HEAVY ROTATION - week of March 23 2009

KURT VILE: The Hunchback EP 12" (RICHIE)
KURT VILE: God Is Saying This To You LP (MEXICAN SUMMER)
DEATH: For All The World To See LP (DRAG CITY)
AMANAZ: Africa LP (SHADOKS)
GROUP BOMBINO: Guitars From Agadez Vol. 2 LP (SUBLIME FREQUENCIES)
IRMA THOMAS: Sings LP (CHANGE)
RTFO BANDWAGON: Dums Will Survive LP (DULL KNIFE)
GARY WAR: New Raytheonport LP (SHDWPLY/DISARO)
KURT VILE: Constant Hitmaker CD (GULCHER)
CAETHUA: Village of the Damned CD (BLUESANCT)

KURT VILE & THE VIOLATORS: The Hunchback EP 12" (RICHIE) Mr. Vile's 'official debut' full-length Constant Hitmaker was Blastitude's favorite album of 2008, but on this brand new follow-up he kinda sidesteps away from the one-man constant hitmaking... now he's got a backing band and they casually throw down a few loud machine-trance workouts, getting into a cool grinding city rock, a little more brooding and grim. On the first album there was a fair amount of sun breaking out of the haze, but now it's definitely night-time. Also, this EP doesn't use any of the zoned-out solo fingerpicking styles that are on the first album, and while on first spin that was slightly disconcerting, on second, third, and now fourth, I don't mind at all. Mainly because the Violators are a serious band - drummer is basically perfect, and so is the way the other two (on guitar, bass, baritone guitar, more) blend with KV's six-string brilliance. I don't even mind that four out of the six cuts are instrumentals, or that the record is over way too fast... makes it that much easier to play it again and again...

Vileness:
MYSPACE.COM/KURTVILEOFPHILLY
DESTINED: KURT VILE
L.A. RECORD
KURT VILE PUSHES BUTTONS
KURT VILE LIVE ON WFMU
BUY
BUY



OFEGE: Try And Love LP (ACADEMY) Reissue of a 1973 rock album by some Nigerian high-schoolers. It isn't quite the raw/chill stunner that my all-time gold standard Amanaz Africa is, but it is a really good album, very solid sun-dappled mid-tempo rock balladry, with some piercing psychedelic lead guitar that, together with an elastic percussive style, keeps the tunes at a deceptively high simmer. Also, it's really a beautiful sleeve by Academy, complete with a nice insert that has a recent interview with the album's producer. BTW, am I reading this interview right -- did Berkley Jones, the guitarist of BLO, "play all the guitar tracks in the absence of the band members"??



SUN CITY GIRLS: Fruit of the Womb/Polite Deception 2LP (ECLIPSE) Hey, the Cloaven Cassettes reissue project is back, still on Eclipse Records, here with #5, the first volume in four or five years. The idea is a projected ten double-vinyl releases, each one reissuing/reimagining two of the 20-plus cassettes that Sun City Girls cluster-bombed the scene with between the years of 1987 and 1990. Fruit of the Womb was "recorded 1984–85 between the first and second Sun City Girls LPs," and it documents a particularly raw, scorching, glowing, go-for-broke session or two, with some songs that are known ("Damcar," "Blue Mamba," "Trippin' on Krupa," "Rappin' Head," "Jokers on a Waltz") and songs that will always be unknown (such as Side B, the 25-minute diehards-only "When the Jewels Roll out of Your Eyes"). As for Polite Deception, it originally came out on the heels of Womb and, according to suncitygirls.com, "side one is a continuation of the previous tape listed." And, the flip features "Gulf Con '79," an impressive early long-form "industrial Mesopotamian Environmental piece." Edition of 950, gatefold sleeve, rad live photos, etc.

TODAY'S HEAVIES
"History of the Man" Amanaz
"Trouble Maker" Chrissy Zebby Tembo & Ngozi Family
"Bang Your Head" Gravediggaz
"Strong Island" JVC Force
"You Gots To Chill" EPMD (2009 anthem)
"Psalm 95" Prince Far I
"Ride On Marcus Version" The Revolutionaries
"Atom Smasher" Cirith Ungol
"Black Machine" Cirith Ungol
"Thrashers" Death Angel
"Mouth Breather" Jesus Lizard
"Hot Burrito #1" Flying Burrito Brothers

and of course the wedding stylings of Abdullah Chmairan

THE GRAND HOTEL: Extra Tiger CD-R (FELT RECORDS)
The moral of the story is: never give up on the to-listen stacks, no matter how old and dusty and in-the-way they're getting. I pulled this disc from pretty near the bottom... it was released a whopping four years ago, after all. No idea when it showed up here at HQ, but I never did listen to it, not even once, until today. I had kept it around simply because the art was promising... an enigmatic-enough B&W drawing pasted on a cool cardboard fold-over holder with an envelope for the disc mounted within... but the real reason I finally put it on the stereo today was a case of mistaken identity. You see, I thought that maybe the Grand Hotel was this older (early 2000s) Bay Area band featuring the late Cayce Lindner, who went on to record one great 2006 album as the leader of a band called Flying Canyon. Turns it out I was wrong... Lindner's older band turned out to be The Golden Hotel, and this was The Grand Hotel, a band (duo as it turns out) from Brooklyn that I really knew nothing about. That quickly changed as the readout gave me one 35-minute track, I pushed play, and got immediately sucked in by a desolate misterioso atmosphere that morphed into vaguely bluesy zoner psych and then serious pounding no-mind post-industrial wave-out... by now I'm more than hooked, and then the drums drop out and that's when they bring back the song, now as a free-floating garage/cloud bliss-out. An early mastery of now-prevalent 'new age noise' styles, and a whole lot more than that too. Glad I dug it out, here's their myspace and other stuff. Anyone with an extra copy of that edition-of-15o LP from 2007, get in touch.

And listened to next, another 'oldie'....

IAN NAGOSKI: Effortless Battle CD (RECORDED)
From waaaaay back in 2003, heavy electronics, really holds up well. Interesting stuff as it is rooted in classic loft-style LaMonte Young drone and minimalism, but still fits right in with its early-2000s noise/electronics solo-artist peers, resulting in some pretty crazy low-end and grinding atmospheres that still have a sort of open-eyed wonder. I could be wrong about this, but it seems that Nagoski more or less retired this music when he became a father and opened up a record store in 2004. He has remained active, currently blogging for Arthur Magazine and in 2007 gathering some of his favorite 78RPM records for the stunning Black Mirror CD compilation on Dust-to-Digital. Actually, is the True Vine Record Shop still open? Weeeeeelll, I just found this July 2008 article from the Baltimore City Paper that explains everything... Nagoski is leaving the record store to his partners Jason Willett and Stewart Mostofsky, and says, "I'm going to keep doing what I've been doing only more so--dealing with records (research, listening, writing, creating, teaching)--and--hey!--making my own music again for the first time in four years." Right on... here's an interview with him from around the time of Effortless Battle (and the opening of the True Vine).

