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SACRED BONES

Cover of Alone & Together by Children's Hospital.

Children's Hospital

Alone & Together

Sacred Bones

    "Alone & Together" is the debut release from Children's Hospital. If their despondent sounds remind you of something you may have once heard its because this is the latest project from the A-Frames/Intelligence/Rodent Plague/afcgt axis. Reminiscent of the brooding and gray skyline of their hometown of Seattle the duo hover between abstract soundscape compositions, Jandek inspired bouts of melancholy droned out dementia, and stripped apart abrasive punk... often combining several of these forms at once. If recent Rodent Plague releases on Killshaman and Jerkave Tapes are any indication it would be ill-advised to sleep on Children's Hospital.

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    Cover of Northern Rocks Bears Weird Vegetable by The Rebel.

    The Rebel

    Northern Rocks Bears Weird Vegetable

    Sacred Bones

      Sacred Bones Records presents "Northern Rocks Bear Weird Vegetable" — the next full-length from London, England's The Rebel. The alter ego of Country Teasers' Ben Wallers, The Rebel dates back to the tail-end of the 80s — having existed side-by-side throughout the Teasers' prolific career—often releasing records at a steadier clip than Waller's main project with songs too madcap to fit into even their William-Burroughs-by-way-of-The-Residents take on country music. Wallers' characteristic self-aware irony and surreal gender/race ruminations are still present but sitting backseat in this more fleshed out concept album about decaying conditions on the planet earth. Although Burroughs comparisons are inevitable, "Northern Rocks Bear Weird Vegetable" could only have been scripted by The Rebel. The album's narrator is in a band, has a valet named Mulholland, but inhabits an otherwise unrecognizable dystopian landscape where evil science laboratories combat college radio personalities, and nuclear war with Iran is well underway. Important issues of today and tomorrow are touched on. In "Why Must I Pay?" Mr. Thatcher, a future Prime Minister, is excoriated for the rising costs of tea, rent, drugs and sex. In "Scarlett Johansen Conceiving the Design" we are shown a horrific world in which starlets replace scientists as consumerdom's inventors. In "You're Just Like Tammy Wynette" the Radical Islam Problem is diagnosed by looking at the politics of ladies headgear, while in "Turtle v. Octopus" a battle between Lovecraftian ancient adversaries plays out, potentially affecting the future of Music itself. This is the first Rebel album to be recorded in the studio with a live backing band...that band being Country Teasers. In terms of sound, "Northern Rocks Bears Weird Vegetable" exchanges The Rebel's clautrophobic home studio layers and diy effects for the improvisational band chemistry and controlled looseness of Country Teasers' infamous live act.

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      Cover of Salt EP by Institute.

      Institute

      Salt EP

      Sacred Bones

        Sacred Bones has long been closely linked with tight-knit regional punk scenes, with roster artists representing everything from the icy precision of Copenhagen (Vår, Lust for Youth) to the acid-fried psych vibes of Tempe, Arizona, (Destruction Unit) to the grimy lawlessness of New York City (The Men, Pop. 1280, Anasazi). Institute stands at the center of another thriving scene in Austin, Texas, and we’re proud to be releasing their Salt EP.

        Formed in Austin in March 2013, Institute includes members of Wiccans, Glue, Blotter, Recide and more. Before they were even a proper band, singer Moses Brown had a couple of raw post-punk songs sitting on a four-track at his house. Once the lineup solidified, the band touched up one of those songs (“Dead Sea”) for a demo, then quickly wrote enough material to flesh out that demo (re-released on Deranged), a seven-inch (on Katorga Works), and now their debut EP for Sacred Bones.

        We fell in love with this band as soon as we heard those early demos, and then saw a blistering set from them in their hometown earlier this year. The Salt EP is as sharp as the band’s earlier work but suggests longer, more experimental forms (“An Absence”) and a more incisive lyrical perspective, dealing with topics from existentialism to Brown’s experience as a closeted youth. Institute have already toured with their new labelmates in Destruction Unit , and we’re stoked to officially welcome these young men into our family.


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        Cover of Mazy Fly by Spellling.

        Spellling

        Mazy Fly

        Sacred Bones

          Mazy Fly, the second full-length by the Bay Area artist SPELLLING, explores the tension between the thrill of exploring the unknown and the terror of imminent destruction. Chrystia Cabral spent the summer of 2018 in her Berkeley studio reflecting on the thresholds of human progress and longing for a new and better tomorrow. She was struck by the way the same technologies that have given humans the ability to achieve utopian dreams of discovery have also brought the world to the precipice of dystopic global devastation. Despite the darkness of this reality, Mazy Fly is defiantly optimistic. It is a celestial voyage into the unknown, piloted by Cabral.

          Each song on Mazy Fly enshrines distinct sentiments within this imagined voyage, from the deeply personal (“Hard to Please Reprise”) to the cosmic (aliens travel to Earth to hear music on “Real Fun”). “Haunted Water” is an intensely heavy song about the memories of colonial violence that haunt the historical slave ship routes of the Middle Passage. “Under the Sun” is a cosmic prayer for good fortune that sees the potential for radical newness in our own lives in the births of stars.

          Mazy Fly musically traverses the spaces between languid, honey-soaked vocals and distant angelic whispers, from thumping 808 club beats to crunching tape loops, and from silky, smooth R&B to whirling organ sonatas. Cabral became enamored by the idea of flight as a harbinger of both progress and apocalypse, and that was expressed in the textures and compositional techniques she utilized. Swarms, flocks, flies, angels, spaceships, flying saucers – all are represented sonically by Cabral and her Juno-106 synthesizer.

          “Secret Thread” is the key to this motif, and the heart of Mazy Fly. When Cabral saw her puppy Cooper running gracefully around an open field, she imagined a winged spirit moving through her new music. She named the spirit, and the album, Mazy Fly.


          FORMAT INFORMATION

          Coloured LP Info: Blue vinyl.

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          Cover of Halloween OST by John Carpenter.

          John Carpenter

          Halloween OST

          Sacred Bones

            For the first time, Sacred Bones Records is making the formerly mailorder-exclusive “art edition” of John Carpenter, Cody Carpenter, and Daniel Davies’s Halloween soundtrack available for wide distribution. The art edition features deluxe packaging with unique art by Chris Bilheimer.

            The new Halloween movie has the distinction of being the first film in the series with creator John Carpenter’s direct involvement since 1982’s Halloween III: Season of the Witch. Carpenter serves on the new David Gordon Green-directed installment as an executive producer, a creative consultant, and, thrillingly, as a soundtrack composer, alongside his collaborators from his three recent solo albums, Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies.

            The new soundtrack pays homage to the classic Halloween score that Carpenter composed and recorded in 1978, when he forever changed the course of horror cinema and synthesizer music with his low-budget masterpiece. Several new versions of the iconic main theme serve as the pulse of Green’s film, its familiar 5/4 refrain stabbing through the soundtrack like the Shape’s knife. The rest of the soundtrack is just as enthralling, incorporating everything from atmospheric synth whooshes to eerie piano-driven pieces to skittering electronic percussion. While the new score was made with a few more resources than Carpenter’s famously shoestring original, its musical spirit was preserved.

            “It was great,” Carpenter said of the experience. “It was transforming. It was not a movie I directed, so I had a lot of freedom in creating the score and getting into the director’s head. I was proud to serve David Gordon Green’s vision.”


            FORMAT INFORMATION

            Coloured LP Info: “Blood Puddle” coloured vinyl (clear vinyl with inset red “puddle”), limited to 2000 copies. Comes with foldout poster.

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            Cover of An Attempt To Draw Aside The Veil by Jozef Van Wissem & Jim Jarmusch.

            Jozef Van Wissem & Jim Jarmusch

            An Attempt To Draw Aside The Veil

            Sacred Bones

              Experimental lute player Jozef Van Wissem and acclaimed film director and musician Jim Jarmusch have a working relationship that dates back to 2006, when they ran into each other on the street in New York City and quickly struck up a friendship. Van Wissem contributed to the soundtrack for Jarmusch’s 2013 movie Only Lovers Left Alive, and the two have collaborated on three previous studio albums — Apokatastasis, Concerning the Entrance Into Eternity, and The Mystery of Heaven. An Attempt to Draw Aside the Veil is their second release as a duo for Sacred Bones Records, following The Mystery of Heaven, and its narrative picks up where that album left off.

              Like The Mystery of Heaven, An Attempt to Draw Aside the Veil delves into the theology of William Blake and Emanuel Swedenborg, this time also exploring the work of Russian occultist and philosopher Helena Blavatsky. The album is mostly instrumental, so the dialogue between the esoteric thinkers who inspired it and Van Wissem and Jarmusch is expressed primarily in the song titles — fittingly arcane phrases like “Concerning the White Horse,” “The Two Paths,” “When the Sun Rises Do You Not See A Round Disc of Fire.”

              Musically, the album finds much of its power in minimalism. Van Wissem’s lute traces the outlines of subdued electronics and ominous guitar drones laid down by Jarmusch. It’s a subtle album, and repeat listens reveal vast depths in its dark corners. Above all, it’s an album that sees two formidable collaborators complement each other brilliantly.

              “An Attempt To Draw Aside The Veil is another adventure with Jozef into the realm of vibrating strings and the dreamlike musical textures of darkness and light,” Jarmusch said of the album. “It was a real pleasure to collaborate with Jozef once again.”


              FORMAT INFORMATION

              Coloured LP Info: Brown marble vinyl, limited to 200 copies.

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              Cover of Wiseblood (Johnny Jewel Remixes) by Zola Jesus.

              Zola Jesus

              Wiseblood (Johnny Jewel Remixes)

              Sacred Bones

                The new limited edition EP by Zola Jesus sees Nika Roza Danilova revisiting a pair of songs from her acclaimed 2017 album, Okovi, alongside prolific composer and musician Johnny Jewel (Chromatics). In a nod to the maxi singles of the 1980s, the album features multiple remixed versions of the two songs, “Ash to Bone” and “Wiseblood.” The track “Wiseblood (Johnny Jewel Remix)” is featured in the soundtrack to the film Beautiful Boy, directed by Felix Van Groeningen and starring Timothée Chalamet and Steve Carell.

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                Cover of Hated: 2008 – 2011 by The Men.

                The Men

                Hated: 2008 – 2011

                Sacred Bones

                NYC’s The Men have made a name for themselves as wayfaring musicians, constantly evolving and eluding their listeners. Before they were genre-hopping through country, post-punk, noise rock, and more, they were applying that experimental nature within the more confined space of punk. Within that genre they were wildly adventurous, playing noise shows, hardcore shows, rock shows, and switching up the instrumentation as they saw fit, while always operating within a general punk ethos. Their first demo was a hand-dubbed and spray-painted run of 32 copies, half of which worked, and their first shows were at New York dives like Tommy’s Tavern, Matchless, and Don Pedro (all of which have been shut down).

                That hand-dubbed demo kicked off a furious run of creative output from 2008 to 2011, much of which is now collected on the new compilation, Hated. The songs on Hated are pulled from a variety of sources — the debut demo tape, a split with Nomos, a 7", a 12" EP, and a slew of unreleased demos, outtakes, and live recordings. These songs show the huge range and potential of a band still in its infancy, when they were just beginning to blaze the path they’re still on to this day.

                The core value of the original incarnation of The Men was work ethic. The band became a lifestyle for original members Chris Hansell, Mark Perro, and Nick Chiericozzi, with Hansell even living off unemployment checks to dedicate his time to the project. The three of them would jam and obsess over music together over all else.

                For those who were at those early NYC shows, Hated will be a welcome reminder of a glorious time in the underground. For those who weren’t, it’s a chance to experience The Men as the locals did, and to get a glimpse of a Brooklyn DIY scene that doesn’t really exist anymore, at least not in the same way. And for diehard fans of the band, it’s a reminder of how much they’ve evolved, and how much more evolution they still have to go.


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                Cover of Thought Gang by Thought Gang.

                Thought Gang

                Thought Gang

                Sacred Bones

                  By the time Twin Peaks’ second season had aired and Fire Walk With Me had just begun principle production, Thought Gang had been born. The esoteric jazz side-project of David Lynch and Angelo Badalamenti evolved from the seeds of Twin Peaks’ trademark slow cool jazz and blossomed into more experimental pastures: horizonless vistas of acid-soaked free-jazz, laced with spoken word narratives and sprawling noisescapes. Fire Walk With Me’s soundtrack would ultimately showcase two preliminary tracks (“A Real Indication” and “The Black Dog Runs at Night”) from a full-length album that wouldn’t see release for two-and-ahalf decades. Beginning in May 1992 and continuing throughout 1993, the bulk of the remaining material for the album was recorded in pieces, and dove-tailed into a string of contracted sessions for other Lynch-Badalamenti projects.

