listen records

…..news letter #780 – lax…..

Howdy all! I just sent out News Letter #779 and here I am, putting together #780. That’s because when you read this, I’m not actually in Edmonton! Unless you are reading this on Friday, then I am actually in Edmonton. Anyway, this list is a little different, because I don’t actually know if these items showed up or not. They are supposed to, and hopefully they did. I could confirm that, but, I’m not going to. They’ll be in eventually, if they aren’t already.

…..picks of the week…..

Bing & Ruth: No Home of the Mind (4AD) LP
Continuing with the deft minimalism that has marked them out in critical circles in recent years, New York ensemble Bing & Ruth return with their third record No Home of the Mind. Established in 2006, Bing & Ruth is an ever-evolving collective steered by composer David Moore. A pianist from Kansas and graduate of New York’s school of Jazz and Contemporary Music at the New School, Moore’s work follows in the great tradition of fellow alumni John Cage and Steve Reich, albeit looking past the more studied repetition of the style’s forerunners toward a meditative form built on feeling. With Moore at its nucleus, Bing & Ruth’s line-up has transmuted from the 11-strong line-up that created debut album City Lake (“A stunning, humble record built on traditions we all understand, yet, somehow feels dizzyingly new.” – The Quietus) to a cast of 7 for 2014’s Tomorrow Was The Golden Age (“One of the finest leftfield releases of the year.” – Pitchfork). With No Home of the Mind, the ensemble has been streamlined to a 5-person unit, exploring the piano’s percussive qualities alongside running woodwinds, warbling tape delays and splattered upright bass lines that stare out with a wide-eyed transcendence, taking so-called “classical” music to new limits.

File Under: Ambient, Classical, Minimalism
Listen Here

Visible Cloaks: Reassemblage (RVNG Intl) LP
Visible Cloaks’ Reassemblage is a collection of delicately rendered passages of silence and sound that invokes – and invites – consciousness. The foundation of the duo’s second album is gently poured upon the ground their musical predecessors explored, using the materials of chance operations, MIDI “translation,” and other generative principles that favor inclusive musical environments over the narrowly constrained. In 2010, Spencer Doran, one part of Visible Cloaks alongside Ryan Carlile, prepared the first volume of Fairlights, Mallets, and Bamboo, a mixtape indicated by Doran as “an investigation into fourth-world undercurrents in Japanese ambient and pop music, years 1980 – 1986.” These mixes contextualized the outré orbit of Yellow Magic Orchestra-related solo projects and their abstract, radiant forays as forever futuristic modes of music. Reassemblage evokes similar musical futures celebrated on the Fairlights mixes, but does so observantly rather than reverently. The title Reassemblage, for example, is taken from a film essay by Trinh T. Minh-ha, which explores the impossibility of ascribing meaning to ethnographic images. The author aims to “speak nearby” rather than “speak about.” In other words, to embrace lapses of understanding, and realize that the impulse to map direct meaning across a cultural gap often results in further disconnect. In an effort to “speak nearby” rather than “speak about,” Visible Cloaks filters and forms source material to become young again. Often the duo strip tonal elements of their specificity or randomize melodies so they become stirring and lucid. Essential patterns emerge, conscious experience heightens. In these moments, the musical language of Reassemblage finds unlimited resonance and presents a path to uninhabited realities. The origin of this language could be described as translingual or polyglottal, working within the eastern / western feedback loop of influence, Fourth World ambiguity, and the universality of human emotion. Incorporating an international array of virtual instruments to advance the idea of panglobalism through digital simulation, tones and colors cohere into a living, breathing pool of sensorial experience in Visible Cloaks’ environs. Beyond embracing the fluidity of worldly musical influences, Visible Cloaks works fluently between mediums. The contribution of stalwart digital and installation artist Brenna Murphy’s dream dimensions to Reassemblage’s cover artwork and surrounding videos extends the album’s exploration of global headspace into a visual, visceral reality.

File Under: Electronic, Ambient, Generative, East/West
Listen Here

…..new arrivals…..

