Tales from the Attic
Volume LII
Revolutions of a 45 and 33 kind.
Third missive in as many days, I guess you’re wondering whether I’ve had a bang on the head. Sadly not, instead we’ve been having a spot of spring cleaning, noticed a few, well quite a lot in fact, old missives / reviews that have been left languishing in the Sunday Experience’s bottom drawer. Having recently been reintroduced to the majority of our old, thought lost, Losing Today archive, we’ve been somewhat enthused again in cobbling out these wordy musings .Indeed I feel your pain. Anyhow there’ll be a few of these over the course of the next few days before a grandstanding Tales of the Attic finale, which may or may not be an extended Fruits de Mer gathering featuring friends, relations and variously associated persons they’ve frequented with over the years such as Mega Dodo and the like, not to mention something featuring the latest lovelies about to adore the labels catalogue between now and the year end and slightly beyond – the Chemistry Set, Michael Padilla, Cranium Pie, Jack Ellister and others among the roll call. After that we embark on dismantling the old regime and rebuilding anew…….details soon……
This missive features grooves from the following…….
Headhit lightwork, auramics, experiments in terror, timglaset, testbild, john 3:16, tim krog, shogun assassin, with the dead, sunflower bean, saint sister, tvam, sweet Williams, leo Abrahams, throw down bones, radar men from the moon, jan grunfeld, mike batt, chris spedding, frank ricotta quartet, lee brown coye, sam mcloughlin, david a jaycock, belbury poly, pye audio corner, mount Vernon arts lab, advisory circle, ghost box, sarah davachi, brian eno, mike oldfield, leonard cohen, Robert wyatt, migrant, akasha, fufanu, awma, blue giant zeta puppies, topos locos, concretism, project moonbase, low, double francoise, keith seatman, the cardiacs, falling stacks, orielles, the candyman, the bordellos, neurotic wreck, the Delaware road, besnard lakes, 3 moons, deju vega, wand……
Here’s a little curio we stumbled across while on a witching hour ramble through cyberspace. Though Lee Brown Coye died over thirty years his legend lives on to the extent that fans new and old are to be treated via a limited vinyl / CD outing through the Cadabra imprint whereupon some of his short stories penned under the guise Chips and Shavings are being exhumed and dusted down to be read by his son Robert. Known for his nightmarish artwork for the Weird Tales publication, this spoken word archive entitled ‘where is abby and other tales’ gathers together a rare selection of those aforementioned stories and presses them onto this must have weird ear platter which itself arrives curdled and adorned in Coye’s trademark macabre depictions no doubt serving to thrill and chill the listener in equal diabolical measure.
Another release high on our wants list is what appears to be a superbly packaged set through those folklore tapes folk. ‘Devon Folklore Tapes Volume III – inland water’ finds Sam McLoughlin paired up with David A Jaycock on a beautifully haunting suite that originally appeared a little while back on cassette whereupon selling out fast it became something of a legend uttered of in hushly fond tones by devotees of strange psychogeographic folk. The set now finds itself expanded over 2 ten inch slabs of wax all beautifully packaged and housed to include a now trademark research book in an edition of 500 – all hand stamped. While we are about it looking for – no doubt begging – for review materials, here’s an extended sound cloud extract. Had us much minded of those prized Ochre sets from Stylus way back in the mists of musical time, this suite beautifully shadow plays between passages of elegant floral fancifulness and weird ear wooziness, blending and interweaving moments of sunny pastorals with haunting hazes of threatening overcasts with occasional detours into demurring dream sequences and the uncovering of secret hideaways – a most bewitching and rewarding listening spectacle finitely balanced between the eerie and the elegiac. https://soundcloud.com/folklore-tapes/devon-folklore-tapes-voliii-inland-water-excerpts
Another release currently on our ‘I want’ list is a double disc set from Ghost Box records entitled ‘in a moment…’ – a celebratory jaunt through the labels extensive archive marking its 10th birthday anniversary. Available in all formats including download, CD and a spiffing looking gatefold vinyl set incidentally limited to just 500 copies and graced by your typical 70’s styled Julian House sleeving. This gathering features a plethora of highly regarded sound archivists such as the advisory circle, belbury poly, pye audio corner, mount Vernon arts lab and many more all crafting sounds / textures and moods displaced from another time found lurking deep in the shadows of the nations collective subconscious for here a lost age of technological hope and fear, televisual idents, open university, public service broadcasts, brit folk horror (The Wicker Man), Nigel Kneale (Quatermass / the Stone Tape), Scarfolk et al stuffed full of spangles all happily play in the village green beneath the watchful eye of a secretly sinister Whitehall department – these are / were after all, the sounds of tomorrow from a lost and forgotten yesterday https://soundcloud.com/ghost-box/sets/in-a-moment-ghost-box
The esteemed Norman Records have in recent months been inviting various guest friends to cobble together podcasts, the latest of which overseen by Sarah Davachi whose cassette release via Constellation Tatsu we remarked fondly upon a little while ago. On this occasion she’s found delving deep in to the vinyl library to curate a 90 minute long cosy toed welcome winter soiree among the track listing spectacle some forgotten gems lurk such as a Mike Oldfield demo from the Tubular sessions, something remarkably off the wall and slightly scatty from Leonard Cohen – yep you read right – scatty and off the wall, an old school Genesis sortie, a Brian Eno curio, something irresistible from the Red House Painters and a head and shoulders above them all appearance of Robert Wyatt’s simply beautiful ‘Sea Song’. Pull up to the open fire, gewt a brew going and fill your boots here – https://soundcloud.com/normanrecords/davachi-normanrecordsmix
As promised earlier, here’s that video accompanying that rather killer cut from the Migrant entitled ‘silence’.
Disquieting, woozy and very much seductively calibrated in a delightfully kooky late 60’s shimmer toning, this folks is Auramics, a Brooklyn based duo by the name of Kristi and Glenn whose spectral sepia shaded gem stone ‘founders of time’ demurs and delights with an uncannily ethereal ghostliness that manages with adept craft to somehow simultaneously touch base with Broadcast, Portishead and Musetta whilst falling headlong under the soft psych spell of Mirror, Mirror, the resulting sonic spectacle a quite something else Radiophonic fantasia.
