AXOLOTL / INCA ORE split (Arbor) 7" 6.98
Super limited single from these two modern masters of soft noise. The A side is from local boy Karl aka Axolotl, who over the last little while has slowly changed direction, the chaotic thick noisescapes of past records gradually becoming more and more melodic and blissed out. His half of this split continues in that direction, beginning with a brief bit of slowed down processed industrial clatter, which slowly gives way to some super blissy vocal drift. Soft swells, warm wheezing organs, bits of electronics, and disembodied vocals slowly shifting and wrapping themselves around one another. Creating strange subtle shapes and gorgeous harmonies. Lo-fi noise-rock pop ambience for sure...
Inca Ore (now also local wethinks) fills up the flipside with whispered vocals and old music box melodies, suspended in an old fashioned haze, late afternoon sun and dust motes hanging motionless in the beams of fading light. A room full of furniture untouched, old faded photos, a life forgotten. Haunting and creepy, mysterious and strangely cinematic, bits of choral fragments pepper the hushed vocals and simple melodies, sounding like it wouldn't be out of place in a Dario Argento movie.
LIMITED TO 450 COPIES, each one hand numbered, pressed on white vinyl, and packaged in thick sleeves with a photocopied insert.

AXOLOTL / MOUTHUS / SKATERS Live At KDVS (Our Mouth) 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 managed to get just a handful of these super limited (and seemingly already out of print, arghh!) cd-r's documenting this particular abstract free noise summit, that took place earlier this year live on the air at KDVS in Sacramento. Featuring names you should all be familiar with by now, Axolotl, Mouthus and the Skaters. Not as noisy as one might expect, instead this is some strange ambient industrial workout, murky and muddy, lots of processed vocals, clanging percussion, and weird swells of sound, cloaked in a dense swirl of lo-fi hiss. Sounds like it could be some lost live Throbbing Gristle outtake. Thick squirming guitars, creep and crawl through a craggy soundscape of thick gritty drones and jagged streaks of feedback, while haunting vocals moan and howl above the crepuscular din.
MPEG Stream: "Live At KDVS"

AXOLOTL / THE SKATERS split (Catsup Plate) lp 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Some vinyl tag team action from these two Bay area based frenzies heavyweights. Axolotl offer up three lengthy tracks, a warped warbly hiss drenched ambient drift with distant singsongy vocals, a soft shimmery cinematic soundscapes, all soft edges, sparkling and glistening, and a crunchy super distorted blown out bliss out. All different but with a distinct certain something that ties them all together and makes them uniquely Axolotl. The Skaters counter with a side long epic, weird birdlike electronics trill and flutter, affected guitar jangles and floats dreamlike, hypnotic vocal loops, lurch and shimmy and eventually blend into a single smeary sound, the whole track dense and murky and warbly and lo-fi but as always so totally soft on the ears.
Gorgeously packaged as are all things on Catsup Plate, this time, metallic textured gold ink on a black sleeve, hand screened with a photocopied insert. SUPER LIMITED. Already out of print at the label, so we might not be able to get more unless they press more!

AXOLOTL / YELLOW SWANS / GERRIT (Jyrk) cd 5.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We only have a handful of these and once they're gone they're gone for good! Super limited triple threat SF free noise cd-r tag team match up between some names you should probably know by now, Axolotl, the Yellow Swans, and Gerritt. With three times the firepower you might think that would mean three times the noise, but be prepared to be surprised! And soothed. That's right, three lengthy tracks that lean more toward the dreamy minimal drone and the shimmering sheets of sonic skree than the all out noise attack. The first track is a slowly shifting gritty electronic soundscape of hazy melody and electronic buzz and hiss, eventually building into a louder, yet no less swath of drone and glitch hiss. Track two is a bit more in your face, with rich slabs of distorted chords and warm warbly drones, with swooping melodies and electronic mosquito buzz. The final track is twenty minutes of thick churning low end grind and grumble, pulsing with some buried beat, until the whole thing explodes into a huge wall of thick electrogrit and fuzzed out feedback screech. Wow. Really nice. And again, this is SUPER LIMITED!!!
MPEG Stream: "One"

AXOLOTL AND WEYES BLUHD Sciamacy (Loci) 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.
Even though Axolotl was San Francisco based, for some reason it was always difficult for us to get many of his releases. Most were extremely limited, a few times we managed to get merely a handful before they disappeared, but for the most part they came and went before we even discovered they were out.
Axolotl may have moved away, but he also started up his own little label, concentrating on releasing various bits of sonic Axolotica. Live shows, impromptu jams, and various other recorded sonic happenings. And thankfully this time we have a direct line to the source, and we've got copies of all three titles in the first batch. All packaged in miniature dvd-style cases, with photocopied covers and some with a little xeroxed insert. And while we're not sure just how limited these are, we're fairly sure it's VERY.
The third release in the inaugural batch of Loci releases finds Axolotl teaming up with someone called Weyes Bluhd. On the first track of two, the duo create some sort of super distorted ghostly folk, where the vocals are crumbling effects drenched moans, surrounded by streaks of feedback and bursts of glitch and crunch, melodies assembled from jagged fragments of sound, all in a murky muddy soundscape of fuzzed out ambience, eventually building to a serious chunk of chaotic free psych blowout, overblown and WAY in the red.
The second track is like a shadow of the first, a whispery shimmer to the openers crunchy buzz, the vocals lonely moans, the instrumentation nothing but barely there slivers of high end shimmer, a lonely guitar drifting through the ether, the surrounding ambience fuzzy and gauzy, some serious abstract ghost town blues.
MPEG Stream: "1"
MPEG Stream: "2"

AYERS, NIGEL / JOHN EVERALL / MICK HARRIS Mesmeric Enabling Device (Soleilmoon) cd 14.98
Outside the morphological sounds of Nocturnal Emissions, Nigel Ayers has embarked on a few collaborative projects - one with Robin Storey and Randy Grief, and this one with Mick Harris (Scorn, Lull, Painkiller), and John Everall (Sentrax Records). Collectively, the trio delves into the deepest pits of the dark ambient, pioneered by the likes of Lustmord. Sublime.

AYSHAY Warn U (Triangle) cd ep 12.98
The two most recent records put out by ultra hip experimental electronic label Triangle, finds that label continuing to push well past the 'witch house' genre ghetto that birthed them. To be fair, the first few proper releases on Triangle, Holy Other, Clams Casino, and Balam Acab, were already a sort of POST witch house strain anyway, with some of the WH tropes retained, but with those groups upping the production big time, and ditching much of the lo-fi drag that defined the best witch house, and in the process, inventing a new electronica. Elsewhere on this week's list you'll find the new record from SF electro weirdos Water Borders, a dizzying slab of Coil worshipping electronic what the fuck genius, and then there's this, the debut from Ayshay, which also incorporates a bit of Coil into the proceedings, but there seem to be no beats at all, at least initially, channeling some sort of Cocteau Twins ethereal drift, with some processed throat singing style vocals as a bass, the only beat a buried pulse, it's pretty compelling, and darkly haunting, and beautiful for sure. The second track offers up more of the same, channeling Grouper and stripping away all that low fidelity murk and instead creating a lush layered symphony of voices, subtly twisted and tweaked, another spectral vocal bliss out, and in fact, the third track is more of the same, it's like a three part vocal song suite that acts as a sort of introduction to the final 12 minute "Nguzunguzu Megamix", which is in fact the first track with beats, and while we may have been expecting some sort of skittery drag, or murky muted low end throb, it actually plays more like some lost Muslimgauze remix, all skittery Eastern percussion, multiple drums and rhythms all tangled up, some hand claps, some serious low end, all over those ethereal vox from the first few tracks, the sound constantly shifting, the beat growing more and more block rockin as the track progresses until it finally blossoms into some almost jungle near the end, the stutter and skitter (and some BIG bass booms), perfectly woven into that strange shimmery swirl of ghostly vox. And it's those last few minutes that are the sort of warped and weird, beat heavy mystery secret weapon that some cool DJ will unleash from his sonic arsenal at just the right time and just destroy the dancefloor. So good, getting tons of play here at AQ and appropriately just in time for the Halloween season...
MPEG Stream: "Warn-U"
MPEG Stream: "Nguzunguzu Megamix"

AYSHAY Warn U (Triangle) 12" 14.98
Now availabe on vinyl!
The two most recent records put out by ultra hip experimental electronic label Triangle, finds that label continuing to push well past the 'witch house' genre ghetto that birthed them. To be fair, the first few proper releases on Triangle, Holy Other, Clams Casino, and Balam Acab, were already a sort of POST witch house strain anyway, with some of the WH tropes retained, but with those groups upping the production big time, and ditching much of the lo-fi drag that defined the best witch house, and in the process, inventing a new electronica. One of those recent releases was from SF electro weirdos Water Borders, a dizzying slab of Coil worshipping electronic what the fuck genius, and then there's this, the debut from Ayshay, which also incorporates a bit of Coil into the proceedings, but there seem to be no beats at all, at least initially, channeling some sort of Cocteau Twins ethereal drift, with some processed throat singing style vocals as a bass, the only beat a buried pulse, it's pretty compelling, and darkly haunting, and beautiful for sure. The second track offers up more of the same, channeling Grouper and stripping away all that low fidelity murk and instead creating a lush layered symphony of voices, subtly twisted and tweaked, another spectral vocal bliss out, and in fact, the third track is more of the same, it's like a three part vocal song suite that acts as a sort of introduction to the final 12 minute "Nguzunguzu Megamix", which is in fact the first track with beats, and while we may have been expecting some sort of skittery drag, or murky muted low end throb, it actually plays more like some lost Muslimgauze remix, all skittery Eastern percussion, multiple drums and rhythms all tangled up, some hand claps, some serious low end, all over those ethereal vox from the first few tracks, the sound constantly shifting, the beat growing more and more block rockin as the track progresses until it finally blossoms into some almost jungle near the end, the stutter and skitter (and some BIG bass booms), perfectly woven into that strange shimmery swirl of ghostly vox. And it's those last few minutes that are the sort of warped and weird, beat heavy mystery secret weapon that some cool DJ will unleash from his sonic arsenal at just the right time and just destroy the dancefloor.
MPEG Stream: "Warn-U"
MPEG Stream: "Nguzunguzu Megamix"

