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The follow up to the excellent Laboratory Series One compilation, whichset the scene pretty well as far as new experimental music inManchester and nearby towns and hovels goes, is a 20 minute EP fromPlanetsounds main man Dave Clarkson. He used to drum for the rock freakout combo White Cube which also included notorious nutter Lord Mongoamongst its ranks and has more recently been spotted on stageperforming with the fluid and inventive Triclops collective. Under theguise of Illuminati he shows off the computer music side of hismultiple sonic personalities.The opening track 'Constantinople' is based on a loop so long it givesthe illusion of a shifting, explosive electro-acoustic piece, with bigrumbles and panning whooshes so beloved of many composers with Frenchnames. 'Winter Fire' couldn't be more different, with a slowly strummedaquatic guitar underpinning some mashed speech gibberish. Hertzlow is aquick burst of noise that's so short you can download the entire trackbelow. Argenteum Astrum is a rip roaring bubbling industrial technoidconcoction that'll get your bowels moving whilst its creator chuckles,and I'm kind of regreting not making a sample of it as it's turning outto be my favourite track. The final track 'Seaghost of Snape' seems tomash up bits of all the other tracks over a rising three note synthfigure that wouldn't sound out of palace on a mid period Autechrerecord, although that's the only similarity. Want another lazyreference? Well, if you like Throbbing Gristle's '20 Jazz Funk Greats'you might also like this.
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Formed in Knoxville, TN, Superdrag released a few singles and EPs onDarla and Arena Rock before signing with Elektra Records to releasetheir debut LP, "Regretfully Yours." That's the one with their big"Buzz Bin" hit single "Sucked Out." It was a bit of a fright, really.John Davis, their gregarious frontman, screaming at what seems to bebeyond his register, "Who sucked out the feeLANG?!" This was rawk. Nowonder Elektra went after them. Their next record, also on Elektra,"Head Trip In Every Key," showed the band maturing into a more melodic,grounded sound, while they still had their Kinks/Beatles/Romanticspower-pop moments. Ultimately, though, super stardom escaped them, andthey returned to the studio after a headlining club tour to start workon their follow-up. Elektra had optioned their next three releases, andwere eager for an album to push that, as they saw it, better reflectedthe "Sucked Out" sound. Superdrag emerged from the studio with thisrelease, their third full-length, "In The Valley Of Dying Stars." AndElektra didn't hear a single. They told the band to go back in and makesome more power pop magic. Why is it always Elektra in these stories,anyway? So Superdrag asked to be let out of their contract, and Elektraagreed. So they returned to Arena Rock, and re-worked "Valley," thoughreportedly not much needed to be altered. It may sound cliche, but it'scertainly no surprise: "Valley" is their finest work to date. Foundingmember Tom Pappas left the group shortly before recording, a voidfilled by Sam Powers, a perfect foil for Davis in the vocal department.The sound of the record is dirtier than the others ("Oooh! It evenSOUNDS indie!"), but that's hardly a detriment to these songs. Therecord is dedicated to the memory of Davis' father, and some of thesongs reflect this loss. But the prevailing theme here is one Davisstarted on "Head Trip": the whoredom of the music industry. Not a freshtopic, but one that Davis certainly gets mileage on. The opening track,"Keep It Close To Me," impresses with its pounding drums and hookyguitar crunch, and the lyrics make it the ultimate kiss-off: "I wantrock and roll but I don't want to deal with the hassle/I know what Iknow but I don't want to feel like an asshole." Davis' vocals havecertainly improved, as he seems more comfortable in his range andstyle. The swagger is bigger and better, and the band's shuck and jivekicks the ever-loving hell out of most bands these days. The sound iseven meatier with Powers, a noticeable improvement. If you want to hearsome solid, formidable rock, you can't go wrong with this release,originally put out in September of last year but widely ignored. Giveit a try.
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The Rhode Island-based duo has their first full-length release nowavailable on Tigerbeat6. Clearly this is first effort, as theinstrumentation is decent (they're good enough to get somebody'sattention) but the songwriting skills are somewhat bland. For the firsthalf of the disc, the duo delivers a pleasant but rather sluggish blendof 4/4 beats, unobtrusive melodies, sub-dub noodlings, and colorings ofglitch and sonic glitter. The album gets rather lengthy at points, butdon't underestimate the power of pleasantness, and about mid-waythrough the album the mood certainly becomes more well-defined. On thewhole, this could have been a stronger release if they both started itaround track eight and didn't try so hard to be clever with the songtitles. While it's not bad, and can be quite colorful aural wallpaper,it's nothing that demands high attention. Maybe being a friend of 606just isn't enough to make for a great album release.
