Being thankful for an earful.
Brand new music by Marie Davidson, Niecy Blues (feat. Joy Guidry), CEL, Marisa Anderson and Luke Schneider, Stina Stjern, Carmen Villain, Murcof, A Lily, and Far Golden Pavilions, with music from the vaults by Tomaga, Ozzobia, Jan Jelinek.
Sushi photo by Lindsay.
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I've been calling this band Bang Bang Bang, but some of my friendsinsist on calling them Chik Chik Chik. According the pronunciationguide on the cover of this new two-track single, we're both right.However, I really prefer the way Bang Bang Bang sounds, and it kind ofrolls off the tongue in an exciting way. "Exciting" is they key wordfor !!!, whose vivid, energetic reinvisionment of early-80'sdance-influenced post-punk thrives on tense, ass-shaking grooves. Sincetheir 2000 debut, !!! have led the way for a whole crop of new bandsexploiting this sound, as well as a rediscovery of the original artistsand classic albums from the period that have been collecting dust fortwenty years. Their 'sister' band Out Hud, featuring some of the samemembers, upped the stakes even higher with the amazing album Street Dad,which concentrated on leftfield instrumental disco with a host ofbrilliant production flourishes. Hearing this new two-track CD singleby !!!, it is now unclear where !!! ends and Out Hud begins. Where!!!'s debut had a lean, guitar-driven sound not dissimiliar from Gangof Four, "Me and Giuliani Down By the Schoolyard" contains all of thedense, layered production that made Out Hud sound so unique. In fact,!!! now sound exactly like Out Hud with vocals. Whether this isindicative of a Parliament/Funkadelic kind of cross-pollenating bandrelationship is uncertain, but I have no complaints about the music,which is fantastic as ever. The title track is a nine-minute "truestory" that urges the stiff, Republican leadership of New York City tolose their inhibitions and "get on up & move it" to the music. Thevocals are buried and mostly inaudible, but it doesn't really matterbecause the beat is all you really care about. The bassline is an echoof ESG's "Erase You," and the production utilizes the whole repertoireof Out Hud's dub-influenced studio trickery to achieve the maximumgroove. Track two is an excellent remix of the song "Intensify" fromthe debut album. "Intensifieder Sunracappellectroshit Mix 03" riflesthrough the book of dub and early house production tricks to build anintensity that is far from gimmicky. The track is reduced to vocals,drums and bass, which are alternately echoed, delayed, layered andmutated. Stabs of synth and odd, CD-skip "hiccups" add to the eclecticdrama of the track. This is an awesome single. Can a new full-length befar behind?
Originally recorded on May 21st, 2002, The War Against Terroris basically one 49-minute song, digitally indexed by six parts, allwhich flow without clear beginnings or endings. While the tune has arather angry feel, from its gritty and hurried pace, distorted dronesand evil synths, it's falls short of making a commentary due to thetiny number of spoken word samples, scarecly repeated throughout thetrack. Back in the old Cabaret Voltaire days, samples were firm andclear, whether it was "Do Right," "Don't Argue," or the brotherstalking on "Low Cool," as choices were made to reinterpret the darkworld sonically. With Kirk recordings as of late, the titles and textare strikingly colorful, but the message in the music itself iscertainly more grey.samples:
Bush Doctrine is Kirk's first release as BioChemical Dread, andis anxiously described as "an incendiary sonic polemic against oilygreed mongering and cultural ignorance," and looking at titles like"False King of the Earth," "King of Baghdad," "Where Is Mr. Sam?,""Zero Democracy Dub," and "I Got Weapons," that would make sense.Musically, this is probably one of the most challenging releases ofKirk's in a long time, threadding non-Western rhythms, wiry radiosamples, voices, wind instruments, and cutting things up into a heftybeat soup with tasty, buzzing noise elements. Kirk flip-flops aroundstyles from intense, high energy tunes to abrasive guitar-ish rockingtunes and slowed down dub numbers, delicately matching hypnotic, classybeats with strong melodies with ample noises. Listening to the tunesand -not- hearing vicious anti-war anti-government samples to match hisapparent sentiments is a let down, however, as I feel that thepackaging (with the song titles and a G. W. Bush cut up on the front)raises the levels of anticipation. I want attitude, I want guts, I wantto watch an accompanying set of visuals with things that will make mystomach turn. Perhaps I'll just have to play this album while watchingsomething awful like Fox News or listening to Democracy Now.
