Alien Community - Alien Community 2

Fax +49-69/450464: 1994

Looky-looky what I got! An honest to God, original print, ultra old-school, limited-run copy of a Fax+ CD! Not a rip, not a reissue, but an O.G. version with the classic cover-art. And with the Earth photo too, not triangular logo. Such releases were part of the 'PW' series, or 'Peter's Worldlabel', where all of his famed, globe-trotting collaborations took place. Not surprisingly, these are highly sought items, releases from the likes of Fires Of Ork, 2350 Broadway, and From Within fetching stupid amounts of money on the collector's market. Sometimes though, you get lucky on the Discogs Marketplace, and I scored myself a source that had all manner of classic Fax+ items up for offer. True, many of them were re-issues on Ambient World, but beggars can't be choosers, and I nabbed me some albums I never thought I'd land without dropping upwards of triple digits for.

One such release I always had my eye on was Namlook's pairing with Jonah Sharp as Alien Community. Their featured track in the Coldcut mix CD Tone Tales From Tomorrow Too made it among my earliest internet explorations (d'at title alone! ...not to mention the sci-fi electro), but discovering it was part of this ca-raaayy-zee catalogue of rare ambient techno, I resigned myself to wistful glances here and there. I mean, the project hadn't even been tapped for reissue with Ambient World. I guess the Spacetime Continuum tie-in just wasn't enough for consistent interest.

Even now, Alien Community doesn't rank terribly high on the list of Fax+ essentials. Well, the first album does, as there is some mighty tasty ambient electro going on there, but not their second (and last) outing under the alias. Why, one can find this for the same price of a regular CD on the used market. Strangely, the same goes for Pete and Jonah's other collaborative project, Wechselspannung, which I haven't really listened to. Its artwork is mighty familiar tho'...

Anyhow, as with many Fax+ releases of this era, Alien Community 2 features a singular sixty-minute composition titled A Long And Perilous Voyage, broken up into twelve parts around five minutes in length for handy CD skipping. Because not everyone is down for those super-noodly, feeling-out, abstract ambient segments these jam sessions often entailed. Seriously, it's like when guitarists spend time tuning their instruments, but instead with twiddly knobs on gear racks.

Also a common feature with these LP-length outings was how they were structured, with rising escalation of the various sounds in use, a mid-section of downtime with various sonic doodlings, each player doing their thing, then a bigger peak-out with everything coming to the fore. It's effective ambient techno jamming, especially if you enjoy Namlook's distinct synth pads and transistor tweeps with Sharp's spaced-out acid tweaks and electro rhythms. Still, it's just following upon the same ideas as the first album, and I can understand why some may feel it the lesser of the two Alien Community releases.

Alphaxone & Xerxes The Dark - Aftermath

Cryo Chamber: 2018

Been a while since I last indulged in the Cryo Chamber catalogue, what with me exploring other dark ambient labels for a spell. Back to the familiar, trusty ol' print of cinematic drone I must go though (yo'), with another CD bundle splurge I can never resist (can't have enough 'cryo chamber' beer can sleeves!). Still a lot of familiar names making the rounds here, but quite few new faces too. Mount Shrine, Ruptured World, Dahlia's Tear, Ager Sonus, In Quantum. Y'know, cheerful aliases! I've also noticed Cryo Chamber's cover art has grown a bit more... colourful? Okay, maybe that's too strong a word, everything still retaining that distinct, muted saturation. Still, I see whites and reds and blues and various scales of grey too. Why, In Quantum's Memory 417 could almost be synthwave cover! A very dark, depressing collection of synthwave, but that seven-segment display for the album's font screams '80s (thanks, The Police's Ghost In The Machine).

There's nothing like settling on the familiar though, and what better way to get reacquainted than with an old standby of Cryo Chamber, Alphaxone. When last I covered him, Mr. Saleh had been pairing up with the dark ambient power couple of Dronny Darko and ProtoU for a pair of albums that were conceptually quite different from each other. Naturally, I gravitated more towards the spacier of the two offerings, and so it goes again in his latest collaboration, this time with fellow Iranian Xerxes The Dark. That... doesn't strike me as the most creative of aliases Morego Dimmer could have come up with. Like, why not Xerxes The تاریک? In any event, he's floated about various dark ambient labels since the mid-'00s, but the gravitational pull of Cryo Chamber drew him within their fold for a collaborative album or three, first appearing on one of the Tomb Of... compilations.

