ULTRALYD Inertiadrome (Rune Grammofon) lp 17.98
While previous albums from this extreme Norwegian instrumental ensemble could be kinda be considered (skronky) jazz, and their previous cd release, 2007's Conditions For A Piece Of Music had its moody, Morricone-ish elements, this one is not so jazzy and not so melodic, coming closer to bass player Kjetil Brandsdal's noiserock act Noxagt in brutal effect. Make no mistake, jazz instrumentation (sax, vibraphone) is still present, but takes a back seat to the heavy duty, and ultimately hypnotic, repetitive rhythmic assault laid down by the bass and drums, over which the synth, electric guitar, sax, and vibes provide additionally apocalyptic coloration, but never truly sidetrack or slow down the chaotic yet cyclic rumble and tumble of these six lurching, long tracks. If it's jazz, it's droog-stomped jazz, muscled up with crunching low-slung bass, and martial, punishing drum beats... imagine maybe if 16-17 and Supersilent teamed up to do something that sounded like Circle... but scary. There's skree and squall, for sure, but it's all focused on the rhythmic imperative, and damn if this isn't as utterly enthralling as it is urgent and ugly. Except that it's not really ugly, just distorted and oppressive. As Rune G's "jazz" bands go, Ultralyd is the one for those who hate jazz, and love hate. Or something like that. Recommended to all you sickos, go on, get it out of your system!
MPEG Stream: "Lahtuma"
MPEG Stream: "Contaminated Man"
MPEG Stream: "Cessathlon"

ULTRAPHALLUS Sowberry Hagan (Riot Season) cd 17.98
Apparently full length number three from these Belgian experimental heavies, though the first thing we've heard from these guys, and it's kicking our asses big time, but then, really we shouldn't be surprised, hell, it's on Riot Season, home to Shit And Shine, Skull Defekts, Black Boned Angel, Aluk Todolo, Todd, Hey Colossus and loads of other aQ faves, and Ultraphallus fit right in, with their twisted avant doom and experimental sludge, a sort of twisted sprawling avant noise rock, that should most definitely appeal to fans of any or all of the above mentioned bands. The cool thing about Ultraphallus is that their sound is al over the place, when we were just cranking this in the store, someone thought it was Unearthly Trance, someone else though it was some nineties noise rock band, both of which could very well have been the case, instead it's a twisted, fucked up hybrid of the two, along with some creeping blackdrone ambience, some blown out ultra doom, some grinding blackened crust and whatever other fractured heaviness these guys can cook up.
The record swings wildly from black ambient noisescapery, thick clouds of swirling crumbling distorted sound, massive buzzing bass, and strange processed vox, to pounding almost Melvins-y sounding noise rock crush, heavy but hooky, with shrieked vox and some seriously catchy melodies, to mathy dirgey droned out doom, all downtuned riffage and pounding dirgey rhythms, to creepy swaggery swampy slither, sprawling and spacious, the vocals a croaked growl, the guitar sinewy, all laid over a grim black expanse of rumble and drift, to full on speaker shredding, crumbling blacknoise, to twisted free jazz drone sludge, squalls of skronking horns over clouds of cymbal sizzle and staticky hiss, to lumbering banjo (?!) flecked sludge pop, to experimental ambience, all layered drones and creepy atmospheres (with some wailed vocalizing by special guest Eugene from Oxbow), to one last jam, a haunting expanse of rumbling, shimmering dark dronemusic, laced with strange samples, stretched out into a hellish landscape of buzz and whir and creep and blur.
Awesome stuff, and most definitely a worthy addition to Riot Season's ever expanding roster of twisted and damaged heaviness.
MPEG Stream: "Pathological Freemind Verse"
MPEG Stream: "Right Models"
MPEG Stream: "River Jude"
MPEG Stream: "Indians Love Rain"

ULTRAVIOLET MAKES ME SICK Soundproof (Camera Obscura) cd 15.98
Three adorable Italian boys playing mellow instrumental post-rock. Lots of soaring guitars in the background, with anguished minor key figerpicking up front. More about creating a real mood than about verse-chorus-verse, y'know. Not as loud as Mogwai, not as quiet as Sonna, but drawing from both of those band's vibes. Unremarkable but quite pleasant. It'll be interesting to hear future material when they truly find their own sound.
RealAudio clip: "Faye"

ULVER Blood Inside (The End) cd 13.98
Ulver. Once one of Norway's black metal, Viking wolfpacks. Worshipping at the dark throne of, ah, Darkthrone. But those days are long past... Ulver have evolved. You know this. Electronica. Techno. Goth. Post-rock. Soundtracks. Pop. Drone. All these things, good things...but no longer black metal. If you've followed the chameleons known as Ulver this far, and you've liked *everything* they've done, then you're gonna like Blood Inside too. But if you've had your doubts, then maybe this is gonna be the toughest one to swallow yet (despite what we heard pre-release about how "heavy" it was gonna be). 'Cause now they kinda sound like Tears For Fears. Tears For Fears at the circus.
Ok, it's not all like that. But there is a lot of singing. And gently gloomy pop atmospheres, and filmic orchestration, and weird progginess, and yes, some heaviness. Maybe later we'll realize this is Ulver's Faith No More's Angel Dust. However, one track features what sounds like an unanswered cell-phone ringing...and ringing. Who needs that on a cd??
Sorry, at first blush we're just not feeling it. Yet maybe Ulver have evolved beyond us. We'll give 'em the benefit of the doubt. But, we can definitely say that if you gave up at their last true studio-recorded full-length album before this one, Perdition City (as did Andee), this won't bring you back. And even if you liked that or subsequent releases like Teachings In Silence (which Allan considers the best post-black metal Ulver) or the A Quick Fix Of Melancholy ep you should check this out but it *might* be too Tears For Fearsy for you nonetheless. Of course, we're sure there's a whole audience for this (Tears For Fears fans?) that have never even heard of Ulver before... but we doubt they're reading this. It's tough. We want to like this. And maybe you will. But the ultimate test had to be, if it didn't say Ulver on it, would we even be listening? The textural glitch improv loveliness of Teachings In Silence definitely passed that test. This, though, well, it might take a few more listens...therein lies the paradox. I guess I'd better take one home just to be on the safe side.
Additional note: this comes enhanced with a video track for your computer.
MPEG Stream: "For The Love Of God"
MPEG Stream: "It Is Not Sound"

ULVER Childhood's End (K-Scope) cd 17.98
Those genre-defying former black metallers (a long long time ago, now!) Ulver return, with an unusual even for them detour into all-covers territory! Specifically, a collection of (mostly) obscure sixties psych faves, as it says on the cover, "lost & found from the Age of Aquarius".
They do 16 such nuggets, all moody, kaleidoscopic treats originally recorded by the following artists: The Pretty Things, The Byrds, Bonniwell's Music Machine, Chocolate Watchband, Jefferson Airplane, Gandalf, The Electric Prunes, 13th Floor Elevators, Troggs, Left Banke, Beau Brummels, Common People, Music Emporium, Curt Boettcher, Les Fleur De Lys, and The United States Of America.
And they do them well. Not totally straight, but not black metal versions either (which, really, might have been even more interesting!). No, this is a respectful tribute, Ulver emulating the originals fairly accurately, but boosted with some modern prog rock power & polish, presumably with the mission of introducing 'em to a new audience, though we'd venture to guess that folks who listen to Ulver these days already have pretty wide ranging musical tastes...
Comes in nice hardback digibook packaging, though we don't know if the use of the iconic napalmed naked Vietnamese children running in the street photo is in such great taste, though it makes sense with the title of course... Ulver definitely demonstrates good taste in their musical selections here, however! We were especially stoked to see the Gandalf pick. It's all great stuff, Ulver's versions reminding us a little bit of another Norwegian fave of ours (also with some black metal connections), Lars Pedersen's When, who also digs the '60s sikepop.


MPEG Stream: "I Had Too Much to Dream Last Night (Electric Prunes) "
MPEG Stream: "Velvet Sunsets (Music Emporium) "

ULVER Shadows Of The Sun (Jester) cd 12.98
The band formerly known as a black metal band Ulver, now known as arty WTF? band Ulver, has morphed and morphed again over the years. Black metal, folk, electronica, pop, techno... some of Ulver's metamorphoses have worked better than others. They've gone through phases influenced by both Portishead and Radiohead. But lately these Norwegian tricksters have seemingly settled down to something stable, an avant-garde, electronica-infused, gloomy pop-prog identity. Their previous album Blood Inside was a bit too Tears For Fearsy for our tastes, unfortunately (though we know lots of folks loved it). Or maybe that would have been ok, but the circus-y bits really lost us. However, Shadows Of The Sun, while charting a similar course, veers mostly to the languid and lovely, which we rather like. The nine tracks here tend to flow together calmly, never breaking the twilight mood. Hints of glitchiness and distortion are interwoven with yearning melody, smooth almost New Agey blissfullness, deep breathy baritone vox. Also, a warning (to some): saxophone. A little. And at this point, needless to say, there's nothing remotely metal about any of it. Well, there is a Black Sabbath cover, but they chose one of the Sabs' most delicate and torpid songs, "Solitude", in keeping with this album's sad mood, Garm's vocals wearier even than were Ozzy's originally, uncheered by the jazz inflections included in Ulver's arrangement. Those who have followed and remained fans of Ulver thus far, though, should find this latest melancholic manifestation quite satisfying. Oh, and considering his following among the AQ crowd, we should note that Christian Fennesz makes a cameo appearance on this record.
MPEG Stream: "Eos"
MPEG Stream: "Let The Children Go"

UMBERTO Confrontations (Not Not Fun) cd 13.98
Another batch of unabashed Goblin / John Carpenter worship from this aQ beloved synth wrangler, and really not sure what to say about Umberto that we haven't already, from song one here, you're immediately ushered into some creepy, lost world, of ominous spirits and glimmering starlit skies, of long lonely winding roads, old abandoned buildings, and mysteries lurking in the shadows. The sound evokes wandering down dimly lit roads, or late night car chases, pulsating rhythms, swirling synths, throbbing drum machines, chorale like textures, squiggly melodies, lush chordal swells, dark and ominous one second, soaring and dramatic the next, super cinematic and soundtracky, all Umberto needs is a time machine and he could definitely go head to head with Goblin back in the day. Moody retro cinematic synthscapery and tense, dark, electronic moodiness that never fails to evoke a glorious sense of sonic dread, and inevitably has us imagining some outlandish scenario, these sounds playing while we desperately try to elude a mystery killer, or escape from some haunted house. Fantastic!
MPEG Stream: "Night Fantasy"
MPEG Stream: "Initial Revelation"
MPEG Stream: "Confrontation"

