DANIELSON FAMILY Tell Another Joke at the Ol' Choppin' Block (Secretly Canadian) cd 13.98

DANIELSON: A FAMILY MOVIE (A DOCUMENTARY MUSICAL BY JL ARONSON) (Image Entertainment) dvd 27.00
Friends, relatives and fans of Daniel Smith and co. (aka Danielson aka the Danielson Family aka Danielson Famile aka Br. Danielson aka...), here's something you'll want to add to your beloved distinctly non-secular pop band's keepsake box. Heck, you probably already intimately know almost all of the stories revealed in this intimate documentary. Well, nothin' like a little reminiscing, right? Actually you might encounter a few surprise revelations along the way. Filmmaker JL Aronson has crafted a pleasure to watch for fans and newcomers alike, an artful work that combines live footage, animation, archival clips and stories galore. Of course, you also get a heap of bonus material too: deleted scenes, commentary, music vids, etc!

DANNY & THE NIGHTMARES The End Is Near Again (Cool Beans) cd 9.98
It's been a while but... the inimitable man-child Daniel Johnston rides again... with full band in tow! The End Is Near showcases Daniel... er, I mean Danny raising a garage rawk style ruckus with his pals the Nightmares. Not for everyone, but hardcore fans of Johnston will surely rejoice!
MPEG Stream: "Lost Hero of Rock n Roll"
MPEG Stream: "Natzi"

DANSE SOCIETY, THE Demos Vol. 1 (Dark Entries) lp 17.98
British Goth outfit the Danse Society signed to Arista in 1983, in the wake of dour post-punk acts like The Cure and Bauhaus getting courted by the major labels with considerable success. The album that followed for the Danse Society - Heaven Is Waiting - was met with a tepid response, given the promise of their raw, commanding live presence and the strength of the two previous singles the band released through their own imprint. These recordings were made prior to the Arista album, with just five of the 11 tracks making the cut for Arista's commercially viable edicts and a few others relegated to B sides. The sound here is much more tempestuous, claustrophobic, and bleak through the band's ferocious rhythm section featuring Paul Gilmartin's tumbling, tribal drums and the spectral, heavy flange of Tim Wright's bass. This was the tried and true formula of many of the Bat Cave alumni: Sex Gang Children, Southern Death Cult, Siouxsie, Virgin Prunes, Specimen, Killing Joke, etc. The intensity of The Danse Society's sound is demonstrated in the differences between the demo version and the Arista version of "Come Inside" the former of which really does put the rock in Goth-rock, with Sisters Of Mercy inflected guitars swarming around that rhythm section and vocalist Steve Rawlings parading around the track with suitable theatrics and bravado. The title track of the Artista album could have been a Killing Joke track off of Nighttime with its death-disco basslines and metronomic percussion, flecked with atmospheric synths and droned guitars. In so many ways, The Danse Society never sounded better than they did on these demos. Another tip of the hat to Dark Entries for digging this one up!
MPEG Stream: "Arabia"
MPEG Stream: "Come Inside"
MPEG Stream: "The Hurt"
MPEG Stream: "Seduction"

DANTE AUGUSTUS SCARLATTI Hemispheres Of Desolation (Auris Apothecary) cassette 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
If you follow aQuarius on Facebook and Twitter, then you may have gotten a little taste of what is quickly becoming our new favorite label, Auris Apothercary. The first releases we got from them, was a tiny glass vial, with a single tape loop within, old Norwegian recordings of oceanographic instruments, the second was a series of NEC tapes, each with the original music from classic Nintendo games, with the packaging perfectly emulating the original designs. The vials sold out in a flash, we might have a couple of the tapes left (just ask), but we will henceforth endeavor to review anything and everything we can get from AA. A quick look at their other releases reveals an impossibly meticulous approach to packaging, everything in limited numbers, mostly because they are all hand designed and assembled, in fact, just take a look at this, a tape from someone (or something) called Dante Augustus Scarlatti, whose tape comes housed in a printed, clear plastic slipcover, with the tapecase itself also silkscreened, not to mention ANOTHER transparent insert, cool line drawings of mountains, and old maps, the two tape spools behind silver inked globes (the tapes cleverly not rewound, so each spool is a perfect planetoid sphere, the various layers perfectly blended into one elaborate almost 3 dimensional image, each one also numbered, limited to just 99 copies. With things like this, it almost doesn't even matter what it sounds like, it's a piece of art, that would look just as nice sitting on your shelf as it would jammed in your Walkman. But don't let its artiness keep you from enjoying the mysterious sounds inside, nearly two hours of rumbling drones and swirling atmospheric mystery, blurred industrial landscapes of dreamlike crumble, buried barely there rhythms, constantly shifting textures, guitars and oscillators woven into heaving swells of washed out decay and feedback wreathed glacial drift, each side a single slow burning expanse of tectonic creep and gauzy greyed out ambience, totally hypnotic and mesmerizing minimal dronemusic that should most definitely appeal to all the aQ shoppin' dronelords out there.
Again, LIMITED TO 99 COPIES, we got a handful, not sure we'll be able to get more when we run out...

DANTE AUGUSTUS SCARLATTI Recycled HNW (Auris Apothecary) cassette 5.98
It's like Christmas around here (we know, it is ACTUALLY like Christmas around here right now), whenever we get a new batch of tapes from Auris Apothecary, not only is it bound to sonically all over the map, without fail the packaging is totally stellar, often high (or low) concept, meticulously hand assembled, often involving organic matter, or broken glass, or sponges, or scrolls, or who knows what else. Needless to say, every AA release is special, and is often as much a work of sonic art, as it is a piece of music.
We reviewed a record by Dante Augustus Scarlatti (the group, not the person, we think) a while back, a fantastic collection of rumbling drones and blurred psychedelic soundscapery, and this latest one is sort of a continuation of that, utilizing 15 separate drones, culled from strings and voices and organs, in the form of buzz and hiss and skree and thrum and hum and whir, laid atop one another, bleeding and oozing into each other, the sound MASSIVE, and thick and layered, the sounds crumbling and constantly shifting, on the surface, this is a noise tape, but the noise is blurred and washed out, and more droney than noisy, thick billows of sound, textured and strangely lush (but still fairly low fidelity), dubbed onto recycled tapes, with the idea that any imperfections in the original tapes, be it bleed through of the original sounds or decay from worn magnetic tape, would all contribute to the sound, and those random imperfections only serve to add texture to the already heavily textured dronescapes. Fear of noise should not keep anyone from enjoying this stuff, cuz as we mentioned, it's a warm, thick, muted undulating noise, that washes over you like a glorious low end avalanche.
LIMITED TO 405 COPIES, each one hand printed, in ELEVEN different color variations, a printed insert along with the tape housed in a stickered and sealed plastic bag with a spray painted white printed label.

DANTESCO s/t (Stormspell) cd 11.98
Recently we highlighted the new album from Puerto Rico's most epic doomy operatic metal band, Dantesco, Seven Years Of Battle. Simultaneously released with that, Stormspell has also brought out this raging disc of demos from their very first year of battle, back in 2004. They were as over the top and impressive then as they are now. Plus bonus tracks, including two more covers rather revealing of their obscure epic influences: "Queen In Black" originally by Swedish cult Sorcerer (whose album has recently been reissued, and we'll probably be listing soon!) and "Deliver Us From Evil" by the legendary Warlord, which by itself would be enough to get the true metal heads here at AQ to buy this, though we'd be buying it anyway since we're Dantesco fans already! For those, like us, who can't get enough of the EPIC! (Or the unintentional visual hilarity of this otherwise quite serious -sounding- band's band photos...)
As with other Stormspell releases, this is a limited, numbered edition...
MPEG Stream: "Cronicas De La Muerte Negra"
MPEG Stream: "Dantesco"
MPEG Stream: "Deliver Us From Evil"

