I wish the ape a lot of success.
Stereo Sisterhood / Blog Graveyard:
- After The Sabbath (R.I.P?) ; All Ages ; Another Nickel (R.I.P.) ; Bachelor ; BangtheBore ; Beard (R.I.P.) ; Beyond The Implode (R.I.P.) ; Black Editions ; Black Time ; Blue Moment ; Bull ; Cocaine & Rhinestones ; Dancing ; DCB (R.I.P.) ; Did Not Chart ; Diskant (R.I.P.) ; DIYSFL ; Dreaming (R.I.P.?) ; Dusted in Exile ; Echoes & Dust ; Every GBV LP ; Flux ; Free ; Freq ; F-in' Record Reviews ; Garage Hangover ; Gramophone ; Grant ; Head Heritage ; Heathen Disco/Doug Mosurock ; Jonathan ; KBD ; Kulkarni ; Landline/Jay Babcock ; Lexicon Devil ; Lost Prom (R.I.P.?) ; LPCoverLover ; Midnight Mines ; Musique Machine ; Mutant Sounds (R.I.P.?) ; Nick Thunk :( ; Norman ; Peel ; Perfect Sound Forever ; Quietus ; Science ; Teleport City ; Terminal Escape ; Terrascope ; Tome ; Transistors ; Ubu ; Upset ; Vibes ; WFMU (R.I.P.) ; XRRF (occasionally resurrected). [If you know of any good rock-write still online, pls let me know.]
Other Place. // One Band. // Another Band. // Spooky Sounds. // MIXES. // Thanks for reading.
Monday, December 23, 2013
Best Records of 2013:
9. Astral Social Club – Electric Yep
(Trensmat)
So I confess I’m in a bit of quandary when it comes to reviewing this one, because, having already marked it up for that all important number # 9 spot, I realise that I only have it on vinyl, and, since I’m now back at my Mum’s place for Christmas, separated from my record player & records, that makes it difficult to follow what would be my usual course of action in a situation like this – that being to neck a few glasses of wine, throw it on and hammer out a pile of subjective, mystic blather, then subsequently seeing how it reads in the morning.
As it turns out, I’m ok for the wine and the blather, but the all-important ‘listening to the record’ bit is proving a challenge. So, for now, I’ll simply have to rely on my memory (never a good idea, especially when it comes to music like this), and just tell you that this is a new-ish LP by Neil Campbell (former main man of Vibracathedral Orchestra), and that it’s bloody brilliant.
I realise that Campbell has put out something like a million records already under the Astral Social Club name, but for some reason it’s been far too long since I checked in with what he was up to, so a chance purchase of this LP proved a suitably invigorating reintroduction, being as it is perhaps the best thing I’ve heard from him since the days of Vibracathedral. In general, I guess we find him hear operating in similar maximalist territory to Matthew Bower’s Sunroof project, or the brighter bits of the Campbell Kneale / Birchville Cat Motel catalogue, only somehow sounding a lot more joyous and approachable than either, laying out some background loops of mind-crushing primitive night club thump , then wrangling massed layers of out of control electronic noise and frippertronic kosmiche guitaring over the top, creating wonderful, dense, impossible tangles of sound to fascinate and delight the curious. Oh, and there’s a jew’s harp in there too somewhere, I seem to remember.
Basically listening to this, I get the image of a man in a small room, wrestling endlessly with massed tendrils of fizzing electrical cables, all animated by some strange, Akira-like intelligence. But y’know – in a nice way. The record label page for the release (linked below) contains a vast amount of praiseful blather of the kind that I can’t possibly try to compete with without the record at hand, so… I’ll direct you over there for further adventures in the reckless use of audio / verbal metaphor, but needless to say, I like this album a hell of a lot.
You can listen to a six minute ‘sampler’ and weep for the fact you didn’t buy this LP whilst it was available via Trensmat records.
