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IMPORTANT (Please read to avoid confusion):
Some items below may be tagged with a bold, red, all-caps "out of print/unavailable" notice. This does NOT mean that all other items not so tagged are, in fact, in stock -- or for that matter, in print and available, though there's a good chance they are. Some folks get confused on this point, and we can see why, so please read this for further clarification and other important before-you-order information. Unlike some mailorder websites, we don't have an electronic inventory system linked to our site, so you can't be sure of what we actually have or don't have in stock at any given moment without asking us -- please email our mailorder department for availability status -- or better yet, just go ahead and place your order using our shopping cart function and we'll get back to you with the status of each item. If you have general non-mailorder questions, email the store.


album cover AINOTAMENISHIS Live '418 (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
You heard 'em on the recent Tokyo Flashback comp number six, now here's a full length document from this Japanese psych/punk combo. Do the math: out of print cd-r release x now on vinyl x on the ever-reliable Holy Mountain label = come 'n get it, Japanese psych fiends! Holy Mountain name drops Gaseneta and Velvet Underground as comparisons/influences. Somewhere in there for sure is the soul of the Ainotamenishis' rock abandon, like so many other heavy-duty Flashbackers we've been lucky to hear.

album cover AUFGEHOBEN Khora (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
Pop quiz! Or not so "pop" really. Whom have we ever compared to Anaal Nathrakh -and- This Heat -and- High Rise -and- Merzbow?? Why Aufgehoben of course. Their name sounds German (it means something along the lines of "nullified" or "voided" in that language). And early on, their music did have krautrocky, rhythmic underpinning. Underpinning brutal ultra distorted NOISE rock that is. And that noise has gotten only noisier and noisier, believe it or not (disbelieve at your peril).
Aufgehoben are in fact from England, and certainly fit in with the harsh n' heavy tradition of bands like Skullflower, God, Ramleh, and more recently, Shit And Shine, with whom they share the multiple drummers thing, though Aufgehoben manage to make do with just two of the species freaking out on their drum kits. They also utilize "bricks and metal" as well as the usual guitars and electronics.
But if you had to guess, from just listening to 'em, you'd probably pick Japan as their country of origin. Again, 'cause of the sheer noisiness of this, but also 'cause of how the album's last, longest track "Jederfursich..." (26:57) is an epic, repetitively pounding psych guitar blow out (blow up?) that would have the combined forces of both Boris and Merzbow running for cover... whereas the tracks that precede it aren't quite as "rock", though no less noisy, maybe more so, in the vein of Wolf Eyes, who too might reach for the earplugs when confronted with this.
Khora's first track "Ignorance Oblivion Contempt" is a vigorous splattering of utterly fried sounds, shrill shards of feedback and frantic trash-compacting percussion colliding and imploding and becoming one dense, writhing mass. That's followed by "Annex Organon", which features a more sparse sort of clatter, but you'd still better be careful about turning up the volume! Next, on "A Bastard Reasoning", we get over ten minutes of mayhem that begin with random meteor strikes of percussive, concussive distortion and then turn into a rumbling, tumbling skree-for-all. Damn.
The relative rockiness n' riffiness of the aforementioned fourth and final track, even if the riffs sound like they're played with explosives rather than on guitars, is just a slightly more controlled sort of chaos, building and building and building... kinda like a Cadaver In Drag track -being- dragged, behind a tank, down a rocky road.
No, Aufgehoben's brand of utterly destroyed instrumental improv has NOT been tamed at all on Khora, their 5th album, and 2nd for Holy Mountain, who quite rightly hail that ultimate track "Jederfursich..." as being "easily the most massive song of the year". Being obsessed with Les Rallizes Denudes and Keiji Haino, and putting out Blues Control and Wooden Shjips records, would lead you too to say things like that about Aufgehoben. Get this and see, we think you'll agree... This damage is definitely for fans of similar subversive sonic conspirators and AQ faves Shit And Shine.
MPEG Stream: "Ignorance Oblivion Contempt"
MPEG Stream: "Jederfursich..."

album cover AUFGEHOBEN Messidor (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
Yer ears ready for a bit of a challenge? This, the fourth album from take-no-prisoners English instrumental noise-rock project Aufgehoben (nee Aufgehoben No Process) ought to be just the thing. Seven tracks, 45 minutes of crumpled, crinkly skree in the form of amp-frying distortion, chaotic falling-down-the-stairs song structures, and clattering pipe-fightin' percussion. It's "music" that's been brutally improvised and manipulated, coming out sounding something like Merzbow meets the Starfuckers. At its most extreme (which is very, and most of the time) this stuff's so in-the-red it's infrared.
This time around we're hearing less of the krauty rhythmic pummel and snatches of near-melody that characterized their earlier releases (like their last one, 2004's Anno Fauve), and more just sheer blown-out, blow-it-up loud skronky noise, or threatening-to-be loud glitchscapes of brief silences, scrapery and FX. The "small print" in the cd booklet somehwhat puzzlingly specifies the instrumentation/methodology as "paper, stone, electronics, two drums, one mono GS" and "no bass, no overdubs, no no no process", along with the usual disclaimer that Aufgehoben "accept no responsibility for health or hardware". A smart lawyer they must have... Messidor is a seriously OTT session for fans of the likes of Wolf Eyes, Shit and Shine, and Skullflower.
MPEG Stream: "Ruckfragen"
MPEG Stream: "Manotgog"