                  In the years following, fragments and working versions of Thought Gang material would make appearances in everything from a Lynch-helmed Adidas commercial to scenes in Hotel Room, Mulholland Dr., Inland Empire, deleted scenes from Fire Walk With Me, and most expansively utilized in Showtime’s third season of Twin Peaks. “Frank 2000” and “Summer Night Noise,” as well as an alternate instrumental mix of “Logic and Common Sense,” would score scenes from season three and aid in defining the show’s distinctly experimental, noisetilted soundtrack.

                  “It’s sort of like jet-fueled jazz in a weird way…but it’s all based on stories,” says Lynch. “It’s Modern Music.”

                  Those two words seem to efficiently capture both Thought Gang’s essence and distinctively genre-less genre. Quite often music that finds release beyond its decade of creation experiences a bit of an aural patina resulting from the process of marinating in the ether of time. Perplexingly, Thought Gang retains a contemporary quality difficult to quantify. Fittingly, the resulting album somehow still sounds “modern” and will continue to remain “modern,” decades upon decades after is creation.


                  FORMAT INFORMATION

                  2xColoured LP Info: “Steel” coloured vinyl.

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                  Cover of Halloween OST by John Carpenter.

                  John Carpenter

                  Halloween OST

                  Sacred Bones

                  When the new Halloween movie hits theaters in October 2018, it will have the distinction of being the first film in the series with creator John Carpenter’s direct involvement since 1982’s Halloween III: Season of the Witch. Carpenter serves on the new David Gordon Green-directed installment as an executive producer, a creative consultant, and, thrillingly, as a soundtrack composer, alongside his collaborators from his three recent solo albums, Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies.

                  The new soundtrack pays homage to the classic Halloween score that Carpenter composed and recorded in 1978, when he forever changed the course of horror cinema and synthesizer music with his low-budget masterpiece. Several new versions of the iconic main theme serve as the pulse of Green’s film, its familiar 5/4 refrain stabbing through the soundtrack like the Shape’s knife. The rest of the soundtrack is just as enthralling, incorporating everything from atmospheric synth whooshes to eerie piano-driven pieces to skittering electronic percussion. While the new score was made with a few more resources than Carpenter’s famously shoestring original, its musical spirit was preserved.

                  “We wanted to honor the original Halloweensoundtrack in terms of the sounds we used,” Davies explained. “We used a lot of the Dave Smith OB-6, bowed guitar, Roland Juno, Korg, Roli, Moog, Roland System 1, Roland System 8, different guitar pedals, mellotron, and piano.”

                  Unlike the Lost Themes albums, where the composers wrote the soundtracks for imaginary movies, Halloween saw the Carpenters and Davies collaborating on music set to images for the first time. Though it marked a significant change from their previous creative process, the trio thrived under the constraints and tight deadlines that film scoring work demands.

                  “Being limited by the length of time in scoring the sequence, we focused on the director’s tempo, timing, and vision,” Davies said. “He would tell us what he had in mind, how long the cue should be, what emotion he wanted, and we would take it from there. It’s only the three of us, there is no elaborate system. We wrote, performed, and orchestrated everything.”

                  For John Carpenter, who reunited on the new film with original Halloween star Jamie Lee Curtis, composing the score felt like a homecoming. Not only had he not worked on a Halloween movie in 35 years, he hadn’t composed a soundtrack since his 2001 sci-fi thriller Ghosts of Mars.

                  “It was great,” Carpenter said of the experience. “It was transforming. It was not a movie I directed, so I had a lot of freedom in creating the score and getting into the director's head. I was proud to serve David Gordon Green’s vision.”

                  For Cody Carpenter, John’s son, and Davies, his godson, it was surreal to work on something that means so much to generations of fans, and that they grew up around.

                  “It was an honor for us to be involved, and we are really happy to be a part of something that so many people are anticipating and excited about,” Davies said. “Working together with both the director of the new Halloween and the creator of the original Halloween was really a fantastic experience.”

                  STAFF COMMENTS

                  Barry says: It's hard to think of horror films without thinking of Carpenter's legendary scores, so it was exciting news that the master of soundtrackery returned with the same collaborators seen on his most recent solo efforts to produce this cinematic masterpiece. Brooding synth throbs, tense string pulls and gloomy, shadowy ambience. As expected, top stuff.

                  FORMAT INFORMATION

                  Dinked Edition LP Info: DINKED STORES EXCLUSIVE:
                  Pumpkin Orange colour.
                  With a FREE 12"x12" Art Print.

                  Coloured LP Info: Blood knife coloured vinyl.

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                  Cover of Obey by Exploded View.

                  Exploded View

                  Obey

                  Sacred Bones

                  Exploded View, the international music project of Annika Henderson, Hugo Quezada, and Martin Thulin has returned and taken flight with their second full-length, Obey. The album was recorded at Hugo’s and Martin’s studios in Mexico City with Annika visiting from Berlin. Leaving behind their raw, live recording process, and embracing overdubs and multi-instrumentalism, the band has crafted their most ambitious work to date. The four-piece that recorded the band’s self-titled debut album and Summer Came Early EP became three to create a more concise collection of songs. Their motivation for creating together remains purely passionate and the improvisational spark the band is known for has morphed into the emotional flames of being close friends with a deep desire to make music with each other.

                  When asked about the title of the record, singer Annika said “this is in reference to so many things. We live in a society where we must obey or risk punishment. This can be social punishment, legal punishment, emotional punishment - if you dare to step outside, you will reap the reward. We live in a time when we are selfcertifying a lot. Whether it’s how we present ourselves on social media or our diet or our job - we obey the social norms. Our fears are used against us by advertisers. Our fears of growing old or being excluded - we must conform or pay the high price - buy this and you will be accepted. We must obey.” She adds musingly at the end, “It’s also funny because in the band we often feel like we are all compromising, so we must all obey each other’s wishes to some extent too.”

                  Striking the balance between precise and wild, between unshackled and grounded, grooving and unhinged, has always been Exploded View’s specialty. They have a special knack for making the esoteric feel accessible and crafting pop music out of seemingly raw consciousness. This unique ability to make beautiful music that feels written beyond the veil is at the heart of what makes the band so captivating and powerful, and it’s on full display all over Obey.


                  STAFF COMMENTS

                  Barry says: Woozy, languid psychedelic atmospheres wrap around a solid foundation of reticent percussion and pulsing bass drones. Elsewhere we get more directed instrumental lines but imbued with the syncopated lag seen elsewhere. A stripped-back but perfectly formed experience, rich and multi-layered but beautifully concise at the same time.

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                  Cover of Hyper Super Mega by Holydrug Couple.

                  Holydrug Couple

                  Hyper Super Mega

                  Sacred Bones

                  It was 10 years ago, in a house on the outskirts of Santiago, Chile, that Ives Sepúlveda Minho and Manuel Parra started playing music together, and The Holydrug Couple was effectively born. A decade later, they’ve made ‘Hyper Super Mega’, an album that represents the culmination of everything they’ve learned in their years as a band.

                  Following the release and surrounding tours of their second album, 2015’s ‘Moonlust’ (Sacred Bones), the duo found themselves back at home, feeling directionless and listless. “The over-riding feeling was one of exhaustion,” Sepúlveda recalls, “exhaustion of the planet and of culture, the overuse of references and information that you see everywhere, in fashion, literature, tourism, music, technology and so on.”

                  So, the duo immersed themselves in these feelings and started to build the foundations of their new record. Amidst eleven tracks of perfectly-formed, heady psych-pop, ‘Hyper Super Mega’ speaks of immediacy, internet and social media, consumption, love and a comfortable despair at the state of the planet. It tells of a world over-connected through cell phones and information, whilst hinting at the place of occult language and imagery in an attempt to convene different and unknown places, or places that are open to interpretation.

                  Sonically, if ‘Hyper Super Mega’ feels, in places, like a classic pop record, that’s because Sepúlveda and Parra spent much of the recording process thinking, too, about the classic pop records of the ’60s and ’70s. Masterpieces by bands like The Beatles, The Beach Boys, and Fleetwood Mac were all reference points, not always explicitly in sound, but certainly in spirit. The duo approached the mythos of the “classic album” from their own inimitable perspective, hoping to make a record that felt authentically like The Holydrug Couple that might fit into the same canon.



                  STAFF COMMENTS

                  Barry says: Longing Indie anthems bolstered with swooning, classic rock solos and huge, soaring synthlines. Cosmic and dreamy but intermittently propulsive, The Holydrug Couple have hit the perfect combination of melancholic, wandering instrumentals and pointed melodicism. Ace.

                  FORMAT INFORMATION

                  Coloured LP Info: Limited red vinyl version!

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                  Cover of Magus by Thou.

                  Thou

                  Magus

                  Sacred Bones

                    Sacred Bones Records is proud to present the new album, Magus, Thou’s first full-length since 2014’s Heathen. In the months leading into the new album, Thou will be releasing three drastically different EPs: The House Primordial on Raw Sugar, Inconsolable on Community Records, and Rhea Sylvia on Deathwish, Inc. Each record will focus on a particular sound—noisy drone, quiet acoustic, and melodic grunge—all of which is incorporated into the new LP, subsumed in the band’s more standard doom metal.

                    While sonically, Magus may be a continuation of Heathen, thematically it stands as a stark rebuttal, a journey beyond the principles of pleasure and pain. It is more the culmination of these distinct EPs, which all orbit some internal black hole. FFO alienation, absurdity, boredom, futility, decay, the tyranny of history, the vulgarities of change, awareness as agony, reason as disease.

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                    Cover of Three Demos by Julee Cruise.

                    Julee Cruise

                    Three Demos

                    Sacred Bones

                      Three Demos is a very unique release, featuring the very first demo recordings for songs from Julee Cruise’s initial lp with David Lynch and Angelo Badalamenti, Floating Into the Night.

                      In 1985, Lynch’s obsession with This Mortal Coil’s “Song to the Siren” was at a fever pitch. Wanting to feature the song in Blue Velvet, the rights to the Tim Buckley cover proved problematic and prohibitively expensive. Lynch had famously just began working with Angelo Badalamenti, who had been suggested by producer Fred Caruso to coach Isabella Rossellini with singing “Blue Velvet” for the film. Faced with the “Song to the Siren” dilemma, Caruso again suggested his friend Badalamenti as a possible solution, encouraging Lynch himself to pen lyrics in order to come up with an original alternative for the film. “David reluctantly agreed to write a lyric, but he thought writing a new song was absolutely preposterous because ‘Song to the Siren’ was his favorite song of all time,” Badalamenti says. The result – “Mysteries of Love,” sung by Cruise – ended up forging a rich blueprint for not just one song, but two full-length albums.

                      Two years after Blue Velvet was released, the notion of a full album of material took shape and three crucial demos were recorded to gain the confidence and financial support of a label. Early versions of “Floating,” “Falling,” and “The World Spins” were all roughed out in economic elegance, rendering distinctive snapshots of what could be if the formula of “Mysteries of Love” was spun into a larger body of work. They’re fascinating glimpses into the genesis of what became Floating Into the Night and the minimal key ingredients that made the material alchemize. An early version of the album opener “Floating” originally began with a stunning spoken-word intro later dropped entirely from the album version. A revelation in its overarching simplicity, the three-song collection is devoid of the lp’s additional arrangement flourishes, and yet still manages to present the same emotional depth charge with only voice, synthesizer, and lyric.

                      FORMAT INFORMATION

                      Ltd 12" Info: Pink vinyl

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                      Cover of The Voice Of Love by Julee Cruise.

                      Julee Cruise

                      The Voice Of Love

                      Sacred Bones

                        25 years after its initial release, Julee Cruise’s sophomore album The Voice of Love is being issued for the first time on vinyl as a deluxe 2xLP, and returning to print on CD.

                        In 1992, after the release of Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, David Lynch, Angelo Badalamenti, and Julee Cruise returned to the studio with new compositions as well as the intent to craft previously instrumental score-based material from Fire Walk With Me and Wild at Heart into Julee Cruise songs. The result was 1993’s final studio album The Voice of Love, a gorgeous ethereal album, which like her debut “Floating Into The Night” had a dreamlike, cinematic feel to it.

                        “In the studio, David would always say ‘[sing] like an angel, like an angel…” Cruise remembers.

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                        Cover of The Long Walk by Uniform.

                        Uniform

                        The Long Walk

                        Sacred Bones

                          Following the release of critically acclaimed LP Wake in Fright, which had two songs featured in the new season of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks, it was time for Uniform vocalist Michael Berdan and instrumentalist Ben Greenberg to return to the studio. The duo decided to up the ante and add a third member to help perfect their vicious post-industrial dystopian cyber-punk. After some deliberation, Greenberg called upon drummer Greg Fox (Liturgy, Zs) to help round out the sound they were looking for. Using a mix of triggered samples and real drums along with layered synths and good old electric guitar, the trio arrived at what would become The Long Walk after only a few short days in the studio.

