Thursday, February 08, 2007
psychform records
wm (from enterruption) recently sent me this package with a couple of releases from stan reed's edmonds, wa-based psychform label. stan's in blue sabbath black cheer alongside wm, he's also broken penis orchestra (as dick flick) [pictured below], broken human machine and he's in plethora. oustide of being a vehicle for stan's personal releases, he's put out albums by the new blockaders & the haters, crank sturgeon, fe-mail, moe! staiano, irr. app. (ext.), and others (i can't seem to find a complete discography and the label's website is on myspace, which i'm having issues connecting to).
broken penis orchestra & at jennie richie
the broken penis orchestra meets at jennie richie 2 x c01
[2006, psychform]
alright, i'm not sure, but i believe that this was originally slated to come out on jeff siwanowicz's stentorian tapes label, which is, heartbreakingly, now defunct. i'm assuming that because of stentorian closing up shop, stan decided to put it out on psychform. again, this is all
assumption. damn, i'm still sad about stentorian not existing anymore. awesome stuff and it was super cheap too. curses.
seeing "c01" immediately makes me think of portland's self released records' waste of plastic series, and how incredibly appropriate that name is. truly, how worth it can a one minute cassette be? or in this case, two one minute cassettes. in srr's defense, shorter tapes are great for noise releases, but one minute long? that's fine for downloading, but why would anyone shell out two bucks for one when you could pay three more and get a twenty or thirty minute tape by the same artists. because you can! that's why.
psychform, perhaps ever aware of the whole "why?" quandry, has put together a nice little package for these cassettes, making the idea of a purchase here less of a question mark. the bpo meets ajr comes in a nice vinyl case, same as impregnable's cherish, and features great (and mildly disturbing) artwork by andy ortmann (panicsville, nihilist records). when you combine that with the fact that it's limited to a mere 50 copies, buying this stops being about "why should i?" and turns into "where can i?" now that is a good question...
lastly, onto the music. if you're familiar with the bpo's aural collage styling, you're not going to be disappointed by anything other than the running time. while short, they are not without their memorable qualities. for anyone outside of the loop, broken penis orchestra exemplifies the experimental in experimental music. using a myriad of sound clips, musical samples (from all kinds of genres) and injecting to that some of his own music, it has a very playful feel to it. it's not jokey music, but it can have a light hearted feel to it. that's definitely the case with these two pieces of music. short and fun. as for some of bpo's other works, i'd highly recommend plays with itself. for me, it's the bpo album that has the most replayability. it's a bit less frantic than other albums, which've tended to focus more on the mashing up of different clips and samples. that's good too, though. the bottom line is that you really can't lose with this project.
at jennie richie's pieces show us how thirty second long tracks don't always work as they come off as being severely fragmented. streetsweeper phone, with it's affected vocal samples and dank musical accompaniment, simply runs out of time before it can really evolve into anything. the best part of ajr's second track, big black american homosexual, is the last half which is just a nice sample of some latin music. kudos for the sampling choice, but after hearing both of these tracks, i don't have a firm grasp for johnny mumbles and happiness + forever's music, yet, i'm still curious. that's a good thing.
wyrm
gnothi seauton c20
[2006, psychform]
wyrm is waynesville, north carolina's allan zane, primarily. the line-up does tend to shift, for this cassette allan's joined by bruce la fountain. wyrm's current line-up; however, is listed as allan zane and john murphy (formerly of spk).
side a's i believe what you said (minimalist miss) is an excursion in ambiance, and a fine one at that. there's some ambient music in the background and that's added by a mixture of field recordings and some light electronics. atmospherically, it makes me feel like i'm in a secluded swamp in the middle of nowhere, in complete darkness. a bit spooky, in feel, the presence of the minimal background music serves this track well.
the b side's desultory subterfuge cipher is an odd, and minimal, piece of music. it centers around allan's highly affected vocals, sounding more like ghostly warbling than anything human, and that's paired with a loop of minimal music.
all in all, this was a nice cassette. a bit on the darker side of the ambient world, but an enjoyable release that will no doubt have me keeping a look out for their future releases.
(i'll try and get some sound clips posted for these two albums in the next few days, bear with me and my crappy internet until i can get it switched over.)
broken penis orchestra & at jennie richie
the broken penis orchestra meets at jennie richie 2 x c01
[2006, psychform]
alright, i'm not sure, but i believe that this was originally slated to come out on jeff siwanowicz's stentorian tapes label, which is, heartbreakingly, now defunct. i'm assuming that because of stentorian closing up shop, stan decided to put it out on psychform. again, this is all
assumption. damn, i'm still sad about stentorian not existing anymore. awesome stuff and it was super cheap too. curses.seeing "c01" immediately makes me think of portland's self released records' waste of plastic series, and how incredibly appropriate that name is. truly, how worth it can a one minute cassette be? or in this case, two one minute cassettes. in srr's defense, shorter tapes are great for noise releases, but one minute long? that's fine for downloading, but why would anyone shell out two bucks for one when you could pay three more and get a twenty or thirty minute tape by the same artists. because you can! that's why.
