Rich Aucoin has one of those hobbies that I might have if I won some massive Powerball jackpot. He collects and plays vintage synthesizers and puts the results onto albums like Synthetic – A Synth Odyssey: Season 2.
You know you’re in for something special as soon as the first notes of “Wav” start playing from a 1939 Hammond Novachord (considered the first analog synthesizer) and the stacking, beautiful beats begin to lift your heart. It sounds like Fatboy Slim could’ve recorded this yesterday, but he didn’t and he’s probably wishing he could raid Aucoin’s storage facility as a result. “Shift” definitely shifts the feel of the record, sounding like the music you’d hear as you race alongside a magnetic track bullet train on your personal hover-bike in the year 3023.
Aucoin’s label describes “Pure” as sounding like 1990s French house music, and I’m not sure I can describe it any better than that. It’s a delightfully fun track. “Space” does indeed send you out of orbit and toward a distant nebula full of stars and growing planets. “Tech Noir” gets a bit symphonic, and, by the way, uses the same EMS VCS3 Prototype (on the cover, fourth column, four down from the top) used on Dark Side of the Moon.
“Roger Luther” is named after (and played on) the Moog synthesizer (on the cover, third column, second one down from the top) that’s named after a Moog employee who eventually became the company’s general manager. It peppy and a bit dangerous, reminding me of some darker Devo tracks.
“Lyra” has kind of a hip-hop sound to its beats and synth bass (and vocal loop). “Prophet” is at first what Pimpbot-3000 plays on his Sony Walkman as he struts down the street, and then it blooms into a video game hero’s anthem. The closing track, “Liminal,” is a subtle one that helps you slowly float back down to Earth and leaves you feeling a bit giddy and warm afterwards…like good sex.
It’s a neat project and a neat record, and Aucoin makes all these vintage synths sound like they’re brand new.
When I first saw the four Yorkshire lads known as Lumer, it was at the 2022 Levitation France music festival. They closed one of the stages one night with their fiery brand of post-punk. They were seen in the festival crowd throughout the day, but they were never just strolling or meandering. They always looked like they were on a mission. They walked with purpose and almost a daring stride that conveyed that they would happily chat with you and sign some merch and share a pint, but one should not try them under any circumstances.
Their 2021 EP Disappearing Act also conveys this feeling of four tough men on a mission. “She’s Innocent” starts the act with gunslinger swagger and Ben Jackson‘s guitar chords that sound like they’re being cooked in a cast iron skillet held by Link Wray. “First Is Too Late” has an urgency to it that is difficult to describe in any good detail. It sounds like they’re playing before the fire in the studio causes the roof to fall on them. Singer Alex Evans yells / growls / howls the vocals that express his lack of apathy for apologies from people who give them out like jellybeans.
Benjamin Morrod‘s bass leads the charge on the title track, with the vocals (and sometimes Jackson’s guitar) sounding like they’re blaring through a megaphone that has a beehive in it. The beat switches on “White Czar” (thanks to Will Evans‘ agile drumming) can leave you shaken if you’re not ready. Alex Evans’ vocal delivery on “By Her Teeth” remind me a lot of Jon King‘s on some of Gang of Four‘s tracks. The song seems to be about one man’s obsession with a woman, or perhaps several of them, that might lead to his doom.
“The Sheets” might be a “walk of shame” song after a passionate night, or one of loneliness and regret. Either way, the whole band cooks on it. Morrod’s groove is subtle, yet relentless. Jackson’s guitar sounds like a jet roar, and Will Evans’ cymbal work on the track is impressive. The EP ends with “Another Day at the Zoo,” which has Alex Evans comparing the endless parade of ads, douchebags, politicians, and old, rich dudes to people wandering through zoos and laughing at the animals (us) they’ve put in physical and metaphorical cages. It’s a raucous, rabid track that threatens to wreck everything around it.
Like I mentioned, Lumer are on a mission. They want us to wake up before we disappear into that zoo. This EP throws the cage doors open for you.
Failure‘s second album, Magnified, had the band refining their Californian shoegaze sound, with Ken Andrews and Greg Edwards doing all of the playing, recording, and mixing themselves. The sound was bigger, bolder, and starting their frog leap toward outer space, but Andrews and Taylor knew they were taking on a big more than even they could chew – especially with the percussion. They put out an ad seeking a drummer, and it was eventually answered by Kellii Scott, who heard Magnified‘s first three tracks and knew he had to get on board the Failure train. As Scott has told in interviews, he missed the original audition time and was nearly fired before Andrews and Edwards heard him play one beat, but thankfully they gave him another chance and were sold within moments thanks to the raw power he creates behind a drum kit. He later joined the band full-time during their tour with Tool and has been with them ever since.
