#Jim Keefe

[nerds-yearbook]

On March 16, 2003 King Features ran their final new Sunday Strip of "Flash Gordon", which had ran from 1934. (Real Life Event)

[dirtyriver]

As usual, Francesco Marciuliano can't resist tearing down that poor 4th wall.

Sally Forth, May 19, 2023

[prehistoric-superheroes]

Some Christmas merriment from some legends by Jim Keefe!

[comicsbyte]

Shakti Comics Set 13

Shakti Comics Set 13 featuring The Phantom and Flash Gordon!

Shakti Comics

#ComicsByte #phantom #flashgordon #shakticomics #newrelease #preorder #ThePhantom

[smashedpages]

Happy birthday to Jim Keefe!

[jedivoodoochile]

The Phantom & Tarzan by Jim Keefe.

[goodbysunball]

You can really feel like you're here

As usual, it's been a minute, but still handling and playing large plastic discs on the regular. A nice variety for June, whether you want to scream at the void or bask in repetition or curl up and smoke ciggies. A short list of off-the-cuff 2024 favorites is at the bottom, too, for the short attention spans.

Arianne Churchman & Benedict Drew, MAY 2xLP (Love's Devotee)

A tip of the hat to Matt K.'s ever-reliable Yellow Green Red for hipping me to this record, something that on paper I would generally pass up but plays out like an invigorating fever dream across four sides of wax. Stealing from the label's writeup: "MAY employs at its base a flank of analog synthesizers, field recordings and Churchman’s layered vocals, each combining to form a beautifully dizzy sonic collage that often spirals out across long durations into hypnotic rhythms and jubilant melodies." The magic is in how the duo manages to effectively take the same trick, going from folk song to swelling grandeur, on nearly every track while still retaining the same sense of wonder. Though, for me, it was the marathon opener, "The Cuckoo," that really did the trick for me the first listen. In a sense, "The Cuckoo" is the line in the sand, as the way it unfolds is much darker and dissonant than anything else on the record, and the dissonance hangs around for a healthy chunk of time. After that, the record basks in the sun, meadows and valleys, Churchman's vocals ceding to the environment of buzzing and gently swaying synthesizer. Something like "Down by the Green Groves" sounds like a Broadcast record or tape left in the sun for weeks, then played at half-speed as it disintegrates. "Day Song" sounds like a properly warped rendition of something off The Wicker Man soundtrack, a fiddle or banjo plucking a melody over plodding drums and sighing, sawing synthesizers. Only "Searching For May" returns slightly to the dissonance found on "The Cuckoo," the titular search turning into slightly desperate yearning, but on the whole MAY is shot through with an appropriate amount of sun-baked awe for the natural world. Experiencing the record on headphones while walking along a beach felt deeply spiritual, as cheesy as that may sound; but the sounds contained here seem designed to be played or experienced in open spaces, to commingle with their inspiration. Outta nowhere gem, and limited to only 350 copies, surely not long for this world once word leaks out.

Matt Krefting, Finer Points (Open Mouth)

The latest from tape manipulator/sound sculptor/Idea Fire Co.-man Matt Krefting, quietly released back in January on Bill Nace's Open Mouth label. This is the first solo outing I've heard from him since the Lymph Est LP on Kye, and it's a stunner, albeit one that skews somber and unadorned. Matt works in a sound world that's been done to death in the last decade or so: tape loops, brittle scrapes and plucks, lonesome mechanical hums, and some keys/synth sprinkled in ("An Eye on the Future," heartbreaking) to soften the landing. In the hands of most, that's a combo you can safely miss, but Krefting has the skill and restraint to make the sounds inviting, enveloping and captivating the listener. The bassy plucking on "A Double Request" feels of a piece with Robert Turman's Flux, but the sounds double back on themselves, twisting the strings into a net to capture your body while your mind wanders. The same goes for "Both This Life and the Next," which even includes the mbira heard across Flux, but there Krefting lets the tape distortion seep in and eventually consume the slow progression of notes. When he wades into field recordings or drone, the sounds feel removed from the action, sometimes foggy ("Let's Look Again") and sometimes deliberately encased in glass, perhaps a not-so-uplifting commentary on screens and devices displacing human-to-human contact. In that sense, the record feels more empathetic than most in the genre, choosing to engage with the darker, depressive emotions rather than cloak them in distortion and remove all human trace. As far as contemporary reference points go, Finer Points reminds me of Incipientium, but less cold and bleak and more tender, as if handling century-old artifacts and recognizing a common humanity. The feather-light synth on "Just to Have Him Around" closes the record, the sun easing up in the sky after a particularly stormy night, a splash of faint yellow to the decidedly fuzzy gray that colors most of Finer Points. Great reading soundtrack, and for those willing to go deeper, a rich, sensuous landscape that comes out just fine on the other side. Sold out from the label, but Forced Exposure somehow still has a few of the original 200 copies.

