One of LA/s outsider music heroes David Liebe Hart and his ventriloquist dummy Chip (who he treats as his son) has a new, all-too-brief 5-song EP that takes his usual flying saucer obsessions and gives it the DJ Screw technique, (minus the Purple Drank, one assumes). Apart from odes to aliens (including one who doesn't want him to look at porn), there's also "Nature," about his experiences on 4-H Club camping trips, in which Hart delivers this memorable lyric, in his warbly baritone:
"We rub sticks together to make fire/We had joy, and desire."
But you'll have to buy the release to hear it, as you only get a short preview on the EP's Bandcamp page:
I've never been a major fan of the chopped 'n 'screwed sound, but the results here perfectly suit Hart's weird world. The result is sharp music shot thru with hilarious strangeness. I've already listened to this one 3 times. Pass the purple drank, please..?
Last year, I reported on the latest sightings of sicko songsters in our society. Not only are they still at it, but some serious competition has joined them. Maniacs rejoice!
Bretts Milk "Daddy's Breath" (release date: Oct. 15) is creepy electronic "pop", like '80s New Wave gone evil. At its most subtly atmospheric, it suggests the darker side of Barnes and Barnes. Upbeat tracks resemble dance music that no-one in their right mind would ever actually dance to. Vocals, sometimes distorted, sound like the Singing Resident in need of a psychiatrist. Or an exorcist. Great fun!
That Ostrich Von Nipple album was probably my fave new release of last year, so am thrilled to hear him guesting on this equally brilliant album. Occasional guitarist for The Residents, Nolan Cook, who also appeared on Von Nipple's LP, applies his twisted 6-string shenaniganshere as well.
Perhaps an even stronger contender for album-of-the-year (so far) is Macula Dog's self-titled release. Someone on their Bandcamp page says "It's like the Residents performing covers of Oh, No!-era Devo inside the universe of Pee Wee's Playhouse," thus saving me the trouble of writing a review - I was going to compare this great band to those very same folks, including Pee Wee!
Macula Dog[listen for free, Name-Your-Price download] If your head isnt caving in yet from all this elegant eccentricity, it very well may after witnessing this stupendous 9 minute video from another avant-tarde veteran, Petunia-Liebling MacPumpkin and her Electric Phantom posse. So impressed was I by the surreal hallucinations and audio manifestations of the vid that I just had to subject Ms. MacPumpkin to a brief interrogation.
Petunia-Liebling MacPumpkin - "Veggie Medley": the vegetables will get you if you don't watch out!
- Do you do all the visual effects/photography yourself? If not, would you like to give a shout-out to your collaborators?
Melody McGinn the caretaker at Electric Phantom does the majority of the visual effects/photography/editing. In this particular story however, Jimmy L. Wright made all of the veggies, Alien and Halbert (the dog). Jodie Lowther created the "set" for part 4, and Frederick Barr the "set" for part 2.
- Where do you shoot your videos? Do you have a studio?
We shoot the videos on greenscreen at Electric Phantom.
- You are in Florida, correct? Is there any strange/experimental art/music scene near you?
Yes! From Orlando originally and now in Gibsonton. hahha I believe there is a noise scene around here, but I don't go out much.
- Do you plan on releasing this music, or is it only the soundtrack to the video?
Oh it's already been released..One more video to go and the album has been completely visualized. http://www.electric-phantom.com/merch.html
- Do you (like me) not really like vegetables, and this vid expresses your fear/guilt having been raised by your mother always trying to get you to EAT YOUR VEGETABLES?!
Actually Im a vegetarian but I had the same exact experience with meat. Maybe this is revenge.
27 tracks of lightning-fast audio edits whizzing by in 24 minutes? It can only mean another release from I Cut People and their ever-improving m.o. of wicked social satire thru a dense collage of countless samples. The album is called "I Quit" but let's hope he isn't. With Negativland members dropping dead left and right, and The Tape Beatles seemingly out of action, ICP would appear to be our best chance for reversing the usual one-way stream of corporate/religious info-tainment, creatively recycling this waste, and spitting it back. The inanity of the mass media, politics and consumerism, and the anxiety it produces in the brainwashed populace has never been more funny! And entertaining! NOW how much would you pay?! I Cut People "I Quit" Picks to click: "Try It," "All You Need Is More Things," and "All About Crap." And if Beavis and Butthead were sound collagists, they would have proudly produced "Dick Bible."
