The Face is a British music, fashion, and culture monthly magazine originally published from 1980 to 2004, and relaunched in 2019. It was first launched in May 1980 in London by Nick Logan, the British journalist who had previously been editor of New Musical Express and Smash Hits.

This exceptional release brings together two of Marcia Griffiths’ most remarkable recordings. Both tracks originally appeared on her acclaimed debut solo album Sweet and Nice, produced by Lloyd Charmers and released on Trojan Records in 1974. These two gorgeous tracks are extremely popular today as highlighted by the hundreds of thousands views on Youtube but incredibly, this is the very first time these two gems are issued on a 7" single!

TRACK LISTING

The First Time I Ever Saw Your Face
Gypsy Man

The London-based psych-folk husband-and-wife duo La Nouvelle Musique released their self-titled debut album earlier in 2025 on Friends Of The Fish/Fruits de Mer Records, after releasing a 7-song EP last year. Singer and pianist Joanna Beck is a composer and performance artist who creates electroacoustic music and sonic art, and has scored theater and film productions. Guitarist Ian de Sylva played in the indie rock band Silver in the 1990s and has recorded as a solo artist. As La Nouvelle Musique, the duo creates psychedelic, cinematic music influenced by British folk.

In line with their preference for incorporating cinematic elements into their music, they chose to record 'Walking In The Air' from the soundtrack of the British animated film The Snowman for their Christmas single. Composer Howard Blake wrote the song, which was originally recorded for the film by Peter Auty and turned into a Top 5 hit in 1985 by another boy chorister, Aled Jones. The song became a British Christmas classic and has been included on many Christmas albums.

Accompanied by acoustic guitar and subtle electronics, Joanna sings the song beautifully. Angelic harmonies and whistling make the song sound even more delicate. In the original song on the B-side, the atmospheric piano ballad 'Face Of A Saint', Joanna showcases the full extent of her vocal range, harmonizing with herself. The song's imaginative lyrics paint a picture of traveling through wintry scenery where gray skies and darkness are illuminated by a light "brighter than we'll ever know". Musically and lyrically, 'Face Of A Saint' complements 'Walking In The Air,' as both songs touch on similar themes and evoke the cozy warmth of a fire on a chilly Christmas night. Releasedas part of the Snowflakes Christmas Singles Club, the single comes packaged in stylish artwork and is pressed on limited-edition white bio vinyl.

TRACK LISTING

1. Walking In The Air
2. Face Of A Saint

Prolapse formed in Leicester in the early 90s and are now spread across the UK and Scandinavia. Still pursuing their own path of repetition and twisted melodies, they merge influences from post punk to krautrock and even folk. Their previous releases have included numerous singles and four albums on various labels, including Cherry Red and Radar. They feature vocalists Mick Derrick and Linda Steelyard, whose intense duelling vocals combine with ferocious triple guitar assault and pummelling rhythms.

The fifth Prolapse album “I Wonder When They’re Going to Destroy Your Face?” will be released on Tapete Records and marks the band’s first new recordings since their last album, “Ghosts of Dead Aeroplanes”, released 26 years ago, but in some ways it feels like there hasn’t a break at all. From the opening incessant riff of ”The Fall of Cashline”, Prolapse set their stall out, hammering the message that they’re back, over and over (and over and over) again.

The album cover is a photo of a broken mirror the band discovered in a skip in South London whilst on tour. If you look closely, you can make out blurred images of the vocalists staring into it.

The first new sound to be heard from Prolapse this millennium, the opening beer can of ”On The Quarter Days“, the return single, perhaps gives an insight into the short, sharp, creative sessions that produced this album. Despite the elapsed 10 years of reformation Prolapse, now actually longer than they existed in the 90s, the time together has been all too brief, gigs every couple of years, writing sessions even rarer.

The album was mainly written in Leicester and recorded at Foel Studio in Wales. Some songs had been evolving for a few years whilst others (three on the album) were improvised and recorded on the spot, just like they’ve always done. Get ready, turn the microphones on, press record…. and something just happens. Perhaps channeling some of the ghosts that have previously recorded at Foel: Amon Düül II, the Groundhogs, Young Marble Giants, My Bloody Valentine and inevitably The Fall. “Err on the Side of Dead” is one of these songs; it grinds and gnaws away, gradually changing until Linda eventually yells “I hate, I hate, I hate”.

