Fresh and Onlys Dan Melchior split on Volar Records

Dan Melchior Und Das Menace:
Daylight Robbery
A Delicate Genius Backstage

Fresh & Onlys:
A Taste Of Hunger
Black Coffin

The fresh and onlys have a couple of new singles coming out lately, just in time for the holidays! Like this split with Dan Melchior on the fledgling Volar Records, they still have color and reg vinyl available, but not for long I'm sure.

The Fresh and Onlys have been steadily evolving since their first fuzzy garage-y one. After that solo full length from Tim Cohen, I'm convinced they can and will go anywhere successfully. The foundation of elements are all there, the melodies, lyrically he's great, they play with early rock elements making that unsettling new/old sound. I've heard this before right? Sort of.
The new ones on myspace from their full length are just getting even catchier with sort of that Jeff Novak 60's reinterpretation feel. They actual era never sounded do good trust me...they are what it should have been. Lots of harmonies and jagged cuts, and all with a kind of optimism, keeping it all upbeat. The perfect way to sit down with some coffee and start the day off, I'm telling you.

Dan Melchior I have less experience with, just a couple of random singles after hearing so much about him, I still have no idea what to expect every time I put one on. Then recently he's exploded with a million releases, I can't keep up, and I push him to the back of the line...slow down man! But on a split with the F&O's? Of course I'm in. It ranges from tepid hippy-ish jams to screaming lo-fi distorted guitar solo for 2 minutes...a genre chameleon, all with an english accent. These are a perfect match.

Goner records has it and Academy too.

Blessure Grave triple split 7" on Release the Bats Records

Oh boy, this one is going to make you insane like it did me, Blessure Grave has this split single from Release The Bats, the amazing Swedish label, but as far as I can tell, they are the only ones offering it for presale so far. It's 60 Kr, I can't be bothered to figure out the exchange because I'm sure shipping would be out of control.
I know Revolver/Midheaven, who just updated their site, (wayyyy easier to navigate and find this stuff), doesn't have it listed yet...just the full length from Captured Tracks, which I have to get over to Academy and pick up actually.
There's a lot of comparisons to Joy Division of course, who, if you believe everything you read, have single handedly spawned the last couple years of interesting music. I'm hearing how closely related it could be to Ian Curtis and Closer, but this is an evolved version of that sound, something closer to Bauhaus... that full on beginning darkwave goth era. It's taking a step back to the origins of that sound...I hope those kids I see walking around with Evanescence or Marilyn Manson shirts eventually get a clue and trace it back to hear what's really happening to their beloved genre.
How can they sound so downright evil with an acoustic guitar is an accomplishment, like on '90 plus days' from a cassette release a little while back. This isn't depressing sad bastard music, I keep getting the feeling Blessure Grave is just metal/doom enough to kick your ass. It's that stark and full of alienation...they have to fight every day for this kind of finely honed darkness. You don't ever wake up in a good mood or watch Southpark...I really imagine that stereotype scene of a house full of death obsessed Rick's from the Young Ones.
The vocals are a little Danzig at times, deep echo's, but the track 'Reduce You to Black Smoke' from their 3 way split on DiTG is a truly great mix of this great synth line, slightly distorted vocals, and pure unsettling melody.

preorder from Release The Bats...BG blogged they are huge fans of the label that has consistently put out stuff they believe in, and were their first choice for this single and their full length, which again is going to cost me to import...they are evil to my wallet and my ears. A double threat.