The Colorist & Emiliana Torrini: s/t (Rough Trade) LP

Rough Trade presents the collaborative album by Emiliana Torrini & The Colorist Orchestra. This is a live album containing ten Torrini songs from her catalog along with two brand new songs. Seeing Emilíana and The Colorist Orchestra in concert is a truly special experience. They have a musical chemistry that is undeniable, and documenting the experience on an album was something that just had to be done. While Torrini needs no introduction, her musical collaborators on this self-titled release have an interesting and creative way of working that warrants further examination. The Colorist Orchestra is a Belgian ensemble founded by Aarich Jespers and Kobe Proesmans in 2013. They re-envision the repertoires of established musicians from across genres using traditional classical instruments and arrangements, along with a variety of their own musical inventions to contribute innovative, never-before-heard sounds and grooves to their compositions and re-compositions. When Jespers and Proesmans, fans of Torrini’s rich catalog, invited her to collaborate on a series of live concerts, she was intrigued, and asked them to re-compose one of her songs to see what their concept was all about. The result, a wholly novel rendition of “Animal Games” from her most recent album Tookah convinced Torrini that working with the group was a creative opportunity that she shouldn’t dare miss. Although The Colorist Orchestra had initially planned to “re-color” only seven of Torrini’s songs, she was so enthralled by what she’d heard that she convinced them to work with her on fifteen of her previously-released tracks. Jespers and Proesmans pulled together a new eight-piece ensemble to create live re-envisionings of the works. The group created a new world out of the music, and while Torrini admitted that she could barely recognize many of her own songs in the rearrangements, the collaboration came together organically and beautifully, with Torrini’s talent elevating the Colorist ensemble’s creativity, and the group helping her rediscover the joy and the power within her own songs in this new light. Two brand-new Torrini songs debut on this album: “Nightfall,” written by Kid Koala and Torrini; and “When We Dance,” written by Jespers, Proesmans, and Torrini. The latter reflects the musical chemistry the three musicians developed during the process of rehearsal and performance for the Colorist concerts.

File Under: Indie Rock
Listen Here

Grails: Chalice Hymnal (Temporary Residence) LP

Rather than pick up where they left off, Grails take the sky-high riff-based heaviness of their earlier albums and distill it into a nuanced, widescreen opus. The perennial influences of mid-20th century Western film scores, obscure library music, and psychedelic krautrock are indelibly imprinted, but Chalice Hymnal exudes an eerie patience in unfurling the many layers of its subtle details. Produced by the band over the past five years, Chalice Hymnal bears some of the European psych and experimental hip-hop production techniques of founding members Alex Hall and Emil Amos’ other group, Lilacs & Champagne. Amos’ meditative metal band, Om, and longtime singer-songwriter project, Holy Sons, also naturally find their way into the Chalice cauldron. Rounding out their leaner line-up, co-founder Zak Riles (also of experimental kraut-psych trio, Watter) layers synths and programming into an electronic-prog hybrid that pushes Grails further into the deep end, displaying a profound resonance, both musically and emotionally. No one else sounds like Grails, and on Chalice Hymnal they sound more like themselves than ever before.

File Under: Psych Rock
Listen Here

Jens Lekman: Life Will See You Now (Secretly Canadian) LP

Jens Lekman describes his new record, Life Will See You Now, playfully, but also honestly, as “a midlife-crisis disco album; it’s an existentialist record, about seeing the consequences of your choices.” It’s a typical Lekman album in several ways: sly humor is key to its heartfelt nature; it inverts pop’s writing norm by making songs with sad concerns sound happy and songs with a happy subject sound sad; and it plays with notions of identity and the self. But, as the title suggests, it also represents a significant move forward, as if across a threshold. It’s the more expansive, upbeat sound of a revitalized Lekman, who is just one of many characters in his new stories about the magic and messiness of different kinds of relationships.

