howdy all,
you know, even when it happens on a weekly basis, i’m still somewhat shocked and annoyed when ups decides once again to not deliver one of my shipments on time. oh well, less work for me today, twice the work tomorrow. anyway, if you haven’t noticed, christmas is creeping up quickly. if you are looking for something specific, be sure to come pick it up sooner than later as it will get harder in the next couple of weeks to get some stuff back in before christmas.
…..pick of the week…..
*omar souleyman – leh jani – sham palaces – lp
- first release on sham palace, a new label from key sublime frequencies conspirator mark gergis. “leh jani” — the legendary omar souleyman track — was originally released in syria as a sprawling 30-minute epic groove, alongside two additional tracks. the entire 60-minute cassette album was recorded live to tape in 1998 at the home studio of producer zuhir maksi in the village of ras al ain in northeastern syria. many of omar’s early tapes were recorded in this fashion to replicate the feeling of his live wedding party performances while minimizing the inherent recording chaos and distractions of those parties. the full track — featured here, reveals plenty more twists and turns from synth and saz during its hypnotic course. “leh jani” appeared in slightly edited form on the original syrian-issued tape, which was distributed throughout the country for a short period of time. the song was further truncated for omar’s debut western compilation, highway to hassake and a concurrently assembled internet video clip of the track helped earn omar his first attention in the west. the album begins with a lively introduction followed by a majestic mawal, before showcasing the incredible uptempo and previously-unreleased “salamat galbi bidek.” all tracks are embellished with the virtuosic folk stylings of longtime collaborators rizan sa’id on keyboards and hamid souleyman on electric bozouk. this complete version of the original leh jani cassette album features an hour of music, and ensures an all-night syrian dabke party no matter where on earth you rest the needle.
…..new arrivals……
13th floor elevators – rockius of levitatum – vinyl lovers – lp
- “to fully understand and appreciate a band like the 13th floor elevators, one had to see them play live, preferably more than once–the reason being that no two elevators shows were ever alike, ranging from brilliantly euphoric to unbelievably catastrophic. of course, the unevenness of their performances was due to one small but powerful thing called lsd. this collection of live tracks gives those of us who weren’t there during those halcyon days of psychedelia, a taste of just what lofty heights (and hellish depths) the elevators were capable of reaching.”
acid baby jesus – lp – slovenly – lp
- ”the debut full length tidal wave from greece’s acid baby jesus, simply titled lp. abj represents the future of heavy psych’n'roll from an isolated, ancient civilization. combining the ruthless elements of american outlaw roots music and celestial glam rock, like fellow deconstructionists demon’s claws, lp suggests the rolling stones at their wearied best, with the electrifying hi-jinks of brian eno bulldozing the swagger into the darkest corners of the cosmos.”
aura – aura (sativa) – lion – lp
- a san francisco psych-funk band that formed in 1974 and played extensively throughout northern california. by 1976, the band recorded their first and only album at pacific recording studio in san mateo. the original title of the album was meant to be sativa, but out of fear that promoting the joys of marijuana would be too controversial, the band omitted the title and just left it as aura. over the ensuing decades, the aura album has grown in stature to become a major soul/funk collector’s item. high quality vinyl reissue, printed on old-school tip-on jacket.
*batsumi – s/t – matsuli music – lp
- “a 1974 masterpiece of spiritualized afro-jazz, and a prodigious singularity in the south african jazz canon. there is nothing else on record from the period that has the deep, resonant urgency of the batsumi sound, a reverb-drenched, formidably focused pulse, underpinned by the tight-locked interplay of traditional and trap drums, and pushed on by the throb of zulu didis mesmeric bass figures. the warm notes of johnny mothopengs guitar complete a soundscape that is at once closely packed with sonic texture and simultaneously vibrating with open space, and in whose shimmer and haze themba koyana and tom masemola soar. a sonorous echo emanating from an ancient well, reverberant with jazz ghosts and warmed by the heat of soul and pop, batsumi is nothing short of revelatory.”
black keys – el camino – nonesuch – lp+cd/cd
- the much anticipated, and oddly timed new album from this monstrous rock duo. you probably don’t need me to sell you on this one, do you?
carol of harvest – s/t – guerssen – lp
- germany, 1978. absolutely early ’70s-sounding progressive and psychedelic folk-rock masterpiece of the first order. entirely sung in english by an incredibly young female vocalist, beate krause, only 16 years-old! long tracks with excellent, killer acid guitar solos, and moog. if you like groups like mellow candle or pentangle, there’s no doubt you need to purchase this one fast. often praised as “the best prog-folk record ever,” this is an absolute classic of the genre.