BLASTWITUDE

So, dear readers, I would like to announce with great non-ironic excitement that I, Larry Dolman, have joined the Twitter nation, nay, the very TWITTERVERSE itself. (Not ironic.) See twitter.com/blastitude. Like it says on the profile page: NEW ARRIVALS TO BLASTITUDE HQ (& A FEW OLD FAVORITES TOO). Basically, I'll use it to list whatever makes it on the record player in between now and #28. Sign up now and read a little more about how good this new R. Millis CD is!



R. MILLIS: 120 CD (ETUDE)

THIS WEEK IN CLASSIC ROCK (20 MARCH 2009)

Next time you give Killed By Finnish Hardcore a spin, this band-name translation guide might come in handy (click on the image for a proper view)... nabbed from the Legacy Document blog (see also: Cosmic Hearse) which got it from the Saapasnahkatorni blog...

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Might as well check out Joe Carducci's YouTube History of Black Flag, just posted by Arthur Magazine.

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This is a nice resource of informed list-serv kudos and general top-of-the-dome nerd-out info on the Kozmigroov subgenre (aka "cosmic groove")... I think a lot of this came from the Drone On list, pre-2000...

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I just realized that a little bit of Robert Wyatt shows up somewhere during the Radio Palestine CD on Sublime Frequencies... from Rock Bottom, no less! Kudos to that enterprising Palestinian DJ, and to Alan Bishop for picking up his/her signal, which hopefully hasn't since been bombed into rubble...

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Check out the archives of the Collective Voice podcast, specializing in Blastitude-type music, as broadcast 2002-2008 from all the way up in the city of St. John's, NL, Canada....

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Oh man, why am I watching Tommy Bolin youtubes tonight? He grew up just 100 miles or so north of where I grew up, so he was always kind of a local hero back there in the Missouri Valley. I remember hanging out in his hometown of Sioux City, Iowa in the late 1980s and seeing posters of him up at bars... yep, feeling the history... wonder if they're still up... his brief career as a journeyman big-leagues rock guitarist may have been something for ole Sewer City but it really wasn't too much to brag about... he died of a multiple drug overdose at 25 and before that his biggest claim to fame was being the second or third replacement guitarist for over-the-hill bands like James Gang and Deep Purple. Of course, there was definitely potential for more... he was a surprisingly balls-out fusion guitarist, as can be heard on Mahavishnu Orchestra drummer Billy Cobham's 1973 solo album Spectrum... unlike John McLaughlin, he wasn't the kind of over-the-top player that could compete with (let alone subdue) the endless wankery of keyboardist Jan Hammer, so the album is no Inner Mounting Flame, but it's still pretty wild. And then there's his biggest solo hit, a song you may have heard as a 'deep cut' on classic rock radio, an unfocused but kinda awesome 9-minute stone groover/fusion fantasia/cautionary tale called "Post Toastee," as in "Don't let your mind post toastee/Like a lot of my friends did." He didn't practice what he preached, but then again maybe he wasn't exactly sure what it meant either.

Here he is not really helping Deep Purple very much... and they do kinda need some help:



He seems to have been better with James Gang, this is at least kinda insane:



(but he can't hold a candle to Walsh):



Here's all 9 minutes of "Post Toastee":



And this is kinda rad, a 1975 clip from a late-night Denver-area show called Rock Talk. Bolin is in Deep Purple at the time and already pretty post toastee, but he seems like a nice dude and handles himself pretty well. Get a load of the other guy on the panel, the one who seems to have walked out of a Will Ferrell movie... I'm talking about the mustache dude who not only is a FLAUTIST, he's the flautist for DAN FOGELBERG....



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Seems like Seven Up, the crazed Ash Ra Tempel album they cut with special guest lead singer and fugitive prisoner Timothy Leary (you can read more of the story in Julian Cope's Krautrocksampler or this excellent article), doesn't get raved about quite as much as their other early masterpieces. Maybe no one can get past the creepy factor of Leary coming on like a Mick Jagger wanna-be on Side One, but the band is great, consistently laying down amazing pre-Hawkwind spiked-pint acid pub insanity. I mean of course the cringe factor is there, particularly the rather gropy song "Right Hand Lover," in which Tim is all "I'm a right hand lover/I got a hinge on my thumb/I'll manipulate you baby" -- okay I'll stop. But even if you can't hang with Side One, pull it back out and put on Side Two, a single extended performance of one of the most dazed and zoned ballads in psych rock history, a 20-minute take of their key song "Suche & Liebe" (there's a slightly shorter and also great version on the Schwingungen album). The moment halfway through when Leary's beatific mutterings, buried in echo, suddenly become crystal clear as he intones the phrase "You're so beautiful" in an awestruck whisper... well, it's really a MOMENT, you know?

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And as long as we're talking about this sort of thing, I thought I'd throw this in here JUST FOR MEDICINAL POSTERITY, straight from The Alice B. Toklas Cookbook as submitted by Brion Gysin (I haven't made it myself and I'm pretty sure I never will, I don't keep enough canibus in the house): "Take 1 teaspoon black peppercorns, 1 whole nutmeg, 4 average sticks of cinnamon, 1 teaspoon coriander. These should all be pulverized in a mortar. About a handful each of stone dates, dried figs, shelled almonds and peanuts: chop these and mix them together. A bunch of canibus sativa can be pulverized. This along with the spices should be dusted over the mixed fruit and nuts, kneaded together. About a cup of sugar dissolved in a big pat of butter. Rolled into a cake and cut into pieces or made into balls about the size of a walnut, it should be eaten with care. Two pieces are quite sufficient. Obtaining the canibus may present certain difficulties. . . . It should be picked and dried as soon as it has gone to seed and while the plant is still green."

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Damn, "Chestnut Mare" by The Byrds... when that chorus kicks in with "I'm going to catch that horse if I can," it's so great that until now I never noticed what he says right after: "And when I do I'll give her my brand," ouch, "And we'll be friends for life/She'll be just like a wife/I'm going to catch that horse if I can." Just like a wife, eh?

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Speaking of wives, I already have one but I have still fallen madly in love with 1976 Ann Wilson thanks to this appearance by her band Heart on the Midnight Special from that year. Not too into the band, especially that hairy guy dressed like Luke Skywalker (Star Wars wasn't out yet, I'll give him that), but oh Miss Ann.... her stern-shouldered dress, her hunched stance... I don't know how else to work through this so I'm blogging about it....








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And speaking of canibus, here's a repost of the Butthole Surfers Bed-In because everyone in the world should watch this at least once a day.



Take that, Lenono!

INTENSE HAUL FROM RECKLESS RECORDS part 2 of ??