AYTHIS Doppelganger (Paradigms) cd 12.98
Latest in the ongoing series of lovingly packaged, super limited releases from UK label Paradigms, who ostensibly are a metal label, but whose releases are sonically all over the map, the gothic chamber music of Amber Asylum, the buzzing blackness of Utlagr and Throne Of Katarsis, the blessed out dream done of the Angelic Process, the psychedelic space folk of Plants, the grinding cinematic noise of Gnaw Their Tongues, the black ambient of Wraiths, the metallic post prog rock of Woburn House, the ultra doooooom of Hjarnidaudi and we could go on and on.
And we most likely will as Paradigms shows no sign of slowing down. Two new releases this time around, a disc of progged out bombastic post black metal from Italian horde Kailash, and this here chunk of dreamy wispy neo-classical ambience from a group called Aythis.
Definitely the most traditionally pretty of the Paradigms releases, Aythis practice a sort of Dead Can Dance meets Der Blutharsch style post industrial neo-classicism, sweeping epic melodies, sung spoken female vocals way down in the mix, martial percussion, angelic choral crooning, twinkling chimes, simple minor key acoustic guitar melodies, all very dark and dreamlike, melancholic and ambient, but with that relentless percussion, the muted pounding of a death march drum, but buried beneath layers of gossamer shimmer, and warm whorls of chordal buzz. Some tracks sparkle and glimmer in the sun, epic and majestic, soul bared and head held high, all washed out and blue skied, warm afternoons suffused with a rich burnished glow, others are murky crawls through barren subterranean chambers, candle light flickering, shadows dancing on blackened walls, the dirt and sand rough against your hands, the sounds rough against your ears.
Pretty and mysterious, haunting and beautiful. Definitely recommended for fans of Dead Can Dance, Arcana, Elend and the prettier side of Cold Meat Industries...
Limited to 750 copies, packaged in a mini lp style sleeve wrapped in a hand stamped brown paper outer sleeve.
MPEG Stream: "Shallow Blackout"
MPEG Stream: "Innermost Land"

AZURE EMOTE Chronicles Of An Aging Mammal (Epidemie) cd 14.98

MPEG Stream: "Complex 25"
MPEG Stream: "Justified God"
MPEG Stream: "Clarity Through Apathy"

B.SON Black Shape Of Nexus (Vendetta) cd 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
A while back we listed a super limited lp from these German doomlords (we still have a couple left, but after those are gone, the vinyl version is gone gone gone), a record that completely and utterly kicked our asses. Now it's available on cd, and it includes not only the tracks from the lp, but also, their tracks from a recent vinyl only split with Crowskin, another German doom/drone/sludge combo we have yet to hear...
As for the sound of B.Son, well, by now, you must all realize how much we at aQ love us some ultra doom, some seriously sick slowness, you know, that doooooom, that is so glacial, that the songs begin to crumble and ooze into viscous black pools. We do. But sometimes we just want our doom to ROCK. Sounds contrary but it's been known to happen. Doom can be slow and low and still rock. Take B.Son for example. Whose particular brand of doomic energy is drawn from bands like Harvey Milk, Karp, The Melvins, godheadSilo, more a sort of downtuned propulsive sludge with doom elements, than pure doom. But goddamn if it isn't just as brutal and heck, doomy...
Thick ropy buzzbass, pounding destructo drums, throaty howls, grinding guitars, all lurching and swaying like some drugged and demented superrock doombeast, all filtered through a bit of grinding screamo and some buzzed out metallic blackness. There are moments of blisssed out post rockiness, and weird laid back grooves, stretched out near ambience and dense little mathy jams, but those moments just serve to keep the doomed sludge rock fury from becoming too much.
Produced by James Plotkin. The cd is packaged in a golden metal fold open cd box (much like the last Caacrinolas) with a full color, four panel, thick paper insert.
MPEG Stream: "IV"
MPEG Stream: "III"

B.SON Black Shape Of Nexus (Vendetta) lp 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
As much as we love us some ultra doom, some seriously sick slowness, you know, that doooooom, that is so glacial, that the songs begin to crumble and ooze into viscous black pools. We do. But sometimes we just want our doom to ROCK. Sounds contrary but it's been known to happen. Doom can be slow and low and still rock. Take B.Son for example. Whose particular brand of doomic energy is drawn from bands like Harvey Milk, Karp, The Melvins, godheadSilo, more a sort of downtuned propulsive sludge with doom elements, than pure doom. But goddamn if it isn't just as brutal and heck, doomy...
Thick ropy buzzbass, pounding destructo drums, throaty howls, grinding guitars, all lurching and swaying like some drugged and demented superrock doombeast, all filtered through a bit of grinding screamo and some buzzed out metallic blackness.Ê
There are moments of blisssedÊ out post rockiness, and weird laid back grooves, stretched out near ambience and dense little mathy jams, but those moments just serve to keep the doomed sludge rock fury from becoming too much.Ê
Produced by James Plotkin. Spiffy black and gold sleeves... This seems to already be out of print as well, so this batch could very well be the last we see of these...

BABYLON DISCO Viva Life (D-Trash) cd 10.98

BAD ACID Tab VII dvd-r+cd-r + mini-magazine 19.98
Finally, Tab 7 of BAD ACID, the "warped outsider music bible", is here, covering pretty much everything we love, from postrock to shoegaze to doom to sludge to grind to ambient to electronic to punk to garage. A massive dose of sensory overload, sounds, images, text, music, videos, interviews, articles, from a ton of bands we know and love, as well as a ton more of which we've never heard.
The previous issue of Bad Acid was a huge hit around here, we could barely keep it in stock, even though it was crazy expensive because of the WEAK dollar and the overseas shipping. But the dollar is not so weak anymore, so this issue is WAY cheaper, but thankfully no less kick ass.
First up, there's a DVD-r, featuring interviews with the Melvins and Celtic Frost, videos from Phantomsmasher, Jacula (!!!!!!) among others, as well as live footage of Morkobot, Ramesses and Isis! Then there's a SEVENTEEN HOUR, ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTEEN band mp3 audio cd-r, featuring tracks from Witchcraft, Otesanek, Coffins, Tenhornedbeast, Numinous Eye, Seven That Spells, Rahdunes, Stumm, Primordial Undermind, Saviours, Aldebaran, Lietterschpich, Journey To Ixtlan, Jamnation, Grave In The Sky, Ovo, Von Thronstahl, Tractor, Zodiacs, Wicked Minds, Gentlemans Pistols, South Saturn Delta, Eptileptinomicon (one of our favorite band names ever) and loads of others.
Finally there's 90 pages of full screen PDF sleeve notes, full color and super psychedelic, featuring lengthy interviews with Sons Of Otis, Ovo, Randy Holden / Blue Cheer, Rahdunes, Fuckbuttons, Helios Creed from Chrome, and Lazarus Blackstar among others! Good grief.
And just to get an idea of how sprawling and expansive and nearly overwhelming Bad Acid is, here's an abbreviated list of the hundred plus bands, new to us, some of which are bound to become new favorites: Resting Rooster, Total System Failure, High Watt Electrocutions, Spitting Off Tall Buildings, Tigrova Mast, The Black Pine, Ventura, Bang Lassi, Tetrix, Phononics, Baby Woodrose, St. Erik, Army Of Flying Robots, Vomm, A Horse Called War, Dyse, Invasion, The Deep Blue, Couldron, El Thule, Sailor Winters, Malachia, Sermoniser, Propane, Nosmaus, Dead.Circuit, Tetriori, Astra, Aftercare, Zone Six, Holy Calibre, Church Of Hed, Rise To Thunder, Cellardoor, Bikini Eyebolt, Motley Motion, Vibravoid, Space Shuttle Pilots, Oresund Space Collective, Forever Changing Concept, Stunt Cock, and again, more more more.
Packaged in a psychedelic dvd sized, 8 panel booklet, with some cool tripped out illustrations, and liner notes.
Total essential reading / viewing / listening for all heavy droney spaced out post kraut free noise jazz avant electronic outsider sound obsessives!

