Its high, and its steep...

This was for J&MC to the 90s what the VU's Loaded was to the 70s; a seminal band that inspired a generation of musicians with their noisiest material release a perfect pure pop record towards the end of their heyday. Occurring amidst the mid-90s mass pop conversion of contemporaries Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr., as well as many of their own sonic descendents such as Pavement, Stoned & Dethroned is an incredibly self-aware and polished record. With hangover clarity, J&MC sift the emotional feedback wall of Just Like Honeys past and distill from it concrete sentiments to be transmuted onto a large variety of guitar pop moods. The simple arrangements and the crisp, nuanced production convey a band stripped naked of any glamour or mystique past darkness might hold and simply continuing to make the music they make, which just so happens to be exactly what their present was ready for. With a Junkie's severity, J&MC observe their position in an forgiving cycle of existence and openly embrace it, with life-changing results.       

Come To Grief

Drown your sorrows in the dismally alcoholic whirlpool of sludge that Grief create. Feel your emotions tugged by the undertow of feedback eroding their riffing. Fall into drone-induced fits of depressive paralysis. Head bang back into consciousness. Come To Grief    

Unspeakable

Tribal paranoid jams of political claustrophobia. War dances for the troops of counter-cultural insurrection. Flee the Thatcheran apocalypse to the sound of nuclear dissolution and social revolution. Only Iceland is safe.

 Unspeakable

What can I say, what can I sing

Don't go to sleep

some hip drum shit

there comes a time when you want to be older

there comes a time when you want to be bolder

I love you more when it's over

there comes a time when your helpful
there comes a time when your doubtful
I love you more when your spiteful 

there comes a time to wake up to whats happening
there comes a time to get out of whats happening
I love you more than whats happening

there comes a time when you are near me

there comes a time when you are near me 

a time that captures what we're after
a time: 
https://rapidshare.com/#!download|693p5|260283246|Ego.rar|100547|0|0

Canadian Black Coffee and Italian Black Metal

Raise the unholy libation, present the sacrifice. This Italian black mass of traditional occult black metal is a mystikal ritual for all to indulge in. Every unearthed corpse has a morbid tale to connect us through seance to our dark master. Black clouds of delirious ceremonial chant and sacremental song augment the dark storms of irratic violence this horde pervertedly procreate. Satan is primordially invoked with riffing orthodoxy and vomitted summonings as the band enact their malevolent musical witchcraft. Meanwhile witches dance in shroud around the offering spilling chalices of blood. Unlike the more dejected, depressive graveyard contemplation of their contemporary Italian sects MonumentuM and Cult of Blood, The 13 Drape deliver their bleak visions of funereality with pumelling grimness and evil. Just look at the dead guy on the cover's reaction.

13th Way

Be flung into this emotional stew of blackest thoughts and demonic impulses. Embrace the left hand and debase the natural. Follow your black mass intuition to the extreior circle of existence. Leave behind this unified and barren universe for chaos eternal. The morbidly opaque spectral veil that is Necromass evoke psychic images of this carnival of blasphemy we call mortality from the abysmal obscurity beyond. Mysteria Mystica Zofiriana is a downwards spiral of bestial adrenaline and Satanic reflection that will leave you dizzily disillusioned. A must at sodomatic orgies of hate.

Into an Image of Left

Going Blind

Been stuck in the 70s lately. At least on wax that is. Anyways, KISS hardly gets lauded enough in metal circles for how heavy they really were for their time. Or maybe they get lauded too much by nerds on the fringe of those circles. Who knows? Who cares? "I don't really know what to do" but enjoy this album as much as I do, on vinyl. After all, it produced probably the best Melvins cover of all time and could be considered a visual precursor to black metal (as KISS clearly were) and innovator of the band shots back cover aesthetic of much BM.

Who's your baby?

How BM is THAT???