BASEBALL ASTROLOGER Famine of the Soul (Holy Mountain) lp 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
If anything, it's about baseball of the soul... It's Tycho Brahe channeled through Ken Nordine in possession of an armload of Sandy Koufax fastballs. OK, I don't really know what Holy Mountain guru JW is talking about, but I think the Baseball Astrologer sounds like Godspeed You Black Emperor (a point of contention for sure, as JW vehemently despises Godspeed). Just as those opening deep drones backed the Native American tale of self-annihilation on F#A#oo, the Baseball Astrologer presents the booming existential monologues of Douglas Berman (painter, astrologer, raconteur, chai-maker, and dedicated walker) with the exceptional guitar drones, courtesy of Stephen Lobdell - currently of Faust. Each copy comes with a different 1970s baseball card - sorry the one with Rollie Fingers was already taken. Keep in mind we also still have the stellar solo LP from Lobdell under the name Davis Redford Triad.

album cover BIGOT, FRED Mono/Stereo (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
Utter obsession with a particular artist or style of music is, of course, something we're familiar with... and fully in favor of. In the case of the oft-praised by us Holy Mountain label, such obsession has lead to some quite amazing discoveries and reissues in the field of Japanese psychedelia, for instance, among other Holy Mountain specialties. This release, too, is the result of obsession, and it's been 10 years in the making. We remember way back, when Holy Mountain head honcho JW, before he had his label (he used to work at one of our suppliers), would rave about the vinyl-only 12"s of French "shuffletime" techno producer Fred Bigot (pronounced Bee-joe we assume). According to JW, Bigot's electronic tracks were in fact utterly psychedelic. And they were. Fuzzed out, raw and repetitive, hypnotic with their shuffle (schaffel) rhythms. We never forgot 'em, and neither did JW/Holy Mountain, who now finally presents the 4 cuts from Bigot's two 12" singles circa 1999 and 2000 on compact disc, along with 4 more tracks, one of 'em from a 2001 comp, the other 3 presumably previously unreleased. Definitely a bit of a 'dream come true' for Holy Mountain.
You may also know Bigot in his -other- guise of Electronicat, who has put out a lot of records we also like. But while Electronicat provides a playful dose of T-Rex style glam and glitter, and even rockabilly, with campy vocals and wah-wah guitars making appearances, upping the glam angle immensely, in comparison these tracks under Bigot's own name are stripped down, minimalistic, and without the more bubblegum elements. Imagine instead Pan Sonic, but with more of the synth-psych spirit of Christine 23 Onna. On the original 12" cuts, it's all about the mesmeric shuffle throb, the distorted crunch and scrunch, the almost drone-like repetition. (We like repetition. We've said it before, we'll say it again.) Definitely good headphone listening, or to be cranked LOUD on your home stereo. And then some of the tracks here, not from the 12"s, aren't even beat-oriented at all.
For starters, there's the intro sine-whine of opener "Chant", pretty abstract and clinical. Then, it's shuffle time, as that's followed by the one-two punch "Mono" and "Stereo" from Bigot's first 12", both tracks crude 8+ minute throb-a-thons, like followed by the equally effective cuts from his second 12", "Binary" and "Ternary", which adds glammy handclap sounds into the mix. Seeing as how getting those two crucial 12"s on cd is worth the price of admission alone, hitting repeat and playing those four tracks over and over again is certainly an option, but when you do continue on with the disc, there's further treats to be found. Next up, a change of pace with the void-ian atmospheres of the windily desolate "Extinction", full of spacey rumble. Then, bang, "Lr-Yz" is another monomaniacal, mesmeric cruncher in the tradition of the 12"s. Following that is "Outside", a 10 minute track suggestive of field recordings, with electronic sounds like crickets chirping, something like Ryoji Ikeda conducting a nighttime nature sounds symphony, but one that speeds up nervously if that's wasn't enough. And then, "Symmetriad" ends the disc, combining the distorted throb of the 12" cuts with the more haunted ambience of the likes of "Extinction" and "Outside". So it all kind of appropriately comes together, and for a collection of tracks not originally intended as an album, this actually adds up into one surprisingly well, a unified vision with a bit of variety. Maybe 'cause all the tracks, recorded in Paris and Berlin, were made with the following only: "Roland TR808 + Rat distortion + Waldorf filter + Sherman filter + Lexicon Jamman". We don't know... but we do like it, can't get enuff. Big ups to Holy Mountain for bringing these Bigot tracks back!! That old obsession never let go we guess, and pays off for all of us now.
MPEG Stream: "Mono"
MPEG Stream: "Binary"
MPEG Stream: "Extinction"