*eddy detroit & sun city girls – eddy detroit meets the sun city girls – ammit – 7″
- “this release features three tracks recorded in various locations in the phoenix area in the mid 1980s. two of these tracks have never been released.” uh… awesome!
foo fighters – s/t – legacy – lp
foo fighters – the colour & the shape – legacy – lp
- reissues of these two albums from this band with the guy that played drums in that other band…
*tim hecker – dropped pianos – kranky – lp
- now available on vinyl!! “sketch pieces recorded in 2010 in preparation for what would become the ravedeath, 1972 album. all of the compositions are piano driven and minimal in nature. this is not a new album, but rather a peek behind the curtains into the working process. that these pieces stand on their own as compelling soundworks is a testament to the fact that tim hecker is at the absolute top of his game at the moment, and has been for years.”
*howling hex – wilson semiconductors – drag city – lp/cd
- “one guitar, four songs, a multitrack recording unit. out of the desert and into the mountains, the howling hex are at large once again, upping the ante by lowering the body count this time around. they wager that you’re the gambling type. if you’re still reading this, you’re curious at least. very curious.”
sharon jones – soul time – daptone – cd
- a “black friday” release… 12 unreleased live favorites and 45 b-sides from the reigning champions of soul.
king dude – love – dais – lp
- “dark pagan-fueled folk wrapped tight with outsider americana, steeped in themes of love, death and redemption. drawing sound influence akin to death in june and sol invictus but sewing together a hybrid of true folk tradition alongside woody guthrie and johnny cash. limited to 500 hand-numbered copies.”
king midas sound – without you – hyperdub – cd
- ‘waiting for you’ returns now as ‘without you’, transformed by a raft of carefully chosen collaborators (including scritti politti’s green gartside, kuedo, flying lotus, gang gang dance, and kode9 & the spaceape). radical reinterpretations that follow somewhat in the tradition of reggae, in the same way that the original ‘waiting for you’ album did.
lewlewal de podor – yuulo jaam – mississippi – lp
- hailing from northern senegal, lewlewal de podor is a pulaar guitar centric band that draws from the folk stylings of fouta toro. featured on last year’s compilation ishilan n-tenere, their first ever full length ranges from mellow acoustic jam sessions to electrified hip shaking concerts. comes with booklet and portrait studio photo. old school “tip-on” cover.
los campesinos! – hello sadness – arts & crafts – lp/cd
– “the fourth album from the welsh indie rock conglomerate. hello sadness’ 10 tracks cover what we are coming to recognize as core los campesinosconcerns – love, loss, heartbreak, football (always football). but this is a record that’s wiser and more focused than its predecessors, confident in its abilities and clear in its aims. los campesinos! at their most melodic, direct and exhilarating.
louvin brothers – satan is real – light in the attic – lp
- “bolstered by one of the most celebrated and startlingly unique record covers ever, 1959′s satan is real delves into a strange netherworld of country that no longer exists. touching on the louvin’s fire and brimstone southern baptist upbringing, the title track’s spoken recitation proclaims the existence of the devil himself. thought by many to be the pinnacle of the louvin brothers’ recording career. it’s certainly an album you’ll never forget.
*master musicians of bukkake – twilight of the kali yuga tours: live totems 2009-2011 – important – lp
- “master musicians of bukkake present a collage of performances from recordings made throughout the totem tours. improvisations and live renditions featuring extended versions of music from totem one, two and three. all on glorious vinyl! limited edition of 1000 copies pressed. selected, mixed and mastered by randall dunn.”
geoff mullen – accidental guitars – rel – lp
- “a new side of his ever-changing and open language, dealing here with his rawest material to date, and in many ways finding himself in a homecoming to the guitar. with little more than an electric guitar, he conjures abstract formations and clattering percussive tones that are starkly contrasted with tape hiss and sudden echoplex’d delay. sustains calm the mood throughout and create a beautiful and oddly soothing atmosphere that seems to move in all directions at once.”