File Under: Indie Rock
Listen Here

OST: Arrival (Deutsche Grammophon) LP

Deutsche Grammophon presents the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack to the 2016 Paramount Pictures film Arrival, with music composed and produced by Johann Johannsson. Arrival marks the composers third cinematic collaboration with French-Canadian director Denis Villeneuve, following on from last years crime thriller Sicario, which garnered Johannsson an Oscar nomination for best original score. Arrival stars Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner and Forest Whitaker, Adams playing the lead role of a linguist who attempts to communicate with the alien intelligence controlling a fleet of spacecraft that has suddenly and ominously appeared at sites all around the globe. As mankind teeters on the brink of global war, she and her team embark on a race against time to find out why these craft have come to earth. More than a conventional sci-fi thriller, this is a thoughtful, intellectual drama with a genre twist. “Arrival is a very unique science fiction film and I decided early on that the human voice would feature prominently in the score,” says Johannsson. “It seemed a natural choice, given that the story is very much about language and communication.” Johannsson worked with several singers and vocal ensembles and combined both classical and avant-garde elements in his compositions, augmenting his already unique approach of combining orchestral writing with digital sound processing. Among those appearing are the prestigious Theatre of Voices, conducted by Paul Hillier, and artists such as Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe and Hildur Guonadottir, known for their unique musicianship. Johannsson also integrated some found sounds from the legendary avant-garde vocalist Joan La Barbara into his score. The soundtrack was recorded in Prague, Copenhagen and his native Reykjavik.

File Under: OST
Listen Here

OST: Jackie (Milan) LP

Directed by Pablo Larrain and written by Noah Oppenheim, Jackie is a one of a kind biopic. Starring Natalie Portman in the role of Jackie Kennedy, Peter Sarsgaard and Greta Gerwig, Jackie follows the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and finds the First Lady fighting through grief and trauma to regain her faith, console her children, and define her husband’s historic legacy. The score to Jackie was composed by experimental British musician Mica Levi, best known for her ethereal score to 2013’s sleeper hit Under the Skin. Mournful and eerie with a touch of the surreal, Levi has delivered an unmistakable musical tapestry every bit as iconic as Jackie O herself. The mastered-for-vinyl score comes pressed on 180g LP and is housed in a heavy stock euro sleeve featuring black-and-white artwork of Jackie. A download card containing a digital version of the soundtrack is also included. “The movie’s gut punch owes part of its exceptional force to Mica Levi’s emotionally charged score,its requiem-style strings heavy with sorrow, sometimes distorted to express a surreal state of warped reality (reminiscent of her fabulous work on Under the Skin).” – The Hollywood Reporter

File Under: OST
Listen Here

Sampha: Process (Young Turks) LP

Process is the debut full length LP from 27 year old vocalist, musician, songwriter and producer, Sampha Sisay, who’s notably worked with SBTRKT, Jessie Ware and FKA Twigs, whilst also lending his talents to hiphop megastars like Kanye West and Drake. The ten track album contains production credits from Sampha himself and XL Studios’ Rodaidh Mcdonald, and features the singles “Timmy’s Prayer” and “Blood On Me.” Morden born Sampha first turned heads back in 2011 with “Valentine,” a duet co-written with singer/songwriter Jessie Ware. With his recognizable vocals and unique, electronica-laced take on modern soul he’s proven himself to be one of Young Turks’ most versatile and talented artists.

File Under: Electronic, Pop
Listen Here

Strand of Oaks: Hard Love (Dead Oceans) LP

Tim Showalter’s latest release as Strand of Oaks, Hard Love, emanates an unabashed, raw, and manic energy that embodies both the songs and the songwriter behind them. “For me, there are always two forces at work: the side that’s constantly on the hunt for the perfect song, and the side that’s naked in the desert screaming at the moon. It’s about finding a place where neither side is compromised, only elevated.” Drawing from his love of Creation Records, Trojan dub compilations, and Jane’s Addiction, and informed by a particularly wild time at Australia’s Boogie Festival, he sought to create a record that would merge all of these influences while evoking something new and visceral. These influences coupled with an uninhibited and collaborative studio experience moved an initial concept for a singularly feel-good record to something more complex and real. As much as Showalter wants this record to seem like a party, it’s more than that. It feels like living. “You went away…you went searching…came back tired of looking” is how Showalter begins the title track, a sentiment that epitomizes his own mentality in beginning Hard Love. As the record progresses, so do the themes of dissatisfaction and frustration with love, family, success, and aging, both in personal experience and songwriting.

