#the crystal spider

[mywifeleftme]

198: "Various Artists" // Box

Box Boots / C.C. / Snake & Remus 2006, HP Cycle

For more than 25 years the gloomy weirdo unknown folk artist who created Box has released his music from behind a veil of secrecy, changing his alias and “record label” with each recording. In 2002, Rojvi (credited to Terry) and Music Performed by the High Mass (credited to Jim Collins) trickled out into the market, distributed without fanfare on the mail order lists of record collectors Paul Major (of Endless Boogie) and Stan Denski; in 2017, a dozen lathe-cut 7” and 12” records appeared in a thrift store, all credited to different artists, each possibly the only one of its kind in existence. His music has tended to be unearthed rather than released, with the exception of 2006’s Box, which collects three LPs originally discovered separately in 2004: Boots (Boots), No Tape Outside (Snake & Remus), and Live at the Rainbows End (C.C.). Box was distributed in an edition of a few hundred by HP Cycle, a Canadian label that, while miniscule, has endured longer than the cicada’s flight enjoyed by each of the artist’s own enterprises. In this sense, it is the closest thing the artist has provided to an intentional entry point to his work—the black peak marking a dark berg beneath the waves.

Mysteries naturally draw adventurers, and I’m indebted to the Discogs user known as envious for the information above, which I’ve drawn from his blog Rabbit Run Down the Hole of a Skull (which also hosts a near-complete digital archive of the artist’s known music). I think it’s helpful to parrot his research here not only because the story is in itself interesting, but because when I post this it will create another node for other seekers to access the next layer beneath the surface. According to envious, the first of the artist’s known pseudonyms Robyn Nice, and this name has become the catchall his small following uses to refer to him. (envious also occasionally refers to Nice as the Crystal Spider, which yes, instantly made me cum.) It’s thought that in his youth Nice spent time living on an acid-drenched Louisiana artist’s community called the Compound. The Compound was led by Damien Youth, himself a somewhat enigmatic folk musician, until harassment from suspicious local police forced its dissolution. Much of Nice’s work seems to call back to the image of an idyllic community, though its frequently bitter, despairing tone suggests the posture of an Adam mourning in exile—or a Manson in the making. envious’s blog digs much more deeply into the Nice mythos than I can here—one of my dream projects after I finish this year of record reviewing is to listen through Nice’s 15-hour catalogue in its entirety.

Moving on to Box itself, we find three 12” records in plain white sleeves, each hand stamped with a title and alias. All three records have a similar structure: free form, acoustic outsider folk songs on the A sides, lengthy jams or field recordings on the flip.

The individual records are packaged in plain sleeves with labels in blue print, like the original 2004 releases.

On the self-titled Boots record, Nice’s voice hits somewhere between early Peter Gabriel and Dylan, but the lyrics are wacked out ravings. On one track he snarls about “shitcaked corpses” and raped children before proclaiming “I’m a farm” and imitating a braying donkey. On another he bellows at what sounds like the top of his lungs about “compromised smells.” His deft progressive folk-inclined guitar playing tends to follow the emotional arc of his vocals, reserved at the outset, ragged and battered by the end. The B-side (“New Earth”) is roughly five minutes of faux-tribal New Age followed by 13 of minimal synth.

On No Tape Outside by Snake & Remus, the artist sounds somewhat older, which may indicate the albums collected in Box don’t all come from the same period. At any rate, Nice is in a more pensive mood, the trancelike songs expansive and beautifully played on guitar with various minimal piano/synth/percussion accompaniments (suggesting Snake & Remus could be a duo project). In place of Boots’s misanthropic rage, No Tape Outside is shrouded in despair at failing relationships, a fallen world. The B-side is fully instrumental, sharing the autumnal feeling of the vocal tracks but skewing more psychedelic, building through passages of rippling echo to a climax like a dozen clocks having a quiet disagreement over the exact time. Unlike the other records in the set, this record has no track names stamped on the disc’s label, leaving you with few moorings. I recall certain passages of inspired playing, snatches of strange poetry (“voice from across the sea / drips red into me / says my mother was wine”), a general sensation by record’s end of doomed peace.

The outlier here is C.C’s Live at the Rainbows End, which clearly features a different (considerably more technically proficient) vocalist. Good news, it’s also weird, though it sounds less like it was recorded by the guy on the cover of Aqualung than the others. envious speculates C.C. may be another Compound personality who used the alias Chris Cologne and recorded a CD called Horn for Blackberry, Nice’s early stab at a conventional indie label. C.C. is either a Brit or affecting an accent (I think the latter), and has a gentle, sighing way with his phrasing that suits these hushed ballads in a Nick Drake-ish mode. There is some downright gorgeous fingerstyle acoustic playing on this one and more conventional musical structures, even a few refrains (though no choruses). The guitar could plausibly be played by Nice, though the technique is cleaner and less shamanic than what we hear elsewhere on Box, but even if it isn’t Live at the Rainbows End shares a certain paranoid energy that somehow marks it as a product of the same artistic camp. The B-side offers one more short romantic tune followed by “Paul’s Jennifer is Dead,” a fifteen-minute field recording of a bonfire and distant, indistinct conversation. envious once again offers an astute guess here, suggesting this may reference the nighttime bonfires where members of Youth’s Compound once communed at the end of each day.

Overall, your mileage with Box will vary depending on your yen for the wilfully obscure. My interest in a savage, disoriented record like Boots is ultimately curious (maybe even prurient), in the same way I like to collect strange postings on street poles around my city. No Tape Outside on the other hand is a genuinely entrancing avant-folk record, while Live at the Rainbows End houses a delicate collection of misty-eyed tunes forked by morbid suspicion and trembling yearning. I think both are superb in their own ways. I am haunted by my questions about Box’s provenance, but also by its contents—both of which make for a strong endorsement to new listeners attuned to similar currents in the musical underworld.

198/365

[daedric-gengar]

[heartnosekid]

spooky labradorite carvings 👻 | prismsouls on ig

[berryblu-arts]

hehe, messed up and over the top harumi design <3

edit: shoutout to this post for the idea!

and this video for the motivation!! <- amazing ninjago edit!!! go watch itt!!!

[gray-ghost-creations]

Tliltocatl albopilosus or curly hair tarantula on amethyst. Done in pastel pencils and colored pencils on pastel mat.

Prints - www.grayghostcreations.etsy.com

[chasingrainbowsforever]

A Frosty UK Morning ~ Getty Images

[hazelnewts]

⋆｡ ﾟ☾ ﾟ｡ ⋆.In the name of the Spider Moon, I'll punish you!!⋆｡ ﾟ☾ ﾟ｡ ⋆.

LINA AKA SPIDER-SCOUT

INSTAGRAM | TWITTER

[twilight-zoned-out]

Edwin Payne is a dweeb who gives terrible weak comebacks, who can be unnecessarily petty, or overly smug, who is inordinately pleased with himself when wearing detective gear and using scientific gear, the thought never crossing his mind that he might not look as cool as he thinks he does, who carries a continual and utter absolute delight at acting like the characters he loved to read about, who was enthralled by his magazine detective and adventure stories and who wears a similar smile when he sits on the bed watching Scooby Doo with Niko, 'these detectives are terribly clever,' whose board game collection is mostly variations of Clue, who requires payment (because any good detective is worth some kind of payment) but whose idea of payment is whatever interesting object the client offers to add to his collection, who has encyclopedic intelligence he clearly dedicated hours to learning, who has a particular way of acting and speaking like everything is of vital importance, because to him, it is.

[icy-watch]

Jay was a train kid

I love it!

[whaliiwatching]

tfw ur spider boyfriend is actually a cat

also a fluffy version bc im incapable of drawing anything that doesn’t induce cavities

[iwasbored777]

I feel like everyone who knows Miles and Gwen thinks that they are/were together at some point and no one believes that they were never anything more than friends and they're like "oh so they're trying to keep their relationship a secret ok I'll just pretend that I don't see how obvious it is that they're secretly a thing" and so everyone goes along with it

[oatusily]

Y’all just to preface I am insane (I mean I am on tumblr so…).

WHAT IF…

When Charles went to find Edwin in hell what if Edwin wasn’t in the room. What if Charles went down to hell and he best friend of some odd 30 years or so wasn’t there and all he saw was he’s best friends body being ripped apart by the spider-baby-demon-thing. That would’ve been devastating but also like what if he got to see Edwin running and getting caught and then torn apart. That’s would also have been devastating but what if. I mean sure I would’ve been sobbing hysterically and all that but like it would’ve been fun (put me in that writers room y’all all be dead, and cry hysterically but it would be fun).

[somnambulant-seraphim]

A couple necklaces I made a while ago <|:^)

I made the spiders with wire and wooden beads, but I may tuck their legs in a bit more, since they're prone to tangling with the chain. I'm not sure what the stones are, they're an opaque olivey-mossy green, and I've had them for a long time since I was quite young. If anyone has ideas of what they could be, feel free to share :)

The second necklace is made with a gold-silver sheen obsidian heart, as well as wire-wrapped bits of black tourmaline, a couple common tektites, and some other unknown stones.

[lexxlifephotography]

[halloween-sweets]

[fuskida]

“Generator VIII” (2023), Quartz crystal, silver-plated stainless steel cable, silver crimps, steel, automotive paint, Dodge trunks | sculpture by Kathleen Ryan