7th Level Music

Review: GOAT – Levitation Sessions

Praise be to the good folks at the Reverberation Appreciation Society for conjuring up another excellent Levitation Sessions live performance recording. Their track record on these sessions is exemplary, and this latest one, featuring Swedish psych-mystics GOAT, is no exception.

The opening track, “Tarot Will Teach You,” pretty much lets you know what you’re in for if you’ve never heard a GOAT record. Jangling, shaking, slithering hand percussion, Mellotron chords, tribal drums, guitars that sound like they’re coming from inside a temple carved into a cliff…It lets you float into a nice space before “Golden Dawn” drops fast funk and one of the singers is asking, “Are you ready to go?” She doesn’t care what your answer is, really, because she and the rest of the band are taking off and will leave you behind if necessary. “Under No Nation” is a great cut with a top-notch guitar solo about how easy it is to forget we are all citizens of the world, not just these little enclaves in which we find ourselves, and that global and local conflicts are worthless endeavors.

“Behind the Plank” is over seven minutes of psych-jazz jamming with killer saxophone work and percussion throughout it. “Do the Dance” makes you want to do exactly that with its pulse-raising beats and power guitar chords played at just the right time. “Fill My Mouth” is the naughtiest song GOAT has released so far, and this live version is raw and funky, and of course there’s a lot of flute in it.

“Lorcan” is nearly seven minutes of krautrock synths and hand percussion. “Queen of the Underground” is vintage GOAT, with heavy riffs, sultry double female vocals, slinky bass, and trance-inducing percussion. “Let It Burn” moves like a fire in a hidden forest clearing, or perhaps atop of cold mountain, with people dancing around it well into the night. The album ends with a tidbit of “Midnight Madness,” which, in the original streamed version of the session, is over seven minutes long. The two-and-a-half minute slice here is a great tease of psych-synth music, leaving all of us wanting more.

It’s always great to hear new stuff from GOAT, who can and have disappeared at will for long stretches of time, only to come back like they never left. Time isn’t linear for them, and their perception of space is probably beyond the senses of many. This live session might help you get there, too.

Keep your mind open.

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Enter the “Lair” of Indonesian soul-funk.

Today, Guruguru Brain are pleased to announce the release of the new record from Indonesian band LAIR. ‘Ngélar’ will be released on February 23rd and the first track from the record, “Tatalu” is online today.

LAIR (pronounced “lah-eer,” a local dialect for the Indonesian word of ‘lahir’, meaning ‘birth’ or, roughly ‘being born’) is a Panturan-soul/funk outfit hailing from Jatiwangi, West Java, Indonesia, a city once celebrated as the country’s largest manufacturer of clay roof tiles. As an artist troupe each with their own practices, the name is interpreted further into continuously giving birth to something, be it music, thoughts, experiments, narratives, and the like. It serves as a platform or an ongoing research institution for each of its members.

Formed in 2018, LAIR’s music, lyrics, and its presentation are vivid, inherently gaudy (in a good way), and honest. The band takes a sizable chunk of inspiration from classical/traditional Panturan Tarling, a form of grassroot musical/performance art popular amongst the people of the northern coast of West and Central Java.

In classic Tarling performance semantics, the musicians are usually bound to give an opening performance (an ‘offering’ for the audience, if you will) which are lovingly referred to as “Tatalu” (or “Tetalu” in Cirebonan). LAIR’s aptly titled new single, “Tatalu,” serves as an opening for a new chapter as they announce a new album with Rotterdam/Tokyo record label Guruguru Brain in collaboration with Bandung’s Orange Cliff Records, and working together with Go Kurosawa (Kikagaku Moyo) as the record’s producer, and singer/songwriter Monica Hapsari as collaborator.

“Tatalu” is an opening anthem for the album, in which the band tries to emulate the frenetic scenery of the Pantura route, the band’s native region. In “Tatalu,” they try to trace—and also draw influences from—the lineage of the contemporary local Panturan culture that is heavily assimilated with Chinese culture. Percussioist Tamyiz Noor’s rebana (local equivalent of the tambourine) rhythm draws influence from Indo-Chinese roadside performance of the Barongsai / Lion Dance or Sar Ping commonly held in Pantura regions, while lead guitarist Tedi Nurmanto explores riffs that he imagined could fit into Chinese action movies.