*paul ngozi – the ghetto – shadoks – lp
- “paul ngozi (nogozi means danger) with his band gave a popular voice to what later was called ‘zamrock,’ a cool fusion of older african rhythms and ’70s rockish underground modes — never too polished, but with a tightness that might have made anglo groups up in London sit up and take notice. the guitars are razor-sharp here which sounds great next to the harder rhythms at the bottom, and the album’s mix of english and zambian lyrics. you will love this one if you liked the witch and amanaz.
thee oh sees/total control – split – castleface – lp
– hailing from melbourne, australia, total control destroy with a wicked follow up to their first lp/masterpiece henge beat. hard psych guitar based tracks and floating and dark keyboard centered pieces make this a well rounded feast for your southern hemisphere hungry ears. while the oh sees return with 4 revised, live, full band versions of four faves that sweaty kids have learned how to writhe to and old chin-scratching music hoarders have proclaimed as “not bad.” it’s raw and all speaker-melty—and holy shit, it comes with a free download so you can pour it in your ear at the gym
pink fairies – what a bunch of sweeties – polydor – lp
- originally released in 1972. “sweeties is a mystifying jumble of tracks as exuberant as they are shambolic, though resonating for most of the time with a simple clarity of feeling and passion. …for all its inconsistencies, sweeties just might be a more punk statement than one may have initially guessed… and at top volume it’s damn near undeniable.” — the seth man
pyramids/horseback – a throne without a king – hydrahead – lp+7″
- “a sprawling beast of unique nature – at once beguiling, terrifying and completely immersive. a more successful pairing of experimental-metal-drone-
ambient-krautish-noise-rock collaborators you are unlikely to find, in our reality or any of its parallel relatives. exclusive individual tracks from both participants, combined with their 45 minute collaborative sonic mass in four parts.”
ralfe band – bunny and the bull ost – ghost ship – lp
- “with their acclaimed original soundtrack to british feature film
bunny and the bull, ralfe band create a magical, inventive and atmospheric journey, with enchanting melodies and beautiful instrumentation featuring piano, guitars, electronic pieces and classical themes, alongside folk and gypsy influences with mandolin, accordion, viola and brass.”
sally smmit and her musicians – hanaghar – drag city – lp
- “surrealism raised its willfully mutated head on the third groovy release,
hangahar. claiming to be the soundtrack of the film
hangahar, the album was inspired by a casual demonstration of a made-up sung language. the groovy gang broke out the oscillator and any other synth devices they had on hand (along with a kitchen cabinet full of impromptu percussives) to back up the operatic overtones of the mysterious eponymous chantueses via drones, riffs, chanting and, with reverb pots fully open, loads of ominous atmosphere throughout.”
ty segall – singles 2007-2010 – goner – lp
- now available on vinyl!
jet-packing around the indie / garage cosmos for the last four years, ty segall has done too many singles and eps and split records and shared records and albums and cassettes to count. goner brings you a double-album of tracks culled from segall’s massive out-of-print catalog—plus some stuff that never made it out in the first place.
pete shelley – sky yen – drag city – lp
- “these groovy releases represent some of the farthest-out sessions on the wild-to-begin-with late-70s manchester scene. the second of the lot was actually the first to be recorded, back in 1974. the material wasn’t exactly easy listening/ambient style — it was raw waves of oscillator tones, wildly leaping up and down and stretching out into a pair of twenty-minute pieces. thirty years of electronics-saturated music culture lends perspective to the appeal of
sky yen — the album’s edges are still jagged and sharp.”
smack – s/t – shadoks – lp
- “recorded in late july and early august 1968 in lawrence, kansas usa. great covers played with extra heavy fuzz guitar, vocals, bass & drums. killer versions of cream and hendrix the whole album (very well produced) has a one of a kind psychedelic feel. there are not many cover albums which gives you another perspective on those known songs”
smashing pumpkins – gish – emi – lp
smashing pumpkins – siamese dream – emi – lp
- super fancy reissues of these two classic 1990s albums. remastered and all that jazz.
andy stott – passed me by/we stay together – modern love – 2cd
- two acclaimed albums from andy stott available for the first time on cd, including four bonus tracks. taking influence from an array of seemingly incoherent noises, these tracks create their own pace and agenda, largely shying away from the dancefloor in favor of something more complex and hard to define.
strange men in sheds with spanners – s/t – drag city – lp
- “after the pubs closed, pete brought back a motley crew of usual suspects and special guests, broke out the synths, drums and what-have-yer attitude, resulting in a wealth of additional material that provided private listening pleasure for the groovy alumni over the years. culled from francis cookson tapes, these pieces make a fourth groovy installment that features a bent towards more disciplined rhythm pieces scored with a very purposeful array of synthetic sounds — truly the lost next new wave of groovy, finally crashing on our ready shores in 2011.”
*sunn o))) – 00 void – southern lord – cd
- a much needed reissue of their massive second album from 2000, which was remixed by nurse with wound and recently released on vinyl as ‘the iron soul of nothing’. heavy.
*talk talk – laughing stock – ba da bing – lp
- back in stock!!! we managed to dig up a nice little stack of this essential reissue. most of these are already spoken for and gone, so don’t think about this, get it today!!
