V/A. Garden Party. Alienor Records.

Some lovely stuff here, particularly the gorgeous Bedflowers who sound like Opal if Amelia Fletcher had joined up after Kendra Smith left. Also, is it just me or does Bulldozer Crash's Changing sound a whole heck of a lot like Just Like Heaven?

Side A

1. Des Garçons Ordinaires - Summer Games
2. Bulldozer Crash - Changing
3. The Spinning Wheels - Don't Get Me Wrong
4. Meek - Beautiful Day
5. The Straw Dogs - My Cherished Lonelyness
6. La Sintesis - September
7. The Bedflowers - My Ex-Lover's Adress
8. Antiseptic Beauty - Shoegaze
9. Les Daffodils - So Easy As You Lie
10. Flame Up - Let The World Smother You
11. Charming Boys - Rain

Side B

1. The Little Rabbits - The Boy Who Never Saw The Light (live)
2. Penelope Trip - Inside The Taxi
3. The Gravy Train - Happy Again
4. Les Chaplinn's - Sunny Day
5. The Prayers - Sister Goodbye
6. The Lovelies - Stupid Habit
7. Kaleidoscope - Dream 2
8. Koma Kino - Weaky Town
9. The Penelopes - A Place Called Home
10. Alival Tiosihteeri - Nasta Kaupunki
11. Mosaic Eyes - Klaus' Eyes
12. Die Time Twisters, Verdammt! - Denn Jetzt Bist Du Da

Garden Party

Henry's Dress. Bust 'Em Green.

One of Slumberland’s best noisepop releases. The band has swept up the shrapnel from their debut into bristling piles of jagged, brightly colored confetti. Their shoegaze excesses have been condensed into blasts of garage punk mauling 60’s mod rock. You can see the genesis of the Aisler’s Set, but it’s a much, much louder, fuzzed-out version of what’s to come. When they’re going full tilt, they have a way of pummeling through a song with delirious abandon, which just digs the hooks in deeper. You may not notice them the first time, but soon you won’t be able to get Hey Allison, All This Time for Nothing, and Self Starter out of your head. It hurtles by in just under half an hour, so I’ve appended the songs from their 1620 single as a bonus.



Green

Seefeel. Quique (Redux).

In 1916, Russian Futurist painter Vladimir Rossiné invented the Optophonic Piano, an electronic instrument that created sounds and projected colors and patterns through a series of painted glass discs. Most likely, it sounded like shit. But if you could do such a thing correctly, and had someone like, say, Helen Frankenthaler or Agnes Martin or Bryce Marden been responsible for the layers of plates, then you might have gotten something quite beautiful. Something like Seefeel.

Formed in the early 90’s as dream pop was just beginning to discover electronics and samples, Seefeel melded My Bloody Valentine’s lush fuzz with Aphex Twin’s serenity into a mesmerizing pulsar of languidly revolving beats, rubbery bass lines, and looped guitars. Approaching the idea of techno from the standpoint of a rock band, and using its instruments to replicate and interpret that sound, they stretched dream pop out like ribbons of taffy, endlessly folding it over and over on itself until it became a moebius strip of glassy-skinned candy.

Like looking through a glass clockworks, their compositions reveal themselves by adding and subtracting layers of sound, with different elements rising to the surface or slinking off into darker depths, with only the slightest of glows to remind you of their presence. Chord and tempo changes are kept to a minimum, so the songs float along as the textural, ambient equivalents of Op Art. It’s better than sonic wallpaper though—it’s more like the dizzy buzz of butterflies in your stomach, or the blissful space between orgasms and sleep.

I seem to remember referencing the Cocteau Twins ambient experiments before and I was planning on doing so again here, when I noticed that Seefeel member Mark Clifford produced those remixes (on the Otherness ep), which is probably why this album feels so familiar. The second disc includes remixes and alternate takes that push the songs further into pillowy, endorphin-flushed, Terry Riley territory.

CD 1
CD 2

Ifwhen. Null Set.

