Taken from Impose: The Future Thanks Jeremy!
DRIPHOUSE “Romati & Gains” (Baked Tapes)
Driphouse is Darren Ho, the guy who played in Racoo-oo-oon but not the mutated duo-form of that band, Wet Hair. Instead here’s his solo dream scores, Driphouse.
This tape was home recorded in Brooklyn in August 2009 “straight into computer soundcard,” with a Roland Alpha Juno-1 and a sweet delay pedal. The world’s basically at Mr. Ho’s finger tips with that potent one-two punch, and here he conjures barren landscapes and slow moving spirit vessels riding his woeful harpsichord melody. Like if Clockwork Orange was about sensitive kids driving around looking for meaningful new experiences instead of rape victims.
Tags: baked tapes, driphouse, foxy digitalis, review
Taken from Tabs Out Thanks Mike!
NASA “High Cube” c32 (Baked Tapes)
I straight up don’t think man has ever landed on the moon. It may be the only fringe conspiracy bullshit that I get behind, but whatever, I’m not ashamed to say it. I just don’t believe it, and basically chalk it up to some macho-alpha-country shit we had going with Russia back when them Ruskies meant business, you know? So we faked that shit and got the space race blue ribbon. USA! USA! Flash forward about 40 years. The 2011 budget is announced and NASA are all being doofuses about getting some cuts. Now, let me be straight, I’m totally about space exploration and advancing our collective scientific understanding about the universe and dark matter and all that shit, but ya know… Maybe just chill for a few years until our money is done melting. Anyway, I’m listening to Fleetwood Mac and thinking about that, and then I think “Didn’t I get a package in the mail from Baked like two weeks ago with some tape called Nasa High Dudes or something like that”? When I found this bright colored banger glowing on my desk I had an intense self-debate on what would be a more prudent venture; listen to this tape or watch Capricorn One (a 1977 non-classic in which OJ Simpson and friends fake a landing on Mars). This cassette won out. After pressing the play button I sat back hoping I made the correct choice. So much was riding on this moment!
The name of this project is simply Nasa, “High Cube” being the title of the cassette. My hasty jog around the interweb would have me believe that Nasa is comprised of three dudes, Floridian in origin, who have released a scattering of cassettes and CDrs over the last 3 years, give or take. “High Cube” a 32 minute burner, revs it’s psychedelic engines with a consciousness-expanding canopy of guitars, some plucking away at twinkled notes, others seeping like a rainbow oil spill. Nasa does an excellent job segregating those ideas, while still highlighting them both. Very reminiscent of earlier Growing material, albeit less “produced” or whatever, but still mega-rich and tantalizing. That segment devolves into primal jam session of sorts; total basic riffing, echoed chants, and… And cowbell? Is that cowbell? I goddamn think it’s cowbell. Dudes totally Shyamalan’d me! The next track dives further into the jam band land that Nasa was, in a way, hinting at. A steady drum beat keeps shit semi-traditional, while weirdo effects and mood swings fuck with your head. It’s all a little sloppy, but in the right mindset (that being really stoned and thinking about space) its a perfect partner in crime.
The B side didn’t rope me in right away, at least not like the flip side material. The start off was a tad to… I don’t know… Structured? As far as coupled with the prior zone out that is, I just wasn’t feeling it to a large degree. A clouded aura of hippie/blues/flannel/mustache “basement to boombox” got deep into my brain and I just couldn’t let it go. It’s not that the shit was bad, it just wasn’t the conclusion I was looking for. Kind of like the season opener to Lost. Did anyone watch that? It was kind of disappointing, but I’m still gonna check out more. As I probably will with these dudes.
The cover for this nugget is an eye opener. A briiiight picture of the sun rising over Disney’s Epcot Center (the big golf ball thing) is illuminated in an orange glow with magenta text, printed on fairly heavy paper. I once heard a rumor that if you die in Disney World they wont declare you dead until you are off the property, therefore, no one can die in Disney World. Man, that anti-semite thought of everything before they froze him, huh? Baked did up 60 copies of “High Cube” and at $5 beans a pop it’s a lot cheaper than going to the moon (for the first time, for real).
Tags: baked tapes, nasa, review, tabs out
Taken from Foxy Digitalis’s Long Decline Thanks Brad!
DRIPHOUSE “Romati & Gains” (Baked Tapes)
“I went all weepy on Driphouse once before, but “Romati & Gains” demands attention cuz it’s one of my favorite tapes of the year, for sure. Minimal electro hypnoses, flying through pristine skies with liquid gold dripping off at lightspeed. I’m such a sucker for this stuff… subtle beats galore drive everything from the backseat. Daren Ho is on fire. I dunno what parts get me more… the inspired ’70s electronic compositional aspects or the total new age vibes that float on top. It’s all mixed-up, it’s all beautiful. I love how this tape just flows from one stop to the next, never losing focus and never getting off-track. Ho’s got some serious pop hooks lurking under veil here, too – a little something for all the kids. B-side is full of heavy meditation – points of light for sure, but a thick mass of synth mud keeps it grounded in a big ball of tension. Driphouse – love it more and more every day. Driphouse vinyl plz! I need it, damnit!”
Tags: baked tapes, driphouse, foxy digitalis, review
Taken from Tabs Out Thanks Dave!
MILLIONS “Shredded Heaven” c30 (Baked Tapes)
Brooklyn resident David Suss, the man working behind the Millions curtain since roughly 2007 offers up his recent recipe Shredded Heaven, which comes to us fresh out of the Baked Tapes neighborhood oven. It’s a damn tasty treat and is well worth keeping in the Rolodex for your next dinner party. I may be wrong but I’d venture to guess that he called this one Shredded Heaven because he got as pissed as I did when he found out those fucking nebula pictures they take in space are actually doctored on a computer to look so cool. Jerks.
Side one is a cosmic drone of the highest order. While being firmly anchored to a foundation of deep, rounded synth thrumming and soft static buzzes, it is also in a constant state of slow, focused fluctuation. Suss is super zoned in here and with a sure, steady, sometimes undetectable hand, he valiantly forges an animate universe of radiant warmth and monolithic force. Ethereal wisps race through the heavenly body at warp speed and slowly evaporate amidst countless brilliant constellations singing beautifully in gracious, reverent chorus. It’s a spectacle to behold and this shit wasn’t colored by Nasa. Fucking assholes.
The flip side unearths some of the deeper buried elements of the first side and incorporates them into more subdued atmospherics. Gentle guitars echo in delicate patters, rippling through warm swelling strings and humming synthesizers. Slow airy mutations shape the backdrop, tense illuminations slowly begin to permeate the surface and a sharp, rusty stringed guitar phrase sends us off. Suss is really on a roll lately and this release is no exception. It’s still available via Baked Tapes, which I might add is also on quite a roll. Go get it and pick up a couple of their other goodies while you’re at it.
Tags: baked tapes, millions, review, tabs out
Taken from Foxy Digitalis Thanks Robert!
CHAOS MAJIK “Cry of the 12th Aethyr” c30 (Baked Tapes)
CM, or Chaos Majik, is Todd Brooks. He founded a group called Pendu. They promote occultism, adhocism, and eroticism in art. This is my kind of dude. “Cry of the 12th Aethyr” is the latest tape from CM, out now on the awesome Baked Tapes label.
Brooks conjures the sound of CM through the use of handmade oscillators and feedback loops. The two pieces on “Cry of the 12th Aethyr” combine high-pitched sounds with a droning low-end. The scrapes and squalls rise and fall, while the persistent rumbles provide something closer to a static element for the proceedings. Everything is drenched and delayed; effects gently draped on top of the other.
This isn’t a revelation of experimental music– but that’s okay. I’m sure this stuff is even better live, especially considering CM kicks out these jams with his equipment housed inside a green suitcase. Brooks’ DIY approach has yielded a couple of tracks of strung-out, astral plane drone on “Cry of the 12th Aethyr.” You can’t complain about that. This is a damn good tape. 7/10 — Robert Oberlander
Tags: baked tapes, chaos majik, foxy digitalis, review
scanned from the December 2009 issue of Decibel Magazine
Tags: baked tapes, chaos majik, decibel magazine, driphouse, millions, review, slasher risk
Taken from Jambands.com Thanks Jesse!
GRASSHOPPER/TWISTYCAT “split” (Abandon Ship)
A pair of stunning New York underground horn noise duos, the trumpet-based Grasshopper and the bari sax/bass clarinet explorers Twisty Cat, here split a cassette for Abandon Ship. Both melt their source sounds into a chirping, droning tone worlds. Grasshopper’s dark, patient builds amid a wall of electronic processing, recall a more successful version of the sometimes frustrating pairing of Jon Hassell and Brian Eno in the late ’70s. Relying more on their instruments’ traditional sounds, Twisty Cat, at least in this incarnation (how many lives again?) are simultaneously more celestial and orchestral, especially with the addition of trap drummer Greg Fox, which brings Ed Bear and Lea Bertucci’s earthy woodwinds into more straightforward—though still resolutely magical—territory.
Tags: grasshopper, jambands, review, twisycat
Taken from Rotten Meats Thanks!
GRASSHOPPER/TWISTYCAT “split” (Abandon Ship)
The Grasshopper side is a live sculpture of quavering tones, slippery synthetics bleeding towards caustic futures… drones that vibrate like the internal ambience of a speeding car with all the windows down, whilst others come across like a ballerina boxed cologne full of beautifully homicidal shadings, wet dream space rituals and grieving requiem. Orchestrated drones that seem to abandon pastoral paths in favour of mainlining an astral vastness, splintering into satisfying machine scream-e-delics.
The flip side immediately grabs you, a sublime ghosting, all mournful foreboding… A wavering horror shot through with shaking larynx, raspy blows and suitably warped melody. Lighter jazz flurries follow, livened up by a drum n cymbal clatter, the sax mulling it over into overblown disarray, a jumbled meltdown… then distraught alto sax/clarinet breaths bloat outward on an oscillating tide of worming distortion…
Abandon ship certainly seem to be channelling some interesting energies…
Tags: grasshopper, review, rotten meats, twistycat
Taken from Vital Weekly Thanks!
GRASSHOPPER/TWISTYCAT “split” (Abandon Ship)
This split is a rarity for the underground experimental scene because both bands employ traditional instruments prominently in their music. In the case of Grasshopper, the New York duo bury doleful trumpeting amid their whirring layers of feedback noise, reverberating sonic detritus, and assorted electronic tomfoolery. Their side of this split happens to be made of severely potent stuff. Terrific opener “Smokey Nights, Melting Flesh” is a momentous and hypnotic work, all wrapped up in a high-pitched electronic rush. Meanwhile, aptly-titled “When Hell Overfills, The Dead Will Walk the Earth” could be the cacophonous score to a Dario Argento climax, thoroughly horrific in its fiery harsh noise, blaring trumpet, and what might be hellishly discordant organ keys. Like the rest of Grasshopper’s side, which progresses through its share of noisy peaks and gentler valleys, it deserves to be played loud and mercilessly. On quite a different front, saxophone and clarinet figure much more centrally into Twisty Cat’s sound than trumpet does into Grasshopper’s. The trio of Ed Bear (Talibam!), Lea Bertucci, and Greg Fox (GDFX, Teeth Mountain) merge woodwinds, drums, and electronics to produce an impressive free-jazz rattle, bounding from spectral and mournful (“Sedenion”) to bouncy yet organized (“XGDFXy”) and then back again (“Guns in Grilling”). The recording could be better, but as things are, this rubs off as a casual peek into a semi-organized band rehearsal; though buried in tape fuzz, one can nevertheless sense the seedlings of glory here. Unlike Grasshopper, however, Twisty Cat doesn’t have a live performance to fill the last half of their side, making for a disappointing length of blank tape to finish this sucker off. While it lasts, though, this split is a damn fine adventure.
Tags: grasshopper, review, twistycat, vital weekly
Taken from Vampire Basketball Thanks Dave!
GRASSHOPPER “Wretched Blood Wraith” c23 (Obsolete Units)
Grasshopper is the fantastic New York based project of Jesse DeRosa and Josh Millrod which I was just recently acquainted with via a stellar live performance that I caught this past November in Newark, Delaware. They pretty much floored me so I grabbed a handful of releases from them at the show that night and they’ve all been on steady rotation ever since. Except for this one…
But that’s because it fell behind my computer desk and I forgot I even had it until the other night. I had just gotten off a long day of work and was sitting down, getting ready to smoke some weed and dropped my lighter on the floor. Of course, when I looked down, it wasn’t anywhere in sight (isn’t that how it always goes?) so I had to get under my desk to look for it. And then, right before me eyes, there she was, in all her orange glory, staring back at me on a puffy white cloud strewn with piles of red and white skulls. She hadeth betwixt her bosoms the tail of a red sea serpent, whose body wrapped around her slender neck and was being heldeth in the blurry hand of the crimson robed serpent keeper. Dude looked pissed and was emitting all kinds of angry yellow sound circles.
It’s triumphant times like these when weed actually is more appropriate than before you dropped the lighter under your desk and cussed under your breath because you actually had to get your lazy ass on the ground, way down there, and look for it. See, the name might not suggest it but Grasshopper are excellent music when you are on the pot. This tape being no exception – baked or not.
Regal Blood Wraith kicks things off with slowly oscillating tones peeking through a dense layer of huge and foreboding, yet surprisingly soothing, brain massaging fuzz. Swirls of colorful synth soon get kneaded into the mix and trumpets sound off in short repeated blasts. All sounds begin to hold tight in a steadfast hum and there is simultaneously a sense of intense motion and complete stasis. It’s like being awe struck in the eye of a tornado as you watch the beautiful beast collect and devour everything in its path.
Two towns over, in the breeze rustled grass is The Langoliers, holding down the b-side. Things are much calmer here but the mood imposed by Regal Blood Wraith is still faintly present, making it a perfect complement to it’s former track while having plenty of personality to stand on its own. The trumpets are pushed a little further into the foreground, giving them a bit more room to wander and the synth elements are more defined, holding things together with simple, repetitive melodic phrases.
This is a fantastic release all around that reveals more and more subtle nuance with each listen. Awesome artwork provided by Witchbeam, as always. This is an edition of 60 and is still available from Obsolete Units. It’s hard to pick a favorite release from Grasshopper, but this might be it.
Tags: grasshopper, review, vampire basketball