BAD BRAINS Live At CBGB 1982 DVD
*** 19 *blistering* live cuts from one of the best hardcore bands of all time. Bonus materials include interviews from 1982 and a bonus audio track.
THE BEATLES Help 2xDVD
*** "2-disc set containing fully restored film with 5.1 surround soundtrack, 7 classic Beatles tracks, a 2nd disc of special features, and a 16 page booklet."
RADIOHEAD The Most Gigantic Lying Mouth Of All Time DVD
*** All the episodes of Radiohead's TV show, with exclusive tunes, and indie store only!
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: Vinyl ))))) Aphex Twin, Battles, Serge, LCD Soundsystem, & much more!
(APHEX TWIN) Caustic Window Compilation 3xLP
*** "Repressed. Caustic Window is Richard D. James aka Aphex Twin/AFX/Diceman/Gak/Polygon Window/Q-Chastic/etc... This release collects ALL of the audio from his classic Joyrex J4/J5/J9i/J9ii releases originally issued in the early-mid '90s."
BATTLES Tonto+ 12"+DVD
*** NOW ON VINYL! And it still has the DVD.
DASO Meine Idee 12"
*** "Daso truly comes into his own on his first Spectral record, expanding upon his marvelous reputation already earned in the house and techno scenes. Blending various elements throughout the EP creates a sound uniquely his own that dancefloors will no doubt covet."
DEAD MACHINES / JOHN WEISE / DAMION ROMERO Friday The 13th 2xLP
*** Totally brainbending Wolf Eyes members and buddies melting your world -- all recorded on Friday the 13th one of these last couple years. Limited, of course.
SERGE GAINSBOURG Rock The Bunker LP
*** "A boogie-ish glam-rock simulation, with the same band as on Vu De L'exterieur . "In 1975 his album Rock Around the Bunker ruffled feathers because he hurled his legendary sarcasm at political ghosts. Gainsbourg insists that Nazism does not stop at the German border, and pokes fun at I-love-a-man-in-uniform chic. He, a Jew who wore the yellow star, is denounced as anti-semitic. Gainsbourg is by now everywhere -- TV, film, scandal sheets, he publishes a novel, has a photo exhibit, does more soundtracks -- at least everywhere in France." -- Bart Plantenga
PAR GRINDVIK Continuate 12"
*** "'Continue In My Words' may start off simple, but it's laced with a tantric-build, pushing subconsciously to the edge where kamikaze lemmings blend mid-air into an exasperated steam machine. 'Continue Me' rides on a topography of mist, blasting and splitting-up, only to be reshaped into gestures that could replace the notion of melody altogether. The few choice notes which actually are singable get de-tuned and tweaked into an irresistible, bittersweet tinge of lust."
JOY DIVISION Closer LP
JOY DIVISION Unknown Pleasures LP
*** BACK IN STOCK! Remastered and pressed on heavy duty vinyl.
LCD SOUNDSYSTEM 45:33 2xLP
*** "45:33 was originally recorded by James Murphy (LCD Soundsystem) as a continuous album-length disco symphony. Commissioned by Nike for their Original Run series, it was the second in the series and proved a massive success, both critically and commercially."
LINDSTROM Lindstrom EP 12"
*** "Repress of these very scarce early Lindstrom 12" releases, on his own Feedelity label."
LINDSTROM The Contemporary Fix 12"
*** You might think the use of banjo, autoharp & clavinet together with acid squiggles on top of live disco-drums is a most unusual combination? Don't be a jerk!
LINDSTROM Plague The Kid 12"
*** "Three tracks from Feedelity-artist and Nordish disco-don Hans-Peter Lindstrom. 'Jodleknappen' and 'Naa Er Bestemor Paa Moten' are 2 nasty tracks with lots of jazzy percussion and techno-ish disco-beats. Arthur Russell meets Carl Craig. 'Gang Sound' is another percussive track from Lindstrom with dirty disco-ish."
MODEST MOUSE We Were Dead Before The Ship Sank 2xLP
*** BACK IN STOCK! Double-LP, 180g.
MOONDOG Snaketime Series LP
*** "The collection of vignettes contained in this album are fully realized attempts to integrate music and sound. Music and life's sounds are inseparable to Moondog." You should probably look this one up.
SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE Shelter From The Ash LP / CD
*** "BEN CHASNY returns with a new SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE album--a most fluid combination of electric and acoustic SOOA styles. Though there are definite song structures in place, improvisations and heavy drones are still a big part of the sound. Includes playing from NOEL HARMONSON (COMETS ON FIRE), TIM GREEN (FUCKING CHAMPS), ELISA AMBROGIO (MAGIK MARKERS), and MATT SWEENEY (SUPERWOLF)."
SMEGMA The Smell Remains The Same LP
*** "Second in a slow series of 7" reissues, The Smell Remains The Same presents 10 tracks originally released in 1990-95 on 7" by various labels. The tracks display Smegma's pioneering style of audiophile-lo-brow folk-noise-rock, in their early-middle age when they were surviving through the birth of grunge, alternative, and indie rock."
SUPERMAYER Save The World 2xLP
*** "Supermayer is Michael Mayer & Superpitcher -- easily Kompakt's most recognizable faces. Save The World places our two superheroes along the edges of the world of techno-bliss. The dynamic duo also take a few death-defying risks by sonically experimenting with some indie-pop and laidback, lounge-y jams. But fear not, there are enough pounding dance beats, stratospheric synth washes and electrified robot voices in their arsenal to slay even the most stubborn of rhythm-haters."
VELVET UNDERGROUND Another View LP
*** Brand new virgin vinyl 180g pressing from 4 Men With Beards.
YOUNG MARBLE GIANTS Colossal Youth LP
*** NOW ON VINYL!
*** "Repressed. Caustic Window is Richard D. James aka Aphex Twin/AFX/Diceman/Gak/Polygon Window/Q-Chastic/etc... This release collects ALL of the audio from his classic Joyrex J4/J5/J9i/J9ii releases originally issued in the early-mid '90s."
BATTLES Tonto+ 12"+DVD
*** NOW ON VINYL! And it still has the DVD.
DASO Meine Idee 12"
*** "Daso truly comes into his own on his first Spectral record, expanding upon his marvelous reputation already earned in the house and techno scenes. Blending various elements throughout the EP creates a sound uniquely his own that dancefloors will no doubt covet."
DEAD MACHINES / JOHN WEISE / DAMION ROMERO Friday The 13th 2xLP
*** Totally brainbending Wolf Eyes members and buddies melting your world -- all recorded on Friday the 13th one of these last couple years. Limited, of course.
SERGE GAINSBOURG Rock The Bunker LP
*** "A boogie-ish glam-rock simulation, with the same band as on Vu De L'exterieur . "In 1975 his album Rock Around the Bunker ruffled feathers because he hurled his legendary sarcasm at political ghosts. Gainsbourg insists that Nazism does not stop at the German border, and pokes fun at I-love-a-man-in-uniform chic. He, a Jew who wore the yellow star, is denounced as anti-semitic. Gainsbourg is by now everywhere -- TV, film, scandal sheets, he publishes a novel, has a photo exhibit, does more soundtracks -- at least everywhere in France." -- Bart Plantenga
PAR GRINDVIK Continuate 12"
*** "'Continue In My Words' may start off simple, but it's laced with a tantric-build, pushing subconsciously to the edge where kamikaze lemmings blend mid-air into an exasperated steam machine. 'Continue Me' rides on a topography of mist, blasting and splitting-up, only to be reshaped into gestures that could replace the notion of melody altogether. The few choice notes which actually are singable get de-tuned and tweaked into an irresistible, bittersweet tinge of lust."
JOY DIVISION Closer LP
JOY DIVISION Unknown Pleasures LP
*** BACK IN STOCK! Remastered and pressed on heavy duty vinyl.
LCD SOUNDSYSTEM 45:33 2xLP
*** "45:33 was originally recorded by James Murphy (LCD Soundsystem) as a continuous album-length disco symphony. Commissioned by Nike for their Original Run series, it was the second in the series and proved a massive success, both critically and commercially."
LINDSTROM Lindstrom EP 12"
*** "Repress of these very scarce early Lindstrom 12" releases, on his own Feedelity label."
LINDSTROM The Contemporary Fix 12"
*** You might think the use of banjo, autoharp & clavinet together with acid squiggles on top of live disco-drums is a most unusual combination? Don't be a jerk!
LINDSTROM Plague The Kid 12"
*** "Three tracks from Feedelity-artist and Nordish disco-don Hans-Peter Lindstrom. 'Jodleknappen' and 'Naa Er Bestemor Paa Moten' are 2 nasty tracks with lots of jazzy percussion and techno-ish disco-beats. Arthur Russell meets Carl Craig. 'Gang Sound' is another percussive track from Lindstrom with dirty disco-ish."
MODEST MOUSE We Were Dead Before The Ship Sank 2xLP
*** BACK IN STOCK! Double-LP, 180g.
MOONDOG Snaketime Series LP
*** "The collection of vignettes contained in this album are fully realized attempts to integrate music and sound. Music and life's sounds are inseparable to Moondog." You should probably look this one up.
SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE Shelter From The Ash LP / CD
*** "BEN CHASNY returns with a new SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE album--a most fluid combination of electric and acoustic SOOA styles. Though there are definite song structures in place, improvisations and heavy drones are still a big part of the sound. Includes playing from NOEL HARMONSON (COMETS ON FIRE), TIM GREEN (FUCKING CHAMPS), ELISA AMBROGIO (MAGIK MARKERS), and MATT SWEENEY (SUPERWOLF)."
SMEGMA The Smell Remains The Same LP
*** "Second in a slow series of 7" reissues, The Smell Remains The Same presents 10 tracks originally released in 1990-95 on 7" by various labels. The tracks display Smegma's pioneering style of audiophile-lo-brow folk-noise-rock, in their early-middle age when they were surviving through the birth of grunge, alternative, and indie rock."
SUPERMAYER Save The World 2xLP
*** "Supermayer is Michael Mayer & Superpitcher -- easily Kompakt's most recognizable faces. Save The World places our two superheroes along the edges of the world of techno-bliss. The dynamic duo also take a few death-defying risks by sonically experimenting with some indie-pop and laidback, lounge-y jams. But fear not, there are enough pounding dance beats, stratospheric synth washes and electrified robot voices in their arsenal to slay even the most stubborn of rhythm-haters."
VELVET UNDERGROUND Another View LP
*** Brand new virgin vinyl 180g pressing from 4 Men With Beards.
YOUNG MARBLE GIANTS Colossal Youth LP
*** NOW ON VINYL!
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: CDs ))))) Led Zep, Amy Winhouse, Harmonia, Vashti, Boris & more
ost BLOOD ON SATAN'S CLAW by Marc Wilkinson CD
*** " Soundtrack from the 1971 cult British horror movie. Scored by Marc Wilkinson, musical ingredients include the ondes Martenot (the earliest electronic instrument) and the cimbalom, which add to the overall spookiness of this recording. And in 38 years, the music has lost none of its depth or addictive, evil hooks. Wilkinson's thoughts: " The descending chromatic scale which features throughout the music omits the perfect fifth (the only true consonant in the chromatic scale) and therefore highlights the diminished fifth, which ever since the middle ages in Europe has been known as the Devil's Interval!"
v/a DISCOVERED: A Collection of Daft Funk Samples CD
*** 12 tracks Daft Punk sampled (with key to which breaks went to which songs) presented in their original forms.
v/a THE IN-KRAUT Vol. 1 CD
v/a THE IN-KRAUT Vol. 2 CD
*** "20 mindblowing beat, now sound, soul & soundtrack nuggets from Germany, recorded in the '60s & '70s.
v/a LOVE IS THE SONG WE SING The True Story Of 1960s San Francisco 4xCD
*** The true story of 1960s San Francisco starts and ends with the music: 4 CDs with 77 tracks from a revolutionary rock 'n' roll community. Includes JEFFERSON AIRPLANE, BIG BROTHER & THE HOLDING CO., THE CHARLATANS, GRATEFUL DEAD, QUICKSILVER MESSENGER SERVICE, COUNTRY JOE & THE FISH, and many more. 120-page book featuring dozens of rare photos included!
v/a NEW ORLEANS FUNK The Original Sound Of Funk 1960-75 CD
*** 2007 repress of this SJR classic from 2000 -- has been o/p for a couple years. "This is a definitive collection of New Orleans funk, featuring acknowledged masters of funk such as the METERS EDDIE BO, ALLEN TOUSSAINT, and LEE DORSEY next to some of the earlier artists from the area who helped shape the meaning of funk. The album is also filled with many rare, sought after, and undiscovered funk tracks from the early 1960s through to the mid-'70s."
v/a SOUL JAZZ SINGLES 2006-2007 2xCD
*** "Featuring exclusive Soul Jazz Records singles over the last two years for the first time on CD. Some of the finest artists around have chosen to work with Soul Jazz Records over the last two years. As well as working with all the top dubstep producers recently such as Digital Mystikz, Skream, Kode 9, etc, Soul Jazz have continued to release new music by the likes of Rekid, Ladybug (The Bug), DJ Rupture and many more while continuing to work with legendary dance music pioneers such as ESG. Dancehall, reggae, Italo-disco, Baile funk, dubstep, German rock, post-punk, deep techno and house all feature. This album brings together tracks that have only been available on 12" vinyl." Artists include: Digital Mystikz, Capracara, Ladybug (feat. Warrior Queen), Kode 9, Subway, Soul 223, Private Lives, Skream, Tetine, Matias Aguayo, Secondo, Capracara/Kit Clayton, Rekid, ESG, DJ Rupture/Sister Nancy/Kid 606, Ladybug (feat. Deize Tigrona), Sutekh, JBP.
AFI I Heard A Voice: Live From Long Beach Arena CD
*** "All the music from AFI's first DVD ever!" 18 joints.
BONNIE 'PRINCE' BILLY Ask Forgiveness LP / CD
*** Eight unidentified covers (although one is attributed to DANZIG!) from Will Oldham, Greg Weeks and Meg Baird of ESPERS.
BORIS w/ MERZBOW Rock Dream CD
*** "This time round its a live, psychedelic, mind expanding collaboration with the legendary Japanese master of abrasion: MERZBOW! The usually harsh, corrosive grate of Merzbow is not as apparent with Boris involved. Also the inspired charge of the Boris rock machine seems to reach new heights with Merzbows' intuitive textures added."
VASHTI BUNYAN Some Things Just Stick In Your Mind 2xCD
*** "Following the amazing success story of Vashti Bunyan's re-emergence as an artist after an exile of over 30 years, comes the release of Some Things Just Stick In Your Mind, a comprehensive compilation of early recordings dating from the period prior to Vashti's classic 1970 album, Just Another Diamond Day. Titled after Vashti's (Jagger/Richards-penned) debut single which opens the compilation, this double-album represents an attempt to both open out and draw a line under the past, and also to try to set the record straight about the disparity between how Vashti viewed (and still views) herself against the way she has been popularly perceived. Widely construed as a folk singer - a tag she fundamentally disagrees with - these recordings instead reveal Vashti as a pop singer, however 'fragile' and unique."
BURIAL Untrue CD
*** "Untrue is a new record of weird soul music, which lovingly processes spectral female voices into vaporized R&B and smudged 2-step garage. Vocal lines are blurred, smeared, pitched up pitched down and pitch bent until their content is cast adrift from their original context and they whisper their saccharin sweet nothings into the void. The album continues with the debut's crackle-drenched yearning and bustling syncopations, haunted by the ghosts of rave, but also reveals some new Burial treats with a more glowing, upbeat energy."
NEKO CASE Canadian Amp CD
*** Available only to indie stores or pals, but this is a gem of a release, recorded in Neko's kitchen -- in her underwear -- no less.
CLUSTER Cluster II CD
*** "Originally released in 1972, this is the second album by legendary German ambient pioneers Dieter Moebius and Hans-Joachim Roedelius. Moebius and Roedelius essentially create ambient electronic soundscapes that ebb and flow, droning on in a suspended world of anti-gravity where machine has conquered man."
