MASSIVE ATTACK 100th Window (Virgin) cd 16.98
Our beloved customer and friend Jesse Zeifman loves this album more than any of the AQ staff did, so we asked him to say a li'l something about it:
It's been five years since Massive Attack's startlingly aggressive Mezzanine marked a turning point for the Bristol trio credited, by most, for creating trip-hop. In the interim, the band's lost two of its three founding members, leaving the reins in Robert "3D" Del Naja's hands.
From Blue Lines (1991), a debut that used hip-hop as an endoskeleton and had a body made of soul music, to the muted, austere, follow-up Protection (1994), no Massive Attack album has sounded alike. For their new release, Del Naja has managed to shape-shift the group once again, eschewing Mezzanine's guitars and static and grit for something closer to ambient electronica.
Beginning with "Future Proof" and its combination of galloping electronic blips, reverberating guitars and layers of feedback, Del Naja throws an unexpected curve when, rather than delivering his lyrics with his signature blunted raps, he sings. Sounding like Thom Yorke stoned might, he doesn't display a lot of range, but he phrases things accordingly, effectively, and where it could have felt soft and wrong it doesn't.
As with their previous efforts, the sound-system dynamic with which the group was built remains in place. While Del Naja helms four of the album's nine tracks, he calls upon two other vocalists, Sinead O'Connor and Horace Andy, to give voice to the rest. O'Connor is, unfortunately, underused, leaving her songs the album's least interesting, but Andy, especially on the lovely "Everywhen", fares better. "Small Time Shot Away" is the album's warmest song. If any tonal comparison is to be drawn, it would be with Boards of Canada's "Music Is Math" (from their latest, Geogaddi). "Antistar" closes 100th Window with a threatening guitar loop smashed against Middle Eastern-flavored strings and Del Naja at his most claustrophobic. Juxtapositions of the beautiful and the ominous betray this track's genetic lineage. It's the take-no-shit younger sibling of Mezzanine's, "Risingson."
The rigor of Massive Attack's production always sets their work apart and 100th Window is no different. It may feel, upon first pass, like a pleasant soundtrack to your next dinner party. Check again. Tracks upon tracks of percussive elements, of tingling, stuttering, noise, of lost guitar loops moving independently, churning in their subterranean canals, makes for an experience of uneasy listening.
Recommended for fans of the group -- if you're new to Massive Attack, please start with Mezzanine.
RealAudio clip: "Everywhen"
RealAudio clip: "Future Proof"

MASSIVE ATTACK 100th Window (Virgin) 3lp 31.00
Our beloved customer and friend Jesse Zeifman loves this album more than any of the AQ staff did, so we asked him to say a li'l something about it:
It's been five years since Massive Attack's startlingly aggressive Mezzanine marked a turning point for the Bristol trio credited, by most, for creating trip-hop. In the interim, the band's lost two of its three founding members, leaving the reins in Robert "3D" Del Naja's hands.
From Blue Lines (1991), a debut that used hip-hop as an endoskeleton and had a body made of soul music, to the muted, austere, follow-up Protection (1994), no Massive Attack album has sounded alike. For their new release, Del Naja has managed to shape-shift the group once again, eschewing Mezzanine's guitars and static and grit for something closer to ambient electronica.
Beginning with "Future Proof" and its combination of galloping electronic blips, reverberating guitars and layers of feedback, Del Naja throws an unexpected curve when, rather than delivering his lyrics with his signature blunted raps, he sings. Sounding like Thom Yorke stoned might, he doesn't display a lot of range, but he phrases things accordingly, effectively, and where it could have felt soft and wrong it doesn't.
As with their previous efforts, the sound-system dynamic with which the group was built remains in place. While Del Naja helms four of the album's nine tracks, he calls upon two other vocalists, Sinead O'Connor and Horace Andy, to give voice to the rest. O'Connor is, unfortunately, underused, leaving her songs the album's least interesting, but Andy, especially on the lovely "Everywhen", fares better. "Small Time Shot Away" is the album's warmest song. If any tonal comparison is to be drawn, it would be with Boards of Canada's "Music Is Math" (from their latest, Geogaddi). "Antistar" closes 100th Window with a threatening guitar loop smashed against Middle Eastern-flavored strings and Del Naja at his most claustrophobic. Juxtapositions of the beautiful and the ominous betray this track's genetic lineage. It's the take-no-shit younger sibling of Mezzanine's, "Risingson."
The rigor of Massive Attack's production always sets their work apart and 100th Window is no different. It may feel, upon first pass, like a pleasant soundtrack to your next dinner party. Check again. Tracks upon tracks of percussive elements, of tingling, stuttering, noise, of lost guitar loops moving independently, churning in their subterranean canals, makes for an experience of uneasy listening.
Recommended for fans of the group -- if you're new to Massive Attack, please start with Mezzanine.

MASSIVE ATTACK Blue Lines (Virgin) cd 16.98

MASSIVE ATTACK Heligoland (Virgin) cd 15.98
We wanted so much to like this new Massive Attack record. It had all the right ingredients (vocals by Horace Andy, Hope Sandoval, Damon Albern, etc.) but damn if it doesn't just fall a little bit flat. There are a few nice moments but as an album it feels a bit dated and really underwhelming. Some consolation can be found in the fact that another record came out not long ago, reviewed last list: King Midas Sound's record Waiting For You, which sounded exactly how we were had hoped the new Massive Attack would, warped and dark and dreamy, hypnotic and otherworldly, washed out and so divine. So if you love how Massive Attack sounded way back when they were great, maybe pass on this one and get King Midas Sound instead!
MPEG Stream: "Pray For Rain"
MPEG Stream: "Psyche"
MPEG Stream: "Saturday Come Slow"

MASSIVE ATTACK Mezzanine (Circa) cd 16.98
Scoffing at Portishead for not really extending themselves beyond the John Barry inspired trip hop of their first album, Massive Attack's Mezzanine is an excellent departure from the blunted references from Protection into a darkly polished gem that features Elizabeth Fraser of The Cocteau Twins on vocals! We think this record out-Trickys Tricky.

MASSIVE ATTACK Vs Mad Professor (Caroline) cd 14.98

MASTER MUSICIANS OF JAJOUKA / TALVIN SINGH s/t (Point Music) cd 15.98
Bachir Attar and the Master Musicians of Jajouka are teamed up with producer Talvin Singh for this traditional Morrocan trance-music meets modern club beats experiment. If you've seen the movie "The Cell" you've heard some music from this album, used as the soundtrack to the "desert" sequences, all layered, massive, and wailing.