Listen to “Tatalu”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKQfmy-KHM8
Pre-order/pre-save ‘Ngélar’: https://snipfeed.co/gurugurubrain

On ‘Ngélar’—the sextet’s second LP—deeper social narratives and more intimate subject matters are more apparent. In which they speak a lot about ‘tanah’ or ‘land/soil,’ owing a lot to their hometown Jatiwangi’s history of being the country’s largest producer of clay/terracotta-based products. Their intertwining relationship with ‘tanah’ is simply unparalleled—even their instruments are mostly made of terracotta.

From the reimagining of their hometown’s past glories, LAIR, along with singer/songwriter Monica Hapsari (who co-wrote and co-composed three songs in the album) and Go Kurosawa (Kikagaku Moyo) helming the project as the producer, sings about the rituals and traditions of harvest, to sending off prayers towards their once-prospering land and the ruins of what was once a dense forest in Jatiwangi, which they are currently trying to reclaim while racing with the massive wave of industrialisation. It is a contextually-sorrowful album as much as it is a candid, cheery commemoration of the band members’ everyday life in today’s northern shores of Java, Indonesia.

‘Ngélar’ is one of the words that might be able to describe the essence of LAIR as a group. The word itself can be traced back to the locals’ culture of ‘going around in celebration of something.’ In their village, ngélar simply means a traveling performance, in which the performers would play music and go around the village, greeting the people around them as they move from place to place, or simply within their immediate surroundings, indicating that there is something nearby that is being celebrated.

Taken outside of the group’s narratives, the music and lyrics speak for themselves, relaying in detail, through aural means, how it is to live on the northern shores of the island of Java. The feeling of salt in the humid air; The tiniest drop of sweat as it runs down the neck of truckers zooming down the hectic roads of Pantura; Posters of the coming election candidates plastered throughout the villages; The lingering smell of burnt chaff in the air; The garish set of stickers decorating the windshield of rundown public transports, braving every pothole with their dangerously-rickety wheels; And, most of all, the scorching heat. All lovingly communicated through the charming perspective of the locals.

LAIR is simply in love with ‘journey,’ ‘time,’ and all of their interactions. ‘Ngélar’, for them, is a representation of their journey. How they go around, interacting and communicating, to celebrating and making sense of everything that is going on within and around them. For LAIR, ‘Ngélar’ is a method, a creative process, and—as an album—a culmination of each of their journeys since the group’s founding.

‘Ngélar’ will be released on February 23rd via Guruguru Brain. Pre-order here.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Kate at Stereo Sanctity.]

Maquina release powerful industrial psych single – “denial.”

Lisbon trio MAQUINA. (‘Machine’) are today announcing album ‘PRATA’ (‘Silver’), due out April 5th on Fuzz Club, and sharing the first single ‘denial’. In support of the release, MAQUINA. will head out on a European tour with A Place To Bury Strangers, followed by festival appearances at Primavera Porto, Sonic Blast and Fuzz Club 2024.

Drawing from minimal krautrock repetition, pounding industrial techno and EBM, MAQUINA. explore the boundaries of these genres with force, carving out an adrenaline-fuelled sound that’s equally suited to dark, sweaty back rooms and the dance floor. On the new single, MAQUINA. write: “denial is about an inner turmoil and restless contemplation. The raw, haunting lyrics explore the struggle to find solace within oneself, amidst a sea of conflicting emotions. The plea to ‘shut me down’ echoes the yearning for respite in the face of overwhelming darkness.”

Listen to single “denial”:https://youtu.be/8QyfC_O3mDc
Pre-order/pre-save album ‘PRATA’:http://maquina.lnk.to/prata

Though their sound might have the club in its sights – ‘PRATA’ follows their aptly-titled 2023 debut EP ‘DIRTY TRACKS FOR CLUBBING’ – this is an organic dance music that’s equally punk and psychedelic, played by a guitar-drums-bass power trio formation firing on all cylinders, without a synthesiser in sight. Having already amassed a notorious reputation in Portugal for the all-out energy of their live shows (as evidenced in this live video broadcast by Canal180), it’s no mean feat to replicate that in the studio but on ‘PRATA’ they have managed exactly that – owing to a creative approach largely rooted in improvisation, both on stage and in the studio.

