last call for otology!
Otology will be shipped on April 16th, Brainwashed's 9th birthday. Otology: The Brainwashed 7" Singles Collected comes free ONLY with the pre-order of all three new limited 7" singles from Brainwashed: BRAIN005 (Sybarite, "Dolorous Echo"/"The Mast"), BRAIN007 (Aranos, "No Religion"/"Spitting Revivalist Dreams of Everlasting Pain"), and BRAIN006 (Jessica Bailiff Live at VPRO Radio). Otology presents on CD for the very first time the music from BRAIN001 (Coil remixes by Thread), BRAIN002 ("Share the Day"/"Dream Stealer" by Edward Ka-Spel) and BRAIN003 ("Bloodstream"/"Airstream" by Greater Than One). Sound samples and the awesome cover artwork images (thanks to Ben Palmer once again and Brain contributor Jim Siegel) are available at Brainwashed Recordings. Copies can be reserved with payment at the commerce page at brainwashed.

m is the 13th letter
Brainwashed is proud to launch The Eye Volume 13: Dial M. The latest Eye DVD-R features segments from Mogwai, Mono, Mouse on Mars, and Papa M. It's now available in the Commerce Section of Brainwashed. Kindest gratitude to all the bands for making it happen.

new videos online
In preparation for the Brainwashed Birthday Bash in Boston, we have been hunting and gathering music videos from some of the bands hosted here on the site. This week, we've added the following promotional videos that you can see (by clicking on the title and it'll pop up just like The Eye does:

• !!! - Hello, Is This Thing On?
• Bowery Electric - Fear of Flying
• Bowery Electric - Freedom Fighter
• Cabaret Voltaire - Sensoria
• The Soft Pink Truth - Promofunk

If you're in the Boston area and want to see them on a big screen, come to the 9th Birthday of Brainwashed.com at River Gods in Cambridge, MA (125 River Street, Central Square) on Friday, April 15th (the official birthday and release of Otology is the 16th but if you bought the set, you can get it at the birthday party if you tell us you're coming). All night we'll be showing videos from the various artists and labels hosted on Brainwashed over the years. Videos on the big screen will include Wire, !!!, Coil, The New Year, Pan American, The Dead Texan, and many, many, many more surprises. The video show starts and 9pm and runs through closing time (1am) and there is no cover charge. Show up early as space is limited.

kranky presents videos online
While we're at the video thing, there's a new section at Kranky compiling various videos from the artists released over the years.

coil get carried away in the ambulance
And the Ambulance Died in His Arms, the latest relase from Coil has made its way into the shops this past week rather suddenly with little warning. The disc is a recording from their appearance at All Tomorrow's Parties and features five songs that have never been released in studio versions: "Triple Sun Introduction," "Snow Falls into Military Temples," "A Slip in the Marylebone Road," "Triple Sons and the One You Bury," and "The Dreamer is Still Asleep - The Somnambulist in an Ambulance." While stores like Rough Trade are carrying it already, the Threshold House should offer it soon.

brainwashed radio rides again
After weeks of installation and configuration, we're happy to say that Brainwashed Radio is back up and running and should remain connected now. Thanks to everybody who pitched in and bought something from us. It's that support that keeps little things like this going.

non
It is impossible to squeeze a lifetime of stories and visuals of Boyd Rice into a half hour, but we hope everybody can appreciate this. Boyd Rice was the first artist signed to Mute Records as Non. Over the last three decades he has made his mark on experimental music with releases as Non and involvements with bands like Coil, Current 93, and Death In June, just to name a few. He has often been boycotted and made a target of by the religious right wing for his involvement with Anton La Vey and the Church of Satan and the far left wing by articles on male empowerment and might. The truth about Boyd Rice, however, is that he's a very friendly and charismatic guy, loves girl groups and pop music, lounge and Tiki art and a tasty cocktail, the Beatles and Abba, and the hours of interviews and footage captured last weekend in Boston during his visit for the Symposium on Evil at MIT will probably be weeded through during the creation of a full-length documentary in the works by BoydRice.com author Brian M. Clark. Since his set at the symposium was so brief, footage for this installment of The Eye has been gathered from the video releases The Tyranny of the Beat and Live In Osaka to visually accent this segment. In addition to this feature on The Eye, we encourage people to listen to the Brainwashed Podcast from this past week, which features Boyd Rice as a guest host and DJ.

