Violets of Dawn

There was a time (shortly after Rev-ola released this cd) when I'd listen to "Violets of Dawn" for hours on end.  That's not a figure of speech, either. I did actually listen to it over and over and over.  In a world of thousands upon thousands of wonderful songs and recordings, to listen obsessively to just one song may seem like a bad use of time but just listen to Mary's voice and you'll hear why I had to.  Have you ever heard a voice so pure in all your life?  Chuck's voice, too, is lovely - soft but certainly not weedy - and the guitar playing and its placement in the mix is perfect.  I'm so glad they didn't crowd the recording with additional needless, distracting instrumentation.   Shamefully, I know nothing about the song's writer, Eric Andersen (time to get reading!), but I do know that his song as recorded in late 1968 by Chuck and Mary Perrin is one of the most bewitchingly beautiful and endlessly comforting things I will ever hear.

Read a little about the lp, including an unexpected namecheck for The Shaggs!) on Chuck's site.  Time-Lag currently has a decidedly non-Mint copy for 450 quid!

Ex Con

Not Unloved asked: Has there been a more enjoyable ear-walloper since Catatonic Youth's mighty "Control My Gun"?

Not Unloved answered: Yes. This!

Released almost a year ago to the day (11th February, 2013 on Bon Voyage Records) but only a part of my life since late December, it's as brutally refreshing a blast of female fronted pop NOISE as I've heard since the days when "Her Jazz", Hole and Royal Trux eviscerated all before them.  All 3 tracks clobber you in the ears and leave you gasping for more.  If Volcanic Tongue hadn't shone a torch on it, I would have been none the wiser.  I guess I'm just lucky that a 20 minute walk away there's a shop run by enthusiasts committed to unearthing the good stuff so that lazy chumps like me don't have to.

CRUISING "You Made Me Do That"

Ever since the early Pavement e.p.'s led my ears towards the crunchy side, a hefty amount of fuzz and distortion allied to a good pop tune is a shortcut to my heart.  On the evidence of "You Made Me Do That",  CRUISING deal in heftier levels of fuzz than most and know their way around a chunky, insistent garage punk tune:

Has there been a more enjoyable ear-walloper since Catatonic Youth's mighty "Control My Gun"?  Not that I've heard (although all suggestions are welcome!).  Hopefully, somebody will feel it incumbent upon them to have it pressed-up on vinyl.  CRUISING boast members of both Girls Names and September Girls so it's no surprise that the first song they've unleashed is such a prime slab of austere scuzz.

Thorn In Her Pride

Have a listen to the intro to King Khan and The Shrines' brilliant "Thorn In Her Pride" (from the belting recent "Idle No More" lp on Merge) and see if you, too, feel the compulsion to scoff a Cadbury's Flake:

The King and his lovingly assembled troupe of reprobates are easily one of the most unforgettable live acts I've had the joy to witness.  Scenes from their 2009 show at Glasgow's Stereo (accurately reviewed here) are branded on my retina to this day.  It was a gloriously kitsch, hootin' an' a hollerin' celebration of old time rock'n'roll kicks. Never in one place, least of all the stage, for long, the King roamed through the crowd taking various band-mates with him.  At one point the keyboard player hauled his vintage Vox or whatever it was onto the roof of the lift adjacent to the stage and played it from there (I hope he had done his online Working In Confined Spaces training beforehand - health and safety is important, after all).  What spectacle! What mayhem! What joy!  King Khan and The Shrines return to Glasgow in April.  I'd feel like a total dud if I missed it.

Space Is The Place (again)

Can it really be true that Windy & Carl have been making records for 20 years?  I guess the fact they are just about to release the "3rd & final installment" of their celebration of their "20th year of releasing music" on their own Blue Flea imprint means that it is!


That single and their adorable recent 7" for The Great Pop Supplement provide ample evidence that they are creating some of the most touching, effortless-sounding music of their career.  "Carnivale" - the B-side of the GPS single - is particularly great and is undoubtedly the single song I've listened to most to date in 2014.  Over a tinkling, all-percussion backing, Windy Weber sings in thee most heavenly voice, foregrounded as never before, about a scene that could have been lifted straight from a David Atttenborough nature documentary:

"Little crabs on hot sand
 Dancing on the hot sand
 Claws outstretched toward the sky
 Snapping claws, feet in time"

It just so exquisitely expresses the wonder of small, everyday things.  Both sides of the Blue Flea release and the A-side of the GPS 7" are more typical of their previous records (shimmering guitars, subdued atmospheres, buried melodies) but done so beautifully and with such understated emotion as to make them career highlights.  With Grouper's steady rise to a certain level of prominence over the last few years, hopefully the conditions are right for Windy & Carl to receive a little more recognition again.  There's no doubt that they deserve it.

Around the time I was first fully immersed in the spectral music of Windy & Carl and their Michigan peers (Fuxa, Auburn Lull, Mahogany, Once Dreamt etc.) I bought a little 4 track cdep of demos by Alison Statton's post-Young Marble Giants group Weekend.  It was flawless from start to finish and seemed to sit just right alongside the similarly elegant music made by those groups.  Earlier today, I was jolted from the tedium of work when I read the Twitter announcement from Norman Records that Blackest Ever Black is set to restore these demos to print, this time on 12" vinyl.  Now the end of February can't come soon enough!

Something Inside

When the reconvened Loop played Edinburgh's The Liquid Rooms in late 2013 they were supported by pummelling psycho-beat merchants The KVB.  Having enjoyed the early 80s housing scheme blues of their lp for Clan Destine, I made a of point of arriving in time to hear their set.  From 7:30pm - crazily early, if you ask me! - they unleashed blast after punishing blast of squalid noise assembled from hollow drum machines, squealing guitars, max-doom synths and submerged male vocals.  It was a wholly exhilarating experience!  At that point I had not yet bought their reissued and expanded "Minus One" record (on The Brian Jonestown Massacre's A Recordings) so I didn't know to pay special attention to the head-scrambling fuzz attack of "Something Inside":

I'm sure they played it and I'm sure it messed with my hair (they were that LOUD!) and my future hearing prospects.  With such darkness abounding it feels like the right time to pick up and then wallow in the sunglasses-after-dark underworld of the recent 39 Clocks vinyl reissue on Luxury Products:

My Secret world - The Story Of Sarah Records

2013 started in fine style with the excitement generated by the release of the trailer for the new Pastels lp.  A year on and it's the release of the trailer for the Sarah Records documentary that has got Not Unloved in a ferment:

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My Secret World - The Story Of Sarah Records. Trailer 2014 from Yes Please! Productions on Vimeo.

Hopefully, the producers will get distribution and their film will be seen.  Visit the film's website here and spread the good word if you can!