The Other Music Update

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	December 11, 2008


			OTHER MUSIC CELEBRATES 13 YEARS WITH A 3-DAY SALE Thirteen years ago this coming week (December 17, 1995 to be exact), Other Music first unlocked its doors at 15 East 4th Street. At that time we weren't quite ready to open yet, we were still fixing the place up and only had a couple of racks of merchandise, but we thought we'd try and get a little bit of that Christmas business and it worked. With the holidays being such a busy time for everyone, we've never really celebrated any kind of anniversary, but with the economic climate being what it is this year, we thought we'd save you some money and drum up a little extra business by having a Lucky 13 Sale. This Friday, Saturday and Sunday (December 12th through the 14th) all purchases, including gift certificates, made in the store and on our CD/LP mailorder website will receive a 13% discount. (We cannot offer this sale on our Digital store, however, mp3 customers can receive the 13% savings by purchasing a Download Gift Certificate, available in $25, $50 and $100 denominations.) Additionally, any purchase over $100 will receive a free Other Music tote bag. We will also be raffling off a few choice boxed sets, so be sure to drop your name and email into the box on the counter (any purchase made online will automatically drop your name into the raffle pool). Now while we normally don't celebrate our anniversary, December wouldn't be complete without our annual best of list. In the past, we've sent out a rather sprawling Year End Recap, but last year we tried something different, our Top 25 picks for new albums and reissues, respectively. The feedback we received from our customers was overwhelmingly positive so we're going to keep things concise once again. It's an inexact science for sure; everyone here submits long lists of their personal picks and somehow we manage to hash through it all, hoping to encapsulate the most exciting music we've heard in the previous 12 months. And while it has indeed been a tough year on the economy and for music retail in particular, there certainly hasn’t been a shortage of wonderful and exciting sounds. For our part, we’ll do our best to stick around and keep pointing you towards the most innovative and original new releases and reissues out there. Look forward to seeing you this weekend for our sale and thanks for 13 great years! Happy Holidays!!!

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WIN TICKETS TO SUSANNA WALLUMROD
This Saturday, Norwegian pianist/vocalist Susanna Wallumrod will be performing at Joe's Pub for her first ever NYC appearance. Her new album, Flower of Evil, is as breathtaking as her work with her former band Susanna & The Magical Orchestra, with haunting makeovers of songs by the likes of Thin Lizzy (a duet with Bonnie 'Prince' Billy), Sandy Denny, Black Sabbath and Abba. Joining her will be Helge Sten (Deathprod) on electric guitar and guest drummer Jeremy Gara from the Arcade Fire. Enter to win a pair of tickets by emailing giveaway@othermusic.com. We'll notify the two winners on Friday, December 12th.

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 13
JOE'S PUB: 425 Lafayette Street NYC
9:30PM / $12 Tickets

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OTHER MUSIC & XLR8R PRESENT: GARY WILSON, PEANUT BUTTER WOLF, DINOWALRUS & MORE
Only weeks away from bolting the doors at their longtime downtown location, the Knitting Factory is marking the end of an era with a series of goodbye shows before their relocation to Brooklyn. Other Music and XLR8R are helping with the send-off, presenting this killer night of music, featuring Peanut Butter Wolf (Video DJ Set), Gary Wilson, Dinowalrus, DJ Duane Harriott (Negroclash), and hosted by Edan! You won't want to miss this one. We've got a pair of tickets up for grabs, just email enter@othermusic.com. We'll notify the winner on Friday, December 12th.

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 14
KNITTING FACTORY: 74 Leonard Street NYC
Tickets available at Other Music

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OTHER MUSIC PRESENTS SCOTT WALKER: 30 CENTURY MAN PREMIERE PARTY
Next Wednesday, December 17, the first ever documentary on the one and only Scott Walker begins its one-week run at New York City's IFC Center. (Preview the trailer here.) Released by Plexifilm, this intimate portrait of the enigmatic musician features rare archival footage as well as an insider's view of the making of 2006's The Drift, with interviews from admirers like David Bowie, Jarvis Cocker, Brian Eno, Radiohead, Johnny Marr, Richard Hawley, Alison Goldfrapp and Damon Albarn, as well as the man himself. To celebrate, Other Music is throwing a premiere party that Wednesday night at K&M Bar, with OM DJs playing Scott Walker tunes and songs by the countless musicians that he's influenced, plus a special guest set from the film's director, Stephen Kijak, who will be previewing tracks from the upcoming Scott Walker tribute album he's producing with Lakeshore Records. We'll be giving away posters and raffling off movie passes (good for any of the film's showings following the Wednesday premiere). You can also enter to win a pair of passes by emailing tickets@othermusic.com. The the three winners will be notified via email on Monday, December 15th.

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 17:
SCOTT WALKER: 30 CENTURY MAN PREMIERE PARTY
K&M BAR: North 8th Street (at Roebling) Williamsburg
9PM to 1AM / No Cover / 21+ with ID


	$13.99 CD		EL GUINCHO Alegranza (XL Recordings) "Palmitos Park" El Guincho's Alegranza was one of those albums whose influences were so vast and plentiful that it was both disorienting and utterly beautiful at the same time. Filled with calypso drums, tropicalia beats, Krautrock synths, exotica rhythms, African highlife guitars, and chanting vocals, Pablo Diaz Reixa wrapped it all up in a sampladelic package that was mindblowing. "Antillas" stormed in with an African guitar line and repetitive carnival beat, and when it seemed like it was going to collapse, Reixa's trademark chanting came in and held down the melody. A swirling mix of tinpan percussion and distorted synths, "Fata Morgana" received its fair share of Panda Bear comparisons (no doubt due to the song's ultra-melodic Beach Boys-inspired vocals), while the chorus to "Kalise" ("a la la ay, a la la oh") had us all jumping out of our seats. Everybody who heard this album was intrigued and mesmerized. It was only February but we had a feeling Alegranza would take top honors by the time the year was over.


