Thank your lucky stars that Jorge Ciccioli has sent this three-track EP from Argentina to us, because ORBITAL XPRNC is a great trip into orbit, out past the moon, and then back again.
The title track opens the EP with space shop bleeps and bloops, sweaty dance floor drum beats, upper atmosphere synths, and rocket rumble synth-bass. “Dappled” ups the bass, making it like an electro-syrup oozing over the waffles you’re eating at someone’s house party at 3:14am. The final track, “Noor,” is the sound of a panicked android running from bounty hunters armed with laser rifles.
Short? Yes. Quiet? No. It’s like pushing the “launch” button on a cartoon rocket and holding on until you’re free of gravity.
I knew Goat‘s new album, Oh Death, was going to be a treat when it opens with a sample of a song from the film The Undertaker and His Pals.
That track is “Soon You Die,” and it brings back Goat back after a year with so much fuzz that you might think your speakers are faulty. The lyrics are about the inevitable coming of death to us all, but how it’s really nothing to worry about when you stop to consider it. “Soon you die, but don’t you cry, ’cause there’s still time to go party.” It’s great to hear the strange, intoxicating sounds that only Goat can seem to create on guitars – even as they fade out and leave you wanting more.
“Chukua Pesa” brings back their love of Middle Eastern instrumentation, rhythms, and vocal stylings. “Under No Nation” has Goat proclaiming, with groovy hand percussion and sweat lodge dance beats (and plenty of wild, acid jazz saxophone), that they’re free of labels, borders, and limits imposed by others or themselves. If you aren’t moving by the time “Do the Dance” comes along, you certainly will be after it starts.
It wouldn’t be a Goat album if there wasn’t at least one song with the word “goat” in the title, and Oh Death has two. The first is the weird, drunken hornets’ next “Apegoat” instrumental and the second is “Goatmilk” – a space-age psych-lounge cut. It perfectly flows into “Blow the Horns” – a call to beings above and beyond us whose guidance we can all use right now.
“Remind Yourself” is a reminder that we can only bring peace from within. In order to project peace, we must first remember that we have it all within us. It’s there, we often just choose, consciously or not, to not accept it. The mix of distorted guitars with clear marimba beats is a wild one. The brief instrumental of “Blessings” drifts into “Passes Like Clouds” – a lovely instrumental to remind you that thoughts, pain, pleasure, life, and, yes, death, all eventually drift away and reform like clouds. Thich Nhat Hanh once said that we are like clouds and “A cloud never dies.” Goat knows this, too, and they want to share that knowledge with us.
Strange, beautiful, psychedelic, and mesmerizing – King Buffalo‘s newest album (and fifth in just the last two years), Regenerator, is another stunning work from them.
Starting with sunrise synths on the opening title track, the album lifts you off the ground much like the cover image astronaut being pulled up from an alien world. The song’s lyrics tell of embracing the sun and Sean McVay‘s guitars seem to reach escape velocity in order to do it. The drums on “Mercury” at first sound like they can’t decide which time signature they want, but you soon realize that Scott Donaldson is playing at such a high level that he’s weaving intricate patterns like a bee creating a hive.
Dan Reynolds cranks the bass fuzz on “Hours,” a song quite suitable for blasting while you’re dodging asteroids in your star fighter. “Interlude” keeps the cosmic vibes rolling as we emerge from the asteroid belt and cruise past a swirling nebula. “Mammoth” is about leaving the past behind so we, like a mammoth, don’t get frozen in it and stuck there forever. It’s a heavy-psych Zen lesson.
McVay’s guitars on “Avalon” have a lovely psych-shimmer to them throughout it as he sings about his hopes of finding paradise after death. “Firmament” brings us back to the ground for just a moment before another, final liftoff. “I have become one with the great eternal blue sky,” McKay sings, and you believe him – especially when the massive bass riffs and Donaldson’s hammering drums join him in orbit.
You’ll likely join them as well when you hear this record.
