Category Archives: MONTHLY REWIND

Ear-catching new tracks from the past month

New noise One Three One

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REWIND MARCH: Urthona soundtracking, Mike Patton Freakzone and MegaDave’s thirteen faves 

Very late round-up of some March bitz so let’s just GET – ON – WITH – IT. Without shouting, sorry.

After waiting like a dum-dum for the Urthona out-of-stock message to vanish on the Arch Drude’s Head Heritage Merchandiser page, I shook off my Total Bell head and went a-virtual hunting for Urthona Plays Atlantis?, another soundtrack to Julian Cope’s One Three One novel: yep, I went to the Source – Urthona’s own campband site. And guess what? Said CD is very-much-there, very-much-in-stock…pretty obvious when you think about, but I didn’t. Anyway, released back in January, this 37-minute two-tracker is livewire drone sculpting writ large, as you’d expect from Urthona’s self-styled heavy rural-ism. Bruxo is windswept soothing with semi-ambient sunburst, while Reppu is barbed and howling, a bringer of the sinister ’til it blows itself out on Pagey violinbow moans to kiss the mellow once again. Top-o’-the-moors stuff. If you know Urthona then no great changes (good, we like it that way), and if One Three One’s epic Vesuvio floated your whatsit last year, be sure to check Atlantis? right here. And – stock arrival alert (finally) – here.

Mike Patton John Kaada 

Kaada Patton are back! Not with More Romances from Johnny and Mikey, but the scarier sounding Bacteria Cult. They were interviewed – no, they spoke to each other and it was broadcast as an interview – on Stuart Maconie’s Freakzone at the weekend, and while the set-up sounds as natural as plastic, you gotta tune in, right? MIKE PATTON, on the wireless! ‘Interview’ is here, around 44 minutes in, and if you stick around in the F-zone there’s a new Enslaved track aired. Stick around even longer and there’s a Saturday night delve into Patton’s Many Many Bands on the Freakier Zone, April 10th. A fine excuse to visit that sprawling Patton back catalogue again.

Daveus Mustaineus Quietus

Of course, he’s not quiet – he knows not how – but this feature in Quietus was a pretty cool read: Mustaine and 13 of his fave formative albums. Words spoken like a fan, and man-of-the-year Bowie and classic Zep in the mix as well.

’til next time!

boris, worriedaboutsatan

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REWIND FEBRUARY: drone returns, electronica reigns

If you haven’t seen the cover of Wire magazine this month, go find it and try not to bladder yourself with excitement: BORIS ARE BACK. New album Gensho is due out in March on Relapse Records, but as ever you gotta ask, which Boris is gonna show? Skullfuck droneheads, aero-bounce popsters or garage-psych heavyweights?

Well, given that Gensho is a joint release with noiselord Merzbow means we can (probably) rule out pop’npsyche and head straight for the drone, all 2CDs/4LPs of it. Re-cooked Boris tracks on album 1, new Merzbow tracks on album 2, specially made so you can play them side by side for full Gensho. The phenomenon. Yeah, sounds bigger than big so better start getting in shape for that one – must clear the house first. Absolutego should do it.

But it’s not all amplifier worship and electrified volume that gets us through, is it? Ryley Walker fired up the Bullingdon this month – see previous post – and the new Melt Yourself Down single Dot to Dot is DEFINITELY worth a go, whatever kind of heavy Afro-contemporary jazz thing it is that they do.

Also:

worriedaboutsatan

Are you?

Don’t be. This northern duo’s guitarless electronic beats and twilight ambience make for some frosted post-winter listening, both dark and light. As with Melt Yourself Down, I don’t have the references for this kind of stuff but it’s doing the job right now, offering some sort of Way following the post-Bowie disorientation that’s made a lot of rock make not a lot of sense. Anyway, check The Woods and Even Temper over on bandcamp and make your own minds about satan’s fret boys.Tom Ragsdale, who is one half of worriedaboutsatan, has had his solo stuff played by Mary Anne Hobbs on 6Music as well of late.

