Monday, December 31, 2007

Happy New Year

Dear friends
as 2007 is coming to it's end and 2008 is read to make it's debout(!) i want to send to all of you my best wishes for the year to come and a big thank for making Mutant Sounds what it is now.I think 2007 was a very good year for our blog.I and Mutant crew assure you that 2008 will be as good as 2007 . Will be back to you just after new year's eve.
Happy new year 2008 ,full of good music and....keep your brains open!
Jim Mutantsounds

Friday, December 28, 2007

Claustrofobia-Arrebato,LP,1984,Spain


Great Spanish electronic post punk/cold wave band.This is their 1st lp released in 1984.Minimal synth all through,angst vocals,the typical cold waveish bassline....reminds me a mix of Sad Lovers and Giants,Chameleons and "european period" Tuxedomoon at times.
All these with the Spanish temperament of course.Awesome record.
get it here
All infos found were in spanish so if anyone could help ,it would be much appreciated!

Tappi Tíkarrass-Bítið Fast í Vítið,MLP,1982+Miranda ,LP,1983,Iceland





Tappi Tíkarrass was a famous Icelandic punk/pop band which added elements of funk, disco and jazz to their music, marking a difference from other traditional bands at that time. The band is also considered the first serious music project of now renowned singer Björk Guðmundsdóttir.
In 1979 Björk was singing in a band called Exodus with guitarists Ásgeir Sæmundsson and Þorvaldur Bjarni Þorvaldsson, bassist Skúli Sverrisson, and drummer Oddur F. Sigurbjarnason. In 1980 she left the band with Oddur and joined bassist Jakob Smári Magnússon and guitarist Eyjólfur Jóhannsson to form a band called Jam-80 because they were meant to play for just one gig, although they continued playing for a while.They performed a mixture of pop and punk music and never released any official record, but recorded a cassette demo during a gig at Hólabrekkuskóli which contained the following tracks: two songs by Janis Ian: “Run too Fast, Fly too High” and “The Other Side of the Sun”; two songs by Deep Purple: “Highball Shooter” and “Demon’s Eyes”; other tracks were “13-16” by Utangarðsmenn, “Boureé” by Jethro Tull, “Funky Town”, and two instrumental songs (untitled).This band came to an end when decided to create a punk band with more serious music. That is how Tappi Tíkarrass came into being by September 1981 with vocalist Eyþór Arnalds, who was replaced a few months later by Björk and a year later, Oddur was replaced in drums by Guðmundur Þór Gunnarsson.
The name Tappi Tíkarrass, which in Icelandic means “Cork the Bitch’s Arse” was given after Jakob’s father claimed that the band’s music “fitted like a cork in a bitch’s arse”.Tappi Tíkarrass combined elements of punk and pop music to create an exotic post punk with references to Siouxsie & the Banshees and the first stage of The Cure.
They started to record in August 1982 and released an EP titled Bítið Fast í Vítið which went out through label Spor. This 12” vinyl was formed of 5 tracks performed by Björk, who replaced the original vocals by Eyþór. The only song in English was “London”.They followed up in 1983 with the release of their first album titled Miranda, which was released by Gramm. This record consisted of 13 tracks and even though Tappi Tíkarrass was the less experimenting project of singer Björk, this album outstands with songs like “Kríó” which feature pop melodies, and “Tjet”, a song that renders a mellow start and ends with disco references.
Tappi Tíkarrass appeared on Rokk í Reykjavík, a TV documentary directed by Friðrik Þór Friðriksson. Tappi Tíkarrass was one of the 19 bands featured in the film and collaborated with two songs: “Hrollur” and “Dúkkulísur”, both of them sung by Björk and Eyþór with Oddur replacing Guðmundur in drums.
In 1983 they appeared on Nýtt Líf, a comedy directed by Þráinn Bertelsson. The film was shot in the Westman Islands and Tappi Tíkarrass played on stage two songs “Sperglar” and “Kukl” (better known as “Seiður”), under the supervision of Megas.
Despite the raise on the interest on this band as Björk developed into an international music artist, the discography of Tappi Tíkarrass has never been reissued and all the original releases are widely unavailable.The band has appeared only in two Icelandic compilations, Satt 3 which was released in 1984 and featured two live B-sides: “Sperglar” and “Seiður”. Finally, by 1998 record label Spor released Nælur, another compilation which contained the songs “Iltí Ební” and “London”, both of them taken from Bítið Fast í Vítið.
By July 1983 the band split up when Björk joined Purrkur Pillnikk’s singer Einar Örn Benediktsson, Þeyr’s guitarist Guðlaugur Kristinn Óttarsson and drummer Sigtryggur Baldursson, with Medúsa’s keyboardist Einar Arnaldur Melax, and finally Birgir Mogensen bassist from Spilafífl. Together they formed a goth-oriented and more experimental band called KUKL.
Jakob Magnússon and Guðmundur joined Bubbi Morthens to play in Das Kapital until 1985, then Jakob followed up with Bubbi & MX-21, and worked as a session player for several artists. In 2003 he released his first solo album, Bassajól. After playing in Das Kapital, Guðmundur withdrew from the music scene.After leaving the band, Eyþór Arnalds studied cello and continued with the band Todmobile and later joined singer Móa Julíusdóttir to form a band called Bong which achieved relative success in Iceland and England. He has released a few solo albums and then collaborated with Móa’s debut album Universal in 1998 and has worked in the Icelandic music industry as sound engineer. More recently, he got involved in politics running for mayor in the town of Árborg.Eyjólfur Jóhannsson continued playing with bands like Dá, The Wunderfoolzs, and in 2002 joined S.S.Sól. Oddur joined a heavy metal band called Foringjarnir, and he became an electrician. More recently he followed up with another band called Santiago releasing an album in 2002.
The last performance of Tappi Tíkarrass took place in 1987 when the band reunited to play at a night club called Safari.
From Wikipedia
Björk is imho one of the most beautiful and important things that "happened" in "pop" music in the 90s...BUT she was active since the late 70s.Having released an album in 1977 when she was just 14 years old(actually a Jazzy record) ,being a daughter of jazz musician,in the early 80s she got involved in the Icelandic punk/post punk scene with bands like Tappi Tíkarrass,Kukl and finally the much succesful Sugarcubes.With her unique voice and talent she gave a new breath to what was considered punk/post punk.Here are the 2 Tappi Tíkarrassrecordings.Highly recommented by all means.
get them both here




The Chrysanthemums-Little Flecks of Foam Around Barking ,2xLP,1988+Insekt Insekt(Go Germany),CD,1995,UK