MATER SUSPIRIA VISION Crack Witch (Living Tapes) lp 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
As we mentioned in the review of the MSV 7" a while back, for a genre that seems to be the NEXT BIG THING, actual physical recordings are surprisingly difficult to come by. Which is maybe the point, much of the musical output comes in the form of tracks on SoundCloud, videos on YouTube, as super limited cd-r's or downloads, and most of the bands have names that are essentially un-Googlable, all symbols and shapes, A's become little black triangles, or three stylized crosses becomes 'Ritualz', etc, hard not to become intrigued, or obsessed, and we most definitely seem to be both.
Salem was the first glimpse the mainstream world got of this strange new genre, a sound that somehow melded blown out lo-fi synths, minimal electro, twisted samples, old school goth, minimal techno, slowed down Southern style chopped and screwed hip hop, choral vox, big beats, into something distorted and murky yet weirdly epic, a sound that the creators described as Witch House, but has also been dubbed grave rave, zombie rave, cave rave and is sometimes lumped in with nu-gaze and chill wave and other outsider electronic micro genres. And Salem is the shit, hell, we made it our Record Of The Week, how could we not, it was and IS one of the coolest record of the last few years. But if Salem are the young witch house upstarts, ramshackle punks legendary for their chaotic live performances, yet who somehow managed to make what is possibly THEE defining record of the genre, and if groups like oOoOO and Balam Acab are crafters of a witch house that is more melodic and dancefloor friendly, then Mater Suspiria Vision are like some mysterious bearded witch house council, the masters of the scene, black cloaked figures that live in a cave somewhere, never glimpsed in the flesh, only via their transmissions, mostly amazing, twisted, fantastically fucked up YouTube videos, mini horror epics, always accompanied by MSV's dirgey, haunting soundtracks, often releasing 3 or 4 in a single day. No idea where these guys are from (Kabul?), if it's one person or a group, male or female, the mystery only adds to the appeal, the imagery, the videos, and the music, which even in a genre defined by it's 'witchiness' manages to be seriously dark, and grim, creepy and scary.
Originally released as a super limited cassette tape, Crack Witch has now been resurrected on vinyl, by the newly launched Living Tapes label (run by the guy from outsider black metal weirdos Yoga by the way), and is probably the best witch house document since Salem's King Night. But MSV's witch house is something else all together, something all together more EVIL sounding, not sure if it's that they're conceived to accompany videos, but they also tend to be super cinematic, just check out the opener "Call Of The Witches", thick buzzing ominous synths, strange snippets of foreign language dialogue, strange spaced out stuttery beats, a stumbling groove, terrified shrieks, sobbing and weeping, everything reverby and echoey, and then an awesome dizzying blast of strange processed melodies, backward synths, almost like Teenage Filmstars style witch house, totally tripped out and seriously sonically scary.
"Evil House Of Forbidden Fruit" offers up big echoey beats, strange heavily effected vocals, the sound super distorted and crumbly, stuttery and rhythmic, underneath mysterious melodies swell, subtle synths pulse, all building to a crunchy corrosive climax. "House Of 7 Witches" is all swirly and shimmery by comparison, until the shimmer is buried beneath an avalanche of heavily delayed beats, and buzzing synth squelch, the beats getting louder and more distorted, careening back and forth, eventually totally obscuring all the other sounds. Finally, side one finishes of with the much more subdued "Wtxchs (A Suite Of Decay), with a low slung groove, wreathed in skitter and hiss, crackle and buzz, and some ominous reverbed female vocals courtesy of someone called Shazzula, the result a sort of warped witchy Portishead, downtempo and lo-fi, a grim ghostly ballad, that quickly splinters into a noise drenched cacophony, all thick synth buzz and glitched out electronics, buried vox, swirling effects, all draped over a skeletal beat, buried in the mix, a lurching dubnoise creep.
All of side 2 is taken up by the 24 minute epic "Trip 2012", a darkly cinematic epic, cobbled together from what sounds like bits of film music, as well as snippets of dialogue, but super reverby and echoey, like a sonic fun house mirror, it's not until about 3 minutes in that the synth drops, a thick, buzzing, snarly bit of wheezing chordal crunch, the various shards of delay and echo coalescing into a sort of beat, again weirdly reminding us of the most far out Teenage Filmstars jams, a sprawling, dubbed out dronescape, every single note, every melody, every voice, transformed by malfunctioning effects into streaks of otherworldly sound, like a way more dubbed out Wolf Eyes in places, a sort of heaving, crumbling industrial crunch, but way more spaced out, and ominous, more creepy and cinematic, and WAY more witchy.
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES! Super striking eye popping full color covers.
MPEG Stream: "Call Of The Witches"
MPEG Stream: "Evil House Of Forbidden Fruits"
MPEG Stream: "House Of 7 Witches"

MATER SUSPIRIA VISION Exorcism Of The Hippies (Pendu Sound) 7" 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
For all the Witch House music out there, it seems like very little of it actually gets released. Instead it's shared, and downloaded, offered on Soundcloud and various other sites, occasionally released as super limited cd-r's, but proper releases are few and far between.
As far as we know this may very well be the first proper release (definitely the first and only vinyl, there's been a cd-r and a cassette) from the mysterious collective called Mater Suspiria Vision, purveyors of witch house, or perhaps ghost drone, haunted disco trance, or even drag, depending on who you ask. The sound of witch house, for the uninitiated, is a twisted hybrid of classic goth, nineties techno, DJ Screw style slowed down sounds (hence the term drag), and all manner of spooky creepy atmospheres, horror movies, giallo soundtracks, all woven into a witchy bit of electronic psychedelic creepiness. And the various monikers tend to be heavy on the strange symbols that you get by pressing option or control on your keyboards, you know, little black triangles, tiny crosses, all those sorts of zapf dingbats style icons. Anyway, Salem is probably the most high profile witch house combo out there, but of all the other outfits we've heard, Mater Suspiria Vision is probably the only other group that comes close to conjuring up the same sort of mystery, coupled with the same sort of sonic heft.
No idea if MSV is a group or a person, it seems to be some sort of collective, or where they're located, all of their various pages list their home as Kabul, which seems suspect. In addition to music, they also create incredible tripped our psychedelic videos, that perfectly capture the same twisted vibe as their music. And they somehow manage to release a continuous stream of sights and sounds, new ones seemingly every day, which is why it's even more remarkable that this is one of only a tiny handful of actual MSV releases.
Regardless, it's a doozy, if you dug the Salem, and the oOoOO and the Balam Acab and maybe that Big Pink Tapes comp, then you are definitely gonna want this. And if you've yet to take the witch house plunge, but dig stuff like Leyland Kirby and Demdike Stare, odds are this is gonna be right up your alley.
A two parter titled provocatively "Exorcism Of The Hippies", it's all fat fuzzed out woozy warbly bass, thick low end swells, strange stuttery handclap rhythms, swooping spaced out effects, creepy dubbed out slo-mo atmospherics, strange voices, vocal snippets and samples, all blurred and smeared, a hazy, gauzy lysergic psychedelic trip out, the soundtrack to some strange foreign horror film from the seventies, coupled to some primitive old school techno 12", both spinning at 16rpm, the whole thing doused in cough syrup and left in the sun, cursed by a witch, buried in a graveyard, only to be dug up, melted down and mixed with liquid thorazine and a handful of horse tranquilizers and then pressed into this here 7". SO GOOD!
Packaged in super swank full color covers, and LIMITED TO 300 COPIES!!!

MATHIEU, STEPHAN Frequency Lib (Mille Plateaux) cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Just as Christian Fennesz transformed the canonical rock icons The Rolling Stones and The Beach Boys into sublime electronica-glitch perfection, Stephan Mathieu has pillaged the 'public domain' archives of the 20th century to create his own digital deconstruction of historical canons. It's quite possible that he could have gotten away with using recordings whose rights are held under legal lock and key, as his DSP reconfiguration is so broad as to render his tracks almost unrecognizable from the original. Never stating what the original pieces are (although he does include a really obvious Smashing Pumpkins reference... but done very well), Mathieu has transfomed those pieces into 25 small sketches of layered digital reversals, downpitched rhythmic crawls, sublime glistening tonalities, and white-hot glitch crackle. At times he emphasizes the age of the original, by manipulating the surface noise of the vinyl (or possibly, wax cylinder), others he pulls from the three notes from some High Lonesome guitarist, or the ethereal quality of an unknown vocalist. Mathieu does not present these digital reconfigurations without order. Rhythmic loops and discreet harmonies ripple throughout Mathieu's album, making for the best Oval-sounding record since Oval made "Diskont 94."
RealAudio clip: "Mrs. Moon"
RealAudio clip: "Some Of Today"
RealAudio clip: "Two Nights"

MATHIEU, STEPHAN Frequency Lib (Mille Plateaux) lp 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Just as Christian Fennesz transformed the canonical rock icons The Rolling Stones and The Beach Boys into sublime electronica-glitch perfection, Stephan Mathieu has pillaged the 'public domain' archives of the 20th century to create his own digital deconstruction of historical canons. It's quite possible that he could have gotten away with using recordings whose rights are held under legal lock and key, as his DSP reconfiguration is so broad as to render his tracks almost unrecognizable from the original. Never stating what the original pieces are (although he does include a really obvious Smashing Pumpkins reference... but done very well), Mathieu has transfomed those pieces into 25 small sketches of layered digital reversals, downpitched rhythmic crawls, sublime glistening tonalities, and white-hot glitch crackle. At times he emphasizes the age of the original, by manipulating the surface noise of the vinyl (or possibly, wax cylinder), others he pulls from the three notes from some High Lonesome guitarist, or the ethereal quality of an unknown vocalist. Mathieu does not present these digital reconfigurations without order. Rhythmic loops and discreet harmonies ripple throughout Mathieu's album, making for the best Oval-sounding record since Oval made "Diskont 94."

MATHIEU, STEPHAN Gigue (Fallt) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Why he records under the moniker Full Swing some of the time and his given name Stephan Mathieu on other occasions is a mystery, as the blueprint for all of his work remains a constant. Nevertheless, Mathieu is quickly becoming the most consistent electronica composer, often upstaging Christian Fennesz and Carsten Nicolai. Picking up where Mathieu left off on his exceptional Full Swing "Edits" album, "Gigue" is a live recording of his synthetic swells expanded out of digital minutae. His signature buzzing resonance drifts warmly out of digitized crackle and thick droning hiss. While such sounds had been common on the aforementioned "Edits" album, Mathieu pushes these sounds even further into a tumultuous wash of reverberant static, white noise and digital percolations, which stand out as quite intense for the typically sublime Mathieu. This crescendo of noise never strives for Merzbow, rather it presents the metaphor of the vast pressures and heat from deep sea hydrothermic vents where blackened plumes of scalding water blast upward amidst the frigid seawater at the bottom of the ocean. A short 30 minutes from this accomplished musician, but well worth every minute!
RealAudio clip: "Gigue"

MATHIEU, STEPHAN The Sad Mac (Headz / Fader) cd 19.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The Macintosh iBooks and iMacs at Aquarius are getting old in digital years, and they're gradually showing their age. So, let's hope and prey that neither the "sad mac" icon nor the "chimes of death" start to haunt our aged computing system. For those Windows operators out there, these are the Mac equivalent of the "blue screen of death," calling attention that something quite dreadful has happened to the computer. Such anxiety producing indicators of a malfuncting computer are the subject matter for this album from German sound artist Stephan Mathieu. Despite the nail-biting angst that such dilemnas can cause, The Sad Mac is a benevolently tranquil recording in which a variety of sounds have been smeared into melancholic ambience, perhaps composed more as a balm of having to deal with those computer problems. Having established himself as one of premier digital composers with the Full Swing album Edits as well as his collaborative Heroin album with Ekkehard Ehlers, Mathieu makes a profound shift in methology as he eschews the "DSP-Magic" of his earlier albums in favor of a much simpler arrangement with a few digital programs applied as pixelated flourishes upon field recordings and minimalist compositions for violin, pump organ, and harpsicord. Even without all of the pixel pushing from his Max-MSP patches of yonder year, Mathieu still manages to construct beautifully sustained drones, seamlessly combining all of the elements as the flicker, echo, dissolve, blur, and expand with his signature fluidity.
MPEG Stream: "Theme For Oud Amelisweerd"
MPEG Stream: "Smile"
MPEG Stream: "Tinfoil Star (Recording Angels)"

MATHIEU, STEPHAN Wurmloch : Variationen (Ritornell) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
"Wurmloch : Variationen" appears to be the first release for Stephan Mathieu who managed to land his debut on Ritornell -- the high-profile experimental subsidiary of Mille Plateaux / Force Inc. Mathieu has constructed these 5 pieces using an original 11-minute long piano piece which has been digital dissolved into ringing drones scraped with glitches. Occasionally the piano is allowed to speak with its original voice, as elegant chords somberly march through a very slow melody; but for the most part, Mathieu prefers to exploit the coldness of digital entropy as it takes over his piano composition. Quite nice.

MATHIEU, STEPHAN & EKKEHARD EHLERS Heroin (Staalplaat) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Similar to their relationship with Dutch radio station VPRO which resulted in the Mort Aux Vaches series, Staalplaat has begun a cooperation with the Dutch arts initiative Extrapool to release work from Extrapool's artist in residency program. The goal being to encourage strange and interesting combinations. In light of this program, Extrapool's choice of laptop glitch technicians Stephan Mathieu and Ekkehard Ehlers is almost too obvious, as both artists have developed similar styles, digitally recombining disfigured yet emotionally dynamic sounds. One of Mathieu's recent projects has been the Full Swing "Edits" 10"s of confounding remixes for Kit Clayton's Orthlorng Musork, and Ehlers too has been on the remix tip with his reconfigurations of Albert Aylers and Cassavettes.
What separates both Mathieu and Ehlers from the rest of the glitch electronica field is their wonderful fascination with antiquity and their maintainence of surface noise and grit within a technological setting that typically has an intrinsic aesthetic for cleanliness and sterility. The rich cracklings of surface noise and fuzzy static of an old tube-amp radio emerge throughout their "Heroin" collaboration. Mellotron organs form whimsical melodies before dissolving into warm pools of warbling timbres; a melodica offers playful tunes over a looped and glitched backing track of the same instrument. Occasionally, Mathieu and Ehlers produce something more in step with the purity of the Raster-Noton sound, but for the most part have constructed a beautiful (if mutant) remnant of pop sentimentality, sounding more like a slightly digital version of Philip Jeck.
RealAudio clip: "Herz"
RealAudio clip: "Rose"

MATHIEU, STEPHAN & EKKEHARD EHLERS Heroin + Remixes (Orthlong Musork) 2cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
NOW BACK IN PRINT! Similar to their relationship with Dutch radio station VPRO which resulted in the Mort Aux Vaches series, Staalplaat has begun a cooperation with the Dutch arts initiative Extrapool to release work from Extrapool's artist in residency program. The goal being to encourage strange and interesting combinations. In light of this program, Extrapool's choice of laptop glitch technicians Stephan Mathieu and Ekkehard Ehlers is almost too obvious, as both artists have developed similar styles, digitally recombining disfigured yet emotionally dynamic sounds. One of Mathieu's recent projects has been the Full Swing "Edits" 10"s of confounding remixes for Kit Clayton's Orthlorng Musork, and Ehlers too has been on the remix tip with his reconfigurations of Albert Aylers and Cassavettes.
What separates both Mathieu and Ehlers from the rest of the glitch electronica field is their wonderful fascination with antiquity and their maintaining of surface noise and grit within a technological setting that typically has an intrinsic aesthetic for cleanliness and sterility. The rich cracklings of surface noise and fuzzy static of an old tube-amp radio emerge throughout their "Heroin" collaboration. Mellotron organs form whimsical melodies before dissolving into warm pools of warbling timbres; a melodica offers playful tunes over a looped and glitched backing track of the same instrument. Occasionally, Mathieu and Ehlers produce something more in step with the purity of the Raster-Noton sound, but for the most part have constructed a beautiful (if mutant) remnant of pop sentimentality, sounding more like a slightly digital version of Philip Jeck.
Along with the "Heroin" album, Orthlorng Musork has commissioned a number of remixes from contemporary electronic artists Josef Suchy, Nobukazu Takemura, Kit Clayton, Frieband, Fennesz, Oren Ambarchi, Carmen Baier, and Akira Rabelais. Unfortunately, the track listing is slightly screwed up as the Frieband and Kit Clayton tracks are switched on the disc. Oops.
RealAudio clip: "Herz"
RealAudio clip: "Rose"

MATHIEU, STEPHAN & EKKEHARD EHLERS Heroin + Remixes (Orthlong Musork) 2lp 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
NOW BACK IN PRINT! Similar to their relationship with Dutch radio station VPRO which resulted in the Mort Aux Vaches series, Staalplaat has begun a cooperation with the Dutch arts initiative Extrapool to release work from Extrapool's artist in residency program. The goal being to encourage strange and interesting combinations. In light of this program, Extrapool's choice of laptop glitch technicians Stephan Mathieu and Ekkehard Ehlers is almost too obvious, as both artists have developed similar styles, digitally recombining disfigured yet emotionally dynamic sounds. One of Mathieu's recent projects has been the Full Swing "Edits" 10"s of confounding remixes for Kit Clayton's Orthlorng Musork, and Ehlers too has been on the remix tip with his reconfigurations of Albert Aylers and Cassavettes.
What separates both Mathieu and Ehlers from the rest of the glitch electronica field is their wonderful fascination with antiquity and their maintaining of surface noise and grit within a technological setting that typically has an intrinsic aesthetic for cleanliness and sterility. The rich cracklings of surface noise and fuzzy static of an old tube-amp radio emerge throughout their "Heroin" collaboration. Mellotron organs form whimsical melodies before dissolving into warm pools of warbling timbres; a melodica offers playful tunes over a looped and glitched backing track of the same instrument. Occasionally, Mathieu and Ehlers produce something more in step with the purity of the Raster-Noton sound, but for the most part have constructed a beautiful (if mutant) remnant of pop sentimentality, sounding more like a slightly digital version of Philip Jeck.
Along with the "Heroin" album, Orthlorng Musork has commissioned a number of remixes from contemporary electronic artists Josef Suchy, Nobukazu Takemura, Kit Clayton, Frieband, Fennesz, Oren Ambarchi, Carmen Baier, and Akira Rabelais. Unfortunately, the track listing is slightly screwed up as the Frieband and Kit Clayton tracks are switched on the disc. Oops.