	$13.99 CD $13.99 LP $9.99 MP3		CRYSTAL STILTS Alight of Night (Slumberland) "Graveyard Orbit" With primitive girl group stand-up drums and reverb-heavy and melodic surf/rockabilly-soaked guitar lines, the songs on Crystal Stilts' debut full-length, Alight of Night were the perfect amalgam of the pop immediacy of the C86/Flying Nun sound, and a DIY take on the spacious '60s work of Spector and Nitzsche, with a little VU and Mary Chain thrown into the mix. Unstoppable, yet only the beginning for this incredibly special Brooklyn band.


	$15.99 CD $9.99 MP3		GROUPER Dragging a Dead Deer up a Hill (Type) "Stuck" For her latest Grouper album, Liz Harris tightened the ambient/drone song structure and brought a more instantly recognizable sound palette to the fore. There's nothing we love more here than a pop sense that gets tweaked in subtle ways, and the genius of this album is that she so successfully managed to combine such moving and memorable songs with the aquatic and somnambulant aesthetic that marked her previous work. Easily one of the loveliest listens we were privy to this year, and deservedly, Harris garnered a mini cult following in '08.


	Microcastle/Weird Era Cont. $13.99 CDx2 Microcastle $9.99 MP3 Weird Era Cont. $9.99 MP3 $13.99 CD $9.99 MP3		DEERHUNTER Microcastle / Weird Era Cont. (Kranky) "Little Kids" ATLAS SOUND Let the Blind Lead Those Who See but Cannot Feel (Kranky) "Recent Bedroom" The Most Important Man in Indie Rock Today, Bradford Cox, kept himself plenty busy this year. Microcastle/Weird Era Cont. saw Cox's main band Deerhunter in a state of re-configuration, shedding the ambient overtones and shoegaze-haze that defined the groundbreaking Cryptograms LP, and charging forward with a straight-ahead rock record. A direct and comparatively clean (for what we're used to from DH) production left little for the songs to hide behind. "These Hands" had one foot in My Bloody Valentine tremolo guitar and the other in the type of dreamy pop songwriting that made Ride a perfect band at times. The majestic "Little Kids" ended in a cluster of building reverb and mountainous sounds almost dense enough to make you forget its homicidal/pyromaniacal lyrics. With Cox's "solo" album as Atlas Sound, synths hung in the air, their melodies colliding with guitar and drone effects, while his voice lingered somewhere above the surface like an apparition. Musically he went after a narcotic/bucolic mindstate, a sonic hunk of sponge cake adrift in a sea of Pepto-Bismol. Uncertainty counteracted itself with safety under Cox's reassuring wing to create a memorable record that rested somewhere between Spiritualized and earlier moments from NYC's own Excepter.


	$14.99 CD $14.99 LP $9.99 MP3		BON IVER For Emma, Forever Ago (Jagjaguwar) "Skinny Love" Bon Iver's For Emma, Forever Ago was one of those truly special singer/songwriter records that only turn up every few years. An extremely intimate album that drew us into the isolation of which it was recorded in (a log cabin), this was also one of the most stunning collections of songs that we heard all year, and one we returned to again and again, every time finding a different tune to break our hearts. If you buy one singer/songwriter album this year, For Emma, Forever Ago should be the one, as it is likely that no other will compare.


	$13.99 CD $9.99 MP3		VIVIAN GIRLS Vivian Girls (In the Red) "Wild Eyes" The familiar can bring out the best in us, and the familiar that the Girls trafficked in on their first album called to mind lost rainy-day classics like the Shop Assistants or Black Tambourine; and in an era of macho striped-tee garage addicts, it was a line in the sand. That these ladies waltzed their way onto America's premiere garage punk label In the Red spoke to their uncanny ability to layer loss, remorse, even rage, into the prettiest 2-minute pop songs that echoe out to infinity.


	TEMPORARILY UNAVAILABLE $11.99 LP		NITE JEWEL MY CD (Human Ear Music) "Artificial Intelligence" NITE JEWEL Good Evening LP (Gloriette) Nite Jewel wooed us with her utterly charming, narcotic, bedroom-disco jams. Imagine Calling Out of Context-era Arthur Russell eating opium with a black rubber-bangled Madonna, while Mark Hollis huddles in a corner where the 4-track tape is rolling. What was so cool about these tracks was how they conjured thoughts of OM posterchild Russell without making the mistake of sounding just like him. Her dubby, single-note, acid house melodies and beats, combined with songs that were ever so distantly related to a Bangles/Cyndi Lauper/Book of Love hit, made Nite Jewel one of our favorite new discoveries on 2008.


	$13.99 CD		FLEET FOXES Fleet Foxes (Sub Pop) "Tiger Mountain Peasant Song" Full arrangements, deep instrumentation, and heartfelt songs earmarked the debut from Fleet Foxes, who approached the singer-songwriter dilemma from an emotionally resonant, communal vibe. This band took a lot of chances with very melodic yet difficult material, and was able to translate the mastery of that difficulty into a sound of their own, something a bit like Dungen but more concerned with sweetness than maelstroms of noise, or perhaps a more Anglicized take on Yeasayer, highly polished yet hitting similar heights.