File Under: Indie Rock
Listen Here

Tinariwen: Elwan (Anti) LP

For the last five years, Tinariwen have been busy crisscrossing the globe bringing their triumpant tours to all five continents and expanding their audience. During this time their beloved homeland in the Adrar des Ifoghas, a Saharan mountain range that straddles the border between north-eastern Mali and southern Algeria has, in effect, been transformed into a conflict zone, a place where nobody can venture without putting themselves in danger. These conflicts have forced the band into exile to record their eighth album, Elwan. Elwan means ‘the elephants’ – an animal metaphor to describe those ‘beasts’, whether militias or multinational consortiums, who have trampled everything in their path: in the desert, where both the human and ecological equilibriums are extremely fragile. Tinariwen chose to record this album in several locations around the world, including for 4 days at the desert hideaway of Rancho De La Luna studio in Joshua Tree, CA, the studio known as a favored refuge for many an eclectic artist from Queens of the Stone Age to Daniel Lanios to Arctic Monkeys to Iggy Pop and more. For Tinariwen, the geographical location of the studio proved to be particularly propitious in terms of creativity. And the human climate was just as favorable. A few friends dropped in during the sessions to add some magic to a few tracks including, Kurt Vile (electric guitar), Mark Lanegan ( Vocals on “Nànnuflày”), Matt Sweeney (electric guitar) and producer/guitarist, Alain Johannes (Cigarbox guitar). Sessions were also recorded in Morocco, where the band were accompanied by local musicians, in a land where they are considered musical legends. Lovers of those sensual yet abrasive riffs that are Tinariwen’s signature won’t be disappointed. But neither will those who love their funky, danceable side, which comes through loud and clear. All that potential has been wonderfully honed by the album’s mixing engineer Andrew Schepps, known well for his work with the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Johnny Cash, and Jay Z.

File Under: Africa, Tuareg, World, Blues
Listen Here

John Zorn: Spy vs Spy: The Music of Ornette Coleman (Music on Vinyl) LP

Spy vs Spy: The Music of Ornette Coleman is the 1989 album by American composer and saxophonist/multi-instrumentalist John Zorn, featuring the compositions of Ornette Coleman performed in the brief intense style of Zorn’s hardcore miniatures. The liner notes thank Ornette and Denardo Coleman, Mick Harris of Napalm Death, Ted Epstein of Blind Idiot God, Pil of Lip Cream (a Japanese thrash core group), The Accused, Craig Flanagan, DRI, CBGB, and “the New York-London-Tokyo Hardcore Triangle”. The outstanding cover artwork was created by indie comic’s personality Mark Beyer (of Amy and Jordan fame). The album itself approaches free jazz from the perspective of hardcore punk, particularly taking note of the contemporary innovations of thrash core and grind core. Zorn would later pursue these preoccupations in the thrash jazz group Naked City. The album was included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.

File Under: Jazz
Listen Here

…..news letter #779 – rip the axe…..

Another slim week, although I suppose a bunch of random, unexpected things could show up tomorrow. We’ve been getting lots of choice used LPs through lately, so I took advantage of the short list and gave some highlights of some recently priced used goodies to whet your appetite. Next week promises to have some wonderful new releases, although I can tell you already, the FIRE WALK WITH ME reissue is going to be late, but it’s coming.

…..pick of the week…..

…..new arrivals…..

David Bowie: Diamond Dogs (Parlophone) LP
Driven by an entirely deeper dynamic than most pop artists, David Bowie inhabited a very special world of extraordinary sounds and endless vision. Unwilling to stay on the treadmill of rock legend and avoiding the descent into ever demeaning and decreasing circles of cliché Bowie continually evolved blurring genres and identities while remaining artistically radical and relevant throughout his trailblazing career. Bowie’s first album of original material since killing off Ziggy Stardust, 1974’s Diamond Dogs was conceptually built off of George Orwell’s dystopian classic 1984, brimming with tension and angst which stood in stark contrast to the disco music that was beginning to crowd the airwaves. It also displayed hints of Bowie’s interest in the music he heard in America. However, authentic soul with a unique UK perspective meant this was far from being a homage. Propelled by the signature single “Rebel Rebel,” Diamond Dogs hit the No. 1 spot in the U.K. and served as Bowie’s big breakthrough in the U.S. where it climbed into the Top 5.

File Under: Rock
Listen Here

David Bowie: Live Nassau Coliseum ’76 (Parlophone) LP
Driven by an entirely deeper dynamic than most pop artists, David Bowie inhabited a very special world of extraordinary sounds and endless vision. Unwilling to stay on the treadmill of rock legend and avoiding the descent into ever demeaning and decreasing circles of cliché Bowie continually evolved blurring genres and identities while remaining artistically radical and relevant throughout his trailblazing career. Recorded live at the Nassau Coliseum Uniondale, NY on March 23, 1976, this double album is the official document of the Isolar/Station To Station tour. Known to fans for many years as the Thin White Duke double album bootleg (among various other titles), the record didn’t get an official release for over thirty years, when it was finally issued as part of the Station To Station deluxe set in September 2010. The bridge between Bowie’s plastic soul days and the Brian Eno infused Berlin trilogy, Live Nassau Coliseum ’76 captures top flight performance of songs from such landmark albums as Hunky Dory (“Changes,” “Queen Bitch,” “Life On Mars?”), Ziggy Stardust (“Five Years,” “Suffragette City”), Aladdin Sane (“Panic in Detroit,” “The Jean Genie”), Diamond Dogs (“Rebel Rebel,” “Diamond Dogs”) and the most recently released Station To Station (“Station to Station,” “Word on a Wing,” “Stay,” “TVC15”).

File Under: Rock
Listen Here

David Bowie: Station to Station (Parlophone) LP
“The return of The Thin White Duke…” So begins David Bowie’s tenth studio album, 1976’s Station To Station. In part influenced by his role in Nicolas Roeg’s film The Man Who Fell To Earth, ever the innovator, Bowie became the character The Thin White Duke; a composite, part his character from the film, alien Thomas Jerome Newton, part Buster Keaton and part European cabaret artist. After the release of 1975’s soul and funk-inspired Young Americans, Bowie and the album’s guitarist Carlos Alomar, Earl Slick (guitar), the E-Street Band’s Roy Bittan (piano), Dennis Davis (drums), George Murray (bass) and Warren Peace (backing vocals) entered Cherokee Studios in Los Angeles to record its follow up. Touching on his love of German electronic bands, American R&B and even film music plus the talents of his American band, Bowie crafted an album drawing on both European and American sensibilities; a transition between his recent Plastic Soul period and what would become his re-acquaintance with European culture when he moved to Berlin the following year. The opening 10-minute title track leaves the listener in no doubt that another ground-breaking Bowie transformation is taking place. From the sound of a moving train and two-note intro, through the introduction and intention of The Thin White Duke – taking in Crowley, Cocaine and Kabbalah and Romanticism – the song is a piece of paranoid and dislocated electronic-funk. This is followed by the distinctive UK and US Top 10 single “Golden Years,” which hints at the funk and soul of his previous album. “Word On A Wing” is the first of the album’s two ballads, with a decidedly Christian theme – a song which in later years Bowie said was something of a cry for help. The back-to-back “TVC15” and “Stay” provide the album with a funkier feel, the former having said to have been influenced by being sprawled in front of a dozen TV monitors and a dream about a girlfriend being eaten by a TV set. A great admirer of Nina Simone’s version of the song, the album’s second ballad and final track is a cover of Dimitri Tiomkin and Ned Washington’s ballad “Wild Is The Wind,” generally considered an inspired and classic Bowie vocal performance. Station To Station was a top 5 success in the U.K. and U.S. It would, as many authorities said, divide the decade for Bowie. He thereafter left the US for Berlin with Iggy Pop and embarked on a journey which saw the creation of his seminal Berlin Trilogy, as well as playing a major role in Iggy’s acclaimed The Idiot and Lust For Life albums.

