What an exciting time to be alive! This week we finally see the reissue of Brian Eno’s four pop masterpieces! (Granted ‘Here Come the Warm Jets’ is late) This has been the biggest peeve of mine for years! These albums are completely essential. But not only did they reissue them, but they are double 45rpm audiophile pressings! I’m pretty curious as there’s never been an audiophile pressing of anything I know well enough to be able to judge if there is anything to this double 45rpm thing. SO, I strongly recommend you buy em, cuz they rule.
…..picks of the week…..
Brian Eno: Another Green World (Astralwerks) LP
***HIGHEST RECOMMENDATION!!!*** In tomorrow…. Brian Eno presents deluxe gatefold, 2LP heavyweight vinyl editions of his classic releases Here Come The Warm Jets, Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy), Another Green World and Before and after Science. Each album is now spread over two 180-gram vinyl discs, which play at 45 RPM and have been mastered at half-speed by Miles Showell at Abbey Road Studios, ensuring these seminal works sound better than ever before. Each album also contains an Obi, download voucher and Abbey Road Half Speed Master certificate. With experimentalism, conceptual art theory and use of the accidental as a foundation, these albums broke through the boundaries of popular music at the time. Elements of prog/psych/art rock, avant garde and 50s rock ‘n’ roll were combined with an array of cultural and philosophical ideas to create fresh sounding music, that was both visionary and captivating. Alongside George Martin and The Beatles’ work on Sgt. Pepper’s, Eno is arguably the other most pre-eminent practitioner of ‘studio as instrument’ ever. His unconventional recording techniques have resulted in a canon of work that places him alongside other iconic producers like Brian Wilson, Lee Scratch Perry and Phil Spector. As these albums progress chronologically, a nascent form of music begins to emerge. The ideas we hear in this early work continue to reveal themselves in Eno’s later ambient and electronic experiments. From its release in 1975 to today, Another Green World has been heaped with accolades. At the time, Village Voice described “the aural equivalent of a park on the moon” and Rolling Stone called it “a major triumph, an important record – and also a brilliant one,” whilst recently Q dubbed it “breathtakingly ahead of its time.” The album’s music veers from the experimental sounds of Eno’s previous albums – based loosely around rock – to the more meditative, synth-oriented instrumental minimalism of his subsequent work. Produced by Eno and Rhett Davies, like his previous solo efforts, Eno had several guest musicians contribute to Another Green World: Robert Fripp, John Cale, Phil Collins and his fellow brand X member Percy Jones. Unlike his previous albums, Eno worked on more solo material, including 6 songs in which he plays all the instruments himself; “In Dark Trees,” “The Big Ship,” “Another Green World,” “Sombre Reptiles,” “Little Fishes” and “Spirits Drifting.”
File Under: Rock, Classics, Essential Grooves, Ambient, Experimental
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Pye Corner Audio: Sleep Games (Ghost Box) LP
Pye Corner Audio’s darkling synthetic transmissions had been hovering under the radar for a couple of years before 2012’s Black Mill Tapes collection on Type brought them to a wider and grateful audience. Now, Martin Jenkins finds himself equally lauded by the likes of Sandwell District’s Juan Mendez and Minimal Wave’s Veronica Vasicka as by the UK hauntological set – a testament to the scope and adaptability of his stygian productions. Nonetheless, this album release feels right at home on Ghost Box, and it follows Jenkins’ contribution to the label’s 7″ Study Series last year. If The Black Mill Tapes focussed on the unheimlich but decidedly driving meta-techno side of the Pye sound, Sleep Games gives as much time to exploring its more abstract and oneiric peripheries. Nonetheless, rhythm is foregrounded throughout: from the woozy, tape-warped Boards of Canada-ism of ‘Sleep Games’, via the Xander Harris/Umberto-esque giallo-disco chug of ‘The Black Mill Video Tape’ through to the distant, dubby pulse of ‘Palais Spectres’ and the rolling toms of ‘Underneath The Dancefloor’. Eschewing the tweeness which has arguably softened the impact of recent Ghost Box releases, Sleep Games is refreshingly drug-hazed and zonked-out yet shark-eyed, minimalist and full of post-apocalyptic, cold-wave menace: you can more easily imagine this stuff soundtracking a car ride through the deserted industrial zones of coastal America than a ramble round the Belbury parish and its bucolic environs. At the same time, this feels like a Ghost Box release through and through: ‘Print Through’ is a radiophonic seance right from the grimoire of Eric Zann, ‘Deep End’ has the school textbook sci-fi sigh of classic Belbury Poly and ‘Yesterday’s Enemy’ the occult public service broadcasting vibe of early Advisory Circle.
