Well, when it’s not raining, it’s starting to actually get pretty nice out! Hopefully it’s gonna be a nice weekend, there’s some real nice slabs out this week for your diggin’ and listening pleasure this weekend. Ghost Box alum The Soundcarriers have a new banger of their 60s space age psych. We’ve finally received the Tragically Hip’s Live at the Roxy. Converge’s Bloodmoon finally exists! Super limited Osees Live album is in. And a whole bunch of other sweet slabs… no Blue Note reissues though… shocker. We’re open 12 – 5 tomorrow for Canada Day and 11 – 5 on Saturday. Have a great weekend!
Current operations…..
– in-store shopping/pick ups – 11 – 6 pm Monday – Friday, 11 am – 5 pm Saturday
(if you don’t want to come into the store for a pick up, call and/or use the back door)
– We will be wearing masks, if you want to, great! If not, that’s also fine, but please be respectful of other people’s space and decisions.
– Sanitize your hands (we’ll have some)
….pick of the week…..
Soundcarriers: Wilds (Phosphonic) LP
There have been many chapters in the life of the band to date and each one is defined by the singular approach and style of the group. Since forming in 2007 the band—comprised of Isherwood, Adam Cann, Dorian Conway and Leonore Wheatley—have released three albums that position them as a distinct and unique force in British music. Eschewing fads and trends that come and go, they have instead focused on honing their own sonic world that glides between woozy psychedelia, immersive grooves, subtle pop and rich, enveloping soundscapes. They’ve consistently moved at their own pace and on their own terms and on their fourth album, Wilds, they return after seven years since their last. “The sessions started in a cottage in the wilds so there’s a literal meaning,” Isherwood says of the title. “But figuratively we’ve pretty much been in the wild for the last few years as far as a lot of people are concerned.” The recording was staggered over a few different locations, from cottages to primary schools, before finishing in an art gallery. “The beauty of recording in non-studio studios is you have the time for the unexpected to happen,” says Isherwood. “Which is really what keeps you coming back for more.” As a result of the timeframe of the album, it’s one that has changed and grown a lot over the years. This sense of it being an album of unique songs is clearly apparent throughout but it also maintains a natural flow and cohesion. This is something that stems from the band’s approach to songwriting for the record. “A lot of the tracks started with a feel or groove,” says Isherwood. “Then building it into a more concise arranged piece. We were conscious that we didn’t want the recording to sound too over-polished so although a lot of the tracks were quite painstaking in how they evolved we wanted the actual recording to be quite raw and not be reliant on cutting things up or overly editing things. We wanted it to sound natural rather than perfect.”
File Under: Psych, Pop, Space Age, Kris’s Picks
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…..new arrivals…..
Alexisonfire: Otherness (Dine Alone) LP
Otherness is the first album in over a decade from the group Rolling Stone declared “put Canadian post-hardcore on the map.” Five guys playing aggressive rock grew to a hockey-arena headlining phenomenon while pushing and pulling between spirited guitar leads, melodic might, and emotional weight. The band never sacrificed the punk soul summoned in beat-up vans and basement shows. Blending their classic sound with new and forward-thinking textures, they produced Otherness themselves. Jonah Falco of Fucked Up mixed. AOF released four hugely successful studio albums, all Music Canada Platinum-certified: Alexisonfire (2002), Watch Out (2004), Crisis (2006), and Old Crows / Young Cardinals (2009). Kerrang! counted Crisis (2006) among the 50 Best Albums of the 21st Century, alongside undeniable classics from Green Day, Muse, Slipknot, My Chemical Romance, Blink-182, and Fall Out Boy. After Crisis hit No. 1 in Canada, at a stage where many bands compromise in search of greater success, Alexisonfire doubled down with even heavier riffs on album four, Old Crows/Young Cardinals. Released in 2009, it became their highest-charting record in America. As Revolver Magazine noted in 2019: “It’s hard to overstate the influence Alexisonfire had in post-hardcore through the mid-2000s, their combination of singing and screaming setting the blueprint for many artists to come.”
File Under: Punk
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Archie James Cavanaugh: Black and White Raven (Numero) LP
A masterpiece of the schooner rock variety, Black and White Raven is an album that emerged from Archie James Cavanaugh’s youthful dream of recording his own music while stuck in the Alaskan wilderness. “This dream was always elusive,” Cavanaugh said, “believing either that it was only meant for those famous artists who got picked up by major record labels, or that it was just too impossible to achieve because of cost and lack of know-how.” With a freewheeling cast culled from Archie’s travels around the Pacific Northwest, Black and White Raven was set down as the ’70s crested and self-released in the spring of 1980. Traces of disco, AM gold, gospel, and yacht mixed freely with his Tlingit heritage, creating a breezy and optimistic portrait of life in the 49th state.
File Under: Jazz, Funk, Soul
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Claypool Lennon Delirium: South of Reality (ATO) LP
2019’s South Of Reality, The Claypool Lennon Delirium’s epic sophomore album might be just the antidote this sick world needs. Music so potent it could repel an asteroid impact from space, these seasoned warriors of psychedelia have crafted timeless songs that may as well be chiseled in stone. The monolithic dream team’s second record was produced by Les Claypool and Sean Lennon themselves, and engineered and mixed by Claypool at his own Rancho Relaxo studio in Sonoma County, California. Amethyst Edition pressed on gatefold colored vinyl 2LP.