Damn we here are pretty much smitten with Auramics – a little root around cyberspace and we unearthed these gems – first up a podcast entitled ‘excursions to the inner conscience’ featuring sonic salvos from Broadcast, Stereolab, the occasional ‘tomorrow people’ signature, some ethereal French pop along with selected visitations of their own – alas no track listing but guaranteed an hour’s listening paradise…….
https://www.mixcloud.com/auramics/excursions-to-the-inner-conscience/
‘experiments in terror – volume 1’ appears to be an album released – who knows when – littered with broadcast references along with the teasing of some smoking Ghost Box noodles and frankly awash with the kind of late 90’s groove once upon a time frequently sneaked out into record world by restless Stereolab personnel, chiefly that quite exquisite split release put out by Monade and the Scott Band for the Apartment label way back long ago. All said though chief inspiration here is the much missed Musetta whose quite divinely crafted jazz noir dream collage ‘mice to meet you’ is lushly stamped ghost like throughout the grooves.
Not quite sure how you’d go about getting a copy of the Swedish fanzine timglaset in the UK, fear not we are hastily making enquiries, mainly because issue 2 comes housing an 11 track musical portrait of Malmo amid whose grooves we eyed this little nugget from testbild! Entitled ‘lernacken’ and as brief as it may be at just 89 seconds in length, there’s certainly something special and kookily coursing through its grooves that ought to appeal all at once to those acutely fond of the ear wares of the ghost box imprint as it’s vintage melodic merry go round mosaic daintily nods to Ron Grainer, Raymond Scott and the analogue courtship of the Resource Centre. https://timglaset.bandcamp.com/
Now Testbild came to our attention when heard featured on a pretty nifty podcast cobbled together by the Dandelion Set. The second outing of ‘the dandelion times’ ought to appeal to lounge-tronic and hauntologist lovers alike for a broad spectrum of sounds, styles and moods pepper this hour long soiree from the magisterial progian opera that is Thumpermonkey’s quite extraordinary ‘419’ to some wig flipped out there-ness via Silver Apples’ ‘Gypsy love’ as well as cuts from current press darlings Odessey and Oracle, boards of Canada, the skeletons, bob crewe, Richard dinaria, van der graaf generator, a few well heeled selections from the dandelion set and that aforementioned cut from Testbild whose ‘belka 26’ could easily be mistaken for a much mistaken lost in the final cut Stereolab gem from ‘dots and loops’…. https://www.mixcloud.com/TheDandelionSet/the-dandelion-times-2nd-edition/
I fear in recent times we’ve been somewhat overlooking the wares of Alrealon Musique, however our interest was piqued by the arrival in our in box of news of a new John 3:16 EP entitled ‘ten thousand times ten thousand angels’ this here cut being the title track. Typically magisterial in terms of atmospherics, the flotillas of riff chorals caught as were in the vapour trailing cross fire tide of high altitude pressure drifts, this brooding beauty patiently hovers arcing ever higher and ever watchful, waiting for its time whereupon for an all too brief moment it impacts to burn intensely before recoiling into withdrawing serene reflection, admirers of ‘true’ era Roy Montgomery and Yellow6 will surely adore. https://soundcloud.com/john316john/ten-thousand-times-ten-thousand-angels
Who would have thought that what lurked beneath the quaintly playful almost regal musical box mosaic of Tim Krog lurked and dark pictorial of nightmarish disturbia. ‘the boogeyman’ released in 1980 was part of a slew of cinematic releases throughout the early 80’s bitten by the slash horror aesthetic of ‘Halloween’ – how it ever made it to sequel stage is a discussion best left for another day. The soundtrack however gets a limited run via one way static (see Cannibal Holocaust, Surf Nazis Must Die…..) wherein it emerges housed in a gatefold sleeve, on coloured vinyl with a bonus CD to boot. Of course the influence of Goblin and Carpenter are clearly detectable but there’s a delightfully futuro pastoral sereneness sweetly fixing itself amid these lightly toned grooves that contrasts sharply with the grim portent scratching away at the twisted and terrifying ‘nightmare’ collage – one we suspect for those much adoring of the Unseen. https://soundcloud.com/onewaystatic/sets/the-boogeyman-original-1980-motion-picture-soundtrack
Also heading out of one way static shortly a no doubt ridiculously limited cassette version of ‘Shogun Assassin’ – a kind of skewed Miami Vice meets Blade Runner relocated to the land of the rising sun….. https://soundcloud.com/onewaystatic/lone-wolfs-theme-shogun?in=onewaystatic/sets/shogun-assassin-original-1980-motion-picture-soundtrack
Just out via Rise Above, an absolute brutal doom draped union of some measure, for far away in the twilight netherworlds away and unseen to the casual passer by an apocalyptic shit storm threatens to breach the dimensional stasis, at the gates a last standing rear guard assault is at play with the balancing scales poised precariously, to the victors the prize of either bedlam, fury and chaos or blissful content. Enter stage left With the Dead, an unholy alliance of Nepalm Death, Electric Wizard and Ramesses types tasked with said detail, a formidable trio gouged in a kind of enviable unifying legacy of rule abandoning attrition, torment and full on head trepanning assault that suggests their self titled full length might well blow speakers not to mention bruise listening spaces for what promises to be a slavish take no prisoners aural assault riddled and ripped in heaving slabs of stoned out riff gore and festering futility.
Following on from us falling head over heels for Auramics, here’s some more of that Brooklyn buzz groove this time from the critically fancied Sunflower Bean. A six track 12 inch no less issued forth into record world by the Fat Possum imprint. Now I’ll admit we’ve only had a brief peak at this – we’ll try and nab full copies / downloads for a full review in the coming days. That said we here were most taking by ‘tame impala’ and opening salvo ‘somebody call a doctor’ – the former a freakish wig flipper daubed in psychotronic wooziness and bleached with a psychosis cooling strut gouging that recalls a youthfully untamed and un-tethered Hookworms while the latter with its shadowy long overcoat 80’s styled chiming revelry is on closer inspection a nifty slice of psych-y progressive grooving that takes its cue from Terry Bickers post House of Love artistry heading up the criminally overlooked Levitation.
