The Blog That Celebrates Itself

Venus in Furs At Dopamine 28/01/2012

2012-01-23T09:10:00.000-08:00

Especialissima edição da melhor festa underground de São Paulo, com os seguintes atrativos:

Dimitry Uziel (The Boss) - Bday

Rob Son (The Other Boss ) - Returns

Presença Xiita da Noite - Adriano Ravon soltando pedradas musicais....

IMPERDIVEL

Lazer Guided Melodies with Thee Piatcions - An Interview

2012-01-23T04:05:00.000-08:00

Há mais ou menos 1 mes ou pouco mais ou pouco menos do que isso, em um domingo ensolarado de manha estava lendo vendo minhas coisas pessoais na internet e de repente um de meus amigos altamente psych soltou um post sobre uma banda intitulada The Piatcions, fiquei curioso já pela capa, psych total, dai o termo druggy sounds, iiiiih dai fodeu, procedencia dos caras Italia, na hora que começou a rolar o album Senseless Sense, foi amor a primeira audição, doses cavalares de Spacemen 3, VU, Spiritualized, Brian Jonestown Massacre, dai é covardia, os italianos são demais, simplesmente peguei e postei o bandcamp dos caras e veio o contato imediato Dave Piatcions Cocks o cara da banda fazendo contato com este que vos escreve dai, trocamos ideiais, gostos pessoais similares e a proposta de rolar uma entrevista foi aceita de cara, sem contar outros projetos que serão divulgados brevemente, o fato é que TBTCI e Piatcions tem como religião Spacemen 3, dai virou amizade e a entrevista esta na sequencia, ah o album, poxa é indispensavel, só isso que eu posso dizer!!!

***** Interview with Thee Piatcions *****

Q. When did Piatcions starts, tell us about the history...

A. Piatcions started few years ago when I and Dave found the drummer we where looking for, Dario. Born as a more garage oriented band we changed line up a couple of times (Dario T., Skaio) before find the right feelings as a 3 man band. During this time our music grew with us till it becomes what it is now.

Q: Who are your influences?

A. We have so many different influences; the principal inspiration comes from all the phsyc/space scene: stuff like my bloody valentine, jesus and mary chain, spacemen 3.. but there are many nuances that come from much more bands.

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…

• Beatles / Sgt Peppers

• Rolling Stones / 12x5

• Velvet Underground / The Velvet Underground & Nico

• Primal Scream / Vanishing Point

• Spiritualized / Ladies & Gentlemen we’re floating in the space

Q. How do you fell playing alive?

A. It's so exciting and funny! When we play live we do our best, regardless of how much people is watching us, but if you see a lot of people jumping and dancing your music you feel a strong charge and it affects your feelings about playing, as well as the upshot of the show. In addition we play that kind of music that enable you to clear your mind and just think about feelings, while you're playing.

Q. How do you describe Piatcions sounds?

A. We've always looked for a great combination between catchy melodies, wall-of-sound ambients and unconventional sound textures. If I have to use adjectives I'd say Loud, Fat and Intense.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?

A. Our latest album has been recorded in so much time; A. we put a lot of work in it and it gave us satisfaction. When we record, tracks are constantly changing, from the first record to the last mix, and this helps us to make songs like they are in our minds.

Q.What does the shoegazer classic era represent to the band?

A. Shoegaze has been a turning point for us. When we began discovering the classic shoegaze scene we were a garage band; since then we kept finding out new stuff and acquiring more and more influences. The basic sounds are so similiar to then, but the end product has been

strongly influenced.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?francy

A. Underground scene is full of new interesting bands I realize it everytime we tour Europe. In England they have Tamborines, Eat light become light, Koolaid Electric Company, One unique signal. France has Zombie Zombie, Dalai Lama Rama Fafafa and Moloko Velocet and even Iceland has bands like Singapore Sling, the, Dead Skeletons and Go-Go Darkness. New-Psych scene has become bigger and bigger during these last years.

Q: What´s the plans for future...

A. For the near future we're planning a couple of tours in Europe; we'll go in UK in the third week of February for some gigs and in April

we'll go in Scandinavia. Then we hope we could arrange a tour in USA. It would be wonderful! For the farer future we can just wait and see what happens!

Thanks Dave!!!

http://www.piatcions.org/
http://iblametheparentsrecords.bandcamp.com/album/piatcions-senseless-sense
https://www.facebook.com/Piatcions

White Cross with Megaphonic Thrift - An Interview

2012-01-16T04:43:00.000-08:00

Depois do estardalhaço do debut Decay Decoy os noruegueses alucinados do Megaphonic Thrift anunciaram via Club AC30 a pré venda do próximo petardo homonimo que estara disponiel dia 06 de fevereiro proximo, ansiedade por aqui não falta, e como é de praxe o capricho da produção com selo de qualidade Club AC30 já avisa no site, vinil branco, coisa finissima, para uma banda que é altamente alucinante, barulheira com pés e cabeças enfurnados em SY, Serena Maneesh e afins, ou seja noise shoegazer rock altamente qualificado, e o TBTCI aproveitando o ensejo encabeça a primeira entrevista pré novo album, e isso não é para quem quer é só para quem pode!!!!Srs Megaphonic Thrift!!!

***** Interview with Megaphonic Thrift *****

Q. When did Megaphonic Thrift e starts, tell us about the history...
A. Richard formed The Megaphonic Thrift after his former band, Stereo21, came to an end. He first asked Feddi, singer and guitarist from Casiokids, to play the drums, and later keyboardist and singer Linn joined on bass. The idea was to get a rawer expression, by combining people with different musical backgrounds and have them play instruments they normally didn't. When we needed someone to be on the more stabil side of guitar playing (in contrast to Richards madness), we asked Njål to join to fulfill our soundscape.

Q: Who are your influences?
A. We get influenced by movies, books, food, art, people, cities and music. Its especially inspiring to lissten to our friends making music. We often work together with different people - helping eachother out in the studio and stuff - and when other people make such great music, it kind of drives you to wanna go do it too.

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…
My Bloody Valentine - Loveless

Motorpsycho - little lucid moments

Spiritualized- Ladies and gentlemen we are floating in space

Beck - sea change
Tortoise - tnt

Q. How do you fell playing alive?
A. Playing live is a great kick for us. Its the best thing we do. We are known for beeing facemelting and blowing people's heads off. In a good way off course! We love sound, and want to bring as much of it as we can out to the audience. We really like to record music, and play with crazy ideas in the studio, but it is while playing live we truly have the total control ourselves. The lisstener don't get to choose the volume, the order of the songs - and the songs differ and develop every time we play them live.

Q. How do you describe Megaphonic Thrift sounds?
A. Loud, noisy, melodic, intense, psychedelic, rhythmic, strange.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the new album?
A. We actually made all the songs on the new album together. On our first album, Decay Decoy, Richard did most of the song writing. This time it just became naturally for us to make it all together by jamming. Thats kind of the reason why we decided to just call the album The Megaphonic Thrift. Cause it's 100% us as a band.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?
A. We wouldn't really describe ourselves as a shoegaze band, but we use some elements in our music. For us I guess the most important influences in the shoegaze music is bands like My bloody valentine and off course Spacemen 3 and Spiritualized. With Loveless, MBV revolutionized music. And the way Jason Pierce has made such great music by making songs so simple and minimalistic - yet so powerful and unique - is admirable and inspiring.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?
A. Would like to recommend some bands from our home city Bergen, Nowray:

Check out Hypertext, Lovecult, Syntax TerrOrkester, Young Dreams and Electric Eye.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?
A. We actually never played any cover songs this far. Would love to noise up some good old Neil Young songs.

Q: What´s the plans for future....
A. 2012 is all about our new album. Touring as much as we can, play as many festivals as possible and spread good music to people. We also hope to get the chance to go to Japan next fall.

Q: Any parting words?
A. Check out our new album! Released worldwide the 11th of februray.

Thanks Megaphonic Thrift!!!

https://www.facebook.com/megaphonicthrift
http://www.myspace.com/megaphonicthrift

Disorder with Karate Free Stylers

2012-01-09T06:07:00.000-08:00

Primeiro post de 2012, retornando com força total o TBTCI inicia o ano com muita ambição e inumeros projetos a serem tocados no desenrolar do ano e para inicia-lo em grande estilo apresentando em primeirissima mão o combo polones Karate Free Stylers dica mais do perfeita do amigo Tom Lugo, socio de carteirinha qui do TBTCI e para os mais desavisados dono da Patetico Records, casa do Karate Free Stylers e mentor do patrimonio Stellarscope. Por inumeros motivos a estreia de uma banda da Patetico tem a ver com os projetos do ano, mas isso é outra historia, e aqui é hora e vez do KFS, poloneses pos punkers com um teor de agressividade absurdo, para tirar o folego de quem estiver pela frente, o clima esfumaçado mesclado com o noise abrasivo de um APTBS é latente, as guitarras gritam, clamam por atenção, o clima gelido das canções vão se estendendo por todo o debut At Least We Are Able To Breathe, é isso pos punk gelido e frio, leia The Sound, Joy Division envolvo a area noiser do APTBS sem tirar nem por, uma metralhadora ensandecida atirando para todos sem qualquer tipo de piedade. E como de praxe a primeira entrevista do ano com total apoio de Tom Lugo, Sras e Srs Karate Free Stylers.

***** Interview with Karate Free Stylers *****

Q. When did Karate Free Stylers starts, tell us about the history...

Originally, KFS started about 5 years ago, when we were at school. I met my band mates, because with one I was going to to the same class for 6 years and with the other one we both had a meeting at our first rehearsal, because we were looking for a drummer. At first we were playing some cover songs, but then we started writing our own material. So we always say that "professionally" we started about 3 years ago.

Q: Who are your influences?

Our influences are very varied. Our bass player's probably favourite band is The Clash and he's rather into this type of music. But he also loves The Jesus And Mary Chain Me and the drummer are very into Sonic Youth, My Bloody Valentine. Bu personally I am also into Deerhunter and Atlas Sound and noise rocky type of music. I also love classic rock, blues (Robert Johnson is my god :D).

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…

My personal list:

1. Nirvana- Nevermind

2. Sonic Youth- Goo

3. My Bloody Valentine- Loveless

4. The Jesus and Mary Chain- Psychocandy

5. Deerhunter- Microcastle

This list refers to albums that were inspiring me through years. But for me best from the best band in the world is Led Zeppelin! I also love The Beatles, Pink Floyd and The Rolling Stones. You should have asked me about top ten...or 50...or 100 albums

Q. How do you fell playing alive?

When I play at home I rather play acoustic than electric guitar and I prefer blues or classic rock songs. Why? For every type of music you have to get to know some basics and for me these classic songs develop skills, they show you how guitar reacts to your playing, to your type of sound. I play electric mostly on rehearsals and there I'm trying out some effects (delays, choruses, fuzzes etc.), but when I'm at home I love to play some oldschool Missisipi blues with a slide and open E tuning. These two types of my inspirations have different effects on me,but I'm always extremely happy. Music and guitars are my whole world. When I'm on stage, I forget about any problems, I'm free and I can do whatever I want. This is my place on earth.

Q. How do you describe Karate Free Stylers sounds?

I think that KFS plays rock'n'roll music heavily inspired by punk rock and first indie bands like Pixies. We mix it with wall of sound inspired by MBV. When people ask me what kind of genre we are, I always say: "We play noise rock". And I think that it is the best term.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the new ep?

Recording process...I think it was very simple. All songs were previously prepared during the rehearsals. Only "Another Dawn Fades" was finished in the studio. I recorded all guitar parts on my Epiphone Supernova Cherry Red, bunch of effects and borrowed Sunn Model T (probably 120 watts) and Marshall JCM900 cab. Our bass player was recording with his Ashdown 180 watt amp and Squier P bass and MXR bass Di +. Our drummer used his old green Yamaha Stage Custom with Mapex snare drum and Zildjan plates. We've done it in probably 4/5 days. Marcin Klimczak, who was our producer and owner of the Mustache Ministry Studio, didn't want our material to be overproduced. We wanted it to be more crude but also full in sound.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?

From this shoegazer classic era I think we only have this wall of sound in some moments of our songs. I think that this part of shoegaze inspires me the most.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?

Huh, I know many new bands that are awesome. I love No Age, Japandroids, Male Bonding and Deerhunter, but from these less known I adore Slowness, 93MilesFromTheSun. I can also recommend some polish bands: Kiev Office, The Spouds, The Black Tapes, Teenagers, Lora Lie. These all band are great!

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

I think that I would like to cover No Age's "Everybody's Down" and The Beatles' "I want You (She's So Heavy)". But that's my opinion. I don't know if my band mates would like to cover any song

Q: What´s the plans for future....

We want to make a Polish tour. We are planning it now with our manager. Probably we will go with our friends from The Spouds. We would als like to make some gigs abroad but unfortunaely know we can't afford that. We also think about recording our first full-lenght, but I think that we have time for that. And we want to be famous

Q: Any parting words?

Listen to music, buy CD's, watch gigs!!!
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Tom Piotr

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Karate-Free-Stylers/133569190024298
http://karatefreestylers.bandcamp.com/album/weird-nightmares-sp

2012 HERE WE GO

2011-12-31T06:58:00.000-08:00

The TBTCI wishes all friends, and all the bands that make this place something really important for all of us music lovers.

2012 here we go

Renato Malizia

HE WHO FEARS DEATH CANNOT ENJOY LIFE

Strange Behavior by Screen Vinyl Image

2011-12-19T04:06:00.000-08:00

É fato que o SVI é unanimidade aqui no TBTCI, desde os aureos tempos do grandioso Alcian Blue Jake e Kim Reid veem se recriando a cada single, ep, album lançado. E para alegria de todos finalmente chega o segundo album do SVI, Strange Behavior, uma pancada supersonica movida a sintetizadores doentios e darks, doses cavalares do post punk, shoegaze frio, e psicodelismo, não há limites para o SVI, Revival é um grande exemplo do que Strange Behavior ter de melhor todos os estilos condensados dentro deste brutal exemplo de como se fazer soar atual mesmo com todas as influências retro.

O TBTCI aguardou ansiosamente o lançamento de Strange Behavior antes de soltar a famosa lista dos melhores do ano, e logicamente que foi a melhor opção a ser feita porque Strange Behavior é facil um dos melhores do ano, aos que soltaram suas listas antes de escutar a perola meus pesames porque quando ouvirem certamente mudarão de ideia.

Para melhor elucidar o album, nada melhor do que o proprio SVI para um track by track especialissimo, enjoy it!!!

Track by Track by SVI

We Don't Belong

This is a song about technology taking over human interactions and two people feeling like they can no longer exist in this "real" world.

Revival
This track is based off a old blues song we saw in a movie. Instead of being a religious tune like in the film, we changed it to being about going off to watch the world end.

Stay AsleepPart science fiction and part contemplative, the first half follows a dream state and the end falls into a nightmare.

My Confession
We wrote this song around the time of Interceptors, but we never quite got the lyrics down. The song is influenced from an old noir film called Double Indemnity. When we were mixing it we had been listening to Shadow of a Doubt by Sonic Youth and tried to keep in the spirit of that.

Station 4
Another older track, it's a song about having to leave someone behind. We pushed our reverb and delays to their limits in the process of this recording.

Rx
This is a song about prescription drugs.

New Visions
We wrote this off of a loop we came up with from a sound generator we built. The lyrics are some thoughts on passing through life.

Night Trip
We lost our cat to cancer this year, she was really awesome and loved to hang out when we worked on music. We wrote this song about losing a friend. The song title is from a film our friend Matt did, it just seemed to fit the mood of the song.
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Thanks SVI

https://www.facebook.com/screenvinylimage

www.screenvinylimage.com

Lay Back in the Sun with Music for Headphones - An Interview

2011-12-14T03:28:00.001-08:00

Music for Headphones, sugere algo extremamente viajante para se ouvir atentamente, certo? Certissimo, lisergia psicodelica ciclica exalando kraut para todos os lados, layers e layers sobrepostos, sintetizadores comandam a festa, guitarras em loop por vezes cristalinas em outras sombrias, a temática é elevar o ouvinte a algum lugar inexplorado, o poder da elevação da mente por meio da repetição e dos loops dão a impressionante sensação de estarmos sendo sugados para dentro do album, aliás o nome da perola, Life in Mono, lançado no já distante inicio desse ano, se sua praia é kraut, shoegazer, psicodelismo e considera Flying Saucer Attack o maximo, coloque seu headphone e deixe o poder dos delays, sintetizadores e das jazzmasters do Music for Headphone de abduzirem, e melhor ainda de play no seu Life in Mono na faixa de abertura a sugestiva Open e deleite-se com a entrevista abaixo.

***** Interview with Music for Headphones *****

Q. When did Music for Headphone starts, tell us about the history...

A. I first used the name in 200 while living and recording in Athens, GA. My drummer at the time and I recorded a sprawling seventy minute space rock opus titled "Dreaming This Coma Life" and Music for Headphones seemed like the obvious choice for the name. After the record was completed we moved to Portland, OR with the intention of setting up a live band, but I lost interest in the project after a few auditions and decided to take some time off. I ended up playing with The Upsidedown for most of 2002 before shifting my focus to only music production.

Fast forward to 2005; I found myself in Philadelphia, PA ending a six year relationship. It was a dark and terrible time and I started recording my own music again. Somehow I had wandered back into a shoegazey, space rock realm and decided to revive the name.

Over the past nearly seven years many people have come and gone from the group (but the last two years have been a steady line up) and I've charted a lot of sonic territory making shoegaze, neopsych, trip hop, experimental and most recently krautrock records, but hopefully have retained my own identity through out it all.

Q: Who are your influences?

A. Sonic Boom/Spectrum/Spacemen 3/Spiritualized, Jesus and Marychain, The Ronnettes/Phil Spector, The Cure, early Mercury Rev, Galaxie 500/Luna, Brian Jonestown Massacre, Neil Young, the Warlocks, David Roback/Opal/Mazzy Star, Sonic Youth, Joy Division/New Order, SWANS, Neu!, La Dusseldorf, Faust, Massive Attack, Stereolab.... the list goes on and on...

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…

A. Introducing The Ronnettes by the Ronnettes

Perfect Prescription by Spacemen 3

Power, Corruption and Lies by New Order

Pure Phase by Spiritualized

Head on the Door by The Cure

Q. How do you fell playing alive?

A. I honestly used to hate it other than the moments of complete sonic chaos because I could get lost in the feeback and noise, but now I am really starting to enjoy it. It probably mostly has to do with growing into my voice, feeling more comfortable.

Q. How do you describe Music for Headphones sounds?

A. I don't think there is a simple way to do that. All of us come from different backgrounds and I/we are constantly trying to push sound in a new and different direction. I can tell you the record we are working on now is huge, spacey and epic. There will be elements of shoegaze, space rock, electro, and 60's psychedelia in it. And a whole lot more!

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the new album?

A. This album is being done very differently than the past records. We've been demoing out ideas live in the studio, take after take of the same idea. Then we all go home and listen, come back to the next session with refreshed ideas. The actual recording will start in the next few weeks and some of it will be done mostly live, others will start with the drums and be built upon. After all the basic tracking is done, most of it will be cut up into new arrangements then parts will either be added or replaced. We are approaching the recording process more like it is a remix, using the technology we have to do something new. Its the most ambitious record we've worked on and I honestly think it will be the best.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?

A. Well, I think the classic era has to be defined by England in the early 90's. My Bloody Valentine, Ride, Chapterhouse, Lush, Slowdive, Swearvedriver... but those bands didn't get there on their own... Spacemen 3, Jesus and Marychain, Sonic Youth... They were making similar noise ten years before.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?

A. Bloody Knives, bliss.city.east, Morpheme, Drowner, SPC ECO, Her Vanished Grace, the December Sound, the Badhoneys, Haunted Leather, Wooden Shijps, Screen Vinyl Image, Dead Leaf Echo... There are a ton I am missing, there's just so much good stuff going on right now.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

A. Spacemen 3, Luna, Depeche Mode, The Cure

Q: What´s the plans for future....

A. Our last album, Life in Mono, is getting reissued on cassette through our new label, XD Records (www.xdrecords.net) and they'll also be putting out our new album next spring. In March we are doing a ten date tour through the southern US to South By Southwest and back. Tentitive plans to go back out to the Chicago area in May as well as a number of mini-tours in the northeastern US. Most likely we will be recording another record in the fall of 2012.

Q: Any parting words?

A. There's a revolution happening. Everybody just needs to open their ears.

Thanks Jonathan...

http://www.myspace.com/musicforheadphones
https://www.facebook.com/musicforheadphones

Dopalovers

2011-12-13T04:23:00.001-08:00

But first, are you experienced?

Have you ever been experienced?

Well, I have........
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2011´s The Last Party

Sweetness and the Light with Drowner - An Interview

2011-12-12T03:19:00.001-08:00

Nos primeiros acordes de Point Dume, faixa de abertura do Ep homonimo dos americanos do Drowner meus sentimentos retornam a duas obras belissimas, Heaven or Las Vegas e Gala, respectivamente de dois patrimonios dos bons sons Cocteau Twins e Lush, a palavra etereo nunca esteve tao bem ilustrada atualmente como nesta maravilha de canção, Never Go Away começa e os sonhos caminham lado a lado com a realidade, ouvir isso depois de pegar um transito infernal cai como um calmante para a alma. Anna Bouchard, vocais, Darren Emanuel, guitarras, Sean Evans, guitarras e Mike Brewer, baixo, nos conduzem a um imaginario mundo de sonhos cintilantes e etereos com direito a passeios fascinantes recheados de delays espaciais, susteianers aconchegantes e pedacinhos do paraiso acabam por fazer parte de nossas vidas pelo menos durante os quase 30 minutos de sedução plena que o ep homonimo nos oferta.

Anna e Darren são leitores do TBTCI e gentilmente concederam não somente ao TBTCI mas a todos nós uma entrevista repleta de revelações e grandes novidades que estão por vir. Esqueçam dos problemas e deem espaço ao Drowner....

***** Interview with Drowner *****

Q. When did Drowner starts, tell us about the history...

Darren: After releasing Swimming In in 2008, I became more interested in guitar textures, especially a kind of distorted, reverb sound I was experimenting with, and I wanted to expand on that and write songs with it. They naturally had a sort of shoegaze/postrock sound, because of that effect, mainly, and I wrote probably ten or fifteen songs that way, just playing with it. At some point in 2009 or early 2010, I'd added drums and bass, and I started thinking about finding a singer. After some failed Craigslist sourcing, I mentioned to Anna (who was working with me on some video color correction) that I was having a lot of trouble finding the right singer for the project. I kind of threw it out there: Would she like to take a crack at it? And, she said yes. She turned around a first draft of one song, and I heard a lot of potential in it, and so asked her if she wanted to be in a band.

Anna: Yeah, everything just seemed to come together. We sent files back and forth via the internet and collaborated on a handful of songs, and finally they started to really mesh, and it looked like a release was possible. We'd progressed, at that point, to writing few new songs together. Mixing began in the spring of 2011, and by June, we had an EP ready for self-release via iTunes, etc. The response to the EP was really positive, and so we decided to keep the momentum going and track a couple of songs for another release, this time a single and B-side. In September, another longtime friend of Darren's, Sean Evans, joined the band on 2nd guitar, and not long after that, Mike Brewer stepped in on bass. Around this time, a few labels were expressing interest in signing Drowner, as we had dubbed ourselves (after the title of a song that we were working on), and SMR seemed like a great fit. We have been really, really happy with that choice.

Q: Who are your influences?

Darren: For me, I'm interested in texture and connecting that with dynamics and emotion, so I appreciate a lot of bands like Hammock, Explosions in the Sky and This Will Destroy You. There are a few bands from the late 80's and early 90's that figure in, as well, and often for the same reasons. The first Verve album, the last two Talk Talk albums and Distintegration by the Cure all share a kind of dynamism, emotion and grandeur.

Anna: “Dynamism, emotion and grandeur” is exactly what moves me, as well, and so I would add to the bands that Darren mentions Mogwai and Sigur Ros, and also the work of Siouxie Sioux, Bjork and Kate Bush. I also find I have a subtler and down-to-earth side that gravitates toward bands like R.E.M.

Q. Made a list of 5 albums of all time…

1. Spirit of Eden-Talk Talk

2. Disintegration-The Cure

3. Astral Weeks-Van Morrison

4. Ágætis byrjun-Sigur Ros

5. Velvet Underground and Nico

Q. How do you fell playing alive?

A. We both agree that we feel very alive in those moments.

Q. How do you describe Drowner sounds?

A. Almost indescribably big. Enveloping, delicate, thunderous, layered, inarticulate or ineffable, overwhelming, shimmering.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the debut album?

Darren: Most of the songs start with a sound on guitar. I’m always listening for a new sound as I'm experimenting with different effects and signal routings. A lot of times, the guitar signal is split into two or three to run separate paths through the gear. I use a rack amp and the speaker cabinet from my Rhodes along with a Space Echo for a lot of it, and then route a mic signal from that through pedals. Another signal might pass through a computer running a series of delays, reverbs and distortions, and then another signal through a grain delay or through the V-synth and vocoder. Sometimes it all goes to tape, and sometimes it gets put back through the chain again with a different configuration. For the newest material I'm using more layered chorus pedals and tremolo, so there's a more distinct, drier channel on top, but the background wall of noise is always there. Luckily by splitting the signals we can pretty much duplicate the sound live.

Anna: Typically, Darren will send chord progressions and demo arrangements to me to listen to. I write lyrics for them and compose the initial vocal melodies. Then, Darren takes what I have written and makes adjustments to the guitar parts and the arrangement to reflect my choices. One area in which we have entered into a lot of collaboration is that of my vox harmonies. It used to be that I would send one or two harmony lines with my initial vox melodies. If we needed additional lines, they were often improvised in the final recording. That led to the two of us sorting out some really effective vox harmonies in the studio, on the dais. And so now, we like to write them more progressively from the outset and in tandem, sorting out what fits most tightly into the final arrangement, while still reflecting how I feel I should sound in the blend. A lot can be said for writing spontaneously together in the room – we do work in that way, sometimes – but we like the results we get from working dynamically in stages, too. So it seems that the one ends up feeding the other, most often.

Darren: By this time, Sean and Mike are listening to the demos and figuring out their parts, and I'll record them. Eventually, the vocals are rerecorded, and overdubs, if needed, are done, and then it's mixed. We're using a hybrid method of mixing this record, with stems being done in the PC, and then the stems are mixed down to two tracks on a Topaz desk to tape. In this way, we get a little of both worlds. I like the bigger sound of hardware, and the EQs on the Topaz are nice, and I think we're achieving a nice wide sound.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?

