SHINS, THE Wincing The Night Away (Sub Pop) lp 14.98
What do you do when one day, you're just another decent, sort of well known indie rock band who writes really great songs and then suddenly you become probably the most famous indie rock band around thanks to a big Hollywood movie and waves of big time hype. Well if you are The Shins you just keep writing totally great songs and remain the same great band that made us all fall in love with them in the first place. It's so nice to see how unfazed they seem to be after their huge rise in popularity. You get the feeling that Wincing The Night Away is the same record they would have made, had luck not been how it was and they still remained a somewhat obscure (by mainstream standards) indie rock band from New Mexico. The infectious breezy melodies are definitely still there. Smart pop that draws upon the richest of influences yet now sounds so singularly their own. Songs that seep into your head and have no plan of leaving anytime soon. Wincing The Night Away also finds them exploring a more moody side. The Shins are like that great friend who gets famous but still calls every time they are in town and you aren't jealous of their fame just super happy for them.
Hey! Vinyl Enthusiasts and iPod users, The Shins got your back as this LP comes with a coupon for a free download of the record.
PS. The first batch of these come with an awesome 7" with a non-album track and the e.p. version of Split Needles, can't promise 'em forever but you'll get one with your purchase while they last...
MPEG Stream: "Australia"
MPEG Stream: "Black Wave"

SHIPP STRING TRIO, MATTHEW Expansion, Power, Release (Hat Hut) cd 16.98
Fucking gorgeous new album from pianist Shipp, who almost never disappoints. Moody, classical-inspired jazz that also makes use of the talents of Mat Maneri (violin) and uber-bassist William Parker. From lyrical and melancholy to nervous and energetic, this spans a range of emotions that would make it an appropriate (if avant) soundtrack to a Hitchcock film...
RealAudio clip: "Functional Form"

SHIPP, MATTHEW (MATTHEW SHIPP QUARTET) Flow of X (2.13.61) cd 14.98
Matt Shipp, piano; Mat Maneri, violin; William Parker, bass; Whit Dickey, drums. Beautiful, difficult.

SHIPP, MATTHEW Art Of The Improviser (Thirsty Ear) 2cd 16.98

SHIPP, MATTHEW Before the World (FMP) cd 17.98

SHIPP, MATTHEW New Orbit (Thirsty Ear) cd 15.98
A lovely new recording from celebrated jazz pianist Matthew Shipp and co. (his sidemen here being trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith, drummer Gerald Cleaver, and of course bassist William Parker). It's part of a new jazz series from Thirsty Ear called "Blue Series" (curated by Shipp himself, actually).

SHIPP, MATTHEW Nu Bop (Thirsty Ear) cd 16.98
Here's another new one from the prolific, AQ-fave jazz pianist Matthew Shipp, another entry in Thirsty Ear's forward-looking, Shipp-curated "Blue Series".
The futuristic jazz found on "Nu Bop" is quite similar to David S. Ware's recent "Corridors & Parallels", which featured three of the players found here: Shipp, bassist extraordinare William Parker, and drummer Guillermo E. Brown. On "Nu Bop", Daniel Carter handles sax & flute, and someone named FLAM is responsible for synths and programming (leaving Shipp to his customary piano, instead of the keyboards he played on the Ware disc). This group has produced a unique, enjoyable mix of electronic beats and droney synth atmospheres, and up-tempo, uh, "nu-bop" jazziness. The album's sci-fi theme is reflected in the somewhat hokey track titles, like "Space Shipp", "X-Ray", "Rocket Shipp", and "ZX-1". As with other Blue Series offerings (like that great Spring Heel Jack "Masses" disc from last year), these hybrid jazz/electronica experiments are both good places for the jazz-curious modern music listener to begin exploring, and for the avant-jazz-centric to branch out. The future sound of jazz? We'll leave that for others to debate. We just hope that Shipp doesn't take it *too* far (no DJ remix disc please!!).
RealAudio clip: "Rocket Shipp"
RealAudio clip: "Nu Abstract"

SHIPP, MATTHEW One (Thirsty Ear) cd 15.98
Much like William Parker whose latest release we loved and listed last time, Matthew Shipp is a jazz great whose plethora of releases makes it easy to kind of lose track and maybe pay as much attention as we should (like William Parker). While his willingness to coloborate and stretch and blur lines of genre is admirable we have to admit that we are sort of partial to him on his own. Something about when it's just him and his piano that is so compelling. Of course he is a ridicously talented piano player but it's also the way in which he can create so much tension and mood with the keys that makes him so special. Not often lately that a solo piano record carries its weight and keeps things interesting enough to attract our interest but we're not surprised that Matthew Shipp's the one to deliver such a record.
MPEG Stream: "Patmos"
MPEG Stream: "The Encounter"

SHIPP, MATTHEW Symbol Systems (No More Records) cd 16.98

SHIPP, MATTHEW DUO W/ WILLIAM PARKER DNA (Thirsty Ear) cd 15.98
Two of the most important and reliable players of the now jazz, with a new piano-bass duo session.

SHIPP, MATTHEW DUO With Roscoe Mitchell (2.13.61) cd 15.98

SHIPP, MATTHEW QUARTET Pastoral Composure (Thirsty Ear) cd 14.98
Just now getting around to listing this relatively recent release (from a couple months back). Of all the currently hip and prolific jazzers out there, Mr. Shipp is probably our favorite. It's just hard to keep up with all his releases, but worth it not to miss 'em, 'cause he's a great pianist and someone who shows that the "difficult" and the "lovely" don't need to be mutually incompatable catagories. On this outing he's joined by Roy Campbell on trumpets, etc. as well as Gerald Cleaver on drums and (another hip, prolific jazz dude we have to like) William Parker on bass.

SHIPP, MATTHEW, "STRING" TRIO By the Law of Music (Hat Art) cd 18.98
The strings of Shipp's piano, William Parker's bass and Mat Maneri's violin. No drums. Challenging, sad, rewarding new music from these great improvisers.

SHIPPING NEWS Flies The Fields (Quarterstick) cd 14.98
As much as we might be led to believe otherwise, post rock is alive and well. And we mean post rock in the 'classic' sense, you know, the late nineties, post-Slint, instrumental mood rock, June Of 44, Tortoise, Rodan, Engine Kid, Bastro and all those bands we loved and still love. As evidenced by the post rockisms of recent aQ faves Chevreuil, Isis, Conifer and now the return of one of the classic post rock bands the Shipping News. We are admittedly suckers for a lot of sounds, the buzz and blur of frosty black metal, the classic amen break drum and bass, big crunchy metallic emo, but almost more than all of those, we can't get enough of that stretched out, hypnotic and rhythmic, brooding, propulsive post rock. Sinewy guitar lines, wound around crisp, intricate drumming, throbbing bass and spoken /sung / shouted vocals. Well, to be honest we -can- get enough of the vocals, in fact the vocals here were almost enough to put us off this record completely, but there's just something about this record that grew on us, even the vocals, especially the vocals. It's got this super dark, claustrophobic vibe, expansive and loose but weirdly tense and paranoid so completely reminiscent of THE post rock record, Slint's Spiderland. And while every band that has employed the quiet-loud, hard-soft song structure has been accused of ripping off Slint, a handful of bands just happened to occupy a similar sonic niche, deftly exploring the structure of rock, dismantling it and re-assembling it as a crystalline framework, delicate, but razor sharp, wrapped in warm melodies, subtle and woozily minor key. But unlike some of their post rock brethren, Shipping News don't ever really get loud, their dynamics are conveyed instead through intensity, and arrangement, owing a sonic debt of sorts to bands like Godspeed and Silver Mt. Zion as much as Slint. Regardless of its influences or precedents, Flies The Fields is just a gorgeously languid, mesmerizingly rhythmic, completely hypnotic epic rock record. Post or otherwise.
MPEG Stream: "Axons And Dendrites"
MPEG Stream: "Sheets And Cylinders"

SHIPPING NEWS Flies The Fields (Quarterstick) lp 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
As much as we might be led to believe otherwise, post rock is alive and well. And we mean post rock in the 'classic' sense, you know, the late nineties, post-Slint, instrumental mood rock, June Of 44, Tortoise, Rodan, Engine Kid, Bastro and all those bands we loved and still love. As evidenced by the post rockisms of recent aQ faves Chevreuil, Isis, Conifer and now the return of one of the classic post rock bands the Shipping News. We are admittedly suckers for a lot of sounds, the buzz and blur of frosty black metal, the classic amen break drum and bass, big crunchy metallic emo, but almost more than all of those, we can't get enough of that stretched out, hypnotic and rhythmic, brooding, propulsive post rock. Sinewy guitar lines, wound around crisp, intricate drumming, throbbing bass and spoken /sung / shouted vocals. Well, to be honest we -can- get enough of the vocals, in fact the vocals here were almost enough to put us off this record completely, but there's just something about this record that grew on us, even the vocals, especially the vocals. It's got this super dark, claustrohpobic vibe, expansive and loose but weirdly tense and paranoid so completely reminiscent of THE post rock record, Slint's Spiderland. And while every band that has employed the quiet-loud, hard-soft song structure has been accused of ripping off Slint, a handful of bands just happened to occupy a similar sonic niche, deftly exploring the structure of rock, dismantling it and re-assembling it as a crystalline framework, delicate, but razor sharp, wrapped in warm melodies, subtle and woozily minor key. But unlike some of their post rock brethren, Shipping News don't ever really get loud, their dynamics are conveyed instead through intensity, and arrangement, owing a sonic debt of sorts to bands like Godspeed and Silver Mt. Zion as much as Slint. Regardless of its influences or precedents, Flies The Fields is just a gorgeously languid, mesmerizingly rhythmic, completely hypnotic epic rock record. Post or otherwise.
MPEG Stream: "Axons And Dendrites"
MPEG Stream: "Sheets And Cylinders"

SHIPPING NEWS Save Everything (Quarterstick) cd 13.98
2 ex-Rodan peoples.

SHIPPING NEWS Save Everything (Quarterstick) lp 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
2 ex-Rodan peoples.

SHIPPING NEWS Three-Four (Quarterstick) cd 14.98
Please note this is not a new Shipping News album! Although it does include three new songs, it's mainly a compilation of their three fairly recent yet now out-of-print RMSN series eps ("Carrier", "Variegated" and "Sickening Bridge"). With the releases (some subtly retitled) strung together in this fashion, the group's musical diversity is revealed over the course of the fourteen songs, making for a rather strangely intriguing journey. And it's a lengthy one too with a running time of 69 minutes. While the songs have all the earmarks of post-rock - stop-starts, loud-quiets, multiple time signatures and tempo shifts - there are also plenty more experimental excursions. FYI: the new songs are "Variegated", "Wax Museum", "The Architect In Hell" and "Everglade".
RealAudio clip: "You Can't Hide The Mark Inside"
RealAudio clip: "Wax Museum"

SHIPPING NEWS Very Soon, and In Pleasant Company (Quarterstick) cd 14.98
The family that brought us Rodan, Rachel's and June of 44 returns after four years with a new album and the results are, well, not worth waiting four years for. Decidedly slower and moodier than their previous releases, Shipping News are unfortunately starting to fall into 'Anahata'-era June of 44 territory. With production that is only marginally better than their live recordings, this album is likely to frustrate fans that eagerly await a return to classic June of 44 rock-rage. Shipping News is going somewhere, but who knows if it's worth the wait.

SHIPPING NEWS Very Soon, and In Pleasant Company (Quarterstick) lp 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The family that brought us Rodan, Rachel's and June of 44 returns after four years with a new album and the results are, well, not worth waiting four years for. Decidedly slower and moodier than their previous releases, Shipping News are unfortunately starting to fall into 'Anahata'-era June of 44 territory. With production that is only marginally better than their live recordings, this album is likely to frustrate fans that eagerly await a return to classic June of 44 rock-rage. Shipping News is going somewhere, but who knows if it's worth the wait.

SHIPTON, DOUG Dedicated Swallower Of Fashion (B-Music / Fat City Recordings) cd 16.98
Awesome mix, as we would expect from firsthand experience, when he DJ'd in the store!

SHIRAISHI & MICO Live Duo (PSF) cd 22.00

SHIRAISHI, TAMIO Sax Solo Performance At Subway In NY (PSF) cd 17.98
Part field recording, part free jazz improv. As the title indicates, solo sax in the subway, that's what this is. But definitely not your usual "busker" fare! Beautiful, but also definitely dog-whistle intense. Japanese saxophonist Tamio Shiraishi has been active since the '70s, and played in an early incarnation of Keiji Haino's Fushitsusha, we're told. He been living in New York City for at least a decade, collaborating with NNCK among others, and apparently likes to haunt the subway in Queens, with his sax, when he's in a pensive mood. The sax he blows here generates a thin, piercing, upper-register "whistling" sound, sometimes a subtle squeal, sometimes a haunting soul-cry, that we'd think would be lost in the clangor of the subway system. But, instead it sounds like he's playing in an abandoned area of the subway, it seems often almost totally silent, but for the saxophone. And except, now and then, for the sounds of a passing train. Clearly it's a lonely stop, late at night or very early in the morning... or maybe the sine-wave like tone of his saxophone has chased all the commuters away. When a train does "run though" the station where Shiraishi is playing, a whole 'nother dimension is added, the ambient, field recording character of this disc becomes apparent, that's definitely what makes this most interesting to us, as listeners. Rumbling, clanking, hissing, rhythmically choo-chooing in its subway way, first in the distance softly, then louder, then receding again to be replaced by the sax it didn't quite drown out... The loneliness of the delicately shrill saxophone soloing is accentuated as the train fades away, each a drone of its own, for moments in brief duet. More than the sum of its parts, we'd definitely rather hear Shiraishi in this subway setting than in a studio - and at the same time, it's NOT quite what you might have thought a subway platform saxophone recording would sound like. So, move over DJ Shadow, David Shire, and Charles Gayle... this is the new sound of the NYC subway system!
MPEG Stream: "track 1"
MPEG Stream: "track 5"

SHIRAISHI, TAMIO & SEAN MEEHAN In The City (Fusetron) 12" 14.98

SHIRE, DAVID The Conversation (OST) (Intrada) cd 30.00
Finally back in stock. One of the best soundtracks to one of the greatest movies EVER!! Really. The last time we listed this was almost 5 years ago and we just now managed to get another batch in. Here's what we had to say about this amazing disc:
This is simply one of the greatest films ever made. You can call AQ and argue with us if you disagree. This film is so personal and intense. So completely thrilling and perfect. And it features what has to be Gene Hackman's best performance ever (except maybe for The French Connection). Also features Harrison Ford, as well as Cindy Williams in one of the best scenes of all time (the scene in the park, filmed in San Francisco's Union Square). And the soundtrack is equally impressive. David Shire, who also did the score for the oh so amazing Taking Of Pelham 123, was presented with a new challenge in the scoring of the Conversation. First, Coppola insisted that the score be simple and stripped down, unlike the bombastic full orchestras Shire was so adept with. Second, the score was composed before the film was finished (like Morricone with Leone), which allowed the score to guide the filming and really help focus the performances. So the score ended up being mostly just solo piano (with Shire believing the whole time that they would orchestrate it later). Dark and minor key. Simple, but so goddamn creepy. It's absolutely chilling and almost too perfectly captures the paranoid unhappiness of Hackman's Harry Caul. It's way scarier and dismal sounding than anything more modern doomsters like Piano Magic or Tindersticks have been trying to pull off. Another interesting aspect of the score is the 'jazz records' that Hackman's character plays sax along to in the film. Those 'records' were actually composed by Shire specifically for the film and Hackman actually played the sax. He had never touched a saxophone before, so on the set he had someone teaching him to play, and he would spend his time practicing scales instead of going over his lines. Those tracks are on this disc, complete with Hackman's sax accompaniment. Another bonus on the disc is a full band version of the Theme From the Conversation, where Shire finally gets to flex his arranging muscles. This soundtrack has never been released in any form, so it's pretty exciting that the folks at Intrada managed to pull it all together and get this out (they actually had to do quite a bit of legwork, remixing, re-EQing, and re-editing to put this all together!). Not really available at stores, we're managed to get a few copies 'cause we're such slobbering The Conversation fans.
And for those of you who haven't seen The Conversation...WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU? WALK AWAY FROM YOUR COMPUTER RIGHT NOW. WALK TO YOUR NEAREST VIDEO STORE. RENT THE VIDEO. UNPLUG THE PHONE. AND WATCH. YOU WILL NOT BE SORRY. An absolutely beautiful film with some of the best performances, directing, and music you will ever see or hear.
MPEG Stream: "Theme From The Conversation"
MPEG Stream: "No More Questions / Phoning The Director"
MPEG Stream: "To The Office / The Elevator"

SHIRE, DAVID The Hindenberg (OST) (Intrada) cd 30.00
Finally back in stock! Another classic soundtrack from the man responsible for the amazing music from both The Conversation and the Taking Of Pelham One Two Three....
Even if David Shire had only ever done those two soundtracks, that alone would seal the deal, ensuring Shire a top spot as one of our favorite film composers EVER. Those two soundtracks are so amazing, so intense and emotional, incredibly dramatic and really really strange. The recurring melodic motif of the Conversation is one of those rare musical moments, a tiny chunk of music that once it enters your head, it sticks there forever. It helps that it's repeated over and over and over in the movie and on the cd...
But Shire did so much more, amazing films, ridiculous movies, tons of TV, silly and fantastic, dark and depressing, some were fairly surprising, cuz who would have ever assumed that the guy who did Pelham 123 and The Conversation was the same man responsible for some of the music for Saturday Night Fever and Norma Rae...
From the same folks who brought us the long overdue cd release of the Conversation comes the soundtrack to The Hindenburg from 1975. One of the final entries in the spate of disaster movies, Airport, The Poseidon Adventure, The Hindenburg is the story of the legendary 1937 crash of The Hindenburg, a German Zeppelin, which remains still one of the worst disasters of the 20th century and one of the first to become a media event due to live radio broadcasts and newsreel footage. The movie transformed the disaster into a mystery, a secret plot to destroy the Hindenburg. A pretty killer cast, George C. Scott, Anne Bancroft, Charles Durning, Burgess Meredith...
The music, while not as idiosyncratic as either Pelham or The Conversation, is still moving and dramatic, much more classic sounding old school soundtrack music, with haunting strings, playful little melodies, sweeping expanses of orchestral swoon, occasional bursts of atonal Bernard Hermann style high end tension, fluttering woodwinds, deep ominous low end, some more classical sounding string sections, it's all pretty great, even removed from the visuals, our favorite moments of course are the darker, dronier more tense and ominous bits, which thankfully make up much of the score.
Also included is a strange vocal track, called "There's A Lot To Be Said For The Fuehrer", a croony tin pan alley style ballad, and the whole record is bookended by newsreel broadcasts, the opening is a brief history of ballooning and the development of the zeppelin, all jaunty and playful, the closing is really intense, a rough scratchy live recording set to music of an eyewitness to the disaster, describing the crash as it unfolds, visibly shaken, his voice cracking as he struggles to keep from weeping. Heavy.
Certainly not the weirdest score, but soundtrack fans will definitely dig, and Shire fans should check this out for sure (as well as the recent Zodiac score that we also have in stock). And as with all the Intrada reissues, tons of photos and super extensive liner notes.
MPEG Stream: "Suspect Montage"
MPEG Stream: "Fin Repair Sequence"
MPEG Stream: "Boerth Sets The Bomb / Preparing To Land"
MPEG Stream: "Prelude To The Holocaust"

SHIRE, DAVID The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (OST) (Retrograde) cd 16.98
The nice guys over at (Film Score Monthly), a glossy magazine devoted to soundtracks, have issued this never-before-available soundtrack to fantastic 1974 suspense film featuring Walter Matthau as salty New York Transit Authority cop. The 12-tone jazz/funk masterpiece of a score was composed by David Shire, who is responsible for the all-piano score to The Conversation, among many others. So now Windy doesn't have to start a label to reissue this soundtrack, but maybe she will anyway -- Barbarella and Yojimbo still beckon...

SHIRE, DAVID The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (OST) (A&R) lp 11.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
LP version of the soundtrack to fantastic 1974 suspense film featuring Walter Matthau as salty New York Transit Authority cop. The 12-tone jazz/funk masterpiece of a score was composed by David Shire, who is responsible for the all-piano score to "The Conversation", among many others. We have had this on cd for a couple years, but now it's on vinyl too! DJ alert: Mixmaster Mike used the main riff from this soundtrack on his "Surprise Packidge" single, to amazing results.

SHIRE, DAVID Zodiac (OST) (Varese Sarabande) cd 16.98

MPEG Stream: "Aftermaths"
MPEG Stream: "Graysmith"
MPEG Stream: "Law & Disorder"

SHIT AND SHINE 229-2299 Girls Against Shit! (Riot Season) cd 16.98
When we first heard / heard about Shit And Shine, a mysterious noise rock collective from the UK, they definitely seemed custom made for aQ, multiple drummers, multiple bass players, someone playing lawnmower, a sound equal parts vintage Butthole Surfers, classic Hawkwind, and modern kraut-psych-drone-rock a la Circle and Pharaoh Overlord and Cave and the like, not to mention the garish, sometimes offensive album, art, the hilarious and usually offensive song titles, we were sold, smitten, totally obsessed. And thankfully, in the several years since that very first 12", very little has changed, almost all of the aforementioned essentials are still part and parcel of the Shit And Shine experience (minus the lawnmowers, but then the more we've come to understand these jokers, the more we realize that probably a lot of the 'facts' circulating about S&S is total bullshit, so odds are there never was any lawnmowers, sigh), and if anything, they've managed the impossible, getting tighter and more polished, more rocking, with better and somewhat proper 'songs', while simultaneously getting more and more fucked up and far out, taking super minimal elements and combining them into something massive and bewitching and baffling and heavy as fuck, but sounding literally unlike anything we've ever heard. Sure there are elements of plenty of stuff we love, but the way these guys twist those elements and cram them into whatever shape THIS is, just blows our minds, and eardrums.
So yeah, garish pink on white cover, masked lady with one of her breasts out on the front, a weird long necked headless super hero lady on the back, inside an awesome scary photo of two little girls, long hair obscuring their faces, standing hand in hand in front of a massive wall of amps, and song titles: "Have You Really Thought About Your Presentation?", "Goodbye And Good Gardening", "Girls Against Shit", "20 Years Of Caring For The Nations Eyes", "The Cusp Of Innocence, Prettily", "I'm Making My Lunch", " People Like You... REALLY!" and on and on, but none of that would mean shit if there wasn't a head spinning gut churning din to back it up, and holy shit do these guys bring the noise this time around.
The opening track, "Have Your Really Thought About Your Presentation" is equal parts Brainbombs and last list's Record Of The Weekers Rusted Shut, but with a little bit of krautish hypnorock mixed in, so what you get is a crushing, super distorted mega main RIFF, a pounding mesmerizing drum beat, everything super hot and blown out and in the red, looped and locked and pounding away over and over and over and over, but with some weird stuff going on, buried vocals, strange bits of glitch and crunch, and the weirdest part of all, seems impossible to play, but every few measures, it sounds like the band skips a beat, almost like the record skips, but it's super subtle, like a weird stutter step, that just makes it all the more weird, but no less trancelike and heavy, and it only gets weirder from there on out.
All the songs here are based on rhythms, which comes with the territory when you have multiple drummers, the second track begins all skittery, an almost drum machine sounding shuffle, which slips into a looped dubbed out pound, while all around the rhythms is buffeted by swirling FX, jagged shards of jangle guitar, and super distorted wild over-saturated leads and weird voices buried in the mix. The next track explodes in a tangle of twisted string buzz and fractured electronics, before those sounds coalesce into a crazy noise drenched rock racket, rife with angular guitars and layer upon layer of drones and voices and feedback and sonic chaos. "USA / Mexico" is some Buttholes gone black metal weirdness, super murky muddy riffage, pounding blast beats, start stop rhythms, bizarre vokills and crazy electronics all over the place.
The crushing stop start chug of "The Cusp Of Innocence, Prettily", almost makes the record for us, with a killer main riff, and an increasingly distorted guitar tone, until a sample of some cheesy European sounding folk song comes in, and like magic, the crunch and chug and pound lock in and fit perfectly with that lilting little ditty, turning it into something nasty and scary and AWESOME. It's only a second, but it's sooooo good.
The abstract dub of the title track, the main rhythm made out of what sounds like someone writing on a chalkboard, some super effected tripped out dubby bursts, random spoken words, thick sheets of warm washed out guitars, until the track gets all Circle-y, but filtered through some fractured nineties industrial, like Pharaoh Overlord jamming Meat Beat Manifesto, but with strangled metal guitars and vrooming motorcycle sounds. There's some dance-y almost house sounding throb and pulse, but it's butted up right against a twisted angular noise rock / electro mashup, that is so distorted it's dabbling in Merzbow territory.
The other looooong track "Roberts Church Problem" sounds like it was recorded live, ad thus sounds like vintage S&S in full on unhinged Buttholes mode, multiple pounding drummers, wall of buzz, fuzzed out heaviness, repetitive and looped and seemingly never ending (we wish!). "Friseur Nelson is another good one, all very Circle, distorted and murky, a killer tribal rhythm, crumbling fuzz bass, and a muted chugging low end, some weird haunting chiming minor key melodies, another one that could have been stretched out to the end of the record and we would have been perfectly happy.
We could go on and on and on (even more than we already have), but why bother? Every song here rules, they're all super strange and heavy and hooky and groovy and noisy, and somehow, for being so disparate, they all manage to sound like part of a proper record. Well, certainly not a PROPER record, but you know what we mean. And while the rest of the songs are just as tripped out, and what-the-fuck and holy shit! as the ones we already described, odds are by now you probably got the feel for whether this is your cup of blown out rhythmic heaviness or not.
The sound of Shit And Shine is like some constantly twisting and transforming, bloody and mangled wreckage, equal parts This Heat, Aluk Todolo, Geronimo, Butthole Surfers, Rusted Shut, Brainbombs, Merzbow, Terminal Cheesecake, Strangulated Beatoffs, Faust, Laddio Bollocko, all pulled apart and reassembled into some damaged Frankenhooker noiserock drum circle spacejam. And odds are if you like any or all of those bands, you're gonna LOVE this...
MPEG Stream: "Have You Really Thought About Your Presentation?"
MPEG Stream: "USA / Mexico"
MPEG Stream: "The Cusp Of Innocence. Prettily"
MPEG Stream: "Girls Against Shit"
MPEG Stream: "Friseur Nelson"

SHIT AND SHINE 229-2299 Girls Against Shit! (Riot Season) lp 32.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
This bad ass past Record Of The Week, finally available on vinyl!!
When we first heard / heard about Shit And Shine, a mysterious noise rock collective from the UK, they definitely seemed custom made for aQ, multiple drummers, multiple bass players, someone playing lawnmower, a sound equal parts vintage Butthole Surfers, classic Hawkwind, and modern kraut-psych-drone-rock a la Circle and Pharaoh Overlord and Cave and the like, not to mention the garish, sometimes offensive album, art, the hilarious and usually offensive song titles, we were sold, smitten, totally obsessed. And thankfully, in the several years since that very first 12", very little has changed, almost all of the aforementioned essentials are still part and parcel of the Shit And Shine experience (minus the lawnmowers, but then the more we've come to understand these jokers, the more we realize that probably a lot of the 'facts' circulating about S&S is total bullshit, so odds are there never was any lawnmowers, sigh), and if anything, they've managed the impossible, getting tighter and more polished, more rocking, with better and somewhat proper 'songs', while simultaneously getting more and more fucked up and far out, taking super minimal elements and combining them into something massive and bewitching and baffling and heavy as fuck, but sounding literally unlike anything we've ever heard. Sure there are elements of plenty of stuff we love, but the way these guys twist those elements and cram them into whatever shape THIS is, just blows our minds, and eardrums.
So yeah, garish pink on black cover, masked lady with one of her breasts out on the front, a weird long necked headless super hero lady on the back, inside an awesome scary photo of two little girls, long hair obscuring their faces, standing hand in hand in front of a massive wall of amps, and song titles: "Have You Really Thought About Your Presentation?", "Goodbye And Good Gardening", "Girls Against Shit", "20 Years Of Caring For The Nations Eyes", "The Cusp Of Innocence, Prettily", "I'm Making My Lunch", " People Like You... REALLY!" and on and on, but none of that would mean shit if there wasn't a head spinning gut churning din to back it up, and holy shit do these guys bring the noise this time around.
The opening track, "Have Your Really Thought About Your Presentation" is equal parts Brainbombs and last list's Record Of The Weekers Rusted Shut, but with a little bit of krautish hypnorock mixed in, so what you get is a crushing, super distorted mega main RIFF, a pounding mesmerizing drum beat, everything super hot and blown out and in the red, looped and locked and pounding away over and over and over and over, but with some weird stuff going on, buried vocals, strange bits of glitch and crunch, and the weirdest part of all, seems impossible to play, but every few measures, it sounds like the band skips a beat, almost like the record skips, but it's super subtle, like a weird stutter step, that just makes it all the more weird, but no less trancelike and heavy, and it only gets weirder from there on out.
All the songs here are based on rhythms, which comes with the territory when you have multiple drummers, the second track begins all skittery, an almost drum machine sounding shuffle, which slips into a looped dubbed out pound, while all around the rhythms is buffeted by swirling FX, jagged shards of jangle guitar, and super distorted wild over-saturated leads and weird voices buried in the mix. The next track explodes in a tangle of twisted string buzz and fractured electronics, before those sounds coalesce into a crazy noise drenched rock racket, rife with angular guitars and layer upon layer of drones and voices and feedback and sonic chaos. "USA / Mexico" is some Buttholes gone black metal weirdness, super murky muddy riffage, pounding blast beats, start stop rhythms, bizarre vokills and crazy electronics all over the place.
The crushing stop start chug of "The Cusp Of Innocence, Prettily", almost makes the record for us, with a killer main riff, and an increasingly distorted guitar tone, until a sample of some cheesy European sounding folk song comes in, and like magic, the crunch and chug and pound lock in and fit perfectly with that lilting little ditty, turning it into something nasty and scary and AWESOME. It's only a second, but it's sooooo good.
The abstract dub of the title track, the main rhythm made out of what sounds like someone writing on a chalkboard, some super effected tripped out dubby bursts, random spoken words, thick sheets of warm washed out guitars, until the track gets all Circle-y, but filtered through some fractured nineties industrial, like Pharaoh Overlord jamming Meat Beat Manifesto, but with strangled metal guitars and vrooming motorcycle sounds. There's some dance-y almost house sounding throb and pulse, but it's butted up right against a twisted angular noise rock / electro mashup, that is so distorted it's dabbling in Merzbow territory.
The other looooong track "Roberts Church Problem" sounds like it was recorded live, ad thus sounds like vintage S&S in full on unhinged Buttholes mode, multiple pounding drummers, wall of buzz, fuzzed out heaviness, repetitive and looped and seemingly never ending (we wish!). "Friseur Nelson is another good one, all very Circle, distorted and murky, a killer tribal rhythm, crumbling fuzz bass, and a muted chugging low end, some weird haunting chiming minor key melodies, another one that could have been stretched out to the end of the record and we would have been perfectly happy.
We could go on and on and on (even more than we already have), but why bother? Every song here rules, they're all super strange and heavy and hooky and groovy and noisy, and somehow, for being so disparate, they all manage to sound like part of a proper record. Well, certainly not a PROPER record, but you know what we mean. And while the rest of the songs are just as tripped out, and what-the-fuck and holy shit! as the ones we already described, odds are by now you probably got the feel for whether this is your cup of blown out rhythmic heaviness or not.
The sound of Shit And Shine is like some constantly twisting and transforming, bloody and mangled wreckage, equal parts This Heat, Aluk Todolo, Geronimo, Butthole Surfers, Rusted Shut, Brainbombs, Merzbow, Terminal Cheesecake, Strangulated Beatoffs, Faust, Laddio Bollocko, all pulled apart and reassembled into some damaged Frankenhooker noiserock drum circle spacejam. And odds are if you like any or all of those bands, you're gonna LOVE this...
MPEG Stream: "Have You Really Thought About Your Presentation?"
MPEG Stream: "USA / Mexico"
MPEG Stream: "The Cusp Of Innocence. Prettily"
MPEG Stream: "Girls Against Shit"
MPEG Stream: "Friseur Nelson"

SHIT AND SHINE Bass Puppy (Badmaster) 12" 13.98
They pretty much had us at "dubstep Shit And Shine". Yep, UK mysterious masked multi drummer-ed noise rock weirdos, who recently destroyed at SXSW, and did a fair bit of damage in the Bay Area recently as well, return with their own take on dubstep, and it's just as fucked up and freaked out as we might have imagined (or hoped), and we have to say it's pretty much how we wish ALL dubstep sounded, heavy and super distorted, blown out, the beats pounding, the bass fuzzed out and crushing, a lurching hypnotic groove, surrounded on all sides by crumbling FX, distorted howls, a dizzying swirl of demented sounds, it's like the Butthole Surfers remixed by Burial, or Kode9 covering Rusted Shut.
The B-side is the blissier of the two, but only just barely, with deep undulating bass, a locked and looped main groove, weird grunts, and blurred voices, little bits of melody, twisted and tweaked, but weirdly tranquil and hypnotic. Some DJ somewhere is gonna whip this out midset and either utterly destroy the dancefloor, or seriously freak folks the fuck out. Much more likely the latter.
Best dubstep jam of the year? Quite possibly...

SHIT AND SHINE Cherry (Riot Season) 2lp 24.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The first time we heard from the UK's bass and drum (not to be confused with drum and bass) ensemble Shit And Shine, we were already predisposed to love them. Seeing as they featured multiple bass players, a stage full of drummers, and most importantly, at least to us, several lawnmowers. Fuck. Yeah.
Over the course of the last three or four years, these guys have continually pummeled us within an inch of our lives, with their throbbing tribal Butthole Surfers style onslaught, a furious blown out in the red drug drenched psych rock, but only the loosest approximation of rock. More like some sort of government drug experiment, where various deviants and ne'er do wells, criminals and sociopaths, were incarcerated, dosed with all manner of experimental psychotropics, then let loose in a concrete bunker filled with drums and amps and busted up old bass guitars, everything recorded for posterity, until someone started leaking the tapes, code name: SHIT AND SHINE.
This was the most wacked shit we'd heard since Terminal Cheesecake or the Strangulate Beatoffs. And every record drifted further and further out, as the band became more and more unhinged, and now there's this, Cherry, a massive double lp that while still demonstrating the kind of physical and psychic damage Shit And Shine can do, also reveals a whole new world of fucked up sound these guys have tapped into. In fact, when we first threw this on, we weren't even sure it was the same band.
The record opens with a simple percussive drum jam, all toms, sort of tribal, beneath a series of samples, and film clips, a little weird, reminiscent of old industrial, until the next track obliterates the first with a blast of awesome processed metallic riffing, almost like some heavily FX-ed Iron Maiden leads, draped over some shitty shiney sludge, then suddenly guitars flip backwards, the sound becoming some freaked out psych damage, lurching into some killer stop / start dynamics, a churning what-the-fuck sort-of metal jam. Oh yeah, there's also a long long track of old school proto disco, groovy, druggy dancefloor shit, unexpected, but it sort of works in S+S's tweaked sound world. And all of that stuff is peppered with brief super short tracks of classic Shit And Shine tribal drugpsych pummel, but it always slips back into somethingÉ curious.
Side three is a single side long track, a gorgeous chunk of layered drone, guitars buzz and rumble, basses throb and pulse, there are probably some synths in there too, the various layers churning and shifting, drifting and shimmering, super hypnotic but still subtly fucked up and creepy.
And finally, for those folks who were put off by all this weirdness, meaning even more weirdness than normal, all of side 4 is taken up by a full on, head crushing Shit And Shine blow out. Doped up and spaced out, huge loping rhythms, pounding multiple drumkits, the basses and guitars a chaotic tangle of crumbling riffs and throbbing distortion, everything locked into relentless looped churning crush. So completely filthy and crusty and damaged that it sounds constantly on the verge of falling to pieces, but it's this continuous chaos and impending doom, that makes S+S's freaky jams so intense and so fucking awesome!
Need we say, TRES RECOMMENDED!
More totally and hilariously garish cover art. LIMITED TO 500 COPIES! We got a bunch but AQ folks seem especially partial to Shit -AND- Shine, so these will probably go pretty quick. You have been warned.

SHIT AND SHINE Cherry (Riot Season) cd+dvd 22.00
We listed this on vinyl a while back, and people flipped out (ourselves included!). It was the sound of a band we already loved finally hitting their stride, all the various confusional aspects of their sound, the thick churning buzz, the tribal multi-drummer blowouts, the killer grooves, the full on noise assaults, finally woven into a record that while still scattershot-sounding and ALL over the sonic map, also managed to be surprisingly cohesive and musical. It also even managed to win over any of the Shit And Shine haters remaining around here...
Not only is it available on cd, it also comes with a live dvd, featuring the band, 10 members strong, performing in a bowling alley. More on that near the end, first let's talk about the record itself.
The first time we heard from the UK's bass and drum (not to be confused with drum and bass) ensemble Shit And Shine, we were already predisposed to love them. Seeing as they featured multiple bass players, a stage full of drummers, and most importantly, at least to us, several lawnmowers. Fuck. Yeah.
Over the course of the last three or four years, these guys have continually pummeled us within an inch of our lives, with their throbbing tribal Butthole Surfers style onslaught, a furious blown out in the red drug drenched psych rock, but only the loosest approximation of rock. More like some sort of government drug experiment, where various deviants and ne'er do wells, criminals and sociopaths, were incarcerated, dosed with all manner of experimental psychotropics, then let loose in a concrete bunker filled with drums and amps and busted up old bass guitars, everything recorded for posterity, until someone started leaking the tapes, code name: SHIT AND SHINE.
This was the most wacked shit we'd heard since Terminal Cheesecake or the Strangulate Beatoffs. And every record drifted further and further out, as the band became more and more unhinged, and now there's this, Cherry, a massive cd (formerly double lp) that while still demonstrating the kind of physical and psychic damage Shit And Shine can do, also reveals a whole new world of fucked up sound these guys have tapped into. In fact, when we first threw this on, we weren't even sure it was the same band.
The record opens with a simple percussive drum jam, all toms, sort of tribal, beneath some spoken word, a series of samples, and film clips, a little weird, reminiscent of old industrial, until the next track obliterates the first with a blast of awesome processed metallic riffing, almost like some heavily FX-ed Iron Maiden leads, draped over some shitty shiney sludge, then suddenly guitars flip backwards, the sound becoming some freaked out psych damage, lurching into some killer stop / start dynamics, a churning what-the-fuck sort-of metal jam. Oh yeah, there's also a long long track of old school proto disco, groovy, druggy dancefloor shit, unexpected, but it sort of works in S+S's tweaked sound world. And all of that stuff is peppered with brief super short tracks of classic Shit And Shine tribal drugpsych pummel, but it always slips back into somethingÉ curious.
Later on there's a single looooooooong track, a gorgeous chunk of layered drone, guitars buzz and rumble, basses throb and pulse, there are probably some synths in there too, the various layers churning and shifting, drifting and shimmering, super hypnotic but still subtly fucked up and creepy.
And finally, for those folks who were put off by all this weirdness, meaning even more weirdness than normal, the rest of the record is taken up by a full on, head crushing Shit And Shine blow out. Doped up and spaced out, huge loping rhythms, pounding multiple drumkits, the basses and guitars a chaotic tangle of crumbling riffs and throbbing distortion, everything locked into relentless looped churning crush. So completely filthy and crusty and damaged that it sounds constantly on the verge of falling to pieces, but it's this continuous chaos and impending doom, that makes S+S's freaky jams so intense and so fucking awesome!
And for the first time we get to see S+S in the flesh. The dvd features a live performance at a bowling alley. The lineup, SIX drummers (4 male, 2 female) pounding out a little tribal loop, a more primal Boredoms perhaps, the pound and pummel goes on for ages, the only other sound, the buzz of the Orange amps in the background, until the other 4 members (3 male, 1 female) take the stage, all gathered around a little plywood table, like their own Spinal Tap Stonehenge. On the table, an array of keyboards, synths, noisemakers and microphones, which the quartet dutifully employ to make a serious squall, of thick churning low end, distorted howls. Eventually the vocals emerge from the murk, a sort of Kim Gordon-ish howl from her, a distorted punk rock wail from him, the four Shit And Shiners gathered around the table, swigging from bottles and head banging, the drummers getting more and more frenzied, building to a totally blown out squall of drumsynthhowl tribal psych tangle, eventually everything but the drums receding, leaving just the rhythm, the incessant pounding slowing way way way down, the drummers hitting harder and harder. Awesome shit. And super well filmed so it sort of feels like you were there, sweaty, beaten, bruised, ears ringing, head spinning.
Need we say, TRES RECOMMENDED!
And packaged in the same totally and hilariously garish cover art as the lp.
MPEG Stream: "Am I A Nice Guy?"
MPEG Stream: "Danielle"
MPEG Stream: "Charm And Counter Charm"
MPEG Stream: "Prize Winning"

SHIT AND SHINE Cigarette Sequence (Skulltone) 7" 5.50
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We thought UK noiseniks Shit & Shine couldn't get any more brutal or abrasive or, well, noisy, but of course we were dead wrongÉ
This two track monstrosity lets us hear us two very different sides of the multi headed S+S beast. The A side finds the band kicking up an absolutely ear shredding din, so noisy and blown out that it's almost impossible to hear the actual band. There are multiple drummers, and multiple bass players, but here it sounds like they're all armed with white noise machines and sine wave generators. Layers of in-the-red buzz and high end hiss, super distorted vocals and a murky rhythmic throb. It almost sounds like what we wished Merzbow sounded like, a fierce super dynamic heavy as fuck white noise juggernaut.
But then there's the unexpected B side, which is downright tranquil, a carnivalesque loop warbling beneath children's voices, tons of delay and reverb, a dizzying blur of funhouse ambience. Weird as fuck, but somehow a good balance for the chaotic skree on the flipside.
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES. Each one hand numbered.

SHIT AND SHINE Cunts With Roses (Noisestar Music) lp 28.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
"Cunts With Roses" doesn't really seem like such a surprising name for a Shit And Shine record when you cast you mind back a few months to their equally problematically titled "Toilet Door Tits" lp on Conspiracy. But then why should a band with such a brilliantly problematic sound, not follow suit with their song titles, album titles and artwork? (Oh, did we mention the cover of "Cunts With Roses" features a close up of a booty being extricated from a thong, with the band name printed in fancy metallic gold leaf? Yep.)
So here we have a crushing archival recording from these UK noisemakers, captured live in a rehearsal studio, preparing for a show opening for the mighty Laibach. Supposedly this is the first recording EVER of the live Shit And Shine experience, and it's a bloody earful for sure. TWO SIDES, ONE RIFF. That's right, just one. But one's really all you need, any more than that and you're basically a prog band, right? A relentless pounding pulverizing repetitive crush, a looped tribal brick to the forehead, churning over and over and over and over and over, it would be quite lulling and soothing if it weren't so fucking skull crushing.
The sound is almost industrial and machinelike, an army of zombie drummers pounding away amidst roiling coils of vacuum cleaner ambience, shouted vocals are sucked under, the bass is slung waaaaay loooow, not so much rocking as churning and throbbing, everything wrapped in a thick crumbling coat of crusty sonic filth. Think Aufgehoben, Swans, Butthole Surfers -- maybe if you took all three, lobotomized them, locked them in a dank cellar with nothing but drums and amps and a tape recorder, and dosed them with PCP, until the whole lot of them went completely berserk, a moldy basement full of convulsing noise rockers pounding and howling and droning as they slowly rot and fall to pieces and lose their minds completely. In other words, WAY recommended.
Ultra limited of course, and a bit pricey cuz of the crap exchange rate and the weight of vinyl shipped overseas. But well worth it for those of you who need a good sonic bashing, which we'd guess is most of you.

SHIT AND SHINE Jealous Of Shit And Shine (Riot Season) 2cd 17.98
Return of the mighty Shit And Shine, a massive sprawling noise rock collective from the UK. Multiple drummers, LOTS of guitars, even some lawnmowers and other noisemakers. This new disc takes their caustic freaked out psych-noise in a whole new direction, channeling their energy into blissed out sort-of krautrocky grooves, albeit still drenched in thick grinding crumbling grit with the needle ALL the way in the red. In fact -most- of the tracks here are some sort of hypnotic stripped down rhythm, just completely damaged and dinged up and pelted with thick slabs of hissy fuzz. Vocals struggly desperately to be heard, even the drums keep getting sucked under the massive swells of acidic sound, swirls of buzzing glitch and super blown out melodies are all draped over the endlessly propulsive rhythms, as they struggle to keep moving forward with layer after layer after layer of dense prickly buzz and drone piled atop them. A gloriously cacophonous caterwaul of rhythmic chaos.
Imagine the Psychic Paramount filtered through a Merzbow production and mastered by Masonna, pressed onto a lathe cut, then played a thousand times until the grooves all began to run together, then play it on a turntable made from an old microwave using a rusty nail as a stylus, and broadcast it through the blown out speakers in that junked car that's been sitting in your neighbor's yard for the last ten years. The record THAT sound, and broadcast it through a HUGE tuba shaped loud speaker with your head stuck all the way into the horn. Kinda like that. Imagine some Aufgehoben No Process, some Laddio Bolocko, some Wolf Eyes, some Butthole Surfers, even some Whitehouse and eighties no wave, but mix in a serious dose of Can and Faust and then douse it in thick swaths of noise, freeze it and shatter it into a million pieces. It all comes together on the album's 30 minute centerpiece "Practicing To Be A Doctor", a simple rock and roll drum beat, a million pounds of grinding low end, some grungy sludgy garage rock riffing, some buried mumbled vocals, and set the whole thing to just sort of lazily unfurl over the course of a lurching, druggy, damaged half hour. Suddenly we're also hearing some Brainbombs, some Terminal Cheesecake, even a bit of the Melvins, all wrapped up into endlessly motorik spaced out tribal sludge rock nirvana.
For a limited time, Jealous Of Shit And Shine also includes an extra cd, which contains their long out of print 12" "You're Lucky To Have Friends Like Us" on cd for the first (and last) time! Here's what we had to say about the 12" when we listed it way back in 2004:
You might want to keep an old rag next to your turntable for this one, to wipe the grit and grime and goo off your needle when you're done listening to this slab of sonic what-the-fuck. A confusional mix of buzzy, damaged psych rock spaceout, Buttholes style tribal weirdness, straight up icepick in the ear noise rock, speaker melting sludge and some very unlikely pop filigree. Instrumentation includes multiple drummers, multiple lawnmowers (?) and lots of guitar all melded into a pummelling wall of grindsludgepopnoisepsych.
MPEG Stream: "Here Come Vikings"
MPEG Stream: "When Extreme Dogs Go Wrong"
MPEG Stream: "Unchained Ladies Shopper"

SHIT AND SHINE Jream Baby Jream (Riot Season) lp 23.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Shit And Shine sure have come a long way from the multiple-drummer-ed Neanderthal noise rock rock pummel that was their M.O. for years. Recent recordings and performances have run the gamut from warped noise drenched dubstep to pounding psych rock laced with balloon squeak solos, so every live show and ever new record is a total unknown, and even once you get into a new record, every track ends up being a warped surprise. But really we wouldn't have it any other way. This new lp Jream Baby Jream pretty much continues right where the sprawling Le Grand Larance Prix triple lp left off, a handful of warped jams that end up going in whatever fucked up direction the $&$ guys want them too. Which requires a quick run through of all the songs...
The A side starts off the 10+ minute "Dinner With My Girlfriend" which couples alien vocoder-ed and auto-tuned vox to some dirgey, blown out super distorted beats, the whole track sounds like it's at the wrong speed, the sounds filthy and crumbling, swirling FX and all manner of weirdness going on beneath the surface, a stunted electro-drug groove that should have some dancefloor bumping, just not one where normal folks congregate. "Mermuda Triangle" is a blast of electronic weirdness, pitch shifted buzzes and constantly shifting layered drones, all over stuttery beats and weird ominously spoken vox, the whole thing laced with weird eighties melodies, which makes the track sound like Faxed Head covering some obscure eighties pop song. The A side closes with the title track, which is the weirdest of the bunch, mostly for being the least weird. It's a straight slow jam rock tune, all stripped down guitar and shuffling rhythm, the weirdest part being the mush mouthed vox, but otherwise it sounds like some warped slow jam high school dance ballad, playing in a gym in bumfuck, nowhere.
The B side starts off with "Woodpecker", a short blast of heavy No U-Turn style dubstep / jungle, all stripped down and pounding, but plenty fractured and fucked up, noisy and rife with all manner of glitches and squelches, before leading into the 10 minute "Rodeo Girls", a woozy, psychedelic slab of looped weirdly distorted kraut-funk, the sound shifting constantly, getting blown out, murky and muddy one second, brittle and crunchy the next, strange melodies surfacing throughout, all the while the main loop remains maniacally mesmerizing.
And finally, "Youth Led Worship" is a dark minimal coda, all murky and pulsing, a dirgey droned out drift, with haunting processed vox, and a field of deep moaning buzz, a blurred blackened sprawl of hushed sinister creep. Weird as fuck, of course, but bafflingly brilliant too.
LIMITED TO 400 COPIES! On either green or orange vinyl! Already sold out at the label and out of print. These are the last copies we'll be able to get!!!

SHIT AND SHINE Kuss Miche, Meine Liebe (Load) cd 15.98
Ahhh, Shit And Shine, even the name give us the warm fuzzies. That's because multiple drummer-ed lawn mower bass tribal drug jams often do. And no one does it better, or quite like the UK's Shit And Shine. With a constantly shifting lineup that often swells to double digits, including as many drummers as they can pack into a room. And a wall of amplifiers that makes SUNNO))) seem like they're playing through practice amps, several bass players, often just a phalanx of shitty Casio keyboards, howling vocals, all tangled up into a heaving mass of post-Butthole Surfers drug psych heaviness.
Much like the cd reissue of Cherry (last week's Record Of The Week), Kuss Mich, Meine Liebe is not entirely brand new, the two longest tracks we've had before on a super limited, crazy expensive lp, but here on cd for the very first time. Along with one other loooooooong jam, and a handful of shorter, but no less appealing chunks of what-the-fuck tribal psych-out heaviness.
Let's cover the tracks we've heard before. "Biggest Cock In Christendom" is an in-the-red tribal workout, like a more metallic and way more distorted and druggy No Neck Blues Band. Or a WAY heavier Chain Reaction disc. Thick pulses of low end drift beneath streaks of super distorted amp damage, all very krautrock sounding, but filtered through a bank of effects pedals, all broken or with dying batteries. Definitely blissed out and mesmerizing, but so ominous and creepy. This is the shit musical dreams are made of. 15 minutes of this stuff is not nearly enough. Set it to repeat, drink a bottle of Nyquil and let yourself get sucked under. The other track from the 12", "Toilet Door Tits", is an endless rhythmic jam, with ultra blown out drums, sounding a bit like some Butthole Surfers / Laddio Bolocko hybrid, albeit WAY more distorted and damaged. The sound is completely fried, the whole track sounding like it's crumbling through your speakers, strangled vocals drift amidst the tribal pummel, as do weird alien sounding squiggly leads that squirm and slither from speaker to speaker giving the whole track a super disorienting effect.
The other long track on Kuss Mich is the epic and drowsily sprawling "Preventions Arise", 10 minutes of muted almost industrial sounding rhythms, way more moody and washed out than the other tracks, an endless muddy murky rhythmic jam, pulsing and throbbing, a propulsive groove beneath a very noir spoken word. Strange but a good balance to the sheer brutality of the other tracks.
Scattered all around these three massive jams are jagged little chunks of shiny shit, blasts of noise and crunch and buzz and pound, from brief flurries of machine like grind, furious blast beats, and stuttering off kilter rhythms, to total Buttholes worship, pounding tribal rhythm, buzzing fuzz guitar, hypnotic and intense, to tripped out abstract skitter, all warbly distorted bass, and processed vox, to huge blown out chug and churn, heavy and epic and massively distorted and blown out.
Once again, more proof that these guys (and gals) are the current reigning kings and queens of crushing chaotic drugged out drone drenched drum corps psych-doom heaviness.
Killer packaging, very simple and cryptic, shit brown paper and metallic gold ink shine!
MPEG Stream: "Biggest Cock In Christendom"
MPEG Stream: "The Germans Call It A Swimming Head"
MPEG Stream: "Kuss Miche, Meine Liebe"

SHIT AND SHINE Kuss Miche, Meine Liebe (Load) lp 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
NOW ON VINYL!!!!
Ahhh, Shit And Shine, even the name give us the warm fuzzies. That's because multiple drummer-ed lawn mower bass tribal drug jams often do. And no one does it better, or quite like the UK's Shit And Shine. With a constantly shifting lineup that often swells to double digits, including as many drummers as they can pack into a room. And a wall of amplifiers that makes SUNNO))) seem like they're playing through practice amps, several bass players, often just a phalanx of shitty Casio keyboards, howling vocals, all tangled up into a heaving mass of post-Butthole Surfers drug psych heaviness.
Much like the cd reissue of Cherry (last week's Record Of The Week), Kuss Mich, Meine Liebe is not entirely brand new, the two longest tracks we've had before on a super limited, crazy expensive lp, but here on cd for the very first time. Along with one other loooooooong jam, and a handful of shorter, but no less appealing chunks of what-the-fuck tribal psych-out heaviness.
Let's cover the tracks we've heard before. "Biggest Cock In Christendom" is an in-the-red tribal workout, like a more metallic and way more distorted and druggy No Neck Blues Band. Or a WAY heavier Chain Reaction disc. Thick pulses of low end drift beneath streaks of super distorted amp damage, all very krautrock sounding, but filtered through a bank of effects pedals, all broken or with dying batteries. Definitely blissed out and mesmerizing, but so ominous and creepy. This is the shit musical dreams are made of. 15 minutes of this stuff is not nearly enough. Set it to repeat, drink a bottle of Nyquil and let yourself get sucked under. The other track from the 12", "Toilet Door Tits", is an endless rhythmic jam, with ultra blown out drums, sounding a bit like some Butthole Surfers / Laddio Bolocko hybrid, albeit WAY more distorted and damaged. The sound is completely fried, the whole track sounding like it's crumbling through your speakers, strangled vocals drift amidst the tribal pummel, as do weird alien sounding squiggly leads that squirm and slither from speaker to speaker giving the whole track a super disorienting effect.
The other long track on Kuss Mich is the epic and drowsily sprawling "Preventions Arise", 10 minutes of muted almost industrial sounding rhythms, way more moody and washed out than the other tracks, an endless muddy murky rhythmic jam, pulsing and throbbing, a propulsive groove beneath a very noir spoken word. Strange but a good balance to the sheer brutality of the other tracks.
Scattered all around these three massive jams are jagged little chunks of shiny shit, blasts of noise and crunch and buzz and pound, from brief flurries of machine like grind, furious blast beats, and stuttering off kilter rhythms, to total Buttholes worship, pounding tribal rhythm, buzzing fuzz guitar, hypnotic and intense, to tripped out abstract skitter, all warbly distorted bass, and processed vox, to huge blown out chug and churn, heavy and epic and massively distorted and blown out.
Once again, more proof that these guys (and gals) are the current reigning kings and queens of crushing chaotic drugged out drone drenched drum corps psych-doom heaviness.
Killer packaging, very simple and cryptic, shit brown paper and metallic gold ink shine!
MPEG Stream: "Biggest Cock In Christendom"
MPEG Stream: "The Germans Call It A Swimming Head"
MPEG Stream: "Kuss Miche, Meine Liebe"

SHIT AND SHINE Ladybird (Latitudes 0:01) (Latitudes / Southern) cd 11.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
These Latitudes cds have beeen a bitch to get. Thanks to everyone for beeing so patient. They are super limited and only a handful even make it to the states, and of that handful we have to fight tooth and nail to get enough to list. We only now managed to get 20 copies of the inaugural Latitudes dics, number ONE, from the UK's Shit And Shine, a gore soaked, bloody nosed, sweat stained knee to the groin. Multiple drummers, lots of guitars, a toy keyboard and one mighty riff. Think prime era Butthole Surfers, add some Stooges stomp and some Hawkwind spaciness, an unstoppable wall of crushing churning psychedelic crunch, thick sludgy basslines, fuzzy filthy guitars, grunted shouted vocals, all in a druggy swirl of effects, random noises and full on brain frying weirdness. A glorious forty minute pummelling.
Comes packaged in a super intricate hand screened die cut fold over sleeve with a full color insert. Each copy hand stamped and numbered. Limited to 1000 copies worldwide, 500 of which made it to the United States, only 20 of which made it here. So you know what that means!
MPEG Stream: "Ladybird (Excerpt)"

SHIT AND SHINE Ladybird (Latitudes 0:01V) (Latitudes / Southern) lp 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
One of our favorite in Southern's Latitudes series, available on super duper limited vinyl!!!! We got 30 copies and will never be able to get more. So jump on these quick...
Full on, over the top, freaked out psychedelic, drum drenched guitarnoise from this massive UK ensemble Shit And Shine, a a gore soaked, bloody nosed, sweat stained sonic knee to the groin. Multiple drummers, lots of guitars, a toy keyboard and one mighty riff. Think prime era Butthole Surfers, add some Stooges stomp and some Hawkwind spaciness, an unstoppable wall of crushing churning psychedelic crunch, thick sludgy basslines, fuzzy filthy guitars, grunted shouted vocals, all in a druggy swirl of effects, random noises and full on brain frying weirdness. A glorious forty minute pummeling.
Comes packaged in a cool diecut sleeve, a variation on the immediately recognizable Latitudes cd packaging, although this time, white on black instead of white on brown. Includes the same insert as the cd. Pressed on bright red vinyl. And of course, SUPER SUPER LIMITED!!!
MPEG Stream: "Ladybird (Excerpt)"

SHIT AND SHINE Le Grand Larance Prix (Riot Season) cd 15.98
Originally released on the Rock Is Hell label as a super limited triple lp, this twisted chunk of sprawling rhythmic whatthefuck weirdness from these Texas-by-way-of-the-UK-by-way-of-Texas-again multiple drummer-ed noiseniks is now finally available on cd, also super limited, originally only orderable direct from the label, we're the only store in the US to have these, and they won't last long, so grab one before they're gone...
Le Grand Larance Prix just might be Shit And Shine's most ambitious and most over the top record yet, which is saying a lot, considering pretty much everything these guys do pretty goddamn over the top. But this one really takes the cake, pushing their sound in a whole different direction. We might have imagined them going even noiser, more drum heavy, but no, instead, $&$ offer up a bunch of epic jams, looped out and tranced out, that tend toward the super minimal, the mesmerizingly rhythmic, ultra repetitive and hypnotic, but not in the usual bombastic heavy $&$ way, no these are like alternative universe minimal dancefloor chillout jams. Or something. Probably best to just go through em one at a time...
"Flirtations At A Cocktail Party", pretty much sets the template, looped tribal drumming, a revving engine, loping low slung bassline, all blurred and looped into a sort of abstract rhythmic mesmer, laced with strange robotic vox, like some sort of alien lo-fi electro, the track gradually growing more and more blown out, finally becoming extra melodic and dense right near the end. That's the most typically Shit & Shine track of the bunch, cuz the next one, "Frankies Theme" dials everything back, loopy and minimal, with muted melodies, a sort of circular slow motion groove, motorik and locked in, while around it sounds swirl and shimmer, distant melodic swells ebb and flow, it's sidelong but it's the sort of thing that sounds like it could have gone on forever.
"Switching 2 Nite Mode" definitely lives up to its title by swiping the main part of the Rolling Stones' "Emotional Rescue" and looping it into a jumbled psychedelic freakout, adding swirls of processed vox (even some sliced and diced Jagger falsetto), dubbed out production, some deep ominous vocals all slowed down, before the song transforms into a slo-mo creep, all weirdly muted and creepily sexy. Which leads right into "Frenchys Automotive", another super minimal loop-jam, a main melody repeated rhythmically, pulsing hypnotically, the vibe almost kosmische, but more sort of murky and mesmerizing, that main figure looped and looped, while all around it, random sounds swirl and shimmer druggily.
The home stretch starts off with "How To Rattle A White Tailed Buck", which unfurls a brittle looped melody, peppered with occasional rib cage rattling boomin' system low end bass thumps, the whole thing sort of blurpy and lumbering, a stuttery groove that shuffles through clouds of staticky hiss, which bleeds right into the final track, "Klipp", which is most definitely the most high fidelity of the bunch, super heavy, repetitive, Circle like hypno-rock, but a bit more minimal, the main guitar riff and shuffling rhythm totally in sync, while all around it sounds swirl and decay, shards of melodies and and crumbling FX, processed vocals and constantly shifting layers wreathe the hypno-rock in a buzzy, blurry, noisy gauze. Fuck yeah. The cd version comes in a green minimal digipak style sleeve that sort of apes the original lp packaging. And as mentioned above, SUPER limited, we have about 25 copies, and then that's probably IT!!
Packaged in a 6 panel hand screened triple gatefold jacket!
MPEG Stream: "Flirtations At A Cocktail Party"
MPEG Stream: "Switching 2 Nite Mode"
MPEG Stream: "Klipp"

SHIT AND SHINE Le Grand Larance Prix (Rock Is Hell) 3lp 44.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Latest sprawling rhythmic whatthefuck epic from these Texas-by-way-of-the-UK-by-way-of-Texas-again multiple drummer-ed weirdos, and it's maybe their most ambitious and most over the top yet, which is saying a lot, considering pretty much everything these guys do pretty goddamn over the top. But this triple lp takes their sound in a whole different direction. We might have imagined them going even noiser, more drum heavy, but no, instead, $&$ offer up six sidelong jams, looped out and tranced out, that tend toward the super minimal, the mesmerizingly rhythmic, ultra repetitive and hypnotic, but not in the usual bombastic heavy $&$ way, no these are like alternative universe minimal dancefloor chillout jams. Or something. Probably best to just go through em one at a time...
Side A, "Flirtations At A Cocktail Party", pretty much sets the template, looped tribal drumming, a revving engine, loping low slung bassline, all blurred and looped into a sort of abstract rhythmic mesmer, laced with strange robotic vox, like some sort of alien lo-fi electro, the track gradually growing more and more blown out, finally becoming extra melodic and dense right near the end. That's the most typically Shit & Shine track of the bunch, cuz the next one, "Frankies Theme" dials everything back, loopy and minimal, with muted melodies, a sort of circular slow motion groove, motorik and locked in, while around it sounds swirl and shimmer, distant melodic swells ebb and flow, it's sidelong but it's the sort of thing that sounds like it could have gone on forever.
The second lp starts with "Switching 2 Nite Mode", which lives up to its title by swiping the main part of the Rolling Stones' "Emotional Rescue" and looping it into a jumbled psychedelic freakout, adding swirls of processed vox (even some sliced and diced Jagger falsetto), dubbed out production, some deep ominous vocals all slowed down, before the song transforms into a slo-mo creep, all weirdly muted and creepily sexy. The flipside, "Frenchys Automotive", is another super minimal loop-jam, a main melody repeated rhythmically, pulsing hypnotically, the vibe almost kosmische, but more sort of murky and mesmerizing, that main figure looped and looped, while all around it, random sounds swirl and shimmer druggily.
The final lp starts off with "How To Rattle A White Tailed Buck", which unfurls a brittle looped melody, peppered with occasional rib cage rattling boomin' system low end bass thumps, the whole thing sort of blurpy and lumbering, a stuttery groove that shuffles through clouds of staticky hiss, which finally leads to the final side / track, "Klipp", which is most definitely the most high fidelity of the bunch, super heavy, repetitive, Circle like hypno-rock, but a bit more minimal, the main guitar riff and shuffling rhythm totally in sync, while all around it sounds swirl and decay, shards of melodies and and crumbling FX, processed vocals and constantly shifting layers wreathe the hypno-rock in a buzzy, blurry, noisy gauze.
Packaged in a 6 panel hand screened triple gatefold jacket, pressed on white vinyl, and LIMITED TO 184 COPIES!!!

SHIT AND SHINE Le Grand Larance Prix (Red) (Rock Is Hell) 3lp 36.00
Back in print/stock, now in a red sleeve with black printing, these came in the mail slightly damaged, so anal record nerds steer clear, but for everyone else, these are seriously discounted, so if slightly bumped corners and less than perfect sleeves don't bug you, snap one of these up before they're gone...
Latest sprawling rhythmic whatthefuck epic from these Texas-by-way-of-the-UK-by-way-of-Texas-again multiple drummer-ed weirdos, and it's maybe their most ambitious and most over the top yet, which is saying a lot, considering pretty much everything these guys do pretty goddamn over the top. But this triple lp takes their sound in a whole different direction. We might have imagined them going even noiser, more drum heavy, but no, instead, $&$ offer up six sidelong jams, looped out and tranced out, that tend toward the super minimal, the mesmerizingly rhythmic, ultra repetitive and hypnotic, but not in the usual bombastic heavy $&$ way, no these are like alternative universe minimal dancefloor chillout jams. Or something. Probably best to just go through em one at a time...
Side A, "Flirtations At A Cocktail Party", pretty much sets the template, looped tribal drumming, a revving engine, loping low slung bassline, all blurred and looped into a sort of abstract rhythmic mesmer, laced with strange robotic vox, like some sort of alien lo-fi electro, the track gradually growing more and more blown out, finally becoming extra melodic and dense right near the end. That's the most typically Shit & Shine track of the bunch, cuz the next one, "Frankies Theme" dials everything back, loopy and minimal, with muted melodies, a sort of circular slow motion groove, motorik and locked in, while around it sounds swirl and shimmer, distant melodic swells ebb and flow, it's sidelong but it's the sort of thing that sounds like it could have gone on forever.
The second lp starts with "Switching 2 Nite Mode", which lives up to its title by swiping the main part of the Rolling Stones' "Emotional Rescue" and looping it into a jumbled psychedelic freakout, adding swirls of processed vox (even some sliced and diced Jagger falsetto), dubbed out production, some deep ominous vocals all slowed down, before the song transforms into a slo-mo creep, all weirdly muted and creepily sexy. The flipside, "Frenchys Automotive", is another super minimal loop-jam, a main melody repeated rhythmically, pulsing hypnotically, the vibe almost kosmische, but more sort of murky and mesmerizing, that main figure looped and looped, while all around it, random sounds swirl and shimmer druggily.
The final lp starts off with "How To Rattle A White Tailed Buck", which unfurls a brittle looped melody, peppered with occasional rib cage rattling boomin' system low end bass thumps, the whole thing sort of blurpy and lumbering, a stuttery groove that shuffles through clouds of staticky hiss, which finally leads to the final side / track, "Klipp", which is most definitely the most high fidelity of the bunch, super heavy, repetitive, Circle like hypno-rock, but a bit more minimal, the main guitar riff and shuffling rhythm totally in sync, while all around it sounds swirl and decay, shards of melodies and and crumbling FX, processed vocals and constantly shifting layers wreathe the hypno-rock in a buzzy, blurry, noisy gauze.
Packaged in a 6 panel hand screened triple gatefold jacket!

SHIT AND SHINE Live At The aQuarius recOrds / WFMU Showcase - SXSW 2010 (Sleeping Giant Glossolalia) lp 17.98
The 2010 aQuarius / WFMU South By Southwest showcase was pretty tough to beat, if we do say so ourselves. An entire night of aQ faves, every single one kicking huge amounts of ass, and basically blowing us away over and over again. Just check out the lineup: Speedwolf, Iron Man, Moon Duo, Pierced Arrows, Dengue Fever, Epileptinomicon, Todd, True Widow, Sonny & The Sunsets, Headdress, Home Blitz, Drunkdriver, and Shit And Shine. We'd be hard pressed to pick a favorite set of the night, but lots of folks, ourselves included, might find ourselves leaning toward the rhythmic chaotic cacophony of Shit And Shine, a UK based multi-drummer drone-psych-noise unit who once called Texas home. And who, besides kicking up a glorious drum heavy racket, managed to keep the crowd riveted for their whole set, the members clad in strange costumes, a bunny suit, creepy plastic masks, furry animal heads, all while manning multiple drumkits and constantly switching instruments, and creating a glorious wall of pulsing, pounding, hypnotic sound. Luckily, the whole thing was captured on tape. And while maybe something is lost without the visuals, the music holds up surprisingly well on its own, the group's single song set spread out over two sides, right out of the gate, the band lock into a rhythm and don't let up.
The sound is blown out and in the red, helping make it sound exactly like being there (and like you forgot your earplugs), the legion of drummers, pounding out a rhythm in perfect unison, while the rest of the $+$ crew do their thing, their thing in this case being super distorted fuzzed out bass, processed alien vocals, blasts of screeching feedback, squalls of psychedelic white noise buzz, a sound that is basically krautrock writ NOISY and BLOWN OUT and HEAD CAVINGLY LOUD!
By the time the second half (side) rolls around, the buzz and pound are interrupted by thick shards of almost poppy melody, streaks of almost shogazey looped fragmented noise, until finally the jam switches gears, just a bit, and we get the $+$ version of 'bringing it down', a churning Circle like sludgekraut hypnorock groove that plays out until the record settles into a locked groove, which if you're not paying attention, will have you listening to that single groove for EVER, before realizing something is up. And hell, we actually listened to it for 5 or 6 minutes, and probably would have let it keep on playing... (and the first side ends with a locked groove too, so be prepared to be mesmerized, endlessly there too!)...
Heavy and hypnotic, the perfect sonic souvenir if you were there, an even more perfect slab of crushing corrosive rhythmic noise rock weirdness if you weren't.
Housed in a full color sleeve, an Austin backyard on one side, one of the $+$-ers on the other. Includes a Xeroxed insert, LIMITED TO 500 COPIES, each one hand numbered.

SHIT AND SHINE Toilet Door Tits (Conspiracy) lp 18.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We discovered a little stash of these long out of print Conspiracy lps, we have between 5 and 10 of each left, and they're all sale priced, WAY cheaper than they were when we listen them a while back. So act fast, cuz these will be gone pretty dang quick, and obviously, once we run out that's it.
Our pals at Conspiracy Records, a label/distro based in Belgium, who in the past have brought us records by Boris, Jesu, Shora and more, are this year celebrating their 10 year anniversary. A decade of amazing music. From a bedroom based punk rock label, to one of Europe's most important and influential labels and distros, all we can say is HURRAY! And HUZZAH! It's always so exciting, when a bunch of folks get together to spread the word about great music, great WEIRD music, and survive, even thrive. Such is the case with Conspiracy. And as if that weren't already enough, just knowing that some great people were selling some amazing music, those sweeties at Conspiracy have decided to share the love with us. And you.
To celebrate their 10th anniversary, they've decided to do a super limited subscription series, 12 records over 12 months, each limited to somewhere between 200-500 copies, ONLY available to series subscribers. EXCEPT, they've decided to let AQ have 20 copies of each, we're the only store with copies of these subscriber only lps, and for a brief moment, we can offer them to you, our loyal AQ customers. Needless to say we are thrilled, as the series lineup reads like a who's who of AQ faves, as well as including a handful of lesser knowns. All pressed on super thick vinyl, and packaged in killer hand screened original art sleeves. But be warned, we only got 20 of each, and we will run out fast and we will not be able to get more. When we do run out, there is a chance you can still get one from Conspiracy direct, but what that means is act fast and prepare to leave empty handed.
We sure do love Shit And Shine. Every record we get by this UK sort-of-collective is weirder, noisier and more fucked up than the last. With a massive lineup featuring multiple guitarists, multiple drummers as well as various unorthodox, non-musical noise makers, these guys manage to make beautiful sounds ugly, and ugly sounds beautiful. It's confusing actually. Their sound is so chaotic and harsh, but so totally captivating and hypnotic, this 12" is no different. Two epic, massive sidelong tracks. The first, an endless rhythmic jam, with ultra blown out drums, sounding a bit like some Butthole Surfers / Laddio Bolocko hybrid, albeit WAY more distorted and damaged. The sound is completely fried, the whole record sounding like it's crumbling through your speakers, strangled vocals drift amidst the tribal pummel, as do weird alien sounding squiggly leads that squirm and slither from speaker to speaker giving the whole track a super disorienting affect.
The second side is a bit more subdued, but only a bit. An in-the-red tribal workout, like a more metallic and way more distorted and druggy No Neck Blues Band. Thick pulses of low end drift beneath streaks of super distorted amp damage, all very krautrock sounding, but filtered through a bank of effects pedals, all broken or with dying batteries. Definitely blissed out and mesmerizing, but so ominous and creepy. A side of this stuff is not nearly enough. Set it to repeat, drink a bottle of Nyquil and let yourself get sucked under.
Cool silkscreened 'bug' cover and some amazingly problematic song titles!

SHIT AND SHINE You're Lucky To Have Friends Like Us (Riot Season) lp 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
You might want to keep an old rag next to your turntable for this one, to wipe the grit and grime and goo off your needle when you're done listening to this slab of sonic what-the-fuck. A confusional mix of buzzy, damaged psych rock spaceout, Buttholes style tribal weirdness, straight up icepick in the ear noise rock, speaker melting sludge and some very unlikely pop filigree. Instrumentation includes multiple drummers, multiple lawnmowers (?) and lots of guitar all melded into a pummelling wall of grindsludgepopnoisepsych. White vinyl with a hand scibbled insert in a thick plastic sleeve. Limited to 500 copies.
MPEG Stream: "The Trees Will Mourn"
MPEG Stream: "Don't Look At Me Don't Leave Me"
MPEG Stream: "Recommencons"

SHIT AND SHINE / EXPENSIVE SHIT Romantic And Macho At The Same Time (Monofonus Press) 7" 8.98
A pretty good match up, and not just based on the band names (although it doesn't get much more perfect than that). Our beloved Texas by way of the UK by way of Texas drum heavy rhythmic noise rockers Shit And Shine start things off with some super lo-fi, looped and repetitive dubbed out minimalism, weird echoey vox draped over a surprisingly super mellow bit of drift and drag, creepy and spaced out, a little skittery and shuffly, at least until it EXPLODES in a blast of grinding distorto noise and howling feedback, transforming the sound into some sort of blacknoise power electronics industrial stomp, yet for all it caustic noisiness, it remains surprisingly rhythmic and hypnotic, the sound SO distorted it seems to be crumbling and decaying as the track plays, replete with all manner of glitches and drop outs, which makes it almost sound like Shit And Shine covering Faxed Head!
We had never heard of Expensive Shit before, but it definitely sounds like the equipment they're using is anything BUT. They counter with their own sort of lo-fi noise rock dubbiness, a twisted, murky, FX flecked dark sonic churn, laced with all manner of clatter and crunch, all over a roiling spaced out dronescape. After a brief blast of noise, the track settles into a slithery, skeletal bit of abstract industrial noise dub, that sounds like Throbbing Gristle recording at King Tubby's and as that might have you imagining, it sounds pretty damn good.

SHIT YOUR PANTS AND DO THE DEATH DANCE Issue #1 zine 5.00