As far as content on this increasingly death-fixated blog goes, one obit I’ve had more time to think about than usual (not that it’s been called into service quite yet, thankfully) is that of Wilko Johnson, who, as you may have heard, was diagnosed with terminal cancer in December, and played what will most likely be his final live performances back in March.

Last weekend, Radio 6 broadcast a one hour interview with him, interspersed with some tunes, and I just thought I’d do a quick post to point readers in the direction of the programme’s seven day tenure on the BBC iPlayer.

Sounds potentially heavy-going, but trust me – it’s worth making time for. Partly because Wilko is, as ever, a funny, erudite and hugely likeable fellow, and partly because every song he chooses is fucking brilliant. But mostly it’s worth listening to for the final section, in which he discusses his illness. Let’s just say that if any of us can approach our own mortality with a spirit half as level-headed and positive as this guy, we’ll be doing bloody well, and that if you can get to the end of this programme without welling up for a good cry, you’ve got a harder heart than I.

Labels: bad news, BBC, Dr Feelgood, radio, Wilko Johnson

Dear Stereo Sanctity reader -

Hello, I hope things are good with you! Sorry for not writing earlier, but the weather here has got nice finally, and there have been so many things to do! Where to start.... well, what seems like a long, long time ago, we went to see Endless Boogie, and that was great, I had a lovely time, although I felt kinda bad for my friend who came with me, because two hours of Endless Boogie is probably quite a lot of endless boogie for those who are not necessarily that thrilled by the concept of endless boogie. Their lead guy is really something else though – he was funny, and made me laugh. He looks like a mountain troll that just ate Johnny Ramone and took on his characteristics. You’d have loved it. I liked the rhythm guy even better though. He sticks in the background, but he’s the one gunning the engine. I bet the other guys don’t fuck with him. Some folks who are at least partially in Bo Ningen supported that night, with a side project thing I don’t remember the name of, and that was really good too. They did it as improv, but I think they knew pretty well where they were heading– Can and Harmonia and Silver Apples and High Rise and everything, all thoroughly digested and making its way back into the food chain.

Sometime after that we saw a whole weekend of stuff that mainly sounded like the ‘90s, but sometimes the ‘80s, and many faces and guitars passed before my eyes. It was nice, but the one I liked the most was The Black Tambourines, perhaps because I was drunk when they played. They have a silly name that made me think they’d be a bad fake psych band and wear sunglasses, but actually they were ok. They sounded like late ‘90s British-wanting-to-be-American indie-rock that has been left to curdle for a long, long time and got all oily and surly and stopped washing its hair. Mm-mm.

Then we went to see King Tuff two times! What fun! The first time, he was headlining, but he played in a crappy place, where the sound was muddy and the atmosphere grim and it was hard to see. He played good, did lots of hits off “Was Dead” and a few new ones that sounded better than the bulk of the self-titled, but in stark contrast to the big fun show he did at the Shacklewell Arms last year, crowd was d-e-a-d. They finished up ready to do the whole encore routine, and everybody just stood there muttering for about five minutes before someone got the notion to clap and make sound. Bloody people, I dunno. Tell you what, tomorrow night, why don’t I charge you all £8 and herd you into a big dark hole where you can shuffle about in a confined space to yr heart’s content, without a rock band getting in the way.

Sorry! Went off the point a little there! Where were we…. oh yes – have you heard about The Dome in Tufnell Park? You should definitely pay it a visit if you’re ever over here, it’s really nice. We saw King Tuff there again the next night, and things were a lot more fun, even if it was only half past eight. Before him, these young men called Jacco Gardner or something played, and they were alright too, even if one of them did insist on wearing a really unfortunate hat (one of those “if you’re not Lee Van Cleef, don’t even think about it” jobs). They sounded a lot like the ‘60s, maybe lurking halfway between SF and LA, and made me feel like I was at a big old hippy ballroom concert. They didn’t have an electric guitar, which also strikes me as poor decision-making, but I think maybe that was just because the other groups on the bill stole all the guitars and wouldn’t give them back. Boy, there sure were a lot of guitars! For instance, this guy Mikal Cronin and his band were banging away on a total of 28 strings, making this sort of ok-ish afternoon festival rock. I couldn’t really find much in the way of tunes – I fear Mr. Cronin might be a bit of a mumblin’ Kurt Vile-esque time-waster, to be frank - but listening to all the guitars was nice, and they put some effort in, nudging the bar up to ‘good’ for their last few numbers. I gave them some big applause, which I think they earned. Hard work, boys & girls, that’s the key.