The supernatural appears again, with “Ghost in the Chair”, perhaps the album’s stand out track, not exactly like the Prolapse you know, but very much the Prolapse you want to come back to now. It starts off sleepy and eerie, as a kind of displaced therapy session between Mick and Linda, before developing into a wash of noise near the end.

The second single ”Cha Cha Cha 2000”, brings Prolapse into a more dare we say ‘jaunty’ sphere, with Mick recounting a dreamlike escapade with Canned Heat, Donovan and Cat Stevens, not regular touchstones in the 90s, but time brings a new perspectives.

“Ectoplasm United” is a messy but melodic maelstrom, which has also recently had a Faust remix (this will be available on a separate 7 inch single with the vinyl release of the album on Tapete Records).

The last words of the album are said by Linda Steelyard, recounting a tale of arriving at Leicester Forest East Services, and deciding to stay….forever.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Who doesn't love a brand new Prolapse? Their first album for over quarter of a century sees the band perfectly mixing raucous scathing punk and cosmic industrial groove with Derrick's snarling voice and the cooling balm of Linda Steelyard.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
The Fall Of Cashline
Cha Cha Cha 2000
Err On The Side Of Dead
Ghost In The Chair

Side B
On The Quarter Days
Cacophany No. C
Jackdaw
Ectoplasm United
A Forever

Side C
Swearing For Decoration

Side D
Ectoplasm Untied (A Faust Remix)

The Face is a British music, fashion, and culture monthly magazine originally published from 1980 to 2004, and relaunched in 2019. It was first launched in May 1980 in London by Nick Logan, the British journalist who had previously been editor of New Musical Express and Smash Hits.

The Face is a British music, fashion, and culture monthly magazine originally published from 1980 to 2004, and relaunched in 2019. It was first launched in May 1980 in London by Nick Logan, the British journalist who had previously been editor of New Musical Express and Smash Hits.

The Residents are an American art collective best known for their over 60 studio albums that were recorded over a period of over forty years. They also created some outstanding multimedia works, mainly three CD ROM projects and ten DVDs. Working as an anonymous collective, their identities were kept secret until in 2017 Hardy Fox revealed himself as their primary composer. Hardy died in October 2018, but the group continue to record and perform. In 2021, the band wanted to depart on a European tour called Dog Stab! but the Covid pandemic put a halt to it. 2022 wasn't more lucky, but early in 2023, The Residents finally made it to Europe stopping in Amsterdam, Brussels, London, Dublin, Oslo, Berlin, Vienna and many others. The concert presented here is the show at Kampnagel, Hamburg. The tour now offered a wider retrospective of The Residents' work, with less emphasis on Metal, Meat & Bone and Duck Stab! than had been seen in the earlier Dog Stab! shows. Instead the concerts focused on the Duck Stab material, with an additional greatest hits part thrown in for good measure. After the tour, The Residents parted ways with their long-time collaborator, guitarist Nolan Cook. Although Cook was planned to join the group on a UK/Europe mini-tour of their theatrical show God In 3 Persons - Live! in April 2024, those shows were ultimately cancelled, leaving the last date of the Faceless Forever tour as Cook's final performance with The Residents.

TRACK LISTING

1. Jambalaya
2. Hello Skinny
3. Cut To The Quick
4. Laughing Song
5. Bach Is Dead
6. Boxes Of Armageddon
7. Would We Be Alive?
8. Marching To The Sea
9. Cold As A Corpse
10. Smelly Tongues
11. Moisture
12. Constantinople
13. The Monkey Man
14. Semolina
15. Kill Him!
16. Blue Rosebuds
17. Theme From Buckaroo Blues
18. The Stampede
19. Lizard Lady
20. Dead Weight
21. Hungry Hound
22. Die! Die! Die!
23. Diskomo
24. Nobody Laughs When They Leave

On March 28th-30th 2022, Car Seat Headrest played three consecutive sold out nights at Brooklyn Steel in New York. An air of celebration, community and showmanship was present, made all the more palpable as the shows were far from a certainty - they took place amidst a year which saw the band having to postpone or cancel a large swath of their North American tour dates due to ongoing health issues.

