The Other Music Update

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	January 25, 2013


	FEATURED NEW RELEASES Ex Cops Mountains Expe Widowspeak Foxygen Toro Y Moi Nosaj Thing Marcos Valle The Crying Princess: 78 RPM Records from Burma (Sublime Frequencies LP) Ty Segall & Mikal Cronin Pretty Wicked Lester Cave Dwellers		Pop Ambient 2013 (Various) FaltyDL ALSO AVAILABLE The Men (Limited 7") Nightlands BACK IN STOCK Laurie Spiegel Follow us on Facebook: facebook.com/othermusicnyc Follow us on Twitter: twitter.com/othermusic

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		OTHER MUSIC NIGHTS AT ACE HOTEL NYC Next week, Other Music is wrapping up our Wednesday residency of this past month at New York's Ace Hotel. OM's Andreas Knutsen will be DJing a wide array of rock-n-roll of all ilks and eras, so come join us for some great cocktails and food in the gorgeous hotel lobby bar, and while you're at the Ace, make sure to check out our new release display located next to the front desk, filled with Other Music's latest favorite albums and reissues. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 30 ACE HOTEL: 20 W. 29th St. NYC

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		WIN PASSES TO A SCREENING OF 'HEIDI' This Wednesday, January 30, Spectacle theater will be showing a rare screening of multi-media artist Mike Kelley & Paul McCarthy's disquieting "real-time" adaptation of Joanna Spyri's classic Swiss children's story. It's a brilliant, gross meta-retelling starring rubber puppets made by the directors, and we have to say it's pretty twisted. Programmed by Joe Denardo of Growing and NYMPH's Jim McHugh, and presented here courtesy of Pettibon and Electronic Arts Intermix. To enter to win a pair of passes, email giveaway@othermusic.com. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 30 @ 8:00 P.M. SPECTACLE THEATER: 124 S. 3rd St. BKLN

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		WIN PASSES TO A SCREENING OF WATTSTAX Next month, BAMcinematek will be presenting A Pryor Engagement, an 18-film retrospective of Richard Pryor, running February 8-13 & 19-21. We've got a couple of pairs of passes to give away to a 35mm screening of director Mel Stuart's Wattstax, which will be showing on Sunday, Feburary 10 at 4:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. Stax brought out the stars for this massive day-long concert held after the 1972 Watts riots, including Isaac Hayes, the Staple Singers, and Rufus Thomas. Along with an awe-inspiring round of "I Am Somebody," the live wire that is Richard Pryor elevates the film to greatness. To enter for your chance to win a pair of passes, email contest@othermusic.com. SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 10 BAM: Peter Jay Sharp Building 30 Lafayette Ave. BKLN


	$11.99 CD $13.99 LP $9.99 MP3		EX COPS True Hallucinations (Other Music Recording Co.) "James" "You Are a Lion, I Am a Lamb" Accolades are already pouring in for this debut from Other Music Recording Co.'s own Ex Cops, and it's all well deserved (if we do say so ourselves). Admittedly, this quartet aren't exactly the first band to make buzz-saw dreamy guitar-pop reverberations, but you'd be hard pressed to find another group these days who does it with this kind of letter-perfect precision. Ex Cops were the first band we signed to our label imprint, and their full-length debut should help you understand why. Led by Brian Harding and Amalie Bruun, Ex Cops make the kind of indie guitar pop that plays out like an early-'90s roll call (MBV, Teenage Fanclub, Jesus & Mary Chain), but instead of simply aspiring to create a reverential tribute album, the group offers their own unique twist on the genre, concentrating on the songwriting and using the hazy reverb as sonic balm and texture instead of the other way around. Tracks like "James," "Billy Pressly" and the propulsive lead single "Ken" beef up the shimmery urgent jangle of all of your fave C86 bands and are tempered with some lovely, perfectly-placed girl-boy harmonies from Amalie and Brian, evoking visions of a lost Robin Guthrie-produced Vaselines session. Each song is a lesson in economy and grace, with enough variety (the foreboding synth-heavy intro "S&HSXX," the woozy Velvets strut of "Nico Beast," or the girl-group sway of "Spring Break (Birthday Song)," and the whole thing scoots by in just over a half an hour, never overstaying its welcome, leaving you the listener eager for more. One of the best records/debuts of 2013, and I honestly mean that. [DH] Follow Ex Cops on Facebook & Twitter Follow Other Music Recording Co. on Facebook & Twitter