Strike Extremes

Sorry readers. Sorry month of May. with all the end of semester BS, the coming of spring and all that other good stuff like seeing family, I've been a neglectful blogfather. Forgive me. I return to the fold with both a warning for the Montreal and Quebec police forces and the Jean Charest government as well as the magnum opus of these grind gods I'm lucky enough to be seeing on Monday: EXTREME CONDITIONS DEMAND EXTREME RESPONSES. I'm sure the current police state mentality of our provincial government towards the striking majority of infuriated and insulted students and citizens of the greater Quebec area would gladly adopt this album's slogan to justify their unconstitutional and power abusing attempts at anti-democratic law-making, but they would miss the point. The 'extreme conditions' to which I refer are the militantly oppressive and socially repressive measures this current joke of an administration are actively taking and proposing in their fear of this convicted and powerful mobilization of a politically disenchanted society. The 'extreme responses' to come are from the natural escalation of radical activity on the part of a population who's government refuses to hear or negotiate with them. Police brutality and trigger happy policy making have immediately damaging physical and social, but easily reparable, repercussions for the state of the province. Widespread dissent among the provincial body - the people with the real power - means change. We're fed up with the bullshit, and Charest and law enforcement are only delaying the inevitable. The power of the masses will crush this heinous disregard for the culturally interested political reforms of Quebec.

Fuck the Police

Oh yeah so I had an amazing time seeing these guys live at Sala Rossa with Nasum, who of course were totally fucking insane as well. What struck me hard with Truth's set was that I couldn't possibly imagine a band sounding at their tightest 20 years after a seminal release like this one. Also they were hilarious. 

All The More Hardcore

In hope that he will see this tribute before he departs into the woods for the next several months, I am posting the latest Nick Persons album now. I apologize for interrupting my occult Italian trilogy but one must Goethe with the floweth. With the terminal defunctness of his group Fucked Butter, rap antagonist Nick Persons has had to keep busy creating his own brand of fucked hop. 2012 has so far seen the release of his primarily instrumental debut 66 Cents and more recently his return to the mic in Depart. Produced largely in bed in the wee hours of dusks and dawns, Depart captures the various altered states which occupy the mind at such times. "My House In Compton Is Off Limits" sounds like Prince on crack at 5AM after a wild house party in the 80s that Foreigner showed up to with some bad blow that gave everyone bloody nostrils. A hit to be sure. "Popular Kids" coins the proverb "we all know how to party, just clap" and makes one believe they do so much so that they will. "Yellow Drink" sounds like a stoned and tense philosophical conversation between Nick himself and Pizza the Hutt. "All the Hardcore" closes off the strange trip with the only sample Dilla was not lucky enough to pick up. All in all, Depart is an incredibly strong effort from a frighteningly deranged mind and deserves to be lauded as the truly innovative take on the hip hop idiom it is. Word up Persons.

Agony Ecstasy Discipline Harmony    

Cult of Blood

As promised (tweeted, that is) here is another tome from Italy's cobwebbed and shrouded vault of occult rites. Released the same year as In Absentia Christi and featuring Agua Regis (Roberto Mammarella, vox + gtr with MonumentuM) on guitar and bass, Cultus Sanguine's epononymous EP is a morose ritual of Lombardian anguish. This is a good soundtrack for the type of party where no one shows because there is a thunderstorm and you drink all the bottles of high percentage table vino you bought and then wander through the darkness and rain into the cemetery only to leave a white rose at the wrong grave and remember that you left candles burning in your appartment. Since those don't happen every weekend (or so I'm told; for me they do) you could just listen now and feel sad.

Ride the winds of hate

In The Absence of Christ

Friends, devoted followers, trash collectors, forgive me for not posting in so long. I have been in a dark place, I am still there. It is a place of text, quotes, indents and of ancient philosophies. It's kind of like the scene in Hackers where they get into that secret folder and E=MC2 is floating around, but more monocrhome and monotonous. Don't fear for me, though, I can see a light at the end of this bleak tunnel of intellectual purgatory. But for now, I barrel on. However, I felt I must share with you the music that both best reflects the interior of my mind at the moment and makes the best soundtrack for this taxing journey I am embarked on.

Very special thanks to Aesop over at the Hearse for dropping yet another forgotten classic quickly become personal fave on my miserable earholes. MonumentuM's In Absentia Christi is just what I've been craving, some good old fashione Italian occultitude. Not easily described using metal terminology (because it sounds like little other metal I've heard) I will attempt to give an experiential equivalent to what I feel listening to this album. Imagine you are at an Italian Catholic funeral in a huge church, everyone is dressed in black and sobbing as the incense burns and the sound of murmured prayer gets louder and louder. The procession starts and you shoulder through the crowd to the son of the deceased to voice your condolences. This sends his long, dark-haired, pale, lanky frame into convulsions of bellowed balling. His tears soon turn to morbid reflection and he begins expounding to you his every thought of dejected agony, in Rozz Williams-like oration, while the chorus of chants and bells behind you rises and falls. He becomes more and more animated as the unusually long walk to the graveyard grows longer and stranger. Daylight turns to unsettling twilight and shadowy cobblestone streets stretch on into infinity. You feel very odd. You realize that the libation someone gave you at the church seems to have had hallucinatory effects. You want this depressing journey to end and yet with his every word you become more sympathetic for your host's bleak revery. Suddenly, the buildings fall away and you look out in front of the crowd to see an expansive cemetery, tombstone upon tombstone, crypt upon crypt, restful and still in the soft hues of the setting sun.

