Category Archives: UPDATE

WHITE FANG – ‘STEADY TRUCKIN’ FOR SUMMER’
MORE BADASS TUNES FROM OUR BADASS BROS: Four fucking freaks who are so truckin’ ready to shred hard. Childhood friends, White Fang rose to prominence in the Portland underground scene with their infamous live shows and social presence. Formed in 2006, White Fang has toured the United States extensively and has released multiple records on almost every format on both US and foreign labels. Combining their infamous reputation with their totally legendary live performance, White Fang is the essential young-man Rock n’ Roll experience. From youngsters grabbing their first instrument to oldies who thought they were jaded years ago, White Fang will ignite the musical spark inside of you and this tape, released as a split between Burger Records and Fang’s PDX imprint Gnar Tapes, is the perfect tape for you to roll hard thru the summer with, on blast, hella loud.

JOVONTAES – ‘ROLL THE DICE’
Mysterious and prolific psychedelic skate burner unit from the minty hot streets of Lexington, KY return with their 2nd cassette for Gnar Tapes, and first with Burger Records. Easily one of their most breezy but hardest hitting releases in their wide and varied catalog. Made by skater stoner weirdos for skater stoner weirdos. This tape is like the feeling right before the mushrooms come on, as you stand on a dusty cliff overlooking an eternal sunset over a flat and wide cityscape. Spend your Summer cruising with your eyes half closed in that eternal sunset, your shirt flapping in the wind, as the trippy cool sounds of Jovontaes whip you clean. Enter the desert of the mind, roll the dice, and seek the oasis. (Tracks: Burto Fernl, Cold Coffee, Know The Now, Cyclone A Late Bottle Blues, Help Moon, Don’t Die (or die))

THE BOYS AGE – ‘FAKE GOLD’
Gnar Tapes and Burger Records have teamed up once again to offer up another heavenly slice of delicious weirdo pop! This time we are pleased to offer you a Japanese duo so uniquely weird and cute that you won’t know what to do with yourself. Combining a full palette of strange and tasty pop, rock, psych, and twee elements with the bizarre and entrancing accent of singer / multi-instrumentalist Kaznary Mutoh, The Boys Age of Saitama, Japan are truly something unlike anything we’ve heard before. “Fake Gold” is a full, full, full length album; a long player with as varied of sounds as you’d find anywhere. Think Magnetic Fields meets The Pixies meets Beat Happening. Then think of Japan and the two Japanese boys responsible for the strangely catchy and hauntingly beautiful music of The Boys Age. Keep your Summer wild. (Tracks: Painful Twilight Pt. 2, Fake Gold Pt. 1, Wolderful Life, I Wish For God’s Sake, It’s Alright, Gigantic Stamp, Grotesque (Dear Mutual Surveillance Society), Big Wave Coming, Viva La Destiny, Maybe, Will Mind, All Forms Of Life Is DEN DEN, Black Sekka, Mirror Lake, Seabirds Only Knows, The Answer Is There, Painful Twilight Pt. 3 Fake Gold Pt. 3, Show Is Over)

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Phil Julian – ‘York 17/08/2012’ C40
A new nine track chrome C40 cassette w/ download code from Phil Julian, a UK based experimental sound artist/composer/musician. Under both the Cheapmachines alias and his own name, Phil Julian has been venturing across various strains of unorthodox sound since the late 1990′s, with his prolific output on a catalogue of imprints encompassing sonic textures ranging from harsh squalls of noise to compositions structured around hyper-minimalistic timbres and drones. York 17/08/2012 was recorded in The Rymer Auditorium at the Music Research Centre, York University 17th August 2012 using two EMS VCS3 synthesisers. Recorded directly to computer HD, edited for length & re-sequenced, no other instrumentation used. Mastered by Jac Beloeil. Limited to 100 copies only.

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SM052 METZENGERSTEIN – ‘Albero Specchio’ CS
“Metzengerstein is a jam band aiming to develop a form of improvised experimental rock based of the ritual form developed by kraut rock in the ’70 with juxtaposed the research for sonic details derived from electronic music. The result of this blend could be immature at some point but has some ideas of undoubted interest. The side A of this cassette is opened by “1”, the longest track of this release, and his almost quiet guitar drone colored by voices and metallic percussions and the sparse drums and what is seems a saxophone gives a quiet ritual flavor to the whole musical structure until, in the second part, it develops in jazz jam and it ends with a ritual guided by drums. “2” starts with a gentle guitar arpeggio and drums and some distant voices until a synth loop introduce the listener to the final noisy part. The side B is opened by “3” that is based on an oriental mood being driven from a sitar until the guitar drive the track in psychedelic fields. “4” is quiet static and meditative track whose first part is based on the juxtapositon of the drones made by the various instruments and the second features the drum trying to develop the piece in more rock-oriented form. “5” close this cassette with the drums above some guitar noises and a flute loop quickly developed by a flute line and ending quietly in an almost free ritual form and ending with a guitar drone. The repetitiveness of the musical form, typical of this ritual oriented music, is balanced by a careful choice of musical timbres trying to balance the fact that some track seems longer than necessary. However, as is a debut release, it reveals quality that ask the attention of all fans of this genre.” Chain D.L.K. Limited to 50 Cassettes + download