Store credit still ruleth (second visit in as many weeks):



DEATH: ...For All The World To See LP (DRAG CITY) This was the record that got me moving, foot into building, cash (er, credit) in hand. You've probably heard about this one... the year is 1975 and, inspired by The Stooges, a black three-piece band in Detroit are inventing punk rock. They wouldn't change their name for Clive Davis and Columbia Records, so we don't find out about their killer music for 33 years. Drag City has just released the 7 songs they wouldn't give to Clive and vinyl has been immediately hard to get. (Apparently they're between represses; this was the store's last copy.) (Update: now on their third pressing.) On first spin it actually seemed a little cleaner and poppier than I expected, with surprise prog leanings as well... I even jotted down that "both the Stooges and the Bad Brains make these guys sound like the Attractions (as in Elvis Costello)," but I quickly shredded the paper that flippancy was written on because this band is truly awesome -- believe the hype. Tons of great hooks, super sharp and mean playing, undeniable heaviness, surprising tempos and changes... not only do they indeed sound like Bad Brains at times, a good three years early (bassist Bobby Hackney's vocals can especially sound like HR), they are simply a great hard rock band as well, three excellent instrumentalists, as heavy and anthemic as Thin Lizzy... and damn near as charismatic... hell, these recordings even beat Jailbreak by a year...



DISAPPEARS: Live Over The Rainbo 10 26 08 CS (PLUS TAPES) I bought everything Reckless had from this new Chicago-based cassette-only label with an eclectic and fresh lineup so far. Disappears is a current Chicago band that I didn't yet know of because I just plain don't go out anymore. I mean, sheez, you have to go to the Rainbo to hear this band? How old do you think I am, 26?? Anyway, the word "shoegaze" was vaguely thrown out there in the store blurb for this tape, but I think it's accurate, and either way lurking underneath is a good old garage pound, bolstering the dreamy elements with taste and strength. The store clerk did tell me Brian Case of 90 Day Men and more recently The Ponies is in this band, so that makes sense.



CHRIS CONNELLY: Lost Episodes CS (PLUS TAPES) I like the idea of an outtakes release for Chris Connelly's The Episodes album, because that's a seriously good record, with extended jammed-out song structures that certainly lend themselves to varied approaches (rather than just getting the song 'right'). And sure enough, this is a cool tape. These versions seem more stripped down than the album... some of them might be Connelly solo, singing and playing guitar (and one song is a vocal a capella). There are also two really good live songs from "the one and only Episodes live show with the full band" (more info about the tape here). Mid-period Tim Buckley-esque is the easy way to describe what Connelly's doing here, but there's something a little more upbeat and hard-driving about Connelly's stuff, less likely to fracture and get lost in halls of mirrors.



THE TRAVELLERS: The Sound of Travellers CS (PLUS TAPES) Not entirely sure about this one... it looks cool, a Sublime Frequencies-worthy groovy-60s mod-rock band from Indonesia or something (Singapore to be exact), but so far the music seems a little on the elevator muzak side, string-laden with Herb Alpert-style trumpet. Sure it has a nice vibe and if it was playing in a grocery store it would be dreamy but I don't really get a 'real band' feeling, more like it was put together by cigar-chompers and studio lackeys to be thrift-scored years later. There's certainly far worse thrift-scores to be scored, don't get me wrong... it really is a pleasant listen, inhabiting that languid lotus-land muzak zone where everything's gonna be alright.... everything's gonna be alright.... no woman, no cr -- wait, where am I?



FUNKADELIC s/t LP (WESTBOUND) Of course I already have this on CD (I even have it on cassette) but when I saw this distinctly 'VG-' original vinyl copy at Reckless for a mere $19.99 I had to pick it up. Just imagining the way Funkadelic sounds on original vinyl gives me shivers, all cloudy, crackling & popping, perfect vintage. And, for as many times as I've listened to it over the years, this album still threw me for a loop when I spun it tonight... not so much a collection of songs as a collection of rituals, heavy chants and exquisitely slow grooves and gutbucket riffs that pile up and gain momentum and swirl around the room like ghosts.


Maximum Rocknroll #310 (The Health Issue) After completely ignoring Maximum Rocknroll for basically all my life, over the last year I keep finding myself buying new issues off of the newstand. I don't know... at $4 the price is right, there always seems to be at least one band/person mentioned on the cover I'd really like to read an interview with (Clockcleaner, Ray Pettibon, Billy Bao, stuff like that), and in this day and age where deep music zines are hardly ever printed on paper, all of a sudden MRR really stands out for being incredibly packed with opinion, ideas, scenes, addresses, you know, culture. Sure, I don't agree with it or care about it all, but so what? I just like the fact that it takes me a couple weeks to get through the columns section alone. Anyway... this time it's a themed issue, the health issue, so you've got all kinds of random real-people stories like getting a vasectomy, being a nursing school dropout, dealing with herpes, not having health insurance (of course), and lots more. This is also the issue with all the staff's year-end record/band/show roundups, so that's cool too. Lots of Sex/Vid mentions.

AND POST-RECKLESS, a theme emerges:
"Great Weird Black Music, Ancient To The Future"



After getting through the Reckless pile with its Death and Funkadelic, I felt the urge to follow up with another recent archival 1970s record, the one and only Chaos (1978-1986) by Wicked Witch. These are recordings by one Richard Simms, a resident not of Detroit but the original Chocolate City, Washington DC, and this is some loose, murky, and funky mutant machine disco with grunting grooves and over-the-top one-man orchestrations. Not necessarily strong in the tunes department but definitely a missing link between P-Funk and 1980s developments like Prince and Cybotron. Things get really weird, and a little dodgy, when he goes into a full-on Narada Michael Walden-era Mahavishnu Orchestra impersonation, and even weirder when he basically pulls it off. If you think Funkadelic got just a little slick in 1978 with One Nation Under A Groove, don't worry, Wicked Witch was handling things in the 'wrong' department..



After this craziness, I figured I was finally ready to hear Chicago's own ONO for the first time. I was wrong, nothing gets you ready to hear ONO. I had only recently heard about these guys for the very first time when Joe Carducci was in town to read from his latest book Enter Naomi. Before the reading started, a couple striking dudes (big, goofy, dreadlocks, sunglasses) showed up who clearly went back with Carducci and hadn't seen him in awhile. Carducci turned to a page in his book and they all looked at it and chuckled. During the Q&A after the reading, he mentioned that these two were in the band ONO, and had been on his record label Thermidor in the 1980s. The page they had looked at featured a reproduction of their original promo glossy. Checking it out later at home, that picture made me expect something kind of art-damaged and new-wave, and Carducci called them a "non-rock art group" in Rock and the Pop Narcotic. Well, tonight I played their debut album Machines That Kill People, and uh, they sure as hell don't sound like Depeche Mode -- this non-rock art is aggressively spaced-out electronic ritual, with off-kilter drum machines snapping haphazardly, mutant sax caterwauling in some far-off room, sharp but inscrutable guitar scrape, surprisingly heavy low-end surges from the non-rhythm non-section, and wow, the singing of Travis (just Travis, the guy with the dreadlocks)... he's all over the place, from Paul Robeson to Jim Morrison to, I don't know, Robby the Robot? Crazy band. Go here for a great article on 'em from the great Roctober magazine.

