(Please, I implore you to listen to this. Yes, I know that’s a triangle, but I assure you that this has nothing to do with drag or witch-house or whatever you wanna call it.)
Black Polygons is the musical project of Cyril Rampall. When I reached out to him for more info on the enigmatic project, Cyril responded with only a sentence or two. In fact the only thing he said to me was: “I’m from Paris, and this EP is my third release. Recorded here, at my home.” A man of few words. I can dig it.
Opting to instead let the music do most of the talking, I can tell you that Landscape is a short collection of minimalist tracks that wield a crushing beauty. Featuring mostly sonic tones created with synths and guitars, these three tracks showcase an organic beauty. Like when the wind sweeps through the trees in just the right way to natural musicality. Haunting, ethereal, and gorgeous.
Title: Mr Wilson Metal BeachArtist: AFRIKA PSEUDOBRUITISMUS357 plays
AFRIKA PSEUDOBRUITISMUS // Waikiki Kosmos
The internet is a strange place, guys. Where else could something like this exist? I mean, I can’t even pretend to understand exactly what this is and frankly I don’t really want to either. Released on the vibe-alicious label Ailanthus Recordings, Waikiki Kosmos is an amalgam of sample-collaging and internet drone that does its best to defy description. So bear with me, I’m going to try and somehow squeeze this into my box of understanding.
According to the label’s bandcamp page, AFRIKA PSEUDOBRUITISMUS operates two different soundcloud pages. One puts the project in Morocco, the other Spain. The project’s blog is a collection of bizarre collage work with accompanying soundcloud and youtube links. It’s this sort of messy ambiguity that defines the music as well as the overall aesthetic. Misplaced samples run rampant, interwoven into pools of watery, era-ambiguous, droning synths. It’s like the byproduct of a pseudo-tropical pool party hosted in ReBoot’s Mainframe City. Hands up if you know what I’m talking about.
This Phoenix band reached out to me after they saw the write-up that I did for one of their fellow Phoenix bands Otro Mundo. They are called Drainbowand they play a very droney brand of psych-noise that could have only come out of an arid climate. It feels dried-out and bleached and it burns with the heat and intensity of the desert sun.
There is something almost naturalistic about the way this band does things and it reaches down into even their chosen imagery. It’s almost as if these four tracks were dreamt up in a smokey sweat lodge session. Each track is most obviously identified by the buzzing guitar distortion that is sort of the burning hot embers at the heart of the music. Building on that foundation the band creates storms of pummeling noise that are as harsh as they are listenable.
Drainbow is out now on Tagobella and you can download it for from Drainbow’s bandcamp page. Make sure you also check out the label’s bandcamp page which is home to a ton of other awesome releases that I will be eagerly checking out in the future.
If you ever, like me, get in the mood for some absolutely soul-crushing drone the search can sometimes be long and arduous. For me, drone is either something that sucks me in or it doesn’t. Fortunately, the folks at Sweat Lodge Guru made the search a little easier by releasing Wroom’s Fungal Overlord. The label not only claims it as one of their best, but also likens it to an “intense, stunning walk through a spidery metallic drone mansion.” There you are, poetry.
It seems a bit criminal to listen to this beast any other way than straight through on a pair of solid headphones or speakers. But to give you just a taste check out the album opener “Cylindrical Cubezoid” a buzzing, creeping monster of viscous gothic noise with doom-like undertones. Fungal Overlord is a dark journey, to be sure, but one that must be taken. You can download it for free on bandcamp or own it on cassette from Sweat Lodge Guru.
Title: Video Thrills - 'Dr. Pepper Party Zone' - Video Thrills - 2011 (AMDD083)563 plays
Video Thrills // Video Thrills
Featuring three of the four members of Honeydrum, this new side project Video Thrillsis the most recent outing by these crazy New Brunswick dudes. If you’re familiar with the pitch-perfect retro pop of Honeydrum then listening to Video Thrills self-titled album should not be too much of a mental stretch. They are definitely riffing off of the same era, albeit in a fundamentally different way.
Just going off of the name, the song titles, and the artwork should give you a clue as to what to expect here. But let me tell you that these guys are into more than just resurrecting and looping tired VHS soundscapes. What they do here is somehow manage to corral what sounds like lost 1980’s commercial transmissions that have been seemingly bouncing around in space for 25 years. Abandoning pop sensibilities for vibrant droning ambient pieces, Video Thrills has created something that feels simultaneously vintage yet wholly new. Fitting in alongside acts James Ferraro, Punks On Mars, and Rangers; the sounds of Video Thrillswill thrill for sure.
I love getting emails with little more than a link. I know that some people hate it but I much prefer it to an endless string of lifeless PR emails spouting off all the reasons why I should love their band. I’m not saying that that sort of thing doesn’t have its place, but I just prefer to let the music speak for itself. And regarding ĸŋüłł that is literally all I was able to do.
You see all of the vocals here are sung/spoken in Russian with the overall fidelity feeling like it’s been tied to the back of a truck and dragged for five miles. The style wavers between crushing drone and some of the slimiest experimental psych this side of the trash can. It’s very dark and potentially alienating music, but for all of its grit and grime there is something undeniably hypnotic about it all. So yeah, no apologies for this one.
Title: Overdoseful YouthArtist: Bodhi Syurfs170 plays
Bodhi Syurfs // Midnight Premiere
I knew I likedBodhi Syurfs, but come on! This release is so crazy good! On his last release, Bodhi Syurfs was content to swirl these big dark clouds of crushing drone and if you were able to see the wonder through the noise then there was a lot to play around with. On his latest album Midnight Premiere he almost basically starts from scratch and builds a solid collection of songs that feels like a noirish California nightmare.
Now don’t be mistaken, Bodhi Syurfs is still all about the noise, but here he adds some coherent lyricism (emphasis on “some”) and it all smacks of a stab at accessibility. If I had to compare it to something I would say that it’s not in an entirely different universe as Alex Zhang Hung-Tai’s Dirty Beaches (when he was content to make camp on the noisier side of town). It’s a dark journey to a shady place where the ghosts of the past still linger amongst the living. Sure the hairs might stand on the back of your neck, but who doesn’t like that feeling?! If this at all sounds appealing to you then please take the journey. It is time well spent.
Title: To Love and be LovedArtist: Good Amount210 plays
Good Amount // Power
Christian Filardo is one righteous dude who really refuses to be pinned down. It was only around a month ago that he released his quite excellent album In a Quiet Way under the name Good Amount. Even though it was his second album under that moniker, Christian managed to completely reinvent Good Amount’s sound to blog acclaim. Rather than rest on his laurels though, he pushed onward to yet another album and once again turned Good Amount on its head with Power.
The difference between In a Quiet Way and Power are immediately recognizable. Where In a Quiet Way experimented with the gap between his previously vocal based compositions and glitchy electronics, Power obliterates the flood gates (heh, that rhymed) and really lets Christian’s creativity run wild. And while Good Amount has always been pretty much synonymous with atmosphere, the lengthy droning pieces on Power feel like thunderous vibrations from another world sent coursing through your body. Nothing is held back and it is all just thrown onto the canvas and allowed to drip and run into itself creating a living world of bleeding colors. If you are into drone then I highly suggest checking it out. You can download it for free on his bandcamp.
By the way, Christian is one of the hardest working dudes in the blogosphere. In addition to Good Amount, he also runs his own digital/cassette label Holy Page, he’s an amazing visual artist as seen on Habitual Glory, and he also (most recently) runs a music blog called Suave Citation with his brother Thomas Filardo.
Here is another one for you to start out the weekend right.
According to his (their?) badcamp, Bodhi Syurfs is “a dude from California with a surf board and some recording equipment in the van.” Now whatever you do, don’t read this as surf rock or beach pop or summer whatever, because that is so not what is going on here. More of a droning experimental noise project, Bodhi Syurfs will smack you upside the head and leave you feeling slightly fuzzy.
It’s sort of like when you are having fun chillin in the ocean and then before you know it a particularly strong wave comes and knocks you off your feet. After tumbling around in the surf and smashing into the sandy ocean floor for a few moments you finally find your footing. You stand up, fix your bathing suit, and head right back out into the surf laughing to yourself.
OK. Now that I’m done highlighting my favorite releases so far this year I can now start highlighting some totally awesome music I’ve heard lately. First up is Native Slacker, whose name actually happens to be quite perfect for the kind of music they play. Let me explain.
Coming to you from sunny San Diego, these guys are making perfect music to just slack off to. Though it’s obviously heavily influenced by drone I would not label it as such (although it does have a “droning” quality to it). Laying a bed of strange sounding samples the band then rips through your ears drums with a buzzing onslaught of almost sludge-like noise. The guitars wail and moan and creep along the floor dragging with them the heavily distorted vocals. It all melts together into an amorphous blob of amazing noise like crayons left in the car on a particularly hot summer day.
I really don’t know if last year’s oil disaster in the Gulf was of inspiration to this song or not. Either way, it’s a scorching five minute drone piece that unfurls a brutal tone on the listener despite a pace that plods along sluggishly on its five minute run. The project itself was originally called BP Gulf also, but has since been changed to Star Destr❀yer.
I’ve actually been spinning this track quite regularly for the last few weeks thanks to mastermind Scott Michael. It was really only a matter of time until I shared it with yall. If you’re a fan of blistering drone then I would highly recommend checking it out. Like a constant barraging sandblast, this track will rust metal and strip the paint so make sure you listen to it on headphones.