Whilst perusing the roughly 5,372 albums R. Stevie Moore has put up on his Bandcamp page, I was delighted to see that the Bingo Gazingo album is now available for your free listening/low-cost purchasing pleasure. Mr. Gazingo was a real character, a senior citizen who started appearing at poetry readings in the 1990s, hilariously declaiming in a New Yawk voice his short, rhymed phrases, often only vaguely related to what his poems where supposed to be about. This, his one and only album, features a back-up band featuring Moore, Chris Butler (of The Waitresses, and Tin Huey), and various djs from WFMU, the station that would release this album. The music is a real variety show, from punk, to soulful r'n'b, to abstract improvs. But of course the late Bingo is the star of the show, proclaiming such profound utterances as: - They're playing classic rock/in Jurassic Park - I want to make my home in/your ovum - Rick the wanker/from Casablanca/I sing like Paul Anka - My projectile/is erectile - I cannot accept/your indecent proposal/maybe a horse'll
I'm glad no-one told him that Tupac's last name isn't pronounced "shaker" - it would have messed up his rhymes. BINGO GAZINGO Speaking of R. Stevie Moore, out of his near-infinite discography, I've heard maybe...3 albums? I def. like "Phonography," esp. the wonderful "Goodbye Piano," where he bumps his head into the mic, and keeps on singing. And I have a couple greatest "hits" collections. But NOW where do I go?
We've been following Frenchman Cartone Sonore's curious career for some time now, most of it concerned with obscure and toy instruments. But his new album is created solely with his voice. Yep, no other sound sources used other than his own singing, clicking, droning, and any other sounds he can coax out of his larynx. It's one of those projects that could just be a gimmick, or art-fart self-indulgence, but the results are quite fresh and original. The on-line album's 11 tracks vaguely resemble everything from Gregorian chants to beatboxing to The Beach Boys (sometimes simultaneously), but really, it feels like a whole new musical vocabulary opening up. The wonders of multi-tracking! Listen and/or buy via Bandcamp: Carton Sonore: "Animago" One of the catchiest tunes on the album, "Dans La Foret" is available for free. My fave track might be the haunting "Un Gout Familier," which sounds like an instant standard. (I don't even know how to label this post. Guess I'll have to make a new label for "Vocal/Acapella.")
"American Folk Music" is the most boring possible name for an album, but fear not! The latest release from veteran North Carolina wackos the Moolah Temple $tringband is anything but dull. They take songs from Harry Smith's venerable "Anthology of American Folk Music" and radically warp them by introducing such elements as exotic Middle Eastern-isms, clanging and banging percussion, incongruous '80s hip-hop style drum machine beatz, even a bit of rapping on one song, and mix them with the trad sounds of guitars, banjos, and a skillful fiddle that suggests that someone has been taking music lessons. The hideously/hilariously inappropriate combination of traditional folk music and Autotune (!) on "Farmland Blues" had me laffin' out loud. Also dig: the fuzz guitar crunch of "Little Moses" (even tho it goes on too long), and a version of "John Hardy" that might even be better than the Gun Club's? Scuzzy vocals are often distorted beyond recognition. "The Titanic," however, actually approaches mainstream respectability, complete with perfectly competent backing vox.
More Bandcamp weirdness ahoy! L.A. nutters Freshly Wrapped Candies have unwrapped an old album of theirs from 1989 chock full of hermetic, inscrutable DIY obsessions that, perhaps inevitably, are sometimes reminiscent of The Residents, esp. on songs like "Grandfathers' Rug". Other standout songs like the downright catchy "Think" and the Beavis and Butthead-ish "Pitter Pat" don't immediately suggest any particular influences. Organically strange, but not off-puttingly so. It emerges from the haze with its' humanity intact.