Drone rock may not be understood by everyone, and it may induce sleepamong non-believers, but at least it has a sense of melody andmusicianship. Frequency Curtain, a project/experiment by Josh Rosen,John Grzinich and Rick Reed, is drone noise for the noise's sake. Usinganalogue and digital sine wave generators, shortwave radios, and laptopelectronics, the three became an experimental media performance groupthat first began displaying their wares at Intersect 4 in 2001.Improvisational sessions find the members powering up their devices andjust producing sound, tweaking and turning knobs on the fly to marry upthe various sounds produced by the devices. As such, I feel it shouldnot be judged on the quality or style of the sounds, but on the way thedevices interact with each other and the effect the whole performancehas on an audience. There are not many artists with this approach, andwith each that releases a recording of their work, I always feel likeI'm missing a component. This album was compiled from longer sessionsof improvisation, and I feel they probably work better with visualaccompaniment. The sounds that invade the speakers do not seem to bedesigned for listening alone, or at least not for listening enjoyment:they cause the hairs on the back of the neck to rise and fall with eachsquelch and high pitched squeak, and continually irritate the ears evenat low volume. But the different sound generators do blend togethernicely, and produce enough disparity to keep the listen interesting andvaried. The tracks do take quite a while to introduce a variation,however, and by that point many may lose interest. Like manyperformances, it can be summed up by asking Goethe's three questions:"What are they doing?"; "How are they doing it?"; and "Is it worthdoing?" The first two are answered above, and the third is a resounding"Yes." I just feel that it should never be presented in this format, asit loses a great deal of the punch. 
One of the great things about some modern pop musicians is theirability to draw from a wide variety of resources and references,carefully blending them together without becoming excessive. When donetastefully, a very interesting hybrid form of music that keeps with itsoriginal direction can be established to much delight. With Under A Different Sky,Chicago singer/songwriter Tania Bowers conveys her laid back popsensibilities approach with, at times, an electro-soul and jazz balladfeel for a rich forty minutes of listening pleasure. As a bass playerherself, Bowers has the fine drumming of John Herndon (Tortoise/A GrapeDope) fill out the rhythm section for the better part of the disc's tentracks while producer Casey Rice (Designer) augments with his signatureskills. Other notable guests include Doug McCombs, Noel Kupersmith,Howe Gelb and Scott Herren (Prefuse 73) providing their musicalsupport. Bowers' songwriting and soulful, sultry vocal style isperfectly suited throughout the varied musical scenes; the airy chordalprogressions of "I Dream Again," "Boltanski," and "Moonlight &Chaos," the dub-infused "In The Deep," and the country-tinged "True"are some of the highlights. The closest the disc gets to having an edgeis the distorted chugging riffage, guitar feedback and two-step beat of"The Rising," which at just over two minutes is all too brief. Foryears, Bowers has leant her vocals to recordings of various artists andprojects within the Chicago scene. Following Dream Of..., her debut EP as bandleader, Under A Different Sky should put her name on the musical map in good company. 
