Reviews – Page 10 – The Resident Sound

REVIEW: Barbed – Barbed / ‘Symbols’ (1994)

A tale as old as time. Two women talk about coleslaw. One voice confirms they need more mayonnaise, and with a “roger roger” all things suddenly burst into a pounding industrial assembly line groove called LFK. This is plunderphonics. More specifically, this is Barbed’s 1994 self-titled debut album, known to fans and the internet alike as ‘Symbols’.

Barbed was recorded meticulously between 1988 and 1993 by bandmates Alex Burrow and Alex McKechnie. Released in 1994 on the experimental music label These Records out of London, ‘Symbols’ gathered some favorable press before fading into obscurity.

User “alexbarbed” of the (terribly named) Muffwigglers forum website, writing as an unspecified member of the band, opened up about the creative process.

“If what we made sounded anything like something we’d heard before, we threw it out. That meant that (with the exception of King of Rock, which we sort of compromised on) there were actually no ‘samples’ on that record. There were tiny fragments of sound that we used as instruments, but no chunks of other people’s work. And there were no concessions to any genre or audience. Looking back though, I guess we wanted to be like an electronic instrumental version of Captain Beefheart.”

While it may now sit comfortably within the often humorous plunderphonics genre, Barbed achieved something many peers didn’t. While the basis of nearly all other forms of music, beat oriented tracks like King of Rock, LFK, and How About Some Butterflies subvert the sound collage propensity for purposefully difficult listening, while allowing for the listener to just have fun. Yet another groundbreaking development from the experimental music scene.

While former member Alex McKechnie’s solo work is available on Bandcamp, the collective effort of McKechnie and Burrow remain elusive. You can stream the full album here or buy the CD from sellers on Discogs.

The album in its entirety was uploaded to Youtube on March 26th, 2016 by user Howard Jacques.

For fans of: John Oswald, Meat Beat Manifesto, The Residents

Like Barbed? Give these a listen: Crash Course In Science, Men’s Recovery Project, Snakefinger

REVIEW: Geisha Girls – Disappearing Act (2006)

Geisha Girls puts their contemporaries to shame with accessible high intensity alternative rock tinged with death rock sensibilities. Pounding tom percussion, use of 16th note hi-hats, and angular power-chord-shy guitar work may feel familiar to any Rikk Agnew/Rozz Williams era Christian Death fans. But with dry production and Hot Hot Heat styled vocals, Disappearing Act is as distinctively 2000s alternative rock as it is anything else.

The bass bounces, nearly plodding along with angsty disregard. That is until Retaining Water. With walking bass lines and a stripped down section where the bassist shines, Geisha Girls skirt the repetitive nature that current death rock bands accept as the boundaries of the genre.

In other ways, Disappearing Act is what Arctic Monkeys fans thought they were into. Tonal similarities wouldn’t be lost on a listener of both bands, but Geisha Girls don’t let the listener off as easy. Songs like This is Novelty, Finding Peers, and Skinny Wrists use dizzying compositional structures with puncturing frenetic drumming.

If you enjoy alternative rock, and are looking to get into something a little bit harder, you need to hear this album.

For fans of: Phantom Planet, Art Brut, Christian Death

Like Geisha Girls? Give these a listen: Infinite Void, Dame, The Atom Age

REVIEW: KAPUTT – Demo 2017 (2017)

Demo 2017 is a uptempo danceable punk splurge of weirdo rock’n’roll archived in stripped-dry production. Its wirey and agile songwriting keeps things moving and interesting for the whole 14 minute ride. What more could you want from a demo?

KAPUTT’s guitar work is, in some way, in lineage of Devo’s Bob 1 and Jerry Casale, while drummer Rikki Will and saxophonist Chrissy Barnacle take a laid back but nevertheless meticulous playing style reminiscent of The Cardiac’s Dominic Luckman and Sarah Smith, respectively.

The band has since released the full-length album Carnage Hall (a demo of the title track appears here on Demo 2017) as well as 2 singles. You can go check out Carnage Hall now, or keep a look out on Resident Sound, as I’m sure I’ll be revisiting KAPUTT more in the coming weeks.