Blessure Grave now gives us their first release on With previous releases on Night People, Captured Tracks and Holidays, San Diegos BlessureRTB. A limited 7" with 2 exclusive tracks that will not be on the upcoming debut album Judged By 12, Carried By 6 (which will be released early 2010, LP on RTB and CD on Alien 8). A perfect blend of post punk and goth, with influences from Danse Society, Death In June and Killing Joke. Artwork by Shawn Reed. 500 copies made, split release with Nail In The Coffin and Grotesque Modern - Release The Bats

Soft Pack tour single on Kemado Records

Saw this in an email from Insound, The Soft Pack has a new single out from Kemado Records for the start of their UK tour, this one has a Cure cover of 'Grinding Halt' on the A-Side (check it out at Gimmie Tinnitus blog).
The Cure has been coming up on random a lot lately for me, especially the early stuff, 17 seconds, Three Imaginary Boys...and it's aged amazingly well. It really just gets better and better...maybe it's what certain things have come back around to...Blessure Grave, Blank Dogs...that minimal, synth based, clear songwriting. It's not catchy necessarily, but it's just solid, and always just exactly the right amount of depressing. Sure his voice might be a bit much at times, but they are just plain amazing tracks, even a lesser song like this that I can't even place on an album..was it a single?
The Soft Pack are all those things and they take this minimal bassline foundation and Matty adds his signature vocals, which kind of sound really upbeat here...inappropriately enough...the B-Side Buick Skylark' I couldn't find on anything..maybe from their new album? Can't wait to hear that...I have to preorder from Insound and get this bonus single.

I think what it is about The Cure is I can't trust my 16 year old self, he listened to some terrible things, so I usually immediately discount the Cure as from that era of my angsty high school experience. They have been beaten to death in my subconscious and I can't even think of them objectively anymore. Well....I haven't given them a chance.
For instance hearing their cover, I must have never actually heard the lyrics for Grinding Halt, and it goes right along with Hollywood's disaster armageddon obsession lately. 2012, I am legend, The Road.
'No food, no people. Stop short. Everything's coming to a grinding halt. No sound no people, no clocks, no people.'
That reminds me, I hope they do another season of The Colony, I loved that thing on discovery. Apocolyptic LA with a bunch of random people and have them attacked and fight for resources. A little sick maybe, but it wasn't another cheesy reality show.
I'll admit, I guess I think about that idea. How it would work out in Brooklyn.
Yikes.
I'm sure they would find me curled up in a corner with a pile of singles I can't play anymore rocking back and forth.
Ah geez.
Anyway, pick this up before the world ends and there's no more electricity and you can't listen to it.
How's that for incentive?


Insound says:
VINYL FORMAT. Tracks: "Grinding Halt" b|w "Buick Skylark." The Soft Pack (formerly the Muslims) have a full length coming out on Kemado in early 2010, but for now here is a limited edition tour only 7", hand numbered out of 500. The A-Side is a Cure cover!

Times New Viking at Mercury Lounge 11-18-09

Just to wrap things up this week, here is the TNV show at Mercury from a few days ago for your listening perusal.

Here's the link.

Times New Viking / Axemen tour single

Picked this up last night at the TNV show at Mercury Lounge with the Axemen...my friend Pat told me to look out for a tour only single at the merch table, and there it was.
Does a band with the power of Matador behind it have to press a split single, hand color the xerox sleeve and inscribe the inner label for their US tour with the Axemen? HELL NO.
But they did it anyway.
I have to admire this.
Plus they set out to educate an audience to a NZ band that probably deserves more due that I've never come across before, I'm always up for that.

Didn't know anything about the Axemen before they went on other than the brief mentions at Siltblog after their reissue by Tom of a huge part of their back catalog. I stood there watching thinking, 'I'm sure these guys are important' especially to the first few rows. I've been reading about their protest albums/accident (crash) into some government office in NZ, they weren't in it for the money obviously. I can respect anyone touring 20+ years later etc...but it just wasn't my thing. The one time they got me was an insane hardcore blast, but honestly they didn't seem happy about it. Have to dive further into the Siltbreeze catalog.
They cover each other on this thing which I wasn't expecting at all. The Axemen track on the single 'SIcKh & TYRED' is a great interpretation of the track from the TNV Stay Awake EP. I'm into it when they replicate the back and forth Beth Adam vocals. Sounds good. They have to feel pretty cool that these guys covered one of their tracks for this. I honestly had no idea until I played it this morning.
Times New Viking on the other side cover 'Rocks in my Heart' by the Axemen. Which includes the lyric 'Sick and Tired' also I noticed...weird. They make this song fit into their catalog, emphasizing the pop chords and immediacy, all with just a touch their special fuzz. Excellent...can't believe this really. I am honored guys. It's too much.

