MAMMATUS The Coast Explodes (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
NOW ON VINYL! Totally like it belongs. Here's our long-ass review of this great album:
Sometimes music is more than just pure sound, or the exposing of deep personal secrets and emotions, or even an homage to one's inspirations. Sometimes it's meant to tell a story... a vessel for a message. Then again sometimes music can combine all of those facets, AND MORE! Such is the case with Mammatus' sophomore effort, The Coast Explodes. On a purely sonic level, this record is absolutely amazing (we'll get there), but it's amazing on a conceptual level as well.
This record is the second installment of Mammatus' gradually unfolding tale of the battle between Light and Darkness. Goodly Light vs. the Evil of Man. Communion with Nature and the casting out of the corrosive agents of Man's doooom. The inhalation of divinity's smoke/breath... exhaling peace from every pore of the translucent flesh. Harnessing the power of Nature in your throat and fingers... swinging the sword to the heart of darkness. Bludgeon the dragon's foul heart! Mammatus is here to bare the Blade of Truth against nature's corrupters, and to ROCK against the cowardly haters of peace! Ahem, their "blade" is of course music, so lets talk about that for a sec.
This epic journey continues right where their self-titled debut left off. The first track "Dragon of the Deep part 3 (Excellent Swordfight)" is a continuation of the Dragon saga (the first album ending with "Dragon of the Deep" parts 1 and 2), and right off the bat you can hear the development. Holy shit! PROG!!!!! Where the last record was more of a trippy blend of hypno-kraut Can-ishness with the slaying heavitude of stoner lordz Sleep, this record somehow maintains that comparison and adds an incredible dose of YES! and YES!!! it rules! So the album starts with a creeping guitar drone, almost as if directly continued from part 2, before bursting in with a driving and hypnotic groove, a la Circle or the above mentioned Can, with little time change shreds at the end of each phrase (kinda proggy) and then suddenly the tempo breaks and we hear a killer stoptime, full-band SHRED! bringing us into another mesmeric groove with beautiful guitar leads soaring perfectly over the everchanging trance. The track builds and builds, ever climbing. Just when you think it can't get more ripping, another amazing riff is unearthed, the band playing so tightly we suspect they might share one cosmically unified mind. In tune with the alignment of the planets and such. All of this is building to something, you can feel it, when suddenly the song crescendos into a freeform cacophonous skronk! Cowbells, drums, and about 500 simultaneous guitar solos! FREAKOUT!
What emerges from this undulating swell is just about all a worshipper of heavy could hope for, an earth shaking riff with the first vocals of the record. Singer Nicky Emmert enters with his first cry to battle, calling us to raise the sword! The vocals are as trippy as ever, beautiful, as if sung from the back of a deep cave. This brutally sick aural climax ends almost as soon as it begins only to plunge axe first into the second track, "Pierce the Darkness", Starting with a gong crash and woodflute solo (!) then charging directly into another trance like groove. The vocals this time start right away, floating and glistening over the motorik pulse, again seemingly a call to arms. The track eventually develops into a blasting free time psychedelic guitar jam which then decompresses into some serious blissy drone.
And what happens next is one of the highlights of the record. The sound of synthesizers enter the drone and build up to a spine tingling harmonized guitar/Moog solo! You know the euphoric feeling you get when listening to shimmery synth part in Yes's "Close to the Edge", and the triumph in the pit of your stomach when Wakeman's church organ finally enters ("I get up, I get down")? A similar energy is in operation here. After this shining moment the song takes another turn towards the HEAVY and some kick ass riffage again fills the speakers. After a bit of strange synth tweakage, the mood of the album changes. Track 3, "The Changing Wind" is an all out drum circle folk jam! Acoustic guitars, propulsive hand drum rhythms, and another lilting melody from Nicky, praising mother nature and her unknowable ways. Hypnotic and blissful for sure. Suddenly the sounds of waves crashing and sea lions barking brings us seamlessly into the final movement, and title track, "The Coast Explodes". Starting with one of the catchiest "stoner" riffs we've heard for a long time. In fact this riff gets stuck in our heads for days at a time. So groovey and catchy, it makes the trees dance. Ahem. This song is a slow builder, rising subtly, and then dipping once more till it finally becomes an almost whisper. The vocals again invoking mother earth, sung in a beautiful falsetto. After this quiet respite the amps again get cranked to 11 and we are blessed with another monolithic slab of heaviness! So satisfying and perfect, it almost makes ya weep. At the end of this journey the chanting of some mythic and mysterious wizard is heard, as if belted out from the peak of a snow covered mountain, beckoning to the children of nature to rise up and join the crusade! The song then gently winds down and the whooshing sounds of the ocean again take over the mix, leaving the listener in a state of utter peace. SHIT! This album really takes you on some sort of transcendental adventure... We got lost there for a minute.
At the most basic level, Mammatus make some of the most inventive and inspired heavy music of our day. Combining diverse inspirations and molding them into something that comes across as totally genuine and pure, and of course TOTALLY RULING! Crushing and mesmerizing and beautiful all at the same time. The story behind the music makes the album all the more powerful. The listening experience of this record is akin to reading a super epic novel, one where the payoffs happen in all the right places. So duh, HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!! For fans of Sleep, Yes, UFOmammut, Can, Circle, King Crimson, and all things heavy and trippy and shredding and rocking and ruling!
MPEG Stream: "Dragon Of The Deep Part Three (Excellent Sword Fight)"
MPEG Stream: "The Coast Explodes"

MAMMOTH VOLUME A Single Book of Songs (The Music Cartel) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The latest (third) and greatest album from this impressive Swedish stoner rock band, one that does more than most to avoid the nu-grunge "Kyuss-clone" tag, and really comes into their own on this disc. Sure, thanks to their big sound and pop sensibility, they do bear some resemblance at times to post-Kyuss hitmakers Queens of the Stone Age, but they also take inspiration from '70s prog-rock (good, early "Heart of the Sunrise" era Yes, anyone?), which takes full-flight on album centerpiece "What Actually Happened In Antioch? (Including A Myraid of Sounds)". It's not everyday stoner rock that finds a use for keyboards and even flute, amidst the kick ass riffage! Basically, what fellow Swedes Opeth have done melding '70s prog to black metal, these guys have done vis-a-vis stoner rock. Definitely their best record yet, offering a bounty of creative, intelligent hard rock, that's catchy and plenty heavy. Recommended!! (Now why isn't this on gatefold double vinyl the way god intended??)
RealAudio clip: "To Gloria"
RealAudio clip: "What Happened In Antioch?"
RealAudio clip: "Out-take/Noara Dance"