For fans of: The Cardiacs, James Chance & The Contortions, Devo

Like KAPUTT? Give these a listen: Crack Cloud, Clinic, Polyrock

REVIEW: Hazy Sour Cherry – Tour De Tokyo (2019)

If the members of either Frankie Cosmos (US) or Hazy Sour Cherry (Japan) ever see this, for the love of god, go on tour together. Your audiences may just see the best show of their lives.

Hazy Sour Cherry wastes no time getting into its melancholic, somewhat beach-y style of indie rock. Drums, guitar, bass and vocals hit the listener with immediate clarity on opening track I Need Your Heart, putting the band’s song-writing skills front and center. But don’t be confused by Tour De Tokyo’s clarity and delicate guitar work, this record is raw. Occasional chimes and vocal backing only enhance the already well written songs’ emotional communication atop its very warm instrumentals.

The emotions are forefront, and it’s perfectly-raw engineering opens the runway to any potential listener, even those whose listening habits may be a little intense.

Tour De Tokyo is, in a lot of ways, the perfect album. The use of light melancholy works as a cohesive bond between each songs’ varying intensities and slight stylistic changes. So what am I saying? Well, Hazy Sour Cherry manages to break free of the monotonous uniformity that befall most indie, punk, and rock acts, which is incredibly refreshing and hopeful.

I regularly listen to this record from start to finish, and I recommend you give it a try.

For fans of: Big Eyes, Haircut 100, Ginny Arnell

Like Hazy Sour Cherry? Give these a listen: Frankie Cosmos, The Temptators, Palm

REVIEW: Acetantina – Temple of Null (2020)

Acetantina, now working as Kaiso Slumber, is the name of a Libyan-German electronic producer working out of Khartoum, Sudan (according to their Bandcamp bio).

Temple of Null full-heartedly embraces the visual and sonic aesthetics of vaporwave while working at a much more frenetic tempo and energy than their vaporwave counterparts. At 35 minutes, this 11-track album is about as professional and polished sounding you’ll ever hear in vaporwave music. Well mixed, well mastered, while managing to keep volume dynamics present in each individual song. While I’m always tempted to put on opening track Puddle of Nitrogen on repeat, Temple of Null works incredibly well as one coherent piece. Tracks like Puddle of Nitrogen, Lonely Network, and Foot Cramp propel the listener forward, throwing the listener into a digital wind tunnel of rolling hi-hats, atmospheric pads and strange digital blips and glitches. The melancholy prevalent in most vaporwave releases is front and center, but Acetantina knows when and where to pull away (Foot Cramp) and when to double down (Lonely Network). If you were to own any vaporwave-adjacent album, make it Temple of Null by Acetantina.

For fans of: Chris†††, Leftfield, Macintosh Plus

Like Acetantina? Give these a listen: Lord Lorenz, MegaZoneEx, Nocera

REVIEW: Veruschka – The Secret (2001)

Released in 2001 on Ant.Zen Records out of Lappersdorf, Germany, The Secret is a 5 song EP by Australian singer Veruschka and producer David Thrussell (Snog, Soma, Black Lung).

The Secret thrives in its cinematic-centricity, degrees of warmth are faintly revealed with vinyl fuzz layers and occasional hand percussion. Slow swelling orchestral synths loom heavily behind the otherwise minimal instrumentation, topped with Veruschka’s neoclassical darkwave vocal styling. Where The Secret falters is in the end with vocal-forward tracks Boredom Kills and The Fruits. This isn’t to say Veruschka’s singing is bad, simply that the vocals aren’t utilized in a way that ultimately enhances the cinematic element as much as they could, which leaves the set-up of opening tracks The Secret and The Department unfulfilled.

What could be accountable for this a lack of post-production focus on vocal tracks, or simply a disconnect from producer to performer. Sure, this thinking may reek of cliche label-control, but what I propose is that when the artist is the producer, the producer needs to play a stronger roll in direction if the artistic vision can’t be reached in the already highly-synthetic post-production process that we hear in trip-hop, sampledelia, and other musique concrète adjacent genres.