	$14.99 CD		FLYING LOTUS Los Angeles (Warp) "Beginner's Falafel" Like a sonic Jackson Pollock drip painting, Flying Lotus embodied J-Dilla's soulful strut, Madlib's word-music collage aesthetic, Prefuse 73's blender skills, and Alice Coltrane's love of transcendence. Los Angeles was mostly instrumental, with some nice vocals seeping in the latter half which showed that he could handle a live voice as well as the beats. Overall it's a little hard to describe without the reference points, but don't let that detract from the fact that Flying Lotus made one of the best hip-hop records of the year.


	$14.99 CD		PORTISHEAD Third (Mercury) "Machine Gun" We cannot name another band or artist that has returned this triumphantly after an 11-year-long hiatus. Portishead's Third was a beautiful, dark masterpiece that shed the "trip hop" tag altogether. An electronic album whose influences were vast and wide, directly influenced by Krautrock, psychedelia, and industrial music, with Beth Gibbons unmistakable vocal delivery floating on top. More than a few of us here had Third pegged for the number one slot...


	$13.99 CD $12.99 LP $9.99 MP3 w/ Exclusive Bonus Track		VAMPIRE WEEKEND Vampire Weekend (XL) "Mansard Roof" Vampire Weekend's sound was built on the backs of literate "underground" bands like Talking Heads and Orange Juice, while simultaneously paying tribute to mainstream artists like Paul Simon and Peter Gabriel, yet they still came off as fresh and original due to the group's clear-eyed honesty as well as their hooky hit-making. The band delivered the goods with a catchy, joyful record that didn't change the direction of modern music, but was destined to create a serious splash and make a stand for smart, global pop music, and penny loafers too.


	Matador Singles $13.99 CD $15.99 LP Singles 06-07 $19.99 CD w/DVD $9.99 MP3		JAY REATARD Matador Singles (Matador) "No Time" JAY REATARD Singles 06-07 (In the Red) "Hammer I Miss You" We don't care if Jay Reatard punched you or your sister in the face, he still made some of the catchiest music we'd heard in a long while. The compilation of Matador 7" singles made for a great collection of damaged pop music with the cohessivness of a proper album. It was a nice comedown after the rush of Blood Visions to hear him fully settle into a pop mode; at the beginning it sounded like Devo without keyboards (i.e. awesome), but by the time we reached the last single Reatard had gone completely early-'80s New Zealand on us, (a la Chris Knox and the Verlaines). The In the Red collection was equally good and well-balanced, with an unmissable Go-Betweens cover and the Goner hit single, "Hammer I Miss You," and much more, including a DVD of live performances.


	$13.99 CD		TALLEST MAN ON EARTH Shallow Grave (Gravitation) "I Won't Be Found" Sweden's Kristian Mattson definitely studied the greats, but instead of just emulating folks like Bob Dylan and Woody Guthrie, he took the music and made it his own. Yes, the terrain covered on Shallow Grave had been gone over before, but how many of his peers had the tunes to back it up? And that's the thing about Tallest Man on Earth; he is an amazing songwriter making music that will stick with you for a long, long time.


	UNAVAILABLE		THE MUSLIMS The Muslims (1928 Recordings) "Extinction" The agitated indie-pop of the Muslims (who changed their name to the Soft Pack towards the end of the year) bristled with the same hyper-energy of groups like the Velvets and the Modern Lovers, and more recently, the Strokes and Jonathan Fire*Eater, yet they effortlessly made it all their own. Track one down at all cost.


	$14.99 CD		HERCULES AND LOVE AFFAIR Hercules and Love Affair (Mute / DFA) "Hercules Theme" The brainchild of DFA's Andrew Butler, the much-anticipated self-titled debut album from Hercules and Love Affair pulled from 70s/80s disco, electro and early house, but was wrapped together with a sweeping emotion that's not normally felt in modern dance music. "Blind" especially seemed to connect the dots between Sylvester and Arthur Russell, with Antony Hegarty's expressive voice sounding unexpectedly right at home amidst the climbing bass and keyboard arpeggiations.


	$15.99 CD		STEN The Essence (Dial) "Daylight" A perfectly titled album from Dial co-chair Peter Kersten (a/k/a Sten, Lawrence, DJ Swap), The Essence contained all of the stripped-down yet propulsive energy that could move the floor in a skillfully subtle and unmistakably heartfelt way, with house-inspired warmth dovetailing perfectly with its techno-inspired momentum. Anyone capable of appreciating the ineffable qualities of the Efdemin full-length, as well as the angular yet completely inviting genius of Robert Hood will be sufficiently moved by this album. Easily the top techno record of 2008.


	$13.99 CD $9.99 MP3 Uproot: The Ingredients (Unmixed) $9.99 MP3		DJ/RUPTURE Uproot Mix (Agriculture) DJ/Rupture returned home to Brooklyn and delivered perhaps his furthest reaching and most listenable mix yet. A banging bouillabaisse of dubstep, Brazilian beat, dancehall, and Moroccan jams, he even tossed in some string arrangements commissioned specifically for this mix! This was probably Rupture's most laidback, un-aggressive release yet and it was all the better as a result. (Preview all the tracks on Other Music Digital.) NOTE: Those who dig on this and want to hear the original, unmixed tracks -- and you will, because they are killers -- can purchase an unmixed collection called Uproot: The Ingredients off our download store.


	$12.99 CD $9.99 MP3		THE WALKMEN You & Me (Gigantic) "In the New Year" The Walkmen's fifth studio album, You & Me, found the New York band reborn. It began with a tentative and exotic "Donde Esta La Playa," and by the time the Walkmen cranked it up on the fourth track, "In the New Year," it was clear that the group hadn't lost the ability to craft music that deserved to be noticed. Returning to and refining older concepts to create strong, beautiful tracks, on You & Me, the Walkmen were, again, the best version of themselves.


	$14.99 CD $9.99 MP3		HIGH PLACES High Places (Thrill Jockey) "The Storm" Found sound percussion bubbled through stereophonic freak-out dub mixing. Un-placeable samples got dropped in buckets of water and exploded into fractured rhythms and melodic fragments. Mary Pearson's vocals glided through the same ethereal space as early 4AD leading ladies (Cocteau Twins, His Name Is Alive) and had a similar serious candor, gentle but never fragile. There was also an understated flirtation with classic electronica sprouting up on this record that wasn't there in previous work. "Namer"'s rolling waves of rhythm called Aphex Twin to mind, and the stop-start beats and synth patches on album closer "From Stardust to Sentience" echoed the melodic sadness of Squarepusher's more washed-out (and subdued) moments. All these elements congealed into something really addictive. So much was happening that it really begged for repeat listening, and we discovered something new each time, be it another layer of sound or an incredible pop song. High Places owned '08.


	$12.99 CD		WAVVES Wavves (Woodsist) "California Goth" Wavves lives in a world where ultra-overdriven guitars collide with trash can drums that sit atop melodic distorted vocals, whose choruses will stick in your head for days. With tracks ranging from Beach Boys-influenced noisy surf gems like "California Goth" to instantly danceable drumbeats and killer melodies, like the trashy punk rock of "Lover," or the gorgeous Sonic Youth-esque "Vermin," we can't wait to hear what he has in store for us in the coming months.


	$17.99 CD		TAPE Luminarium (Hapna) "Repeto" There was a surplus of post-post-rock-indie-folktronica this year but luckily Tape didn't reside in that ghetto. Yes, they used acoustic instruments, both sampled and played, alongside laptops that oozed field recordings and processed sounds; but like their comrades in arms, Mountains, they utilized these elements with wide-open eyes and ears to create rooms of sound for us to reside in. We were surprised how song-oriented this album was while simultaneously outdoing their previous records in subtlety, movement and refinement. Throughout Luminarium, familiar instruments were given a new clarity and personality, and there was an incredible balance of fullness and minimalism that demanded listening not just out of curiosity, but pleasure. Imagine that!


	$12.99 CD $9.99 MP3		TIMES NEW VIKING Rip It Off (Matador) "Teen Drama" Following two killer records on Siltbreeze, Columbus-based art punks Times New Viking released their first album for Matador in 2008. Rip It Off's sixteen short, sharp bursts of lo-fi pop reminded us of everything from early Pavement and Guided by Voices, to UK post-punkers Swell Maps and Desperate Bicycles. The album was a perfect example of DIY as a necessity instead of fashion statement.


	$14.99 CD $9.99 MP3		THE WAR ON DRUGS Wagonwheel Blues (Secretly Canadian) "Taking the Farm" Philadelphia's War on Drugs seemingly came out of nowhere with an album that was in constant rotation for months at Other Music. Wagonwheel Blues was an amazing debut, and every time we listened we found different things to love. At various moments we heard Dylan, Springsteen, the Walkmen, Animal Collective...the list went on and on. It was the perfect amalgamation of classic rock and modern day indie, with the songs to boot.


	$11.99 CD		BLANK DOGS On Two Sides (Sacred Bones) "Twenty Two" The mysterious and ultra-prolific Mr. Blank Dog has released a multitude of records over the last few years, of which, On Two Sides is the best. He took his love of early Factory Records, synth wave, and punk and distilled it into sharp yet dark 3-minute (and often shorter) pop songs caked in reverb and distortion. Now, what will the cloaked one bring us in 2009?


	$13.99 CD $9.99 MP3		VETIVER Thing of the Past (Gnomonsong) "Sleep a Million Years" Vetiver delivered 12 things of the past on Thing of the Past, a litany of mostly obscure 1970s singer-songwriters who serve as inspiration for the new-old sound of Vetiver and their ilk. As with many young indie stars, singer Andy Cabic is a super-fan even as much as a musician in his own right, and he has a great ear for an unsung classic, and the passion and talent to breathe new life into these songs. By no means was this an album of bold innovation, as the band basically recreated some of their favorite songs in the same style as the originals, but by ALL means was it a beautiful and haunting record.


	$26.99 CDx2		VARIOUS ARTISTS Thank You Friends: The Ardent Records Story (Big Beat) "Back of a Car (Demo)" Big Star With 48 tracks spread over two CDs chronicling legendary Memphis label and recording studio Ardent, including scarce and unissued Big Star material, Thank You Friends is not a compilation, it is an EVENT. The first disc collects the best of Ardent's 60s output, including plenty of soulful (this is Memphis after all) and twisted garage scorchers, some truly inventive psychedelic productions, and AMAZING early Big Star-related songs, such as two each by Icewater and Rock City, which was pretty much Big Star without Chilton. Disc-two is pure magic, chock full of unreleased and rare Big Star material, as well as powerpop gold by Tommy Hoehn and the Scruffs. The most important musical document of the year.


