Look what we sneaked online while you were sleeping…
Transmission 30.0…. w/e 29/07/2017
Revolutions of a 33 and 45 kind….
features……..will sergeant, stylus, simon james, ariel pink, bill mackay, Trentemøller:, squrl, Laetitia sadier source ensemble, slowthaw, baldruin, drlng, a year in the country, Quimper, the gold needles, floodcoats, morphoex, echo and the bunnymen, the fall, buffalos bay, toby twirl, Edan Laniado, vukovar, the mekano set, da!, suburban lawns, Robert rental, carol, nine circles, mark lane, the quarks, Liverpool festival of psychedelia, lone taxidermist, seawitches, the bordellos, mauno, gary numan, Сафари (Safari), Data Bank A, the Actor, XNO, sons of science, hante, h ø r d, run logan run, anton barbeau, fuschia…..
This is Glide assisting you into your Sunday morning, very mellow and trippy, the track is ‘space van’ taken from an old outing for Ochre many, many moons ago, Glide in case you were unaware is Will Bunnymen…..
Opening this particular missive with a news of release that’s been much anticipated around these here parts since our ears first hooked upon its radio dramatization last year. This is the ‘theme from Akiha Den Den’ as tweaked by Jon Brooks, the album heading out of Castles in Space features, we assume, just the very excellent incidental sounds created by Simon James. The set, on clear vinyl comes replete with an additional bonus CD of exclusive material totalling 70 minutes of sound suites along with a redacted booklet featuring artwork by Nick Taylor. The sounds utilising vintage electronic mediums are very much an echo of classic 60’s / 70’s radio productions, here I’m thinking Radiophonic Workshop, left in the hands of James they provide and colour an unworldly and ghostly palette whose atmospheric reach stirs obliquely from the subconscious shadows to loom between the menacing and the macabre serving to unsettle, heighten and forge a uniquely intimate relationship between the listeners imagination and the power of the narrative in what is ultimately, a classically toned old school ghost story. https://simonjames-cis.bandcamp.com/
Hell’s teeth this has been causing a fair amount of ruction around these here parts since popping up on our player towards the end of last week, latest from Ariel Pink heading out on scouting detail heralding a September planned full length ‘dedicated to Bobby Jameson’, this is ‘time to live’. In short a jubilant sub six minute head shrooming event which has the imagining of a hulking euphoria bathed celestial mirror ball showering all in pure kaleidoscopic radiance and yes it does feature a brief nibbling of the coda from the Buggles’ ‘video killed the radio star’ which enters the fray at 3.07 before being consumed in the psychedelicised cloud along with what sounds like the all too brief riff from Death Cult’s ‘God’s Zoo’, that said all you really need to know is that this is one ridiculously infectious fringe flipping blast.
One that got away, a recent from the Drag City sound house, this is the simply smoking ‘powder mill park’ by Bill MacKay, a track culled from a full length set by the name ‘esker’, doesn’t get any better for here breezy flotillas of prairie parched mountain blues prowl and opine howling and humming to lost sonic tongues all flavoured with a dead heading cool strut kissed swing, not a million miles sound wise it has to be said, from the purist grooving attaching to those rarefied platters by Scott William Urquhart.
Happened across this on a customary ramble around cyber space, this is the rather superb ‘hands down’ by Trentemøller: featuring Warpaint’s jennylee, at once darkly shadow formed and spectral, sounding like a lost nugget forgotten in the fog of an early 80’s post punk fall out and something that had us loosely recalling the much-missed controller. controller.
Essential ear gear from the Sacred Bones folk, while you are busy eyeing up those Psychic TV re-issues for purchase, take a little time to sample the recently released EP from Squrl which features a remix by Brian Jonestown Massacre head honcho Anton Newcombe with vocals provided by Tess Parks. Now this is darkly brooding stuff for ‘gates of ishtar’ comes filleted in n’er do well occurrences and all manner eerie juju that literally suck you in to its tension racked paranoia permeating grooves much like some ghost lit séance, all the time prowling and picking away forming a scabbing wasteland from out of whose mists emerge the siren tones of Tess Parks, the atmospherics all the time shuffling and gathering in intensity peaking at the 8.12 mark where all of a sudden a radiant fanfare momentarily emerges out of the watchful disturbia to recall Add N to X.
