The Mothers of Invention

'Tis the Season to be Jelly
Foo Eee Records



I used to own a few of these Beat The Boots/Rhino Foo-Eee series of Zappa bootlegs, but parted with them because the sound was either putrid or simply not as entertaining as their studio album or legitimate live releases. I did hang on to this one as it's rather good and is also a spotlight on my favorite configuration of The Mothers.
And this is a good example of what rock critics used to write about the Mothers; the wacky amalgam of Classical, jazz and 50's hit parade crap. Also, it seems Zappa boots are all the rage, and I don't see this one around yet. Here's a much better review of it (from The Daily Vault) than I can muster:

But what sets this album - and, for that matter, The Mothers --apart from everything else is the mixture of music that they play onstage. From the shuffle-waltz tempo of "You Didn't Try To Call Me," Zappa leads the band into a portion of Stravinsky's"Petroushka," and instantly transforms a classical work into a catchy pop number. (Hardcore classical music fans would call this sacrilege; I call it introducing a form of music to a newaudience.) If this weren't enough, the band segues from "Petroushka" to "Bristol Stomp," then into "Baby Love"...finally into "Big Leg Emma," all without skipping a measure or leaving a noticeable seam. This, my friends, is Talent.

The highlight of Tis The Season To Be Jelly is an early performance of The Mothers' jazz-rock masterpiece "King Kong," including a brief description of the song from Zappa. Admittedly, "King Kong" is the type of song you must show some patience to get through, but in the end, it's well worth it, and may even open up some people's minds and ears to the world of jazz.

Although, I disagree with his assessment of King Kong. I could listen to a whole album of versions of that song.

Track List:

1. You Didn't Try to Call Me
2. Petroushka
3. Baby Love
4. Big Leg Emma
5. No Matter What You Do (Tchaikovsky's 6th)
6. Blue Suede Shoes
7. Hound Dog
8. Gee
9. King Kong
10. It Can't Happen Here

Get it here.

Updates and cool finds

Hi everyone.
How are you?
I'm feeling alright. Enjoying a very casual Saturday, eating hot Indian curry and posting.
Been doing some thinking about reorganizing the way I do posts and uploads. I noticed quite a lot of downloads but not a lot of comments, other than problems with unzipping. I don't know what I can do about the latter, but the former makes me wonder about putting up a password. I just want you - my loyal readers - to be able to download my shares, rather than let folks sniff them out the back door. Let them suffer through my long-winding posts just like 'yall.
What do you think?
I'm also not sure what to make of Rapidshare's impending shortening of share shelflife. It might really change the whole Sharrity blogosphere considerably. Any thoughts or ideas on that?
Also, if you find that one of my shares has expired, be sure to say which one when commenting. I have blogger enabled to tell forward comments to my Email, but it doesn't always tell me which post it comes from. So often I get an anonymous request to re-up, but don't know which file. It speeds up the process for both of us. I will try to re-up as soon as I can, but will probably only do it on a request basis, unless it's one I feel got lost in the shuffle and should be heard.

I just got through watching The Devil and Daniel Johnston, so may post some. It's a very moving film which I recommend. I was always kind of on the fence about his music, but now find that I like it a lot.
GPOD has it as a bittorent, if you are so inclined.

Are Friends Electric has been posting some very cool late eighties/early nineties dance/industrial, including a band I've been looking for and - until now - not been able to find: Tackhead. He just put up one of my lost faves Friendly as a Handgrenade. I was looking for this stuff when I did my feature on bands like Consolidated, EBN and Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy, as they're very much in the same milieu. He's got the goods here.

Mr. Lo-Fi Jr. has got another fantastic contender for the title of Ugly Atonal Eighties, with Madison Wisconsin's Tar Babies. I used to play their awesome We Are the New Poor incessantly. He has two albums by them, as well as a swell write-up. Go check it out.

Stefan over at Moodswings Music has been on a World music spree, sharing lots of great stuff. He even put up soem Transylvanian Gypsy music, which I find really interesting, being on a Balkan, Eastern European kick lately.

I'm also on a Cabaret Voltaire kick, and One2zero is holding. He's got their fantastic 2x45 album up, one of the last of the Chris Watson lineup. He saved me from having to rip my vinyl of it and for that I'm eternally grateful ('cuz I'm a lazy bastard).

Our favorite Evil Doer has put up another band I plum forgot all about - but who nevertheless rock, The Nomads.
They are great in a way that so many modern psychobilly bands aren't. Give 'em a listen and tell me I'm wrong.

As the season changes while we slide into October, I dark plans for this site. I will repost some scarier music, will rerun last year's Kill Ugly Radio Halloween podcast and finally put out a new one. Halloween is my favorite holiday, and I want to keep it dark and scary and not let the crazy X-tian conspiracy exorcize it of it's darkness.
That's right, the War On Halloween has begun. Do you know that some schools don't let kids celebrate halloween? How will they ever find darkeness?
In that light (hehe) i was delighted to find that someone has posted Art Zoyd's Nosferatu soundtrack.
NNW list devotees One of the Lists is Bending Up has got it here.