	$14.99 CD $19.99 LPx2		MOUNTAINS Centralia (Thrill Jockey) "Identical Ship" "Propeller" In the traditional terms, it's hard to describe the kind of music Brooklyn-based electro-acoustic duo Mountains make: instrumental soundscapes created by layers and layers of low, minimal synthesizer tones that both arpeggiate and drone, matched with cyclical acoustic guitar melodies and doleful piano lines. It's music that's beautiful, but it's not music you put on to sing a familiar chorus, it's not music to pick you up, and it's not music to bring you down. It's music for wanderlust, body and mind. And that's the special thing about Mountains; Koen Holtkamp and Brendon Anderegg craft music that you can feel just as much as your ears can listen. The music has an undeniable texture that constantly fluctuates, both slowly and surprisingly, into boundless, vast expanses. On opener "Sand," Mountains build to a great, palpable crescendo before quietly turning the song in on itself, ending it in a moment of sonic reflection via a quelling cello. This is a template they follow for most compositions on the album, the most ambitious being the 20-minute "Propeller," and they pull it off with an uncanny ease. For most part, this is because, although the music is largely made by electronics, each track pulsates with heart, always twisting and hypnotic. "Circular C" has both pitch-perfect guitar work -- a little Jack Rose meets Six Organ's Ben Chasny -- and a lovely, lilting piano that cascades and falls over a murmur of bubbling modular synth tones. Belying an earlier point, it's this mix of organic and inorganic, soft sounds matched by icy timbres, that keeps the album so interesting. Plus, who would have guessed a band like Mountains would pull out all the stops and go for broke with power chords to grand effect on the penultimate track, "Liana"? This is Mountains' fourth album and they not only sound more impressive, but more inspired. In fact, many stretches of Centralia, especially "Tilt," actually remind me of an OM favorite, the surf soundtrack, Sea of Joy, by '70s Australian psych-folk group Tully; just like that record, the music here is on another level, it sounds as deep as the ocean and reflects the power and magnitude of the ever-shifting ebb and flow of the waves of sound Mountains create. I love Sea of Joy because it's beguiling, rolling and, at times, intense, but that natural flow is actually pretty hard to achieve these days. As a band, you have to avoid the trappings of overly long improvisation as well as the constructs of "epic" compositional rock long practiced by post-rock groups like Explosions in the Sky. On Centralia, Mountains do just that. This is their best yet, gorgeous, plain and simple. [PG]


	$17.99 CD		EXPE Emeralda (Wonderyou) "Holizana" "Goya" This stunning album by Japanese guitarist Yoshitake Expe slipped into our orbit a few weeks back and at first spin I was blown away by its beauty, its rhythmic hypnotism, and its complexity. Just about every customer shopping while the album played apparently was too, as we sold out of all the copies we had of the disc before it had even reached the last track! Expe blends his spindly, arpeggiated guitar lines into an interlocking puzzle of polyrhythmic drums and Brazilian percussion, outer space synth gauze, and a bit of popping, funked-up bass grooves; it makes for an odd but beautiful combination, one that at times recalls everything from Ash Ra Tempel and Manuel Gottsching to the clipped, stuttering grooves of Tortoise circa TNT and Standards, while its avant-garde folkloric fragility sounds like it could be a modern-day antecedent to the Saravah Records catalogue out of France. Topping it all off is a bit of the tribal psychedelia of recent Boredoms thrown into the mix (EYE from the Bore tribe actually provides a quote of endorsement/respect on the album's front obi strip), and altogether it's a unique, surprising, yet warmly familiar sound. What's most refreshing about the album, though, is the way it effortlessly balances instrumental virtuosity with a clear, uncluttered efficiency; rather than noodle on for extended periods of time while layers of drums and synth thicken the soup, Yoshitake gives each musician and instrument enough space to breathe and move both with and around his guitar lines. And while each of the five cuts on Emeralda extends past the ten-minute mark, nothing ever outstays its welcome. The 20-minute "Caleide" strips things down to just two interlocking acoustic guitar arpeggios dancing across the stereo field, a skittering hi-hat and 4/4 kick drum pulse, and quiet but passionate wordless vocal cries, until a gentle synth cloud floats into the mix 15 minutes in. It, like the album as a whole, relaxes the mind while instigating motion in the body, and its deft blend of ambient drift, dexterous virtuosity, and heavy spirituality make this one of the deepest, most unique records I've heard in a while. Lose yourself in this one... it's a dream. [IQ]