I don’t mind letting it be known that we’ve grown something of a sweet spot for this quietly arresting little lovely. Debuting outing for duo Gemma and Morgan who trade under the collective nom du plume Saint Sister. Emerging by way of trout records shortly, 4 track EP ‘Madrid’ is a divinely demurring lesson in minimalist murmured elegance softly gathering wood crafted hymnals all cradled in love noted yearns whose reference markers appear to be as at home gently pointing the way of the Earlies and Shady Bard as they do more obviously to Vashti Bunyan (not least as evidenced on the parting ‘visions of hate’\), Linda Perhacs and Karen Dalton. Ghostly folk siren-esque harmonic interweaves aligned to spectral arrangements that whisper of twilight wonderment are the order of the day here, bewitchment and entrancement skip hand in hand amid these faintly dimpled folk bouquet. And while lead out track ‘Madrid’ might deservingly get the plaudits and air play, its dreaming apparitions and harp flotillas making for something bordering on the seductively supernatural its elsewhere on this set whereupon we found ourselves arrested and subdued. Proving itself to be quite something else, the cleverly intricate time signatures and shifting sands classicism that courses through ‘blood moon’ tenderly and tenaciously positions itself somewhere between a ‘the dreaming’ era Kate Bush and the ridiculously talented Laura J Martin. For us though ‘Castles’ stands head and shoulders above all, angelic, poised and ushered in by a cosy toed winter-esque spiritual like aura all seductively crushed in the kind of celebratory feel good tingle that spirits away to loosely recall Dream Academy’s ‘life in a northern town’. Quite simply breathlessly exquisite.
Alas no sound links just yet but we did manage to unearth this live session version of ‘Castles’
Due soon on limited lathe cut variants, new Static Caravan nugget from TVAM – here’s the video…….for words in case you missed them first time of asking go here https://marklosingtoday.wordpress.com/2015/09/24/tvam-4/ – this – to pardon the vernacular – is the dogs doo dahs…..
<p><a href=”https://vimeo.com/133500969″>TVAM – PORSCHE MAJEURE</a> from <a href=”https://vimeo.com/tvam”>TVAM</a> on <a href=”https://vimeo.com”>Vimeo</a>.</p>
Hands up those of you who remember nights huddled up to your transistor listening to that Peel dude playing must have salvos from the likes of Codeine, Palace Brothers and was it – the 68 comeback – I could mistaken on the latter – but the point I’m trying to make is that Sweet Williams make the same kind of beaten around the edges, disfigured and damaged and dare we say darkly cured slo-core groove as once curdled the airwaves of late night radio sometime in the mid 80’s, we must admit we need to hear more of this not least so that we can bliss out on the seemingly shambolic and distressed grudge groove that these chaps indelibly concoct. There is a super limited 8 inch lathe doing bad things on the pop underground – just 10 of the blighters so act sharpish. http://endless-records.bandcamp.com/album/leave-with-haste-gowns
okay there’s new afoot of a new listening center album shortly to grace the polytechnic youth imprint in an edition of just 100 copies – those previously unfamiliar may want to briefly recap on matters by directing yourselves somewhere here https://marklosingtoday.wordpress.com/2014/11/23/listening-center/ – however that’s not strictly where we wanted to draw your attention – for we’ve heard on the grapevine of a killer remix 12 inch featuring guest remixers retooling gems by Akasha including a by all accounts superb rephrasing by – yep you guessed it – listening center. Alas having hunted high and low we’re still a little short on sound links but have instead turned up an Akasha album teaser which ought to have all you lounge psych tropicadelicists swooning blissfully as though lazily floating upon some lysergic boat with the Superimposers and the Winston Giles Orchestra at the helm heading for Monsterism Island…..
https://soundcloud.com/akasha_uk/sets/new-album-taster-hail-the-sun
Is it just me or are we all hearing the vague ghost light flickers of Clock DVA gracing the grooves of this quite becoming albeit fractured and obliquely love noted anthem. Latest single from Leo Abrahams just ahead of his forthcoming full length ‘daylight’ entitled ‘Chain’ finds him locking state of the art studio horns with Brian Eno for what can only be described as something of a senses prickling skewed and nagging sonic ear-bud. Out via lo recordings ‘Chain’ whirrs away eroding your defences, a post punk sore thumb grooved in crunchy glitching electronica all swathed in icy orbital halos and the angular intricacy of riff ruptures topped off by a sermonising Eno culturing an effect that sits pointedly somewhere between Magazine and Wire. https://soundcloud.com/lo-recordings/leo-abrahams-chain
One album being eagerly awaited in our gaff, hell we are even busy prepping suitably attired bunting for its landing, is the debuting full length platter from Fufano entitled ‘few more days to go’ due late November time via one little Indian. Just ahead of it comes ‘your collection’ – a flat lining dansette dead header cowed in a deliciously thickening and suffocating post punk psychosis that oozes blankly in a sumptuously unravelling ice cold stalker-delic menace to literally bear down hard on you to catch you in its bleakly expressionless sonic tractor beam – and something which for the second in as many reviews had us much minded of Magazine – is there some kind of trendy re-appraisal hatching amid the indie underground that we here aren’t party to we wonder. https://soundcloud.com/fufanu_music/your-collection
Something lovely from Hidden Shoal approaches this way, having already had us adoring of that recently released Chloe March salvo, we are yet to hear a prepped for loving set from Kramies. Though before we get to that there’s the small but consequential matter of a debuting self titled EP outing from AWMA to be considered. Featuring members of the caseworker, the red thread and mist and mast, lead out track ‘broadcast history’ arrives to fanfares advertised with such descriptors as ‘atmospheric’, ‘intense’ and ‘prowling’ to which you can add brooding, majestic and alluring among the many, best described as being akin to the oncoming drift wind of some hitherto slow burn of quietly grand euphoria, amid the bliss kissed hazes and the dust sparse hinterlands the slow spun riff recoils and hushed spectral hymnals whisper to the fallen echoes of Sennen and Working for a Nuclear Free City as they ghost through the grooves with silently graceful intent all summoned and fashioned in the image of an at rest and thoughtfully magisterial sounding The Church. https://soundcloud.com/hidden_shoal/awma-broadcast-history/
Happened across this dandy on a trawl of cyberspace and er, well, thought you might want to give it a spin. Heading out of Fuzz Club shortly where it will be graced to a super limited 100 only black and white vinyl pressing in a hand stamped / numbered silk screened gatefold sleeving, this is throw down bones of whom we have no information on alas. Safe to say though that teaser cut ‘exposure’ lifted from said album is a bit of beast, a full on cosmic head fryer tripwired in synapse pulsing psychotropic pulsars all vapour trailed in shimmery orbs of stratospheric dream weaves and chipped in a mind expanding hazy tribal toned gouging that recalls early variants of Gnod and the Hookworms mutating and dissipating as were into spectral swathes of Chameleons cool. https://soundcloud.com/fuzz-club/throw-down-bones-exposure