"Kontakt der Jünglinge" is the title of each CD in a series of collaborations between Tietchens and Köner. Like 1, -1 was recorded live at the Lagerhaus in Bremen. One day I listened to two Tietchens CDs in sequence: 7 Stücke followed by -1. At first, -1 sounded like a continuation of 7 Stücke, opening with sounds of objects being dragged/scraped along a surface. But -1 quickly builds up dense layers of sound, unlike the rather sparse 7 Stücke.The breezy drones provide a background to a variety of noise fromindustrial grinds to crystalline ringing sounds. About halfway throughthis 46-minute piece, we are even treated to some vocals! Okay, it'sjust someone reciting a numeral here and there, but it's all lovely andfun. I look forward to hearing something equally enticing when this duoperforms at the MUTEK festival in Montréal on Wednesday, May 28.(www.mutek.ca)
"Kontakt der Jünglinge" is the title of each CD in a series of collaborations between Tietchens and Köner. Like 1, -1 was recorded live at the Lagerhaus in Bremen. One day I listened to two Tietchens CDs in sequence: 7 Stücke followed by -1. At first, -1 sounded like a continuation of 7 Stücke, opening with sounds of objects being dragged/scraped along a surface. But -1 quickly builds up dense layers of sound, unlike the rather sparse 7 Stücke.The breezy drones provide a background to a variety of noise fromindustrial grinds to crystalline ringing sounds. About halfway throughthis 46-minute piece, we are even treated to some vocals! Okay, it'sjust someone reciting a numeral here and there, but it's all lovely andfun. I look forward to hearing something equally enticing when this duoperforms at the MUTEK festival in Montréal on Wednesday, May 28.(www.mutek.ca)
Asmus Tietchens collaborated with American drummer Jon Mueller for thistrip to the studio, which translates as "7 Pieces." You can recognizethe drum sounds in the first few pieces on the CD, but by the thirdpiece the percussion has either been manipulated beyond recognition byTietchens, or else Mueller is not drumming anymore—maybe he is makingthose sounds of objects being dragged and scraped across a surface?It's hard to tell, but it may a pleasant journey through all sevenpieces for those who enjoy musique concrète. It's difficult listeningfor the rest of us—I was even getting bored part way through, but bylistening all the way to the end, I found sound enjoyable parts,especially pieces 5 through 7. I'm also extremely fond of theoccasional "buzz-pop" noise—it's clearly the sound of a patch cablebeing disconnected, with the quick "it's not grounded" buzz soundfollowed by the "pop" of disconnection. What might be regarded byothers as a mistake that should be edited out, is instead consideredpart of the sound manipulation.
Asmus Tietchens collaborated with American drummer Jon Mueller for thistrip to the studio, which translates as "7 Pieces." You can recognizethe drum sounds in the first few pieces on the CD, but by the thirdpiece the percussion has either been manipulated beyond recognition byTietchens, or else Mueller is not drumming anymore—maybe he is makingthose sounds of objects being dragged and scraped across a surface?It's hard to tell, but it may a pleasant journey through all sevenpieces for those who enjoy musique concrète. It's difficult listeningfor the rest of us—I was even getting bored part way through, but bylistening all the way to the end, I found sound enjoyable parts,especially pieces 5 through 7. I'm also extremely fond of theoccasional "buzz-pop" noise—it's clearly the sound of a patch cablebeing disconnected, with the quick "it's not grounded" buzz soundfollowed by the "pop" of disconnection. What might be regarded byothers as a mistake that should be edited out, is instead consideredpart of the sound manipulation.
With guitars, electronics and some light percussion, Norwegian bandMonopot make some of the quietest, sweetest music I've heard in awhile. They avoid the bombast of other ambient post-rock bands likeMogwai, GYBE or Low but their second disc, "Optipess" is at least asgood as anything by your those bands. The distinctive feature that setsMonopot apart is their minimalism. Optipesshas a cover of Cockney Rebel's 70's semi-hit, "Sebastian", which helpsdrive the minimalist point home: By listening to something that they'vealtered, you get to hear where they're coming from, and where they'retrying to go. Where there were cocky, playful vocals backed with aglorious choir there are now shy, whispered vocals. The string and horncrescendos of the original become a reverbed melancholic guitar playinga head-nodding version of the melody and then circling back on itself.Monopot's original material is much the same: slow, minimal, soothing."Scena Napoletana"'s low, mellow guitar tones and gentle singing on topof low drones and the guitar's pace-keeping are like a short, gentlelullaby. My only complaint about the disc is that it's only 40 minuteslong, and by the time I got to the end of the disc I wanted the musicto keep going.