I don't even know how to deal with the death of David Bowie, at least so far as this blog is concerned. He was such a monumental figure in my musical upbringing that I wouldn't know where to begin. Ah well...in lieu of anything relevant, here's the post I had planned for today. If, like me, you've just been listening to lots of Bowie and want to take a break for something a little new and different, I must say that the mood of these songs is strangely appropriate:
What will you do with all that xmas scratch your relatives laid on ya? What, they didn't give you anything? Bastards! No matter - these zesty-flavored new(ish) releases can be listened to, and in some cases downloaded, for free.
We're long-time fans of Twink, The Toy Piano Band, and not only can you now check out his entire discography on the Bandcamps, but you cats must also dig his latest:
This album is inspired by winter, and so has a somewhat more somber tone to it. Somber, yet cartoon-ish, if you can imagine that. The master of toy-tronica is in fine form on such pick hits as "Pipper Snitch," and "Sparklemuffin."
Not sure how I discovered Corpus Callosum, probably by searching for unusual instruments, but this bunch of eccentric California folkies have come up with what is possibly the most gorgeous tune on Bandcamp. Musical saws and accordions beautifully creak along with sing-along vocals:
Now that you're all properly relaxed, I shall send you off to dream-land with this stunning bit of Eno-Frippy drum-less drone courtesy of the Connecticut combo Landing.
A year we ago we wrote about artists such as The Fruiting Body who make music out of everyday sounds. I am happy to say that this trend is continuing. People of Earth! Your musical instruments are...OBSOLETE!
We salute you, France, for you are the country that gave us, among other things,musique concrète. And Furniker (aka Franz Schultz), who might literally be making concrete music - I would not be surprised if an actual concrete mixer was featured in the track "Construction Site." That's a song featured onFurniker's brand new, all-too-brief, 4-track'net release that takes everyday stuff (song titles include "In The Kitchen" and "Work") and samples and loops them into a rhythmic, compelling din. You won't find too many hummable melodies here, but if you like industrial music, well..this really is industrial. Furniker/"Furniker" (Bandcamp streaming) Furniker/"Furniker" (archive.org free downloading/streaming)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I found this chap on Bandcamp: Spannerman Dan ("instruments are made from found and recycled objects") His short, low-key songs (sketches, more like) aren't too spectacular, but "Pailito" is nice, and "Calder Waltz" is very nice, with what sounds like alien animals vocalizing over pleasantly chiming bell-like sounds. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sneak previews of two forthcoming albums that I am very much looking forward to (bookmark this page!):
The great Matmos have released a track from their forthcoming (Feb 2016) album named after the only "instrument" they used to make it: a Whirlpool "Ultimate Care II" washing machine. Dig this swell percussion jam that will also make whites whiter, colors brighter:
And Miles Copeland (the IRS Records founder/manager of The Police, I assume?) will be releasing this Dec. 10th a collection of his field recordings of the "Sea Organ" built into the coastline of Croatia. Waves roll into tubes of various sizes, creating a theoretically endless, random piece of music. Quite lovely. Two tracks for, if you'll pardon the expression, streaming, are now up: "Sea Organ"
The late, great Hans Reichel gets a lot of props in the modern jazz world for his guitar playing, which is all well and good, but Maniacs should proceed directly to the few recordings he made highlighting his invention, the hand-crafted wooden objects known as Daxophones. Imagine a school kid bending his ruler over his desk making a boing! sound, only played with a violin or cello bow. In the hands of Reichel, a master musician as well as inventor, the Dax is amazingly versatile, capable of all manner of sounds, often with cartoonish undercurrents.
Reichel calls this album an 'operetta' even tho there are no singers. Indeed, there are no other instruments on this album besides the Daxophone. Yet the instrument has the uncanny ability to mimic human speech sound. Not only that, but the song "Bubu And His Friends" sounds like a whole barnyard of animals singing in harmony. Not only do these instruments sing, they swing, dad. These are not just weird noises for a chin-stroking avant-garde academic. "Street Song" is filled with hand-clapping joy. The percussion-heavy "You Can Dance With Me" reaches an almost Afro-Cuban level of danceable groove. And the catchy bubblegum rock of "Oway Oway" could convert the most brainwashed of mainstream music followers (well, in my fantasy world...) Some songs suggest actual musical genres, like salsa, jazz or country, but played as if by Martians who, after picking up some terrestrial radio transmissions, attempt to interpret the music of Earthlings on their alien instruments, tuned to no known scale. A wonderful work of weird genius. The fact that the name 'Hans Reichel' is not as well known as 'Kardashian' does not speak well for the human species, but we can start changing that right now:
Hans Reichel - "Yuxo, A New Daxophone Operetta" [2002] You can also listen to/buy another great Daxophone album (along with a slew of his guitar releases) here:
It's fall, Halloween is around the corner, so let's get moody with these FREE! listening/download contemporary internet releases of a decidedly strange and obscure nature. If Lovecraft's Miskatonic University had a college radio station, these albums would be on heavy rotation.