DANTESCO Seven Years Of Battle (Stormspell) cd 11.98
THEE most epic, grandiose, operatic, regal, majestic, bombastic, portentous power / doom metal this side of Sweden's mighty Candlemass, quite possibly comes from the island of Puerto Rico, in the form of this band, called Dantesco. We haven't listed anything by them before, but we've actually been fans of 'em for a while (well, Allan and Andee anyway, as this particular style of metal isn't admittedly to everyone's taste). So we were excited to get this new disc, their third proper album, not surprisingly released seven years after the band's inception, which comes to us via the excellent Stormspell label, who specialize in anything obscure and '80s (or that sounds that way) in the metal realm. See also Immaculate, reviewed this list, and also recent releases by Noctum and DarkBlack.
The big deal with Dantesco is pretty much their singer, Erico La Bestia, who possesses a powerful and versatile voice, capable of deep somber recitations, as well as fists-clenched screaming in his upper range (which is up there!). We'd guess he's a tenor, not quite sure, but he sure sounds operatic, and regardless of whether he's singing in English or Spanish (on this album, 2 of the 8 tracks are in Spanish) we find both his voice and vocal stylings quite compelling. The man was clearly BORN to sing in a band like this, lucky for the other dudes in Dantesco. If such a thing as epic doom metal didn't exist, they'd have had to invent it for him.
Not that the rest of the band are chopped liver. The crunching, lead weight riffage provides a solid base for La Bestia's histrionics, and certainly the spiraling, intricate soloing of the guitarists also grabs our attention. It's all part of the vast and elaborate architecture, the castle walls and cathedral spires, conjured by Dantesco's music, which ultimately conveys much emotion and a great deal of gravitas. And is of course very very metal. To underscore that point, the disc ends with a slaying Savatage cover, "The Dungeons Are Calling", and it's evident that Erico relishes doing that sudden "aaaaah!!" thing that was Savatage singer Jon Oliva's trademark. Also of course this is for fans of the aforementioned Candlemass, as well as the likes of Solitude Aeternus, Doomsword, Mercyful Fate, Powers Court, Warlord, Cirith Ungol, etc.
As with other Stormspell releases, this is a limited, numbered edition. FYI they've also just put out a self-titled Dantesco disc, consisting of the band's demos from seven years ago.
MPEG Stream: "Rasputin"
MPEG Stream: "Purinos Polemos (Viriathus)"
MPEG Stream: "El Baile De Las Brujas"

DANUBIANS s/t (Cuneiform) cd 13.98
The wonderful Seattle-based improviser Amy Denio (sax, accordion, guitars, voice) meets up with a group of folks from the Eastern European improv/rock scene, including Czech drummer Pavel Fajt (who you might know from his work with Iva Bittova) and the guitarist and violinist from Hungarian band Kampec Dolores. The results are predictably pleasant and quirky, melding jazz, rock, and folk music.

DANUBIUS s/t (Web Of Mimicry) cd 13.98
Mr. Bungle/Secret Chiefs 3 guitarist Trey Spruance discovered this group playing the folk/gypsy music of Eastern Europe (Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, the Balkans) in a local San Francisco cafe, and immediately persuaded 'em to release a cd on his own Web of Mimicry label 'cause he was so impressed. And indeed, Danubius are an undeniably fun and capable band, with a repertoire stretching from the streets of Budapest to the Carpathian Mountains to the Black Sea -- bringing in both "village" and "city" musics, demonstrating more diversity than many other traditional Eastern European music groups might. The twenty tracks on this album are organized into several suites, ethnomusical groupings such as "Hungarian Gypsy restaurant style" and "Transylvanian Suite". All share unflagging energy, bright sounds, evocative traditional instrumentation (accordion, cimbalom, tambura, hurdy gurdy, etc.), and some fancy pickin' on the ancient folk/popular tunes they're bringing to your stereo. We're told that the band members (who originally hail from all over Eastern Europe) will get into violent arguments on stage about how the pieces should be played, or say things like "I'm from Romania -- what do I know about this song from your village in Hungary?" but this disc demonstrates that when they manage to set aside their differences they can make some beautiful music together. And in fact, they have a serious purpose in doing so. To quote the liner notes: "Danubius is hoping to show a way into the future that allows traditional world musics to flourish, not just exist as a resource for 'samples' that can be thrown into some 'mix'. We believe that the experience of hearing this music live creates an emotional reaction that cannot be compared to hearing bits and pieces in films, in electronic compostions, or as a component of a 'world music' recording." A laudable goal. The liners go on to briefly discuss each track, helping to make this an educational package -- but one you can dance to as well.
Danubius are not unlike "old world" bands like Taraf de Haidouks and Fanfare Ciocarlia who have created a following for gypsy/wedding music in the West, although those groups, especially Fanfare Ciocarlia, play what might be termed a more "hardcore", frenzied version of these musics. Whereas, after all, the music of Danubius *does* sound like tunes you'd hear in (appropriate) restaurants. Even the wildest Romanian dance music they play won't make you choke on your dinner, while Fanfare's performance might require the Heimlich. Danubius are little more restrained. At least on disc -- but after hearing this I'm going to have to look for a chance to see 'em live.
RealAudio clip: "Hategana"
RealAudio clip: "Joc ca la Stana"
RealAudio clip: "Blateshnichka kopanista"

DARA PUSPITA 1966-1968 (Sublime Frequencies) cd 21.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We first heard about this Indonesian sixties all girl garage group when three of their records were reissued on Chicago label PlusTapes, we all went nuts for them, as did you, we couldn't keep them in stock, but sadly they were crazy limited. Even at the time, and even on tape, we wanted to make one or all of them Records Of The Week, but they disappeared before we had a chance. But now Sublime Frequencies swoops in and saves the day, reissuing on a compact disc all three of the Dara Puspita's records proper (all the stuff on the cassettes, and then some!). But what's so great about these ladies? Read on....
Dara Puspita (Flower Girls in English) were Indonesia's most successful girl group in the sixties, and one of the few -actual- bands, who played their own instruments as opposed to just singing with all male backing bands. Even though rock and roll was banned at the time, with some bands being jailed for performing rock music live (Koes Bersaudara in particular, whose Sublime Frequencies disc we reviewed a few lists back - Dara Puspita and Koes Bersaudara had very similar histories, their careers often directly influenced by each other, the whole story to be found in the copious liner notes). Dara Puspita took their influence from that banned rock music, borrowing liberally from the Rolling Stones, The Beatles (whose songs they were warned by the authority to not perform, the very songs that got Koes Bersaudara jailed!) and the like, but giving it their own twist.
Performing a mix of covers and originals, these ladies were legendary for their wild live shows, but they really shine on record, with a totally distinctive and keen pop sensibility, gorgeous lilting vocals, an awesome rhythm section and some really excellent guitar playing. Dara Puspita weren't avant garde or super far out, not really heavy or psychedelic, instead they were just a kick ass pop group, an awesome garagey rock and roll band, catchy and fun, super energetic and with a distinctly unique vibe that makes this sound so special. Just listen to the sound samples. You'll be hooked in no time.
Lavish packaging, a full color six panel digipak, with tons of photos, a huge booklet of liner notes, with the story of the band, of the recording, more about the state of Indonesia at the time, the producer and more more more. So great!!
MPEG Stream: "Lonely Street"
MPEG Stream: "Bertamasja"
MPEG Stream: "Mari Mari"
MPEG Stream: "Minggu Jang Lalu"
MPEG Stream: "A Go-Go"
MPEG Stream: "To Love Somebody"
MPEG Stream: "Aku Tetap"

DARA PUSPITA A Go Go (PlusTapes) cassette 5.50
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
From the newly launched Plustapes cassette label comes THREE tapes from this Indonesian sixties all girl garage group. Do you really need to know any thing more? Indonesian. Sixties. All girl. Garage? We didn't think so, but just for the heck of it...
We were gonna write separate reviews for each of these, but they're so cheap, and so good, and odds are if you want one, you're going to want them all. So far pretty much everyone who has heard these has gone totally nuts for these kick ass garage rock girls.
Dara Puspita (Flower Girls in English) were Indonesia's most successful girl group in the sixties, and one of the few -actual- bands, who played their own instruments as opposed to just singing with all male backing bands. Even though rock and roll was banned at the time, with some bands being jailed for performing rock music live, Dara Puspita took their influence from that banned rock music, borrowing liberally from the Rolling Stones, The Beatles (whose songs they were warned by the authority to not perform) and the like, but giving it their own twist.
Performing a mix of covers and originals, these ladies were legendary for their wild live shows, but they really shone on record, with a totally distinctive and keen pop sensibility, gorgeous lilting vocals, an awesome rhythm section and some really excellent guitar playing. Dara Puspita weren't avant garde or super far out, not really heavy or psychedelic, instead they were just a kick ass pop group, an awesome garagey rock and roll band, catchy and fun, super energetic and with a distinctly unique vibe that makes this sound so special. Not to mention all the fuzzy record crackle, which only adds to the appeal! For us at least...
Each tape is strictly LIMITED TO 100 COPIES, each one hand numbered, the tapes are the same color as the covers, each of which sports original artwork from Plastic Crimewave!!
ONE PER CUSTOMER!!!
MPEG Stream: "A Go-Go"
MPEG Stream: "To Love Somebody"
MPEG Stream: "Aku Tetap"