Here's Jared working on the covers...

Coreyfukinfeldman on Trigger on the Dutendoo Records

Wow, Tim sent me another round of music from Trigger on the Dutendoo Records. He's been pressing personal music projects into singles since 2002!!! What can I say, all my bands never made it past the 'stereo' recording from the boombox in the garage...should they be pressed now? No, never. But Tim had the foresight to start a label! Damn. He's like Mississippi records for his own life. Next thing you know you turn around and there's another piece pressed in vinyl that you kind of forgot about, but when you go back and listen it's pretty amazing. You can't even find the master anymore, it's just that one scratchy record that encapsulates one night of insanity...or two nights in this case.
All the similar projects through history are lost on 4-track cassettes in Salvation Armies, but this one will be that touchstone for the double bass speed metal distorted punk vocals set.
Like any recently discovered artifact, there's a story behind it that sets the scene from Tim's personal mythology. It's all in the liner notes, but briefly, a band was formed one night with one bass amp, and two basses. Tim didn't play drums, so he was on drums. Friends living together in some really clean, beautifully decorated place probably. They record one night with the help of beer. The tape is then lost inadvertently, found a year or so later. It's then played on a karaoke machine and recorded onto another tape with feedback and distortion... lyrics are written... this time with the help of whiskey and the 13 best are pressed into vinyl....it's like a fucking Eno oblique strategy card!
The time and effort that went into this doesn't try to show off though, it's subtle. A lot of low end vibration, frantic thin beats that are almost completely overwhelmed by the rumbling bass in an apt room mic'ed, bleeding through the walls. Lyrically, I wish it was mixed a little more understandably, but let's remember what we're working with here and that it also just might benefit from being mostly buried at times...for your ears sake.
The problem is you'll miss out on the genius of 'Geris in the kitchen on a skateboard singin':

It's the 80's / Let's do a lot of coke / and vote for Ronald Reagan!!!

Jello would be proud. This is another mammoth 13 song EP from the Dutendoo. On 7"'s alone I've heard more songs from this guy than from an entire career of some bands full length recordings. I'm working on getting him on the phone for a podcast interview...that is if he can take a night away from pressing records.

He wrote me something on the back of an old show flyer and I completely agree. 'Records...are an open diary sort of thing, and if they didn't exist then it's all just a story of a drunken memory that's near impossible to explain.' It's like Summersteps records...you don't need anyone, just put it together yourself and I guarantee it's a million times better than me wasting a minute thinking or listening to all the rest of the bullshit out there! Why? Because there's no alterior motives behind it, there's nothing but the desire to make music and unselfishly put it out into the world. That can be the number one criteria for owning a record for me.

I don't, however, take my own advice so no record of my life even exists yet. I need to start pressing records about what I had to eat this morning...but I won't..it's a funny idea, but I'll give up on it by lunch. Tim on the other hand... did it, and I am jealous....he went through with it and it's bad ass.

No myspace / label website...just hit up Tim directly at trigger.on.the.dutendoo (at) gmail to get your hands on all these documents....this guy is like the library of congress.
The library of Tim.

Landing, Vol.7 on Geographic North Records

The latest Geographic North single made it to my mailbox the other day from another band I've never had any experience with: Landing. They are from Middletown, CT, not a place I think I can name another band from actually, and not a place I would imagine these slow, dirgy epic soundscapes that are rattling the speakers to come from.
The North Side 'Into the Hall' has some vocals on top of slow drone electronics, that are going in Eno directions, until a snare march comes in with delayed quiet guitar melody. It's a little Jesu, a little Explosions...and the vocals are barely understandable, they are up close, louder than anything, but almost whispered around the same range as the bass and deep electronics so it bleeds into a single plane of melodic hummmmmm.