BAD ACID The Burnout Issue (Tabs 10,11,12) 3 x dvd-r + mini-magazine 27.00
Sad sad news, UK underground heavy/spacey/metallic/psychedelic magazine/compilation Bad Acid is no more. Longtime readers of the aQ list have no doubt enjoyed an issue or two (or three or four) of this sprawling publication, a combination printed zine, and computerized PDF zine, complete with an audio component that usually clocks in at at least 12 hours, sometimes twice that. It's been 10 years, and Bad Acid editor Dave Gedge has a family, and kids, has been losing money (magazines, even ones as amazing as Bad Acid are most definitely a labor of love) and furthermore is a Buddhist, so in addition to simplifying his life, Gedge has simply been burnt out, which is why this final salvo is called The Burnout Issue. And this final issue is the only bit of silver lining, but WHAT a silver lining it is. This final issue is in fact, THREE issues, #10, #11 and #12, and while the printed part might be the most minimal yet, it's more than made up for by the contents of the 3 dvd-r's. This time, the magazine itself is more of an index, as it takes EIGHT pages, in tiny text, to list all the bands and songs and videos and interviews and articles.
As usual, it's split into sections, the first is the PDF magazine, accompanied by music from each band as well as a review of the band's most recent record. Some of the bands in the magazine this time around: Carlton Melton, Aluk Todolo, Bong, Plastic Crimewave Sound, Sylvester Anfang, Residual Echoes, White Hills, Der Blutharsch, GNOD, Jazzfinger, Grey Daturas, Hooded Menace, Necro Deathmort, The Gates Of Slumber, Flood, The Wounded Kings, Full Blown Expansion, Hey Colossus, Ancestral, Isis, Pelican, Scott Kelly of Neurosis, Sutcliffe Jugend, The Accused, Inade, The Brian Jonestown Massacre, Atomic Bitchwax, Snail, The Twilight Sad, Ramesses, Ufomammut, Witchsorrow, Assemble Head In Sunburst Sound, Slomatics, Root, Nordvargr, Antonius Rex, Russian Circles, Centurions Ghost, Nebula, Freedom Hawk, Steve Von Till of Neurosis, Leeches Of Lore, Dianogah, Sardonis, Torche, Turzi, Ancestors, L'Acephale, and loads more, including TONS of bands we had never heard of.
The second section is the interviews, and features Meads Of Asphodel, Nadja, Expo 70, Centurions Ghost, Vincent Black Shadow, Gnaw, Unearthly Trance, At War With False Noise, Old Corpse Road, Alice Donut, and more! The next section features label profiles of Denovali, Rocket and Future Noise, featuring loads of recordings from lots of bands on each label.
Then there's a section of bonus audio, with still more tracks, including jams from Sundial, B*Tong, Disappears, Fire Witch, Realmbuilder, Jex Thoth, White Buzz, Rich Hoak, Loscil, Jonas Reinhardt, Fauna, Big City Orchestra, and once again, a whole mess of bands we've never heard.
There's also a bunch of videos, by Total Fucking Destruction, White Hills, Psychofagist and a bunch more, some short films as well, and finally, a section of bonus MP4's, featuring promo videos from Expo 70 and others, and more short films and live footage.
Phew! It's epic and sprawling, and is equal parts rad bands you know and new discoveries. Way recommended for anyone who likes music AT ALL. But definitely Bad Acid leans toward the heavy and the psychedelic and the left of center. So yeah, obviously WAY recommend, and while Bad Acid will continue on in a different, bloggier, form, it just won't be the same, so you best buy this final issue of Bad Acid and add it to that shelf of magazines you keep and treasure and reread...

BAD SECTOR + TOMMASO LISA Reset / Rebis Perferiche (Old Europa Cafe) cd / book / 3"cd 24.00

BAD SECTOR / CONTAGIOUS ORGASM Vacuum Pulse (Old Europa Cafe) cd 15.98
"Vacuum Pulse" is a collaborative effort between Japan's Contagious Orgasm and Italy's Bad Sector, both of whom have extensive catalogues of post-industrial rumblings. This was originally a cassette from Old Europa Cafe, who fortunately issued this again in a digital format with two extra collaborative tracks. Bad Sector's sound is typified by slow Wagnerian melodic progressions creeping out of tense John Duncan-esque data-crunched drones. Contagious Orgasm prefers to lace processed authoritative speech patterns with Eraserhead radiator sounds. Their collaborative efforts sounds a lot like a louder Main without as much bass and with a gilded aura surrounding all of the work.

BAD STATISTICS Lucky Town Gone (Pseudo Arcana) cd 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Awesome! We'd been waiting and wanting more from New Zealand's bizarre Bad Statistics ever since we got their vinyl-only debut, Static, last year. In addition to thinking they had a really excellent band name, we loved the doomic, droning weirdness of their propulsive krauty NZ noiserock, made even weirder by the utter outsider vocal garble that arose over their ritualistic music, like spirits or specters seemingly summoned from the other side. Now, huzzah, there's this new full-length, an actual cd on the Pseudo-Arcana label, and it pretty much picks up where the LP left off! 47 and a half minutes more of mysterious musical ceremony, Bad Statistics style, on these seven tracks. Again, the vocals (produced from the throat of one Thebis Mutante) are really strange, unhinged alien hippy rant-chant, like Ya Ho Wah's Father Yod speaking in tongues, sometimes looped and layered. Together with the throbbing drum beats, distorted electronic textures from guitar and bass, and hollow horn bleat and twitter on a track or two, you have the basic tempel-vibrating template for Bad Statistics' repetitive, rumbling, mesmerizing murk. Best listened to from a yogic position of spiritual openness, legs crossed, mind clear, third eye unblinking. Though, at their loudest, most intense chugging psychrock peaks, some vigorous rocking back and forth will be called for, maybe even full-on writhing on the floor.
Let's take the 13-minute title track as an example... it's moaningly eased into, the percussive plod slow and sparse, but after a short while Thebis cries out quite like Can's Damo Suzuki, and the pace picks up, cymbals crashing... before another long droning lull with whistling and mumbling drifting over the slo-mo chug of the guitars and drums... then towards the very end, the singer suddenly seems possessed, his voice dropping into a guttural exhortations, the din of the instruments rising into a psychedelic swirling howl... welcome to the reverse exorcism!!
Imagine the kosmic-kraut-primitivism of early Amon Duul, Tangerine Dream, or Siloah, with Circle's Mika Ratto as voice coach, encouraging Yod x Yoko vocal vibrations. Or the linear lo-fi insanity of a secret Dead C meets Reynols monster jam, if directed towards the worship of some ancient god, recorded on cheap cassette only as an afterthought. Yeah. It's pretty much awesome.
MPEG Stream: "Balloon Outbreak"
MPEG Stream: "Three Swarms Of Bees"

BAD STATISTICS Static ((K-RAA-K)3) lp 13.98
One of our favorite new records of late, comes to us all the way from New Zealand, but via Belgium (where their label, long time AQ faves Kraak are based). A mysterious troupe called Bad Statistics, their debut a two song vinyl only EPIC. Equal parts droney noise rock, propulsive krautrock, and even some weird sort-of-doom. Drenched in swirls of chaotic FX and a blown out in-the-red recording, that manages to be fierce and murky at the same time.
Each track takes up a whole side and is given plenty of time to change shape and direction, sound and spirit, transforming gradually, but managing to remain hypnotic and blissed out. The A side, begins as a doomy plod, but with clean guitars instead of downtuned distorted ones, the drums spare, and all manner of weird demon-y vocals, a sort of post rocky crawl. Eventually, synths join the fray, and along with the drums, they lock into a looped cyclical groove, over which, still more strange vocals croon and moan. And we're talking REALLY strange, mewling moaning howling weirdness. The music sounds like some spaced out Tangerine Dream, the drums a constant pound way down in the mix, the synths pulsing and throbbing, the vocals though turn it into some damaged outsider space jam. At one point the synths drop out and the vocals go crazy, sounding like they're speaking in tongues, before the band kick back in, launching into a fierce Hawkwind style FX drenched psychrock outro that goes on forever.
The second track is even better, and one of our favorite songs of the year hands down. A gorgeously blown out dirge, the guitars so hot they crumble with every downbeat, the recording super distorted and raw, but the melody and the main riff are super gorgeous, catchy and minor key, the track relaxes briefly, spreading out into a glitchy ambient murmur, over which guitars shimmer, little bits of electronics flutter, and the bass holds it all together with a simple dreamy groove. Very krautrocky, and a bit like a more lo-fi noiserock Necks. The track shifts constantly over the next ten minutes or so, to weird doomy twang, with gorgeous majestic riffing, thick bass chords, and some shapeless falsetto vocals, then to a super distorted psychdrone freakout, replete with chiming guitar harmonics, and a pulsing throbbing rhythm buried beneath a layer of crunchy buzz, then to a sunbaked space jam, all open chords, simple drumming, more shapeless vox, and finally to a washed out krautrock dirge, peppered with bits of backwards percussion, garbled voices, reverse guitar, and jagged chunks of crumbling distortion, until the whole thing slowly burns to black.
Sorry to everyone without a turntable, but this just may be the blown out space psych doom kraut jam of the year!!
MPEG Stream: "Static One (Excerpt)"
MPEG Stream: "Static Two (Excerpt)"