MATHIEU, STEPHAN / RADBOUD MENS / JANEK SCHAEFER / TIMEBLIND Quality Hotel (Mutek) cd 16.98
A previous Mutek release found the minimalist techno outfit Goem collaborating with a number of artists who simply stopped by Goem's hotel room during the 2001 Mutek festival. While Goem's record had all of the good natured intentions of warm comradery, it fell flat as a poor recapitulation of Goem's micro-techno. Fortunately, the second effort between artists collaborating in a hotel room during the 2002 Mutek festival is a much better offering. With none of the blunted hip-hop rhythms of Timeblind, none of Radboud Mens' fragile minimalist techno, and few slivers of Janek Schaefer's bleak sonic abstractions, the dominant aesthetic is that of Stephan Mathieu, which is totally fine by us! As a result, "Quality Hotel" is a delicate affair of fizzing digital ambience, with samples that flicker, twist, and bloom into sleepy drones cracked with miniscule glitches and glassine vibrations. It's a very subdued record, but is is just as good as any of Mathieu's previous outings.
MPEG Stream: "track 1"
MPEG Stream: "track 2"

MATMOS A Chance To Cut Is A Chance To Cure (Matador) cd 15.98
The Matmos back catalogue of quirky electronica features an odd litany of sound sources which sets them apart from their contemporaries trapped within the bunker mentality of laptop trickery. Whoopie cushions contextualized as surface noise, the neural synapse of a crayfish turned into a bassline, latex popped into a post-Autechre rhythmic algorithm, theremins created from toy walkie talkies. While their previous records have been wacky electronic collages which almost indiscriminately blended sources from everywhere, "A Chance To Cut Is A Chance To Cure" is single minded in its conceptual dedication to medicine. Directed in most part from Matmos' Drew Daniel with his collaborator M.C. Schmidt quick to offer a witty offhand remark, their fourth album is a perverse album of clunky house numbers that deftly avoids sounding terribly macabre, given their subject matter.
The album begins with the light shuffling house groove of "Lipostudio (And So On...)" which includes an odd textural duet between human fat gurgling through a tiny vacuum and a bleating clarinet supplied by Stephen Thrower (currently of Cylobe, formerly of Coil). "Spondee" works another house groove around the rhythmic recitation of spondees -- duo-syllabic words / phrases in which neither syllable is particularly stressed -- by an audiologist testing deaf children. By the end of the album, Matmos needed to address the reality of death and did so with "Momento Mori" - a 23Skidoo-ish death-funk groove built out of sounds generated from a human skull.
This is easily Matmos' most successful record to date, and will make fans of Coil's "Love's Secret Domain" or Doctor Rockit's "D Is For Doctor" very happy!
RealAudio clip: "Lipostudio (And So On...)"
RealAudio clip: "Momento Mori"
RealAudio clip: "Spondee"

MATMOS A Chance To Cut Is A Chance To Cure (Matador) lp 11.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The Matmos back catalogue of quirky electronica features an odd litany of sound sources which sets them apart from their contemporaries trapped within the bunker mentality of laptop trickery. Whoopie cushions contextualized as surface noise, the neural synapse of a crayfish turned into a bassline, latex popped into a post-Autechre rhythmic algorithm, theremins created from toy walkie talkies. While their previous records have been wacky electronic collages which almost indiscriminately blended sources from everywhere, "A Chance To Cut Is A Chance To Cure" is single minded in its conceptual dedication to medicine. Directed in most part from Matmos' Drew Daniel with his collaborator M.C. Schmidt quick to offer a witty offhand remark, their fourth album is a perverse album of clunky house numbers that deftly avoids sounding terribly macabre, given their subject matter.
The album begins with the light shuffling house groove of "Lipostudio (And So On...)" which includes an odd textural duet between human fat gurgling through a tiny vacuum and a bleating clarinet supplied by Stephen Thrower (currently of Cylobe, formerly of Coil). "Spondee" works another house groove around the rhythmic recitation of spondees -- duo-syllabic words / phrases in which neither syllable is particularly stressed -- by an audiologist testing deaf children. By the end of the album, Matmos needed to address the reality of death and did so with "Momento Mori" - a 23Skidoo-ish death-funk groove built out of sounds generated from a human skull.
This is easily Matmos' most successful record to date, and will make fans of Coil's "Love's Secret Domain" or Doctor Rockit's "D Is For Doctor" very happy!

MATMOS California Rhinoplasty (Matador) cd ep 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
A teaser ep from Matmos' upcoming record "A Chance To Cut Is A Chance To Cure" -- the medical album for San Francisco's beloved electronica duo, who of course keeps this rather sterile and grim theme lighthearted and wacky. In keeping true to the medical theme, Matmos procured remixes from Dr. Rockit and Surgeon of the title track... and did a cover of Coil's "Disco Hospital" (which features Stephen Thrower - formerly of Coil). Who said drilling through a person's nose or suctioning out all of the fat from some rich lady's ass couldn't be fun? Or sound great?!
RealAudio clip: "California Rhinoplasty"
RealAudio clip: "Disco Hospital"

MATMOS California Rhinoplasty (Matador) 12" 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
A teaser ep from Matmos' upcoming record "A Chance To Cut Is A Chance To Cure" -- the medical album for San Francisco's beloved electronica duo, who of course keeps this rather sterile and grim theme lighthearted and wacky. In keeping true to the medical theme, Matmos procured remixes from Dr. Rockit and Surgeon of the title track... and did a cover of Coil's "Disco Hospital" (which features Stephen Thrower - formerly of Coil). Who said drilling through a person's nose or suctioning out all of the fat from some rich lady's ass couldn't be fun? Or sound great?!

MATMOS For Alan Turing (Vague Terrain) 3"cd 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
This limited pressing 3" cd from local sound alchemists Matmos continues in the same conceptual vein as their last major release, The Rose Has Teeth In The Mouth Of The Beast, where each track was dedicated to a musical, philosophical or literary figure (Boyd McDonald, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Larry Levan, etc.). The material for this cd was originally commissioned by members of The Mathematical Sciences Research Institute and Matmos took the opportunity to create three pieces for one of their scientific heroes, Alan Turing. Who is Alan Turing, you ask? Well, Alan Turing was an English mathematician, logician, and cryptographer who became a pioeering figure in modern computing, and who contributed much to the debate about artificial intelligence and whether machines could ever develop consciousness and independently think (ever hear of the Turing Test?). But what makes Alan Turing an even more interesting and ultimately tragic figure for Matmos is the charges that were brought against him in the early fifties of "acts of gross indecency" for admitting to a sexual relationship with another man. After being put on probation and ordered to undergo hormone therapy, Turing ate an apple laced with cyanide. His death was ruled a suicide. Taking cues from Turing's work with cryptographic devices (otherwise known as the Enigma Machine) and his personal effects including postcards he sent to his lover before his suicide entitled Messages From The Unseen World, Matmos gained access to an actual Enigma machine and were able to use its sound for this recording. Enlisting help from David Tibet of Current 93, and Clodagh Simonds of Fovea Hex, Keith Fullerton Whitman, Matthew Curry and Mark Lightcap, Matmos have created three beautiful and touching pieces paying tribute this important and tragic figure. Limited to 1000 copies, and highly recommended!!!
MPEG Stream: "Enigma Machine For Alan Turing"
MPEG Stream: "Messages From The Unseen World"

MATMOS Quasi-Objects (Matador) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Simply filing this excellent album under "experimental electronica" is to give it short shrift. San Francisco boyfriends Drew Daniel and M.C. Schmidt (whose faces are morphed into one on the back cover) have crafted a record each of whose songs is a concept brought to fruit and to full percussive grooviness. One piece is composed entirely of manipulated samples of human voices, anothers sole instrument is a stretched wet latex shirt, and yet anothers sound source is the "silent recordings" which came about as two walkie talkies were held over a 4 channel tape recorder with nothing plugged into it, the resulting audible interference manipulated a la the theremin. Don't be put off by the weird instrumentation, this record heavily grooves like '80s electro, clanks like Balinese ketjak, and blips'n'bleeps like the best Mouse on Mars tracks. Highly, highly recommended!