Finally, despite major new albums by rock heavyweights like Cult of Luna and Iggy Pop/Josh Homme on the way, it’ll be a youthful oldie stealing the metal press in March surely, because that’s when the raging progthrash meisterwork  Master of Puppets hits 30. SHIT!!! Peace Sells and Reign in Blood also reach three-zero in the next few months.

1986. Nice vintage.

’til next time: BATTERY

Where are we now?

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REWIND JANUARY: TOTAL BOWIE IMMERSION 

Has there been anything Beyond Bowie this month?

Well, there’s news of an Iggy Pop/Josh Homme album – Post Pop Depression – in March, and a post Vesuvio hook-up between archdrude Julian Cope and arch low-frequencer Stephen O’Malley, but that’s it as far as amp-heavy music goes. January has been Bowie, nothing else. New listenings of old albums, hearing more with every spin and becoming ever more spooked by the timing – the sad, immaculate perfection – of the man’s exit from Planet Life. Real life fiction.

Tony Visconti said Bowie’s death was a work of art, and it looks more and more like it was – the act of an artist who, having no control over cANCER and its dignity-stripping debilitations, took total control of whatever he could – and this is because he could – to create work and create space that helped him to leave on his own terms. Nothing was gonna mess the final act. It was like a choreographed last dance, an Outside death/art subplot come true.

Bowie’s influence in life, in popartrock terms, is without question. Will he influence in death too – as in, the way musicians sign off? Is the Death Statement, aka the Blackstar, gonna be a conscious direction for those who know they’re eyeballing their end time?

Wouldn’t be surprised.

’til next time

 

XMAS LISTS AND A 2015 REWIND

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REWIND DECEMBER: THE BIG AND THE BRAVE AND THE SUNN AND THE TOP AND A TEENYTINY LOOKBACK AT 2015

Festive salutations! How’s your end-of-year listmania? Drowning in the scale and volume of it all?

Me too, but more of that later when we get on to a super-slashed no-budget scrap of a list of twentyfifteen music highlights. First, a question:

What have ZZ Top got to do with Christmas?

On the face of it, beyond a pair of slowly whitening beards, nowt. No xmas tunes, no songs about ice or snow, nothin’. Sink a little deeper though and you find good-time vibes. Bar-room vibes. Infectious groove-time vibes and cheek-tongued naughties and, most crucial of all for the festive season’s softly softly low-light ambience … warmth. Not the warmth that comes from a Texas blue-sky beatdown – that would be horrific, this is CHRISTMAS fercrissake – but the warmth that comes from the fingers of a proper human person type being. We’re talking about the Un-Rivalled Guitar Tone of Billy Gibbons, pure as the last snowfall.

Yep, warmth is what we need at this time of year, or least it would be if it weren’t so maddeningly mild, but what the fork – we can’t let a little thing like temperature change our winter playlister habits, can we? So, along with the xmas tunes and the Scandi ice merchants and the vintage storytellers that keep us company on these long nights – Cave, Waits, Dylan, Young – we need some feelgood warmth and this year, it’s ZZ Top who are doing the job. Mebbe that’s just me ‘coz I’ve got a ZZ soft spot burned 30-years deep by a 7-inch Sharp Dressed Man and an Eliminator/Afterburner double dose, but even if you don’t have those Texan rocks buried deep from way-back at Woolies, you can do a lot worse than spin some Top this winter. Try Rhythmeen from 1996 and see where the Black Keys were getting ideas from. Thicker and phatter than those synth-edged ZZ blockbusters of the mid 80s, Rhythmeen’s blues-based robo riffs (see why Josh Homme’s a fan?) roll and flow as much as they rock, and the whole thing just makes you feel GOOD. Check the slow-bar crawl of Vincent Price Blues or Hummbucking Part 2‘s non-stop fills and see if they don’t put a guitar-loving grin on your frontal. Then have a(nother) drink. ’tis Christmas after all.

Right then: highlights of 2015?

Let’s have a little one that happened just a handful of hours ago on the December 23rd:

SunnO))) with Scott Walker were played on the radio just after midday.