The three night residency is captured on Faces From The Masquerade - a double album’s worth of live performances that finds Car Seat Headrest at their most playful, exuberant and precision honed. The title alludes to the by now familiar, custom-made gas mask worn by frontman Will Toledo at shows, complete with an expressive LED display for eyes. In addition to the group’s four core members - Toledo, guitarist/backing vocalist Ethan Ives, bassist Seth Dalby and drummer Andrew Katz - they were joined on the tour by keyboard player Ben Roth.

TRACK LISTING

1. Crows
2. Weightlifters
3. Fill In The Blank
4. Hymn
5. Hollywood
6. Bodys
7. Something Soon
8. 1937 State Park
9. Sober To Death
10. Drunk Drivers/Killer Whales
11. It’s My Child (I’ll Do What I Like)
12. Can’t Cool Me Down
13. Beach Life-In-Death
14. Deadlines

Another blink-and-you'll-miss-it, cult curio from Relaxin Records - the people that brought you Inga Copeland's "Higher Powers" from a few weeks back. Still unclear who is behind the label but mystic and intrigue has always been the remit of Inga Copeland, Dean Blunt's infamous collaborator, and the artist behind the Lolina alias.

It's a jagged and skeletal post-punk / disco-not-disco project mainly centered around (real name) Alina Astrova's quirky, dead pan vocal utterances. "Face The Music" features a stripped back palette mainly based around live drums, bass and some added mallets and outta tune guitar squiggles. "Forget It Left Bank" utilizes warped loops akin to her work as Hype Williams; a non-linear dark daydream smothered in a benzo-induced haze.

"Music Is The Drug" is an opiated and smudged crawl through uncategorizable sounds; an undefinable track that keeps you hooked on pure novel expression. "What Is Power" continues to colour in this strange mutant soundscape; throwing any kind of standard musical tradition out of the window and into the landfill; adopting a kind of hanging-on-the-edge-of-sleep, liminality that is both alien and alluring in equal measure. Oh, and is that Dean Blunt on guest vocals? Or the dude with long hair from Bar Italia (whom we know are all part of the same creative circle)?? The mystery continues...

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: As odd and as strange a sonic curio you're ever likely to hear. There's an alluring quality that draws you in (Inga Copeland's trademark) and though throwing the 'standard' musical rulebook out of the window completely; the discord and strange rhythms are fascinating and strangely dulcet.

TRACK LISTING

1. Face The Music 
2. Forget It Left Bank
3. Music Is The Drug (Album Version)
4. What Is Power 

“Out of love in the face of a shadow” is the new album from Credit Electric. Exploring the human unconscious through impressionistic pop vignettes, the album represents a significant evolution of the band’s sound that originally stemmed from limitations put in place by the global pandemic, before blossoming into something altogether new and unexpected. What started to emerge was a body of work that drew upon lo-fi jazz, dub, post-rock, ambient music, 70’s studio experimentation, and 90’s indie rock as much as the rustic folk of their past releases.

The resulting album “out of love in face of a shadow” calls to mind influences as disparate as Hiroshi Yoshimura, American Football, Scientist, and Magnolia Electric Co, all the while inhabiting a world completely of their own design. Highly anticipated sophomore album from Credit Electric. Press coverage on recent releases includes reviews and features in New Commute (Albums of the Year), Various Small Flames, Raven Sings the Blues, Psychedelic Baby Magazine, and more. 

TRACK LISTING

1. Out Of Love In The Face Of A Shadow
2. Carrot
3. St. Francis’s Child
4. Immunity
5. Heights
6. Selfs
7. Silver Line
8. Summit Sipper
9. Winner
10. Mocking Bird

Long overdue vinyl repress of the sixth The Oh Sees album, and indeed, the first Castle Face release Yes! the sixth THE OH SEES album (from 2007!) and their first for their own label Castle Face. Now reissued on Black Vinyl for the first time in an age..has a DL included … . Produced by KELLEY STOLTZ using all green energy (no joke), the album serves as a half-way point between the band's Cool Death of the Island Raiders album and their most recent material. we got some right now, dig in!

I can't actually remember why we decided to do this project other than ask ourself, why had it not been done years ago? let's do it! Linkwood and Other Lands are well known from their various outings on Firecracker, Night Theatre, The Nuclear Family, Rush Hour, Dekmantel, AOTN and many other labels, both talented musicians and fierce producers. The plan was simple, drop them into the mostly finished Athens of the North studio and cross the streams….

