Eve McGivern

I love the smell of vinyl.

 

(Any weirdness at the site front-end, blame her.)

 

 

 

 

 

3708 Hits

Jon Whitney

Jon began his music career at the age of 14 as a disc jockey for WMUA at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst and currently spins at WZBC at Boston College in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts.  At 18 he moved to New York and interned at three major record companies.  He moved back to Boston at 19 and began working part time with one more until graduating from Northeastern University with a bachelors degree (double concentration of music and business).  Jon also currently DJs/VJs a music video night, The Sound Your Eyes Can Follow regularly in the Boston area and irregularly elsewhere.

Jon began Brainwashed.com in April of 1996 to host websites for some bands that needed some representaion on the web.  In 1998, he began the weekly magazine The Brain as a weekly digest for the staff and contributors of Brainwashed to keep tabs on each other featuring the news of the bands and labels whose Web sites are hosted at Brainwashed, to post brief reviews of music that we're listening to, release dates, and in 2003 began producing video segments for the Web site featuring exclusive interviews and live footage of some of today's most innovative independent artists.  The Brain was retired in 2005 to make way for the new Brainwashed.com which is nearly the same thing: a weekly dose of independent music and information. 

Jon's personal website is turbid.com.

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193186 Hits

Anthony D'Amico

Anthony D'Amico lives a quiet life in New York's Hudson Valley.  He lives vicariously through books, music, and film.  He used to subsist primarily on Indian and Thai food, but he has recently decided that ice cream is also enjoyable.  He enjoys making photo and video collages.  He has been writing for Brainwashed since 2008, but was a reader of the site long before that, as he has been a huge Nurse With Wound and Current 93 fan since his teens.    

He has recently changed his "dear god, please do not send me any more fucking promos" stance to "feel free to send or recommend any albums that he might like."  He loves that there is a thriving and supportive community of underground music fans, artists, and labels all over the world and decided it would be a good idea to be more accessible and open to unsolicited emails, even if it comes at great cost to his fragile sanity.  There are some caveats, however:

1.) He gets A LOT of email and is terrible at responding to people.  I do not believe that he is particularly unique in this regard.  Nevertheless, you may rest assured that he feels low-level guilt at all times.  He DOES read it all though and will listen to anything that seems particularly interesting or original.

2.) There is always a mountain of stuff that he personally wants to cover.  In a perfect world, he would exclusively cover albums that he believes are amazing (regardless of when they were released or what label they are on).  However, he also tries to cover as many "major" albums as he can within the Brainwashed milieu.  It's a delicate balance and a lot of great albums fall through the cracks.  Heartbreaking, yet unavoidable.

3.) He tries to be as open minded as possible, but he unavoidably has some deeply held subjective preferences.  It is generally ill-advised to send him anything bombastic, intensely angry, toothlessly New Age-y, or jammy and meandering.  He also can't stand improvised/abstract music that could be reasonably described as "a bunch of honking and clattering," unless someone is extremely good at it. 

4.) Conversely, he generally loves the weirder fringes of psychedelia (Natural Snow Buildings, Ak'chamel, My Cat is an Alien) and the more melodic side of tape music (Tape Loop Orchestra, William Basinski).  He also has favorable feelings about mangled guitars, drone, dub, and classic Jamaican, Thai, and African music.

He can be reached here:

email: misplaced_sandwich at hotmail.com

Cultural Delights That Greatly Brightened An Otherwise Dreary 2021

  • Kier-La Janisse's Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched
  • Aaron Dilloway/Lucrecia Dalt, "Lucy & Aaron" (Hanson)
  • Fluxion, "Parallel Moves" (Vibrant)
  • Ryusuke Hamaguchi's Drive My Car
  • Chris Corsano & Bill Orcutt, "Made Out of Sound" (Palilalia)
  • Chuck Johnson, "The Cinder Grove" (VDSQ)
  • claire rousay, "a softer focus" (American Dreams)
  • Dean McPhee, "Witch's Ladder" (Hood Faire)
  • Lawrence English, "Observation Of Breath" (Hallow Ground)
  • Bendik Giske, "Cracks" (Smalltown Supersound) and his cover of Caterina Barbieri's "Fantas"
  • Die Welttraumforscher, "A Young Person's Guide To The Early Welttraumforscher" (A Colourful Storm) & "Die Rückkehr der echten Menschheit (1981 - 1990)" (Bureau B)
  • James Ginzburg, "crystallise, a frozen eye" (Subtext)
  • Myriam Gendron, "Ma Délire - Songs of Love Lost & Found" (Feeding Tube)
  • Jeff Burch, "Samum Suite" (Important)
  • Kleistwahr, "Winter" (Helen Scarsdale Agency)
  • Laura Cannell & Kate Ellis's amazing run of monthly EPs
  • Leven Signs, "Hemp Is Here" (Futura Resistenza)
  • Meitei / ??, "Kof? II / ?? II" (Kitchen Label)
  • My Cat is an Alien & Joëlle Vinciarelli, "Eternal Beyond III" (Opax/Up Against the Wall, Motherfuckers!)
  • Nonconnah, "Songs For And About Ghosts" (Ernest Jenning)
  • Noveller, ""Aphantasia" & "Red Room" (self-released)
  • People Like Us, "Welcome Abroad" (Discrepant)
  • Steph Kretowicz, "I Hate it Here" (Curl)
  • Tasos Stamou, "Monoliths" (Moving Furniture)
  • Martyna Basta, "Making Eye Contact With Solitude" (Warm Winters Ltd)
  • Stereolab, "Electrically Possessed [Switched On Volume 4]" (Duophonic)
  • The Humble Bee, "A Miscellany For The Quiet Hours" reissue (Astral Industries)
  • The Volume Settings Folder, "Pastorage Sights" (self-released)
  • Thomas Ankersmit, "Perceptual Geography" (Shelter Press)
  • Vanishing Twin, "Ookii Gekkou" (Fire)
  • Tomaga, "Intimate Immensity" (Hands in the Dark)
  • HTRK, "Rhinestones" (Heavy Machinery)
  • Various Artists, "La Ola Interior (Spanish Ambient & Acid Exoticism 1983-1990)" (Bongo Joe)
  • Grouper, "Shade" (Kranky)
  • Sublime Frequencies' entire 2021 output
  • Rachika Nayar, "fragments" (RVNG Intl.) & "Our Hands Against The Dusk" (NNA Tapes)
  • Bombay Lunatic Asylum, "Mad Song" (Oaken Palace)
  • Anders Brørby, "Constant Shallowness Leads to Body Horror" (Fort Evil Fruit)
  • CZN, "Commutator" (Offen/Lovers & Lollipops)
  • NTS Live
  • Todd Haynes' The Velvet Underground
  • Obscure film blogs (MyDuckIsDead/Cinema of the World/Rarelust) & Ubuweb
  • Dream Weapons mixtape blog (and revisiting classic ?øly ?ayabl?? mixtapes)
  • Reading Megan Boyle (Live Blog), Scott McClanahan (Crapalachia & Collected Works, Vol. I), and Brad Phillips (Essays & Fictions)
  • All things Everything is Terrible!-related
  • Belatedly discovering the plunderphonic genius of The Found Sound Orchestra & Cassetteboy
  • Almodovar's Parallel Mothers
  • JD Twitch's mixtapes for Optimo
  • The White Lotus
  • Succession
  • I Think You Should Leave


Things That Provided Some Much-Needed Joy & Amusement For Me in 2020

  • William Basinski, "Lamentations" (Temporary Residence)
  • Mary Lattimore, "Silver Ladders" (Ghostly International)
  • KMRU, "Peel" (Editions Mego)
  • Meitei, "Kofu" (Kitchen)
  • Ian William Craig, "Red Sun Through Smoke" (130701)
  • Clarice Jensen, "The experience of repetition as death" (130701)
  • Félicia Atkinson, "Everything evaporate" (Shelter Press)
  • Midwife, "Forever" (The Flenser)
  • Klara Lewis, "Ingrid" (Editions Mego)
  • Celer, "Future Predictions" (Two Acorns)
  • Everything Marc Richter released this year.
  • Ashley Paul, "Ray" (Slip)
  • Ike Yard reissues
  • Helm, "Saturnalia" and "Oregon Crisis" (Alter)
  • Carl Stone, "Ganci & Figli" (Unseen Worlds)
  • Everything Big Blood released or re-released this year.
  • Teleplasmiste, "To Kiss Earth Goodbye" (House of Mythology)
  • Don Herzfeldt's World of Tomorrow Episode Three: The Absent Destinations of David Prime
  • Various Slim K & Chopstars mixtapes
  • Andrew Chalk finally having a Bandcamp page
  • Bandcamp Fridays
  • Several NTS Radio shows (Bianca Lexis, Sarah Davachi, Carla dal Forno, Maria Somerville, ONY, Andrew Weatherall, Lucifer Over LA)
  • Watching many, many films by Jonas Mekas, Bela Tarr, Andrei Tarkovsky, and James Benning (beginning of pandemic)
  • Obsessively watching trashy '70s Euro-Crime films, YouTube collections of vintage grindhouse trailers, and old episodes of Dance Fever and Soul Train (several months later)
  • Finally watching Twin Peaks: The Return & rewatching the rest of Twin Peaks
  • Mexican Coke
  • Cooking increasingly ridiculous & experimental variations of pizza and chicken tikka masala.

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31562 Hits

Duncan Edwards

Duncan Edwards lives in Bergen with another human, two deerhounds, two seagulls, a crow, and a dove. Previously he was exiled in Texas from New Orleans where he was previously exiled from England where he sometimes felt a bit exiled while sitting comfortably at home. He did a radio show for a few years called Not Your Cup Of Tea. The first record he bought was "Ride A White Swan." 

