Archive for May, 2009

CIRCULATORY SYSTEM – SIGNAL MORNING

Tuesday, May 19th, 2009

2009, Cloud Recordings
01. Woodpecker Greeting Worker Ant; 02. Rocks and Stones; 03. This Morning (We Remembered Everything); 04. Tiny Concerts; 05. Electronic Diversion; 06. Overjoyed; 07. The Breathing Universe; 08. New From The Heavenly Loom; 09. The Spinning Continuous; 10. I You We; 11. Blasting Through; 12. Solid Forms Dissolving; 13. Gold Will Stay; 14. The Frozen Lake/The Symmetry; 15. Until Moon Medium Hears The Message; 16. (Drifts); 17. Signal Morning

Featuring all the members of The Olivia Tremor Control, as well as Jeff Mangum and Julian Koster of Neutral Milk Hotel, Signal Morning has been eagerly anticipated since the release of the first Circulatory System record earlier this decade. It’s a homemade double vinyl, gatefold sleeve release on Hurt’s own Cloud Recordings, due August 4. Band Myspace.

“An imperative blast of kinetic motion, composed by W. Cullen Hart while in the midst of battling Multiple Sclerosis within his own system – broadcasting his urgent pleas to the world(s) to evolve into a higher dimension or for existing patterns to reveal themselves at peace within the natural order of the universe.”

Rocks and Stones

Signal Morning

ROCK PLAZA CENTRAL – …AT THE MOMENT OF OUR (…)

Monday, May 18th, 2009

2009, Paper Bag Records
01. Oh I Can; 02. A Mule on Fire; 03. (Don’t You Believe the Words of) Handsome Men; 04. O Lord, How Many Are My Foes; 05. (The World Is) Good Enough; 06. Country C; 07. Them That Are Good and Them That Are Bad; 08. The Wrong Side of the Right; 09. Holy Rider; 10. The Long Dead March; 11. We Are Full of Light (That Blinds Us at the Moment of our Most Needing); 12. Wherever You Are, I’m Home; 13. The Hot Blind Earth

The new album is strongly influenced by Faulkner’s Light in August. “(…) story of a young woman, eight-and-a-half months pregnant, who leaves home with big dreams and returns in shame, which she wears with pride, as she searches for her lover/her betrayer/the father of her unborn child.” Okkervil River, anyone?

SOUNDS LIKE
Folk songs with a pinch of Neutral Milk Hotel and Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy thrown in for good measure. Also, “the new tracks were produced by Dale Morningstar (Godspeed! You Black Emperor)…”

Oh I Can

(The World Is) Good Enough

…at the Moment of our Most Needing, or If Only They Could Turn Around, They Would Know They Weren’t Alone is out June 16 in the U.S. Pre-order. Band Myspace.

V/A – UNDERWATER PEOPLES SUMMER SHOWCASE

Monday, May 18th, 2009

2009, Underwater Peoples
01. Julian Lynch – Banana Jam Pt.1; 02. Real Estate – Beach Comber; 03. Frat Dad – Brosef; 04. Pill Wonder – Wishing Whale; 05. Dana Jewell – Baby Come On; 06. Sad City – Agua; 07. Real Estate – Snow (Instrumental); 08. Family Portrait – Mega Secrets; 09. Julian Lynch – Droplet On A Hot Stone; 10. Ducktails – Backyard; 11. Liam the Younger – Country Wide; 12. Andrew Cedermark – Anchorite; 13. Liam the Younger – This Land Pt.1; 14. Broken Trees – Happy Still; 15. Pill Wonder – Wasted By The Screen

Upcoming Summertime Showcase, featuring Real Estate, Ducktails, Julian Lynch, Pill Wonder, Andrew Cedermark (of Titus Andronicus) and more. The official CD release is set for May 28 for $4.50. Preorder via underwaterpeoples@gmail.com. You can also try it.

Frat Dad – Brosef

Julian Lynch – Droplet on a Hot Stone

WOLF EYES – ALWAYS WRONG

Sunday, May 17th, 2009

2009, Hospital Productions
01. Cellar; 02. Living Stone; 03. Broken Order; 04. Pretending Alive; 05.We All Hate You; 06. Always Wrong; 07. Droll/Cut The Dog

SOUNDS LIKE
#$94wj023 mfwfjs9w3 u53sdgmsdlw3 op08jgld kmgd nmnvajujtNOISE. Or – “Wolf Eyes create harsh and hypnotic electronic landscapes that merge the frenzied energy of hardcore with the nihilistic menace of early industrial and noise.”
Get the new album here. Official site.

Living Stone

PROJEKT A-KO – YOYODYNE

Saturday, May 16th, 2009

2009, Milk Pie Records
01. Hey Palooka! 02. Nothing Works Twice 03. Supertriste Duxelle 04. Here Comes New Challenger! 05. Xavier 06. Molten Hearts 07. Scintilla 08. Ichiro on Third 09. Otaku Blue 10. Utopia 11. Black Empire 12. Yoyodyne (Scintilla II)

Projekt A-ko are a lo-fi indie outfit based in Glasgow. They formed from the ashes of Urusei Yatsura, the most Pavementy band since, well, Pavement. They’ve been around since 2001, but Yoyodyne is actually their debut album. Why do so many bands get off on Thomas Pynchon, I’ll never know.