Describing ‘PRATA’, recorded and co-produced by Carlos de Jesus (Sunflowers) at Arda Recorders, they write: “This album was composed spontaneously in the studio throughout the year 2023. It’s music of colour, delving into depths and dimensions that resonate with scale and contrast. Pushing sounds together to make noise and pushing noise together to make sounds. Emphasising textures that evoke feelings and soundscapes rather than relying solely on textual narratives. The music breathes life into auditory canvases, painting sonic panoramas pushing into a world of tactile sensation and immersive experiences.”

MAQUINA. tour dates:
06/04 – Köln, DE @ Club Volta*
07/04 – Karlsruhe, DE @ P8*
09/04 – Milan, IT @ Arci Bellezza*
10/04 – Bologna, IT @ Covo Club*
11/04 – Rome, IT @ Monk*
15/04 – Zurich, CH @ Bogen F*
17/04 – Marseille, FR @ La Makeda*
18/04 – Toulouse, FR @ Le Rex*
20/04 – Madrid, ES @ El Sol*
21/04 – San Sebastián, ES @ Dabadaba*
04/05 – Eindhoven, NL @ Fuzz Club 2024
07/06 – Porto, PT @ Primavera Sound
8-10/08 – Âncora, PT @ Sonic Blast 24
* with A Place To Bury Strangers

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Kate at Stereo Sanctity.]

Squid announce new single and North American tour dates.

Next month, Squid — the British quintet of Louis Borlase, Ollie Judge, Arthur Leadbetter, Laurie Nankivell, and Anton Pearson — will embark on a North American tour in support of last year’s expansive and evocative O Monolith. In anticipation, the band share a new single, “Fugue (Bin Song).” A fan favorite and fixture in the band’s live performances over the past several years, the song was recorded during the O Monolith sessions with long-time collaborator Dan Carey at Peter Gabriel’s Real World studio in the spring of 2022 and was initially intended to be included on O Monolith, but didn’t make the final tracklisting. The song was re-mixed and edited by John McEntire (of Tortoise) in the later half of 2023.

Listen to “Fugue (Bin Song)”

O Monolith was praised by Consequence as “one of the most impressively creative rock records to grace 2023.” Following the band’s biggest UK and EU shows yet, Squid’s North American tour will see them stopping in Austin, Philadelphia, Brooklyn, Chicago, Los Angeles, and more with Water From Your Eyes supporting all dates. All concerts are listed below and tickets are available here.

This run will feature exclusive tour merch, including a collaborative tour poster from both bands and a homemade, tour exclusive cassette mixtapes from Squid. “It’s an antidote to the immediateness of music consumption nowadays,” Judge says. “It features music by friends and people I admire, probably best to be played at nighttime whilst sat on your favorite chair.” All copies are hand-stamped by Judge and features a Lino print design by Natalie Whiteland.

Purchase O Monolith
Watch Squid’s “The Blades” Video
Watch Squid’s “Undergrowth” Visualizer
Watch Squid’s “Swing (In A Dream)” Video

Squid Tour Dates:
Fri. Feb. 2 – Austin, TX @ The Parish *
Sat. Feb. 3 – Dallas, TX @ Dada *
Mon. Feb. 5 – Nashville, TN @ Basement East *
Tue. Feb. 6 – Atlanta, GA @ Terminal West *
Thu. Feb. 8 – Washington, DC @ 9:30 Club *
Fri. Feb. 9 – Philadelphia, PA @ Union Transfer *
Sat. Feb. 10 – Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Steel *
Wed. Feb. 14 – Boston, MA @ Paradise Rock Club*
Thu. Feb. 15 – Montreal, QC @ SAT *
Fri. Feb. 16 – Toronto, ON @ Phoenix Concert Theatre *
Sun. Feb. 18 – Chicago, IL @ Thalia Hall *
Mon. Feb. 19 – Minneapolis, MN @ Fine Line *
Fri. Feb. 23 – Portland, OR @ Revolution Hall *
Sat. Feb. 24 – Vancouver, BC @ Rickshaw Theatre *
Sun. Feb. 25 – Seattle, WA @ The Crocodile *
Tue. Feb. 27 – San Francisco, CA @ Regency Ballroom *
Thu. Feb. 29 – Santa Ana, CA @ The Observatory *
Fri. March 1 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Belasco *

* w/ Water From Your Eyes

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Ben at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Robber Robber debuts first single – “Sea or War.”