BAILEY, BANKS Vibrations From The Holocene (Quiet World) cd-r 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Having contributed to a very nice collaborative drone record with Darren Tate and Ian Holloway about a year ago, Banks Bailey presents a solo offering of field recordings that mostly focus on the desert environs of his native Arizona. On this album, Bailey proves to be a very patient phonographer, as his recordings reveal a considered approach to choosing the sites to record and then waiting for those environments to erupt with sound. Anybody who has listened to Chris Watson's impeccable recordings and thought, "hmmm, I could do this too." has no doubt suffered from the frustration that such a task is far from easy. We'll be honest in saying that Bailey's aren't quite as good as Watson's (seriously, he's the best for a reason!), but don't take that as a swipe against Bailey's richly detailed sounds.
The first two tracks originate in Ohio, with the first investigating the delirious sounds of tree frogs and cicadas crosshatching their sustained buzzings into a wonderful humid ambience from a summertime bog. The second recording contains some of the only industrial and manmade sounds in the recording, as Bailey wanders through downtown Springfield, Ohio where the only sounds can be heard from incoming trains with bellowing steam whistles and rumbling motors. The remainder of the recordings were culled from various excursions into the Arizona wilderness, where the diversity of birdlife is plainly evident. Tweets, trills, and whistles emanate from one bird (which may be something as common as a sparrow, but we can't tell you what it is) whom Bailey has recorded while the bird was perched above a trickling stream. Later on, Bailey documents a very melodious and quite loud bird (again, no telling which one), whose song is reflected with a slight natural echo from the environment. A windstorm through a canyon seems to annoy a red-tailed hawk (now, we can get that one!), who screeches into the wind. Each of the tracks clock in about 8-10 minutes, and provide lots of details of the environment. Exactly what we want in our field recordings, in a micro-edition of 75 copies!
MPEG Stream: "Cedar Bog"
MPEG Stream: "Reservation Lake"
MPEG Stream: "Soldier Canyon"

BAILEY, BANKS / DARREN TATE / IAN HOLLOWAY Summerland (Fungal / Quiet World) cd-r 13.98
We sold out of this pretty quick when we first listed it, but we managed to get a handful of copies (maybe the last?) direct from Mr. Bailey. So here's what we had to say about it when we first listed it not too long ago...
We're not all that sure who Banks Bailey or Ian Holloway are, but Darren Tate has long proved to be a reliable source for long-form dronemusik thanks to his previous collaboration with Andrew Chalk as Ora and his ongoing work with Colin Potter in Monos. Not to mention the multitude of self-released cd-rs under his own name. Tate's aesthetic for sculpted drones through field recordings, pedal manipulation, and occluded processing is central to Summerland, as it has been noted that Tate proved the treated guitar drones with Bailey contributing some of the field recordings and Holloway reconfiguring everything at the end. Thick shadowy tones hover ominously alongside fluctuations of tactile crackle, sounding more like some of the earlier Ora recordings than anything that Tate has produced recently. Elsewhere, tin-strung guitars splutter with atonal resonance, which stretch, elongate, and blur into drifting dark ambience.
Summerland is a limited production. There are only 150 copies of these in existence, and Summerland is already out of print at the two labels who released this.
MPEG Stream: "Summerland 1"
MPEG Stream: "Summerland 3"
MPEG Stream: "Summerland 4"

BAILEY, DEREK Ballads (Tzadik) cd 15.98
John Zorn's Tzadik label presents legendary (notorious?) British guitar improviser Derek Bailey playing, like the title says, a set of classic ballads (recorded at the behest of Zorn himself). No, he's not taking the piss: these really are jazz standards from Bailey's youth, done in his certainly un-standard (but respectful) style, melding free improv with these sentimental melodies. He's applied his chaotic, spidery string manipulation to drum and bass, so why not Hoagy Carmichael? And if you think, like our Andee does, that Derek Bailey doesn't really know how to play the guitar, this might (might) change your mind. Bailey's stark, atonal takes on stuff like "My Melancholy Baby", "Georgia On My Mind" and "Body and Soul" creates a unique mood for sure. With liner notes by Marc Ribot.
RealAudio clip: "Laura"

BAILEY, DEREK Carpal Tunnel (Tzadik) cd 15.98
Here's the third solo Derek Bailey album released by big Bailey fan John Zorn's Tzadik label, and as the title sadly suggests, this disc is in part a document of the legendary (and now rather elderly) British free improv guitarist's bout with the painful condition that's the bane of office workers everywhere. Bailey didn't get it from too much mousing and keyboarding of course, it's the fretboard that did it to him. And that's no laughing matter, a guitarist suffering from carpal tunnel syndrome -- yet somehow you can imagine that if any guitarist could persevere through a crippling hand/wrist ailment, Bailey could. In fact, due to his usually rather abstract and atonal sound, some might (unfairly) say that we'd never notice... Certainly, despite the carpal tunnel, these tracks are full of all the stark, scrabbling, skeletal beauty that Bailey fans appreciate in his work. Ringing, scraping sounds with occasional alarming jumps in volume that threaten to feed back. Should we imagine gentle cries of pain?
The first track, "Explanation & Thanks", features Bailey's voice as well as his precariously plucked guitar. He's not singing, but rather speaking, in a very personal tone as if to some friends (who may have been present?). It's kinda nice, really, the feeling of his warm and halting talking perhaps influencing how you'll hear his guitar playing on this and subsequent tracks, full of human personality rather than being the alienating skronk for which some might mistake it.
MPEG Stream: "Explanation & Thanks"
MPEG Stream: "After 7 Weeks"

BAILEY, DEREK Guitar, Drums 'n' Bass (Avant) cd 19.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Back in stock and at a much more reasonable price thanks to the new domestic distribution of Zorn's Japanese Avant label... Again, this is the critically-disputed love-it-or-hate-it record featuring British guitar improv legend Bailey "dueting" with DJ Ninj (who some might recall contributed the beats to Buckethead's jungle disc). Probably -- heck, definitely -- a record that will appeal much more to Bailey fans than jungle buffs.

BAILEY, DEREK Improvisation (Ampersand) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Recording from 1975 originally issued in Italy of 14 short (each under five minutes) solo improvisations by Bailey. At the request of the artist, no historical liner notes have been included - instead there are four nice photos of Derek eating an apple. Ooh, now there's a selling point!

BAILEY, DEREK Pieces For Guitar (Tzadik) cd 16.98
Earliest ever recordings of legendary British free improv guitar dude Derek Bailey playing solo, circa '66/'67. Those who only know (and love or hate) Bailey for his later, freely improvised, spidery abstractions will find that these unreleased (until now) private practice tapes reveal more melodic, composed moods to Bailey's playing than you might expect, although "sparse" and "difficult" are still terms that would apply here. Really this is primarily of historical interest to Bailey fans, giving a window thru which knowledgeable, interested observers can perhaps see how his musical development at the time incorporated his disciplined jazz-based background, the new, free music of the day, and his obssession with the not-so-free music of Webern (as detailed in Bailey's liner notes). Others may find this interesting as well, as sorta pretty, kinda spooky, lo-fi guitar noodling.
RealAudio clip: "G.E.B."
RealAudio clip: "Improvisation On Guitar Piece No. 2"

BAILEY, DEREK Playbacks (Bingo) cd 12.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Wherein Derek Bailey, the measure by which other improv guitarists strive to equal, plays along to rhythm tracks created by: Henry Kaiser, John Oswald, Casey Rice, Tied and Tickled Trio, Jim O'Rourke, Bundy Brown, John French, Loren Mazzacane Connors, and more. There's been a bit of controversy involving Henry Kaiser, who has sent out a public statement complaining about the music being out of phase or something (he's really unhappy with the way the recording sounds), but Bailey puts the issue to rest with his own statement:
"Although you wouldn't know this, occasionally I play 'live' with DJs or tracks by DJs. I never go direct to the desk or anything else. Nor do I wear earphones. This kind of 'live' situation is what I wanted to replicate in the studio. No direct line, no earphones, a mike on the amp and one on the guitar; one take only on each track. Which is exactly what Toby did for me, to my complete satisfaction. In essence, Playbacks is a live recording, not a studio recording. There are a number of reasons why I do this but the main one is musical. I want a mix of ambient and non-ambient sound. Integration has to be musical NOT technological and obviously so. THE WAY THE RECORD SOUNDS IS THE WAY I WANT IT TO SOUND.
"Let me try and remove any possible ambiguity: The success or otherwise of this record depends almost entirely on the success of the playing. If I thought at the time that this end would have been better served by recording it in the street, I would have done so. These are what is known, in some circles, as artistic decisions. If I made a similar record again, I would do it in exactly the same way."

BAILEY, DEREK & MIN XIAO-FEN Viper (Avant) cd 19.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

BAILEY, DEREK & THE RUINS Tohjinbo (Paratactile) cd 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
East-meets-west in unusual fashion as legendary free guitar improviser Bailey teams up with Min Xiao-Fen and her pipa on the relatively-delicate Viper, then really rips it up in his second meeting with Japanese progcore bass/drums duo Ruins on Tohjinbo, a worthy follow-up to their prior, equally out-there collaboration on Tzadik.

BAILEY, DEREK AND RUINS Saisoro (Tzadik) cd 16.98
Derek Bailey, one of the world's most innovative improvisers, with the Japanese bass-heavy Ruins.

