Albums and Singles

06 October 2010

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Albums and Singles

The Caretaker is here to take listeners on a trip deep into the foggy subconscious mind where perception, memory, and dream all collapse into a syrupy void. If this six disc set isn't enough murky drone for a lifetime, I don't know what is.

V/vm Test Records

In a long history of projects that I admire on a conceptual level more than I enjoy on a practical one, this limited edition six disc set has to be right up there. The Caretaker's entire raison d'être is to explore the vibe of a scene from Kubrick's The Shining through sound. Sure, there's a bit more to it as the well-written liner notes instruct, but the basic premise is really that simple. There's that scene in The Shining where the ghostly ballroom emerges and the caretaker seems dislocated in time, unable to distinguish the present from the past, the real from the imagined, or the dream state from the waking, and that's the backdrop for six full length cds of minimal drones. I should start by saying that the music is almost all beautiful, albeit in a creepy way. It appears to be composed of bits of sampled music that have been slowed down, stretched, and reverberated into near oblivion the way that a fistfull of sand is dispersed when you throw it against concrete.

To describe the music is to do the whole project a disservice. In fact, if this were the kind of release that was meant to be described by one person to another, there wouldn't be six discs of basically the same thing. At first, I was mesmerized by the basic sound design and the concept. I don't know that I was really letting go of myself in the kind of way that would be required for this set to work its full magic, but I was playing along. I popped in the second disc and was greeted with more of the same kind of grainy, slow, drifts of sound that populated the first disc. Ocassionally, there are tiny fragments of recognizable music the float into the mix like David Lynch's Lady in the Radiator playing DJ to a Christmas party. Still, trainspotting samples in a set like this is also beside the point.

By the time I was on the third disc, I started to realize that the whole enterprise was either a cruel joke (and V/Vm are known perhaps as much for their pranks and offbeat sense of humor as for their music) or the logical result of carrying out the experiment to lose touch with time and place quite seriously. Because by the third disc, I wasn't sure if I'd already heard these bits before on the first one. By the fourth disc, I was just skipping randomly through tracks and then listening back to the whole thing wondering what would happen if I had six cd players all plugged in to a 12 speaker surround sound setup. I found it almost impossible to concentrate on the music itself or on the mood it was evoking, as I was far too concerned with how the discs might be used in other ways; sped up to sound 'normal' or played backwards or all at once or sampled to make hip hop tracks--my mind was boggling.

At that point, I realized that the experience of Theoretically Pure Anterograde Amnesia is going to be both resolutely individual depending on the listener, and that the whole thing takes a certain kind of release of the will in order to work. I've never been good at sitting in one of those chairs where you strap on some LED flashing goggles while a guy plays you alpha wave inducing drones. I just can't let my conscious self go enough for that not to seem completely corny. In the same way, it feels like a six hour marathon of these discs without interruption would be the only way to truly grok what it is they are about. I must say that I'm absolutely curious what The Caretaker will be doing live to bring this experience to an audience. I'm glad to have this strange and beautiful but ultimately overwhelming artifact of their work if for no other reason than it's a terrific example of a simple idea manifest in a deeply challenging way.

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06 October 2010

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Albums and Singles

Merzbow & Z'EV - 'Spiral Right / Spiral Left'

Artist: Merzbow & Z'EV
Title: Spiral Right / Spiral Left
Catalogue No: CSR133CD
Barcode: 8 2356649922 0
Format: Digisleeve
Genre: Dark Ambient Noise
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In the planning (and many faxes, emails and discussions in person) for 20 years, finally this stunning collaborative release for Cold Spring from Japanese Noise king Merzbow and legendary elemental sound artist Z'EV is here. The tracks were created in London and Tokyo, with each artist remixing the other's original sounds. Two tracks weighing in at 22 minutes apiece! Dark Ambient Noise in a special card digisleeve.

Tracks: 1. Spiral Right | 2. Spiral Left

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06 October 2010

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Albums and Singles

Steven Severin - 'Blood Of A Poet'

Artist: Steven Severin
Title: Blood Of A Poet
Catalogue No: CSR135CD
Barcode: 8 2356650482 5
Format: CD in hardback digisleeve with inner sleeve
Genre: Dark Ambient / Soundtrack
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Acclaimed solo artist and founding member of the legendary Siouxsie and the Banshees, Steven Severin’s debut album for Cold Spring Records is titled "Blood Of A Poet (Le Sang d’un Poete). This album is his entire soundtrack to Jean Cocteau’s 1930 black & white surrealist classic and is the second in his ongoing series of "Music For Silents".

