REDD KROSS Third Eye (Rhino Encore) cd 13.98
Redd Kross are absolutely one of my all time favorite bands EVER (sez Andee). They've been kicking ass for more than 25 years, going from snotty bratty punks, to brooding glam rockers, to power pop geniuses to some impossible combination of all three. They played recently here in SF, with their classic lineup, and played songs from their whole career, punk oldies and more recent pop gems and they all sounded amazing. Every show is a gas, the band going off on insane tangents, playing loads of covers (PJ Harvey, Abba) and sometimes totally destroying their own songs.
Every single one of their records is amazing, maybe none more so than this one right here, simultaneously their least and most popular. Their least, cuz it was a pretty dramatic sonic shift. True fans shifted right along with them, but casual fans did not dig their new even flowery pop sound. BUT, they had their biggest hit with this record, the totally genius "Annie's Gone", which you might not know by title, but once you hear it you'll most likely recognize it immediately. Whatever anyone thinks, if you're into killer pop, it's hard to imagine you wouldn't totally dig Third Eye.
Anyway, this is part of a strange reissue program where records are re-released, but are only available for 6 months and then they'll go out of print again (like the recent Alice Cooper Records Of The Week). So while we're not sure what the reasoning behind that is, all we can say is we'll take a Third Eye reissue anytime and anyhow. So what's the big deal? Well beyond style and history and past records and all the non musical bullshit, Redd Kross are some of the best pop songwriters EVER. EVER. No hyperbole, these guys seem like they can effortlessly whip out perfect pop on a moments notice. Incredible hooks, killer riffs, unforgettable memories, gorgeous harmonies, shredding guitar, kick ass drumming, and the unmistakable voices of frontmen/brothers Jeff and Steven McDonald. Listening to this again, it's really hard to imagine how any one into Redd Kross wouldn't have dug this disc. It's appropriately schizophrenic (like RK always are), it's got some ass kicking rockers, some dreamy almost ballads, maybe it was the hit, nothing like a hit to get folks screaming "sell out" But fuck it. This record rules. The hit especially. "Annie's Gone" is a dark minor key jam, with a chorus to die for, with a video featuring Anne Magnuson of Bongwater! "Shonen Knife" is a super rocking blast of Stooges-y riffing and still even more hooks. "1976" was the other big hit, another caffeinated blast of feel good power pop, with pounding piano, big distorted guitars and lots of wah wah! "Bubblegum Factory" is just that. Total pure bubblegum pop, and practically perfect to boot. The record finishes off with "Elephant Flares" another grungy garage-y rocker, with a killer metallic groove chorus. Eighteen years later and Third Eye still sounds as great as it did when I was 20! Needless to say, pop kids who don't own this or god forbid have never heard Redd Kross absolutely MUST own this. One of Andee's all time favorite records, from one of his all time favorite bands!!!!!!
MPEG Stream: "Annie's Gone"
MPEG Stream: "Shonen Knife"
MPEG Stream: "Bubblegum Factory"
MPEG Stream: "Elephant Flares"

REDROT Deviant (Bloodlust!) 7" 11.98
Oh man, does this hit the spot. Total old school, abject, cold and clinical, noise drenched industrial, a symphony of rusty old machines, the cranks and levers operated by rotting corpses, this crumbling sound factory situated upon a blackened expanse of charred remains and ruined cities, the voice a reverb drenched howl, a totally hypnotic rhythmic clatter creates the skeletal framework, while all around, clouds of hiss and buzz are woven into slow shifting almost-riffs, lumbering, stumbling, dark and dour, shot through with barely there streaks of melody, a brief bit of cinematic apocalyptica, the flip side, features another lurching steam punked Skinny Puppied rhythm track, this time pelted by bits of glitch and fuzzed out sine waves, a female voice speaks over the top, telling tales of violence and mayhem, in a calm measured tone, a strange contrast to the looped decaying sprawl of Redrot's harrowing soundscapery. Deep processed vocals are morphed into thick undulating tones, fragmented electronics wrapped around a frizzled underwater pulse, a swirling backdrop of creak and crunch and whir, the motorik lo-fi robotic beat in lockstep with a growling alien commentary. Awesome stuff for sure. So awesome in fact, that we just listened to this like 3 times in a row, and we're only really stopping now because we have other reviews to write...
LIMITED TO 200 COPIES!!!

REED, LES Girl On A Motorcycle (OST) (Get Back) lp 15.98
Newly Reissued on Vinyl!
Hot stuff! The liner notes for this soundtrack suggest that the movie, which paired the ultra sexy Marianne Faithfull with the equally irresistible Alain Delon, fell "somewhere between fetish and fantasy" and we'd venture to say that this soundtrack does too. Sooo perfectly '60s - bringing together the grand orchestra and the rock band! There's the expressive horns that frolic, chuckle, taunt and weep... the glorious strings and woodwinds that sweep you around a dancefloor or along an open road... oh and let's not forget the funky noodly electric guitars and keyboards. Now, punctuated the proceedings with some thunderous timpani drums, some enchanting Cleo Laine and Mireille Mathieu vocals and yes, some ambient sounds from the film itself like the roar of a motorcycle! Super sexy and stylin'. If you dig hip '60s flicks, this soundtrack and the movie is totally for you.
MPEG Stream: "Surrender To A Stranger"
MPEG Stream: "Sweet Souvenirs"

REED, LOU Animal Serenade (Reprise) 2cd 19.98
Live in LA 2003, a double disc set of songs spanning ol' Lou's career from his days in the Velvets to more recent endeavors.
MPEG Stream: "All Tomorrow's Parties"

REED, LOU Hudson River Wind Meditations (Sounds True) cd 16.98
We had to remember one of the most important rules we learned as kids when it came to this record. Don't judge a book by its cover. Man, was it hard not to. When we first heard that Lou Reed made a record for meditation that was mostly being sold and marketed at new age stores it got lots of eyes rolling and lots of jokes flying around here. But then we tried to listen without prejudice, per the above mentioned rule, and guess what? Truth be told, this is really pretty damn good! Once you get past the packaging and non-musical baggage that comes with this disc of "New Age" music, you remember that if anyone has the right to make a record of drones it's someone who was in the goddamn Velvet Underground, as they were one of the first bands to really introduce the drone into (semi)mainstream rock and pop. Originally recorded by Reed for his own meditation and Tai Chi practice, many of his friends heard it and asked him to make copies for them. Much like David Bowie's instrumental work in the '70s mostly given to friends, it's easy to hear that these are sounds coming from a place that has nothing to do with wanting to make a hit record, but instead come from a deeper place. And that's a very good thing considering he hasn't made much music in recent years that we've been too excited about. If this record came to us as a mysterious cd-r with stark packaging and a cultish name (like many AQ favorites do!) we probably would have been lauding its meditative drones and intense ambience. This could be something you could almost imagine coming out on Yarn Lazer or Root Strata or Faraway Press. Even when the music seems peaceful there is still sonic tension underneath, which really does set this apart from most meditation music. In the end it's just a really good record filled with deep drones that allow the listener to close their eyes and ignore the outside world and go to a different state. So nice.
MPEG Stream: "Move Your Heart"
MPEG Stream: "Find Your Note"
MPEG Stream: "Wind Coda"

