RECENT LISTENING #42

Working (mostly) backwards through the 21st Century with records by Willie Lane, Soft Gang, Broken Telepathy, Mi Ami, Eloine, Spanyurd, Zumigaloogie, and Wold.

WILLIE LANE Bobcat Turnaround LP (CORD-ART) This is a new album that you can’t stream on Bandcamp, and here I am so addicted to streaming new records that instead of just buying the damn thing for $30 postpaid or whatever, I first had to pirate MP3s of it like it was 1999 and I was using goddamn Napster. Just so I could stream it before buying it, even if just once (and it did in fact turn out to be only once). I did already like Mr. Lane’s previous instrumental records on Cord-Art (recently reissued on Feeding Tube), but they’re a little too sketchbooky for me to love. Needed some vocals and melodies to really make things count. Verses like paperweights to hold down all the guitar riffs and licks in case they flutter away in the breeze. Needed a rhythm section like Rob Thomas and Ryan Jewell to help push, and make the songs expand and contract a little more (like when people describe music as “breathing”). Jewell only plays drums on two tracks, the weirdly roaming and triumphant album opener “Hemlock Holmes” and side two opener “Plant Life,” but his presence is somehow felt throughout, maybe because Thomas plays bass on every track but one, really grinding in deep with active basslines that can drop into symphonizing guitar-style chordage which fills up the space left by an absent drummer, and also because Lane is slyly overdubbing (or maybe even one-man-banding while playing guitar) some rudimentary percussion here and there as well, even if it’s mostly just single hi-hat quarter notes like on track three “Figure in the Dune.” Can’t help think of mid-late Souled American where Chris Grigoroff and Joe Adducci were grinding out their eccentric, careful, and implacable country/folk/rock/punk songs on guitar and bass while the rest of their bandmates slowly disappeared around ‘em Pulse-style (2001, d. Kiyoshi Kurosawa). And speaking of horror movies, something needs to be said about the spare but effective weird-fiction lyrics Lane supplies for this album. I would compare the libretto to no less than that of Bill Fay’s Time of the Last Persecution, in the way both utilize cryptic and oft-cutting shards of obliquely apocalyptic imagery. Like how that aforementioned opening track “Hemlock Holmes” repeats the unsettling question “are you defective?,” or the implications of the entire four-line libretto of “Figure in the Dune”: “Figure in the dune/Coming so soon/Better get used/To sharing your room.” Side two opener “Plant Life” could be described as actual sci-fi horror (“Imagine it walking the streets/blocking the aisles/Spilling right out of the seats”), and there’s also the second-to-last song, plainly called “Plain Truth Armageddon,” about the creeping horror of current (though frankly timeless) events: “A sickening word slices into the crowd/Loyalties flip and proceedings break down.” After listening to my S******k bootleg that one single time, I immediately ordered the record directly from the email listed on the Bandcamp page (good communication, fast shipping, 5 out of 5 would order from again). Came in the mail today, and I’ve just sat and listened to it twice in a row. The second time was mainly just to catch more of the lyrics, because of how they come and go at rare moments and I pick up different oblique statements each time, but also just to hear the rolling, loose, and gutsy string interplay between Lane’s guitar multitracks and Thomas’s bass. Plenty of gentle surprises and slow curves within. (POSTSCRIPT 4/8/2025: The original vinyl run is now sold out at source, though still available in select stores, which means you can now stream the album in full on Bandcamp and/or buy it digitally for $5.)