Still trying to rummage through our in box in search of that Elefant release, or did we dream it, so while we get on with that, here’s another track pulled from Laetitia Sadier Source Ensembles’ recent ‘finding me finding you’ full length. Perhaps the most playful cut from that set, ‘Sacred Project’ is a most distracting beauty that’s very much tuned, style wise, to her former charges ‘Sound Dust’ album, all woozily disconnected and free forming not to mention oozing with a darkly seductive cosmopolitan noir chic which sprayed in celestial chorus’, purr with an amorphous intimacy and a daydream fluttering.
An insightful prehistory comes to pass on a newly released ‘pay what you like’ mix tape heading out of the Aetheric sound house. The recordings, incidentally entitled ‘never waking up’, date from some 6 years ago and provide an early sonic utterance by the labels head honcho Alistair. The sounds within, rather than being the as expected trademark grim disturbia that we’ve come to love and adore from the safety afforded by the back of the sofa, are lighter in tonality, truth be told trippier to, there are signs here that he may have even been a tad obsessed or at the very least much smitten by Carpenter / Howarth’s ‘Halloween III’ score courtesy of the third segment pulsar which kicks in around the 8-minute mark. Elsewhere add into the mix some leviathan like dronal recitals, leave them to silently shimmer in the void much like it has to be said, a slo-mo Astral Social Club on a super chilled setting with the addition of some ice formed ethereals and an exit guiding slice of 70’s vintage Italo horror Giallo sounds, hello Goblin, and you have yourself and damn nifty 14-minute sonic equivalent of finding yourself lost in the woods at night with a roll call of who’s who horror ghouls on your trail. https://aetheric-records.bandcamp.com/album/never-waking-up-mixtape-by-slowthaw
staying with Aetheric, last one out before this one, another we hopelessly missed, is a limited three label free for all vinyl outing from Baldruin by the name ‘Biotische Verwitterung’ from off which we’ve found ourselves somewhat taken by ‘falsche fahrte’. A 153 second fright wig, all we’ll say is don’t be distracted or fooled by its brief visitation, the chill this gives off will leave lasting peering over the shoulder nightly terrors long after its departed from your listening space, look upon it as a demonic dream machine and then some. https://aetheric-records.bandcamp.com/album/biotische-verwitterung
must admit this ‘un caught us quite on the hop. New loveliness from sore thumb Quimper is a most beguiling affair, available on a ‘name your price’ turn, ‘wake up Gastone’ features four tracks of such eerily enchanted elegance that we’ve given up trying to pick our jaw up from off the floor, a truly magical affair which doesn’t stop at the opening title track, as though bewitched enough by the hypnotically balletic spectral lullaby ethereally whispering amid what appears a snoozing void. Rather more, the further you step inside Quimper’s playground the more you’re seduced by its softly embracing day dreaming demurs, ‘elephant’ surely the centre attraction, is wrapped by the mesmeric shimmer of starry cascades, a cosmic carousel which to these ears sounds not unlike Gulliver in cahoots with Le Bleu being put through the kaleidoscopic sonic washing machine of Polymer Cities on a hot wash. Somewhere else stirs the wonderfully touching neo classicist mysterio ‘years out’, instantly bringing to recall a ghostified lunar murmur transfusing elements of Komeda, Goldfrapp and Musetta. All said, this being Quimper you didn’t think you’d escape your listening pleasure without a degree of the strange, so step forward ‘he woke up’ all adored in silvery garlands delectably weaved in ghost lit dub apertures, quite spooky if you ask me. https://quimper.bandcamp.com/album/wake-up-gastone