Clocking in at just four tracks (with one of them being a remix), Gary Holldman‘s URA87 EP is a solid trance-dance record that will make you want to dance, kickbox, shag, or perhaps all three.
The opening title track is a slick, futuristic one with slippery synth-cymbals, heartbeat drums, and pulsing bass. The ORBE remix of it follows, turning the track more robotic and industrial.
“SAM22” floats back and forth between sweaty dance club beats and subdued make-out bass, getting you in the mood or keeping you, ahem, in the game, if you get my drift. I don’t know if “NAT20” refers to a “natural 20” roll in Dungeons & Dragons(which usually indicates at least double damage done to an opponent), but the track is naturally groovy with muted teletype-like cymbals building up to throbbing KMFDM-like bass.
Yes, it’s a short EP, but it packs a wallop about equal to the cover image.
The debut EP from Austin, Texas’ Rickshaw Billie’s Burger Patrol, Burger Time Classics, is a protein-packed wallop in just six songs.
I mean, the opening chords and vocals of “Born to Lose” alone will smack you upside the head – and that’s before the heavy snare pounding and cymbal sizzling enters the fray. “Dickhead” starts sounds like an old Weezer track they never released and then drops chugging guitars that Weezer still dreams of playing.
“Maggot” is almost sludge metal. “Kill for the Thrill” is so hot and that it’s practically charbroiled. It’s hard to tell which instrument is putting out the most volume in it. The title of “All Beef, Patty” is not only funny, but it also lets you know what’s in store for you over the next three minutes and thirty-seven seconds: pure beefy rock with a little extra grease. “Maniac” has touches of thrash metal sprinkled in for good measure.
The Black Angels don’t get enough credit for the design of their album covers. The artwork is always mind-bending on them. Take, for instance, the cover of their newest record, Wilderness of Mirrors. It looks like a bunch of repeating right angles in various patterns, like a gigantic maze you can neither enter or exit. You feel like something is there, however. Then, you look at it just right, or look at it while you move it one way or another, and the message in the art reveals itself.
It’s the same with their music. Their songs are often multi-layered or have things you seem to hear only when in certain states of mind, in certain environments, or during certain types of weather.
“With a Trace” starts sounding muted and then bursts forth with hypnotizing fuzz. “History of the Future” has both a wonderful title (a meditation on how something will be perceived before it even exists) and some of the heaviest guitar riffs and drums on the record. It’s difficult at times to determine if Stephanie Bailey‘s beats or Christian Bland‘s guitars are dominating the song because they swing back and forth like Godzilla fighting King Kong.
“We can watch it all go to hell,” Alex Maas sings on “Empires Falling” – a song about the rage and cries for justice (“Our country’s bleeding from street to bloody street.”). It swirls and roars, serving as both a call to action and a warning. “El Jardín” is a psych-rock love song, the kind that The Black Angels do so well – a tale of love, mystery, probably death, and acceptance of whatever outcome the universe has planned.
On “La Pared (Govt. Wall Blues),” they sing about the impermanence of things that seem indestructible at first, and the rage they felt at a border wall being built in their home state of Texas (“You can build this wall of hate, but we’ll never separate.”). “Firefly” includes sexy French vocals in another song about lost love. “Make It Known” and “The River” are cool psych-drifts, the latter of which names Syd Barrett, Roky Erickson, and other psychedelic legends.
The title track has a dangerous swagger to it and sounds like it belongs in an A24 Studios horror film. “I’ve been trying to warn you, here and now, and always,” Maas sings on “Here & Now” – a dire warning about what we’re doing to Mother Earth. “100 Flowers of Paracusia” has an ethereal feel to it that floats back down to Earth with Morricone-like guitar chords.