album cover BIRDS OF MAYA Vol. 1 (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98

album cover BLUES CONTROL s/t (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
Don't let the punny name fool ya, this surely isn't "blues rock". Nor blues. Nor rock. Not really. Nor is it of Yugoslav origin, despite the biographical misinformation posted on the Holy Mountain website that claims Blues Control to be an obscure '70s psych band from Yugoslavia. Nope, Blues Control are an instrumental Brooklyn duo on guitar and synths and drums, making a wonderfully fucked up yet pleasantly listenable psych-squabble of a sound that's not super easy to describe, actually... let's just say that if it were blues rock, it'd be druggily confused, utterly EXPERIMENTAL blues rock. The eight tracks found on this eponymous debut wander through mellow, spacey passages, interludes of seasick synth symphonics, and blown-out epic episodes full of fuzzed-up motorpsycho guitar leads, drunken and damaged sounding. Blues Control's two-man trash team are up to something strange here, counter-intuitive creativity that can make a cool track out of some pretty piano dropped into a droney wash, followed up by a broken-amp bass solo and some off-kilter beats, ferinstance. This totally fits in on the out-there Holy Mountain label alongside the likes of Residual Echoes and Aufgehoben, especially considering how fractured and distorted they can get, almost like a fuzzed-out Starfuckers on the very first track. We're digging this a lot.
MPEG Stream: "Blues Control"
MPEG Stream: "Boiled Peanuts"
MPEG Stream: "No Sweat"

album cover BLUES CONTROL s/t (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
NOW ON VINYL! Here's our review from before when we highlighted the cd version:
Don't let the punny name fool ya, this surely isn't "blues rock". Nor blues. Nor rock. Not really. Nor is it of Yugoslav origin, despite the biographical misinformation posted on the Holy Mountain website that claims Blues Control to be an obscure '70s psych band from Yugoslavia. Nope, Blues Control are an instrumental Brooklyn duo on guitar and synths and drums, making a wonderfully fucked up yet pleasantly listenable psych-squabble of a sound that's not super easy to describe, actually... let's just say that if it were blues rock, it'd be druggily confused, utterly EXPERIMENTAL blues rock. The eight tracks found on this eponymous debut wander through mellow, spacey passages, interludes of seasick synth symphonics, and blown-out epic episodes full of fuzzed-up motorpsycho guitar leads, drunken and damaged sounding. Blues Control's two-man trash team are up to something strange here, counter-intuitive creativity that can make a cool track out of some pretty piano dropped into a droney wash, followed up by a broken-amp bass solo and some off-kilter beats, ferinstance. This totally fits in on the out-there Holy Mountain label alongside the likes of Residual Echoes and Aufgehoben, especially considering how fractured and distorted they can get, almost like a fuzzed-out Starfuckers on the very first track. We're digging this a lot.
MPEG Stream: "Blues Control"
MPEG Stream: "Boiled Peanuts"
MPEG Stream: "No Sweat"

album cover CLOUDLAND CANYON Silver Tongue Sisyphus (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
Now on Vinyl! Here's what we said about the cd version when it came out in '07:
One of our most unexpected surprises last year came from Cloudland Canyon who totally blew us away with Requiems Der Natur 2002-2004, a shimmering sonic concoction, that sounded a bit like Ash Ra Tempel being channeled through the more melodic side of The Dead C.
They've followed that remarkable outing with a record that contains only two songs, but what it lacks in length it more then makes up for in cosmic-kraut brilliance. Listening to the two long tracks on this record is like being transported away on some otherworldly helicopter co-piloted by LaMonte Young and a very spaced out Hawkwind. We keep listening to these two epic tracks over and over and every time we do a customer is inevitably convinced that we're playing some obscure vintage kraut gem that they somehow have never heard before. Folks are always stunned to find out that this is brand new, but what makes Cloudland Canyon so great is that they manage to tap into that magical moment of cosmic kraut bliss, but do so without merely sounding like a tribute band, as there is something very immediate and timeless to the sounds they create. With another brand new full length coming soon on Kranky [Lie In Light] we predict that everyone blasting their Wooden Shjips records right now will be blissing out and taking off with Cloudland Canyon very soon. We sure are! You can start now.
MPEG Stream: "Dambala"
MPEG Stream: "Silver Tongued Sisyphus"

album cover CLOUDLAND CANYON / LICHENS Exterminating Angel (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
This is a match that makes perfect sense. As Lichens and Cloudland Canyon have both been making some of the most compelling and rewarding crystalline soundscapes of the last few years. One long track clocking in at around a half hour "Exterminating Angel" does sound like the sum of both of these artists' parts. With the first half sounding much more like Lichens, gorgeous deep in space hazy explorations while the krautier leanings of Cloudland Canyon come into focus in the second half of the track propelling the sounds into their kosmiche orbit. Fans of mid-late '70s Tangerine Dream and early Heldon will for sure want to jump aboard this cosmic adventure.
MPEG Stream: "Babylon"

