Published on
June 27, 2016
Category
Features
From Mala’s Andean adventure to a Melvins classic reissued, dive in to this week’s selection.
Although it’s been a terrible year for deaths, 2016 has spoilt us with 12″s and LPs. As June goes out and H1 draws to a close, it’s yet another great week with Mala packaging his Andean adventure into a full-length on Gilles Peterson’s label, the Melvins reissuing their classic Kurt Cobain-backed Houdini album, and Huerco S dropping a hazy ambient LP.
Meanwhile in the singles club, seminal punk act the Killjoys return on 7″ and Young Turk’s Whities label unveil an exceptional techno 12″ courtesy of Quirke.
Scroll down for our definitive across-the-board rundown of the week’s new vinyl releases as selected by The Vinyl Factory’s Chris Summers, Patrick Ryder and James Hammond with help from Norman Records. 5 singles and 5 LPs every 7 days that are unmissable additions to any collection.
Singles
The Brian Jonestown Massacre
Bout Des Doigts
(‘a’ Recordings)
A simple riff spinning around, Pixies-like guitar lines and dreamy female vocals. That’s all the ingredients that are needed for a classic slice of BJM repetition. The two tracks on this EP are the same thing sung in different languages by different singers but it lulls you so far in to it’s heat haze world you could stay with it all day.
Quirke
Whities 007
(Whities)
The best techno-ish music you’ll hear all week. Hands down. Following on from his Young Turks debut, Quirke now appears on sub-label Whities – headed up by Boiler Room’s Nic Tasker – with a 12″ worth the two year wait. If you haven’t already, spend some time with the growing Whities catalogue.
The Killjoys
Johnny Won’t Get To Heaven
(Damaged Goods)
Another week and another seminal punk classic gets the reissue treatment from those excellent folks at Damaged Goods. Before Kevin Rowland formed Dexys he had another band called The Killjoys and they kind of moved in jazz circles but when punk broke in 1977 so did Kevin and he turned the unit into one of the best punk bands of the time. This is a straight up classic.
Andrea Belfi
Cera Persa
(Latency)
Having played the drums since the age of 14 and developing his chops in punk bands before moving to experimental music, instrumentalist Andrea Belfi brings a wide ranging musical vocabulary to his releases, and Cera Persa’s 2 sides of pulsing ambience are a point in case. With richly textured electronic sounds fluxing around Belfi’s insistent drum structures, there’s a pleasing sense of physicality within the abstract here, and it sounds all the better for avoiding an overreliance on drum machines and presets.
Various
Moon Faze Sun Gaze III
(Multi Culti)
Multi Culti’s astronomic rise continues with a trio of various artist 12”s celebrating the label’s particular brand of leftfield deepness and space oddity. The third instalment of the series (naturally the second to be released…) finds a host of label debutants joining the evergreen Crowdpleaser for six excursions into the shadowy corners of the cosmic dance floor. Between ethno-psychedelia, future primitive funk and sluggish acid there’s a wealth of riches to savour, chiefly Nicola Cruz’s Grace Jones-sampling swamp funk and the ‘wimba-wey-ing’ brilliance of Umoja’s cheerful ‘Umboweti’.
LPs
Melvins
Houdini
(Third Man Records)
What else can be said that hasn’t been said already about this legendary band and this legendary album? Thanks to the good folks at Third Man they have reissued this classic (along with Stag and Stoner Witch) and made it available for the first time on vinyl since 1993. Six tracks produced by Kurt Cobain. Cover by Frank Kozik. 180g gram vinyl. Gatefold sleeve. This is the real heavy shit and still no one comes close.
Mala
Mirrors
(Brownswood)
Following Mala in Cuba, the sub-zero specialist has packaged a new ethnographic dub adventure into a full-length album. For this project, Mala made several trips to Peru where he discovered ancient instruments, Afro-Peruvian percussionists, grassroots tap dancers, music from the mountains and Andean sopranos. He said in our recent feature: “Peru made me feel liberated” – and giving Mirrors a few rotations, you can really tell.
Huerco S
For Those Of You Who Have Never (And Also Those Who Have)
(Proibito)
After a lengthy tour of the web’s more bookish corners, the sophomore LP from Kansas-born Brooklynite Huerco S finally touches down on vinyl – and it is totally worth the wait. Over the past few years the producer has steadily led us through his unique aural fug, serving up innovative soundscapes and entirely dislocated club tracks without ever disappearing up his own vaporiser. This nine tracker sees Mr Leeds reach the next level, laying down an immersive, futuristic web of hazy ambience which will surely feature prominently in the end of year charts.
Less Win
Trust
(The Big Oil Recording Company)
Coming from Denmark but sounding like they were dragged up on the filthy streets on 1970s Manchester are Less Win who combine the metallic post punk slashing guitars of Mission of Burma and This Heat with the slightly more streamlined sounds of Interpol to create an album of clanking but tuneful guitar rock that will appeal to fans of Preoccupations.
Ian William Craig
Meaning Turns to Whispers
(Aguirre)
With the CD originally released on Sean Mc Cann’s Recital Program (which is a go to source for the unusual or beautifully abstract), here we have the first vinyl press of this aural oddity on Belgium’s Aguirre. This is certainly a record for traversing sound realms, as FM distortion loops simultaneously corrodes and intertwines with Craig’s delicately layered piano work. Never comfortably settling into the wistful piano, this one strives to get to the core of the sounds by exposing their innards- one for those who like their ambience deep-fried.
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