The music of Peopling is a jarring swan dive that sends the listener headlong into a world of jagged lines and sharp electronic noise. Gears squeak and crank and the vocals are trickled down through a filter of metallic fuzz. Primal screams crack through the atmosphere with the electric intensity of a bolt of lightning. Although this wasteland is littered with sharp metal and rusted hinges, there is something truly compelling about it. Hailing from Brooklyn, Peopling will take you to a place that you might not want to visit at first, but once you’re there you’ll find it hard to leave. Stream and/or buy this beast on their bandcamp site. Not for the feint of heart, but I’m really digging this delicious noise.
With no shortage of character, the tracks on Wallscenery Demos’ Half Asleep. Half Awake are full of atmosphere and seem to float in on a cloud of dreamy psychedelia. Dabbling in folk, psych, and dream pop the band really does their best to set these songs up before the listeners with the care and precision of a studio set designer. Creating lush worlds for the listeners to explore, the tracks are accessible enough that a first listen is all that is necessary to fall in love; yet they also possess a quality of timed maturity that allows the tracks to grow inside the comfort of the ear canals. (Again) to stream or buy this thing, head to their bandcamp site.
The bedroom pop project of J. Blake Wood is an exercise in beauty through limitations. Recording under the name The Bird and the Radio, Wood purposely set up recording obstacles surrounding his EP. Establishing a “$100 rule” he decided that any instrument or piece of recording equipment had to be less than $100 or had to be received as gifts. It’s an interesting concept that steps dangerously close to being gimmicky, but the music stands as testament to capable hands. While the production smacks of obvious bedroom quality, the music itself has a charm that no amount of money can buy. Stream or download
Deep within Aster there are two churning black lungs puffing breaths of smokey air into the atmosphere. Then like a whirling dust storm they slowly take the form of these buzzing drone pieces. Sparks fly as power lines cross their path and anything not nailed down is sucked into the vortex. It’s the perfect storm. On their bandcamp Aster has three EPs each consisting of three tracks. It’s as if the music is acting as some sort of unholy trilogy of noise. If you dig it you can download all three EPs for free. They’re just a few clicks away, so get on it.
It’s looking like tomorrow will be the last of the mega posts. Hope you guys enjoyed unorthodoxy. Regularity should resume shortly. Looking forward to it!
Title: A Waltz (To Wonder)Artist: Austyn Sullivan250 plays
Austyn Sullivan // Recollections/Become
What beautiful noise this dude can make. Austyn Sullivan, being no stranger to this blog, has wowed me once again with his ability to manipulate what at first might seem like a cacophony of fuzzy noise into these short bursts of dream like drone. It’s as if he molding the noise with his bare hands, sculpting it until his creation is complete. If you listen closely, buried underneath all of the static and the reverb lie beautiful melodies. They are there if you are willing to find them.
The tracks on Recollections/Become find Austyn whittling down his sound to near perfection. Our picture of who Austyn might be becomes a little clearer as he pushes himself further and further into the light.
Recollections/Become is actually serving as a precursor to an upcoming full-length album called Recollections Become Phantoms. For now head to his bandcamp where you can download the EP as well as his other material.
Dan Lewis from Bon Voyage Records just sent me this incredible release. It’s the label’s most recent cassette by an Australian band called Secret Birds. If you’re into spacey, world-music-influencedpsych rock then this should be right up your alley.
If you’re going to commit to making 10-minute long experimental pieces then you have to have something there in the music that commands the listeners attention. Secret Birds have created such a texturally rich cassette with Peace Forest. Layers of trailing wobbly psych music snakes its way across the jungle floor, absorbing anything and everything that falls under its belly. It grows fat and bulbous and on the verge of exploding with life. There is so much to be discovered here. Fans of High Wolf and Sun Araw should find this to be easy listening.
Peace Forest is a stunning listen. You can still buy the cassette from the label’s store.
If there is one thing that I love about Babes’ music is their refusal to stick to one style. I previously posted about their track “Teeth” and how I fell in love with its super blow-outness. Now most of the songs on this five-track single sound much cleaner (save for maybe “Kitty”), but they are still undeniably Babes.
The stylistic wandering is pretty wide here, given the single is only five tracks long. Whether Babes is crafting 1980’s influence synth pop jams or experimenting with sonic drone textures they always do it with this sort of sweet & sour type of flare. Babes mastermind (who only goes by the name “Z”), sticks to the confines of the conventional song structure, but his love of warped experimentation is what really keeps things interesting here. It is the balance between those two elements that keep Babes’ music interesting, and as long as he allows his creativity to wander I’ll happily go along for the ride.
Download the Jets single (as well as his other stuff) for free on his bandcamp.
