Olympia's Milk Music returns to the fold with their first proper full length album. Their "Beyond Living" EP was a shop fave and we burned through many freakin' copies over the years its hard to say how many times we stocked and restocked that killer platter. These dudes have rocked the Chicago shop on one of their first go-arounds out on the road and have steadily built a reputation for themselves amongst the DIY underground circuit.
On "Cruise Your Illusion", Milk Music has harnessed their 90's grunge pop powerhouse to its most fine tuned and unleashed 12 tracks of Dinosaur Jr/Husker Du flavored super fuzz big muffs with a touch higher production. The vocals are a tad less obscured and a yearning confidence can be discerned in each new gritty hook. Milk Music's latest finds the band utilizing less noise and refining their songs to a more mature place. But don't fret, the blistering guitar wailings are still firmly in place and the rhythm section is bringing the back up big time. "Cruise Your Illusion" is full of fleshed out slacker rock and 8+ minute closer "The Final Scene" is down right epic. If you've been digging the evolved acts of The Men's "New Moon" or Purling Hiss' "Water On Mars" then "Cruise Your Illusion" will bowl a strike right down your alley.
Sate your appetite for re-construction and grab this boss long player now. CD is forthcoming from Fat Possum Records, the Milk Music duders keep it real and self release the coveted vinyl format. Fully Recommended.
This might be the most aptly titled album ever… "Heavy Syrup" is a thick and sticky concoction of gargling synths, whimsical drum machines and blurry vocals that slowly finds its way into your earholes filling up your brain with its sweetly disturbing yet fun loving tones. Greg Boring features members of Sky Needle and has a touch of their avant outsider weirdo vibes, which we totally dig. "Heavy Syrup" is like the Slits if they made music for a children's TV program or a musical malfunctioning vacuum cleaner that has attained the ability to coo breathy oddities in your ear. Their like a female fronted Suicide if they were on a steady dose of Prozac. Greg Boring sound like a Soft Machine, not the band but an actual object. Needless to say, we've been spinning this thing on repeat round the shop and are more than jazzed to add this to our ever growing collection of Aussie gems that keep showing up. Syrupy Recommended.
Armageddon Records drops a stunning heavy rock platter on the scene with this self-titled album by Magic Circle!!!!
Holy Shit Balls! It is always a breath of fresh air to hear a modern band totally nail that classic sound and Magic Circle's late 70's/early 80's riff worship is fucking pristine and perfect. Thunderous rhythm section, searing guitars and a vocalist with pipes for days. This sucker is epic as fuck, majestically paced and filled with fantastic metal madness from start to finish. Fans of Black Sabbath, Witchcraft and Graveyard take note, cuz Magic Circle is bringin' it hard and heavy with musical chops that'll run circles round most bands. This self-titled debut is a stone cold winner in our book so you know it comes with our Highest Recommendation.
LP - Boris Sujdovic - Desperate Girl - Import - $21.99 - BUY
Whoah! This is one sinister banger of an album from ex-Scientist / Beast of Bourbon, Boris Sujdovic! Sujdovic was the bassist for The Scientists from their formation and thru their swampy, darker rebirth a few years later and those subterranean sounds are the jumping off point for these new recordings. Bang! Records (no not the label that launched Neil Diamond to fame, this is a Spanish label!) released this one, so load one into the chamber and pull the hammer back!
The A-Side of "Desperate Girl" is Sujdovic, guitar and drum machine (no bass), while the flip is Sujdovic, BASS and a drum machine (no guitar)! It's an interesting concept - particularly when dealing with Sujdovic's dark, sparse arrangements that augment the cold, detachment of the tunes. Our man Boris has got a mesmerizing monotone too - instantly reminding us of the dead cool delivery of the Reid Bros and JAMC!
Pop this bad-boy on and imagine yourself cruising down a deserted city street in the wee hours of the morning - you know, when the FREAKS come out! RECOMMENDED!
Smokin' new 12-inch EP from Perth's Soviet Valves - a band that featured future Total Control drummer James Vinciguerra!
Definitely some killer 'thinkin' man's punk' going on here! Soviet Valves are taking the aggressive down-stroking of The Buzzcocks and the angular smarts of Wire and melding it with some pop-smarts a'la early Scientists, creating an addictive weaving of punk history with the musicality of the current guard of punk stalwarts! Fans of more modern stuff like Marked Men, Gaunt, Carbonas, etc need to get this one in their earholes ASAP! RECOMMENDED!
Merchandise drops a choice new LP on Night People and they've evolved further into their noise pop sound with a lush production and long form songs that have been carefully crafted into sonic room filling grandeur. They've conjured the 4AD catalog of past and infused a thoroughly modern gloss atop their echo-y rhythms, buzzing guitars and honey throated vocals. This band continues to out do itself with each new release and this Sonic Boom mastered latest is another testament to their steadily rising star. Dreamy blurred pop tunes that drift and burn with swirling effects and heart wrenching psychedelic beauty. Recommended.
Hot (or cold?) damn the folks at Electric Voice have compiled quite the compilation of minimal dark synth oddities and not-so-oddities for your listening pleasure.
This massive comp collects choice cuts from some of our favorite old and new acts like Tropic of Cancer and Ike Yard, juxtaposing the old foundations of the dark/minimal synth world with the new extensions of the genre. If that wasn't enough, the tireless efforts of the Electric Voice crew bring to light unreleased material from P-Rex favs Vita Noctis and Nine Circles. Fans of the BIPP or Minimal Tapes compilations will certainly be into this, as well as anybody with an even fleeting interest in dark wave or industrial music. Super recommended!!
LP - Various Artists - Drop on Down in Florida: Field Recordings of African American Traditional Music 1977-1980 - $41.99 - BUY - LISTEN 
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DEAD STOCK ALERT!!!!
Great googily-moogily! The Florida Folklife Program dusted off some original 1981 stock of this amazing collection of American roots music.
Aside from some minor nics and bumps on the jackets these 2xLPs are still in the original shrinkwrap and look to be in great shape. We love it when things like this show up at the shop. Fans of the Alan Lomax recordings and Mississippi Records heads should definitely take note on this one. "Drop on Down in Florida: Field Recordings of African American Traditional Music 1977-1980" is a magical collection of blues, gospel and down home music and a legitimate piece of history unearthed and given a second life some 30 odd years later. It's a beautiful thing! Recommended.
Originally released on Siren Records, Reissued by Cleopatra Records at the nice price!
ONE OF THE BEST RECORDS OF ALL TIME. Originally released in 1979 and reissued at a very kind price. This is the second proper Chrome LP with both of the key members (Damon Edge and Helios Creed) on board. Chrome has been referenced as an influence on everything from post punk to art punk to industrial rock to noise rock. Jesus Lizard included a Chrome medley (two songs off of this LP, in fact) on their first 7" exactly one decade after the release of "Half Machine Lip Moves". It's a totally fucked up, unhinged, sci-fi, weird, psychedelic punk LP and it comes highly recommended!
The quintessential Ye-Ye Girl record from the (arguable) face of Yeh-Yeh - Françoise Hardy! Originally released in the USA in 1965 on the 4 Corners imprint (a "world music" subsidiary of Kapp Records) as "The Yeh-Yeh Girl From Paris", and reissued here by the musical connoisseurs at Doxy Records!
Recent cinema buffs might recognize "La Temps de L'Amour" from it's inclusion in Wes Anderson's 'Moonrise Kingdom' and French music aficionados should be familiar with Hardy's work, but few have actually laid eyes on her rare first album! "Françoise Hardy" sets itself apart from many Yeh-Yeh albums with a fragile immediacy - many of the tunes are just Hardy accompanying herself on guitar with sparse backing, while some tracks feature Roger Samyn and his orchestra. Hardy knows her way around a tune, co-penning 10 of the 12 tracks here that range from melancholy ballads, to more upbeat groovers! We loooooove this stuff around here and this is a welcome addition to the racks - throw this one on the turntable on a fresh spring morn and stare at Hardy's gorgeous mug on the cover and daydream! OOH-LA-LA! Dudes, you know this one's RECOMMENDED!
FINALLY! An affordable reissue of THE classic Afro-Rock album from Witch - "Lazy Bones"! Originally reissued a few years back on the mysterious Shadoks label at a not-so-comfortable price, but reissued here by Now Again at a less wince-inducing price-tag!
Of all the Witch reissues now available, this might be their shining moment - a perfect distillation of their boiling pot of funk, psych, and dark, bewitching harmonies. The songwriting is their strongest too - we dare you to not hum along to the title track after one listen! Guitarist Chris Mbewe's fuzz-guitar attack elevates the tunes into the acid-fried stratosphere, and the rhythms pulse and writhe so fluidly, you almost forget how intricate they are! Originals are essentially non-existant and the Shadoks reissue from a few years back will cost you around 100 (lazy) bones, so don't miss your chance to add this one to your stash! A stone-cold classic - RECOMMENDED!
The fourth Witch LP, "Lukombo Vibes" reissued by Now Again rounding out their Witch discography reissue campaign!
"Lukombo Vibes" would prove to be the band's last record in it's original incarnation - a final LP would follow in the early Eighties, embracing a more slick, over-produced style owing serious debts to disco, but "Lukombo Vibes" still shakes and shimmy's with the pounding beat of Afro-Rock, albeit a touch more refined. The boys had toured hard with breakthrough UK act Osibisa and their more polished delivery seems to have rubbed off. There's still some killer grooves here; "Blood Donor" is a smoky soul number with some righteous organ courtesy of keys-wizard Cosmos Zani and wicked flanged guitar from Chris Mbewe, while "Fool's Ride" amps up the fuzz and is a pseudo-proggy, hard-rockin' number (especially for these boys). Killer closer to the Witch reissue series - gotta get 'em all! RECOMMENDED!
Captcha Records releases the fan-fucking-tastic follow up to Lorelle Meets The Obsolete's 2011 debut psyche stunner "On Welfare"!!!!!
Lorelle Meets The Obsolete are quickly becoming an untouchable act, their blend of smeary psychedelia, gentle desert rock and shoegaze majesty is setting them far above any current peers plying their take on this sound. And their latest offering "Corruptible Faces" goes further to prove the quality sonics this group is bringing. The songcraft and arrangements are stellar, the production work is sublime and the tunes just hands down deliver. We're talking top notch songs people, Lorelle Meets The Obsolete know when to lay back and let the pulse pace the song, when to guide the listener through the clouds with Lorelle's breathy echoed come hither vocals and when to lay into a track hard and heavy and blistering with effect-riddled guitar squalor and feedback drenched acid damaged psyche sorcery. Supremely Recommended.
YES!! 3-song teaser single from the forthcoming White Fence LP "Cyclops Reap" on Msr. Presley's new home over at Castle Face Records (and split-released with Presley's own Birth Records)!
"Pink Gorilla" is a stone-cold WF classic, with a warbly intro and an earworm of a chorus, while the two shorter tunes on the B-side are exclusive to this single and are worthy A-side status themselves! "Fragility" in particular is a dreamy pop ditty grounded in a warm bed of acoustic guitar and is a higher-fidelity affair that almost sounds like Presley's work in his previous band Darker My Love! A worthy addition to your 7-inch collection! RECOMMENDED!!!
The Scott and Charlene's Wedding Record (re-released on Bedroom Suck early last year) got an ass-load of spins 'round these parts, and that LP has now been picked up by the fine folks at Fire Records and will be reissued AGAIN shortly... in the mean time we have this teaser single from London label Critical Heights that contains two of the best tracks from that under-heard gem of an album "Footscray Station" and "Rejected", both of which are jangly, NZ-indie-inflected pop of the highest order! Careful of all those Nun's Flying around up in here - watch your head! If you dig the mellower side of the Aussie-invasion (Twerps, Boomgates, Lower Plenty, Dick Diver) then Scott and Charlene's Wedding are right up in your wheelhouse! Get on it! RECOMMENDED!
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES
Orange County garage scene stalwarts and rambunctious Burger Records mainstays, Audacity return with a brand new sunshine soaked platter of tunes on Suicide Squeeze!!!!
If you haven't dove head first in the shimmering waters of the upstart SoCal garage rock scene, Audacity is the perfect band to start with. Equal parts King Tuff, Moonhearts, Mean Jeans and Jeff The Brotherhood, Audacity mixes a potent summer cocktail of high strung power pop melodies, wall of garage fuzz and the angsty OC punk rock attitude that's been simmering in their hometown since the 80s-- everything we here at the shop love, so yes this one's a party starter.
This double shot of Audacity comes with a download card so you can blast it out yr car windows, on yr smart phone at the beach and of course at high volume in yer punk rock house. SUPER RECOMMENDED. Grab your copy quick.
7in - Hecks - Trust And Order b/w The Time I Played With My Puppy (Black Vinyl) - $6.99 - BUY - LISTEN
- LISTEN The mighty Moniker Records fuels forward into 2013 with another walloping release of outsider art school noise pop from Chicago up and comers The Hecks!!!!!
With catchy guitar lines and a steady backbeat this young duo are making tunes that are reminiscent of early Flying Nun groups and the Xpressway catalog. B-side cut "The Time I Play With My Puppy" is reminding us of Factums side project Le Sang Song with it's guitar driven feedback floating fluidity while the A-side opener "Trust And Order" is a picture perfect cut of a group supplying easy going laid back outsider pop that warrants many a re-spin. Severely Recommended.
Mag - Arthur - Number 34 March 2013 - $4.99 - BUY
We're always stoked to get new issues of Arthur here at Permanent and this newest issue is another brain busting page-turner. It features a beautiful full-color cover illustration by Arik Roper (the artist that is responsible for the Sleep "Dopesmoker" cover amongst other visual delights…), articles on home brewing, video games and anarcho-occultism as well as interviews with Matt Valentine and Feeding People, an article about the Melvins' "Lysol" album, the Bull Tongue record reviews and some killer commix. Grab this rag and get to learnin' about all sorts of neato stuffs and thangs! Recommended.