Ak'chamel: "Old Norse Mara" - Like the Residents attempting to summon occult entities (or The Elder Gods), this album is dark, distorted, evil ambience, culminating in the compelling "Death Was On You From The Moment of Birth." But it's then followed by an utterly incongruous surf-punk instrumental(?!). No matter, a demonically-possessed muppet then takes over the lead vox for the next track. (The more overtly shaman-istic "Fucking With Spirits" is plenty cool, too.) Price: Name your price.
Sasha Olynyk: "1955" (EP) - What is this, a '50s crooner & an EZ orchestra collaborating with Portishead? It's hard to tell thru the hallucinogenic fog. 25 minutes of mysterious melancholy, sometimes quite beautiful, a la Boards of Canada, only Olynyk really is Canadian. The moment in "Surfers Dream" where the "Rebel Without A Cause" soundtrack morphs into the song is magical. Price: Name your price.
Hanetration - "Murmurist" ep - One of our faveambient-ists. "Begin" is indeed a great place to begin; the gently clanking percussion + church organ drone of "Sundown" = one of his best ever. Price: Free
Duet for Theremin and Lap Steel: does what it says on the tin. Tho sometimes joined by guests, most of these free releases are by an Atlanta, GA duo who deliver deep drone instrumentals that sound nothing like the Space Age sounds you'd expect from theremins, or the usual country/Hawaiian-isms of steel guitar. All live, all improvised. Price: Name your price. See also: http://duetonline.net/sample
Back in 2008 we posted a hilarious radio spot from the conservative religious group
Focus on the Family responding to a law passed in Colorado that allowed
trans-gendered people to use public bathrooms. Recently we received this fairly genius bit of animation that illustrates the ad, making it even funnier. It comes to us courtesy of Mutant Lab, who are clearly doing the Lord's work. Work it, girl!
A clever, amusing new music video by Los Angeles rocker Taylor Locke finds the artist tooling around town in a motorized easy chair, the comfy kind one might find in a living room. The video makes it look like a cheesy tv commercial for what I thought couldn't possibly be a real product, but upon further investigation, the website appears to be real. Ok...What could one possible do with one of these things? I doubt that they're street-legal. It certainly does make music videos more interesting (along with the nekkid lady!) The catchy power-pop music is quite good, too.
Sound collagist I Cut People have a mordantly funny new on-line album that slices and dices innumerable American media sound bites, revealing the existential angst, neuroses, and anxieties contained in bland public service announcements, cheerful commercials for medications, news broadcasts, and chat shows. The tracks are brief and the whole thing flies by fairly quickly, but it's not background music. Attention must be paid to catch the rapid-fire edits in such wickedly surreal cut-ups as "Ebola Vacation" and the lewd, rude "Watch Me, Innocence." Listen for free, buy for cheap: I Cut People: "Miserable Day" Bandcamp page
As today is March 4th, let's march forth once again with the Now Sounds of alternative marching/brass bands with a sampler of releases from recent years from bands that you won't see parading onto a sporting events field, or serenading politicians. A sterling example of 'antique-garde' music - new, experimental sounds using pre-rock, antique instruments and methods. I don't know how mobile they all are. I did see Mucca Pazza live a year or two ago, so I can vouch for them- they went marching all over the place before they finally hit the stage. March Forth 2015 1. 9th Ward Marching Band - Halloween Beat [covering John Carpenter, and a bit of Mike Oldfield] 2. 9th Ward Marching Band - Slowride [a couple of classic rock covers, from this krewe that features the king and queen of New Orleans high weirdness, Quintron and Miss Pussycat] 3. 