Thou, Umbilical LP + 7" (Sacred Bones)

Much respect for the grind of Thou, a band that's somehow both risen from and stayed true to DIY ethics, draped in scathing philosophizing and often wretchedly heavy music. (The Sisters in Christ record store rules, too.) For various reasons, I haven't followed the band closely in the past decade, but the outta nowhere collaboration with Mizmor, Myopia, bested both groups' recent works in my estimation, a sound that married Thou's heaving sludge with Mizmor's black metal, each pushing the other to more violent extremes. The press release teased that Umbilical was Thou's hardcore record, and while I guess that's relatively true due to the shorter song lengths and, on some tracks, a discernible verse-chorus structure ("The Promise"), the LP plays out like a singles compilation. It’s as if Thou returned to the days where they released a split with anyone every other month. If you, like me, are a fan of Thou songs like "Smoke Pigs" and "Don't Vote," you'll find a lot to like on Umbilical, easily the band's best record since Summit. The idea behind the record is vocalist Bryan Funck criticizing himself and Thou in the guise of a much younger, more militantly DIY or anarchistic version of himself. The lyrics are vicious, and the music shows up prepared for the evisceration: "I Return as Chained and Bound to You" ranks as one of Thou's heaviest, recalling the Their Hooves Carve Craters in the Earth 10", and "Lonely Vigil" drags the listener through quicksand with its crawling, crushing riffs. "House of Ideas" meanders at the end for a little too long, but this is a lean, tight record, worthy of all wild and tired descriptors that basically say "heavy" over and over. The physical package includes a 7" with two more tracks, both leaning more toward crowded punk tempos, riffs buried in the maelstrom of Funck's shredded vocals. That the two tracks were placed on to a 7" makes them feel more like afterthoughts, which they're not, but when the eight-song LP is properly satisfying, it probably means it's not a 7" I'll be revisiting often (even if the end of "Unbidden Guest" rules). Umbilical is a spoil of riches in that sense, an appropriately crushing soundtrack to vitriolic self-flagellation that reinvigorates an old sound with new twists.

Verity Den, s/t LP (Amish Records)

It took me a long while to check out Verity Den's LP, something I quickly bookmarked months back, but it's been played to death the last few weeks in my hut. The trio from Carrboro, NC use loud, gauzy guitars like their shoegaze forebears, and their songs patiently unfurl like the smoke from a snuffed candle. From the opening chords ringing out on "Washer/Dryer," it's clear this band isn't the ten-thousandth rehash of Loveless but something much more strange; Casey Proctor's vocals flutter on the surface like Meg Baird's in Heron Oblivion, and the lyrics unexpectedly leave a dark, wet trail, knocking the listener off-kilter. A track like the gorgeous "Prudence," featuring some beautifully hesitant and restrained guitar work, somehow has with the opening lines "Broke-ass ho/where'd he go?/Owes me dough," while other song titles like "Crush Meds" and "Everyone Thought You Were Dead" point to a much bleaker launching point for these songs than the end result does. An exception might be "Other People," which glides along on a motorik beat, the subtle chord change at the chorus causing chills both times it hits. The LP is a collection of separately released tracks or releases, but only the relatively conventionally structured "Priest Boss" feels slightly out of place, though it's clear the song is woven into the fabric of the record when the title's repeated in the lyrics of "Other People" later on. Verity Den plays out like settling in to the pleasant buzz of a second beer, but doesn't dissuade stormier currents from running through your brain. Extremely strong and affecting debut; fans of True Widow, Mount Trout or the aforementioned Heron Oblivion would do well to check in with Verity Den posthaste.

Water Damage, In E 2xLP (12XU)

Water Damage quickly follow up last year's incredible 2 Songs with In E, a new double-LP of their raison d'être: heaving, droning repetition delivered at maximum volume. Might be the inclusion of a violin this time around, but In E feels lot more classical than the band's previous work, slowly shifting away from "rock" and evolving into a proper ensemble, albeit one with a heavy reliance on feedback. There's one song per side here, the last being a perfectly fine cover of "Ladybird" by Shit & Shine, but one that adds little to the ground covered by the first three tracks. Grayson Haver Currin accurately labeled the record "a rare mind eraser for our increasingly plugged-in times," and that's really the calling card for the band's discography. "Reel E" kicks off the record, the ensemble swelling over the same drumbeat for the duration. Feedback, guitar and violin saw away at the ever-expanding mass, sometimes combining to sound like the wheels of a train scraping against its metal track. It's my favorite thing the band's done so far, powerful and invigorating minimalism pushed to the red, capable of blotting out everything wrong in your sphere for 20 minutes. Things slow a little on "Reel EE," the drums left alone for the first few minutes, until everyone else kicks in to create an ecstatic drone that seems to continue rising upward forever. "Reel EEE" feels the most wide-open, taking five minutes for the drums to lock in, featuring stabs of guitar cut short in deference to the shrill flute/violin combo. The band shows an uncommon restraint on "EEE," but after "Reel E," it feels like Water Damage peeling back the layers lessens the smothering, mind-altering effect of their best tracks. A group like Incapacitants can blast away the listener on every track and I still own multiple records by 'em; seems like Water Damage could do the same if they wanted. Still, there's no arguing that In E is a powerful statement, the whole record buzzing, simmering and occasionally screaming with the ecstasy of repetition, something that a lucky few get to experience this summer and fall as the group plays a few dates outside of Texas. If the heat doesn't make you have visions, I've little doubt that Water Damage and In E will do the trick.