fade to grey...

Don't Burn The Fires

... On a more wholesome note, I give you the crowning couple of the husband-and-wife band trend, which has spread like wildfire throughout indie scenes since. Toody and Fred and their various drummers still wear the belt for hardest working, most solid and sonically consistent performing, producing independent artists. With a recorded output that didn't quit for eighteen years, Dead Moon have left in their tombstone shaped shadow a legacy of life changing and heart breaking anthems. The legacy began with this record, packed with ballads of rock 'n' roll's seedy past and foreboding future. From the opening twang and drum hit of In the Graveyard to the chillingly somber singing and dreamy guitar of Dead in the Saddle, from the meddling drones of Don't Burn the Fires to the bitter sorrow of I Hate the Blues, In The Graveyard is the prototypical Dead Moon trip, and a fantastic introduction to one of Portland's longest running music/culture institutions.

I'm never comin' home

Don't shoot the messenger

Disclaimer: I in no way take lightly, am unsympathetic to experiences of nor, least of all, condone rape. I have known both women and men who have been sexual assault and rape victims. My contact with these issues on a personal level has fixed my stance to be staunchly intolerant of the moronic "cultural" insensitivity that arises around these issues. However, I am an enemy of any kind of censorship or inhibition of freedom of speech, including PC-motivated forms of this. If the issue exists in our society, it must be talked about. Making people afraid to use the word 'rape' or address the fact - in any light - that such inhumanities exist is several steps backwards in regards to ever resolving or dealing with such an issue. Music has been the only platform for much discussion of omnipresent social taboos over at least the course of the last half a century and more. I refuse to accept that there is any subject that cannot be addressed through music and lyricism as we have very thoroughly closed so many other doors to avenues of discussion of these topics culturally. With that, I give you both one of the most controversial and influential bands of the 1980s:

Whether you love or hate him (I go back and forth), Steve Albini's impact on electric guitar-based music, record engineering and independent music making is indelible. While his assumed "politics" (remember that term audio-politics I coined?) and overall anti-populist approach to every aspect of the music business has polarized general opinion of him, the sonic signature he left is far from being forgotten. This short-lived, highly provocative follow-up band to his Big Black, named after a disturbing Japanese manga series, are an example of Albini's musical memorability, in spite of negative public reaction. The fact that the comic book which the band cited as the source of the name garnered nowhere near as much criticism (if any at all) from protesters of the band evidences a late 80s PC mentality that was not in search of addressing larger issues but prefered they be skirted and not brought up at all. In case you were wondering, the music here is not overly offensive nor explicit, in fact I'd say less so than most of Big Black's output. Sonically, this is confrontational music, like the rest of Albini's catalog. Being the first band of his with drums, there are amazingly audible similarities to the sounds of bands he would later engineer, such as Nirvana. Vocally, Steve really comes into his own here, defining the soft/loud approach that would mark the grunge era. The recorded sounds themselves are impressively defined, marking the beginning of his thorough 'precise presentation of performance' style of strategic mic placement and minimal effects/overdubbing. Nods to the Cockrock canon of bands like Golden Earring and ZZ Top, with numbers like Radar Love Lizard and a cover of the latter's hit, Just Got Paid, continue what I see as Albini's career-long satire of rock patriarchy. This is where I feel the lyrical subject matter of Big Black, Rapeman and Shellac are most widely misconstrued. It is one thing to be a man making rock music with other men obliviously, another to self-criticize and try to eschew that cliche and another entirely to try and embody all the negative implications of the cliche. I, for one, commend Mr. Albini for his attempt at the latter. After all, isn't that what punk was all about?

This file is really big for some reason...

ABOLISH ALL YOUR IGNORANT THOUGHTS NOW !