DARA PUSPITA Green Green Grass (PlusTapes) cassette 5.50
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
From the newly launched Plustapes cassette label comes THREE tapes from this Indonesian sixties all girl garage group. Do you really need to know any thing more? Indonesian. Sixties. All girl. Garage? We didn't think so, but just for the heck of it...
We were gonna write separate reviews for each of these, but they're so cheap, and so good, and odds are if you want one, you're going to want them all. So far pretty much everyone who has heard these has gone totally nuts for these kick ass garage rock girls.
Dara Puspita (Flower Girls in English) were Indonesia's most successful girl group in the sixties, and one of the few -actual- bands, who played their own instruments as opposed to just singing with all male backing bands. Even though rock and roll was banned at the time, with some bands being jailed for performing rock music live, Dara Puspita took their influence from that banned rock music, borrowing liberally from the Rolling Stones, The Beatles (whose songs they were warned by the authority to not perform) and the like, but giving it their own twist.
Performing a mix of covers and originals, these ladies were legendary for their wild live shows, but they really shone on record, with a totally distinctive and keen pop sensibility, gorgeous lilting vocals, an awesome rhythm section and some really excellent guitar playing. Dara Puspita weren't avant garde or super far out, not really heavy or psychedelic, instead they were just a kick ass pop group, an awesome garagey rock and roll band, catchy and fun, super energetic and with a distinctly unique vibe that makes this sound so special. Not to mention all the fuzzy record crackle, which only adds to the appeal! For us at least...
Each tape is strictly LIMITED TO 100 COPIES, each one hand numbered, the tapes are the same color as the covers, each of which sports original artwork from Plastic Crimewave!!
ONE PER CUSTOMER!!!
MPEG Stream: "Lonely Street"
MPEG Stream: "Bertamasja"

DARA PUSPITA Jang Pertama (PlusTapes) cassette 5.50
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
From the newly launched Plustapes cassette label comes THREE tapes from this Indonesian sixties all girl garage group. Do you really need to know any thing more? Indonesian. Sixties. All girl. Garage? We didn't think so, but just for the heck of it...
We were gonna write separate reviews for each of these, but they're so cheap, and so good, and odds are if you want one, you're going to want them all. So far pretty much everyone who has heard these has gone totally nuts for these kick ass garage rock girls.
Dara Puspita (Flower Girls in English) were Indonesia's most successful girl group in the sixties, and one of the few -actual- bands, who played their own instruments as opposed to just singing with all male backing bands. Even though rock and roll was banned at the time, with some bands being jailed for performing rock music live, Dara Puspita took their influence from that banned rock music, borrowing liberally from the Rolling Stones, The Beatles (whose songs they were warned by the authority to not perform) and the like, but giving it their own twist.
Performing a mix of covers and originals, these ladies were legendary for their wild live shows, but they really shone on record, with a totally distinctive and keen pop sensibility, gorgeous lilting vocals, an awesome rhythm section and some really excellent guitar playing. Dara Puspita weren't avant garde or super far out, not really heavy or psychedelic, instead they were just a kick ass pop group, an awesome garagey rock and roll band, catchy and fun, super energetic and with a distinctly unique vibe that makes this sound so special. Not to mention all the fuzzy record crackle, which only adds to the appeal! For us at least...
Each tape is strictly LIMITED TO 100 COPIES, each one hand numbered, the tapes are the same color as the covers, each of which sports original artwork from Plastic Crimewave!!
ONE PER CUSTOMER!!!
MPEG Stream: "Mari Mari"
MPEG Stream: "Minggu Jang Lalu"

DARA PUSPITA The Garage Years (Groovie) lp 32.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
After a couple fantastic cd reissues on Sublime Frequencies, of this incredible Indonesian sixties all girl garage rock group, a handful of those tracks have been gathered up and released on vinyl! Pricey import, but still quite cool...
We first heard about these Indonesian girl group garage rockers when three of their records were reissued on Chicago label PlusTapes, we all went nuts for them, as did the aQ legions, we couldn't keep them in stock, but sadly they were crazy limited. Even at the time, and even on tape, we wanted to make one or all of them Records Of The Week, but they disappeared before we had a chance. So when Sublime Frequencies swooped in and reissued on a compact disc all three of Dara Puspita's records proper (all the stuff on the cassettes, and then some!), we got to gush like crazy and indeed bestow Record Of The Week honors on these amazing ladies and their incredible music. And now, for those of you who were holding out for something on vinyl...
Dara Puspita (Flower Girls in English) were Indonesia's most successful girl group in the sixties, and one of the few -actual- bands, who played their own instruments as opposed to just singing with all male backing bands. Even though rock and roll was banned at the time, with some bands being jailed for performing rock music live (Koes Bersaudara in particular, whose Sublime Frequencies discs we reviewed a while back - Dara Puspita and Koes Bersaudara had very similar histories, their careers often directly influenced by each other). Dara Puspita took their influence from that banned rock music, borrowing liberally from the Rolling Stones, The Beatles (whose songs they were warned by the authority to not perform, the very songs that got Koes Bersaudara jailed!) and the like, but giving it their own twist.
Performing a mix of covers and originals, these ladies were legendary for their wild live shows, but they really shine on record, with a totally distinctive and keen pop sensibility, gorgeous lilting vocals, an awesome rhythm section and some really excellent guitar playing. Dara Puspita weren't avant garde or super far out, not really heavy or psychedelic, instead they were just a kick ass pop group, an awesome garagey rock and roll band, catchy and fun, super energetic and with a distinctly unique vibe that makes this sound so special. Just listen to the sound samples. You'll be hooked in no time. So great!!
MPEG Stream: "Bertamasja"
MPEG Stream: "A Go-Go"

DARE DEVIL BAND s/t (PSF) cd 22.00
Fans of freaky free improv exploration, particularily skronk of Japanese origin, may remember a disc a called Dare Devil released some years back featuring saxophonist Peter Brotzman and drummer Shoji Hano. Jazz drummer Hano -- who has also played in 'rock' contexts with Mainliner and Keiji Haino -- reactivated the Dare Devil name for this new PSF project, for which he's enlisted the talents of Mainliner and Acid Mothers Temple guitarist Makoto Kawabata (no chance of an Aquarius list going by without at least one or two appearances somewhere by ol' Kawabata!) and bassist/vocalist Atsushi Tsuyama (also of AMT, Omoide Hatoba, Akaten, and many others). Together, the trio stir up a mess o' psychedelic improv trouble, a bit along the lines of Musica Transonic. Freeform skronk chaos, very "out" there indeed. AMT fans will feel at home, and Tsuyama's unusual vocals give this a silliness factor that much clattery free improv lacks. Meanwhile Kawabata's guitar spazzes endlessly, almost Ginn-like, and Hano provides a strong, propulsive foundation.
Nice packaging, btw, in a gatefold mini-LP styled cd sleeve.
MPEG Stream: "Musha"

DAREDIABLO Twenty Paces (Southern) cd 14.98
Third album (first we've listed, but the others are good too!) from NYC's Darediablo, a keyboards/guitar/drums power trio that anyone into instrumental heavy rockin' ought to investigate forthwith! Taking sonic inspiration from '70s heavy prog/metal organ-combos like Deep Purple, but losing the singer and upping the math quotient, Darediablo are probably the only band we've ever heard who have been compared in the same breath to both Slayer and Booker T & the MGs and, heck, that does kind of make sense! They surely don't go all the way to either of those two extremes, but you can see how they fit in there between 'em someplace (though, we'd say closer to Booker T). Heavy yet groovy. Stoner rock gone a little bit prog, this could could be a good one for fans of Stinking Lizaveta, Karma To Burn, and the Mystick Crewe of Clearlight to name a few bands that operate in the sonic vicinity of these guys.
MPEG Stream: "Twenty Paces"
MPEG Stream: "Apache Chicken"

DARGAR s/t (Rising Beast Records) cassette 3.98

DARGE, MONIEK Crete Soundies (Kye) cd 15.98
Moniek Darge is a Belgian composer, performer, and artist with quite an extensive history, but she's probably one who hasn't really gained much of an audience outside of the European academic circles. That's a shame, as she's done some amazing, wild, and engaging work over the years. She runs the Logos Foundation, which is something of a thinktank for experimental practices with plenty of high-brow theory coating their post-Fluxus happenings, many of which seem to involve a whole lot of nudity! Throughout the three decades of work through the Logos Foundation, Darge has been involved in building strange variations on music boxes, various robots & automatons, and pneumatic devices that must have been an influence on Yoshi Wada's post-bagpipe installation pieces. On the compositional side for Darge's, there's a unique hybridization of musique concrete practices, avant-garde vocalization, and a dystopic / mystical realization of minimalism.
Beginning in 2006, Darge embarked on the first of several journey to the Isle of Crete, working with local artists, presenting intermedia events, and composing the three extended pieces on this album. While one idea purported through the sound work was to conjure the mystical atmospheres of an ancient cult and its utopian principles, Darge's work here, as it typically has been, is haunting, eerie, and disarming. Deep moaning vocals open the first piece, emerging as a lugubrious chorale of intertwining ululations and eerie utterances. A melancholy drone, maybe from a harmonium, settles into the background while Darge, brings recordings of cicadas and variously untuned bells into the mix. It's not unlike Fursaxa or Christina Carter as reinterpreted by Luc Ferrari. The second piece is dominate by an impressive display of field recording prowess of the whipping winds around one of the mountains on Crete, with various clanks, metal creaking, and bells breaking up a recurring narrative of spoken texts. The final piece is a collage of aquatic tumblings, more cicadas, and more swirls of wind with an interest in the sound ecology of the island, rather than the narrative properties mentioned above. This compelling album has been released on Kye, the label run by Graham Lambkin from The Shadow Ring. Now, there's a nice endorsement!
MPEG Stream: "Magnesia"
MPEG Stream: "Anemos"
MPEG Stream: "East Crete"

DARJEELING LIMITED, THE OST (Abkco) cd 17.98
Wes Anderson movie soundtracks are always cool. And this one's got the Bollywood angle as well. 'Nuff said.