Today, Burlington-based band Robber Robber — Nina Cates (vocals / rhythm guitar), Zack James (drums), Will Krulak (lead guitar), and Carney Hemler (bass) — share their new single/video, “Sea or War.” Co-produced by James, Cates, and Benny Yurco (Grace Potter), “Sea or War” speaks to the moments of confusion and reflection that happen as you try to navigate a messy world, represented through relentless percussion contrasted with fluid melodies. Of the track, the band explains: “‘Sea or War’ explores how fine the balance feels between comfort and futility. There are various opposing forces being fused together, which can be felt in the lyrics, musical arrangement, and production.”

Watch Robber Robber’s “Sea or War” Video

James and Cates have been playing music together since they were kids. Immersing themselves in the eclectic Burlington scene, they began writing songs and formed Robber Robber. The past few years has given the project time to “live and breathe” while the band honed in on their songwriting and captured the tangible group dynamic they’ve cultivated on stage: “With this curiosity-driven approach, we were able to really conceptualize and fine-tune what we wanted Robber Robber to be,” says the band. “This project is very conceptual, and therefore can be difficult to pinpoint, and that’s part of what we find refreshing about it. We feel a lot of freedom in having loose parameters to fit into.”

Next month, Robber Robber will play shows in Burlington, Northampton, and Brooklyn previewing new music to be released later this year.

Robber Robber Live Dates
Thu. Feb. 1 – Burlington, VT @ Radio Bean
Fri. Feb. 2 – Northampton, MA @ 90 King St.
Sat. Feb. 3 – Brooklyn, NY @ The Sultan Room
Thu. March 28 – Boston, MA @ O’Briens Pub *

* = w/ Thus Love and Native Sun
Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Ahmad at Pitch Perfect PR.]

fanclubwallet strive to be a “Band Like That” with their new single.

fanclubwallet — the project of Canadian singer-songwriter Hannah Judge — announces a new, full band EP, Our Bodies Paint Traffic Lines, out March 29th via Cool Online, and shares lead single “Band Like That.” The 24-year-old, until now proudly DIY in her approach, has enlisted the help of three close friends from the Ottawa scene (who also happen to be her touring band) for her most exciting release yet and “Band Like That” is the first taste of the band’s new direction. “I had spent months studying everyone else’s bands,” says Hannah, acknowledging a love for the likes of Metric, Pinback, Plumtree, and Alex G. “What made them so good? Why couldnt I be like them? And that’s where this new track came from.” In the accompanying video, Hannah’s character obsesses over a local band, eventually kidnapping its members and becoming headline news in a real-life newspaper called Club Chronicles created by Hannah herself and to be distributed around her hometown of Ottawa in the near future.

Watch fanclubwallet’s “Band Like That” Video

Once upon a time Hannah had been perfectly content sitting at home alone mucking around with cheap keyboards. But as fanclubwallet garnered more and more listeners on streaming services (breakthrough song “Car Crash in G Major” currently sits pretty on 13 million Spotify plays), a nationwide live tour quickly became an inevitability – even if it was something the once “debilitatingly shy” Hannah never expected would happen to her.

Things change when you leave the confines of your bedroom — not least the need to reconceptualize certain songs for a full-band dynamic. Thankfully for Hannah, that transition from DIY singer-songwriter to band leader was free of the usual tensions. In fact, since fanclubwallet had already started touring as a quartet before the new material came along, it could hardly have been simpler.

“I was lucky that when the time came to find a band, I had one standing right in front of me,” she says. Step forward: Nathan Reid (bass), Eric Graham (guitar) and Michael Watson, who not only played drums, but produced and mixed the record. “It’s cool to let your best friends take the lead,” says Hannah, who’s known half the band since way back in third grade, and once upon a time acted as their tour photographer. “They feel like my arms and my legs. Extensions of myself!”

After tracking one demo in a LA Airbnb and another in Alabama when their van broke down while on tour, the four of them de-banked to a cottage in Gatineau, Quebec, before applying the final touches at Port William Sound in Frontenac, Ontario – “an awesome place in the middle of nowhere.” The result is an EP partly conceived on the road which also deals thematically with the trials and tribulations of living and working in music — whether that’s the initial shock of leaving your more normal sedentary existence behind, band envy, stage fright, creepy photographers or simply finding joy in the collective.