The results are nothing short of spectacular but putting them into words or genres on paper is somewhat of a challenge. Folding modular textures, post-punk, Electro, House and Techno even ending in some lush Balearic business, they have moulded their years of experience and translated it into something new.

What strikes me when listening to the LP is both their voices have come through in this production. Other Lands guitar work and Vocal and Linkwood deep sense of Rhythm and structure. The recording of this LP was just pre-covid which seems strange as it fits now so well. Like a dream of what it would be like to be out In the city night in all its different factions.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: This shimmering dancefloor stormer from Linkwood & Other Lands hits all the high points of a night out, the slow start, blistering, groove-filled highs and slow, languid finish. Brilliantly satisfying, and perfectly crafted.

TRACK LISTING

1. Theme For City
2. First Take
3. Porty
4. Face The Facts
5. 3VSR
6. Meet In The Middle
7. Don't Throw It
8. Gold Leith
9. Downright
10. Varial
11. Shapes
12. Silver Nows
13. Up Wrong

Tip-top of our osmosis list is the first quiver of tunes from Brigid Dawson and her newly minted Mothers Network: wise warnings dyed in dark hues, knotted and hard-won torch songs from the edge of a turbulent sea, bittersweet balladry spun in defense against evils familiar and unknown. Lovely though it may seem from a distance, the striation of loss quicksilvered throughout provides weighty balance to her contralto lilt. Those familiar with her harmonic counterpoint from her time in Thee Oh Sees or in OCS know she can belt as well as lullaby but there’s a fresh and smolderingly heavy swing in her step on display here that we mightily dig.

“Ballet of Apes” tapestries together sessions that read like a who’s who from outside our own castle walls - in Australia with Mikey Young (Total Control/Eddy Current Suppression Ring), in San Francisco with Mike Donovan (ex Sic Alps), Shayde Sartin (ex Fresh & Onlys/lifetime ringer) and Mike Shoun (ex Oh Sees/Peacers), and in Brooklyn with instrumental heavy-weights Sunwatchers - and the results are spellbinding. At the focal point of this maelstrom, our lady, as if illumed by candlelight, intones, pleads, consoles - white magic perhaps but it carries with it the anodized tang of blood. 

TRACK LISTING

1. Is The Time For New Incarnations
2. The Fool
3. Carletta’s In Hats Again
4. When My Day Of The Crone Comes
5. Ballet Of Apes
6. Heartbreak Jazz
7. Trixxx

“Thee Hounds of Foggy Notion / Live Performances Sans Stages And Whatnots With Thee Oh Sees (2008), is a film we made just over a decade ago, and this record is the soundtrack. I loved making it, and I love all that were involved. I’m honestly blissed-out proud to hear over the years that it somehow is loved by so many others, too. “I first met John Dwyer on Flag Day. I was blown away by a trio of roving Coachwhips guerrilla street shows that climaxed at the the scenic vista parking lot high above San Francisco atop Mt. Sutro. Amongst the gathered uninitiated hordes of souvenir sweatshirt selling families, and puzzled elderly global tourist translators, and a white weirdo tuxedo wedding party, was the sonic corruption of the Coachwhips...I’m certain that this exact event was the idea seed for Thee Hounds Of Foggy Notion, and that it saved my life a little bit. “When JPD asked me to consider making a video for Thee Oh Sees with the sole stipulation that he didn’t want to do anything fake-y to playback, my head started swimming. What we mutually agreed upon was to essentially reprise Flag Day, and film Thee Oh Sees performing live, but not on stages. “I rented a 15-passenger van, a generator, and the minimal cinematic equipment my trusted cinematographer friend James Wall deemed we needed. Everything sound wise was JPD territory and went through an ancient mixing board that Johnny had housed within a Samsonite suitcase. We ran all the plate mics from the drums, and the li’l pedestal mics from the amps through this old mixer, and we all believed that all would be well and swell.” — Brian Lee Hughes

TRACK LISTING

1. The Gilded Cunt
2. Island Raiders
3. Ship
4. Block Of Ice
5. Curtains
6. Dumb Drums
7. We Are Free
8. Thee Hounds Of Foggy Notion
9. Make Them Kiss
10. Golden Phones
11. If I Had A Reason
12. Highland Wife’s Lament
13. Dreadful Heart
14. Ghost In The Trees
15. Iceberg
16. Second Date

Announcing a reissue of The Oh Sees - The Cool Death of Island Raiders
We here at Castle Face are not afraid to get our shins dirty mucking around in the stacks and we’re well aware of an out-of-press gap of Oh Sees releases right before 2006 when we started the label with Sucks Blood. We’re rectifying that and first among these is The Cool Death of Island Raiders, a particularly dusty gem that we think merits another look.