	Nigeria Special $24.99 CDx2 $17.99 MP3 Nigeria Rock Special $17.99 CD $9.99 MP3 Nigeria Disco Funk Special $17.99 CD $9.99 MP3		VARIOUS ARTISTS Nigeria Special: Modern Highlife, Afro-sounds and Nigerian Blues (Soundway) "Akula Owu Onyeara" The Funkees VARIOUS ARTISTS Nigeria Rock Special (Soundway) "More Bread to the People" Action 13 VARIOUS ARTISTS Nigeria Disco Funk Special: The Sound of the Underground Lagos Dancefloor 1974-79 (Soundway) "Take Your Soul" The Sahara All-Stars One of the most important African reissue labels (alongside Sterns and Analog Africa), Soundway batted three for three in '08. First came Nigeria Special which, over two discs and 26 tracks, journeyed into the heart and soul of Nigeria to offer a selection from mostly one-off bands whose music had previously been unissued outside of the country. An excellent companion piece to the Nigeria '70 comp from a few years back, this is more of a slow burner, yet every bit as essential. Next up was Nigeria Disco Special, which featured a handful of stompers that dominated the clubs of Lagos in the mid to late 1970s. While the first Special set traced the evolution of the music that revolved around highlife in the early to mid 1970s, the nine tracks gathered here are distinctly funkier propositions, documenting a series of fat low-end grooves dotted with echoing horns and swelling keyboard lines that kept the city crowds moving each and every weekend. Last but not least came Nigeria Rock Special, which focused on Afro-rock and funk. There's a definite Western influence on some of these tracks, with the influence of Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, Santana, and the Chambers Brothers looming large. The fifteen tracks are fuzzed-out and rocking, with heavy African rhythms as the backbone, and it's easy to imagine this as the soundtrack for the nightclubs in Swinging Lagos.


	$31.99 CDx4 $24.99 MP3		GAS Nah Und Fern (Kompakt) "Konigsforst" As a kid or otherwise, who hasn't been mesmerized during a night drive down the highway, looking out a dew-covered windshield with the lights in the distance, the rhythmic, almost subliminal drone of the tires on the wet pavement and the gently random rhythm of the rain hitting the glass, all miraculously synchronized with the dull, monotonous, heartbeat-like thud of the windshield wipers? Now imagine that with Cocteau Twins and your favorite ambient drone record playing simultaneously on the stereo loudly but with a wet towel over the speakers. That's Gas. The most exquisitely gorgeous ambient recordings of the last 15 years finally saw reissue in the form of this lavish 4-CD box on Kompakt. Essential!


	$25.99 CDx2		DENNIS WILSON Pacific Ocean Blue (Epic) "Dreamer" The most one of a kind of all one of a kind albums finally got a proper reissue this year. Every song on Pacific Ocean Blue is a wonderful fragmentary ode to feeling perpetually psychically adrift, a 70's specialty. And this album is up there with other Myth Rock staples like David Crosby's If I Could Only Remember My Name and Gene Clark's truly insane No Other. Like both those artists, Wilson had significant experience in very heralded bands, though unlike them his group was thematically based on a (heavily edited) perception of his very lifestyle. The 2-CD format provided room to include the oft-bootlegged Bamboo, POB's abandoned follow-up. A lot of the tracks hinge on Dennis' piano playing and occasional drumming, and songs like "Cocktails" are so harrowingly apropos in execution that we almost wanted to enter therapy.


	$11.99 CD		TOMMY JAY Tall Tales of Trauma (Columbus Discount) "I Was There" Sheltered from view until now, Columbus' underground legend Tommy Jay's body of work grew wild and unkempt, from anxious experiments with drum machines and Casios to beautifully shook, engagingly strange parlor ruminations on the unknown, with windblown psychedelia, beer-bottle slide blues, and much more, all evincing a deep-seeded loneliness that carries across the twelve years represented in this collection. Fans of outsider music, Dead Moon, Roky, the Velvets (wait'll you hear Jay's expansive cover of "Ocean"), and the enduring legacy of Ohio rock as it turned to punk and new wave, your ship just came in. Easily one of the most remarkable archival discoveries in years.


	$15.99 CD $9.99 MP3		VAN DUREN Are You Serious? (Water) "Chemical Fire" While many bands and artists have been hyped as carrying the Big Star torch, most of them couldn't even light the match, but Van Duren is the real deal. Originally released in 1977, although Duren had started working on demos (with Andrew Loog Oldham!) as early as 1975, Are You Serious? is a thirteen course pop feast, with heaping piles of irresistible melodies, catchy choruses, and shimmering guitar work. It's a perfect mix of Todd Rundgren, Emitt Rhodes, Badfinger, Raspberries, and Big Star. No faint praise but would we lie to you?


	$22.99 CD		CHRISSY ZEBBY TEMBO My Ancestors (Hummingbird) "My Ancestors" We listened to My Ancestors and were blown away by its uniquely awkward charm. To us, Tembo is the Ozzy-inspired Afro-Sabbath, Kenneth Higney meets '70s Sesame Street jingle vibe of Afrobeat. There's just something so charmingly dumb about this record; and we mean that in the best possible way. Just look at the vacant, gape-mouthed visage of Tembo on the album cover. He looks just like the type of wayward accidental almost-genius that would stumble upon this unique blend of simple, raw, almost-naïve fuzz pop. Exactly the kind of guy who would absent-mindedly blend fuzzy Hendrix/Iommi guitar licks with a double-layered young Ozzy-sounding vocal with Afrobeat.