MATMOS Rat Relocation Program (Locust) cd 14.98
Eek! Rats! You can always count on the mischevious Matmos (Drew and Martin, SF's darling duo of experimental electronica, who you probably know not only for their own weird, wonderful releases but also their work with Bjork) to make the most of the strangest sound-sources. In this case, a rat they (humanely) trapped in their Tenderloin apartment! Why? Well this is one of Locust's "Met Life" releases...that's not an insurance company but rather a "location sound series" for which sound artists were asked to both provide field recordings of their urban environment as well as "respond" musically to that environment. This 30 minute cd consists of two tracks. Track one is just the poor rat giving a solo performance, of squeaks and screams. If you have a cat this might interest them greatly. On the second track Matmos join in, turning the rat's cage into a nightclub for Intelligent Dance Music, with beats ranging from the purely abstract to the downright groovy. The rat's squeaks remain the same, coming in as if on cue in breaks in the music as orchestrated by Matmos. The rat's no house diva that's for sure, and we like the effect. Matmos' dance grooves are totally dark, and rat-appropriate while other parts of this (and the rat's original performance) echo some avant-garde 20th century classical with its use of space and silence. A successful 'collaboration' indeed. And don't worry, I don't think they actually subjected the rat to this mix. Furthermore, in the liner notes Matmos explain that "the following morning we took the rat to a wealthy suburban neighborhood and set it free."
MPEG Stream: "track 2"

MATMOS s/t (Matador) cd 14.98
This is one of our unanimous store favorites, a very accesible, murky electronic record inspired by electro and the sounds of hair, breathing and Polish trains. Recommended without reservation, this is some of the best of the bunch.
RealAudio clip: "It Seems"

MATMOS Supreme Balloon (Matador) cd 13.98
Matmos have that very rare and special talent of being able to turn endless creativity and playful spirit into something transcendental. While much of the press they get ends up being about their unique methods and approaches to gathering sounds (plastic surgery, semen, polish trains, rats, etc.) or the famous folks they have worked with (Bjork, Kronos Quartet, Terry Riley, etc.) the truth is that ultimately it's the strength of their varied albums and engaging live performances that have made them one of the best and most compelling music makers of the last decade.
Supreme Balloon finds Matmos stripped down in a sense as they put their contact mic's away and decided to make a record made solely with synthesizers and samplers, and the results are pretty damn stunning! Showing that they could give the DFA camp a tutorial if asked ("Polychords"), keeping their playful spirit on high with their Switched on Matmos take on "Les Folies Francaises" as well as reaching outer orbits of pure psychedelic bliss on the 24 minute title track. They use their wide range of synthesizers to create a kraut-like sensation with bursts of fluorescence and a sense of adventure and eye on the multicolor sky that is so damn hard to resist. Matmos manage to find the hidden smile in Klaus Schulze's stern visage, the relics of a Tangerine Dream with a half dose of ecstasy we always wished was out there somewhere. Once again they've proven that you can be smart without being stiff, playful without being dumb. Supreme Balloon will be a definite contender for record of the year!
(P.S., vinyl fans should note that the double-LP version of this record comes with three extra tracks including a great collaboration with Terry Riley titled "The Hashish Master"!)
MPEG Stream: "Polychords"
MPEG Stream: "Supreme Balloon"
MPEG Stream: "Rainbow Flag"

MATMOS Supreme Balloon (Matador) 2lp 26.00
Matmos have that very rare and special talent of being able to turn endless creativity and playful spirit into something transcendental. While much of the press they get ends up being about their unique methods and approaches to gathering sounds (plastic surgery, semen, polish trains, rats, etc.) or the famous folks they have worked with (Bjork, Kronos Quartet, Terry Riley, etc.) the truth is that ultimately it's the strength of their varied albums and engaging live performances that have made them one of the best and most compelling music makers of the last decade.
Supreme Balloon finds Matmos stripped down in a sense as they put their contact mic's away and decided to make a record made solely with synthesizers and samplers, and the results are pretty damn stunning! Showing that they could give the DFA camp a tutorial if asked ("Polychords"), keeping their playful spirit on high with their Switched on Matmos take on "Les Folies Francaises" as well as reaching outer orbits of pure psychedelic bliss on the 24 minute title track. They use their wide range of synthesizers to create a kraut-like sensation with bursts of fluorescence and a sense of adventure and eye on the multicolor sky that is so damn hard to resist. Matmos manage to find the hidden smile in Klaus Schulze's stern visage, the relics of a Tangerine Dream with a half dose of ecstasy we always wished was out there somewhere. Once again they've proven that you can be smart without being stiff, playful without being dumb. Supreme Balloon will be a definite contender for record of the year!
(P.S., vinyl fans should note that the double-LP version of this record comes with three extra tracks including a great collaboration with Terry Riley titled "The Hashish Master"!)
MPEG Stream: "Polychords"
MPEG Stream: "Supreme Balloon"
MPEG Stream: "Rainbow Flag"

MATMOS The Civil War (Matador) cd 14.98
If Drew Daniel got to indulge his big-booty-beach-party perversions on the Soft Pink Truth album, then Martin Schmidt, who is the other half of Matmos duo, should have the opportunity to elaborate his own musical virtues and vices. That said, it would be too easy to qualify "The Civil War" as the Martin record; but there are many more than a few similarities between this album and the previous outing "The West," Matmos' historically coded album which Matmos has publicly announced as being masterminded by Martin. Again, Matmos and their comrades in arms (J Lesser, Blevin Blechtum, Keith Fullerton Whitman, David Grubbs, Mark Lightcap, and others) wield some atypical instruments -- an emergency alarm system, blood, a rabbit pelt, conductive jelly, and an ultrasonic doppler flow detector (huh?); but what is most surprising about "The Civil War" is its dramatic break from the directions of contemporary electronica. Structurally, this album is a pastiche of jaunty Renaissance jigs, fife and drum marches, medieval madrigals for hurdy gurdy, and rustic folk. Yet, smeared across the surfaces of these archaic musics are digital pixels, microtonal glissandos, misplaced electronic beats, and intrusive glitches. This is an overtly clever take on appropriation, never allowing an exact mimesis of the older forms, rather Matmos position the old and the new in a context of dislocation. At their best, perhaps on "The Struggle Against Unreality Begins," Matmos reconstitutes the alchemy of Coil during their "Horse Rotovator" period, where the anarchronistic references collapse into a monstrous dirge with sly glances toward the carnivalesque.
Those Bjork fans who love her swansongs and wish to indulge in the genius of her technicians must be warned that "The Civil War" is a willfully difficult listen. But those adventurous listeners will certainly be delighted by the collision of state of the art electronics and the music of yesteryear.
MPEG Stream: "Regicide"
MPEG Stream: "Y.T.T.E"
MPEG Stream: "The Struggle Against Reality Begins"

MATMOS The Civil War (Matador) lp 11.98
If Drew Daniel got to indulge his big-booty-beach-party perversions on the Soft Pink Truth album, then Martin Schmidt, who is the other half of Matmos duo, should have the opportunity to elaborate his own musical virtues and vices. That said, it would be too easy to qualify "The Civil War" as the Martin record; but there are many more than a few similarities between this album and the previous outing "The West," Matmos' historically coded album which Matmos has publicly announced as being masterminded by Martin. Again, Matmos and their comrades in arms (J Lesser, Blevin Blechtum, Keith Fullerton Whitman, David Grubbs, Mark Lightcap, and others) wield some atypical instruments -- an emergency alarm system, blood, a rabbit pelt, conductive jelly, and an ultrasonic doppler flow detector (huh?); but what is most surprising about "The Civil War" is its dramatic break from the directions of contemporary electronica. Structurally, this album is a pastiche of jaunty Renaissance jigs, fife and drum marches, medieval madrigals for hurdy gurdy, and rustic folk. Yet, smeared across the surfaces of these archaic musics are digital pixels, microtonal glissandos, misplaced electronic beats, and intrusive glitches. This is an overtly clever take on appropriation, never allowing an exact mimesis of the older forms, rather Matmos position the old and the new in a context of dislocation. At their best, perhaps on "The Struggle Against Unreality Begins," Matmos reconstitutes the alchemy of Coil during their "Horse Rotovator" period, where the anarchronistic references collapse into a monstrous dirge with sly glances toward the carnivalesque.
Those Bjork fans who love her swansongs and wish to indulge in the genius of her technicians must be warned that "The Civil War" is a willfully difficult listen. But those adventurous listeners will certainly be delighted by the collision of state of the art electronics and the music of yesteryear.

