Three Lobed presents the debut 7" from Jack Rose/D. Charles Speer piano player Hans Chew. The best little piece of boogie bar blues that's come this way in quite some time.

Hans Chew – New Cyprus Grove Boogie 7" Chew has played piano on Jack Rose's Black Dirt Sessions as well as D. Charles Speer and the Helix's last album and his gritty piano blues have added a much needed coloration to those recordings. Here Chew takes

his honest, southern country blues sound solo and both recordings are steeped in Memphis-smoked barroom auras that feel nothing if not authentic. The A-side is a full crown, dancefloor mover that practically swells with whiskey and cheap beer. The flip is a last-call cleanup, pulling final cigarettes and cab hails alongside sincere farewells. Both songs will be featured on Chew's upcoming LP Tennessee and Other Stories. Download: [MP3] Hans Chew - New Cyprus Grove Boogie Support the artist. Buy it HERE

Coconuts

Despite the tropical name, coconuts have little to do with sun or sand or island breezes. Instead the group fashions funeral paced incantations that waft in on sinister vibes of grinding guitars and ceremonial drums. The heavy fist of fear grips around their cold, industrial wasteland rhythms and burns images of grey psychedelic furor into the back of the retinas. As the album progresses the funeral procession sounds open up to slashing rain and ripped torrents of feedback sirens. Coconuts sound doesn't adhere to closely to any one genre but seems to have found itself the perfect precarious balance between psych, noise and industrial; a hard feat to pull off without sinking backward but they pull it off masterfully.

Download:
[MP3] Coconuts - Silver Lights

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

Robert A.A. Lowe & Rose Lazar

Though this is not the first time that Lowe and Lazar have shared billing on a release, it is the longest musical collaboration. They've previously collaborated on a 72 page book featuring the art of both Lowe and Rose Lazar called Gyromancy. Here too artwork plays a central role to the release, with the LP only album being accompanied by a 12" x 36" poster that showcases the artwork that serves as a framework for this album. The images of cosmic landscapes do seem to perfectly mirror the analog wonderment that ensues on Eclipses. The album is one part Omni instructional journey and one part dronedream hallucination. Lowe, long since a master of the analog synthesizer as Lichens focuses the instrument into a soundtrack of trepedatious exploration through far flung lobes of the unconscious mind. A worthy trip to take if you're ready.

Download:
[MP3] Robert A.A. Lowe & Rose Lazar - Suno vidis

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

Balaclavas

Balaclavas follow two notable EPs with the release of their debut album Roman Holiday on Dull Knife. The band pick up an echo of the darkwave trend that seems to be flowing in spurts of late but dive further into the rhythmic dub holes left in the atmosphere by the likes of Public Image Ltd and Can. The album's smeared with concrete and a permanent overcast just waiting for the downpour; sulking through the streets in fervent desperation for connection. There's a certain element of dance swarming underneath many of Balaclavas' songs but it's by no means an exuberant expression of joy, rather an unconscious expulsion of physical lashing out that echoes the tightly restrained fury and grit-toothed anxiety of the surrounding melodies. A decidedly darker side of the Texas underground.

Download:
[MP3] Balaclavas - Night Worship

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

	A.R. & Machines - Die Die Grüne Reise: The Green Journey A very transitory record for Reichel, his '71 solo debut would originally be derided by critics who were used to his teen pop persona, completely caught off guard by this strident foray into blues and a burgeoning
Krautrock sound. Here he began his journey into the effects that would later prove to be so pivotal to his second record Echo, discovering a repeating effect while messing around with an Akai X-3300. Though the second album created landscapes of echo, this roots itself a bit in harder driving song forms that get lost in the ebb and flow of constant repetition. This album has been cited by Brian Eno as a great inspiration for Another Green World and indeed it does share some of the eerie overtones and sense of experimentation that fuels that record. Reichel went on to a rich solo career but its these first two post-pop albums that really seems to stick out as a quality time period in the songwriters life. Definitely a great part of the German rock continuum. Download: [MP3] A. R. & Machines - In The Same Boat [MP3] A. R. & Machines - Cosmic Vibration Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