*various – boddie recording company: cleveland, ohio – numero – 5lp/3cd
- from 1958 to 1993, the industrious boddie recording company issued nearly 300 albums and 45s, recorded 10,000 hours of tape, and remained in operation longer than any other studio, pressing plant, or label group in the history of cleveland. long forgotten even by the standards of the chronically overlooked northeastern ohio music scene, boddie was a fusion of its owner’s engineering genius and his limited economic means; its diy recording studio housed in a humble barn, churned night and day to capture the sounds emanating from cleveland’s east side neighborhoods. the 58 tracks on these three cds (or 65 track 5lp) represent the best of the boddies’ in-house soul kitchen, luau, and bounty labels, which released an unspoiled treasure trove of kitchen-sink eccentric soul, fuzzbox funk, shoestring doo-wop, and haunted, eerily hook-laden spirituals. enclosed inside is a mountain of office-styled ephemera: two massive booklets brimming with detail on the boddies and their artists; extensive notes and scores of unpublished photos; a complete detailed discography folio; reproduced fliers; and a boddie greeting card—all rendered with the handcrafted charm that was the boddie hallmark. call it a self-contained record industry crammed into one box.
*various – eccentric soul – the nickel & penny labels – numero – lp/cd
- chicago’s richard pegue was one of the most intriguing figures to come out of the chicago soul scene in the 1960s and 1970s. raised during the city’s fertile doo-wop era, pegue immersed himself in music immediately. the nickel and penny labels featured in this compilation are twin sides of the same eccentric coin, pegue himself. he was the writer, arranger and producer of some of the most beautiful chicago soul records in the ’60s and ’70s; too bad they all went out of print weeks after being released.
…..restocks…..
bjork – biophilia – nonesuch – 2lp
black keys – chulahoma – fat possum – lp
*can – tago mago – spoon – 2cd
*karen dalton – it’s so hard to tell… – light in the attic – lp
dinosaur jr – green mind – rhino – lp
dinosaur jr – s/t – jagjaguwar – lp
dinosaur jr – bug – jagjaguwar – lp
dinosaur jr – you’re living all over me – jagjaguwar – lp
dum dum girls – only in dreams – sub pop – lp
electric wizard – dopethrone – rise above – lp
electric wizard – witchcult today – rise above – lp
far east family band – nipponjin – phoenix – lp
fugazi – instrument soundtrack – dischord – lp
fugazi – red medicine – dischord – lp
fugazi – steady diet of nothing – dischord – lp
helmet – strap it on – original – lp
*mark hollis – s/t – ba da bing – lp
howlin’ wolf – moanin’ – doxy – lp
*thomas koner – nunatak/teimo/permafrost – type – 3cd
metallica – kill ‘em all – elektra – lp
*metallica – master of puppets – elektra – lp
metallica – and justice for all – elektra – lp
ministry – ke*a*h** (psalm 69) – rhino – lp
nirvana – mtv unplugged in nyc – geffen – lp
oh sees – carrion crawler – in the red – lp
*om – conference of the birds – holy mountain – cd
real estate – days – domino – lp
*steve roden – i listen to the wind… – dust to digital – 2cd+book
rural alberta advantage – departing – paper bag – lp
she & him – a very she & him christmas – merge – lp/cd
*soft boys – underwater moonlight – yep rock – lp
*sonic youth – sister – original – lp
*stars of the lid – and their refinement of the decline – kranky – 2cd
*stars of the lid – avec laudenum – kranky – lp
*stars of the lid – ballasted orchestra – kranky – cd
*stars of the lid – tired sounds of… – kranky – 2cd
supreme dicks – the emotional plague – jagjaguwar – lp
t rex – bolan’s zip gun – fat possum – lp
tycho – dive – ghostly – lp
chad van gaalen – diaper island – flemish eye – lp
*vulcan – meet your ghost – lysergic – lp
tom waits – bad as me – anti – lp/cd
weakerthans – reconstruction site – epitaph – lp
weakerthans – left & leaving – anti – lp
*bry webb – provider – idee fixee – lp/cd
wilco – a ghost is born – nonesuch – lp
*wolves in the throne room – celestial lineage – southern lord – lp
*vernon wray – wasted – sebastian speaks – lp
*various – bambara mystic soul – analog africa – lp/cd
*various – bombshell baby – bombay connection – lp
various – group flexi vol 1 – castleface – 5×7″
*various – last time around – mississippi – lp
*various – psych funk 101 – world psych funk classics – lp/cd
*various – this may be my last time singing – tompkins square – 3cd
as always, thanks for reading….
listen records
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edmonton, ab
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