MAMMUT s/t (Long Hair) cd 27.00
The Long Hair label digs up another kool krautrock obscurity for reissue here, one that Andee and Allan both happened to have heard already via a previous cd edition. It's an album that we're now glad to be able to get to list (with a bonus track!). Originally released on LP in 1971 (natch) on a tiny label with the wonderful name of Mouse Trick Track Music, this one-off rarity is a bit of a trippy gem, groovy and flutey and fuzzy. And plenty weird too, as is evidenced by the album's odd song titles, each with the word "Mammut" in them:
"Bird Mammut" (indeed featuring birds twittering, and birdsong like flute flutter, amidst propulsively grooving drumming), "Classical Mammut" (a brief interlude of whooshing wind, crying baby, placid piano), "Mammut Ecstasy" (hippy chant, fuzzed out guitar heaviness), "Footmachine Mammut" (laidback groove, what sounds like a lively dinner party in the background, with clinking percussion/wine glasses, more guitar soloing), "Short Mammut" (kinda like "Mammut Ecstacy", but shorter), "Shizoyd Mammut" (shrieking vocals, organ jamming)... and that's just side 1. Side 2 actually consists of just two songs, longer, more lyrical ones, including the 13+ minute psychedelic tour de force "Mammut Opera", that's both dramatic and rather lovely.
The whole thing, the way it combines the acid rock guitar action with Hammond organ, flute, and even field recordings (both outdoor and indoor it would seem), sorta sounds like a demented Deep Purple dosed on drugs, jazzily jamming away at some hippy party place in the Black Forest (where the were, recording in the studios of jazz label MPS). It's more groovy than heavy, but they let loose with some wild guitar riffery now and then, as well as dabbling in some (Beatles inspired?) songiness, particularly on the second half of the record. Krautrock aficionados should definitely investigate! And, especially as we know they overlap, Acid Mothers Temple fans too! There's definitely a precursor to AMT's funny freeform freakout vibe going on here. Specific krautrock comparisons could be to some of the previous Long Hair reissues like Et Cetera, Kollektiv and Wolfgang Dauner's The Oimels.
This official reissue has been digitally remastered, and comes with a thick, textually informative cd booklet, and the aforementioned 5 minute bonus track ("Da Du Da", recorded by these musicians in '69 for a compilation album, leading to the formation of the Mammut band/album project).
MPEG Stream: "Bird Mammut"
MPEG Stream: "Mammut Ecstasy"

MAMMUT s/t (Long Hair) lp 33.00
Now available on vinyl!
The Long Hair label digs up another kool krautrock obscurity for reissue here, one that Andee and Allan both happened to have heard already via a previous cd edition. It's an album that we're now glad to be able to get to list (with a bonus track!). Originally released on LP in 1971 (natch) on a tiny label with the wonderful name of Mouse Trick Track Music, this one-off rarity is a bit of a trippy gem, groovy and flutey and fuzzy. And plenty weird too, as is evidenced by the album's odd song titles, each with the word "Mammut" in them:
"Bird Mammut" (indeed featuring birds twittering, and birdsong like flute flutter, amidst propulsively grooving drumming), "Classical Mammut" (a brief interlude of whooshing wind, crying baby, placid piano), "Mammut Ecstasy" (hippy chant, fuzzed out guitar heaviness), "Footmachine Mammut" (laidback groove, what sounds like a lively dinner party in the background, with clinking percussion/wine glasses, more guitar soloing), "Short Mammut" (kinda like "Mammut Ecstacy", but shorter), "Shizoyd Mammut" (shrieking vocals, organ jamming)... and that's just side 1. Side 2 actually consists of just two songs, longer, more lyrical ones, including the 13+ minute psychedelic tour de force "Mammut Opera", that's both dramatic and rather lovely.
The whole thing, the way it combines the acid rock guitar action with Hammond organ, flute, and even field recordings (both outdoor and indoor it would seem), sorta sounds like a demented Deep Purple dosed on drugs, jazzily jamming away at some hippy party place in the Black Forest (where the were, recording in the studios of jazz label MPS). It's more groovy than heavy, but they let loose with some wild guitar riffery now and then, as well as dabbling in some (Beatles inspired?) songiness, particularly on the second half of the record. Krautrock aficionados should definitely investigate! And, especially as we know they overlap, Acid Mothers Temple fans too! There's definitely a precursor to AMT's funny freeform freakout vibe going on here. Specific krautrock comparisons could be to some of the previous Long Hair reissues like Et Cetera, Kollektiv and Wolfgang Dauner's The Oimels.
This new vinyl reissue, just like the cd version we already highlighted, includes the aforementioned 5 minute bonus track ("Da Du Da", recorded by these musicians in '69 for a compilation album, leading to the formation of the Mammut band/album project).
MPEG Stream: "Bird Mammut"
MPEG Stream: "Mammut Ecstasy"

MAN FOREVER Pansophical Cataract (Thrill Jockey) cd 14.98
Apparently the impetus for creating this multiple drummer-ed outfit, was to create something akin to Metal Machine Music for drums, which makes sense when you realize the man behind Man Forever is Kid Millions, drummer for NY experimental rockers Oneida, and one of the drum leaders in the huge many drummer-ed Boredoms performances that happened a few years back.
What started out as something more like a mini-Boadrum situation, became something much more subtle and simple, with whole kits ditched in favor of single drums, with the drummers playing single stroke rolls, and amidst this flurry of rhythms, allowing all manner of patterns to emerge, similar in the way that dronemusic often involves various overtones from the various sounds interacting, in Man Forever, the dense drumming, stops sounding like drumming after a while, and becomes more textural, and actually becomes a sort of drone, the shifting rhythmic subtleties adding all sorts of color to the sound. But this is not just music for drum nerds (although if you are one, you WANT this), the group add guitar and bass, but much like the drums, those instruments seem less concerned with 'riffing' and more with adding still more texture to the proceedings, rumbles and drones and thrum and hum and moaning low end, barely there melodies, when the whole group is finally in full effect, like halfway through "Surface Patterns" it sounds a bit like the Boredoms jamming out with Phill Niblock, or SUNNO))) backed by a drumcorps, heady and hypnotic, the repetition and rhythmic mesmer evoking Reich and Riley.
The second track, "Ur Eternity", is another dense drumscape, a smoldering rhythmic slowbuild, that manages to be hypnotic enough sans any other instruments, but when the rest of the band join in, with strange staticky drones, and clipped looped fragmented melodies, the result is something surprisingly psychedelic, still hypnotic and minimal, but also droney and a little bit soundtracky, dense and textural, the drums sounding less like drums and more like the pounding of feet, or the churning of some machine, and until the rest of the track less about driving the music, and more about spreading out beneath it, adding a haunting heft that is more felt than heard. So good!
MPEG Stream: "Surface Patterns"

