Aug 20, 2007

HOLD ON FOR HIATUS


As y'all've probably gathered like good kids oughta, I'll be taking a break from this for the next month or so, as an odyssey awaits me. If you happen to live in Lumberton NC, the Outer Banks, Krumville or Munnsville NY, Barre VT, or Parts Unknown ME, drop me a digital line and I'll come do my laundry on your tab and throw shoes at your pets. You'll be sorry I came. I'll be too drunk to remember. It'll be fantastic.
Then I'll be returning--from new digs!--hopefully with some kickin slices to talk on. Keep watching your skis and always eat your oatmeal. Or at least until mid-September. I'll know.

Aug 9, 2007

Church Police - Gilligan's Wings (7", Skulltones 2007)

Call me a cynical Northerner (read: a Northerner), but Skulltones is pretty over--and I don't mean that in a carny/pro-wrestling way--right?. I mean, they're finished, washed-up & 86'ed. I generally mount up on anything Tom Lax gets his mitts on, but I guess I missed the Der TPK debutante ball. I had the directions straight, but apparently my feet thought better.
So here we are. Another Jewelled Antler-sponsored drunk-in-the-studio one-off to be consumed by 8 people who all know each other. To the credit of the whole JA crew, they's got a sense of humor their peers oughta envy. I'd much rather give 16-minutes to something that at the very least sounds like a blast to make than something that sounds like it's supposed to have been "a really intense trip, man. We totally got out there. Really stretching and reaching through some doors." That is, if it's going to suck about 5 different ways regardless. Which this mostly does. "Life is Fun" is the best delirious wastoid rumble never to be on a Footprints of God 7"--for whatever it's worth. Kind of like the Bunnybrains doing German Oak. Yeah. There's my press release quote, Skulltones. Dine and be merry, for tomorrow you're boots. For rill.

AND WITH A HEARTY MEH

Agitated Radio Pilot & Nether Dawn - The Ghost of Medb/Under Your Night (split vinyl Pseudo Arcana)

So apparently months and months ago I wrote this review and some shady Internet business went down and it was relegated to the land of unwanted drafts. I don't remember a lick of this. Too much mud or too much Canadian; decide if you wish. So, moons and moons later, here is another tirade on some thangs:


Soon. Soon I will take a break and go back to reviewing dumpy black metal or maybe not review anything for a bit. Music is starting to feel like homework. It's hard enough to keep track of what new shit I've got, nevermind what I actually think about it.
So here we are again. I put this on and I let it play. I thought I knew Nether Dawn from Last Visible Dog's something or other but apparently I was mistaken. They're from somewhere. Who knows. Agitated Radio Pilot could be anyone of any gender recording anywhere in the world right now near as I can tell. It's got all the pretty, lilting festoonery of aged lore and forgotten colored paper and...oh shit! I started falling asleep there for a minute. Nothing stood out. Drones drone. I mean, what else do they do? Really good ones work their way into your head until they wind through the muscles in your back and then you're linked good & proper. It's like a bulldozer: you don't just hand it to anyone and expect him to know how to steer. And folk'll tell me I should be glad to hear boring drone and raga'ed-up folk than, say, bad metal. But it's all the same to me: you is or you ain't, and ain't no use in being anything but what you is. See the Cloudland Canyon bit for more unnecessarily heated ranting.
Anyhow, I like the Nether Dawn side because they at least smother their sound rather than gettin all cathedral on me. Don't we get enough of that these days? I mean, ND's "Sky Dust" had me with my ear to the floor, rather than thinking I was at Pseudo Arcana's midnight mass. And the melodies are challenging, in a loose and lopsided way. The point being, I'm not sorry I heard them. This might not climb to the top of some imaginary list in my head nor be something I cling to and put on for friends who want to know where you go after you've already heard the Congos and Dead C. Then again, I've got a ton of stuff like that. You know, sometimes you're hungry, but not just for anything. And maybe the spot you find the most fresh-dipped is closed for remodeling or the line's around the block. So you take a walk down a street that's kind of familiar but you don't recognize a single face. You see an open booth through a window framed with patterned curtains and you go inside and sit down. The menu looks appealing, nice layout, staff is mint, floor's pretty clean. Food arrives quickly. It doesn't change your life, but it's not cloying and now you've assuaged hunger. Doesn't mean you'll be back, but who can say. Who can say?

Aug 8, 2007

Davenport Family - At the Foot of Zodiac Mountain (Meu Dia De Morte 2007)

The Korean lady at World of Beverage tried like hell to convince me the 8oz flask I was buying was lined with glass inside so the hooch wouldn't taste like steel. And the whole time I'm waiting for her to bag my shit up, some round-faced greasewig is asking me what part of CT I'm from. New Haven, I say. Might as well be from Harlem, he says. I laughed right in his face. What else was there to do? Anyhow, I didn't buy the glass-lining bit for a second, but I did buy the flask. Astounding what someone will convince herself so she can convince you to drop eight more bills. Round here we call that carny.
The Davenport Family sure is trying hard to get the money of many a bearded, fussy-shoe-wearing clown on a fixed gear. Go ahead. Judge the cover. If you must, you can even put it on and revel in the unexciting, aping, gaping, yawning smudge upon your boombox. Jackie-O Neck Blues Band of the Occult Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants.
Available wherever v-neck t-shirts and things with stripes on them are waiting outside. Or hoof on over to Fusetron, if you must.

FEEL THE MEDIOCRITY