REED, LOU Metal Machine Music (RCA) cd 9.98
Once again this reissue has fallen into our hands. Recorded in 1975, Lou Reed created some of the most brutal, blistering guitar noise and feedback ever heard. A four track sonic, subversive assault. The best and/or worst record in the history of rock & roll. Of course it depends on who you ask... we find it rather beautiful. Then again, several of us also own Merzboxes. And this probably *inspired* Merzbow. As well as pissing off legions of Reed/VU fans.
MPEG Stream: "Metal Machine Music, Part I"
MPEG Stream: "Metal Machine Music, Part IV"

REED, LOU & METALLICA Lulu (Warner Bros.) 2cd 18.98
We know you've all be waiting for us to weigh in on one of the burning issues of our time: just how terrible IS the Lou Reed / Metallica album? Is it terrible terrible, or maybe so bad it's good (but still terrible)? Or, perhaps, like The Wire, would we be all contrary and proclaim it to actually be brilliant, not terrible? Well... let's just say that actually writing a review of Lulu is difficult 'cause simply sitting through Lulu is difficult! Imagine a random rock band (Metallica) jamming on some generic stoner riffs they wrote in like 5 minutes, while Grandpa Simpson (Lou Reed) speak-sings disturbing/cryptic/asinine lyrics from the POV of an underage girl prostitute and whatnot over the top... and it's TWO freaking discs long!
Well, even opinion here at AQ is divided... just like when Morbid Angel's Illud Divinum Insanus came out. We DO like stuff that's "fucked up" after all, and certainly this is. And there's ways in which the "transgressiveness" of this might appeal to Oxbow fans, for sure (and we're Oxbow fans). But if you're a Metallica fan... well you're a glutton for punishment already anyway at this point, and this IS better than St. Anger (what isn't)? Is it possible that Lulu is Lou Reed's laughing-all-the-way-to-the-bank joke on a clueless, desperate-to-be-artistic Metallica?
Maybe we should just cop out and say that Lulu stands outside of any conventional good/bad judgment. It's just...ludicrous. And not 'cause it's Lou Reed and Metallica, as a concept, per se. Actually, when we first heard about Lou Reed teaming up with Metallica, some of us thought it had potential. On paper. After all, Lou Reed had written songs for KISS before (on 1981's Music From The Elder) and look how that turned out. No, seriously, we dig that KISS album. And if Lou was good enough to write songs for KISS, he should be good enough to write songs for Metallica, heck they should have brought him in sooner. Or, another possibility, was that they would do a full-on noise album together, conducted by Reed: Metallica Machine Music, perhaps?! That could have been cool. Instead, we got this arty absurdity. Which, to be fair, does have its (unintentionally HILARIOUS) moments. For instance, "I Am The Table" (not the name of the song, but it should be, it's actually called "The View", after the TV talk show) is almost worth the price of admission, it's already a classic. Or, check out the very next song, "Pumping Blood", sample lyric from Reed: "Waggle my ass like a dark prostitute coagulating heart pumpin' blood... c'mon, James!"
Yes, he really says/sings that. Wow.
And if Reed's half-assed spoken word style, way-too-high-in-the-mix vox weren't ruinous enough, James Hetfield then sings backup throughout, in his usual heartfelt, gruff, rock dude croon. Singing stuff like the aforementioned, "I am the table!". The juxtaposition is, again, just so ridiculous. As is the entire album. We're not sure what's worse, when they try to do "songs" (like "Iced Honey") or when it's just Lars on the drums providing random backup for Reed's beat poetry.
Ok, it's not all laffs. Ferinstance, in the finale of the set, the whole second half of the epic 20 minute "Junior Dad" is just droning somber strings, and that's quite pretty, although that part doesn't appear to involve either the members of Metallica OR Lou Reed...
So, our "verdict": you should definitely hear this, a least a bit of it, for a laugh. But buy the thing? Well, we've got one copy, and expect to have it for a while. But please go ahead, buy it. We dare you. And when you're listening to it, try not to imagine this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRPzElP_eSI
MPEG Stream: "Brandenberg Gate"
MPEG Stream: "The View"
MPEG Stream: "Cheat On Me"

REED, LOU, JOHN CALE & NICO Le Bataclan '72 (Dynamic) cd 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
1972... Le Bataclan, Paris... Reed, Cale & Nico... Together one more time to give a very stoney, distant and dark performance. Until now, this was only available on crappy bootlegs. Now, finally fully released for you VU enthusiasts and completists out there. This is a no-brainer must-have.
MPEG Stream: "Waiting For The Man"
MPEG Stream: "Ghost Story"

REEDBEDS Swells On High (Hooker Vision) cassette 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
A really lovely tape from the anonymous Reedbeds who seems to be a one-person pastoral ambient project for guitar, synth, and looping pedals. It's pretty easy to confuse some of these tracks with those from Mark McGuire's earlier cassettes and albums, in the delicate interplay of drone-strum and repeating melancholy melodies that gradually evolves over the long arcing passages cast in hues of sodden blues and damp greens. Through the four tracks on this 44 minute cassette, Reedbeds maintains an unhurried and understated pace to their work with plenty of space for the repeating patterns to wrap their tendrils around other loops, keeping true to minor-key ambience and glum romanticism of these mesmerizing blissout guitar jams. Just 100 copies from the Hooker Vision imprint run by Rachel and Grant Evans of Motion Sickness of Time Travel and Nova Scotia Arms separately, or Quiet Evenings collectively.
MPEG Stream: "Untitled"

REEKS AND THE WRECKS Knife Hits (tUMULt) cd 11.98
An old drum kit. Homemade amps. A dented old trombone. A bucket and a handful of firecrackers. The Reeks make a sound that is otherworldly. Dark and stumbling, folk-flecked basement blues. A mix of woozy slide guitar, swampy trombone, sparse and erratic percussion, tape hiss, amp buzz, shortwave interference and dark doomy brilliance. Like a ghostly, indie rock New Orleans funeral jazz band or Roland S. Howard fronting the Dead C. Haunting, mesmerizing, gorgeously raucous, dreamily creepy and absolutely unlike anything you have ever heard.
For years the Reeks played all up and down the West Coast, in basements, back porches, living rooms, pizza parlours, with only a 12" record and a battered old suitcase full of hand dubbed cassettes to their name, spreading their warm cloak of pulsing, droning creepy crawly throb over anyone lucky enough to be packed into the same sweaty space. At once jubilant and danceable, but at the same time, dark and lugubrious, ominous and somnabulent. Lovers of weird music couldn't get enough, but eventually, even dyed in the wool indie rockers began to embrace the Reeks, having perhaps found something that still smacked of their beloved indie rock, but was a little darker and a whole lot weirder than they were used to. But by then it was too late.
The release of Knife Hits is truly bittersweet. After years of recording and re-recording, mixing and remixing, when Knife Hits was finally ready to be released, and the rest of the world would finally get to hear the Reeks' amazing off kilter avant indie funeral folk, tragedy struck. Orion Satushek, Reeks mainman, guitar player, instrument builder and one of the nicest guys ever, was hit and killed by a drunk driver. The personal loss, is indescribable, a deep sting everytime we think about him, his band, his music, his friendship. And the loss to music, to the music community, is immeasurable. Years of playing, and practicing and rocking and sweating in tiny cramped basements and doing with a crappy old drum kit and a couple of homemade amps what most bands can't do with all the equipment in the world is somehow all crammed onto this single disc. These ten songs. The passion, the playfulness, the dark moodiness, the spaced out droniness, the wild sweaty chaos, the sheer joy of making an unholy racket. This record is not only a totally unique chunk of damaged outsider rock brilliance, but it's also a fitting tribute to the loss of a very special friend.
We miss you, Orion.
MPEG Stream: "Blue Ballroom"
MPEG Stream: "Mosquito Cash Diamond Gun"
MPEG Stream: "Maui Wow Wow"

REEKS AND THE WRECKS s/t (Red Alert Works) lp 7.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Dark and stumbling, folk-flecked basement blues. Like Roland S. Howard fronting a band on Siltbreeze. A mix of slide guitar, trombone, sparse and erratic percussion, tape hiss, buzz, shortwave interference, and recording inconsistancy. Absolutely amazing.