“Let It Drip” is the first of the tracks Scott heard that made him think, “Damn, I need to be in this band,” and it’s not surprising. Andrews’ guitar riffs on it are downright urgent, Edwards’ bass sounds like a grumpy grizzly, and the drums both of them put on it take off like a rocket – a theme that would continue through Failure’s work ever since. “Moth” was the second track Scott heard, and it’s one of Failure’s biggest hits. The power of it is unstoppable, and Scott probably pushed in all of his poker chips as soon as he heard the first verse.
As powerful as “Moth” is, “Frogs,” somehow, hits even harder. Edwards’ bass swings like a battle axe, and Scott was floored by this point of hearing them. The drum tracks on it hit so hard they seem to be shattering everything in sight. Andrews sings a tale of someone spinning into, and then embracing, madness (“Frogs are bouncing off my brain stem. So excited to be sane. Didn’t it seem kind of silly, the way the doctors carried on? So, now that I’ve become a monster to them, I’ll have to keep their fear turned on all night long.”).”
“Bernie” is a song about a woman they knew back in the 1990s who had “the way to feel good times” and lived “on the way to the park.” It’s no secret that Failure were battling various addictions around this time, so this song about a woman they knew who could help them out at any time of day (“We don’t have to wait until dark.”) is both poignant and epic. I also can’t help if it’s sort of a companion piece to “Leo” – a song on Fantastic Planet about someone in drug-induced paranoia.
As if the album didn’t rock enough, they stomp the gas pedal on the title track – a song about how we’re all just ants burning under the sun as we run through the race of life. It makes a sudden stop and then wallops you with acoustic guitar chords and weird, yet soothing reversed synths. It’s sort of an unnamed, hidden “Segue” – a short instrumental track that Failure would feature on future albums, starting with Fantastic Planet.
The beats on “Wonderful Life” (a song about struggling against the tempting spiral down into depression and exhaustion) sound simple at first, but you soon realize are deceptively deft. They stop and start with suddenness that can be jolting to the uninitiated. Those deft beats continue on “Undone” – the album’s first single – and uses looping to cool effects that continue their evolution into space rock. These beats are even more impressive when you consider Edwards recorded them one piece at a time and later edited them together.
“Wet Gravity,” a tale about a woman on the edge of madness (“Brain squeals, the same time as last time.”) who puts river stones in her pockets to give herself a physical sense of being grounded (the “wet gravity” of the title). The band unleashes a damn lightning storm on it. The guitar solo blazes, the drum hits boom, and the bass licks roar. It’s hard to determine who’s playing lead on it at any time…and then, like “Magnified,” it transforms into an instrumental mind-melt.
“Empty Friend” has Andrews singing about a “friend” who subtly kept him from achieving some of his goals (“Some empty friend who talked me into sleep…and threw my wings into the blazing sun.”), and “Small Crimes” is a sizzling, brooding track about a man who’s considering burning his world down to destroy his fears and the cacophony of everyone’s complaints. Edwards’ bass on it is the low growl in the protagonist’s brain.
As you might’ve guessed by now, depression, madness, existential crises, the hidden meanings of dreams, the complexity of relationships, and the wonder of what lies beyond us and within us are common themes in Failure’s work, and Magnified is a magnifying glass on those themes in them and the rest of us.
I’ve been waiting for a new album from Japanese kraut-rockers Minami Deutsch for a while. They were too good to fade away without at least one more record of their intoxicating music. Thankfully, Fortune Goodiescame along last October and gave us a nice record for sitting back and contemplating our higher selves.
Starting with “Your Pulse,” the album gets off to a thumping start by mixing electronic and physical beats with breath sounds to simulate the rising, enjoyable tension in you as the song grows. You might feel “Still Foggy” by the next track. It blends repetitive bass notes with what sounds like clinking glasses, shuffling papers, and other subtle, odd noises that bring to mind going to work after staying up too late. “Grumpy Joa” is so fun and peppy that you really can’t be grumpy during it.
