Showing posts with label diy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label diy. Show all posts

Friday, December 31, 2010

VA ~ Terrace Industry: M Squared Box 1980-1983 4xCD [Ascension, 2010]



ANCD036

1.01 Systematics - Pulp Baby 4:39
1.02 Systematics - Nuts To You 2:42
1.03 Systematics - Product 2:24
1.04 Systematics - Numbers In General 1:57
1.05 Systematics - 2,4,5,T 2:20
1.06 Systematics - When I'm Older 2:13
1.07 Systematics - Flowers On The Wall 3:26
1.08 Systematics - Vanessa Teratology 2:51
1.09 Systematics - Dinner's On The Table 1:30
1.10 Systematics - Stuh Echipidah 4:12
1.11 Systematics - Mmmm 1:58
1.12 Systematics - Midnight On Balancing Day 3:19
1.13 Systematics - Die For My House 2:19
1.14 Systematics - International Voltage 1:58
1.15 Systematics - Bovine 2:20
1.16 Systematics - Fat Cows Go Down An Eastern Beach 1:46
1.17 Systematics - BBD 2:39
1.18 Splendid Mess - NASA Secret Anzac 5:06
1.19 Patrick Gibson - Bland A 5:02
1.20 Patrick Gibson - Church Of England TV 3:36
1.21 Patrick Gibson - Yeah OK 3:17
1.22 Patrick Gibson - Catatonic 4:42

2.01 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - Dead Travel Fast 6:33
2.02 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - Tael Of A Saeghors 4:42
2.03 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - The Dumbwaiters 4:12
2.04 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - No Threat 4:11
2.05 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - Copper Hats 4:29
2.06 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - Lovers Of Observatory Time 4:12
2.07 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - Speed 3:56
2.08 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - Twisting Toxic Forms 1:19
2.09 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - Fibrephone 1:42
2.10 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - Lumber 4:05
2.11 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - Sea Heads 4:44
2.12 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - We Sway In Our Boats 4:32
2.13 Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast, The - Fighting Baboons 4:04
2.14 A Cloakroom Assembly - Fossil Crash Sleeping 8:18
2.15 A Cloakroom Assembly - Trace And Rumble 2:11
2.16 A Cloakroom Assembly - Trace And Tumble 2:13



3.01 Scattered Order - Bent Up 2:11
3.02 Scattered Order - I'm Not Whole 2:32
3.03 Scattered Order - Pilot Reads Crosswords 4:41
3.04 Scattered Order - The Learn Useless Knowing 2:41
3.05 Scattered Order - Wronging Dogs With Ladders 2:34
3.06 Scattered Order - Hold My Cold Hand 2:41
3.07 Scattered Order - Heat 3:51
3.08 Scattered Order - Personal Safety 3:24
3.09 Scattered Order - Yellow Suit Weighing Machine 4:17
3.10 Barons, The (2) - Paint It Black 4:03
3.11 Height/Dismay - Girl From Ipanema 2:08
3.12 Height/Dismay - Mother's Footsteps 3:12
3.13 Height/Dismay - Picnic On The Nile 2:11
3.14 Prod - A Brick Short 3:30
3.15 Prod - Walkers Walk 2:08
3.16 Prod - N.W.O.B. 4:50
3.17 Prod - Coming Attractions 1:10
3.18 Prod - Fish Hook 3:11
3.19 SoliPsiK - See Saw 2:25
3.20 SoliPsiK - Chamber Musik 3:10
3.21 SoliPsiK - Zombod 3:05

4.01 Ya Ya Choral - Waiting Time 3:19
4.02 Ya Ya Choral - Cowboys Are Pt 2 3:23
4.03 Ya Ya Choral - No Control 2:16
4.04 Ya Ya Choral - Nonsense 2:46
4.05 Ya Ya Choral - Jolly Work 2:33
4.06 Ya Ya Choral - My Friend The Chocolate Cake 2:30
4.07 Ya Ya Choral - You Ruined My Fun 2:18
4.08 Ya Ya Choral - God's Buzzsaw 2:55
4.09 Belle Du Soir - Treasure Island 2:22
4.10 Belle Du Soir - Ultramarine 1:45
4.11 Pel Mel - Click Click 2:51
4.12 Wild West - Pelican 2:19
4.13 Limp, The - Pony Club 2:46
4.14 Tame O'Mearas - Curl Curl 2:20
4.15 No Night Sweats - Harry Wong's Cat 2:54
4.16 Denial - California Dreaming 3:11
4.17 Same, The - Why 2:34
4.18 Slugfuckers - Dolphins ? Fish 4:34
4.19 Pleasant Peasants - Pussman Polka 2:36
4.20 Severed Heads - Eat Roland 3:42
4.21 Terse - Hello M Squared 2:18
4.22 M Squared - Hello Terse 2:3