psychform, perhaps ever aware of the whole "why?" quandry, has put together a nice little package for these cassettes, making the idea of a purchase here less of a question mark. the bpo meets ajr comes in a nice vinyl case, same as impregnable's cherish, and features great (and mildly disturbing) artwork by andy ortmann (panicsville, nihilist records). when you combine that with the fact that it's limited to a mere 50 copies, buying this stops being about "why should i?" and turns into "where can i?" now that is a good question...
lastly, onto the music. if you're familiar with the bpo's aural collage styling, you're not going to be disappointed by anything other than the running time. while short, they are not without their memorable qualities. for anyone outside of the loop, broken penis orchestra exemplifies the experimental in experimental music. using a myriad of sound clips, musical samples (from all kinds of genres) and injecting to that some of his own music, it has a very playful feel to it. it's not jokey music, but it can have a light hearted feel to it. that's definitely the case with these two pieces of music. short and fun. as for some of bpo's other works, i'd highly recommend plays with itself. for me, it's the bpo album that has the most replayability. it's a bit less frantic than other albums, which've tended to focus more on the mashing up of different clips and samples. that's good too, though. the bottom line is that you really can't lose with this project.at jennie richie's pieces show us how thirty second long tracks don't always work as they come off as being severely fragmented. streetsweeper phone, with it's affected vocal samples and dank musical accompaniment, simply runs out of time before it can really evolve into anything. the best part of ajr's second track, big black american homosexual, is the last half which is just a nice sample of some latin music. kudos for the sampling choice, but after hearing both of these tracks, i don't have a firm grasp for johnny mumbles and happiness + forever's music, yet, i'm still curious. that's a good thing.
wyrm
gnothi seauton c20
[2006, psychform]
wyrm is waynesville, north carolina's allan zane, primarily. the line-up does tend to shift, for this cassette allan's joined by bruce la fountain. wyrm's current line-up; however, is listed as allan zane and john murphy (formerly of spk).
side a's i believe what you said (minimalist miss) is an excursion in ambiance, and a fine one at that. there's some ambient music in the background and that's added by a mixture of field recordings and some light electronics. atmospherically, it makes me feel like i'm in a secluded swamp in the middle of nowhere, in complete darkness. a bit spooky, in feel, the presence of the minimal background music serves this track well.
the b side's desultory subterfuge cipher is an odd, and minimal, piece of music. it centers around allan's highly affected vocals, sounding more like ghostly warbling than anything human, and that's paired with a loop of minimal music.
all in all, this was a nice cassette. a bit on the darker side of the ambient world, but an enjoyable release that will no doubt have me keeping a look out for their future releases.
(i'll try and get some sound clips posted for these two albums in the next few days, bear with me and my crappy internet until i can get it switched over.)
jean-luc guionnet, emmanuel petit,
david chiesa & éric la casa
belvédère dans l'étendue
[2005, creative sources]
a nice shift of gears from your usual fiercely insular improvised release, belvédère sees the french quartet expand proceedings beyond the point where they really operate as a quartet at all. recorded live in and around a home in the french countryside, guionnet, petit and chiesa (a line up of alto sax, guitar and double bass) literally get up and wander the grounds individually, exploring the acoustic space, leaving la casa with the task of weaving the three disparate threads being fed back to him into a single piece (not to mention the piped-in birdsong and infrequent mechanical incursions fed in from the surrounds of the house). the end result could be a shambles but whether its the restrained nature of the music, or
the experience the quartet has in fooling with their environment (see: sion on w.m.o/r, or the chloe label's metro pre saint gervais release), the sound'll occasionally stall but never become unglued.
for the most part, contributions are kept (or trimmed) to fairly minimal stretches of sax moans/tones and feedback with the occasional recognisable run up and down on chiesa's bass. shunning tight interplay, the musicians individually and independently piece together an oddly inviting panorama; digested over time the piece gives more of an impression of taking in a forest view (complete with guionnet's squawking calls as he wanders to the edge of hearing and back) than any strictly musical equivalent. purists will probably bemoan the lack of obsessive sound generation and the cardinal sin of distinguishable instruments in the mix, but you'll probably find that those same purists are pretty much 90% jerks.
so not so much the piece to bank on if you're the twitchy type, but let it run without an expectation of instant gratification and the quartet's patient, detached chorus works brilliantly. those who need things to shift up a notch can always look for the pathologically aloof guionnet and chiesa (i wondered if guionnet'd picked up that particular trait from former teacher iannis xenakis; google returns 1500 results for "xenakis aloof", and far be it from me to suggest the internet'd ever steer you wrong)... [the dynamic duo] on the similarly impressive church-based sounds of sion, where they once again refuse to cuddle up to then-collaborators marchetti and noetinger, perched in different levels of the structure. there's some great organ noodling on that one, actually, but that's, as they say, a whole other story.
no extract this time, sorry. just doesn't wash with this release; an abritrary three minutes of silence, birdcalls and the odd sustained tone? just get the whole slab.