REEKS AND THE WRECKS s/t (Red Alert Works) lp 23.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Longtime readers of the aQ list and fans of Andee's tUMULt label are no doubt familiar with the late great Bellingham Washington band Reeks And The Wrecks, their Knife Hits record on tUMULt still amazes and confounds, but will forever be tainted by a tinge of sadness, as Reeks guitarist Orion Satushek was killed by a drunk driver right before the record was released. Knife Hits stands as an amazing tribute to the man and his talent, and few bands have managed since to create something as wholly original.
Recently PRND were in town, which just so happens to feature another former Reeks member, and in addition to their amazing cd-r (which we have reviewed elsewhere on this week's list), he had copies of the 'lost' first Reeks lp, so we took a whole bunch cuz odds are most folks even big fans have not heard this, and it's a doozy, chronicling the band at a very early stage when they were equal parts dark stumbling funereal folk blues and wild chaotic math rock, a strange combination, that sounds as good now as it ever did.
Our description of Knife Hits pretty much applies to these recordings too: "An old drum kit. Homemade amps. A dented old trombone. A bucket and a handful of firecrackers. The Reeks make a sound that is otherworldly. Dark and stumbling, folk-flecked basement blues. A mix of woozy slide guitar, swampy trombone, sparse and erratic percussion, tape hiss, amp buzz, shortwave interference and dark doomy brilliance. Like a ghostly, indie rock New Orleans funeral jazz band or Roland S. Howard fronting the Dead C. Haunting, mesmerizing, gorgeously raucous, dreamily creepy and absolutely unlike anything you have ever heard." Hard to resist, huh? Well, don't. You won't be sorry. The sound is gorgeous and chaotic and mournful and weirdly full of life and energy. And those sounds are balanced on this lp by the other side of the band that seemed to fade as the band moved forward, loose chaotic post/math rock blow outs, angular crunchy guitars, wild octopoidal drumming, the moody funereal side definitely dominated, but when the band exploded into those heavier parts, it only made them sound that much heavier.
Also, the pressing of this lp is a weird old one, the records themselves are a bit weird, so it's SUPER noisy, not sure how much of it is the pressing, and how much is the awesomely ramshackle lo-fi recording, but whatever it is, it suits them, with the sound erupting into weird squalls of surface noise, lots of hiss and buzz, the band were total DIY, they even had a song that included setting off firecrackers in a bucket, which means, embrace the noise and the low fidelity, and uptight vinyl nerds KEEP AWAY.
One of the greatest bands EVER!!! And this record RULES.
R.I.P. Orion.
Comes in a super swank silkscreened red ink on brown cardstock sleeve.

REFLECTOR Pass (Rock Is Hell) lp 21.00
Record number two from this mysterious metallic math rock band. Reflector's first record Flugangst was a surprise hit around here, a crunching math metal juggernaut, perpetrated by the now ubiquitous guitar/drums/no bass lineup, but Reflector certainly didn't suffer for it. Heavy and complex and brooding and massive, with plenty of doomy slow core bits and shimmery drone-y drifts.
If anything, Pass takes everything we liked about Flugangst and cranks it up, the sound is incredible, lush and thick and expansive, REALLY hard to believe they're a bass-less two piece here, the guitars are hard and dense and chuggy, the drums crushing, the two locked into killer grooves, Neurosis like lumbering plod one second, super tangled post rock weirdness the next, even some slow motion Slayer riffing here and there.
It's criminal these guys aren't huge, they should be touring with Mastodon and Baroness and all those low slung bearded sludgelords, but this ain't sludge (although they are perfectly capable of getting plenty sludge-y!), this is almost some sort of pop infused downtuned metal, shot through with plenty of post rock mathisms, strange textures, catchy melodies, and riffs that KILL.
We don't have a whole lot of these, so if we run out be patient, we have to get more from overseas, but hell, anyone into slow and low heaviness, or the new breed of post / math / metal / gaze / whatever, these guys could very well be your new favorite band.

REFLECTOR The Heritage (Rock Is Hell / Noise Appeal / Interstellar) lp 17.98
This is record number three from these aQ faves, a metallic math rock duo whose sound is pretty much the perfect hybrid of all the heavy stuff we like, a sprawling, dizzying collection of tangled metallic, dirgey instrumental grooves, woozy post rock drift, strange almost operatic epicness, plenty of warped experimentation, lots of texture, and tranced out mesmer, although technically it's not a collection, as this is in fact a single song, spread out over both sides of the record, but as with any 29 minute song, it's essentially, a bunch of different parts, or even different songs woven into one single epic.
The A side starts off all droney and creepy, before the thick buzz bass and skittery drums come in, eventually exploding into a killer sprawl of almost stonery riffage, psychedelic and groovy, heavy as hell, we can almost picture wailing vocals over the top, but these guys are mostly instrumental, so instead, they continue to rock out sans vox, the vibe more trancey than rocking. As the song unwinds, things get way more mathy and complex, super dynamic, at times sounding like some impossible hybrid of Neurosis and the Fucking Champs, which is obviously not at all a bad thing. The last part of the A side is all loping post rock heaviness, super hypnotic and cyclical, before the guitars drop out completely, and the last 90 seconds are just drums.
The flipide starts off right where the A side ended, it is the same song after all, the solo drum fills, tribal and spaced out, building a framework of keening feedback, some piano (!), ominous and brooding, tinkling chimes, and then POW, the song explodes into some seriously crushing riffage, utterly crushing and eminently headbangable. The sound gets mathier, and then the vocals come in for the first time more sort of spoken word at first, and then a second vocal, which sounds like a processed female vox, and gives the sound a seriously psychedelic, almost dream poppy vibe, at least briefly, soon the song erupts into another stretch of chugging heaviness, and eventually explodes into a final sprawl of galloping double kick driven, riffy metal crush. Fucking awesome. No idea why these guys aren't more popular. Maybe third times the charm.
This comes with a download code too. But we thought we should mention, it's a 32 CHARACTER DOWNLOAD CODE!!!! Took us three tries to get it entered right, good grief! Pressed on lovely pale blue vinyl, with a full color printed cardstock insert.
MPEG Stream: "The Heritage Pt. 1"
MPEG Stream: "The Heritage Pt. 2"