File Under: Electronic, Ambient, Synth Dreams
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…..new arrivals…..
Arcade Fire: Everything Now (Sonovox) LP
Limited ‘language’ cover variants now available! Free posters while supplies last! Everything Now is the fifth full-length offering from Quebec art-rock outfit Arcade Fire and follow-up to 2013’s Grammy-nominated Reflektor. The thirteen track release features the dance-friendly, David Bowie-esque title track lead single “Everything Now” and was produced by Arcade Fire, Thomas Bangalter (Daft Punk) and Steve Mackey (Pulp), with co-production by Markus Dravs (The Suburbs, Coldplay, Mumford & Sons). The album was recorded at Boombox Studios in New Orleans, Sonovox Studios in Montreal, and Gang Recording Studio in Paris. “There’s sort of an everything-nowness to life, I feel like almost every event and everything that happens surrounds you on all sides,” frontman Win Butler explained to BBC Radio 1. “It’s trying to capture some of the experiences of being alive now in all its flaws and all its glory.” 12″ black heavyweight vinyl in a gatefold sleeve, with a folded lyric sheet insert.
File Under: Indie Rock, Pop
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Tim Buckley: Goodbye and Hello (Rhino) LP
50th anniversary, 180 gram mono reissue! One of the great rock vocalists of the 1960s, Tim Buckley drew from folk, psychedelic rock, and progressive jazz to create a considerable body of adventurous work in his brief lifetime. Often cited as the ultimate Tim Buckley statement, Goodbye and Hello is indeed a fabulous album. Contains ‘Once I Was’ and ‘Pleasant Street.’ Original artwork.
File Under: Folk, Psych, Rock
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Electric Prunes: s/t (Rhino) LP
50th anniversary, purple vinyl mono reissue! When it comes to garage bands from the ‘60s, few delivered debut albums as immediately addictive as these guys. Side 1 kicks off with “I Had Too Much to Dream Last Night,” and Side 2 starts with “Get Me to the World on Time,” both classics.
File Under: Garage, Psych
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Brian Eno: Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy) (Astralwerks) LP
In tomorrow…. Brian Eno presents deluxe gatefold, 2LP heavyweight vinyl editions of his classic releases Here Come The Warm Jets, Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy), Another Green World and Before and after Science. Each album is now spread over two 180-gram vinyl discs, which play at 45 RPM and have been mastered at half-speed by Miles Showell at Abbey Road Studios, ensuring these seminal works sound better than ever before. Each album also contains an Obi, download voucher and Abbey Road Half Speed Master certificate. With experimentalism, conceptual art theory and use of the accidental as a foundation, these albums broke through the boundaries of popular music at the time. Elements of prog/psych/art rock, avant garde and 50s rock ‘n’ roll were combined with an array of cultural and philosophical ideas to create fresh sounding music, that was both visionary and captivating. Alongside George Martin and The Beatles’ work on Sgt. Pepper’s, Eno is arguably the other most pre-eminent practitioner of ‘studio as instrument’ ever. His unconventional recording techniques have resulted in a canon of work that places him alongside other iconic producers like Brian Wilson, Lee Scratch Perry and Phil Spector. As these albums progress chronologically, a nascent form of music begins to emerge. The ideas we hear in this early work continue to reveal themselves in Eno’s later ambient and electronic experiments. 1974’s Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy) is a loose concept album with topics ranging from espionage to the Chinese Communist revolution. To help guide production of the album, Eno and the album’s cover artist Peter Schmidt developed the highly influential Oblique Strategies cards which proffered instructions intended to aid creativity. They were also used on subsequent albums and are still consulted by Eno and many others to this day. Unlike Here Come the Warm Jets Eno used fewer guest musicians, instead opting for a core band consisting of Phil Manzanera, Andy Mackey, Brian Turrington and Freddie Smith of The Winkies, Robert Wyatt, Phil Collins of Genesis and Brand X, members of Randi & The Pyramids, The Simplistics and Portsmouth Sinfonia (an orchestra in which Eno had once played clarinet.)