[2005, creative sources]
a nice shift of gears from your usual fiercely insular improvised release, belvédère sees the french quartet expand proceedings beyond the point where they really operate as a quartet at all. recorded live in and around a home in the french countryside, guionnet, petit and chiesa (a line up of alto sax, guitar and double bass) literally get up and wander the grounds individually, exploring the acoustic space, leaving la casa with the task of weaving the three disparate threads being fed back to him into a single piece (not to mention the piped-in birdsong and infrequent mechanical incursions fed in from the surrounds of the house). the end result could be a shambles but whether its the restrained nature of the music, or
the experience the quartet has in fooling with their environment (see: sion on w.m.o/r, or the chloe label's metro pre saint gervais release), the sound'll occasionally stall but never become unglued.for the most part, contributions are kept (or trimmed) to fairly minimal stretches of sax moans/tones and feedback with the occasional recognisable run up and down on chiesa's bass. shunning tight interplay, the musicians individually and independently piece together an oddly inviting panorama; digested over time the piece gives more of an impression of taking in a forest view (complete with guionnet's squawking calls as he wanders to the edge of hearing and back) than any strictly musical equivalent. purists will probably bemoan the lack of obsessive sound generation and the cardinal sin of distinguishable instruments in the mix, but you'll probably find that those same purists are pretty much 90% jerks.
so not so much the piece to bank on if you're the twitchy type, but let it run without an expectation of instant gratification and the quartet's patient, detached chorus works brilliantly. those who need things to shift up a notch can always look for the pathologically aloof guionnet and chiesa (i wondered if guionnet'd picked up that particular trait from former teacher iannis xenakis; google returns 1500 results for "xenakis aloof", and far be it from me to suggest the internet'd ever steer you wrong)... [the dynamic duo] on the similarly impressive church-based sounds of sion, where they once again refuse to cuddle up to then-collaborators marchetti and noetinger, perched in different levels of the structure. there's some great organ noodling on that one, actually, but that's, as they say, a whole other story.
no extract this time, sorry. just doesn't wash with this release; an abritrary three minutes of silence, birdcalls and the odd sustained tone? just get the whole slab.
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
lambsbread
king of the crop 7"
[2006, skulltones]
there’s something so undeniably fun about listening to someone else’s jams. not only do you not know where the song is going, but the knowledge that those actually on the recording had no idea either makes it all the more exciting. building your entire discography around this, however, can be challenging. thank the gods of ganja that midwest über-proliferates lambsbread can handle the challenge like no other.
lambsbread call ohio home where they somehow manage to balance smoking weed by the pound and releasing a slew of tapes and cd-rs. information on them is scarce except that they run the mostly tape label maim & disfigure which provides an outlet for a majority of their releases.
“king of the crop” is lambsbread’s first foray into the world of the seven inch, a format that doesn’t quite lend itself to the concept of “free rock” or a “jam band”. most jams would just be getting started in the time that one side of a seven inch (a 45 no less!) allots. lesser bands would falter, even fail miserably, but not lambsbread. they’ve taken everything we have come to love about their extended compositions and condensed them into three brief, (dare i say?) “punk rock” blasts. these three unnamed tracks are heavy on blown-out percussion and faux-noodley guitar work without straying too far into “free rock” territory. it’s party music for dirty acid-heads. nothing but pure heaviness. one flaw becomes apparent at the end of it all, though. while brevity was necessary for the format, it seems that lambsbread could have given us a little more in terms of length: the record clocks in at less than five minutes.
skulltones pressed 300 copies of this slab, but they’ve all been swiped. so keep your fingers crossed for another pressing, maybe with a few additional outtakes from the bong-session that spawned these tracks.
King Of The Crop A2
reviewed by bortron
[2006, skulltones]
there’s something so undeniably fun about listening to someone else’s jams. not only do you not know where the song is going, but the knowledge that those actually on the recording had no idea either makes it all the more exciting. building your entire discography around this, however, can be challenging. thank the gods of ganja that midwest über-proliferates lambsbread can handle the challenge like no other.
lambsbread call ohio home where they somehow manage to balance smoking weed by the pound and releasing a slew of tapes and cd-rs. information on them is scarce except that they run the mostly tape label maim & disfigure which provides an outlet for a majority of their releases.“king of the crop” is lambsbread’s first foray into the world of the seven inch, a format that doesn’t quite lend itself to the concept of “free rock” or a “jam band”. most jams would just be getting started in the time that one side of a seven inch (a 45 no less!) allots. lesser bands would falter, even fail miserably, but not lambsbread. they’ve taken everything we have come to love about their extended compositions and condensed them into three brief, (dare i say?) “punk rock” blasts. these three unnamed tracks are heavy on blown-out percussion and faux-noodley guitar work without straying too far into “free rock” territory. it’s party music for dirty acid-heads. nothing but pure heaviness. one flaw becomes apparent at the end of it all, though. while brevity was necessary for the format, it seems that lambsbread could have given us a little more in terms of length: the record clocks in at less than five minutes.
skulltones pressed 300 copies of this slab, but they’ve all been swiped. so keep your fingers crossed for another pressing, maybe with a few additional outtakes from the bong-session that spawned these tracks.
King Of The Crop A2
reviewed by bortron