During their reign, Siouxsie & the Banshees established themselves as one of the foremost alternative artists and the only survivors of the London punk scene to evolve, innovate and succeed until their final demise in 2002. Severin has since committed himself almost exclusively to scoring for film & TV.

Since May 2008 Severin has been performing live accompaniment to silent films, startling audiences across the globe who have now come to expect the unexpected from the man who has crossed paths with such diverse luminaries as John Cale, Alan Moore, Jarboe, Lydia Lunch, Marc Almond, Merc Cunningham, Robert Smith and the Tiger Lillies. "Blood Of A Poet" received it’s premiere at the Silent Movie Theater in Hollywood in January this year and this October sees Severin embark on his first ever solo tour of the UK hosted by the Picturehouse chain of cinemas. View full tour details here.

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06 October 2010

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Albums and Singles

Band Of Pain - 'Sacred Flesh'

Artist: Band Of Pain
Title: Sacred Flesh O.S.T.
Catalogue No: CSR33CD
Barcode: 0 1753326192 1
Format: CD in jewelcase
Genre: Dark Ambient / Black Ambient / Soundtrack
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10 Year Anniversary reissue. Ltd x 666 copies only!

The soundtrack was written by Band Of Pain (aka Steve Pittis, ex-Splintered), creating a very dark, brooding atmosphere to compliment Nigel Wingroves' film. Sacred Flesh is dark journey into realms of mental anguish and repression; a very Black Ambient soundtrack. This is Band Of Pain working in the medium to which it is most suited. A incredible album with massive demand from both film and music distributors alike.

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06 October 2010

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Albums and Singles

Goatvargr - 'Black Snow Epoch'

Artist: Goatvargr
Title: Black Snow Epoch
Catalogue No: CSR126CD
Barcode: 8 2356649882 7
Format: CD in jewelcase with poster cover
Genre: Black Industrial / Power Noise
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The second unholy union of Lord Nordvargr (MZ.412, Folkstorm, Toroidh etc) and Goat (USA). Time, pilgrimages and bloodlines have been bourn since the first testament of Goatvargr was witnessed in this era of false knowledge. The first covenant of Goatvargr was baleful, lycanthropic and lethiferous. A rejection of the techgnostic kingdom and circuitry idols which seduce our era. The downfall of light has brought a world of coldness. This Black Snow Epoch is a time to honour our forbearers such as MZ.412 and the elements of flesh, wood and alchemical steel. Industrial loops and analogue keyboards merge with sheet metal and chains to create a solemn winter hymn where the cold steel stings your flesh. The wolf instinctively hunts through the frost, and the goat is blamed for human transgressions, yet during the Black Snow Epoch, the true hunters will pursue.

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06 October 2010

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Albums and Singles

Fire In The Head - 'Confessions Of A Narcissist'

Artist: Fire In The Head
Title: Confessions Of A Narcissist
Catalogue No: CSR120CD
Barcode: 8 2356649912 1
Format: CD in jewelcase
Genre: Power Electronics
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"Confessions Of A Narcissist" marks the final full-length release by Fire In The Head ending six years of sonic warfare with an assault of manic, self-indulgent industrial electronics. Drawing as much influence from early punk / hardcore as from industrial / power electronics, F/I/T/H was conceived as a cathartic outlet to explore and ratify the delusions and social perversions resultant of psychosis and the darker side of man's conflicted dual nature, to fan the flames which engulf the borders between obsession, compulsion, lust and need. The tracks on this release were recorded in 2007-2008 and are the last of the "short, sharp, shock" vocal tracks which Michael abandoned in favour of "epic" length industrial / ambient compositions. Features guest appearances from Nick Blinko (Rudimentary Peni) and J. Randall (Agoraphobic Nosebleed), with exclusive artwork from Blinko. Stickered for stores.