DJ SHADOW & CUT CHEMIST Product Placement CD
*** Back in stock!
FAIRPORT CONVENTION Unhalfbricking CD
FAIRPORT CONVENTION What We Did On Our Holidays CD
*** Remastered w/ bonus tracks
KILN Dusker CD
*** "Electronic composition with an almost impossible organic sense, its lush songs packed with flourishes that appear and disappear, cycling, spilling and disintegrating across the stereo field. It is an aural feast on headphones, and a perfect companion for a stroll through auburn fields. KILN have a knack for balancing heart rending melodies & progressions against rhythmic forms & textures of incredible depth, making for a richness of sound that may well be instrumental for the sole fact that words could never express as much."
HARMONIA Musik Von Harmonia CD
HARMONIA Deluxe CD
*** RECOMMENDED. Now available domestically.
HARUMI Harumi CD
*** "Produced by Tom Wilson (VU, Dylan, Simon & Garfunkel), this lengthy set of Japanese acid pop and folk makes its long-awaited CD debut here. Its contents range from Eastern-tinged pop to introverted epics, all featuring a range of Japanese instruments. Sure to delight all fans of mystic psychedelia."
KIM HIORTHOY My Last Day CD
*** "Second full-length album since his critically acclaimed debut Hei in 2000. Compared to his debut, My Last Day is less fragmented & more song based, more melodic & complete, organic & folk-like, placing him in the forefront of the new electronic folk music movement."
ROBYN HITCHCOCK Eye CD
*** "Deluxe reissue of 1990 album with 4 previously unreleased bonus tracks and expanded packaging."
ROBYN HITCHCOCK I Often Dream Of Trains CD
*** "Deluxe reissue of 1984 album with 6 previously unreleased bonus tracks and expanded packaging."
ROBYN HITCHCOCK Black Snake Diamond Role CD
*** "Deluxe reissue of 1981 debut solo album with 8 bonus tracks and expanded packaging."
ALICIA KEYS As I Am CD
*** The new album featuring many, many hit singles and a tune "featuring a special guest appearance by JOHN MAYER."
THE KILLERS Sawdust: B-Sides & Rarities 2003-2007 CD
*** I know what you're thinking: it's about time The Killers had a b-sides collection! My only question is why it took so long. Includes 4 new, never-before-released songs, including a guest spot from LOU REED.
KRAFTWERK Kraftwerk 2 CD
*** The hard-to-find second Kraftwerk release, originally released in 1971. This was before the robots but shortly after the invention of primitive drum machines, giving the sound a more motorik Krauty feel ala Neu!, especially since it's an instrumental affair.
LED ZEPPELIN Mothership 2xCD
LED ZEPPELIN Mothership 2xCD+DVD
*** I know what you're thinking: it's about time Led Zeppelin had a best of collection! My only question is why it took so long. "The very best of Led Zeppelin remastered on 2 CDs." The special edition includes DVD with over two hours of footage from the Led Zeppelin DVD.
LED ZEPPELIN The Song Remains The Same 2xCD
*** "Remastered & expanded with 6 previously unreleased tracks from LZ's legendary 1973 performance at Madison Square Garden plus new liner notes by Cameron Crowe."
MAJOR STARS Mirror/Messenger CD
*** "Mirror/Messenger is an assault on poplular music, with considerable muscle exerted to create a jukebox-ready duck-and-shuffle--if the needle doesn’t get tossed out of the groove, that is. Eight powerful tracks loaded with screaming solos and psych-heavy riffs."
NINE INCH NAILS Year Zero Remixed CD+DVD-ROM
*** "includes 14 new remixes by SAUL WILLIAMS, LADYTRON, THE FAINT, FENNESZ, THE KNIFE, BILL LASWELL, and more. Bonus DVD-ROM has the complete Year Zero multitrack recordings for creating your own remix."
OH NO! OH MY! Oh No! Oh My! CD
*** Practically an indie store-only debut.
PHISH The White Tape CD
*** Indie store-only release of Phish's first album, originally a self-released affair and very hard to come by.
SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE Shelter From The Ash LP / CD
*** "BEN CHASNY returns with a new SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE album--a most fluid combination of electric and acoustic SOOA styles. Though there are definite song structures in place, improvisations and heavy drones are still a big part of the sound. Includes playing from NOEL HARMONSON (COMETS ON FIRE), TIM GREEN (FUCKING CHAMPS), ELISA AMBROGIO (MAGIK MARKERS), and MATT SWEENEY (SUPERWOLF)."
MEIC STEVENS Outlander CD
*** "In the popular music of Wales, Meic Stevens is as important there as Bob Dylan in the United States, John Lennon in England, Caetano Veloso in Brazil and Serge Gainsbourg in France. Outlander, his sole English language release from 1970, is a diverse mix of folk, psych and rock with a distinct Welsh flavor."
SUPERMAYER Save The World CD
*** "Supermayer is Michael Mayer & Superpitcher -- easily Kompakt's most recognizable faces. Save The World places our two superheroes along the edges of the world of techno-bliss -- a trumpet, saxophone, acoustic guitar, melodica, flute, a vast array of percussive instruments and even a gong are just a handful of gizmos they used to defeat those electronic purists who would not dance. The dynamic duo also take a few death-defying risks by sonically experimenting with some indie-pop and laidback, lounge-y jams. But fear not, there are enough pounding dance beats, stratospheric synth washes and electrified robot voices in their arsenal to slay even the most stubborn of rhythm-haters. This is certainly the most musically diverse album release to have ever come from the Kompakt stable."
SUPERSILENT Supersilent 8 CD
*** "Supersilent celebrate 10 years as a groundbreaking quartet with their first studio album in almost 5 years, the eighth release in their series. Supersilent is a band that refuse categorization, with experiments in such disparate elements as ambient, jazz, electronica, rock, techno, noise and musique concréte."
TOKYO POLICE CLUB Smith EP CD
*** 4 killer cuts and 3 videos from this Pitchfork-approved band.
U2 The Joshua Tree Deluxe 2xCD
*** "Remastered audio plus b-sides and previously unreleased tracks."
THE VALERIE PROJECT The Valerie Project CD
*** g Weeks (of Espers) is describing the genesis of a new musical entitled The Valerie Project. Inspired by a classic of Czech New Wave cinema, Jaromir Jires’ VALERIE AND HER WEEK OF WONDERS (1970), Greg, joined by members of Espers and other Philadelphia groups Fern Knight, Grass, Fursaxa, Timesbold, Woodwose and Rake (as enigmatic electronicist Charles Cohen), conceived a new soundtrack the film. VALERIE AND HER WEEK OF WONDERS is allegorical coming of age work populated by bewitched earrings, weasels, vampires, frisky maidens, friskier huntsmen, wicked aunts, bespectacled eagles and the handsomest mustache this side of 1970, the year the film debuted. Key to The Valerie Project’s conception is how reframing the film’s with an alternate soundtrack draws new interpretations from a work depth and changeable meaning. Lubos Fiser’s original score is lovingly recalled and ambitiously targeted by the group as a sound cycle to equaled every time they play it. The tone is dense and ornate, expansively acid-charged -- “a symphonic version of Magma” at its zenith.
ANY WINEHOUSE Frank CD
*** "Amy's debut album now available domestically. Features the smash hit 'F*** Me Pumps'."
*** " Soundtrack from the 1971 cult British horror movie. Scored by Marc Wilkinson, musical ingredients include the ondes Martenot (the earliest electronic instrument) and the cimbalom, which add to the overall spookiness of this recording. And in 38 years, the music has lost none of its depth or addictive, evil hooks. Wilkinson's thoughts: " The descending chromatic scale which features throughout the music omits the perfect fifth (the only true consonant in the chromatic scale) and therefore highlights the diminished fifth, which ever since the middle ages in Europe has been known as the Devil's Interval!"
v/a DISCOVERED: A Collection of Daft Funk Samples CD
*** 12 tracks Daft Punk sampled (with key to which breaks went to which songs) presented in their original forms.
v/a THE IN-KRAUT Vol. 1 CD
v/a THE IN-KRAUT Vol. 2 CD
*** "20 mindblowing beat, now sound, soul & soundtrack nuggets from Germany, recorded in the '60s & '70s.
v/a LOVE IS THE SONG WE SING The True Story Of 1960s San Francisco 4xCD
*** The true story of 1960s San Francisco starts and ends with the music: 4 CDs with 77 tracks from a revolutionary rock 'n' roll community. Includes JEFFERSON AIRPLANE, BIG BROTHER & THE HOLDING CO., THE CHARLATANS, GRATEFUL DEAD, QUICKSILVER MESSENGER SERVICE, COUNTRY JOE & THE FISH, and many more. 120-page book featuring dozens of rare photos included!
v/a NEW ORLEANS FUNK The Original Sound Of Funk 1960-75 CD
*** 2007 repress of this SJR classic from 2000 -- has been o/p for a couple years. "This is a definitive collection of New Orleans funk, featuring acknowledged masters of funk such as the METERS EDDIE BO, ALLEN TOUSSAINT, and LEE DORSEY next to some of the earlier artists from the area who helped shape the meaning of funk. The album is also filled with many rare, sought after, and undiscovered funk tracks from the early 1960s through to the mid-'70s."
v/a SOUL JAZZ SINGLES 2006-2007 2xCD
*** "Featuring exclusive Soul Jazz Records singles over the last two years for the first time on CD. Some of the finest artists around have chosen to work with Soul Jazz Records over the last two years. As well as working with all the top dubstep producers recently such as Digital Mystikz, Skream, Kode 9, etc, Soul Jazz have continued to release new music by the likes of Rekid, Ladybug (The Bug), DJ Rupture and many more while continuing to work with legendary dance music pioneers such as ESG. Dancehall, reggae, Italo-disco, Baile funk, dubstep, German rock, post-punk, deep techno and house all feature. This album brings together tracks that have only been available on 12" vinyl." Artists include: Digital Mystikz, Capracara, Ladybug (feat. Warrior Queen), Kode 9, Subway, Soul 223, Private Lives, Skream, Tetine, Matias Aguayo, Secondo, Capracara/Kit Clayton, Rekid, ESG, DJ Rupture/Sister Nancy/Kid 606, Ladybug (feat. Deize Tigrona), Sutekh, JBP.
AFI I Heard A Voice: Live From Long Beach Arena CD
*** "All the music from AFI's first DVD ever!" 18 joints.
BONNIE 'PRINCE' BILLY Ask Forgiveness LP / CD
*** Eight unidentified covers (although one is attributed to DANZIG!) from Will Oldham, Greg Weeks and Meg Baird of ESPERS.
BORIS w/ MERZBOW Rock Dream CD
*** "This time round its a live, psychedelic, mind expanding collaboration with the legendary Japanese master of abrasion: MERZBOW! The usually harsh, corrosive grate of Merzbow is not as apparent with Boris involved. Also the inspired charge of the Boris rock machine seems to reach new heights with Merzbows' intuitive textures added."
VASHTI BUNYAN Some Things Just Stick In Your Mind 2xCD
*** "Following the amazing success story of Vashti Bunyan's re-emergence as an artist after an exile of over 30 years, comes the release of Some Things Just Stick In Your Mind, a comprehensive compilation of early recordings dating from the period prior to Vashti's classic 1970 album, Just Another Diamond Day. Titled after Vashti's (Jagger/Richards-penned) debut single which opens the compilation, this double-album represents an attempt to both open out and draw a line under the past, and also to try to set the record straight about the disparity between how Vashti viewed (and still views) herself against the way she has been popularly perceived. Widely construed as a folk singer - a tag she fundamentally disagrees with - these recordings instead reveal Vashti as a pop singer, however 'fragile' and unique."
BURIAL Untrue CD
*** "Untrue is a new record of weird soul music, which lovingly processes spectral female voices into vaporized R&B and smudged 2-step garage. Vocal lines are blurred, smeared, pitched up pitched down and pitch bent until their content is cast adrift from their original context and they whisper their saccharin sweet nothings into the void. The album continues with the debut's crackle-drenched yearning and bustling syncopations, haunted by the ghosts of rave, but also reveals some new Burial treats with a more glowing, upbeat energy."
NEKO CASE Canadian Amp CD
*** Available only to indie stores or pals, but this is a gem of a release, recorded in Neko's kitchen -- in her underwear -- no less.
CLUSTER Cluster II CD
*** "Originally released in 1972, this is the second album by legendary German ambient pioneers Dieter Moebius and Hans-Joachim Roedelius. Moebius and Roedelius essentially create ambient electronic soundscapes that ebb and flow, droning on in a suspended world of anti-gravity where machine has conquered man."
DJ SHADOW & CUT CHEMIST Product Placement CD
*** Back in stock!
FAIRPORT CONVENTION Unhalfbricking CD
FAIRPORT CONVENTION What We Did On Our Holidays CD
*** Remastered w/ bonus tracks
KILN Dusker CD
*** "Electronic composition with an almost impossible organic sense, its lush songs packed with flourishes that appear and disappear, cycling, spilling and disintegrating across the stereo field. It is an aural feast on headphones, and a perfect companion for a stroll through auburn fields. KILN have a knack for balancing heart rending melodies & progressions against rhythmic forms & textures of incredible depth, making for a richness of sound that may well be instrumental for the sole fact that words could never express as much."
HARMONIA Musik Von Harmonia CD
HARMONIA Deluxe CD
*** RECOMMENDED. Now available domestically.
HARUMI Harumi CD
*** "Produced by Tom Wilson (VU, Dylan, Simon & Garfunkel), this lengthy set of Japanese acid pop and folk makes its long-awaited CD debut here. Its contents range from Eastern-tinged pop to introverted epics, all featuring a range of Japanese instruments. Sure to delight all fans of mystic psychedelia."
KIM HIORTHOY My Last Day CD
*** "Second full-length album since his critically acclaimed debut Hei in 2000. Compared to his debut, My Last Day is less fragmented & more song based, more melodic & complete, organic & folk-like, placing him in the forefront of the new electronic folk music movement."
ROBYN HITCHCOCK Eye CD
*** "Deluxe reissue of 1990 album with 4 previously unreleased bonus tracks and expanded packaging."
ROBYN HITCHCOCK I Often Dream Of Trains CD
*** "Deluxe reissue of 1984 album with 6 previously unreleased bonus tracks and expanded packaging."
ROBYN HITCHCOCK Black Snake Diamond Role CD
*** "Deluxe reissue of 1981 debut solo album with 8 bonus tracks and expanded packaging."
ALICIA KEYS As I Am CD
*** The new album featuring many, many hit singles and a tune "featuring a special guest appearance by JOHN MAYER."
THE KILLERS Sawdust: B-Sides & Rarities 2003-2007 CD
*** I know what you're thinking: it's about time The Killers had a b-sides collection! My only question is why it took so long. Includes 4 new, never-before-released songs, including a guest spot from LOU REED.
KRAFTWERK Kraftwerk 2 CD
*** The hard-to-find second Kraftwerk release, originally released in 1971. This was before the robots but shortly after the invention of primitive drum machines, giving the sound a more motorik Krauty feel ala Neu!, especially since it's an instrumental affair.
LED ZEPPELIN Mothership 2xCD
LED ZEPPELIN Mothership 2xCD+DVD
*** I know what you're thinking: it's about time Led Zeppelin had a best of collection! My only question is why it took so long. "The very best of Led Zeppelin remastered on 2 CDs." The special edition includes DVD with over two hours of footage from the Led Zeppelin DVD.
LED ZEPPELIN The Song Remains The Same 2xCD
*** "Remastered & expanded with 6 previously unreleased tracks from LZ's legendary 1973 performance at Madison Square Garden plus new liner notes by Cameron Crowe."
MAJOR STARS Mirror/Messenger CD
*** "Mirror/Messenger is an assault on poplular music, with considerable muscle exerted to create a jukebox-ready duck-and-shuffle--if the needle doesn’t get tossed out of the groove, that is. Eight powerful tracks loaded with screaming solos and psych-heavy riffs."
NINE INCH NAILS Year Zero Remixed CD+DVD-ROM
*** "includes 14 new remixes by SAUL WILLIAMS, LADYTRON, THE FAINT, FENNESZ, THE KNIFE, BILL LASWELL, and more. Bonus DVD-ROM has the complete Year Zero multitrack recordings for creating your own remix."
