2014 NEW RELEASES WEEK #6 FEBRUARY 4, 2014

FEBRUARY 4, 2014 (WEEK #6)

1.    ASGEIR-“IN THE SILENCE” (2/4) 

2.    AUGUSTINES-“AUGUSTINES” (2/4) 

3.    NICOLE ATKINS-“SLOW PHASER” (2/4)

4.    SCOTT H BIRAM-“NOTHIN BUT BLOOD” (2/4)

5.    BLACK DIRT OAK-“WAWAYANDA PATENT” (2/4) (The epic Wawayanda Patent by Black Dirt Oak is the Black Dirt Studio-affiliated supergroup with members of Pelt, No Neck Blues Band, Desert Heat, Rhyton, Pigeons, and more. Wawayanda Patent is available in a limited edition of 500 LPs with a download code. "MIE has cast a harvest wreath upon our season's door, a deceptively intricate record woven like a spell by many interlocked arms and voices: a welcome hex. Featuring Steve Gunn (GHQ, Desert Heat, Violators), Nathan Bowles (Pelt, Black Twig Pickers), Jimy SeiTang (Rhyton, Stygian Stride, Psychic Ills), Justin Tripp (Georgia, Steve Gunn), Margot Bianca (Flown, Key Demo), Dave Shuford (Rhyton, D. Charles Speer, NNCK), and Wednesday Knudsen (Pigeons, Sea Donkeys), Black Dirt Oak's Wawayanda Patent is a song sung from a splintered Ouija board, a mass Shaker gift-drawing, a truly exquisite corpse. All these musicians have been fixtures at this rural studio west of New York City for years, but never so integrated as in this bizarre working. With songs that seem both plant and animal, this music splices many logics into a trembling unity. Without a doubt, an alkaloid-laden root is cellared down in Jason Meagher's Black Dirt Studio. To drop the needle onto this record is to slice across its concentric spheres. The fumes instigate fever dreams: Arco banjo strings and horns spiral like vines and gently strangle steeples erected by drum machines, leaving a skyline of electrified maypoles twinkling in the dark. Hands clasp and graft synthetic and old-world strains into an agrarian wish. The plant leafs out, flowers, fruits, and then sinks silvery seeds back into the rot. Someone plucks a song out in processional cadence only to fall backwards into a séance, channeling creation myths aloft in winds of disembodied voices. The harmonics float down and shroud the earth in breathable fabrics, tenderly draped over dead electronics like stainless skeletons half-buried in dirt, grinning to expose a circuitry of gold fillings amidst the teeth. To describe this music is to clog a drain with hair. You can see what repeated listenings do. I've flooded my bath. To be sure, each musician has left her telltale fingerprints all over this record; however, the patterns are spun around an entirely different magnetic north, or maybe an underworld passage where the pole should be: Bowles blankets SeiTang's synthesized landforms in wet forests of frailed banjo, wooded hollows haunted by Bianca's porcelain song. Their impossible horizon melts with a setting inner sun that turns out to be Knudsen's sax. Meagher spins the whole like a glass witch ball, the distended interior described by Tripp's geomantic figures, the crystalline surface etched by Shuford's acid. Gunn delicately suspends the microcosm by a golden thread... and then they all trade places without us even noticing. Familiar sounds are put to unfamiliar tasks. While the music was germinated in the protected warmth of this cellar, pressing up against those walls are ten-thousand hectares of soaked earth, the drained and fertile remainder of ancient swamplands known as the Wawayanda Patent: soil fat with sulfuric allums, tubers, and now this occult growth, uprooted from below Orange County's sun-soaked surface. Ingest with care." --Rob Smith (Pigeons, Rhyton); Artwork and design by Georgia. Mastered by Patrick Klem.)

6.    BOMBAY BICYCLE CLUB-“SO LONG, SEE YOU TOMORROW” (2/4)

7.    BROKEN BELLS-“AFTER THE DISCO” (2/4) 

8.    THE CHAIN GANG OF 1974-“DAYDREAM FOREVER” (2/4)

9.    THE DREAM SYNDICATE-“THE DAY BEFORE WINE AND ROSES” (2/4) (A few weeks before The Dream Syndicate entered the studio to record their seminal The Days Of Wine And Roses album, they set up in Studio ZZZZ at KPFK in Los Angeles for a live set. In attendance were members of R.E.M., the Bangles and Green On Red. On February 4, 2014, you can be there, too. The Day Before Wine And Roses available on CD for the first time in 15 years documents the genesis of one of the most important pieces of the Paisley Underground puzzle. The band (Steve Wynn: guitar & vocals, Karl Precoda: guitar, Kendra Smith: bass and Dennis Duck: drums) began playing at 2 AM according to Wynn's liner notes, and that could not have been a more perfect time for the ethereal sounds of this highly influential band. Comprised of originals that appeared on their first EP and others which would later appear on their classic debut, as well as covers of classics by Neil Young, Bob Dylan and Donovan, The Day Before Wine And Roses is not only a release that presents an important time in alternative music, but defines it. Packaged with a full color booklet, the packaging also features the complete 1994 liners and a postscript from original and current reissue producer Pat Thomas. There are times when it is difficult to remember what happened the day before. With The Day Before Wine And Roses, that will no longer be a problem.)