Stick this in your pipe and smoke it. There is so much shit going on in the world, especially my world, right now; people fighting for what we assumed too long to be our given rights and getting tear gassed. Students on strike because they've learned something from school and those that haven't opposing to keep blindly feeding into the business model that will make our Universities into men-in-suits-with-briefcases factories and leave the concept of class mobility and personal betterment through public education in the dust. We need this kind of apocalyptic idealism right now, or I do anyways. Take a bite out of that Crunchy Bar guitar tone and the bludgeoning drum machine gun precision of Mick Harris, who bashed buckets on Scum the very same year this came out. Be confused by the 20sec-1min tributes to the band's favourite cartoon cat and friends. Be astonished by the nihilistic brutality that accompanies them. Look into your nuclear crystal ball and see the end times. Abolish all your ignorant thoughts now!

Uninformed

Here I am a blog post on a webpage: some text with a JPEG and a link, OH!

Ok so this oddity of an historical musical act in the 70s rock arena has been a bit of an obsession of mine lately. A couple of Manchester lads with a smashing studio set-up in Stockport who anonymously worked their way up the charts under various band names until finally landing a #2 with the questionable hit "Neanderthal Man" under the Hotlegs moniker in 1970. It was as 10cc that the team of Creme, Godley, Gouldman and Stewart redefined themselves as hopelessly Zappa-obsessed album rockers with plenty of music industry cynicism and studio experimentation to fill at least two volumes with material strange and fascinating enough to catch the ear of one J-Dilla. Oh and hooks, they had lots of those.

Hum drum days

The band's s/t debut traverses the rich lyrical ladscapes and sonically iconic soundscapes of 50s & early 60s rock cliche, all the while with tongue protrudently in cheek. Opening with the memorable martydom of Johnny Kowalski ("aka Johnny Angel"), and effectively that of the motor-accident subgenre which created him, 10cc begin their extensive project to lampoon each of the rock's idiomatic inventions and their inherent cultural givens. The project continues with the portrait of the classic idle femme in "Donna" (which shamelessly borrows from "Oh! Darling") and the application of real life law enforcement temperaments to the "Jailhouse Rock" tradition in "Rubber Bullets". On all accounts, these bubblegum homages raise questions of identity within the framework of rock 'n' roll subject matter. Interestingly, in looking back to this earlier framework - as many of their glam and proto-punk contemporaries were - 10cc would seem to find and get at these issues more directly rather than simply emulate a retro aesthetic, while writing fun and catchy ditties that stick in your head for days. Perhaps my favourite cut from this disc, "The Dean and I", exemplifies this: an epic journey from adolescent innocence and its corresponding popular contexts and sentiments through sexual maturity and nuclear familial fulfillment and into the oblivion of moral responsibility: capitalism! 

Play Me

Very easily the band's opus, Sheet Music is an intricately crafted journey through the ins and outs of success in the rock world of the 70s, with a handful of ingenius melodies and recording techniques to boot. Opening with the Neil Young meets Spoon infectiousness of "The Wall Street Shuffle", 10cc turn their scathing critical eye upon NY's financial gravy train, recently the site of some kind of pinko occupation or other. Having set the tone for an economic commentary that will run throughout the album, the band turns that same fiery beam of cynicism upon themselves in the now highly coveted (RIP Dilla) "The Worst Band In The World", a track that really shows their mad scientist sound engineer side. It seems to me what Dilla did with the aforementioned track (retitled "Workinonit" on his Donuts) is exactly what pop music used to do: reappropriate something timelessly appreciated by all and update it. This is, of course, exactly what 10cc were doing themselves on their debut. It's Dilla's adaptation of their song that highlights exactly how ahead of their time they were in certain regards. "Old Wild Men" is a simply beautiful tribute to their rock forefathers while "Silly Love" showcases again the band's chameleon quality, with it's Marc Bolan-esque fuzz leads and ADT-ed barked shouts. "Somewhere In Hollywood" is a majestically beautiful odyssey through yet another commercial American cityscape and features a totally unecessary "The Long and Winding Road" melodic quote. "The Sacro-iliac" is an appropriately relaxed look into the future of the cushily retired rock musician, giving us a sense of where 10cc saw themselves in a decade and not a bad guess at that!

The whole affair brags lush textures, untouchable 70s drum sounds and a treasure of oddball samples for the hungry digger. DIG!    