White Fence had a lot of guitars too, but oh my days, they were HATEFUL. What a bummer. I mean, maybe you heard some of their records and thought they sounded ok, but don’t be fooled! The man orchestrating this collective looks like a prune-faced, scowling ghost who escaped from Noel Gallagher’s sock drawer, and his dream of perfect music seems to consist of grinding, joyless sheets of ear-hurting guitar treble set to lolloping, sub-Brian Jonestown Massacre type ‘grooves’, playing out in indistinguishable five minute chunks for about fourteen hours. I hear they may be heading your way, so beware. Some beardy nerd guys in the crowd had an actual, nose-bloodying fight whilst they played, that’s how bad the vibes were getting. Come back Jocco Gardner or whatever, I’m sorry I laughed at your hat, please save us from this.

By the time all that was over with, a lot of people had gone off to catch their trains and stuff, which was sad, because Purling Hiss were headlining, and you’ll remember how much I like them! Cos let’s face it, White Fence could have a hundred of their stupid chimy little guitars and they wouldn’t have as much guitar as Mike Pollize is packing just in his own little hands. Everybody was tired, including him probably, but boy did they go for it! Played about the whole of the new record, and just about everything in his earlier discography that could pass for a ‘pop song’, and a wild rip through about six or seven minutes of ‘Almost Washed My Hair’ too, and gee whiz, you shoulda heard him go! The dude was wanking away so shamelessly, I almost felt embarrassed watching it with other people present – total slobbering, face-pulling guitar nonsense, hopping about on his pedals like fucking Riverdance, and I loved every minute of it.

And after all that throbbing masculinity, it was good to chill out by going to see Bleached, whom you might have read about in the free newspapers. They are actual girls, y’see, and two of them were in Mika Miko. They do a chimy, airhead summer guitar-pop thing, but with a big Wipers-y rhythmic undercurrent that knocks Best Coast on their ass, and, whilst I was worried I might find them a bit too cutesy and vacant for my liking, I gotta admit that, live at least, they were bloody great. Simple, fun, satisfying pop/rock music, and if they’re not exactly writing any sequels to ‘Double Nickels on the Dime’, well, so what. Neither are you. Thank god.

In between all that, somehow we found time to go and see Discharge, and The Melvins, which was a laugh. I think. It’s not been out-and-about time all the time though, and at home I’ve been having a nice time listening to Peaking Lights and Quiet Evenings and Black Devil Disco Club and James Brown and Otis Redding and Cheap Trick and Black Mamba Beat and The Undertones and Nancy & Lee. I bought a copy of Neil Young’s ‘Journey Through The Past’, which is a strange one, because side 4 is stuck on the back of side 1, and the second disc has sides 2 and 3, so when the second side I played opened with some hippie guy rambling, then went into a lengthy recording of Handel’s ‘Messiah’ followed by an instrumental Beach Boys song, I was even more confused than I would have been if I’d realised it was side 4. Oh Neil, will we ever fathom your mysteries. The other three sides are pretty good, if you’re keeping score.

I’ve also had a real nice time spinning The Young Fresh Fellows' 1985 album ‘Topsy Turvy’, which I wish I could find on CD or mp3, because some of the songs on it are real crackers, and I’d like to share them with you. ‘The New John Agar’ is a particular favourite of mine, and I’d love to do a cover, if only I was smart enough to transcribe piano songs by ear (as opposed to no songs by nothing).

And that’s about it I think, but oh! How could I forget! Last week we went to Brighton to see Jeffrey Lewis and Peter Stampfel, and it was one of the best concerts I’ve ever been to ever. I mean, it was at least as good as that one I went to a few months back where Brilliant Colors and LaLa Vasquez and Good Throb played on a boat, or – no, actually it was better. They are wonderful guys who play great and funny songs together with much gusto, and it really makes me happy. I think they’d already done a full and satisfying set of their own fine material by the time Jeff busted out ‘Don’t Be Upset’, which I still find really sweet, and then they played Daniel Johnston’s ‘True Love Will Find You In the End’, followed by Hawkwind’s ‘Orgone Accumulator’, and then segued ‘Surfin’ Bird’ into ‘Freebird’, and then Peter came back on and played fucking ‘Goldfinger’ on the banjo! Take note fucking White Fence and whoever, that’s the way to do business, if you want to convey some joy, express some spirit and generally show the folks a good time. Such a great show, I damn near cried.

And so that’s that. I’m sorry to write you such an obscenely long postcard, but there was so much to tell! (I hope you kept the magnifying glass and decoder ring I sent you last time.) I trust that everything’s going well in your music-brain – I know you’ve got that big suspension bridge job to finish, and your dog’s not well, and you’re scared of train stations and only listen to pre-war jazz, but if you ever feel like visiting, we’d all love to see you. Will write soon.

Love & hugs,

That guy who writes the Stereo Sanctity weblog.

