Monday, November 30, 2009
Magazine - Real Life
Bro, this album is so... so... so... REAL.
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Allmusic: Howard Devoto had the foresight to promote two infamous Sex Pistols concerts in Manchester, and his vision was no less acute when he left Buzzcocks after recording Spiral Scratch. Possibly sensing the festering of punk's clichés and limitations, and unquestionably not taken by the movement's beginnings, he bailed -- effectively skipping out on most of 1977 -- and resurfaced with Magazine. Initially, the departure from punk was not complete. "Shot by Both Sides," the band's first single, was based off an old riff given by Devoto's Buzzcocks partner Pete Shelley, and the guts of follow-up single "Touch and Go" were rather basic rev-and-vroom. And, like many punk bands, Magazine would likely cite David Bowie, Iggy Pop, and Roxy Music. However -- this point is crucial -- instead of playing mindlessly sloppy variants of "Hang on to Yourself," "Search and Destroy," and "Virginia Plain," the band was inspired by the much more adventurous Low, The Idiot, and "For Your Pleasure." That is the driving force behind Real Life's status as one of the post-punk era's major jump-off points. Punk's untethered energy is rigidly controlled, run through arrangements that are tightly wound, herky-jerky, unpredictable, proficiently dynamic. The rapidly careening "Shot by Both Sides" (up there with PiL's "Public Image" as an indelible post-punk single) and the slowly unfolding "Parade" (the closest thing to a ballad, its hook is "Sometimes I forget that we're supposed to be in love") are equally ill-at-ease. The dynamism is all the more perceptible when Dave Formula's alternately flighty and assaultive keyboards are present: the opening "Definitive Gaze," for instance, switches between a sci-fi love theme and the score for a chase scene. As close as the band comes to upstaging Devoto, the singer is central, with his live wire tendencies typically enhanced, rather than truly outshined, by his mates. The interplay is at its best in "The Light Pours out of Me," a song that defines Magazine more than "Shot by Both Sides," while also functioning as the closest the band got to making an anthem. Various aspects of Devoto's personality and legacy, truly brought forth throughout this album, have been transferred and blown up throughout the careers of Momus (the restless, unapologetic intellectual), Thom Yorke (the pensive outsider), and maybe even Luke Haines (the nonchalantly acidic crank).
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Mogwai - Young Team
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Allmusic: Young Team, Mogwai's first full-length album fulfills the promise of their early singles and EPs, offering a complex, intertwining set of crawling instrumentals, shimmering soundscapes, and shards of noise. Picking up where Ten Rapid left off, Mogwai use the sheer length of an album to their advantage, recording a series of songs that meld together — it's easy to forget where one song begins and the other ends. The record itself takes its time to begin, as the sound of chiming processed guitars and murmured sampled vocals floats to the surface. Throughout the album, the sound of the band keeps shifting, and it's not just through explosions of noise — Mogwai isn't merely jamming, they have a planned vision, subtly texturing their music with small, telling details. When the epic "Mogwai Fears Satan" draws the album to a close, it becomes clear that the band has expanded the horizons of post-rock, creating a record of sonic invention and emotional force that sounds unlike anything their guitar-based contemporaries have created.
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Sunday, November 29, 2009
Squarepusher - Big Loada
Brain frying & mezzzzmerizing. _____________________________
Brainwashed Review: Squarepusher is Tom Jenkinson.
