Hi folks!
Here’s a second round of reviews posted here and nowhere else!
In case you missed my post from a week ago, we had a nice backlog of several dozen reviews that there was not room for in the current issue 63, or we received the albums right as we were going to press. So again, I thought, let’s put them here for you for now so that you can still read them—and to give those of you who have not seen one of our issues before a taste of what we have been doing in our pages these last 29 years (wow, that’s a long time, isn’t it?). As promised last week, I will try to post them all, a dozen at a time, in this space. So keep checking back every few days and you will find more!
Note: I only wrote about half of these, so the author of each review is identified at the start so you will know who you are reading.
And if you missed last week’s group, that dozen can be read here:
http://www.bigtakeover.com/reviews/a-dozen-reviews-debuted-here-aids-wolfkoenjihyakkei-a-storm-of-light-behexen-between-the-buried-and-me-blackmarket-mac-blackout-bushart-california-guitar-trio-paul-collins-beat-the-crowd-dora-flood-and-mike-edison-breakthru-radios-live-studio
and the reviews were of: Aids Wolf/Koenjihyakkei, A Storm of Light, Behexen, Between the Buried and Me, Blackmarket, Mac Blackout, Bushart, California Guitar Trio, Paul Collins’ Beat, the Crowd, Dora Flood, and Mike Edison
Regards!
Jack R
Here’s this week’s fresh dozen!
—
eddie & the subtitles
fuck you eddie!
(Frontier)
(by Jack Rabid) I remember hearing this L.A. trio’s debut, the1980 No Label records “Fuck You Eddie” 7” a-side “American Society” on *Rodney Bingenheimer*’s KROQ show that year, in town after graduating high school back East. Blown away, I hungrily plunked down the $2 and tax with relish the next day at Zed Records in Long Beach, despite having scant bucks. It was a time when punk in that ripening region was just starting to get faster, faster, fastest as a rule (following the release of the highly influential Germs album, itself following the hyper-slam velocity of the pioneering, major-signed Dickies, and four particularly shocking indie EPs by Middle Class, Rhino 39, The Dils, and the Germs themselves). This increasing MPH was amazingly fresh for about two years, before it became so moronically monochromatic-militant circa 1982. In that environment, the slow, lumbering, stoned-out, absolutely lurching values of this five-minute, almost hippy-ish, raw punk a-side left a scorching hole in all who heard it. It leads off this retrospective on Frontier, and it still jarring in all the best ways, an almost unprecedented, unexpected punk classic; it’s like Flipper as a scary band, rather than a diseased one. (Although who was more stoned at the time between the two bands would be a matter of conjecture, and a hell of a contest!) Its main lyrical conceit, “I don’t want to drown in American Society” closed the deal perfectly, the nightmare of suburban O.C.’s plastic family values pummeled into you over and over at the maddeningly slow tempo, as if you were playing a 45 record on 33.
The trouble, as the LP that followed later that year (_Skeletons in the Closet_) made clear, was that Fullerton, Orange County’s Eddie Joseph had not one other idea quite like it; nothing one-tenth as devilishly, absurdly, darkly catchy. He had… well… a few OK tunes improved by the group’s fairly hot playing, masking that deficiency (like “No Virgins in Hollywood” and “Zombie Drug Killers”). But little more. And that inescapable problem is what still sinks this collection. (Frontier has also reissued the original 7” recently, and truth be told, for vinyl types that can suffice. It just goes to show that some short-lived bands that tantalized us through history by breaking up after only one hot single may have done us a favor.)
