JUNE REWIND: EARTH TONGUE, SHOW ME THE BODY AND STALE STORLOKKEN

A fragmented Rewind, this – just three tracks from the past month, that’s it. Why so little?

Because time ran away.

Because the ace new Raketkanon, Cave In and Ifriqiyya Electrique albums haven’t been played enough to write up YET.

Because King Crimson dominated the month by having the cheek-faced bare to celebrate 50 years in music with a Royal Albert Hall stint and so instigate a last-minute decision to go and witness another visceral KC performance.

Because the Basic Dicks tape hasn’t arrived yet.

Because because because ….

Time, dammit. Here are those new chunks.

EARTH TONGUE: Microscopic God

Packing thick new-jazz busy beats and non-4/4 signatures under fuzzy metallic riffs and semi robotic male-female vocalising, New Zealand duo Earth Tongue are a few steps removed from the blues roots of many a guitar-drum two-piece we’ve come to know. It’s a bit alien, a bit one-off, like a not-yet-realised Melvins collaboration or even a cyborg Crystal Fairy. Warm and cold and sexy and so Very Very Now. Check the Microscopic one here.

SHOW ME THE BODY: Forks and Knives

New York hardcore with electro noise abrasion and Dalek-heavy hip-hop distortions thrown in. Unrelenting in a Gnod kinda way, but urgent and fleeting and almost unfinished. Don’t know why it made me want to revisit Protomartyr’s Relatives in Descent, but it did. Urban anger? Maybe, though this lot crank it way more. Forks and Knives this way.

STALE STORLOKKEN: Skyrocket Hotel

No vocals here, just arcing surging drones and buried lo-tech electronics with a 70s filmscore vibe, forged by Norwegian jazz player Stale Storlokken who counts Supersilent and Motorpsycho among his gigs. I know nothing. But if drone done the Urthona or To Blacken The Pages way is your thing, this’ll grab you where it feels good. It did me.

Right then, that’s it. Live action soon with Algiers in Oxford next week.

’til next time!

amplifier wordsmith: the monthly rewind