File Under: Rock
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Converge: Bloodmoon: 1 (Death Wish) LP
“We wanted to do something grander than the typical four-piece Converge music.” That’s CONVERGE vocalist Jacob Bannon talking about the seed of inspiration that eventually bloomed into BLOODMOON:I, the new collaborative album created by the legendary hardcore band alongside dark songstress Chelsea Wolfe, her bandmate/writing partner Ben Chisholm and Cave In vocalist/guitarist Steve Brodsky. What began as a mutual admiration society between festival bands has grown into a collaborative project featuring the indie music scene’s finest song writers. Harrowing and atmospheric, triumphant and melodious, BLOODMOON:I is CONVERGE as you’ve never heard them before. Produced by Kurt Ballou at his God City Studio. “It’s hard to find new ways to be creative, but I think we’ve been good at sort of forcing ourselves to do that,” Ballou says. “And this project is no exception. Getting Steve and Chelsea and Ben to contribute with us, we were kind of playing musical Cupid with all of them. But we had a feeling that if we got this group of people together, something powerful would come out of it.”
File Under: Metal
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Earthen Sea: Ghost Poems (Kranky) LP
“Jacob Long’s third Earthen Sea outing for Kranky, Ghost Poems, further refines his fragile, fractured palette into fluttering arrythmias of dust, percussion, and yearning. Composed during the first wave of lockdowns in New York, the pieces took shape patiently from samples of piano, texture, and domestic sounds (sink splashing, room tone, clinking objects), filtered through live FX to imbue them with an intuitive, immaterial feel. Wisps of melody splinter, shimmer, and refract, like light on water; pulses accrue and dissipate, as if mapping shifting sands. Throughout, there’s a sense of matter made animate, of absences felt. Long cites notions of ‘the studio as a dub instrument’ and the melancholy of ‘7th chords on a fake Rhodes patch’ as central elements in his process, transforming raw materials into rare thresholds of symbiosis and hypnosis. This is music for night skies in hollowed-out cities, for views across rivers towards unknown shores: restless, placeless, and profound.”
File Under: Ambient, Electronic
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Fallen Angels: It’s A Long Way Down (Jackpot) LP
Released only one year after their psychedelic debut, The Fallen Angels’ sophomore album, It’s A Long Way Down, lays it all out on the line. Unfettered by label interference, The Fallen Angels’ second and final record highlights all the band has to offer. Off-kilter time signatures, experimental soundscapes, and white-hot guitar licks abound across It’s A Long Way Down’s dozen tracks, with lead singer Jack Bryant’s vocals serving as a guiding light through the paisley-patterned tunnel. Album high points like “Poor Old Man” and “Something New You Can Hide In” tease early signs of progressive rock with their weird and winding melodies, and impress with rock-solid instrumentation. An early marvel of psych rock that holds up to this day. Mastered from its original tapes and pressed at RTI on red vinyl, in its original gatefold design.
File Under: Psych
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Fallen Angels: s/t (Jackpot) LP
Pioneers of psychedelic rock, Jackpot Records is thrilled to offer the first-ever vinyl reissue of The Fallen Angels’ debut album! An unsung classic of ’60s psychedelia, The Fallen Angels, originally released in 1967, showcases the frenetic energy and melodic mélange of early garage and psych rock. Hailing from the Washington, D.C. area, The Fallen Angels masterfully blended driving guitar solos, groovy basslines, and playful distortion, with lead vocalist Jack Bryant’s bluesy and charismatic vocals. Standout tracks like “Introspective Looking Glass,” “Room At The Top,” and “No Way Out” are replete with punchy horn sections, raucous drums, and just enough reverb-stricken sitar for that true late-’60s flavor. Pressed on limited edition purple vinyl at RTI and mastered by Kevin Gray from the original tapes.
File Under: Psych
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Faster Pussycat: Whipped! (Real Gone) LP
Any band that names itself after a Russ Meyer film has a reputation to uphold. And with tracks like “Big Dictionary” (get it?), the fourth track on their 1992 album Whipped!, Faster Pussycat did just that, along with other blasts of Sunset Strip braggadocio like “Out with a Bang” (not to mention the dominatrix on the front cover)! But a closer listen reveals a band hitting its hard rock stride right at the wrong time, when grunge flannel was supplanting eyeliner and big hair in the hearts of American youth. The minor hit “Nonstop to Nowhere” had a classic, country-ish Stones vibe, and “Mr. Lovedog” was a heartfelt tribute to deceased Mother Love Bone singer Andrew Wood; those were just two highlights on an album that was funny, surprisingly varied, and tuneful. In short, Whipped! got largely ignored in the wake of the early ’90s Nirvana-inspired craze but it deserved a better fate. For its first-ever U.S. vinyl release (the European vinyl release is real rare and pricy), we’ve whipped up (sorry) a milky clear “whipped cream” vinyl pressing limited to 2000 copies, nestled inside a jacket with inner sleeve sporting lyrics. For those who like some raunch with their roll!
File Under: Rock
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Ella Fitzgerlad: Ella at the Hollywood Bowl – The Irving Berlin Songbook (Verve) LP
Ella Fitzgerald’s “Songbook” records – with her peerless renditions of the best songs from iconic composers from Irving Berlin to Rogers & Hart to Cole Porter to George & Ira Gershwin – are the cornerstone of the Verve catalog and the standard for jazz vocal recordings. Ella never released a live version of these Songbooks. This record, discovered in the private collection of Norman Granz, will make the first time a live Songbook has been released from the First Lady of Song.
File Under: Jazz
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Guided By Voices: Tremblers And Goggles By Rank (GBV Inc) LP
“Tremblers And Goggles By Rank marks a new phase in Robert Pollard’s songwriting evolution. His songs have always included non-traditional approaches to form and song structure, but with this album, he has pushed it further than ever. While the familiar Guided By Voices pop-craft and melodic virtuosity always occupies center stage, the first-time listener will never be able to predict what’s coming next in a song. ‘Alex Bell’ and ‘Focus On The Flock’ are the two anchors, each one expansive and filled with rock grandeur, and both exemplifying the complex wordplay, melodies, and structures that are hallmarks of the album. GBV’s latest batch of brilliant songs ride on colorful psychedelic flourishes and brash post-punk textures that make this ten-song album a one-of-a-kind head trip. While there are hooks and earworms aplenty within, this album is a complex and kaleidoscopic journey, representing a new echelon in the Guided By Voices universe. It represents another level of songwriting and performance from the group. It plays out like an intricate and powerful collage, in a very multicolored and multi-faceted fashion; a work grand in scale and undertaking. There are triumphant and glorious choruses, deep and dark wormholes, sinewy twists and turns, bold and theatrical bravados, massive cliffs, plateaus, peaks, and valleys — these emotional landscapes reach new and unexpected heights along the way.”