Drummer *Matt Simon*’s liner notes 28 years later make it clear what the trouble was, solving the mystery at last: too many drugs; too much scene-hanging on those drugs; too little interest from freeloading bassist Mike Patton of Middle Class, who treated his decade-older, feckless bandleader as a combination gratis pusher and money-pit; too much tithing of much better, younger OC bands that Joseph was managing or booking in svengali exploitation (he deserves credit, I suppose, for giving a leg-up to Adolescents, Social Distortion, T.S.O.L., and others when they were nobody teenagers—but his dealings on their behalf turned predictably shady); and too little of the tight wound nervousness of their singular moment. Fuck You does its best to present the Subtitles in their best light, jettisoning a fairly unlistenable half of _Skeletons_—though I take exception to the decision to leave off the moody, haunting tribute to the recently-killed in a car crash Rhino 39 singer, “*Dave Dacron*,” as in: “Dave Dacron/Dead and Gone/You have sung your last song”—and replacing them with a strong unreleased song and a too-rough rehearsal tape, then tacking on two serviceable tracks on Joseph’s 1983 follow-up (with three totally different backing players), Dead Drunks Don’t Dance, originally released on Social Distortion’s manager *Monk*’s label, 13th Floor. (That same day, 13th Floor issued Social D’s incredible debut, Mommy’s Little Monster.) But one is challenged to keep listening after the opening tracks, as the diminishing marginal returns become too clear. This is really an EP masquerading as an album. And though I’ve often heard that Joseph left this mortal coil some years back, perhaps the victim of his habits, that notion is just as often denied. Who knows! Oh, but for that brief, shining moment of “American Society,” though… It still spins the head! If you buy this, you’d be smart to put that cut on repeat, and fall prey to its sinister spell for a long, long, long time. (frontierrecords.com)
equimanthorn
lectionum antiquarum
nindinugga nimshimshargal enlillara
(Metalhit)
(by Chuck Foster) From the deepest, darkest depths of Sumerian mythology, Equimanthorn summon the demons of ancients past into our ever-evolving present. A side project of death metal occultists Absu, they prefer dark, ambient noise and demonic whispers to the technique and speed of your typical extreme metal. Lectionum collects the earliest recordings into an eerie compilation that’s somewhere between the lo-fi dark noise of Yen Pox and Blood Box, and the creepy atmospheres of Throbbing Gristle’s Heathen Earth. Nindinugga is slightly more polished, bringing multiple voices and electronic elements into the Sumerian incantations. Here, Diamanda Galás’ Masque of the Red Death trilogy is evoked, sounds and voices swirling through chaos. Frightening, unsettling, yet hypnotically fascinating, these will give you nightmares when awake and bring demons to your dreams. (metalhit.com)
the furious seasons
the furious seasons
(Eskimo)
(by Jack Rabid) In my reviews of L.A.’s Black Watch, I’ve often wondered what John Andrew Fredrick and Co. had to do to get noticed after more than two-decades of quality thinking-man’s indie pop records. The same could be said about singer/songwriter David Steinhart (here released on *Black Watch*’s label instead of the previous other way around). Perhaps even more so, since Steinhart has such a lovely, trilling voice, whereas Frederick’s is more out of the Dylan-to-Reed-to-Go-Betweens dry-roasted type; albeit both are equal romantic-literate heartbreakers. For 24 years, whether with his two brothers in the underrated R.E.M/dBs-sweet early-‘80s L.A. band Pop Art, or for nearly two decades since with Smart Brown Handbag, Steinhart has been a perennial cottage industry goldmine for those who carry torches for soft, finely-crafted, windswept pop, like the kind Flying Nun obsessives gobbled on import from New Zealand in years past. And this is Steinhart’s 17th—correct, 17th—album. Perhaps it’s his first as “The Furious Seasons,” and his bassplaying brother Jeff is back in the riding posse. But we/methinks it will take more than a name change (maybe Steinhart needs to pop out of a giant Jell-O cake on YouTube?) to draw the eyeballs and ear canals that his careful, bittersweet, golden-hued lovelies full of solicitously resigned breakup introspection merit. This time he’s even more acoustic, lightly-ringing, and quietly, unabashedly moving, in an exquisitely gentle flow that resembles the light-pop classics The Mutton Birds and their singer Don McGlashan, another New Zealander, have given us for as long. (“Back to This Side” and “Suitable Love” could even be McGlashan songs!) Best of all, all 13 songs are of a similar type but sit just right, like gorgeous weather that lasts from dawn to dusk, improving everyone’s mood over the duration. Don’t miss “So Long Great City” and “A Big Chunk of Change” for the closest things to up-tempo flavors akin to his pedigree; but really, feel free to hit “shuffle,” because every song is as lithely graceful as the next. (furiousseasons.com)