Taking inspiration from 90s zine culture and leaning on Hannah’s side hustle as a cartoonist, fanclubwallet will release the EP with an exclusive set of comics, trading cards and chord charts for each song allowing fans to play along.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Patrick at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Dry Cleaning to reissue their first two EPs on March 08th and play a tour of smaller venues.

Dry Cleaning will reissue their first two EPs, Boundary Road Snacks and Drinks / Sweet Princess, on March 8th, 2024. Remastered to celebrate the release, Boundary Road Snacks and Drinks and Sweet Princess will be pressed as one single vinyl record. The former will be available on cassette for the first time and include an exclusive bonus single, a demo of New Long Leg single, “Strong Feelings,” recorded during the sessions for Boundary Road Snacks and Drinks. Today, the band has shared a new visualizer for the song “Sit Down Meal,” the first in a series of new visualizers created for all tracks across the EP by original ‘Magic of Meghan’ video collaborator Lucy Vann.

Watch the visualizer for “Sit Down Meal”

To coincide with the reissues, Dry Cleaning will head back on the road this March and April for headline sets that will lean heavily on songs from Boundary Road Snacks and Drinks and Sweet Princess. The tour will offer fans the chance to see the band play in more intimate venues and honor US shows that were postponed in 2020 (including SXSW). Tickets are on sale. Full tour dates are listed below and for tickets and information, head HERE.

The EPs will be reissued on vinyl featuring the original artwork and lyric sheet. Boundary Road Snacks and Drinks / Sweet Princess will be available digitally, on standard black LP, transparent blue LP (indie variant), CD and cassette on March 8th. To pre-order head HERE.

After a prolific 18-month period releasing two critically acclaimed John Parish-produced studio albums, New Long Leg (2021) and Stumpwork (2022), as well as last year’s companion release the five-track Swampy EP, South London’s Dry Cleaning are taking a moment to reflect on their journey and pay homage to their roots.

Dry Cleaning’s origin story is well known by now. Guitarist Tom Dowse, drummer Nick Buxton, and bassist Lewis Maynard had been friends and musical collaborators for years, and invited mutual friend Florence Shaw – a visual artist, picture researcher and drawing lecturer – to join the band in 2017. With clear musical influences from the Feelies, the Necessaries, the B52s and Pylon, and constrained by the small garage space they rehearsed in, Dry Cleaning were drawn to making simple music; direct and uncomplicated, anything superfluous was left behind.

By March 2018 the group had recorded the six-track debut EP Sweet Princess with producer Kristian Craig Robinson at Total Refreshment Centre in a single day. Two months later, in May 2018, the band played their first live show in Dalston at the Shacklewell Arms, and released the EP in August. Sweet Princess was a thrilling debut, its dizzying and restless instrumentals with Shaw’s sardonic vocals delivering a satirical collage of witty observations and social commentary. A further 6 songs in the form of the Boundary Road Snacks and Drinks EP quickly followed two months after. It was named in tribute to the band’s rehearsal space in Maynard’s family’s south London (Sidcup) home, and to his mother Susan whose home-cooked meals sustained the four friends in between sessions. With singles like “Sit Down Meal” and “Viking Hair,” Boundary Road Snacks and Drinks is a powerful companion to Sweet Princess. They share a similar pent-up energy, unsurprising given they came to life in the same environment those EPs were created in, an environment that had a huge influence on the band during those formative years.

Boundary Road Snacks and Drinks / Sweet Princess Tracklisting:
Boundary Road Snacks and Drinks:
A1. Dog Proposal
A2. Viking Hair
A3. Spoils
A4. Jam After School
A5. Sit Down Meal

Sweet Princess:
B1. Goodnight
B2. New Job
B3. Magic of Meghan
B4. Traditional Fish
B5. Phone Scam
B6. Conversation