EXCELLENT HAUL FROM RECKLESS RECORDS

Got some store credit at Reckless....



THE MIDDLE CLASS: Out Of Vogue 7" (FRONTIER) Thought it would be fun to buy this reissue of a classic for $4.99... and it has been. It is known by many as the first HC record... I guess it's either this one or Black Flag's Nervous Breakdown 7", which is listed with an October 1978 release date at discogs.com, but no one seems to know the month in '78 that Out of Vogue came out. This article says that "Out of Vogue was released concurrently with Black Flag's Nervous Breakdown seven-inch in January 1979", which on the surface would be incorrect but may be pretty accurate in an 'entering the collective unconscious' kind of way. Regardless, Out of Vogue really is a monster record. Unlike Flag, you can hear some new wave elements in there (that apparently came to the fore with later releases, none of which I've heard), but the tempo/delivery/attitude are just nuts. Drummer Bruce Atta really drives these tunes.



MI AMI: Ark of the Covenant 12" (LOVERS ROCK) Side A is a ripping and tearing uptempo number that is not on their excellent full-length debut Watersports. By the end it cools down a little with a roaming bassline and spacy guitars, and this is the vibe that is continued for the "version" on Side B. I'm as on the fence as anybody when it comes to the wild shrieking and pleading falsetto vocals, but you gotta applaud him for sheer boldness, and I am consistently knocked out by what all three members do instrumentally, taking some trendy influences like dub, dance, punk, etc. and making something deep, brooding, and challenging, and therefore not trendy at all.



ROYAL TRUX: Twin Infinitives 2LP reissue (DRAG CITY) Oh man. Throughout the 1990s when I was doing a lot more actual record digging, an original vinyl copy of this was high on the ol' want list. It was probably the Forced Exposure review that made it so desirable, especially after buying the CD reissue -- not only did the sounds live up to the review, but the artwork clearly had to be experienced at LP gatefold scale... that stark black & white cover that folded out into a band portrait, Neil/Jennifer, man/woman, yin/yang, twin infinitives, and then on the inside foldout a huge photo/art collage, sorta like the one on the back of There's A Riot Goin' On mixed with like ancient and/or futuristic hieroglyphics... but as I often say about various records, none of it would matter if wasn't for the sounds, and these sounds were about as baffling and unpinnable as rock music got after Trout Mask Replica... I'm not going to try to explain it, but I will quote Neil Hagerty himself on the process: "I took all the tapes I had: rehearsals, studio stuff that survived, other random shit like shortwave recording etc and cut that together in a long collage. Then I broke that into short segments arbitrarily, about the length of a good rock song. We dumped those segments onto multitrack, called them songs, and just started putting little patchwork bits here and there for the next year and a half or whatever it was." Right on, and now that Drag City has reissued the thing on double vinyl in all its original gatefolded glory, I gotta say the sonics really do hold up. Side A has a bunch of short songs -- the first one "Solid Gold Tooth" is more heraldic and incantatory than likeable, but then comes "Ice Cream" and "Jet Pet" which are the two greatest songs on the album. The last two "RTX-USA" and "Kool Down Wheels" have incredible titles and sound plenty kool while listening (I just checked) but are somehow consistently impossible to remember, not because they are forgettable, but because of the dream-state fervor of creation that Hagerty alludes to in his production notes. Side B starts with another classic, the third greatest song on the album, and the first greatest manifesto on the album, "Chances Are The Comets In Our Future." (I always loved the line "Our home is everywhere we've been.") Great vocals by Herrema, on this song and "Ice Cream," in a sweeter non-growling style that she seemed to have mostly ditched in later years. Side B is rounded out by "Yin Jim Versus The Vomit Creature" and "Osiris," more incredible titles, also completely immemorable dream surge action. Side three really lays it on the line with a side-longer called "Edge of the Ape Oven," and the band comes up aces -- Trux could indeed jam extendo, though it's something they haven't done too much of during their career as a whole. (The somewhat overlooked Hand of Glory notwithstanding.) Finally, side four mirrors side one by ending the album with a handful of short tracks, again all with incredible rock titles: "Florida Avenue Theme," "Lick My Boots," "Glitterburst," "Funky Son," "Ratcreeps," "NY Avenue Bridge." Guess what, I can't put my finger on anything about any of these songs either but, like the rest of the album, they sound amazing when you're listening (I just checked).



YAHOWA 13: Feather of Wisdom LP (PHOENIX) Being the furtive owner of quasi-illegal downloads of the entire 13-disc God and Hair box set, I didn't think I needed any more Yahowa music in my life. However, with credit in my pocket, this new LP seemed worth it just for the way the silkscreened sleeve looked and felt. Also, and perhaps more importantly, I had heard that it was just two side-long jams from a November 2007 reunion gig in San Francisco, and one thing I have a Carduccian appreciation for about the Yahowa music is that, from the Spirit of '76 to Yahowa 13 to Fire, Water, Air all the way up to this LP a good 30 years later, it has always been made by the same core power trio: Djin on guitar, Sunflower on bass, and Octavius on drums. That, and their total commitment to improvisation, that is, to the jam. This show/LP opens with some atmospheric chanting and gong rolls which lead into the familiar extended oozing psychedelic death-trip crud that only these three can lay down. I gotta say they sound as dark, as weird, and as crude as ever, and still with that driving garage/soul undercurrent.



GROUP BOMBINO: Guitars From Agadez Vol. 2 LP (SUBLIME FREQUENCIES) Didn't even hesitate to get this one despite the 23.99 price tag. Well worth it, I say... another electric guitar band in that loping Tuareg style, as heard from Group Inerane on SF's Guitars From Agadez Vol. 1 release. This time, however, side one is all-acoustic, known as the "dry guitar" style, and it's really nice... the soulful, grooving, and propulsive style certainly still comes through... but when the band plays electric on the flip side, they are next-level, with a great driving machine edge.