Favorites of 2024 so far:

42 Dugg, "Wock N Red"

Bobby Would, Relics of Our Life LP (Digital Regress)

Thomas Bush, The Next 60 Years (Jolly Discs)

Chief Keef & Mike WiLL Made-It, Dirty Nachos (43B/Eardrummer/RBC)

Arianne Churchman & Benedict Drew, MAY 2xLP (Love's Devotee)

Contaminated, Celebratory Beheading LP (Blood Harvest)

Klonns, Heaven LP (Iron Lung)

Matt Krefting, Finer Points LP (Open Mouth)

Light Metal Age, s/t CS (self-released)

Jim Marlowe, Mirror Green Rotor In Profile CS (Medium Sound)

Phill Niblock, Looking For Daniel CD (Unsounds)

Pain Appendix, Manuhypnoz CD (Freak Animal)

REALYUNGPHIL, Niontay & Surf Gang, "Halftones/Amnesia"

Verity Den, s/t (Amish)

YKSI, Ultrasensory Exploration CD (Freak Animal)

[dustedmagazine]

Dust Volume 8, Number 12

Blood Incantation (but not Blood/Incantation)

Dusted closes out 2022 with blood and incantation.

Specifically, this Dust features two separate recordings with identical band names, one a split release by a pair of metal bands, one named Blood, the other Incantation, the other also metal but more atmospheric whose name is Blood Incantation.  It’s a lot of blood. A lot of incantation.

But never fear if your tastes are less sanguinary. We’ve also got experimental klezmer, power pop, sound art, new weird traditionalism, synth pop, deep house, death metal and jazz both free and more traditional. This edition’s contributors include Bryon Hayes, Jennifer Kelly, Bill Meyer, Jonathan Shaw, Ian Mathers, Patrick Masterson and Jim Marks.

Baltic Furs — Contemporary Ruin (Round Bale Recordings)

Contemporary Ruin by Baltic Furs

For its final release of 2022, the Minnesota-based Round Bale Recordings label offers a cassette from someone in its inner circle. Baltic Furs is the alter ego of Matt Irwin, a graphic designer whose optical artistry enswathes some of the label’s output. Irwin is a drummer-cum-synthesist whose aural hue leans toward the inky black end of the spectrum. On Contemporary Ruin, both Irwin’s percussionist origins and his tendency toward the inchoate are on display. Dreamlike, dimly lit images attempt to bring themselves into focus as warped, bell-shaped tones emanate from unholy objects. Irwin is signalling the coming of an impending disaster: it could be the end of the world or a demon emerging from its resting place. He’s happy to let the listener decide their fate. The latter half of the cassette begets emergent strains of melody that seem to brighten as the music runs its course. The tenderness is nascent and without form, but it’s also indicative that Contemporary Ruin is the first page in the next chapter of Irwin’s engaging narrative.

Bryon Hayes

 Black Ox Orkestar — Everything Returns (Constellation)

Everything Returns by Black Ox Orkestar

Even when it dances, klezmer has a melancholic air. It commemorates, after all, a Jewish-East European culture that flourished despite centuries of persecution until ending, abruptly, in the Holocaust. True, Jewish emigres brought this rollicking but wistful concoction of clarinet and fiddle, elegy and celebration, with them in the diaspora. It reached, even, the experimental precincts of Montreal, where members of Godspeed You! Black Emperor and Thee Silver Mt. Zion formed Black Ox Orkestar in the early aughts, then left it fallow for a decade and a half. Everything Returns is their lovely (and timely) return, a pensive exploration of cross-cultural discourse that melds Jewish, gypsy, Arab and European traditions in bittersweet rumination. This is music made of shadows and sighs, but ready, nonetheless, for the fight. It’s opening salvo, “Tish Nign,” layers wordless vocals over piano, then gathers its strength in martial cadences of bass clarinet. “Skotshne” sparkles with cimbalom, a dulcimer-like instrument with a ghostly echo; it skitters over a skeletal foundation of drums and acoustic bass. But it’s “Viderkol” that stops you short, a dusky lament hedged in by the low hum of clarinet, a run of piano. Even sung in English, it has a foreign, historical aura, as the principals remember the lost with the gentlest, least bitter sort of sadness. “There’s something in us that could make us whole,” they sing, and maybe they mean music and remembering.

Jennifer Kelly

 Blood/Incantation — Split 7” (Hell’s Headbangers)

Not Blood Incantation, but Blood and Incantation (see what they did there?) collaborate on this divertingly atavistic split record. Blood Incantation seems to provide the newest front opened in the Hipster Metal Wars — and to be honest, this reviewer can’t really fault the offended (“ambient death metal?”). If anyone might have any sort of right to defend the traditional boundaries of the kingdom of Metal ov Death, the dudes in Blood might be able to claim it. The German band has been making records since 1986, and the two new tracks on this split record are still the same old moldy stuff, a grinding, guttural assault on good taste. Incantation is by contrast the fresher face, having only started releasing music 1990—but the band certainly has the bigger name. Their tune, “Quantum Firmament,” is also the more engaging side of the split. Whether you find this record to be more than a sort of scenester-snarky, vinyl-mediated pun may depend on the degree of your interest in Incantation’s music; if you dig the band, “Quantum Firmament” is worth hearing.

Jonathan Shaw 

 Blood Incantation — Timewave Zero (Century Media)

Denver death metal psychonauts Blood Incantation have never concealed their love of ambient, cosmische, new age synths, et al. They also were clear even before putting out their second record Hidden History of the Human Race that their third would be their own entry into those fields. A 40-minute, two-track EP, Timewave Zero has (based on comments) clearly come as an unpleasant surprise to a grouchy, vocal minority of their existing fanbase. but those more into avowed influence Klaus Schulze than blastbeats, death metal growls and intense riffs will find that Blood Incantation know what they’re doing. This isn’t just the quartet noodling around with some neat synth sounds; there’s pacing, sculpting and evidence of a compositional eye on both halves of the EP. Timewave Zero, then, is admirable on multiple fronts, both as a totally solid record and as evidence of a band determined to follow its muse even in the face of requests to keep making more of the same.

