Friday, May 20, 2011

Devin, Gary, and Ross "Bounce" on Altered Zones!

Devin Gary & Ross: "4 Corners"

Instantly smitten with this ramshackle psych-folk number by New York's Devin Gary & Ross, the visually inclined trio of cartoon animator Devin Ross, photographer and sign painter Ross Goldstein, and illustrator, designer, and all-around Renaissance weirdo Gary Panter, perhaps best known as the art director for "Pee-wee's Playhouse." Pete Nolan of Spectre Folk is putting out their debut EP, Four Corners Bounce, on his own Arbitrary Signs imprint, and we can definitely hear the family resemblance. Think Velvet Underground-era VU meets Alexander "Skip" Spence meets the equally LSD-infused solo output of Germany's Juergen Gleue, only WAY more deadpan. --Emilie Friedlander, Altered Zones

MP3: Devin Gary & Ross: "4 Corners"

Four Corners Bounce EP is out soon on Arbitrary Signs

Tags: devin gary & ross, audio

Posted by alteredzones on 05/20/2011 at 2 p.m..








Available June 15. 2011
Pre-order yours today!


prices




Monday, May 16, 2011

Magik Markers and Spectre Folk to play Brooklyn's Northside Festival

Elisa Ambrogio of Magik Markers
Elisa Ambrogio, Magik Markers


Spectre Folk





Magik Markers and Spectre Folk will both be playing Northside Fest this year. On June 17th the Markers play at St. Cecilia's Church in Greenpoint with Woods and Ed Askew. The next night, June 17th Spectre Folk plays the same spot with Ida, Rebecca Gates and Eleanor Friedberger of Fiery Furnaces. We're proud to represent right here in our own neighborhood. Come on and check it out... Details are posted below from Brooklyn Vegan:


St. Cecilia's Church in Greenpoint will host Northside Festival shows

St Cecilias

In their own words:

Northside Festival is thrilled to announce special series of shows in beautiful St. Cecilia's church in Greenpoint.

St. Cecilia's is one of the most beautiful and vital churches in Brooklyn. We are excited to be working with this community institution and proud to say that St. Cecilia's will be an important part of Northside.

There will be four shows taking place at the most spectacular venue imaginable.

And the shows are:

Northside Flyer

June 16 -- Atlas Sound, with Special Guests. Doors at 7 pm ($15 advance, $17 day of show)
June 17 -- Woods, with Magik Markers, Ed Askew. Doors at 7 pm ($12 advance, $15 day of show
June 18 -- Eleanor Friedberger, Rebecca Gates, Ida, Spectre Folk. Doors at 6:30 pm ($15 advance, $17 day of show)
June 19 -- Mount Eerie, With Nicholas Krgovich (No Kids), Wyrd Visions. Doors at 6 ($12 advance, $15 day of show)

Saturday, May 14, 2011

Arbitrary Signs Interviews Brian Sullivan Creator of United Waters "Your First Ever River"




Arbitrary Signs: This record was recorded and put together over a few years right? Exactly how long have you been working on this?


Brian Sullivan - hard to say.solidly,or more solid than before,about a year.there were pieces floating in the stratosphere and buried in the ground for a while.just had to wait to find them and for the right time to use them.you know how that goes,you got some ideas but not a place for them yet.i had a lot of other stuff in the works to keep my focus,so i was being patient w/ this stuff.two of the tracks are around 11 years old.they are different than their earlier forms,but same dna ,similar structure.about 2 years ago,shit started coalescing to a point where i realized it had a sound and a form that wanted to take on a more definitive shape and that i wanted to roll with.so by the time i had the "my geology" tracks,"platetectonics" and "no end to eyes" done, which was around a year ago, it was going at its own pace.

A.S: You played me a some of this stuff over a year ago and it sounded like there was different stuff... How many changes/permutations has this record undergone till arriving at the final masterpiece that it is? Is there a lot of stuff that didn't make it on the final record?

