Zachary Cale

Had a chance to check Cale out live the other night and it prompted me to immediately circle back to this album, which had been awaiting review on my pile. Live, Cale came across with a troubadour's natural grace, striking a balance between Neil Young's furrowed intensity and the storyteller charm of 70's Tom Petty; but underneath that comfortable stage exterior there was something else that seemed to drive Cale's songs. Opening up into The Blue Rider it becomes clear that the syncopated folk-blues picking that dominates the album, utilizing a tuning favored by Skip James, gives his singer-songwriter routine a bit of heft. The album is stripped back musically from his last, and that austerity works wonderfully in Cale's favor, both live and on record. The songs have an unhurried air about them that puts Cale's picking and voice at the forefront, but lets organ and the skitter of drums creep in the background just off the periphery, pulling the album tight in a jacket of comforting ennui. Its not a flashy record, and that perfectly fine, Cale makes no moves to buff the songs into a shine that blinds the eyes, rather he lets his natural ease and proficiency with lyrics prove the best asset. Well worth a listen or five if you're looking for an album to cozy up with this fall.

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Forest Swords - "Thor's Stone" Video

I've spent some time absorbing the latest Forest Swords release before getting anything up here. Its such a dense and harrowing record that its hard to sum up easily but perhaps this video featuring dancer Guzman Rosado captures the feeling of the album best. His physical, chaotic, tortured performance seems to mirror the feelings that bubble to the surface while listening to Engravings. Its a good year for high art meets technologically obsessive musicians and between this and the latest Onehtrix video centered on dark fetishism, its going to some intriguingly dark spaces.

Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

Tropic of Cancer

Tropic of Cancer has never been for the sunny moments in life. Camella Lobo, has had a history of mining goth's dark currents and pasting them to a murky brand of synthwave resulting in a glowing black mass of negative euphoria. Here she teams up with Karl O'Connor, aka Regis, to take the vibe of her EPs and craft it into a molten black abyss of an album that seems to draw the curtains and etch the room in creeping darkness as the needle winds its way through the groove. It's not all 8th grade eyeliner pastiche, rather Lobo takes uses the space in her tracks to create a cinematic gloom that feels worthy of titles like "Children of a Lesser God". She's taken the splintered tears of her previous work and formed them into something that's certainly consistent and weaves a heavy cloud of lip-bitten pain as haunted pop. It’s not for the optimists in the crowd but for those looking to soak in the doom, this is a perfect sign of winter's foreboding encroachment.

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Fuzz

Fuzz is upon us and how were we ever without it? The highly anticipated album from Ty, Charlie Moothart, and bassist Roland Cosio is everything that the stoner high school notebook cover art promised and more. The album is thickly resined and stonewashed with so much Sabbath thunder that Tony Iommi's probably collecting at least a few royalty checks from this release. But the fun of the album is, who the fuck cares if it’s breaking new ground? They set out to make an album of bong rattling, carb metal and its perfect in its celebration of the form. You can feel the joy just wafting off of the album and after the emotionally charged solo set from Ty earlier in the year its understandable that this winds up as a sowing of musical oats and blowing off the kind of steam that makes sixteen year-old's headbang til whiplash sets in. Though lets not just chalk this up to a one off whim, because though they stick to a pallette, the songs here are top notch and can't help but come off as live scorchers. May Fuzz not just wind up lost in the deluge of Ty's wake but continue to be an outpouring of love for stoner metal for many years to come. The world needs a little Fuzz every now and then.

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Night Beats

Night Beats' debut still stands around here as something of a staple, a great LP to throw on when life needs a little gritting up, tearing up or greasing up. The band brings that same sense of back alley rock charm to their latest album, Sonic Bloom. They've always had this low-swung sway that feels cock sure in a cigarette danglin' sunglasses indoors kinda way and they don't lose a step here. The songs loll along in an unhurried manner but with the kind of energy that clears sidewalks and shifts eyes in the wake of their path. Guitars snap and twang (when they're not breaking off shards of fuzz), the drums have a certain primitive thud that cares more about what the pound does to your sternum than your sense of style and atop it all is the nasal blues call of Danny Lee Blackwell; sounding the conch for all the denim children of the night to come out and nod to the sound. It’s another notch on the post for Night Beats, a perfectly crafted cruiser for your Saturday night rotation.