MATMOS The Rose Has Teeth In The Mouth Of A Beast (Matador) cd 15.98
San Francisco's darling electronic conceptualists Matmos have crafted an ambitious collection of audio portraits for their 6th full album, allowing their baroque sampling tricknology to articulate the metaphors in mapping out the complexities of each of the portraits. The collection of audio portraits represents the inspiration pantheon for Matmos, ranging from the ivory tower of academia to far reaches of underground culture. Hence, there's analytical philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, the scabrous feminist Valarie Solanas, New York house legend Larry Levan, Germs' frontman Darby Crash, homoerotic photographer James Bidgood, eccentric producer Joe Meek, gay chronicler Boyd McDonald, countercultural godfather William S. Burroughs, and noir-thriller novelist Patricia Highsmith. Matmos' work has always been a cavalcade of electro-acoustic stunts directed within a studied and adventurous reading of contemporary electronica tinged with comedic overtones, ranging from black humour to slapstick antics. The Rose Has Teeth In The Mouth Of A Beast is no different, romping through wah-wah splattered porno funk, mutant disco beats clipped with diva-house vocals, noirish concrete-collages, and tracks literally wrapped in semen stained sheets. As Matmos deconstructs and compresses the dense histories of each of their portrait subjects into the context of a six to ten minute electronica tracks, it's the details that Matmos amass that give each of their portraits such charm and pleasure. Very well done, indeed!
MPEG Stream: "Steam And Sequins For Larry Levan"
MPEG Stream: "Semen Song For James Bidgood"
MPEG Stream: "Solo Buttons For Joe Meek"

MATMOS The Rose Has Teeth In The Mouth Of A Beast (Matador) 2lp 16.98
San Francisco's darling electronic conceptualists Matmos have crafted an ambitious collection of audio portraits for their 6th full album, allowing their baroque sampling tricknology to articulate the metaphors in mapping out the complexities of each of the portraits. The collection of audio portraits represents the inspiration pantheon for Matmos, ranging from the ivory tower of academia to far reaches of underground culture. Hence, there's analytical philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, the scabrous feminist Valarie Solanas, New York house legend Larry Levan, Germs' frontman Darby Crash, homoerotic photographer James Bidgood, eccentric producer Joe Meek, gay chronicler Boyd McDonald, countercultural godfather William S. Burroughs, and noir-thriller novelist Patricia Highsmith. Matmos' work has always been a cavalcade of electro-acoustic stunts directed within a studied and adventurous reading of contemporary electronica tinged with comedic overtones, ranging from black humour to slapstick antics. The Rose Has Teeth In The Mouth Of A Beast is no different, romping through wah-wah splattered porno funk, mutant disco beats clipped with diva-house vocals, noirish concrete-collages, and tracks literally wrapped in semen stained sheets. As Matmos deconstructs and compresses the dense histories of each of their portrait subjects into the context of a six to ten minute electronica tracks, it's the details that Matmos amass that give each of their portraits such charm and pleasure. Very well done, indeed!
MPEG Stream: "Steam And Sequins For Larry Levan"
MPEG Stream: "Semen Song For James Bidgood"
MPEG Stream: "Solo Buttons For Joe Meek"

MATMOS The West (Deluxe) cd 12.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The CD release of last year's fantastic vinyl-only album from San Francisco's Matmos comes with an extra track AND some new artwork (buy it for the cowboy photo of Jay Lesser on a horse!). Totally amazing organic electronica laced with playful electro beats, wildly manipulated field recordings, arid soundtracks, and guest appearances from David Pajo (Slint, Tortoise, Aerial M), Kris Force (Amber Asylum), and Jay Lesser (who has now officially joined Matmos).

MATMOS The West (Autofact / Vague Terrain) cd 14.98
At long last, possibly our favorite Matmos record ever is back in print! The West is by far the most sprawling and highway ready record in their illustrious back catalog. With all the well deserved attention they've received over the years for their innovative methods and countless collaborations one thing that's often overlooked is how well their records tend to predict and predate what's about to come floating up from the musical underground. Recorded and released a few years before the big new weird America/freak folk movement took off and before everyone was using laptops to create folktronica, Matmos made this amazing album that perfectly melds their leftfield electronic roots with spacious and trance inducing guitar to create the kind of record you would imagine might have been made if Henry Flynt and Jim O'Rourke were to collaborate or if Christian Fennesz got to twist knobs while John Fahey was playing in one of his most exploratory moments. With a long list of guests including J. Lesser and David Pajo (Slint, Papa M) on board for the record, Drew & Martin once again demonstrate how great they are at letting others into their world and being open to where the sounds will take them while still maintaining a distinct vision.
The West is for sure one of our favorite roadtrip records of all time. "Sun on 5 at 152" really does sound exactly how it feels when the sun is blasting through your dirty windshield and you can't really see what's ahead but you keep your foot on the pedal and just follow the road to wherever it may lead you. While no two Matmos records are alike The West probably finds its most kindred spirit in The Civil War, another Matmos record that proves there is much more to these great music makers then simply synths and samples. No matter what they create, soul seeps richly through their fractured sounds and in our opinion The West may be their most soulful, satisfying and resonating release EVER. Highly recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Sun on 5 at 152"
MPEG Stream: "Last Delicious Cigarette"
MPEG Stream: "Action at a Distance"

MATMOS / MOTION (Fat Cat) 12" 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The 11th split 12" from Fat Cat features San Francisco's electronica geniuses Matmos and hard disc editors Motion. Matmos starts off with "Freak 'n' You" full of Funkstorifique damage on some sappy R&B slow-jam with lots of time-stretching, cybernetic sampledelica, and fractured beat skitter. This is followed by a collaboration with David Pajo and part time Matmos member Jay Lesser for a collage of string plucks from laptop modified banjos and guitars to create almost Pierre Schaeffer-ish creakiness and theremin-like vibrato.
Motion's digital kaleidoscope of warbling cd skips resembles the painterly squiggles of Microstoria.

MATMOS WITH J LESSER Live (Vague Terrain) cd 11.98
This limited edition collection of live material from Matmos with J Lesser (and a couple of guests) exposes the improvisational ability of this San Francisco electronica duo (or trio if you count Lesser) who are mostly reknowned for their transmutation of arcane sound sources (surgical suction, crayfish nerves, acupuncture) into IDM / tech-house. Where their studio albums have been crafted in full cognizance of the play between techno's rhythmic propulsion and the textural eccentricity of some of their source material, Matmos' live performances always try to integrate the performative, risk-taking elements of improvisation alongside pre-programmed rhythms and sequences. Thus, Matmos' live shows can't ever be accused of being the non-performances of a dude and his laptop, or sounding like their records for that matter. With these 11 live excerpts, Matmos ramble through dense processed bloopings made with skipping cds, walkie talkies, acoustic guitar, vacuum cleaner tubes, and duck calls (the latter being the most obtuse sound source on this album) alongside plenty of electronic skitter, resulting in something more in line with Gastr Del Sol and Red Crayola than what one may expect from Matmos. A couple of tracks (ones not qualified as improvisations in the liner notes) do venture into the throbbing electronica found on "Quasi-Objects" and "A Chance To Cut Is A Chance To Cure," including those aforementioned duck calls which I would really like to think is Matmos member M.C. Schmidt's answer to house divas. These tracks span the band's career with tracks dating back to 1997.
Matmos wanted to keep this a limited release, only selling these to a handful of shops across the globe. While not quite exclusive to Aquarius, this album isn't terribly likely to be showing up at many other shops! Act fast!
RealAudio clip: "Live 4"
RealAudio clip: "Live 6"
RealAudio clip: "Live 8"

MATRIX Various Films (Chain Reaction) cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

MPEG Stream: "Blue Film #2"
MPEG Stream: "Milieux"
MPEG Stream: "Red Film #2"