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04 October 2010

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Albums and Singles

Vague Terrain

In addition to being the first non-Matmos release to surface on Martin Schmidt and Drew Daniel's Vague Terrain label, Unseen Forcesis also the debut release for the San Francisco audiovisual supergroupSagan. While an increasing number of electronic and experimentalartists are defining themselves as "audiovisual," Sagan is one of thefew I've encountered that have released the visual component of theirwork simultaneously to the audio component, thereby assuring that anaudience, beyond those who see a live performance, will be able toexperience their work in a proper context. The group is comprised ofelectronic heavyweights J. Lesser, Blevin Blectum, Jon Leidecker (AKAWobbly) and video artist Ryan Junell. It's an ambitious project thatpays homage to the late Carl Sagan, popular scientist, astronomer, andthe turtlenecked host of the seminal PBS series Cosmos. In wayof tribute to this looming hero of nerds, Sagan the group offers anhour-long excursion into the far-flung realms of the universe,eschewing the kind of glitched-up laptop pranks we might have expectedfrom these three, in favor of an unexpectedly cosmic amalgam ofanalogue synthesizers, field recordings and sample-driven electronica.The three musicians throw everything including the kitchen sink intothese twelve tracks, but somehow distill and process their many inputsinto a cohesive work that cannot be easily compared to anything thathas come before. The press notes try to make the case for a comparisonto 70s kosmische rockers Hawkwind and Vangelis, and while thoseinfluences are certainly present, it's a misleading way to characterizethe sounds on Unseen Forces. In the span of seven minutes,Sagan travel from windswept ambient spacescapes to crunchy rhythms andsquelching computer glitches; from a Gyorgi Ligeti choir of ghostlyvoices to sudden blasts of heavy metal guitar; from shuddering,synth-heavy science-class filmstrips to a jungle full of screechingmonkeys and cawing birds; from Middle Eastern breaks todigitally-obliterated gabbercore trance and subtle atmospheric passagesof tinkling piano. It may sound like a recipe for short-attention-spandilettantism or plunderphonia, but it's actually remarkably focused,and remains very much on the theme of science and that essential aweand wonder inherent in the infinite possibilities of the universe. Asentertaining as the music can be at times, it works even better incontext with the 40-minute video included on the DVD. In a series ofsilly-to-brilliant Viewmaster slide sketches, video artist Ryan Junellilluminates important scientific disoveries. In one of the openingsketches, a vivid illustration of the Big Bang is performed in front ofaudience by a group of flashlight-wielding astronomy enthusiasts in adark room. In the next sketch, M.C. Schmidt and Drew Daniel of Matmosreenact Pausianus' discovery of air as a substance, doubling as a gaypick-up scene in an ice cream parlor. I learned about the contentiouspartnership of early astronomers Tyco Brahe and Johannes Kepler in avery funny sketch involving quiche and a gold-plated nose. In anothermemorable sketch, Lesser and Blectum portray Pierre and Marie Curie,discovering radiation as well as their love for each other. The DVDalso includes six hours of MP3 audio, documenting Sagan's liveperformances. I'm very impressed by the amount of work put into thispackage, and the artists' genuine love and reverence for Carl Sagan andhis beloved scientific method is definitely contagious. It very nearlyqualifies as educational material, on a par with Charles and Ray Eames'The Powers of Ten, or anything that is genuinely able to make learning fun.