Sometime after posting All Natural Lemon & Lime Flavor’s Turning Into Small, I got an email from guitarist Merc letting me know that he and drummer Brian Doherty had a new band called Ifwhen. Actually, they’ve been around since 2003, but they do have a new EP that’s available as a free download from their website. I’ve got it linked below in mp3 format, but if you head over there you can also get it in FLAC, plus download their cover of Syd Barrett’s No Good Trying.

Ifwhen doesn’t sound exactly like ANL&LF, but it does sound like its natural progression. The shoegaze and post-rock elements have become very compressed, and the songs are more jaggedly three-dimensional. There’s a geometric feel to it, as if they aren’t playing melodies, but unspooling the schematics of theoretical architecture from an AUTOCAD machine that’s just finished reading House of Leaves.

The logic/programming implications of their name become readily apparent in the multifaceted intersections of sound and direction. Each song is a maze of possibilities being explored simultaneously. It verges on noise, but like ANL&LF, Ifwhen is always revolving around and reflecting a solid pop core through its many twirling prisms. It’s the Everlasting Gobstopper of ear candy. It’s still highly disorienting—psychotically (psychedelically) schizoid, like listening to Barrett, Belong and Melt Banana all at the same time—but they really are working to fuck your shit up for your own good. They’re trying to change your perception.

And they can do it, too. Unlike most post-MBV bands, Ifwhen don’t compose based on volume, or reverb, or textures, or shades of color. They aren’t feeling things out improvisationally, they’re reconfiguring the actual internal structure of the music. Keyboardist Mary McDowell can actually play in two different time signatures (one with each hand) at the same time. And Merc’s guitar has a way of constantly folding in on itself like origami that never resolves into known shapes. Everything is oblique without being obfuscatory. The hidden song structures will slowly crystallize on repeated listens as you learn to navigate their psychohedron space.

Null Set

Secret Shine. After Years.

Secret Shine devoured When You Sleep like an overripe orange, and now its viscous juice and glistening pulp sweetens their lips and sticks to their fingers. It’s gone viral in their DNA, and they’re pushing it back out through their pores. Loveblind (sample it below) is simply unfuckwithable. It doesn’t matter if they’re simply MBV devotes. All the shoegaze bands were (to the point where a MBV comparison is meaningless in telling you what they sound like. To expand, Secret Shine sound a bit like a warmer Lush with elements of the Cure’s Disintegration and a bit of the Pixies or the Jesus & Mary Chain’s spikiness). All that matters is how universally awesome they were at it.

After Years collects the Ephemeral and Loveblind singles, the Untouched album, and the Greater Than God EP, and places them all in chronological order so you can hear them progress with each song. Born as indie popsters in the classic Sarah Records mold, Secret Shine always wrote the songs first before worrying about the atmospherics. That they ended up being quite good at it didn’t overshadow the fact that you could have loved them in any genre.

After Years

My Bloody Valentine. Loom. Vancouver. 7/1/92.

Amazing facts about My Bloody Valentine:

• Since its release in 1991, Loveless has been played on a continuous loop through underwater speakers, inspiring certain erotic feelings in cetaceans, and is single-handedly responsible for the resurgence of the Humpback Whale population
• Before being mastered, the original tracks were beamed into space, bounced off the rings of Saturn, and then filtered through a device that mimics the sound of dragonflies on absinthe.
• Loveless sounds the same in every known alternate universe.
• Early copies of the album came with packets of Dramamine to counteract wooziness.
• Not that I would know, but under certain influences you can actually listen to the album just by looking at the cover.
• The band was named after an unsuccessful Bing Crosby Christmas special.
• At least one track was created by dropping magnetic recording tape through the Aurora Borealis.
• Vinyl copies of Loveless actually contain minute trace amounts of love, Pixie Stix, and Kevin Shields’ pocket lint.

Loom

Sway. The Millia Pink and Green.