Labels: Bleached, Bo Ningen, Endless Boogie, Jacco Gardner, Jeffrey Lewis, King Tuff, Mikal Cronin, Neil Young, Peter Stampfel, Purling Hiss, The Black Tambourines, The Young Fresh Fellows, White Fence

Hey everybody, welcome to the next stop on the non-stop obituary express that this blog has recently become. Our sincerest apologies for the delay in getting you here – had the wrong kind of leaves on the line recently, y’know what I’m sayin’ – but the fact is, nearly a week after news of Jeff Hanneman’s passing, I can’t find anything more profound to say than:


Chances are, if you needed this blog to inform you of the bad news, or to encourage you to dial up ‘Angel of Death and ‘Raining Blood’ on Tubify, something has gone slightly wrong with your life, and you should probably reflect on that. As such, I’m unsure exactly what the purpose of a post like this really is (especially a week late), but let’s try another tack:

Imagine an average student dorm room about a decade ago, occupied by a feeble, nerdy indie kid. Imagine he just bought ‘Reign in Blood’ as part of some 3-LPs-for-£15 deal at a record fair in the local leisure centre, cos he thought all that metal stuff sounds like a bit of a laugh, and maybe he should check some out.

Imagine me five minutes later, prostrate before the turntable in the posture of a martyred saint, catatonic with utter disbelief, unable to properly comprehend the sheer off-the-scale power-hurricane I was hearing.

Ten years and innumerable thrash/death/black/doom purchases & random issues of ‘Terrorizer’ later, it still has the same effect. It’s difficult to speak, let alone stand, by the time ‘Necrophobic’ kicks in.

I’m extremely glad that I got to see Slayer’s classic line-up in full effect a few years back, but very sad that there will be no more Slayer, just when we need berserk teenage rebellion music more than ever.

Well, I mean, there undoubtedly will be tours and merchandise and recordings which carry the name of Slayer – that’s how the metal world works – but as far as I’m concerned, there is no more Slayer. Just as there is no more Stooges, and no more Sabbath, regardless of what the marketing men might like us to think. And what a colossal bummer that is. Makes me wanna…. drop the needle, assume head-banging posture, hope for the best. I’ll leave you guys to peel me off the floor when it’s time to turn over for side #2.

Labels: deathblog, METAL, Slayer

Labels: deathblog, Hipgnosis, record covers, Storm Thorgerson

 So it has come to my attention that this Saturday is ‘Record Store (SHOP, goddamnit, SHOP) Day’.

A theoretically fine and noble occasion - one that is closer to my heart than most self-imposed ‘Days’, but that has in recent years begun to attract more in the way of scorn and cynicism than enthusiasm from its presumed adherents. This has resulted mainly from the growing tendency for established record labels to flood the market with pointless Special Limitied Edition Record Store Day Items (generally of suspiciously slim cultural and aesthetic value), thus fuelling the widespread perception that this Saturday will see all remaining record emporiums flooded from dawn ‘til dusk with hordes of nefarious, tone deaf ebay speculators, blocking the doors and exuding the fetid stench of the grave as they clamber over each other in search of these much-vaunted ‘Special Items’, ruining the calm, rarefied atmosphere of near-bankruptcy that us TRVE music fans seek of an afternoon.

Whether this be truth or fabrication (and it’s more the latter than the former I suspect), the larger independent record shops seem happy to play up to this idea, orchestrating unwarranted events and PR-sanctioned ‘appearances’ to further distract us from our shopping, and generally doing obscene things like hiring Paul Weller to balefully oversee the carnage in the racks, like the drummer on a particularly listless slave galley.

Well friends, I have a simple solution to this – one which I hope will allow us to quietly celebrate and support the fading idyll of the record shop universe without making a fuss about it or succumbing to any of this general palaver.

Firstly, completely ignore the existence of these Special Items. Even on the off chance there is one you simply must own (in which case god help you, but I’m in no position to judge), you’ll probably find it sitting like an unwanted step-child in the 7” bin in Music & Video Exchange within two months tops.

Secondly, do not go to Rough Trade or your local equivalent thereof. Instead, head to some part of town you don’t normally go to, and look for some real down at heel, staffed-by-a-single-creepy-guy second hand record shop - I mean, the kind of ass-backward place where they probably don't even know it's “Record Store Day” and wouldn’t care a hoot if they did. I realise such places are few and far between these days, but that’s precisely the reason we should go out of our way to support the ones that remain. If you live in an urban area there’s probably still one *somewhere* within easy travelling distance of you. Have a think.

So you go to this place, and you do your record-shopping thing. Anyone who began liking music at some point prior to about 2004 will not require any further instruction. And as you do your rounds, and encounter the inevitable ‘maybes’… well today is the day when you’re just going to get them all.

