CIRCLE Tyrant (Latitudes 0:10) (Southern) cd 14.98
BRAND NEW CIRCLE ALBUM!!! TYRANT!! INCREDIBLY LIMITED LATEST INSTALLMENT IN THE LATITUDES SERIES!!! IT'S HERE!!!!
Okay, just wanted to get your attention. We've been waiting for this for a long, long time. As have many of you, we imagine. We've all been loving the Latitudes series of ultra limited releases from bands like Ginnungagap, Shit And Shine, the Grails, Ariel Pink, Sir Richard Bishop... so when we heard that Finland's gods of metallic hypno drone rock were going to do one, we were so psyched, and so we waited anxiously, but patiently, until finally, after months of waiting, they arrived, just a few days ago, and as if we even have to tell you, IT'S AWESOME!!!
But this declaration of awesomeness does require a bit more elaboration, as Circle have a wide variety of awesome sounds: murky propulsive modern day krautrock, wild guitar heavy NWOFHM proto-metal, extended ambient drones, loping mesmeric jazzy shuffle, it's really hard to know where the band will head next. As if it were too much to wish for, Tyrant, somehow manages to combine all of their disparate sounds into one practically perfect whole, and some of us are declaring this our favorite Circle record in ages (no mean feat, since their last one, Miljard, was fantastic, a Record Of The Week too). Three 15 minute tracks, each one a slow building epic, droning, dense, dark, hypnotic, but each with its own unique elements.
The opener, "Screaming Luovutus", is an endlessly looping space rock drone mantra, a relentlessly throbbing bassline, haunting little swirls of fluttering keyboard melody, little bits of guitar filigree, simple propulsive rhythmic shuffle, all woven into a endlessly throbbing krautrocky swirl, when suddenly over the top strange whispery demonic growls surface, super distorted, another layer of fuzzy sound, howling and whispering all ragged and harsh, almost like Circle covering Abruptum or a black metal Necks, if that makes any sense. Dizzying and weirdly heavy, a black ambient krautrock drone groove, if such a thing were possible. And if it were, you know Circle would be the ones, ahem, ARE the ones to make it happen.
The second track, with the very metal title "Steel Torment Warrior", is maybe the least metal of the batch. A super creepy, almost jazzy, soundscape, of muted rumble, bursts of super effected dubbed out drums, flurries of spaced out FX, hushed hissed vocals, splattery free jazz skitter, warbly, seasick guitar tangles all wrapped in a druggy blissy ambience. It's like a less propulsive Necks, a damaged jazzy shuffle looping into infinity, but twisted into a uniquely Circular shape.
The closer, with the even MORE metal title of "Amputation Crusade", is the grooviest and space rockiest of the three, a simple darkly melodic guitar figure, loops lazily above a slow slithery bassline and a super laid back, barely there rhythmic shuffle, like Can or Faust in extreme slow motion... you can hear the Necks again, but the band add some extra druggy fuzz guitar, and the laid back riffing is pregnant with the possibility of imminent explosion. Strange vocals lurk below the surface, the whole thing an epic trawl through some jazzy black space rock soundscape. Near the end, things build to a bit of a subdued climax, the guitars ringing and chiming, the drums pounding a bit more, very epic and majestic, but still somehow muted and laid back, petering out into a creepy little coda of guitar FX and gurgling monster vocals...
Wow. Seriously, we love Circle and everything, more than most folks, but this disc is an absolute killer!! Heavy and droney, groovy and jazzy and completely epic and mesmerizing and amazing!!
Comes packaged in a super intricate hand screened die cut fold over sleeve with a full color insert (featuring the band posing with spiked gauntlets in front of Stonehenge!!! Well, actually, in front of the chainlink fence in front of Stonehenge, which somehow makes more sense). The cover has two strange NWOFHM / Tyrant (the 't's in tyrant are battle axes of course) hooded knights silkscreened on the front and each copy is hand stamped and numbered. Limited to 1000 copies worldwide, 500 of which made it to the United States, about 250 of which made it HERE. That's right, we got an entire quarter of the pressing. And we're pretty sure that still won't be enough, we guarantee these will not be around for long...
MPEG Stream: "Screaming Luovutus"
MPEG Stream: "Steel Torment Warrior"

MAKES NICE, THE Candy Wrapper And Twelve Other Songs (Frenetic) cd 14.98
All right, before we go naming the debut album from San Francisco's The Makes Nice the #1 Pop Album Of The Summer Even Though It's Barely February Already, full disclosure: we do happen to know these guys. An especially good friend of ours is guitarist/vocalist Josh Smith, whom you too probably know from some other bands of his in the past -- he used to play lead guitar in the The Fucking Champs, and also was integral to the legendary SF black metal band Weakling! So after Josh quit the Champs a few years ago, you can imagine our reaction when, eventually, he told us that his next band project was gonna be a power pop, power trio -- with him singing as well as playing guitar! That's pretty far from the instrumental metal of The Champs, or the epic evil of Weakling, eh?? But damn if he didn't pull it off!
Teamed up with Aaron Burnham (of The Mothballs) on bass and vocals, and Jack Matthew (of Harold Ray Live In Concert) on drums, Josh's new band has not only only blown us away with their live shows but now present their killer debut album, the cryptically-titled Candy Wrapper And Twelve Other Songs. The thirteen tracks here run about 31 and a half minutes -- most of 'em not even hitting the 2 minute mark. But each is crammed with so much blazing pop energy in the vein of freakbeat, psych-pop heroes of yesteryear who populate compilations like the Nuggets 2 box set (they'll tell you themselves) that it's got enough head-nodding, foot-tapping hooks for an album twice its length, and could power a full on ballroom blitz to boot.
Hopping on a White Striped bandwagon? No, not at all. What sets The Makes Nice apart from a lot of the current crop of garage rock outfits is their emphasis on Beach Boys/Beatles styled vocal harmonies and sheer songcraft. Yeah, most of these songs are totally raw and rockin' and full of high energy sonics, but also carefully arranged with vocal sweetness that would do Brian Wilson proud. Furthermore, the album is woven throughout with memorable guitar solos. Peeling off licks with tasteful abandon and doses of thick fuzz, Josh's virtuosic playing really gives The Makes Nice their unique signature and vitality. Fucking Champs fans who pick this up just 'cause Josh is on it won't find any metal, but they will hear plenty o' great guitar playing -- and in fact, Josh really lets loose with more soloing here than he ever did in the Champs! So rad guitar + sweet harmonies + utter catchiness = why The Makes Nice totally rule, basically.
And they didn't got to all that work with the vocals without giving some thought to the lyrics as well, so this thing has just got about all the angles covered, top of the pops as far as we're concerned. Definitely this disc should have a lot of appeal to fans of sixties Brits like The Who, Pretty Things, Creation, and Tomorrow up through '70s, '80s, and '90s North American acts like The Raspberries, Cheap Trick, Redd Kross and Sloan! Seriously, the toughest thing about writing this is that we still have to write a bunch of other reviews before this week's New Arrivals list goes out, but from working on this, we've got pretty much this entire record stuck in our heads right now -- and we don't want to make it stop!
MPEG Stream: "Candy Wrapper"
MPEG Stream: "Enough Is Enough"
MPEG Stream: "November Girls"

WOLD Screech Owl (Profound Lore) cd 14.98
Seems kind of foolish to continue to proclaim different black metal bands the "weirdest ever" or "the most fucked up we've ever heard". We're quite tempted to take that route again with this bizarre Canadian horde, but the truth is, they were barely black metal to begin with, more a sort of Jeckish, Basinskian ambient blackness that bordered on the downright dreamy. Well, if anything the band has moved even further away from traditional black metal and into a distinctly, more damaged and significantly noisier world of sound.
Fortress Crookedjaw, Obey and Opex, the trio who make up this ensemble, have taken the strange scratched, looped sepia toned smear of their first record, and torn it apart, doused it in white hot sheets of crumbling guitar and damaged feedback, offering up an even more obscured black metal, a metal turned inside out so we can see the squirming guts inside, malfunctioning electronics everywhere, coating every single riff, every growled lyric, every snatch of barely audible drums, in a crackling sparking field of sonic solar flares. Like listening to Jeck's Surf on a busted car radio, where it's mostly static, but you can -almost- hear bits of melody in there somewhere. Or more accurately, listening to some old skipping 78's on Masami Akita's custom sound system, while Malefic from Xasthur sings along.
Some tracks are almost pure noise, the riffs and drums and anything else discernible as actual music, buried beneath an avalanche of Merzbowian skree, usually the vocals hovering atop, like another harsh jagged layer of sound. But occasionally, the noise abates, and we get a glimpse of some melancholy melodic murk inside, or a brief blast of black riffing, but more often than not, those bits are quickly subsumed and the record becomes a roiling chaotic black swirl once more.
A few tracks, like "The Field Hag", harken back to the first record, with the noise reeled in, and a haunting muddy soundscape allowed to drift and shimmer ghostlike, beneath a thick layer of fuzz and grit and a glass gargling demonic screech, and theoretically, every track on Screech Owl is like that, just some are more obscured and obfuscated than others. Tracks like "Windmill" and "A Sword Becomes Red With Fury" are so distorted and blown out, that they become Pan Sonic style glitch and buzz scapes, pulsing short circuited rhythms, spare and skeletal, with almost no trace of melody, metal or otherwise. Like that busted car radio when you go through a tunnel, all distorted and choppy with only little bits and snippets able to surface through the distortion and static.
Screech Owl weaves chaotically from blown out dreamscapes doused in furious fuzz, to crumbling damaged black loopscapes, to Whitehouse style noise, to soft focus looped ambience to ultra lo-fi black metal buzz, often in the same song. Distortion, noise, processed feedback, every track a delicate balance between huge pulsing flows of fuzzed out electronics, buzzing black metal madness and dreamy fuzzy drone and whir. Baffling and fucking brilliant!
MPEG Stream: "Ray Of Gold"
MPEG Stream: "So That No Sword May Strike Him Down"
MPEG Stream: "The Field Hag"
MPEG Stream: "A Sword Becomes Red With Fury"

