Yes, this is for real. Our second studio album and second vinyl pressing, Lossless Loss, was officially released last night, and we have them in our hands. Recorded two years ago in Virginia, and completed in May 2008, we finally found a wonderful and supportive home in Prophase Records (who also releases Yahowha 13, Acid Mothers Temple, Plastic Crimewave Sound, and soon, the debut of VA's own Dark Sea Dream). More info on the record can be found after the show description, and what a show it is: you will not find four bands on one bill who worship Chrome and Simply Saucer more than these bands. So if you're not into synapse-frying space-punk, stay clear of this one. This is also the DC debut of both Human Eye and Wizzard Sleeve, who already have earned reputations as two of the most exciting live bands in the underground garage-psych circuit. So...please celebrate with us!
Also, there's an exciting experimental show at the Velvet this Thursday, featuring two of Philly's best noise bands and three of DC's most intriguing provocateurs of atonality. Yeah, five bands is a lot, but these guys all play under 20 minutes, which is better than watching some jam band wank on and on for two hours. Info below as well, plus upcoming Clavius and Clavius-related events at the Velvet Lounge and Bossa.
Sunday, October 11
Velvet Lounge
915 U St NW WDC
http://www.velvetloungedc.com202-462-3213
$8, 18+
doors at 8:30, show at 9pm
Kohoutek (LP release on Prophase!)
Human Eye (In the Red, Detroit, ex-Clone Defects)
TV Ghost (In the Red, Indiana)
Wizzard Sleeve (Confederate glue goth tard-wave from Alabama)
Kohoutek
http://claviusproductions.alkem.org/kohoutek Lossless Loss, the second studio album from Mid-Atlantic improv collective Kohoutek, covers most of the dynamic stylistic range Kohoutek is known for: abstract and textural sound, atmospheric rock, harsh noise freakouts, clattering percussion, guitar heroics, and alien electronics congealing to form a multihued psychedelic extravaganza. Recorded deep in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia in September 2007, the five members embarked on a psilocybic twilight journey, and this 44-minute aural excursion is the result. No overdubs and minimal editing create an experience as close as possible to a Kohoutek performance. With longtime core members Scott Verrastro (percussion, flute), Craig Garrett (bass) and Scott Allison (electronics) augmented by Vic Salazar (electric guitar) and Damian Languell (vocals, harmonica, clarinet, didgeridoo, Space Echo), Kohoutek forge their own path in the improv universe, and Lossless Loss is another burning fragment of this fleeting sonic comet.
Human Eye
http://www.myspace.com/humaneyedetroithttp://www.hookorcrook.com/start.htm Watching Human Eye onstage is like being attacked by space aliens. They are like something dreamed up by Philip K. Dick during an acid flashback, a science fiction sound world with rock and roll roots assaulting all of the senses. Their second full-length release, Fragments of the Universe Nurse, continues their musical mission with more mind-derailing time changes, laser-beam synthesizer blasts, hallucinatory overdriven echoplex, and a generally brutal assemblage of disparate elements from a sonic palette that ranges from mid-70's punk rock to psychedelia, prog, free jazz, and Sci-Fi movie sound effects. Writhing giant robot snakes, huge illuminated plastic eyeballs, flying T.V. sets, and exploding flourescent paint-filled balloons only heighten the atmosphere of transformed reality and universal anxiety suggested by Human Eye's music. The musical structures whirl and explode in an entangled storm of opposites fusing together and colliding with strange precision. On first listen, you might think you're hearing traces of Beefheart, Germs, Chrome, Soupy Sales, the Residents, Hendrix, Gentle Giant, and the Boredoms. By the second or third listen, you'll (hopefully) be too disoriented to think, analyze, etc.
Singer/guitarist Timmy V. was previously in the Clone Defects, where he would often do unexpected things in the middle of a song, like attack himself with a vacuum cleaner until he was standing surrounded by shredded metal and plastic, in a swirling cloud of lint. Human Eye hasn't toned down any of these tendencies, they've just reorganized the placement and frequency of these gestures. Their new album is their strangest and best yet. They've been constructing this thing in darkness, shrouded in secrecy. It is now ready to hatch and implant itself into minds starved for action everywhere. With tunes like their glam-anthem "Slop Culture," "Gorilla Garden," "Two Headed Woman," and the epic "Poison Frog People," consciousness will be altered.
TV Ghost
http://www.myspace.com/televisionghost "First things first: there is nothing catchy about this album. No hooks, no prominent melody, no singalong vocals. Indiana post-punk TV Ghost is one of those bands you discover at a show in someone?s basement and become totally obsessed with by virtue of their energy alone. Something in the raucous-to-danceable-and-back-again rhythms is just too much to resist.
It doesn?t hurt that they obviously love The Birthday Party, The Cramps and Antioch Arrow, probably in that order. There?s a serious early '00s synth-punk thing happening on Cold Fish, but it?s more about psychobilly and creepy surf than violent new wave a la Le Shok. ?The Network? may be anchored by a familiar thrashy dance beat, but the ominous harmonies and moan-and-groan vocals give it a fresh, uber-creepy atmosphere. Same goes for other standouts ?Seasick?, with its sleazy, cabaret trash riff, and the frenetic surf guitars on ?The Singularity?; there?s nothing all that new here, but something in the deep, dark nightmare of it makes the best songs addictively good."
Wizzard Sleeve
http://www.myspace.com/wizzardsleeve "I doubt iTunes recognizes ?confederate glue goth tard-wave? as a genre, but that?s the name Alabama?s WIZZARD SLEEVE have given their music, and I?m hard-pressed to improve on it. Robo-trippy and plodding, grindingly repetitive but oddly triumphal, the songs mix and match Tubeway Army-era Gary Numan (if you replace the Asperger?s syndrome with a case of Sparks Plus), effects-pedal ennui a la Bauhaus, and greasy gray noise worthy of mid-'80s Butthole Surfers, then filter everything through the warped lens of a deep Southern post-everything aesthetic." (Brian Costello, Chicago Reader)
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Thursday, October 8
Velvet Lounge
$7, 18+
doors at 8:30, show at 9pm
Magnetic Band (DC, thee legendary Gideon's new collective)
PJB (MD, thee legendary Paul Joyner's old collective)
http://www.myspace.com/psychedelicjambandDrums Like Machine Guns (Philly noise goofballs and masters of the 7-minute set)
http://www.myspace.com/drumslikemachinegunsNervous Sex (Philly noise rock with a serious Load Records jones...think Six Finger Satellite without bass or guitar)
http://www.myspace.com/nervoussexCa$h $lave Clique (Northern VA's best example to keep the death penalty)
http://www.myspace.com/cashslaveclique ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
upcoming DC events:
Thursday 10/29 @ Velvet Lounge: The High Dials (awesome psych-pop from Montreal)/The Receiver $8, 18+, doors at 8:30pm
Friday 10/30 @ Velvet Lounge: Beatnik Flies/Pup Tent/Ottley! $10, 18+, doors at 9pm
Friday 11/13 @ Velvet Lounge: Chinese Underground Tour (featuring some of China's contemporary boundary breakers) $8, 18+, doors at 9pm
Friday 11/20 @ Velvet Lounge: The Numbers Band (legendary Cleveland art-punk ensemble who were peers of Pere Ubu, Devo, Rocket From the Tombs, The Mirrors, Electric Eels, etc.)
$10, 21+, doors at 9pm
Wednesday 12/2 @ Bossa: Chromatic Mysteries w/ Khan Jamal (legendary Philly avant-jazz vibraphonist), Kohoutek Dashin Gassoudan $5, 21+, doors at 8pm
