Music

“We do not want to please, we want to question the Knife.” – Olof Dreijer, in the manuscript for the group’s latest album, Shaking The Habitual. From the heavy-handed manuscript and bio written to accompany their first album in seven years to the album’s eye piercing artwork, The Knife pull no punches in making sure the ideology behind Shaking The Habitual is made clear. And while it’s not always executed gracefully, the two Swedish siblings certainly remain a relevant force on this indoctrinating album. What’s most difficult to ignore upon first glance is Shaking the Habitual‘s expansive track listing. Clocking in near 100 minutes, with a 19-minute track positioned squarely at the center, Shaking the Habitual is an album bent [...]

This mixtape is an ode to the tender elegance and unbridled wanderlust of every springtime renewal. It’s our way of saying: goodbye endless winter, hello brand new sunshine.

Leven Signs Hemp Is Here Digitalis (2013 Reissue; 1985) Some records are made before their time. Many things have changed in the 28 years since Hemp Is Here was first released – but even now, with an additional 3 decades of ethnomusicology under our belts, its thrift store Hindustani vibrations still sound freaky. This must’ve been entirely far out when it was first transmitted. You can hear strains of what would become hypnagogic pop, like James Ferraro’s funny globe-trotting uncle returning from Marrakesh with a stack of weird, sun-warped cassette tapes. Perhaps the finally time is right for Digitalis to rescue this one from the dustheap of history. Our Position Vanishes by Leven Signs  

Fat White Family Champagne Holocaust Trashmouth Records My first listen of Fat White Family’s debut, Champagne Holocaust, left me thinking of notorious criminal Charles Manson. No sense emerged from this until my thoughts turned to the stark contrast, chasm even, between the monstrousness of Manson and the majesty of his music: deranged yet lucid, at once pretty yet horrific. A subsequent visit to Fat White Family’s Tumblr page displayed the visage of Manson whose own Family, it turns out, partly inspired this British band’s name. Like Manson’s, their odd charm is seductive, and among the accolades they’ve accrued is The Quietus’ Tomorrow’s Cult Star Today award at BBC 6 Music Blog Awards. Some have attributed this popularity to their live [...]

F.S. BLUMM Food Audio Dregs (2013) After a break of five years, Frank Schültge Blumm, aka F.S. BLUMM, the Bremen-born, Berlin-based composer and musician, has released his first solo album, Food. Out on Audio Dregs, a record label and music collective out of Portland Oregon, this release is by an artist who, we are told, is just warming up and finding his feet again. “Experimental music made by people equally in love with melody and invention, with special attention being paid to music that falls between the genres,” is how Audio Dregs describes its mission. This description is wholly appropriate for this album by Blumm, with its tuneful and thoughtfully constructed compositions executed through the combination of jazz, blues, folk [...]

Cyclopean Cyclopean Mute Records / Spoon Records (2013) Named after an ancient construction style involving stacks of irregularly-shaped rocks, Cyclopean is an instrumental quartet comprised of Burnt Friedman, Jono Podmore, and two founding members of Can, Jaki Liebezeit and Irmin Schmidt. In line with their namesake, Cyclopean piece together disjointed building blocks to form sonic megaliths, as if to stress not just the importance of an impressive final form, but of minute attention to detail as well. Repetition and minimalism go hand-in-hand on Cyclopean; finely-tuned percussive components and well-placed electronic drones, noises, and theremin textures comprise the foundation of the record. Though the EP initially weighs heavy, it grows increasingly airy as it progresses. By its end, it has been [...]

“Women’s imaginary is inexhaustible, like music, painting, writing: their stream of phantasms is incredible.” (sic) – Hélène Cixous

The music video for “Crescent” is a bizarre piece of work, minimal and almost Lynchian in feel, without much going on save for slow movements and small textural or geometric changes. Directed by Nick Criscuolo, it opens with what look like paintings roaring, like unbridled fires, to be followed by the slow morphing between some unusually magnetic characters (a Frankenstein-like mortician and a space cadet?). The entire music video is largely in greyscale, tinged only by carefully-placed red accents — but such a color scheme seems appropriate for the melancholy sense of mystery that ERAAS seem to prefer (they’d rather not speak about their music videos, for example). In the full post, you can view the music video for “Crescent”, [...]

“Pop music shouldn’t always get a bad rap,” says Top Pops!, a recurring selection of pop music highlights across a selection of styles, updated throughout every month to bring you the best of the funk. +++ FULL POST + TOP POPS! COLUMNS + ALL MUSIC COLUMNS   Dutch Uncles – “Bellio” Vocally one part Bear In Heaven and one part Field Music, Dutch Uncles have a lot of fascinating things going on as far as the world of pop music goes. Cascading instrumentation, unforeseen breakdowns, and minimalism in occasionally suitable points make “Bellio” a track that may not be initially mind-blowing, but shifts here and there into a rainbow-clad Battles. Their upcoming record, Out of Touch in the Wild, will [...]

AURAL DEVASTATION is a regular column about heavy music. This month, Circle Takes the Square awaken from an eight-year slumber and Sweden’s gothic masters Ghost return from their spectral hideout, plus tracks from KEN Mode, Kvelertak, and Shai Hulud. +++ FULL POST + AURAL DEVASTATION COLUMNS + ALL MUSIC COLUMNS   Circle Takes the Square – Decompositions Decompositions:Volume Number One by Circle Takes the Square     Eight years ago, the Savannah, Georgia screamo/thrash/post-hardcore outfit Circle Takes the Square dropped As the Roots Undo on this mortal world , andpopulations of head-banging enthusiasts went nuts accordingly. The dual shrieks of vocalists Drew Speziale and Kathy Coppola over guitars centered in thrash and drums focused on grind elements were enough to [...]