30 Minutes, Quicktime Streaming Video

TECH SPECS
Necessary:

• A current web browser
• A modern computer
• The latest quicktime plugin for streaming media (hint: use the latest Mozilla if other browsers aren't working)

Recommended:

• A fast connection
• A willingness to learn

Unnecessary:

• 'tude

If you see a blank window without anything streaming, don't complain to us. You don't have the latest version of Quicktime for streaming media. Go download it. It's free.

The Residents, "Animal Lover"
Mute
Famously cryptic and deliberately obscure, the San Francisco-based Residents have one-upped themselves with Animal Lover, a set of bizarre (even for them) tunes with rhythm tracks based upon animal mating calls. Using bugs, frogs and the occasional mammal for inspiration, it's not quite clear if the anonymous Residents are trying to make a Darwinian statement or if they just decided to (once again) do something no one else had thought of. Just in time for spring—the release was originally scheduled for February but was pushed back several times for unknown reasons—and the lovely mating calls and hordes of insects the season brings, the cacophonous collection calls upon the whole breadth of the Residents' musical abilities in order to replicate the sounds of nature. Jazz horns recreate the bleat of a bullfrog, classical strings and cellos emulate the buzz of cicadas or a swarm of flies, elements of their musical beginnings as and every "human"-made vocal is put through enough synthesizers and effects to make them sound like a bug or some other creature. To the extent that they are decipherable, the lyrics are also animal-inspired. The opener, "On The Way (to Oklahoma)" in part follows the travails of a fly as it flies about, stopping to "feast on a dog/ lying in the heat." Most of the other vocals are too distorted to hear clearly, and are sometimes so adulterated as to be unbearably grating, not actually sounding like a bug but a train derailment. There are some very enchanting melodies on the more instrumental tracks: "Ingrid's Oily Tongue" features a lonely opera soprano vocal dueting with a mellow horn and synth (made me think of a snake), and the busy backbeat of "Mr. Bee's Bumble" manages to overcome the nearly insufferable vocal interludes. Animal Lover's most enjoyable moment is "Inner Space," when the female vocalist's (the Residents have refused to reveal their identies throughout their forty-year career) hauntingly beautiful alto is allowed to be heard unruined by the effects, keeping time to a stark and mysterious background complete with tintinnabulating bells. Disturbing and lovely. As a novelty, Animal Lover is notable and unique: in my knowledge, nothing quite like it has ever been done before, at least not to this extent. As one of the Residents' many accomplishments, however, which include scoring Pee Wee's Playhouse, Dadaist interpretations of Elvis and the Beatles, and a memorable 40-song album that snuck its way onto the Billboard Top 40, it ranks way down the pecking order. Fans of the Residents may dismiss such criticism as uncomprehending, or Phillistinic, but it's spot-on: as music most of Animal Lover is neither pleasing nor impressive (aside from being very, very different), two key components of any enjoyable album with lasting appeal aside from mere novelty. - Chris Roberts

samples:

• On the Way
• Inner Space
• Mr. Bee's Bumble

SUNBURNED HAND OF THE MAN, "NO MAGIC MAN"
Bastet
I picked up this CD after the Sunburned Hand of the Man performance at the Notown Sound Festival in Atlanta this past weekend, directly from SBHOTM themselves, who seemed very proud of the album, claiming it was their best release yet. It's hard to disagree. Only a week after reviewing their quite good self-titled reissue on Wabana, I am forced to agree that this is the finest missive yet issued from the Boston collective. It's the group's first release on the Bastet label, the record-releasing arm of the trendy Arthur Magazine, a flimsy, ink-smudged free-press monthly from Los Angeles that seems to have become the taste-making publication du jour for the indie folk, psych and metal scenes. Bastet has already released a limited Sunn O))) live album and the scene-defining Golden Apples of the Sun compilation, and here comes a third great release that is sure to solidify its status as a label to keep an eye on. No Magic Man boasts the finest quality SBHOTM live recording yet, appearing to have been edited down from a series of recent performances, and carefully sequenced so that it has the feel of a coherent whole, a concept album of sorts. The loose concept is Egyptian high magical ritual, and the album is littered with transitional tracks that seem to have been taken from a 1970s TV documentary on the mysteries of Ancient Egypt, the narrator's voice pitched down and distorted at random intervals. This conceptual musique concrête technique creates a hauntingly cryptic and nostalgic mood to the proceedings, and the tracks where the ensemble works their improvisational magic are utterly hypnotizing. The group has matured considerably in the few years they've been playing together, and No Magic Man evidences this growth. Their improvisations spend less time meandering about as players find their footing, and more time locked into a solid groove. The keyboards and guitar are in especially fine form throughout the album, creating melodic loops of ascending and descending melodies that weave around each other in a strange and hypnotic dance. Vaguely Arabic sounding scales are created with guitar and synthesizer that form perfect scaffolding over which the other eight-or-so members hang their contributions. On "The Air Itself," Rob takes the microphone for one of his free-associated lysergic monologues that should be familiar to anyone who has seen the band live recently. His Bostonian accent, frequent tentative uhs and stoned, surrealistic automatism make the track at once hilarious and mind-expanding, which is largely the appeal of a Sunburned live experience. "Yer Own Eyes & The Number None" is the darkest and most menacing track, an Ash Ra Temple-esque jam that suddenly erupts into an intense whirlpool of chaotic noise, which is sucked out the other end of a Sun Ra album played backwards. Band members meet and communicate in trancelike rhythmic conversations that easily dissolve and journey into ever groovier, more righteously fucked-up territories. Hopefully, SBHOTM can keep measuring up to the new bar they've set with No Magic Man, as it is truly one of the most unstoppably groovy, shamanistic records yet to surface this year. - Jonathan Dean

samples:

• Every Direction
• No Magic Man
• Yer Own Eyes & The Number None

GUM, "Vinyl Anthology"
23Five
Gum was the late 1980s project of two locked groove-obsessed Australian youths. Seduced by the sounds of their warped and scratched records, Andrew Curtis and Philip Samartzis developed a conceptually challenging way to harness the hidden and embarrassing music of phonographic media gone wrong. They, along with people like Christian Marclay, Emil Beaulieau, and Boyd Rice, became the first to take a turntable's archaic playback mechanism to task as an instrument, capable not only of an easily-manipulated and virtually inexhaustible bank of noise, but also of almost automatic syntactic headfuckery. The plunderphonic, Negativlandian impulse had already begun to assert itself in 1987, but Gum's purely phonographic stance brought that same brand of pop culture commentary and exploited sound-bytes in immediate collision with things purely visceral. The duo scratched, sanded, baked, burnt, and otherwise mutated their thrift store finds, assembling a collection of locked grooves and blasted sound chips that essentially gave forgotten records new life, fodder for a kind of surreal puppet circus where strung-up corpses grind out stunted, nervous repetitions of a living dance. Gum's trajectory moves from something like a punkier incarnation of the plunderphonic phenomenon, to amateur industrial klang, to wildly successful sound collage efforts that in many ways predict the sounds of today's turntable namedrops: Philip Jeck, Martin Tretault, Janek Schaefer. Curtis and Samartzis put more emphasis on the process end, that is the abrasions and mutations of the records and their precise recombination, than on any kind of re-contextualization of recognizable sources. The few tracks to actually show their age are in fact the ones where the duo's intent appears too transparent, their motives too easy: phone-sex dialogue featuring Curtis set to an effected Super Fly soundtrack or a live set where the Bee Gee's Saturday Night Fever becomes the rhythmic template. Elsewhere, the simple and arresting power of the duo's surface scavenges, and their queasy track titles ("Testicle Stretch," "Smooth Torture in Exile," "Arm Fuck"), become more than adequate in communicating a hilarious, dystopian, and ultimately beautiful worldview. Especially on the longer tracks like "Banning" or "Melted Limp Fallout," Gum achieves mysterious and immersive sound environments that feel perfectly suited to the present day and help to explain Samartzis' future work as an accomplished sound artist. Vinyl Anthology collects everything Gum released plus several unreleased and live tracks; it is indispensable document for fans of turntable-based music, punkers, noisers, and pop theorists worldwide. - Andrew Culler