A. Ride-Nowhere probably best exemplifies the classic era to us.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?

A. We're really into Exitmusic, The Fauns and SPC ECO right now.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

A. We would love to cover Straitjacket Fits, R.E.M., Talk Talk, The Cure. We hope there will be some great covers in our future.

Q: What´s the plans for future....

A. An all-new LP for Saint Marie Records in Spring 2012, the release of an expanded, deluxe version of our debut EP, more cool videos, and some surprise, secret stuff.

Q: Any parting words?

A. Look for us in 2012. It's going to be a big year for Drowner.

Thanks Anna & Darren.....

http://www.drownerband.com/
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Drowner/182014378508957

Haus der Luge with Sobre a Maquina

2011-12-09T06:13:00.000-08:00

Não acredito em cena nacional underground, prefiro crer que existem movimentos isolados tipo no RS, temos a Transfusão, a Sinewave, e temos uma caralhada de bandas dispersas tentando criar algo relevante e inovador, e vou ser sincero, a ebulição da cena underground do underground nacional esta realmente recheada de ótimas bandas, mas infelizmente aqui no Brasil as coisas caminham de forma desconexa porque quem comanda a musica usualmente não entende absolutamente nada de musica, e o trabalho dos musicos e suas bandas são dificies, inumeros reveses e inumeras acabam sucumbindo pelo sistema hipocrita.

Agora em contrapartida me deixa extremamente orgulhoso, saber que algumas bandas fogem do amadorismo e da mesmice e criam algo absolutamente inovador, com conteudo e com conceito proprio acima de tudo, pessoas que realmente acreditam que possa existir qualidade fora o amadorismo latente que é notorio quando falamos de underground.

Uma dessas bandas atende pela alcunha de Sobre a Maquina, pequeno intervalo aqui, tomei conhecimento através do Fernando da revista online Floga-se onde ele me disse, Renatão ouça isso, é indigesto, quero ouvir tua opinião a respeito. Ok, demorei um pouco mas acabei ouvindo após um bate papo com Cadu Tenorio um dos mentores da banda, e fiquei literalmente chocado, aqueles drones, me foderam literalmente, Lingua Negra a faixa de abertura do EP Areia é algo fora do contexto atual da musica nacional seja alternativa ou não, o experimentalismo explicito é decupado pelos integrantes de forma minuciosa e perfeccionista, cada detalhe, cada nuance é sentida a cada audição. Lingua Negra é extremamente dificil de ser analisada friamente, Einstürzende Neubauten, PIL, Throbbing Gristle, Krautrock, leia-se NEU! pode ser o que vem primeiramente a cabeça ouvindo isso, acrescente os loops e drones do Loop, a perversão do Suicide, Mogwai, mas veja vem isso não é post rock, isso é post industrial, post sei lá o que é inqualificavel , se é que a palavra existe, o som do Sobre a Maquina e a obra prima Lingua Negra.

Se você conseguiu passar pelo choque de Lingua Negra, o clima torna-se mais ameno em Barca, durante minha primeira audição comentei com o Cadu, que me lembrou absurdamente o Durutti Column, e após ver o que ele proprio escreveu reafirmo, seria algo como se Vini Reilly fizesse um duo com Blixa Bargeld, um clima de desespero clamando saudade ronda a musica inteira....ainda temos Foz e Garça, que segundo Cadu é a resumo do Sobre a Maquina.

Simplesmente um dos melhores albuns nacionais que foram lançados em muito muito tempo, sem contar na parte da arte que é um conceito a parte....Ah sim vale ressaltar que teremos uma rara oportunidade no da 21/01/2012 de poder conferir o poder sonoro do Sobre a Maquina aqui em São Paulo.

E mais, convidei Cadu para realizar um track by track do Areia para que o TBTCI e todos os interessados possam adentrar mais e mais no mundo pessoal do Sobre a Maquina. Aproveitem.

Track by Track com Cadu Tenorio - Sobre a Maquina "Areia"

Bem, idéia interessante do Malizia me convidar pra escrever um faixa a faixa do Areia. Começo isso dizendo que não costumo pensar minha produção sonora a partir de outros trabalhos, não passa pela minha cabeça reproduzir, muito menos referendar explicitamente nenhum outro trabalho artistico. Tenho por mim o desejo - talvez idiota, talvez não - de fazer um som próprio. Agora é inegável que muita coisa influencia esse processo. Desde a formação músical, o que você ouve, o que te agrada até suas visões de mundo. Enfim, vamos tentar aqui, de forma breve e sem delongas.

Língua Negra
Essa música foi idealizada por ultimo no contexto do disco, mas desde o ínicio pensava que precisaria de uma faixa como ela para abrir. Queria que ela seguisse um groove hipnótico através de uma percussão tensa e pesada, porém minimal, algo que fosse uma espécie de saída do Decompor... Synths e vozes jogados de forma doentia por cima criando os ápices e climas. A batida tinha que ser especial, tive a idéia de montar um set de percussão metalizada que junto aos efeitos fizesse a base hipnótica desse som, as microfonias foram feitas a partir de manipulação do volume para com a sala. A música concreta e o early-industrial do Neubauten, SPK e Throbbing Gristle sempre fizeram minha cabeça, e não teria pensado nessa batida tocada com uma velha bomba de bicicleta, um triângulo(sim o instrumento de forró e samba) e a base de aluminio de um ventilador. Unimos isso a microfonação com reverb e delay milimétricamente dosados e conseguimos o resultado desejado. Considero o riff de baixo de fato hipnotizante, impossível negar as raízes que pelo menos ao meu ver viriam do Joy Division, apesar de tudo. Ela é o abre alas do cd porque de certa forma desemboca como uma "língua negra" no que está por vir haha. O climax ou o final, como preferir, acabou virando algo que me remete de leve à trabalhos como os do Fennesz e Tim Hecker, é o único momento onde uma guitarra tocada com o delay invertido surge pra complementar os synths. Ao meu a música não poderia terminar diferente cai como uma luva no Início de Barca. Creio que o Kraut do Faust e o Can tenham sido boas influências pra esse disco também.

Barca
Foi a primeira faixa a ficar pronta. Foi criada num momento de muita saudade. De certa forma tenho que admitir que é uma música "romântica" à seu modo caótico e inconformado haha. As percussões e sons metálizados gerados pelo desnível do ventilador com o chão de mármore - as velocidades do ventilador o faziam tremer e bater com as "pernas de base" desníveladas nesse chão criando um som motorizado bem interessante -. Esses sons foram gravados com um condenser próximo ao chão, eu e Emygdio resolvemos cobrir tudo - ventilador, barras de ferro -, inclusive nós mesmos com um edredom pra abafar a ambiência externa, enquanto rolava o feedback natural dos motores e batidas no chão tocamos as barras de aluminio e aço inspirados pela violência sonora das velhas barcas que atravessam a baía de guanabara - costumo fazer essa travessia Rio/Niterói com certa frequência e sempre fico fascinado, pra quem não conhece é algo assustador o som dessas barcas, como seria quase impossível gravar o som direto de lá com qualidade, resolvemos criar algo inspirado naquilo. A travessia em sí foi minha inspiração, a baía é um contraste de beleza e degradação intensa que é mais ou menos a balança que pende nessa música. O tema de piano bem simples e quase onipresente costura toda a loucura berrante das guitarras e dos sintetizadores. Tudo culmina num ápice que considero emocionante haha, a bateria é uma das que mais demorei a fazer na história da banda, prestando atenção ela contém muitos detalhes porque foi a junção de três baterias construidas e mixadas por lados diferentes em volumes e velocidades também diferentes. Parando pra analisar as influências que poderia tirar pra faixa, pode-se dizer que são o industrial do Throbbing Gristle e o drone de Tim Hecker, mas pensando agora também me traz de leve a lembrança alguns trabalhos como os do Richard D. James(Aphex Twin). As referencias de timbre pro riff sabbathico lentíssimo do final - gravado pelo Gameiro - foi o Sunn O))). Curioso que foi muito dificil mixar esse final da forma que eu gostaria, a guitarra com a referencia de timbre inicial engolia tudo, tivemos que nos desdobrar pra dar vazão a tudo, aos synths do ápice, as leves variações de clima nos pianos(são dois timbres fazendo uma dobra), a descontrução da bateria e a segunda guitarra que fazia o noise drone pontual, sendo que tudo acontecia ao mesmo tempo como uma mudança brusca. No fim acho que alcançamos a melhor forma possível até o momento, a música nos satisfaz muito, e é curioso como ela consegue soar agradável até mesmo a quem não tem nenhuma familiariadade com as influências da banda. Gosto muito também da linha de baixo que não muda em momento algum, pontuando as mesmas notas bem GRAVE haha.

Foz
Tinha ela toda pronta, os synths e a bateria, seria um groove intenso e tenso, pensei que ficaria lindo, um riff de baixo pontuando uma espécie de groove orquestrado pelos synths e bateria, então o Emygdio traduziu num riff que caiu como uma luva, trabalhamos bem no timbre deleo mais ENFERRUJADO possível - - no geral temos uma preocupação grandiosa com todos os timbres, sempre -, a idéia de investir na hipnose veio com as harmonias de voz improvisadas que gravamos, elas deveriam criar o clima em contraponto a guitarra que seria o fundo, guitarra essa improvisada pelo Emygdio sob condições de extrema exaustão pra ficar o mais claustrofóbica possível(as vezes achamos legais esses métodos que pra muita gente são bobos haha) com tudo isso desenvolvido uma segunda guitarra vai surgindo em loop alterada freneticamente no pedal de delay, tentamos gravar em vários takes essa guitarra, o Gameiro gravou várias vezes até acharmos que estava no ponto. Há também barulhos sutis feitos com coisas sutis como estalos de dedo e coisas do tipo espalhados que vão descontruindo a coisa toda. Na época achamos a sonoridade sensacional e esse amontoado de detalhes deixaria a música cada vez mais cheia, de uma forma não gritante, sem perder a idéia hipnótica e tornaria ainda mais impactante o encontro com o outro rio, um extremo totalmente oposto. Mudanças nas modulações dos synths e duas guitarras num dedilhado dissonante tranquilo, seguidas de perto por uma linha de baixo pulsante e um sax tenor quase smooth jazz e estranhamente tocado como se fosse uma flauta transversa pelo querido Alexandere Zhemchuznikov é a redenção completa. É uma música e tanto, foi a única disco que trabalhamos todos de fato juntos nas idéias, Emygdio e Ricardo contribuiram com ótimas melodias. E ela seria a síntese desse contraste entre o caos e calmaria. Referências de Kraut e do industrial continuam ali, mas há uma lembrança ao jazz... Pasamos muitas madrugadas gravando cada detalhe. Há quem diga que é uma música com cores. haha

Garça
O tema central dela existia antes mesmo de Barca, mas as nuances não. Nessa música o teor jazzístico é explícito. Ela funciona como o ápice do disco inteiro. O timbre do Rhodes é tenso. A batida é seca, minimal, envolvente, como tinha que ser, arrastada. Avaliando aqui agora vejo influências de drone, jazz e claro do early-Industrial. Percussão com latas e tudo em prol do clima, baixo e piano andam juntos firmemente costurados pela bateria enquanto todos os outros elementos improvisam livremente sobre o tema adotando uma postura de quase silencio, envolvendo. A primeira guitarra que entra faz um drone que remete a Morricone quase que sem querer. E daí pra frente o drone toma corpo e vai até não restar mais nada, tudo acaba, devagar, e que sobre é o caos. O cimax é a parte mais intensa do disco, não saberia traduzir ele em palavras, os riffs tanto do teclado quanto da guitarra são pesados e hostís, uma segunda guitarra chora acompanhando o sax tenor desgovernado tocado numa levada "Brotzmann". Se tivesse que achar alguma banda pra referendar diria que é uma cruza entre o Coil e o próprio Brotzmann. Um fato curioso é que o sax foi gravado acompanhando apenas os temas de piano rhodes e a bateria todo o arranjo posterior foi construído por címa.
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Obrigado Cadu!!

http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=3704281818281367352
http://sobreamaquina.bandcamp.com/

The Best Albuns of 2011

2011-12-07T04:22:00.000-08:00

Chegou a hora, e os melhores dos melhores de um ano que para o shoegazer e o psychedelic sounds foi acima, muito acima, grandes albuns....e sem maiores explicações tá aí a lista deste que vos escreve:

LORELLE MEETS THE OBSOLETE – ON WELFARE
93MMFTS – NORTHERN SKY
RINGO DEATHSTARR – COLOUR TRIP
DEAD SKELETONS - DEAD MAGICK
THE OSCILLATION - VEILS
YOUNG PRISMS – FRIENDS FOR NOW
SCREEN VINYL IMAGE – STRANGE BEHAVIOR
THE HORRORS - SKYING
ALL IN THE GOLDEN AFTERNOON – MAGIC LIGHTHOUSE ON THE INFINITE SEA
WOODEN SHIJPS – WEST
CRYSTAL STILTS – IN LOVE WITH OBLIVION
MOON DUO – MAZES
BIG TROUBLES – ROMANTIC COMEDY
SISTERS OF YOUR SUNSHINE VAPOR – SPECTRA SPIRIT
THE NOVA SAINTS - NEWFOUNDLAND
YOUNGTEAM - DAYDREAMER
STELLARSCOPE - ST
SPC ECO – YOU TELL ME
SPOTLIGHT KID – DISASTER TOURIST
VINYL WILLIAMS – LEMNISCATE

MENÇÕES HONROSAS PARA:

PINK PLAYGROUND – DESTINATION ECSTASY – shoegazer classico, um daqueles albuns revivalistas que faria um sucesso enorme nos inferninhos dos 90´s….indispensavel para qualquer shoegazer xiita.

CHAPEL CLUB – PALACE – o melhor album do pop britanico em muitos e muitos anos…

EAT LIGHTS BECOME LIGHTS – AUTOPIA – Krautrock atualizado da melhor qualidade

DEEP CUT - DISORIENTATION - Matt Flint é Matt Flint e ponto final.

Shoegazer Archives with Grabbel and The Final Cut - An Interview

2011-12-06T04:03:00.000-08:00

Grabbel and The Final Cut soa familiar a você? Imaginei...para mim também não, mas depois de trocar emails com Stefan, guitarras e vocais, fui apresentado a uma genuina perola esquecida e perdida no submundo dos bons sons, 20 anos passaram-se e agora graças ao espertissimo selo Captured Tracks e seu projeto de resgatar preciosidade desconhecidas do shoegazer, finamente o Grabbel and The Final Cut tera seu nome devidamente reconhecido.

Diretamente da Alemanha, o Grabbel faz um noise pop pegajoso com trejeitos de shoegazer classico, os caras nunca lançaram um album propriamente dito, a discografia contém inumeros cassetes, singles e eps, onde o escolhido para ser relançado é o Get Your Feet Back On The Ground, 3 petardos magnificos Psycho Popsong, The Finest Thing e Out of Work and on the Dole mostram o porque o Grabbel esta sendo resgatado, e mais, isso motivou Stefan e a banda a voltarem a tocar, simplesmente sensacional, logicamente que o TBTCI aproveitando a oportunidade já engatou uma entrevista para celebrar o momento e pagar tributo ao ex desconhecido Grabbel and The Final Cut e com o maior prazer do mundo, Sras e Srs, Stefan e seu maravilhoso Grabbel and The Final Cut.

***** Interview with Grabbel and The final Cut *****

Q: When did Grabbel and The Final Cut start, tell us about the history...

A. The band was formed in 1989 in our hometown Lüneburg in Germany, which is a smaller city close to Hamburg. We weren't really musicians, just friends who loved the same kind of music. We figured out how to playour instruments by trying to play cover versions of our favorite bands. But that didn't work out too well and so we started writing our own tunes.

After a few months we had our first gig in a nearby club, the Wahnhof in Bardowick. The owner of the club, Ture Carstensen, wasn't really sure if he should let us play, but somehow we managed to persuade him. And when we played our very first concert, the venue was packed! Somehow everyone brought his friends, and friends of friends. There were more than 200 people, and Ture was so happy, selling lots of drinks and stuff, so that from then on we could play there whenever we wanted (and we did a couple of times in the following years). So the Wahnhof was something like a second home for us, we used to hang out there at nights and became good friends with Ture.

The sad end of the story is that the Wahnhof building got torn down in 1992. The autobahn from Lüneburg to Hamburg took its place...

Q: Who are your influences?

A. When we started the band our biggest influence of course were the current bands we listened to at that time, at the end of the 80s, like The Smiths, The Jesus And Mary Chain, The House Of Love and My Bloody Valentine (yeah, this was before Loveless came out...), plus some older stuff like Joy Division / New Order, and maybe most important: The Velvet Underground. When I heard the first Velvets album, this was like a revelation. I suddenly realised that you don't need great musical skills, as long as you have great songs.

Q: Make a list of the 5 best albums of all time...

A. Well, I can only speak for myself, as the other guys in the band would surely name some other albums, but mine are..., hmm..., all time? Tough decision..., maybe these (in no particular order):

"The Velvet Underground & Nico" by The Velvet Underground

"Tommy" by The Who

"All Mod Cons" by The Jam

"The Queen Is Dead" by The Smiths

"Psychocandy" by The Jesus And Mary Chain

Q: How do you feel playing live?

A. Playing live was always great, we enjoyed it very much. On a good day there's some kind of really positive interaction between the band and the audience, and the music is the link between the two. On a bad day however, it can be a real disaster..., but we only had that once, when we played in some small village in Bavaria, southern Germany. The people there were expecting some different kind of music, obviously..., they started yelling at us, and we were yelling back from the stage..., in the end we had to leave the location through the bathroom window, haha!

Q: How do you describe Grabbel and The Final Cut sounds?

A. Er..., once back in the day, when we sent out some information about the band to the local daily newspaper, we wrote that we're doing "noise-guitar-psych-pop". A few days later there was indeed an article about us, but the heading read: "Psycho Pop from Lüneburg"

So I'm not going to make up some new term for you now, else who knows what you'll come up with...? ;-)

By the way, after this "Psycho Pop" article I decided to rename a song I had just written. It was originally titled "Perfect Popsong" but became the "Psycho Popsong" then.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the Get Your Feet Back On

The Ground EP...

A. Back then we recorded everything on cassette tapes. Ture, the owner of the Wahnhof club, had a 4-track cassette recorder we could kindly borrow from time to time. I can't remember the exact model, but I think it was an early TEAC cassette system. So this was cool, a real gift actually, because we didn't have to go to an expensive studio to record some rushed demos. Instead we could take our time with Ture's cassette thing at home, and it wouldn't matter if it took a few days longer than originally planned.

Anyway, we had one ok microphone (a Sennheiser-something) and one not-so-ok-but-fine-for-us mic (some SM58 copy), which we both used for vocals when playing in our rehearsal room. And when we had the 4-track cassette in our room we realised that we didn't have enough microphones to record the drums properly. We were really keen on starting the recording session, but alas, money was short. So we went downtown to the local Woolworth store to see what they got. They had cheap microphones and they had very cheap microphones. So we took two of each home, placed them where we thought they should be and made some tests with varying mic positions. And it sounded fine!

When I prepared the tracks for the forthcoming EP release now, I actually thought "wow! this sounds really good!". And it was recorded using these crappy yellow plastic microphones... True Lo-Fi, but the weird thing is that it doesn't sound like Lo-Fi at all.

Q: What represents the classic shoegazer era to the band?

A. That was a cool period. All of a sudden there were so many great noisy guitar-pop bands around. Before that, there were maybe a handful of bands that paved the way, like The Jesus And Mary Chain (of course!), The House Of Love and the pre-Loveless My Bloody Valentine.

But in late 1989 for me the "new bands" took off with the Pale Saints "Barging Into The Presence Of God" EP. I heard the song "She Rides The Waves" late at night on the radio and was blown away. Went to my favorite record shop the next day and bought the EP. Then came bands like Ride, Slowdive, Swervedriver and The Boo Radleys, and then Revolver, Moose and Catherine Wheel, and later on Adorable, who might be the last of the better known first-wave shoegazers. Or maybe shoegaze had ended by then already...? Hard to tell, but the scene faded in 1993 and somehow transformed into... Britpop!

Q: Which new bands do you recommended?

A. Well, these aren't exactly "new" bands, but of all bands I got to know in the past few years, I guess The Electric Soft Parade and Brakes made the biggest impact on me. They're both from Brighton, UK and they're sharing some band members, which is cool.

Best bands I saw live this year were Ra Ra Riot, The Joy Formidable and We Were Promised Jetpacks.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

A. That would definitely be the song "Flying Pizza" by Swearing At Motorists!

Q: What's the plans for future....

A. With the forthcoming Captured Tracks release of our Get Your Feet Back On The Ground EP in January, we're indeed thinking about getting back on stage again! So we've started rehearsing and we're currently planning some gigs in Hamburg and Lüneburg, and then I guess we'll see what happens...

Q: Any parting words?

A. Thanks to all the bloggers and everyone out there, who said such nice things about our music in the past few weeks. That was some really amazing feedback and it means a lot to us. And special thanks to Mike Sniper at Captured Tracks who made this all possible in the first place; without him our songs would still sit there on Bandcamp and Last.fm and rarely get heard...
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Thanks Stefan!!!

http://grabbelandthefinalcut.wordpress.com/2011/11/29/captured-tracks-record-label-to-release-grabbel-and-the-final-cut-ep-in-january/
http://grabbelandthefinalcut.wordpress.com/about/
http://grabbelandthefinalcut.bandcamp.com/album/get-your-feet-back-on-the-ground-ep
https://www.facebook.com/GrabbelAndTheFinalCut

Xiita´s Weekend at SP

2011-12-02T10:43:00.000-08:00

Em três diferentes versões a noite de São Paulo nesse final de semana tem ares xiitas em todos os locais...

Perfect Prescription with Dead Star Sonics

2011-11-30T08:34:00.000-08:00

Antes de mais nada dedico este post ao meu chapa Robson Gomes, guitarras e vocais do grande, digo muito grande The Concept, mas deixando o Concept para outra história (breve por sinal ok), e vou começar o post com uma frase do Robson: "A musica boa se renova a todo momento....".

Eu não só concordo como acredito piamente neste dogma, e para justificar esse sentimento, ou melhor este fato, apresento a vocês Dead Star Sonics, a banda de Nick Watts, um viciante e encharcado lo fi psychedelic sound, muito rock´n´roll classico, garageira 60´s mesclado com a familia Spacemen 3 e o Velvet Underground, impossivel não ficar pasmo com Original Sonic Blues, Spikey ou Velveteen, é grudento até dizer chega.

Ah sim, não há nada oficial do Dead Star Sonics e isso é o que instiga mais ainda, o tesão de fazer musica crua e nua, com amor e com conhecimento de causa, Nick Watts ganhou dois fãns imediatos, este que vos escreve e meu comparsa Robson, simplesmente porque Dead Star Sonics é foda!!!Ah sim, tomei conhecimento da banda através do proprio Nick via TBTCI, é um prazer sabe que o TBTCI tem leitores tão seletos.

E para deixar mais ilustrado e com maiores explicações, abaixo um track by track pelo proprio Nick Watts, enjoy it!!

Original Sonic Blues

I was going for a ‘Waiting For The Man’ vibe with this one. Trashy guitars, a pounding beat and two chords – it’s a good song to walk to. You should always judge a song by how it makes you walk along the street when you’re listening to it on headphones.

Seventeening

I love writing simple pop songs and then trying to mess them up and make them sound dirty. A great way of doing that is to make the guitars sound cheap and nasty. There’s a load of tremolo all over the middle section - I love tremolo. There should be more tremolo in the world.

Velveteen

When I was a kid, computer games came on cassettes that you had to load on to your computer. If you put the cassette in a normal tape player, it made these weird, random electronic sounds. I basically built this song around that sound.

Halfway to Nowhere

A simple, three-chord, trashy rock song. I normally use a drum machine because I record at home and real drums would scare my hamster, but this one has real drums played by a guy called Dan. All hail Dan.

Spiked

I try to have as few chords as possible in a song. This is all basically an A chord. There’s a droning sitar in there too. Most of the stuff I do has some kind of drone – a guitar or a synth playing the same note or chord all the way through. Gotta love the drone.

Lord, Don’t Take Me Now

Another song built around one chord. I love Spacemen 3 and the way they use drones and tremolo stutters, and I was trying to do something similar but also make it a full, well-rounded song. This is one of my favourites.

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Thanks Nick!!

http://www.deadstarsonics.com

Dead Souds with Ars Phoenix - An Interview

2011-11-18T04:48:00.000-08:00

Dark wave, post punk, electro noise, shoegazer esses são os territórios visitados por Jon e Page ou se preferir Ars Phoenix, combo perturbador que segue os caminhos do predileto SVI porém mais soturnos e eletronicos, o debut Hanging Fire fala por si só, desde a abertura com Hanging Fire a musica até os derradeiros momentos em Engines of Progress (Faith in Machinery Version) a dark wave comanda a grande parte das musicas e credencia o Ars Phoenix a ficar na linha de frente com bandas como Cold Cave e Soft Moon nas que remodelam os estilos escuros do 80´s e os trazem com roupagem atualizada para nossos tempos.

Tomei conhecimento do Ars Phoenix através de uma postagem no FB do SVI onde vi o video dos caras e me interessei de imediato comentando positivamente que havia gostado muito do que ouvi, de imediato recebi o contato imediato de Jon Glover responsavel por tudo na banda com exceção das guitarras e ai conversa vai conversa vem, e o TBTCI aproveitando a oportunidade descolamos mais uma entrevista para melhor apresentar a todos o poderio do Ars Phoenix.

***** Interview with Ars Phoenix *****

Q. When did Ars Phoenix, tell us about the history...

A. Ars Phoenix has a somewhat confusing history due to several relocations, recurrent lineup changes, and a series of unintentional, long-term hiatuses. The most recognizable form of Ars Phoenix, the Hanging Fire lineup of myself (vocals, synths, beats, guitar) and Paige Fowler (guitar), took shape in 2008. Paige and I had both just moved to Gainesville, Florida to begin working on PhDs in English Literature at the University of Florida. I had an album’s worth of material—2008’s Engines of Progress (FDO Recordings)—that I wanted to release and support with live shows, so I was in search of either a guitarist or a keyboardist who could help me perform the recordings live as a duo. We met when Paige overhead me chatting about music with another graduate student at an orientation meeting. Shortly thereafter, Paige and I began rehearsing and retooling the old material as well as writing, slowly but surely, what would eventually become 2011’s Hanging Fire (FDO).

