Sleater-Kinney - Live @ The Crystal Ballroom - Portland, OR - 12-30-2005 (320 kbps)

Portland, Oregon's now disbanded Sleater-Kinney probably don't need an introduction here, but for those who don't know them I'll give a brief one. Sleater-Kinney was originally formed in 1994 by vocalist and rhythm guitar player Corin Tucker and lead guitar player Carrie Brownstein in Olympia, Washington. The band was a vehicle for their anger, frustration and feminist politics. As time passed, their punk sound became more refined on each album with Brownstein, Tucker and drummer Janet Weiss turning out to be marvelous and passionate musicians. The band eventually split in 2006 for reasons that I won't speculate on here. I have no doubt that they will reunite someday for another album and another tour and maybe then I can finally see them play live.

This is a bootleg soundboard recording of decent quality. It may not be 100% perfect, but that is what I love about it. And the performances are raw and boisterous and punk as hell, as they should be. When I put on a S-K album, most of the time I put on the their final 2005 album The Woods, although I do love most of their previous albums. It is such a pleasure to hear these songs from The Woods played live, unpolished and lacking the over-production of the CD. Hearing them do a noisy encore cover of Creedence Clearwater Revival's Fortunate Son put smile on my face, too. It really doesn't matter if you have never heard this band before, a bootleg live recording is just a good a place to start as the studio albums. Enjoy.

Year of Recording: 2005
Label: None / Bootleg
Genre: Punk
Media: Digital
Format: MP3
Bitrate: 320 kbps
FLAC available by request.

Track List:
01 intro
02 THE FOX
03 OXYGEN
04 WILDERNESS
05 JUMPERS
06 SYMPATHY
07 EVERYTHING
08 MODERN GIRL
09 ROLLERCOASTER
10 GET UP
11 WHAT'S MINE IS YOURS
12 STEEP AIR
13 LET'S CALL IT LOVE
14 ENTERTAIN

ENCORE
15 START TOGETHER
16 IRON CLAD
17 LITTLE MOUTH
18 FORTUNATE SON

Download: Sleater-Kinney - Live @ The Crystal Ballroom 12-30-2005
Download Size: 196 MB

Wiht - Wiht (2009 - 320 kps)

My mind has been in a comfortable haze all morning transversing the possible future ahead of me. It all seems rather optimistic and uplifting especially with the right music to put me in that special place. Wiht does that with an unidentifiable gentle touch tossed in amidst lumbering despondent metal. The UK band has no real genre, but most would classify their 2009 self-titled release as sludgy stoner doom. Personally, I would add space rock to that to make it a more accurate description.

This release only has three songs but two of them rank up on the 16 minute mark with the other being 9 minutes long. Each one is a ride that you most likely won’t forget for a good while to come. Just to be clear, this is an instrumental release so the music speaks for itself. Track pattern, if you can call it that, for the longer songs is a slow bluesy start before the heavy drone of the bass slaps you in the face. It comes in unexpectedly and it dies off as quickly as it came melting into trippy space rock; the effects used to get that effect aren’t overdone and ties in nicely with the rest of the music. The pattern repeats itself in the song and the result is anything but boring. It’s really hypnotic and immersive; simply can’t stress that enough.

“And The Thunder Rolls” has the fastest pace in this trio and the drums are showcased nicely. Solid beats with a wonderful bluesy guitar-tone in this song make it one of the more addictive tracks. Good news is that this release isn’t the only release they plan on cranking out. They have a full-length planned soon titled “The Harrowing of The North” so keep an eye out for it.

Year of Release: 2009
Genre: Stoner/Sludge/Doom Metal. Psychedelic/Space Rock.
Format: MP3
Bitrate: 320 kpbs

Track List:
1. Into Ruin
2. And The Thunder Rolls
3. Vasta

Download: Wiht - Wiht
Download Size: 96.9 mb

El Bandit Moor - Demo (2008)

Welcome. El Bandit Moor is a black/doom band from Spain who only produced two demos a year apart. Not much else is known about it except that it's a one-man band and the influence for it's name is Karl von Moor from F. Shiller's "The Robbers" ("Die rauber").

I'm looking at his 2008 nameless demo. The three songs on it average from 6 to 7 minutes long each. The black metal influence is obvious with the guitar work, vocals, and drums. Personally, I don't see the doom in this. It's very good ambient black metal though. Vocals come in and tear at you at the right intervals and the guitar work is versatile ranging from rhythmic work to distorted noise. Bass' presence isn't overwhelming if felt at all. As with bands like this, their main purpose is to evoke darker emotions within us. What I get from this demo is so much pain and sorrow with a bit of muffled anger. Perhaps that's why the man behind this project added “doom” into the genre field in the first place. If so, then he deserves quite a bit of credit for more than successfully making that intent carry through the music. I would have to say that the song that accomplishes this the most for me is “L'enemic Interior.” It's grotesquely beautiful but very very painful to listen to which makes it all the more alluring in my eyes. Vocals at 2:55 to 3:06 make my heart ache. Whatever pain this person tapped into must have been pretty fresh and/or deep. My advice is to not listen to that song if you're going through some hard times unless you're the type that becomes detached. At which point, this demo takes the place of a sympathetic ear.