BAILEY, DEREK WITH MIN TANAKA Music and Dance (Revenant) cd 14.98
Improv legend Bailey's live 1980 guitar accompaniment to a "percussive" dance performance. Sparse (with the sound of falling rain figuring prominently on one track) and beautiful. Brought to you by John Fahey's new Revenant label.

BAIM, MATTEAH Death Of The Sun (DiCristina) cd 13.98
We weren't all that familiar with Matteah Baim really, other than the fact that she was one half of the Metallic Falcons, with Cocorosie's Sierra Cassidy. Death Of The Sun is actually not that sonically distant from the Metallic Falcons, however where that group was a sort of prog metallic folk, a patchwork of moody free folk, druggy rock, and lush choral arrangements, Baim's solo record is self described 'new age grunge', and thus much more subdued, intimate and personal. Her voice husky and raspy, sexy and sort of torch-singery, drifting over sparse and dark soundscapes, muted and murky, swirling and gently throbbing, the main melodies pecked out on a reverbed piano, simple but quite stirring. It's hard not to hear Cat Power in the vocals, but the arrangements are not that polished at all, instead, they're hushed and lo-fi, lush in their own homespun way. Imagine a countrified Grouper with Chan Marshall on vocals and you might be getting close. Abstract and dark, minor key and so so lovely.
Plus have a gander at the guests: Devendra Banhart, Jana Hunter, Rob Lowe (Lichens) and a bunch more...
MPEG Stream: "River"
MPEG Stream: "Dark Ship"
MPEG Stream: "Wounded Whale"

BAKER, AIDAN Book of Nods (Beta-Lactam Ring) cd 17.98
Another new Aidan Baker release, another sublime gem. And again, we find ourselves wanting to just review it with a single sentence. "New Aidan Baker. If you are a fan, you will love this. So buy it." But look at the rest of this list. If we had that sort of self control, and if we weren't so inclined to gush, this list would be a whole different beast.
But before we get into it, you might as well take our aborted abbreviated review to heart. If you are a fan, you WILL love this and should probably buy it. So fans can push the buy button and move on. Except for those fans who aren't so sure they need another Baker disc to add to the already-threatening-to-collapse Baker/Nadja cd shelf at home. You all can stick around, along with the folks who might somehow be asking "who the heck is this Aidan Baker guy and what's he all about?" The simple answer just requires a visit to the aQ website, and a quick search on either Aidan Baker or Nadja. There you can read all about it, and listen to almost everything we've carried by him/them. But as with all Baker releases, this one is a bit different, and bears a bit more of a description.
Book Of Nods begins with a 8 minute drift that sounds remarkable like a more subdued Necks jam. Simple piano figure repeated over and over, slowly shifting and changing, but looped and hypnotic and dreamily repetitive. Almost like a much more mellow and muted Lubomyr Melnyk, soft flurries of piano blurred into indistinct streaks, quite lovely. The 18 minute follow up is another sort-of-jazz sprawl, slow smoldering drones, super spare abstract percussion, warm and languid and laid waaaaay back, before the original slow motion drift is subsumed by some Pop Ambient washed out whir, giving the track a strange alien ethereal sheen. Track 3, "Obsession", is like a dubbed out hybrid of Low and Bohren, jazzy slowcore, allowed to slither and crawl, the drums a bit more skittery, some of the melodies effected, and flipped backwards, allowed to swoop and thhhhwp, there are even some fluttering flutes, again, bringing to mind a Necks style jazz jam, but give a bit of an electronic tweaking. The 15 minute closer, is yet another slow burning jazzy slowcore crawl, but here the drums are a bit harder, the mood is much more ominous and foreboding, everything wreathed in deep shimmering drones and distant rumbles, peppered with still more swooping backward beats, steaks of feedback, building to an intense, skittery, skipping coda, sounding a bit like Oval remixing the Necks. Nice.
And thus somehow, yet another Baker disc well worth owning! And not a bad place to start for the newbie, although the sounds here are unlike most of Baker's output.
Beautifully packaged in an oversized fold over textured paper digisleeve, with a dearth of information, just various Asian calligraphic characters. LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!
MPEG Stream: "Love"

BAKER, AIDAN Broken & Remade (Volubilis) cd 12.98
The Aidan Baker / Nadja musical onslaught shows no signs of letting up any time soon, but we're sure as heck not complaining. This week's Record of the Week is the blissy doom of Nadja's Touched, we also have the vinyl reissue of Bodycage, and then we've got this, Broken & Remade, a definite new direction for Baker, who for this disc, used 4 to 8 second samples of live recordings of analog instruments -- guitar, bass, flute, drums, violin, trumpet, and voice -- to construct these moody, almost jazzy soundscapes.
If you're not listening to close it does just sound like some modern jazz band, crawling through a particularly blissy and smokey jam, the Necks for sure come to mind, as does Bohren Und Der Club Of Gore. The drums shuffle, the guitars buzz, the melodies are serpentine and dreamy, the obvious looping is kept to a minimum, at least in the beginning. Imagine the Bad Plus covering Oval or some Fennesz / Necks remix and you might get a rough idea. The second track, is a bit more glitchy and obviously sampled, but it doesn't take Baker long to build a killer groove, turning all of those little sonic fragments into some sort of Spring Heel Jack, Boards Of Canada dreamy almost IDM shuffle. Even at its smoothest and most straight ahead, Baker laces the proceedings with little bits of digital filigree, a kick drum sputtering repeatedly, a simple lick chopped and reassembled into a little burst of stuttery fuzz, a note here or a drum beat there flipped backwards, it all adds subtle bits of weirdness to the proceedings.
Later in the record things get decidedly more aggressive and freaked out, with thick slabs of distorted sound turned into stuttering fuzz drenched drones, chopped into staggered sonic pulses over drifting mariachi trumpet. Intense post rock workouts gradually become more and more dense until they are dizzying squalls of skittering drums and tangled guitar melodies. Pretty far out, but the songs never become unhinged, this is not any kind of Shitmat style mashup, this is a lot more subtle than that, some seriously deft composition, creating an immensely appealing alien post rock jazz, unlike anything we've heard before.
While Baker fans and Nadja obsessives will NEED this, folks into Boards Of Canada, Spring Heel Jack, Bohren, the Necks, the Bad Plus, and even stuff like Portishead and other late night groove merchants might really dig this as well.
MPEG Stream: "Debra Modern Ken"
MPEG Stream: "Ab Mad Kern One Te"

BAKER, AIDAN Exoskeleton Heart (Crucial Bliss) cd-r 8.98
Another in the recent trilogy of new releases (along with Light Of Shipwreck and Luasa Raelon reviewed elsewhere on this list) from one of our favorite labels, Crucial Bliss, a dronier driftier offshoot of the Crucial Blast label. And as the names should make obvious, the stuff on Crucial Blast -blasts-, and the stuff on Crucial Bliss, is, wellÉ blissed out.
So here we have yet another release from the man who does not sleep. Ever. He couldn't possibly, he must spend every minute of every day and night doing nothing but recording gorgeous spaced out driftscapes (under his own name) and crushing slow motion pummel (as Nadja). This is release number ten in just about a year, and that's not even counting all the microreleases and limited editions that slipped by us completely. But as we've mentioned time and time again, it's all good. Really good. Great in fact. So as folks trying to review all this stuff, we definitely get overwhelmed, but for the listener, who in their right mind would complain about more amazing and mysterious soundsÉ
This new one, is all electric guitar, recorded live, and manages to merge Baker's two sonic sides. The dense and the airy, the heavy and the pretty, the delicate and the intense. Two half hour epics, the first track is a roiling swirl of deep reverberant whirring and soft buzzing, sometimes thickening into an almost SUNNO)))-y wall of sound, but just as often shimmering dreamily, peppered with some super chaotic stretches, where things get really intense, bordering on straight up noise, sounding almost like Total, massive ur-drone, speaker melting white noise, but somehow twisted into something pretty.
The second track is much grittier, the sound more raw and lo-fi, very industrial at the outset, but as the track progresses, strange melodies drift up from below, the sound gets smoother and more washed out, and then somehow, even as it gets prettier and prettier, it also gets heavier, the sound getting louder and more blown out, culminating in a gloriously blurred blast of in-the-red, white hot, blissed out buzz, the aural equivalent of staring into the sun. So nice.
As with all Crucial Bliss releases, the packaging is super swank, an oversized fold over thick cardstock sleeve, full color inside and out, the cd attached to a plastic hub affixed to the sleeve.
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES!!
MPEG Stream: "Interior"
MPEG Stream: "Anterior"

