New music!

If you've been following the audioscrobbler scrawl above (and I know that all of you have what I listen to on your RSS feeds), you'd notice that I have a LOT of new music right now. Woo.

Partial List:
Erkin Koray— The Electronic Turkuler
EK's the big man of Turkish psych, and I'm looking forward to this album. All I've heard from him have been comps, but this looks pretty solid and is supposed to be his most psychedelic album.

Nautical Almanac— Rejerks vol. 1
Nautical Almanac are part of the second wave of noise artists, and this is a set of "songs" that were pulled from their albums as not being up to snuff or whatever. Still, it's pretty great stuff, with heavy Nurse With Wound overtones and a fair amount of random bleeping. Much less abrasive than most noise, this is more skittering and thudding.

v/a- Simla Beat
Indian Psych comp. Haven't listened to it yet, but looking forward to it.

v/a- Garage Beats Vol. 1-4
Once you start down that Nuggets rabbithole, it's hard to stop. There's always more and more and more and more garage stuff, and this seems like a fairly good collection of it. Lots of the same songs that appeared on the Nuggets comps, but with shittier recording usually. What I do like is that there's a lot more trippy weird shit, and there are a lot more women represented.

Lady Sovereign— Vertically Challenged
I've heard good things about this 19(!)-year-old grime MC, and I liked The Broom and Cha-Ching (and the reply song to Bad Ass Stripper that she did). I like that she's unafraid of dis tracks, and usually has good production. Still haven't heard this one.

Nation of Ulysseus— The Embassy Tapes
I was in Wazoo with a limited amount to spend a couple years ago, and was wondering whether I should get the Young Liars ep or Plays Pretty For Baby. The clerk looked at me and said, "Well, TV on the Radio's pretty good, but Ulysseus are a fucking weapon, man." I went with the Ulysseus (though I later picked up the ep), and I haven't been disappointed. I haven't gotten around to this, a later recording made at the "Embassy," but I'm looking forward to it.

Six Finger Satellite— The Pigeon is the Most Popular Bird
I had been hearing about these guys, well, since a classmate had a poster in his locker of them in high school (though I later found out that he didn't like their music at all, just the silver poster, and that it came with a Zumpano album in mail order). But I finally got around to finding one of thier albums, their first one, and I love it. Totally the missing link between Gang of Four and Brainiac. Spazz guitars, angular funk bassline, squalling electronics. I really need to find the rest of their albums, and I feel like a schmuck for sleeping on them the first time around.

Destroyer— Your Blues
In seeking to write some interview with Dan Bejar for Current (which, becuase of deadline stuff, never came through) I got a copy of Rubies, their latest album, and really dug it. So the next step was to go one back, to an album referenced on Rubies, Your Blues. I've only listened to it once, and vaguely liked it (though not as much as Rubies), but will give it another shot sometime soon.

Metal Urbain— Anarchy in Paris
More weird-ass electropunkery, this time from French anarchists. I had loved their track Ultra Violence for a while, having found it on some sampler or another, but this album throbs and thrumms in all the right places. God bless 'em. I look forward to listening to this again.

Red Krayola— Fingerpainting
Red Krayola— God Save the Good Ship...
While at 'CBN, helping with their fund drive, I burned this and another Red Krayola album outof curiousity. I've heard their Hurricane Fighter Plane and liked it, heard their 'singles' album and thought it was OK, and was willing to give them another shot (you know, since I was basically getting 'em for free). Haven't listened to Fingerpainting, have listened to God Save. I expected a little more 13th Floor Elevators on God Save, but it's really quiet, quick pop tunes, more a template for 1/2 Jap than anything else. I did find out that Frederick Bartholme, the author, used to play with them. He's the brother of one of the best metafiction authors, Donald Bartholme.

Dog Faced Hermans— Hum of Life
God, I had no idea. I have an Ex singles comp and thought of them as kinda bland political hardcore, but this side project from the mid-'80s is fucking fantastic. Skronk sax, post-punk bass, yelping, cooing. Yes! Have to get more.

