Review Archive Series #9: Mew, Deerhoof, Panda Bear, and Whitehouse

The following review represents a series of reviews published during the latter half of 2006, and in early 2007, near the end of my tenure as the resident music critic and assistant Arts Editor for The Phoenix: the official student newspaper of UBC-Okanagan in Kelowna, B.C. They are reprinted here with my own permission, and further edits were made where I saw fit, because I do what I want, bitch.

Mew, And the Glass Handed Kites
Sony, 2006.

And the Glass Handed Kites is the smash-hit sophomore release from the Danish progressive rock group Mew, and if you were in Denmark right now, you'd already know that. In fact, if you were Danish, you wouldn't even be reading this right now (never-mind the fact that the album has a sticker telling you just how "brilliant" and "strangely beautiful" this album is, satements which I assure you are NOT libelous, as hackneyed and trite as they are). Yes, if you were Danish you would know the names of Jonas Bjerre, Bo Madsen, Silas Utke Graae Jørgensen and Johan Wohlert by heart. Why, they'd be your George, Paul, John, and Ringo! You'd see this review as complete kitsch; the barely informative, redundant wankings of some jobless Arts student. Assuming you are Danish (remember: we're pretending), you're absolutely right. Nothing needs to to be said about this band. In Europe, and coming soon to an Asia near you, they're huge! "Sure", you'd scoff, "but so is David Hasselhoff." Shame on you naysayers and player-haters! And the Glass Handed Kites is dreamy pop perfection distilled into fourteen easily digestable tracks. It takes no effort to love this album, all you need are ears! See how I just wrote "takes" instead of "requires" or "necessitates"? It's that easy! Need a reference check? And the Glass Handed Kites is the sort of shoegazer epic My Bloody Valentine just doesn't make anymore and cold-blooded Coldplay can barely fathom conjuring in their weakly impotent, post-Radiohead pop commercials. For the remaining skeptics, I recommend listening to the three songs which I feel compose the album's power-triptych: "Apocalypso", "Special", and "The Zookeeper's Boy." If you haven't fallen madly in love with this band after hearing any one of these songs, let alone all three, you are not Danish, and you never will be.


Panda Bear, Person Pitch
Paw Tracks, 2007

For fans and critics alike, Noah Lennox's latest solo outing, Person Pitch, has a lot of lofty expectations to live up to. As a full-time member of the unpredictable art-rock quartet, Animal Collective, whose last full-length Feels joyously wormed its way into the collective hearts of many condescending critics and hopeful fans (including yours truly), Panda Bear risks treading redundant sonic ground, alienating Animal Collective fans, or worse, producing another Danse Manatee (arguably A.C.'s worst album). Thankfully, Person Pitch entirely avoids each of these possible creative pitfalls, delivering instead eight pitch-perfect pop songs which draw fantastic images of Zombies attacking Brian Wilson's blissed-out beach house as reverb-soaked foams crashes soflty upon the shore. Produced on his laptop, and composed entirely of Lennox's voice and found samples, the album is a perfect example of Panda Bear's unique pop sensibilities and increasingly approachable songcraft. Person Pitch is a far cry from the wild psychedelic freak-outs of Animal Collective's 2004 noise rock record Here Comes the Indian, as much as it is a deviation from the painful mourning which he expressed on his first official solo record, Young Prayer. Whether it be wading in swimming pools on a sunny summer day, drifting in and out through morphine drips, or the wet anxious lips of your first, Person Pitch sounds like every sweet memorable moment of your life condensed into forty-five minutes. I could sail on these sounds for days at a time.