Sitting uncomfortably wherever it is that minimalism overlaps with bothnew age and American academic experimentation, Ingram Marshall is a bitof a baffler. I liked Fog Tropeswhen I first heard it on the radio way back in my college days butdiscovered, when I bought a disk of it not so long ago, that I hadgrown out of it, as I have with most minimalism. The other works onthat New Albion disk had decidedly off-putting new age spiritual cheesegoing on. However, the sleeve notes that Marshall wrote for the CD ofCharlemange Palestine's Schlingen Blängen convince me that itmisses the mark to dismiss him as a secondary figure in commercialminimalism with a bit of a spiritual bent. Present as a young man inthe New York minimalist scene of the '60s, Marshall had goodconnections and began experimenting with tape and electronic music andhas kept it up since. This CD documents his tape and electronic outputduring the years of minimalism's downfall in the 1970s as nascentneo-romantic composers like Reich and Glass co-opted it for their ownends and gave it a capital M. Five of the seven pieces are tapecompositions based on human voices, using repetition and electronicmanipulation to build up eerie artificial sound spaces. These piecesrange from the quite effective Cortez (see Brain v06i16) to the rather unconvincing Weather Reportand suggest that Marshall was sincere and committed to working hardwith very limited personal artistic resources. However, the remainingtwo pieces, Rop på fjellet and Sibelius in His Radio Corner,lay bare Marshall's abject skills in harmony and melody withrun-for-cover embarrassing horribleness. An artist has to bothcultivate and rely upon his or her voice of artistic conscience—thatlittle Jiminy Cricket voice that whispers in your ear "Dude, that kindasucks. Keep it to yourself and work on something else instead." Thisvoice is one of an artist's most crucial assets. I think Marshall,deceived by the success of his music with those New Albion typeaudiences, allowed himself to overrule his conscience a few times toooften to maintain credibility. This CD shows that, unlike many otherless than entirely great composers, this wasn't just a problem reservedfor his later years.
The 3 CDs that make up ACIDare packed with extras and b-sides, but overall, it's all pretty raw.It's like the first EP, which makes up the first five tracks on thefirst disc, sung by Mark Coyne (Wayne's brother who later left theband). It's great if you're a fan, with a cover of Sonic Youth's "DeathValley '69," Neil Young's "After The Gold Rush," along with someclassic Flaming Lips songs like "One Million Billionth Of A MillisecondOn A Sunday Morning." The majority of the material from the 3 disc setcomes from the band's first few albums, Hear It Is, OH MY GAWD!!!...The Flaming Lips and Telepathic Surgery.The only concession to space seems to be "Hell's Angel's CrackerFactory," edited down from 20+ minutes to three. Excellent liner notesby head Lip, Wayne, round out the set as a real gem. A cheaper, morecompact overview of the pre-Warner bros. Flaming Lips, 1984-1990, is also available on Restless.Samples:
The Day They Shot A Hole In The Jesus EGG on the other hand, is a 2-disc set made up of the In A Priest Driven Ambulance album (and some extras) and a CD version of the often-bootlegged Mushroom Tapes (demos and outtakes from the In A Priest Driven Ambulanceperiod). The album itself is the first truly great Flaming Lips recordand the last before they went to Warner Bros. and is in many ways, thepinnacle of the Flaming Lips' pre-Warner/punk days. It included theaddition of another guitarist, Jonathan Donahue (later in Mercury Rev)and it was also the first time they worked with Dave Fridman, who wouldhelp the band sculpt itself into what it has become (this album was hissenior year thesis in college.) There are moments of brilliancescattered casually all over the album: the ambient cricket sounds andpassing cars on "There You Are" are because the band recorded theacoustic guitars in the middle of the night in a grocery store parkinglot near a highway; Wayne's off-key singing which give the songs anearnest feel they would otherwise lack; and the use of Jesus as a"something to believe in" stand-in rather than as a religioussignifier. The original In A Priest Driven Ambulance albumclosed off with a lopsided, but very (unintentionally) sweet cover of"What A Wonderful World," but this expanded version has a few moreextras, including a medley of The Sonics' "Strychnine," and "(What's SoFunny 'Bout) Peace, Love & Understanding." The second disc has afair amount of really cool outtakes, including a slide guitar jam thatlater became "There You Are." Also included are the two versions of oneof Priest Driven Ambulance's highlights, "Five Stop MotherSuperior Rain." One is made up of three minutes of feedback drones, theother twice as long and with a lovely piano line, while the original onthe first disc has melodic guitar lines instead of the piano. For abonus disc, it fulfils its purpose remarkably well—alongside the"Priest Driven Ambulance," the discs compliment each other beautifullyin a way that they couldn't alone.
