Wednesday, December 10, 2008

Boar : seeing and loving what you are seeing

IS THERE SOMEONE ALIVE IN THERE...
..ARE YOU OK..ARE YOU OK......
IM GONNA GET YOU OUT OF THERE....
says the panicked female voice in distress,
its a sample from some movie,
no googling brought up the right
script so i don't know what its from,
but its how the first felt cat records
released Boar album starts,

track two is a two and a half minuet
static hysteria jam, with a whooping
siren and microphone feedback,
i don't know if he actually used a
microphone but its that kind of sharp
and swooning feedback you get from a speaker,


track three slows things down considerably
with stars of the lid or Windy and Carl
type vibes, soft and floaty, a constant
and repeating melody washed out and bassy
with cymbals,

track four is like a battleship game in a bathtub
its bubbly and splashing attack noise,
it turns into squealing screams like that thing
you can do with a balloon by stretching
the neck and making it wail and squawk,

boar is alex nowacki from Dubuque Iowa,
i have reviewed his work before and he
always produces something different and exciting
ranging from harsh attack noise too soft ambient
guitar and drum musings,

this album is no exception,
its a mix of plunderphonics and original
noise destruction and drum punkouts,

it comes in a folded brown paper bag
sealed with wax with a piece of label
runner devin darts jeans on the front
with boar written in marker, its a charming
DIY aesthetic of recycled materials and homemade
love,
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felt cat 08
http://www.myspace.com/feltcat
http://www.myspace.com/boarnoise

Monday, December 8, 2008

Ghost bees :Tasseomancy

Ghost bees is a twosome from Halifax, nova scotia,
comprised of twins Romy and Sari Lightman,
they started as a bigger band back in 2005
with others accompanying them on drum bass and violin etc..

they left the bigger collective sound behind
for a more delicate and elementary style,
giving more room to exercise
there lyrical fortitude,

they have a formidable ability
to make your heart swoon and your stomach
churn all at the same time, the marriage
of there beautiful harmony's and the seriousness
of there gruesome tales of wedding vampires and
elf kings stealing peoples children, is like drinking
absinthe in pineapple juice,

they have released a beautiful debut on
youth club records filled with fairytale imagery
and simple and eloquent mandolin and guitar
melodies,

most of these songs where available
on a previously released 6 track demo,
Sinai and Tasseomancy where new to this edition
but one of the tracks i was hoping to hear
rerecorded "haunting intervals" was missing
but after listening to the whole album
i found it as a bonus track at the end
of goldfish and metermaids,which was a nice
surprise, this was probably documented
on the youth club website and every thing
but i was happy to be surprised,

i cant say that one track stands out from the others
it kind of all fits together as one mouthful,
like a book or a film, not that its a concept album
or anything like that but track to track it dose
flow like a family tree of story's, these two girls
deliver songs about other peoples history as if they
had lived it themselves, they do delve into
there own history in the song tasseomancy,
which tells the tale of there great great grandmother
who practiced the art of tea leaf reading ,

i have seen ghost bees compared to joanna newsom
so many times i have even made a poster for a
ghost bees show where i was told to write
"for fans of Joanna Newsome" on it,
if anyone wants to explain this to me id love it,
it seems people like to compare female vocalist
with any other women who are doing anything offbeat,
maybe i just don't hear it though who knows,


i cant say enough good thing about these
two, this cd is a must have for any fans
of the rising folkpunk/gothfolk genera that's building
with bands like timber timbre, Laura Barrett
and bruce-peninsula,

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here is some video footage i captured last year, check it

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Kevin Greenspon : Del Tecate

12 tracks of pure pop punk,
not your supermarket sk8ter pop,
but unadulterated angular influenced
pop melodys played in a sloppy analog
sound,

its a concept album about the
effects of alcohol on a group of young kids
in a small valley town in southern California,
which obviously leads to binge drinking
unprotected sex, crack babies, posting your one night stands
diary on the internet and all that fun stuff,


the album plays around with feelings
of isolation and going nowhere in life,
but still finding those moments when you
wouldn't want to be any where else than
where you are,

Greenspon released this album on his
own wierdpunk and popfolk label Bridgetown Records,
on cdr, it was also released on cassette limited to 20 on
scotch tapes, who put out all recycled material really limited
cool shit,

its a good release but i would like to
hear these songs with drum and bass added,
just to spread it out a bit

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buy all the goodshit here
http://www.bridgetownrecords.tk/