MAN FOREVER Pansophical Cataract (Thrill Jockey) lp 15.98
Apparently the impetus for creating this multiple drummer-ed outfit, was to create something akin to Metal Machine Music for drums, which makes sense when you realize the man behind Man Forever is Kid Millions, drummer for NY experimental rockers Oneida, and one of the drum leaders in the huge many drummer-ed Boredoms performances that happened a few years back.
What started out as something more like a mini-Boadrum situation, became something much more subtle and simple, with whole kits ditched in favor of single drums, with the drummers playing single stroke rolls, and amidst this flurry of rhythms, allowing all manner of patterns to emerge, similar in the way that dronemusic often involves various overtones from the various sounds interacting, in Man Forever, the dense drumming, stops sounding like drumming after a while, and becomes more textural, and actually becomes a sort of drone, the shifting rhythmic subtleties adding all sorts of color to the sound. But this is not just music for drum nerds (although if you are one, you WANT this), the group add guitar and bass, but much like the drums, those instruments seem less concerned with 'riffing' and more with adding still more texture to the proceedings, rumbles and drones and thrum and hum and moaning low end, barely there melodies, when the whole group is finally in full effect, like halfway through "Surface Patterns" it sounds a bit like the Boredoms jamming out with Phill Niblock, or SUNNO))) backed by a drumcorps, heady and hypnotic, the repetition and rhythmic mesmer evoking Reich and Riley.
The second track, "Ur Eternity", is another dense drumscape, a smoldering rhythmic slowbuild, that manages to be hypnotic enough sans any other instruments, but when the rest of the band join in, with strange staticky drones, and clipped looped fragmented melodies, the result is something surprisingly psychedelic, still hypnotic and minimal, but also droney and a little bit soundtracky, dense and textural, the drums sounding less like drums and more like the pounding of feet, or the churning of some machine, and until the rest of the track less about driving the music, and more about spreading out beneath it, adding a haunting heft that is more felt than heard. So good!

MAN FOREVER s/t (St. Ives) lp 16.98
These days, something like this is a fairly strange occurrence, a (mostly) all drums solo record from a drummer. It wasn't rare at all back in the day for a jazz drummer to step out of his normal gig and go solo, but when was the last time you heard a solo drum record from the drummer of a modern indie rock band, and if somehow you DID, we'd guess it probably wasn't nearly as bad ass, and/or listenable as this, the debut from Man Forever, the Metal Machine Music style all drum freakout project of Kid Millions, the drummer for Oneida and White Hills among others.
A live performance of Lou Reed's Metal Machine music is precisely what inspired Millions to wonder if you could create the same sort of dense wall of sound, replete with strange harmonics and overtones, using just drums, and so Millions tuned his drums in a manner that would theoretically produce the most harmonic complexity and overtones, and went to town, recording himself over and over, layering track after track after track, one on top of the other into this flurry of octopoidal percussion, an endless percussive avalanche, chaotic and frenzied and FREE but somehow still a bit measured, and even composed at times. It does have the feel of free jazz, but it also feels like some sort of heavy noise rock experiment. The first side is a non stop fury of relentless drummage, imagine a hundred drummers all playing intensely and inventively, but not necessarily playing with each other, the sound is dizzying and far out, and in its own way psychedelic, but then as you listen, the notes and tones of the individual drums begin to interact, producing weird buzzed and rumbles and skrees, a symphony of buried overtones and strange harmonics, it suddenly ceased being just a drum solo, and becomes some gorgeous abstract composition for drums, layered and textured and lush, and in its own way weirdly mesmerizing. The only other sounds to be found are a bit of bass accompaniment, the bass itself thick and gnarled and corrosively buzzy, which at one point transforms the sound into something closer to warped grinding noise rock, almost like a more minimal avant Lightning Bolt, before finishing off with a brief squall of just buzzing distorted bass. Exhausting for sure, but also gloriously cathartic.
The flipside gets all dubby right of the bat, various beats wreathed in delay and reverb and echo and sent spinning off into the ether, the low end here is thick, the overtones and harmonics piling up until it's almost like rhythmic dronemusic, and when the bass does come in again, all thick and crunchy and buzzy, it transforms the sound once again into some sort of deep heaving drum driven dronedoom. So cool.
LIMITED TO 250 COPIES! Housed in nice hand silkscreened covers.

MAN IS BASTARD Thoughtless (Theologian) cd 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
California's comrades in power violence want you to get political with their noise. Hardcore to ambient, always heavy. The lp is an handsome picture disc, and the cd comes with poster of the picture disc graphics, you can't lose.

MAN IS BASTARD Thoughtless (Theologian) lp 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
California's comrades in power violence want you to get political with their noise. Hardcore to ambient, always heavy. The lp is an handsome picture disc, and the cd comes with poster of the picture disc graphics, you can't lose.

MAN IS THE BASTARD Mancruel (Deep Six) cd 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
This flagship political power violence band broke up a while back, but those without some of their best 12" vinyl tracks will be glad of having this newly released cd compilation. Includes the songs from their split ep w/ Capitalist Casualties.

MAN IS THE BASTARD / MUMIA ABU JAMAL split (Alternative Tentacles) cd 10.98
Ultra PC "kick in the balls" to indie kid complacency. Mumia, accused of killing a cop, speaks from his cell on death row. MITB add their two cents by bashing in your skull with a two-bass-and-drums hash-induced 4 song assault. PC, my ass. (Includes contributions from Allen Ginsberg, Jello Biafra, Assata Shakur, and Bob Dole. Really.)

MAN IS THE BASTARD NOISE / GERRIT split (Misanthropic Agenda) 7" 3.50
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
From the label that brought us the amazing Merzbow 'Frog' lp comes this noisy 7" artifact. One side is Man Is The Bastard Noise, more commonly known as Bastard Noise and is the free/electronic/noise offshoot of sludge rockers Man Is The Bastard. BN is Wood from MITB and AQ buddy John Weise. Their side of this single is an almost tranquil blanket of high end whir, sounding like an orchestra of mosquitoes, helicopters, kitchen appliances and madly chirping birds. Almost dreamy in that peculiar noise kind of way. The B side comes courtesy of label honcho Gerritt Wittmer and is three tracks of affected sinister vocals, looped and chopped chunks of low end distortion, very eighties industrial sounding, and I mean that in a good way. Plus Misanthropic's usual impeccable packaging!

MAN MAN Six Demon Bag (Ace Fu) cd 14.98

MAN OR ASTROMAN 1000X (Touch & Go) cd 8.98
Super-nice lookin' new seven-song effort from these sci-fi surfers, fun as usual.

MAN OR ASTROMAN 1000X (Touch & Go) 10" 6.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Super-nice lookin' new seven-song effort from these sci-fi surfers, fun as usual. Vinyl is limited ed. color.

MAN OR ASTROMAN? A Spectrum of Infinite Scale (Touch & Go) cd 14.98
Space-surf masters' new effort, the latest in a countless line of fan-pleasing discs.

MAN OR ASTROMAN? Beyond The Black Hole (Estrus) cd 14.98
One of the hardest working, most prolific bands from the last ten years have yet another album for the eager ears of space cadets everywhere. Their last bunch of records have ventured away from their decidedly kitsch'n'garage early sounds, but this album revisits those olden days. Actually now that they've settled snugly in their deluxe space-age studios that they constructed themselves from the ground up, the Astro-men have given this record their full attention. But please note this is not new material but a remixed, remastered incarnation of their very out of print Australian release "What Remains Inside a Black Hole". With new artwork by Art Chantry.
RealAudio clip: "Surf Terror"
RealAudio clip: "Within A Martian Heart"

MAN OR ASTROMAN? EEVIAC (Touch & Go) cd 13.98
10,000 releases along, these futuristic surf instro-rockers still got it.