album cover CLOUDLAND CANYON / LICHENS Exterminating Angel (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
NOW ON VINYL!
This is a match that makes perfect sense. As Lichens and Cloudland Canyon have both been making some of the most compelling and rewarding crystalline soundscapes of the last few years. One long track clocking in at around a half hour "Exterminating Angel" does sound like the sum of both of these artists' parts. With the first half sounding much more like Lichens, gorgeous deep in space hazy explorations while the krautier leanings of Cloudland Canyon come into focus in the second half of the track propelling the sounds into their kosmiche orbit. Fans of mid-late '70s Tangerine Dream and early Heldon will for sure want to jump aboard this cosmic adventure.
MPEG Stream: "Babylon"

album cover DAVIS REDFORD TRIAD Blue Cloud (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
As heavy psych guitar power trios channelling the lost '70s krautrock vibe go, well, these guys are the current champs of the US of A (and rival the heavy hitters like Acid Mothers Temple from Japan as well). Of course, they're from the hippie coast up north from here (Portland actually), though their guitarist/mastermind Steven Wray Lobdell has connections in Germany -- he plays in Faust too y'know! This latest DRT album takes their spacey, drugged out, droney psychedelia into some aggro areas, while remaining totally dreamy at other times. The single misstep occurs early in the album -- we'll be hitting the 'skip' button at track two in future after hearing it once, as it's based on a pseudo-beat poetry spoken word thing by The Baseball Astrologer. He's a cool old dude, sure, with some right-on sentiments about "America, my violent stupid friend" but we prefer the music to do the talking. Which it does on the rest of the disc, instrumentals stretched out to the horizons of your inner consciousness, man. The centerpiece to the album, "Mellowed For Over 80 Million Years", takes the listener on a 15+ minute blissed out trip, while other tracks are much heavier and freakier. It's mind-expanding, lava-lamp goodness. Recommended.
MPEG Stream: "Into The Mist"
MPEG Stream: "The Temple Of The Jaguar"

album cover DAVIS REDFORD TRIAD Code Orange (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
Out of the misty Pacific Northwest, underground psychedelic guitar god Stephen Wray Lobdell (heck he's been playing guitar for legendary krautrockers Faust, that's close to godhood, right?) and the other three guys in the strangely named Davis Redford Triad enter our waking dreamspace yet again with "Code Orange". The Triad is Lobdell's primary venue for his way-out instrumental drone guitar psych -- think Japan's Fushitsusha or SF's Comets On Fire. Chugging, chiming, wailing, haunting, heavy effin' cosmic beauty. This disc is a "live collage" from the band's tour in the spring of 2002, and features not only favorites like "Solar Aquarius" and "Apocalypse Greeting Card" from their two studio albums, but also adaptations of some Lobdell compositions originally found on his lovely "Automatic Writing" solo album -- suitably amped up for Triad performance -- AND three totally new songs as well!! Numbered, limited to 500, consider this a (must-have for fans) teaser of sorts for the Triad's upcoming studio full-length "Blue Cloud" on Holy Mountain this fall. Now, how'd Holy Mtn. honcho John Whitson manage to get our gov't to bump the official "panic rating" up to Code Orange for real the very same week this was due for release? I don't want to think about it, we'll leave that to the FBI. Maybe Tom Ridge is a mystical dude. Anyway, the, um, coincidence is an "Apocalypse Greeting Card" for us, indeed.
RealAudio clip: "All Mystics Are Numbered"
RealAudio clip: "Blue Cloud"

DAVIS REDFORD TRIAD Ewige Blumenkraft (Holy Mountain) cd 12.98
This excellent droney guitar-psych band's second album, after their acclaimed vinyl-only Holy Mountain debut a year or two ago, "The Mystical Path of The Number 86". Making the move to cd hopefully will increase the chances that more folks will be lucky enough to check them out. The Triad (Davis Redford is not a real person) features, and I mean really features, the oceanic guitar playing of one Stephen Wray Lobdell, who has been responsible for that instrument on the last few Faust recordings and live tours (maybe that's where he got the German for the title). So, fans of Faust's fine "Ravvivando" as well as the likes of Doldrums, Ghost, Nurse With Wound, and similar, krautrocky things should bend an ear towards Lobdell's combo for sure. Lovely stuff, all dreamy and Eastern-tinged. It's epic, and it'll take you places.