	$12.99 CD $14.99 LP		WIDOWSPEAK Almanac (Captured Tracks) "Ballad of the Golden Hour " "Sore Eyes" Widowspeak's self-titled 2011 debut succeeded as much because of silence and space as it did because of melody and rhythm. The band delivered simple, sad, sweetly embracing songs that were built around Molly Hamilton's coy, breathy voice, Robert Thomas' twangy guitar melodies, and Michael Stasiak's minimalist drumming, and while it was full of hooks and built on solid songwriting, it was the texture and emotion and mood that really stuck with the listener -- the lazy pace and open, airy sound. And while the core of what made us fall in love with Widowspeak remains unchanged on Almanac, the group has pushed their music forward, adding flesh to the bones and layers of sound to their once stark production; they are still a wispy sigh of a band, but now with a bit more meat to grab onto. Stasiak has left the group, to be replaced by a full-fledged rhythm section, and while the busier rhythms and consistent bass marks a major change in the tone here, it's really Thomas' guitar that leads the charge of their expanded sonic palette, with layered, shifting leads and swirling textures that leave far less to the imagination than on earlier recordings, yet deliver lush and satisfying sonics. Hamilton's voice, too, has stepped somewhat out of the shadows, still aching and airy, but more confident in both pitch and emotional range, still dreamy, but maybe a little less fragile. Almanac takes chances that Widowspeak avoided, and while the band may have lost some of their charming naïveté, they have found a more complex sound that shows forward growth and movement, bringing in more "classic" rock elements and more boundary-pushing ideas than their spare and lovely pop previously allowed. Widowspeak has filled in some of that silence and space that first drew us in, and yet the lush tapestry that has replaced it is no less warm and enveloping. [JM]


	$13.99 CD $14.99 LP $9.99 MP3		FOXYGEN We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace and Magic (Jagjaguwar) Preview Songs on Other Music's Download Store" Before noon on a rainy Friday during the CMJ festival a few months back, a band stumbled onto the stage in the half-dark back room of a small Brooklyn club, clearly hung over, tousled, a little damp and seemingly amused to find themselves in front of a thickening crowd drinking free rum and pushing towards them at that unlikely hour. The five musicians were tinkering with an unruly stack of rickety old organs, busted tambourines and an assortment of beat-up effects pedals, several of which were inexplicably duct taped to the face of a guitar. At the center of this shambling group were a pair of ruby-cheeked boys who both looked like a cross between mid-'60s London dandies and standard-issue 2012 Brooklyn hipsters, with disheveled mod haircuts, tight-fitting jeans and scuffed Beatle boots. Sam France and Jonathan Rado started Foxygen a few years back while they were still in high school, and since then, with a variety of supporting players, the duo, now based in L.A., have been crafting their stoned retro psychedelic pop, self-releasing piles of home-recorded songs of varying quality, gigging around the west coast, and, I like to think, imbibing copious quantities of acid, weed and absinthe. Jagjaguwar released an interesting EP of their schizophrenic home recordings last year, but this new one finds Foxygen in the studio with Richard Swift producing, doing everything they can to live up to their silly band name and ridiculous album title, and generally succeeding. Both on stage and on record, the first thing you notice about the group is France's wicked Mick Jagger impression; he pouts, quivers and struts throughout this disc in an unfailing imitation of mid-late-'60s Jagger, and no doubt the Stones, along with the Kinks, T. Rex, early Bowie, Velvets, and Barrett-era Pink Floyd, loom large over this band's music. And yet, despite the obvious imitation, somehow Foxygen not only do it well, they make it their own, exploring the music of 1967 from a cheap flat in Silver Lake 2013, with wit, style, and a modern DIY approach that somehow keeps this homage fresh. Rather than taking the archivists approach to retro sounds, Foxygen have such a playful, fun-loving attitude towards both their songwriting and their production choices, they never nod towards the oldies circuit, and France manages to be both sincere and ridiculous in perfect balance. From soul breakdowns to acid-rock freakouts to sweet-voiced love songs, Foxygen have managed to both liberally quote from and reinvent one of the more thoroughly explored time periods in rock & roll, and by the end of this great record you almost believe that they may in fact me the 21st century ambassadors of love and magic -- or at least a really fun band. [JM]