File Under: Rock, Art Rock, Electronic
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Brian Eno: Before and After Science (Astralwerks) LP
In tomorrow…. Brian Eno presents deluxe gatefold, 2LP heavyweight vinyl editions of his classic releases Here Come The Warm Jets, Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy), Another Green World and Before and after Science. Each album is now spread over two 180-gram vinyl discs, which play at 45 RPM and have been mastered at half-speed by Miles Showell at Abbey Road Studios, ensuring these seminal works sound better than ever before. Each album also contains an Obi, download voucher and Abbey Road Half Speed Master certificate. With experimentalism, conceptual art theory and use of the accidental as a foundation, these albums broke through the boundaries of popular music at the time. Elements of prog/psych/art rock, avant garde and 50s rock ‘n’ roll were combined with an array of cultural and philosophical ideas to create fresh sounding music, that was both visionary and captivating. Alongside George Martin and The Beatles’ work on Sgt. Pepper’s, Eno is arguably the other most pre-eminent practitioner of ‘studio as instrument’ ever. His unconventional recording techniques have resulted in a canon of work that places him alongside other iconic producers like Brian Wilson, Lee Scratch Perry and Phil Spector. As these albums progress chronologically, a nascent form of music begins to emerge. The ideas we hear in this early work continue to reveal themselves in Eno’s later ambient and electronic experiments. Produced by Eno and Rhett Davies, over 100 tracks were written for 1977’s Before and After Science with only 10 making the album’s final cut. The musical styles featured range from energetic and jagged to more languid and ethereal. The album marks Eno’s last foray into rock music in the ‘70s as a solo artist, with all his remaining records of the decade showcasing more of his ambient music, which was hinted at on the second half of Before and after Science. Unlike Eno’s previous albums, which were recorded in a very short time, Before and after Science was two years in the making. During this two-year period, Eno was busy working on his solo ambient albums Music for Films and Discreet Music, as well as Bowie’s Heroes and Low. On Before and after Science Eno worked with Fred Frith, Jaki Liebezeit of Can, Cluster, Dave Mattacks of Fairport Convention, Andy Fraser of Free, Percy Jones, Phil Collins, Robert Fripp, Paul Rudolph of Hawkwind, Bill MacCormick from Matching Mole / Quiet Sun , Phil Manzanera and Robert Wyatt who went under the pseudonym of Shirley Williams.
File Under: Rock, Electronic, Ambient
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Aretha Franklin: Aretha Arrives (Rhino) LP
50th anniversary, 180 gram mono reissue! Seriously, how many artists can successfully pull off covers of the Rolling Stones, Question Mark and the Mysterians, and Willie Nelson and do so credibly? Bow down before the Queen of Soul!
File Under: Soul
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The La’s: s/t (Polydor) LP
Originally released in 1990 on the Go! Discs label, The La’s equally enigmatic and exalted self-titled debut is a tasty nugget of classic British pop (Kinks, Small Faces) matched with the post-punk jangle of groups like the Smiths and XTC. Predating the second British invasion by a number of years, this, the sole album by the La’s features the classic “There She Goes” along with eleven more slices of pure pop goodness. “Upon its release, The La’s was immediately hailed by critics and adored by college radio. The harmonies and hooks are indelibly tied to early 60s pop, with a strong tip of the hat to another set of Liverpudlians. The band’s sound, despite the obvious linkage to a bygone era, never sounds dated, maintaining a fresh, unique identity without ever becoming derivative or ironic.” – Len Comaratta, Consequence of Sound
File Under: Rock, Pop, Post Punk
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Love: s/t (Rhino) LP
50th anniversary, 180 gram mono reissue! After gigging around the Los Angeles scene for three years, Arthur Lee was ready for something different. Inspired by seeing The Byrds live, he decided to merge their folk-rock sound with the driving R&B he had been playing to create a new group, dubbed Love. Recruiting guitarists Johnny Echols and ex-Byrds roadie Bryan Maclean, bassist Ken Forssi and drummer Alban “Snoopy” Pfisterer, Love began recording their eponymous debut LP in January 1966. Their first single, Bacharach/David composition “My Little Red Book,” spotlights an insistent, menacing riff that sounds nothing like what their contemporaries were committing to vinyl. Other cuts highlight the writing talents of Lee and the band members, notably on Lee’s anti-drug essay “Signed, D.C.” and Maclean’s “Softly to Me.” Also included is their version of the rock standard “Hey Joe,” rivaling The Leaves’ hit version for power and sporting some lyric alterations. The group, which lived communally at the time in a house formerly owned by Boris Karloff (they are pictured in the house’s garden on the LP cover), quickly coalesced into one of the West Coast’s most influential and exciting groups; here is where it all began.