half light
sleep more, take more drugs, do whatever we want
(Groove House)
(by Marcel Feldmar) This drifting and atmospheric, guitar-dream gaze rolls across my ears like some Cocteau ocean on a Sunday afternoon. The vocals croon and drift, a little like The Sundays perhaps, but smoother, and a little more… mysterious; a mystery that fits perfectly with the music. These songs are like secrets, whispered and caught in starlight. The drums and rhythms tell stories of driving and highway nights, while the guitars fall like rain-shine across the worlds that are created in this seductive half light. This music feels like dusk and flows like dawn, and though it seems like it’s all tied to your dreams, it won’t let you sleep. It lifts you up and holds you brightly, showing you the chords and choruses that bring you back home. (halflightmusic.net)
hellhole
uppers/downers
(Don Giovanni)
(by David Obenour) It’s kind of hard to judge a band based on a 7” alone. It gets even harder when said band only has one more 7” to their name and doesn’t play out all that frequently. That said, this 4-track 7” consisting of three uppers and one downer (on the respective sides) doesn’t do all that much as a whole. Uppers consist of three brief but pretty classic sounding hardcore tunes a la the Cro-Mags, but Downers is a rather droning track with a desperate howl over top of it. There still could be more stuff to Hellhole, but I’ll be damned if I could tell from these four tracks alone. (dongiovannirecords.com)
hospital ships
oh, ramona
(Graveface)
(by Jack Rabid) In this age of cheap/cheaper/cheapest home recording, no one seems content nor even stymied in their regular bands. Everyone is working on their solo albums without aid of any other human, freed from the logistical and financial constraints that used to preclude such efforts on any wide scale. Not that they ever seem to release the final products of such singularity under their own names, endlessly preferring to invent band monikers to hide behind! Ha! Predictably, the vast majority of these lack much grand vision or anything unique, beyond demo-ish pastiches of what a band might do better with varied inputs and the spark of collaboration. But then there is the eye-opening exceptions, of which this is one. Lawrence, KS’s Jordan Geiger is the only member of Hospital Ships (a few other souls flit in and out), normally the songsmith of Minus Story and a trumpeter for Shearwater. And though he names his “project” after a Flaming Lips song, there is none of those neighboring Okies’ idiosyncratic, whacked out, post-psychedelic incoherence. Instead, this is a chamber-folk guy who, given just a piano or acoustic and his highly EQed lost lad tenor, brews up the Imagine era John Lennon (“Sink Your Teeth into Me” is also a blend of “Julia” and “Dear Prudence” off The White Album) as condensed into the ghostly fragility of Big Star’s Third, like on the frosty solo “I Don’t Understand.” The organ out of The Animals’ “House of the Rising Sun” on the opening “Bitter Radio Single” and a few other places is also more creepy-crawly than sociable! I’d like to see this gent on a bill with Wheat, Idaho, solo Joe Pernice, and solo Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow—other go-it-alone types who do late afternoon gloom insularity with similarly graceful, creative brooding. (graveface.com)
the jealous girlfriends
the jealous girlfriends
(Good Fences)
(by Elizabeth Brady) The Jealous Girlfriends epitomize the standard indie band of today. One part shoegaze, another part new wave synth, with touches of piano lounge on “Robuxulla.” Dueling male/female vocals work over loud guitars and melodies, and lyrical narratives covering topics like breakups and apartment-dwelling are rudimentary at best. You won’t hear anything that hasn’t already been pioneered, but it’s still pretty darn good. (www.good-fences)
the jet age
what did you do during the war, daddy?
