Swell Maps.

"Swell Maps were a British experimental rock group of the 1970s from Birmingham, that foreshadowed the birth of post-punk."



"Influenced by the disparate likes of T-rex and the German progressive outfit Can, they created a new soundscape that would be heavily mined by others in the post-punk era. Despite existing in various forms since 1972, Swell Maps only really came together as a musical entity after the birth of British punk rock."



A Trip to Marineville (1979)



They squeezed out only two former studio albums and some singles/b-sides, but their influence is unmistakable. After breakin' up, members formed part of Crime and the City Solution, and the Television Personalities.



FUCK The Strokes. There. I said it. *PHEW* I feel so much better now.

Jane from occupied Europe (1980)

Gong - The Flying Teapot (Radio Gnome Invisible, Pt. 1)

GONG, son. Respect.

Gnome it

Circle - Katapult

More Circle for my friend Duke.

"Inside the sleeve of Circle's umpteenth album Katapult (there have been more than 25 since 1991) and under the disc are the initials "NWOFHM." They stand for "New Wave of Finnish Heavy Metal." This is the same band who've brought everything -- from their own version of a trance-inducing, circular, overdriven, droning update of classic Krautrock to restrained imaginative acoustic ambience (2006's Miljard), to rugged wily, punk ethos-infused boogie rock (2007's Arkades), to jazzed downtempo fusion à la Miles Davis' In a Silent Way and the sonic grooviness of Tortoise (2007's Tower). But this is no mere heavy metal recording -- death, black, progressive, power, or otherwise. Circle have too much of an individual ethos to downright ape anything. They have a "sound" that they've brought to every single record that bears their name, and even to some side projects of their individual members' (Pharaoh Overlord for one). That said, Katapult is yet another side of the band none of us has heard before. There are big repetitive rhythmic grooves, riffs, and psychedelic space rock moving ever forward toward nowhere but out. The pulse is constant and it breathes. But the vibe on this recording is downright dark and nasty. Hard and crunchy at the outset, "Saturnus Reality" opens with a full guitar throttle on a riff and a percussion throb powered by rumbling basslines you've heard in everything from early Hawkwind to Celtic Frost to Motörhead. But keyboards enter the picture as Jussi Lehtisalo growls à la Andrew Eldritch from the Sisters of Mercy at his most sinister, even as the backing vocals are sung in falsetto! "Torpedo Star Throne" picks up right where it left off, even as skittering snares, electronic loops, synths, and crunchy guitar start pushing from the back to the front and overtaking the tune, making the "circle" (no pun intended) spin faster and faster even as a big church organ plays at quarter speed to deepen the chill. And chill it does. There is something mysterious, and truly nasty sounding, about this album. Katapult is in some ways a return for fans of the old Circle, but it's something further out than the band has ever tried before. As the tracks move on -- all of them are relatively short, between three-and-a-half and six-and-a-half minutes (short for Circle in full-on pummel mode) -- alien sounds and deeper textures start to settle in. They never replace the guitars, bass, and drums, but they lengthen the shadows considerably and make themselves felt. What's left is a completely psychedelic, and seamless, mind blowing affair. Ambient soundscapes creep in on "Black Black Never Never Land," yet even as the title is chanted over and again, the six-string slash and burn and triple-timed drums never cease their incessant struggle for domination -- even as wafting vocals buried in the mix carry themselves forth to float just under the mix. Effects, textures, colors, shapes, and riffs begin to intermingle and entwine; they create a harrowing sonic journey for the listener in and out of tunnels of echo, reverb, weird '70s glam rock-style bridges to angular synth patterns (that are literally next to one another in the closer "Snow Olympics"), and so many other topsy-turvy flips and labyrinthine flops, that Katapult should be a mess. It's not. It's as tight a record as this band has ever pulled off while still sprawling into infinity. This is Circle at a whole new level in an entirely new direction and more focused and frighteningly intense than they've ever been. - Thom Jurek

Skeletor

Circle - Andexelt

Another awesome effort from these Finnish bastards.

Third Eye

Bongwater - The Power of Pussy

God bless Bongwater and those who sail(ed) with them.