IRMA THOMAS: Sings LP (CHANGE) Oh man, what a great record. I had read about her but I really hadn't heard her music until this grey-area reissue album came out and people were raving about it. Now I am too -- I can't get these songs out of my head, especially "Somebody Told You" with its absolutely slamming verse/chorus: "Somebody told you I was running around/Somebody said with Mr. Brown across town/If ya don't see sharp ya might be flat/It's always somebody sayin this, somebody sayin that but never a fact." Then "Mrs. Brown across town" shows up on "I Done Got Over"... this time Irma is the one getting run around on, and it's more of a mid-tempo aching ballad. Or how about the slow-burning "It's Raining" and "Ruler Of My Heart"? Apparently Otis R. adapted the latter for his "Pain In My Heart" but I've forgotten all about that now that I've heard this... man, the way she sings "Make me a queen/Happy again/Hear my cry/Please, my king"... whoah. Or how about the male background vocals on "You Were Here," the tuff-as-nails way they sing the title and then actually go "Diddy-loo-bop, doo-bop, doo-bop, doo-bop"... anyway, every song on this record is truly great and I love them more every time I play it. (And hey, here's an interview with her by John Sinclair himself.)

TO BE CONTINUED!

#27 IS FINALLY UP

At BLASTITUDE.COM. Thanks for your patience. Really great articles by Derek Monypeny (Morocco Tour Diary), Chris Sienko (Complete Rahsaan Roland Kirk LP Guide), and Tony Rettman (Tribute to George Carlin). Carlin really was the best. Buncha reviews by me but so what. Today's rulers: Wolf Eyes Dead Hills, John Fahey Days Have Gone By, and Joaquin Phoenix on Letterman. Bummed about Lux Interior. Have a good one, more regular updates coming soon here on the blog.

PREVIEW FROM BLASTITUDE #27

Here's a heavy preview from The Oud and the Ney: A Morocco Diary by Derek Monypeny, coming up in a couple weeks when Blastitude #27 goes up...



And, related:



Stay tuned!

CIRITH UNGOL
King of the Dead (Enigma, 1984)
If you're reading this you've probably heard of them, and have assumed correctly that they are a metal band, but have you actually heard them yet? Apparently the band was formed in 1972, but existed somewhat nebulously and without discography until 1979, when they self-released a demo tape and then an LP called Frost & Fire. Finally in 1981 they scored a deal with independent metal/punk/new wave powerhouse Enigma Records (Poison, 45 Grave, Agent Orange, DEVO, Don Dixon, Bill Nelson, Peter Hammill, Al Stewart, Barren Cross, Berlin, Channel 3, Lääz Rockit, Chris Poland, XYZ, The Dead Milkmen, Death Angel, Obsession, Stryper, Great White, Hurricane, Green on Red, Lizzy Borden, Mötley Crüe, Mojo Nixon & Skid Roper, Ratt, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Slayer, The Smithereens, Steve Kilbey, Guardian, TSOL, The Untouchables, Wednesday Week, Ike Willis, The Leaving Trains, Plasticland, The Terminator OST, River's Edge OST, Sonic Youth's Daydream Nation...), who re-released Frost & Fire and then three more albums that, though highly identifiable due to the sword-and-sorcery cover paintings by Michael Whelan, were completely ignored by almost everyone, to this very day.

I think people were/are simply put off by the name, one of the weirdest in heavy metal history, an unknown phrase that may be the name of a person, place, or thing, or perhaps some strange state of being, but in any case strikes a perfect pitch between fantasy, horror, and total arcane obscurity. What it really means is "spider's cleft," at least in the Elvish language Sindarin, and it is the name of a fantastically extreme mountain pass in J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle Earth (check The Return Of The King). This is all very heavy, but then you finally hear the band, as I finally have via a digital copy of their second album King of the Dead (generally considered their best), and the whole story takes another left turn, because they don't come on as ultra-heavy. Even though they were SoCal peers with Metallica, having appeared on the same 1982 Metal Massacre comp that James and Lars and company debuted on, their grooves are slower, bluesier, stonery-er, very 1970s hard rock, a sound that competely ignores punk and its speed-metal stepchildren. (Says drummer Robert Garvin in an interview with Sleazegrinder.com: "I like a lot of punk and that’s why I guess we were so turned off by speed metal, because it seemed as if it was an unholy cross of punk and metal, I still don’t like speed metal or rap rock for that matter.") They are also more midrangy than you might expect -- even the bassist Michael "Flint" Vujea has a trebly tone, plays loose with the riffs, and sprinkles in plucky fills that are sometimes even borderline jazzy. Another left turn comes in the form of occasional crude classical filigree (the penultimate track on King of the Dead is a shred-metal version of Bach's "Tocatta in D" -- after all, another peer was Yngwie Malmsteen himself, who also made his vinyl debut on that first Metal Massacre comp, in the band Steeler) that furthers the twisted 'garage occult' flavor of the band name, and can blossom into moments of heavy-duty epic-ness, such as the twin guitar solo on "Finger of Scorn."

But nothing about the band is as twisted as the singer. He is the amazing and terrible leather-and-headband-wearing long-hair named Tim Baker, and he sings in some sort of constant screeching hiss. I'm sure mileage will vary on this guy, but he had me by the second song, especially because said song is called "Black Machine" and has a chorus that carries on the same biker dirge riff as the verse as Baker hisses one of the ultimate metal phrases: "Get on and RIIIIDE!!!" followed by "The Black MaCHIIIIIIIIIIINNNE!" Not to mention verses like "Pearly whites behind back drawn lips/Ride with the Masters of the Pit/Snapping jaws of the dogs of doom/Kick your way from this stagnant tomb." The lyrics throughout the whole album are prime sword-and-sorcery/horror/comic book stuff, with nothing about babes, partying, or anything from the entire modern world mentioned ever. (This is not the case with their debut album Frost & Fire, which is still a pretty interesting listen, but with a bit more of a party-metal thing going on, and I haven't been able to get into it after King of the Dead. Still haven't gotten to their later albums.)



The correct way is to pronounce it like a “K”; this is from the “Lord of the Rings”. However we always pronounce it with a soft “C” like an “S” like Searith, which is of course wrong, but hey, we all read the books. We should have read all the appendixes too, I guess!



No one could really dance to our music. I remember once even yelling in the microphone for people to sit down and that we did not want "Any dancing fools." I think we were so into our music we took it as an insult and expected our listeners to sit down as if they were at a classical concert.



I am not completely happy with the legacy we have left behind but I am proud of “Frost & Fire” & “King of the Dead” as they are the albums that we had complete control over, and if we could have remained in control of our music the rest would have been as good!

When I look into the mirror and deep in my heart, possibly I am the one to blame for Cirith Ungol’s failure. This is the burden that I must carry the rest of my life, and is my greatest sorrow. All I ever wanted to do is play drums and I still dream at night about getting a new set, or the band getting back together. I am haunted and tortured by the ghost of Cirith Ungol, and I am not sure that I will ever find peace.