OH NO! OH MY! Oh No! Oh My! CD
*** Practically an indie store-only debut.
PHISH The White Tape CD
*** Indie store-only release of Phish's first album, originally a self-released affair and very hard to come by.
SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE Shelter From The Ash LP / CD
*** "BEN CHASNY returns with a new SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE album--a most fluid combination of electric and acoustic SOOA styles. Though there are definite song structures in place, improvisations and heavy drones are still a big part of the sound. Includes playing from NOEL HARMONSON (COMETS ON FIRE), TIM GREEN (FUCKING CHAMPS), ELISA AMBROGIO (MAGIK MARKERS), and MATT SWEENEY (SUPERWOLF)."
MEIC STEVENS Outlander CD
*** "In the popular music of Wales, Meic Stevens is as important there as Bob Dylan in the United States, John Lennon in England, Caetano Veloso in Brazil and Serge Gainsbourg in France. Outlander, his sole English language release from 1970, is a diverse mix of folk, psych and rock with a distinct Welsh flavor."
SUPERMAYER Save The World CD
*** "Supermayer is Michael Mayer & Superpitcher -- easily Kompakt's most recognizable faces. Save The World places our two superheroes along the edges of the world of techno-bliss -- a trumpet, saxophone, acoustic guitar, melodica, flute, a vast array of percussive instruments and even a gong are just a handful of gizmos they used to defeat those electronic purists who would not dance. The dynamic duo also take a few death-defying risks by sonically experimenting with some indie-pop and laidback, lounge-y jams. But fear not, there are enough pounding dance beats, stratospheric synth washes and electrified robot voices in their arsenal to slay even the most stubborn of rhythm-haters. This is certainly the most musically diverse album release to have ever come from the Kompakt stable."
SUPERSILENT Supersilent 8 CD
*** "Supersilent celebrate 10 years as a groundbreaking quartet with their first studio album in almost 5 years, the eighth release in their series. Supersilent is a band that refuse categorization, with experiments in such disparate elements as ambient, jazz, electronica, rock, techno, noise and musique concréte."
TOKYO POLICE CLUB Smith EP CD
*** 4 killer cuts and 3 videos from this Pitchfork-approved band.
U2 The Joshua Tree Deluxe 2xCD
*** "Remastered audio plus b-sides and previously unreleased tracks."
THE VALERIE PROJECT The Valerie Project CD
*** g Weeks (of Espers) is describing the genesis of a new musical entitled The Valerie Project. Inspired by a classic of Czech New Wave cinema, Jaromir Jires’ VALERIE AND HER WEEK OF WONDERS (1970), Greg, joined by members of Espers and other Philadelphia groups Fern Knight, Grass, Fursaxa, Timesbold, Woodwose and Rake (as enigmatic electronicist Charles Cohen), conceived a new soundtrack the film. VALERIE AND HER WEEK OF WONDERS is allegorical coming of age work populated by bewitched earrings, weasels, vampires, frisky maidens, friskier huntsmen, wicked aunts, bespectacled eagles and the handsomest mustache this side of 1970, the year the film debuted. Key to The Valerie Project’s conception is how reframing the film’s with an alternate soundtrack draws new interpretations from a work depth and changeable meaning. Lubos Fiser’s original score is lovingly recalled and ambitiously targeted by the group as a sound cycle to equaled every time they play it. The tone is dense and ornate, expansively acid-charged -- “a symphonic version of Magma” at its zenith.
ANY WINEHOUSE Frank CD
*** "Amy's debut album now available domestically. Features the smash hit 'F*** Me Pumps'."
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: DVD ))))) Can, Neil Young, Otis Redding, Make Up, & more
CAN Can DVD 2xDVD
*** Much cheaper non-CD version of this ridiculously great document on one of Germany's most influential bands. Includes a full concert, documentary, tribute by BRIAN ENO, and more.
MAKE UP In Film / On Video DVD
*** Awesome DVD collection of the Blue Is Beautiful "documentary" (including scenes from the late, great Zoots in Detroit) bookended by four videos with previously unreleased versions of songs, 43 minutes of live footage, and an excerpt from a German TV show (!).
RADIO ON by Christopher Petit DVD
*** BACK IN STOCK! "The 1979 post-punk classic, with music by DAVID BOWIE, KRAFTWERK, STING, LENE LOVICH, & more." Co-produced by WIM WENDERS.
OTIS REDDING Dreams To Remember: The Legacy Of... DVD
*** "First-ever full length DVD featuring the soul music legend!"
SPEND AN EVENING WITH SADDLE CREEK The First Ten Years of Saddle Creek Records DVD
*** A feature-length documentary on the first ten years of Omaha record label Saddle Creek featuring pretty much everyone on the Saddle Creek roster incuding BRIGHT EYES, THE FAINT, and some others.
NEIL YOUNG Rust Never Sleeps DVD
*** 1978 "concert fantasy" was picked by Rolling Stone magazine as one of the "greatest live performances of the last twenty years."
*** Much cheaper non-CD version of this ridiculously great document on one of Germany's most influential bands. Includes a full concert, documentary, tribute by BRIAN ENO, and more.
MAKE UP In Film / On Video DVD
*** Awesome DVD collection of the Blue Is Beautiful "documentary" (including scenes from the late, great Zoots in Detroit) bookended by four videos with previously unreleased versions of songs, 43 minutes of live footage, and an excerpt from a German TV show (!).
RADIO ON by Christopher Petit DVD
*** BACK IN STOCK! "The 1979 post-punk classic, with music by DAVID BOWIE, KRAFTWERK, STING, LENE LOVICH, & more." Co-produced by WIM WENDERS.
OTIS REDDING Dreams To Remember: The Legacy Of... DVD
*** "First-ever full length DVD featuring the soul music legend!"
SPEND AN EVENING WITH SADDLE CREEK The First Ten Years of Saddle Creek Records DVD
*** A feature-length documentary on the first ten years of Omaha record label Saddle Creek featuring pretty much everyone on the Saddle Creek roster incuding BRIGHT EYES, THE FAINT, and some others.
NEIL YOUNG Rust Never Sleeps DVD
*** 1978 "concert fantasy" was picked by Rolling Stone magazine as one of the "greatest live performances of the last twenty years."
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: Vinyl ))))) Kon & Amir edits on 45!
MATTHEW L. CASSELL / THE BLACK SOULS Heaven / Baki Mutane Nakuka 7"
*** Cratediggers extraordinaire KON & AMIR pick two cuts off their recent unmixed comp of latin & soul classics.
*** Cratediggers extraordinaire KON & AMIR pick two cuts off their recent unmixed comp of latin & soul classics.
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: CDs ))))) Battles, Grizzly Bear, David Byrne
BATTLES Tonto+ LP+DVD / CD+DVD
*** Brand new EP featuring an album cut, a live version, remixes by FOUR TET, THE FIELD, and some other guy. Includes a DVD with their excellent videos of "Tonto" and "Atlas".
BRIGHT EYES Motion Sickness CD
*** The live re-release.
DAVID BYRNE The Knee Plays CD+DVD
*** "Available on CD for the first time. DAVID BYRNE and ROBERT WILSON's 1984 collaboration from the theatrical epic the CIVIL warS. Includes 8 bonus tracks, plus full-length DVD slide show featuring JoAnn Verburg's photographs of the performers with music."
DR. DRE Chronicles Deluxe CD+DVD
*** "Deluxe edition includes 50 minute bonus DVD featuring the classic videos 'Nuthin But A G Thang', 'Let Me Ride', 'Natural Born Killaz', and many more."
EINSTURZENDE NEUBAUTEN Alles Wieder Offen CD
*** "Many a younger band would be delighted with this as a debut, let alone the 20-oddth studio album of a consistently innovative career, not just musically but also the very means by which a record is made."
GRIZZLY BEAR Friend EP 12" / CD
*** "Includes new songs and Grizzly Bear covers by CSS, BAND OF HORSES, and ATLAS SOUND (Bradford Cox of DEERHUNTER)."
JAY-Z American Gangster CD
*** Allegedly HOTT new album inspired by the movie of the same name. Blockbuster!
VAN MORRISON Still On Top - The Greatest Hits CD
*** "Together for the first time! 21 career-spanning hits."
NAS Greatest Hits CD
*** 14 classic cuts!
OPERATION IVY Operation Ivy CD
*** Back in print on Tim "Lint" Armstrong's Hellcat label.
JOHN SEBASTIAN & DAVID GRISMAN Satisfied CD
*** 14 jugband waltzes!
SIGUR ROS Hvart / Heim 2xCD
*** A companion to the as yet unreleased DVD with one disc of 5 brand new recordings and a second disc of 6 new live acoustic recordings.
STEVIE RAY VAUGHAN & FRIENDS Solos, Sessions, & Encores CD
*** "The very best of Stevie's collaborations. Features studio tracks, live jams, & guest appearances. Includes 6 previously unreleased performances." Includes "Let's Dance".
*** Brand new EP featuring an album cut, a live version, remixes by FOUR TET, THE FIELD, and some other guy. Includes a DVD with their excellent videos of "Tonto" and "Atlas".
BRIGHT EYES Motion Sickness CD
*** The live re-release.
DAVID BYRNE The Knee Plays CD+DVD
*** "Available on CD for the first time. DAVID BYRNE and ROBERT WILSON's 1984 collaboration from the theatrical epic the CIVIL warS. Includes 8 bonus tracks, plus full-length DVD slide show featuring JoAnn Verburg's photographs of the performers with music."
DR. DRE Chronicles Deluxe CD+DVD
*** "Deluxe edition includes 50 minute bonus DVD featuring the classic videos 'Nuthin But A G Thang', 'Let Me Ride', 'Natural Born Killaz', and many more."
EINSTURZENDE NEUBAUTEN Alles Wieder Offen CD
*** "Many a younger band would be delighted with this as a debut, let alone the 20-oddth studio album of a consistently innovative career, not just musically but also the very means by which a record is made."
GRIZZLY BEAR Friend EP 12" / CD
*** "Includes new songs and Grizzly Bear covers by CSS, BAND OF HORSES, and ATLAS SOUND (Bradford Cox of DEERHUNTER)."
JAY-Z American Gangster CD
*** Allegedly HOTT new album inspired by the movie of the same name. Blockbuster!
VAN MORRISON Still On Top - The Greatest Hits CD
*** "Together for the first time! 21 career-spanning hits."
NAS Greatest Hits CD
*** 14 classic cuts!
OPERATION IVY Operation Ivy CD
*** Back in print on Tim "Lint" Armstrong's Hellcat label.
JOHN SEBASTIAN & DAVID GRISMAN Satisfied CD
*** 14 jugband waltzes!
SIGUR ROS Hvart / Heim 2xCD
*** A companion to the as yet unreleased DVD with one disc of 5 brand new recordings and a second disc of 6 new live acoustic recordings.
STEVIE RAY VAUGHAN & FRIENDS Solos, Sessions, & Encores CD
*** "The very best of Stevie's collaborations. Features studio tracks, live jams, & guest appearances. Includes 6 previously unreleased performances." Includes "Let's Dance".
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: DVD ))))) Bob Dylan
BOB DYLAN The Other Side Of The Mirror: Dylan Live At The Newport Folk Festival DVD
*** "Over 80 minutes of Bob Dylan's groundbreaking and controversial appearances at Newport. Featuring rare and previously unseen performances of some of Dylan's greatest songs."
*** "Over 80 minutes of Bob Dylan's groundbreaking and controversial appearances at Newport. Featuring rare and previously unseen performances of some of Dylan's greatest songs."
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: Vinyl ))))) Akron / Family, Vashti Bunyan, Italians Do It Better
AKRON / FAMILY Love Is Simple 2xLP
*** NOW ON VINYL!
VASHTI BUNYAN Some Things Just Stick In Your Mind 7"
*** Repress of Vashti's debut Decca single, written by Sir Mick Jagger and Keith Richards for the forthcoming two-disc collection of old odds and ends.
CHROMATICS In The City 12"
*** “CHROMATICS draft in new vocalist RUTH RADELET for this ‘70s opus of Chicago Nosferatu disco. A stabby little cardiac-monitor bleep darts back and forth through the shimmering strings and swathes of gold and silver. Chromatics cast themselves as afro-ed divas gliding through the city in a gleaming Back To The Future Delorean, but we’re only seeing this in the dazzling reflective sheen from their aviator shades as the vroom off into 2012 AD leaving flaming tire marks."
DJ BLAQSTARR Shake It To The Ground 12"
*** "With Baltimore club's influence seeping everywhere else on earth, it might seem strange that the new 12" from DJ Blaqstarr - Bmore's most talented and quickest rising producer - is way darker and more intense than your average gimmick club track." Released on DIPLO's Mad Decent label. SWITCH, CLAUDE VON STROKE, and DROP THE LIME remix.
FAUST Faust LP
*** "Legendary German post-rock band formed in 1971 by undisputed noise pioneer Uwe Nettelbeck, Faust garnered an immediate following due to its artistically extreme experimentations with music cut ups and other mixed sources hinging on cacophony and distortion. Don't miss their 1971 cult classic debut, now reissued with its original clear printed sleeve on clear vinyl."
GLASS CANDY Miss Broadway 12"
*** "One of GLASS CANDY's most insane covers ever! Originally recorded by Euro-disco legends Belle Epoque, “Miss Broadway” is a legendary baeleric disco song. Known for the epic string arrangements and insane vocal range--the band does it justice." Features main, instrumental, and synth/drum mix versions.
HOLY GHOST Hold On 12"
*** "Holy Ghost! consists of NY boys Nicholas Millhiser and Alexander Frankel formerly of AUTOMATO. Holy Ghost! is a product of their obsessions with analog synthesizers, rare disco, and ancient production techniques. Their first single is 'Hold On', a thumping disco trot that recalls a smoother and more mysterious time. Accompanying the title track is an instrumental version and a rhythmic French disco remix by Blackjoy a.k.a. Jerome Caron."
JAY DEE Jay Deelicious 3xLP
*** NOW ON VINYL!
PHAT KAT Carte Blanche 2xLP
*** NOW ON VINYL!
PROFESSOR GENIUS La Grotta 12"
*** "PROFESSOR GENIUS come out of Jersey City with three totally intense dancefloor anthems rocked with breezy synths, thumping Italo basslines, and smooth analog drums that brings to mind Cerrone and Moroder, but with a more soundtrackish feel à la Midnight Express or Scarface."
RUB Party Medleys 12"
*** "Basically the record is 4 medleys, about 6 minutes long each, in four different genres (at four different tempos). Each side is a continuous 12 minutes, so that is also valuable if you have to run to the bathroom, or if you're a beginner, just to throw on at a party. It's all quick mixed, NYC party style, but with intros and outros to each medley for mixing, and it's easy enough to just run a couple songs off of it."
SAGE FRANCIS Personal Journals 2xLP / CD
*** BACK IN PRINT!
SCOTTIE B Money Lotion Vol. 3 12"
*** "Baltimore club godfather Scottie B sets the record straight on this new EP for the DJ's champ, the Money Lotion series. Sick of all the amateurish Baltimore-style records dropping lately, Scottie’s created an instant classic with every style of the Baltimore spectrum represented. Scottie finally unleashes the track that EVERYONE has been look for the Bmore version of: “Never Be Alone.” (This one’s been getting hammered by Hollertronix, Tittsworth, Ayres...)" Limited edition.
SHIT ROBOT Chasm 12"
*** "On the epic A-side, 'Chasm', Lambkin masterfully joins relentless, brooding, patiently building techno with underlying melodic rock grooves. This dance track is both innovative and immediately familiar. The flipside, appropriately titled 'Lonely Planet', is a galactic krautrock adventure through whirling synths into the unknown." On DFA.
JON SPENCER BLUES EXPLOSION Jukebox Explosion LP / CD
*** "Beginning in 1992, The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion earmarked songs from their recording sessions for their Jukebox Single Series on In The Red. Now, for the first time, all five out-of-print singles have been collected in one place on Jukebox Explosion, along with eight previously unheard rarities from the band's early days that are every bit as action-packed, frantic, and furious."
STILL GOING Still Going Theme 12"
*** "Still Going is the combination of two NYC dance music leaders-- Eric 'Dunks' Duncan of Rub 'n' Tug and Olivier Spencer of Manthraxx and Mr. Negative." On DFA.
