Friday, July 31, 2009
DEBUT LP BY SHITS AND GIGGLES (aka ARIEL PINK & VAS DEFERENS ORGANIZATION) OUT NOW + FREE DOPE AND FUCKING IN THE STREETS AND THE NEW VDO SITE LAUNCH
Just a small announcement to let all of you know that Shits And Giggles' debut LP "Trick Or Treat" is finally available and can either be obtained directly from Vas Deferens Organization's new label Free Dope And Fucking In The Streets or from distributors like Forced Exposure, Aquarius Records or Fusetron, whom it will reach within about 10 days and also to inform one and all that the new Vas Deferens Organization site has launched simultaneously with this. Now back to our regularly scheduled programming...
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
CARLES SANTOS-VOICETRACKS, LP, 1981, SPAIN
A multi-media artist with a wide remit, Santos' initial exposure within the music world was as a pianist and interpreter of the modern classical canon, but his incipient vocal antics (initially staged between piano pieces) would soon take on a life of their own and cement his reputation as both a master avant vocalist and a complete nutter. Unlike most who operate in this sphere, Santos moves easily between the distinct universes of both sound poetry and free improv vocals, sparring elsewhere with the likes of Shelley Hirsch, David Moss and Greetje Bijma. The work at hand though is both more formal and more idiosyncratic than his collaborative affairs; Santos' gibbering, spluttering glossolalian fits of absurdist vocal genius here being tightly choreographed and modulating through incremental stages in a way that both suggests the demented warbling trills and whisper-to-a-shout histrionics of Area vocalist Demetrio Stratos' solo albums and the repetitive and cellularly expanding vocal theatrics of San Francisco performance/multi-media artist Michael Peppe's Behaviormusik performances. It's breathtaking and peerless work and it's also managed to reduce to fits of helpless laughter pretty much everyone I know (though usually in direct proportion to the amount of intoxicants ingested).
***************NEW LINK POSTED SEPTEMBER 2012***************
Get it here
DAVID TUKHMANOV-По волне моей памяти (ON THE WAVE OF MY MEMORY), LP, 1975, RUSSIA
All over the map (and admittedly more than a bit patchy), this Russian curio still seems like ripe fodder for savvy heads, though one can't help think that a familiarity with their language would go some way toward helping to clarify the point of this parade of bombast; the cavalcade of the amusingly dubious that ensues taking in Rocky Horror Picture Show camp, blaring Big band themes, Cop show orchestral funk, weepy baladeering, whizzing synths and varying shades of strident power folk over it's course, the garish composite perhaps coming closest to the Modry Efekt album opposite the Czech Radio Jazz Orchestra that I posted a while back. If your good taste in bad taste has reached an advanced stage, look no further for your node of the confounding to get cheerfully fingered.
WAZMO NARIZ-TELL ME HOW TO LIVE, LP, 1981, USA
Damn fine studio slicked New Wave pop eccentricity that mates the quirk pop polish of early Split Enz/early Tubes with the puckish herky jerk of of early XTC and Tin Huey (and by dint of that, makes this "Zolo" to a certain small sector of obsessives), though admittedly the smirkily mannered and hiccupy vocals here might be a deal breaker for some.
EYE/THREE FORKS-SPLIT POLYCARBONATE LATHE 10", 2005, NEW ZEALAND
One of the current manifestations of New Zealand underground luminary Peter Stapleton (Terminals, Pin Group, Bilders, Scorched Earth Policy etc.), Eye's initial salvo here on this 50 copy lathe cut split disc is two minutes of shattered free rock in the distinct mode of Dead C, followed much more enticingly by an eight minute fragile flicker of decayed guitar harmonics and above the fretboard clinks and chimes that creates mystery and drama from subtly manipulating these bare embers, while unknown quantities Three Forks fill the flip with a squashed and wobbly L.A. Free Music Society-like universe of small toy abuse, pause button tape mangle, broken key wander and dadaist lip flap that falls away to reveal the ravaged remains of an acid folk undercarriage.