File Under: Indie Rock
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Gun Club: Las Vegas Story (Blixa Sound) LP
Deluxe Edition of The Las Vegas Story, the classic 1984 album by punk rock legends The Gun Club – this Deluxe edition includes a second CD of the unearthed 1984 concert at Scorgie’s in Rochester, NY, and a bonus DVD of previously unreleased footage – 1984 Home Movie: The Gun Club On The Road. This classic 1984 album has been digitally re-mastered and comes in beautiful gatefold packaging. The CD package will also include a 24-page booklet. The Las Vegas Story Deluxe Edition features extensive liner notes written by Gun Club members Terry Graham, Kid Congo Powers, and Patricia Morrison, as well as guest musicians Dave Alvin, Phast Phreddie Patterson, and producer Jeff Eyrich. The booklet also includes archival photos and other collectable images. This classic line- up only stayed together for this one album, featuring original drummer Terry Graham, as well as guitar from Kid Congo Powers (The Cramps, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds) and bassist Patricia Morrison (Sisters Of Mercy). This is considered by many to be the most iconic Gun Club line-up and was only together for this one album and tour!
File Under: Punk
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Tim Heidecker: High School (Spacebomb) LP
Since 2016, Tim Heidecker has chronicled the annals of adulthood on a series of supreme singer-songwriter albums. The crushing devastation of divorce and the existential malaise of middle-age, the minutiae of home ownership and the ritual of family vacation, child rearing and global warming: Heidecker has handled it all with humor and heart. But, there’s one pivotal lodestar of human development he has yet to mine – that’s right, High School. High School is Tim’s new album with first single “Buddy.” Produced by Heidecker, Drew Erickson, Eric D. Johnson and Mac DeMarco, High School sees Heidecker emerging as an increasingly playful and poignant story teller, infusing childhood tales with new gravity. This album chronicles not only the adventures and misadventures of life as a Pennsylvania teen in the early ’90s, but also how it felt to lose a juvenile sense of mystery and possibility as an adult. This album is about high school – and, really, the way it helped shape everything else.
File Under: Indie Rock
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Hercules & Love Affair: In Amber (Skint) LP
Hercules & Love Affair – a project led by DJ and producer Andy Butler – returns with their first new album since 2017’s Omnion. In Amber also finds Butler collaborating with ANOHNI for the first time since “Blind” from Hercules’ self-titled 2008 debut. “In dance music, the focus is more on celebration, joy, desire, sadness,” Butler said. “But anger? Life meditation? Not so much…some emotions seem limitless. In some ways, ‘In Amber’ is a record I did not know I had. As an artist who has always put my personal life experience ahead of my work, not to mention the turmoil of living in these recent times, I can’t in good conscience do something comfortable. I had to express my discomfort. Making a ’90s sounding techno or house record, or a weird’ 80s sounding dance track isn’t anything I have to do.”
File Under: Electronic
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Susie Ibarra & Tashi Dorji: Master of Time (Astral Spirits) LP
Master of Time is a live performance commissioned for the exhibition of Bardo Now, The Second Buddha: Master of Time at the Tang Teaching Museum during a residency on April 16-18, 2019. LP version contains the tracks “Confluence” and “The Way of the Clouds.” Tracks 2 & 4 are digital only bonus tracks. Recorded by Frank Moscowitz at the Tang Teaching Museum 2019. Mixed by Eli Crews at Spillway Studio 2020
File Under: Jazz
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Japanese Breakfast: Sable OST (Dead Oceans) LP
Embark on a unique and unforgettable journey and guide Sable through her Gliding; a rite of passage that will take her across vast deserts and mesmerizing landscapes, capped by the remains of spaceships and ancient wonders. Explore the dunes on your hoverbike, scale monumental ruins and encounter other nomads as you unearth mysteries long forgotten and discover who she really is behind her mask. With its unique art style and original soundtrack by Japanese Breakfast, envelop yourself in Sable’s world and explore everything at your own pace. There is a lot in this world just waiting to be discovered. Do not be afraid. Take the leap. “I was so lucky Daniel Fineberg and Gregorios Kythreotis from Shedworks invited me onto this game so early on,” Michelle Zauner said. “I was immediately captivated by the world they’d built, a desert planet filled with mysterious natural and architectural wonders, and the story they’d imagined, one of a young girl coming of age through exploration. It was important to me that each biome in this world felt unique.”
File Under: Indie Rock, OST
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Charles Lloyd: 8: Kindred Spirits (Blue Note) LP
The legendary saxophonist, composer, and jazz mystic Charles Lloyd celebrated his 80th birthday on March 15, 2018, at his hometown venue, Santa Barbara’s Lobero Theatre, with an unprecedented grouping of musical friends including guitarist Julian Lage, pianist Gerald Clayton, bassist Reuben Rogers, and drummer Eric Harland, with special guests organist Booker T. Jones and bassist Don Was joining the ensemble midway. His 2020 album 8: Kindred Spirits (Live From the Lobero) documents both the sights and sounds of that extraordinary date. The concert’s first half is available here as a vinyl 2LP-set with accompanying DVD and book.