Alternatively, it can be hard to say what the business arrangement was for this album and how that effected it. Maybe producer David Thrussell played a secondary roll, maybe there were financial or time restraints with having the album produced. Unfortunately we haven’t seen a second release from this duo, which could very well right the course with a stronger follow-up.

While The Secret may lack the vocal prowess of Portishead’s Beth Gibbons, the cold, cinematic production and ethereal Dead Can Dance-esque vocals should win over most fans of Portishead’s Dummy or Tricky’s Maxinquaye.

For fans of: Portishead, Dead Can Dance, Dido

Like Veruschka? Give these a listen: Cold Choir, Theft Design Firm, Haircuts For Men

REVIEW: Self Deconstruction – Virtue (2014)

This post originally appeared on the 10th Dentist blog on Friday, February 5th, 2021.

Japan has been the new frontier for Western metal audiences looking for something fresh.

Self Deconstruction’s chaotic punk microclipses and occasional 3/4 timing may bring a hint of familiarity for Rudimentary Peni fans, but its ultimate grindcore sensibilities make this a strong contender for any metal fan’s music collection.

Virtue presents a fully formed idea without succumbing to overindulgence. Each motif is given an equal sliver of time to present itself and exit stage left. This not even 5-minute album of near pure-aggression presents itself like a frenzied attack from a monster coming out of the bushes, rather than the hellscaped demonic journey common among American and European bands.

A distinction should be made to separate the term ‘raw’ from the often synonymously used (but quite different) ‘shitty’ sound worshiped among metal heads, edge lords, and the uninformed alike. No, this album is raw, and it serves its frenzied nature well. Well mixed, well recorded, Virtue’s fanciest production trick is its use of occasionally panned vocals. This album brings back memories of seeing south-eastern weirdo power-violence and grindcore bands in North Carolina, or of hearing Minor Threat 7”s, early Pig Destroyer, or Bad Brain’s Black Dot album for the first time.

For fans of: Pig Destroyer, Rudimentary Peni, Sete Star Sept

Like Self Deconstruction? Give these a listen: Ents, Flagitious Idiosyncrasy in the Dilapidation,Cheap Art

Want more Self Deconstruction? Check out this interview at Lixiviat Records!

REVIEW: M.A.Z.E. – Tour Tape 2020 (2020)

This post originally appeared on the 10th Dentist blog on Monday, January 25th, 2021.

2020 was not the best year for tours, though it seems Japanese punk rockers M.A.Z.E. were able to make it under the wire, finishing the final American leg of their tour in early March. This 6 track EP is a muddied lo-fi romp of wobbly processed guitars that only features 1 d-beat (on ‘Typical Credit’). Raw and seemingly untouched in post, Tour Tape 2020 may appeal to certain garage-rock circles but never bows to Thee Oh Sees-level dry-as-dust monotony.

What leads to some internal conflict for this listener is the band’s ‘punk’ self-identity. They are far too interesting to be lumped in with current western ‘punk,’ a vapid term for commercialized, dummy-jock rock. Though in Japan it seems as if ‘punk’ is being explored and experienced, not worn and modeled. Which is the real ‘punk’? Is the true ‘punk’ the easily digestible, take-no-risks rock? Or the off-beat, entry-level-0 art form? Simply, it doesn’t matter. The grey swath of ‘punk rock’ sycophants and fetishists will continue to worship and make legend of a scene many people (including my parents) just lived.

Who should be rewarded are the simon-pure with vision built through craft. While the willing mousinauts may find new favorites in Japanese and other non-anglophonic punk scenes, Cro-Mags fans may have difficulty sitting through closing track ‘Pink Wall.’

For fans of: DEVO, Crack Cloud, The Fall

Like M.A.Z.E.? Give these a listen: XL-Fits, Men’s Recovery Project, Gossip,

REVIEW: Shorty Can’t Eat Books – Shorty Can’t Eat Books (2014)

This post originally appeared on the 10th Dentist blog on Friday, March 5th, 2021.