'The M Squared label operated in Sydney, Australia from 1980 to 1983. Founded by Mitch Jones and Michael Tee of seminal noisemakers Scattered Order, and quickly joined by Systematics' Patrick Gibson, the label produced 24 vinyl and seven cassette releases over three hectic years. It all took place in a modest recording studio in an inner city terrace house.

The M Squared catalogue, then and now, is resistant to classification. Contemporary journalists tagged it experimental, electronic and avant-garde – shorthand for 'not what the rest of us are listening to'. In hindsight it's been described as post punk, minimalist, synth wave, no wave, synth pop, ambient, noise, pop electronica, art rock... whatever. Genres were never the point, and many M Squared artists took more than one approach to their music.

During the label's brief lifespan, Sydney's inner city was home to a great variety of sounds that existed almost completely outside the mainstream. M Squared, its artists and supporters had, over the intervening 30 years or so, been largely unacknowledged as a small but vibrant episode in the story of Australian music.

This 30-year anniversary set includes tracks from Systematics, The Makers of The Dead Travel Fast, Scattered Order, Ya Ya Choral, A Cloakroom Assembly, Patrick Gibson, Prod, Pel Mel, Wild West, SoliPsiK, The Limp, Tame O'Mearas, Severed Heads, Height/Dismay, Belle du Soir, The Slugfuckers, The Same, Splendid Mess, Pleasant Peasants and The Barons. In addition, a 36 page booklet contains a label history, recollections from the bands involved and unpublished photos. And to slip under your glass as you sit comfortably for a listen, a set of commemorative drink coasters. Cheers'

==> perch merch <==

aint seen this cracker on any of the hep year end best-of lists, but i reckon this kinda ish is destined fer dustbin status regardless of who might wave the freak flag. pound fer pound, some of the freshest takes on the mutagenic, post-punk, synth-wave strains to date, featuring several of the most original Oz bands evvver. the makers of the dead travel fast are of course my heroes, but i spin the rest with freq & am forever hipping youngsters to virtually every weirdo on here. please support the label & bands by perching the merch & honour their memory by including em on future mixes/playlists :) 320 rips

Saturday, October 23, 2010

KHA - YM ~ 10 " GMT LP [FLVM,1979]



A1. Balance
A2. Un Matin a St. Anand
A3 San Fedo
A4. Recontre Impromptue
A5. Big Ben
A6. Dernier Flash

B1. Voyage ou Comment y Aller
B2. Seven Easy Calls
B3. Special 2
B4. Melopee a Retard
B5. Georges
B6. 10 '' GMT



'Kha-Ym was a duo of Alain Gerbe and Jacky Michaud. Alain conceived the album on his own and essentially played all the other parts on the recording - bass, percussions, guitars and keyboards. He brought in Jacky to fill out the drums and add additional percussions. Influenced by their interest in progressive music, they decided to create an album. Alain wrote the music, and the duo practiced for some time before they began recording, in their home, with two Revox A77 tape machines. That way they put together all the tracks recorded to be included on their only album - 10" GMT. Knowing in advance that no big label would sign them because their music was not commercial [& punk was the flavor of the season at the end of the 1970s], they decided to press the album themselves at FLVM, a French ‘do it yourself’ label. Before taking it to press, the guys added some overdubbing at Roanne studio with sound engineer Mark Tamburro, and the album was released as a Roanne Music record. The big advantage at the Roanne studio were the additional instruments and the polyphonic Korg synth that Alain used through the recording.' source