UMBERTO Confrontations (Not Not Fun) lp 14.98
Another batch of unabashed Goblin / John Carpenter worship from this aQ beloved synth wrangler, and really not sure what to say about Umberto that we haven't already, from song one here, you're immediately ushered into some creepy, lost world, of ominous spirits and glimmering starlit skies, of long lonely winding roads, old abandoned buildings, and mysteries lurking in the shadows. The sound evokes wandering down dimly lit roads, or late night car chases, pulsating rhythms, swirling synths, throbbing drum machines, chorale like textures, squiggly melodies, lush chordal swells, dark and ominous one second, soaring and dramatic the next, super cinematic and soundtracky, all Umberto needs is a time machine and he could definitely go head to head with Goblin back in the day. Moody retro cinematic synthscapery and tense, dark, electronic moodiness that never fails to evoke a glorious sense of sonic dread, and inevitably has us imagining some outlandish scenario, these sounds playing while we desperately try to elude a mystery killer, or escape from some haunted house. Fantastic!
MPEG Stream: "Night Fantasy"
MPEG Stream: "Initial Revelation"
MPEG Stream: "Confrontation"

UMBERTO Final Exit (Black Moss) one-sided silk-screened 12" 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The latest chunk of seventies/eighties faux giallo soundtrack John Carpenter / Goblin worship from longtime aQ faves Umberto comes in the form of this EXTREMELY limited one-sided silk-screened 12". Umberto, aka Matt Hill, who is one half of psychedelic spacekraut explorers Expo 70, offers up another glorious slab of brooding cinematic ambience, this one a lot more ambient that past outings. More on that in a second. Final Exit is packaged in a super striking fold over sleeve, which features the image of one unlucky man's final exit, laying on a bed, suffocated with a plastic bag over his head, the sleeve also bears the legend: "This record is intended to accompany the last moments of your suffering." It also features a seal, adorned with a flower, and the words "good life / good death". The record itself is one sided, the flipside featuring another image of that same man, this time eyes opened and bulging! Morbid for sure. And the music follows suit. Sort of. In some ways it almost sounds more like a slightly more sinister and soundtracky Expo 70, with warm swoonsome synth swirls, a sort of darkly new age-y drift, moody and broody, with lush swells that sound almost choral, the vibe is definitely majestic and cinematic, but is also minimal and restrained. A few minutes in, percolating synth melodies surface amidst the dark swirls, and then a simple heartbeat like pulse, motorik and minimally propulsive, near the end the sound changes tone and timbre becoming much more gristly and distorted the hum and thrum transformed into a crumbling buzz, ominous and sinister, the whole sound hazy and gauzy, and gradually fading to black.
The record sounds great at both 33 and 45rpm, but we tend to like things slower, so at 33 it definitely sounds much creepier and gloomier.
LIMITED TO JUST 150 COPIES!!! Each one is hand numbered. When we run out, we will NOT be able to get more, so if you want one, act fast.
Word of warning: These come in those super brittle plastic picture disc sleeves that, to be blunt, kinda suck, so every single one of the sleeves is slightly damaged, whether it's cracked on the corner, or with a seam split, it's the nature of those sleeves, and of having them shipped from overseas too (which also resulted in some some bent corners and so forth), so if you're super anal, or a nit picky collector, you have been warned, everyone else, you should be fine, they're all housed in a second polybag anyway, and the records themselves are in perfect condition (and look amazing!), so grab one before they're gone!

UMBERTO From The Grave (Permanent) lp 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
NOW ON VINYL (& earlier cd-r version is out of print)!!!!
Doubtless many movie (and music) buffs would agree that Italian '70s and '80s "giallo" (horror/thriller) cinema, from directors like Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci, had soundtracks usually as evocative and inspirational as any visual aspect of the films, soundtracks which often stand as effective works of art all on their own. The scores by prog band Goblin being perhaps best known, influencing such modern day bands as Zombi and Crime In Choir. Now here's another, utterly blatant and most excellent example of Italian giallo soundtrack worship by a current artist: Umberto!
Umberto is actually a one-man band, that man being Matt Hill, live collaborator / touring member of AQ faves Expo '70! Under his guise of Umberto, he has just released his first album as limited edition cassette and cd-r on the Sonic Meditations label run by Expo '70 mainman Justin Wright. While Expo '70 has proven to be especially adept at channelling the heavy kosmiche bliss of prime '70s krautrock a la Klaus Schulze, Tangerine Dream and Ash Ra Tempel, Umberto is equally savvy at conjuring the dark, suspenseful soundtrack-y sounds of Goblin and the like. With, some cosmic Klaus-y krauty-ness thrown in as well. This definitely sounds like it could be an actual soundtrack, in fact, someone should MAKE a film just to use this as a soundtrack. You can certainly do so in your imagination, aided perhaps by the cinematically suggestive track titles, which include "Running Blade", "Intermission", "Dream Sequence", "Shower Scene", and "End Credits" (the only track here with vocals, otherwise it's all instrumental... and the vocals on this last track are some sort of hard-to understand, chant-like invocation). Listen with the lights off for best results.
Umberto has a heavily synthesized sound, keyboards buzzing and droning and squelching, crunchily distorted or eerily ethereal, sounding at once like ominous Gothic organ music and also spacey futuristic electronica. Mechanical drumming plods along, propulsive beats adding to the menacing atmosphere. There's also plenty of fat disco synth-bass, and we bet folks into Italians Do It Better 12"s, or Black Devil Disco Club, or even skweee would get a kick out of this too, not just Goblin fanatics... but yeah Goblin fanatics (and John Carpenter and Zombi fans too) REALLY ought to check this out! Very cool, very creepy, and even at times kinda catchy-groovy.
MPEG Stream: "Forsaken Dawn"
MPEG Stream: "It Came From The Swamp"
MPEG Stream: "Running Blade"

UMBERTO From The Grave (Sonic Meditations) cassette 5.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Doubtless many movie (and music) buffs would agree that Italian '70s and '80s "giallo" (horror/thriller) cinema, from directors like Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci, had soundtracks usually as evocative and inspirational as any visual aspect of the films, soundtracks which often stand as effective works of art all on their own. The scores by prog band Goblin being perhaps best known, influencing such modern day bands as Zombi and Crime In Choir. Now here's another, utterly blatant and most excellent example of Italian giallo soundtrack worship by a current artist: Umberto!
Umberto is actually a one-man band, that man being Matt Hill, live collaborator / touring member of AQ faves Expo '70! Under his guise of Umberto, he has just released his first album as limited edition cassette and cd-r on the Sonic Meditations label run by Expo '70 mainman Justin Wright. While Expo '70 has proven to be especially adept at channelling the heavy kosmiche bliss of prime '70s krautrock a la Klaus Schulze, Tangerine Dream and Ash Ra Tempel, Umberto is equally savvy at conjuring the dark, suspenseful soundtrack-y sounds of Goblin and the like. With, some cosmic Klaus-y krauty-ness thrown in as well. This definitely sounds like it could be an actual soundtrack, in fact, someone should MAKE a film just to use this as a soundtrack. You can certainly do so in your imagination, aided perhaps by the cinematically suggestive track titles, which include "Running Blade", "Intermission", "Dream Sequence", "Shower Scene", and "End Credits" (the only track here with vocals, otherwise it's all instrumental... and the vocals on this last track are some sort of hard-to understand, chant-like invocation). Listen with the lights off for best results.
Umberto has a heavily synthesized sound, keyboards buzzing and droning and squelching, crunchily distorted or eerily ethereal, sounding at once like ominous Gothic organ music and also spacey futuristic electronica. Mechanical drumming plods along, propulsive beats adding to the menacing atmosphere. There's also plenty of fat disco synth-bass, and we bet folks into Italians Do It Better 12"s, or Black Devil Disco Club, or even skweee would get a kick out of this too, not just Goblin fanatics... but yeah Goblin fanatics (and John Carpenter and Zombi fans too) REALLY ought to check this out! Very cool, very creepy, and even at times kinda catchy-groovy.
MPEG Stream: "Forsaken Dawn"
MPEG Stream: "It Came From The Swamp"
MPEG Stream: "Running Blade"

UMBERTO From The Grave (Sonic Meditations) cd-r 5.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Doubtless many movie (and music) buffs would agree that Italian '70s and '80s "giallo" (horror/thriller) cinema, from directors like Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci, had soundtracks usually as evocative and inspirational as any visual aspect of the films, soundtracks which often stand as effective works of art all on their own. The scores by prog band Goblin being perhaps best known, influencing such modern day bands as Zombi and Crime In Choir. Now here's another, utterly blatant and most excellent example of Italian giallo soundtrack worship by a current artist: Umberto!
Umberto is actually a one-man band, that man being Matt Hill, live collaborator / touring member of AQ faves Expo '70! Under his guise of Umberto, he has just released his first album as limited edition cassette and cd-r on the Sonic Meditations label run by Expo '70 mainman Justin Wright. While Expo '70 has proven to be especially adept at channelling the heavy kosmiche bliss of prime '70s krautrock a la Klaus Schulze, Tangerine Dream and Ash Ra Tempel, Umberto is equally savvy at conjuring the dark, suspenseful soundtrack-y sounds of Goblin and the like. With, some cosmic Klaus-y krauty-ness thrown in as well. This definitely sounds like it could be an actual soundtrack, in fact, someone should MAKE a film just to use this as a soundtrack. You can certainly do so in your imagination, aided perhaps by the cinematically suggestive track titles, which include "Running Blade", "Intermission", "Dream Sequence", "Shower Scene", and "End Credits" (the only track here with vocals, otherwise it's all instrumental... and the vocals on this last track are some sort of hard-to understand, chant-like invocation). Listen with the lights off for best results.
Umberto has a heavily synthesized sound, keyboards buzzing and droning and squelching, crunchily distorted or eerily ethereal, sounding at once like ominous Gothic organ music and also spacey futuristic electronica. Mechanical drumming plods along, propulsive beats adding to the menacing atmosphere. There's also plenty of fat disco synth-bass, and we bet folks into Italians Do It Better 12"s, or Black Devil Disco Club, or even skweee would get a kick out of this too, not just Goblin fanatics... but yeah Goblin fanatics (and John Carpenter and Zombi fans too) REALLY ought to check this out! Very cool, very creepy, and even at times kinda catchy-groovy.
MPEG Stream: "Forsaken Dawn"
MPEG Stream: "It Came From The Swamp"
MPEG Stream: "Running Blade"