album cover DAVIS REDFORD TRIAD The Mystical Path Of The Number Eighty Six (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
Psychedelic rock music inspired by and/or the cause of various psychological anomalies and psychic phenomena! Seriously. The Davis Redford Triad is the fully levitational drone-rock unit centered on the outer-mind guitar explorations of Steven Wray Lobdell (just don't call him Stevie Wray!). He's the bearded hippy with the brow, holding the dog in his lap, both of whom stare out at you from the back cover of this release. You may also know him from his other projects (Baseball Astrologer, Sufi Mind Game, and the lovely acoustic solo set "Automatic Writing By The Moon", also on Holy Mountain). Oh, and of course he's also the guitarist in Faust! Yes, although Lobdell's from the Pacific Northwest, he somehow ended up playing guitar with those re-united krautrockers on their last few albums. Faust of course wouldn't hire just any old long-hair to play guitar, and our favorite 'new Faust' album "Ravvivando" wouldn't have been nearly as excellent without him.
We really liked the Triad's second album, 2000's German-titled but Eastern-tinged "Ewige Blumenkraft" but really, *really* liked their much heavier first LP, "The Mystical Path Of The Number Eighty Six". Originally released in 1997 as a limited edition vinyl artifact, the Triad's debut album has long been in need of compact disc reissue, and at last here it is. This classic has now re-emerged in remixed and re-sequenced form, and includes a theremin track mysteriously missing from the LP version...
It's a really good late night listen, as Lobdell & co. conjur a kosmic kraut vibe via deep, droney instrumental psych jams on guitar and organ, with drums on one track and some electronics thrown in. But mostly guitar, lots of guitar! It's essentially a solo album. Fans of Keiji Haino (another Faust collaborator) and his band Fushitsusha should dig this...though Fushitsusha can be a lot more abrasive. Lobdell's clouds of distortion are rather more 'round' and pleasant than the extremes of Haino's skree. Yet amid the Triad's transportational anthems you'll find some abrasive distorto-grind to be sure (right in the very loud, very dark first track actually). Other comparisons could be made to guitarists like Caspar Brotzman (at his most Hendrix-feeling), or Blue Cheer's Randy Holden (at his most abstract)...
Truly essential for anyone into heavy drone-psych guitar from Bardo Pond to Population II to Fushistsusha. Even if you have the original vinyl, you should check this cd out, as it's quite a bit different. And look for a new Triad release in the fall.
RealAudio clip: "Solar Aquarius"
RealAudio clip: "Mysteries of Cydonia"
RealAudio clip: "Hymn of the Virgin Sun Queen"

DAVIS REDFORD TRIAD The Mystical Path of the Number Eighty Six (Holy Mountain) lp 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Stephen Wray Lobdell, the mysterious guy who played guitar on Faust's "Rien," surfaces again on the respected Holy Mountain label, with a guitar/organ psychedelic drone record. Lovely sleeve. Limited to 500 copies.

album cover DORONCO GUMO Old Punks (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
Part Les Rallizes Denudes, part Maher Shalal Hash Baz, this Japanese super group do a sort of droney, jangley garage psych pop, that over the course of Old Punks slips from woozy indie rock to brooding looped psych rock, playful power pop, to reverby almost ballads to Velvets-y minimal lope. The band is super laid back, the songs are weary and ragged and drawly and shambling, the guitars loose and detuned sounding, the drums spare and simple, the vocals, which might make or break DG for most folks, are sort of flat and tuneless, mumbled and moaned, sometimes crooned, but usually buried in the mix, just another layer of whirling sonic warmth.
Occasionally, things do get weird, some crunchy surf guitars, some strange jumbled group vocals, all tangled and chaotic, and of course bursts of psychedelic solo guitar squall, but for the most part Old Punks traffics in simple stripped down psychedelic rock, laced with bits of folk and pop, and of course shadows of both Maher and Les Rallizes.
Comes with a download card so you can grab yourself a digital copy of the record too!

album cover EDEN EXPRESS Que Amour Que (Holy Mountain) cd 14.98
While just about everything Holy Mountain puts out is awesome they also tend to focus on the heavier side of the underground musical landscape. With this debut by Eden Express they're showing their softer side, while managing to keep the awesomeness on full throttle! There would be no other time for this record to get released then smack dab in the midst of summer as this is some sun-soaked-tripped-out-bake-at-the-beach-psych-pop that we can't get enough of. Featuring one member of Cloudland Canyon, this is a group who understand how to evoke colorful and vivid sensations. Mixing Eastern tinged psychedelia with delicious hints of washed out samba with such an effortless and breezy delivery. This is a timeless sounding record that could just as easily be some lost early '70s South American psychedelic gem (which the cover design suggests) as much as a much more drugged out Antena or Brightblack Morning Light jamming on the beach with some Finnish folks like Lau Nau and Islaja at their side. Such delicious delay and reverb, just the right touches of flute and otherworldliness, and it's about time psych gets out of the forest and onto the sand. A record made to soak in sun and melt with.
NB. includes a cover of "Loneliest Person" by The Pretty Things.
MPEG Stream: "Skin De Sol"
MPEG Stream: "Swelling Moon"
MPEG Stream: "On The Beach"