Deerhoof, Friend Opportunity
Kill Rock Stars, 2007

The cat is finally out of the bag: Deerhoof are, without question, one of the sweetest bands currently rocking on the green planet. Their ninth studio album to date, Friend Opportunity finds the terrific trio of vocalist and bassist Satomi Matsuzuki, guitarist John Dieterich, and drum-savant Greg Saunier satisfied in having outgrown their garage roots and art-rock pretensions, and ready to become the biggest stars in the Milky Way galaxy. Satomi introduces herself (and by association, the rest of the band) in Friend Opportunity's first song, saying "Meet me. Meet the perfect me," in the album's opening track, and she is absolutely right. Though the album is considerably shorter in length than its predecessor, it is much more focused than The Runners Four; featuring tighter, brighter, and more dynamic arrangements, supporting quirky, memorable songs guaranteed to be bouncing around in your brain-case for days on end. This is the sound of a group in their finest form, playing purely for the sheer fun of it. Seriously. If you even need proof, "Kidz Are So Small"s alchemical mixture of booty bass, Thomas Dolby "She Blinded Me with Sciene" style keyboards, and Satomi's endless repetition of "If I were a man and you a dog, I'd through a stick for you" is so infectiously silly that it's simply impossible to resist its charms. Check your chest cousin, 'cuz if you don't get Deerhoof, you got no heart n' no soul.

Whitehouse, Asceticists 2006
Susan Lawly, 2006

William Bennett is the father of power electronics, and, along with TG pioneer Genesis P. Orridge and early tape manipulator Boyd Rice (aka Non), one of the godfathers of noise music as we know it today. Without the hateful, insolent influence of Whitehouse, current harsh noise heavyweights such as Wolf Eyes, John Wiese, or even No Fun curator Carlos Giffoni would not possibly perform as they do today. That said, being influential does not instantly make one worth listening to, and if there is one thing Ascetecists 2006 proves, it demonstrates, without remorse or reproach, that Whitehouse's white hot power electronics and broken glass cut-ups of Bennett's virulent rants are just as powerful and relevant as the current noise-mongering of their contemporaries. Ascetecists 2006, despite Whitehouse's reputation as detestable noisemakers unworthy of your attention or even your respect, is not an anti-record. True, the back of the album does say "warning: extreme electronic and acoustic music - please acquire with caution," but Asceticists 2006 is an album, and believe it or not, it does contain actual songs possessing deliberate form and content, lyrical subject matter (as obscene and incendiary as ever), and building progressions of high frequency violence coupled with intense, cut-up glitchscapes. What the fuck is 'real music' anyways? I'll tell you what it is, absolute SHIT! Ascetecists 2006 is an expert, point-blank execution of a single-minded concept which could only be pulled off by one of extreme music's most (dis)reputable acts. The title of Asceticists 2006's final cut says it all, dump the fucking rubbish indeed!

News: White Stripes in Iqaluit coverage, and new reports from deep within Interzone to come later this week!

Things have been pretty exciting here at Heavy Vibes for the past two days. Very recently, my girlfriend was graciously given one of the coveted, extremely limited tickets to The White Stripes concert at the Arctic Winter Games Arena in Iqaluit, Nunavut! Jack and Meg will be performing here in Iqaluit on June 27th, just eight days after the release of their highly anticipated (Inuit eat this shit up, seriously!) sixth album, "Icky Thump," so expect both an album and show review from guest contributor, Le Zais, sometime around the end of next month.

But on a more serious note: what the fuck are the White Stripes doing playing a show at an overhyped hockey rink in the Eastern Arctic? And why the fuck do I keep coming to this place every summer?!

Pocahaunted and Robedoor, Mouth of Prayer cdr review

Pocahaunted and Robedoor, Mouth of Prayer cdr,
released on Blackest Rainbow

The hard-working people at the Not Not Fun label have been making plenty of waves recently with the burgeoning success of Goliath Bird Eater, as well their Bored Fortress 7" series, and I decided it was time, for my own benefit, to give some of bands associated with the L.A. label a much needed listen. Having heard the Robedoor's Shining Smoke cdr, released on LongLongChaney Records, I had some idea what to expect of this collaborative effort, but having no exposure to Pocahaunted previous to this release, I was still in for quite the surprise, and what a surprise! Blooming like a haunted orchid unfolding in one long single track, Mouth of Prayer opens with the light strumming of some distant looped guitar chords, surrounded by the warmth of a gently growing drone. As the warm tones thicken and become more layered, mournful, angelic vocals enter into the mix, crying out over softly padded tribal drumming. Robedoor definitely explore their softer side on Mouth of Prayer, ditching their usually heavily layered, smoke-machine drone textures for a more subtle, breathy approach, exposing a much softer side of the duo's doom-dub experiments. Most likely, this is a result of the more playful company they decided to keep on this cdr. Wordlessly channelling voices from some native netherworld, the ladies from Pocahaunted chant in ghostly circles, adding an ethereal element to Robedoor's burning spirit-fire. Mouth of Prayer is repetitive, but in a good way, and can be experienced as an exercise in ritual ambience. While fans familiar with Not Not Fun's skronkier, no(w)-wave styled releases might be turned off by Pocahaunted and Robedoor's New Agey jrone and jrum circle jams, listeners looking for something to soothe their noise-seared ears would do well to take a swim in these ghostly waters.

Excepter, Stream 40 review

Excepter, Stream 40
Self-released, 2007

Stream 40 is exactly what it sounds like, the 40th in series of self-released streaming media audio documents straight outta computers from the Excepter camp, the only difference being that this particular podcast is five hours long! I shit you not, five hours of pure unadultered Excepter pouring out your iPod headphones like the Dalai Lama decided to spend damn near 1/4 of a day in your head praying and chanting on a bed of synthesizers. Not only is this the longest podcast or encoded mp3 in the history of the digital age, it's a solid slab of Excepter's dub-inflected, noise-hop hybridization from start to finish. Stylistically, Stream 40 runs the gamut from the lo-fidelity sci-fi ghettotronics of the Tank Tapes cassette to the howling dub spiritual sound-system psychedelinoise of Throne and KA, skullfully approximating the alternating sounds of this ever-mutating group from past to present, laying down a five-hour blueprint that sounds more like a five-year plan of what's yet to come. Excepter have been releasing these streams through their site on podomatic for a couple of years now, but never have these free downloads been so essential. Excepter recently saw the potential in these releases and put out a slimmed down 2-disc compilation of all the quality cuts through Fusetron called entitled Streams 1, but you'd be missing out if you didn't go to their page on podomatic now and grab all these streams while they're still free.

Review Archive Series #8: The Flying Luttenbachers, Cataclysm cd

The following review represents one in a series of reviews published during my tenure as the resident music critic and assistant Arts Editor for The Phoenix, the official student newspaper of UBC-Okanagan in Kelowna, B.C. They are being reprinted here because I feel that while these reviews might represent a point of serious-suckitude in the developement of my writing, they are examples of my earliest attempts at criticism (if jerking off on an album's cover can be considered criticism), and above all: these albums desperately deserve the attention of your tinnitus-damaged ears.















The Flying Luttenbachers, Cataclysm
ugEXPLODE, 2006

Weasel Walter is on a mission to make modern music his prison bitch. Having penetrated the gaping-asshole blackness of godless infinity on 2004's The Void, Cataclysm finds the self-described 'free-chromaticist' and his partners in 21st century compositional crime, Mike Green, Ed Rodriguez, and the inimitable Mick Barr, celebrating "the inevitable self destruction of decadent, tyrannical, or non-sustainable systems." Wowza. Well...if there is one thing you can't accuse Weasel Walter of, it's not taking his music seriously enough. Case in point: on one of the albums stand-out tracks, the Luttenbachers cover the fourth movement of French composer Olivier Messiaen's "L'Ascension;" which accentuates the album's conceptual framework while attesting to Walter's affinity for twentieth-century avant-garde composition. The most recent addition to the Luttenbachers line-up, Mick Barr, makes his manic mark all over Cataclysm, delivering his best shredding since Orthrelm's obscene 2005 masterwork, OV. Showing no signs of slowing down, this iridescent behemoth of a band continues to hybridize itself and its sound; incorporating every conceivable genre from brutal progressive rock and no-wave skronk to technically absurd avant-jazz and beyond. Give Weasel Walter your money!

Review Archive Series #7: The Advantage, Elf-Titled cd

The following review represents one in a series of reviews published during my tenure as the resident music critic and assistant Arts Editor for The Phoenix, the official student newspaper of UBC-Okanagan in Kelowna, B.C. They are being reprinted here because I feel that while these reviews might represent a point of serious-suckitude in the developement of my writing, they are examples of my earliest attempts at criticism (if jerking off on an album's cover can be considered criticism), and above all: these albums desperately deserve the attention of your tinnitus-damaged ears.



















The Advantage, Elf Titled
5RC, 2006

Concussive bolts of blocky energy whirred past me, shimmering in the glass of my space helmet's face-plate as sweat beaded down my forehead. My panicked eyes had long gone bloodshot, vision blurred. Nervously I gripped my controller tighter, pressing it in closely to my chest. Energy tank low, I descended down airlocked corridors in the deep catacombs of Zebes: firing off blasts into the deep blackness. Finally, I reach my target. Its scale is massive, towering from floor to ceiling, a seemingly endless 8-bit behemoth. The single, lidless eye of Mother Brain stares at me coldly. Suddenly, hungry Metroids appear out of nowhere, there's a flash, I dive to move out of the way...

My controller smashes against the carpet floor, my mouth dry from screaming childish obscenities. Mother Brain tells me that I've had enough for today, and to go outside and play in the 'real world'. Fuming, pissed, and defeated, I leave: the cartridge quietly collecting dust within the mocking grey console.

My childhood is populated with scenes like this: hours spent with eyes captivated on the television screen only to end in humiliating defeat at the hands of Dracula, Dr. Wily, or those damned eggplant wizards from Kid Icarus. The Advantage are a progressive rock four-piece who made their debut in 2005, covering the classic themes of the NES games that were the source of so much of my childhood joys and frustrations. Where their debut covered many of the more well-known bases, Elf-Titled tackles the themes of more obscure Nintendo classics, as well as some old favorites, and Castlevania, Megaman II, Ducktails, Double-Dragon, and Metroid are just a few of the games feature on the album's sixteen compositions, which includes two, three-part medleys.

Not unlike the classic NES games which inspired it's creation, Elf-Titled's greatest strength lies in it's replayability. More often than not, The Advantage's new renditions surpass the original themes them by giving them a sonic depth and texture the 8-bit system simply wasn't capable of, and their ingenuity and technical skill put them head and shoulders above the rest of their nintendocore contemporaries. What few critics tend to realize is that the themes to these games weren't just cute little keyboard compositions set to play as muzak while us gamers brought down alien civilizations or saved Princess Peach for the nth time. These tunes were thought to be examples of modern classical music in Japan. So obviously, bringing these themes to life requires impeccable musicianship, which thankfully, The Advantage have in spades. Armed with a diverse arsenal of instruments ranging from electric sitars to Hammond organs, The Advantage rock with as much passion as technical precision, coming off as a King Crimson for the Nintendo generation. Elf-titled features a variety of musical styles, from the hard-driving electro-funk of "Batman - Stage 1" to the symphonic metal medley of "Castlevania III - Boss Music > Willow - Village > Megaman II - Bubble Man", with each song building in strength until the triumphant finale of "Wizards & Warriors - Tree Trunk > Woods > Victory". Fans of The Fucking Champs, the aforementioned King Crimson, Rush, and The Minibosses should have a lot of fun with this record, making it the perfect soundtrack to a long night of munchies and Mountain Dew in the Mushroom Kingdom. Game on.

Review Archive Series #6: Mindflayer, Expedition to the Hairier Peaks cd

The following review represents one in a series of reviews published during my tenure as the resident music critic and assistant Arts Editor for The Phoenix, the official student newspaper of UBC-Okanagan in Kelowna, B.C. They are being reprinted here because I feel that while these reviews might represent a point of serious-suckitude in the developement of my writing, they are examples of my earliest attempts at criticism (if jerking off on an album's cover can be considered criticism), and above all: these albums desperately deserve the attention of your tinnitus-damaged ears.



