The guitars on “Pueblo” fire up a sense of adventure and a few nods to Carlos Santana. “Interpreters of Forest” slides like a lazy cat into psychedelia, and the title track (appropriately the longest on the record) is nearly eight minutes of toe-tapping, trippy delights. They pump up the fuzz a bit on “Whereabouts,” which has a bit of a 1960s garage rock touch. It’s also one of multiple tracks in which lead singer and guitarist Kyotaro Miula adds an interesting vocal effect that makes it sound like his voice is coming out of an old radio. It’s a neat touch that adds to the otherworldly sounds they create.
“Steller Waffle” is wonderfully weird with its percolator beats and synths. “Floating Fountain” is just as relaxing and meditative as you hope it will be with a title like that, and the final track, “The Border,” is even more elevating. It might cause astral projection if listened to at the right volume and in the right space.
I’m glad Minami Deutsch is back, and hope to see them tour the U.S. again soon. A live show of this new material would be transcendent.
Keep your mind open.
[I would consider it good fortune if you subscribed.]
For one thing, the influences abound. Spencer, an Englishman, was born in Peru, also has Swedish roots, and now lives most of the time in France. I think he speaks at least four languages. Meanwhile, I’m still trying to learn French and stuttering through English half the time. As a result of his multi-cultural upbringing, Spencer’s album combines a lot of styles ranging from surf rock to torch songs, and he especially shows off his love of French music (Spencer calls the album “…a love letter to France”) from the 1960s through the 1980s by collaborating with famous French musicians on the record. The mix of influences and styles is one he pulls off with ease. I don’t know how he kept track of all of it, let alone made it sound effortless.
“Hail Caesar,” with guitar assists by French rock icons Gilles Tandy and Jean Felzine, launches the album with a wild surf guitar rocker before taking a turn down a dark cobblestone road in Angers, France for “Get Out into the Pigs” – which reminds me a lot of some of Julian Cope‘s work with Spencer’s vocal style and his rumination on things past that linger in his memory.
“Isn’t That What Jimi Said” is both a lovely look back on Spencer’s childhood days in Sweden (“Sometimes the breadth of my emotion’s not covered.”) and Jimi Hendrix‘s influence on him (and everyone else, really). As if Spencer wasn’t cool enough, the next thing you know he’s singing a duet, “When I Whisper in Your Ear,” with singer, actress, and former “Miss Tahiti,” Mareva Galenter. The two of them team up for a sultry, and somewhat spooky, song that even includes siren-like sounds from opera star Aurélie Ligerot.
The thick bass on “Jane Loves the Highway” will have you tearing away from the curb as you leave the bank in a hurry with a lovely lady in the back seat holding a heavy bag and a handgun. “Everything I ever did was bad,” he says on “Requiem,” making me wonder if he and Jane are to regret their roadtrip. It has a bit of a 1960s R&B girl group sound to it (particularly in the drum beat) that’s a nice touch. “Cult of Personality” is not a cover of Living Colour‘s classic hit (although it would be interesting to hear Spencer do this). It’s rather a song of hope (“There’s an angel passing over you.”) hidden among somber piano chords and lonely western guitars.
The uplifting messages, and his passion for so many different types of music, continue on “Broken By the Song,” with Spencer telling us, “You can be beautiful…There will come a day.” Things can always turn around and change. Sorrow, like joy, will pass away like everything else. “Waiting for Sorrow,” his first single from the album, features an intro from French pop icon Jacqueline Taïeb and has Spencer’s boldest vocals on the record. I mean, he absolutely belts the chorus and bounces it off the back of the concert hall to lodge deep in your chest, and the bright, jangling guitar riffs only help it settle there.
The title track has slithering snake-like guitar and percussion and Spencer’s witty lyrics (and David Vanian-like vocals) about his complicated relationship with an ex-lover, and perhaps even with England. The way the album fades out with sparkling synths on “Knew That One Day” is a neat way to send us out on a levitating note.
The album is multi-layered, like Spencer himself, and I suspect will reveal more of itself with multiple listens. Vous devriez l’entendre.
Returning with their first full-length album in four years, Ladytron are back with their distinctive style of electro-pop music with Time’s Arrow – an album that, like most of their catalogue, hypnotizes you into an altered state and also makes you want to dance at the same time.
