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Almost 20 years since their last album Time for a Witness, the Feelies are back with a brand new record! An apt title if there ever was one, Here Before picks up perfectly from where these indie purveyors left us, with group founders Glen Mercer and Bill Million, joined by the same line-up first featured on 1986's classic The Good Earth, delivering a great set of their trademark jangle and post-Velvet Underground pop. Download this free track, "Should Be Gone," off the new record and celebrate with us the return of Hoboken's finest!
New York-based producer Quinn Luke has just released his third solo album, Shadow to Shine, under the nom de plume of Bing Ji Ling (which translates to "ice cream" in Mandarin). Like the music he creates as a member of the Phenomenal Handclap Band, his new record has a distinctly retro feel, taking cues from psychedelic pop and '70s soul and resulting in something that's truly infectious and timeless. Featuring members of Antibalas, the Dap Kings, Scissor Sisters, and the Phenomenal Handclap Band, you won't find a better album to go along with the warm days ahead. Enjoy this free download of "Move On," the first single from Shadow to Shine. This Week's Featured Downloads More than a month since the devastating earthquake, and the news coming out of Japan continues to be grim. Kompakt and its family of distributed labels have assembled this 34-track download compilation in order to help our Japanese friends in their time of need. Featuring well-known producers and artists like Marsen Jules, Efdemin, Antonelli, Lawrence, Michael Mayer, My Favorite Robot, Kaito, SCSI-9, DJ Olive, and many, many more, this 3-hour-and-45-minute collection of music moves through ambient, house, underground disco and experimental sounds, and includes several exclusive cuts. 100% of the $8.99 price will be donated to the German Red Cross (Deutsches Rotes Kreuz).
American synthesist and analogue conjurer Jeff Witscher has been on a rock solid winning streak lately, thanks to a series of captivating releases under his Rene Hell moniker. Following his stunning debut album, Porcelain Opera, for Type last year under the Hell name, Witscher has been unleashing countless limited 7"s, cassette-only releases and collaborations, but they all seem like warm ups to this new full-length... the main event. With Terminal Symphony, he takes the myriad of influences that made his first full-length so stunning -- dark, gritty, rhythmic analogue soundscapes that tie together the work of such groundbreaking misfits as Conrad Schnitzler, Throbbing Gristle, Aphex Twin, and Philip Glass -- and he fuses them together into new contexts which are stark but rich, thick but clear-cut, and hypnotizing but never distracting. The Philip Glass influence is perhaps one of the biggest changes between this and the previous album; where the debut was comprised of fewer longer pieces which evolved as they progressed, Terminal Symphony sees Witscher's works fully formed, concentrated to their purest essences. Synths gurgle, throb, and pulsate, while soft drones and gently piercing tones weave themselves over and under the thickets of rhythms. I love the way things shift from the sort of arpeggiated dreamscapes of Klaus Schulze or Vangelis into the thicker, more complex textures of something like Catherine Christer Hennix's The Electric Harpsichord. This album is simply gorgeous, and its success lies in its ability to appeal to everyone from your classic old-school Glass/Reich/Riley New York minimalists to your Oneohtrix Point Emeralds new-jack synth kids. That he manages to also infuse the recordings with the sort of Afro-futurist leanings of Sun Ra and Juan Atkins, and tie it all together with a post-industrial ribbon which Chris, Cosey, Sleazy, and Gen would probably approve makes this one of the standout releases of 2011. If you've been sheepish about this stuff in the past, I can't think of a better crash course in science. If you've been flying the flag all along, here is your new national anthem. Please rise for the Terminal Symphony. While supplies last, a very limited quantity of the LP format (with CD included) also available on our mail order site (and in our NYC store) for $21.99.
The connection that fans of the Minutemen have with that band's music is as intensely powerful and personal as any in music. In "History Lesson - Part II" from the group's iconic 1984 Double Nickels on the Dime album, D. Boon sang Mike Watt's telling of the best friend's shared roots in the Southern California punk scene, and the origins of their own band, and proclaimed "this is Bob Dylan to me." If you have spent as many hours as I have listening to the rumble of the turning engines that frame that record, you probably know what he means; the music they loved, and the music that they made, touched hearts and minds, and souls even, as deeply as any poetry can. Boon died in a car wreck a year after that record was released, and Watt, by any account, has struggled mightily since losing his friend. He is a world-class bass player, and he has made some great music over the last 25 years, with his primary post-Minutemen project fIREHOSE, as a hired player in some great bands including the Stooges, and across several enjoyable solo records. But this latest album, a fragmented, oddball, deeply personal and perfectly Watt-sian suite of songs that recalls his old group's sound as well as their passion better than anything he has done since, is his best. As always, Watt's solo albums come with themes; these 30 lightening-quick, angular songs are each said to be based on figures in Hieronymus Bosch paintings, but these character studies, with titles like "boot-wearing-fish-man," "hollowed-out-man," and "bird-in-the-helmet-man," clearly are splintered windows into Watt's own psyche. It is the many-hued (and much-hyphenated) self-portrait of an aging, deeply impassioned and wonderfully flawed punk-rock idealist. The sound, with Tom Watson on guitar and Raul Morales on drums, closely resembles the Minutemen's early spastic, hardcore-jazz-whatever, and the lyrics are both as sharp and as beguilingly abstract as anything Watt has written. Straight up, it's a great record; Mike Watt can still spiel with the best of them -- some would argue that he's actually aging better than Dylan. -Josh Madell Cameroonian writer, artist, and musician Francis Bebey was a seminal force in spreading the cultural impact of African music to the greater world; his book African Music: A People's Art is essential reading for anyone with a deep interest in the topic, and his albums have explored everything from classical-inspired guitar to thumb-piano explorations, quiet etudes for small ensembles to wild synth/beatbox jams, sometimes all combined into one song. His work shows the passion of a man who never rested on his laurels, and who used music as the ultimate communicative tool, writing and performing songs that combine Afrobeat's sociopolitical commentary with a sentimentality and saudade often reserved for the bossa nova. Bebey's in a class of his own, and his records have been criminally out of print for years. This collection on Cantos offers up a wonderful cross section of his work in different styles, serving up soft guitar lullabies, witty tunes with comical spoken-word tales overtop skittering electro beats, and funky soul makossa jams (it should be noted that Bebey was also the man who helped launch the career of Makossa Man #1, Manu Dibango). While by no means definitive or comprehensive -- Bebey released over 20 albums during his lifetime -- this collection provides a vital overview to his dizzying but valuable career. To hear him go from the gentle sway of "Mwana O" to the pop-locking Afro-electro of "La Condition Masculine" and then to the hypnotic solo guitar piece "Fond D'ivresse" is wild, impressive, and surprisingly well sequenced; as diverse as the styles can get, everything is tied together with an anchor of purpose and soul that brings an extra layer of warmth even to the more rigid synthetic pieces that have been driving minimal synth heads rabid with excitement lately. It makes total sense that Bebey worked for UNESCO during his lifetime -- listening to his work on this comp is like sitting in with the most hip conference of the United Nations you could imagine. Bebey's records are pure magic, and I cannot recommend this collection more highly. -Mikey IQ Jones
And for those of you who need some more Bebey in your diet (and we all do, believe me!), we're fortunate enough to have another collection of his work available. While La Condition Masculine was the title of a 1976 album by Bebey and that record's cover art and title are both used here, this digital release, however, is actually a collection of early works from his mid- to late-1970s period, focusing heavily on his more esoteric, electronic-influenced productions. Nearly all of the tracks on this album date from 1976 and '77, and they use early drum machine/beatbox technology to dizzying effect; he layers wild poly-rhythms together with electric organ and primitive synth settings in an odd mix that sounds a bit like the Young Marble Giants on a safari in the African savanna, with his vocal delivery often similar to Serge Gainsbourg's post-Melody Nelson sing-speak of the period. While some of the sounds can come across as a bit chintzy to modern ears, it's astonishing to hear how far he pushes such basic technology to fit his vision; it's difficult to imagine these tunes arranged in acoustic form, yet you can distinctly hear the roots of makossa, soukous, and highlife throughout. It's a tough call to say which collection is a better place to start; I suppose that really depends on your personal preference. One thing is for certain, though: any enthusiast of African sounds who shares an appreciation for more indie-centric sounds should check at least one of these sets ASAP. There's a tiny bit of overlap, but on the whole, this is more Bebey in one serving than has been available for some time. Ultimate highest recommendation, folks!! -Mikey IQ Jones Belgian dark wave act Isolation Ward gets the expert reissue treatment from LTM with Point Final, a collection of the bulk of this fantastic band's material in one place for the first time since their dissolution in 1983. Formed in 1979 in Brussels, Isolation Ward released only two singles for the Crepuscule label and two other limited edition cassettes during their brief existence. Emerging from a scene heavily influenced by British punk (Joy Division and Siouxsie and the Banshees are two key points of reference), Isolation Ward's sound is dark, brooding, and employs a wide array of instrumentation -- ambient electronic textures, synthesizers, violin, and horns along with the skeletal guitar work and deep bass lines that dark wave is known for -- which allowed the group to explore a sound different, and more interesting, than many of the copycat bands that formed after punk broke. Point Final opens with Isolation Ward's signature track "Lamina Christus." Sounding like a lost B-side to Siouxsie and the Banshees' The Scream, the song features a great, dank bass line and an eerie vocal performance from the group's first singer, Nathalie Bourlard. A lot of bands wrote songs like this, but for whatever reason Isolation Ward hits it so perfectly here, making for one of the greatest dark wave songs ever put to wax. Besides the singles, the other real treat on Point Final are the tracks compiled from Isolation Ward's cassette releases. Lo-fi as all hell and at points almost darkly psychedelic, these recordings really capture the group at their rawest, as on the atmospheric "A Request" or the upbeat (for Isolation Ward, at least) "Waste" that has this really awkward synth line that just rules. Overall, this is a killer reissue of a band instrumental in defining the dark wave sound. Fans of the previously mentioned groups as well as the Names, Christian Death, Section 25, or the darker moments of the Cure take note! -Chris Pappas
Seminal Sheffield band Cabaret Voltaire was named after the Dada performance night curated by Hugo Ball and his wife Emmy. Obscure NY band Ike Yard (complete early recordings here unearthed by the hidden-gem-hunting Acute label) was named after the record shop in A Clockwork Orange. Both groups shared a penchant for dubbed-out, urban, subterranean art pulse, and during the same post-punk time period. The difference between the two lies, at least partially, in the names. Early on, Cabaret Voltaire had more of a barely there, lofty, esoteric vibe while, throughout their recorded output, Ike Yard's was an unmistakable sexual throb that had a darker, slightly meatier but no-less-sophisticated sound. Also, while Cabaret Voltaire was greatly influenced by early hip-hop, Ike Yard, who actually sounded a lot less like early hip-hop, actually had direct connections, their drummer, Stuart "Dominatrix Sleeps Tonight" Argabright, making tracks on the side with Rammellzee in the Death Comet Crew. Ask Stuart, he's got a million stories. Now forget the hip-hop influence for a second. Yes, DAF and an overall German New Wave influence (the stripped-down groove of Malaria or Liaisons Dangereuses) is in there. The influence of first generation Krautrock (Can, Neu!, etc.) is also in there, and keeps the aforementioned "sex throb" in the pocket and expansive. But what I'm not hearing anyone talk about is the minimal Birthday Party-like rhythm section: minimal scrapes a la Roland S. Howard, a propulsive Kraut version of bass a la Tracy Pew, and the well-timed crashes of a restrained Phil Calvert/Mick Harvey. I never really dreamed of a band sounding like Birthday Voltaire, especially a dubby, minimal Krautrock version, but if anything comes close, this is it and it works. Replace the drunken cabaret (no pun) style of Birthday Party with the dubby exploration of Krautrock and Neu Deutsche Welle and there you have it. Even the primal essence of Swans, undoubtedly a product of the then essential Lower East Side survival tactics, is evident in an understated way without being at all macho. A collection of tracks utilizing sounds that you're used to hearing in a smoked-out synth-art-jam way that actually ends up grabbing you by the face and jerking your head around with some authority. A band that would have been as fitting on Zick Zack as Factory (who they recorded an LP for, tracks included here), now they're just as fitting on Acute. Essential New York Underground tracks. -Scott Mou |
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