'A duo, composed of a multi-instrumentalist (keyboards, guitar, bass, voice) and a percussionist, which offers an album constituted of multiple, short, varied, polished, inventive, instrumental pieces, with a naîve charm, sometimes evocative of EDEN, EGG or ROEDELIUS. The compositions are attractive, built around and developed around some organ's notes, some guitar's chords or some outlines of melodies, often delicate and fragile, constructed by the keyboards whose the multiple registers and sounds create solemn and precious tones or sometimes evoke the timbre of a harpsichord, a harp or a mechanical organ... Original and excellent' source

owl asked me to post some obscure 'classics' & while i've never been a huge fan of 'prog' per se, this is music to my ears. weird diy keyboard driven bedroom prog with some occasional baroque folque elements i guess & a really unique vibe throughout. no two songs sound the same & they have many different styles, all of them ace & super listenable. it was difficult to choose a representative sound sample because this record just keeps getting better & i have a different fav depending on the weather. i know i'm pretty terrible at writing record reviews but i hate reading them anyway. that's why there's quotes! a 320 rip of a wonderfully original album, perfect for a rainy day like today!

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

The Makers of the Dead Travel Fast ~ The Vessels [M Squared] 1981



A1 No Threat
A2 The Shadows Of Mde. Velo's Story
A3 Illuminated Bay, Illuminated Buoy
A4 Row Boat
A5 Into The Arc
A6 Dance Of The Trout
A7 Copper Hats

B1 Mesh
B2 Lovers Of Observatory Time
B3 The Barbers, The Barbers
B4 Zebra Crossing



Peter Richardson [piano, keyboards]
Greg Addison [guitar]
Steve Couri [bass, guitar, synth]
Tim Schultz [bongos, saxophone]
Shane Fahey [synthesizer]

Recorded at M Squared Studios

'One of the best kept secrets in rock n' roll is the renaissance in Australian music in the first half of the 80s. Almost every capital city in the nation produced at least one or two really good bands, and Sydney and Melbourne a stack. Makers Of the Dead Travel Fast were likely the most obscure of the lot.

I simply must tell you this story, because it illustrates the band perfectly. The Makers gig we attended in Sydney in 1981 was the most laid-back rock n' roll show I've ever seen. The entire audience was sitting cross-legged on the floor. The band came on, six or seven people. They never introduced themselves, they just played. Throughout the entire show no one in the band said a word. Not a single person clapped, cheered, booed or even talked during the songs. We couldn't even figure out if it was them or not, because no one had ever seen a photograph of them, and they didn't play anything off the album. Then they played "Zebra Crossing". The song finished and we cheered like maniacs - all five of us! The band walked offstage. That was it.

The Vessels is post-punk instrumental music. The album is bookended by probably the two weirdest pop songs I've ever heard. It is pop - melodic, concise - but it's just out there. Electronic, robotic..? But catchy! And lyrics to boot: "Two of my former idols have now gone to the pack/ I pitted them against each other while we were countin' back to back.'

Between these bookends is the mood music. The mood is of being adrift on a still dark ocean in the middle of the night. It is curious, it is creaking. Just when things seem to be sinking right down into ambience, the pace lifts a tad again, piano-playing respectful and measured. And then.. "Copper Hats"!! One of the classic weird rock n' roll songs, 'Copper Hats' is the sound of a bunch of retards banging pots and pans and muttering - yet still the ever-lingering pop catchiness!

Side 2 sees the band clearly transcending the ambient tag with the addition of some free-form brass which reflects the milieu of jazz-punk contemporaries Laughing Clowns and others. This side is less essential, with repetitive, hypnotic pounding beginning to drag by the middle of the side. A strong finish though, with 'Zebra Crossing'. The Vessels, another minor classic; the sort of obscure rock n' roll grail you could - if you were that way inclined - spend the rest of your life searching for.' ~ source

one of the dreamiest albums from Oz's answer to Tuxedomoon, who retain a haunting vibe throughout without resorting to too much saxophone silliness. simply stunning piano musique, 320 enchanting evocations later

Saturday, October 9, 2010

Bruce Haack ~ Farad: The Electric Voice [Stones Throw, 2010]







released & unreleased vocoder recordings, 1970-1982

'Bruce Haack's music is rooted in the idea that humans and electronic machines share a reciprocal relationship that manifests itself through sounds. In order to further explore this dynamic, Haack dropped out of Juilliard to pursue a more experimental course in, surprisingly, educational children's music. Haack released material off his own label Dimension 5 Records in 1962, which allowed him to mix kinetic energy, infuse psychedelic philosophy, and pluck sounds from various genres across the board. Adding to his musical pastiches, Haack used home-made modular synthesizers, proto-vocoders, and the heat-touch sensitive Dermatron to expand his music into the technological realm of creativity.