                          From the opening whirr of the title track, it’s clear that the band is onto something special. Recorded in Strange Weather studios in the first part of 2018, The Long Walk is eight new tracks by the duo of Greenberg and Berdan, incorporating Fox’s skills behind the drum kit to add an entirely new dimension to the signature Uniform sound. Ditching sequenced tracks, Greenberg opted for single takes to highlight the Frankenstein-like guitar-bass-synth hybrid that oozes throughout the recording. Meanwhile, crushing guitar thunder is punched up by Fox’s masterful drumming while Berdan’s cries from the nether feel more desperate and morose than ever. This is Uniform at its most bleak, emotional, and powerful.

                          Lyrically, The Long Walk deals with paradoxes in spirituality and organized religion. Berdan went to Catholic school for most of his primary education. Fear of Biblical hell and damnation felt tangible. As Berdan grew and matured emotionally, he began to reject Catholicism bit by bit. In the recent past, Berdan found himself slowly reconnecting with his background, observing how the faith that he found so repressive served as a great source of comfort and strength for so many. Yet therein lay the contradiction that drove him from religion in the first place — many of the human traditions of the church also dealt in repression, intolerance, and bigotry. Could one observe the rituals and practice of a faith while acknowledging and rejecting its ugliest elements?


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                          Cover of London Sessions by Follakzoid.

                          Follakzoid

                          London Sessions

                          Sacred Bones

                            It should come as no surprise to fans of the Chilean trio Föllakzoid that upon meeting the legendary Jason Pierce a.k.a. J. Spaceman (Spacemen 3, Spiritualized), they discovered they were kindred spirits. Föllakzoid and Spaceman’s projects share a restless drive to explore the outer limits of music, as well as an uncanny ability to lock into a groove until it infiltrates the deepest recesses of the listener’s psyche. When Föllakzoid met Spaceman backstage at a Wooden Shjips gig at London’s Electric Ballroom several years ago, they instantly became friends. For London Sessions, the Chileans and Spaceman joined forces for new, live-to-tape renditions of “Electric” and “Earth,” two highlights from Föllakzoid’s III.

                            The recordings were made in a private studio in London while Föllakzoid was on tour in Europe in June 2016, and Spaceman’s contributions breathe new life into the songs. “Jason added a very different harmonic atmosphere to the songs,” guitarist Domingo Garcia-Huidobro explained. “It somehow rearticulated the space and metric that already existed in a way the band never could.”

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                            Cover of Hard To Please by Spellling.

                            Spellling

                            Hard To Please

                            Sacred Bones

                              Hard to Please is the debut Sacred Bones 7" release by Bay Area artist Chystia Cabral, aka SPELLLING. She released her first full length Pantheon of Me in September 2017, and it was self-written, performed, and produced in her apartment in Berkeley, California. She began experimenting with music production in 2015 in effort to carry on the creative legacy of a lost loved one. Drawing heavily from messages in her dreams, her sound spirals through clarity and obscurity searching through landscapes of psychic space. The result is a divine soul music, soft in its restraint but heavy with passion. SPELLLING’s powerful vocal range dances over compositions that vary from rhythmic and ethereal to crunchy and hypnotic, while all remaining singularly cohesive to her distinct and enveloping sound. Pantheon of Me was Bandcamp’s #4 record of the year in 2017 and they raved of that sound: “Cabral has it, from her careful sense of composition to her charismatic presence to her ability to communicate with her music straight through to the listener’s heart.”

                              Her newest tracks “Hard to Please” and “My Other Voice” (a cover of Sparks’ 1979 symphonic disco track) pair together to reflect on bittersweet passions of an obsessive romance. “Hard to Please” swells through the excitement and pain of yearning to please an unsatisfiable lover, with “eyes of winter” but a promising “heart of spring.” The track presents as dance music but journeys through a swirling climax to something more spiritual. “My Other Voice” channels a more sinister state of romantic high, commanding obedience from this aloof lover, “you’re so independent but that’s going to change real soon, with my other voice I can destroy this room.” The sinister tone is juxtaposed with the elated music, that grooves celestially along, entrancing the listener and destroying the proverbial room with the power of SPELLLING’s voice, which elevates this cover beyond an homage and to a unique vision entirely its own.


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                              Cover of The Long Sleep by Jenny Hval.

                              Jenny Hval

                              The Long Sleep

                              Sacred Bones

                                What am I doing here? Am I communicating? Am I promoting?

                                I just want to tell you something.

                                There should be something I could tell you, there should be something I could do to reach you directly, but there is nothing useful in the way we define “you”, or “me”. There should be something I could tell you, there should be something I could say directly without lyrics and melody.

                                Maybe that’s what I’m trying here. Something else than lyrics or melody. It’s not the words. It’s not in the rhythm. It’s not in the streaming. It’s not in the “message”. It’s not in the product. It’s not in the algorithms. It’s not something you decided. It’s not something they decided for you.

                                I want to tell you something. I just want to say: Thank you. I love you.

                                The follow-up to Jenny Hval’s acclaimed 2016 album Blood Bitch is The Long Sleep, an adventurous new EP that sees the Norwegian multidisciplinary artist embracing an instinctive, even subconscious, approach to creating meaning. In contrast to Hval’s more explicitly conceptual work, The Long Sleep foregrounds the act of composition itself, letting the melodies and structures reveal the other elements of the songs. All of the songs on the EP recycle the same compositional motives, but manipulate them into very different shapes that take them further and further out of their original, "life-like" context.

                                Hval recorded The Long Sleep with longtime collaborator Håvard Volden and producer Lasse Marhaug, along with an ace new supporting cast of talented players from the jazz world — Kyrre Laastad on percussion, Anja Lauvdal on piano, Espen Reinertsen on saxophone, and Eivind Lønning on trumpet. Hval calls them some of her favorite contemporary musicians, and their musical background helps to give the songs on The Long Sleep their intuitive, improvised feel.

                                STAFF COMMENTS

                                Barry says: Sacred Bones once again bring the goods for the new Jenny Hval LP, following on from the mindblowing 'Blood Bitch', 'The Long Sleep' is a less abrasive but equally as stunning affair, rich in the brooding ambience and soaring beauty of her previous work.

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                                Cover of Vive La Void by Vive La Void.

                                Vive La Void

                                Vive La Void

                                Sacred Bones

                                Vive la Void is the new solo project of Sanae Yamada, co-founder and keyboard player of Moon Duo. Yamada wrote and recorded the self-titled debut album over roughly a two-year period, during windows of downtime in Moon Duo’s substantial touring and recording schedule. The dense, shape-shifting atmospheres of the seven songs grew out of late-night basement experiments in the layering of synthesizer tracks, a process that also led to meditations on the changeable nature of memory and perception. The result is an undulating blend of ethereal swirl, low end thrumming, and electric crackle, buoyed by Yamada’s understated but captivating vocal melodies and her striking lyrics.

                                “The lyrics were a way of reckoning with my own memories and also of trying to process my reactions to the human situation,” Yamada explains. “I wanted the voice to have a kind of ghostly quality, to emerge from and recede back into the song, or to pass over it like weather. It’s one of many layers of sound, which are meant to blend together in such a way that on one listen you might hear one thing, and on another listen you might hear something else, so the music seems to change even as it stays the same.” Yamada has spent the last decade as a working musician, moving between semipermanent home bases whenever she isn’t living in a tour van. In some ways, then, it feels inevitable that Vive la Void became a meditation on the strange rhythms of long-term touring, constant relocation, and the accompanying stream of brief but compelling encounters. It’s a testament to her empathy and creativity that these songs feel both specific and universal, familiar yet tantalizingly unknowable.

                                “I feel like the movement of life in the sphere of consciousness is this process of trace-leaving,” Yamada reflects. “Wherever we go, whomever we interact with, whatever we touch, we leave and absorb these invisible traces, this residue of memory that lingers. I wanted the sonic textures of this record to explore that state of being there and not there, of something being with you but not tangible.”

                                STAFF COMMENTS

                                Barry says: Mixing the hypnotic driven forces of Moon Duo with a clear influence from Krautrock and cosmic ambient works of the 70's, Yamada has crafted a superb LP, a great indicator for the future.

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                                Cover of Okovi: Additions by Zola Jesus.

                                Zola Jesus

                                Okovi: Additions

                                Sacred Bones

                                  Zola Jesus’ Okovi: Additions lp offers a new angle on her 2017 album, Okovi. The collection pairs four previously unreleased songs from the Okovi sessions with four remixes by a diverse cast of artists.

                                  Johnny Jewel turns “Ash to Bone” into a late-night cinematic torch song, Tri Angle Records composer Katie Gately’s “Siphon” is a dark choir of warping angels, black metal band Wolves in the Throne Room’s take on “Exhumed” makes the pounding industrial anthem even denser and heavier, and Toronto producer Joanne Pollock (formerly one half of Poemss with Venetian Snares’ Aaron Funk) makes “Soak” feel like an aching classical standard— until it starts warping in on itself and goes somewhere else entirely.

                                  The songs on Additions traverse a vast amount of sonic ground, but taken together, they cohere remarkably well as an album, all while serving to enrich the experience of Okovi.

                                  “These four new songs were intended to be on Okovi,” Nika Roza Danilova explains. “Each of them represents a snapshot of my journey in making the record, and are just as precious to me as the songs that made it onto the final track listing. The remixes are beloved in their own way, as most were born from organic circumstances, and have drawn the original songs into completely new atmospheres.”

                                  FORMAT INFORMATION

                                  Coloured LP Info: Grey and black starburst vinyl.

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                                  Cover of Drift by The Men.

                                  The Men

                                  Drift

                                  Sacred Bones

                                  Drift is the seventh full-length by NYC rock polymaths The Men. The band’s last album, the self-released Devil Music, was the sound of a band who had been through hell hitting reset and looking to their roots to rediscover themselves. On Drift, The Men return to their longtime label Sacred Bones Records and explore the openness that Devil Music helped them find.

                                  The immediately evident result of that exploration is the experimental quality of much of the material on Drift. Songwriters Mark Perro and Nick Chiericozzi chase their muses down a few dozen thrilling rabbit-holes over the course of the album’s nine tracks. The songs on Drift veer in a number of directions, but notably, almost none of them feature a prominent electric guitar. The lone exception, “Killed Someone,” is a rowdy riff-rocker, worthy of the finest moments of the band’s now-classic Leave Home and Open Your Heart albums. The rest of the album drives down stranger highways. “Secret Light” is an improvisation based on an old piano riff of Perro’s. “Maybe I’m Crazy” is a synth-driven dancefloor stomper for long after last call. “Rose on Top of the World” and “When I Held You in My Arms” are paisley-hued, psyched-out jams with big, beating hearts.

                                  The album was recorded to 2" tape with Travis Harrison (Guided by Voices) at Serious Business Studios in Brooklyn. A whole pile of instruments was involved — synths, strings, sax, steel, harmonica, tape loops, on top of the usual guitar, bass, and drums. Unlike recent releases from The Men, there aren’t many overdubs on Drift — a reflection of the personalities of its makers becoming less frantic, Chiericozzi suggests. In fact, the band removed a lot of the additional parts they tried adding early on, giving the final product a bit of a ghostly feel. The songs on Drift took giant leaps and trips from their beginnings only to find the band returning to the first spark of creation.

                                  FORMAT INFORMATION

                                  Coloured LP Info: “Deep Drift” colour vinyl.

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                                  Cover of Criminal by The Soft Moon.

                                  The Soft Moon

                                  Criminal

                                  Sacred Bones

                                  Criminal’ is a confessional work. Through the stark lens of shame and guilt that has followed Luis Vasquez since a violent childhood growing up within the humming ambient sprawl of 80s Mojave Desert, here he documents the gut-wrenching sound of going to war with himself. Battling with his own sanity, self-hatred, insecurity, self-entitlement and grappling with the risk of these things transforming him into a person he despises, Vasquez has laid his feelings bare with this: his confession and most self-reflective work to date.

                                  “Guilt is my biggest demon and has been following me since childhood. Everything I do strengthens the narrative that I am guilty” Vasquez reflects. “The concept of ‘Criminal’ is a desperate attempt to find relief by both confessing to my wrongdoings and by blaming others for their wrongdoings that have affected me.”

                                  ‘Criminal’ marks a striking and important chapter in his self-exploration, both artistically and emotionally. As a young musician living in Oakland, Vasquez began to try and process the narrative of his difficult upbringing veiled through musical exploration. Taking krautrock's motorik beats and Post-Punk deconstructions and honing them into a hushed percussive incantation, The Soft Moon's self-titled debut album took shape. The album was released in late 2010 by Captured Tracks and was praised by critics and emulated by contemporaries.

                                  In 2012 the apocalyptic conceptual work of 'Zeros' emerged, shortly followed by Vasquez moving to Venice, Italy in 2013, acting as a catalyst for 2014’s release, ‘Deeper’. While previous albums were primarily instrumental records, where Vasquez’s voice was diffused amidst the music as another instrument, ‘Deeper’ marked the beginning of a new musical direction where vocals and lyrics became something more than a mere presence. ‘Deeper’ was a descent into the womb of childhood trauma, anxiety and fear, and although Vasquez survived this dark exploration of himself, he did not return alone.