Dry Cleaning 2024 Tour Dates:
Sun. Mar. 10 – Chicago, IL @ Empty Bottle
Mon. Mar. 11 – Chicago, IL @ Empty Bottle
Wed. Mar. 13 – Sat. Mar. 16 – Austin, TX @ SXSW
Mon. Mar. 18 – Los Angeles, CA @ Roxy
Tue. Mar. 19 – Los Angeles, CA @ Roxy
Thu. Mar. 21 – San Francisco, CA @ The Independent
Fri. Mar. 22 – San Francisco, CA @ The Independent
Sat. Mar. 23 – Boise, ID @ Treefort Festival
Mon. Mar. 25 – New York, NY @ Bowery Ballroom
Tue. Mar. 26 – New York, NY @ Bowery Ballroom
Fri. Apr. 5 – Glasgow, UK @ Saint Luke’s
Sat. Apr. 6 – Newcastle, UK @ The Grove
Sun. Apr. 7 – Birkenhead, UK @ Future Yard
Tue. Apr. 9 – Dublin, IE @ Whelan’s
Wed. Apr. 10 – Dublin, IE @ Whelan’s
Fri. Apr. 12 – Leeds, UK @ Brudenell Social Club
Sat. Apr. 13 – Leeds, UK @ Brudenell Social Club
Mon. Apr. 15 – Birmingham, UK @ Hare and Hounds
Tue. Apr. 16 – Birmingham, UK @ Hare and Hounds
Thu. Apr. 18 – London, UK @ EartH Theatre
Sat. Apr. 20 – Rotterdam, NL @ Motel Mozaique
Sun. Apr. 21 – Antwerp, BE @ Trix Hall
Tue. Apr. 23 – Munster, DE @ Gleis 22
Wed. Apr. 24 – Berlin, DE @ Halle am Berghain
Fri. Apr. 26 – Paris, FR @ La Gaite Lyrique
Fri. May 24 – Madrid, ES @ Tomavistas Festival
Sat. Jun. 29 – North Adams, MA @ Solid Sound Festival

Keep your mind open.

[Don’t forget to subscribe before you go.]

[Thanks to Jacob at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Rewind Review: For the Love of House (2006)

I picked up this delightful three-disc house music compilation at Reckless Records in London last year for a mere two pounds. As the cover reads, it’s forty-five tracks. You could just put any of these into a DJ set and walk away for a little while.

Each of the discs has plenty of outstanding tracks on it. Disc One, for example, has a lovely mix of Ron Hall and The Muthafunkaz‘ “The Way You Love Me” with Marc Evans on vocals. Paul Johnson‘s “Get Get Down” is a lot of fun. Kathy Brown‘s “Don’t Give Up” is pure house bliss, as is the ’98 mix of Maw‘s “To Be in Love.” Soulsearcher‘s “Can’t Get Enough” is a house classic and not to be missed.

Disco Two starts off with six straight bangers: Bob Sinclair‘s “I Feel for You,” Powerhouse‘s “What You Need,” A.T.F.C.‘s “Bad Habit,” Sandy Rivera‘s ” I Can’t Stop,” and Knee Deep‘s “Good for Da Hole” and “I”ll Be There For You.” Soul Rebels‘ “I’ll Be Good,” with the great Lisa Millet on vocals, is a for-sure floor-filler.

Disc Three gets thumping right away with Junior Jack‘s “Stupidisco.” “Believe” by Ministers De La Funk (with Jocelyn Brown on vocals) brings a bit of gospel flair to the mix, which is always welcome in house music. M‘s “So Fly” is killer, full of fun raps and retro video game bleeps backed with a solid dance beat. Timmy Vegas & Andy Daniell‘s “Disco Shit” is the shit. The early 90’s rave vibe of it is top-notch. Martin Solveig‘s “Rocking Music” gets your attention and doesn’t let go of it. Mood II Swing‘s “Can’t Get Away” is a good example of a house music staple – songs about how you sometimes can’t quit love that’s great in some ways but bad in others.

This compilation is well worth finding if you can.

Keep your mind open.

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Mr. Bungle announces 2024 U.S. tour dates.

Mr. Bungle continue to extend their 2024 world tour, adding headlining dates to cities the band has not visited since the turn of the millennium, with newly announced performances now also slated for the Southeastern and Midwestern U.S.:

May 6 Dallas, TX House of Blues

May 7 Austin, TX Emo’s

May 8 Houston, TX House of Blues

May 11 Atlanta, GA Tabernacle

May 12 Raleigh, NC The Ritz

May 14 Nashville, TN Brooklyn Bowl

May 15 Indianapolis, IN Egyptian Room

May 19 Minneapolis, MN First Avenue

Tickets are on-sale this Friday, Jan. 26 at 10 am local time. Ipecac alum, Otto Von Schirach opens on all headlining dates. Ticketing links are available at Ipecac.com/tours.