A BROKEN CONSORT-THE SHAPE LEAVES, CDR, 2006, UK
Emotive autumnal accretions of multi-tracked string scrape and plucked acoustic filigree, the layers strafing against each other in overlapping moire patterns. Another moving document from the fine mind of one Richard Skelton, whose equally rich and expressive Carousell project (posted previously) also suggested windswept vistas and obscure esoteric rituals.
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Sunday, July 19, 2009
DEBUT LP BY ARIEL PINK AND VDO'S NEW BAND SHITS AND GIGGLES+FREE DOPE AND FUCKING IN THE STREETS RECORDS+ALL RELATED WEBSITES TO LAUNCH AT END OF JULY
As attentive Wire Magazine subscribers will likely have discovered by now, "Trick Or Treat", the debut LP by Shits And Giggles, Ariel Pink's new band together with Vas Deferens Organization (the little 'ol band that I'm a member of) is to be available on VDO's new label Free Dope And Fucking In The Streets by the tail end of this month, with the formal launch of websites for the band as well as for the label to be unveiled simultaneously. Stay tuned...
HENRI TEXIER-AMIR, LP, 1976, FRANCE
As a follow-up to my post of the third album by this legendary French jazz bassist (his c.v. including stints with Don Cherry and Didier Lockwood amongst others) and one time member of French psych/folk/prog masters Total Issue, here's his swooningly lovely solo debut, it's lump-in-throat human poignancy distilled from the sparest of ingredients, with supple buttery wafts of wordless vocalizations elevated to a plane of sheer soul conveyance alternately snaking across a heaving weave of bowed bass drone or negotiating their way through alternately thrummingly insistent and delicately intricate note configurations, occasionally offset by subtle hand percussion.
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***NOTE: THERE'S A MIRRORED MEDIAFIRE LINK IN THE COMMENT FIELD***
BRUCE GILBERT-MUSIC FOR FRUIT, LP, 1991, U.K.
Containing music commissioned for a dance troupe and an animated film, Music For Fruit is another master class in the art of the unnerving from this former Wire, Dome and Cupol member and all 'round guru of subterranean acid menace, with Alan Splet-like Eraserhead atmospheric conditions and distant concatenations of factory noise rippling across the surface of cathedral reverbed synthetic surges and opaque delayed ghostings.
***************NEW LINK POSTED SEPTEMBER 2012***************
Get it here
ZYPRESSEN-S/T, CD, 1996, JAPAN
The work of this stunning Japanese R.I.O. outfit is manifestly an outgrowth of the dark chamber rock tradition of the Univers Zero/Art Zoyd/Present axis, but their penchant for folkloric and quasi-romantic themes and instrumental voicings brings this far closer to the territory that Univers Zero leader Daniel Denis was charting on his two solo albums from the early 90's (Les Eaux Troubles in particular) and closer still to that dislocated zone between systemic minimalism and angular art rock mined by Birdsongs Of The Mesozoic and the Mikel Rouse Broken Consort. An embarrassment of riches to explore here, folks. Note: this has been posted elsewhere in the blogosphere, but only as inaccessible-to-many .ogg files, so it felt well worth re-sharing this here.
***************NEW LINK POSTED SEPTEMBER 2012***************
Get it here
CLIMAX GOLDEN TWINS-IMPERIAL HOUSEHOLD ORCHESTRA, CD, 1996, USA
Gifted with both a macro scale grasp of how to sustain the dream logic of surrealist audio architecture and an acute ear for the cellular detail residing therein, this early endeavor from these Seattle eccentrics is all over the damn place, but in a highly engaging way, with location recordings, free jazz, noise rock, electroacoustic studies, dadaist tape loop manglings, bongo-and-birdcalls hippy jams and Caretaker-like broadcasts from The Shining ballroom all rubbing shoulders in a deliciously dissociative and squirrely fashion.
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GNAGS-PA VEJ, LP, 1973, DENMARK
Since the link for this sweetly dewy eyed and anthemic slice of Danish folk rock wonderment has been down for eons elsewhere in the blogosphere, it felt irresistible to re-post here. I could almost picture a whole tribe of Danish hippie teens skipping arm in arm across a rustic idyll in some 70's Euro coming of age flick to this stuff...