(Images from The Official Cirith Ungol Website)
(Quotes by Cirith Ungol drummer Robert Garvin, interviewed by Sleazegrinder.com)

TODAY'S MINDBLOWERS

As tipped and ripped for listening pleasure over at the To Live And Shave In L.A. blog (check out the great performance photo and Tom's on-point caption), this 1977 LP is a masterpiece. Goofy cover (that Carly Ptak may or may not have been thinking about in this photo shoot) but the music within is dead serious (well, it can be pretty playful too). Vocal and electronic techniques somewhere between contemporary classical melisma, pre-punk Yoko Ono avant/jazz freakout, and outright dolphin-speak... Side Two is an extremely heavy jammed-out composition called "Thunder" in which La Barbara is joined by two timpanis... legions of young noisers today need to recognize this predecessor, still at it today...



Ah, the Tuvan throat singing of Huun-Huur-Tu.... this one could also go into the 'extended vocal technique' pile but really it's just some glorious heavy ecstatic high-steppes ancient animal/wind/etc-communion drone folk. I bought their classic CD 60 Horses In My Herd back in like 1993 or something, and then in the summer of 2002 I actually got to see them live at the Chicago Folk & Roots Festival in Welles Park. It was one of the most amazing shows I've ever seen. They played at about 2 or 3 in the afternoon with a particularly blazing July sun positioned directly behind and just above the stage. It was impossible to look directly at the band, so I just stood there and closed my eyes as this otherworldy droning gentle and soulful music seemed to emanate from directly inside the sun. Occasionally I would dare to look upon the stage, just long enough to see the stoic silhouettes of one or two of the band members as they sat and sang and/or strummed*. And today, in the very beginning of 2009, I'm listening to a 2008 release by them called Mother Earth! Father Sky! and it is so good, as sundazed as ever, better than 60 Horses, with what seems to be plenty of their own songs, and a real contempo and genuinely psychedelic ballad feel, especially when the band is joined by one Sainkho Namtchylak, a wonderful and heavy Tuvan female singer apparently of some reknown....

*Holy shit, I was just now at the Wikipedia page for Huun-Huur-Tu and here's what it says: "Not long afterwards, the group changed its name to Huun-Huur-Tu, meaning "sunbeams" (literally "sun propeller")."

RON ASHETON 1948-2009

Man . . . 60 is too young. Gonna listen to The Stooges and Funhouse to pay tribute. Especially "Dirt". Truly gut-wrenching and explosive guitar playing.

NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTION: CLEAN UP STACKS AND STACKS OF RECORDS

I hate to just make a list like this but I'm cleaning out a cabinet stuffed with well over 200 official CD releases (well, a lot of them are official CDR releases) that all came out in the last two or three years. This is where I put stuff that I listened to at least once and found intriguing, or outright excellent, but had yet to do enough research or be hit by the right inspiration to write up an actual review. However, I'm listing them here because they are all good enough to have a copy registered, for posterity, in the Library of Blastitude, as of today. (In other words, I'm not going to try to trade them in at Reckless.) I know that to you, the reader, it may just be another list you'll skim over, big deal, but I thought these records should at least get some props -- you should see how many more went in the 'sell or throw away' pile. I won't name those.

So, before these all get filed and dispersed into the impersonality of the collection-at-large, here's what was stuffed in that cabinet, in the order they were stacked after approximately 3 years of on-and-mostly-off use:

BASS TONE TRAP: Trapping (MUSIC A LA COQUE)
BILL BROVOLD AND LARVAL: Surviving Death/Alive Why? (CUNEIFORM)
JEREMIAH CYMERMAN: Big Exploitation (SOLPONTICELLO)
KING DARVES: Linkling Piratical (?) (SELF-RELEASED)
MIGHTY VITAMINS: Take-Out (PUBLIC EYESORE)
PRURIENT: Black Vase (LOAD)
JACK WRIGHT: As Is (SPRING GARDEN MUSIC maybe)
YUMA NORA: 2003-2004 Best of Portland Live + Still (SELF-RELEASED)
THE NEW FLESH: Filth & Degradation Volume One (IMVATED/MT6)
SHELF LIFE: Ductworks (PUBLIC EYESORE)
UNIVERSITY OF ERRORS: Jet Propelled Photographs (CUNEIFORM)
RODENT SQUEALS: High Pitch Distress Cries (APOP)
JAZZFINGER: Listen And Vanish (CUT HANDS)
VARIOUS ARTISTS: Deeded To Itself: Athens Southernoise (THOR'S RUBBER HAMMER)
LAKE OF DRACULA: Skeletal Remains (SAVAGE LAND)
CHRIS FORSYTH & NATE WOOLEY: The Duchess of Oysterville (CREATIVE SOURCES)
VARIOUS ARTISTS: Singing At The Moon (SINGING KNIVES)
CLOCKCLEAN ER: Babylon Rules (LOAD)
MAGICAL, BEAUTIFUL: Obscure Love (I HEAR A NEW WORLD)
COUGHS: Secret Passage CD (LOAD)
THE JAGUAR: Bag of Jag (WILD TANGENT)
DEAD MACHINES/SCIENTIFIC EXPLANATION OF DESPAIR split (KITTY PLAY)
VENISON WHIRLED: Venison World (SISTER SKULL)
KATHLEEN BAIRD: Lullaby For Strangers (SECRET EYE)
PETER WRIGHT: Pariahs Sing Om (LAST VISIBLE DOG)
CABINET OF NATURAL CURIOSITIES: Glass Vs. Grass (SELF-RELEASED)
CABINET OF NATURAL CURIOSITIES: Vineland (SELF-RELEASED)
TO LIVE AND SHAVE IN L.A. 2: The 300 Dollar Silk Shirt CD (X+Z=0/UGEXPLODE)
HAT CITY INTUITIVE/LA OTRACINA/BIG NURSE: The World Will End Yesterday (COLOUR SOUNDS)
KING DARVES: Do Don't (SELF-RELEASED)
PHANTOM LIMB & BISON s/t (EXPLODING EAR)
MATTIN: Proletarian Of Noise (HIBARI)
CARDBOARD: Live At Jimmy's Chicken Shack (CARSONA)
VOLE: Vole Radio 1 (SELF-RELEASED)
RADIO SHOCK: Burn Down Radio EP (ROGER)
ALEC K. REDFEARN AND THE EYESORES: The Blind Spot (CUNEIFORM)
WEASEL WALTER: Early Recordings 1988-1991 (SAVAGE LAND)
MISS ALEX WHITE & THE RED ORCHESTRA: Space & Time (IN THE RED)
SLOW SIX: Nor'easter CD (NEW ALBION)
THE FLAT CAN CO. s/t (STAB)
ROSS HAMMOND TRIO: Gauche (PRESCOTT)
JOHN HEGRE: Colors Don't Clash (DEKORDER)
NO-NECK BLUES BAND: Live At Ken's Electric Lake reissue (LOCUST)
VARIOUS ARTISTS: Flat Gettin' It (SCENERY AUDIO ARCHIVE)
DAVID KHAN: Music For Piano & Voice (kRkRkRk)
WOODEN SHJIPS s/t (HOLY MOUNTAIN)
ARGUMENTIX & GHOST TO FALCO: Widow Masters (BELOW PDX)
KEVIN FRENETTE 4: Connections (FULLER STREET MUSIC)
ZELIENOPLE: His/Hers (TYPE)
HAUNTED GEORGE: Pile O' Meat (HOOK OR CROOK)
WHITE MICE: Blassstphlegmeice (LOAD)
FRIDAY GROUP: Crystal Eunuch Reversal (SELF-RELEASED)
VIKI s/t (ANIMAL DISGUISE)
MY CAT IS AN ALIEN: The Cosmological Eye Trilogy (LAST VISIBLE DOG)
VARIOUS ARTISTS: Zum Audio Volume 3 (ZUM)
MEN'S RECOVERY PROJECT: The Very Best Of... (5 RUE CHRISTINE)
MATHS BALANCE VOLUMES: Cattle Skulls And Railroad Tracks (CHOCOLATE MONK)
MATHS BALANCE VOLUMES: I Tried To Make Heaven My Home (MISCEGENY)
NAI HTAW PAING ENSEMBLE: Mon Music Of Burma (FIRE MUSEUM)
COMET III: Astral Voyager (FIRE MUSEUM)
KRAKEN FURY: Burn In Earth (RAMPART)
ANLA COURTIS: Fractal Albur Solenoide 3" (23 PRODUCTIONS)
R.O.T. 3" CDR (VEGLIA)
GOAT/SIXES/XOME: Deluxe Incinerator 3x3" (C.I.P.)
FESTERING FAWN: Belgium Demo 3" (BREAKING WORLD)
THREE LEGGED RACE/CABOLADIES split (MOUNTAAIN)
BJERGA/IVERSEN: Shortest Way To The Moon (HARHA-ASKEL)
MICHAEL HENRITZI: Keith Rowe Serves Imperialism (W.M.O/R)
WOMEN IN TRAGEDY: Constellations (CUT HANDS)
HENRY JAMES GLOVER: Queen Freq (SELF-RELEASED)
CRAPPY NIGHTMAREVILLE: Shadow Garden (SELF-RELEASED)
NEON TEMPAL s/t (RAYON)
CARS s/t (RAYON)
REALICIDE: Narcissism Is The Enemy (OUTFALL CHANNEL)
THE MAGICKAL FOLK OF THE FARAWAY TREE: The Mildew Leaf (DESERTED VILLAGE)
BRIMSTONE HOWL: Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! (SPEED NEBRASKA)