As all you might have guessed i consider Deep Freeze Mice and all their reformations and relative bands(The Chrysanthemums,Ruth's Refrigerator,PO!,Junk Analysts,etc),as one of the most influential,amazing,important bands in the 80s UK underground music scene.Having posted quite many of the Deep Freeze Mice family recordings,and Chrysanthemums 1st LP and 7" ,here come 2 more.As always highly recommented !
The Chrysanthemums were an English pop group active between 1987 and 1998. The project began as a collaboration between multi-instrumentalist Terry Burrows (known in the band as "Yukio Yung") and Alan Jenkins, the guitarist with The Deep Freeze Mice. The first releases were performed in the studio by Burrows and Jenkins alone: other personnel were gradually added including Robyn Gibson on drums and Jonathan Lemon formerly of Jesus Couldn't Drum on keyboards, enabling them to complete several tours of mainland Europe, where there was most interest in the band's work.
The music was an odd blend of lo-fi Sixties pop, punk rock and progressive rock. Lyrics were often surreal in nature, and delivered by Burrows in a laconic English "pop" voice that recalled Ray Davies of The Kinks or Robyn Hitchcock.
The original band became inactive in the mid-1990s. Burrows and bassist Vladimir Zajkowiecz later recorded an album and single as Chrys&themums, creating a sound that was largely indistinguishable from the band's earlier releases.
Burrows went on to record as Yukio Yung and under various other aliases; he also become a successful author. Jenkins formed The Creams and opened a recording studio in Leicester, England. He currently plays in The Thurston Lava Tube.
AMG REVIEW: The Chrysanthemums' second album is a two-record parody of such overblown progressive rock concept albums as Yes' Tales of Topographic Oceans and Jethro Tull's Thick as a Brick. Housed in a gold-on-black sleeve-covered front, back and spine with fake hieroglyphics, the double album comes with a lengthy sleeve note written by guitarist Alan Jenkins explaining the album's inspiration and detailing the complicated story the 27 songs purport to tell. The Pythonesque story has something to do with giant eggplants from outer space and a time-traveling World War II bi-plane. The songs, of course, are entirely unconnected, both to the concept and to each other. Ranging in length from 27 seconds to just over seven minutes, these songs are simultaneously instantly catchy and deeply strange. Jenkins and singer/keyboardist Terry Burrows have a knack for psych-influenced pop songs that wouldn't sound out of place on Carnaby Street-era Kinks and Who records, but their lyrics are a weird mix of Bonzo Dog Band-style humor, bizarre imagery, and throwaway references to pop culture figures from soul legend Harold Melvin to U.K. television personality Lucinda Lambton. The five-minute "God and the Dave Clark Five" embodies the eclectic spirit of the album in microcosm, moving from a bouncy freakbeat verse to a middle section of Krautrocky drones and chants, ending up with a Hendrix-like noise guitar solo by way of a direct quote from the Monkees' theme song. Elsewhere, "(They Must Have Made It With Their) Hats" marries a circa-1966 Beatles melody with backing vocals that substitute random three-syllable words (aubergine, Reginald, mandolin, etc.) for the expected "la-la-las," and "Light Transforms the Peugeot Dealers" mixes ukulele and sampled horns manipulated to sound like steam escaping from some huge forbidding machine. The stylistic shifts make sense as a whole, and the album is dense and melodic enough to stand up to repeated listens. Headphones are recommended to capture the subtleties of the rather muddy homemade production, however.
~Stewart Mason, All Music Guide (2001)
R. Steve Moore on Little Flecks:"We were recording some tracks for our first album Is that a fish on your shoulder or are you just pleased to see me? and I had a few minutes to myself in the bathroom before helping Yukio Yung record a particularly arduous shawm solo (track two, side one - the shawm in question is an unusually long oriental instrument that requires so much air pressure to produce a reasonable tone that Yukio can only do it while someone else is blowing into his nose very hard). Anyway, leafing through a copy of the Egyptian Book of the Dead, I got caught up in the lengthy footnote on page 483, which tells a bizarre story involving time travel, evolution, little flecks of foam and many strange breeds of dog. Immediately I was able to visualize a double concept album based on the story and I became so absorbed in it that before I knew what had happened a whole week had gone by and some firemen were breaking down the door to get me out. I made my way back to the studio, Yukio had been able to record the shawm solo using and old diving suit and a few parts from a washing machine. I sketched out my idea to Yukio and Vladimir. Vladimir thought it was all right but Yukio said it was the most stupid idea he had ever heard in his whole life and I should get psychiatric help as soon as possible but not using Egg Plant money because it was probably a waste of time and I was out of the badn anyway for hiding in the bathroom for a week during a recording session. I told him that he could'nt sing in tune and he was a big git, at which point he tried to force a polythene bag over my head. However, that evening Yukio had so much to drink that the next morning he couldn't remember anything that had happened and when I put my idea about the Egyptian Book of the Dead to him again he liked it a lot and insisted upon beginning work immediately. Unfortunately Vladimir now hated the idea and threatened to bring out a court injunction to prevent us from making the album unless we incorporated his idea of performing the story as a ballet with trained penguins. We agreed to his proposal while deciding secretly to stage an accident whereby all the penguins were killed on the way to the first rehersal. In the event, this action turned out to be unnecessary as Vladimir forgot all about the idea. Yukio and I began holding sessions by candlelight to work out how to fit the maximum number of guitar and keyboard solos on to the album, and by about March 1988 things had come together jolly well. We had a total of over 150 solos on side three alone. During one six-hour session, which continued until 10.30 p.m. when we went to bed, we figured out how to include 4,000 solos, some of which lasted for over ten minutes. It was a magical experience, which left Vladimir confused for days, after which he tried to kill himself by overdosing on some potatoes that he found in the kitchen. Luckily I caught him trying to inhale one in the garden and called an ambulance. Everyone contributed to the music during the ensuing session and we had recorded the album by about June, although afterwards Yukio and I had our doubts about whether there were enough solos on side four and we added a few extra ones. The album was now absolutely perfect in every respect in spite of the fact that Vladimir had to be hypnotized, against his will, before he would agree to finish all his bass parts. Also, whenever he regained consciousness he would try to eat the studio equipment, so we had to strap him in a corner for long periods and tape his mouth shut to stop him crying loudly during the vocal overdubs. Fortunately, he improved half-way through the sessions and made several important contributions. At one point he suggested adding some extra solos to a few tracks (for example 'Raymond Chandler') and we agreed. The album was now really and truly complete. (although we did take some extra solos to the cutting room just in case we needed some more, and, in the event, we used them all. Some were so effective that we used them two or three times). Below is a track-by-track explanation of the album's storyline. Originally the tale was set in Ancient Egypt, of course, but we decided to bring it up to date and set it in Barking to make it more accessible to a modern audience. The cheeping of the robot bees: Side one opens with the sound of propellers as Dave, a deaf, dumb, and blind bomber pilot, flies his Lancaster in a daring daylight raid over Barking in 1941. (Actually he thinks he's over Berlin and he doesn't know it's daylight). He sings of his lost childhood in China and of his pet dog, Dominic. The navigator enters the cockpit to ask Dave why he is flying only four feet off the ground and just then the plane crashes into the side of an old warehouse. By a remarkable twist of fate a splinter of glass penetrates the base of Dave's skull and he recovers his sight, speech and hearing. He then dies of a massive brain haemorrhage. The scene then moves to the present day. Terry, an inventor, rents the very same warehouse in order to work on his latest project entitled 'Robot Bees'. Terry has some prototype robot bees with him in a carrier bag and together they explore the warehouse, which is very untidy, having been in disuse for over forty years. They sing of the nature of dust. Terry says he likes it but the robot bees reply that it gets in their wings and makes them cheep even more than usual. They are surprised to find a Lancaster bomber sticking through the wall. Dream string: We meet Alan, a local estate agent, who is showing a young couple, both called Jane, around a new house. He sings of his surprise when he notices that their pet dachshund appears to have the word 'aubergine' embroidered on its back. Jane explains that this is a rare birthmark and is completely natural. Alan changes the subject, pointing out some nice trees in the back garden. Jane replies 'Yes, but look at those strange flecks of foam up there in the branches.' Alan says 'Oh, that's nothing a few poisonous chemicals won't take care of. In fact I have several with me.' Accidentally, he drops some on the dog, who bites him. God and The Dave Clark Five: We meet Martin, the proprietor of a dogs' boarding kennels. After a long dream about working on an indigo farm in India he wakes up to find himself staring at the word 'aubergine', which appears to be suspended in front of his face. He realizes that it is actually written on the side of his great dane, Fiona, who is standing by the side of the bed. The overseer on the indigo farm: Martin makes the round of his kennels and feeds all the dogs. He is alarmed to find that two of them are missing and sings of his sadness at their loss and of what he thinks the owners might say to him when they come back from their holidays. This is the aria: 'What have you done with our dog you bastard?' On examining the fronts of the cages to try to discover how the dogs have escaped, he finds the chicken-wire strangely twisted and broken as if bitten by a giant beak. The hygrometer song: Meanwhile, many thousands of miles away in the little town of Upper Montclaire, New Jersey, USA, a strange man sings a song about a hygrometer. And your dog can sing: Alan receives a phone call from Jane and Jane. They have bought the house he showed them and now, one week later, they are alarmed by the flecks of foam in the tree in the garden. These, they say have become much enlarged and sinister dark shapes can be observed moving about inside them. Alan tells them that this adds charm to their property and that if they ever want to sell the house he will mention the interesting flecks of foam in the advertisements. Raymond