9th Ward Marching Band - The Letter 4. Duk - Bilbo [from the excellent Bandcamp release "Early Worm Gets The Bird"] 5. Hypnotic Brass Ensemble - Moments [cover of Art of Noise's "Moments in Love"] 6. Hypnotic Brass Ensemble & Tony Allen - Marcus Garvey [w/Fela Kuti's master drummer Allen] 7. Mucca Pazza - Chick Habit [two songs from their super album "A Little Marching Band"; this wild take on the France Gall/April March classic features a rarity in this field: vocals] 8. Mucca Pazza - Dirge [doesn't get any less traditional than this: a creepy circus waltz for accordion and musical saw] 9. No BS! Brass Band - Take on Me [A Ha cover; always amazing to hear a great take on a song I'd never given the slightest thought to before] 10. Youngblood Brass Band - Human Nature, Pt. 2 [quite an improvement on Michael Jackson's original] 11. Youngblood Brass Band - Nate Mccarish Handbills For No Man [can't quite determine what strange sounds are featured here]
Continuing our survey of new music you can listen to, and in many cases, download for free on Bandcamp.com, we fly off to exotic lands. It is the depths of winter now, so I felt a tropical vacation was in order. And this first album is especially timely, as it features Evan Crankshaw from the great "Flash Strap" blog, who just debuted his all-exotica radio show, "The Explorer's Room" last week. The Cumberland County Mean Gang "Crashing Waves"
Starts off a bit New Age-y, but track #3 "Slave Trade" is really great psychedelic exotica that sounds like it was played on your grandma's electric organ after someone spiked her Ensure with mescaline; it dovetails nicely right into the next track, which is almost 9 minutes of pure lysergic abandon. "Under The Jungle" does indeed sport jungle ambiance, tho the music is more Jean-Michel Jarre '70s-type electronica than Martin Denny. It's melody is re-used in the next track, a Giorgio Morodor-on-cheap-ass-Casios techno-dance stomper. The most excellent "Ritual of Flight" begins with theremin- ish electronics, followed by haunted-house organ...and exotic bird calls? Just what kind of spook show is this, anyway? Was happy to hear grandma's psychedelic organ again on track 8. Price: Name Your Price. And enjoy your flight. The Mad Drummer - from South Africa, but sounding more Zappa than Zulu. The inverse of Paul Simon and Vampire Weekend? A lot better than them, that's for sure. All 6 songs are good, but for someone who calls himself a mad drummer, the synthetic drums are the one (minor) fault I find with this. Price: $3.
Boolz "S.O.S.[Slovvd-n-Chopped]" - Also from South Africa comes this trippy dub electronica. I like the bugged-out VV3ΔK [SLOWD-N-CHXPPXD] Price: Name Your Price Some comps that will keep you busy and dancing for days:
Analog Africa - 21 albums! Haven't listened to all of them, but I can def recommend "African Scream Contest" - just don't buy the line about it being "psychedelia." It's James Brown-ish funk and West African highlife, and what's wrong with that? Can we stop throwing the word 'psychedelic' around so much? It's getting to be as meaningless a term as 'experimental.' And be sure to read this as you dig the crate diggin' sounds of Analog Africa: Dusty African Grooves.
I am quite delighted to announce that the crucial WFMU show "Bodega Pop" will devote all three hours of its weekly programming to this here web-log as our 10th anniversary festivities continue. This Wednesday 7:00PM Eastern time on Woof-Moo's "Give The Drummer Some" stream (not the over-the-air broadcast) the party commences. Your host-with-the-most Gary Sullivan helms a blog also called "Bodega Pop", and its tales of international music-collecting derring-do fills me with insane envy. Damn, this guy's got a great collection. And now, my latest Bandcamp discovery: AllMusic said about today's album: "In the running for strangest novelty item of the year [2007], A Drop in the Glass is nevertheless an impressive display of musicality." Indeed. GlassDuo from Poland have constructed what they claim is the world's largest wine glass instrument, some 57 pieces strong. Yes, wine glasses. You know how you can wet your finger and rub it along the rim of the glass to produce a musical, if somewhat squeaky, tone? Well, these two have taken this old idea to a virtuoso level. Mussorgsky's "Pictures At An Exhibition" is one of those classical war-horses that I'd never really given much thought to, but that was before I heard the familiar opening "Promenade" performed on something I am now drinking out of.
