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Frank Zappa :: Apostrophe (50th Anniversary Edition)

Frank ZappaPosted on

For many years Zappa’s best selling record, 1974’s Apostrophe holds a weird place in Zappa’s large discography. Rather than being a snapshot of where he was at the time it's a jumbled patchwork. But looks are deceiving. The success of the goofy “Don’t Eat the Yellow Snow” drove this record into the top ten and remains one of Zappa’s best-known singles. But buried beneath the silliness you find tight soulful blues, R&B, and jams. A new 50th anniversary edition expands it further with alternate takes and live sets . . .

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Nick Lowe :: Indoor Safari

Nick LowePosted on

It's a joyous comfort to know that Nick Lowe is still at it. With a title and appearance harkening back to archetypal exotica motifs, Indoor Safari is the musician's first full length since a seasonal offering over a decade ago. In many ways, it's a culmination of Lowe's prolific solo career being revamped when he began touring with instrumental surf outfit Los Straitjackets as his backing band . . .

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Etran de L’Aïr :: 100% Sahara Guitar

Etran de L’AïrPosted on

It feels somehow wrong though to refer to the particularly vibrant brand of Tuareg rock played by Etran de L’Aïr as blues, desert or otherwise. There’s an exuberance in their adrenaline-fueled anthems and frenzied jams that resists the term. The band has its roots as a touring wedding band in central Niger, and the group’s songs more often than not feel buoyed by the ecstasy of celebration, conjuring scenes of late nights dancing beneath the desert stars. 100% Sahara Guitar is the clearest vision we’ve had yet of Etran de L’Aïr’s . . .

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Steve Brenner :: Signals (1985)

Steve BrennerPosted on

Independently released in 1985, Steve Brenner’s Signals is a dark and haunted electronic voyage through a future that never happened. A multifaceted composite of synths and drum machines, Signals has been called everything from “Ferrari-crime music” to “space-rock.” We shed some light on the album’s ominous history and anachronistic music . . .

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Six Organs of Admittance :: Companion Rises (Twig Harper Remix)

Six Organs of Admittance Twig HarperPosted on

Six Organs’ Ben Chasny handed over the keys to Twig Harper for this remix album, giving the noise/electronic experimenter total freedom to remake his 2020 album Companion Rises. The result is something entirely different in this reconfiguration; its warm, clear guitars, its eerie, attenuated vocals, even its forays into digital noise and dissonance have morphed beyond recognition . . .

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Transmissions :: Joe Boyd

Joe Boyd PodcastPosted on

This week on Transmissions, we're sitting down with a genuine legend: Joe Boyd, author of And The Roots of Rhythm Remain: A Journey Through Global Music, out September 24 from ZE Books. On the front cover of the book Brian Eno—a venerated saint in the Aquarium Drunkard canon—declares, “I doubt I’ll ever read a better account of the history and sociology of popular music than this one.” Boyd joins us to discuss the book and his work with Nick Drake, Fairport Convention, Sandy Denny, and much more . . .

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Otis Shanty :: Up On The Hill

Otis ShantyPosted on

On their sophomore album, On the Hill, the quartet combines the shaggy dilettantism of '90s indie rock with the pristine haze of earlier shoegaze bands, looking for new things to make with old tools . . .

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MJ Lenderman :: Manning Fireworks

MJ LendermanPosted on

2022’s Boat Songs propelled North Carolina string-bender MJ Lenderman into the vernacular. A marriage of witty lyrics, twanging guitars, and indie pomp with a mountain drawl delivery and a grungy attitude. Since, Lenderman has been bouncing about and building up a reputation as a spontaneous livewire guitarist when placed in front of a crowd. In between all of this – somehow – he has pieced together a record of significant growth. Manning Fireworks not only showcases the further-honed guitar pyrotechnics Lenderman is becoming best known for but displays his notable development as a literate songwriter with a 21st century . . .

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Josephine Foster :: Haunted House / Pendulum

Josephine FosterPosted on

Josephine Foster’s 2023 album Domestic Sphere is a collection of songs that reflect Fisher’s understanding of haunting as failed mourning. The idea of being haunted within Domestic Sphere is conveyed most fully in the songs “Pendulum” and, naturally, “Haunted House.” But Foster’s haunted expression goes beyond the lyrical content of the songs—it also encompasses the way she sings those words, her overdubbed vocals, and the comprehensive sonic experiences of the two songs . . .

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Virtual Dreams II :: Ambient Explorations In The House & Techno Age, Japan 1993-1999

CompilationPosted on

Circumventing the music collector mania of Japan at the height of the acid house fever of the 1990s, these minimal tracks, based on sharp silken hi-hats and psychedelic space-age phasers, add a new twist to the history of the Detroit genre at the same time that they sound as contemporary as any new work by Actress, Jon Hopkins, or Pantha du Prince . . .

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YAI :: Sky Time

YAIPosted on

The duo of multi-instrumentalist David Lackner and percussionist and engineer John Thayer met while working on Arp's fourth world revivalist masterpiece Zebra. Their group YAI takes that album's treated jazz instrumentation and squirming electronics and reinforces them with throbbing beats and deep dub bass tones. The result, Sky Time, lands somewhere between ambient jazz and the chillout room . . .

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Radio Free Aquarium Drunkard :: September 2024

Radio Free Aquarium DrunkardPosted on

Freeform transmissions from Radio Free Aquarium Drunkard on dublab. Airing every third Sunday of the month, RFAD on dublab features the pairing of Tyler Wilcox’s Doom and Gloom from the Tomb and Chad DePasquale’s New Happy Gathering. This month, Wilcox kicks things off with an exploration of the Setting sound, drawing from the improv-based North Carolina group's recent releases, plus some side-trips into the trio's various other projects. Then, DePasquale shares a sweet mix of recent 2024 digs, both new + archival. Sunday, 4-6pm PT . . .

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Fievel Is Glauque :: Rong Weicknes

Fievel Is GlauquePosted on

Fievel is Glauque is as pop as ever in their new single "As Above So Below," from Rong Weickness, their forthcoming album. The frenetic chord changes and Stereolab meets Tori Kudo meets Guillermo Klein aesthetic are still there, but now Ma Clement's honey-waxed high notes are allowed more space to shine, favored by the tight production and arrangement of the track . . .

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Amelia Courthouse :: Broken Things

Amelia CourthousePosted on

On her second album under her Amelia Courthouse moniker, Leah Toth crafts a work of American hauntology. Wrought with church organ, field recordings, ambient hiss and a faded hymnal, the stark and lovely broken things is curiously permeated by religion's absences and presences . . .

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Ginger Root :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview

Ginger Root The AD InterviewPosted on

Ahead of forthcoming record SHINBANGUMI, Ginger Root joins us to discuss the musical and visual world building that went into the endeavor. Drawing on new horizons as well as the pastiche of eighties City Pop and vintage soul, we explore a deep dive into the musician and filmmaker's meticulously crafted cinematic world. Plus, recording drums in a dusty karaoke bar and the importance of Glen Campbell covers . . .

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