"Kicking off with the great title track, a slow-chugging anthem with a sharp Magnuson lead and lyric, along with guest vocals from none other than the B-52s' Fred Schneider, Pussy pumps up Magnuson's vicious, intelligent feminism to an even higher level than before. From the barbed "What If..." and "Women Tied Up in Knots" to her incredible spoken word "What Kind of Man Reads Playboy" and more, she's on a very artistic rampage. Style, performance, sass, and rage combine brilliantly throughout. In general, Bongwater, with Licht back on drums in place of Sleep's rhythm boxes, continue as before, incorporating a more creepy sweetness at points. "Great Radio" is a standout, the group performing a slow, drony, and druggy piece with gentle power, while other songs like "I Need a New Tape" mix up the zoned psychedelic hush of past albums once again. Covers again crop up, both quite striking. The Weavers' folk standard "Kisses Sweeter Than Wine" gets a lovely, haunting take, with guest banjo from roots music legend Peter Stampfel, while Dudley Moore's hilariously dismissive "Bedazzled," from the mid-'60s film of the same name, is tailor-made for a crackerjack Magnuson spotlight vocal. Throughout Pussy, pop culture is roasted over a slow fire in a multitude of ways. "Nick Cave Dolls," besides concluding with Magnuson's breathy, delicious whine about wanting one of said items, slips in everything from references to Hollywood and Dorothy Stratten to some of the notorious profane tapes of Buddy Rich abusing his band. The absolute hands-down winner comes right at the end, the lengthy "Folk Song." Tackling everything from wannabe rebels to corporate and political idiocy from the top on down -- not to mention a ripping dissection of then-recent hit-movie Pretty Woman that spares absolutely nobody -- Magnuson is in excelsis throughout." - Ned Raggett

Nick Cave Doll

Young Marble Giants - Colossal Youth

More cream of the crop up in here.

"Although Prefix cannot unequivocally commit to an album that is "strenuously stiff," most critics have no reservations about labeling the album a classic. And MusicOMH advises, "You only get one chance to hear Colossal Youth for the first time. So if you’re not yet initiated, unhook the phone, put some time aside and revel in its tiny beauty." Dusted–and many critics–find that the material holds up quite well: "Three decades later, Colossal Youth & Collected Works still feels like the start of a brand new life." Exclaim! agrees, saying, "Colossal Youth sounds as important in 2007 as it likely did in 1980." And Treble adds, "While there are certainly many who have taken cues from YMG’s atmospheric new wave sound, their style remains distinctive and largely without peer."

Brian Eno is an oft-mentioned reference point in reviews of the hugely-respected Colossal Youth, but Dusted also hears echoes of Joe Meek and Lee Hazlewood. Like many reviewers, Gigwise zeroes in on the album’s deconstructionist nature: "What remains immediately striking is that ‘Colossal Youth’ is clearly an album of experimentation – a record of boundless artistic ambition that deconstructs song structure to its core principles." Filter hears "precise and elegant sketches" that amount to "primitivism at its most perfect." And the Seattle Weekly calls attention to the tension inherent in YMG’s minimalist style: "Because of this restraint, you keep waiting for the songs on Colossal Youth to explode, like ticking time bombs. But they never do."

As for the reissue itself (rather than just the original album), Exclaim! calls the new collection "thorough and, above all, necessary," while Gigwise deems it "essential," and The Guardian, "spellbinding." The latter publication adds that the material marks "an unassuming triumph, but a triumph nonetheless." Pitchfork notes that the extra material cannot live up to the standard set by the album: "Colossal Youth is such a bracing artifact, even now, that it begs for context; the other two discs demonstrate that the album is really all the band had to say, and the way they said it best." The Village Voice, however, appreciates the new material, declaring that "even demos of now-familiar songs can startle" in the context of different arrangements.

[Colossal Youth] is a record without genre, arguably outstripping The Slits in its disdain for rock structures or Wire in the way the songs appear to exhaust their ideas then stop dead, perfectly sated."

Taxi

Einstürzende Neubauten - Silence is Sexy

As requested by Jorge, i'll be uploading some EN works from the the late 90's-early 00's. We start with this magnum opus.

Disc 1

Disc 2

Skullflower - Form Destroyer

They make your bones shiver and HUM.