SM054 GEMINI REVOLUTION – ‘Geminids Vol. I’ CS
Gemini Revolution is a three-piece band consisting of Dedric Moore, Delaney Moore, and Mika Tayana. Originally formed as an off-shoot of the local Kansas City based Monta At Odds, the trio have become a creative force of expression ranging from indie rock to avant jazz to dub and ambient. Gemini Revolution have released two EPs, a full length LP on Canadian label Upstairs Recordings, and were selected to perform at Pop Montreal last November, 2012. Limited to 100 Cassettes + download

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Aqua Dentata – ‘Ten Thousand Wooden Faces’ CDr
‘Ten Thousand Wooden Faces’ is the sixth release by Hackney drone anomaly, Aqua Dentata, recorded during the first half of June. Based around a minimal set-up of synthesizers, strings and occasional household miscellany, ‘Ten Thousand Wooden Faces’ is a dense, textural odyssey of meditative surrealism and curious abstractions. Limited to 77 copies, with tactile cardboard inlays. How does a crashing door dress?

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RUSSIAN TSARLAG – ‘GAGGED IN BOONESVILLE’ LP
providence’s pride and confusion, carlos gonzales, returns with
another expansive sleepwalk through the halls of mystic delirium.
broken music for broken brains. attention LA: Tsarlag plays live
TONIGHT and TMRW!! google for details.

HIGH WOLF – ‘KAIROS: CHRONOS’ LP
france’s passport-burning snake-charmer collages all his favorite
magic eye designs into a returnal tapestry of aztec fantasy,
heatstroke-psych, and burning vines. his best record, period.

ENSEMBLE ECONOMIQUE – ‘FEVER LOGIC’ LP
co-captain starving weirdo brian pyle steers his solo vessel into increasingly lightless ritual trenches, heavy with exiled electric guitar, prisoner electronics, and keening final witness vox. descension blues for losing touch.

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PHR-104 SEWN LEATHER – ‘Ροαξη Φινγερζζ ΒΣ. Ροψκ Σλινγερζζ’ 1-sided LP 15€(EU)/18€(World)
Sewn Leather is a trigger, a road warrior, the punk that can be smoked. Somewhere between Whitehouse nihilism, Wolf Eyes’ high pitched suffocation and evil Prodigy rhythmology, Griifin Pyn re-invents the 21st century punk! On ‘Ροαξη Φινγερζζ ΒΣ. Ροψκ Σλινγερζζ’, he offers his four latest (and yet cleanest) songs, soaked in battery acid, swallow-ready for the confusion generation. Sewn Leather is real. Edition of 200 copies w/ 1-color offset covers.

PHR-103 BUDALAH/DEAD TRAVELLER split C40 6€
Muddy, nihilistic freak-out non-musical jamz from Thessaloniki’s mysterious trio Budalah (neither Buddha nor Allah) and an archival dictaphones and mics performance by Dead Traveler (Nicolas Malevitsis from Absurd fame) at Modern Art Museum of Skopje, 2004. Everything sounds so wrong to be true. Edition of 70 cassettes w/ on-body printing.

PHR-102 SARONGS s/t C30 6€
Sarongs were a 5-piece from Syracuse, New York which shook things up w/ sweaty DIY house shows and an awkward sound which confused everyone. When all other bands were dealing w/ playful garage warmth, Sarongs were making stripped-down minimal prog w/ doses of post punk, witty lyrics and raw, focused energy. Always true, often political, way ahead of their times. This is a reissue of the first Sarongs cassette that was released in 2011 by Prison Art / Velidoxi Records, not to be confused w/ the also eponymous LP that followed a year later. Edition of 100 cassettes w/ on-body printing and multi-fold j-card w/ excerpts of the only Sarongs interview, courtesy of “Bande a Part” zine.

