History Is What's Happening
Emerging out of Amsterdam's vibrant squat scene in 1979, The Ex -- a name chosen for the ease and speed with which it could be spray-painted onto a wall -- have for four decades been an entirely self-sustaining musical entity, charting a course through the global underground with a spirit of freedom and radical exploration. Originally released in 1982, History Is What's Happening features one of the most harrowing title/cover art combinations in recent memory. What at first glance looks like a f…
All Corpses Smell The Same
**few copies available** Emerging out of Amsterdam's vibrant squat scene in 1979, The Ex -- a name chosen for the ease and speed with which it could be spray-painted onto a wall -- have for four decades been an entirely self-sustaining musical entity, charting a course through the global underground with a spirit of freedom and radical exploration. All Corpses Smell The Same, The Ex's first single, marks the beginning of this DIY odyssey -- appearing in June 1980 on Hé Records, a precursor to th…
Cleveland Confidential
**Shipping the next week. Limited edition translucent orange vinyl**"When I say 1980 was a kind of dead zone in the Cleveland music scene, I can hear a collective, 'Isn't every year a dead zone in Cleveland?' Go ahead, take your Johnny Carson-era jokes and see what they buy you. Puff your chest about NYC in '75 or London in '76 or L.A. in '77 to some 27-something today. Allow me to save you face and remind you to add in late '70s Cleveland. Because when you revisit this comp of struggling, strag…
Night After Night
**Limited edition translucent red vinyl** New York no-wavers Ike Yard are perhaps best known for being the first American band signed to Factory Records, and it isn't difficult to hear why: the group's music has much in common with the existential frigidness of Joy Division and early New Order as well as the mutant noise-funk of Section 25 and A Certain Ratio. That said, the sound of Night After Night, the band's debut EP, is one that could only have emerged from the lawless dystopia of '70s New…
Totale's Turns
Given The Fall's penchant for iconoclasm, it's no surprise that they decided to say goodbye to the '70s with a series of gigs at Northern England's gruffest halls. The band's formidable live show was met with even more derision and disorder than customary during these late '79 and early '80 performances, and they skillfully amplified such sentiments back at the crowd. Totale's Turns, The Fall's first live album, was released on Rough Trade just prior to their pivotal third album, 1980's Grotesqu…
Tracce Magnetiche
Searching for new languages beyond the bitter and nihilist dialect of punk, bands like Gaz Nevada, Litfiba, CCCP, Diaframma, Neon, and many others, began spreading their message all along the Italian peninsula during the early eighties and many of the members of these bands are now some of the best musicians/producers in the Italian independent music panorama (Giovanni Lindo Ferretti, Piero Pelù/Litfiba, Bisca, etc.). 16 tracks by 16 Italian underground bands from 1982-1984: bands who faded into…
Behind The Wall – The Record
Life behind the Berlin Wall, before the fall. Once there was DDR (Deutsche Demokratische Republik), otherwise known as East Germany. Verging on the ruins of the 2nd world war, in the fog of the socialist utopia, there was a widespread scene fighting against corporations and restrictions. Die neuen Bands, that was the manifesto, a number of small alternative bands facing the efforts of the post-punk (and even post-industrial) revolution. This was happening right after the English new wave or the …
Tapetopia 002: GDR Underground Tapes (1984-1989)
To release a tape in East Germany in 1986 called Ihre großen Erfolge (Their Great Successes) illustrates how every situation produces people that are unwilling to accept that situation. Claus Löser and Florian Merkel were two such people. Their band Die Gehirne and their many side-projects ensured that their hometown of Karl-Marx-Stadt, today's Chemnitz, could assert its role in the independent art world of the GDR. Inspirations included Frank Bretschneider from the experimental electronic band …
Tapetopia 001: GDR Underground Tapes (1984-1989)
Tapetopia 001 -- A Collection of East German Underground Tapes. In 1988, the legendary freak wave outfit Ornament & Verbrechen handed out some 20 to 30 copies of their Rotmaul-Tape to friends. The band, formed by the Lippok brothers, emerged from the first East Berlin punk group Rosa Extra and the avant-wave project Fünf Wochen im Ballon. From the moment of O&V's inception, the band was the wellspring for many acts that would subsequently branch off as tributaries and streams in the East Berlin …
Ike Yard
Ike Yard remain a legendary band of early '80s New York City – at once immensely influential, yet obscured by a far-too-brief initial phase. Their debut EP, the dark and absorbing Night After Night, sounds almost like a different group, so rapidly would Ike Yard evolve towards the calmly menacing electro throb of their self-titled LP. Originally released on Factory in 1982, the album put Ike Yard's indelible mark on the synth-driven experimental rock scene then emerging all over the planet. Whi…
