TWO leaks in less than 24 hours, a record for us

When it rains, it pours. First a sink in the apartment above Andee's tUMULt closet overflowed... that was last night... then this morning a different sink in a different apartment over the store ALSO overflowed. Good grief. Fortunately, the damage to merchandise was minimal. Again, maybe we should change the name from Aquarius to Aquarium...

BMSR listening happy hour TONITE

Tuesday, May 26th
Terrorbird Media, Aquarius Records, & Graveface Present:
BLACK MOTH SUPER RAINBOW "Eating Us" Album Listening Party
featuring live performances from Ghosts On Tape and Tempo No Tempo
+ free BMSR giveaways & exclusive download cards & your chance to win the entire BMSR catalog from Graveface!!!
6-9pm, FREE, 21+
@ The Knockout
3223 Mission St.
San Francisco, CA 94110

To coincide with the release of the new BMSR album as well as their current cross country tour with School Of Seven Bells, Graveface records is throwing a string of release/listening parties across the country in conjunction with Terrorbird Media, record stores, and college radio stations. For the San Francisco edition, Graveface teams up with Aquarius Records and Terrorbird Media to throw a happy hour bash from 6-9pm at the Knockout in San Francisco, where folks will have a chance to get BMSR freebies, and maybe even win the entire Black Moth Super Rainbow back catalog as well as the special import only "hairy" edition of the album! In addition to a full listen of "Eating Us", joining the SF festivities are live performances local post-dub/disco upstarts Tempo No Tempo as well as tropical-bass maestro Ghosts On Tape. This event is FREE and open to the pubic from 6-9pm, 21+!

In addition, Black Moth Super Rainbow hits San Francisco two days later on Thursday, May 28th @ Bottom of the Hill for a sold out show with School of Seven Bells and Odd Nosdam.

Windy & Carl Wednesday!

Just a reminder... a chance for free tickets if you act quick...

Aquarius Records & Kranky Records present

WINDY & CARL (on their first tour in six years!)
Jonas Reinhardt
Nudge

Wednesday, May 27th
8 pm
$10
@ The Rickshaw Stop (155 Fell St.)

And we have TWO PAIRS of tickets to give away to this show, we'll be doing that sometime tomorrow (Tuesday) so better get your entries in asap - send an email to storeaquariusrecords.org with WINDY & CARL TIX in the subject line, and we'll pick two winners at random!

Here's our review of their last year's album on Kranky, "Songs For The Broken Hearted":

Dream-drone, slow-slowcore uberwunder duo Windy & Carl are long-time favorites of Aquarius, and by long we mean looooong. As in, we've been with them the whole way, and this fall marks 19 years for the project. So anyway, we were plenty excited when we finally got a copy of this, their newest record. Hot on the heels of Windy's lovely (and haunting) solo record, these tracks were actually started at the same time and nearly went unfinished. Thankfully they were saved! Press releases mentioned vocals, vocals, vocals. Those who know W&C probably understand that "lots of vocals" is relative. Two or three songs a record with Windy singing is kind of a lot! Yeah, so when we got this we were totally blown away. Again! Man, there's definitely a reason we hold them in such high regard: they never fail to take us exactly where we want to go. If you're a fan, you already know that W&C can conjure up the dreamiest six-string drones, never, ever drums, and the sweetest daydream vocals, employed sparingly and pretty damn perfectly. Fans of Labradford, Stars of the Lid, maybe even the quietest Low, this is already - or soon to be - your favorite band! We love Windy & Carl, and we want you to have the chance to love them, too. This is definitely a great place to start. Oh, and check out "Snow Covers Everything," it might be our favorite track on here. If you couldn't tell already, recommended!

New Arrivals list #319

It's up. We're up now too, barely.

Records Of The Week:
Nadja "When I See The Sun Always Shines On TV" (The End) cd $14.98
The Canadian dronedoomduo who offer up perhaps their most accessible album yet, a sublime all-covers affair paying tribute to their influences, from My Bloody Valentine to Slayer to A-Ha! We liked the concept, being curious before we'd even heard it, and it turned out to be even better than we were hoping for.
Telescopes "Singles Compilation #2" (Mind Expansion) cd $15.98
A Record Of The Week sequel of sorts, a second volume of spaced-out singles from '90s UK drug-psych rockers the Telescopes. Their first Singles Compilation was a Record Of The Week and part 2 is just as good, maybe even more far out.

Instore! Today! Cave!

That's right, today Saturday May 23rd (though it seems like tomorrow as I type this, since it's 1:25 am) we're having AQ faves CAVE play a special, slightly less loud than usual for them, improvised set. At 6pm, so if you're not already down here shopping, skip out on whatever Memorial Day weekend stuff you've got going on and c'mon down to see 'em. They played Friday night, moments ago really, at the Hemlock with Mammatus and Prizehog, wish we coulda gone but it was/is "list night" here... but at least we'll get to see 'em later today!

For those not so terribly familiar with Cave, here's our review of their sadly out of print debut LP "Hunt Like Devil" we made a Record Of The Week sometime last year:

At first glance, it might be difficult to know what this record is all about. The sleeve is just a photo of trees and leaves, a dense overgrown forest. Pull out the cd, that too is cryptic, just some random letters on the disc, the sleeve, an old crinkled photo from some seventies porn mag of a topless cowgirl with a gun in her mouth. There's an insert, with a bunch of strange shapes, the word CAVE right at the top. But we know what it is. We've been waiting for this disc for ages. The debut recording from, wait for it... CAVE! Who just so happen to be the spacerock krautrock dronerock riff heavy jam band side project of one Warhammer 48K, who were already spacey and krauty and droney to begin with, so needless to say this is some seriously kick ass, aQ freakout worthy shit.
For the attention span impaired, howabout some Hawkwind, Can, Circle, Lightning Bolt, Pharaoh Overlord? Sounds good huh? Well, it's easy to hear bits and pieces of all of those bands in the sound of Cave, a dual drummer-ed riff heavy psych rock, that takes single riffs and hammers at them, pounding and pummeling, repetitive and mesmerizing, a sort of kraut flecked hypnorock, but with all sorts of strange twists and turns, bizarre arrangements, baffling breakdowns, but woven into longform jams that should have anyone into the above mentioned bands frothing at the mouth.
The opening track is a gorgeous little tangle of minor key melodies, looped and repeated, over a tense distant drone, thick swaths of keyboard whir over soft tangles of acoustic guitar and space-y backwards guitar swoops, but then the opening riff of the second track kicks in, and it's all fuzzy and feral, the greatest riff Pharoah Overlord never wrote, and they just hang on it, way longer than any normal band would, FOREVER, before the drums kick in, and they're off, a relentless and hooky groove, with brief blasts of super dynamic chaos, before slipping right back into it. Keyboards lay still more hypnotic melodies over the top, vocals, when there are any, are shouted way down in the mix, or are wordless falsetto la-la-la's, adding more texture and sonic complexity than anything. The dual drummers mix it up spitting out occasional tribal squalls, sometimes thick swirls of staticky fuzz wash over the proceedings, but their propulsive fortitude never falters. The first two tracks would almost be enough. Nearly 12 minutes of heavy freaked out space jam nirvana. You can practically feel the walls heaving and the sweat dripping through the speakers. You'll probably need a lie down afterwards. But there's no time, cuz hell, there's 6 more tracks to dig through. The sound is punk rock, lo-fi, but lush and epic, damaged and delirious, like garage rockers raised on Magma and Faust, there's plenty of Neu! in there, Stereolab too then, but it's way heavier than that, the guitars crunchy and thick, occasionally opening up into wailing psychrock blowouts, the drums getting more and more distorted and frenzied. Imagine an amphetamine fueled Circle or Can, but via the basement, the sound a sweat soaked drug drenched mostly instrumental kraut groove
Mathy, murky, like the fucked up younger brother of Yes, a Neanderthal krautrock, laced with awesome grinding space rock riffage, blown out squalls of ur-psych, flurries of percussive splatter, chanting cult vocals, bits of what the fuck vocoder (!), but for all the weirdness, the core sound of Cave is THE RIFF. Whether it's a warbly synth, or a superdistorted guitar, or tra-la-la vocals, they all align themselves with that riff, the mission, to entrance, to ensorcel, a heaving, pulsing, throbbing mass, the sound magnetic and irresistible. Endless jams that aren't really, but feel like they should be. Like they are anyway. Transcending the laws of time and space, dragging us kicking and screaming, bouncing and bobbing, into some blissed out basement at the end of the universe, where we subsist of nothing but riffs, drums and FX. We never want to leave.

And btw they have a brand NEW album coming out super soon, called "Psychic Psummer", that is THE JAM, likely to be another Record Of The Week on an immediately upcoming AQ-list. Heck maybe they'll have some with 'em.

Wicked Witch speaks!

In case you missed it, there's an interview in the latest issue of the SF Bay Guardian with the reclusive guy behind Wicked Witch, that awesome acid-funk, "Afro-surreal" '80s obscurity reissued recently by Japan's EM Records! You can read it online here.

Another cool (& noisy) show upcoming

Black Dice
Wolf Eyes
Sic Alps
Pod Blotz

w/
VJ Kamau Patton
DJ McDuece

Friday, May 29th
OCD Warehouse
758 Natoma (@ 9TH)

[edit] Oh yeah, we're selling tickets here!

Tonight at Thee Parkside

Speaking of shows, tonight, Friday May 15th, there's another one happening that looks to be pretty cool, featuring AQ faves Wooden Shjips headlining, alongside Japanese psych monger Masami Kawaguchi's New Rock Syndicate, and openers Eternal Tapestry from Portland.

It'll be a special San Francisco edition of the New Rock Syndicate, by the way, featuring members of Thee Oh Sees, Mirza, and Numinous Eye performing with guitarist Kawaguchi.

Again, that's tonight at Thee Parkside, 9pm.

Night Of Thee Drones

Letting locals know, that some (droney) artists we've recently reviewed on our list happen to be be playing in the neighborhood tomorrow. Those would be the latter three below:

NIGHT OF THEE DRONES
The Argus Lounge
3187 Mission (@ Valencia)
Friday May 15th 9pm $5
9pm - Holly Caust - http://www.myspace.com/aleekarim
9:45pm - Laces http://www.myspace.com/ladiesoflaces
10:25pm - Thomas Dimuzio - http://www.thomasdimuzio.com/
11:10pm - Darwinsbitch - http://www.myspace.com/darwinsbitch
12:00am - Maleficia - http://www.myspace.com/maleficianoise

Prizehog (and more) audio from AQXWFMUXSXSW show

You'll find mp3s of Prizehog's awesomely spacey, heavy set here: http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2009/05/prizehog-mp3s-from-wfmuaq-sxsw-09.html

and also here: http://freemusicarchive.org/curator/WFMU/WFMUAquarius_Records_2009_SXSW_showcase__Spiros_in_Austin_TX

where the Gunslingers, Major Stars, and Mayyors sets are also archived, with more to come!!

Iron & Wine & Creme Brulee

We'll have some more pix and perhaps some audio to post from the fantastic Iron & Wine instore that happened here the other day. In the meantime, though, here's a picture of Curtis who brought his crème brûlée cart to the instore (on the left) and Sam of Iron & Wine on the right.

New Arrivals list #318

Belatedly blogging that our new New Arrivals list is up, here.

Records Of The Week:
Amen Dunes "Dia" (Locust) cd/lp $14.98/$17.98
A totally inspirational druggy drone pop freakout from one this mysterious one man band, so catchy and psychedelic!
Black Vomit "Jungle Death" (Rusty Axe) cd $9.98
The first proper cd (not cd-r) from the 'True Sheffield Black Psychedelia' scene, truly unclassifiable genius drone ambient grind wtf...
Don Cherry & Latif Khan "Music/Sangam" (Heavenly Sweetness) cd/lp $22.00/$25.00
Reissue of a brilliant 1978 East-meets-West minimalist drone jazz prog raga record from trumpeter Cherry and tabla master Khan.

Psst

In case you didn't get our last minute email, fyi we've got Iron & Wine doing an instore here today at 6pm!

28 more inches of skweee

Just in today, along with a restock of the two Museum Of Future Sound compilations on Finnish skweee label Flogsta Danshall, we received 4 new skweee 7" singles. Just a couple copies of each, so we probably won't be reviewing them, but if you're trying to stay hip to the latest skweee action, come on down (or email). They're $6.98 each. Artists/titles as follows:
Daniel Savio "Jihad Akhbar / The Djinn"
Rigas Den Andre "Too Low For Show / No Class"
EDMX "R100 / Uday Rmx"
Vakttornet / Boyz of Caligula "Tower of Murdur / Must 'Amaba"

And while we're on the subject, we should note we also have some skweee 12" vinyls in stock that are also pretty fresh, from Daniel Savio and Rigas Den Andre, as well as a split between Randy Barracuda and Mesak.

And if reading this you're like, er, what's skweee? then we should refer you to the Museum Of Future Sound reviews on our website!