MIDDAY SUNNO))), can you imagine? Was a great bit of listening and it came about because Mary Anne Hobbs had Stephen O’Malley guesting on 6 Music – well worth grabbing so you can hear his thoughtful reflection on the role of patience in the way we approach music. Also worth a visit, if it’s still available, is his Freakzone show from the other week. Top curating.

As for the records of 2015, were do you start? Catch up is the name’s game and there are tonnes of albums missed but if there are four that I’d want to share, it’s probably these:

Godspeed You! Black Emperor – Asunder, Sweet and Other Distress. We all know what GY!BE are about but even by their standards, this is going some. Beefed up and warmer than previous outings but with zero loss of intensity, Asunder is an arthouse beast of a record.

Ryley Walker – Primrose Green. Acoustic songwriter in the Tim Buckley/John Martyn vein, blazing with a group of sharp-as-shit jazz musos who don’t smoothe the raw edges – check Sweet Satisfaction for evidence. Fiery folk, anyone?

Led Zeppelin – Coda (reissue). Always a much better collection than it’s given credit for – you can’t argue with We’re Gonna Groove, not ever – this 3-CD expansion is a gem, not just for the two Bombay Orchestra tracks but also the Bonham-does-Meters hard funk piledriver St Tristan’s Sword and the loping alt-Levee If It Keeps On Raining. 

Big|Brave – Au De La. Only just got this so I’m in no way familiar enough but it’s making a pretty colossal impression with its, what would you say, Feedbacker Boris meets Thee Silver Mt Zion  post/drone sprawls? Heavy and spacious, it’s on Southern Lord and was recorded by Efrim Manuel Menick so that probably tells you enough. Better go and play it some more

but not before some intoxicating late night ZZ.

HAPPY CHRISTMAS, MERRY NEW YEAR! Bowie Blackstar within sight now…

p.s. Old Man Lizard reviewed and profiled in this month’s Terrorizer, and Undersmile’s Anhedonia makes the Terrorizer Top 50 albums of the year. Not bad, eh?

FreakzO)))ne radio

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REWIND NOVEMBER

Although Audioscope 2015 is very much the November biggie for those of us in Oxford, life does go on (but now with Gazelle Twin’s UNFLESH stalking our lives) and so this Rewind is a radio special coz there’s been some proper fringe rock stuff on the 6Music Freakzone this past month. Dip into this lot on t’ iplayer, but check ’em quick – some have just one week left, some have up to three, all links are in there.

Electronic Math Rock – Boredoms, 65daysofstatic, Three Trapped Tigers, Dawn of Midi and Battles bring the restless propulsions and scattergun glitch. What more do you want?

Motorpsycho and Helge Sten – never actually heard Motorpsycho’s music before but prog-psych-jazz-and-more (ie everything) seems to be the thing for these Norwegian brainiacs.

Coil – half-hour history of Coil with the slow-talking John Doran from The Quietus.

Stephen O’Malley Freakzone – a WHOLE BLOODY TWO-HOURS curated by half of SunnO))) and it’s a first-rate show of avant heavy, prog weird and free jazz exhibits. This is the stuff that compilations are made of: Goatsnake, Magma, Julia Holter, Today is the Day, Annette Peacock, Virus, a track from the new Sunn O))) album, what more do you want etc etc.Available til Dec 20th ish.

Right then, there goes the radio rewind – tonnes of new discoveries, just in time for Xmas spends and Santa lists. Motorpsycho are on mine. 

Lastly, Philthy Animal Taylor passed on from this world on November 11…RIP. Dug out the old No Remorse double vinyl and played the start of side two – Bomber, Iron Fist. What a clatter that guy made. Overkill and We Are the Road Crew say it better than anything.

’til next time!

 

KILLING JOKE live

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REWIND OCTOBER: Killing Joke@Oxford O2, Oct 30th 2015

A gig-heavy Rewind, this one. Godspeed You! Black Emperor did an artful deconstruction job on everyone at the Warwick Arts Centre the other week, and Liverpool doom trio Coltsblood bulldozed the Wheatsheaf with Undersmile-slow riffs and blastbeat breaks. Godspeed you can read about over here, but Coltsblood? Musically very cool and hefty, but the growlscreamgrowlscream vocal thing … man, it wore me down and brought on a major Doom Burnout. One to come back to another day, methinks.