File Under: Rock
Listen Here

David Bowie: Young Americans (Parlophone) LP
1975’s Young Americans spent almost a year on the U.S. charts, peaking at No. 9 on Billboard’s Albums chart, while its single “Fame” hit No. 1 on the Pop Singles chart. Bowie’s Diamond Dogs had cracked the U.S. Top 5 the previous year, so while Young Americans was not the album that initially broke Bowie in America, it was certainly the one that aligned him with Rod Stewart and Elton John in the top ranks of the decade’s Stateside superstars. Young Americans, representing the zenith of Bowie’s influential soul period, contributed in no small measure to breaking white soul music into the mainstream. The album was, in theory, about “emotional drive,” but came to represent much more than that, both upon its release and over time. Young Americans is Bowie’s vision of and reply to a wide swath of above-board and underground musical and socio-political influences, including soul music, politics, sex, drugs, dancing, and the cultural scenes of downtown New York and uptown Philadelphia. A No. 2 U.K. chart peak made it Bowie’s first studio album in three years not to reach the top spot. Nonetheless, the album’s legacy would be profound, as a new movement of U.K. soul drew inspiration from Bowie’s cool version of Americana and revolutionized British pop in the process. Bowie’s soul boy look and haircut, later to be known as ‘the wedge,’ became the hallmarks of classic clubland cool, not just for the soul boys themselves but across the greater New Romantic era, as well. It is not often that an album makes such a sweeping musical, cultural and subcultural impact. David Bowie’s Young Americans is one of the rare, era-defining records that altered the course of both popular music and modern style.

File Under: Rock
Listen Here

Homeshake: Fresh Air (Royal Mountain) LP
In tomorrow… Born in the bleak isolation of the secluded prairie city of Edmonton, Canada, Homeshake’s Peter Sagar worked with friends in a number of local bands before picking up and moving to Montreal in 2011 to begin recording under the Homeshake moniker. Following two self-released cassettes (The Homeshake Tapes and Dynamic Meditation) and two acclaimed full lengths (In The Shower and Midnight Snack), Sagar cracks a window open with his third album for Sinderlyn – Fresh Air. Started immediately following the recording of Midnight Snack, Fresh Air continues Sagar’s exploration of dreamy, downtempo bedroom R&B and draws inspiration from such disparate artists like Sade, The Band, Broadcast, Prince, and Angelo Badalamenti. As the title Fresh Air suggests, Sagar’s songs were created to clear his listeners’ minds of negativity. Full of smokey, laid back love songs and airy productions, Sagar’s decidedly stoned sound is a breath of fresh air.

File Under: Indie Rock
Listen Here

Jesca Hoop: Memories Are Now Included (Sub Pop) LP
Jesca Hoop’s new album Memories Are Now,, wastes no time in making clear its confidence, confrontation, and craftsmanship. The stark and reverberant title track opens the album with “a fighting spirit,” says Hoop, serving as an anthem to push through any obstacle and put forth your very best work. And she has unequivocally done that here, with an album of stunningly original songs – minimalist yet brimming with energy, emerging from a wealth of life experience, great emotional depth, and years of honing the craft of singing. As riveting as it is reflective, the album, produced by Blake Mills (Fiona Apple, Alabama Shakes), is a fresh debut of sorts for Hoop, as the first of her solo records made outside of Tony Berg’s Zeitgeist Studios where she and Mills were mentored. Says Hoop, “Blake is so utterly musical and emotionally intelligent in his expression. I wanted to see what we could do, just he and I out from under Tony’s wing.” Mills pushed her to strip away layers, keeping it as close to the live experience as possible, using whole live takes and working very quickly. “It’s still covered in embryonic fluid, for lack of a better way to put it,” says Hoop. However fast the work, Memories Are Now covers a great deal of ground, showcasing every edge and curve of Hoop’s captivating voice, with sounds and themes ranging from the mythic to the deeply intimate. She sings of the religion that weighs heavily on her past and the world, of the imagination of myth, of the cruel nature of life and love. The defiance that permeates Memories Are Now is both a product and necessity of a career that has been independently driven and self-funded from the beginning. “All of my successes have been won on the grassroots level, with handshakes and hugs from great people who believe in me,” says Hoop, more than a decade into her career and with new paths to forge. As she sings in the title track, “I’ve lived enough life, I’ve earned my stripes. That’s my knife in the ground, this is mine.”

File Under: Indie Rock
Listen Here

Old Crow Medicine Show: Best of (Nettwerk) LP
Two-time Grammy Award winners and Grand Ole Opry members Old Crow Medicine Show release Best Of, which features 12 of the most memorable and beloved songs from O.C.M.S. (2004), Big Iron World (2006), Tennessee Pusher (2008) including Wagon Wheel” as well as two previously unreleased tracks: Black Haired Quebecoise and Heart Up In The Sky.

