Posts Tagged ‘Drag City Records’

WAND – ” Passage of the Dream “

Posted: June 12, 2016 in MUSIC
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It’s been a while since Wand have dropped a new record or video! 250 whole days have come and gone since the release of the wonderful 1000 Days, and there was a tour and a video awhile back, but then nothing! Thankfully our Wandlessness has been noted by none other than the band, who have waved their magic you-know-what, and-poof, we have a video AND some shows! Picked from the still ripe 1000 Days, “Passage of the Dream” receives the video treatment with a seamless mix of claymation and buoyant crossbred animation with lithographic textures! In other words, it’s visual ecstasy for the expansive acid drenched guitars and ethereal vocals that can be found in the slow burn of “Passage of the Dream”.

West coasters in the USA are encouraged to keep the dream in their minds through next month, when Wand fly up their land for a lightning-fast week of shows! Europeans get a heavier, denser batch of shows but sorry y’all – you’ve got to wait all the way til November! Still – saddle the unicorn now and plan ahead, it’s looking to be
Wand heck of a ride!

Song from the LP/CS/CD “1000 Days” on Drag City Records.

TY SEGALL – ” Emotional Mugger “

Posted: February 4, 2016 in MUSIC
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Ty Segall gets ambitious with a new short film, Emotional Mugger, which was directed by Matt Yoka. Though it uses songs from the album of the same name (often in stripped/remixed form), calling it a music video would be wrong. The 15-minute short film is a paranoid sci-fi horror flick where Los Angeles is as much the star as Ty. (This is very much the weird L.A. of Repo Man.) Witness to all manner of very strange occurrences, Ty Segall is more an emotionless spectator than a participant. Might he be an actualzombie? Strange in all the right ways, watch Emotional Mugger

Ty Segall

Ty Segall’s “Emotional Mugger” is available from Drag City on LP, Cassette, CD, and Digital formats.

BONNIE PRINCE BILLY – ” Rich Wife Full of Happiness “

Posted: January 10, 2016 in MUSIC
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…similar in tone but NOT from the forthcoming Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy release “Pond Scum”, in stores LP, CD, and Cassette on January 22nd on Drag City Records. “Rich Wife, Full of Happiness” appears on Bonny’s EASE DOWN THE ROAD RECORD in its full-arrangement. The BBC sessions gave room to represent the original bones of the song.

There are no Peel sessions anymore – that tradition was buried in the pyramids with John Peel himself upon the great man’s passing. Of the thousands left in the wake, six are ascribed to Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy – and of those six, three have been combined to form the deeply congruous experience of  “Pond Scum” .A span of eight years is covered, in reverse, and many chestnuts are rolled out, freed of former contexts with sparse arrangements. “(I Was Drunk at the) Pulpit” feels, ten years from inception, more vividly worn; “Death to Everyone” is loosed from its frame, the bones decoupled and spread out, giving the song a reflective air (as opposed the biting declamation of the original); “Arise, Therefore” adapts its metronomic base, the evangelic twist of its roots made palpable. With the center of the performance in stark relief, the gnomic qualities of two “Get On Jolly” pieces are intensified. Further accenting the devoted spirit of this collection is the inclusion of Bonnie‘s take on Prince’s “The Cross”, as well as the previously-unreleased original “Beezle.”

JOANNA NEWSOM – ” Divers “

Posted: December 1, 2015 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSIC
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Last year Joanna Newsom appeared in Inherent Vice, a Paul Thomas Anderson film adapted from a Thomas Pynchon novel. Newsom’s releases are met with the same breathless anticipation reserved for auteurs of their ilk, and rightly so: All three of them have applied a singular vision to many dense, wondrous works that give you a lot to think about and even more to feel. On “Divers”, Newsom’s latest and arguably greatest, the newly married singer/composer/harpist fixates on time’s relentless march and the way true love raises the stakes. As ever, her ideas are presented in meticulously crafted song-suites laden with historical and literary Easter eggs and sung in her unflinchingly distinctive quakes and quivers. The approach could not be farther from the middle of the road, but the sentiment could not be more universal

Track from Joanna Newsom LP/CASS/CD “Divers”, available on October 23rd, 2015 on Drag City Records

MEG BAIRD – ” Counterfeiters “

Posted: August 1, 2015 in MUSIC
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A new release from airy folk bard Meg Baird (Espers), who has recorded some of the most gorgeous folk I’ve heard in the past decade. Hearkening back to talents such as the late, great Sandy Denny and her sister in song, Maddy Prior, you can’t go wrong with music of this ilk. Recorded after a geographical change in Meg’s life, moving her from the Philly area to San Francisco. Given Meg’s predilection for psychedelic musical turns, I’d say she’s in the right place. Her voice soars easily to the highest heights even while dipping into alto valleys, and her double-tracked harmonies expand her sonic palette even further. Her acoustic guitar and piano are accompanied by longtime collaborator Charlie Saufley on guitar.