BAKER, AIDAN Figures (Volubilis) cd 12.98
It's tough not to joke about Baker's ridiculously prolific output. Same with Acid Mothers Temple. Every time a new record comes out, we don't really want to mention it at all, but we sort of feel remiss if we don't. It sort of comes with the territory, when you begin averaging a release a month, maybe more. But if you're anything like us, and it seems you pretty much are, then when you decide to love an artist, you want everything they put out. And like you, we've decided to love Aidan Baker, which means not only a million Nadja cds, but a million more released under his own name.
But like Acid Mothers Temple, we've yet to be disappointed, each Baker release is fantastic, similar sounding enough to be recognizable, but varied enough to keep it interesting.
This one is another full band record, the instrumentation is guitar, bass, drums, vocals, flute, violin, with someone credited with remix, but this one is a lot different than most anything we've heard so far from Baker. This is essentially a dreamy indie rock slowcore record, with bits of production fuckery here and there, but for the most part, this is slow, lovely, melancholy, lap steel, shuffling drums, sparse reverbed guitar, and vocals, mumbled indie sad boy vocals, drawled over the lilting dreamy depressive plod. Track three is where the slowcore gets sort of smeared and smudged into more typically Baker fare, a washed out low end shimmer, guitars blurry and indistinct, feedback pulsing and shimmering. The next two tracks are more of the same, that foggy, soft focus dreamlike blur Baker is so adept at. But by track six, we're back to a loping late night wander, circular guitar figure, simple and meditative, simple jazzy drums, barely noticeable bits of woozy ambience, distant smears of high end melody, dour and gorgeously mournful. That track is moments later muted and again spread into a thick blurry abstract, a single deep cavernous drone, rumbling and reverberant, but rife with mumbled melodies and fragmented instrumental shards, barely recognizable in the swirling blackened drift.
The big surprise is the final track, a Codeine worthy slowcore crawl, this time the guitars are heavier, electric, the vocals doused in reverb and drifting ghostlike over the dirge, always threatening to explode in a burst of Nadja like metallic bliss, but never quite getting there, instead opting for soaring sublimated drama, tangled high end psychedelic melodies over a constantly shifting swirl of fuzzy guitars and buzzing ambience, and that steady simple drumming, sounding like some long lost live fuzzy and blissy Galaxie 500 jam...
MPEG Stream: "Figures"
MPEG Stream: "Figure One"

BAKER, AIDAN Fragile Moments In Slow Motion (Universal Tongue) 3"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 new Aidan Baker, this one a brief 20 minute solo guitar piece, part of series of gorgeously packaged and super limited 3"cd releases on the Universal Tongue label (we got a handful of the Gnaw Their Tongues release, not enough to list, but if you want one, just ask, they probably won't last long).
Here Baker takes his electric guitar and transforms it into a soft noise generator, unleashing tranquil swells of deep dark resonant rumbles, layered and whispering softly at each other, like dangling your toes in some black sea, the soft sonics lapping at your feet. Near the halfway mark, the indistinct blurs coalesce into distinct pulses, throbbing softly in a swirl of distant buzz and dark whir, eventually spreading out again into a sprawling mass of thick viscous shimmer. Not sure what else to say. As always gorgeous and dreamy, Baker and Nadja fans will NEED this, drone obsessives will dig big time. But of course, we only got a handful, so these will no doubt be gone in a flash.
Packaged in a mini 3" dvd-style case, with full color artwork, and pressed on a black cd-r. LIMITED TO 101 COPIES!!!
MPEG Stream: "Fragile Moments In Slow Motion (excerpt 1)"
MPEG Stream: "Fragile Moments In Slow Motion (excerpt 2)"

BAKER, AIDAN Gathering Blue (Equation) 2lp 30.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
It's been a (little) while since we've had some brand new Aidan Baker / Nadja for the store, thankfully this week heralds two new releases. To be reviewed next time, there's long awaited Nadja all-covers disc (which we'll tell you right now is great), and then there's this, a brand new, limited double lp from Baker solo, and as always it's a doozy, sprawling and shimmery and expansive, that sort of blissed out ambient dronemusic he does so well. But it's far from more of the same. The first track we threw on was almost jungle, with skittery beats buried beneath softly undulating layers of warm whir and deep drifts of soft swirling sound. There's also a bit of Spacemen 3 like processed psych guitar, which gives way to some buzzing raga like blur, draped over still more dreamlike dronescapes, although here, it's laced with chunks of processed alien crunch, and weird little bits of scrape and fragmented riffage.
Long stretches of underwater Oval-like wooziness, shot through with streaks of space-y effects and muted bits of glitch and buzz, some of the most washed out and wondrous space (not quite) rock ever! Warped warbly organs are stretched and smeared into warped Philip Jeck like doomy drifts, one of which is apparently a cover of Joy Division's "Twenty Four Hours", although we could only tell by the vocals, and even then, they're so hushed and barely there, that any sense of the original seems to melt into a gorgeously oozing expanse of thrum and shimmer and softly warped rumble.
Another fantastic and gorgeous and of course WAY too limited chunk of droney dreaminess from Mr. Baker. Released on the always amazing Equation Records, who really go all out with the packaging as well. Thick swirled/splattered blue vinyl, thick full color gatefold jacket, and a printed full color postcard, each of which is hand numbered, LIMITED TO 444 COPIES! Just 2 left!!!

BAKER, AIDAN Green & Cold (Gears Of Sand) cd-r 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Aidan Baker is back, still vying for the most prolific man in show business award (well, at least underground, free drone show business) with a double shot of washed out dreamy droniness. There's the latest from Nadja, reflecting his more metal side, and then there's this, the follow up to last year's Pendulum, which was a fantastic slab of glistening disembodied dronemusic. Green & Gold follows suit but with an interesting twist. Vocals. Lots of 'em. Baker is no stranger to singing, his whispery croon has graced more than a few of his releases, but on G & C, the vocals are a big part of the songs, and the songs are actual songs, with drums, and verses and choruses and everything. Well, sort of.
Some tracks, like the untitled opener, are indeed still just wispy slow shifting expanses of fuzzy dreamlike sound, which we can NEVER get enough of, but others, like "Chainsaw", are actual lowercase, slow motion, dark and dolorous slowcore pop songs. Simple murky guitar riffs, wreathed of course in all manner of reverb and soft focus fuzz, hovering over stripped down shuffling rhythms, while Baker croons softly over the top, a hushed almost whisper, sounding not entirely unlike Iron & Wine's Sam Beam actually. Even the music sounds a little like a blissier tarpit version of Iron & Wine. There is some definite twang there, subtle, but it's there, nestled amidst the delicate folky strum and the glistening sonic glimmer. Imagine an even more somnambulant Low, or Spacemen 3 at 16 rpm, a ultra druggy (druggier?) Galaxie 500, each track a pop song mumbled and murky, a moonlit crawl through a hazy landscape of shuffle and shimmer, of strum and twang, all wrapped up in soft swirls of shimmer.
Essential for fans of all things Jeck and Tim Hecker and Jasper TX and Machinefabriek and Grouper and Troum and Main and the like, but also worth a listen for more adventurous fans of Iron & Wine, Spacemen 3, Galaxie 500, Low and other slowcore drugrock dreaminess...
MPEG Stream: "---"
MPEG Stream: "Chainsaw"
MPEG Stream: "Merge"

BAKER, AIDAN Green and Cold (Beta-Lactam Ring) cd 22.00
One of our favorite Baker discs, out of print on cd-r, now repressed as a proper cd and available again, and of course packaged in one of those fancy Beta-Lactam sleeves. Plus weirdly, it's LIMITED TO ONLY 300 COPIES!! Here's what we had to say about the disc first time around:
Aidan Baker is back, still vying for the most prolific man in show business award (well, at least underground, free drone show business) with a double shot of washed out dreamy droniness. There's the latest from Nadja, reflecting his more metal side, and then there's this, the follow up to last year's Pendulum, which was a fantastic slab of glistening disembodied dronemusic. Green & Gold follows suit but with an interesting twist. Vocals. Lots of 'em. Baker is no stranger to singing, his whispery croon has graced more than a few of his releases, but on G & C, the vocals are a big part of the songs, and the songs are actual songs, with drums, and verses and choruses and everything. Well, sort of.
Some tracks, like the untitled opener, are indeed still just wispy slow shifting expanses of fuzzy dreamlike sound, which we can NEVER get enough of, but others, like "Chainsaw", are actual lowercase, slow motion, dark and dolorous slowcore pop songs. Simple murky guitar riffs, wreathed of course in all manner of reverb and soft focus fuzz, hovering over stripped down shuffling rhythms, while Baker croons softly over the top, a hushed almost whisper, sounding not entirely unlike Iron & Wine's Sam Beam actually. Even the music sounds a little like a blissier tarpit version of Iron & Wine. There is some definite twang there, subtle, but it's there, nestled amidst the delicate folky strum and the glistening sonic glimmer. Imagine an even more somnambulant Low, or Spacemen 3 at 16 rpm, a ultra druggy (druggier?) Galaxie 500, each track a pop song mumbled and murky, a moonlit crawl through a hazy landscape of shuffle and shimmer, of strum and twang, all wrapped up in soft swirls of shimmer.
Essential for fans of all things Jeck and Tim Hecker and Jasper TX and Machinefabriek and Grouper and Troum and Main and the like, but also worth a listen for more adventurous fans of Iron & Wine, Spacemen 3, Galaxie 500, Low and other slowcore drugrock dreaminess...
MPEG Stream: "---"
MPEG Stream: "Chainsaw"
MPEG Stream: "Merge"