	$13.99 CD $19.99 LPx2 $9.99 MP3		TORO Y MOI Anything in Return (Carpark) "So Many Details" "Studies" When Toro Y Moi last left us with the Freaking Out EP, Chaz Bundick was steering away from the chillwave missives that first put him on the music radar back in 2010. Coming off his second full-length, 2011's Underneath the Pine, in which Bundick eschewed the gooey reverb wash of Causers of This and transformed his one-man bedroom project into a grooving, proper-band affair with a shared love of disco and motorik space-age funk (e.g. Stereolab), this EP was even more of an unexpected page turn. Very much a solitary studio endeavor again, here Bundick took his Toro Y Moi guise into full-on dancefloor territory, with not-so-subtle nods to clubby Reagan-era synth-pop, freestyle, and R&B radio jams filtered through swooshing phase-shifts and polished, sparkling production. Though only five-songs long, including a cover of Cherrelle and Alexander O'Neal's 1985 hit "Saturday Love," one got the impression that the mini-album was a preview of what was to come, and Freaking Out just so happened to be Toro Y Moi's most exciting and fully realized outing yet. Sure enough, Anything in Return isn't another reinvention but rather a natural progression from where that too-short EP left us, with Bundick continuing to refine both his pop chops and his production skills -- in fact, this is about as far from bedroom-recorded sounding as you can get. From the '90s-inspired house-pop of tracks like "Harm in Change" (complete with black-key piano-chord accents and diva samples), "Say That" (with even more chopped-up diva samples) and the chilled shuffle of "Rose Quartz," to the heady, break-driven psych-soul of "Studies" or the slow-jam yearn of "Cola," the album reveals itself to be Toro Y Moi's most nuanced work to date. Though first and foremost centered on song-craft, there's still no shortage of Bundick's sonic signatures, with plenty of hip-hop rhythms, shimmering synths and electric Rhodes, and of course his bittersweet breathy melodies that channel both Pharrell and Sam Prekop in equal measure. There are more than a few numbers here that will sound great in a club, but Anything in Return is an album best listened to from start to finish with headphones on, eyes closed, and mind cleared for Bundick to take you places with his meticulously layered arrangements, swirling multi-colored production and laidback croon -- funky AND visceral, it all makes for a grower in the best possible way. [GH]


	$13.99 CD $18.99 LPx2 $9.99 MP3		NOSAJ THING Home (Innovative Leisure) "Eclipse/Blue" "Snap" Los Angeles-based producer Jason Chung made quite a splash with his 2009 debut as Nosaj Thing; Drift, released on the small Alpha Pup label, was a refreshing take on the post-Dilla beat aesthetic, adding melodic and glitchy electronics to the mix, like a hip-hop take on Boards of Canada. Since then Chung has been championed by critics as well as his peers, finding himself in the good company of some of the freshest producers in the California scene -- names like FlyLo, Daedelus, and Teebs. For his long-awaited follow-up, Home, Chung has stepped further afield into an arena that hosts the likes of Four Tet, Dntel, and Aphex Twin, where pastoral, crystalline, and skittery electronics percolate and float along with each meticulously sculpted sound -- clean, clear, and emotive sounds that never feel cluttered or random. Across the album, Chung effectively and maturely moves from beats to beat-less soundscapes, with the nice addition of two vocal tracks; Kazu Makino from Blonde Redhead adds a feminine beauty to lead single "Eclipse/Blue," while Toro Y Moi brings an almost Thom Yorke-like attitude to the track "Try." Overall, Home feels like a more grounded, slightly more 'pop' variation on Chung's debut, yet this pristine and minimal approach is still top-notch. This is one of the first must-hear electronic albums of 2013, and it comes from a name that has been missed over the last few years. Fans of glitch-hop, the heyday of Morr Music, the Brainfeeder crew, or just warm and inviting electronica, shouldn't hesitate to pick this one up. [DG]


	Marcos Valle $16.99 CD $21.99 LP Garra $16.99 CD $21.99 LP		MARCOS VALLE Marcos Valle (Light in the Attic) "Dez Leis" "Os Grilos" MARCOS VALLE Garra (Light in the Attic) "Garra" "Vinte E Seis Anos De Vida Normal " This wonderful 1970 LP was Marcos Valle's seventh release and was a transitional one for him. He had returned to Brazil from the US several years before, and was developing a new approach to songwriting and recording; here Valle recruited the hot new psych-rock band Som Imaginário to back him up, while also availing himself of the in-house orchestra that EMI-Odeon Records had at their studio in those days. As a result, the album ping-pongs between a funky-psych-rock element and the sort of lush orchestration reminiscent of '40s Hollywood. The latter, intriguingly, is what caught Kanye West's ear and led him to sample "Ele e Ela" for Jay-Z's "Thank You." This Light in the Attic reissue is everything the album has always deserved, with copious liner notes contextualizing the work, and lyrics transcribed and translated. Need more? "Freio Aerodinâmico" is nothing less than the genesis of Stereolab, "Os Grilos" is a unique rock-fuzz-dub arrangement of one of Valle's best-known songs, and the album-closing nine-minute instrumental "Suite Imaginária" is guaranteed to thrill acolytes of David Axelrod. It's a long-overdue official introduction to the North American market for a highly intriguing, classic LP. The gem of LITA's Marcos Valle reissue series, 1971's Garra is Valle's high-water mark and one of the finest pop albums of the 1960s/early-'70s, especially from a global perspective. It has a glow to it that suggests an auteur who can't put a foot wrong if he tried, and embodies everything great about early-'70s Brazilian pop. Songs like the incredible title track, "Que Bandeira," "Wanda Vidal" and "O Cafona" combine West Coast pop, Italian and French '60s influences, the Beatles (obviously) and the harmonic daring of the bossa nova generation to produce an album that has gathered an obsessive cult following over the years, even leading some to declare it Brazil's answer to Pet Sounds or Histoire De Melody Nelson. It certainly bests the contemporary works of his better-known peers Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil, and while Valle was not a member of the Tropicalia movement, this album actually delivers on the promise of that scene, but in a more straightforward and accessible fashion, with a hummability factor shooting straight through the roof. This is the definitive edition this legendary record deserves, with extensive liner notes detailing the socio-political subtext of many of the songs, and lyrics translated from Portuguese to English for the first time ever -- quite simply an essential purchase. [GC]


	$19.99 LP		VARIOUS ARTISTS The Crying Princess: 78 RPM Records from Burma (Sublime Frequencies) This is a slightly atypical release on Sublime Frequencies in that it presents archival material stretching all the way back to 1909, culled from Robert Mills and Alan Bishop's collections of 78 RPM records from Burma (Myanmar). The transmissions contained here are prismatic, evocative windows into antiquity, with many of the traditional styles represented stretching back to the 16th century, when what is now called Burma was still part of the Thai kingdom of Ayutthaya. As with most comps sourced from 78s, there is a fair amount of sands-of-time entropy at work, giving this LP a crackly, hazy surface that well suits the kind of ancient, royal vibe the music invokes. There is a uniquely captivating alien quality to Burmese musical logic, as melodic lines seem to unspool and crawl in many directions at once at a deliberately gauzy pace, all with a bedrock built on cascading bells, gongs, and the ubiquitous saung, a boat-shaped harp (pictured on the front cover of this set being plucked by a lovely lady). Most of the songs here are folk music based on classical traditions, with the instrumentation based on sidaw ensemble music, with drums, bells, a distinctive clapper, the aforementioned harp, and xylophone. On the second side of the disc, the later recordings stretching into the '40s and '50s, other western instruments are introduced, including horns, piano and, on the last tracks, an electric guitar. These songs are just jaw-droppingly gorgeous, with a pastoral twang that cuts across international lines, right to the heart of any of the most emotionally affecting folk music. The comp includes a nice insert penned by Robert Mills, and a gorgeous tip-on sleeve, giving it a solid, archival quality befitting the rarity of the sounds within. [SG]