VENETIAN SNARES My Downfall 2xLP / CD
*** "Since 2005, there has been one Venetian Snares album that everybody has talked about: the masterpiece Rossz Csillag Allat Szuletett, Aaron Funk's story of falling in love among the spires of Budapest, scored by an orchestra and the Amen break. If that album was in effect a question, then this one is his answer: the unfolding of this particular Hungarian story. If anything, My Downfall is even more epic and bombastic than its predecessor, but not without those little humorous touches so beloved of Snares."
NEIL YOUNG Tonight's The Night LP
*** BACK IN STOCK!
*** NOW ON VINYL!
VASHTI BUNYAN Some Things Just Stick In Your Mind 7"
*** Repress of Vashti's debut Decca single, written by Sir Mick Jagger and Keith Richards for the forthcoming two-disc collection of old odds and ends.
CHROMATICS In The City 12"
*** “CHROMATICS draft in new vocalist RUTH RADELET for this ‘70s opus of Chicago Nosferatu disco. A stabby little cardiac-monitor bleep darts back and forth through the shimmering strings and swathes of gold and silver. Chromatics cast themselves as afro-ed divas gliding through the city in a gleaming Back To The Future Delorean, but we’re only seeing this in the dazzling reflective sheen from their aviator shades as the vroom off into 2012 AD leaving flaming tire marks."
DJ BLAQSTARR Shake It To The Ground 12"
*** "With Baltimore club's influence seeping everywhere else on earth, it might seem strange that the new 12" from DJ Blaqstarr - Bmore's most talented and quickest rising producer - is way darker and more intense than your average gimmick club track." Released on DIPLO's Mad Decent label. SWITCH, CLAUDE VON STROKE, and DROP THE LIME remix.
FAUST Faust LP
*** "Legendary German post-rock band formed in 1971 by undisputed noise pioneer Uwe Nettelbeck, Faust garnered an immediate following due to its artistically extreme experimentations with music cut ups and other mixed sources hinging on cacophony and distortion. Don't miss their 1971 cult classic debut, now reissued with its original clear printed sleeve on clear vinyl."
GLASS CANDY Miss Broadway 12"
*** "One of GLASS CANDY's most insane covers ever! Originally recorded by Euro-disco legends Belle Epoque, “Miss Broadway” is a legendary baeleric disco song. Known for the epic string arrangements and insane vocal range--the band does it justice." Features main, instrumental, and synth/drum mix versions.
HOLY GHOST Hold On 12"
*** "Holy Ghost! consists of NY boys Nicholas Millhiser and Alexander Frankel formerly of AUTOMATO. Holy Ghost! is a product of their obsessions with analog synthesizers, rare disco, and ancient production techniques. Their first single is 'Hold On', a thumping disco trot that recalls a smoother and more mysterious time. Accompanying the title track is an instrumental version and a rhythmic French disco remix by Blackjoy a.k.a. Jerome Caron."
JAY DEE Jay Deelicious 3xLP
*** NOW ON VINYL!
PHAT KAT Carte Blanche 2xLP
*** NOW ON VINYL!
PROFESSOR GENIUS La Grotta 12"
*** "PROFESSOR GENIUS come out of Jersey City with three totally intense dancefloor anthems rocked with breezy synths, thumping Italo basslines, and smooth analog drums that brings to mind Cerrone and Moroder, but with a more soundtrackish feel à la Midnight Express or Scarface."
RUB Party Medleys 12"
*** "Basically the record is 4 medleys, about 6 minutes long each, in four different genres (at four different tempos). Each side is a continuous 12 minutes, so that is also valuable if you have to run to the bathroom, or if you're a beginner, just to throw on at a party. It's all quick mixed, NYC party style, but with intros and outros to each medley for mixing, and it's easy enough to just run a couple songs off of it."
SAGE FRANCIS Personal Journals 2xLP / CD
*** BACK IN PRINT!
SCOTTIE B Money Lotion Vol. 3 12"
*** "Baltimore club godfather Scottie B sets the record straight on this new EP for the DJ's champ, the Money Lotion series. Sick of all the amateurish Baltimore-style records dropping lately, Scottie’s created an instant classic with every style of the Baltimore spectrum represented. Scottie finally unleashes the track that EVERYONE has been look for the Bmore version of: “Never Be Alone.” (This one’s been getting hammered by Hollertronix, Tittsworth, Ayres...)" Limited edition.
SHIT ROBOT Chasm 12"
*** "On the epic A-side, 'Chasm', Lambkin masterfully joins relentless, brooding, patiently building techno with underlying melodic rock grooves. This dance track is both innovative and immediately familiar. The flipside, appropriately titled 'Lonely Planet', is a galactic krautrock adventure through whirling synths into the unknown." On DFA.
JON SPENCER BLUES EXPLOSION Jukebox Explosion LP / CD
*** "Beginning in 1992, The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion earmarked songs from their recording sessions for their Jukebox Single Series on In The Red. Now, for the first time, all five out-of-print singles have been collected in one place on Jukebox Explosion, along with eight previously unheard rarities from the band's early days that are every bit as action-packed, frantic, and furious."
STILL GOING Still Going Theme 12"
*** "Still Going is the combination of two NYC dance music leaders-- Eric 'Dunks' Duncan of Rub 'n' Tug and Olivier Spencer of Manthraxx and Mr. Negative." On DFA.
VENETIAN SNARES My Downfall 2xLP / CD
*** "Since 2005, there has been one Venetian Snares album that everybody has talked about: the masterpiece Rossz Csillag Allat Szuletett, Aaron Funk's story of falling in love among the spires of Budapest, scored by an orchestra and the Amen break. If that album was in effect a question, then this one is his answer: the unfolding of this particular Hungarian story. If anything, My Downfall is even more epic and bombastic than its predecessor, but not without those little humorous touches so beloved of Snares."
NEIL YOUNG Tonight's The Night LP
*** BACK IN STOCK!
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: CDs ))))) Chromatics, Coltrane, Venetian Snares, & more
o.s.t. TWIN PEAKS Season Two Music & More CD
*** 21 jams by the great ANGELO BADALAMENTI from Twin Peaks second season and another jam from David Lynch hisself.
v/a MILKY DISCO CD
*** "Variously referred to as Nu Disco or Cosmic Disco, this underground scene has been getting bigger and stronger in the last couple of years. Milky Disco features exclusive tracks from LINDSTROM (under his Six Cups Of Rebel alias), SALLY SHAPIRO, QUIET VILLAGE, KERRIER DISTRICT, and BLACK MUSTANG, along with rare tracks previously released on vinyl only, making this the quintessential cosmic disco compendium."
v/a PORTABLE SUPERSOUND CD
*** "Label compilation showcasing the current & future sounds of Smalltown Supersound. Features ARP, DISKJOKKE, LINDSTROM, KIM HIORTHOY, BJORN TORSKE, 120 DAYS, MENTAL OVERDRIVE (with a track that is soon to be released on 12” by DFAbroad in US and by Prins Thomas`s Full Pupp label in Europe), LARS HORNTVETH (Four Tet remix) & TOY."
A PLACE TO BURY STRANGERS A Place To Bury Strangers CD
*** "A PLACE TO BURY STRANGERS is not loud simply for the sake of it. The sonically overdriven sound they've accomplished is no clumsy accident, but a carefully cultivated and well-maintained entity all its own, fostered by an unbridled passion that's clearly evident in every live show they play and each recording they make. While there are obvious reference points--Pornography-era Cure, early Ride, My Bloody Valentine, and pre-1990s Jesus and Mary Chain--the sound is all their own."
ACID MOTHERS GURU GURU Psychedelic Navigator CD
*** "AcidMothersGuruGuru features Mani Neumeier from the legendary and influential German Krautrock group Guru Guru as well as Kawabata Makoto and Atsushi Tsuyama from Japan's holy Acid Mothers Temple. The result is a fiery fantasy filled, loud/soft, colorful trans-generational psychedelic collaboration."
ANGELS OF LIGHT We Are Him CD
*** "We Are Him is the fifth album from Angels of Light, the main vehicle for Michael Gira's music since he disbanded Swans in 1997. Backing/contributing musicians include Akron/Family, Bill Rieflin (Ministry, Swans, Robert Fripp, and currently drummer for both Robyn Hitchcock and REM), Julia Kent (Antony and the Johnsons) Christoph Hahn (longtime Angel and former Swan) and many, many more...."
BLACK MOTH SUPER RAINBOW Falling Through A Field CD
BLACK MOTH SUPER RAINBOW Start A People CD
*** The first two BMSR albums re-released with bonus tracks!
BUCK 65 Situation CD
*** "Following his prior record's release, BUCK 65's label folded. While waiting to get through the red tape, he made a record with Tortoise (which saw no American release), moved to Paris, fell in love, scored a film, won a Juno (he also co-hosted said awards show with Pamela Anderson), and toured the globe. He settled in after all that and made his most realized work yet-- Situation, out on Strange Famous Records/Warner Bros. worldwide."
BURIED AT SEA Ghosts CD
*** "Buried At Sea is a flowing wave of trance-like massiveness. They combine elements of doom, space rock, and experimental noise to create a sound of thick and heavy textures that migrate from quiet to an Earth-rattling assault. The weak need not apply."
CHROMATICS IV Night Drive CD
*** "Nite Drive is the latest CHROMATICS tour CD turned-actual-release due to consumer demand. Like the After Dark compilation, the response was so great the label had to do a proper pressing. Like all IDIB releases, this one is limited (1,000 copies) and will probably not be repressed. Vinyl will be released sometime next year.
JOHN COLTRANE The Impulse! Albums Volume One 5xCD
*** "Specially priced, limited edition 5 CD box set containing these five classic, influnential John Coltrane albums: Africa/Brass (1961), Live At The Village Vanguard (1961), Coltrane (1962), Duke Ellington & John Coltrane (1962), and Ballads (1962). Each album newly remastered from the original master tapes."
DOSE ONE Skeleton Repellent CD
*** "An inspired collection of hooks, mayhem and mantras, produced entirely by doseone. From prose to percussion, doseone wields and reveals the fallapart then fullon production style behind his band's SUBTLE, THEMSELVES, and cLOUDDEAD. Fear not, the terms rap, rock, folk, ambient, electronic, and experimental all apply here."
FRUSTRATIONS Glowing Red Pill CD
*** From X! Records Detroit!
JOY DIVISION Unknown Pleasures 2xCD
JOY DIVISION Closer 2xCD
*** The albums newly remastered with a bonus disc for each including one live show from 1979 and 1980.
LINDSTROM Contemporary Fix EP CD
*** "This EP features the original version of The Contemporay Fix as well as a alternative version by Lindstrom himself called Serious Syntoms version. Also features a fantastic remix from EYE of The Boredoms who delivers a raving tribal-disco mix, and a remix by the innovator of the Norwegian disco scene, BJORN TORSKE."
MURCOF Cosmos CD
*** "Fernando Corona's long-awaited third album as Murcof marks a dramatic departure from previous works. Truly monumental in scale, Cosmos is composed almost entirely of recordings of classical instruments, a process which Corona describes as 'expanding the possibilities of acoustic instruments through electronics.'î It's a move away from the micro-programmed sound he helped to pioneer, and his seamless integration of these apparently opposed forms is almost unprecedented."
OCTOPUS PROJECT Hello Avalanche CD
*** "With ragged, furious distorted guitars at one end of the spectrum and the pure, luminescent tones of the Theremin at the other, the members of The Octopus Project mine a staggering variety of sounds in between (via strings, synthesizers, drums, glockenspiel, trombones, etc.), filling their songs with brilliant contrasting colors and cascading waves of sonic bliss."
TERRY RILEY Music For The Gift CD
*** This CD brings together four seminal tape works of Terry Riley. The Gift music was performed in Paris 1963 by Chet Baker, with tape manipulations by Riley--the first use of tape delay to fragment, attenuate, and return time, looping tape through twin-tape recorders. The Gift recordings, referred to often by Soft Machine members, is the precursor to the landmark that launched the minimalist movement In C. Also included are 'Bird of Paradise', 'Mescalin Mix', and 'Concert for Two Pianos and Five Tape Recorders' with La Monte Young."
SAGE FRANCIS Personal Journals LP / CD
*** BACK IN PRINT!
SAVES THE DAY Under The Boards CD
*** 13 new tunes. Includes a bonus DVD that gives you a behind-the-scenes look into the making of the album.
BIM SHERMAN Tribulation: Down In Jamdown 1974 to 1979 CD
*** 23 tracks, about half original tunes and half the tasty dub versions. Too cool.
JON SPENCER BLUES EXPLOSION Jukebox Explosion LP / CD
*** "Beginning in 1992, The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion earmarked songs from their recording sessions for their Jukebox Single Series on In The Red. Now, for the first time, all five out-of-print singles have been collected in one place on Jukebox Explosion, along with eight previously unheard rarities from the band's early days that are every bit as action-packed, frantic, and furious."
SUNBURNED HAND OF THE MAN Fire Escape CD
*** "Produced by FOUR TET with artwork by EYE. In March 2006, FOUR TET asked the band if they would like him to record them with the idea that he would take the recordings & construct his vision of a Sunburned record. This is that vision!"
TUSSLE Warning EP CD
*** "Tussle remix EP with remixes by HOT CHIP, OPTIMO, DENNIS YOUNG (LIQUID LIQUID) and KANGO & TORKILL!" “Makes the last Rapture album sound like some rank American jam band" -(9/10 VICE MAGAZINE)
VALET Blood Is Clean CD
*** "The debut release from Portland, Oregon’s HONEY OWENS (JACKIE-O MOTHERFUCKER) under the name VALET. The songs are at once spare and expansive; exploratory, yet deceptively simple. A mix of alien-psychedelic-blues jams, Voodoo drumming, and shamanic dream music." On KRANKY.
VENETIAN SNARES My Downfall 2xLP / CD
*** "Since 2005, there has been one Venetian Snares album that everybody has talked about: the masterpiece Rossz Csillag Allat Szuletett, Aaron Funk's story of falling in love among the spires of Budapest, scored by an orchestra and the Amen break. If that album was in effect a question, then this one is his answer: the unfolding of this particular Hungarian story. If anything, My Downfall is even more epic and bombastic than its predecessor, but not without those little humorous touches so beloved of Snares."
LUKE VIBERT & JEAN JACQUES PERRY Moog Acid CD
*** "The Godfather of space age pop meets the undisputed champ of left field Moog beats to create one of the most unusual records of the year so far. An eclectic but accessible mixture of electronica, dnb, disco, hip hop and beyond."
XBXRX Sounds CD
*** "Sounds documents the improvisational side of XBXRX. Through the years improvisation has been a major part of the XBXRX live show, but remained unrecorded until now. The album features 7 improvisations of distinctive character and mood ranging from frenzied storms of white noise to pointillistic chamber music."
*** 21 jams by the great ANGELO BADALAMENTI from Twin Peaks second season and another jam from David Lynch hisself.
v/a MILKY DISCO CD
*** "Variously referred to as Nu Disco or Cosmic Disco, this underground scene has been getting bigger and stronger in the last couple of years. Milky Disco features exclusive tracks from LINDSTROM (under his Six Cups Of Rebel alias), SALLY SHAPIRO, QUIET VILLAGE, KERRIER DISTRICT, and BLACK MUSTANG, along with rare tracks previously released on vinyl only, making this the quintessential cosmic disco compendium."
v/a PORTABLE SUPERSOUND CD
*** "Label compilation showcasing the current & future sounds of Smalltown Supersound. Features ARP, DISKJOKKE, LINDSTROM, KIM HIORTHOY, BJORN TORSKE, 120 DAYS, MENTAL OVERDRIVE (with a track that is soon to be released on 12” by DFAbroad in US and by Prins Thomas`s Full Pupp label in Europe), LARS HORNTVETH (Four Tet remix) & TOY."
A PLACE TO BURY STRANGERS A Place To Bury Strangers CD
*** "A PLACE TO BURY STRANGERS is not loud simply for the sake of it. The sonically overdriven sound they've accomplished is no clumsy accident, but a carefully cultivated and well-maintained entity all its own, fostered by an unbridled passion that's clearly evident in every live show they play and each recording they make. While there are obvious reference points--Pornography-era Cure, early Ride, My Bloody Valentine, and pre-1990s Jesus and Mary Chain--the sound is all their own."