MAN OR ASTROMAN? EEVIAC (Touch & Go) lp 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
10,000 releases along, these futuristic surf instro-rockers still got it.

MAN OR ASTROMAN? Is It... (Estrus) lp 14.98
Die-hard Man Or Astro-man? devotees, it's finally time to dust off and fire up your rawkets! Pacific Northwest garage rock kingpins Estrus Records has kindly released a limited edition vinyl reissue of the 1993 debut album by these intergalactic surf brainiacs from the South!
For those unfamiliar... While the heart of their sound was driven by a deep reverence for the raw buzzing guitar licks of the legendary Link Wray, The Ventures, The Sonics among others, the journey into the MOAM? cosmos was equally injected with sci-fi kitsch spectacles and science geekery, and genuine smarts. Live shows were wildly fun and rockin', featuring full costumes and a giant working Tesla coil! Over the years, the beloved four piece evolved quite a bit. In later years, their sound drew closer to Sonic Youth than the abovementioned Wray. As well, they eventually added vocals to their instrumental sound, and formulated clone bands to tour in place of the official band members! Hearing this album again will surely bring back some awesome fan memories of this super entertaining and endearing band, and trigger some newbies to search YouTube for live footage to see what they missed. Hurrah!

MAN VERSUS HUMANITY In The Line Of Fire (Troubleman Unlimited) cd 10.98
Super furious, metallic hardcore (heavy on the metal) from Germany. Pummelling and complex, noisy and chaotic. For fans of Knut (last AQ list), Botch, old Cave In, Converge and stuff like that. Really Great.

MAN... OR ASTROMAN? Needles in the Cosmic Haystack (East Side Records) 7" 4.50
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

MANATEE Single Payer Class War (Slumberland) 7" flexidisc 4.98
Single number two from these Oakland punk poppers, and while their first 7"s was beholden to the Replacements and the Velvet Underground, this one is definitely more on the punk side of the equation, three chords, pounding drums, rollicking and a little ramshackle, BUT, then thee's the vocals, which change everything. The vocals are not shouted or grunted or howled, instead they're delivered in a dramatic sung-spoken croon, reminding us a little of Morrisey, but a lot of the the singer from the Smoking Popes (who always reminded us of Morrissey anyway), and the effects is pretty instantaneous, turning furious punk energy into something a bit more twee poppy, even the second track, which is more furiously punky, is pushed popward by the vox, the lyrics too, goofy and silly and fun, the second track is called "Chased By Anderson Cooper" after all.
Minus those vocals, we can't imagine this being in Slumberland, but with them, it makes perfect sense. Oh did we mention this is a flexi disc? Well, it is, one sided, two songs on the one side, still housed in a proper 7" sleeve and jacket.

MANBEARD / AVARUS Split (Tour CDR 2007) (Secret Eye) cd-r 5.00
**SALE **SALE* *SALE**
This is the first we've heard from the brilliantly named Manbeard, the fucked up freak folk cabaret offshoot of old aQ faves Urdog. Here they share a cd-r with furry Finnish folk combo Avarus, originally a tour only release, and while it might not seem like it, weirdly it's kind of a good match. Manbeard are tough to explain. Very jaunty and sing songy, almost like sea shanties, big drums, dramatic WAY over the top vocals, angular riffing, a little bit gloomy and dark, gothic even, with squiggly synths, damaged percussion, and really twisted songs. And really bizarre overdubs, strange characters making announcements, speaking to the listener, adding their 2 cents to various songs. Definitely an acquired taste, but if you're into the same weird stuff we are, then acquiring it might not be that difficult. The weird thing is, this disc is jam packed with short-ish Manbeard songs, then right in the middle, tack 5 in fact, is the ONE Avarus song, a massive half hour jam, recorded live, all ramshackle rhythms, and detuned guitars, chanted vocals, fluttering woodwinds, raga like buzzing, stumbling druggy far out freaked out damaged outsider genius for sure. It sounds like a blast, like they just set up on the street in the middle of rush hour, and their merrymaking just sucked in a massive crowd, dancing and howling and whooping and wildly frolicking through the streets of Helsinki. At least that's what it sounds like.
Then it's time again for more Manbeard weirdness, fragmented song experiments, fucked up drones, lo-fi off kilter bedroom folk, fractured dada-ist pop and whatever else crossed their twisted musical minds.
In cool hand screened color sleeves, with printed inserts. We got these direct from The Manbeard when he was in town, and he mentioned these might be the last copies, so if we run out that might be it.
MPEG Stream: MANBEARD "Original Performance Of The Manbeard Denizens Folk Classic, Manbearde Folk Classic, Manbeard Factory"
MPEG Stream: AVARUS "Mayra Syo Junkun Ihmiseh"

MANCO, BARIS 2023 (Guerssen) cd 17.98
You know that we at aQ are big fans of Turkish psych legend Erkin Koray. We were even incredibly lucky enough to have him spend an afternoon here recently, signing autographs!! We've also recommended stuff by various of Koray's contemporaries, like Cem Karaca and Edip Akbayram. But, we haven't gotten much of a chance to talk about another Turkish psych/pop legend, Baris Manco, a man immediately recognizable by his luxuriant long hair and impressive mustache.
Now, Spain's Guerssen label has, for the first time, properly reissued on cd several classics from Manco's discography. We'll start with this one. It's Manco's first full-length album, we think, from 1975, and is considered by some to be his masterpiece. Certainly it's got its special charms - most notably, as you might guess from the title 2023, there's a futuristic vibe to it. Which means, lots of far out synthesizer sounds accompany the traditional Anadolu Pop folk elements. So it sounds just a bit like Bruce Haack goes belly dancing! Weird that may be, but Manco's smooth singing tends to accentuate the mostly laid back, mellow mood here. Though this Middle Eastern soft rock prog does of course get kinda funky/groovy too. And we definitely can call it "prog", when one track is a 12 minute plus multi-part suite that incorporates both flute and field recordings of bird twitter, right? Oh, and there's one song, we swear if Ozzy were singing instead of Baris, that would sound a lot like Sabbath's "Planet Caravan".
To sum up: pretty cool. We wish our country's "most influential pop artists" made weird sci-fi sounding concept albums like this. And if you were wondering, our guess, without looking at the copious liner notes that this comes with, is that the significance of the "2023" date has to do with how that year will be the centennial anniversary of the founding of the modern Turkish Republic.
MPEG Stream: "Kayalarõn Oglu"
MPEG Stream: "2023"
MPEG Stream: "Tavuklara Kõsst De"