B:
- there were a lot of permutations and mixes.by the time you heard it a year ago,things that existed were in their place,but not at their final mixes and "my geology" was def missing some layers.i had to step back from that for a while and see how it wanted to fit together and then add some final elements.over all, the pieces grew at their own pace.if something wasnt working,i would just put the song down and work on something else till i found a sound or part that worked with it.that might be a few days or months. i wasnt in a rush once i realized how it was going to come together.as for the stuff that didnt make the lp -there were 3 songs that got jettisoned pretty early on.2 were older and didnt fit the vibe.more acoustic oriented than the rest of the record.they were pretty much done,and i didnt want to fuck with them by adding layers that they didnt need to make it fit the album.the 3rd song that didnt make it was more of a tape collage that didnt flow with the rest of the pieces.just interrupted everything. sounds good,but not within the context of the lp. it takes a while to get the feel of the album or how the songs want to play themselves out.once that comes into focus,its easy to remove things that dont fit

A.S.:

This is a mellow record with all kinds of awesome sounds happening all the time. What is the best situation for listeners to check out this record?

B:

- through a huge p.a.....it sounds pretty awesome that way.but i guess that aint too logistically realistic. i think that is up to the listener.lots of people say headphones - which is cool.there is a lot going on,but i feel you can crank up the stereo and absorb it all. the best situation is one where you can have some time and space to devote to listening to it.

A.S.:
I heard that Conrad Capistrano once said "I have no worldview." Does this record represent a philosophy or worldview that could be articulated?

B:
- dont know why conrad said that.give him some hegel.and a beer. everyone has something of a "worldview" -they might not call it that and it might not be as articulated and developed as any philosopher or scientist you feel like inserting here.but over time,everyone develops pattern recognition and starts piecing together events and ideas that occur within their life.you kind of need that to navigate a world full of other people doing the same.or else pouring a bowl of cereal is gonna be a pretty heavy deal- way too confusing than it needs to be. so does "your first ever river" embody some philosophy?i suppose it does,since its coming from me.and in doing these things ,you are just taking in everything and filtering it through yourself. but i think its best articulated in the form that it is in. to extract the brain from it to examine would lose a lot in translation.might even be unknowable from the whole.its largely about adaptation.

A.S.:

What instrumentation was involved with the making of this record?

B:
-tons.literally tons. obvious shit being guitars.lots of them.1st time i used pedal steel guitar to record.good thing to have.drums machines. sampled a bunch of percussion ,electronic and acoustic. keys and synth. voice.tapes.air.

A.S.:

How was it recorded/mixed?

B:

- i recorded it mostly at home on reel to reel 8 track. spent to much time in the pit over the years,needed a break and a fresh set of walls to bounce the sound off of. also,wanted to record at a lower volume.cant do that with 4x12's and 2x18's.mixed it on reel to reel.edited some stuff on computer.used to do all the splices by hand on tape,but cutting on the computer can give you several different permutations of what you want to do and set them side by side for immediate comparison.got into this while filmmaking.instead of cutting a sequence w/ the film,viewing it and then disassembling it to reconfigure it for another option[and possibly forgetting how the 1st one made you feel].just do both through a computer and check them out consecutively.there is the lack of physicality in that process which i miss,but everything else is pretty hands on ,and the freedom of almost instant recombination through this editing process trumps the cons.

A.S.:

How is your approach to the United Waters material different from Mouthus or your solo output under the Eskimo King moniker?

B:

-this is just a new stage or phase.thats why its under united waters.its a lot more constructed than most of the eskimo king stuff -though there are songs with the eskimo king ,but it had a different vibe,different time.as for difference btwn this mouthus,there's no nate.mouthus is the both of us working together.mouthus can be looser in execution and process.usually just hitting record and going.i do do the mixing and editing for mouthus,but its different material than my solo stuff,so i approach it differently. obvoiusly the interplay between nate and i is different than the me bouncing ideas off the past me which recorded something and i am now reacting to. motuhus is a present moment in the playing and recording.my solo jams are a little more geological or architectural in its development.got to sift and dig and build.