"Skullflower was the flagship band of the Broken Flag collective, a group of experimental noise rock bands from the U.K. (most notably Ramleh, Total, and Sunroof!) that often swapped ideas and personnel. Led by guitarist Matthew Bower, the highly prolific Skullflower boasted the largest cult following of the bunch, with a sound based on sludgy, Black Sabbath-style riffs overlaid with feedback, fuzzed-out guitar noise, and throttling rhythms, all played at an ungodly volume. Always an improvisational outfit, their textured noise freak-outs grew increasingly free-form over the course of their career, moving farther and farther away from even loose definitions of "rock." Skullflower claimed a broad range of influences in addition to the aforementioned Sabbath: heavy psychedelia (Blue Cheer, et al.), Krautrock, classical avant-gardists (John Cage, Steve Reich, Terry Riley), early industrial music (Throbbing Gristle, Einstürzende Neubauten, Whitehouse), and noise rockers from the American indie world (Sonic Youth, Big Black, the Butthole Surfers). Despite a clear association with industrial music, Skullflower never employed much tape manipulation or electronic instrumentation, preferring a standard guitar/bass/drums lineup. The results often drew comparisons to bands like Savage Republic, Nurse With Wound, and New Zealand's Dead C, and were an avowed influence on bands as diverse as Bardo Pond and Godflesh.Skullflower was formed in London in 1987, growing out of guitarist Matthew Bower's previous band, Total (which subsequently turned into a solo side project). Skullflower's early core members were Bower, drummer Stuart Dennison (the only other constant besides Bower), and bassist/guitarist Stefan Jaworzyn. The lineup was fairly fluid, however, especially early on; other contributors included guitarist Gary Mundy (also the leader of Ramleh), bassist Alex Binnie, bassist/drummer Stephen Thrower (also of Coil), and auxiliary bassist/guitarist/drummer Anthony DiFranco (also known as JFK). Initially recording for the Broken Flag label, a community enterprise that also handled Ramleh and Total, Skullflower made their recorded debut with the 1988 EP Birthdeath, and followed it with the full-length Form Destroyer in 1989. Like much of their subsequent output, both releases were pressed in extremely limited quantities. Material from both was included on 1990's Ruins, the group's first release on Jaworzyn's Shock label; several tracks appeared in remixed form.The contentious mixing process for Skullflower's next release, 1990's Xaman, spelled the end of Jaworzyn's involvement in the group. Bower subsequently recruited Anthony DiFranco to take over the full-time bass duties, and this trio recorded 1992's IIIrd Gatekeeper for Godflesh guitarist Justin Broadrick's HeadDirt label; they also toured as Godflesh's opening act that fall. Two more albums followed in 1993: Last Shot to Heaven, on Noiseville, and Obsidian Shaking Codex, on RRR. By this time, DiFranco was decreasing his involvement in the group, and eventually left altogether to record as Ax; his place was filled by official second guitarist Russell Smith, formerly of Terminal Cheesecake.Hereafter, Skullflower concentrated on free-form noise improv to a greater degree than ever before. 1994's Carved Into Roses, on VHF, featured guest vocals from Philip Best (also of Ramleh and Whitehouse), plus Casio squiggles from Simon Wickham-Smith. 1995 was a prolific year even for Skullflower: Argon (issued on Freek) added horn players John Godbert and Tim Hodgkinson to the overall din, while Infinityland (a second effort for HeadDirt) again welcomed Best and Wickham-Smith, and the live Adieu, All You Judges (back on Broken Flag) captured a joint performance with Ramleh. 1996's Transformer was released on the prominent, garage-oriented indie label Sympathy for the Record Industry, and marked a quieter, more ambient direction for the band, complete with strings. It was followed later that year by the similar This Is Skullflower, which appeared on VHF and featured Godbert on piano, as well as third guitarist Richard Youngs. Following that release, Matthew Bower opted to concentrate on his other bands, the even more improvisational Sunroof! and Total, and retired the Skullflower name.Bower and Dennison resurrected the group in 2003, recording Exquisite Fucking Boredom for the tUMULt label along with guitarist Mark Burns and bassist Steve Martin; it was co-produced by Neil Campbell (Vibracathedral Orchestra, ex-Total) and Colin Potter (Nurse With Wound)." - S Huey

FD

Oneida - The Wedding

One of Brooklyn's finest.