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As with any Meg Baird record, you can expect beautifully sung, exquisitely wrought songs, tunes that show glimmers and fleeting moments of life, airy and light even while plumbing deep wells of emotion. “Past Houses” and its reprise are like pools of shade on a hot summer’s day, while the lovely, pastoral “Counterfeiters” almost reminds me of a speeded up Pink Floyd song. Her voice here is like delicate lace, lightly touching down between Charlie’s slide work and her own fingerpicking. She is both confident and reticent, putting her voice out there while she emotionally withdraws from the listener. Listen to “Stars Unwinding” as it inhabits your mind, and you may be reminded of old Pentangle tunes. The gorgeous “Mosquito Hawks” could be a great lost tune from Richard and Linda Thompson, and is possibly the best track among a string of superlative songs. Despite the solitary demeanor displayed on some of these songs, Meg sings and plays with a sureness born of great talent, perseverance, and patience. The waiting time between albums is long, and perhaps songs are slowly borne as life happens around her.

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“Back to You” has an almost Renaissance feeling to it, and Meg’s voice here is plaintive and yearning. “Leaving Song” is a madrigal, and is far too short. I am fairly sure I could listen to an entire album of such angelic beauty. A minute is definitely not long enough! “Good Directions” is more complicated, sounding as though an Appalachian folk group rose out of the earth to accompany Meg on this tune. It has a fast pace, but you can’t quite dance a reel to this song. It certainly underscores how well these two musicians play together, and is another high mark on this release.

The soft, gentle title track, “Don’t Weigh Down the Light” is an early morning song for sitting on the porch with coffee in hand, enjoying the view of mist shrouding the surrounding hills. It maintains its thoughtful, mournful air throughout, before fading out to the sad breakup song that follows, “Even the Walls Don’t Want You to Go.” Its slightly atonal melody suits the subject matter, and at times, Meg’s backing vocal sounds horn-like. “Past Houses (Reprise)” finishes out the record, and makes me think of Neil Young in his After the Gold Rush days.

This lovely album is a must for all fans of English folk, Renaissance, and Appalachian roots music, or for those who like their folk somber, mystical and beautifully rendered.

Available on CD here (UK/EU), and here (US), and on vinyl here (UK/EU),or here (US).

WAND – ” Stolen Footsteps “

Posted: July 11, 2015 in MUSIC
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A new Song taken from the LP/CASS/CD “1000 Days” by Wand, due to be released September 25th, 2015 on Drag City Records. New Wand aloft!  Wand manufacture a little life within an elaborate craftwork of sound amongst the endless social contrivances of popular music .On their Drag City debut, 1000 Days, Wand move restlessly and gracefully through different divergent phases of music in a single passage of a song. This is how they make their music. Recorded in their hometown of Los Angeles and San Francisco, 1000 Days finds Wand searching in corners and finding extra texture via synthetic animation. The atmosphere is quicksilver and the space acoustic; as a beacon sparks electric, a cascade of hi-fi noises for everyone’s ears – raucous, impassive, inevitable musical expressions.

1000 Days is Wand‘s third album in what can only be called the relative blink of an eye, and their best album too. August of 2014 saw the release of Ganglion Reef, Wand‘s debut album release on God?. Following that, they ranged from their south-Cali base playing shows of all kinds home and abroad. And suddenly, it was March of 2015, with a second album entitled Golem trailing Wand‘s sound farther down the road. No time to spare; more dates to be played across the landmass. And another set of European dates later, 1000 Days. is out September 25th and available for pre-order now; sneak a peek at the first song revealed from 1000 Days here titled Stolen Footsteps.

MEG BAIRD – ” Counterfeiters “

Posted: April 3, 2015 in MUSIC
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Track off of her forthcoming album “Don’t Weigh Down The Light”, out June 23rd Meg Baird is an American musician based in San Francisco, California, who, in addition to her solo career, is known as a founding member and the lead female vocalist of Philadelphia psychedelic folk rock band Espers. Most recently, she became a founding member, lead vocalist, and drummer for Heron Oblivion, along with members from Assemble Head in Sunburst Sound and Comets on Fire. Songs of memory and forgetting…within the architecture of shimmering guitars and melancholy light…razor sharp edge of her voice in your bones.

Originally from New Jersey, US, Baird’s family history is based in the folk tradition: Baird is the great-great niece of Isaac Garfield “I.G.” Greer, a historian and Appalachian folk singer born in 1881. His inclusion on one of the earliest albums issued by the Archive of Folk Culture in the Library of Congress helped expose Baird to folk music at a young age, while she was taking piano lessons, teaching herself guitar, 

DEATH – ” Keep On Knocking “

Posted: January 17, 2015 in MUSIC
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Death are a  Garage rock and proto punk band formed in Detroit, Michigan in 1971 by brothers Bobby (bass, vocals), David (guitar), and Dannis (drums) Hackney. The trio started out as a funk band but switched to rock after seeing a concert by The Who and  Alice Cooper play who was also an inspiration.  David “pushed the group in a hard-rock direction that presaged punk,  The band broke up by 1977 but reformed in 2009 when the Drag City Records label released their 70s demos for the first time.

WHITE FENCE – ” Like That “

Posted: December 31, 2014 in MUSIC
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One of the closest allies of the Ty Segall, Tim Presley also released his latest White Fence album titled “For the Recently Found Innocent” on Drag City Records.

Their blissed-out psych belter has the 60’s feel with echoes of the Who…. all over it, conjuring memories of The Yardbirds and similar bands of that era, It could be counted among some of the most chorus-driven work Presley has produced too, with a sun-drenched vibe that was rarely off our stereo over the summer. The very best kind of a nostalgia trip.

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