If anyone wants to give, or ask for, any more information on any of these records, or just say "hey I like that one too," you are welcome to leave a comment. Thanks and a sincere Happy Blastitew Year to all readers!

Actual "2008 in review" list and actual new issue coming before January is over, I swear....

HAPPY NOT 2005!

Well a Happy New Year to all of you, may it be half as happy as mine, sitting here home alone tonight cleaning up the house (believe me, it's intentional and I love it), finally getting to a bunch of vinyl that's been sitting in a hidden away stack by my stereo for well over a year, probably well over two years. Okay, okay, it's been THREE YEARS in some cases. It's these records that all came out at about the same time, mid-late 2005 seems about right, and I tell ya, I don't usually get too negative on the ole blog here, but I haven't even gotten to a side two yet with any of these. I keep taking them off instead of flipping them over because they're all this same sort of annoying shriek-tactic art-school (or wanna-be art-school) tantrum-punk. First record was by An Albatross (I can't show you the 'rad' and 'gnarly' silkscreened monster/thing on the cover because I can't find an image online but the album is called Freedom Summer Live if you wanna research it yourself). I didn't even make it through the first side. Next was Abe Vigoda. I know people like them, and it was a better album -- I made it through all of Side A -- but I still didn't see the point. I mean, it punk rocks along all right, but I'm just not getting any specific soul or nuance from it, and the singer doesn't seem to be saying anything as he sort of hum-yells his way along in a strictly sub-instrumental role that might as well be wordless. There's skill and cleverness in the playing and the guitar/bass/drums arrangements and the way the parts move and interlock and forge ahead, sure, and I imagine they can put on an exciting show, but I'll put this one (even with its stylin' Not Not Fun silk-screened and hand-sewn and marbled-vinyl package) in the sell pile. Let me know if you want it... After Abe Vigoda I put on this crazy (great) looking picture disc (lots of cats) by a Bay Area band called So So Many White White Tigers whom I remember hearing about circa 2005... I see that Chris Woodhouse recorded it, I like his bands like Karate Party and the Mayyors, but this So So Many band is just not my cup of songwriting tea, nothing but stiffly fast caterwaul and meaningless aggro. I made it through all of Side A but I think only because it's a 45 RPM. Jeez, what is up with this music?? I'm really glad that around 2006 the weird underground rediscovered KBD or soul music or something, because I feel like the music that's been bubbling up since then has gotten more listenable overall... even when this newer so-called "weird punk" is generic (and it often is), at least it's not constantly frantic-times-ten, at least it can slow down to a fast trot and groove a little (like the aforementioned Mayyors), at least the singers occasionally make an actual statement involving words, ideas, or feelings, and sometimes they're even good enough to do it via actual musical phrasing... instead of just shrieks or aggro sounds. Funny, next record on the pile was Prescribed Burning by the Hair Police... now this is a band I actually listened to and liked in 2005, but I haven't listened to 'em too much lately, and I was like "Hmm, they do shrieks and aggro too, maybe I won't like this anymore," but you know what, this is a much better record than the last three, simply because Hair Police are a much better band. I mean it's not Hair Police's best, maybe not even in their top five, but it's got QUIET PARTS. It's a record that remembers that human beings BREATHE. And it's still plenty noisy too, take that all you 2005 aggro art punkers.

WINTERLUDE, WINTERLUDE

All photos from the Chicago area, taken this week, lifted from the WGN Weather Center Blog!

