Sylvia Monnier / Class of 69 split (supermalprodelica)

[€5 for Cassette // €7 to Download // https://supermalprodelica.bandcamp.com/album/sylvia-monnier-class-of-69-split]

I was a big fan of Sylvia Monnier's cassette "Lucinda's River" and as such I wanted to hear this one.    It's on a label from Paris though, so I'm sort of okay with just hearing the digital for now but eventually I will probably buy this on cassette if I can because it is rather good.

Sylvia Monnier has two tracks and the first begins with a ringing bowl hum.   There is guitar distortion in the background and then tones like a dialtone begin to beep as well.   Is it cliche to call it tone drone?    How about electronic ambient?   With space laser whirrs come record scratches and then tones begin to drop like gems, to borrow a phrase.     There is an eerie mystique to the next set of tones which come through will full on beats.

From here, Monnier shifts into a long stretch of drone which can only ever remind me of the opening to The Who's "Baba O'Riley" (just sit back, close your eyes and think about it)   Some whirrs come in with sonic lasers before it's over and then it ends on some banging for good measure.

This is my first time hearing Class of 69 and while I was in this split for Sylvia Monnier I must say that Class of 69 is more than just filler.    There is a lot of sharp ringing on repeat, cymbal rim taps and then it just seemingly grows louder until that Jay Peele bowl playing feel comes out.    It's somewhere between angels and ghosts before the change to sonar which reminds me of a submarine.    My point is only further proved by the beeping that presents itself as the sounds begin to come through in waves.

The beeping becomes more distant as the signal is seemingly growing lost and then the sounds of Jay Peele come back before all is said and done.    This split really had me because of the involvement of Sylvia Monnier but Class of 69 makes this a must have cassette.

Pare Ohm / JWPaton (Junk Mnemonic)

[[$5 AUD // Edition of 10 // https://junkmnemonic.bandcamp.com/album/jm-1 ]]

This is the first release from Junk Mnemonic and it is a split between two artists.     It has a cassette release though it is limited to only ten and comes from Australia so I'm doing it digitally because I feel as if I should only do digital reviews from this point going forward if it is something special such as this.

Pare Ohm's piece begins with that sound of an old furnace perhaps, but something of that nature making some sort of noise that is just dragging out in a drone way.     It is almost definitely the sound of some kind of plugged in appliance dying but I can't place what one exactly.    It somehow has this almost rusty sound to it, like I imagine whatever it is being metal for that reason, because it is rusting out and dying.    The sounds continue in this way and it begins to sound like a horror movie somehow as well.      It quiets down then shifts in the jingling of bells.    This fades in and out which reminds me more of space than anything else.   After a short pause of sorts we move from what I can assume to be the first movement into the second, though it's still Pare Ohm and would still be Side A on the cassette.

This has become quieter now.   Still the jingles of sorts but more like a spatial glass structure being built instead.   It comes through in gently crashing waves.    I keep thinking it might just be the interlude ending, as it takes breaks, but it does come back interminently and as such I can feel this as being the "Mouth Breather" portion.   A slight hint of sonar has presented itself in the background and we've gone from space to underwater.   I do not recommend breathing out of your mouth while underwater.   Drum sticks seem to be hitting together now.   Synth beats are kicking in with these bamboo stick type of tones following in a rhythm.   The inhales and exhales of the title also sound like they could be the hiss of a snake.   This all slows to an end.

JWPaton begins next with two tracks joined into one only there is no interlude this time around it would seem.    It begins with a crackling, shattering of glass type of sound that could be harsh noise but it could also somewhat just as easily convert into industrial by the way it's going.    It has that electricity sound to it, like if you stick your hand in an electric socket and are getting fried.   It's pretty cool because it makes me think of the Marvel villain (and Spider-Man foe) Electro taking on a Transformer.   If that is not yet a comic book crossover it needs to happen.

This all comes crashing down in the hum of a dial tone, though it does kind of more closely resemble someone sitting on a keyboard for some reason (the musical one, not the type I'm typing on)   Some rather sharp feedback follows and I'm not entirely putting it past this piece to be industrial still for reasons that I could still imagine it being in a boiler room.  (To the extent that I want to look up when Mankind and Undertaker had the boiler room brawl and watch it)

And now the screaming is breaking on through, crushing any notions I had of it being industrial and turning it into harsh noise.    It was building to that moment and I should have heard it coming the first time, but wow what a payoff.   It ends with that organ drone sound once again but it does have quite the force behind it.

Both of these artists are bringing something original and vital to the table with this release and it is something that really must be heard.

Animal Flag & Plainview "Things That Keep Us Up At Night"

[[Name Your Price Download // https://animalflag.bandcamp.com/album/things-that-keep-us-up-at-night]]

After reviewing two Animal Flag albums previously, I find myself listening to this split EP and only really thinking about how Animal Flag has acoustic based songs and electric based ones as well, yet whatever comes into my mind never really seems to matter anymore as Animal Flag has become its own entity to me.

It makes a great deal of sense since I've been hearing Animal Flag in other artists for quite some time now (and making note of it in the appropriate reviews)    That distinctive voice that I once tried to place just sounds like Animal Flag to me now.  

The song "Grown" is about how all of the bad stuff has helped make us who we are and in its own way it can be somewhat catchy.   It's more of the get up and dance track of the two because it is followed by "When the Victim is Played", which is the acoustic, sad number that for some reason sounds like it's raining in the background of throughout.

If you've still somehow managed to not hear Animal Flag then these two songs on this EP are a somewhat fair introduction to how the music can be electric or acoustic and just give you an overall idea of what to expect when listening to more songs (which you definitely need to, though saying it makes me feel like a broken record)

This EP does serve as my introduction to Plainview though, which as a name reminds me of a shortened version of Hidden in Plainview, who were never my favorite band.   The first of the two songs has this punk vibe underneath the otherwise tone of perhaps Forgive Durden and what I want to say is ska.   It's something like The Rocket Summer or The Academy Is, but really it just has that quality where you can say it belongs with those sorts of bands without actually sounding like one of them definitively.

The vocals have a way of being stretched out as so they're almost screamed and sometimes that primal scream does come out.    In fact, that bridge that does somewhat scream in "2338" (Which is odd because the instruments get quieter while the vocals grow louder) reminds me of I Am the Avalanche.

"Seasons", the second song, has an acoustic vibe to it that reminds me a lot more of, well, Animal Flag than anything else.   Yes, I do reference comparisons to Animal Flag in other reviews but, no, I didn't think I'd be doing it in this review as well.   There are still some Avalanche undertones though.    What can only be best described as baseball organs take us into a slew of lyrics about the winter and that actually does make this sound a little bit more like a Christmas song.

A dreamy guitar solo leaves me uncertain as to who to compare this to now, but I do picture Santa Claus playing the guitar and yet I still want to hear more from Plainview so that's saying something.   The way the song kind of draws out at the end here reminds me of The Honorary Title but it doesn't really resemble them in any other ways specifically.

So I'd go through my normal thing here and say that this is four songs and two of them I knew were good ahead of time and the other two I wasn't sure of because I'd never heard of the artist before, but let's be real about this, people.   This is an Animal Flag split and you can download it for zero dollars.   You knew I would be downloading this regardless of what the other two songs sounded like.    Thankfully, they're rather good and now I'm going to go look them up when my internet is done glitching.