Sunday, May 6, 2018

Garbage Man - Tobacco Bong Rips [Personal Militia/Forbidden Place]/Slush - Frog Water [Personal Militia]

When a package showed up from Sheboygan, WI, I thought it might be some Gus Polinski & The Kenosha Kickers reissues. I was wrong. So wrong.

Garbage Man - Tobacco Bong Rips [Personal Militia/Forbidden Place]
This ain't news anyone but there's a lot of irony in music these days. Not so with Garbage Man. They named their band Garbage Man and they sound like a band named Garbage Man. Tobacco Bong Rips is a double-A-side cassette-turned-sludge barge zippin' down the Mississippi. The guitar player's named Nick Duude, the bass player's named Roach and the drummer's named Jeff, so you know you're in the right place.
This thing is heavy on the bass frequencies, at least on my system. The guitar and bass are nearly indistinguishable creating a thick fuzzy morass on "Hillbilly Kick Squad" punctuated by the pop of the snare drum and Duude trying to shout above the racket.  The 49 second "Dinners" and "Engine" drift more into hardcore territory while "Sea Shanty for Planet Hopping" delves into some straight up metal riffing. Somewhat ironically, my favorite track is the "bonus" entitled "Belinda Would Make a Good Car Aisle" which is less Melvins, more 90s Touch & Go.
The bottom line is simple: Garbage Man lives to pummel. There aren't many hooks here, so only listen if you want to get thumped. Don't worry, the bloody nose is normal.
There is one big no-no here though, dudes you gotta get your spine right side-up next time around.
Nab the tape here or if you prefer your sludge served on a platter you can pre-order Tobacco Bong Rips on a blue and red 7" at the same link. But no "Belinda" on that one so choose wisely.


Slush - Frog Water [Personal Militia]
While we're on the subject of band names, "Slush"instantly evokes the vibe here sounding like some short-lived slumrock outfit that split a 7" on AmRep in '93 and disappeared. That sort of gets you in the general range, but Slush, to their credit, throw a staggering number of curveballs making it difficult to actually identify what the hell they are.
The 80 second blast "Your Place" kicks things off in style, riding a relentless riff that sounds like it's emanating from a battery powered amp. Slush quickly shift gears to a heavily 'verbed organ-driven surf ditty called "Predator" topped off with plenty of ride cymbal. The singer is barely a blur in the midst of everything. Didn't see that one coming.
Much like their brothers in Garbage, Slush shows a hardcore side on "H.O.L.E."--but not content to be merely conventional, I'm pretty sure they've stuck a trumpet in the mix somewhere. The title track makes be think Slush might just be fucking with me with a long-ass intro chugging along on a cello riff and some cackling right out of the 60s spooky surf  genre. If the Bomboras could get a major label record deal, why can't these guys? I didn't even mention that the eventual frenetic riot marking the middle of the track ultimately breaks up into a weird lounge act.
"Losing" is maybe even the most unexpected track (are those 7th chords?) with a surprising bit of Strokes-vibes (circa the one good album they made) with a reasonably compact space-prog conclusion. I don't know what's going on but I'm feelin' it.
"Victim" gets your head throbbing again malformed into a degenerative half-breed of "Zoo Music Girl" and Faith No More-style jitter metal. Sweet. They wrap Side A with a campfire singalong "In the Junkyard" because of course they would.
Opening the second side, "To Mind or Care" dips back into those space-prog vibes lead by echoing piano strikes and militant snare rolls hitting the post-rock power ballad target with ease. The average song length just about doubles on the flip so Side B brings different, more expansive and/or dirge-like vibes than the spunky, agitated Side A. The final track is an unholy collision of 50's doo-wop ballad and arena metal rave up, and, yeah, it's about as strange as that sounds.
All in all, this is a weird weird and warmly welcome dose of mad rock & roll science.
Slurp some Slushy Frog Water here.