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Slightly more dull in the composition department but more creativelyglitchy in the production is the collaborative effort between Uwe Zahnand Eliot Perkins, more commondly known as Arovane and Phonem. Out ofthe eight seemingly endless tracks here, four are collaborations whileeach each supply two on their own. It seems like an interestingmatch-up, as Arovane's a hardware-backed gearhead while Phonem's asoftware-based nerdy glitch boy. Once again the music's quite pleasant,but even more so than Stars as Eyes, I'm forcing myself to stay awake.The music on Aer is moderate-paced electronics, unobtrusive andunoffensive, but it's hardly as interesting as something like theaforementioned Phonecia, emotive as something like Boards of Canada,resourceful like Matmos or creative like a whole host of others.Perhaps this could be the start of a new sub-genre, SDM (sleepy dancemusic).
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- Aer (Valid)
- (Fard) Ent:r (Arovane)
- Decay (Phonem)
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Portland-based Hochenkeit's second album "omu4h 4aholab" (which isapparently a transliteration of the Mayan phrase "400 boys") is acollection of space-rock jams that fall somewhere between early livePink Floyd and Amon DÙÙl II. The album opens with "Seen," a mellowtrack that builds a very Middle Eastern inspired groove around crashingpercussion and a Harmonium drone. The Pink Floyd influence on the bandshows through "Two Fish Kissing," this time with a rather Indiansounding drone and Turkish mandolin. The drones cease temporarilyduring the opening of "To Be Born Drunk and Die Dreaming," which buildsand twists not unlike a rather funky ragga, each member of the bandsoloing here and there until a screaming wall of noise has been built.The funk vibe continues into "Give Them To the Ants," where a groove isformed and Middle Eastern touches are improvised over it. "400 Boys" isthe first of a pair of fourteen minute jams that close the album. Itis, for the most part, a series of drones by guitar, Harmonium, violin,and sax, with the occasional appearance of cymbals. The song goes on alittle bit too long, though. "Please Turn Out the Sun" finishes thealbum nearly where it started, with Middle Eastern percussion and alight drone. It builds in a way that reminds me of the first Godspeedyou black emperor! album, methodically adding drums, guitar,synthesizer tones and sampled speech; the guitar and Harmoniumeventually take over and the song suddenly becomes a depressedpost-rock jam. Finally, the drones and percussion from "400 Boys"return for the last few minutes of the track. What Hochenkeit do withthe space-rock sound is nothing short of beautiful, and they do itwithout poorly repeating the 70s like many of their contemporaries.
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Calling music like this "electronica" is a massive underestimation of what kind of work must go into a release like this. Of course, I hate that term anyway, so there you go. Four Tet, started as an off-shoot project for Kieran Hebden when he wasn't working on Fridge, is an interesting mix of programmed beats and sampled live instruments, often looped, to create soundscapes that can appeal to a great variety of listeners. Where other releases by bands who use these techniques come off sounding derivative, and often over work the concept (Manitoba is a perfect example, though Dan Snaith of Manitoba reportedly contributed to/helped inspire parts of "Pause"), Hebden seems to know just where to go with these tracks. The beats aren't the same canned beats you hear on many releases, and occasionally there are live drums, sampled though they are. In fact, it is the use of samples of live instruments that make this release so compelling. Strings, guitar, piano, and percussion certainly sound better in this mix than synth lines and beeps and whistles. I wish more artists in the genre would use this approach. "Parks" is where it all came together for me, with horns, vibes, and backwards guitar grounded by a driving, stuttering beat. Never mind the obligatory kids in the playground sound sample every band seems to want to use these days (see gybe!, tortoise, trans am, etc.). A few tracks, like the intriguing "Leila Came Round and We Watched A Video," are simple, beautiful, priceless. It's like the first time someone smiled at you: you felt warm inside, and you just wanted it to happen again, but you knew from now on it would never be the same. Music that provokes this level of visceral response, if possible, is the only kind of music I would like to listen to. Failing that, I will be sure to have Four Tet around always. This record affected me in a way I didn't expect. Hopefully it will have the same affect on you. "Pause" is out in the UK now, and will be released on these shores next month. You know what you have to do.