I have to say I'm impressed by the sound quality of the single at 33. There are super lows, and layers of subtle distortions, it sounds great on vinyl, this really highlights the range of sound they are dealing with.
The slow tension buildup, sounding kind of classically influenced...it's really reminding me of Locrian or Godspeed you... like on the B-Side with 'Following Daylight'...those slow, shifting layers of sound fading in and out. Just a huge black wall, you can't see the ends or top, it's just closing in.

All of it pressed on snow white vinyl with their trademark minimal geometric sleeve. This single, as well as subscriptions to the whole series, is still available from Geographic North, lots of interesting artists, way off the radar of my usual garage/no-fi/weirdness, and I'm grateful.

Sunset Rubdown picture disc on Aagoo Records

Spencer Krug is a musical genius...like Conner Oberst, he's beyond talented, it's a little off putting actually when I stop to think about it...there's no way to relate sometimes. He can't be a regular guy. He makes fun of himself onstage, it's not an act. But as many people as he's inspired top pick up a guitar, he's made as many walk down to the river and throw it in once and for all.

2 tracks here: "Insane Love Is Awakening" and "Coming To At Dawn" "written and recorded by Spencer in his house." it says...in a true sign of talent, the best work comes god knows when in your own space, working by yourself. Now go throw away the microphones and the old tapes....the pedals, or give them away. Someone else could make way better use of them obviously.

It seems like contradictory sides of Spencer are at work here, the piano, and electric guitar, but they're both performed with the exact same intensity. Coming to at Dawn he uses the easiest way to make the piano emotional...saturate it with an echo. There's nothing like killing a puppy like the big room piano sound. It doesn't matter what you sing...guys/recording companies have known this for years, in making out or selling records...it's a formula. You want to get an emotional response, play a piano in an empty room. It's better than a million wind machines and lightning. Now all that being said, you would think he'd never attempt to go this basic but he does and really earns it. I'll admit it...it makes me sad just hearing it, if I start to pay attention to the lyrics here I'm going to be pushed to the edge...next side already before I turn it up again and slit wrists.

Insane Love Awakening ...it's great to hear he's as adept on electric guitar as he is on piano. It's going to kill you, a lonely reverb twin amp in a room, someone playing pop chords...well 80's blue collar pop, and then his voice comes in with an echo no one else could pull off. He's in love with his voice, and it works. I really had to make sure I've never heard this before, it's pretty familiar lyrically, he's up to his old tricks. He's a short story novelist,..now how can I reconcile all this talent? What deals did he make? I don't try.

"I can only assume the answer was blue / I can only assume the answer is the breaking of an astronautical truce"

Still available from Aagoo Records...maybe because it's $10? But it's a piece of work, great picture disc, two amazing unreleased tracks...I subscribed to this 6 disc series maybe a year, more than a year ago? Come on guys finish this up!

Thanks to BleepBloing for the videos of both sides...hallelujah!

John Barrett and The Bass Drum of Death Interview

Episode 65 - download the MP3 here, or listen on the streaming embedded player lower right.

Talked to John from Bass Drum of Death this week about his single on Fat Possum, the tour he's currently on and a new single on Baby Don't Records sometime in January. Stick around at the end for the track 'Sucker Free' which is bad ass hyper fuzz garage blues. Nice.