DARK AGES A Chronicle Of The Plague (Supernal) cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The return of our favorite Medieval, Middle Ages, and plague obsessed ambient atmospheric dronescapers Dark Ages, who just so happens to be a member of Ukrainian black metal Hordes Drudkh and Hate Forest. No buzzing blackness here, instead Dark Ages is a sonic trip through, well, through the Dark Ages. Another Bosch / Breughel style painting on the cover, this time skeletons on horses, pulling a wagon full of skulls, driving through a town square littered with corpses and robed skeletons. The song titles are also appropriately grim: "Ships Full Of Blackened Corpses", "Rats", "Dead Desolate Villages", "The Doors With Scarlet Crosses" and of course "Black Death".
The sound this time around is even darker and scarier. This is ambient music, sure, but it's also a sonic travelogue, a weary wander through the plague ravaged villages of Middle Europe. The sky is choked with black smoke and the stench of burning flesh. Corpses lay stacked like firewood. Dead children litter the ground like leaves fallen from trees. The few survivors, walk zombie like, an endless death march with no destination other than the grave.
The music is sounds JUST LIKE THAT. It's totally evocative and ultra creepy. Thick washes of keyboard drones, chiming minor key melodies repeated mantra like, a deep churning dark ambience underpinning the melancholy ambience, stabs of atonal harpsichord add jagged shards of horror here and there. Long stretches of super dramatic cinematic shimmer definitely recall Goblin and Zombi, some tracks are super murky minimal rumbles, with the melodies muted and buried under a thick crumbling wash of mumbled whirs and swirling low end, others are majestic and grand, fanfares for the dead and dying. They're all quite grim, a bit black, super intense, and surprisingly emotional.
Sonically, Dark Ages almost sounds like a super dismal, way blacker Dead Can Dance, or like Tangerine Dream or Popol Vuh covering Skepticism. Or even like some long lost Jacula album.
So gorgeously dark and creepy. Recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Ships Full Of Blackened Corpses"
MPEG Stream: "Rats"
MPEG Stream: "Blessed Be The Waters Of The Avignon River"

DARK AGES A Chronicle Of The Plague (Elegy) cd 13.98
Finally, this long time aQ fave is back in print and available again. And with swank new artwork! A Chronicle Of The Plague, in fact chronicled the return of our favorite Medieval, Middle Ages, and plague obsessed ambient atmospheric dronescaper Dark Ages, who just so happens to be a member of Ukrainian black metal Hordes Drudkh and Hate Forest. No buzzing blackness here, instead Dark Ages is a sonic trip through, well, through the Dark Ages. A grim Bosch / Breughel style painting on the cover, skeletons on horses, pulling a wagon full of skulls, driving through a town square littered with corpses and discarded robes and bones. The song titles are also appropriately grim as well: "Ships Full Of Blackened Corpses", "Rats", "Dead Desolate Villages", "The Doors With Scarlet Crosses" and of course "Black Death".
The sound itself is even darker and scarier. This is ambient music, sure, but it's also a sonic travelogue, a weary wander through the plague ravaged villages of Middle Europe. The sky is choked with black smoke and the stench of burning flesh. Corpses lay stacked like firewood. Dead children litter the ground like leaves fallen from trees. The few survivors, walk zombie like, an endless death march with no destination other than the grave.
The music sounds JUST LIKE THAT. It's totally evocative and ultra creepy. Thick washes of keyboard drones, chiming minor key melodies repeated mantra like, a deep churning dark ambience underpinning the melancholy ambience, stabs of atonal harpsichord add jagged shards of horror here and there. Long stretches of super dramatic cinematic shimmer definitely recall Goblin and Zombi, some tracks are super murky minimal rumbles, with the melodies muted and buried under a thick crumbling wash of mumbled whirs and swirling low end, others are majestic and grand, fanfares for the dead and dying. They're all quite grim, a bit black, super intense, and surprisingly emotional.
Sonically, Dark Ages almost sounds like a super dismal, way blacker Dead Can Dance, or like Tangerine Dream or Popol Vuh covering Skepticism. Or even like some long lost Jacula album.
So gorgeously dark and creepy. Recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Ships Full Of Blackened Corpses"
MPEG Stream: "Rats"
MPEG Stream: "Blessed Be The Waters Of The Avignon River"

DARK AGES A Chronicle Of The Plague (Northern Heritage) lp 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Another AQ fave available on vinyl for a super limited time. A killer slab of black ambience from a member of Drudkh and Hate Forest. All new artwork, ONLY 250 COPIES PRESSED, so these will be gone before you know it.
The return of our favorite Medieval, Middle Ages, and plague obsessed ambient atmospheric dronescapers Dark Ages, who just so happens to be a member of Ukrainian black metal Hordes Drudkh and Hate Forest. No buzzing blackness here, instead Dark Ages is a sonic trip through, well, through the Dark Ages. Another Bosch / Breughel style painting on the cover, this time skeletons on horses, pulling a wagon full of skulls, driving through a town square littered with corpses and robed skeletons. The song titles are also appropriately grim: "Ships Full Of Blackened Corpses", "Rats", "Dead Desolate Villages", "The Doors With Scarlet Crosses" and of course "Black Death".
The sound this time around is even darker and scarier. This is ambient music, sure, but it's also a sonic travelogue, a weary wander through the plague ravaged villages of Middle Europe. The sky is choked with black smoke and the stench of burning flesh. Corpses lay stacked like firewood. Dead children litter the ground like leaves fallen from trees. The few survivors, walk zombie like, an endless death march with no destination other than the grave.
The music is sounds JUST LIKE THAT. It's totally evocative and ultra creepy. Thick washes of keyboard drones, chiming minor key melodies repeated mantra like, a deep churning dark ambience underpinning the melancholy ambience, stabs of atonal harpsichord add jagged shards of horror here and there. Long stretches of super dramatic cinematic shimmer definitely recall Goblin and Zombi, some tracks are super murky minimal rumbles, with the melodies muted and buried under a thick crumbling wash of mumbled whirs and swirling low end, others are majestic and grand, fanfares for the dead and dying. They're all quite grim, a bit black, super intense, and surprisingly emotional.
Sonically, Dark Ages almost sounds like a super dismal, way blacker Dead Can Dance, or like Tangerine Dream or Popol Vuh covering Skepticism. Or even like some long lost Jacula album.
So gorgeously dark and creepy. Recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Ships Full Of Blackened Corpses"
MPEG Stream: "Rats"
MPEG Stream: "Blessed Be The Waters Of The Avignon River"

DARK AGES Twilight Of Europe (Supernal) cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
What would you expect from a band called Dark Ages? With cover art from some Bosch / Breughel style painting depciting hell and misery and war and famine? With song titles like "Breath Of The Black Plague" and "Birth Of The Antichrist" and "Formulas Written In Blood"? A disc released on Supernal, the label that brought us Benighted Leams, Drudkh, Meads Of Asphodel, Hate Forest and the rest? What would you expect? Well, definitely not this. Dark Ages are not metal, are not even heavy actually, instead they offer up a series of dark ambient medieval dronescapes, beautifully creepy, dark and haunting and endlessly mesmerizing. There are definite sonic similarities to our favorite drone artists: Chalk, Coleclough, Mirror, Maeror Tri and the like, but Twilight Of Europe has a sort of looped hypnotic quality lending the sound a much more Jeck, Basinski vibe. But always cloaked in the tattered black cloak of the dark ages, a lonely sonic stroll through the ruins of a long gone Rennaisance Faire, a stroll that slowly shifts to an actual wander through a ruined post plague, European village, of grey stone walls, lit blue by the moonlight, casting shadows that dart and dance in the glow of torchlight, the blackened remains of fires long since burnt out, colorful tents faded by the sun now lay in ruined heaps, the stench of death and decay in the air. The sound is rich with resonant church organs, bells and buzzing strings, haunting chant like vocals all wrapped in gauzy fuzzy drones and subterranean rumbles, each track a dreamy repetition of a haunting, ghostly medieval loop. Over and over and over as you drift off, as the city around you crumbles and the sky above you darkens.
MPEG Stream: "Breath Of The Black Plague"
MPEG Stream: "Birth Of The Antichrist"
MPEG Stream: "Dungeons"