Long before all that, though, I had started Ars Phoenix as a solo project in 2001/2002. At the time, I was in a very ambitious band called Kilborough, in which we attempted to blend post rock, shoegaze, ethereal, and experimental electronic music. It was a thrilling experience as well as a head ache, because the band had too many strong personalities, all competent songwriters with inventive ideas, that inevitably came into creative conflict. We peaked early with a sought after opening spot with The Faint, who were touring in support of Danse Macabre at the time, but the torturous process of completing our second album (recently released on cassette by our friend Patrick Norris) led me to quit.

I then started using Ars Phoenix as a vehicle for realizing my vision of Kilborough, although Ars Phoenix ended up only partially resembling my idealization of that band. The other members of Kilborough have since gone on to do some amazing things, including A Soft Perversion/Leo Ashline and The Nude Scene. Perhaps most notably, ex-Kilborough guitarist Todd Brooks has found substantial and well-deserved notoriety with his Pendu Recordings label and NYC dance parties, both of which became central fixtures of the Witch House genre/movement in 2010.

During the solo version of Ars Phoenix, I was living in Naples, Florida. I didn’t play out much, but when I did, I enjoyed the support of some great musicians: Sean Stevenson and Chris Farren from Fake Problems, Joe Merrill from Daleth, and Terence Hannum, now of Locrian. But Ars Phoenix kind of fell off the map shortly thereafter when I moved to Orlando to pursue a Master’s degree. I wrote and recorded a bit here and there, but Ars Phoenix was pretty much nonexistent until I moved to Gainesville and resurrected the project with Paige’s help. Just recently, the band has gone through another lineup change, the addition of my significant other, Caitlin, on synthesizer. With the new lineup and my PhD now complete, we’re more mobile than ever and hope to make 2012 a year full of live shows.

Q: Who are your influences?

A. I’m pretty obsessed with the early days of 4AD, especially vintage Clan of Xymox and, of course, the Cocteau Twins. Joy Division/New Order, The Cure, and The Smiths are also obvious influences, but I also have a deep fondness for Slowdive and My Bloody Valentine, and it would be a huge oversight for me not to recognize the role that Godspeed You! Black Emperor and Aphex Twin have played on my musical outlook, even though the pop sensibilities of Ars Phoenix might make those more soundtracky/experimental influences less recognizable to some listeners. Speaking of soundtracks, I also love horror and sci-fi film scores—John Carpenter, Goblin, Vangelis, Morricone, and Badalamenti come to mind. So I guess it is fitting that a recent review compares the atmosphere of Hanging Fire to the “psychotronic film genre.” I also love classic synthpop and the more electronics-driven side of British post-punk, including Depeche Mode, Cabaret Voltaire, and old Human League, as well as bands like Danse Society and Fad Gadget. More surprisingly perhaps, my formative years were dominated by Dischord Records, especially the almighty Fugazi, Nation of Ulysses, and Hoover, which explains the trace of post-hardcore some listeners and reviewers have perceived, particularly on Engines of Progress. Lately, though, Caitlin and I have been on a deep Dead Can Dance and Piano Magic kick, and I’m keen to see if those influences will impact the material we plan to begin writing next year.

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…

A. That is such a tough question, nearly unanswerable. I will do my best, but if you asked me again in a week, the list would most certainly shift a bit! In no particular order my top 5 are:

The Cure – Pornography,

Slowdive – Slouvaki,

Clan of Xymox – Medusa,

The Smiths – The Queen is Dead,

Joy Division – Closer,

John Foxx – Metamatic.

Q. How do you fell playing alive?

A. I’m addicted to playing live. On the drive home from a show, all I can think about is how much I wish we were on tour, because the wait between shows is going to kill me. While in the moment of the performance, I suppose I feel vital and expressive in an uninhibited way that is not quite acquirable in day to day life. During more hypnotic passages of the songs, there’s also a meditative quality to the feel of the performance. The vibrations brought on by extreme decibel levels and the wash of sound brought on by the use of delay pedals and layered guitars and synths almost has an immersive effect that, when at its best, can make you feel subsumed into the sound…like a release from the individuation of ego.

Q. How do you describe Ars Phoenix´s sounds?

A. To my mind, Ars Phoenix is an electronics-driven post punk band with shoegaze-influenced guitar tones, the moodiness of vintage darkwave, the hooks of classic synthpop, and the cinematic edge of post rock, lo-fi film scores, and experimental electronic music.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the eps?

A. I’ve recorded every Ars Phoenix album to date on a Boss BR8 digital 8 track. After the fact, I usually have someone do some software mastering, but I’ve never used any software during the actual recording of the tracks, only hardware. The recording and songwriting also blend together, with the songs mutating as the needs of recording can lead to happy accidents regarding song composition.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?

A. I tend to construe things broadly, so some of my answers might veer a little beyond a purist’s definition of shoegaze. That being said, Slowdive, My Bloody Valentine, Ride, and Chapterhouse immediately come to mind, but so do Cocteau Twins, Catherine Wheel, Lycia, and even The Chameleons, even though some of these bands might be seen more as atmospheric/ethereal pop-rock than proper shoegaze.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?

A. Of course, Screen Vinyl Image, whom I absolutely love and had the privilege of playing with in an Arlington, Virginia basement in the summer of 2009. I’d also like to recommend a Gainesville band called Averkiou, who are not exactly a shoegaze band, but they do apply a touch of shoegaze influence to a raw and raucous indie pop sound. My two other recommendations are more on the post-punk/darkwave tip, but you must check out Entertainment and Feeding Fingers, with whom we’ve also had the honor of sharing the stage.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

A. The only covers we’ve ever learned were for a Joy Division/New Order tribute show. We played “The Eternal,” “Dead Souls,” “Transmission,” “She’s Lost Control,” and “True Faith.” We still get requests for our versions of “Transmission” and “She’s Lost Control,” though we’ve got too many originals to choose from now, so adding a cover into the set has become kind of tedious.

We also used to play a cover of "Cold" by The Cure. I was Robert Smith one Halloween, and we played the cover all weekend at a few different Halloween shows--great fun!

Q: What´s the plans for future....

A. Writing, recording, and more shows.

Q: Any parting words?

A. I like to think that if Lynch/Frost had been able to film season 3 of Twin Peaks, Bob would have been exorcised from Coop. Coop is too gentle of spirit and pure of heart to go down in possession from a dark spirit. Usually, I prefer ominous endings, but this is a notable exception, just because I love that charact.

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Thanks Jon

http://arsphoenix.bandcamp.com/

BAD VIBRATIONS At The SWU - A Trip Inside This House

2011-11-16T08:45:00.001-08:00

SWU, Paulinia, SP, 14.11.2011

Este foi o Festival, a cidade, o estado e a data do evento....onde o jargão era musica e sustentabilidade (sic) sustentabilidade do que?!?!? Estacionamento mediocre, organização regular, comida bem ruim, tudo caro para cacete ta a cerveja até que estava legal, sujeira para todo o lado, ok ok ok ok, não foi tão ruim assim, só um desabafo inicial para testar a paciência ...ahahahhahahhahahhahahahah....como comentou um brother meu - "tem cigarro?", resposta, "não aqui no SWU não vende tabaco.", replica - "é mesmo, mas vende cachorro quente e cerveja?" digna conversinha de pseudo riponga metido a biologo......bom deixa quieto esta parte....

Pegamos a estrada eu mais Plinio para nos encontrar-mos com os comparsas no sugestivo Blue Lake.....ou seria a Lagoa Azul?!??!Ok ok não encontramos a Brooke Shields, mas os brother Cicero, Andre passaram diretamente ao Hell Boy e no outro carro, Green, Robson, Vagner, Marcão e Eliane seguiram-nos após alguns entraves até Paulinia ROCK CITY?!?!!?hmmmm mais ou menos.....sou mais o ABC ou o ITAIM PAULISTA......ok ok ok vamos lá....

Chegando lá, o já citado pessimo estacionamento e dai em diante começou a trip dos Bad Vibrations no bom sentido é obvio....cerveja vai, blue vem, pink vai, green vem, yellow vai, blue vai, cerveja vem, não necessariamente nessa ordem mas mais ou menos por ai, seguimos no aguardo do inicio, meio sem saber onde irmos, e meio sem querer subimos para os dois palcos principais, e damos de cara com o Dinho Ouro Preto Blonde, ops quer dizer Duffy Blonde, ex Guns, que gritava mais SAOOO PAULOOOOS do que cantava ou tocava, um farsante, um fake que teve que tocar Misfits para agradar um pouquinho e se jogou na plateia, um fanfarrão....dai demorou mas acabou.

De frente a nos entram dois caras e uma garota, diga-se de passagem linda e com cara de pouquissimos amigos e começa 666, é isso ai BRMC, não tinhamos sacado ainda mas logo logo caimos na real e ai o festival começou para valer....Beat The Devils Tattoo veio e ai fodeu tudo, classicos e mais classicos, se bem que eu juro que aguardava mais do BRMC algo mais rocker, mais sujo, mais forte, que só foi concretiza na derradeira Whatever Happen to my rock´n´roll....e essa frase caiu como um manto na nossa cabeça, I GIVE MY SOUL TO A NEW RELIGION.....o ponto é que só alguns gatos pingados realmente venderam suas almas, ainda bem que eu e meus comparsas vendemos no atacado.

Pausa no festival, descemos procurando informações sobre onde seria o Black Angels, eu, Plinio e Cicero literalmente meio tensos, meio ansiosos, meio eletricos, meio cansados, mas no aguardo, dai finalmente a benção, uma alma abençoada mandou, vai ser daqui 20 minutos aqui na frente....opaaaaaaa agora sim....é só nos prepararmos, blue, green, cervejas em ação e a movimentação no palca, amplicadores valvulados, rickenbacker, fender jaguar, orgão a´la 13th Floor Elevators e o clima esquentando e ficando mais tenso....atraso para começar e dai toda a trupe aparece....e a chuva inicia lentamente no mesmo momento do primeiro acorde do Black Angels mas eu meu chapa, a trip começou, aquela musica, aqueles videos, as caras e bocas dos amigos tudo virou uma verdadeira ODE ORGIASTICA de musica, e foi uma a uma, Phosperene Dream, Sunday Afternoon, Telephone, e BAD VIBRATIONS, e ai meus caros, virei para meu brother Cicero e insanamente berrei BAAAAAAAAD VIBRATIONS e ele sorriu de forma gargalhante e dançamos até o fim dos mundos....lisergia, psicodelismo, insanidade, hipnose, tudo são meros adjetivos para descrever o tamanho do estrago que esse show fez em todos nós.

Fim de show, fim do transe, opa SY....muito trabalho para subir, barro para todo lado, e finalmente chegamos e Death Valley 69 tinha acabado de terminar....o cansaço estava nos dominando, mas ainda haviam forças, THIS SONG IS CALL SISTER, mentira era Schizophrenia....e ai a ode foi completa, ainda teve mais, Teenage Riot e o final apoteotico, levantadinha de saia da Kim, só para deixar claro que das 3 loiras das bandas é ELA QUEM MANDA!!!!!

E ai fim de historia, nos encontramos todos, nos separamos, mas todos nos jamais esqueceremos do show do Black Angels uma verdadeira obra messianica que só amigos como todos nos podemos entender....

Nunca esquecerei das palavras do meu grande, digo muito grande amigo Marcão ao me despedir, - "Mestre X, demorei anos para te conhecer mas voce é um grande grande amigo meu de todos os tempos." ....

Isso chama-se amizade ETERNA.....ou como diz a letra I GIVE MY SOUL TO A NEW RELIGION!!!!!!!!!!!

First and Last and Always with The KVB - An Interview

2011-11-16T04:49:00.000-08:00

Klaus Von Barrel é a mente perturbada por detrás deste intenso e poderoso mix de darkwave, pos punk, electronoise, shoegazer e tudo que houver barulho e insanidade dentro da musica, o The KVB é assim, insanidade gratuita e durissima, algo desnorteando encharcado de beat tribais, vocais guturais, camadas e mais camadas de guitarras em forma de drones, ou riffs fantasmagóricos que servem perfeitamente para trilha sonora de filmes de Kenneth Anger, alias Anger é influência latente para Klaus. Com uma discografia extensa e complexa, dominada por cassetes, 7", 12" e um album extremamente perturbador intitulado The Black Sun, que para o TBTCI é um dos melhores do ano passado, o The KVB tem sua estréia aqui no TBTCI no melhor estilo, uma entrevista daquelas para não deixar duvida alguma sobre as intenções de Klaus e do que o KVB nos prepara daqui para frente além de influências e o mais importante poder mostrar o quão espetacular esta preciosidade densa e psicotica pode server de trilha sonora para o caos atual, amigos com vocês Klaus Von Barrel e seu assombroso The KVB.

***** Interview with The KVB *****

Q. When did KVB, tell us about the history...

A. I started the kvb in late 2009 by accident. I was already playing guitar in the band suicide party when i wrote and recorded a few ideas with a new synth i had just bought. I figured they didn't really fit in with what the band were doing, so i decided to start something new.

I had previously explored solo recording before then, with a project called ManOnTheMoon, which was more psychedelic & folky - so it was a kind of noisey/darker progression on from that.

Q: Who are your influences?

A. I have so many in all different forms of music, art, life etc. - but the obvious major influences on my music include the likes of; the jesus & mary chain, suicide, fad gadget, loop, bowie, joy division, scott walker, echo & the bunnymen, cabaret voltaire and Love. More recent musical influences have been bands like crystal stilts, aptbs, velvet condom.etc. Outside of music; friends, family and my girlfriend kat are big influences to me and what i do.

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…

A. Echo & the bunnymen - ocean rain, jesus & mary chain - psychocandy, Love - Forever Changes, velvet underground & nico, joy division - closer.

Q. How do you fell playing alive?

A. From most of my past experiences, Its great fun playing live (and being on tour too!). I am only just getting around to bringing the kvb to the stage as a band now, so it'll be great finally getting to play the kvb tracks to a live audience.

Q. How do you describe KVB sounds?

A. It often gets described as 'dark wave' (and 'shoegaze'), which i guess makes sense, but as its a solo project, i feel i have the freedom to explore a lot of different styles and ideas.

So some tracks may be loud and guitar based, others may be more minimal and synth based, some tracks use samples etc. It all depends on my mood, inspirations and the instruments i'm using at the time.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the songs?

A. I record and mix everything myself at home. Its normally a pretty quick process, it has to be, otherwise i'll end up analysing a track too much and trying something new. The songs are normally built around a drum machine beat and a bass or synth line. Then the rest gets added, whatever that may be.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?

A. Of course i love lots of the bands from the original classic shoegaze era, but i think the current wave of bands in this style are very exciting too, bands like screen vinyl image, stellarium, belong, ceremony and so many more are taking the original aesthetic to new places, via electronica, surf, punk and ambient styles.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?

A. Pink Playground, Tropic of Cancer, Dirty Beaches, Woven Bones, Ela Orleans, The Vivids are all highly recommended!

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?.

A. It'd be good to have a go at covering another current bands song, something a bit different to what im doing...

I have previously covered 'these boots are made for walking', so i might do something like that again too.

Q: What´s the plans for future....

A. Well, i've just released a limited tape on clan destine records called 'subjection/subordination' (http://clandestinerecords.bigcartel.com/product/the-kvb-subjection-subordination) and I have some live tour dates around europe planned for january. Then, there is a full length album called 'pray to the light machine', hopefully coming out at the end of february, which will be followed up by more live dates. Hopefully that cycle can continue, as long as people are into it.

Q: Any parting words?

A. Yeah, if you're into what im doing, please check my other projects Die Jungen (http://diejungen.bandcamp.com) and Suicide Party (www.facebook.com/suicideparty). Thanks!

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Thanks Klaus!!!

http://thekvb.bandcamp.com/

https://www.facebook.com/thekvb1

3 Years of The Blog That Celebrates Itself

2011-11-09T04:07:00.000-08:00

Pois é, quem diria hein, 3 anos, 3 anos intensos que mais uma vez deram uma reviravolta na vida deste que vos escreve, o amor pela musica esta inserido nos posts destes 36 meses onde simplesmente o que aconteceu foi estreitar o relacionamento entre amantes da musica, sejam músicos, fãns ou qualquer um interessado em descobrir e vivenciar novas experiências....

Obrigado a todos que de uma forma ou de outra contribuem diretamente ou indiretamente ao sucesso do TBTCI!!!!

Abraço a todos....

Disco Inferno with The Oscillation - An Interview

2011-11-01T06:14:00.000-07:00

Absolutamente intenso e complexo, uma das obras a serem apreciadas ciclicamente, sem desviar a atenção um segundo sequer, um mix insano de psicodelismo em estado bruto, kraut em doses brutais e cavalares, drones, wall of sound, post punk, assim é Veils segundo album dos ingleses do The Oscillation, impecável e inspirado do inicio ao fim, facilmente constara nas listas mais antenadas dos melhores do ano, canções como Future Echo, Sandstorm, Fall, Telephatic Birdman nos conduzem a um grandioso transe continuo unindo som e alma de forma a ser inevitável não ser abduzido pela lisergia intensa gerada por estes magos intitulados The Oscillation.

Não a toa a adoração deste que vos escreve acabou por querer dissecar mais a fundo o porque de tudo isso, e nada mais propício do que sabermos diretamente da banda suas origens, influencias e para onde caminham, com vocês The Oscillation.

***** Interview with The Oscillation *****

Q. When did Oscillation starts, tell us about the history...

A. The Oscillation started under that recording name in 2006 with a single called "New Way To Feel". After that I was recording as The Orichalc Phase which was a bit more krautrock/disco and also another project called Mesma, all got a bit confusing really. They were going to be seperate projects but I decided to combine all under the name of the Oscillation in 2007 for my debut album on DC Recordings.

Q: Who are your influences?

A. There's loads of stuff I'm always coming back too..

Can, The Cure, Popol Vuh, Jesus And Mary Chain, Spacemen 3, Loop, MC5, Blue Cheer, The Durutti Column, Roy Montgomery, Ash Ra Tempel, Tangerine Dream, Neu, Miles Davis, Suicide, PIL

Q. Made a list of 5 albums of all time…

A. Do you mean classic albums? If so at this moment in time I'll go for:

The Velvet Underground- The Velvet Underground & Nico

PIL- Metal Box

The Cure- Pornography

The Pretty Things- S.F Sorrow

The Jesus And Mary Chain- Psychocandy

Q. How do you feel playing live?

A. I feel kind of complete and lost sometimes. You have to surrender yourself to that point in time so you're always in "the now" moment. You can't run away or think ahead, or change what's just happened. You can't predict what the other musicians are always going to do and can never be perfect so it feels quite honest in some ways and really exciting when you feel like something great is happening.. Surfing a good wave (not that I can surf ha ha).

Q. How do you describe Oscillations sounds?

A. I'd like to achieve a feeling of lots of layers all happening at once. Many emotions and feelings contradicting each other, unhinged and but somehow controlled, like some wierd psychological sound experiment where you can forget about reality or at least the structured reality that we all have to deal with and accept. I like the the idea of parallel realities or states of being where you can take a negative and make a positive out of it. Or sometimes a sound/lyric that has no particular feeling of commiting to happy or sad. So you can interpret as it suits you

Q: Tell us about the process of recording Veils, and what´s the greatest difference between the Out of Phase and Veils?

A. Veils was a bit longer to record that Out Of Phase but a bit freer in a way for me personally. Out Of Phase was kind of an attempt to make a clubby(ish) album for DC, whereas on Veils it was more like I just wanted to include tracks that expressed a period of my life at the time. I got to get a lot of negativity out of my system which I didn't realize until it was all finished.

I don't know what to say about the actual proccess of recording specifically for the album as I'm always working on tracks. Also, I had a full-time job for a couple of years while I was recording it that was driving me totally round the bend. So while I was at work I'd just be fantazing about sounds to obliterate that experience. On the weekend and evenings I'd just immerse myself into the music void with as much energy and will power as possible before I had to go back the the bullshit! Veils feels a bit more coherent and balanced to me.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?

A. Soft Moon I really like a lot. I just (finally) heard some music by The Haxan Cloak which sounds amazing so I got to get that album, it's kind of like Ligetti or Scelsi. Quite dark and mournful but beautiful too.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

A. I'd love to cover a Cure song like something off Pornography or Faith but I'm never sure which one to do. I'd have to find a way to it different which I haven't thought of yet so for now I just enjoy them as they are.. Also I'd really like to do a song by The Chocolate Watchband or Electric Prunes... you got me thinking again anyway!

Q: What´s the plans for future....

A. Just to be as prolific as possible, play in as many countries as possible..

There's a new Oscillation EP and video coming out in a month and I'm not far off the next Oscillation album. There's a project called Booze with a friend of mine who was in Chrome Hoof so there's an album of that this November too. Also Tom (from The Oscillation) and I have an ambient album we're working on. I feel a big sense of urgency to keep moving forward with lots of music and to make the most of the opportunity to be able to get it out there. I really just want to do as many albums and projects as possible.

Q: Any parting words?

A. First word: Yes.

Second word: Thanks

Thanks Tom Relleen & Demian Castellanos

http://theoscillation.bandcamp.com/

Catch the Breeze with Whirr - An Interview

2011-10-27T08:45:00.000-07:00

Diretamente do norte da California um petardo classicamente shoegazer, antes conhecido como Whirl mas que por motivos legais foi obrigado a alterar o nome para Whirr, o fato é que o 12" Distressor do ao passado, ainda sob a alcunha de Whirl foi um dos mais elogiados lançamentos shoegazers do ano, Slowdive, The Cure em doses cavalares para fazer a alegria dos saudosistas de plantão e xiitas aficionados por muralhas de guitarras mescladas com andamento pos punk e aquele ar etereo digno de virar obra prima para qualquer fã do genero. Agora o Whirr devidamente adotado pela Tee Pee joga no mercado um 7" absolutamente fantastico, June é o nome da maravilha Junebounvier e Sundae são verdadeiras perolas ainda mais grandiosas do que as canções de do Distressor, principalmente Junebounvier algo soberbo ecos de Ride, Slowdive, Moose estilhaçados por dentre a canção de pouco menos de 4 minutos, Sundae representa o lado etereo do Whirr, e novamente o TBTCI atraves de contatos imediatos, através de Nick, apresenta em primeira mão a história dessa pequena maravilhosa escondida no universo dos bons.

***** Interview with Whirr *****

Q. When did Whirr starts, tell us about the history...

A. Whirr began under the name Whirl and we had our first practice on Halloween of 2009. The band came together after I wrote demo versions of a few of the songs from the Distressor EP through a MIDI program called Tab It. I showed them to my friends (who all jammed and hung out regularly) and we decided to start a band. We recorded and put out a DIY demo cassette in January of 2010 with our friend Byanca Munoz on vocals.

After the positive response to the cassette, we took a more serious approach toward the band and began writing more songs together. In March 2010, we went into the studio with Jack Shirley at the Atomic Garden in Palo Alto, California and recorded seven songs, which would become the Distressor EP. Following the release of the Distressor EP, Byanca departed from the band, and in January of 2011 we found Alexandra Morte, who is our singer/keyboard player now. In February, we again went into the studio with Jack Shirley to record two songs which would be released as the June 7". Unfortunately, not long after we recieved an Email from an attorney representing another artist named "Whirl" who had trademarked the name, so we changed it to "Whirr". In the midst of the name change we received an offer from Tee Pee records and signed with them. They put out the June 7" in September and will be releasing our debut LP in early 2012.

Q. Make a list of your favorite 5 albums of all time…

A. In no particular order :

The Smiths - Self Titled

The Cure - Disintegration

Slowdive - Just for a day

Smashing Pumpklins - Siamese Dream

Dinosaur Jr - Green Mind

Q. How do you describe Whirr sounds?

A. I'm not sure how to describe our sound, early on we aimed for sort of Slowdive/MBV worship but with more of a pop song structure. However, now it's much more of all of our influences combined, while still adding our own touch to things.

Q. About Distressor ep, many many people consider one of the best records from last year, what´s your opinion?

A. We're all proud of the record and very thankful that people enjoy it.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the new 7"?

A. There really wasn't much to it, ha ha. We wrote/jammed the songs together for a few weeks, then headed into the studio and live recorded the songs in a day.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?

A. Yuck, Tears Run Rings, Nostalgist, Anne, Young Prisms, Broken Water, Weekend.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

A. I would love to cover : The Cure - A forest, Husker Du - Don't want to know if you're lonely and Foo Fighters - Everlong.

Q: What´s the plans for future....

A. Put out our debut LP on Tee Pee records in early 2012, hopefully do a full US tour and continue playing shows and writing songs.

Q: Any parting words?

A. Thanks so much for for the interview opportunity Renato, thanks to anyone who listens to/supports our band.

Shout outs :

Nostalgist, Anne, Deafheaven, DNF, Lycus, FDBVK, American Gods, Moonbeams, Traif Lip, Broken Water, Wife

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Thanks Nick

www.facebook.com/whirrband
http://whirrband.tumblr.com/
http://whirrband.bandcamp.com/album/june

Psychotic Reaction with Teenage Mary - An Interview

2011-10-27T06:16:00.000-07:00

Psicodelismo garageiro daqueles que só quem é iniciado sabe, essa é a maxima para a novidade encharcada de fuzz chamada Teenage Mary que ainda não lançou nada oficialmente mas já causa frisson por onde passou e obviamente o TBTCI sempre ligado nas grandes barulheiras nos quatro cantos do mundo, descolou através de contatos imediatos, este feito por Steven, guitarrista do combo. Srs, aprofundem-se no universo psicotico e freak do Teenage Mary.

***** Interview with Teenage Mary *****

Q. When did Teenage Mary start, tell us about the history...

A. We started out about 7 months ago, we always fancied starting a band up so we got together and started jamming. We are all into the same sort of music so it was easy to find our sound and we just started writing tunes and getting great feedback on them. We played our first gig in June and it went really well, we have recently played more gigs supporting the likes of the Lucid Dream and Dead Sons.

Q: Who are your influences?

A. Our main influences include bands like The Beatles, Brian Jonestown Massacre, Black Angles, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, The Verve, Jesus and Mary Chain, Spiritualized, Spacemen 3, The Velvet Underground and many more.

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time.

A. This can change every week, but as a collective of the whole band:

The Beatles: Rubber Soul

Brian Jonestown Massacre: Strung Out In Heaven

Jesus and Mary Chain: Psychocandy

The Verve: A Northern Soul

Oasis: Definitely Maybe

Q. How do you feel playing live?

A. We love playing live, there isn't a better buzz for us than getting up on stage and playing our songs to an audience.

Q. How do you describe Teenage Mary sounds?

A: Our sound is dirty 'rock and roll' with a lot of fuzz and drones. There are a couple of new songs in the process of being completed at the moment that have dialed back the fuzz quite a lot.

Q: When is the first official release due?

A: We are looking at releasing our first EP in February/March time next year but we don't have an official date as of yet.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?