No such burnout on Friday though when Killing Joke – new album Pylon just one week young – took the O2 stage with an old-new one-two: The Wait and Autonomous Zone, and while it takes a little while for the crowd to warm, mostly coz of the sadistic air-con blasting a cold force-ten in our faces down stage front left, it ain’t long before there’s a ring of slamming jumping bods lapping it up. Killing Joke will always invoke some kind of movement –  there’s just something in that fluid, swirling, awkward rhythm-force that sets their sound far apart from other rock bands and pokes at people’s mania, especially the early stuff. Fall of Because, with its Ferguson-propelled death dance and Coleman’s first cut-loose vocal of the night, STILL feels like madness being conjured.

Highlights? With such vintage on show it’s too subjective a question to answer … depends where and when you entered KJ’s world/they entered yours, but Money Is Not Our God, Eighties, Wardance, Requiem, Asteroooooiiiiid (yesssss), Communion (doubleyesssss) and an encoring Pandemonium are all in there, among others. Other than those, it’s another Pylon newie I am the Virus – future classic, surely – preceded by a pulverising Exorcism that stand out for me, but for anthemic goth pop writ  l a r g e  you cannot top the monster-big Love Like Blood. 

So, plenty of gigs in October (and that’s without getting to see Hawkwind). What else was there?

Well, after last Rewind asked are-Maiden-prog?, who turned up in Prog Rock magazine but Steve Harris, having a big ol’ chat about Genesis, Tull and General Prog love. ‘nuff sed.

David Bowie announced a new single and album. Officially, this is Too Exciting to Write About.

And Audioscope announced their line-up for the all-day bash at the Bully on November 21st. Part Chimp, Guapo, Dave Heumann AND LOADS MORE will stride that small stage, just as we like it.

‘til next time!

No repent from Slayer

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REWIND SEPTEMBER: SLAYER RETURN

There’s something very, very right about listening to Slayer in September. Cool air becoming cold, days light but pulling up short, winter the next turn … yeah, September is Slayer time, and when there’s a fresh Slayer bloodflow – Repentless – it’s even better. A new rekkid is always summat to get stoked by, but this one – with Hanneman and Lombardo gone – seems more pivotal than most. Can they cut it? It’s way too early to get a proper perspective but the first impression sez fuuuuuuuckyeah. Araya and King have got a grade-A groove on, Holt shreds with melody and Bostaph … well, we already know he’s got Slayer-approved chops but his precise, punishingly physical performance on Repentless – in contrast to Lombardo’s tight-but-loose thrash flair – is exactly what Slayer needs right now: an anchor. Some of that God Hates Us All certainty.

Elsewhere in September rambles:

Is prog a four-letter word? That was the question put to Steven Wilson by Stuart Maconie on the Freakzone the other week (the tardiness of this Rewind means it’s probably just slipped off the iplayer now), and while Maconie would never feature any classic metal on his zone, you gotta wonder where the difference is. Take Iron Maiden – none more classic a metal band, right? Yet their new Book of Souls double album is home to the Irons’ longest-ever track Empire of the Clouds, a widescreen Bruce-athon which stops the clock at a Yes-bothering 18 minutes. Given their output since Brave New World, are latter-day Maiden prog?

And if so, is Steven Wilson Iron Maiden?

Ach, we’ll save the prog discourse for the time when Tales from Topographic Oceans finally hits the runout groove on side four, but if Pink Floyd are coming to be seen as prog, as Wilson posits, then we’re seeing a slow rehab of the p word. And a lot of what characterises P-rock – instrumentals, time and tempo shifts, length – applies to any number of spacepostavantmath types which bust out beyond the four-minute 4/4. SEMANTICS ROCK(s).

And that’s that for now, except to say there are a couple o’ good gigs coming up in Ox, including the ever-mighty Killing Joke the night before Halloween.

’til next time!