File Under: Jazz
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Doug McKechnie: San Francisco Moog: 1968-72 Vol. 1 (VG+) LP
San Francisco Moog: 1968-72 documents a missing link in the history of electronic music, as well as the little-known moment when psychedelic music went electronic. In 1968, Bay Area native Doug McKechnie got hold of one the very first modular Moog synthesizers ever made and began finding his own way to play it. Soon, he was hauling the finicky instrument around to perform improvised concerts at colleges and ballrooms, as well as an ill-fated appearance on the bill at Altamont. Many of the performances were recorded, and the surviving tapes—never before released—capture a free-flowing, transportive sound that fills in the gap between the austere mid-century academic avant garde and the expansive cosmic suites of Tangerine Dream and the rest of the Berlin School in the ’70s. This is not another corny old Moog record. San Francisco Moog sounds as fresh as anything by today’s analog-synth heads while bringing to life a lost moment in the development of the music. “Astonishing stuff, pure early Moog electronics . . . vibrating with the joy taken in the discovery of the new sounds this machine was capable of.” —Electronic Sound “Presages both Tangerine Dream’s soundtracks and, in its most grimy moments, ‘Acid Tracks.” —The Wire
File Under: Electronic, Psych
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David Nance: Pulverized & Slightly Peaced (Petty Bunco) LP
A collection of raw, ragged, home-recorded originals from the down-home prolific mind of Omaha’s top talent David Nance. Originally slated for a 2017 release on Richie Records, the tunes were shelved in favor of some comparatively slicker recordings with Nance’s fleshed out band for what would become the Peaced & Slightly Pulverized on the Trouble in Mind label. Only a fool would find fault with that album. Nevertheless, this one (with a confusingly similar title to that other release) is a ripping, screaming, blown-out affair that comes out the gates salty and hungry for blood on “Ham Sandwich” and it never seems to lose its appetite. Conceived and recorded within a single work week, with our blue-collar Nance setting up all the microphones, playing all the instruments, and riding all the faders, Pulverized & Slightly Peaced contains all the elements that we at Petty Bunco admire in music: the tried and true Rn’R instruments lovingly misused to create a vital ragged sound dripping with personality and verve. And along with it all: Nance’s unmistakable soulful howl. To wit: the sidelong “Amethyst”, should go down as this era’s Broken Arrow, a tune with twists and turns and a cathartic climax that’ll inspire air-guitar heroics and repeated needle drops over and over and over again.
File Under: Psych, Indie Rock
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Molly Nilsson: Extreme (Night School) LP
Extreme is Molly Nilsson’s tenth studio album. Recorded in 2019 and throughout the 2020 global pandemic at home in Berlin, it is a departure for Nilsson, an explosion of angry love. It’s an album of anthems for the jilted generation, soaked with joy and offering solace, bristling with distorted, metal guitars and planet-sized choruses that bring light to the dark centre of the galaxy. It’s an album of the times, by the times and for the people. It’s a record about power. About how to fight it, how to take it and how to share it. Every song here is a gleaming gem in a pouch of jewels. Examples include “Kids Today,” where Nilsson is the voice of wisdom, archly commenting on the eternal struggle between youth and authority. “They Will Pay” brings big, distorted power chords in the form of a agit-punk, pop slammer. Of course, when Molly Nilsson does punk pop one gets the catchiest chorus this side of The Bangles or The Nerves. However, it’s on “Pompeii” that Nilsson delivers the album’s epic, emotional heartbreaker. Like “1995” on Nilsson’s album Zenith, or “Days Of Dust” on Twenty Twenty, the lyrics of “Pompeii” are heavy with a transcendent sadness, an aching poetry that cuts to the truth of the heart like the best Leonard Cohen lines. It contains the most personal moments of Extreme, a song lit by the dying embers of romance. Yet it’s here where the alchemy at the base of all Nilsson’s best work is found. Turning small nuggets of personal truth into big, generous universal moments that invite everyone to cry, to love and to fight the power. In an album of jewels, it might be the shining star. This is Molly Nilsson’s biggest, boldest and most vital album to date, Extreme is about power. Against the love of power and for the power of love.
File Under: Indie Rock
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OCS: 1 (No Coast) 3LP
A reissue of the debut album from JOHN DWYER under the OCS moniker. Original released in 2003 as a double CD. This is the first time it has seen a vinyl treatment! Lovingly remastered at Golden! Cut by CARL SAFF.
File Under: Indie Rock, Psych
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Osees: Live at Henry Miller Library, Big Sur (Spiritual Pajamas) LP
“When we finally decided to bite the bullet during Covid’s initial shut down and subsequent clubs shuttering, we thought we should play some lovely and close to our heart spots to keep it interesting. Henry Miller Library fits that bill perfectly. Lovely place, lovely people and general good vibes. A perfect place for us to set up and record. We’ve dipped deep into the dark waters of our song-sack of holding and found several more never-before-performed-live tunes and paired them up with some oldies we’ve knocked the dust off of, as well as some fan favorites and general surprises to make the merry very. That’s right, we’ve been paying attention. Also, included here are the covers we did because why the fuck not. Recorded from dusk ’til dawn too at the gorgeous Henry Miller Library in Big Sur. Same killer crew, similar killer vibes. An enchanting pre-holiday evening to tell you that we miss and love you. Play it loud and have one on us. And keep your chin up for goodness sake. Be well out there.” – OSEES
File Under: Psych, Punk
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OST: Wild Style (Mr. Bongo) LP
Animal Records – founded by Chris Stein of Blondie fame – only ever released one album in its brief early-80s history, but what an album that was. Wild Style remains the most seminal soundtrack in hip-hop history, a snapshot of the scene as it evolved from the streets to the recording studio. But it’s not just a vital document, it’s also a damn good listen. The line-up is a who’s who of those who stood out from hip-hop’s nascent block party days. The Double Trouble pairing of Rodney Cee and KK Rockwell, The Chief Rocker himself, Busy Bee, the mighty line-ups of both The Cold Crush Brothers and The Fantastic Freaks. The music captures the free-form, roaming nature of the film – it’s rough at the edges, it’s occasionally amateurish, but it’s completely, utterly glorious. The original Animal tracklisting, of which this is a reissue, is full of recurring sounds and motifs, all of them co-produced by Chris Stein and Fab Five Freddy, stepping away from breakbeats to produce a sound that reminds you of them, while being totally unique. The epic drums are courtesy of Lenny ‘Ferrari’ Ferraro, a Vietnam vet and punk drummer whose career spanned stints backing Aretha Franklin and Lou Reed. Over time, those sounds – the Charlie Chase and Grand Wizard Theodore scratches, the indelible lyrics – have become hip-hop touchstones, endlessly sampled and referenced, the bedrock of so much music to follow. That’s because the soundtrack perfectly encapsulated the essence of the film, the scene and hip-hop’s emergence from The Bronx to the attention of the wider world. Presented in this reissue with the original artwork, it remains the blueprint.