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BENIGHTED LEAMS Obombrid Welkins (Supernal) cd 15.98
Way back in 1999, the first time we ever heard them, we referred to Benighted Leams as "possibly the most retarded black metal band ever"! A level of dementedness and fucked up-ness by which all others would be measured. Leams mainman A.K. took umbrage, wondering why we would possibly describe his band that way, and how such a review could be expected to sell records?
Funny thing is, we sold tons and tons, Benighted Leams becoming THE sort of AQ black metal band. Gloriously damaged and demented, fucked up and oh so weird. Perhaps 'retarded' was not the ideal word choice, but we were trying to capture the essence of BL's then-sound, a sort of stumbling, struggling WTF black metal buzz. The drums were programmed and off time, often too loud, the guitars and vocals were alternately buried in the mix, and ear shreddingly loud. BUT! It was one of those perfect moments, where all of those various accidents and musical mistakes combined to create something vastly superior to its constituent parts. Still to this day, one of the greatest, weirdest, most inspired outsider bands EVER.
So here we are, almost 8 years, and a few Leams discs later, when we got word of a brand new Benighted Leams!!! Holy Shit were we excited!! A new Leams on the way. We had been hovering around the front door waiting for the mailman like kids at Christmas, when the day suddenly came and there was a big ol' package for us (and you!) from the UK, and inside we knew, lurked the new Leams!!
A lot has changed in the Benighted Leams camp -- no struggling damaged fucked up black metal stumble anymore, nope, the new Leams is thick and heavy, relentless, and HUGE sounding, like maybe it was recorded in a real studio, the guitars are massive and crunchy, the riffs killer and grim, the drums could still be programmed, but they sound much more organic, settled perfectly in the mix, a swirling, mostly midtempo blackness, with brief bursts of glorious blasting buzz. The vocals are buried, alternating with bits of found sound and purloined speeches. On first listen the untrained ear might not necessarily realize that this was Benighted Leams, but we know! There's no disguising the gloriously bizarre blackness that is Benighted leams. From the album title, Obombrid Welkins, to the song titles, "Kevin Macdonald's Theory Of Eurocentralism As A Group Evolution Strategy", "There Descends A Nauseating Dampness", "Alopaecia", to the strange but gorgeous design and layout, complete with a photo to accompany each track's lyrics (including a shot of a head obviously afflicted with "Alopaecia"), to the murky band photos (one half of BL is female apparently!), to the music! Drone drenched black metal, relentless and hypnotic, single riffs repeated over and over, simple and mournful and mesmerizing, minor key melodies tangled up in fuzzed out buzz, the vocals and samples making the songs sound ghostly and haunting.
Definitely not the weirdest Benighted Leams record, but possibly the best! As with all things Leams, HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!
MPEG Stream: "Kevin Macdonald's Theory Of Eurocentralism As A Group Evolution Strategy"
MPEG Stream: "Obombrid Welkins"
MPEG Stream: "The Fame Of Dead Mens Deeds"

BIRDFLESH / HATEBEAK Happy Death / The Thing That Should Not Beak (Relapse) 7" 3.50
Finally! The return of our favorite parrot fronted grind metal outfit, Hatebeak! And as if realizing that a bird squawking along to death metal might be a one trick pony, the band has gone and mixed things up, turning their jokey avian death metal into something way more weird and damaged and in the long run, an even better (and more musically complex) joke.
It's still high concept: Waldo the parrot is lead vocalist for the band Hatebeak, a play on the band Hatebreed we can only assume. This time, the cover is some horrible creature (Cthulhu we presume) with a parrot perched on its shoulder. Titled "The Thing That Should Not Beak" coupled with the track "Hellbent For Feathers" (Metallica and Judas Priest jokes respectively for the metallically dim out there) and the Hatebeak logo is done in the style of the Relapse Records logo... it's all very funny, metal nerd inside jokes, but the thing is, as a band, Hatebeak totally shred!
The two tracks are bookended by what ends up being a parrot prank call, but in between it's raging, complex, super technical grinding death metal. Another one of those bands that had they ditched the whole bird on vocals angle, could probably be huge! And this time it's not just regular old bird squawks and squeaks, Waldo's 'vocals' are bizarre, obviously overdubbed, they go from strange almost talking, to screeches, to weird guttural almost death metal vocals, all tangled up amidst insanely brutal, super stop start grinding metal mayhem. Awesome!
On the B side are Swedish goof grinders Birdflesh, chosen for their monicker as much as their sound we'd assume, but sonically, they are the perfect match, a whole bunch of songs crammed onto their side, fast and furious, technical and brutal, and just a little bit goofy, like their bizarre, costumed band photos on the cover.
Pressed on swirled lime green vinyl and as with most things like this, extremely limited!

BISHOP, SIR RICHARD Fingering The Devil (Latitudes 0:07V) (Latitudes) lp 21.00
We've all been going nuts for Southern's Latitudes series, super limited releases from Ginnungagap, Shit And Shine, Ariel Pink, Grails, Paradise Island, and elsewhere on this list, new ones from Magik Markers and Circle! Well the fine folks at Southern have decided to press a few of those Latitudes discs on vinyl! The first of which is Fingering The Devil from the Sun City Girls' Sir Richard Bishop, in his solo guitar Improvika mode. Very much in the spirit of the current American Primitive / neo Appalachia sound, exploring similar territory as Jack Rose, Stephen Basho-Jungans, Charlie Schmidt and of course John Fahey, but on these improvised tracks, Bishop injects a healthy dose of flamenco which is sort of surprising. Not that Bishop isn't well versed in various musics of the world, he most definitely is as any number of SCG records will attest to, but it still sounds a little surprising in this context, but the result is truly gorgeous. Moody and emotional, dark and dense, dreamy and lyrical. Just Bishop and a steel string guitar unfurling dense tangles of intricate fingerpicking, as well as slow contemplative melodies, all rich with Spanish flavor. Occasionally Bishop goes for an Eastern raga like vibe instead, and ends up sounding closer to UK guitarist James Blackshaw or Rose at his most drone-y. So so lovely indeed!
Comes packaged in a cool diecut sleeve, a variation on the immediately recognizable Latitudes cd packaging, although this time, white on black instead of white on brown. Includes the same insert as the cd. Pressed on cool grey splatter vinyl. And of course, SUPER SUPER LIMITED!!!
MPEG Stream: "Abydos"
MPEG Stream: "Dream Of The Lotus Eaters"
MPEG Stream: "Romany Trail"

BOREDOMS Super Roots 3 (Vice) cd 12.98
Vice magazine may be most (in)famous for their magazine, especially the always enjoyable Do's & Don't's, but you've also got to hand it to their record label arm for championing the one and only Boredoms on this side of the Pacific. First they brought us the US edition of the Boredom's latest album Seadrum/House Of Sun, now they're reissuing the semi-legendary Super Roots series! So far, installments 1, 3 and 5. Eventually 6 and beyond (we hear tell that SR 9 is currently in the works, over in Japan). Er, what about 2 and 4 you're wondering? Well, Super Roots 2 was a limited edition promotional 3" cd ep only available with purchase of the Japanese release of Chocolate Synthesizer, and for the life of us we can't recall what the deal was (or wasn't) with Super Roots 4, actually we don't think it ever existed!
Confused? Well if you're not a hardcore Bore-fan, you might not even know what the heck the Super Roots discs are all about. Well, they were (are) sort of a series of between-album experiments wherein the Bore-crew goes off to explore some weird tangents... as hard as it is to imagine anything MORE experimental and weird than "regular" Boredoms albums themselves!!
And only Super Roots 1 and 6 were ever previously released in the USA, back when the Boredoms were still, in some Lollapalooza related hangover, seen by major label Reprise as being a reasonable investment! So 3 and 5, having only been available before as expensive Japanese imports, are going to be new to a lot of folks... and it's about time you heard 'em!! Seriously, if you're into any sort of psychedelic drone excess from the underground bands that we're constantly freaking on and on about some limited edition cd-r by, or love love love you some Boris, not to mention the likes of the Boredom's own kraut-drone masterpiece Super Ae and subsequent albums, you're gonna NEED to hear Super Roots 3 and Super Roots 5, they'll make you feel GOOD.
Super Roots 3, specifically: some, uh, "hard bore", um, "bore core" here from 1994!! It's just one track, that might be titled "Hard Trance Away (Karaoke Of Cosmos)". Or maybe that's just a random slogan on the sleeve, it's hard to tell. In any case, the track is a doozy! Slightly over a half hour of raging, relentless, rhythmic chug, followed by a few minutes of silence. It's pretty amazing, the monomaniacal, minimalist, thrashing energy of this all-instrumental punk-metal gallop, you can imagine that the floor of the studio was shin-deep in sweat by the time they were done recording. Ultimately psychedelic in its repetitiousness, this piece seems always to be striving to attain some higher level, that eventually you realize they (and you, the listener) have reached long ago. Definitely the sort of thing (in a similar but different way as Super Roots 5 as well) that fans of Boris at their most extreme would dig... and thus quite recommended!!
MPEG Stream: "Hard Trance Away [excerpt 1]"
MPEG Stream: "Hard Trance Away [excerpt 2]"