ACID MOTHERS GURU GURU Psychedelic Navigator CD
*** "AcidMothersGuruGuru features Mani Neumeier from the legendary and influential German Krautrock group Guru Guru as well as Kawabata Makoto and Atsushi Tsuyama from Japan's holy Acid Mothers Temple. The result is a fiery fantasy filled, loud/soft, colorful trans-generational psychedelic collaboration."
ANGELS OF LIGHT We Are Him CD
*** "We Are Him is the fifth album from Angels of Light, the main vehicle for Michael Gira's music since he disbanded Swans in 1997. Backing/contributing musicians include Akron/Family, Bill Rieflin (Ministry, Swans, Robert Fripp, and currently drummer for both Robyn Hitchcock and REM), Julia Kent (Antony and the Johnsons) Christoph Hahn (longtime Angel and former Swan) and many, many more...."
BLACK MOTH SUPER RAINBOW Falling Through A Field CD
BLACK MOTH SUPER RAINBOW Start A People CD
*** The first two BMSR albums re-released with bonus tracks!
BUCK 65 Situation CD
*** "Following his prior record's release, BUCK 65's label folded. While waiting to get through the red tape, he made a record with Tortoise (which saw no American release), moved to Paris, fell in love, scored a film, won a Juno (he also co-hosted said awards show with Pamela Anderson), and toured the globe. He settled in after all that and made his most realized work yet-- Situation, out on Strange Famous Records/Warner Bros. worldwide."
BURIED AT SEA Ghosts CD
*** "Buried At Sea is a flowing wave of trance-like massiveness. They combine elements of doom, space rock, and experimental noise to create a sound of thick and heavy textures that migrate from quiet to an Earth-rattling assault. The weak need not apply."
CHROMATICS IV Night Drive CD
*** "Nite Drive is the latest CHROMATICS tour CD turned-actual-release due to consumer demand. Like the After Dark compilation, the response was so great the label had to do a proper pressing. Like all IDIB releases, this one is limited (1,000 copies) and will probably not be repressed. Vinyl will be released sometime next year.
JOHN COLTRANE The Impulse! Albums Volume One 5xCD
*** "Specially priced, limited edition 5 CD box set containing these five classic, influnential John Coltrane albums: Africa/Brass (1961), Live At The Village Vanguard (1961), Coltrane (1962), Duke Ellington & John Coltrane (1962), and Ballads (1962). Each album newly remastered from the original master tapes."
DOSE ONE Skeleton Repellent CD
*** "An inspired collection of hooks, mayhem and mantras, produced entirely by doseone. From prose to percussion, doseone wields and reveals the fallapart then fullon production style behind his band's SUBTLE, THEMSELVES, and cLOUDDEAD. Fear not, the terms rap, rock, folk, ambient, electronic, and experimental all apply here."
FRUSTRATIONS Glowing Red Pill CD
*** From X! Records Detroit!
JOY DIVISION Unknown Pleasures 2xCD
JOY DIVISION Closer 2xCD
*** The albums newly remastered with a bonus disc for each including one live show from 1979 and 1980.
LINDSTROM Contemporary Fix EP CD
*** "This EP features the original version of The Contemporay Fix as well as a alternative version by Lindstrom himself called Serious Syntoms version. Also features a fantastic remix from EYE of The Boredoms who delivers a raving tribal-disco mix, and a remix by the innovator of the Norwegian disco scene, BJORN TORSKE."
MURCOF Cosmos CD
*** "Fernando Corona's long-awaited third album as Murcof marks a dramatic departure from previous works. Truly monumental in scale, Cosmos is composed almost entirely of recordings of classical instruments, a process which Corona describes as 'expanding the possibilities of acoustic instruments through electronics.'î It's a move away from the micro-programmed sound he helped to pioneer, and his seamless integration of these apparently opposed forms is almost unprecedented."
OCTOPUS PROJECT Hello Avalanche CD
*** "With ragged, furious distorted guitars at one end of the spectrum and the pure, luminescent tones of the Theremin at the other, the members of The Octopus Project mine a staggering variety of sounds in between (via strings, synthesizers, drums, glockenspiel, trombones, etc.), filling their songs with brilliant contrasting colors and cascading waves of sonic bliss."
TERRY RILEY Music For The Gift CD
*** This CD brings together four seminal tape works of Terry Riley. The Gift music was performed in Paris 1963 by Chet Baker, with tape manipulations by Riley--the first use of tape delay to fragment, attenuate, and return time, looping tape through twin-tape recorders. The Gift recordings, referred to often by Soft Machine members, is the precursor to the landmark that launched the minimalist movement In C. Also included are 'Bird of Paradise', 'Mescalin Mix', and 'Concert for Two Pianos and Five Tape Recorders' with La Monte Young."
SAGE FRANCIS Personal Journals LP / CD
*** BACK IN PRINT!
SAVES THE DAY Under The Boards CD
*** 13 new tunes. Includes a bonus DVD that gives you a behind-the-scenes look into the making of the album.
BIM SHERMAN Tribulation: Down In Jamdown 1974 to 1979 CD
*** 23 tracks, about half original tunes and half the tasty dub versions. Too cool.
JON SPENCER BLUES EXPLOSION Jukebox Explosion LP / CD
*** "Beginning in 1992, The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion earmarked songs from their recording sessions for their Jukebox Single Series on In The Red. Now, for the first time, all five out-of-print singles have been collected in one place on Jukebox Explosion, along with eight previously unheard rarities from the band's early days that are every bit as action-packed, frantic, and furious."
SUNBURNED HAND OF THE MAN Fire Escape CD
*** "Produced by FOUR TET with artwork by EYE. In March 2006, FOUR TET asked the band if they would like him to record them with the idea that he would take the recordings & construct his vision of a Sunburned record. This is that vision!"
TUSSLE Warning EP CD
*** "Tussle remix EP with remixes by HOT CHIP, OPTIMO, DENNIS YOUNG (LIQUID LIQUID) and KANGO & TORKILL!" “Makes the last Rapture album sound like some rank American jam band" -(9/10 VICE MAGAZINE)
VALET Blood Is Clean CD
*** "The debut release from Portland, Oregon’s HONEY OWENS (JACKIE-O MOTHERFUCKER) under the name VALET. The songs are at once spare and expansive; exploratory, yet deceptively simple. A mix of alien-psychedelic-blues jams, Voodoo drumming, and shamanic dream music." On KRANKY.
VENETIAN SNARES My Downfall 2xLP / CD
*** "Since 2005, there has been one Venetian Snares album that everybody has talked about: the masterpiece Rossz Csillag Allat Szuletett, Aaron Funk's story of falling in love among the spires of Budapest, scored by an orchestra and the Amen break. If that album was in effect a question, then this one is his answer: the unfolding of this particular Hungarian story. If anything, My Downfall is even more epic and bombastic than its predecessor, but not without those little humorous touches so beloved of Snares."
LUKE VIBERT & JEAN JACQUES PERRY Moog Acid CD
*** "The Godfather of space age pop meets the undisputed champ of left field Moog beats to create one of the most unusual records of the year so far. An eclectic but accessible mixture of electronica, dnb, disco, hip hop and beyond."
XBXRX Sounds CD
*** "Sounds documents the improvisational side of XBXRX. Through the years improvisation has been a major part of the XBXRX live show, but remained unrecorded until now. The album features 7 improvisations of distinctive character and mood ranging from frenzied storms of white noise to pointillistic chamber music."
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: CDs ))))) Scott Walker, Saturday Looks Good To Me, Black Dice, etc.
RYAN ADAMS & THE CARDINALS Follow The Lights CD
*** When this arrived, I thought "Another Ryan Adams album!?" It turns out it's not an album after all--it's a 7-song EP, featuring 4 new tracks and 3 alternate versions of Adams' songs.
OREN AMBARCHI In The Pendulum's Embrace CD
*** "Ambarchi continues his otherworldly investigations with his latest where he expands the scope and range of his unique musical language, incorporating an even broader palette of instruments and sensibilities."
BABYSHAMBLES Shotters Nation CD
*** The NME said: "Babyshambles have far exceeded all expectations. This record is the work of a bunch of musicians hellbent on making he best record they have in them."
BLACK DICE Load Blown CD
*** "Strange and abrasive, yet somehow more familiar, accessible and familiar than ever, this is Black Dice at their most palatable yet."
CAN Anthology 2xCD
*** "A double CD of 29 classic CAN tracks--the perfect intro to the legendary German musical pioneers."
CASSIUS 15 Again CD
*** "Features the international dance floor smash 'Toop Toop' and the PHARRELL collabo 'Eye Water'." Plus bonus track!
CASTANETS In The Vines CD
*** "Appropriately, the album he was struggling to complete is based on a Hindu fable about being trapped in an inescapable fate, with death and the limitations of our physical lives closing in from all corners. The songs are sung with such intimacy and earnestness that "In The Vines" sways somewhere between the serpent, elephant, bees and rats, the honey representing a strange sense of hope and delight in the brief moments of beauty that sustain our lives."
COHEED AND CAMBRIA No World For Tomorrow CD
*** Yes, they're still mining that prog/hardcore thing, even going so far as to include a 5-part (re: song) cycle called "The End Complete". Most hilariously fantastic art of 2007? Perhaps. (Curious about the 2006 cover? It was Lupe Fiasco's Food & Liquer album. It was every 1980s 5th grader's dream yearbook photo.)
iLIKETRAINS Elegies To Lessons Learnt CD
*** "The Leeds five piece arrived in 2006 with their powerful tales of morose events from bygone days, murder and misfortune. The stories told by iLiKETRAiNS are set to carefully structured, adorning melodies with instrumental patterns capable of creating an incredible range of emotions."
JESU Lifeline CD
*** It looks like Jesu took a note from Ryan Adams and decided to pop out an EP following an album too. Damn, 2007! But yeah, this features JARBOE of Swans and is a "clutch of dream rock gems. ...Lifeline is upper-atmosphere music that works just as well down here on Earth."
KRAFTWERK Aerodynamik / La Forme CD
*** NOW ON CD.
LITTLE BROTHER Get Back CD
*** These guys were so hot and then it slowed down but I think it's going to pick back up. LIL' WAYNE guests, for crying out loud.
METALOCALYPSE Dethklok CD
*** "The full length album from the most brutal band on the planet. Featuring songs from the [adult swim] series."
OF MONTREAL If He Is Protecting Our Nation Then Who Will Protect Big Oil, Our Children? CD
*** Would you like a mouthfull with your Of Montreal reissue? Just say the title! Moving on, this was an import-only item that's been unavailable for a year or so now.
ORTHODOX Amanecer en Puerta Oscura CD
*** "Sophomore release from this Spanish power trio helps give a new perspective into the soul of the music they create as well as its movement into several different directions without forgetting their metal roots."
ROBERT PLANT & ALISON KRAUSS Raising Sand CD
*** What!? Are these two together? MOJO magazine seems to think so, referring to it as their "courtship dance." I also heard it's "gentle, attentive, and respectfully intimate."
PREFUSE 73 Preparations 2xCD / LP+CD
*** "By focusing on the foundation of his creative process and less on the intricacies of his trademark editing and chopping magic, he's emerged with an album that will give fans a subtle taste of his record that have come before." Apparently the bonus disc is the jam.
SATURDAY LOOKS GOOD TO ME Fill Up The Room CD
*** Yow! Fred Thomas jumped the Michigan ship and got signed to Olympia, WA's #1 former cassette label: K! Congrats, fellow. It turns out Thomas has been shying away from the Motown sound of past records and has expanded into the ether a bit. Give it a whirl.
DAVID SHRIGLEY Worried Noodles 2xCD+BOOK
*** Two years ago, artist DAVID SHRIGLEY released an LP-sized book of song lyrics which sold out almost immediately. It found a slew of admirers in music circles, wherein the idea of adapting these songs to music was realized. Featuring 39 exclusive tracks with contributions from DAVID BYRNE, FRANZ FERDINAND, ISLANDS, GRIZZLY BEAR, TV ON THE RADIO, HOT CHIP, LIARS, TRANS AM, and many more. Included with the two discs is a hardcover book reproduction of the lyrics.
SIGHTINGS Through The Panama CD
*** Produced by ANDREW WK. "Bass, drums, and guitars meshed together with a synthetic twine envisioned in future think tanks...this is a rock album, but a rock for times coming, a sound of future days."
SKULL DISCO Soundboy Punishments 2xCD
*** "Skull Disco's dubwise approach is a mutant mix of techno, tribal drums, eastern drum patterns and dubbed out resonating bass lines fused together to make this one of the most exciting and forward thinking new sounds to come out of the UK's underground dance scene. Includes RICARDO VILLALOBOS' epic remix of 'Blood On My Hands'."
SUBTLE Yell & Ice CD
*** Their second disc of collabos and exclusive b-sides, etc., featuring TV ON THE RADIO, NOTWIST (remember them?), WOLF PARADE, FOG and believe it or not, CLOUDEAD!
THE THRILLS Teenager CD
*** Perhaps the most apt cover art in regard to the album title. Hmm... what else should you know? It's a 4 star (****) album according to both MOJO and UNCUT.
SCOTT WALKER And Who Shall Go To The Ball? And What Shall Go To The Ball? CD
*** "After confirming his position as one of the most singular talents working in any field of the arts by releasing The Drift, Scott was commissioned by London's South Bank Centre to write music for a contemporary dance piece. Titled 'And Who Shall Go To The Ball? And What Shall Go To The Ball?', the entirely instrumental composition is made up of four movements with a total running time of 25 minutes. This is a limited edition release in deluxe packaging and will never be repressed."
ROGER WATERS / RON GEESIN Music From The Body CD
*** "Sound experimentalist Ron Geesin collaborated with Pink Floyd's Roger Waters to release this twisted auditory exploration of the human body. PINK FLOYD joins the duo for the soundtrack finale."
WEEN La Cucaracha CD
*** The brothers Ween holed up in a rented bungalow and recorded at least three albums worth of tunes, but here's 13. Like the last few albums preceding it, the fellows eek out a little bit serious territory while polishing up the fart jokes for a truly strange experience.
WEST INDIAN GIRL 4th & Wall CD
*** New album from very pretty, very Astralwerks sounding band formerly known in Ann Arbor as WIG.
WITCHCRAFT The Alchemist CD
*** "Third album from Witchcraft, finding the band delivering their 70s laden rock while expanding into a progressive soundscape. Includes a 13 minute three-part doom epic."
YEASAYER All Hour Cymbals CD
*** "Pulling from every spectrum and mashing, then re-mashing, the YEASAYER collective have bent genre's until unrecognizable. YEASAYER'S components are four, each multi-instrumentalist, vocalist, songwriter, and chanter. Founded by half of a barbershop quartet, then followed by the rhythm, YEASAYER is a tight brotherhood undisrupted by the external."
NEIL YOUNG Chrome Dreams II CD
NEIL YOUNG Chrome Dreams II CD+DVD
*** Critically acclaimed new album of ten songs and a sequel to an unreleased album. This is Neil Young's world!
*** When this arrived, I thought "Another Ryan Adams album!?" It turns out it's not an album after all--it's a 7-song EP, featuring 4 new tracks and 3 alternate versions of Adams' songs.
OREN AMBARCHI In The Pendulum's Embrace CD
*** "Ambarchi continues his otherworldly investigations with his latest where he expands the scope and range of his unique musical language, incorporating an even broader palette of instruments and sensibilities."
BABYSHAMBLES Shotters Nation CD
*** The NME said: "Babyshambles have far exceeded all expectations. This record is the work of a bunch of musicians hellbent on making he best record they have in them."
BLACK DICE Load Blown CD
*** "Strange and abrasive, yet somehow more familiar, accessible and familiar than ever, this is Black Dice at their most palatable yet."