REFRACTORS, THE Eight Years Sleep - Folio Series (Dynamophone) cd-r 11.98
Here's a new-to-us volume of the Dynamophone Folio series! We've known that this Bay Area label features some of the prettiest drone music around, both of the experimental and more pop leaning kind. The Refractors are a fine addition to the fold. So soothing and mesmerizing. An angelic female voice surfaces on the second song, and whispery murmurs materialize at later points in the proceedings. The tracks with the added vocal dimension are definitely our faves of the release, although the rest of the dozen tracks are mighty lovely too! This cd compiles eight recordings circa 2001-2008, as well as reissues four numbers from the label's now out of print 2009 Parcel 3" cdr series.
MPEG Stream: "Lull"
MPEG Stream: "Swept Away"

REFRIGERATOR Anchors of Bleed (Communion) cd 12.98

REFRIGERATOR Anchors of Bleed (Communion) lp 7.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

REFRIGERATOR Comedy Minus One (Shrimper) cd 13.98
I've loved Refrigerator for so long that hearing a new album from them is like replacing one warm blanket with another. This lonesome downer rock quartet fronted by LA's Callaci brothers is back with one of their most upbeat albums yet... but don't let that make you think they're happy. They're still despondent, introspective, slow to laugh, but when you're down and out, Refrigerator will keep you company. Somewhere between Bob Dylan and Smog lies Refrigerator.
RealAudio clip: "Open Fan Mail"
RealAudio clip: "Never Nowhere"

REFRIGERATOR Dangerous (Shrimper) cd 13.98
Refrigerator is woefully under represented on the aQ site, with 5 records listed (of the 20 or so full lengths, singles, eps and cassettes they've released in the last 20+ years) most without reviews, and the ones that do have a review only get a sentence or two. Which is strange, cuz we've always been fans, and we've always felt a definite kinship between Shrimper and aQuarius. Amps For Christ, Franklin Bruno, Nothing Painted Blue, Dump, Mountain Goats, Sebadoh, Wckr Spgt, Soul Junk, Bugskull, John Davis, Pork Queen, Simon Joyner, Good Horsey, Herman Dune, Woods and of course Shrimper flagship band Refrigerator.
And we always considered Refrigerator vocalist Allen Callaci one of the most underappreciated vocalists in the underground, his voice so soulful and emotive and passionate, on the verge of cracking, always sounding like it's about to slip into a falsetto, but instead, it's simply high and clear, pure and plaintive, and so perfectly matched to the group's gorgeous, melancholy downer lo-fi pop.
Dangerous is an odd first Refrigerator record to finally get the aQ love it deserves, as it's not a proper new full length, instead, it's a collection of demos, intended to be expanded into a proper electric full band record, but after a band member's injury and gradual recovery, by the time they went back to work on new music, the band were itching to work on new songs, but it was decided the demos were to good to just let slip through the cracks, so they became Dangerous, and even in stripped down demo form, this is some seriously gorgeous, moving, emotional music. Just check out the first track, "Be Positive", which just might be the sweetest, saddest, most heart wrenchingly lovely song we've heard in ages. Allen Callaci's vocals impossibly gorgeous, the melodies so perfect, the whole song only benefiting from the minimal instrumentation. And from there on out, it's just another classic, practically perfect Refrigerator record, lovely, soft souled song after darkly intimate song, all minimal strum, subtle percussion, more about the arrangements and melodies and those vocals, a gorgeous collection of lo-fi folk pop that few can pull off the way these guys can. We've been listening to this non stop, and that first song is definitely one of our favorite tracks of the year so far. With more joining that one the more we listen!
All the songs were recorded live too, with no overdubs (they were demos after all) which only adds to the immediate/intimate vibe. Also includes guest spots from Nothing Painted Blue's Franklin Bruno (who wrote one song, and sings on two), as well as a couple songs written by Refrigerator drummer Chris Jones. Includes a booklet with liner notes and lyrics too.
MPEG Stream: "Be Positive"
MPEG Stream: "The Worthless Rearview"
MPEG Stream: "Amaze Me"

REFRIGERATOR Glitter Jazz (Shrimper) cd 12.98
Southern California trio's BEST, most cohesive album yet, full of tender, shuffling, exceedingly lo-fi pop. Allen Callaci's voice and delivery are heartbreakingly poignant. Plus special guest, Franklin Bruno!

REFRIGERATOR s/t (Shrimper) cd 12.98
Newest album from Upland, CA, trio.

REFRIGERATOR s/t (Shrimper) lp 7.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Newest album from Upland, CA, trio.

REFRIGERATOR Somehow (Shrimper) cdep 7.98
Upland's sweet lo-fi stars Refrigerator take a stylistic step in the right direction (as usual) with this new ep of more fuzzed-out material than you're used to. Very nice.

REFUSED Songs To Fan The Flames Of Discontent (Epitaph / Burning Heart) cd 12.98
Originally released back in 1996, the remastered reissue of The Refused's definitive album Songs To Fan The Flames Of Discontent (easily as good as their breakthrough / final release The Shape Of Punk To Come) confirms this Swedish band's music to be just as vital and potent today as it was eight years ago, and so much more so than the majority of bands calling themselves 'punk' and 'hardcore' these days. Theirs is far more concentrated, cerebral and challenging than flaccid fist-pumpin' 3-chord punk rawkTM. The Refused was a truly compelling, caustic force levelling all in its path. Ready to get your ass kicked?
MPEG Stream: "Return To The Closet"
MPEG Stream: "Life Support Addiction"

REFUSED The E.P. Comp (Epitaph / Burning Heart) cd 12.98
The reissue of this great singles collection from the sadly defunct Swedish band The Refused reminds us: a) just how fierce and awesome this band really was, b) just how varied and wide a musical scope they had, c) they just don't make 'em like they used to! Blazing and heavy, weird and wild, catchy as fuck but so intense and supercharged. Their classic final release The Shape Of Punk To Come will soon be re-issued, but until then this singles comp and the also-just-just-rereleased Songs To Fan The Flames Of Discontent should be plenty to keep your blood boiling, fists pumping and head banging until then!

REGGAEE, THE Balthar (Tipped Bowler Tapes) cassette 6.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Latest analog blast of abstract hypno skree from this French one man band and it's a beaut. Looped high end shimmer, distant industrial grind and creak and a creepy whispered mantra are smeared into a gorgeously woozy blur, eventually joined by some random woodpecker percussion. Strange but really quite beautiful and mesmerizing. The flipside is another mantra-like loop based drone, lots of tape hiss, and lo fi rumble, tape warble and stuttering fragments of hiss all drifting on a swirling sea of crumbling low end, and peppered with bits of crackle and crunch. Weird and wonderful.
Amazingly packaged, a green and yellow hand painted tape, in a full color sleeve, inside a full color insert and a folded up short story printed on super nice textured paper. LIMITED TO 68 COPIES!!!

