BUDWEISER SPRITE "Muculent Passage" C60 (OMS-B)FORM A LOG "Air Circus" C30 (I Just Live Here)

A C60 of straight noise does not always make me jump for joy, but what we have here is actually quite good. Budweiser Sprite is the one man band of Dan Rizer and he creates a massive sound. Not too massive, however, to take time for dynamic shifts and moments of (relative) peace. This tape is rather epic and has a real nice arc to it. There is some really great mixer greasing going on here, along with a sizable amount of four track crunching, a dash of knob twiddling and a heavy dose of psychedelic doom. It's been said that writing about music is like dancing about architecture and this tape makes me dance about a dungeon ... a really fun dungeon that you will want to listen to again and again.


Form A Log is a Philadelphia super group (related projects: God Willing, Social Junk, New Flesh) and "Air Circus" is their third tape. The first one found them thrashing amiably and amateurishly on guitar/bass/drums. This is an entirely different beast. Each of the three members operates a four track tape player and little else, an instrumentation that seems so obvious in this day and age, but when I saw these guys a fortnight ago at the Montague Phantom Brain Exchange in Turners Falls MA, it was the first time I'd ever seen a band with that particular make up. The live set and the tape are remarkably similar so my impressions of the two blend together. Perhaps even more so than the Budweiser Sprite outing, this tape is very dynamic and displays a variety of forms of sonic trickery. The four track's ability to be used as a mixer or playback device, along with it's variable speed control give the musicians almost limitless freedom. Thing about it: three dudes = twelve tracks of insanity. Like all of I Just Live Here's releases, this looks very nice: a great screen print and a black and white insert with a poem by Alex Hampshire. The label's website (operated by Ren - God Willing) says there are only five copies left, so scoop this up soon!

oms-b.org
ijustlivehere.org

BUDWEISER SPRITE "trash on the grass" (905 Tapes)

Back with more noise-constructed rock n' roll, the man with the positive vibe has an epic one this time. A c-92 usually means dulldome for just about anyone, but here Budweiser Sprite shines. Starting off with unrelenting, fast paced, driving rhythms that last for nearly half the side of the cassette, there is no boredom to be found. Only after it seems that this approach will define the entire release do the rhythms begin to change. Still using mixer/4track/circuit feedback to create sludgy and farty loops, the aesthetic is lo-fi. Unlike so much lo-fi noise though, this is multi-textured, surprisingly expressive, and never flat or dull. Rather, it occupies a certian voice that is immediately recognizable as Budweiser Sprite. This is greatly due to how he uses this fart-range. So much action is put into the sounds, so much movement and an incredible sense of head bobbing and fist pumping pace, that the true joy he gets out of making this music is immediatly translated to the listener. These muffled tones come from a party beyond the perifory, centered into focus in a way that shows how awesome and straight up happy the unknown and mysterious can be.

BUDWEISER SPRITE "Mouthbreather" (Iatrogenesis)

The importance of band mythology/audience mind-shaping is typically influenced in equal parts band name, release art, and actual sounds when it comes to noise. Well, in all pop music actualy, but in a unique way for noise due to the particularly abstract nature of the sounds. While emotional pitch is definitely well under control by the experts, even the masters often use non-musical elements to help steer an act into a very particular place in their listeners' minds. Case in point: Shitty Vibe Smasher. Fellow Portlandites Yellow Swans have self-identified politically since the get-go, but Shitty Vibe Smasher are a little more merged as a noise/politics act. In other words, they are politics in action. By name they set forth on the more rarely blazed trail of "happy noise"... or more accurately: hero noise (a defiant political stance indeed.) And with Patrick Mair aka Glamorous Pat at the helm you know that the sunny side of noise is well represented. Of course, this is not just Pat's act, this is a group... this is that communal act which further pushes their sound from the vague realm of ambient noise into a clear Utopian smile zone. And it is here, at long last, that we get to the actual review in this text: As a member of Shitty Vibe Smasher, Daniel Rizer sacrificed self for the benefit of the whole and to lift identity to it's hoped pinnacle. As Budweiser Sprite though, Daniel defies the types of expectations that band names set forth, and delivers some of the most rockin' NOT RIDICULOUS noise that a dood named Budweiser Sprite could ever not be anticipated to make! Cassette manipulation, 4-track mixer feedback, and a passion for finding the true energy of sound are the tools used. Still extremely positive sounding, the use of aggressive loops and growling half-magnetizations invokes foot stomping at its most wild and foreshadows even more rock when being pensive. Daniel Rizer's silly stage name only elevates his expert use of the wide world of possible sounds (from murky to shrill to you name it) to put together a uniquely rock sound by virtue of the smile you wear upon seeing the whole picture. Not a surprise coming from a member of Shitty Vibe Smasher. Not just amazing music, but masterful entertainment all around.