King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard With Mild High Club Sketches Of Brunswick East photo: turntablelab.com In some ways, Sketches of Brunswick East is an album that left me more impressed with King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard than Murder of the Universe. The latter album is what made me fall in love with the band and solidified what the name “King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard” is supposed to represent musically. But, this band doesn’t adhere by any standards:...
El Topo Soundtrack Alejandro Jodorowksy photo: turntablelab.com El Topo is the kind of movie that should be seen by everyone simply due to its historical significance. It’s one of those movies that has nothing to lose. Some will love it and become interested in its creator Alejandro Jodorowsky and all his movies, others will like it, others will appreciate it for just how unique and strange it is, others will consider this movie homework and something a film buff ought...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Go Farther In Lightness 2LP by Gang Of Youths. For the nearly half-century since the genre’s inception now, one of the few steadfast foundations upon which punk rock has stood has been nihilism. Consistently, the spirit of punk has been one of “Fuck it all – strip the music down to the barest essentials and get emotionally dark and bleak – at least that way we’ll all beat the world at...
Xetas The Tower How does one begin to describe Xetas? “Powerful,” that’s how. But also sinister, relentless, and exciting. Xetas came to my attention by pure chance. A chance I love to take with 12XU records. More and more they are becoming my primary source for new music exposure. That goes for you as well, dear reader. Listening to the Tower it’s evident that Xetas are not interested in wasting anyone’s time. Yours or their, for that matter. Legend has...
Miles Davis Sorcerer (Vinyl Me Please) Jazz is like art to me. I don’t understand it, I think it’s pretentious and I think it hasn’t been good for decades, but I know what I like when I experience it. What’s a person like me to do? It’s been more than a decade that I decided to give jazz a shot and I haven’t looked back since. I have my favorite artists, albums, and songs. I have no idea what makes...
Obnox Niggative Approach Finding new music can be a daunting thing. There’s so much of it and most of it is bad. And, conventional news outlets are either snobby or just flat-out-wrong (not us, of course). So if you want to be exposed to good new music, there’ a few things you can do. First, always take the advice of friends. Second, stick to a magazine that caters to your sensibilities. Third, dip into the releases of a label you...
Bloodshot Bill & Shannon Shaw “Honey Time” 7 Inch EP Every now and then, the stars align just right to give us something unique and special. That’s exactly the thought that goes through my head when I think of the Bloodshot Bill and Shannon Shaw split 7” Honey Time. For those not in the know, this 7 inch is a fitting and peculiar union of songwriters. Bloodshot Bill is a honky-tonk madman and, as Jon Spencer said, the hardest working...
Howlin’ Wolf Best of the Sun Records Sessions Are you serious about music? We are. So much so that we consider it homework. It’s not enough to enjoy the music, but also to understand where it came from: to trace it and pinpoint references. Forget what people say about appropriation: good art is all about combining influences and making something new; it’s all about bottom-up expression. This is why it’s important to go back and understand the sources....
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into Vamos’ 1, 2, 3 LP. The problem with every great music revival is that, as energizing and exciting as it might be, there’s a certain safety and security in knowing that the ideas involved have worked before and can work again in a walk – if enough people believe in it. Such thought processes have worked well several times over in the last twenty-five years, and it would be easy to figure...
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the This American Blues LP by Ford Madox Ford. Remember a couple of decades ago when, against some fairly long odds, The Blasters managed to cross-wire punk rock and Americana/roots music? The results were pretty cool – the group actually did manage to break onto the popular radar for a minute (with some help from Quentin Tarantino and the soundtrack from From Dusk Til Dawn), but basically remained pretty niche because punk...