A Very Hospitals Christmas

After listening to a few sides of Blind Lemon Jefferson while stoking some logs, I wasn't quite sure what to reach for next until my eyes happened to rest upon the tropical photograph adorning The Hospitals' Hairdryer Peace. It doesn't look as if the picture was taken in Hawaii, although possibly it might have be a picture of part of a TV screen in a hotel room in Hawaii that happened to be showing Mister Roberts or maybe just an episode of Fantasy Island. In any event, it is a modern classic freak's Christmas LP, and not just because it sounds like the Cherry Blossoms doing their crudest boombox version of the Department Store Santas' At the Medieval Castle album.

If you listen closely, you can hear sleigh bells being crushed under reindeer's hooves, double-tracked with digital delay. And something that smells vaguely like burnt ginger bread. It's really all there. If you've ever looked peeked between the blinds at a sky full of clouds and fixed upon one that looked a little bit like both Mick Jagger and Lou Reed, then you will understand how a few moments of this LP feels to the mind. Between those moments is the inside of the pyramid and the tampon magnet at the bottom of a gas station wastebasket. Not so different from a typical Christmas with one's closest fifty relatives.

Ethan at Dusted wrote

Adam Stonehouse, Chris Gunn, Rob Enbom and Rod Meyer spit out one of the most damagingly psychedelic records ever set to wax. Shitstorm noise, cracked folk and rocket fueled punk all running into and on top of each other. Is this a joke? I certainly hope not.

It may not be a joke, but it's more fun than Herb Alpert's Christmas album by a long shot. I'm thinking it has New Years Eve potential, too.

While I'm mentioning other bloggers out there, I'll comment on two things I read recently. First, Doug Mosurock in his year-end reference to the Tommy Jay reissue:

Thankfully, lo-fi is running its course, and the better participants of that mess (Times New Viking, Women, Pink Reason) are doing what they can to keep the good separated from the multitudes of bad.

I agree with everything except the bit about "lo-fi is running its course". As long as "lo fi" includes distortion and other "recording artefacts", then lo-fi will never "run its course." Besides, prior to the Pink Reason, Women and TNK records, there were multitudes of (admittedly far less intelligent and worthy) critics and commenters who had buried "lo-fi" for good, dumped their Siltbreeze vinyl, and invested in CD releases on Rune Grammaphon. Seriously, I can only imagine the bullshit that Doug has to wade through. But as long as miracles like Robert Martin's Long Goodbye LP keep turning up, I'm not hoping that music of any fidelity has "run its course."

And then there was the shock of the year earlier this week when I stumbled upon this in Larry Dolman's essential Blogstitude:

Two or three completely separate times this year I've come across someone saying that "Pink Frost" by The Chills is a great song. I took note, of course, but I've always been more of a post-Xpressway NZ head and ended up never hearing the band or song until today

Say wha ..??!?!!?!??! Larry is a person whom I've never met but, thanks to the miracles of the Internets, has turned me onto some good shit. Like a lot of my favorite music writers, I feel that I can trust him because he digs (for good reason) some of the same shit that I dig, i.e., the Velvets, Fahey, the Sun City Girls and (without shame) good old Grateful Dead. So it was beyond imagining that a cultivated, erudite chap like Larry could not have heard or appreciated The Chills Pink Frost -- almost inarguably the greatest A side of any seven inch to come out of New Zealand ever -- until just this month. Frankly, I'm envious of Larry because as I recall it was a lot of fun listening to that record hundreds of times over the past fifteen years and memorizing every freaking note.

There is a lesson here: keep turning people on to good shit, whatever the fuck it is. My next post will be dedicated to Larry, in that spirit.

Henson Was a Freak

As times goes by, the importance of imprinting at an early age becomes more obvious:

No Hype

I saw that my music lover brother Will is hawking a copy of Robert Valente's NO HYPE album at the usual place where buyers should always be wary (unless you're buying from Will, that is). This LP is more than excellent, in my opinion. Here's what I wrote about it earlier this summer when I parted with a spare:

Chris Deden (consumate Simon Joyner bandmate) turned me onto this obscure rarity quite a few years ago and it immediately became one of my favorite records. Time has been very kind and while a whole boatload of previously admired sounds has eroded into worthless piffle before my eyes, this album has just grown mightier in my eyes. Valente stums an electric guitar and, in his haunting voice – lying somewhere between Jandek, Neil Young, and Will Oldham – he sings a variety of existential songs that alternate between sparse two chord dirges and more folky pop numbers. To my ears, the sound is more like early 70s LA coffeehouse folk than anything that could have come out of Iowa City in 1979 … but then there was that Units LP out of Houston around the same time …

There is a strong vibe of redemption running through the record that may turn off those who are prefer their angst unadulterated with references to well-known belief systems. The Jesus dude is name-dropped, e.g., “High School” (“Sittin’ in this high school/ wishing that I was stoned/ everyday this is crazy/ feelin’ I want to go home’/ won’t you come on back/ mr. jesus/ won’t you come on back/ right now”) and “Chain Gang” (“A rollin’ out on a chain gang/ a rollin’ on a chain gang/ I killed that woman I went insane/ rollin’ I’ve got this heavy chain/ I’m callin on jesus/ lord they drove me insane”).

Valente is still working and making CDs. I can confidently say that, other than his instantly recognizable voice, none of his contemporary releases sound anything like his far more austere and dark debut album. When there are so many (nearly all?) dubious Christian rock or “outsider” reissues being peddler these days, it’s a travesty that this album has been virtually ignored since its release nearly 30 years ago. So here’s a fairly spiffy original copy. If you like the sort of music that I like, my advice is to jump on this one. And yes I’m aware of the obvious irony.

I Don't Want to Sleep Alone

I really must try a bit harder to keep up with the posting. For some time I've been meaning to compile a few of my favorite music vids in that elemental format: the man-woman duet. I'll begin with the basics, Dolly and Porter, singing Parton's "Tomorrow is Forever" circa 1970:



Fantastic version, in every respect.

Then, moving right along from Dolly and Porter's oddly repressed sexuality to Kris and Rita's oddly unrepressed (as in "get a room!") sexuality, we present this classic performance:



I won't post it here but if you need the video equivalent of a cold shower after that, check out Johnny and June's rendition of the same song. Cold, baby.

As much as I'd like to watch Kris and Rita melt the stage with their chemistry, something must be done here to acknowledge two voices that match each other at least as well as Kris and Rita's gonads did (for a time, anyway). These two characters never sounded better together than in this TV footage from 1976:

The last minute or so when the camera moves in is quite nice, as the performers return in unison to the shared mic at the center of the image as if they also shared a brain...

...and last but far from least is a video that is something of a gold standard in terms of the photography of a live performance. Is this "acting"? Were Rita and Kris "acting"? I can't be sure but Linda looks into the camera and out of my computer screen at 2:09 and I think she's looking into the future directly at me. I feel helpless, drowning in reverb. Maybe I need a thick wolly hat.



I always crack up at the cutaway to the douchebag at the end. The spell is broken! We get it, bro'. Cut to the fish and chips commercial.

I'm always interested in seeing more stuff in this vein. So if these ring your bell but you are aware of another that I should know about ... well, fill up the comment box with them.

John Fahey, The Transfiguration, the Ocean, and Days of Auld Lang Syne

I recently parted with a spare copy Fahey's LP "The Transfiguration of Blind Joe Death," and had some fun doing the research so I thought I'd share.





Up to this point, Fahey's LPs had been released on Takoma. This one came out on Riverbaoat Records (I don't know whether the label released anything else; I certainly don't have anything else from the label on my shelves). The edition of the album shown in the photos is not the “pre-subscription” edition (I wish!!!) or the “original” 1966 “Boston address” edition. Rather, this is the 1970 “Cambridge address” edition. The address is the only difference between this edition and the earlier commercial edition. It’s clearly not the 1972 edition because it has the original “Riverboat” font on the front cover (the last picture above shows the lower right portion of the album cover overlayed by the last page of the nice booklet insert that comes with the LP). I learned all this stuff (and more) at Stephen the Beard’s excellent John Fahey blog (specifically, this page) which I highly recommend if you ever find yourself wondering what Fahey vinyl you have and what you still need (God forbid you try to collect it all).