	Ty Segall & Mikal Cronin $13.99 CD $16.99 LP Traditional Fools $13.99 CD $16.99 LP		TY SEGALL & MIKAL CRONIN Reverse Shark Attack (In the Red) "Drop Dead Baby" "Reverse Shark Attack" THE TRADITIONAL FOOLS The Traditional Fools (In the Red) "Davy Crockett" "Please" After his three album releases last year, the prolific Ty Segall is easing into 2013 with an announcement of a new band, Fuzz, and some cool reissues, including this collaborative venture with longtime cohort Mikal Cronin. Reverse Shark Attack is an eight-cut caboodle of explosive psychedelia and hyper garage rock, laced in Ty's signature vocal (dis)harmonies. This record, originally released as a vinyl-only piece in 2009, floats somewhere between his latest poppier full-length, Twins, and the raging Slaughterhouse (which featured Cronin prominently), and it all makes for a set of loud, fast rock'n'roll -- a great mess of overloaded two-minute tracks that are too cool for school. The last couple of cuts might be my favorites though, the penultimate being a cover of early Pink Floyd's "Take Up Thy Stethoscope and Walk," an appropriate choice for the Syd Barrett-influenced duo. The closing title track is a weird and wonderful ten-minute epic voyage, a medley of vibrant Dick Dale surf guitar madness, colliding drums and underwater vocals, with a carefully sewn narrative that slows down and erupts with its own skewed logic. Cover art on this one is superb too, with Segall and Cronin posing on the beach dressed in smart suits and plush shark heads. It just about sums up the record's intention: just a coupla silly kids delivering clever, serious rock'n'roll. Reverse Shark Attack is not afraid to bite your behind and is a great treat for the New Year. Also, make sure to pick up a copy of Segall's other recent reissue from his surf-punk project the Traditional Fools (featuring Ty, Andrew Luttrell and David Fox), which is equally as ace! Originally released in 2008 and then outta print faster than you could say "wipe out," the trio delivers an awesome, snotty, primal set of lo-fi, surf-inspired garage-punk, including covers by Redd Kross and Thee Headcoats. [ACo]


	Pretty $14.99 7"x2 Wicked Lester $14.99 7"x2 Cave Dwellers $14.99 7"x2		PRETTY Moustache in Your Face (The Numero Group) WICKED LESTER You Are Doomed (The Numero Group) CAVE DWELLERS Run Around (The Numero Group) The Numero Group's 700 series kicks off with three ferociously rockin' double seven-inch dispatches from the American Midwest. Hailing from Kansas City, Pretty were more famously known as the Fabulous Four, a local beat combo that ground their way through the K.C. club scene from 1959 to 1976. In 1969, they buried themselves in a hole in a Missouri hillside, known as the Cavern Recording Studio, alongside Electric Prunes drummer Michael "Quint" Weakley. Together, they churned out eight tracks as Pretty -- earthy, grooving hard rock pushed to the hilt with stuttering, psychedelic Wurlitzer work and some supremely heeeeeavy fuzzed-out electric guitar riffs. The title track, "Mustache in Your Face," is the pick of this litter, featuring hilariously incongruous lyrics about "a girl/yeah yeah," "the devil and the monkeys are comin' upstairs," and "what a lie, what a lie/mustache in your face." Don't bother trying to parse out the sentiments, just keep these psychedelic scorchers on rotation; all the b-sides are killers in their own rights. Next up are three outta-their-heads, gloriously trashed Cleveland teenagers who, in 1981, decided that they were going to just outright shoplift the name "Wicked Lester" from a band that had already ditched the moniker in favor of something a little punchier: Kiss. Recorded at the legendary Boddie Studios, the songs remind me of the 1972 LP Have You Reached Yet by the Clap (reissued courtesy of Sing Sing a couple years ago), in terms of fidelity and spirit. I don't know how a band can be both scrappy and in-the-red ballsy at the same time but these three righteous punks achieved just that, with barely disguised riffs "inspired" by Sabbath and Zeppelin; the stealing is forgiven entirely by the heart and snot of teens who devoured Motorhead, MC5, and '60s beat pop in equal measure. Hot shit, and highly recommended for fans of the aforementioned or biker-bar psych-rock like that Stone Coal White LP. The cover of this last one is totally amazing: five Chicago teenagers who look like they raided Raquel Welch's costume trailer. It's not the most subtle touch (cavemen, furry vests, ya dig?) and it seems a little pre-packaged and Monkees-ish in a way. The A-side kind of confirms that, as "You Know Why" comes across like Dino, Desi and Billy sweetening up a Vagrants ballad. It's a pleasurable tune, with lots of burbling horns and keys drowning out the electric guitars, but nowhere near as thrilling as B-side "Run Around." With the precision of the Remains and the hot rod snarl of the Sonics, the Cave Dwellers show their true colors and burst the chains of all that lush orchestration. The second 7" features two ramshackle love songs that take the Stones' "Play with Fire" and "Heart of Stone" as both starting and ending points. All three of these double 7-inch sets are beautifully housed in gatefold sleeves and replete with thoughtful liner notes and grainy, time capsule photographs. I can't recommend these discs more, especially to all who have been digging Numero's Midwest rock odyssey (Titan label, Buttons comps, and Pisces). [MS]