‘Oh, a mid-‘80s Hawkwind LP, but hmm, I dunno, £8…’ = GET IT.

‘I think somebody once told me I should listen to this forgotten early ‘90s band, but hmm, I dunno if it looks like my kinda thing to be honest..’ = GET IT.

‘Wow, I have no idea what this is, but that cover art is unbelievable..’ = GET IT.

And so on.

As a result of your weird, self-serving quasi-philanthropy, the creepy bloke behind the counter will have a good day, temporarily convinced that his struggling boutique still has a role in people’s lives. And you too will have a good day, going to a new(?) place, breaking your usual routine, and heading home to put the kettle on and explore the strange and damp-damaged new world of sound you’ve just bought yourself a slice of. Everyone’s a winner, and the happy tradition of crummy, old fashioned record shopping limps on a little longer. Halleluiah.

Labels: blather, ranting, record shops

I was all set to take the more dignified “well what’s done is done, and it’s never good when people die” line, but then the thought of a bloody city-halting state funeral and nothing good on the radio for a week pushed me back over the edge into pettiness, hatred and childhood bad memories.

Sadly, the kind of morbid, celebratory glee envisaged by Darren Hayman & co doesn’t seem quite the ticket, as her dead-eyed minions continue to dismantle and obstruct everything that was once good & noble about post-war Britain etc etc… but let’s at least hope she doesn’t get retrospectively white-washed by the centre/left press the way Reagan did when he kicked the bucket.

Labels: Hefner, politics, ranting, wrongness

Part nine in my ever on-going series of expanded-definition psyche mixes, I thought for this one we’d get back to basis to some extent by front-loading some hefty chunks of no-bullshit psychedelic rock, leavened as ever with occasional excursions into other realms altogether. Worryingly, a bit of a Charles Manson type theme seemed to be developing mid-way through, so I thought we might as well go all out with it.

Along the way, we’ve got welcome returns from such Msytery Ships/Planes regulars as Angus Maclise, Vibracathedral Orchestra, Delia Derbyshire and the mighty Rallizes, alongside debut appearances from Colosseum, Chuck Cowen, the mysterious Religious Girls, and a young lad called Neil, heard here bumming out a cheery East Coast bar crowd with some seriously heavy vibes. He could far with the right management.

Labels: mixtapes, Psychedelia

Here’s a quick 73 minute mix I put together this month. Often I make a kind of ‘start of Spring’ mix, but as Spring has yet to appear, it’s basically just a bunch of stuff I like that is not really fast rock music, arranged in a manner that pleases me. A few old favourites, a few things I’ve been getting into recently, a few surprises, I hope. There is something of a concentration of tunes with excellent rhythm tracks across the first half, a bit of a weird section through the middle, and something of a downbeat tone towards the end. Nothing deliberate or self-referential – that’s just the way it panned out. Hope you enjoy it.

Labels: mixtapes

Labels: lameness, pissing and moaning, ranting

I was sad to hear about the death of Reg Presley yesterday.

He always seemed like a nice fella, and aside from anything else you’ve gotta love the way he spent all the cash from that number-one-for-a-million-weeks ‘90s cover version investigating UFOs and lost cities and such.

Obviously The Troggs were one of the best and most over-looked psych-thunk, proto-punk, transcendent god-pop beat groups ever – everyone knows that, and if they don’t, they should. From the name on down, they really were the perfect idiot-savant garage band – so good that if they didn’t exist someone would have to invent them.

So do I really need any more excuse to post a bunch of Troggs videos to prove the point? No, not really.

Labels: deathblog, The Troggs

Sorry for taking the best part of a month off. I didn't mean to really... it just sorta went that way. January, y'know.

I have finally, falteringly begun throwing together some new posts which should be ready shortly, but in the meantime;

Whilst ploughing through some other work this evening, I somehow found myself mooching over to 8-Tracks for the first time in years, there to create a sonic impression of how the winter's gone thus far.

Within, you'll find a handful of tracks that could well claim to be 'much loved classics' in this neck of the woods, a lot of heavy rock and very little subtlety... but it is, after all, the fucking winter, and this is the kinda stuff that gets me through the day.

EDIT: It has come to my attention that 8-Tracks were letting adverts run rampant over the simple embed code that was previously in this space, so fuck 'em. The link to my page there is on the list above if you're interested, and in future maybe I'll just share small quantities of unlicensed music the old fashioned way... anyone got some C60s going spare?

