NO-CORE blog

Neg-Fi at Silent Barn 03/13/11

I am hereby going to dub Neg-Fi “The most punctual band in New York City.” Even though they did cut an agreement with the organizers to start a few minutes after their designated time and put in what, for them, qualifies as an epic set (20 minutes?), I’m pretty sure no other band is in the running for this title. I’m always using the word minimal to describe Neg-Fi’s music, but I don’t think that’s really the right word, because they’re always plenty loud and fill the room with sound. It’s just such tightly scripted and executed music. Punctual is actually closer. Or maybe maximal.

E.I.D. at Silent Barn 03/13/11

This was one of the Silent Barn’s upstairs-downstairs shows, and downstairs the one-man noise project E.I.D. (Explosive Improvised Device) was going on. This contact mic harsh noise has been around almost 20 years now if you think about it, though it seems to be less popular at the moment and I think E.I.D. is too early for a retro resurgence – but he’s definitely carrying the flame.

The sounds here were actually really varied and dynamic. Lots of quiet-loud moments. More like a Masonna without the vocals than a C.C.C.C. or something. My only complaint: protective gloves! Does Masonna wear kneepads? Does Lucas Abela put masking tape on the edges of his glass? Bleeding for your noise is just part of the HARSHness, dude. Okay, okay, I’m giving E.I.D. a hard time, but there’s just something about a guy doing the full-on, serious noise thing (in a Macronympha T-shirt no less) that begs for a little heckling. But for real, I was impressed by how good this sounded.

Benn Miller at Silent Barn 03/13/11

Back upstairs was Benn Miller, who played a table full of fun, ancient-looking stuff. Cassette tapes, loop station, reel-to-reel, old synthesizer, and saxophone run through effects. There was also a drummer who did a good job of playing along, keeping things loose enough so that the oddball sounds could run free, and just tight enough to add a little rock. My only complaint here is that all the stuff could have been turned up because the drums were by far the loudest part.

Deathcrush at Silent Barn 03/13/11

Then Deathcrush (from Norway I discovered) played, and at first I honestly thought this was just terrible, but I was totally won over by the end. So many things made it seem like this was going to be awful. First, I’m always skeptical of bands that seem like they spent more time getting their hair, make-up and clothes right than their music. (male or female of course) Deathcrush came out of the gate with rock star “attitude” and “moves,” accompanied by completely un-tuned guitars and beyond rudimentary technique. (except the drummer who clearly had some solid skills) My first impression was that this band did all their song-writing and practicing in front of a mirror with non-functioning prop instruments, and this was the first time they’d been handed the real thing to use. It was like they thought they were in Def Leppard but came out sounding more like… The Dead C?

Deathcrush at Silent Barn 03/13/11

But as I watched, I found I did a complete 180 in my thinking. First I thought: if they were pulling out rock star moves and sounding like Def Leppard, would that be better? No way, that would be terrible. If they sounded like a sludgy & dirgey noise-rock band but spent the show crouching over their amps and staring at their feet, would that be better? Again, no way. Then at some point they did this one song and by some combination of willpower and magical happenstance it sounded perfect. Even when the guitarist was holding up her guitar and gesturing to her tourmates that a new string was needed, feedback howling away and sounding no different than it was when she was furiously doing something with it a minute ago – there was this great semi-melodic vortex of sound going on, like a Venus in Furs moment – and I officially changed my mind. The headbanging into the audience finale sealed the deal. Deathcrush were kind of awesome.

Paranoid Critical Revolution at Silent Barn 03/13/11

The Paranoid Critical Revolution, usually a duo, played without their drummer, who I’m told had quit the band. So it was just member Reg Bloor playing guitar. Reg also plays in Glenn Branca’s guitar orchestra, and on her own she sounds like a whole orchestra of guitars. I don’t really know how it’s done, but using an amp that doesn’t look all that big, she can blow out any eardrums in the room. Earplugs take a ton of the treble away, but it still sounds hellishly loud.