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Every once in a not so great while David Tibet of Current 93 and StevenStapleton of Nurse With Wound join their respective Durtro and UnitedDairies labels as United Durtro for collaborations and to reissue theforgotten or nearly impossible to obtain work of late '60s/early '70s'Krautrock' bands they admire. Sand were the first to receive suchtreatment and now fellow Germanic collective Xhol (pronounced 'soul',aka Soul Caravan and Xhol Caravan) are next with two nicely recorded,previously unreleased live performances. Disc 1 is entitled "FreedomOpera" from 1968 and disc 2 is a Frankfurt WDR radio set from 1969,both discs somewhat annoyingly indexed as one 57 minute track. Thetapestry of sound includes vocals, electric guitar, bass guitar, organ,saxophones, flute and drums. First and foremost Xhol are a rock androll band with a soul center, but they also take in a number of otherstyles, and this is no exaggeration: psychedelic, freeform jazz andnoise, rhythm and blues, progressive, '60s pop and rock and even a bitof funk. But vocalist James Rhodes defines it best mid disc 1 simply as"black music". Long, meandering solos and instrumental excursionswander on and off the path of hippie bliss as Rhodes belts out theblues rather nicely or recites timely poetry. Loose covers of VanillaFudge's "Poems" and Donovan's "Season of the Witch" (which was alsocovered by Vanilla Fudge) are among the six originals on disc 1. Disc 2comes with no tracklisting and I think I know why. It seems to be onelong, often spontaneous instrumental jam by just four members, forwhatever reason - bass, tenor sax, organ and drums - it's just as goodand at times reminiscent of recent live explorations I've witnessed byThe Legendary Pink Dots. After hearing Xhol, for the first time might Iadd, I really have to wonder why I haven't seen their name mentionedbefore in the annals of late '60s rock. As a special treat for c93, NWWand Christoph Heemann fans, a third limited edition disc entitled "HotButtered Xhol" showcases superb Xhol 'covers' by each, c93's "Memories"being particularly mesmerizing. The packaging is also fantastic with a12 page insert, beautifully covered up by Stapleton, that contains anon-stage photo of the band, show posters and liner notes, all in Germanunfortunately save for Stapleton, Tibet and Heemann's virgin Xholexperiences. Good job guys! Through the magic of shiny polycarbonatediscs, "Motherfuckers Live" is like an amber encrusted insect preservedfor all eternity to admire.
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With the latest offerings, Vert (and Mouse on Mars on their Soniglabel) have proven to be masters of their own kind. The disc opens with"Blindsight," where animated and robotic beats that envoke pure digitalcharm. Melodies and rhythms are moving, physically and blissfully. Fromthere, it gets into the quirky and raw - theremin-esque noises withreverb-soaked samples and voice clips, with a constant click & popfeel. Some of the third track, "Codfish Dada" has a scratchy-jazzyfeel, like typical Sonig-esque squishy squigly noises throughout butstill maintaining nice composition & form. Some of the sounds onthis album remind me of more of what was on their 12",Mooremooseicforme, which I thought were possibly from some of the samesampling/sessions that much of Mouse on Mars' recent stuff has beenfrom. Some tracks, "Somewhere Between Here and Last Week", for example,feature improvised antique organ sounds with dusty blip soundsthroughout. I picture funny little clown-men playing jazz music for amass in a dusty and crumbling old church. But then they break intosomething like a digital hardcore take on dub. Screeching synths andmorphing, building waves of noise ... some trip-hop atari music to justlie back and close your eyes. Then the strings kick in, and it's trulybeautiful, quirkiness or not. As the disc comes to close, a slow fuzzbuild-up turns to nice pensive piano turns into a sonic wall of organsthat force the listener's eyes to jet open after being harshly brokenfrom the moods that the music had previously set up. It fades out, andthe closer, "Scope/Lifetime", seems to tie in the whole of the album -remaining inconsistent within it's boundaries. Seriously, thequirkiness and diversity in this album are really something that fewothers know quite how to do.
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You're drifting back in the timeline of electronic music... pastglitch, through drill n' bass, left at Braindance, back to a moreoptimistic time where Black Dog was 3 people, and naive melodies on topof percussion with little or no processing could still be talked aboutas being non-derivative. If you enjoy that classic "IDM" sound,Estermann delivers. His style isn't the most original on the block, buthistorically he's also been one of the artists who do it best. A few of the tracks have little snippets of digital processing (thefinal track, "Menca", among them) but for the most part the CD consistsof a very clean, likely almost exclusively hardware-based, sound. Ithas an abundance of out-of-vogue lushness and "cute" melodiescontrasting with upbeat "hard" tweaked hip-hop percussion. Decentprogression, too, as the genre goes. Definitely chilled afternoonmusic, along similar lines as Michael Fakesch or Funkstorung, but withbetter tunes and minus the Autechre-worshiping. Stops short of beingtotally cheesy, and nothing your brain can't handle!