Dead C— Trapdoor Fucking Exit
I've been curious about these noise folks for a while, and liked the album a lot. Fairly flush and drony, but well-balanced. I'll have to give it a few more spins to sink in.

Asa-Chang & Junray— Jun Ray Sung Chang
Asa-Chang is apparently the #1 tabla player in Japan, an honor that no doubt makes his parents very proud. In addition to being the studio musician to call if you're recording in Japan and need tablas, he also has released a couple of solo albums of him and electronic programming. Odd, open and spacy, I've put the song Hana on mixes before and really enjoy the sparse percussion married to the heavily treated vocals.

Animal Collective- Sung Tongs
Animal Collective- Feels
I could only hear so much hype about this band before breaking down and erm... burning their record from 'CBN. Why? Because while I had heard plenty of things that intrigued me (like comparisons to psych workouts from the '60s and Faust), I mostly heard them from jerks who only like indie rock. I've listened to Feels and enjoyed the first half a lot, and by the middle was wishing that I'd actually paid for the album and bought it sooner, but then the second half of the album was pretty boring. Maybe my high was wearing off. I'll get to Sung Tongs later.

Sly and the Family Stone— There's A Riot Goin' On
Sly's dark and drugged out album seemed to be a good enough place to start, and I like it a lot. I can see how it might be disappointing for fans, as it's a lot denser than some of the other stuff I've heard from him, and it does rework a fair amount of material that he'd already recorded, but I've liked it on first listen. I'll give it another shot later.

Dr. John— Gris Gris
Really, just look a little below. I already covered this. Jeez.

The Ethiopians— Stay Loose
Amy's parents wanted some reggae because they're going to Jamaica for vacation. Well, I don't really like much reggae (though I like a lot of dub), as the production tends to be bright and cheesy, and I had too much Bob Marley in the home growing up. But it meant raiding my dad's collection, and so I picked up this and a couple other albums that I vagely remembered being good. I know that somewhere, there's supposed to be a good African Head Charge album, but I keep finding the mediocre hit and miss ones.

Broadcast— Tender Buttons
Another album that I had heard about with psych and krautrock overtones. Except that this one sounds like a glitchy Stereolab, which is OK, I guess, but kinda boring for a full album.

Guru Guru— UFO
Now, this is what I'm talking about. Huge, explosive krautrock with a fuzzy feeling. I'll listen to this more in a bit.

Jay Dee— Welcome to Detroit
I'd been meaning to pick up more from Jay Dee, including the new Doughnuts album. Then he died. Ahh well. Great production album, you can tell that Jay Dee really took a lot from Prince Paul, but some of the rhymes are weak. Still, a lot of fun.

Magma— Mekanik Destruktiw Kommandoh
Fuckin' prog frogs, with their choirs and their rounds. Good stuff. A lot like Gong, which makes sense.

Slick Rick— The Great Adventures of Slick Rick
His first and best solo album, apparently. Kind of a disappointment, especially because I didn't look to see if La-Di-Da-Di was on there, which is my favorite track from him. Still, some good stuff (Child's Story), some stuff that'd be good if it weren't so fucking misogynist (Treat Her Like A Prostitute, Indian), and some stuff that's just boring. Ahh well, they can't all be perfect.

Delorean— some ep that I forget the title of
Apparently Delorean are usually an alt-country band, but these are mostly remixes that dance it up. Decent stuff, and I'll give it another listen later. Hopefully, I can figure out exactly what it is...

Disco Inferno— DI Go Pop
Along with Dog Faced Hermans and Six Finger Satellite, I really dig this album a lot. It's in Amy's car now, otherwise I'd be playing it. Described by the 'CBN review as "boring Kraftwerk-meets-Blur," it's lucky that I had already been looking for it otherwise I would have missed a great album. Too bad the reviewer had no frame of reference outside of those two, as it's really a lot closer to post punk or a poppier version of 6FS.

There are a few more, but I can't lay my hands on 'em right now. And soon enough, I'll update this with music from these albums. Lemme know if there's anything you're curious about.