also out via fuzz club in a limited 500 only pressing, this is Radar Men from the Moon whose EP ‘subversive’ is high on our wants list at present not least because aside sampler cut ‘heading to the void’ sounding exactly as it hints on the tin, we here are definitely picking up vibes that suggest its parentage has been forged by some studio bunk up between Mugstar and Man or Astro Man, for what emerges here from the blind side of the moon is a full on heads down dead eyed dark star impacting speaker smoker replete with white noise warp factor fractures that provides a kick arse lock grooved jaunt into oblivion. https://soundcloud.com/fuzz-club/radar-men-from-the-moon
More of those dreamily drifting riff rolling moments of bliss kissed sereneness I’m afraid. Out now via the La Bel imprint found on this occasion in collaboration with the Headphonica label, this is ‘music for plants’ by Jan Grunfeld. Now we must, before we move on to musical matters, address a pressing matter, in so much as we owe a small apologetic debt to La Bel who in recent times have been known to pepper our in box with all manner of murmuring delights without so much as a mention, a nod or a thank you. Safe to say such instances won’t be repeated especially if the wares they sneak out are anything as becalming and beautiful as this. With nods to Wil Bolton, Inch Time, Manual and perhaps, most obvious of all, Vinni Reilly we here would be hard pressed at present to recommend a better release (except maybe the latest Yellow6 outing) for losing yourself in, whether it’s the expansive allure of the peaceful and at one with nature murmuring of the subduing ‘come gentle spring, come at winter’s end’ or the sleepy headed yawn of the slow to burn restful chime of the very stars of the lid like ‘full bloom’ with its softly sprayed ethereal chorals, there’s something here amid these picturesque and tranquil melodic murals that’s untouched, pure and free from the polluting grasp and greed of everyday modern life for you to withdraw a while to hide away. That said ‘the nightshade’ momentarily disturbs the vibe but only so much that it ushers in the dissipating and disorientating fall in dream sleep though all said and done the sets centrepiece must surely be the parting ‘feels alife’ – understated, elegant and prettified in softly thawing neo classical opines. http://www.labelnetlabel.com/releases/lbn031-music-for-plants-jan-grunfeld
Many thanks to David from Throw Down Bones for sending this along, this floppy fringe folks is the recent single from the band put out by Fuzz Club a few weeks ago. ‘Saturator’ is more of your eye whitening psyche shimmering, this ‘un proving to be something of a kaleidoscopic head expanding dream machining imagining of a strobe shimmying gathering of Suicide, ‘movement’ era New Order and Harmonia types all plugged into a hive consciousness and motorikally mainlining on mind melting mosaics under the piloting eye of Sonic Boom. Out there and flying.
***Incidentally as previously reported their forthcoming debut full length comes in a special 100 only black / white wax pressing housed in a silk screened gatefold sleeving – a standard issue of 500 is also available.
Those of you attuned to the more shadowy regions of Alrealon Musique’s extensive catalogue – and here we are leaning towards Black Saturn – might well do yourselves a favour by hooking up to this bad boy. Admittedly hanging around in our in box for a while, nearly lost as it happens, much to our embarrassment, this is Headhit Lightworks and ‘zeitgeist’. An edgily brooding shadow forming slab of conspiracist disto-blivion that had us here at various intervals recalling as were a gloomed future vision cooked up by a seriously weary Biosphere colluding mischievously with Clock DVA though which upon further inspection erodes with the servile industrial menace of 70 Gwen Party. https://soundcloud.com/headhit-lightworks/zeitgeist
I must admit i’ve never seen such a gathering of uncomfortable looking blokes for a photo shoot as portrayed on the tag picture to their sound cloud page. Happy to say it doesn’t translate in the sounds, at least not within ‘pop song’. This honey crusted feel good west coast weaving sun charmer is heading up a shortly to be released full length set entitled ‘anglo saxon summer’ which ought to be arriving any day soon via lollipop. Anyhow they are a quartet who go by the name Dante Elephante and beyond that the information trail goes a little cold though safe to say this little lazy eyed smoker freefalls headlong into the vapour trailing lovelorn corridors of Avi Buffalo, Ariel Pink and Woods. https://soundcloud.com/lolipoprecords/dante-elephante-pop-song
Futuristic cosmic uber groove from our favourite b-movie obsessed spaghetti-fied sci-fi scalped twang-a-rella beat pop combo the Blue Giant Zeta Puppies. The double feature ‘Semyorka’ set is currently in the planning stage for a limited 7 inch outing, presently to be found emitting toe tapping transmissions from a secret sky base that marshals and scouts the heavens for unwanted alien space dudes, this seven track dandy comes marooned upon two sides amid whose grooves Link ray gun riffs are set to roll while the Zeta cadets gorge over a 60’s diet of Century 21 TV shows in between cooking up stereo rumbling salvos whose clone DNA is positively brimming in Man or Astro Man, Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet and TV Personalities cultures. https://thebluegiantzetapuppies.bandcamp.com/
And so it’s with a heavy heart that we offer many, many apologies to Topos Locos who, aside first appearing on our radar way back earlier this year whereupon they featured on that quite superb ‘strange fruit and veg’ comp put out by Fruits de Mer , come the end of the weekend, you’ll be fed up to the back teeth of hearing about, sent us a demo copy of a planned EP /single which in typical chaotically time honoured fashion we managed to mislay, find and mislay again. Anyhow we’ve super-glued the blighter to the turntable in readiness for our regular Sunday sonic soiree. For now to whet the appetites here’s a cover of the theme to 70’s TV show ‘White Horses’ – alas we can’t find a super duper you tube link so you’ll have to hook up to their face book page whereby you can eye test pressings of the aforementioned forthcoming single and shower them with admiring messages. Anyhow this cut is your tasty ear zinging slice of strut grooved surfadelic garage cool – really – need I say more. https://www.facebook.com/toposlocos1