Back in pre-covid days, as I faintly recall, Shorty Can’t Eat Books was introduced to me through a local barista (and I believe former member of the band) one morning before work. There is not much to be found on Shorty Can’t Eat Books. An Asheville, NC band whose only release was this 2014 self-titled album recorded at Hi Z / Lo Z Studio (now defunct) located in the back of Static Age Records. A music video for instrumental ruckus-romp surf punk song Breakdown was made and posted on Youtube to little fanfare a week before the album’s release. A sense of camaraderie may or may not have been shared over the laborious process of stop-motion animating. Such interactions are seen through rose-colored glasses now.

Tracks like I Was That Guy and Baby Baby are perfect examples of a specific vein of punk music that thrives within southern DIY circuits. Too honest for for indie hipsters and too weird for punks nationwide (with exception to the Midwestern scene, godbless’em). Essentially, the musical equivalent to The Captain & Casey Show.

After three tracks of fake-jazz verses and patio lounging surf diddies, it could be best described as the meeting of The Minutemen and Southern Culture on The Skids. That is of course until the aggression and secret agent-pastiche of Breakdown and Dumb Town break up the albums seemingly established route. Breakdown may be the longest (2 mins, 20 secds) the album goes with out sleazy ska horns, clunky no wave piano smashing, or (quite honestly) goofy (but fitting) bongo percussion parts.

Shorty Can’t Eat Books may be the quintessential Asheville band. They released one self titled album that fell on deaf ears, remembered only by long-time locals and dedicated scene goers. Their influences range incredibly and pastiche may be one of the three main ingredients. But through this is a great sense of honesty. This album is almost unforgivably North Carolinian. Lazy days on the patio, weird folk influences, and a lack of direct aggression that shows itself instead through scorned (but never embittered) melancholy.

As Asheville city officials and the tourism industry continues to kill and run out its locals through neglect (“sacrifice zone”), lobbyist interference, and lack of accountability, it’s important that outsiders remember what actually makes Asheville special; the locals. The locals who have created a sense of community, who have created the art, albums, and cool spaces you inevitably run them out of.

This angst over the city was certainly felt by many around this time, and maybe now more than ever after the empty promises of reparations to Asheville’s black community and the lack of support for local businesses. All of this makes closing track Nuclear Doowop’s melancholic desperation feel more like an omen and less a feeling of its time.

For fans of: The Minutemen, Polvo, The Big Boys

Like Shorty Can’t Eat Books? Give these a listen: Nature Boys,Pleasures of The Ultraviolent,The Krektones

REVIEW: MegaZoneEx – SEAPUNK’D (2021)

This post originally appeared on the 10th Dentist blog on Sunday, January 24th, 2021.

Released through Australian “Post-internet” label Sunset Grid on January 24th of 2021, MegaZoneEx’s SEAPUNK’D serves as a hopeful refresher of the vaporwave genre. While weaving their way through vaporwave and sister genres, MegaZoneEx explores but never falls victim to the cliches of those genres. Track highlights include the more accessible Ladytron-esque ‘The Shuffle,’ and industrial-nod ‘On My Mind’ built of a surprisingly soothing mix of vaporwave and industrial sonic aesthetics. SEAPUNK’D should be worked into casual rotation for the more particular vaporwave and future funk connoisseurs who may find themselves overwhelmed with quantity and underwhelmed with quality.

Unfortunately, where SEAPUNK’D ultimately suffers is in its inability to distinguish itself as a fully realized album. From smaller details such as directionless track naming to a much more jarring max volume inconsistency, this effort at times can feel more like a mix-CD. Its 16 track, 29 minute runtime can feel very bloated, but hopefully going forward MegaZoneEx can enforce a stricter self-editorial approach.

As stated in the album closing manifesto ‘PSA,’ “…[vaporwave] is still young. Its pioneers come and go, leaving it astray with no rules or guidelines. Vaporwave keeps dying because no one is here to save it.” While vaporwave is far from saved, MegaZoneEx is keeping it alive with yet another breath.

For fans of: Ladytron, Macintosh Plus, Ventech97

Like MegaZoneEx? Give these a listen: Acetantina, vice*AIRバイス*空気自然の愛, False Tropics