Like an amplifier should

Yes, here it is, back on track, for now. Sorry if the next few entries don't match the exceedingly high standards I started out with, but I am sick and tired and busy with you've heard all this bullshit before get to the music goddamn.


If there's one thing I really do like when it comes to music, it's shoegaze. Terrifically loud, noisy, dense, occasionally poppy, and even the general aesthetic is just so damn cool. A little pretentious, maybe, a little ridiculous, sure, but those are words I'm totally comfortable associating myself with.

Holler, Wild Rose! sort of fall under this umbrella. Sort of, yeah. "Marylawn Hair" is My Bloody Valentine worship at it's finest, with that frankly glorious wavering synth wading through the mix. And "Holler, Wild Rose!" has a fantastic, almost post-rockish explosive intro. But instead of falling into fuzz-on-ten, reverb-on-eleven, three-two-one-LOOK-DOWN tedium, Our Little Hymnal is one of the most delightfully varied debut albums I've heard in a while (even if I am several years behind on this one... oops.)



From the flat-out, wall-of-geetar gaze sounds to surprisingly delicate acoustics to spirituals to tastefully done ambient interludes to whatever sort of "indie rawk" you wanna call it, it stays interesting and, more importantly, stays good. It's loud, it's soft, it's melodic, uplifting, heartfelt; wickedly solid record. They should have a new one coming out sometime soon, and the only thing out there besides this is the limited-to-200 Yarn EP. which is a nice little stopgap between albums.

I did my best to give you some representative tracks, but as always, if you think you'll dig the rest of 'em, throw some dollars at 'em.

Holler, Wild Rose! - Marylawn Hair
Holler, Wild Rose! - Sun Vines

ohhh shhhiiiiiii-

sorry,
been real busy with school/work
exam time, you see
I've been pretty dead this week
back to regular thing soon

Cover version extravaganza! Part one.

I basically wrote this just so I can share what has become one of my favourite covers ever, but then decided it could (potentially) become a nifty idea to come back to in future entries (i.e., when I am too lazy to do something original (woah, meta.)

The cover song is a funny thing. It used to be the primary type of single in the early days of the music industry, where songs by black musicians would be stolen, reworked (and usually totally pussied-up) and performed by white groups, earning ridiculous sums of money for zero effort. Now, it's not quite as common for a band's biggest hit to be a cover (lol Gary Jules), but what's most alarming is that a discomforting amount of modern covers are not recognized as covers by the [dang ol'] kids these days [who won't git off my lawn]. I cringe when I think of how many 14 year old girls think My Chemical Romance wrote "Desolation Row."

However, the "cover" can also be fascinating when a band completely reworks a song and actually makes it their own; it's a fantastic way of paying tribute to an influence. And these are the types of covers I will be presenting.

Today's pick is "Only Shallow" by Nadja, song originally by My Bloody Valentine (but you knew that, right?) Both bands are known for their huge wall-of-guitar sound, with mouldy molasses-thick fuzz, barely-there vocals and just generally loud-as-fuck all-consuming soundscaping. I imagine a brief bio of the coveree would be superfluous to most of y'all, but regarding the coverer: Nadja are a drone/doom duo comprised of Aidan Baker and Leah Buckareff based right here in Toronto (ok, right there in Toronto since I'm technically in a different city) and are, hands down, the most prolific drone-duo the city has ever seen (an oft challenged position, no doubt.) Not only do they have a fucking absurd amount of releases in an amazingly short amount of time, but they are almost unanimously high-quality.



With regards to the cover, I can't think of a band more fitting to cover thee almighty My Bloody Valentine (except maybe A Place to Bury Strangers). You can tell Nadja are deeply indebted to them, and their cover is a brilliant tribute. In a truly Nadjian move, the tempo has been halved; the [pseudo-]iconic opening drum roll of the song is slowed to a lazy pace, with the guitars and keyboard following suit. However, the slower speed works stunningly well here. Combined with the thousands of overdubs and no less than 5 fuzz pedals turned up to 12 (all figures are estimates), it proves to be even dreamier and more ethereal than the original. Completely mesmerizing, and completely worth the time for fans of either band, or folks who can dig a nice shoegaze tune in general.

Nadja - Only Shallow

Hey, whaddaya know, these cats just put out a whole record of covers. As always, buy what you like.

I am a filthy, lying whore.

Sorry, something came up that took priority over writing that 3 people will read.

Update Tuesday, hopefully with something significant.

Sorry

Last week got super busy.

Update today, promise.

With Throats As Fine As Needles

Cool recording techniques, to my knowledge, always yield cool albums. Set Fire to Flames set up a bunch of equipment in a condemned house for a week with a whole lot of drugs to see what would happen, and put out the stellar Sings Reign Rebuilder. Sunn O))) set up shop in an old Norwegian cathedral to do Domkirke and churned out some of the best material of their decade-long existence (chiefly "Why Dost Thou Hide Thyself In Clouds?"). With Throats As Fine As Needles formed a four-man drone supergroup (featuring members of Nether Dawn and Birchville Cat Motel), then holed up in an abandoned bunker with portable instruments in a concept that, on paper, pretty much makes my dick explode.



Luckily the dick-explosion pretty much carries though on to record, too. (Wait, "luckily"...?) As one would could guess based on the talents involved in this project and the circumstances they put themselves in, this is abrasive, varied, noisy, and hugely reverbed stuff. It's all very layered and extremely dense, with so much shit going on it can't help but meld together into some blissed-out drone grooooooves, man. Especially the first track, where it feels like all four of them are going full bore and it comes off sounding like a much more evil Vibracathedral Orchestra or Natural Snow Buildings (both of which are terrible comparisons at face value, but imagine each of them were... locked in a bunker with battery-powered instruments.)

The packaging for this thing is swell too, with a hand-dyed rice (?) paper sleeve, so I'm assuming each of these is going to be unique. Less than 999 copies left, so get it while you can.

With Throats As Fine As Needles - I
With Throats As Fine As Needles - II

Flags Of The Sacred Harp

Sorry, today's entry is going to blow ass because I am operating on very little sleep, having pulled an almost-all-nighter to finish (and, for that matter, start) an essay & whatwith work the night of, before, and after, I am effectively dead.

Jackie-O Motherfucker (yeah, sorry, no spiel/context today) are a group musicians (OH SHIT!) who seemingly vary in number/instrumentation on an album-to-album basis, but there always seem to be guitar/drums/bass/something that is bowed and/or squeezed and my goodness every ounce of my creative energy is well and truly sapped.



Point is, they play some brand of sound which can be loosely umbrella'd under "psychedelic folk", usually in perfect proportions of "psych" and "folk" (at least on the album I'm talking about here), although they are certainly not afraid to go full-bore into either genre (take the alarmingly pleasant "Rockaway" compared to the cacophonous ending to "Nice One"). Speaking of "Nice One", they need more songs like this: abso-fucking-brilliant. The minimalist beginning slowly building-up to the psychy-noisy-folky-freakout is really goddamnn cool. That being said, if you like what you hear here, the whole album is definitely worth your money (though you can probably find it cheaper than this...)

Wow, sorry this was so shit. Better writing next Monday, I pinky-swear.

Jackie-O Motherfucker - Nice One
Jackie-O Motherfucker - Hey! Mr. Sky