I've taken in plenty of cosmic drone, but very little cosmic horror. The existential dread of utter nothingness is enough to send cold shivers down my neck, no need of madness-inducing unrealities mixing in. Still, Alphaxone's very good at crafting captivating soundscapes fitting of altered dimensions, so I'm in safe(?) hands with him leading the way into this domain. I'm not so sure about Xerxes though, unfamiliar with his brand of drone as I am. Can I pick out distinct attributes in Aftermath from Alphaxone's aesthetic?

Can't say I did. This still feels like an Alphaxone album, though perhaps more structured in narrative than some of his other works. As with the best of Cryo Chamber, each track serves as another chapter in whatever tale the artists look to tell, in this case, exploration of the interplanetary unknown, and what wonders or horrors may come from there. There are points where an almost benign tone settles in (ooh, shimmery piano to close out!), but yeah, this is a very minimalist excursion into cinematic dronescapes. Not that I'd want to hear inhuman field recordings in something like Aftermath.

Neil Young - After The Goldrush

Reprise Records: 1970/1993

A little unfinished business, this. I totally skipped After The Goldrush when going through my block of 'A'-titled albums, because the record was already significantly covered when I reviewed the Neil Young Archives collection. Still, I can't very well claim to have reviewed everything in my music library if I don't also do this, even if there's little more I can add. One thing did come to mind though.

In its commitment to presenting the tracklist in chronological order, the Archives collection failed to showcase one of After The Goldrush's best strengths, how each side of the record mirrored each other. A wonderful, group acoustic love song opener, followed by a reflective commentary on society, then a lovelorn ditty, a hard rocker, and finishing off with a charming doodle. Okay, Side-B doesn't quite match up, what with an extra song there, but put I Believe In You where Birds is, and it matches, mang!

That's all I got left to say. Here's what I wrote before to eat up the rest of my self-imposed word count obligation. Enjoy!

Despite taking a step back from the limelight, Neil Young once again found himself a very important person in the world of American rock. It'd only been half-a-decade since he sought music fortune in Los Angeles, and he'd accomplished more commercially and creatively than most could have ever hoped for, even for the fruitful '60s. What else could he do beyond being part of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, one of the country's most popular bands?

“How about scoring a movie?” suggested Young's Topanga neighbour Dean Stockwell. Yes, that Dean Stockwell, who'd been interested in scripting and filming a movie called After The Goldrush. It piqued ol' Shakey's interest enough to start writing a few tunes for it, and though the film never materialized, some of the intended music turned out to be some of the highlights of Young's album of the same name (Tell Me Why, After The Goldrush, Don’t Let It Bring You Down). It also sparked his creativity ever further, vivid lyrics compared to songs past, and unafraid at stretching his limited vocal range into areas yet attempted. You can really hear him crackling the high notes in After The Goldrush for the first time, exposing a naked sincerity to his music.

The other two standouts from these sessions are Southern Man (an incendiary condemnation of, well, southern redneck ‘justice’ and treatment of African-Americans) and When You Dance, I Can Really Love, capturing Young and his Crazy Horse band in full-on swagger musically. Added to the mix is seventeen year old Nils Lofgren, a budding guitarist that’d been something of an understudy to Young. In what had to been either crazy brilliant or brilliantly crazy, Neil suggested Nils play piano for these songs, an instrument lil’ Lofgren had no prior experience with. The kid fuckin’ smashed it! That’s Mr. Young for you though, so often bringing the best out of those around him.

Cosmic Replicant - After A Long Rain

self released: 2018

A pure ambient album with modern classical touches? Sure, why not. Pavel's done nearly everything else with his Cosmic Replicant project that the psy scene can offer, so it's only natural he'd stretch out into this field. Plenty of his full-lengths have a dronescape track or three, so it's not unexplored territory either. And if other Altar Records alum can release such records (AstroPilot; Chronos; others, probably), so can this one. Perhaps a bit of a shame he had to do it independently, but then Mr. Shirsin hasn't been part of the Altar family for nearly a half-decade now- oh, wait, he did release an ambient EP with them just this year. Man, it's hard keeping tabs on a discography when the artist's Bandcamp isn't always the primary output. There's only so many email lists I want to be part of.