	$21.99 CD		YOSHI WADA Off the Wall (Omega Point / Em) "Off the Wall l" Japan's Omega Point and Em Records struck gold again with their third collaboration of amazing reissues of works by bagpipist/sound sculptor/drone avatar Yoshi Wada. Off the Wall finds Wada jamming out in a group consisting of two bagpipists (himself included), a percussionist, and someone playing "adapted organ". Compared to the previous two reissues (Lament for the Rise & Fall of the Elephantine Crocodile and The Appointed Cloud), this one's more direct and decidedly less serene than the others, but as always with Wada's music, entirely listenable and hypnotizing. The cassette fidelity of the bonus track adds an extra dimension of psychedelic swirl to the proceedings, with the tympani holding forth on a heavy ceremonial pulse that keeps the intertwining of the two bagpipes' overtones fully majestic and utterly spellbinding. Gorgeous, heavy s**t!


	$15.99 CD		QUARTETO EM CY Aleluia 1964-66 (El / Cherry Red) "Reza" What can we say; this is simply some of the most sublime music to have ever been created in Brazil. If you've ever heard Baden Powell and Vinicius De Moraes' Os Afros Sambas, arguably the greatest Brazilian LP ever recorded, and on which the four sisters who comprise Quarteto Em Cy sang such an integral part, then you know what we're talking about. A review couldn't even do it justice, so suffice it to say that charms of this CD are in direct proportion to the complexity of Quarteto Em Cy's beautiful and mysterious harmonies, of which they know no bounds. Matchless, peerless, unparalleled...


	$16.99 CDx2		STEINSKI What Does It All Mean? 1983-2006 Restrospective (Illegal Art) "Ain't No Thing" Steinski's remixing approach predated the sound collage production aesthetic of Prince Paul, Cut Chemist, Coldcut, Hank Shocklee and the Bomb Squad by 10 years, not to mention the "mash-up" style of 2manydjs, Girl Talk, Diplo, Optimo and the like. Tracks such as "The Motorcade Sped On," which samples dialogue from the JFK assassination broadcast, to the hilarious ode to audio porn, "I'm Wild About That Thing," parallels the wacky audio collage of Negativland and Stock, Hausen and Walkman. In a nutshell, these recordings are important audio documents of post-modern expression in popular music. To our ears, this is some of the freshest dance music ever made and if you have even a passing interest in hip-hop, or are a fan of any of the aforementioned, we consider this required listening.


	$14.99 CD $9.99 MP3		VARIOUS ARTISTS Dr. Boogie Presents Rarities from the Bob Hite Vaults (Sub Rosa) "Wiggle Tail" Googie Rene About the last thing we expected to see the Sub Rosa label drop was a collection of 1950's boogie 78s from the collection of Bob Hite, the legendary singer of Canned Heat. But hey, what the hell, it's an awesome comp and who are we to pigeonhole those guys? Hite was one of those obsessive-compulsive record-mad types, like Joe Bussard, John Fahey, or Dick Spottswood that devoted most of their available free time to scrounging around in dusty cubbyholes in the hopes of finding exceedingly scarce 78s. What we have here then is a stellar collection of super rare tracks by mostly well-known artists like Johnny Otis, Bill Haley, Otis Rush, Etta James, and Elmore James. This isn't an area of music we've ever focused on too much here at Other Music, as it seems our tastes usually run more to the pre-war variety of blues and sixties and seventies R&B, but damn if this didn't sound as fresh as you can imagine.


	$17.99 CD $9.99 MP3		BULLWACKIES ALL STARS Black World (Wackies) "Recording Connection" Jah T The Lloyd Barnes-led Bullwackie instrumental albums are some of the deepest, heaviest roots rhythms you'll ever hear. These dub records aren't as ethereal as Pablo's, or as technical as the Scientist's, and they're certainly not as unhinged as Perry's. But the emotional nature of the playing speaks volumes. The economical reverb-treated guitar in "United Rock" told us more about the blues than any Clapton slowhand solo ever could. Other highlights includes their version of the Horace Andy tune "Skylarking," which features heavily treated, cascading drums and plaintive piano fills, as well as the full vocal version of Joe Auximate's "Trouble Land," from his infamous lost album, which was apparently mistakenly erased years ago. (See what weed can do?) Heck, the whole album is a highlight and if you've been a follower of dub for years or a novice not familiar with this sound, this'll probably be stuck in your player for a while.


	$24.99 CDx2		VARIOUS ARTISTS Dancehall (Soul Jazz) "Trash and Ready" Super Cat Soul Jazz came through with an all-killer, no-filler 2CD collection of solid dancehall jams charting the movement's early history, providing nearly all sides of the sound from slack, sexed-up jams to roots-conscious decrees, to the heavy skills of early female MCs on the scene. The excellent selection features foundation DJs like Yellowman, Ini Kamoze, Cutty Ranks, Eek A Mouse, Triston Palma, and Barrington Levy alongside lesser known champions such as Brigadier Jerry, General Echo (with "Track Shoes," perhaps the first-ever jam praising sneaker culture), Michigan & Smiley, Lady Ann, and Clint Eastwood, not to mention our favorite, Sister Nancy. You've pulled up the roots, you've scrubbed up on the dub, now it's time to nice up the dance!