Ian Mathers 

 Dazy — OUTOFBODY (Lame-O)

OUTOFBODY by Dazy

Power pop is harder than it looks. It balances on a knife edge between crusty fuzz and open-hearted tunefulness, and it’s easily tipped towards noise or daffiness. But James Goodson, out of Richmond, gets the blend just about right, a bit to the sweet side of Teenage Fan Club, a bit more muscular than the Raspberries. Indeed, the buzzy, frictive “On My Way” sounds like the Dirtbombs crossed with James, which is to say gloriously clangorous but with its earnest heart showing. “Motionless Parade” swoons and jangles in the vein of True West and the Rain Parade, while “Choose Your Ramone” hilariously amps it up, with a blistering, squalling guitar solo that is neither Joey nor Johnny. Goodson may never be a big star (or a Big Star), but it’s fun watching him try.

Jennifer Kelly

 Bruno Duplant — Nox (Unfathomless)

nox by Bruno Duplant

Art reckons with life on Nox, which is one of the nine full-length recordings that the ultra-productive French sound artist has realized in 2022. The artist’s statement references observations, both recent and antique, of certain bad navigational habits of humans, to wit, they closely circle things that will scorch them. At least moths, who aren’t noted for their brain mass, have an excuse… But even if you aren’t acquainted with the musician’s intent, you’re likely to grasp this immersive, 40-minute-long piece’s intimations of decay. Gathered and generated sounds creak, crackle, and bob around the listener like the chunks of debris that swirled around your surfboard that one time you fell asleep on the beach at low tide and woke up in the middle of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

Bill Meyer

 Kelman Duran — “Loko” (self-released)

Kelman Duran is a low-key LA-based Dominican producer who’s made his name on art school dancehall and reggaeton edits, notably 2017’s excellent 1804 Kids. But “Loko” is another animal, blisteringly zooted deep house filth all taut and suspended in that leery-eyed fork in the road where the head says no and makes the good decision but the heart speaks louder, beats yes, makes an ellipsis for you to fill in. Adriana Roslin’s epileptic video (in which she appears, by the way) is the perfect accompaniment, exuding the self-assured swagger of a fashion school grad-turned-social media manager by day and club rat queen by night; you’ll see what I mean when you watch. It’s unclear if this is a brief diversion from his usual speed or a turn toward a more permanent 4/4 producing mode, but either way, Duran has left one of the best dance tracks of 2022 rather late in the going. How late? Consider: At the time I write this, Dust is scheduled to go live in about two hours; “Loko” has been up for less than 24. But we weren’t going to miss out. You shouldn’t, either.

Patrick Masterson

 Family Ravine — Jumpthefox (Round Bale Recordings)

Jumpthefox by Family Ravine

With his Family Ravine project, Kevin Cahill navigates a similar path to that of Henry Flynt, welding his avant-garde sensibility to traditional musical styles. Jumpthefox follows hot on the heels of Away & Instinct, and both records document Cahill’s polyglot approach to music making. The musician has created an Interzone-like fusion of American, British and European folk forms, which he has processed through his tireless creative instinct. Cahill builds a fluid-like loam from loops and fragments, which he layers repeatedly into a strange topography. Working primarily with stringed instruments and melodica, Cahill materializes his songs in a spectrum of shades, from shimmering and bright to muted and foreboding. It must be magical to hear his songs being crafted in real time, but we’ll have to settle for experiencing the finished product. This writer is certainly not complaining.

Bryon Hayes

  Hot Chip — Freakout/Release (Domino)

Consistent quality is a great asset for a band and a thrill for fans, but it can have the opposite of a silver lining for us music writers. Freakout/Release is another topnotch set of emotionally mature, sometimes melancholy synthpop bangers from the now sort-of-venerable Hot Chip (their eighth!). It’s not as if they’re not trying new things, heck here you actually hear a couple of guest vocalists (Lou Hayter on “Hard to Be Funky” and a blistering Cadence Weapon on “The Evil That Men Do”) and the title track is more rough-and-tumble than the Chip usually gets. “Down” rides a Universal Togetherness Band sample to dancefloor glory, while tracks like the hopeful “Broken” and the gossamer “Not Alone” show their more emotive strengths. It’s another great record in a career full of them, and if it’s hard to know what more to say, it feels unfair to them to leave it at that.

Ian Mathers

 Keefe Jackson / Jim Baker /Julian Kirschner — Routines (Kettlehole)

Routines by Keefe Jackson / Jim Baker / Julian Kirshner

Routines? I don’t know. On the one hand, the title might acknowledge that the three musicians on the album can, either together or separately, be counted upon to be heard in some small space that hosts Chicagoan improvisers, on a pretty routine basis. But the music itself is far from routine, unless you want to take a step back and acknowledge that each musician habitually figures out apposite responses to any given situation. Jim Baker can be relied upon to completely change any sound environment with a pivot of his seat, since that will determine whether one is going to hear his restlessly assertive voice on the piano and or the ozone-scorching sizzles he obtains from his ARP 2600. Keefe Jackson can likewise be counted upon to be equally engaged playing either sopranino or tenor saxophone, but lightning disruption he launches from the first differs profoundly from the mercurial forcefulness he summons on the second. Kirshner can also be expected to keep things moving without lapsing into cliché. But the trio keeps enough variables in play that you’ll never know quite how the music is going to get from start to end.

