It’s time for another installment of Radio Free Aquarium Drunkard on dublab, four hours of sounds from AD selectors and friends. Up first, Chad DePasquale shares The New Happy Gathering Holiday Special: crunchy leaf folk, woolen country, and a palm wine-jazz cocktail. Then, Jason P. Woodbury concludes Range and Basin with a longform instrumental drift, encompassing digital soundtrack jazz, lunar epics, and synths. Then, Tyler Wilcox shares a special Doom and Gloom from the Tomb, featuring tunes heard in his CD-focused Bonus Tracks column. And to close, Gabriel Birnbaum shares a broadcast of his Foxy Digitalis Mix.
Author: Justin Gage
Gram Parsons and The Fallen Angels :: The Last Roundup
We complained in a Bonus Tracks column a few months back about the Gram Parsons archive series, which had kicked off with a Vol. 1 way back in 2007, leaving us hanging for Vol. 2. Someone must have heard our prayers for more unreleased Parsons. The Last Roundup offers an unearthed soundboard tape of Gram and his short-lived Fallen Angels band playing Philadelphia’s Bijou Café in the spring of 1973. The recording comes from just a few days after the Fallen Angels’ previous/posthumous live LP, so there’s quite a bit of overlap here — but no one’s going to complain, considering the dearth of pro tapes from Parsons’ all-too-brief solo era.
Rubber Band Gun :: Shut Up and Deal
Shut Up and Deal is the latest from Rubber Band Gun, the solo vehicle of musician, sound engineer and producer Kevin Basko. Recorded in his own studio, Historic New Jersey, the album’s soundscapes weave a double image that evokes the careless whimsy of a Vegas casino—but also said establishments shadowy corner booths. The album
art—hand-painted by John Andrews—mirrors that atmosphere, featuring two grinning jokers holding up either side of a signature RBG playing card.
Yo La Tengo :: The Sounds of the Sounds of Science
With a 78-minute runtime and only a single track not eclipsing the eight minutes, The Sounds of the Sounds of Science is an almost meditative aquatic soundscape created for a series of short films by avant-garde filmmaker Jean Painlevé. Specializing in underwater cinematography, the French director’s short films (ranging in dates from 1927-1982) were compiled by Criterion in a collection titled Science is Fiction, with eight of them receiving YLT scores to break the deep sea silence.
The Lagniappe Sessions :: Graves
Earlier this year, Graves (moniker of veteran singer-songwriter Greg Olin) released his best record yet in Gary Owens: I Have Some Thoughts, a country gem influenced by “a lineage of West Coast dreamers, surfers and skaters”. The California-based musician treats his inaugural Lagniappe Session with a similar country touch, the five eclectic tracks accompanied accompanied by pedal steel guitar, Wurlitzer piano and more.
William Eggleston :: 512
William Eggleston, one of the world’s most celebrated photographers, first turned to music in 2017 with Musik, an improvised album performed entirely by the artist on a Korg digital keyboard. His follow-up, 512, shifts the main field of action to a Bösendorfer grand piano and invites like-minded collaborators—Sam Amidon, Leo Abrahams, Matana Roberts and Brian Eno among them—to deconstruct beloved standards.
Hardcore Iconoclastic :: Mark Lightcap on the Woozy Drifts of Acetone
Ahead of the career-spanning collection i’m still waiting. guitarist Mark Lightcap joins us to discuss the evolution and mythology of Acetone, his Southern California trio. “We’re just stirring this cauldron of musical information waiting for the flavor to congeal in a way that we like.”
Tyvek :: Overground
It’s been nearly a decade since Tyvek’s last proper album, but the Detroit rock denizens haven’t missed a beat. Overground returns to the barreling, bare-bones sound the band are known for, with frontman Kevin Boyer’s wiggly guitar solos now sharing space with sax blurts from his latest recruit, Emily Roll of XV. When the going gets weird, the underground poke their heads above the surface, but this is still the Tyvek we know and love.
The Aquarium Drunkard Show: SIRIUS/XMU (7pm PST, Channel 35)
Via satellite, transmitting from northeast Los Angeles — the Aquarium Drunkard Show on SIRIUS/XMU, channel 35. 7pm California time, Wednesdays.
34.1090° N, 118.2334° W
Bex Burch :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
On her International Anthem debut There is only love and fear, xylophonist Bex Burch creates a world of sound that jumps between jazz loops, found sound, ambient soundscapes, and propulsive, rhythmic “messy minimalism.” But those individual components equal something more than the sum of their parts. Burch joins us to discuss the choice between love and fear, her “messy minimalism,” and welcoming the sounds of nature into her record—and realizing that her record was in and of itself a natural sound: “I am part of nature singing my song.”
Transmissions :: Conner Habib
This week on Transmissions: Conner Habib. He’s the author of the Pen/Faulkner award longlisted horror novel, Hawk Mountain, and the host of the weekly podcast Against Everyone with Conner Habib. Informed by his practice of Anthroposophy and Christian mysticism, AEWCH focuses on the esoteric and ventures into strange and unusual places, touching frequently on Habib’s spiritual views while also exploring his views on sex work, his interest in art and literature, punk rock ethos, and his singular conversational style.
John Sinclair Presents Detroit Artists Workshop: Community, Jazz and Art in the Motor City, 1965-1981
You probably know John Sinclair’s name from his status as a legendary Detroit activist and MC5 manager. But he also worked with trumpeter Charles Moore to put on a wide variety of Detroit Artists Workshop shows that highlighted some of the best local jazz talent. This new compilation gives us a glimpse of the sweet sounds that went down over the years. Some familiar names here (Donald Byrd playing a marvelously moody version of “Cristo Redentor”) and some less familiar names (organist Lyman Woodard sounds fantastic).
Misha Panfilov :: Atlântico
Estonian composer, multi-instrumentalist, and producer Misha Panfilov continues to operate in his own diaphanous waters where waves of funk, jazz, and exotica crash upon mystic sands of psychedelic rock and kosmische music. Recorded in the archipelago of Madeira, his latest album, Atlântico, shifts tectonic plates of space and sound, leaving a decidedly more spiritual and serene landscape in its wake.
Ananya Ganesh :: Precis-Loving
At just about 16 minutes, Ananya Ganesh’s Precis-Loving feels fleeting. But that makes sense. These improvised piano and voice pieces capture something very in-the-moment and spontaneous; it’s almost as though you’re hearing Ganesh think out loud, eavesdropping on her inner monologue. The fact that this collection was recorded in non-professional settings on a phone (you’ll catch bits of ambient background noise at times) adds to the intimacy. Whether this approach will be carried forward in Ganesh’s future releases remains to be seen, but for now Precis-Loving is a priceless document.
Moon Bros. :: The Wheel
Moon Bros. returns with an absolutely wonderful five-song mini-LP of lightly fried folk rambles. Fred Schneider recorded The Wheel mostly on his own, but he expertly conjures up a laid-back scene of friends sitting around a cozy living room playing together — sweetly groaning pedal steel, chiming 12-string, stoned harmonica, intimate vocals. (It’s not entirely a solo affair: the great Josephine Foster shows up to sing along on one song.) The result is kind of like a heretofore unimagined collab between Robbie Basho and Michael Hurley. Vivid visions of the country, indeed.