Overall impression: excellent. Nothing Records has finally bothered to put some Squarepusher out domestically in the States! "Big Loada" and the new album, "Music is Rotted One Note" are my first exposure to Tom's music and I'm very impressed by both even though these 2 discs are very different from one another. Nothing took the original "Big Loada" ep, rearranged the track listing a little and added the "Port Rhombus" ep ("Port Rhombus", "Problem Child", "Significant Others") and two tracks from the "Vic Acid" ep ("The Barn" and "Lone Ravers"), as well as tacking on the spiffy Chris Cunningham directed (see also Aphex Twin "Come to Daddy" video) "Come on My Selector" video in quicktime format. "Big Loada" is insanely complex, jazzy, hyperspeed drill 'n bass with the usual quirky samples and melodies (ala Aphex Twin, u-ziq, etc) and lots of bass guitar fills *played* by Tom. Each song is a hodgepodge, cut 'n paste smorbasbord of percussion, bass, bass guitar, and all sorts of miscellaneous bleeps, bells, whistles and keyboard sounds all tightly woven together in a brain numbing blast of sound. Occasionally the speed slows down here and there to slip into a nice groove, such as on "Massif", "Tequila Fish" and "Port Rhombus".
Really fun stuff, but something I have to be in the mood for or my brain may either melt or explode. Now I see what all the hype is about ... Tom is one talented guy, whether it be pushing buttons on his machines or playing live bass guitar, drums and keyboards (see also "Music is Rotted One Note"). I'm very happy to finally get my hands on this at domestic prices and I'm looking forward to whatever else Nothing releases from the backcatalogue ...
Friday, November 27, 2009
The Singing Nun - Soeur Sourire
The Singing Nun, Sister Luc-Gabrielle, (aka Jeanine Deckers) recorded souvenir records to be given away to guests of her convent in Belgium. Somehow she became a sensation in Europe as a result. In December, 1963, her single, Dominique, topped the US pop charts for 4 weeks. In the wake of JFK's assasination radio stations turned to softer and more religious themed music and the Singing Nun fit the bill. The song relegated Louie Louie to the #2 spot.
Shortly after the success she left the convent feeling the church was too conservative. She had never desired the limelight and also left the music business. But in 1966 she recorded a second album pointedly titled I Am Not A Star that failed disastrously, though it did take on several controversial subjects and included the ode to birth control, Glory be to God for the Golden Pill. When the album tanked she founded and ran a school for children with autism.
A sappy biopic about her starring Debbie Reynolds and Ricardo Montalban was released in 1966, though Deckers denounced it as complete fiction.
Throughout the 70's she fought the Belgian government over their demand for payment of back taxes. She claimed the convent and a former manager had taken most of her money. She also came out as a lesbian. In 1982, out of desperation she recorded Dominique again as sort of a new wave disco cover in hopes of raising the funds needed to pay the back taxes. It bombed. Three years later, citing the financial pressures she and her lover of the previous ten years committed suicide. Ironically, the very day of their deaths, and unbeknownst to them, the Belgian equivalent of ASCAP awarded her $300,000 in back royalties owed her - more than enough to have paid off her $65,000 in back taxes.
To this day she remains the only Belgian artist to ever top the US charts.
So settle back and sing along with the sister - just don't make it a habit.
Hear
And here's a vid of the 1982 disco version (very much a camp classic).
Monday, November 23, 2009
Butthole Surfers - Psychic... Powerless... Another Man's Sac
Must keep it a little weird around here or I start getting paranoid.
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Wikipedia: The band embarked on a decidedly more psychedelic direction with their first LP. However, while the album's first half, and in particular "Cherub," have definite psychedelic qualities, elements of traditional punk ("Butthole Surfer"), blues ("Lady Sniff"), surf rock ("Mexican Caravan"), and country rock ("Gary Floyd") are also on display.
Dum Dum is also notable for being another song in the Butthole Surfers' catalogue to be based around parts of a Black Sabbath song whilst the lyrics revolve around an entirely different concept from the original. The drums are lifted in this instance, from Children Of The Grave, from the Master Of Reality album.
Many of Psychic...'s tracks were enhanced with extensive tape editing and, in some cases, the addition of non-traditional instrumentation, including the barrage of bizarre sounds (spitting, vomiting, Spanish radio station, etc.) heard in "Lady Sniff." Lead vocalist Gibby Haynes debuted a new vocal technique by singing through a bullhorn for some songs, and played saxophone and eardrums on "Negro Observer" and "Cowboy Bob." This was the first Surfers studio album to feature double drummers King Coffey and Teresa Nervosa, and the last with bass player Bill Jolly, who had also performed on the band's first two releases.