Eddy Current Suppression Ring

Four words we couldn't be happier to see reappear on RSTB. Eddy Current Suppression Ring strike back with another raw nerve of a record after their 2008 sleeper favorite Primary Colours. Sliding just this side of the '79/'80 punk divide and still simmering with their own brand of stained emotion that threatens to break through the skin at any moment; the record is everything we'd been anticipating. No pretensions, no lo-fi affectations, no mercy; just the kind of proto-punk stamp that befit the Verlaine era of rock, before classification landed it on essential lists of influences for rumpled teens everywhere. The songs on Rush to Relax course through the veins with the stark determination and pallid reality of a Mapplethorpe portrait. They hold the mirror and leave judgment to the hunched mass writhing in front of them. Livin' up to every expectation here and more and its highly recommended you pick up a copy.

Download:
[MP3] Eddy Current Suppression Ring - Anxiety
[MP3] Eddy Current Suppression Ring - I Can Be a Jerk

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

Still getting caught up on the glut of singles that continue to storm the desk at Raven HQ (its sooo much less impressive than that sounds) and now onto a nice batch from HoZac. As usual the highest quality garage and punk around.

	Myelin Sheaths – Do the Mental Twist 7" Canada exports a serious fuzz nugget in the form of Myelin Sheaths. The band bangs, pops and buzzes through three rabid garage punk tunes that leave very little room for air let alone contemplation. It's all over in a flash
of light and a flail of arms. The A-side packs the biggest melodic punch but, tumbling over drums and guitars without every tripping up the buried gem of a pop melody. The b-side's no less fun with a decidedly post-punk guitar lean on "Drugstore Pharmacy" and a stampeding finish in the form of "I Don't Wanna Have an Operation" Download: [MP3] Myelin Sheaths - Do The Mental Twist Support the artist. Buy it HERE
	Mickey – She's So Crazy 7" Mickey take the HoZac family's rough edges and glam them up a bit, hitting some sweet 70's strides and pulling some major platform moves on those guitars. The A-Side's got a bit of glitter in it, but still plenty of latter day sneer chalked up on top of all the
sheen. The band slows pace and lowers the temperature for a simmering number on the flip that has just the right mix of guitar twang and sweet back up vocals. Not as sweaty and intense as the Sheath's entry but a pretty good piece of the HoZac family. Download: [MP3] Mickey - She's So Crazy Support the artist. Buy it HERE

Art Museums

The Art Museums' album lands and deftly lives up to the high hopes that we had coming into this one. Glenn Donaldson pairs his distinctive touch and guitar skills with Josh Alper's equally strident voice into a perfect amalgam of pastel 80's pop that doesn't quite hit the new wave buttons as square on the head as they've claimed in their sweetly smirking press runoffs; but still has us running to the record shelf to place those "me decade" tendencies in context. Those who've stayed true to the Raven will know that we've loved pretty much every shade of Donaldson's career and this latest turn bodes no different for us, bearing his mark neatly between the notes of every sun-fried bit of California ennui-pop. Summer's radiating off this slab in hot pink waves and though a nice reminder now of what we're missing out on the frigid East Coast, feelings are high that this will remain front and center on the stereo come June.

Download:
[MP3] Art Museums - Sculpture Gardens

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

Voice of the Seven Thunders

Rick Tomlinson returns to the frayed edges of psychedelia, this time amending his moniker to Voice of the Seven Thunders; and with the name change comes a corresponding emphasis on the guitar in its ragged, electrified state. The often pervasive emphasis on fingerpicking is not forgotten here, but rather downplayed a bit on this album which seems to step into the eastern psychedelic shadow that Tomlinson began building on his S/T (Voice of the Seven Woods) LP on Finders Keepers. Drenched with the sound of guitars pushed to the point of ignition, the album wrangles through a canon of instrumental psychedelia that pulls as much at Fahey as it does Erkin Koray and weaves them into a hypnotic and visceral experience that seems to look forward as much as it pines for a past decade. Tomlinson hasn't exactly been absent from world following the last proper VVIIW album, releasing an acoustic album under his own name along the way, but as Voice of the Seven Thunders he makes a defiant statement of purpose and presence that can't be ignored.