10. GARDENS & VILLA-“DUNES” (2/4) 

11. THE HADEN TRIPLETS-“THE HADEN TRIPLETS” (2/4)

12. HAVE A NICE LIFE-“UNNATURAL WORLD” (2/4) "The Unnatural World is eight-songs and 47 minutes. The Unnatural World is Have A Nice Life’s most monumental work yet—a colossally-sounding, perfectly-orchestrated example of industrial shoegaze. The Unnatural World will leave fans comatose on the ground near their record player. This second full length promises doom and gloom at a new level, more focused and soul tearing than ever. " (Fans of Connecticut's post-industrial doomgaze two-piece HAVE A NICE LIFE have been restlessly awaiting the band's second gloom fueled auto-biographical meditation and The Flenser is pleased to present HAVE A NICE LIFE's The Unnatural World. The Unnatural World is eight-songs and 47 minutes. The Unnatural World is Have A Nice Life's most monumental work yet-a colossally-sounding, perfectly-orchestrated example of industrial shoegaze. The Unnatural World will leave fans comatose on the ground near their record player. This second full length promises doom and gloom at a new level, more focused and soul tearing than ever. Dredging up themes of modern legend, religious insecurity, and crushing depression, the weight of sound is matched only by the band's piercingly uncomfortable and personal lyrics. Wave after overwhelming wave will slam listeners down into the psychological depths of existentialism and woe. Much like its predecessor release, the band's 2008 full-length Deathconsciousness, the same intense energy is maintained throughout the quiet lows and staggering highs of The Unnatural World. No speaker will do it justice and none of you are worthy! Have A Nice Life's DAN and TIM co-founded and curated the the anti-establishment imprint Enemies List Home Recordings which has gained a reputation of releasing gloom inspired bedroom albums whose quality has rivaled the output of much larger labels. Over the past 10 years Have A Nice Life and Enemies List have acquired a legion of followers of gloom, loneliness, and unrequited love. For the first time, the band has teamed up with San Francisco-based dark music label The Flenser to co-release the full-length alongside their own Enemies List. Have A Nice Life commented, "Working with Flenser lets us keep things comfortable on our end, while also pressing enough copies to actually meet the need and not creating an artificially-inflated collector's market, as happened with some of our past releases." The Flenser is proud to unleash Have A Nice Life's The Unnatural World.

13. HELM-“IMPASSE” (2/4) (Impasse is a sideways journey into the archives of London based artist Luke Younger, aka Helm. Originally conceived six years ago in the wake of a Birds of Delay tour, an edited version of Impasse saw the light of day as a mini CD-R in 2008. This expanded reissue has the two original tracks remastered along with two other pieces from the same sessions that remained unmixed and unreleased until a couple of years ago. Impasse is somewhat of an anomaly in the Helm canon when put alongside recent live performances and his work for labels like PAN and Kye. Where these explore the mystery inherent in obscure/everyday sounds, acoustic phenomena and mutated rhythm that results in an unusual urban experience, Impasse is significantly brighter in tone. Consisting of four loop based pieces the record moves into more fantastic worlds as electronics rise to the occasion, evoking similar atmospheres found in the work of Terry Riley and Boyd Rice's early ambient works.

14. HELM-“THE HOLLOW ORGAN” [EP] (1/24) 

15. JUCIFER-“THERE IS NO LAND BEYOND THE VOLGA” (2/4)

16. MARK MCGUIRE-“ALONG THE WAY” (2/4)

17. PAT METHENY-“KIN (< - - >)” (2/4) In 2012, for the first time since 1980, guitarist Pat Metheny recorded with a band that highlighted tenor saxophone. Unity Band, which went on to win Metheny his 20th Grammy Award, featured Chris Potter on sax and bass clarinet, longtime collaborator Antonio Sanchez on drums, and Ben Williams on bass. Metheny added another musician, multi-instrumentalist Giulio Carmassi, and christened the ensemble Pat Metheny Unity Group. Their first record is Kin ( ). The vinyl includes two 140-gram LPs pressed at Pallas MFG in Diepholz, Germany, and a CD of the album.

Metheny says of this Group, "The core quartet of Chris, Ben, Antonio, and me played more than 100 concerts over the year that followed the release of our Unity Band record. Over the course of that period, the band became one of those rare combinations of players where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts; it gelled in every way, and that just seemed to beg for expansion and further research." He continues, "Simultaneously, I had been itching to write using more of a lush and orchestrated kind of concept that went beyond the sonic limits of what a straight-ahead quartet might invoke. But I really didn t want to lose the energy, focus, and intensity of what this band had developed. I wanted to take it further. If the first Unity Band record was a thoughtful, black and white documentary of four musicians in a recording studio playing, this record is more like the Technicolor, IMAX version of what a band like this could be but with that hardcore thing still sitting right in the middle of it all."