Full list of Mr. Bungle tour dates:

February 28 Tokyo, JP Toyosu Pit

February 29 Osaka, JP Namba Hatch

March 3 Auckland, NZ Auckland Town Hall +

March 6 Melbourne, AUS Festival Hall +

March 7 Adelaide, AUS Hindley Street Music Hall +

March 9 Sydney, AUS Hordern Pavilion +

March 10 Brisbane, AUS Fortitude Music Hall +

March 12 Perth, AUS Metro City +

May 6 Dallas, TX House of Blues #

May 7 Austin, TX Emo’s #

May 8 Houston, TX House of Blues #

May 10 Daytona Beach, FL Welcome to Rockville

May 11 Atlanta, GA Tabernacle #

May 12 Raleigh, NC The Ritz #

May 14 Nashville, TN Brooklyn Bowl #

May 15 Indianapolis, IN Egyptian Room #

May 17 Columbus, OH Sonic Temple

May 18 Milwaukee, WI Milwaukee Metal Fest

May 19 Minneapolis, MN First Avenue #

June 16 Zurich, CH X-Tra %

June 17 Milan, IT Magnolia %

June 19 Berlin, DE Huxley’s %

June 20 Copenhagen, DK Copenhell

June 23 Luxembourg Atelier %

June 24 Tilburg, NL 013 Poppodium %

June 27 Oslo, NO Tons of Rock

June 29 Clisson, FR Hellfest

+ with Melvins

% with Oxbow & Spotlights

# with Otto Von Schirach

Keep your mind open.

[Don’t forget to subscribe before you go.]

[Thanks to Monica at Speakeasy PR.]

Review: Claudio Simonetti – Demons soundtrack (2023 reissue)

I picked this up the night I saw Claudio Simonetti’s Goblin play this score live to a screening of Demons (properly known as Demoni) in Chicago last year. The film is nuts, to put it mildly, and the score is a wild synthwave ride into dark places and crazy action sequences.

“Demon” starts us off with throbbing synth-bass to set the tone for what’s going to be a weird experience, and “Cruel Demon” is like a discovering a snake has slithered into the room and leads us into “Killing.” There’s plenty of that in the film, so it’s only appropriate that there’s a song called this. Heck, Lamberto Bava and Dario Argento, the creators of the film, could’ve just called it Killing. The song has neat orchestral synths mixed with electro-drums and metal guitar solos.

“The Evil One” is, appropriately, the creepiest tune on the entire soundtrack, with heartbeat beats and sinister synths to give you chills. “Out of Time” begins with violins and then switches to almost vaporwave sounds straight out of an early 1980s shopping mall. It’s wonderfully weird.

The Rustblade edition of the score is full of bonus tracks. The CD version is two discs. Disc One has two demo versions of the title track and one of “Killing,” a 2002 live version of “Demon,” a Simonetti Horror Project version of it from 1990, and, best of all the previously unreleased “Demon’s Lounge,” which, yes, is a lounge version of the title track. It’s amazing. I’d love a whole album of stuff like this from Simonetti.

Disc Two is all remixes by various artists, with only one by the Simonetti Horror Project. OHGR first remixes “Demons,” then Cervello Elettronico provides a cool industrial version of “Cruel Demon.” Simulakrum Lab gets you to to the dance floor with their remix of “Killing.” The Devil and The Universe remix “Threat” into something you’d hear while Jason Vorhees is pursuing you through a late night dance club.

:Bahntier// turns “The Evil One” into a full-out rave classic. Needle Sharing sees that and raises a drum and bass remix of “Out of Time.” Leæther Strip‘s remix of “Demons” adds more industrial throbs and grit to Simonetti’s original track. Chris Alexander gets creepy on his remix of “Killing,” and Creature from the Black goes all-out dance club mix on “Demon.” Dope Star Inc. slows things down on their remix of “Killing,” turning it into a stalking machine. Finally, the Simonetti Horror Project version of “Demon” pumps up the jams with hip hop beats and cool synth flairs to round out the second disc with a remix that is, I dare say, fun.

It’s a classic score for a wild horror film, and a must for fans of such stuff.

Keep your mind open.

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