Labels: 8 Tracks, lameness, winter

Well this is a nice surprise. Beyond continuing to listen to their old records a lot, I’ve remained largely unfamiliar with the recent doings of the group known as Pelt, but would have guessed that the untimely death of founding member Jack Rose a few years back might have put the kibosh on their activities for good. Not so as it turns out, and here Mike Gangloff and Patrick Best return with two new members, and one of their strongest and most satisfying records since, well… ever? For yes, extraordinary as some of their turn of the century magnum opuses remain, I’d say this one finds a happy space in the ‘career highlights’ sidebar for sure.

Essentially, Pelt’s methodology remains unchanged. Taking on the sonic ideal of LaMonte Young’s Eastern-derived minimalism and disconnecting it from the constraints of both an urban art world context and ‘official’/academic modernism, they instead drive us far, far out of town and, with the distracting background chatter of civilisation duly extinguished, direct our attention instead toward the grand expanse of the American landscape and its primeval history; that natural world which remains oddly under-hymned in contemporary US culture, even as the human aspects of rural life are flattened into direst cliché.

The central presence of stuff like Tibetan prayer bowls, Indian stringed instruments and so on in the band’s arsenal of course serves to draw a direct connection to the Eastern classical traditions that gave initially gave composers like Young a kick up the arse, but in the hands of these men their presence has never seemed gimmicky, or in any way incompatible with the notion of making music that is North American to its very core. Instead, the organic and uncontrived feel of the recordings that emerge seems to evoke a whole world of alternate possibilities, sometimes sounding like the music that might have resulted if explorers from the Indian sub-continent had somehow trekked their way across pre-colonial Georgia, tamburas in hand.

So that’s Pelt for Beginners dealt with, but returning specifically to ‘Effigy’, I won’t do these pieces a disservice by trying to describe them. Instead I’ll simply take the bait and outline the two thematic concerns that the band seem to be addressing herein. The first, as rendered on the rather beguiling cover art, is a contemplation of the mysterious animal-shaped burial mounds that dot the landscape of rural Wisconsin. The second is a requiem for their fallen comrade, as is clearly signalled by the screeching, knotty dissonance of ‘Of Jack’s Darbari’, which opens the record, and, more poignantly, by the brief, somnambulant mist of ‘The Doctor’s Nightcap’, which closes proceedings an hour or so later. The implicit connection between these two themes speaks for itself rather beautifully, and in between: mountains and stars, caverns and lake-beds, ancient dust and newly-birthed forests, and all the stuff you’d expect.

Ok, so it’s a late 2011 release I think, but I was playing this one throughout the first half of ’12, and I liked it a lot.

From February 2012:

"‘Grenzenlos’ is seven songs, all loosely themed around travel and places, and all extremely good. Building on an unapologetically rough bedrock of OD channel guitar, stand-up drumming and this-is-my-speaking-voice-what’s-the-problem-w/-that vocals, Humousexual could be said to kinda split the difference between classic pop-punk, Messthetics amateurism and C86 bounce, but really I think their chief characteristic is more that of making music entirely devoid of affectation. A rare occurrence in rock/pop music, not necessarily always a good thing, but in this case, both disarming and… what’s the word..? ‘Refreshing’, maybe? Ugh, no – makes them sound like mouthwash or something, but I can’t think of an alternative right now – you get what I mean.

There’s a Billy Bragg-esque ‘blokes singing songs about stuff that matters to them’ sorta feel to what Humousexual do, but with the earnestness and miscellaneous twattery that blights most such contemporary ‘folk songs for modern times’ singer-songwriter type ventures cannily avoided – partly through keeping the pace fast and the punk grit foregrounded, but mostly just by being funny and elegantly constructed and generous of spirit and righteous of intent and just, well, good, y’know.

It’s hard to express the extent to which I’ve grown to love the songs on this CD over the past couple of months. Playing them all several times over during a long, cold walk down the Old Kent Road in December, I wanted to clutch them to my heart in some weird gesture of brotherhood, to do *something* to try to express my solidarity with these two voices in my headphones, who seem very much to be rising above the confusion and isolation and cultural disintegration of these dark days, cutting the crap and pressing forward (politically/aesthetically/morally/musically) in the RIGHT direction.”



Another late 2011 release (in fact I think I initially picked up on it via someone’s ‘best of year’ list at the end of last year..), but still feels like a 2012 album to me. In fact, fuck it, until some other bands this good turn up, it feels like a 2013 and a 2014 album too. I hear that Shoppers have already split up, which is a colossal shame, but they certainly made their mark. Beyond all the micro-trends and reheated misanthropy and ebay 7” scrabbling and ‘ask a punk’ elitism that characterise contemporary punk rock, this feels like the future right here, roaring on past. Did you catch a glimpse?

From January 2012:

“I don’t want to become the kind of blog that falls back on overblown macho clichés when considering heavy music, but if you’ll allow me some leeway just this once, this really is the kind of racket that hands you your ass and asks you to sign for it. Terrifyingly viscous, technically accomplished, riot grrl-informed punk rock, recorded in simple ‘room sound’ style, but with the guitar amp cranked to the level of pure noise, the drummer hammering through like a rhinoceros stampede – bloody great serpentine riffs, big landslide rhythms, tons of feedbacking skree, like the ballsiest heavy rock bluster taken on some sort of unheimlich futurist joyride.

Somehow, both the write-ups of Shoppers I’ve encountered so far have concentrated on the lyrics. God knows how loud they’re listening to pick all that up, cos all I’m getting through my earphones is the occasional phrase or two – sounds like fragments of phone conversations overheard on buses, half-hearted fridge-door lovenotes and late night arguments, yelled back in the faces of their proponents with a bitterness that seems to lay bare their craven insincerity. Heavy feelings to accompany heavy music.

Weirdly, the general vibe and production reminds me of nothing so much as Napalm Death’s ‘From Enslavement to Obliteration’ – the sound of a band looking to make things as dense and unapproachable as possible for their listeners, shedding fair-weather fans in seconds. January, February, my listening always falls back on this kinda thing, and ‘Silver Year’ is hitting the spot hard.”

(Psst – you can still get a copy cheap from here.)



It’s an odd process that kicks in each time I initially check out one of these doom/drone/long form psyche type bands. It’s a form I love, but 75% of the time, they lose me immediately. Their basic way of doing business – their groove, in essence – doesn’t connect with me. I just can’t hang with it, and staying the course as they pound it into the ground for XX minutes is unlikely to prove a happy experience. Sometimes things are a bit more interesting, and I’ll give ‘em the benefit of the doubt for a while, see if it grows on me. But then, occasionally, there’s one that just hits me straight between the eyes; that sees a a readybrek glow surround me as soon as the amp noise fades in and the first slow-mo cymbals crash; that has me exclaiming FUCK YES, taking the phone off the hook, lighting the candles, and settling in for a prolonged period of immersion.

Such was the case when I first heard Bong’s extraordinary ‘Beyond Ancient Space’ in 2011. I wouldn’t have thought it possible that they could summon up a more fully realised expression of their chosen sound, and yet here we are a year later, and ‘Mana-Yood-Sushai’ (title taken from the writings of Lord Dunsany, incidentally) does the job nicely.

With a far cleaner, sharper recorded sound than they’ve gone for previously, the two pieces here reveal a more delicate and diffuse side to the band that seems to cut the umbilical cord connecting them to the world of metal almost entirely, setting the controls instead for a wholly self-defined journey in amplified, devotional psychedelia. If the album initially lacks the unified cosmic roar of ‘..Ancient Space’, the upshot is that the contributions of the individual band members, and the inspired heights of their slow motion improvisational interplay, stand out far clearer than before.

Were I writing a longer review here, I’m sure I could bore you with a poorly composed paragraph praising the contribution of each of the band’s four members, before attempting to describe the way they bring it all together… but thankfully for us all, this is just a quick end of year run-down type entry.

So essentially, let’s just say that what we’re dealing with here is four people surrendering themselves to a higher, mightier whole, lost in their own individual sounds, but circling each other all the same, working together at an almost telepathic level in the creation and nourishment of a vast, pulsing, living GROOVE, its contours etched in the listeners’ mind deeper than Saturn’s rings.

I’ve often thought there’s some sort of bullshit thesis waiting to be written on the use of heavy rock as a spiritual/meditational practice. No doubt the members of Bong are sufficiently down to earth to would laugh off such a concept, but in their heart of hearts they must know what they’re doing here, as the roar from the amps hits the air like a thousand trappists giving it their all, and whoever writes that thesis really needs to check this shit out.


This doesn’t really feel like a big, #1 Album of the Year or anything. But as I think I said in my original write-up: good songs, good sound, good performance – sometimes that’s all it takes. I've listened to this one a hundred times, and I’m about to listen to it a few more.

From June:

“Aside from anything else, it’s great to hear a white, male vocalist who sounds like he’s really fucking committed to the idea of being the vocalist in a rock band, rather than just ‘the guy who happens to sing’, delivering these Motown and Big Star informed numbers the way they need to be delivered in punk scene context – big and bellowy, but without being a preening jerk about it or anything, like a detoxed Robert Pollard giving it his best Otis Redding moves.