                                  Working once more with Maurizio Baggio, who produced ‘Deeper’, at La Distilleria in Bassano Del Grappa, Italy, ‘Criminal’ sees Vasquez further explore putting his lyrics at the forefront and letting his raw emotions flow. The album is Vasquez's way of holding himself accountable and seeking redemption for the abuse he inflicts on himself and others, and acknowledges roots in the abuse which, inflicted upon him as a child, broke him.

                                  STAFF COMMENTS

                                  Barry says: Thudding drum machines, screaming distorted guitars and barely-there vocal abstractions fed through a wall of effects. It's a delicate but perfectly achieved bout of melodic suggestions and visceral, white-hot emotion.

                                  FORMAT INFORMATION

                                  Coloured LP Info: Limited edition clear vinyl.

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                                  Cover of Jukebox Babe / No Fun by Moon Duo.

                                  Moon Duo

                                  Jukebox Babe / No Fun

                                  Sacred Bones

                                    Following the resounding success of their two-volume, Yin-and-Yang song cycle Occult Architecture, the Portland psych heroes in Moon Duo return with a limited edition 12" paying tribute to two of their musical heroes — Iggy Pop and Alan Vega. Moon Duo’s versions of these classic songs push them into bold new sonic territory, and show that Ripley Johnson and Sanae Yamada’s expansive musical imaginations are still firing on all cylinders.

                                    “We started playing ‘No Fun’ after BBC6 Radio asked us to record an Iggy song for his 70th birthday. We added it to our set to work it out for the session and kept playing it every night because everyone loves that song. We worked up a version of ‘Jukebox Babe’ because our sound engineer Larry got it stuck in his head and was singing it all the time. We figured, we may as well play it if we’re going to hear it all the time.

                                    The Stooges and Iggy, and Suicide/Alan Vega/Martin Rev, are all huge influences on us. But we never want to do faithful covers of great songs, because what’s the point? So we tried to push both of the tracks in less obvious directions, incorporating other influences, like California psych and cosmic disco, giving them more of a summer vibe. We knew Sonic Boom was working outside of Lisbon, so we asked him to produce the tracks, recording them in August for maximal summer heat.”

                                    FORMAT INFORMATION

                                    Ltd 12" Info: White vinyl edition.

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                                    Cover of Anthology: Movie Themes 1974-1998 by John Carpenter.

                                    John Carpenter

                                    Anthology: Movie Themes 1974-1998

                                    Sacred Bones

                                    John Carpenter is a legend. As the director and composer behind dozens of classic movies, Carpenter has established a reputation as one of the greatest filmmakers in the history of modern cinema, as well as one of its most influential musicians. The minimal, synthesizer-driven themes to films like Halloween, Escape From New York, and Assault on Precinct 13 are as indelible as their images, and their timelessness was evident as Carpenter performed them live in a string of internationally sold-out concert dates in 2016. Anthology: Movie Themes 1974-1998 collects 13 classic themes from Carpenter’s illustrious career together on one volume for the first time. Each theme has been newly recorded with the same collaborators that Carpenter worked with on his hit Lost Themes studio albums: his son, Cody Carpenter, and godson, Daniel Davies.

                                    Anthology is a near-comprehensive survey of John Carpenter’s greatest themes, from his very first movie, the no-budget sci-fi film Dark Star, to 1998’s supernatu¬ral Western, Vampires. Those sit alongside the driving, Led Zeppelin-influenced Assault on Precinct 13 theme, Halloween’s iconic 5/4 piano riff, and the eerie synth work of The Fog. Carpenter and his band also cover Ennio Morricone’s bleak, minimalist theme for The Thing.

                                    We also get vital new recordings of the themes to ’80s classics and fan favorites Big Trouble in Little China, Escape From New York, Christine, and They Live, along with the romantic Starman, which earned Jeff Bridges his first Oscar nomination as a lead actor. The collection is rounded out by the menacing, heavy themes to Prince of Darkness and In the Mouth of Madness, the latter a Metallica-inspired riff originally played for the film by Kinks guitarist Dave Davies, and now played by his son Daniel.



                                    STAFF COMMENTS

                                    Barry says: I don't think many people could argue that John Carpenter isn't one of the most respected and prolific figures in soundtrackery, and this should prove it. Some of the most recognisable themes in all the land. Awesome.

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                                    Cover of Okovi by Zola Jesus.

                                    Zola Jesus

                                    Okovi

                                    Sacred Bones

                                    For over a decade, Nika Roza Danilova has been recording music as Zola Jesus. She’s been on Sacred Bones Records for most of that time, and Okovi marks her reunion with the label.

                                    Fittingly, the 11 electronics-driven songs on Okovi share musical DNA with her early work on Sacred Bones. The music was written in pure catharsis, and as a result, the sonics are heavy, dark, and exploratory. In addition to the contributions of Danilova’s longtime live bandmate Alex DeGroot, producer/musician WIFE, cellist/noise-maker Shannon Kennedy from Pedestrian Deposit, and percussionist Ted Byrnes all helped build Okovi’s textural universe.

                                    With Okovi, Zola Jesus has crafted a profound meditation on loss and reconciliation that stands tall alongside the major works of its genre. The album peaks of tragedy with great wisdom and clarity. Its songs plumb dark depths, but they reflect light as well.

                                    ARTIST STATEMENT:

                                    Last year, I moved back to the woods in Wisconsin where I was raised. I built a little house just steps away from where my dilapidated childhood tree fort is slowly recombining into earth. Okovi was fed by this return to roots and several very personal traumas.

                                    While writing Okovi, I endured people very close to me trying to die, and others trying desperately not to. Meanwhile, I was fighting through a haze so thick I wasn’t sure I’d find my way to the other side. Death, in all of its masks, has been encircling everyone I love, and with it the questions of legacy, worth, and will.

                                    Okovi is a Slavic word for shackles. We’re all shackled to something—to life, to death, to bodies, to minds, to illness, to people, to birthright, to duty. Each of us born with a unique debt, and we have until we die to pay it back. Without this cost, what gives us the right to live? And moreover, what gives us the right to die? Are we really even free to choose?

                                    This album is a deeply personal snapshot of loss, reconciliation, and a sympathy for the chains that keep us all grounded to the unforgiving laws of nature. To bring it to life, I decided to enlist the help of Alex DeGroot, who has been the only constant in my live band and helped mix the Stridulum EP back in 2010. It will be released on Sacred Bones, the closest group of people I’ll ever have to blood-bound family.

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                                    Cover of Stridulum - Reissue by Zola Jesus.

                                    Zola Jesus

                                    Stridulum - Reissue

                                    Sacred Bones

                                    “Seven yers ago, it was winter break at university in Madison, Wisconsin. There was a snowstorm that covered the city with a still white haze. Not a single person in the streets. I was sitting on my bed with a cheap keyboard and a computer, screaming into the void. I barely remember writing the songs. It was a chaotic point in my life. I had no time to think about process or intent. It was a purge. I do remember taking a break from recording, bundling up, and walking through the barren streets while listening to the demos I’d made. The world, at once, felt clear. After writing and producing what would become the Stridulum EP, I contacted a new friend, Alex DeGroot, to come over and record my vocals. He was studying audio engineering and had more knowledge and gear than I could dream of. He helped mix Stridulum, too, because all I had was a pair of headphones. (Since then, Alex has stuck by me, as a live bandmate, technical director, co-producer, mixer, and engineer.) These songs were a huge leap of faith back then. It was my first time singing without layers of distortion, echo, and reverb. It was the first time I peeled back the layers to find out what was at the core. I’m still on that path today, seeing how far I can push myself into unknown places, whether through clarification or destruction. It’s like Stridulum’s still here with me, underneath it all. Still, it’s surreal to think that this record, made by a 19-year-old girl sitting on a bed in a freezing old house in Madison, would make its way into strangers’ ears seven years later.”

                                    -Nika Roza Danilova, June 2017

                                    Collects the early Zola Jesus EPs Stridulum and Valusia in a single volume for the first time.


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                                    Cover of The Spoils by Zola Jesus.

                                    Zola Jesus

                                    The Spoils

                                    Sacred Bones

                                    Sacred Bones present "The Spoils" from Zola Jesus. Hailing from the unsuspecting locale of Madison, WI, Zola Jesus—the alter ego of Nika Roza Danilova—occupy a sphere of sparse industrial rhythms, no-fi drones, and ethereal femme vocals. Those who have seen her handful of live shows, heard her WFMU set, or caught any of the acclaimed, sought after, and now mostly out of print releases on Die Stasi or Troubleman Unlimited already know. For those uninitiated "The Spoils" may be the most fully realized representation of her sound. Zola Jesus have two previous releases on Sacred Bones, the "Souer Sewer" single and a limited CD of a live performance from WNYU.

                                    FORMAT INFORMATION

                                    Coloured LP Info: Smoke coloured vinyl.

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                                    Cover of EP#260 by SQÜRL.

                                    SQÜRL

                                    EP#260

                                    Sacred Bones

                                    “Contradictions embraced: Although SQÜRL’s music is anti-mathematic, SQÜRL loves mathematics. We love the Fibonacci numbers. And magic numbers. Perfect numbers. Bell numbers. Catalan numbers. 260 is none of these. It isn’t a perfect number, and not factional of any number. It’s not even a regular number. 260, though, is the number of days in all Mesoamerican calendars. The Mayan calendar. The Tolkien calendar. 260 is also the number of days of human gestation. (Orangutans also). 260 also has an elliptical connection to the dark rift; a series of molecular dust clouds located between our solar system and the Sagittarius Arm of the Milky Way. And although not a magic number, 260 is the magic constant of the magic square investigated by Benjamin Franklin, and part of the solution to a famous chess problem; the n-queens problem for n=8. 260 is also the country code for Zambia. And the US area code for Fort Wayne, Indiana. Therefore, SQÜRL has labeled this recording EP #260.” -Jim Jarmusch, March 1, 2017

                                    SQÜRL is: Jim Jarmusch, Carter Logan and Shane Stoneback.

                                    An enthusiastically marginal rock band from New York City who like big drums & distorted guitars, cassette recorders, loops, feedback, sad country songs, molten stoner core, chopped & screwed hip-hop, and imaginary movie scores.

                                    SQÜRL began in 2009 when Jim Jarmusch and Carter Logan teamed with producer Shane Stoneback to record some original music for the film The Limits of Control. Echoing the varied Spanish landscapes captured in the film, the three emerged with a set of slow-motion psychedelic rock instrumentals (releasing them as Bad Rabbit). Following these scoring sessions Jim, Shane, and Carter continued to record new originals while also exploring the back-alleys of American country, noise, and psychedelia. SQÜRL released a series of 3 EPs, recorded over a 3 year period by Shane at Treefort Recording in Brooklyn, NY. Jarmusch and Logan’s collaboration continued as a duo with SQÜRL’s acclaimed score for Paterson, and a trio with Stoneback for EP #260

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                                    Cover of Allegory & Self by Psychic TV.

                                    Psychic TV

                                    Allegory & Self

                                    Sacred Bones

                                    Beginning in 1982, the conceptual audiovisual troupe labeled Psychic TV set out on a multimedia journey filled with subversion, liberation, and rebellion. Materialized between Throbbing Gristle co-founder Genesis P-Orridge and Alternative TV songwriter Alex Fergusson, Psychic TV started pulling in familiar faces with the likes of Peter “Sleazy” Christopherson, Paula P-Orridge, Jhonn Balance, David Tibet, John Gosling and countless others. While the members’ previous works took root in the counterculture zeitgeist of late ’70s UK punk and conceptual art, it was no longer a question of how to rebel against authority, but rather how to carefully subvert it through collective infiltration. Parallel to Psychic TV, its members formed the anti-cult faction The Temple of Psychick Youth, further propagating the Psychic TV message and vision.

                                    While the ensuing years saw Psychic TV’s major label infection and record breaking live album release binge, it wasn’t until 1988 that the band started to ready itself for a chart-friendly pop endeavor in the form of Allegory and Self. This would be the band’s most notable and successful endeavor, but tragically, it would be the final songwriting collaboration between P-Orridge and Fergusson. Allegory and Self was a perfect storm of catchy pop melody along with subversive counter-culture reference and occult leanings, packaged in a perfect bundle of underground hits.

                                    The record’s opening track “Godstar,” a song gushing obsessive praise upon the fallen Rolling Stones member Brian Jones, would give the album its most notable identity. “Godstar’s” melodic hooks and haunting, Phil Spector-era lyrical chant gives into to all the hallmarks of a chart-topping hit. “Just Like Arcadia” and “Being Lost” follows in similar footsteps, charging along with a somewhat whimsical Beach Boys-esque pop quality. The album also contained a sneak-peak into what direction Psychic TV was heading into going forward, apparent in the acid house number “She Was Surprised.” Tracks like “Starlit Mire” and “Thee Dweller” reflect more of what the Psychic TV live experience was akin to in the ’80s, aggressive and hypnotic. All together, Allegory and Self would stand alone as the band’s signature apex from the original ’80s line-up.