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	Moin - EP 12" The somewhat secretive Moin shared a side with Pete Swanson last year that left their name on the tongues of noisemakers and questions to be answered, but it appears that time has shown Moin to be pseudonym for Raime, who have released dense electronic
sides for Blackest Ever Black. This 12", also appearing for BEB, shared a darkness, intensity and think wall of sound with their other project but it diverges down roads paved by stark, muscular rockers like Rapeman or This Heat and the onslaught of post-rock to come. Where they take things to another level here, is that the skin tight combination of guitar and drums have been recorded then sequenced for a feeling that is part human rock and part mechanical menace. It’s a borg of an EP that never once lets up, laced with stabbing, furious vocals that seem to come swiftly from the shadows. Defintely ones to keep an eye on here and with their work in Raime. Listen: Support the artist. Buy it: HERE

KG & the LW - I'm Not A Man Unless I Have A Woman (Video)

You know how you never realized a song paired perfectly with found footage of biker rallies until someone had the bright idea to stitch the two together? Well that epiphany has stuck here as King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard have paired their phaser-rich, psychedelic-soul number "I'm Not A Man Unless I Have A Woman" from this year's already essential album Float Along – Fill Your Lungs with an Altamont-ready number of bikers (albeit with far less violent results). This one is necessary listening for 2013, and now apparently necessary watching as well.

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The Gooch Palms

More great garage pop from Australia this year with the debut album from Newcastle's Gooch Palms out soon on Anti-Fade. Following on an EP from last year that perked ears around here, the album was recorded in one day with Nobunny's Jason Testasecca (aka Elvis Christ) at the helm and it retains close ties with both of his bands' bubblegum squeak and guitar pummel. The songs aren't overworked, instead keeping the feeling of that marathon recording session fizzing in the veins of each track on Novo's. They break every so often from the bounce and froth to slow things down to a soulful sway, proving they have a couple of tricks in their bag; feeling at home with labelmates The Living Eyes but also with fellow Aussie crooners Royal Headache. Gotta hand it to the South Hemi, they know their guitar rock and seem to keep us constantly on our toes and searching out those import copies.

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Faint Wild Light

Those familiar with James Ginzburg only through his Multiverse Music label, or perhaps through noise deconstructionist alter ego Emptyset will certainly be surprised to find him embracing the hushed warmth of close quarters folk on his latest outing. Its folk through the eyes and ears of someone versed in electronic music though, and it hearkens back to the tail end of the psychedelic-folk boom of the early 2000s when a subset began experimenting with skittering beats, found sounds and multi-tracked vocals to form a folktronic stew. Names like Gravenhurst have already been thrown about but there's a certain similarity to Tunng, Tenniscoats or Silje Nes going on here as well. Though, no matter how you try to pin him down in genre, Ginzburg seems to find an inviting way to bring the listener closer, with a tendency to envelop a room in sound like a heated blanket all the while letting the electronic accoutrements behind his flannel voice dance around the ceiling like firelight. As fall grows nearer, this is the perfect companion.

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Nobunny

Nobunny returns with a new album of power punk crush, sweet shimmy shakers and a few harder impulses that reflect that foray into Maximum Rock n' Roll on his previous EP. More to the point they embrace the sweaty severity of his live shows. Still there's the syrup stickiness and childish glee that's always been the draw to Nobunny's corner of the play yard and that's why we've been cranking this one since an inbox delivery made RSTB's day last week. Nobunny has always been a punk cocktail, one part Banana Splits, two parts Ramones, one part John Waters and throwing the rest of the concoction up all over your sister's record collection. The album takes a few fidelic turns, giving it less consistency than First Blood's crisp crackle, but the trappings never matter when the song's underneath are trademarked bunny jams with the kind of exuberance that spills out of your speakers in waves.

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	The Mistys - Stalking / Drawers 7" In the past, The Boats have been a project I'd associate with floating calm, skittered beats and hushed vocals. This year not only have they shed that image with a release of their own that's digging through structured noise and techno
influences, the band's Andrew Hargreaves shatters it with this release as The Mistys. Romping through post punk and synthwave impulses and feeling like he's absolutely hitting all the right touchstones down those paths, the first single roars out of the gates with a propulsive, dark, twisted sense of fun. Drug pumped beats propel these soundtracks of lubricated bass and breathlessly cold vocals from Beth Roberts, whose accent adds just a touch of unfamilarity to the post-punk template. An excellent entry from the band and hopefully not the last we'll hear from these two. Listen: Support the artist, buy it HERE

David Novick

Novick released this album in a miniscule run of 100 last year on his own Sun Sneeze records (please tell me that's a Pete & Pete reference) also home to his band Water Cooler. The record is full of the kind of hushed and gnarled smoke psych that Kurt Vile once perpetrated on his first couple of releases but cut through with a wandering sense of 90's indie touchpoints that brush through both Dino Jr. and Sebadoh in their more languidly sunburnt moments. It dives further down the psych rabbit hole on "Ashtray" which blends an echo laden Six Organs/Emeralds/Flying Saucer Attack approach into a quivering psych swelter. The record doesn't put on too much in the way of a production hat, its mostly just Novick, a guitar and his 4-track laying down folk-psych nuggets that beat with the heart of his San Francisco locale. He's raised his profile by locking a stint opening for Ty Segall, but if you didn't catch him on that run, the record is a great place to start to get familiar with him. The first run is out of print but Ty is reissuing it on his new Drag City imprint GOD? next month.

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Joseph Childress - "Dance With Me" Video

Joseph Childress has released a video for "Dance With Me", a tender ode to loneliness from his recently released The Rebirths. The record is full of hushed moments and an incredible feeling of intimacy and the video captures this on a solo walk to the sea, ending with Childress immersing himself in a baptism of release, washing away the melancholy vibes of the song into a natural entropy. If you haven't picked up the record already, its highly recommended that you pop on over to Empty Cellar and nab one.

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Reviving the Jukebox once again because... why the hell not? You guys all seem to love them and this one's taking a bit of a twist. After a few weeks break to absorb The Dirtbombs love letter to 60's Bubblegum, I've taken stock of some of my favorites from the genre. Bubblegum fits into the natural progression from garage and soul to glam and power pop, which, if you've spent any time hanging around RSTB for the past half a decade or so, you'd know that I have a few soft spots for those particular genres. The mix is below and you can head on over to the Soundcloud page to download it.

Its by no means definitive but in all my searching through compilations, no one hit on this combination of bands. I love the perfect pop behind The Archies and Lancelot Link (courtesy of the talents of Don Kirshner and Steve Hoffman respectably) and I'll be damned if Josie and the Pussycats didn't lay down one of the best J5 imitations ever. Tried to get a nice mix of obvious heavies and some fringe outliers that need attention, hence the inclusion of Shadows of Knight during their later, session players filled period. Also that single is on Buddah, the home of Bubblegum. Tell ya what, lay some of your favorites down in the comments. Its been a while since RSTB had a lively discussion.

The full tracklist is over at Soundcloud.

Mike Donovan

Tempering the sad news that Sic Alps will no longer grace us with releases was the news that the band's Mike Donovan would continue on in a solo capacity and his first album Wot continues the stripping down of the Alps' sound from a downtempo boogie to a full on folk-blues ramble. "New Fieldhand Blues" opens things up with a spare and honest strummer about technological woes and the album fully embraces this acoustic approach as it wears on with tracks that dip in and out of reverbed caverns and careen down roads littered with the detritus of Skip Spence, Marc Bolan and the blues that ran through their veins. The album is short on noise and packed with bleary-eyed hooks that feel like Sunday morning come downs plowing through regret and acting as a tonic for the day ahead. Only Donovan could take a song cheekily titled "Baroque Ass" and make it a sweet tipped instrumental ramble that brings out his harmonica skills to chase the sun down the horizon. Its good to see Donovan fully embracing his inner guitar hermit and plowing through the Woodland Rock and clean-hued, low strung blues rockers that we always new lurked beneath the scratched surfaces of Sic Alps' catalog. Our world may have just gotten a little less Sic, but knowing that Donovan will keep his skewed sense of pop in print warms RSTB's heart.

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M. Geddes Gengras

Known for collaborations with Sun Araw and for production work / session work for Pocahaunted, L.A. Vampires, Robedoor, and Akron/Family, Gengras has recently come to the forefront of conversations around synth and Kosmiche circles, especially after his solo debut, Test Leads. Long before that release though, he'd been laying experiments with Moog Rogue and MG-1 units to 4-track tape, laced with tracks that floated serenely along a collected consciousness through line that would connect all of his work. Thrill Jockey has collected these recordings, made from 2008 - 2011 and pressed them to a gorgeously packaged LP. The works have a haunted ennui about them and utilize the heaviest emotional aspects of the Moog's capabilities to express a longing that's not always associated with the synthesizer. There's certainly New Age connotations as the label would suggest but more so there are echoes of the endless drift of experimental sets that feel a kinship with Gengras' work, and a heavily furrowed countenance that hangs over the whole collection. Had you slept on Gengras in the past, or solely associated him with the Sun Araw / Congos collaboration, be prepared to open a new chapter on him in your book of synth masters.

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Wooden Wand & the World War IV

James Jackson Toth is a musical force to be reckoned with, and you're either watching the tides that herald new offerings or you're left wondering what all the fuss is about. RSTB has for a long time been watching those tides ebb and flow, pulled by the moon, mortality, desperation and drink and eventually hewn into rough toothed instruments of creation and destruction that refuse to be hemmed in by genre or expectation. On his third album with the group of musicians who jumped aboard the Homewood Studio sessions that wrought Briarwood, Toth begins by shaving away some of the good vibes and large sound that swaddled the last two records. He and the band, now dubbed The World War IV, cut two distinct sides, and the first is rubbed raw, bone stark and delivered with more than a little dirt in the teeth. But as with most Wand sides, even when there's that burn of angst, there's a softness, and a country troubadour that begins to pop through after the biting two first cuts. Even the rusted cuts of guitar smooth when the backing vocals of Janet Elizabeth Simpson float into earshot. The second side takes the vitriol of the first and dissipates in a haze of state fog and cigarette smoke. Laying back into the psych blues shamble down pace that Toth knows well and then pairing it with some of his most emphatic and tangled guitar work yet. These are the kinds of tracks that shake down an encore and evolve into sixteen-minute exorcisms of faith and fry and fuzz. The two humors of the album, yellow bile in a tug-o-war with the phlegmatic drive, seem to set it somehow in perfect balance. It fights and rests and finds it’s footing in a place that feels at peace by the end.

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	Phil Seymour - Phil Seymour Known for being Dwight Twiley's guitarist, Seymour struck out on his own for this album in 1980 and its filled with plenty of his able-bodied power pop that spills over into both the bubblegum and edged new wave waters. The album, produced by Richard Podolor
and engineer Bill Cooper showcased just why he was chosen to helm session work for Tom Petty, Twiley, fellow power poppers 20/20 and Moon Martin. The album placed him on essential power pop lists for years, and though it was followed up with the somewhat lackluster 2, its hard not to see him as one of the masters of the form. The response to his sophomore album and the subsequent death of Boardwalk label president Neil Bogart would result in the end of his solo career after being dropped from the label but he'd continue to take up session work until his own untimely death from lymphoma in 1993. Well worth diving into the work here though as well as Twiley's debut to really see the impact of Seymour's best work. Listen: Buy it HERE.

Bloods

Syndey's Bloods have been bubbling up at RSTB for some time now, with a couple of singles finding their way into rotation on many Raven playlists. The band have finally gotten a pair of more substantial releases, one for the US crowds and one for the hometown set and the pair makes for a good argument in keeping both eyes on this trio in the coming months. First, the band unleashes a debut EP for their Aussie label, SHOCK. The Golden Fang EP rounds up previous high wire climber, "Back To You" along with current single "Into My Arms" and four others for a frayed and furious release that highlights their energy and syrup n' cyanide double punch of pop hooks married to fuzz punk assaults that pay a heavy debt the the through line of Sleater-Kinney to Dum Dum Girls. For the American audiences Whooping Crane Records knocks out their first domestic 7", wrapping up Golden Fang track "Into My Arms" (though a different version) and throwing in three additional, exclusive tracks that keep things a bit more lo-fi than the Aussie EP but still showcase the band's high energy melodic chops. They're climbing the industry ladder in the South Hemi, but here's the litmus to see if they'll make that same impact abroad as well. I'm putting in a vote for their widespread acclaim

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Support the artist. Buy it: HERE (7"), HERE (EP)