Chandler: The Janes ring Alan again and tell him that the flecks of foam are now even larger and that they connect this phenomenon with certain disappearances. Apparently their dachshund has gone, and there is a large domestic appliance missing from the kitchen, but they can't remember what it is. Alan goes round to check and arrives just in time to see a huge, black, leathery bird flying across the garden with a mongrel dog in its beak. The bird, as large as a settee, perches in a tree in the garden. (They must have made it with their) Hats: At this moment Martin's head appears over the garden fence. It turns out that his dog kennels are right next door to Jane and Jane's house. He says that the giant bird has been taking his dogs and flying back with them to the giant fleck of foam in which it lives. It also transpires that many other little flecks of foam are appearing all over Barking and that inside each one a dog-eating bird is developing. However, the bird did not take the domestic appliance from the kitchen. Martin admits, amid smiles all round, that he stole it and sold it because he was hard up. The Janes call the police. But apart from that everyone is reconciled and they all sing a jolly song about hats. I am a hen (Lucinda Lambton): As side two opens, we find Terry slumped in an armchair in front of the television. He is asleep and we hear his dreams merging with the programme on the television., which is presented by Lucinda Lampton. The dream ends, as a large dictionary falls on Terry's head. He goes to the fridge for a beer but the fridge has gone. Irreversible syntax errors: Terry wanders about in the warehouse looking for his fridge. He pauses in various places and examines some of his experiments so see how they are getting on. Eventually he arrives at the World War Two bomber, which is still sticking out of the wall like moose's head. Terry observes the skeleton of Dave in the cockpit and muses first upon the past and then upon the nature of time itself. He sings 'Nietzsche tells us that time is like a camel with an infinity of humps. Or was that Hegel?' The deathbed song: Terry continues to examine the bomber and discovers ana acretion of foam in the remains of one of the engines. Upon investigation he finds that the foam has dripped through a skylight in the roof, where it fell from a tree outside. This part of the story is told in flashback by three spotty dogs dressed as clowns. They take the part of the narrator in the story and sing in a tight three-part harmony always accompanied by finger cymbals, which represent the bells on their clown costumes. Anyhow, the point is that a freakish chemical reaction has taken place in the engine between the foam and the forty-seven-year-old engine fuel. Light transforms the Peugeot dealers: Terry climbs into the cockpit of the aircraft (why, we do not know; perhaps upon some unexplained impulse.) He pushes the skeleton out of the way and tries the starter motor. Three of the engines are destroyed with rust but the fourth, the one mysteriously lubricated by the foam, starts first time. Then very strange things begin to happen. The room changes: the flaking paintwork repairs itself, the dust becomes thinner, little spiders appear and rapidly absorb all the cobwebs into their bodies, objects move and figures come and go at high speed. These events pass by at greater and greater speed until Terry can see only a blur. Eventually the walls themselves disappear, to be replaced by unfamiliar buildings and open spaces. Pigs and eagles: This song is sung by the busy spiders as they scuttle about the warehouse absorbing their webs. They comment that the place is rather untidy in their view. At one point, a spider falls out of a window and plummets to its death twelve floors below. This is represented by the organ solo. Double 'O' gauge dogs: With the audio equivalent of a montage of newspaper headlines, we are told of the increasing number of dog-eating birds sited all over Barking, which live in flecks of foam in trees. No dog is safe to go out on its own. Tearful owners are interviewed. Mrs Melvyn Lawrence says 'I was just doing the washing-up when I looked out of the window to see a massive, leathery bird descend upon our lawn. It took Prudence and Pandora, my adorable little pekenese puppies, in its talons and flew away with them. We were heartbroken at first but we're thinking of getting a turtle now.' The burning fascia: Meanwhile, Terry is stunned by the implications of his discovery. Returning to his familiar warehouse simply by putting the engine in reverse, he realizes that he has invented a time machine. Initially, supposing that he may have dreamed it all, he accidentally sets fire to the building while trying to wake himself up with an electric fire. Things look dangerous for a while but he manages to put it out. The hapless criminal: Stunned (still), Terry goes to an Ingmar Bergman quadruple bill at his local cinema. Unable to read the subtitles in his confused state of mind, he misinterprets one of the films completely. He stands up on his seat and loudly denounces Bergman as a running dog lackey of the Capitalist oppressors. He is thrown out. Love is for the astronauts: He feels a lot better the following day and tries a different experiment with the bomber. He travels into the future to the year 1992 where he experiences many adventures before returning to his warehouse a few minutes before he left. He discovers that he has a strange new hairstyle. Josephine and Tchaikovsky: Terry is beginning to enjoy gadding about through time in his bomber. He meets Tchaikovsky and gives him a few interesting hints on symphonic structure. He suggest that Tchaikovsky write a concerto for the stylophone which he has brought with him from the future but Tchaikovsky doesn't think this is a good idea. He accepts the stylophone as a present but only uses it for scaring pigeons off his front lawn. He's had his bears: Back in Barking in the present, Martin is in a very bad mood. All of his dogs have either been carried of by dog-eating birds or have inexplicably acquired the word 'aubergine' as part of their markings. He thinks that this has been done by a mad person using a stencil and a can of spray paint. (But he is wrong.) Oddly, the chemical analysis reveals no trace of any dye and indicates that the 'aubergines' are natural markings with which the dogs are born. Martin tries to figure out a way to explain all this to his customers. But he can't. The last great dogfight: A pause in the action as Dave's skeleton sings a soliloquy about his days in the RAF. This is very sad. Totally unacceptable (full of holes): Interlude: Robert, a surrealist builder from Felixstowe, arranges some bricks in a nice pattern. Spew forth frogs: Martin decides to put his kennels on the market and move to Belgium with the proceeds. He contacts Alan, who comes round to value the property but quickly decides that it doesn't have one. Martin tells Alan about all his business problems. Alan resolves to help him and starts to think of ways that he can rid Barking of the flecks of foam, which are also affecting house prices in the area. Er: Still in a pensive mood, Alan goes to a wild party and gets into a conversation with Terry, who has absentmindedly turned up at the party, mistaking the venue for his warehouse, which is next door. Terry mentions that he has just invented a time machine and Alan wonders if it could be used to raise a lot of money to fund the removal of the dog-eating birds. Terry is moved by Alan's story and agrees to help. Life's not like that really (Yukio's dream #3): That night Terry has a dream during which a plan is revealed to him that will enable him to make money from his time machine. Unfortunately, it doesn't make too much sense in the morning, but he thinks up another plan over breakfast: he will send Alan back into time with a tape recorder to interview Jesus Christ; then they will sell the interview to a big newspaper. Oh dear, what shall we do about the Christians? (Harold Melvin II: the heretic): Alan climbs into the cockpit of the bomber, starts the engine and soon finds himself back at the very beginning of the Christian era. By clever manipulation of the bomber's controls, he turns up in the right location: the Holy Land, then under Roman occupation. He locates Christ's entourage near the Sea of Galilee, waits for a suitable moment and then asks a passing Christian where he can find wither Jesus or one of his twelve disciples. He is introduced to a strange woman who claims to be Saint Margaret, a little-known Welsh apostle. He asks her if he can have an interview with Jesus but she says he has been drinking heavily and may become violent. Eventually, however, she shows Alan to a big tent where she stops at the front flap and shouts: 'Jesus, there's another journalist here.' It turns out that Jesus has been doing a lot of interviews with journalists from the twenty-first century when time machines become commonplace. Jesus tells Alan that he is beginning to have grave doubts about the whole thing and will probably go back to carpentry soon. After a while, he becomes abusive and punches Alan in the eye but he is sorry afterwards and shows Alan his tattoos. Then he starts talking about his personal problems. He puts his arms around Alan's shoulders and cries. Alan says he has to get back because his bomber is on a meter. Climb aboard the groove tractor (pencils): Alan tries to return to the present but the bomber flies out of control (represented by the rhythm guitar) and crashes into a swamp. Alan finds himself stranded forever in Iron Age Britain, but he soon adapts and goes back into business as an estate agent. The fading memory of Mr Rose: A very dramatic event occurs at this point. While out for a stroll one evening, Alan sees a dog being attacked by a huge bird. The bird is beaten off by a fur-clad Iron Age warrior called Jonathan, who hits it with strange purple vegetables, using a small, guitar-like musical instrument as a bat. Suddenly Alan realizes how he can save Barking from the flecks of foam. Also tennis is invented. Vulture culture: The theory of evolution is explained by a chorus of marine iguanas. This is not very interesting but is crucial to a full understanding of the plot. A big dog: All the loose ends are tied up (or forgotten about) in this song. Terry and Martin realize that Alan, stranded in the Iron Age, has manipulated the evolution of the domestic dog in order to send them a message through time about how to get rid of the dog-eating birds. Using selective breeding, Alan has fixed it so that lots of dogs now have markings on their backs in the form of letters that spell out the word 'aubergine', The dog-eating birds, which have been driven away from earth in the Iron Age and forced into the present day using the time distorting properties of the foam in which they live, are very sensitive to aubergines, and all Terry and Martin have to do is throw aubergines at the birds and they will have no choice but to leave twentieth-century earth, never to return. They do this and it works. The handkerchief man's last bonfire: Everyone lives happily ever after, but there's a twist right at the end when Terry sees a dog with 'beware giant moths from outer space' written on its back. However he soon realizes that Martin has done this with a felt tip pen as a joke. Everyone laughs. Ha ha."