Other highlights: Chopin's "Prelude" (tho I prefer Serge Gainsbourg's remake "Jane B"), the clanging of metal percussion (a trash can, perhaps?) halfway into "Great Gate of Kiev", and the medley of hits from Grieg's proto-goth "Peer Gynt." After a while you may forget the unusual methods used to produce these sounds, and just listen to it for it's musical merits. It's available for purchase, or listen to the free stream: GlassDuo: "A Drop In The Glass" An mp3 for ya: GlassDuo: "In The Hall of the Mountain King" (excerpt from track 10) I'm finally listening to some proper classical music. My mother will be so proud.
More indie album wonderfulness courtesy of sites like Bandcamp (and remember, you can always listen for free) from geniuses that would otherwise go unheard because no label in their right mind would ever give 'em a record deal. This time we're spotlighting colorful cartoonish craziness - after all, "novelty music" is not a bad word 'round these parts. To quote one of the album titles featured here, let's have fun:
Twink the Toy Piano Band "Miniatures Vol. 2": I can unhesitatingly recommend this brief, kooky album, performed on toy piano and other whimsical sound-making thingies. I actually think this is one of Twink's finest efforts of toy-tronic pop instrumentals. Price: FREE 1000 Needles: "Osiris": More toy tunes, this time from a band using modified Nintendo and Gameboys playing 8-bit melodies while guitars and drums rock along. Some great songs in this 7-track set that, as on the standout tracks "Error 537" and "Monument 101," skillfully mix rinky-dink electronics with rawk power. Price: $4 The Invertebrates "Let's Have Fun": Not a new release this time, but a re-issue of some classic New Wave post-punk weirdness from a criminally underrated San Fran combo who we first featured here a few years back when we posted a vinyl rip of their "Eat 'Em While They're Young" EP. That one's long gone off-line, but maybe it will get the re-issue treatment like this gem, which sports concrète andbackwards
tape effects, dada lyrics that sometimes sound like they're being sung
verbatim from magazine articles, B52s-ish femme vox and electric organ, and on one of the album's catchiest songs "Atilla The Hun," Jews harp, and a crazed percussion break. Price: $7 The Kominas "Wild Nights in Guantanamo Bay": I guarantee you've never heard any punk rock like this before: a Muslim American band hitting us with stuff like the Sex Pistols-quoting 'Sharia Law in the U.S.A,' campy sound bites, a great surf-punk song ('Ayesha') that ends
with a Muslim chant sound-collage, and a catchy funky rap song called (heh heh) 'Suicide Bomb the Gap.' Apart from courting controversy (and they did indeed get media coverage that scarcely described their music), there's actual good sounds here that break out of the punk mold, e.g.: the unique, rhythmically complex, kinda Caribbean-sounding 'Layla' (no, not that one). Price: FREE, but you'll probably end up on all kinds of watch lists for downloading it.
Carton Sonore "Modarn": And now for something completely different - a collection of musical fragments only seconds long that are meant to played on shuffle play, effectively creating a new song every time. Like Eno's "generative" works, it's never the same twice. Price: 1€
Thiaz Itch "Frivolurium": Like Carton Sonore, another funny Frenchman. The description tags tell the story: "carnivale,
circus,
comedy,
electro,
space-age-pop." Utterly delightful modern vaudeville cut from the same zany cloth as Twink...not to mention Perrey and Kingsley, Spike Jones, and Monty Python, who's "Bright Side of Life" gets brilliantly covered here. But this album is no child's play - it gets almost proggy in it's experimentation: the polka-esque "Splooshy il Chiocciolo" features everything from Chipmunk vocals to heavy rock guitar to fruity horns. My current Favorite-ist Album In The Whole Wide World. And remember, "don't step on my foreskin!" Price: 5 €
Another strange-music-making Australian ("odd-stray-alien," as our expert in such matters Buttress O'Kneel says) is the chap in the above video, Rod Cooper, a metal-worker who makes fantastic plunky/boingy/screechy hand-built metal instruments. Seeing him live would be the optimal way to experience him, I would imagine, considering how, to quote B'O'K: "he used to play in subterranean stormwater drains and stuff, secret illegal gigs that utilised the tunnels' natural reverb to the fullest." And of course, you'd get to see these gizmos up close.
