Past Lives - Tapestry of Webs (2010)

 

Growing up in a small city with limited resources for bands, one that was never included on anyone's tour schedule, was frustrating for a young me. Situated firmly between NYC and Philadelphia, you'd think that teenage me would have many options. 

Life wasn't like that, however.

Fast forward to my first experience living in a bigger city. My desire for live music was so pent up that every year I would bankrupt myself seeing live music. It was like a drug. I would get yearly bonuses that would all be dwindled 4 months, where I'd inevitably pull money from my retirement fund to cover rent. 

One of the bands I saw in this time was Past Lives. I was working with the bassist from The Thermals, who were opening, so I had the rare opportunity to see a show for free, and I loved The Thermals so win win. Then Past Lives takes the stage and within minutes my little mind was splattered all over the walls of the venue. 

Past Lives featured Jordan Blilie on vocals... a very recognizable voice in the music scene of the Pacific Northwest. I'd loved his earlier band The Blood Brothers, but didn't really follow Blilie's career or even know what he looked like. So immediately when he started singing I knew he was standing right in front of me. 

Tapestry of Webs is post-hardcore pushed up toward colorful melodicism and away from the dismal, grey vibes more indicative of the genre. The music is energetic and thrashing at times but also swings towards balladry. There's singing AND screaming. Guitars AND saxophone and... is that a clarinet or a bassoon in there? A wild, beautiful, inspired record that 13 years later is still giving newness to my ears. 

Past Lives - Tapestry of Webs

Music for 4/20

420 is a dumb tradition in the United States that has to do with smoking marijuana. Every April 20th hundreds of thousands of college kids are making both dumb jokes and excuses to get blasted today. 

I used to be one of them, so I use the word "dumb" lovingly. 

Weed is a lot more accepted in the US today than it ever has been with stores selling it legally in several states. They are strange places, almost more like banks than, say, liquor stores. One does not browse at a weed store. The transaction is very business-like... almost cold. You wait in a line (or in some instances a waiting room) until it is your turn to order. You speak to a stoner (sometimes called a "budtender") who helps you find what you are looking for (weed, you are looking for weed). You get your wares and you GTFO. 

Anyway. Those days are behind me but no judgement if you took the day off to smoke a ton of weed and do whatever. May these records guide be your soundtrack.

Holy - All These Worlds Are Yours

Holy is from Stockholm, Sweden and they remind me of Tame Impala's Innerspeaker and Lonerism days. Swirling phased out drum fills and Beatles-esque vocals make this well-produced record one that I've returned to several times over the past several years.

Holy is solid, psychedelic indie rock. Also - a limited amount of vinyl remaining on this one.

2019 release on Punk Slime.

Dead Finks - The Death and Resurrection of Johnathan Cowboy 

Sometimes I gather so much music that I forget to listen to it. Popped this one on the jukebox the other night and boy howdy, a gripping rock record from a Berlin duo. Just straightforward punk that's more slightly more rock than punk to my ears but your experience may differ.

The chord changes are just slightly askew and I like how they double (triple? quadruple?) the vocal tracks. Will probably get this on vinyl.

For stoners who like IPAs with their bong hits.

Kadhja Bonet - Childqueen

Here's some gorgeous soul/jazz/r'n'b out of Los Angeles. I think it was during the initial phase of the pandemic that I went on a bit of a music buying spree and Kadhja Bonet was one that I bought several things from.

Chill music in case your mellow gets harshed. Track 4, Delphine, is at least worth 6 minutes of your day. Here's a great live performance of a song on a different release. 

Jogging House - Face

Another contribution from Germany. Here we have Jogging House from Frankfurt, which is the ambient project of one Boris Potschubay. Since getting into ambient music 3 years ago I've consistently enjoyed the music of Mr. Potschubay. The tones are warm and nostalgia inducing with touches of 8-bit grit. 

This is his most recent release under the Jogging House name. Good for zoning the eff out while doodling or whatever stoners do these days. I listen to it while doing chores on rainy Sunday mornings because like I've said before... I'm old now.

The Molds - Saltine (2018)

One of the most interesting things about Bandcamp is that it's truly a website for everyone: big names but there music on there of course, but so does the everyday person who records music but holds a completely different day job.

The Molds is the monicker that a guy named Matt Ojala uses to write and record rock music somewhere between Seattle and NYC (and maybe Charleston, SC) when he's not working in project development. 

The tracks are pretty lo-fi but punchy and loud. It's kinda punk and it's kinda throttling indie rock. The rhythms are strange... not in a time signature kind of way but in a "why is he hitting the snare drum there" kind of way. Try bobbing your head along to the rhythm. It's like being on an old wooden roller coaster ...it all works but in a jerky sort of way. 

Impressively good music from an obvious talent who ALSO just so happens to also develop affordable housing communities. Makes me wonder what the hell I'm doing with my life.

The Molds - Saltine

 

Print Head - Happy Happy & Hardcore Pop (2021)

From 2017 to 2021 I had a radio show at a college in a small Pennsylvania city. I'd scour bandcamp, drinking beer, using student loans to buy music so I could play it over the airwaves to weird 50-something hipsters that never left the valley or truckers just passing through town. 

Print Head was from that batch of music purchased from bandcamp. There's not much information that I can find about this artist. It seems to be the work of a singular person, Brandon Saucier. It's got that lo-fi, recorded-in-a-basement quality that I cherish. It's angular and dissonant while not being completely alienating, incorporating punk and garage into it's experimental song structures... all of which clock in under 2 minutes for the most part. 

This release combines two of Print Head's earliest releases: Hardcore Pop from 2019 and Happy Happy from 2020. Both were self-released individually on cassette, and then Spanish punk label Discos Perquébien put out the double release in 2021. Since these efforts, Saucier has released around 6 other tapes. That's 8 releases total in 4 years, NONE TOO SHABS, as they say (no one says that). 

This particular double release is on the Discos Perquébien bandcamp page which I will link below, but should you want to check out all the other releases of his (don't get your hopes up over cassettes, they're all sold out), click here to get to the Print Head bandcamp page.

Click below for the 25 track double release.

Happy Happy & Hardcore Pop

Music for Your Weekend

 

World Domination Enterprises - Too Bad (I Can't Control Myself)

This is a post-punk band active in the 80s that is currently pushing out unreleased singles on their bandcamp page. 

Here are two versions of this song. The "RnB" version is just my cup of tea. Playing it while driving will increase speeds by at least 20mph. The "Rangalanga box" version is also quite good, much more drum-machine bedroom post-punk which needs to be a genre explored more. 

HUSHPUPPY - Singles Club (Remastered)

Here is a repost of an artist named Zoë Brecher and their incredibly catchy lo-fi pop music. 

Worthy of reposting for several reasons: Brecher has been making waves lately, getting more notoriety and well-deserved spotlights. She sat in as house drummer for Late Night with Seth Meyers recently, and also recorded with none other than the state bird of New Jersey himself, Bruce Springsteen, on his latest 60's soul covers record "Only The Strong Survive". 

Also - when first posted on Spacerockmountain - there was only a digital and cassette tape version of this available. But now there is vinyl! Blue or Yellow. It being Bandcamp Friday, all proceeds go to the artist, so that's cool.

Vangas - Facial Tissue

I've been digging through stuff I downloaded years ago to find some gems I never wrote about here. Vangas seems tailer-made for Spacerockmountain because it's aggressive scuzzy noise rock. 

Coming out of Georgia, this band makes music that's heavy but experimental. Maybe Unwound meets Pissed Jeans gets you close to what you'll find here. 

And with track names like "I Have Three Faces and I Hang With Dogs" (which is an awesome track) and the over 9 minute closer, "Two Men Fucking" you have music that's fun for the whole family, really. 

Required listening.

Burger Shot - Small Town Glory

There is undoubtedly 99% terrible music on bandcamp so when something unique finds the ears, my brain becomes magnetized. I'm not a connoisseur of the Vaporwave genre, and this could not quite qualify as that, but whatever this is... I fucking dig it.

Burger Shot is from Jackson, Wyoming and a project between two individuals, billybob and drey. They tagged the music herein as "Americanawave" which feels accurate. The music is like modern country, slowed way down ala Vaporwave, and chopped minimally like a wedge salad. 

Have you played a record at 45 instead of 33 by mistake, and liked it better that way? This is the opposite experience. 

Scrivener - A Signal (2017)

Olympia, Washington, where the smell of salt water competes with the aroma of roasting coffee (which smells a lot like burning toast), is also where some of music's most well known artists gestated and spewed forth definitive records of early American indie rock. It was ground zero for the Riot Grrrl movement, and both Beck and Modest Mouse recorded there. Kurt Cobain lived just east of downtown, where he wrote much of Nevermind - a record that sent a whole nation of angsty teenagers hurdling towards thrift stores, searching feverishly for smoke-stained plaid shirts. More recently, Olympia has spurred forth one of the greatest black metal bands in recent times, Wolves In The Throne Room, and has lead the country in amazing queer, d-beat, hardcore punk bands like G.L.O.S.S. and Slouch.

It's just happens to be a great town for bands. I remember walking downtown from my little black house near the San Francisco Street Bakery, and on almost every block you could hear bands practicing in garages, living rooms, and basements. The community is tight knit and insular which, while making the social scene a difficult nut to crack, makes for a strong and supportive environment for artists.

It's from this environment that my new favorite band has emerged. This is Scrivener's first recording I believe, and it's so good that I had to dust off this long-neglected blog to steer any lingering readers toward their bandcamp page. Their style is like glam-hardcore punk... and by "glam" I refer to the almost theatric vocal delivery. Usually with any genre of music, a vocalist will stick to one vocal delivery - singing, speak-singing (think post-motorcycle accident Dylan), screaming... etc. but Scrivener's vocalist moves fluidly through all, using a range of expression missing from the vast majority of punk singers, or rock vocalists in general. Take the screaming of any metal or hardcore band and add bit of animated, matter-of-fact conversation - it's such a fresh delivery that it keeps this record on constant rotation. Scrivener is simultaneously playful and brutal.

8 songs, pay what you want for digital or buy their self-released cassette tape through their bandcamp page.

Scrivener - A Signal

Favorite track:

No Babies - S/T (2011)

Life throws curve balls, there's no doubt about that. There's no sense in trying to brace yourself for this beforehand, however, just be on the look out and take things as they come. Without getting into specifics (because you come here to find out about music and not be burdened with someone else's dirty laundry) let's just say the irony of studying a chapter on muscle contractions the same week a good friend has an unexpected grand mal seizure in your living room... that's an irony of life you can not only keep but you can shove it far up your ass.

Seizures aren't even train-wreck-level of interesting to watch, just plain fucking scary. Though, as it turns out, relatively harmless (refrain from putting something in between their teeth! See a doctor!)

Read more about seizures here.

So, in these times, I turn to chaotic music to give my inner chaos a sounding board by which it may have a partner to dance with. 

Thank you, Oakland's No Babies. 

Noisy, disarticulated skronk. A perfect soundtrack for the moments when you get cut off in traffic by some shitmonger driving a hummer with a license plate that reads "Free Tibet". When the universe throws shit into the fan you innocently used to cool yourself from the heat of the daily grind. The bee in your beer. The ice in your underwear. You get what I'm saying? Ugh, I need to sleep. If there are bedbugs in your sheets, No Babies are the perfect lullaby.

10 songs, name your price.

No Babies - S/T