(Sonic Boomerang)
(by Jack Rabid) For their follow-up to 2007’s Breathless, D.C.’s power-trio (with two ex-*Hurricane Lamp* members) Jet Age are fairly quickly, easily, and painlessly described as what a cheaper, basement-recorded Swervedriver might sound like, if they were actually as obsessed with the early, more power-pop-oriented ‘60s Who as their two Who covers would lead one to believe—instead of their actual overriding influence, The Stooges. (One could also imagine this record released on Homestead or SST in the ‘80s, for a larger-scale frame of reference, and there’s bits of “You Made Me Realize”-era My Bloody Valentine as well.) A drummer as busy as Pete Nuwayser is a total giveaway, although he actually sounds more like Keith Moon’s key punk rock disciple, Rat Scabies on The Damned’s first album Damned Damned Damned, chattering and thrashing away overpoweringly behind leader *Eric Tischler*’s Pete Townshend-ish ringing power chords. (Sometimes maybe a little too overpoweringly, if that’s possible for drummers playing loud, fast rock ‘n’ roll! It’s a non-stop battering that sometimes obscures Tischler’s songs’ rapid-fire tunefulness more than Moon did early in his career, when Who songs were shorter, sharper, and faster.) And the smoking gun is that What is an unabashed rock opera, albeit with an original twist that would not likely occur to Tischler’s mentor, nor many of us: It’s an 11-song, brief-in-context, 35-minute, plausible, explosive (in sound and idea) exploration of a normal American dad’s descent into murderous madness in the face of post-9/11 government hatred: specifically, he becomes a political suicide bomber, appalled at the reign of Bush II’s assaults on our Constitution and ruinous wars. It touches on some of the dark themes embodied in the more juvenile, confused, militant daughter of privilege turned 1968 political (anti-Vietnam) bomber in Phillip Roth’s disturbing 1997 novel, American Pastoral. And in the whipping, fierce maelstrom assault of this record, these twisted places can feel even more alarming. Released earlier in 2008, What is perhaps mitigated somewhat by the electoral sea-change that followed, but that doesn’t blunt its overall themes of the limitations of violent revolt, any more than Roth’s recitation of the Weather Underground’s corner of a tumultuous era. Better to take righteous anger to the town meeting, the coffee shop, the chat room, and ultimately the ballot box, than to leave your wife a widow. A highly striking record, in any case! (sonicboomerangrecords.com)
juniper lane
wake from yourself
(DJ Boy)
(by Chip Midnight) There’s a bar across the street from my day gig that features live music. More often than not, the bands have easily forgettable names and glossy promo photos and aren’t playing to a discriminating crowd of music fans, but rather to people drawn in by the big screen TVs and the 2-for-1 specials on “Ladies Night.” Juniper Lane sounds like that type of band—technically proficient (a nice way of saying the band is too watered down and plain despite having guys who play their instruments well and a singer with a good voice) and headstrong in their determination to make it as a mainstream act that gets played on alt-rock radio. The music will appeal to fans of safe corporate rock like Evanescence, U2, and Coldplay (the last of which are namedropped as huge influences), but is nothing I’d ever go out of my way to track down or see. (djboy.com)
kid montana
temperamental + singles
(LTM U.K.)
