ALUK TODOLO Descension (Riot Season) lp 21.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Finally, the first full length from these mysterious French post black metal krautrock alchemists. And if you think calling a band French post black metal krautrock alchemists might be overdoing it, you haven't heard Aluk Todolo.
An offshoot of black metal horde Diamatregon (who have one record on tUMULt, and another one coming soon), this trio, just guitar, bass and drums, are most definitely alchemists, working some sort of ancient magic, turning the simplest of rock band instrumentation, into something massive and mysterious, heavy and haunting, brutal and mesmerizing, repetitive and motorik. Crafting songs, that manage to be both pieces, in the classical sense, abstract and intellectual collections and arrangements of sound, subtle shadings, tonal color and timbre, harmony and dissonance, and SONGS, in the rock sense, fucking kick ass jams, that seem to go on forever, killer riffs, and relentless head nodding rhythms, like krautrock, only heavier and darker and way way blacker. Like black metal but without all the buzz and howl, stripped down to its very essence, to just mood and rhythm, ambience and propulsion.
In the review of the previous 7" we described the band's sound as: Ominous krautrock rhythms over Einsterzende style industrial clatter, some lost seventies psych rock holy grail channeled through modern post rock. Dreamy and dark and mesmerizing. Hypnotic guitar lines and simple shuffling rhythms that build into clattery propulsive jams, all clanging angular riffs and dense tangled drumming. VERY This Heat like, and reminiscent of the late great Laddio Bolocko. Some sort of dangerous and mysterious postrock / krautrock hybrid, lo-fi but thick and dense and amazingly heavy.
And the full length essentially still sounds like that, but having loosed themselves from the shackles of the way too brief 7" format, the band can take all those elements, and lay them out, an epic massive post rock, krautrock, dronerock, experimental post black metal sprawl. These are the kinds of songs and sounds that need space, and time, need to lull the listener in, to entrance, ensorcel, the rhythms are stripped down and repetitive, looped and hypnotic, simple, but surprisingly and subtly complex at the same time. It's not hard to hear other hypno rockers in Aluk Todolo's sound, Circle, Salvatore and the like, but also space rock masters of repetition, Hawkwind, The Heads, and of course krautrock legends Can and Faust. Especially Can, with their focus on the power of the rhythm, no mater how seemingly simple or plain. But more than anything, it's legendary UK experimentalists This Heat whose, haunting mysterious rhythmic influence is all over Descension.
The opening track is the heaviest, a brutal slab of in the red distorted riffage, the actual riffs barely discernible, more like a heaving mass of crumbling distortion and space rock FX, but the rhythms that frame the whole record are already in place, pounding steadily beneath the buzz and skree. A head nodding pulse underpinning the swirling distorted clouds above. A bracing and white hot burst of blackdronekrautpsych that has the speakers rattling for all of its 8+ minutes.
But that track mostly serves as an intro to the complex and moody rhythmic sprawl that makes up the other three tracks. "Burial Ground" begins with what sounds like a slowed down This Heat rhythm track synched up to the free abstract drift of legendary seventies dronepsych collective Taj Mahal Travellers. The drums unwavering, but the background constantly in flux, swaths of black buzz, brief flurries of chaotic FX, distant low end swells, haunting fragmented melodies, a gorgeous spare kraut rock jam dropped into the abyss.
"Woodchurch" is a dense wall of high end buzz, all swirling distorted hum and keening feedback, tones all tangled up, a chordal wash of tuned vacuum cleaners, a sort of Sunroof! Style urdrone, but beneath it, the simplest of bass lines, distorted and downtuned, a heartbeat like throb, only a handful of notes, just enough to tie into the even simpler drum part, just kick drum and snare, a two step tattoo, as completely mesmerizing as it us utterly simple. The background buzz, swaying and pulsing, like some massive black sea, or clouds of insects ravaging a blighted sonic landscape.
The disc closes with "Disease" which opens with an ultra heavy slide guitar, unfurling a slow motion blues riff, caked in black buzz and thick distortion, the notes left to hang, ringing out until the tones slowly transform into feedback, immediately being swallowed up by the riff right behind it. It's like Robert Johnson playing SUNNO))), and then suddenly, the sound shifts, and the band reverts to its murky trawl, a thick throbbing bass line, another Can like rhythm, guitars warm and warbly, more like a layer of wet fuzz than distinct riffing, but occasionally, bits of that opening salvo return, offering up brief blasts of speaker destroying crunch, or brief bits of grinding buzz, a sudden start that almost, but doesn't quite wake you from your soporific reverie. Near the end, the distorted slide guitar returns, and drums drop out, and the track finishes with a thick coda of pealing guitar roar and shimmering chordal droneÉ
Intense and hypnotic and heavy and fucking genius. Ritualistic sounds, both black and brilliant, pulled from the void, a mysterious and sonic netherworld. Definite contender for record of the year.
MPEG Stream: "Obedience"
MPEG Stream: "Burial Ground"

ALUK TODOLO Finsternis (Utech Records) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
It's been two long years we've been waiting for this, another mysterious rhythmic communique from French blackened post krautrock alchemists Aluk Todolo. But it's not like they've been idle. Since 2007's Descension, two thirds of Aluk Todolo have recorded a record and toured the world as Gunslingers, and all of Aluk Todolo do double duty in French black metallers Diamatregon, who recently released a new full length on tUMULt called Crossroad.
But as much as we love those other two bands, and we do, there will always be something magical about the strange sonic world Aluk Todolo are able to conjure up. Especially considering they're a three piece, a power trio, drums, guitar, bass. Nothing else, no synths, no strings, just the basic rock band instruments. It's testament to the power these three wield, that they can do so much with so little. Or more accurately, so little with so little. As the music of Aluk Todolo, is disarmingly simple, subtle and minimal, but in its minimalism, lies its power. The power of rhythm, of texture, of mood, these five long pieces are so evocative, so expressive and strangely emotional. Even at its most spare and skeletal, the sound is palpable, almost a physical presence, which is surprising again considering just how stripped down Finsternis actually is.
Descension, Aluk Todolo's debut, was heavy and space-y and rhythmic, we described it as a buzz-less black metal, some of the songs were thick and caustic, others were loping and motorik, but on Finsternis, it's as if the band decided to strip away all the extraneous sounds, leaving just the core, the root, the heart of the music, and that heart beats out a simple, hypnotic rhythm.
The record is split into 4 parts, with a brief interlude, but those four parts are split into two distinct movements. The first, which comprises the first two parts, is much of what we described above, simple skeletal rhythms, surrounded by minimal guitar whir, bursts of grinding distortion, fragmented jangle, keening feedback, but it's all about the rhythm. After a brief burst of mathy chaos, the track reverts to its initial rhythm, this time the bass more prominent, fuzzy, distorted, woozy and mesmerizing, the band locked in tight, the bass and drums solid and unwavering, while the guitar sings in the background, moaning and keening and howling, giving the track an ominous otherworldly vibe, a trudge across some hostile alien landscape, a weary, washed out deathmarch.
Then the interlude, a haunting abstract percussive sprawl, simple percussive thuds set amidst a sea of warped distorted low end, bits of glitch and hiss, and grinding shards of industrial clatter, which gives way to the second, noisier movement, the drums transformed into a simple machinelike pound, snare and cymbal crashing over and over and over, the guitars whipped into a frenzy of blurred buzz and warped swirling blackened chaos, what at first sounds noisy and harsh, soon reveals itself as strangely textural, and as hypnotic as the more stripped down first movement, the guitars slip from monochromatic whir, to insectoid black metal riffing, constantly swirling around the motorik pound and pummel, the final track finds the guitars slipping into ever higher registers, blissing out, laced with feedback, smoothing out into warm smears and blurs, before a brief deconstruction, and a surprisingly tranquil last few minutes, the drums back to a woozy lope, the guitar offering up warm swells and shimmering thrum, the bass throbbing beneath, eventually stumbling to a halt in a cloud of creaking metals and static-like tape hiss. Woah.
Just like Descension, Finsternis is an intense and emotional journey through sound, a haunting and hard to describe exploration of rhythm, mood and texture, a slow shifting otherworld defined by This Heat, Geronimo, Laddio Bolocko, Can, Faust, accessible only via the three shadowy figures that make up Aluk Todolo, whose magic and mystery has been rendered in these glorious black rhythms.
Housed in a multi panel jacket with super striking original artwork by Stephen Kasner, on the always impressive Utech label (whose other two new releases, from Gog and Olivier Dumont, we'll review on the next list, although we do have both in stock if you want 'em, and we're fairly sure you do!).
MPEG Stream: "Premier Contact"
MPEG Stream: "Deuxieme Contact"
MPEG Stream: "Totalite"

ALUK TODOLO Finsternis (Public Guilt) lp 26.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
It's been two long years we've been waiting for this, another mysterious rhythmic communique from French blackened post krautrock alchemists Aluk Todolo. But it's not like they've been idle. Since 2007's Descension, two thirds of Aluk Todolo have recorded a record and toured the world as Gunslingers, and all of Aluk Todolo do double duty in French black metallers Diamatregon, who recently released a new full length on tUMULt called Crossroad.
But as much as we love those other two bands, and we do, there will always be something magical about the strange sonic world Aluk Todolo are able to conjure up. Especially considering they're a three piece, a power trio, drums, guitar, bass. Nothing else, no synths, no strings, just the basic rock band instruments. It's testament to the power these three wield, that they can do so much with so little. Or more accurately, so little with so little. As the music of Aluk Todolo, is disarmingly simple, subtle and minimal, but in its minimalism, lies its power. The power of rhythm, of texture, of mood, these five long pieces are so evocative, so expressive and strangely emotional. Even at its most spare and skeletal, the sound is palpable, almost a physical presence, which is surprising again considering just how stripped down Finsternis actually is.
Descension, Aluk Todolo's debut, was heavy and space-y and rhythmic, we described it as a buzz-less black metal, some of the songs were thick and caustic, others were loping and motorik, but on Finsternis, it's as if the band decided to strip away all the extraneous sounds, leaving just the core, the root, the heart of the music, and that heart beats out a simple, hypnotic rhythm.
The record is split into 4 parts, with a brief interlude, but those four parts are split into two distinct movements. The first, which comprises the first two parts, is much of what we described above, simple skeletal rhythms, surrounded by minimal guitar whir, bursts of grinding distortion, fragmented jangle, keening feedback, but it's all about the rhythm. After a brief burst of mathy chaos, the track reverts to its initial rhythm, this time the bass more prominent, fuzzy, distorted, woozy and mesmerizing, the band locked in tight, the bass and drums solid and unwavering, while the guitar sings in the background, moaning and keening and howling, giving the track an ominous otherworldly vibe, a trudge across some hostile alien landscape, a weary, washed out deathmarch.
Then the interlude, a haunting abstract percussive sprawl, simple percussive thuds set amidst a sea of warped distorted low end, bits of glitch and hiss, and grinding shards of industrial clatter, which gives way to the second, noisier movement, the drums transformed into a simple machinelike pound, snare and cymbal crashing over and over and over, the guitars whipped into a frenzy of blurred buzz and warped swirling blackened chaos, what at first sounds noisy and harsh, soon reveals itself as strangely textural, and as hypnotic as the more stripped down first movement, the guitars slip from monochromatic whir, to insectoid black metal riffing, constantly swirling around the motorik pound and pummel, the final track finds the guitars slipping into ever higher registers, blissing out, laced with feedback, smoothing out into warm smears and blurs, before a brief deconstruction, and a surprisingly tranquil last few minutes, the drums back to a woozy lope, the guitar offering up warm swells and shimmering thrum, the bass throbbing beneath, eventually stumbling to a halt in a cloud of creaking metals and static-like tape hiss. Woah.
Just like Descension, Finsternis is an intense and emotional journey through sound, a haunting and hard to describe exploration of rhythm, mood and texture, a slow shifting otherworld defined by This Heat, Geronimo, Laddio Bolocko, Can, Faust, accessible only via the three shadowy figures that make up Aluk Todolo, whose magic and mystery has been rendered in these glorious black rhythms.
Housed in a multi panel jacket with super striking original artwork by Stephen Kasner, on the always impressive Utech label (whose other two new releases, from Gog and Olivier Dumont, we'll review on the next list, although we do have both in stock if you want 'em, and we're fairly sure you do!).
MPEG Stream: "Premier Contact"
MPEG Stream: "Deuxieme Contact"
MPEG Stream: "Totalite"

ALUMBRADOS A Garden Of Vipers (Important) cd 14.98
AQ has been all Gibbons Brothers all the time lately. First these Bardo bros hit us with maybe the best record yet from their main band Bardo Pond, Ticket Crystals, which has stayed in seriously heavy rotation all summer long. Then we got floored by Alaeshir, another of their many side projects, that one a sort of headbanging rock meets daydreaming bliss-out. And then Vapour Theories with its droning sax and psych guitar offerings, AND a super limited ultra kick ass live Bardo Pond release on Archive, and now... --pause to catch breath-- this two track, 40 minute disc of deep in the forest ethno-drones, drenched in buzz and shimmer. Sitar, guitar, cumbas and all sorts of percussion create exquisite layers psych drone Nirvana that will transport you to another dimension. Strangely peaceful, the music we hear in our heads when we lay in grass at night staring at the stars. So very nice!
MPEG Stream: "Principium I"
MPEG Stream: "Green Lion"

ALUMBRADOS Monochord (Important Records) lp 22.00
The most calm and serene of the four Bardo Pond related lps from Important, Alumbrados documents the mystic explorations of John and Michael Gibbons through the hazy scope of loosely arranged cosmic atmospheres and acoustic psychedelic ethno-droones. Though it probably goes without saying, Monochord reaches out from the deep ringing center of an ancient gong, sending soaring tones of bowed acoustic guitar, buzzing sitar, and ritual percussion high into the midnight sky. A short step away from the driving, more rockin' sound of their Alasehir project, Alumbrados shimmers with the distant glow of woodland lanterns and dreamy grasslands, all effortlessly sculpted into a somber raga-esque drone masterpiece. Calm acoustic finger picking in the distance, ritualistic percussion thumping away, all drenched in an eastern wash of buzzing strings and far off flutes. Limited to 500 copies, this one will be gone in no time, so pick it up while you still can!

ALUMINUM GROUP Happyness (Wishing Tree) cd 13.98
Soft, sleek pop that harkens back to '70s AM radio as well as '60s space age lounge-y flair. Aluminum Group is primarily brothers Frank and John Navin, however on this release the band roster is a veritable orchestra of 19 members including Chicago starlets John McEntire, John Herndon, Doug McCombs, Rebecca Gates, Rob Mazurek, and Jeff Parker. Bubbly synths fizz and flutter amid Mangione-esque horns and crisp percussion while the suave gent croons in dulcet tones that bring to mind ELO, the Moody Blues, the Alan Parsons Project or more recently Kings Of Convenience. Occasional female vocals add an extra prettiness to the already glistening proceedings. That said, they may be from the Midwest but their music sounds as though it's coming to you from some euro jetset club - maybe having a nightcap with Air, the Style Council and Burt Bacharach. Laidback and smooooth! And there's more to come, apparently this is the first installment of an Aluminum Group trilogy.
RealAudio clip: "Kid"
RealAudio clip: "Stroke"

ALUMINUM GROUP Pedals (Minty Fresh) cd 14.98
With a name that recalls Stereolab and a bunch of guest appearances from indie-cred names like Jim O'Rourke (sickly-sweet avant-pop production, guitars, piano, etc), Sean O'Hagan (High Llamas dude on banjo), Sally Timms (Mekons vocalist doing backing vocals), Edith Frost (also on backing vocals), and Doug McCombs (from Tortoise adding his 6 string bass), this Chicago band brings together the corniest aspects of Eno, Steely Dan, the High Llamas, and the Sea & Cake into a cute pop album.

ALUMINUM GROUP Pelo (Hefty) cd 13.98
Hey didn't Stereolab already apply a heavy dollop of Os Mutantes-style Tropicalia to their aloof space age bachelor pad sounds? In case you need to hear more of the same, here's the second album from Chicago's Aluminum Group, complete with a Laetitia impersonator.

ALVA Slattery For Ungdom (Menlo Park) cd 11.98
This mysterious all-female avant-chamber-rock trio from Florida, who wowed discerning attendees with their performance at the '98 Terrastock II, and who released their first album on John Zorn's Avant label, make their return with this disc of strange and wonderful songs. Perhaps this could be described as mostly instrumental, almost Carl Stalling-like cartoon classical music combined with improv and no-wave. Unique and excellent.

ALVARIUS B Baroque Primitiva (Poon Village) cd 17.98
Here's the much anticipated cd reissue of this way-too limited Alvarius B album which came and went on vinyl in a matter of days early in 2011. Alvarius B is the solo project of Alan Bishop, better known as one of the Sun City Girls - a project which dissolved after over twenty years following the death of drummer and fellow provocateur Charles Goucher. The Girls (a trio rounded out by Bishop's brother Richard) were specialists in frustratingly brilliant psychedelic-punk, damaged with free jazz, Southeast Asian pop, and fucked-up beat poetry. They were notorious for their designed lack of editorial constraints in situating brilliantly over-charged weirdo-pop melodic crescendos often hybridizing the likes of Ennio Morricone and Vietnamese songwriter Trinh Cong Son next to an uncomfortably misogynistic rant from Alan Bishop's slimy Bukowski parody as Uncle Jim. Even the most die-hard Sun City Girls fans who could stomach and perhaps grow to love their confrontational affronts will undeniably say that it's Torch Of The Mystics or 303,003 Crossdressers From The Rig Veda that are the masterpieces of borderless songwriting.
So with the Girls no more, where would Alan Bishop take his own work? The Sir Richard Bishop records have been uniformly brilliant in their fiery elliptical fingerpicking, exploding the Takoma handbook; and Alan has often given off the appearance of being a trickster figure, presenting himself as a minstrel with an immense emotional range only to pull back the mask to reveal a devilish, blackened heart intent on causing misery upon all who hear. With all of this as a preamble, we can say that Alan has followed where the Sun City Girls ended their career on Funeral Mariachi, with this gorgeous record in the form of Baroque Primitiva.
The album is rich with covers, although an Alan Bishop cover would certainly amount to a delirious transfiguration. The man has long been obsessed by Ennio Morricone, and this expertise has been applied to some of the best compendiums of Morricone's best work during the '60s and '70s. And 6 of the albums 12 songs are attributed to Morricone, or "Maestro Padre Supremo" as Bishop describes him in the liner notes. These songs enjoy the lilting yet complex melodies that Morricone had been so known for, with Bishop crooning all of the wordless oohs and ahhs that Morricone had originally penned for a female vocalist. Bishop has long been known for his ability to hit sharp falsettos in the Girls. Even though he does bend many of the notes towards atonality, he is quite reverential towards the Morricone text. In fact, the contrast between Morricone's ecstatic songs and the many cracks in Bishop's deliberately lo-fi production (think Sebadoh's four-track recordings with just multi-tracked voice, guitar and chord organ) serves to heighten the drama of these recordings. There are a couple of Bishop originals, "Humor Police" is very much a manic carnavalesque number and "Well Known Stranger" is a classic downer jam of strum and vocal mope that sounds like it could be a lost Neil Young tune, but done way better. The two other covers on the album are also quite noteworthy: the only song to emerge from his aborted album of John Barry covers in the form of "You Only Live Twice" and one hell of jubilant romp through the Beach Boys' "God Only Knows."
This is very nicely packaged in the form of a 30 page hardback book, featuring various close-ups of the nude mandala artwork photographed by Kristen Anderson, to sweeten the deal. Already proving to be one of the best albums of 2011. So don't let the cd pass you by, if you didn't have the good fortune of getting hold of the vinyl already.
MPEG Stream: "Well Known Stranger"
MPEG Stream: "Funny Thing Is..."
MPEG Stream: "God Only Be Without You"
MPEG Stream: "Humor Police"

ALVARIUS B Blood Operatives Of The Barium Sunset (Abduction ) lp 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

ALVARIUS B s/t (Abduction) cd 14.98
It goes without saying that the Sun City Girls often exhibit splashes of hallucinatory brilliance throughout their pseudo-eastern psychedelia mashed with cinematic grandeur and way-fucking-far-out esoterica, but at the same time, the Girls have a bad habit of releasing way too much meanderingly psychotic material that definitely tries the patience of even the most die-hard SCG fan. Curiously enough, the smattering of solo recordings from the Bishop brothers, Sir Richard Bishop and Alvarius B (aka Alan Bishop), have managed to avoid the failings of some of the SCG recordings. The reissue of the first Alvarius B record clearly demonstrates this (as well as the 2005 vinyl-only record Blood Operatives Of The Barium Sunset). Recorded between 1981-1989, many of Alan's severely mangled folk-songs are curiously prescient of the current flourishing of acid folk fingerpicking. At the same time, these fucked-up lo-fi indie-spluttering instrumentals sound like an excessively complex Sebadoh tune played by one guy with a tuneless guitar. Either way you look at it, here's one of the great recordings from one of the Bishop brothers. It went out of print quickly the first time it was released on vinyl back in 1994. We hope it won't happen again.
MPEG Stream: "Track 3"
MPEG Stream: "Track 11"

ALVARIUS B AND CERBERUS SHOAL The Vim And Vigor Of (North East Indie) cd 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Cerberus Shoal wrote a song. Alvarius B wrote a couple songs. All in all, three songs were written. between 1996 and 2002, Alvarius B, who is Alan Bishop from the Sun City Girls, recorded his two songs and the Cerberus Shoal song and Cerberus Shoal, who do their droney folky collective thing with lots of instruments from all over the world way out there in Maine, recorded their song and the two Alvarius B songs. Ok, so that's the story of how this second installment in North East Indie's series of splits came to be (first was " The Whys and Hows of Herman Dune and Cerberus Shoal," upcoming splits in the series will include Magic Carpathians and Guapo). This pairing seems natural; past AQ reviews have compared Cerberus Shoal with Sun City Girls, and each person / group's style suits the songwriting of the other one very nicely. Alvarius B brings warm lo-fi acoustic guitar and vocals; Cerberus Shoal's musical universe, not so overtly "ethnic" here as on some of their other recordings, is populated by banjos, clattering typewriter percussiveness, and a uniquely droll vocal delivery.
Both Cerberus Shoal and Alvarius B contribute darkly surreal lyrical imagery, alternately plaintive and fucked-up, contributing to a psych-folk sound that manages to be simultaneously blackly comic and genuinely moving.
MPEG Stream: CERBERUS SHOAL "The Real Ding"
MPEG Stream: ALVARIUS B "Viking Christmas"

AMADOU ET MARIAM Je Pense A Toi (Universal) cd 16.98

AMALGAMATED SONS OF REST s/t (Galaxia) cd ep 9.98
On local / Santa Cruz-based label Galaxia comes this supergroup of sorts. Amalgamated Sons of Rest is Will Oldham of PALACE, Jason Molina of SONGS:OHIA, and Alasdair Roberts of APPENDIX OUT. These guys have basically written the book on broken-voiced, broken-hearted, hollow-eyed, lovely back porch indie twang. A one of a kind 6-song (one more than the lp) session. *Really* nice and even more stripped down than these guys usually are -- harking back to the earliest Songs:Ohia records and the most despairing Palace tracks.
RealAudio clip: "Maa Bonny Lad"

AMALGAMATED SONS OF REST s/t (Galaxia) lp 8.98
On local / Santa Cruz-based label Galaxia comes this supergroup of sorts. Amalgamated Sons of Rest is Will Oldham of PALACE, Jason Molina of SONGS:OHIA, and Alasdair Roberts of APPENDIX OUT. These guys have basically written the book on broken-voiced, broken-hearted, hollow-eyed, lovely back porch indie twang. A one of a kind 5-song session. Nice. Vinyl is one sided with a marine-life themed etching. CD available Sept 10, 2002.

AMANAZ Africa (Q.D.K. / Normal) cd 16.98
The lo-fi, garagey, psychedelic "Zam Rock" scene that flourished in the southern African nation of Zambia during the mid '70s is now getting some long overdue exposure and appreciation over here, thanks to a bunch of recent reissues: Chrissy Zebby Tembo, Ngozi Family, Witch (highlighted last list) and now, also the lesser known but no less amazing Amanaz! Like Witch its reissue was facilitated by Egon of Stones Throw, who also wrote the liner notes, which make us realize how lucky we are to have these reissues, 'cause the original Zambian LPs are super rare and, Egon says, usually in about the same poor condition as an experienced frisbee. He also helps explain the genesis of the Zam Rock movement, suggesting that Zambia's Socialist government required a preponderance of "Zambian" content on the radio. Apparently the gov't also mandated a high fuzz content as well!
The Amanaz album, from 1975, certainly fulfills that quota, though at first listen we thought that maybe this one was mellower than some of the others like Witch, and parts if it are, in a stoned sorta way, and it's also somewhat more "African" sounding as befits its title, in its rhythms and vocal stylings, with some of the singing doing in the Bembe tongue, though most songs are in English. But still there's quite a supply of heavy fuzz here, with the likes of "History Of Man" being plenty brutal in that dep't. for sure!
And man is it beautiful, full of lovely, lovely grooves in a warm bath of lo-fi hiss and hum, maybe not as gritty as Witch and Ngozi but still gritty enough, and maybe even more memorably groov'd. There's fully a dozen songs here and it's hard to pick highlights, we dig 'em all, somehow so fuzzy yet so gentle, well, not always gentle, like how the otherwise laidback "Nsunka Lwendo" includes a phenomenally LOUD and PIERCING guitar solo, that wanders back and forth from left channel to the right channel, looking for a way to crack into your skull. Meanwhile the sizzling, syncopated "Green Apple" throbs with what almost sounds like a buried Geezer Butler bass line, and the exuberant "Making The Scene" features a part that we swear appears on a Witchcraft album, or close to anyway! Wow. More proof Zam Rock RULES. Recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Amanaz"
MPEG Stream: "History Of Man"
MPEG Stream: "Africa"

AMANDINE Leave Out The Sad Parts (Fat Cat) cd ep 8.98
Leave Out The Sad Parts is the new cdep from this Swedish foursome who briefly went by the less fitting moniker Wichita Linemen. This U.S.-only release includes one song ("Firefly") from their fine debut album, 2005's This is Where Our Hearts Collide and two tunes previously only available on a UK 7". Amandine's sound is perhaps most characterized by the vocals of Olof Gidlof. He has one of those voices of which it's difficult to discern the gender. We believed it to be a female singer until we checked the band lineup. It sounds as though the weight of the world is preventing him from raising his voice beyond a low, muted register. Some of us thought this was quite reminiscent of '70s heavy hearts such as Bread. It's a disarmingly warm, melancholic assembly of piano, guitar, bass and drums accompanied by accordion, theremin, banjo and trumpet. The final song "Between What He's Saying And What He Regrets" is graced with some suitably sleepy fiddle... a definite highlight!
MPEG Stream: "Firefly"
MPEG Stream: "Between What He's Saying And What He Regrets"

AMANDINE This Is Where Our Hearts Collide (Fat Cat) cd 15.98
After their terrific Leave Out The Sad Parts cdep came out (now quite some time ago), we were left oh so eagerly anticipating the domestic release of this Swedish band's debut full length (which came out overseas in 2005). We waited and waited and waited. The sun came up the sun went down, seasons changed... but no Amandine album surfaced... until now! So if you dug the ep, dig into more of their beautiful, dark country rock characterized by prominent strings and piano and the charmingly caramelized voice of Olof Gidlof. Wonderful!
MPEG Stream: "Firefly"

AMAZING, THE Code II (Mexican Summer) 10" 16.98

AMBER ASYLUM Frozen In Amber (Neurot) cd 14.98
Reissue of the debut cd from this atmospheric local group, that uses classical chamber music instrumentation to create dark, beautiful sounds akin to a black metal Rachel's. Black metal? Well, this was originally released this by Elfenblut, an imprint of now defunct British label Misanthropy, famous as the home of Burzum! And, for further "heavy" credentials, we should mention that band leader Kris Force has played with both Neurosis and Swans. This was previously only an import, and now boasts three bonus tracks exclusive to this new version!

AMBER ASYLUM Garden of Love, Autonomy Suite, Still Point (Bio-Fidelic) 10" 9.98
First we've heard from local moody metallic chamber ensemble Amber Asylum in quite some time. Rumor is there have been label problems, but you'd never know it from this amazing self released 10" (other than it being, um, self released). Three brand new tracks that take Amber Asylum's gothic strings and vocals soun even further out, having now expanded their lineup to include former members of the Gault and SF black metal legends Weakling. The opening track is quite possibly the best thing we've heard from them, a brooding dramatic soundscape of intensely moody strings, and anguished melodies. Locked in by simple almost programmed sounding rhythms with haunting operatic vocals drifting ghostlike through the mix. Sounds a bit like Skepticism with a string section, and you know that is a very good thing. The second track heads into almost Goblin territory at points with super aggressive pizzicato strings, bows sawing away at the strings emitting truly ominous melodies. Side B clocks in at a little over 12 minutes, and is far more tranquil, an expansive, romantic epic, melancholic yet hopeful, with delicate crystalline piano figures, very subtle strings and sweetly plaintive vocals. So nice. Available only on limited edition 10" vinyl!

AMBER ASYLUM Still Point (Profound Lore) cd 12.98
Esteemed chamber music goddess Kris Force returns with what is quite possibly her most stark compositions to date. She's joined by some of the Bay Area's finest and most beloved of the indie metal and rock community including John Cobbett (Hammers Of Misfortune, Ludicra), Jackie Perez-Gratz (Grayceon), Tim Green (The Fucking Champs, Concentrick), Lorraine Rath (The Gault), and Sarah Schaffer (The Gault, Weakling). Still Point begins with three songs that slowly drift in on droning strings (violin, viola and cello) and ghostly choral vocals. From there the gothic proceedings build gradually with the entrance of minimal piano, guitar, flute, trumpet and percussion. As always, absolutely haunting and stunningly gorgeous!
MPEG Stream: "In The Still Point He Remains"
MPEG Stream: "Black Phoebe"
MPEG Stream: "The Summation"

AMBER ASYLUM The Supernatural Parlour Collection (Release) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Fourth album from this popular local chamber-rock outfit. Somewhere between Dead Can Dance, Godspeed You Black Emperor, and In Extremo (the more RenFaire parts). Gothic atmospheres created with cello, violin, drums, and wispy female vocals. Mournful instrumental acoustic string-drone embellished with electronic effects: a beautiful, depressive sound. The album concludes with their surprisingly straightforward cello-metal version of "Black Sabbath" (complete with rain and thunder intro). That cover, which seemed so suitable, is a bit disappointing, but the rest of the disc is quite nice and mood-inducing.

AMBOY DUKES Journey To The Center Of The Mind (Mainstream) lp 16.98

AMEBIX Arise! (Alternative Tentacles) cd 14.98
Awesome reissue of this seminal crust classic. Heavy and noisy and brilliant. Includes 2 bonus tracks!

AMEBIX No Sanctuary (Alternative Tentacles) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

MPEG Stream: "Battery Humans"
MPEG Stream: "Control"
MPEG Stream: "No Gods No Masters"

AMEBIX No Sanctuary (Alternative Tentacles) lp+7" 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

MPEG Stream: "Battery Humans"
MPEG Stream: "Control"
MPEG Stream: "No Gods No Masters"

AMEN DUNES Dia (Locust) cd 14.98
When we first got this in, we were convinced it was some reissued lost psychedelic gem from the sixties or seventies. From the blurry red and black cover, the dearth of information, and heck it's on Locust, a label well known for killer reissues. So we threw it on, and we were still convinced, although we were blown away by its raw feral blown out psychedelic poppiness. Were there really bands making this sort of inspired and drug fueled racket 30 or 40 years ago? Perhaps, but Amen Dunes wasn't one of them. No, Amen Dunes is apparently the work of one man, a guy called Damon McMahon, who spent an extended stretch holed up in his house in the Catskills (although apparently now, he's holed up in his new house, in CHINA!) channeling some serious demons, and creating a brain melting, warped and distorted, fucked up and freaked out psychedelic classic.
There are definitely hints of the new wave of noise rock, all that shit gaze stuff, and lo-fi garage, Eat Skull, Psychedelic Horseshit, Wavves, Oh Sees, etc, but Amen Dunes' sound is much more old school, going all the way back to drugged out sonic visionaries like Roky Erickson and George Brigman and the like.
Super distorted, everything doused in reverb and delay and distortion, the recording super lo-fi, tape hiss all over the place, murky and muddy, and gloriously fuggy, the vocals slipping from feral shriek, to swoonsome moan, to almost Beach Boys like croon, but even at their most melodic, they remain a bit off kilter, slightly ominous, the rantings of some inspired lunatic right on the edge. The music is rough and raw, but catchy as hell, guitars buzz and jangle, detuned into bizarre Eastern sounding modalities or whipped up into a frenzied squall of Hendrixian freakout. The bass is a huge part of the sound too, rubbery and warm, thick and undulating, sometimes just offering up a layer of deep rumble, other times creating some truly haunting melodic counterpoint. The drums are simple and sporadic, a shuffling pound, a minimal skitter, a loose rickety framework for the Dunes' constantly-on-the-verge-of-collapse echo drenched drone pop, a sort of chilled out Dead C vibe permeates the proceedings as well, a way more damaged and even more druggy Velvets vibe too, all of this shit through with some old timey folkiness, it's a bit of a hodge podge, but it works.
The fractured looped psych drone weirdness of "Fleshless Esta Mira Wife Of Spades" is followed by the almost countryish "Patagonian Domes", before the woozy atonal Supreme Dicks worship of "By The Bridal", with some serious shades of Neutral Milk Hotel (we kid you not).
The rest of the record is equally as tripped out and all over the place, while managing to sound like an actual record, not just a collection of songs. "White Lace" is a gorgeous chunk of softly strummed murk, with super catchy vocals, layers of hiss and buzz, and a smattering of strange electronics, "Castles" is total Laurel Canyon country folk, but infused with just a little more pathos, the vocals a super gorgeous, on the verge of cracking wail, the hand claps, shakers and simple strumming underpinned by a warm wheezing organ. A handful of the songs sound almost Beatles-esque, super classic jangly pop, just barely psychedelic, with the guitars subtly warped, but the killer hooks totally intact, and then the record closes with "Breaker", maybe one of the most moving and intense tracks on the record, the musical accompaniment, minimal, simple softly strummed guitar, and some soft organ shimmer, but the vocals, so impassioned and emotional, raw and way up front, melodic and intense, howling and wailing, with multiple voices multitracked into a gorgeous wavery, fractured two part harmony, that ends up sounding like some sort of outsider gospel music. Totally inspirational, mind blowing, rocking, catchy, darkly mysterious... Easily one of our favorite records of the year so far!!
MPEG Stream: "Amen Dunes"
MPEG Stream: "Miami Beach"
MPEG Stream: "Fleshless Esta Mira Wife Of Space"
MPEG Stream: "Patagonian Domes"
MPEG Stream: "Breaker"

AMEN DUNES Dia (Locust) lp 17.98
When we first got this in, we were convinced it was some reissued lost psychedelic gem from the sixties or seventies. From the blurry red and black cover, the dearth of information, and heck it's on Locust, a label well known for killer reissues. So we threw it on, and we were still convinced, although we were blown away by its raw feral blown out psychedelic poppiness. Were there really bands making this sort of inspired and drug fueled racket 30 or 40 years ago? Perhaps, but Amen Dunes wasn't one of them. No, Amen Dunes is apparently the work of one man, a guy called Damon McMahon, who spent an extended stretch holed up in his house in the Catskills (although apparently now, he's holed up in his new house, in CHINA!) channeling some serious demons, and creating a brain melting, warped and distorted, fucked up and freaked out psychedelic classic.
There are definitely hints of the new wave of noise rock, all that shit gaze stuff, and lo-fi garage, Eat Skull, Psychedelic Horseshit, Wavves, Oh Sees, etc, but Amen Dunes' sound is much more old school, going all the way back to drugged out sonic visionaries like Roky Erickson and George Brigman and the like.
Super distorted, everything doused in reverb and delay and distortion, the recording super lo-fi, tape hiss all over the place, murky and muddy, and gloriously fuggy, the vocals slipping from feral shriek, to swoonsome moan, to almost Beach Boys like croon, but even at their most melodic, they remain a bit off kilter, slightly ominous, the rantings of some inspired lunatic right on the edge. The music is rough and raw, but catchy as hell, guitars buzz and jangle, detuned into bizarre Eastern sounding modalities or whipped up into a frenzied squall of Hendrixian freakout. The bass is a huge part of the sound too, rubbery and warm, thick and undulating, sometimes just offering up a layer of deep rumble, other times creating some truly haunting melodic counterpoint. The drums are simple and sporadic, a shuffling pound, a minimal skitter, a loose rickety framework for the Dunes' constantly-on-the-verge-of-collapse echo drenched drone pop, a sort of chilled out Dead C vibe permeates the proceedings as well, a way more damaged and even more druggy Velvets vibe too, all of this shit through with some old timey folkiness, it's a bit of a hodge podge, but it works.
The fractured looped psych drone weirdness of "Fleshless Esta Mira Wife Of Spades" is followed by the almost countryish "Patagonian Domes", before the woozy atonal Supreme Dicks worship of "By The Bridal", with some serious shades of Neutral Milk Hotel (we kid you not).
The rest of the record is equally as tripped out and all over the place, while managing to sound like an actual record, not just a collection of songs. "White Lace" is a gorgeous chunk of softly strummed murk, with super catchy vocals, layers of hiss and buzz, and a smattering of strange electronics, "Castles" is total Laurel Canyon country folk, but infused with just a little more pathos, the vocals a super gorgeous, on the verge of cracking wail, the hand claps, shakers and simple strumming underpinned by a warm wheezing organ. A handful of the songs sound almost Beatles-esque, super classic jangly pop, just barely psychedelic, with the guitars subtly warped, but the killer hooks totally intact, and then the record closes with "Breaker", maybe one of the most moving and intense tracks on the record, the musical accompaniment, minimal, simple softly strummed guitar, and some soft organ shimmer, but the vocals, so impassioned and emotional, raw and way up front, melodic and intense, howling and wailing, with multiple voices multitracked into a gorgeous wavery, fractured two part harmony, that ends up sounding like some sort of outsider gospel music. Totally inspirational, mind blowing, rocking, catchy, darkly mysterious... Easily one of our favorite records of the year so far!!
MPEG Stream: "Amen Dunes"
MPEG Stream: "Miami Beach"
MPEG Stream: "Fleshless Esta Mira Wife Of Space"
MPEG Stream: "Patagonian Domes"
MPEG Stream: "Breaker"

AMEN DUNES Murder Dull Mind (Sacred Bones) 12" 14.98
When we first discovered the timeless otherworldly space drone psych folk of Amen Dunes, we couldn't shake the feeling that it had to be old, some lost psych holy grail. For all its fuzz and warble and crunch, it had this strange timeless quality, at once personal and intimate, as if, like many small private pressings, the actual pressing was just going through the motions, a sort of validation that meant very little to the creator, but for the listener, the fact that these sounds were captured, it was perhaps as important as the creation itself. We of course eventually accepted the fact that Amen Dunes was not in fact some strange guru-like mystic, white bearded and black robed, living in a cave somewhere (somewhere that just so happened to have recording capabilities of course) and was in fact, a young guy, a music maker, band dude, who just so happened to be able to channel the spirit of some lost time, be it the sixties, seventies, eighties... the sound of Amen Dunes, was, and is, a soft cacophony of jangle and buzz, laced with elements of raga and drone, folk and country, all woven into an idiosyncratic whole, that somehow sounds like all of those and none of those. Ever since that record, which of course we made a Record Of The Week, we had been dying for more.
With the release of Murder Dull Mind, the reason for no new recordings is made obvious, as the man behind Amen Dunes, Damon McMahon, was in fact living in China for the last few years, where this ep was recorded in his apartment. Mostly improvised, these songs manage to capture the same spirit as the debut, but definitely takes the Amen Dunes sound in a new, more hushed and intimate direction.
That sound is still ritualistic and psychedelic, beginning with a strange incantation, alien vocal harmonies, sounding a bit like a more ominous Beach Boys vocal track, wound around deep synth thrum and mysterious flickering electronics, before giving way to spare skeletal acoustic guitars, all reverby and hazy, wrapped in tangled psychedelic filigree, echo drenched vocals, and some soaring distorted and blown out choruses. It's like some sort of woozy Eastern tinged raga psych-folk, a bit like the first record, but more stripped down, occasionally abstract and buzzy, but just as often downright poppy. While elsewhere, simple snare drum skitter shuffles beneath urgently strummed steel string guitar, the sound almost Latin, way blown out vox, also suggestive of seventies acid folk. The A-side finishes off with a caustic noise jam, a swirling squall of chaotic psych guitar noise, buried voices and gnarled string buzz collide with buried percussive stutter and howling Haino-ish freakouts.
The B-side features 3 tracks of soft spacious almost country sounding reverby folk, strange vocals drift amidst hazy streaks of washed out sound, atmospheric and weirdly lush, very rainy day sounding (in fact, on one of the tracks, you can hear what almost sounds like rain in the background), the whole thing simple and stripped down, personal and emotional, yet still somehow subtly lysergic and psychedelic, a gorgeous intimate sonic missive, a fervent fever dream in sound. So good.

AMEN DUNES Through Donkey Jaw (Sacred Bones) cd 15.98
Newest record from Damon McMahon, aka Amen Dunes. His first record, Dia, we made a Record Of The Week, describing it as sounding like some lost psychedelic gem from the Sixties, and the second Amen Dunes record, Murder Dull Mind, was more of the same, gloriously haunting, outsider bedroom psych, channeling the spirit of Syd Barrett and Skip Spence, a mysterious otherworldly folk-pop artifact steeped in druggy atmosphere and loosed from traditional folk music tropes, resulting in haunting sonic ritualism that seemed to exist out of time.
This latest record is a logical extension of its two predecessors, and if anything, it seems to be the poppiest of the bunch. Right from the start, "Baba Yaga" had us expecting something WAY more far out, but instead, it's a gorgeous slab of soaring folk pop, all sun dappled and dreamy, with some surprisingly powerful vocals, all wound up in blurry shimmer, and what sounds like tangled strings or heavily effected harmonicas, either way, it might be the best proper 'song' McMahon has come up with yet. And much of the record follows suit, taking the early Pink Floydisms and mixing those up with some Byrds-y twang, some Grateful Dead jamminess, all blurred into a hazy chunk of lost Sixties folk pop. We can even hear some early Bee Gees, some Zombies, some truly gleefully twisted classic pop moments mixed in (check out "Not A Slave", which sounds like it could have been some alternate universe hit), which makes Through Donkey Jaw a surprisingly catchy record. And we have to say it definitely suits them (him?). Not sure if it was a conscious decision, or a natural progression, but this record is most definitely about songs first, that said, the sounds those songs are created with, are pretty impressive, a dead ringer for records of the era, but here and there some strange synth, or some odd bit of production will give it away as something more modern that it purports to be.
And there's still plenty of experimentalism going on, it's just more subtle, either whole non-song-tracks, or subtly woven in amidst the hooks and weirdly proper verse chorus verse arrangements. The vocals are woozy and laid back, wreathed in soft effects, but still much more of a driving force than on past records, the sound shifting easily from jangle pop to gloom folk, tripped out psychedelia to jammy psych rock without batting an eye, and managing to make it all hang together like a proper record.
The final track (a bonus track) is titled "Tomorrow Never Knows". Is it a cover of THAT song? It's actually hard to tell, but what we do know is that it's one of the most gloriously far out moments on the record, a dark brooding bit of rhythmic propulsive krautrock, laced with pounding piano, swirls of distorted guitar crunch, bleating horns, shards of feedback, wild tribal freakouts, after the otherwise song oriented psychedelic folk pop of the preceding thirteen tracks, it's a pretty unexpected, fantastic, and sonically unhinged finale.
MPEG Stream: "Baba Yaga"
MPEG Stream: "Lower Mind"
MPEG Stream: "Swim Up Behind Me"
MPEG Stream: "Tomorrow Never Knows"

AMEN DUNES Through Donkey Jaw (Sacred Bones) lp 15.98
NOW ON VINYL!
Newest record from Damon McMahon, aka Amen Dunes, whose first record, Dia, we made our Record Of The Week, describing it as sounding like some lost psychedelic gem from the sixties, and the second Amen Dunes record, Murder Dull Mind was more of the same, gloriously haunting, outsider bedroom psych, channeling the spirit of Syd Barrett and Skip Spence, a mysterious otherworldly folk pop steeped in druggy atmosphere and loosed from traditional folk music tropes, the result a haunting sonic ritualism that seemed to exist out of time. This latest record is a logical extension of its two predecessors, and if anything, it seems to be the poppiest of the bunch. Right frm the start, "Baba Yaga" which had us expecting something WAY more far out, but instead, it's a gorgeous slab of soaring folk pop, all sun dappled and dreamy, with some surprisingly powerful vocals, all wound up in burry shimmer, and what sounds like tangled strings or heavily effected harmonicas, either way, it might be the best proper 'song' McMahon has come up with yet. And much of the record follows suit, taking the early Pink Floydisms and mixing those up with some Byrds-y twang, some Grateful Dead jamminess, all blurred into a hazy chunk of lost sixties folk pop. We can even hear some early Bee Gees, some Zombies, some truly gleefully twisted classic pop moments mixed in (check out "Not A Slave", which sounds like it could have been some alternate universe hit), which makes Through Donkey Jaw a surprisingly catchy record. And we have to say it definitely suits them (him?). Not sure if it was a conscious decision, or a natural progression, but this record is most definitely about songs first, that said, the sounds those songs are created with, are pretty impressive, a dead ringer for records of the era, but here and there some strange synth, or some odd bit of production will give it a way as something more modern that it purports to be.
And there's still plenty of experimentalism going on, it's just more subtle, either whole non-song-tracks, or subtly woven in amidst the hooks and weirdly proper verser chorus verse arrangements. The vocals are woozy and laid back, wreathed in soft effects, but still much more of a driving force than on past records, the sound shifting easily from jangle pop to gloom folk, tripped out psychedelia to jammy psych rock without batting an eye, and managing to make it all hang together like a proper record.
The final track (a bonus track) is titled "Tomorrow Never Knows". Is it a cover of THAT song? It's actually hard to tell, but what we do know is that it's one of the most gloriously far out moments on the record, a dark brooding bit of rhythmic propulsive krautrock, laced with pounding piano, swirls of distorted guitar crunch, bleating horns, shards of feedback, wild tribal freakouts, after the otherwise song oriented psychedelic folk pop of the preceding thirteen tracks, it's a pretty unexpected, fantastic, and sonically unhinged finale.
Includes download card for mp3s of the whole album, which gets you the 2 extra tracks found on the cd version as well.
MPEG Stream: "Baba Yaga"
MPEG Stream: "Lower Mind"
MPEG Stream: "Swim Up Behind Me"
MPEG Stream: "Tomorrow Never Knows"

AMENTI SUNCROWN Zenith Pitch (World Serpent) cd 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Not your laptop processing from Mille Plateaux or 12K, Amenti Suncrown prefer the increasingly antiquated arsenal of multiple keyboards, samplers, and color flashing gadgets to achieve their dark ambient / electronic soundscapes. Aptly released by World Serpent, Amenti Suncrown reflects a number of the same ideas held by World Serpent staples Coil and Nurse With Wound, with an absurdist / sci-fi / occultist view of the seminal electronic synthesis created by Klaus Schulze and Conrad Schnitzler. For those of you current re-living New Wave through Adult, Fischerspooner, and The Faint, Amenti Suncrown will offer a slight detour back to the 'magick ov 23.'

AMERICAN ANALOG SET (Emperor Jones/Touch & Go) 7" 3.50
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Sounds Extremely Close to a lighter, less technically proficient but just-as-enjoyable Jessamine, without the dark Can influences. For 4AD and Kranky fans. Beautiful sleeve.

AMERICAN ANALOG SET Know By Heart (Tiger Style) cd 14.98
Following last year's wonderful compilation of this Austin, TX gentle pop combo's miscellaneous singles and unreleased tracks 'Through The '90s' and their warm'n'breezy album from '99 'The Golden Band' is 'Know By Heart' their fourth full length. Another batch of the lovely, hushed tunes for which the A.A.S. are well known and loved. Plentiful chiming organ tones, lightly strummed guitars, and quiet boy vocals. But this time around they've thrown in a bit of a krautrock-y repetitive edge ("Like Foxes Through Fences"). Once again, quite recommended for fans of the Sea and Cake. If you're new to this group, I'd definitely suggest checking out the singles compilation first before moving on to this one.
RealAudio clip: "Like Foxes Through Fences"
RealAudio clip: "Choir Vandals"

AMERICAN ANALOG SET Promise of Love (Tiger Style) cd 14.98
Starting things off with lengthy cycle of a lil' drum beat and an off kilter organ melody, this new American Analog Set album sounds not unlike an indie, lo-fi Stereolab. Add some soft male and female vocals, a tambourine along with some electric guitars and the familiar AAS sound comes a little bit more into focus. However the next song stirs thoughts of Pinback and Portastatic. Perhaps it's because Promise Of Love is definitely one of AAS's most fleshed out albums. No great departures from past efforts, just positively brimming with mellow lushness. So pretty pretty pretty!
MPEG Stream: "Continuous Hit Music"
MPEG Stream: "The Hatist"

AMERICAN ANALOG SET Set Free (Arts & Crafts) cd 15.98
Wistful, blissful and oh so dreamy. The occasionally self-abbreviated AmAnSet hone their post-rock shaded indie pop stylings just a little bit more on Set Free. With their murmurred sleepy-boy vocals, smooth chiming tones and warm guitar interplay, they once again nestle in nicely right amongst the gentle likes of Sea & Cake, Low, Pinback and the slow Ira-sung songs of Yo La Tengo. Includes a suitably drowsy cover of Codeine's "Jr". Ahhh, no sharp edges here, just such soothing sweetness!
MPEG Stream: "Immaculate Heart 1"
MPEG Stream: "Sharp Briar"

AMERICAN ANALOG SET The Golden Band (Emperor Jones) cd 13.98
Dark and slow post rock; warm, laid back and a little bit fuzzy. Fans of The Sea and Cake: this is right up your alley. Breezy.

AMERICAN ANALOG SET Through the 90's: Singles and Unreleased (Emperor Norton) cd 12.98
The soothing mellowness of American Analog Set is captured wonderfully on this collection of various singles and unreleased tracks (original sleeve artworks are reproduced in the liner notes). Conjuring lazy-summer-afternoon-in-a-hammock daydreams that bring to mind the sheer bliss of other dream pop crafters Yo La Tengo, The Sea & Cake or Low. Everything: slow, quiet, and lovely. Includes a remix and two live recordings. Wonderful.
RealAudio clip: "High Fidelity Vs. Guy Fidelity"
RealAudio clip: "Magnificent Seventies"

AMERICAN ANALOG SET Updates (Tiger Style) cd ep 8.98
Well, one thing's for sure, American Analog Set sure like their crash cymbals loud... at least that's how it seems from the first track "Desert Eagle (All I Want For Christmas Mix)". Rattled me right outta my seat. Luckily that doesn't happen too often on this six-song EP. Packed with reworkings and remixes, it features two tracks by the band themselves (one a remix, one a cover of a Her Space Holiday song), two contributions from their seeming electronic counterparts Her Space Holiday (actually those particular tracks also sound like there was some input from The Faint camp too... hmmm). HSH first stretch an already glistening, mellow AmAnSet pop tune out into an even more laidback, shuffling number, then picking things up a bit with an almost funky groovin' remix. The last two tracks are the re-workings of Belgian's Styrofoam who gently break AmAnSet's melodies apart and apply their own light, sparkling electronics to the picture.
RealAudio clip: "Desert Eagle (All I Want For Christmas Mix)"
RealAudio clip: "Know By Heart (Her Space Holiday Mix)"
RealAudio clip: "The Postman (Styrofoam's Just Like The Nineties Never Happened Mix)"

AMERICAN FOOTBALL s/t (Polyvinyl) cd 13.98
Accounts of the music and sports worlds colliding should certainly have their own chapter in the rock history books - immediate visions of a putting Hootie and a soccerball-kickin' Robert Smith spring to mind - and oftentimes it seems a little questionable whether it was such a good idea. Case in point, this band's chosen moniker. Not to be confused with Death Cab For Cutie Ben Gibbard's side project All Time Quarterback! I admit I'm not aware of if the name has a story behind it or if they just thought it sounded good. All I imagine is them taking the stage with a "Hi, we're American Football!" But anyways, AF are a trio of lads namely Steve Holmes (on guitar), Steve Lamos (on drums and trumpet... just like in the movie "Waiting For Guffman" - well, sort of.) and vocalist Mike Kinsella (member of so many bands, we've lost count, some of which include Joan of Arc, Owls and Cap'n Jazz, not to mention his recent, lovely solo project Owen). It follows in very much the same path as all of Kinsella's other musical endeavours, that is, sensitive guy emo indie post-rock, with a bit of a jazzy feel. Pretty guitar melodies. Gentle, hushed vocals. Horns drifting in and out and all around. Quite nice, know what I mean? So, of course if you're a fan you won't be disappointed. Mike Kinsella completists: Collect 'em all just like baseball cards!

AMERICAN MUSIC CLUB Engine (Warner) cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
AMC's first 2 albums finally reissued on disc. This is Engine, the 2nd one. You still see Engine around in used LP bins, but Restless Stranger is really rare. I guess that's how Warner Bros justifies the price.

AMERICAN MUSIC CLUB Everclear (Alias) cd 14.98
Hey, look what SF classic just resurfaced after many moons languishing in label limbo / out-of-print-ness. American Music Club's fifth full length Everclear! This album which was originally released fifteen years ago delivers Mark Eitzel and co. in fine form from the bittersweet heartache of "Why Won't You Stay" to the anthemic proportions of "Rise" to the hillbilly hilarity of "Crabwalk". Really makes you wonder how great albums like this could be allowed to go out of print in the first place. Don't blow it, grab one of these before they disappear again...
MPEG Stream: "Why Won't You Stay"
MPEG Stream: "Crabwalk"

AMERICAN MUSIC CLUB Golden Age (Merge) cd 14.98
American Music Club's Mark Eitzel and Vudi are back with some new bandmates in tow, rhythm section Steve Didelot and Sean Hoffman. Golden Age marks this veteran SF/LA band's ninth album and it is perhaps their most elaborate and expansive to date! With freshly stoked fires, it overflows with burnished, well crafted earthy country pop/rock songs. The lushness of the vocal harmonies and arrangements is remarkable and unheard of prior to this album. They complement Eitzel's dusky vocals and words. Perpetually overcast in mood with a fevered furrowed brow, he cuts right to the heart... and to the heart of the matter with lyrics both politically insightful and intimately poetic. Recommended.
MPEG Stream: "The Sleeping Beauty"
MPEG Stream: "The Window On The World"

AMERICAN MUSIC CLUB Love Songs For Patriots (Merge) cd 13.98
It's been just shy of a decade since this beloved Bay Area band parted ways with members pursuing various solo endeavors (most notably mainman Mark Eitzel) but the legions of patient American Music Club fans will surely extend a warm welcome to this, the group's reunion album, and it doesn't disappoint. Love Songs For Patriots is a suitably somber, burnished work that smoothly picks up where the band left off back in 1995. That means you can expect a consistently high standard of songcraft and musicianship on par with the likes of Robyn Hitchcock, mid-career Elvis Costello, and Red House Painters' Mark Kozelek. Really, the only thing that seems a bit out of place is the first song. It has a smoky, almost cabaret feel, but after that things settle into more familiar AMC achingly earnest, downbeat kind of mood.
MPEG Stream: "Love Is"
MPEG Stream: "Song Of The Rats Leaving The Sinking Ship"

AMERICAN MUSIC CLUB Love Songs For Patriots (Devil In The Woods) 2lp 17.98
Now on vinyl! It's been just shy of a decade since this beloved Bay Area band parted ways with members pursuing various solo endeavors (most notably mainman Mark Eitzel) but the legions of patient American Music Club fans will surely extend a warm welcome to this, the group's reunion album, and it doesn't disappoint. Love Songs For Patriots is a suitably somber, burnished work that smoothly picks up where the band left off back in 1995. That means you can expect a consistently high standard of songcraft and musicianship on par with the likes of Robyn Hitchcock, mid-career Elvis Costello, and Red House Painters' Mark Kozelek. Really, the only thing that seems a bit out of place is the first song. It has a smoky, almost cabaret feel, but after that things settle into more familiar AMC achingly earnest, downbeat kind of mood.
MPEG Stream: "Love Is"
MPEG Stream: "Song Of The Rats Leaving The Sinking Ship"

AMERICAN MUSIC CLUB The Restless Stranger (Warner) cd 15.98
AMC's first 2 albums finally reissued on disc. This is Restless Stranger, the first one. You still see Engine around in used LP bins, but Restless Stranger is really rare. I guess that's how Warner Bros justifies the price.

AMESOEURS Ruines Humaines (Northern Silence) cd ep 11.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We had sort of given up on ever getting this in stock, which was killing us. One of our favorite records of last year (one of Andee's top 10), a record some of us listened to EVERY DAY, over and over. Heavy and buzzy, but so beautiful and relentlessly catchy. Sure we've had black metal records in the past that were 'pretty'. Catchy too. But those records took their hooks and their soaring melodies and wrapped them all up in spiky blackness, subtly catching our ear beneath all the buzz, the prettiness more a byproduct than a reason for being. But Amesoeurs are completely different. It's almost like some shoegazey, indie druggy drone rock band decided their blissed out indie jangle needed more, well, BLACKNESS, and thus enlisted a corpsepainted frontman, with a demonic banshee shriek, to wail and gnash his teeth over the band's nearly perfect buzzing pop.
From the first notes of the opener "Bonheur Ampute" you're hooked. If you didn't know what was playing, you'd probably be thinking it was some lost Swervedriver track, or some modern band channeling My Bloody Valentine and Ride. The music is that gorgeous. The guitars are thick and heavy, a little buzzy, but they glisten and sparkle, and well, jangle. The opening riff is so impossibly catchy, sort of minor key, but only barely, this is simply perfect pop music wrapped in a thin layer of buzzing blackness. There's no denying it. A loping riff, underpinned by strummed acoustic guitar, while over the top guitars keen and soar, melodies intertwine, harmonies drift and shimmer, even the black metal shriek starts to transform into something less evil becoming more just another element of the blissy poppy buzz. Near the end of the first track, all the other instruments drop out leaving just the acoustic guitar, and when the band kicks back in, they go for it, transforming the track into some otherworldy buzzpop, that original riff ringing out, but over the top some gorgeously melodic underwater, blooping Pinback like bass lines and soaring angular guitar melodies.
The second track begins with a haunting spidery Slinty guitar line, minor key and skeletal, hovering in a wide open expanse of dark shimmer, when the band lurches into action, the main riff sounds like some classic Maiden hook, transformed into a loping pop song, the band eventually ramp it up, the drums becoming a double kicking blast, the vocals shrieking, but the main melody remains and the song becomes a haunting emotional minor key buzz drenched slab of shoegazer black metal, complete with acoustic breakdowns and a mysterious percussive coda.
The final track opens up with another gorgeous tangled bit of clean guitar, that turns into straight up clean ringing indie jangle, but surprises us with ethereal female vocals, which transform it into some nineties sounding dark pop like Velocity Girl or something. Eventually, a buzzing guitar joins the fray, and by the end, it's another swirling blackened slab of blissed out buzz. So fucking awesome.
Black metal record of the year! Of forever! And that's assuming that this even counts as black metal... Either way, this is absolutely essential. Black metalheads don't be put off by the prettiness, we love us some Antaeus and Katharsis and Darkthrone and all that, but this is just so goddamn good. And all you indie rock mix tape makers, try blowing somebody's mind by slipping one of these tracks into your next mix, right there between Spoon and Pavement. The perfect black metal gateway drug...
And be sure to check out Amesoeurs mainman Neige's other bands, Alcest, who take the blissed out pop thing even further, and Peste Noire, a more black, but equally strange and pretty outfit.
MPEG Stream: "Bonheur Ampute"
MPEG Stream: "Ruines Humaines"

AMESOEURS Ruines Humaines (Northern Silence) 10" 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
One of our favorite blasts of black buzzing beauty available on vinyl for a super limited time, with new artwork and a printed insert.
Here's what we had to say about Ruines Humaines when we highlighted the cd on the list a short while back:
We had sort of given up on ever getting this in stock, which was killing us. One of our favorite records of last year (one of Andee's top 10), a record some of us listened to EVERY DAY, over and over. Heavy and buzzy, but so beautiful and relentlessly catchy. Sure we've had black metal records in the past that were 'pretty'. Catchy too. But those records took their hooks and their soaring melodies and wrapped them all up in spiky blackness, subtly catching our ear beneath all the buzz, the prettiness more a byproduct than a reason for being. But Amesoeurs are completely different. It's almost like some shoegazey, indie druggy drone rock band decided their blissed out indie jangle needed more, well, BLACKNESS, and thus enlisted a corpsepainted frontman, with a demonic banshee shriek, to wail and gnash his teeth over the band's nearly perfect buzzing pop.
From the first notes of the opener "Bonheur Ampute" you're hooked. If you didn't know what was playing, you'd probably be thinking it was some lost Swervedriver track, or some modern band channeling My Bloody Valentine and Ride. The music is that gorgeous. The guitars are thick and heavy, a little buzzy, but they glisten and sparkle, and well, jangle. The opening riff is so impossibly catchy, sort of minor key, but only barely, this is simply perfect pop music wrapped in a thin layer of buzzing blackness. There's no denying it. A loping riff, underpinned by strummed acoustic guitar, while over the top guitars keen and soar, melodies intertwine, harmonies drift and shimmer, even the black metal shriek starts to transform into something less evil becoming more just another element of the blissy poppy buzz. Near the end of the first track, all the other instruments drop out leaving just the acoustic guitar, and when the band kicks back in, they go for it, transforming the track into some otherworldy buzzpop, that original riff ringing out, but over the top some gorgeously melodic underwater, blooping Pinback like bass lines and soaring angular guitar melodies.
The second track begins with a haunting spidery Slinty guitar line, minor key and skeletal, hovering in a wide open expanse of dark shimmer, when the band lurches into action, the main riff sounds like some classic Maiden hook, transformed into a loping pop song, the band eventually ramp it up, the drums becoming a double kicking blast, the vocals shrieking, but the main melody remains and the song becomes a haunting emotional minor key buzz drenched slab of shoegazer black metal, complete with acoustic breakdowns and a mysterious percussive coda.
The final track opens up with another gorgeous tangled bit of clean guitar, that turns into straight up clean ringing indie jangle, but surprises us with ethereal female vocals, which transform it into some nineties sounding dark pop like Velocity Girl or something. Eventually, a buzzing guitar joins the fray, and by the end, it's another swirling blackened slab of blissed out buzz. So fucking awesome.
Black metal record of the year! Of forever! And that's assuming that this even counts as black metal... Either way, this is absolutely essential. Black metalheads don't be put off by the prettiness, we love us some Antaeus and Katharsis and Darkthrone and all that, but this is just so goddamn good. And all you indie rock mix tape makers, try blowing somebody's mind by slipping one of these tracks into your next mix, right there between Spoon and Pavement. The perfect black metal gateway drug...
And be sure to check out Amesoeurs mainman Neige's other bands, Alcest, who take the blissed out pop thing even further, and Peste Noire, a more black, but equally strange and pretty outfit.
MPEG Stream: "Bonheur Ampute"
MPEG Stream: "Ruines Humaines"