say other than that this is truly arresting outsider art. Not a whole lot of information about this album online, but his last album is on CD Baby, and seems to mine similar territory. Upon further research, he has somewhat of a cult hit song on Youtube and a disturbing, yet fascinating backstory.

Sidsel Endresen & Stian Westerhus: Didymoi Dreams (Rune Grammofon, 2012)

December 1, 2013 at 12:37 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Another disc that’s been staring me in the face from my desk for a year that I never got around to reviewing. I’m determined to get to the bottom of each and every pile of recorded media on my desk and floor before I start buying any more music, period. This album pits veteran Norwegian avant-jazz singer Endresen against relative newcomer Westerhus, who creates haunting soundscapes forming a backdrop for Endresen’s convulsing, stuttering improvised vocals. Endresen’s vocals mimic glitching and malfunctioning machines, while Westerhus’ guitars similarly swirl in the background and crash and splitter in the foreground. On “Wayward Ho”, Endresen almost sounds like a jungle MC speaking in tongues. Other tracks are super quiet and just seem to consist of minimal humming. The unexpected presence of applause at the end of a couple tracks reminds you that this is all being performed live, which makes everything all the more jarring.

Russian Tsarlag: Gagged In Boonesville LP (Not Not Fun, 2013)

November 30, 2013 at 11:46 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

I still have a flyer from when Russian Tsarlag played a show with Kites and Black Pus in my friend’s basement back in 2007, but I skipped that show so I could see Duran Duran Duran and Skymall play at some swanky hotel in NYC. So I’ve kind of missed out on the career of this prolific lo-fi musician for the past 7 years or so. Serious bedroom downer vibes, might seem a bit too dour to get into at first, but it’s actually pretty accessible. It’s slow and minimal, but it’s not lazy. Everything from the vocals to the tape and noise effects seem considered and planned. “One Way Out” has some sort of warped easy listening vibe, but other songs definitely don’t sound as easy. “Green Woman” sounds troubled and disturbed, and the nervous, maniacal laughter at the end only emphasizes this. “Play This Tape Again” has a nice warped, warbling texture, while “Become Solid” is a solemn near-instrumental with just a bit of tight-lipped speaking. “Plastic Door” ends the LP with some backwards, circuitbent sounds which segue into another downcast basement pop song.

Hydropark: untitled tapes (Life Like, 2013)

November 30, 2013 at 11:19 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Existing pretty far under the radar, this is a cosmic instrumental synth/drums project Fred Thomas has been working on with a couple other musicians. Two tapes have been released so far, both untitled. The first dates from April, and features soundtrack-y synthesizer tones and guitar loops, with occasional simmering, crashing and echoing drums. Side B is taken up by an epic meditation called “Everybody Wants To Go Swimming, Every Last One Worth Their Weight In Tomorrows”, which follows a lonely, shivering synth line and guitar, with more simmering, echoed panning drums, and later some laser-scapes. It’s a bit cold and isolated and even quite sad, and I’m in awe of it.

The second tape is just being released now as part of Life Like’s Winter 2013 bundle, but Encore had copies a few months ago, so I guess an early batch sneaked out. This one starts with a furious Krautrock/spacerock jam, with thundering motorik drumming and thick buzzing organ, and harsh waves of synth washing over everything. The second track has funkier drumming and more explosive, glimmering synths. It just goes on forever and seems to get more fried and spacey, then it just glops to a stop. Unfortunately the A-side of this tape comes mostly out of the right speaker, I’m hoping this was corrected when the winter batch was released, because this is a truly astounding tape that deserves to be heard correctly. But the second side plays fine, and features more spacey, jittery synth and thundering drums. Asteroid-destroying.

Craig Johnson: untitled tape (self-released, 2013)

November 30, 2013 at 10:15 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Originally released in an edition of 7 CDr’s under the title Flugelrad, this is a tape of brief improv sketches by Craig Johnson (aka Laserbeams of Boredom). While it includes that project’s mindblowing drumming, it also features drum machines and lots of circuitbent toy instruments, giving it kind of a playful, junky trash-art feel. The tracks with distorted drum machine beats particularly blow things out of proportion, and the bit with all the chiming crystal and chipmunk-y sounds? Too much. This guy just fries my brain and eats it for dinner, every single time.