Kicking off the record with what should have been the hit of the summer that year but for the hard C in the title, "The Gilded Cunt" seems to clearly preface Oh Sees’ later psych skewed pop sensibilities. At the time it was an obvious jam and I recall being floored by its shuffling beauty. Chirping birds, gently lapping tempos and the nascent harmonization of Bridgid Dawson and Dwyer detail what I consider to be a definitive highlight of their early quiet period of the band. The tree hangs heavy with Patrick Mullins’ handiwork, manning the musical saw, drums, and an assortment of home made electronics. It seemed a bit radical to be so quiet about it but the tunes are total earworms among the assorted drones, cut up bits of tape noise, and mellow front porch vibes, and the whole thing hangs together in a lovely hand-made way, helped in no small part by Dave Sitek’s production (he would later work on Master’s Bedroom as well). “

We flew Brigid out a fresh woman and literally sent her home on a plane with a trash bag of her clothes” says John. Evidently the whole record was accidentally erased at some point right around when the photo on the back of the jacket was taken, which makes it all the more remarkable that the result sounds so casually and confidently careworn. 

TRACK LISTING

1. The Gilded Cunt
2. The Dumb Drums
3. Turn Offs
4. Losers In The Sun
5. Drone Number One
6. Island Raiders
7. Cool Death
8. Broken Stems
9. We Are Free
10. Drone Number Two
11. You Oughta Go Home

“For folks who dig A Frames, Country Teasers, Wire, Gang of Four, pita chips and dad’s boozy breath, may we present The Intelligence, captured live in a truly subterranean underground show space below SF vintage clothier Vacation.

“Lars Finberg: a name synonymous with artisanal hand-crafted, locally brewed, and organically-farmed song lasers. Hilarious, fast, tour-tight and ballsy—the band has all these perks in pocket, and all that on borrowed gear! I’ve watched this band go through many variations over the years and in their own right all of them have been marvelous. This particular version of the line up is constructed entirely of road-dogs. These guys don’t fuck around—or maybe they only fuck around, who can tell anymore? They drink, they get bawdy, they shred, and when we asked Lars if the band would be into doing a small show in a basement in the Tenderloin in SF for a live LP, he asked ‘What should we play?’ and I replied ‘nothing but the hits’— and they did exactly that.

“The Intelligence and Lars himself are masters at the penning of hits—hit after hit after hit—and with a soft-shoed tippity-tap of crowd work and banter, you can really smell the basement on this one and feel the cobwebs grazing the top of your head as you go deaf in one ear from the eye level PA pointed directly at your soul hole. If you love this band then this is a great live LP of them scorching the hits and talking trash. If you don’t know this band (shame on you) then this is a good place to start.” —John Dwyer

TRACK LISTING

1. Virgos
2. Dating Cops
3. Debt & ESP
4. We Refuse (To Pay The Dues)
5. Whip My Valet
6. Evil Is Easy
7. Thank You God For Fixing The Tape Machine
8. Estate Sales
9. Janitors
10. (They Found Me In The Back Of The) Galaxy
11. Confidence
12. Telephone Wires
13. Males

Experimental garage rock / art punk duo featuring Zach Hill and Andy Morin of Death Grips, with guitar from Tristan Tozer (Yah Mos, Drug Apts) The latest release from the mysterious, experimental duo comprised of Zach Hill and Andy Morin of Death Grips, Bodyguard also features guitar work from Tristan Tozer (Yah Mos, Drug Apts).

“...with Bodyguard, they’ve given us, I would argue, an album a whole lot more bracing and immediate and fun and welcoming than anything Death Grips will ever allow themselves to make.” – Tom Breihan, Stereogum

TRACK LISTING

1. Wash My Hands Shorty
2. Well Known People Want To Know
3. Gargoyle
4. Quietly Being The Best
5. 49er Lighter
6. I Love You Man
7. The Treatment
8. This Is How It Is Now
9. Bobo
10. The Studio

From the same misty mountaintop tape spool as August’s A Weird Exits, Thee Oh Sees bring the companion album An Odd Entrances.