up next that promised cover from the Gold Needles. Alas no sound links for now, this is their version of the Monkees’ cut ‘the poster’ which originally appeared on their ‘the birds, the bees and the Monkees’ set from ’68, indeed the one that featured ‘daydream believer’. A faultlessly faithful homage that if anything, manages to out round the sharp edges of the original and into the bargain teases out a smokily mellow toning that glints delicately in a hazily lolloping arrest of a 60’s west coast sun all the time piped and purred by the lazy eyed lull of caressing chime corteges. The track features of 7a’s celebration of the Monkees entitled ‘listen to the bands’ – the set a gathering of 25 cover versions by a wealth of talent currently buzzing around on the outer edges of the underground, proceeds of which go to the Davy Jones Equine Memorial Fund. Here’s a brief snippet of what’s instore…. https://soundcloud.com/user-346379991/listen-to-the-bands-25-monkees-cover-versions-from-7a-records
Latest in the very excellent postings of sonic journals exploring the countryside and its interaction with modernity and mythology, that has seen the turning in of a formidable body of recordings featuring contributions from the likes of the Assembled Minds, Polypores, the Hare and the Moon, the listening center, Vic mars and more besides. incoming for inclusion within that sonic library is a nine-track suite by A Year in the Country entitled ‘undercurrents’. As the tittle hints, this collection seeks to dig, unearth and shine a light upon a darkening alternative mirror reflection, a reflection contrary to the bucolic natural beauty often taken as a given of these greenlands. These silent spaces, untouched by progression offer a unique link to a lost past, behind their wild abandoned beauty, they yawn beneath the weight of tradition, mourn for the dark untold secrets they’ve observed and borne witness to whilst from afar, remote and isolated in their safe kingdom, they stare partly with envy, though hitherto more in fear as the order of the old ways slowly dissolves into memory and custom. Utilising the spirit, the atmosphere and the very fabric of their detachment and remoteness and with the application of field recordings, ‘undercurrents’ explores and gives voice to these woodlands and marshes. As mentioned previously, comprised of nine suites, it irrefutably nods and strays along an ancestral path where is scattered classic era Radiophonic Workshop fayre (as on the brooding and psychotropically enhanced ‘drifting parts I-IV’ very Mount Vernon Arts Lab) amid which shattered remnants of the manipulated mosaics crafted by Tristam Cary on his landmark ‘Quatermass and the Pit’ soundtrack lurk, A Year in the Country intricately weaves a palette that finitely captures the lonesome quotient not to mention that searing sense of the lost and forgotten, and while images of such locations beneath the cover of darkness may well inspire a recipe for the eerie, the sinister and the haunting (mind you ‘the heart of the storm’ might have something to say about that, very much coded and cooled in terrains more associated with Assembled Minds), the common theme brought to bear throughout here is something rather more bruised in melancholy (\we suggest you partake of the tenderly torn ‘dreamscapes of old’ whereupon the tear trickled feeling of neglect is pushed to the point of paralysing) and enchanted in mystery (as evidenced perfectly on the frost flecked fantasia that is ‘a pastoral playground’) with the overriding sense of forever encapsulated exquisitely. For here these monolithic drone recitals act as something akin to aural cartography capturing eloquently the very pulse, the bleak beauty and the secret majesty of these wide-open spaces all the time bowing forth to their legacy. The set opens to the eerie ‘your hearth is not a home’, a brief though all same beautiful fort day like apparition before sombrely proceeding forth through the cavernous passages of ‘undertows’ – a leviathan colossus replete with regalistic fanfares. Missed memories of fort dax are rekindled again on the radiant pulsar ‘caught in the flow’ while crouched in the shadowlands, spectral and somewhat creepy lurks the ever watchful ‘currents’. Essential in case you had already guessed for yourselves. http://ayearinthecountry.co.uk/
Been way too long since we had cause to have DRLNG seduce our sound player. A message from Martin from the band to say that this ‘un is imminent and features the Veldt’s Danny and Hayato, the track in question ‘black blue’ is a slow burning beauty. It arrives sealed in an amorphous nocturnal turning whose sparsely spectral toning trips to a shadowy noir purr, amidst which whose fragile almost airless beauty demurs with the kind of mesmeric murmuring that one might well imagine steeling itself into the night air following after hours studio love in between Musetta and Portishead. https://drlngmusic.bandcamp.com/track/black-blue
