Sample-heavy folk drone collage from Peter Taylor (Mortuus Auris & the Black Hand) and Maria Thompson. 10 very different tracks, utilizing gamelan percussion, throat singing, birdsong, opera, sitars, film dialogue, and numerous other sounds. Lots of acoustic instruments and nature sounds combined with electronic drone. “Birds” and “Frogs” sample records about those very things. “Clouds” samples dialogue about clouds, double tracking it with a second or two of delay so it says everything twice, and combines it first with aggressive, crunchy beats, then later with sublime nature-film synths. It sort of creates a new world music, one that draws from disparate elements, and most importantly from nature itself.
A rather short tape from an artist who seems to prefer leaving details up to the listener’s imagination. Two seven-minute tracks of slowed, warped ambience with beats that sound like they’re being played off a tape player whose battery is just about to die, but it’s smoothed out enough so that it actually sounds like a coherent musical statement. There’s also a lot of sounds that come in waves, like piano loops that fully fade out, stop, and start up again, but again in a way that makes sense. Very faded and distant and edge-of-consciousness, and it works so well.
Nightrunners is an album that I feel like I shouldn’t have to review; it’s easily one of my favorite albums of last year, by far, and I feel like everyone should’ve heard it by now and praised it as one of the best albums of the year. Plus, you know, I wrote for their website so I’m biased anyway. But I’m guessing most people haven’t heard Nightrunners yet, in which case you can just head on over to Bandcamp right now and hear what you’ve been missing. Musically, it’s just really incredible synth/dream-pop, the arrangements and vocals are a definite improvement over their first album, the songs are catchy and touching, and it alternately reminds me of older Morr Music stuff, mid-’90s µ-Ziq (the synth sounds anyway), and Land Of The Loops. I fucking love Land Of The Loops.
I’m guessing the vinyl is no longer available, but Crash Symbols released it on tape with a track-by-track remix album on the second side (this is very nearly sold out as of this blog post). This is also available on Bandcamp (for free, even) so even if the tape’s sold out you can still hear it. The remixes tend to go for a deconstructive approach, looping and chopping up sections of vocals, rarely just taking them as is and merely applying their original song structures to new beats. Interpretations range from Seekers International’s wild dub take on “Digital Gold Futures”, to No UFOs’ dub-techno version of “Parallel Lives”, to a sensuous downtempo mix by Discoverer of “No Spring Till Summer”. “Fledgling” is my favorite song on the original album, and Ghibli’s remix doesn’t even try to capture what makes the original so special; instead, it isolates a heavily distorted vocal snippet, and loops an ecstatic melody over a loud clapping beat, and it’s over in a couple of minutes. Ricardo Donoso does a big dramatic cinematic edit of “New Designs”, focusing on the “we’re all lost but we don’t care” chorus and truly placing it in an appropriate new context.
mic break music = giuseppe ielasi/kassel jaeger: parallel/grayscale Hour 1
3:02 AM autechre ~ nodezsh ~ exai ~ warp
3:15 AM iannis xenakis ~ concret ph ~ grm works 1957-1962 ~ recollection grm
3:18 AM denis smalley ~ pentes (1974) ~ traces two ~ recollection grm
3:30 AM ashley paul ~ soak the ocean (pete swanson rmx) ~ mp3
3:39 AM brunch ~ piedmont ~ 7″ ~ fedora corpse
3:42 AM mazes ~ sucker punched ~ ores & minerals ~ fatcat
3:46 AM toxie ~ newgate ~ 7″ ~ goner
3:48 AM golden grrrls ~ wrld peace ~ golden grrrls ~ slumberland
3:50 AM saturday looks good to me ~ invisible friend ~ one kiss ends it all ~ polyvinyl
3:52 AM veronica falls ~ buried alive ~ waiting for something to happen ~ slumberland
3:55 AM sally shapiro ~ what can i do ~ somewhere else ~ paper bag Hour 2
4:02 AM informatics ~ underlife ~ dance to a dangerous beat ~ dark entries
4:07 AM fall of saigon ~ visions ~ fall of saigon ~ dark entries
4:09 AM soft drinks ~ pepsi cola ~ the thing from the crypt ~ dark entries
4:12 AM smersh ~ herman ~ cassette pets ~ dark entries
4:18 AM lust for youth ~ always changing ~ growing seeds ~ sacred bones