Delving more towards the contemplative than the faceskinning aspects of its predecessor, this sister album is a cosmic exercise en plein aire with John Dwyer and company double-drum shuffling, lounging with cellos, following a flute around the groove, and spooling a few Grimm-dark lullabies along the way. Lurking in the grass are a snake or two, like the celestial facing instrumental buzz of “Unwrap The Fiend Pt. 1.”…But for the most part this is a relatively hushed affair, a morning rather than evening listen.

The band plans on donating half their profits from the first pressing to Elizabeth House, a local charity in Pasadena that specifically helps homeless women with children get back on their feet.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: If this forms the Yang to 'A Weird Exit's Ying, there is between them a fully realised and startlingly broad palette of skills. Where 'Weird Exits' brought the fire, this brings the sweet, sweet burn cream. Rhythms are more pronounced, the distortion is turned down a little but still forms a brilliantly nuanced and fantastically executed whole. Superb.

TRACK LISTING

1. You Will Find It Here
2. The Poem
3. Jammed Exit
4. At The End, On The Stairs
5. Unwrap The Fiend, Pt. 1
6. Nervous Tech (Nah John) 

Announcing a totally far-out split release from unexpected corners: fave Hoosier-via-SF tripper transplants Burnt Ones sweet-talked the one and only Space Lady into a sharing an album, and the results are magical. In her inimitable style The Space Lady sparkles through “Across the Universe,” “Starman,” a brand-new original called “The Next Right Thing” and an achingly elegaic “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” These beautiful tunes are wonderful additions to her lovely repertoire.

For their half, Burnt Ones mellow down their sound, crafting a warm cocoon on two kaliedoscopic creepers, peaking just a little with a floweringly spaced-out version of the Space Lady’s greatest hit, “Synthesize Me,” and closing with another druggy lullaby. It’s sweet and mellow ride through both sides and it’s out on Castle Face Records.

TRACK LISTING

1. Space Lady - Across The Universe
2. Space Lady - Starman
3. Space Lady - The Next Right Thing
4. Space Lady - Somewhere Over The Rainbow
5. Burnt Ones - The Good Life
6. Burnt Ones - Infinity Suite
7. Burnt Ones - Synthesize Me
8. Burnt Ones - Not Here, But There

When I was a child, I spoke to Helen.

Helen is a pop group from Oregon. Liz Harris (vocals/lead guitar) AKA GROUPER, Jed Bindeman (drums/tambourine), Scott Simmons (bass/guitar), and Helen (back up vocals).

Originally started with the intention of being a thrash band, it turned into something else entirely.The Original Faces was recorded over a period of several years in Portland by the band members, their friends Nick, Chris and, largely, Justin Higgins. Written together, some songs based on Liz and Scott?s demos. 

Announcing the long overdue seventh entry in Castle Face’s Live in San Francisco series, starring The Blind Shake.

Captured to tape at the same shows as the OBN IIIs’ live record, The Blind Shake were tour-greased and fully torqued over three night at The Chapel in San Francisco way back in 2013. For those unfamiliar: the sheer bodily reaction to seeing these guys is a unique pleasure. They are consistently one of the most fun bands doin’ it to it these days—such a direct channel to your inner teenager it’s more often than not you end up in the pit, awash in baritone guitar and that “let’s wig out” beat.

Whether you’re a noob or a vet, all your bludgeoning favorites are here, one song combing into the next with tasty bites of guitar, and man, they swing that hammer all over this thing. A sterling testament to their claim as the heaviest nice guys around. Their chrome domes shined up real nice for the excellent night-of photographs from main man Brian Pritchard, and as usual John Dwyer, Chris Woodhouse, Eric Bauer and Bob Marshall were manning the decks, keepin’ it crisped for the hi-fis at home.

Our lad John P. Dwyer has been lancing eardrums with Thee Oh Sees in an ever-escalating flurry of records for the past six years. Since the release of The Master’s Bedroom Is Worth Spending a Night In announced a new loud era (and excepting a few momentary detours into home-baked territory - Dog Poison and Castlemania, for example), Dwyer and company have pummelled a bit harder each time out, cementing their reputation as a live force to be reckoned with and leaving legions sweaty and bruised in the process. Late last year, after years of relentlessly touring the world, the word got out… Dwyer’s moving to Los Angeles (fear not, still California!) and Thee Oh Sees are taking a much-needed hiatus with a shifting of gears ahead and a new album on the way. This is that album.