Limited vinyl pressing of ‘town planning’ selling fast via the Norman Record in store imprint public house, under his nom de plume Concretism, Chris Sharp is quickly assuming the mantle of being one of the foremost authors of cold war paranoiac electronica inhabiting the sinister secret Government domains of Nigel Kneale whilst cautiously navigating territories on the shadowy side of Duke St Workshop, the Advisory Circle and Midwich Youth Club. From that set here’s ‘the age of the train’ which finds Mr Sharp in lighter mode nodding ever so slightly to a vintage mid 70’s kosmische era populated by la dusseldorf, Harmonia and Schulze whilst invested heavy of the melodic fluency of Jarre with the impacting sense of the grand of Carpenter all indelibly sculptured in the image of fortdax. https://soundcloud.com/concretism/the-age-of-the-train
Concretism also appears on a recent podcast cobbled together by those project moonbase dudes. This edition is a ‘town and country’ special marking / celebrating the arrival / release of Vic Mars’ recent ‘the land and the garden’ full length and comes sumptuously populated by all manner of strange sounds, library take outs, lounge lilts and sonic curios. As said Mr Sharp’s ever watchful shimmer toning orbital ‘town planning’ features here sharing groove space with Belbury Poly’s acutely dinky ‘model country’ which unless our ears do deceive, except of course for the brief Elizabethan mosaic, has a kind of 70’s promenade music hall re-imagining ‘telstar’ as a rural steam engine jaunt. We mentioned curios, well none more curious here than the visitation of synthesonic sounds whose moog’d variant of ‘English country garden’ simply oozes quaintly turned pastoral tweeness whilst the note takers among you might well be interested to hear it features ex Womble, Mike Batt, incidentally more furry litter pickers feature elsewhere for amid the line up of the Frank Ricotti Quartet there lurks a certain Chris Spedding. Vic Mars heads out the broadcast with ‘the road through the village’ – an utterly divine slice of rustic heaven which to not put to fine a point on matters tip toes with willowy wonders as though a cooing recital wherein Satie trims are tenderly teased in courtship by the dizzying demur of Nyman-esque and Debussy swirls. http://www.projectmoonbase.com/archives/8555
I’ve a feeling I might be about to step on a few toes and for my sins be subjected to a torrent of responses – some couched I dare say – in terminology of an Anglo Saxon tongue and tone, but is it just me or does the new Low cut ‘lies’ hint of the subtle under toning of Fleetwood Mac. There I’ve said it. No doubt pyres for torching are being assembled as I write. Culled from their most accessible full length to date, ‘ones and sixes’ marks a shift in dynamic, intent and ambition for Low with ‘lies’ providing the set with one of its key note centre pieces to hitherto find the collective drawing on their want for the slow cured and murmured melodic detailing and enhancing it with a beautified and expressive pop toning whose seduction sits invitingly rather than slow burning and smothered as it has on past encounters. The typical trappings are ever present – that melancholic ache and that indelible hymnal grace fall, yet ‘lies’ twinkles with a sly immediacy tracing the same mercurial forlorn foot prints that smoulders the latter day Flaming Lips salvos not least as evidenced on ‘peace sword’.
If there’s one complaint I have with Double Francoise’s delightful ‘les French Chanteuses’ set it’s just that it’s too brief and over just as you’re beginning to fall adored beneath its spell. Double Francoise are duo Maxence and Lisa, he crafts kookily trimmed sun kissed retro bossa nova boog-a-loo on vintage keyboards while she purrs seductively lost in the moment, five tracks grace this adorable EP which ought to be an immediate port of call for those much admirers of the lightly shimmered 60’s pop once upon a time turned out at pace by the much missed Shado imprint and while you are there those appreciating of the equally missed Le Mans (non more so than on the softly svelte cooed chic of the title track), Free Design and as it happens Stereolab (especially on the Monade like ‘ladybird’) might do well to seek out and savour. Incidentally it should also be noted that Francoise Hardy is never too far away in as much as gracefully echoing the grooves. Treats aplenty here not least on the funky lounge French cool of ‘L’Automobile’ which towards its end gets quite alluringly wiggy making the occasional detour into lunar moonage territories. For us though best moment is the parting ‘je te suis’ – a previously unreleased Jacques Duvall penned cut which here is turned in with a coolly sophisticated chamber noir elegance. Available incidentally through the quite impeccable Freaksville imprint. https://doublefrancoise.bandcamp.com/
Halloween is looming, so we thought we’d chill you with this, alas no track listing but gruesome listening from behind the safety of the sofa all the same. Should also say at this point we’ve just received a stack of WAV files from One Way Static records so you can expect grimness abound with the occasional appearance of mentions for bogeymen, cannibal holocaust, candyman and many more throughout this dark season….. https://www.mixcloud.com/gary-reeves/is-it-halloween-yet/
I’m certain we’ve gone on record in the past saying that had he still been alive then I’m certain the Bordellos would have been embraced into the family fold at Peel acres. They’ve a curiously out of sync wherewithal about them that’s emboldened and embellished by the kind of beaten about the edges outsider pop ideology that can at any given point evoke elements of the Velvets, the Fall, Half Japanese and of arrowe hill, all trademarks I’m sure you’ll agree that would have made for immediate play listing by the late great man. This being the Bordellos they apply their typically skewed sore thumb mindset in their own tribute to the coming anniversary of his passing with ‘did the bastards at the BBC kill John Peel’. Part of a three track session recorded for Dandelion radio’s Mark Whitby to be aired throughout October, it touches on a subject matter which if memory serves right was much commented upon by Peel side kick Andy Kershaw upon the news of his death and something that drills down into Peel’s own sense of paranoia as he worked beneath the shadow of fear of the axe at the hands of his pay masters. As to the track itself, well outside of Dandelion there’s scant chance that this will endear them to the BBC airwaves, but then it does raise a few valid points which to draw reference to the Radiophonic Workshop, there’s a growing tendency by the BEEB to dismiss their crowning jewels only to hold them up aloft and in regard once their gone, indeed the Peel lectures, playlist time given over to celebration by way of Peel days would I suspect have drawn a cynical harrumph from the bearded one who may have retorted and argued for an additional hour to his schedules by way of a reward for services. Elsewhere included on this set a version of ‘straight outta Southport’ – a souring slice of bleakening melancholic groove etched in an early 90’s styled Fall-esque gnawing grandness while ‘melody inn’ is an intimately homely version of a cut shortly to appear on a forthcoming split cassette release with Schizo Fun Addict that reveals not for the first time that these dudes have when called upon an unfailing knack for tugging hard on the heartstrings to apply ‘Wilder’-esque terrains albeit here subdued in the shadow fall of a bruised Joy Division as were fronted by a withdrawn Scott Walker. We will – rest assured – be begging for usable links.