DARK AGES Twilight Of Europe (Inferna Profundus / Primitive Reaction) cd 14.98
Finally available again, the gorgeously dark debut of mesmerizing blackened ambient dronemusic from Dark Ages, the solo project of Roman Saenko, who plays in a whole bunch of black metal bands we love, Hate Forest, Drudkh, Blood Of Kingu, Lucifugum, but Dark Ages is a whole 'nother beast. This new version is in a super swank digipak, and includes a bonus track not on the original release, which we described like this:
What would you expect from a band called Dark Ages? With cover art from some Bosch / Breughel style painting depicting hell and misery and war and famine? With song titles like "Breath Of The Black Plague" and "Birth Of The Antichrist" and "Formulas Written In Blood"? A disc released on Supernal, the label that brought us Benighted Leams, Drudkh, Meads Of Asphodel, Hate Forest and the rest? What would you expect? Well, definitely not this. Dark Ages are not metal, are not even heavy actually, instead they offer up a series of dark ambient medieval dronescapes, beautifully creepy, dark and haunting and endlessly mesmerizing. There are definite sonic similarities to our favorite drone artists: Chalk, Coleclough, Mirror, Maeror Tri and the like, but Twilight Of Europe has a sort of looped hypnotic quality lending the sound a much more Jeck, Basinski vibe. But always cloaked in the tattered black cloak of the dark ages, a lonely sonic stroll through the ruins of a long gone Renaissance Faire, a stroll that slowly shifts to an actual wander through a ruined post plague, European village, of grey stone walls, lit blue by the moonlight, casting shadows that dart and dance in the glow of torchlight, the blackened remains of fires long since burnt out, colorful tents faded by the sun now lay in ruined heaps, the stench of death and decay in the air. The sound is rich with resonant church organs, bells and buzzing strings, haunting chant like vocals all wrapped in gauzy fuzzy drones and subterranean rumbles, each track a dreamy repetition of a haunting, ghostly medieval loop. Over and over and over as you drift off, as the city around you crumbles and the sky above you darkens.
MPEG Stream: "Breath Of The Black Plague"
MPEG Stream: "Birth Of The Antichrist"
MPEG Stream: "Dungeons"

DARK CASTLE Surrender To All Life Beyond Form (Profound Lore) cd 13.98
Latest blast of psychedelic avant doom from this Floridian boy/girl duo, apparently often referred to as the doom metal White Stripes, based we assume entirely on the boy guitarist / girl drummer lineup, cuz sonically this is miles away from the Stripes' bluesy stomp. Instead, these two whip up a swirling, noisy, progged out, psychedelic sort of doom, which really is only classified as doom, because of the downtuned chugging, and slow-ish tempos. But the songs here are not slo-mo sludgefests, or funereal drags, these songs are furious tangles of wild guitar freakouts, of twisted effects drenched melody, of howled vitriolic vokills, of crashing chaotic drummage, and yeah, there are certainly stretches of plodding doomic crush, but even there things are not strictly doomy, the guitars sound warped and woozy, effects everywhere, the ambience seeming to melt in some sort of lysergic haze, the duo transformed into a lurching, lumbering doom-ed deity, sonically smiting all who stand in their way.
The guitars constantly flit from crunchy distorted metallic buzz, to effects drenched warble, to slippery spidery squiggle, the drums following suit, the arrangements and structures seeming to continuously mutate, flecked in various places with chanted chorale like vocals, pulsing new wave synths, thick low end rumbles, even programmed drums, "To Hide Is To Die" sounds almost like a metal version of the current John Carpenter / Goblin worship, and has us sort of hankering for a whole record of metalwave retro-giallo-doom. But the next track slips right back into the duo's gnarled prog-psych-doom, before finally finishing things off with a super strange chunk of piano driven ultra distorted dirge, haunting, and cinematic, everything blown out and warped, harsh vox draped over the top, a pounding, minor key miserablist abstract doom lament, the perfect finish to a fucking killer record, that's fast becoming one of our new faves...
Features guest spots by all sorts of underground metal luminaries including Mike Scheidt from YOB, Blake Judd from Nachtmystium, Nate Hall from U.S. Christmas, and Parker Sanford from Minsk, who also recorded the record.
MPEG Stream: "Surrender To All Life Beyond Form"
MPEG Stream: "Stare Into Absence"
MPEG Stream: "Create An Impulse"

DARK DAY Strange Clockwork (self-released) cd 12.98
R.L. Crutchfield is best known as one of the pioneers of no-wave in his band DNA as well as a forefather of cold-wave with his first few outings as Dark Day. What lots of people don't know is that Crutchfield has continued to make and release records under the radar without pause for the better part of three decades. His newer recordings, including Strange Clockwork, find him working in an almost miniature style. Short tracks that have a music box fragility but also incorporate sort of renaissance fair elements, all transformed into sonic stop motion experiments. Primitive sounding drum machine beats under electronics heavily influenced by baroque classical music. In many ways reminiscent of some of the more recent work of another electronic music pioneer, Wendy Carlos.
MPEG Stream: "Telegraph"
MPEG Stream: "Floating Island"
MPEG Stream: "Sleepwalking"

DARK DAY Window (Dark Entries) lp 15.98
To coincide with the reissue of another Dark Day lp, this former Record Of The Week is BACK IN PRINT, AGAIN!!!
So cool! And cold wavey. A wonderfully produced piece of vinyl to replace those crappy downloads which have been bouncing around the internet for the past five or six years. Dark Day was the project spearheaded by R.L. Crutchfield who first worked with Arto Lindsay and Ikue Mori in the earliest incarnation of the seminal No Wave band DNA in the mid '70s. By 1979, Crutchfield was striking out on his own as Dark Day; and at first, this band was an intentional reversal of roles within the trad-rock band with two women playing guitars and drums and a man behind the keyboards. The ladies for that incarnation were Nancy Arlen of Mars and Nina Canal of Ut; and they managed a few gigs and one hell of a great single - "Hands In The Dark" - which appeared many years later on a Soul Jazz No Wave compilation and has been covered spectacularly by the Chromatics. Canal and Arlen weren't terribly interested in continuing in the project, leaving Crutchfield to find likeminded folks to work with. The second (and last) Dark Day record was recorded in 1982, with Crutchfield going into the studio with a bunch of cheap electronics and toy synthesizers with Bill Sack to flesh out the accompaniments on similar instruments. Their interlocking arpeggiations are punctuated with blooping electronics that are equal parts Trio and Kraftwerk with an underlying dread to the spiralling songs that detoured from Kraftwerk's utopian vision of man-machine hybrids and down a paranoid vision of man being at the mercy of his machines, no matter how innocent their intent. Dark Day's songs are insistent and catchy despite their utterly simple structures. "Metal Benders" and "Danger / Dance" are probably the closest thing to being 'hits' on the album as weird / anti-romantic variations of Young Marble Giants with whip crack rhythms and spectral pre-X-Files electronic whistling melodies. Coming out of the NYC No Wave scene helped craft Dark Day into a something other than neo-Romantic post-punk outfit with electronics. This was a wholly unique band, who never got the attention that many of their contemporaries. Kudos to Dark Entries once again on a splendid reissue!