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                                    Cover of Subordination by Institute.

                                    Institute

                                    Subordination

                                    Sacred Bones

                                      Since their first demo in 2013, the Austin expats in Institute have edged their raw anarcho punk blitz into something much more expansive and nuanced. 2014’s Salt EP marked the beginning of the band’s working relationship with Sacred Bones, and it explored longer, more experimental song forms. Catharsis, the band’s debut full-length, was another huge push forward, with a slightly cleaner production and some Krautrock influence creeping in around the edges. Subordination sees them push themselves further out of genre, incorporating hard rock and glam and writing some of the most diverse material of their career.

                                      Subordination was written in the days leading up to Institute’s first European tour, where they then had a chance to sculpt the songs live before recording them in summer of 2016. The song writing and recording process sought to close the gap between the band’s records and shows, to make an album as representative of their live set as possible. It was the most collaborative Institute writing session to date, with all four band members contributing (gtr -Arak Avakian, drums - Barry Elkanick, bass- Adam Cahoon & vox - Moses Brown). They worked again with producer Ben Greenberg (Uniform) and fully captured the intensity that has made them one of the best live punk bands touring today.

                                      Frontman Moses Brown’s lyrics remain deeply personal, but rather than diving into introspection and plucking out intimate details about his life, he attempts to dismantle systems of patriarchal thought and power. Brown investigates national insecurities and American socialization failures through the lens of his personal experiences in both public school and art schools.

                                      The songs on Subordination address the lonely sham of playing by the rules, the search for money and power, the annihilation of a true personality, and the stan¬dards of normalcy that from childhood conditions us to feel abject.

                                      FORMAT INFORMATION

                                      Coloured LP Info: Indies exclusive coloured vinyl.

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                                      Cover of Occult Architecture Vol.2 by Moon Duo.

                                      Moon Duo

                                      Occult Architecture Vol.2

                                      Sacred Bones

                                      Meaning all things magick and supernatural, the root of the word occult is that which is hidden, concealed, beyond the limits of our minds. If this is occult, then the Occult Architecture of Moon Duo’s fourth album - a psychedelic opus in two separate volumes released in 2017 is an intricately woven hymn to the invisible structures found in the cycle of seasons and the journey of day into night, dark into light.

                                      Offering a cosmic glimpse into the hidden patterning embedded in everything, Occult Architecture reflects the harmonious duality of these light and dark energies through the Chinese theory of Yin and Yang.

                                      Following the Yin (feminine, darkness, night, earth) represented on Occult Architecture Vol. 1, Vol. 2 presents the Yang. Yang means “the bright side of the hill” and is associated with the male, sun, light and the spirit of heaven, and as such Vol. 2 explores the light and airy elements of Moon Duo’s complex psyche.

                                      “In production we referred to Vol. 1 as the fuzz dungeon, and Vol. 2 as the crystal palace,” guitarist Ripley Johnson explains. “The darkness of Vol. 1 gave birth to the light of Vol. 2. We had to have both elements in order to complete the cycle. We’re releasing them separately to allow them their own space, and to ensure clarity of vision. To that end we also mixed Vol. 2 separately, in the height of Portland summer, focusing on its sonic qualities of lightness, air, and sun. Listeners can ultimately use the two volumes individually or together, depending on circumstance or the desired effect.”

                                      Vol. 2 was mixed in Portland by the band’s longtime collaborator Jonas Verwijnen

                                      STAFF COMMENTS

                                      Barry says: If you haven't heard of Moon Duo already, where have you been? This is the second (and equally excellent) album they have put out in 3 months! Driven psychedelic haze, hypnotic distortion and ethereal vocals, pushed together into a perfect combination of melody and drive. How do they keep doing it?

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                                      Cover of World Eater by Blanck Mass.

                                      Blanck Mass

                                      World Eater

                                      Sacred Bones

                                      As humans, we are aware of our inner beast and should therefore be able to control it. We understand our hard-wired primal urges and why they exist in an evolutional sense. We understand the relationship between mind and body. Highly evolved and intelligent, we should be able to recognize these genetic hangovers and control them as a means to act positively and move forward as a compassion-ate species. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Recent global events have proven this. The human race is consuming itself.

                                      World Eater, the new album by Benjamin John Power’s Blanck Mass project, is a reaction to this. There is an underlying violence and anger throughout the record, even though some of these tracks are the closest Power has ever come to writing, in his words, “actual love songs.”

                                      “Maybe subconsciously this was some kind of countermeasure to restore some personal balance,” Power explains.

                                      On World Eater, Power further perfects the propulsive, engrossing electronic music he has created throughout his impressive decade-plus career, both under the Blanck Mass moniker and as one-half of Fuck Buttons, as he elaborates upon the sound of 2015’s brilliant double album Dumb Flesh. As massive as the sonic world of the new record often feels, its greatest achievement is in its maximization of a limited set of tools, a restriction intentionally set by Power himself.

                                      “As an exercise in better understanding myself musically, I found myself using an increasingly restricted palette during the World Eater creative process. Evoking these intense emotions using minimal components really put me outside of my comfort zone and was unlike the process I am used to. Feeling exposed shone a new light on this particular snapshot. I feel enriched for doing so.”


                                      STAFF COMMENTS

                                      Barry says: Once again, Power brings it with a heady and churning suite of crackling drones, glimmering pads and reticent melodies. Forged through repetition and determination, there lies within a wealth of beauty and startling directional clarity, revealed through minute changes in timbre and force. A brilliantly measured and impeccably conceived electronic rite of passage.

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                                      Cover of Occult Architecture Vol.1 by Moon Duo.

                                      Moon Duo

                                      Occult Architecture Vol.1

                                      Sacred Bones

                                      Meaning all things magick and supernatural, the root of the word occult is that which is hidden, concealed, beyond the limits of our minds. If this is occult, then the Occult Architecture of Moon Duo’s fourth album - a psychedelic opus in two separate volumes released in 2017 - is an intricately woven hymn to the invisible structures found in the cycle of seasons and the journey of day into night, dark into light.

                                      Offering a cosmic glimpse into the hidden patterning embedded in everything, Occult Architecture reflects the harmonious duality of these light and dark energies through the Chinese theory of Yin and Yang.

                                      In Chinese, Yin means “the shady side of the hill” and is associated with the feminine, darkness, night, earth. Following this logic, Vol. 1 embraces and embodies Moon Duo’s darker qualities — released appropriately on February 3, in the heart of winter in the Northern Hemisphere.

                                      According to guitarist Ripley Johnson, “the concept of the dark/light, two-part album came as we were recording and mixing the songs, beginning in the dead of winter and continuing into the rebirth and blossoming of the spring. There’s something really powerful about the changing of the seasons in the Northwest, the physical and psychic impact it has on you, especially after we spent so many years in the seasonal void of California. I became interested in gnostic and hermetic literature around that time, especially the relationship between music and occult qualities and that fed into the whole vibe.”

                                      Adds keyboardist Sanae Yamada, “the two parts are also intended to represent inverted components of a singular entity, like two faces on the same head which stare always in opposite directions but are inextricably driven by the same brain.”

                                      Vol. 1 was mixed in Berlin by the band’s longtime collaborator Jonas Verwijnen.


                                      STAFF COMMENTS

                                      Barry says: Pulsing, synth-driven electronica meets hypnotic psych headfirst on Moon Duo's latest odyssey. From the dark-wave gloom-step of 'Cold Fear' to the rocking swagger of'White Rose', Moon Duo consistently smash the boundaries. Play loud.

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                                      Cover of Wake In Fright by Uniform.

                                      Uniform

                                      Wake In Fright

                                      Sacred Bones

                                      Wake in Fright, the second full-length by the New York City duo Uniform, is a harrowing exploration of self-medication, painted in the colors of war. Following the Ghosthouse 12", whose A-side Pitchfork called “their most relentless track yet,” vocalist Michael Berdan and guitarist/producer Ben Greenberg return with a new batch of even more punishing songs that incorporate elements of industrial music, thrash metal, harsh noise, and power electronics.

                                      “This record is primarily about psychic transition,” Berdan explained. “The distress that these songs attempt to illustrate comes from a place of stagnation and monotony. This is what happens when old ways of thinking become exhausted and old ways of coping prove ineffective. Something must change or it will break.”

                                      The characters Berdan brings to life in his lyrics quit using but have ruinous relapses (“Habit”) or struggle as their resolve crumbles (“Bootlicker”); they use alcohol to ease their insomnia but and are helpless when they get sober and stop sleeping again (“Night of Fear”); they’re existential misanthropes trapped in dead-end lives (“The Lost”).

                                      Greenberg sets these stories to menacing guitar and samples of literal sounds of war — the kick drums are bombs going off, the snares are gunshots. He drew the record’s immense sample library from action movies, Foley sound packs, field recordings, and more, and the result is devastating. The guitar is also as crucial as ever, and now as indebted Slayeras it is to Big Black. Greenberg conjures up massive riffs and shredding solos, pushing the band deeper into the metal world whose borderlands they’ve long stalked.

                                      “We are surrounded by war and the whole world is burning and it doesn’t seem like there are any appropriate reactions or responses left anymore,” Greenberg elaborated. “This music is our response to and our reflection of the overwhelming violence, chaos, hate, and destruction that confronts us and everyone else in the world every day of our lives. When we play, I don’t feel powerless anymore. I hope this record can help others transcend their anger and frustration.”

                                      STAFF COMMENTS

                                      Barry says: A visceral and brutal assault of double kick drums, pummelling grindcore guitars and low-fi gritty production aesthetic make this a force to be reckoned with. Electronic backboned brutalist sound sculptures for the enraged.

                                      FORMAT INFORMATION

                                      Coloured LP Info: Indies exclusive white vinyl.

                                      Coloured LP includes MP3 Download Code.

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                                      Cover of Almost Holy - Original Motion Picture Soundtrack by Atticus Rose, Leopold Ross And Bobby Krlic.

                                      Atticus Rose, Leopold Ross And Bobby Krlic

                                      Almost Holy - Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

                                      Sacred Bones

                                        After the collapse of the Soviet Union, a number of Ukraine’s youth wound up homeless and addicted to a lethal cocktail of injected cold medicine and alcohol. Steve Hoover’s documentary Almost Holy follows a pastor named Gennadiy Mokhnenko, who saves street kids, at times by forcible abduction, and brings them to his Pilgrim Republic rehabilitation center. The film’s depiction of a country in the grip of poverty, addiction, and warfare is made even more powerful by its captivating electronic score by award-winning composer Atticus Ross, his brother Leopold Ross, and Bobby Krlic (The Haxan Cloak).

                                        “Occasionally a project comes along where one feels compelled to contribute,” Atticus said of seeing the early footage that convinced him to work on the film. “It’s a different world over there – of course we have dire poverty in the U.S. – but to see an army of drug-addicted children living in those conditions, children the same age as my own, under ten years old but covered in track marks and sleeping on sewers to stay warm, and someone is asking you to write a little music to help the cause. It would be hard to find a reason not to.”

                                        His collaborators felt the same way, and the trio soon began work on the score — the Ross brothers in the U.S. and Krlic in the U.K. The distance meant the composers initially worked separately, but in the end, the soundtrack feels remarkably coherent.

                                        The message and content of film kept the trio inspired, and once Krlic had emigrated to the U.S., they met at Atticus’ studio and continued to work on the album as a free-standing piece. The film remained the anchor and the catalyst for their creativity, but several of the tracks on the record don’t appear in the picture at all. Almost Holy is thus not simply a soundtrack album, but a soundtrack and an album, one that both enriches its film and stands apart from it.

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                                        Cover of Blood Bitch by Jenny Hval.

                                        Jenny Hval

                                        Blood Bitch

                                        Sacred Bones

                                        Norwegian artist Jenny Hval announces the release of her new album, Blood Bitch via Sacred Bones. Co-produced with acumen noise producer Lasse Marhaug, Blood Bitch is in many respects a complete 180° from her last album, Apocalypse, girl, in subject matter, execution and production. It is Hval’s most focused album, but the lens is filtered through a gaze which the viewer least expects.

                                        In the words of Jenny Hval: “Blood Bitch is an investigation of blood. Blood that is shed naturally. The purest and most powerful, yet most trivial, and most terrifying blood: Menstruation. The white and red toilet roll chain which ties together the virgins, the whores, the mothers, the witches, the dreamers, and the lovers. Blood Bitch is also a fictitious story, fed by characters and images from horror and exploitation films of the '70s. With that language, rather than smart, modern social commentary, I found I could tell a different story about myself and my own time: a poetic diary of modern transience and transcendence. There is a character in this story that is a vampire Orlando, traveling through time and space. But there is also a story here of a 35-year old artist stuck in a touring loop, and wearing a black wig. She is always up at night, jet lagged, playing late night shows - and by day she is quietly resting over an Arp Odyssey synthesizer while a black van drives her around Europe and America. So this is my most fictional and most personal album. It’s also the first album where I’ve started reconnecting with the goth and metal scene I started out playing in many years ago, by remembering the drony qualities of Norwegian Black Metal. It’s an album of vampires, lunar cycles, sticky choruses, and the smell of warm leaves and winter.”

                                        Jenny Hval has developed her distinct take on intimate sound since the release of her debut album in 2006. For her last two solo albums, 2013's Innocence Is Kinky and 2015’s Apocalypse, girl, Hval has received thoughtful and widespread international acclaim for her fascinating voice, singular delivery and markedly non-traditional arrangements which incorporate elements of poetry, prose writing,
                                        performance art, and film. She eloquently brings to light issues of both male and female gaze.


                                        STAFF COMMENTS

                                        Barry says: It sounds like Hval may have just written her opus. Subversive synthetic rhythms and churning drones are cut through with stunningly serene moments (Conceptual Romance is a particularly stunning interlude after an abstract trio of mood-setting numbers). Spoken word samples set the tone to a backdrop of meditative swirls and vocal swoops on 'Untamed Region' while follower 'The Great Undressing' is brilliantly syncopated spoken/sung words over the backdrop of almost utopian arpeggios and crescentic pads. Harsh moments make the lucid intervals all the more stunning, revealing the beauty behind the struggles, accentuating both the highs and lows. Masterpiece.

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                                        Cover of Ghosthouse by Uniform.

                                        Uniform

                                        Ghosthouse

                                        Sacred Bones

                                          Uniform formed in New York City in 2013 when old friends Ben Greenberg (ex-The Men, Hubble, and the producer/engineer responsible for much of the Sacred Bones catalog) and Michael Berdan (ex-Drunkdriver, York Factory Complaint) reconnected and realized that they had evolved to a similar place musically. Wanting as intimate an experience as possible, they decided to keep the project a two-man show, eschewing a live rhythm section for programmed drums and low-end synths, augmented with Greenberg playing guitar and Berdan handling vocals. The collaboration quickly yielded a raw 12", followed by a full-length, Perfect World. The Ghosthouse12", is the first Uniform release on Sacred Bones Records, and it will be followed by a full-length in early 2017.

                                          Ghosthouse shares a basic configuration with the previous Uniform releases, but the tools have evolved far beyond their initial drum machine and bass synth setup. These songs have grown from a broader palette of sounds — shots, explosions, implosions, impacts, ricochets, collapse; the sounds of conflict, war, and destruction that we witness every day. The result is the most sonically confrontational Uniform material to date, and Berdan’s lyrics, largely inspired by his lifelong battle with insomnia and depression, match them for relentlessness.

                                          The three songs on Ghosthouseshow the incisiveness that Greenberg and Berdan now have at their command. The title track addresses the feeling of lying awake at night and wondering if it’s still possible to make peace with an estranged friend after their death. “Waiting Period,” a riff on the Hubert Selby Jr. novel of the same name, is the internal dialogue of a man waiting for his handgun application to clear so he can kill himself. The “Symptom of the Universe” cover pays mostly faithful homage to Black Sabbath, but trades the original’s “summer skies of love” for something far bleaker. These tracks reveal the incredible range that’s possible within the Uniform musical template, and they provide a fascinating glimpse of what’s to come.


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                                          Cover of Telling It Like It Is by Marching Church.

                                          Marching Church

                                          Telling It Like It Is

                                          Sacred Bones

                                            Marching Church, the onetime solo project and now bona fide big band formed by singer Elias Bender Rønnenfelt, has followed its leader’s muse everywhere from their early days of 4-track lo-fi tapes, to Sam Cooke-tinged soul on This World is Not Enough, to outré free jazz on their most recent Coming Down 12".

                                            For Telling It Like It Is, Rønnenfelt and his bandmates have foregone much of their past proclivity for wild stylistic swings in favor of thematically unified, complicated, but fundamentally cohesive song arrangements; the studio itself at times acting as an auxiliary band member. The result is the most focused vision of Marching Church yet, but one that has lost none of its swagger, and none of its power to enthrall.“We have here one world united under the sparks of one enormous disco ball hanging over us like the moon,” Rønnenfelt elaborates. “In one fleeting moment in the light of its mirrored surface we see human endurance, in the next we see doom.” The light and shade he finds in this worldview permeate the songs on Telling It Like It Is. Rønnenfelt describes the new work “an album which raises multiple flags,” and “the sound of individualism stuck in the center of the modern world, swimming with and against the current.”

                                            The band in 2016 comprises Rønnenfelt and his frequent collaborator and Iceage bandmate Johan S. Weith (on electric viola and guitar here), Lower‘s rhythm section of Kristian Emdal and Anton Rothstein, trumpet player Jakob Emil Lamdahl, and Hand of Dust’s Bo Høyer Hansen. Augmenting these sessions are Maaike Van der Linde and Thora Sveinsdottir of the Stargaze Orchestraon flute and strings, and Sonja La Bianca of Choir of Young Believers on saxophone. The obvious chemistry among these players makes this the most cultivated Marching Church album to date, unveiling the full spectrum of capabilities and musical dexterity of each player. Telling It Like It Is taps into a debauched lunacy that teeters equally on the verge of exhaustion, and the charged sensuality rooted in our loins that keep us going.


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                                            Cover of Exploded View by Exploded View.

                                            Exploded View

                                            Exploded View

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            After recently signing to Sacred Bones Records, new four-piece Exploded View, fronted by German/Bristol political- journalist-turned-musician/singer Anika, announce news of their debut self-titled album.

                                            While lead single ‘No More Parties in The Attic’ is laden with an enticing no-wave, post-punk sound, layered with distorted guitars and ominous drones– ‘Orlando' chimes in with echoing vintage synths, courtesy of Hugo Quezada that clash with a chilly electro backbeat and an anthemic soulful bass line setting the tone. With her disarming quietude nursery rhyme like vocal delivery, Anika remarks on the creation process: “Well, that day I was speechless and empty; a reflection of the times. I became a vessel for the past; the only way to deal with or help understand the present. Enlightenment came with the help of some strong leading ladies; A certain author, a certain film and a certain actress. Go figure.”

                                            Anika released her self-titled debut album in collaboration with Geoff Barrow’s Invada imprint and Stones Throw to critical acclaim in 2010. This new project was created during the rehearsal sessions for Anika's Mexican live debut back in March 2014. An unexpected partnership formed between Annika and local producers, Martin Thulin (Crocodiles producer) synth-head Hugo Quezada (Robota) and Riotboy sweetheart Hector Melgarejo (Jessy Bulbo / Nos llamamos) to form Exploded View. The four musicians discovered a new sound, several steps removed from the krautrock-isms of Henderson’s previous work during their rehearsals and live performances in Mexico City. The straight to tape sessions that followed in the San Rafael neighborhood, ventured somewhere new; a lighter place, unguarded, veering from any script. Improvisation was the guiding principle and the source of the band’s inspiration. The studio itself was outfitted so that every sound produced in the room would be recorded. A Tascam 388 8-track captured everything – fully live, fully improvised, first-takes only. Produced by Thulin and Quezada and mastered by Josh Bonati in NYC.

                                            For fans of Can, dub, and political revolution.


                                            STAFF COMMENTS

                                            Martin says: Berlin's Exploded View formed around Annika Henderson (aka Anika), better known, up to this point, for the sparse, troubled beauty of her solo work. The exploded view in this case is formed by what was initially intended to be Anika's backing band, but is now the entity in its own right. This is a disturbed dream, a fitful night of drones, Kraut dub and fractured melodies over which Anika's low tones brood and rant on subjects as diverse as capitalism, the illusion of existence and Robert De Niro. A dark joy.

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                                            Cover of Lost Themes II by John Carpenter.

                                            John Carpenter

                                            Lost Themes II

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            On Halloween 2014, the director and composer John Carpenter introduced the world to the next phase of his career with “Vortex,” the first single from Lost Themes, his first-ever solo record. In the months that followed, Lost Themes rightfully returned Carpenter to the forefront of the discussion of music and film’s crucial intersection. Carpenter’s foundational primacy and lasting influence on genre score work was both rediscovered and reaffirmed. So widespread was the acclaim for Lost Themes, that the composer was moved to embark on something he had never before entertained – playing his music live in front of an audience.

                                            2016 will host the first ever John Carpenter tour and in true Carpenter spirit, a sequel to Lost Themes: Lost Themes II. The follow-up brings quite a few noticeable changes to the process, which result in an even more cohesive record. Lost Themes’ cowriters Cody Carpenter (John’s son) and Daniel Davies (John’s godson) both returned. Cody was recently also heard as a composer for Showtime’s Masters of Horror series (Cigarette Burns and Pro-Life), and NBC’s Zoo. Davies was a composer for NBC’s Zoo, as well as the motion picture Condemned.

                                            All three brought in sketches and worked together in the same city, a luxury they weren’t afforded on the first Lost Themes. The result was a more focused effort, one that was completed on a compressed schedule — not unlike Carpenter’s classic, notoriously low-budget early films. The musical world of Lost Themes II is also a wider one than that of its predecessor. More electric and acoustic guitar help flesh out the songs, still driven by Carpenter’s trademark minimal synth.

                                            Keep your eyes peeled for John and his co-writers to hit the road next year performing both lost and newly found themes, in addition to retrospective work from Mr. Carpenter’s multi-generational career. Long live the Horror Master.

                                            STAFF COMMENTS

                                            Barry says: Master of Kosmische synth-workouts and general synth-based sountracking legend John Carpenter returns here with the second instalment of his surprising 'not a soundtrack' offering from last year. More twinkling synths, motorik pulses and cavern-soaked reverbed drums. Though soundtracks have always been Carpenters raison d'etre, this outstanding expansion on his lost themes selections just goes to show that Carpenter is indeed the king of the cosmic.

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                                            Cover of Spend The Night With... (Bonus Disc Edition) by Cheena.

                                            Cheena

                                            Spend The Night With... (Bonus Disc Edition)

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            Both formats include an exclusive free Sacred Bones label sampler bonus disc CD.

                                            Don’t sleep. Don’t retreat. Stay awhile. Let’s spend the night together. Cheena testify to a long history of New York nights, trading insults and borrowing beer at rooftop parties that began years ago. There’s plenty of New York in this band – Lou Reed’s better glam punches found a jawline or two among them, the heavy handed playing of the Dolls, and that particular manner of NY glam you can hear in Kiss– that’s all in Cheena.

                                            Spend The Night With...is a soundtrack to nights where revelry and lust are never isolated from poor decisions and vanity, where the grave sincerity of a bathroom confession explodes into cruelty and hysteria. Nights on busy streets or crowded subway cars coloured with elegant ambition and constrained by the practicality of street smarts. While we say this is NY music, we must also say this is American music. One could imagine a timeless jukebox of American RNR history from hard glam to cocaine / codeine country has blasted into the imbibed ears of our Cheens for many nights on end. Thus we hear songs for and of the night, songs pieced together out of iPhone recordings of 5am guitar histrionics and lyrics scraped out of speed fried text exchanges. There is a long history of bands as disparate as the Byrds, Gun Club, and the Flesh Eaters which had to reconcile RNR with country and blues roots; a tradition of truly AMERICAN music that feeds on itself. This is where I would isolate the sound of Cheena.

                                            America eating itself. Every generation gets the Cheena it deserves because we still live in cities and we still need RNR to live. We still need guitars to be gripped by gods. We still need bards to write odes to heroic crime and ignoble, destitute hedonistic excess, we still need music to drink to that also contains the darkness and disease of hangovers so we aren’t too far away from what is raw and what is real. With love and admiration, I kiss your hand from Melbourne to the Sacred Bones offices and the 538 roof. – DX (Total Control, UV Race, Distort).


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                                            Reduced Cover of Negative Feedback Resistor by Destruction Unit.

                                            Destruction Unit

                                            Negative Feedback Resistor

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            For two years now, the psychedelic Destruction Unit has been keeping the world waiting for a new album. And it’s not because they’ve grown up or gotten soft, rather because they’ve been in the streets and in your backyards, pushing the freek agenda and imminentizing the alien-eschaton. They’ve been up and down and all around this globe, battling the greedy club owners, show promoters and control pigs to bring the new American heavy underground through your back door. Now here we are, with the psychedelic Unit’s second album for Sacred Bones, Negative Feedback Resistor.

                                            In the spirit of solidarity with the other revolutionary communities of our sisters and brothers, the psychedelic Unit urges you to use this album’s energy, energy your speakers can hardly contain, for its intended purpose: to break the chains which you, at the dawn of your understanding, have fastened around your hands and feet. And to see to it that the thrones of every despot erected within you are destroyed. This is crazed-psychedelic-freek-noise guerrilla warfare and these are our streets. The pigs of the law can use their system to manipulate and censor our messages. The control creeps can keep their airwaves safe and comfortable. But none of them have been able to make us turn our voices or our guitar amps down. Destruction Unit sacrificed their ears to make this album as loud of a statement as possible. Will you lend them yours? Negative Feedback Resistor was produced by The Ascetic House and Joe Cardamon in 2015, with the help of Adult Swim and Sacred Bones Records. It was recorded by Joe Cardamon and Greg Gordon at Valley Recording Company, mixed by Ben Greenberg at The Bunker and mastered by Alex DeTurk at Strange Weather.

                                            Destruction Unit is R. Rousseau, J.S. Aurelius, N. Nappa, R. Rousseau, A. Flores with additional accompaniments by A.Z. Hungtai (Dirty Beaches, Last Lizard), D. Bolles, (The Germs), L. Rahbek (Lust For Youth, Posh Isolation) and J. Sanes (Hoax, Liebestod).

                                            STAFF COMMENTS

                                            Barry says: A wall of feedback has never been such an enticing start to a song as on 'Negative Feedback Resistor'. What will happen next? Sludgy stoner bass, walls of distortion, driving distorted hardcore guitar? All are possible (probable, even) and are fist-pumpingly
                                            triumphant to boot. Get in the pit, this one is rawkous.

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                                            Reduced Cover of Call By Night by Wymond Miles.

                                            Wymond Miles

                                            Call By Night

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            Wymond Miles was raised in the working-class small towns of the American West. On Call by Night, the singer’s latest widescreen opus, Miles masterfully evokes that lost landscape, all while grappling with issues of fatherhood, privacy, PTSD, violence, and dissipated romance. The album adds a critical new chapter to the Fresh & Onlys guitarist’s story as an artist, and reasserts him as a major voice in contemporary songwriting. Call by Night sees Miles building a noticeably bigger sound than on his previous solo records, while simultaneously standing as his most intimate work.

                                            It’s a record explicitly written for the fidelity of the vinyl format, with louder songs beginning each album side and quieter songs at the interior. His attention to sequencing paid off; the album flows like a piece of classic cinema, and sounds like it’s splashed across a drive-in screen in 70mm. Recorded using vintage gear by Phil Manley (The Fucking Champs, Trans Am) at El Studio in San Francisco and Miles’ Garden Chamber home studio, the record is a treasure of tube-amp warmth, and a landmark in the songwriter’s catalog. Miles wrote most of Call by Night on piano, and while the wall-of-sound guitar and cinematic synth playing that helped define his earlier efforts is still present, the beating heart of the songs is left more open thanks to his new method.

                                            Where previous full-lengths were cloaked in distinct aesthetic choices, this record exists outside of any stylistic restraints. “Divided in Two,” the lead single, considers dignity, class, honor, and father-son relationships through the devastating lens of PTSD, all set to a sardonic flag-waving waltz, with martial percussive bomb blasts. The title track explores the enduring aesthetic of British psych-folk. Other songs dip into the traditions of gospel music, sea shanties, and even big-box power ballads, using antique instruments and Miles’ unique perspective on the modern world to forge a new collection of entries for the American songbook. Miles has said the songs on Call by Night mark his “more definitive commitment to seek, listen, and give voice to an enduring muse.” If that’s true, then the muse has obviously been singing to him loud and clear.

                                            New solo record by the guitarist of The Fresh & Onlys


                                            FORMAT INFORMATION

                                            LP includes MP3 Download Code.

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                                            Cover of Inner Journey Out by Psychic Ills.

                                            Psychic Ills

                                            Inner Journey Out

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            The seekers in New York City’s Psychic Ills have spent more than a decade following their muse wherever it takes them. Inner Journey Out, the band’s highly anticipated fifth album and first since 2013, is the culmination of an odyssey of three years of writing, traversing the psych-rock landscape they’ve carved throughout their career and taking inspired pilgrimages into country, blues, gospel, and jazz.

                                            Inner Journey Out started out the way many Ills records have - with frontman Tres Warren's demos. Like all of their records, Elizabeth Hart's bass is the glue that holds everything together. Where other recent albums found Warren overdubbing himself to create a blown-out, widescreen sound, this recording handed the reigns to a multitude of guest players. A cadre of musicians and vocalists – including Mazzy Star’s Hope Sandoval, who duets on lead single “I Don’t Mind” – join in on the journey. This is the first record to feature touring keyboard player Brent Cordero, his Farfisa and Wurlitzer work is a staple throughout. Rounding things out, is a platoon of drummers and percussionists including Chris Millstein, Harry Druzd of Endless Boogie, Derek James of The Entrance Band, and Charles Burst, one of the record’s engineers. These musicians build the frame on which Warren lays his hazy guitar and vocals. An endless array of friends and guests also provide pedal steel guitar, horns, strings, and backing vocals, which culminate in a career-defining moment for the Ills.

                                            Thematically, Inner Journey Out is a detailed exploration of the interior and the exterior, and the pathway between the two. The focused songwriting makes the stylistic departures fit seamlessly within the band’s dexterous ethos. The rousing gospel number “Another Change” and the far-out free jazz exploration “Ra Wah Wah” help shape Inner Journey Out into a multi-faceted, full album experience. It’s the most personal Psychic Ills album, too, hinting tantalizingly at love and loss but denying the listener resolution — asking questions, but never answering; seeking, but never fully concluding.

                                            A decade on from releasing their critically lauded cult debut, Dins, and the deep dive into cosmic improvisation of Mirror Eye that followed, through the more recent and straightforward outings of Hazed Dream and One Track Mind, Psychic Ills have delivered their most remarkable statement yet with Inner Journey Out.

                                            File next to other drop out symphonies like Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space by Spiritualized, Pacific Ocean Blue by Dennis Wilson, and Born to Be With You by Dion, and let your journey begin.


                                            STAFF COMMENTS

                                            Barry says: This is a swooning, cosmic psych delight. Swaying bass and distant guitars meld together beautifully into a cauldron of reverb and delay. Reminiscent of early Floyd freak-outs and modern psychedelic indie bastions. Swooning melodies and slide guitar abound. Acid-soaked summer sounds.

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                                            Cover of Compassion by Lust For Youth.

                                            Lust For Youth

                                            Compassion

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            Movement and gesture is natural. The flâneur has an iPhone, and their heart is embroidered into a microfiber sleeve in gold.

                                            Lust for Youth are a three-piece from Copenhagen. 2014’s acclaimed album, International, took the melancholic insomnia of their former releases out into the street and away from the domestic frustrations of a life in headphones. Suddenly, surrounded by bodies, and with a staccato heart, Balearic infatuations and capricious nights in crowded clubs set the mood for Norrvide’s pining sighs. International marked Lust For Youth’s new-found decadence with fully resolved charm and enhanced self-deprecation. This was swiftly channeled into their recent hit, “Better Looking Brother.” Compassion’s first single was streamed over 50k times in its first month, capping off a highly successful 2015 of worldwide tours and critical social media updates.

                                            Compassion restates beauty for a time of crisis and clickbait. Judgement, design, form, and opinion: to what end will we refine our world if we can’t also make an anthem of our lives? This is the tender conspiracy: I’m on twitter; I have an anthem. Do we have an anthem? We have lust. Let’s meet IRL.

                                            Lust for Youth are affectionately vicious, and vulnerably sharp. They are the anticipation of the comedown as you come up on the best you’ve ever been offered from a bathroom stall. This is the spectrum: a low you know, and a dizzy new height.

                                            Hearts blind lights and finance desire. Is it the fate of the cunning to look good, or is it just cunning to look this good? Compassion is dexterity: we all look this good. An impulse is an appetite, and you’re entitled to everything. Multitask collapse and revolution because you’re a beautiful mess.

                                            Compassion is deliverance.
                                            Anticipate compassion. —Patrick Quick

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                                            Cover of Paradise by Pop. 1280.

                                            Pop. 1280

                                            Paradise

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            Human culture has reached its terminus. The corporate and political machinery that seeks to subjugate our bodies and control our minds has utterly defeated us, and we didn’t put up a fight. We willingly participate in the constant surveillance that has stripped us of any semblance of privacy. It is this world that Pop.1280 inhabits, and unto this world that they offer Paradise, their third full-length album. Paradise is an act of defiance against the engineers of these end times, yes — but it’s also an unforgiving look into the mirror; it’s the paradise we created for ourselves.

                                            While Paradise is indeed concerned about the ills that technology has wrought in the modern world, it’s also a record fraught with existential ennui. A fear permeates the record that the world will never get any better; that we as humans have made our bed and now must lie in it. The combined weight of those external and internal forces lay the foundation for the album, and they give it its power. Paradise builds on 2013’s Imps of Perversion LP and 2015’s Penetrate 7" by venturing further outside of traditional notions of punk, and diving even deeper into outer sounds. Synthesizers, mechanized drum machines, and samplers play as critical a role on the record as the more familiar squall of Ivan Drip’s buzzsaw guitar and Chris Bug’s vocals. Any noise a band member could make that helped contribute to the record’s atmosphere of unease was welcome; synth player Allegra Sauvage adds cello to two songs, and drummer/producer Andy Chugg plays trumpet on the title track.

                                            The sessions for Paradise were held at the Population Control Center, and the result is the most collaborative Pop. 1280 release to date. Despite its misgivings about technology, Paradise was made possible by the confluence of humans and their machines, at times struggling for control, but ultimately working together to create this vital, vicious piece of art. If the bitter irony makes you smile, hold that pose — the camera lens is watching.

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                                            Reduced Cover of Apocalypse, Girl by Jenny Hval.

                                            Jenny Hval

                                            Apocalypse, Girl

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            Think big, girl, like a king, think kingsize. Jenny Hval’s new record opens with a quote from the Danish poet Mette Moestrup, and continues towards the abyss. Apocalypse, girl is a hallucinatory narrative that exists somewhere between fiction and reality, a post-op fever dream, a colourful timelapse of death and rebirth, close-ups of impossible bodies — all told through the language of impossible pop music.

                                            When Norwegian noise legend Lasse Marhaug interviewed Jenny Hval for his fanzine in early 2014, they started talking about movies, and the conversation was so interesting that she asked him to produce her next record. It turned out that talking about film was a great jumping off point for album production. Hval’s songs slowly expanded from computer loops and vocal edits to band mates Håvard Volden and Kyrre Laastad — and finally exploding into collaborations from Øystein Moen (Jaga Jazzist/Puma), Thor Harris (Swans), improv cellist Okkyung Lee and harpist Rhodri Davis. All of these musicians have two things in common: they are fierce players with a great ear for intimacy, and they hear music in the closing of a suitcase as much as in a beautiful melody.

                                            And so Apocalypse, girl is a very intimate, very visual beast. It dreams of an old science fiction movie where gospel choir girls are punks and run the world with auto-erotic impulses. It’s a gentle hum from a doomsday cult, a soft desire for collective devotion, an ode to the close-up and magnified, unruly desires. Jenny Hval has developed her own take on intimate sound since the release of her debut album in 2006. Her work, which includes 2013's critically celebrated Innocence Is Kinky (Rune Grammophone), has gradually incorporated books, sound installations and collaborations with poets and visual artists. For Hval, language is central, always torn between the vulnerable, the explosive and total humiliation.


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                                            Cover of This World Is Not Enough by Marching Church.

                                            Marching Church

                                            This World Is Not Enough

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            Since 2010, Elias Bender Rønnenfelt (Iceage, Vår) has used the Marching Church moniker to a variety of musical ends, both live and recorded. However, the project as it exists on This World Is Not Enough wasn’t born until November 2013. With a live performance looming and no real idea what the set would be, Rønnenfelt found a new vision for the band while daydreaming at a gig at the venue where Marching Church was set to perform. “What I pictured was me in a comfortable armchair, adorned in a golden robe, leading a band while a girl kept pouring me champagne when I required it,” Rønnenfelt explained. “This raised the question, ‘What sort of music would go along with this picture?’”

                                            Rønnenfelt discovered the answer to that question with a lineup rounded out by Kristian Emdal and Anton Rothstein of Lower, Cæcilie Trier (Choir of Young Believers), Bo H. Hansen (Hand of Dust, Sexdrome) and Frederikke Hoffmeier (Puce Mary). Under Rønnenfelt’s leadership, the group composed some music, rehearsed twice, and played their show. It was decided that night that this incarnation of Marching Church would make a record.

                                            This World Is Not Enough was influenced at first by obscure works like David Maranha’s experimental drone-rock saga Antarctica, and eventually by soul bandleaders like James Brown and Sam Cooke. “The whole month of writing and rehearsing and the one week we had in the studio was truly an explosion of ideas,” Rønnenfelt said. “Improvisation, something I have never worked with before, was crucial in the making of this album, considering the loose nature of the writing on some of these songs. The album works because of the band’s incredible ability of breathing life into these, at times, very simple ideas and experiments.” The eight tracks that made the final cut are, in Rønnenfelt’s words, “songs of nocturnal longing, preposterous self-obsession and cockeyed etiquette,” and they are an exemplary statement of the songwriter’s extraordinary growth since the birth of Iceage.