Friday, May 4, 2018

Ivy Meadows - Zodiac [Moon Glyph]/Capricorn Vertical Slum - "Various Portals & Sleazo Inputs Vol. 1: Tourism" [Moon Glyph]

We have a salty/sweet astrological double feature on the docket this evening from the Bay Area's preeminent lunar linguists at Moon Glyph. Let's get to it.

Ivy Meadows - Zodiac [Moon Glyph]
The praises of this one have already been sung by much sharper individuals than I, so I'm not sure how helpful me chiming in is, but that's a question I've asked since AO's inception. Why answer it now?
From the first glimpse of Zodiac my antennas were up: (1) We've got a handsomely packaged tape with a watercolor of a spirit woman (wrong term I'm sure) on the cover with the scrawled subtitle "Magic is life." (2) We've got a heavy dose of the astrology horseshit that I've spent nearly 30 years ignoring in the form of 12 tracks each named for a sign of the zodiac. (3) And, perhaps most importantly of all, this is a long-ass tape. (Hard to tell with pro-dubs but probably a c-90.) I was all ready to write the "how many fucking 90 minute neo-New-New-Age cassettes do we actually need on our cramped shelves?" think piece which I'm sure would have gone over swimmingly. Ivy Meadows threw a wrench in my plans, however, because after a few listens I gotta say this is good stuff. Meadows a.k.a. Camilla Padgitt-Coles is clearly very skilled at crafting these ethereal wisps and imbuing them with gravity (I've heard legions of mediocre drones in my day, so it's easy to spot talent when I hear it.) She doesn't just drench everything in reverb and call it good. Rather, Padgitt-Coles finds the right balance between too-little and too-much nearly every time. And this thing just sounds stellar (props to Zeljko McMullen's mastering as well).
The extent of my criticism of Zodiac is simply that it's too long. "Taure" is nice but I don't need 9 minutes of it. With the most unambiguous rhythms on display, "Géminis" gets the blood pumping near the middle of the album which is welcome but it could stand a bit of editing as well. Yet, because I'm forever the hypocrite, the longest track "Capricorn" may actually be my favorite. Go figure, I'm just a mixed up kid.
 As with all things this comes down to taste, some folks wanna jam out to the dulcet tones of Zodiac for an hour and a half, other folks (me) would rather have an abridged c-30 but the vibes are good ones nonetheless.
Grab the tape from Moon Glyph here.

   
Capricorn Vertical Slum - "Various Portals & Sleazo Inputs Vol. 1: Tourism" [Moon Glyph]
Sticking with the zodiac theme, we move on to Capricorn Vertical Slum. The stars aligned for me on this one (is that how astrology works?) as I came across this cassette of an early Moon Glyph vintage (MG13 if you're a nerd) during some bandying about the state earlier in the year. The differences from Ivy Meadows are stark, but I always welcome differences into my tape deck.
In fact, the vibes fit well within the "that's my shit" zone. Buzzy, scuzzy, slob-on-the-outside/savant-on-the-inside hand smeared tunes. Probably a lazy comparison but Psychedelic Horseshit popped to mind, though CVS eschews the against-the-grain, "fuck you" petulance for a more eager-to-please beating pop heart. In particular, "Palatial Estates in Wallpaper" and "The Best Cocaine in the Canyon" are wisely indebted to Marc Bolan's bubblegum stomp and it doesn't take a lot of squinting to imagine a different version of rock history featuring a teenage T. Rex whittling away on his Tascam during the summer of 1989. Even the ballad on the b-side is really a well-formed change of pace in the bedroom genius mold. Eight good songs, zero bad ones, no time wasted, thumbs up. I wish reviewing music was always this easy.
And now for the bad news, according to Discogs, there hasn't been any new music from Capricorn Vertical Slum (or its single credited member, Colin Johnson) in eight long years. Basically, where the fuck is Various Portals & Sleazo Inputs Vol. 2? What gives, Universe?
You are in luck however, because these suckers are still for sale on Moon Glyph's website for a lowly fiver. Act on your impulse here.