A.S.:

How do you feel about comparison's to the whole Twisted Village aesthetic that this record has gotten? Does this make sense to you or would you lump it in with more of a Kanye kind of thing?

B:

-it has? i take that as a compliment.i dig twisted village.i think wayne is great guitarist.but twisted villages stuff is more blown out rock in most of its production. kind of going for a different vibe here. definitely not the kayne vibe.unless i get to interrupt stupid acceptance speeches with equally stupid ones.

A.S.:

What's your next move for United Waters? Do you plan to do this stuff live anytime soon?

B:

-recording new material.doing that. playing live is gonna happen,just got to figure out how to translate this stuff into a live setting.right now its occupying the world of studio and thats the way it got constructed.so i got to bring it out in a way that i am psyched about.its good at being an album i need to see how it will be being a live sound. new stuff is a little more translatable live,so maybe just roll with that and let that happen.

b.

United Waters "Your First Ever River" available now





Spectre Folk guest post on Altered Zones

Spectre Folk's Pete Nolan says:
So I'm gonna shoot for a couple of moods here. I had a pretty aggro day yesterday and a fairly mellow day today, so I didn't want to pigeonhole my post into one camp or the other. Here are a couple of "obscure things that I'm feeling right now":

The magnetic fuzz wah snuff film that is "Street Crime" by the Index is what I'm feeling right now (yesterday). A high school band from Grosse Pointe, MI, circa 1966. John Ford manages to infuse his guitar playing with all the violence and malevolence of Lou Reed on "Sister Ray" or Link Wray on "Switchblade," all the while wearing black motorcycle gloves. The home-fi recording is nuts, too. Listen to how blown-out the drums are at the beginning?! These guys were making up their own rules for what shit should sound like, and their first record sounds like it was recorded in a cave or something. Most retarded version of "8 Miles High" ever. And "Shock Wave"? I'd rather listen to that than Hendrix anyday. I just stumbled onto this jam though and I'm digging the immediacy of the fuzz and drum tones. The cover shot they chose for the YouTube is creepy too. Maybe it's the dreaded onset of another New York summer, or just a crowded, uptight vibe, but I'm in the mood for some violent guitar playing-- the kind you never hear anymore. It was a toss up between this and "Frustration" by The Mystic Tide (one of those holy grail records I've killed countless hours trolling for in Long Island thrift shops). I had to stick with my Michigan roots on this one though. I don't think this song ever even came out on either of the 2 O.G. LPs that they pressed 100 of, so it qualifies as obscure. And yeah, with today's headlines being "Drunk Tour Bus Driver Runs Down Tourist in Times Square," and "Woman Throws Sulferic Acid on Brooklyn Man for Unknown Reasons," I'm definitely feeling "Street Crime" right now.

Ok. Mood 2 (today) is this track from Jem Targal called "Call Your Name." Something about this guy's vibe kind of reminds me of The Godz. Maybe it's the whole, extremely-stoned-loner-trying-to-make-really-catchy-pop-songs thing. The way the tape starts with the ONE (of 2,3,4) being all low demon wind-up vox makes this sound like you're tuning in to some collective unconscious radio station: "I'm not sleeping... to have bad dreams." This dude is so far out he thinks he's gotta smooth talk the foxy chick coming at him in his dream. Damn, that drum machine sounds so good... I could listen to it all night. I love how the song doesn't wanna end; he just keeps kind of jamming out on all the instruments, one at a time, because the groove feels so good. What a fucking weird dude.

Holy crap... I just found out here that like The Index, Jem is also from Michigan. I must be feeling homesick or something. I'd only ever heard this guy before on Tony Coulter's radio showa few years back. I guess he was the principle songwriter behind The Third Power'sBelieve, which is one of the best hard rock albums of the psychedelic era. I have a feeling I know what tomorrow's mood will be...