SOUNDS LIKE
The mid 90s. And summer. Yoyodyne is bursting with noisy pop songs with plenty of distortion and great melodic hooks you can’t help but sing along to. And the combined vocals of Fergus and Elaine make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

Molten Hearts

Hey Palooka!

You can get the album here. More songs at their MySpace.

NOTHING PEOPLE – LATE NIGHT

Friday, May 15th, 2009

2009, S. S. Records
01. When I Drink; 02. It’s Not Your Speakers; 03. Stick In The Mud; 04. Pushing Buttons; 05. 1-11; 06. Crunch Time; 07. Another Rattle; 08. Janet; 09. There’s Sun In Your Eyes; 10. Late Night

SOUNDS LIKE
“From the sci-fi, psych, proto punk bombast of the first, the Nothing People shift gears into a moodier, darker, and creepier existance. This record does sound like a late night, on a deserted highway (…)”. Something like that, yes.
You can get the album at their Myspace.
Stick In The Mud

Another Rattle

ANIMAL COLLECTIVE – ANIMAL CRACK BOX

Friday, May 15th, 2009

2009, Catsup Plate
A1. Jimmy Raven; A2. Ahhh Good Country; A3. Iko Ovo; B1. Pumpkin Gets a Snakebite; B2. Pumpkin’s Hallucination; B3. Pumpkin’s Funeral; C1. Jungle Heat; C2. Hey Friend; C3. De Soto De Son; D1. Oh Sweet; D2. Young Prayer #2; D3. Do the Nurse; E1. Ice Cream Factory; E2. Hey Light; E3. Two Sails; F1. Don’t Believe the Pilot; F2. Who Could Win a Rabbit; F3. Mouth Wooed Her; F4. Covered in Frogs; F5. We Tigers

“The 3xLP set gathers live material that was recorded live to MiniDisc at various locations over the course of the course of the first three years or so of the band.” Repeat: “first three years”. That is to say this ain’t no Merriweather Post Pavilion. Ain’t no Sung Tongs either. Mostly experimental stuff, with some recordings from their practice space.
Also, it appears to be sold out. But we’ve got a couple of tracks for you.

Hey Light

Who Could Win a Rabbit

Covered in Frogs

FORMER GHOSTS (XIU XIU + ZOLA JESUS + THIS SONG…)

Thursday, May 14th, 2009

Former Ghosts = Freddy Ruppert (This Song Is a Mess But So Am I) + Jamie Stewart (Xiu Xiu) + Nika Roza (Zola Jesus).

SOUNDS LIKE
If Zola Jesus played in Xiu Xiu. Who would have thought?
I was a bit surprised to find that this little “supergroup” had only 78 listeners on last.fm (considering Xiu Xiu’s near 250,000). They have 4 songs up on their Myspace page and are working on an as-yet-untitled LP, which will be released later this year on Upset the Rhythm.
You can download the Zola Jesus-esque ballad The Bull and the Ram and the Xiu Xiu-esque track Us and Now below.

The Bull and the Ram

Us and Now

TEETH MOUNTAIN – LIVE ON LP

Thursday, May 14th, 2009

2009, Not Not Fun
01. Live on (Side A); 02. Live on (Side B)

“A seven-piece jam crew comprised of 2-3 odd drum kits, sax, clarinet, mixer drones, electric guitar, a pile of pedals, various voices, and probably other unknown mystery junk, they straddle a fine, fucked up line between carefully orchestrated rhythmic psychedelia and total drum-circle-damaged freeform freak-sprawl. (…) Two all-new sides of artfully interwoven live recordings encompassing all the band’s best moods: outsider world scorch, jittery horn ragas, basement attack trance, etc. Raw and real and alive as life.”
Get it from Not Not Fun. Band Myspace.

Live on (Side B)

Thursday, May 14th, 2009

THE TWILIGHT SAD – REFLECTION OF THE TELEVISION

Wednesday, May 13th, 2009

Our favorite tearjerkers are set to release a new album this fall via Fat Cat. It’s called Forget the Night Ahead. After their debut Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters sent us curling into the fetal position on more than one occasion, I know we’re anxious to see what they have in store for us next.

The new track seems a little more controlled than their previous stuff. It builds up in the last minute ending with a fuzzy wall of sound, but it still never reaches that level of oomph that we’re used to hearing from them.

Reflection of the Television

Band website & Myspace.

LICHENS – LIMITED EDITION TOUR EP

Wednesday, May 13th, 2009

2009, Self-Released
01. Tempered Restorations (Re-Edit of HOSS007); 02. Magnus (es) (AUM); Ringing Wworlds (Verfim)

Solo project of Rob Lowe who plays bass and sings with 90 Day Men.

SOUNDS LIKE
Good ambient drone. “He’s working at the familiar intersection of abstract folk and drone, but he uses delays and samples to create heavily layered tracks in real time. (…) His pieces, which tend to be long, can be a bit like spinning plates, as he sets various sounds in motion and keeps them going while figuring out where the music is going next.”
The EP is available at the shows. More about Lichens.

Tempered Restorations (Re-Edit of HOSS007)