Concerning Insekt CD it's all recorded live .Released as LP+7" box set,and CD boxset (this is the editition posted here).
get little flecks here
get insekt here

Look de Bouk-Lacrimae rerum,LP,1985,France.

Denis Tagu, once a member of Hellebore, picked up bunch of musicians after the Hellebore's split (though I suspect that the former Hellebore members just assumed funny pseudonyms and continue to work in a realm of weird music for at least a few years (and more, for the linear notes promise band's ressurection in years to come, and thus 2003 being one of these years)). Lacrimae Rerum(L'Acre Hymne Aerait Rome) being listened to from a distance sounds like head on collision of 80's Residents and Barricade 3 era ZNR, at a closer "Look" listener recognizes a swarming mass of unexpected sonic combinations. More wavy than Hellebore (sometimes even discoid, and thus more in the spirit of the age). Pascal Comelade-like toy-sounds mingle with "serious" ones, say ZNR-ic or better said Satiesque keyboard passage, oozing out a myriad of eccentricities. Placed on the line of humor, but on quite the opposite side of [Hellebore's] Il y a des Jours, "Tout Comme Bach" is perhaps the finest example. Pretty good and highly recommended. Bec et Ongles is weirder in construction, looser and more playful, yet it sounds quite "normal". Playful to the degree of being thoroughly childish and containing 24 short tracks, it comes even closer to Klimperei, Pascal Comelade and other French "toylovers". The main point of this offering is not to concentrate on presentation of odd combinations but to present the everlastingness of the young spirits in general and their youth in particular. So the results are plainly charming and not mind-disturbing. It must be noted, though, that the work was accomplished with the help of L'Ensemble Raye members and associates (such as Brode Tango) in whose studio in Switzerland Bec et Ongles was recorded. The "unity" of the actors involved may help to grasp the further shift from brooding experimentation of early Hellebore days to childish ear friendliness of Look's Bec. The material thus sounds somewhat similar to Ensemble Raye efforts, but still, these may be light years away. Indispensable for any avant-prog collector.
-- Nenad Kobal for New Giblartar Enc. Of Prog. Rock
Awesome 1st LP released through AYAA label ,with contribution of Patrick Q. Wright of Legendary Pink Dots fame.A magic record....RIO experimentation at it's best.

get it here

BRUME-Program T4,1987+Fuck your Sun ,1988,Tapes,France

Following Eric's recent post of Brume stuff,here are 2 more tapes of his very early stuff.More abstract industrial construction here,yet sometimes it gets danceable!(well in a mutant way).The known hammers and metal-on - metal sounds,drilling your ears in a dark fiesta .
Unfortunatelly no pic sleeve scans of both tapes are available.Any help will be much appreciated.

get them here and here

R.Pinhas

As requested R.Pinhas :L'Ethique LP is now re-upped.More to follow...

Thursday, December 27, 2007

IT'S RAINING CAN BOOTLEGS!








Thought I'd offer up these additional three titles after Jim's massive Can bootleg post earlier today. I don't expect that reviews or explanations are required here. Live Can = essential listening. Enjoy!

Get Great Britain 1977 Vol. 2 Here

Get Free Concert part one Here

Get Free Concert part two Here

Get Future Days And past Nights part one Here

Get Future Days And past Nights part two Here

A bunch of CAN









Following Eric's glorious post of CAN's rarities here's a bunch of bootleg LPs .Hear them and find once more the genius of this band!

Wednesday, December 26, 2007

Paroni Paakkunainen-Plastic Maailma,LP,1971,Finnland

Following my previous post of Tuohihuilu, here 's his 1st LP from 1971 .Unfortunately no pic sleeve scans again.Please urgent help needed!Those 2 LPs although not much known and much ignored by visitors here, are milestones of Finnish prog/psych scene(well some may call it Jazz,...hmm i don't think so).Here are some additional infos found:
"Woodwind-player Seppo "Paroni" Paakkunainen has had a long career as a session musician, band leader and arranger, with a stylistic spectrum encompassing rock, pop, jazz, folk and classical. On the progressive front he has been the driving force behind the progressive folk group Karelia, while his horns have graced the albums of, among others, Wigwam, Jukka Tolonen and Pekka Pohjola. His first bonafide solo album, Plastic Maailma (LP Scandia SLP 559), is a kind of sweep through those many styles, progressive in the sense that styles are juxtaposed and explored with little prejudice. Four instrumentals join six vocal numbers where the gruff vocals of Harri Saksala alternate with the purer voice of pop-chanteuse Arja Saijonmaa, criticising consumerism, poking fun at contemporary sexual mores or singing praises to Nordic egalitarianism with the kind of sincerity that makes it hard to distinguish seriousness from levity. Throughout, the "Baron" acts as an old-style band leader, tastefully adding his saxophones and flutes to the normal flow of guitars, organs, pianos and rock rhythm section, resulting in some very colourful arrangements. He goes to East with the quasi-raga sitar/flute duet "Mango", grapples some hung-over blues-rock with "Laulajan blues" ("Singer's Blues") and takes delight in lightweight vocal pop with jazzy arrangements and a few progressive touches (e.g. sudden textural and dynamic shifts) in the likes of "Kun elämä alkaa" ("When Life Begins"). More obvious homages to prevalent progressive role models appear too: The flute carries the swaying main melody of "Ennen nyt" ("Before Now"), taking to Jethro Tull-like hoarse riffing and soloing during the instrumental interlude, while "Beat Bolero" has Coltraneish saxophone stabbing riffs in unison with the guitar and wailing over gloomy organ chords and the martial drumbeat, very much out of the Crimson cookbook. The end result is a slightly dated, but charmingly odd-ball collection that can be of interest to fans of early progressive. It is still best remembered for its surrealistic cover painting. --
Kai Karmanheimo for New Giblartar Enc of Prog Rock"

get it here ,and wish and hope not to ignore it this time.