Labels: Astral Social Club, best of 2013
Comments:
Post a Comment
Archives
- 05/01/2004 - 06/01/2004
- 06/01/2004 - 07/01/2004
- 07/01/2004 - 08/01/2004
- 08/01/2004 - 09/01/2004
- 09/01/2004 - 10/01/2004
- 10/01/2004 - 11/01/2004
- 11/01/2004 - 12/01/2004
- 12/01/2004 - 01/01/2005
- 01/01/2005 - 02/01/2005
- 02/01/2005 - 03/01/2005
- 03/01/2005 - 04/01/2005
- 04/01/2005 - 05/01/2005
- 05/01/2005 - 06/01/2005
- 06/01/2005 - 07/01/2005
- 07/01/2005 - 08/01/2005
- 08/01/2005 - 09/01/2005
- 09/01/2005 - 10/01/2005
- 10/01/2005 - 11/01/2005
- 11/01/2005 - 12/01/2005
- 12/01/2005 - 01/01/2006
- 01/01/2006 - 02/01/2006
- 02/01/2006 - 03/01/2006
- 03/01/2006 - 04/01/2006
- 04/01/2006 - 05/01/2006
- 05/01/2006 - 06/01/2006
- 06/01/2006 - 07/01/2006
- 07/01/2006 - 08/01/2006
- 08/01/2006 - 09/01/2006
- 09/01/2006 - 10/01/2006
- 10/01/2006 - 11/01/2006
- 11/01/2006 - 12/01/2006
- 12/01/2006 - 01/01/2007
- 01/01/2007 - 02/01/2007
- 02/01/2007 - 03/01/2007
- 03/01/2007 - 04/01/2007
- 04/01/2007 - 05/01/2007
- 05/01/2007 - 06/01/2007
- 06/01/2007 - 07/01/2007
- 07/01/2007 - 08/01/2007
- 08/01/2007 - 09/01/2007
- 09/01/2007 - 10/01/2007
- 10/01/2007 - 11/01/2007
- 11/01/2007 - 12/01/2007
- 12/01/2007 - 01/01/2008
- 01/01/2008 - 02/01/2008
- 02/01/2008 - 03/01/2008
- 03/01/2008 - 04/01/2008
- 04/01/2008 - 05/01/2008
- 05/01/2008 - 06/01/2008
- 06/01/2008 - 07/01/2008
- 07/01/2008 - 08/01/2008
- 08/01/2008 - 09/01/2008
- 09/01/2008 - 10/01/2008
- 10/01/2008 - 11/01/2008
- 11/01/2008 - 12/01/2008
- 12/01/2008 - 01/01/2009
- 01/01/2009 - 02/01/2009
- 02/01/2009 - 03/01/2009
- 03/01/2009 - 04/01/2009
- 04/01/2009 - 05/01/2009
- 05/01/2009 - 06/01/2009
- 06/01/2009 - 07/01/2009
- 07/01/2009 - 08/01/2009
- 08/01/2009 - 09/01/2009
- 09/01/2009 - 10/01/2009
- 10/01/2009 - 11/01/2009
- 11/01/2009 - 12/01/2009
- 12/01/2009 - 01/01/2010
- 01/01/2010 - 02/01/2010
- 02/01/2010 - 03/01/2010
- 03/01/2010 - 04/01/2010
- 04/01/2010 - 05/01/2010
- 05/01/2010 - 06/01/2010
- 06/01/2010 - 07/01/2010
- 07/01/2010 - 08/01/2010
- 08/01/2010 - 09/01/2010
- 09/01/2010 - 10/01/2010
- 10/01/2010 - 11/01/2010
- 11/01/2010 - 12/01/2010
- 12/01/2010 - 01/01/2011
- 01/01/2011 - 02/01/2011
- 02/01/2011 - 03/01/2011
- 03/01/2011 - 04/01/2011
- 04/01/2011 - 05/01/2011
- 05/01/2011 - 06/01/2011
- 06/01/2011 - 07/01/2011
- 07/01/2011 - 08/01/2011
- 08/01/2011 - 09/01/2011
- 09/01/2011 - 10/01/2011
- 10/01/2011 - 11/01/2011
- 11/01/2011 - 12/01/2011
- 12/01/2011 - 01/01/2012
- 01/01/2012 - 02/01/2012
- 02/01/2012 - 03/01/2012