UMBERTO Prophecy Of The Black Widow (Not Not Fun) cd 11.98
It's about a month late for Halloween, but we're still pretty thrilled that this Record Of The Week from last year is now available as a cd! Here's what we said about the original vinyl version which we got in October, last year:
We LOVED the previous Umberto album, From The Grave, and are stoked that he/they/it have finally returned with another full length packed with oodles of Goblin-y goodness, just in time for Halloween!!
But the sound of the Expo 70-associated Umberto is not strictly that scary, at least not all the time, in fact, like Goblin and other '80s Italian fright-film soundtrackers, most of the scary stuff here is really just an *underlying* un-ease, a sinister suspenseful undercurrent over which more "groovy" stuff gets down. And way more groovy this one most definitely is, some serious haunted dancefloor action, or horror movie disco, or whatever you want to call it, but Umberto has for sure upped the funk/groove quotient, lacing the usual cocktail of thick, tense, pulsing synth throb, minimal motorik rhythms and heavy ominous drones with plenty of funky basslines, crunchy modulated keyboard buzz, soaring synths, chanted voices and propulsive grooves... Here and there, the sound gets all stripped down leaving just gurgly, crumbly distorted low end peppered with spaced out booming rhythms, or creepy ambient atmospheres, but the songs tend to slip quickly back into haunted shuffly rhythms, woozy horror movie atmospherics, ominous strings laced funky grooves and dark descending bass blarp.
The second side begins with one of those tracks that sounds like the music that always introduces us to the main character in all those seventies thrillers, the little girl playing with her dollies, the old woman in the garden, the sound is tranquil but subtly sinister, here it's a music box like melody, plinking dreamily beneath haunting strings, and soft swirls of creepy voice like synth, total horror movie soundtrack shivers for sure.
After that it's back to wah guitars, chiming bells, groovy Italo funk haunted dancefloor grooviness, but this time with some cool washed out M83 style female vocal textures, a shoegazey gauze over that propulsive Goblin-y groove.
If we had to pick a single song that was THE ONE here, it would probably be "Someone Chasing Someone Through A House" which sounds exactly LIKE THAT, pulsing throbbing synths, electronic squelches, deep ominous drones, dark swells, foreboding and creepy and tense and SCARY!
The album ends with an upbeat track entitled "Everything Is Going To Be Ok", all sun-coming-up, yay we survived the zombie onslaught good cheer & cheesiness. The sort of music that plays over the closing credits, or even better, over the final shot which lulls you into a sense of false security, before a decaying hand bursts through the ground, or a beast explodes from the water and drag our heroine out of the boar, some sort of shock to let you know that evil won't stay buried... which of course usually leads to a sequel, and we are definitely looking forward to the next installment of groovy Gobliny sonic scares from Umberto!
MPEG Stream: "Temple Room"
MPEG Stream: "Widow Of The Web"
MPEG Stream: "Black Candles"

UMBERTO Prophecy Of The Black Widow (Not Not Fun) lp 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We LOVED the previous Umberto album, From The Grave, and are stoked that he/they/it have finally returned with another full length packed with oodles of Goblin-y goodness, just in time for Halloween!!
But the sound of the Expo 70-associated Umberto is not strictly that scary, at least not all the time, in fact, like Goblin and other '80s Italian fright-film soundtrackers, most of the scary stuff here is really just an *underlying* un-ease, a sinister suspenseful undercurrent over which more "groovy" stuff gets down. And way more groovy this one most definitely is, some serious haunted dancefloor action, or horror movie disco, or whatever you want to call it, but Umberto has for sure upped the funk/groove quotient, lacing the usual cocktail of thick, tense, pulsing synth throb, minimal motorik rhythms and heavy ominous drones with plenty of funky basslines, crunchy modulated keyboard buzz, soaring synths, chanted voices and propulsive grooves... Here and there, the sound gets all stripped down leaving just gurgly, crumbly distorted low end peppered with spaced out booming rhythms, or creepy ambient atmospheres, but the songs tend to slip quickly back into haunted shuffly rhythms, woozy horror movie atmospherics, ominous strings laced funky grooves and dark descending bass blarp.
The second side begins with one of those tracks that sounds like the music that always introduces us to the main character in all those seventies thrillers, the little girl playing with her dollies, the old woman in the garden, the sound is tranquil but subtly sinister, here it's a music box like melody, plinking dreamily beneath haunting strings, and soft swirls of creepy voice like synth, total horror movie soundtrack shivers for sure.
After that it's back to wah guitars, chiming bells, groovy Italo funk haunted dancefloor grooviness, but this time with some cool washed out M83 style female vocal textures, a shoegazey gauze over that propulsive Goblin-y groove.
If we had to pick a single song that was THE ONE here, it would probably be "Someone Chasing Someone Through A House" which sounds exactly LIKE THAT, pulsing throbbing synths, electronic squelches, deep ominous drones, dark swells, foreboding and creepy and tense and SCARY!
The album ends with an upbeat track entitled "Everything Is Going To Be Ok", all sun-coming-up, yay we survived the zombie onslaught good cheer & cheesiness. The sort of music that plays over the closing credits, or even better, over the final shot which lulls you into a sense of false security, before a decaying hand bursts through the ground, or a beast explodes from the water and drag our heroine out of the boar, some sort of shock to let you know that evil won't stay buried... which of course usually leads to a sequel, and we are definitely looking forward to the next installment of groovy Gobliny sonic scares from Umberto!

UMBERTO Welcome To The Chillzone (The Great Pop Supplement) lp 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
You're not imagining things, that skull in the rearview mirror is looking at you. Expo 70 sideman Matt Hill, aka Umberto, is back... eerie as ever! Following his recent, limited, and now out of print one-sided 12" entitled Final Exit on Italian label Black Moss, comes this strikingly-sleeved 45rpm 12" via UK label The Great Pop Supplement, also quite limited (500 copies only), vinylizing a cassette put out by Solid Melts in an even scarcer edition a year ago. Welcome To The Chillzone consists of two tracks of equal 10:03 durations, really one piece split over two sides, both quietly brooding and creepy, side A slowly unfolding, building up to the somewhat more intense but still restrained side B... which ends, though, as side A begins, the whole composition looping like the original tape. Umberto's sinister sonics are indeed chilling here, full of blissful yet shivery synthwork, like hushed melodic whispers drifting above an ominous hallucinatory hum... eventually there's sequenced rhythmic pulsations, but gentle, this 12" as compelling and effective as any suspense film soundtrack we can think of. As with Final Exit, 'tis more ambient and icy than the deathly disco of Umberto's more electro beat-driven earlier efforts, so next to Goblin and John Carpenter among the giallo-obsessed Umberto's influences, have been added the zoned out cinematic synths of Tangerine Dream, perhaps.
As we said, limited edition of 500 copies, already sold out at the label!! We got a couple dozen, but when they're gone, they're gone, we won't be able to get any more...

UMBRELLAS IN THE SUN A Crepuscule / Factory Benelux DVD 1979-1987 (LTM) dvd 28.00
A two hour plus anthology of rare digitally remastered studio clips and live footage by various groups from the archives of Factory Records, Factory Benelux, Les Disques du Crepuscle between 1979 and 1987. Featuring Antena, A Certain Ratio, Josef K, Caberet Voltaire, Section 25, Durutti Column, New Order, Crispy Ambulance, Tuxedomoon, Paul Haig, Quando Quango and many, many others.

UMLAUT Total Disfuckingcography (Crimethinc) cd 12.98
There's a lot of talk about intensity in music -- hot guitar licks, fast drumming, empassioned vocals. But then you hear something like the entire recorded output of the mighty Umlaut and from then on you realize that everything you thought you knew about limits of musical ferocity was bullshit. There is no aural equivalent to this raging onslaught of blasting, anthemic hardcore/grind.
Mostly unknown outside of their Scandinavian hinterlands, Umlaut is a secretive outlaw collective of hard-drinking hard-riding anarchist Finnish biker punks who pause only long enough on their ceaselessly marauding cross-tundra doom rides to destroy squats with a typically brief 10-minute set of their incendiary brand of hardcore-crust-grind. Suspiciously evasive in interviews as to the nature of their identity, they espouse their violently radical political beliefs with a vehemence matched only by their loathing of customs agents (on the song "Denied at Customs" sung to the tune of S.O.D.'s "United Forces") and a certain American metalcore band coming to their native land and expecting everyone to speak English.
Most tracks here sound like first-take recordings, and I mean that in a good way -- there's a raw unbridled natural live feel to the songs that make them sound like they're about to disintegrate into chaos at any moment. It is a work of no small heroism on the part of the drummer to keep these songs contained into concrete, if not surprisingly tight, structures. The vocals are positively seething, the guitars the perfect blend of heaviness and rawness, the drums near-death-metal fast and the songs are surprisingly catchy even in their rarely-over-30-seconds length. You could play this on the lowest volume setting and the Finnish motorcycling death squad that is Umlaut will still sound like they're positively charging out of your speakers, ready to run you down and grind your guts into the spokes of their burning wheels.
The real question though is how could a band this amazing actually exist? Seems to good to be true!! I mean, c'mon, Finnish, bikers, metal, hardcore, it's almost like someone deliberately designed the coolest band ever. Weird.
MPEG Stream: "Brothers In Arms"
MPEG Stream: "Intifada (Called Terrorists By Terrorists)"
MPEG Stream: "Denied At Customs"
MPEG Stream: "Bomb Threat"

UN Un (Siltbreeze) lp 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
It's a big mystery.

UN FESTIN SAGITAL Sic Deus Dilexit Mundum (Beta-Lactam Ring) 2cd 15.98
Last list, you may recall, we had as one of our Records Of The Week, what was more precisely a Cassette Of The Week, a tape on the Black Horizons label by a band of sonic surrealists from Santiago, Chile known as Un Festin Sagital. In that rave review, we mentioned that Un Festin Sagital had a full-length upcoming on the Beta-Lactam Ring label - which made perfect sense, what with Beta-Lactam putting out such weirdness as Nurse With Wound reissues among other things. Well, what we hadn't realized, is that Un Festin Sagital ALREADY had a couple Beta-Lactam cd releases to their credit, that we'd somehow overlooked. So, naturally, we need to review those too. This one's their most recent, from actually just a few months ago - a sprawling double cd set, one studio, one live, packaged in nice gatefold mini-lp style sleeve.
And it's just as crazy and compelling as that tape that turned us on to 'em. We previously described UFS as a "occult prog-metal / angular post-punk / psychedelic free noise / black ambient orchestra" and that's still a good, broad description of what this experimental musical collective is up to - namely WTF? weirdness with a dark, moody vibe to it.
The first disc's epic eight-part, 22+ minute opening track, "El Nino Ateo" should thoroughly infect you with Un Festin Sagital's lysergic musical sickness - or else cause the less stout of heart and eccentric of taste to flee in terror! It's like a sinister soundtrack, part symphonic 20th century classical, part distorted industrial churn, part krauty synth throb. There's eerie Magma-esque choral parts, mumbled incantations, screams, Satanic-sounding chant (shades of Igor Wakhevitch for sure); ominous haunting stretches of avant-classical murk replete with groans and drones and sudden, stabbing piano chords... Clearly "RIO" avant-prog chamber rock a la Art Zoyd is an inspiration, but Un Festin Sagital take it to absurd extremes. You could kind of imagine this is what modern-day aQ prog faves Guapo (who also have a fine new album reviewed this list) might sound like, if only they dwelled in some far off South American mountain village, wore animal masks, and chewed on hallucinogenic jungle plants all day.
"El Nino Ateo" ranges from sheer mesmerism to utter mayhem and back again, as does the rest of this disc, the other three tracks dabbling in gentle acoustic folk ritual, exploding with spastic prog nuttery, and experimenting with atmospheric neo-classical soundscapery. And then there's the second disc, entitled La Muerte Solar, which was recorded live, but you wouldn't know that but for the occasional outburst of applause from the audience - which in UFS's strange sound-world, could easily be mistaken for just another intentional, sampled element of their collage-like compositions. Their 12+ minute rendition of "El Nino Ateo" here is a true tour de force, and the whole disc is easily the equal to the set's studio half.
At their heaviest, they kind of remind us of Orthodox or Blizaro, at their spazziest of Uz Jsme Doma or The Ex, and at their weirdest of NWW or even Reynols (whose Alan Courtis has in fact guested on one of Un Festin Sagital's other albums). Throw in some Circle at their most "operatic", and one of Tatsuya Yoshida's improv groups, roll all that into a ball and smoke it, and you've got some idea of how freaky this shit is! Not every single moment here "works" but overall, yeah, it sure does.
MPEG Stream: "El Nino Ateo"
MPEG Stream: "La Cancion Del Nino Ateo (Nacio, Bailo Y Murio)"
MPEG Stream: "Sic Deus Dilexit Mundum"
MPEG Stream: "Nino Ateo (live)"

