ELECTRIC BLANKET “Living Room Relapse” (self-released)

Electric Blanket, aka Kevin Frank of British Columbia, is a genius band namer. He’s taken the twin concepts at the heart of shoegaze, electricity and the suffocating at times but ultimately safe swathing of a blanket (in this case, a blanket of guitar effects). Bear fucking with me.* You know how your favorite shoegaze bands, whether it’s My Bloody Valentine or Slowdive or Lush or any of the other ones, just feel right, just feel like they get you and that you can go to them (meaning their records, not them them) with any of your problems? You can close out the rest of the world when you’re hanging out with your best shoegaze buds, you can insulate and medicate, you can, ahem, cover yourself in the comforting blanket of sonic joy they produce.

Oh yeah, that makes total sense! Electric Blanket is an electric-y blanket-y wash of lo-fi sonic ear candy, cotton candy, candy that’s sticky and dense and light and fluffy and sweet all at the same time. It’s an antidote to the melancholy of youth and should make you feel better when that special someone doesn’t quite return your affection for them. I should know – I’ve felt affection for and been spurned by many. I mean, to be honest, this was like almost twenty years ago or so now, and my emotional radar barely registers anything anymore. No blips, no bloops, no pings. I’m an old, rotten husk, wondering how Electric Blanket can still do it, pining for his youth. Maybe there’s some sort of Brothers Grimm magic where I can siphon off his life force like a witch or something. Nah, I’d much rather just listen to the seven sweet songs on this luscious green cassette.

*Or don’t bear fucking with me, your call.

Electric Blanket

--Ryan Masteller

JQ “Quiet Music” C14 (This Ain’t Heaven)

JQ might not make the most in-your-face music (see, for reference, the album title), nor might his Quiet Music cassette last awfully long (fourteen minutes), but in the time I’ve spent with it, it’s made me feel pretty great about myself. It’s this insular electronic thing – somebody probably said “chillwave” today somewhere, and maybe they said it seriously, but it’s probably the best thing to yammer when you’re listening to this. “Headphones,” I say, “It’s you and me and this chillwave. I feel so bloody good.” I really said that out loud to myself just now, but mainly so that you readers believe that I’ll go the extra mile in order to get my story straight.

Whatever and then some, because right now I’m in a good place. I used to play a lot of Final Fantasy, mainly the PS1 system entries VII through IX, and JQ shoots me right back to those cut scenes where there’s some kind of introspection going on, or there’s a quiet moment in a town, or there’s a moment of truth between two romantically linked characters, or there’s a mana spring that’s just glistening with magic power and that magic power manifests itself in actual sound. Either way, I’m immersed in this short journey, and if it becomes a bigger, longer piece of an expanded universe, then I’m already ready for it. Just give me an elixir or a potion or a phoenix down or one of those items before I set off, just so I’m equipped. Mentally I’m all set, it’s just a matter of preparation.

JQ

This Ain’t Heaven

--Ryan Masteller

CENTAUR NOIR VS. BABY ALCHEMY "Baby Noir" C44 (Sass Bologna/Deep Cuts)

Here’s a collaborative effort between two Midwestern electro-duos, one more hip than pop, the other, vice-versa. Individually, they’re much busier/engaging to my (admittedly texture-hungry) ears, whereas this joint effort sounds much more like a demo tape, with tracks provided by one to another, but not fully explored. I love me some minimalism, but the compositions sound anemically skeletal. Do do yourself a favor and check out their non-collaborative releases, especially CN’s “Lean On Me” for a most pleasant shakedown.

centaurnoir.bandcamp.com/

soundcloud.com/baby-alchemy

deepcutsrecords.bandcamp.com/album/baby-noir

and/or

sassbologna.org/

­­

-- Jacob An Kittenplan

TREES TAKE EASE "Lifelike" C22 (Self-Released)

I’m honestly not too familiar with the 49 shades of Death-Cab-For-Attractiveness, but I’d say this barebones bid for Something-Kinda-Like-Aeroplanes ought truly please all those interested in Lo-Fi bedroom folk/pop, for sure, and then some.

Plenty o’ simple, nylon string’d fingerstyle ploddings, expertly executed falsetto vocals laying down lone melodies, metronomic bass-snare mantras, the occasional virtuosic flourish…

This tape is pleasant. It’s nice. The employment of birdcalls-as-background on side B is unexpected and beautiful. The finale leaves us all on a spliff-hanger. I’m glad this happened…I think. I dunno. So much saccharine is flowing between my earholes, I’m not sure how well balanced I truly am. 

