THIS WEEKS ESSENTIAL NEW RELEASES 17th June 2016

Posted: June 19, 2016 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSIC, THIS WEEKS ESSENTIAL PURCHASES
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Couple With Records

Image of Case / Lang / Veirs - Case / Lang / Veirs

Case/Lang/Veers – case/lang/veers CD/LP+MP3 (ANTI-Records)

case/lang/veirs = Neko Case, k.d. lang, and Laura Veirs. Full of stunning harmonies and spellbinding rhythms, case/lang/veirs travels through aches and eras, torch songs and tributes to the undersung. Several years ago K.D. Lang sent an email to Neko Case and Laura Veirs on a whim. It read simply, “I think we should make a record together.” Though the three musicians were barely more than acquaintances “Laura and I both responded immediately,” recalls Case. “There was no question.”

But now there is an answer. ‘case/lang/veirs,’ a new album by three phenomenal, self-driven artists. ‘case/lang/veirs’ features fourteen new, original songs written by the artists over a period of two-and-a-half years. It was recorded in Portland, OR where lang and Veirs both live, and produced by Tucker Martine with the group. Sessions commenced in lang’s loft with a view of Mount St. Helens, and in Veirs‘ dining room and backyard studio.
Full of stunning harmonies and spellbinding rhythms, ‘case/lang/veirs‘ draws inspiration from alluring, mysterious subjects: a supermoon, the tumbledown story of 70s singer Judee Sill, and the “best kept secret” in Silver Lake, to name but three.

Image of Radiohead - A Moon Shaped Pool

RADIOHEAD – A Moon Shaped Pool

Radiohead’s ninth LP proper sees them once again couple with mega-producer Nigel Godrich. Together they have created possibly the band’s most coherent record of their whole career.  Some of these songs date well back in time and that coupled with the accessibility of comeback single Burn The Witch and their recent  dare-I-say fan-pleasing set-lists suggest a group finally comfortable in their own skin, embracing all that they really are.  So you do still get electronica, but less of the fractured kind. Sure, Thom still sings of alienation, doubt and paranoia, but  in the most beautiful way imaginable. These songs  build and build, swept into shape by Johnny Greenwood’s London Contemporary Orchestra strings, peppered with psych-folk and even dub reggae vibes. It’s heavy, (let’s face it) depressive, but eminently listenable. One for diehards, but crucially, the casual listeners too.

Image of Low Anthem - Eyeland

Low Anthem – Eyeland CD (Razor & Tie)

The Low Anthem are not only musical artists, they live their lives as art. The band creates constantly for themselves and others in their home base, The Columbus Theater in Providence, Rhode Island. This new release is the return from an extraordinary five-year journey with Eyeland, an unprecedented collection of multi-dimensional future folk crafted with uncommon vision and emotional depth. The Providence, RI-based band’s fifth full-length recording, Eyeland began as a “vague and rather abstract” short story by co-founder/singer/guitarist Ben Knox Miller, based around the “sonic mythology of a moth’s dreams.”

The tall tale became real life as Low Anthem immersed themselves in the creation of their own Eyeland Studios, developing Providence’s once obsolete Columbus Theatre into an innovative and in-demand recording space and live concert venue. Eyeland proves a prism of the album’s inner themes, refracting Miller and co-founding drummer/multi-instrumentalist Jeff Prystowsky’s sonic escapades into a full-blown Möbius strip of music and meaning. Low Anthem’s lofty aspirations and creative capriciousness resonate throughout songs like “The Pepsi Moon” and “Behind The Airport Mirror,” their elegiac arrangements and lyrical frankness marked by shimmering ambience and a hauntingly defiant tension. Psychedelic in the truest sense of that overused word, Eyeland is a perspective-shifting musical experience at once elliptical and intangible yet still precise and powerfully personal.

Image of Mitski - Puberty 2

Mitski – Puberty 2 CD/LP/Cassette (Dead Oceans)

“Mitski Miyawaki is only 25 years old, but she’s already on her fourth album, and she’s developed an emotional vocabulary light years beyond almost anyone else working right now. With her new Puberty 2, Mitski has made one of the year’s best indie rock albums: An auteurist piece of profound, personal lo-fi music that finds sharp ways to say serious things. The album veers in different stylistic directions, but it’s also cohesive enough to get lost in.”  [Limited white color vinyl copies also available.]

WEAVES – WEAVES

Weaves have been working on their debut LP for almost as long as they have been a band, tracking with Leon Taheny (Dilly Dally, Owen Pallett, Austra) in sessions that span most of the last two years. Mixed by Alex Newport (Bloc Party, Melvins, At The Drive In) and mastered by John Greenham (Death Grips, Sky Ferreira), the result is an album that traverses the band’s history, exploring every facet of their always adventurous approach to pop music and leaving no idea unexplored. Filled beyond bursting with hooks and possibilities, it’s the sound of a band propelled forward by the thrill of discovering the limits of their sound and gleefully pushing past them. Think a mix of an angry Micachu fronting the Pixies or a punky Tune-yards with brilliant flashes of melody.
LP – Neon Pink LP with download code.

THE CULT OF DOM KELLER – GOODBYE TO THE LIGHT

12″ coloured vinyl. TCODK – a four-piece from the Midlands – make the kind of experimental goth- tinged psych that, has thus far, eluded 2016. Fans of Swans and The Icarus Line will find plenty to entertain them here – this is a band unafraid to take risks. The thing that first impresses on hearing TCODK is the sheer scale of their intentions. Speaking of first single ‘Broken Arm Of God,’ the band said “we wanted it to sound like a volcano giving birth to an atomic bomb. It has bass and baritone guitar that killed 3 guitar amps in one afternoon, then a studio preamp. It’s probably costing us a fortune in damages and repairs. The result was exactly what we wanted though” This band can make a lot of noise. To focus on that however would be to negate what makes this band truly beguiling: nuance. Take ‘Deepest Pit Of Emptiness’ for example – its prog leanings combined with a decidedly English vocal delivery are as distinctive and profound as anything released this year. TCODK have pushed themselves sonically on this album, it’s by far their most experimental release to date. It’s also an album rooted in darkness. “The new album deals with the theme of uncertainty, and put more simply – the end.” That theme resonates throughout the entire album. Fans of Black Rebel Motorcycle Club will be enamoured, but play to it a Sisters Of Mercy fan and watch their reaction: there is a new contender for the throne.

LOU REED –  WALTZING MATILDA (LOVE HAS GONE AWAY)

Third in the series of Lou Reed live Concert albums these two shows taken from the 1978 Street Hassle Tour. Features in depth liner notes by author Dick Porter, Unseen photographs in the 12-page booklet plus deluxe album cover packaging. Includes classic tracks   Walk On The Wild Side & Satellite of Love from the iconic Transformer album as well as Velvet Underground tracks Sweet Jane & Rock N Roll and introducing the just shy of 13 minute brutal Street Hassle. Disc One Cleveland Music hall Ohio 26th April 1978.

Re-Issue

David Bowie – The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars [Reissue/1972] 2xLP (Rhino/Parlophone)
David Bowie – Live Santa Monica ’72 [Reissue/1973] 2xLP (Rhino/Parlophone)
HQ-180gm vinyl reissues now available.

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