A. The Lucid Dream, Wild Eyes, Toba Caldera and Minaret are all great bands and friends of ours.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

A: We currently do a cover of The La's: I Can't Sleep

Q: What´s the plans for future

A. Our plan is to release our EP and just keep playing as many gigs as we can and spread the word about us, hopefully get on some festivals next year also.

Q: Any parting words?

A: Thank you for taking the time to ask us these questions. You can find us and listen to our recordings on www.soundcloud.com and www.facebook.com/teenagemary

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Thanks Steve and Teenage Mary

Krautpsychdrone with Eat Lights Become Lights - An Interview

2011-10-13T07:38:00.000-07:00

Ouvir o debut Autopia do combo Eat Lights Become Lights é uma viagem sem precedentes ao mundo imaginario do kraut rock alemão clássico dos 70´s mais precisamente NEU!, Can e Faust passando pelas dissonantes trips de Spacemen 3 com pinceladas de shoegazer tudo isso atualizado e transportado para os dias de hoje. A trinca de abertura com Test Driver, Dark Matter e Machine Language deixa altamente ilustrado e clarissimo que estamos diante de uma pequena obra prima que poucos terão acesso, mas certamente quem estiver frente a frente com Autopia sera presenteado com uma audição riquissima, Dark Matter é a alma do album, um kraut noise em altissima rotação, torna-se predileta desde o inico, ainda tem Stargazer e White Horse para fazer de Autopia uns dos albuns do anos.

Como sou aficcionado pela sonoridade não houve como não fazer contato com Neil Rudd, guitarras, sintetizadores, loops, programming e outros barulhinhos mais e descolar essa entrevista exclusiva do já predileto Eat Lights Become Lights, entre e boa viagem.

***** Interview with Eat Lights Become Lights *****

Q. When did ELBL starts, tell us about the history...
A. ELBL started in around 2007/2008. I used to be in a band that did the standard post rock thing, quiet/loud, Explosions in the sky/Mogwai kinda thing. I've always been a massive fan of the German 70's bands that become know and grouped under the Krautrock banner. I'd always really loved the motorik beat and that fast forward kinda sound and interesting use of repetition.
So ELBL started out as side project but it quickly became evident that it was way more enjoyable doing the ELBL thing so I focused all my energies in this direction.

I'm a massive believer in getting the right people into a line up. Once you have them it makes the act of playing the music I write effortless as everyone is coming from the same influences and using the same musical language. You don't have to explain yourself with the right people, it becomes more an intuitive thing. I had a few line ups that really didn't work for one reason of another. But in the last few years I've been working with some people that really understand what is required and make the process fun.

Currently I'm putting together a new line up of ELB here in L.A and its really starting to come together. I've begun working with a really talented keys/synth player called Matt McMurray who has a fantastic analogue synth collection and is a great musician in his own right.

Q: Who are your influences?
A-I've a fairly broad range of influences, a lot of minimalist composers- Steve Reich, through to a lot of German 70's bands- Kraftwerk, Neu!, Can, Harmonia, Cluster, Popol Vuh as well as more contemporary bands such as Spacemen 3, Camera, Holy Fuck, Maserati, 12, K-X-P, Cave. I guess they all have a lot in common with each other as a lot of them explore the repetitive elements that I love.

Q. Make a list of your 5 albums of all time…
A-Impossible to limit it to 5 but I guess if I had to...
Brian Eno- Music for Airports
Steve Reich- Works !965-1995
Kraftwerk- Autobahn
Neu!- Neu!
Spacemen 3- Playing with Fire

Q. How do you feel playing live?
A. The live ELBL sound and the recorded sound are two very different things. When we play live we always try and make it that bit more immediate and heavier than the records. I've never been a fan of bands that just replicate what is on their records. I always like to see bands that are pushing their sounded further out there, improvising and experimenting on the fly. This for me is the most exciting time, when your not quite sure what is coming next- it si pure creativity.
I've played guitar quite a few times for Damo Suzuki, the sets are always 100% improvised and these for me are some of the most rewarding gigs I've ever done.

Q. How do you describe ELBL sounds?
A. Kraut-Psych-Drone

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the new album?
A. The new album sessions began earlier this year and its going pretty well right now. I've finished about 12 tracks and I've around another 10 to complete. Then I'll choose which will be going on the new record.

The process is always the same when I right. I generally start with a seed of an idea and build layers and layers of guitars and synths to the point where I've gone way to far. Then it become a reductive process of stripping back layers of sound till it reaches a point that I'm happy with.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?
A. I'm a massive fan of a German band called Camera. I don't think there is any recorded output by them. They perform generally on the streets of Berlin. They are a 3 piece, guitar, keys, drums and its all, as far as I'm aware totally improvised. They have this incredible honesty in their music, it feels extremely pure. They really seem to get what it is to make this kind of music. There are loads of videos on Youtube of their street gigs. Its far to say I'm completely obsessed with them right now.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?
A. Lou Reed- Metal Machine Music

Q: What´s the plans for future....
A. We are releasing a split 7" with a band called Cloudland Canyon on The Great Pop Supplement label early in 2012. They are an amazing band so I'm very excited to be a part of that. We did our last single with The Great Pop Supplement "Test Drive" which had a Silver Apples remix of the track on the flip side. It came out on square, green vinyl so I'm keen to see what we can do this time around. I've an idea about getting the needle to start at the centre and for the needle to travel out to the edge...We'll see.

After that the next album should be ready for release around March I think. This time around I've tried to strip back the ELBL sound. Less layers and a more direct approach to the sounds and rhythms. It currently feels like its a good follow up sonically to our last album AUTOPIA which came out earlier this year on Enraptured records.

Q: Any parting words?
A. Make music to make music, don't make music to become famous. Scenes come and go but the best music is timeless.
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Thanks Neil Lights....

http://eatlightsbecomelights.bandcamp.com/album/autopia

Heaven Sent An Angel with Deep Cut - An Interview

2011-09-13T05:45:00.000-07:00

Inicio dos 90´s e uma das bandas mais amadas da classica era do shoegazer sem duvida foi o Revolver do grande Mat Flint, Mollases, Heaven Send An Angel, Crimson, Venice são classicos, depois do fim do Revolver em 1994, Mat aventurou-se no Death in Vegas tocando baixo, e historias a parte o fato é que agora Mat voltou as origens guitarras a mão reuniu-se junto a seu irmão Simon Flint no baixo, Ian Button na bateria, Ped Bailey guitarra e Emma Bailey nos vocais e formaram o delicioso Deeo Cut, prediletissimo deste que vos escreve e inumeros outros aficcionados no noisepop shoegazer que Mat & Cia promovem. Depois do debut My Thoughts Light Fires chegou a vez do novíssimo Disorientation que chega para alçar o Deep Cut a brigar pelos melhores albuns do ano se o debut tinha Time to Kill o novo album tem Something´s Got to Give, impossível a canção não grudar em sua mente, e o TBTCI através do amigo Robin Allport do grande selo Club AC30 gravadora do Deep Cut, descolou uma daquelas que tornam-se desde já clássicas entrevistas aqui no TBTCI, afinal não é todo dia que Mat Flint da as caras por terras brasilis, então chega né, vamos lá, Mr. Mat Flint e seu delicioso Deep Cut:

***** Interview with Mat Flint - Deep Cut/Revolver/Death in Vegas *****

Q. When did Deep Cut starts, tell us about the history...
A. I was playing bass for Death In Vegas, and when they stopped touring in 2005 I really fancied having a go at doing some of my own songs again, although I didn't want to be the singer. I had been the singer/songwriter in Revolver before DIV, but now I just wanted to play guitar and write songs. So I started doing some demos at home with my brother, and when we'd got some tracks nearly finished, we started looking for a singer. We couldn't find anyone that worked, and one day Emma - my girlfriend - said that she wanted to have a go. It worked out really well, and we made 3 demos which we put up on Myspace. Robin from AC30 heard the tracks and said that we should come down and play at one of his club nights - so we had to get a band together, which we did. Ian, who was also in the Death in Vegas live band on guitar, joined us on drums, and Emma's brother Pad came in on guitar. We played some gigs, then recorded a single that Tim Holmes from DIV engineered, which AC30 put out, and it went on from there really - although we completely engineer and produce ourselves now.

Q: Who are your influences?
A. Suicide, Neu, Harmonia, Beatles, Velvets, 90s hip hop, MBV, Sonic Youth, Marychain, Primal Scream, Smiths, Stooges, MC5, Syd Barrett, Pistols, PIL, acid house and techno, dub reggae, the Byrds , Big Star, Flying Burrito Brothers. I could go on forever!

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…

"Illmatic"- Nas
"The Notorious Byrd Brothers" - The Byrds
"Forever Changes" - Love
"Pet Sounds" - The Beach Boys
"Psychocandy" - the Jesus and Mary Chain

Q. How do you feel playing live?
A. We love it, although we don't get to do as many gigs as we would like to. Some of us have children, we all have full-time jobs, we don't all live near each other. So it's difficult to do long tours or anything like that. But we try to play as often as we can, and we get a really good buzz from it. We were rehearsing last night, actually, for our next gig on Wednesday. It's our album launch party.

Q. How do you describe Deep Cut´s sounds?
A. 21st century psychedelic pop music; alternative guitar music with a twist.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the new album?
A. Me and Si (my brother) did the demos for it at my house, with Emma adding vocals whenever each track was finished. Then, when we had enough tracks for the album, we went into our rehearsal studio and recording the backing tracks - drums, bass and guide guitars, over 3 separate sessions. We then did all the overdubs either in our rehearsal studio, or in my living room, over a few months. We are lucky that our drummer, Ian, is a recording wizard - he's a genius engineer who knows Logic inside out, and knows how to mike things up properly to get the best sounds, and so on. So we did most of the overdubs and the mixing in my living room, we didn't need to go into the studio.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?
A. It depends how you're defining "shoegazer" - and it's not a term I use myself. But if I go with what I think you mean, it would be the period in late 1988-early 1989 when My Bloody Valentine went from being a really good indie band, to an absolutely fucking phenomenal group, the best band on the planet. The "You Made Me Realise" and "Feed Me With Your Kiss" EPs, and then the "Isn't Anything" album. I was lucky enough to see them loads of times through this period, it was extraordinary - and had a massive influence on everything I did afterwards.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?
A. Our best friends are in a band called the Real Sound, they will blow you away, if they ever get round to releasing anything! they've got songs that will blow your mind.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

Bands covering us? I only think you should cover something if you think can do a radicallly different interpretation of it. I can't see the point A. of doing a similar version, which will never be as good. So I don't know, really. I always wanted to hear some cheesy pop singer to cover "Heaven Sent An Angel" by Revolver, and make me loads of money by having a massive hit!

Q: What´s the plans for future....
A. Well, our new album "Disorientation" is out next week. More gigs, then me and Si are doing some remixes, maybe some producing/mixing, then might do another single - an EP or something. Then start writing the next album. I might also play on a few people's records.

Q: Any parting words?
A. Check us out if you haven't heard us. You'll like it.
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Thanks Mat, thanks Robin!!!

http://www.clubac30.com
http://www.myspace.com/thedeepcut
http://www.facebook.com/deepcutband

Hey Alchemist / Neuralgia by One Unique Signal - Guest Nick Keech

2011-09-05T07:31:00.000-07:00

É fato que o TBTCI é fã incondicional da desconstrução sonora movida a wall of sound em decibeis altissimos que o One Unique Signal pratica, veja algumas passagens do OUS por aqui 1, 2, 3 e a entrevista, e chegou a hora do retorno do eletrochoque dos ingleses que pegam NEU!, PIL, Loop, Telescopes e adicionam querosene em estado bruto, o novissimo single Hey Alchemist / Neuralgia é puro incêndio em altas dimensões, wall of sound a niveis que poucas vezes foi-se notado e para melhor ilustrar o single, Nick Keech do OUS faz a vez no TBTCI:

Hey Alchemist / Neuralgia

Recording process:
We worked with the same people who have recorded all but one of our releases, our friends Dan Horn and Wayne Pennell. They run a superb recording space in Isleworth, west London called the Sound Bunker. It's always our first choice of studio as we have people there who understand our sound and have been with us as our music has evolved. There is an argument for seeing what kind of record we would get by using someone else. The work we did recently at Anton's (BJM) place in Berlin and with Richard Formby on the new Telescopes material offered us an insight into the way other studios work which was really interesting. The effect it had on me was to focus less on a live sounding recording and move more into a layered studio sound. It therefore seemed to make sense to stick with the people we are comfortable with and focus on taking a more active role in producing a massive sounding recording. Whilst there is a lot to be said for capturing the band live on a recording, I'm currently more into the idea of treating it as another aspect of the band. OUS don't offer any political messages, nor do we expect to change anyone's life with our lyrics and so the way I see it there are three main areas left for us to get our vibe across: Live sound, recorded sound and our artwork. Previously we have tried to make our recordings sound similar to our live performances but it struck me as a wasted opportunity. It's a real chance to build a beast and enjoy a creative experience that isn't doable in a live setup. The two tracks on the new record, Neuralgia especially, have plenty going on in there. It's great headphone music! We have only scratched the surface and I'm really looking forward to getting better at constructing our sound in the studio.

The influence:
This record is just two songs, side A 'Alchemist' that came out of a demo written by Byron and side B 'Neuralgia' from a demo of mine. I can't speak for Byron's initial influence when writing but it's fair to say that a large part of it came out of a mutual love of minimal chord progressions and repetition. The whole band sing from the same hymn sheet when it comes to sound, and any one of us bringing a demo into the practice room can be sure that the band will evolve it in a way that compliments the initial idea. My track Neuralgia was born out of an ongoing desire to take the repetition gospel and run with it. It's pretty obvious where my influences come from and all I'm trying to do is express my interpretation of the music I love. I'm at home immersed in volume coupled with a riff that is repeatedly droning on, suspending you in it's vibration. Two minutes of the same riff is boring...Five minutes and it starts to come alive...seven minutes plus and it begins to become your world! At this point you can drop in a single note through a wah pedal and it turns the music on it's head. The simplest addition can be epic.

New album:
We actually recorded four songs when doing this single. The remaining two will be held back for possible inclusion in the new album but this is a way off at the moment. Maybe if the single does well enough we'll have a good argument to take to the label and ask for another release We have an idea (in the very early stages at the moment) to self record and release a collection of mellow stuff. Dan, Jim and Mess are especially good at this sort of stuff and have a large collection of songs already waiting in the wings. Byron and me also have a bunch of ideas and so it seems like a possibility. There is also a new Telescopes record due in the not too distant future which is Stephen Lawrie and us.
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Thanks Nick

http://itunes.apple.com/gb/album/hey-alchemist!-neuralgia-single/id462795740

Victorialand with Spell 336 - An Interview

2011-09-05T06:13:00.000-07:00

Paul Lopez e Martin Huerta são os responsáveis pela ternura magica contida sob a alcunha de Spell 336, que conta em seu currículo com o magistral debut homonimo e o ep Reverse, ambos, recheados de trejeitos shoegazer clássicos, texturas absurdamente dreampop com um apelo denso e soturno, tudo equalizado de forma atual e altamente instigante.

Convidei Paul Lopez para conceder uma entrevista ao TBTCI o que de fato acontece e ilustra bem o quão necessário se faz a qualquer amante de Cocteau Twins e shoegazer a audição para enfim tornar-se o mais novo refém desde mundo pessoal do Spell 336.

***** An Interview with Paul Lopez from Spell 336 *****

Q. When did Spell 336 starts, tell us about the history...

Spell 336 began in 1991. Myself and my band mate Martin Huerta became friends in high school right around 1984. At that time we formed our first band. Martin had just started to play the guitar and I was the drummer. I started playing the drums when I was 10. This was in 1979. When me and Martin started to play music he was not singing at the time. A couple of years later I quit the group and it was then when Martin began to sing vocals and his musicianship on the guitar started to flow. After we graduated from high school in 1986 and 1987 respectively I lost contact with Martin. He had moved to Los Angeles and I stayed in our hometown. During this period I became close friends with Martin's younger brother. This was around late 1990. Martin was coming for a family visit and came by my home and we re-established our friendship. Martin was working in Los Angeles at the old Tower Records store. During his visit he brought some promotional CD's of Lush, Cocteau Twins, Tones On Tail to give to me. We had been fans of 4ad and of the various bands on their roster for quite some time. Martin stated that he was still playing the guitar and I had just started to play the guitar as well in addition to the drums and I had began to write lyrics. I remember telling Martin that I had some lyrics in a notebook that I kept with me. Martin had some songs as well and it was then that we decided to take this seriously and do something with what we had. I have old practice cassettes of our first rehearsals and I was amazed how easy it was to play with Martin. During those rehearsals I wrote 'Silence.'

Q: Who are your influences?

That really is a tough question. I really like all forms of music. Pop, Soul, Jazz. The list goes on. Martin's influences are all over the place as well. If it is a piece of music that I like no matter what the genre is that can be an influence for me. I think my band mate shares the same thoughts. Earlier I was listening to some 10cc, The Cars, and some Astrud Gilbreto. See what I mean??

Q. Make a list of 5 albums of all time…

These choices will not be in any particular order. So here goes...

1. What's Going On-Marvin Gaye
2. Pink Moon-Nick Drake
3. #1 Record-Big Star
4. Kind Of Blue-Miles Davis
5. White Album-The Beatles
All of these albums are on my all time list. But on any given day I may change my mind. Every one of those records deals with loss,protest, isolation,etc..These are things that everyone at some time has experienced. But the main thing is the music and these recordings are pure art!

Q. How do you fell playing live?

In a live situation I always get nervous. A little stage fright but it disappears the moment that we play. Over the years I am not quite as bad as I used to be. I consider that a personal best for me. As a band we really enjoy our shows. The songs that we have recorded in the past always takes on a different feel live. We always try to duplicate the studio in a live setting. But the majority of the time we do the opposite and we have always felt that we sounded better. We have shows coming very soon and I get excited at the fact that most of our new material has not been performed before an audience. We may improvise to some extent but to finally hear those songs in a live show is something that we look forward to.

Q. How do you describe Spell 336 sounds?

Someone once told us that we sounded 'Atmospheric.' I guess that can be up for interpretation? Our sound ranges from Shoegaze to Dreampop. We tend to use every available gadget when it comes to the sounds that we create. We try not to use so much but it can't be helped. Most of the time we come up with the sounds that are constantly in our brains and we have been very successful in translating that either in a live setting or recording. Maybe 'Atmospheric' is a good term for us after all?

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the new album?

We are always writing lyrics and music and everything that we bring to the table is never discarded. We use everything. The last couple of songs that we have put out in the past few weeks shows what we are doing now but we still enjoy the Shoegaze sound. There really is a fair amount of recordings in the can. The cool thing is that these tracks sound as if it was recorded yesterday. But the truth is that we have come back to these songs to add new parts, lyrics, etc...Our process is somewhat simple. I come up with lyrics and music and Martin does the same thing. Then we work on it non-stop and if it feels good we record. One thing that we are proud of is we have a lot of material to play with and it gives us a fair amount of comfort knowing that we always upgrade and improve on what we have. When we record we always do it late at night. I always feel that our best work is recorded in the dead of night. 'Silence' was one of those tracks that we recorded late at night. I think when you hear 'Silence' you will feel the same vibe that we had when it was being recorded. I used to keep a notebook near me when I slept so I could write things down that could be used for a song. But the last few years when I write it feels like Automatic Writing. I can't force anything to come out. I could be anywhere and a lyric or a riff will pop in my head and I scramble to write it down before it disappears. It is all collected then put together and recorded.

Q. What´s represents the Shoegazer classic era to the band?

Classic Shoegaze era? I would have to go with the Cocteau Twins. Their music is so important to me and during that specific time frame is when I began to take my music to a different place. 'Victorialand' by the Cocteau Twins was a record that I was always listening to and it helped me when I needed it the most in terms of my songwriting. 'Silence' was written during that time frame. You can always list MBV, Slowdive, etc.. But the Cocteau Twins defined that era for me and gave me the inspiration that I needed. I hope I was successful??

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?

There are so many bands out there. But on a personal level I really love, Bliss City East, Drowner, Morpheme, Spc Eco, Data Unit, Music For Headphones,Stellarscope, Folie Adieu, Lightfoils, Deepfieldview, Brief Candles, Arafura, Ghost Box Orchestra, The Thief and The Architect, Her Vanished Grace, Starfire Connective Sound, Herod Layne. The list could go on forever!! Check back soon for a new update.

Q: Which bands you love to make a cover version?

I am lost on that one? We did a cover of 'Hypnotized' by Fleetwood Mac recently. But I am sure down the road we may do another. But we are very picky about who to cover next. But I am sure it will happen in the future.

Q: What´s the plans for future....

We just want to get our music out there and we will continue to record and write. We also plan to start playing live very soon. Hopefully before the end of the new year we will start doing some shows in California. But we plan to do this as long as we can. We enjoy what we do and as long as the inspiration is there we will never stop.

Q: Any parting words?

A big thank you to everyone who has supported Spell 336. The list of names are endless but you all know who you are. Thanks for taking the time to listen to us and it is always appreciated and never forgotten. Cheers!!!!!!!!
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Thanks Paul!!!!

http://www.facebook.com/pages/SPELL-336/188201040964
http://www.myspace.com/spell336

Catch the Breeze with A Shoreline Dream - An Interview

2011-08-15T05:09:00.000-07:00

Denver, Colorado é o lar do cultuado A Shoreline Dream mesmo refutando a ideia do shoegazer os americanos Ryan, vocais, guitarras e teclados, Erik, guitarras, Enoc baixo e Jennifer bateria, evocam as as mais classicas caracteristicas do shoegazer com albuns absolutamente intrigantes e densos, Avoiding the Consequences e Recolletctions of Memory fora o soberdo EP Coastal, por vezes cristalinas e viajantes camadas de guitarras e drones repetitidos, por outras tensas e densas sequencias em crescendo em altos decibeis fazem do mundo dos sonhos do A Shoreline Dream tornar-se extremamente peculiar e atrativo. Aproveitando o lançamento de Losing Them All To this Time o novissimo album dos caras o TBTCI mais do que depressa apresenta a todos o mundo particular dos sonhos deste prediletissimo da casa.

***** Interview with A Shoreline Dream *****

Q. When did A Shorilne Dream starts, tell us about the history...

A. A Shoreline Dream began back in 2005, with the first album being released in 2005. It started with a member of my previous band, Drop The Fear, and was quite literally a sound we had been striving to try out for many years. Something lush, something dark, and something that had an endless space to fill. We began with a remix we were working on titled "motherly advice". At the time it was just the two of us, but as we found the tone we were hoping to achieve, we realized something was missing. That being more instrumentation, and a live feel, since it originated as an electronic oriented project. I got ahold of a member of another project I was in for many years called Pure Drama, and soon we found ourselves working with Erik Jeffries, and Enoc Torraca, who was a fan of Drop the Fear. This began a summer of live experimentation in my home studio, and after some stoney sessions, we realized we had all stumbled upon a sound we all loved. Something bigger than we ever imagined. The production really brought it all to life, and soon thereafter we felt so confident in what we had, that I took a loan out, and we started our own label, latenight weeknight records. We figured it wasn't really worth shopping our disc around to countless labels, only to become aggravated in a market that was struggling to survive. We just wanted people to hear what we had created, and we wanted to remove the step of finding an investor. We invested in ourselves, and still do to this day. We've made some amazing alliances through it all, and we've released nine discs thus far through the label, with this new album "losing them all to this time" being the third full length album for a shoreline dream.

Q: Who are your influences?

A. This is a great question, as to be totally honest, when we first started this up, my biggest influence, and one which probably influenced our whole production style more than any other was Dead Can Dance. Not all of their work has appealed to me, but their first disc is still to this day one of my all time favorites. The spacial qualities, and the overall tonality revolutionized the goth genre, while not being goth. It was something entirely new. It was something that still hasn't been recreated to this day, and I love it. That along with The Smashing Pumpkins, Tori Amos, Depeche Mode and even bands as obscure and different as Morgoth and Cynic, all lead to the influences that you hear in our music.

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…
A. Wow, this one is difficult, but I'll try. This list could change tomorrow ;)

5. Depeche Mode - Violator
4. Type O Negative - October Rust
3. Engineers - Engineers
2. Iron Maiden - Iron Maiden
1. Dead Can Dance - Dead Can Dance

Q. How do you feel playing alive?

A. Playing live is something I can't explain. Everytime it happens I can't remember. It goes by so fast. It's such a huge release of emotion and of frustrations. It's amazing. I couldn't live without it. It's a life force all within itself. When we played with Chapterhouse last fall I had a somehwat holy experience, and I'm not even religious. I don't know how I could ever do another gig as amazing as that one. I found myself falling on the floor with my guitar in hand on numerous occasions.

Q. How do you describe A Shoreline Dream sounds?
A. Our sounds are strange. I always like the melodipsych term. Someone called us that once and we always go by it. Obscure enough without sounding pretentious. I personally think we sound like a band playing at the bottom of a well. The vocals are layered, and the tones all play out handing off to one another. We're like a train passing by at 100 miles per hour.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the albuns, What´s the difference between them?A. All of our material has primarily happened in a similar way. We have a permanent setup at my studio where we literally just jam away in, recording everything that happens. Sometimes we'll come back after one session and realize we have a song done. Other times we might find parts that we dig, and we'll expand on them. It totally depends on our moods, the time of year, and the sound quality of the room at the time. Ona few occassions, such as last year, songs have come together outside of the studio. I travelled to London and wrote a track with Ulrich Schnauss in his studio. It's good to mix it up. Sometimes the vibe of the city comes through in the power of the song. On this new album we literally had songs that happened in one take, and some which we worked on for months and months.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?
A. I still don't entirely understand what shoegazer really means, or what the sound really is when someone says it. I've never really considered ourselves a shoegazer band. I don't know what the hell we are really. But if someone says we are playing classic shoegaze, and they like that way of describing us, I'm all for it. I think all music is really up to interpretation. Some might say we're progressive. Some might say we're goth, while many might consider us shoegaze. It doesn't really matter what you call us, as long as you're listening ;)

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?
A. So many great acts out there. I'd say Engineers for sure if you haven't heard of them already. Digging Serena-Maneesh as well. Jaga Jazzist is outstanding. A few bands from our hometown also shine quite brightly, such as Moonspeed and Hearts in Space. Of course, as a self plug I must also mention Brim Liski. It's a side project of mine with another artist in the Denver area named Cacheflowe. Even though it's self produced, I've been listening to it quite often.... Hope others do as well!

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?
A. We recently did our first cover, that being "the chain" by Fleetwood Mac. Had a great time with that one. Love taking older songs and giving the beef in production value.