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Saturday, July 11, 2009
RUNZELSTIRN & GURGELSTOCK-BEI ABWESSENHEIT JEGLICHER GENUSSEMPFINDUNGEN, ONE-SIDED LP, 1989, SWITZERLAND
Like shit smeared berserkers armed with clown noses, bike horns and yelping chihuahuas, Switzerland's Runzelstirn & Gurgelstock (aka Rudolv Eb.Er assisted on and off by compadres Joke Lanz and Dave Philips) have haunted the margins of post-industrial extremism with their dada damaged and Otto Muehl/AA Kommune-derived antics for some 20-odd years now. Drew Daniel of Matmos penned the penultimate piece on these fringe nutters for the Wire some years back (the article can be found Here ) but one small detail not noted in Daniel's profile is the blatant streak of humor that coursed though their earlier output, a dimension thats been progressively excised from their formulations over time in favor of ramping up the jarring severity of their shock tactic postures, and while I feel an enormous sympathy for their overall aesthetic stance, the initial era of their work as demonstrated on this insane debut document remains hard to top, with hacked/spliced/vivisected fragments of inspired buffoonery, animal sounds and voiding orifices mating with corroded chunks of metal debris, the results wetly flung about Eb.Er's padded chamber in a rather Bladder Flask-like fashion, albeit cut by episodes of pregnant silence that are as integral to their "music" as is the audible portion. More of this crew's sickness will be posted soon.
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MARK ANTHONY HEIDE-NEW MUSIC FOR USE, LP, 1983, USA
One of the rarest and most whispered about minimal synth platters, the approach on this private press American obscurity is decidedly spare (sometimes in the extreme), with the instrumental etudes herein often sounding like nothing so much as the backing tracks of Robin Crutchfield's Dark Day circa Exterminating Angel, but offset by bare bones synth theme studies that feel more like sketches. Some very nice bits to be found here nevertheless...
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V/A-WHAT IS TRUTH? VOLUME TWO, LP, 1989, USA
This choice document of 80's American marginal fringe malarky carries on where the first installment that I posted a few weeks back left off, with many of the same parties reappearing here and articulating a distinctly rough hewn American spin on this era of improv, tape collage, noise and assorted avant esoterica; pride of place on this one for me going to the Woo-meets-Biota wobble of Canada's Violence & The Sacred and Randy Greif's spot-on roundelay through subterranean mesmerism.
Track listing:
Violence & The Sacred-Butchered Edit
Blitzoids-Theme From A Summer Place
German Shepherds-It's Always Wet In Debby's Prison
Randy Greif-A Lot Like You
German Shepherds-The First Man To Give Birth
Musica Menta-Weasels Of Tibet
Furry Couch-Skeleton Orchestra
Proof Of Utah-Hot Rods To Hell
Gary Marks-Improvisation 1-19-88
Eugene Chadbourne-A-The First Porthole Solo In History, B-The Last Communist Banjo Solo Of 1987
Haters-Huwa
Elizabeth Harper-Green
Scott Marshall-The Enemy Within
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SPECIES BEING-YONILICIOUS, CD, 1998, USA
Ferocious and dazzling art prog maneuvers from an outfit spearheaded by former Sleepytime Gorilla Museum drummer Frank Grau, this eyebrow-raising and R.I.O.-indebted debut of theirs mating the ebullient horn charting eccentricity of France's Six Cylindres En V to the dense and circus-y post-Klezmer R.I.O. moves of American units like Hamster Theater and Amoebic Ensemble, but cut by a combination of space rock power drives and intermittent kosmiche production values, a seemingly chalk and cheese combo on the written page but one they manage to make seem both obvious and effortless.
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V.A.-STATIC MUSEUM.TWO, CDR, 2001, AUSTRALIA
Briefly issued many years back as an individually burned CDR from Sevcom.com (long since deleted), this sensational compendium of Australian experimental electronic talent is very deserving of a wider reception. Featuring several Aussie notables that have been displayed in the MS vitrine over time (Bradbury, Loop Orchestra, Minit), this is anything but the odd-'n'-sods mop up job of loose ends that so many comps often wind up being, the artists involved almost to a one delivering top of their game material, including hacked-'n'-chopped digital effluvia from Rik Rue, Andrews and Wake Up And Listen, the Loop Orchestra's dysfunctional calliope quease and compilation cappers from Minit , who offer a sublime continuum of oscillating ooze and the slowly coalescing ping/bloop architecture of Bradbury.
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Wednesday, July 1, 2009
KAN MIKAMI-BANG!, LP, 1974, JAPAN
A true legend of the Japanese countercultural underground, having over time worked with everyone from Shuji Terayama and his Tenjo Sajiki theatrical troupe to leading lights of the PSF-related Japanese noise psych camp via his work in Vajra and the Haino/Mikami/Yoshizawa trio, though it must be said that the deeper resonances of much of what Mikami has created over the years seems mostly available to Japanese speakers, predicated as his style is on rawboned and direct emotional conveyance and play with the Japanese language, though his ravaged articulation and soul bearing naked angst has it's western admirers even when just operating as just a man a his guitar. This early explosion of inscrutable avant folk rock/studio fucked strangeness will however go some ways toward initiating those not yet ready for the austere blast of otherness that comprises so much of his solo canon; the nerve shattering Friendsound-worthy psychotropic meele of the title track in particular being one of the more confounding/astounding artifacts of the whole Japanese psych/prog era.
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V/A-CODEX: MIDLOTHIAN/SLUSS-->HEK, LP, 1984, SWEDEN
A gobsmackingly great out of the blue master class in surrealist mesmerism courtesy of one Per Giobel, a heretofore unknown (well...to me anyway) Swedish experimentalist who both fills the A side with a jaw-dropping expanse of immersive and equilibrium addling electronics worthy of the kosmiche masters and lends his deft production gravitas to the handful of associates that occupy the flip of this compendium, all coincidentally occupying a similarly heaving and sighing slipstream of askew electronic acid wonderment mixed with Tietchens-esque smeary/bleary subdued menace.
GEINS'T NAIT-YVONE, CD, 1990, FRANCE
Following my post of this peculiar and fascinating French post-industrial group's "L'Or'N Cat" LP and Jim's post of their Fishes LP, here is, for me, their very finest hour, though the first bit out of the gate here might unintentionally wrongfoot the uninitiated as hammering Test Dept./Dissecting Table-style industrial rhythms set the stage. Such tactics however are but a fraction of the arsenal that Geins't Nait have in their bag of tricks, which takes in everything from deformed minimal synthy technopop ala Bene Gesserit to Nurse With Wound like surrealist malarky, but with a polymorphous inclusivity that treats every methodology concocted during this genre's heyday as grist for their mill, and by dint of that bears closest comparison to the polyvalent maneuvers of Dutch maestros De Fabriek. A consummation and distillation of their various strategies and a a fine example of what continues to remain vital about the output of this era. Thanks to longstanding blog friend Fuzztunnel for this gem.
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MARBLE SHEEP & THE RUN-DOWN SUN'S CHILDREN-BIG DEAL, CD, 1992, JAPAN
Following my posts of three albums worth of this Japanese psychedelic unit's face melting early style (in the PSF-approved noise psych mode), here's a broadcast from the era that saw them swerving 180 degrees into some sort of lazily pastoral/post-Grateful Dead/quasi Caribbean/happy groove psych modality that immediately polarized their fanbase, with the utterly absurd (if charming) easy listening summer evening sashays of "Melted Moon" and "Fish" in particular seemingly guaranteed to constrict the sphincters of Japannoise devotees worldwide. Me? I think it's stellar, if a world away from their bloodletting early era and deserves consideration for a whole other set of reasons. Come to your own conclusions...
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THE JAUNTIES-S.T., 3x7" BOXSET, 1993, USA
Sometime Half Japanese member, leader of Megaphone label units The Dramatics & The Attitude Robots and collaborator with Tatsuya Yoshida, Eye Yamatsuka, Jac Berrocal and an unholy host of other fringe art damage mongers, The Jaunties was an early project of Jason Willett's in consort with a terminally hyperactive 15 freak named Benb Gallaher and it's frantically fucked and lo-fi spazz/skronk/splatter/wobble (imagine Faxedhead playing Flipper covers while wearing boxing gloves) ought to endear it to many within our ranks, particularly those that are hot and bothered over the contempo post-No Wave/free rock crowd.
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