BOREDOMS Super Roots 5 (Vice) cd 15.98
Vice magazine may be most (in)famous for their magazine, especially the always enjoyable Do's & Don't's, but you've also got to hand it to their record label arm for championing the one and only Boredoms on this side of the Pacific. First they brought us the US edition of the Boredom's latest album Seadrum/House Of Sun, now they're reissuing the semi-legendary Super Roots series! So far, installments 1, 3 and 5. Eventually 6 and beyond (we hear tell that SR 9 is currently in the works, over in Japan). Er, what about 2 and 4 you're wondering? Well, Super Roots 2 was a limited edition promotional 3" cd ep only available with purchase of the Japanese release of Chocolate Synthesizer, and for the life of us we can't recall what the deal was (or wasn't) with Super Roots 4, actually we don't think it ever existed!
Confused? Well if you're not a hardcore Bore-fan, you might not even know what the heck the Super Roots discs are all about. Well, they were (are) sort of a series of between-album experiments wherein the Bore-crew goes off to explore some weird tangents... as hard as it is to imagine anything MORE experimental and weird than "regular" Boredoms albums themselves!!
And only Super Roots 1 and 6 were ever previously released in the USA, back when the Boredoms were still, in some Lollapalooza related hangover, seen by major label Reprise as being a reasonable investment! So 3 and 5, having only been available before as expensive Japanese imports, are going to be new to a lot of folks... and it's about time you heard 'em!! Seriously, if you're into any sort of psychedelic drone excess from the underground bands that we're constantly freaking on and on about some limited edition cd-r by, or love love love you some Boris, not to mention the likes of the Boredom's own kraut-drone masterpiece Super Ae and subsequent albums, you're gonna NEED to hear Super Roots 3 and Super Roots 5, they'll make you feel GOOD.
Here's the lowdown on Super Roots 5... Like Super Roots 3, this is also just one track. But it's about twice as long -- over an hour! Originally released in 1995, Super Roots 5 begins with one of those soft-loud potential heart attacks (at about five minutes in, when Eye shouts "Go!" and the volume EXPLODES) that Boris and Corrupted have also utilized to good effect. From then on, it's a MASSIVE sea of sonic waves, crashing and crossing, surging and rarely slacking. Foreshadowing the heavily percussive attack of later "Voordoms" efforts, a big part of this seems to be cymbals, excited into a constant, shifting, shimmering drone... It's GORGEOUS. And mesmerizing. Something to surrender to, something that if it lasted hours, rather than "just" an hour, would elicit no complaints from us at all! Y'know how some of the Boredoms' recent output, and particularly their "Voordoms" live shows, have drawn comparisons to some sort of "extreme" drum circle? Well how 'bout with Super Roots 5, it's not a circle, but an infinitely heavy and dense dot?
Pretty much a Boredoms ESSENTIAL, this one, 'specially now that it's more affordable/available!
MPEG Stream: "Super Roots 5 [excerpt 1]"
MPEG Stream: "Super Roots 5 [excerpt 2]"

CHATHAM, RHYS A Crimson Grail (Table Of The Elements) cd 16.98
In 2005 the city of Paris commissioned avant-composer and no-wave legend Rhys Chatham to orchestrate and conduct a piece to be played in the basilica of Sacre-Coeur, the largest church in France. Chatham took this amazing opportunity to have his piece A Crimson Grail performed for this first time. The piece calls for 400 electric guitars!!! In a Basilica!! Holy Shit!! Rhys Chatham and 400 electric guitars = get ready to be blasted by unrelenting noise, right? WRONG! Somehow Chatham manages to use this army of guitars to make one of his most beautiful and celestial pieces to date. The guitars come together to create a glistening wall of sound that had to make those 10,000 in attendance simply melt into their seats. Exciting to hear what could have been overblown bombast, and a flexing of too much guitar muscle turned into a subtle and shimmering work that creates space and tension and emotion and seeps right into your soul. Last year was chock full of great Chatham reissues, we couldn't get enough, so it's thrilling to start the new year not with a reissue, but a brand new piece as thrilling as anything Chatham has ever done. So totally stunning!
MPEG Stream: "A Crimson Grail: Part One"
MPEG Stream: "A Crimson Grail: Part Three"

CROW, ROB Living Well (Temporary Residence) cd 14.98
Mr. Rob Crow is one very swell, very talented, very varied and very prolific chap. His awesome projects past and present include Pinback, The Ladies, Heavy Vegetable, Thingy, Optiganally Yours, and oh yes, Goblin Cock too! All of them bear the unmistakable crafty clever catchy stamp of Mr. Crow. His latest solo outing is no exception. All the good stuff that we love about this songsmith is here in spades -- time signature twists, endearing dreamy boy vocals, noodle-oodly guitar lines, and the catchiest hooks. He keeps a lot of the tunes short and sweet, getting right to the heart of the matter and movin' on. Most of the fourteen songs stroll along at a drowsy pace. It's like taking a wonderfully leisurely stroll or bike ride in the warm afternoon sun. As prolific as he is, it could be easy to take Mr. Crow for granted but how could we when he's for sure one of the best songwriters around! Need we say more? Recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Over Your Heart"
MPEG Stream: "No Sun"

DOIRON, JULIE Woke Myself Up (Jagjaguwar) cd 14.98
We've always been fans of Julie Doiron and her wonderfully sweet voice. From all the way back to the '90s when she was in Sub Pop lo-fi pop combo Eric's Trip, to her many solo outings. However, none of her solo records captured her essence, they were good but not great. But with Woke Myself Up, it sounds like she finally got it right! Oh so right! The sound is so immediate, so bare and achingly intimate. So much presence. With honest heartfelt lyrics and a vocal delivery that recall some of our favorites, Edith Frost and Cat Power. Much like Frost's last outing, It's A Game, this is born of heart break and heart ache. The instrumentation is the perfect combination of sparse and chilling, allowing Doiron's voice to get right to the core of it all. So totally beautiful!
MPEG Stream: "Me And My Friend"
MPEG Stream: "You Look So Alive"

FEAR FALLS BURNING The Rainbow Mirrors A Burning Heart (Aufabwegen) lp 21.00
Another gorgeous installment in Dirk Serries' exploration of the electric guitar, the amplifier, and just how far both can be taken with as little interference from human hands. As we've mentioned before, a quick listen might have you lumping Serries and his Fear Falls Burning in with his sludgier compatriots, Earth, SUNNO))), etc... but FFB is not about sludge and pummel, it's about drift and shimmer, finding much more in common with outfits like Nadja or the Angelic Process or Hjarnidaudi. But unlike those groups, FFB is just guitar and amp, allowed to feed off each other and slowly unfurl, huge sonic tapestries, lush with subtle overtones and muted melodies, a massive massive minimalism, that continues to rub us exactly the right way.
These two tracks, recorded live, demonstrate again the breadth of Serries' delicate mastery of the amplified guitar. Soft sonic shimmers slowly fluctuate, sounding more like Niblock than anything, overtones shifting and intertwining, steel strings reverberating and stirring up microscopic whirs which all smear together into one living breathing sonic drift. The overtones become more pronounced, taking on melodic shapes, and sounding almost choral, little angelic events, subtly reminding us of Arvo Part. So lovely.
Side two seems to continue on from the very same point side one left off, a delicate serene shimmer, that slowly transforms into an undulating low end crumble, but far from sounding sludgey or even doomy, this is some sort of mystical glistening and sparkling Ur-drone, taking the thuggish caveman throb of the more well know sludgelords, and transforming it into absolute beauty, powerful, physical and surprisingly musical. Awesome.
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES, each copy hand numbered.

FLOATING FLOWER 1st + 2nd (Feathered Spirit Of Mother) cd 13.98
ACID MOTHERS TEMPLE ALERT!!!! Wait maybe we should rephrase that. Totally blissed out and stoned to beautiful perfection ACID MOTHERS TEMPLE alert!!!
Floating Flower are a trio composed of AMT leader Kawabata Makoto on electric and acoustic guitars, Yuki on violin, electric sitar and textural vocals and Kaneko Tetsuya on tabla and electric guitar. This is spaced out acid folk at its most trance inducing. Yuki and Tetsuya are said to have been living and traveling around India for many years leading up to these recordings which were originally released as two discs on Acid Mothers Temple's label. We love how space soaked and sundrenched these songs sound. Always drifting, droning, and shimmering with feathers of tripped out voyages into endless days. It's so easy to get lost in the drugged out sonic clouds these folks conjure up. Kind of like the best slow hazy moments of Bardo Pond taken to another planet and planted in alien soil, allowing solar winds to carry beautiful flower petals into deep space, where they will drift weightless forever and ever, never coming down. So good.
MPEG Stream: "Shizuku No Youni"
MPEG Stream: "Fuwa Fuwa"
MPEG Stream: "Desert"