What's a boy to do?

In returning to my "great over-looked local records of 2011" theme I am realizing that, in trying to cast a far-reaching analytical gaze beyond my city's borders, I have, on two accounts now, overlooked the closest & earliest influence on my musical tastes: my older sister. While in my adolescence it was her years ahead that benefitted me greatly with an early knowledge of life-changers like the Ramones and the Cure, in recent times I've become exposed to amazing Montreal musicians she happens to know personally. Ensorcelor are one such case, as are tUnE-yArDs. The latter's 2011 release is truly a marvel. An extremely dynamic and ecletic pop record that weaves words and themes as intricately and effortlessly as it does complex rhythms and soaring melodies, W H O K I L L is a trip, to put it bluntly. It is a trip through a neighbourhood, through the minds of the people and the events that make it one like no other. It is a trip through a bleeding heart's arteries, showing us where personal indifference dead-ends and where emotion derails political meaning. I certainly have yet to and doubt I ever will hear a record that so perfectly captures the simultaneous socio-political claustrophobia and expressive freedoms that intersect haphazardly in this city. Merril steps on toes lovingly, shouts revolution unforgivingly and all to highly rhythmically complex and frenetic arrangements and lush melodies. Her current explosion onto the larger North-American "indie" scene comes as no surprise when I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that a little city like Montreal contained such a larger-than-life artistic persona this long. If you haven't heard this yet you probably already have a friend who loves it, get ready to join in the fun.

Doorstep

More Power to the People

Rounding out the scintilating trio of 1971 freak outs (see Headless Heroes of the Apocalypse & There's a Riot Goin' On) is this, Funkadelic's LSD-drenched manifesto. This masterpiece takes the shape of an entropic epic in retrograde motion and like those other two apocalyptic sonic documents of '71, Maggot Brain comes off as generally rapped up in post-60s disillusionment. Opening with George Clinton's prophesizing "Mother Earth is pregnant for the third time, for y'all have knocked her up. I have tasted the maggots in the mind of the universe, I was not offended for I knew I had to rise above it ALL, or drown in my own SHIT" we are swiftly swept into Eddie Hazel's sludgey six-string trascendence. Clinton's bold production choice to drop all accompanying instruments but guitar arpeggios and snare drum tell us from the start who is in the driver's seat for this experiential trip of an album as well as what a visionary he truly was. With an acoustic guitar riff we're chimed into the upbeat ode to capitalistic love, "Can You Get to That" only to headbang that lesson away to the promiscuous "Hit It and Quit It". Closing the first side is the nursery rhyme derived plea for the virtue of community amongst classes "You and Your Folks, Me and My Folks. "Super Stupid" provides a heavy-rocking reintroduction and a sound that Lenny Kravitz would make a career out of in the inverted 60s. Following is "Back In Our Minds", a deranged return to consciousness setting us up for the domestic degeneracy, street rioting and ultimate nuclear devastation of the thoroughly corporealizing "Wars of Armageddon". In just six numbers Funkadelic manages to take you on a journey from your cerebral cortex to your bowels and through every facet of humanity in between.

I've linked for you here the reissue with the incredible bonus tracks "Whole Lot of BS" and "I Miss My Baby" as well as the unmixed version of the Maggot Brain jam, replete with acid fried backing track. Go on Hit It an' Quit!

Riot

The best burnout of the 20th century would have to come from the '60s wouldn't it? And it would of course have to come from Sly Stone, the number of drugs he used in the recording and production of this album likely being close to the amount of overdubs. This hazy trip into the socio-political mind of America's foremost popular Soul/R&B/Funk group at the time cast an inescapable shadow over the futures of hip-hop and electronic music movements alike. Tape hiss and a mix determined more by mechanical degradations than human ears convey the claustrophobic nature of Sly's creative process as well as his drug-induced paranoia perfectly. Here and there darkly tinged proto-electro-soul pop non sequitors emerge ("Runnin' Away"), freeing the listener enough to breath deep before revisiting one of the Family's anthems through Stone's murky disillusionment ("Thank You For Talking To Me Africa"). This is still avant and lo-fi by today's standards, let alone seethingly cynical and funky.