Supernormal freakzone metal

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REWIND JULY: BOUNDLESS WIRELESS

No gigs attended in July but there’s been a noisier-than-usual Freak Zone bent this past few weeks on 6Music – Sabbath AND Boris as featured albums, no less – so this Rewind is nothing more than a shameless bit of pass-it-on.

A LA CARTER ROCK

Daniel P Carter from the Radio 1 Rock Show turned up on the Freakier Zone with a half hour’s worth of grade-A heaviness the other week. It’s no longer on iplayer but here’s what he brung in:

Horseback – Mithras. Floyd-at-Pompeii meets Arbouretum heavy meets BLACK FCKN METAL …. yep, a jarring combo.

Fucked Up – Year of the Hare (excerpt). Piano wonk, noise stabs and post-hardcore stretched over 20 minutes. Ace. EP out this month.

Myrkur – the woman who is… well, who really knows? But this track, whatever it’s called (didn’t catch that bit), sweeps from black metal ferocity to folkish ambience pretty seamlessly, a real double-header. Pitchfork have been sniffy, citing PR machinations and identity scams (she’s a Chanel model. Is she?), but Terrorizer mag – surely more credible for this kind of thing – have put Myrkur on the front cover. Debut album M out this month.

Chelsea Wolfe – she was on the Freak Zone last week, her new record Abyss was Phil Alexander’s featured album on Planet Rock this week, and one hit of that luscious Nadja/Type O guitar-wall density starts to tell you why. Abyss is out this month.

So it’s hats off to Carter for bringing the noise to the Zone ( Steve Von Till got aired as well), and if this is the kind of stuff that appears in the last hour of his rock show – and he said it does – then I’ll be tempted for an end-of-show snoop. Not been to Radio 1 since John Peel died and Mary Anne Hobbs gave it up. 

SUPERNORMAL OXON QUAKER

But Maconie’s guitar excursions don’t stop with Carter, Sabbath or Boris because this coming weekend, he talks to the organisers of Supernormal festival in Oxfordshire. Never been to it meself, and I won’t be going this time either but that’s my loss – a loss that’s a bit bigger for having just encountered two of the bands, Father Murphy and Ghold. Especially Ghold: Om rhythms, Melvins obtuse. Sounds like a Beehoover/Big Business drum-bass gig, but I’ve only heard one track (Pursed) and not dug any deeper yet so what do I know? Bugger all. Bet they loosen a few fillings at Braziers Park though.

Right then, that’s it for now. Plenty of names to check, and we didn’t even mention the last of the Zep reissues …

’til next time!

Kanye feel it?

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REWIND JUNE: ARMCHAIR GIGGING

June means Glastonbury means headliner anticipation means a whole lotta speculation, and who are we to resist?

Last year it was Metallica who fired the ire, and while they weren’t pin-sharp they were human and knew what the game was, pulling off what looked – from the TV at least – like one of those pretty great Underdogs Victorious shows. This year’s bad-boy was even more divisive: everyone’s favourite Kardashian, Mr Kanye.

Should he have been there? ‘course he should. All that moaning and groaning and, lamest of all, a petition from the Fuckwits of Glastonbury 2015, was so far beyond the festival spirit that it was laughable. A petition? What, like you’re gonna sign something and change the bill so that Another Mainstream Guitar Band can headline? GET A LIFE!!! It’s music, not an illegal invasion – go watch something else, there’s not exactly a shortage at Worthy Farm, is there?

Me, I wanted Kanye West Inc to blow minds. Can’t say I’m a fan (megalomaniacal hip hop not my area) but I do have Yeezus and, musically at least, it’s a dense piece of work – way more intense than you might think – and if KWest is a fraction as good as people/he claim then a headline slot should be a piece of piss. Let him prove it. That way, it’s his gig to win or lose.

And for the first three or four tracks, he does win. Black Skinhead festival-loud? Immense. Excess-all-areas gigawatt light show? Ditto. NASA-scale spectacle that unfolds from one-man intro to mega-band multimedia Show Biz Ness ‘I was there’ moment?