He has a few albums for sale, but here's one you can listen to via Bandcamp as Klunk, a duo with John Bell on vibraphone and percussion:
Many of these improvised instrumentals are nice indeed, with Cooper coaxing all kinds of atmospheric, almost ambient soundscapes out of his Highly Resonant Object. No harsh industrial pounding here. The interplay between vibes and HRO on "Aluminum" is quite lovely, and the dramatic "Columbium" is compelling. I love jazz vibes, but on some tracks the aimless wandering vibraphone doesn't do much for me. Tracks like the sparse, haunting "Stainless" are more successful.
Here are two samplers, both almost 6 minutes long:
You may have seen that "viral" (as the kids say) sensation Babymetal, the cutesy Japanese girl metal band. But from down Melbourne way comes something even stranger: Satanic death-metal that isn't metal at all but hip-hop. Over boomin' (if dark) electro beatz, MC Ice Cold drops rhymes like "Your life I steal and your soul I’m takin
/cookin MCs like a pound of bacon...
dissers be dissin and the hataz be hatin
/but it aint no thang when you’re in league with SATAN" (from the song "Awaken Ancient Spirits"). Vocals delivered, but of course, in that menacing Cookie-Monster growl. Very funny, but despite song titles like "Satan Iz Tha Gangsta" it's not intended to be a parody but rather, according to our Aussie spy Buttress O'Kneel, "he says it's more like a 'what if' - 'what if hiphop had been the outlet
for necrosatanists rather than metal?' - like those books that imagine
what it would be like if hitler won the war, or if the dinosaurs hadn't
died out."
I wonder if anyone has done anything like this before? After all, the
inverse - ghetto gangstas playing heavy rock - has been around for
decades, e.g.: Ice T's Body Count, Suicidal Tendencies, the "Judgement
Night" soundtrack.
More strange sonic wonders from Down Under coming soon. Thanks, B'O'K!
Like I was saying...Listen for free, buy if you like. This batch is loosely associated by a shared fascination with the surreal and fantastic, injecting a little much-needed magic into our world.
- Ergo Phizmiz "Idiot": The prolific madman across the water has two more winners. This one's a generous 18 tracks of mostly instrumentals (w/some sampled vox) cobbled together out of found-sounds and whimsical instruments. "Ornidisco" is a dance track ingeniously fashioned entirely from sampled bird sound effects. "Night on The Town" is an absurd disco raver performed entirely acappella (complete with beatboxing) that's as funny as it is funky. Avant-garde, or just good ol' British eccentricity? Price: free. - Ergo Phizmiz "Music for Pleasure": "A 17 track behemoth of Ergo Phizmiz's singular take on guitar based rock'n'roll & pop music." Yep, these ramshackle constructions suggest actual rock music, sometimes in the Neil Innes or Syd Barret vein, with much Kink-y garage punk energy. Bonus points for reviving Bobby Goldsboro's '60s bubblegum gem "Little Things." Album title = truth in advertising. Price: £7.
- Doctor Midnight "Crotch Rocket Extremities and/or Popular Culture Atrocities": What the ..? This short (12 tracks in 23 minutes), utterly unpredictable album makes as much sense as that album title. This duo comes from Alabama, not with a banjo on it's knee, but plenty of other noises: sound effects, screaming, computers, piano, marimba, guitars, and scary hillbilly voices that may be sampled, or may belong to the band members. My fave moment is when "Chocodino" almost turns into a remake of Steve Reich's "It's Gonna Rain," followed by 38 seconds of "There Ain't Shit On TV!" Price: free. Paul and Pierre "Eggs Benedict With Mr Wu On The Seahorse Monorail": Pierre is the man behind naive/ toy-pop masters Carton Sonore; this time out he's joined by Scottish warbler Paul Vickers for actual songs, but still retaining the whimsy of past projects. Acoustic instruments like musical saw and mandolin meet Casio-tronics to realize sea shanty-like sing-alongs replete with fantastical imagery. Well written, wonderfully evocative, effortlessly enjoyable. Price: €7, tho the super song "Lon Chaney" is free, and you know a song has to be good if it's about Lon Chaney. -Zlata Sandor/Shaun Sandor "Band on the Moon": If you're pressed for time, here's 5 minutes of a father and his 4-year-old daughter singing about the kinds of things you would expect little girls to sing about, e.g.: party balloons, animals, and playing on the moon. C'mon, how can you not like this? Price: $1.00.