	$15.99 CD $18.99 LP+CD		VARIOUS ARTISTS Pop Ambient 2013 (Kompakt) "Jean Vigo" Triola "Ambianopolis" Wolfgang Voigt Kompakt's newest Pop Ambient installment arrives right in time for the Deep Freeze of 2013, this edition of the much-loved annual series featuring 10 tracks of beguiling, pastoral soundscapes perfect for accompanying these frigid days and nights. The Cologne imprint has always used PA and the more 4/4-friendly editions of their yearly Total comps to showcase both staple names and friends of the label, and this one nicely follows in that tradition. We find regulars like Marsen Jules, Mikkel Metal, Triola (a/k/a Jorg Burger), Jens-Uwe Beyer (a/k/a Popnoname), Wolfgang Voigt, and Leandro Fresco (who hasn't contributed to Pop Ambient in 11 years and returns with not one but two tracks) sitting alongside some newcomers to PA, including Anton Kubikov (better known as SCSI-9) and Kompakt honcho Michael Mayer, who's actually making his series debut. (Here, "Sully," off Mayer's recent Mantasy full-length, is reworked by label founder Wolfgang Voigt, who reshapes the original with the amorphous textures of his Gas project.) Most surprising, however, is the album closer from Terrapin, a new collaboration between Jorg Burger and Matias Aguayo, with the duo offering a faithful cover of the Pink Floyd obscurity "Cirrus Minor," adding a warm bed of effervescent synths which hum beneath a descending guitar passage, bird noises, and Aguayo singing David Gilmour's haunting melody -- a vocal appearance on PA is almost unheard of. One of the most consistent Pop Ambient volumes in recent years, the series indeed remains a relevant source for some of the best new works of the genre, produced by many of electronic music's most creative and enduring talents. [GH]


	$14.99 CD $22.99 LPx2 $9.99 MP3		FALTYDL Hardcourage (Ninja Tune) "Stay I'm Changed" "Karben Dallas" New York-based producer Drew Lustman has made waves both stateside and internationally with two full-lengths on Planet Mu and a handful of EPs and remixes for Rush Hour, Ramp, and Swamp81. Now comes his debut full-length on Ninja Tune and here we find FaltyDL tightening the reins on his brand of IDM meets garage/house, offering an accomplished outing of streamlined, emotion-driven house music. Unlike some of his previous material, Hardcourage shifts the focus from low-end fullness to high-end refinement, and while the tracks shine with a clean production value, the album does lack a bit of that "umph" which could be considered one of his signature motifs. The jagged and abstract elements have been smoothed out as well, and Hardcourage is left with sounds that seem to be pretty familiar fodder for many producers. Things do, however, get more interesting during the second half of the album during cuts like "For Karme" and "Finally Some Shit," where the darker side of FDL's production finally appears. Overall, though, the sound is uptempo, glossy and bright, with treated vocals and some vocal snippets adding a necessary human element to tracks that mostly seem aimed at the cosmopolitan dance floor. [DG]


	$5.99 45 $1.99 MP3		THE MEN Electric b/w Water Babies (Sacred Bones) Preview Songs on Other Music's Download Store" Coming off a pretty awesome year for these punks whose Open Your Heart topped countless best-of 2012 lists (including our own), the Men have since traded city life for the bucolic calm of the Catskills, where they recorded this limited 7" in their new home studio. Okay, on second thought, forget that we said bucolic and calm, it is the Men after all, and these tracks are two killer slabs of raw, garage-punk rock that should help tide you over to their new album, hitting store shelves on March 5.


	$11.99 CD $13.99 LP $9.99 MP3		NIGHTLANDS Oak Island (Secretly Canadian) "So Far So Long" "Nico" Dave Hartley returns with the second album from his Nightlands guise, which builds upon the more ethereal elements of his main band, Americana-Krautrock explorers War on Drugs, creating wonderfully intimate, dreamy, soft-focus pop that owes almost as much to Eno as it does to the chill-pill AM gold of 10CC and Alan Parsons.


	$17.99 CDx2		LAURIE SPIEGEL The Expanding Universe (Unseen Worlds) "Patchwork" "Drums" There is a wonderful disclaimer in the liner notes to this lovely expanded edition of electronic music pioneer Laurie Speigel's 1980 masterpiece, The Expanding Universe. Working from the original master tapes, Spiegel writes, "I have intentionally left in bits of tape hiss, distortion or buzz from a leaking sampling rate oscillator," because she believes that, sometime in the near future, a sonic "touch-up" program will be invented that can thoroughly polish such annoyances out of the music. As a scientist at Bell Laboratories in Berkeley Heights, New Jersey, Spiegel pioneered the application of algorithms and computers in electronic music, and helped create the first affordable, consumer music-making software programs. For her, the technological universe is the same ever-expanding playground that she titled her record after -- there are only improvements to be made. The notes to this set are essential, as they are packed with the technical specs of the equipment at Bell (the phrase most often used to describe the computers of the mid-1970s is "room-sized"), a confrontational interview Spiegel conducted with herself, as well as notes on every piece and the technological obstacles that were hurdled over. Of the music, she writes, "This is not ambient music...this is music for concentrated attention." Spiegel strikes many moods across the nine tracks that make up the original LP -- on "Patchwork," several different synthesizer tones bloom from one another as the song progresses, and I promise that what Spiegel says is true: this record rewards concentrated study. What strikes me is the physicality of the sounds and the way you can hear Spiegel opening and closing gates, adjusting tones. Her compositions are never frantic and the changes are never abrupt; notes and themes glide into existence and glide out. She also strikes gloomy, unpredictable energy into pieces like "Pentachrome," which features impressively out-of-step percussion taps that bounce around the soundscape like the echoes of falling water droplets in a cave. The second disc is filled with songs from the same period, but whose nature is more of a leisurely, beautiful wander through untamed gardens. Every piece on the second disc is essential listening, and I return to "East River Dawn" and both parts of "The Dirge" regularly for their haunted fragility. This is one of the best reissues of the past year, and a must-have for fans of the recent Suzanne Ciani retrospectives, or followers of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop and psychedelic composers like Manuel Gottsching. Highly recommended listening! [MS]


	PHONE ORDERS Phone orders are accepted at (212) 477-8150 (ext. #2, mailorder) Mon-Fri, Noon - 7pm EST EMAIL For general inquiries or other information please email sales@othermusic.com. Do not reply to this message. REMOVE This is an automated list. If you would like to be removed for any reason, please visit: digital.othermusic.com/subscribe.php		THIS WEEK'S CONTRIBUTORS [GC] Greg Caz [ACo] Anastasia Cohen [PG] Pamela Garavano-Coolbaugh [DG] Daniel Givens [SG] Simon Greezly [GH] Gerald Hammill [DH] Duane Harriott [IQ] Mikey IQ Jones [JM] Josh Madell [MS] Michael Stasiak THANKS FOR READING - all of us at Other Music

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