REGGIE AND THE FULL EFFECT Greatest Hits '84-'87 (Vagrant) cd 14.98

REGGIE AND THE FULL EFFECT Last Stop: Crappy Town (Vagrant) cd 13.98

MPEG Stream: "G"
MPEG Stream: "Smith & 9th"
MPEG Stream: "F"

REGGIE AND THE FULL EFFECT Promotional Copy (Vagrant) cd 13.98
Depending on how you look at it, this record is either the best, or the funniest record we've heard in a while. A pretty successful pastiche of the highly illogical musical tastes of adolescence; post-Hardcore grind, shiny-faced emo pop, and gangsta rap (brilliantly exploited, with a Ween-like irreverance; the opening 'skit' makes Reggie the victim of a driveby shooting). Plus bizarre but totally appealing '80s new wave love songs, faux-Crass faux-Euro polito-punk songs (the hilarious 'Dwarf Invasion'), and pure disco grooves MC'ed by a hillbilly calling for some weird linedance that could only have origins in Fresno. Totally absurd but, man, it works. I'm the first one around here to immediately dismiss a joke record, but this is no joke. The pop songs are first rate, hooks and kick ass melodies. The metal is metal! Grinding and pounding, thanks in no small part to members of Coalesce being the core of Reggie. But some of the disc's best moments come with the effortless mix of the two, crunching brutality mixed up with Weezer-worthy radio fare. God knows how it works but it does. Humor + honest to gosh pop hooks + crazy surprises may be the formula. Yup, a unanimous AQ staff favourite.
RealAudio clip: "From Me 2 U"
RealAudio clip: "Gloves"
RealAudio clip: "Dwarf Invasion"

REGGIE AND THE FULL EFFECT Songs Not To Get Married To (Vagrant) cd 14.98
Every time we start a review with a phrase like "we don't really like techno all that much" or "we've never been huge fans of pop punk" we end up getting people writing in defending the genre in question. But truth be told, we -do- like techno and we -do- like pop punk, and we do like all kinds of music, it's sort of the point of this store. It's just that we generally tend to dig the weirder, more far out, more creative risk-taking fringes of all those genres, which is -also- the point of this store. But that said, we don't actually like pop punk all that much, at least not the strain of cookie cutter made-for-MTV dreck that one typically thinks of as pop punk. But we do love pop. Do we ever!!! And we do love punk! And unlike the bad math that results from adding metal and hip hop (oh how we desperately wish someone could make that work!), pop and punk fit pretty comfortably together, add some good songs, and maybe even some metal riffage, and we're in business. Thus we have Reggie And The Full Effect, originally a joke side project for a handful of emo / pop punk luminaries (Coalesce anyone?), now a band that's as good as if not better than all of the serious bands that spawned it. They are the ultimate emo band. Of course you have the huge kick ass production, great catchy songs, sensitive whiny boy vocals and big distorted guitars. BUT THEN, you've got some chugging metal guitars and howling throat shredding vocals, fuzzy synths, goofy lyrics, and an ultra dumb / totally brilliant sense of humour. And as if that weren't enough, every third or fourth song is a total eighties synthpop workout, straight up New Order mockery / worship (one of which is a dead ringer for track two on the recent Killers record! Now who's laughing?!). Goofy and silly, but actually really good and fun and catchy. And finally, you've got RATFE's hardcore alter ego, the fictitious Finnish electro punk outfit Common Denominator, who have contributed one track to each Reggie record, always with Common Denominator's lead vocalist introducing the band, in a thick inexplicably German accent: "HELLO AMERICANS, THIS IS KLAUS FROM COMMON DENOMINATOR. WE ARE THE BAND YOU THAT YOU ARE LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW WE ARE FROM FINLAND AND THIS IS THE THIRD SONG OFF OUR DEBUT ALBUM IN AMERICA, THIS SONG IS CALLED DEATHNOTRONIC AND IT GOES LIKE THIS!!! And what follow is what can only be described as Ministry meets Rammstein meets that song that ALWAYS seems to play during cheerleader competitions (Y'all Ready For This!) as well as some awesome noodly guitar leads.
Even with the presence of Common Denominator, and the occasional synthpop workout, this is Reggie's least 'jokey' record to date, which is probably what makes it their best. Even the lyrics aren't as straight up goofy, in fact if anything, unless this is all a REALLY subtle joke, the lyrics tend toward straight up emo territory, love and loss and boys and girls and all that stuff. Pretty heartfelt stuff actually, and if there's one thing we're a sucker for it's emo! In fact the final song, a brooding piano driven emo ballad to end all emo ballads, is SO sincere, it seems like it MUST be a joke coming from these guys. But it's not. At least we don't think so. At first we were a little disappointed by the lack of skits and random stupidity, but as much as we love those old Reggie records, this one definitely has the potential for most repeated listens. There's just something about Reggie's combination of crunchy metallic guitars, weird Cars / Tupac synth melodies, perfect pop and goofy eighties high school ballads that we can't seem to get enough of!
MPEG Stream: "What The Hell Is Contempt"
MPEG Stream: "Get Well Soon"
MPEG Stream: "Deathnotronic (Common Denominator)"

REGGIE AND THE FULL EFFECT Under the Tray... (Vagrant) cd 14.98
Yeah! A new Reggie And The Full Effect! Everybody here at AQ *loved* their last album "Promotional Copy" for its tongue-in-cheek emocore silliness, rampant absurdity, and seriously melodic and metallic might. One of the best joke bands ever, 'cause they kinda make you ask, is this a joke? And the music is awesome, no joke. "Under The Tray..." doesn't top "Promotional Copy" but it's pretty great too, even featuring another appearance by their parodic Euro political punk persona, Common Denominator. By the way, there's a reason why this is called "Under The Tray..." but we'll leave that for you to discover when you get a copy.
Now let's turn this review over to our Professor Jim for his weighty thoughts on Reggie's latest opus:
While most emo bands render heartbreak with fervor and intensity, Reggie & The Full Effect is the only one to map out a broad cross section of the hormonally dysfunctional emotions that emerge as the illogical displays of teen angst, giddiness, impossible desires, and raw mania. Pretty much the solo project of James DeWees (keyboardist for the emo-punk band The Get Up Kids and drummer for metalcore legends Coalesce), Reggie & The Full Effect previously succeeded on the "Promotional Copy" album by applying a metalcore chug to emo's earnest sentiment and bracketing this in silly (but strikingly accurate) renditions of new wave theatricality.
"Under The Tray..." picks up exactly where "Promotional Copy" left off, with the wholesale appropriation of musical signifiers geared to console teen angst including the current run of earnest power pop bands tinged with pop (i.e. Get Up Kids, Weezer, etc.), morose, black-lipstick staples (i.e. Depeche Mode and the "Pretty In Pink" soundtrack), and adolescent male aggression (i.e. Andrew W.K. and crusty skate-punk). Instead of mocking these stereotypes, Reggie adopts them as a legitimate language; and I don't even think Reggie's albums can be qualified as irony, considering how 'authentic' most of this sounds. But "Under The Tray..." doesn't concern itself with any of art school crap about irony, mimesis, or post-modernity; after all, this band knows its audience very well, and succeeds as a great, corn-ball pop record.
RealAudio clip: "Happy V-Day"
RealAudio clip: "Image Is Nothing, Lobsters Are Everything"
RealAudio clip: "Congratulations Smack & Katy"

REGGIE AND THE FULL EFFECT / KOUFAX (Heroes & Villains) split 7" 3.99
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
A brand new song by Reggie and the Full Effect, otherwise known as the mysterious side project of a couple of the Get Up Kids and a couple of members of Coalesce. You may have already heard Reggie's brilliant previous full length "Promotional Copy", and if so, then you already know the sweet-sour kick-ass grindpop they do so well. This single contains one more song of similar stellar quality. Backed by Koufax, a pleasant indie rock mouthful too. On the Get Up Kids' label Heroes & Villains. Recommended.