GHOST In Stormy Nights (Drag City) cd 14.98
The follow-up to 2004's magnificent Hypnotic Underworld from Japanese communal psych vets Ghost is finally here! The heavy-prog moves of that album are still in evidence, as well as their perpetual penchant for otherworldly folk -- and, as well, on the nearly half-hour "Hemicyclic Anthelion", Ghost venture into the realm of what goes beyond mere prog to sound remarkably like avant-garde 20th century classical! Ghost are certainly an ambitious band, with talent to match. With the dark, abstract, droning vibes of "Hemicyclic Anthelion" hanging over the proceedings, In Stormy Nights proves to be, well, a dark and stormy album. Downright aggressive, even, are the trio of tracks that follow it in the middle of this disc.
True, In Stormy Nights starts placidly enough with "Motherly Bluster", classic Ghost style acid folk, Batoh's calm voice singing from some mystic plane of crosslegged bliss. But then, the aforementioned "Hemicyclic Anthelion" takes the stage -- literally, as this piece is apparently constructed from excerpts of live in-concert improvs, an electro-acoustic, slow-mo freakout that represents Ghost at their most out-there and experimental. Following that, it seems that Ghost have fallen to the Dark Side of the Force. Indeed, the ominous "Water Door Yellow Gate" actually reminds us a bit of the music from Star Wars (!), with martial drumming and majestic chant. "Gareki No Toshi" is noisier, with distorted vocals and suspense-film urgency. What's next? Something even more frightening -- a stirring cover of the song "Caledonia" by none other than cult ESP-label sixties psych-rock "tribe" Cromagnon!! Wow. Of all of Batoh & Co.'s various cover versions over the years (they've done songs by Syd Barrett, Pearls Before Swine, The Rolling Stones, and Earth & Fire, just to name ones we can think of right now) this has to be our favorite. Partially 'cause we'd never thought we'd hear a Cromagnon cover, partially 'cause it's such a great song, and partially 'cause Ghost do it so well, complete with bleating Celtic horn, black metallish vocal rasping, and swirling, droning, bellicose ambiance. For us, this penultimate track is the climax to the album, but Ghost provide a coda, "Grisaille" coming full circle back to the gentle balladry of "Motherly Bluster", the dark side having perhaps been vanquished... for now.
MPEG Stream: "Water Door Yellow Gate"
MPEG Stream: "Hemicyclic Anthelion"
MPEG Stream: "Caledonia"

GHOST In Stormy Nights (Drag City) lp 15.98
The follow-up to 2004's magnificent Hypnotic Underworld from Japanese communal psych vets Ghost is finally here! The heavy-prog moves of that album are still in evidence, as well as their perpetual penchant for otherworldly folk -- and, as well, on the nearly half-hour "Hemicyclic Anthelion", Ghost venture into the realm of what goes beyond mere prog to sound remarkably like avant-garde 20th century classical! Ghost are certainly an ambitious band, with talent to match. With the dark, abstract, droning vibes of "Hemicyclic Anthelion" hanging over the proceedings, In Stormy Nights proves to be, well, a dark and stormy album. Downright aggressive, even, are the trio of tracks that follow it in the middle of this disc.
True, In Stormy Nights starts placidly enough with "Motherly Bluster", classic Ghost style acid folk, Batoh's calm voice singing from some mystic plane of crosslegged bliss. But then, the aforementioned "Hemicyclic Anthelion" takes the stage -- literally, as this piece is apparently constructed from excerpts of live in-concert improvs, an electro-acoustic, slow-mo freakout that represents Ghost at their most out-there and experimental. Following that, it seems that Ghost have fallen to the Dark Side of the Force. Indeed, the ominous "Water Door Yellow Gate" actually reminds us a bit of the music from Star Wars (!), with martial drumming and majestic chant. "Gareki No Toshi" is noisier, with distorted vocals and suspense-film urgency. What's next? Something even more frightening -- a stirring cover of the song "Caledonia" by none other than cult ESP-label sixties psych-rock "tribe" Cromagnon!! Wow. Of all of Batoh & Co.'s various cover versions over the years (they've done songs by Syd Barrett, Pearls Before Swine, The Rolling Stones, and Earth & Fire, just to name ones we can think of right now) this has to be our favorite. Partially 'cause we'd never thought we'd hear a Cromagnon cover, partially 'cause it's such a great song, and partially 'cause Ghost do it so well, complete with bleating Celtic horn, black metallish vocal rasping, and swirling, droning, bellicose ambiance. For us, this penultimate track is the climax to the album, but Ghost provide a coda, "Grisaille" coming full circle back to the gentle balladry of "Motherly Bluster", the dark side having perhaps been vanquished... for now.
MPEG Stream: "Water Door Yellow Gate"
MPEG Stream: "Hemicyclic Anthelion"
MPEG Stream: "Caledonia"

GOSTA BERLINGS SAGA Tid Dr Ljud (Transubstans) cd 16.98
ATTENTION PROG ROCKERS! You know who you are. We are too. And while sure there's plenty of old faves and obscure '70s reissues to occupy your/our time, it's nice once in a while to get a hold of something new, something current, that still gives you that '70s prog-rock kick, right? We do our best to find stuff like that, and when we do we want to let you know. One recent example that hopefully you've already picked up was the new album from San Francisco's Crime In Choir. Well here's something else along those lines -- the cd debut from this really cool prog/jazz/psych band from Stockholm, Sweden. Recorded mid-2006, yet chock full of Mellotron, and even flute!! Yeah! And like CIC, GBS is also an all-instrumental proposition.
Gosta Berlings Saga -- we don't know why they chose it, but their name comes from the title of a 1891 Swedish novel, later (in 1924) made into a silent film that featured Greta Garbo in her first first starring role -- are definitely sorta retro, but still seem youthful and hip (a la Dungen, perhaps). They are definitely heavy on the keys, from Mellotron to synth to Fender Rhodes, but guitar and bass aren't neglected in the lineup. The drummer also has a crucial role to play, propelling these songs through their mostly 8-minutes-and-upwards lengths... In addition, they bring in that flute for one song, and also guests playing violins on a couple other cuts. Oh, and we've got to mention that there's somebody credited with "Buddha Machine" on another track!! All of this is woven together into a delightfully proggy, jazzy sound, reminding us of bits of Yes and Univers Zero as well as (fellow Swedes) Hansson & Karlsson and Kebnekajse. The seven tracks here encompass moods both bright and cheery, or (to a lesser extent, though) dim and dark, being by turns melancholic and sentimental, or dramatic and urgent. Apparently this is a concept album of sorts, something about the interaction of the forest and the city, with detours into outer space -- and ancient Egypt?? Well, of course, since it's instrumental (and furthermore the song titles are in Swedish), we can't really tell all that from just listening, as evocative as their music is, though the cool cd booklet artwork holds some clues (as does the band's website, from whence we got our information). Add some more prog rock points then for the concept album concept! And GBS gets even more points for definitely being about the MUSIC, not the playing. While it's obvious that these guys are good, they're not showing off, they're writing and performing some marvelous, melodic music without pretense that's still wonderfully PROG.
MPEG Stream: "Ljud Fran Stan"
MPEG Stream: "Knolsvanen"

HASEGAWA-SHIZUO Songs Of An Umbilical Cord (Tiliqua) lp 26.00
Album number two from this Japanese improv drone duo, featuring Hirotomo Hasegawa and Shizu Uchida, who weave their wonderfully abstract soundworld from bass, vocals, single string koto and a double-reed wind instrument called the "hichiriki". Much like their debut cd on PSF, record number two is epic and sparse, dark and mysteriously haunting. Two side long tracks, culled from live improvisations with no overdubs, two sides of the record, two sides of this band's split personality.
Side one is a barely there creep through wide open space, space space and more space. Peppered with occasional bits of reedy skronk and low end flutter, these little sonic disturbances drift in a black expanse. The first half of the side in fact is almost nothing. So minimal it requires seriously deep listening to take it in. Soon however the bass surfaces offering a distant abstract drone, that sort of weaves in and out of the audible world, giving the reed and the spare vocals something to orbit, however tenuously.
Side two finds the band in a much more psychedelic Ur-drone state of mind, channeling the spirit of the Taj Mahal Travellers. The sound is still spacious, just not so empty, the skronk toned down to a reedy Eastern melody, sprawled out over a slowly shifting back drop of churning, roiling low end rumble and throb. A living sound like the universe slowly folding in on itself. Reverb wrapped around slow low melodies, all tangled up in the snake charmer sound of the hichiriki, a sound that seems to unfurl as if it might go on forever. So gorgeous.
Vinyl only. LIMITED TO 400 COPIES! We have a handful but will NOT be able to get more. Pressed on nice thick vinyl, packaged in a super thick, gorgeously printed sleeve, with a Japanese style obi!

