I Feel Like a Porsche

Constant Mongrel, “Living In Excellence” from Living In Excellence (2018)

If you’ve somehow made it to December without hearing Constant Mongrel’s Living In Excellence, it’s time to remedy that situation. This is Constant Mongrel bigger and meaner than ever, 30 minutes of bad vibes smeared with caustic, snarling vocals. That’s always been the band’s modus operandi, but Living In Excellence features significant upticks in production, plus added sax and synth (provided by Al Montfort and Tom Hardisty, respectively) that take tracks like the opening 1-2 of “600 Pounds” and “Action” to ferocious new levels. The added instrumentation allows the band to rework “The Law” from the DCM 7″ into a real rave-up, and don’t get me started on the way “Birch” falls into a half-time stomper or the mantle-shattering guitar line of the title track. “Living In Excellence” is my favorite song of the year, the oouugh after the “L-I-E” chorus a boot to the chest. This is burly, bucket wheel excavator-sized punk with balance, provided by the relative calm of “Lifeless Crisis” and “Puffy,” the latter featuring such headscratchers as “Do you know what a puffy jacket is?” and “Do you know what a pillow feels like?” We all knew Constant Mongrel had this vicious of a record in ‘em, taking topics like world politics and bro culture equally to task with the efficiency of a surgeon, but Living In Excellence mows down everything in its path, rendering records in a similar genre flat and put-on. Constant Mongrel were already on my short list of bands I’d make extensive arrangements to go see live, and now Living In Excellence has me checking the airfare to Australia. Here’s hoping for a US tour in the near future so I can shout along to “Warm Hands.”

You already know this is one of the year’s best records, right? La Vida Es Un Mus put Living In Excellence out for the non-Australians, and they still have a handful of the limited-to-100 transparent green vinyl version available. Support the label directly, because you can’t put a price on having someone like Paco at LVEUM sift through all the shit to bring you the cream of the crop year in and year out.

The Doozer, “Winning” from Figurines (2018)

Gotta thank Jay Hinman/Dynamite Hemorrhage for hipping me to the Doozer, through both regular play on his show and the spotlight write-up on Feeding Tube Records. The UK duo has several previous LPs on labels like Golden Lab and Siltbreeze, a fact that means little other than the Doozer has managed to evade the general consciousness despite the helping hand from arbiters of good taste. Figurines is on Feeding Tube, so who knows, maybe a Byron Coley hype sheet and Jay Hinman’s dogged perseverance will finally buoy them to the top, deservedly so.

The Doozer’s brand of slow acoustic strum and spare accompaniment on Figurines will sound familiar to anyone who’s heard The Madcap Laughs, something that is especially apparent on the title track. But these deceptively simple songs are barbed with loaded and calmly intoned one liners: “It’s a constant life”  is the quiet observation that starts the record and knocks it off balance; “You’ve got a mask for every type of occasion” is another gut punch, here accented with a bright, out of tune keyboard accompaniment. It’d be as jarring as water cooler drivel if it weren’t for the intermittent instrumental gold across the record, like the brief guitar duel on “Ticket Price.” The dim affirmations of “The Way You Move” are bolstered by the shortest guitar solo that’ll break your heart in two, and the droning “Exit” piles on to drive the point home, the two tracks combining to give Alastair Galbraith’s “Cemetery Raga” a run for its money. Everything about this record feels very studied, from the parsed-down lyrics to the carefully timed musical flourishes, but it’s well-worn, broken in, never once crossing into something wooden or pedantic. Afternoons have been spent just flipping Figurines over; its brevity is an asset, sure, but this one’s got a dour charm that’s as soothing as it is hard to shake. It’s high time we all got familiar with the Doozer.

Figurines is available from Feeding Tube Records. I think you’re outta luck if you’d like to stream it somewhere, but there’s another video for “Red Eye Coming” off of the LP here.