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                                            Reduced Cover of Shadow Of The Sun by Moon Duo.

                                            Moon Duo

                                            Shadow Of The Sun

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            The highest apex of psychedelia, be it art, music, drugs or literature, is to induce a prolonged consciousness shift that affects the consumer far beyond the time that they were privy to the act. Moon Duo‘s third full-length LP, Shadow of the Sun, was written entirely during one of these evolving phases. Working in a rare and uneasy rest period for the band, devoid of the constant adrenaline of performing live and the stimulation of traveling through endless moving landscapes, offered Moon Duo a new space to reflect on all of these previous experiences and cradle them while cultivating the new album in the unfamiliar environment of a new dwelling; a dark Portland basement. The effect was akin to the act of descending from a train after a long and arduous trip, only to see it (and all your subsequent realities) speed off into the horizon without you. It was from this stir-crazy fire that Shadow of the Sun was forged.

                                            Evolving the sound of their critically acclaimed first two full length records, Mazes (2011) and Circles (2012), Ripley Johnson and Sanae Yamada have developed their ideas with the help of their newly acquired steam engine, Canadian drummer John Jeffrey (present on the band‘s last release, Live in Ravenna. Moon Duo used the creative process as a flickering beacon of sanity in an ocean of uncertainty while in these land bound months. The unchartered rhythms and tones of this album reflect their striving for equilibrium in this new environment, and you can hear that Shadow of the Sun is the result of months of wrangling with this profound, unsettling way of being. Exploring the record, a listener will perceive the song "Night Beat," with its off-kilter dance rhythm, as an attempt by the band to find meaning and acceptance in this new, shifting ground, while “Wilding" delivers a familiar Moon Duo sound, taking refuge in a repetitive, grinding riff-scape. Elsewhere on the record, the band recognizes that no journey is possible without being on the road, paying tribute to the cosmic trucker boogie saint in “Slow Down Low” and “Free the Skull.” From the narcoleptic dancefloor killer “Zero,” the record spirals perfectly into a resplendent daydream, the ecstatically pretty “In a Cloud,” which is a spectacular moment to witness.

                                            In a nod to a great pop tradition, the lead single, “Animal,” will appear as the A-side of a 7-inch, packaged with each copy of the vinyl edition. The song has an early West Coast punk viciousness to it that is entirely unique to the Moon Duo catalog, and it will also appear as the last track on the CD.

                                            To further coat the album with an air of uncertainty and tension, the duo decamped to Berlin to mix with Finnish beat-meister Jonas Verwijnen of Kaiku Studios. There in a counter-intuitive act of creative catharsis, they managed to dissolve the album’s formal technique into a cool and paradoxically sane sound of confusion.

                                            The result, at the end of the trip, is the album Shadow of the Sun.

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                                            Cover of Lost Themes by John Carpenter.

                                            John Carpenter

                                            Lost Themes

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            John Carpenter, the legendary director and composer behind Halloween, Escape From New York, They Live, Assault on Precinct 13 and many more announces his debut solo album ‘Lost Themes’ on Sacred Bones Records. 

                                            John Carpenter has been responsible for much of the horror genre’s most striking soundtrack work in the fifteen movies he’s both directed and scored. The themes that drive them can be stripped to a few coldly repeating notes, take on the electrifying thunder of a rock concert, or submerge themselves into exotic, unholy miasmas. It’s work that instantly floods his fans’ musical memory with imagery of a menacing shape stalking a babysitter, a relentless wall of ghost-filled fog, lightning-fisted kung fufighters, or a mirror holding the gateway to hell. Lost Themes asks Carpenter’s acolytes to visualize their own nightmares.

                                            “Lost Themes was all about having fun,” Carpenter says. “It can be both great and bad to score over images, which is what I’m used to. Here there were no pressures. No actors asking me what they’re supposed to do. No crew waiting. No cutting room to go to. No release pending. It’s just fun. And I couldn’t have a better set-up at my house, where I depended on (collaborators) Cody (Carpenter, of the band Ludrium) and Daniel (Davies, who scored I, Frankenstein) to bring me ideas as we began improvising. The plan was to make my music more complete and fuller, because we had unlimited tracks. I wasn’t dealing with just analogue anymore. It’s a brand new world. And there was nothing in any of our heads when we started other than to make it moody.”

                                            As is Carpenter’s style, repetition is the key to the thundering power of these tracks, their energy swirling with shredding chords, soaring organs, unnerving pianos and captivating percussion. Singularly titled to inspire dread with such names as “Vortex,” “Dominion,” “Abyss,” and “Purgatory,” but all linked into a unified whole, Lost Themes has a mesmerizing power. Horror fans will be reminded of Carpenter’s past works, as well as ancestors like Mike Oldfeld’s Tubular Bells and the raging guitars and chiming percussion of Goblin’s Suspiria. “’Both classical music and rock and roll are part of my musical language, which is riff-driven,” Carpenter explains. “So if you listen carefully, I’m sure you can hear some echoes from my past. But I’m sure that’s true of any composer. You just bring your music along with you.”

                                            FORMAT INFORMATION

                                            LP includes MP3 Download Code.

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                                            Cover of International by Lust For Youth.

                                            Lust For Youth

                                            International

                                            Sacred Bones

                                            Sacred Bones Records is proud to present International, The third full length LP from Copenhagen's Lust For Youth. To put it bluntly, International is unrecognizable as a Lust For Youth record on first listen. Hannes Norrvide’s previous solo albums under the Lust for Youth moniker have been described as “dark, cold, atonal, tormented, lonely, and lower than lo-fi.” The approach on International has shifted dramatically. Writing as a three-piece now, with longtime live collaborator Loke Rahbek and new band member Malthe Fisher, who produces and plays guitar, LFY have entered a completely new territory. The result is stunning. International is a buoyant synth masterpiece in the vein of early Depeche Mode, Pet Shop Boys and New Order. Norrvide’s work has always had pop sensibilities buried deep in the reverb, but the hooks are front and center on International, and there is nothing lo-fi about it.

                                            That is not to say the record is without substance. There are still some deeply introspective moments as well, notably the instrumental passages “Ultras” and “Basorexia,” which evoke the morning-after loneliness that a lot of earlier Lust For Youth work has explored. According to Rahbek, “the record sort of happened by chance. Hannes and I had talked about recording some stuff together for the fun of it, and Malthe offered to help us record. Initially, we were just going to do a song or two, but within a few weeks it was obvious that it was a combination that worked. The period was strange, terrible things happened in everyone’s life outside of the studio, so as a result many hours were spent in the studio, like a safe zone.”

                                            “As the title indicates,” Rahbek adds, “the record deals with the rootless, sometimes almost inhuman, nature of traveling and touring. Hotel rooms and strangers’ beds, drugs and clubs, and the impossibility of living a regular life.” It may be an irregular life, but nothing could suit them better. International is Norrvide’s magnum opus, and with Fisher’s production and Rahbek’s co-writing skills, the potential this band has always shown has been fully realized. The album features additional production by Elias Bender Rønnenfelt of Iceage as well as Adrian Toubro of Lower

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                                            Cover of The Air Is On Fire - Vinyl Edition by David Lynch.

                                            David Lynch

                                            The Air Is On Fire - Vinyl Edition

                                            Sacred Bones

                                              THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2014 EXCLUSIVE, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

                                              In early 2007, David Lynch was the subject of a retrospective art exhibition at Paris' Fondation Cartier pour l'art contemporain. Evocatively titled The Air is on Fire, it was notable for being the first major comprehensive exhibition of the avant-garde director's paintings, photographs and drawings. It wasn't strictly a visual affair; throughout the entire gallery's two floors and four rooms, a pervasive, interactive soundscape escorted viewers through the work. That soundscape, which shares the name of the exhibition, was composed by Lynch and his collaborator, Dean Hurley, and it's being issued for the first time on vinyl by Sacred Bones Records as a special Record Store Day release.

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                                              Cover of Mazes - Import Edition by Moon Duo.

                                              Moon Duo

                                              Mazes - Import Edition

                                              Sacred Bones

                                              Formed in San Francisco in 2009 by Wooden Shijps guitarist Ripley Johnson and his partner, Sanae Yamada, Moon Duo’s first two critically acclaimed EPs, "Killing Time" (2009) and "Escape" (2010), fused the futuristic pylon hum and transistor reverb of Suicide or Silver Apples with the heat-haze fuzz of American rock ‘n’ roll to create tracks of blistering, 12-cylinder space rock. Now their debut album "Mazes", recorded in San Francisco and mixed in Berlin during 2010 as the band prepared to move to the mountains of Colorado, explores a far broader, lighter, sound.

                                              That’s most clear on the dreamy organ and skipping riff of the title track, which recalls the Velvet Underground, or the handclaps and swinging organ bloops over the potent shredding and guttural riff delivered by Johnson in "When You Cut": 'He is an incredible guitar player', enthuses Yamada, 'He is one of those musicians who has the ability to elicit a guttural, corporeal response in the listener'. Throughout, "Mazes" is the sound of Moon Duo carving out their own identity, looking to the horizon, and moving forward.

                                              Ripley says that, as a guitarist and songwriter, delineating between Moon Duo and Wooden Shijps 'happens naturally. I focus on one project at a time, and the way the two bands operate is very different. And there are certain limitations that Moon Duo is forced to accept, not having a drummer for example, and I really like that. I like the creative challenge of working with limitations. Having done so much home recording cultivates that. Working with one other person is much different from working with four'.

                                              Yamada is happy to discuss how the romantic relationship at the core of Moon Duo has affected "Mazes": 'Any creative partnership involves a certain level of intimacy, as does any coupling. In each type of partnership you understand certain things about the other or others involved based on the nature of your interactions', she explains. 'To mix the two is kind of a melding of intimacies – you discover different dimensions of knowing the other person. At the same time it is hard to distill specific aspects that that dynamic brings to the music'. And she insists: 'The music is the music'.

                                              'We wanted to do something in a more ‘rock 'n' roll band’ style, something a bit fuller than our previous recordings'. In terms of recording this meant that Moon Duo 'used more tracks on this record, in order to get a denser, layered sound to make this our ‘rock band’ record. I grew up a huge Stones fan, so I've always liked that dense sound, with multiple guitar tracks, percussion, piano, organ - anything you can squeeze into the mix'.

                                              This meant a vastly different recording process to Moon Duo’s first two EPs, which were recorded fast and at home. "Mazes" was a more drawn-out process, involving proper recording studios for the first time including the trip to Berlin to mix and re-record certain parts and the track "Run Around". 'The working title was Die Blumen [the flowers], so going into the mix sessions we kind of felt like it was becoming our ‘Berlin record’, but in the end it retained the stamp of San Francisco and we liked Mazes title better anyway'. And ultimately, "Mazes" is a definably American record, recorded against the backdrop of the Johnson and Yamada’s move from the Californian coast to the heights of Colorado. 'I think a lot of our music has something to do with the mythology of the road', muses Moon Duo’s Sanae Yamada. And if "Mazes" is a quest, a journey through American landscape and music, Johnson concludes that its key is 'finding one's place in the world; moving forward, and the different paths one takes moving through life, trying to reach various goals, literally moving; love; pain; change. Or just getting by, and making sense of things'.

                                              STAFF COMMENTS

                                              Darryl says: All the Moon Duo dynamics are in place; repetitive grinding riffs and the swirling keyboards, but with an added 60s garage-esque bounce the songs really shine through.

                                              FORMAT INFORMATION

                                              Ltd LP Info: 180g pressing in deluxe spot-gloss printed gatefold sleeve.

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                                              Cover of Immer Etwas by Nice Face.

                                              Nice Face

                                              Immer Etwas

                                              Sacred Bones

                                              Immer Etwas is the first full length release from this one man bedroom recording project turned full on 5-piece live band. Nice Face have been turning out singles, comp tracks, and cassettes at a steady clip over the past two years and change. This LP is a solid thirteen tracks of drum-machine driven blown out hook-laden punk rock that one reviewer prone to curmudgeonly ranting proclaimed 'locks Blank Dogs in the pound, erases 'Psychedelic' from Psychedelic Horseshit, makes purses and boots out of Crocodiles, and, oh I don’t know…makes a puddle out of Wavves?' We think that is the cheesiest sentence ever written, even though it was intended as a compliment. Live the band now counts members of Livefastdie and Imaginary Icons among its ranks.

                                              STAFF COMMENTS

                                              Darryl says: Wild, electro-garage-rock. A mutant cross of Cabaret Voltaire and The Gories, totally recommended!!

                                              FORMAT INFORMATION

                                              CD Info: The CD includes the two Sacred Bones singles, the HoZac single, and the song from Killer Diller Records' Wild About Jenkem comp.

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