Sex Swing – Type II

Now, this one is probably old news to most of you.

I actually ignored these for quite a while for reasons that all say more about me than the band. 1) Don’t like the band name. 2) I see the word ‘supergroup’ and I just think swearwords about people phoning it in. 3) What is that cover? Fucking disgusting.

So God Unknown records put it out recently after I’d ignored it’s initial issue on Rocket, and for reasons I don’t know why I decided to listen to it. Actually, I do know why. It was a Monday and I was in a Monday mood so wanted to listen to gnarliness and I thought these might tick that box. And they did tick that box. They ticked it righteously. But they did more than tick that box, they turned that box into a well of unfathomable depth with their riffing, repetitious, droning, hypnotic gnarliness.

And it turns out that one of them has visited these parts before, and that also had a ghastly cover.

Ruckzuck – Dynamic Equilibrium Redefined

This one is from when I was scrolling through the aforementioned wishlist and saw this, which isn’t actually that far down it. Nonetheless, I had zero memory of putting it there so I played it to try to jog said memory.

Now, memory remains un-jogged. None of the songs sounded like something I had actually heard before, so I doubt I’d heard it on the radion,and I had zero idea of this band at all, so what made me add it to the wishlist will probably remain unknown to me forever and ever amen. But I’m glad I did. This is very pleasing indeed. They sound like one of those bands who don’t take themselves uber-seriously yet want to make some bloody good music nonetheless.

It’s got more of a ‘classic’ psych rock feel, by which I mean it sounds more like the late 60s psych explosion than most of what I listen to, but they do it very well. It doesn’t sound like pastiche to me, rather that they just happen to like making this particular type of noise. And why would anyone make noise other than that which they want to make?

AHRKH – Beams From a Spiritual Panorama

So my epic wishlist on Bandcamp has exploded since I re-discovered online radio late last year, but every now and again I need to remind myself of the stuff that’s been on there for absolutely ages.

So I was listening to the radio show that Golden Ratio Frequencies do, and it wasn’t doing a lot for me. It was full of the more new-age-bromide-y ambient music that I ultimately find a bit cloying. So I went to the aforementioned wishlist and scrolled right down to look for stuff that had been there ages and that I couldn’t really remember what it was, and I saw this, so I clicked on it and pressed play.

And got turned into a monged out vegetable. This is a very powerful piece of immersive and rather intense drone. I love it.

And then I noticed this was on the Golden Ratio Frequencies label, and I suspect is the man who does Golden Ratio Frequencies himself, who also is part of the Gnod family. They get everywhere!

Funny how circles close sometimes.

Dhidalah – Sensoria

Some Japanese rock goodness for you here, something I’m not convinced I do too often.

I didn’t intend to leave it this long between posts, but time do get away, do it not? So, though they may be short of words, I am now about to post a bunch of stuff I’ve discovered lately that I think is really good.

In a completely unrelated note, my 12 year old daughter has just asked me whether or not I regularly question the nature of my existence, and upon receiving an affirmative answer, suggested that she wants to form an existential dread club. Shome mishtake, shurely? I’m sure we were late teens when we all hit that phase. They grow up so quickly these days…