HYPOTHERMIA Veins (Insikt) cd 13.98
Finally after years of demos and splits and cassette tape releases, the first proper full length from Swedish suicidal black metallers Hypothermia. You might remember Hypothermia from their split with Dimhymn, in the review of which we described their sound as "Epic fuzzed out glacial dirge, with thick riffs spread out in a black smear, the drums a caveman plod, and some of the most fucked vocals ever: weird, something-caught-in-the-throat sort of strangulated grunts and mewls, guttural growls and strange falsetto-y squeaks." And not too much has changed. In fact, Hypothermia's final track on that split was an "epic 16 minute midtempo buzzscape, [with] looped riffs, totally repetitive and hypnotic..." and dang if Veins isn't three of those, each a massive buzzing midtempo black dirge, slowly pounding drums, simple raw hypnotic riffing, repeated and repeated, into a mesmerizing musical mantra, the relentless buzz blurring into near drones, and anguished, cries of utter agony, over swirls of dismal black buzz.
Definitely for fans of Burzum, Nortt, Make A Change... Kill Yourself, Silencer, Xasthur and other purveyors of doomic black hate.
And if the music weren't depressed and dismal enough, the sleeve sports some seriously horrific and blood drenched images, bloody slit wrists, the word failure carved into an arm, a bathtub splattered with blood, and all the lyrics written in blood on blood soaked paper towels...
MPEG Stream: "Isolation"
MPEG Stream: "Failure"

ISIS In The Absence Of Truth (Japanese Version) (Daymare) 2lp 45.00
OK, now Isis are getting in on the confusing multiple version thing, but, c'mon, you know you love it!! This is the fancy imported Japanese version, on Daymare Recordings, of the most recent Isis record In The Absence Of Truth. Not to be confused with the domestic version on Robotic Empire. This is of course incredibly limited, the ones we have are on either clear, or red vinyl, and which color you get will be COMPLETELY RANDOM, so please DO NOT request a particular color. Nice thick gatefold jackets, printed inner sleeves. These are super expensive, they're imports, they have almost the exact same artwork as the domestic version, except for a Japanese style obi, and obviously the colored vinyl. But knowing you Isis fans, you'll probably want both this one AND the Robotic Empire one, and why the heck not, it's a fucking kick ass record:
What can we say about Isis that we haven't already said at this point. They are the masters. The Lords of epic, brooding, slow burn, metallic post rock majesty. And rightfully so. Every record has managed to push forward, exploring new territory, without losing what it is that makes us like them so much. Which is tough to do. But Isis make it seem effortless.
Sure, you can blame them for the recent glut of mediocre moody epic math rock. But it's really not their fault. Everytime a band happens upon a 'new' sound, a sound that is dramatic, and exciting, a sound that captures the ears of jaded music fans, well, undoubtedly in the wake of that band will follow an army of wannabees.
But Isis remain unfazed. They sit within their castle, atop a mountain of mighty riffs, and sharp craggy melodies, gazing down from the heavens. Free to do whatever they want with their sound, even if it pisses off the masses, especially if it pisses off the masses.
So with In The Absence Of Truth, Isis have again redefined and reassessed, resulting in a new record that is distinctly less metal, and much more moody and expansive. Lots of tribal drumming, crooning vocals, the metallic chugs aren't huge back-breaking riffs, instead they are part of the sonic landscape, contributing to the texture almost more than the overall heaviness. Where Isis were once worshippers at the altar of Neurosis, they have now pretty much entirely shed their Neurotic trappings and emerged butterfly like to display their new shape and blindingly resplendent colors. Rare is the heavy band that is as adept at crafting epic soundscapes, creating tension and weaving elaborate sonic tapestries as they are at crushing and pounding and pummeling, but Isis are definitely that rare band.
However, don't be misled by all this talk of mood and ambience, a lot of In The Absence Of Truth is very heavy, and is quite metal, vocals howl and downtuned riffs crush, drums pound and the bass throbs, the band transforming into a swaying lurching metallic behemoth. BUT, these huge bursts of metallic might are placed with care, used sparingly, the way a writer judiciously doles out his exclamation points, each blast nestled between lengthy sonic explorations and slow meandering moody mathiness, resulting in a super dynamic and entirely captivating slab of subtle heaviness.
MPEG Stream: "Wrists Of Kings"
MPEG Stream: "Dulcinea"

ISIS In The Absence Of Truth (Robotic Empire) 2lp 16.98
OK, now Isis are getting in on the confusing multiple version thing, but, c'mon, you know you love it!! This is the domestic vinyl version of the most recent Isis record In The Absence Of Truth. It's on Robotic Empire, it's of course incredibly limited, the ones we have are on black vinyl, maybe not as collectable as the colored versions, but everyone knows black vinyl sounds better... Nice thick gatefold jackets, printed inner sleeves. Anyway, there is another version reviewed elsewhere on this list, it's the Japanese import version, almost the same artwork, except it has an obi and is on colored vinyl. Oh, and it's insanely expensive. But knowing you Isis fans, you'll probably want both this one AND the pricey Japanese version, and why the heck not, it's a fucking kick ass record:
What can we say about Isis that we haven't already said at this point. They are the masters. The Lords of epic, brooding, slow burn, metallic post rock majesty. And rightfully so. Every record has managed to push forward, exploring new territory, without losing what it is that makes us like them so much. Which is tough to do. But Isis make it seem effortless.
Sure, you can blame them for the recent glut of mediocre moody epic math rock. But it's really not their fault. Everytime a band happens upon a 'new' sound, a sound that is dramatic, and exciting, a sound that captures the ears of jaded music fans, well, undoubtedly in the wake of that band will follow an army of wannabees.
But Isis remain unfazed. They sit within their castle, atop a mountain of mighty riffs, and sharp craggy melodies, gazing down from the heavens. Free to do whatever they want with their sound, even if it pisses off the masses, especially if it pisses off the masses.
So with In The Absence Of Truth, Isis have again redefined and reassessed, resulting in a new record that is distinctly less metal, and much more moody and expansive. Lots of tribal drumming, crooning vocals, the metallic chugs aren't huge back-breaking riffs, instead they are part of the sonic landscape, contributing to the texture almost more than the overall heaviness. Where Isis were once worshippers at the altar of Neurosis, they have now pretty much entirely shed their Neurotic trappings and emerged butterfly like to display their new shape and blindingly resplendent colors. Rare is the heavy band that is as adept at crafting epic soundscapes, creating tension and weaving elaborate sonic tapestries as they are at crushing and pounding and pummeling, but Isis are definitely that rare band.
However, don't be misled by all this talk of mood and ambience, a lot of In The Absence Of Truth is very heavy, and is quite metal, vocals howl and downtuned riffs crush, drums pound and the bass throbs, the band transforming into a swaying lurching metallic behemoth. BUT, these huge bursts of metallic might are placed with care, used sparingly, the way a writer judiciously doles out his exclamation points, each blast nestled between lengthy sonic explorations and slow meandering moody mathiness, resulting in a super dynamic and entirely captivating slab of subtle heaviness.
MPEG Stream: "Wrists Of Kings"
MPEG Stream: "Dulcinea"

LERMAN, RICHARD Music Of Richard Lerman 1964-1987 - Featuring Travelon Gamelon (Music For Bicycles) (EM Records) cd 29.00
Japan's EM records strikes again. Without a doubt, the coolest, weirdest, most amazing re-issue label EVER!! We could list again all the killer reissues we've carried and reviewed and raved about over the past year or two, but we've done that in pretty much every other EM review, so do a label search for EM Records on the AQ website, and prepare to have your mind blown!
Another long lost, long sought after holy grail of sorts, dug up and dusted off and beautifully presented by EM, Travelon Gamelon, a piece by Richard Lerman for amplified bicycles! Performed on stage with upturned bikes, but also, performed on the streets, the bikes mic'ed and each with it's own tiny amplifier broadcasting the various sounds of the bike rolling along streets, the metallic flutter of spokes, the sounds of passing cars, squeaking brakes, whipping wind, all woven into the organic whole. A piece of moving music, constantly shifting, obviously improvised and random, and so totally wonderful.
There are two versions of the piece, which has been performed for years all over the world, one is the concert version, which features musicians on stage, with upside down bikes, using various implements with which to strike, rub and bow the different parts of the bicycles, these are the versions that are the most gamelan like, a gorgeous assemblage of metallic clangs and percussive clamor. From dreamy and spare, to cacophonous and wildly chaotic. A sort of junkyard gamelan, definitely clattery but also strangely melodic.
But it's the other versions, the Promenade versions, that are the most exciting. These pieces are basically field recordings of cyclists on mic'ed and amplified bicycles, every sound their riding creates being broadcast through little speakers affixed to the bikes, and recorded by Lerman! So not only is this group of bikes creating this gorgeous whirring mechanical ambience, that sound is also travelling through city streets, a self contained performance of sorts, a strange little cloud of metallic shimmer and buzzing mechanical ambience performed for all passersby. It's also cool to hear the organizers' instructions, children laughing and playing, running alongside, ringing their own bike bells, you can hear Lerman giving orders to the cyclists as they prepare to begin the piece, and various warnings like "Watch out for the metal!" Street cleaners, random cars, voices and footsteps, all a sort of organic backdrop to the divine slow shifting whir the bicycles produce. Constantly shifting, and changing, depending on the speed of the bikes, the direction of the amplifiers the placement of the mics, the people or cars, amazing. It reminds us a bit of the Taj Mahal Travellers in fact, TMT's method of broadcasting their sounds out of loudspeakers, and then recapturing them with microphones placed at various distances, well, Travelon Gamelon is almost like a mobile Taj Mahal Travellers. So cool!
This collection would be well worth it for disc one alone, 5 lengthy excerpts from various performances of Travelon Gamelon, but also included is a second disc, of various other pieces Lerman composed and performed over the years spanning 1964-1986.
"For Two Of Them" is a soundscape of old records, a spring reverb, and manipulated tapes, very dark and dreamy, a fuzzy, multilayered drone shot through with streaks of metallic shimmer and sounding not all that different than contemporary noismakers like the Starving Weirdos, the Skaters and the like. In fact, most of the pieces on disc two, could just as easily come from some super limited cd-r we just managed to track down. "Sections For Screen, Performers And Audience" features the score presented as a film projected on a screen, the performers face the screen with their backs to the audience, and their improvisations are electronically modified into a gorgeous bit of twisted Twentieth Century. "End Of The Line" is a very dramatic tape piece based on the deaths of close friends, and is another piece that sounds presciently modern, huge dramatic swells, very melancholic and resonant, huge fields of drone and buzz. Even tracks like "Soundspot", a piece for amplified 40 foot Slinky, with its gorgeously resonant creaking and moaning and whistling metallic buzz, and "Music For Plinky And Straw", a piece for bendy straw and reverb, creating a dense field of abstract melodies, crystalline shimmer and percussive chimes, sound less Twentieth Century and more like any number of modern free noise abstract drone releases! This is the sort of collection we wish had been expanded to 4 discs, or 8 discs!! We want more.
But even with two discs there is plenty here to keep you busy and your ears full and happy for sure. Two hours plus of remarkable sound, a massive booklet, with tons of photos, liner notes in both English and Japanese, as well as notes on each individual piece, but also included are a rare video of Lerman performing his piece for bendy straw, as well as scores for several pieces, and a killer photo guide to building a tape delay out of two walkmans!! SO SO SO RECOMMENDED!
The perfect record to bring music nerds and bike nerds together (most of us here are both!)...
MPEG Stream: "Promenade Version [Boston, MA, July 2, 1979]"
MPEG Stream: "Concert Version [Pittsburg, PA, June 6, 1981]"
MPEG Stream: "For Two Of Them [1964]"
MPEG Stream: "Sections For Screen, Performers And Audience [1975]"