MAUS, JOHN We Must Become The Pitiless Censors Of Ourselves (Ribbon Music) cd 12.98
Love Is Real, the last record from warped lo-fi popsmith John Maus, is an all time aQ favorite, a dizzying trip into some alternate reality FM radio, where the Cure recorded on answering machines, OMD crafted pop hits on broken tape decks and malfunctioning 4 tracks, a cosmic beat laden dream pop drug trip that managed to be as catchy and irresistible as it was baffling and totally and insanely demented.
Needless to say, we were super excited to discover there was a new John Maus record, the strangely titled We Must Become The Pitiless Censors Of Ourselves, a record that got even stranger when we discovered there was a song called "Cop Killer" on it. Naturally we assumed it was a cover of Body Count's infamous banned jam, so we played that track first, and besides being surprised that it was in fact an original, we also ended up being totally blown away by what might be the sweetest, most dreamily twisted John Maus track EVER.
A broody, almost torch songy ballad, all woozy synths, and big eighties drums, Maus delivering the bizarrely provocative lyrics in his best warm velvety croon: "Cop killer, cop killer, Let's kill the cops tonight, kiiiiiiill them, cop killer, kill every cop in sight", and then the delirious refrain "Against the law" repeated over and over in a tangled storm of intense pulsing synths. The sound lush and explosive, thick and softly blown out, a serious shot across Ariel Pink's bow, a definite challenge for the warped lysergic lo-fi pop crown, a challenge that's gonna be tough to answer. Especially considering that the rest of the record, is just as good, if not as immediately catchy. But catchy it is. "Matter Of Fact" sounds like Maus channeling Devo through his cracked eighties FM pop filter, with some equally baffling lyrics ("Pussy is not the matter of fact"), and some gorgeous hazy synth ambience. "Streetlight" is total eighties new wave pop with the delay and echo effects cranked, the vocals careening wildly through dubbed out clouds of delay, while underneath synths pulse and rhythms groove. "Quantum Leap" is haunting and gorgeously gloomy, Maus the consummate crooner, his deep dramatic vocals bobbing atop thick bouncy basslines, handclap percussion, and lots of swirling sonic murk. "...And The Rain" is another darkly dramatic dream pop doom synth dirge, all rainy late night ambience, and again cloaked in thick swirls of soft focus distortion and blurred echoey shimmer, every track seeming to constantly grow more and more washed out and effects drenched, constantly on the verge of total collapse, but somehow, the more tripped out and damaged they sound, the more pretty and poppy and dreamy they become, a fantastically fractured collection of twisted outsider gloom pop that really has no equal. About as close to a perfect pop record as Maus is liable to get, assuming you like your pop buried in buzz and all blurry and druggy and woozy and warped. Which we most definitely DO.
MPEG Stream: "Cop Killer"
MPEG Stream: "Streetlight"
MPEG Stream: "Quantum Leap"
MPEG Stream: "...And The Rain"

MAUS, JOHN We Must Become The Pitiless Censors Of Ourselves (Ribbon Music) lp 23.00
Love Is Real, the last record from warped lo-fi popsmith John Maus, is an all time aQ favorite, a dizzying trip into some alternate reality FM radio, where the Cure recorded on answering machines, OMD crafted pop hits on broken tape decks and malfunctioning 4 tracks, a cosmic beat laden dream pop drug trip that managed to be as catchy and irresistible as it was baffling and totally and insanely demented.
Needless to say, we were super excited to discover there was a new John Maus record, the strangely titled We Must Become The Pitiless Censors Of Ourselves, a record that got even stranger when we discovered there was a song called "Cop Killer" on it. Naturally we assumed it was a cover of Body Count's infamous banned jam, so we played that track first, and besides being surprised that it was in fact an original, we also ended up being totally blown away by what might be the sweetest, most dreamily twisted John Maus track EVER.
A broody, almost torch songy ballad, all woozy synths, and big eighties drums, Maus delivering the bizarrely provocative lyrics in his best warm velvety croon: "Cop killer, cop killer, Let's kill the cops tonight, kiiiiiiill them, cop killer, kill every cop in sight", and then the delirious refrain "Against the law" repeated over and over in a tangled storm of intense pulsing synths. The sound lush and explosive, thick and softly blown out, a serious shot across Ariel Pink's bow, a definite challenge for the warped lysergic lo-fi pop crown, a challenge that's gonna be tough to answer. Especially considering that the rest of the record, is just as good, if not as immediately catchy. But catchy it is. "Matter Of Fact" sounds like Maus channeling Devo through his cracked eighties FM pop filter, with some equally baffling lyrics ("Pussy is not the matter of fact"), and some gorgeous hazy synth ambience. "Streetlight" is total eighties new wave pop with the delay and echo effects cranked, the vocals careening wildly through dubbed out clouds of delay, while underneath synths pulse and rhythms groove. "Quantum Leap" is haunting and gorgeously gloomy, Maus the consummate crooner, his deep dramatic vocals bobbing atop thick bouncy basslines, handclap percussion, and lots of swirling sonic murk. "...And The Rain" is another darkly dramatic dream pop doom synth dirge, all rainy late night ambience, and again cloaked in thick swirls of soft focus distortion and blurred echoey shimmer, every track seeming to constantly grow more and more washed out and effects drenched, constantly on the verge of total collapse, but somehow, the more tripped out and damaged they sound, the more pretty and poppy and dreamy they become, a fantastically fractured collection of twisted outsider gloom pop that really has no equal. About as close to a perfect pop record as Maus is liable to get, assuming you like your pop buried in buzz and all blurry and druggy and woozy and warped. Which we most definitely DO.
MPEG Stream: "Cop Killer"
MPEG Stream: "Streetlight"
MPEG Stream: "Quantum Leap"
MPEG Stream: "...And The Rain"

MAX ERNST & 2 (Max Ernst) 12" 9.98
I'm pretty sure that this is Thomas P. Brinkmann, although no information can be found on the record inspite of an etching with Pole and Din (it sound like neither) scrawled on the run-out groove. Yet the metronomic techno punctuated by a disjointed looping sample of a jazz riff has all the signifiers that Tom is the man behind this one. Fans of Plastikman and Chain Reaction should take note!

MAYER, MICHAEL Immer 2 (Kompact) cd 15.98

MPEG Stream: SOMEONE ELSE "Ploosh"
MPEG Stream: JESSE SOMFAY "Lying In A Bed Of Myst"

MAYER, MICHAEL Neuhouse (Kompakt) cd 17.98

MAYER, MICHAEL Touch (Kompakt) cd 15.98

MCGUIRE, MARK Get Lost (Editions Mego) cd 16.98
It's gonna be interesting to hear what Emeralds will sound like on their follow-up to the 2010 album Does It Look Like I'm Here? Since that album, two of the three members - John Elliott and Mark McGuire - have been super prolific in their own projects, all of which seem to be eschewing the post-noise melancholy which streamed through Emeralds' melodies of intertwined kosmische synth arpeggiation and stratospheric guitar loopings. Elliott's numerous solo and side projects have found him entertaining a new age ethos more and more, complete with a cosmically induced alter-ego. So far the music's still good for Elliott, but there could be some warning signs that he could take a nose-dive in the worst possible way. At least, his Spectrum Spools imprint seems to be keeping an edgier sensibility (especially those Bee Mask albums). Mark McGuire's own work has been one of a perpetually-stoned-in-summertime time-loop, where his brightly ringing guitar wraps itself into layered patterns upon which he builds cinematically charged ambient-pop crescendos. His album Living With Yourself certainly built from this template, and McGuire proves just how versatile that template can be on Get Lost. There's plenty of effervescent synths which noodle and blorp through rippling echo patterns, which takeover McGuire's proceedings on the aptly named "Firefly Constellations" but McGuire is at his best when employing guitar and loop station as on the urgent chime of "Another Dead End" furthered by Vini Reilly like flourishes that burst into an expressive solo mirroring something from early Guru Guru. The rest of the tracks settle into a warm groove as if bathed in late-summer sunlight, including the vocal number "Alma" which certainly looks to Animal Collective in its quadruple-tracked vocals but with an ear for Eno's melodies instead of Brian Wilson's. McGuire has never failed in delivering something lovely, and that's the case with Get Lost.
MPEG Stream: "Alma"
MPEG Stream: "Another Dead End"
MPEG Stream: "Firefly Constellations"