John and The Bass Drum of Death are hitting the west coast the next few weeks, if you get a chance check them out live:

Nov 14 2009 8:00P	five stars bar (w/ lover!)	Los Angeles, California
Nov 15 2009 8:00P	bar pink (w/ lover!)	San Diego, California
Nov 16 2009 8:00P	yucca tap room (w/ lover!)	Phoenix, Arizona
Nov 17 2009 8:00P	burt’s (w/ lover!)	Albuquerque, New Mexico
Nov 18 2009 8:00P	three kings (w/ lover!)	Denver, Colorado
Nov 19 2009 8:00P	replay lounge (w/ lover!)	Lawrence, Kansas
Nov 20 2009 8:00P	o’leavers (w/ lover!)	Omaha, Nebraska
Nov 21 2009 8:00P	the bloodline (w/ lover!)	Chicago, Illinois
Nov 28 2009 8:00P	529 (w/ gg king, barreracudas)	Atlanta, Georgia

Dylan Ettinger and the Heat on Not Not Fun

Just got an email from NNF about this Dylan Ettinger single. I'm always impressed with NNF's site, the volume of releases they continue to put out and the amazing bands they consistently are exposing me to.
Dylan has his own cassette label El Tule and has been busy putting out a bunch of his work out on his own, but I think this is his first release on vinyl.
Based on his myspace, he's working in a sort of dense abstract experimentalism. Heavy on effects and making all kinds of weird sounds vocally, or maybe with samples, it's reminiscent of Ducktails live show, with less emphasis on the cool Caribbean vibe and more towards the ominous, (although those things peek in, kettle drum, windchimes). Like 'Pushin', I can hear the attraction to the harder to place sounds, creating this overall scary funhouse...you're lost, messed up on something and not coming down anytime soon...and that's the scariest, to lose control like that...it's only when you give in and just let it wash in, who knows when it's going to end. Just go with it that you relax and appreciate.
I love this detailed complexity of sound. It essentially seems easy to put this together and just let the sound happen, as if you could set up the paint and watch the painting come together. This has insane potential live to be a new experience every time, and that's where this way of working really shines. The recordings are templates for an experience...the photo sadly captures a sliver of the scene.

From the great NNF, who also repressed the Vibes single, which I still have to get a copy of.

Best Coast on Group Tightener / Art Fag Records

Pocahaunted has split (?, I'm pretty sure) and Bethany has moved on to her Best Coast project with Bob Bruno of Goliath Bird Eater...they have a drummer too, but played recent NYC shows with some recorded rhythm accompanyment. Monster Island, The Cake Shop...I missed them all...what a jerk.
Based on the myspace tracks, (still haven't picked any of these up yet, and that's gong to change) it's distorted vocal heavy and melodic. Slow droning guitar, great....well pop songs really...I'm a little surprised. I'm not hearing much of Pocahaunted here...I would never think it's related. Every track seems to be about literal relationships, 'When I'm with you, 'Wish he was you.'. 'ooooooo, baby.' It's that Shangri-La's full harmony and hand claps filter on an old mono speaker that can't handle the new sound. That's going around a lot. The ooooooo's are sung through bad mic's with the old MXR distortion...it's not even a voice anymore. That's a great sound, the blurring of the source into something else. It's right alongside Vivian Girls, Dum Dum Girls, Christmas Island, Wavves...you're going to get into this.

This Group Tightener single is really a mini-EP with four tracks, one of them a cover of the Beach Boys 'In My Room', which I have to hear. They are such an influence on everything lately, I guess always...so I'm forced to listen to Pet Sounds again and try to get it this time....or just stick with the Best Coast and all the ways it's reinterpreted. It's better.
No, I have to appreciate what came before all this, it just feels like work...and Brian Wilsons autobiography was terrible.
Did you record music? Oh I forgot because ALL I READ ABOUT WAS YOUR STUPID PATHETIC DRUG HABITS AND DOUCHEBAG THERAPIST!