File Under: Hip Hop, OST
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Porcupine Tree: Closure/Continuation (Sony) LP
Over the years Porcupine Tree (featuring Steven Wilson, Richard Barbieri and Gavin Harrison) have constantly evolved as their expansive music has shifted from pastoral psychedelic rock and ambient electronic soundscapes to experimental pop and eventually – with 21st century masterpiece In Absentia – a propulsive metal sound all of their own. Their latter records effortlessly combined each of those genres and allowed Porcupine Tree to occupy a musical universe unique to them. One of the UK’s most forward thinking, genre defying rock bands, returns in 2022 with their first new music in twelve years! Over a decade in the making, Closure/Continuation is a grand statement wholly worthy of the revered PT name.
File Under: Rock
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Asha Puthli: The Essential (Mr. Bongo) LP
We can’t think of many other performers like the singer/songwriter/dancer/actress Asha Puthli who have excelled in such a broad range of genres. From 60s psych, Classical Indian music, Free Jazz, Pop, Soul, Disco, to Rock, the list goes on. A ‘best-of’ or an ‘essential collection’ is always going to be a subjective thing, but for what is unbelievably the first official compilation covering the full breadth of Asha’s illustrious career, we aimed to provide a snapshot into her ever-evolving musical journey and a tribute to the vast richness of her catalogue. Some singers want to be famous, others are pop star icons, and some are artists; Asha is the latter. Asha is a true force of nature, regardless of the genre she explores, she fully commits, moves on, and reinvents herself, always progressing. Looking back on Asha’s career, it is evident what a trail-blazer she was, opening doors for her contemporaries and those who came later to step through. Whether it was conscious or not, you can recognise Asha’s influence in aspects of Kate Bush’s ethereal image and performance, in Donna Summer’s high-smooth vocal sound and disco stylings, and in the gumption and power of Grace Jones. Kick-starting the compilation is ‘Pain’, the Indian psychedelic garage rock sounds of The Savages featuring Asha. We have to admit, we had to strongarm Asha into letting us include this track at first; also due to its rare nature (and lack of any master tapes) the recording we present here is raw and low-fi. However, we felt its inclusion was important to fully represent the journey of Asha’s career, the same consideration was also applied to two of the Asha & The Surfers’ songs that we have included in this collection. Asha saw a link between jazz and classical Indian music “the improvisation, the minor chords, the free form, the liberalness of the art” we showcase her love of jazz here with seminal works with the legendary Ornette Coleman, taken from the revered ‘Science Fiction’ album. Asha’s ‘CBS years’ are represented here, how could we not include ‘Space Talk’ on this collection, and how these years progressed into her amazing disco offerings such as ‘I’m Gonna Dance’ & ‘Music Machine’. The bizarre ‘We’re Gonna Bury The Rock With The Roll Tonight’ from 1980 has also won us over. A pseudo-50s throw-back song that sounds not un-similar to the post-modern, leftfield, pop of an MIA production to come years later. Rounding off the compilation we have Asha’s interpretation of a Michael Jackson classic that sat lost on a cassette-only released in India.
File Under: Jazz, Soul, Experimental
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Redgreenblue: The End and The Beginning (Astral Spirits) LP
The debut LP from RedGreenBlue posits a mesmeric, minimalist extension of Chicago’s groove-based improvised music tradition. Over the course of two introverted, side-long pieces, the band patiently crafts hypnotic—yet still dynamic—sonic spaces using languid pulsations, careful shifts in colour, and occasional bursts of virtuosic urgency. It’s music that hovers between worlds, unfurling a foundation of almost-ambient weightlessness that’s inflected with audible spontaneity and given breadth through rhythm. The expansive result intimates connections to the most atmospheric corners of Miles Davis’ electric catalogue, hints at Terry Riley’s trance-inducing drones, makes oblique references to dub, and even nods in the direction of Town and Country’s DIY chamber music. Yet, all the while it inhabits its very own aesthetic space—a gravity-defying blend of the ethereal and the earthbound that draws the ear in slowly and subliminally.