Approximately half the songs on this album, including "Negro Observer," "Lady Sniff," "Cherub," "Mexican Caravan," "Cowboy Bob," and "Gary Floyd," are staples of the Surfers' live shows.
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Debarge - In A Special Way
Undoubtedly a perfect example of it is what it is. Pure and sincere and I really don't use that many (different) drugs anymore... unless you call sweet cleans soul some kinda jenke then geddemn hook a brother up, na mean!?
This forces to remove you from your hepster barriers, your kool suspenders. Jyst listen.
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From the Dean of American Rock Critics, Robert Christgau: When first I fell in love with the austere lilt and falsetto fantasy they've pinned to plastic here, I thought it was just that I'd finally outgrown the high-energy fixation that's always blocked my emotional access to falsetto ballads. So I went back to Spinners and Blue Magic, Philip Bailey and my man Russell Thompkins Jr., and indeed, they all struck a little deeper--but only, I soon realized, because the superior skill of these kids had opened me up. I know of no pop music more shameless in its pursuit of pure beauty--not emotional (much less intellectual) expression, just voices joining for their own sweet sake, with the subtle Latinized rhythms (like the close harmonies themselves) working to soften odd melodic shapes and strengthen the music's weave. High energy doesn't always manifest itself as speed and volume--sometimes it gets winnowed down to its essence. A+
LINK REMOVED
Saturday, November 21, 2009
S.O.S. Band - On The Rise
Hear
Password = 80sonspeed
Art Pepper - Meets The Rhythim Section
Art Pepper was a different cat. He was as cool, but his self-destruction was not his delight. He didn't like being a junkie, fought his addiction and its negative affects with on and off success throughout his life. And unlike Baker, he became a better musician by the end.
After a couple of stints in the clink in the mid 50s, he was really trying to get clean when he got the chance to record this piece, a comeback of sorts. It was arranged for him by his wife, though she kept it a secret from him so as not to send him spiraling down. He was only informed of the session the morning of.
He hadn't played in 6 months. His horn was broken and he had to fashion a working instrument from borrowed pieces. Packing a dried-out cork taped to his sax with a bandaid he stepped into the studio shaking like a leaf. It only got worse for him. The sidemen were Miles' guys, men he had idolized, but never met (and had not been told would be there): Red Garland, Paul Chambers, and Philly Joe Jones. They were the epitome of East Coast Hot. The first number they laid down, You'd Be So Nice To Come Home To, Pepper literally forgot the melody and was forced to figure it out as tape ran. Everything said this session would be a disaster.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
It is precisely the looseness/tension. the Cool/Hot, the desperation/ahh, fuck it feeling that makes this Pepper's best recording from his early years. He grows and gains confidence throughout the record. You can hear his bandmates challenging him on, popping him forward. It is at times dazzling as in Tin Tin Deo when he rips away the cool and swings it hard before dropping it back into an ocean of ease.
Out of context it's a stand out recording, but with its history this record is a testament to brilliant musicianship, courage under fire, and a man beating back his demons, if only for a while.
Hear
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
The Templeton Twins with Teddy Turner's Bunsen Burners - Trill It Like It Was [1970]
I found this little oddity after an evening of drunken discussion wherein I made asinine statements along the lines of, "I could always hear a little Van Halen in Clear Spot after I discovered Ted Templeton produced it." The next morning found me browsing Ted's production oeuvre over the years. Beyond that brief stint with the Captain and VH, I wasn't that familiar. Amidst many mediocre albums the following stuck out on his wiki page:
"That same year (1970), Templeman recorded what is now considered a cult classic. Using doubletracking, he appeared as "The Templeton Twins" backed by "Teddy Turner & his Bunsen Burners," recording contemporary hits of the time such as "Hey Jude" and "Light My Fire" in a pseudo-1920s style."
My interest piqued, quick research found this long out of print, but "available" out there as a relatively clean vinyl rip. It's quite goofy, dripping with pastiche, but technically very refined and occasionally inspired. Spinning Wheel really stands out for me, as does Everybody's Talkin'.
I'm not certain on the editions released of this album, but I've found a few candidates for album art which I hope covers Baywatch's ecru/chartreuse marble vinyl Swedish version.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Van Dyke Parks - Song Cycle
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AMG: Van Dyke Parks moved on from the Beach Boys' abortive SMiLE sessions to record his own solo debut, Song Cycle, an audacious and occasionally brilliant attempt to mount a fully orchestrated, classically minded work within the context of contemporary pop. As indicated by its title, Song Cycle is a thematically coherent work, one which attempts to embrace the breadth of American popular music; bluegrass, ragtime, show tunes -- nothing escapes Parks' radar, and the sheer eclecticism and individualism of his work is remarkable. Opening with "Vine Street," authored by Randy Newman (another pop composer with serious classical aspirations), the album is both forward-thinking and backward-minded, a collision of bygone musical styles with the progressive sensibilities of the late '60s; while occasionally overambitious and at times insufferably coy, it's nevertheless a one-of-a-kind record, the product of true inspiration.
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Karlheinz Stockhausen - Gesang Der Junglinge, Kontakte
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Walter Wanderley - Rain Forest
Doing a little research on Wanderley releases I came across the following blog post on this record. I think this says way more than intended and does this record a fine honor. Sexy music, I say!
from LORONIX blog: This amazing cover shows a Toucan, a Ramphastos. They are not social like zecalouro but are really beautiful. Perhaps only a few Loronixers had the chance to touch a Toucan and take a closer look. An angry Toucan can make serious injury to each other when there are fertile females around. Their beautiful big peak is hot like the body with a thin tongue.
Well, this is a music blog and zecalouro is going nuts! Let's go back to business...
HEAR
Julius Hemphill - Dogon A. D.
HEAR
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
John Lee Hooker and The Groundhogs - Hooker and The Hogs
...and yes THOSE Groundhogs. SOLID!
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AMG: McPhee and the Groundhogs' most important musical legacy, this 1996 reissue of Hooker & The Hogs has an unusual history. Tony McPhee and the Groundhogs first played with John Lee Hooker in June of 1964, when John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers were unable to fulfill a commitment to back Hooker on the final week of his British tour. The Groundhogs were deputized on the spot and played their first show with him at the Twisted Wheel in Manchester. At the end of the week, Hooker told McPhee how much he liked working with his band and agreed to use the Groundhogs as his backing band on his next visit to England. Hooker was back in May and June of 1965, and not only used them as his band but recorded this album with the Groundhogs. The band was Tony McPhee on guitar, Peter Cruickshank on bass, Dave Boorman on drums, and Tom Parker on keyboards -- some of the stuff here may have surfaced elsewhere, on the Interchord label (as Don't Want Nobody) with brass dubbed on, but this release consists of the undubbed recordings. The sound is raw, tight, and raunchy, some of the best band-backed recordings of Hooker's career. He's notoriously difficult to play support for because of the spontaneity of his work, but these guys keep up and then some, adding engaging flourishes and grace notes. Hooker is in excellent voice, and his material is as strong as any album in his output, rough, dark, and moody. The ominous, surging "Little Dreamer" is worth the price of admission all by itself. The 11 tracks with the Groundhogs are rounded out with four Hooker solo bonus tracks, which are even louder and more savage than the Groundhogs' stuff, though a little noisy (like that ever mattered with The Hook).