CAN Anthology 2xCD
*** "A double CD of 29 classic CAN tracks--the perfect intro to the legendary German musical pioneers."
CASSIUS 15 Again CD
*** "Features the international dance floor smash 'Toop Toop' and the PHARRELL collabo 'Eye Water'." Plus bonus track!
CASTANETS In The Vines CD
*** "Appropriately, the album he was struggling to complete is based on a Hindu fable about being trapped in an inescapable fate, with death and the limitations of our physical lives closing in from all corners. The songs are sung with such intimacy and earnestness that "In The Vines" sways somewhere between the serpent, elephant, bees and rats, the honey representing a strange sense of hope and delight in the brief moments of beauty that sustain our lives."
COHEED AND CAMBRIA No World For Tomorrow CD
*** Yes, they're still mining that prog/hardcore thing, even going so far as to include a 5-part (re: song) cycle called "The End Complete". Most hilariously fantastic art of 2007? Perhaps. (Curious about the 2006 cover? It was Lupe Fiasco's Food & Liquer album. It was every 1980s 5th grader's dream yearbook photo.)
iLIKETRAINS Elegies To Lessons Learnt CD
*** "The Leeds five piece arrived in 2006 with their powerful tales of morose events from bygone days, murder and misfortune. The stories told by iLiKETRAiNS are set to carefully structured, adorning melodies with instrumental patterns capable of creating an incredible range of emotions."
JESU Lifeline CD
*** It looks like Jesu took a note from Ryan Adams and decided to pop out an EP following an album too. Damn, 2007! But yeah, this features JARBOE of Swans and is a "clutch of dream rock gems. ...Lifeline is upper-atmosphere music that works just as well down here on Earth."
KRAFTWERK Aerodynamik / La Forme CD
*** NOW ON CD.
LITTLE BROTHER Get Back CD
*** These guys were so hot and then it slowed down but I think it's going to pick back up. LIL' WAYNE guests, for crying out loud.
METALOCALYPSE Dethklok CD
*** "The full length album from the most brutal band on the planet. Featuring songs from the [adult swim] series."
OF MONTREAL If He Is Protecting Our Nation Then Who Will Protect Big Oil, Our Children? CD
*** Would you like a mouthfull with your Of Montreal reissue? Just say the title! Moving on, this was an import-only item that's been unavailable for a year or so now.
ORTHODOX Amanecer en Puerta Oscura CD
*** "Sophomore release from this Spanish power trio helps give a new perspective into the soul of the music they create as well as its movement into several different directions without forgetting their metal roots."
ROBERT PLANT & ALISON KRAUSS Raising Sand CD
*** What!? Are these two together? MOJO magazine seems to think so, referring to it as their "courtship dance." I also heard it's "gentle, attentive, and respectfully intimate."
PREFUSE 73 Preparations 2xCD / LP+CD
*** "By focusing on the foundation of his creative process and less on the intricacies of his trademark editing and chopping magic, he's emerged with an album that will give fans a subtle taste of his record that have come before." Apparently the bonus disc is the jam.
SATURDAY LOOKS GOOD TO ME Fill Up The Room CD
*** Yow! Fred Thomas jumped the Michigan ship and got signed to Olympia, WA's #1 former cassette label: K! Congrats, fellow. It turns out Thomas has been shying away from the Motown sound of past records and has expanded into the ether a bit. Give it a whirl.
DAVID SHRIGLEY Worried Noodles 2xCD+BOOK
*** Two years ago, artist DAVID SHRIGLEY released an LP-sized book of song lyrics which sold out almost immediately. It found a slew of admirers in music circles, wherein the idea of adapting these songs to music was realized. Featuring 39 exclusive tracks with contributions from DAVID BYRNE, FRANZ FERDINAND, ISLANDS, GRIZZLY BEAR, TV ON THE RADIO, HOT CHIP, LIARS, TRANS AM, and many more. Included with the two discs is a hardcover book reproduction of the lyrics.
SIGHTINGS Through The Panama CD
*** Produced by ANDREW WK. "Bass, drums, and guitars meshed together with a synthetic twine envisioned in future think tanks...this is a rock album, but a rock for times coming, a sound of future days."
SKULL DISCO Soundboy Punishments 2xCD
*** "Skull Disco's dubwise approach is a mutant mix of techno, tribal drums, eastern drum patterns and dubbed out resonating bass lines fused together to make this one of the most exciting and forward thinking new sounds to come out of the UK's underground dance scene. Includes RICARDO VILLALOBOS' epic remix of 'Blood On My Hands'."
SUBTLE Yell & Ice CD
*** Their second disc of collabos and exclusive b-sides, etc., featuring TV ON THE RADIO, NOTWIST (remember them?), WOLF PARADE, FOG and believe it or not, CLOUDEAD!
THE THRILLS Teenager CD
*** Perhaps the most apt cover art in regard to the album title. Hmm... what else should you know? It's a 4 star (****) album according to both MOJO and UNCUT.
SCOTT WALKER And Who Shall Go To The Ball? And What Shall Go To The Ball? CD
*** "After confirming his position as one of the most singular talents working in any field of the arts by releasing The Drift, Scott was commissioned by London's South Bank Centre to write music for a contemporary dance piece. Titled 'And Who Shall Go To The Ball? And What Shall Go To The Ball?', the entirely instrumental composition is made up of four movements with a total running time of 25 minutes. This is a limited edition release in deluxe packaging and will never be repressed."
ROGER WATERS / RON GEESIN Music From The Body CD
*** "Sound experimentalist Ron Geesin collaborated with Pink Floyd's Roger Waters to release this twisted auditory exploration of the human body. PINK FLOYD joins the duo for the soundtrack finale."
WEEN La Cucaracha CD
*** The brothers Ween holed up in a rented bungalow and recorded at least three albums worth of tunes, but here's 13. Like the last few albums preceding it, the fellows eek out a little bit serious territory while polishing up the fart jokes for a truly strange experience.
WEST INDIAN GIRL 4th & Wall CD
*** New album from very pretty, very Astralwerks sounding band formerly known in Ann Arbor as WIG.
WITCHCRAFT The Alchemist CD
*** "Third album from Witchcraft, finding the band delivering their 70s laden rock while expanding into a progressive soundscape. Includes a 13 minute three-part doom epic."
YEASAYER All Hour Cymbals CD
*** "Pulling from every spectrum and mashing, then re-mashing, the YEASAYER collective have bent genre's until unrecognizable. YEASAYER'S components are four, each multi-instrumentalist, vocalist, songwriter, and chanter. Founded by half of a barbershop quartet, then followed by the rhythm, YEASAYER is a tight brotherhood undisrupted by the external."
NEIL YOUNG Chrome Dreams II CD
NEIL YOUNG Chrome Dreams II CD+DVD
*** Critically acclaimed new album of ten songs and a sequel to an unreleased album. This is Neil Young's world!
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: Vinyl ))))) Black Dice, Matt Dear, and some new porn (get it?)
ACEYALONE Lightning Strikes 2xLP
*** NOW ON VINYL!
BLACK DICE Load Blown LP
*** "Five tracks from Load Blown not previously released on vinyl." Includes 22" x 22" poster.
MATTHEW DEAR Don & Sherri 12"
*** Why'd Matt Dear do a record about my parents? Who knows but it's the jam! Includes remixes by HOT CHIP and DJ KOZE. Nice. Real nice.
HOLY FUCK LP LP
*** "If electronic music is a highly sophisticated robot operated by hi-tech computers, Holy Fuck are the evil counterpart, hell bent with battery operated gadgets, keyboards and analogue tape. They are less of an indie rock band then they are the exploded diagram of an indie rock band, splitting open to reveal organic guts, tangled wires, and brokenbits of drumsticks. Balanced somewhere between an experimental noise-out and a free-forall dance party."
NEW PORNOGRAPHERS Myriad Harbor 7"
*** "Matador UK 7" for the ultima-hyper catchy 'Myriad Harbour' with the excellent 'Fugue State' now making it's first vinyl appearance as well. All wrapped in one of the funniest sleeves of any record in quite some time."
*** NOW ON VINYL!
BLACK DICE Load Blown LP
*** "Five tracks from Load Blown not previously released on vinyl." Includes 22" x 22" poster.
MATTHEW DEAR Don & Sherri 12"
*** Why'd Matt Dear do a record about my parents? Who knows but it's the jam! Includes remixes by HOT CHIP and DJ KOZE. Nice. Real nice.
HOLY FUCK LP LP
*** "If electronic music is a highly sophisticated robot operated by hi-tech computers, Holy Fuck are the evil counterpart, hell bent with battery operated gadgets, keyboards and analogue tape. They are less of an indie rock band then they are the exploded diagram of an indie rock band, splitting open to reveal organic guts, tangled wires, and brokenbits of drumsticks. Balanced somewhere between an experimental noise-out and a free-forall dance party."
NEW PORNOGRAPHERS Myriad Harbor 7"
*** "Matador UK 7" for the ultima-hyper catchy 'Myriad Harbour' with the excellent 'Fugue State' now making it's first vinyl appearance as well. All wrapped in one of the funniest sleeves of any record in quite some time."
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: DVD ))))) The Invasion of Thunderbolt Pagoda
IRA COHEN The Invasion of Thunderbolt Pagoda DVD
*** "The first-ever, fully authorized commercial release of Ira Cohen's legendary 1968 film, The Invasion of Thunderbolt Pagoda, fully restored and director's cut. The legendary soundtrack, newly remastered by Tim Barnes, featuring The Universal Mutant Repertory Company (Loren Standlee, Ziska Baum, Angus MacLise, Raja Samayana, Tony Conrad, Henry Flynt and Jackson MacLow) and two new, never-before-released alternative soundtracks to Invasion by SUNBURNED HAND OF THE MAN and ACID MOTHERS TEMPLE SWR."
*** "The first-ever, fully authorized commercial release of Ira Cohen's legendary 1968 film, The Invasion of Thunderbolt Pagoda, fully restored and director's cut. The legendary soundtrack, newly remastered by Tim Barnes, featuring The Universal Mutant Repertory Company (Loren Standlee, Ziska Baum, Angus MacLise, Raja Samayana, Tony Conrad, Henry Flynt and Jackson MacLow) and two new, never-before-released alternative soundtracks to Invasion by SUNBURNED HAND OF THE MAN and ACID MOTHERS TEMPLE SWR."
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: Vinyl ))))) Kompakt, Soul Jazz, & more
V/A Brazil 70 -- After Tropicalia 2xLP/CD
*** On SOUL JAZZ. Brazil 70 follows Brazilian music in the 1970s in the aftermath of Tropicalia and as the country's dictatorship entered its most oppressive phase. Musicians and artists from the Tropicalia period of the late-60s such as Gilberto Gil, Rita Lee (Os Mutantes lead-singer) and Gal Costa entered a new phase mixing rock, funk, samba and soul alongside a wealth of like-minded new artists such as Novos Baianos, Raul Seixas, Nelson Angelo and Joyce and more."
V/A Detroit Beatdown Vol. 2 EP
*** The first of five EPs from Third Ear of their Detroit Beatdown series. First up in DB2 is EP1: The 'Black' EP." Included here: DJ Minx, Reggie Dokes, Smith, Black Art Music.
BABY OLIVER Feelings 2/Shot Caller 12"
*** "Check out the new record from new Environ act, Baby Oliver! More hot and twisted tracks for disco jackers and neurotic nu-romantics... you don't want to miss it. Baby Oliver's jams slice across genre divides and sound like nothing else coming out! Sure to drive your dancefloors wild."
BORATTO, GUI Chromophobia Remixe Part 2 12"
*** The second part of the Chromophobia Remixe series is purely dedicated to "Beautiful Life." The original version got re-mastered and re-cut in order to blow up each and every open-air summer jam. Gui Boratto himself provides a dense remix that translates the exuberant original into a dark and sexy club version. BPitch's Sascha Funke did what he does best: he transformed "Beautiful Life" into a cheeky little heartbreaker.
SOUNDMURDERER + SK1 Soundmurderer + SK1 2xLP
*** "Compilation of some of the best tracks from the Detroit jungle label Rewind by Soundmurderer (aka Todd Osborn) and SK-1 (aka Tadd Mullinix). Rewind are leaders of a wave of American junglists obsessed with the development of the original ruffneck ragga and frenetic breakbeat sound."
STUDIO Life's a Beach! 12"
*** Mixes by Prins Thomas & Todd Terje. "Sweden's Studio make beautiful organic electronic music that falls midway between dance/indie and electronica. Here the Norwegian kings of nu-disco remix the bands signature release to devastating effect. Latter day comparisons would read Cluster / Neu / La Dusseldorf / Kraftwerk / Manuel Gottsching."
STUDIO West Coast 2xLP/CD
*** "This is the first full-length album by Studio, finally given a full-fledged release after a limited release disappeared from the racks last year. West Coast will appeal to fans of the new slo-mo Italo disco and is the missing link between The Cure and Lindstrøm touching on Can, Neu, Happy Mondays and The Smiths in their creation of an Afrobeat-dub-disco-indie-pop adventure."
SUPERMAYER Two of Us 12"
*** Supermayer are Superpitcher and Michael Mayer, the super-power duo who will the save the world of techno. "Two of Us" is an irresistible bass-driven groove that steamrolls the first three minutes until the glockenspiel puts a magic spell on the dancefloor. On the flipside, Geiger delivers a killer remix in a deeper, dubby fashion without missing the euphoric peak of the original. Last but not least, Supermayer bring back the glockenspiel for an excessive DJ tool. Its mantra-like repetition sounds like a message.
*** On SOUL JAZZ. Brazil 70 follows Brazilian music in the 1970s in the aftermath of Tropicalia and as the country's dictatorship entered its most oppressive phase. Musicians and artists from the Tropicalia period of the late-60s such as Gilberto Gil, Rita Lee (Os Mutantes lead-singer) and Gal Costa entered a new phase mixing rock, funk, samba and soul alongside a wealth of like-minded new artists such as Novos Baianos, Raul Seixas, Nelson Angelo and Joyce and more."
V/A Detroit Beatdown Vol. 2 EP
*** The first of five EPs from Third Ear of their Detroit Beatdown series. First up in DB2 is EP1: The 'Black' EP." Included here: DJ Minx, Reggie Dokes, Smith, Black Art Music.
BABY OLIVER Feelings 2/Shot Caller 12"
*** "Check out the new record from new Environ act, Baby Oliver! More hot and twisted tracks for disco jackers and neurotic nu-romantics... you don't want to miss it. Baby Oliver's jams slice across genre divides and sound like nothing else coming out! Sure to drive your dancefloors wild."
BORATTO, GUI Chromophobia Remixe Part 2 12"
*** The second part of the Chromophobia Remixe series is purely dedicated to "Beautiful Life." The original version got re-mastered and re-cut in order to blow up each and every open-air summer jam. Gui Boratto himself provides a dense remix that translates the exuberant original into a dark and sexy club version. BPitch's Sascha Funke did what he does best: he transformed "Beautiful Life" into a cheeky little heartbreaker.
SOUNDMURDERER + SK1 Soundmurderer + SK1 2xLP
*** "Compilation of some of the best tracks from the Detroit jungle label Rewind by Soundmurderer (aka Todd Osborn) and SK-1 (aka Tadd Mullinix). Rewind are leaders of a wave of American junglists obsessed with the development of the original ruffneck ragga and frenetic breakbeat sound."
STUDIO Life's a Beach! 12"
*** Mixes by Prins Thomas & Todd Terje. "Sweden's Studio make beautiful organic electronic music that falls midway between dance/indie and electronica. Here the Norwegian kings of nu-disco remix the bands signature release to devastating effect. Latter day comparisons would read Cluster / Neu / La Dusseldorf / Kraftwerk / Manuel Gottsching."
STUDIO West Coast 2xLP/CD
*** "This is the first full-length album by Studio, finally given a full-fledged release after a limited release disappeared from the racks last year. West Coast will appeal to fans of the new slo-mo Italo disco and is the missing link between The Cure and Lindstrøm touching on Can, Neu, Happy Mondays and The Smiths in their creation of an Afrobeat-dub-disco-indie-pop adventure."
SUPERMAYER Two of Us 12"
*** Supermayer are Superpitcher and Michael Mayer, the super-power duo who will the save the world of techno. "Two of Us" is an irresistible bass-driven groove that steamrolls the first three minutes until the glockenspiel puts a magic spell on the dancefloor. On the flipside, Geiger delivers a killer remix in a deeper, dubby fashion without missing the euphoric peak of the original. Last but not least, Supermayer bring back the glockenspiel for an excessive DJ tool. Its mantra-like repetition sounds like a message.