Africa is talking to you

Jungle Love

This comes as a reminder that even on Valentine's Heavy Shit still goes down. Similarly this disc would seem to have come as reminder to the world in '61 that Heavy Shit still goes down in jazz. With the move towards the public adoption of jazz as a foundation of North American cultural identity by the end of the '50s, all but the acknowledgement of the continuing opression of its originators had been accepted into mainstream (read: white) media. This, no doubt, posed itself as a challenge to those great minds of jazz to push the extremely progressive idiom into the stratosphere of experiential composition and performance. No group could be more apt to do this than this colossal meeting of minds, the original Power Violence power trio. As with much of the rest of their catalogue, Duke and Chaz set about recontextualizing and reconfiguring the older musical forms from which jazz sprung with the disintegration of post/hard-bop as backdrop. Max goes about doing what he does best: drop innovative rhythm bombs over everything. The opening drum lick of the title track(and track in its entirety) was arguably the most brutal moment in jazz at that point. What makes this record destructively brilliant is that none of these musical muscles hold back whatsoever. The full-on audio assault of the album's rockers as well as the floating serenity of the ballads are all treated with the same tastefully immersed participation (or lack thereof) of each musician featured here. Money Jungle is an atmospheric stew of the physical substances of jazz's underbelly - hooch, prostitutes, switchblades, drug money, session joints - distilled into a freely interpretive and rhythmically liberated landscape.

DIG

She Was Different

   

  Git In There!

  

Anti-Love 

Even with the recent renaissance of interest in her highly innovative musical output, Betty Davis remains one of the most underrated figures in music. Leave out the all-too-talked-about marriage to and influence on Miles Davis (we get it), being backed by some of the funkiest line-ups ever (among their ranks former Family Stone members, Herbie Hancock, Alphonse Mouzon...) and an unmistakeable image, Betty Davis should be praised for the sexual revolutionary that she was. Her in-your-face "I don't give a damn" lyrics were light years ahead of the misogynistic implications of the free love movement and waspy conservatism of second wave feminism. Betty took the female objectification being glorified in male musical circles at the time and threw it back in the mainstream's face. She showed that seduction, sexual deviation and promiscuity have implicit power and were not simply tools for gender oppression and championed other taboo sexuality like masturbation ("In The Meantime"). As for the music, it reminds us pungently of where the term funk comes from. You can practically smell these bass and guitar licks while drums and keys stay a throbbing pulse to keep your hips gyrating. Betty soars over it all with a vocal approach half-way between Sly Stone and Patti Smith. By the time of her third album, Nasty Gal, her vocals had grown into their own commanding raspy bellow of bedroom domination. Start with these two classics and see if you don't start sweating.

Two sides of Gene / left rev MCD

Gene side - Popular, commercial, smooth, "vanilla", straight, orchestral,  patriarchal, crooning.

Strangely I came to know the identity of this incredible voice through his not so sappy, yet not so subtle Jack Nitzsche arranged hit "Walk With A Winner". The overtly competitive machismo that defined this musical seduction of sugar mamas the world over, coupled with Gene's vocal bravado, won me quickly, helped by a few well-placed tubular bell parts from Jack. I quickly sought out his discography, which at first disappointed me with its over-saturation of (A. Nobody) writer credits and chart fluff as well his credit for penning forgettable Yardbirds hit "I'm A Man" ("that's spelled M-A-N"). However my further discoveries of this fascinating figure's pedigree sowed seeds for whats become a longtime appreciation for both Gene's smaltzy beginnings and his Hip-Hop championed self-reinvention...

left rev MCD side - Unhinged, political, funky, dark, stoned, fused, radical, unnerving.

This is the artist that lands himself as one of the greats to be remembered this and every month. The indescribable feeling of hearing "get it together... SEE WHAT'S HAPPENING!" in its original musical context as well as the "Jagger the Dagger" groove will never leave me, having redefined my teenage ear as profoundly as Q-Tip and the Beasties defined my adolescent one. Headless Heroes is one of those extremely unique early moments after jazz's heydey in which you truly get to see the black indivdual in total unabashed, political, social and artistic expression, all synthesized into a truly experiential album. The unmistakable textures on this record would inspire a generation of disciples to the vinyl statements of black cultural consciousness of which MCD was at the fore. Even his adoption of the Master of Ceremonies abreviation began a tradition that became central to hip-hop and rap culture. The ease with which the left rev spins something like Jesus' love, supermarkets and discovery of the americas into fever-pitched, politically charged lyrical landscapes is impressive in light of the climate of media repression around such issues. Mention must also be made of one Alphonse Mouzon who's performance at the drumkit here is unrivaled by any other. Playing with bold character and wild abandon, Mouzon's deep grooves and chopped polyrhytmic breaks shape the percussive backbone of hip-hop to the present day. I have no doubt anyone who hears this will fall head over heels for the bleeding heart radical that Eugene McDaniels became and produced his most influential work as.

