Tag Archives: alternative

Anna von Hausswolff – ICONOCLASTS (Year0001)

Posted by John Lithium on

Label Description:

1st Issue CD available via shop.year0001.com

credits

released October 31, 2025

Released by YEAR0001
A&R Oskar Ekman

‘ICONOCLASTS’
Written by Anna von Hausswolff
Produced by Anna von Hausswolff & Filip Leyman
Tracks 1, 5, 8-9 Written with Otis Sandsjö
Tracks 5, 8-9 Written with Filip Leyman
Tracks 5, 9 Written with David Sabel
Track 10 Written with Abul Mogard

Vocals on Tracks 2-7, 9-11 by Anna von Hausswolff
Vocals on Track 4 by Iggy Pop
Vocals on Track 7 by Ethel Cain
Vocals on Track 11 by Maria Von Hausswolff

Church Organ on Tracks 1-9, 11-12 by Anna von Hausswolff

Guitar on Tracks 6, 9 by Anna von Hausswolff
Guitar on Tracks 3-4, 9 by Filip Leyman
Guitar on Tracks 2-3, 5-6, 9 by Joel Fabiansson
Acoustic Guitar on Track 4 by Karl Vento
Bass Guitar on Tracks 2-3, 5-6, 9 by David Sabel

Drums & Percussion on Tracks 2-5, 7, 9, 11 by Filip Leyman
Drums on Tracks 3, 6 by Love Meyerson

Synthesizer on Tracks 1-9, 11-12 by Filip Leyman

Saxophone on Tracks 1-3, 5-9, 11 by Otis Sandsjö
Clarinet on Tracks 3,5,7,9,11 by Otis Sandsjö

Strings on Track 4 Performed & Arranged by Samuel Runsteen

String Ensemble on Tracks 3, 5, 7, 9, 11
Violins by Jenny Jonsson, Alexander Chojecki, Annie Svedund, Charlotta Grahn-Wetter
Viola by Märta Eriksson
Cello by Lisa Reuter
Double Bass by Viktor Reuter
With String Arrangements by Martin Schaub
Track 9 Arranged with Anna von Hausswolff

Woodwinds on Tracks 1, 3, 5, 8 Arranged by Anna von Hausswolff & Otis Sandsjö
Woodwinds on Tracks 7, 11 Arranged by Anna von Hausswolff

Electronics on Track 10 by Abul Mogard

Recorded at Leyman Studio, Svenska Grammofonstudion, Candy Bomber, Annedal Church, Örgryte New Church & Vinberg Church
Engineered by Filip Leyman, Oskar Lindberg, Ingo Krauss
Mixed by Sven Johansson (Tracks 1-9, 11), Filip Leyman (Tracks 1, 12) & Abul Mogard (Track 10)
Mastered by Magnus Lindberg

Creative Direction by André Jofré
Art Direction by Victor Svedberg
Photography by Evalena von Hausswolff
Artwork by Lotta Antonsson

Cate Le Bon – Michelangelo Dying (Mexican Summer)

Posted by John Lithium on

Label Description: Its creation led by pure emotion, Cate Le Bon’s seventh record Michelangelo Dying usurped the album she thought she was making. The product of all- consuming heartache, her feelings overrode her reluctance to write an album about love, and in the process became a kind of exorcism. What emerges is a wonderfully iridescent attempt to photograph a wound before it closes up but which in doing so, picks at it too.

Musically, there is a continuation and expansion of a sound a machine with a heart that has taken shape over her last two records (2019s Reward and 2022s Pompeii) as Le Bon has increasingly taken control of the playing and producing herself. As guitars and saxophones are pushed through pedals and percussion and voices are fed through filters, an iridescent, green and silky sound emerges, with flashes of the artistic singularities of David Bowie, Nico, John McGeoch and Laurie Anderson surfacing and disappearing below the waterline throughout.

What were left with is an ever-changing, continuous entity, a kind of song cycle. Each iteration reflects and progresses the last, each one a shard of the same broken mirror shifting, glinting, concealing and revealing, depending on how it is turned in the light. There are ultimately, Cate asserts, No revelations. No conclusions. There is no reason. There is repetition and chaos. I eventually allowed myself a vacant mind to experience it without resistance and without searching for a revelation or order to any of it.