Download:
[MP3] Voice of the Seven Thunders - Out of the Smoke
[MP3] Voice of the Seven Thunders - The Burning Mountain

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

Viva L'American Death Ray Music

Viva L'American Death Ray Music have been floating around limited releases for the last couple years and now they find themselves among the ranks at Mexican Summer. In the past their releases have tended to wander the psych/garage/dub landscape and this EP is no different, acting as rather a nice encapsulation of their past impulses. Bookending springy dub with sneer-worthy, driving garage and the paced throbs of sinister psychedelia; the band are as vital here as they've ever been. Naturally the Mex Summer tag means this comes at a limited quantity so be sure to grab one while they stick around!

Download:
[MP3] Viva L'American Death Ray Music - One Hour

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

	Witch - Lazy Bones!! Before J. Mascis and crew took up the handle, there was another Witch, a Zambian rock behemoth that plowed through heavy fuzz psych underpinned by crashing rhythms. The ZamRock phenomenon has been largely overshadowed
by their Nigerian counterparts but the scene was no less littered with funky, blistering bands and if nothing else stands testament to this, its Witch's Lazy Bones. The band isn't all bombast and grind, though, they dip into acoustic tinged 60's style ballads, psych stretches and melodic rock workouts that break up the electric mayhem. With so much of Africa's rock archives being dug up lately it's hard to know which are truly essential, but Witch's album fall clearly into classic category, making this reissue all the more welcome. Download: [MP3] Witch - Tooth Factory [MP3] Witch - Lazy Bones Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

Yellow Swans

Yellow Swans have always been a force of nature, rippling with the deterioration of earth, of mind and of the gods themselves. They echo the primal. They mirror the industrial. They are the sound of breaking restraint and of final submission. To label Yellow Swans merely noise is to miss the point of what's happening in their dense canon of soundscapes. They are the fallout and the flashpoint. They've felt your foreboding, your ambivalence, your hatred and your acceptance. They've churned these elements into the primordial soup of sound that rises up your spine like the first and last inkling of panic. Once it grips you, you're too late, so you might as well lay back and let the lava wash over you. They are the sound of entropy and of rebirth. Going Places is reportedly the duo's last statement, a period on a career that's already said so much. Although I feel like I've heard that sentiment before. Isn't it always Yellow Swans' last album? If this is indeed the final blow, its a heavy exit from a bleak world of their own making.

Download:
[MP3] Yellow Swans - Limited Space

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

All right, well the singles cup overflows this week as I've got so many great 7"s my hands are tired from flipping them over. A lot of solid contenders make their way into light this week and a few old favorites simply prove why they've gotten such well deserved praise around here in the past. Open those wallets and set the speed to 45.

	Sonny and the Sunsets – The Hypnotist b/w Stranded 7" Four new cuts from a voice we've become well acquainted with around here. Sonny Smith keeps it simple and sweet with acoustic tales that shuffle and saunter through the beach of your mind. Sonny is
confessional one minute and jokingly guarded the next. He's a true troubadour busking his days out on the boardwalk as therapy and doing a melodic soft-shoe for no one but himself. There's always an element to Sonny's music that makes listeners feel like an old friend has stepped into the room with a wry smile, change for one more beer and time to wrap the conversation in knots. In the words of better men, it's good to know that Sonny's out there taking it easy for all us sinners." Download: [MP3] Sonny and the Sunsets - Stranded Support the artist. Buy it HERE (on blue/yellow vinyl if you act quick!)
	Hanoi Janes – Across the Sea b/w Skeleton Girl 7" Its mighty hard not to smile a touch when Hanoi Janes come caterwauling out of nearby speakers. The band's debut 7" for Captured Tracks tumbles like a fizzy ball of candy coated exuberance and sticks to the folds of
your brain in ways that are usually reserved for indie-pop royalty. The closest current bunch hitting these same buttons might be Magic Kids but the Janes have them beat in shear magnetism; tugging at all the right melodic elements and begging to explode with each note. Download: [MP3] Hanoi Janes - Across the Sea Support the artist. Buy it HERE
	Nothing People – Enemy With an Invitation b/w Reinstall 7" Corrosive as ever, Nothing People continue their nervous trip down the halls once walked by their shamanic predecessors in Chrome. The band further explores the barren, acidic side of post-punk, lacing fumes
of putrid dissonance amongst their churning brew of insistent rhythm and buzzing guitar. The band now count Doug Pearson of Monoshock among their ranks and this addition seems to have changed the dynamic a bit, fleshing out their formerly barren sound a bit. The single is limited to 600 and beautifully stamped with gold foil lettering. A nice pieces indeed. Download: [MP3] Nothing People - Reinstall Support the artist. Buy it HERE
	Dignan Porch – On a Ride 7" Another stunner from the ranks of Captured Tracks. The London group lay their strum laden pop in a bed of sunlight guaze; staring straight into the rays and leaking out in a blur of memories and faint glances. This single bodes well for their
upcoming Cap Tracks album, laying hopes that it too will rest easily in shimmering waves of the 90's shuffle-pop heyday and radiating the warm tenderness of summer on the air. Download: [MP3] Dignan Porch - On a Ride Support the artist. Buy it HERE

White Fence

Tim Presley knows his way around the same garage-psych buttons that drive RSTB to dig into the debris of '66, the detritus of '67 and the fallout of '72. Floating from wide-eyed fuzz rattled garage-psych to the soft edges of Barrett-topped lysergic comedowns and on through jangle pocked pop nuggets; White Fence's S/T debut on Make a Mess is a much needed entry into 2010. The lo-fi garage stable of late has gone through a lot of phases but rarely touches on such lush arenas of anglophile comfort without injecting a bit snottiness, but Presley seems to pull it off with earnest style. Having spent time in both Darker My Love and The Strange Boys, he's no stranger to both the bare and lush sides of psychedelia and this album feels like a postcard to the past with a subtle XOXO scrawled at the bottom. I think we'd wholeheartedly echo that sentiment.

Download:
[MP3] White Fence - Destroy Everything
[MP3] White Fence - Mr. Adams

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

Moon Duo

Moon Duo catapult off the release of two formidable EPs and strike hot and vicious with their first album, Escape. The record breathes and swells like a living organism, drenched in the perspiration of permanent noon and marred with the molten tar of the Western seaboard. Helmed by Wooden Shjips' Ripley Johnson and aided expertly by Sanae Yamada, the duo make good on that namesake, rarely feeling rooted in our atmosphere but intrinsically bound to this world by the unseen pull of gravity and vibrations both benign and sinister. The foaming wall of guitars and organ rise and fall like tides; threatening always to break free of their bonds but inevitably snapping back with the undulating flow of rhythm. We've long been fans around here of the Shjips' output but Ripley proves again and again that Moon Duo are a force in their own right, not to be taken lightly.

Download:
[MP3] Moon Duo - Stumbling 22nd St.

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

White Mystery

The real nasty, hardcore grit of garage from the better part of the past 50 odd years has been marked by the kind of sweat and intensity that you can taste pouring out of tattered speaker cones; the kind of visceral, guttural, writhing rock that contorts you, contorts itself and then sneers maddeningly into the eyes of challengers and admirers with the same flame of fuck-all intent. Though Miss Alex White has been a fixture in garage for some years, it's just here and now that she's completely and totally immersed herself in this self-same grit. The guitars growl and strangle, choked with enough gravel to kill lesser beats; her vocals ring full of the soul that only age, defeat and perseverance can concoct and with few exceptions the songs themselves seem poised to break. White Mystery have stripped bare to the skeleton of rock, flaying the skin and leaving only the essentials of movement and of course sweat to remain howling on the floor. It's been a while since the Raven turntable has met a release that bears such repeated listens. In short, you need this one.

Download:
[MP3] White Mystery - Power Glove
[MP3] White Mystery - Vorpal

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

It seems about time for another blast from the jukebox, so here are 5 more fun and fuzzy bits of rock's past. Pretty much straight garage fodder this week, heavy on the sneer and completely essential.

[MP3] Thee Midniters - Jump, Jive & Harmonize
L.A. rockers Thee Midniters work their way through the soul-blues maneuvers like old pros. A crash of rhythm and some blues harp wailing in the background all with that heavy fuzz riff holding it all together.

[MP3] The Little Boy Blues - You Don't Love Me
Let's keep the garage-blues train rolling. Little Boy Blues wail and shuffle, scruffy as hell but sneering like the punks they are. This one's a little rougher and truer to heart with some decent leads pulling out in the end there.

[MP3] Original Sinners - You'll Never Know (What Love is All About)
Original Sinners bring the melody with a jaunty swing and even a shake of tambourine in the background. They wrap a tale of caution with the right amount of twang and scuffle then keep it stuck in your head for weeks to come.

[MP3] Lindy Blaskey & The LaVells - You Ain't Tuff
A tentative bass leads into the chugging garage wonder, breaking open into call and response before the smoldering bridge. Blaskey chides and smirks while the band rolls and tumbles behind him. Maybe not enough to sustain them a career but they sound fine here.

[MP3] Sounds Unlimited - Why Doesn't She Believe Me
Some acrobatic vocals and a fast sprint drive this track along. Add to that a simmering organ break and some pitch perfect clanging on the guitars and Sounds Unlimited have cemented themselves into our garage canon.

RSTB + Aquarium Drunkard + Sirius Blog Radio

So RSTB fans if you have Sirius Radio (or want to try a quick trial version) you can hear us on XMU channel 26 as we guest this Friday on Aquarium Drunkard's radio show. We'll be presenting an hour's worth of tunes (which you can download as a mixtape HERE.) that will sound mighty familiar to fans of this site.

The show will air Friday at noon and again at midnight. Tune in to hear me break out my old college radio skills (or lack therof) and play a few garage nuggets that'll warm the heart and frazzle the ears.

The Strange Boys

In short order, Austin's Strange Boys deliver another record and another RSTB fave. Be Brave skews a bit calmer than its predecessor but it retains the swagger that that seems to curl at the edges of all Strange Boys recordings; and even if boys have picked up a few acoustic guitars along the way they still play them with all the twang and sneer of Jagger/Richards house party. The new leanings seem to be echoed even in the album's cover art, lackadaisical summer strums obscured by the haze of an afternoon sun. And while February might feel like a weird time for such a sunny record to hit shelves, perhaps this will steam some life back into those bitter days or at least inspire a slow smile of days passed. Honestly, we couldn't be happier to sink into these sun stroked melodies.

Download:
[MP3] The Strange Boys - Be Brave
[MP3] The Strange Boys - Night Might

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

City Center return with two tracks that sound nothing like their previous Type album, instead winding their way through distorted garage and heated ambiance.

City Center – Cops Don't Care 7" City Center drew a lot of heat for comparisons to Panda Bear when their self-titled album came out but this single ought to dispel any rumblings that Fred Thomas is hooked on the same track as Noah Lenox. He dabbles here in a quake of fuzz that

crackles through the title track like a disease, eroding at the heart of his soft pop with no trace of the loops that bubbled on the album. The flip deals more in sweaty ambiance, throbbing and pulsating its way along drone cushioned corridors that seem to fit Thomas like a second home. The whole package is superbly wrapped in a cover by Hisham Bharoocha which makes it all the more enticing. Download: [MP3] City Center - Heat Isn't the Word Support the artist. Buy it HERE

Home

I've long loved Brah, the bastard arm of the SC/Jagjag/Dead O multi-armed Midwestern behemoth from Bloomington and son of Oneida. They've again struck a chord at RSTB by following up Home's Sexteen with its natural sequel Seventeen. Southern Florida's Home has had a long and storied history, from tapes distributed via record counter to a seemingly improbable brush with major label action. They've put out sixteen previous scotch-taped albums and are now finally into their seventeenth and despite this long and winded history their cracked pop remains as engaging as ever. Seventeen was conceived as the band dug through their first eight albums and transferred them from musty tapes to digital, reportedly rediscovering their love for making music in the process. Well it's rather fortuitous that they have as Seventeen winds through layers of bombastic pop, careening like Guided By Voices without the liquor or maybe with more, its hard to tell. The disparate pieces and shards of Home shouldn't necessarily fit together but like puzzle pieces hammered together in fury and glee they make a picture that's probably better than the original sad-eyed puppy or Van Gough museum gift shop fodder could ever have been. If you haven't been hipped to Home now's the time. Grab this then dive into the box set that's just been unearthed. We promise you won't be disappointed.

Download:
[MP3] Home - Photographed With Ease

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

Danny Paul Grody

Grody comes not only from one of my past favorites but from two greatly loved RSTB bands, having spent time in Tarentel and more recently in The Drift. The connection to The Drift was the first thing that caught my eye with this release, and though its much closer in structure to recent solo guitar outings that have cropped up across the American landscape the tone is as bittersweet and somber as anything in Grody's canon. The pieces don't ramble or bubble like Junghans or Bishop; rather they chime in a mournful but emotional way that sometimes recalls Chasney, occasionally hitting the burnt psychedelic connection. Everything about his Root Strata release conveys the faded detriment of age; from the album cover on down to the worn grip on the strings, moving slowly but in a way that seems contemplative or almost lost in reflection. It's a beautiful sadness though, caught with the last rays of the sun and the last sips of drink in hand, it can be a welcome journey back through the years.

Download:
[MP3] Danny Paul Grody - Dawn
[MP3] Danny Paul Grody - Well Wisher

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

Infinite Body

In some ways it's easy to see why Infinite Body should end up on PPM, the label run by No Age's Dean Spunt. Much of the lush fuzz that Carve Out the Face of My God is soaked in sounds as if it could be the bed track for a No Age song, just aching to have a bit of atmospheric punk draped over the top of it. But Kyle Parker never comes near pop; rather he immerses himself into the gauzy foam of drone loops, feedback and the shimmering brightness of tone. Infinite Body seems to embrace its moniker as a mission statement, stretching endlessly towards ending the ties between surroundings and body. Parker only increases this effect in his live performance, toting a simple but effective lighting rig with him that increases in intensity as his drones reach higher volumes. I'm not sure what face exactly Parker is carving for his god, but I'm damn certain it shines in opalescent hues that would blind less resilient sculptors.

Download:
[MP3] Infinite Body - Beside Me in the Dawn
[MP3] Infinite Body - Carve Out the Face of My God

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

	Los Mac's - Kaleidoscope Men Los Mac's third album, Kaleidoscope Men bears the mark of Sargent Pepper's quite clearly and often been regarded by collectors as the best psychedelic album to come out of Chile in the 60's. The band had to make due with a lack of equipment,
both live and in the studio, which makes this lush, orchestral recording and timely effects even more impressive in hindsight. There is not as much of a spark of the Lennon/McCartney songwriting genius but what they lack in catchiness they make up in grandeur and ambition. Though collectors have made this a well sought after and now rightfully reissued record, at the time it wasn't so well received in their native Chile. The band was panned in reviews, which ultimately lead to their expatriating to Italy, where they thought they might be better received. They weren't so lucky and some members returned to Chile later while Willie Morales, the groups main songwriter stayed on to pursue a solo career. Still this album, despite all its setbacks at the time, stands as a great album of the psychedelic generation. Download: [MP3] Los Mac's - Tensión Extrema [MP3] Los Mac's - Dear Friend Bob Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

Home Blitz

Jersey's Home Blitz wrangle catchy garage-punk from the molten ball of fuzz they surround themselves in and the results will make you shake if not shimmy. Buried in a barrage of clang and fizzle are some truly great pop tunes kicking to get out and once they tumble flailing out of your speakers, its hard to stop setting the needle back to the beginning each time. Out of Phase despite being housed in 3rd grade school notebook drawings, packs a considerable punch, further proof that no good can come from judging records on appearance. No surprise that a lo-fi nugget like this should show up on Richie Records (former home of Kurt Vile among others). The band only strays from their killer formula a for a few interludes wrap in odd attempts at field recording and a blitz of harsh noise but aside from those few diversions its 100% fun the whole way through. Highly recommended that you pick up a copy.

Download:
[MP3] Home Blitz - Don't Talk To Me
[MP3] Home Blitz - Is Anybody There?

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE