PHARAOH OVERLORD Horn (Full Contact / Svart) lp 24.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The good news: at last, we finally got some copies of this recent vinyl-only PO album! The not-so-good-news: we only were able to get a few, not nearly as many as we'd wanted. And that's it, when they're gone they're gone. So, if you're a fan of Finland's Pharaoh Overlord (and/or their mothership act Circle, which this could just as easily be, sonically), act fast if you want one.
Some further info: the four (long!) tracks on Horn were recorded live at something called "Space Force 1, 2nd Flight" in Lahti, Finland in late 2010. Three out of the four are exclusive-to-this-record PO compositions: "Lalibela", "Solar Stomp", and "Sky". And then other one's a cover of "Revolution" by Spacemen 3. All are riffy, raucous, rhythmic noiserock, with some stray pretty piano plinking and enthusiastic crowd response whenever the band takes a between-song break. And the packaging is sumptuous, the thick gatefold sleeve bearing colorful artwork, band name stamped in golden foil... Limited to only 500 copies and as we said, we got all we're gonna be able to get, ever.
Well, we probably don't need to say a whole lot more, but absolutely have to quote the blurb on the sticker on the cover. Pretty much sums it up: "Horn documents 'The Lord' in their rawest, nastiest live mood. Like an early Mudhoney jamming with Crazy Cavan and The Rhythm Rockers, or Sonic Youth tearing it up with Elakelaiset." Yeah, we totally agree! Even though we've never heard of ('70s teddy boy rockabilly act from Wales, it turns out) Crazy Cavan and the Rhythm Rockers before, nor novelty Finnish "humppa" band Elakelaiset, neither. But the Mudhoney and Sonic Youth, we hear, yeah.
'Tis wild stuff, not exactly in PO's "New Wave Of Finnish Heavy Metal" style like their recent Out Of Darkness album, but definitely ROCK, channelling Spacemen 3 (obviously, since they do the cover) and Funhouse-era Stooges. But noisier! It's blasting, throbbing, distortodelic overload, that WE might compare to a rabid combination of The Heads and Circle. Awww yeah!
MPEG Stream: "Solar Stomp"
MPEG Stream: "Sky"

PHARAOH OVERLORD II (No Quarter) cd 15.98
Yay. Pharaoh Overlord is the all-instrumental so-called "stoner rock" side project of our favorite Finns, Circle. Now they're back, with the aptly titled "II", and a new line-up that's apparently all members of Circle. Interestingly, while Circle themselves went kinda metal with "Sunrise", Pharaoh Overlord seem to have have mellowed out. Well not quite, as track 4 amps up the riffs a bit. But you'd be hard pressed to call this "stoner rock" anymore. It's more like a really relaxed Circle, still "heavy" but in a way that has less to do with being loud than being low (a bit like them other AQ-faves Bohren and Der Club Of Gore). Repetitive trance-inducing space rock, all deep, rumbling, and spacious. A real nod-scene. Metronomyic drums, meandering guitars, six long tracks of minimal, mellow menace. Even darker and dubbier than their first album. Definitely dubbier. But still totally psychedelic. Goes well with the disc Argentine stoner rockers Los Natas recorded for Circle's label Ektro, "Toba-Trance". And Circle fans will of course be pleased -- we're reminded of Circle's "Paint It Black" cover... Lovingly packaged courtesy of No Quarter, a label also responsible for some excellent releases from the likes of Earth and Laddio Bollocko.
MPEG Stream: "August"
MPEG Stream: "Skyline"

PHARAOH OVERLORD Live In Suomi Finland (Vivo) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Bow down, people. Just bow down. If extended, repetitive, droned-out krauty stoner prog a la Circle is your thing, then this disc definitely for you, surprise surprise. Sheer hypnosis. Utterly mesmeric. Sounds sooooooooooooo gooooooooooood. It's hard to think of these guys as just a band, the music here seems produced by some organic force. It's a living thing really. A throbbing monster of an album.
Just like their sister band Circle, of which they're all members, Finnish psychsters Pharaoh Overlord have built a discography (they're up to six albums now, counting this one) that somehow maintains a core identity yet always does something different each time out. They started off with the stoner rock riff mantras of #1, then went to the mostly subdued noirishness of II, followed that with the live-and-raw Battle Of The Axehammer, then came back with the krautrockingly Circle-like diversions of #3, all before delving into the absurdly headbanging metallisms of #4 that even added vocals to their previously instrumental lineup. So, now what? What next? A second live album, this time called Live In Suomi Finland, recorded in Helsinki in May of 2006. On it the regular Pharaoh Overlord lineup of Jussi, Tomi and Janne is augmented by two more Finnish friends, and special guest Hans Joachim Irmler of legendary krautrockers Faust! His electric organ grind here adds an extra dose of distorted drone to the proceedings.
Of the two live PO discs this is definitely the best sounding. It's not as raw and blown-out as Battle Of The Axehammer, it's got better fidelity, but if anything it's even heavier!! Perhaps its the additional "remixing" credited to Irmler, whatever magic he worked in later in the Faust studio definitely makes this more than "just" a live album.
There's five tracks here, though it's a very continuously flowing disc... starting with the infectious riffery of "Black Horse" (which has appeared previously only in another live version on Battle Of The Axehammer), followed by two totally new tracks, "Tutankharmony" and "Zero Gravity" that relax the volume and mood a bit with a sense of smokey, improv mystery. Then they launch into "Skyline", the heaviest cut from II, before winding up / blowing out with a quarter-hour rendition #1's "Mangrove". An incredible 50+ minutes all told. Boy, we wish we'd been there! Too bad SF-Helsinki flights aren't quick or cheap...
MPEG Stream: "Mangrove"
MPEG Stream: "Zero Gravity"

PHARAOH OVERLORD Live In Suomi Finland (Klangbad) lp 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Awesome! Faust's label Klangbad now has put this out on vinyl, an Irmler-enhanced stellar live set from this Circle side-project, originally released on cd by Poland's Vivo label back in 2007, and long out of print in that format. Here's what we said then:
Bow down, people. Just bow down. If extended, repetitive, droned-out krauty stoner prog a la Circle is your thing, then this disc definitely for you, surprise surprise. Sheer hypnosis. Utterly mesmeric. Sounds sooooooooooooo gooooooooooood. It's hard to think of these guys as just a band, the music here seems produced by some organic force. It's a living thing really. A throbbing monster of an album.
Just like their sister band Circle, of which they're all members, Finnish psychsters Pharaoh Overlord have built a discography (they're up to six albums now, counting this one) that somehow maintains a core identity yet always does something different each time out. They started off with the stoner rock riff mantras of #1, then went to the mostly subdued noirishness of II, followed that with the live-and-raw Battle Of The Axehammer, then came back with the krautrockingly Circle-like diversions of #3, all before delving into the absurdly headbanging metallisms of #4 that even added vocals to their previously instrumental lineup. So, now what? What next? A second live album, this time called Live In Suomi Finland, recorded in Helsinki in May of 2006. On it the regular Pharaoh Overlord lineup of Jussi, Tomi and Janne is augmented by two more Finnish friends, and special guest Hans Joachim Irmler of legendary krautrockers Faust! His electric organ grind here adds an extra dose of distorted drone to the proceedings.
Of the two live PO discs this is definitely the best sounding. It's not as raw and blown-out as Battle Of The Axehammer, it's got better fidelity, but if anything it's even heavier!! Perhaps its the additional "remixing" credited to Irmler, whatever magic he worked in later in the Faust studio definitely makes this more than "just" a live album.
There's five tracks here, though it's a very continuously flowing disc... starting with the infectious riffery of "Black Horse" (which has appeared previously only in another live version on Battle Of The Axehammer), followed by two totally new tracks, "Tutankharmony" and "Zero Gravity" that relax the volume and mood a bit with a sense of smokey, improv mystery. Then they launch into "Skyline", the heaviest cut from II, before winding up / blowing out with a quarter-hour rendition #1's "Mangrove". An incredible 50+ minutes all told. Boy, we wish we'd been there! Too bad SF-Helsinki flights aren't quick or cheap...
Just so you know, the box these were mailed over here from Germany in was kinda flimsy, and the lp sleeves themselves aren't that thick, so please don't be too upset if a corner of the cover of the copy you get is just a little bit bent, though we think that's more due to the shrinkwrapping than from the trip in the mail...
MPEG Stream: "Mangrove"
MPEG Stream: "Zero Gravity"

PHARAOH OVERLORD Out Of Darkness (Ektro) cd 19.98
It's "NWOFHM" in overdrive overload this week, with not one but two new albums from key exemplars of that Circle side project "scene" up there in Finland. The new vinyl-only offering from Steel Mammoth called Radiation Funeral, you'll find reviewed elsewhere this list, and then there's this, Out Of Darkness, the new cd from Pharaoh Overlord. With fists in the air (and tongues possibly not in cheek?) these two releases have really upped the ante regarding the METAL part of the NWOFHM equation.
Quick recap for those out of the loop: Finnish space prog neo-Kraut band (and massive AQ faves) Circle like to dabble in the metal realms, on their own albums and also by means of various side projects, enough of which exist to populate a self-proclaimed, quasi-parodic New Wave Of Finnish Heavy Metal movement, NWOFHM for short. These bands usually use metal "signifiers" for their own twisted purposes, making music that's as much experimental and pop and prog as it is metal, but done up in leather and spikes basically for fun.
Circle offshoot Pharaoh Overlord was originally more of a stoner rock take on Circle's motorik mesmerism, dark and psychedelic and heavy. But not "metal". Then they did the album entitled #4, which was NWOFHM almost to the point of being "actual" metal (though still totally repetitive and hypnotic a la Circle of course). But #4's follow up, their previous disc to this, Siluurikaudella, was, while we liked it quite a bit, a definite departure, more of a freakout/improv thing, definitely not remotely metal (or NWOFHM).
So for anyone a bit confused by Siluurikaudella, you'll be happy to hear that Out Of Darkness returns PO to headbanging territory, and then some!! Definitely a metal album, and a rockin' one. Well, it starts off with a lovely acoustic guitar intro, "Eyes Of The Pharaoh", but starts rockin' about 43 seconds later, when the title track erupts, total classic metal riffage with Danzig meets Hetfield vocals courtesy of the singer from US stoner metal band Night Horse, who also appears on the disc's killer final track "I Am The Light". He's not the only guest, as Circle's big hero Bruce "Jesters Of Destiny" Duff and his bandmate Frank Meyer from LA sleaze rockers Angus Khan have cameos too, providing some guest vocals and lead guitar on a few of the cuts here as well.
The nearly ten minute "Devastator" demonstrates that Pharaoh Overlord haven't abandoned the "Circular" style of minimalist repetition, that track devastates indeed with its seeming endlessness (which is awesome). Somewhat poppier is the next track, the chugging "Doomsday Mourning", that's got some psychedelic Uriah Heepishness to it, laden with synths, psych soloing, and dramatic vocals. And that's more the norm, this album being really pretty darn catchy throughout, Pharaoh Overlord mixing their '80s metal obsessions with some Teutonic '70s proginess, and whatthefuckever else they desire. Our heads aren't just banging, they're spinning. Turns out they weren't kidding with the song title "We Came To Rock"! Ok, it gets a bit goofy on the two Bruce Duff sung tracks (especially "No Speed Limit") but that's entertaining too, however for the most part this is a REAL metal / hard rock album, or at least sounds that way, being strange rather than silly when it's not full on metal. For fans of Circle, Queen, krautrock, Thor, La Otracina, Blue Oyster Cult, Accept, Judas Priest, Metallica, Steel Mammoth, Destruction, Anvil, Alice Cooper, Lucifer's Friend, White Boy And The Average Rat Band, uh, and everything else that's awesome.
Oh, if this wasn't cool enough already, love the outer space neon lazer tiger cover artwork!!! Purrfect for the tight ripping soundz within. The cd booklet also contains an interesting quote from R. Buckminster Fuller. Didn't know he was a metalhead.
FYI, there's another new PO album too, vinyl-only effort called Horn, that we're hoping to get soon too. Haven't heard it yet, don't know where it falls on the NWOFHM spectrum...
MPEG Stream: "Out Of Darkness"
MPEG Stream: "Devastator"
MPEG Stream: "Doomsday Mourning"
MPEG Stream: "I Am The Night"

PHARAOH OVERLORD Out Of Darkness (Svart / Full Contact) lp 22.00
Hahahaha! Now on lp, this great PO album. Here's what we said about the cd version when it came out a few months back, concurrently with Steel Mammoth's Radiation Funeral (funnily enough, this week there's also a NEW Steel Mammoth lp in stock as well, Nuclear Rebirth, reviewed nearby)...
It's "NWOFHM" in overdrive overload this week, with not one but two new albums from key exemplars of that Circle side project "scene" up there in Finland. The new vinyl-only offering from Steel Mammoth, and then this, Out Of Darkness, the new album from Pharaoh Overlord. With fists in the air (and tongues possibly not in cheek?) these two releases have really upped the ante regarding the METAL part of the NWOFHM equation.
Quick recap for those out of the loop: Finnish space prog neo-Kraut band (and massive AQ faves) Circle like to dabble in the metal realms, on their own albums and also by means of various side projects, enough of which exist to populate a self-proclaimed, quasi-parodic New Wave Of Finnish Heavy Metal movement, NWOFHM for short. These bands usually use metal "signifiers" for their own twisted purposes, making music that's as much experimental and pop and prog as it is metal, but done up in leather and spikes basically for fun.
Circle offshoot Pharaoh Overlord was originally more of a stoner rock take on Circle's motorik mesmerism, dark and psychedelic and heavy. But not "metal". Then they did the album entitled #4, which was NWOFHM almost to the point of being "actual" metal (though still totally repetitive and hypnotic a la Circle of course). But #4's follow up, their previous disc to this, Siluurikaudella, was, while we liked it quite a bit, a definite departure, more of a freakout/improv thing, definitely not remotely metal (or NWOFHM).
So for anyone a bit confused by Siluurikaudella, you'll be happy to hear that Out Of Darkness returns PO to headbanging territory, and then some!! Definitely a metal album, and a rockin' one. Well, it starts off with a lovely acoustic guitar intro, "Eyes Of The Pharaoh", but starts rockin' about 43 seconds later, when the title track erupts, total classic metal riffage with Danzig meets Hetfield vocals courtesy of the singer from US stoner metal band Night Horse, who also appears on the disc's killer final track "I Am The Light". He's not the only guest, as Circle's big hero Bruce "Jesters Of Destiny" Duff and his bandmate Frank Meyer from LA sleaze rockers Angus Khan have cameos too, providing some guest vocals and lead guitar on a few of the cuts here as well.
The nearly ten minute "Devastator" demonstrates that Pharaoh Overlord haven't abandoned the "Circular" style of minimalist repetition, that track devastates indeed with its seeming endlessness (which is awesome). Somewhat poppier is the next track, the chugging "Doomsday Mourning", that's got some psychedelic Uriah Heepishness to it, laden with synths, psych soloing, and dramatic vocals. And that's more the norm, this album being really pretty darn catchy throughout, Pharaoh Overlord mixing their '80s metal obsessions with some Teutonic '70s proginess, and whatthefuckever else they desire. Our heads aren't just banging, they're spinning. Turns out they weren't kidding with the song title "We Came To Rock"! Ok, it gets a bit goofy on the two Bruce Duff sung tracks (especially "No Speed Limit") but that's entertaining too, however for the most part this is a REAL metal / hard rock album, or at least sounds that way, being strange rather than silly when it's not full on metal. For fans of Circle, Queen, krautrock, Thor, La Otracina, Blue Oyster Cult, Accept, Judas Priest, Metallica, Steel Mammoth, Destruction, Anvil, Alice Cooper, Lucifer's Friend, White Boy And The Average Rat Band, uh, and everything else that's awesome.
Oh, if this wasn't cool enough already, love the outer space neon lazer tiger cover artwork!!! Purrfect for the tight ripping soundz within.
MPEG Stream: "Out Of Darkness"
MPEG Stream: "Devastator"
MPEG Stream: "Doomsday Mourning"
MPEG Stream: "I Am The Night"

PHARAOH OVERLORD Siluurikaudella (Ektro) cd 14.98
Our favorite Finnish hypnorock band Circle, and related offshoots, are always both doing the expected, AND the unexpected. Expected, in that in almost all cases, Circle hew to the repetitive, rhythmic, krautrock-inspired "circular" grooves from whence they get their name. Yet, while adhering to that basic concept, they've managed to put out umpteen dozen upon dozen albums that are all completely different... some spacey and pretty, some heavy and riffy, some with Gregorian style chant, some with operatic metallic vokills, and all brilliant (ask anybody, but especially us!). Pharaoh Overlord, one of the more popular and prolific Circle "side projects", with a lineup almost (exactly?) the same as Circle, has pretty much followed the same path. Originally, ostensibly a "stoner rock" version of Circle (which you can definitely hear on the live lp we recently listed), they got even more truly metal with their last album, #4, maybe the ultimate "NWOFHM" statement from the Circle camp.
That said, this new, 5th album from Pharaoh Overlord is way more unexpected than the expected, content-wise!! Totally different from #4 for sure. There's three long, instrumental tracks here, and each of them is quite different too. The disc begins with the 22:33 of "Vesitorni", a seemingly improvised piece that's extremely quiet, abstract, mysterious. Sudden skitter of the drums. Chiming glimmer of the guitars. Shimmering cymbals. Pulsation of the bass. It's almost "onkyo" in its sparse, low-key, quasi-jazz loveliness. Really nice, and really not at all remotely "NWOFHM".
Then, wham! Maybe we shouldn't even warn you. Track two, "Valujuhla" (12:47) erupts with a frenzy of loud, chaotic, freeform freaking-out. Here is where we wonder, is Siluurikaudella the record on which the PO/Circle guys go free jazz? Seems like it. And it kinda makes sense. Up until now, they've been famed for their motorik, locked-in, precise clockwork rhythms. With this, it's like those clockwork gears have come unsprung, gone completely haywire, and everyone's playing everything all at once, anarchy reigns! It had to happen, something had to give. But, then this track too quiets down, and we can tell Pharaoh Overlord still have it under control.
Following that, the eighteen minute "Piirros" takes over the final portion of the disc. It shares some similarities with the first track, staying mostly quiet and abstract. But it's definitely got more of a propulsive groove-shuffle going on underneath. And rather than abstract jazz... it reminds us of an abstract, creaky, cavernous blues. Super moody and dark and weird. Probably our favorite of the three.
So, PO definitely surprised us with this one. Took a short while to get our heads around. But now we're definitely digging it. And think that Circle, Doktor Kettu, Keiji Haino, Nels Cline, Tetuzi Akiyama, even Jandek fans will totally dig it too. Improvised, instrumental, eccentric! Oh yeah.
MPEG Stream: "Vesitorni"
MPEG Stream: "Valujuhla"
MPEG Stream: "Piirros"

PHARAOH OVERLORD The Battle Of The Axehammer (Live) (Last Visible Dog) cd 9.98
The Last Visible Dog label, who specialize in some of our favorite genres (improv drones, Finnish weirdness, Japanese free-psych, NZ noise) sadly seems to be winding things down, but we did just arrange to restock a whole bunch of their stuff to sell at a "nice price" (thanks Chris!), including a few old aQ faves that we got enough of to relist, though these are the very last copies we're gonna have, ever...
Here's what we said about this one, a PO essential, back in 2004:
The wonderfully named Pharaoh Overlord, as you hopefully know already, is the instrumental psychedelic "stoner rock" side project of Circle's Jussi Lehtisalo and friends. The repetitive pulse of Circle jacked into some amped up, blown out Kyuss-worthy riffage. Needless to say, awesome stuff.
Here comes these Finnish freaks' third album, and it's more like their spacey rockin' debut than the more experimental, mellow menace of Pharaoh Overlord II. It's a live album, with versions of two songs from their 1st album and one from their 2nd, plus two new compositions (also rendered live). And the nature of this music means that live may well be superior to studio, due to the element of psychedelic improv exploration at play and the energy being projected. And the speaker shredding "production" as well. Certainly in comparison to their first album, let alone the second, this is somewhat heavier and rawer, a real mantric beat-down from what could be a jackbooted, Iggy-less Stooges, jamming until the drugs run out. A rumbling, bashing, single-minded beast. Not unlike Skullflower's Exquisite Fucking Boredom. The live sound is gritty, super-sludgy, with a bit of that Doktor Kettu murk. Like one big throbbing distorto gland. A Julian Cope wet dream wethinks. Five tracks stretched out over almost one hour. They're marching towards oblivion and you'll be happy to fall in line. Hup hup. The applause from the live audience that ends each track is almost bizarre, not simply because it seems that such outbursts of positivity would have been preemptively silenced by the relentless negatory doom-throb of this music, but also because it doesn't even seem like there should be an audience at all. Pharaoh Overlord should be playing this music high on a mesa somewhere in a blasted desert, heard only by ugly, heavy-lidded lizards.
Nice title by the way. The Battle of the Axehammer??? Yeah! Great cover art too.
MPEG Stream: "Mystery Shopper"
MPEG Stream: "Black Horse"

PHILEMON ARTHUR AND THE DUNG Musikens Historia Del 1 Och 2 (Silence) cd 17.98

PHILEMON ARTHUR AND THE DUNG The Very Pest Of (Silence) cd 17.98

PICCHIO DAL POZZO s/t (Vinyl Magic) cd 26.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Perhaps you're familiar with that kick ass Prog Is Not A Four Letter Word compilation on Delay 68? It's sure been a big seller hereabouts. One of the bands that compiler Andy Votel introduced us to via that collection was an Italian group by the name of Picchio Dal Pozzo. Their track "La Merta", in all its gently gorgeous glory of tinkling, buzzing, and wordless vocal "aaaah-aaaahhing", made us curious to hear more by them! Turns out "La Merta" was taken from this, their self-titled debut originally released in 1976 on the Grog label. And indeed it was indicative of the mellow and mysterious delights of this album, a work of cosmically spacey, jazz-inflected, psychedelic chamber-prog inspired by the Canterbury sounds of Robert Wyatt era Soft Machine (indeed, it bears a dedication to "Roberto Viatti" aka Robert Wyatt). They were probably into Terry Riley too. Yet nothing prepared us for track three, this record's ten-minute masterpiece, the suite entitled "Seppia" that freakin' blew our minds with its droning, throbbing, Magmoid, synth-sizzling heaviness. Wow! Have the Boredoms heard this?? So, a very nice record indeed, with at least one track that just takes things to another level entirely. Seriously, if you're like us you'll being playing that one over and over again. Instantly a new Italian prog fave here -- half the AQ staff bought copies for themselves!
MPEG Stream: "La Merta"
MPEG Stream: "Seppia"
MPEG Stream: "La Bolla"

PICCHIO DAL POZZO s/t (Goodfellas) cd 28.00
The prog-fiends at AQ (and everyone at AQ is a prog-fiend when it comes to Picchio Dal Pozzo) were stoked to find a new reissue had just come out of this awesome Italian prog album, and on vinyl now, too!!!
Here's what we said a while back about the previous, cd only reish:
Perhaps you're familiar with that kick ass Prog Is Not A Four Letter Word compilation? It's sure been a big seller hereabouts. One of the bands that compiler Andy Votel introduced us to via that collection was an Italian group by the name of Picchio Dal Pozzo. Their track "La Merta", in all its gently gorgeous glory of tinkling, buzzing, and wordless vocal "aaaah-aaaahhing", made us curious to hear more by them! Turns out "La Merta" was taken from this, their self-titled debut originally released in 1976 on the Grog label. And indeed it was indicative of the mellow and mysterious delights of this album, a work of cosmically spacey, jazz-inflected, psychedelic chamber-prog inspired by the Canterbury sounds of Robert Wyatt era Soft Machine (indeed, it bears a dedication to "Roberto Viatti" aka Robert Wyatt). They were probably into Terry Riley too. Yet nothing prepared us for track three, this record's ten-minute masterpiece, the suite entitled "Seppia" that freakin' blew our minds with its droning, throbbing, Magmoid, synth-sizzling heaviness. Wow! Have the Boredoms heard this?? So, a very nice record indeed, with at least one track that just takes things to another level entirely. Seriously, if you're like us you'll being playing that one over and over again. Instantly a new Italian prog fave here - half the AQ staff bought copies for themselves!
MPEG Stream: "La Merta"
MPEG Stream: "Seppia"
MPEG Stream: "La Bolla"