DARK DAY (R.L. CRUTCHFIELD'S) Exterminating Angel (Dark Entries) lp 14.98
Synth punk at its best! Here is the long overdue reissue of Dark Day's homage to the Luis Bunuel film of the same name. Dark Day was the project spearheaded by R.L. Crutchfield who first worked with Arto Lindsay and Ikue Mori in the earliest incarnation of the seminal No Wave band DNA in the mid '70s. By 1979, Crutchfield was striking out on his own as Dark Day; and at first, this band was an intentional reversal of roles within the trad-rock band with two women playing guitars and drums and a man behind the keyboards. The ladies for that incarnation were Nancy Arlen of Mars and Nina Canal of Ut; and they managed a few gigs and one hell of a great single - "Hands In The Dark" - which appeared many years later on a Soul Jazz No Wave compilation and has been covered spectacularly by the Chromatics. Canal and Arlen weren't terribly interested in continuing in the project, leaving Crutchfield to find likeminded folks to work with.
On Exterminating Angel (originally released in 1980 on the Lust/Unlust imprint Infidelity), Crutchfield recruited Phil Kline and Barry Friar to flesh out the Dark Day sound. At the time, Kline was an emerging composer who had worked with Glenn Branca and at least here, he styles himself after Mark Ribot or Arto Lindsay with his expressive shards and bends of guitar melody; and Friar follows the tom-heavy patter that Nancy Arlen brought to Dark Day on the "Hands In The Dark" single. But Dark Day is truly Crutchfield's vision, with his heavily syncopated synth chords, elliptical repetitions, and spiral staircase ascensions in lieu of the traditional verse-chorus song. Crutchfield preferred to keep a very restrictive use of synth tones and filters, all the while crafting a very claustrophobic, horror-laden atmosphere. The inventiveness of his minimalist melodies and twisted lullaby-like structures are all the more impressive, perhaps only matched by Young Marble Giants or Suicide. Motorik yet stumbling, Dark Day's songs are stark and bold in their poetry about freaks, suffocating anxiety, and the toxic life of contemporary society circa 1980. "Trapped" was a strange song to be the single for the album, as it's an epic, spiralling number with those ominous synths and siren-like blurts from a distant saxophone. Many of the other songs on the album were short and condensed, jabbing the grimly simple melodies deep into the ear-canal and then moving on. Like "Trapped" the album's finale - "No, Never, Nothing" - is another lengthy track, appropriating a Moroder like disco-syncopation to a sinister, nihilistic collage of texts taken from a children's book about raising unusual pets such as squirrels and chimpanzees. The more the song spins through it's punchy chords the creepier it becomes.
Exterminating Angel is the high-point of Crutchfield's recorded works, and stands also as one of lost gems of the No Wave era. This should have been released long ago, so we have to commend Dark Entries once again for their reissue campaign.
MPEG Stream: "Chameleon"
MPEG Stream: "Flightless Birds"
MPEG Stream: "No, Never, Nothing"

DARK FOG Cosmic Tone (Original Sound Recordings) cd 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Look past the garish, whooah-I'm-trippin'-now psychedelic cover art of Dark Fog's Cosmic Tone and you'll find a quite moody and marvellous and, yes, psychedelic debut album from this Chicago-land band, who've loaded up on trippy guitar effects and super spaced-out vocals to produce this hypnotic 33 minute dose of stoner/psych shoegazer bliss. Some parts are hushed and mellow, others Deetroit drivin', chugging along with nods to Pink Floyd, Spacemen Three, and Hawkwind... we'd also compare these guys favorably to such contemporary comrades-in-arms as Pharaoh Overlord, Acid Mothers Temple, and Dead Meadow. It's heavy (in that "heavy, maaan" way that we differentiate from, like, doom metal heaviness, such as that practiced by labelmates Buried At Sea), with lot of fuzz and drone but definitely also has a lighter, melodic side that makes this swirling dark fog seem rather welcoming, more fragrant than miasmic, redolent of aromatic smoke and suffused with a gentle glow. Recommended.
MPEG Stream: "Anywhere"
MPEG Stream: "Cosmic Dust"

DARK FOG Ultimate Cult Of Psychedelic Psychosis (Original Sound Recordings) cd 8.98
2nd album from these spaced-out, shoegazery Chicagoans. We recommended their debut, Cosmic Tone, last year and this one is equally stoned, maybe darker and yet more melodic too -- and has equally over the top, garish "psychedelic" cover art... though since they chose to call the album The Ultimate Cult of Psychedelic Psychosis we can't say that's a surprise, clearly they're not trying to be subtle about their avowed artistic program! Though we can compare 'em to the likes of Acid Mothers Temple, Boris, and Pharaoh Overlord in terms of freaked-out heaviness, we've also gotta come back to the indie-rock component as well, with gentle vocals drifting over or beneath slumbering lumbering swirling guitar/effects like Dead Meadow meets MBV, with a little Dinosaur Jr. in there too... quite a nice (sinister, murky) nod-scene indeed.
MPEG Stream: "Tomorrow"
MPEG Stream: "Andromeda"

DARK FOG Ultimate Cult Of Psychedelic Psychosis (Original Sound Recordings) 2lp 24.00
2nd album from these spaced-out, shoegazery Chicagoans. We recommended their debut, Cosmic Tone, last year and this one is equally stoned, maybe darker and yet more melodic too -- and has equally over the top, garish "psychedelic" cover art... though since they chose to call the album The Ultimate Cult of Psychedelic Psychosis we can't say that's a surprise, clearly they're not trying to be subtle about their avowed artistic program! Though we can compare 'em to the likes of Acid Mothers Temple, Boris, and Pharaoh Overlord in terms of freaked-out heaviness, we've also gotta come back to the indie-rock component as well, with gentle vocals drifting over or beneath slumbering lumbering swirling guitar/effects like Dead Meadow meets MBV, with a little Dinosaur Jr. in there too... quite a nice (sinister, murky) nod-scene indeed.
MPEG Stream: "Tomorrow"
MPEG Stream: "Andromeda"

DARK FOREST s/t (Eyes Like Snow) cd 13.98
Old school (NWOBHM) style metal from this young British band!

DARK FUNERAL / INFERNAL Under Wings Of Hell (Hammerheart) cd 13.98
Not new recordings but a blast from the past from these black metal stalwarts. The Dark Funeral tracks date from 1994 and the Infernal tracks are from a couple years ago. And as with a lot of black metal, you'd be hard pressed to tell where DF's side stops and Infernal's starts, but I guess that's why they're sharing this split cd, a shared love of blazing, raw old school black metal. Oh, that a venomous hatred for Christianity and all of mankind. EVIL!
RealAudio clip: DARK FUNERAL "Open The Gates"
RealAudio clip: INFERNAL "Requiem (The Coming Age Of Satan)"

DARK MATTER HALO The Hermetic Drone Volume 1 (CD Over Vinyl) cd-r 8.98
The Hermetic Drone is the first release from Dark Matter Halo, the most recent project of Monte Cimino, aQ pal, and head honcho of brooding twang flecked heavies Burial Tree, as well as the man behind BT ambient offshoot Time Spent. Dark Matter Halo has more in common with Time Spent, but pushes the sound even further into the kosmische drift, ditching all of the rhythmic elements that drove Time Spent, barring the subtle pulsations caused by the ever shifting overtones, these two lengthy tracks, sprawling expanses of dreamlike shimmer, lush layered tones infused with a warm energy, softly undulating chordal swells, wreathed in a soft halo of gauze-y blissed out blur. The first track, "A.M.", definitely has a sun dappled morning vibe, bleary slowly unfurling melodies, a time lapse exploration of tonal color, a grey landscape gradually taking on color, the tones here seeming to fill the sky with a prismatic palette of warm sonic hues, gorgeously mesmerizing and dreamily meditative.
The second track, appropriately titled "P.M." reverse engineers the first, effortlessly conjuring up a world in hibernation, a sky full of darkened blue, casting lengthening shadows, a lush crystalline expanse of low tones, woven into a gloriously textured backdrop, for the glimmering, glistening ghostlike melodies that hover above, spectral streaks of somnambulant mesmer, gliding lazily toward the dark, a soundtrack for drifting off, a sonic gateway to what lays beyond the veil. So lovely.
MPEG Stream: "The Hermetic Drone A.M."
MPEG Stream: "The Hermetic Drone P.M."

DARK NOERD The Beholder (Flapping Jet) 12" 9.98
AQ buddy Ian Christe is DARK NOERD, who so far has only made one recorded appearance, on the awesome 'Gummo' soundtrack. When Christe is not writing a comprehensive history of heavy metal or DJing, he's making black metal electronica unlike anything you've ever heard. This 12" splits its time pretty evenly between straight up drum 'n bass ala Photek and noisy black metal. On a couple of the tracks, the two meet, in a sloppy not-entirely-evil-sounding collision. With chugging lo-fi riffs being juggled between ping ponging electronic beats and howled hyper-distorted vocals. Can't say that it works exactly, but it is cool and weird and pretty impressive. One of the few records you metalheads can dance to.