“A Walk on the Outside” is a lyrical riff on Lou Reed‘s “Walk on the Wild Side,” and the heavy bass and wild synths spin around you like a kitten chasing a shoestring held by a little kid. “Vermillion Eyes” lifts you off the ground and lets you float there without worry. The soaring guitars on “Icon” then send you into outer space as Maas mentions Nico and The Velvet Underground (from whom the band get their name, in case you weren’t aware) and you’re soon lost in a neat state of being that’s difficult to describe. The album ends with “Suffocation,” an interesting name for a final track on an album about facing what’s within us (whether we want to or not) and breaking free of illusion. The track isn’t suffocating at all. It’s uplifting by the end. The Black Angels leave us with hope that we can remove our metaphorical masks and walk out of the wilderness we’ve created into something real and meaningful.
It’s their best album in a while – and that’s saying something since they’ve yet to release a bad record.
“Raw” might be the best way for me to describe The Anomalys‘ newest record, Glitch.
Hailing from Amsterdam and touring around the world, The Anomalys have a simple mission – to rock your socks off and maybe frighten you a bit while doing it (in a good way, like a classic Universal Studios monster film).
Rémi Pablo‘s opening drum salvo on “Smart Patrol” gets things off to a roaring start, and then Looch Vibrato and lead singer Bone unleash guitar fury. “Trooper” has a growl throughout it and bounces around like a hopping rhinoceros in your living room. “Anomalys Rise” is a fierce instrumental, which I always appreciate. It blends their love of surf with goth / monster rock.
“Dead Friends” is a lament to those who have gone on before us and wondering when we’ll all be able to have another drink together. “Panic” is a straight-up shot of surf without a chaser. Just hold on for dear life and hope you don’t get crushed by it. “Everything’s gonna be okay,” Bone sings on “Ready to Die” – a swaggering, groovy cut. Speaking of cuts, “Bleed for Me” is dangerous with its snarling guitars and vocals.
You can practically hear Vibrato and Bone’s guitars protesting in “Far Ahead” as they seem to bend them like professional wrestlers trying to make them tap out. “Steppin’ Out” isn’t a Joe Jackson cover (although that would be wild), but rather a jagged, punchy track to send the album out on a sweaty note.
One of three albums released by King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizardin the same month (and four albums released this year), Laminated Denim consists of just two tracks – each fifteen minutes in length. The songs were recorded so they could be played during intermissions of their epic three-hour live sets at the Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Colorado, but they’re not the original tracks made for those sets.
Those tracks were recorded and released on the half-hour, two-track album Made in Timeland released earlier this year. The Made in Timeland tracks were never played during the Red Rocks intermissions because those 2019 shows never happened due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The tracks sat unused for nearly three years before the band, know for their endless energy and prolific output, decided to release Made in Timeland at a three-hour hometown gig.
The problem that then arose was, “What do we play at the upcoming Red Rocks intermissions now?” The answer to that was to record two new long tracks, and thus Laminated Denim (an anagram of “Made in Timeland”) was born.
The first track, “The Land Before Timeland,” gets off to a quiet start that builds into a lengthy jam session of happy guitars over soft jazz drums. Ambrose Kenny-Smith‘s harmonica weaves in and out of the song quite well.
“Hypertension” brings in some of the microtonal elements that KGATLW are known to love. It’s a faster jam that the previous track, probably designed that way to slowly build the audience’s anticipation for what’s to come after intermission.
These two tracks pick you up, carry you away, and let you drift along with them for a nice half-hour jaunt.
Recorded in 1991 and released only on a minuscule run of cassettes, Tinariwen‘s Kel Tinariwen is a fascinating timepiece of their early sound and the building blocks of what would become the desert blues style the band that would make the band famous around the world.
Opening with a song about history, “À L’Histoire,” you hear bits of late 80s Afropop and synth music mixed with their traditional style Tuareg vocals (with female co-vocals sung in French!). “Kedou Kedou” brings in what would become their familiar, hypnotic guitar sound, and the mesmerizing sounds only increase on “Atahoura Techragh D’Azaka Nin.”
“Matadjem Yinmexan” is bouncy and lively. You’ll hear how much Tinariwen have influenced Goat on this track. “Awa Idjan War Infa Iman” puts together simple synth-strings and trance-inducing vocals and guitar rhythms. “Sendad Eghlalan” has a brightness to it that is difficult to explain until you hear it. It’s probably from the shopping mall-organ riffs and beats.
