REDNECK S.T. Redneck Vol. 5 - AHR37 C10

Stoked. Bought this one up2nd hand; still building up my hoard of Suicidal Tendons, aka RedNeck. A tornado of brutal harsh noise. Static on distortion. Twists and turns. Hold it, now hit it. Hellbent with intent to noise. Total destruction. Zero high pitched microphone feedback. Fucking ripper. The only pussy-footing around with a contact mic on this tape is in the first 30 seconds or so; the rest is harsh noise for dudes that like harsh noise, in stereo. The liner notes say Fuck You. short and sweet. Jcard has an extra flap with full color graphic close-up of eyeball edge. Long out of print on pdx's Alienated Hominid Recordings.

Mixed Band Philanthropist - The Impossible Humane

This tape is a trip. 

Winters in Osaka / Plastic Crimewave - Swamp of Fogs LP out now on Dismantle Records

Bought this one on a whim. Was mostly attracted to the artwork and the spooky swap fonts. How could one go wrong with having a snake spiral up a tree, a gator, and a terradactal looking bird all hand drawn on yer cover? Right? 
I've seen Winters in Osaka's name around for years, but haven't delved in til now. This LP is a collaboration between Chicago artists Winters in Osaka and Plastic Crimewave, the latter is a name I do not recall seeing before. WIN lists their 6 band members with the preface on this recording as, which leads me to believe they have somewhat of a revolving line-up. PCw does not list any names, just prepared guitar/vox. 
Side A is one long track. It starts out pretty damn quiet with a thin drone and slowly the tide rises. Things begin to pick up speed. Whizzing hums like living inside of a bee hive. Sweeping buzz-drones make up the bulk of this track. Half way through, there's some choppiness like that of mode selecting yer DL-4 mid drone. Sort of a buzzkill but brief enough to forget about it quickly. Some degraded lo-res echo vox are added to thicken the broth. Buzzing and wavering drones make a come-back and the climax portion of the track falls away to reveal some odd pulsing and bizarre vocal echos.
Side B has all kinds of cool sounds on it. Footsteps echoing down a hall, repetitive scraping that reminds me of those windmill things with two lumberjacks perpetually sawing a log, and some didgeridoo. And that's in the first seconds! As more layers materialize, the thickness of the dark-ambient doom pulls you in. There's a lot going on here, but it not muddied or spastic. It's easy enough to latch onto a sound and follow it through, or just lie back a let it all wash over you. Erie synth? Ominous horns? I'm not really in the know, but its ambient groove from the dark side for sure. Next track has distorted guitar wanks and drums (played backwards?) along with a smooth mess of I don't know what else. The Final track is.... oh... wait a sec... I've been listening to this whole record pitched down 10% from 33rpm. Fuck. I guess it's slightly less dark than I thought... It happens... B3 is an ambient wall. Pretty solid, but not much for me to blither about. Side B of this LP always gets an instant replay.
Pressed on awesome Trans-Grey vinyl. 
Jacket is made of thick white paper, but still fairly flimsy.
Main gripe with the LP would have to be the low levels. Got my volume knob pegged, but aint in the red.

SCARD - Hellscum c30

Hails from the pacific northwest, SCARD is the solo work of Jared Huston. Side A, "Locked Within" offers up some seriously remorseful and life-loathing drone noise. It's not really fair to call it noise though. There are black oceans of evil lurking behind these sounds. Maybe this is actucutally some SDBM. Skillfully crafted scapes that make yer skin crawl. Think BSBC w/well laid growling, spooky synth, static creaks, tribal war-drums, and frothing at the mic. Exquisite melody that bleeds through toward the end is really sort of breath taking. You'd be into it. Side B, "A Serpent's Coil" is some straight-up bedroom blackmetal the way it's meant to be. One man, one drum machine, some real drums (maybe), blistery guitar, gag'n vocals chords. Jcard: b&w image of the sun through the trees is a nice touch. These dubs sound awesome too. Get one. http://scard.sonicmunitions.com/

DEADBEAT - Source Tape for lonely Nights

Does your noise suck? You need a better sound source. Just pipe this baby through your rig and you're noise'n like the big dogs! Add as much or as little variation as you wish. You can even do nothing if you just wanna knob-sync, and you'll still sound like a harsh noise god. The foundation is laid. All the fundamentals of pummeling harsh rumble and wicked crackle can be yours for the sourcing. DEADBEAT is on point. This really is a noiser's noise tape. Each side serves up a 20 minute slab of moving but not changing HNW. Not the stale static walls, but the kind you can really sink yer teeth into. Get yer panties wet walls. No sour notes or bogus tones. The end of side B degrades into a bass drone, so you can tell when you're almost done sourcing. Cover photo of gross human tugging shirt collar, showing off hickey. MADE IN U.S.A.

Mutant Video - "Head Scan" Part Two out on IRON LUNG Records

Kick back & relax. Act normal. Go on about your usual business; let "Head Scan" Part Two do its thing. Creepishly lurking at your back, this minimally invasive full-length cassette is the shit. General vibe is subtle seething dirge of synth drone and bass gut. Simmering pads, haunting throbs, and the occasional old school industrial drum beat tastefully comprise the trove of slow burnning jams. Track names like "Comb Over", "Oil Change", & "Business Expense" fail at eluding to the vast awe you succumb to when you realize the sinister truths hidden between the lines of routine monotony within your everyday life. If Mutant Video aimed at pulling off a masterful album with real staying power, without having it sound the least bit over-produced or schtiky, then they hit the mark. Bar raised. Nice looking pro-dub just like real tapes back in the 1980's. Download code included with tape if yer into it. Look for your copy over at IRON LUNG

Sunshine California - Leavin' on a Jetplane C40 on ghost dad

I remember hearing some Sunshine California circa 2007, and it was some thick&burly harsh wall. I've been searching for that release ever since. The problem with noise releases, is that its hard to collect all 12+ releases of any particular artist when they only put em out in editions of 7 or 12 copies. This tape happens to be of an edition of 50. Leavin' on a Jetplane starts out kinda flat, another low-fi bedroom recording of clicking hissing bare patch cord buzzing fuckery that doesn't really do much but lay there and squirm. In fact, all of side A and the first part of side B are more or less trash. By about the time you're ready to give up on this tape, SC hits a groove and drives it into a distorted echoing mess of awesome guitar that doesn't sound like guitar. Crush and reel. It's one of those heavy noise jams that hits your noise-spot if you listen with the right kind of ears. Spray-painted tape and case (something I usually wont tolerate) wasn't a deal breaker this time around. This probly isn't the Sunshine California I'm looking for, but it ain so bad. The search goes on.

Cover Art by Chris Ando

CIEN MUCHACHOS AT JENNIE RICHIE C20 out on Readymades Tapes - Quality Since 1893

AJR gets weirder every time. This tape offers up a dose of everything under the sun. A "smooth" flowing collage of  this and that: soft ambient walls of pad drone harsh bursts trippy bluejazz breakdowns lo-res xylaphone loop samples darkened dirge trumpet riff more bell manual cd skipping vynil starting hop crafty processing full spread stereo panning the works. Never muddy, never dull. J-card printed on semi-translucent paper w/red insert + photoshop guy. Side A: The Dance Of A Thousand Dances. Side B: Arrojado, Audaz, Inteligente. AJR fans seek this. Edition of 5. Good luck.


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AT JENNIE RICHIE The Vest Coast Volume 1 C20 out on Readymades Tapes - Quality Since 1893

I'm posting these tape reviews in tandem because, well, I'm not entirely sure that I haven't gotten them mixed up. The tape artwork doesn't list the titles, and I've been swapping these tapes back&4th-in&out my tape deck for the last few days; as far as matching track titles to tracks on the tape, I'm at a loss. It could go either way. With that said, I'm high to see that all of these tracks are courtesy of The Nine Day Antler Society And The Seven Gallery. Side A titled Mixtape Found In Karadesh (Get Down, Get Back) is a track that I would totally believe was a tape found in some place that sounds like a Hindi-Buddist sort of country, or I could see it being a looped sample jam of an old b&w disney cartoon set in such a place. Solid jam fer sure. Crank it up and roll through the mall parkinglot. Windows down. Straight face. All Summer long. Side B. Organ Operator Footage - Raw Organ Footage I - Automatic Perception seems like a darker drench of players .Not as happy-go-lucky but well worth the wear on your tape head. Edition of 5. Trans Jcard W/Captivating Jcard insert: pages from Romaji Diary TAKU BOKU.