And as to the band, well… given the style of music they’re aiming for, I could easily see Royal Headache turning into one of those groups who record a really disappointing, over-polished follow-up album with all their vital energy drained out into some gutter behind the studio, gathered up in plastic bags by some unscrupulous sound engineer, watered down and sold back piecemeal to lethargic teenage punk bands (because that’s the kind of thing they do in studios, kids). But for the moment, on this first record, Royal Headache are just fucking ON. Personally I might not have gone with that ultra-trebley Rickenbacker guitar sound, but that’s the dude’s choice and he does good work with it, high-end distortion spreading hither on yon across the to-my-ears-perfect 8-track tape level fidelity, all musicians audible even as everything bleeds everywhere for a big, warm, band-in-a-room sound, amp noise cleaving across into the cymbals on each chorus for authentically headache-y effect.

As I say, this kind of magic rarely lasts long these days, but to all intents and purposes this Royal Headache LP is some real ‘lightning in a bottle’ shit, capturing the rush of a great band just being a great band. And that’s something that’s hard to beat, regardless of where they head in future.”

Labels: best of 2012, Bong, Humousexual, Pelt, Royal Headache, Shoppers

From October:

“Though not quite a concept album (god forbid), there is definitely a strong, overarching theme connecting the songs on ‘Bubblegum Graveyard’, as the record sets out kind of a rough story arc, gleefully exploring a worst case scenario of the assorted perils that could befall unprepared youngsters immersed in the tumultuous world of mid-‘60s American pop culture (21st century retrospective fantasy edition). As the path of that mad decade lurches on blindly, our protagonists find themselves navigating dangerous and uncertain terrain, as the suburban enclave of Archie Comics, candy bars and bubblegum pop slides without warning into a Blue Cheer-soundtracked world of drug-induced revelations, vagrant living and armed robbery, leading inevitably towards the sinister orbit of “The Fried Stranger”, staying one step ahead of the law with his guitar and tape-deck.

The yin/yang of California ‘60s, and the hyper-accelerated learning curve of kids who wanted to make it through the perils of that decade in one piece, has of course been grist to the mill of imaginative songwriters ever since Arthur Lee gave us his view from the front-lines, and Apache Dropout are happy to play merry hell with the pulpier end of that aesthetic legacy, which has rarely sounded as comprehensively creepy as it does here, with “Quaaludes ‘68”s central chant of “this is my life / how do I work it?” sounding all the more plaintive amid the slurred tales of ghosts, blood and drugs that surround it.

[…]
Far more interesting than a mere retro invocation of period clichés, Apache Dropout’s central technique of crafting songs *about* their chosen era of obsession strikes me as an area of vast & vibrant possibility, allowing ‘Bubblegum Graveyard’ to emerge as a real keeper - a record that fascinates more and transports further with each repeated play. As the lyrical details and odd sonic detritus of these songs work their way into your mind, initial reservations about the quality of the recording & performances seem increasingly irrelevant, as the band’s particular headspace starts to feel like an entirely natural and rewarding place to be. Not just a fun, twisted rock record, ‘Bubblegum Graveyard’ is a whole widescreen innocence & experience tale, framed in imagery dredged from the darkest corners of 20th century American mythology… and how many 30 minute garage rock albums do you get the chance to write sentence like that about?”

Labels: Apache Dropout, best of 2012, Mount Carmel, Nu Sensae, The Liminanas, The Necks

One of the best live performances I saw this year was London trio The Choo Choo Trains, in a crowded room full of chattering bodies not paying a great deal of attention. Playing in slow, quiet and determined fashion, the band pretty much ignored their audience and surroundings, building a solid, self-contained universe around themselves amid the chaos, running through a series of skeletal, minor key pop ballads and sad, strange guitar instrumentals, reluctantly allowing us a glimpse into a private world that seemed very special indeed.

From a know-it-all music fan POV, the band possess a kind of wallflower otherness that very much aligns them with Dolly Mixture or The Marine Girls, with a persistent sense of melancholy that seems to come entirely from the latter. But there is nothing deliberately referential going on here. Absolutely none of the contrived scene boosterism or ill-advised C86 nostalgia that so often blights this sort of thing. The world of The Choo Choo Trains seems wholly self-created and self-sustaining. Not precious or arch or garish or ironic, just… simple, and modest, and different. And good, more to the point.

I don’t want to push the naivety angle over-much here, but, rather than carefully composed (ie, boring) album, this lengthy ‘complete recordings’ style tape release is a format that seems to suit this band very well. It has the feel of an unedited collection of things they came up with during a long, long, unhurried practice session, quietly discovering the joy of making music together. And if it could perhaps be argued that, conventionally speaking, we don’t really need to hear a repetitious five minute organ instrumental with snatches of foreign language spoken word (‘Rockabilly Blue’) or an awkwardly executed bit of high school prom night incidental music (‘Something About Dancing’), they all form part of the overall spell being cast, and I’m glad that they are here.