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Friday, November 6, 2009
Unrest - Perfect Teeth [1993]
Unrest - Imperial f.f.r.r. [1992]
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
John Cale / Tony Conrad / Angus Maclise / La Monte Young / Marian Zazeela - Inside The Dream Syndicate Volume I: Day of Niagara (1965)
Thinking Fellers Union Local #282 - Admonishing The Bishop
This record doesn't try to be anyone or anything it isn't. Sometimes when you don't give 110% you get 100%.
There were times this band just out n' out nailed it. Hurricane is one of those moments. There are other times this band kind of missed it. This EP skipped those moments.
I thought everyone had a million dollars
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HEAR
Monday, November 2, 2009
The Vaselines - Enter The Vaselines
p.s. it would nice for once to encounter things about the Vaselines, Meat Puppets & Daniel Johnston that didn't incessantly namecheck CKurt Cobain. There have been a lot of suicidal junkies who loved these bands.
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Allmusic: Kurt Cobain made plenty of mistakes in his life, but loving the Vaselines was not among them. Nirvana covered three of their songs, and as Kurt might tell you if he were alive today, from 1986 to 1989 the Vaselines were the best pop band around. Sub Pop was smart enough to cash in on the Nirvana connection, and in 1992 released the career retrospective The Way of the Vaselines: A Complete History. From the stomping, singalong opener "Son of a Gun" to the distorted and nasty "Let's Get Ugly" 17 tracks later, this collection was the Holy Grail of indie pop. In 2009, hot off of Eugene Kelly and Frances McKee's reunion (and appearance at Sub Pop's 20th anniversary bash), the label remastered the studio recordings, added a second disc of demos and live performances, and retitled the whole thing Enter the Vaselines.
The Vaselines' music is unfailingly amateurish, almost completely silly, occasionally quite perverted, and always about sex. It has the simplicity and ear-grabbing melodies of the best bubblegum, the loud and semi-competent guitars of punk, and some of the attitude and lo-fi sound of their noise rock contemporaries like the Jesus and Mary Chain. They also had a charmingly unschooled vocal approach (Kelly sounding cool and tough, McKee sweet as pie) with a fleeting acquaintance to pitch but tons of humor, attitude, and style. Throw in a bunch of religion and add brilliantly simple choruses that will have you singing along the first time you hear the songs (as well as the thousandth), and you've got genius. This brilliance shines brightest on the band's first two EPs, which were recorded by Stephen Pastel and contain the songs the group was best known for, like "Molly's Lips," "Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam," and "Son of a Gun." The full-length album Dum-Dum, recorded without Pastel's guidance and with a bulked-up, rockier sound, is still quite amazing and features some timelessly cool songs like "Sex Sux (Amen)," which includes the immortal line "Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost/I'm the Sacred Host with the most," the rip-roaring "Monsterpussy," and the hilarious "The Day I Was a Horse." Taken together, the band's official output is brainy, funny, sexy, catchy pop music at its best.
So if the first disc of Enter the Vaselines is absolutely essential, the bonus disc is for fanatics only. The demos for "Son of a Gun" and unrecorded songs "Rosary Job" and "Red Poppy" are interesting from a historical perspective but not very listenable, as the duo hadn't really put its sound together yet. The live set from December of 1986 (three months before the first EP was recorded) is a sloppy, stiff performance with Kelly and McKee backed by a drum machine and fighting to be heard above the din of the unimpressed crowd. Much better is the live set from 1988 with a full band playing songs from the EPs and Dum-Dum (and a cover of Gary Glitter's "I Didn't Know I Loved You ['Til I Saw You Rock 'n' Roll]") in front of a semi-enthusiastic crowd. They still sound raw and amateurish but also like they are having much more fun. Kelly, McKee, and Pastel also seem to have had fun when they sat down for the chat about the history of the band that is a part of the set's beautiful packaging. Credit Sub Pop for putting tons of effort into the release of Enter the Vaselines and treating the band and the music with the respect they deserve. For a short period of time, there was nothing like them on Earth.
HEAR Disc 1
HEAR Disc 2