Art & Language and the Red Crayola -Black Snakes,LP,1983,UK/USA

The Red Crayola was a psychedelic, avant-garde rock band from Houston, Texas, formed by art students at the University of St. Thomas (Texas) in 1966. The band was led by singer/guitarist and visual artist Mayo Thompson, along with drummer Rick Barthelme (brother of novelist Donald Barthelme) and Steve Cunningham. Their work prefigured punk and the no wave scene in 1980s New York City.
Thompson has continued using the name, in its legally-required permutation The Red Krayola, for his musical projects since.
They make noise rock, psychedelia and occasionally folk/country songs and instrumentals in a DIY-punk fashion, an approach that presaged the lo-fi aesthetic of many 1990s US indie rock groups. Negative reviews have come often during The Red Krayola's history. A critic once wrote, "It's a band that has no idea how to play its instruments. In fact, they don't even know what instruments are, or if the guitarist has the ability to remain conscious long enough to play whatever it is a 'note' might be." He added, "This is a band that was paid ten dollars to stop a performance in Berkeley. If Berkeley's not having it, you know you're in for rough sledding."
In 1966 the band signed to International Artists, home label to fellow psych-rockers The 13th Floor Elevators that was run by Lelan Rogers (brother of country musician Kenny Rogers). In 1967 the label released the psychedelic album, Parable of Arable Land, featuring six songs by the original three members interwoven with a cacophony generated by approximately 100 anonymous followers known as The Familiar Ugly who appear on a number of noise tracks called Free-Form Freak-Outs. The album's title track was a tape loop of electronic sounds with musical improvisations layered on top of it, a sound that foreshadowed the Red Crayola's second recording.
The minimalist music album Coconut Hotel was recorded in 1967 but rejected by International Artists for its lack of commercial potential because of its complete departure from the full-sounding guitar/bass/drums/vocals rock sound of the Red Crayola's first album. Coconut Hotel featured such self-described tracks as "Organ Buildup", "Free Guitar" and a series of atonal "One-Second Pieces" for piano, trumpet and percussion. The album did not see release until 1995. During this period, the band performed a concert in Berkeley, California where they attached a contact microphone to a sheet of aluminium foil that was set under a block of melting ice. The Red Crayola also performed with guitarist John Fahey and recorded an entire studio album of music in collaboration with him, but label head Lelan Rogers demanded possession of the tapes and recorded documentation of those sessions has been missing ever since.
The band's second album to see release (and the first to be released with the new "Krayola" spelling) was 1968's God Bless The Red Krayola And All Who Sail With It. God Bless presented a middle ground between Parable of Arable Land and Coconut Hotel, having veered away from the cacophonous psychedelic approach of their first album, but performing short, minimalist songs on electric guitar, bass and drums (interspersed with occasional a cappella harmonies and piano interludes) to achieve some surprisingly melodic results and even more surprisingly off-kilter lyrics. Hints of the as-of-yet unheard music on Coconut Hotel also revealed themselves (the track "Listen To This" is a one-second piece with spoken introduction) and the album as a whole sounds more like the early post-punk of the late 1970s than the Red Krayola's hippie-era contemporaries. The album was not as well received as the band's first release and the Red Krayola's original lineup disbanded.
In 1969, Thompson recorded a solo album called Corky's Debt to His Father for a small label called Texas Revolution. The album, which has come to be regarded by many as the unheralded jewel of the Crayola catalogue, is devoid of Thompson's usual avant-garde indulgences, and consists instead of ten lyrically-dense but warm-hearted pop songs, in various styles - Dylan-inspired blues-rock, Tex-Mex pop-rock with psychedelic touches, and early country rock not dissimilar to the contemporary work of Gram Parsons and the Flying Burrito Brothers. Thompson was backed by studio musicians on the album and none of his usual Crayola (or 13th Floor Elevators) cohorts appear.
Mayo Thompson continued to make music, both under his own name and as The Red Krayola. He teamed up with American drummer Jesse Chamberlain and recorded the single 'Wives in Orbit' and the album Soldier Talk both of which could be seen as musical responses to punk rock. His collaborations in the 1970s and 1980s read like a roll call of the avant-garde and experimental artists and musicians of the era. The Red Krayola teamed up with the Conceptual Art collective Art & Language for three LPs: 1976's Corrected Slogans, 1981's Kangaroo? (also featuring The Raincoats' Gina Birch, Lora Logic and Swell Maps' Epic Soundtracks) and 1983's Black Snakes. Thompson joined Pere Ubu for a period in the early 1980s, performing on several releases, and provided soundtrack music for Derek Jarman. Throughout this time he was prolific as a producer for many other seminal experimental and alternative rock acts, including The Fall (1980's Grotesque (After the Gramme)), The Raincoats, Scritti Politti, Blue Orchids, Cabaret Voltaire, Stiff Little Fingers, Kleenex, The Chills and Primal Scream.
The 1990s found The Red Krayola with a new audience, who came to the group via musicians associated with Chicago's Post Rock scene and in particular the Drag City label, who had joined the band's ever-shifting line-up for a number of releases including the LPs Hazel (1996) and Fingerpainting (1999). These were, amongst others, Jim O'Rourke and David Grubbs of Gastr del Sol, the post-Conceptual visual artist Stephen Prina, German painter Albert Oehlen, George Hurley (formerly of The Minutemen and fIREHOSE), Tom Watson of Slovenly, and John McEntire of Tortoise. In 2006 the group issued an album, Introduction and an EP, Red Gold.
In 1995, Drag City released 1967's Coconut Hotel LP and in 1998 issued The Red Crayola Live 1967 with material from the Angry Arts Festival and Berkeley Folk Music Festival including their live collaboration with John Fahey.
Thompson is active as an art critic and currently lives in Edinburgh, Scotland, and in California, where he teaches at the Pasadena Art Center College of Design.
British Space Rock group Spacemen 3 recorded a version of "Transparent Radiation" from the Red Crayola's Parable of Arable Land, and the same album's lead track "Hurricane Fighter Plane" was covered by UK deathrock group Alien Sex Fiend in 1986 and by Scottish act Future Pilot AKA in 1996.
From Wikipedia
Although no introduction was needed for this influential band i had typically to place one here.This is a rare LP from 1983,released through Rec Rec in 1983 and rereleased in 1997 from Drag City (both now out of print).Coming out just after Kangaroo this LP is blending the great schizophrenic Mayo Thompson post punkish improvisation assisted by members of Essential Logic and as far as i remember Swell Maps ,mixing post punk ,jazz and psych hints.

as requested, get it here

Clara Mondshine – Memorymetropolis,1983,LP,Germany


For those who requested it ,here's the 2nd Clara Mondshine LP.More quirky this time,blending some minimal electronics feeling but always in her/his exceptional way.Some additional infos found:"Clara Mondshine is a pseudonym. The musician is male (real name - Walter Bachauer). Berlin School electronics in Schulze style with experimental trends on later works." from Encyclopedia of electronic Music.
get it here

Uve Schikora und seine Gruppe-Das Gewitter,LP,1972,Germany (former DDR)


A highly recommended gem from the vaults of East German's Amiga label. a review on UK’S Vinylvulture describes 'Das Gewitter' (translated with 'the storm') sounding 'like Black Sabbath meets the Mohawks!' indeed the music featured here is a superb mix of Progressive, Funk & Krautrock including heavyduty hammond riffs, violent fuzz guitars leads, killer basslines, electric wahwah sax, over the top musicianship & above all, long numbers! big samples and breaks on the 12 (!) minute title track, which is loaded with wicked proggy beats supplied by funky organ culminating in some delirius rock drumming. 'Oh Angela' is a blaxploitation style tribute to Angela Davis with great lyrics in german. 'Deine Augen' kicks off with a catchy uptempo Funk Beat, turning in its 2nd half into a weird oriental freakout percussion groove. more exclusive proggy beats on 'So Einen Sommer Lang' featuring a mad midtempo fuzz break sounding just like 'Graves To The Graveyard' from 'The Last Rebel' soundtrack. absolute essential Euro Prog album .In parts reminding me the Zappaesque funky prog of Dutch band Doctor Dopojam,while hints of Xhol can be found in the instrumental parts.
Here's what Crack In The Cosmic Edge writes:
"An obscure DDR band, who took a step on from pop music, blending in psychedelia and Krautrock, to make something quite unique. Beyond Die Puhdys, quaintly dated, yet with the raw edge of invention, and hints of Nosferatu and Xhol in the instrumentals. It shows that, had history been different, bands like this may have blossomed like their Western counterparts.
Uve Schikora (vocals, soprano sax, piano, organ), Michael Schubert (vocals, 12-string guitar), Bernd Müller (organ), Jürgen Matkiowitz (guitar), Jurgen Diessner (bass), Reiner Miehatsch (drums), + Frank Schöbel (vocals)."
get it here