*This album progresses, so a cursory sweep through won’t do. Give it its less-than-half-hour due for your most well-informed judgement.

https://treestakeease.bandcamp.com/album/lifelike

-- Jacob An Kittenplan

TOTAL DISCHARGE "Automatic Zone" C32 (self released)

Not a punk/hardcore band. Nope.

I’d just finished reviewing/fawning over a solid batch of four RRAADD tapes recently released by a local tape label I pretty much can’t get enough of (CT), so… I thought… “Hey,…I’ll just pick out a rando tape with some shitty (read: “Name my ego doesn’t immediately relate to”) name, just, y’know… to get it out of the way…

Remember that wise old qibong turtle or whatever that says to not judge a race by its covert density?

Long fable short, this tape blew my (shitty) expectations out of most potable liquids. I’m on my 7th round, now, and am still discovering hidden complexities/parallels to all them Eighties New Wave acts I’ve loved since my inception.

Note! I’d already appreciated the multitude of timbre changes/noisy permutations of the noisy synthesizer(s) that dominate each of these track’s movements. I’d also felt great about wishing I were (theoretically) a part of some tighter-than-tight Bass/Drum contingent that could drive a band like this to its commanding authority. I’d also wondered if this is what David Yow sounded like as a teenager, before diving headfirst into his (delightful!) megalomania. So many explorations!

I cannot even appropriately tie in the shades of Brainiac and ‘90s Gary Numan that are sprinkled throughout this album, so I’ll just leave this sentence here.

This isn’t punk/hardcore. Nope. It is, however, beyond dynamic, driving, dissonant, daunting, delightful, and great. Did I mention that this may very well be their first recorded effort? Holy SHIT! More please! Sorry I misjudged your name, TD!

http://totaldischarge.bandcamp.com/releases

-- Jacob An Kittenplan

STEVE KENNEY / TARR split"Nero Porca Miseria"(THIRDSEX)

The first side, Steve Kenney's "side two" is a short drone piece that keeps you intrigued as the track progresses. A dirty, dark synth loop that is always slightly changing underlies the track, short wailing synth bits come in and out of the track as they please. As the base of the track is moving forward these different alien abduction synth sounds distract you from the small changes happening. The track is minimal, but keeps me interested, I found out later that the steve kenney track on this tape is an excerpt from a larger drone track from another album of his, which made sense given that when the track ended the first time around, I was left wanting for the track to keep going. I'm assuming the Tarr side of this tape is also a Tarr track from another album, but Tarr's music seems to be harder to find online.

Tarr's "sux by suxwest" (great name) is a rougher noise piece that quickly switches in overall sound, there's a lot going on as different sections of the track are all multi-layered of rich extremely processed sounds that blend with each other to sound like i've been kicked in the head and i'm listening to my brain try and piece itself back together. Parts of this track really are impressive with how much is going on, and similar to Steve Kenney's side of this tape, I was left wanting more of the track. I actually can't find anywhere on the internet where I can find more information on Tarr, but I could find some tracks under his/her alias Drahog. But then again, as with any obscure noise artist. Maybe one day I'll find another Tarr tape in a random record shop similar to how I found this one, and I'll be able to piece together more of Tarr's/Drahog's music.

Both sides of this short tape had my attention throughout, and never really reached parts of repetition that would allow me to wander off. The tape was put out by THIRDSEX. Which I believe is run by Tarr/Drahog, and is Nero Porca Miseria on facebook. Their latest post says that NPM has been terminated. Damn. This goes out to you THIRDSEX/NPM/Tarr/Drahog.

-- Lucas Martinez

MONOL!TH / GOD WALK split (GYM)

What makes a god start fires? Or, better yet, what makes a god start supernovae? That’s more like it – a vast display is more fitting. Then again, if you’re a god, what’s the point at stopping at a supernova? Why not just collapse spacetime and start over? Do something different, maybe? You can do whatever you want if you’re a god, the only being you need to impress is you. You don’t even need to follow the laws of physics if you don’t want to. You created physics, you can break its rules! Who needs a stable Higgs boson? Yeah! Magic power!

MONL!TH makes music for space creation, interstellar blasts of wonderful synth that disturb molecules.

God Walk is the postcreation comedown, the meandering experimental soundtrack for wandering through Eden. Before humans get there to screw it all up. You bunch of greedy jerks. Each artist complements the other, and a wonderful split is born in the cosmos, magnetic tape wound around spools encased in plastic, but these materials have been blessed by a being more powerful than any one of us could possibly imagine. At any rate, this music is huge and must be acknowledged. Preferably through prayerful self-flagellation. Who’s got the cat-o-nine-tails?

By the way, I’ve reviewed this one more fully already at Critical Masses, so check it out and enjoy thoroughly. I’m always happy to revisit this tape.

GYM

--Ryan Masteller