BAKER, AIDAN I Fall Into You (Basses Frequences) cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We're not sure how it happens really. We were joking in our review of the Nadja elsewhere on this list, that it wouldn't be an aQ list without a new Nadja. Then suddenly, we get an old Aidan Baker disc, one of our faves, reissued, then moments later, the mailman drops off another Baker disc, another reissue! So maybe we should alter our statement a bit, and say that it wouldn't be an aQ list without three or four discs by Baker/Nadja. Phew.Ê
We are really running out of things to say about Baker and Nadja. We definitely need someone to send us a new Nadja thesaurus. We do tend to like most everything he does. Baker has perfected a sound that definitely hits the spot, a dreamy dark droney one on his solo records, a blown out shoegazey metal one on Nadja discs. This disc originally came out as a cd-r on Public Eyesore way back in 2002, and is presented here as an actual cd, limited to 500 copies. And it's a good one.Ê
Back then there seemed to be a bit less space between the two sides of Baker's sonic personality. The opening and closing tracks here have doomy drums, everything bathed in a washed out woozy, glitchy and crackly, squiggly little effects, like it was some old old recording, moody and swoonsome and haunting, not really heavy, but more dense than most of Baker's more ethereal solo recordings.Ê
Between these sonic bookends, lie 3 tracks, 35 minutes of deep drifting tranquility, muted guitar strum, some distant drones, bits of glitch and hum, a stretch of shuffling jazzy drumming, and weirdly enough, some strange vocal samples.Ê
Obviously if you're a fan, and don't have this, or have the cd-r and want to upgrade, you'll definitely want this. And Baker newbies, this is as good a place to start as any.
MPEG Stream: "Lapse"
MPEG Stream: "Symbiosis"

BAKER, AIDAN I Will Always And Forever Hold You In My Heart And Mind (Small Doses) cd 8.98
Finally available again, now on actual compact disc instead of cd-r!!! Originally released in 2007, here's what we said about this then:
Another slab of blissed out dreaminess from AQ fave Aidan Baker. His umpteenth release this year, every single one of them fantastic. This one, titled like a Damien Hirst piece, I Will Always And Forever Hold You In My Heart And Mind, is one single 50+ minute piece, separated into 12 parts, one for each word of the title, all woven into a single expansive whole.
The opener took us right back to Oval's Diskont 94, a shuffling shimmering underwater swirl, but instead of skipping cds as source material, Baker seems to be using some sort of loping Three Mile Pilot like bass, chopped and looped and smeared over a wash of drawn out synth drones, totally tranquil and dreamlike, but with that bass, lending the track a bit of subtle forward momentum. In fact the whole disc seems to be rooted in the interplay between droning synths and that processed bass. It's a bit krautrocky at times, a little bit Popol Vuh, ambient and abstract but propulsive at the same time. Some of the tracks are more layered, with strange muted bits of percussion, or more distinct melodies (also muted), while others get more and more distorted threatening to crumble to pieces, and still others, remain austere and minimal, throwing a shimmering sonic cloak over the hypnotic circular melodies and slow shifting sonic swells.
What more to say? As always, totally beautiful and completely hypnotic. Another perfect late night soundtrack for spacing out and drifting off...
MPEG Stream: "I"
MPEG Stream: "Will"
MPEG Stream: "Always"

BAKER, AIDAN I Will Always And Forever Hold You In My Heart And Mind (Small Doses) 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.
This super limited cd-r, which went out of print in a flash, is available once again, for a limited time, in slightly less elaborate packaging, but still with the same gorgeous music. Here's our review from when we first listed it:
Another slab of blissed out dreaminess from AQ fave Aidan Baker. His umpteenth release this year, every single one of them fantastic. This one, titled like a Damien Hirst piece, I Will Always And Forever Hold You In My Heart And Mind, is one single 50+ minute piece, separated into 12 parts, one for each word of the title, all woven into a single expansive whole.
The opener took us right back to Oval's Diskont 94, a shuffling shimmering underwater swirl, but instead of skipping cds as source material, Baker seems to be using some sort of loping Three Mile Pilot like bass, chopped and looped and smeared over a wash of drawn out synth drones, totally tranquil and dreamlike, but with that bass, lending the track a bit of subtle forward momentum. In fact the whole disc seems to be rooted in the interplay between droning synths and that processed bass. It's a bit krautrocky at times, a little bit Popol Vuh, ambient and abstract but propulsive at the same time. Some of the tracks are more layered, with strange muted bits of percussion, or more distinct melodies (also muted), while others get more and more distorted threatening to crumble to pieces, and still others, remain austere and minimal, throwing a shimmering sonic cloak over the hypnotic circular melodies and slow shifting sonic swells.
What more to say? As always, totally beautiful and completely hypnotic. Another perfect late night soundtrack for spacing out and drifting off...
MPEG Stream: "I"
MPEG Stream: "Will"
MPEG Stream: "Always"

BAKER, AIDAN I Wish Too, To Be Absorbed (Important) 2cd 15.98
At first we were a little put off by the idea of a double disc Aidan Baker 'greatest hits' collection. As avid readers of the list no doubt have realized, we average close to a new Baker record every two weeks. One a list! So collecting random tracks to create yet -another- release seems a bit like overkill. But as we dug deeper, we discovered that these two discs were culled from super rare and long out of print releases, spanning the years 2000 to 2007. So rare in fact that even the avid Baker / Nadja obsessives around here didn't recognize 90 percent of the releases these tracks came from. Which ultimately means that I Wish Too is essentially a whole new record, which is perfectly fine with us. The tracks are quite varied, seeing as they span almost a decade, and include vastly different instrumentation, and varying lineups, but it's all pretty great, from the delicate drift of "Element #1", not all that far removed from the Aidan Baker dreamdronedrift we know and love, to the lilting post rock chamber music of "K", with real drums, cello and violin, a dramatic Godspeed / Rachel's sort of meander, that is quite lovely, to the rumbling subterranean low end sprawl of "Merge", a deep shimmery drift that is draped with ethereal falsetto vocals, to the tribal ambience of "Calibrate" which sound a bit like a murkier Muslimgauze or a super stripped down, much dronier African Head Charge. And there's more, lots more. A glimpse at every sonic side of Baker: huge slow moving industrial whirs and glimmering abstract shimmer, stuttering looped soundscapes that sound like alien filed recordings mixed with minimal Raster-Noton jams, warm, washed out slow jam trip hop, with skittery beats over deep low end swells, and stretched out jazzy dirgescapes, shuffling drums, and muted trumpet, soft focus piano, all locked into ever expanding loops like a more abstract Necks. And that's just disc one. Just one disc! The second disc collects a whole 'nother hour+ of drones and drifts and loping meander and whirring shimmer, a pretty serious retrospective for sure.
Needless to say, Baker fanatics, even the most obsessive, will probably not have all this stuff, and newbies will definitely have lots to dig in to and discover. So once again, if your already overloaded Baker / Nadja shelf can handle the additional strain, RECOMMENDED!
MPEG Stream: "Element #1"
MPEG Stream: "Reversion"
MPEG Stream: "Summer Chill"

BAKER, AIDAN Letters (Basses Frequences) lp 12.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
**SALE **SALE* *SALE**
Originally released as a cd-r in 2002, so limited we never managed to get ANY at all. So for lots of Baker fans, this will probably be your first chance to wrap your ears around Letters.
Really hard to know what to say about Baker anymore. He definitely has a sound, unlike his dirgier more metallic blissed out doom duo Nadja, his solo stuff tends toward the super minimal, the dark and droney and drifty, the hushed and shimmery, and Letters is no different. But within that somewhat well defined sound, there is in fact much variation, subtle as it may be.
On Letters, Baker offers up soft billows of sound, which are wrapped around a hushed vocals, more of a murmur actually, but instead of a drone record, it transforms the sound into some super minimal slowcore, the pop element sublimated to almost non existence, the vocal melody being the only thing keeping the track from sprawling out into abstract smears and blurs (not that we mind that either mind you). The instrumentation is simple, just guitars and cymbals, but deftly processed into something deep and sonorous, and surprisingly melodic. Streaks of high end drift in and out (guitar or falsetto vocal, it's hard to say), as the record drifts dreamily. The sound does change dramatically here and there, deep overlapping low end tones, soft squalls of spaced out effects, glimmering streaks of washed out doomic blur, stretches of almost symphonic shimmer, the guitars transformed into hushed string sections, but it all resolves in an extended outro of soft deep swells. As always, absolutely lovely.
LIMITED TO 400 COPIES!!!!