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04 October 2010

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Albums and Singles

Merge

American Music Club triumphantly return after ten years of absence. Foranybody not in-the-know, AMC is much more than Mark Eitzel's piercinglyrics and bleeding vocals: it's Vudi's chaotic guitar, Danny Pearson'sthree-string bass and simultaneous percussive playing acrobatics, TimMooney's shuffling rhtyhms, and Bruce Kaphan's pedal steel and piano(replaced this time around with lap steel by Vudi and piano by newmember Marc Capelle). While Eitzel has recorded and performed solo forthe last ten years, the perfectly paired sounds of the group with hisvoice—the disorder, discomfort, and awe-inspiring beauty—has been sadlymissed. These are sounds of a group which has been such a largeinfluence to so criminally few people. With 1991's Everclear,AMC perhaps recorded their first perfect album, flawless and intense,(conincidentally released at the time I discovered hard liquor!). Theyupped the stakes with 1993's Mercury, a bold album of theirbrand of slow yet raw tunes where the group experimented with new waysof composing and recording, all of which fit into a perfect mix. Ofcourse, for their Warner Bros. bosses, it wasn't enough, and I'm surethe pressure was on for them to have a "hit single." 1994's San Franciscowas probably their most sonically digestible album, primed for popradio, but it didn't feel like everybody was quite on board. Inretrospect, it's no surprise Eitzel was probably frustrated, called ita day, fired everybody, and went solo. Love Songs for Patriotsopens with Eitzel's voice front stage center, with the familiar soundof AMC's past blasting through like an unstoppable train that'sexploded in a tunnel as the smoke and fire move through, ready to comeout the other end, faster and hotter. The gentle songs like "AnotherMorning," "Love Is," and especially "Myopic Books" are excellentbreathers: sweet, gentle, sandwiched in between the rough and loudsongs, and echo fan favorites like "Last Harbor" and "Jenny."Content-wise, Eitzel's lyrics are as brilliant as they have ever been,with new stories about love and god, almost entirely void of rhymescheme, and requiring intense group therapy for any listener who'sactually paying attention. It's for his lyrics alone that make AMC andEitzel a terrible band to listen to in the car, as a driver needs to bepaying attention to the road, not the male stripper with underwear fullof George Washingtons, the star of the brilliant tune "Patriot'sHeart," or Mark's mom who likes Manhattans, which he says "taste likemouthwash." (Even Kathleen makes her way onto this record!) Like Coilonce were encouraging "deep listening" to delicately layeredinstrumental music, American Music Club is "deep listening" for lyricalcontent, super soaked in emotion with obscure references to reitred popicons, the bible, and idealized Americana. Eitzel is equal parts dramaand comedy and only with AMC do I feel he's truly meeting his match atthe same time, all the time. I look forward to their upcoming tour andhope this isn't just a one-off reunion, as AMC is one of the mostinfluential bands to my own musical taste evolution and maturation.

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04 October 2010

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Albums and Singles

Though it was never recognized as such in its own time, the Virgin Prunes' 1982 debut ...If I Die, I Die truly represented a creative apex of gothic rock. Retrospectively, it's difficult to think of another album that more effectively channeled the decadent perversity, outlandish freakiness and theatrical melodrama that characterized the movement, while avoiding the pitfalls of overwrought self-parody and puerility.

Mute

Even other more widely acknowledged classics of gothic post-punk, such as Bauhaus' In the Flat Field, can't match the intensity and single-mindedness of ...If I Die, I Die. The album was produced by Colin Newman of Wire, who seems to have allowed the Prunes' own flamboyant aesthetic to shine through strongly, even while skillfully streamlining their sound and reigning in some of the band's more experimental tendencies. But Newman knew a good thing when he heard it, highlighting the fascinating interplay of the band's three vocalists—Gavin, Guggi and Dave-id—whose menacing voices intertwine and overlap to frequently hair-raising effect. Virgin Prunes' penchant for tribal jackhammer percussion, gloomy bass melodies and spidery guitar figures are in full evidence on the album, and are given a substantial boost by the fine remastering job on this Mute reissue. The packaging has also been given a makeover, with new cover art showing the band in their full costumed glory, and a lyric booklet with further photographic evidence of the Prunes' peculiar style, a combination of glam cover-models and pagan wood-nymphs. The album is loaded with terrifically intense performances to match the band's baroque aesthetic, most notably in the snarling triple-vocal assaults of classics like "Sweethome Under White Clouds" and "Baby Turns Blue." Newman's unorthodox production is positively teeming with atmospheric touches on tracks like "Bau-Dachong," named in the Prunes' invented language of Bo-Prune. Jagged guitar chords and violent drumming propels songs like "Walls of Jericho" into a bleak, claustrophobic atmosphere, even as the singalong chorus pushes the song into poppy territory. Most tracks walk a fine line between dissonance and focus, but occasionally, as on "Caucasian Walk," the band digresses into unhinged chaos. "Ballad of the Man" seemed like the most embarassingly dated of the album's songs, until I realized that it was actually a brutal style-parody of Bruce Springsteen, inverting the Boss' working-class hero mythology to spin a satirical tale about a bank robber. The Prunes' save the weirdest material for the end of the album, with the bizarre "Chance of a Lifetime" and "Yeo," both utilizing reverb and phasing to eerie psychedelic effect, and the latter an inexplicable sequence of vocal intonations and piano melodies being played in a rainstorm. ...If I Die, I Die might not be the most adventurous album of the Virgin Prunes' career, but its certainly the most focused, and a remarkably fierce statement of artistic integrity.