Information on the band is almost nonexistent. The website listed on the album has disappeared, and the band itself abruptly and inexplicably changed names a number of times. As far as anyone knows, they’ve broken up, which is too bad as this seems to be regarded by those who like their pop dreamy as one of the best shoegaze albums of the decade (admittedly, there probably aren’t a lot of bands still working in this category).

Instead of following MBV’s swarming, electron-honeybee buzz, Sway tend more towards the blissful, liquid pigmentation of Slowdive, Chapterhouse, and Lush. Their waterfall guitars are blurred and melted like those super-saturated polaroids of flowers that used to show up all the time on fffound.

Short and sweet.

Pink and Green

All Natural Lemon & Lime Flavors. Turning Into Small.

Although it’s fair to say that All Natural Lemon & Lime Flavors sound like an exquisitely realized cross between My Bloody Valentine and Stereolab, they’re actually more interested in shaping and manipulating those waves of feedback and distortion into a kind of frazzled, cubist space-rock rather than solid sheets of blissed-out headspace. Eschewing classic shoegaze’s supposed avoidance of straightforward melodies, they compose their swells of woozy, stomach-ache synths and guitars as “actual” songs, slipping in subtle instrumentation, psychedelic washes, and shuffling funk beats amidst the syrupy speaker-drippings. Your Imagination could be the blueprint for A Sunny Day in Glasgow, and Lattershed totally makes out with New Order. The whole album feels like being swept under in a threatening but majestic riptide.

Small

The Ecstasy of St Theresa. Susurrate.

Inspired by the divinely orgasmic states (in which she was bodily pierced by a flaming spear) described by the 16th century mystic nun, The Ecstasy of St Theresa take their namesake to heart, attempting either to replicate that holy delirium or inspire it through clouds of angelic vocals dissolving in a volcanic barrage of tremoloed guitars.

Apparently, they’ve long since switched to an ambient/techno sound, but in early 1992, they were reinterpreting Isn’t Anything era MBV as a Dvorakian noise symphony. As possibly the only shoegaze band in Czechoslovakia, The Ecstasy of St Theresa received what little attention they did after recording a session for the omnipresent John Peel. Even that didn’t translate into much success, and this album sank without a trace only to be rescued from obscurity nearly a decade later by the indispensable Clairecords.

Aside from the obligatory MBV references, The Ecstasy of St Theresa share plenty of DNA with Dinosaur Jr. and Catherine Wheel—pitching their blurred, thundering songs down a wind-tunnel of melodic, emotional shifts. They’re drowning you in sound, but they always keep their ear on the “big moment”, finally climaxing with the reckless, free-form maelstrom of Absinth. It may not be the most innovative or original recording of the shoegaze era, but it’s definitely a classic example of everything that so often made the genre so transcendently great.

Susurrate

V/A. One Last Kiss.

It's not the Courtney Love you're thinking of.

1. Swirlies - Chris R
2. Suddenly, Tammy! - Lamp
3. Lorelei - Mimesis
4. Veronica Lake - Daisy Kiss
5. The Magnetic Fields - 100,000 Fireflies
6. White Town - Hair Like Alain Delon
7. Honeybunch - Arm in Arm
8. Swirl - Helicopter
9. Our American Cousin - One Wish Too Many
10. Tree Fort Angst - You Should've Seen the One That Got Away
11. Crayon - All the Stars
12. Jane Pow - Shutdown
13. Whorl - I Love Her All the Time
14. Small Factory - Hey Lucille
15. Velocity Girl - My Forgotten Favorite
16. Courtney Love - Baseball Bat
17. Lilys - Any Several Sundays
18. Black Tambourine - We Can't Be Friends
19. Wimp Factor 14 - Change of Address Kit

Kiss

The High Violets. 44 Down.

I was pretty sure these guys were British (probably as a result of discovering them in a record store during my one trip overseas), but it turns out they're from Portland. They could easily have been some lost band from the early 90s prime dream-pop/shoegaze period, sounding as they do like an otherworldly mix of The Field Mice, The Cocteau Twins, MBV, Lush, Spaceman 3, Galaxie 500, and Julee Cruise. Cool angelic vocals, waves of white light climaxes, and spooling gossamer guitar chaos make this perfect dorm-room make-out music. It's like mirrorballs as satellites.