"Oneida have become one of the more rewarding groups in experimental music in the mid-2000s, since they're so unfailingly curious about all their detours. Catatonic psych-rock, heavy blues dirge, post-punk, garage, the anxious blipping of a vintage keyboard -- it's all fair territory for them. 2005's Wedding is no different. Hanoi Jane, Kid Millions, and Bobby Matador drop some inventive pop with "You're Drifting" and "High Life," two songs with real melodies that still manage the unlikely instrumentation and the misdirection you've come to expect. A violin punctuates an exalted ending chorus, blurry organs wail, and -- of course -- someone pisses in Prospect Park. Both songs are like more lucid versions of those Eric Gaffney contributions on Sebadoh's old albums. ("Holy Picture" on III being just one example.) But that's only one facet of Wedding. Speaking of violins, the album begins with "Eiger," where the Swiss mountaintop becomes a place for proclamations to pretty German girls and a full chamber quartet. "Run Through My Hair" matches a brittle mandolin to electric guitar stabs and treated drums for some great psyche weirdness, while "Heavenly Choir" is some clammy sewer drain version of 1970s boogie rock, like an alternate universe Edgar Winter Group. None of these tangents sound forced, or made for the sake of being screwy. Instead they're twisty vines off a central root. So when Oneida opens the nearly eight-minute "Beginning Is Nigh" with a light saber warble and some steadily building organ, you know you're in for a ride. Unfortunately, you're not -- there's a guy mumbling, and a guitar making some noise, but nothing really happens. That's okay, though. Oneida come right back with "August Morning Haze," which brings the strings back to match wits with the liquid tones of a Rhodes and some more impressive vocal harmonies. Wedding might not be Oneida's most way-out album, but it's as satisfyingly restless as anything in their catalog. " - Johnny Loftus

Nigh

Hovercraft - Experiment Below

For Felix, second album by these Northwest psychonauts.

"The title of Hovercraft's second recording for Mute is wholly appropriate, given their tendency to treat the recording studio as some kind of laboratory. Nearly impossible to describe, the instrumental sounds here are never soothing, even though Sadie 7 (aka Beth Liebling, aka Mrs. Eddie Vedder) certainly is capable of playing a lush bass guitar. But the screeching, scratching sonics of Campbell 2000's guitar takes her lullaby rhythms and turns them inside out. While not a sign of conformity by any means, Below finds Hovercraft offering up more structure, orchestrating stronger dramatic climaxes than their previous work and knowing when to pull the plug on the atonal moments. Some songs, like the ghostly "Phantom Limb" or the static-embraced "Transmitter" even cry out similarities to the blackened spirit of Joy Division in their most saddened state. This is challenging music that certainly has its rewards for those patient enough to hang around." - Jason Kaufman

Epoxy

Hovercraft - Akathisia

This group has been largely forgotten these days (aside from a few good friends of mine and me), and unfairly so I might add. They conjure up tense, taut and razor sharp space rock/psych instrumental constructions, filled with a spot-on sense of experimentation and drama.

"Perhaps everyone and their mothers -- assuming the moms were into such things -- were indeed raving endlessly about post-rock in all its supposed forms throughout much of the '90s, instead of that seeming like an involved indie rock dream. Where Hovercraft fits into all this isn't so much in style and scene as it is in direct participation -- if not quite as freaked out as, say, Main -- the trio on Akathisia did a fantastic job of whipping up five dark, engrossing instrumentals that avoided any pretense of commercial acceptance. The inclusion of drummer Dave gave the group a touch more traditional rock punch without otherwise sounding too traditional, though he does have an ear for the steady post-psych tribal drumming doom approach that must have scared a few folks taking bong hits in 1972. One can almost audibly hear the three members testing each other out with their experiments; jam sessions turned into creepy alien soundtracks, the end descendants of everyone and everything from Ash Ra Tempel and instrumental Pink Floyd to Joy Division, and even Wire at its most unsettled-but-calm. Perhaps by default Ryan is the most openly exploratory member; while the rhythm section finds its own paces and subtle rhythm shifts, Ryan freaks out in his own way, wailing guitars shooting up, down, and all around, with mixed brief, repetitive parts that obsessively focus on rhythm as well. But he doesn't dominate, and indeed Beth Liebling and Dave are often the most prominent in the mix -- consider "Angular Momentum" and its steady, just doomy enough crawl forward towards the end. "Haloparidol" plays around with some Arabic scales here and there to attractive effect, while "De-Orbit Burn" is a killer ending for the album, with some seriously noisy feedback damage from Ryan and Liebling throughout." - Ned Raggett