Staying with the Bordellos – well loosely at least – here’s Dan from the band who these days appears to be splitting his hours between eking out nuggets with longdrone flowers types as Vukovar – whose debuting album earlier this year is bidding highly to attract votes in our year end summing up – whilst moonlighting on his ridiculously quietly sneaked out solo musings as Neurotic Wreck. Described as windowgaaze – there you go NME-ers bet none of you thought of that as you sat in the local bar ligging, getting fat on advertising revenue and trying to decide which ambulance – sorry wagon – to jump on this week. With an album slated for release on the rather impeccable Small Bear imprint, the five track ‘our lady of the conflagration’ EP is cultured in such blistered finesse as would attractively sit proudly on the CV of any of the more recognisable though lesser talents you’d care to mention that you might find poisoning the playlists of the hype fleeted underground these days. No waste nor trim here, each a gem in its own right with ‘keep breathing’ opening the account, a sunglasses adorned slice of fizzing slo-cored shoegaziness freefalling ever so seductively into Skywave terrains albeit here as though headed up by a kaleidoscopically frazzled June Panic. Oozed upon an 80’s mainframe, the love noted and lunar lilted ‘mental’ slipstreams into the kind of glacial territories of a classic forgotten flip cut dating from a ‘power corruption and lies’ era New Order whilst the slinky and acutely primal ‘Annalise’ trips out on the kind of prowling seduction of the Doors as rephrased through the Bunnymen on ‘thorn of crowns’. Undoubtedly the sets centrepiece, ‘sad place for a small shadow’ is brimming with a positive smorgasbord of ideas, it loosely mutates constantly shape shifting, its base marker drawing reference to the Revolutionary Corps of Teenage Jesus and last year’s pairing between Automat and Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, its funky dub mosaics ghosted in spectral minimalism allude initially to the creepy whirr of ‘silver shamrock’ motifs before fermenting into a groove not unlike that found on the Bunnymen’s ‘fuel’ whereupon the rhythmic tones skitter and scatter falling away only to reassemble anew to drive the psychotropic hypno-groove into a different direction – frankly he ought to consider a locked groove wax variant of it. For us though just edging matters in the affection stakes the parting ‘always joking’ finds the classical enigmatic threads of Joy Division descending like an eerie mist upon the creeping riff fissures of a youthful Bauhaus, a smoking gun that veers with steel eyed cool intent nodding to Gun Club yet more crucially frayed, fried and blistered by the kind of fragmented edginess that coursed through the darkly bleak grooves of the Birthday Party’s ‘junkyard’. https://neuroticwreck.bandcamp.com/album/our-lady-of-conflagration-ep
So adoring of this track, from the debuting ‘Madrid’ EP from duo Saint Sister through trout, this is ‘blood moon’ which we fondly mentioned here – https://marklosingtoday.wordpress.com/2015/10/08/saint-sister/ – in truth one of the finest debuts of the year – all at once ethereal, elegant and eerily enchanting.
https://soundcloud.com/saint-sister/blood-moon-1/s-Tv8pB
Forthcoming on buried treasure, ‘the Delaware road’ release gets a dedicated evening next month over at the South Street Arts Centre in Reading, your compare for the event Dolly Dolly, DJ sets by Jonny Trunk and the Séance with live weirdness and occultist electronic gumbo by the likes of the Dandelion Set, the Twelve Hour Foundation, Revbjelde and more – an album to follow – alas the information appears a little tight lipped so far – but from what we can gather – strangeness abound from John Baker and various Radiophonic luminaries – we are busily summoning Buried Treasure through the medium of thought contact which hopefully will result in news aplenty and quite possibly sounds for review…..for now some obliquely mysterious trailers to tweak your supernatural mystic eye….
****addendum –
brief update from Alan over at Buried Treasure – ‘the Delaware road’ is an intended screenplay to be performed for the first time at the aforementioned show in Reading, a soundtrack will be released on the same day, the initial idea for the screenplay centred on Radiophonic Workshop’s two leading lights John and Delia though, according to Alan, as time drew on, the idea spiralled and mushroomed into a gargantuan radiophonic supernatural thriller – images of the titles, poster slides and various other pictorial ephemera can be viewed here https://m.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1548956328689545&__mref=message_bubble
As promised, back with Topos Locos who you may recall featured earlier when we fell over adoring of their cover of ‘white horses’ and even earlier still whereupon they were fondly mused upon via an appearance on Fruit De Mer’s ‘strange fruit and veg’ selection earlier this year. Seems these dudes have a forthcoming split release planned whereby they’ll be sharing sides with the blue giant zeta puppies – more details as and when we get them. For now a much delayed mention for a strictly limited CD entitled ‘the psychiatrist tapes’ which much to our shame shimmied into our listening lives some months ago whereupon the blighter went AWOL. Featuring three covers, the set opens to ‘(what’s happening at) the psychiatrist?’ – one time or other made famous by Big Bird and the Steam Shovel (this indeed being the version that featured on that aforementioned Fruits de Mer compilation), a lysergic carpet ride rippled in hazy 60’s psych mirages all kissed with a ‘white room’ era Cream-esque strut. Whilst studiously studded by a killer vintage toning. Up next a frankly drop dead cool rephrasing of the Cryin Shames’ ‘come on back’ is found here honed, toned and shimmered in an ear candy tugging freak beat rama-lama replete with woozy kaleidoscopic key swirls that craftily nod to the Chocolate Watchband which while it’s safe to say these dudes have something of the twang beat about them, there’s definitely a kinship with Bevis Frond, the Walking Seeds and most critically Wimple Winch mooching about the grooves not to mention an admiring nod or three to the Pretty Things. I’m almost embarrassed to admit that I can’t place ‘is it a lie’ – though I’m expecting nay-saying disbelieving emails and messages by the truck load and will, I fear, not hear the last of this. Anyway without doubt the most poppified accessible moment of the set tastily turned in all manner of 50’s golden era bubble grooving not to mention impacting on your stereo player with all the repeat button pressing contagion of a rash.