DARK PROCESSION Mists Of Darkness (E.E.E Recordings) cd-r 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Another back room discovery, a record from a couple years back, released on unblack label E.E.E., a 2006 ep from these Indiana based (un?) black metallers, who mix dark, raw and grim riffage, with strange twisted black ambience, grinding processed glitchscapes and haunting sinister drones.
Five tracks, 25 minutes, after a sprawling graveyard fog intro, all moonlit creep and gnarled bleak rumble, the band explode into "Mists Of Darkness", some super raw heaviness, blasting and chaotic and blown out, primitive and frosty for sure, but imbued with plenty of ominous mystery and warped ambience. A long stretch of acoustic guitar post rock, all spidery jangle and skeletal drift, gives way to another burst of pounding, grunted blackcrush.
"Burn The Twilight" begins with some ethereal looped guitar that grows more and more tangled and squiggly, before finally splintering into another squall of jagged black shards, and stumbling primitive blackness. "Nox Noctis" starts out Slinty, before getting all folky and softly psychedelic, the drums giving it a sort of spacey post rock vibe, the track slips subtly back and forth between the two until some dark minimal piano enters the picture, only to get swallowed up by some swirling turbulent black drones, that final track sprawling and slowly decaying, fragmented melodies and bits of piano, surfacing and the then drifting off into the ether.
Fans of all things E.E.E. and mysterious dark metal and experimental ambient blackness will DIG DIG DIG. And this is out of print, these are the last 7 or 8 copies, so snag one while you can!
MPEG Stream: "Mists Of Darkness"
MPEG Stream: "Burn The Twilight"

DARK QUARTERER s/t (Unisound) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Odd and obscure '80s heavy metal alert!! If that got your attention, you may remember that not too long ago we reviewed a disc by a band called Black Hole, '80s Italian metallers who were all spaced-out and psychedelic, like some strange mix of Jacula and Voivod. In that review, we made mention of one of their contemporaries, a band by the name of Dark Quarterer, whose debut album from 1985 is to be found on this slipcased cd reissue. We were pretty stoked to find a supplier for these and grabbed a bunch 'cause we figure anything that both Allan and Andee and Andee's fiancee Heather all instantly fell in love with, is something that at least a select few AQ customers are gonna dig too. Why did A, A and H all fall for DQ? Well Dark Quarterer just push all our eccentric, ancient metal buttons. To us, the low-budget, fidelity-impared production is part of their charm (what are those drums made of? cardboard?), the English-almost-as-a-second-language vocal stylings as well (without looking at the lyric sheet you'll have some trouble puzzling out what he's singing about -- his pronunciation is, let's say, creative). And the name "Dark Quarterer" curiously great too. But what's most important (and the reason why they indeed do have a cult following to this day) is that they wrote some awesomely epic and undeniably catchy metal songs. While Black Hole's favorite band must have been Black Sabbath, we're pretty sure Dark Quarterer were inspired by the grandiose he-man metal of Manowar. But it's Manowar-worship laced with the influence of Goblin and Yes and other proggy weirdness, as befits a band from the prog-crazy land of Italy. Andee even detects some hints of our beloved Comus in the title track, though we should stress that Dark Quarterer are very, very metal. Bizarre and poverty-stricken, yep, but metal through and through, with heaps of heroic vocals and majestic riffage to put some starch in your shorts (or loin cloth?). Not terribly unlike another eccentric '80s metal fave 'round here, Manilla Road.
MPEG Stream: "Red Hot Gloves"
MPEG Stream: "Dark Quarterer"

DARK QUARTERER s/t (Shadow Kingdom) 2cd 14.98
The truly dedicated & demented weird-metal obsessives at aQ are pretty excited right now. Leave it to cult metal label Shadow Kingdom to come out with a 'new & improved' version of this 1987 album from Italian epic metal maestros Dark Quarterer! When we first reviewed a previous, import reissue cd of this back in 2007, we started off by saying, ODD AND OBSCURE '80s HEAVY METAL ALERT!! We figured if that got your attention, you might also have remembered that not long before, we had we reviewed a disc by Black Hole (also later re-reissued by Shadow Kingdom), a band of '80s Italian metallers who were all spaced-out and psychedelic, like some strange mix of Jacula and Voivod. In that review, we made mention of one of their contemporaries, a band by the name of Dark Quarterer, whose debut album from 1987 is what we're now discussing.
We were pretty stoked to get copies of this for the store the first time, 'cause we assumed anything that both aQ's Allan and Andee, and Andee's fiancee Heather too, all instantly fell in love with, is something that at least a select few aQ customers were gonna dig as well. Why did A, A and H all fall for DQ? Well Dark Quarterer just push all our eccentric, ancient metal buttons. To us, the low-budget, fidelity-impaired production is part of their charm (what are those drums made of? cardboard? hard moldy cheese?), the English-as-a-second-language vocal stylings as well (without looking at the lyric sheet you'll have some trouble puzzling out what he's so operatically singing about - his pronunciation is, let's say, creative). And the name "Dark Quarterer" curiously great too. But what's MOST important (and the reason why they indeed do have a cult following to this day) is that they wrote some awesomely epic and undeniably catchy metal songs. While Black Hole's favorite band must have been doomlords Black Sabbath, we're pretty sure Dark Quarterer were inspired by the grandiose he-man metal of Manowar. But it's Manowar-worship laced with the influence of Goblin and Yes and other proggy weirdness, as befits a band from the prog-crazy land of Italy. Andee even thinks he detects some hints of our beloved Comus in the title track, though we should stress that Dark Quarterer are very, very metal. Peculiar and poverty-stricken, yep, but metal through and through, with heaps of heroic vocals and majestic riffage to put some starch in your shorts (or loin cloth?). Not terribly unlike another eccentric '80s metal fave 'round here, Manilla Road.
A lot of you agreed that this was quite special, and picked up a copy of the import, but it's here again if you missed it before - and even if you DO have it, folks who really love it just might have to buy it again 'cause this Shadow Kingdom edition, in addition to doing whatever was possible to improve the sound/mix of the original album tracks, includes a bonus track ("Lady Scolopendra Buona"), AND an entire bonus disc, on which the band, who 25 years later are still active, re-recorded the entire album in a modern studio. Of course, that sacrifices some of its original charm, but it's still cool to hear these songs done again in the even more powerful, overblown, grandiose manner that they can currently achieve (piling on more classical keyboards and bombastic arrangements).
And if you need any more convincing about the bizarre merits of Dark Quarterer, this rare YouTube video clip of the band rehearsing "Red Hot Gloves" in a farmhouse somewhere in Italy circa 1984 ought to do it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYy6kwvXTio
MPEG Stream: "Red Hot Gloves"
MPEG Stream: "Dark Quarterer"

DARK REVOLUTION COLLECTIVE Dark Revolution / Madmen Union (Qbico) picture disc 12" 21.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The Dark Revolution Collective was the first musical group formed by Kawabata Makoto, who has since earned considerable notoriety in the incredibly prolific Acid Mother's Temple. Recorded back in 1978, Kawabata with Tetsushi Kawagishi and Yasuo Iwaki had no instruments, but managed to borrow a synthesizer and acquired some equipment from their high school science laboratory to use as percussion. The unwavering rhythmic clatter from the multiple percussionists, hammering away at PVC pipes, glass beakers, and metal pots with an assortment of cutlery, sound somewhat like a human powered version of Joe Jones' solar umbrellas and automated percussive devices. The first edition of these recordings was a super limited cassette published by R.E.P. in the '80s and more recently had been issued in the equally limited 10 CD-R box set of Kawabata's early works. The Dark Revolution Collective now gets reissued as a beautiful picture disc courtesy of the Italian label Qbico, which supposedly had been founded specifically to release a handful of early Kawabata recordings.
While these recordings are not as good as the recent flurry of AMT activities, you should realise that the mean age of the Dark Revolution Collective at the time of this recording was 13!!! Some of the Acid Mothers Temple freaks here think it's worth it, yet also some of us think you could save your money and get Andee's upcoming tUMULt label AMT picture disc "41st Century Splendid Man" instead.

DARK SIDE OF THE COP s/t (self-released) cd 11.98
The self-titled debut cd by the oddly monikered Dark Side Of The Cop (aka Marco Panella) is a super sweet and buoyant affair. Despite his name's nod to Pink Floyd, this one man band certainly wears his Brian Wilson influences on his sleeves in many ways. For one thing he has one of those soft wistful boy singing voices that occasionally brings to mind the abovementioned Wilson or David Gates. The disc opens with what sounds like a somber procession of tin toy trains, and robots, but they're just the tip of Panella's own personal mini orchestra. Warm guitar and piano soon join the fray along with some softly prickly programmed rhythms. So nice.
MPEG Stream: "Detroit (Prelude)"
MPEG Stream: "Fool In The Hill"