Great winter-time listening today and tonight - every album has been a perfect soundtrack for a December-in-Chicago deep freeze that has lasted for basically three weeks now (one of the Top 20 coldest winter starts in the last 150 years... something like that... wait, just figured it out, it's Chicago's "13th snowiest open to a cold season since 1884," to be exact). It's been snowing all day and we're at 4 to 5 inches right now, at 9:19PM. And, of course, I've been listening to music all day too, starting at 7:30 AM and still going strong, and this is how it looks:

EXCEPTER: Dusted Desert Island Dozen podcast, thanks to Kick to Kill blog for the reminder... what better way to start a day at work in a freezing basement than on a virtual technicolor beach...
GROUPER: Dragging A Dead Deer Up The Hill (TYPE) So good... 1970's sweet lady folk rock + 2000's dream noise + 1600's chorale music that indeed sounds like its transmitting directly from the sky over some still frozen planet.
THE CHILLS: 5 songs, Pink Frost and Rolling Moon 7-inches (FLYING NUN) Two or three completely separate times this year I've come across someone saying that "Pink Frost" by The Chills is a great song. I took note, of course, but I've always been more of a post-Xpressway NZ head and ended up never hearing the band or song until today when one of the ladies at work was playing this great sparse eerie driving post-punk mood-pop... I asked her who it was and she didn't know, it wasn't her mix... I googled some lyrics, "I'm so scared" and "Now she's dead," which seemed a little too generic to be effective but there it was anyway at the top of the results: "Pink Frost." Good thing I had finally gotten around to downloading it a couple weeks ago because some blog had posted rips of these two early singles (1984 and 1982 respectively)...
DONOVAN QUINN: October Lanterns (PUISSANT) Apparently this is a sold-out edition-of-1oo CDR-only release... I got this from a blog too and it's pretty good, with a rather grim and cold downbeat folk-rock atmosphere, certainly part of the If I Could Only Remember My Name lineage... although I wonder if he's been listening to the even colder (East Coast) Peter Kelley LPs or those modern-day Kelley acolytes from Chi-town, you know, Jim Collins, Tommy Roundtree, Arian Sample, C.C., Boots, Snake, Remus... Terry... those guys. The label on the other hand says "a bit off-key and folky, and calls to mind the recorded works of Treacy and Kusworth at their most dour..."
GRATEFUL DEAD: Dick's Picks #11 (GRATEFUL DEAD RECORDS) September 27, 1972 at the Stanley Theater in Jersey City. For all the warm California breeze in their music, it's just as easy to imagine it as frozen glinting ice... Ice Nine, in fact....
VELVET UNDERGROUND: 3rd (VERVE) Haven't listened to this in ages, still love it so much...
SOULED AMERICAN: Around the Horn (ROUGH TRADE) HAVE listened to this in ages, still love it so much...
THE CHILLS, those five songs again, perfect while waiting for the bus as snow falls in 20 degree weather. And then, back home:
JOHN FAHEY: The New Possibility LP (TAKOMA) and....
VINCE GUARALDI TRIO: A Charlie Brown Christmas CD (FANTASY) A couple of December staples for those evenings gathered 'round the hearth (i.e. radiator).
CURRENT AMNESIA: Pull On The Floor Board CDR (LEAF LEAF) Great edition-of-3o CDR of chilled and distant electroacoustic improvisational New Brunswick atmosphere... this dude is one-half of Car Commercials but this is much more calm and beautiful stuff...
BLACK TIME: Double Negative CD (IN THE RED) Brand new album by loud booming weird-fi British prole-punks.... didn't put it on intentionally but it was in the player after the Current Amnesia and, with its deep black design scheme, loud but cold amp tones, and general Northern England smokestack winter attitude, it certainly fit the bleak December bill. Dunno if the songwriting is gonna grab me yet or not, but I'll definitely be coming back for the wild production techniques and overall sound...
THE CHILLS, just "Pink Frost" this time, twice...
DARKTHRONE: Transilvanian Hunger CD (PEACEVILLE) "So cold...."
MILES DAVIS: Live in Copenhagen, 1969, a stunning series of Youtubes posted by the Ideologic blog (scroll down a bit)... everyone in the band is great, other than the utterly commanding MD presence I'm really digging Corea and DeJohnette especially.... no other band really sounds like this, chilly and fiery at the same time... "lonely fire," as one of their own titles put it (on the Big Fun album)...

IN THE MEANTIME.....

(Helmet reference? Yes.)

Mammal has a great new tape out on Ides Recordings, a C60 called Distant Days. It features 12 years worth of previously unreleased demos, outtakes, live stuff, etc, but for an odds 'n' sods cassette collection this thing is really just about as good as his 2007 double-LP magnum opus Lonesome Drifter. A lot of it seems like a sketchbook for that album, with those same bleak distorto-bass/drum-machine vibes cast in an even starker instrumental light, and some cuts are newer demos for the follow-up (ADR 101, to be titled Lago, I'm really looking forward to it). It can be a surprisingly mellow tape too, and even when it comes to older tracks, he seems to have selected only the most minimalist and psychedelic stuff. (None of the 'rave era' beats some of you may remember circa 2001... I can understand if he wants to leave that stuff behind but "Fog Face" from the Fog Walkers LP will always be a fave around here...) Anyway, I've been putting this on every night since I got it. Go order it from Ides and get some other stuff too, it's a really good cassette label.

Another odds & sods compilation has come our way from Load Records, this one featuring the one and only Harry Pussy, called You'll Never Play This Town Again. If you're reading this I probably don't have to tell you TOO much about them, but just in case you missed the 1990s, well, they were from Miami, Adris Hoyos is (was) a holy terror on drums and vocals but so is (was) Bill Orcutt on guitar and they are (were) a blistering impossible Beefheart/Yoko/No Wave/HC take-no-prisoners noise-rock attack that released some 7-inches and a short blast of a 12" on Siltbreeze, all of which and more is compiled on that label's crucial What Was Music? CD. This new one on Load cleans up most of their other releases, stuff like "the long out of print self released tour 12", the Cherry Smash live 10", Live at Salon Zwerge 12", Pelt & Frosty split 7"s & the De Stijl 7"s..." Some of this stuff seems to be compiled with deletions and additions - carrying on the tradition of the What Was Music? CD, the tracklisting isn't clear on the sources, but either way, all the tracks were recorded in 1997 when they were at the top of their game, playing as a red-hot gtr/gtr/drums trio. I saw 'em live in 1996 (on tour with Charalambides and Shadow Ring!) and I can recall some of the songs here specifically from that show... a lot of short blasts but there's this one very memorable track called "Mandolin" where they shift gears and play these slow gnarly tangled free-floating guitar tone clusters over Hoyos's inimitable spread-out sprawl-drumming.... it's the sole track on the one-sided Salon Zwerge record (originally released by Blackbean & Placenta) and appears three other times on here as well. But there's lots more to dig into here, heavy stuff all around, a fine disc for the fan or the newcomer.

AND NOW ON THE INTERNET:

Check out Tony Rettman's interview with Joe Carducci over at Swingset Magazine online, Part 1 and Part 2.

Interview with the late Quorthon of Bathory. As the dust continues to settle I really do find them to be one of the greatest metal bands of the last 25 years.

Say what you will about the CIA/UFO opening and the cheezy embedded sound, but I like this interpretation of 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Nicole Panter has some old photos (and big skies) on her Flickr page...

Bill Cosby portraits from Life Magazine, as tipped by WFMU's Beware of the Blog....

Man, I haven't watched Letterman in awhile but I am digging these Lyle the Intern youtubes! His first appearance is a stone classic and this one is pretty good too... "Best thing to happen on Dave since Chris Elliott"....."omfg LMFFFFAO!!!!!!!! Lyle should be Ben's son on Lost"......"I'm seriously feeling Lyle's walk"....