PICCHIO DAL POZZO s/t (Goodfellas) lp 30.00
The prog-fiends at AQ (and everyone at AQ is a prog-fiend when it comes to Picchio Dal Pozzo) were stoked to find a new reissue had just come out of this awesome Italian prog album, and on vinyl now, too!!!
Here's what we said a while back about the previous, cd only reish:
Perhaps you're familiar with that kick ass Prog Is Not A Four Letter Word compilation? It's sure been a big seller hereabouts. One of the bands that compiler Andy Votel introduced us to via that collection was an Italian group by the name of Picchio Dal Pozzo. Their track "La Merta", in all its gently gorgeous glory of tinkling, buzzing, and wordless vocal "aaaah-aaaahhing", made us curious to hear more by them! Turns out "La Merta" was taken from this, their self-titled debut originally released in 1976 on the Grog label. And indeed it was indicative of the mellow and mysterious delights of this album, a work of cosmically spacey, jazz-inflected, psychedelic chamber-prog inspired by the Canterbury sounds of Robert Wyatt era Soft Machine (indeed, it bears a dedication to "Roberto Viatti" aka Robert Wyatt). They were probably into Terry Riley too. Yet nothing prepared us for track three, this record's ten-minute masterpiece, the suite entitled "Seppia" that freakin' blew our minds with its droning, throbbing, Magmoid, synth-sizzling heaviness. Wow! Have the Boredoms heard this?? So, a very nice record indeed, with at least one track that just takes things to another level entirely. Seriously, if you're like us you'll being playing that one over and over again. Instantly a new Italian prog fave here - half the AQ staff bought copies for themselves!
MPEG Stream: "La Merta"
MPEG Stream: "Seppia"
MPEG Stream: "La Bolla"

PIENZA ETHNORKESTRA Indiens D'Europe (12 Productions) cd 22.00
Prog rock and/or Magma fans, pay attention: what we've got here is a smokin' live album from a three-piece instrumental group featuring current Magma guitarist James MacGaw. He's on electric bass here, joined by drummer Daniel Jeand'heur and Thierry Bruneau on "vielle a roue". What's that? Some sort of traditional French hurdy-gurdy type of instrument, apparently. And that's what gives the Pienza Ethnorkestra their special flavor. MacGaw's burbling, burping basslines and Jeand'heur's propulsive, peppery battery are exciting enough, but add to that the wild fiddle-ish flights of melody and stretches of melancholic drone from Bruneau's ancient instrument and you've got an amazing hybrid of a Magmoid rhythm section and a Balkan gypsy wedding band. Indeed, several of the tracks here are traditional Bulgarian and Hungarian folk tunes, fitting in perfectly with the originals written by this "ethnorkestra".
To reference two AQ faves with Eastern European influences, we'd say that the frenzied energy with which Pienza Ethnorkestra approach this material (and the occasional electric-guitar like distortion applied to the vielle a roue) make this sound more like Tatsuya Yoshida's Koenjihyakkei (with strings) than it does like Steven R. Smith's Hala Strana. That this is a live recording only increases our amazement at how much these three kick ass. And the audience whoops it up appropriately. You might too, listening to his at home.
MPEG Stream: "Ali Lennti"
MPEG Stream: "Gengis Khan"

PINHAS, RICHARD East / West (Cuneiform) cd 15.98
Another early Richard Pinhas album has been reissued! East/West was his fourth solo outing and was originally released in 1980. As the title suggests, the sounds are definitely reminiscent of those from the far east and west, more so the former than the latter perhaps. That said, the eleven tracks are incredibly varied. Check out the kinetic shimmering cityscape of "Kyoto: Kyoto #3", the slinking Fripp inspirations of "La Ville Sans Nom" and Beautiful May", the fevered unprocessed and vocoder'd vocals of the driving prog "Houston 69 Part 1". As with most every Pinhas solo album (and those of his band Heldon), East/West is a wealth of cyclical rhythms, looming atmospheres and near-industrial textures. In fact, it may also pique the interest of fans of Download if it hasn't already. As we were digging this, it made us want to revisit the seemingly likeminded The Eyes Of Stanley Pain from 1996. Included are two previously unreleased bonus tracks!
MPEG Stream: "Houston 69 Part 1"
MPEG Stream: "La Ville Sans Nom"

PINHAS, RICHARD Iceland (Cuneiform) cd 13.98
Did you know electronic music pioneer and guitarist for the mighty '70s prog rock band Heldon, Richard Pinhas was recently in the Bay Area to play two criminally underpromoted shows? Yes, fortunately the word of mouth reached our ears at the very last minute, and some of us were able to attend this rare event. It was his first time performing in SF and only his second visit to the city in twenty five years. Less than ideal sound and somewhat awkward stage set up aside, Pinhas on guitar, his laptop collaborator Jerome Schmidt and drummer Antoine Paganotti made the most of the situation, holding the small audience rapt for the duration of their performance. Quite possibly the most intimate and casual setting in which he's performed in years. Pinhas' musical path has travelled from early loose rock jams into absolutely tight prog precision and outwards through richly textured atmospheric soundscapes.
Iceland is his third solo album which was released back in 1979. It focuses on the latter two directions, flowing seamlessly from one into the other and back again. The sixth track "The Last Kings Of Thule (Part 2)" highlights the deep influence Robert Fripp's snaking sinewy guitar work has had on Pinhas who slinks his way into far more dystopic territory. While the eighth track titled "Greenland" flows out into an epic expanse of overlapping cyclical synthesizer sequences. The album closes with the twenty four minute long Eno-friendly frosty shimmering dronescape of "Wintermusic". Meditative and beautiful. The album as a whole could be the perfect soundtrack to a winter night's Aurora Borealis. A majestic, hypnotic wonder.
MPEG Stream: "The Last Kings Of Thule (Part 2)"
MPEG Stream: "Greenland"
MPEG Stream: "Wintermusic"

PINHAS, RICHARD L'Ethique (Cuneiform) cd 15.98
Hurrah, we have a double dose of Richard Pinhas for you this week!
We've just stocked and reviewed the latest album from this French prog pioneer (Metal/Crystal, his collaboration with Wolf Eyes and Merzbow. Check out what we had to say about it elsewhere on this aQ List!), but we've also just gotten a reissue of a stellar album of his that we've never carried before! L'Ethique was recorded back in 1982 and orginally released in 1991. The ten tracks (the original nine plus one bonus cut) enshrouds your headspace with immensely atmospheric and propulsive French prog. Some here found it to closely resemble that of Magma as well as his own band Heldon (such as on "The Western Wail Pt. 1"). The latter isn't really all that surprising since his Heldon bandmates contributed a good deal to the proceedings. This album covers a lot of territory - moving through stretches of both glorious beauty (such as on "Melodic Simple Transition") and reelingly ominous aggression (such as on "Belfast" and the bonus track"Southbound"). Heavy with electronics, analog synthesizers and processed electric guitars, this is sure to satiate any cravings for the dark, heady and dystopic. Yes, highly recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Belfast"
MPEG Stream: "Melodic Simple Transition"
MPEG Stream: "The Western Wail Pt. 1"

PINHAS, RICHARD Metatron (Cuneiform) 2cd 19.98
Metatron is the brand new album from Richard Pinhas, well respected as both a solo artist and member of '70s French electronic rock trailblazers Heldon. He's joined by an equally revered group of players from around the globe -- his former Heldon bandmates Didier Batard (bass), Patrick Gauthier (synthesizer) and Alain Renaud (guitar), Magma's Antoine Paganotti (drums), Philipe Simon (violin), Djam Karet's Chuck Oken Jr. and his frequent collaborator Jerome Schmidt (laptop). The twelve lengthy tracks on Metatron effectively integrate the many facets of Pinhas' illustrious career from Heldon's early mid-'70s raw rock jams to their later jaw-droppingly tight propulsive synth prog rock to his slinky intricate Fripp inspired guitar pieces to his more recent solo shimmeringly hypnotic soundscape works. Yes, it's all here and yes, it's quite a feast for the ears. The only parts that we could do without might be the bits with spoken word, the music is just fine all by itself, Mr. Pinhas!! Ah well, that's just our knee-jerk reaction to that sort of thing...
MPEG Stream: "Aleph Number 1"
MPEG Stream: "Metatron(ic) Rock"

PINHAS, RICHARD Single Collection 1972-1980 (Captain Trip) cd 26.00
Richard Pinhas is the mastermind behind French '70s synth-prog-proto-industrial pioneers Heldon, who combined spacey analog electronics with punkish attitude, hypnotic rhythms, and Robert Fripp-style flights of electric guitar. Next to Magma they're one of our all-time favorites from France.
Japan's Captain Trip label has been digging into the Heldon/Pinhas vaults, bringing us some cool live recordings reviewed here not long ago, and now this. Packaged in a handsome silvery metallic mini-LP styled jacket, this cd collects Pinhas's various singles releases as a solo artist, under the Heldon moniker, and in various other earlier guises -- starting with his heavy psych act Schizo from 1972, who were obviously heavily influenced by Hendrix, sounding also quite a bit like the "heavy metal thunder" of Steppenwolf! Those tracks, such as "Schizo (And The Little Girl)" and "Paraphrenia Praecox", certainly fit with the so-called Francais Metal de Proto scene we've been digging lately, bands like Les Variations and Docdail. Cool! That's only the first four tracks and already we're pretty excited.
This disc also contains singles from Heldon, one-off spin-off band T.H.X., and Pinhas solo, all progressively getting more and more into a space age new wave prog thing that fans of the band Zombi will love, cult sci-fi writer Norman Spinrad even showing up for a guest vocals on the paranoid groove of "Houston 69". While some of these singles are are in fact extracts from albums (Heldon's "Baader-Meinhof Blues" for instance), others were only available in this format (like T.H.X.'s version of Joe Meek's classic instrumental "Telstar"!). So this is essential for any dedicated Heldon fan -- and in a lot of ways a great single-disc introduction to the the Pinhas oeuvre, one that's more eclectic and extreme than we'd previously imagined, ranging from Schizo's ponderous psych to the circa-1980, NYC Disco-Not-Disco cool of his solo singles! And as we said, this comes handsomely packaged, with a cd booklet including track details and images of each 7" release compiled here.
MPEG Stream: SCHIZO "Paraphrenia Praecox"
MPEG Stream: HELDON "Perspectives 1"
MPEG Stream: RICHARD PINHAS "Houston 69"

PINHAS, RICHARD Tranzition (Cuneiform) cd 14.98
Where do you go once you've collected everything Robert Fripp has ever recorded? (Yes, even including Sacred Songs, his mid '80s collaboration with Daryl Hall...). Try Richard Pinhas. He's likely to tell you himself (although it'd be in French) that he's Fripp's number one fan. Pinhas (and his old band Heldon) have a long history, since the mid '70s, of churning out minimalist prog records, many of which directly express a certain devotion to the sounds pioneered by Fripp and Eno with their multiple reel tape loop system (it was the title "In the Wake of King Fripp"â that convinced me to buy, not without a little embarassment, the beautiful Heldon record Allez Teia years ago). On Tranzition we find Pinhas & band (himself on guitar & electronics, with a violinist, a drummer and a "laptop boy") sculpting blissful and edgy atmospheres. The skittering drum beats are repetitious and seductive, the songs spacious and evolving. Perhaps Pinhas has also become a fan of Godspeed You Black Emperor! because he does resort on one track to an unnecessary and slightly irritating voice sample (as always, it'd be better if it weren't in English!). Also we note a song title from the Pinhas disc prior to this: "GSYBE (Thanks To)"! Even so, we can forgive this old-timer his indulgences (at least he's still checking out new music) and appreciate this rare example of a fan actually outdoing his heroes. If you're one of those who finally gave up on King Crimson a while back, you might find yourself getting excited over this release, hearing in it what could've been... [AQ thanks Loren Chasse for this review...hmm maybe we should put him on the payroll.]
MPEG Stream: "Tranzition"
MPEG Stream: "Aboulafia Blues"

PINHAS, RICHARD & MERZBOW Rhizome (Cuneiform) cd + dvd 15.98
Thee prolific master of Japanese noise, Merzbow, once again teams up with French '70s synth-prog veteran, guitarist Richard Pinhas of AQ faves Heldon. Their first collaboration, the double disc Keio Line from 2008, was quite a success, Merzbow's electronic noise tempered into more of a sci-fi synth enhancement to Pinhas's glorious pulsating psychedelic guitar drone. The two made such beautiful music together, that they continued the collaboration on another double disc, with Wolf Eyes (!) joining in as well. Now, here Merzbow and Pinhas are again, with a cd -and- dvd package, documenting a live duo performance (Merzbow: laptop(s), Pinhas: guitar and "loop system") at the Sonic Circuits Festival in our nation's capital, September 2010. The five tracks on the hour-long cd ebb and flow with shimmering glitch and stutter, it's a fuzzy warm bath of distortion/drone that's loudly blissful, and on occasion even melodic! Meanwhile, the dvd disc features video excerpts from the same performance, so you can see just what these two are up to on stage.
Lovely stuff, for fans of Pinhas in particular, and the not-so-harsh side of Merzbow.... As one reviewer has said, they're like an updated version of Fripp & Eno, and that's not far off the mark.
MPEG Stream: "Rhizome 1 - 010011010011011"
RealAudio clip: "Rhizome 2 - 100101000111010"

PINHAS, RICHARD (W/ MERZBOW & WOLF EYES) Metal/Crystal (Cuneiform) 2cd 22.00
Though it's 2011 already, turns out there's still some cool 2010 releases we haven't yet gotten a chance to list. We try to keep ahead of the curve, but we can't always get to everything of course. Here's one we don't want to overlook, though. A couple years ago, veteran French guitar/synth maestro Richard Pinhas (of Heldon fame) teamed up with infamous Japanese noise maker Merzbow for a fantastic double disc entitled Keio Line. That combo of '70s cosmic prog-rock electronics and harsh noise/drone was a winner. Here's the sequel, another double disc this time teaming Pinhas not just with the prolific Merzbow but also everyone's favorite underground American noise mavens Wolf Eyes!! Good lord. Batten down the hatches, people! And not only that, but Pinhas cohorts Antoine Paganotti (Magma), Didier Batard (Heldon), and Patrick Gauthier (Heldon, Magma, Weidorje), among others, also contribute on several of the tracks here... of which there are six, sprawling across the two discs.
The first track, disc one, entitled "Bi-Polarity (Gold)", is nearly 16 minutes of rhythmic spaced-out stoner-funk, with skittering drums and plenty of shimmering guitar widdle amidst much glorious hiss, feedback, and distortion. Groovy. Track two, "Paranoia (Iridium)" is almost as long, at 14:21, and is a searing, soaring, synthy soundscape, kind of like an extreme version of Fripp/Eno. Neither of those first two tracks features Merzbow or any of the Wolf Eyes, and that's just fine. Track three, "Depression (Loukoum)", at last brings those guest stars in, giving 'em plenty of space (the track clocks in at about 29 minutes), for a piece that's kind of a combo of the first two tracks. More free jazzish drumming, layered with droning pulsations and washes of shimmering guitar and electronics. It's sorta like Frippertronics meets a spacey Acid Mothers Temple jam, real nice! We are sure a lot of you, who like the AMT and the Necks and the more abstract Circle stuff, will dig this.
Disc two continues the collaboration, with two more epics from the full Pinhas+Merzbow+Wolf Eyes ensemble, "Hysteria (Palladium)" and "Schizophrenia (Silver)", both each almost 30 minutes. The harsh noise/power electronics element is definitely upped on "Hysteria", which starts off like a field recording from a mad scientist's laboratory and by the end gets quite destructively distorted; very Merzbowian indeed. Awesome and satisfying. "Shizophrenia" is rather like "Depression", but rocks out much more, in a psych prog freakout kind of way, before its over. Wow. And finally, the disc finishes up with a solo, seven minute Pinhas piece, "Legend", a calming coda after the intense ensemble action that precedes it.
Gotta hand it to Pinhas, after 40+ years of music making, keeping yourself challenged and on the cutting edge can't be easy, but this is definitely one way (a great way) to do it. Meanwhile, Merzbow and the Wolf Eyes guys must have been floatin', to get to jam with one of the fellows who helped pioneer much of the music they love. Maybe next time Emeralds, Kawabata Makoto, or Oneothrix Point Never can pay their respects. Recommended, even (or especially) to those who are more used to buying releases on, say, Not Not Fun than Cuneiform.
MPEG Stream: "Bi-Polarity (Gold)"
MPEG Stream: "Depression (Loukoum)"
MPEG Stream: "Hysteria (Palladium)"

PINHAS, RICHARD / MERZBOW Keio Line (Cuneiform) 2cd 16.98
Yes, that's right. Japanese noise maestro Masami Akita, aka Merzbow, teamed up here with guitarist Richard Pinhas of pioneering '70s French synth-prog act Heldon in a Tokyo studio last year. An unexpected collaboration, perhaps, but a successful one - two action-packed discs worth! Here at AQ you could call us Merzbow fans - one of us even dutifully reviewed EVERY SINGLE FREAKIN' DISC in the 50-cd Merzbox that came out a few years ago. He's not only pretty much thee originator of Japanese noise but we still find him to be one of the genre's most interesting practitioners. But since Merzbow is, almost by definition, so prolific, we can't get excited about every single release he puts out (the obi blurb here claiming "He has recorded and released nearly 100 cds" may be the understatement of the century... isn't it more like 1000??). This one, though, we are quite excited about. 'Cause Pinhas is another AQ fave. We love Heldon, and also enjoy much of his solo work since the '70s, right up to 2006's Metatron.
So, what does the Merzbow-Pinhas summit sound like? It's plentiful and varied, but the basic impression is that of Merzbow's fried electronic noise zips and zaps like someone shooting down spaceships amidst Pinhas's glimmering, glorious Frippish guitar drone. Merzbow is credited with EMS Synthi A and "all noises" though Pinhas, with his guitar and "loop system" isn't exactly quiet. As Merzbow's machines emulate the sound of a sparking, arcing live electric wire, electricity shooting sparks in sizzling patterns, Pinhas keeps the pleasurable pulse of his guitar going and going. There was obviously much mutual admiration here, between "Merzdon" and "Heldrow" as one of the track titles puts it, Merzbow thrilled to play with one of his '70s heroes, Pinhas quite aware of how he paved the way for further extremes of experimental, electronic music, but not resting on his laurels at all. They bring out the best in each other, easily making this one of our favorite recent documents from either artist. Pinhas sure can't wimp out here, and Merzbow keeps his contributions psychedelically listenable.
This is available as a double cd on Cuneiform, or a deluxe triple vinyl set on the Dirter Promotions label. Expensive, but quite fancy.
MPEG Stream: "Chaos Line"
MPEG Stream: "Fuck The Power (and Fuck Global Players)"

PINHAS, RICHARD / MERZBOW Keio Line (Dirter Promotions) 3lp 42.00
Yes, that's right. Japanese noise maestro Masami Akita, aka Merzbow, teamed up here with guitarist Richard Pinhas of pioneering '70s French synth-prog act Heldon in a Tokyo studio last year. An unexpected collaboration, perhaps, but a successful one - two action-packed discs worth! Here at AQ you could call us Merzbow fans - one of us even dutifully reviewed EVERY SINGLE FREAKIN' DISC in the 50-cd Merzbox that came out a few years ago. He's not only pretty much thee originator of Japanese noise but we still find him to be one of the genre's most interesting practitioners. But since Merzbow is, almost by definition, so prolific, we can't get excited about every single release he puts out (the obi blurb here claiming "He has recorded and released nearly 100 cds" may be the understatement of the century... isn't it more like 1000??). This one, though, we are quite excited about. 'Cause Pinhas is another AQ fave. We love Heldon, and also enjoy much of his solo work since the '70s, right up to 2006's Metatron.
So, what does the Merzbow-Pinhas summit sound like? It's plentiful and varied, but the basic impression is that of Merzbow's fried electronic noise zips and zaps like someone shooting down spaceships amidst Pinhas's glimmering, glorious Frippish guitar drone. Merzbow is credited with EMS Synthi A and "all noises" though Pinhas, with his guitar and "loop system" isn't exactly quiet. As Merzbow's machines emulate the sound of a sparking, arcing live electric wire, electricity shooting sparks in sizzling patterns, Pinhas keeps the pleasurable pulse of his guitar going and going. There was obviously much mutual admiration here, between "Merzdon" and "Heldrow" as one of the track titles puts it, Merzbow thrilled to play with one of his '70s heroes, Pinhas quite aware of how he paved the way for further extremes of experimental, electronic music, but not resting on his laurels at all. They bring out the best in each other, easily making this one of our favorite recent documents from either artist. Pinhas sure can't wimp out here, and Merzbow keeps his contributions psychedelically listenable.
This is available as a double cd on Cuneiform, or a deluxe triple vinyl set on the Dirter Promotions label. Expensive, but quite fancy.
MPEG Stream: "Chaos Line"
MPEG Stream: "Fuck The Power (and Fuck Global Players)"

PLUTO s/t (Breathless) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Ok, here's this list's special treat for all you proto-metal fans: a reissue of obscure, early '70s UK hard rockers Pluto! This digipack reissue isn't new, it came out a few years back but we missed it at the time - and in fact, as far as we know it's out of print (the whole Breathless label being now defunct), but we found a handful of these at one of our suppliers and grabbed 'em all. So, they won't be here for long, act fast if you want one.
Pluto's sole album was originally released in 1971 (yes, once again, 1971 completely blows our minds, good grief!) on Pye's progressive, "underground" Dawn label. But the type of progressive rock Pluto plays isn't, y'know, like Yes or Genesis, or Comus for that matter (whose First Utterance was also a '71 Dawn release). No flutes or tricky time signatures. They just play poppy, heavy rock and aren't afraid to boogie. This digipack reissue contains 13 tracks in all, 3 of 'em non-album bonus cuts from singles.
Bonus single track "I Really Want It" is possibly the star of the show, it's been comped several times, on Dawn anthologies and so forth, and for good reason, with suggestive lyrics that are well matched by the song's slow, stomping groove. But there's LOTS of good songs here, from cowbell knockin' fuzz rockers to some more melodic, ballady, even Beatlesy ones.
Recommended for folks into the likes of early Wishbone Ash, Orang-utan, Leaf Hound, Human Beast, Power Of Zeus, Three Man Army, Luv Machine, Bubble Puppy, and other vintage, semi-heavy obscurities.
MPEG Stream: "I Really Want It"
MPEG Stream: "Crossfire"
MPEG Stream: "She's Innocent"

POLIFEMO II (Condor's Cave) cd 21.00
Hard-rockin' and sometimes jazzy progressive rock from Argentina, recorded in Buenos Aires in 1977. A four piece, guitar/bass/drums and the requisite assortment of keyboard instruments, including mellotron. Includes bonus tracks not on original LP. Lots of emotion and instrumental flash: psych-style guitar heroics, piano jammin', latin percussion, etc.

POSSESSED Exploration (Rise Above Relics) cd 17.98
First things first, this Possessed has nothing to do with the '80s Bay Area metal band of the same name. No, this Possessed hails from even further back in time, the early '70s to be precise. And that leads us to say this: oh man, if we only had a time machine! Sure we'd go back and kill Hitler's parents and buy Google stock and all that... but our time machine day dream today is dominated by a flyer reproduced in the cd booklet to this release, advertising a month's worth of "progressive concerts" upcoming at a venue, somewhere in England, featuring performances by T2, Judus [sic] Priest, Israel's Jericho Jones, Thin Lizzy and this very band, Possessed. Good grief. We'd have been very very broke blokes back then, spending our last dime, I mean, farthing, on going out to such shows! What a time for hairy, heavy proto-metal awesomeness!
Thinking along those lines, Cathedral vocalist Lee Dorrian *has* built a time machine of sorts, though -- his label Rise Above now has an archival/reissue imprint called Rise Above Relics, dedicated to unearthing the heavy sounds of the past for them to be heard again today. This Possessed album (along with Luv Machine, also reviewed) is one of the first releases and we've gotta say they've dug up a gem, hitherto unknown to us.
Possessed, who you'd think might be some sort of occultic, Comusy folk band from the name and the Art Nouveau, Aubrey Beardsley style cover art, actually play a kinda proggy, kinda glammy hard rock that definitely bears some resemblance to aspects of Led Zeppelin. Just coincidence that Possessed's singer and guitarist, the India-born Vernon Pereira, had been in the original lineup of an outfit called The Band Of Joy, which also included Zeps-to-be Robert Plant and John Bonham? In any case, Possessed's most notable attributes would have to be the sinuous, crunchy riffing of guitarist Pereira, and also his Plant-like lead vocals. Furthermore, the band's spiralingly complex and bombastic songwriting ventures into the variety of "funk" displayed by Led Zeppelin on such songs as "Trampled Underfoot". Then there's the acoustic break of "Exploration Pt. II", also very Zeppish to be sure, though besides Zep, we'd compare this to Thin Lizzy and also to obscurities like Hard Stuff and even AQ faves Zolar X!
Despite being so worthy, Possessed never released an album, though they did record one in 1971 that, due to label disinterest, was shelved (until now, this is it). Sadly, three key band members, including Pereira, died in a motorway accident in 1976 ("Driver of Pop Group Death Van Dozed Off" reads the headline to one of the vintage newspaper clippings reproduced in the cd booklet), bringing a tragic end to the hopes and history of Possessed. The '70s rock star glory experienced by their chums in Led Zeppelin was never to be for this ill-fated band, though things could have, should have, turned out much differently, as at the time of the accident, they were on the verge at last of a major record deal. And they were supposedly slated to play shows in the USA with the Sex Pistols, bizarrely enough. Of course, that never happened.
So we're left with Exploration, while not the best unreleased album of the era ever (Jacula? Bedemon? Sproton Layer?), definitely a pretty darn cool one. It's a bit raw sounding, maybe a still a work in progress with some of the riffing rather similar in a couple of the songs, but it's definitely something that fans of both Led Zep and all the early '70s hard rock rarities we love should investigate! Nicely packaged with a fat, 20 page booklet full of notes and photos, slipcased to boot.
MPEG Stream: "The Love That You Gave"
MPEG Stream: "Darkness, Darkness"

POSSESSED Exploration (Rise Above Relics) lp + 7" 27.00
Now on vinyl!! And with a bonus 7" single!
First things first, this Possessed has nothing to do with the '80s Bay Area metal band of the same name. No, this Possessed hails from even further back in time, the early '70s to be precise. And that leads us to say this: oh man, if we only had a time machine! Sure we'd go back and kill Hitler's parents and buy Google stock and all that... but our time machine day dream today is dominated by a flyer reproduced in the cd booklet to this release, advertising a month's worth of "progressive concerts" upcoming at a venue, somewhere in England, featuring performances by T2, Judus [sic] Priest, Israel's Jericho Jones, Thin Lizzy and this very band, Possessed. Good grief. We'd have been very very broke blokes back then, spending our last dime, I mean, farthing, on going out to such shows! What a time for hairy, heavy proto-metal awesomeness!
Thinking along those lines, Cathedral vocalist Lee Dorrian *has* built a time machine of sorts, though -- his label Rise Above now has an archival/reissue imprint called Rise Above Relics, dedicated to unearthing the heavy sounds of the past for them to be heard again today. This Possessed album (along with Luv Machine, also reviewed) is one of the first releases and we've gotta say they've dug up a gem, hitherto unknown to us.
Possessed, who you'd think might be some sort of occultic, Comusy folk band from the name and the Art Nouveau, Aubrey Beardsley style cover art, actually play a kinda proggy, kinda glammy hard rock that definitely bears some resemblance to aspects of Led Zeppelin. Just coincidence that Possessed's singer and guitarist, the India-born Vernon Pereira, had been in the original lineup of an outfit called The Band Of Joy, which also included Zeps-to-be Robert Plant and John Bonham? In any case, Possessed's most notable attributes would have to be the sinuous, crunchy riffing of guitarist Pereira, and also his Plant-like lead vocals. Furthermore, the band's spiralingly complex and bombastic songwriting ventures into the variety of "funk" displayed by Led Zeppelin on such songs as "Trampled Underfoot". Then there's the acoustic break of "Exploration Pt. II", also very Zeppish to be sure, though besides Zep, we'd compare this to Thin Lizzy and also to obscurities like Hard Stuff and even AQ faves Zolar X!
Despite being so worthy, Possessed never released an album, though they did record one in 1971 that, due to label disinterest, was shelved (until now, this is it). Sadly, three key band members, including Pereira, died in a motorway accident in 1976 ("Driver of Pop Group Death Van Dozed Off" reads the headline to one of the vintage newspaper clippings reproduced in the cd booklet), bringing a tragic end to the hopes and history of Possessed. The '70s rock star glory experienced by their chums in Led Zeppelin was never to be for this ill-fated band, though things could have, should have, turned out much differently, as at the time of the accident, they were on the verge at last of a major record deal. And they were supposedly slated to play shows in the USA with the Sex Pistols, bizarrely enough. Of course, that never happened.
So we're left with Exploration, while not the best unreleased album of the era ever (Jacula? Bedemon? Sproton Layer?), definitely a pretty darn cool one. It's a bit raw sounding, maybe a still a work in progress with some of the riffing rather similar in a couple of the songs, but it's definitely something that fans of both Led Zep and all the early '70s hard rock rarities we love should investigate! Nicely packaged too with tones of notes and photos.
Also includes a super limited 7", a replica of Possessed's ultra rare Zella Studios demo single!!!
MPEG Stream: "The Love That You Gave"
MPEG Stream: "Darkness, Darkness"

POTEMKINE Triton (Soleil Zeuhl) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Cd reissue of the 1975 second album from obscure French prog-fusion act Potemkine, a "Zeuhl" band in the mold of Magma. Not as heavy or dark as we were hoping for, but still it's cool, complex stuff. Includes tracks some from their debut lp and single as bonus material.

POWELL, ROGER / M. FROG (JEAN YVES LABAT) Air Pocket / M. Frog (Edsel) cd 15.98
Oh, wow. Finally found a reasonably-priced cd reissue of this freaky, far out '70s artifact, that we first heard of being raved about by The Seth Man on Julian Cope's Head Heritage website a while back. We're talking about the "M. Frog" half of this twofer disc (we'll get to the Roger Powell part, in a bit). Originally released in 1973, it's a rockin' psych-prog opus laden with copious EMS Synthi-A workouts and an anarchic spirit of anything-goes fun. This record was the vibrant solo debut from a Frenchman named Jean Yves Labat (aka M. Frog), who at the time was the keyboard player for Todd Rundgren's Utopia - that being the American pop producer's proggier-than-thou outfit, Rundgren's answer to English bands like Yes and Genesis, as you may know. So Labat was quite the keyboard wiz, and also a bit of a weirdo, almost becoming a Benedictine monk, before he gave that up for a life of progressive rock excess. The M. Frog album draws upon his schooling in avant-garde composition - the colorful cover art is actually a part of a graphic score done in Labat's own unique color-coded notation for synthesizer operation. But it's very much hippie, heavy rock n' roll entertainment too.
This album's opener and presumable alternate-universe hit single sold us right away - "We Are Crazy" lives up to its title, coming across like krautrock goofs Guru Guru jamming with Perrey-Kingsley, or Jean-Pierre Massiera endeavoring to outdo the Osmonds' "Crazy Horses"! The song is built upon catchy riffage with a TON of crazy synth action, and brilliant/dumb non-sequitur lyrics (about how they're crazy and stupid and lazy and if you understand you'll win a washing machine or a date with the Queen) that really drive the "We Are Crazy" point home. It's also reprised later in the album in an instrumental version (even more synth!!) and in both cases exemplifies Jean Yves Labat's statement of purpose: "I want the music to pop out. It's funny music. It's alive. It is for the living."
The next track takes the volume but not the weirdness down a few notches, the moodier "Champegarpaen" being a kinda krautrocky percolating groove, adorned not just with synth but with sawing violin, Munchkin voices, Gregorian chant, musique concrete effects, and cowbell...
Speaking of krautrock, some of this reminds us of Faust, in that it's more comic, than cosmic! Really each and every track here pretty wild, a manic mix of heavy rock jams, plenty of synth zips and zaps, and 'novelty' tunage replete with funny voices. There's some calmer, spacey moments too, as on album-ender "Relax Goliath" (such relaxation is needed by then). And Todd Rungren himself contributes a few fuzzed-out & synth-processed guitar solos here and there; not to be outshined, however, by Jean Yves' own indulgences in crazy complex keyboard solo sections too.
They really don't make 'em like this anymore, and M. Frog must be the ultimate at whatever it is, exactly. A worthy reissue we're so glad to have, done quite nicely with lengthy informative liner notes in the thick cd booklet, which also includes more full-color examples of Labat's unusual & eye-catching musical notation.
AND, that's not all, there's actually a whole 'nother album on this disc, by a totally different guy. That's right, the aforementioned Roger Powell, with his album Air Pocket. The rationale for putting these two together on the same cd is that Powell was, in a later lineup, also the keyboard player for Todd Rundgren's Utopia. Also both albums came out on the Bearsville label. But other than that, and total synth overload, they don't have too much else in common. Powell's brand of prog was less nutty, more cheesy, let's sayÉ but not without its charms. Air Pocket, which actually comes first on this disc, non-chronologically for some reason, definitely has got a lot of '80s glossiness to it, with drum machines and plenty of synthesizer wank - enough that it was voted 1980 Album Of The Year by the readers of Keyboard Magazine. The record starts off pretty cool, the spacey "Lunar Plexus" sounding like the lighter side of something along the lines of John Carpenter, definitely the sort of thing today's fans of Zombi/Majeure will probably like. Then, the futuristic disco new wave pop of "Landmark" adds vocals, it's dated but kinda nifty in a wayÉ the singing in particular kinda reminds us of XTC, for a moment anyway, maybe just 'cause Powell is English.
Air Pocket gets a little freakier on "Emergency Splashdown", with klaxon alarm sounds, urgent rhythms, processed voxÉ More blissfully ambient-sounding electronics are represented by the brief "Morning Chorus", with guitar by Todd Rundgren. And then, as the second side of the original lp really gets underway, Roger Powell demonstrates his true prog/fantasy allegiances on a series of instrumentals, with titles like "March Of The Dragonslayers" and "Sands Of Arrakis". Which range from bright and chimey TV theme song tuneishness to more moody swirling ambience. Overall, Roger Powell's Air Pocket is a lightly proggy, soft, synth-laden yacht rock record that's kitschy fun, and not un-catchy.
A bonus track by Powell is also included here, from a single he did in 1978, a slightly sinister synth version of surf classic "Pipeline", with a pounding bass beat. Good times! We probably dig that cover more than the actual Air Pocket album, in fact.
But anyway, we already said the real reason to get this disc is for the M. Frog half, otherwise unavailable on its own, while you can count whichever Roger Powell tracks you like as fun, free bonuses and forget the rest.
MPEG Stream: M. FROG (JEAN YVES LABAT) "We Are Crazy"
MPEG Stream: M. FROG (JEAN YVES LABAT) "Champegarpaen"
MPEG Stream: M. FROG (JEAN YVES LABAT) "Suckling-pigs Game"
MPEG Stream: ROGER POWELL "Lunar Plexus"
MPEG Stream: ROGER POWELL "Dragons 'n' Griffins / Mr. Triscuits Theme"

PRITCHARD, DAVID Nocturnal Earthworm Stew (Pacemaker) cd 15.98
Nocturnal Earthworm Stew? Ew. Well, perhaps the French title of this Canadian record will tempt your appetite: Bouillabaisse Nocturne Aux Vers De Terre. Sounds much tastier, eh? Actually as long as you have an appetite for unusual, analog-synth based, musique concrete fashioned psychedelia, you'll find this to your liking! Yes, that Hans Edler album isn't the only weird and wonderful, long lost '70s electronic music artifact that we've been digging here at AQ lately. Lucky us, we also just got in this reissue of an amazing 1976 album from one David Pritchard, a Canadian underground radio DJ who was so into the experimental electronic sounds coming out of Germany at the time (Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze, Kluster, Kraftwerk, and the like) that he started collecting the requisite equipment and began writing music that proved well worthy of his overseas influences. Seriously, this could be one of the best Krautrock rarities ever, if Pritchard were German not Canadian. His instrumental compositions feature both an array of analog synths (vintage machines cooler today than ever, the ARP 2600 and EMS AKS) and more conventional instrumentation (violin, guitar, drums, etc.) as well shortwave radio noise / samples and field recordings. All of which you'll hear, for instance, on the fifteen-minute album centerpiece "Thunderpeat", a true tour-de-force of headphone listening, as is the rest of this disc. Quite rhythmically soothing, but with challenging and unusual sonic textures, recalling everything from
Stockhausen to Eno to Dr. Who soundtracks to AQ-fave obscure krautrocker Gunter Schickert. Maybe because of the title, we had expected this to sound like some dark, scary proto-industrial thing, but instead it's remarkably pleasant, full of pretty little melodies -- including a synthesized version of "My Favorite Things". But although Pritchard was the first Canadian artist signed to Island Records, we can't imagine that Nocturnal Earthworm Stew ever hit the pop charts in Canada or anywhere else. It's just too weird and eerie and arcane. Despite how lovely his songwriting can be, this certainly does possess a hefty share of foreboding atmosphere, some of this (tracks like "Evil Orge Interlude / Satan's Seaside Walk" for instance) coming across like an ominous mixture of Tangerine Dream and Italian horror soundtrack masters Goblin. Not a bad thing! This cd reissue includes four bonus tracks and a thick booklet full of photos and informative text, including notes from Pritchard himself. Note to Canadian music nerds: this album also marks the recording debut of none other than Nash the Slash, who guests here on a couple tracks on violin.
MPEG Stream: "The Harry Parchment"
MPEG Stream: "Yellow Stickers"
MPEG Stream: "An Admission Of Guilt"

PROSCRIPTOR Thoth Music(k) (Tarot Productions) 7" 6.50
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
As much as it hurts us to say, it might just be time to give up on hoping for a new Absu record. That bizarre Texan horde is responsible for some of our favorite weirdo black metal ever. But it's been years since we've heard from them, collectively that is. We recently reviewed an electro record from Absu guitarist Equitant. Not metal electro, but real, squelchy, house-y electro. Cool stuff, but nothing we ever imagined hearing from any of the Absu guys, no matter how weird they were. So here we have the latest recording from Absu drummer Proscriptor, who in the past has dabbled in some serious weirdness outside of Absu, with a handful of strange ambient recordings, but this, this is so far out we thought at first we must have put on the wrong record. But as with most things Absu it didn't take long for us to become completely and utterly smitten.
Packaged in a mysterious silver sleeve, with bits of strange numerology and symbology, including an appropriately black metal Proscriptor logo with bat wings and candles and flames. So side one begins with tinkling new age chimes, very tranquil and serene, when suddenly very intense male female vocals, harmonizing, singing of the 4 Horseman, very haunting, almost cheesy, when the band kicks into a fill on rock jam, BIG drums, crunchy guitars, throbbing bass, heavy riffing, wild guitar solos... and then back to the weird dramatic vocals. It doesn't sound so much like metal as it does some sort of bombastic musical. Over the top with a through-the-roof WTF factor. But after a few listens, we sort of WANTED it to actually be a musical, we could imagine some sort of Bat Out Of Hell super stage show, with Proscriptor and his lady battling the Four Horsemen. So it was on to side 2 and if we thought it couldn't get any weirder, well, we were WRONG! Groovy almost Southern rock, but with harsh black metal vocals and bizarre female back up vocals, the whole thing sounding like a metallized Rocky Horror Picture Show. Some impossible mix of Venom and ZZ Top and... wait a minute, we suddenly recognize the song, the cover says it's called "Epod No Sknup Etihw", but it sounds, suspiciously like... THE TUBES. Holy shit! It's a cover of the Tubes "White Punks On Dope"! Again, WHAT THE FUCK?!? Sure, it's amazing, demented, tweaked, bizarre, but this is the drummer from Absu!!! Who would have thought?!?! Only makes us love him more. And for some reason we can't stop listening to either of these tracks... (the first of which, by the way, turns out to a cover of a song originally by Greek sixties psychsters Aphrodite's Child!).
Cool packaging, metallic silver jacket, printed inner sleeve, and pressed on the THICKEST white vinyl ever!!!

PSYOPUS Ideas Of Reference (Metal Blade) cd 10.98
Good lord. Our friend Ian Christe, author of Sound Of The Beast: The Complete Headbanging History Of Heavy Metal, happened to mention this band in passing in an email to us recently...something along the lines of, you're selling a lot of Psyopus, aren't you? Well we didn't want to admit to Ian that we didn't know what he was talking about, so we just went ahead and ordered this album figuring it must be something good. Well...that's fer sure. If you like ass-kicking ultra technical metalcore a la Dillinger Escape Plan, the kind of band that's got jazz chops and your head on the chopping block. And they're not just a technical tour-de-force, they actually have, y'know, songs. Freakin' impressive and insane... The drumming can only be described as "inhuman" while what the guitarists are doing is equally cracked. The kind of thing you'll play for friends just to see the expressions on their faces. Particularily if they're musicians. Obviously not for everybody, but if you're one of our prog/avant/metal customers, check this out!
MPEG Stream: "Mork and Mindy (Daydream Lover)"
MPEG Stream: "Anomaly"

QUINTESSENCE Self (Esoteric) cd 21.00

RADIOMOBEL Tramsebox (Transubstans Records) cd 14.98
In addition to the various Silence label restocks we've listed in the past month or so (Algarnas Tradgard, International Harvester, Harvester, and Trad Gras Och Stenar) we've got another, first-time reissue of "Scandinavian krautrock" for y'all. Radiomobel ("radio furniture") were an enthusiastic, if amateur, band of teenagers coming along a few years after the aforementioned acts, circa 1975, operating in a similar psych-prog space... Basement-recorded with minimal equipment (much of it home-built), the languorous songs found on Radiomobel's rare (100 copies pressed) private-label debut LP feature lots of rhythmic chug, meandering acid rock guitar leads, and chant-like vocals. Tramsebox is often gentle, but also capable of bearing down and getting heavy, always with a similar stoned vibe to the Trad Gras Och Stenar stuff... of course, this is something for those who already have explored all those great bands mentioned above and want more of that sound, just like these guys did (or should we say, still do, as it seems they were more-or-less active thru 'til the '90s and maybe even today!).
MPEG Stream: "Vl Hater Stenar"
MPEG Stream: "Three Miles"

RAG I RYGGEN s/t (Transubstans) cd 17.98
A heavy, hard rocking Dungen? From actually back in the day? That's kind of what this newly reissued (first time on cd) Swedish hard rock rarity sounds like. Recorded in 1975 by a teenage band with big league chops, equipment, and ambition, the sole album from Rag I Ryggen (Strength And Courage, in English) is what collectors/dealers like to term a "fuzz monster". And it is full of that fuzz we love. The Rag I Ryggen boys were basically trying to be Sweden's answer to Deep Purple and Uriah Heep. And while they've got all the guitar heroics, heavy riffs, and Hammond organ action required, they're a heck of a lot more Swedish sounding, in part 'cause they sing in Swedish (and sometimes English too, on such tracks as "Queen Of Darkness") and also because they bring in a lot of folkiness on tracks like "Jan Banan" that remind us of bands like Kebnekajse. It's very rockin' mix of melody, folkiness, Moog-ed symphonic prog bombast and '70s heaviness. What's not to like? And this reish comes with three live bonus tracks, detailed liner notes, etc. Nice.
MPEG Stream: "Det Kan Val Inte Varta Farligt"
MPEG Stream: "Sanningsserum"

RAIN Norsk Suite (Shadoks) cd 17.98
As much as we love the Beatles (and we do), we don't really find ourselves putting on Rubber Soul or Revolver on a daily basis. No, if we're gonna listen to Lennon/McCartney compositions, we'd rather hear 'em done a bit differently, like for instance rearranged by an obscure psychedelic orchestral jazz-rock ensemble from Norway, as found here. Recorded circa 1969-70, Rain's album features epic covers of Beatles classics "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "A Day In The Life", as well as John Lennon's own "Isolation", amidst a bunch of impressive progged-out originals, all heavy on the sweeping Hammond organ, fuzz guitar, horn arrangements, and grand Nordic vocals. The ambitious musicians in Rain shift from jazzy grooves to delicate '60s psych to electro-acoustic avant-classical experimentation (as on the stark and strange "Norsk Suite"), all except the latter staying nicely melodic as well as quite technically complex. George Martin & the Beatles were an inspiration of course, but also apparently Varese, Stravinsky, and Vanilla Fudge too!
This Shadoks release includes a 20 minute bonus track of free improvisation, as well as extensive liner notes in the form of an interview with Rain's guitarist/violinist, and plenty of vintage photos.
MPEG Stream: "A Day In The Life"
MPEG Stream: "Join The City War"
MPEG Stream: "Have You Seen Your Father's Face"

RAMEL, MIKAEL Exra Vagansa cd 21.00

RAMEL, MIKAEL Till Dej (Sonet / Universal) cd 21.00
The son of one of Sweden's most beloved musicians, Ramel meticulously recorded this psych folk rock album almost completely on his own, dumping mixed tracks onto one track, adding another track, dumping those down, etc.
Oddly, Ramel at times shares some of the exuberance and playful unpredictability of Brazil's similarly psychedelic Tropicalia sound (Os Mutantes, Caetano Veloso). Cool!

RASHOMON The Ruined Map (Film Music Volume 1) (Mirrors) cd 14.98
Another disc we've been meaning to list for ages. The first release from Rashomon, the new project of Matt Thompson, former and founding member of UK prog combo Guapo. Rashomon incorporates much of what drove the music of Guapo, avant prog, psychedelic rock, soundtrack music, even metal into their sound.
But Thompson is approaching this new music from more of a filmic angle, the sounds much more cinematic, which should have been obvious from the name of the project, the record's title, and even the songs, each bearing the name of a classic film. Might be a bit pretentious in other hands, but this is the guy who founded Guapo, his prog cred is solid as a rock, as is his instrumental prowess, and it's obvious listening to these songs.
How the music here relates to the various films, is a bit tough for us to comment on since, we're embarrassed to say, we've seen only 2 of the 8 films referenced, but we're certainly excited to check the rest of them out now.
The opening track is a dark brooding convoluted space prog workout, channeling Goblin, as well as John Carpenter, into an intense creepscape, all minor key and darkly ominous, with long stretches of haunted house synth and wheezing harmoniums, the drums complex, skittering amidst a winding droneprog jam, heavy on the low-end and the tension building shimmer.
The second track is all smokey and jazzy, a minimal shuffle beneath some atonal scrabbly Derek Bailey like guitars, the track soon morphing into creepy sepia tone music box melodies.
Over the course of the rest of the record, as the tracks slip from film to film director to director, Bresson to Suzuki, Starewicz to Shindo, Branded To Kill, Lancelot Du Lac, Onibaba, The Mascot, the songs follow suit, shifting from mood to mood, sound to sound, soaring strings, ballroom jazz, bursts of acid fried synth blow outs, tribal almost African sounding drumming, gypsy folk violins, super intense spastic freaked out avant metal damage, deep shimmering drones, long stretches of creaking industrial ambience, haunting bagpipe like melodies, moody abstract drifts, gently strummed guitars clouds of cymbal shimmer, a constantly shifting world of sound, deep and layered, expansive and indeed, so cinematic.
Fans of Guapo will want this for sure, but anyone into far out soundtracks, experimental soundscapes or avant prog should definitely check this out as well.
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!!
MPEG Stream: "Onibaba"
MPEG Stream: "Blast Of Silence"
MPEG Stream: "A Quiet Week In The House"

RATTO JA LEHTISALO Kopernikus Hortoilee Nakinkengassa (Ektro) cd 14.98
As you might have guessed from the review of Ektroverde's "Ukkossalama" above/elsewhere, and will shortly learn from this review, we have to say: the two new Ektro label releases aren't -exactly- our absolute favorites from our fine Finnish friend Jussi and his accomplices. Then again, that didn't stop Andee and Allan from buying copies! But Circle fans should know what they're getting into here: with the Ratto Ja Lehtisalo album it's a stab at vocal and instrumental synth pop (with lyrics like "heyheyshalalalalala") that features lots of Circle-lite spacerock synth-work. Cheesy '80s synths that is. Maybe they can't find cooler ones at the Finnish flea markets? Or maybe this is some sort of obscure and/or drunken joke. Not that it's *bad* or anything, we just don't understand, and would like it better if it wasn't so...smooth. It's very poppy and mild, with gentle psychedelic guitar leads spun out by Aki Peltonen (otherwise, as you might guess from the name, this is the duo of Circle bassist Jussi Lehtisalo and Circle keyboardist/vocalist Mika Ratto, here also playing drums). But fans of Circle's Neu!-inspired rhythms looking for a pleasant, sunshiney listen may well enjoy. It's nothing if not nice. So, check out the sound samples, see what you think...
MPEG Stream: "Valonnopeus"
MPEG Stream: "Avaruusshampanja"

RAVJUNK Uppsala Stadshotell Brinner (Transubstans) 2cd 29.00
This raw Swedish progg-punk band, whose name, delightfully enough, means "fox piss" in English, got their start back in 1970, a bunch of teenagers drinking beer and jamming and doing the occasional Black Sabbath or Jimi Hendrix cover. As they got a little more serious, they wrote more original songs, but jamming remained a big thing with them. They were part of the Swedish underground music scene in the '70s, playing the summer free festivals and hanging with freaks and anarchists and so forth... also they were friends with such better known bands as Guidbrallan and Samla Mammas Manna.
It wasn't until 1976, not long after they'd started calling themselves Ravjunk (named after some terrible coffee the drummer had been confronted with one morning), that they got around to recording an album, Uppsala Stadshotell Brinner, made on the cheap in their own, primitive but functional home-built DIY recording studio. They pressed up copies of the record themselves, and distributed it as best they could, indeed getting some good reviews and radio-play. It was to be Ravjunk's only album, but they did follow it over the final years of the decade, before their dissolution in 1981, with a number of 7" singles (not included here), the band apparently pursuing more and more of a heavy punk rock sound... which you can already hear hinted at on their album.
The album itself, is a heavily fuzzed out mix of bluesy jams, Hendrixian guitar wailing, krautrockish drone, and plenty of garagey proto-punk attitude, all recorded mostly live, with a raw, lo-fi sound... all the more charming for it, really. It's all here on this deluxe digipack double disc cd reissue, along with unreleased material from the Uppsala Stadshotell Brinner sessions, and recently discovered demos and even rawer live tapes, the complete recorded works of Ravjunk circa 1976-1977. It would have been cool if they had included Ravjunk's 1978-1980 singles too (one of which was banned in Sweden for political reasons), but there is -plenty- of music here, almost two hours of it, from the gruff blues punk of "Hey Little Girl" (something you might imagine the Baby Grandmothers would sound like if they'd heard Motorhead) to the brooding title track to the calm and blissful spacerock of "Nasten (Den Tysta Skogen)"... the krautrock of Can and the like is definitely an influence on these discs' many sinuous, rhythmic instrumental psych excursions like "Vi Ses (Vid Taj Mahal)". Other obvious inspirations include the Stooges, Trad Gras Och Stenar, Cream, the Groundhogs, Hawkwind, etc... the MySpace page for the (recently reunited) band even cites T2, Joakim Skogsberg and Magma! If you're into gritty '70s underground sounds, then this could definitely be your cup of fox's piss! Perhaps grittiest on the non-album material included, such as the 21 minute endless jamming rant and rave of the bonus track that ends disc one, "Naturbarn". (Meanwhile, the second disc ends with a 10+ minute live garage-psych punk stomper, a version of David Peel and the Lower East Side's "Who Killed Brian Jones? Was It One Of The Rolling Stones?"). Very cool.
MPEG Stream: "Hey Little Girl"
MPEG Stream: "Inferno (Maestro) part 2"
MPEG Stream: "Delerium"
MPEG Stream: "Snospar (Del 1, 2, & 3)"

REICHEL, ACHIM & MACHINES Die Grune Reise (The Green Journey) / Erholung (Melting Point) cd 21.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
How is it that these long overdue A.R. & Machines reissues just keep making us fall in love with Ol' Achim Reichel over and over again? 'Cause it's some of the best krautrock EVER that's how. Die Grune Reise is a re-release of the first official A.R. & Machines LP from 1970 and, while slightly less epic and grand than the blissful Echo (part of the double disc reissue we raved about a few months ago), it's no less mesmerizing, exploratory and exciting. Reichel's trademark meandering, repetitive guitar and percussion are in full effect -- spacey and grooving, but instead of totally transporting the listener into the realm of ether, there's something more rockin' and also sometimes ridiculous that keeps it in the realm of the studio. Well it had to be since EVERYTHING on here was performed and recorded by Achim Reichel himself, a total one-man-jam! Sounds like a whole hairy freak-troupe though. Die Grune Reise is like watching a preview of the even more awesome journey that Reichel eventually takes you on with Echo (which, by the way, is finally back in stock!). It's entirely possible that all the weird, sometimes goofy-hippy vocals on this album maybe make us a little self-conscious... Yes, there's a lot of the madhouse 'digga-digga-aahh-waaahhh!??" type vocals on here that at turns challenge and delight us, but they're tempered with a more than generous helping of signature chug-jams to keep us totally boogeying (dig the ZZ Top guitar riffery on track 2!) and lilting interludes to help us come down gently. When absorbing this album, it's hard to shake the very specific image of a naked, twirling free-spirited German longhair in the desert at night alone with his arms wide open holding a hand rolled cigarette/joint in one hand and doing graceful hand maneuvers with the other...and that's fine by us. We grok that dude and these albums. There's actually two of them (albums) here, as this disc also includes A.R. VI, Echolung, originally released by Brain in 1975. Compared to Die Grune Reise it's a bit more mellowed out, if anything more cosmic and spacey... real nice! Total krautrock essentials, both of these. Fans of both Can and Circle need to hear 'em...
MPEG Stream: "Station 1: Globus"
MPEG Stream: "Station 1: In The Same Boat"
MPEG Stream: "Gute Reise"

REVEREND BIZARRE / RATTO JA LEHTISALO split (Full Contact / Ektro) 12" 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Ratto Ja Lehtisalo are a weird band. Made up of half of aQ faves Circle, their sound is less krautrock, and more like some weird hybrid of eighties new wave faves, Oingo Boingo, The Fixx, Sparks, Talking Heads, but then Circle are pretty weird themselves, flitting from murky propulsive hypnorock, to bombastic metal to atmospheric drone to eighties style New Wave Of British Heavy Metal and back again. And the side projects, too many to name here, but needless to say, they are all pretty far out.
This here is the latest from Ratto Ja Lehtisalo, and find the band, doing what they do best, confounding and confusing, and even more confounding and confusing is that they are teamed up with the mighty late great doomlords Reverend Bizarre!! Sure they're both from Finland, and yeah, RB's Albert Witchfinder got recent aQ Record Of The Week recipients Quest For Blood signed to Jussi from Circle's Ektro label, but sonically, the couldn't be more different, and yet, weirdly enough, they sound kind of cool back to back.
Anyway, Ratto Ja Lehtisalo start things off with some demented court jester music, sounding very twisted and Renn Faire, before slipping into some moody almost Circle-ish drama, a weird almost-krautrock, but way lighter and jazzier, with chanted vocals that sometimes sound like Queen, sometimes like Circle, the first thing that came to mind was Cluster mixed with Shadowfax, which sounds bad, we know, but is more, just sort of, strange, it's like the music to some insane production of seventies mime troupe Mummenschanz, the band lock into a very Circle-like jam, but soft and fuzzy and jazzy, but just like the Circle mothership, easy enough to get lost in and carried away by.
The flipside comes from Finnish doomsters Reverend Bizarre, who like Tupac, just seem to keep releasing records post mortem, but heck we're not complaining ONE BIT.
A new track composed over an improvised drum track, and it's obvious cuz the drums steal the show. Huge roiling guitars, throbbing doomy bass, and those vocals, deep and resonant and soaring. This is, my friends TRUE DOOM! The track lurches and sways, grooves and swings, sometimes slipping into seriously dense tangles of angular riffing and freaked out drumming, near the end the band launch into a blissed out psychedelic space rock drift that devolves into a bizarre coda all bellowed vocals and wild drums, and yep, a DRUM SOLO!! Before slipping back into the riff and dooming their way to the very end. As always. awesome.
A weird and wonderful, and did we say WEIRD, split of far out Finnish freakiness. Super limited. Pressed on thick swirled opaque white vinyl, with killer cover art by Albert Witchfinder.

RHYTON s/t (Thrill Jockey) 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, sure, "experimental/improv/psych" bands based outta Brooklyn are probably a dime a dozen these days, so what makes the debut from this new Thrill Jockey signing worthy of glorious Record Of The Week status here at aQ? Well, for one thing, Thrill Jockey have had a pretty good track record in that area lately, with aQ fave bands like White Hills and Barn Owl, and fans of either ought to check out Rhyton. At least, we had to give it a listen, and when we did, WOW! Totally tripped out and hypnotic, stonery psych explorations embraced our ears - and we think gently tingled any mystic sixth or seventh senses we may possess. Their jamming has a fuzzed-out edge, and a definite exotic, Eastern vibe, buzzing with electric saz for one thing... as if they're not from Brooklyn, they're from Brooklynistan!
The mesmeric music of Rhyton is a mind-melting mind-meld involving three well-matched musicians, a supergroop of sorts, the trio consisting of D. Charles Speer from the No Neck Blues Band, Jimmy SeiTang of Psychic Ills, and Spencer Herbst from some bands we confess we've not heard of before. Speer is on the strings, playing electric saz, electric mandolin, and baritone guitar. SeiTang is on bass and tape delay. Herbst is on drums and percussion (and videocassettes, we read somewhere?). A good set up for playing something that's rock, but not.
Over the course of the five, mostly long, mainly instrumental tracks here, Rhyton easily convinced us to make this Record Of The Week, or maybe hypnotized us into doing so! We just couldn't say no to their repetitive, reverby bath of shuddering soundwaves, sub-bass pulsations, meandering raga-like "split stereo, dual amped" leads, and loads of oscillators, loops, n' effects.
Relatively mellow opening track "Stone Colored" eases us in, giving us a sense of, if not where Rhyton is going, at least how they're gonna get there. And, as the cliche says, the journey is the destination. That's before the 12+ minute "Pontian Grave" heavies things up even more, and the raw side of Rhyton's experimentation is revealed. And so it goes, Rhyton getting into outre modes of instrumental psychedelic possession, centerpiece "Teke" being the perhaps the most druggily dubbed-out of the album's varied transmissions...and then, on the fantastic final cut, "Shank Raids", we REALLY hear the Middle Eastern influence come to the fore. It's not just the electric saz they've been making use of, on this one the rhythms n' melodies sound straight out of the Turkish psych songbook, stately and spacey, but also gnarly, warped and distortion-damaged, almost what it would be like to Greg Ginn's Gone, or Black Flag circa The Process Of Weeding Out, attempting a Mogollar or 3 Hur-el cover, yeah! There's a whiff of Sun City Girls to this as well.
Eastern aspects aside (or not), Rhyton's unique vibrations are on roughly the same wavelength as those of such outfits as Carlton Melton, Davis Redford Triad, White Hills, Titan, Bardo Pond, etc., and thus this should appeal to quite a few of you. So we say, get it! And get it quick, as the compact disc edition, packaged in a slim handmade sleeve (abstract art glued on front, hand-stamped text on back), is ultra limited to only 200 hand-numbered copies!! We got a bunch, but that bunch is probably all we'll get. Meanwhile, the differently-appointed vinyl version is just a bit less limited, 500 copies made, and it comes with a postcard insert and free download code.
MPEG Stream: "Pontian Grave"
MPEG Stream: "Teke"
MPEG Stream: "Shank Raids"

RHYTON s/t (Thrill Jockey) lp 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
So, sure, "experimental/improv/psych" bands based outta Brooklyn are probably a dime a dozen these days, so what makes the debut from this new Thrill Jockey signing worthy of glorious Record Of The Week status here at aQ? Well, for one thing, Thrill Jockey have had a pretty good track record in that area lately, with aQ fave bands like White Hills and Barn Owl, and fans of either ought to check out Rhyton. At least, we had to give it a listen, and when we did, WOW! Totally tripped out and hypnotic, stonery psych explorations embraced our ears - and we think gently tingled any mystic sixth or seventh senses we may possess. Their jamming has a fuzzed-out edge, and a definite exotic, Eastern vibe, buzzing with electric saz for one thing... as if they're not from Brooklyn, they're from Brooklynistan!
The mesmeric music of Rhyton is a mind-melting mind-meld involving three well-matched musicians, a supergroop of sorts, the trio consisting of D. Charles Speer from the No Neck Blues Band, Jimmy SeiTang of Psychic Ills, and Spencer Herbst from some bands we confess we've not heard of before. Speer is on the strings, playing electric saz, electric mandolin, and baritone guitar. SeiTang is on bass and tape delay. Herbst is on drums and percussion (and videocassettes, we read somewhere?). A good set up for playing something that's rock, but not.
Over the course of the five, mostly long, mainly instrumental tracks here, Rhyton easily convinced us to make this Record Of The Week, or maybe hypnotized us into doing so! We just couldn't say no to their repetitive, reverby bath of shuddering soundwaves, sub-bass pulsations, meandering raga-like "split stereo, dual amped" leads, and loads of oscillators, loops, n' effects.
Relatively mellow opening track "Stone Colored" eases us in, giving us a sense of, if not where Rhyton is going, at least how they're gonna get there. And, as the cliche says, the journey is the destination. That's before the 12+ minute "Pontian Grave" heavies things up even more, and the raw side of Rhyton's experimentation is revealed. And so it goes, Rhyton getting into outre modes of instrumental psychedelic possession, centerpiece "Teke" being the perhaps the most druggily dubbed-out of the album's varied transmissions...and then, on the fantastic final cut, "Shank Raids", we REALLY hear the Middle Eastern influence come to the fore. It's not just the electric saz they've been making use of, on this one the rhythms n' melodies sound straight out of the Turkish psych songbook, stately and spacey, but also gnarly, warped and distortion-damaged, almost what it would be like to Greg Ginn's Gone, or Black Flag circa The Process Of Weeding Out, attempting a Mogollar or 3 Hur-el cover, yeah! There's a whiff of Sun City Girls to this as well.
Eastern aspects aside (or not), Rhyton's unique vibrations are on roughly the same wavelength as those of such outfits as Carlton Melton, Davis Redford Triad, White Hills, Titan, Bardo Pond, etc., and thus this should appeal to quite a few of you. So we say, get it! And get it quick, as the compact disc edition, packaged in a slim handmade sleeve (abstract art glued on front, hand-stamped text on back), is ultra limited to only 200 hand-numbered copies!! We got a bunch, but that bunch is probably all we'll get. Meanwhile, the differently-appointed vinyl version is just a bit less limited, 500 copies made, and it comes with a postcard insert and free download code.
MPEG Stream: "Pontian Grave"
MPEG Stream: "Teke"
MPEG Stream: "Shank Raids"

RORSCHACH Remain Sedate / Protestant (Gern Blandsten) cd 16.98

MPEG Stream: "Pavlov's Dogs"
MPEG Stream: "In The Year Of Our Lord"
MPEG Stream: "In Ruins"
MPEG Stream: "Drawn And Quartered"

ROTOMAGUS The Sky Turns Red: Complete Anthology (Lion Productions) cd 14.98
Woah! Francais Metal de Proto!!! Dunno if y'all remember a cd-r mix that was floating around a few years ago, featuring such obscure & amazing early '70s French proto-metal, heavy psych acts as Docdail, Les Variations, Chico Magnetic Band, Quo Vadis, Zoo, and this band, Rotomagus. It caused a bit of sensation 'round these parts. Seriously, there was some incredible, ahead-of-its-time heaviness on there. So whenever we track something down by any of those bands we get pretty dang excited. And this is the best reissue related to that to come along yet, an anthology of the complete recorded works of this group, responsible for the raucous, more proto-punk than proto-metal really track "Fighting Cock" on that comp, which also featured Rotomagus' equally radical singles tracks "Eros" and "Madame Wanda". Those are all here, of course, as well as five more tracks from 45s, and entirety of the band's even more maniacal final unreleased 1971 demo session, which includes rawer versions of "Fighting Cock" and a few of the other singles cuts too... 17 tracks in all. Quite a treasure trove!
Now, as we've previously discussed, a LOT of awesome music came out in 1971. But very little if any of it was quite as freaked out and fucking punk as "Fighting Cock"! Elsewhere, among the tracks here, there ARE some poppier, melodic moments, which only make the aggro acid rock explosions of most of the rest of the disc seem even more insane. Certainly the two flowery tracks from the band's debut 1969 single, lush and la-la-la filled, don't provide any warning of how crazed Rotomagus would sound just a year or two later. Too bad the band never got to record a proper album, but presumably the record company heard the full-length demo found here and, shocked, pulled the plug on Rotomagus's career, robbing the world of an early entree into a realm of Raw Power that it would take Iggy & the Stooges another couple years to achieve... Seriously, this stuff is proof that Rotomagus belong in the annals of the "early heavy", high energy division, alongside the likes of the Stooges, MC5, Sir Lord Baltimore, Jerusalem, Night Sun, Crushed Butler, Colored Balls, Cerebrum, May Blitz, and Detroit's Death.
So, if you want a disc full of distorted stomp, wailing wah-wah'd out geetar, and wild vocals, look no further! There's fuzz and FX a-plenty, plus schizoid proggery and other weirdness (like the chipmunk vocals of the single version of "Laureline"). The Hendrix-y title cut is almost tame by comparison to some of the rest of this stuff, which comes off like the Pink Fairies at their most punk... It's funny, France turned out some bands in the late '70s who sounded like the Stooges (Angel Face, Soggy) but who knew they had one this early too?
As with all Lion reissues, nicely appointed, with a 32 page booklet full of liner notes, in both English and French, including the (practically frothing with amazement and disbelief) review of the "Fighting Cock" single that the Seth Man originally scribed for Julian Cope's Head Heritage website a few years ago...
FYI there is also a double lp vinyl version of this planned for release sometime this fall.
MPEG Stream: "Fighting Cock (demo)"
MPEG Stream: "Eros"
MPEG Stream: "Laureline (single)"
MPEG Stream: "Hello The Binaries"

ROTOMAGUS The Sky Turns Red: Complete Anthology (Lion Productions) 2lp 24.00
NOW ON VINYL!!
Woah! Francais Metal de Proto!!! Dunno if y'all remember a cd-r mix that was floating around a few years ago, featuring such obscure & amazing early '70s French proto-metal, heavy psych acts as Docdail, Les Variations, Chico Magnetic Band, Quo Vadis, Zoo, and this band, Rotomagus. It caused a bit of sensation 'round these parts. Seriously, there was some incredible, ahead-of-its-time heaviness on there. So whenever we track something down by any of those bands we get pretty dang excited. And this is the best reissue related to that to come along yet, an anthology of the complete recorded works of this group, responsible for the raucous, more proto-punk than proto-metal really track "Fighting Cock" on that comp, which also featured Rotomagus' equally radical singles tracks "Eros" and "Madame Wanda". Those are all here, of course, as well as five more tracks from 45s, and entirety of the band's even more maniacal final unreleased 1971 demo session, which includes rawer versions of "Fighting Cock" and a few of the other singles cuts too... 17 tracks in all. Quite a treasure trove!
Now, as we've previously discussed, a LOT of awesome music came out in 1971. But very little if any of it was quite as freaked out and fucking punk as "Fighting Cock"! Elsewhere, among the tracks here, there ARE some poppier, melodic moments, which only make the aggro acid rock explosions of most of the rest of the disc seem even more insane. Certainly the two flowery tracks from the band's debut 1969 single, lush and la-la-la filled, don't provide any warning of how crazed Rotomagus would sound just a year or two later. Too bad the band never got to record a proper album, but presumably the record company heard the full-length demo found here and, shocked, pulled the plug on Rotomagus's career, robbing the world of an early entree into a realm of Raw Power that it would take Iggy & the Stooges another couple years to achieve... Seriously, this stuff is proof that Rotomagus belong in the annals of the "early heavy", high energy division, alongside the likes of the Stooges, MC5, Sir Lord Baltimore, Jerusalem, Night Sun, Crushed Butler, Colored Balls, Cerebrum, May Blitz, and Detroit's Death.
So, if you want a disc full of distorted stomp, wailing wah-wah'd out geetar, and wild vocals, look no further! There's fuzz and FX a-plenty, plus schizoid proggery and other weirdness (like the chipmunk vocals of the single version of "Laureline"). The Hendrix-y title cut is almost tame by comparison to some of the rest of this stuff, which comes off like the Pink Fairies at their most punk... It's funny, France turned out some bands in the late '70s who sounded like the Stooges (Angel Face, Soggy) but who knew they had one this early too?
As with all Lion reissues, nicely appointed, with extensive liner notes, in both English and French, including the (practically frothing with amazement and disbelief) review of the "Fighting Cock" single that the Seth Man originally scribed for Julian Cope's Head Heritage website a few years ago...
MPEG Stream: "Fighting Cock (demo)"
MPEG Stream: "Eros"
MPEG Stream: "Laureline (single)"
MPEG Stream: "Hello The Binaries"

RUINS Hyderomastgroningem (Tzadik) cd 16.98
Relisting this in case you missed it on our mystery themed in-between list last week (we gave it a new, expanded write-up just for that).
"Japanese duo on John Zorn's domestic label." Good grief, is that ALL we wrote about this when we first listed it way back when (1995)?? Might as well say that the Beatles were "a British quartet on London-based label Parlophone". There's a lot more to the story.
First off, bass and drums two piece Ruins are/were probably our favorite crazy underground Japanese band, next to the Boredoms. Drummer/mastermind Tatsuya Yoshida is a musical genius, and if you've been paying attention to our site over the years you're read our raves about many, many of his various albums and projects, from Ruins to Koenjiyyakei to Korekyojinn to Zubi Zuva... etc., etc.
Hyderomastgroningem (that's a mouthful!) was the first Ruins disc to come out on Tzadik. It features bassist Ryuichi Masuda, who also played on their out of print classic Burning Stone (1992), and may in fact be the only Masuda-era Ruins disc still in print, as well as being the last one that he appeared on (Ruins has had several bassists over the years, all of them amazing, but Masuda was our fave).
There's 20 tracks here of the Ruins' complex, heavy, stripped down Magma-inspired prog madness, some continuing the catchiness of Burning Stone and earlier works, others getting more imrov-like and experimental and noisy... super distorted bass, faux-operatic (and nonsensical) vocals, Yoshida's usual octopoidal drumming, repetitive rhythmic bludgeon... it's all here, along with unique touches to this album, like a track where Masuda plays a radio, for instance.
MPEG Stream: "Pig Brag Crack"
MPEG Stream: "Gravestone"
MPEG Stream: "Memories Of Zworrisdeh"
MPEG Stream: "Del Fanci Kant"