Sunday, December 20, 2009

New Arrivals #335

Partied so hard last night at our shopping shindig / Alan Lomax In Haiti box set release party that we almost forgot to blog about the list we just sent out, which you'll of course find here.

Records Of The Week:

Tony Tears "Voci Dal Passato" (Manium Evocandorum Doctrina) cd $22.00
Sad, psychedelic Goblin meets Doom Metal music from an Italian one-man-band. Eerie, hypnotic, and vaguely dubby dirges that are soooo sad and beautiful, and heavy too.
Lloyd Miller "A Lifetime In Oriental Jazz" (Jazzman) cd $17.98
We're super stoked on the "Oriental Jazz" stylings of Lloyd Miller, who put Persian instruments and Indian ragas into his compositions back in the '50s and '60s, as documented on this amazing new collection of his otherworldly "world music" jazz sides.
Oneohtrix Point Never "Rifts" (No Fun Productions) 2cd $16.98
A double cd anthology of this cosmic electronic project's three vinyl releases of 2009, a sprawling selection of ambient sonic vapor trails passing through moonlit nightscapes redrawn in neon hyperdelic colors...

Thursday, December 17, 2009

You know it's that time of the year when

Moon Duo Release Free Holiday Track (in the Wooden Shjips tradition)

San Francisco drone-rockers Moon Duo (Woodsist, Sacred Bones) have released a free download of the holiday nugget "Silver Bells", available at the following sites:

http://www.myspace.com/moonduo (widget under band members)
http://www.tweetforatrack.com/moonduo

Peace!! and happy holidays everyone!

(the above from an email from Sick Thirst)

Party time again!

You may have already seen our email about this (or heard about it on KQED's Forum show this morning), but we're having another late night AQ shopping party this weekend, to celebrate the holidays and also the release of a really amazing box set... here's the skinny:

Everybody had such a good time at the last aQ after hours party, we figured we should definitely do it again. Especially since a bunch of folks weren't able to come the first time. So if you missed out, here's your chance, to hang out, play games, eat, drink and buy records!

Plus this time around, we can combine all that hanging out, eating, drinking, playing video arcade games and buying records, with a special Record Release Party for the long long long in the works Alan Lomax In Haiti TEN CD box set, newly issued by our pal David's label Harte Recordings!

The recordings gathered together in this box were originally recorded between 1936-1937, when Lomax and his wife were documenting music and rituals for the Library Of Congress. Over 50 hours of field recordings (captured on archaic aluminum discs! Over 500 in all), from street musicians, to children's songs, far out jazz to dreamy vocal music, classical piano to angelic torch songs, voudou worship to big band, an incredible collection of sounds, none available to the public before now!! The box is gorgeous too, and includes two books, one is Lomax's Haitian field journal, the other a hard bound set of liner notes and essays, as well as a a facsimile of Lomax's period map of Haiti, covered in his handwritten notes. WOW.

We'll be playing selections from the box all night, so be prepared to be blown away, and of course we'll have the boxes available to purchase.

But besides the record release celebration, it's also, of course, a chance to do some record shopping, pick up some cool tunes while you sup and sip and socialize. The perfect time to get some of that last minute Xmas shopping done, while eating creme brulee and talking to Andee about his baffling love of crabcore, or getting some D&D pointers from Allan, or just shooting the musical shit with aQ staffers and customers alike.

And like last time, We'll be staying open late, we'll have snacks, sodas, a bunch of beer (but you can BYOB too!), and as most of you know, we have some awesome video games, we'll set 'em on free play.

We'll have some snacks too, the usual party fare, and there'll be plenty of other munchables, thanks to some of SF's food cart elite, the Creme Brulee Cart is coming by for sure, we're hoping to get the the Magic Curry Kart back, and possibly one or two of the other amazing purveyors of portable food in the city. In fact, if you read our list, and have a cart yourself, feel free to come by and set up outside and be a part of the festivities!

So please come and spend part of your weekend with us, should be a blast, make an evening of it, we'd love to see you, and please help support our shop by buying some records while you're here!

The details are these:

SATURDAY 12.19.09
AQ After Hours Record Shopping Shindig #2
+ Alan Lomax In Haiti 10cd Boxset Record Release Party

From 9-11pm
Right here, aQuarius recOrds
1055 Valencia Street (btwn 21st and 22nd)


Hopefully see you Saturday!!

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

None more academic (aca-demonic?)

Did you see Ben Ratliff's article entitled Thank You, Professor, That Was Putrid in today's New York Times, about an academic symposium of sorts dedicated to black metal? We found it interesting, and thought you might too.

(Thanks to AQ customer Chris Beirne for directing us to this item.)

Monday, December 14, 2009

Isis gets Circular

Check out this live footage of Circle's Mika Ratto singing for Isis!



The two bands were just on tour together in Europe, is the explanation.

Sunday, December 6, 2009

Some virtual aQ press clippings

Andee was just quoted in this LA Times article about Norwegian black metal documentary "Until The Light Takes Us".

And back in October, Allan was interviewed for this online Wall Street Journal piece pertaining to the heavy metal video game "Brutal Legend" and its soundtrack.

We knew somebody was gonna do something like this

An iPhone orchestra!

New Arrivals #334

If you haven't checked out our latest list already, here, please do!

Records Of The Week:

The Puritan "Lithium Gates" (Spinefarm) cd $16.98
After much effort, we FINALLY managed to get copies of this unique Finnish ultra-doom masterpiece, a compact disc collecting two out of print 12"s by the warped and weird new band of former Reverend Bizarre frontman S.A. Hynninen, aka Sir Albert Witchfinder!
Jute Gyte "Old Ways" (Jeshimoth) cd-r $11.98
Incredible obscure cd-r of super strange mandolin laced blown out crumbling ultra raw industrial tinged synth laden black metal!

Oh, and by the way, if you did look at the list Saturday morning, a bunch of the sound samples weren't working, sorry. Those have been fixed!