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A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the California Heart LP by Great Apes. It is often said that the mastering process required to present music on vinyl (instead of CD or mp3) is part of what really changes the overall experience of the format (above and beyond the obvious physical contact made between stylus and vinyl), but that still doesn’t exactly explain the difference a listener will discover between a digital copy of Great Apes’ newest album, California...

Artist: Mike Watt Album: “Ring Spiel” Tour ’95 Label: Columbia/Legacy/Sony Music Ever walked into a record store and, digging through a vast and vastly disorganized bin of CDs, come across a genuine treasure of the sort that no one ever expects to find? That was the feeling which overtook me when I opened my copy of “Ring Spiel” Tour ’95. Now, I’m familiar with plenty of the back story behind that period of time in Mike Watt’s life; the bassist...

Artist: Great Apes Album: California Heart Label: Asian Man Records It may have taken a few releases for the band to get the bugs worked out of their sound (they’ve already got one full-length album, one comp which collected a bunch of previously released tracks and a bunch of singles and EPs on top of that too), but Great Apes have truly found their magic on California Heart – their sophomore Asian Man-released album. That is not to say California...

A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the vinyl reissue of Streets of San Francisco by the Swingin’ Utters. Continuing our coverage, we come to Streets of San Francisco, probably the most important release in the Swingin’ Utters catalogue. I’m going to start off by making it clear that I absolutely adore this album, that it’s one of the greatest street punk records ever released, that it’s a perfect example of a band putting all their ducks in a...