samples:

• Sporadic Acts of Violence
• Smooth Torture in Exile
• Cicada Material

A HAWK AND A HACKSAW, "DARKNESS AT NOON"
The Leaf Label
A Hawk and a Hacksaw is chiefly the work of Jeremy Barnes, previously of krautrock brain-sizzlers Bablicon, and more recently of Guignol, a bizarre one-off with members of Volcano the Bear. With A Hawk and a Hacksaw, Barnes takes many of the European folk music fixations first glimpsed on the Guignol album to their logical conclusion, creating a suite of ethnographical crossbreeds of indigenous music from France, Spain, Czech, Great Britain and Mexico. There are clear and obvious references to Klezmer, French street music and Flamenco idioms in the music, and less obvious hints of Mariachi, American and Brit trad-folk. Though the music here is still unmistakably the work of Jeremy Barnes, with odd passages of psychedelic whimsy, the strangeness comes mostly from unexpected cultural juxtapositions and stylistic cross-germinations, rather than from the extended, improvised freakouts of his previous projects. There is a new emphasis placed on composition, musicianship and melody on Darkness at Noon, bringing the project closer in style to groups such as The Magic Carphathians or The One Ensemble of Daniel Padden. Most tracks are based around Barnes' accordion playing, which is by turns fast and furious, or slow and droning. Filling out the sound are an array of instruments drawn from at least three continents: harp, oud, Turkish cumbus, jaw harp and an array of percussion. For the most part, the album is bright, energetic and upbeat, with all the instrumental elements in perfect synch with each other. "Laughter in the Dark" begins with a Morricone Mexico-by-way-of-Italia trumpet solo, soon joined by Barnes' squeezebox and percussion. The track slowly and decisively builds to a fantastically orgasmic center, with a resounding chorus of voices chanting words drawn from a George W. Bush speech. The distinctly Gallic sound of "The Moon Under Water" sounds like a lost cut from Yann Tiersen's soundtrack to Amelie, while "The Water Under the Moon" is a romantic waltz with strings and piano that skips over wet cobblestones on a dark European street. Perhaps its just that my brain seems to leap to film imagery, but there are many moments on Darkness at Noon when I was reminded of classic cinema like Reed's The Third Man (shades of Anton Karas' gypsy music score) and Fellini's carnivalesque La Strada. "For Slavoj" is a musical tribute to the great postmodern thinker Slavoj Zizek, playing on the Lacanian philosopher's ideas of nostalgia and kitsch with a recollective folk tune, replete with syrupy repeated chorus of "I love you," before dissolving into Steve Reich-style modern classical piano piece. This is just one of many examples of the breadth and scope of AHAAH's eclectic musical vision, which for all of its hard-won complexity, arrives to my ears as a deliciously gelled and eminently listenable whole. - Jonathan Dean

samples:

• Laughter in the Dark
• For Slavoj
• Portlandtown

Giuseppe Ielasi, "Gesine"
Häpna
Ielasi's last solo record Plans is an overplayed favorite of mine and one that marked quite a departure from the artist's past work as a featherweight improv stylist, a miner of hidden textures and master of the infinitesimal dynamic. Plans was a grandiose electroacoustic collage largely avoiding Ielasi's tradmark guitar which appeared only at the beginning and end of the piece, resolving the brief flights of lyricism able to tilt the disparate currents of the whole toward a slow expanse of weightless, melancholic bliss. Gesine marks the return of the guitar as dominant voice, this time a rarely-treated almost acoustic sound occupying a far more subdued setting. Backed only by finger-snap-size percussion, a few earth-toned hums and feedback drones, the instrument enters within the already charged atmosphere of the bedroom where the lowest relief or incidental amplifies to the potential hinge for a song's drama. Ielasi's guitar drops like ink in water suspension, coloring and adding sculpture to the backdrop's warm restlessness. His figures, though, are not fixed, meandering instead across a ghostly and ascetic blues, very much in the MazzaCane Connors or Charalambides realm and with a similar hidden complexity. Close listening provides that Ielasi has in many cases, quadruple-tracked his guitar, two of its clones doing a mirror-walk on the scratchy surface level blues patterns while two more layer harmonic overtones beneath. These under-layers take on a degree of sterility in their arrangement and inhuman constancy, pulling Gesine further from the golden antebellum views of Connors and the C-bides and closer to the disquieted atmospherics of Ielasi's fellow Italian and Viennese improvisers. By the fifth of the six tracks, background and foreground have coalesced into a dual-stranded dagger of whining feedback, a slow black-out of Gesine's intimate texture that leaves only the drowsy, given-up plucking of the sixth track to map out a final hesitancy. The 30 minute disc is simply one more beautifully packaged and recorded release from Ielasi, the above only one reading of music whose inflated miniatures and subtle guitar anti-heroics require many more. - Andrew Culler

samples:

• 1
• 4
• 5

BEEQUEEN, "MUSIC FOR THE HEAD BALLET"
Infraction
This is a reissue of an album that was originally released in a limited run on the now-defunct Isomorphic Records in 1996. For this edition, a previously unreleased 13-minute bonus track from the original sessions has been appended to the album. Music For the Head Ballet is possibly Beequeen's most ambient work to date: a series of quietly abstract, lengthy organ drones that amass slowly over time, gradually revealing their denseness and complexity. Each of the four tracks begins in total silence, which is actually unpotentiated sound just beyond the threshold of audibility. Slowly and gorgeously, the dense sound of vintage electric organs begin to coalesce in the far distance, looped steam calliope melodies smeared out across the sky like cumulonimbus cotton candy clouds. Soft and murmuring, Beequeen's drones are sweet and airy, filling the room with densely immersive but spiritually uplifting sound, a gossamer architecture of floating spiderwebs and translucent dirigables. It's a sound birthed in a daydream, buoyant melodies from a distant circus big top obfuscated by layers of fog and abstracted by years spent asleep and dreaming. Music For the Head Ballet has far more to say than an average album of minimalist, electronic ambience, which shouldn't be surprising to those who have listened to Beequeen's work through the years. Freek and Frans and singularly talented at the seemingly effortless creation of mood and atmosphere, impregnating their nebulous compositions with a cerebral quality that always welcomes repeated listens. In the midst of its disarming beauty, "Days That Never Were" contains uncanny elements of the ominous, haunted by the distant, fragmented memories of childhood. In contrast, "These Foolish Days" seems breezy and uncomplicated, though it travels through mysteriously gauzy chambers of tantalizingly fuzzy discombobulation. "White Feathers on a Dish, Used to Erect the Pyramids" sounds like an Angelo Badalamenti score skirting just outside the edge of melody and cohesion. The new addition of "Remind Me of You" takes an atonal, shapeless swell of organ drones and sets it against the summer buzz of sunlight and distant lawn sprinklers. Head Ballet is not for those looking for pleasures concrete and tuneful, but rather for those that wouldn't mind a total immersion in an esoteric audio environment full of half-remembered dreams that slip back into the cloudy murk before they can be fully grasped. - Jonathan Dean

samples:

• Days That Never Were
• These Foolish Days
• Remind Me of You

Matt Elliott, "Drinking Songs"
Ici d'Ailleurs
By all accounts I should be loving this album. Matt Elliott has taken music much farther than I could have ever imagined from listening to Third Eye Foundation back in the 1990s. He's a fantastically talented multi-instrumentalist, composer, producer, and arranger, and Drinking Songs once again progresses very slightly from its predecessor. The album opens with the soft pluckings of guitar and blossoms with airy vocals and delicate piano and other organic sounds put through his own brand of "creepatorium" filter. However, it seems as if he's spinning his wheels when it comes to the actual evolution of each song. Anywhere between 2.5 and 11 minutes pass for nearly every song on the album but I don't feel a sense of journey like I did with the songs on The Mess We Made. Although they're still emotional, tortured expressions—even a chorus of Elliott's voice on tracks like "The Kursk," where by the eighth minute, everything's looping backwards and forwards—the surrealistic editing jobs don't cover the fact that there isn't much going on in terms of musical progression within each song. By the end, Elliott almost gives a hint that these could be outtakes of The Mess We Made by including a 20+ minute reprise called "The Maid We Messed," something that could have simply been a bonus CD-R to accompany The Mess We Made. I look forward to new recordings from Matt and I still have the uttmost respect for his talents, but I can't say I connect with Drinking Songs the way I connected with the stunning The Mess We Made and the beat-filled 10" single Borderline Schizophrenic released almost concurrently. - Jon Whitney

samples:

• The Guilty Party
• The Kursk
• The Maid We Messed

"Everything Comes & Goes"
Temporary Residence
Thinking critically about tribute albums is always easier when the songs are not mere regurgitations of the originals. To laud one band's nearly-symmetric treatment of another band's song leaves a grotesque taste in your mouth and feels almost a betrayal in some way. The cover version could certainly sound better and be better recorded, but without the actual authorship of the song, there is an emptiness. Much better to take a song and create a variation on a theme, inspired by the original but not onerously dictated by it. And so in keeping with this notion, Temporary Residence presents their Black Sabbath tribute album called "Everything Comes & Goes," featuring self-proclaimed "interpretations" and "mutilations" of Sabbath's songs (with perhaps one or so being a little more straightforward than the rest). The bands assembled here stick exclusively to pre-1975 material so there is no confusion about whether this is Ozzy's Sabbath or Ronnie's or Tony's. This is strictly an Osbournian identity. Matmos inaugurate the sacred rites of tribute with a sparse electronic conception of "F/X." There is a great distance between the original song and Matmos' treatment but, again, this is the kernel of distinction between being a true tribute album and simply a facsimile album. Japan's Ruins throw their typical curveball in what is definitively not a cover version but rather a medley of Sabbath themes enjambed next to one another. The song is forgettable but the band's preemptory (and unnecessary) apology in the liner notes is humorous. The Grails have a post-rock imagining of "Black Sabbath" which is adapted well by the inclusion of the band's violin. Another post-rock instrumental is supplied by Paul Newman who metallurgically add a measure of angularity to "Faeries Wear Boots." Four Tet offer a saccharine version of "Iron Man" as only they can. Again, there is not a lot of profundity here, but a pleasant listen nonetheless. Curtis Harvey (late of Rex) Trio add an almost straightforward cover of "Changes" but they countrify and folk it up just enough to make it one of the better interpretations on the collection. Ned Oldham's Anomoanon supply the most ghostly and eerie "mutilation" with their take on "Planet Caravan." The song is haunting, meditative, and deliberate, perhaps the most evocative on the album. In the final two slots, Racebannon satanically blasts out "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath" while Greenness w/ Philly G pieces together the most Sabbath-sounding offering yet in their cover of "Sweet Leaf," all the while being quite careful not to sound anything like Mogwai's cover of the song. While the individual bands here have certainly paid just tribute to Black Sabbath, I don't think that they have necessarily done them justice. Everything Comes & Goes is more amusing than invigorating, but such amusement should not be disregarded because it creates a cute album of variations. The bands were prudent in clinging to the early Sabbath material since soon afterward (post-1980) Sabbath itself became more amusing than invigorating. - Joshua David Mann

samples:

• Four Tet - Iron Man
• The Anomoanon - Planet Caravan
• Racebannon - Sabbath Bloody Sabbath

We know that our music picks may be somewhat challenging to find, which is why we have a community section which can be used to obtain nearly everything available on this site.

WEEK OF APRIL 10 - APRIL 16
ADULT. - D.U.M.E. 12"/CDEP (Thrill Jockey, US)
Aranos No Religion/Spitting Revivalist Dreams of Everlasting Poison 7" [ltd edition of 500 copies] (Brainwashed, US)
Jessica Bailiff - Live on VPRO Radio Amsterdam 7" [ltd edition of 500 copies] (Brainwashed, US)
Bloc Party - Silent Alarm 2xLP (Dim Mak/Vice/Atlantic, US)
F.S. Blumm - Zweite Meer CD/LP (Morr Music, Germany)
The Body Lovers/The Body Haters - The Body Lovers/The Body Haters 2xCD [reissue of these two Michael Gira projects as a double CD package] (Young God, US)
Boom Bip - Dos & Don'ts 12"/CDEP (Lex/Warp, UK)
Chok Rock - Big City Loser 12"/CDEP (Warp, UK)
* Efterklang - Springer 12"/CDEP [reissue] (Leaf, UK)
Hafler Trio - Being A Firefighter Isn't Just About Squirting Water CDEP (Important, US)
* Richard Jobson - 10.30 On a Summer Night/An Afternoon in Company CD [remastered reissue of two albums on one CD] (LTM, UK)
Quasimodo Jones - Robots & Rebels CD/2xLP (Shitkatapult, Germany)
LCEDP - De L'Utilite Des Convoyeurs CD (.Angle.Rec., Canada)
* Martha & The Muffins - This Is The Ice Age CD [reissue with bonus tracks] (Virgin, UK)
Mindless Self Indulgence - You'll Rebel to Anything CD/LP (Metropolis, US)
* Northern Picture Library - Alaska + Love Song for the Dead Che CD [remastered reissue] (LTM, UK)
Of Montreal - The Sunlandic Twins CD/LP (Polyvinyl, US)
Pharaoh Overlord - #3 CD (Riot Season, UK)
Petra Jean Phillipson - Extended Play 12"/CDEP (Gronland, Germany)
Port-Royal - Flares CD (Resonant, UK)
* Blaine L. Reininger - Book Of Hours CD [remastered reissue with bonus tracks] (LTM, UK)
Rusuden - Formulae Remixes CD [mixes by The Gasman, Ochre, Enduser, Wisp, Line47, Multiplex and more] (Terminal Dusk, US)
Silicone Soul - Staring Into Space LP (Soma, Scotland)
Sybarite - Dolorous Echo/The Mast 7" [ltd edition of 500 copies] (Brainwashed, US)
Various - Otology CDR [anthology of six Brainwashed 7" singles released up until this point] (Brainwashed, US)
VNV Nation - Matter + Form CD (Metropolis, US)
:wumpscut: - Evoke CD (Metropolis, US)
Yuko Nexus6 - Nexus6 Song Book CD (Sonore, Japan/France)

This is simply this week's highlights from the NEW RELEASES provided by Greg and Feedback Monitor. For a more detailed schedule stretching into the future, please check out the page, since release dates can and will often change.

Results from last poll:

the countown is on...
Not only is Friday May 6th the premiere of Salt Marie Celeste: The Musical, it is also No Pants Day. Show up to the NWW show in Vienna with no pants on and win a prize. Serious!
www.nopantsday.com

wire on the eye

Subject: The Wire

Have you noticed the new section on The Wire's web site - they've got a Githead interview cut with performance just like The Eye. I know you didn't invent streaming technology but they're clearly imitating The Eye.

Well, they say imitation is the most sincere form of flattery. We're flattered The Wire look to Brainwashed for direction as much as they do, despite being a few years behind. At the rate they're going, it will probably take them 200 years to collect anywhere close to the 100+ video features we've done here. It's refreshing to know that after three years of recommending/requesting a feature on Irr.App.(Ext.), they finally have done it. Perhaps they just never had room with all the old geezers they tend to adore.