MAGIK MARKERS The Voldoror Dance (Latitudes 0:09) (Southern) cd 14.98
Another release in Southern Records' series of ultra limited Latitudes releases, past installments have included the Grails, Ginnungagap, Ariel Pink, Shit And Shine, Sir Richard Bishop, and others. A wildly disparate group for sure, but one that seems to suit this band just fine...
The Magik Markers are definitely one of those love 'em or hate 'em kind of bands. Sloppy and chaotic, noisy and psychedelic, free and seriously fucked up. Live they can be an explosive revelation, or an absolute mess. One show found the drummer blasting away on stage, while the quite comely guitarist clambered through the audience, climbing over audience members, dragging her guitar behind her, stirring up a seriously chaotic skree. Great to see, but not the best thing to listen to. And the band seem to know that, at least on The Voldoror Dance, not relying on any sort of unorthodox antics or wildly destructive staging the band simply unleash some seriously drug addled, psychedelic space rock bliss. Free and blown out, actually VERY free, this is like a band hurling their equipment into the abyss, and capturing every second on tape, the drums a constant splattery free jazz web, the bass (or is it another guitar) buzzing and warbling, throbbing and pulsing, wrapped in dense little tangles around the relentless drumming, while over the top, vocals drift and hover, ghostlike, barely audible over the din of the main guitar, a squirming, squealing sonic supernova, spewing wild peals of shrieking feedback, dense sheets of corrosive skree, walls of fuzzy riffs, smeared into almost-white-noise, tons of FX, wah wah, delay, a relentless free rock, space psych blow out. Tripping wildly though free jazz, free rock, drone rock and drug rock territory, sometimes all at the same time. An ultra noisy, dizzy, stumbling, crumbling, explosive mind melting musical trip.
Comes packaged in a super intricate hand screened die cut fold over sleeve with a full color insert. The cover has a sticker affixed to the front and each copy is hand stamped and numbered. Limited to 1000 copies worldwide, 500 of which made it to the United States, about 25 of which made it here. So you know what that means!
MPEG Stream: "The Scream Of The Horses Glowing White"
MPEG Stream: "Ab'R-AChad-Ab"

NIGHTLY GALE Illusion Of Evil (Foreshadow) cd 14.98
We've been trying to list this for ages, but our first batch was destroyed in the post, and our second batch took its own sweet time getting here from Poland, but here we are, almost a year after we initially ordered 'em, and we can finally unleash the bizarre tech prog metal of Poland's Nightly Gale on the masses.
So yeah, this is definitely doom. Maybe even toss in a few extra 'o's, cause this is damn doomy. But it's also pretty freaking weird. Four massive lengthy epics, each with its own strange vibe.
The opener is a slow plod, epic guitars, soaring over downtuned chug, a glacial trudge but with super dramatic prog rock crooning over the top, sometimes almost slipping into a sort of yodel. Then suddenly, the rhythm lurches into a strangely technical start stop stutter, with gurgling keyboards and space rock FX, and some harsh black metal vocals. The second track is more of that strange tech-prog-doom, with fuzzy synthesizers, programmed drums, at times it almost sounds like Meshuggah slowed waaaaaaaay down, strangely technical, but as if played in slow motion, with weird processed underwater prog vocals, and some almost Viking growls. Some delicate dreamlike piano, gently placed amidst super harsh screams and massive downtuned crunch. It's like prog Cradle Of Filth at 16 rpm. Actually, we have no idea what this is like...
It's at this point that one is forced to think, WHAT THE FUCK?!? How have we not heard this band? Why aren't more people completely obsessed with these guys? WE DON'T KNOW.
Tracks 3 and 4 continue on in the same sort of schizophrenic, prog doom direction. With long expanses of swooshing ambience, moody melancholy acoustic passages, epic emotional guitar harmonies, huge cinematic synths, track three almost sounds like a doom metal Genesis, if such a thing were possible, and we're beginning to think it is! The track ends with a groovy little shuffling Nine Inch Nails sort of murky electronic dirge with hissed whispery vocals, before launching into the 15 minute closer, which initially sounds like it might be the most straight ahead doom track on the record, until about halfway through, where the band breaks down into a creepy nursery rhyme sort of interlude with bizarre production, freaky sound effects and haunting vocals, before launching back into a killer mathy jam, lurching and stuttering hypnotically before fading out into some dreamy dirgey melancholy dream doom, complete with strangely Alice In Chains-like vocals (a good thing btw) and a repeating minor key piano figure. So freaking heavy, and weird and goddamn great!
We only have about 20 copies, and we're pretty sure that since it took us so long to get these that it's probably out of print, so odds are once these are gone, we won't be able to get more...
MPEG Stream: "At Your Command"
MPEG Stream: "Illusion Of Evil"

PALESTINE, CHARLEMAGNE / TONY CONRAD An Aural Symbiotic Mystery (Subrosa) cd 14.98
We think the mystery suggested in the title is why this is the first ever recorded collaboration between these two giants of improvised left-field minimalist drone. Both Tony Conrad and Charlemagne Palestine, key figures in early American minimalism and the New York avant-garde of the early seventies had only performed three times together previously and since reuniting in Belgium in 2001, hadn't even seen each other in three decades. What's equally amazing is that neither one fully dominates this extended performance. Palestine's multiple crystalline organ drones graft neatly with Conrad's bowed pulsations from his modified 5 string violin, eventually intensifying with blistering shimmers and burning organic keyboard crescendos before falling into subdued space and void. There the two sweep the dust off and begin to spar with each other all over again, getting into some heated free-music territory culminating in Palestine's delayed vocal drones and Conrad's blissful undulating vibrations. Gorgeous!
MPEG Stream: "An Aural Symbiotic Mystery 1"
MPEG Stream: "An Aural Symbiotic Mystery 2"

ROY, DILIP Namaskaar (Cloud Forest) cd 16.98
In our utopian dreams of what it would be like to get off the plane and arrive in India this is what our would immediately fill our ears! It makes so much sense that the title of this album is Namaskaar, as it's an age-old traditional greeting in India. An expression used as a warm welcome to visitors and honored guests. It also makes sense that this record was supposedly produced originally as a promotional item for Air India!
Dilip Roy is an Indian composer who creates deeply inviting and warm sounds that make you feel like you've been lifted off your feet and taken to some majestic land filled with color, melody and elegance. While this record was recorded in 1983, we would have guessed it was from the late '60s or early '70s as it has that slightly tripped out sound and lush arrangement that might have been the result had R.D. Burman and David Axelrod joined forces. We can just imagine Four Tet's Kieren Hebden and DJ Shadow drooling over these sounds and wishing they had gotten their hands on them to sample and steal. Imagine the tracks those two could come up with working with this stuff!! It's was no surprise when we learned that Roy sometimes collaborated with Ananda Shankar, such amazing grooves, but what we love so much about this record is how it has echoes of Bollywood in its sound yet it's way more calm and tranquil while somehow still managing to be just as much of a bright and colorful trip. Highly recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Nattu Padangal"
MPEG Stream: "Yaman"
MPEG Stream: "Priyatama"

RUINS OF BEVERAST, THE Rain Upon The Impure (Van) cd 13.98
We were heartbroken after the dissolution of German black metal outfit Nagelfar (not to be confused with the Swedish e-less Naglfar). Their all time black metal masterpiece Virus West, has been a huge favorite of all the metal heads around these parts (and has just been reissued, and will be reviewed on the list soon!) but a few years after the death of Nagelfar, a new band was born out off the ashes, a strangely monickered beast called the Ruins Of Beverast. Purveyors of, in their own words, "oppressive black metal", and indeed, the sound of RoB was totally unlike the blazing Scandinavian style of buzzing black metal, instead, they offered up a sprawl of midtempo misery, as doom as much as black.
And this, their second album continues on a similar sonic path. There is of course plenty of buzz, this is grim black metal after all, but RoB have a much more expansive vision. Out of the seven tracks, five clock in at around 15 minutes (the other two are brief ambient interludes of cavernous whir and crumbling subterranean drones) and find a grim black buzz stretched waaaaaaay out into long stretches of Burzumic doom. The guitars are thick and spacious, not just buzzy and compressed, the production is massive, each song is like a journey through some massive underworld, drifting through firelit caverns, along some viscous black river. The rhythms are loping, seasick waltzes, sometimes slowing down to glacial dirges, with arpeggiated chords spread out over thick backdrops of warm blurry buzz, howled vocals, simple pounding drums, all wrapped in huge swaths of reverb, making all the edges bleed together, turning buzzy black metal into fuzzed out doomdrone metal. The oppressive blackened crush lets up once in a while, allowing brief bits of shimmer to shine through, a weird post rocky slowcore crawl, some minor key jangly clean guitar, slow building Godspeed like ambience, bits of epic synth, always returning to the relentless buzzing dirge, allowing off course for brief flurries of furious blasting black metal, but those always seem to give way to still more slow and sorrowful blackdoom beauty.
MPEG Stream: "50 Forts Along The Rhine"
MPEG Stream: "Soliloquy Of The Stigmatized Shepherd"

