Psychedelic : Shoegazing : Reverberation
![img-grouper_183203818619 [Bootleg] Grouper at ATP](http://www.interviewmagazine.com/files/2009/09/15/img-grouper_183203818619.jpg "[bootleg] Grouper At Atp")
While I’ve always enjoyed Grouper’s recorded work, she’s a whole other beast live. The first 15 minutes of her performance at last month’s ATP festival *slamming head on desk for not going* is nothing but the most epic nature music ever. Flying over mountains, exploring oceanic trenches – her live shit is stratospheric and aquatic. I can’t stop listening to this excerpt. Thanks WFMU for winning at everything.
You can grip the entire bootleg here.
MP3 :::
Grouper – Live @ ATP [excerpt]
As a prodigal son of Burlington, Vermont, home to Ben & Jerry’s and *yaaaawn* Phish, it’s a goddamned miracle that Greg Davis isn’t churning out some rehashed hippie shit. On the contrary, Kranky’s Greg Davis is a student of a happier, warmer school of ambient music. Sublimely optimistic and viscerally beautiful, the just-released Mutually Arising, his first full length in seven years, is the summertime evening response to Tim Hecker’s and Keith Fullerton Whitman’s icier dronescapes.
As with most work in the modern classical/minimalist/drone genre, the album is meant to be enjoyed as a whole. However, the excerpt below should demonstrate what I’m talking about. “Hall of Pure Bliss” is just that – a canticle adoring the opening to a portal, or the soundtrack to sprouting flowers. Truly beautiful stuff.
Mutually Arising just dropped this week courtesy of Kranky.
For fans of: Stars of the Lid, Tim Hecker, Labradford
MP3 :::
Greg Davis – Hall of Pure Bliss [excerpt]
Earlier this afternoon I posted a review and some tracks from sunny shoegazers The Legends, saying the album was perfect for these warmer months. But I failed to include the Sunn o))) fans in this conversation, many of whom probably find summer to be “lame,” and probably make up a healthy portion of this blog’s readership. Never fear, Chicago’s FSS label just dropped a new doosey by the metal-informed noise/power ambient Grief No Absolution.
Grief No Absolution is truth in advertising. This is suffocating, horrifying, paranoid music – the soundtrack you hear when you’ve been demoted a circle of hell or two for insolence. The group, who formed in 2008 in the orb of primordial ooze that rotates near the Earth’s core, makes Khanate look like more of a “pastel black.” GNA will be releasing two vinyl EPs next month, Eurostopodus Argus and Crypsis, which will also be available for purchase as a single package download. Both EPs play as a full single movement, so the MP3 below is simply an out-of-context taste of what you can expect. Enjoy the sample, then boogie on down to church.
Eurostopodus Argus and Crypsis are available August 10 courtesy of FSS. Celebrate good times.
For fans of: Sunn O))), Wolf Eyes, Earth, Prurient
MP3 :::
Grief No Absolution – My Hands Are Your Fading Cinder
The long awaited box set of early performances/demos of Animal Collective, spanning roughly 2000 to 2003, recently became available in limited quantities… and said quantities are all gone. Not sure if Catsup Plate is planning on a wider distribution, but Hansen was fortunate enough to grip a copy. Fans of Sung Tongs and before will be absolutely delighted with the sound quality and inclusion of unfamiliar tracks, especially if you were disappointed with Merriweather Post Pavilion (as many of this blog’s readers were, I believe).
That reminds me, if you loved pop-friendly Merriweather Post Pavilion, there’s a good chance you might hate Animal Crack Box. Animal Collective started as a noise and Holy Modal Rounders-style folk band that used to shred hard with C Spencer Yeh and his crew. And now they’re kickin’ it with Letterman! They grew up so fast… But yeah, I love the older stuff, so Animal Crack Box is Christmas come early for me.
