Louie Caliente

Knurl – Nervescrap [Pure]

Louie Caliente   6/11/2019   A Library, CD

Walls on walls on walls of noise. Blistering, full-spectrum, ear-piercing, colon-clenching noise. Bottomless layers of samples, static, and screeches combine to an overwhelming chaos that fills every second of this album.

Knurl is Toronto-based experimental musician Alan Bloor. He avoids synthesizers digital sounds, instead using found objects such as fan blades, typewriters, scrap metal and car springs to create music that is completely devoid of rhythm, melody, vocals, and production quality.

Released in 1994, Nervescrap is Knurl’s second album (after Initial Shock). First a self-produced cassette, it was later released on Pure Records, the budget imprint subsidiary of RRR.

Refree – La Otra Mitad [Glitter Beat]

Louie Caliente   5/22/2019   12-inch, International

Modern Flamenco explorations from Spanish composer, producer, and musician Raül Fernandez Miró, aka Raül Refree. Intricate acoustic and electric guitars — often looped and delayed — mix with spiritual vocal incantations and subtle street recordings.

Songs blend elements of jazz, classical, experimental, and folksy singer/songwriter styles. Most of the songs were composed as a soundtrack to the the film “Entre Dos Aguas”, while the others seem to be spontaneous improvisations. While quite varied, the whole album is very peaceful and calming, with the exception of “Flamencos Negros” (B-2) which layers traditional Flemenco with harsh stabs and deep static drones.

Moor, Andy / Kyriakides, Yannis – Rebetika – [Unsounds]

Louie Caliente   5/13/2019   CD, International

Rebetika is a type of Greek folk music dating back to the Ottoman Empire, popular in coffee shops, hashish dens, and prisons of the era. Lyrics often describe crime, drink, drugs, poverty, prostitution, and violence. The music is traditionally played on the bouzouki, a Greek instrument with Turkish roots, and can be accompanied by voice, accordion, cymbals, and a variety of other stringed instruments.

Here we have modern re-interpretations of 9 classical Rebetika songs for guitar and electronics from Andy Moor (The Ex) and Cypriot composer and sound artist Yannis Kyriakides. Almost all were recorded live.

Moor’s intricate guitar picking is sampled, layered, and looped. The Greek influence is pervasive, but Kyriakides’ electronic treatment takes it in entirely new directions. Traditional tunes melt into heavy drones. Notes and phrases are deconstructed into sparse collages, then congeal under their own weight into stuttering glitchy rhythms, harkening back to the urban nightlife where this music first took shape. Faint vocal samples (also Greek) heighten the dramatic tension on a few tracks, more like memories of vocals rather than vocals themselves. Love, joy, and sorrow.

Deadbeat and Camara – Trinity Thirty – [Constellation]

Louie Caliente   4/16/2019   A Library, CD

Deadbeat (Scott Monteith) and Fatima Camara are Canadian electronic musicians now living in Berlin. Here, the duo have taken on the almost scarily ambitious project of re-envisioning one of the most iconic albums of all time: Cowboy Junkies The Trinity Sessions.

2 years in the making, and released 30 years after the original, Trinity Thirty strips down the already-sparse sound to the bare bones, and the song’s tempos are slowed almost to the breaking point. Wistful ethereal vocals hover over minimal dubby beats and tranquilizing synth drones. The mood is somber and even haunting at times.

The Trinity Sessions was famously recorded around a single microphone in inside Toronto’s Church of the Holy Trinity, which gave the album a unique sense of space and acoustics. Trinity Thirty, recorded at Berlin’s Studio Chez Cherie, similarly emphasizes wide open spaces, solitude, and emptiness, moods further enhanced by the mastering work of Stefan Betke (aka Pole).

Houser, Dylan – Dismal King / Dreary – [Self-released]

Louie Caliente   4/15/2019   A Library, CD

Guitar and found-sound oddness from Floridian Dylan Houser. It’s a two-EPs-in-one-CD kinda thing, combining recordings from late 2018 and 2019, all recorded and released directly by the artist.

Dismal King is spontaneous solo guitar compositions, looped and layered. Lo-fi but not too soupy, and with just enough distortion to take the edge off. A wide range of styles and moods on display, starting with the introspective and melancholy “Spring Vein” (T1). Things quickly ramp up to the propulsive “Dismal King” (T2) and the positively shredding “Locust Driver” (T3). We mellow out a bit (just a bit) with the psychedelic “Molting Riviera” (T4) and wrap up with an extended crunchy synth noise jam on “Tinker Galute” (T5), the only non-guitar piece on the EP.

Dreary is harder to categorize. It begins with “Lungform Deth Radio” (T6) a schizophrenic field recording collage featuring spoken word and the sounds of proper dental hygiene. The following track “Sarcophagus in Orbit” (T7) is more spaced-out improvised guitar work. The last three songs are rich synth drones with varying amounts of noise (T8, T10) and cheese (T9).

Mamarracho – Fifty-Nine – [Betley Welcomes Careful Drivers]

Louie Caliente   3/26/2019   7-inch, A Library

Mamarracho are Shobu and Fuyuhiko Saitoh, two Japanese brothers and both former members of The Gerogerigegege. According to the liner notes, Shobu is the “young captain with false sportsmanship”, while Fuku is the “eternal bench warmer”.

“Fifty-Nine” is a banana-yellow baseball-themed 7″ with four aggressive tracks. A joint release on Destroy All Music and Betley Welcomes Careful Drivers.

Hunt The Sluggers (A-1) and Camping For Victory (B-1) are face-smashing thrashy grindcore. Big walls of distortion, squealing feedback, and real drums! Both have vocals (of sorts), although they are completely unintelligible, and in the case of Camping, sound like the microphone was swallowed before recording.

Next Generation Of H.H.S. (B-2) is traditional Japanese power electronics. Quasar blasts, machine gun static, electro-squiggles, and radio tuners. For me, Deformed Uniform (A-2) is the stand-out track. A hypnotic bass line with K-hole beats and an electronic edge. Slow and sludgy.

Minimal Technology – Play – Musica Para Videoinstalaciones 1991 – 1993 – [Hueso Records]

Louie Caliente   2/26/2019   12-inch, A Library

Minimal Technology is an avant-garde trio from Santiago Chile that formed in the early nineties. They explored new forms of video art and sound sculptures, and performed only twice, both times at the University of Chile.

Tell Me What Will Happen Today (B-2) contains the recording of one of their performances, which was accompanied by a video installation. Traditional rhythmic percussion and flute mixes with chopped samples and slow throbbing synth waves.

The other two tracks were recorded and released in Tokyo on Kino Mitsouko’s record label Dinn International. Listen to this Example (A-1) consists of cut-up fragments of English and Spanish dialogue over a repetitive bass riff, mechanistic clicks and whirs, and what sounds like a dot-matrix printer. Se Armó La Rosca (B-1) is an experimental turntable piece that scratches and mixes a variety of Spanish music at different speeds, both forwards and backwards.

Chamber Industrial – Per Bloland – [Tzadik]

Louie Caliente   2/26/2019   A Library, CD

Per Bloland studied music composition at Stanford and now teaches at Miami University. He often composes for an electromagnetically-prepared piano of his own design. The piano has a series of electromagnets placed along different strings, each of which can be driven by audio signal. This allows the timbre, sustain, and dynamics of each note to be controlled, and enables new type of resonance and feedback.

Chamber Industrial contains 5 works for chamber ensemble inspired by a variety of literary works and performed by The Ecce Ensemble. Moods are tense and suspenseful, contrasting delicate flutes and bells with the discordant growls produced by the sax, double-bass, and piano. Bloland evokes the energy of industrial music through abrasive, distorted textures and simple motifs. The electromagnetically-prepared piano is featured on T4, while T2 and T4 are purely acoustic.

Mineta, Tetsu – #4 – [Union Pole]

Louie Caliente   2/11/2019   A Library, CD

Tetsu Mineta is a Japanese guitarist and singer. He’s a member of the rock group “Both Cheese”, but here he’s solo with an acoustic guitar and tape recorder. As the album title implies, this is his fourth release, all on cassette.

Most of the album is slow, soothing, lo-fi acoustic guitar work layered over quiet beds of tape recorder hum, indiscernible distant rustles, and occasional backwards instrumentation (T2, T6). Fahey-esque at times, but shrouded in a mysterious opium haze. “Nova E.x.P.” (T4) is a rich, blissful stoned-out guitar drone.

The first track, “Moshpitloser”, is unlike the rest. A quick rhythmic percussion riff featuring bongos, toms, cymbals, and a cowbell played faster and faster until the whole thing blasts off like a spaceship.

Maioli, Walter / Gales, Fred / Piccinelli, Pit – Amazonia 6891- [Black Sweat Records]

Louie Caliente   2/4/2019   A Library, CD

Semi-synthetic fantasy field recordings from the heart of the Amazonian rain-forest. Accurate, intricate, and immersive.

Recordings of real Amazonian animals and artifacts mix with electronics, drums, and reeds — all faithfully mimicking a dense jungle. Birds chirp, cackle, and caw. Insects hummm. Rain drops puddle and splash. Distant tribes sing and dance, engaged in a mysterious ritual.

Amazonia 6891 was recorded in 1985, after Italian artist and composer Walter Maioli crossed paths with ethnographer Pit Piccinelli and his collection of South American artifacts. Maioli recorded their sounds and later shared them with anthropologist and electronic musician Fred Gales. The two musicians performed a 30-minute live mix of jungle and electronic sounds, a work that was then released on cassette via Sound Reporters records. This new 2016 CD edition is from Italy’s Black Sweat label.

Track 1 is the main event: a 30-minute visceral Amazonian jungle experience. Overwhelming growth. Overwhelming fornication.

Track 2 contains all the raw recordings that were used as material for the first piece. A listing of the exact sounds and their sources can be found inside. Although it is less “composed” than Track 1, it still manages to flow nicely, and is a compelling and interesting listen the whole way through.

Wai Fat, Chan – Foo Cup Kwan Nan (Hardly Breathing) – [Fatsound]

Louie Caliente   1/29/2019   A Library, CD

Chan Wai Fat is a self-taught musician and composer from Hong Kong. He’s been active since the late 80s, playing in a number of noise-rock bands before later focusing on totally free improvisation. He is the founder of CIMG (Collective Improvisational Music Group), and has performed with John Zorn, Yamatsuka Eye, Fred Frith, and many others.

Foo Cup Kwan Nan (Hardly Breathing) is Wai Fat’s debut solo recording, released in 1996. Here he plays a variety of stringed instruments, including prepared guitar, Hawaiian steel guitar, octavilla (a 14-string Spanish instrument), and a damaged cello. All tracks are completely improvised and recorded direct to DAT, with “no overdub, remix, synthesizers, or pre-recorded samples.”

The center-piece of the album is the “12 Pieces for Prepared Acoustic Guitar” (T5-T16) which feature beautifully sparse and delicate guitar strumming and tinkering, as well as a few more “accidental” sounds. Wai Fat evokes similar peaceful moods with his pentatonic plucking on the Hawaiian steel guitar (T2) as well as on the octavilla (T20). There are some nice drones here as well — “Miles Away” (T3) is probably my favorite on the whole album. The final (listed) track “Songbird: Variation on a Theme by Kenny G” (T21) features the most energetic — often frenetic — noodling (again on the octavilla) with no discernible sign of Kenny G.

DJs TAKE NOTE:
1) The first track ends with the sounds of a skipping CD player. Do not panic, the CD is fine. I actually really recommend this one.
2) The final track (T22) is not listed in the liner notes, and is almost completely SILENT, except for the sound of the tape recorder, very distant birds, and an occasional footstep.

Runzelstirn & Gurgelstock / The Beast People [coll] – [Spite]

Louie Caliente   1/23/2019   12-inch, A Library

Split 12″ released in 2005, but featuring early works from both artists recorded a decade earlier.

Runzelstirn & Gurgelstøck is Rudolph Eb.er, Swiss experimentalist now living in Osaka, and founder of Schimpfluch-Gruppe.

Holy hell! Demonic moans and primal screams. Repeated punches to the face. Emergency whistles. Long periods of silence that only increase the tension before the sheer terror and panic kicks back in. Will leave you nauseated and sweaty.

The Beast People are old-school Michigan noise-makers Aaron Dilloway (Wolf Eyes, Universal Indians, Hanson Records…), Twig Harper (Nautical Almanac), and Nate Young (Wolf Eyes, Moon Pool & Dead Ban, Stare Case…). Their side of this split contains a series of pieces pulled from early (unreleased?) tapes.

Sputtering machinery. Groans and grunts. Warbling tape noise. Leaky valves. Glottal and esophageal scribblings. Abstract and disorienting.

Broken Bells Vs 伝助 (Den-Suke) – “Broken Bells Breaks Vol. 1” – [Shi-Ra-Nui]

Louie Caliente   1/22/2019   A Library, CD

Jazzy downtempo hip-hop beats and from Japan. Heavy (upright) bass licks, scribbly-scratchy turntables, out-of-place found sounds, and open-faced piano tinkering.

Some of the tracks bust out the beats pretty early on (T3, T5, T10, T11), others patiently allow the beat to arise out of thick abstract musique-concret murkiness (T1, T4, T6), but when it hits, man does it hit. The remaining tracks will absorb you so deep in the electro-orchestral opium soup that you won’t even care that there is no beat (T2, T7, T8, T9).

There’s not a lot of info out there about this release, at least not in English. From what I gather, this is a collaboration between two DJs: Broken Bells Beats (sometimes credited as B.B.B.) and Den-Suke. No idea who B.B.B. is (maybe a reader can help fill in the details). Den-Suke is Keiji Yamabe, owner of Tokyo’s ¿Los Apson? record store. This was released on the Shi-Ra-Nui, active since 1996, but completely unrepresented in the KFJC library (until today).

Mania – “Little Pieces of Violence” – [Phage Tapes]

Louie Caliente   1/15/2019   A Library, CD

Mania is Texan Keith Brewer, well-known for his psycho-sado-sexual power electronics project “Taint”. “Little Pieces of Violence” is his latest full-length album, released on Phage Tapes.

8 untitled tracks soaked in uncomfortable tension. Surprisingly sparse at first. Echoing rumbles, dragging metal, banging pipes. The pieces build in intensity, exposing the pure hatred and agony within. Piercing screeches. Electronic sizzlings. Feedback enters the mix, followed by screams of rage and horror. The layers compound and magnify. Earfuls of raw aggression. Watch the levels!

Features some nice dentally-damaged album artwork from Brewer himself.

Snake Charmer’s Beautiful Daughter, The [coll] – [Betley Welcomes Careful D]

Louie Caliente   10/23/2018   A Library, CD

Wow, where to begin? Yes, it’s noise, but not just ANY noise. This is REALLY FUCKING GOOD NOISE from two absolute masters of the craft. Fast, hard, and relentless, just how KFJC likes it.

Pain Jerk is Kohei Gomi, owner of noise label AMP and frequent collaborator with pretty much everybody in the Japanoise scene. Dogliveroil is Phil Todd (of Ashtray Navigations) and a rotating cast of friends. This collaboration CD was released on Todd’s venerable Betley Welcomes Careful Drivers label.

“The Eight Snake Stigmata” (T1) is Dogliveroil as remixed by Pain Jerk. Like feeding laxatives to an already spastic and inflamed colon. A non-stop barrage of heavy static blasts, screeching electronics, and glitched-out samples. So fast it’s hard to wrap your ears around it.

“The Snake Charmer’s Beautiful Daughter Is a Vampire!!!” (T2) begins softly, with spooky ghost-like synth sounds (maybe the snake charmer?). That quickly gives way to more spazzed-out static blasts similar to the first track. Half-way through, the noise breaks for a dialog from the classic vampire movie Nosferatu. Then a return to noise.

“Doggin’ The Nogginometer” (T3) is a live recording of Dogliveroil and friends. It begins with a poorly-performed and poorly-recorded sample of Strauss’s Blue Danube Waltz. The fidelity gets worse and worse, until drowned out by squealing feedback, sizzling electronics, distorted distortion, and what sounds like Todd screaming through a PVC pipe. The pace here is much less frenetic than the other tracks, almost minimalist in comparison (not really though). Definitely gets the crowd going!

“Pac Man” (T4) is solo Pain Jerk. To my ears, this is the harshest and most punishing track on the album. The electronics are more tortuous, the feedback is more piercing, and the static is more severe. Not to be missed!

Psudoku – “Planetarisk Sudoku” – [Drid Machine Records]

Louie Caliente   10/10/2018   A Library, Cassette

Psudoko (formerly Parlamentarisk Sodomi) is Steinar Kittilsen, a one-man time-travelling prog-grind-math-core band from Trondheim Norway. This cassette was released in 2014 on Drid Machine, but recorded much later.

The sound is an adrenaline-heavy mix of prog-rock, math-rock, punk-rock, and butt-rock. Impossibly fast, impossibly intricate, and impossibly powerful. Highly controlled chaos.

Thumping bass lines and break-neck blast-beats. Fast, angular riffs that turn on a dime. Guitars that scream, scribble, and shred. What really sets this album apart is the meticulous arrangement and orchestration found in each track. Brief and beautiful piano interludes balance out blistering guitar solos. Violins sing and bells chime with perfect clarity alongside distorted strings and fuzz.

The future is here, and it is fast.

Moody Alien – “Down to The Junkyard” – [Thirsty Leaves Music]

Louie Caliente   10/2/2018   A Library, Cassette

Hazy, smooth, and rhythmic lo-fi electro-acoustic compositions from Moody Alien, an anonymous artist from Thessaloniki Greece and proprietor or the Thirsty Leaves Music micro-label which put this cassette out (edition of only 50).

Warm samples of acoustic instruments are layered, blended, and tweaked. Recordings of scattered chords, echoey drones, and flowing melodic patterns mix with field recordings and sparse, distant vocals. The layers are deep, but not dense. The result an enveloping, dream-like feeling of mysterious familiarity. The pieces each build carefully and in their own way, some juust baarely venturing into heavy free-folk proto-grooves before retreating back to the comfort of a nice drone.

A rich variety of instruments are on display here. Moody Alien plays classical guitar, 2 harmonicas, trumpet, cello, double-bass, glockenspiel, toy piano, numerous household objects and “a few body parts”. The credits call out several other musicians who lend their unique sound on different tracks: electric guitar on T1, bouzouki on T2, trumpet on T4, dulcimer on T4 and T5, and more!

Beautiful, rich, and heavy sounds.

Birthright [coll] – [Worldmadefleshrecordings]

Louie Caliente   9/25/2018   7-inch, A Library

Beautiful blood-red 7″ from two harsh noise masters, released in 1994.

With this addition, KFJC now owns the complete back catalog of Worldmadeflesh recordings. (There is only one other release, a split 7″ entitled Japanese Torture Comedy Hour, also featuring Autoerotichrist.)

Richard Ramirez (of Black Leather Jesus and more), brings some serious coprophagic cacophony. Very dense, heavy, and mean. Infinite ever-shifting layers of explosions, screeches, and roars. A thick wall, with only brief interludes of piercing electro-fuckery.

Autoerotichrist is Russell Mason of Enemy Soil (also well-represented in the KFJC library). His side is more dynamic and full of abrupt changes. It almost has a call-and-response structure at times, like being pummeled by alternating fists. The blows come harder and heavier, as you bleed out your ears.

Play at 33.

Balalaika Noise – “III” – [Stauropygial Records]

Louie Caliente   9/25/2018   A Library, Cassette

A Balalaika is a Russian stringed instrument known for its triangular body. This cassette is the third installment of noise music performed on a Balalaika, released on Stauropygial Records out of Russia.

It’s difficult to tell that there is even a stringed instrument on this cassette, let alone a Balalaika. It shrieks, squiggles, screams, and only occasionally shreds. All this is soaked in layers of reverb, heavy distortion, autotune oblivion, and pervasive piercing feedback.

There are two side-long tracks, each with a lot of variety. Depending on your mood, some sequences may be harder to take than others. But it’s different, and oddly compelling, and the sound is going to change in a few minutes anyways, so stick with it!

Sickness – “Fuck Your Punk Rock” – [RRRecords]

Louie Caliente   9/18/2018   12-inch, A Library

Old school american power electronics. A relentless, fast-paced assault of scorched samples, blown circuits, and human misery. Not a continuous wall of noise, but still fairly impenetrable.

Machine gun static screeching blasts, pummeling and painful. Conjuring up images of car wrecks, difficult dental work, and close encounters with heavy machinery.

Sickness is Chris Goudreau, who’s been active in the noise industrial scene since the mid 80s. Despite being fairly prolific, “Fuck Your Punk Rock” (RRRecords 2004) is only the second full-length to enter the KFJC library.  There are apparently 7 tracks on this album, but it’s difficult to tell them apart, and the picture disk makes it impossible to cue anyways, so just drop the needle and let it ride.

FIRST AND LAST TRACKS ARE LOCKED GROOVES!