MANCO, BARIS 2023 (Guerssen) lp 32.00
NOW REISSUED ON VINYL TOO!
You know that we at aQ are big fans of Turkish psych legend Erkin Koray. We were even incredibly lucky enough to have him spend an afternoon here recently, signing autographs!! We've also recommended stuff by various of Koray's contemporaries, like Cem Karaca and Edip Akbayram. But, we haven't gotten much of a chance to talk about another Turkish psych/pop legend, Baris Manco, a man immediately recognizable by his luxuriant long hair and impressive mustache.
Now, Spain's Guerssen label has, for the first time, properly reissued on cd several classics from Manco's discography. We'll start with this one. It's Manco's first full-length album, we think, from 1975, and is considered by some to be his masterpiece. Certainly it's got its special charms - most notably, as you might guess from the title 2023, there's a futuristic vibe to it. Which means, lots of far out synthesizer sounds accompany the traditional Anadolu Pop folk elements. So it sounds just a bit like Bruce Haack goes belly dancing! Weird that may be, but Manco's smooth singing tends to accentuate the mostly laid back, mellow mood here. Though this Middle Eastern soft rock prog does of course get kinda funky/groovy too. And we definitely can call it "prog", when one track is a 12 minute plus multi-part suite that incorporates both flute and field recordings of bird twitter, right? Oh, and there's one song, we swear if Ozzy were singing instead of Baris, that would sound a lot like Sabbath's "Planet Caravan".
To sum up: pretty cool. We wish our country's "most influential pop artists" made weird sci-fi sounding concept albums like this.
MPEG Stream: "Kayalarõn Oglu"
MPEG Stream: "2023"
MPEG Stream: "Tavuklara Kõsst De"

MANCO, BARIS Dunden Begune (Turkuola) lp 33.00
Turkish psych singer.

MANCO, BARIS s/t (Turkuola) lp 33.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

MANDELBROT & SKYY OD-Axis (Digitalis) lp 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

MANDIBLE CHATTER Grace (Magnanimous Records) cd 14.98
Digipack reissue of 1999 album on Manifold from these local weirdos!

MANDRAKE Featherweight (E14) cd 9.98
On its surface Mandrake's music may ring familiar with elements of Americana folk and pop traditions, but to categorize this East Bay foursome as a folk pop band would be far too simplistic. In fact, that's why it's taken us this long to find words to write about their impressive debut album Featherweight. We should have known from their Prelude cdep which came out a couple years ago. Its title suggested beginnings, and we drew from it a sense of eager anticipation for things to come. Indeed, it and this full length prove 'twas no beginner's luck. They resonate with a depth, composition and composure far beyond their years. The songs echo with, but are not enslaved to the influences of greats such as Tim Buckley, Nick Drake, Cat Stevens and Gram Parsons. As has become the norm for contemporary bands, the standard pop/rock instrumentation of guitar, bass, drums and vocals opens its arms to embrace strings of other sorts, horns and such. However, Mandrake never falls prey to empty accessorizing. They fully integrate each one tastefully into their often subtly prog-leaning, but very earthy songs. Each member's exceptional musicianship allows the band to ably leap from skeletal voice and guitar intimacies to fully fleshed rock numbers in a flash. Heavy in mood and emotion, dark in tone and lyrical matter, need we say, this album's title is a misnomer! Recommended for those that dig the more recent sounds of Bright Eyes, Jason Molina and My Morning Jacket.
MPEG Stream: "Endless Days"
MPEG Stream: "Nothing's For Always"

MANGUM, JEFF Live at Jittery Joe's (Orange Twin) cd 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Finally in stock, the long awaited solo acoustic live set by Neutral Milk Hotel's beloved Jeff Mangum, about whom I simply cannot be objective -- the two NMH records *still* make me cry everytime I listen to them, they're that lovely and touching and brilliant. This 1997 concert was performed in an Xmas-light-filled room with an occasional baby enthusiastically chiming in alongside Mangum's super earnest vocal delivery. If you've ever seen Neutral Milk Hotel in concert, you already know that Jeff will deviate often from the recorded versions of his music, sometimes stretching out a multi-note wail for much longer, sometimes speeding up or changing a rhythm. That's what makes this live disc worth it -- for the variations he introduces, super sweet but just different enough to keep it fresh for those of us who have listened to the two NMH records hundreds of times already.
This show is super lo-fi (the venue is a cofeehouse), but the performance is quite focused and heartfelt. Contains songs that will be familiar to NMH fans, plus a few others, a cover of Phil Spector's "I Love How You Love Me", and best of all, the entire concert is also playable as a 48 minute film on your computer! Comes with no liner notes to speak of but there is a nice foldout poster. On Orange Twin, the new label started by Mangum and Elf Power's Laura Carter.
Since there's no track listing, we'll provide that for ya here: Intro / A Baby for Pree / Glow Into You / 2 Headed Boy / I Will Bury You in Time / Gardenhead / 2 Headed Boy Part 2 / I Love How You Love Me / Engine / Naomi / Jesus Christ / Up and Over We Go / Oh Comely.
MPEG Stream: "Up and Over We Go"
MPEG Stream: "I Love How You Love Me"

MANGUM, JEFF Live At Jittery Joe's (American Dust) lp 15.98
Now on vinyl - AGAIN!
Finally, the long awaited solo acoustic live set by Neutral Milk Hotel's beloved Jeff Mangum, about whom I simply cannot be objective - the two NMH records *still* make me cry everytime I listen to them, they're that lovely and touching and brilliant. This 1997 concert was performed in an Xmas-light-filled room with an occasional baby enthusiastically chiming in alongside Mangum's super earnest vocal delivery. If you've ever seen Neutral Milk Hotel in concert, you already know that Jeff will deviate often from the recorded versions of his music, sometimes stretching out a multi-note wail for much longer, sometimes speeding up or changing a rhythm. That's what makes this live disc worth it - for the variations he introduces, super sweet but just different enough to keep it fresh for those of us who have listened to the two NMH records hundreds of times already.
This show is super lo-fi (the venue is a coffeehouse), but the performance is quite focused and heartfelt. Contains songs that will be familiar to NMH fans, plus a few others, a cover of Phil Spector's "I Love How You Love Me".
MPEG Stream: "Up and Over We Go"
MPEG Stream: "I Love How You Love Me"

