The Antarcticans - Teach Children: Fear All Teachings Of Eternity

So The Antarcticans. The chances that you've heard about them are small, though they released this album as late as 2006. They are a post-rock band basically. On the other hand they got a lot more to offer than just plain post-rock. Picture yourself Dick Dale playing Godspeed You! Black Emperor, while listening to Sonic Youth Records. The harsh mix between Post-Rock, Noise-Rock, Surf, Psych (the list carries on) makes this album one of the greatest released last year.

There is nothing to discuss. If you don't listen to this and/or don't like it, you're an ignorant. Enough has been said, now;

Listen here.

Enon - Lost Marbles And Exploded Evidence

Listening to this record for the first time, you sit and think to yourself: "Hmm, I wonder what that was?!" Listening to it again will make you go: "Hmm, electronics, semi-distorted vocals, not bad at all!" Listening to it for the third time will leave you astonished and overwhelmed: "Just how do they manage to put all those exciting, spine-tingling sounds on a single CD?"

Such is the nature of Lost Marbles And Exploded Evidence. It's not an easy listen. But then again, it is all too facile to just put it on the stereo, groove away to the playful bass-line of the first track, and slowly forget about the whole thing. Until you reach the sixth track, and these minimal, pumped-to-the-verge-of-overdriven drums hit you up side the head and make you go right back to the start and give it a closer inspection. Or you could show the album some repect and give it your full attention right from the beginning!

LMAEE (or LAMEE if you're an ignorant) is a multi-faceted collection of relatively short musical explorations, and though it is not avant-garde or definable as traditional experimental music, its mix of primal rhytmic body-manipulation (parts of it even makes you wanna bop your head!), slacker-like vocals of both female and male persuasion (sometimes even in harmony, lo and behold!), weird tremulating sounds and semi-noisy soundscapes all adds up to quite a worthwhile experience. This is electrorock/pop as it always should be. Definitely lives up to its title!

Listen here.

Cornershop is as rare a thing as a good Indian indie band. Actually they are not pure Indian, but was formed in the English city of Leicester in 1992. There are several Indian members in the band though - and so the music has roots in different Indian music. Hold On It Hurts was their debut from 1994 and is impossible to put in one of those boxes, which are very popular these days. A mix of Indie, Psych, Rock'n'Roll, Surf and much more goes hand in hand on this album.

If you only know them through the hit-album When I Was Borned For The 7th time, there is no excuse not listening to this, since this is indescribably musch better.

Listen right here

The Index

It's about time to give some credit to the band, who gave this blog it's name. The Index was a californian band in the sixties. They recorded their debut album in a cellar and so it was later released on DC Recordings. Later on two of the members met again and recorded another album.

A lot of feedback on about every instrument ensures that this album has an amazing dreaming sound. Truly ´67 psych.

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Nick Drake - Pink Moon

Recommending Nick Drake, shouldn't really be necessary these days. We’ll do it anyway in case that someone should have missed him. Nick Drake was an English singer/songwriter born in 1948 and died in 1974 – only two years after releasing his third album; Pink Moon.

During his lifetime he never managed to reach commercial succes, and none of his works sold more than five thousand copies. Despite this fact, he is, today, considered to be one of the most important artists in English singer/songwriting tradition.

Drake was signed to Island Records, who after the lack of succes related to the first releases – Five Leaves Left (1969) and Bryter Layter (1970) – didn’t showed much interest in releasing another album. However the founder of Island Records; Chris Blackwell, liked Nick Drakes music and believed that Pink Moon could reach commerciel succes, and thus the album was released in the end.

Pink Moon is a very stark and bare recording, mainly because Drake had been really dissapointed with the sound on his previous releases. It is approximately 28 minutes, with Drakes voice and guitar – only accompanied by a piano once (on the title track). This record should be in every record collection really, and there is no reason to make further comments to the music itself, just enjoy this fantastic piece of musical art.

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Jim O'Rourke - I'm Happy And I'm Singing, And a 1,2,3,4

Jim O'Rourke er født i 1969, og associeres ofte med Chicagos Tidlige experimental scene. På de seneste år vil mange dog nok forbinde ham med Sonic Youth, som han blev medlem af i 2000. Siden (2005) er han dog stoppet som fuldtidsmedlem for at fokusere på sin filmkunst.

Udover at have udgivet en god portion soloalbums har han også produceret for en lang række artister. Af de mest kendte kan man nævne bl.a. Wilco, Smog, Faust og Beth Orton. Han er meget alsidig både som musiker og producer, hvilket vel også fremgår ret åbenlyst af ovenstående navne.

I'm Happy And I'm Singing, And a 1,2,3,4 består af tre numre, der hedder henholdsvist I'm Happy, And I'm Singing og And a 1,2,3,4. Åbningsnummeret er relativt syret/dronet electronica, man vil kunne drage sammenligninger med bl.a. engelske Orbital. Et langt trancendentalt stykke, der langsomt bygger op omkring aggressive panorerede lyde, for til sidst at gå ned i det dybere register og blive mere meditativt.

And I'm Singing Har nogenlunde samme princip, men er dog, umiddelbart mere lettilgængeligt, hvis man kan bruge et sådant ord i sammenhæng med denne plade. Rent faktisk har dette nummer også en stortromme der giver noget der kan minde om tempofeeling.

Tredje nummer er den 21 min. lange And a 1,2,3,4, der er min personlige favorit. Den er langfra ligeså aggressiv som de to foregående, men bygger langsomt op med synths og rolige guitarklangflader. Det er meditativt, roligt, behageligt og en masse andre dejlige ting.

Man bør høre denne plade.

Myspace (dog ikke indeholdende nogen tracks fra omtalte plade)