One aspect of Stephen's website I've been waiting for him to attend to is some elucidation of the mystery of the "Early Sessions" LP:


Judging from the notes and track listing on the back cover, the Early Sessions release was intended as a double LP release compiling the 1962-1963 (mostly 1963) recordings of the Blind Joe Death LP and Death Chants LP.

Here's the mystery: every time I see a copy of this record for sale, it includes only one piece of vinyl: Blind Joe Death. Given the dodge-and-weave nature of the Takoma catalog through the mid-60s to early 70s, and the fact that the Early Sessions release was quickly withdrawn, I have always questioned whether this "compilation" was, in fact, ever actually sold with 2LPs in the sleeve. Note also that the sleeve is not a gatefold nor is it any thicker than other Takoma sleeves from the same period.

As you can see from the photos, the single slab of vinyl which came with my copy has a matrix and catalog number unique to the set (i.e., C-1000 Vol. 1). I'd like to see at least a photo of the label (which should read "C-1000 Vol. 2") and runoff groove of a Death Chants LP pressed for this compilation. Otherwise I'm sticking to my story: Early Sessions was never sold with 2LPs in the sleeve, in contradiction to the notes on the back of the sleeve, or if it was sold that way, Takoma simply stuck in spare copies of the Death Chants vinyl (cat. number C-1003) into the jacket.

Go ahead. Make my day. ;)

Back to Transfiguration. What turns Transfiguration into pure gold in my book is the all-time classic Fahey track, “On the Sunny Side of the Ocean,” and a fine version too. You can actually watch Fahey perform the track live in 1978 here:



If that were the only Fahey composition on Transfiguration and the rest was covers of the Osmonds’ Greatest Hits, I’d still be loving it. But in addition there’s “Orinda-Moraga,” and “Death of Clayton Peacock,” two fascinating Fahey compositions that are worth listening to, well, endlessly. Everything else (like the Uncle Dave Macon covers and the particularly lovely “Southern Medley”) is executed with Fahey’s genius ear for invention and his uncanny ability to milk whole cream out of the udder of our musical heritage where so many other artists end up with skim milk (or cheese).

There's a bunch of nice Fahey videos on YouTube, including some cool "instructional" videos that I assume you were made for commercial purposes at some later point in Fahey's life. Because it's one of my favorite songs, I'm partial to this vid of Fahey demonstrating his version of the Bobby Burns song "Auld Lang Syne. "



And if you like that, I highly recommend checking the other immortal video performance of that song, sung by Jean Redpath, with Roscoe Holcomb and Pete Seeger playing along. It doesn't get much better than that. Sadly, that segment of Rainbow Quest (episode 17) is missing from Youtube at the moment ...

Sea Donkeys Live At The S.S. Marie Antoinette (Assophon)

I remember listening to the first Sea Donkeys record ("Volume 1") shortly after its release a couple years back and thinking, "OK, this is going to take some getting used to." Parts of it sounded like Burl Ives screaming in the bathroom as he tried to pass Tony Snell through his urethra. I filed it away for a rainy day. The next thing I know, a second Sea Donkeys full-length is arrived at my doorstep. This one, entitled "Live At The S.S. Marie Antoinette," has the additional distinction of being the first release on a new label, Assophon. I poured myself a glass of wine, and sat back in the rocking chair and listened to it straight through. The twangy, burnt-out opener with its cobbled bridges, rusty hooks and halfjapped vocals put me in just the right mood, transporting back to the glorious days of yesteryear when the In The Pineys 10" was as fresh as a slap in the face. The Sea Donkeys' version of "Rainy Day" sounds more like an independently discovered riff and lyric than a Faust cover. They now own the song. Midway through the electric drill solo, I'd forgotten I'd ever heard of silly labels like "krautrock," "jazz," or "music." Side 2 begins with another album highlight, "Ethnic," sung with the deranged righteousness of a jug-empowered wino relieving himself against the side of your house. The entire album is perfectly recorded for my ears, room mic'd without any evident post-production baloney or pre-production pretensions. And rumor has it that there's a different drummer on every track. I like them all. You can order direct from Assophon by clicking here.

Suurin Onni self-titled LP

(Boing Being 2004)

I admit becoming overwhelmed at some point a couple years ago by the wave of Finnish releases which were all pretty good. But this one flipped my wig as an instant classic and it’s rather different from nearly everything else that crosses my radar via the usual channels.

From the label listing: “I only compose music that makes me feel home” says Kusti and yes, that is exactly how this record will make you feel. Being around for eigth years, we finally proudly present the band’s debut album. By sounding nothing but themselves they perform gentle free improvised jazz with folk influences - three calm horns with occasional outbursts wander above hypnotic five-piece rhyhtm section.”

To me, it sounds like something you’d hear in a Casablancan beer hall where Sun Ra got up and conducted the house band while listening to Jamaican radio on his portable headphones. As alluded to above, the band’s instruments include trombone, accordian, clarinet, alto sax, two double basses, and three percussionists. In case it isn’t clear, there are no flutes, no guitars, no computers, no keyboards (unless you count the accordian which shows up very rarely and just when you want it to), no drum solos, no “free form improvisation” and no vocalizing on this record. In other words: it’s something quite different from most of the freak stuff going around the block these days but that doesn’t mean it ain’t weird.

The album artwork is fantastic: an ornate, shiny gold screen printing on a thick, fibrous forest-green cardstock, depicting a floating castle. The image perfectly matches the music and will also match your mood while you listen to the record and drink a bottle of apple brandy while carving a lifesize bear from an old redwood trunk.

Last time I checked, Boing Being still had this on their website for $20, not including shipping from Finland). It won't be around forever.

Magik Markers Inverted Belgium EP

(Hospital Producctions 2006)

I respectfully submit that this one-sided EP contains the most remarkably engineered recording of ego shattering sonic destruction that I have heard on vinyl. Without taking anything away from the Markers -- who were surely on fire that summer night in Belgium (May 9, 2005) -- I hereby nominate Dominik Fernow for a frigging Nobel Prize in music. I suppose the nearest experience I had prior to putting this on the turntable was in the bathroom at Alpine Valley and I’m not 100% sure that what I heard there was emanating from the stage. The next closest side might be the Universal Indians half of their split 12” with Gravatar (Charnel, 1995) but that's relatively polished and structured compared to this. Seriously folks: this is what it sounds like at the peak of any serious trip, plus it's free and there's no hangover.

The Sun City Girls and the Eye Hash Attache

About every month or so we try to clean house and put some stuff up for sale on that popular auction site that shall not be named here. We try to sell mostly records that we love (and many of them are spare copies picked up over the years). The theme of the first batch of auctions (now ended) was "Exotica at $9.99 a Day," and included mostly records that (in our humble opinion) were at least tangentially related to the ever-expanding universe centered around the Sun City Girls.

The first time I heard the Sun City Girls' music was when I wandered into Penny Lane Records on State Street in Madison, Wisconsin. This was 1987 or thereabouts. One of the guys from Killdozer was sitting behind the counter. He was spinning this weird noodly guitar album that, to my crudely trained ears, reminded me of something the Dead might attempt to float in the middle of a Dark Star, circa 1970. I asked him if the record was for sale and he said it was: five dollars, used. I bought it, took it home, played it a few times and didn't think much about it until years later when I discovered Torch of the Mystics and realized, "Hey, don't I already have a record by these guys?"

Anyway, the rest of the story is the usual one about trying to track down all the music that "the Girls" released. In the beginning, it was hard as hell. I had to pick stuff up from disreputable, unaccountable people who sent their lists of mostly crappy and overpriced records by U.S. mail. And then the Internets came along ...

One of the items in the first auction that attracted quite a bit of attention was the Eye Hash Attache. Here's a slightly edited version of the original auction listing:

Okay so here is something strange and most likely unique in its own weird way. About fifteen years ago, around the time that the Sun City Girls were moving to Seattle, I became acquainted with some contemporaneous and future SCG collaborators. As part of an exchange of recorded goods, I obtained these copies of the so-called Cloaven cassettes. As you can see from the attached pics, some of the tapes are adorned with artwork (xeroxed) of unknown origin. At least one source I have spoken with maintains that some copies of the Cloaven tapes were made into esoteric art objects while other copies (of the same releases) were whipped out with, shall we say, a bit less attention to detail ...

... although the recording quality is not always everything it could be, the Cloaven tapes are legendary for a reason. While some are nearly unlistenable FUs to the civilized world, others make you wonder why they weren’t released as vinyl albums, as is. Of course, parts of the tapes eventually made it onto albums and compilation CDs and the Eclipse Label appeared to make some headway towards putting all of the tapes on vinyl. But even the Eclipse Label reissues omit some material from the tapes (as well as adding material that does not appear on the tapes).

Oh yes, I almost forgot: the suitcase! The tapes were delivered to me in this box by a tall man wearing reflective sunglasses and a ridiculous orange-colored tan like you’d get in one of those mall salons. He rang my doorbell about 8:00 am (bastard woke me up), handed me the suitcase and said “These are for you.” That was it. Later that morning I went out in the backyard and there were three holes burned in the lawn, perfectly round, about a foot in diameter and spaced equidistant from each other, about eight feet apart. Weird. The suitcase is some sort of pressed cardboard with fake alligator skin trim and a metal buckle. Inside the suitcase are the tapes (of course) as well as two “beef summer sausage with cheese” links, sealed in plastic wrap, and a custom-modified Sun City Girls PEZ dispenser. When I set the dispenser down to take the picture, some ants started swarming over it. Serious Phase IV activity! There is some candy in the dispenser and I tried one. Stale but still edible. The sausage looks tasty and the seal is unbroken so it’s probably been better preserved than the PEZ candy. I doubt the tapes or the suitcase were “authorized” in the usual manner with a bunch of executives and representatives sitting around a table. The freaking thing strikes me as more of an homage to the Sun City Girls than an official release. I probably should have kept a better eye on the tapes while I owned them, but what’s done is done. It’s time for someone else to control their destiny and ponder the mystery of the Eye Hash Attache.

Here are two views of the lizard and title on the "spine" of the attache (the top of the suitcase is shown above):

To the left is the interior, with 23 cassettes, two sausages, and one custom-modified Pez dispenser.








Close-ups of the Third Eye Pez dispenser. The raised letters "SCG" appear on each side.


























The picture below is the inside of the attache with the green hay removed. The coins are Moroccan. The photos are attached to the bottom of the partition, which is also removable.


The next picture is the same shot as the previous picture, except the partition has been flipped over.

When the partition is removed, you can see the magick skull design that hides beneath.

The stones directly above the head read "SCG". The center of the skull bears a pyramid/eye that appears to have been cut from US currency. The skull itself is not fixed to the bottom of the attache. Gently pulling it upwards in the direction of the top of the pyramid triggers the playback of "music."

So there you have it. The Eye Hash Attache, containing copies of all 23 of the Cloaven Theatre cassettes, now resides somewhere in the Midwest, guarded by not one but two charging dogs. Consider yourself alerted.

"The Grass"

Let's get to the music.

Milvia Son, our affiliated record label, released the first Bad Drumlin Grass CDR and their first vinyl LP (a second vinyl LP due shortly ...)

Here's the cover of the CDR:



I think Ed at Eclipse Records and Nemo at Time-Lag still have a few copies of the CDR to sell. We've got some here as well.





The Invigorating Scent LP can be had from the usual purveyors of kind music (e.g., the above-mentioned folks, Fusetron, or Forced Exposure) . Or you can get it from us.

















Some reviews of the LP:

http://www.dustedmagazine.com/features/658
http://zgun.blogspot.com/2007_12_01_archive.html
http://www.blastitude.com/26/#queequeg

"Who am I? Why am I here?"

These questions have no answers. As long as you remain interested, keep reading.