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: CDs ))))) Strange, unusual, wonderful and beautiful music...
OST The Wicker Man CD
*** "Music and songs by Paul Giovanni. First ever release of the stereo masters of all the songs from this cult British Horror Film. The original stereo masters that were prepared for a US album release in 1977 were thought lost but have now been discovered." Deluxe US version with a 20-booklet of elaborate liner notes and photos.
V/A Brazil 70 -- After Tropicalia 2xLP/CD
*** On SOUL JAZZ. Brazil 70 follows Brazilian music in the 1970s in the aftermath of Tropicalia and as the country's dictatorship entered its most oppressive phase. Musicians and artists from the Tropicalia period of the late-60s such as Gilberto Gil, Rita Lee (Os Mutantes lead-singer) and Gal Costa entered a new phase mixing rock, funk, samba and soul alongside a wealth of like-minded new artists such as Novos Baianos, Raul Seixas, Nelson Angelo and Joyce and more."
V/A Guitars of the Golden Triangle: Folk and Pop Music... CD
*** "Never before presented outside a tiny minority of the Burmese community, this unbelievable collection of garage and psychedelic rock, raw folk-blues ballads, and country-western styled music is a product of Shan and Pa'o musicians hailing from the early 1970s."
V/A The Great Lakes Sound: Techno from the I94/I104 Corridor 2xCD
*** "What you hold in your hands is from the next wave of electronic musicians from the Great Lakes area of the American Midwest -- the cradle of house music and techno. On the path cut by Juan Atkins, Derrick May, Jeff Mills, Underground Resistance, Richie Hawtin, DJ T-1000, Mike Dearborn and Green Velvet, Thee Madkatt Courtship and DJ Skull, the artists on this compilation are working their gear to keep the heavy grooves and the driving beats flowing."
V/A The In-Kraut: Hip Shaking Grooves Made in Germany 1966-1974 CD
*** "Twenty handpicked soul, beat, now sound, mod and soundtrack gems from Germany -- all recorded between 1966 and 1974. Among them many Kraut-pleasin' obscurities and long-forgotten nuggets that appear now for the very first time on CD."
V/A The In-Kraut Vol. 2 CD
*** "Once again we take a deep trip into the funky musical spheres of 1960s and 1970s Germany -- an undiscovered universe full of Hammond-heavy grooves, tight big band arrangements and fuzz guitar enhanced dancefloor nuggets. Dip into a motherlode of 20 rare soul, beat, now sound, mod and soundtrack gems -- most of them appearing for the first time on CD."
V/A Prog Is Not a Four Letter Word CD
*** RECOMMENDED "Forget such flamboyant cover stars such as Genesis, Yes and ELP, what about the unintentionally progressive musicians from the far reaches of the globe who were forced to create their own brand of psychedelic rock in a country shielded from the influence of the western world? Even though most of the 15 tracks on this compilation were recorded over 30 years ago they still, individually embody a wide range of challenging progressive musical ideas which are as relevant today as they were when the vinyl first came off the press in each of their scattered countries of origin." Artists: Picchio dal Pozzo, Visitors, Baris Manco, Phillipe Besombes Drugi Nacin, Bran, Breakout, Martin Kratochvil, San Ul Lim, Egg, 3 Hurel, Illes, Jean Claude Vannier, Embryo, Czerwone Gitary, Jazz Q.
BABY GRANDMOTHERS Baby Grandmothers CD
*** "Baby Grandmothers were a short-lived Swedish band, but one of the most prolific and unique psychedelic, modal, experimental power-trios to emerge out of the Scandinavian psychedelic underground scene in 1967."
BEN, JORGE Força Bruta CD
*** "First time on CD in the U.S.! A groundbreaking album from the young Jorge Ben -- one of Brazil's most soulful singers ever -- heard here at a pivotal point in his career. Força Bruta is a record that forever transformed Brazilian music with its unique blend of samba and soul -- and it features some tremendous rhythm work from Trio Mocoto -- who bring in a wide variety of percussion techniques to make the whole thing groove. There's an earthy, laid-back feel to the whole set -- one that makes the album feel like a spontaneous expression of genius, even at the few points when larger orchestrations slide into the mix. The album is easily one of Jorge Ben's greatest!"
LUOMO Paper Tigers CD
*** Vladislav Delay is finally back as Luomo. Paper Tigers is brilliantly lush and expansive dance music, and it is here to stay. As the trends of electronic music shift like Saharan sands, there are a few releases which stand as classics. For Luomo, House music is an aquatic experience, vocals are edited, beats are environments and atmosphere extends outward past the solar system and inwards towards the ear canal, until the two meet at your feet.
SECOND HAND Reality CD
*** "An acknowledged landmark of progressive acid rock, this 1968 classic combines top-notch songwriting with vicious guitar, swathes of mellotron and dense arrangements, to unique and unsettling effect. Late-period UK psychedelia with weird strings, flute melodies other synthie orchestral moments."
SOUNDMURDERER + SK1 Rewind CD
*** "Compilation of some of the best tracks from the Detroit jungle label Rewind by Soundmurderer (aka Todd Osborn) and SK-1 (aka Tadd Mullinix). Rewind are leaders of a wave of American junglists obsessed with the development of the original ruffneck ragga and frenetic breakbeat sound."
STUDIO West Coast 2xLP/CD
*** "This is the first full-length album by Studio, finally given a full-fledged release after a limited release disappeared from the racks last year. West Coast will appeal to fans of the new slo-mo Italo disco and is the missing link between The Cure and Lindstrøm touching on Can, Neu, Happy Mondays and The Smiths in their creation of an Afrobeat-dub-disco-indie-pop adventure."
TRENTEMØLLER The Last Resort CD
*** This is Danish producer Anders Trentemøller 's debut full-length. The 13 instrumental tracks together form a wordless musical story, almost like the soundtrack to a movie. It manages to capture a whole range of emotions in subtle melodic miniatures, dreamy ambiences, dusty beats, deep dub-tracks and driving groove-excursions. Although it's definitely an electronic album, it also incorporates live drums, guitars and other acoustic instruments like celesta, glockenspiel, melodica and even DJ scratching to create a more organic feel."
*** "Music and songs by Paul Giovanni. First ever release of the stereo masters of all the songs from this cult British Horror Film. The original stereo masters that were prepared for a US album release in 1977 were thought lost but have now been discovered." Deluxe US version with a 20-booklet of elaborate liner notes and photos.
V/A Brazil 70 -- After Tropicalia 2xLP/CD
*** On SOUL JAZZ. Brazil 70 follows Brazilian music in the 1970s in the aftermath of Tropicalia and as the country's dictatorship entered its most oppressive phase. Musicians and artists from the Tropicalia period of the late-60s such as Gilberto Gil, Rita Lee (Os Mutantes lead-singer) and Gal Costa entered a new phase mixing rock, funk, samba and soul alongside a wealth of like-minded new artists such as Novos Baianos, Raul Seixas, Nelson Angelo and Joyce and more."
V/A Guitars of the Golden Triangle: Folk and Pop Music... CD
*** "Never before presented outside a tiny minority of the Burmese community, this unbelievable collection of garage and psychedelic rock, raw folk-blues ballads, and country-western styled music is a product of Shan and Pa'o musicians hailing from the early 1970s."
V/A The Great Lakes Sound: Techno from the I94/I104 Corridor 2xCD
*** "What you hold in your hands is from the next wave of electronic musicians from the Great Lakes area of the American Midwest -- the cradle of house music and techno. On the path cut by Juan Atkins, Derrick May, Jeff Mills, Underground Resistance, Richie Hawtin, DJ T-1000, Mike Dearborn and Green Velvet, Thee Madkatt Courtship and DJ Skull, the artists on this compilation are working their gear to keep the heavy grooves and the driving beats flowing."
V/A The In-Kraut: Hip Shaking Grooves Made in Germany 1966-1974 CD
*** "Twenty handpicked soul, beat, now sound, mod and soundtrack gems from Germany -- all recorded between 1966 and 1974. Among them many Kraut-pleasin' obscurities and long-forgotten nuggets that appear now for the very first time on CD."
V/A The In-Kraut Vol. 2 CD
*** "Once again we take a deep trip into the funky musical spheres of 1960s and 1970s Germany -- an undiscovered universe full of Hammond-heavy grooves, tight big band arrangements and fuzz guitar enhanced dancefloor nuggets. Dip into a motherlode of 20 rare soul, beat, now sound, mod and soundtrack gems -- most of them appearing for the first time on CD."
V/A Prog Is Not a Four Letter Word CD
*** RECOMMENDED "Forget such flamboyant cover stars such as Genesis, Yes and ELP, what about the unintentionally progressive musicians from the far reaches of the globe who were forced to create their own brand of psychedelic rock in a country shielded from the influence of the western world? Even though most of the 15 tracks on this compilation were recorded over 30 years ago they still, individually embody a wide range of challenging progressive musical ideas which are as relevant today as they were when the vinyl first came off the press in each of their scattered countries of origin." Artists: Picchio dal Pozzo, Visitors, Baris Manco, Phillipe Besombes Drugi Nacin, Bran, Breakout, Martin Kratochvil, San Ul Lim, Egg, 3 Hurel, Illes, Jean Claude Vannier, Embryo, Czerwone Gitary, Jazz Q.
BABY GRANDMOTHERS Baby Grandmothers CD
*** "Baby Grandmothers were a short-lived Swedish band, but one of the most prolific and unique psychedelic, modal, experimental power-trios to emerge out of the Scandinavian psychedelic underground scene in 1967."
BEN, JORGE Força Bruta CD
*** "First time on CD in the U.S.! A groundbreaking album from the young Jorge Ben -- one of Brazil's most soulful singers ever -- heard here at a pivotal point in his career. Força Bruta is a record that forever transformed Brazilian music with its unique blend of samba and soul -- and it features some tremendous rhythm work from Trio Mocoto -- who bring in a wide variety of percussion techniques to make the whole thing groove. There's an earthy, laid-back feel to the whole set -- one that makes the album feel like a spontaneous expression of genius, even at the few points when larger orchestrations slide into the mix. The album is easily one of Jorge Ben's greatest!"
LUOMO Paper Tigers CD
*** Vladislav Delay is finally back as Luomo. Paper Tigers is brilliantly lush and expansive dance music, and it is here to stay. As the trends of electronic music shift like Saharan sands, there are a few releases which stand as classics. For Luomo, House music is an aquatic experience, vocals are edited, beats are environments and atmosphere extends outward past the solar system and inwards towards the ear canal, until the two meet at your feet.
SECOND HAND Reality CD
*** "An acknowledged landmark of progressive acid rock, this 1968 classic combines top-notch songwriting with vicious guitar, swathes of mellotron and dense arrangements, to unique and unsettling effect. Late-period UK psychedelia with weird strings, flute melodies other synthie orchestral moments."
SOUNDMURDERER + SK1 Rewind CD
*** "Compilation of some of the best tracks from the Detroit jungle label Rewind by Soundmurderer (aka Todd Osborn) and SK-1 (aka Tadd Mullinix). Rewind are leaders of a wave of American junglists obsessed with the development of the original ruffneck ragga and frenetic breakbeat sound."
STUDIO West Coast 2xLP/CD
*** "This is the first full-length album by Studio, finally given a full-fledged release after a limited release disappeared from the racks last year. West Coast will appeal to fans of the new slo-mo Italo disco and is the missing link between The Cure and Lindstrøm touching on Can, Neu, Happy Mondays and The Smiths in their creation of an Afrobeat-dub-disco-indie-pop adventure."
TRENTEMØLLER The Last Resort CD
*** This is Danish producer Anders Trentemøller 's debut full-length. The 13 instrumental tracks together form a wordless musical story, almost like the soundtrack to a movie. It manages to capture a whole range of emotions in subtle melodic miniatures, dreamy ambiences, dusty beats, deep dub-tracks and driving groove-excursions. Although it's definitely an electronic album, it also incorporates live drums, guitars and other acoustic instruments like celesta, glockenspiel, melodica and even DJ scratching to create a more organic feel."
Monday, October 15, 2007
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: RESTOCKS )))))
FM3 Buddha Machine GADGET
*** Have you heard of this yet? Awesome little box about the size of an iPod with an 1/8" headphone jack and built-in speaker. This little gem plays nine (9) ambient loops but I dare you to make it past the first one during the first month of ownership. Batteries included!
DEREN, MAYA Experimental Films (1943-1959) DVD
*** "From the early 1940's until her death in 1961, Maya Deren evoked and exemplified the American avant-garde movement virtually by herself. Her first film, Meshes Of The Afternoon, set the tone for the decade and linked the movement to the older European avant-garde films of Cocteau and Bunuel ." -- Cecil Starr, The New York Times. 'Intensely personal, symbolic and surreal films that reveal her deepest, darkest fantasies. She's Fellini and Bergman wrapped in one gloriously possessed body. Watching these films can change forever your concept of what cinema can be." -- L.A. Weekly.
V/A The Bombay Connection: Funk From Bollywood Action Thrillers CD
V/A Bombshell Baby of Bombay: Bouncin' Nightclub Grooves.. CD
*** Excellent compilation series of Bollywood music from the 1960s to 1980s covering bizarre funk and some of the best nightclub jazz you've never heard.
V/A Box of Dub: Dubstep and Future Dub CD
*** Soul Jazz comp of new tracks, all dubstep and beyond.
V/A Music De Wolfe Vol. 1 CD
*** One of the first comps of DeWolfe library tracks to make it out of vinyl purgatory. This disc covers a fair amount of DeWolfe's hard and dirty funk. The original records are very rare and very hard to find.
V/A The Tomorrow People - Original Television Music CD
*** BBC Radiophonic Workshop alert! Perhaps the last of the unreleased Radiophonic song and sound experiments from they early days.
AFX Analogue Bubblebath 3 CD
AFX Chosen Lords CD
*** Richard D. James restocked.
APPARAT Walls CD
*** Brand new excellent album from Ellen Allien's recent cohort.
GUI BORATTO Chromophobia CD
*** One of Kompakt's biggest stars.
ESG Come Away With ESG CD
*** Oof--one of the best early '80s downtown NYC albums. Really key stuff. Simple and infecting. Amazing.
THE FIELD From Here We Go Sublime CD
*** Another recent Kompakt star.
SQUAREPUSHER Feed Me Weird Things CD
*** Squarepusher's first album. We haven't carried this in a long time.
V/A Tropicalia: A Brazilian Revolution in Sound 2xLP
*** One of Soul Jazz's best comps--hands down. A must!
BURIAL Burial 2xLP
*** This is a hot item 'round these parts and we can barely keep this heavy-duty vinyl in stock.
THE FIELD Things Keep Falling Down 12"
*** Kompakt's golden boy, currently on tour with !!!, nice EP.
JUSTICE D.A.N.C.E. Remixes 12"
*** A tasty 12" from France's hottest export. Great remix by JACKSON (Warp Records).
LIQUID LIQUID Liquid Liquid 2LP
*** Another hard-to-find record from the early '80s downtown NYC scene. These fellows were best buds with ESG and made some of the most provocative and sampled "body music."
*** Have you heard of this yet? Awesome little box about the size of an iPod with an 1/8" headphone jack and built-in speaker. This little gem plays nine (9) ambient loops but I dare you to make it past the first one during the first month of ownership. Batteries included!
DEREN, MAYA Experimental Films (1943-1959) DVD
*** "From the early 1940's until her death in 1961, Maya Deren evoked and exemplified the American avant-garde movement virtually by herself. Her first film, Meshes Of The Afternoon, set the tone for the decade and linked the movement to the older European avant-garde films of Cocteau and Bunuel ." -- Cecil Starr, The New York Times. 'Intensely personal, symbolic and surreal films that reveal her deepest, darkest fantasies. She's Fellini and Bergman wrapped in one gloriously possessed body. Watching these films can change forever your concept of what cinema can be." -- L.A. Weekly.
V/A The Bombay Connection: Funk From Bollywood Action Thrillers CD
V/A Bombshell Baby of Bombay: Bouncin' Nightclub Grooves.. CD
*** Excellent compilation series of Bollywood music from the 1960s to 1980s covering bizarre funk and some of the best nightclub jazz you've never heard.