File Under: Garage, Psych
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Naomi Punk: Yellow (Captured Tracks) LP
The 25 tracks on Yellow, conceived as a double album from day one, were self-recorded steadily throughout 2015-2017 at various locations. Much of the material was derived from what the band called The Scorpion Suite, a state of mind reached only by the alternative version of Naomi Punk they call The Scorpions (disambiguated). Many Scorpion Sessions were conducted by The Scorpions, each member performing their predetermined roll in a project half-aspiring to the register of licensing music, half-aspiring to musical novelty. The self-referential musical language of The Feeling (2012) was wrung out into the starker, live-informed Television Man (2014). On Yellow this language becomes a means, not an end. Integrated into the album are glimpses of live recordings, sounds of equipment being pushed around, hard rock sample libraries, sounds of the flapping wings of the album’s host (“I Found My Angel Wings” is embedded in thematic variation throughout), windy field recordings, emulsive synthetic woodwinds, a busted car stereo, a few four-track acoustic ballads, and more than a few puzzles and jokes. Much of the record conjures this notion of the undoing of ‘society’, at least in a western societal sense, and its supercession via the natural world; the revenge of Mother Earth.
File Under: Punk, Rock
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OST: Valerian (Idol) LP
Inspired by the cult French comic book from the 70s, Valerian and the city of thousand planets, represents the biggest European budget of all time (180M€) and will have a US launch budget (90M$) equal to Star Wars, Disney or Marvel. Leading roles are Cara Delevingne and Dana Dehaan and support roles are Rihanna, Clive Owen, Herbie Hancock, Kris Wu and Alain Chabat! It will be released in more than 300 theaters in Canada in 3D & real 3D. The amazing score is composed by very well-known French composer Alexandre Desplats (Harry Potter, Twilight, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Grand Budapest Hotel and many more). It was recorded in the prestigious Radio France Studio 104 with the National French Orchestra (97 musicians) and the Choeur de Radio France (40 choristers) and has a continuous and determining presence in the movie.
File Under: OST
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Stone Sour: Hydrograd (Roadrunner) LP
Hard rockers Stone Sour, led by Slipknot frontman Corey Taylor, return with their fifth full-length slab Hydrograd. Recorded at Sphere Studios in North Hollywood, CA with producer Jay Ruston, Hydrograd comes preceded by the epically heavy lead tracks “Fabuless” and “Song #3.” Taylor on the new album, “This album is great because it’s got elements of everything. It’s got the heavy energy of the ’80s, there’s punk moments, there’s hard rock moments, all the great amalgam of music. There’s even jazz and hip-hop moments. It’s really, really cool. It’s probably the coolest album I’ve made since the first Slipknot album, let’s put it that way. It’s dope, dude. And, hey, I feel very confident making that statement, because it’s so good.”