- 03/01/2012 - 04/01/2012
- 04/01/2012 - 05/01/2012
- 05/01/2012 - 06/01/2012
- 06/01/2012 - 07/01/2012
- 07/01/2012 - 08/01/2012
- 08/01/2012 - 09/01/2012
- 09/01/2012 - 10/01/2012
- 10/01/2012 - 11/01/2012
- 11/01/2012 - 12/01/2012
- 12/01/2012 - 01/01/2013
- 01/01/2013 - 02/01/2013
- 02/01/2013 - 03/01/2013
- 03/01/2013 - 04/01/2013
- 04/01/2013 - 05/01/2013
- 05/01/2013 - 06/01/2013
- 06/01/2013 - 07/01/2013
- 09/01/2013 - 10/01/2013
- 10/01/2013 - 11/01/2013
- 11/01/2013 - 12/01/2013
- 12/01/2013 - 01/01/2014
- 01/01/2014 - 02/01/2014
- 02/01/2014 - 03/01/2014
- 03/01/2014 - 04/01/2014
- 04/01/2014 - 05/01/2014
- 05/01/2014 - 06/01/2014
- 06/01/2014 - 07/01/2014
- 07/01/2014 - 08/01/2014
- 08/01/2014 - 09/01/2014
- 09/01/2014 - 10/01/2014
- 10/01/2014 - 11/01/2014
- 11/01/2014 - 12/01/2014
- 12/01/2014 - 01/01/2015
- 01/01/2015 - 02/01/2015
- 02/01/2015 - 03/01/2015
- 04/01/2015 - 05/01/2015
- 05/01/2015 - 06/01/2015
- 06/01/2015 - 07/01/2015
- 07/01/2015 - 08/01/2015
- 08/01/2015 - 09/01/2015
- 09/01/2015 - 10/01/2015
- 10/01/2015 - 11/01/2015
- 11/01/2015 - 12/01/2015
- 12/01/2015 - 01/01/2016
- 01/01/2016 - 02/01/2016
- 04/01/2016 - 05/01/2016
- 06/01/2016 - 07/01/2016
- 07/01/2016 - 08/01/2016
- 10/01/2016 - 11/01/2016
- 11/01/2016 - 12/01/2016
- 12/01/2016 - 01/01/2017
- 01/01/2017 - 02/01/2017
- 02/01/2017 - 03/01/2017
- 03/01/2017 - 04/01/2017
- 04/01/2017 - 05/01/2017
- 05/01/2017 - 06/01/2017
- 09/01/2017 - 10/01/2017
- 11/01/2017 - 12/01/2017
- 12/01/2017 - 01/01/2018
- 01/01/2018 - 02/01/2018
- 02/01/2018 - 03/01/2018
- 03/01/2018 - 04/01/2018
- 04/01/2018 - 05/01/2018
- 05/01/2018 - 06/01/2018
- 07/01/2018 - 08/01/2018
- 08/01/2018 - 09/01/2018
- 09/01/2018 - 10/01/2018
- 10/01/2018 - 11/01/2018
- 11/01/2018 - 12/01/2018
- 12/01/2018 - 01/01/2019
- 01/01/2019 - 02/01/2019
- 02/01/2019 - 03/01/2019
- 03/01/2019 - 04/01/2019
- 04/01/2019 - 05/01/2019
- 05/01/2019 - 06/01/2019
- 06/01/2019 - 07/01/2019
- 07/01/2019 - 08/01/2019
- 08/01/2019 - 09/01/2019
- 09/01/2019 - 10/01/2019
- 10/01/2019 - 11/01/2019
- 11/01/2019 - 12/01/2019
- 12/01/2019 - 01/01/2020
- 01/01/2020 - 02/01/2020
- 02/01/2020 - 03/01/2020
- 03/01/2020 - 04/01/2020
- 04/01/2020 - 05/01/2020
- 05/01/2020 - 06/01/2020
- 06/01/2020 - 07/01/2020
- 07/01/2020 - 08/01/2020
- 09/01/2020 - 10/01/2020
- 10/01/2020 - 11/01/2020
- 11/01/2020 - 12/01/2020
- 12/01/2020 - 01/01/2021
- 01/01/2021 - 02/01/2021
- 02/01/2021 - 03/01/2021
- 03/01/2021 - 04/01/2021
- 08/01/2021 - 09/01/2021
- 10/01/2021 - 11/01/2021