Er … no. And that’s what kills it for the non-Kanyes who coulda been won. There is no spectacle from the World’s Greatest Rock Star (whatever), there is no attempt to connect, there is nothing at all but Wanye K in his sweaty combats, singing to his own tunes like a celebrity karaoke/Kanyeoke special. Real-time hubris: ‘I shall own this motherfucking stage. Coz I’m not letting anyone else on it.’

Flick the channel and see a saviour in Suede, performing to and for the FANS. Flick back to the Pyramid Stage and see a man on his own. In a crane.

West just lost.

Back on more familiar Amplifier ground, what about Motorhead? Sadly, it looks like the days of Motorheadaches might be gone. Lemmy is uncomfortably frail to watch, and when Ace of Spades gets sung instead of Overkill… ach. Sad to see. At least Spiritualized ace it over the weekend.

’til next time!

Oxford: the doom inspires

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REWIND MARCH

April’s in. March is out. What happened? The return of one of the slowest, heaviest bands in the land, that’s what: UNDERSMILE. And if you’ve ever been within a mile or eleven of their nightmare doomcrawl, you’ll know that’s no exaggeration – last year I stood within a few feet when they supported Beehoover and felt utterly punished by the set’s end. Not exactly pleasurable, yet weirdly compelling … if torpid glacier is a pace you’re partial to. Either way, it was pretty damned cool to see them nab Nightshift’s front cover in March, and it’s an all-round good read so check it out – the band are funny and friendly (everything the music is not), there’s a new word for our vocabulary and you’ll find some highly impressive, though not remotely big-headed, namedrops of Billy Anderson, Dylan Carlson and Mr 2.13.61 himself, Henry Rollins. Why the Big Interview status? Oh yeah: Undersmile have got a new album looming. It’s called Anhedonia.

But you’ll find no review here coz it’s not out til a bit later in April so, as a warm up, let’s turn to 2013’s Wood and Wire. I’ll admit that I haven’t squared up to the Narwhal debut, mostly because I’ve been too scared, but this split album is shaping up to be a proper entry point to the world of Undersmile. For starters, it’s not just them – it’s a split album with Coma Wall, who are … Undersmile? Yes. In disguise. As ACOUSTIC BALLADEERS, faaaaa’ckinnelll!!!

Except there’s no b*ll*dry on show here, I made that bit up. Coma Wall are acoustic though, and the three tracks here – each of them 6 minutes plus – have the same addictive downer harmonies that recall Alice in Chains’ Sap EP, yet the low cello drone and slow-pick banjo on the standout track You Are My Death (it WILL stick in your head) turns the vibe dial to Rustic Americana. Love it. No wonder Dylan Carlson’s been sniffing around.

The flip to Coma Wall’s melancholic drift is Undersmile’s amplified hit: bog-slow and Dopesmoker-huge, the inyerface clarity is well removed from the stoner end of doom, not just because of the recording itself (co-produced by no less than Justin Greaves) but also because Undersmile don’t do that blues-based Sabbath-rooted derivative riffing thing. They don’t chug, not here at least, and they definitely don’t swing or groove. Undersmile pound and lurch, dragging things down with those moaning dead-souls-in-harmony vocals. Sure it’s monotonous on first listen but with extra reps, you find the spaces and the range. The Slint-like unease (Killer Bob), the Neurosis tension (Hives). And it grows, absolutely. Undersmile are no easy ride but one thing’s for sure – they stand apart in this heaviest of rock divisions, and Wood and Wire’s split format could be your way in. Did the job for me.

Digital download of Wood and Wire available at Shaman Recordings, it’s well cheap

Undersmile interview with Oxford’s Nightshift is in the March issue, page 4 of the PDF. Album review on page 5.

Last bit …

6Music went underground on March 21 when John Doran, editor of online sprawl The Quietus, guested on Maconie’s Freakier Zone for a 30-minute special on SUBTERRANEAN WORLDS. Not all of it’s essential but if you’re poking abut the iPlayer it’s worth checking for these two reasons: Lustmord’s ambient industrial menace, and the Butthole Surfers dementedness. Because you don’t really get this stuff on air very often, do you?

And that’s that. ‘til next time!