That's it kids...
See ya real soon.

Flipper

Sex Bomb Baby
Infinite Zero



By popular demand, I bring you the 1995 posthumous compilation of odds n' ends from the tragically short career of Flipper. It's a crime against humanity that they are no more and so many lesser bands are still chugging away, collecting money, selling T-shirts, etc...
Kids these days.
Contained herein are various live bits, B-sides, compilation cuts, and -of course - an old lady who swallowed a fly. I guess she'll die.

"Forget it, you wouldn't understand anyway...."
(reupped 12/16/06)

Laibach

John Peel Sessions
Strange Fruit



In 1986 and 1987 Laibach recorded two sessions for the late John Peel's radio show which weren't released until 2002. With the exception of Krvava Gruda - which sounds indistinguishable from that available on Nova Akropola- all songs are vastly different than we've heard them performed before. Life is Life, which many would hear later on Opus Dei, sounds much slower - with a greater reliance on keyboards than in previous incarnations of this band - and Milan Fras' voice is a hoarse croak. But the real shocker is Leben Tod, which rocks harder than anything that they've ever done before or since, with razor sharp guitars and gut-pounding bass.
For some reason Ti, Ki Izzivaš has become a song called Krvoprelitje. Who knows why? There's even a track performed from Baptism Under Triglav.
An interesting document that catches Laibach in the crossroads between their Croation Slovene-sung, dark industrial music and their Germanic, pop song skewering phase.

Tracklist:

1. Krvava Gruda - Plodna Zemlja
2. Krst
3. Life Is Life
4. Leben-Tod
5. Trans-National
6. Krvoprelitje

Life is Life
(re-upped 12/25/06)

UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #7: Flipper

Blowin' Chunks
ROIR



In all that I can't believe that I forgot to post any Flipper, the band that may have spawned the genre in the first place. The Butthole Surfers have long stated this Bay Area band as a major influence. Poison 13's fuzzed and out of tune guitars sound like Flipper on a good day.
I can't really explain the oversight, or how I managed to ransack my CD shelf and skip over both this and Sex Bomb Baby, another great Flipper LP.
This one wins out because it's live presentation is even more menacing and fucked up than anything else they've recorded and also contains my favorite song 'Life' ("the only thing worth living for...").
Snap it up, Chuck.

Get it?
Re-upped 10/12

Happy Sharetime Shoutouts

Hi 'yall...
I have gotten a few unfortunate instances of people being unable to unzip some of my ups.
I'm not sure what to do at this point. I may switch to another method, but don't really have the time to do simultaneous uploads (i.e.; having both Megaupload, Rapidshare in the same post.).
But what I need to know is if people are actually being able to unzip them at all. Not to whine, but the only feedback I seem to be getting is from those who are unable to unzip them. My stats say that lots of downloading is going on in any given share, but I can't imaging that all of them are broken, eh?. Casual browsing of other sharrity blogs suggest that there is a certain margin of error where this is concerned. I'd like to do what I can to minimize it as much as is practically possible, but if no one's able to enjoy the shares, I may as well fold up my little lemonade stand and pack it away.
Don't make me write a feedback form....

UPDATE:
An anonymous visitor reports the following:

"I clicked "repair archive" function on WinRar and it worked for me, I was able to extract the files from the repaired .zip, yes as you might have guessed, on a pc..."

Hope that advice turns out to be handy for some of you...

Chu Ishikawa

Tetsuo - The Iron Man Soundtrack
Japan Overseas



Music from Shinya Tsukamoto's synapse bursting Tetsuo movies. The bulk of the songs are from the second flick, The Body Hammer and most appear to be adaptations of themes and motifs from the movies themselves, rather than the songs actually used in the films, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.
Megatron is a grand reworking of The Iron Man's theme, featuring Ishikawa's precise industrial percussion and martial rhythms. The faux-Arabic keyboard sounds on Mausoleum are a lot more restrained here, but the song is expanded out to a regular length - something Tsukamoto's unconventional cinematic narrative style and brain-fry editing don't allow. Jerked out of their surreal celluloid context, it's easier to scrutinize Ishikawa's musical style, even if his sounds and his director's images seem inextricably linked.
Nice. I'm really glad I found this.

"Sakoi!"
(re-upped 12-10)

Various Artists

Return of the Living Dead Soundtrack
Enigma/Restless 1985















Pretty hokey by today's standards, but this punked out (1985-style) soundtrack to one of the first zombie movie revival flicks - and a pretty hot one to boot- was a really big deal at the time. Not only did some very cool acts on the Enigma label get some mainstream exposure, it was the first thing that we heard from The Cramps for at least a couple of years, after IRS stranded them in some contractual gulag. Their Surfin' Dead was a taste of the madness to shortly come when they unleashed A Date With Elvis a year later. Another hot-shit track is The Flesheater's Eyes Without a Face, where Chris D sounds like he's gargling Liquid Plumber.
There's a few pre-Goth horror punk staples; the Damned make an appearance, as well as the vastly overated TSOL. 45 Grave do a metal anthem that would make Quiet Riot proud. Sheesh, it's hard to believe that this is the same band that did White Cross or I Got Fucked By the Devil! SSQ embarass everyone one with a few songs that were dated sounding (whomp-whack electronic drums) ten minutes after they were cut.
Another truly amazing track is Roky Erickson's Burn the Flames, used to great effect in the film.
This soundtrack went out of print awhile back, and even cassettes of it fetched high prices for a spell. Mine is a little odd - not too surprising considering that I dredged it up from Russian sources - in that it includes the title music, not seen on any issues of the album. Hmmm.