Rites Wild megapost

November 30, 2013 at 9:30 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Yet another post about an artist I saw at SXSW earlier this year, and never got around to posting about or reviewing here. I actually saw Rites Wild (AKA Stacey Wilson) twice, once at night during the Not Not Fun showcase, and during the day at an all Australian showcase which I mostly went to because there was free food, but I had to stay for Rites Wild’s set because it was so awesome the night before. Her music is definitely on the dark, shadowy end of the lo-fi NNF spectrum, conjuring up the best of classic darkwave and minimal synth, but not succumbing to the typical goth cliches. The vocals stick to being veiled enough to be indecipherable, and the slow, ticking drum machines frame the expansive synth/organ melodies. The dark atmospherics make it seem too shadowy and abstract to really be considered “pop”, but the songs themselves are pretty compact and structured, they don’t meander.

Not Not Fun released Rites Wild’s Ways Of BeingLP last year, and it’s a prime example of what she does best. Slow and drowsy and a little distorted, but never fully obscured. There’s a few would-be club hits if clubs played dark, drowsy lo-fi darkwave (“Thieves”), and even a stunning dub excursion (“Minimal Where”), with vaguely “The Model”-esque organ and crashing drum fills covered in waterfalls of echo. Deep, haunted dancehall from down under.

Also released last year was The Past Will Become New Again, a cassette on Heavy Lows containing a 23 minute piece composed as a soundtrack for a radio show. This piece lets her zone out into deep space, focusing on repetitive synth sequences, heavy shifting atmospheres, and more obscured, submerged vocals. Just when you think it’s completely drifted out into space, a dubby pulse-beat emerges and some late-night synth-string melodies reflect the night sky onto the dance floor. Definitely more heady and psychedelic than the tracks on her LP. Seriously incredible and easy to get lost in. I was actually disappointed when it ended and there was no music on the second side of the tape.
Also of note is her alter ego Regional Curse, who released a tape on Night People called Natural Living. More haunted spacey sounds, with some songs stretching to the 10 minute mark. Not so many vocals on this tape, mostly slow throbbing beats and atmospherics, but the title track has some echoed whispering and a bit more of a progression than the other tracks. 10-minute closer “Best Believe” truly takes things into the void, with a slow beat crawling through mountains of delayed effects and zombie vocals. Such a horrible night to have a curse.

Policy: Postscript LP (100% Silk, 2013)

November 30, 2013 at 7:38 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Policy has been on my radar since his “Emotional”/”Speed Of Life” digital single on Ill Cosby’s Car Crash Set label back in 2010. After a few 12″s and a digital album on Rush Hour, Policy is now releasing a full-length LP on 100% Silk, which also recently released a tape by Cosby. The 6 tracks on here all clock in around 6 minutes, and have bright melodic house vibes. Opener “Postscript 187” cuts it up microhouse style, with horn blasts and sprinkles of chimes and bits of vocals. “Grove Street Freeze” is sunny, chiming, melodic, and has a chipper bassline and a bit of the cut-n-paste lo-fi charm of the best of the 100% Silk roster, while still recalling classic deep house. “Rememberance” goes a little closer to the clipped, staccato sounds of UK garage, with hints of dramatic strings and another chiming melody. On the B-side, “Ghost In The Groove” is probably the most slamming 4/4 dance track, weaving a blanket of vocal samples and scattered piano chords, with a Derrick May-esque bassline tying it all together. “Wiseblood” goes for even more of a late-night Detroit skyline feel, cruising into the city with “E2-E4” faintly playing in the background. “Big Beast Anthem” ends the album with more of a techno headrush, pumping the tempo up a bit and using frequent crashing snare rushes. A fresh set of tracks from an always on-point producer.