Surprisingly, especially given his alias, this isn't a cosmic ambient album as so many of his peers typically go. Rather, Pavel's focused his muse in a grounded reality, the sort of feelings one may experience after a brisk downpour of autumn rainfall. Not the cooling sun-showers of summer, nor the icy drip of wintry sleet, but that in-between perspiration that still carries some warmth from oceanic fronts. Rain that nourishes the fungi blooms feasting upon decaying leaf piles. So many fungi blooms about Vancouver right now. Just... so many. Which is weird, considering we've had a remarkable run of cold, sunny weather as of late, right when we should be in perpetual drizzle season. May have to start laying out the road salt earlier than usual.

The opening track is called Silence On The Air, and it's almost dark ambient in how moody and suffocating its drone feels. A gentle melody echoing through the atmosphere does keep it just on this side of the realms of light (or however you want to demarcate ambient from dark ambient). Thoughts That Carried Away carries on in similar vein, a sombre dronescape with delicate crystalline tones piercing the murk. It's not all dour downpour though, the mood of subsequent tracks slowly but surely turning more tranquil and refreshing – a piano as your primary melody helps. Why, Cloudy Friday Day is downright chipper, with a jaunty, echoing electric guitar and actual bassline. I can easily imagine this playing to a scene of kids splashing in post-rain puddles.

I wouldn't call myself a critic if I couldn't find something to be nitpicky about though, and there is a quibble. Music and albums centred around the concept of rainfall are typically quite intimate affairs, as rainfall itself forces us to turn withdrawn and huddled from the elements abroad. For as lovely the pieces Cosmic Replicant has crafted here, however, they're rather grandiose. Gentle and calming, yes, but they make me feel like I'm watching the water cycle in action on an IMAX screen, not trickling through the trees outside my window-pane. Yeah, the quibbliest of quibbles, that.

Si Matthews - Across The Ether

Carpe Sonum Records: 2018

Been an age since I last talked up Si Matthews. Chap seemed like one of those promising new talents the current era of Fax+ influenced artists who were gonna' lead us into a post-Namlook era. He's taken a 'slow and steady' approach to his release rate though, settling on about an album a year rather than the twenty-dozen items some of his peers churn out. Slow and steady wins the race, I guess, but what are we racing for? Can making music be considered a race, against the limited time we have to create all that our muses allow us to express? Can the sonic soul even be sated, when there's infinite possibilities before us, countless that which have yet to be discovered? Just some thoughts as I stare into the Pillars Of Creation for the umpteenth time.

I felt Si's sophomore album, Aurora, was a good enough follow-up to his applauded debut Tales Of Ten Worlds, if a bit slight in content compared to the richness offered in the former. No chance of similar feelings with his next album, Across The Ether, a whopping double-LP outing from Mr. Matthews! Interestingly, this is one of the few times Carpe Sonum Records has ever released a 2CD album, and remained a lone example of the format until just this year's release of Sven Kössler's Bck t· Lvng. Coincidentally, Si and Sven have been working together this past year, though their release on Fantasy Enhancing wasn't a double-LP, so I can only imagine should they also cook up something for Carpe Sonum, it'll be nothing less than a 4CD box-set! Maybe wait until they can nab the impossible catalogue number SEIZE-XXL though. (yes, I find it hilarious that the first Carpe Sonum double-LP release is SEIZE-XL)

CD1 is subtitled Ambient, and that's what you're gonna' get, by g'ar. Nine tracks of spaced-out, cosmic synth pads with occasional splashes of soft rhythms. Real planetarium stuff, in other words, which shouldn't be of any surprise with the head of the Eagle Nebula plastered across the cover art. Admittedly it can get rather samey throughout, though folks diving into this style of ambient music aren't looking for much variation either, so it works out. Except for In Stone, a minimalist bleepy ambient techno track that sounds like it drifted in from the FireScope label.