4:21 AM holy balm ~ holy balm theme ~ it’s you ~ not not fun
4:25 AM german army ~ hornhead ~ extract character flaw ~ family time records
4:26 AM net shaker ~ phone away ~ i’m so cold ~ kill shaman
4:30 AM moira scar ~ telepathos ~ scarred for life ~ resipiscent
4:41 AM el fog ~ silent soaring ~ reverberate slowly ~ flau
4:47 AM unpopular electronics ~ track 3 ~ she just won’t quit ~ holy cheever church recordings
4:58 AM loop 2.4.3 ~ american elder ~ american dreamland ~ music starts from silence Hour 3
5:03 AM guelewar ~ sanehmentereng ~ halleli n’dakarou ~ teranga beat
5:08 AM royal band de thies ~ kouye magana ~ kadior demb ~ teranga beat
5:12 AM dan friel ~ landslide ~ total folklore ~ thrill jockey
5:15 AM umberto ~ dead silent ~ morning confrontations ~ not not fun
5:20 AM freak ache ~ blue hole – black ocean ~ live ep ~ cdr
5:24 AM doldrums ~ sunrise ~ lesser evil ~ arbutus
5:26 AM pascal pinon ~ kertid ~ twosomeness ~ morr music
5:37 AM beach fossils ~ burn you down ~ clash the truth ~ captured tracks
5:40 AM the lovely bad things ~ maybe i know ~ the late great whatever ~ volcom
5:42 AM ty segall & mikal cronin ~ ramona ~ reverse shark attack ~ in the red
5:44 AM eat skull ~ how do i know when to say goodnite? ~ iii ~ woodsist
5:47 AM ducktails ~ sedan magic ~ the flower lane ~ domino
5:52 AM lucrecia dalt ~ escopolamina ~ commotus ~ human ear music
5:56 AM grouper ~ cover the long way ~ the man who died in his boat ~ kranky
Kompakt is celebrating their 20th anniversary this year (the original record store that became Kompakt opened in 1993) so me and Tyler played 2 hours of our favorite Kompakt tracks. Here’s my hour.
Crush Collision 2/28/13
10:01 PM mikkel metal ~ dorant
10:05 PM freiland ~ frei
10:09 PM thomas fehlmann ~ streets of blah
10:11 PM wolfgang voigt ~ frieden
10:16 PM jurgen paape ~ so weit wie noch nie
10:19 PM justus kohncke ~ timecode (edit)
10:22 PM dirk leyers ~ wellen
10:27 PM m. mayer ~ 17 & 4
10:30 PM dj koze ~ mariposa
10:35 PM hug ~ tiny stars
10:38 PM dj koze ~ the gekloppel continues b2
10:41 PM jonas bering/dettinger ~ intershop
10:46 PM the field ~ over the ice
10:51 PM voigt & voigt ~ triptychon nummer 7
10:54 PM the orb ~ captain korma
Unassuming little 7″ on Goner by a new band from Memphis made up of members of Magic Kids, Coasting, and The Barbaras. “Newgate” starts off as a straightforward rough-guitar indie-pop song with understated female vocals, but then some new wave synths swell up for the chorus (“and in the middle of the night, I call your name”), which attacks you with catchiness, then you get hit with “ooooohhhh”s in the background, spoken vocals (“we’re all waiting to die”), another verse, another chorus, and then it’s over and you’re frantically pressing replay a bunch of times. I think we have a hit. B-side “Ties” has a similar tight sound, with a bit more detail (cool left-right panning guitar, good dynamic control, some slightly surfy sounds), and a bit more of a laid-back grunge feel, but definitely not too loose. Not really garage-y at all. My ears are perked up.
Bionulor describes his music as “100% sound recycling”, and bases all of his works on a single short sample of a previously recorded work, with no additional instrumentation. This album consists of takes on Erik Satie’s “Gymnopédies”, which is such a well-known composition that it begs the question of what could possibly be added to it, why would anyone mess with such a classic? Didn’t people get tired of “old stuff remixed” albums years ago anyway? Well, fortunately, this is a lot more interesting than that. It’s all recognizable as the same source material; the first track sounds like the familiar piano melody played backwards, with static and some delay effects. It gets more twisted from that point, though. He applies some Fennesz-like filtering sounds, some stereo separation, makes abstract rhythms out of skipping static, and at one point almost approximates steel guitar out of the sound of backwards piano. The last track seems to reveal more of the melody, but deliberately chops it up and stitches it back together (seams very audible), and adds a few discordant plunks approximating prepared pianos. “Gymnopédies” is the type of piece that never gets tiring no matter how many times you hear it, so hearing 48 minutes of slight, glitchy variations on it is nothing less than a pleasure.
For whatever reason, I thought I had associated C V L T S with witch house, probably because of the name and the AMDISCS association. This tape (which is actually an expanded edition of an LP that came out earlier last year on Aguirre) is so far beyond that, though. It’s hazy and lo-fi, alright, but without any goth pretensions. Instead of being otherworldly, conjuring up images of witches and spirits and ghosts, it comparatively sounds, well, worldly. It sounds closer to something created by imaginative humans. Some of it is heavy on effects and atmosphere, but some of it sounds like honest-to-god Indie Rock. And it works perfectly fine that way. “Brahma Weapons” has swirling guitars, driving drums and bass, and low-mixed whispered vocals, and “Sandstone Retreat” is a 2-minute slice of bedroom slowcore. Other songs have hypnotic loops and blurry guitars, and seem to stick to a grubby 4-track aesthetic instead of going for more hi-tech trickery. The final track, “Suki”, seems to have a bit more digital-sounding tones, but it develops into a rich pool of fuzz and stays sufficiently warped, and retains its lo-fi-ness. And it ends with applause, which is looped and repeated, causing you to wonder if it’s actually a live performance or if it was just a trick added onto the end of the song. So basically, this tape doesn’t convince me of any sort of supernatural forces or anything, but it does sound like a well-done, enjoyable tape of lo-fi guitar and effects.
I’ll always have a soft spot for Slumberland’s brand of twee-pop. The label keeps unearthing new bands offering their variation on C86-style indie-pop, shoegaze and noise-pop, and even if most of them don’t hit it out of the park, or even to outfield, the label usually puts out a few albums per year that I can’t help but enjoy. This is one of them. I was prepared to hate it because of the band name, and the first couple tracks are kind of “this could go either way”. But the group’s three-part harmonies (one male, two female) are unique, and they manage a few catchy songs, especially during the second half of the album. The album sounds a little rough, though; there’s some songs (such as “Paul Simon”) where the guitars sound just a little too high in the mix, and a few other songs seem to start too suddenly, like half of the first note of the song sounds chopped off, and that doesn’t sound correct. Actually, upon further listening, the imperfections are a little distracting, which is a shame because some of the songs are pretty good and the harmonies are quite interesting. This album could be better, but I do give this band credit because I like their sound.
4 years after SLGTM ended and Fred Thomas started focusing on City Center, the band has resurfaced with a new lineup (of course) and new songs, with plans to release an album this year. Life Like released a tour tape last year, which was excellent and full of promise for the new album. Before the end of the year, 2 7″s were also released, giving us a clearer taste of the band’s new sound. “Sunglasses” is their latest earworm, and the album’s first single. While it still has their classic pop sound, it’s a little bit alarming to hear modern, almost crunk-sounding drum machine beats come in when the vocals first hit, and again towards the end. The rest of the song has their usual full pop-band sound, with baritone sax by Dan Bennett (also of NOMO), some surfy guitar, and lyrics about wanting to have a good time in spite of life’s pressures and frustrations. Fred’s been saying that the new album is musically more subtle and intricate than their older stuff, and this is an intriguing taste of that. Also, the vocals are by new singer Carol Catherine, who fits in with the band’s sound, although I do have to say that my favorite SLGTM songs tended to be the ones with Erika Hoffman singing, mostly because her voice just sounded so awesome and I really miss Godzuki and the songs she did with His Name Is Alive. So we’ll see how Carol continues the band’s legacy. The B-side is a minute-long duet by Fred and Amber, singing slightly creepy lyrics over nervous, warbling organ.
Saturday Looks Good To Me/Traffic Light: split 7″
The other new SLGTM single is a split 7″ on Japanese label Violet and Claire. The song’s called “Ride To The Party”, and it also appeared on their tour tape last year. It’s a little bit similar to one of their other new songs, “Invisible Friend”, which was also on that tape, although I think this song’s maybe a little lass catchy. But it’s still a breezy, sunny pop song, with an insistent drumbeat and some cool synth sounds towards the end. Not as intricate as “Sunglasses”, and maybe it goes down a little easier too. The B-side is by Japanese band Traffic Light, who do a decent take on straightforward power-pop.
The Answer Is In The Beat 