SHOEMAKER, MATT Spots In The Sun (Limited Edition) ( The Helen Scarsdale Agency) cd 16.98
The music found within Matt Shoemaker's Spots In the Sun certainly makes for one of our favorite records in recent memory, unfortunately this ultra limited version is already out of print and will most likely not be around for long (but fear not, the regular version will follow soon after).
Shoemaker's exquisite manifestations of abstracted field recordings pushed to the point of grotesque minimalism is some of the finest that we've heard (comparable to the likes of BJ Nilsen, Machinefabriek, Loren Chasse, Philip Jeck's Surf, and mnortham), but what makes this "special edition" so unique is the packaging. You may remember many moons ago that The Helen Scarsdale Agency issued an edition of the BJ Nilsen & Stilluppsteypa release with a copper foil cover mounted within a jewel case as the artwork. Well, Matt Shoemaker's Spots in the Sun sports similarly dazzling packaging, a corroded sheet of brass upon which the album text has been silkscreened, only to be slightly distressed in order to give it a beautiful worried quality. How limited is this edition? Fifty, of which we only got less than a dozen. So act fast, or bide your time until the regular version comes out in a month or so...
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STARVING WEIRDOS Harry Smith (Root Strata) 12" 9.98
Latest in the slow flow of dreamy sounds from this Humboldt County duo, who not counting their 20 or so unreleased full lengths, have gradually built up an amazing body of work, most unfortunately super limited, this new lp no exception.
Released on Tarentel's Root Strata label, Harry Smith is a single side long track, a slow burning cinematic wonder, a huge buzzing field of charged particles, run through old beat up guitars and a table full of FX pedals and broken toy instruments, alchemically changed from lead into a gold.
A sitar-like buzz, submerged in reverb and wrapped in dense overtones, spreads out like a melting glacier, constantly shifting and changing shape, above that drift huge washes of metallic shimmer, effulgent yet muted and murky, a subdued sonic glare, warm and wistful. These dreamlike expanses are punctuated by ghostlike pulses, bells or chimes smeared into indistinct tones, let loose and allowed to fade into the subtly churning sonic backdrop. Very dark and dramatic. And oh so lovely.
This is a one sided lp. The flip side has black and white artwork pasted right on the vinyl, housed in a clear plastic sleeve. And of course super limited...
ONLY 300 COPIES PRESSED!!!

THRONE OF BLOOD I Hope You Fail Miserably And Never Accomplish Anything Ever Again (Corleone) cd-r 13.98
We may indulge in some hyperbole now and then, but it's usually just because we're so excited by some new record. That's why there can be so many 'best ever's and 'greatest of all time's. But we're serious now. This is, without a doubt, and with nary a trace of hyperbole, the greatest and weirdest packaging we have ever seen. Really.
So before we get to the music (whatever... music... pshhh) let's talk about the case this disc is housed in. It was at one time, a regular old DVD case, but it has been coated in molded rubber, looking like the Necronomicon from Evil Dead, only the cover is a unicorn, all molded in 3-D complete with an actual glass eye, with various vines and flowers molded in along side the unicorn head and EYE!!! The back has the band name and more vines molded in. It smells like old tires and feels all soft and rubbery. It's got a little Gwar to it. But holy shit!!! It's so amazing to look at and to hold and to smell. Inside is an oversized screen printed booklet, with glittery eye animals, typewriter style liner notes affixed to the inside. Wow! It almost wouldn't matter what the music sounded like but the music is just as amazing. A freaked out furious grinding metallic onslaught, most songs clocking in around 30 seconds with one or two coming in around 9 minutes. 32 songs in 38 minutes. Buzzing guitars, blasting drum splatter and some seriously awesome fucked up vocals, squealing impossibly high, doused in FX, it sounds like a woman, or a guy with an impossibly high falsetto, it's almost like a grind metal Melt Banana, but with super fuzzy lo-fi fucked up production and some seriously damaged sounding guitars. Actually the vocals sort of sound like the little girl from Kiss' "God Of Thunder" all grown up and seriously hysterical. But that's not all, there's the album, a series of fucked up blasts of brilliant black metal grind fury, then a a few noise tracks, a live set, and then THE WHOLE RECORD IN REVERSE, as in backwards, fucking awesome! Everything sounds better backwards and Throne Of Blood is no exception. Then there's a few more noise tracks, then the second to last track, the record's nine minute epic, one riff repeated over and over and over and over and over. Minimal math metal genius. And then the final four minute number which sounds like it could be a whole 'nother record, with about a million tracks compressed into one 4 minute chunk, with more outrageously over the top insane vocals. Actually, it's a whole live set!!!
What more to say? The record is completely nuts, the packaging even more so. It's just too bad it's so limited. This cloud has a distinctly black lining.
LIMITED TO 125 COPIES!!! We tried to order lots more than we got, which ended up being about 20 copies, and once these are gone, this is gone for good...
MPEG Stream: "Mayham"
MPEG Stream: "New Kings"
MPEG Stream: "Flesh Quest"
MPEG Stream: "Miles"

TITAN A Raining Sun Of Light & Love For You & You & You (Tee Pee) cd 15.98
Our favorite Brooklyn-based stoner space rockers are back, with their first proper studio album (the limited Paradigms cd, and the self-released cd-r we've had before were both live recordings, apparently). If you liked those, you'll like this -- though they get up to some new tricks here as well. In fact, we weren't sure we were even listening to Titan when we first put this on, as the first of the four tracks found here starts off all folky for a minute, with strumming and singing that could be Comus or Devendra... before blasting into loud, distorted, truly TITANIC heavy instrumental psych rock powered in part by some extremely proggy keyboard action. It's like ELP jamming with Comets On Fire, or Tarantula Hawk gone '70s, or a much heavier, blow-out n' drugged-up Crime In Choir! A wild torrent of amp-ed up, cosmic crunch, spiralling energetically.
The following tracks have their blissed out interludes, and droning FX, and mantric rhythmic pulses, and other bits of weirdness (field recordings of what might be crickets chirping, and a fan blowing, are mixed in at one point), but that heavy space prog riffola isn't lacking either. Definitely there's plenty here to appeal to fans of the abovementioned bands, as well as, oh, AMT, Circle, Zombi, Ufomammut, Boris, Mammatus, and MoRkObOt among others... in a word, recommended!!
MPEG Stream: "track 1"
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TITAN A Raining Sun Of Light & Love For You & You & You (Tee Pee) lp 15.98
Our favorite Brooklyn-based stoner space rockers are back, with their first proper studio album (the limited Paradigms cd, and the self-released cd-r we've had before were both live recordings, apparently). If you liked those, you'll like this -- though they get up to some new tricks here as well. In fact, we weren't sure we were even listening to Titan when we first put this on, as the first of the four tracks found here starts off all folky for a minute, with strumming and singing that could be Comus or Devendra... before blasting into loud, distorted, truly TITANIC heavy instrumental psych rock powered in part by some extremely proggy keyboard action. It's like ELP jamming with Comets On Fire, or Tarantula Hawk gone '70s, or a much heavier, blow-out n' drugged-up Crime In Choir! A wild torrent of amp-ed up, cosmic crunch, spiralling energetically.
The following tracks have their blissed out interludes, and droning FX, and mantric rhythmic pulses, and other bits of weirdness (field recordings of what might be crickets chirping, and a fan blowing, are mixed in at one point), but that heavy space prog riffola isn't lacking either. Definitely there's plenty here to appeal to fans of the abovementioned bands, as well as, oh, AMT, Circle, Zombi, Ufomammut, Boris, Mammatus, and MoRkObOt among others... in a word, recommended!!
MPEG Stream: "track 1"
MPEG Stream: "track 3"