GET IT TOGETHER

AfroFuture

This needs no introduction nor petty bantering text soon to be lost in the vortex of the internet. What you need to know: Black History Month is here, it has been here. Black Americans are here, they have been here. They have changed things greatly and for so much the better. You need to appreciate them, my posts this month are going to give you some musical examples of why. You are now entering an outerspace.

Space is the Place

HAVE A HIT

The first PSF Tokyo Flashback compilation was my teenage introduction to the long and devote tradition of Japanese musical pyschedelia. Not sure, but it seems like at the time this was released it must have been a pretty exciting little pu pu platter of unearthed recordings obscure enough to make at least the western enthusiasts salivate. It was here that I got a formal penetrating of my virgin ears to the disturbing utterances of one Keiji Haino, both alone in a large room and with his longstanding ensemble 不失者 (Fushitsusha). What this little sampler does particularly well is present both the rocking, wanking (High-Rise, White Heaven) and the dark, mystical (Ghost, 不失者, 光束夜, 灰野敬二) sides of the early Japanese scene, as well as those that are the summation of both (Marble Sheep , Verzerk). As far as personal faves go I needn't go on about the importance of Haino or his veteran act (whose 1990 live session here will fuck you up), however I cannot speak highly enough of Verzerk or 光束夜 (Kousokuya). The former, although somewhat trad, deliver a crusher of fuzzy lead heavy psych bordering on metal which the internet claims to be their only work. This is perhaps explained by two of the members evidently pictured literally behind bars in the liners. Kousokuya on the other hand yield what seems to be a characteristically suffering and broken performance that gets at a drunken and deeply depressed emotional interior to pysch rock's posturing facade. Though, really, I love every track, its hard not to also give High-Rise honourable mention for their contribution (notable namesake to the illustrious Japanese outfit from my last post) and clearly being way too cool, and loud, to hear anyone who accuses them of a dated aesthetic. Through live and studio representations, this comp communicates superbly the religiosity with which long-haired Tokyo-ites have practiced their duly inherited craft for decades. Although we weren't there, and we missed the acid, we can still have the Flashback.



Back in '95

Mellow Out

"Now that's a HIT!"

 Brooklyn ZOO!



Just saw that I only had four posts for January and started feeling guilty. Well, what do these three disparately legendary recordings have in common? They are all OLD and DIRTY... and DIRTAY! Just as aesthetic similarities can be drawn from Eric's Trip and Ulver's 90s four-track masterpieces, Mainliner, GBV and ODB formed these seminal works through seemingly similar DIY approaches. While four-track tape portastudios are likely implicated in each of these records, it is a whole other common element to these artist's worlds that each manages to capture on disc: dirt. Grit, degradation, imperfection; the creative influence of the presence of such qualities in these musicians' artistic environs shape their output and are readily acknowledged and, in one way or another, transformed. For Mainliner, dirstortion, fuzz and minimalistic repetition are a direct route, through hynoptic sonic immersion, to obscure subconscious realms. GBV's Robert Pollard understands the importance of the spontaneous recording (and beer) to capturing great melodies and pop sensibility. For Dirty, existence in the world's underside is the longest and most intensive scholarly experience and yields knowledge that is tangible through its universal cultural applicablity. Get dirty.

  

Somebody gave the GOVERNMENT a FLAT TIRE

In honour of ANONYMOUS' mighty retaliation to Megaupload's shut down and time bought as well as minds changed for the SOPA/PIPA bill, I have decided to post a bite-sized Canadian new wave treat. The Government are a band with a small output and even smaller legacy, but who remain a sought after name in the world of obscure early art punk and new wave 7"s. This is, no doubt, a result of the unique sounds contained on this plastic cylinder from 1979. A perfect sonic polaroid of a highly anamolous moment in music and counter-culture. Quite unlike anything else to come out of Canada and it's punk scene at the time, these four numbers are some delightful little oddities set to a metric, chugging beat. My personal fave remains Flat Tire, which seems a fitting tribute to the impressive work of our fellow online-activist brethren and at least the temporary thwarting of the powers of evil and greed in recent days. Enjoy with beer and salted sarcasm.