Anything put out by Bruit Direct Disques is something you’re gonna want to lend an ear to, and Yulith Lilith, the most recent double LP by Japan’s Mamitri Yulith Empress Yonagunisan, might be the strongest bit of supporting evidence yet. The band’s moniker changes slightly from record to record, but the music’s consistently chameleonic and unbound. Clean guitars are strummed as fast as possible on one track, cloaked in ethereal reverb on the next, the loose-limbed drummer able to play the anchor or propellant as needed. The vocals, when present, are soft, buried under the hazy hues or skimming along the surface of the band’s stabs at punk (”Black Zodiac,” ”Uroboros”). As is the case for most records of this length, it can be trying in spots, notably on “Minus” where a guitar line sounds like a child’s taunting, but the nitpicking stops there for me; there is a freedom present on Yulith Lilith that wasn’t as evident on previous recordings. That means that it can sound like each member is playing a different song, but repeated spins dissolve that notion. Sometimes they sound like Sightings unburdened of the steel industrial clouds (“Gos Lei”), songs drawn so tightly that they don’t end as much as split apart; they also wander into some revelatory territory on wide-open tracks like “Yulith” and especially “Fade Blue,” affected washes of guitar presented in all the colors of a sunset. On the first few spins it’s these longer, lusher tracks that make the listen “worth it,” but luxuriating in this record’s unusual approach and understated confidence starts to reveal a method buried in the folds. Every member has an ear bent towards the other, and whether the result is controlled chaos or horizonless expanses, it is evident that there is an apparent purpose and exuberance driving the whole thing. I could go on until I’m blue about how much I’ve enjoyed this record the past 6 months or so, but everyone oughta trust Tom Lax more, who says Yulith Lilith is one of 2018′s best “by a mile. Not to be missed.”

I don’t think copies of Yulith Lilith made it stateside in any shops or distros, so you’ve gotta go to Bruit Direct for your fix. Looks like the whole back catalog is on sale there, so now’s a good time to fill any BD-sized gaps. @still-single has a positive take on this record, too, should you need any more convincing.

The Skull Defekts hung it up this year, ending a 13 year run as one of Sweden’s most challenging and frustrating exports. Joachim Nordwall wrote a brief history of the band in light of this being the final record, a history that is self-effacing, immodest and without saccharine nostalgia. I can verify that when he mentions that the US tour following the release of Peer Amid was the “absolute highlight” of the band, he is not fucking around. The band came through Madison, WI as a last-minute stop and absolutely leveled the place for all 20-some people lucky enough to catch wind of the show in time. Peer Amid doesn’t come close to capturing the intensity of that show; the band was an ecstatic percussive force. One of the members was wailing on some mic’d plastic gas cans, and Daniel Higgs was finally given the proper backing to make his shamanic performance equal parts terrifying and revelatory. It remains one of the best shows I’ve ever seen, the memory of which is still sending chills down my spine.

The band didn’t seem to capitalize on the momentum, however, or maybe they just couldn’t reach such highs twice. The months and years following that tour mostly saw the Skull Defekts floundering: Dances in Dreams of the Known Unknown was disappointing, a stale venture into grungy alterna-rock that lacked any personality. The band looked deflated on the tour following the album, and it seemed like they’d never create a record that captured the intensity that they were clearly capable of. The Temple and Peer Amid are fairly strong albums, but it wasn’t until the band decided to end that they were able to really dial it in. As Nordwall writes, “The Skull Defekts might be our strongest album musically. It is the album that might be the most composed one.”

He’s right: this is the best Skull Defekts record, combining all of their strengths - repetition, slashing guitars and drone, all driven by a percussive engine - into something that is as dense and perplexing as it is accessible. What seems to set this album apart is a sense of dynamics from the band. Songs are still beaten into the ground, but the guitars and other electronic signals let up, hold still or raise hell in response to the other elements. New to the band on this record is Mariam Wallentin, whose vocals take tracks like “Slow Storm” to the same heady unreality that Higgs’ vocals did, but the result is twice as effective. Whereas normally I’d take umbrage with Wallentin chanting “whipped cream” or whatever (”Powdered Faces”), allowances are made in the mental world created by The Skull Defekts. Part of the reason is that the production here is exceptional: the band created an album best experienced on headphones. You can feel the electronic interference across “A Message From the Skull Defekts,” and the drums in “Clean Mind” hit with an immediacy that dictates your heart rate. You could dance to it, and you should: funerals should be celebrations, something the Skull Defekts seem to have understood in creating this self-titled farewell. It’s an audio document worthy of the band’s fiery existence, and one of the year’s finest under-the-radar offerings.

The Skull Defekts is on Bandcamp, and you can buy physical copies there or directly from Thrill Jockey. Joachim Nordwall also runs the highly experimental iDEAL Recordings label, and he made a playlist of underground Scandinavian music for Self-Titled Magazine: it’s well worth your time.