Mindflayer, Expedition to the Hairier Peaks
Corleone Records, 2005

Expedition to the Hairier Peaks opens with a maelstrom of messy noise bursts that burr and whirl about in a harsh, barely discernible rhythm: setting the tone for an album whose appeal is limited at best to the most rabid fans of LOAD Records extended family. Once the initial blast is over, and the radioactive dust begins to settle, Chippendales psychotic drumming fades into the mix. By the time the third track, "Netherworld Bike Patrol C.H.A.O.S.", blows out your speakers, a discernible pattern begins to emerge from the ruins Mindflayer have left smoldering in their wake. "Time Tunnel (Cosmic Crypt Chronoscape Collision Course)" draws the listener deeper into the album's painfully psychedelic keyboard and drum jihad, and the song's repetetive rhythm and noise combo holds brutally hypnotic power over the bludgeoned listener.

Previous releases had Mindflayer tagged by some as the mere bastard lovechild of Lightning Bolt and Forcefield. Nothing could be further from the truth. Expedition to the Hairier Peaks, their fouth album, indicates the deadly seriousness of this duo as a not the work of a side-project. Set apart from their tamer siblings, Mindflayer are an altogether different animal: a nasty-ass irascible beast with acid blood dripping from its frothing rabid chittering maw. Expedition to the Hairier Peaks features three epic patience-testers, which is fitting considering the albums name is a play on the name of a Dungeons and Dragons add-on. The fourteen minute "Nasty Meeting at Peak Park (Exploding Remains)" stands as the most terrifying amalgamation of Matt Brinkman's throbbing electronic gristle, and Chippendale's drumming is the stuff to inspire all-out prog-genocide. Throughout the album, vocals are barely audible, buried deep beneath layers of sound. When heard, the vocals are distorted, demonic, and screamed like scraped nails across a chalk board of white noise. There is little rock to be found in the raging wind-tunnel noise at the top of the Hairier Peaks, but that shouldn't turn curiosity seekers away. This stuff may be for the dudes whose ears are already ringing, but it isn't Merzbow, and it will lead to a greater appreciation of Forcefield, Lightning Bolt, and all their related excursions into your ear (especially the excellent Brian Chippendale solo-project, Black Pus!).

RTX, Western Xterminator cd review

The following review was originally written for The Artbeat zine, issue #1, published May 3, 2007.












RTX, Western Xterminator
Drag City, 2007

SHIT YES! With or without the junkie-guitar gunslinging of grunge-hero Neil Micheal Haggerty, Royal Trux continues to ride towards Rock and Roll Heaven on a flaming deathcycle of pure a-w-e-s-o-m-e. I mean, just look at the cover of this thing! Lead-vocal vamp Jennifer Herrera is decked out like a badass cartoon super-pirate, and she's playing a fucking flute! And yeah, for the record, she actually does play a rippin' flute on the opening track, it's all part of the fun. Make no mistake, Western Xterminator is an acid-washed rock record in tradition of Wendy O Williams, AC/DC's Highway to Hell, and G'N'R's mammoth Appetite for Destruction, sans the shitty ballads and Axl Rose aquanet jumpsuit theatrics. Instead, RTX cut the fat, and deliver only what's expected of them: sleazy, drop-out rock and roll. Seriously, if not for the total sense of embarrassment I'd suffer at the hands of "respectable" friends and family, Western Xterminator makes me want to carve myself a dyed-blonde skullet, tear the sleeves off all my t-'s, and crack open a case of Pabst Blue Ribbon as I chug to nothing but Motorhead's "Ace of Spades" (every time Lemmy roars "the Ace of Spades", drink!).

Wolf Eyes, A Black Wing Over the Sand cd and Lambsbread, Stereo Mars lp reviews

The following reviews were originally written for Artbeat zine issue #2, published May 17, 2007.



