UNCLE ACID Poison Apple (Rise Above) 7" 14.98
Elsewhere on this week's list you'll find our review of the new full length, Mind Control, from UK psychedelic stoners Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats, but this right here is the teaser single that came out a few months back. We got a bunch and sold out, and just managed to get a handful more, most likely the last copies we'll be able to get. We won't go into too much detail, as a single like this is mostly for the rabid fans, seeing as it's $15 for two songs, one of which is on the new full length. So basically you're paying for one exclusive track, but it's a doozy, and as we've discovered, Uncle Acid fans are an obsessive bunch, so if you are one, might want to grab one before they're gone.
The A side is "Poison Apple", from the new record, which pretty much takes up right where the last record Blood Lust left off, sounding like it could have been a deep cut plucked from that first record, a woozy, slithery main riff, that kills, the vocals sing-songy and crazy catchy, lots of swirling psychedelic organ, if anything a little bit darker than the first record, but that's most definitely not a bad thing at all. The B side even more than "Poison Apple" sounds like it could have come straight off Blood Lust. swaggery and swinging, groovy and stonery, a wicked main hook, and a kick ass almost classic metal sounding riff. And unlike much of the new record, that does tend toward a sound that's darker, and slower, and more laid back, "Under The Spell" sounds like what Mind Control could have sounded like if the band just made a Blood Lust part two, a poppy heaviness that few bands can pull off as well as these guys, and the more we listen to this track, the more we think it just might be worth the $14.98. Obviously recommended, mostly for fans, but odds are if this ends up being the first thing you hear from Uncle Acid, you'll end up wanting everything else as well!
MPEG Stream: "Under The Spell"

UNCLE ACID & THE DEADBEATS Blood Lust (Rise Above / Metal Blade) cd 14.98
Hell yeah, at last! When this now-semi-legendary album was first released by UK heavy psych doom metal specialists Rise Above in 2011, it came out in an ultra limited edition of just three hundred vinyl-only copies, which proved almost impossible to come by. That first edition sold out instantly and those lps started trading for seriously ridiculous amounts of money on eBay and elsewhere. Even though, really, who the heck were Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats? Well it wasn't just the cool band name generating a buzz, the music was awesome, as we later were able to ascertain. Eventually Rise Above did a repress, of which we were able to get a few, though those were expensive too and we were never able to get enough of 'em to actually list. But, we did figure out why this record was in such demand (as we'll discuss in more detail in a moment). We also learned that Blood Lust had also come out on compact disc, but oddly enough via a small Finnish label instead of Rise Above, and again we never were able to get enough of those to list, either. But we had hope that someday, somehow, we'd be able to review this for you, 'cause eventually most Rise Above stuff gets released in the USA by licensees Metal Blade, and while its been a damn long time, we're now pleased to, ta da, finally have Blood Lust on cd at a domestic price. Record Of The Week? You bet!
So, what we thought we were in for, way back when all we knew about band was their name & label, was some lysergic sludgey doomy jamming, like maybe Electric Wizard (another Rise Above band) or UFOmammut. Which we would have been perfectly happy with, of course. But, instead, Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats proved to be a lot more song-oriented and more melodic than we expected, with a kind of poppy '60s garage psych rock side to 'em, amidst their heavy fuzz-filled riffage. The singer (that's ol' Uncle Acid himself, natch, also on guitar in this power trio, and mellotron and synths too) croons his twisted tales of witchburning, black magic, and murder, in a languid whine, his voice nasally pinched and reverb effected, reminding us a bit of Kyle Thomas of aQ faves Witch (and King Tuff and Happy Birthday too by the way). His delivery lends a delicate, decadent touch to the band's brand of both despondent plod and swinging catchiness, able to render lines like "I was born a bitter man, no hopes or dreams / I get my kicks from torturing and screams / I lust for womens blood, and their evil ways / I twist my words to what the good book says" with sick sincerity -and- showmanship, in a way that is surprisingly not very much metallic, instead staying (despite the music's undeniable heaviness) more in the pop realm, though one obsessed with vintage horror films.
These rollicking, but dread-infused tunes are further full of ripping fuzz guitar leads, and lumbering downer riffs. Without a doubt, doom originators Black Sabbath are a major factor in this band's sound, but they're doing something rather different with that particular inspiration than most do. And we're also reminded of some other British '60s/'70s proto-metallers like Stray, High Tide, T2, and May Blitz, who were quite heavy but psych-pop catchy as well. Perhaps very early, very psychedelic Alice Cooper could be added to Uncle Acid's roster of influences too, we're thinking of the way the song "Ritual Knife" marries a pounding tribal beat and urgently chugging ominous riffery with glorious bursts of shining melody come chorus time.
One much more recent band that these guys also remind us of, is Swedish occult rock sensations Ghost, another act whose "pop side" is so effective as to possibly threaten their "metal cred" among the more closeminded. We'd also recommend Uncle Acid to fans of that other recent, equally retro stunner from Rise Above, Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell. And, like last week's Record Of The Week by Golden Void, this has that laidback classic sounding '70s psychrock vibe, immediately familiar, though Uncle Acid comes across as much more dark and sinister to be sure. And lastly, fans of Witchcraft should pay attention - we'd rank this up there with that band's celebrated Rise Above debut, we're pretty sure this is gonna be considered a classic too. We're sooooooo glad they didn't just press only those 300 vinyl copies and leave it at that!! You will be too.
This cd reissue includes a bonus track not on vinyl, which provides a nice coda to the record proper, relinquishing the fuzz guitar for acoustic strum and hand percussion, Uncle Acid doing their doom-pop-psych in a more folky style a la, say, Bolan's Tyrannosaurus Rex.
MPEG Stream: "I'll Cut You Down"
MPEG Stream: "Curse In The Trees"
MPEG Stream: "13 Candles"

UNCLE ACID & THE DEADBEATS Blood Lust (Rise Above) lp 39.00
Hell yeah, at last! When this now-semi-legendary album was first released by UK heavy psych doom metal specialists Rise Above in 2011, it came out in an ultra limited edition of just three hundred vinyl-only copies, which proved almost impossible to come by. That first edition sold out instantly and those lps started trading for seriously ridiculous amounts of money on eBay and elsewhere. Even though, really, who the heck were Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats? Well it wasn't just the cool band name generating a buzz, the music was awesome, as we later were able to ascertain. Eventually Rise Above did a repress, of which we were able to get a few, though those were expensive too and we were never able to get enough of 'em to actually list. But, we did figure out why this record was in such demand (as we'll discuss in more detail in a moment). We also learned that Blood Lust had also come out on compact disc, but oddly enough via a small Finnish label instead of Rise Above, and again we never were able to get enough of those to list, either. But we had hope that someday, somehow, we'd be able to review this for you, 'cause eventually most Rise Above stuff gets released in the USA by licensees Metal Blade, and while its been a damn long time, we're now pleased to, ta da, finally have Blood Lust on cd at a domestic price. Record Of The Week? You bet!
So, what we thought we were in for, way back when all we knew about band was their name & label, was some lysergic sludgey doomy jamming, like maybe Electric Wizard (another Rise Above band) or UFOmammut. Which we would have been perfectly happy with, of course. But, instead, Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats proved to be a lot more song-oriented and more melodic than we expected, with a kind of poppy '60s garage psych rock side to 'em, amidst their heavy fuzz-filled riffage. The singer (that's ol' Uncle Acid himself, natch, also on guitar in this power trio, and mellotron and synths too) croons his twisted tales of witchburning, black magic, and murder, in a languid whine, his voice nasally pinched and reverb effected, reminding us a bit of Kyle Thomas of aQ faves Witch (and King Tuff and Happy Birthday too by the way). His delivery lends a delicate, decadent touch to the band's brand of both despondent plod and swinging catchiness, able to render lines like "I was born a bitter man, no hopes or dreams / I get my kicks from torturing and screams / I lust for womens blood, and their evil ways / I twist my words to what the good book says" with sick sincerity -and- showmanship, in a way that is surprisingly not very much metallic, instead staying (despite the music's undeniable heaviness) more in the pop realm, though one obsessed with vintage horror films.
These rollicking, but dread-infused tunes are further full of ripping fuzz guitar leads, and lumbering downer riffs. Without a doubt, doom originators Black Sabbath are a major factor in this band's sound, but they're doing something rather different with that particular inspiration than most do. And we're also reminded of some other British '60s/'70s proto-metallers like Stray, High Tide, T2, and May Blitz, who were quite heavy but psych-pop catchy as well. Perhaps very early, very psychedelic Alice Cooper could be added to Uncle Acid's roster of influences too, we're thinking of the way the song "Ritual Knife" marries a pounding tribal beat and urgently chugging ominous riffery with glorious bursts of shining melody come chorus time.
One much more recent band that these guys also remind us of, is Swedish occult rock sensations Ghost, another act whose "pop side" is so effective as to possibly threaten their "metal cred" among the more closeminded. We'd also recommend Uncle Acid to fans of that other recent, equally retro stunner from Rise Above, Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell. And, like last week's Record Of The Week by Golden Void, this has that laidback classic sounding '70s psychrock vibe, immediately familiar, though Uncle Acid comes across as much more dark and sinister to be sure. And lastly, fans of Witchcraft should pay attention - we'd rank this up there with that band's celebrated Rise Above debut, we're pretty sure this is gonna be considered a classic too. We're sooooooo glad they didn't just press only those 300 vinyl copies and leave it at that!! You will be too.
This cd reissue includes a bonus track not on vinyl, which provides a nice coda to the record proper, relinquishing the fuzz guitar for acoustic strum and hand percussion, Uncle Acid doing their doom-pop-psych in a more folky style a la, say, Bolan's Tyrannosaurus Rex.
MPEG Stream: "I'll Cut You Down"
MPEG Stream: "Curse In The Trees"
MPEG Stream: "13 Candles"