album cover EDEN EXPRESS Que Amour Que (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
Now Available On Vinyl!
While just about everything Holy Mountain puts out is awesome they also tend to focus on the heavier side of the underground musical landscape. With this debut by Eden Express they're showing their softer side, while managing to keep the awesomeness on full throttle! There would be no other time for this record to get released then smack dab in the midst of summer as this is some sun-soaked-tripped-out-bake-at-the-beach-psych-pop that we can't get enough of. Featuring one member of Cloudland Canyon, this is a group who understand how to evoke colorful and vivid sensations. Mixing Eastern tinged psychedelia with delicious hints of washed out samba with such an effortless and breezy delivery. This is a timeless sounding record that could just as easily be some lost early '70s South American psychedelic gem (which the cover design suggests) as much as a much more drugged out Antena or Brightblack Morning Light jamming on the beach with some Finnish folks like Lau Nau and Islaja at their side. Such delicious delay and reverb, just the right touches of flute and otherworldliness, and it's about time psych gets out of the forest and onto the sand. A record made to soak in sun and melt with.
NB. includes a cover of "Loneliest Person" by The Pretty Things.
MPEG Stream: "Skin De Sol"
MPEG Stream: "Swelling Moon"
MPEG Stream: "On The Beach"

album cover FERRARO, JAMES Clear (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
It's been a while since we've listed anything Skaters related, and not for lack of action on their part, they have an avalanche of new cd-r's, that we'll try to get to eventually, but for now, let's tackle this, the latest lp from half of the Skaters, James Ferraro. Pretty sure this is an lp reissue of some out of print tapes or something, but it hardly matters, cuz wherever it came from it's pretty damn cool. The sticker calls the sounds within "tropical drones". But if we had to describe it, NEW AGE seems way more accurate. And we don't meant that in a bad way at all. We love new age, as long as it's like this, gorgeous blissed out crystalline shimmer, long slow moving tones, delicate melodies, everything glistening and glimmering, reflective and prismatic and hypnotic, but then about halfway through the song shifts and things get freaky, in come the muted crunchy eighties sounding guitars and the muffled buried rhythms, the original tones get a little fuzzier as the song evolves into an imaginary eighties new wave cop show theme song. Which is awesome.
The flipside definitely sounds tropical, with squiggly fake flute melodies, the chirp of dolphin calls buried in the ooze and warble of the shimmery underwater warble, the sound gorgeously warped and washed out, trippy and almost otherworldly, it's a bit like the sound you hear when you wake up on the couch in the middle of the night, all groggy and half asleep and you left the TV on and some bizarre nature program or softcore porn is playing, but all you can hear is the sound, and then you suddenly open your eyes and all you can see are clouds and pyramids and your living room seems to have sunken into the deep blue, it sort of sounds like that. Awesome.
Comes with a download card too, so you can get your self another digital chunk of underwater tropical new age-y bliss.

album cover FERRARO, JAMES Discovery (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
Don't be confused, it may look the same, but in fact, it's the second of two lp reissues from James Ferraro, one half of floor core legends the Skaters. We reviewed his Clear lp on our last list, this time it's Discovery, almost the exact same cover, the alien pyramids floating in some strange sea, only the name of the record is different (and don't trust the sticker, on about half of the lps we got the stickers were all switched up), although really it barely matters, as the sounds on Discovery, sound very much like the ones on Clear, which make sense as they are archival recordings from about the same time period.
Two side long jams, exploring that alien new age only those Skaters guys seem capable of, this one sounds like two parts of the same jam, equal parts new age swoosh, staticky old AM radio and alien soap opera theme music, all blurred and smeared into a weirdly organic warped and warbly drift. Bleary and blown out, glistening and glimmery, a buried krautrock groove, that seems to fade out and return at random, all imbued with a cool psychedelic eighties B-movie Goblin vibe.
The flipside is more of the same, only a bit more rocking, more feedback and distortion, but just barely, the guitars a tad more noodly and spidery, but all the sounds still washed out and sun dappled and hypnotic. Like Clear before it, Discovery is a fantastic chunk of blissed out Baywatch new age, and here's hoping Holy Mountain keeps digging up and reissuing these tripped out artifacts.
Comes with a download card too, so you can get iPod-able versions of these tracks as well!!

album cover HEXLOVE Knew Abloom (Life's Hood) (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
Member of Hella, Who's Your Favorite Son God and Prints goin' percussion crazy here on this DIY slab of weirdness.