TROLLMANN AV ILDTOPPBERG Dark Clouds Blacken The Sky On The Eve Of The Thousandth Sacrifice (Monolith) cd-r 10.98
Not sure what else to say about these guys that we haven't already said. If you've somehow managed to miss our reviews of their first couple records, Forest Of Doom and Arcane Runes Adorn The Ice-Veiled Monoliths Of The Ancient Cavern Of The Stars, as well as the Trollmann side project Ungl'Unl'rrlh'Chchch, for chrissakes, do yourself a favor and just order all three. And this one while you're at it. Check out the other reviews for a more in depth history of what has to be our all time favorite caveman doom duo, but to briefly recap:
Trollmann Av Ildtoppberg. C'mon, they're called Trollmann Av Ildtoppberg!! They have record titles like Arcane Runes Adorn The Ice-Veiled Monoliths Of The Ancient Cavern Of The Stars and Dark Clouds Blacken The Sky On The Eve Of The Thousandth Sacrifice and Tolling Beyond The Tombs Of Ancient Grimnity and Forest Of Doom. They have a similar sounding side project called Ungl'Unl'rrlh'Chchch! The band members are pictured in drawings on the back of the cd, one as a strange little bearded gnome/elf sitting on a huge toadstool, the other a bearded furclad mountain man leaning on a mighty axe. The gnome is named Belegur and is credited with "Cosmic keys to gates unknown." The mountain man is Thundarr, and is credited with "Rumblings Of Doom, Prophecies Of Times To Come." For those of you well versed in that sort of thing, you'll realize that this duo is just bass and keyboards, which is remarkable in its own right. But the fact that Trollmann play a sort of medieval Skepticism style slow motion doom sludge with just bass and keyboards it seems even more amazing.
Phew, there's more of course, but that's it in a nutshell. Not only are they mysterious, and weird, and possessing a what-the-fuck quotient that's through the roof, the music is fucking amazing! This is not that so weird it's good, or so retarded it's amazing kind of thing, this is absolute genius. Dark and creepy, heavy and sloooooooooooooooow, minimal sludge soaked abstract ambient doom. Or something. Just bass and keyboards, spewing an unholy flow of low end throb, and grinding downtuned slither. The keyboard drones and spreads out in a fuzzy blur, only occasionally offering up some sort of melodic counterpoint to the bass, as it trudges sluggishly onward.
Of all the Trollmann records, Dark Clouds is probably the heaviest, the meanest, the least melodic and the most intense. The first two tracks, both shockingly under 3 minutes, set the tone, the first, is some sort of slow motion post rock drift, a thick wash of grinding low end sludge beneath garbled demonic whispers while above drift absolutely dreamy slow drifting harmonics. The second track is a stunner, almost 'rocking', at least by Trollmann standards, some sort of primitive caveman hardcore, huge throbbing, ultra distorted downtuned buzz, with fuzzed out Butthole Surfers-ish guitar leads, and super distorted death metal grunts a stumbling hyper aggressive pummel. But after that, it's back to business as usual. Long slow extended doomy drifts. Average track length hovering at about 15 minutes, the bass a throbbing, glacial presence, the riff stretched out into eons, each note reverberating and pulsing into oblivion before the next kicks in. The keyboard just adding another layer of buzzing sludge. The bass sometimes starts to stutter and pulse, creating some sort of super blown out low end rhythm, stumbling over a thick wash of keyboard buzz, before settling back down into its glacial groove.
Epic and massive and bewildering, hypnotic and bizarre and fucking brilliant!
MPEG Stream: "Descent From The Mountains Of Madness"
MPEG Stream: "Kuu Paistaa Lapi Saatanan Puut"
MPEG Stream: "Sa Jord Bloter Svarten Stjerne Av Satan Oppgangen Triumpherend In Himmel"

TUK Proud Princess Of A Brand New City ((K-RAA-K)3) cd 15.98
We were WAY over glitchy laptronica when Tuk's Shallow Water Blackout knocked us upside the head a few lists back and demonstrated that just cuz some sound was played to death, didn't mean that amazing things couldn't still be done with it.
That Diskont itch that seemingly only Oval could scratch, had been getting itchier without us even knowing it, who would have realized we had been secretly hankering for a gitched up stuttery underseascape of burble and skitter, of muted rhythm and haunted melody. Well we were and Shallow Water Blackout hit she spot, and good! So much so that we figured we oughta track down Tuk's previous record, Proud Princess Of A Brand New City, and dang if it ain't just as purty!
In fact, it might even actually be a little bit prettier, definitely more serene and subdued, a little bit more musical. The rapid fire chop and splice and reassemble of Shallow Water Blackout is still present but in smaller measures. There's a bit more of a minimal angle, it's much more melodic and dreamy, rife with low drones and mumbled melody, and more actual instrumentation. It's got a fuzzy sort of sheen that has us thinking even more of groups like Jasper TX and Machinefabriek than the new one did.
Our favorite track might just be "German Holidays", beginning with a simple sad, guitar line, it's quickly surrounded by bits of glitchy ambience, clouds of record crackle and weird disembodied buzz, but it's about halfway through where it gets really good, suddenly, in comes some distorted guitar, eighties cop show, made for TV movie music, looped into a super Circular rhythm with breathy background vocals and streaks of glistening feedback, it sort of krautrocks along before it begins to deteriorate, the riff getting more and more distorted, the melodies beginning to crumble, beautiful and haunting, and surprisingly super catchy.
Those sorts of unlikely musical moments continue to surface throughout the record, suspended in Tuk's wide open fields of blissy glitch and whirring warble, making us want to just curl up and drift off...
MPEG Stream: "Sensational Soft"
MPEG Stream: "John Carpenter"
MPEG Stream: "German Holidays"

VELOSO, CAETANO CE (Universal) cd 17.98
Last year was a pretty great year for Tropicalia. With a reunited Os Mutantes touring all over the world, a killer Soul Jazz compilation that helped more ears fall in love with the thrilling sounds coming from Brazil in the oh so turbulent late '60s / early '70s. So it makes so much cosmic sense that one of the founders of Tropicalia, Caetano Veloso, starts off this year releasing one of his best and most rocking records in years. While his last few outings have veered towards the easy listening schmaltz side of the sonic spectrum with far too many ballads, Ce finds him all stripped down and exuding a youthful energy that we haven't seen or heard for years. Such vibrancy and color! It's so hard to believe he's 64 years old, and we'd be hard pressed to think of many other people his age still making music as compelling as the sounds on Ce, as this blows away anything folks like Bowie, McCartney or Young have made in recent years. Worth it alone for the opening track "Outro", a scorching almost indie-rock sounding anthem, which has our vote for one of the best songs of the year. The album as a whole is so solid and listen after listen we keep falling in love again and again with Veloso's song writing prowess. Recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Outro"
MPEG Stream: "Rocks"

VELVET CACOON Dextronaut (Full Moon Productions) 2cd 14.98
Very few bands have as convoluted and controversial a back story as Portland's black metal weirdos Velvet Cacoon. First the name, Velvet Cacoon. Spelled C A C O O N. According to the band "The name originated back in 1996 when we formed the band. Velvet is one of many names applied to the chemical dextromethorphan, and CACOON are the initials of a catacomb just outside Portland city limits where we usually go to write music." It also happens to be the seed from some tropical vine. But let's continue. There was also the band's political alignment, supposedly they were some sort of super reclusive, "eco-fascist" collective. Okay, sure. Then there's the sound. And it's the sound that really matters. And oh what a sound, an impossibly lush orchestra of black buzz, thick and mesmerizing and blurry, the fuzziest buzz we had ever heard. But how does a band achieve that sort of impossibly glorious buzz? Well, by inventing and playing an instrument called a "dieselharp", a sort of diesel fuel powered pick up driven fuzz-drone-guitar thing. So okay, how could we not love them, the sound was black buzz nirvana, and they were some weird eco forest freaks. Supposedly.
A little time passes, and it comes to light that it was all a scam, not the music obviously, but everything else, the politics, the dieselharp, all designed to fuck with the black metal community. The band is revealed to be one guy and his girlfriend. He's got short hair, they listen to Nina Simone and drink tea, and black metalheads are pissed. We of course think it's hilarious, and while we were duped as well, so what, it's a great joke, and fuck, the music still totally destroys. At one point if you went to the VC website, all you got was a link to an Air MP3?!? And still the only photos are of a woman in candlelight (presumably the girlfriend). And there were various reports that some of the songs were stolen from another artist who was uncredited and not compensated.
Phew! It's the sort of story that would ALWAYS be on the cover of the black metal version of US magazine!! If there was such a thing (oh why oh why is there not?!?!)
So here we are a few years down the line, the band is working on a new record, sans dieselharp of course, and while we wait, we have this massive double disc document of the band's early years, the music that started it all.
The first disc begins with a dreamy bit of pastoral ambience, before bursting into some ultra fast, blown out black buzz drenched black metal. Melancholy and moody, but swathed in super thick swirls of BUZZ BUZZ BUZZ. If anything, the stuff on Dextronaut sounds a bit more traditional than either of the other two releases, but a more traditional VC is still leagues weirder than most other BM outfits. Most of the tracks are blurry smeary buzzscapes, the melodies and drums and vocals, smothered under gloriously suffocating layers of, yep, still even more BUZZ!!! The best track, and also the weirdest, is the loping midtempo "Perched On A Neverending Peak". A blast of Burzum-worthy buzz, the guitars dense squalls of blown out fuzz, and all of this buzz and fuzz wrapped around an impossibly sad melody, but with a series of strange drop outs, where all the fuzz abates, only briefly, giving us a brief glimpse behind the veil of buzz, before it's quickly swallowed up again by the black wall of fuzz.
The second disc is three loooooong tracks, epic black ambience, gorgeous and darkly mysterious. The first a lazy looped low end gurgle, very Marclay or Strotter, an hypnotic muted underwater Oval sort of drift. The second is a cavernous drone, rife with distant buzz and some weird Trollmann like melodies. the final track is a slow burning expanse of soft focus shimmer, warbling and warm, soft and serene, and it wouldn't be VC if they didn't subtly interject some strange guttural demonic vocalizations right near the end...
Our only complaint is the ultra ghetto packaging. A single square of paper in lieu of a booklet, the tray card beneath the hinged double disc tray is blank, the artwork all over is pixelated and blurry, but knowing the band it could be part of the concept, either way, for a record as massive and weird and fucking amazing, the packaging is a bit of a let down. Regardless, once these discs are in your stereo, you'll be in a buzz drenched nacoticized black haze so deep and deadly, shoddy packaging will be the least of your concerns...
MPEG Stream: "Nest Of Hate"
MPEG Stream: "Perched On A Neverending Peak"
MPEG Stream: "Setting Off The Twilights"
MPEG Stream: "Velorum"

VOMIT ORCHESTRA Bridges Burnt (Autumn Wind Productions)