SOFT GANG s/t LP (SOPHOMORE LOUNGE); SOFT GANG s/t CDR (SOPHOMORE LOUNGE) Ah, the self-titled debut LP by the Soft Gang, as released by the Sophomore Lounge label back in 2016. It’s been sitting near my turntable in my trusty “on deck/up next/to be reviewed” pile (which has now become three separate overflowing piles) for over 8 years. I’ve even listened to it 3 or 4 (or more) times along the way, digging it, always putting it back “on deck,” never actually filing it away, thinking about what I might write about it in this here ongoing BlastiLetter, and, well, it’s like our cranky but lovable Uncle Neil once said: “You’ve gotta move to start.” Sometimes the best way to write about a record is to just write about it, even if you don’t think you’re ready to, so I’ll start by wondering out loud . . . just why did this one take me so long? Maybe because I thought it seemed kinda hipster in that post-gentrification guitar-based-but-also-synthy NYC art-pop way? And that I liked it anyway, in spite of any perceived hipsterness, which is a nuanced thing and therefore too complex to just knock off in a quick record review? Today I’m putting it on and reminded that I simply like it because it’s heavy, and that it not only rocks but swings too. And the vocals by Kaori Nakamura are also a cut above the herd. And by the way, the band is not actually synthy at all, so I take that back. They’re a full-on heavy guitar-bass-drums rock band, it’s just that guitarist Darin Mickey is a beast who often uses shimmery electroharmonic effects and overdubs to great synthy effect, without ever losing that raw guitar heft. Looking further at the credits I see Dominic Cipolla is on drums, which makes sense as his dependable post-krautrock grooves certainly tied the nuances together on some other 21st C. rock records of note, such as Sapat’s essential Mortise and Tenon, or any of the records by Cipolla’s band the Phantom Family Halo, where he serves as a singing drummer. Bassist Charlie Hines is super-strong as well, with confident tectonic-plate root-note perfection throughout, giving Mickey and Nakamura all the space they need. I recommend this album for the 11-minute opening epic “Beautiful Human” alone, but the rest is great too. And bonus review: I also have this mysterious CDR hanging around the on-deck piles with the phrase “SOFT GANG EP” hand-written neatly on its face with Sharpie marker. Was this a “first 50 copies” value-add kinda thing? I could see Sophomore Lounge doing that; they’ve always been a generous label. Oh ha, just pulled the original one-sheet out of the sleeve, and it says: “All pre-orders include CD-R containing bonus/live material.” So there ya go. It’s 29 minutes long, and is definitely a live recording, sounding to me like a single full set, rough and ready in front of a small bar audience, sounding even more like a pure guitar/bass/drums rock band than on the LP, and when I hear that in combination with Nakamura’s multilingual post-Damo vocalisation I can’t help but say that the spirit of Aunt Sally is alive and well. Also noting that I’m so far behind talking about Soft Gang that they now have a new incarnation as Broken Telepathy, with a self-titled 2024 LP I have here as well, but probably won’t review for another 8 years. It’s OK, Mosurock has, go read that.

BROKEN TELEPATHY “S/T” LP (SOPHOMORE LOUNGE) Sike! After writing the above, I went looking for my own copy of the new self-titled Broken Telepathy LP. Couldn’t find it anywhere, making me question my memory — was I even sent a copy in the first place? Until today when I was finally digging through the long-neglected back half of the side-pile I casually refer to as “On Deck 1C” . . . and there it was. No band name or words at all on the enigmatic cover, but I had a feeling it was the one, and I was right. Broken Telepathy are the duo of Darin Mickey on guitars and Kaori Nakamura on vocals, each of whom played the same roles in Soft Gang, but as explained in the previous review, Soft Gang was a rock quartet that also included a bassist and a drummer. Broken Telepathy is a duo where Nakamura writes the words and sings them while Mickey does everything else, including creating the rhythm section by playing bass and supplying “drum machines, drum loops, sequencer.” It’s interesting how close it is to Soft Gang, with Mickey essentially replicating the absent Hines/Cipolla rhythm section, which actually makes me miss the live immediacy and pushed-air texture we got from the quartet. The more synthetic Mickey’s rhythm section sounds the more Broken Telepathy becomes its own new thing, as happens a few songs into side one with the catchy groovy unnerving “Parasites,” featuring Nakamura’s most outre vocal nasalities yet and a nerdy synth-bass/handclap earworm that wouldn’t sound out-of-place on a record by Chicago’s own James Marlon Magas. Nakamura’s vocals, even if they’re also essentially replicating the Soft Gang role, are more distorted throughout, more mineralized than they were in that band. Not terribly different than a second Soft Gang LP probably would’ve been, and therefore welcome, but also definitely different.

MI AMI Ark of the Covenant 12” (LOVERS ROCK) Every now and then some poor record has to be the target of my wrath for not making it obvious which is the A side versus the B side and/or at what speed the record should be played. It’s surprising, or maybe it isn’t, just how many times a single record is guilty of both crimes. Like this one here! Luckily, once I finally stare at the run-out groove in just the right light long enough figure out which side to play first, it’s easy to tell what speed Mi Ami should be played at; their music is already so highly pitched and active that when it’s on the wrong speed it’s downright Chipmunks-obvious. Indeed, listening back to these Mi Ami records now, a good 15 years later, this band is more startling than ever. The yelping falsetto shriek of lead vocalist Daniel Martin-McCormick is so wild, and he’s simultaneously playing heavy slashing rhythm guitar as well. The drummer Damon Palermo is also nuts, the way he maintains these relentless booming and bouncing polyrhythmic beats, driving one-man dance-parties that always sound like they have at least one auxiliary hand-drummer but still work for aggressive punk rock, which is essentially what Mi Ami remain. The bassist Jacob Long plays the stabilizer role, like the hard-to-track-yet-always-present middle vocalist in a close-harmony trio, establishing wide space and patience and clear harmonic ground within an ensemble sound that could otherwise be described as unstable and anxious. And by the way, I realize it would be more journalistic and news-worthy of me to be writing about Martin-McCormick and Long’s other previous band Black Eyes, as they have recently reunited after releasing some highly regarded records in the early 2000s on Dischord, but . . . would you believe I’ve still never heard Black Eyes? As the entirety of this review section tells you, I’m still catching up to much of the 21st Century. For example:

ELOINE Short Community CDR (FOXGLOVE); Sagebrush/Deimos CDR (STENTORIAN TAPES); Moldy Cushions CD (FLAG DAY RECORDINGS) This is an early/mid-2000s solo project by Bryan Day, who has always moved in Midwestern cassette/CDR-label circles very close to my own, and I don’t mean cool Midwestern circles like Michigan/Ohio/Indiana/Illinois but uncool Iowa/Nebraska ones. Now he lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, and I live in Chicago, and we’re both old and greying, so none of that matters (and of course never did) anyway. What does matter is that Day has so many releases on his long-running Public Eyesore label, and so many various musical projects, that I’ve never even been close to reviewing them all. Hilariously, I’ve meant to review these two CDRs by his solo project called Eloine for (apparently) over 20 years now, Short Community (2004, Foxglove) and Sagebrush/Deimos (2005, Stentorian Tapes). Came back across these 3-4 months ago while doing some organizing and alphabetizing and started listening to them again, and would you believe that just a month or so after that Day sent me my third ever Eloine release, a brand new CD (format upgrade!) called Moldy Cushions (2024, Flag Day Recordings)? There are no instruments credited on the two older releases but on Moldy Cushions, Day credits himself with “invented instruments, broken electronics, vintage computer synthesizers, field recordings,” and that sounds about right for the earlier two as well, though I find them a little more sparse/small/acoustic and less busy/big/electronic than the new one. Still one always gets the sense of Day just standing over an array of the above instrumentation and hitting and grinding various triggers so that there is continuous sound within long lingering spaces. In fact, one of the major reasons I think I’ve kept these Eloine CDRs in the review pile for over 20 years is that they make me think of Roscoe Mitchell of the Art Ensemble of Chicago, entering his percussion rooms and tinkling away implacably, creating new senses of progression through time.

SPANYURD/ZUMIGALOOJE Split Ends split CS (ALREADY DEAD) Chicago’s a big place, and here’s a band called Spanyurd that existed here in the 2010s, as did I, probably less than 10 miles away, and I had no idea who they are or were until being sent a copy of this 2024 cassette. Which is surprising because they’re a very powerful band, good ole electric guitar, electric bass, and trapkit drumming taking that Don Caballero blueprint of wild instrumental rock relentlessness all the way out into the brutal territory of Chicago’s own Flying Luttenbachers. I guess I was keeping up with that scene more in the 2000s and had stopped by the time Spanyurd came along in the 2010s, but now I’m caught up, thanks to side one of this cassette being an intense balls-to-the-wall 4-song demo that they made in 2014 before going on a hiatus. I can see why they stopped playing, because this music sounds exhausting to conceive of, rehearse, and perform, even if it’s pretty exhilarating to listen to. When they finally reconvened in 2019 to try making music again, they felt their sound and approach and respective influences had changed enough that a new band name was warranted and they became Zumigalooje, whose recordings make up side two of the cassette. Never heard of them either, but I’m glad I have now; their music maintains some/all of the noise-rock intensity of Spanyurd, as on the second track “You Point Zero,” but grafts it onto this crazy semi-synthetic (sounds like both drum machines and live drums are being used) mutant-funk/Downtown 80s hypergroove. Is it like Don Cab guesting on My Life in the Bush of Ghosts but with Bill Laswell himself producing? Well, no. I mean, yeah, sure. Which is to say: just check it out.

WOLD Imperator CS (ROTTING CHAPEL) I don’t think I was ready to say it 16 years ago, when I last listened to this cassette one or two times when it came out in 2009, but Wold kinda suck. Just more lo-fi black metal bullshit, but even worse than usual because there’s no rhythm at all, not even a posturing and/or overdubbed drummer who only knows one inept blur/blast technique. I mean maybe there is a drummer but they’re recorded so badly I actually can’t make them out. If I cared, I’d tell you. Also, regarding not just Wold but black metal in general, I think that any genre of music where the vocalist simply screams at the top of their lungs in a single monotone is never going to be truly great. An attention-getter, sure. A memorable curiosity, sure. But never something great on multiple levels. I do think metal requires melody, and I’ll admit, after being mindblown by my first two or three black metal records back in the 1990s, mostly by Darkthrone, I just couldn’t listen to it anymore as it became so monotonous. You do you, I just think it’s literally the most boring single subgenre of music there is. For example sludge metal and doom metal, while still not being especially melodic, are both more interesting and provide more space for instrumental interaction and rhythmic variation.