Four ofthese tracks (by my count) out of the twelve have been released on theInzec and Musik aus Strom labels, although scattered over 3 vinylreleases. This is the first CD release by Estermann as well as thefirst CD release on the "sellwell" label, and we thank him profuselyfor not releasing every song he's ever done. Quality control is alwaysgood for the wallet as well as street cred. Weird slot-loading milkyplastic CD case with orange trigger/ejector doohickey completes thepackage, if you're into that sort of thing.
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"How gerrmann!" me and my friend said to ourselves (in nasal "Deiter"voice) when confronted with this album. It seems like a good chunk ofthe decent electronic music is sourced in one of several cities in thecountry, one of which is Berlin - Enter the Lux Nigra label and Michael(_not_ John, thankfully) Zorn. From his music, one can easily drawkraut connections to the Din, Morr Music, or Chain Reaction labels, orcomparisons to Arovane or Monolake. Pretty wicked stuff with a stew ofinfluences, including house, IDM, and dub. Building up from where his last 12" left off, mid to high BPM heavyThomas Brinkmann-esque 4/4 beats with dub and house gestures form thebasis of Michael Zorn's composition. But these are no stripped-downskeletal tracks a la Pole or Farben - he has no fear of "filling in thegaps" to create full, busy songs. This guy actually wants to take thesetracks somewhere! Repetative, lush synthesized melodies sit side byside with heavily groovy bass drum percussion without either becomingannoying or overbearing. Songs evolve satisfyingly in a matter ofminutes, not (as it seems) hours as is common in the area ofdub-influenced techno, creating an album which will find applicationson the dancefloor as well as in the living room. Fascinating, amultifaceted release which will gain prestige with age. It connectsnicely with his recent "Eckermann" 7" on highly collectable City CentreOffices label (also a proud .de imprint). Already craps on a number ofthe current crop of "laptop" producers from a great height.
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The VVMCPS virus spreads its tentacles across the seas, or at least afew ponds, and into the memories of those who dare to deconstruct thecrap novelty minor pop abortions of a comedy cleaning woman. SuPollard, who played the dotty chalet mopper in the Great Britishholiday camp 'comedy' horrorshow 'Hi-De-Hi' has been responsible forfilling the mouldy old singles boxes of many a charity shop. She is nowanonymously employed as a cleaner for All Tomorrow's Parties, or so therumour I just started has it.Meanwhile, in complete avoidance of that event a kid from Manchesterinvited lots of folks to have a go at Su via his website in tribute to The Lady in Big Glasses Herself.There this entire thing can be downloaded in MP3 format but if youcan't be bothered waiting he'll flog you a CD-R for the price of a pint.
The Pollard is put through a glitch grinder with ding dong bells on theopening cut from d-503 who sound like they've been immersed in TheMagic Sound of Fenn O'Berg, which is no bad thing. Next up Jim Kirbytries to get into Su's knickers with a crackled up 'Starting Together'.You know exactly what this bit of V/Vm remouldy doughness is going todo, skipping on the word 'faults' right on cue. Happily not that muchof this ends up sounding like a tribute to V/Vm, but Notphik could beJim trying it on again after Su's ditched ham forever, and is anattempt more likely to get a quick one round the back of the chalet.Jansky Noise breaks the rules a bit by noise butchering the theme to'Hi-De-Hi' which is not strictly speaking a Su Pollard opus. Amongstall the other relative unknowns Binary Being deserves a special mentionfor cobbling together a chirpy and bright happy piano pop sample feastthat La Pollard herself might actually be able to spoil with a bit ofcheap karaoke if she was slipped double bad acid at Sonar and if theBeing was daft enough to let her, which thankfully he's not. TheResurrexit track should keep all fucked up noise heads happy as askinhead on glue, whilst Cho'Pin displays a slightly more refinedapproach to noise construction, reducing Su to a decelerating hauntedgraveyard ghost flutter that can't go on. If you only download onetrack, however, go for the gloomy loop mutations that morph intohilarious manic gibberish sing-glitch pile up from Bess Keloid, someonewho's happy to wear a Nurse with Wound influence on his sleeve andprobably in other less visible places too...
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