CRUCIAL '78

 

From the opening echoes of PRINCE JAMMY's track that sets the tones to a bizarre dub from JOE GIBBS & THE PROFESSIONALS to TRINITY to U-ROY's smooth rizzed out rock steady, Crucial '78 is a master class in dub, crackling beats and hopelessly infectious reggae adjacent sounds. A glorious (and presumably homemade) mix that truly makes you feel like you've been on a journey once it's finished.  

CRUCIAL '78

JASPER PATTISON

A wonderful gift arrived in our box some weeks ago, simply titled A Short JP Collection. Aural musings from CULTURE SHOCK/CITIZEN FISH bassist Jasper Pattison created and compiled in the early months of Covid. Twenty minutes of dub breaks, spoken word, subdued oddball angular punk freak outs - there's a level of creative genius in Bath that is astounding, and sadly I feel like it's going to take a (punk) generation for folks to realize what they've been missing. Listen to TEN TENNANTS, listen to THE CLUTTON BROTHERS, listen to BURGLE KING, listen to Jasper. 

A SHORT JP COLLECTION: AUG 2020

WICKERMAN

 

In the moment we all just called this "industrial dance" music or something similar, because we didn't really know better and because subgenrefication of music hadn't really taken over (yet). It wasn't quite what we knew of as acid house, surely wasn't techno, kinda had a darker edge (and guitars) and you could absolutely dance down to it, so....we were teenagers, not critics. We wanted to sneak out of the house and drive 90 miles to hit the after hours club and sweat until 4am and drive back home fighting sleep and adolescent exhaustion, hoping to make it into bed before the adults woke up. And that's what we did - and WICKERMAN would have been the sound track to one of those drives, had I known WICKERMAN existed. 

WICKERMAN
CONTENTS: Two tracks that land somewhere between Kooler Than Jesus and Land Of Rape And Honey, one drugged out dub number, and a whole bunch of questions. 

ERIC LOU ROOT

 

A simply indescribable recording from 1980s Netherlands, a private pressing unearthed by nerds in Amsterdam and presented on cassette by the geniuses at Loathed Sound. Drugged out synths dominate a recording that was perhaps initially meant by the artist to be akin to reggae/dub, but manifests something completely different. Like a SCIENTIST session invaded by Latvia's ZODIAC, Root jams through an hour of bizarre, innocent and pure sounds that transcend earth and universe, unrestrained by convention, tradition, or gravity. You can feel how deep inside himself the creator had to go to pull these sounds out...makes you wonder if he ever came back. 

DON'T WORRY

JASPER

 I received this gem in the post last week, and it's had me walking on a cloud for the last few days. Ultimately, it's just Jasper hanging out with his mate, playing some tapes and occasionally talking about records, and that's exactly the magic. You're in the room with them, cranking some dub demos while enjoying morning coffee and tinkering with bicycles, spitting out poetry when moved to do so. The jams are excellent, grounding, and there's something joyous about the way your host/s approach PARQUET COURTS with the same interest and/or glee they bestow upon classics that have been with them for 40 years. While J.P. Spoken Word + Mix Tape is perfect as a background, expect an increased benefit from a dedicated listen. 

J.P. SPOKEN WORD + MIX TAPE

As an extra piece of aural joy, Jasper has unearthed several (digital) releases in the last months via the Basement 7 imprint. I feel like the cassette posted today is a natural extension of recordings like these, format expanded to make space for other artists. All of the recordings are sublime (as is the brilliant BURGLE KING release from 2008) , but I can't seem to get A Pen Will Dream out of my head. 

MUTABARUKA

I can assure you that Outcry is as killer as the cover suggests. Jamaican dub poet MUTABARUKA sounds fully acclimated to the eighties world of synths and production here, quite a departure from  the gloriously primitive debut Check It!, but it was 1984....so almost all production miscues are forgiven. But listen underneath - the flute on "Canaan Lan'," the poetry of "Black Queen," and the entirety of "Blacks In Amerika" and "Free Up De Lan'" demonstrate the power without question. 

OUTCRY

MALEEM MAHMOUD GHANIA with PHAROAH SANDERS

Pharoah Sanders should need no introduction, and Maleem Mahmoud Ghania is a Moroccan Gnawa master. This collaboration was recorded in 1994, Sanders joining with Mahmoud's ensemble in Morocco. Simply put, this recording is incredible. 

THE TRANCE OF SEVEN COLORS

This recording was released on cassette by Bill Laswell's Axiom in 1994, re-issued digitally in 2016, booted in 2017 (pictured), and given proper vinyl treatment earlier this year by the German Zehra label. 

CRABSKULL

Incredibly chill ambient dub from Canada. Like.....extremely chill. 

JOVIAN BLACK OPERA

GALGET // IKARIYA EIICHI

Two new-to-me Japanese acts teamed up to make a likely new-to-you cassette that reminds all of us what a good idea it can be to make hardcore coexist with different sounds. GALGET's uncompromising fastcore attack is a breath of fresh air (and fellow band folks - listen to how the change the presentation of three chord riffs to make them into entirely "different" parts...far from a lazy way to make songs, I think of it as economical and kinda genius), and it just sounds like they are partying. The non-cover for MINOR THREAT's cover of that WIRE banger to close the side is perhaps and accidental harbinger of what's to come on the IKARIYA EIICHI side...a blown out screwed version of BAD BRAINS' "Leaving Babylon" and a truly bizarre non-take of "Pay To Cum." Bear in mind that this is a band who also dropped a Japanese language proto-dub psychedelic version of "(Take Me Home) Country Roads," so reinterpretations seem to be the name of the game. Good and fast meets good and weird....keep 'em coming, punks. 

GALGET // IKARIYA EIICHI

ENEMIE (USA)

A hypnotic collection of minimal dub and synth/electronics recorded and mixed live during two sessions last year. Simple enough to fade into the background if you let it, but these sounds are like quicksand if you are paying attention. The five minute molasses dirge (simply labeled here as "03") was the turning point for this listener...

041615 & 042115

ŚMIERĆ KILINCZNA

The second volume of Punky Reggae Party (find the first tape here, hard to believe that I posted those tracks more than five fukkn years ago). I'm going to avoid a history lesson, primarily because I know little about ŚMIERĆ KILINCZNA aside from their two 45s on Tonpress, these two cassettes, and the things you find when you slip down an internet hole....like this insane video for "Paciorek" (a more subdued, yet weirder, version of that track can be found on Punky Reggae Party cześć 1). Basically, I know that ŚMIERĆ KILINCZNA were a band of Polish punks active in the early '80s who bridged punk and reggae sounds and approached everything with an intellectual weirdness that is difficult to describe. Favorite jammer on this installment is "Robinson," but this might simply be because it rocks harder that any of the tunes aside from the untitled and impossible to digest final track, a free form rocker that sadly falls victim to age and the physical limitations of magnetic tape. Their normal approach was steeped in reggae/punk, but these two tapes forgo the latter for the former, and you should prepare yourself for extended jams and gratuitous guitar solos...not that I'm complaining. I can't pretend that these tracks weren't a hard toke at first, but context and concentration is everything, my friends....and now I find myself binging on these two tapes with almost alarming frequency. If nothing else, this version of "Edukacja" from the second Tonpress single is really really cool.

PUNKY REGGAE PARTY cześć II

CITIZEN FISH

I will freely admit that I joined the CITIZEN FISH camp pretty late in the game. The early '90s were, by most accounts, the heyday of both the band's output and their popularity, but I didn't even see them play live until 1997 (and even then, it was only because Karoline was on tour with them, I am not sure I had ever even heard their music). But it didn't take much to see why people and punks from virtually every subsection of every scene were into the band, and I've been an unabashed fan ever since that first show. I'll still hold Life Size as my favorite record, but please don't ask me to pick a favorite show because there have been to many to choose from...and they are never bad. It just doesn't happen. The Psychological Background Reports are collections of outtakes, field recordings and remixes, things that few bands could pull off in an even remotely interesting fashion, but when CITIZEN FISH digs into the archives, the result is nothing short of fantastic.  This is the first installment, circa 1993....a full hour of dub, reggae, remixes, techno (lest you thought Phil was a latecomer to the electronic music game!), alternates and interviews, all carefully manipulated for your listening pleasure. Sometimes I rip tapes and leave them in the background while I get on with life, but this one held me mesmerized....the manipulation is every bit as effective today as it was then. And, for the record, no matter how many crucial shows (or years?) I missed out on by jumping on the bandwagon late, I wouldn't change a thing about my relationship to the band or their music because it's been nothing short of perfect from that show in San Luis Obispo until today...

FIRST PSYCHOLOGICAL BACKGROUND REPORT

THE SHOWBOAT EXPERIENCE

Before we trolled the internet looking for new (or old) sounds, those of us lucky enough to live in the broadcast range of someone more enlightened or informed would crowd around the radio and listen. College stations were the obvious sources of many early punk educations, but I remember tuning into a hazy KMOD from Tulsa and adjusting the foil outside my window so I could hear their "deep cut" classic rock LPs on Sunday nights (I recorded many of them, and the thrill of snagging an early '70s DEEP PURPLE record as a 13 year old was immense). When I was 15, I started a new wave radio show on the AOR/easy listening/schlock format station in my small town, and ran with it until I left town, so hopefully someone tuned in to hear whatever gems I had unearthed during the week (though for the first couple of years it was mostly non-single cuts off of CURE and VIOLENT FEMMES with a DEAD KENNEDYS or THRILL KILL KULT track thrown in here and there). Maybe (probably?) the internet will take over completely (or maybe the radio format will just transfer to the internet, as with the still excellent and still weekly Maximum Rocknroll Radio whose show this week features pals of mine) but there's something special about the static swelling in and out of a poorly recorded cassette recorded by a kid hoping to hear something new, and last winter I definitely cruised through Grants, New Mexico at 3am listening to a certifiably ill black metal show on a Native community station. Found a place to park on a hill where I could get a clear signal and I just listened...

TIM & PAT: THE SHOWBOAT EXPERIENCE

Anarcho punk, late '80s college rock, reggae weird snippets, and two dudes talking about tunes they like and generally being weirdos. Exactly what we want.

KUCHALANA

Closed minded hardcore pricks can move right along to Wednesday (when I will probably post some synth drone annoyance) and try your luck, while those of you who like to approach punk with open ears and no preconceptions are probably about to be stoked. I admit that I like this more than I think I should, and that I cannot really defend my appreciation of what is essentially  college beach cabana meets surfer douche outfit with one kinda punk song (and my defense would not extend to the 6+ minute "The Fall" -  I have no excuse for that one), but that doesn't change the fact that the jams are chill...which is the whole point. It's the dub element that appeals to me more than the reggae - "Silent Stare" into the weird "Silent Songs #2" remix that closes the tape are fukkn killers...and the whole tape somehow makes me feel like I'm on vacation. I cannot imagine that very many people will listen to this, considering the general demographic of Escape visitors and my description, but I think that those who do will be rewarded.

THE INPUT FOR AN OUTPUT