The trippy, haunting melodies of “Tenidagh High Djeredjere” are like an appetizer for the main course of the album’s closer, “Arghane Manine,” which is full of electric dance beats, hand percussion, and a simple, repetitive guitar lick that perfectly matches with the Tuareg vocals and chants.
I don’t know if members of Tinariwen thought this album would be a massive success, or if they were just happy with being able to make it, put it out there, and spread the stories of the Tuareg people. Thankfully, they decided to re-release it for all of us on a wide scale for the first time so we can hear these old stories and get lost in them.
Recorded somewhat by accident in 2011, Protomartyr‘s debut album, No Passion All Technique, was originally supposed to be a 7″ single. As the story goes, however, they were convinced to record as much material as possible within the four hours of studio time they’d booked, and they ended up with twenty-one tracks. The result became a 2012 release of a post-punk modern classic that quickly sold out and is now a collector’s item.
Thankfully, the Detroit quartet reissued the album a few years ago (with bonus tracks if you get the digital download) for those of us who missed the boat in the last decade. It’s a fiery, raw, and sometimes humorous record fueled by a case of beer and Detroit attitude.
Greg Ahee‘s opening guitar riff of “In My Sphere” gets the record off to a jagged, wobbly start, and soon vocalist Joe Casey shows up to rant and rave before Scott Davidson and Alex Leonard come crashing in on bass and drums like bandits robbing a bank in an Old West town. The aggression continues on “Machinist Man,” a song about how the daily grind of Detroit factory work can drive a man to madness. “Hot Wheel City” is another post-punk poem about their hometown (“This city is a stray dog.”).
“3 Swallows” covers one of Protomartyr’s favorite subjects – barflies, lushes, and others who drown their sorrows in Hamm’s at the local watering hole. “I used to light my cigarette on the fire that you had in your eyes, and I was the king of hanging around with wastes of time.” Damn. “Free Supper” is a punk rager about people just wanting basic needs (food, freedom) while skirting the edge of entitlement.
The first time I played “Jumbo’s” (a song about barflies who keep returning to the same pub for booze and gambling despite always swearing they’ll never do it again) for a friend of mine, he replied, “That is some urgent shit.” The song has since become a favorite of the crowd at their live sets. “Ypsilanti” is about patients at the closed mental health asylum in Ypsilanti, Michigan.
“Too Many Jewels” creeps up to you (thanks to Davidson’s wicked bass line) and then Casey’s spoken / yelled street corner preacher-like vocals (and lyrics) give you a jump scare. “(Don’t You) Call Me Out My Name” is a fast, feral punk thrasher that blasts by you at near-light speed. “How He Lived After He Died” might be a precautionary tale of Casey wondering how he’s going to end up when he’s old. Will he be sitting in a chair, surrounded by books? Or will he be so alone that he can’t even bother to set his clock back for daylight savings time?
“Feral Cats” is even more bleak, with Casey warning of how society’s falling apart and most of us will just watch it happen and wait to pick up the scraps. The furious chorus almost blindsides you every time you hear it, even when you know it’s coming. “Wine of Ape” seems to be a story of Casey being confronted by a random stranger (who might be drunk or high) who tries to tell him a dirty joke, but Casey has no time for it and just wants to be left alone, walking away while the guy yells at him. “Principalities” could very well be the drunk guy’s ramblings, or Casey’s bottled up frustration with Detroit as it tried to deal with the aftermath of the burst housing bubble and thousands fleeing the city in search of better opportunities…leaving everyone else in their little neighborhoods to figure out how to manage.
The band has gone on record about how they didn’t expect their debut album to be this good. The title is a bit misleading. The album is full of passion, and the band’s techniques are in their early stages, which sound great.
Keep your mind open.
[It doesn’t take much technique to subscribe, you know.]
