Monday, September 24, 2007

Land Animal / Melt Yr Ears

I'll get around to the 'Coming Soon' list shortly (or, well, soon...) but first another mixtape post.


I

A new writer by the name of Land Animal has started up a blog devoted solely to mixtapes. LAB005 'One Step Ahead to the Time of Nothingness' has just been released there, featuring a selection of some of the best and less well-known Japanese bands of recent times. It is proof - as if we needed it - of the fact that every form of rock music that the Japanese touch turns to gold, as one blogger puts it. And what Japanese bands may lack in the clarity of their English translations (see: the name of the mixtape, the title of an Envy song) they more than make up for in the brutality of their guitar sounds (see: most Envy songs). As you can tell, I like Envy. But there are plenty more Japanese bands that you and I must discover in the near future.



II

This is a mixtape of my own, and a kind of sequel to 'Tickle Yr Ears'. As its name might suggest, it features some stranger and noisier sounds, as well as some of the more sonically inventive bands that I have had the pleasure to discover, either through blogs or my own knowledge of the (often far too bland) world of punk and hardcore. Anyway, here's a more prosaic description and a tracklist:

'Melt Yr Ears'


"This mixtape is meant to be a subversive statement on music, but is also a celebration of music (that is, pleasurable noise) in itself. Aside from all definitions and natures, part of it is heavy, and parts of it are beautifully lulling. Again, I find that the progression of songs works as much on the concept of contrast as on similarity. Regrettably, the sequence outlaid could not accomodate any Suicide (a severe omission for a work of this kind) but doubtless an intrepid soul somewhere, sometime, will make a mixtape containing 'Frankie Teardrop'. Finally, pay close attention to the instructions at the beginning of the first track."


SIDE A


1. The Black Keys - The Breaks

2. Buckets Full of Teeth - Dreams of Dead Bosses

3. McLusky - The All Encompassing Positive

4. The Clash - Lose This Skin

5. La Quiete - Sulla Diffrenza Fra Un Sorriso E Una Risata

6. Sugar - Tilted

7. Mohinder - Expiration

8. Slint - Rhoda


SIDE B


1. Lou Reed - Metal Machine Music III

2. Husker Du - Recurring Dreams



4 comments:

Anonymous said...

haha, this is amazing. thanks. nice mix as well. i just picked up the black keys - junior kimbrough covers tonight.

i considered lhasa, but i only have the 3-way with raein and daitro, and their material doesn't hold a candle next to those bands. do they have newer material? thanks again

-LA

gabbagabbahey said...

Cool, the Chulahoma EP is really good. Much better than the Black Keys originals these days, in my opinion. I have a disc of the Kimbrough originals as well, which is pretty good if you want it.

As for Lhasa, it is rumoured that they are going to make an album. Other than that, it's just the 3-way split. And, again in my opinion, those three songs are outstanding (have you seen my review?). Daitro and Raein are merely very good in comparison.

Anonymous said...

dreams of dead bosses is clearly the best bft song... im glad to see it getting put on a mix!

gabbagabbahey said...

yep, it was one of the BFT tracks that stood out for me originally - but it was hard to choose, all the same, since their all so damn short! Except for the one-band, one-song convention, I probably would have put 'Sickened' in immediately afterwards, and 'Wake Up', and so on...
It's hard to appreciate their songs in isolation - they're more of an organic whole.