Heroin - (1993) ST 12''

Heroin were one of the defining innovators in early '90s hardcore. The first 7" record by the band, released in 1991, also marked the first release for upstart label Gravity Records. Operating out of San Diego, CA, Gravity was soon to be one of the preeminent representatives of the '90s emo vanguard. Interesting, innovative, mysterious, and somewhat pretentious in presentation, Heroin made amazingly dynamic landscapes out of one minute blasts of noisy vitriol.
While Heroin's influence may be substantial, the back catalog left behind is not. Nearly two years after the initial 7" release, the sole full-length release and final album from the band was offered up in 1993. Matt Anderson went on to engineer and occasionally perform on several releases with artists such as A Minor Forest, Angel Hair, Kari Bunn, and Mohinder. Ron Avila kept hangin' tough with Antioch Arrow, Final Conflict, and Get Hustle.

Homer & Jethro - (1968) The Best Of Homer & Jethro LP

Known as "the thinking man's hillbillies," Homer Haynes and Jethro Burns got a lot of mileage out of an act that shouldn't have lasted or gone as far as it did, at least on the surface of things. Certainly there were other, far more established duos mining similar turf on the country music circuit, with Lonzo & Oscar leading the way. But Homer & Jethro were far more than just two hayseeds doing cornball send-ups of pop tunes. Underneath the cornpone facade were two top-flight musicians with a decidedly perverse sense of humor and a keen sense of satire.

John Fahey - (1967) Requia LP

In his liner notes to this release, John Fahey mentions his desire to have an entire world orchestra in his guitar, Western to Eastern, bagpipes to gamelan. Perhaps it's this mental approach that sets his music so deliciously far apart from other so-called folk guitarists. Requia is essentially in two sections. One is a series of blues-based pieces in line with music he had previously recorded. These include the lovely "Requiem for John Hurt" and a wry "Fight On Christians, Fight On," both of which sound remarkably modern more than three decades after they were recorded. The slightly off-center variations he works on these songs are more vital and gorgeous than any ten of his peers. The second major section here is a four-part suite, "Requiem for Molly," which interpolates tape collages with his guitar playing. These do, in fact, sound a bit dated, largely because his source material ("Deutschland Uber Alles," marching bands, screams, etc.) sounds heavy-handed and trite in retrospect. Still, he anticipates similar usage by Charlie Haden in his Liberation Music Orchestra from the following year, as well as pointing toward wider explorations in that field that Fahey himself would undertake in the future. Requia doesn't rank up with the absolute best of his releases, but contains enough fine and interesting work to recommend it to Fahey fans.

Magic Trick - (2011) Bad Blood 2x7''

Magic Trick is the '60s psychedelia and '70s folk-influenced band led by the Fresh & Onlys' frontman, Tim Cohen. The group began in San Francisco as Cohen's solo outlet between Fresh & Onlys tour dates, which yielded the albums The Two Sides of Tim Cohen, Laugh Tracks, and Tim Cohen's Magic Trick between 2009 and 2011. When it came time to play the songs live, Cohen tapped James Kim (Kelley Stoltz), Alicia Vanden Heuvel (Aislers Set), and Noelle Cahill, with Magic Trick eventually morphing into a full-time band. The first official Magic Trick release, The Glad Birth of Love, arrived on the Empty Cellar label in 2011, featuring four long-form compositions infused with Cohen's vivid lyrical imagery and sounds ranging from acoustic blues to dense ragas to lush harmonies, followed later that year by the Bad Blood EP for Captured Tracks. Magic Trick jumped to the Hardly Art label in 2012, offering sophomore album Ruler of the Night that June. In 2013 the project found itself on yet another label, with third album River of Souls arriving on Empty Cellar late in the year. 

