Familia
(After Music Recordings) LP $16.50 (Out-of-stock)
All hail The New Desolation. One of America’s premier noise bands, Boy Dirt Car returns with a sermon, or possibly a soundtrack to a beautiful yet disturbed mantra, with a possible insight to breakdown. Darren Brown, Dave Szolwinski, Dan Kubinski, Keith Brammer, Steve Whalen, and Jeff Hamilton are joined by guests Rico McCoulm, Mike Sawyer, Josh Mead and Jarrod Olman for this journey into enlightenment or dementia. Found sounds combine with interludes of thrashed out bass, distorto guitar, and manipulations alongside vocal musings, tantrums and almost choral-like insertions within and around. Seems like one for the headphones. Jackets silkscreened by Josh Mead. Vinyl includes one track not available digitally. Edition of 300. TEDIUM HOUSE BEST OF 2010.
Treacherous Young Witches
(After Music Recordings) split LP $16.50 (Out-of-stock)
Boy Dirt Car has got the drift again on this textural affair with layers of echoing and twisting noises, guitar undercurrents, razor'd electro interruptions and erosions. Their twenty-minute, bounce-heavy, clanking rhythm-bed, touched by marimba, fused with found sounds, is organic as a kitten and possessed as the Oracle's mono-toned pronouncements. On the flip, Andy Gallagher enlists the help of Mike Watt (Minutemen), Mike Hoffman, Steve Summers and Graham Brown for four songs. The instantly memorable opener “Should've Stayed in Bed” is reminiscent of a melancholy Grant Hart and won't leave your memory anytime soon. If you're into Dinosaur Jr and Sebadoh, Gallagher has you covered. Original artwork from Josh Mead and Astrid Young (Neil's sister). Edition of 300.
North Beach Jazz
(After Music Recordings) LP $16.00 (Out-of-stock)
The first all-jazz vinyl LP by legendary sax player most famous for his work with the Stooges, but he's also played with everyone from The Violent Femmes to Snakefinger to Smegma. Joined by Mike Watt. Silkscreened sleeve.
MANHORSE 3 THE MEATBAG / MANIMAL QUARTET
Verses b/w Hapless and Seething
(After Music Recordings) split LP $16.50 (Out-of-stock)
Self-described as “new post wave,” Manimal Quartet is Josh Mead’s duo with Aaron Wanzerski. Their six songs here are a primal stew of pop, new wave, psychedelia and punk. Manhorse 3 The Meatbag started as Mead’s aural pipecleaner after the disintegration of Neglected Receptors; as a reaction to the cleaner pop of Manimal Quartet, this fuzzy collection of misanthropic love songs ranges from bombastic scorchers, meditations on alienation and revenge, as well as a delicate ukulele ballad. Comparisons have been made to Men’s Recovery Project, Pere Ubu, and Chrome in a fist fight with Guided by Voices. Screenprinted jacket.
Texar / Maria Askatu
(After Music Recordings) split LP $16.50 (Out-of-stock)
Minneapolis-based improv duet Texar features Darren Brown (Boy Dirt Car) on electronics and recordings and Richard McCollum on guitars and theremin. Maria Askatu is a shadowy collective from Spain lead by Jarrod Olman. Their untitled collage was recorded in their Basque homeland and in Amsterdam. Silkscreened jackets. Edition of 150.
Songs For Nothing
(After Music Recordings) LP $16.50 (Out-of-stock)
A soundtrack for the end of civilization, written for those who can only watch it happen on Youtube with the camera miles away. Songs For Nothing combines the atmosphere of Creation Death Machine (MaxCorp 2010), the creeping walls of Fairweather Mask (Autumn Wind Productions 2009) and various textural elements that showed up on the seven-inches, tapes and CDRs in between. Woods loses a minimal amount of past experimentation to make way for a more straightforward, pissed-off approach. Crashing pianos, broken electronics, a variety of different vocal styles, synth swells and field recordings merge with a thematic focus on our inability to control the the world. This is a record about screaming truth to power in a sound proof room. Red vinyl. Hand-screened cardboard sleeve. Photocopied insert.