Picks of 2008 with possible leakage from 2007 and into 2009:

Tracks:
potpie - "six"
The Gubernatorial Candidates - "No Remainder"
MaxTundra - "Will Get Fooled Again"
Aufgehoben - "Annex Organon"
Group Inerane - "Awal September"
The Low Anthem - "Ticket Taker"
The Stranger - "Something To Do With Death"
DJ Spooky/James Joyce/ Erik Satie - "Eolian Episode/Gnossiene"
DJ Spooky/Shukar/Radio Mentale/Raoul Hausmann - "Cika-Laka/Cool Noises Pt2/BBB"
The Subliminator - "Howl"
John Baker - "Woman's Hour (Reading Your Letters)"
Blackout Beach - "Cloud Of Evil"
Ethan Rose - "On Wheels Rotating"
Fotheringay - "Wild Mountain Thyme"
Lucille Bogan - "Tricks Ain't Walking"
Surf City - "Mt Kill"
Mt. Eerie/Julie Doiron/Fred Squire - "With My Hands Out"
Lucky Dragons - "Desert Rose"
Deer Tick - "City Of Sin"
Olafur Arnalds - "0040"
LT - "England Story"
A Place To Bury Strangers - "Sunbeam"
Karl Blau - "Stream Of Ganders"
Herman Dune - "When The Water Gets Cold And Freezes On The Lake"
Raglani - "Perilous Straits"
Oren Ambarchi - "Highway of Diamonds"
Anna Jarvinen - "Nedgangslaten"
Johann Johannsson - "Fordlandia"
Ben Simmons - "Untitled"
Alessandra Celletti - "Foolish Child"
Haswell & Hecker - "Aguirre I"
IfIHadAHiFi - "Get Killed, Get Noticed"

Albums:
Victrola Favorites
Folklore - The Ghost of H.W. Beavermann
Awake My Soul
Gavin Bryars/Philip Jeck/Alter Ego - The Sinking of The Titanic
Sun City Girls - You're Never Alone With A Cigarette:Singles Volume 1
Max Richter - 24 Postcards In Full Colour
Russell Haswell - Second Live Salvage

 

Picks of 2007:

Basil Kirchin, "I Start Counting" 
A Place To Bury Strangers, "Another Step Away"
Porn Sword Tobacco, "Den Rose Sporten"
Keith Hudson, "Darkest Night On A Wet Looking Road"
Wyndham Lewis, "If So The Man You Are" 
Porn sword Tobacco, "Ljus,Der Yhersa Gavan"

Edward Ka-Spel, "Doughnut" 
Kode 9 & The SpaceApe, "Victims" 
Roger Lavern & The Microns, "Moon Rocket" 
Mike Sammes, "Timex"
Future Conditional, "Crying's What You Need" 
No Age, "Everybody's Down" 
Eric Malberg, "Leksand, Tidigt Nittiolal" 
Brion Gysin, "Cut-Ups (1959)" 
Young Marble Giants, "Choci Loni" 
Celestine Ukwu & His Philosopher's National,  "Okwukwe Na Nchekwube"  
Pluramon, "Turn In" 
Wisbey, "The Ladies Bra's" 
Sir Richard Bishop, "Ecstacies In The Open Air" 
Fog, Ditherer
Jakob Olausson, Moonlight Farm
Sandro Perri, "Family Tree" 
Amp, "Moon Tree"  
Sandro Perri, "Mirror Tree" 
Robert Wyatt, "A Beautiful War"

Joe Boyd, "White Bicycles" (Book)

31650 Hits

Creaig Dunton

Creaig Dunton was born in 1979 and grew up in a small town in Central Florida.  Always wanting to be a computer programmer until actually faced with the task as a college junior, he switched to psychology and then graduate work in criminal justice when the dot com burst of the early 21st century made gainful employment impossible.  He now is finishing his dissertation for his doctorate in criminal justice at the University at Albany in New York, and is a full time lecturer and program coordinator at a small upstate NY university.

More relevant to music, he started writing reviews on his personal website around 1996 as a way to get “free CDs and meet girls”.  The former worked, the latter didn’t.  His reviews were then carried over to the short lived (but nonetheless awesome) False Prophet Campaign webzine, which he founded with friend James Quirk.  He joined Brainwashed in early 2007 to review music once again, based on the unquestionable allure of free music.

In what little spare time he has, he adds to an embarrassingly large classic video game collection, pretends to be a musician, and runs his own micro experimental/noise vanity label.  Feel free to contact him at creaig [at] gmail [dot] com.

Top Albums of 2015 (subject to change)

Big Freedia – Just Be Free (Queen Diva)
Black Spirituals – Of Deconstruction (SIGE)
Burial Hex – The Hierophant (Handmade Birds)
Consumer Electronics – Estuary English (Dirtier)
Godflesh – A World Lit Only By Fire (Avalanche)
High-Functioning Flesh – A Unity of Miseries, A Misery of Unities (DKA)
Interpol – El Pintor (Matador)
King Crimson – Starless (DGM)
Edvard Graham Lewis – All Over (Editions Mego)
Klara Lewis – Ett (Editions Mego)
Parashi – Pilot Salt (Retrograde Tapes)
Pinkcourtesyphone – Description of Problem (LINE Segments)
Sleaford Mods – Divide & Exit (Harbinger Sound)
Swans – To Be Kind (Young God)
The Tobacconists – A Secret Place (Fabrica/A Giant Fern)

21070 Hits