MANILAPEDE s/t (Turgid Animal) cd 13.98
One half of avant experimental dronescapers the Starving Weirdos strikes out on his own, teaming up with some other mysterious noisemaker to form Manilapede and craft this disc of 'dune rock', which is essentially a Starving Weirdos record writ buzzing and black, super distorted and blown out. A series of thick undulating drones, cobbled together from dense churning slo-mo metal riffage, buried hiss-like skree, which to these ears sounds like some sort of barely recognizable vokills, peppered with bits of weird percussion (which on the opening track sounds like someone hitting a chainlink fence with a two-by-four), Manilapede are basically some sort of avant-SUNNO))), and "Peninsula Overdrive" lays out their modus operandi pretty perfectly, a sprawling buzzscape, roils and grinds, the sounds so distorted they seem to ooze, the low tones rumble and thrum, impossibly thick, shot through with streaks of high end melody, wrapped around the aforementioned chainlink fence percussion, it's a creepy, haunting bit of mysterious dronedirgedoom, that barring its experimental leanings, holds up pretty damn well alongside the various more metal practitioners of similar sounding heaviness. And that opening track is good enough that we would have been perfectly happy if the whole record was just an hour of that and nothing else.
Thankfully, the rest of the record is essentially variations of that same sound, multiple movements in a singular sprawling epic songsuite, trancelike riffs are blurred and smeared and stretched into loooooong streaks, then layered and set to undulating, various bits of crunch and glitch and hiss are harnessed to form skeletal rhythms, giving the proceedings an obliquely industrial vibe, glacial and corrosive, buzzy and fuzzy and near static, 'dune rock' is essentially a more experimental drone metal, a sort of modern minimalism applied to the new wave of dirge/drone/doom, and the results we are happy to report, are as awesome as you might imagine. Hypnotic and heavy, droney and dark, murky and mesmerising and in its own way, pretty fucking metal.
MPEG Stream: "Peninsula Overdrive"
MPEG Stream: "Dead Man's Drop"
MPEG Stream: "Minus Tide"

MANILLA ROAD After Midnight Live (Shadow Kingdom) cd 14.98
If you're into metal that's both "cult" and "true", you're probably into those underground epic metal legends from Kansas, Manilla Road. How many bands as obscure and eccentric have been around for over 30 years and are still making (good!) records? And maybe what's more incredible than the fact that Manilla Road still put out cool records (as recently as 2008's Voyager, reviewed elsewhere on our website along with several others from their long career), they've apparently also got enough "long lost" recordings from way back when for entire albums of previously unreleased material to occasionally appear! There was a complete studio album from 1981 that finally saw the light of day as Mark Of The Beast over twenty years later, and now this, a live-in-the-studio session from December of 1979, recorded for a radio show on Wichita State University's KMUW, by Manilla Road's original lineup, the trio of Mark "The Shark" Shelton (guitar/vocals), Scott "Scooter" Park (bass), and Rich "Ziggy" Fisher (drums), shortly before they released their debut album Invasion in 1980.
Apparently, this disc represents the second half of their set that night - the tapes of the first half, mostly stuff from Invasion, haven't been located, yet. What's cool (and surprising) is that these particular songs DON'T appear on any other 'Road recordings, though we do think maybe we hear echoes of a few parts in some later compositions of theirs. There's just five tracks here, but the disc is still 44 minutes long, as these are all prog-rock length jams (the longest one, "Life's So Hard" clocks in at 12:42), and as we said, they're an EPIC band. Although of course some of the time on this disc is also occupied by chatter between the female radio host and Mr. Shelton, introducing the songs, which can be rather amusing - at one point the DJ mentions all the calls they've been getting from listeners, that "everybody seems to be getting off and partying to the music". Right on! It's still the '70s you gotta remember. And so too, this is Manilla Road in their early daze, before they were really exposed to NWOBHM influences like Iron Maiden (though you can hear how they were certainly primed for that stuff).
This vintage material is almost proto-metallic, kinda like on their first couple of albums, displaying their unique spin on various classic rock, space rock, progressive and AOR influences, we're pretty sure stuff like Blue Oyster Cult, Rush, Thin Lizzy, and Ted Nugent. It's mostly hard rockin', though they mellow out sometimes too, and you get the idea that maybe back then they thought their career could go in a commercial, pop direction, rather than heading for the true cult metal status they eventually achieved. But it's Manilla Road all right, with Shelton's gravelly wailing vox and squirrelly psychedelic soloing here being recognizable (and trademark) parts of their sound even today.
While this is live and raw, the young band is definitely ON and kicking ass, and it's decent sounding recording. So, obviously this is an archival discovery for Manilla Road enthusiasts to get excited about! Especially fans of their earlier stuff, before they got thrashy in the later '80s. If you're not already a MR fan, though, we suppose this might be a strange place to start.
Released on limited vinyl last year by High Roller, now on cd via Shadow Kingdom, with a booklet including lyrics, photos, and liner notes by "The Shark" himself.
MPEG Stream: "Chromaphobia"
MPEG Stream: "Pentacle Of Truth"

MANILLA ROAD Mark Of The Beast (Forged In Fire / Rockadrome) cd 12.98
Back in print, back in stock!
Here's one for fans of the USA's most cult '80s era true/power/heavy/epic metal band (who are still around, as a matter of fact). We've lauded them before, as being a uber-eccentric low-budget take on Maiden and Manowar, with hints of '70s prog, precursor to the likes of The Lord Weird Slough Feg. But it's also one of their weirdest, a lot more than hints of that '70s prog here, so others than strictly Manilla Road and/or metal fans might wanna check out...
First issued by pre-Rockadrome imprint Monster Records back in 2002, this is actually much older than that - it's an unreleased album from 1981, originally titled "Dreams of Eschaton". The band, for some reason, didn't like the recordings at the time and shelved them, but bootleg tapes have circulated among the Manilla Road faithful for years. Eventually Monster Records persuaded Manilla Road mainman Mark "The Shark" Shelton that it was time to give the album a proper release at last. Boasting cover art from Jim Fitzpatrick (who a lot of art for Thin Lizzy - as well as being responsible for the famous Che Guevara portrait poster you see everywhere), Mark of the Beast is a worthy addition to the Road's official catalog, though not their heaviest - it's a doomy but kinda mellow and psychedelic and spaced out album of epic, sad melodicism and majesty. The vocals are doused in FX, the entire recording is echoey and rickety, a few songs (like "Black Lotus") totally rock out, while many others wend and wind in a laidback druggy daze.
Like all Manilla Road, this doesn't fit any generic metal template...some of this reminds us of Rush's early songs, and there's even a proto-Current 93 narration thing happening on one track too!
MPEG Stream: "Mark Of The Beast "
MPEG Stream: "Avatar"

MANINKARI Art Des Poussieres (Conspiracy) lp 19.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

MANINKARI Le Diable Avec Ses Chevaux (Conspiracy) 2cd 22.00
Just a few months ago this French post/chamber/drone rock (rock? no, not rock...) duo successfully piqued our interest with their two song debut ep, rounded out by Justin Broadrick (Jesu) and Robin Rimbaud (Scanner) remixes. Now they've followed it up with a sprawling double cd (11 tracks, 110 minutes)... when they said a "full-length" was upcoming, they meant it! And it's magnificent. Maninkari's music, made with viola, piano, drums, cymbalom, santour, synth, and samples, is exceedingly textural, almost classically eerie. Like Thuja scoring a thriller or horror film soundtrack, perhaps. There's droning and groaning strings, mumbled, whispered voices, the rattle of bells and percussion, rumbling electronics, a drifting wash of sound usually underpinned with repeating, precise piano parts, compelling rhythmic figures, or some other driving sonic element emerging from the moody murk. Each track is carefully composed and undoubtedly effective, simmering along with slowly unfolding suspense, showing quiet restraint, allowing the minor key melancholic melodies and repetitive motifs to go to work on your nervous system! Hypnotically lovely yet ever so creepy, a bit like The Necks gone goth... ambient "dronejazz" soundscapery, abstract industrial chamber music, whatever you want to call it, we like it!
MPEG Stream: "Vol De Nuit"
MPEG Stream: "Crossing The Echo"
MPEG Stream: "Ota"