	$13.99 CD		JORGE BEN Jorge Ben (Dusty Groove) "Pais Troical" Jorge Ben's most infamous yet seldom heard album was FINALLY available again for the greedy Brazilian beat/tropicalist gobbling public... and it has never sounded better! A rare album that lives up to nearly all of the praise piled upon its reputation, Jorge Ben's 1969 self-titled masterpiece is perhaps one of the best, most well balanced cornucopias of what many call tropicalia, but which in all honesty were simply trademarks of Ben's sound from early on in his career: heavy and sensual samba jazz rhythms (courtesy Trio Mocoto), Ben's choppy rhythm guitar, lush Technicolor horn and string arrangements (courtesy tropicalia's maestro supreme Rogerio Duprat), and soulful vocals that drip melodies like the juice of a ripe jungle fruit.


	$18.99 CD		GAVIN BRYARS Hommages (LTM) "The English Mail-Coach" Written and recorded during a period in which Gavin Bryars digested a heavy diet of Erik Satie and French novelist Raymond Roussel, each piece here -- performed by small ensembles often including the composer -- oozes with a dark, exquisite beauty, but also manages to display a playfulness that some of Bryars' early works occasionally lacked due to their density and heavily emotional subject matter. "Out of Zaleski's Gazebo," for 2 pianos and 6 or 8 hands, is perhaps the most forceful and certainly the most overtly "minimalist" composition Byrars had written up until then; "Danse Dieppoise," for piano, vibes, tuba, and baritone horn, is his most Roussel-inspired piece and even quotes a passage from Debussy's La Mer at one point... it's fabulous, soothing, and simply gorgeous, just like the rest of the record.


	$12.99 CD		BILL COSBY Badfoot Brown and the Bunions Bradford Funeral and Marching Band (Dusty Groove) "Martin's Funeral" Two side-long, expressive instrumental jazz-funk cuts make up this early '70s album, both composed by Bill Cosby and ostensibly played by a crack session of studio musicians, including drummer Big Black. "Martin's Funeral," written as a remembrance of Cosby's participation in the funeral march for Martin Luther King, Jr. in Atlanta, is a fifteen-minute journey through emotional pain and perseverance, kept alive by the martial beat of the drum and a four-note blues that washes away the hurt. The track changes wildly through its runtime, and you'll likely recognize part of it as having been sampled by A Tribe Called Quest years back. "Hybish Shybish" is an equally unpredictable, uptight jazz-funk vamp that stretches out over 20 minutes, and works on similar repetitive themes and soul structures, shifting groovily to the whim of the players. Is there anything the Cos can't do??


	$22.99 CD		VARIOUS ARTISTS African Scream Contest (Analog Africa) "It's a Vanity" Gabo Brown & Orchestre Poly-Rythmo African Scream Contest was a treasure trove of all unknowns. Located between Ghana and Nigeria, the little-mined countries of Benin and Togo are ripe for reissue discovery, as proved by this amazing set of '70s tunes. These fourteen songs are wild and unhinged, with a decided Western rock and funk influence. The guitar work is choppy and psychedelic while the drumming is airtight, with aspiring young vocalists who appear completely absorbed by the idea of out-belting James Brown. Like the Nigeria series but twice as wild!


	$15.99 CD $9.99 MP3		ARTHUR RUSSELL Love Is Overtaking Me (Audika) "What It's Like" Audika Records released one of the most important pieces in the puzzle that is the creative engima of Arthur Russell with Love Is Overtaking Me, a beautiful collection of folk, pop and country tunes recorded from 1973-1990. While many know of Arthur's dance experiments and his forays into modern classical composition, few were aware of this side of the man. He took part in and formed many different pop groups during his lifetime, all of which would seemingly evaporate before things really got rolling, and he was constantly writing and recording tunes influenced by his Midwest roots and his time in California during the early 1970s. Songs from a few of those groups are included here, along with many solo tunes often featuring just Arthur and an acoustic guitar, and the occasional accompaniment of his unique cello playing. Most striking upon early listens is Arthur's singing voice -- usually a muffled riddle of onomatopoeia, here he mostly sings in clear, ringing tones. His lyrical muse is very much the same -- fragile, deeply emotional tunes of love & loss possessed of a haiku-like simplicity, with a directness often difficult to express in song.


	$31.99 CDx3		VARIOUS ARTISTS Never Ever Land: 83 Texan Nuggets from International Artists (Recall) "Fire Engine" The 13th Floor Elevators There's not a whole lot of info about the International Artists label that doesn't directly relate to the 13th Floor Elevators releases. You don't really get the impression that they had much else going on besides Roky & crew and maybe the Red Crayola. That is until you start getting into Never Ever Land where you find the Chayns, Lost and Found, Bubble Puppy, Endle St. Cloud, and the Golden Dawn, and you discover obviously, that was not the case because even if you exclude the Elevators tracks, these discs here make up one the best '60s comps out there. It's all packed in a nice little box with a great booklet that includes a label overview, info on the bands, a superb interview with IA employee (and the man responsible for a lot of the commercial success that the Elevators and IA had) Lelan Rogers and a complete label discography.


