Wednesday, December 28, 2005
5 Records More Repetitive Than Who Is Mike Jones
(here's some unclaimed nonsense that oozed out of me a few weeks ago. I'll have a real-life top ten hoohaw up one minute after midnight on January 1st.)
Best known as that guy named Mike Jones, Mike Jones has ridden his unified theory of rappery to the top of the rappin' charts. Repeating himself endlessly was the key to his success, and his single-minded persistence has influenced an entire burgeoning subgenre of mind-expanding, experimental hip-hop. Instead of repeating certain words or phrases ad infinitum, these intrepid explorers extend entire musical figures, or even single notes, for as long as a human’s consciousness can endure. Forget "screw", “drone” is where the “kids” are at now, and here's a brief rundown on some of the best drone “joints” of the year.
Excepter, Throne, Load Records: Between any two defined points lie an infinite number of points. Between any two defined points on Throne lies an infinite amount of utter badassedness. Excepter's churning exercise in Biblical cosmogony howls like the furthest regions of known creation. Not just the best drone record of the year, the best album overall, for my money.
Double Leopards, Out of One, Through One and To One, Eclipse Records: Deep druidic drones, shifting like tectonic plates, or the tiny bones of your skulls doing an impersonation thereof. The music of the Double Leopards sounds less created than summoned.
Skaters, Pavilionous Miracles of Circular Facet Dice, Chocolate Monk: If the secrets of spiritual knowledge are encoded in the architecture of cathedrals, then the Skaters have been constructing miniature Chartres through feedback and delay for a couple of years now. With a karaoke machine, two voices, and a multitude of effects pedals, the Skaters orchestrate a gospel music wherein the Lord is truly all-encompassing, and kind of splattery, too.
Davenport, O, Too High Ditty For My Simple Rhyme, Time-Lag Records: Slowly unfolding rustic rumbling that is tolerant and welcoming of all cultures. It's like Eastern Mysticism Hee-Haw in Thule, with fiddles and throat-singing and probably zithers, and shit, too. Mostly, though, this two-track album is a nice, warm-hearted American take on classic icy Nordicism, with some Buddhist stuff thrown in for good measure.
Avarus, Ruskea Timantti, tUMULt Records: In actuality a compilation, but one released in ’05, and mostly of music almost impossible to find in America, so we’ll let it slide. Avarus is the all-consuming vortex at the center of the bally-hooed Finnish improv-folk scene. Avarus records are generally pretty excellent, but the main reason to pick this up is for the amazing number “AVP”. Its propulsive minimalism sounds like Can playing Terry Riley, and is a guaranteed twenty minutes of blissful mental paralysis.
(here's some unclaimed nonsense that oozed out of me a few weeks ago. I'll have a real-life top ten hoohaw up one minute after midnight on January 1st.)
Best known as that guy named Mike Jones, Mike Jones has ridden his unified theory of rappery to the top of the rappin' charts. Repeating himself endlessly was the key to his success, and his single-minded persistence has influenced an entire burgeoning subgenre of mind-expanding, experimental hip-hop. Instead of repeating certain words or phrases ad infinitum, these intrepid explorers extend entire musical figures, or even single notes, for as long as a human’s consciousness can endure. Forget "screw", “drone” is where the “kids” are at now, and here's a brief rundown on some of the best drone “joints” of the year.
Excepter, Throne, Load Records: Between any two defined points lie an infinite number of points. Between any two defined points on Throne lies an infinite amount of utter badassedness. Excepter's churning exercise in Biblical cosmogony howls like the furthest regions of known creation. Not just the best drone record of the year, the best album overall, for my money.
Double Leopards, Out of One, Through One and To One, Eclipse Records: Deep druidic drones, shifting like tectonic plates, or the tiny bones of your skulls doing an impersonation thereof. The music of the Double Leopards sounds less created than summoned.
Skaters, Pavilionous Miracles of Circular Facet Dice, Chocolate Monk: If the secrets of spiritual knowledge are encoded in the architecture of cathedrals, then the Skaters have been constructing miniature Chartres through feedback and delay for a couple of years now. With a karaoke machine, two voices, and a multitude of effects pedals, the Skaters orchestrate a gospel music wherein the Lord is truly all-encompassing, and kind of splattery, too.
Davenport, O, Too High Ditty For My Simple Rhyme, Time-Lag Records: Slowly unfolding rustic rumbling that is tolerant and welcoming of all cultures. It's like Eastern Mysticism Hee-Haw in Thule, with fiddles and throat-singing and probably zithers, and shit, too. Mostly, though, this two-track album is a nice, warm-hearted American take on classic icy Nordicism, with some Buddhist stuff thrown in for good measure.
Avarus, Ruskea Timantti, tUMULt Records: In actuality a compilation, but one released in ’05, and mostly of music almost impossible to find in America, so we’ll let it slide. Avarus is the all-consuming vortex at the center of the bally-hooed Finnish improv-folk scene. Avarus records are generally pretty excellent, but the main reason to pick this up is for the amazing number “AVP”. Its propulsive minimalism sounds like Can playing Terry Riley, and is a guaranteed twenty minutes of blissful mental paralysis.