Först River Man Allt
**300 copies** Kizza Ping formed in Linköping 1980 from the ashes of local punk bands such as Spy, RAS, ÅOBF and Zpamhead. Much in line with the current strains of Ny Våg/postpunk happenings around the country in the early '80s, the six members of Kizza Ping went for more a pop-oriented sound though still being somewhat firmly rooted in their DIY punk past. Influences came from acts like New Order and Reeperbahn, but the band added their own touch to the sound, especially thanks to the harmonizi…
Höre - Staune - Gute Laune: Rondo Singles + Sessions 1979-82
**In process of stocking. Limited edition, Japan release only, few copies available.** Suezan presents a completely remastered double CD set which compiles almost all the 7" releases of legendary German Punk/New Wave label Rondo.The compilation is presented in a gatefold sleeve with two booklets: the first is a detailed explanation by Franz Bielmeier, the Rondo label owner and comes in full color with 64 pages and rare photos; the second booklet contains a Japanese translation version by Masanor…
Love
*250 copies** "Yor is a Leipzig outfit formed by artists Nataly, Tony and Susanne. Known in their local scene for their Beach Boys covers and associations with bands like Mosquito Ego, the trio confounded the bleary-eyed audience at KRAAK Festival 2019’s 24-hour experiment with their offbeat no wave that does not shy away from moments of funky reflection or manic free-form detours.On Love, they bounce from energetic bursts of guitar-laden catharses to groovy bass lines designed for a strange int…
Closely Watched Trains
Onderstroom present a reissue of Glorious Din's Closely Watched Trains, originally released in 1987. How a boy from the Sri Lankan jungle formed the greatest post-punk band you've never heard. Fronted by an intense singer with an oblique songbook and a mysterious past, Glorious Din was unlike any other group to emerge from San Francisco's '80s underground. With singer Eric Cope, the chosen persona of a Joy Division-obsessed Sri Lankan boy who travelled halfway around the world to follow his punk…
Ροαξη Φινγερζζ ΒΣ. Ροψκ Σλινγερζζ
Sewn Leather is a trigger, a road warrior, the punk that can be smoked. Somewhere between Whitehouse nihilism, Wolf Eyes' high pitched suffocation and evil Prodigy rhythmology, Griifin Pyn re-invents the 21st century punk! On "Ροαξη Φινγερζζ ΒΣ. Ροψκ Σλινγερζζ", he offers his four latest (and yet cleanest) songs, soaked in battery acid, swallow-ready for the confusion generation. Sewn Leather is real.Edition of 200 copies w/ 1-color offset covers.
Ref. 907
Originally released in collaboration with the historic Italian Records label, this compilation deeply influenced the Italian underground music scene at the time, clearing the road for technological innovations. This pioneering artistic and musical model, cast aside any form of sentimentality, for a more intimate relationship with the electronic universe. In 1981, Absurdo, Eurotunes, Ipnotico Tango, Kerosene and Metal Vox appeared on this compilation by Toni Brillanti, lighting the way for even…
Back Ground Music
**2020 small repress** BGM was the very first project by Japanese living legend and electronic music producer Takayuki Shiraishi; the album was released on legendary experimental music label Vanity Records. Now, one of the most demanded alternative music album from Japan is finally reissued on vinyl, remastered from the original tapes by Kuniyuki Takahashi.Shiraishi created Back Ground Music when he was a 17 year old high school student. Wanting to realize his musical vision at the time, he invi…
Post Internet Blues
Post Internet Blues is UK group Gad Whip's latest album, following several low-key cassette albums released since 2014, plus the four tracks that constitute 2017's limited edition In A Room EP. Gad Whip blend avant-garde sensibilities with a contemporary take on the place where D.I.Y. culture meets post-punk, hints of deconstructed garage rock and interstellar voyaging through sweat-drenched waking dreams. Immediate, powerful, confounding and kept in place by wry, sometimes observational, vocals…
Primitive Emotions
A collection of Alternative TV songs during recent years that have appeared on vinyl-only releases or compilations and suchlike. Includes This Little Girl, Negative Primitive, The System, Radiator, Walls, and Chinese Burn, amongst others. Chinese Burn will be a different version to the one which appears on the Low Expectations compilation 10" on Fourth Dimension. Even if you own some of the vinyl, this will be a neat way of listening to the tracks as they map out an arc in the group's more recen…
Scars On Sunday
Mark Perry has overseen the reissue of 1979's Scars On Sunday, which was originally released as a limited run cassette and is now highly collectible. Comprising material from around the same period as the excellent Vibing Up the Senile Man album period, the ideas behind the music were very much informed by Mark's experience of touring with Here & Now. Perhaps serving as a statement on punk, or the many hordes by this time now completely straitjacketed by it, it could be contended it was conceptu…