MANINKARI Psychoide / Participation Mystic (Conspiracy) cd 10.98
Mysterious, quaking, hissing, clattering instrumental post-rock soundscapery, a murky improv, weird and warm, full of shimmering strings slightly dissonant, like something processed from the sounds of a symphony tuning up, building to bombastic dense, droning nirvana. Very cool... What is this? Well, we're always interested in what Belgium's Conspiracy label decides to release (just look 'em up on our website and you'll find a slew of AQ faves, from a bunch of Boris to the recent Sunburned Circle album). Never heard of Paris' Maninkari before, but this debut release of theirs being on Conspiracy gets our attention -- as does the fact that Jesu's Justin Broadrick contributes a remix (as does Robin Rimbaud aka Scanner). That's right, as the title suggests, this disc is just two songs, plus two remixes... it's 42 minutes total, though, so if it's not a full-length album, it's not exactly just an ep either.
Maninkari construct a gorgeous soft cacophony of epic post-rock drift and minimal jazzy shuffle on 8:21 opener "Pyschoide". Dense drumming, frenzied strings, wound into tense soundscapes of slow burning shimmer. Godspeed plays the Dirty Three, or maybe Angus Maclise jamming with Chris Corsano, dark and druggy, some sort of glorious mantra-like minimalist dronejazz, with a super cinematic Phillip Glass like coda... That's followed by "Participation Mystic", a 16 minute track of lilting pizzicato strings, underpinned by deep soft swells of shimmering warmth and distant bits of industrial clatter, a slow burning ambient drift that is eventually joined by a simple motorik rhythm, transforming the pulsing ambience into something jazzy and minimal, propulsive and hypnotic, channeling the spirit of Finnish hypnorockers Circle and minimal dronejazz combo the Necks... and again near the end, everything enveloped by intense swarms of frenetic strings...
The two remixes are different enough from the originals to be quite worthwhile, and stand by themselves, not surprisingly being more "electronic music" sounding, and in the case of Broadrick's remix, more "extreme"!
Limited to 1000 copies. Full-length to follow soon...
MPEG Stream: "Psychoide"
MPEG Stream: "Participation Mystic Remix"

MANISHEVITZ Grammar Bell And The All Fall Down (Jagjaguwar) cd 13.98
Lush & beautiful, wry & too clever, stumbling pop songs from an ex-member of the Curious Digit. Great!

MANITOBA Up In Flames (Domino / Leaf) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The dreamy pop-tronica second album from this unassuming artist who was formerly known as Manitoba, and is now Caribou! FYI: His early releases such as this one have been reissued with tons of extras. You can find 'em under 'Caribou'!

MANLEY, PHIL Life Coach (Thrill Jockey) cd 15.98
While most aQ customers probably know the name Phil Manley by now, the ones who don't still have probably heard one of the bands he's played in: Trans Am, The Fucking Champs, Jonas Reinhardt, Oneida, or maybe one of the bands he's recorded: The Alps, Moon Duo, Wooden Shjips, Mi Ami, Arp, Saviours. And while like us, you might have been thinking a solo record from Manley would sound like either the Champs or Trans Am, or something right in between, Manley instead looked back to a certain German music of the seventies, music that most definitely informed Trans Am, and continues to influence Manley and his music, stuff like Kraftwerk, Neu!, Cluster, Popol Vuh, Harmonia, and while around aQ, modern folks trying their hand at krautrock is nothing revolutionary, Manley proves his krautrock mettle with a suite of songs that manage to fuse the classic sounds of old with something slightly more modern. The opener is all pulsing synths and spidery Rother like guitar melodies, and a warm swelling melodic refrain, the Kraftwerk vibe is huge, while the follow up "Commercial Potential" takes what sounds like the main melody from Metallica's "Enter Sandman" and stretches it out into something much more haunting and meditative, lacing it with piano, softly swirling new agey synths. Dark and brooding and quite lovely.
"Lawrence KS" is post rock gone krautrock, with a guitar part that sounds a bit Slinty, draped over a stuttering minimal rhythmic pulse, which leads into "Forest Opening Theme", a lush bit of hazy, softly psychedelic krautdrone drift, like some lost Popol Vuh soundtrack.
"Work It Out" is all buzzing synths and lush layered spaciness, while "Make Good Choices" is some super spare steel string Appalachia, subtly droney building to a softly chaotic finish. "Gay Bathers" is a brief bit of (seemingly) tongue in cheek new age-y shimmer, all swoonsome synths, and "doot doot doo" falsetto vox, sounding more like a lost backing track for the High Llamas.
But it's "Night Visions" that feels like the album's centerpiece" a 9+ minute Tangerine Dreamy sprawl of arpeggiated melodies, soft synth swells, swirling moody minimal melodies, all drifty and hypnotic and minimal and abstract and so utterly mesmerizing, one of those tracks that definitely could have kept right on going.
And finally, the title track, which returns to the pulsing synth and motorik rhythms of the record opener.
So good. And don't let the silly album cover and goofy song and album titles fool you, Manley and friends just have a dorky sense of humor (see: The Fucking Champs, Trans Am, etc.), and Life Coach is a serious, and seriously kick ass slab of modern minimal krautrock. Dig it!
MPEG Stream: "FT2 Theme"
MPEG Stream: "Commercial Potential"
MPEG Stream: "Lawrence, KS"
MPEG Stream: "Night Visions"