In all seriousness, however, the fact is the technology is here and it only helps the greater picture if more people take advantage of it. The Wire and Brainwashed have similar goals: to get people to listen and to share the music knowledge. Brainwashed would seriously like to see many more websites with entertaining features on the artists -not- in the mainstream. Maybe one day The Wire might delve into a 24/7 streaming web radio, podcasting, or DVD compilations. We can only hope.

Subject: Brainwashed Podcast

I don't know who this Boyd Rice character is but he's got great taste in music.

Scroll up and you might begin to understand out who he is!

Subject: eye hate paypal

hello. i find the fact that you're selling aranos' CDs now great. i wanted to buy your "the eye" DVDs and would certainly buy records, but i have a problem: you operate through paypal, which is obviously a fascist company supporting only very few rich countries and not caring at all about the rest 90% of the world, even when it comes to credit card payment through them WITHOUT being "registered" (i live in croatia). sending money through mail, on the other hand is just too risky and extra cost with international money orders is just too big. of course, it would be ideal if you were able to support credit card payments, or if that's not possible for you, maybe there could be a way for you to arrange something to be available through distributors such as revolver/midheaven or forced exposure. is there any chance of seeing any of those two solutions? i believe i'm not the only one with this problem. thanks.

First of all, PayPal is far less fascist evil empire than credit card companies. Secondly, we don't do nearly the business at Brainwashed to justify the costs. Lastly, if it's absolutely necessary, you can always send cash. We recommend going to a used CD store, buying something dreadful, and stuffing cash inside the CD-tray and adding a slip of white paper over it so it doesn't look like there's anything in there, wrapping up the CD as a gift and leaving a note "Happy Birthday" or "Congratulations on your Divorce" or something as festive. Include photos and a postcard too. They go on the wall. Other people are finding BidPay and Western Union payments working though. Or you can get on email lists and strike up friends who can exchange your currency. It's all about community building, my friend!

Subject: NWW

Hey...Just curious about the reissues that are supposedly coming soon. Is there some kind of expected date for them to come out or must I continue to wait, carefully chewing my dirty fingernails in anticipation?

Love you guys in all your caustic beauty!!

Your guess is as good as ours. We find we're increasingly out of the loop on these sorts of things as of late. Maybe our importance is waning.

Subject: TG samples

I'd like to hear the MP3 for persuasion & hot on the heels, but all I get is silence ... why ?

No need to get back at me (ha ha !!) just, if you can get that out there.

Also, united got cut off & starts in the middle of the song.

Sorry, we'll try and fix the broken ones, but as for starting and ending in the middle, well, we're not authorized to give out full songs from everybody, sorry again.

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become a contributor
We're always looking for more writers and are welcoming applicants who meet the criteria. Have a look at our new section, Write for The Brain and don't be shy.

sign up for the announcement list
Do you want to be the first on your block to hear about special limited pressings and happenings of Brainwashed? An announcement list has been set up at www.hollyfeld.org/mailman/listinfo/brainwashed. It's not a forum and subscribers will be the first to hear about new releases on Brainwashed Recordings, a new Brainwashed Handmade imprint, the hopefully soon to launch Brainwashed Archives label, and any music fest(s) to coincide with Brainwashed's 10th Anniversary (which is only a year away). Thanks again for the support, it keeps us going.

join the audioscrobbling community
Share your playlists with other readers/fans at the Brainwashed Group at Audoscrobbler.

let us know what you think
Communicate with us, tell us what's in your player, tell us what you want more/less of, send recipes.

Towering Inferno
Throbbing Gristle - Live at Camber Sands 2004
Henry Flynt - Purified by the Fire
1349 Rykkin - Brown Ring of Fury
Legendary Pink Dots - The Tower
Berkowitz Lake & Dahmer - Drain Salmon Forgery
Boris With Merzbow - Megatone
Nurse With Wound - Spiral Insana
Double - Palm Fronds
Wolf Eyes - Dead Hills
Non - God & Beast

Kev Pinski from San Diego.