After contributing to commercials, TV shows such as Mister Rogers, and theatre productions, Haack released the acid-rock-techno gem Electric Lucifer, a conceptual masterpiece that maps out a war between heaven and hell, and where notions of "powerlove" are mediated through Moog synths.

Farad serves as a glowing primer of Haack's work throughout his career. Touching on the lush, pysch-electronic grooves of the Electric Lucifer period and extending to his more abstract, angular works, this compilation highlights his use of the Farad, one of the first musical vocoders invented at the time. Yet amidst echoey reverb and haunting drones, Haack himself manages to create something primal and human, not necessarily conflating human and electronic but posing them as compatible partners.' ~ press hype

'Amazing electric grooves from synth innovator Bruce Haack – whose pioneering use of analog synths and vocoder vocals in the service of great, if far out songcraft was pretty much unrivaled in the 70s and into the early 80s – the period in which this excellent compilation on Stones Throw highlights! Haack's earlier successes were children's music in the 60s, and one of the coolest aspects of his 70s recordings was how that somewhat bright-eyed and innocent sing-song-y approach moved into more surrealist, weirder realms on albums like Electric Lucifer, that album's lesser known, still quite brilliant sequel, and albums like Haackula and Bite. Choice cuts from those albums as well as rare singles are rounded up for Stones Throw's impeccably curated overview. The electric voice and synth errata brings an otherworldly vibe to catchy songs – and Haack's use of the vocoder was followed by so many others who would become household names, from Kraftwerk to Pink Floyd to Moroder.' ~ dusty

snap up the re-ish

pretty slammin correction of uncle brucie's vocoder steez, even a couple we'd never heard before. for the uninitiated, it's highly recommended you trace both 'electric lucifer' lp's as well. they're owl up in the interwebs, just perform a quick search with yr favourite engine

Friday, July 9, 2010

Milk from Cheltenham - Triptych of Poisoners [It's War Boys] 1983 UK







01 The Man Who Cried 2:20
02 Where Is The Money To Come From? 0:56
03 Mr. Fridge 1:38
04 International Questionnaire 0:42
05 What About Air War 2:15
06 Do The Ready Can 2:07
07 Decisions 0:57
08 Snappy Fingers 2:44
09 The Plan Must Rule 1:12
10 El Toro Saldrà Cuando Suena El Clarin 6:40
11 Our Dictator 1:08
12 Invitation To Action 2:56
13 Das Elefantenkalb 4:01
14 Air - Sound - Light 1:36
15 Passport To Happiness! 1:56
16 Triptych Of Poisoners 2:18
17 Krazy Golf 2:10
18 Can A Vacuum Cleaner Really Work Quietly? 0:50
19 The Geek 3:39



Brass - Miss Blick
Cello - Sandhya E
Drums [Kettle], Percussion - Lance Hunter
Executive Producer - Emanuele Carcano
Featuring - Lepke Buchvalter , Salamander, Victorr Lounge
Piano [Grand] - Veronique
Producer - Christopher Grey , Milk From Cheltenham , Xentos Bentos
Recorded By - Chris Grey , L. Voag , Milk From Cheltenham , Peter Bullen , Thoth
Saxophone, Engineer [Dubbing] - Peter Bullen
Vocals [Vox Humana] - Susanne Browne

'Amos [aka L. Voag] of the Homosexuals released this gem on his It's War Boys label in 1983, in a limited run of a measly 300 copies. The material was recorded, mostly on a cassette recorder, between 1979-1981, and although band leader Lepke claims to have wanted Milk from Cheltenham to sound like the Beach Boys, Triptych of Poisoners is a barrage of twisted avant pop, art rock, sound collages, and experimental noise that bears some semblance to This Heat, Resident, Zoviet France & Henry Cow, but primarily explores uncharted musical waters. highly recommended'

prolly not one for the strictly global village musique lovers [too noisy & lo-fi] but we endeavour to provide a lil sumptin fer every stripe. 19 post punk passports to peppiness