July 18 - 31 (201 - 213)

#201) Hammers of Misfortune - The Bastard (2001) 

#202) Emo Summer - Land of Emotional Plastic Furniture (1999) bad. not for me

#203) George Holdcroft - The FP Soundtrack (2011) 

#204) Disunicorps - Try (2011) 

#205) Disunicorps - Re:Try (2012) 

#206) Sutekh Hexen- Larvae (2012) 

#207) Panopticon - Social Disservices (2011) 

#208) The Paper Chase - Cntrl-Alt-Delete-U (2001) 

#209) Richard Cheese - Dick at Nite (2007) 

#210) Trust - Trst (2012) 

#211) Antigama/Drugs of Faith split (2007) 

#212) Nadja - The Bungled & the Botched (2008) 

#213) In Defence - Into the Sewer (2009) 

Negative Entropy - City Open to the Nomad

Electric Air

#144) Negative Entropy - City Open to the Nomad (2001)

 1. City Open to the Nomad
 2. A Desert Realm of Rish
 3. Electric Air
 4. Phosphoric Water

i don't really know a lot about this project.  to be honest, i didn't really like it enough to do any research on it. it's not that it's bad, it has some cool parts, but overall it really didn't blow me away. it falls somewhere in the realm of experimental/electronic/avant-garde/noise/whatever.  like i said, there are some cool parts, and the track Electric Air is pretty rad, but as a whole i felt like it was lacking something to make it truly noteworthy.

Pentagram - First Daze Here/First Daze Here Too

I Only See The Graveyard Dancer Who Lead Me Down Into The Abyss

#59a) Pentagram - First Daze Here (2001)

 1. Forever My Queen
 2. When the Screams Come
 3. Walk in the Blue Light
 4. Starlady
 5. Lazylady
 6. Review Your Choices
 7. Hurricane
 8. Livin' in a Ram's Head
 9. Earth Flight
 10. 20 Buck Spin
 11. Be Forewarned
 12. Last Days Here

59b) First Daze Here Too (2006)

 Disc 1

 1. Wheel of Fortune
 2. When the Screams Come
 3. Under My Thumb
 4. Smokescreen
 5. Teaser
 6. Little Games
 7. Much Too Young to Know
 
Disc 2

 1. Virgin Death
 2. Yes I Do
 3. Ask No More
 4. Man
 5. Be Forewarned
 6. Catwalk
 7. Die In Your Sleep
 8. Frustration
 9. Target
 10. Everything's Turning to Night
 11. Take Me Away
 12. Nightmare Gown
 13. Cartwheel
 14. Cat & Mouse
 15. Show 'em How


theme time again, this time adam_biedermann got to choose and he went with 70s. at first i thought "cool, that'll finally get me to listen to some Pentagram" a band that i've been meaning to check out for a while now. however my enthusiasm was quickly curbed when i discovered that though Pentagram formed in '71 and released a few singles, they didn't actually release a full length until 1985. curses... luckily Relapse came to my rescue with this 3 disc collection of recordings spanning '71 to '76, which covers what many consider the "classic" line-up of the band, Bobby Liebling on vocals, Vincent McAllister on guitar, Greg Mayne on bass and Geof O'Keefe on drums. these discs contain some of the 7" tracks as well as a bunch of demos and practice space recordings, or warehouse recordings as the band refers to them.

Pentagram was formed in '71 by Bobby and Geof who were both unhappy with their current bands. over the next 5 years the band entered the studio several times, wrote nearly 80 original songs, broke up and reunited without ever getting a contract or any real mainstream recognition. it's a shame because this is some great old school metal, the first wave when metal bands still had big fuzzy blues riffs and big fuzzy hair. these guys were basically America's lesser known version of Black Sabbath who, along with Blue Cheer, are cited as big influences on the band. in this collection of early stuff you can hear the band kind of bounce between more traditional 70s hard rock and that early metal sound. 