I initially thought it had drifted in from CD2 though, what with its subtitle being Beats and all. And yeah, th'ar be beats here, though not of the IDM-leaning variety B12's print is known for. I mean, this is still a Fax+ influenced artist releasing music on a Fax+ inspired label, so the rhythms are mostly in service of gentle, spacey pad melodies with light dubby effects. And that's fine, another serving of familiar sounds that release the exact amount of endorphins I hope to get from cover art like this. Across The Ether is ambient techno that goes down like a nice cup of hot chocolate. In SPACE!

ACE TRACKS: October 2019

I never realized just how addicted I've become to the sun now, at least to feel even the slightest bit productive. It wasn't such a big deal before, as my work schedule always left me with some remaining Sol energy in the day. Now though, with me working a more 'traditional' 9-5 shift, I'm getting home, it's grown dark (if not already dark), and my will power to do anything productive is gone, man, just gone.

Not that there aren't other factors that impede my ability to do much of anything in the evening hours (damn you, Neebs Gaming, and your addictive Cinematic Gameplay videos!), but unlike the summer months, where I could still crank something out before 9pm, my mind totally checks out come 6pm now. Guess it's back to the ultra-early rises to get my writing done then. That seemed to work quite well for me this past winter. Leave me an hour to get in a morning swim too. In the meanwhile, here's the ACE TRACKS for the month of October:


Full track list here.


MISSING ALBUMS:
The Winterhouse - Winter Gardens
Convextion - 2845
Emiliana Torrini - Love In The Time Of Science

Percentage Of Hip-Hop: 0%
Percentage Of Rock: 14%
Most “WTF?” Track: The noisiest outing from Ringo Sheena.

Lots of Phantogram and Ringo Sheena, obviously, what with Patreon Requests eating up a bulk of my review time this past month (the Sheena ones were long overdue requests). Why, you'd almost forget there's things like house, techno, and ambient in here too. Tracks arranged alphabetically, it seems most of the tracks still bunched up together by artist. Huh, my whole deal in doing it my way is to break up the potential monotony of hearing the same artist over and over. Something screwy is afoot this past month, methinks.

Ringo Sheena - Shōso Strip

Virgin: 2000

(a Patreon Request from Philoi)

I think we all have to come to grips that I'm woefully unqualified to talk about Japanese pop music with any sort of authoritative perspective. Yeah, I can appreciate, and even enjoy it, at a basic, superficial aesthetic level (sounds do good things on brain, me likey!), but I've no real insights or analysis to provide from the experience. Beyond what a couple Wiki links of information can offer (y'know, collegiate level research), there's very little I can explore or detail regarding the cultural impact of such music.

Like, I can get proper-deep regarding rave music, as I've been part of, digested, consumed, and researched nearly all facets of it for a quarter of a century now (a significant portion of my life indeed). And while I've covered other music genres or scenes I'm not so involved with (your alternative rock, your jazz-bop, your country twang), they're at least still prevalent enough in my sphere of the globe that I know enough about them via cultural osmosis. It's incredibly rare that mass market music from other (non English-speaking) artists ever had much impact here, no matter how successful they may have been elsewhere.

It's almost entirely thanks to the power of global social media that we've started seeing actual cultural cross-over in the Americas from the mega-stars of Japan and Korea. Even as I type this, my localized Twitter feed is blowing up about Wonho leaving MONSTA X (everything else is Halloween stuff). Let's face it, a newer, younger generation has discovered something they know their parents just won't understand. What better rebel music than music that's not even Caucasian, amirite? Nah, guy, there's just a lot of East Asian transplants in Vancouver.

Anyhow, Ringo Sheena (or Shiina Ringo, if you're Discoggian) turned quite a few heads upon her debut, a teenage wonder-kid who fused noisy Western rock with noisy Japanese rock, presented in that spiffy, over-the-top j-pop stylee everyone just thinks all Japanese pop music sounds like. Sales proved her a potential break-out star that could possibly make it big overseas, thus was immediately signed to the mighty Virgin empire, the quick follow-up Shōso Strip the result.

Almost too quickly, apparently, as the budding star felt the tracklist was too similar to her debut. I can dig that, as I felt like I was listening to Muzai Moratorium all over again with this one. Yeah, there's a few additional wrinkles here and there (ooh, techno thump-thumps in 浴室) and the song-writing comes off more polished than the first – the chaotic production is focused and targeted. Yet I still had to double-check I was listening to the correct album a couple times, unsure whether it was the first or second (didn't help my digital player couldn't convert kanji properly).

And sadly, I can't give any deeper analysis than that. As mentioned, I simply don't connect to this music beyond the superficial. Y'all would be better served listening to the Spotify link for your own conclusions.

Phantogram - Three

Republic Records: 2016

(a Discography Patreon Request from Omskbird)

Every time I say Phantogram out loud, I can't help but say it in a similar manner to how the word 'speakerboxxx' is oft repeated in the OutKast album Speakerboxxx. Like, “Phan-Toe-Gram”. Did the Big Boi influence somehow worm its way into my brain in ways I can't possibly comprehend? That non sequitor out the way...

Like Thanos, the Pop Music Machine is inevitable. Whatever unique traits or style you had will be scrubbed clean by various studio hands for maximum market penetration. Your individual talent will be made to fit predetermined moulds that have proven success rates with as wide a demographic as your handlers feel is possible. This is not some insidious secret only revealed when an unwitting participant has signed their names away. They go into the Machine willingly, hoping to take their brand to commercial heights of success only dreamed of before. It will naturally annoy and even piss-off some hardcore followers that helped nurture an act's rise to prominence from the beginning, but as I said, the process is inevitable.

Not that it isn't possible to make the Machine work for you, but it takes an incredible talent, plus force of personality and will to shine in an industry that disposes of its resources if they don't turn out the expectant results. Even those that do have their time in the limelight are quickly left to the dustbin if a newer, fresher hotness can easily replace them. For real, when was the last time folks cared about a Madonna release?

This isn't a mould I hear Phantogram fitting with Three. For sure they give it their best effort (Sarah Barthel is at times bellowing her soul out, understandable given many of the songs were inspired by the suicidal death of a friend), bringing in professional studio producers and crafting songs with big-huge, wall-of-sound chorus/drops, as was the style at the time (is it still? Please say we've moved on from that). These don't sound like only Phantogram could have made them though. You're Mine could have been done by any number of contemporary starlets as the feature. I sure wouldn't know the difference if I heard it on the work radio. For all the influences of musicians new and old I heard in Phantogram's earlier works, at least I could tell it was Sarah and Josh performing them.

This isn't me condemning the duo though, oh no. If slick anthem pop in the vein of Imagine Dragons is what they wanted to make, then they did it very well, and I'm sure it pleased many fans of this kind of music. It just wasn't made for me, and I have no interest in returning to it anytime soon. Well, maybe Funeral Pyre. That one kinda' felt like the genre-fusion synth-pop act I heard on their earlier works.

I took a listen to one of their recent singles, to hear if they've stayed the course from Three. Yep, that's some big-huge production from Into Happiness.

Phantogram - Voices

Indica: 2014

(a Discography Patreon Request from Omskbird)

I may have oversold my enthusiasm for the Nightlife mini-album. Maybe for Phantogram too? I don't dislike anything I've heard, and find their music worming its way into my brain the more I listen to it, but I can't say I want to re-listen to it. They fall into that nebulous blob of genre interest I think of as the 'This Is Fine' bubble – where every critic's 6/10 records reside. Not that I'd give this such a ranking myself (and even if I did, probably a little higher), but as my music collection balloons and grows, things get lost in the shuffle, including the Random Shuffle feature on my PC. So many songs to 'randomly' choose from, yet it never, ever lands on Fu-Schnickens' Sneakin' Up On Ya? What's up with that? Erm, what I'm getting at is, if Spotify Discovery was to discover me some Phantogram, I'd enjoy it, but wouldn't go out of my way to explore their discography further.