Track list:
1.) Main Title -- Matt Clifford
2.) Surfin' Dead -- The Cramps
3.) Partytime (Zombie version) -- 45 Grave
4.) Nothing For You -- TSOL
5.) Eyes Without A Face -- The Flesheaters
6.) Burn the Flames -- Rocky Erickson
7.) Deadbeat Dance -- The Damned
8.) Take A Walk -- Tall Boys
9.) Love Under Will -- The Jet Black Berries
10.) Tonight (We'll Make Love Until We Die) -- SSQ
11.) Trash's Theme -- SSQ

I think it's been picked up by Ryko, and may or may not be OoP again.

"BRAINS..."(rs)
re-upped on 10/12

Problems Unzipping?

I've gotten two or three meassages from folks who haven't been able to unzip the last couple of downloads from me.
Is this happening to many people? I doubt it.
87 people downloaded the Butthole Surfers Rembrandt Pussyhorse, and two people replied, if only to say that they couldn't get them unzipped. I don't often download mine to see if they are OK, but when I do, they are alright and I end up having to wait an hour to download something else.
I have updated my zip utility - Stuffit, which has been prompting me to update for a week or so - but I don't think that's it.
Anybody hear of some Mac/Stuffit vs PC/Winzip incompatibilty issue?

If you've been successful at unzipping files from me recently, give me a shout-out.
If you continue to have problems, let me know.
Assuming that the majority isn't having any problems, I'm not sure what I can do.
I am open to suggestions....

Cabaret Voltaire

Johnny Yesno Soundtrack
Mute















Cabaret Voltaire's soundtrack to Peter Care's film I've never seen about a junky. Chances are you've never seen it either. However, it's a great all instrumental album, featuring the last of the Chris Watson lineup - if I'm not mistaken. Having Cab Volt work in the soundtrack genre lets them stretch out compositions and frees them from the constraints of rhythm and beats, although Taxi Music sounds like mutant jungle music. A nice diversion, and a last taste of weirdness before Watson left for a career in television and Mallinder and Kirk went into poppier (albiet still very weird) dance oriented music.

Johnny Yesno

BTW: The awesome one2zero has got the entire 2x45, two disc EP up for us to download. It's probably one of the best of the early dance-era CV. Check it out, as well as his other top-notch shares.

Diamanda Galás

Plague Mass
Mute















Fantastic live album of Galás performing The Plague Mass, recorded at The Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York. It's a culmination of efforts from her earlier albums that indict those who would sweep the AIDS epidemic under the rug and - like many of her pieces - she channels buried victims and lends them a voice.
Harrowing, to say the least.
Here's a snip from a wikipedia article on her:

Susan McClary writes that Galás, "heralds a new moment in the history of musical representation," after describing her thus: "Galás emerged within the post-modern performance art scene in the seventies... protesting... the treatment of victims of the Greek junta, attitudes towards victims of AIDS... Her pieces are constructed from the ululation of traditional Mediterranean keening...whispers, shrieks, and moans."

Utilizing the Book of Revelations, Leviticus, Galás intones pronunciations on the wicked, all the while stripped to the waist and drenched in (apparently real) blood. In a Catholic Cathedral.
If you've ever had the fortune to see her perform live, it's an experience you won't soon forget. Her multi-octave voice is truly stunning and she's one of few performers I've seen who really undergo a frightening transformation onstage.
Difficult listening to be sure, but rewarding nontheless.

This is the law of the plague
(@320kbps - 150 megs!)

Butthole Surfers

Rembrandt Pussyhorse/Cream Corn from the Socket of Davis
Touch and Go














By request, The Butthole Surfers' follow up to Another Man's Sac...
Not much to write about it. It has much more finesse and polish than the latter album, and was produced by Kramer (Shockabilly, Bongwater...), who also plays some organ on it. Not too bad.
Also includes the EP Cream Corn from the Socket of Davis, featuring the crazy college radio staple Movin' to Florida.

UPDATE: Here's a re-up of Rembrandt Pussyhorse.
If this doesn't work, I don't know what I can do for you. I tested it on someone's PC and it worked fine.
Hopefully it's just a fluke.

Laibach

Tanz Mit Laibach (EP)
Mute



In anticipation of a forthcoming Laibach Album* (Volk, due Oct. 23rd), I present Tanz Mit Laibach, the advance single from 2003's WAT. Tanz was Laibach's answer to George Bush's New World Order - or was it? As usual, you can't take Laibach product at face value. They apparently mock authority systems and methods by imitating and assimilating them. Here they praise German/American relations (and namecheck D.A.F. in the credits) with the frightening couplets:

Amerikano Freunde,
und Deutscher Kamerad,
wir tanzen gut zussamen,
wir tanzen nach Bagdad!

Stylistically the song sounds a lot like DAF's Der Mussolini and also Der Sherriff, their own Gulf War indictment. Lyrics also mention the dictator characters from Chaplin's The Great Dictator (Ado Hinkel, Benzino Napoloni). Included on this single are four rather radical remixes of the song by Slovene DJs Temponauta, Zeta Reticula and others .

EINS, ZWEI, DREI, VIER (@320 kbps)
re-upped on 10/14 (megaupload)

* I plan on upping a few rare Laibach items until the new album is out. Hopefully no one is too offended by them. Even if some folks 'get' Laibach's act, I also understand that their look, imagery and even lyrics can offend some, especially those of you in the EU. I feel that way with some Death-folk and Darkwave stuff that use Germanofilia and Nazi motifs as an overall look/sound.
Thanks for understanding.

Robert Fripp

Exposure
DGM



Robert Fripp emerged from his music biz exile (where he taught guitar to lucky students for a few years) to play on a few Bowie albums ( with Eno) and to produce one for Peter Gabriel. Somewhere along the way, he ended up in New York and recorded a fantastic solo debut. However, it became his problem child, as his vocalist Daryll Hall's record label didn't think it was an appropriate product to link their employee's image with. Subsequently it was released with fewer vocals by Hall and more with Peter Hammill and Terre Roche and a different mix of guest Peter Gabriel's Here Comes the Flood. Unhappy with the results, Fripp and others allegedly lent out tapes of the original version, probably spawning bootlegs versions.

This is an album I've wanted to own for years, but has eluded me at every turn. When I finally found it on CD, it's mix -and , hell even versions - varied from what I'd heard on the radio, back in the eighties. Honestly - and not to get into some kind of movie director's cut-type debate - I like both versions. Although this album makes me really admire Daryll Hall a lot more, I don't know of any song that smokes as much as Hammill's version of Disengage. When listening to Exposure, I pick some from column A and some from Column B, because even if they didn't suit Mr. Fripp at the time, the compromise album is great as well. It's Fripp at his poppiest, most experimental and - dare we say - punkiest. He's never done another album quite like this.

I'm always a little hesitant to post something new and obviously in print, but feel that everyone who's into Fripp ought to check this out, and has probably -and will continue to - go out and buy it for themselves. Plus the liner notes (with Fripp diary entries) are swell, to boot.

24-bit Remastered version - 2006, ripped @ 320kbps

Exposure (First Edition)
Exposure (Third Edition + bonus tracks)

Links removed per request.

Warning! Super-mega post below

Ugly Atonal Eighties Series
Wherein I attempt to document a little slice of time and place in the crawl to the new millenium around a segment of bands who shared a similar style and/or lyrical outlook.

The post punk American landscape spawned some mighty ugly music. Festering out of the hardcore punk scene, and perhaps due to punk establishing an orthodox, perhaps even fundamentalist ethos, bands came around that truly sounded threatening again.

It starts here:

Kill Ugly Index:
UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #1: Butthole Surfers
UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #2: Killdozer
UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #3: Scratch Acid
UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #4: Big Black
UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #5: Poison 13
UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #6: Shockabilly

This is a work in process and might be ongoing. your only warning.
If anybody would like to add to this, or see a glaring ommision, feel free to drop comments in this post and I'll respond accordingly as time allows.

UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #6: Shockabilly

Colosseum
Rough Trade



Contemporaneous detractors aside, Shockabilly were one of the great unsung heroes of the ugly, atonal eighties. They beat the Butthole Surfers to the windowpane-acid spiked punch bowl and could out-goon the Cramps on any day.
Actually, most critics of the band seemed to center on guitar molester Eugene Chadbourne's Muppet-on-DMT vocal stylizations, which is understandable and difficult to defend. But in today's musical pantheon, he doesn't sound all that out of place say next to Les Claypool, nor do they sound as hickoid-on-bathtub crank as, say Bob Log III or countless psychobilly cats.

My favorite Shockabilly record, hands down, is Colosseum, their second full-length album.
Here they've edged away from country and rockabilly (save a hilarious take on Roger Miller's Dang Me) and move straight into psychedelic rock and retardo sludge.
The semi-autobiographical The Secret of the Cooler is one of the most beautiful ugly songs I've ever heard. The album also features more original songs by both Chadbourne and Kramer than on their debut EP and subsequent album. A Chadbourne original, Hattisburg Miss. is one of the straightest things this trio has ever committed to vinyl. Eugene really cuts loose on a version of the Byrd's Eight Miles High with a fat, overdriven solo which at times sounds like Robert Fripp channeling the late, great Sonny Sharrock.
Sadly, Eugene Chadbourne claims Shockabilly was one of his least favorite projects and Kramer has apparently desecrated the mixes on subsequent reissues of the Shockabilly catalog he put out on his Shimmy-Disc label.

Secret of the Cooler

Note: This is a repost from earlier last month - a ringer, if you will.

UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #5: Poison 13

Wine is Red, Poison is Blue
Sub Pop



Yet another Texas band (fercrissake! - is it in the water?!) is Poison 13, a Cramps n' Blues influenced unit that crawled out of the Big Boys fetid remains. Don't let the blues leaning scare you off though - it's somewhat more in the vein of Gun Club, though without the histrionics of that outfit. Poison 13's outlook was exceedingly dank, and best typified by vocalist Mike Carroll's (ex-Big Boy roadie) wounded coyote yelp. The fuzzed n' scuzzed guitars of Bill Anderson and tasteful slide work by Tim Kerr , as well as some swell bass playing, drive the swampwater tinged songs along nicely. Covers abound. Bands as diverse as Joy Division, The Troggs, The Sonics and blues standards get the P13 treatment. Doubtless this band was a big influence not only on later grunge rockers, but also today's psychobilly set.
Like a lot of the albums in this mega-post, this is a compilation of LP's and EP's of the type that lots of labels were doing in the early nineties, but stopped doing in favor of individually packaged, 'Remastered' editions. Yeah, right. Snap it up.

Wine Is Red, Poison is Blue

UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #4: Big Black

Hammer Party
Touch and Go



Big Black came out of nerd-boy and later recording engineer-god Steve Albini's solo taping project. He later found partners in crime in Jeff Pezzati and Santiago Durango (both veterans of the excellent Naked Raygun). Operating without a proper drummer - rather a drum machine they dubbed Roland, the trio made some of the most fucked up noise imaginable, albiet in a very disciplined, orderly manner (especially compared to the rest of the Ugly Atonal Eighties). Obvious influences of Gang of Four, The Pop Group and Wire notwithstanding, Big Black had one of the most innovative, original sounds of the post-hardcore punk era. Their precisely coordinated bass and drum pummeling, as well as Albini's beautifully, messed up, scratchy guitar and lyrics dealing with first-person character studies of depravity made BB a truly distinctive band. Ever the abrasive fellow, Albini's lyrics, album cover and song title choices assured they'd always be controversial figures. One Ep (the aptly-named Headache) featured a grotesque mortician slab photo of a shotgun suicide hatchet victim's head. A late LP was entitled Songs About Fucking. Despite all this, Albini's lyrics and magazine writing were intelligent and above most shock-rock agitators that would engage in such antics. Albini went on to form the not-too-dissimilar Rapeman and Shellac.

Hammer Party
Re-upped 10/12

UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #3: Scratch Acid

Greatest Gift
Touch and Go



Scratch Acid came from the same Austin scene from which the Butthole Surfers festered out of and also shared a record label (Touch & Go) with Killdozer. Scratch Acid's sound was driven by some propulsive bass playing and a guitarist (David Wm. Sims) capable of frenzied riffing one moment and middle eastern fingerings the next. But the real selling point was the aptly named David Yow's manic singing/shrieking/hysterical screaming. Yow's lyrics dealt with all kinds of psychotronic imagery and deviations of every sort. The core of 'Acid eventually morphed into The Jesus Lizard, a not-much-less manic unit that traded during the grunge era.

Greatest Gift is a compilation of their first EP and subsequent album.

Greatest Gift

UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #2: Killdozer

Intellectuals are the Shoeshine Boys of the Ruling Elite / Snakeboy EP
Touch and Go



Arriving around the same time as the Buttholes, but from Madison Wisconsin, was Killdozer. Killdozer's sound was driven by repetitive beats, a plodding, pounding bass, a fuzzy, wall of sound guitar and frontman Michael Gerald's guttural, hilariously unlistenable vocals. Most of their songs were in a first-person, demented point of view (usually that of a menacing, brainless redneck). Cover songs - amusingly mutilated - figured predominately in their early outings and became more of a feature (even dedicating one album - Burl- to folk musician Burl Ives) until the band split up in 1990 (there were reunion gigs, natch). Many of their songs dealt with cannibalism, murder and going to the beach. I remember playing the last mentioned song when I lived with my parents and my mom kept thinking something horrible was going to happen in it because of the ominous nature of the music, but they lyrics were just about going to the beach:

"We're goin to the beach today, just me and mom and dad..."

Intellectuals are the Shoeshine Boys of the Ruling Elite
(re-upped 12/16/06)

UGLY ATONAL EIGHTIES SERIES #1: Butthole Surfers

Psychic, Powerless... ...Another Man's Sac
Fundamental



The post punk American landscape spawned some mighty ugly music. Festering out of the hardcore punk scene, and perhaps due to punk establishing an orthodox, perhaps even fundamentalist ethos, bands came around that truly sounded threatening again. Some - like the Butthole Surfers - had strong, chemical fueled psychedelic leanings. The Buttholes came out of the already fertile Austin Texas scene and released a pair of EPs on Alternative Tentacles (Brown Reason to Live and the PCPEP - virtually a live recreation of the former). Their sound is driven by manic twin drummers (literally!) and some loopy, frenzied psychedelic guitar work by Paul Leary. By the time of their first full-length LP, they mastered a grungy (long before it became a household word, it described music such as this - I kid you not!), vomit-tinged sound from some dank dungeon. Formerly un-punk elements such as backwards tape manipulation, loads of guitar effects and Gibby Hayne's (offspring of a TV kiddie-show host) patented megaphone vocal distortions (now de-riguer among generic rockers) all made for bad trip to nowhere that had me wearing out the disc. Strictly apolitical, nothing is sacred with the BH's. Lyrics were meaningless and scatological and were stream-of-conscious in a way that would be unsuccessfully imitated by later grunge-munchers. The Buttholes are true originals.