File Under: Rock, Slipknot
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This is the Kit: Moonshine Freeze (Rough Trade) LP
This Is The Kit – the musical project which holds exceptional Paris-via-Bristol songwriter Kate Stables close to its heart – have earned the adoration of peers including Guy Garvey, The National, and Sharon van Etten. ‘Moonshine Freeze’, is undoubtedly their most compelling and accomplished to date. Produced by John Parish (PJ Harvey, M Ward, Perfume Genius), it began in the immediate wake of its predecessor, ‘Bashed Out’, when days after coming off tour last November, Stables and her band (Rozi Plain, Jamie Whitby-Coles, Neil Smith and Jesse D Vernon) headed into Geoff Barrow’s Invada studios in Bristol. Aaron Dessner of The National also features on six of the album tracks. Stables’ chiaroscuro lyrics, and the detailed arrangements that have earned her fans in fellow musicians and thoughtful listeners, are here in full bloom, of course. But the songs themselves encompass more space and volume than ever before, with choruses at once inexplicable as well as singalong; the odd Motown-style horn chart cropping up here and there, in unexpected, but utterly welcome, interludes; sounds that veer from delicate to dusty to swelling in a moment. With Moonshine Freeze, This Is The Kit have struck a balance between the esoteric and the accessible, and have brought together a collection of brilliant songs with tremendous potential. Though the album’s songs were already written before heading into the studio, Stables says she had no fierce vision for how they should sound, preferring to let them take shape with the input of her band and Parish. “I’m not yet someone who says ‘I want this album to sound like an 80’s French nightclub’,” she says. “All I can do is write the songs and then step back from them and see what themes or patterns there are, then bring those patterns out so it’s a coherent piece of work, sonically and in terms of feeling.” Sonically, Moonshine Freeze is a beguiling mixture of great musical sophistication and something more guileless —children’s games, incantations and snatches of nursery rhymes. Stables’ voice too is a remarkable thing: in its angles there lies an exquisite strangeness reminiscent of Will Oldham, Magnolia Electric Co, Robert Wyatt, Karen Dalton.
File Under: Folk
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Link Wray: s/t (Future Days) LP
Recorded in a shaky makeshift chicken shack in rural Maryland, Link Wray’s eponymous 1971 solo album is a compelling and forward-looking piece of honest, handmade Americana. This album is vastly different from his previous work, foregoing instrumentals entirely. Instead, Wray, left with only one lung following a bout with tuberculosis in 1956, gives us his raw voice, full of spit and vinegar, as he blends elements of country, rock ‘n’ roll, roots, folk and gospel marked with fuzzy guitar and booming percussion. He kicks off with a track, “La De Da”, that may be the greatest song the Stones never wrote. Elsewhere, the single “Fallin’ Rain” channels Dylan at his most political, with lyrics about “stabbings and shootings and young men dying all around.” Link Wray proved to be the only album that the guitarist issued in his own name to hit the American charts during his nearly 50-year recording career. Although it didn’t receive much critical acclaim at the time of its release, Link Wray has seen a resurgence in recent years and developed a cult following, with artists from Nick Cave to The Neville Brothers recording versions of its tracks. Link, along with brothers Vernon and Doug began playing together professionally in 1942, their rowdy instrumental single “Rumble” charting at number 16 in 1958. Following a string of hits on Philadelphia-based Swan Records, Vernon began to serve as the family’s producer, eventually starting his own studio; first in the basement of his home and then–after his wife Evelyn complained about the noise–in a converted shack on the property. It was there that Link, Vernon and producer Steve Verroca found a sound that marked “a return to simplicity.” This carefully remastered reissue will take you right back to that chicken shack, and to sessions so electric you can almost feel the atmosphere.
File Under: Country, Rock, Blues
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…..Restocks…..
Courtney Barnett: The Double EP (Mom & Pop) LP
Courtney Barnett: Sometimes… (Mom & Pop) LP
Buena Vista Social Club: s/t (World Circuit) LP
Electric Wizard: Dopethrone (Rise Above) LP
Electric Wizard: Come My Fanatics (Rise Above) LP
Guided By Voices: Alien Lanes (Matador) LP
Nick Hakim: Green Twins (ATO) LP
Jason Isbell: Southeastern (Sony) LP
Jason Isbell: The Nashville Sound (Thirty Tigers) LP
King Crimson: In the Court of the Crimson King (Pangyric) LP
King Crimson: In the Wake of Poesiden (Pangyric) LP
King Crimson: Starless And Bible Black (Pangyric) LP
Morrissey: Vauxhall & I (Parlophone) LP
Morrissey: Your Arsenal (Sire) LP
The National: Boxer (Beggars) LP
Patti Smith: Horses (Legacy) LP
Jack White: Blunderbuss (Thirdman) LP