(by Joshua Gabriel) Many seem unable to hear, or are unaware of the searing friction of “smooth” music, especially of the ‘80s new wave ilk, when the precedent of punk had begat such thundering ruminations into impressionable hearts. The growing up, newer experiences and greater understanding of the world brought an altered perception of what constitutes tension, bombast, and release. Kid Montana were a Belgian synth-pop duo with roots in the brilliantly neurotic Digital Dance (please see their LTM reissue), which balanced the anxiety of post-punk and the preemptive reserve of a patient awaiting terminal news. The merciful lament of “Tender Complications” balanced with the playful take on Classics IV 1968 #3 classic “Spooky” bestows a subtle versatility that gets overlooked in lieu of idiots knocking the sensuality, grace, and dignity in favor of quips determining such fare as “that gay ‘80s new wave shit.” Their loss. (ltmrecordings.com)
knitting by twilight
an evening out of town
(It’s Twilight Time)
(by Jack Rabid) Promised three years ago in the wake of 2005’s Someone to Break the Silence EP, the third album from this always out of the ordinary, 14-year-old Providence, RI art collective led by John Orsi is here, offering up new worlds of modern sonic texture again. Most bands offer square peg into square hole genre comforts. But the out-of-time instrumentals KbT offers are like new attitudes all around. Having used The Cure’s Pornography as the barest hint for the EP (whose “Audrey” is repeated here in remixed form), given it’s occasional bouts of tribal percussion (appearing again here on occasion), one would have to vastly expand the referencial base to include ambient Brian Eno records, both on his own and with other collaborators (Robert Fripp, David Bowie, David Byrne, Phil Manzanera, etc.), as well as space-oriented film soundtracks, folk, progressive rock, new age, and lots of artistic electronica. The repetitions just drive the spare, moody dreamscapes deeper and deeper into your skull, full of light and airy tones kept bare of ostentation or bombast. It all adds up to 40 minutes of soft-lit reflection, the feeling that your body is floating in an Apollo spacesuit, weightless, through the mesosphere or thermosphere, never to return to earth. (overflower.com)
koufax
strugglers
(Doghouse)
(by Steve Holtje) I loved the keyboardcentricity of early Koufax, lost touch after two albums, and am horrified by what they’ve become: just another overwrought indie-rawk band. There are too many clichés here for me to care anymore. (doghouserecords.com)
——More news from the Breakthruradio.com folks:
FOR IMMEDIATE PUBLICATION:
BREAK THRU RADIO Announces Mumiy Troll’s First Live North American Radio Performance on ‘LIVE STUDIO’!
BreakThru Radio (BTR) is proud to announce that seminal Russian outfit, Mumiy Troll will be gracing its ‘Live Studio’ program for their first ever LIVE North American radio performance.Having released 8 studio albums, written and produced soundtracks for a full length cartoon movie, and donated tracks to feature films including Russian blockbuster, “Night Watch’ – where Mumiy Troll founder, Ilya Lagutenko also plays the Vampire – makes Mumiy Troll one of the most successful, long-standing independent bands in Russia.
After an extensive US tour which will see the band performing to audiences from Washington DC to Seattle, Mumiy Troll will release their first US album, ‘Comrade Ambassador’. For more details, check the band’s site here: http://www.mumiytroll.com/en
The exclusive ‘Live Studio’ session which includes a selection of live performances and interview by BTR’s Maia Macdonald, will be available from Friday, January 30th and can be located here:
http://www.breakthruradio.com/index.php?show=5992
About BreakThru Radio’s LIVE STUDIO:
BTR, the World’s source for the best Independent music on the Internet, where expert DJs expose the rich underground of sound not found on commercial radio. Whether it’s Indie-Rock, Dancehall, Dubstep, Hip-Hop, Skronk, Roots, Country, Reggae, Electronica, Acid Jazz, Ambient Beats, Dub, Two-Step, Death Metal or Folk; whatever genre you can imagine, BTR’s on-demand programming has it well-stocked, and with no expiration date.
Live Studio, one of BTR’s most popular shows, aggregates about 1,800,000 total listens per broadcast. Live Studio’s Director, Maia Macdonald presents the twice weekly shows which capture intimate live performances and compelling interviews which are pre-recorded at Dubway Studios and Shelter Island Sound in New York.
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