Though the atmosphere remains remarkably consistent across the tape, variety is plentiful. Ramshackle indie-pop bangers (‘Hilma’, ‘Dreaming’), subdued, carefully crafted twangy guitar instrumentals (‘Peppermint Gardener’), hesitant recreations of Buddy Holly-esque heartbroken ‘50s pop (‘Lonely’, ‘(all I Ever Think About is) Rabbits’), eccentric Jonathan Richman style hymns to the everyday (‘Rocket Bicycle’) – all are present and correct.

Touching & inspiring, this is music made with no audience in mind, no real purpose beyond its creators’ own satisfaction. The feeling it conveys reminds me very of such holy documents as Epic Soundtracks’ ‘Debris’ or The Clean’s early EPs – a reassuring flame, and a timely reminder of why I do all this stuff in the first place.

Labels: best of 2012, Getatchew Mekuria, Mi Ami, Motion Sickness of Time Travel, Six Organs of Admittance, The Choo Choo Trains, The Ex

I suppose it makes sense that as the whole Ghostbox thing starts to get a little long in the tooth, the label should begin to expand its aesthetic remit slightly, welcoming in a slightly younger generation on music-makers for whom newly-excavated shadows of the ‘80s form the primary source material, as the hallowed ‘70s fall deeper into the semi-remembered past. Hence: Martin Jenkins, whose work here thankfully rises above his somewhat twee recording moniker, building a familiarly Ghostbox-y nest of retro-spook comforts from… well, you can guess where he’s going be going with this, right?

Yes, cry out in delight or bury your head in your hands as you will, but I’m afraid he’s going to John Carpenter town, and there’s nothing you can do about it. As my Umberto review in the last post will have hopefully made clear, my own reaction to such things is still very much in the former category, so I’m good. To reduce ‘Sleep Games’ to the horribly reductive, “in-a-nutshell” style summary it seems to be crying out for, what’s essentially going on here is Carpenter/Howarth synth action put through a Boards of Canada filter. Obviously there’s more to be pulled out of it should you wish, but basically if that sounds like your idea of a fun time, you’ll probably enjoy it, and if not, well, never mind.

And so things progress exactly the way you might expect: simple, hard-hitting synth lines in the foreground, gradually contaminated and warped by that oh-so-familiar brand of comforting, ordered unease, seeding the clean, sharp angles of the neon & PVC riffs with mossy, overgrown beds of artfully corroded electronic texture, sounds that seem to have been planted by some benevolent library music father way back in the mists of time and left to breed and spread within the depths of some forgotten room-sized analogue instrument… ready for when an ambitious horror movie director finally powers it up again and sits at the keyboard to kick some minimalist ass.

Like those old Boards of Canada records, it’s hard to put your finger on Precisely what it is that makes Pye Corner Audio so compelling – there’s a kind of oblique, impersonal quality to the music, a recognition of the fact that he/they isn’t really doing anything that wouldn’t be wholly expected, given the place and time from which he is broadcasting, and yet, for whatever reason, it works, where so many other contenders breakdown, mired in cheese.

Several track titles (‘The Mirrorball Cracked’, ‘Underneath the Dancefloor’) seem to invoke the kind of ‘curdled rave nostalgia’ / haunted dancefloor aesthetic that so many electronic artists have hooked onto in recent years, but in actuality ‘Sleep Games’ bears very little resemblance to any kind of music people ever danced to – it’s lineage is lonely, bedroom-dwelling electro through and through, with even the zombified Detroit techno of ‘Into The Maze’ coming to us via several brick walls at the very least. The Precinct 13 pulse of ‘The Mirror Ball Cracked’ is unmistakable, with only distant, disembodied groans serving to remind us of the time & intent separating Jenkins from his master, whilst ‘The Black Mill Video Tape’ leads us on precisely the kind of Stone Tape-style ghost hunt the title would suggest, perhaps relocated to some mid-80s LA backlot zone, perhaps overseen by…. yes – ‘Prince of Darkness’! You’re one step ahead of me! And we could play this game throughout the album’s fifty minute duration, right until the distant sirens and ominous synth oboe on ‘Chlorine’ take us outside the city, closing on the more familiarly pastoral Ghostbox stylings of ‘Nature Reclaims The Town’.

Now that Ghostbox have caught up with the era of VHS and Snake Plisskin, who knows what delights await as the reconfigured nostalgia wagon rumbles on? Things are moving quickly, as advance guards in the states are already plundering the most lamentable forgotten corners of the ‘90s for inspiration, and a pertinent question for a few years down the line might be: what the hell do we do when it catches up with now?

Labels: best of 2012, Goat, Lantern, Peaking Lights, Pye Corner Audio, The Caretaker