BAKER, AIDAN Liminoid / Lifeforms (Alien8 Recordings) cd 15.98
The latest from the always impressive, and always prolific Aidan Baker, who creates thick wall of sound doomgaze in the duo Nadja, and much more personal, hushed drone music under his own name, but more and more has been expanding his scope with various collaborations and large ensembles. This might be the biggest ensemble he's worked with, 8 players, all contributing vocals, three guitars, two drummers, violin and two cellos. And it does sound like what you might imagine, a sort of Aidan Baker drone record / chamber music hybrid, long languid tones, plenty of cymbal shimmer, the strings moan and sing, the sounds ebb and flow, swelling ominously, building to swirling crescendos, before slipping back into something more minimal and contemplative, "Liminoid" is split into 4 movements, and is about as close to classical music as Baker has come, at least in the first part, the second part shifts gears dramatically, transforming into something more jazzy and propulsive, a sort of krautrock thing, but with a jazzy slow shifting Necks vibe, eventually building to a dense tribal workout, before slipping into part 3, all shimmery blissy drift, soft focus and sun dappled, the drums an understated slowcore shuffle, leading up to the 15 minute final movement, where the vocalists team up for a haunting bit of choral drama, which explodes into full on free jazz freakout wall of sound, finishing off with a long form spaced out drone jam, that definitely reminds us of a super stripped down White Hills, psychedelic and washed out and very hypnotic.
The second piece, the nearly 30 minute "Lifeforms" is a smaller ensemble, Baker on guitar, with violin, cello and 'amplified metal works', the metal works had us expecting something clangy and bombastic, but instead, it's almost all warm whirling ambient shimmer, much more in keeping with Baker's solo sounds, near the end, the sounds shift, and the strings move to the fore, weaving dramatic melodies over the slow burning drone underneath, the result very cinematic. Quite nice.
MPEG Stream: "Liminoid 1"
MPEG Stream: "Liminoid 2"
MPEG Stream: "Lifeforms"

BAKER, AIDAN Live From The Rotunda (Philadelphia, PA, February 2007) (Gears Of Sand) cd-r 12.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Not one, but TWO new Aidan Baker releases this time around, the reissue of Nadja's out of print cd-r Bliss Torn From Emptiness, and this, an ultra limited live document, of Baker performing in Philadelphia in February of 2007.
A gorgeous set of deep dark ambient drones, minimal, ghostly, haunting, slow building, but never really reaching resolution, instead building all sorts of glorious tension, then slowly fading out again. The opener, is a slowly swirling sea of deep dark tones, almost bell like, but spread out into lugubrious melodies, softly pulsing and gently drifting. The middle two tracks are much less bass heavy, instead offering up hisses and whirs, the creepy exhalations of some old abandoned industrial wasteland, notes and tones and chimes, slowly making their way up from the abyss, through the hazy, gauzey atmosphere, indistinct and blurred, but gradually taking shape, and assembling themselves into almost-melodies.
The final and longest track, begins super spare, long tones, and single notes let loose in an expanse of soft shimmer and lots and lots of space, like someone playing a guitar, in slow motion, miles away, the sounds taking forever to reach the speakers, and once they do, they've degraded and changed, merely shadows of the original sounds they once were. But the track explodes near the end into a glorious polyphonic sonic sunburst, streaks of high end skree shot skyward, the crowd bathed in the white glow of this pulsing, organic, slowly expanding sound. And with all live shows like this, the smattering of applause at the end is so surprising, like there were only maybe 20 people there (which there probably were) as the sound is so massive, it's hard not to imagine that Baker wasn't in some huge cathedral, behind a massive bank of lights and soundmakers, instead of hunched over his gear in some dingy little club.
Recorded by Scott Slimm, who runs the aRCHIVE label (as well as recording many of the live aRCHIVE releases), and gorgeously packaged in an elaborate fold over origami style cardstock sleeve, silkscreened, each one hand numbered, with a full color insert, and of course... LIMITED TO ONLY 100 COPIES!!!
MPEG Stream: "One"
MPEG Stream: "Two"

BAKER, AIDAN Lost In A Rat Maze (Consouling Sounds) cd 14.98
Latest from musical polymath Aidan Baker, and by now, long time readers of the aQ list should be well aware of the scope of Baker's musical vision, solo, it ranges from deep drones to shimmery abstract jazz to hushed minimal ambience, and of course in his duo Nadja, the sound shifts from crushing slo-mo dreamgaze doom to lumbering metallic crush, with plenty of forays into more abstract minimalism. From what we'd read about this record, supposedly it found Baker expanding his seemingly boundary-free sound once again, by trying his hand at a sort of post rock, or more specifically, harnessing his incredible soundscaping skills into a slightly more song based form.
There does seem to be a bit more structure, but really, it's only a bit, the songs here drift and shimmer, sprawl and drift, most anchored by a minimal skeletal rhythm, but even then, the sound isn't rhythmic as much as atmospheric. The rhythm exists more as a pulse, adding to the texture more than the propulsion, at its MOST rhythmic, it adds a sort of looped mesmer, regardless, it seems that Baker can do no wrong, cuz this is a gorgeous chunk of ethereal drift.
The opening prelude is a lush, gauzy bit of piano flecked Jeck-like thrum, a warm, whirling soft focus abstract ballad, and it's yet another number that we would have been perfectly happy to see fill up the whole rest of the cd, but it is titled "Prelude" for a reason, and introduces us to the gorgeous soundworld that is Lost In The Rat Maze. We kind of expected the record to launch into something much more rocking, especially with all the talk of 'post rock', but instead, the title track unfurls dreamily like some Philip Jeck / Necks mash up, minimal and cyclical, the rhythm here more skittery and WAY abstract, wordless vocals drifting in the cloudy fuzzy mix, a definite looped feel too, the sound lush and layered, a little jazzy, but more than anything mesmerizingly dreamlike, even when guitars (recognizable ones at least) come in, they simple hover and shimmer, and add another layer of sound. And this track too, like the rest of them, could easily have been stretched out into their very own full lengths. In fact, there may not be better praise for this record than just that, the fact that this almost sounds like a collection of edits, it's not hard at all to imagine each of these tracks being their own fully contained album, but here, they're all woven into a single songsuite, the songs bleeding into one another, following an ethereal dreammusic arc, the sound shifting ever so subtly from hushed shimmer, to soft rhythmic churn and back again, all the while bathed in a haze of warm sonic hum, which gives the whole record that sort of washed out otherworldly sound we can't seem to ever get enough of. Feels foolish to proclaim every new Baker record our favorite, but we're digging this one about as much as his recent Still Life, which is saying A LOT.
MPEG Stream: "Lost In A Rat Maze"
MPEG Stream: "Fanciful Flights"
MPEG Stream: "I Can't Stand"

BAKER, AIDAN Noise Of Silence (Essence Music) cd 14.98
We sold out of the pre-ordered super deluxe boxset version of the latest full length from dronescaper Aidan Baker, but fear not, for those of you who didn't want to shell out $52 for that deluxe edition, we've got this, the standard version, still quite swank, a deluxe black, blue and silver metallic, 6 panel digipak style sleeve, with the same amazing music at a much nicer price...
By now, long time readers of the aQ list know how much we dig Aidan Baker and all his various projects, and it seems that you all do too, based on how many of his records we sell. The sad thing is that so many of his most amazing records were released as super limited cd-r's, often so limited that we were never able to get any for the shop at all. Such was the case with 2007's Noise Of Silence. Originally released on Hyperblasted, the amazing Essence Music in Brazil has now stepped in to make this dark droney gem available again...
So what's the big deal about Noise Of Silence? Needless to say at this point, it's doozy, a gorgeous, haunting, 50 minute abstract drone/drift, super cinematic, rife with dark chordal swells, layered shimmer, mysterious disembodied voices, a strange bit of processed sibilance, that could be the vocals processed, but instead becomes weird little shards of soft focus white noise peppering the hushed soundscape, almost like the sonic equivalent of white caps on a blackened sea. It doesn't take long for the track to blossom into something far from tranquil and drifty, the sound growing more agitated, the vibe more noisy, the atmosphere more dense, the voices more strident, a swirling cacophony, that manages to build to an almost white noise squall, but even them the edges are smoothed out, and the sound, while harsh and heavy, still manages to be darkly droney and weirdly hypnotic, the sounds grinding and crunching, the various tones splintering and crumbling, a heady blown out wildly looped collage that gradually settles into something much more mellow, the last 20 minutes a slowly decaying stretch of ambient dronemusic, the whispery shadows of that cacophony still present, hissing and swirling just below the surface, seriously and surprisingly haunting and demonic Baker, we can definitely imaging this as the score for some experimental foreign horror / art film. Gorgeous stuff for sure, and definitely on the dark side of Baker's sound, one we don't get to hear as much as we'd like. Obviously WAY recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Excerpt"

BAKER, AIDAN Oneiromancer (Die Stadt) cd 25.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
BACK IN STOCK, BUT ONLY THE SINGLE DISC VERSION.
There was a time not too long ago, when Aidan Baker and his various projects (Nadja, Arc) were an underground secret. Loads of super limited releases, a small but loyal following. But that is slowly beginning to change. It was unavoidable really. A quick look at Baker's website reveals the fact that there are over sixty releases, as well as a bunch of compilation appearances. And all of the ones we've heard display a deft hand at dark minimal drones, slow crushing sludge and krautrock flecked psychedelic drift (solo, Nadja and Arc respectively). Often some delirious mix of the three. On Oneiromancer, Baker flies solo, managing a small one man ensemble of electric guitar, bass guitar, tapeloops, piano, percussion, drum machine, vocals all recorded on recorded on 4-track, and woven into rumbling, cavernous dronescapes, filled with all manner of little sonic imperfections, haunting fragments of melody, noisy clatter, and ambient hiss and whir. Each track is a murky musical journey through thick washes of lowercase sound. Whether it's the subaquatic drift of the album's opener, floating weightless through a dark but sun dappled undersea world, or the conversation filled cavern of the second track, voices shimmer and echo, surrounded by soft billowing low end, and haunting footstep like click and thump. The whole record continues in the same vein, exploring lost worlds, at its darkest, Oneiromancer invokes a sense of dread, a feeling of claustrophobia, incorporating elements of industrial noise, processed vocals, creaking groaning metal and thick heavily effected guitar, at its dreamiest, it's a tranquil spacescape of soft shapes and liquid atmospheres, an eyes closed out of body sonic experience. So lovely.
MPEG Stream: "Wake Up"
MPEG Stream: "Death Too Wrapped In Dream"