UNCLE TUPELO 89/93: Anthology (Columbia) cd 16.98
So I'm going to try and not gush too much. I don't want to come across like a 13 year old girl reviewing the newest N-Sync record. But it's kind of hard to be objective when you're trying to turn people on to one of your all time favorite bands. And Uncle Tupelo happen to be one of ours (Andee & Windy). And like a lot of other bands that we love, I feel compelled to recommend against any sort of greatest hits, when to me, the actual records have so many great songs that a greatest hits collection invariably leaves out some of the best songs (especially when greatest hits are often determined by sales or radio play). But since their back catalog is currently unavailable, for now this is all we have to work with. So, for those of you who don't know, Uncle Tupelo were one of the first bands to really combine indie/underground american rock and traditional country, into something original and vital. So much so, that the name of their first record 'No Depression' (borrowed of course from the Carter Family) became an actual genre as well as the name of a magazine covering this new alternative country. But regardless of their influence, or their position as THE seminal indie alt.country band, it's all about the music, and over the course of 4 albums, Uncle Tupelo created some of the most stirring, innovative, evocative, gorgeous, and kick ass music of the last decade.
Their debut, 'No Depression' was a furious amalgam of punk rock and country, with guitars on 10, crashing drums and some totally intense songs (check out the sound clips for 'Whiskey Bottle' and 'Graveyard Shift' from that record). They managed to capture a midwestern working man's hopelessness so perfectly that the songs spoke to you even if you lived in the city and had never even seen a tractor.
Their second record 'Still Feel Gone' continued along the same lines but with a little less aggression and a little more melody. Their third record marked a big shift in their sound and direction, when they enlisted Peter Buck of R.E.M. to help them record a record of traditionals (Coal Miners songs and the like) as well as some acoustic (traditional sounding) originals (check out the sound clip for 'Fatal Wound').
Their fourth and sadly last record 'Anodyne' is the record where everything fell into place. The music was pefect. So was the production, and they were finally selling lots of records. A lot of folks criticise 'Anodyne' for being too professional and too polished, but it seems to me, that's where they were headed all along. Top rate players, a gorgeously lush production and probably the best songs of their career helped push them even further into the public eye (check out the sound clip for 'Chickamauga'). But unfortunately for us, that was to be it. The two main songwriters (who by that point essentially wrote their own songs and brought them completed to the band) just needed to follow their own muses. So Jay Farrar went on to form Son Volt and now performs solo, and Jeff Tweedy went on to start Wilco, who are currently in major label hell with an finished record that the label stupidly deemed unreleasable. (The album in its entirety is available for download from Wilco's website, and reportedly over a hundred thousand people have downloaded it!)
So while there -are- plans to eventually release their first three albums, those of you who have never heard Uncle Tupelo might want to pick this up, at least until the original albums are finally released. And those of you who, like me, are Uncle Tupelo obsessives, will find plenty of reasons to own this (two bonus tracks, a demo and a thouroughly Tupelo-ized version of the Stooges' 'I Wanna Be Your Dog' as well as loads of photos and liner notes). And anyone who is at all into "alt. country" and listens to the Palace Brothers, and Songs:Ohia and Red Red Meat and Califone really owes it to themselves to check out Uncle Tupelo. You won't be sorry.
And if you decide to heed our advice and look for the full albums, Uncle Tupelo's last record, 'Anodyne' , their last and perhaps best, -is- still available and we can not recommend it highly enough.
RealAudio clip: "Whiskey Bottle"
RealAudio clip: "Graveyard Shift"
RealAudio clip: "Fatal Wound"
RealAudio clip: "Chickamauga"
RealAudio clip: "I Wanna Be Your Dog"

UNCLE TUPELO Anodyne (Sire / Reprise) lp 27.00
One of our favorite records EVER, now available on 180-gram vinyl...
Despite the fact that Anodyne, originally released in 1993, was Tupelo's major label debut and everyone was nervous that it would suck, somehow everything came together and they recorded their most mature and perfect album (and that's sayin' a lot since their first three records are also stellar). Artistic differences eventually broke up the band, with Jeff Tweedy going on to form WILCO and Jay Farrar forming SON VOLT. But listen, if you're a fan of either of those two groups but *haven't* heard Uncle Tupelo yet, do yourself a favor. Ditto if you're a fan of "no depression" style Americana - most of those bands will point to Uncle Tupelo as their main inspiration.
This record is absolutely classic in flavor, staying power, talent and songwriting. Farrar's downtrodden and minor key heartstring-tuggers alternate with Tweedy's lighter ditties; upbeat fiddle-led numbers are nestled amongst slower tunes. And everywhere is the undeniable tug of the bittersweet to give it incredible depth. We have been listening to this album probably every week for the last ten years and have never gotten tired of it.
MPEG Stream: "Slate"
MPEG Stream: "Acuff-Rose"

UNEARTHLY TRANCE / WOODEN WAND split (Chrome Peeler) 7" 14.98

UNEARTHLY TRANCE / WOODEN WAND split (Chrome Peeler) 7" 14.98

UNHOLY CADAVER (AKA HAMMERS OF MISFORTUNE) s/t (Shadow Kingdom) 2lp+cd 28.00
Some of you may have heard of Unholy Cadaver. But a LOT of you have heard of Hammers Of Misfortune, San Francisco's best rock-operatic political power prog metal (and more) band, featuring members of Ludicra and (formerly) The Lord Weird Slough Feg, among others. Our own Andee's tUMULt label put out their first album, The Bastard, in 2001. That's been followed by three (or four, depending on how you count, 'cause one was a double!) albums for Cruz Del Sur and Profound Lore. Their entire discography was then recently reissued by Metal Blade, who also signed the band for a new, upcoming opus.
Well, not quite their entire discography... 'Cause before The Bastard, Hammers Of Misfortune were known by another name - Unholy Cadaver. Who recorded an unreleased album back in 1997. They put out a rare demo cd-r at the time, with just three of that album's nine tracks on it, none of which sound like "demos" despite being recorded in the band's practice space. But until now, the entire hour-long recording - which includes a song called "Hammers Of Misfortune", by the way, a nearly 15 minute epic, all of side C here - has never been properly released. The always on top of it (when "it" is cult metal) Shadow Kingdom label has rectified that, and then some, with this limited, deluxe edition of what's essentially the real Hammers Of Misfortune debut, done as a double vinyl lp with cd version also included!
This is where it all started, mastermind John Cobbett & Co.'s unusual, amazing mash up of epic / traditional stylings with "extreme" metal mayhem, with loads of guitar shred, dramatic dynamics, majestic bombast, and an influx of avant garde / black metal weirdness. Unholy Cadaver's line up consisted of Cobbett (guitars/vocals), Chewy Marzolo (drums), still the core of Hammers today. They enlisted several guests for the male and female "operatic" singing parts: Mike Scalzi (of Slough Feg), Erica Stolz (of Lost Goat), and Lorraine Rath (currently in Worm Ouroboros, formerly of The Gault), who also did the cover art and logo. In some sort of quid pro quo, Cobbett joined up for a stint in Slough Feg on 2nd guitar not long afterwards, and Scalzi stayed on with Hammers for their first three albums, playing guitar live as well as singing.
The prototypical Hammers herky-jerky stop-start loud-soft songwriting style is already in full effect, incorporating glorious guitar harmonies and bludgeoning brutality both... with social commentary (and a sense of humor) hidden, or not so hidden, in the often allegorical fantasy lyrics. Signs of their origin in "abso-futurist" metalpunk band Thunderchimp remain, both the presence of John's rasping black metallish (and guttural death metallish) vokills (which were dropped entirely after The Bastard), and seemingly silly (but actually serious) song titles/concepts like "Fuck The Galactic Police".
John and Chewy also do clean, sorta chant like vocals on some of the tracks, presumably written/recorded before they had availed themselves of Mike's triumphant baritone, the inimitable sound of which you'll hear here, appropriately enough, on the aforementioned epic "Hammers Of Misfortune", that's where they really become Hammers Of Misfortune! Not that the rest of this doesn't sound like Hammers, it sure does, but the male-female mock-operatic thing utterly comes to the fore, on that tour-de-force of a track (which also features a surprising amount of profanity from Rath's "caged princess" character).
We should also mention the final cut, all of side D, the nine-minute "Kloven Septum", which is more of an experimental, freaked out "noise" composition, but still metal. We expect the unexpected from 'em, but yet it's unlike much else in their discography, and actually we could do with a whole album of this, too! It and the other extreme metal aspects of Unholy Cadaver perhaps could be seen as feeding in to Cobbett's Ludicra project later on, as well.
Eventually Janis Tanaka took over the female vocalist/bass player position from Erica, and with a solid, full band lineup instituted, they relegated these early recordings to the vault, changed the name (good call) and plunged ahead into forging The Bastard... but Unholy Cadaver's long lost album was definitely more than a warm up, hearing the whole thing now we wonder why it took so long for this to finally see the light of day.
Considering that The Bastard happens to be our favorite of the Hammers albums, and this is what led up to it, a most welcome and highly recommended release! And we're guessing it's kind of limited, too. The packaging is quite fancy, a double gatefold lp, with one of the inside panels holding the compact disc version. There's also a 12"x12" insert on some sort of glossy photo-paper, with old b&w pictures of the band back then, complete lyrics, and new liner notes giving the history of UC/HoM. The cover features L. Rath's painting, originally used for the demo cd-r, bigger and better than before, 'cause it's now in full color. Oh and both the vinyl and the cd versions have been individually remastered! Nice work. Epically recommended!!!
MPEG Stream: "On This Final Night"
MPEG Stream: "Unsheathe The Sword Of Blasphemy"
MPEG Stream: "Hammers Of Misfortune"

UNHOLY GRAVE Terroraging Crisis (Grindfreaks) cd 13.98
The first release on Grindfreaks, the record label affiliated with the Grave record store in Osaka Japan, run by Takaho from Unholy Grave (but often manned by Chew, the drummer from Corrupted!) Grave only sells grind, grind and more grind (oh, and ok, a little hardcore and black metal), so what better way to launch the label than with the latest release from one of the longest running and most infamous Japanese grind bands of all time (and most prolific with nearly 70 releases, nearly all of them splits!!).
Unholy Grave are going on nearly 15 years of grinding destruction, and they still sound as fierce, and fucked up as ever. And even though it's 2007, in the world of Unholy Grave, it still sounds like it's 1987. Falling somewhere between Napalm Death's Scum and Carcass's Reek Of Putrefaction, but filtered through their own Japanese grind filter, the sound of Unholy Grave is gloriously guttural, furiously fast, and ultra distorted, with some of the most bad ass riffs EVER, and everything sooooooooo completely in the red, occasionally the band blasts into full on Japanoise territory. At their fiercest, it's like sticking your head in a dryer full of rusty nails, a relentless barrage of crusty sludge and blown out brutal blasts. But the band does slow down here and there, into weird moshy grooves, super intense doomy stomps and tangled mathy breakdowns, but never for long, always returning to a super fierce, face melting white hot rrrrroooooaaaar. The vocals are all over the shop too, from hysterical shriek, to growling gurgle, nimbly balancing on a musical bed of jagged glass, everything battered and bloodied and so gloriously kick ass and heavy. Some of us have been listening to this NONSTOP since we got it...
The booklet is awesome too, a full on old school punk rock collage of lyrics and slogans and clip art (including an obi of course!) and some seriously awesome art inside the tray card, a Russian leaflet, of which supposedly a million copies were distributed in 1941, with the legend: "GRINDCORE Against Terrorism" along side a Hitler moustachioed monkey behind bars, wearing an iron cross and a swastika armband... and in the corner the words "Gorilla Adolf", and in German: "Caution! Rabid!"
MPEG Stream: "Confession"
MPEG Stream: "Perigo Minasi"
MPEG Stream: "Realities Of Terrorism"
MPEG Stream: "Murderer"
MPEG Stream: "Justice?"

