Author’s note: this article originally appeared in 2012 on a now-defunct website called Dead Journalist. It has been salvaged, edited and updated for Aquarium Drunkard. - j jackson toth . . .
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AD contributor Tyler Wilcox has spent the last few weeks trying to wrap his head around Oren Ambarchi's latest, a collaboration with famed Brazilian percussionist Cyro Baptista. But Simian Angel is slippery — it sounds different every time you spin it. New details emerge, textures shift, grooves come undone. What feels soothing and meditative on one listen seems to skirt the edges of disquieting dissonance on the next . . .
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Two new releases from the Detroit underground, Tyvek's Changing Patterns of Protective Coating and Deadbeat Beat's How Far, trade in surrealism and inspired scuzz, showcasing the bruised vibrancy of the city's experimental punk scene . . .
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August 7th, tragic news broke that David Berman, poet and leader of Silver Jews and Purple Mountains, had passed away. A chronicler of despair and beauty, Bermans' work casts a long shadow. Here, Wooden Wand's James Jackson Toth reflects on his singular stature and remembers the man . . .
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It's Wednesday night, and we're setting your Penfield Mood Organ for 11. Sliding of the coast of California, weird tales from the pacific rim -- The Aquarium Drunkard Show on SIRIUS/XM. Channel 35, 7pm PST, Wednesdays + on-demand . . .
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As Bob Dylan's swampy and haunted classic Oh Mercy turns 30 years old, producer and musician Daniel Lanois reflects on the strange magic he helped create in New Orleans, driven by a willingness to explore seemingly contradictory spaces: "I wanted to make sure that that the music was trying to destroy the singer at the same time as support him . . .
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Terry Allen is a maker of things. A sculptor, illustrator, playwright, collagist, and, perhaps most famously, a singer and songwriter who, over the last five decades, has amassed an extensive catalog of avant-country gold. His 1975 album Juarez, a striking and brilliant concept album that plays as a kind of sunburned, southwestern Badlands, and 1979’s sprawling Lubbock (On Everything), a rollicking and wry send-up of Allen’s West Texas hometown, are rightly held up as unimpeachable masterpieces of proto-americana music. Each have recently received extensive reissues by the North Carolina label Paradise of Bachelors, who will . . .
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St. Louis-based gospel singer Zella Jackson (whose life story is startling to say the least) wrote and recorded this fierce platter in 1974. A midtempo but empowering work of gospel, “Days Are Just Like People” is a B-side that blurs the genre with its scorching synth-draped funk and prog-infused elements of flute and harpsichord. With a single copy of the original 7” going for a cool 370 on Discogs, here’s a rip for your personal salvation . . .
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Twenty years ago next month, at the crest of the twentieth century, the BBC aired an episode of its long-running "Songwriters Circle" with featured guests John Cale, Nick Cave and Chrissie Hynde. Recorded in London at the Subterania Club, it's an intimate, potent pairing.
In contrast to its cacophonous origins (via 1982's Music for a New Society), an acoustic rendering of Cale's "Thoughtless Kind" kicks things off, setting the evening's subsequent pace. Nick Cave's catholic treatment of "Into My Arms" shines, while Hynde runs through her sturdy run of . . .
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Outré California. Even more weird tales from the pacific rim. The Aquarium Drunkard Show on SIRIUS/XMU, channel 35. 7pm PST, Wednesdays + on-demand . . .
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For a minute there in the early 1970s, they tried calling Lou Reed the “Phantom of Rock.” It might have been a better fit for Peter Laughner. Since the Cleveland singer/songwriter/guitarist’s death in 1977, the Rocket From the Tombs and Pere Ubu member has been a spectral presence in the underground, more heard of than heard. Laughner only made it to his 24th year. But he packed an unbelievable amount of musical activity into that brief span of time – and we’re finally getting a full portrait of the man via a long-in-the-works five . . .
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In "Tight Connection To My Heart," director Paul Schrader envisions a glittering, metropolitan Tokyo, wrapping our hero up in a surreal web of imagery. Wide pans and sudden zooms only add to the disorienting effect, as Bob Dylan wanders the city, searching for something we wouldn’t even know how to begin to describe . . .
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Former roller-disco queen Alice Cohen has returned with Artificial Fairytales, recorded in her New York home with the Channel 14 Weather Team, the duo of Swedish composer Adrian Knight and saxophonist David Lackner . . .
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You’re tuned into the Aquarium Drunkard Transmissions podcast...This month, we bring you the uncut edition of our conversation with Tim Heidecker, explaining the classic inspirations behind his latest LP, What The Broken Hearted Do. Also, a review of the John Coltrane boxset, Coltrane ’58: The Prestige Recordings. And to close out, Johnathan Rice live at Gold Diggers, discussing both his haikus—optimized for the social media age—and new album, The Long Game . . .
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Sonny Smith is back, this time with a compilation of “great and weird new art happening in San Francisco” on his Rocks In Your Head Records label. Hot Sick And Vile Fun primarly showcases a bumper crop of current day groups that reside in a sort of San Francisco meets Flying Nun vein (Galore, Cindy, Rays), though there are some unexpected and welcome moves . . .
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