What is it about this track that quietly creeps upon us whispering in our ear ‘go on press repeat’, is it the curious cool kosmische mirror ball pulsating upon a pristine pop axis. Perhaps the affectionately vintage electronic ripples colouring the starry heavens with lullaby motifs or maybe the way the whole thing magnetically draws you in all the time softly assuming orbital mass, definition and a most alluringly radiant shimmering synth savvy. Well we here are stumped, lovely all the same, this is Flood Coats with ‘don’t hold the door’ – a track heralding the arrival of their ‘Vaquita’ full length for hey amigo recordings, don’t know about you but I think we are in love. https://soundcloud.com/floodcoats/dont-hold-the-door
Out sometime this week, a rather pricey live vinyl set by the Bunnymen recorded in April 1985 and taken from a radio broadcast aired on the Swedish National Radio from the Karen Club, the set comes pressed 180g, black vinyl comes housed in a single sleeve aqueous-gloss, old school tip-on Stoughton sleeve with brand new artwork and hard stock insert – you can tell I’m reading this from the press release, also features rare photos and liner notes by Mr Sergeant…. Anyhow here they are covering a Dylan classic, the set incidentally is called ‘it’s all live now’…..
Next up on the Polytechnic Youth conveyor belt scheduling, will be a vinyl outing, their first, for Morphoex. Already mentioned in passing to much adoring enthusiasm when we went a tad smitten for ‘UFO’, ‘Soviet System’ is due for anticipated chatter and cheer on the in tuned underground this coming August, from it by way of a teaser sampling here’s the title track, a quite attractively addictive slab of Balearic ‘bot bop is what’s on offer, this ‘un very much wiring itself into the state of art grooves once upon a time retuning and turning on the minds of an early 80’s club floor meets minimal tech Cabaret Voltaire, quite classically classy if you ask me.
Apologies for the lack of finance swallowing moving picture shows, guess you’ll have to make do with a live recording. Still they always sounded better live than on record, this be the Fall with ‘new facts emerge’ a track you’ll find on their incoming new thing of the same name through the mighty Cherry Red. Bugger me this has got some kick, a whole heap of dragster gouged rock a hula, twangs aplenty blistered onto a killer primitive 50’s scowl, an acutely on the button beaten around the edges feral, fried and rampant roustabout which for a moment had us of a mind to dig out our much played to near destruction Gene Vincent and the Blue Caps grooves.
This one heads up a forthcoming EP from Belfast psych poppers Buffalos Bay entitled ‘living under the reef’ heading out to break hearts and be the subject of swooning aplenty sometime mid-September. This is the quite frankly perfect ‘in the factory’ appearing fully formed and emerging from some late 60’s west coast haze no doubt sporting their Byrd’s button badges and racing to the latest hipster boutique trying to nab their own prized Sunshine Fix t-shirt. As to the sounds, all adorably peppered in a mellowing lazy eyed chiming lilt that lollops, croons and blisses to a soft psych phrasing dappled in a tropicalic wooziness, a bit like a beach holidaying Wicked Whispers if you must.
Arriving this coming October via Mega Dodo where it’ll get a spruced up 300 only wax appraisal, this is the thought lost debut album by Toby Twirl. Discovered in a ‘dusty box’ by the bands drummer, these recordings were feared long gone, the tapes carefully transferred, cleaned and mastered. sound as though they’ve just walked out of a 60’s recording studio. The band hailing from Newcastle scored three highly sought-after singles for Decca in the late 60’s before imploding and going their separate ways. Don’t know about you but we’ve had to nail our feet to the floor to stop the incessant tapping such is the infectious radiance of these tunes, okay there are nods to the Bee Gees and Herman’s Hermits, which before you say, are no bad thing with this brief teaser excerpt very much revealing of a collective of impish tunesmiths found sitting on the sunnier and poppier side of the 60’s dream. Full mentions to come.
Alas the teaser video links are disabled so you might have to cut n’ paste this – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7d_wgDWrZk
However, undeterred by such minor hitches we’ve unearthed this, ‘movin in’ – one of the tracks featured on the album, a cut which by these ears is blessed with a killer hipster savvy not to mention soulfully smoky sassiness with added nods to Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Titch.
Literally just appeared in our inbox. Many thanks to Rick from Vukovar for dropping by the bands forthcoming single. Now we’ll just start by saying, this shares a very special space somewhere at a point where the Wild Swans’ ‘revolutionary spirit’ finishes and the Bunnymen’s ‘in bluer skies’ begins, indeed that good. From the moment ‘the clockwork dance’ kicks in you are immediately aware you are in the rarefied company of something truly majestic and spectrally cut in the finest late 70’s angular post punk vintage, its ghostly aura curdled in a classic era Factory sound, its sparseness and minimalist toning blessed with a radiant knowingness that locks you in its dead eyed stare. In short, the coolest thing in record land right this minute, that said the B-sides even better but we’ll leave the mentioning of that till tomorrow, don’t wanna spoil you now.
Must admit we’ve been pausing at intervals to look out of the window to check to see if Christmas has arrived. Why oh why have you been doing that you might rightly ask, well simply because there’s something so wonderfully winter-some and snow kissed about ‘brains remain’ by Edan Laniado that lends itself to shying away into the shadows during these summery moments. Softly twinkling, a slow burn love note if you must, demurringly dinked within a porcelain pop framing that yearns, coos, coaxes and seduces with softly stirred stealth. The track is a teaser tasting of things afoot shortly with the release of a debuting full length entitled ‘the opposite wall’ – something one would imagine, perfect listening for those much admiring of a less bruised and vulnerable Kramies. https://soundcloud.com/edan-laniado/brains-remain
So, kicking myself that thus far we haven’t gotten around to mentioning the Mekano Set sooner. But this rare moment of focus was prompted by a heads up by the Vukovar guys who we understand will be sharing the billing with them this coming October. With that in mind we rummaged through the cyber corridors and turned up this, their latest release, we believe, entitled ‘imaginary weather’. By way of a brief hello and how are you, we’ve homed in on just three of the featured tracks seducing the grooves here. Opener ‘no conspiracy’ arrives so gorged in a hazy spiritual mystique replete with soul bathing reverence that you might be forgiven for thinking you’d stumbled upon some divine ceremony, the Gregorian chants and that sense of transcendental otherworldliness impart a rarefied toning of graceful majesty. ‘the disaffect’ channels darker terrains, a cosmic outlander draped in psychotropic pulsars and mind-expanding mosaics which on coalescing forge a deep amorphously seductive subliminal foretelling whose tripping tonalities on closer inspection purr to a cruise controlled gathering of biosphere and astralasia types being threaded through the mystical third eye of Loop. All said our favourite moment is the clearly chemically induced happening ‘thirst’ here found remodelled by Sweet Tooth, an event horizon tripadelic slab of immersive blissed out wig flippery, nuff said. https://themekanoset.bandcamp.com/album/imaginary-weather
As promised previously the flip side to that forthcoming Vukovar release. I mean let’s set the record straight, ‘the clockwork dance’ is quite something else, but this, well let’s just say, is an altogether different beast, a wretched and rabid dark twin for this brooding beauty is called ‘quiet’. This live recording culled from a Preston date late last year is a scabbing slice of feral psychosis whose itching and prickling weave takes its cue from those legendary Bauhaus B-sides. At once skittish and schizoid, it’s best imagined as the Doors channelling a youthful Birthday Party and then some, anti-pop in its finest and purest form.
Interlude……post punk, minimalist pop and all that gubbins……da!, suburban lawns, Robert rental, carol, nine circles, mark lane, the quarks…..
Da!……
Suburban lawns…..
Robert rental…..
Carol…..
Nine circles….
Mark lane….
The quarks….
Up next a few teaser trailers for the up and coming Liverpool Festival of Psychedelia happenings this September – VIMEO source codes allowing – er yea……
<p><a href=”https://vimeo.com/219513611″>Liverpool Psych Fest 2017 #2</a> from <a href=”https://vimeo.com/pzyk”>Liverpool Psych Fest</a> on <a href=”https://vimeo.com”>Vimeo</a>.</p>
<p><a href=”https://vimeo.com/206399062″>Liverpool Psych Fest 2017 #1T</a> from <a href=”https://vimeo.com/pzyk”>Liverpool Psych Fest</a> on <a href=”https://vimeo.com”>Vimeo</a>.</p>
<p><a href=”https://vimeo.com/216981272″>PZYK 17 Live Teaser</a> from <a href=”https://vimeo.com/pzyk”>Liverpool Psych Fest</a> on <a href=”https://vimeo.com”>Vimeo</a>.</p>
Latest obsession around these here parts are the quite amazing and clearly cuckoo Lone Taxidermist, who you might have noticed have somewhat sneaked on occasion in to these pages this very missive already. This cut comes prized from a forthcoming set heading out through memetune next month we believe, entitled ‘trifle’, this ‘un being the strangely surreal ‘knicker elastic’. Too fried for even those weird heads the Mighty Boosh, lone taxidermist inhabit a world where the narrow lines between the macabre, theatre and freak circus collide. With hints of the Au Pairs and slits sonically skin grafted onto a Manimal era Rainbow Arabia, they craft a peculiarly potent potion that hisses of a creative free spirit owing more to the experimental art fried outsider scene emerging from out of the shadows of the late 70’s punk fall out along the way weaving kookily cute grooves spell formed from electroid dub dialects.
Latest volume of vault digging rarities served up on one of those ‘name your price’ soirees, the seventh in fact of their ongoing ‘underground tapes’ project, this is the criminally neglected St Helens sore thumbs the Bordellos with four more from the cutting room floor. This is, I guess, the one you could call their ‘love songs’ set and okay while they mightn’t do love songs that most are accustomed to – you know the ones – boy meets girl blah blah blah, the Bordellos skewed and oddly off centred approach is one oozed in a humdrum slippers n’ pipe familiarity. Barbed humour, fading recollections and minimalist wistfulness peppered with the occasional bite are the order of the day on this quartet gathering of fraying fry ups. We must admit to adoring the intimacy of these homeless lo-fi rambles as they slyly blister, prime cut here being the dandelion session take of ‘straight outta Southport’ – a crumpled sonic postcard distressed by life and a moment lost softly spun in a tear stained nostalgia that probes, picks and prickles at the emotional defences leaving you somewhat humbled and hurtfully cowered, one for the Decoration fans among you. Running it a close second in the affection stakes, ‘jolly old England’ almost had us of a mind to go rooting out our much-loved copy of Freed Unit’s ‘gigglegoo’ while similarly calling to mind the mighty Of Arrowe Hill, which at this point anyone residing close by – please give them a nudge cos it’s been a long while. Elsewhere there’s the wonderfully ramshackle glaze of the impishly titled ‘tesco chainstore massacre’ while amidst the hazy wooziness of a slacker psych crookedness, you suspect a rollicking killer cut is impatiently waiting to break from the lazy eyed casualness that dulls and stupefies the grooves of ‘they shoot horses don’t they’. Essential – as though you needed telling. https://bordellos.bandcamp.com/album/the-bordellos-underground-tape-vol-7
Now I’ll be brutally honest in admitting that we weren’t quite expecting this given the introduction note it came accompanied with seemed, shall we say, straying on the side of uncertain. This is Sea Witches who you may recall from previous dispatches, with a new one, in fact out tomorrow, entitled ‘absolve’. A snaking spell charm of sultry seduction slickly shimmering in hush hollowed haloes of dust swirled arabesques softly daubing milky mind morphing mosaics that recall a smokey sounding Gulp caught in the drift wind of a bliss kissed Lake Ruth, an absolutely adoring trip toning fantasia.
Mentioned this a little while back – here in fact https://marklosingtoday.wordpress.com/2017/07/10/gary-numan-7/ – new happenings from Gary Numan courtesy of the on the button savage and scorched panoramic post-apocalyptic anthem that is ‘my name is ruin’, a newly peeled video has just been released featuring his daughter Persia accompanying on vocals. An album, ‘Savage (Songs From A Broken World)’ looms on the hazy horizon due for seismic impact mid-September via BMG.
Fairly certain we missed their last Tin Angel full length to which we’ve been kicking ourselves furiously about. Not quite sure where this one fits or doesn’t, as the case may be. This is Mauno with ‘how long’ – another slice of distracting off kilter odd pop and we say all this with a becoming degree of affection, not least because this lot excel in crafting or should that be de-crafting, a curious flair for fractured dayglo pop that coos, croons and woozes with such lazy eyed slackery as to imagine a slightly worse for wear Pavement in cahoots with Garlic trying out for Elephant 6 Collective adoration. Three minutes of peculiar precociousness is what you’ll be treated to here, where moments dreamily dissolve between the occasioning of riff blisters and the appearance of hymnals and a whole heap load of crooked loveliness sprayed in blissing raptures of hazy euphoria. https://soundcloud.com/tin-angel-records/mauno-how-long
Mauno have released new tour dates, including shows with Chad VanGaalen.
23.09. Hamburg (DE), Reeperbahn Festival
24.09. Berlin (DE), Monarch
26.09. Amsterdam (NL), Sugar Factory
27.09. Brussels (BE), Atelier 210
30.09. Paris (FR), Espace B
04.10. London (UK), The Islington Get Tickets
05.10. Coventry (UK), Inspire
15.10. Utrecht (NL), EKKO *
16.10. Rotterdam (NL), Rotown *
18.10. Leeds (UK), Brudenell Social Club *
21.10. Copenhagen (DK), Stengade *
24.10. Düdingen (CH), Bad Bonn *
25.10. Lyon (FR), Le Sonic *
26.10. Amiens (FR), La Lune des Pirates *
29.10. Tourcoing (FR), Le Grand Mix *
30.10. Luxembourg (LU), Rotondes *
31.10. Gent (BE), BIB *
* w/ Chad VanGaalen
Interlude…….electronica, chill wave, ice pop………..Сафари (Safari), Data Bank A, the Actor, XNO, sons of science, hante, h ø r d…..
Сафари (Safari) (probably not the actual band name but the title……. help appreciated) ….
Data Bank A…..
The Actor……
XNO…..
Sons of Science…..
Hante……
h ø r d…..
Amended note…….these should have appeared a missive or two ago but were erroneously left on the editing floor…….apologies to all concerned….
This early warning just popped up on our sound player, this ‘un is being readied up for polytechnic youth action – date unknown / quantity unclear. By French alchemist Morphoex from a forthcoming happening ‘Soviet System’ this is ‘UFO’. Alas not the theme from the iconic Gerry Anderson TV series of the same name from the early 70’s but rather more a spot of coolly chic floor shuffling futurist electro funk which curiously enough manages to find itself a safe haven tucked in between the sonic sound houses of polymer cities, concretism and pye corner audio in so much as it sounds so fashionably 70’s, mind you that said in our minds eye its subliminal hypnotic symphony is replaying looped images of a space lab colonised by an army of robotech’s all in regimental formations at assembly lines processing endless copies of Kraftwerkian doppelgangers. Perhaps I really ought to lay off the sherbert. https://morphoex.bandcamp.com/track/u-f-o
Sheesh, you turn your back for five minutes and the blighters sneak a handful more releases on their bandcamp page. Latest salvos from the esteemed Champion Version sound house, which all come hand pressed on limited quantities of lathe wax made to order within a very limited purchase window. Okay I’ll readily admit that the prospect of an ensemble based around just drums and saxophone mightn’t solicit the flinging of bunting in expectant adoration among some folk, we here though are made of testier stuff and anyway similar such sonic tribulations from the foolproof project imprint have always been met with affectionate gusto here. This then is Run Logan Run, a duo based in Bristol who we’re surprised to find haven’t had Fat Cat sniffing around