(This spoof originally appeared in the SF Weekly.)
We like Aquarius Records, the boutique record shop located on Valencia Street in the Mission. The clerks there are helpful, their recommendations sound. And for the extremely discerning music fan, the store’s insightful reviews, posted weekly on its Web site, provide a wealth of context to obscure, overlooked sounds. Sometimes too much context. Often too much context. What follows are two sample reviews, one real, one fake. Do you have what it takes to spot the impostor, or are you one of those music tourists who only just now discovered Charlemagne Palestine?
Widow Sundae
Capistrana Fortunata
(AnonRec)
Was a bad Italian prog-rock record ever actually made during the ’70s? That’s the red-hot topic of discussion around the Aquarius office these days, and we’ve decided to answer that question with a resounding NO because the latest batch of sturdy 180-gram virgin vinyl rereleases from the always-reliable but mysterious AnonRec imprint (operating out of Middle Dalmatia?) is solid proof that just about every sleepy fishing village on Italy’s Southern Adriatic coast during the decade of bell-bottoms and disco balls was home to a healthy and robust prog-rock scene consisting of swarthy, long-haired Italian musicians replicating (and often improving upon) the sounds of such British prog-masters as Gentle Giant, the Nice, and Henry Cow… but with a few twists. What sets Widow Sundae apart from the rest of the highly revered Corso Vittorio Emanuele prog scene of Bari, Italy, is the group’s bizarre use of richly textured multipart harmonies containing a powerful baritone core actually reminiscent of crooner Claudio Villa’s voice from his string of beautiful Italo-pop hits during the late ’50s. Imagine the first two Premiata Forneria Marconi records but with more of a Latin-flavored symphonic edge!!!
Asian Mae
Collsing
(A Little Dab Will Do You/Plane-Tree)
Holy shit! The motherfuckin’ Corndawg has his own little record label! That’s right. Our
favorite Southern-fried indie-comedian and country-folk novelty singer with an authentic twang (who just released a new CD titled The Liberated North) has been quietly releasing, via his A Little Dab Will Do You imprint, limited-edition CD-Rs by such obscure indie-folk oddities as Jimmy Cousins, Colin Matthews, and Uke of Phillips. But, the first ALDWDY disc to really make us feel all giddy and warm throughout our music-loving innards is Asian Mae’s gorgeous Collsing, which we’ve been playing in the store just about every day over the last month. It’s a magical collection of homemade, lo-fi country-folk with plenty of subtle psychedelic production tricks for all you fuzzy little Animal Collective fans out there. However, this Asian Mae (of Portland, Maine) also possesses a wondrous voice and a genuine talent for writing sweet pop tunes. Sure, we still enjoy Devendra and Joanna and Ms. Nadler, but Asian Mae is truly creating something special for the heart. By the way, we recently found out that Asian Mae is none other than Colleen Kinsella of the avant-folk outfit Cerberus Shoal, who has previously worked with the legendary Alvarius B (of the Sun City Girls). Wow! Talk about a small world.
Field Tales is a double-disc collection of 35 field recordings from the Davenport Family (aka Davenport), a Wisconsin collective that jams and records like digital-age salt-of-the-earth indie-folk types inside rustic barns, in pastures, in the woods… However, these musicians don’t “gather ’round the campfire” reinterpreting ancient folk tunes. Instead, they create improvised, ritualistic noise comprised of stringed instruments, hand-held percussion, human voice, and the random atmospheric chatter endemic to recording out-of-doors (dogs barking, birds chirping, wind blowing, etc.). Imagine a musical commune of old friends and family who prefer free jazz and electronic psychedelia to bluegrass and Irish folk. It’s an idea I still really dig despite the fact that it has become the basis for a well-articulated subcultural commodity regularly referred to as “free folk” or “New Weird America.” On the other hand, after listening to and casually enjoying a slew of Davenport’s limited-edition discs including Field Tales, I’m still left wanting a truly definitive piece of work from these guys. These free-folkie types need to produce a couple of bona fide classics in order to justify the movement’s ever-growing hype.
Shattered-blues meditations; stoned, staggering polkas; ancient tongues spewing forth haunted voodoo-gibberish; back-porch gospel delirium; a room full of Chess session musicians tinkering with their instruments, too wasted to pull it together for just one more take before the crack of dawn — these are just a few of the fleeting impressions the unique American music of one Little Howling Wolf evokes. As legend has it, Wolf (aka James Pobiega of Chicago) is a Polish-American genius-freak street busker who self-released approximately 32 45s and two LPs during the late ’70s and early ’80s. When these singles are consumed in a compilation-size dose — as they can be with this release — LHW’s aesthetic becomes a panorama of 20th-century American folk and pop forms, methodically shredded and Scotch-taped back together into a mangled folk-blues groove that’s incessantly threatening collapse into some incoherent muttering-madness — but never does. Even when saxes, mouth harps, acoustic guitars, drums, various percussive effects, and LHW’s guttural vox are all seemingly jamming on vastly different tunes from widely different eras, the ship holds together. That’s because this Little Howling Wolf character possesses true outsider vision. Somebody declare this guy a national treasure.
Scheduling an interview with hip-as-shit rockers on the rise is always an arduous, energy-sucking affair. How is a struggling San Fran freelance hack supposed to hone his chops and become the next Danny Sugarman or, hell, the next Gary James when he’s devoting more time to coordinating an interview than actually writing his damn story? (By the way, James is my teenage hero — a real, old-school rock critic and flea-market habitué residing in Syracuse, N.Y., who, in the late ’80s, played an integral role in investigating the “Elvis is alive, and he frequently dines at a Wendy’s in Kalamazoo, Mich.” conspiracy.)
Magik Markers are this seminoisy, lo-fi indie-rock trio from New England incessantly championed in print by the grand dragon of all things indie, Thurston Moore (i.e., the tall dude in Sonic Youth). In fact, Moore released this LP on his imprint, and he also packaged it with a hand-numbered poetry zine dedicated to this revered cult act featuring a rather silly fan poem that he actually penned. Moore’s enthusiasm for the modern underground is commendable, but MM’s rote interpretation of early ’90s, Velvet Underground/no wave-inspired punk-noise is sonic terrain too often traveled over the past 20 years. Guitarists Elisa Ambrogio and Leah Quimby essentially rekindle Moore’s own atonal six-string attack from mid-’80s Sonic Youth (but with noticeably diminished returns), while drummer Pete Nolan, admittedly a physical presence behind the kit, lays down rudimentary rhythms that limit just how free and out there his group can be. Call me a dogmatic modernist, but the future is too rich in aesthetic possibilities for a band (considered cutting edge) to be dicking around with such dated structures and grooves, even if they are suffused with howling feedback. And here I thought Thurston was the type of guy who understood this.