Psychic, Powerless...

Robert Fripp

Gates of Paradise
DGM



A spooky, yet ethereal soundscape piece by Fripp, recorded in 1996. Fripp's Soundscapes have evolved way past No Pussyfooting and Let the Power Fall; they are much more symphonic in nature and feature many more layers of delay than of those in the past. This one is darkly beautiful, dealing as it does with the afterlife and the imagery suggested by the titles (that being passing through gates and/or planes of existence) fit the music perfectly. Fripp projects falling guitar figures (although it rarely sounds like guitar here) into the aether and they float off in the darkness. At times it sounds like the soundtrack to a frightening horror movie, without becoming schlocky or unrelentingly scary.
Breakdown of the four tracks as follows (from Elephant Talk):

1 THE OUTER DARKNESS

• 5'02 i The Outer Darkness
• 1'19 ii Perimeter I
• 0'58 iii Perimeter II
• 1'58 iv Wailing I
• 1'15 v Perimeter III
• 3'26 vi Wailing II
• 1'23 vii Perimeter IV
• 3'05 viii Wailing III
• 4'05 ix Black Light
• 1'01 x A Wailing And Gnashing of Teeth

2 THE GATES OF PARADISE

• 5'22 i Abandonment to Divine Providence
• 8'34 ii Pie Jesu

3 THE OUTER DARKNESS

• 10'17 xi In Fear And Trembling Of The Lord

4 THE GATES OF PARADISE

• 6'53 iii Sometimes God Hides
• 4'48 iv Acceptance

Gates of Paradise (@256 kbps)

Links removed by request.

King Black Acid and The Womb Star Orchestra

Sunlit
Cavity Search Records



First rate stoner music from Portland's King Black Acid, who I posted about here.
Just three long, slow songs that bring to mind Meddle-era Pink Floyd. This is - in my humble opinion - KBA's finest moment, and bridges their earlier experimentalism with their latter poppier, alt-rock attempts.

"Everyone knows you get high..."

Rachid Taha

Made In Medina
Barclay Records



I don't often find good music at the Goodwill (a chain of charity-run thrift shops here in the colonies), but did this afternoon.
It's Rachid Taha's Made in Medina, a great techno-Raï-Arabic fusion album. I have been keeping an eye out for Taha's stuff since hearing bits of him on the BBC and after his concerts with Brian Eno. Taha has a rich, husky voice and he sounds great in this beat heavy mix, which was produced and arranged by none other than Steve Hillage. Some of the standout tracks (so far - i just got it and haven't stopped listening to it since) are Barra Barra, Qalantiqa and Hey Anta.
Here's a bit from Wikipedia on him:

Rachid Taha (born 1958 in Oran, Algeria) is a French-Algerian musician. His music is influenced by many different styles such as raï, techno, rock and punk. Based in Paris, France where he began his solo career after his beginnings as the leader of the French rock band "Carte de Séjour", he is the only rocker singing in Arabic. Politically-engaged, he has always stood up to defend democracy, tolerance and altruism against racism, communitarism and discrimination.

So far I really like Taha's music and hope to run into more soon. I keep playing his version of The Clash's Rock the Casbah and understand that he performed it live with Eno and Mike Jones recently. There is a DVD available of the Stop the War concert that they all did recently (along with Imogene Heap, among others).

Made in Medina

Bonus:
Rachid Taha - Rock El Casbah (mp3)

A Nice Show About Kittens and Pies

Boomtown Rats - Whitehall 1212
Syd Barrett - Gigolo Aunt
United Mutation - Lice Flies and Vermin
Tornados - Telstar
The Fall - Squid Law
Peeping Tom - Mojo
Motorhead - Overkill
Midnight Oil - Tin Legs and Tin Mines
Karen Finley - Party Animal
Freddy K and the Breeze - Clean Friends
Flamin' Groovies - Slow Death
Chu Ishikawa - Metal Succubus' Dance
Bijelo Dugme - Kad bi' bio bijelo dugme
Suicide - Johnny
Paul Giovanni - Willow's Song
Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds - Wanted Man
Modern Lovers - Pablo Picasso
Magazine - Model Worker
Les Rita Mitsouko - C'est Comme Ca
Godley & Creme - Sandwiches of you

Play as stream

Mike Patton

Adult Themes for Voice
Tzadik



For some reason I keep thinking I already posted this.
Perhaps it's because it reminds me of Marc Ribot's Book of Heads. Like that album, this one really isn't what you expect from the artist. This is singer Mike Patton (Faith No More, Tomahawk, Mr. Bungle, Fantômas, etc..), while on tour in hotel rooms simply making noises into a tape recorder, and then processing the results ala Musique Concrete. I personally find it pretty damn amusing, even though this album has nearly everyone I've played it for completely annoyed. The best way I've found to listen to it is to have it in an MP3 player (or your computer's jukebox) on random, completely dispersed throughout other selections.
Petula Clark's Don't Sleep on the Subway, Darlin' will never sound the same again, after being sandwiched between Porno Holocaust (my fave) and Red Mouth, Black Orgasm.