album cover HIGGS, DANIEL (A.I.U.) Ancestral Songs (Holy Mountain) cd 15.98
Daniel Higgs is a very strange man. Or maybe we should say, Daniel (Arcus Incus Ululat) Higgs, Interdimensional Song-Seamstress, is a very strange man. His artwork is amazing and bizarre, Spock ears and eye-balled Christmas trees, emaciated figures riding strange hellish beasts, an amazing personal mythology represented as a menagerie of impossible and impossibly beautiful figures and beasts. His music seems to somehow embody the same mystery, a world that Higgs inhabits simultaneously to his presence in our own. That must be the only thing that can truly explain the man and his music. That he walks around, one foot in our world, of people places and things, the other in some kaleidoscopic world where sounds are tasted and sights are smelled, a synesthetic wonderland, that when translated and brought over to our plain of existence, appears distorted, twisted, haunting and hard to fathom. But at the same time imbued with some otherworldly warmth and a beauty that while alien, represents a higher state, maybe unreachable here. That is Higgs' gift. He is a traveler and a troubadour. He allows us to see visions, to hear musical mysteries. Through paintings, drawings, tattoos and especially music. From the moment we first heard his 'rock' band Lungfish we were smitten. Actually, the very first time we heard Lungfish was in a record store in another town, years ago. Our first thought was "What the hell is this?" But after several more songs, we were compelled to sheepishly approach the counter and ask the clerk what was playing. We bought it, and loved it. And maybe that's the magic of Higgs' music. It's esoteric and not always approachable. It takes some trust, a leap of faith, some sonic daring. But that faith is always repaid many times over. Outside of Lungfish, Higgs also plays in the Pupils along with his Lungfish bandmate Asa, a more intimate stripped down version of his rock band. The same cyclical riffs and chant like vocals, but all acoustic, and sparsely arranged. There is also his amazing sort-of Appalachian solo guitar work, and his very very strange solo Jew's harp recordings.
This disc is Higgs' first proper solo release and manages to tie up all his disparate sonic threads into one big gorgeous Gordian knot.
Several tracks sound like they could have come straight off the Pupils record. Simple, haunting acoustic guitar riffs, repeated and repeated until they becomes totally hypnotic, mantra like, with Higgs' gorgeous vocals over the top, a mix of old timey sea shanty and folk standard. The rest drift dreamily from sound to sound, like a sonic journey through the soul of the man. Gorgeous tangles of banjo or some banjo-like instrument drift amidst field recordings of birds (knowing Higgs it may have been actually recorded right there in the woods, although he has been known to travel with a portable recorder to capture whatever strikes his fancy) a steel string buzz, that wanders from near traditional sounding Appalachian twang to some sort of jaunty Celtic melody to brief melodic flurries, impossibly buzzy and blurry. Thick swaths of buzzing guitar swirl and squirm, doomy, melancholy melodies spread out over a machine like whir, sounding like a guitar being played like a bagpipe. While over the top drifts tiny tangles of steel string picking all drenched in strange FX and allowed to twist and distort, sounding almost the way a Jew's harp does when you change the shape of your mouth. And as if pre-ordained (which it most likely was), out comes the Jew's harp, but it sounds like no Jew's harp you've ever heard. Super brittle and distorted, like some sort of metallic marimba, or a Konono outtake broadcast via shortwave and played through a crappy transistor radio. A gorgeous buzzy abstract hoedown. Finally, the record winds up (most definitely not down) with a thick swirl of super lo-fi psych guitar freakout, the chords and notes bent and twisted, pitches slipping back and forth, overtones subtly shifting, notes colliding and exploding into little bursts of jagged buzz before settling back into a droning hypnotic thrum. Like some alien jig, if aliens had a practice space full of strangely tuned guitars and really loud amps with blown speakers. And again, it sounds like somehow Higgs figured out a way to hold the guitar up to his mouth and play it like a Jew's harp, the sounds changing shape as much as tone, a warm and fuzzed out smear of distorted buzz that washes over you, as does this whole sonic scripture, like a shower of rich wet soil and sparkling uncut diamonds.
MPEG Stream: "Living In The Kingdom Of Death"
MPEG Stream: "Thy Chosen Bride"