Q: What´s the plans for future....
A. We're looking to play out again once the dust settles, and do a US West Coast tour, or possibly hit up the East Coast as well. We'd love to get out of our country and do some gigs around the world as well. One step at a time...

Q: Any parting words?
A. Please people, keep buying music. I know it's easy to steal, and it doesn't seem wrong, but it is. Lotsa hungry, talented musicians out there, and they depend on you to help keep them going. It's damn near impossible to survive off of music these days, and I blame it all on the internet.
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Thanks Ryan!!

http://www.ashorelinedream.com/RECOLLECTIONS_SITE/index.html

Fait Accompli with Blindness - An Interview

2011-08-01T11:21:00.001-07:00

Novidade absoluta, cortesia de meu queridissimo amigo desde os tempo do Club AC30 Matt Wyatt e seu gravadora White Label Music e é o seguinte primeiro ep da ex Curve/SPC Eco Debbie com sua novissima banda, Blindness, o som, well o som é um thriller eletronico e noise como nos bons tempos do Curve, mais pesado e caotico, dá para sacar pelas influencias das meninas, que voce pega na exclusivissima entrevista com essas garotas que perpetuaram os desejos da galera, sem mais conversa, Blindness.

***** Interview with Blindness *****

Q. When did Blindness starts, tell us about the history...

A: At the end of 2007 when I left my previous band I started learning to use software. I knew Debbie from Curve and Kendra from her previous band Flame On and knew I'd like to work with both of them. Debbie was playing with Dean Garcia's band SPC-ECO and I went to see them a few times and eventually approached Debbie about playing on some tracks of mine. She agreed to have a listen and after that agree to do some recording, so I took a the tracks on my laptop to her flat and we did loads of recording in an afternoon.

I asked Kendra about playing but she was tied up with Flame On at the time. A few months later she came back to me as Flame On was starting to wind down and said she'd be up for playing so we got practicing and booked our first gig as an all-girl three-piece in May 2009.

Later on that year, Debbie ran into Alex, who she had played with years previously in Night Nurse, and he said that he was looking for a band so we got him down to practice and rest is a very noisy history!

Q: Who are your influences?

A: Kate Bush, Nine Inch Nails, Curve, PJ Harvey, The Jesus & Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine, Garbage, The Fall.

Q. Made a list of 5 albums of all time…

A: Hounds Of Love - Kate Bush

VU - The Velvet Underground

Pixies – Doolittle

MBV – Loveless

NIN – The Fragile

Q. How do you fell playing alive?

A: Alive. And sweaty

Q. How do you describe Blindness´ sounds?

A: Electro filth, walls of guitar, girly lushness vocals, pounding rhythm section.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the debut ep?

A: Guitars were mostly recorded in my living room. The neighbours are very understanding.

A: The programmed drums, synths and vocals were recorded in my living room and then I took them to Debbie's living room where we recorded guitars. Bass was recorded in Kendra's living room and then it was mixed by Jim "Ping" King and myself in Finsbury Park.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to Blindness?

A: Floppy fringes, long-sleeved T-Shirts and Home Counties accents, mainly.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?

A: The Koolaid Electric Company, Pope Joan, Teeth Of The Sea

A: Blindness. Oh, apart from us? Hold Kiss Kill.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

A: We've done a few - Pet Shop Boys, Slits, Beyonce.

What´s the plans for future....

A: To have a good time. All of the time. That's my ambition, Marty.

Q: Any parting words?
A: WALLOP!

A: "Everyday, once a day, give yourself a present."
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Thanks Blindness....and thanks Matt!!

http://wlmshoponline.co.uk/

Never Lose That Feeling with The Ludvico Treatment - An Interview

2011-08-01T09:35:00.000-07:00

Ludvico Treatment, soa desconhecido para você?! Pode até soar, mas não deveria, ainda mais se estamos falando de shoegazer clássico, layers e mais layers de guitarras, muito Ride e Swervedriver condensados e expurgados diretamente para 2011, vinte anos após a era clássica a profecia continua, e vem em grandioso estilo o segundo album do Ludvico Treatment é literalmente uma obra de arte, a começar pela concepção uma luxuosa embalagem em limitadissima tiragem de 100 copias que é melhor colocar uma foto para ter a real noção do capricho e bom gosto, sem contar a sonoridade que pelo inicio do texto já dá para ilustrar bem a vertente dos canadenses, se o primeiro album Romanticism já deixava clarissimo que além dos shoegazer classicos citados a crueza de um Smashing Pumpinks fica elucidade definitivamente nessa epopeia chamada Politeia, um daqueles albuns que poucos irão ouvir, mas quem ouvir certamente vibrara exaustivamente tamanho a grandeza das canções, e aproveitando o ensejo o TBTCI rapidamente publica a todos mais uma das classicas entrevistas, desssa vez com o grande, mais muito grande Ludvico Treatment.

***** Interview with Ludvico Treatment *****

Q. When did Luvico Treatment e starts, tell us about the history...
Alex: Adam & I met in 2000 through mutual friends. He had formed a makeshift band and when it turned out that the bassist wasn't going to work out, those mutual friends pointed out that I could play guitar. After a year or so of creating strange glam punk / metal fusions of obnoxious noise the band broke up. However, Adam & I had suddenly found a style and method of working that fit us rather well. All this happened in Calgary, Alberta, but after years of writing and recording material, our unsuccessful struggles to find musicians for a live band resulted in Adam leaving to find fresher pastures while I stayed behind to finish my English degree. We maintained a writing relationship and Adam formed various excellent line ups to play the songs in Vancouver. The live band really was excellent, and did things with our work that I wouldn't have believed possible. And now we're here. Adam is living in Montreal and I am just about to move to Toronto. The writing and recording continues.

Q: Who are your influences?
Adam: When we first started writing Ludvico material in 2003 we wanted to make loud rock music with a bit of electronics on the side. Turns out The Cooper Temple Clause beat us to it and definitely influenced us. Aside from the big names in shoegaze (My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive and the like), we’ve taken a lot of influence from The Smiths & Manic Street Preachers, and our mixing tendencies of loud drums & guitars comes from Nirvana.

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…
Adam: David Sandström – Om Det Inte Händer Nåt Innan Imorgon Så Kommer Jag (a big influence on how our album Politeia turned out), Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds – Let Love In, The Magnetic Fields – The Charm of the Highway Strip, Spiritualized – Pure Phase, Slowdive – Souvlaki.

Alex: Manic Street Preachers - The Holy Bible, Refused - The Shape of Punk to Come, Mansun - Six, My Bloody Valentine - Loveless, Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds - Murder Ballads.

Q. How do you fell playing alive?
Adam: Well, I’ve always been in charge of the live band (though Alex joined us for our final show in Vancouver) and nothing beats the feeling of a successful gig. I have to say that some of my best experiences with the live band were in the practice space though; there have been some great feedback-laden jams over the years, particularly when we had new guitar pedals to play with. Makes me wish we recorded our practices!

Q. How do you describe Ludvico Treatment sounds?

Alex: I think the simple answer here is that Adam and I share a passion for trying to put the ugly and the beautiful together. I did this with the lyrics of our latest release, Politeia, by telling what is quite an ugly allegory in a form that I tried to make as beautiful as possible. As for our sound, we try to couple loud, abrasive noise with beautiful melodies. I like to think of the noises that Adam creates as glacial, both beautiful and terrible, in the sense of terror-inducing, at the same time.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the new album?
Adam: This new album (Politeia) is a bit odd as we started recording it back in 2004 and I added bits and pieces to it over a very long period of time, usually recording in basements & home studios with borrowed equipment. The songs were basically written and mostly complete by the time our first album was released but I felt that the production wasn’t perfect. It started to feel like what Brian Wilson must have felt with the Beach Boys’ album “Smile” and I started feeling like the album mixes would never match the sounds in my head. Then in 2010 we opened for Adam Franklin from Swervedriver- that gave me the inspiration to just finish Politeia and just put it out, perfect or not. His band had this amazing rawness to it. After that show I plugged in my old Echoplex tape delay, added some new guitar parts, remixed a few songs and released it.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?
Adam: 1991-1993 is the ‘classic’ period for us. The press backlash against shoegaze was at its peak in the UK which might explain how so many great albums came out in those years... perhaps the backlash spurred those bands on to greatness! Loveless, Just for a Day, Raise, Lazer Guided Melodies, Going Blank Again, Souvlaki, Mezcal Head, Ferment- not to mention all the 12” EPs that came out in that period. Wow.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?
Adam: The Hope Slide is the new electro-gaze project by the singer and lead guitarist from Hinterland who were a great Canadian shoegaze band. Cruyff in the Bedroom from Japan have been around a while but they still amaze me. The drumming on the first two albums is unbelievable.

Alex: I've been finding my head turned by quieter electronica-laden work at the moment. The band Guerre is going to become something quite lovely, I think. I've also been listening to the album by Spider and the Flies a lot. They're made up by two of the guys from the Horrors using sounds inspired by the BBC Radiophonic Workshop in the 60s. Really interesting.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?
Adam: Our live sets often started with Angel by Massive Attack and we recorded Reptile Smile by Th’ Faith Healers for our Myspace page, both are great songs. Right now we’re recording our interpretation of a David Bowie LP (Earthling) just for fun. I love that album but the production feels a bit mismatched with the songs in some places. We’re hoping to finish it & post it online by the end of the summer… it should be interesting to say the least!

Q: What´s the plans for future....
Alex: We have a habit of working on our next project while finishing our current one. We did that with our first release, Romanticism, and Politeia, and we've done it again. Work is already well underway on our third album, as well as our re-envisioning of Earthling and a couple of other projects. I'm incredibly excited about the directions Adam and I have gone recently. Look out for something (relatively) soon.

Q: Any parting words?
Adam: I’ve had the good fortune of getting production advice from Graham Lewis of Wire on a few occasions and it has always proven invaluable for us. Despite the recent trend of D.I.Y.-everything in the music industry (which we do as much as anyone), an unbiased perspective is still crucial when making an album. The wisdom of an experienced producer can transform a decent album into something truly excellent.
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Thanks guys!!!

http://theludvicotreatment.bandcamp.com/

Behind Us Now by Skylight - An Interview with Perry Pelonero & Brent Martino

2011-08-01T07:13:00.000-07:00

A era clássca do shoegazer trouxe-nos inumeros clássicos MBV, Slowdive, Chapterhouse, Ride, Swervedriver, enfim os top of the tops daquela epoca, porém o submundo dos bons sons também esta completamente recheado de pequenas obscuridades tão maravilhosas como as principais, é o caso do Skylight, pequeno combo noise shoegazer, imerso sob microfonias, loops, eletronices caoticos, dream pop, ou seja todos os elementos fundamentais para se criar obras primas do genero. 1991 foi o ano que Perry Peloreno colocou suas excentricidades em forma musical, inumeras formações e singles, eps, passaram-se na tumultuada trajetoria do Skylight, que contou ate seus ultimos devaneios com o proprio Perry em companhia de Brent Martino e ja em seu final com Kim Wesh, após o Skylight a junção de Perry e Kim transformou-se em bliss.city.eat grandiosa banda dream/shoegazer/electro/noise nos moldes de SVI e mais ainda Morpheme e a junção com Dean Garcia ex Curve e atual SPC Eco junto com Perry e Kim, sem perder o folego, vamos a entrevista historica de Perry e Brent para o TBTCI explicando definitivamente o porque o Skylight tem uma cultuada gama de seguidores no qual eu me incluo, além de causos de Perry com Swervedriver, MBV, Mercury Rev e outros masters da epoca, desde já entrevista que virara cult aqui TBTCI.

***** Interview with Perry Pelonero (Skylight/bliss.city.eat/Morpheme & Brent Martino (Skylight/ The Scarlet Mouning *****

Q. About the early years of Skylight, tell us about the beginning, when did the band starts?
Perry: Some mixed up memories.

The band started around 1991 when i met Mike Bunnell through some friends. I had just moved to the Boston area after leaving New York City. In NYC i was heavily involved in the punk rock hardcore scene and by the late 80s, i was sick of it.. At first me and Mike started making noise tracks with a sampler and whatever else we had laying around. We eventually shared an apartment together and we used to record via a radio shack mixer into a cassette player. It was fucking weird, but it worked well. Mike was one of the first peoplei knew to make loops with a guitar i think... Using an Alesis sampler. We started listening to music coming out of the UK that i guess was called shoegaze? We had already been heavily influenced by bands from the UK .. Echo and the bunnymen, the cure etc... But this stuff was different. We put a band together and brought some different people in and got a manager who in the end fucked us pretty hard after moving to NYC and vanishing. He even stole our original recordings. His name was Howard... And i would love to kick his fucking ass inside out to this day. We recorded a demo with him not long after meeting him. Mike had this great idea of running his guitar through this old yamaha noise keyboard synth after i found we could input the guitar with it... It gave us that string effect for the original As you leave recording. Amazing stuff it was for us. After recording the first demo, we added two new members to the band. A friend of ours Marie played guitar along with Mike, and a drummer. We practiced in the basement of this house we were all living in. We had no money at all, and had to fill our oil furnace with diesel fuel because we could not afford oil. We had a house full of cats as well, because they kept having kittens... We had one cat that used to jump off the roof of the house into a flower pot. People would come over just to see it.

Really it was kind of fucked up. Everybody was fucking everybody, strange people showing up to our house, people getting piercings in fucked up places on their bodies... Everybody in the house got crabs at one point because somebody had dropped some in our house. Me and Mike made up strange games to play during the day to keep us busy. Like tossing super balls in cans. We had a car that would not start unless one of us pushed it down a hill. So every place we went we had to park on a hill. We lived next door to this asshole with a ham radio and giant fucking antenna. He use to come through on all of our recordings the signal was so strong. We asked him to stop but he never did. Instead he would talk about us on his radio and we would hear him. We tried calling the FCC but that failed. So one day we cut and spliced a bunch of his words that we had recorded on a tape. We arranged the words so he would call himself an asshole. Making him say he ate his own shit and stuff. Really funny things... But some drums and keys behind it... We then made a tape and put it on his front door and rain his doorbell. He was so so mad. He even called our landlord... But to us it was funny. We laughed for days about it. He never turned his fucking radio down though.

Before our first show we really wanted video playing behind us so we came up with some cool ideas. We went to the library and rented a film about nature. Flowers, birds etc... We then took a camera and took all sorts of weird photos. Like close ups of wonder bread bags and windows etc. We turned those photos into slides. And ran the slides over the nature film which gave this really cool effect. It really went well with our live show actually. Trippy. Our friend had made a video of it at one point, but it’s long gone now. Kind of sad, because i would give anything to see it again.

After going through rehearsals for our first live show we were ready. Our friend Eric booked us at a club that had just opened. The day of the show came, and the place was packed with people. I think we were a bit shocked. It was time to hit the stage and when we did it all started. First off, our drummer straight off played everything the wrong way. We had been practicing with him for weeks. Complete fuck up. I still say he was nervous and had never played a live show. After suffering through a few songs with him, i got really pissed off and threw my bass on the ground... I came back a minute later and we just started making NON stop noise. For at least 15 minutes. Mind you, this was before MBV had ever made it to the USA . Although i cannot confirm that. I think we had heard stories of them doing the noise bliss though. At this point the crowd we brought in started clearing out. Funny to look back on actually. By the end of the show, our drummer took off. According to Brent a friend who joined Skylight later on, i had been threatening to kill the drummer and he was scared shitless. We fired him after that show and went back to using two different drum machines. We continued to record and play various shows in our living room and other places.Then one day our manager called and said he was leaving and moving to NYC. At this point we thought what do we have to lose by doing the same?? I contacted my sister who was living just over the bridge from NYC in NJ and asked her if we could come down and stay with her for a short time. So we had a huge yard sale and made money. Packed up all our shit. Rented a U haul and drove to NJ. We arrived at my sister’s house in NJ. Not long before we arrived, her neighbor had just blown his heart up by swallowing a couple of 8 balls of cocaine because the cops had pulled him over in the driveway. My sister was visibly upset but also acting really weird about it. I thought to myself holy shit what are we doing here!! Come to find out she was moving because she had lost her house due to a serious drug issue she had so she helped us all find a new place to live which ended up being on top of a strip club in the worst neighborhood in Paterson NJ. It was horrible. Every night the song I LIKE BIG BUTTS would blast through the floors of our apartment. The club was disgusting. Hookers all over the neighborhood tons of crack being sold. My sister had all sorts of weird people coming in and out of the apartment. One of them was this dude who told us a story about his mother making somebody float out from underneath her bed one night. And when we tried to walk away from him, he pulled out a gun and told us to stay. Yeah, it was that fucked up. During this time our manager had vanished into thin air. We tried calling him and he never returned calls. We rented rehearsal time in Hoboken and rehearsed whenever we could. We had no money what so ever, and had to take jobs for a towing service that my sister’s boyfriend at the time owned. We stayed in the area as long as we could. Shows, hanging out at a friend’s record store and making music whenever we could. We saw a lot of cool shows in New York City around that time. And really that time period was just as electric for music as it was in the 80s. Timeless.Eventually after some of us going through some serious drug problems, we packed the band up and moved back to the Boston area. Looking back on this though, we really had a ton of fun as well. I mean we were all about the music, and played whenever we could. The noise man.. the noise man..

Once we got back, we had no idea what to do honestly. We spent a short time doing whatever we could. Until one day Mike just up and left for college. This was around the same time the Brent joined the band actually. I have always been on the same page with Brent musically. All of these years went by and when we started writing together again, it was magic. I would bet it will always be like that... Aside from Brent writing his side of things here, i emailed him the other day and asked him to share some memories of that time period and this is what he sent me. Hilarious to read this because i forgot about most of it! In 1993 Brent said this.

Brent: I came to be in skylght in the spring of 1993 when the band was basically Mike and Perry, I had known Perry for a couple of years through a friend I was in another band with. Shortly after joining Mike left and we became Bloome, we added another guitar player (Sean) and a drummer (Rick), I think mostly because I love to use live drums. Perry typically had bad luck with drummers so we had been using a drum machine but their is just something about a live drummer that pulls it all together for me. We recorded an unfinished 4 song demo and played live once, then things fell apart and we went our separate ways. Perry continued on with other versions of Skylight over the years. Perry and I reconnected through myspace in 2007 after close to 12 years and within a couple of weeks we were trading tracks online and Skylight was once again reborn, soon after we added Pete Kontos on Guitar and Kim Welsh on Vocals

Q. What are the bands influences?
Perry: It is impossible for me to sum up influences. Even in the early 90s i was listening to tons of classic rock. I believe we did a sabbath cover once during rehearsals. All music is an influence to me really... I suppose everything!

Brent: All the usual suspects MBV, Slowdive, Boo Radleys, Swervdriver, all of those late 80's early 90's bands. I think the thing that has always made skylight special is that in addition to our shared shoegaze influences we also all had a very diverse set of other influences and though we were a "Shoegaze" band we weren't afraid to draw on bands outside that genre. For me that is bands like Jane's Addiction, The Sisters of Mercy, Prince, Fields of the Nephilim, and especially The Cure.

Q. Tell us about the Skylight gigs, how is it?
Perry: When we did play it was awesome really. Besides out first show with the idiotic drummer. Once we got the drum machines settled it was cool... We used a boss DR Rhythm and slaved an Alesis via midi.. We tried a cassette once but that failed. We were all about the noise though. Whenever we had a chance we would just make tons of noise. Mike and I would always add extra people when we could but that never really worked out so well. To be honest, Marie was the best we ever had. We taught her all the guitar parts she needed to know. And she would just come out and play. She was into the noise man. She was very talented. Nobody has a clue what ever happened to her actually. I was in touch with her years ago, but her fuck nut boyfriend intercepted emails and said nobody was allowed to email her anymore. Live she was always good... It was about fun for us though. Making noise was all we wanted to do. And that is exactly what we did every time we played. Some loved it, most hated it. Which is exactly what we wanted.

Brent: Because Perry and Kim are in Chicago and Pete and I are in Boston we have essentially been a virtual band for the last few years. We had talked about going out there or them coming here to do a show but life gets in the way and so far it hasn't happened. Back in the day whether writing or recording Perry and I have always been on the same page musically, we have some kind of musical telepathy.

Q. What´s your favourite Skylight song, why?
Perry: As You Leave and Winter Lights. As you leave because it was one of the first that me and Mike ever wrote together. And Winter Lights because it was the first Kim wrote after joining Skylight. Those words have special meaning.

Brent: It's a tie between Winter Lights and Tigerlily. Winter lights because it was the first thing Perry and I wrote together after not talking in over 12 years and tigerlily because I love the atmosphere it creates.

Q. Made a list of your top five albums from all time
Perry: No fucking way. You and i both now that is totally impossible J As much as i would love to do that.. How about anything Led Zeppelin did? Or Killing Joke?? Or T Rex. Or The Cars.

Brent: As I said I have a wide range of influences but I will narrow it down to 5. If you asked me again tomorrow it would probably change. These are 5 that I love and had the most influence on my playing over the years.

The Cure, Disintegration
The Sisters of Mercy, First and Last And Always
Slowdive, Souvlaki
Jane's Addiction, Nothings Shocking
Asobi Seksu, Citrus

Q. Skylight emerge during the classic era of Shoegazer, do you have some histories with bands like MBV, Slowdive, etc…
Brent: Perry has a lot more other band stories he was always more outgoing then me and always knew everyone. The one story I have was spending an evening drinking with Swervedriver at the Rat Skellar in Boston. Perry is friends with them and we had gone down to see their show with the Smashing pumpkins but due to a series of crazy mishaps the show was cancelled. So instead we drank, talked about our mutual love of Alice Cooper and their bass player gave me some great relationship advice, LOL.

Perry: We were lucky in that sense. Wet met Swervedriver early on and i became friends with Adam.... What a wonderful person he is really. I actually love his solo records so much maybe more so than the swervedriver records. Although they both are different to me. I was going to play with him a couple of years ago when his bass player broke his ankle or something. In the end the Churchs keyboard player filled in which was good because i had two days to learn the songs and one of those days we had a power failure at our house.

I spent a lot of time with swervies in the 90s. For various reasons and have some funny stories about being on tour with them. One of them was the great stolen camera incidentJ.. A good friend Claire was with us on tour in 94 and we were in Rhode Island. Swerves had a merch dude Matt. He was incredibly funny this guy. So one night Claire went off some place and Matt grabbed me with a sharpie in hand, and Claires camera. She had left it with Matt to watch. So Matt takes me outside and said this. You take this sharpie, i will pull down my pants and you write HELLO CLAIRE on my ass. Take a picture of it. So Matt rips down his pants, i write HELLO CLAIRE as big as i could, and i took a picture. After the tour back in England, she got the photos developed and we were in Swervies managers office and Claire comes in and said MY PARENTS almost saw this!! Or maybe they did. I cannot remember. It was a classic moment though.

The great thing about the folks in Swervedriver is they were just cool people to hang out with. Never any bullshit with them. The music they made was just always there man. Mezcal Head being one of the best rock records done in the 90s in my opinion. An album that still stands up and can be listened to over and over.

We spent a lot of time with MBV and Mercury Rev as well. Rev were really cool and MBV smoked a shit ton of weed man. One joint would go out and another would just be passed around. Debbie is/was the best person in that band really. She was incredibly sweet and spent a lot of time talking with us in Canada one time. I remember bringing Skylight demos to them as well.

It was funny seeing MBV with DINO JR when we did, because Dino Jr just blew them off the stage. I was always convinced that Kevin Shields made all that noise knowing full well they did not even compare to DINO JR live. When MBV did the reunion i had NO interest in seeing them. I actually agree with what Alan McGee said about loveless which was basically that he cannot stand to even listen to it. And truthfully i feel the same way. One note from loveless and i am ready to vomit. I can listen to the early Eps though. Without the vomit . Some records from back then stand the test of time. That is not one of them in my opinion. Not much different from how i feel about slowdive actually. GAK.. I think its cool Kevin went on to do things with Primal Scream though. I love Primal Scream. We met Bobby and the rest once when they played with Depeche Mode i think it was. He could hardly stand up. He was wobbling back and forth but incredibly nice. And they were almost always good live when we saw them. We have a number stories from back then. Maybe we should write a book or something.

Oh, i almost forgot about Brad and the Medicine folks! Awesome people and fun to watch live!!! As i said i should write a book!!!!!!

Q. Why Skylight RIP?
Brent: Though at the moment Perry would likely disagree I would never call it dead, maybe in a state of suspended animation. Skylight has a way of popping back up when we least expect it. At the moment though perry is busy with his other bands, Bliss City East and Morpheme and Pete and I have a new band called This Scarlet Mourning (along with Don Barry on Bass and Katie Bunting on vocals). We are planning to hit the studio in July for a new single called Stupid World. As for Skylight you never know it's only ever one Facebook message from Perry away from waking up, we may be in an old age home when it happens but who knows "elderly gaze" might catch on!

Perry: Skylight has been following me on and off for a long time. I appreciate people remembering the band, asking us to do shows as well. But i kind of felt with Brent doing his own band out east now, and me and Kim doing bliss.city.east and morpheme with Dean i just cannot see time doing anything else. I am not saying its over completely. I mean, we were asked to do a show in Chicago as a reunion kind of thing, but really it would only be me as an original member. I am not saying NO but i am also not saying YES. Depends on my mood.

Q. About bliss.city.east, when the band starts?
Perry: Bliss started a couple of years ago with Kim Welsh my girlfriend and baby Mama We did it so we could play live shows mainly. But as it turns out, we just love making music together. We spend an incredible amount of time together. We have a studio in our house, so we record whenever we feel the need. Its awesome actually. I could not ask for anything more with Kim. She is perfect. We went through some other members during this time. None of them really worked out until Eric D’Asto joined the band, who has also been PERFECT. He just adds to everything we do and makes it perfect always.

We had another dude who was in the band for a short time but was a horrible musician. When we listen back to his tracks on our recordings now, its just awful. He has also been stalking us via the net for a couple of years now. Non stop. Put our music up on his site as well and its blatantly obvious its me playing guitar. He is a real sick fucker actually. He even sent threatening emails about shooting us and stuff. It’s been taken care of, but you really need to watch out who you invite in the band these days!! bliss started off with Gail and Reuben in the band. Two people that helped out so much and did a ton. We see Reuben all the time but Gail just kind of vanished a year or so ago.

I love bliss though. Our live shows are always shitty, but we have fun doing what we do and that is all that matters to us. It’s perfect.

Q. How you define bliss.city.east sounds?
Perry: I have NO idea. Its just whatever comes out of us at the time. Black and Blue was our tribute to The Cars. If that helps at all. I suppose maybe Dream pop??? I hate genres even though i know they are needed in some way. So yeah, Dream pop.