Gruff, unrelenting and quite discordantly perfect if you ask me, new thing from Falling Stacks, well old thing as it happens given it featured on their acclaimed debuting full length platter ‘no wives’ earlier this year (which we in fact singled out for much love – see below). Anyhow the band are heading out on a short tour and this blistered and scuffed around the edges nugget is being given a deserved pride of place release in its own right. ‘pool party’ squirms and squirrels with agitant delight applying combination jabs and the occasional upper cut to leave you firmly pinned to the ropes, admirers of old school Touch n’ Go will drool at the intricately turned acutely angular mathematiques bearing down on your cranium.
Previous Falling Stacks occurrences…… https://marklosingtoday.wordpress.com/2015/04/15/falling-stacks-2
Blessed with a stratospheric swagger all swooned in wide screened euphoric ripples, this is the new single from Keep Breathing. Recorded under the watchful eye of knob twiddling Ed Buller, ‘weather warning’ is ablaze in 80’s halos, what first sounds as though arrested in classic era Mission glazes soon rears up and unfurls to twinkle amid jet streaming effervescent waves of chiming corteges, ethereal chorals and the subtle tracing of a soulful strut cool.
We’ve a sly soft spot for the Orielles for it’s been no small accident that they’ve peppered these pages on the odd occasion mainly for the fact that there’s something decidedly radiant and out of time about their sound which aside being as though they were the subject of some hitherto secret 50’s foretelling of a group assembled from frente, Sundays and allo darling types they also have an enviable knack for the turning out of impeccably infectious ear candy seemingly at the doff of a cap. Case in point this little gem. ‘Joey says we got it’ is being primed for cassette store day action via the Weiner, Alcopop and Superfan99 imprints, a gloriously lazy eyed slacker-esque sortie marooned on idyllic far flung beaches indelibly inscribed with the affectionate tanning of Johnny Thunders and Patti Palladin’s ‘copy cats’.
Ah, the Cardiacs, the original sore thumbs – erratic, eccentric and deeply essential, they defy categorisation some have tried, most have failed – to some they are the saviours of progressive rock, some prefer references to psych’s more kaleidoscopic daubing while to others they are wilfully wired alchemists of art pop. In truth they are orphans without a generic home, melodic magpies feeding on the best bits of others chewing up the disparate ingredients and chucking them into a hulking hot setting spin dryer on a programme that refuses to finish until all the contents have bled, blurred and become anew.
In truth I blame Pretty Things’ ‘defecting grey’ – not wishing to demean the precociously skewed craft at work, there’s a sense that leads one to suspect that head Cardiac Tim Smith might well have frazzled and fried his headspace on contact with this gem and a result emerged from the experience somewhat better for it albeit now blessed with a slightly off set and schizoid view of the world.
So why am I mentioning all this. Well due soon, about time we should add, a complete vinyl outing for 1984’s acclaimed ‘the seaside’. Originally appearing on cassette ‘the seaside’ in some respects perhaps provides the classic Cardiacs blue print / template, a schizoid offering that sounds as freshly skedaddled today as it did over thirty years ago, a collection that marked shifts in personnel (Cawthra going, Drake arriving) and a release that for various reasons (often strangely given – destroyed tapes etc….) has never received a full vinyl / CD release (earlier outings omitted cuts and re-arranged track listings). Due the end of November, ‘the seaside’ will arrive lavishly pressed on both CD and wax (double vinyl) variants, the recordings taken straight from the original masters tapes will be restored to their tracking whilst for the serious Cardiac head in your family / network there’s a bulging box set which included inside are to be found all manner of goodies such as walker prints, newsletters, lyric and photo books, a poster and the cassette. Frankly they are spoiling us.
‘the seaside’ is a kaleidoscopic action painting, skittish, nonsensical oft barking always playful, a place that finds Cardiacs at their most skewed and impishly deranged peering from out of a spout of a tea pot secretly hidden in a hidey hole lushly smothered in English psych peculiarity, a warping opera through whose viewfinder the aforementioned Pretty Things run riot with Devo, the Fire Engines, Pink Fairies, Gong and the Purple Gang. Amid these grooves a tensely theatrical high wiring carnival unfolds riddled by the acute turn of obtusely seesawing time signatures all threaded intricately and occasioned by the liberal trimming of goonery and lunacy as encountered on the surreal nursery rhymed bandstand shanty ‘a little man and a house’ and a frenetic urgency as serviced by the Wire on sulphates like hypertensive ‘nurses whispering verses’ or the disfiguring clownery funfair of ‘it’s a lovely day’. Elsewhere Smith and Co’s most famously well known moment ‘is this the life’ lurks and finds them almost kowtowing to the rule book kissed in scarring riffola, a darkly forlorn rapture oozed in a quietly knowing majesty that hints of a youthful Cure before the gloom in a face-off with a Magazine at the height of their fracturing paranoia powers. Somewhere else the frankly fried and manically maddening ‘jibber and twitch’ skitters, stutters, chuckles and charges with insanely affectionate alarm managing to shoehorn not so much the kitchen sink but a whole shop units worth of household fare into its warping waywardness. Lest we omit to mention ‘Gena Lolla Brigida’ a brass belching bonkers brigade of speed freaking soul boy wilfulness that’s only out shone in freak pop stakes by the fraying dementia of ‘mr sparrow’ – a glorious slab of bizarro non pop that manages to melt the melodic heads of Adam and the Ants ‘dirk wears’ and weld them onto James Chance and the Contortions. For all its peculiarity, ultimately it’s pop, just not the kind of pop you might expect or want, the nations saving grace anyone?