Bill Meyer

 Philip Jeck — Resistenza (Touch)

Resistenza by Philip Jeck

Touch has never been about staying in the past, so it makes sense that the firm would experiment with new formats. Resistenza is a digital-only recording issued on what would have been the 70th birthday of the late Philip Jeck, whose passing was just one of those that has made 2022 an especially rough slog. It’s simultaneously a bit sad and quite poetic that the first (and hopefully not last) posthumous release by an artist whose work was all about the stubborn physicality of vinyl would be a non-physical edition. It comprises two live recordings, both made in 2017-18. The more recent is “Live in Torino,” a fittingly ephemeral sequence of sounds snatched from old records and manipulated into ghostly scraps that spin and bob like the luminous traces left by deep sea fishes. “The Longest Wave,” which was recorded in Jeck’s home town of Liverpool, is quite the opposite. Jeck is joined by Jonathan Raisin, whose piano trills augment Jeck’s already lush flow. The best moments come when the turntablist breaks out some sub-aquatic bass figures that ballast Raisin’s delay-dampened drizzle of notes.

Bill Meyer 

 Niko Karlsson — Its Own Phantom (Feeding Tube)

Its Own Phantom by Niko Karlsson

Look out the window of your Finnish country cabin in the winter and your view is likely to be reduced to a few essentials. Grey sky, green trees, white snow — that’s about it. Its Own Phantom is an apt soundtrack for an afternoon spent gazing upon such a vista. None of its tracks are in a hurry, and each sweep of hand across strings (mostly guitar, sometimes banjo or sitar) unleashes a stream of melodious sound that’ll draw your mind into an imaginary space situated somewhere beyond the farthest visible fir. The term “acid folk” implies a potentially psychedelic experience generated by not entirely voltage dependent means. Let’s call this tape snowshoe folk; it may not induce hallucinatory states, but it has its own way of elevating the listener beyond the cold ground.

Bill Meyer

Eva Klesse Quartett — Songs Against Loneliness (Enja)

Songs against loneliness by Eva Klesse Quartett

Holiday season got you feeling isolated? Eva Klesse is here to help you feel better with Songs Against Loneliness. This new set of jazz originals by her quartet (joined occasionally by guitarist Wolfgang Muthspiel) is soothing but not sleepy. Klesse, a drummer, composed five of the 13 tracks here, and the other members of the group, Evgeny Ring on sax, Marc Muellbauer on double bass and Philip Frischkorn on piano, contributed the rest of the compositions.

In practice, apart from the titles of the tracks (“Glory Glory Misfits,” “Der Eremit,” and so on), there is nothing ponderous (or overly perky) about the melodies and arrangements on display here. The quartet’s decade of playing and recording together (apart from Muellbauer, who replaces Robert Lucaciu this time around) is evident in its cohesiveness. Muthspiel and Klesse have worked together before, and his contributions here are fully integrated into the quartet’s sound, beginning with the poignant chords that open the title track “Minor Is What I Feel.” That track and some of the others seem carefully composed, while others, such as “Past, Tense,” are more improvisation. This cut builds slowly from a solo by Muellbauer to the full quartet. Klesse’s rattling percussion keeping things together without ever quite settling on a rhythm.

So take heart if you’re feeling left out and let these well-crafted tunes serve as your soundtrack for the journey back from loneliness. And if you’re already in the holiday spirit, Songs Against Loneliness will help keep you feeling warm and fuzzy.

Jim Marks

 Mdou Moctar — Niger EP Vol. 2 (Matador)

Niger EP Vol. 2 by Mdou Moctar

This is the second in a series to collect early cassette tape recordings of the Niger-ian guitar phenomenon as he and his band travelled, often by bus, to informal gigs: weddings, rehearsals, house parties. The vibe is not much different from Moctar’s studio recordings, pacing torrid runs of guitar with homespun handclaps and hand drums. The difference comes in the ambient sounds. A motorcycle zooms away at the end of “Iblis Amghar,” birds chirp and people go on with the ordinary activities in their lives, even with such incendiary music going on around them. And, indeed, it is fire, this music, balancing locomotive percussion and hypnogogic trance, as on driving, dreaming “Ibitilan” or the searing blues of “Asditke Akal.” “Chimoumounim” sounds as if it comes in from a great distance, its groove approaching, then taking up a central place in our ears and hearts. Moctar’s grooves sound great in the studio, but maybe even better here in their natural space.

Jennifer Kelly

 Mister Water Wet— Top Natural Drum (Soda Gong)

Top Natural Drum by Mister Water Wet

Top Natural Drum is Kansas City producer Iggy Romeu’s third album as Mister Water Wet. It’s also his first to arrive via a label other than West Mineral Ltd., the imprint founded by his buddy Brian Leeds, who most know as Huerco S. Although they’re connected, Romeu and Leeds have taken divergent paths. Romeu’s first two MWW outings were colorful and strange in comparison to Leeds’ grainy, monochromatic fog banks. He brews up his ambient tinctures with hints of jazz, hip hop and elements sourced from his Puerto Rican roots. Romeu is also careful to add subtle bits of the arcane to his concoctions, revealing himself to be a master crate digger. With Top Natural Drum, he drops the ambient veil to show off some rhythmic chops. The result is a series of head nodding beat-scapes sure to please those who spent the 1990s with their ears glued to the turntablism scene.  

Bryon Hayes

 The Modern Folk Trio Band — Always Be Recording (Island House)

IH-002 Always Be Recording by modern folk trio band

The Modern Folk Trio Band is actually a quintet, formed around J. Moss’s languid, liquid guitar, but including Austin Richards, Zach Barbery, Remi Lew and Trevor Schorey trading off on additional guitars, bass, drums and synthesizers. This cassette includes three tracks, two lengthy and one succinct, but all three fluid and luminous. “Diet Coke Extra Ice” winds placidly through slow, chugging lyricism, its lead guitar high and clear and full of light. “Slide Solo,” the short one, is just what its name implies, an interlude of intriguingly bent and haunted sounds, tinged by blues but not exactly boxed into it. And “Hot Jam,” the final cut, is not as viscerally physical as its title suggests, but rather a glistening, nodding, extended drone, grounded by the thud of drums but reaching always for an ethereal other-ness. Throughout, a loose improvisatory air presides. If you’re always recording, sometimes you get something good.

Jennifer Kelly

 Woody Sullender — Music from Four Movements & Other Favorites (Woody Sullender)

Music from 'Four Movements' & Other Favorites by Woody Sullender

What’s the difference between listening and performing listening? If you have the time and credit, you could take up the matter while you pursue an MFA. Or you could go to www.fourmovements.woodysullender.com and download Four Movements, a video game space that “consists of several navigable environments where the virtual participant can perform listening” and live the difference. It is the work of an artist and musician who has studied under Maryanne Amacher and previously performed banjo music under the guise, Uncle Woody Sullender, and it provides the sort of disparate yet cohesive sound experience one might expect from a person whose creative map contains such aesthetic/methodological coordinates. Cantering banjo in just intonation coexists with techno beats, a Robert Hood cover sounds like a streamlined remembrance of Conlon Nancarrow’s player piano music, and moments arise when you might wonder if this guy’s spent some salon time with Horse Lords.

Bill Meyer

 Tchornobog/Abyssal — Split LP (Lupus Lounge)

Tchornobog / Abyssal by Tchornobog

You get two epically scaled tracks of death metal-adjacent mayhem on this split LP. More bang for your buck? More yuck, for sure. Markov Soroka’s utterly whacko project Tchornobog is given the A side, and his 25-minute song “The Vomiting Choir” pummels and roils, blackened on its edges but still very much belly-down in layers of rancid muck (see that title…). There aren’t many opportunities to lift your face out of the sodden slurry and grab a breath — which is sort of impressive for a song so long, and by its halfway point, pretty oppressive, too. So, you may be grossed out by the bubbling, gurgling noises that become audible around the 11-minute mark, but at least the mix is a little less clogged up with clangor and crunch. Abyssal’s contribution, titled “Antechamber of the Wakeless Mind,” is only a minute shorter, but the song seems by contrast rather mannered, alternating slowly suppurating death-doom with long spells of churning, dissonant riffage that always feel consciously composed. The split is not a pleasant experience so much as it is an interesting experiment in differing modes of metal excess.

Jonathan Shaw 

 temp. — Taking notes (American Dreams)

Taking Notes by temp.

temp.’s Erica Mei Gamble is a producer, DJ and video archivist based in Chicago—and one half of the experimental electronic duo Dungeon Mother, but her Taking notes represents a significant step forward for the artist. It gathers music previously posted on Soundcloud into a chilly, cerebral and surprisingly cohesive statement; that is, it sounds very much like an album. It starts in wordless abstraction, the cut “Air” lofting translucent tones of synthesizer onto a pristine background. They pulse and flare like northern lights, unearthly also visceral. “Yah” finds the ghost in the machine as a human cry punctures glistening electric pulses; the cut is clean and a little spooky, like a quieter Shackleton. But it's “What’s Beyond,” performed with Gamble’s Dungeon Mother collaborator Sarah Leitten, that fully realizes the juncture between unreal, ominous sonics and fragile human consciousness. Leitten chants poetry against a seething mesh of synth tones, her words encompassing both natural and super-natural imagery (For example: “I’ll dance with the stars above/and I hold the moon in my hands/and I drink the sun with my eyes/and I am the darkness/I am the abyss.”) Later, with Emme Williams in “Trying to Climb,” Gamble stakes out a minimalist corner of the disco floor, with beats that glitch and blot and corrode and a half-remembered recorder melody tootling in the background.

Jennifer Kelly

  Wild Pink — ILYSM (Royal Mountain)

ILYSM by Wild Pink

John Ross got the idea for his song, “Hold My Hand” while lying on an operating table, waiting for the anesthetic to knock him out before surgery. Ross, who is the main creative force behind Wild Pink, found out he had cancer mid-way through recording this fourth full-length. His uncertainties around this diagnosis, combined with his dogged insistence to finish anyway, define this album, whose bright, soft indie pop textures wrap around some very dark textures. Consider, for instance, “Hell Is Cold,” with its thumping rhythms, its half-focused glitch textures, its shimmering layers of piano. Ross sings just above a whisper, here and elsewhere, in a confiding tone that tickles the hairs inside your ear. Yet while the sonically, the song bounds and wafts, its message doesn’t. “I know I’ll be free when I die,” sings Ross, and the song ends abruptly like a life snuffed out. Likewise, the title track, aims at the kind of soccer stadium anthemic-ness that sends beach balls bobbling out over festival crowds. “I love you so much,” Ross intones over surging synths and pounding drums. Still, despite its ebullience, the cut has a vertiginous feel, as if the bottom is dropping out. Like many people facing difficulties, Ross reached out to friends for aid. The album has striking cameos from Julien Baker (“Hold My Hand”) and a multigenerational brace of guitarists, J. Mascis (who rips a sidewinder “See You Better Now”), Ryley Walker (breezily anthemic in “Simple Glyphs”) and Yasmin Williams (shimmering and gorgeous in “The Grass Widow in the Glass Window”). And yet, for all that, and despite the serious subject matter, the music mostly feels bland and oversaccharine, except for the sludgy, guitar-driven fury of “Sucking on Birdshot” and, at the end, “ICLYM” shuffling out like the Beta Band in shambolic triumph.

