Dabbling With Gravity And Who You Are
(VHF) Used CD $5.00
Assembled from recordings of their weekly sessions in Michael Flower’s kitchen, the tracks here represent the joyous, celebratory side of the VCO — all forward motion, massed strings, percussion, horns, and little instruments rocketing in a swirl of sound, taking off from where the loose hippie-chant-and-drum action of collectives like Amon Düül intersects with the polygot instrumental approach of mid-’60s Sun Ra.
Hollin
([ no label ]) Used CDR $10.00
Companion piece to Lino Hi, recorded around the same time, and including two live sections. Comes in beautiful sleeve hand-painted and -assembled by Bridget Hayden.
Hot Booty
([ no label ]) Used CDR $12.00
Excellent dense drones from 1999, complete with pipe organ, recorded in a squatted church in Leeds. Clear plastic insert inside standard jewel box
INFINITE LIGHT / VIBRACATHEDRAL ORCHESTRA
Infinite Light / Vibracathedral Orchestra
(Krayon Recordings - KR013) split 7-inch $8.25
VCO drops straight into a heads-down, fully tranced narco-dust trail, with guitar-born fireflies leading the way through a never-changing backdrop heat haze of low-lying smoke-mist and earth-veined throb. Tweets and rattlesnake percussion join mystic keyboard spirits blowing in a weightless drift. The first cut from Infinite Light is a section lifted from a show featuring Barry Dean on guitar, Mick Flower on guitar and organ and Pete Nolan jamming the traps, and its a full, free-rock, psych-out captured through a heavy veil of no-fi smog. Part two wraps solo harmonic guitar vignettes around a falsetto vocal cadence fluctuating at the point of saturation.
JACKIE O MOTHERFUCKER / VIBRACATHEDRAL ORCHESTRA
Jackie O Motherfucker / Vibracathedral Orchestra
(Textile) Used Split LP $12.00
An inspired 2002 pairing of two experimental space drone freak raga outfits
Joka Baya
(VHF) Used LP $12.00
Shorter pieces on the A-side in a high-fidelity style contrast the dark, smoky sound of the rest of the tracks. The percussive grooves are overlaid with Sunroof!-like shimmer, stabbing electric leads, gentle acoustic rain, and droning organ peeking through at opportune moments. The roaring side-long epic on the flip is a droning, phasing slice of psychedelia with the drums of Sunburned Hand’s John Moloney battering the tape in between long stretches of humming stasis.
Lino Ho
(Giardia) Used CD $7.00
“Possibly the perfect CD for anyone who wishes the intro to ‘Venus In Furs’ could last a lifetime,” according to Perfect Sound Forever. “ ‘Can I Put My Thumb In Your Pudding Please?’ sounds like the Art Ensemble of Chicago warming up for a bike race, but after that... wow! You’re thrown into a world where John Cale, Angus Maclise, pre-dipshit Sonic Boom, Elanora Romana, Terry Riley, The Seventh Sons, etc., all meet and climb a beanpole to the stars.”
Long Live The Weeds
([ no label ]) Used CDR $7.00
Three rough-hewn chunks from 1999 and 2000, all recorded in front of actual members of the public at notable Leeds drinking establishments. Each track sees VCO augmented by additional members, including Sticky Foster, Matthew Bower, John Godbert, John Clyde-Evans and Ross Parfitt.
Music For Red Breath
([ no label ]) Used CDR $8.00 (Out-of-stock)
Soundtrack for a film by NYC filmmaker Justin Allen, available at merch tables and via mailorder-only. Clear plastic front insert and metallic traycard in jewelbox
My Gate’s Open Tremble by My Side
(Lexicon Devil) Used CD $5.00
(Roaratorio) Used LP $35.00
Monolithic sheets of organic, repetitive drones that arch into quieter, more subtle territory, rhythms and grooves. A scorchful masterpiece.
CD is a 2004 reissue with three bonus tracks from the same sessions.
LP is from 1999, with painting and rubber-stamped art and text.
Pontiac Lady
(VHF) Used 3xCDR $12.00
2003 tour document with live recordings from WMBR (Cambridge MA), Ecstatic Yod / New Grass (Florence, MA), Free 103 (Brooklyn NY), Orbits (Fredericksburg, VA), Carhole (Belchertown, MA), and Khyber Pass (Philadelphia PA). Edition of 300
Ragged + Right
([ no label ]) Used CDR $15.00
Four tracks, self-released on the occasion of a live performance at the Holy Trinity Church, Leeds, in 2004. Cover is paint and photo on cardboard. Edition of 60
Ridin’ Free / Captain Labour
(Eclipse) Used LP $18.00
Multi-layered live recordings from 2004. Microcosmic sound world. Silkscreened jacket. Edition of 400
Secret Base
(VHF) Used LP $12.00
Full throttle, straight into a raw-sounding live outing, with Mick Flower’s overdriven guitar occupying the same sonic space that gives his Japan banjo / shaahi baaja workouts with Chris Corsano their urgency. The sound is dark and rough, almost Xpressway-like in its claustrophobic atmosphere. The percolating krautrock stylings of “If You Can’t Smoke ’Em” chugs along hypnotically for over 13 minutes to close out the side. The entire B-side is devoted to the clanging free sound of “Eyes of Wood,” where gamelan-like metal percussion dominates.
Smoke Song
(VHF) Used LP $12.00
Gentle exposition starts with Adam Davenport’s santoor (a type of hammered dulcimer) leading the band into a lengthy mid-tempo groove. The second side’s 17-minute “Get It?” lays down the tremolo and phase in a manner reminiscent of the best Spacemen 3 comedowns, taking a pulse and riding it into organ- and percussion-fueled bliss.
Sun Balance
(Qbico) Used LP $25.00
Two side-long excursions from 2007 that “get the neurons firing,” according to Foxy Digitalis. “Manic, static, patient buzz. The guitars and toy instruments pile up on one another and create a dense foam, a musky lather. Demented church organ sounds drive headfirst and there’s even some percussion thrown in for a bit…. Vibracathedral Orchestra pulses, undulates and rides on a wave of sweet electric drone.” Green vinyl
The Queen Of Guess
(VHF) Used CD $6.00
Immense, visceral, rackety, upbeat and percussive, the nine tracks here run through a wide range of styles. “The Slient Socket” has a gamelan-like five-note melody overlaid with a hovering drone. “Magnetic Burn” is the band at its most rock, with “Sister Ray”-style guitar careening along side actual drums. The two twenty-minute epics that bookend the record are a study in contrasts: “Ramshackle Sunrise” has the heavy and excited buzz of the group’s frequent and unpredictable live shows, while the closing “Goodnight Stars Goodnight Air” is a gentler acoustic epilogue, gliding into the rosy future.
Tuning To The Rooster
(Important) Used CD $6.00
The first record by VCO using a 24-track mixing board “is music as a shamanic aid, made as much for the players themselves as for the listeners,” asserts Julian Cope. “The twelve-and-a-half minute ‘Wearing Clothes of Ash’ is like a piano-led Paradieswarts-period drone-a-thon with John Cale and Terry Riley guesting on viola and keys. Following this, the sublime ‘Baptism Bar Blues’ is proof positive that they can rock the riot house with pure adrenaline rush.”
Untitled
([ no label ]) Used 10-inch $28.00
Stellar recordings of cosmic improv from 1998 recalling early John Cale. Silkscreen folder. Edition of 200
Untitled
(Gold Soundz - GS#18) 7-inch $5.00 (Out-of-stock)
Heady drone-based hypnosis from 2004, recorded live. Self-assured, textural, mind-altering. Edition of 420
Versatile Arab Chord Chart
(VHF) Used CD $8.00
Led by Neil Campbell’s sawing violin, tracks like “Wearing Quid Frock” and the epic “Japan Banjo” build up arcs of lingering overtones beneath an undercurrent of melody. They cut the drones with extremely effective bursts of near rock, in a style reminiscent of the Velvet Underground, circa 1966. The band’s combination of clattering percussion, droning strings, and considerable sense of where to put the “groove” on tracks like “Catching Loners With Blank Arms” makes them unique among their peers. Sealed
SUNROOF / VIBRACATHEDRAL ORCHESTRA
Wings Over America
(VHF) Used Split CD $8.00
Eight tracks by Sunroof, a mix of archetypical drone and shimmer, and wild, jarring sampler-analog-bloop-driven action. VCO weigh in with an eclectic mix, including the delicate “Let A Thousand Flowers Bloom,” a clip from a gig at the Royal Festival Hall, and Bridget Hayden blowing up a storm on the flute. Released in 2003 in conjuction with first-ever US tour both groups. Chipboard jacket.
Wisdom Thunderbolt
(VHF) Used CD $5.00
A rocking dispatch neatly combining the Ra-like collage of the title track with the insistent jams of the pulsing “A Natural Fact” and “Order of the Broad Eraser.” More old-school VCO thick blanket of sound are “Ochre Dust” and “Rainbow Whirlwind,” tuned-percussion melody peeking out from the fog. Music by Mick Flower, Bridget Hayden, Neil Campbell, and Adam Davenport. Guest appearances by Chris Corsano, Pete Nolan, John Godbert, and Matthew Bower.