“City of Angels” might be about Los Angeles, but it seems more about a city inhabited by beings of light to which Ladytron can readily travel through their use of heavenly synths, electronic beats, and ghost-like vocals. “Faces come from yesterday and arrive tomorrow,” sing Helen Marnie and Mira Aroyo on “Faces” – a song about how people drift in and out of our lives and how we struggle at times to remember them. “Misery Remember Me” is flat-out beautiful with soaring synths and vocals that sounds like they’re bouncing up from a canyon at sunset.
On “Flight from Ankor,” Aroyo sings above shimmering synths about waking from a dream and realizing that the life around her is just as incredible as the dream. “I hear whispers on the wire,” Marnie sings on “We Never Went Away,” a dreamy reassurance to their fans that is a little bittersweet now since one of the band’s founding members, Reuben Wu, left the band earlier this year to focus on his photography and fine art. “The Night” brings the pop to their electro-pop with snappy beats that melt into “The Dreamers,” a darker synthwave track that might have you folding up an origami unicorn.
“Sargasso Sea” sounds exactly like you think it should: Floating synths, seagull calls, bubbling bass, and siren vocals. “California” is possibly a callback to “City of Angels,” and is a song about how the state is a mix of luxury, mystery, and misery. The title track ends the album and has a bold, almost off-Broadway brashness to it with its thudding percussion and swaggering vocals.
Time’s Arrow is a nice return for Ladytron, whose synthwave seduction is always welcome.
Viagra Boys‘ debut EP, Consistency of Energy, is a good blueprint of how you should come out of the gate with your new band: Bring all of the energy, all of the time.
The Swedish post / art-punk band love poking fun at “bro culture,” toxic masculinity, consumerism, fashion, perceptions of what is or isn’t beautiful, rich snobs, drug culture, pop culture, and more. Their name alone is a poke in the eye to dudes who willingly trade raging hard-ons now for chronic heart and blood pressure issues later.
The EP’s opening track, “Research Chemcials,” is a home run in their first at-bat. The heavy bass tone from Henrik Höckert builds and builds until the track breaks open like a freight train without breaks coming down a hill toward a bus of school kids stalled at a railroad crossing. In it, lead singer Sebastian Murphy both rails against and praises the drugs he’s taking (“Research chemicals got me bleeding from my ears. Research chemicals…They make ’em better every year.”). There are times in the track when you can’t tell if Oskar Carls‘ saxophone is broken or in proper working order, which means he’s either a master player or a madman (not unlike Captain Beefheart on saxophone), which means it’s great.
On “I Don’t Remember That,” Murphy tells a tale of him being so drunk and / or high, that he can’t remember, or refuses to admit, all the crazy stuff he’s done the last couple nights – despite multiple witnesses telling him he “peed on the carpet” and “broke your mother’s vase.” Meanwhile, Benjamin Vallé‘s guitar rips through the track like a power washer hose left unattended on full blast.
The perils of too much drug use continue on “Can’t Get It Up,” in which Murphy wants to have some sexy time with his lady friend, but is too burnt-out on snorted research chemicals to give it the ole college try. Tor Sjödén‘s drum beats are the sound of Murphy’s heart pounding from sexual excitement and performance anxiety (“I didn’t mean to ruin your night, girl. I truly do apologize, but since we’re lyin’ here doin’ nothin’, I might as well do another line.”).
The final track, “Liquids,” is about Murphy’s desire to have his lover give him a golden shower (as he admitted on stage when I saw them play it live in February 2023, “That’s a song about gettin’ peed on.”). Murphy is a slave to his desires and Höckert‘s thumping bass is both the throbbing in Murphy’s brain (“She makes me sick, my brain hurt. She’s got my weakness under her skirt.”) and Martin Ehrencron‘s subtle synths are the power of the woman he wants to dominate him (“She’s got me shaking down to my gizzard. She speaks just like some kind of lizard. She’s dressed in robes like some weird wizard. I fantasize until I get blisters. She ain’t no human, I ain’t no ape. I want her liquids all on my face.”).
It’s just four tracks, but they’re four tracks of raw power, and it was a great way for them to launch their assault on an unsuspecting world.
It was a cool night in Kalamazoo, and the music venue at Bell’s Brewery in Kalamazoo, Michigan, Bell’s Eccentric Café, was packed with fans of heavy psychedelic rock. Thankfully, both power trios performing that night were ready to blast out heavy sets of it.