We’d had a brief conversation about black metal before the show started and with that in my mind, I couldn’t help thinking how Reg’s style is kind of black metal. The super-fast strumming with little notes picked out of a hurricane of white noise. It’s like part black metal, part no wave, and part nuclear holocaust.

Because of some overlap, I only caught the end of Altaar’s set. They also had thoroughly filled the room with smoke-machine fog, so my point and shoot camera was useless. This was the band that had been described as black metal, but we Americans do know a thing or two about our metal genres, and just because a band is from Norway does not make them black metal. I’d put this firmly in the sludge/doom metal category. Maybe with a noise-rock bent, given all the pedals in use. So what I saw was about 10 minutes of slow, heavy, thudding noise-dirge – which it wouldn’t really be fair to judge these guys on, as it was probably just the triumphant climax to an epic show. I’m going to assume that’s the case.

Satanized at the Cake-Shop

The Cake-Shop is one of the last places left in Manhattan that I still go to for shows, with virtually every other show happening in Brooklyn these days, but it’s also just about my favorite place for shows. They’ve got coffee and yes, cake!, and awesome records to browse, and the downstairs show space is great. And of course they host awesome shows like this one, which deserved a far larger crowd than it got.

White Suns at the Cake-Shop 2/27/11

The White Suns opened things up with their thunderous noise/rock. For some reason, this sounded better than any previous time I’ve seen them. Things can sometimes sound pretty indistinct when you’ve got 3 different people making 3 different grinding and/or screeching noises, but I could distinguish everything that went into the formula this time. While watching them, it occurred to me that while they look like a rock band, this is really a noise band with some rock instrumentation. They do scripted songs, but elements like rhythm or, um, melody? (ha ha) are distant seconds to sheer noise terror.

Drums Like Machine Guns at the Cake-Shop 2/27/11

Drums Like Machine Guns are a long-time favorite. They’re generally a mixture of oddball experiments and howling, head-banging beats-&-noise. To be honest, this show was noticeably less intense than I’ve seen from them. I mean, these dudes always sound great, but they’ve set the bar pretty damn high for themselves with past performances. On the other hand, they did some different stuff, possibly knowing that most of the people in attendance had seen them several times before – and that’s a good choice too.

Satanized at the Cake-Shop 2/27/11 - 2

Satanized at the Cake-Shop 2/27/11 - 3

Satanized pushed things to new extremes with their music, becoming more obtuse and perplexing than ever. Which is meant as a high compliment, in case you don’t know me very well. Satanized are both heavy-bottomed and high-ended. The chugging bass and heavy, complex drums almost sound like they’re operating in a different dimension than the super-shrill guitar, which sounds like equal parts Mick Barr and Big Black. I’m used to Alex’s maxed-treble guitar sound, but he did some harmonics things this time that went into dog-whistle territory.

Cellular Chaos at the Cake-Shop 2/27/11

I hadn’t seen Cellular Chaos before, but since I’m almost always into Weasel Walter’s projects, it’s no surprise I thought they were great. It’s nice to see Weasel playing guitar too, and some of the heavy-handedness of Lake of Dracula is definitely present, but it’s also nice how there was subtlety and complexity involved too. All the members of this group are definitely players, but mercifully un-showy ones. There were moments of freakout improv and moments of rigid tightness, on-a-dime switches between the two, and times when it wasn’t entirely clear what was happening. Unclear to the audience that is, but the band was in command at all times.

All around great show, killer line-up from start to finish.

Satanized on MySpace
Drums Like Machine Guns
White Suns
Cellular Chaos

bbigpigg "Phantom Photography"

*****UPDATE: This album now available for free download at http://www.bbigpigg.com/bp.html GET IT!*****

Bbigpigg are an NYC band and this is their debut 5-song EP. This is noise-rock that falls just about halfway between what I call noise-rock (music with rock beats, but incorporating real dissonant sounds or noise) and what some other people call noise-rock (loud edgy rock in the vein of the Jesus Lizard or somesuch). Shrill and tweaked guitars stab at you, but unlike some other modern No Wavers, this is anchored to a rock-solidly skilled rhythm section. Like… Shellac playing Arab on Radar covers? If you like Satanized or Microwaves you’ll probably want to check these guys out.

Let me get one complaint out of the way. For some reason I never like pig-themed things so I’m not into the band name. It might just be me. (I also don’t like songs about volcanos. Can’t say why.) I do think the curious spelling is going to throw people off though. I kept typing it in as bbiggppigg. Nope, the letters in the middle are not doubled. It’s bbigpigg. I never liked Boss Hogg’s name either (similarity intentional?) but somehow I got over it.

I caught a show by these guys last weekend and it sounded great live, and I was impressed by the one-slide-on-each-hand guitar technique. (not present on this album?) I think I caught more atypical time signatures going on at the show too. In fact my favorite track on this is the last one, “Foxx the Fox” where one guitar is playing in threes, the other in fives, and I couldn’t quite pick up on what the drummer and bassist were doing but it was something weird. It makes for a constantly shifting mess – of the best kind imaginable. And it makes me want to listen again so I can figure it out. That counts as a big win in my book.

http://www.myspace.com/bbigpigg
Contact bbigpigg-AT-gmail to get a copy.

HumanBeast at Death by Audio

Phew! Some kind of line-up, right? This is going to be the Brooklyn show to top in 2011. And there were lots of big cameras popping off everywhere, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that this event has already shown up on a bunch of other music blogs. But hey, I was there, I took pictures, it was awesome, I may as well put my show review out into the virtual world too.

dubknowdub – live at zebulon

So first of all, I missed DubKnowDub, but they’re great. I know the show had 6 bands on the bill, but this being Brooklyn, I still didn’t believe the show would actually start before 9PM. So as a consolation, hit play on the above track and let it be your soundtrack to No-Core browsing. (Music starts about the 1:45 mark.) I don’t know who DubKnowDub are exactly, but they get on lots of great shows somehow and they’re tons of fun. Yup, it’s kinda dub, and also kinda noise. Great live. Don’t make my mistake next time!

Diamond Black Hearted Boy at Death by Audio

I did get there in time to catch Diamond Black Hearted Boy, a guy I’ve met before though I didn’t mentally piece together that it was the same person until I talked to him at the show! DBHB comes from the same Richmond freak scene that Narwhalz and Shams do and performance-wise you can tell he’s on the same page. Live, it’s kinda confrontational (for anyone who’s not into it) or just good fun if you are into it. Lots of goofy genre tags have been slapped on him, but honestly, I’d say his music is sort of proto-industrial. Claustrophobic, pushed-too-far-into-the-red samples and loops, usually rhythmic, sometimes with actual beats. Tonight DBHB also made ample use of a piercing whistle blown straight into the microphone which sounded pretty awesome (maybe a little tiresome after a while though) like it was hitting the resonant frequency of your eardrums.

Shawn Greenlee at Death by Audio

Shawn Greenlee’s performance was really fantastic. He used some kind of camera to scan from a handmade book, and then what must have been custom software to turn the images into noise. Then there was a weird spinning disk, and he’d use the trackpad kind of like a Kaossilator, and… well, just watch him do his thing here. That’s my best guess as to what was going on. It sounded super-sweet too, better than it came out in this video. I was captivated.

And then, humanbeast. This was SO GOOD.

HumanBeast at Death by Audio 3

HumanBeast at Death by Audio 2

Last year at the International Noise Conference in Miami, I, like any mortal person, had to take a break and miss some of the acts. When I got back and asked people what I missed, everyone kept saying “Humanbeast! Humanbeast!” (I’m using the no-space spelling that appears on the tape I got) – so I was excited to finally see these guys. They did not disappoint! Their music was absolutely gorgeous, while at the same time being really dirty and messed up – which was also sort of how their performance played out – and how the theme of their lyrics go – taken together it’s cohesive, deadly effective, and totally entrancing. Amazing music meets amazing noise. Again, I couldn’t really capture the sound in full, but here’s my video of them playing “Come Through the Cloth.” I just watched it again and got chills at the point where she sings at the top of her lungs without the microphone.

I don't know if all those expensive cameras are safe there...

And then Rat Bastard of INC and Laundryroom Squelchers fame took to the stage, with his guitar with only 4 strings and 4 tuning pegs remaining. He was joined by Roger of Monotract fame and another guy who I probably should know but don’t, both on guitars. This was basically a performance following the Laundryroom Squelchers M.O. – a terrific squall that sounds at first like sheer white noise. The infamous Nondor Nevai made his trademark after-the-band-has-started appearance and took over vocals, striking poses but largely inaudible over the din. The thing about these Rat performances is that the beginning always seems just like random loud noodling, but if you’re willing to keep listening it starts to take shape and details come out at you. And these guys must have been listening to one another, because somehow they all knew when it was done around the same time.

AIDS Wolf at Death by Audio

AIDS Wolf went on last, and this was the first time I’ve seen their new(ish) 3-person line-up. (and Chloe’s new glasses!) Losing a guitarist has certainly not diminished the volume or chaos of AIDS Wolf live. In fact, I think I like the new sound even better. The band members really seem to be working toward some sort of Harry-Pussy-like psychic communication music that relies on feeling and intuition more than counting beats. They also introduced some sampled sounds and vocal effects which broadened the sound pallet. At least, I think that was an effect and not just a technical difficulty – but you know what? I really enjoy it when a band can make me wonder what’s intentional and what’s not. Living at the edge of chaos. I was also happy to see that the musical chaos inspired some physical chaos in the crowd. It looks like people are just standing around in the above photo, but there was some serious mosh action happening.

In closing: Awesome show. Good people, good times, great sounds. Show ran on time?!?! (props to Edan) Amazing. I went home feeling reinvigorated about music in general.

Realicide - Detroit 2009

Everyone loves free mp3 albums right? So maybe you’ve already found these, but it can’t hurt to spread the good word. The gabber/noise/omni-core group Realicide have made a whole bunch of music available for you. They’re frequently compared to Atari Teenage Riot, which is not far off the mark, except they often make ATR sound like, I don’t know… Jesus Jones?

Anyway, you can get no less than THREE collections of stuff, a mega-mix of samples from the latest album with live stuff and b-sides here:

http://www.lunaticfringe.org/~schizoid/dtrashrecords/digitaldownloads/135.html

and a 20-minute tape of misc. live material turned digital release, directly linked here:

http://ia311020.us.archive.org/1/items/Wild063-Realicide/Wild063-Realicide-DigitalScraps2008.zip

and basically a whole live album, with interviews and photos! This one’s pretty awesome. Here:

http://www.digitalvomit.com/dvr048

Rose for Bohdan

And next up, Brian of Foot Village/Deathbombarc pointed out in the comments to another post that his band Rose For Bohdan’s last album was made available as a free download, but since I figure few people saw it there, I’m reiterating it here. 3 members of Foot Village, recently reviewed, were also in this band. Get it here:

http://deathbombarc.com/sound/r4b/creepingmoraldecay/creeping.htm

The last time I wrote something about the infamous 4-drummer/vocalist band Foot Village, I said that they reminded me of one of those weekend project bands that would normally play one show and be forgotten. Somehow or other I had in fact forgotten that I actually WAS in a percussion-and-vocals-only band called The Old Joe Smiths. It was formed on a weekend and did play exactly one show.

But wait, this is not one of those self-absorbed reviews where I just talk about me, I have a point about Foot Village. As soon as the Old Joe Smiths band concept was born, it immediately expanded to include multiple odd percussion instruments, including glass bottles with varying amounts of water to make a crude xylophone. Foot Village on the other hand, has a much stronger purity of vision. If someone tells you that a band is made of 4 drummer/vocalists, you might picture some kind of world music group with bongos, bells, vocal harmonies, etc. Heck, even other multi-drummer noise-rock groups like Aa or current Boredoms go in for this stuff.

Foot Village? None of that. Four matching rock drum kits. Kick, tom, snare, hi-hat, crash. Times four. Pounding and screaming. That’s what you get. They allow themselves exactly one additional “instrument” – the megaphone. I suspect the tone in “Death of the Endless” is megaphone feedback and the sirens in “National Jamthum” and “Chicken & Cheese 2″ are a default sound created by the same megaphone. In addition to these restrictions, Foot Village also operate within an established concept – they are building their own nation. This album, “Anti-Magic,” is vaguely about their first war, with the forces of mysticism and magic. The album art shows Foot Village tribe members – all nude – fighting wizard types with sticks, spears, and bombs. I thought this concept might be about the battle between superstition and rationalism, but if so it comes across vague and playful, not political.

You might think the tight restrictions would make things boring, but no. It just forces Foot Village to push the creativity of their composition and interaction. There is one small deviation from this plan, the half-way point track “Grace’s Death” which is mostly vocal, then veers into some kind of remixed/electronic segment. A nice little break, then back to the drums. Also, the album closes with the track ”Chicken & Cheese 2,” which turns into a relay race of rad underground bands covering the song, one after the other. The results are extremely varied and it’s a super-fun way to close things out. In fact, each edition of the album: CD, vinyl, cassette, and digital – has a different collection of bands doing the covers.

One last thought: It is really hard to capture multiple drums in a recording. I don’t know if it always sounds like there are 4 drum kits here, but it almost always sounds like there’s more than one. The drum-layering works best when there are lots of fast rolls going on, like those in “Reggae War Zone.” The “heavy” all-together pounding moments sound much more impressive in a live setting, which is really how you ought to experience Foot Village. Still, none of that changes the fact that this is a great and super-entertaining album. (But maybe they should put out a Dolby 5.1 version too).

Free mp3 sample download: Foot Village – Reggae War Zone

Foot Village website
Foot Village on last.fm
album can be bought here

Social Junk are an experimental duo (often with collaborators) originally from West Virginia and recently located to the ever-growing fun-noise capital of Philadelphia. What I admire and like best about them is how they can’t be easily pegged into one narrow niche. Sure, you could call them “experimental” like I just did, but they’ll only fit into a broad category like that. In our modern era of hyper-compartmentalization and scene fragmentation, Social Junk seem like boundary crossers.

They mash up lo-tech industrial clang, delay-loving moan-wave, organic noise-folk, Wolf Eyes-style creep and scrape soundscapes, and pin it all together with occasional white light/white heat noise-rock. The central and title track on this album, the 15-minute “Born Into It,” is what you’re most likely to get at a Social Junk show. It starts with some indistinct, watery, reverb noises and electronic squeaks. The volume builds as echoing crashes ring out. Then as that part dies out there’s a second hushed part, echoing voices joining. Screeching and howling feedback noise starts to overwhelm things and for a finale the drums roll in with the noise still rising to a dense mess and ending abruptly at the climax. Pretty much a perfect 15-minute I.N.C.-style performance. The other tracks explore different parts of this sonic terrain, sometimes harsher, sometimes more free-form, sometimes more blissful and vocal-focused.

I’ve dropped some terms in describing Social Junk that would normally make me shy away from a band, like “noise-folk” or “moan-wave.” These tags are usually applied to groups that are just a bit too cute and mild for me to appreciate. Social Junk might appeal to fans of that stuff, but haters won’t want to dump them in that crowd, because Social Junk always have an edge, the sounds are never 100% nice, there’s always some lurking tension and you know things could start sounding downright ugly. In the best possible way. These guys just finished a tour with other awesome noise jammers Dick Neff and Mincemeat Or Tenspeed, and they’ll probably be heading out on tour again before you know it.

Social Junk on last.fm
Social Junk on MySpace
Order from Digitalis

I think I promised some photos from this show quite a while ago. (click for slightly bigger files) The Silent Barn is a DIY venue in Bushwick, Brooklyn, and the closest thing you’re going to get to a house show around here. First up, Hot Guts play some hi-NRG garage rock through gobs of effects. It actually sounds kind of like this image:

Hot Guts at Silent Barn

Gay Beast played in the middle and I think I’ve raved about them enough, right? It’s twice as great live as on record. Brain-melting nu-math no-wave.

Gay Beast at Silent Barn 1

Gay Beast at Silent Barn 2

Satanized closed things out with an intense and sweaty set. They play harsh math/noise-rock, often leaning toward the technical. This night things leaned toward the heavy and pounding.

Satanized at Silent Barn 1

Satanized at Silent Barn 2

Satanized at Silent Barn 3

Awesome. Sorry about the slow blogging, but things will pick up here. And hey, if anyone thinks there is a Brooklyn show that I really shouldn’t miss, be sure to shoot me an email!

So, you’ve been waiting for the no-wave/math/prog/noise-rock album of the year? Well, here you go! Heck, this might be the winner in that category for the decade. Double heck, one of the only other serious contenders for that title would probably be Gay Beast’s last album, “Disrobics.”

This is a glorious collision of angular guitar parts, analog synth sweeps and bleeps, sax blurts, and drumming in that complex endless-fill style. And some real singing. (I like me some screeching or hollering too, but it’s nice to hear a different approach here.) Oh yeah, and TUNES.

I told a friend who attended a recent Gay Beast show with me that what I loved about them was how they could make challenging and amazingly complex music and also fill it with catchy hooks. After the show, this person, who is far more inclined than I am to listen to “pop” music, said that “maybe it’s catchy for music that YOU listen to.” Well, point taken. It can be a matter of perspective. Maybe Gay Beast is what Deerhoof sounds like to your average indie rock fan. (if I had pull-quotes, that would be it)

Still, I maintain that the hooks are there. Even to me, they seemed a little hard to “get” on first listen, but now after my 20th listen or so I find myself singing as I walk down the street, “Don’t sweep me a-a-aah – don’t sweep me under the rug – I am only human!” I have even woken up with Gay Beast songs running through my head.

And there may be the best selling point for “second wave” – it will bring great rewards upon many, many repeated listens. By the time you have the songs figured out, you will find that you’ve fallen in love with them. This ranks high as the album most worth your hard-earned dollars. All the more amazing that band singer/keyboardist/saxophonist Danimal gave this to me in trade, after he tried to pay for MY disc which I handed him. Could there be a more stand-up dude? (At the aforementioned show. Photos posted soon. I cannot guarantee this trading trick will work more than once.)

FREE MP3 SAMPLE: “eeexxxpppaaannndddiiinnnggg”

Bonus trivia: see if you can catch the DEVO tune semi-hidden on the album.

LP and CD on Skin Graft Records

http://www.last.fm/music/Gay+Beast
http://www.myspace.com/gaybeast
http://skingraftrecords.com/news_desk.html

Here’s a video of them killing it at the Cake-Shop back in Oh-6.

And not just from some unknown punks neither, but some danged “luminaries.”

XBXRX have made their new album, “Un Usper,” available for “FREE” download direct from their website:

http://www.xbxrx.com

This album is a nice mish-mash of punk rock moves, noise-rock attitude, free-jamming, synth sounds, and is that a xylophone? Nice.

Those quotes around free are, however, intentional. While you are permitted to download it for free, XBXRX ask that you make a donation in return. I know that sometimes it feels like digital music should be completely free, but I reasoned with myself as follows: I would blow 4 bucks just to make a round-trip subway ride to the record store, and that’s more than most bands on a label get from each CD sale, so heck, it seems reasonable to throw those few dollars to XBXRX and support really, truly DIY music. But hey, don’t let me discourage you from donating more… or less…

Next up, AIDS Wolf “Pas Rapport”:

It’s a tour-only tape of improv jams, or maybe they’re not totally improvised. The boombox quality recording is not too much different from the blown-out sound on their album proper and the tracks are all punctual full-band jams. So if you liked the albums, you will definitely want to grab this while the download link still works.

Get it here!

AIDS Wolf ask for nothing in return, but you might consider following their blog (http://aidswolfs.blogspot.com) so you can find out about things like this, and of course go see them when they come around on tour!

ENJOY.