KOWALSKY, GREGG Tendrils In Vigne (Root Strata) lp 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Latest release from this Bay Area composer, electronic musician and dronologist Gregg Kowalsky. A one sided lp documenting part of his Master's Thesis, which entailed taking one of his electronic compositions, scoring it for a live ensemble and then conducting the performance.
Kowalsky enlisted the Contemporary Performance Ensemble, directed by Fred Frith, who also contributed violin. Recorded in 2005 at Mills college, the result was sublime. A gorgeous organic piece that references Feldman and Part and Melnyk as much as Kowalsky's previous works.
The strings are low and buzz and throb dramatically, the piano is minor key and delicate, fluttering in brief little flurries, streaks of high end run through the swirling moodiness, over the top voices soar in choral fragments, washes of cymbals sizzle, horns moan, all manner of instruments are smeared into a heaving organic whole, shakuhachi, vibraphone, flute, a sonic cloud constantly expanding, intensifying chordal whir, like some moody rock band with the bones pulled out, leaving just a gloriously amorphous sound shape, slithering and drifting, creeping and billowing, building and building, some sort of classic chorale stretched out into a shimmering dreamlike blur. On the surface, it's a dark drift, but beneath the surface, sounds are roiling and churning, a sonic sea of tension and emotion, subtly psychedelic, a gorgeous, organic, orchestral drone.
Packaged in a thick cardstock sleeve, with a Xeroxed yellow paste on cover.
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES!!

KOWLOON WALLED CITY Gambling On The Richter Scale (The Perpetual Motion Machine) cd 8.98
Now on cd! Packaged in super sweet, hand screened origami style sleeves...
More and more every day we miss that brief period in the nineties when rock music was heavy, and noisy, and LOUD. Not necessarily metal, although to some ears it probably sounded like metal. It was more about BIG riffs, lumbering tempos, huge pounding drums, throat shredding vox. Think: Unsane, Halo Of Flies, Today Is The Day, Tad, Killdozer, Tar, Helmet, Lubricated Goat, Karp, Unwound, we could go on and on, but you understand what we're talking about.
There are very few modern bands who can channel the same sort of sonic energy without being retro, and typically, the heavier they are, the more they get lumped in with some metal subsect. But goddamn if there doesn't seem to be a bit of a modern noise rock scene brewing, bands popping up here and there, pushing all those noise rock buttons, and totally hitting the spot.
Which brings us to local boys Kowloon Walled City, whose recent Turk Street ep knocked us on our asses with it's noise rock / doom sludge hybrid. Weirdly enough, with this here debut full length, Gambling On The Richter Scale, the band somehow sound WAY heavier, but at the same time way less metal. Tapping into the rich noise rock history, and creating a disc that's both intense and punishing, melodic and heavy, and yeah, still a bit metallic here and there..
Opener "Annandale" is a churning hook filled noise rock jam, with big guitars, some killer melodies, harsh vox, wild dense drumming, some awesomely soaring high guitar parts, as well as the occasional burst of super melodic almost indie rock, before lurching back into the chug and crush. The sound definitely veers closer to a band like Torche or Floor than Neurosis or Eyehategod.
The second track though totally reminds us of the Unsane, with its roiling distorted bass, looped churning riffage, and weirdly mathy arrangement, some cool dynamics and some stop / starts that definitely had us in math rock heaven. But even here, the band inject some clean guitars, and some downright pretty melody before getting all aggro again.
It's a pretty relentless record, but thankfully KWC mix it up, changing up tempos, letting the drums breath here and there, giving riffs space to ring out and decay once in a while, stretching out into spaced out slowmo ambient drifts, pulling tracks apart into almost groovy sounding doomy dirges, slipping in plenty of subtle pop, heavy hooks galore. The title track is a monster, beginning with some clean guitar strum, minor key and tense, before lurching into a fierce chugging plod, with some Maideny guitar harmonies, plenty of palm muted guitar throb, an impossibly heavy downtuned chorus, and subtle melody mixed in throughout.
The record finishes off with the 6+ minute "More Like The Shit Factory", a sprawling slowjam, the guitars droning out in long streaks, peppered with bursts of downtuned crunch, the drums never really kicking in, the guitars all intertwined and layered, beating against each other, a cloud of swirling overtones, while the vocals howl, the drums sporadically pound, eventually everything dropping out entirely, leaving just a blown out psychedelic dual guitar drone, which crumbles and gradually fades out over the last minute, although. we'd have been perfectly happy had they let those guitars drone endlessly and fill up the rest of the record. Next time maybe.
So yeah, if you're in the market for some heavy, catchy as fuck, NOISE ROCK, okay, maybe call it metal, then Gambling On The Richter Scale is IT, and by the sounds of this record, they probably destroy live. On that same label that that brought us Catalyst, another bad ass noise rock band well worth checking out.
MPEG Stream: "Annandale"
MPEG Stream: "Diabetic Feet"
MPEG Stream: "More Like The Shit Factory"

KOWLOON WALLED CITY Gambling On The Richter Scale (The Perpetual Motion Machine) lp 10.98
More and more every day we miss that brief period in the nineties when rock music was heavy, and noisy, and LOUD. Not necessarily metal, although to some ears it probably sounded like metal. It was more about BIG riffs, lumbering tempos, huge pounding drums, throat shredding vox. Think: Unsane, Halo Of Flies, Today Is The Day, Tad, Killdozer, Tar, Helmet, Lubricated Goat, Karp, Unwound, we could go on and on, but you understand what we're talking about.
There are very few modern bands who can channel the same sort of sonic energy without being retro, and typically, the heavier they are, the more they get lumped in with some metal subsect. But goddamn if there doesn't seem to be a bit of a modern noise rock scene brewing, bands popping up here and there, pushing all those noise rock buttons, and totally hitting the spot.
Which brings us to local boys Kowloon Walled City, whose recent Turk Street ep knocked us on our asses with it's noise rock / doom sludge hybrid. Weirdly enough, with this here debut full length, Gambling On The Richter Scale, the band somehow sound WAY heavier, but at the same time way less metal. Tapping into the rich noise rock history, and creating a disc that's both intense and punishing, melodic and heavy, and yeah, still a bit metallic here and there..
Opener "Annandale" is a churning hook filled noise rock jam, with big guitars, some killer melodies, harsh vox, wild dense drumming, some awesomely soaring high guitar parts, as well as the occasional burst of super melodic almost indie rock, before lurching back into the chug and crush. The sound definitely veers closer to a band like Torche or Floor than Neurosis or Eyehategod.
The second track though totally reminds us of the Unsane, with its roiling distorted bass, looped churning riffage, and weirdly mathy arrangement, some cool dynamics and some stop / starts that definitely had us in math rock heaven. But even here, the band inject some clean guitars, and some downright pretty melody before getting all aggro again.
It's a pretty relentless record, but thankfully KWC mix it up, changing up tempos, letting the drums breath here and there, giving riffs space to ring out and decay once in a while, stretching out into spaced out slowmo ambient drifts, pulling tracks apart into almost groovy sounding doomy dirges, slipping in plenty of subtle pop, heavy hooks galore. The title track is a monster, beginning with some clean guitar strum, minor key and tense, before lurching into a fierce chugging plod, with some Maideny guitar harmonies, plenty of palm muted guitar throb, an impossibly heavy downtuned chorus, and subtle melody mixed in throughout.
The record finishes off with the 6+ minute "More Like The Shit Factory", a sprawling slowjam, the guitars droning out in long streaks, peppered with bursts of downtuned crunch, the drums never really kicking in, the guitars all intertwined and layered, beating against each other, a cloud of swirling overtones, while the vocals howl, the drums sporadically pound, eventually everything dropping out entirely, leaving just a blown out psychedelic dual guitar drone, which crumbles and gradually fades out over the last minute, although. we'd have been perfectly happy had they let those guitars drone endlessly and fill up the rest of the record. Next time maybe.
So yeah, if you're in the market for some heavy, catchy as fuck, NOISE ROCK, okay, maybe call it metal, then Gambling On The Richter Scale is IT, and by the sounds of this record, they probably destroy live. On that same label that that brought us Catalyst, another bad ass noise rock band well worth checking out.

MPEG Stream: "Annandale"
MPEG Stream: "Diabetic Feet"
MPEG Stream: "More Like The Shit Factory"

KOWLOON WALLED CITY Turk Street (Howling Mine / Feast Of Tentacles) 10" 11.98
Finally repressed and available again (on black and red swirled vinyl), the crushing debut from these local heavies, here's our review from when we first listed this way back in 2008:
Pretty much every metalhead in SF went to see Carcass at the Grand Ballroom the other night (in fact, we were joking that a well placed incendiary device could have wiped out the entire scene in one fell swoop). And yeah, of course Carcass destroyed, but the very same night, all the way across town, a band called Kowloon Walled City were faced with the daunting task of laying waste to a room not exactly full of the few metalheads who for whatever reason were not at the Carcass show.
And listening to this, the debut release from this SF foursome, we'd be hard pressed to say that the folks at Carcass, ourselves included, didn't miss out on something serious. Thankfully, unlike Carcass, KWC are a going concern, so we'll get another chance, but until then, get a load of this five song ep, of fierce, furious, crushing heaviness. Think Unsane, old Helmet, the Melvins, Buzzov-en, Neurosis of course, this is some seriously heavy shit. The guitars massive and downtuned, a relentless sea of roiling chug and churn, the drums dense and pounding, the vocals a throat shredding howl. The AmRep vibe is all over these songs, the sound incredibly thick and corrosive, the rhythms alternatingly pounding and lurching, most often settling into a lumbering almost-groove, the melodies buried amidst the crunch and rumble, sometimes surfacing as the band slips into something more dynamic, letting the guitars moan and keen, the drums getting all spacious, sheets of Eyehategod style feedback, a weirdly doomy sort of abstract sludge, before slipping back into a furious grinding metallic crush. Pretty fucking excellent, and definitely has us looking forward to finally seeing what we missed that fateful night.
MPEG Stream: "Another Corporate Takeover"
MPEG Stream: "Turk, Taylor, and Jones"

KOWLOON WALLED CITY / FIGHT AMP / LADDER DEVILS Lose Lose Lose (Brutal Panda) lp 14.98
Killer 3 way vinyl split of extreme heaviness, starting off with SF's own Kowloon Walled City, who by now really have to be one of the best and one of the most criminally under-hyped heavy bands in the city, super brutal and intense, their sound dense and crushing and epic, equal parts modern metal and old school AmRep style noise rock, a hybrid few can pull off as well as these guys, yet outside of a select few, it seems these guys have yet to be discovered by the world at large, but with every record, it seems like they can't remain a secret much longer.
And here they bring the noise (rock) big time, their first track a lurching stop/start mini-epic, the guitars corrosive and downtuned and THICK, driven by some seriously kick ass thumping drum damage, the vocals a frenzied (but still melodic) yowl, the arrangement strange and super dynamic, the whole thing hooky as hell, one of those tracks that had it come out in 1997 as a single it would probably be one of your most treasured 7"s. Their second track is totally different, reigning in that wanton bash and crush for something a bit more low slung and brooding, a weird sort of Neurosis / Killing Joke hybrid, super melodic, dark and moody, but with no shortage of extreme sonic crush.
We had never heard (or heard of) Ladder Devils before, but they're a pretty good match for KWC, they too have a sort of noise rock thing going on, their take a bit more punky and grungy, still hyper rhythmic and heavy as fuck, but way more loose, some awesomely howled vocals, thick syrupy low end, chugging guitars, hooky riffs, both tracks rule, even recorded evoking wild and sweaty live cub destroying chaos. Definitely psyched to hear more.
And finally Jersey metallic post rock sludgelords Fight Amp, who are only now making their first appearance on the aQ site, even though a few of us have been fans for a while. Fight Amp have a sound not all that far removed from folks like Baroness, Kylesa and the like, a sort of Southern sludge via slow brooding Neur-Isis style heaviness, and their two tracks here offer up a seriously heavy heaping helping of just that, churning and thick and epic, a little groovy, WAY downtuned, a little mathy and proggy too, giving it a sort of Voivod feel, albeit quite a bit more crusty and sludgey, but it's a pretty killer combo, and again, a pretty perfect match for both Ladder Devils and Kowloon Walled City...
Killer packaging too, a thick PVC style jacket, hand silkscreened, housing a printed folded sleeve, the back half of the sleeve cut away to reveal the clear vinyl and the printed images beneath it. LIMITED TO 300 COPIES!

KOZELEK, MARK What's Next To The Moon (Badman) cd 14.98
As if the three AC/DC covers on Kozelek's recent "Rock 'n Roll Singer" album weren't enough, this new cd is composed solely of AC/DC songs -- ten of them. The emotional depth that Kozelek imparts to these very serene, meditative versions is remarkable and fun. Does contain the three songs from his previous album, but I believe these are new substantively different takes. Wonderful! Those waiting for the new Red House Painters album (which is finally going to see the light of day this spring) should wait no longer -- this is prime sadcore from one of its inventors.
RealAudio clip: "Up to My Neck in You"
RealAudio clip: "What's Next to the Moon"
RealAudio clip: "You Ain't Got a Hold On Me"

KOZELEK, MARK White Christmas Live (Sub Pop) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Limited to 5000 copies and mainly available only thru web and direct distribution channels, we're pleased to be carrying this live album from Red House Painters' Mark Kozelek. It's got three of the AC/DC covers we love so much, delivered somber-Kozelek-style of course, along with other Red House / Kozelek favorites. If you can believe it, the tone and mood of this album is even MORE intimate than his already-intimate studio recordings. A nice intro to his music, if you're not already familiar with him. Also a nice collectors item for uber fans. He does "White Christmas"!
RealAudio clip: "Evil"
RealAudio clip: "White Christmas"

KRADDY Truth Has No Path (Refiner) cd 10.98
Kraddy's shadowy, sinewy, jagged electronic sounds bring to mind the deeply textured tracks of many late-'90s IDM artists. It's odd, we've not seen many releases of this ilk in some time... many of the artists who were part of the IDM flurry a few years ago (with the exception of the aforementioned Plaid) have fallen silent as of late. That said, one of the notable differences between 'then' and 'now' is Kraddy's surprisingly basic programmed beats, as opposed to the considerably more complex ones of earlier artists. If you've a been seeking a lengthy late night listenin' album filled with prickly shards jutting out of thick droning swells, you're ready to roll!
MPEG Stream: "8 Electrodes"
MPEG Stream: "Looking In Windows"

KRONOS QUARTET Floodplain (Nonesuch) cd 14.98
Legendary San Francisco ensemble tackles grand sounds from around the globe.

KRONOS QUARTET Released 1985-1995 (Nonesuch/Warner Bros) 2cd 15.98
Double cd with previously-released selections from Henryck Gorecki (that's pronounced ~goretsky~, folks) to Arvo Part to Astor Piazzolla to Tigran Tahmizyan. Disc #2 features 4 songs never released before: pieces by Jimi Hendrix, Scott Johnson, Michael Daugherty, and Raymond Scott.

KRUMMENACHER, VICTOR Bittersweet (Magnetic) cd 13.98
Local stalwart Victor Krummenacher delivers another wellcrafted collection of singer songwriter material. With the assistance of musicians such as Dave Alvin, Carla Bozulich (Geraldine Fibbers), Alison Faith Levy, and David Immergluck and Jonathan Segel of Krummenahcer's old band Camper Van Beethoven, Krummenacher writes instantly catchy poignant songs, with the high points being the duets with female vocalists. Check out the title track "Bittersweet" and see if you aren't immediately drawn in. This is high quality music from a talent so steady and mature that he doesn't make any mistakes. Nice.
RealAudio clip: "Bittersweet"

KULZICK, ALFIE Chatterbox: Biography Of A Bar - San Francisco 1986-1990 (Chatterbox) book 16.95
We listed the documentary about the notorious late '80s Valencia Street rock bar, The Chatterbox, a few lists back. Now we have copies of the official book written by vintage Aquarius Records employee, Alfie Kulzick!
SF music scene vets will no doubt fondly recall the days of the Chameleon Lounge bar which was located on Valencia Street a few blocks away from aQ. It was a beer-soaked and black velvet painting festooned underground rock haven through most of the '90s. These days that spot is now occupied by a considerably less gritty and tattered bar called Amnesia. However, you'll score super duper old school cred points if you can remember the venue that predated the Chameleon... The Chatterbox!... even more so if you have some first hand memories of your own! And if you do happen to have some of your own then you're probably in this book, aren't you?
Most of us here at aQ were either still underage back then and/or hadn't made our way to the Bay Area yet. So unfortunately we weren't privy to the club's glory years circa 1986-1990, but we all can now catch a time machine-esque sneak peek via this book. It's packed with plenty of live rawk photos, punk fliers and vivid anecdotes with the likes of Hewhocannotbenamed, Boom (of Boom & The Legion Of Doom), Buck Naked, Ginger Coyote, Blag Dahlia, Gary X Indiana, SF Dogs, Sister Double Happiness, among many many others. Plus amazing photos and stories of touring bands such as the Dwarves, The Mentors, and Nirvana. We spotted friends like Chewy and John from Hammers Of Misfortune in there too (back then, in the band Osgood Slaughter). It makes for a wildly colorful patchwork of recollections (er, though the pics themselves are all black and white)! And it gives equal love to the music acts, the staff and the patrons, conveying the beloved neighborhood bar's strong sense of community, and offering a vivid raw glimpse of the late '80s SF music scene.
The book's layout and content really captures the feel of a well-worn zine from back in the day. Y'know, cut'n'pasted together with love and very rough around the edges, almost like it was assembled in the wee hours at the Kinko's on Market Street (back when it was open 24 hours).
Fuck Yeah!

KUNIN, BEN Acoustic Adventures (Communion) cd 13.98
One guy and his acoustic guitar, conjuring up the spirits of Kottke, Basho, and Fahey. Gentle, mellow, folk-classical guitar explorations, pretty and somewhat melancholy. Kunin's playing, while adept and intricate, is not as out there as what fellow Takoma label nostalgic Steffen Basho Junghans gets up to. All tracks are originals by Kunin except one piece based on a song by Ali Akbar Khan -- Kunin, it turns out, is an expert in Hindustani music theory and teaches the sarod at a school founded by Mr. Khan north of San Francisco. So there's an East-meets-West aspect to this as well. Quite a lovely disc, and sorta Windham Hill-ish (but we really mean that in a good way; after all, George Winston is one of Andee's all-time faves).
RealAudio clip: "Brindavan"

KUNIN, BEN / ANDRES SABOGAL Point Of Departure (self-released) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

KWISP Teriyaki Vest Odyssey (Pinephone) cd 11.98
Attention fans of that '60s experimental psychedelic freakout The Fifty Foot Hose: members of the '90s reunion group have resurfaced with this new entity simply named Kwisp. Walter Funk and Reid Johnston craft sonic DaDa-esque squirreliness composed of squelch-effected vocalizations, a jumble of found sounds and dialogue samples, wheezy horn spasms, analog burblings and masses of custom made instruments. With guests Daevid Allen, Fifty Foot Hose founder Cork Marcheschi, and Mandible Chatter's Grant Miller.
MPEG Stream: "Dragon Titties"
MPEG Stream: "Ether Bunny's Music For The Masses"

L/R When I Lift I Can Feel My Sunburn Singing (Paha Porvari) cd-r 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We're so excited to finally be holding this long in the works release in our grubby little paws. A long term collaboration between Loren Chasse and Ray Guillette, When I Lift I Can Feel My Sunburn Singing was originally intended to be released as a picture disc on tUMULt, but through a series of strange circumstances, the picture disc series was put on hold indefinitely, and the L/R record just sort of languished on a dusty shelf somewhere, which was an absolute shame as this is a beautiful piece of work. Thankfully, the folks at Paha Porvari tracked this record down and decided to give it a proper release. While we sort of wish they had pressed this as a real cd, the cd-r format's transitive nature is perfectly suited to the record's sound and theme.
Culled from a series of field recordings collected at the site of a ruined factory in South San Francisco way back in 1996, When I Lift I Can Feel My Sunburn Singing is the document of several live performances in 1997 and 1998 assembled from those sounds.
L/R explore a world of thick washed out drones, swirling seas of whir, gorgeously shimmery expanses of sun dappled sound, all peppered with crackle and glitch, cavernous windblown soundscapes, haunting metallic chimes and muted percussive events, jagged shards of sound, recontextualized into haunting rhythmic grooves, a constantly shifting soundworld of mystery and magic, alternately jagged and caustic, soothing and dreamlike. Incredible stuff!
Gorgeously packaged in an oversized black on black cardstock sleeve, inside lots of beautiful full color inserts, drawings and etchings and paintings reproduced on super nice paper, as well as two delicate vellum inserts with liner notes and credits.
MPEG Stream: "One"
MPEG Stream: "Two"
MPEG Stream: "Three"

LA REPRODUCTION INTERDITE D'UNE PEINTURE DE CRISE s/t (Kids Eat Free) cd 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
A dark, spartan work of sonic disintegrations and accumulations. At times, very much akin to Village of Savoonga or Godspeed. Metallic abrasions, clouds of hiss and static, field recordings (of birds and airplanes), and short purring loops surface, mingle and dissipate. The two lengthy tracks are punctuated by the occasional appearance of frail A haunting and lovely 24 minutes from the duo of Dorothy Geller and Douglas Wolf, recorded in 1999.
RealAudio clip: "Excerpt 1"

LADY GENIUS s/t (Gold Robot) 10" 7.98
Channeling the orchestral pop sound of many of the Elephant Six bands (Olivia Tremor Control, Neutral Milk Hotel, Apples In Stereo, The Minders) this Bay Area five piece has got some mighty fine pop chops of their own. "Saber Ace" is probably our favorite of the bunch which is so delightfully sweet & sour and benefits from the somewhat lo-fi and dirty recording. They do a really nice job of sprinkling tasteful horns on a few of these tracks. Six sweet songs grace this red vinyl record which also comes with a code for a free download.

LAKE, BAMBI My Glamourous Life As A Broadway Hostess (Bambi Lake) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Perhaps one of the most recognizable figures from the old school SF punk scene -- if you've checked out Jim Jocoy's great photo book We're Desperate, you might've seen a snapshot of her from back in the day! -- Bambi Lake has just released a lounge cabaret-styled album of covers and originals including "Cockettes Remembrances", "The Golden Age Of Hustlers" and "I'm One Of God's Children (Who Hasn't Got Wings)". Recorded live at the Dark Room here in SF.
MPEG Stream: "Cockettes Remembrances"
MPEG Stream: "I'm One Of God's Children (Who Hasn't Got Wings)"

LANNON, NYLES Pressure (Badman) cd 13.98
You might recognize Mr. Nyles Lannon from his time in Bay Area band Film School or as his laptoppin' folktronic alter ego n.lannon. When we'd play Chemical Friends (his 2004 debut album as a solo artist) in the store, it was frequently mistaken for a posthumous Elliott Smith release. Pressure is his second solo album. Far darker and heavier in mood, it will undoubtedly draw comparisons once again to the late singer/songwriter as well as bringing to mind the textured melodic qualities of Grizzly Bear and the sharp songwriting of fellow San Franciscan Kelly Stoltz. Pressure is a really strong album, without a dud in the batch. Subdued, withered and heartrending, but still very dreamy.
MPEG Stream: "Slipping"
MPEG Stream: "Hesitation"

LASCOWIEC Asgard Mysteries (Dark Hidden Productions) cd 8.00
**SALE **SALE* *SALE**
We sold out of these pretty quick, so for those of you who may have missed out, here's another chance...
We've been meaning to review something from this SF duo for a while now, the mysteriously monickered Z.V.H. and V.J.C, who make up the equally mysterious Lascoviec (formerly Angkor Vat). But their demos disappeared before we had the chance, and we've yet to receive the forthcoming split with Hungarian black metal masters Marblebog, but thankfully, Dark Hidden Productions has compiled their first two demos, Gesamkunstwerk and Gunshots Ring Out Over Vinland Streets, both originally released in 2006, onto one cd, and added a few bonus tracks to sweeten the deal.
Lascoviec traffic in droning, hypnotic, trance like black metal buzz, the guitars long washed out streaks, the vocals a distorted croak, often sounding like another layer of static, the melodies are melancholy and sorrowful, some tracks have programmed drums, pounding away machine like under a buzzy blurry blanket of epic majestic chordal whir, others are harsh and chaotic, with the drums lost int he mix, leaving just a thick undulating sheet of acid riffing and tortured vokills. There are plenty of clean guitars, and tranquil folky interludes, but just as many grinding ultra raw blackened dirges, the guitars thick and viscous, the vocals more of a animalistic hiss, the drums a buried throb, here and there dreamy washes of synth surface, but far from being tranquil, they're fuzzy and distorted, and slightly ominous, with a definite Tim Hecker or Philip Jeck vibe. Elsewhere the band craft weird sort of new wave sounding reverbed guitar jam, but still subtly creepy and haunting. Swirls of strings build ominous tension before exploding into super sharp jagged shards of weirdly blown out clean guitar riffing over relentless blastbeats.
And that's sort of what's so amazing about these guys, their sound varies so dramatically, from record to record, but even from song to song, sort of like the EEE stuff, the texture and the production are as critical as the songs and the riff, some are muted and murky and bassy and lo fi, others are sharp and angular, the guitars sonically are all over the place, sometimes soft and subtle, sometimes downtuned and sludgy, sometimes buzzy and brittle, the drums more often than not are buried WAY down in the mix, but that just makes the songs sound freer, as if they could fall apart or drift away at any moment.
Grim and gorgeous, twisted and intense, dramatic and a bit fucked up, long sheets of buzzed out bliss butted up against short sharp raw blasts of true blurred blackness, often getting all tangled up within the same song. What's not to like, this is some seriously amazing shit. Buzzy and black enough for the grimmest of warriors, but tripped out enough for folks into freaky outsider blackness.
Fair warning: Lasoviec are on Dark Hidden Productions, a label with dubious political leanings, and with definite ties to the Pagan Front, the hub for all things NSBM, aka National Socialist Black Metal. Although the band seem to be more concerned with themes cosmic and spiritual, nature and mythology, there are definite racist implications, the link is undeniable, so regardless of the band's stance, the label's is clear, and thus, another instance where the listener has to decide if the music trumps the possible unpleasant politics.
MPEG Stream: "I"
MPEG Stream: "II"
MPEG Stream: "Borghild Darkened"
MPEG Stream: "Outro"

LAST OF THE BLACKSMITHS s/t (self-released) cd 9.98
The hospitable Bay Area country/folk stable grows and grows. There's such an awesome sense of kinship among the artists (think of sorta 'six degrees of Jolie Holland' - yes, she does make an appearance here on viola!). Garrett Pierce and Matt Bauer, the band's pals and terrific singer/songwriters in their own right, brought this in recently on the band's behalf, and we're glad they did. This self-titled, self-released album is quite an impressive debut. The Last Of The Blacksmiths' Americana sound which vacillates between woe begone twang and roots rock groove has much in common with the likes of Jason Molina, Jay Farrar and Will Oldham. Fans of those artists should definitely sit up and take notice.
MPEG Stream: "Knowing Me"
MPEG Stream: "Pushing Down"

LAST OF THE BLACKSMITHS Young Family Song (Vanguard Squad) cd ep 11.98
You might recall The Last Of The Blacksmiths' fine self-titled debut back in 2006. Despite this Bay Area band's name, The Last Of The Blacksmiths prove they're in no danger of extinction. They've stood strong for over two years and now have a sophomore cdep under their belt. If you've a hankering for some slow creeping soulful Americana, Young Family Song is for you. The band's brooding bleary folk-rock melancholia will bring you down in the best possible way. Steeped in hard liquor and salty tears, these are songs of slurred speech and blurred vision that cast a heady spell that linger long after this short ep is over.
MPEG Stream: "Autumn Vacation"
MPEG Stream: "Giving Up"

LATEDUSTER Easy Pieces (Merck) cd 13.98

LATEDUSTER Five Easy Pieces (Firetrunk) cd ep 12.98
Lateduster are a pleasingly lowkey, soothing combo from Minneapolis, and guess what? We've got not one, but two cds by them in stock - this right here is their new five song ep. Neither release veers too far from their path of mellowness, if anything, these newer tracks are a bit more active and at times tread on more solid ground than those that came before. Five Easy Pieces shows Lateduster shifting gears somewhat, trading in the soft washes and sparse twang of their self-titled debut for a more sinewy electric guitar sound and a definite overall jazzy feel. Features members of Fog - Andrew Broder and Martin Dosh.
MPEG Stream: "Shaker/Flicker"
MPEG Stream: "A Gallon Of Hope"

LATEDUSTER s/t (Firetrunk) cd 12.98
One of two Lateduster cds that we have in stock right now! This is officially their full length debut, but it's actually a collection of two new songs and six remastered ones which were originally released on two previous eps. Are we making things more confusing than necessary? Let's make things a bit more straightforward then and say that this Minneapolis trio have made some lovely pastoral soundscapes - soothing lengthy ones that allow you to sink in for a good five to ten minutes. They done so by skillfully blending together drifting waves of spartan lanky guitars, sampled beats, gently grooving bass, shuffling percussion, and electronic hiss and sputter - locking in with each other for a spell, then dispersing into the mist. Features members of Fog - Andrew Broder and Martin Dosh. Very nice!
MPEG Stream: "Leave It On"
MPEG Stream: "Watermelancholy"

LATYRX The Album (Quannum Projects) cd 14.98
This amazing album was originally issued in 1997 but it sounds so incredibly fresh even today -- I readily admit that I didn't recognize its true brilliance until now. Most of the members of the now-famous Solesides crew pitched in on this self-titled debut statement from Latyrx (MCs Lateef and Lyrics Born), including DJ Shadow who produces four stunning tracks, Chief Xcel, and Blackalicious. The two MCs often let their rhymes flow forth right on top of each other, a cool textural effect is produced, as if the production efforts weren't interesting sounding enough -- overall you're hearing Mo'Wax-style groove, smart samples, and advanced apocalyptic scariness that today's El-P and Cannibal Ox have perfected. Recommended!
RealAudio clip: "Latyrx"
RealAudio clip: "Burnt Pride"

LAUDANUM Coronation (20 Buck Spin) cd 10.98
All you really need to know about these Oakland sludge/doom merchants is what is being played, and what bands the various members hail from. So, howabout Graves At Sea, Brainoil and Pig Heart Transplant for a heavy low ended pedigree? And what exactly is employed to create this gloriously grim racket? "Overdriven string corrosion, ambient texture and documentation", "battering ram and subsonic transmissions", "low end frequency discharge, vocal disruption and auditory experimentation" and of course "battery acid, bellows and blasphemy". So yeah, you know where these crushers are coming from. Crushing, punishing doom infused sludge, laced with thick black drones and buzzing abject industrial ambience, all blurred into a massive heaving blackened brutal sonic beast.
Beginning with some sort of alien soundscape, until huge sheets of white noise take over, you're not sure if you hear the sounds of a guitar or maybe just overwhelming electronic wind-like sounds, all strange and buzzing and creepy.
Finally, weird little bits of abstract keyboard buzz and drift before the band kicks in. And WHAM, super heavy and sludgey, like black tar heroin, but also Eyehategod groovy; Khanate vokills that almost exude a black metal vibe. Lots of negative space to make things tense and uncomfortable. A second singer bellows in his best Neurosis voice, the perfect foil for the other more high pitched yowl, all tangled up with a cool, but weirdly sour guitar lick, giving the track a much more twisted vibe.
The record slips from crushing doom, to dense blackened rumble and back again, inserting angelic choral vocals, strange blurred electronics, super intense subsonic feedback, the bass thick and gritty and dirty, the sound here, when the band is rocking, is not at all that far removed from Burning Witch or Zoroaster, but the band pepper their sludgy crush with gorgeous black drone interludes, which makes this more of an EP, only one of epic doom-ic proportions, which renders it an EP that just so happens to stretch out to 50 minutes. Bad ass.
MPEG Stream: "Invoke"
MPEG Stream: "Wooden Horse"
MPEG Stream: "Apotheosis"

LAUDANUM Coronation (Life Is Abuse) lp 19.98
Now on Vinyl!
All you really need to know about these Oakland sludge/doom merchants is what is being played, and what bands the various members hail from. So, how about Graves At Sea, Brainoil and Pig Heart Transplant for a heavy low ended pedigree? And what exactly is employed to create this gloriously grim racket? "Overdriven string corrosion, ambient texture and documentation", "battering ram and subsonic transmissions", "low end frequency discharge, vocal disruption and auditory experimentation" and of course "battery acid, bellows and blasphemy". So yeah, you know where these crushers are coming from. Crushing, punishing doom infused sludge, laced with thick black drones and buzzing abject industrial ambience, all blurred into a massive heaving blackened brutal sonic beast.
Beginning with some sort of alien soundscape, until huge sheets of white noise take over, you're not sure if you hear the sounds of a guitar or maybe just overwhelming electronic wind-like sounds, all strange and buzzing and creepy.
Finally, weird little bits of abstract keyboard buzz and drift before the band kicks in. And WHAM, super heavy and sludgey, like black tar heroin, but also Eyehategod groovy; Khanate vokills that almost exude a black metal vibe. Lots of negative space to make things tense and uncomfortable. A second singer bellows in his best Neurosis voice, the perfect foil for the other more high pitched yowl, all tangled up with a cool, but weirdly sour guitar lick, giving the track a much more twisted vibe.
The record slips from crushing doom, to dense blackened rumble and back again, inserting angelic choral vocals, strange blurred electronics, super intense subsonic feedback, the bass thick and gritty and dirty, the sound here, when the band is rocking, is not at all that far removed from Burning Witch or Zoroaster, but the band pepper their sludgy crush with gorgeous black drone interludes, which makes this more of an EP, only one of epic doom-ic proportions, which renders it an EP that just so happens to stretch out to 50 minutes. Bad ass.
MPEG Stream: "Invoke"
MPEG Stream: "Wooden Horse"
MPEG Stream: "Apotheosis"

LAUGHINGSTOCK Underskin (self-released) cd 11.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
They say (i.e, the band's own reference points): Radiohead, Tindersticks and Nick Drake. We thought: Talk Talk and Chris Isaak. What seems to be the common ground with all of these artists we've singled out is that regardless of genre and instrumentation each has crafted their own deeply emotive and richly evocative music. So what does this say about Laughingstock? Well, that they do indeed have a knack for making sleek dramatic songs. Multi-layered lilting, oft-melancholic male vocals, distant textural sounds (a rainstick perhaps?), atmospheric droning strings, languid chapman stick, acoustic and programmed percussion all come together to make for some ambitious, lushly intricate slightly mysterious songs.
MPEG Stream: "Fast (Strange Euphoria)"
MPEG Stream: "Slow On Fast"

LAZARUS Songs For An Unborn Sun (Temporary Residence Ltd.) cd 14.98
Gorgeous album! Lazarus is Trevor Montgomery (ex-Tarentel), the lanky, gravel-voiced troubadour of sadness who has here laid down some of the most poignant and heartfelt vocal and acoustic guitar tracks ever. And the album would be lovely left at that, but then to make it even better, Trevor asked Marty Anderson from the amazing local group Dilute to embellish the music: the results are quietly stunning. Marty adds his own barely-there creaky treble vocals -- he sounds like a wrinkled crone following creepily on Montgomery's every step (in a good way) -- and tiny dots of electric guitar squiggles. A singer songwriter record with fascinating audible touches that make it both hauntingly bittersweet and yet refreshingly cleansing. Another winner from the Temporary Residence label.
MPEG Stream: "Poets the Liars"
MPEG Stream: "Ocean (Burn the Highways)"

LAZARUS Trickster (St. Ives) lp 13.98
This is not new, but we never listed it before and we've always been fans of Trevor Montgomery's (Tarentel, The Drift, Believer) solo downer folk-blues project Lazarus, and seeing that he had a stash left of these, we jumped at the chance to share this beauty with you.
Trickster from 2009 is the third album from Lazarus and it's just as beautiful and heart-wrenching as the previous ones. Like a folkier Nick Cave, Trevor's baritone gothic blues-tinged croon is more refined but no less weary. Backed by simple lyrical guitar, organ, bells and shimmering electro-acoustic tones, the well-written songs display a despairing majesty that show glimmers of hope and redemption.
Limited to 300 copies on swirly smoke or blood colored vinyl, each cover uniquely hand-painted. Trevor has significantly less than 300 left so we don't know how long these will stick around. Highly Recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Lord I Know Because I Told You To Go Away"
MPEG Stream: "Real Fun"
MPEG Stream: "I Will Let You Live"

LAZER SWORD s/t (Innovative Leisure) cd 15.98
The space-age sounds of Lazer Sword make us here at aQuarius recOrds feel like we are living in the kind of future where everyone has mohawks and wears plastic dresses and there is no light but flashing neon-colored spotlights. But, hey, we've been waiting for this record for what seems like years now, so we ARE living in the future, albeit one (slightly) less Blade Runner-esque. You'd never know that, though from the cover of Lazer Sword's self-titled debut, which looks like something out of Tron, or maybe Voltron (!). Former aQ employee Antaeus Roy and collaborator Bryant Rutledge have given us a record filled with beats and synths that don't so much throwback to as reinvent the '80s by chopping the hell out of them and reassembling the parts. On the surface somewhat akin to Flying Lotus or Zomby (the one with the "y", not the proggier one with the "i"), Lazer Sword's sampling is a bit more frenetic, though, and leans toward hip-hop rather than dub.
After opening the record with three mostly instrumental tracks, Lazer Sword brings in a bit of help from Turf Talk on "I'm Gone." The strange rhythm samples provide a perfect background for the catchy pitch-shifted hook: "Pass me that control / I'm in a fucking zone / I'm on my spaceship / I'm outta here I'm gone!" Just when you think the track is going to stay hot the whole way through, Lazer Sword takes it down a notch and drops the drums, leaving you floating in space for a minute and a half. The four or so tracks where Lazer Sword bring in outside guests (including Myka 9) to do vocals stand out, but not as much as you'd think because of the way LS incorporates sampled vocals into the layers of sound. This is a record that definitely requires either a dancefloor, a blunt, or quite possibly both.
MPEG Stream: "Surf News"
MPEG Stream: "I'm Gone Ft. Turf Talk"
MPEG Stream: "4Loco"

LE REVELATEUR & SABRINA RATTE Fictions (Root Strata) dvd-r 16.98
Now a visually-augmented dvd-r release, this music was originally released on vinyl via the Gneiss Things label, run by Emeralds' Steve Hauschildt (whose solo Kranky debut we reviewed here recently). Fictions is release number two of gorgeous kosmische synth drift from this former member of Godspeed You Black Emperor and Fly Pan Am, whose previous release, a way too limited cassette on Root Strata, had most of the folks here flipping out. Le Revelateur, aka Roger Tellier-Craig, also performed at last year's On Land Festival here in SF, and amidst a pretty incredible lineup, managed, at least as far as many of us were concerned, to steal the show.
And those who did see the show, also got to witness the accompanying visuals, a gorgeous collection of films created by Teller-Craig's partner Sabrina Ratte, whose fantastical prismatic impressionism is the perfect visual accompaniment for Teller-Craig's futuristic kosmische. synthscapery. Let's revisit the music first, as the music here is the same as on the lp:
The three tracks on Fictions plays like a single track, separated into movements, which is appropriate considering in some ways it's a modern reimagining of the classic seventies synth work of Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze and all the rest, and of course, the sounds of Le Revelateur will most definitely appeal to fans of other modern synth retro-revisionists, like Mist, Emeralds, Innercity, Oneohtrix Point Never et all, but there's something about Le Revelateur's sound that manages to elevate it above its sonic brethren, Tellier-Craig so adept at unfurling sounds and gradually building these epic, dreamlike celestial synthscapes, and the thing is, it's not all static tones, and long layered shimmer, no, the synths here are surprisingly active, emitting flurries of notes, glimmering squalls of psychedelic swirl, but those are all woven into these epic expanses of spaced out dreamdrone drift, the first track, an 18 minute epic, spends its first half drifting ethereally, before a pulsing synth rhythm finally surface, adding a bit of propulsion to the mix, and transforming new age shimmer into swirling buzzing pulsating krautdrone bliss, the sound getting downright noisy near the end, the edges sharper and slightly more abrasive, only to then quickly dissipate in a gorgeous blissed out high end raga like coda.
The second track starts off with a whirling starfield of softly swirling notes, a blurry tangle of psychedelic synths, layered and textural, offering up brief flurries of soaring melody, getting darkly proggy and droney about halfway through, only to finish off with an epic sprawl of Sunroof!-like upper register spacekraut raga, before finishing off with the comparatively more muted final track, which begins sounding a bit like the music from some seventies planetarium show, only to blossom into a gorgeously rhythmic stretch of percolating retro synthscapery, a pulsing futuristic soundworld that also builds and builds to a near psychedelic climax, before finally finishing off in a hazy cloud of soft focus synth swirl.
And Ratte's visuals, as mentioned above, could almost be described in the same way, the images and colors and moving shapes, are almost musical, flickering and slowly shifting, with rainbow solar flares, and vintage video game grids, mysterious shapes and flashing colors, it's like equal parts video game and fever dream, some of it looks like a James Ferraro album cover come to life, bold and bright colors and shapes, all retro VHS / late night cable psychedelia, a head spinning, mind melting feast for the (third?) eyes. Gorgeous, sonically AND visually.
LIMITED TO 100 COPIES, comes in a slim dvd style case, with full color art inside and out, as well as a printed clear plastic insert.
MPEG Stream: "Receiving Mirages"
MPEG Stream: "Age Maze"

LEDESMA, J.C. Voice Sutra (Root Strata) 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.
You may not recognize the name J.C. Ledesma. But how about the name Jefre Cantu Ledesma? Ring any bells now? Okay, well how about the name the-guy-from-Tarentel? Okay, now we're getting somewhere. J.C. Ledesma is indeed on half of the core duo that drives ambient space rock experimentalists Tarentel, and on this, his first record under this name (not his first solo record however), as well as the first record on his very own label Root Strata, Ledesma takes the ambience of his main outfit and stretches it out even further, creating "Voice Sutra" a half hour long, slowly building drone piece constructed from vocals, shruti box, percussion and electronics. A dreamy and tranquil, but still think and fuzzy, slowly shifting soundscape that spends the first fifteen minutes writhing and squirming like a downed electrical wire, buzzing with electronic fuzz and spitting sonic sparks, emitting a thick wash of sonic skree not unlike Total, eventually calming down into a more tranquil ambience, shimmering and simmering and slowly fading to black. Quite nice. Droneheads obviously need this. Packaged in hand screened cardboard sleeves, and VERY LIMITED (we have the last 20 or so copies)!
MPEG Stream: "Voice Sutra"

LEDESMA, J.C. / PAUL CLIPSON Constellations Of Spring (Root Strata) dvd-r 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Just a brief word about this one as it was limited to 50 copies, is already out of print, and we only have about 10 copies left. The second in a series, Tarentel's Jefre Cantu Ledesma joins up with filmmaker Paul Clipson, to drift dreamlike through a dense visual latticework of plants, chainlink fences, branches, leaves, stoplights, neon signs, a delirious series of slow motion visual tangles and patterns. A bug's eye view of the world mysterious and wonderful, like cutting room floor super-8 plant studies and urban landscapes woven into soft focus home movies. All set to the warm glow of Ledesma's swelling dronescapes. So gorgeous.
Packaged in a lovely folded vellum sleeve printed with images of dried leaves.
Again, we only have about 10 of these, so prepare to be disappointed.

LEDESMA, JEFRE SEI GETSU Namu Kie Butsu (NNA Tapes) cassette 8.98
Latest tape from Jefre Cantu Ledesma, a member of long running post rockers Tarentel, one of the head honchos of the Root Strata label, and a sublime crafter of divine dronemusic on his own, here rechristened 'Sei Getsu', Cantu utilizes "motorized electric guitar" to conjure up a lovely collection of blissful brooding evening ambience.
Like the Caboladies / Oneohtrix tape reviewed elsewhere on this week's list, Cantu's tape went through a whole pressing (albeit only 100 copies) before we got wind of it, and thankfully the label deigned to make another batch, which will no doubt disappear as quickly as the first.
Hushed and minimal, but more intense than much of what we've heard from Cantu, thick swells of rumbling low end, deep swaths of burnished buzz, glistening and glimmering, delicate sheets of shimmer draped over something much more dark and grim, a heaving roiling blackness, that swirls and pulses, its barbs muted and smoothed, but that darkness definitely infuses the proceedings with a ghostly, even ghastly vibe. Even so, the sounds manage to remain meditative and abstract, it's almost like SUNNO))) stripped down and mellowed out, still heavy, but more dense and intense than outwardly crushing. Gorgeous stuff, but sadly, crazy limited and maybe gone for good before you know it.

LEFT SENSORY BYPASS Temporal Exclusion (self-released) cd-r 6.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

LEGONG: DANCE OF THE VIRGINS (Milestone) dvd 34.00
Here's a fine specimen of film history and a semi-authentic look at Bali in the early 20th century. Filmed on location in 1933 in glorious Technicolor, the film fell almost immediately into obscurity. Its lackluster success was perhaps due to the perception amongst critics of the director as a Hollywood dilletante. For while Legong was directed by French aristocrat the Marquis Henry de la Falaise de la Coudray, the project was produced with funds from his current wife at the time -- the actress Constance Bennett. Falaise was certainly jumping on board the boats of F.W. Murnau and Robert Flaherty, the latter's Nanook of the North was the groundbreaking docu-fiction for which Murnau took inspiration for his final masterpiece in 1931. So when Falaise came around two years later with a film shot on location on the exotic isle of Bali with an all native cast and boasting cultural authenticity, it was met with heavy skepticism. In retrospect however, aside from Falaise's dubious credentials as a filmmaker, the project stands the test of time. Woven into this sad tale of unrequited love are stunning shots of Balinese life and ceremony, inluding the Legong and Barong dances and cremation ceremonies. But perhaps what makes this DVD most worth getting worked up about is the newly added score collaboratively composed by Richard Marriott and I Made Subandi and performed by the Club Foot Orchestra and Gamelan Sekar Jaya. And before all you purists get worked up about it: yes, the original score is also included. So you can choose either one when you watch the film. The new score however is absolutely stunning. It's wonderfully tempered scene to scene with parts featuring only the Club Foot Orchestra, others with solely Sekar Jaya and parts where both play. Along with completely newly composed material there are some sections where Club Foot Orchestra echoes the original score, while in others Sekar Jaya performs the traditional pieces that you witness on the screen. While it would be impossible to sync up the sound for an entire dance without a recut of the film, they do manage to arrange their pieces in the film such that during both a Barong and Legong dance there are scenes which perfectly match up to the dancers' movements. Included along with the entire film, presented completely restored and uncut (the British print in the day censored images of violence, while the American print censored the nudity) for the first time are a 1956 documentary entitled Gods Of Bali by Robert Snyder, Falaise's Kliou, The Killer (which had been believed to have been lost) and an interview with composers Subandi and Marriott.

LEONARD, CHERYL E. Chattermarks (All Ways North) cd 13.98
In January 2009, the Bay Area sound-artist and composer Cheryl Leonard embarked on a residency program at the Palmer Station in Antarctica. There, she took every opportunity to venture out into the summer's perpetual daylight to make as many field recordings as possible and to collect an array of penguin bones (with the permission of the Palmer Station, of course) to use in her rather elegant, beguiling compositions. In the past, Leonard had used a variety of branches, rocks, and other natural elements in these beautifully textured compositions whereby she would bow and clink those objects into masses of textures that came across somewhere between the work of Loren Chasse, Jeph Jerman, and Small Cruel Party. So, it shouldn't come as a surprise that she actually released a split 7" with SMC's Key Ransome some 15 years ago.
While Chattermarks is a collection of pure field recordings, the use of those abraded sounds within a composed swarm points to what she was listening for in Antarctica. In hearing Leonard talk about her Antarctic adventure, she is quick to describe the brutality of the wind and the intensity of the cold, all of which wreaked havoc upon her binaural mics and hydraphones. Many of her recordings feature the noises of Antarctic animal life: adelie penguins, elephant seals, skuas, and gulls. The slumbering snore from a couple of the elephant seals is particularly striking as are their bellowing barks and guttural thrumbings. But the sounds of ice are probably the most intriguing recordings on Chattermarks, from the huge rumbles of a glacier that crumbles into the ocean with smaller tinklings of ice racing down an embankment to the searing hiss of millions of shards of ice clattering together next to a disintegrating wall of packed snow. The only document of the Antarctic wind was captured in a haunting recording of wind whipping around an antenna punctuated by the booms of a glacier splitting in two somewhere in the distance. An obvious treat for anyone keen on Douglas Quin's polar recordings, but Leonard has an excellent flair for subtle drama that's also heard in those impeccable Chris Watson field recordings. Highly recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Beach Adelie Penguins"
MPEG Stream: "Shore Brash Ice"
MPEG Stream: "Elephant Seal Nap"
MPEG Stream: "Storm At Gamage Point"

LEONE, DOMINIQUE Abstract Expression (Important) cd 14.98
Ambitious power-prog-pop!?! Mixing elements of everything from Magma to the Fiery Furnaces, The Boredoms to the Dirty Projectors, Van Dyke Parks to Heavy Vegetable. A fun and colorful ride.
MPEG Stream: "Cover Yourself"
MPEG Stream: "Reasonable Snow"

LESS Cover, Protective, Individual (Firecode Core) cd 14.98
This is strange indeed. The last Less record (reviewed 2+ years ago) was a blast of MTV ready prog-gloom post-metal, equal parts Tool, Rage Against The Machine and Nine Inch Nails with strange and wonderful math rock filligree a la Don Caballero. We predicted that in a couple years we'd probably be seeing them all over MTV if there was any justice in this world. So you can imagine how surprised we were when we first threw this, the new Less record, on. A completely different beast altogether. Well, not completely. First off, there's not a distorted guitar to be found. Anywhere. And all traces of pounding percussion have been replaced by skittery brushwork and delicate whispery shuffles. The riffs remain, still sort of doomy and heavy, but slowed down, played on a steel string guitar, giving them a sort of backwoods mystery and acoustic urgency. This may be stripped down and acoustic, but it's definitely not wimpy. This is dark and heavy and groovy, grim and sinister, creepy and crawly. Slightly distorted/reverbed vocals wail minor key laments over dirgy minor key doomscapes, vocals slithering between the riffs, tense and intense. Lots of ambient murk, backwoods twang, and sinister groove. Think Sixteen Horsepower crossed with Deadboy And the Elephantmen, or Woven Hand mixed with Agents Of Oblivion, or an even darker, creepier version of Alice In Chains' acoustic record Sap. Recommended.
MPEG Stream: "Starvation"
MPEG Stream: "Our Sin"

LESSER Gearhound (Matador UK) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
So here it is. The new Lesser record. On Matador no less. We were all a little afraid, that not wanting to blow his big chance (it's quite a leap from Vinyl Communications to Matador), Jay Lesser was going to soften his attack, blunt his weapons, and make a 'nice' record (one the Plaid/Plone/Boards of Canada crowd could get into) which probably would be okay, but lacking the confusional chaos that we here at AQ love so much but which most people have trouble getting their heads around. Fear not. This is THE record Lesser has been trying to make for years. It all comes together just right. Gone is most of the drum 'n bass dabbling of the last record, and in its place a tangled mess of skittering beats (like a malfunctioning Autechre), funky hiccupping beats patched together from a thousand skipping cds, long stretches of ambient noise, radio interference and just completely random sound. Probably the most difficult Lesser record yet. Certainly the most difficult thing you've heard on Matador. But it's worth the work, because underneath all this mayhem and confusion are some amazing songs, catchy melodies super funky beats, hilarious (usually unrecognizable) samples, and some of the most unique amazing 'sound' you've ever heard. Imagine an Autechre / Merzbow soundclash on New Years Eve, in Central Park, and for some reason their rig is intercepting thousands of cellular phone calls / radio transmissions / crowd sounds, and then it begins to rain, and the whole thing short circuits, causing an ungodly assortment of sizzle and crackle and white noise and total mayhem. It's kind of like that, but with a few pretty parts.
I mean, any record that gets a review calling it "a detriment to humanity" (Stanford Intermission) has got to be great. Most musicians, kings, presidents, criminals and supervillains work their whole lives towards that end and still don't make it.
Hopefully this record will steal some of the Kid606 / Matmos / Blechdom / Kit Clayton thunder and put it back where it probably belonged all along.
Fucking essential.
RealAudio clip: "Deep Sixed in the Back Nine"
RealAudio clip: "Matador Records Tax Deduction"

LESSER Gearhound (Matador UK) lp 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
So here it is. The new Lesser record. On Matador no less. We were all a little afraid, that not wanting to blow his big chance (it's quite a leap from Vinyl Communications to Matador), Jay Lesser was going to soften his attack, blunt his weapons, and make a 'nice' record (one the Plaid/Plone/Boards of Canada crowd could get into) which probably would be okay, but lacking the confusional chaos that we here at AQ love so much but which most people have trouble getting their heads around. Fear not. This is THE record Lesser has been trying to make for years. It all comes together just right. Gone is most of the drum 'n bass dabbling of the last record, and in its place a tangled mess of skittering beats (like a malfunctioning Autechre), funky hiccupping beats patched together from a thousand skipping cds, long stretches of ambient noise, radio interference and just completely random sound. Probably the most difficult Lesser record yet. Certainly the most difficult thing you've heard on Matador. But it's worth the work, because underneath all this mayhem and confusion are some amazing songs, catchy melodies super funky beats, hilarious (usually unrecognizable) samples, and some of the most unique amazing 'sound' you've ever heard. Imagine an Autechre / Merzbow soundclash on New Years Eve, in Central Park, and for some reason their rig is intercepting thousands of cellular phone calls / radio transmissions / crowd sounds, and then it begins to rain, and the whole thing short circuits, causing an ungodly assortment of sizzle and crackle and white noise and total mayhem. It's kind of like that, but with a few pretty parts.
I mean, any record that gets a review calling it "a detriment to humanity" (Stanford Intermission) has got to be great. Most musicians, kings, presidents, criminals and supervillains work their whole lives towards that end and still don't make it.
Hopefully this record will steal some of the Kid606 / Matmos / Blechdom / Kit Clayton thunder and put it back where it probably belonged all along.
Fucking essential.

LESSER + V/A C64 SID 6581 Massive: Tigerbeat6 Houseparty Series Volume 1 (Tigerbeat6) cd 7.98
For me (Andee), this record brings back terrifying memories of driving across the United States with Lesser. Everytime it was his turn to drive (driver controls the stereo, you know the rule) he would play Commodore 64 and Atari 2600 music full blast. It got so no matter how tired we were, we would still drive, just to keep control of the stereo away from Lesser! So years later, some of that stuff sees a proper release on Kid606's Tigerbeat 6 label. And out of the context of being exhausted and hungry in Nebraska, this stuff sounds pretty darn good. While still mildy irritating (as all video game music is to a certain degree) this is cool and kitschy and pretty fun stuff. Sounds like a Mario Brothers rave or a Sonic The Hedgehog dance party. We love Lesser.
RealAudio clip: "Necrophobic"
RealAudio clip: "The Syndrom"

LESSER / MATMOS / WOBBLY Simultaneous Quodlibet (Important Records) lp 17.98

LESSER / MATMOS / WOBBLY Simultaneous Quodlibet (Important Records) lp 17.98

LESSER / ROB CROW split (Vinyl Communications) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

LETTER WHY, THE s/t (self-released) cd 14.98

LEVIATHAN A Silhouette In Splinters (Moribund) cd 14.98
Probably very little needs to be said about this. Previously available as a super limited lp, we sold out in a heartbeat, now long out of print, and finally available on cd, for the multitudes who missed out first time around, and all you turntableless holdout heathens.
A Silhouette In Splinters was the long in the works "ambient" record from Leviathan, originally released on Canadian label Profound Lore, which offered a glimpse into a side of Leviathan, that while an integral part of his sound, was often relegated to intros or outros or interludes, but here Wrest got to prove that he was as deft with long swaths of black ambience and haunting drones as he was with buzzing riffs and blasting beats. Which is probably obvious to anyone who considers themselves a fan, as a huge part of what makes Leviathan records so powerful and mesmerizing is Wrest's mastery of mood and ambience, and Silhouette is an entire album of bleak and depressive atmospheres. All as haunting and mysterious as anything we've heard from Wrest. But this is not pure ambient music, its ambience is only obvious when compared to the dense complex sound world of other Leviathan releases. This is not static ambience, not in the least, these are actual songs, not just creepy swooshings and simple drones. Silhouette is like an entire record made up of the best black metal intros ever, but here, each one is fleshed out into actual musical narratives. Skeletal guitar figures, drift and shimmer darkly over ominous swells of mournful minor key lament. What little percussion there is, hovers ghostlike beneath a wash of blackened swirl. The entire record is wrapped in a foggy cloak of starlit skies and murky underground passages. A haunting soundtrack to misery and horror, death and dying. Fucking genius.
MPEG Stream: "It Comes In Whispers Part: 2"
MPEG Stream: "A Silhouette In Splinters"