Those of you fancying some creeping dread psychosis purred disturbia in readiness to celebrate the season of death / rebirth will probably have to dig deep to find anything as out there, strange and eerie as Keith Seatman’s sinisterly shadow smothered ‘a rest before the walk’. Embarking on a darkening trip through forgotten pathways and memories shrouded in macabre haziness, Mr Seatman’s disquieting jaunt encounters along its way detouring dead ends where, lurking to the left are found Wizards Tell Lies, whilst to the right gloomed in supernatural fog, the Unseen lie in wait. Populated by apparitions and shadowy echoes of things both lost and gone and those to come, ’a rest before the walk’ sits perched in the twilight realms, a shadowy hinterland gloomed in the warping psychological macabre of ghostly recitals, rituals and reruns of 70’s horrorphonia (as on the fog bound séance that is the Carpenter-esque skin tingling ‘there’s something outside’) and mind evaporating psychosis (as on our favourite track of the set ‘along the corridor 1st on the left room 2882’ – as it subtly joins hands with Duke St. Workshop) all eerily threaded upon a chilled dread headed filmic landscape of haunted playgrounds and decaying derelict fairgrounds directed by Fulci (not least as evidenced on the Goblin-esque lullaby psychosis of ‘strange tales and lost paper trails’).
Those familiar with Melmoth the Wanderers occasional transmissions not to mention the Hare and the Moon and the darker corners of horror folk as adeptly traded in by the likes of the Reverb Worship imprint will find much to revel in here, the ice cold doom draped chill of the bleakly remote pulsars that descend upon ‘made by sun and ice’ forge an eerie kinship that trades between Stylus and Mount Vernon Arts Lab’s ‘the séance at Hob’s Lane’ whilst elsewhere the glooming spectral that is the monochrome mysterio ‘waiting for Mr Fieldpole’ is slyly ghosted in all manner of droning Radiophonic dream drifts. That said, what makes ‘a rest before a walk’ so engaging is the unnerving way it manages to detach the listener and draw you deep beneath its darkening spell, its sinister symphonia all at once bewitching and beguiling is cloaked in spectral whispers and fleeting dissipates of dreamy translucence. It’s something that makes more sense when you realise that the premise / subtext of the album is the exploration and understanding of wandering thoughts whilst out walking, that unconscious knack of drifting away deep in thought scarcely able to recall the ramble or journey embarked upon, the thoughts free flowing perhaps inspired by a smell, a sound, a memory, a problem, mere planning or an instance of déjà vu perhaps rekindled and reawakened by the landscapes, terrain or time of day. Much like a waking dream ‘a rest before the walk’ hones in on these strange mysteries, fragmenting realism and intertwining it into a dissolving and dissipating fantasia.
Admirers of the Ghost Box imprint will do well to take note that production credits, on an advisory capacity, come from Jim Jupp whilst on the sets three lightest moments – ‘broken folk’, ‘my morning ritual’ and ‘a rest before the walk’ Douglas E. Powell features applying vocal duties to such exquisite effect that on second named track something disorientating approaching Edward Ka-Spell donning youthful Peter Gabriel skins emerges while the latter mentioned woozily wanders into the fracturing shadow lands of Komeda albeit as though spirit guided by some hitherto dark twin of the Superimposers.
www.testtransmissionarchive.blogspot.com
https://soundcloud.com/keith-seatman/a-rest-before-the-walk-excerpts
there’s an interview with Mr Seatman in the latest issue of Wyrd Daze along with a track from the album ‘strange tales and lost paper trails’ which you can download for free by twiddling your mouse / pointy thing here https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B5u0h21mF0e2VU5SNmRrdUliWDA&usp=sharing
hapless fools that we are we forgot to include the video link for the latest forthcoming agit platter from falling stacks, so without further ado here’s the blistering ‘pool party’…..
I’m a bit disappointed, more so, embarrassed to admit that it’s been a fair old while since the Besnard Lakes came calling to trouble our turntable. Incoming shortly a new 12 inch platter through jagjaguwar with a freshly pressed album ‘a complex coliseum museum’ to follow in January, lead cut from the EP set ‘the Golden Lion’ is a bit of a sweetie, peppered and blurred in hallucinogenic hazes all resplendently lead from the fore by the feel good swoon of brass fanfares this psych prog tinged smoker sounds to these ears like the oncoming wave of a sunglasses adorned cavalry over the hill. https://soundcloud.com/jagjaguwar/the-besnard-lakes-golden-lion/s-oyFsF
We will be revisiting this in full – I promise – sometime later in the week, I can almost hear the howls of derision from Moon Glyph head honcho Steve upon reading this because I’m suspecting we’ve had an annoying habit of cherry picking at previous MG releases always ending said review with the same apocryphal words. But this is special. After a smattering of limited self released outings, this will be the first release by Oakland’s duo 3 Moons to be graced with a vinyl serving. ‘Astronomy of Dreams’ is set for release next week as a limited 250 only wax platter, described in passing by the label as a ‘project seeped in psychedelia, busted blues and dark folk cosmic electronics’, it may well prove to be Moon Glyph’s finest hour if initial listens are anything to judge by for teaser cut ‘H.A.A.R.P. (we milk the clouds)’ sounds to these ears like a classic era late 90’s gospeed in situ Contellation records spiritual gathering headed up by an equally youthful Black Heart Procession summoning up a darkly spun twilight haunting emerging from the eerie threat of a hazy fog scratched in a primordial slo-core howling all bruised, bewitching and oddly beguiling. www.moonglyph.com/releases/mg83
Been trying to decide what’s more freakier and wiring, the head pummelling sounds gouging away at the groove lines or the dude in the video with the blanked out Frank Sidebottom head set doing what can only be best described as his take on the Mark E Smith shuffle. This bright things is a forthcoming shot of nerves jangling aural adrenalin from the hotly tipped Deju Vega. ‘pentagrams’ is your full throttle space spiked boog-a-loo rippled and ravaged in swathes of glowering needle sharp riffola all kissed with an unrelenting ear candy fix of head popping scowling scar forming sonic jabs think that covers all you need to know.
Ripped from their ‘1000 days’ full length, which alas we are yet to hear, says he grumbling between gritted painted smile, this is the latest honey from Wand. ‘Out via Drag City, a label who’ve been admittedly much missed around these here pages of late, ‘Sleepy Dog’ is a wig flipping hallucinogenic head trip lush in mind wiring psyched out freak pop wooziness all sumptuously dropped amid a cosmicalic carnival hitched up upon a Technicolor dream draped magic carpet venturing lands happened upon by Jacco Gardner.
And that’s your lot for a day or three. As ever many thanks for all the kind messages, sound links and general support….we can be contacted via…
www.marklosingtoday.wordpress.com
www.facebook.com/thesundayexperience
Take care of yourselves,
Mark
x
the sunday experience 