Spongey

SOPA and PIPA want you to buy movies, not have a voice or the availability of uncensored information on the web, STOP THEM

People this is serious. I urge everyone who sees this post to stop whatever it is they are doing and spread the word as far as they can about this heinous crime against human rights. We all deserve to be heard, to educate ourselves and to lead a censorship-free internet life. Like they have been so many times before, grey-haired, out-of-touch, non-internet-using fogies are being given the power to restrict the world from information they have a right to. Don't be fooled by the shady bill shelving that's been happening, this thing is moving and it is moving fast. If you are American, go here to voice your objection to a representative. If you think someone like me deserves to be sued for what I do here, or you'd like to never see your comment posted again or you hate access to free obscure music that may never make it to your part of the world then sit on your ass and do nothing but the trivial internet activities of the everyday, they'll only be gone this January 21st, better make the best of 'em.
If not, you can take action through this petition from Avaaz, one of the more prominent and influential activism sites on the web. Fight it!

Canadian Metal Classics Pt. 4 - Winter Metal

It is that magical time of year when the thick, fluffy head of condensation spills from the heavens and covers my part of the world. It is a time of howling winds, hail that whips the earth like chains and engines stalling as their drivers accelerate into white death. It is the season where nature and technology alike go to die. What better mascot could it have than some spikey, spaghetti-mopped, webbed-mouthed, killing technology wielding stormtrooper???! And what better sound track than one of Canada's earliest contributions to international stereo grimness. Voivod are, to me, our Celtic Frost or Venom. From the get go, with this debut, they set about blurring the jagged lines of speed, thrash and heavy metal and punk. Owing about as much to Charged GBH or D.O.A. as Hellhammer or Slayer, Voivod were one of those fearless acts, like CF, who knew that one could crush just as easily at sludgey, slothful tempos as blazing fast ones. It is their similarly idiosyncratic style to the Frost's, which sacrifices no heaviness in maintaining a chilling atmosphere throughout, that set Voivod apart upon release of this criminally underacknowledged record and eventually gained them international appreciation. From the icey church bell hits that open the album to the ashen desolation of closer Nuclear War, War and Pain is a long, blackened trudge through Quebec winter replete with hulking snow drifts of doomy riffs and frigid frenzies of guitar violence at whirlwind tempos. Easily one of the most important records to the development of Thrash, Black and Death Metal as well as Crust Punk, this demands your worship. R.I.P. Piggy, forever.

Your Sky is Black Today

BEST 4 LAST BITCHES!

Evidently my 2011 ear was in crude enough shape to overlook one of Canada's most monolithic doom metal offerings of some time, right under my nose here in Montreal no less! Ensorcelor have been making waves in the city's small but mighty scene of true sonic sculptors of morbidly misanthropic magic. Their bearded, tree-wielding wizard-reared rituals caught my attention not more than a year ago at the unholy Death Church in St. Henri and they have remained ever-present in my mind as a colossal local live force worthy to dish it out along side numeroUS heavies (Thou, Yob, Krallice) to pass through this city's gates in recent times. It is the lumbering emotional juggernaut of their live performance, perhaps, that obscured my radar when hunting down great Canadian metal releases this past anno. I have seen the error of my ways. I could not see the dark woods for the light of the true path had blinded me. Having properly installed this blackened volume at my cylindrical altar my heart now rests as it should: in mother nature's darkness. What has struck me most immediately here is the band's ability to invoke such unholy hordes to my mind Thergothon, Skepticism, Mournful Congregation and the Woodsmoke crowd while remaining entirely unique and original, retaining only a few hints of such influences. On top of all this, the record very eloquently evades the all too common sludgisms of much modern funeral doom. The true strength of this unit is their ability to capture the earthiness of doom metal lore and the seasonal moodiness this music exudes. For those south of our snowy expanses, this is the most direct audio tap into the feeling of long trudges through white abyss; of waking up to days on end of dimmed sunlight consumed willingly by early nightfall. This album represents perfectly the musical equivalent of the black cloud that can envelope one's thoughts under a winter's moon...

and if at the bottom of everything there were only a wild ferment...

Raise Your Glass