*Vinyl Update for December '11

1. Sixx - Sister Devil
 - listen -
so the other night, a friend and i decided to go to the Reckless shop on Broadway, as neither of us had been to that particular location in a hot minute. dodging in from the cold rain, i immediately began scanning the Goth/Industrial section (duh) and came up with zilch. after flipping through half of the punk LPs and mostly finding re-issues of generic records, i became discouraged and convinced that i'd be walking out empty-handed. my friend, however, had snagged a copy of THOU's new 12" EP Baton Rouge, You Have Much to Answer For. i did spot a limited copy of The Cure's Pornography, but it was not all that well packaged (and $30).

 needless to say, i was feeling rather salty. that is, until i flipped through a random spot in the metal section. i saw this image of a red-eyed nun with a pentagram carved into her palm and thought, "okay, okay...". then i read the description: "2009 release of the obscure 1991 'Sister Devil' demo from SIXX (comprised of the same people responsible for the legendary VON). Originally released on cassette, in an edition of 100 copies, 'Sister Devil' shows a different, yet sinister, side of VON. SIXX has elements of VON (a dark aura & obsessive, chanting lyrics), yet musically this has more in common with SISTERS OF MERCY, CHRISTIAN DEATH, SAMHAIN, FOR AGAINST, early CURE, etc. Satanic deathrock. On NUCLEAR WAR NOW! Productions" and my jaw hit the fucking floor.

while i knew NWN! had been dropping gems like DRAGGED INTO SUNLIGHT and the aforementioned THOU release, i certainly did not anticipate them taking interest in a side-project of this caliber. how wrong i was. my copy is black vinyl w/ a fold-out poster of the cover art (which, as you can see, is wicked), but NWN! even has a 2xLP on clear red w/ poster, sticker, patch, and supplemental zine...for $15. wtf. want.

the record moves exactly as one would expect the tape too, with that yummy, ever-present hissing and extremely tinny cymbal pings. the guitar tone is well suited for this style of release as well, as it is a twangy clean channel with most of the notes being tediously picked out and plucked harshly. mostly mid-tempo, dreary, dancey, dissonant (some songs more than others), and with a ritualistic chant introducing each track - i think it's safe to say that my $10 was well fucking spent. incidentally, this is the first record i listened to in the company of my new dog, Zero. so, you know, things were kind of perfect for about half an hour.

2. Oak - II
- listen -
beautifully simple gatefold layout on this 2-track monster-of-an-album. even more props to the folks at a389 for fucking killing it right now. best label in heavy underground, imo. limited to 666 copies on dense as fuck 210g vinyl, OAK plays a satanic, doom-laden drone metal. i readily compared their feel and aesthetic to COUGH, but without wailing/note-bending vocals and psychedelic riffs. way more brooding and, well, metal sounding than that. early 90's death-metal styled "oar"s and "raaah"s. abysmal. also, came with a download code and shiny silver-on-black sticker. neat.

3. Wolf Eyes - River Slaughter
- listen -
to use one of those annoying descriptions about where the "music 'takes you'", not unlike the entirety of my last post, River Slaughter is kind of like watching the opening scene in Jaws. there's an eerily calm body of water under a black sky, and it hums and it moves and you feel at peace with it. sooo, you cast off your attire in a carefree fashion and become one with the scenery. your boyfriend's busy eating sand or something, anyway. so you're just kind of floating there, but then the tone turns ominous and you can't help but shake the feeling that something's not right. then a fucking SHARK GRABS YOUR LEG AND TOSSES YOU ABOUT LIKE THE WORTHLESS MORSEL YOU ARE AND SHREDS YOU APART IN A MATTER OF SECONDS. then your boyfriend is like "huh?" and the shark peaces out and if someone else were to have arrived minutes later they wouldn't have known the difference. did i mention it's an OOP diy gatefold? oh. well, it is. gnar-ly.

4. Young and In the Way - V. Eternal Depression
- listen -
mentioned these guys a while ago. they released this all sneaky-like and with very limited copies. pressing info here courtesy of Antithetic Records. a little more blackened style this time around, but a similar set-up to Amen where the b-side is just one long, epic track. totally atmospheric and beautifully minimal in design. kvlt, u no.

LOOKIT!