REICHEL, ACHIM AR5 - Autovision (Germanofon) cd 17.98

REICHEL, ACHIM & MACHINES Die Grune Reise (The Green Journey) / Erholung (Melting Point) cd 21.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
How is it that these long overdue A.R. & Machines reissues just keep making us fall in love with Ol' Achim Reichel over and over again? 'Cause it's some of the best krautrock EVER that's how. Die Grune Reise is a re-release of the first official A.R. & Machines LP from 1970 and, while slightly less epic and grand than the blissful Echo (part of the double disc reissue we raved about a few months ago), it's no less mesmerizing, exploratory and exciting. Reichel's trademark meandering, repetitive guitar and percussion are in full effect -- spacey and grooving, but instead of totally transporting the listener into the realm of ether, there's something more rockin' and also sometimes ridiculous that keeps it in the realm of the studio. Well it had to be since EVERYTHING on here was performed and recorded by Achim Reichel himself, a total one-man-jam! Sounds like a whole hairy freak-troupe though. Die Grune Reise is like watching a preview of the even more awesome journey that Reichel eventually takes you on with Echo (which, by the way, is finally back in stock!). It's entirely possible that all the weird, sometimes goofy-hippy vocals on this album maybe make us a little self-conscious... Yes, there's a lot of the madhouse 'digga-digga-aahh-waaahhh!??" type vocals on here that at turns challenge and delight us, but they're tempered with a more than generous helping of signature chug-jams to keep us totally boogeying (dig the ZZ Top guitar riffery on track 2!) and lilting interludes to help us come down gently. When absorbing this album, it's hard to shake the very specific image of a naked, twirling free-spirited German longhair in the desert at night alone with his arms wide open holding a hand rolled cigarette/joint in one hand and doing graceful hand maneuvers with the other...and that's fine by us. We grok that dude and these albums. There's actually two of them (albums) here, as this disc also includes A.R. VI, Echolung, originally released by Brain in 1975. Compared to Die Grune Reise it's a bit more mellowed out, if anything more cosmic and spacey... real nice! Total krautrock essentials, both of these. Fans of both Can and Circle need to hear 'em...
MPEG Stream: "Station 1: Globus"
MPEG Stream: "Station 1: In The Same Boat"
MPEG Stream: "Gute Reise"

REICHEL, ACHIM & MACHINES Die Grune Reise - The Green Journey (Tangram) cd+dvd 25.00
An old fave, in fact a former Record Of The Week, at last reissued and available again, previously it was part of a 2-on-1 cd with another A.R. album, Echolung, but here it's by itself (with bonus dvd, more on that later). Nice packaging, great sound, so glad to have this back in the store! Here's more or less what we said before:
How is it that these long overdue A.R. & Machines reissues just keep making us fall in love with Ol' Achim Reichel over and over again? 'Cause it's some of the best krautrock EVER that's how. Die Grune Reise is a re-release of the first official A.R. & Machines LP from 1970 and, while slightly less epic and grand than the blissful Echo (one we raved about a few months ago), it's no less mesmerizing, exploratory and exciting. Reichel's trademark meandering, repetitive guitar and percussion are in full effect - spacey and grooving, but instead of totally transporting the listener into the realm of ether, there's something more rockin' and also sometimes ridiculous that keeps it in the realm of the studio. Well it had to be since EVERYTHING on here was performed and recorded by Achim Reichel himself, a total one-man-jam! Sounds like a whole hairy freak-troupe though. Die Grune Reise is like watching a preview of the even more awesome journey that Reichel eventually takes you on with Echo. It's entirely possible that all the weird, sometimes goofy-hippy vocals on this album maybe make us a little self-conscious... Yes, there's a lot of the madhouse 'digga-digga-aahh-waaahhh!??" type vocals on here that at turns challenge and delight us, but they're tempered with a more than generous helping of signature chug-jams to keep us totally boogeying (dig the ZZ Top guitar riffery on track 2!) and lilting interludes to help us come down gently. When absorbing this album, it's hard to shake the very specific image of a naked, twirling free-spirited German longhair in the desert at night alone with his arms wide open holding a hand rolled cigarette/joint in one hand and doing graceful hand maneuvers with the other...and that's fine by us. A total krautrock essentials. Fans of both Can and Circle need to hear it.
This new, artist approved "Achim Reichel Edition" of Die Grune Reise is digitally remastered, and comes packaged with an extra, dvd disc (PAL, region 0, so it'll work in your computer but maybe not your dvd player) that contains an album length 42 minute video interpretation of the whole record ("Grune Reise - Der Film") that looks to be made fairly recently, with lots of trippy computer graphics going on, it's maybe better than the watching the "visualizer" on your iTunes but not much. Chances are, the pictures A.R.'s music will make in your mind are better than this, so use your imagination instead. The dvd also includes a 10 minute "Making Of" feature, but we don't know if that's a making of the album or a making of the video, 'cause the dvd menu/interface is just about the most confusing thing ever and we weren't able to figure out how to access that segment. So, the dvd is a bit of a bust, though again we didn't actually watch everything... and maybe the surround sound feature is a cool. Regardless, the album itself is highly, highly recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Globus"
MPEG Stream: "In The Same Boat"

REICHEL, ACHIM & MACHINES Echo / A.R. IV (New Amos Records) 2cd 31.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
BACK IN STOCK!! Yay! Just when we thought this was gone for good, suddenly the label decided to repress this amazing double cd set. Here's our review from before, get it while you can, if you missed it the first time we had it...
Oh boy. A red-letter day at AQ when we got this in. You see, several years ago, we'd stocked an amazing "best of" collection called Echoes Aus Zeiten Der Grunen Reise by this krautrock artist, A.R. & Machines (turns out the A.R. stands for Achim Reichel) that in itself was a far out minimalist psychedelic electronic masterpiece years ahead of its time -- and it was just a "best of"! Everybody here loved it. It's been out of print for years, though, and we'd never come across any other reissues, until now! Hence our excitement about this, a double cd containing TWO of Reichel's albums in their entirety, Echo and A.R. IV.
If you're familiar with that "best of" cd, you'll recognize a few of the songs, but transformed, extended and built upon -- like you're finally experiencing the entire complex film, not just the titillating preview. If you're not familiar with that "best of," then expect a hypnotic, meandering cream dream that any lover of Eno, Cluster, Can, Neu, Bo Hansson, Kraftwerk, and even Wendy Carlos Williams shouldn't miss. Completely groovy.
1972's Echo, which takes up the largest portion of the two cds, is the highlight here. Long before the re-issue, Julian Cope made it a record of the month on his website and it's not hard to see why. It's a meandering four part -- well, we wouldn't even say "piece," it's more like a realized world -- made up of journeying guitars and plodding percussion with the occasional wailing vocals in English that take it well into the stratosphere. At times low-key, at other times frenzied, but always with an intensity that moves it along steadily. By the time you get to the freakout vocal jam of that acts as the come down of Echo, you've been led through so many emotions and states of mind, that you're spent.
Take a break between the two albums since A.R. IV (1973) is another, separate adventure -- still groovy and rhythmic, but a little funkier, a little louder and more focused -- like he's revisiting the territory he covered in Echo but he's more familiar with the place & can take you directly to all the cool places.
Actually, this re-issue would have been a shoo-in for Record Of The Week if only we thought we could get more. But according to our supplier, the forty or so copies we have now might be the last we'll get, as this is apparently an all-too-limited reissue. Ah well. Get it while you can!
MPEG Stream: "Das Echo Der Gegenwart"
MPEG Stream: "Vita"