MANLEY, PHIL Life Coach (Thrill Jockey) lp 16.98
While most aQ customers probably know the name Phil Manley by now, the ones who don't still have probably heard one of the bands he's played in: Trans Am, The Fucking Champs, Jonas Reinhardt, Oneida, or maybe one of the bands he's recorded: The Alps, Moon Duo, Wooden Shjips, Mi Ami, Arp, Saviours. And while like us, you might have been thinking a solo record from Manley would sound like either the Champs or Trans Am, or something right in between, Manley instead looked back to a certain German music of the seventies, music that most definitely informed Trans Am, and continues to influence Manley and his music, stuff like Kraftwerk, Neu!, Cluster, Popol Vuh, Harmonia, and while around aQ, modern folks trying their hand at krautrock is nothing revolutionary, Manley proves his krautrock mettle with a suite of songs that manage to fuse the classic sounds of old with something slightly more modern. The opener is all pulsing synths and spidery Rother like guitar melodies, and a warm swelling melodic refrain, the Kraftwerk vibe is huge, while the follow up "Commercial Potential" takes what sounds like the main melody from Metallica's "Enter Sandman" and stretches it out into something much more haunting and meditative, lacing it with piano, softly swirling new agey synths. Dark and brooding and quite lovely.
"Lawrence KS" is post rock gone krautrock, with a guitar part that sounds a bit Slinty, draped over a stuttering minimal rhythmic pulse, which leads into "Forest Opening Theme", a lush bit of hazy, softly psychedelic krautdrone drift, like some lost Popol Vuh soundtrack.
"Work It Out" is all buzzing synths and lush layered spaciness, while "Make Good Choices" is some super spare steel string Appalachia, subtly droney building to a softly chaotic finish. "Gay Bathers" is a brief bit of (seemingly) tongue in cheek new age-y shimmer, all swoonsome synths, and "doot doot doo" falsetto vox, sounding more like a lost backing track for the High Llamas.
But it's "Night Visions" that feels like the album's centerpiece" a 9+ minute Tangerine Dreamy sprawl of arpeggiated melodies, soft synth swells, swirling moody minimal melodies, all drifty and hypnotic and minimal and abstract and so utterly mesmerizing, one of those tracks that definitely could have kept right on going.
And finally, the title track, which returns to the pulsing synth and motorik rhythms of the record opener.
So good. And don't let the silly album cover and goofy song and album titles fool you, Manley and friends just have a dorky sense of humor (see: The Fucking Champs, Trans Am, etc.), and Life Coach is a serious, and seriously kick ass slab of modern minimal krautrock. Dig it!
MPEG Stream: "FT2 Theme"
MPEG Stream: "Commercial Potential"
MPEG Stream: "Lawrence, KS"
MPEG Stream: "Night Visions"

MANN, AIMEE Bachelor #2, or, the last remains of the dodo (SuperEgo) cd 15.98
Forget all your preconceived notions about Aimee Mann's middle-of-the-road Lilith Fair brand of singer slash songwriter. Yeah, okay, that's what she is, but like Elvis Costello in his prime, she elevates the genre head and shoulders above her peers. This album is so hook-filled and so lovely and Mann's voice is so exceptionally entrancing that even this listener's jaded ears are enamored. Highly recommended! (All the songs, including one co-written with Elvis Costello, are new, with only one repeated from the "Magnolia" soundtrack.)

MANN, AIMEE Lost In Space (SuperEgo) cd 17.98
The highly anticipated follow-up to Ms Mann's marvelous Bachelor #2 album has arrived. Now, first things first, the title: Lost In Space? Surely she's not referring to herself 'cause on this album, she's sounding more grounded and self-assured than ever. The intimacy, emotion, and integrity she conveys through each song reminded me a lot of Lucinda Williams and Tom Waits. While their music is nothing alike, each artist straddles that fence between the mainstream and for lack of a better word the 'indie'. They've each retained their own sound and unique voice within the 'industry', although unlike Williams, Mann's music hasn't been overly glossified in production. Her wonderful, distinct voice is in top form, and the songwriting's super-solid with some immediately hummable melodies, full warm instrumentation and nerve-touching lyrics. Features a comic book insert illustrated by Seth.
RealAudio clip: "Pavlov's Bell"
RealAudio clip: "Humpty Dumpty"
RealAudio clip: "Lost In Space"

MANN, AIMEE Lost In Space Special Edition (Super Ego) 2cd + book 19.98
Re-released as a double cd set encased in a deluxe hardcover edition resembling an old style children's board-cover book. The comic book by the artist known as Seth which came as an insert in the original pressing has been integrated into the package. It bookends the alternating pages of lyrics and full page Seth illustrations. The second 'bonus' disc contains a bunch of quality Aimee stuff: live recordings, previously unreleased songs (including "Observatory" cowritten by Glenn Tilbrook) and a video for "Pavlov's Bell" to boot!
Here's what we said last year about the album on its own:
The highly anticipated follow-up to Ms Mann's marvelous Bachelor #2 album has arrived. Now, first things first, the title: Lost In Space? Surely she's not referring to herself 'cause on this album, she's sounding more grounded and self-assured than ever. The intimacy, emotion, and integrity she conveys through each song reminded me a lot of Lucinda Williams and Tom Waits. While their music is nothing alike, each artist straddles that fence between the mainstream and for lack of a better word the 'indie'. They've each retained their own sound and unique voice within the 'industry', although unlike Williams, Mann's music hasn't been overly glossified in production. Her wonderful, distinct voice is in top form, and the songwriting's super-solid with some immediately hummable melodies, full warm instrumentation and nerve-touching lyrics.
MPEG Stream: "Observatory"
MPEG Stream: "The Scientist (live)"

MANN, AIMEE One More Drifter In The Snow (Super Ego) cd 15.98
Ms Aimee bestows her warm holiday wishes a little earlier than the rest of the crowd with this, her Christmas album! In her unmistakable dulcet voice, she sweetly sings eight traditional numbers such as "I'll Be Home For Christmas", White Christmas", "Winter Wonderland", "The Christmas Song" and "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen", but also adds one of her own titled "Calling On Mary" as well as "You're A Mean One Mr. Grinch"!
MPEG Stream: "Calling On Mary"
MPEG Stream: "You're A Mean One Mr. Grinch"

MANN, AIMEE The Forgotten Arm (SuperEgo Records) cd 16.98
Mann fanns (tee hee, sorry!), here's another gem to add to your garland of Aimee. Never anything fancy nor flashy, but what she does, she does exceptionally well. Adored by critics and fans alike, she just quietly goes about her business of making wonderful, heartrending albums. She's such a fine storyteller with an unmistakable calm (and calming) voice, few can articulates the empty ache of loss and neglect with the eloquence that she does. The only criticisms that really arise with regard to her work is that there can be a sameyness to it all. While some might call it 'predictable', just as many others surely call it 'reliable'. Her latest album certainly takes not drastic detours, but it's different in that its lyrics are linked thematically. The twelve songs follow a bleak narrative string about the fictional life a substance addicted boxer. Perhaps one of her most heady and heavy works to date -- somehow both dark and luminous at the same time. She makes listening to tales of absolutely heartbreaking hopelessness an enjoyable experience. How does she do it?? Produced by Joe Henry.
MPEG Stream: "Going Through The Motions"
MPEG Stream: "I Can't Help You Anymore"

MANN, JAKE Daytime Ghost (Crossbill Records) cd 10.98
Here's the debut solo album by singer/songwriter Jake Mann formerly of Bay Area band The Zim-Zims (you might recall he stepped out on his own for the cdr release Solo Electric EP). If you dig indie rock'n'pop, this gent's your ears' new best buddy! The super fuzzed out guitar lines on songs like "Satellite In Bloomington" could easily be mistaken for something comin' from Sam Coombes and Quasi. Mann keeps his pop tunes' buoyancy weighted down by minor chords and charming hushed vocals. Later in the album, "Mudflat" perks things up a bit, offering sounds akin to the bright, slightly tweaked pop of Olivia Tremor Control. Nicely varied, low-key popcraft.
MPEG Stream: "Satellite In Bloomington"
MPEG Stream: "Mudflat"

MANN, JAKE Daytime Ghost: Out-takes & Remixes (Crossbill) cd ep 5.98