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04 October 2010

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Albums and Singles

Kranky

There's something new churning inside the supernatural bones of thesesongs. The world of instrumental evolution and ultra-processed sound isripe with abrasiveness and cosmic dust. While most of what KeithFullerton Whitman releases under his own name is numinous and hazy,there's an extra dose of the dark and unfathomable on Schöner Flußengel. Bits and pieces of Antithesisremain on this record; the album moves via the progression of obviousinstrumentation and recognizable musical elements. The record floats,however, in a way that its predecessor did not. Whitman's melodicmovements are seemingly circular and they build a labyrinthinestructure that lacks no amount of intimidation. "Lixus (VersionAnalogique)" opens the album with the ghastly moan of cymbalsscratching against each other, but the cymbals give way suddenly to aguitar melody that will be repeated later in the album. Lightpercussion highlights this oddly looped melody until strange soundsbegin to shine over it and place it within the context of something fargreater than itself. The guitar falls away into an abyss of heavy andsubtle percussive elements and whale-like echoes. Immediately followingthis thematic opening is a giant hole in the space-time continuum. It'sas though a massive star collapsed in on itself right in the middle ofthis record and left a record of its nature. The massive and meandering"Bewusstseinserweiternd Tonaufnahme (Einer & Zweiter Teile)" is aconfounding piece of recording. Like a mammoth and unmovable monumentdedicated to the ruinous gods of the ancient world, it towers over therest of Schöner Flußengel and establishes the tone that comesto dominate the record. At various points in this song I'm quite surethat it is the moan of devilish monks I'm hearing reverberate throughthe morbidly decorated architecture of an unholy church. The dark,all-consuming sound continues up and until "Lixus (Version Numerique)"and the closing "Weiter." The guitar theme from the opening trackreturns and is now complimented by a host of obscene sounds and starryshrieks. Distortion stumbles back and forth, bleating and honking inshort bursts and adding a fullness that was missing from "Lixus(Version Analogique)." Instead of fading into nothingness, however, thewave of guitar and alien gasps resolves itself into a stunning displayor synthetic orchestras and rhythmic, digital crashes. A piano ormodified organ sound (sometimes even sounding like a strange guitar)rotates through a series of patterns, both percussive and melodic innature, which creates a beautiful stream of artificial chamber music.Slowly the baroque style of the piece transforms into a seemingly liveperformance inside an imagined temple with its roof open to theterrifying vacancy above. The bizarre and grotesquely hypnoticqualities it harbors provide a mysterious aura around it that makesrepeated listens necessary and the record more enjoyable each timethrough. -

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04 October 2010

Michael Patrick Brady

Albums and Singles

For this band to adopt the name Landing seems like a dash of irony.There is nothing grounded about this band, nothing the least bitindicative that they are or are about to touch the Earth and accept therules and mechanics that govern it. Their sound is one of the sublime,the surreal, more akin to the forces that invisibly hold things aloftand floating than the submission to gravity. "Fluency of Colors"initiates the album's upward motion, each note slipping over anotherand flickering darkly like a dying bulb burning after images intomemory. The music envelops, and what at first seems so delicate andvaporous begins to obscure everything else. Sphereis an album of meditation, of contemplative thought, using thehypnotic, patient bloom of the band's music to instigate a sense ofcalm and focus. Along the course of the album, there are threeinstrumental interludes, each titled "Gravitational." These interludesare the moment of greatest upheaval and dissonance on the album, pointswhere the urge to escape the pull results in stress and tension. Thethree pieces gradually build from the chilly wind-scape of the first tothe creaking buzz of the third. These pieces serve as weights orcounterpoints to the soaring jags the compromise the proper songs."Solstice" shimmers brightly while a stinging updraft of guitar searsthrough the temperate atmosphere. The intensity of the guitar's ascentis almost jarring in contrast to the lightness of the back drop,however the contrast heightens the perception of each elementindividually until ultimately they coalesce together perfectly. Thevery titles of the songs hint at a connection with perception,connection with the sights, sounds, and smells of the world around you.This thread of connection stretches itself between each song and bindstogether the album's experience, linking it to a greater application ofsense and feeling. Sphere would make an excellent album for sinking into thought, escaping the white noise of the mind.

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