Tabs Out

cassette podcast focusing on noise & experimental sounds
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Tabs Out | Ian MacPhee – Everything

Ian MacPhee – Everything

10.7.22 by Matty McPherson

Ventura art space show with a five band bill can put you in contact with a lot of chaps. Had a moment to catch up with my two favorite Cal Arts oriented Flenser-core acts: Sprain (LP2 one day in another dimension) and Drowse (who is currently working on a doctorate there in performing arts; rock on sir). Both continuing to evolve as humans and refine their own documentations of 2020s era decrepit mindsets and botched pathways to human transcendence; alright that’s just a fancy way for me to say “I think their doom-laden sounds hit the q-zone for what DIY can provide at the moment.” Anyways, one of the chaps on the bill was Ian MacPhee. He’s done an ample job keeping one ear tethered to the world of Moon Glyph, Aural Canyon, HausMo, Orange Milk, and other ambience in Simi Valley, a special kind of suburban dystopia.

Everything is MacPhee’s C20ish demo release (2 tracks on Bandcamp, with a third bonus on the tape), likely the first sounds he’s decided to amply share with the world. “Line 6 DL4, Yamaha Portasound, the sounds outside my house [in Simi Valley, CA].” that’s the template he’s serving on. It likely deserves a home in your collection if you have a heart for “freeway ambience” and “subterranean overpass rave.” Seriously, that’s the best way I can describe the longforms and the surprisingly detailed short rave single that interludes between them. The title track lands somewhere between whatever maverick energy Jefre Cantu-Ledesma found himself nestled with on the radiant longform work of Tracing Back the Radiance. Seriously, just imagine a gargantuan six lane interstate carrying you out of the SFV by moonlight. MacPhee might as well have, taking a mix of chill out room ambience (from small electronic squiggles to field recordings) and pouring it into a soft yet powerfully radiating guitar drone. It’s the whole framework of the Side A longform, those chords played out like a series of deep breaths, longing to glide off towards somewhere far away.

Meanwhile, “LEAVING” opens side 2 as a rather enigmatic ethereal near-rave soundscape. Guitar reverb mended by murky drum machines that sound like they were captured from one flooded basement over; all the while the edges of the sound frizzle and fry. It’s a memory of an energy flash more than a snapshot of a rave outright, a fantastic proof of concept for where MacPhee could well end up on his next release. Shame it can only sustain itself for three-ish minutes, as that frizzle sudden deteriorates the ferric until it just swallows itself whole, but then again that’s what makes it such a potent track. Spring pt. 2 appears to close at the tape; it’s the most straightfoward ambient cut as well as a bit of a ghostly sound hunt. MacPhee teases small glimmers of feedback while a strange, squiggly aberration tip toes across the frequencies. It ebbs and flows, using small impasses of noise as if to suggest a tension. Although its quick fade out perhaps leaves the track as is, more a suggestion of what’s to come than a full blown assault.

Limited run of hand dubbed cassettes, design by Jeremy Colegrove, available at the Ian MacPhee Bandcamp page

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Tabs Out | Invertebrates – Demo

Invertebrates – Demo

10.3.22 by Matty McPherson

If my brother is sending me a punk tape and I really haven’t a proper clue of what Im to do with it, I let it sizzle. I’d dub this an act of tender love and affection, but the truth is I should of had six minutes sooner! if you have six minutes, you should just do the right thing and take every tape as a study break from real work–enough to study those differences between the shades of hardcore punk; this is real scholarly activity that puts you on the level of Zorn! Such was the case with my excursion listening to Invertebrates, a Richmond, VA based punk quartet that my brother happened to make posters for and somehow knew to save me a tape. Thanks brother, I dearly appreciated this.

Anyways, with limited promotion, Raleigh, NC-based label Sorry State Records and Invertebrates seemed to quickly and quietly sell out of two runs of tapes for this demo. Exactly what was the fuss? Well Chubb, Merm, Jerry, and Minx–some of which are members of Public Aid and “NC punk legends WRIGGLE”–hashed out a bonafide burst of hardcore, pristine ’82 vintage energy; any SST tape hound who thinks “Spot-handshake deal” production is the pinnacle of guitar music will find joy in these 4 cuts. They screen printed the tapes, with slight deviations between the covers. It’s a power move that genuinely indicates “this ain’t no crapshoot, but a quality product that is one of a kind and yours to cherish.”

Over the course of nearly six minutes, the quartet hit the ground with mad-capper energy, power chords, and an unwieldy good time. It’s not so much that this does extend quite well to the pits of Gonerfest or the pages of Maximum Rock n’ Roll, but that these little energy burst is primed and directed with finesse. Clearly, these 4 tracks are explosive, but its a precise “carpet-bomb” type of explosion they burst out. Even while all the cuts are kept to the red (with vocals delivered over a collect call line from hell), there’s a significant push-and-pull melody that keeps a zany, unkempt swagger; the kind that ebbs and flows enough to tell that even if the guitar is slashing and going “AWOOGA,” its the drums who run the tempo and dictate the direction. Such is in particular on Shit Pit’s devious breakdown and shotgun rush blast beats that practically kick the tempo up high enough to force the guitar solo to speed up.

Demo sold out at all sources, although it remains name your price, with all proceeds going to the Richmond Reproductive Freedom Project. Chip in, won’t you?