Guilty Connector - Beats, Noise, and Life.

imagine you come to find yourself dazed, in the middle of what appears to be an ever-expanding field of corn. you're lying on your back and with each subtle movement, the sun flickers directly into your eyes. you spot a black bird, and then another, and another, and another, until the sky slowly (yet frantically) becomes a sea. their wings wave to the beat of an alarm that sounds violently inside your stomach, but to your ears is faint and possibly delusional. a thought; the birds are either pulling a capsule over your perceived world behind them, or your body is not registering its own decision to stand.

the stalks that surround you begin to rust, and a piercing sound rings incessantly. just then, what you can only imagine to be a railroad spike is driven straight through the center of your skull. almost immediately after the shattering impact, you experience a euphoric moment of serenity as it seems the same black sea that covered the sky begins to run like tar over your brain. the clarity isn't fleeting, but is still complicated by the painful sound of ill-fitting gears struggling to rotate.

is industry coming or going? what part do i now play in this event? can i move (with intention)? do i care to change a thing? the sea is everywhere, and you are no longer able to discern whether you are the lonesome vessel or the rapidly flowing force sent to swallow it whole. you come to realize that your/the world's cyclical gestures and any semblance of pattern has been broken, and everything - including your own sense of self - is ripped to shreds and dispersed in every imaginable direction. you explode, but only to find your (true) self set in permanent motion and everything is experienced in singular moments. whether or not they are remembered is theoretically questionable, but you don't think to wonder. you're moving.

...that's what the opening track, "New York Shibaki Terror Conversation" is like. have fun with the other thirty minutes.

last.fm, Planet Mu Records, myspace in the title.

MOTIONLESS.

Gasp - Drome Triler of Puzzle Zoo People

to the handful of you who actually maintain interest in this blog: i do apologize for the wait and commend you for your patience. hopefully i'll be back to doing this on  the regular now that my life is (a little) less crazy. onto the monotonous ramblings!

gasp (pretty sure they preferred lowercase spelling, as i do, but sometimes it's capitalized for the sake of consistency and organizing...) was a noisy, atmospheric project which, without being formulaic, played spazzy powerviolence and/or heavy sludge. though only active for a brief period in the late 90's, the band appears to have had a lasting impact on other artists that are trying to push the limits of what punk rock can and should consist of. listening to this release in particular calls to mind the efforts made by bands like REFUSED, who seamlessly tied together an album that contained an array of styles, sound clips and samples, varying dynamics, etc. in a definitive and cohesive manner. in short, it shatters people's perceptions and expectations, and one can only hope it does so for the better.

in terms of the way it sounds, i'd put it much more on par with something like if GRIEF were to perform a live album underwater while tripping and forcing all the majestic sea creatures who come in contact with the sound waves/acid to get hella existential...which is just kind of what i envision rather than what it objectively sounds like. maybe i'd describe it as "bubbly" in this sense. if it helps, i'd also say the vocals remind me a lot of the later CHARLES BRONSON releases, and that the record was put out by Slap-a-Ham. no? alright. you should probably just listen to it for yourselves. it's really cool and miserable and stuff. i highly recommend listening to it alone on the subway or on rainy, introspective nights. you'll probably discover (if you haven't already) that a lot of things are "wrong" with you, but that's why we're "here" in the first place, isn't it? ANSWER ME.

instead of over-hyping it or going into useless details i'll let it speak for itself, as it has done so quietly for the last decade or so.

personal favorites include: Silk Orbita, Sky Flowers Through Horse Eggs, Auroren, and Trippy Dead Zone.

last.fm in the post's link, myspace here.

Full of Hell - Roots of Earth are Consuming My Home

UHHH 9.6/10 SERIOUSLY OLD NEWS I KNO GUYS BUT OMG I'VE BEEN LISTENING TO IT ON REPEAT FOR ALMOST A MONTH NOW AND IT'S BASICALLY THE BEST SO GO BUY IT DOWNLOAD IT GET SOME MERCH SEE THEM ON TOUR I DON'T CARE JUST FUCKING APPRECIATE THIS SHIT BECAUSE IT COMES ONCE IN A BLUE MOON GOD LORD WILL SOMEONE LET ME JOIN THIS BAND IS IT TOO SOON FOR A COVER BAND I DON'T KNOW SO MANY QUESTIONS IS THAT A CATERPILLAR NOPE JUST A CIGARETTE I LEFT IN MY WINDOW SILL WHOOPS.

eff this crowd, srsly. i'd be murdering everyone >>>

Welkin Dusk - Born into a Dying World

after a less-than-impressive 4 track demo released about a year ago, WELKIN DUSK have tightened things up significantly with this self-produced and distributed full-length debut.

a self-proclaimed anarchist quartet hailing from the south side of Chicago, these kids play a heavily blackened brand of crust punk in the vein of LIFE IS HELL. lyrics range from sociopolitical commentary to the ever-relevant topic of hate for oneself (and all things), and suicide.