Jennifer Kelly

[badmovieihave]

Bad movie I have Being Human 1994

[macrolit]

The 100 Best Books of the 21st Century.

As voted on by 503 novelists, nonfiction writers, poets, critics and other book lovers — with a little help from the staff of The New York Times Book Review.

NYT Article.

*************

Q: How many of the 100 have you read? Q: Which ones did you love/hate? Q: What's missing?

Here's the full list.

100. Tree of Smoke, Denis Johnson 99. How to Be Both, Ali Smith 98. Bel Canto, Ann Patchett 97. Men We Reaped, Jesmyn Ward 96. Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments, Saidiya Hartman 95. Bring Up the Bodies, Hilary Mantel 94. On Beauty, Zadie Smith 93. Station Eleven, Emily St. John Mandel 92. The Days of Abandonment, Elena Ferrante 91. The Human Stain, Philip Roth 90. The Sympathizer, Viet Thanh Nguyen 89. The Return, Hisham Matar 88. The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis 87. Detransition, Baby, Torrey Peters 86. Frederick Douglass, David W. Blight 85. Pastoralia, George Saunders 84. The Emperor of All Maladies, Siddhartha Mukherjee 83. When We Cease to Understand the World, Benjamin Labutat 82. Hurricane Season, Fernanda Melchor 81. Pulphead, John Jeremiah Sullivan 80. The Story of the Lost Child, Elena Ferrante 79. A Manual for Cleaning Women, Lucia Berlin 78. Septology, Jon Fosse 77. An American Marriage, Tayari Jones 76. Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, Gabrielle Zevin 75. Exit West, Mohsin Hamid 74. Olive Kitteridge, Elizabeth Strout 73. The Passage of Power, Robert Caro 72. Secondhand Time, Svetlana Alexievich 71. The Copenhagen Trilogy, Tove Ditlevsen 70. All Aunt Hagar's Children, Edward P. Jones 69. The New Jim Crow, Michelle Alexander 68. The Friend, Sigrid Nunez 67. Far From the Tree, Andrew Solomon 66. We the Animals, Justin Torres 65. The Plot Against America, Philip Roth 64. The Great Believers, Rebecca Makkai 63. Veronica, Mary Gaitskill 62. 10:04, Ben Lerner 61. Demon Copperhead, Barbara Kingsolver 60. Heavy, Kiese Laymon 59. Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides 58. Stay True, Hua Hsu 57. Nickel and Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich 56. The Flamethrowers, Rachel Kushner 55. The Looming Tower, Lawrence Wright 54. Tenth of December, George Saunders 53. Runaway, Alice Munro 52. Train Dreams, Denis Johnson 51. Life After Life, Kate Atkinson 50. Trust, Hernan Diaz 49. The Vegetarian, Han Kang 48. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi 47. A Mercy, Toni Morrison 46. The Goldfinch, Donna Tartt 45. The Argonauts, Maggie Nelson 44. The Fifth Season, N.K. Jemisin 43. Postwar, Tony Judt 42. A Brief History of Seven Killings, Marlon James 41. Small Things Like These, Claire Keegan 40. H Is for Hawk, Helen Macdonald 39. A Visit from the Goon Squad, Jennifer Egan 38. The Savage Detectives, Roberto Balano 37. The Years, Annie Ernaux 36. Between the World and Me, Ta-Nehisi Coates 35. Fun Home, Alison Bechdel 34. Citizen, Claudia Rankine 33. Salvage the Bones, Jesmyn Ward 32. The Lines of Beauty, Alan Hollinghurst 31. White Teeth, Zadie Smith 30. Sing, Unburied, Sing, Jesmyn Ward 29. The Last Samurai, Helen DeWitt 28. Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell 27. Americanah, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie 26. Atonement, Ian McEwan 25. Random Family, Adrian Nicole LeBlanc 24. The Overstory, Richard Powers 23. Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage, Alice Munro 22. Behind the Beautiful Forevers, Katherine Boo 21. Evicted, Matthew Desmond 20. Erasure, Percival Everett 19. Say Nothing, Patrick Radden Keefe 18. Lincoln in the Bardo, George Saunders 17. The Sellout, Paul Beatty 16. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Michael Chabon 15. Pachinko, Min Jin Lee 14. Outline, Rachel Cusk 13. The Road, Cormac McCarthy 12. The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion 11. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Diaz 10. Gilead, Marilynne Robinson 9. Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro 8. Austerlitz, W.G. Sebald 7. The Underground Railroad, Colson Whitehead 6. 2666, Roberto Bolano 5. The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen 4. The Known World, Edward P. Jones 3. Wolf Hall, Hilary Mantel 2. The Warmth of Other Suns, Isabel Wilkerson 1. My Brilliant Friend, Elena Ferrante

[hauntedppgpaints]

Hottest NHL Coach Poll Results!!