Orgy In Reverb (10 Kilometers Of Lust)

Weird DC Hardcore

Hiya.
Been too damn busy to do much, having just returned to work and have a pile of crap to get caught up on.
Here's something that I'd given up looking for, but found the other day:
It's United Mutation, a weird thrash-metal punk band that recorded an EP (Fugitive Family) in the mid-eighties.
They are a very bizarre, horror-tinged outfit with cartoonish vocals and everything is drenched in reverb. Frankly, I found this stuff spookier than contemporaries The Misfits; it's psychedelic metallic sludge riffing and the Linda Blair/Evil Dead type singer sounds much scarier than Glenn Danzig's cow-with-a-cattle-prod-up-the-rectum crooning anyday, even if I really liked the 'Fits, back in the eighties.
M³ over at Ochlokratie 2.0 has got a compilation of UM's output and another DC band, Malefice - whom I always thought were some Japanese band for some reason - up and ready for you to download.
Go check out his great post on them here.
Check it out to see the weirder side of 80's hardcore.

Various Artists

Mesomorph Enduros
Big Cat Records



A slice o' time compiled by Jim (Foetus) Thirwell.
15 very noisy (or otherwise deviant) bands show the more abrasive side to early nineties rock, just to show it's not all about flannel, stagediving and soul-patches. This comp really defines the AmRep/Matador/Touch & Go aesthetic of that era as well, as typified by Jesus Lizard's Stub, Of Cabbaages & King's horrific The Reign and Tad's Pig Iron. This is a dank, noisy trip to the gutter all round. Many of these tracks appear elsewhere, but it's a great standalone sampler of Mr. Foetus's favorite (circa 1992) noise mongers that went straight to the cutout bins and shortly disappeared forever.

Track Listing

1. Cop Shoot Cop - Room 429
2. Melvins - Vile
3. Jesus Lizard - Nub
4. Hammerhead - Louse
5. Helios Creed - Sister Sarah
6. Tad - Pig Iron
7. Foetus Inc. - Incesticide
8. Thinking Fellers Union Local 282 - Nothing Solid
9. Laughing Hyenas - Candy
10. Drunk Tank - Hog Ditch
11. Pain Teens - Hands in Fire
12. Of Cabbages and Kings - The Reign
13. Barkmarket - Johnny Shiv
14. Unsane - Bath
15. Motherhead Bug - Blister

Mesomorph Enduros

Greg Sage

Sacrifice (For Love)
Restless



Greg Sage's second solo album, recorded after relocating to Arizona.
The difference between a Sage solo record and a Wipers album are relatively minor; save that his solo output tends to be composed mainly of ballad-ish material that pops up from time to time on Wipers outings. His weird, distorted and warbly guitar is usually toned down in favor of delicate acoustic work or gentle, Southwestern tinged modes. It also helps that the songwriting is better here than on 1985's Straight Ahead, which seemed unsure of itself, and somewhat lackluster. Here the songs seem more heartfelt and Sage displays the beautiful side of his utterly distinctive guitar style.

Sacrifice
Re-upped 10-14 (megaupload)

V/A: Fourteen Songs for Greg Sage and the Wipers

Tim Kerr Records



Keeping with the Portland beat for a bit more...
The Wipers were one of Portland's best bands, period.
If you don't believe me, go buy any of their P-Town recorded output (everything up to Land of the Lost, if i'm not mistaken), and give it a spin. Actually, any of Sage's records are worthy of multiple spins, but for the academic spiel I'm layin' on you, the first four will suffice. Can't find any? Slobodan at Only In It For The Music has got you covered here, here and here. Snap 'em up and give it a listen, Pete.

In 1993 Tim Kerr Records put out a tribute album (and aren't we sick to death of those yet?) dedicated to Greg Sage's songwriting - both in the Wipers and in his solo records. Almost every act on the disc (it was formerly issued as a boxed set of 7" records) is from Portland (Poison Idea, Napalm Beach, Dharma Bums, Hazel, etc.) or is a Portland Alumni or neighbor (Nirvana, Hole). As with most tribute albums, some play 'em straight, while others choose to reinterpret them in a unique manner. The Whirlies turn the repetitive grind of Land of the Lost into a galloping, funky death-knell and Crackerbash plays a medley of sorts. The big pull will be Nirvana's take on Return of the Rat, which is available elsewhere and suffers from being by Nirvana.
Fellow P-Towners Poison Idea's take on Up Front is a scorcher.