REID, TERRY River (Water) cd 16.98

MPEG Stream: "Dean"
MPEG Stream: "Avenue"

REID, TERRY Silver White Light: Live At The Isle Of Wight 1970 (Water) cd 15.98

REID, TERRY Superlungs (Astralwerks) cd 16.98
Made infamous as the man responsible for Robert Plant's voice blasting on classic rock radio for years to never end, 'cause Reid turned down Jimmy Page's request in 1968 to be the singer for his new band The New Yardbirds which of course became Led Zeppelin (and Reid actually was the one to suggest in his place Plant and also John Bonham for Page's new outfit). A pretty good guitar player in his own right, he didn't want to be just the singer for a band so he stayed on his own. This collections compiles tracks from his first two albums (including covers of Dylan and Donovan) as well as some bonus material. The first two tracks are absolute killers, on par with his older more country tinged haunting sound (as heard also on the Devil's Rejects soundtrack!), while the rest of this collection leans more toward solid blues tinged rock, from a man who could have been...
MPEG Stream: "Superlungs My Supergirl"
MPEG Stream: "Loving Time"

REIGN GHOST s/t (Akarma) cd 15.98

REIGNING SOUND Love And Curses (In The Red) cd 13.98

REIGNING SOUND Love And Curses (In The Red) lp 10.98

REIGNING SOUND Time Bomb High School (In The Red) cd 13.98
This is a project of Greg Cartwright of the Oblivians, whom I (Sadie) am a big fan of. His past recordings are sooo good, my favorite being Bad Man, which one of my other favorite bands, the Detroit Cobras, have covered brilliantly (both those releases are available on Sympathy for the Record Industry). Although I found this new project not to be quite charming or bittersweet as Greg's previous endeavors (his progress technically and the hi fi recording kinda bummed me out -- no more toy pianos and fucked up acoustic guitar, boo hoo), this is still a great and rockin' record, just different from what I liked about this other stuff, which was its sweet awkwardness and sad lyrics. What he's up to here sounds more like self confident laid back '70s-esque rock, a la The Rolling Stones or The Boss which ain't such a bad thing, to some. Indeed, some of Reigning Sound's songs (especially the title track) have the organ and vocal quality of old Bruce Springsteen records, big time.
RealAudio clip: "You're Not As Pretty"
RealAudio clip: "Time Bomb High School"

REIGNING SOUND Too Much Guitar (In The Red) cd 13.98
Too Much Guitar is the name of the new Reigning Sound album, and in case you're wonderin' what kind of guitar there's too much of... well, let's just say "murky '60s style garage rawk". Don't get us wrong, we're not against lo-fi, retro-style recordings (which is what it seems they were shooting for), but this on the other hand just sounds uneven and poorly recorded. Totally neutering the raw energy of many songs. The tinny guitars are joined by a cloudy wash of cymbals which pretty much clutters up the rest of the sound spectrum. We figure The Reigning Sound just might make you wanna stomp and shout along with the singer Greg Cartwright (who possesses the perfect hoarse howl for this music)... if you could make out the words let alone his voice amid the muddy din. 14 songs in all... some fare better than others.
MPEG Stream: "We Repel Each Other"
MPEG Stream: "When You Touch Me"

REIGNS House On The Causeway (Monotreme) cd 15.98
A few years ago, they surveyed a drowned, underwater village in a dammed up valley, and on the album before that, they lowered a microphone deep into a hole in the ground, making some unusual discoveries... well, not REALLY, but in their musical imaginations. Now, enter with Reigns into the 'house on the causeway'. That's right, it's the return of our favorite moody, mysteriously conceptual site-based post rockish indie gloom pop electronica act from England! Again they're exploring/evoking an imaginary locale, and what creepy things may or may not have happened there, through their mostly dreamy, little bit nightmarish music... They've got something in common with a lot of the artists on Miasmah and Type labels, though less soundscapey, more actually song oriented. They also are reminding us a lot of Tarwater this time around. Maybe that's accentuated by the inclusion of more in the way of vocals (usually quite processed, however) on some of the tracks here, while in the past they'd been primarily instrumental, with textual information (or disinformation) presented in the cd or 7" booklet...
The House On The Causeway seems to feature two (related) modes of song - the purely instrumental, slowly unfolding ones; and the slightly more uptempo ones with singing/rhyming and skittering drum beats... It's all quite lovely as always with Reigns, their looping piano notes and ambient electronics a blissful reverie, but also as always an eerily lurking menace persists, both sonically (minor key ominousness that emotionally suggests horrors but shocks only sparingly, as with the distorted noisy outburst at the end of "Crex, Crex, Crex") and intellectually via the accumulation of sinister signifiers in the cryptic lyrics, songtitles ("Everything Beyond These Walls Has Been Razed", "Mirrors At Night", "Your Tiny Hand Is Frozen") and artwork that the listener can't quite square with the seemingly sweet music, music that seems to conceal whispers and weepings.
MPEG Stream: "Bad Slate"
MPEG Stream: "Vaulted"
MPEG Stream: "The Black Cramp"

REIGNS Styne Vallis (Jonson Family Records) cd 14.98
Ah, Reigns. This UK band is one of our favorites when it comes to gentle, electronica-flecked post-rock loveliness. You could compare 'em to lots of stuff, from Godspeed You Black Emperor! to Sigur Ros to Eluvium to to Stafraenn Hakon... but what makes Reigns rule is that they create an additional layer of conceptual strangeness, each recording, despite being mostly instrumental, supposedly documenting an "investigation" into a specific, mysterious, otherworldly locale. On their first album, entitled We Lowered A Microphone Into The Ground, reviewed here last year, was "about" exactly what the title suggests. Plumbing the depths of the earth with a microphone, Reigns "operatives A & B" experienced disturbing psychosomatic (?) phenomena... it was all very surreal and vague and created an intriguing aesthetic dissonance between the very pretty music and the accompanying text.
This new full-length is along the same lines, another dreamy experience, quietly melodic and placid, this time a soundtrack of sorts to the exploration of a lost village, Styne Vallis, in a Wessex valley damned up and flooded long ago to make a reservoir. It's -not- in any sense a field recording -- the drowned pastoral landscape this documents is conjured conceptually by the music alone. It's more about evoking emotions of these places than images. Again what makes this have extra resonance is that as gorgeous as this music is, there are little hints of something else, something sinister afoot... something weird, maybe wrong, is going on, in the background. This music is suggestive of secrets. Curious and curiouser it and its listeners both will be...
Warm and detailed and sooo good. Recommended.
MPEG Stream: "The Lost Black Mass Footage"
MPEG Stream: "The Three Pockets"

REIGNS The Blank Tape / Frozen Acid (Jonson Family Records) 7" 3.00
**SALE **SALE* *SALE**
Another back room discovery! Back in stock for as long as they last...
Er, when it Reigns it pours... as you should remember, last list we reviewed the new full-length cd from one of our favorite UK post rock acts, Reigns. We're waiting for a restock of those now, but in the meantime we've got *another* new Reigns release, a limited edition 2-song 7" single. Two new tracks of their lovely, so lovely and evocative instrumental music. Shimmering and mesmeric. That would be reason enough to pick this up, but, there's more: this comes packaged with a twelve-page booklet full of text in a tiny tiny font, detailing more of the adventures of Reigns Operative B, a diary of a field recording investigation into the English countryside. Of course things get a bit fantastical and weird, and in the end it's a bit like something by Thomas Ligotti. This is totally what we think makes Reigns extra-special, that added dash of imagination and mystery, presented in a confusional, supposedly scientific yet tongue-in-cheek manner. Neat!

REIGNS The House On The Causeway (Monotreme) lp 28.00
A few years ago, they surveyed a drowned, underwater village in a dammed up valley, and on the album before that, they lowered a microphone deep into a hole in the ground, making some unusual discoveries... well, not REALLY, but in their musical imaginations. Now, enter with Reigns into the 'house on the causeway'. That's right, it's the return of our favorite moody, mysteriously conceptual site-based post rockish indie gloom pop electronica act from England! Again they're exploring/evoking an imaginary locale, and what creepy things may or may not have happened there, through their mostly dreamy, little bit nightmarish music... They've got something in common with a lot of the artists on Miasmah and Type labels, though less soundscapey, more actually song oriented. They also are reminding us a lot of Tarwater this time around. Maybe that's accentuated by the inclusion of more in the way of vocals (usually quite processed, however) on some of the tracks here, while in the past they'd been primarily instrumental, with textual information (or disinformation) presented in the cd or 7" booklet...
The House On The Causeway seems to feature two (related) modes of song - the purely instrumental, slowly unfolding ones; and the slightly more uptempo ones with singing/rhyming and skittering drum beats... It's all quite lovely as always with Reigns, their looping piano notes and ambient electronics a blissful reverie, but also as always an eerily lurking menace persists, both sonically (minor key ominousness that emotionally suggests horrors but shocks only sparingly, as with the distorted noisy outburst at the end of "Crex, Crex, Crex") and intellectually via the accumulation of sinister signifiers in the cryptic lyrics, songtitles ("Everything Beyond These Walls Has Been Razed", "Mirrors At Night", "Your Tiny Hand Is Frozen") and artwork that the listener can't quite square with the seemingly sweet music, music that seems to conceal whispers and weepings.
MPEG Stream: "Bad Slate"
MPEG Stream: "Vaulted"
MPEG Stream: "The Black Cramp"

REIGNS The Widow Blades (Monotreme) cd 16.98
Yay! It's a new one from "our favorite moody, mysteriously conceptual site-based post rockish indie gloom pop electronica act from England", as we've elaborately described 'em before. Site-based? Well, what that means is that the concept behind each of their albums is the sonic evocation of a location where something strange once happened, allegedly. These (possibly entirely spurious) sites explored on previous Reigns records include an abandoned house on a causeway, a bottomless hole in the ground, and an entire underwater village in a dammed up valley. In all cases, the Reigns duo of "operatives A & B" have conjured wonderfully dreamy, yet slightly creepy, oft instrumental imaginary soundtracks to these locales. These aren't actual "field recordings" but rather musical analogs to such, emotional field recordings if you will.
On the new Widow Blades, Reigns takes as their subject the (true?) story of a woman who vanished in a blizzard back in 1978. And just judging by the typically curious and unsettling song titles here ("Green Butter", "I Will Burn For This", "Horse Murders", "Four And A Half Minutes Missing"...), clearly there is more to this tragic tale than merely it being an unhappy wintertime mishap. The listener is invited to investigate, Reigns setting the scene with placid piano, gentle drones, minimal electronics, occasional downtempo beats, and some deep voiced vocals providing the solemn narrative, all very whispery and wintry and quite lovely despite the downer subject matter. It's slow and sad quasi ambience, and once again, we'd say Tarwater makes a good comparison. As always with Reigns, very much recommended! In fact, this would be worth it just for the final epic atmospheric track alone, "The Mounds", a dramatic 19-minute tour de force of suspenseful, glitchy beat-repetition and glimmering luminous melody. It certainly makes sense that Reigns have also been employed making actual soundtracks to some BBC television shows, lately. And this could easily fit in with the Miasmah catalog, too, for fans of that label.
MPEG Stream: "Vessels"
MPEG Stream: "I Will Burn For This"
MPEG Stream: "The Mounds"

REIGNS We Lowered A Microphone Into The Ground (Jonson Family Records) cd 14.98
Along with the new cd (reviewed last list) and the new 7" (reviewed this list), we also got restocked on this first Reigns cd... Originally reviewed on AQ list #239 thusly, for those who missed it then:
From the same UK label that brought us that great Hey Colossus album listed recently, here's something also really cool but VERY very different.... where Hey Colossus was brutally heavy and rhythmic, this band, Reigns, is so pleasantly pretty and placid. Utterly gorgeous, really, and mysterious. We're reminded of such artists as Stafraenn Hakon, Eluvium, Sonna, and Sigur Ros. It's that sort of gauzy, mellow, melodic post-rock, with songs constructed from gentle guitar and piano figures, operating in a zone of beautiful ambience, infused with indistinct electronic detritus. Swells of live percussion or electronic beats sometimes appear, too, but the mood remains blissful, if almost somber. But not really somber since there's a strange, very subtle sense of humor afoot, part of the weird conceptual framework that Reigns have invented for this album. Yes, it's a concept album! And a mostly-instrumental one at that, with no real singing to speak of, though you will occasionally hear voices drifting in the mix, including a computer voice (a la Radiohead) on the fourth track, "Translating".
The concept? It's intentionally vague and sort of surreal, but first off we're told that this was supposedly "recorded on location by Reigns operatives A & B". The title We Lowered A Microphone Into The Ground, taken literally, provides an imaginary scheme for the album. Each track is assigned a depth, ranging from 23 meters to 1 mile. Thus, track 2: "Corners & The Straights (102 metres)". Or track 9: "The Fattest Goose Shall Be The Soonest To The Spit (1460 metres)". Inside the handsome digipack you'll find the "Original Site Transcript" giving notes on what was encountered at each depth by the two Reigns operatives. Some examples:
"(102 metres) First subterranean voice. Operative B suffers small breakout of hives on ungloved hand."
"(416 metres) Foul smelling miasma rises from hole. Surrounding grass visibly pales."
"(1001 metres) Sudden rise in static. Recording levels unchanged. Operative B demands that A stop pinching at nape of B's neck. A denies any such activity."
More events and phenomena, both mundane and peculiar, are documented. But this is all in the liner notes -- you'll hear the voices mentioned but otherwise this isn't at all meant to -sound- like any sort of static-y, subterranean field recording...it's just very lovely music. Pretty nifty, as most more ordinary post-rock efforts don't exhibit such imagination! We like.
MPEG Stream: "Buried Chandelier (416 metres)"
MPEG Stream: "Pentecost (1001 metres)"