Tuesday, December 25, 2007

Esa Kotilainen-Ajatuslapsi,LP,1977,Finnland

By the 1970s, Finland had produced a number of interesting academic and avant-garde electronic music pieces, ranging from the electronic études of Bengt Johansson to M.A. Numminen's ear-razing experiments with digital-synthesizer pioneer Erkki Kurenniemi's "electric quartet". However, it was keyboard wizard Esa Kotilainen's Ajatuslapsi (LP Love Records LRLP 196) that really spearheaded the emergence of rock-oriented, Berlin-school synth music in the country. You can hear this on the album's centrepiece, the suite "Unisalissa" (In the Dream Hall) that spans its A-side. A few minutes into the piece, the harmony settles on to a single droning organ chord, over which a synthesizer slowly draws four-note melodic fragments that shine as incessantly as any mentally-disturbed jewel. Soon we have multiple synthesizer ostinati echoing across the Rubycon while the spooky organ and string-synthesizer's melodies prophesy a Phaedra-like tragedy. However, Kotilainen next goes beyond this familiar German space: most of the rest of the suite is taken up by a corrosive, Arabic-modal organ solo over the ominously trudging, buzzing and trilling synthesizer accompaniment. And as if to balance the electronic darkness of the piece, the brief coda has accordion playing a frostily folky melody, backed by that most Finnish of instruments, the kantele. On the B-side, "Avartuva nδkemys" (A Widening Perspective) is more an intricate sound-effect narrative than a fully engaging musical composition, but "Ilmassa" ("In the Air") is another hugely effective synthesizer meditation over a single organ chord. Kotilainen's work may lack Klaus Schulze's Wagnerian monumentalism or Tangerine Dream's atmospheric profundity. Instead its homespun production values, its modest instrumentation and its subtle folkloristic touches make it sound quite refreshing within a musical style that later has been followed, imitated, copied, remixed and sampled nearly to death with all the state-of-the-art electronic instrumentation modern technology has produced. It is derivative yet different enough to be interesting, if not earthshaking. Love Records' successor Siboney has been promising a CD re-release for years, but at the beginning of 2005 those were still just promises.
In addition to his prolific studio works and collaborations with the Lapp artist and author Nils-Aslak Valkeapää, Kotilainen has played with many Finnish progressive rock artists, including Wigwam and Jukka Tolonen. At one time he was the sole owner of a working Mellotron in the country. The white beast makes an appearance on his 1995 solo album Aamu joella - Morning by the River, but this album is more a showcase for his accordion and more about folk music than anything else. From 1999 on he has been the regular keyboard player for the reformed Wigwam.
From New Giblartar Encyclopedia of Progressive rock
One of the 70s milestones in electronic music.

As requested,get it here

Vasilisk-Whirling dervishes,1987,LP,Japan

In 1985, after the split up of the political unit 'White Hospital', Tomo Kuwabara started up the unit Vasilisk with Yukio Nagoshi (percussions/guitars) and Chiaki (percussions). They made a first album called 'Whirling Dervishes' in 1987, released through Eskimo, which was the label established by Yun 'Grim' Konagaya. In this album they played several and unusual instruments: African skin-drums, African flute, Tibetan percussions, Ancestor's voices. In 1988 they made a second album called 'Mkwaju' with the same line-up and also released by Eskimo. Just after the release of this album, Tomo and Yukio joined Rose Mcdowall's new project Candy Cain. They toured through Japan during most of 1988. Around that time, Luciano Dari invited them to release their next album on his label Musica Maxima Magnetica. After the collaboration with the Rose's project in 1989, they started to record their third album 'Acqua' in London and Naples (Italy) with the same three members. 'Acqua' was released at the end of the same year by Musica Maxima Magnetica. After they came back from Europe, they started to compile and remix their previous material from the three albums in order to release their most intensive tracks on their debut CD release, entitled 'Liberation and Ecstasy'. After that they went into a long silence of 5 years. Tomo traveled around Asian countries for nearly 2 years starting in 1991, in order to search his identity as an Asian.... Most people knowing and expecting a lot from this unique band, were thinking they had stopped all activities, but that was not true! In fact during this time they had recorded two (still) unreleased albums. The first unreleased one was recorded in 1993 and it was called 'Tongue'. At that time the line up was changed as Yayoi (voice), Hidero (guitars) and Tomo (percussions). In 1994 they went to Moscow in order to make their own documentary program on TV and join the Contemporary Music and Art Festival. In 1995 they made a second unreleased album, recorded in Tokyo. Unfortunately they decided not to release these 2 albums as they thought the sound was odd and incomplete. They went further in song-oriented direction including a female vocalist...but they felt that direction was inappropriate for them, because of the lyrics; whereas most artists are using lyrics to express their policy, they felt the lyrics were a constraint, since they tend to define the image of music and imagination of listeners. After those chaos years, Tomo met Tsuyoshi (keyboard) and they started as Vasilisk to create a new sound with another method of musical expression. They were admiring the techno-sound with strong rhythm to create a state of trance like ancient shamans....full of united groove. So they choose the psychedelic trance sound which stimulates their brain directly without any words.
IMHO their best LP with a variety of styles,from dark ambient to strange ballads(one song is written by Suzanne Vega!).

Get it here

V/A:The last Daze,tape,1985,USA


Dark perverted industrial electronics by Inner-X-Music label,aka Sleep Chamber/John Zewizz and Co. Released in 1985 and the influence of early Come org. is obvious.Maybe that was what John Zewizz was trying to do and when this failed he turned to electro /EBM acts. Anyway this tape is absolutely great.
Tracklisting:
A1 Daze Of Trance Asshole Song
A2 Sleep Chamber Dream Akoasm
A3 7 From Life Eaten By His Own Dream
A4 Hidious In Strength For Zora & Priss
A5 Women Of The SS Trying To Please The SS
A6 Architectural Metaphor Innervistas
B1 Psi Field The Summoning
B2 Flagellants Protective Custody
B3 Holy Cow MKC-MWBD
B4 Coup De Grace Aufziehen
B5 Coup De Grace New Toxick Force
B6 Sleep Chamber Warming Up In Background, Raid By Police On Last Night
get it here

V/A:This Strange little cricket,tape,1981,USA


Great and very rare compilation from 1981,gathering some of the most extreme experimental acts of it's time.Released through YCLEPT label, features the legends of Bomis Predin,Tom and Marty Band,Orthotonics,Idiot Savant ,Wm. Burke amongst others.The complete tracklist is depicted above.Strange improvisational music all through here close to LAFMS sound combined with some Residents and early Cabaret Voltaire influences.
get it here

V/A - Vi Kan Leva Utan Kärnkraft,LP,1975,Sweden

Continuing our explorations in 70s Swedish underground music scene ,here's a compilation came out through Silence label,gathering some of the most important folkish progressive acts of it's time. The whole project is blended by leftist feeling,pacificism,and all those "alternative" 70s ideologies.Musically it varys from folk to pilitic cabaret,some rockish tunes, protest ballads.
here's the tracklist:

Side A:
1. Bernt Staf - Högenergi eller lågeneri (3:47)
2. Tore Berger - Kapitalets bön (4:01)
3. Elektriska Linden - Röster i vinden (4:14)
4. Turid - Solens Visa (5:56)
5. Roland von Malmborg - Stoppa all atomkraft (4:10)
Side B:
1. Nynningen - Det löser sig (6:11)
2. Røde Mor - Kärnkraft (5:11)
3. Thomas Wiehe - Marianne (5:57)
4. Thomas Tidholm - Fortsättning följer (4:40)
get it here

Vertical Slit-Basement 2215,1986 +Your Wife Is Licking My Strobe Light and Grinning,1990,tapes,USA

Vertical Slit was spearheaded by the prolific and uncompromising Columbus, OH-based singer/guitarist Jim Shepard, later known for fronting the band V-3. Formed during the mid-'70s, the loosely constructed Vertical Slit took its cues from Shepard's piercing, feedback-intensive guitar and corrosive lyrical outlook, first documented on the barely released 1977 cassette Slit and Pre-Slit. A series of releases followed -- 1980's The Live EP and 1981's Smudge 7" among them -- all barely heard or acknowledged outside of the Ohio underground community. Though recorded a good five or six years earlier, the live Under the Blood Red Lava Lamp cassette went unreleased until 1986, followed a year later by Basement 2115; only a subsequent feature in Forced Exposure magazine brought Shepard and Vertical Slit any kind of national attention, prompting collectors to begin futilely scouring bins for the band's long-out-of-print releases. 1990's Vertical Slit and Beyond assembled highlights from the group's catalog, but excepting the 1991 cassette Your Wife Is Licking My Strobe Light and Grinning, Shepard now focused virtually all of his energies into his new outfit, V-3, taking time off upon completing 1992's Negotiate Nothing after nearly losing his hand in an industrial accident. When V-3 resurfaced in 1996 with Photograph Burns, remarkably enough, they'd landed on a major label, American's short-lived Onion imprint. Sadly, Shepard committed suicide on October 16, 1998; he was just 40 years old. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Music Guide
The first tape is recordings from 1976-1980,more improvisational at it's song formating but with a punky feeling,while the 2nd one (your wife....) is live recording,more "in your face " punk rock in a Stooges,MC5 way. LAFMSish experimentation with hints of Pery Ubu,MC5,Sonny Sharrock,and Michael Karoli of CAN fame,with extraordinary guitar constructions and black humur lyrics.Missing the 2nd tape covers(any help?).

***************NEW LINK POSTED SEPTEMBER 2012***************

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Aroma Di Amore - Koude Oorlog(1983)+Koudvuur(1987),LPs,Belgium


AROMA DI AMORE have always been outsiders, even within the confinement of the alternative rock circuit.
Their peculiar blend of raw guitars, electronics, Dutch lyrics and unconventional song structures was too hybrid for many. Those howewer who, without prejudice, would lend an ear to the band's music, discovered an energetic, authentic and uncompromising collective that stood above all trends. While so many Belgiaan "connaisseurs" had their doubts about the possibilities of international recognition for a band singing in Dutch, AROMA FI AMORE toured France, Switzerland and Spain; their records figured in alternative charts from Poland to Canada.
From beginning to end the nucleus of AROMA DI AMORE consisted of Elvis PEETERS, who in a inimitable, possessed way delivered his highly original lyrics, and Fred ANGST, guitarist mastering the heaviest riffs as well as refined tapestries of sound.
Furthermore, the line-up varied throughout the band's carreer with:- H.K. (Guitarist from 1982 until 1983)- Andrea SMITS (Organ from 1982 until 1985)- Luc PILLARDS (Synthsizer in 1986)- Jan WANDELAAR (Guitar and synthesizer in 1986)- Pulcherie (Saxophone in 1983)- Wout DOCKX (Bass from 1987 until 1988)and especially- Lo MEULEN (Bass from 1983 until 1987)and the late Frits DE CAUTER (Saxophone from 1984 until 1986)contributing to the music.
Great and much underrated band ,playing a mix of goth and early 80s post punk...worth trying it at least!
get them here +the 2 missing songs from Koude Oorlog here and here

Voice of Eye-ST,tape,1990,USA


Voice Of Eye is the duo of Bonnie McNairn and Jim Wilson. The two started playing together when Bonnie joined the avantgarde ensemble Cruor based in Houston (Texas). When they parted ways with Ure Thrall, the other members continued on as the noise/industrial combo Esoterica Landscapes 7. Later the group reduced still to become just Bonnie and Jim as Voice Of Eye. In the early 1990's, they collaborated with Ure Thrall's Terminus (2) project and became Asianova, which is long defunct, but still trickling out archival material. Since relocating from Texas to rural New Mexico, they have disappeared from the public eye. Voice Of Eye's specialty is "organic sound sculpting": a form of electronic ethnic ambient music that relies mainly on electronic drones and manipulated instruments. Of particular note is that Jim Wilson has built several special instrument for the group.
Dark drioning industrial soundscapes at it's best!Using only handmade and acoustic instruments (no samplers/synthesizers), VOICE OF EYEs beautifully dense and atmospherically-charged work summons shadowy, obscure , and ancient spirits.
get it here and here

CAN-OUTTAKE EDITION-COMPLETE DEMO OUTTAKE REHEARSAL COLLECTION, 4xCDR, 2005 (RECORDED: 1968-1977), GERMANY




There's no need for backstory or explanation about this seminal Krautrock crew in these quarters, I expect. This four disc boot is a variable compendium of the incandescent and the not-ready-for-primetime (but then you'd expect that from rehearsal and soundcheck audio, no?). Anyone who's ever wondered what that post-Damo one-off trial run with Tim Hardin as vocalist sounded like need speculate no further (he appears on the track "Rehearsal"), though the results are as stillborn as you might expect and a low point of the set. 25 minutes of 1968 recordings set the stage here, with "Upduff's Birth" offering a fascinating window into the development of the musical portion of "Mother Upduff". With a group of magi as lofty as Can, even impromptu extemporizations have a real inherent fascination and those into the myth will find much to savor here. Disc two's 70+ minutes of Damo-era jams are a highlight of the set and lovely things to behold; especially the latter, a deadly 36 minute version of a two minute throwaway cut from "Unlimited Edition". Disc three is an equal eye opener: 59 minutes of otherwise unobtainable collaborations with Japanese avant chanteuse Phew; her wild, whacked and often Damo-like exhortations being overdubbed onto pre-existing recordings, if I'm interpreting the scant liner notes correctly. Whatever the case, this is a real gift for those who can't get enough of Phew's amazing collaborations with Can members over the years; the disc capping with an album length slab of desolate abstact weirdity, it's freaked out and frostbitten tone lending it a sound like some lost Vanity Records release from the early 80's. For 1975, it's intensely startling work. The 1975-77 period covered by disc 4 (in some ways, my favorite era, but then I'm the sort of loony that maintains that they peaked with "Out Of Reach", so what the hell do I know?) is unfortunately frequently pretty ropey sound quality wise, though the audio quality improves significantly for the latter half of the disc; the liquidy sizzle that's so much a part of why this era of Can is unimpeachable for moi coming across with ferocious vividness on the tracks, "Spree" and "Chairside Thumper".

Get disc 1 pt. 1 Here

Get disc 1 pt. 2 Here

Get disc 2 pt. 1 Here

Get disc 2 pt. 2 Here

Get disc 3 pt. 1 Here

Get disc 3 pt. 2 Here

Get disc 4 pt. 1 Here

Get disc 4 pt. 2 Here

V/A-LIGHT BULB ISSUE 3 CHRISTMAS CASSETTE, TAPE, 1977, USA





This insanely rare L.A. Free Music Society compilation manifests the most wooly and off-the-cuff facets of the cabal of dadaist noisemakers that comprised L.A.F.M.S. and is thus larded with jokey skits, stoned malarky and tape loop malapropisms, most proffered in bite-sized morsels of under a minute and a half. Pisstakey in parts, art brut brilliant at others, the latter primarily consisting of Patients' stunning 8+ minute communal trudge psych reworking of "Dreidle Dreidle Dreidle"; equal parts Parson Sound/Arbete Och Fritid heavy-lidded festival psych trudge and discombobulated contempo Finnish freak folk sprawl, and a passel of mad tidbits from Le Forte Four, Doodooettes and Ju Suk Reet Meate. Plus you get a 10 minute interview with Frederik Nilsen (Doodooettes, Bpeople, Extended Organ) pontificating on his work and life....and yogurt, ferrets and the smell of welded metal. Thanks to Brad Laner for the contents of this post.