Hermit and the Recluse, “Argo” from Orpheus vs. the Sirens (2018)

Hermit and the Recluse is Ka teaming up with Animoss as his producer, further pushing listeners away with increasingly ornate and drumless loops. Depending on where you stand, it’s either Ka’s most or least engaging album, eyes glued to the floor, determined to bend the will of the world to his own. The mournful, windswept guitar loop of “Orpheus” might test the unfamiliar, but the album picks up a steady, measured momentum from there. It peaks on “Oedipus,” a track that passes for joyous in Ka’s world, all rolling drums and voices and horns reaching for heaven. Animoss’ production on here is outstanding: his beats are warm and dusty, the rich keys on “The Punishment of Sisyphus” a soothing balm, the patient distant snare on “Argo” like walking in a deserted city at night. Ka, for his part, is kind of rehashing the same themes he’s been using on the past few albums: he’s done some dirty work, he hopes he’s having a positive influence now, but he’ll return to his past if pressed. It’s getting dangerously close to preachy old man rap, but his calm delivery and flow remain captivating to these ears at least. The ready acknowledgement of his flawed nature prevents this from becoming a chore, and the production makes sure it stays that way. While not reaching the heights of The Night’s Gambit or Days With Dr. Yen Lo, Orpheus vs. the Sirens is still a strong addition to Ka’s stellar discography. Come for the music, stay for the woe-to-triumph stories from a decidedly imperfect, decidedly human source.

Ka now puts out his projects on his own, a hustle you can’t knock. His website has all the goods. You can pay $100 for Orpheus vs. the Sirens if you want, an option that was the only vinyl version available for a while. Thankfully the regular black vinyl version is back in stock as of yesterday: go ahead and grip.

1800 is the debut album from Australia’s Big Supermarket, a group featuring one member of the Stevens and, as is that country’s wont, probably members from several other bands. Recorded over a span of three years, 1800 has the feel of a band recording largely for themselves, unsure if the songs will see the light of day or not. Most of the songs here are pop in the Aussie tradition at their core, but Big Supermarket don’t play it so straight. Vocals are often deadpan, guitar lines can be given plenty of space to work themselves out (”Old News,” “Laura C.”), and any momentum can be suddenly halted by the inclusion of several sub-minute instrumental passages. This is especially jarring when “SuperHwy” crash-lands into “Feel the Warm Breeze,” though on the whole the effect is not as dramatic. Think of 1800 as the much less bleary-eyed cousin to the Lavender Flu’s Heavy Air, but here noise is used as a glue between pieces rather than as a smothering force. I don’t think I’d be returning to 1800 as often as I have without the more experimental flourishes; the “proper” songs themselves are strong (one listen to “Peter” and it’ll be in your head for days) but throwing in something as fractured as “Armchair Television” amongst the pop nuggets serves to make this a much more endearing and engaging album. There’s a lot to lap up between the shimmering opener “Welcome” and the elevator pop of “Black Death,” and more sticks to the ribs with each subsequent listen. It’s an exceptional debut, one that I can’t stop playing recently, and one of my top picks for the year. 

Big Supermarket’s 1800 is available directly from the Hobbies Galore Bandcamp page. American Damage in the US has some Hobbies Galore titles; keep an eye out for a restock of 1800 there. It is also available from Lulu’s in Australia, who is having a 20% off sale on everything, though I’m not sure that it applies to online orders. There was also a recent interview done with Alex Macfarlane, head of the Hobbies Galore label, in Difficult Fun - read all about it.

The Nightcrawlers were a synthesizer trio banging out heavily zoned Komische explorations from the basements of Philly in the early ‘80s, producing an extraordinary number of limited tapes and a handful of LPs documenting these homemade explorations. Can’t say this is the style of music I go for often, but since Philadelphia was a critical locale in my own musical upbringing, my ears perked up. Glad I did - The Biophonic Boombox Recordings is a hugely enjoyable compilation of selections across their cassette releases, journeys that, according to the liner notes, attempt to capture the “edge of consciousness.” It’s a heady brew if you want to take a sip, but the recordings themselves are remarkably grounded and subdued, not least of all demonstrated by the coughing left in on “Geistesblitz.” The 2xLP is sequenced to build up to the (relative) momentum of face C, especially “Transsonic,” where the self-admitted reference point of Tangerine Dream comes to the fore. The Nightcrawlers really shine on the more languid pieces, reminding me of the work of Hans-Joachim Roedelius, soaking in the gentle drum machine patter and the rich washes of synthesizer. It’s been endlessly rewarding any way you cut it, and since we’re close to the end of 2018, I’ll call it: the psychic balm of The Biophonic Boombox Recordings is my top pick in yet another reissue-saturated year. The continued use of the Nightcrawlers as background music is increasingly cutting into the foreground here, especially as daily realities become more warped and harder to digest. The shivers down my spine say we ain’t done for yet.

The Biophonic Boombox Recordings is available directly from Anthology Recordings, and like most contemporary reissues, plenty of copies are around. Looks like Midheaven is still carrying so there’s a chance your local shop will be able to get it for ya. It comes in a gorgeous gatefold jacket and includes extensive, illuminating liner notes.