Artist: BEST COAST
Title: Make You Mine
Format: 7"
Label: Group Tightener
Country: USA
Price: $6.50
"Former POCAHAUNTED member BETHANY COSENTINO (aka BEST COAST) embodies California. Her songs are effortlessly ramshackle, layers of fuzzed guitar and a voice with enough heft and soul that it brings to mind 1950s girl soul groups or even a female-centric Beach Boys. Theres also a sense of permanent longing, an inescapable melancholy that can only come from living near the beach, perpetually sunny but a little sad too. Her four-song Make you Mine 7-inch was recorded with longtime friend BOBB BRUNO, and is packed with enough hooks and gorgeous melodies to fill an entire album. It is Group Tighteners first release." - GroupTightener - fusetron



Artist: BEST COAST
Title: Sun Was High (So Was I)
Format: 7"
Label: Art Fag
Country: USA
Price: $6.50 - fusetron

Fusetron has got the Art Fag single still...

The Super Vacations 'Henry' on Shdwply Records

Been checking out The Super Vacations this morning, they have a single on Shdwply Records that isn't released yet exactly...the preorder red vinyl was (damn) but now it's just the regular old copy, which hasn't actually gone up yet, but should be any day now. Was really into the Florida single they just put out and then all of a sudden there's 10 more records from this label...just saw that the SV's self titled was Shdwply's first release...I swear I need a research intern.

So the Super Vacations are fuzzy garage with 90's indie rock influences. But every time I look at how I've just described them, the next track starts and it's completely different.
They use really nice high vocal harmonies against the distortion, the haze of an old tape machine, singing in a giant warehouse...the weirdo melodies...that's the thing that has to come naturally and can make or break this style. You have to be able to instinctively know where the melody is going...like Gary War, Ariel Pink...it's an internal melody that has to exist the way you're singing it, but it has no reference to what the guitar...what everything else is playing. That's what I want to hear.

'Henry' has this scary pop melody, like a demented old sitcom is up next...this is the theme song. But it was added 10 years after they shot it...it's hastily written, but would be better than any composed average mess. I think this is the A-Side track. It's interesting to have these psyche feeling trippy dreams clock in at under 2 minutes. They could really put out a mini EP on the 45. Before you know it that drugged out trip is over. Like smoking salvia.

According to Myspc the Void looks like it's the B-Side, this one is really going dark,depressing bassline, faraway guitar echo tone, and harmonized distorted vocals are reminding me of (I'm lazy) Joy Division, it's slow, taking it's time to build this rhythm like an old goth demo tape.

Found it for (pre) sale? on Midheaven distro...could be the red vinyl copies? Might not be. They have a new site, which is a huge upgrade from the black and white text thingy they had for the past 20 years...it worked, but searching was impossible...now it's good.

SUPER VACATIONS - Henry - Shdwply - SHDWPLY 012 - 7" - $ 5.25
***"Definitely one of the more ambitious and mysterioso bands of this run-down, SUPER VACATIONS provide a perfect example of a group turning the limitations of home-recording to their advantage, assembling a beguiling psych rock sound from the palette of slightly warped rock n' pop elements at their disposal. Their debut album burns through sixteen songs in about twenty-five minutes, each of them a swirling wonder of crisply recorded hi-hat n' snare grooves, twangin', FX heavy surf guitar, hazy layers of psychedelic jangle, occasional bursts of chaotic space-fuzz washout and ultra-compressed vocal tracks that range from pristine, chanted harmonies to distorted answering machine skree. Recalling the spirit of classic-era Guided By Voices records, these one-to-two minutes cuts are veritable bonsai trees of weird beauty that make their point and then disappear into the void, providing tantalizing glimpses into what we assume to be a whole universe of unguessed at four-track wonderment. Inevitably, Super Vacations' songwriting is sketchy and indistinct in comparison to the heights scaled on a daily basis by Ohio's finest in the mid-'90s, but nonetheless, they've got a good handle on the kind of sound they're going for, and the material at hand is up to the task, allowing them to stand proud alongside the very best of the '90s neo-psych-pop mob (Lilies, The Swirlies, pre-ego meltdown Brain Jonestown Massacre etc.) without ever having to venture beyond their basement. (I'd like to think this band's stuff was recorded in a basement. It... has that kinda feel to it. I'd be disillusioned to discover actual sunlight was involved at any stage.)"--Shdwply - midheaven