album cover HIGGS, DANIEL (A.I.U.) Ancestral Songs (Holy Mountain) lp 15.98
Daniel Higgs is a very strange man. Or maybe we should say, Daniel (Arcus Incus Ululat) Higgs, Interdimensional Song-Seamstress, is a very strange man. His artwork is amazing and bizarre, Spock ears and eye-balled Christmas trees, emaciated figures riding strange hellish beasts, an amazing personal mythology represented as a menagerie of impossible and impossibly beautiful figures and beasts. His music seems to somehow embody the same mystery, a world that Higgs inhabits simultaneously to his presence in our own. That must be the only thing that can truly explain the man and his music. That he walks around, one foot in our world, of people places and things, the other in some kaleidoscopic world where sounds are tasted and sights are smelled, a synesthetic wonderland, that when translated and brought over to our plain of existence, appears distorted, twisted, haunting and hard to fathom. But at the same time imbued with some otherworldly warmth and a beauty that while alien, represents a higher state, maybe unreachable here. That is Higgs' gift. He is a traveler and a troubadour. He allows us to see visions, to hear musical mysteries. Through paintings, drawings, tattoos and especially music. From the moment we first heard his 'rock' band Lungfish we were smitten. Actually, the very first time we heard Lungfish was in a record store in another town, years ago. Our first thought was "What the hell is this?" But after several more songs, we were compelled to sheepishly approach the counter and ask the clerk what was playing. We bought it, and loved it. And maybe that's the magic of Higgs' music. It's esoteric and not always approachable. It takes some trust, a leap of faith, some sonic daring. But that faith is always repaid many times over. Outside of Lungfish, Higgs also plays in the Pupils along with his Lungfish bandmate Asa, a more intimate stripped down version of his rock band. The same cyclical riffs and chant like vocals, but all acoustic, and sparsely arranged. There is also his amazing sort-of Appalachian solo guitar work, and his very very strange solo Jew's harp recordings.
This disc is Higgs' first proper solo release and manages to tie up all his disparate sonic threads into one big gorgeous Gordian knot.
Several tracks sound like they could have come straight off the Pupils record. Simple, haunting acoustic guitar riffs, repeated and repeated until they becomes totally hypnotic, mantra like, with Higgs' gorgeous vocals over the top, a mix of old timey sea shanty and folk standard. The rest drift dreamily from sound to sound, like a sonic journey through the soul of the man. Gorgeous tangles of banjo or some banjo-like instrument drift amidst field recordings of birds (knowing Higgs it may have been actually recorded right there in the woods, although he has been known to travel with a portable recorder to capture whatever strikes his fancy) a steel string buzz, that wanders from near traditional sounding Appalachian twang to some sort of jaunty Celtic melody to brief melodic flurries, impossibly buzzy and blurry. Thick swaths of buzzing guitar swirl and squirm, doomy, melancholy melodies spread out over a machine like whir, sounding like a guitar being played like a bagpipe. While over the top drifts tiny tangles of steel string picking all drenched in strange FX and allowed to twist and distort, sounding almost the way a Jew's harp does when you change the shape of your mouth. And as if pre-ordained (which it most likely was), out comes the Jew's harp, but it sounds like no Jew's harp you've ever heard. Super brittle and distorted, like some sort of metallic marimba, or a Konono outtake broadcast via shortwave and played through a crappy transistor radio. A gorgeous buzzy abstract hoedown. Finally, the record winds up (most definitely not down) with a thick swirl of super lo-fi psych guitar freakout, the chords and notes bent and twisted, pitches slipping back and forth, overtones subtly shifting, notes colliding and exploding into little bursts of jagged buzz before settling back into a droning hypnotic thrum. Like some alien jig, if aliens had a practice space full of strangely tuned guitars and really loud amps with blown speakers. And again, it sounds like somehow Higgs figured out a way to hold the guitar up to his mouth and play it like a Jew's harp, the sounds changing shape as much as tone, a warm and fuzzed out smear of distorted buzz that washes over you, as does this whole sonic scripture, like a shower of rich wet soil and sparkling uncut diamonds.
MPEG Stream: "Living In The Kingdom Of Death"
MPEG Stream: "Thy Chosen Bride"

album cover HIGGS, DANIEL "BELTESHAZZAR" Metempsychotic Memories (Holy Mountain) cd 14.98
We'd be happy if Daniel Higgs would put out a new album every month. Every week, even. His songs can be long (up to 14 minutes on this disc's "Love Abides") but eventually they do end and we always want more more more. Because they are totally entrancing, his raw "Appalachian raga" folk picking style wending and winding while he chants his mystic lyrics repetitively, warbling with the outsider intensity of a Charles Manson... a dramatic delivery that eccentrically enhances the weird wisdom of his words, worth absorbing for their imagery even when their import is not immediately understandable. Well though he's not THAT prolific we're happy to have this new disc on Holy Mountain already, following Atomic Yggdrasil Tarot on Thrill Jockey earlier this year.
Metempsychotic Melodies (whatever that means, it seems like a good title for this!!) starts off with a stark and skillful instrumental, "Universal Salutation", which we're told was "recorded aboard the Starship Weep-For-Lucifer". Again, we believe it, that somehow makes sense. That leads into the aforementioned "Love Abides", an extended mantra for voice and banjo (in fact, banjo is the main instrument throughout), wherein Higgs sings lines like "Love is the secret seam between waking and dream / love is a breath that bears a boundless scream" and offers up further thoughts from his personal gnosis of love, notions guaranteed to never be repeated in any other "love song" ever!! Such as: "Love, like a basilisk hatched in the nest of a dove / love's got a bible it hides in the folds of a cloud" and "Love is your name when your name has fallen away / love tends the last dawning of the last day"...
As if allowing an interlude to let all that sink in, the third track "Leontocephaline Rhapsody" is a loping, psychedelic instrumental, a gentle jam densely droning and alive with electricity. Then comes the fourth and final song, "All Cherished Things", another display of Higgs' druggy, fascinating poetry. "There's a pearl in your head / the head between your double-head / it's flashing blue and red - hear it sing". He goes on to touch upon some favored themes, Christ, Krishna, coitus, his own dead body, love... Lyrics like "The skull at the foot of the cross is my own" could be creepy, or pretentious, as could be Higgs' unique vocal stylings, but no, not as far as we're concerned. Ok, maybe it is a bit creepy. He's on a wavelength that works (for him -- maybe no one else could pull this off). If Higgs had a cult, we'd seriously consider joining it...truly a treasure of the US indie rock scene, and one of the realest deals in the "acid folk" underground. We'll be spinning this highly recommended album with ceremonial regularity as it takes its honored place in our collection of his music, and of course our anticipation of his next set of shamanic sermons remains high.
MPEG Stream: "All Cherished Things"
MPEG Stream: "Universal Salutation"
MPEG Stream: "Love Abides"

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