Q. Tell us about the process of recording the songs...
Perry: It’s been tough with no drummer i can tell you that much. If we had a drummer things would be different. But i have BAD drummer luck. I cannot stand most of them. They either cannot keep up with us, or are just flat out fucking weird. So i gave up on finding one. I do most of the programming of drums myself here at our studio. Most of the time it would be writing the base of the song and then have Kim and Eric come in behind me and add parts. This year though, we have been running drum tracks and all writing together. This is something i truly love and plan to continue. We have a ton of songs, none of them are ready. We are in no hurry to release anything.

Q. The split with Vigulgi OoyoO is a masterpiece to me, do you agree?
Perry: A masterpiece? I don’t know about that!! But thank you!!! We appreciate it! Vidulgi had some great tracks on that album. So did we actually .Nothing ever came of that record. We had a label in England who supposed to release it on vinyl and CD but they ended up just fucking us over completely. Honestly, i am kind of disgusted the way the whole thing was done in the end. Music was great on it though...

Q. What do you think about the classic Shoegaze era?
Perry: It was electric. The shows, the people most of the bands. We were lucky to be front and center when it all went down. I miss that time and i miss a lot of the bands as well.

Q. Which bands would you like to do a cover version of?
Perry: The only cover song we would ever do would be something from The Cars J. we are working on our version of moving in stereo. Although, i would love to cover Higher than the sun by Primal Scream.

Q. Which new bands would you recommend?
Perry: Screen Vinyl Image for sure. Jake and Kim rule and put on one of the greatest live shows. Love Culture from Ohio. Great people and a good band. Tom Lugo and Stellarscope! Plus his label Patetico!!! Music for headphones as well!!! Man the list goes on, and i am sure i am missing some.BLOODY KNIVES. !! Great people and fun to play a show with... Presents for Sally as well. Matt Etherton is a really great person. I heard this band SPC ECO was good. Try them out. So many awesome people involved in this scene these days though. The folks from when the sun hits, Paul Lopez who runs the shoegaze collective. Ambient Airwaves, all of these people working hard to support the bands. My apologies to bands i missed. If you know me well, then you will understand I have a hard enough time remembering my name!!!

Q. About Morpheme, what´s the concept of the band and how´s working with Dean Garcia?
Perry: AS long i do not have to hear THE C WORD ( Curve ).. Don’t get me wrong, Curve did some great things no doubt!! Seriously though...Working with Dean is awesome. We are good friends besides. We have a really cool chemistry between us in music and friendship.. It’s like we read each other’s minds when it comes to music as well.So much has changed in the music business. So its much different than either one of us are used to dealing with. Honestly, we should have been doing this in the 90s!! But its just perfect writing with him. We never really had a concept. Although Kim has been getting a bit political with her lyrics. We all just write what we feel. I pop it off to Dean, he sends it back. Kim adds her lovely voice to it and Bobs Yer Uncle Kim has been doing our videos as well. The video for stratosphere was banned from facebook! Rock on...

Q. What the plans for the future?
Perry: Finish the Morpheme record with Dean and Kim. Finish the bliss album with Kim and Eric. Raise my beautiful daughter. And that is about it.

Q. Any parting words?
Perry: Yeah. I want to take a moment to thank all the people out there supporting all of our bands. Buying our music. Stealing our music whatever. You guys are all awesome. In Chicago i wanted to take a moment to thank Arunas from Darkroom and DJ Scarylady Sarah, William Faith and Philly Peroxide for putting on a great two day festival of bands last month. It was awesome. They have a once a month shoegaze thing here in Chicago at Late bar called Shimmer. So if you are in Chicago, you should go to this.!!! Joey Levenson from SPC ECO for always adding his bits to bliss music. Again i am sure that i am missing people i should be thanking. I am a scatter brain!!!

And finally thank YOU for doing this interview and waiting for me to finish it!!!

Pardon all my jumbled words and stories as well!!

Peace
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Thanks Perry and Brent

http://skylight91.bandcamp.com/album/behind-us-now

Gone Beyond by PeRPLeXa

2011-07-28T11:22:00.000-07:00

Uma daquelas preciosidades que permanecerão obscuras e poucos mortais terão acesso ao sublime mundo de visões enigmaticas, viagens oniricas, anjos, demônios, tudo de forma mezzo post rock, mezzo experimental, mezzo post punk, mezzo psychedelic, assim é o mundo de Jonathan Wald e seu PeRPLeXa, uma celebração movida a ritmos tribais, layers e mais layers de guitarras epicas e cristalinas celebrando tragedias, amores, musica para entrar na alma e não sair nunca mais. Quer conhecer mais a fundo, então faça um grande favor a você mesmo, leia a entrevista que gentilmente foi concebida pelo proprio Jonathan sobre o mundo particular de seu PeRPLeXa, entre nos links, compre o album, baixe, procure, enfim infiltre-se rapidamente e boa viagem.

Detalhe, alguns convidados do album Gone Beyond, artwork by Natty Brooker, Ex Spacemen 3, baixo, Will Carruthers, ex Spacemen 3, precisa de mais alguma coisa!?!?

***** Intervew with Jonathan Wald - PeRPLeXa *****

Q. When did you start to play music? Tell us the beginning...

A. I tried playing clarinet in school when I was 10. On my own, I attempted to play a snare drum at 13. I acquired my first drum set at age 15, sold it at 16, found another at 18, sold it at 20, tried again at 22 and haven't given up since. I never took a lesson, as I found drumming too much fun to complicate with rules.

I create from feel and then visualize a pattern of shape and sound. I begin with a cyclical root pattern, then develop a theme with subtle variations by way of nuance and detail. If I can't feel it or visualize it, I can't play it and don't want to.

Q. When did Perplexa start?

A. PeRPLeXa began in 1994 in Ann Arbor, Michigan

Q. What´s your personal influences?

A. Authenticity, creativity, intuition, truth, heart, rhythm, breath(dth), mystery, and small things.

Q. How do you describe your sounds?

A. Epic, hypnotic, intense, passionate, cinematic, sensual, psychedelic, soothing, tribal, spiritual, and beyond.

Q. What was the process to recording gone beyond?

A. The simple answer...

Gone Beyond started a long time ago the "old fashioned" way... like all of our recordings, we played our instruments while surrounded by microphones and perform our songs to analog tape. I know... sounds strange because it wasn't recorded into a computer, and endlessly looped and edited. Some songs were written and some were improv'd. We tend to avoid most common song writing methods and approach ideas with more of a fine art sensibility. We engineer our music, in our own space, with our own equipment. I took on a much greater role in all aspects of production than I ever had in the past.

Q. What's the differences between the ST debut and gone beyond?

A. Spanning the first two releases, represents a time when we were a three piece band. Essentially guitar, bass, and drums. We just performed and recorded our live set to tape. We were more overt in our way of bringing about sonic intensity. By the time we wrote and recorded our third record, The Sun and The Moon Getting it On, the core of PeRPLeXa was a two piece. At this time, cello accompanied us and together we explored a more crafted experience than our previous recordings.

For our fourth recording, we hope that we've become better at creating the journey we're trying to help the listener experience. Gone Beyond is an infinitely more expansive endeavor, a greater scope, and of course, much more life informed. Gone Beyond still retains the core two piece and cello, as well, many talented friends helped bring about this crazy dream.

Q. About gig´s, what´s your feeling of playing live...

A. Playing live is a wonderfully amazing and inexplicable ride that I love, while at the same time, being so afraid. A very humbling experience that I'm always compelled to engage in again and again. PeRPLeXa has always been a live spectacle and we hope to be so always.

Q. Make a list of your top 5 albums of all time...

A. Absolutely impossible to pick five! Here are some of the records that I have enjoyed for years...

Alice Coltrane - Journey in Satchidananda

Durutti Column - LC

Talk Talk - Laughing Stock

This Heat - Deceit

The Raincoats - Odyshape

Pop Group - Y

Chet Baker - Jazz at Ann Arbor

Crash Worship - Triple Mania II

Can - Ege Bamyasi

Dead Can Dance - Within the Realm of a Dying Sun

African Head Charge - Songs of Praise

...and so many more.

Q. Which new bands do you recommend?

A. I wouldn't know what others might like, but some of the music that I've currently been listening to is all over the place...

Django Reinhardt

Joanna Newsom

Dirty Projectors

Die Antwoord

Name of the Moon

Q. About the future, what are your plans?

A. Well, I live in the moment but if I could imagine tomorrow... I hope to learn more, feel more, love more, and create more.

Q. Any parting words..

A. For your entrancing pleasure, now and always... Gone Beyond

Thanks Jonathan!!

http://perplexa.bandcamp.com/album/gone-beyond

http://www.outlierrecords.co.uk/store/index.php?act=viewProd&productId=19

Anticipating Nowhere with Lorelle Meets The Obsolete - An Interview

2011-07-15T20:43:00.000-07:00

Leia atentamente, o negócio é serissimo, sugiro prestar extrema atenção no que escreverei daqui por diante simplesmente pelo fato de que o que vem a seguir é algo que não se encontra em qualquer esquina, fui claro?!? Bom, não me lembro como e porque cheguei até o Lorelle Meets The Obsolete, estou sendo sincero não me lembro e olha que isso faz menos de dois meses, também isso pouco importa para o tamanho do estrago que aconteceu no dia que acessei o bandcamp deles e me deparei com o debut intitulado On Welfare, preste atenção, tudo ao acaso, apenas cheguei até o site não sei bem o porque entretanto quando fiquei curioso e comecei a ouvir a primeira faixa do álbum, chamada Traveler o baque foi instantâneo, o que me veio a mente naquele momento durante um mero dia de trabalho foi a mesmíssima sensação de quando ouvi o absurdamente essencial Taste dos Telescopes ou quando ouvi o Playing With Fire do Spacemen 3, um parênteses aqui, para quem me conhece sabe muito bem que o Taste e o Playing With Fire para mim são obras primas irretocáveis, fecha parênteses, retomando então, eu poderia muito bem escrever mais algumas máximas para o estupendo debut do Lorelle Meets The Obsolete mas realmente não dá, o resultado obtido após a audição do álbum é devastadora, veja bem, devastadora no sentido de insanidade, inconformismo e isso meus caros é algo que foi criado e concebido em 2011, é sabido que estamos em um estagio do qual temos a internet, por conseqüência as redes sociais e tudo fica mais simples logicamente concordam?!?Porém o Lorelle Meets The Obsolete não é inglês, americano, dinamarquês, sueco, canadense, etc, etc...a banda vem diretamente de Guadalajara isso mesmo Guadalajara Mexico, e digo a vocês impressiona mais ainda, afinal qual o histórico de bandas de Guadalajara??? Sinceramente sou leigo nesse quesito todavia isso também pouco importa porque On Welfare grita e grita altíssimo e atinge o objetivo a cada acorde, psicodelismo noise selvagem, inconformismo social em letras dolorosas e diretas This Plain City, Waiting for The Orange Sunshine, Traveler são peculiares exemplos de que ainda existe questionamento e inconformismo, desculpem a repetição da palavra, mas é a mais pura realidade, não há como ficar indiferente as canções deste espetacular On Welfare, ainda mais quando no seu intimo, digo na sua essência ainda há uma chama de contestação da situação na qual nos subtemo-nos neste capitalismo fodido das grandes metrópoles que vivemos, e digo mais, nos amamos as ditas metropoles, amigos, francamente uma obra prima como esta certamente passara despercebida pela grande maioria mesmo porque as possibilidades das bandas divulgarem seus trabalhos são inúmeras e claramente vivemos em uma época extremamente exuberante de grandes e desconhecidos trabalhos, ficando quase que inviável tomarmos conhecimento de 100% do que esta sendo lançado no mercado, veja, o álbum On Welfare tem o selo da Captcha Records de Chicago, ou seja, resumidamente a globalização colabora neste sentido entretanto de que forma, você tomaria conhecimento do que estou apresentando neste momento?!? Admiro pessoas como os comparsas Miguel e Tadeu da BARSA ALTERNATIVA Amor Louco, cito ainda o grande Pedro e seu incansável Shoegazer Alive já na versão 5, tem mais, Al Schenkel com o barulhento Sussurros e Escarros, isto somente citando uma pequena parcela das revistas alternativas que hoje intitulam-se BLOGS, mas que ofertam conhecimento, fora os gringos When The Sun Hits e tantos outros, o fato é que, a musica alternativa atual esta recheada de grandes, mais muito grandes bandas e a divulgação é online, quase que simultânea, o que precisa ser considerado é, deixar o amadorismo de lado e todos os meios se falarem e unirem-se para criar algo realmente perturbador, ponto final. Bom, finalizando, On Welfare debut do Lorelle Meets The Obselete certamente, será, a não ser que algo aconteça de forma inusitada, o álbum do ano para o TBTCI, sem mais, Renato Malizia.

Ah, finalizando a historia, logicamente que este que vos escreve não contente em comprar o debut, leia-se VINIL, detalhe somente disponível em Vinil ou MP3, no mesmo dia em que conheci a banda, realizei um contato imediato com Lorelle e The Obsolete, onde para minha surpresa eles conheciam e freqüentavam o TBTCI, e o resultado não poderia ser melhor, esta devidamente estampado nas entrelinhas da entrevista abaixo.

PS – mais um detalhe absurdamente relevante, quando recebi o vinil ai que fudeu mais ainda, vejam pelo capricho do vinil branco em detalhes esverdeados, um verdadeiro item de colecionador, fácil fácil o vinil mais bonito que já vi em toda minha vida!!!!!Simplesmente essencial!!!!

***** An Interview with Lorelle and The Obsolete *****

Q. When did Lorelle Meets The Obsolete starts tell us about the history...
A. The Obsolete: It started last year in Guadalajara when Lorena had a batch of songs that didn't fit much into our former band Soho Riots. She wanted to record them so she invited me to do the tweaking. And that's pretty much it. It all started as a recording project not as a band.

Lorelle: Those songs didn't fit with the Riots because they all came up as a unity. I couldn't separate them from each other. It was almost as if each song was part of a story. If you cut one song out the whole story won't make sense anymore. It also was the best opportunity to start something we were meaning a long time to do: a duo between Alberto and me. Even though we love the idea of having a band, we needed a space in which we didn't depend on other people whether to rehearse, record or play.

Q: Who are your influences?

A. The Obsolete: There's a certain comfort zone of which you can't get out easily but during the recording of On Welfare I was heavily listening to Kurt Vile, Christian Bland's solo stuff, Thee Oh Sees and The War on Drugs.

Lorelle: The Cramps, Spectrum, Black Mountain, Dead Meadow, Spacemen 3... I keep returning to those bands, again and again.

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…

A. Lorelle: The Cure - Disintegration, The Cramps - Bad Music For Bad People, Emily Haines & The Soft Skeleton - Knives Don't Have Your Back, Spacemen 3 - Playing With Fire, Deerhunter - Cryptograms.

The Obsolete: That's a tough one. I'd say The Velvet Underground - White Light / White Heat, Spacemen 3 - The Sound of Confusion, Galaxie 500 - On Fire, 13th Floor Elevators - The Psychedelic Sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators, The War on Drugs - Wagonwheel Blues (this is a new addition and it is truly a great record).

Q. How do you fell playing alive?

A. Lorelle: Playing live is a vital part of all the process. For me is like being in a complete honest state of mind. It is a way of projecting yourself as real as possible without obstacles. At a gig you can be certain about the realm of any connection achieved with the audience. There can't be any masks up there. I guess you could say that the live act is purely emotional for us.

Q. How do you describe Lorelle Meets The Obsolete sounds?

A. Lorelle: It definitely sounds as the social malaise.

The Obsolete: I do think there's a lot of intimacy in our sound. I mean, when you listen to the record you can imagine there's a band in your room you know. Like a bedroom-psych rock sort of thing.

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the debut album?

A. The Obsolete: It all happened quite quickly. As I said, Lorena had these songs she wanted to record. Most of them were all stripped down, vocals and guitar only. So we started by adding some drums and bass, then some extra guitars, organs, etc. The fun part started when we mixed it 'cause we messed a lot with all the tracks. This particular song, "The Means of Production", got really interesting during the mixing because it ended up as a really twisted version of the original song. "Perverted by its Time" it's also a good example of all the mess we did. That song was intended to be some kind of division between the two major parts of "Taken". We couldn't figure out how to fit it in so then we realized it actually worked as an interlude for the whole album.

Soon after the record was almost done we invited a friend of ours (who happens to be in a mind-blowing band called Robota) to add some Omnichord and other layers to certain songs.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to the band?

A. For us it's really all about My Bloody Valentine. They've been a HUGE influence to us. Especially in the "live experience" approach on music. They've showed us how music can become extremely physical to the point of making people's skin literary vibrate. The "holocaust" moment during "You Made Me Realize" is a perfect example of how they took music into a physical state as a means to an end.

Q. Which new bands do you recommended?

A. Lorelle: The Soft Province, you've probably heard of them. It's a project by, former Besnard Lake member, Michael Gardiner. Its first record is really sweet. It has become a regular listen on my day-to-day activities. I'd also recommend Mentira Mentira. It's a one-man band actually and everything is arranged by our spoiled friend Gaby. He's like a human dynamo and he's about to put three records out at the same time. He's definitely one of the most prolific, charismatic and honest musicians we've met. Now beware 'cause he's 22 and he has threaten us with ending his music career at 26 so if I were you I would listen to his stuff right away.

The Obsolete: I've been into some of the great music that Woodsist has been putting out. The Spectre Folk and Purling Hiss stuff especially. There's also this awesome band of our friends Bruno and Giovanni called Tony Danza. They're finishing the recording of their first album and it's going to be really big! I'm really stoked about the anger in their songs. Plus, they have a bit of Velvet Underground going on there.

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

A. Lorelle: I would love to do “So Hot” by Spacemen 3. The Obsolete: I would cover any Galaxie 500 song hehe.

Q: What´s the plans for future....

A. Lorelle: We're going to start the recording of our second album, which we hope to have ready by the autumn. There are also plans of putting out a 7" before the second album comes out. And there are rumors that say we will be playing outside of Mexico for the first time, so stay tuned :)

The Obsolete: We're planning to do a big collaboration with Tony Danza and our friends Richie and Leila (the sweetest couple). The thing is to setup lots of instruments in a room so everybody can play something, improvise and finally tape it. This one might take a while but when it happens it will sure be amazing.

Q: Any parting words?
The Obsolete: Let us know if you enjoyed our record and do share it. And thanks for having us in your place Renato.
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Thanks!!!!

http://obsoletelorelle.bandcamp.com/album/on-welfare

http://www.myspace.com/obsoletelorelle

http://nodata.tv/21818

For All the Fucked-Up Children of This World We Give You Starfire Connective Sound - An Interview

2011-06-29T11:01:00.001-07:00

Dando sequência a primeira aparição do Starfire Connective Sound aqui no TBTCI, Al Schenkel a mente por detrás da perturbação sonora a qual se propõe o SCS coloca o definitivo 1º EP do Starfire com direções bem explicitas, caos sendo o mais caótico possível, reverberações, delírios distribuídos dentre as 7 canções, I Sweep The Streets Without Finding, They Call Her One Eye, This Modern Cave (assombrossa), Electric Whore, Love Is a Lonely Ghost Floating, Wall Whitman´s Brain, Starfire Connective Sound que simplesmente impressiona os mais desavisados, saca assim, os grandes genios perturbados do naipe de Nick Cave, Tom Waits, Blixa Bargeld, os Irmãos Reid, Kevin Shields, Lou Reed e acresça Al Schenkel no meio, acha pouco, foda-se, o negocio aqui é serissimo.

Para deixar claro que o SCS tem planos que se tornar a maior revelação do ano, pegue em primeira mão a entrevista concedida por ele ao TBTCI, sem muito bla bla bla, Al Schenkel e seu Starfire Connective Sound.

***** Interview with Al Schenkel - Starfire Connective Sound *****

Q. Quando o Starfire Connective Sound começou?
O projeto começou a ganhar vida em maio deste ano, mas a ideia de voltar a tocar e compor já rondava meus pensamentos há uns bons 3 anos, data mais ou menos em que tive minhas últimas experiências com bandas de garagem. O Nome, Starfire Connective Sound foi a sugestão de um amigo de Novo Hamburgo chamado Johnny, e é uma ligação meio louca entre uma caixa elétrica que ele projeta na Springer chamada Starfire e um episódio de Dungeons and Dragons (Caverna do dragão), envolvendo um avião da segunda guerra mundial.

Q. Quais as influencias do SCS?

Além das vertentes noise-pop, shoegaze, experimentais, no-wave, post-punk, space-rock, electro-rock, industriais de bandas como The Birthday Party, The Velvet Underground, My Bloody Valentine, Spaceman 3, Six Finger Satellite, JAMC, Slowdive, The Sound, Joy Division, Bardo Pond, Medicine, Love And Rockets, Sonic Youth e Suicide as influências literárias também são bem gritantes, passando por nomes como Walt Whitman, Antonin Artaud, Gregory Corso, Carl Solomon, Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouak, William Burroughs, Rimbaud, Garcia Lorca e Bukowski e é claro, de cinema alternativo e experimental também.

Q. Quais os 5 essenciais albuns de todos os tempos?
Eu enquadraria uns 30 ou mais álbuns tranquilamente nesta lista...rsrsrs...Mas vamos lá. Vou Citar 5 discos que mudaram minha concepção dentro da música: The Velvet underground And Nico (1967), The Velvet Underground; Prayers On Fire (1981), The Birthday Party; Siter (1987), Sonic Youth; Crocodiles (1980), Echo And The Bunnymen; Isn't Anything (1988), My Bloody Valentine;

Q. Como voce define o som do SCS?
Uma fusão de soundscapes, colagens e ambientações que oscila entre alucinações, perturbações, sonhos, violência, amor, raiva e caos mental, reverberados em muita distorção e repetições psíquicas. Uma bad trip com raros ou quase nenhum momento de lucidez.

Q. Como é o produção de criação das musicas, quais as influencias?
Devido a falta de gente que divida as mesmas influências e paixões por este tipo de sonoridade aqui em Criciúma, SC me vi na obrigação de criar tudo sozinho. As canções geralmente são criadas a a partir de algum loop de bateria criados com a ajuda de softwares de produção e criação de áudio, tendo as guitarras e sintetizadores sendo jogados aos poucos em cima, junto a camadas e mais camadas de distorções e efeitos de pedal, até chegar ao ponto que pretendo deixá-las.

Q. Como foi o processo de gravação do EP?
O processo de gravação seguiu os mesmos passos da criação dos sons, totalmente caseiro e baseado nos mesmos softwares que uso para criação. Conforme sentia que as canções estavam prontas eu ia arquivando-as para uma seleção futura, o que acabou rendendo o primeiro EP.

Q. Quais os planos para o futuro?ALbum cheio?Shows?...
A ideia principal é arrancar este projeto de dentro da minha casa e executá-lo ao lado de outros músicos, tornando-o ainda mais barulhento e visceral. Já estou trabalhando em outras canções, duas delas podem ser conferidas no soundcloud do SCS. Uma das que ficaram de fora da seleção do EP ganharão vocais e mais guitarras e provavelmente integrarão o novo EP, assim como também ocorrerá em outras faixas, que terão vocais de amigos de outras bandas que toparam parceria adicionados. Por enquanto em relação a shows fica meio complicado, mas apartir do momento em que o projeto tome estatus de banda completa, certamente este será o principal objetivo do Starfire Connective Sound.

Q. Alguma coisa a mais a acrescentar?

Aproveitando para agradecer ao The Blog That Celebrates Itself pela iniciativa, queria pedir encarecidamente para os amantes do rock independente e underound brasileiro que vehnam a frequentar shows das bandas nacionais deste ramo, comprem os CDS, vistam a camiseta e de um modo geral apoiem e deem seu parecer sobre esta cena maravilhosa e super barulhenta que está se erguendo no Brasil, pois eu tenho certeza que este país jamais produziu tanto e em tamanha qualidade com se tem visto nos dias de hoje, mas para isto continuar se alastrando é necessário o ativismo e a colaboração de cada um.
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Valeu Al

http://starfireconnectivesound.bandcamp.com/

Pygmalion with Foreign Cinema - An Interview

2011-06-15T13:28:00.000-07:00

Lembram-se do Astral?!?Obvio que sim, prediletissimo aqui do TBTCI, varios reviews e uma interview daquelas memoraveis, leia novamente aqui, e não é que através de contatos imediatos contactei a Natty Dagger, brasileira de Goiania, foi direto para os Estados Unidos e capitanea uma projeto daqueles mais do que essenciais ao lado do proprio Dave do Astral , dai a conexão, o Foreign Cinema já citado na entrevista com o mentor do Astral passeia por caminhos diferentes, batidas eletronicas quase tribais mesclados com uma ambientação meio trip hop meio post punk e caindo por um lado shoegazer climatico tudo isso junto coloca-os como uma das grandes promessas para este ano ouça Lovers an Killers e veja do que se trata todo esse vislumbre da minha parte.

E logico, como de praxe o TBTCI descolou via Natty mais uma das já classicas interviews do blog, sem mais Foreign Cinema.

***** Interview with Natty Dagger - Foreign Cinema *****

Q. When did Foreign Cinema form, tell us about the beginning…

The band formed in 2008. We (Dave & Natalia) both were into the same kind of music and have previous band experience so naturally we joined forces and pursued the musical venture with the goal of bringing something new to the indie music scene.

Q. What are the band’s influences?

A lot of contemporary electronic music as well as some classic shoegaze & post-punk have really been big drivers in our musical influence. Massive Attack, Thievery Corporation, Air, Cocteau Twins, Dead Can Dance, Echo & the Bunnymen & Siouxsie and The Banshees are among the most notable.

Q. Tell us about the recording process for the debut EP?

The original master recordings of the EP was done completely analog (aside from the final format being released on CD), and recorded on a 1/2" tape, 8-track tape machine at our home studio. Retaining a fat organic low end in our sound is really important. The 4 songs were recorded, mixed and mastered in less than a month, which was very quickly compared with how long we're taking to put out our new album... about 2 years! hahaha

Q. When is the album due?

The album will be out in a couple months but we do not have a release date set yet. We are currently finalizing the mixes and it will be mastered in a week or so. After that, it will be off to the pressing plant. This album will be released on vinyl in very limited quantities.

Q, Tell us about playing live.

Playing live is always a pleasure. connecting with listeners is one of the most rewarding experiences about being a recording/ performing artist. We are about to do our first show with live drums and also a cello player and we're hoping to incorporate more diverse instruments into our live shows for the future including sitar and other world instruments.

Q. What do you think about the classic shoegaze era?

Let's just say without it, a huge part of our influences would never have existed.

Q. Which new bands you recommended?

We like bands that are a little bit different from the rest. Here in the Bay Area our favorites are Return to Mono, Stripmall Architecture, Silver Swans & Slowness. It's hard to find new bands that are totally original but it's always refreshing when a band takes a new twist on an old sound and not just copy some style of music that's already been done.

Q. Which songs by other bands would you like to do cover versions of?

Dead Can Dance - The Ubiquitous Mr. Lovegrove and also In Power we Entrust the Love Advocated (we're BIG Dead Can Dance fans :)

Echo & the Bunnymen - Porcupine

Q. What are the plans for the future?

We are on the verge of releasing our first vinyl 7" single. The songs will be exclusive to this release (Palace of Fine Junk b/w Velvet Sky) and not available on anything else. We are very proud of these songs and we've already gotten a lot of positive feedback on them. In the near term, we'll continue to perform and promote the new album and single, as well as do more regional touring.

Q. Any important news to tell us…

Only that we have a couple of shows coming up in San Francisco and that people should come out! :) One is at the legendary Cafe Du Nord, on June 23rd and the other at the Rickshaw Stop on July 16. Our website is www.foreigncinema.com.br and people can keep up with us by visiting our Facebook page (facebook.com/foreigncinemamusic) and Twitter (@foreigncinema)

Thank you so much Renato!

Thanks Natty & Dave!!!Cheers Renato

http://www.myspace.com/foreigncinemamusic

Foreign Cinema - Lovers and Killers

Sonic, Flower and Groove with The Tamborines - An Interview

2011-06-14T09:54:00.000-07:00

Com maior prazer e orgulho escuto incansavelmente meu Camera & Tremor, debut dos paranaenses de Maringa, o grande mais muito grande Tamborines, de meu camarada Henrique Laurindo que simplesmente pegou tudo e foi para Londres e ai a historia do Tamborines é exatamente essa Sonic, Flower and Groove, shows e shows, eps sensacionais e agora o album, simplesmente espetacular, Henrique e Lulu Grave são especialistas em criar pequenas gemas a base de distorção, fuzz romantismo e profundo conhecimento de causa, 31st Floor, Come Together, What Took You So Long e a emblematica Sanny O´Gannon explicam o porque os Tamborines são comparados a Dandy Warhols, Teenage Fanclub primeira fase, Ride, alias MArk Gardener faz backing vocals em Come Together, e junto ai Velvet Underground fase Loaded e a festa esta completa, outro grande momento deste Camera & Tremor é o cover Let me Down dos herois do guitar sound nacional os Pin Ups, diante de tantos motivos é recomendavel urgentemente que voce vá até sua loja predileta e pegue logo seu Camera & Tremor e seja mais feliz.

Aproveitando o ensejo todo, o comparsa Henrique concedeu ao TBTCI uma especialissima entrevista abordando toda a trajetoria dos Tamborines, então recomendo leia e releia e delicie-se

***** Interview with Henrique Laurindo - The Tamborines *****

Q. Quando o Tamborines começou? Conte-nos a historia da banda...
A. Comecei a escrever as musicas que seriam a base dos Tamborines em 1999/2000 na epoca eu tinha acabado de sair de uma banda bem noise/shoegaze, e eu estava afim de fazer algo mais calmo, folk ate. Assim surgiram as musicas do "Dressed up to better feel the sun", inclusive chegamos a gravar 8 musicas com a intencao de lancar 2 eps. No final acabamos perdendo as masters e ficou so o "Dressed Up .." mesmo.

Q. Quais as influencias da banda?
A. Dificil dizer, nos tres temos gostos bem variados...

Q. Quais os discos de cabeceira do Tamborines...
A. Os meus mudam sempre, no momento os que vem a tona sao: Velvet Underground - Velvet Underground; Isn't Anything - MBV; Cowboy in Sweden - Lee Hazlewood; Scrabby? - Pin Ups; Daydream Nation - Sonic Youth; In the Airplane over the sea - Neutral Milk Hotel; Bringing it all back home - Bob Dylan...

Q. Depois do primeiro EP pela Midsummer, como surgiu a ideia de se radicar em Londres?
A. Na verdade eu tinha essa ideia desde que peguei na guitarra pela primeira vez!

Coisa de adolecente que acabou por se tornar realidade...

Q. Porque o fim prematuro ?
A. Quando chegamos em Londres a primeira coisa que sacamos foi que teriamos que nos adaptar a uma outra realidade. Esse Tamborines que saiu do Brasil nao teria a minima chance de fazer algo aqui, entao resolvemos colocar a coisa on hold e curtir o que estava acontecendo com a gente: ver shows, exposicoes, eventos. Devoramos tudo.

Q. No retorno em 2005, qual foi a grande mudança em relação a primeira formação?
A. Bem, ai ja estavamos ouvindo outras coisas, em uma total outra realidade, mais "dentro" de Londres. Comecamos a gravar demos e passa-las pros amigos, porem nao tinhamos banda: era so a Lulu nos teclados, eu na guitarra e uma drum machine.

No Brasil a coisa era um pouco mais maleavel e incerta: gravamos o ep em tres (com o Renato na bateria) porem ao vivo era basicamente amigos nos dando uma mao. O que era super bacana, ninguem (nem mesmo a banda) sabia quem iria tocar o que. Caos total.

Q. Como são os shows do Tamborines?
A. Caos total.

Q. Tocar ao lado de grandes bandas como Charlatans, Chapterhouse, Crystal Stilts significa o que para o Tamborines?
A. Espero que signifique que somos grandes em algum aspecto tambem hahahahaha. Claro que eh otimo dividir o palco com bandas que admiramos, mas outras coisas bem mais emocionantes ja aconteceram pra gente. Por exemplo: ter o Mark Gardener cantando uma musica nossa (3 alias!!) foi mind-blowing!!

Q. Como foi o processo de gravação do debut Camera & Tremor?
A. Desnecessariamente longo e extremamente complicado.

Adoro o disco e as musicas e acho que apesar de tudo representa bem o que o Tamborines era naquele momento. Mas foram 3 bateristas diferentes, em varios estudios. Ouve muita confusao, muitas opinioes divergentes etc..

Quando o disco saiu eu fiquem sem ouvi-lo durante meses e ja mergulhei de cara em musicas novas.

Dai a Luciana passou dos teclados pra bateria - o que provou ser a decisao mais correta que fizemos - o Chokis (ex-Wry) assumiu o baixo e ja comecamos a tocar musicas novas. So quando fomos em turne na Alemanha e Italia que voltamos a tocar as musicas do "Camera & Tremor", e dai voltou aquele feeling bom e hoje eu aprecio essas confusoes e divergencias.

Q. O que representa a cena shoegazer classica para o Tamborines?
A. Eu cresci ouvindo Ride, MBV, Jesus & Mary Chain etc... e acho que esse som abriu possibilidades pra curtir outras coisas como velvets, byrds, phil spector, love ou mesmo beatles, folk e motown.

Mas confesso que nao ouco muito bandas shoegaze ultimamente. Alias nem acho que o Tamborines seja shoegaze, embora seja inevitavel a associacao visto que lancamos um single pela Sonic Cathedral.

Q. Quais bandas da atualidade vocês recomendam?
A. Gosto bastante do Crystal Stilts, o primeiro album eh fantastico, mas ainda nao ouvi o novo. Gosto bastante do Yuck tambem, otimas cancoes. Soft Moon me pegou de surpresa e tornou-se uma das prediletas da casa. Tem o Moon Duo tambem. Crocodiles, Veronica Falls, Minks, Warpaint, Frankie Rose and the Outs etc..

Q. Quais os planos para o futuro?Turnes?Talvez algum show no Brasil...
A. Estamos indo pra Italia em Julho gravar o segundo disco e depois disso iremos ao Brasil. Esse ano promete!

Q. Alguma mensagem há mais...
A. Estamos com saudades dos amigos e nao vemos a hora de estar ai. Baladas como as do Brasil nao existem iguais!
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Valeu Henrique....abs Renato

http://www.thetamborines.com/

The Tamborines - 31st Floor, Come Together

Purple Shoe(gaze) with R.M. Hendrix

2011-06-02T11:30:00.000-07:00

Diretamente do contato imediato feito pelo mentor Michael Hendrix, um ep (Super Moo) e um album que tiraram o folego do TBTCI, shoegazer em formato atual misturando com glam e muito wall of sound pegue o album This Dreadful Mess e vá direto para a soberba Yr Queen is Dead e veja do que estou falando, riffs pegajosos, muito Swervedriver e Serena Maneesh em formato atualizado, Global Affair/Crack the Code é um Flying Saucer Attack light, um deleite, The Nóir é outro exemplo crucial de que o novissimo R.M. Hendrix vem como um raio brilhante e barulhento rechear o universo do shoegazer atual, absolutamente necessario.

Para elucidar mais ainda o post, como tem sido praxe aqui no TBTCI, convidamos Mr. Michael Hendrix para tecer comentarios sobre processo de gravação e peculiaridades das canções, com vocÊs R.M. Hendrix:

The Dreadfull Mess & Super Moo by Michael Hendrix :

I recorded the basic tracks of the songs with either Jazzmaster or Jaguar running through a Vox AC15. This gave me a consistent sound bed to experiment upon. Once I had that recorded then I could start letting all my influences play out for both tones and vocals. This was really liberating because I could let the lyrics and mood guide how each song evolved without worrying if it would get so different that it didn't sound like it belonged on the record.

Here are the influences track by track on This Dreadful Mess:
1. My Bloody Valentine
2. Fennesz
3. Swervedriver, Serenah Maneesh, Neu
4. Bowie, Catherine Wheel, Radiohead, Starflyer 59
5. The Cure, Seefeel
6. MBV, Radiohead
7. Primal Scream, Stooges, Jesus & Mary Chain, Chapterhouse

Super Mo are really thematic outtakes from Mess. They were all love songs and didn't really fit with the spy theme. Same gear set up, but you can see how they are more optimistic than the other tunes.
1. Radiohead
2. Bowie
3. New Order
4. Burial, Sparklehorse
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Thanks Michael

www.rmhendrix.com

I Saw The Ghost That Follows You with Bloody Knives

2011-06-02T07:41:00.000-07:00

Preston Maddox do espetacular Bloody Knives já é socio de carterinha do TBTCI, e logicamente o Bloody Knives um dos prediletissimos da nova geração de excelentes bandas surgidas, depois do estrago realizado com o debut Burn it All Down, Preston e seu Bloody Knives atacam com o devastador Disappear, a destruição em forma de canção começa com You Know You Want To e só termina nos ultimos acordes da catarse final com Disappear, simplesmente um ep que eleva ainda mais o status do Bloody Knives com uma das mais destruidoras bandas da atualidade com seu mix insano de electro, shoegazer, noise, pos punk chega para ensurdecer ainda mais os timpanos dos menos despreparados.

Ilustrando ainda mais este post especial do TBTCI, convidei Mr. Maddox para disecar o ep, vejam o que acontece por detras da mente do nosso amigo Preston:

The Process:

July 2010: We had the idea of making a record out of improvisations. The idea of having a forced time frame, and to create something from something else were the main themes behind creating the music.

We were on tour and had a day off so we decided to go to Brooklyn and record with our friend Ryan Steele (Makeshift Studios). Ryan recorded our old bands’ last record at his old place. We could not record at his new place, so we packed up all the recording equipment in our van and went to a practice spot in Brooklyn called Sweatshop. I’m pretty sure we were in room four. We had a six hours to record.

We setup all the equipment in the practice space, miked the drums, DI’ed the bass, got some beer and shitty Mexican food, and started to record. There was some terrible cover band in the room next to us banging out the worst songs of the past 30 years at full volume, in the other room beside us was a metal drummer banging out blast beats. We were sure the noise was gonna make it into the ambient mics but it didn’t happen, the bleed was minimal.

“ill never leave you alone” was written in the first hour of the session. The Mexican food started to give me a stomach ache. Around that time we wrote “my blood is in your veins”. We took a short drinking and eating break and started up again. During this time we recorded the last three songs. "i want to be the one to blame" and " you know you want to" were recorded back to back. "disappear" was the last song we did.

We packed up and left Sweatshop. Ryan gave us the audio files and we took the disc back to Austin with us. I loaded the files up and recorded the keyboard parts at our studio in Austin. I went to Brooklyn to record some more, but after the sessions the blizzard killed off the hard drive. Some files were recovered, the others we re-recorded at my studio in Austin. Jim added effects and interludes. We sent the record back to Ryan to mix and master. Jake did the artwork.

Song Explanations:

1. "you know you want to"
you think too much, be impulsive, you know you want to, so c'mon.

2 "i want to be the one to blame
the joy of corruption, stealing innocence, and the inabilty to resist what you want.

3 "ill never leave you alone
you caught the infection, the virus spread, you will carry the infection until your death.

4 "my blood is in your veins"
your destiny is waiting for you to give you what you deserve. there is nothing worse than too late.

5. "disappear"
there is a hole inside you that you will never fill, the more you try the bigger the vacany gets......disappear.

Thanks Preston my friend...

http://bloodyknives.bandcamp.com/album/disappear

Satansville Revisited with Swervedriver - An Interview with Adam Franklin

2011-06-02T06:55:00.000-07:00

Depois de um tornado que literalmente consumiu este que vos escreve fazendo com que eu ficasse um pouco distante do TBTCI, eis que a volta eminente estaria prestes a ser executada e finalmente o TBTCI esta novamente a ativa e para comemorar em grande, digo grande mais muito grande estilo o TBTCI tem a honra de apresentar e conceder a todos uma historica entrevista com o grandioso Adam Franklin do seminal, espetacular, poderoso e prediletissimo de todos os tempos Swervedriver, sim isso mesmo, uma entrevista que perdurou para ser concebida em 1 ano de conversação, troca de emails, e finalmente Mr Adam Franklin nos concedeu esta que facilmente é uma das mais importantes entrevistas já realizadas pelo TBTCI.

Quanto ao Swervedriver o que dizer, o que acrescentar ao que já foi escrito, discutido e tudo mais, simplesmente a mais barulhenta das bandas da primeira fase da Scene, albuns absolutamente indispensaveis como Raise, Mezcal Head, Ejector Seat Reservation e 99th Dream, sem contar nos eps e b-sides tão abrassivos e poderosos quanto os albuns cheios, por essas e outras que hoje é um dia de comemoração no TBTCI, um marco absoluto na historia do blog e principalmente para este que vos escreve, afinal a idolatria minha em torno do Swervedriver é incondicional, amigos deliciem com Mr. Adam Franklin.

***** Interview with Adam Franklin (Swervedriver, Magnetic Morning, Toshack Highway and Bolts of Melody *****

Q. About the early years, when did Swervedriver starts?
Swervedriver formed in the winter of 1988-89 after the break-up of our previous band Shake Appeal. That band had been well known locally in Oxford and was once voted Best Band in Oxford in 1987 or something by readers of a local music paper but we had become bored with it. We were doing this Stooges/MC5 thing and felt like we were in a bit of a vacuum but by 1988 there was actually something else bubbling up that was a lot more interesting. There is some Shake Appeal footage in this new Oxford documentary film Anyone Can Play Guitar which also features Swervedriver as well as Radiohead, Supergrass and Ride: http://www.indiegogo.com/anyone-can-play-guitar

Q. Who are your influences/heroes?
Myself and Jimmy Hartridge were both really into the Glam Rock guitar bands of the early 70s like T.Rex and Slade. When the band formed we were big fans of Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr, Husker Du - the more interesting guitar music that had been bubbling up - as well as old favourites The Stooges, MC5 and Jimi Hendrix. There was also some great music emerging from the UK at that time - it was an exciting time for underground guitar music.

Q. Tell us about the gigs, what´s the feeling to playing live?
We love playing live - this is where the songs literally come to life afterall. They sort of move around when played live - the recordings can be like photographs, they're just a record of how the band played the song that day but when played live, the songs are constantly evolving. There are parts or sounds that we don't ever play the same twice but generally we're pretty true to the recordings of course.

Q. In your opinion, what´s the best Swervedriver album, and the most emblematic song?
I don't know, they all have great moments but I don't ever listen to them - sometimes the odd song. For that reason the compilation album Juggernaut Rides 89-98 has the most high points in my opinion, for obvious reasons. Most emblematic song? Duel maybe? Son of Mustang Ford is killer isn't it? Although we were never crazy about that recording. Some of my favourite songs are probably the b-sides and obscurities like Maelstrom, 93 Million Miles From The Sun, Why Say Yeah, Scrawl & Scream - the songs that never that make the set! What else? These Times, The Other Jesus, The Birds, MM Abduction. I like most of them.

Q. How do you describe Swerve´s sounds?
It's all about power and melody I suppose. The songs might reach points of almost white noise in some parts but it's always layered over a strong tune.

Q. What´s your opinion about early shoegazing era? Do you feel Swerve´s are part of it?
Not really 'shoegazing', no but the whole era, of course. At the time there wasn't such a thing as a shoegazing era of course, because nobody had come up with a name for anything at that point - there was just a bunch of bands and everyone was doing their own thing whether it was Teenage Fanclub or Slowdive. There were a lot of great guitar bands coming out of the UK and the US - the more well known stuff like Sonic Youth or Spacemen 3 and then a lot of bands that made one record and then broke up and are now somewhat lost in the mists of time such as The Lavender Faction or The Loveblobs. I just think that in the late 80s/early 90s there were a lot of bands wanting to turn up the guitars and create something noisy and melodic.

Q. After break up, tell us about your projects: Toshack Highway and your solo albums?
In 1999 I recorded the Toshack Highway album which was me plugging keyboards into amps instead of guitars. I bought a Yamaha electric piano and an Italian Crumar synthesiser and started plugging them into my Vox AC30 and Marshall guitar amps and putting them through effects pedals just to see what would happen. The resulting album was half-instrumental and had a kind of 'soundtrack' vibe although Charlie Francis who recorded it with me immediately heard a late 70s Eno vibe which I hadn't picked up on. I'm really proud of that record! You should check out Harlem and Board The Bullet Train - someone said they thought the Lost In Translation soundtrack would have been even better if those songs had been on there.

I then moved to New York and there were some more releases under the name Toshack Highway which probably should have been released as 'Adam Franklin' records as they were more solo and lo-fi and sort of folky guitar affairs. Eventually people suggested I should release records under my own name and so in 2007 we finally released the first Adam Franklin album 'Bolts of Melody' but although my name was on the front it was very much a band record. This was followed in 2009 and 2010 by two more 'solo' albums Spent Bullets and I Could Sleep For A Thousand Years - the latest one is credited to Adam Franklin & Bolts of Melody because Bolts of Melody has become the name for the band. I have some great guys in New York and London that I play with on this stuff. Check out Ramonesland, Two Dollar Dress and I Want You Right Now.

Q. Whats the concept behind Magnetic Morning?
Magnetic Morning is a collaboration between myself and Sam Fogarino, the drummer in Interpol. We met in New York and just decided to record some music together, with no concept as such but simply to see where it would end up. Sam had some strong ideas that he'd written on keyboards or guitar, some of which was quite abstract and I helped turn them into songs. An overall sound emerged and I then wrote some songs specifically for that also. We released an EP in 2007 and an album 'AM' in 2008 and we were really pleased with how it turned out - the live band was great too. I'd recommend Cold War Kids, Don't Go To Dreamstate and Indian Summer.

Q. About Swerve´s return, what´s the feeling to play with the guys again?
Well it's been great! Swervedriver is still as fast and loud and heavy as it ever was and the band has been very warmly received after being away for a long time which is truly amazing.

Q. About the future, what´s your plans? New solo records, maybe a Swerve´s new album, play in Brazil one day....
Been working on the next Adam Franklin & Bolts of Melody album and it's gonna be pretty interesting I think as some of it actually started out with the intention of being a new Toshack Highway album, so there's more of that film soundtrack kind of sound mixed with rock'n'roll, I think. A new Swervedriver album? Maybe. But as far as Brazil is concerned - we'd love to! Where do we sign?

Q. Any parting words...
Thank you Renato - you have a great night!
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Thanks Adam!!!!

Swervedriver - Son of a Mustang For / Sandblasted

Ghost Riders with Moon Duo

2011-05-11T06:01:00.000-07:00

Mazes é o nome do já clássico album lançado este ano pelo espetacular Moon Duo, Ripley Johnson do grande Wooden Shjips e Sanae Yamada formam esse cataclisma de psicodelia, experimentalismo e drone fincando suas matrizes em Suicide, Spacemen 3, Silver Apples e tudo que tem a ver com alucinações sensoriais em formato de canções, pegue a faixa de abertura Seer um transe a´la Spacemen 3 arrastado, climaticamente flutuando entre as parades de wall of sound a sequencia com a faixa titulo Mazes é um dos pontos altos do album, um bubblegum psicodelico, mas essa goma de mascar é puro vicio a linha de teclados e o vocal dão o apelo pop que o Moon Duo condensa sabiamente com sua excentricidade psicodelica, um deleite, mas é em When You Cut que o album atinge o status de masterpiece, Suicide fundido com 13th Floor Elevators e as palminhas evocam as girl groups, a guitarra incansavelmente grudenta é algo fora do padrão, When You Cut é isso e muito mais, Run Around é, como posso explicar, ah deixa para lá, é por essas e outras e cravo este Mazes como um dos grandes albuns do ano.

Moon Duo - Mazes

Sonic, Flower and Groove with Thunder Bunny

2011-05-10T10:42:00.000-07:00

Christopher Padula é a mente que cria a desorientação plena e completa deste esquizofrenico Thunder Bunny, dissonancias, reverberações, psicodelismo, lo-fi, noise, muito Spacemen 3 e Spiritualized, jogue no caldeirão as excentricidades de Flaming Lips e Mercury Rev e esta feita a esbornia sonora do Thunder Bunny, tudo em clima altamente lo-fi, Christopher literalmente compõe uma massa sonora arrastada e propositalmente deleixada, o e que excita mais ainda a audição deste The Other Children of This Quickly Passing Winter só disponivel em versão digital. O Thunder Bunny, tem uma discografia dificilima cheia de 7" em varios labels, musicas aqui e ali, que se acontecer com você o que aconteceu com o TBTCI, ou seja eu mesmo, fodeu, você vai vascular a internet de cabo a rabo até saciar sua sede por Thunder Bunny, e digo novamente isso aqui vicia sem dó nem piedade.

Thunder Bunny - The Other Children of This Quickly Passing Winter

Playing with Fire with Tone Rodent - An Interview

2011-04-29T10:42:00.000-07:00

Tone Rodent, soa estranho a você? Certamente porque você não esta devidamente interado com o que de melhor acontece no mundo do noise, psych, space, drone e shoegazer no que há de melhor no rastro de Spacemen 3 e derivações, o Tone Rodent deixa um lastro de extrema devoção por onde passa, sem contar o curriculo de shows do caras, vide, The Fall, The Warlocks, The Black Angels, Floorian e desce a lista, ou seja, da para sacar o potencial dos caras. Diretamente de St Louis para qualquer espaço disposto a suportar verdadeiras jam sessions, pesadissimas, com um parede sonora altamente barulhenta ciclica e viciante.

Como o TBTCI tem em Spacemen 3 um de seus tops, não é a toda a adoraração do TBTCI pelo grandioso Tone Rodent e é obvio que mais dia menos dia a tão desejada entrevista iria acontecer, então sem maiores bla bla blas, Tone Rodent.

***** Interview with Tone Rodent *****

Adam Watkins: Vocals, Guitar
Matty Coonfield: Bass, Backing Vocals
Mark Early: Keys, Synths, Oscillations
Jeff Robtoy: Guitar, Backing Vocals
Adam Dick: Drums
Ashley Hohman: Tambourine, Backing Vocals

Q. When did Tone Rodent form, tell us about the beginning…

A. The initial idea of Tone Rodent started in 1999 and really came to fruition in 2000 in Canterbury, England. I was in the midst of my Masters studies in painting at the Kent Institute of Art and Design and I began playing with sounds and layering them in the same way I was painting. It became infinitely more interesting to me than actually painting at the time. So… I began to teach myself guitar and con some other musicians to work with me and when I moved back to the US Tone Rodent was fully born. The plan was to always surround myself with better musicians than I and to play and write within my capabilities. We’ve had several lineup changes over the past 11 years, members have gone on to other projects, but each time new energy and focus comes. We’re a much stronger, cohesive unit these days. It’s really exciting to write music within our band, because I’m never quite sure how or what will come next.

Q. What are the band’s influences?

A. Each member has such varied, obscure and diverse influences it’s really hard to answer in short form. Rock and Psychedelia play a big part, but we all influence each other in our playing and creative process.

Q. Tell us about the recording process?

A. The first record was recorded with Jason Hutto in St. Louis. It was put down as much live to tape as possible with as few overdubs as we could manage. We wanted to try and capture some of the live band in the room vibe. The new Ep featuring Martin Atkins on drums from PiL, Killing Joke, Pigface etc. was recording quite differently. We recorded all of our parts track by track to a click track in St. Louis with Patrick Hunt, then we sent all of the master tracks to Martin in Chicago and he went into his own studio and laid down the drums. He sent the tracks back to us and Patrick took those with him to Pennsylvania and started mixing, producing and putting it all together. He did an amazing job! The songs sound fantastic. And it’s been more than a thrill to work with Martin. Then we sent our raw tracks and Martin’s tracks to Sterling Roswell aka Rosco from Spacemen 3 and The Darkside in London and he started adding beats and oscillations and remixing and flipping stuff around which led to another Ep of songs that began the same, but are completely different. Two companion pieces if you will. I’ve known Rosco for a few years now and we’ve collaborated on some other projects, but this is the first time we did a Tone Rodent project and it won’t be the last.

Q. Describe Tone Rodent sounds....

A. That’s always a difficult question to answer, as our perception is probably quite contradictory to what actually comes out of the amps! We’ve always tried to write songs that are not only fun to play but that we would enjoy listening to. All of the members in the band come from such a wide variety of influences and styles that when we’re all together in a room it’s really refreshing when the sounds and space are created. So back to the question… It’s rock, loud, dirgey, dark, heavy, psyche, shoegaze … I think.

Q. Made a list of your top five albums from all time.

A. From the band, in no particular order:

Primal Scream: Xtrmntr
Hawkwind: Space Ritual
The Sound: Jeopardy
Snowy Red: The Right To Die
The Birthday Party: The Bad Seed E.P.
Chrome: Red Exposure
The Middle Class: Out Of Vogue E.P.
Joy Division: Unknown Pleasures
Spacemen 3: Perfect Prescription
Brian Eno: Here Come The Warm Jets
The Cure: Pornography
The Jesus and Mary Chain: Darklands

Q. Tell us about playing live.... What’s the feeling.....?

A. We love playing live. The new lineup has come together really well. The old songs are tighter than ever and the new ones sound great live. The crowds have been really responsive. We just played a show with The Black Angels and we took to the stage with tornado sirens going off and a tornado hitting the airport and people loved it.

Q. What do you think about the classic shoegaze era?

A. I love that stuff! I still do. I grew up in a small town outside of Chicago and would go to this record store called Record Revolution and this old Vietnam Vet used to sell me records and for some reason he started selling me shoegaze, Spacemen 3, The Telescopes, Ride, My Bloody Valentine and some Jesus and Mary Chain. It blew me away. I dig the softer side like Slowdive and the poppier/tripper side like Lush and Chapterhouse as well, but I really like the darker side. The Perfect Needle by The Telescopes is one of my favorite songs of all time. It’s really exciting to see a resurgence of bands playing these days with a nod to those bands. The catch is to not wear those influences to prominently on your sleeve.

Q. Which new bands you recommended?

A. There are a lot in our local area that are really dynamic and amazing like:

Bug Chaser
Doom Town
Egg Chef
Glass Teeth
Medical Tourists
and Brain Idea

But we also love,

The Black Angels
Pete International Airport
Fucked Up
No Age
Pissed Jeans
Floorian
The Vandelles
and A Place To Bury Strangers

Q. Which songs by other bands would you like to do cover versions of?

A. Well, we’ve done a version of These Blues by Spacemen 3 that’s on a charity comp called Rock Back for Japan that everyone should check out, there’s like 6 volumes over 80 bands from all over the world and all of the money raised goes to help earthquake/tsunami relief in Japan.

We’ve talked about doing Motorcycle by Love and Rockets, When The Whip Comes Down by The Rolling Stones, Teenage Lust by The Jesus and Mary Chain, Crimson and Clover by Tommy James and The Shondells and ages ago we did I Need You by The Kinks and from time to time we’ve done Revolution by Spacemen 3.

Q. What are the plans for the future?

A. Right now we’re setting up some dates in the summer and getting ready to go into the studio to begin recording a batch of new songs for the next record.

Q. Any important news to tell us…

A. The next record is going to be a split with Rosco and us. One side our new material and the other side Rosco’s. We’re also trying to get him over to the US to do some shows. Fingers crossed and of course anyone interested in helping out… get in touch!
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Thanks Adam and all Tone Rodent ...

http://www.tonerodent.com/

Lazer Guided Melodies with Slowness - An Interview

2011-04-27T06:38:00.000-07:00

Diretamente da ensolarada São Francisco, California, um EP complementamente intenso e fascinante com canções que de cara te jogam para o inicio da Scene, shoegazer classico com nuances de pos punk assim caminham Black & White, Duck & Cover, Slowboat e Little King as quatro magistrais musicas do debut Hopeless but Otherwise, ah sim já ia me esquecendo, esta maravilha atende pelo nome de Slowness. Geoffrey Scott, guitarras e vocais, Julie Lynn baixo e vocais e Scott Putnam bateria e vocais são os responsaveis pelas viagens envoltas de wall of sound etereo e denso, vocalização menino, menina quase soando como um instrumento a mais no contexto climatico do EP, um deleite indispensavel e artefato primordial para qualquer coleção de amantes de shoegazer, pos punk que se preze.

Aproveitando a ocasião, o TBTCI em contato com Geoffrey viabilizou uma entrevista que desde já torna-se clássica aqui em nossas paginas, delicie-se com Slowness.

***** Interview with Geoffrey Scott - Slowness *****

Q. When did Slowness form, tell us about the beginning…

A. Slowness formed with no name during the summer of 2008 in a house I was house-sitting in, just north of the Golden Gate Bridge. Julie was encouraging me to turn some guitar sketches into actual songs. And our friend Erik would come up to help me with the yard and the animals, and he brought his drums up and we started doing demos in this great big living room.

Q. What are the band’s influences?

A. There are so many. Aside from the obvious independent-alternative rock, we all love jazz and ambient and some classical and electronic experimental stuff too.

Q. Tell us about the recording process for the debut EP?

A. We shared our demos with our friend Conor and he suggested we record with Monte Vallier. We went in with about 11 songs. "Duck an Cover" we engineered on our own, in our rehearsal space, and did overdubs and vocals in our apartments. In the end, seven seemed to work, but after we mastered and pressed a bunch for a US tour, we came home feeling that only four really represented us well. So we re-mastered with Kramer and did a new pressing with new artwork and all. Now we're finally really happy with it.

Q. Make a list of your top five albums from all time.

1. R.E.M. "Reconstruction of the Fables"
2. The Cure "Disintegration"
3. Stereolab "Mars Audiac Quintet"
4. Spiritualized "Lazer Guided Melodies"
5. The Smiths "The Smiths"

Q. Tell us about playing live.

A. We love it. We don't play much in San Francisco because we don't see ourselves as a local band. We did the tour last year and it was great playing every night for three and a half weeks. You get so much better as a band, and it's the best 40 minutes of your day. We just played in March for the first time in nine months with our new drummer, Scott Putnam, and it felt great. Our best shows tend to be in small, dingy basement-like places full with about 60 people. We'll do a mini-tour in July between New York and Washington, DC.

Q. What do you think about the classic shoegaze era?

A. It's very strange because I started playing the guitar during the height of that era, but I was starting to write songs, you know, cheesy stuff with three chords and the truth. In other words, nothing shoegaze. But somehow something shoegazey started coming out when I started recording demos on a two-track cassette boom-box. But Slowness never sat down and went, "okay, let's be a shoegaze band." Scott and I are metalheads at the core, and Julie is a porch musician.

Q. Which new bands do you recommend?

A: I'm not really one to have a pulse on the latest thing. When I buy records, I'm mostly digging into the past and gathering what I missed, you know, like For Against or Spectrum, or even super early Rolling Stones. There is so much great stuff that snuck by me, probably because I was the oldest sibling and didn't have many older friends. Most modern music I hear, that has broken through to indie stardom, as in the latest Pitchfork craze, I'm not crazy about, but then there's so much good stuff out there. It's a bit overwhelming in the new age of digital distribution. Most of what we like are bands we've come to know in San Francisco or while touring, like Foreign Cinema, Dead Leaf Echo, and Moonbeams.

Q. Could you explain the songs from "Hopeless but Otherwise" and your inspirations to compose them?

A. "Black & White" I guess is both personal and political. I guess I just realized at the time that the last eight years of life in the US had been been pretty shitty. Ever since 9/11 things have been weird, and things still don't seem right. But then I suppose it was just a case of me growing up. As if dropping the bomb in 1945, or the Holocaust, or the Rape of Nanking were any lighter. "Duck & Cover" is about someone getting out of your life because of choice or circumstance, and you suddenly realize that the relationship was actually poisoning you at the time. "Slowboat" somehow morphed into something completely different than how it began, basically because of Julie's bass line. Thank heavens for it. I had all these verses, but then we stepped back and thought about repeating just the one phrase, plus a few asides in the second verse. It's about the need to change our entire way of life. To start over, rebuild and, god-forbid, actually take care of each other as a society. But before that we would need to see the footage of all the destruction we've caused up until now. Unfortunately, American public schools generally don't do a good enough job actually educating our youth about what's really gone on in our shared history. Take the details of the Civil Rights Movement and the 100 years of Reconstruction and Jim Crow laws that led up to it. Only a few people get educated on subjects like these growing up, so we have a public that is essentially ignorant, or in denial. "Little King" is about keeping your sense of humor amidst all this dark stuff.

Q. Which songs by other bands would you like to do cover versions of?

A. We've only ever performed two covers, but in my fantasy world we'd have these in our arsenal: "A Short Term Effect" by The Cure, "Silver Rider" by Low, "Kahoutek" by R.E.M., "The Hand that Rocks the Cradle" by the Smiths, "Leave Them All Behind" by Ride-- but we'll probably do none of them since we're just trying to write and arrange new songs, and practice what we have so far.

Q. What are the plans for the future?

A. We are in the studio now working on what was supposed to be a follow-up EP but we think it might be turning into a full-length LP. It's about half finished. We're doing the tour in July and we're all spending the summer months on the East Coast, mainly in New York. Then we'll come back in September and continue working on the record. It should be done by November or December, but who knows with these things. We're also planning to tour Europe and Japan in 2012.

Q. Any important news to tell us…

A. We have Sean Eden (Luna) playing on a couple tracks for the new LP. We're lucky we bumped into him at Maxwell's last summer at a Feelies show. Oh yeah, and I've written two songs with Julie's six year-old daughter. We only need to wait another 15years before she can go on tour with us and play keyboards. Until then, we'll probably use a few magic tricks when we play live.
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Thanks Geoffrey....

http://www.slownessmusic.com/

Transparent Radiation with Starfire Connective Sound

2011-04-25T05:21:00.000-07:00

Al Schenkel é a mente por detrás do barulhento Sussuros e Escarros, além de brother e comparsa dos bons agora o cara ataca com seu projeto Starfire Connective Sound, pancada alucinogena e desconcertante que afeta o fundo da alma, os neuronios também sente o impacto, o projeto de um homem só de Al, vem com um electrotrancenoisepsychspace daqueles de dispensar qualquer tipo de psicotropico durante sua audição, mas se você é como eu um cara vivido e pode se dar ao luxo de misturar drogas tão fortes, então meu chapa, vai fundo que o resultado é mais perturbador ainda.

Another Girl Another Planet with Duplodeck

2011-04-25T04:48:00.001-07:00

É pessoal, passando o periodo de provas, feriados, tensão no trabalho, estou em divida com uma penca de gente, e sem muito bla bla bla, vamos começar a salda-las uma a uma sem dó nem piedade, e para iniciar, nada mais bacana do que receber email do brother Edu da Pug Records sobre o mais novo petardo dos caras, Duplodeck, um mix bacanerrimo da sonoridade da Elephant com Sterolab trejeitos shoegazer com nuancas de bossa, soa estranho de cara, mas faz todo sentindo, pega Cool Breeze e Francis Bacon sem conta na cover de Another Girl Another Planet do Only Ones, tipo assim do caralho!!!

Para os amigos de fora do pais, vai o release em ingles:

The only unanimity among the members of duplodeck was their admiration for their compatriot singer-songwriter Jorge Ben. The press once called them the “Brazilian Stereolab” – rather narrow title for a band that also resonated Pixies, Comet Gain and Deerhoof, to name a few. Conceived in Juiz de Fora, Minas Gerais, duplodeck existed from 2001 to 2005 – time in which they wrote a huge amount of songs, but recorded only one never released EP. With new mixing, their self-titled debut now resurfaces with guitars louder than originally planned, whilst its four songs remain incredibly fresh. Pug Records has just made the EP available for free download, also compiling an extended version in cassette. The release has encouraged a reunion of the group – they’re preparing a full-length album for the end of the year.

The cassette B-side brings rarities that not even the band members were aware of. In addition to the EP songs, the bonuses encompass live performances, drunken rehearsals and jam sessions. Towards shoegaze noisemaking or bossa nova harmonies and beats, these tracks escape from the EP’s pop format. Such diversity also shows in the two covers: a Beulah-resembling reinvention of Temptations’ My Girl and an appropriation of the post-punk hit Another Girl, Another Planet, from The Only Ones. More than just drafts for the upcoming LP, this material, despite the inappropriate recording, represents a fair sample of the sextet’s great potential.

Duplo Deck - http://www.pugrecords.com/duplodeck/

Magnificent Oblivion by Fleeting Joys - An Interview

2011-04-13T10:21:00.000-07:00

Lembro da primeira vez que ouvi Fleeting Joys, um amigo disse o seguinte, "Renato, você que ama MBV, escute urgente Despondent Transponder do Fleeting Joys....você vai ficar impressionado"....dai lá fui eu atrás do album dos caras, e quando The Break Up começou ficou paralisado, chocado, pensei comigo caralho, isso é puro My Bloody Valentine, meu deus, como conseguiram chegar nessa sonoridade, quem são esses caras......e foi indo até chegar em Magnificent Oblivion e os loops, os vocais, as guitarras o andamento da bateria, eu estava entregue naquele momento e fui completamente abduzido por este album, virou discoteca basica e motivo de devoção, passado um tempo veio o segundo Occult Radiance e mais idolatria e mais tesouros vieram, nao a toa o TBTCI idolatra o Fleeting Joys e enfim chegou a hora de sabermos a historia completa de Rorika, John e Cia, diretamente das mentes destes mestres do shoegazer atual, simplesmente essencial para qualquer amante do genero.

*****Interview with Fleeting Joys *****

Q: When did Fleeting Joys starts, tell us about the history...

A. We met through a mutual friend. Rorika was working at a studio and she would practice her engineering skills on whatever project John had going. We spent a year trying to sonically maneuver into each other's pants! When John first met Rorika, he was impressed because she was “the only girl he knew that had Isn’t Anything and Glider as well as Loveless."

Q: Who are your influences?

A. Besides the albums listed, Johnny Marr, also.

Q. Made a list of 5 albuns of all time…

A. MBV / Loveless

Velvet Underground & Nico

Sonic Youth / Dirty

Cocteau Twins / Pink Opaque - John

The Beatles / Revolver - John

The Cure / Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me - Rorika

Q: Tell us about the Fleeting Joys´ gigs... how do you fell playing alive?

A. It's selfish self-indulgence! Being wrapped in waves of gorgeous chords is such an experience that's hard to describe. It's also impossible to hear yourself sing over it all!

Q. How do you describe FJ´s sounds?

A. We write a lot of songs that are beautiful just on an acoustic guitar, then begin twisting them around, trying different things, flying in parts of other songs until we find it more interesting. It has to convey an emotion first. Then, we begin creating layers of sounds that we'd like to be immersed in onstage.

Q: In your opinion what´s the best FT´s album?

A. Probably the one you haven't heard yet!

Q: Tell us about the process of recording the albuns?

A. We have always had a music room at home where most everything gets recorded. We will go over to Matt's for the drums and do overdubs at home. Our neighbors all hate us! Not really...they find it interesting.

Q. What´s represents the shoegazer classic era to FJ?

A. If you look very closely, you can see a wide-eyed John in the audience of MBV's Austin show at Liberty Lunch (Japanese bootleg video)!

Q. And about the new shoegazer scene all over the world,..which new bands you recommended?

A. So many good things going on..afraid we'll leave someone out!

Q: Which bands you love to made a cover version?

A. We were asked to do a cover of a "guilty pleasure" recently and that was more fun than you'd think. So many possibilities!! It was a toss up between Evanessence's Bring Me To Life and HIM's Bury Me Deep Inside Your Heart...in the end, we blew it all off.

Q: What´s the plans for future....

A. This week, we are finishing a really beautiful song for a compilation that Thomason and Vinyl Junkie are putting out in Japan to donate to the earthquake victims.

Possibly adding another person for live shows. John has been teaching Rorika some of the second guitar parts and she really enjoys that, so we'll see...she just bought a vintage Jaguar. We've just released Despondent Transponder on vinyl with FTHPR in Norway, so hoping to plan a tour over there sometime this year.

Going to South America is something that we've always wanted to do because there was such huge support coming from there as soon as DT was released. The same was true with Japan. So, when we toured there. It was like visiting old friends because they'd all been with us for years!

Working on an EP of new songs. Thinking about releasing them digitally instead of making CDs. Not sure how everyone feels about that? Rorika likes to be able to download new songs often rather than waiting for an album to be released., But, John feels that an album or ep makes a story/impression when it's presented grouped together...even the order of the songs matters...as well as the artwork.

Q: Any parting words?

A. We feel so lucky to have fans everywhere that really support music and us. All we want to do is keep giving them more to love!

**** Thanks FJ!!!!

http://www.myspace.com/fleetingjoys

Movement with Custom Made Music - An Interview with Dave A.

2011-04-11T11:15:00.000-07:00

Com imenso prazer apresento aos leitores do TBTCI uma das novissimas e grandes gravadoras da atualidade, trata-se da bacanerrima Custom Made Music, responsavel por nada mais nada menos do que colocar no mercado gente do cacife de Ceremony, SVI, Dead Leaf Echo, Sky Drops, e inumeras outras preciosidades. Capitaneada por Dave A. e sua esposa Chrischa a CMM segue a trilha de grandiosas gravadoras independentes como Factory, Creation, Beggars Banquet, SST, Sub Pop, 4AD e inumeras outras que fizeram da musica alternativa um novo conceito, quabrando tabus do mainstream e indo contra tudo e todos no mais perfeito estilo do it yourself, por essas e outras o TBTCI cai de cabeça e decupa juntamente com Davi A. a fantastica Custom Made Music, prediletissima por aqui.

***** Interview with Dave A. from Custom Made Music *****

Q. When did Custom Made Music start?

Well I officially started Custom Made Music in Fall of 2007. However I started distributing recordings and working with bands around 1988. In High School I had a band that played Cure and Ramones covers and we wrote our own songs too. We recorded a homemade demo and started selling them and trading them at school and it just evolved from there. I'd make copies of our demo and put other local bands songs on the B side of the tape so that people could hear our friends bands too. Eventually I had friends in all the area high schools and colleges passing these tapes around. I started booking shows too. After meeting a few touring bands I started making comp tapes that had bands from other areas on it. Soon I started helping bands distribute their 7"'s and LP's at shows and around 94 I was able to help put some money towards pressing some records for a few bands. I kept up a steady catalog of stuff that I distributed all the way till around 2004. At that time the music industry really changed a lot as far as how labels and distributing music worked. In 2005 I switched gears and focused on running a few music venues here in Virginia. However in 2007 I realized how much I missed putting out records so I started up Custom Made Music and it's been building ever since. So in a manner of speaking Ive been doing this for a little over 20 years.

Q. Do you consider that Custom Made Music is a shoegazer oriented label? What´s the context behind it.....

Well Custom Made Music certainly work with many bands who have a sound that's rooted and influenced by the original shoegaze sound. We also work with bands like The Static Minds who are a straight up rock n roll band along the lines of The Stooges and The MC5 and we have done other punk & garage rock type releases in the past. I release music from bands that really inspire me and it happens to be that I like a lot of music being made by bands who are heavily influenced by the sounds of My Bloody Valentine, Ride, The Jesus And Mary Chain and others of that era. I however don't limit the music I release on the label to any specific genre or sound.

Q. Who are your influences/heroes?

From a label perspective I'm influenced greatly by Tony Wilson and Factory Records. The attitude and mind set behind that label is pretty much a blue print for any aspiring small label. Other labels that have had a major influence on me would be Too Many Records/Very Small, Creation Records and SST. As far as hero's go I'd have to say my dad George Allison. As a kid I woke up every Saturday morning to music he was playing on the living room turntable and that's what really got me into listening to music all the time.

Q. What´s your opinion about the classic shoegazer era?

I was a huge fan of all of the original shoegaze bands. In high school a friend of mine would tape 120 minutes every Sunday night and Monday after school we'd hang out at his house and watch it. I'll never forget seeing the video for Ride's "Like A Daydream" for the first time. I was definitely hooked at that point and we would anxiously await the next release from each band. That original scene has just been so influential on so much other great music to come out over the years it's unbelievable.

Q. What´s your opinion about the new shoegazer era?

I enjoy listening to many of the new bands out there that have fallen under the shoegaze moniker. Personally I enjoy the bands that put their own spin or add in other influences to their sound besides just borrowing from the bands that where a part of that original time period.

Q. Make a list of your top five records from all time?

Man that's a tough one. How about a list of 10 records that I hold in very high regard.

T Rex "Electric Warrior"

The Stooges "Raw Power"

New York Dolls S/T

David Bowie "Hunky Dory"

The Velvet Underground & Nico

Black Flag "The First Four Years"

My Bloody Valentine "Loveless"

The Jesus And Mary Chain "Psycho Candy"

Brian Eno "Music For Airports"

Roxy Music S/T

Q. Tell us about forthcoming stuff from Custom Made Music...

Well we just released two new E.P.'s one from Ceremony called "Not Tonight" and one from The Sky Drops called "Making Mountains". which are available now. We also just got in some limited edition copies of the Screen Vinyl Image/Rude 66 split 7" which is a release we've been really looking forward to. Then there's a new Screen Vinyl Image 12" single for their song "Too Much Speed" coming out in a couple of weeks. Other new releases include a split 7" from my band Last Remaining Pinnacle & Pan Galactic Straw Boss as well as a new Dead Leaf Echo E.P. called "Verisimilitude" that is a collection of remixes and collaborations. Later in 2012 there will be a new Screen Vinyl Image full length album and a new Dead Leaf Echo single as well as a few other releases.

Q. What´s your favourite Custom Made Music release?

Well they are all favorites and I have different reasons for each one being a favorite. When you put so much time and energy and love into each release, well that release becomes a part of you and that's what happens each time I put out a record. Putting out records is something I'm very passionate about and I honestly can't think of anything else I'd rather do.

And now about Last Remaining Pinnacle:

Q. About your personal band, Last Remaining Pinnacle, when the band starts?

Last Remaining Pinnacle started in 1995 as a solo project.I focused mainly on harsh noise and ambient soundtrack type recordings. Making these recordings was a great outlet for me for a good number of years. I loved seeing how intense I could make each recording. From 1995-2001 I recorded many cassette releases and was featured on a bunch of different compilations from various labels that were released on vinyl, CD and cassette formats alongside bands that ranged from Merzbow and The Locust to Less Than Jake and J Church. Over the years I started doing demos for more "Song Like" material while continuing to do an ambient/soundtrack type cassette release from time to time. In 2009 I got the chance to do a live show and I that's when my wife Chrischa joined me as the other member of Last Remaining Pinnacle. The sounds has shifted to a more dark psych rock/drone guitar based sound since she joined and our most recent song "Students Of The V.U." that's on the upcoming split 7" with Pan Galactic Straw Boss is a reflection of that.

Q. Who are the influences from the band?

Oh there are so many. Chrischa and I just love so much stuff and it all plays in to the music we make. A few that stand out would be Dinosaur Jr, The Velvet Underground, Pink Floyd, MBV, NON, Joan Jett, Van Halen, Replacements, JAMC, The Ramones, The Cure, Def Leppard, Brian Eno, T Rex, The Woven Hand, New Order, The Stooges, The Ventures Arcade Fire, The Shins and so many more.

Q. Tell us about the process of recording the split 7´´?

Our song for the split 7" was recorded by Steven Jordan who is also the guitar player in Pan Galactic Straw Boss. We recorded it all in our house. I had written the basic idea and done a demo of the song a few months earlier an played it for Chrischa. Once we started practicing it for a live show we decided to incorporate more experimental sounds into the basic riff. When we went to record the track with Steven everything just flowed together well and we are really happy with how it turned out.

Q. Describe Last Remaining Pinnacle sounds?

I'd say dark psychedelic atmospheric sounds led by fuzzed out guitar's and almost tribal like drumming. There's also a great amount of experimental sounds going along with the guitars and drums including droning synths and samples that we use to add to the dynamics of the songs. I think we both look at the band as a way to channel out a lot of aggression. It's also a really great thing to be able to do together and I know I wouldn't want to play with anyone else.

Q. When the album comes?

The split 7" with Pan Galactic Straw Boss has an official release date of Tuesday April 26th. There will be a couple of limited versions that will only be available through the Custom Made Music site and at our shows that will come out before the official release date.

Q. What´s the plans for future?

We plan on playing as many shows as possible this Spring and Summer. We are also going to be releasing a split 7" with Cult Of Dom Keller around July of this year. Cult Of Dom Keller are an amazing Psych Rock band from the U.K. We're also planning a couple of other 7" releases and then an E.P. that will feature all the 7" tracks by the end of 2011.

Q. Any Final Words?

Thank you Renato for all your support of Custom Made Music and Last Remaining Pinnacle. We appreciate it very much and thanks to all the bands that work with Custom Made Music and to those that enjoy the records we release.

* * *

Thanks Dave, It´s a pleasure to me....best Renato

http://www.custommademusicva.com/

Special One with Sunshower Orphans

2011-03-29T11:00:00.000-07:00

Diretamente de NY e mais precisamente via diretamente da rede, outro contato imediatao chegou via email diretamente de Mike, desta vez informando que o recem lançado Avenue Abyss é o debut do Sunshower Orphans, composto pelo proprio Mike G. somando-se a Rob A., Travis F. e Brian A.. e de cara temos um do it yourself que os caras disponilizaram na integra e gratuitamente em seu site, para deleite dos amantes de dreampop moderno cito, Radio Dept. Depreciation Guild o Sunshower Orphans é dessas preciosidades que viciam a cada audição do album, perolas em forma de musca como Sunspots, Kaleidoscope Plan, Manic Flaneur e tantas outras misturadas dentre as 14 maravilhas sonhadoras contidas nesta obra lindissima do mais belo dreampop da atualidade que atende pelo singelo nome de Avenue Abyss, não esqueça Sunshower Orphans, sua mais nova banda predileta.

http://sunshowerorphans.bandcamp.com/

Love Kills Slowly by Teenage Sin Taste

2011-03-29T05:38:00.000-07:00

Contatos imediatos via rede acontecem quase que diariamente graças ao TBTCI e as bandas que por aqui passam outras obscuridades belissimas e que dificilmente eu teria acesso rapidamente acabam chegando em altissima velocidade, é o caso do Teenage Sin Taste, projeto frances de um homem só, no caso Wil Garcia que também é guitarrista do cultuado Curl banda que conta na formação com ex membros do cultuadissimo Cranes, o TST ja desponta com uma extensa discografia e um curriculo impressionante. Aqui é a vez do novissimo EP Love Kills Slowly, electro dark shoegazer em alta rotação, a semelhança com os prediletos SVI é automatica, todavia fica claro, Jake & Kim de certa forma aparecem no TST vide remixes e outras coisas, voltando ao EP a abertura caotica com Adrenalin deixa claro beats, loops, um electro dark shoegazer de quebrar a espinha, a sequencia com Some Girls are Darker than Others remete pelo titulo diretamente a Morrissey & Marr em Some Girls are Bigger than Others mas aqui a coincidencia para por aqui, o clima fica mais tenso ainda, algo como se o Sisters of Mercy mixassem o SVI ou se o NIN gravasse com o Alcian Blue, dai chega a vez de Love Kills Slowly e o clima dark vem de uma vez só um esporro sonoro de electro noise shoegazer post punk assustadoramente perfeito e brutal, não acaba por ai ainda temos a demencia de Japanese Pleasures e o remix do proprio SVI para Love Kills Slowly além de outro remix de Stolearm para 12 Stories. Love Kills Slowly credencia o TST para se seguir os passos do proprio SVI e de outro grande esporro electro dark gazer o Bloody Knives. Recomendadissimo.

Teenage Sin Taste - Love Kills Slowly