Wolf Eyes, Black Wing Over the Sand
2007, iDEAL Recordings

I once read in an interview with Ben Chasney that he envisioned Six Organs of Admittance's 2006 album The Sun Awakens to be an audio experience akin to Alejandro Jodorowsky's bloody zen spaghetti western epic El Topo. Well, if Six Organ's The Sun Awakens evoked visions of El Topo's savage desert space and mystic grandeur, then Wolf Eyes' Black Wing Over the Sand is more like some imaginary El Topo 3000, where the Mexican cyborg gunslinger hero doesn't even get a chance to rot before his failing body is picked clean by a flock of monstrous, mechanical vultures. Wolf Eyes have often managed to churn up visceral images of bio-horror and organic decomposition with their mass of homemade oscillators, decaying tape loops, synapse-frying saxophone, and a whole other manner of instrumentation traditional and jerry-rigged alike, and Black Wing Over the Sand, not unlike the recent "official" Sub-Pop release Human Animal, continues to confuse sound sources both organic and electronic into a seamless hypnotic horror with frightening prolificacy. Released on Gothenberg, Sweden's iDEAL Recordings, Black Wing Over the Sand is spread out over two sides (or two tracks, if you've got the slightly-less limited cd version), with each track just breaking the seventeen-minute mark. Side A begins with some electronic detritus, squealing tapes, a screeching loop (the vultures begin to circle), and a gaping chasmic synth drone that'll set your head to spin and stone. Side Two is essentially a continuation of the first, featuring similar stretches of undulating rhythms and sonic shrapnel that should please anyone familiar with the Wolf boys at this point in their career, but should also provide a more accessible jumping point for anyone who shied away from Human Animal's more intense, concentrated miasma. Black Wing Over the Sand is not entirely essential, but it's endemic of Wolf Eye's current musical direction, and I for one can't wait to hear what they cook up next.



















Lambsbread, Stereo Mars
2007, Ecstatic Peace!

Stereo Mars is the latest semi-ultra-limited (that's 500 copies brothers and sisters) release from Lambsbread, a trio of Ohio-based Harry Pussy lovers who rip into righteously distorted free-improv instrumental hardcore in the polluted, lo-fi vein of Husker Du's Land Speed Record, or the aformentioned Harry Pussy's infamously titled In An Emergency You Can Shit On A Puerto-Rican Whore. Still, any apt comparisons between Stereo Mars, or any selection from Lambsbread's rapidly growing discography, becomes pathetically null and meaningless given that the greater majority of 80's hardcore goons performed songs which gave up the ghost after a minute at most, Lambsbread allow their sonic spasms some space, spreading out the skree out for nearly fifteen minutes on both sides, without barely pause or reflection. Guitarists Zac Davis and Kathy O'Dell inspire feedback spiked freakouts and total fretboard-fuckery in ways that haven't been pulled off successfully by any player in the post-Thurston world, and drummer Shane Mackenzie provides an element which balances Lambsbread's transcendental thrash with raw percussive power. Prior to checking this lp out I'd heard nothing but good things about Lambsbread, and given my fondness for Harry Pussy styled free-noise, Stereo Mars did not disappoint.

Review Archive Series #5: Behold...the Arctopus, Nano-Nucleonic Cyborg Summoning cd

The following review represents one in a series of reviews published during my tenure as the resident music critic and assistant Arts Editor for The Phoenix, the official student newspaper of UBC-Okanagan in Kelowna, B.C. They are being reprinted here because I feel that while these reviews might represent a point of serious-suckitude in the developement of my writing, they are examples of my earliest attempts at criticism (if jerking off on an album's cover can be considered criticism), and above all: these albums desperately deserve the attention of your tinnitus-damaged ears.


















Behold...the Arctopus, Nano-Nucleonic Cyborg Summoning cd
Metal Blade/Black Market Activities, 2006

Dear reader, please indulge me in a favor. I entreat you to, in heart, mind, and spirit, ignore the fact that Nano-Nucleonic Cyborg Summoning is quite possibly the most-ridiculously titled album, ever. A name not even surpassed by the trio who hath wrought such a fucking perplexing beast of an ep. That being said, this three-song, 17 minute ep is one of the most mind-blowingly brilliant documents of instrumental progressive rock made in America today. I'm talking a prog-rock blowjob for your brain that you'll never forget! Nano-Nucleonic Cyborg Summoning is the King of prog-blowjobs (or Queen of said blowjobs, if that's your trip)! With this, their sophomore effort, Behold...the Arctopus crown themselves as the true successors to the throne of King Crimson. I cannot exaggerate this record's sheer awesomeness enough: this record is the soundtrack for the real 21st Century Schizoid Man.

Each solo launched on Colin Marston’s 12-string customized Warr guitar viciously assaults the human mind’s capacity to interpret rhythm and melody: first resulting in confusion,closely followed by reverent awe, and resulting finally in a total fucking face-melting. As indicated by ludicrous, pseudo-scientific song titles like "Estrogen-Pathogen Exchange Program", it is clear that the Arctopus’ tongue is placed so firmly in cheek that it has managed to pulsate, grow, pierce through the flesh, and lick it’s own eye. Fucking Behold this shit already!

Special Note: this cd was re-released by Metal Blade/Black Market Activities months later, completely remastered and featuring not only their previously released Arctopocalypse Now...Warmageddon Later ep, but some live cuts which shred even more than the 'official' studio tracks.

Review Archive Series #4: Arsis, A Diamond For Disease ep

The following review represents one in a series of reviews published during my tenure as the resident music critic and assistant Arts Editor for The Phoenix, the official student newspaper of UBC-Okanagan in Kelowna, B.C. They are being reprinted here because I feel that while these reviews might represent a point of serious-suckitude in the developement of my writing, they are examples of my earliest attempts at criticism (if jerking off on an album's cover and then snorting the cum in a line off my hand can be considered criticism).



















Arsis, A Diamond for Disease ep
Willowtip, 2005

The title track of this three-track ep by two-man American Death Metal innovators Arsis is beyond a shadow of a doubt the most ambitious single to be released this year by any aspiring prog-metal duo with only guitar, drums, and a whole bloody ballet company at their disposal! Forget the amusingly aggressive cover of Alice Cooper’s “Roses on White Lace” or the relentlessly repetitive bore, “The Promise of Never”, all that is really supposed to matter about this releases is the incredibly wank thirteen-minute melodic metal 'masterwork' that is “A Diamond for Disease.” A Diamond for Disease is the follow-up to last year’s A Celebration of Guilt, which along with Neuraxis’ Trilateral Progression was one of the best technical death-metal albums of 2004, let’s hope this trend of super-duper-fantastic releases from Willowtip continues to rejuvinate and revitalize what is truly the new classical music genre of the new millineum (snobbish technical posturing and refusal to branch out in ways that don't involve a ballet company intact). Heavy, but this attempt at legitimizing metal by combining it with an "avant-theatre troupe" is trying on my patience at best. Metal is best served with satan, beer, and/or dope, but not ballet slippers.

Exact review date unknown.

Review Archive Series #3: Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti 8, Worn Copy cd

The following review represents one in a series of reviews published during my tenure as the resident music critic and assistant Arts Editor for The Phoenix, the official student newspaper of UBC-Okanagan in Kelowna, B.C. They are being reprinted here because I feel that while these reviews might represent a point of serious-suckitude in the developement of my writing, they are examples of my earliest attempts at criticism (if jerking off on an album's cover can be considered criticism), and above all: these albums desperately deserve the attention of your tinnitus-damaged ears.



















Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti 8, Worn Copy
Paw Tracks, 2005

Imagine that you built yourself an odd time machine, one that would not necessarily transport you physically into the past, but would tune your consciousness to a late 1970's dial, causing you to live forever caught in a mental rerun: transported to a hazy haunted realm of poisoned Air Supply sucked dry and made equals menacing and goofy, with the glam of Ziggy Stardust, and the banal pop A.M. light radio gone violent and junk-sick vampire a la Near Dark. Now imagine that something weirdly wrong has happened, real weird, and not just the decade doesn't sound as it should, nothing does. If the things you hear and see are lo-fi beyond compare, abrasively acid-washed, obstructed, and abstracted to near-Dadaist lengths, this time machine, your stereo, has obviously tuned you into 2005's Worn Copy, the latest offering from obscurist pop eccentric Ariel Pink. It would be irresponsible of me to tell you, that if you listen to enough of Worn Copy, cloud your head with it, you will honestly never want to leave the place your mind travels to. Just start listening to it, day and day-glo night, and prove me wrong ("The Drummer", "Creepshow", or "Credit" wouldn't be a bad start for the A.P. curious). There are no suggestions I can offer you, brave traveller, nothing I can say could possibly be of aid to your ears. The only advice I can offer you is this: be careful, for these are strange times.

Exact review date unknown.

Review Archive Series #2: AIDS Wolf, The Lovvers Lp

The following review represents one in a series of reviews published during my tenure as the resident music critic and assistant Arts Editor for The Phoenix, the official student newspaper of UBC-Okanagan in Kelowna, B.C. They are being reprinted here because I feel that while these reviews might represent a point of serious-suckitude in the developement of my writing, they are examples of my earliest attempts at criticism (if jerking off on an album's cover can be considered criticism), and above all: these albums desperately deserve the attention of your tinnitus-damaged ears.



















AIDS Wolf - The Lovvers Lp
Lovepump United, 2006

Aids Wolf are on the prowl to burst the Pop bubble using jagged shards of broken beer bottles. Trapped inside the bubble is your mind, and Aids Wolf wish to set it free- at a price. That price, is whatever you’re willing to pay for their debut album, The Lovvers Lp: LSD and pints of human blood not accepted as hard currency at all retailers. This is noisy, proggy, "free your mind and your ass/cock/pussy will follow" art-punk in the nasty-ass spiked vein of Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, Onani Bomb Meets the Sex Pistols-era Boredoms, Lake of Dracula, and Les Georges Leningrad. Curious? Be careful, this album is what killed the cat. The stabbing pogo beats and string scrapings on the album's opener, "Spit Tastes Like Metal", sound like an homage to the shower scene from Psycho, while the cacophonous, anarchic glee heard on "Panty Mind" and "I Multiply" remind the listener what this is all about- peace, love, and playing games with loaded guns. Great fun for art-damaged eardrums, but for the rest of you, stay inside the safety of the bubble until the aural area contaminated by AIDS Wolf has been thoroughly disinfected and sterilized.

Exact review date unknown.

Review Archive Series #1: AIDS Wolf, Live Deth cdr

The following review represents one in a series of reviews published during my tenure as the resident music critic and assistant Arts Editor for The Phoenix, the official student newspaper of UBC-Okanagan in Kelowna, B.C. They are being reprinted here because I feel that while these reviews might represent a point of serious-suckitude in the developement of my writing, they are examples of my earliest attempts at criticism (if jerking off on an album's cover can be considered criticism), and above all: these albums desperately deserve the attention of your tinnitus-damaged ears.








Aids Wolf, Live Deth cdr
Kitty Play, 2005

Ask me who my favorite, currently active Canadian group is, and I’ll tell you it’s Montreal, Quebec’s AIDS Wolf. Why? This independently released 3" cdr called Live Deth, that’s why. Both sprawling and sprawled out on the floor, AIDS Wolf slashes through convention with a silkscreened straight-razor, leaving a messy trail of pink blood and white-hot strings freshly snapped from the axe of a battered guitar, the remnants of a drum kit found face down in a nearby river, minds blown in so many directions the janitor quit on the spot, “I refuse to clean this shit up (as he walks away).” Shameless, gutless, and murderous; AIDS Wolf have distilled noise-rock into a neon black slime, addictive and organic, a pulsating, thriving, deadly sound. Their full length, THE LOVVERS LP will be released in January 2006, and until then I’m left alone as this rabid disease itches and gnaws away my ears, leaving me to foam at the mouth in hot anticipation.

Exact review date unknown.

Heavy Vibrations

Salaam.

This is the first, albeit slightly unofficial, post of Heavy Vibes, a new review blog designed to focus on the awesome, the pop, the esoteric, the underappreciated, and the totally fucked! In other words, anything that gives you that totally unadultered rush of the weird gnostic truth of FUCK YES! The sort of feeling that would (when mixed with a few red bennies) keep Lester Bangs up all night; the same feeling I got when I first heard the Sex Pistols, or Sunn O))). It doesn't have to be meaningful (but by all means draw meaning from oblivion if it suits you), but it does, it absolutely MUST inspire a feeling. I've gotten these vibes mostly from records, cds, and tapes, but I've felt it through films, video games, drugs, art, when travelling, fucking, and from hours of staring at the ocean, feeling like I was the ocean!

So, if you've ever felt like that, keep coming back true believer, and you might just feel those vibes again.

Peace.