2/16/12: Coaltar of the Deepers - Robot EP (2001)

2/16/12: Coaltar of the Deepers - Robot EP (2001)

1. Joy Ride (edit)
2. The System's Made of Greed
3. Sarah3
4. Mexico (Ver. 1)
5. Astro Vs. Apatch

     Seeing that both of us have now listened to some Coaltar of the Deepers I figured I would do at least a few more entries for their stuff. The first 2 EPs I reviewed "Dog" and "Penguin" were so drastically different, and I enjoyed their more Metal stuff from the Penguin EP much more. I decided to figure out which parts of their catalog were more on the Metal and Electronic side of things. The first of those that I found was the "Robot EP".
     This EP jumps all over the place and was great. It opens with an amazing electronic song, that breaks way into an awesome metal song. From there they have what is possibly the heaviest Shoegaze track I've ever heard. Ends up i dig shoegaze when there is a heavy dose of metal influence. From there it brings it back down with a dreamy acoustic track with a guest female vocalist and to keep you off balance that leads into the heaviest track on the EP. This was another super enjoyable and incredibly A.D.D. EP from my new Favorite Japanese band. Next time I bring them up, I hope to have listened to one of their full lengths. (047)

The Silverman - State of Union

 Dawn's Underwater Light

#18) The Silverman - State of Union (2007)

 1. Note of Longing
 2. Dawn's Underwater Light
 3. State of Union
 4. Jacob's Ladder
 5. First Utterance
 6. Rainy Day Reflection
 7. Butterfly Effect
 8. On Icarus' Wings
 9. Your Drifting Heart  

The Silverman is an ambient/experimental project of Phil Knight who is co-founder of Legendary Pink Dots, a super experimental rock band from that 80s that still puts out albums and tours. State of Union is a compilation album and this version is a remaster of a cdr that was released in 2001. tracks 1, 2, 3, 4, and 8 were written in 2001 are from recordings sessions for the then upcoming album Requiem Settings. track 5 (1997) was used to open his solo performances throughout 1998. tracks 6 and 7 were written in 1993, track 7 being composed for a fashion show. track 9 is a bonus song only available in this version. the album was limited to 500 copies.

i really hated the first track, it sounded like some new age bullshit and at 9 and a half minutes it's way too long. i actually almost stopped listening to the cd after a couple minutes assuming that the whole album would be this kind of crap but i stuck with it and i'm glad i did because the rest of the album got into the darker, eerie ambient soundscape territory that i dig. at times it reminded me of Akira Yamaoka's work for the Silent Hill series (probably my favorite game music ever...and one of my all time favorite game series).
if you're not a fan of ambienty stuff this probably won't change your mind but i dug it and i'll definitely be checking out more from this guy.

Henry Rollins - A Rollins In The Wry

"Poetry Readings Can Go Die"

#8) Henry Rollins - A Rollins In The Wry (2001)

 1. Intro
 2. Death to Poets
 3. Journal
 4. Clintonese
 5. Language
 6. Never Again
 7. The United Colors of West L.A.
 8. Rite Aid
 9. Israel
 10. Maturity
 11. Men in Make Up
 12. Future Parents
 13. Encore

i've read a lot of his books, seen a bunch of his live dvds, seen him live a few times, watched his show on IFC and the specials he did for them, but for some reason i've barely listened to any of his spoken word cds. like maybe 1 or 2 besides this one. i don't know why, dude consistently makes me laugh and think and i keep buying his cds. whatever. i guess this project is the perfect time to get to some of that shit. so yeah, this was recorded back in '99 when he was doing a 9 week run at Luna Park in LA. it's not a full show but more like a highlight reel from his time there. material was also used for the Live at Luna Park dvd, like pretty much exactly what was on this disc. kind of a drag, but even though i recognized most of the stuff from the dvd it was still pretty funny. probably helps that i haven't watched the dvd in about 5 years. and besides a few topical bits (the Clinton scandal, Columbine) it's aged well.