44 Down

High Violets on myspace

Henry's Dress. Henry's Dress.

Long before founding the divine Aislers Set, Amy Linton fronted this noise-pop garage band on Slumberland Records. Here, her sweet, laid-back voice floats atop peals of crisp feedback and heavy bass-lines that judder and thump like a dragster down a dirt road. Chopping down early Jesus & Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine, and Black Tambourine into a Phil Spectorish girl-group sound, Henry's Dress made heavily distorted and immensely fun bursts of messy pop.

Henry's Dress

Henry's Dress on myspace

An old interview with the band

A Sunny Day in Glasgow. The Sunniest Day Ever & Tout New Age.

Pretty noisy/Noisy, pretty.

Everyone calls them shoegazers, so I guess I'll go along with that. It's not shoegaze like anyone I'm familiar with, though. The Sunniest Day Ever is a masterpiece of vertiginous, see-sawing rhythms and smashed glitter-ball textures that suggests an alternate universe Siouxsie Sioux/Cocteau Twins mash-up with severe equilibrium problems. I've never listened to it on headphones, but I'm pretty sure it would be impossible to do while standing. You know that sliding sensation you get just before fainting, where the world itself seems to have tilted before you realize it's actually you? That's what this sounds like. A Mundane Telephone Call to Jack Parsons is a whole new kind of awesome.

Tout New Age is a bit tamer, eliding into the sort of sound the Cocteau Twins were exploring on their later ambient remixes (this has become more pronounced on their latest release, Ashes Grammar). Not quite as fractured as thier first EP, but still adventerous and very pretty.

Sunniest

ASDIG official site

ASDIG on myspace

The Charlottes. Lovehappy.

One of the earliest shoegaze bands, The Charlottes had a harder edge than their billowy pals, My Bloody Valentine or Slowdive, though they never achieved the same levels of success. I think at the time they were regarded more like The Primitives, but it's hard to tell. They fell into that twee-band-with-a-distortion-pedal period that's just on the verge of the prime shoegaze years. It may just encompass this record, actually. They're much tighter than their shambolic forebears, each song a little candy sweetart. It's a short album—barely half an hour—but they managed to get the whole thing just right.

In other unbearably twee news, today is our eighteen year anniversary (my girlfriend and me, not this blog, obviously). So, if you're reading this, my dear Candy-O, I love you.

Lovehappy

V/A. I Might Walk Home Alone.

1. Shine! - Bite The Apple
2. The Bardots - Summerhouse
3. The Replicas - Culture Shock
4. Blair 1523 - Take Me There
5. Catherine Wheel - She Is My Friend
6. The Suncharms - Sparkle
7. Red Hour - Treat
8. The Suncharms - Wash Away
9. Cherry Forever - Spook
10. Basinger - Looking At Him
11. The Pushkins - Sea Egg
12. The Badgers - Cycleface
13. The Replicas - You Can Red
14. Storm House - Inside
15. The Hobbyards - Red Candle

I Might

Rollerskate Skinny. Threshold.

I don't know if anyone remembers this band. They came and went without much notice, only releasing two albums and a handful of singles. If they get mentioned at all, it's to note that Kevin Shields' brother was a member. Released inbetween albums, this three-song EP isn't quite up to the flawless perfection of Horsedrawn Wishes (though, what is?), but you can tell they're taking the template they developed on Shoulder Voices (a mixture of early Mercury Rev's tilt-a-whirl symphonies, mid-period Flaming Lips' knack for a killer melody, and, of course, My Bloody Valentine's woozy blur) and fumbling towards something bigger.

Threshold

Rollerskate Skinny on myspace

Mixtape. 22 Bees.

Barbed pop songs shot like buzzing atoms into the center of your brain. