New Arrivals
Capricorn Born Again
Amanda from Pocahaunted joins Robedoor for this first full-length as Topaz Rags, and the album's a real winner, kicking off with 'Darker Sooner' sounding like a Portishead album recorded over the phone. Elsewhere, twisted blues and moaning, haunted house vocals convene for 'Sightings', and 'Wear You Thin' is like a chill-wave night terror. An uneasy listen, but Capricorn Born Again is a druggy, beautiful raincloud of a record that's got appeal beyond the more conventional parameters of the Not N…
Bounced Check
Wally Shoup, Chris Corsano and Paul Flaherty make up this screamin' free punk jazz liquid solid noize trio captured LIVE 'in your face' style in Seattle, WA. Totally improvised double sax and drum explosions that break down into duos and solos and re-ignite as trio howlin' paint splattered madness gone butt-naked wilder. Recorded at an art gallery with artwork melting off the walls and frightened fans nervously mopping their furrowed blood-stained brows (they were especially afraid one or both o…
Warmth
Even though Warmth main man Steev Thompson still appears to be incommunicado, totally epic recordings continue to surface. Before Roxanne Jean Polise was officially over and Steev still lived in Chicago, he joined up with another then-Chicago resident Branden Diven of Quilts/American Grizzly Records. The jams that were created filled a couple of CD-Rs and the Warmth side of the split with Quintana Roo on Not Not Fun. This LP consists of a remixed and edited version of the original CD-R ru…
Songs for the Gentle Man
"Originally released in 1971 on Dandelion Records this was Bridget St. John's second and, arguably, best album. Produced and scored by Pink Floyd collaborator Ron Geesin, Songs For The Gentle Man was recorded at Sound Techniques in Chelsea (where everybody from Fairport Convention to Nick Drake had made albums) and is a far more sophisticated work than its predecessor. Organized around a small chamber orchestra, Songs For The Gentle Man is a set of cool, pastel songs that simultaneously h…
The Violent Blow
After a long time out of print Sacred Trails 7", a new release from Altar Of Flies for Wendy.Minimalistic textures, tape loops, field recordings and junk abuse, all mixed in an unique cruel sound. AOF explores line between man and nature, with analog machines he transforms in sound the cold of his lands, the feeling of no light, the man perfection in loneliness. The result is the must organic, deep and dark AOF release ever.A new start for this criminally underrated artist, a new powerfully soun…
(Fake) The Facts
After the runaway success of the Akita/Gustafsson/O'Rourke LP One Bird Two Bird (DEMEGO 016LP), Swedish sax legend Mats Gustafsson returns to Editions Mego with another storming collaboration. Now a resident of Vienna, he teamed up with experimental artists dieb13 and Martin Siewert for a live and studio session. (Fake) The Facts is the result. A dense fog of sound comes from all directions, but whereas the general impetus is a full-on attack, the trio finds enough restraint to create a deepe…
Rekkez
Limited edition of 250, with full color 23 by 33 poster designed and painted by G.Loli. Mutamassik (= tenacity in Arabic) is the musical avatar of Giulia Loli, who merges Egyptian percussions with hardcore breaks. The result, sometimes dubbed Sa'aidi hardcore & Baladi breakbeats is a mutant, syncopated form of instrumental hip-hop. The history of Giulia Loli herself is marked by fluid borders, being born in Italy of an Egyptian mother, moving to the United States in her childhood, staying in Egy…
Tweek
"since the last senking album "pong" (r-n122) was a great success in 2010 and sold out quickly raster-noton swiftly asked for a follow-up of massel's sound cosmos. on "tweek" senking again reveals his sense of cineastic atmospheres and dark abysmal depths of sound, which are subordinate to extremely slow choky basses and delayed beats. references to dubstep are rather the result of testing the outlying areas of the frequency spectrum than a direct relation to the genre. nevertheless it se…
The Shepherdess and the Bone-White Bird
Stone Breath returns with their first new album in over 5 years. A visionary creation of Eastern-influenced rural acid folk. From fingerpicked acoustics; to clawhammer banjo excursions; to the side-long exaltation that is “The Shepherdess of the Fiery Wheels,” Stone Breath manifest their best work to date; an entire set of originals with the strange and beautiful harmonies and instrumentation which graced their past work. They are clear in sight, united in purpose, and shining in the darkness. C…
Seches Abstände
Five dense movements from abstract composer, Ralf Wehowsky, co-founder of the great Wahrnehmungen & Selektion labels. Recorded in 2008.
A
A is Sunburned's second album with producer Kieran Hebden, a.k.a. Four Tet. Directed by Kieran like actors in a film, Sunburned is taken off the bandana smokestage of their previous collaboration -- Fire Escape -- and put onto a sweat-soaked 4am lysergic dance floor. Kieran uses the band like his live instrument laptop and sampler. The results are truly stunning which makes this record into one of the best moments of each artist's respective musical careers. With artwork by California vis…
Low Fiction
Great 2nd full-length collaboration between Lee Counts, Matt Franco (of Air Conditioning, Holy Family Parish), and Jason Crumer. Acoustic and processed power tools on scrap metal. This record is more spare and moody than their first, lush and industrial, elegiac sanders and spareness building up and blasting away from somber to near rapture.
Space Programs
When the shoe drops on the first bars of the USA is the Monster's new full length, it becomes clear some changes have occured since the last record, Sunset at the End of the Industrial Age. Buttery synth and elaborate vocal harmonies combine to levitate hairpieces at least a wee bit. This is the perfect synthesis of the pastoral wanderings circa thier second full length record, Wohaw, and the punk spunk junk of their first and third full lengths. The band is still a New York two-piece tribe of N…
Bildnerei die Geisteskranken Vol. 2. Ruhe
This is Mama Br solo with voice, tape, guitar, feedback. Limited to 300 copies. White vinyl. Cover from the artist. "A relatively tranquil trance induced by repetetive autistic thumping while Ms. Hjuler successfully calls down the moon. Lousy electric guitar, detuned piano, backwards cassette tapes, and a microphone banged against a floor all get guest spots. Best of all, there's a giggling section." Weirdo Records
Go Grey
The second full-length release by U.S. Girls is an even more fully realized excursion into a hazy alternate universe where pop vocals and muzzy scree fuse in harmony. Go Grey conjures up ambient aerosols while luminous kaleidoscopes of sound sizzle, peak, and explode. Megan Remy is a chanteuse from (perhaps) the future, guiding all who choose to sail an evocative trip through her unique aural hallucinogenic landscapes. It's a journey of lush vistas, warm currents, and complex beauties. 23nd-Cent…
Always Wrong
f you're wondering whether record labels still matter, consider the case of Wolf Eyes. Their last two widely distributed albums, 2004's Burned Mind and 2006's Human Animal, came out on Sub Pop and got lots of media attention, even landing the band on the cover of The Wire. Three years later, Wolf Eyes return with Always Wrong, a follow-up of sorts after reams of smaller-run releases. It came out on Hospital in May, and I can't find a single review beyond a few blog entries and tweets. Even The W…
No Earthly Man
Updating canonical Scottish folk tunes is a rather unfashionable niche, placing these songs within the context of modern/alternative rock is an even tougher chore, but it's one that Scottish neo-traditionalist Alasdair Roberts approaches with pluck and somber intensity. Previously with the band Appendix Out, No Earthly Man is Roberts' third album as a solo artist and it is undoubtedly his most difficult to approach. His previous album, Farewell Sorrow, was a collection of joyful, filigreed songs…
Kokning
"Norway's Bjorn Torske returns with his fourth studio album 'Kokning'. Opening on a playful note with a slow-building title track, Torske strums a lone acoustic guitar against a background of shimmering synths setting the scene for a highly engaging piece of work. Throughout the course of the album a wide palette of genres are taken in and adapted to the Skrangle-House style (an open ended take on house music stemming from the Oslo nightclub 'Skansen'), and dub looms large over much of the music…
The Man-Machine
LP edition of Kraftwerk's 7th album, from 1978, and perhaps their most commercially successful album -- a non-offensive synth-pop classic. 'The album has 'classic' stamped all over it... in time it would acquire the same ageless quality as The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper or The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds...' -- Pascal Bussy, Kraftwerk: Man Machine And Music"
Irrlicht
Vinyl version of Klaus Schulze's first solo album, from 1972. "After stints in the legendary bands Tangerine Dream and Ash Ra Tempel, Irrlicht was Klaus Schulze's first stab at a a solo project. He had radical ideas for the newly developed electronic music scene which are blatantly present here. Equipped with a small orchestra, 4-track, guitar, percussion, organ, and a little electronic gadgetry, he created a 'cosmic classic'. No synthesizers were used here, just a remarkable use of sampl…