Las Cobras – Selva

So the other day when I went to the Cardinal Fuzz page looking for an album, I should actually have gone to Fuzz Club Records. Are they by any chance related? I think we should be told. After all, they’ve never been seen in the same photo together.

It says ‘London,’ only ‘London’ on the bandcamp page. I can be amongst the more stupid members of our race sometimes, but I strongly suspect Las Cobras don’t originate from London. I bet that’s actually Fuzz Club Records HQ. A quick and dirty net search suggests Uruguay, marking them as the first Uruguayans (to my knowledge) to land in this parish.

It sometimes puts me in mind of 80s stuff like Jesus & Mary Chain, that kind of genre, a name I do not know and do not care to. There’s been a through line of that thing all the way up to the present day so this isn’t a throwback, I’m just feeling too stupid to think of any other examples at the moment. Some of the tunes are proper good, though, and as an album it is an excellent thing to listen to.

Autotelia – I

I love this album whenever I listen to it, but it’s bang on perfect for these semi-hypnagogic states that my first couple of hours of each day tends to be.

This is that kind of mellow motorik kosmiche type music that is just totally trance inducing. An altered state all by itself.

I understand one half of Autotelia is no longer with us, which is very sad. This is some legacy, however.

somesurprises (self titled)

So I’m on the right PC this morning, in a semi-hypnagogic state. Let the buses continue.

This is one of those albums that I’m not entirely sure why I listened to since the description didn’t make me overly-confident, but that just goes to show you how much of a guide descriptions can be. I’m wondering if actually I do have instincts, and they can sometimes be good.

The last track in particular is one of those legendary tunes which in any just world would be amongst the most famous songs ever written, the longest song on the album by some distance and it still isn’t long enough. Eternal music, that kind of song is. But the whole thing is good.

Anna von Hausswolff – All Thoughts Fly

I must admit, when I read the press release from Southern Lord what did say that this was Anna simply playing the organ unaccompanied, no singing, nuthin’ (exact words, guv), I wasn’t filled with hope.

Maybe it’s because I had a bit of a beast of a last month, but when I did play it, all doubts vanished. It was, is, and forever will be perfect. It genuinely does not matter that her wonderful voice is kept in the cupboard on this album (no, it really was, she told me, she had a special box made for it and even provided it with a personal servant while she communicated with people via email, semaphore and carrier-pigeon).

Despite the strange ways my life has turned over the years, I don’t have that many regrets, even now, but one of them is not going to see her play in Leicester late in 2015 because it clashed with the night my ex-wife was going for a weekly visit to a friend and I didn’t think it worth the battle at the time. And then about a week later I got into her second album and really regretted it. Not fighting the battle, I mean. But then I always thought I’m a lover, not a fighter, except that’s been a rather bitter laugh over the last few years…

Enough of my woes, listen to the organ! (and there was me saying I don’t type much these days).

The Janitors – Noisolation Session vol​.​1

I actually went to the Cardinal Fuzz page looking for something whose name I’ve totally forgot, and remembered that I played this last night and it rocked. Can’t find the thing I was looking for, though. Have to wait until I’m back on the work PC.

The Janitors have grown on me. I don’t think I was initially impressed, but this one hits the spot, and hits it good.

The fact that I myself have just finished some self-isolation is entirely unrelated.

Gnod & João Pais Filipe – Faca de Fogo

And since we’re talking about dudes who are on it, why don’t we add Gnod to the party?

This is where maelstromic trance goes dark. My only complaint is it ain’t long enough, but I don’t think it ever could be.

I’ve noticed I type less and less words with my posts these days. This can only be a good thing.

Paisiel – Unconscious Death Wishes

Whims, eh? There’s actually a fair bit I’ve discovered lately, but I’m on the wrong PC and have bad memory. Otherwise I suspect I’d bombard you with another buses series.

How often do I need to post the work of Julius Gabriel? Probably as often as he does it. Dude is properly on it. So is his partner in this maelstrom, João Pais Filipe, who you will also hear in the next post, equally maelstromic. Neologisms, eh? I love ’em. This is the musical equivalent.

This be the second Paisiel album, so I hope it means there will be more.

Thee Telepaths – The Velvet Lounge

I have something in common with Thee Telepaths. I’ve also recorded music at Far Heath recording Studios. I did it with the old blues band I was in. We recorded a demo. It is a marvellous place to record music, surrounded by fields, devilishly difficult to find, lovely spacious vibe.

Bit like this music, really. Music that is also dense. Difficult trick to pull off, but they do it well. My only nark is that they’ve split what is essentially 3 long tunes into separate pieces which mean that when you listen digitally – as I have to – you get a gap at what seem like quite arbitrary intervals.

As someone who has no intention of ever buying a vinyl player due to not having money to waste on relics of our imperial greatness (face it, people, it’s over), I get rather annoyed by the snobbery shown towards those of us who focus on the digital music.

Sereias – O País a Arder

This album will not appeal to many. But those who it does will fackin love it.

You could not predict this. You could not algorithm it. No AI or machine intelligence could begin to parse or grok this in any way. This is humans at their very, most outrageous best.

The above paragraph is probably influenced by my reading of a newsletter called The Convivial Society which lands in my inbox every now and again and whose premise is very close to my heart.

Self Help – Grand Hotel Ibis

People who have read this blog before may well have picked up on my long standing tendency to snark at music journalism, like I’m soooo much cooler (which actually I am, though that is irrelevant). (coolness is and always has been a bullshit concept). (concepts are and always have been over-rated). (this is what happens when writing a blog post is roughly the second conscious thing you do one morning after making a cup of coffee because you’ve remembered you actually get to start work a bit later today because reasons).

So anyway, because music journalists, I really didn’t want to like this album, as it contains man from The Quietus. To be fair to The Quietus, they are actually the least objectionable music publication by some distance, and I even read it sometimes. I hardly ever see the word ‘sophomore’ used when describing a ‘second’ album. This is to be encouraged. Also, other things.

Ponder for a moment what sort of mind listens to an album that he really didn’t want to like. Or don’t. Maybe working from home does funny things to you. Or maybe I actually listened because Tesla Tapes, because Gnod, because I just damn well listened to it.

It’s like nothing I can describe, which isn’t actually unusual in that regard. But it’s also brilliant. All four tracks are very different, and they’re all great.