Below is a small selection of some of my favorites from the box set with the corresponding liner notes:
“Hey Friend” – recorded live to MiniDisc winter early 2001 at 67 Atlantic Ave, Brooklyn by Avey/Panda
“Covered in Frogs” – recorded live to MiniDisc sometime and somewhere in 2003 (recording details are lost) by Avey/Panda
“Jimmy Raven” – recorded live to MiniDisc 18 September 2000 at the Cooler, NYC by Avey/Panda
MP3 :::
Animal Collective – Hey Friend
Animal Collective – Covered in Frogs
Animal Collective – Jimmy Raven
One of my favorite Lexbros, Mick Jeffries, captured a little bit of Windy & Carl’s drone-out performance last night at new art space slash music venue Land of Tomorrow.
The two music communities most directly responsible for the American post-rock movement are, without much argument, Chicago and Louisville. Since I used to live in the former and currently live in the latter, I suppose I have a natural inclination toward what we know as post rock. In its heyday, post rock was the dominant form of any experimental rock in the indie world, which has since been replaced with the New Weird America dudes. I like both movements myself, but I’m glad to see post rock is making a comeback (particularly since Mogwai’s latter output hasn’t been cutting the mustard). To that end, it’s good to know we have a guy like Bruce Adams, co-founder of Kranky who now runs a new, very art-centric label called Flingco Sound. Of course it’s out of Chicago, and of course the roster is really good (albeit modest right now).
Interbellum is one of these offerings. Hey, remember Rachel’s? Remember how they ruled? Yeah, me too. Interbellum, the project of jazz drummer Brendan Burke, reproduces that exact sunshine through the covers feel wherein minimal stringed instrumentation is utilized to a massive effect. Sparse electronic flourishes and field recordings evoke GYBE and Set Fire to Flames, but with a more cinematic slant. If hopeful chamber noir isn’t a genre yet, let’s make it for Interbellum. The two tracks below can be found on Over All of Spain the Sky is Clear.
Haptic is another group of Windy City weirdo rippers, and man, I like “Patience Worth.” So don’t look so glum, chums!
Sure, this sort of ambient approach isn’t for everyone, but if aquatic blips and fuzzy, Basinski-style tape loops pique your interest, make no haste in mashing play on the song. Sparse percussion and flapping static make a great soundtrack for flight. I’m pipping this track in on my next parasailing excursion (dude, I’m not kidding).
There are a couple of other artists on the FSS label worth czeching out, and I would encourage you to do so. Between these offerings and massive groups such as Flowers of Hell, post-rock is coming back for more. And I’m excited.
MP3 :::
Interbellum – Gran Canaria
Interbellum – 6EQUJ5
Haptic – Patience Worth
Tim Hecker is not nearly as celebrated as he ought to be, though this notion presents quite a dilemma. His influence stretches far and wide – you hear him in everything from ambient-minded Boards of Canada and Fennesz to pop-oriented M83 (before they sucked it) and Manitoba, to artists that blend the two extremes like Broadcast and Pram. Hecker’s vision and innovation is remarkable, but many of his interpreters have, in some ways, released superior material to him. It parallels the auto industry in a sense – Hecker is the GM to BoC’s Toyota, ya know? That’s certainly a bummer. To this end, Hecker may have realized that some of his more ambient wandering might benefit from a little pruning. Thus, An Imaginary Country.
Out on Kranky on March 10, An Imaginary Country is one of Hecker’s more concise works. However, the sound doesn’t deviate too much – Panopticon-sized swells of warm electronic architecture and lots of spacious, slow-burning textures. “Utropics” ropes in a rather fluid, shoegazey sound a la the Goslings (though less evil). “Currents of Electrostasy” features the aquatic, pinging electronic static hums with an Atomic Age twist that make Ghost Box releases fascinating to listen to. “The Inner Shore” hones in on the subtle melodic beauty that made Hecker’s previous project Jetone so remarkable to the IDM crowd (minus the rhythm, of course). However, very little sticks out beyond these aforementioned movements.
Though Hecker’s recordings are always a mysterious embryonic journey, I think he’s overdue to take back his tradmark sound and expand it into new sonic territories. There’s no doubt how exciting it would be. But An Imaginary Country is all old-hat, save for a slight but possibly insincere sense of urgency. Boreds of Canada indeed.
Fagen-Becker Rating for Quality:
MP3 :::
Tim Hecker – Utropics
Tim Hecker – Currents of Electrostasy