DARK STAR s/t (Krescendo Records) cd 15.98
As always, gotta give it up for the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal. We mention that fecund scene upon occasion, usually in context of saying some current metal band has NWOBHM influences. So it's nice now and then to get a reissue of an actual NWOBHM cult classic to review. In this case, from 1981, the debut album by Dark Star, a band best known for their track "Lady Of Mars", which appears here. That's how we got into Dark Star, hearing that song, it's been on a lot of comps (starting with Metal For Muthas Vol. II), really a brilliant example of anthemic, super catchy, fists-clenched, heavy metal grandeur - and it's a love song too. A few years back Andee took a trip to Japan, the land where albums like this get reissued on compact disc long before they do over here, if ever, and scored copies of this for both himself and Allan (as you can imagine, there was a BIG and potentially expensive list of '80s metal rarities he had to look for, this was towards the top though). Turns out, while "Lady Of Mars" is an obvious stand out, the whole record is a killer piece of melodic hard rockin' British metal, with '70s influences (not so strange considering it was barely the '80s), notably UFO and Thin Lizzy - the majestic "Lady Love", another stand out, certainly has some of the bright galloping glory of classic Lizzy.
With heavy guitar riffs, strong soaring vocals, and plenty of hooks, Dark Star deliver the NWOBHM goods. It's mostly mid paced, and there's some mellow moments... it seems they've got a romantic side, they even have a number called "Rock 'n' Romancin'" (not included here, sadly) and we mentioned that "Lady Of Mars" is a love song already, right? But, as on the Riot-ish "Rock 'n' Romancin'", the rock comes first, and Dark Star rocks out as only a band who would also do an appropriately kickass song called "Rock Bringer" can (which IS included here).
So, now this album has at last been reissued here in the States, so of course we had to list it. Unfortunately, this version omits the bonus tracks from singles that were on that Japanese reish.
Dunno how deep you want your NWOBHM collection to go, but this is a good 'un to get. Worth it for "Lady Of Mars" but also worth it for more than just "Lady Of Mars"!
MPEG Stream: "Kaptain Amerika"
MPEG Stream: "Lady Of Mars"

DARK TRANQUILITY Character (Century Media) cd 12.98

DARK YOGA Breath Of Life (Yarnlazer) cd-r 7.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We remember AQ pal John Gossard, from doom-mongers Asunder and defunct SF black metallers Weakling, talking about one of his favorite pastimes, black metal tennis! It was tough to discern exactly what was involved, but we do know it included a couple rackets, LOTS of wine, and typically took place in the middle of the night. We can only assume, after some black metal tennis, those guys would unwind with some dark yoga, and we're not even gonna guess what that might entail, but judging from this disc from Northwestern drone psych fuzz groove ensemble Dark Yoga, it most likely included an entire pharmacy of drugs, a suitcase full of FX, and amps and guitars galore.
So yep, another winner from the Yarnlazer label (Acre, Valet, Ghosting, Bonecloud), a live recording from 2006 featuring a whole posse of Portland noisemakers including Yarnlazer head honcho Honey Owens (who also records as Valet). Dark Yoga is a sprawling psychedelic krautrock free fuzz jam, simple throbbing basslines, slowed down vocals, shimmering clouds of buzzing effects and swirling disembodied guitar fuzz, blown out guitar leads, simple tribal drumming, propulsive and motorik, with long stretches of tinkling effervescence and spaced out ambience. The sound is super heavy on the Can, even down to some of the very (infrequent) Damo like vocals. Or imagine No Neck Blues Band and Sunburned Hand Of The Man in full on psych jam mode, less tribal and clattery and more druggy and space-y and languidly rocking. There are some groovy stretches of fuzzy funk too, like some tarpit demonic dance jams, but even those parts are dense with fuzzy murk and spacepsych swirl.
Packaged in cool hand screened sleeves, so heavy with paint and intense smelling, that all you really need is to toss the sleeve into a paper bag while you're listening and huff your way into the perfect Dark Yoga mind space. Also contains a little full color metallic insert.
LIMITED TO 100 COPIES!!!
MPEG Stream: "One "
MPEG Stream: "Two"

DARKBLACK Midnight Wraith (Stormspell) cd ep 5.98
This Portland-based band's debut album, The Sellsword, was a bit of a hit around here last year, in part 'cause their twin guitar harmony metal sounded a heck of a lot like that of AQ-faves The Fucking Champs. Unlike The Champs, though, they aren't all-instrumental, they've got a singer belting it out in classic high-pitched fashion over their galloping riffage, sweet!
The full-length was limited to 500 copies, and is now out of print, but the band are back with a 5-song follow-up, also limited to 500 numbered copies. This new DarkBlack is definitely less "epic power metal", more NWOBHM-ish rock n' roll, but still undeniably Champsy in parts (the chuggery of "Golden Idol" ferinstance) though perhaps not quite so Champsy as before. Not that they've backed off on the guitars, nosiree, you want hot guitar-on-guitar action, you got it here. Shreddin' solos and soaring harmonies galore, definitely their raison d'etre, outshining the decent-but-unexceptional vocals, a ragged whine at times that lacks the power to truly compete with the axes. Yep, it's the guitars that butter the bread in this band.
Anyone into authentic old school metal revivalism oughtta get a kick out of DarkBlack's garagey '70s sounding sincerity and impressive chops, and these five songs come at a bargain price as well. All of 'em deliver the goods, from the catchy opener "Doom Herald" through to the speedy closer "Broken Oath", with the hectic energetic title track standing out as one of our faves, full of twisty changes and triumphant lead work. At ep-length, it's easy to spin this again and again and discerning headbangers should do so forthwith.
MPEG Stream: "Doom Herald"
MPEG Stream: "Midnight Wraith"

DARKBLACK The Sellsword (Stormspell) cd 11.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Even if we hadn't already heard, and liked (though not listed) this Portland, Oregon true metal trio's earlier ep The Barbarian's Hammer, we'd have been curious about this, their debut full-length, 'cause it bears a blurb on the front recommending this "if you dig early Lord Weird Slough Feg and Thin Lizzy"! Dunno what about DarkBlack other than their Maiden-y twin guitar attack makes 'em cite Slough Feg in particular (early or otherwise) but whatever, it's true anyone into Slough Feg's typical epic dual axe action and ought to check this out, though really they don't sound TOO much alike. Probably it's just that DarkBlack are fans of Slough Feg, though we'll guess they grew up listening to Maiden albums, not Slough Feg ones, unless they're even younger than we think.
Actually, if we were writing the blurb, we'd have suggested it say "if you dig The Fucking Champs, but wonder what they'd sound like if they really went for it and got a real wailing higher-pitched heavy metal singer"! Just listen to the guitars at beginning of "Icy Tomb Of Time"... that sounds SO MUCH like The Champs, it coulda fooled us! Identical tone. Also the drumming sounds similar too.
There's nine songs here, all about ancient epic battle fantasy concepts it seems. And they're a real rollercoaster of rippage, with galloping rhythms, shredding leads, and of course those great dual guitar harmonies. DarkBlack's music is heavy and hectic, tightly wound, choppy but fluid too, giving the singer something slaying over which to soar.
Bracingly triumphant and underground, DarkBlack are another "throwback" '80s-ish power metal band that sounds fully alive and kickass right NOW. So, for fans of Slough Feg, sure, not so much Thin Lizzy really but Iron Maiden yeah, and The Champs like we said, plus Bible Of The Devil, The Sword (but less stoner, more shreddy), Cauldron, Enforcer, and of course all sorts of classic NWOBHM stuff.
Limited to 500 numbered copies, going fast...
MPEG Stream: "Sword Of The Morning"
MPEG Stream: "Icy Tomb Of Time"
MPEG Stream: "The Sellsword"

DARKEL s/t (Astralwerks) cd 17.98
Nobody does suave, sleek, atmospheric electronic pop better then Air, so it's no surprise that this solo outing from one half of the French duo, hits the same spot pretty much dead on. Jean-Benoit Dunckel took time in between Air's follow up to Talkie Walkie and their work on Charlotte Gainsbourg's upcoming release to make his first solo record. This definitely leans toward the more song orientated pop leanings of Air. Still so lush, dreamy and sensual but with melodies and vocals that find their way into your head and don't ever go away. Catchy and inviting, this has bedtime romance written all over it. One of those great records to lounge around in the morning to, or to use as a secret weapon when you want to put the moves on that special someone. THE make-out record of 2006.
MPEG Stream: "Be My Friend"
MPEG Stream: "Earth"

DARKER MY LOVE 2 (Dangerbird Records) cd 14.98
If you're not scared of labels like Cherry Red, Creation, or Hut, then keep reading. And if you first heard those labels on college radio, then definitely keep reading. Darker My Love is an LA-based 4-piece that channels the energy of bands like The Stone Roses and very early Oasis. Sure, throw in some Supergrass. Absolutely summertime, windows down, driving along the coast, feel good music. The group's arrangements are thoughtful while remaining accessible and breezy. In particular we can't help but notice the vocal melodies, provided by guitarist Tim Presley and bassist Rob Barbatto. Interestingly, both artists are former members of The Fall. Also, drummer Andy Granelli was in both The Nerve Agents and The Distillers. Either way, if '90s pop, early '80s power pop, or any other kind of pop has an appeal, this is your summer record!
MPEG Stream: "Pale Sun"
MPEG Stream: "Talking Words"

DARKER MY LOVE / MOCCASIN s/t (I Hate Rock N' Roll) 12" 11.98

DARKEST HOUR Deliver Us (Victory) cd 15.98