Haloparidol (sic)

Tim Buckley - Lorca

"Lorca took this lilting, jazzy aesthetic further in, and further out: Buckley elongated his songs into monumental, leisurely trajectories, expanses of Song, whose emphatically simple laments take on the cyclical, hypnotic quality of something like Pibroch. Buckley (and the trio of Underwood, Colins and bassist John Balkin) eschew facile solo-ing or fancy improvisation for a taut, sensual exploration of tempo ... Tempo as texture, and texture as mood ... A transcription of late night intimacies, of sensual surety, a hushed and hallowed pulse. These are conversational songs. These are adult lullabies. These the sort of songs, as Lorca once said, that demonstrate that a moonlight night of one hundred years ago is the same as a moonlit night of ten years ago.

"Songs which were only a song still to come ... they guided the sailor towards that space where singing would really begin."
- Maurice Blanchot, The Song of The Sirens."

- Ian Penman

Git

Tim Buckley - Starsailor

Epochal.

"DESPITE ITS STRANGE time-signatures (‘The Healing Festival’ was in 10/4) and unusual instrumentation (flugelhorn, pipe organ, alto-flute), Starsailor still rocks, in its own singular and unorthodox way, thanks to the internal combustion engine stroked by Lee Underwood's scalding rhythm guitar, John Balkin's lunging and twisting bass, and the elegant frenzy of Maury Baker's drumming. Riding the group's implacable drive, Buckley's abstract expressionist ballet-for-voice is at its most untethered and gaseous. On the solo voice ‘Starsailor’, the singer multiplied himself into an astral choir. Sixteen strands of Buckley's eeriest vocal goo – overdubbed, but amazingly not treated with effects in any way – ooze and extrude, striate and shiver, forming a multi-octave meshwork of rippling filaments and quivering tentacles. It's like you're somehow inside Buckley's body – exploring its labyrinthine architecture of erotic energies and pre-verbal intensities, an inner-spatial honeycomb of bliss and dread, attraction and repulsion.

The only parallels for what he was doing on ‘Starsailor’ – and the most gravity-defying and ectoplasmic vocal manouevres on ‘Jungle Fire’ and ‘Healing Festival’ – are Gyorgi Ligeti's hair-raising choral music on the soundtrack of 2001: A Space Odyssey, or Diamanda Galas' Litanies Of Satan. The Ligeti comparison is all the more astounding given that Buckley had no formal knowledge of music theory, harmony, et al, and had never even taken a single voice lesson.

In rock, only Iggy Pop (the un-human snarls and expectorations of ‘TV Eye’) and Robert Wyatt (the muezzin-wail-meets-scat falsetto altitudes scaled in the final minutes of ‘Sea Song’) have taken the human voice as far as Buckley did on Starsailor. Weirdly, given that the album seemed to represent Buckley's final push to break free of being "a slave to the lyrics", the words were among his best ever – a sort of erotic-mystic Fauvist beat poetry, all "baited moans" and "I love you like a jungle fire". Larry Beckett, back on board, also came up with some triptastic imagery, like the title track's "Though I memorised the slope of water/Oblivion carries me on his shoulder/Beyond the suns I speak and circuits shiver." Starsailor was critically hailed, receiving a five-star review from jazz mag Downbeat and inspiring purple praise galore (Idris Walters described Buckley as a "vagrant in the void" and a "multioctave drifter in the oblivionosphere".) But the record bombed commercially, and the efforts at live translation went down like a cup of cold sick with audiences baffled by Buckley's forays into Dada-style bruitisme

or sound poetry – snoring, yodelling, barking. Devastated, Buckley sank into depression, drowning his sorrows with barbiturates, booze, and, when it came his way, heroin.

For a couple of years, he retired from the business, legendarily chauffeuring for Sly Stone and working in the ethnomusicology department of UCLA on the notation of Japanese and Balinese music. (Both these activities may actually be more of Buckley's tall tales.) He did a bit of acting, co-starring with OJ Simpson in a never-released movie called Why?, and writing equally unsuccessful screenplays like Fully Air-Conditioned Inside, the story of a struggling musician." - Simon Reynolds

Song to the Siren

Boredoms - Chocolate Synthesizer

Let EYE and co. confound your mind.

"4th album from 1994. ...chocolate synthesiser was the boredoms second major-label album + while it bears little or no resemblance to their new stuff its absolutely essential listening & very much in the same ecstatic spirit. it's very raw but also sophisticated - blending elements of speed-core, punk (there seems to be a tribute of sorts to the electric eels at one point), dub, psychedelia, biker rock, the gross-out too-muchness of the butthole surfers at their lunatic best. Ace." - Boomkat

Mama Brain

Fushitsusha - Origin's Hesitation

One of my favorite groups, but not for everyone. If you don't like your musical preconceptions pushed to the limit, steer clear away. This is one of their most difficult records.

"Japanese guitarist, multi-instrumentalist, and vocalist Keiji Haino had been a prominent figure in the Tokyo underground since the mid-'70s before forming this incredible group that stands as one of Japan's most inventive and extraordinary and powerful groups of the era. Their work draJws on noise,rock, free improvisation, and psychedelia, yet they sculpt their group sound in a fashion that their music is relative to few forms. In fact, the sound of Fushitsusha could best be described as contemporary Japanese music as some of their modalities and vigorous improvisational manner reflects the Japanese folk and traditional formulas. On the other hand, the electricity and refined indulgence of their feedback drenched albums and live concerts bares similarities to early Sonic Youth and the Swans, yet is as challenging as avant-garde improvisation. Sonny Sharrock's Black Woman and Peter Brötzmann's Machine Gun are good points of reference, as are Captain Beefheart, Guru Guru, or even Can.

Fushitsusha is part of a continuum in Japanese avant-garde music that was developing in the '60s with noisy improvisational groups such as Group Ongaku, Taj Mahal Travellers, and, most notably, New Direction Unit, who were versed in a free-form noise dialect that went beyond the free jazz movement to higher and more unsettling places. Where Fushitsusha fit into the spectrum of rock, noise, and avant-garde could be pondered for hours. The conclusion, in most cases, could only be that they are a phenomenon of an incredibly creative force in leader Keiji Haino, who has forged some of the most magnificent avant-garde recordings of the '90s seemingly out of blood, sweat, and tears. As a solo performer, he has such an extraordinary and singular approach one could only compare him to an artist like Cecil Taylor, as his work is all-consuming, brutally passionate, and individual. " - Skip Jansen


"Expectations exploded, intentions fleetingly revealed, faith justified. A new album from Keiji Haino's Fushitsusha is always going to be a major event. And to make the release of Origin's Hesitation even more significant, it is the first new album from the group in almost two years, the first studio recordings by the new duo line-up, and the first Fushitsusha album on PSF since 1994's stunning Pathetique. The popular perception of Fushitsusha has usually been as a rock band, albeit one that pushed the definition of that term further than anyone had ever done before. While the group's approach has always been (and remains) rock to the core, the outside manifestation of those intentions have gradually moved further and further away from the rock framework. Shockingly, on this release, Haino takes the process to its natural conclusion and has decided to eschew the guitar entirely. In its place, nothing but the eerily empty hiss of overdriven amplification. Here Haino sings, plays drums, and conjures with spectres. Consequently, the sound palette is starker, and Haino's intentions plainer than they have ever been before. The no overdubs policy remains, though both Haino and bassist Ozawa work with realtime loops. The unique dynamic hallmarks of the group are preserved, the focus on individual sounds and their interaction underlined. Attack, duration, beginnings and endings all merge into one heartrending, emotionally eternal present. This is a hugely important, hauntingly insistent, spectral blast of a record. Quite simply and beyond any doubts, one of the releases of the year." - Alan Cummings

Two Exist

The Pop Group - We Are All Prostitutes

Another Andres request. Pure magnificence.

"The Pop Group was the quintessential experimental (and agit-prop) combo, integrating elements of jazz, funk, rock, dub and classical music. Their music was revolutionary in word and in spirit. Y (1979), one of the most intense, touching and vibrant albums in the history of rock music, was the outcome of the Pop Group's quest for a catastrophic balance between primitivism and futurism: the new wave's futuristic ambitions got transformed into a regression to prehistoric barbarism. At the same time, the band's furious stylistic fusion led to a a nuclear magma of violent funk syncopation, monster dub lines, savage African rhythms (Bruce Smith), dissonant saxophone (Gareth Sager), and visceral shouts and cries (Mark Stewart). The lyrics celebrated the unlikely wedding of punk nihilism and militant slogans. Both the method and the medium were permeated by an anarchic and subversive spirit. In fact, Stewart's declamation was closer to Brecht's theater than to "singing". Another dose of lava-like anger was poured into the funk-rock foundations by the anthemic rants of For How Much Longer Do We Tolerate Mass Murder (1980). Both albums sounded like assortments of mental disorders. A sound so revolutionary (in both senses of the word) had not been heard since the heydays of the Canterbury school."- Scaruffi

Everyone has their price

Jesus Lizard - Head/Pure

The almighty Jesus Lizard. Need I say more?

If you had lips

Gravitar - You Must First Learn to Draw The Real

Like Fushitsusha, Harry Pussy, Mainliner, Skullflower and Chrome, Gravitar took Rock to its logical conclusion of utter extremity, enveloping their massive onslaughts in debauched, raging Sonic Miasma. True Motherfuckers of the netherworld, opening your Third Eye to unfathomable, Blakean visions. Respect.

"A set of rarities and unreleased tracks from 1996 make up You Must First Learn To Draw The Real (Monotremata, 2000), a collection that often matches the power and intensity of their masterpieces. These improvised jams transcend psychedelic rock. Often they sound like a guitar transcription of John Coltrane's and Sun Ra's cosmic-jazz suites. Geoff Walker's epic guitar runs the gamut of Hendrixiana. Eric Cook's drumming is sometimes the cathartic destruction that allows for rebirth and sometimes the quiet observer of a cataclysm of biblical proportions. The other guitar's carpet bombing sets a background for the act. Night Dub is a hypnotic piece that lays a steady, disjointed rhythm for the guitar to drop cascades of metallic tones. The band exhausts its cacophonous repertory in the sublimely raw Blues For Charlie. The ferocious, frenzied, propulsive maelstrom of URR ranks among the most intense rock and roll attacks of all times. The sixteen-minutes opus Rocket To Dearborn is an ever fainting raga that centers on one guitar's wall of reverbs and squeaks. Contrary to first impression, these are carefully orchestrated pieces that employ guitar effects in a scientific way and match it to mathematically calculated rhythms. The ebullient psychedelia of the early albums has been supplanted by a far more refined, even pretentious, art." - Scaruffi

URRRR

International Harvester - Sov Gott Rose-Marie

Primal Swedish protodronerocking dementors that penetrate your frontal lobes with aural icepicks.

"Like a Swedish version of communal krautrockers, Amon Düül [I], the ominous music saunters around the room, occasionally breaking into political slogans or stage play recitations, not unlike The Mothers of Invention or the improv scenes by The Committee in “Billy Jack.” You may also hear the seeds of the more avant garde, psych/folk bands emerging from Scandinavia today, such as Finland’s Kemialliset Ystävät and Avarus or Norway’s Origami Republik. In either event, it’s certainly not “musical” and it’s a very antagonistic listen combining sloganeering, stage plays, Scandinavian folk melodies, documentary-styled sound bytes and a totally wigged-out, 60s’ political vibe not unlike Ya Ho Wa 13, with Persson assuming the mantle of Father Yod. Nevertheless, it is a key artefact from the formative Swedish psychedelic scene – just be prepared to have your brain pulled in 40 different directions at once!" - Digitalis

Tunis

Henry Cow - Western Culture

"The most telling description of Henry Cow's music comes from the movement they started, Rock In Opposition (henceforth denoted RIO). Their music truly is "in opposition." It pounds with the fury and intensity of rock music, but it cannot be called "rock." It shows the intelligence and musical knowledge of classical music, but it refuses to fit into any established style. It has plenty of dissonance and avant-garde tendencies, and it certainly challenges the listener, but it does not drive the listener away. Above all, though, it is in opposition to the commerciality of music, and this music is certainly not commercial. They started as a fun, jazzy Canterbury style prog band (Legend), gradually moving in a more avant-garde direction (starting on Unrest). In Praise of Learning, a collaboration with Slapp Happy, saw them moving in a more purely avant-garde direction, but it faltered slightly at times, failing to live up to their first two releases (though their other album with Slapp Happy, Desperate Straights, is fantastic). On Western Culture, however, they take the best elements of In Praise of Learning, tighten them, and the result is a masterpiece.

Unlike previous releases, Western Culture is entirely instrumental and entirely composed, which is a large part of why it is their best work. While their improvisations often succeeded, they also often didn't. Their compositions, on the other hand, almost always were highlights on their respective albums. As for the vocals, they are simply unnecessary here, as the music tells a potent story (two actually) without the need for Chris Cutler's overly preachy lyrics. Western Culture is split into two halves, each telling its own story. The first, "History and Prospects," is a three part musical representation of the decay of western society (Henry Cow were far left politically). The second, "Day By Day," seems to look for equality in everyday life, as is highlighted by final track, "Half the Sky," whose title comes from the Chinese proverb, "women hold up half the sky." Not coincidentally, "Half the Sky" was a collaboration between Lindsay Cooper (who wrote the rest of "Day By Day") and Tim Hodgkinson (who wrote "History and Prospects"). Those familiar with the band's earlier work might be dismayed to learn that Chris Cutler and Fred Frith do not have any songwriting credits, but have no fear, for those songs are on Art Bears' excellent Hopes and Fears album.

"History and Prospects" opens with the mind-boggling "Industry," which is the band's single greatest achievement. An exercise in listenable dissonance for the first six minutes, it builds up to a pounding climax that features what is, quite frankly, the best drumming I have ever heard. This entire CD redefines the notion of a drummer's role in the band, as Chris Cutler does not limit himself to just rhythms, but instead creates his own musical themes with his trademark "pots and pans" style drumming. Indeed, one of the most compelling moments on Western Culture comes on "Falling Away" (the first part of "Day By Day"), where Cutler duels with Lindsay Cooper on what I believe is bassoon (or some other reed instrument). But, returning to "History and Prospects," don't be worried that Western Culture falters after opening with "Industry." The controlled chaos of "The Decay of Cities" and the faint, desperate, despairing saxophone whine of "On the Raft" are worthy follow-ups to "Industry."

Whereas "History and Prospects" largely focused on dissonance and Cutler's drumming, "Day By Day" features reed instruments prominently and is far less overbearing. Indeed, when "Falling Away" explodes into the racing reed instrument theme about a minute in, it wouldn't be a stretch to call it bouncy. It's still no easy listen — "Look Back" is similar to the darkness and despair of Univers Zero's Heresie – but it's more accessible for the newcomer to Henry Cow's music. Even "Half the Sky," which features more of the whining saxophone that colored "On the Raft," can't stay bleak for long, featuring happier reed sections later on.

Henry Cow left the world with a rich musical history — four studio CDs and the legendary Rock In Opposition movement. Even after they disbanded, Chris Cutler and Fred Frith would go on to produce plenty of excellent music in bands such as Art Bears, News From Babel, Skeleton Crew, Cassiber, Massacre, and far more (I don't like all of these bands, but they all feature Cutler and/or Frith). However, Western Culture is the clear masterpiece of the many Henry Cow and related offerings, a stunning slice of perfection that is essential for anyone interested in avant-garde rock music, or even just really good drumming. It takes a while to get used to, but once it hits, it hits hard. Needless to say, I give it my highest recommendation." - Aaron N.

Henry Cow's most potent recorded statement.

Industrious