Music Reviews

Village of Spaces – “That’s Understanding” – [Feeding Tube Records]

humana   4/15/2024   12-inch, A Library

This release from Dan Beckman with help from others (including Amy Moon and Caleb Mulkerin) is a pleasing creation of songs written in Big Sur and Santa Cruz and recorded during a pandemic quarantine. Beckman’s voice (as well as other voices) is mellow and backed by various field sounds like surf, birdsong, and other instruments like flute. My favorite tracks are “Agnes of Rainbows” and “Little Wind and Sea.” “Song for Moon” is the most active (rock-like) song on here, and it’s enjoyable, too.

SPF 1985 – “Sunburner” – [Don’t Look Down]

Cousin Mary   4/15/2024   12-inch, A Library

This fine new-to-me instrumental band from Petaluma plays around with surf sounds. Vocals are subtle and hardly noticeable. Interesting use of synths takes this music out of the usual reverb drenched tradition and gives it a full rich quality. Delighted to meet this NorCal band.

Grim, Wayne – “Electric Space Gardeners” – [Thee Obscurantist]

humana   4/14/2024   A Library, CD

Grim composed the music on this CD that is set to the text of “Electric Space Gardeners,” written by Jovi Schnell (who also drew the images on the CD cover). Majel Connery’s lovely voice takes us through the storyline on most of the tracks, which summon sparse images with cello, vibraphone, and other instruments. This is a fascinating listen.

Auditor – “Vernepator Cur” – [Black Horizons]

whngr   4/11/2024   A Library, Cassette

EPILEPTIC AURA EMULATOR

Brooding electronic ambience, intermittent percussive elements, self-harm meditations, intervals of monolithic drones, decaying digital signals, spurned canid therapy, seven horrifying angels with seven electronic trumpets heralding in this final chapter as Moloch feeds. We are drawn to these sounds like moths to flames. Looming and strange, we are a mote among colossi.

Auditor is one Brandon Elkins (Iron Forest, Emerge From The Womb Of The Earth, An Evening Redness) of Chicago, IL and has stated that Auditor was conceived as a method of exploring his depression.

Black Horizons / Sol Y Nieve – 2016

Rust Worship / Nu Sire [coll] – [Self Release]

whngr   4/11/2024   A Library, CD

ANODYNIC BIPOLAR DESTROYER 

Electronic manifestation of manic depression in two parts. The first track a hypnotic ambient bath with distant abstractions and later, a buried electronic pulse. In this pathologic analogy I bestow upon “Defeated / Intercommunicative” the role of the depressive cycle offering a stark contrast to the second track “Avoidant”, an unreasonably disjointed collapse of one’s neural network in real time; frenetic, menacing, varied and focused enough to be legitimately upsetting… unless you’re sick. 

Rust Worship is one Paul Haney of Los Angeles and operator of the Obsolete Units label.

Nu Sire is one Jason “Force Placement” James, also from L.A. Underground electronic producer, dj, and resident of The Black Lodge event collective.

Self release – 2021

Pénombre – “Grande Flamme” – [Forbidden Sonority]

whngr   4/11/2024   A Library, Cassette

CULTE DE L’OMBRE

A grim frontal assault in nine parts from northern three-piece bearing fierce countenances, a genuine underground inscrutability that maintains the proven black metal template (crust punk/d-beat lineage, rocking; not swinging) without feeling derivative. Exhibiting subtle but extremely catchy variation in sound despite moderate lack of production, their crude, emblematic, and medieval French aesthetic further drives home the clou diabolique. Trve, cvlt and wicked, this cassette is in its essence, a perfect North American black metal release from gnarled root to withered fruit.

They have recently found a new thematic direction, casting aside their former Judeo-Christian lyrical content and have further embraced the region of their birth. Including Québécois poet Émile Nelligan’s “Cœurs Blasés” (track 8/B4), a visceral perspective on the miserable fates of the frontiersman who succumbed to their own fears, we receive and understand the devotion to their home as slightly threatening.

Active in the Montréal area of Quebec, Pénombre have been sighted clad in hooded cloaks and are linked nefariously to local analog dominant label:

Forbidden Sonority – 2021

White People Killed Them – “White People Killed Them” – [Sige Records]

Preston Peace   4/10/2024   12-inch, A Library

Free improv without the skronk: The trio of Raven Chacon, John Dieterich (of Deerhoof), and Marshall Trammell improvised these two side-long pieces in 2019 in New Mexico. Electronics, guitar and drums warble, squeal, rumble, stutter and bounce across the 21 minutes of each side of the record. Deftly navigating between frenzy and restraint for the duration, each side has its own character.

Side A is full-bore out of the gate, with all players contributing. It tends noisier, the guitar more dense, the stop-start drumming using the whole kit, and the electronics ranging from high pitched screeches to more modulated tones. It ends in a slow descent, electronics and guitars crackling, rumbling and sawing towards its end.

Side B starts more sparsely, almost a minute of bent guitar before the other players join in. It’s warbling, menacing, paranoid. Electronics come to the forefront, with the guitar more atmospheric than on the A-side. An astonishing moment occurs just before the 8 minute mark: the abstract electronics settle into a melody, the guitar sounding more like a krautrock bassline, and Chacon and Dieterich ride this synchronicity atop Trammell’s percussive whirlwind before it breaks apart less than a minute later.
After working up to a frenzied peak, the b-side decays and fizzles out to near-silence for the last two minutes, the guitar almost entirely absent, the electronics caught in a decaying loop, dominated by a quietly hectic cymbal (and bass drum) workout.

The title and sleeve art provide a suggestion of a political statement, more mystery than manifesto. Who are the “them” of the title? When, and where, were they killed? The A-side runout elaborates slightly: “White people killed them all”. To this reviewer, the US’s treatment of Indigenous peoples came to mind. Draw your own conclusions.

Khruangbin – “A LA SALA” – [Dead Oceans]

Brian Damage   4/10/2024   A Library, CD

Khruangbin: “Airplane” in Thai.

Where they’re from: Burton, Texas, a tiny town midway between Houston and Austin.

They’re popular-ish in places like Australia, New Zealand, Germany, and the UK.

Their fifth album, A LA SALA, is a chill psych-soul-rock-international-instro excursion. Think of it as a soundtrack for an imaginary early-70s French-Brazilian romantic spy film. Mostly instrumental, but some vocals in English, some in French, some in Spanish, some in Portuguese. Lots of Texas-flavored atmospheric reverb guitar and Motown bass. There’s something for everyone here, even if that something is an entremets from an endless stream of the genre you might be leaning a bit too heavily on. Songs run in the 2 – 4 1/2 minute range. No FCCs.

Big Richard – “Live From Telluride” – [CD Baby]

humana   4/9/2024   CD, Country

Big Richard is a fourtet of amazing bluegrass/country musicians and singers who deliver upbeat, swinging music. Mandolin, bass guitar, fiddle, cello, rollicking good lyrics that comment on everything from how everything is going to fall down no matter how big it is to irresistable attraction to loneliness. This is GREAT!

Charming Hostess – “Feast: Eat & Punch Fusion” – [!aNGRr!]

humana   4/6/2024   12-inch, A Library

Charming Hostess offers this Feast of Eat, originally released in 1998, and Punch, originally released in 2005. Hearty, lusty lyrics either sung in Bulgarian, Judeo-Spanish, or English backed by equally lively instruments summons rich cultures and beliefs. Jewlia Eisenberg writes a lot of the words and sings them (with a great chorus of others) and arranges the music. Be sure to look at the sleeve notes to get the full effect.