Anyhow, we've flash-jumped a few years, and our intrepid Sarah & Josh duo have hit the big-time, in a low-key sort of way. Tons of tours, tons of festivals. Tons of appearances on late night talk shows (so many Jimmy Fallon performances, just... so many). Tons of nods and approvals within their scene (opening for genre icons M83 couldn't have hurt) and from players outside looking in (yes, Big Boi had taken a liking to them by now). You'd almost think they were half a dozen albums deep into their career with this much promotion behind them, and yet Voices is only their second LP, released half a decade after their first. Dang, dawg and dawgette, you gotta' get into that studio and start cranking out some more music stat, lest your set playlist grow old and stale. Maybe get a major label backing your efforts in the process, for that little extra exposure, really go for the 'pop' in the synth-pop.

I feel like I should like this more. The songcraft is more refined, the production is top-grade, and there's plenty of moments that leap out at me as it plays through. The crunchy guitar action in Nothing But Trouble. The buzzy, punchy bassline in Fall In Love. The percussion in Howling At The Moon (yeah, there's trap snares in there, but oh so much more too). Josh Carter's one-the-nose Peter Gabriel wailing in Never Going Home (whole track sounds like a Peter Gabriel tune, for that matter). There's a few moments that strike me as odd choices, like that same buzzy bassline used in the dream pop of Bill Murray - how can I feel bliss and chill with a sputtering transistor in the background? - but it's hardly detrimental to the album as a whole.

Yet, Voices doesn't grab me the way Eyelid Movies did. It's like, in perfecting their genre fusion, it's turned their neapolitan style into a strict vanilla flavour. But one of those good vanilla flavours, like vanilla bean, or dame blanche.

Phantogram - Nightlife

Bursak Records: 2011

(a Discography Patreon Request from Omskbird)

The debut album's out, the buzz is building, but all that touring is impacting your ability to hop into the studio for another full-length session. Fortunately, the good ol' mini-album option has become quite fruitful in the modern era, a handful of songs all that's needed to be propelled into super-stardom. Why, look at that Skrillex kid, one of the biggest acts of 2011, based almost entirely off a single EP. If he can do it, why not Phantogram? Oh, that whole 'completely different genre and scene' factor, I guess. Yeah, Josh Carter and Sarah Barthel definitely make music of a different style compared to headline festival mosh. I sure didn't hear anything resembling overblown anthems in Eyelid Movies, nothing even hinting at such potential. Guess they'll stay in their lane, the steady rise of synth-pop songcraft within a nurturing indie scene bringing them the fame their later sales numbers indicate. Have I mentioned looking only at Wiki sales charts isn't a good idea to get a full story of a band's development?

The other good thing about making a mini-album is how it keeps things to the point. Eyelid Movies had plenty of good musical ideas about it, but was kinda' rambly in its direction too, one of those LPs where the musicians tend to throw everything at the wall. Such is the case with many debut albums though, muses bursting at the seems to flood out for all to hear. Typically a producer can reign things in, but Phantogram apparently did it all themselves, so here we are. Time to focus your ideas into with surgical precision, then, using what you've learned and build upon it.

Nightlife definitely is that, to such a degree I almost wish this had been longer, exploring these musical ideas and themes for a proper full-length. Sure, the concept is straight-forward enough, one of those inside-out looks at the self-destructive romanticism of hitting up bars and clubs when you're young. I'm sure touring about exposed Sarah and Josh to all manner of ups and downs within their scene, the decadent highs and the dilapidated lows. It's not a specific narrative, mind you, but it does capture the roller coaster of feelings in a night out with an always lingering, nagging doubt of whether your actions mean anything at all. Or maybe I'm reading a bit much into it, but hey, sometimes over-analyzing music half the fun of listening to music. Like, it's practically a mission statement from all those Pitchfork wanna-be clones that existed a decade ago. This is catnip for them! The indie-leaning genre fusion too.

Oh, and of that genre fusion? Yeah, it's still on that synthy indie-rock, dream-pop vein, though less of the wilder leaps into things like funk and soul and whatnot from Eyelid Movies. Again, smaller record, less room to let the muses roam free. Makes for a nice, tight listening experience though, leaving the listener anxious for more. All hail the mini-album, for those who don't have time for artistic bullshit!