File Under: Jazz
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Jonas Reinhardt: A Ragged Ghost (Trouble In Mind) LP
A Ragged Ghost is the eighth full-length album from electronic producer Jonas Reinhardt. Following albums on Kranky, Not Not Fun, Constellation Tatsu, and more, his debut release for Trouble In Mind brings together 11 new pieces that explore themes of life and death, netherworlds, and the liminal spaces in between. Taken together as a single narrative, the album offers a stirring exploration of mortality and immortality in what Reinhardt describes as ‘a dance of religious syncretism, navigating spaces between the living and the dead’. A Ragged Ghost finds him synthesizing influences organically from familiar teutonic strains to the intense austerity of early 21st century electronic pioneers such as Biosphere and Susumu Yokota. A whisper of the Italo-disco-esque romps of Jonas’ 2012’s Foam Fangs EP and 2013’s Mask of The Maker LP merge with his more kosmische leanings into a sinister, slightly funky, but also studious suite that at times feels like a lost sound library record from the KPM archives. Openers “Ape & The Universal Axis” and “In Lotto Commodore” decidedly sound like a selection from a lost film score while others like the bubbling “Sly Tomb” recall the works of Roedelius or Vangelis’ serene soundscapes. Meanwhile, fans of the electro-ambience of Manuel Göttsching’s strobe-light, proto-house (on his seminal E2-E4) or the pulsing insistence of John Carpenter’s visceral non-horror scores (i.e. Escape From New York or Assault on Precinct 13) will find a lot to love about songs like “Tumb Tumb” and “Wretched Orchestra of Armistice”.
File Under: Electronic
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Jonathan Richman: Want to Visit My Inner House (Blue Arrow) LP
A brand new album from the legendary JONATHAN RICHMAN. Ten tracks strong. “I’m very happy with this release on Blue Arrow Records. JERRY HARRISON, NICOLE MONTALBANO and I produced this album, as well as SA (2018). To us, the two albums are related in the sense that Want To Visit My Inner House? suggests where SA was starting to head.”—Jonathan
File Under: Rock
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Savage Necromancy: Feathers Fall to Flames (20 Buck Spin) LP
ON LIMITED BLOOD RED VINYL!!! Black and death metal are uniquely positioned entities as both grounds for vast experimentation and unyielding pillars of tradition. Both directions have merit and appreciation within the underground, both keep the genre weltering in new blood. Savage Necromancy are firmly in the latter camp, preserving and strengthening the heritage of the most unholy and barbaric blasphemies in ways immediately recognizable and deeply worshipped, yet putting their distinctive mark on the style. The cruel sound and influences displayed on the Savage Necromancy debut album Feathers Fall To Flames are instantly familiar, and when done with such magisterial fervor and conquering fire become not occasion for admonishment but cause for debauched blood-soaked celebration. Tried and true bestial ferocity, profane mockery and spike-fisted black metal victory that leaves no cross unturned. As Savage Necromancy prepares the already under construction second album for new label 20 Buck Spin, Feathers Fall To Flames now experiences a wider release for the first time after its initial short run in 2021. Savage Necromancy has only begun to storm the gates of Heaven.
File Under: Metal
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Strictly Missionary: Heisse Scheisse (Astral Spirits) LP
It has been a while since I’ve heard an outside skronky rock-inflected jazz album quite like this. Naked City, Captain Beefheart, Henry Cow…comparisons are possible but don’t quite hit the mark. Strictly Missionary is a genuine supergroup of NYC-based creative musicians, including guitarist Wendy Eisenberg (who seems to be everywhere these days, do they sleep?), saxophonist Chris Pitsiokos, bassist Richard Lenz, drummer Kevin Murray, and percussionist Nick Neuburg. Pitsiokos also contributes electronics, recorder, whistle, harmonica, and drum samples. At its best moments – throughout most of the album in fact—Heisse Scheisse is joyous chaos. The quintet seems to relish playing two or three different overlapping pieces of music. Case in point, Lapsarian begins with a labyrinthine riff-like structure that rapidly deteriorates into Eisenberg and Neuburg heading in their own directions. After a relatively calm and short interlude, Pitsiokos and Eisenberg both solo at the same time, but in an orthogonal fashion, before the overall structure is loosened once again to a more free-form exploration. This simultaneous adherence to form and discarding thereof is not easy to pull off, but is found throughout the album. Eisenberg, in particular, drives the group from within by way of gritty tone, speed picking, and note bending. Pitsiokis’s wailing on the recorder and whistle just adds to the weirdness. Elements of punk, funk, electronica, and blues pop up now and then. Nothing is out of bounds for Strictly Missionary.”—Avant Music News
File Under: Jazz
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Tegan & Sarah: Still Jealous (Sire) LP
Tegan and Sara revisit the indie-pop duo’s 2004 breakout album, So Jealous, on a new version of the record titled Still Jealous. It features the original’s 14 tracks, all of which have been re-recorded acoustically, with the twin sisters singing each other’s songs. The idea to record the new album came in the spring of 2020 as they were preparing to launch a fundraiser for the Tegan and Sara Foundation, where the grand prize was two guitars used to record So Jealous. To promote the campaign, Sara decided to record an acoustic version of “You Wouldn’t Like Me,” one of the songs Tegan wrote for the album. “When I was done, it was clear to us both that the project was more than background music for the fundraiser,” Sara explained. “Over the next few months, we let our interpretations of each other’s original songs become more experimental and fluid. It was comforting to live inside of familiar music during such a destabilizing time. Performing each other’s songs became a salve during the longest period that either of us has gone without an audience to sing for.” On Still Jealous, Tegan and Sara reimagine the original album by stripping back some of the sonic layers that gave So Jealous its distinctive sound, a move that underscores the strong songwriting and the emotions at the core of each song. Highlights from the new album include Sara’s “covers” of “Speak Slow” and “Where Does The Good Go” and Tegan’s reinterpretations of “I Bet It Stung” and “Walking With A Ghost,” a song The White Stripes covered in 2005 on the group’s EP, Walking With A Ghost.