	$17.99 CD $22.99 LPx2		MILK 'N' COOKIES Milk 'n' Cookies (Radio Heartbeat) "Not Enough (Girls in the World)" Milk 'n' Cookies straddled the line between glam and early New York punk rock but never fully fit in with either scene. They should have been a successful teenybopper group, but stardom evaded them in part because of their staunch refusal to be associated with the Bay City Rollers. Frontman Justin Strauss's ultra-fey vocals weren't androgynous like Bowie's or Jobriath's, but instead had a non-threatening but still kinda creepy quality along the lines of KISS' quasi-feminine womanizer, Paul Stanley. The band's insanely catchy anthems were pure high school locker room posturing, girl-crazed odes to underage lust with titles like "Rabbits Make Love," "Not Enough (Girls in the World)," and "Little, Lost and Innocent," in which Strauss playfully laments, "She's so young, and oh, would it be wrong?" It may sound dirty in writing, but it's actually about as innocuous as Joey Ramone cooing "hey little girl, I wanna be your boyfriend," and just as much fun.


	OUT OF PRINT		J.T. IV Cosmic Lightning (Galactic Zoo) Hooray, another iconic Midwestern outsider who lived out his rock and roll fantasies while no one was listening. We were fully ready to track this album down based solely on the killer "Death Trip" single, after being led to it MySpace-style six months ago. It's a fully ripping nihilistic song that sounds like the grind of Chrome with a bit of Hawkwind-chug, with a trace of the lovesick/misogyny of early GG Allin complete with a killer solo. Of course, this is all wrapped up in the same outsider-stuck-in-a culture-starved atmosphere found in records by Jim Shepard and Tommy Jay, not to mention Gary Wilson or even Ariel Pink. Later, tunes like "Song for Suzanne," "In the Can" and "I Really Love You/You Know That I Love You Don't You?" reveal a tender ballad-y/spaced-out, dumb/poetic Roky Erickson-vibe sung by a non-mush mouthed Darby Crash. To top it all off, the package came with a DVD of J.T. prancing and posturing in his dimly lit basement. Amazing.


	$22.99 CD		COLD SUN Dark Shadows (World in Sound) "Twisted Flower" And there it was: a beautifully presented, legit reissue of one of the most hallowed corners of psychedelic expression. Said to be the end product of heavy peyote consumption, Cold Sun's Dark Shadows certainly sounds it, yet remains remarkably together, despite its knocking the traditional rock band dynamic on its side; bass guitar provides the lead melodies, colored by velvet haze and a snake-eyed demeanor that veers from toughness to terror in a matter of moments. Credit frontman Bill Miller and his electric autoharp, who'd later back Roky Erickson in righteously damaged ventures throughout the '70s and '80s -- his presence on vocals ranks in the upper echelon of drug-fueled music of any generation. Easily a top ten psych record, unlike anything in your collection.


	$17.99 CD		SHOP ASSISTANTS Will Anything Happen (Cherry Red) "I Don't Want to Be Friends with You" Shop Assistants were one of the crown jewels of the UK C86 compilation and the subsequent "movement" which followed in its wake. Songs like the driving "I Don't Want to Be Friends with You," "All That Ever Mattered," "Caledonia Rd," and "Seems to Be" paved the way for the likes of current NYC faves the Vivian Girls, fusing post-Mo Tucker drum styles with jangly, buzzing guitars and an infectious exhilaration that will instantly win you over upon first listen.

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VARIOUS ARTISTS
Perfect Unpop: Peel Show Hits And Long Lost Lo-Fi Favourites - Vol 1. 1976-80
(Cherry Red)

"Teenage Treats" The Wasps

Perfect Unpop spotlighted John Peel's passion for unpretentious young voices of Britain in the mid to late '70s. Celebrating broken-pop-with-a-punch, this collection played like the legendary DJ's Radio One show. The bands on Perfect Unpop all share a DIY ethic and a drive for purity in their music, a rejection of commercialism which Peel embraced. Many of these groups frequented London's Roxy and 100 Club, the later of which hosted the now famous 100 Club Punk Festival which Subway Sect and the Vibrators (featured on the compilation) both performed. Other highlights include powerpop classics by the Wasps and the Tours and Peel Show classics by Eater, Swell Maps, and Kleenex, with quirky pop by the Prefects, Wreckless Eric, and Monochrome Set thrown in for good measure. Though it wasn't the most obscure of collections, it was absolutely unbeatable in the quality department.


	$17.99 CD		DAVE MASON & CASS ELLIOT Dave Mason & Cass Elliot (Rev-Ola) "On and On" From the opening acoustic guitar strains of "Walk to the Point," to the rich three-part harmonies throughout, this one-off collaboration between these two superstars sounds so comforting and familiar, you'd swear that you've been hearing these songs all your life. Around the time of this recording, Dave Mason was in the process of getting kicked out of Traffic, and Cass Elliot's Mamas and the Papas were pretty much broken up. Mason was hanging out at Elliott's house playing some new tunes he wrote and when she started to add harmonies, it sounded so good they had to hit the studio. What they came up with was quite a departure from their work with their respective bands. The record's not as gritty as Mason's work with Traffic, or his later solo material, and it's not as poppy as the Mamas and the Papas. It's loose, rollickin', and close in attitude and sound to artists like Delaney & Bonnie, CSN&Y, America, and Terry Reid. Mason sings lead on all but one of the songs here, but what truly makes this album special is the beautiful back-up vocals provided by Cass and her sister Leah. It's an easygoing, tranquil album from two troubled yet talented stars who were still hitting some creative peaks.


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