Over the course of more than three decades, guitarist Pat Metheny has set himself apart from the jazz mainstream, expanding and blurring boundaries and musical styles. His record-setting body of work includes 20 Grammy Awards in 12 separate categories; a series of influential trio recordings; award-winning solo albums; scores for hit Hollywood motion pictures; and collaborations and duets with major artists such as Ornette Coleman, Steve Reich, Charlie Haden, Brad Mehldau, and many others. His band the Pat Metheny Group, founded in 1977, is the only ensemble in history to win Grammys for seven consecutive releases.)

18. MODERAT-“LAST TIME” [EP] (1/14) 

19. MOUSE ON MARS-“SPEZMODIA” [EP] (1/10) 

20. MARISSA NADLER-“JULY” (2/4) 

21. NINE INCH NAILS-“SEED EIGHT” (REMIX EP) (2/4) 

22. PEGGY SUE-“CHOIR OF ECHOES” (PRODUCED BY JOHN PARISH) (2/4) (IMPORT)

23. PLUS/MINUS (+/-)-“JUMPING THE TRACKS” (2/4) (The fifth album from NYC's +/- (PLUS/MINUS) and their first in over four years. There are eight new songs on the LP joined by four more on the download card. There is lots of pent up demand from their fervent and loyal fan base for this great new album--a stunning collection of pop songs with the +/- trademark emblazoned on them--polyrhythmic percussion, glorious harmonies, and their innate knack for writing a killer hook.)

24. REBOOT-“DEEP_V” (2/4) (Deep Vibes Recordings returns to the fore with none other than the notorious Frank Heinrich aka Reboot, purveyor of masterfully-crafted rhythm études and a highly-respected member of Frankfurt's vibrant house scene. With Deep_V, the Offenbach-bred producer brings his seething second album to Sascha Dive's imprint, bursting at the seams with intricate percussive bliss and nimble-footed grooves for the enthused dancer. The Reboot project certainly hasn't lost its flair for fine-grained, impressively bendy tracks since the very first full-length offering Shunyata (CADENZA 006CD/051LP) on Luciano's legendary Cadenza outlet, presenting a new set of underground cuts deeply ingrained in dance music's rich history of kinetic hypnotism. Honed to perfection, opening jam "Tortoise" sets the tone with a pleasantly relaxed jog in the company of seemingly scattered drum fragments, nevertheless revealing a deliberate focus and polymorphic confidence at every turn. Following microbangers "Harsh Time for Kids" and "Che Meloni" occupy themselves with slowly raising the stakes, growing bolder with each sequence and populating the dancefloor with snazzy moves. The build-up leads to neotribal workout "Banging Ear Drums," captivating the senses with a fine assortment of airy samples and driving drum patterns. Together with CD bonus tracks "Tantric Behaviours" and "How Province Saved the Funk" -- both every bit as oscillatory as their vinyl relatives -- this makes for a rather complete package from an artist who already excels at the art of living, breathing beats, but keeps on getting better before our very ears.)

25. SNOWBIRD-“MOON” (2-CD) (2/4) (SIMON RAYMONDE OF COCTEAU TWINS & STEPHANIE DOSEN) 

26. ANDY STOTT-“PASSED ME BY B/W WE STAY TOGETHER” (SINGLE) (2/4)

27. SUNN O))) & ULVER-“TERRESTRIALS” (2/4)

28. WATER LIARS-“WATER LIARS” (2/4) (If you haven't listened to WATER LIARS, let the music be your introduction. Is it important to know that BRYANT is from Mississippi and KINKEL-SCHUSTER is from Arkansas, that they're shaped by the writers whose influence shines through in everything they make--Frank Stanford and Barry Hannah especially--and that their pain is the pain of the wretched and beautiful South. Sure, and it's all there in the songs. On "Vespers," Kinkel- Schuster sings, "When I left her house / It was snowing out / and I left her for the South / But who cares? / We don't want no one to see us cry. / No, darling, we'd rather die." These are songs about leaving and staying, about lost fathers and new loves, about distance and memory. These songs are a consideration of what Kentucky poet Joe Bolton called "a future that seems already to have acquired / The irrevocability of the past." These songs smell of autumn. These songs are the hugeness of rain, the heaviness of breath, the strangeness of cities. Light a cigarette and close your eyes--let these songs whiskey into you, let them brighten your blood, let them be endless in the night.) 

29. XIU XIU-“ANGEL GUTS: RED CLASSROOM” (2/4) 

30. VARIOUS ARTISTS-“THIS IS THE TOWN: A TRIBUTE TO NILLSON” (VOLUME 1) (2/4)

31. VARIOUS ARTISTS-“POP AMBIENT 2014” (2/4)

32. VARIOUS ARTISTS-“SWEETHEART 2014” (2/4)