File Under: Folk
Listen Here

Oxbow: An Evil Heat (Concrete Lofi) LP
Oxbow is one of THE avant-garde rock bands of our generation. We are proud to present their groundbreaking 2002 album, An Evil Heat, on vinyl for the first time. Remastered double album for maximum effect with Oxbow’s preferred studio, Golden Mastering. The original artwork had been lost over time, so we carefully restored and crafted the artwork for the 12″ format. Hailing from the San Francisco Bay Area, Oxbow is a collective of radical musicians that are anti-formula rock machine murderers. They make chaos a publicly accepted art form, alongside fellow “in need of a mental hospital sojourn” musicians such as Mr. Bungle, Fantômas and the Melvins. At any time they may shift from music concrete to a stoner-type jam to pure insanity and madness. However, things sound incredibly calculated, making this bunch worthy of suspicion and wariness, which is the trait of any true artist.

File Under: Avant-Rock, Metal
Listen Here

Ultimate Spinach: Behold & See (Sundazed) LP
It was legendary record producer Alan Lorber that came up with the concept of “The Bosstown Sound” – “The Sound Heard ‘Round The World” to market and promote the best and brightest of the Bean Town sixties psychedelic scene. (Boston’s key groups at the time included Orpheus, Beacon Street Union, Ultimate Spinach, Chamaeleon Church and others). Ultimate Spinach, arguably the finest of them all, produced magnificent examples of surreal psychedelic record-making, now prized by crate-diggers and outsider music fans alike. The Spinach’s self-titled debut album is now considered a psychedelic classic, but it’s the group’s second record, Behold and See, that is perhaps their finest achievement. Ostensibly a concept album, it’s centered around lead singer/songwriter/keyboardist/guitarist Ian Bruce-Douglas’ cynical worldview. He skewers “normal” society with all the fervor of Zappa and all the surreality (and insanity) of Bob Markley on songs like “Visions of Your Reality” and the four-part “Suite: Genesis of Beauty.” Add in the lush, floating vocals of Barbara Jean Hudson, fuzz guitar and some great late-60s psych jangle and you’ve got the formula for an unhinged classic that stands up to the best of the non-coastal psych sounds of the late-60s. For decades, the only available version of Behold and See was a heavily-edited “director’s cut” which omitted an entire song and presented edited versions of others. On this edition, Sundazed proudly presents the album in its rare, original, superior dedicated mono mix, unexpurgated and unedited. This “ultimate edition” is presented on (of course! and at last!) custom spinach-colored vinyl and nestled into a jacket with beautifully restored artwork. Behold and See is the perfect place to dig into the “Bosstown Sound” – a tremendous and beautiful album now on Sundazed!

File Under: Psych
Listen Here

Weeknd: Starboy (Republic) LP
In tomorrow…. Academy Award-nominated, 2x Grammy Award-winning, and 9x JUNO Award-winning alternative R&B artist The Weeknd’s third studio album Starboy has finally arrived! The highly anticipated follow-up to his triple platinum 2015 release Beauty Behind the Madness captured the No. 1 spot in a staggering 90 countries and debuted atop the Billboard 200. The 18-track double album features four songs that have been soaring up the charts since their release – “Starboy,” “False Alarm,” “I Feel It Coming” and “Party Monster” plus incredible features from Daft Punk (album opener and lead single “Starboy and funky closer “I Feel It Coming”), Kendrick Lamar (“Sidewalks”), Lana Del Rey (“Stargirl Interlude”) and Future (“All I Know”).

File Under: R&B, Pop
Listen Here

…..Restocks…..

David Axelrod: Auction (Decca) LP
Courtney Barnett: Sometimes I Just Sit (Mom & Pop) LP
Courtney Barnett: The Double EP (Mom & Pop) LP
Bing & Ruth: Tomorrow Was the Golden Age (RVNG INTL) LP
Biosphere: Departed Glories (Smalltown Supersound) LP
Bjork: Debut (One Little Indian) LP
Blue Cheer: Vincebus Eruptum (Sundazed) LP
David Bowie: Hunky Dory (Parlophone) LP
David Bowie: The Next Day (Columbia) LP
Broadcast & The Focus Group: Investigate Witch Cults (Warp) LP
Budos Band: III (Daptone) LP
Vic Chesnut: Little (New West) LP
Constantines: Kensington Heights (Arts & Crafts) LP
Death Grips: The Money Store (Sony) LP
Bob Dylan: The Real Royal Albert Hall (Sony) LP
Flying Lotus: Cosmogramma (Warp) LP
Green Day: Dookie (Universal) LP
Billie Holiday: Lady in Satin (Legacy) LP
Norah Jones: Day Breaks (Blue Note) LP
Albert King: Born Under A Bad Sign (Sundazed) LP
Albert King: The Big Blues (Sundazed) LP
Fela Kuti: Live w/ Ginger Baker (Knitting Factory) LP
Kendrick Lamar: Good Kid M.A.A.D. City (Aftermath) LP
Charles Mingus: Mingus Ah Um (Music on Vinyl) LP
Mitski: Puberty 2 (Dead Oceans) LP
Neurosis: Eye Of Every Storm (Relapse) LP
Night Beats: Who Sold My Generation (Heavenly) LP
Angel Olsen: My Woman (Jagjaguwar) LP
Pink Floyd: Obscured By Clouds (Pink Floyd) LP
Portishead: Third (Mercury) LP
Otis Redding: Dictionary of Soul (Sundazed) LP
Lou Reed: Transformer (Legacy) LP
Rolling Stones: Blue & Lonesome (Polydor) LP
Royal Headache: s/t (What’s Your Rupture) LP
Run The Jewels: s/t (Mass Appeal) LP
Sturgill Simpson: A Sailors Guide to the Earth (Atlantic) LP
Sturgill Simpson: Metamodern Sounds (Thirty Tigers) LP
Solange: A Seat At The Table (Columbia) LP
Taake: Noregs Vaapen (Dark Essence) LP
A Tribe Called Quest: Midnight Marauders (Jive) LP
Tribes of Neurot: Grace (Relapse) LP
Jack White: Lazaretto (Third Man) LP
Jack White: Blunderbuss (Third Man) LP

…..Used Goodies…..

AFX: 2 Remixes by AFX (EFA) 12″
Badbadnotgood: II (Innovative Leisure) LP
Badbadnotgood & Ghostface Killah: Sour Soul (Lex) Gold LP
Badbadnotgood & Ghostface Killah: Sour Soul (Lex) Sealed Gold LP
Black Dice: Beaches & Canyons (DFA) LP
The Books: Lemon of Pink (Tomlab) LP
Camel: Mirage (Deram) UK LP
The Doors: Morrison Hotel (Warner) LP
Ella Fitzgerald: Sings the Gershwin Song Book 2 (Verve) LP
Fleetwood Mac: Tusk (Warner) LP
Ghost: Hypnotic Underworld (Drag City) LP
Hawkwind: Domi Fasol Latido (United Artists) LP
Hawkwind: Space Ritual (United Artists) LP
Hawkwind: Warrior on the Edge of Time (United Artists) LP
Bobby Hutcherson: Total Eclipse (Blue Note) LP
Bob Marley & The Wailers: Catch A Fire (Island) LP
Pablo Moses: A Song (Mongo) LP
Klaus Nom: Simple Man (Spindizzy) UK LP
Ozzy Osborne: Randy Rhoads Tribute (CBS) LP
Pink Floyd: The Wall (Columbia) LP
Plasmatics: Beyond the Valley of 1984 (Stiff) LP
Rush: 2112 (Anthem) LP
Rush: Hemispheres (Anthem) LP
Rush: Moving Pictures (Anthem) LP
Stars of the Lid: Tired Sounds of (Kranky) Sealed 1st press LP
Toots & The Maytals: Pass the Pipe (Mongo) LP
Bunny Wailer: Blackheart Man (Mongo) LP
Bunny Wailer: Rock n Groove (Solomonic) LP
Bunny Wailer: Tribute (Solomonic) Jamaican LP
Wolf Eyes: Burned Mind (Hanson) LP
Zoviet France: s/t (AKA Hessian) (Red Rhino) LP
Zoviet France: Norsch (Red Rhino) LP

listen records

Edmonton's Eclectic Music Emporium

…..news letter #780 – lax…..

…..news letter #779 – rip the axe…..