Drop was recorded in a banana-ripening warehouse (no joke) with hair-farming studio warlock Chris Woodhouse playing drums; it’s also graced with the presence of talented gurus Mikal Cronin, Greer McGettrick and Casafis adding horns and vocals. The result pushes the familiar polarities of the group farther outward than ever before. Opener “Penetrating Eye” might be the heaviest Oh Sees song yet, “Transparent World” and “Put Some Reverb On My Brother” foam with seasick fuzz, and yet the ballads, like the harpsichorded “King’s Nose” and the lush and stately closer “The Lens,” extend their oeuvre into mellotronic, far-out pop with delicacy and grace.

This schizophrenia heralds the man and the band into an unseen future in classic Dwyer fashion - restless energy harnessed into exquisitely crafted jams, with an emphasis on the pensive and the paranoid in turns.

TRACK LISTING

1. Penetrating Eye
2. Encrypted Bounce
3. Savage Victory
4. Put Some Reverb On My Brother
5. Drop
6. Camera (Queer Sound)
7. King's Nose
8. Transparent World
9. The Lens

A collection of unearthed demos and repolished old tracks, out September 24th on Castle Face Records Featuring original artwork by Shalo P

No one sounds like The Herms.
No one sounds like Matthew Lutz.

The Herms are a smudged window into a neighboring dimension to ours, Berkeley. Even though it's right next door to Oakland and San Francisco, it may as well be a million musical-miles away. Back when they were playing around town, it felt to me like not too many in my scene "got" this band. I thought people should have been going crazy for these guys. The local rag gave them accolades (a curse perhaps?), and even a cursory listen to this collection should clue you in to how great they were. This may be one of the few times that I have to concur with a music writer - this band is amazing. They are sun, heartbreak, pop and fried-static all in one master package, evolving from song to song, and I think they're fantastic.

The Herms did have a proper release years ago, but on CD only (gasp!) and frankly I've always been in love with these earlier, rawer 8 track Tascam demos. They sound like the band did when you were standing in front of them. I love The Herms and have been waiting a looooong time to do a proper release for them. Sorry it took exhuming their songs from the grave before I was ready. Please listen loudly with the windows open, so maybe that music writer may pass by, hear it and think, "Finally! I told you so, you assholes". John Dwyer 7-10-13.

TRACK LISTING

Power Joystick (original)
The Organization (Tascam Demo)
Volleyball
Now Everyone
Drop Out
All The Things You Do
When We Comin' Through
Here We Are
Art School Groove Exit Theme
Come On Down
Kalypso
This Operation (Acoustic Demo)

Perhaps you've heard of the trajectory our beloved friend Greer McGettrick and her cohorts in The Mallard have traced across the current musical landscape…a promisingly home-baked debut full of twists and turns that nonetheless felt of the time and lived in…tours and tours and tours…songs on splits and compilations, including both Son Of Flex and our covers record of The Velvet Underground and Nico…shifting band members and band members shifting instruments…the now infamous Noise Pop performance where they played as Throbbing Gristle at one of the oldest and most venerated venues in San Francisco, The Great American Music Hall, to a thoroughly bewildered audience…all the while getting faster darker and sharper…and after coming back from SXSW, the sudden dissolution - with an album finished, and already being printed and pressed with us, their now-swan song Finding Meaning In Deference.

It's a conversation interrupted to be sure, but one that you should be listening in on. There's an unapologetic maelstrom of dark energy simmering beneath the surface of these tunes, but it never subsumes some of the group's best songwriting efforts yet. The myriad guitar/vocal interplay is sharp as ever, the pissed-off is turned up to 10, but there's an ever-present bop and hook to even the most bummed-out tunes here. If you never got to see them, I'm sorry - but this record catches them in excellent form at the zenith of their powers, a guitar somehow hung from the rafters for the rest of eternity - we're sad to see them go, but thrilled to share this excellent record with the world.