 

Magic Trick - (2011) The Glad Birth Of Love LP

The Glad Birth of Love. This is Tim Cohen's fourth album following his 2009 debut, The Two Sides of Tim Cohen (Empty Cellar), and two full-lengths (Laugh Tracks / Tim Cohen's Magic Trick) and one EP (Bad Blood) on New York's Captured Tracks label.  Featuring guest appearances by JOHN DWYER (THEE OH SEES), GRACE COOPER (SANDWITCHES), DIEGO GONZALEZ (GONG, CITAY, JONAS REINHARDT, DRY SPELLS), JOE ROBERTS (BLACK FICTION), AMBER LAMPRECHT (RODRIGUEZ BAND), and STEVE PEACOCK, The Glad Birth of Love is the first Tim Cohen album to not directly bear his name, but the name of his band, MAGIC TRICK. Recorded in a tower at Tim Cohen's home this album marks a departure from his signature radio-ready song craft. The Glad Birth of Love is a 45 minute album composed of four epic long-form compositions saturated with Tim's uncanny pop sensibilities and vivid lyrical imagery. Transitioning seamlessly from sparse acoustic blues, to dense psychedelic bass & oud ragas, to lush layered vocal harmonies this album is a culmination of Tim's work to date.

Man Is The Bastard - (1995) Thoughtless LP

The mysterious noise rock combo known as Man Is the Bastard was a project put together by Eric Wood and Joel Connell after they had left hardcore outfit Pissed Happy Children. Dubbing the band "power violence," the sound was a brutal mix of complicated technical riffing and straight-up hardcore. Making things even more interesting were the member's interest in the burgeoning noise scene, something that affected their music greatly. The group lasted until 1997, when they mutually decided that if they continued they would no longer make quality music. The members still work together on projects, including Wood's Bastard Noise projects.

Man Is The Bastard - (2015) The Lost M.I.T.B. Sessions LP

BEATTIE (vocals), CONNELL (drums/cymbals) and WOOD ("FOUR STEEL GIRDERS"/ vocals) teamed up with sinister BASTARD NOISE lead vocalist ARTZ and the astounding voice of AMBER ASYLUM, KRIS FORCE to create this long, long awaited album of sound and cinematic vision. Carefully orchestrated basses layered to massive perfection, the most progressively brutal and tasteful drumming coupled with ornate four part vocal arrangements and drilling, esoteric TROGOTRONIC custom "skull electronics" make The Lost M.I.T.B. Sessions one for the record books.

Merryl & Flex1000 - (2014) Split CS

Merryl side (banger1) has these odd beginning sounds, and, I can’t tell whether I’m spooked or chill. I think a lot of people call this a Lynchian vibe, which basically means that it’s 1) creepy, 2) tense, and 3) a little funny, too. Fuzzed out vocal samples are mixed in, creating a bouncy Dilloway moment that’s immediately thrown out the fucking window when the whole thing BREAKS. Soon, the side flies off the handle into a slow-burning smack-down where the sonic violence gets super transcendental.

Flex’s side (banger2) delivers driving synth pulses set to his own distorted, apocalyptic vocal blasts. After some preliminary wylin’ out, the side digs deep into phases of serious head-nodding rhythms that are blown, scorched, torched – whatever – they’re badass and real (real-as-in…punch your friend at the show and then kiss your friend at the show). 

 

Roger Miller - (1969) Walkin' In The Sunshine LP

After a triumvirate of near-perfect albums came this harbinger of the decline of a particularly imaginative and original country artist. Upon listening to the first side, one wonders if this is the same Roger Miller whose string of zany hits had made listening to the hit parade so much fun. We get three of his most inconsequential and unformed songs ever recorded, and sandwiched between are covers of "Ruby, Don't Take Your Love to Town" and "Green Green Grass of Home" that should never have been hatched. Miller positively sleepwalks his way through these performances. Things definitely look up upon a flip of the side, though. We get three high quality Miller songs, and, although close inspection reveals these also to be a bit imitative of his past glories, they are still full of the detail and spiky twists this artist is known for. "Pardon My Coffin" is really a fantastic song, despite the "Sixteen Tons" lick in there. And how about this bit of poetry tossed in at the end of "I'd Come Back to Me": "If egg was foo, if I was you, you'd be too young for me." Miller's cover of "Hey Good Lookin'" by Hank Williams makes one wonder why he didn't approach more of his cover versions like this. He takes total liberty with the lyrics and structure of the song, turning it inside out very casually, as if what he was doing was the original version. Not all the material on the second side is that good, but the high points would certainly have become more well-known parts of the Miller canon if they had not been surrounded by such drek on their original release. The session backup sounds great when they stick to a small jazz-flavored country combo. The strings are the last thing Miller needs, weighing him down worse than if arranger Jerry Kennedy himself had climbed onto the artist's back and demanded a shoulder ride. A key part of Miller's sound all along, Kennedy should have known better.