Get the tape Here


Get the cover photos Here

Saturday, December 22, 2007

THE OPEN WINDOW-S/T, LP, 1969, USA




Luminous, elegant and often sensationally lovely psych pop confections that owe a substantial debt to Brian Wilson and Van Dyke Parks courtesy of what is, without a doubt, the least hip looking psych band that has ever existed. This features a pre-P.D.Q. Bach Peter Schickele, for those whom that means something (not I). To quote the cover: The Open Window has been described by reviewers as a chamber-rock-jazz trio, a pop-classical ensemble and a folk rock raga group, and all the names fit, except that they leave out the honky-tonk piano rolls and the Russian chants."

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STAHLBAU-TODLICHT VERUNGLUCKT, TAPE, 1982 + DIE MACHT DER REICHEN, TAPE, 1983, USA




Gristly and cantankerous faux Neue Deutsche Welle sturm und drang (geniale dilettanten variety) kicked up by two snarky teen rogues from L.A. intent on conning the sub-underground (apparently successfully) into believing that they were a legit NDW outfit, having secured releases under this ruse with two notable cassette imprints of the era. That one of said teens was in fact a barely post-pubescent Brad Laner (Steaming Coils, Savage Republic, Medicine, Electric Company and the person we can thank for this post's contents) shifts Stahlbau from merely being an amusing subcultural anecdote to a historical artifact of some heft, chronicling the birth pangs of Laner's fried sensibility en route to his life changing work with Steaming Coils some 2-3 years later, nascent flashes of which flicker during some of the most compelling moments here, particularly on Die Macht Der Reichen. Throbbing Gristle seems as much of an influence here as do the likes of Einsturzende Neubauten, especially on Todlicht Verungluckt, which starts with fangs bared but midway through begins tapping into a richer vein of juddering surrealism and art rock fragmentation before winding down with a cover of Can's "Soul Desert". Die Macht Der Reichen ups the stakes and widens the reach substantially, with scrambled art punk gestures gasping for breath in turbid pools of post-industrial sediment, sooty side steps into tenebrous ambience and stark bursts of electronic fizzle and splut all competing for airtime. Stahlbau's other member Mike Fey (a teen music guru to Brad and a member of Debt Of Nature's second line-up) penned a fake interview with himself in the guise of Stahlbau's Matthias Faller (Brad was known as Bernd Leitz) for the L.A. underground zine Unsound, which Brad also used to write for and which I've included below to both clue you into the spirit of the enterprise and to cement the legend.


"I am going to attempt to explain a few things about Stahlbau through an interview and my personal experiences with the "leader" of the band, Matthias Faller (in as far as that he can be called the leader of the band). I first met Matthias when I was 14 at a boarding school in Ottersberg near Bremen, Germany. Over the three years that I knew him he always seemed very distant from everything, a trait which most people who met him perceived as arrogance, which to a small extent, it may have been. There was one thing about him I always found amusing, even though odd, and this was his basic hatred of music. He would leave the room if you put on something he didn't like and that wouuld include everything except for the approximate 10 records he owned (all the Amon Duul albums, A few Can, Faust and Edgar Varese). These records were the only music that he would listen to. What does all that have to do with Stahlbau? Most people that I know that have heard the band are annoyed and/or intrigued by their sounds and attitude, and I believe that this can be directly traced back to Matthias' teenage years, although the group steadfastly denies there being a leader, it must be obvious that it is Matthias that dictates that sound as the influences are the exact same as the groups mentioned earlier, and it is true that he surrounds himself with those who are like minded, so as not to have to deal with what he calls "irrelevant influences". When I moved back to America in 1976, I lost contact with Matthias, and was therefore very surprised to receive a long letter and cassette in the mail in 1982, which contained most of what became their first release on Another Room's cassette label. Personally I find their material far more powerful than any other recent German band; their music is as if someone had found a way to successfully record emotions, and while most people hearing the cassette will (to an extent) assume that this emotion is pure anger and hatred, this is mostly true, but it seems to me that the main idea that the band is trying to put across is a deadly fear of what they honestly feel is our inescapable future (the story behind their cassettes is not some pretentious fable that they have recently devised to seem hip and dangeerous, but something that Matthias really believed would happen back when I first met him). There is a basic storyline behind their cassette which I will try to outline here briefly: the rich have, after war/holocaust/etc. managed to take over the world and, due to the vast financial resources that they had, were able to survive this completely unharmed. Everybody else (the few left) are too weak to make any kind of attempt to prevent this takeover. They are essentially slaves to the rich, and the rich, in order to ensure total submission, will immediately (actually have killed) anybody who disobeys, steps out of line, or does not fill their work quota (this is actually quite logical, as if the person charged is not given any chance to defend himself, cannot spread dissent, and hence, the people are governed by fear in a completely fascist state). The series of cassettes that the band hopes to put out will chronicle the events taking place there. Oh yeah, the story does not have a happy ending for the workers. The band tries to avoid all contact with their fans, not out of arrogance but because they feel that there is absolutely nothing that they could offer them outside of their music, and that any meeting between the group and a fan would be disillusioning to the fan, as the group is withdrawn around others to an almost absurd extent.

The group's next cassette will be out on Aeon by the time you read this.

The following is a short interview with Matthias conducted by Michael Fey, in August 1983.

Us: How long until the tape series is finished?

Matthias: Three, maybe four years. You see, we only record as we are asked to. When somebody desires to release our music we take up where we left off on the last tape and continue. This is good in that there exists absolutely no outtakes of ours that may be released at some other time. This affords us all the control over the music as we could hope for.

Us: As a German band it is a bit unusual for you to have no German label; to only be dealing (so far) with American labels. You are all but unknown in Germany, right?

Matthias: This is true, but then we have never geared our music for any specific market. Most of the people over here who heard our first music hated it, and this made us all the more determined to get it released. While it would have been nice to have had the cassettes put out on a German record label, the attempts to have this done were frustrating and degrading. You know, by having sent the cassette to Americans has shown how easy it was to generate interest. Too us it only matters that the music is released and our message heard. Germany had it's chance, and they lost it. Nobody here cares about the band, why should we care about them? Besides, as I said, we make the music as it is desired from the label. Most German labels would want a finished product and are not at all willing to wait six months to a year while we finish it for them. We feel that we have had much luck with getting music to people and have little to complain about. Besides, I think it to be quite novel being a German band without a German label, do you not?

Us: Will you tour?

Matthias: We will not be treated like animals while touring. If our conditions are met we will tour. So far promoters have found our proposals unacceptable, Until they are met, we won't tour. Live shows are uncomfortable to do for us, and if we do them, then we must have a very good reason to do them. Our conditions are these reasons.

Us: Why do you avoid contact with your fans?

Matthias: There is nothing we can say to them that would be of interest to them. Most who meet us are disappointed and think of us as cold, arrogant people.We are not, we just find it extraordinarily difficult to communicate with those whom we have never met and find being put in that position very uncomfortable. Look at it this way: If you are a fan of somebody's you probably have a very high opinion of them. But what if when you meet them and they are very worn out, or are not what you expected? Then you dislike that person as they have disappointed you, right? By avoiding contact with our fans, we also avoid disappointing them, which in the long run is better for both us and the fans, do you not think so? Our music says all we could say to them as strangers. Our music is our communique to our fans."

*********NEW LINK FOR TODLICHT VERUNGLUCKT POSTED OCTOBER 2012**********

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