File Under: Pop
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Tragically Hip: Live at the Roxy (Universal) LP
The Tragically Hip release a standalone vinyl 2LP edition of Live At The Roxy which was previously only included in the Road Apples 30th Anniversary Deluxe package. Originally recorded on May 3, 1991, at the iconic Los Angeles venue for a Westwood One radio show, only 40 minutes of the set was broadcasted on air at the time, making the full recording that much more in demand. This renowned concert saw the band at peak performance and is considered one of the best live shows from any rock band of the era. Reminiscing on the night and what made this show particularly special for the band, bassist Gord Sinclair recalls: “I remember the Roxy show like it was yesterday. We had spent a year on the road before recording Road Apples and got right back in the saddle when we finished. The new tunes worked great live and by the time we got to LA we were firing on all pistons.” Live At The Roxy is the second standalone live record for the band and it’s been 25 years since their first, Live Between Us, released in 1997. With all tracks completely remastered in 2021 by Ted Jensen at Sterling Sound in Nashville, the album features the fan favorite “Killer Whale Tank” version of “New Orleans Is Sinking.” The nine-minute track is characterized by mid-song story from the late frontman Gord Downie about a job cleaning an aquarium and inadvertently causing friction between the two whales held in the tank, fact or fiction, fans listen in wonderment. The captivating adlibbing throughout the entirety of the record creates the experience for the listener and as Sinclair describes: “A great show is something you just have to experience to understand. The magic stays with you. Listening back 30 years later and I’m transported to that hot, sweaty, and very special night. The band was tight and unstoppable. Great crowd, great venue. Together we took things to another level.” The Tragically Hip fans brought this release to fruition after countless requests for the deep cut versions of some of the band’s most celebrated songs. Live At The Roxy offers a timeless experience of this sensational night as never before released. The striking album artwork is sequential to the Road Apples 30th Anniversary Deluxe art sure to be a favorite of any collection.
File Under: Rock
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Doris Troy: Just One Look (Real Gone) LP
The late Doris Troy was one of America’s great female soul singers. Discovered by James Brown while working as an usherette at the Apollo Theater, Doris became a founding member of The Sweet Inspirations along with Cissy Houston and Dionne and Dee Dee Warwick, was signed by the Beatles to their Apple record label, and sang back-up with Pink Floyd (Dark Side of the Moon), the Rolling Stones (“You Can’t Always Get What You Want”), Carly Simon (“You’re So Vain”), and on many other legendary recordings. She was also unusual among her contemporaries in being an accomplished songwriter; it was Doris (under the name “Doris Payne”) that wrote the all-time classic “Just One Look” along with seven other tunes – including the British hit “What’cha Gonna Do About It” – on this, her debut LP on Atlantic from 1963. Produced by the legendary Artie Ripp, Just One Look has somehow escaped vinyl reissue till now…emerald green pressing!
File Under: Soul, Funk
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Otha Turner & The Rising Star Fife and Drum Band: Everybody Hollerin’ Goat (Birdman) LP
“The trance blues stylings of Otha Turner and his Rising Star Fife And Drum Band should be a music classification unto itself, a whole new primitive take on drum and bass. This music is the oldest still-practiced post-colonial American music, and Turner was one of its greatest artists of the 20th century. Blowing the cane fife with a band of drummers as back up, The Rising Star Fife And Drum band was legendary in the hills of Tate County, Mississippi, where they would perform during the yearly goat picnics on Turner’s farm. These tracks were recorded by Luther Dickinson during such picnics and released when Turner was ninety years old. Everybody Hollerin’ Goat shows firsthand the hypnotic and rhythmic style of fife and drum music at its best — raw and beautiful. It is every bit as essential a document of America’s folk-music heritage as anything Harry Smith or Alan Lomax ever offered up for posterity. Turner’s band included some of his children and grandchildren that have gone on to continue the fife and drum tradition since his death in 2003. This first ever vinyl release of Everybody Hollerin’ Goat contains a whole side of unreleased recordings from one night of the picnic and is intended to bring the experience of hollerin’ for goat in Senatobia, Mississippi to the living room. Dancing around the plants is recommended (but don’t eat the pickled eggs). The entire album is remastered by legend Gary Hobish.” “One of the top five blues LPs from the 90s.” –David Fricke, Rolling Stone
File Under: Blues
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Jeff Tweedy: Love is the King/Live is the King (dBpm) LP
The expanded vinyl 2LP package Love Is The King / Live Is The King features the original album plus a bonus disc with live versions of all eleven songs played by Jeff Tweedy with a full band. The live versions were recorded at The Loft (Wilco’s studio) and Chicago’s Constellation club in January 2021. The band features Jeff, sons Sammy and Spencer Tweedy, Liam Kazar, James Elkington and Sima Cunningham. The live set closes with a cover version of Neil Young’s classic “The Old Country Waltz”. Love Is The King / Live Is The King was produced by Jeff and Tom Schick at Wilco’s Chicago studio, The Loft. Love Is The King, a “beautifully honest ode to love and hope,” served as the follow-up to 2018’s Warm and 2019’s Warmer and featured 11 new Jeff Tweedy-penned and performed songs. “At the beginning of the lockdown I started writing country songs to console myself,” says Jeff. “Folk and country type forms being the shapes that come most easily to me in a comfort food sort of way. ‘Guess Again’ is a good example of the success I was having at pushing the world away, counting my blessings – taking stock in my good fortune to have love in my life. A few weeks later things began to sound like ‘Love Is The King’ – a little more frayed around the edges with a lot more fear creeping in. Still hopeful but definitely discovering the limits of my own ability to self soothe.”
