Weirdo Rippers #8

While it’s almost been two months since our last Weirdo Rippers dispatch, that’s not to say things have eased up. Quite the opposite, in fact.

Which is why we’ve been experimenting a bit more; firstly, with this feature where we are considering presenting it as a by-monthly with more albums to sink your claws into.

Let’s see how it goes, but the thinking behind it hopefully benefits both readers and artists, with more music readily available rather than having to backtrack through the site in search of an album that was covered weeks prior. Yes, we know your time is valuable, and this is our way of trying not waste too much of it.

Again, it’s all an experiment (pardon the pun), so the idea may be short-lived; either way, this feature will continue in one form or another, with plenty of gems unearthed from soils of the ever bourgeoning left-field sound world.

The past two months has seen a stack of important releases that we’re pretty sure will feature deep into 2023: namely our Top 50 records of the year. Water Damage’s 2 Songs instantly springs to mind, the Texas collective delivering a searing gusto that continues their wonderful run of form from last year’s Repeater.

Others include the Cruel Nature one-two of Gvantsa Narim’s Apotheosis Animæ and Waterflower’s All Art is Ecological, while Ramble Records founder, Michael Sill, unleased the latest record under his the Man from Atlantis moniker, Blues for Archie Shepp (check out interviews with all three artists via the links above.)

There have been countless others, too, and while August is set for a bumper month (stay tuned in the coming days) for now, below are what we consider to be the finest releases in the weird esoteric world of new music over the last six weeks.

Including a Sun 13 exclusive video for the Dissociative Identity Quartet’s lead-track, High Voltage. Taken from their debut album, Excursion, which drops tomorrow via Cruel Nature Records, we are excited to share it with you below.

Dissociative Identity Quartet: Excursions
Cruel Nature Records

The story revolves around this band’s name. Who are the Dissociative Identity Quartet? Billed to be from the North East of England, there are rumblings that suggest otherwise. Where, you ask? Well, no one knows, and the lengths this project and its members (who knows if it’s actually a quartet?) have gone to well and truly apes Will Bevan in the anonymity war.

On their debut, Excursions, (we’ll assume there’s more than one member) the project reveals a series of glitch-y hardware-inspired greyscale voidscapes that go through the emotions of a chemical-fuelled Saturday night, slowly leading us into that Sunday a.m. dread. The hedonism is subtle, more in the realm of Autechre and Blondes than any euphoric tent-filling noise that we’d associate during a festival’s early hours.

Dissociative Identity Quartet have probably inhabited such settings throughout their journey, but for someone getting a little longer in the tooth, a record like Excursions can be enjoyed just as in your own surroundings. Lights out, volume up, with the aggro of a sweaty dancefloor nothing more than a faded memory.

Black Duck: Black Duck
Thrill Jockey

Black Duck is the wonderful collaboration between Chicago stalwarts, bassist Doug McCombs (Tortoise, Eleventh Dream Day), experimental guitarist Bill Mackay and drummer, Charles Rumback (Ryley Walker).

Between the three musicians who have sprinkled both Thrill Jockey and Drag City’s catalogue with gold dust over the years, Black Duck’s self-titled debut is everything this collaboration boasts on paper, with MacKay’s lush guitar sketches finding spaces between McCombs’ searching bass lines and Rumback’s perceptive percussion.

In a year that has seen so many great collaborative releases, add enough to that ever-growing list. This is a big win for the crate diggers out there, and we can only hope this is the start of the Black Duck story.

Black To Comm: Earth
Cellule 75

German artist, Marc Richter, operates under many guises. Perhaps best known for his work under his Black To Comm moniker, Richter returned last month with Earth.

Also reissuing 2009’s Alphabet 1968 on the same day – a release which canvasses the complete works of Richter, underlining him as an influential voice to the likes of Ex-Easter Island Head – on Earth he shakes off the acid-mangled journey which has seen him scour the worlds of tech-house, jazz and black metal for something inspired by the perilous paths Scott Walker once walked down.

Earth shows a new side to Black To Comm in what is a release that is positively fractured and poetically abstract. It’s another string to the bow of one of the most consistent voices in this space.

Repo Man Interview: “The quality of the ideas is more important than any kind of dogma”

David Colohan: Sargasso Sky
Cruel Nature Records

Whether it’s been in the United Bible Studies or in his solo capacity, David Colohan’s latest run of work has been up there with the very best in the experimental underground. And while it’s hard to imagine, his latest, Sargasso Sky, might just be his finest offering yet.

Throughout these ten compositions, on Sargasso Sky Colohan finds a unique to way of finding the sheltered parts of the soul, with sound vibrations that cascade like gentle waves to the shore.

Not many experimental-based albums outside the ambient paradigm have a way of creating so much emotional tension, but on Sargasso Sky Colohan manages to produce something deeply unsettling, overtly hymnal and undeniably nostalgic. So forceful, you just have to submit and deal with the consequences in what is yet another masterstroke from the Irish artist.

Cowboy Builder: Organs EP
PX4M

Edinburgh’s Cowboy Builder were one of the first under the stable of Edinburgh’s PX4M label, and following their 2021 release, The Name of the Demon Is… Cowboy Builder, they return with another beauty in the realm of utter weirdness with the Organs EP.

While billed as an EP, it unravels more like an LP, with half of the songs recorded between a charity shop basement and several flats at once. I’m not really sure how that works, but holding an ear to these seven tracks and, well, it makes sense!

If the Berlin-era Bad Seeds and Crime and the City Solution ever formed as one, then it would have sounded like this. All told, Cowboy Builder are a melting pot for miscreants, and the Organs EP is the latest release to frazzle the mind. It’s great stuff.

Ernesto Diaz-Infante: Bats in the Lavender Sky
Ramble Records 

San Francisco experimentalist, Ernesto Diaz-Infante, makes warped moonscapes inspired by star-filled night skies. On his latest, Bats in the Lavender Sky, one must only look at the artwork to imagine what this record sounds like.

The partner of filmmaker Marjorie Sturm, with Bats in the Lavender Sky, Diaz-Infante takes us to the kind of world once associated with early Julia Holter records. Here, though, Diaz-Infante does it by flitting between the lines of Robert Hampson’s psychedelic odyssey of Main and the howling drones of Loop.

It’s yet another vital slab in the framework of Ramble Records and, speaking of, there is talk of a collaboration between Diaz-Infante and label founder, Michael Sill. For now, though, it’s time to enjoy this.

Matt LaJoie: On Garudan Wing
Flower Room

Portland, Maine’s Matt LaJoie is a world builder. While the guitarist is one of many that deals in the primitive guitar arena of long-form composition, few manage to capture the magic atmospheres LaJoie does.

His latest, On Garudan Wing, is like a sweeping echo across the same majestic landscapes occupied by Danny Paul Grody and Chuck Johnson. With a woodsy grace and Tortoise-inspired noodlings, LaJoie draws things out, guiding you into his sound world in the palm of his hand.

At three songs just over 38 minutes, On Garudan Wing is to be indulged in quiet, pitch-black rooms. The same environment as a hard-hitting tech-house record, but instead of escaping reality, this record is immersed in it. And the results are grand.

Missing Scenes: Sturgeon Moon / Fever Moon
Earth In Sound

The brainchild of R. Hunter, Missing Scenes is said to be “exploring the interplay between the natural and synthetic, the light and haze, and the designed and unexpected.”

In the latest Moon series releases, Sturgeon Moon / Fever Moon is a beautiful wash of cascading soundscapes that hit with the impact of an iceberg.

Operating on the fringes of the sound world the likes of Fennesz and Markus Guentner occupy, on Sturgeon Moon / Fever Moon Hunter captures the close-your-eyes euphoria that we all want to feel when engaging with music. It really an exquisite releases, and yet another fine addition to an very underrated body of work.

Sons of Zevedeus: Sons of Zevedeus
Ramble Records

Majority of things containing the name “Sons” usually turn out to be rather good. Christ, even Sons of Anarchy had its moments in a ‘big dumb show’ kind of way.

Sons of Zevedeus keep the flag flying on this front with their self-titled release. While it was initially released some years ago now, with the timely reissue via Ramble Records, it felt only right to include here. Granted, this feature is quite scarce on the riffs front, but the Athens collective, led by multi-instrumentalist Themis Vasiliou, prop it up with a humid prog jazz metal work-out that sounds like Mr. Bungle on the downers.

Sons of Zevedeus is an all-purpose built affair for all moods and seasons. There’s plenty here for everyone, and the more you listen, the more it’s apparent just how much this band would shred live. While the effects of Brexit probably won’t make that possible here, perhaps a trip to Greece is on the cards?

Trio Not Trio: Siguiente
Gizeh Records

The second in the series of Aidan Baker’s five improvisational releases as Trio Not Trio features Argentinian saxophonist, Sofia Salvo and Australian drummer, Rohan Robeiro (My Disco).

Siguiente takes us on a journey of minimalism. Far quieter than the first Trio Not Trio release, Yn Gyntaf (more on that here), Baker creates a thread of eerie drones that slowly surface from the void. It’s the perfect setting for Salvo to introduce her quiet saxophones that feel like deep echoes from another world, while Robeiro adds the finishing touches to something that is oddly meditative.

With three releases in the series to go, on Siguiente Baker hasn’t made us look like completed fools given our earlier predictions: this remains set up to be one of the most compelling collaboration series of the year.

Karen Vogt: Le Mans
Waxing Crescent Records

The reason we do what we do around her is because of albums like Karen Vogt’s Le Mans. Waxing Crescent is a pioneering label who only release music outside of the box, and Vogt’s Le Mans fits the bill.

Sleep deprived during the 24 hour Le Mans race in 2022, the Paris-based Australian experimentalist proceeded to record the incessant race cars roars and drones, using these recordings as the backdrop to her wonderful vocals that cascade throughout these 10 tracks like a narcotic dream-state.

It’s a stroke of genius in a beautifully unique way, and another forward-thinking record by both artist and label. Fans of Low will lap this up, and in its own strange way, oddly this feels like a beautiful homage to the late Mimi Parker.

Karen Willems: KAAP MIJ
W.E.R.F. Records

Maldegem, Belgium percussionist, Karen Willems, likes to take her audience into strange, dark places.

Following her 2022 release, Grichte, the experimentalist returns with KAAP MIJ; an album that feels like Willems has spent a good portion of time down an Einstürzende Neubauten rabbit hole. The ensuing result is a minimalism pop-inspired series of elasticity compositions that stretch beyond the boundaries of sound design.

The spontaneity throughout KAAP MIJ echoes a similar vibe to Waterflower’s All Art is Ecological. Both albums proving an odd foil for one another, and while not an album that sinks in on first listen, persistence is key with KAAP MIJ. A record that is very interesting indeed.

Previous Weirdo Rippers features:

#7
#6
#5
#4
#3
#2
#1