MCGUIRE, MARK Get Lost (Editions Mego) lp 22.00
It's gonna be interesting to hear what Emeralds will sound like on their follow-up to the 2010 album Does It Look Like I'm Here? Since that album, two of the three members - John Elliott and Mark McGuire - have been super prolific in their own projects, all of which seem to be eschewing the post-noise melancholy which streamed through Emeralds' melodies of intertwined kosmische synth arpeggiation and stratospheric guitar loopings. Elliott's numerous solo and side projects have found him entertaining a new age ethos more and more, complete with a cosmically induced alter-ego. So far the music's still good for Elliott, but there could be some warning signs that he could take a nose-dive in the worst possible way. At least, his Spectrum Spools imprint seems to be keeping an edgier sensibility (especially those Bee Mask albums). Mark McGuire's own work has been one of a perpetually-stoned-in-summertime time-loop, where his brightly ringing guitar wraps itself into layered patterns upon which he builds cinematically charged ambient-pop crescendos. His album Living With Yourself certainly built from this template, and McGuire proves just how versatile that template can be on Get Lost. There's plenty of effervescent synths which noodle and blorp through rippling echo patterns, which takeover McGuire's proceedings on the aptly named "Firefly Constellations" but McGuire is at his best when employing guitar and loop station as on the urgent chime of "Another Dead End" furthered by Vini Reilly like flourishes that burst into an expressive solo mirroring something from early Guru Guru. The rest of the tracks settle into a warm groove as if bathed in late-summer sunlight, including the vocal number "Alma" which certainly looks to Animal Collective in its quadruple-tracked vocals but with an ear for Eno's melodies instead of Brian Wilson's. McGuire has never failed in delivering something lovely, and that's the case with Get Lost.
MPEG Stream: "Alma"
MPEG Stream: "Another Dead End"
MPEG Stream: "Firefly Constellations"

MCLEAN, BARTON AND PRISCILLA Electronic Landscapes (EM Records) cd 23.00
Back in print, back in stock!
More pioneering electronic music unearthed by Japan's EM Records (previous releases include discs by Barton Smith, David Rosenboom, and Noah Creshevsky). This time, it's Barton and Priscilla McLean. A husband and wife team, but no Sonny and Cher here!! This duo performed live as the "McLean Mix", and were responsible for a bunch of sought-after Folkways LPs in their time, including 1979's "Electro-Symphonic Landscapes" (all the tracks from which are found here). The cover of this cd is an adaptation of the cover of that LP, the artwork actually being the graphical score for Barton's "Song Of The Nahuatl" (it's interesting to note that while the McLeans worked together, they didn't collaborate compositionally it seems -- half the tracks here are by the Mr. and half by the Mrs.). The McLeans got their start together in electronic composition in academia, at the University of Indiana, South Bend, 'round about 1973, when the Music Department there brought in a huge EMS Synthi-100 synthesizer and Synthi-256 sequencer. Hours of tape-splicing creativity would ensue! That mega-synthesizer was later repossessed (!) so the McLeans turned to musique concrete techniques (bouncing steak knives on violin strings, metal bars on piano strings, that sort of thing) to source their sounds, combined with the output of what electronic equipment they were able to access. Much of this disc, tracks dating back to 1975, feature this sort of laborious processing of sound. And the results are fantastic! Reminds us a bit of the classic Forbidden Planet soundtrack by Louis and Bebe Barron, another husband and wife team who preceded the McLeans in the annals of electronic music... In addition to the vintage '70s stuff here, there's a couple tracks of some newer material from the digital age... which holds up quite well, actually! Keening drones, mysterious pulses, psychedelic bleepage -- yep, way better than Sonny n' Cher!
EM has graciously provided both English and Japanese liner notes, so the 22 page cd booklet makes good reading for anyone curious about the McLeans' musical methodology, as well as providing cool graphics and intriguing photos to ponder.
MPEG Stream: PRISCILLA MCLEAN "Voices Of The Invisible"
MPEG Stream: BARTON MCLEAN "Song Of The Nahuatl"

MDK A Friend Is A Stranger You Haven't Met (Spymania) cd 16.98
British electronica maverick MDK starts "A Friend Is A Stranger You Haven't Met" on the evil side of things, with a digitally hacked collage of industrial strength thrash metal. Before you begin to think about Francisco Lopez or Alec Empire and their digital synthesis of metal, MDK makes a quick left turn into beautifully Oval-esque passages for laptop processed string samples. This trend of quick genre edits continues through hip hop, Mego noise, house grooves, etc... Fortunately, MDK has enough sense to retain a common thread to his work -- an undefined sentiment of sadness. This is an album that is strangely seductive, and superior to his previous full-length.

MEESHA Clack / Block (LoDubs) 12"+cd-r 8.98

MEGABATS Goes To A Lemon (Debacle) cd-r 8.98
We've slowly been dipping into the impressive catalog of Debacle Records, and pretty much everything we've heard so far has ruled, the recently reviewed Blackout cd-r by space psych explorers Expo 70, and the synth and vocal bliss drone excursions of The Slaves, and now this, the most recent record from Megabats, whose pun titled cd-r offers up a selection of sounds that definitely fit pretty perfectly between both The Slaves and Expo 70, as well as other spaced out electronic weirdos like Fuck Buttons and Oneohtrix Point Never and Pulse Emitter, a sort of sci-fi synth drone tethered to pulsing minimal electro, and then blurred into hazy expanses of far out shimmery drone flecked electro synth throb, that manages to be energizing and urgent, while somehow remaining blissed out and spacey and oh so hypnotic.
The 'beats' are buried underneath thick layers of synth buzz, the beat usually a barely audible pulse, a sort of heroin house underwater rhythm, skeletal and spare, there less for propulsion or groove, and more for an anchor, a mesmerizing metronomic center, which entrances and enthralls, as the layers of buzz and thrum slowly wrap themselves around you and fill your ears with liquid warmth.
Total late night drugged out, sun rise chill out drift off soundscapery, every track here is epic and repetitive and hypnotic, many ditching the pulse completely and instead unfurling lush landscapes of glistening glimmering synthy shimmer, sun dappled sheets of spacey swirl, culminating in the title track, which takes all of the above, and adds a strangely ominous vibe, cinematic and darkly sinister, a fuzzy low end drone drifting beneath crystalline melodies and hushed buzzy blur, the two elements inexorably linked, a darkly beautiful bit of soundtracky synth swell, haunting but also weirdly spacey and soothing, a brooding new age spacesynth finish to a pretty fantastic collection of otherworldly, electro zoner-drone drone-drift bliss!
MPEG Stream: "Smugshot"
MPEG Stream: "Medicine Hat"
MPEG Stream: "Goes To A Lemon"

MELCHIOR, DAN Assemblage Blues (Siltbreeze) lp 14.98
Our only real exposure to Dan Melchior, frontman of the Broke Revue and sometime collaborator with Billy Childish and Holly Golightly, was on a recent split with local garage poppers the Fresh & Onlys, and we were blown away, describing his side of the split as "awesomely super distorted garage pop, like Elvis Costello, all jammed up and slathered in crumbling hiss and grit, the vocals delivered in a thick English accent, the drums blown out, effects all over the place, everything buried beneath a patina of blurred buzz..." which pretty much describes Melchior's Siltbreeze record as well, but if anything, all the blown out weirdness and heavily effected and damaged aspects we dug so much on that 7", have been cranked WAY up here. Noisier, more lo-fi, way more chaotic and confusional, the proper songs that do surface are slathered in distortion and FX, and transformed into some sort of outsider lo-fi avant garage psych weirdness.
"Atomizer" is some sort of no-fi distorto new wave, the whole song driven by a churning muddied electronic pulse, the vocals distorted and WAY up in the mix, robotic and clinical, but crumbling around the edges, pelted by jagged shards of blown out guitar, and squalls of cascading psychnoise, and the lyrics, twisted and appropriately baffling. "Bewildered And Wild" begins all folky and strummy, until the vocals come in, all processed and effected, making it sound like some alien blues, everything smeared with grit and grime and hiss, total interplanetary back porch moon blues weirdness, rife with the occasional super distorted swell of low end buzz. "Bread Bin Wailing (Moonlight Crow)" is all muted backwards warble, and ultra thick metallic bass buzz, echoey vocals, smears of psychedelic leads, and so it goes, the whole record some sort of drug addled bedroom blues, filtered through NZ noise rock, eighties cold wave, outsider loner zoner psych, and spit out in all its filthy fractured fucked up glory! Think Suicide crossed with Chrome crossed with the Shadow Ring crossed with Robyn Hitchcock crossed with Alastair Galbraith crossed Wreck Small Speakers on Expensive Stereos. Indeed.
Comes with a download coupon too...
MPEG Stream: "Atomizer"
MPEG Stream: "Bewildered and Wild"
MPEG Stream: "Dugan"