First were Detroit’s Sisters of Your Sunshine Vapor, three lads I’ve known for a while and who never disappoint with their sets. They played a combination of stuff from their last couple albums and some new material from an album they just finished recording and will soon be mastering for release. The new material has industrial influences that mix well with their “Doors meet early Pink Floyd” sound and bring a new powerful energy to their music. Bassist Eric Oppitz (playing in a chair due to having a leg brace thanks to a hockey accident) told me they plan to tour for a couple months once the new album is finished.
Sisters of Your Sunshine Vapor
King Buffalo, all the way from Rochester, New York (and SOYSV) had just played the night before at a small venue in Whitestown, Indiana, and I overheard multiple people saying they’d followed both bands from there to Kalamazoo. King Buffalo were wrapping up their North American tour and didn’t skimp on anything just because it was their last show before heading to Europe. The crowd was enthusiastic for the entire set, with many singing along with every song they played.
The crowd was still buzzing after King Buffalo’s powerful set, feeling like they’d been levitating for the last hour. Venues in Europe are going to love their sets. Also, both bands don’t overprice their merchandise, so load up on their stuff whenever you see them.
I made the chilly trip to Chicago once again, but this time to see a full night of doom metal at one of the best punk and metal clubs in town – Reggie’s. Four bands playing doom and stoner rock? I’m there.
First up were two local bands, the first being Unto the Earth, who played a solid doom and sludge set set with serious shredding (on one of the most metal-looking guitars I’ve seen in a while). They were clearly having a great time.
Unto the Earth
Next, from nearby DeKalb, Illinois, came Blunt, who set up their gear, tuned a bit, and then said, “Hello. We are Blunt.” and then proceeded to unload a thundering set of sludge metal.
Blunt
I admit, I was a little sleepy after Blunt’s set. This was not from their set. It had been a long day and a two-hour drive to Reggie’s from my house, so I was a little drowsy during the downtime after they were taking their gear from the stage. That ended when, all the way from Sweden, Firebreather came out and practically set the place on fire with their blast furnace-like set.
Firebreather
Closing out the night were The Well, from Austin, Texas, who are one of my favorite doom-psych bands out there. I’d last seen them at Levitation Austin last year, and they sounded even better here. Praise must be given to whomever was mixing the sound at Reggie’s that night, because he or she helped pull every note from The Well’s set to help melt our faces and minds. One of the highlights for me was hearing a new song they’re working on (tentatively called “Christmas” or “Christmas Lights”) after hearing it for the first time at Levitation. I could tell they’d been working the song for a while because it was tighter, creepier, and stronger. The whole set roared.
The Well
The Well and Firebreather are still touring together, so get to see this heavy double-bill while you can.
What do you get when Tim Alexander (on percussion) of Primus and Skerik (on saxophones and synths) of Les Claypool’s Fearless Flying Frog Brigade have a jam session one night and later invite bassist and synth-player Timm Mason from Wolves in the Throne Room to the party? You get something that sounds like Neu! mixed with Aphex Twin. You get Sound Cipher.
Their debut album, All That Syncs Must Diverge, is a wild mix of electronica, pulsing beats, saxophone skronks, and glitchy android synths. “Grind Incursion” is the sound of panic in a robot disco. “Ransomwar” reminds you of faraway desert oasis fires and beautiful dancing maidens…and all of it is a slightly unnerving hologram. The way Alexander’s percussion drifts into “Church Turing” and slowly takes over the song like dusk turning to night is a cool effect.
“Permissive Action Link” starts the second half of the album with bad-ass synth bass and growling percussion that will inspire you to throw on a black faux-leather coat and ride a futuristic motorcycle fitted with flame throwers and rockets into a post-nuclear war wasteland in order to rescue someone lovely from a band of mutants. “God Mode” is the song that plays when that quest takes a strange turn after you accidentally fall into a missile silo that’s now used as an underground temple for a strange cult that worships the AI computer that started the war. The song rolls straight into “Entropy Pool,” threatening to pull you down into an even deeper abyss, but showing you a way out of it: a pulsing light in the distance and the sounds of tribal drumming and smoky saxophone reminding you of the lovely companion you came here to rescue. It won’t be an easy climb out of the old missile silo, but it can be done. It must be done.
So, yeah, All That Syncs Must Diverge is pretty much the soundtrack to a cool 1980s European post-apocalyptic / future dystopia film you found one night while scrolling through a weird Roku channel. I hope this project isn’t just a one-off thing. I’d love to hear more from them.