while i don't find that they fit in with the current trend in raw usbm, they do maintain the general feel of said style by having released this album on cassette and, intentionally or not, emphasizing the high-end of things both musically and vocally. additionally, WD doesn't go for the epic neocrust prologue, nor do they perform SKAGOS (or, as the name may imply, EMPEROR) worship. 7 songs in 24 minutes. hello *screams* goodbye.

the drumming is tight and the vocals are incredible shrieks and growls. my only complaint, really, is the guitar tone. it's this twangy fender sound that, on the beginning of the album's first track, "Buried Deep in My Hate"  sounds like a cool intro effect that would later blend into a nice, rich, metallic low-end with tons of gain (like MARTYRDÖD, for example). but nope, guitar stays really weird and dry. i suppose it makes the riffs more audible, but i just think these songs would hit harder - even on a cassette - with some more depth. i wanna wall-o-sounnnd.

back on the positive side, the drumming is fairly technical, and none of the songs have a tendency to repeat themselves; neither in pattern/structure, nor riff or lyrics. it's pretty "diverse", but definitely still sounds and feels like a whole release, not just 7 songs thrown onto one tape and called an LP. plus their lives shows are pretty killer. they sounded wayyy more dense and atmospheric on stage than they do on the release. but again, it's a solid effort and the song-writing is really what counts.

check 'em out on myspace, or their bandcamp (in the post's title).

SORRY EVERYONE I'M KINDA LAZY RIGHT NOW. WANT PUMPKIN COFFEE.

CTTS - Decompositions Vol I, Chapter I: Rites of Initiation

i don't have to say anything, do i? well, just to be sure: this is the new CIRCLE TAKES THE FUCKING SQUARE EP. as far as i understand, it will be the first quarter of their upcoming full-length. i don't even have words for how excited i am. it WILL be the best album of the year.

the only words i can muster are, "holy shit, this is heavy". i'm in awe. may be over-hyping it for some of you, but idgaf. Way of Ever-Branching Paths and The Ancestral Other Side are just phenomenally amazing. that's right. double adjective. head-spinning. lots of depth.

BANDCAMP IN THE TITLE, SUCKERS.

White Lung - It's The Evil

Vancouver's own 3/4 lady-garage-punk-quartet.

apologies, all. i've been slacking on this blog front lately. i promise that a three-fer is on the way. maybe older/timeless records that i think go unnoticed? but onto this review:

i may be alone in this, but i'm totally stoked on/excited for this band to be in existence. It's The Evil is an awesome record from front to back. no lulls and little filler. it's just full force; aggressive, but with a hint of that rebellious apathy that i find endlessly appealing, especially in stage presence.

basically, this act is a way better version of the YEAH YEAH YEAHS. dancey but moshable punk rock. "raw" and "grungy", but not in the commonly understood sense of the terms. the emotion and "rawness" in presentation is palpable. you can't help but feel it bursting through your speakers. "grungy" in a rock-and-roll sense, but no fuzzy distortion. guitar(s) are crisp and clean, but the amount of gain is ear-piercing. same with the drums. these kids play their instruments hard.

vocally, Mish Way is whiny and wavy, but not in a nauseating or obnoxious way. her vocal style is very well balanced, especially with regards to the flow of the album. a good mix of yelling, screaming, singing, and snottiness. i hate to say it, because it seems all too obvious, but she honestly does remind of of Kathleen Hanna (BIKINI KILL) with the way she enunciates certain words in a mocking-like fashion. you know what i'm talking about. that being said, i wouldn't call WHITE LUNG a riot grrl band. which, incidentally, i think is for the better. (sorry to burst your bubble, second-wavers.) but i digress.

the bass has a distinct fender jazz sound with an excellent tone that blends well with the rest of the band, but stands out when it should/needs to. the cymbals sound like they're shattering to pieces every time they're hit. the snare is punching you in the throat. the guitar plays loud as fuck open chords and dizzying/hypnotic lead parts, but crystal clear and also (somehow) not overpowering. tracks like Viva La Rat, Shoot, and Like Dad (which are my three favorites on the albummm) feature what i find to be the raddest of lead riffs that help define the band. i also think the affect it has on the listener compliments the artwork and vice-versa. a lot of that good old fashioned 16th note stuff going on all around, but they can seemingly stop on a dime. well done.

favvsies: Viva La Rat, Two Seen, Shoot, Like Dad. (Atlanta gets a shout-out too for being hella catchy.)

so yeah, these folks are all over the interwebs: tumblr in the title, myspace, facebook, Deranged Records.

someone book them a show in Chicago. like, maybe that RVIVR/THIS IS MY FIST one in September?

MORE TO COME. I SVVEARRR.