Dispelling any burden of ‘the difficult second album’, Esben And The Witch have comprehensively transcended any such slump or curse with ‘Wash The Sins Not Only The Face’, a majestic, haunting and triumphant work that is not ‘difficult’ in the slightest.

Their second full-length brings to fruition concepts that glimmered on their first, 2011’s acclaimed ‘Violet Cries’, but there are no laurels being rested upon here. To make their second album, Esben And The Witch questioned, challenged and rewired their past to find the way to their future and have produced their first masterpiece.

To quote Daniel Copeman, “We had a clearer idea of what we wanted to achieve on this album, and how we could achieve it. We’re more focused, more confident.”

Their first album took them on the road, and the road took them all over the globe. It was on these journeys, during van-held conversations, that their second album began to take shape, the band happening upon an ancient Greek palindrome ‘Nipson anomēmata mē monan opsin’ which, when translated, gave ‘Wash The Sins Not Only The Face’ its title.

They wanted the album to unfurl like a journey, like a day, where opening songs are possessed of a brightness, an optimism that ebbs away over the record’s course. The radiant glide of opener ‘Iceland Spar’, gives way to the bleak lonesomeness of ‘Yellow Wood’, the moment where the sun sets, with closing track ‘Smashed To Pieces In The Still Of The Night’ ending proceedings at a peak of drama and intensity.

Previously, lyrics were written more collaboratively between the trio; this time Rachel assumed the sole responsibility herself, honing her words and stories. The lyrics are inspired by TS Eliot and Sylvia Plath, by the works of Vladimir Nabokov and Philip Pullman, Salvador Dali and the surrealist movement; that, and van conversations questioning what it would be like to meet your doppelganger thousands of miles from home.

The result is an album that finds new shades within the Esben palette, and when placed alongside ‘Violet Cries’, feels like a fuzzy image that’s pulled successfully into focus.

All of this makes you wonder where this road will take them next. More to the point, it makes you want to savour where Esben And The Witch are at now, because ‘Wash The Sins Not Only The Face’ is a sublime experience, an album whose mysteries and riddles will entrance.

TRACK LISTING

Iceland Spar
Slow Wave
When That Head Splits
Shimmering
Deathwaltz
Yellow Wood
Despair
Putting Down The Prey
The Fall Of Glorieta Mountain
Smashed To Pieces In The Still Of The Night

John Dwyer and his Oh Sees (aka OCS) reissue the "Suck Blood" album on his own Castle Face imprint. Produced by Kelley Stoltz using all green energy (no joke), the album serves as a half-way point between the band's "Cool Death Of The Island Raiders" album and their most recent material. Thee Oh Sees are the underground punk rock of 2009!!

TRACK LISTING

1. It Killed Mom 02:42
2. Sucks Blood 03:42
3. Iceberg 02:58
4. The Gouger 01:53
5. You Make Me Sick, Oh Yeah 03:41
6. [Untitled Drone #] 01:30
7. The Killer 03:50
8. Ship 02:42
9. What The Driven Drink 02:05
10. Invitation 03:14
11. Golden Phones 03:30
12. [Untitled Drone #2] 01:39

First was "Neurotic Reactions", then "Some Songs Stuck In My Mind" and now it's "Artificial Faces!" One of the most exciting and higher quality compilation labels is back with another eclectic comp featuring 16 underground dancefloor tracks from the late 60s/early 70s. Groovy psychedelia, freakbeat, garage, hard funky-rock grooves... you can expect the usual dose of fuzz guitars, Hammond organs, drum breaks and psychedelic effects! Including bands and artists from USA, South America, France, Spain. Listen to the crazy electro-psych sounds from Erasmo Carlos, Elevators influenced garage-psych by The Hobbits, female garage by Sonia and Enchanted Forest, Spanish soul-freakbeat by Nino Bravo, John Wonderling with the original pop-sike version of "Midway Down", later popularised by The Creation, heavy phasing-psych by Giant Crab, Brazilian fuzz-freakbeat by Eduardo Araujo, hard psychedelic grooves by Skins, The Bag... and more! Fully remastered sound, great artwork, with detailed liner notes and pictures.

Never Surrender features John Porcell who is the embodiement of true NYC hardcore. This split CD has five new songs blasting out with his new band that are bound to make a splash. Split CD with another angry, pissed off, fast hardcore band in Face The Enemy. Think bands like American Nightmare and Poison The Well.