Timur and the Dime Museum "X-ray Sunsets": These Angelenos conjure up a dark carnival for accordion, ukulele, violin, and on the rollicking "Distance Of The moon," a spot of toy piano, with a bona-fide opera singer up front; I featured their amazing take on Nine Inch Nails' "Closer" here previously, but this album is all original and it's all good. Don't be surprised if David Lynch uses the dreamy doo-wop ballad "Asleep At The Wheel" in his next film. Flamboyantly theatrical without quite being campy. Recommended, even if you hate opera. Price: $7.
Tho he was hardly an indie band/ bedroom producer like the above, I still would like to point out that - holy crap! - there are now 48 Fela Kuti albums now available on Bandcamp.
...tho compared to the '80s/'90s tape underground: - the sound quality of indie music sites like Bandcamp is usually a lot better than those hissy tapes - even if you don't buy you can listen for free - you don't have to go to the bother of sending away for items via the mail: they're right here! Go get 'em! So consider this post the equivalent of when magazines like 'Option' used to have tape reviews.
- Convivial Cannibal "Buy The People Afford The People": An album as good as the band name; Absolutely fascinating unclassifiable L.A.-area weirdness that conjures up an air of dark esoterica by mixing live instruments with what sound like old ethnic music samples, children's music boxes played backwards, and unidentified sounds; the audio equivalent of a Joseph Cornell shadow box. Sometimes it resembles traditional music when it's just singing and guitar, but they're both buried under effects to the point of illegibility. "Avant garble" they call it. Numerous other-worldy videos and the new "Iniquitous Ubiquitous" album (check the hypnotically droning "There Are Greys Outside Your Window") are likewise recommended. Price: name your price.
- Dr. D.R. Barclay "One Note Mixtape": I don't believe this. Some mad genius has taken every one-note guitar solo he could find from the rock era and mixed them together into two 7-minute mixes. Some I recognized (Neil Young, The Ramones) and plenty I didn't. Hilarious and utterly mental. Price: $3.
- "Roncheras" v/a: Traditional Mexican styles like the polka-esque ranchera and the melodramatic mariachi get cooked into a delicious burrito of electro, rock, experimental, even 8-bit post-modernism for a furious fiesta. Highlites include Dr. Almeja's rockin' 'Ek Chuac,' and Dada Ket's cartoonishly crazy 'LA Costenida.' Muy fun. Price: free. -The Hathaway Family Plot "Worry": a horrible year of illness and family deaths inspired this brief but powerful electro/noise suite. Individual tracks like "I Should Be" work well on their own, but the album is best experienced as a start-to-finish whole. - Jaw Harp Potential "My Boyfriend, Your Cat": Need a little light relief after "Worry"? Try this: three wholesome girls from Iowa who sing five simple, catchy songs on accordion, ukulele, toy piano, glockenspiel, and harp (not a 'blues harp,' an actual harp) that are cute without being overly cutesy. Better then most Beat Happening albums. Really quite wonderful. Price: free.
Oh man, I've got at least 6 more albums I was gonna review...err...think I'll wait until another "issue" of our little 'zine here, this post is getting too long. (Press 'eject.')
One of LA/s outsider music heroes David Liebe Hart and his ventriloquist dummy Chip (who he treats as his son) has a new, all-too-brief 5-song EP that takes his usual flying saucer obsessions and gives it the DJ Screw technique, (minus the Purple Drank, one assumes). Apart from odes to aliens (including one who doesn't want him to look at porn), there's also "Nature," about his experiences on 4-H Club camping trips, in which Hart delivers this memorable lyric, in his warbly baritone: 
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