Part of me really really wishes that the lyrics were known to the online world. They would add another layer to emotions that music is trying to express. Regardless, enjoy this release from a fairly unknown project that almost slipped past my gaze.

Year of Release: 2008
Genre: Doom/Black Metal.
Format: WAV
Bitrate: Unknown

Track List:
1. Creenca
2. L'enemic Interior
3. El Bandit Moor

Download: El Bandit Moor - 2008 Demo
Download Size: 159.36 mb

The Nuclear Beauty Parlor/Awake split 7" (1983-320Kpbs)

Nuclear Beauty Parlor..."Want to look good for the arms race? At the Nuclear Beauty Parlor you can curl up & dye. Have an MX perm with B1 curls. You can be the envy of all the girls." This is some avant-garde weirdness from the early 80s that needs to be heard. It seems most appropriately at home at Digital Meltd0wn.

In the early 80s in San Francisco there were a group of art fags acting in performance art troupes like Monster Girls or Nuclear Beauty Parlor. This single is the second release from NBP. Both sides were written basically by Vicki Krohn. Re Styles of The Tubes fame sings the A-side while Vicki & some friends do the B-side. There are some other now famous musicians on this gem: Larry Batiste; Clayton (aka Claytoven) Richardson; & Will Kennedy. The cover illustration & design was done by Sub-Genii Paul Mavrides.

Year of Release: 1983
Label: NBP Records TFS 0002
Genre: Abstract, Industrial, Avantgarde, Minimal

Tracklist:
Side A...Re Styles & the Final Rinse - The Nuclear Beauty Parlor
Side B...V.K. & SCI-FI - Awake

Download: The Nuclear Beauty Parlor/ Awake split 7"
Download Size: 19.5MB

Out of The Circle - Unfinished Samples (2011)

During my ever arresting journey through cyberspace, a gold nugget fell at my feet via the undead nation known as Myspace. An unknown musician from Greece, who is nameless so far, just released a demo for his personal project called Out of The Circle. The name of the demo is pretty straight forward, "Unfinished Samples From A Lo-Fi Hell," but it belies the complexity of emotion that I've found laying within. A Lo-Fi Hell describes his work as melodic crust, but it's not your typical punk music since it has electronic elements like synths and minor noticeable vocal alterations (as seen in the back-up vocals for “Red Fractions” mainly).

There are two songs that are the crowning jewels of this demo: The first track, “zugzwang,” starts with an interesting sample from the Greek movie The King, also known as O Vasilias, which paves the way for a symphonic ballad permeated with a guitar solo. Using this song as a preset for the rest of the demo, it seems like the electronic additions are the melodic part of this equation. The traditional instruments stay within the realm of crust in a very pleasing way; bass is palpable, dirty guitar riffs, drums vary from blast beats to slower tempos and vocals are very guttural. Most of the songs are very catchy and the vocals play a large role in this.

The fourth track, “Unfinished Samples From A Lo-Fi Hell,” is hauntingly melancholic with an aggressive edge provided via the harsh vocals and bass. This song is a journey. It's the progression of emotion that I have while walking through a desolate part of the ghetto alone at night. Cracked littered concrete sidewalk, large empty lots filled with unwanted garbage, tag wars spray-painted on the side of abandoned buildings and warehouses, broken glass doors of apartment complexes, pot-hole filled street revealing brick underneath, and a dried anonymous blood smear on a pole that once held a metal stop sign laying nearby next the curb for drivers to somehow obey.

It's hard to describe the emotions in the rest of the songs since they don't come out as clearly. That's my only real critique of this demo and it's a very small one since that doesn't make the songs in question any less catchy or likeable. Yet, the lyrics do add a prevailing theme and an emotional weight to the more muddled songs. It's a story of loss and someone trying to unsuccessfully come to terms with it. The past rears it's ugly head, tormenting this person's mind until it's all that they yearn for. The story is told in three songs via lyrics provided with the demo: track two “Departing (from Utopia),” track three “Degenerate Song,” and track five “Red Fractions.”

our days of freedom
are devoured by the past
a dream was once born
and now it turns black
slaves of the universe
tormented by our lives

-From "Red Fractions"

Overall, I can't get over how addictive the vocals make this demo. This point can't be stressed enough since it's not often that I enjoy vocal work so thoroughly. Hope the songs on this demo haunt your mind as much as they have hounded mine.

Year of Release: 2011
Genre: Melodic Crust.
Format: OGG
Bitrate: Unknown

Track List:
1. Zugzwang
2. Departing (from Utopia)
3. Degenerate Song
4. Unfinished Samples from A Lo-Fi Hell
5. Red Fractions
6. Anthropi Fita
7. Glikia Kravgi

Download: Out of The Circle - Unfinished Samples
Download Size: 32.84 mb