PHR-101 TOM CRUISIN’ – ‘The Drifter’s Almanac’ 3″CDr 6€
This is the kind of music you should be listening while driving your car in a big metropolitan city, way deep into the night. City looks abandoned but you feel there’s a pulse hidden somewhere. A duet, sounds a bit like a Suicide cover band, is playing at the lowest basement downtown. So loud and so low, the tires bouncing over asphalt vibrations caused by groovebox pumps and fiendish electricity. It’s the sound of the city itself. A city which looks different every morning but is always the same at night. Edition of 70 copies w/ artwork and disc attached on heavy cardstock.

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Machine Circuit/DJ U – ‘700112462481’ split C64 $6
700112462481 represents a barcode, a machine readable representation of data. Numbers and lines that form meaning only when interpreted through mechanics. Machine Circuit and DJ U fill out this split tape as an illustration of how mechanics can be interpreted, repositions, and reinterpreted. Machine Circuit is the collaboration of Igor Amokian and Big Epoch. The circuit bent master crafts his own distorted delusion of tweaked toys and noise that escalate and fall in-between the cracks of beats and production of Big Epoch. The longevity is rendered and kept in time, cleanly drained and fringed. DJ U deconstructs the already deconstructed. A further exploration of the work of ’89palms of who he represents one half of, DJ U’s remixes are reminiscent of the broken LP style but limits to vocal constraints and develops its own dubbed out destroyed sonic sounds. The two groups stand alone as distinct albums, but placed side by side they compliment one another and provide a very unique blend of machine readable representation of sound. Machine Circuit is from Los Angeles and DJ U finds Seattle as his home. Limited to 60 yellow cassettes.

P X A/Felix Castenzio – ‘Phases’ split C40 $6
Phases is one of the most beautiful releases we have had the pleasure to be part of, from the album artwork and cassette to the split sounds of P X A and Felix Castenzio. We begin with the retro feel of P X A, a project of Astro Nautico’s Paolo Xz. The mixes dance like silk dresses on a spring day, they are so light and rolling, it is an emotional decay, the perfect way to end a hard day and the perfect moments of relaxation. We are fortunate to have this Brooklyn based artist develop such a meditative relaxation piece, like glass gently tapping on ice, or the clink clink of champaign, the moment before sleep overcomes, the drag of the day dissipates like ripples in water. Felix Castenzio fuses the sounds of the 80’s and 90’s into a formable cool respite from the summer’s heat. The feeling of the air conditioner on a hot body after returning from long-boarding or a quick game of tennis with your girlfriend and her white short shorts, this just feels right. It is all timed out like a distant buzz of a lawnmower or the lucid dreams from a nap in the hot son. Its the moments of bubbling bliss that makes this lo-fi soundscape sensational. Limited to 60 c40 pink tint cassettes.

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NR-008 Abstinentiadivinorum – ‘Hopelessness/Benzedrine’ 2xC90 $10(US)
In this 2xC90 are some of the darkest drones and soundscapes to grace magnetic tape. Abstinentiadivinorum is a project hailing from Russia by Viktoria Mengele, and centers around very longform drone pieces that are rich with emotion and texture. The command the listeners attention and yet lull them. The feeling of imminent doom. Pulsating pain. For anyone who enjoys drone and dark ambient. Limited to 25 copies on black and white hand labeled tapes, with full color double sided three panel artwork by Viktoria herself.

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Dylan Ethier – ‘Nightly Exchange’ $5
“Tape reconstruction of saturated analogue electronic patterns focusing, through fragmentation, on the exchange between lucidity and loss. Recorded September 2011- February 2012 in Nashville, Tennessee. Edition of 100. Includes high fidelity download. An alternate version of nightly exchange was presented as an interactive installation on march 9, 2012 in Nashville, TN in collaboration with the exhibition titled Nest curated by Molly Lahym. The installation involved real time collaging of deteriorating 1/4″ tape recordings. These recordings were then looped / manipulated between three tape machines at various speeds which additionally subtly triggered synthesized video projections. Presented inside a structure of black fabric and wood, exhibitors were free to further manipulate the audio / visual content. The intent here was in utilizing found materials in the process of constructing a creative and meditative environment.”

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Duckyousucker – ‘OF TOMORROW’ C15 $2
Edition of 100. Duckyousucker is a San Francisco-based trio utilizing samplers, saxophone, drums, and guitar. While many of their songs are instrumental, to call them simply post-rock is a long way off. They pull from a rich canon of influences, summoning the spirits of Pharoah Sanders and Gilberto Gil, unleashing the Melting Paraiso UFO. Looped samples nucleate grooves that weave throughout densely layered textures. Before you know it, dance happens.

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