Tabs Out, Author at | Page 96 of 1032

November 23, 2021November 23, 2021

Tabs Out | Tara Jane O’Neil – Dispatches from the Drift

Tara Jane O’Neil – Dispatches from the Drift

There’s a heavenly sound (Tara Jane O’Neil, improvising on the keys) emanating from the boombox a few rooms over right now; it’s the kind of sound of a still, foggy grey morning. Maybe you’d think it church music or the soundtrack to a cavernous caper on TCM at 7:46. Nevertheless, it’s always the classic thoughtful probings of Tara Jane O’Neil. TJO’s latest, Dispatches from the Drift, follows her 2010s folk odysseys and synth explorations. Yet, Dispatches finds the old folk maverick and bass superstar in a decisively laid back modus operandus.

Having come to the tape from her Kranky and K records releases, this release is more of a unique outlier than an outright pivot. TJO’s improvisations on the piano lean towards the baroque and while they never betray her intimacy, they do feel smaller, for lack of a better term. “Use them however you like” is TJO’s only request. As such, I turned them into furniture music and went off onto my own blissed out drift. It is a genuine blast letting the music travel from rooms over and let the sounds mutate into ancillary narcotics of their own accord. Not every sound here is clear exactly why its on the tape, yet this act of honesty and openness is a worthy adventure.. With TJO, you are literally hanging out with a musician who has a way of blurring the emotive lines subtly and meticulously–this hour of material is no different, its effects just are more spaced out. Track titles and the overarching differences between pieces were less the focus than just admiring the open-armed melancholy as much as pleasant ambivalence that these pieces saunter through. That’s not to say you shouldn’t read the titles or will even find this tape carrying sounds of dismay. It’s a utilitarian, seamless kind of affair in this droney bliss or drugged down dreams.

200 pro dub Super Ferric(!) tapes in clear, imprinted shells with three color, Risograph-printed photo j-cards packaged in black & white Norelco cases available at the Tara Jane O’Neil bandcamp page

November 21, 2021November 21, 2021

—__–___ – The Heart Pumps Kool-Aid

11.21.21 by Matty McPherson

November 21, 2021November 21, 2021

Tabs Out | —–_ – The Heart Pumps Kool-Aid

—__–___ – The Heart Pumps Kool-Aid

1.1.21 by Matty McPherson

I think I was most gripped by that bloody cover. That Bumblebee Mannequin Ghoul isn’t an anomaly; they haunt swap meets of all shapes and deals. But this one (based on a photo) has that same visceral impact that the viral tweet of a degraded Chuck E Cheese animatronic gave me from a while back. Not quite sure how to describe that feeling of that naked corporate pizza mouse character–a tear between a real Junker’s Delight and a grade-A example of the Refinement of the Decline. Sonically, Orange Milk releases are usually good extrapolations of such debris that surfaces on the digital scroll. That the label’s overarching sounds parallel such things that fly through our digital feeds lends an easy shorthand, used too leniently. It is true that they do operate where language and synchronicity falter in a way sound can truly collapse into bonafide feeling.

The Heart Pumps Kool-Aid is a collaboration between maverick goofballs Seth Graham and More Eaze. Yes, their project is literally called —__–___ and it likely requires apt usage of proper enunciation of “beeps and boops” if you want to request it on the radio. If you know both of their work, then the elements of mumble type pop beats n’ croons, Astral Spirits free noise, and somber digital ambiance is likely a good friend of yours. If you don’t, well the best way I can describe this album is that it seamlessly mixes these characteristics into a full concept piece.

In fact, it is so seamless that everytime I listen to this half hour, I end up letting it fill the room, trying to take in every tiptoeing key and thousand yard stare of a string. It has been there for me most mornings, as I clean the kitchen, whipping up microwave oatmeal that I proceed to dump coffee all over; arguably this is the most ideal time to digest the depth of this project. Unlike most Orange Milk releases, this one carries wrinkles of a humdrum dawn, a stark pre-conscious clarity that works its way through your nostrils until you’ve come to your senses.

In a way, it is in the same spiritual wheelhouse as Giant Claw’s 2021 ECM New Series inversion, Mirror Guide. A stiller complement to that album’s (horny) frenzy, it too eschews at the fabric of classic orchestration, by often focusing on friend’s commissions that push towards sonic peripheries. There’s the embrace of fringe genres that ropes in Rob fecking Magil’s world of drone and recovery girl black metal outbursts with open arms. Taken in tandem with cello, xylophone, and vocal harmonies that flash like fireworks, it’s a creative goldmine. That does not even account for proxy.exe’s piercing spoken word piece, rock bottom ohio, which is a frank, unabashed detailing of survival.

All in all, what’s mended together is brevitous in a way I don’t expect from Orange Milk. The Heart Pumps Kool Aid is a constructivist epigraph for whatever the fuck it means to wake up and know you live in America, a neon junkyard of cultural amnesia. It evokes an energy that comes as close as anything in recent memory to Lucas Foster’s sorely missed writings. Might you find yourself wandering through it on a tantalizing fall morning.

Available at fine retailers stocking Orange Milk

Tabs Out | Mot – Defect

Mot – Defect

11.10.21 by Jacob DeRaadt

Mot is the sound world of Canadian visual artist Paul Van Trigt, whose art has been spreading like wildfire in the noise underground, gracing covers of labels worldwide. First side opens with some lo-fi turntable abuse interspersed with ripping physical textures, some stop and start punctuated with what sounds like digital delay feedback and a mangled vocal sample. Overlapping tape loops of low-end drones and scrap metal melodies. Great elements, some good movement, nothing overstaying its welcome.

The second side is where things really start to get into a groove. Shrill feedback tones bouncing in and out of a spinning vortex. …Silence… Underwater movements are evoked by contact mic’d textures with a filmy bass tone sitting on top like pond muck. Junk metal and feedback slowly coming up in the mix, then a quick shift to more junk metal and drones that evoke violins on downers. Best parts of this tape are the scrap metal abuse and hovering drones. Looking forward to more from this project.

First edition sold out.
Second edition sold out.
From Cruel Symphonies.