An exercise in the viscerality(sic) of life, of love, of humanity for both listener and artist, Michelangelo Dying knows what it is to hold, to be held, and to be exquisitely, profoundly alone. “The characters are interchangeable” concludes Cate, “but at the end of it all, its me meeting myself.” 

Bardo Pond – Volumes 4 & 5 (Fire Records)

Posted by John Lithium on

Label Description: A double LP package from Bardo Pond, combining two of their super rare jam volumes on vinyl for the first time. A further edition in this celebrated series, ‘Volume 4’ and ‘Volume 5’ feature more freeform improvisational pieces from the hypnotic Philadelphia outfit.
Capturing the raw essence of the band, whose fearless exploration blurs the lines between structure, chaos, melody and noise. Bardo Pond’s music traverses space rock, acid rock, post-rock, shoegaze, noise, Krautrock and psychedelia.
‘Volume 4’ hails from self-released sessions recorded in January 2002, its five tracks include the supremely tripped out heaviness of ‘K2’ and the balance-shifting ‘New Drunks (Revisited)’ with Isobel Sollenberger’s exquisite and, frankly, quite disturbing vocal. They’re shorter interrogations of sound by Bardo terms, almost succinct in their mesmerising riffage and off-kilter arrangements.
By contrast, ‘Volume 5’ consists of two lengthy mantras recorded between 2000 and 2004 and released as the tape spool spiralled out. ‘FUFO’ sounds like Cluster unravelling with Merzbow mixing, a post-industrial slew of hypnotic proportions, while ‘Monarch’ begins as a Current 93-like neo-folk mood piece before evolving into a wailing slice of drone-drenched Americana by way of a Velvets’ jam.
“We were pushing improvisations as far as we could. It was glorious having the studio. The more that our heads were spinning after a session, the better we knew that session would sound when we listened back. We were getting together two nights a week, usually three or four hours working on material and songs and the other half the time letting loose. Volumes 4 and 5 gather together some of these improvisations, and one early song that we felt like doing.” Adds Michael Gibbons of Bardo Pond.

“One of underground rock’s most extraordinary enigmas, a majestic command of sound.” The Quietus 

Sir Richard Bishop – Hillbilly Ragas (Drag City)

Posted by John Lithium on

Label Description: Our favorite six-string shaman is waving that axe around again! Sir Richard Bishop wrenches forth fresh damnable truth and beauty from a musical kamikaze run through histories both known and unknown. Turning a gimlet eye to the American Primitive guitar style, Sir Rick applies his own bloodthirsty interpretive methods on a self-described “excursion into the dark woods,” to locate – and play along with – the Primitive’s moonshine-fed inner savage.

Six Flags Guy – And Nothing Did So What (Self-Released)

Posted by John Lithium on

a0434364824_10

Label Description:

Adorning the cover of Six Flags Guy’s debut album, And Nothing Did So What, is a warehouse on fire. Some stumble over to watch with passive amusement before wandering off unphased. Over eight tracks, the Ohio post-rock band captures this disparate tone, one that contains cataclysm within numbness and feigned apathy. From the noisy opener “John Wayne” to the exhausted aggression of “RJ Dreams of a Blackwater Mercenary Contract” to the final explosion of emotion on the epic closer “Work Song,” Six Flags Guy comes through with a project writhe with frustration, wild dynamics, and much-needed catharsis. And Nothing Did So What is the sound of a band with something to say, an impressive first showing from newcomers on the rise.

“The album’s eight songs wander through smoky, dingy soundscapes unmoored from recognizable structure, with subtle vocals and guitar work both ready to launch into a frenzy of noise at any given moment… Every song on And Nothing Did So What feels like a journey” — Rosy Overdrive

“Not sure how to describe Six Flags Guy but they’re sick” — Local show flyer

“john wayne rips” — RYM user dietz

credits

released July 14, 2023

license

all rights reserved