UNICORNS Who Will Cut Our Hair When We're Gone? (Alien8 Recordings) cd 14.98
Montreal, Quebec has spawned a vast array of eclectic and eccentric artists - many being the more 'serious' and intellectual kind. However here comes a young 'n' spritely new indie rock combo called Unicorns to shake things up a little. They're a quirky jumble of ramshackle, tweaked twee fun. Gleefully lo-fi and full of woozy whimsy, they even have a Unicorns anthem of sorts ("I Was Born (A Unicorn)"! Imagine a kiddie-pop meeting of Olivia Tremor Control and Flaming Lips, and you might have some idea of the toothsome songs that make up Who Will Cut Our Hair When We're Gone? Now, that's not to say they've reached the wondrous heights or either of those pop greats, but they certainly show much potential, and offer up a good time while doing so. Kooky and charming!
MPEG Stream: "Child Star"
MPEG Stream: "I Was Born (A Unicorn)"

UNICORNS Who Will Cut Our Hair When We're Gone? (Alien8 Recordings) lp 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Now on vinyl. Montreal, Quebec has spawned a vast array of eclectic and eccentric artists - many being the more 'serious' and intellectual kind. However here comes a young 'n' spritely new indie rock combo called Unicorns to shake things up a little. They're a quirky jumble of ramshackle, tweaked twee fun. Gleefully lo-fi and full of woozy whimsy, they even have a Unicorns anthem of sorts ("I Was Born (A Unicorn)"! Imagine a kiddie-pop meeting of Olivia Tremor Control and Flaming Lips, and you might have some idea of the toothsome songs that make up Who Will Cut Our Hair When We're Gone? Now, that's not to say they've reached the wondrous heights or either of those pop greats, but they certainly show much potential, and offer up a good time while doing so. Kooky and charming!
MPEG Stream: "Child Star"
MPEG Stream: "I Was Born (A Unicorn)"

UNIFORM, THE Black and Vain (Morphius) cd 13.98
Fans of UOA, The Great Unravelling, Fifth Column, The Helikopters, and/or The Thumbs (whew!), take note. Members of all of those bands are present in the ranks of The Uniform (and they're only a trio!). They've already got a couple 7"'s and a few full lengths out, and here's another! They've been described as no-waveish, angular, and agitated, but to be honest my first impression was... that their singer sounded sooo much like Mike Peters of The Alarm. Really! Especially on the track "All Were Offensive"... so very much like "The Stand". Although maybe they were aiming more for The Clash? I'm not sure, but I've also noticed that the drumming sounds quite like the Gang Of Four which could be the root of the "angular"-ness that they've been tagged with. A very brief 24 minutes long.
RealAudio clip: "Oh Be Joyful"
RealAudio clip: "All Were Offensive"

UNION CARBIDE PRODUCTIONS In The Air Tonight (Radium 226.05) cd 17.98
First/best from these Swedish Stooges worshippers, reissued. Features members-to-be of Soundtrack Of Our Lives.

UNION CARBIDE PRODUCTIONS Remastered To Be Recycled (MNW) cd 14.98

UNION TRADE, THE Everyday Including (Tricycle Records) cd 9.98
For their second cd and first full length, The Union Trade's previous post-rock leanings are embraced by their fuzzy indie rock selves. Definitely brings to mind the slouchy, slightly dour charm of '90s college rock kingpins Sebadoh and Seam... for sure a good thing in our books! They've stripped back quite a bit of the guitar effects which dominated their previous release 2007's Now The Swell ep (or perhaps have more thoroughly integrated them), and have retained a nice warm blanket of reverb and gentler squalls of distortion. They're much more vocal heavy too. Eleven terrific songs for these overcast drizzly days!
MPEG Stream: "Self Possession"
MPEG Stream: "For The Resilient"

UNION TRADE, THE Everyday Including (Tricycle Records) lp 14.98
NOW AVAILABLE ON VINYL!
Here's what we said when we reviewed the cd:
For their second release and first full length, The Union Trade's previous post-rock leanings are embraced by their fuzzy indie rock selves. Definitely brings to mind the slouchy, slightly dour charm of '90s college rock kingpins Sebadoh and Seam... for sure a good thing in our books! They've stripped back quite a bit of the guitar effects which dominated their previous release 2007's Now The Swell ep (or perhaps have more thoroughly integrated them), and have retained a nice warm blanket of reverb and gentler squalls of distortion. They're much more vocal heavy too. Eleven terrific songs for these overcast drizzly days!
MPEG Stream: "Self Possession"
MPEG Stream: "For The Resilient"

UNION TRADE, THE Now The Swell (Tricycle) cd ep 4.98
The Union Trade are a young Bay Area foursome who craft mostly instrumental atmospheric post-rock a la Codeine, Mogwai and Slint. Yes, the 'quiet-loud-quiet' dynamics live on in this band! Occasionally a bit mathy and a bit trippy with lots of effected, distorted electric guitar textures. When vocals come into the picture, they're hushed and quite resemble those of Lou Barlow. A promising debut.
MPEG Stream: "Strings Break"
MPEG Stream: "Violent And Beautiful"

UNION TRADE, THE Why We Need Night (Tricycle) cd ep 7.98

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA s/t (Sundazed) cd 16.98
United States Of America is quite a politically charged monicker these days, what with the whole country / world divided over the war in Iraq and our President and gay marriage and everything else under the sun. Probably wasn't a whole lot less volatile 36 years ago, in the midst of the Vietnam War, when this record was first released. Which was precisely the point.
USoA mastermind Joseph Byrd was a long time devotee of twentieth century composition and minimalism, studying and/or studying with LaMonte Young, John Cage, Steve Reich, Terry Riley, Charles Ives and the rest. While at UCLA, Byrd helped organise the New Music Workshop and eventually arranged an elaborate set of concerts which culminated in a Lamonte Young piece that involved the inflation of a giant hot air balloon. Fearful that the less sophisticated members of the audience would get bored and leave, Byrd formed a blues band to play during that part of the performance and convinced his pal Linda Rondstadt to sing. Thus came the realisation that a rock band would give Byrd access to a much bigger audience, and so began his quest to start a psychedelic rock band, which would eventually be realized as United States Of America. Made up of Byrd's friends from academia and ethnomusicology and his ex-girlfriend, and born from his frustration with the war and his leaving UCLA, USoA became a politically charged experimental psychedelic rock combo unlike any that had come before. Utilising a not exactly standard bass /drums /guitar /violin lineup, their sound was further augmented by ring modulators, organ, harpsichord, and calliope. The end result was a sixties rock band, drenched in psychedelic filligree, swooping electronic trippiness, all sorts of circus-y weirdness, bizarre editing and song structures, but never losing sight of great songs.
And a lot of these songs are indeed great. Probably the best track on the record is "The Garden Of Earthly Delights", a super rocking Stereolab meets Jefferson Airplane number, that would not sound at all out of place on Emperor Tomato Ketchup, if it weren't for the gritty sixties rock chorus (with a hook to die for) and the storm of buzzing and bleeping, overloaded affects and tripped out swooping and soaring bleeps and bloops. And then there's the final track, a three part experimental montage / coda, all ambient jangle and ethereal ambience, with snippets and samples from the rest of the tracks on the record, resulting in a super damaged art-rock musical acid trip. And the rest of the record veers from countryish campfire stomps, to smoke-y sultry ballads, to freaked out psych jams and everything in between. All blessed by the absolutely gorgeous vocals of Dorothy Moskowitz. This record may be a psychedelic country pop rock record, but boy is it more than that. Reminds us quite a bit of recent AQ record of the week Euphoria, with it's complicated and bizarre arrangements and its unlikely melding of country rock, lush baroque pop and acid fried guitar leads. Imagine a Frankensteinian sonic monster constructed from Euphoria, Stereolab, Fifty Foot Hose, the Beatles, the Beach Boys, the Byrds...then make said monster do some coursework in twentieth century compostion and experimental minimalism, and let it experiment with a suitcase full of homemade sound generators and you'd still have trouble imagining how great this record is. As always Sundazed does the reissue right, with extensive liner notes from Joseph Byrd, and interview with Dorothy Moskowitz and TEN bonus tracks, almost all of them unreleased, and most of them as good as anything on the album proper!
MPEG Stream: "The Garden Of Earthly Delights"
MPEG Stream: "Hard Coming Love"
MPEG Stream: "The American Metaphysical Circus"
MPEG Stream: "Cloud Song"

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, THE s/t (Columbia) lp 23.00
Now available on lp! 180 gram vinyl!
United States Of America is quite a politically charged monicker these days, what with the whole country / world divided over the war in Iraq and our President and gay marriage and everything else under the sun. Probably wasn't a whole lot less volatile 36 years ago, in the midst of the Vietnam War, when this record was first released. Which was precisely the point.
USoA mastermind Joseph Byrd was a long time devotee of twentieth century composition and minimalism, studying and/or studying with LaMonte Young, John Cage, Steve Reich, Terry Riley, Charles Ives and the rest. While at UCLA, Byrd helped organise the New Music Workshop and eventually arranged an elaborate set of concerts which culminated in a Lamonte Young piece that involved the inflation of a giant hot air balloon. Fearful that the less sophisticated members of the audience would get bored and leave, Byrd formed a blues band to play during that part of the performance and convinced his pal Linda Rondstadt to sing. Thus came the realisation that a rock band would give Byrd access to a much bigger audience, and so began his quest to start a psychedelic rock band, which would eventually be realized as United States Of America. Made up of Byrd's friends from academia and ethnomusicology and his ex-girlfriend, and born from his frustration with the war and his leaving UCLA, USoA became a politically charged experimental psychedelic rock combo unlike any that had come before. Utilising a not exactly standard bass /drums /guitar /violin lineup, their sound was further augmented by ring modulators, organ, harpsichord, and calliope. The end result was a sixties rock band, drenched in psychedelic filigree, swooping electronic trippiness, all sorts of circus-y weirdness, bizarre editing and song structures, but never losing sight of great songs.
And a lot of these songs are indeed great. Probably the best track on the record is "The Garden Of Earthly Delights", a super rocking Stereolab meets Jefferson Airplane number, that would not sound at all out of place on Emperor Tomato Ketchup, if it weren't for the gritty sixties rock chorus (with a hook to die for) and the storm of buzzing and bleeping, overloaded affects and tripped out swooping and soaring bleeps and bloops. And then there's the final track, a three part experimental montage / coda, all ambient jangle and ethereal ambience, with snippets and samples from the rest of the tracks on the record, resulting in a super damaged art-rock musical acid trip. And the rest of the record veers from countryish campfire stomps, to smoke-y sultry ballads, to freaked out psych jams and everything in between. All blessed by the absolutely gorgeous vocals of Dorothy Moskowitz. This record may be a psychedelic country pop rock record, but boy is it more than that. Reminds us quite a bit of recent AQ record of the week Euphoria, with it's complicated and bizarre arrangements and its unlikely melding of country rock, lush baroque pop and acid fried guitar leads. Imagine a Frankensteinian sonic monster constructed from Euphoria, Stereolab, Fifty Foot Hose, the Beatles, the Beach Boys, the Byrds...then make said monster do some coursework in twentieth century composition and experimental minimalism, and let it experiment with a suitcase full of homemade sound generators and you'd still have trouble imagining how great this record is.
MPEG Stream: "The Garden Of Earthly Delights"
MPEG Stream: "Hard Coming Love"
MPEG Stream: "The American Metaphysical Circus"
MPEG Stream: "Cloud Song"

UNITS History Of The Units (Community Library) cd 14.98
Moog-enabled synth punk subversion straight outta San Francisco in the late '70s/early '80s, entertaining n' agitating electronic New Wave action excavated and reissued! And it's totally timely considering how many bands in today's scene would so love to sound like this.
We won't pretend we were familiar with The Units before this fantastic anthology album showed up. Perhaps we'd heard the name before (or maybe we were confusing 'em with ol' Jandek's 1978 debut album, also under the name The Units), but we knew nothing about this band 'til we heard this disc a few weeks ago. And as soon as we did, it went into heavy rotation here at the store. These Units were definitely a important piece of San Francisco punk/new wave history, but just a bit before our time. Well, not Aquarius's time, just us folks who work here now! Actually, a close reading of the thanks list in the cd booklet will find a shout out to Aquarius, 'cause (if you didn't know) Aquarius was THEE punk/new wave record store in San Francisco in the '70s... (Which reminds us, we've got to get more of our history up on the AQ website.) And, in fact, The Units' debut lp Digital Stimulation was the very first release on seminal SF indie 415 Records (who had their biggest hit with Romeo Void), a label run in part by Aquarius' owners at the time. So this most certainly isn't the first time that The Units music has been blasting regularly in the Aquarius shop, it's just been a few years, is all.
Putting things in proper place/time/scene perspective, this archival disc starts off with an audio snippet of the late SF punk "godfather" Dirk Dirksen on stage at Mabuhay Gardens, good-naturedly mocking both The Units (accidentally referring to them by the name of another band, the Zeros) and their cheering fans (with the sardonic comment "obviously, people with as little taste as yourself would become ecstatic over such average talent"). Then, making us ecstatic, twenty tracks of prime Units music follows, The History Of The Units containing most all of the tracks from their 1980 415 Records album Digital Stimulation as well as a handful of stuff taken from early 7"s and demo tapes, as well as more experimental pieces recorded for film soundtracks and art happenings and other ephemera.
Not unlike Devo, The Units had a concept thing going, all about a critique of alienated modern industrial society, dehumanizing conformity, and corporate culture, with songs like "Cannibals" and "Work". Perhaps perversely choosing to use machines to make their point, The Units tried to take the human element out of the rock band equation, preferring for instance to project their own propaganda films rather than allow the audience to focus on a frontperson. And yes, they do also sound quite bit like Devo at times, which is way okay by us!
Their synth-obsession was also in part an anti-guitar thing, a reaction to the mainstream. In fact, they took their anti-guitar philosophy to the extreme of not only having a "stamp out guitars" logo, but also making fake guitars out of plywood to smash on stage, while letting their synths play on "cruise control". So definitely The Units were highly conceptual, art schoolish, but not academic - the liner notes are clear that the idea was to be an all-synth band that "kicks ass" (the full quote being: ""I wanted an all synthesizer band... and not some fucking polite, socially acceptable electronic experiment in academia. I didn't want a doctorate in electronic doodling. No, I'm talking about a synth band that kicks ass!") and according to what we're hearing here, they succeeded. And they were not without contemporaries. There were The Screamers, Nervous Gender, and of course Devo; all of whom wanted to take the synthesizer into punk. For many of the Units tracks, it would very easy to replace the lead synth lines with guitars and have an equally kick ass rock song, but the fact is that these are Moog-powered cuts which do oscillate between a quirky sensibility with angular chops and a full-throttle punk car-crash. If you would think the former finds the Units sounding like Devo and the latter like the Screamers, you'd be right!
Yes indeed, the songs on this disc range from urgent Devo-esque pop punk and Screamers-y rants to moody proto-'80s dance tracks to more abstract, instrumental, rhythmic/textural electronic pieces like "Tight Fit" and "East West". There's loads of electric energy, some goofy humor, and certainly serious intent. So many gems here, incorporating buzzing droning distorted synths, propulsively skittering drum beats, and monotone vocals (both male and female).
Their incredible singles "Cannibals" (a tempestuous, driving song that was pure '70s punk), "High Pressure Days", and "Warm Moving Bodies," are prominently featured here, all of which were impressively catchy. Their ability to write these hooks earned them a deal with Epic, who released two seminal 12" singles (which couldn't be licensed for this compilation) and has been sitting on another collection of recordings since 1983. But beyond the hook, the Units were plenty weird, as seen in their peculiar lullaby melodies on "Red" which almost comes across like a Rodd Keith song-poem with a very sparse arrangement. Despite the band's curses toward academic music, a few choice intertwining moments of the Units minimalist grooves come awfully close to sounding like a punked out Terry Riley! Hardly polite music!
Other selections here include the cold wave weird science of "Digital Stimulation", the gloriously grinding downer melody of "Contemporary Emotion" (apparently a cover, a song by some contemporaneous hard rock band we've never heard of called Trakstod Station), and there's even an ode to our very neighborhood, "The Mission Is Bitchin", with lyrics about burritos and marijuana!
Of course it's all a bit dated, of its era, and that's part of the charm... but like we said, a lot of this also sounds like it could be put out by a band today, since everything old is new again and the '80s New Wave / synth thing is a current retro craze. Definitely this is a good time for The Units to be reissued!
And Community Library have done a really nice job of it, the gatefold cd sleeve containing a thick 32 page cd booklet with elaborate colorful collage style liner notes by bandleader Scott "Dr. Tex Nology" Ryser, a Units manifesto of sorts, he also talks about the wild and crazy San Francisco of the '70s/early '80s era, and also there's several pages of old fliers for Units gigs at the Fab Mab and other SF punk venues... we noticed one for the Warfield too, with The Units opening for OMD and Gary Numan. Also shows with Romeo Void, Dead Boys, Soft Cell, Psychedelic Furs, Dead Kennedys, Crime, Screamers, Iggy Pop, the Police, Tuxedomoon... Definitely makes us young 'uns wish we'd been around in SF back then. (Another note about the packaging, it says copyright 2007 on the back but that that's a mistake, it's when the artwork was initially prepared, this is indeed a brand new 2009 release, with also a vinyl version upcoming as well, not sure when, though.)
MPEG Stream: "Cannibals"
MPEG Stream: "Warm Moving Bodies"
MPEG Stream: "i Night"
MPEG Stream: "East West"

UNITS History Of The Units - The Early Years: 1977-1983 (Community Library) lp 14.98
This past Record Of The Week NOW AVAILABLE ON VINYL!!! There's fewer tracks than on the cd version, but at least the lp includes a download code to get mp3s of ALL of the tracks from the cd reissue. No booklet unfortunately (although it seems some of the booklet is reprinted on the cover), but there is an insert, with some liner notes, as well as an explanation for the song choice on both the cd and lp, the lack of the Units' major label material and the reasoning behind less songs on the lp. Regardless, totally essential, especially now that it's on vinyl. Here's what we said about it before:
Moog-enabled synth punk subversion straight outta San Francisco in the late '70s/early '80s, entertaining n' agitating electronic New Wave action excavated and reissued! And it's totally timely considering how many bands in today's scene would so love to sound like this.
We won't pretend we were familiar with The Units before this fantastic anthology album showed up. Perhaps we'd heard the name before (or maybe we were confusing 'em with ol' Jandek's 1978 debut album, also under the name The Units), but we knew nothing about this band 'til we heard this disc a few weeks ago. And as soon as we did, it went into heavy rotation here at the store. These Units were definitely a important piece of San Francisco punk/new wave history, but just a bit before our time. Well, not Aquarius's time, just us folks who work here now! Actually, a close reading of the thanks list in the cd booklet will find a shout out to Aquarius, 'cause (if you didn't know) Aquarius was THEE punk/new wave record store in San Francisco in the '70s... (Which reminds us, we've got to get more of our history up on the AQ website.) And, in fact, The Units' debut lp Digital Stimulation was the very first release on seminal SF indie 415 Records (who had their biggest hit with Romeo Void), a label run in part by Aquarius' owners at the time. So this most certainly isn't the first time that The Units music has been blasting regularly in the Aquarius shop, it's just been a few years, is all.
Putting things in proper place/time/scene perspective, this archival disc starts off with an audio snippet of the late SF punk "godfather" Dirk Dirksen on stage at Mabuhay Gardens, good-naturedly mocking both The Units (accidentally referring to them by the name of another band, the Zeros) and their cheering fans (with the sardonic comment "obviously, people with as little taste as yourself would become ecstatic over such average talent"). Then, making us ecstatic, twenty tracks of prime Units music follows, The History Of The Units containing most all of the tracks from their 1980 415 Records album Digital Stimulation as well as a handful of stuff taken from early 7"s and demo tapes, as well as more experimental pieces recorded for film soundtracks and art happenings and other ephemera.
Not unlike Devo, The Units had a concept thing going, all about a critique of alienated modern industrial society, dehumanizing conformity, and corporate culture, with songs like "Cannibals" and "Work". Perhaps perversely choosing to use machines to make their point, The Units tried to take the human element out of the rock band equation, preferring for instance to project their own propaganda films rather than allow the audience to focus on a frontperson. And yes, they do also sound quite bit like Devo at times, which is way okay by us!
Their synth-obsession was also in part an anti-guitar thing, a reaction to the mainstream. In fact, they took their anti-guitar philosophy to the extreme of not only having a "stamp out guitars" logo, but also making fake guitars out of plywood to smash on stage, while letting their synths play on "cruise control". So definitely The Units were highly conceptual, art schoolish, but not academic - the liner notes are clear that the idea was to be an all-synth band that "kicks ass" (the full quote being: ""I wanted an all synthesizer band... and not some fucking polite, socially acceptable electronic experiment in academia. I didn't want a doctorate in electronic doodling. No, I'm talking about a synth band that kicks ass!") and according to what we're hearing here, they succeeded. And they were not without contemporaries. There were The Screamers, Nervous Gender, and of course Devo; all of whom wanted to take the synthesizer into punk. For many of the Units tracks, it would very easy to replace the lead synth lines with guitars and have an equally kick ass rock song, but the fact is that these are Moog-powered cuts which do oscillate between a quirky sensibility with angular chops and a full-throttle punk car-crash. If you would think the former finds the Units sounding like Devo and the latter like the Screamers, you'd be right!
Yes indeed, the songs on this disc range from urgent Devo-esque pop punk and Screamers-y rants to moody proto-'80s dance tracks to more abstract, instrumental, rhythmic/textural electronic pieces like "Tight Fit" and "East West". There's loads of electric energy, some goofy humor, and certainly serious intent. So many gems here, incorporating buzzing droning distorted synths, propulsively skittering drum beats, and monotone vocals (both male and female).
Their incredible singles "Cannibals" (a tempestuous, driving song that was pure '70s punk), "High Pressure Days", and "Warm Moving Bodies," are prominently featured here, all of which were impressively catchy. Their ability to write these hooks earned them a deal with Epic, who released two seminal 12" singles (which couldn't be licensed for this compilation) and has been sitting on another collection of recordings since 1983. But beyond the hook, the Units were plenty weird, as seen in their peculiar lullaby melodies on "Red" which almost comes across like a Rodd Keith song-poem with a very sparse arrangement. Despite the band's curses toward academic music, a few choice intertwining moments of the Units minimalist grooves come awfully close to sounding like a punked out Terry Riley! Hardly polite music!
Other selections here include the cold wave weird science of "Digital Stimulation", the gloriously grinding downer melody of "Contemporary Emotion" (apparently a cover, a song by some contemporaneous hard rock band we've never heard of called Trakstod Station), and there's even an ode to our very neighborhood, "The Mission Is Bitchin", with lyrics about burritos and marijuana!
Of course it's all a bit dated, of its era, and that's part of the charm... but like we said, a lot of this also sounds like it could be put out by a band today, since everything old is new again and the '80s New Wave / synth thing is a current retro craze. Definitely this is a good time for The Units to be reissued!
MPEG Stream: "Cannibals"
MPEG Stream: "Warm Moving Bodies"
MPEG Stream: "i Night"
MPEG Stream: "East West"

UNIVERS ZERO Crawling Wind (Cuneiform) cd 14.98
This starts off in a deceptively "happy" manner, before delving into the darkness that we generally expect from what's always been a superbly creepy chamber-prog band. "Crawling Wind" is this Belgian group's super-rare Japanese only 12" ep from 1983, now for the first time reissued on cd in remastered and expanded form -- the three tracks from the original plus three live tracks (from 1982, '84, and '79). UZ are at their eerie, Magma-meets-20th Century classical best on this disc. The liner notes provide a detailed history of the band, from some members' stint in Magma circa '72 to their involvement in overtly Lovecraftian bands Arkham and Necronomicon, pre-UZ. Flirtations with jazz and medieval music are also mentioned. And you can hear all that on "Crawling Wind". Recommended!
RealAudio clip: "Before The Heat"
RealAudio clip: "Influences"

UNIVERSAL INDIANS Monster Approach (Killertree) lp 9.00
**SALE **SALE* *SALE**
Universal Indians are a long lost noise rock behemoth, from way back in the nineties, featuring Mr. John Olson of the Wolf Eyes on the drums, these guys whipped up a serious blast of blown out super distorted garagey psychedelic noise rock. The opening track is heavy and thick, pulverizingly aggressive, drums totally in the red, guitars crumbling and white hot, the whole recording doing much damage to the speakers, vocals that are sort of sung/spoken, the whole thing sounds very Brainbombs actually, which is a VERY good thing. Come track two though, and the production drops about a hundred notches and suddenly we're in old school noise rock, tin can and twine blow out territory, which is still good, just different, and a surprise after the ultra hot opener. But the rest of the record proceeds along with some serious Dead C worship, mumbled vocals, angular guitars, barely audible drums, recorded in an airplane hangar or a cave somewhere, with some damaged Dylan-y strum and warble mixed in, everything wreathed in lo-fi hiss and tape recorded warble. Gloriously ramshackle... Side two is a single sidelong epic, a sparse, outrock jam, simple strummed guitars, spacious stumbling drums, almost sounds like some long lost old Sebadoh practice tape, albeit run through with some extra noisy ambience and fucked up weirdness. Cool stuff, almost like some sort of super poppy Wolf Eyes... a stumbling, damaged, noise drenched spaced out psych pop...

UNIVERSAL INDIANS / ASHTRAY NAVIGATIONS Blues For Black Afternoon/Blues For Nervous System (American Tapes) split cd 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Michigan's Universal Indians (who you may remember from their handsome split lp with Gravitar) and Scotland's Ashtray Navigations (known for their tapes) combine on this split cd, both bands being purveyors of murky psych/noise guitar improv splurge. Pretty cool, the packaging is crap though...

UNKLE End Titles... Stories For Film (Surrender All) cd 14.98

UNKNOWN MORTAL ORCHESTRA II (Jagjaguwar) cd 14.98
Once upon a time, there was a band called the Mint Chicks, whose sound was a total Pixies style blast of psych-fuzz jangle pop bombast, lush and super melodic, crunchy and crazy catchy, and while the pop kids around here were huge fans, for whatever reason, we were never able to get their records, at least not at a reasonable price. Hopefully someday those record will get (re)issued domestically, especially considering that one of the Mint Chicks has a new band, that's getting a lot of hype, and no undeservedly so. And while the music may not be super similar to the Mint Chicks, Unknown Mortal Orchestra do have a super distinctive sound, one that manages to fuse classic pop tradition and old school power pop songsmithery with warped home brewed DIY experimentation that most definitely manages to skew the sonic proceedings here into a more gloriously off kilter lo-fi indie rock direction.
On the first listen, the sound is immediately poppy and breezy, subtly psychedelic, very Beatles-esque for sure. If Tame Impala are the modern equivalent of Beatles-ish psychedelic bombast, UMO borrow more from the darker, dreamier, songier side of the Fab Four, taking swoonsome falsetto vox, shimmery jangle, woozy basslines, and irresistible melodies, and wrapping them in hazy swirls of sonic fug, a little bit lo-fi and a lot bit murky, but still propulsive and weirdly rocking at times, the songs most definitely possessed of a warbly AM radio sound, reminding us of Ariel Pink or John Maus, and at times Ween, but Ween at their perfectly poppiest, as well as recent Record Of The Weekers, Donnie & Joe Emerson. The songs tend toward the woozy, and lysergic, dreamy and drifty but often blossom into stretches both rhythmic and propulsive, groovy and a little bit krautrocky, but ultimately, the core sound is an old school sixties sounding jangle pop, hooky and heavenly, dark and dreamy, and just that little bit tweaked and twisted enough to make this more of a subtly out-pop record, which should appeal to fans of more mainstream sounds, as well as the usual aQ suspects into more underground murk-pop weirdness...
MPEG Stream: "From The Sun"
MPEG Stream: "Swim And Sleep"
MPEG Stream: "So Good At Being In Trouble"
MPEG Stream: "One At A Time"

UNKNOWN MORTAL ORCHESTRA II (Jagjaguwar) lp 17.98
Once upon a time, there was a band called the Mint Chicks, whose sound was a total Pixies style blast of psych-fuzz jangle pop bombast, lush and super melodic, crunchy and crazy catchy, and while the pop kids around here were huge fans, for whatever reason, we were never able to get their records, at least not at a reasonable price. Hopefully someday those record will get (re)issued domestically, especially considering that one of the Mint Chicks has a new band, that's getting a lot of hype, and no undeservedly so. And while the music may not be super similar to the Mint Chicks, Unknown Mortal Orchestra do have a super distinctive sound, one that manages to fuse classic pop tradition and old school power pop songsmithery with warped home brewed DIY experimentation that most definitely manages to skew the sonic proceedings here into a more gloriously off kilter lo-fi indie rock direction.
On the first listen, the sound is immediately poppy and breezy, subtly psychedelic, very Beatles-esque for sure. If Tame Impala are the modern equivalent of Beatles-ish psychedelic bombast, UMO borrow more from the darker, dreamier, songier side of the Fab Four, taking swoonsome falsetto vox, shimmery jangle, woozy basslines, and irresistible melodies, and wrapping them in hazy swirls of sonic fug, a little bit lo-fi and a lot bit murky, but still propulsive and weirdly rocking at times, the songs most definitely possessed of a warbly AM radio sound, reminding us of Ariel Pink or John Maus, and at times Ween, but Ween at their perfectly poppiest, as well as recent Record Of The Weekers, Donnie & Joe Emerson. The songs tend toward the woozy, and lysergic, dreamy and drifty but often blossom into stretches both rhythmic and propulsive, groovy and a little bit krautrocky, but ultimately, the core sound is an old school sixties sounding jangle pop, hooky and heavenly, dark and dreamy, and just that little bit tweaked and twisted enough to make this more of a subtly out-pop record, which should appeal to fans of more mainstream sounds, as well as the usual aQ suspects into more underground murk-pop weirdness...
MPEG Stream: "From The Sun"
MPEG Stream: "Swim And Sleep"
MPEG Stream: "So Good At Being In Trouble"
MPEG Stream: "One At A Time"

UNKNOWN PASSAGE: THE DEAD MOON STORY (Magic Umbrella) dvd 14.98
Dead Moon were most certainly a rock band like no other. Fred & Toody Cole (along with drummer Andrew Loomis) slugged it out in nearly every corner of the planet for the last twenty years; a constant touring machine that never sonically strayed very far from the formula that has made them legendary as a REAL rock 'n' roll band.
Countless bands from every musical genre count Dead Moon as a personal favorite, and for those in the know, it's not at all difficult to see why. And we were all pretty heartbroken to discover the band that could never and would never break up, finally did. But what a run they had...
For those of you who DON'T know Dead Moon (where have YOU been, huh?), this 90 minute documentary is absolutely fascinating and will for sure have you running out to see these guys live, or at least buy all their records. And even for old fans like us, there's so much amazing stuff to discover, and stuff we absolutely did not know.
Mostly interview footage with Fred, Toody and Andrew, each telling stories of their lives before and during Dead Moon, there are also lots of early photographs and home video footage, we get to meet their kids (!!!), and it all somehow makes perfect sense in the Dead Moon story. We also get some good live footage, but this DVD isn't called "The Dead Moon Story" for nothing! Lots of heartfelt storytelling, it's rare to see a band whose music is indeed their WHOLE life -- these guys are sooo ROCK -- all the while no member of the band is without a cigarette or drink -- EVAR! Fred Cole has stated he wants to play a gig when he's 100 years old and if anyone is gonna pull it off, it's him. No band has mojo like these guys do -- believe it!
The DVD also includes lots of extras including home movies, tour footage as well as archival footage of their earlier bands, an other cool stuff. Easily up there with "We Jam Econo" the story of the Minutemen, as an absolute must-have music documentary!

UNLUCKY ATLAS s/t (self-released) cd-r 8.98
The sweet sound of mandolin charts the course for Unlucky Atlas. Sorry, couldn't resist the pun, but yes, that stringed instrument is integral to this new Chicago acoustic foursome's sound. Said instrument along with guitar, fiddle, cello, autoharp, and male and female vocals are entwined gracefully making for a harmony filled, somberly atmospheric, earthen seven song debut. Comes packaged in a lovely letter pressed cardboard jacket. Very very nice.
MPEG Stream: "Noble Enterprise"
MPEG Stream: "Great Awakening"

UNNATURAL HELPERS s/t (self-released) cd 11.98
Whoa, some of the most unwashed, ragged, loose, ass-slappin' garage rawk we've heard in a long time has just landed in our unexpecting laps with a sweaty how-do-you-do! Seattle's Unnatural Helpers are at your service for those times when you just wanna get down to the not so serious business of rawkin'. And if you dig the low slung, kick in the pants goodness of bands like Tight Bros From Way Back When and Hot Snakes, you'll do yourself and them a favor and take 'em for a spin. A rowdy, beer-goggled shot in the arm.
MPEG Stream: "Gettin' Classy"