Sage cut quite a figure, scene-wise, whilst he was here (he's relocated to Arizona). He was often at other band's shows when not performing, looking like a gaunt zombie without really trying. I once ran into him at Sandy Barr's Flea Market (in the Portland Wrestling Arena) and was too stupid to say anything more than that I really liked his music. I always got the impression that his local fame made him uncomfortable.
It's good to see that his post-Northwest output is still really good.

Get it now

Dead Moon

Strange Pray Tell
Music Maniac (Germany)



Fred Cole, his wife Toody and Andrew Loomis have been cranking out their acid-drenched brand of punk rock scuzz for nearly thirty years now. Allegedly inspired by seeing The Ramones for the first time, long-time band veteran Cole sought out to interpret their fury in a unique way. Dead Moon's take on punk (which owes as much to the sixties, Sonic/Wailers era as it does that mid-seventies band of brothers) can only come from the Northwest - perhaps it's the mold from the constant rain or from inhaling way too many Douglas Fir needles.
I don't know for sure.
1992's Strange Pray Tell is recorded in glorious mono, probably cut right to a record lathe in the Cole's music store/label headquarters Tombstone Music. I once traded them an odd sixties guitar for a fuzzbox and the couple got into a heated squabble about the lineage of the old axe (it was a Kay-built Silvertone, Toody informed me), but that's another story.
If you're familiar with Dead Moon, you are in for a treat. If not, imagine the Seeds meets the Ramones on some very bad windowpane acid and cheap wine.

Room 213

For Korpus!

Hitting Birth

Thirst of the Fast Three Years
Tim Kerr Records



Compilation of assorted odds n' ends from Portland Industrial heavyweights Hitting Birth Family Circus.
There's tribal drumming and scrap metal percussion to spare, as well as pounding, driving bass on top of the spacey electronics. The unit - which reeks as much of patchouli as they do industrial-strength gear oil - incorporates elements of surrealism and Dada as well as Hip Hop. There is ample evidence to suspect that they were aided and abetted by the mighty Smegma, another Portland institution. This is a savage document of another time and place and a weird artifact of the aggro-industrial period as filtered through P-Town's hippy-dippy sensibility.

Kiss of the Last Three Tears

King Black Acid

Womb Star Sessions
Cavity Search Recs.



Portland Oregon band King Black Acid grew out of the remains of the great Hitting Birth Family Circus as frontman Daniel Riddle's solo project. It eventually picked up members and gained momentum as a spacey, post-rock outfit that recorded four studio albums, a movie soundtrack (The Mothman Prophecies), yet ultimately succumbed to the implosion of the post-Nirvana Northwest scene.

Their first recorded document was a great, live in-studio album recorded at KBOO and broadcast live over the air in 1995.
Opening the set is a lengthy, meditative track that sounds like Tibetan Buddhist's devotional chanting in outer space, followed by the beautifully repetitive and hypnotic Aloha. The remaining two songs (Alone on Mars, Autumn) feature Riddle on vocals and - like much of KBA's subsequent output - are rather reminiscent of Meddle-era Pink Floyd.

Womb Star Session @320

Vacation time

Hi all,
I am taking my sons to the coast for a couple of days and so shall disappear of the radar screen till Monday or so.
After Wednesday, I go back to the grind after nearly ten glorious days of leisure, blogging and bamboo wrangling.
See ya,
Rich

In the meantime, go here and check out this guys mixes - freaking fantastic!

Renaldo & The Loaf

Elbow is Taboo
T.E.C. Tones



In response to an anonymous contributor's gift of R & L's Songs for Swinging Larvae, I offer up 1987's Elbow is Taboo. It's a great, characteristically messed up mish mash of faux-ethnic music, grammatically skewed spewings and sampledelica. Most of the songs sound like national anthems from far flung nations in some bizarre alternate universe planet earth. Extracting the Re Re sounds like the bastard offspring of Muslimgauze and My Life in the Bush of Ghosts.
From Brian Poole's liner notes to the 1993 CD edition:

We were fired up by intriguing phrases like 'The Elbow is Taboo', 'Here's To the Oblong Boys' and 'A Street Called Straight'. In the instance of 'Hambu Hodo' that was seen on the side of a distressed fast-food wagon where some of the letters from 'Hamburgers/Hotdogs' had fallen off; so, naturally, the lyrics had to be equally distressed. 'Boule!' was recorded for a project by the French band Ptose, who invited us to produce a cover version of their song about an itinerant dog. Similarly, 'Extracting the Re-re' was prepared for a touch tapes (UK) project on ritual.
Each song attempts to tell its own story, be it a child's desire to control (A Street Called Straight), the ridiculous purdah of an innocent part of the body (The Elbow is Taboo), a call for help in times of angst (Here's To the Oblong Boys), the rigours of a bread fetish (The Bread Song), the anger of a dance teacher to the terminally inept (Critical/Dance) or a ritual call to prayer, somewhere (Extracting the Re-re).

Personally important is that each song is also a distinct memory of a time, place or observation; a diary of the odd scenarios and obtuse thoughts that, back then, went buzzing through our heads.

It's a great addition to their Ralph output, even though some modern (for 1987) electronic instrumentation (drum machines, 80's pre-programmed synths) make it all sound a bit dated.

Here's to the Oblong Boys