V/A Box of Dub: Dubstep and Future Dub CD
*** Soul Jazz comp of new tracks, all dubstep and beyond.
V/A Music De Wolfe Vol. 1 CD
*** One of the first comps of DeWolfe library tracks to make it out of vinyl purgatory. This disc covers a fair amount of DeWolfe's hard and dirty funk. The original records are very rare and very hard to find.
V/A The Tomorrow People - Original Television Music CD
*** BBC Radiophonic Workshop alert! Perhaps the last of the unreleased Radiophonic song and sound experiments from they early days.
AFX Analogue Bubblebath 3 CD
AFX Chosen Lords CD
*** Richard D. James restocked.
APPARAT Walls CD
*** Brand new excellent album from Ellen Allien's recent cohort.
GUI BORATTO Chromophobia CD
*** One of Kompakt's biggest stars.
ESG Come Away With ESG CD
*** Oof--one of the best early '80s downtown NYC albums. Really key stuff. Simple and infecting. Amazing.
THE FIELD From Here We Go Sublime CD
*** Another recent Kompakt star.
SQUAREPUSHER Feed Me Weird Things CD
*** Squarepusher's first album. We haven't carried this in a long time.
V/A Tropicalia: A Brazilian Revolution in Sound 2xLP
*** One of Soul Jazz's best comps--hands down. A must!
BURIAL Burial 2xLP
*** This is a hot item 'round these parts and we can barely keep this heavy-duty vinyl in stock.
THE FIELD Things Keep Falling Down 12"
*** Kompakt's golden boy, currently on tour with !!!, nice EP.
JUSTICE D.A.N.C.E. Remixes 12"
*** A tasty 12" from France's hottest export. Great remix by JACKSON (Warp Records).
LIQUID LIQUID Liquid Liquid 2LP
*** Another hard-to-find record from the early '80s downtown NYC scene. These fellows were best buds with ESG and made some of the most provocative and sampled "body music."
Tuesday, October 9, 2007
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: DVD ))))) Tom Verlaine scores!
TOM VERLAINE & JIMMY RIP Music For Experimental Film DVD
*** "Innovative and influential musician Tom Verlaine, joined by celebrated producer and guitarist Jimmy Rip, reawaken the spirit of the avant-garde film as they perform a series of newly composed musical scores. The ground-breaking works of Man Ray, Watson & Weber, Fernand Leger and Hans Richter take on new life wrapped in scores that are by turns playful, haunting, serene and intense."
Read more about this release here: http://www.kino.com/video/item.php?film_id=876
*** "Innovative and influential musician Tom Verlaine, joined by celebrated producer and guitarist Jimmy Rip, reawaken the spirit of the avant-garde film as they perform a series of newly composed musical scores. The ground-breaking works of Man Ray, Watson & Weber, Fernand Leger and Hans Richter take on new life wrapped in scores that are by turns playful, haunting, serene and intense."
Read more about this release here: http://www.kino.com/video/item.php?film_id=876
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: Vinyl ))))) Kraftwerk, Super Furry Animals & more!
BAND OF HORSES Cease To Begin LP / CD
*** "The songs on Cease to Begin are strikingly beautiful, if less elliptical and more straightforward, dealing with the reconciliation of attachment and detachment, the strength that’s found through suffering, and the understanding that we are as significant as we are insignificant. It’s also a great rock record."
BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE PRESENTS: KEVIN DREW Spirit If... 2xLP+MP3s
*** NOW ON VINYL!
FIERY FURNACES Widow City 2xLP / CD
*** "The sixth album (and first for Thrill Jockey) from the FIERY FURNACES. While Widow City is rooted in the Furnace’s aesthetic of challenging conventional notions of timing and song structure, the record is absolutely unlike any other in their expansive repertoire. Sixteen tracks that are among the finest and catchiest they’ve written to date."
KRAFTWERK + HOT CHIP Aerodynamik / La Forme 12"
*** Total nerds HOT CHIP remix the O.G. German nerds. Did it have to happen? I don't know!
JENS LEKMAN Night Falls Over Kortedala LP / CD
*** "JENS arduously labored over these songs over the last three years. It's characterized by a vague musical pop sound with hints of tropicalia, it has more in common with PAUL SIMON's Graceland'."
SUPER FURRY ANIMALS Hey Venus LP+MP3s
*** "One the Super Furries catchiest and best albums to date" on vinyl-only in the US for now, but it has a coupon for mp3s!
*** "The songs on Cease to Begin are strikingly beautiful, if less elliptical and more straightforward, dealing with the reconciliation of attachment and detachment, the strength that’s found through suffering, and the understanding that we are as significant as we are insignificant. It’s also a great rock record."
BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE PRESENTS: KEVIN DREW Spirit If... 2xLP+MP3s
*** NOW ON VINYL!
FIERY FURNACES Widow City 2xLP / CD
*** "The sixth album (and first for Thrill Jockey) from the FIERY FURNACES. While Widow City is rooted in the Furnace’s aesthetic of challenging conventional notions of timing and song structure, the record is absolutely unlike any other in their expansive repertoire. Sixteen tracks that are among the finest and catchiest they’ve written to date."
KRAFTWERK + HOT CHIP Aerodynamik / La Forme 12"
*** Total nerds HOT CHIP remix the O.G. German nerds. Did it have to happen? I don't know!
JENS LEKMAN Night Falls Over Kortedala LP / CD
*** "JENS arduously labored over these songs over the last three years. It's characterized by a vague musical pop sound with hints of tropicalia, it has more in common with PAUL SIMON's Graceland'."
SUPER FURRY ANIMALS Hey Venus LP+MP3s
*** "One the Super Furries catchiest and best albums to date" on vinyl-only in the US for now, but it has a coupon for mp3s!
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: CDs ))))) Beirut, Band Of Horses, Fiery Furnaces, Jens Lekman & more!
BAND OF HORSES Cease To Begin LP / CD
*** "The songs on Cease to Begin are strikingly beautiful, if less elliptical and more straightforward, dealing with the reconciliation of attachment and detachment, the strength that’s found through suffering, and the understanding that we are as significant as we are insignificant. It’s also a great rock record."
BEIRUT The Flying Club Cup CD
*** "Six months of recording led to an homage to France's culture, fashion, history, and music. Two years ago, Zach Condon immersed himself in Balkan folk, absorbed sounds, scales, styles, and the sonic joys of a skeletally structured, cacophonic ensemble and moved west. Soaking up the likes of Francois Hardy, Charles Aznavour, and, most notably, Jacques Brel (a huge influence on both Scott Walker and Mark E. Smith), Condon has been articulating his conversational French for this new platter."
CELEBRATION The Modern Tribe CD
*** "The Modern Tribe is an album of sublime colours, rich textures and glorious, ascending melody. And if tracks like "Pony" and "Fly The Fly" have the dense groove and full-throated impact of past classics, they're balanced by the swooning swirl of "Evergreen", the heady gospel of "Heartbreak" and the cosmic, chanted "Tame The Savage". It's a development which has to be heard to be believed, and one that establishes Celebration as one of the most distinctive bands at work in the world today.
DUKE ELLINGTON Meets Coleman Hawkins CD
*** Remastered and made to look nice.
ENON Grass Geysers... Carbon Clouds CD
*** "Enon are back with their long-awaited 5th album, and this time they brought the can of whoop ass! Blasting through 12 tunes lodged between your conscience and the red lights, this is their most consistent and striking work yet. It builds you up from 'Mirror on You' before burning you down in 'Ashish'. A manic and fast paced punch in the neck."
ENON Believo CD
*** "Long, long ago, at the beginning of the new millennium, the world begot Enon. It was before Willliamsburg was, like, totally over, before beards made you cool, and just at the cusp of all this modern computer recording tomfoolery. This record makes a bridge between the 20th and 21st centuries full of effects, samples, pop sensibilities, and a complete respect for and disregard of The Rules."
FIERY FURNACES Widow City 2xLP / CD
*** "The sixth album (and first for Thrill Jockey) from the FIERY FURNACES. While Widow City is rooted in the Furnace’s aesthetic of challenging conventional notions of timing and song structure, the record is absolutely unlike any other in their expansive repertoire. Sixteen tracks that are among the finest and catchiest they’ve written to date."
KID ROCK Rock N Roll Jesus CD
*** Surely, the original "early mornin' stoned pimp" needs no introduction. Rolling Stone gave it four (4!) stars.
JENS LEKMAN Night Falls Over Kortedala LP / CD
*** "JENS arduously labored over these songs over the last three years. It's characterized by a vague musical pop sound with hints of tropicalia, it has more in common with PAUL SIMON's Graceland'."
CASS MCCOMBS Dropping The Writ CD
*** New! and quite tuneful.
SCOUT NIBLETT This Fool Can Die Now CD
*** "Recorded at Electrical Audio with Steve Albini, featuring Will Oldham (aka Bonnie 'Prince' Billy) on vocals. Mournful pleas, plaintive cries, and guitar-driven indignation over 14 songs that traverse a spectrum of charged emotions from yearning and grief to resignation and acceptance."
ROBERT POLLARD Coast To Coast Carpet Of Love CD
ROBERT POLLARD Standard Gargoyle Decisions CD
*** "In the universe where Bob Pollard explains the Freudian divisions of his psyche he calls Coast his id; Standard his ego; and himself his super ego. A psych 101 course might change that order a bit -- but it's one good explaination for his continued prolificacy."
SHE WANTS REVENGE This Is Forever CD
*** "With no intention of playing it safe this time out, the boys continue on the path of creating thought-provoking and emotional dance music both challenging and compelling."
SUNSET RUBDOWN Random Spirit Lover CD
*** "The woven lyrics and singular songwriting style heard in SUNSET RUBDOWN invoke a mythological world, where magical narratives and tiny metaphors give shape to ordinary objects in the room; sometimes beautiful, sometimes beastly. Twelve songs that bleed in and out of each other, mixing portents with theatrics, confusions with conversions."
TRENTEMOLLER Chronicles 2xCD
*** "His best songs and remixes, 2003-2007. Includes new and unreleased material and his remixes for ROYKSOPP, MOBY, THE KNIFE, etc."
*** "The songs on Cease to Begin are strikingly beautiful, if less elliptical and more straightforward, dealing with the reconciliation of attachment and detachment, the strength that’s found through suffering, and the understanding that we are as significant as we are insignificant. It’s also a great rock record."
BEIRUT The Flying Club Cup CD
*** "Six months of recording led to an homage to France's culture, fashion, history, and music. Two years ago, Zach Condon immersed himself in Balkan folk, absorbed sounds, scales, styles, and the sonic joys of a skeletally structured, cacophonic ensemble and moved west. Soaking up the likes of Francois Hardy, Charles Aznavour, and, most notably, Jacques Brel (a huge influence on both Scott Walker and Mark E. Smith), Condon has been articulating his conversational French for this new platter."
CELEBRATION The Modern Tribe CD
*** "The Modern Tribe is an album of sublime colours, rich textures and glorious, ascending melody. And if tracks like "Pony" and "Fly The Fly" have the dense groove and full-throated impact of past classics, they're balanced by the swooning swirl of "Evergreen", the heady gospel of "Heartbreak" and the cosmic, chanted "Tame The Savage". It's a development which has to be heard to be believed, and one that establishes Celebration as one of the most distinctive bands at work in the world today.
DUKE ELLINGTON Meets Coleman Hawkins CD
*** Remastered and made to look nice.
ENON Grass Geysers... Carbon Clouds CD
*** "Enon are back with their long-awaited 5th album, and this time they brought the can of whoop ass! Blasting through 12 tunes lodged between your conscience and the red lights, this is their most consistent and striking work yet. It builds you up from 'Mirror on You' before burning you down in 'Ashish'. A manic and fast paced punch in the neck."
ENON Believo CD
*** "Long, long ago, at the beginning of the new millennium, the world begot Enon. It was before Willliamsburg was, like, totally over, before beards made you cool, and just at the cusp of all this modern computer recording tomfoolery. This record makes a bridge between the 20th and 21st centuries full of effects, samples, pop sensibilities, and a complete respect for and disregard of The Rules."
FIERY FURNACES Widow City 2xLP / CD
*** "The sixth album (and first for Thrill Jockey) from the FIERY FURNACES. While Widow City is rooted in the Furnace’s aesthetic of challenging conventional notions of timing and song structure, the record is absolutely unlike any other in their expansive repertoire. Sixteen tracks that are among the finest and catchiest they’ve written to date."
KID ROCK Rock N Roll Jesus CD
*** Surely, the original "early mornin' stoned pimp" needs no introduction. Rolling Stone gave it four (4!) stars.
JENS LEKMAN Night Falls Over Kortedala LP / CD
*** "JENS arduously labored over these songs over the last three years. It's characterized by a vague musical pop sound with hints of tropicalia, it has more in common with PAUL SIMON's Graceland'."
CASS MCCOMBS Dropping The Writ CD
*** New! and quite tuneful.
SCOUT NIBLETT This Fool Can Die Now CD
*** "Recorded at Electrical Audio with Steve Albini, featuring Will Oldham (aka Bonnie 'Prince' Billy) on vocals. Mournful pleas, plaintive cries, and guitar-driven indignation over 14 songs that traverse a spectrum of charged emotions from yearning and grief to resignation and acceptance."
ROBERT POLLARD Coast To Coast Carpet Of Love CD
ROBERT POLLARD Standard Gargoyle Decisions CD
*** "In the universe where Bob Pollard explains the Freudian divisions of his psyche he calls Coast his id; Standard his ego; and himself his super ego. A psych 101 course might change that order a bit -- but it's one good explaination for his continued prolificacy."
SHE WANTS REVENGE This Is Forever CD
*** "With no intention of playing it safe this time out, the boys continue on the path of creating thought-provoking and emotional dance music both challenging and compelling."
SUNSET RUBDOWN Random Spirit Lover CD
*** "The woven lyrics and singular songwriting style heard in SUNSET RUBDOWN invoke a mythological world, where magical narratives and tiny metaphors give shape to ordinary objects in the room; sometimes beautiful, sometimes beastly. Twelve songs that bleed in and out of each other, mixing portents with theatrics, confusions with conversions."
TRENTEMOLLER Chronicles 2xCD
*** "His best songs and remixes, 2003-2007. Includes new and unreleased material and his remixes for ROYKSOPP, MOBY, THE KNIFE, etc."
Monday, October 8, 2007
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: RESTOCKS ))))) Can, Seefeel, & Cinema16
CAN Can DVD 2xDVD
*** BACK IN STOCK! The non-CD version of the very excellent CAN concert and more. If you aren't a CAN fan now, this will change you.
CINEMA 16: European Short Films 2xDVD
*** BACK IN STOCK! Excellent compilation of short films featuring the first films RIDLEY SCOTT and LARS VON TRIER made among many other excellent films.
SEEFEEL Quique 2xCD
*** REISSUED in jewelcase. The landmark record is back again after a short delay.
*** BACK IN STOCK! The non-CD version of the very excellent CAN concert and more. If you aren't a CAN fan now, this will change you.
CINEMA 16: European Short Films 2xDVD
*** BACK IN STOCK! Excellent compilation of short films featuring the first films RIDLEY SCOTT and LARS VON TRIER made among many other excellent films.
SEEFEEL Quique 2xCD
*** REISSUED in jewelcase. The landmark record is back again after a short delay.
Wednesday, October 3, 2007
((((( NEW ARRIVALS: DVD ))))) The second & final volume of films by Kenneth Anger!
KENNETH ANGER The Films Of...Vol II DVD
*** RECOMMENDED. "Covering the second half of Anger's career, from his legendary Scorpio Rising to his breathtaking phantasmagoria Lucifer Rising, this is the long-awaited final volume of films by this revolutionary and groundbreaking maverick."
Read more about this release here: http://www.fantoma.com/fantoma.html
*** RECOMMENDED. "Covering the second half of Anger's career, from his legendary Scorpio Rising to his breathtaking phantasmagoria Lucifer Rising, this is the long-awaited final volume of films by this revolutionary and groundbreaking maverick."
Read more about this release here: http://www.fantoma.com/fantoma.html
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