because at one time in the not so distant past, this would have been right up their listening tree. Described in passing as ‘punk jazz’ a term so narrowing that it rarely does it justice, freeform yes, angular indeed and potent. Two tracks feature here, simply titled ‘3.34’ and ‘3.43’ the first of which sounds like desert dry ravaged some primitive Tibetan howl. However, it’s the second cut that’s the main player here, smokier, bonged out and a damn sight looser in tone, reference wise imagine Wizards of Twiddly on some Marrakesh retreat and then some with additional Tubby Hayes wig outs. http://store.championversion.com/album/moksha
Part of the Fruits de Mer summer selection, new limited coloured wax happenings from Anton Barbeau features a flip wigged feast of mind frying woozy mosaics that include three covers and one original penning. Not sure how many of these beauties are being pressed but they are arriving on blue vinyl and by rights ought to be flying off the records racks. The EP titled ‘heaven is in your mind’ is a reference to the Traffic track of the same name to which a quite sublime cover of opens proceedings. Psychedelically enhanced and peppered with flowery pastorals there’s a magical mistiness attaching that recalls moments from the Pretty Things’ ‘S F Sorrow’ albeit as rewoven through the kaleidoscopic viewfinder of Tomorrows’ Keith West. Original penning ‘secretion of the wafer’ finds Barbeau cloaked in a tempestuous psych prog drama that distantly skirts the magisterial worlds of Rob Gould, pitched in a darkly woven mythical imagery scalped with storm laden overcasts, this brooding ghost light courts a shadowy gothic toning more attuned to the back catalogue of Paul Roland. Bookending this set a dead eyed and withering take on Bowie’s ‘scary monsters and super creeps’, as mentioned in previous despatches – see last missive LWWSOWYWA #28 – Barbeau draws the fracturing tension of the original and in its place, heightens the nightmare quotient several notches. Best moment of the set though by a short distance, Big Star’s ‘September Gurls’ is given a long overdue day in the sun, kookily rephrased in warping mirages and trimmed delectably in oodles of 50’s teen trembled bubblegum motifs and then gathered up and respun within a wonderfully classicist glam grooved vintage. Bliss.
Also on the essential must have list via Fruits de Mer a superb double disc EP featuring a smattering of tracks – seven in all in case you are counting – spanning the 50-year recording career of Tony Durant better known to the acid / psych folk community as the man behind Fuchsia. In all honesty a by all accounts superbly packaged set that aside featuring two seven-inch slabs on vinyl housed in a silver gatefold sleeve, also includes a repro of a 24-page concert programme from back in the day when a pre-Fuchsia Mr Durant was a member of the Ottawa Music Company sharing space with members of Egg and future Henry Cow folk Chris Cutler and Fred Frith. Anyhow the EP features tracks selected by Mr Durant himself, for the purists essential listening mainly for the fact that the opening cut is a rare acetate find from pre-Fuchsia combo Louise here found cutting it up in true garage psych style stepping between the cracks of Cream and the Misunderstood, one thoroughly recommended to those Nuggets loving dudes among you. Up next another rare slice of scarceness with a demo version of ‘the band’ that pre-dates the band’s first album and something which aside revealing an eccentricric creative craft might certainly be worthy of the ear of any early 70’s Ray Davies admiring patron. Add in a smattering of choice cuts from both ‘Fuchsia I’ and ‘Fuchsia II’ including the epic ‘nothing songs’ while Side 4, unless my eyes do deceive or perhaps a typo is afoot, is occupied by two cuts from Fuchsia III – alas our CD only goes as far as letting us into the first four gems before playing hardball……
Contact resources….
Email – marklosingtoday@gmail.com
Facebook – http://www.facebook.com/thesundayexperience
Word press – marklosingtoday.wordpress.com
Twitter – @marklosingtoday
Physical – 46 Webster Avenue, BOOTLE, Merseyside, L20 9JF, UK
End grooves…..
Stylus……
the sunday experience 