GOOOOOOOOOD EVENING HOCKEYBLR!

I've got the piping hot results of the poll I posted this week, served fresh and ready to be read! The final count was 456 votes!

HOTTEST COACHES ACROSS THE LEAGUE:

Martin St. Louis, 91 votes, 20%

Jared Bednar, 83 votes, 18.2%

Rod Brind'Amour, 66 votes, 14.5%

Paul Maurice, 39 votes, 8.6%

John Tortorella, 27 votes, 5.9%

Kris Knoblauch & Mike Sullivan, 26 votes, 5.7%

Spencer Carbery, 22 votes, 4.8%

Rick Tocchet, 18 votes, 3.9%

Luke Richardson, 13 votes, 2.9%

Dean Evason, 12 votes, 2.6%

Greg Cronin, 5 votes, 1.1%

Ryan Warsofsky & Jon Cooper, 4 votes, 0.9%

Peter DeBoer & Dan Bylsma, 3 votes, 0.7%

Andrew Brunette & Sheldon Keefe & Patrick Roy & Andre Tourigny & Bruce Cassidy, 2 votes, 0.4%

John Hynes & Peter Laviolette & Travis Green & Craig Berube, 1 vote, 0.2%

The coaches that received NO votes are Jim Montgomery, Lindy Ruff, Ryan Huska, Derek Lalonde, Jim Hiller, Drew Bannister, and Scott Arniel

[twinleska]

Hi again, roleplay Tumblr,

I’m tired of making the same roleplay posts over and over again so, to keep it short, I’ll brief through what I’m looking for and tag any others that I may have forgotten. As always, 18+ only, if I see you’re a minor interacting, I’ll block. Plots to be discussed through PM and the likes. I don’t bite and am open to most anything!! I will bold characters who I am most interested in playing. Most I’m not really willing to budge from but, could possibly be swayed.

— Good Omens (just now starting S2 but, would like to work within canon!) Crowley/Aziraphale

— Hannibal NBC - Will/Hannibal

— The Office - Jim/Pam , Jim/Dwight

— Righteous Gemstones - Keefe/Kelvin (Open to like, most pairings from this fandom and extensive writing experience as Gideon)

— This is the End (literally any pairing)

— SAW I - Adam/Lawrence

— Death of Dick Long - (literally any pairing)

— Your Pretty Face is Going to Hell (any)

— Breaking Bad (certain pairings)

— Descendants (certain pairings)

Will add more as they come to mind. I can write through email, Discord or really anything else you prefer. Thanks!

[dirtyriver]

We've already seen Hil reading Mary Shelley's Frankenstein illustrated by Bernie Wrightson. That kid's got great taste.

[ultralazycreatorfan]

Kotlc as happenings from the annual work Christmas party (note: we work with public works/the people who clean your water, run sewers, make sidewalks, etc)

Sophie (with Tam): so last year someone was really worried we’d be tattooing each other (Keefe) and someone was very sad we weren’t (also Keefe)

Fitz: if I were a wolf my name would be Fitzroy ✨Wastewater✨

Biana: there are so many men… I like this table (all women)

Keefe, after Tam gets a life straw in white elephant: you can test it by coming to the wastewater plant <3

Dex: Jim Carrey is a frightening creature

Tam: did you bring a high chair for Keefe?

Linh: I accidentally put one of your personal gifts in the white elephant pile. If someone opens it… I will be taking it back…

Ro, whispering: I hope someone eats these muffins… they taste like fish… I’d love to see it (evil giggling) (no one ate the muffins)

[comicsbyte]

Shakti Comics - Set 12 Pre-Order - Phantom and Flash Gordon

शक्ति कॉमिक्स - सेट 12 प्री-आर्डर - फैंटम और फ़्लैश गॉर्डोन (Shakti Comics - Set 12 Pre-Order - Phantom and Flash Gordon)

Shakti Comics

#ComicsByte #comics #comicbooks #newrelease #preorder #thephantom #flashgordon #phantom

[forgiveness-in-the-misery]

I really love the way that shows like Our Flag Means Death and Good Omens and The Righteous Gemstones interact with queerness.

I love how it is just part of these shows, that characters can be queer and just exist as they are and we never need a PSA about it.

Good Omens had two lesbians, a nonbinary demon, two male presenting entities who are madly in love with each other, a shop owner with a partner who presents femme.

Righteous Gemstones essentially had a whole arc of BJ who is straight and cis becoming comfortable with his femininity and wearing pink and other colors and clothing styles his family made him feel like a freak for but Judy and her family makes him feel safe to be his true self. Kelvin and Keefe had whatever they had going on and nobody in the family questioned it or judged just judged Keefe for being a weird goth dude. Kelvin and Keefe kissing wasn’t a big deal for the others, they just now accept he’s part of their family.

Our Flag Means Death has had tons of poly relationships, we have Ed and Stede together, Pete and Lucius are engaged, we have whatever Izzy is doing with Fang and Frenchie, we had Jim and Olu and now Jim and Archie and maybe Olu, we have Jim a nonbinary person. We have so many queer characters and romances.

It is all so casual and there. There is no speech, there are no scenes and episodes explaining why somebody is gay or trans, they just are and it is so comforting snd beautiful.