File Under: Folk, Rock
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Water Damage: Repeater (12xu) LP
There is something really special about music based on drones. Whether it’s the vocals of Pandit Pran Nath, the ARP 2500 of Eliane Radigue, or the nearly-blown amps of Sunn O))), by changing the listeners’s focus on details to one that favors flow, drones are uniquely capable of transporting our brains far far away. The debut LP, ‘Repeater’, by this loudly droning Austin septet is a goddamn splendid example of how the process works. Using the motto, “Maximal Repetition Minimal Deviation,” Water Damage create glowing fields of post-rock lava that pretty much suck you right in and boil you alive. Water Damage, while technically a septet, actually operate in various configurations, with the proviso there should always be two drummers and two bass players on hand. They prefer if each of their sonic ideas takes up a whole reel of tape, and once they start they don’t look back. Everything proceeds towards an imaginary end point that is only achieved when the tape starts flapping. What a way to run a railroad! But the folks in the band are all vets of various projects—Spray Paint, USA/Mexico, Marriage, Black Eyes, Thor & Friends, among others—so let’s assume they know what they’re doing. And why not? They sound fucking great. Their approach to the form is less front-loaded than most of their peers, and the surface of their sound is sometimes ruffled by aural events of an un-drone-like nature. But the main gush is usually a blend of harmonic tones and textures pointing towards a goal that is just out of ear-shot, just over the next bluff, and perhaps forever just beyond our reach. So remember to drink plenty of liquid while you spin this fine album. Nobody wants you to parch.”—Byron Coley
File Under: Drone, Experimental
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West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band: Part One (Jackpot) LP
Formed in Los Angeles in 1965, THE WEST COAST POP ART EXPERIMENTAL BAND were considered by many to be the West Coast’s answer to the Velvet Underground. The group created California psych/rock music that was both fragile and dreamy. Part One was originally released in 1967 on Frank Sinatra’s Reprise Records. Though they didn’t achieve the fame or notoriety of other bands from the area, they have nonetheless achieved a cult status among collectors and people curious about a rich, albeit short-lived musical genre known as West- Coast Psychedelia. First time reissued in MONO, from the original master tapes.
File Under: Psych
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West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band: Vol. 2 (Jackpot) LP
Released in 1967 on Reprise Records as a follow up to Part One, Vol. 2 takes the band into more ambitious territory. Reaching out to more psychedelic territory than the debut LP, Vol. 2 maintains their unique pop sound mixed with ominous fuzz guitar, jumping from graceful folk-rock to wailing guitar freakouts, to multilayered avant-garde compositions at a moment’s notice. First time reissued in MONO, from the original master tapes.
File Under: Psych
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West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band: Vol. 3 (Jackpot) LP
Released in July 1968 on Reprise Records, Vol.3: A Child’s Guide To Good & Evil is considered to be the band’s most accomplished work and a masterpiece of the psychedelic genre. Released just nine months after Vol. 2, the band explores their incredibly creative psychedelic pop song writing with an accomplished mastery of studio techniques . Featuring iconic original artwork by JOHN VAN HAMERSVELD (Beatles, Rolling Stones) A long awaited reissue from the master tapes. “One of the 40 greatest Psychedelic Records of all time.”—Mojo Magazine. Limited edition MONO pressing. Packaged with printed inner sleeve with master reel photos.
File Under: Psych
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Various: Brown Acid: Thirteenth Trip (Riding Easy) LP
Here are just some of the gems from this latest edition of the popular compilation series featuring long-lost vintage ’60s-’70s proto-metal and stoner rock singles, Brown Acid – The Thirteenth Trip: Max, from Montreal, QC—originally known as Dawn, before Tony Orlando & Dawn forced a name change—kick things off with “Run Run” from their lone 1970 single. It’s a hard-hitting rocker with scale climbing crunching guitars and powerful Bonham-esque drumming. “Feelin’ Dead” is extremely heavy blues from this also extremely rare 1974 single by Detroit, MI’s Master Danse, which was only released as a promo 45. Think Led Zeppelin’s “Since I’ve Been Loving You.” Gary Del Vecchio is “Buzzin’” hard, and from what sounds like an in-studio party of yelps and chatter at the start of the song, it seems that the whole band was in on the festivities. The funky blues riff, reminiscent of Led Zeppelin’s “Heartbreaker” and rollicking rhythmic changes certainly keep the buzz a rollin’. Finally, Good Humore’s swaggering 1976 rocker “Detroit” is a slick and smooth paen to the Motor City. It most likely doesn’t predate “Detroit Rock City” by Kiss, also released in 1976, and it has more rock’n’roll swing, but it could fit comfortably alongside the era’s arena anthems.
…..restocks…..
Ichiko Aoba: Windswept Adan (Ba Da Bing) LP
Bad Religion: Process of Belief (Epitaph) LP
Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers: w/ Thelonious Monk (Atlantic) LP
David Bowie: Ziggy Stardust (Parlophone) LP
Vashti Bunyan: Just Another Diamond Day (Dicristina Stairs) LP
Johnny Cash: With His Hot & Blue Guitar (ORG) LP
Clash: Combat Rock (Epic) LP
Cocteau Twins: Blue Bell Knoll (4AD) LP
Cocteau Twins: Heaven Or Las Vegas (4AD) LP
Miles Davis: Bitches Brew (Legacy) LP
The Doors: s/t (Rhino) LP
Duster: Stratosphere (Numero) LP
Fleetwood Mac: Rumors (Rhino) LP
Florence & The Machine: Dance Fever (Republic) LP
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard: Nonagon Infinity (ATO) LP
Mark Korven: The Lighthouse OST (Sacred Bones) LP
Melvins: Ozma (Boner) LP
Modest Mouse: Moon & Antarctica (Epic) LP
Van Morrison: Astral Weeks (Rhino) LP
Oh Sees: Carrion Crawler/The Dream (In The Red) LP
Pearl Jam: Ten (Epic) LP
Pennywise: Full Circle (Epitaph) LP
Max Romeo & The Upsetters: War Ina Babylon (4 Men With Beards) LP
Nina Simone: The Amazing Nina Simone (4 Men With Beards) LP
Spoon: Gimme Fiction (Matador) LP
Spoon: Hot Thoughts (Matador) LP
Spoon: Lucifer on the Sofa (Matador) LP
Television: Adventure (4 Men With Beards) LP
Tomb Mold: Planetary Clairvoyance (20 Buck Spin) LP
Wipers: Land of the Lost (Jackpot) LP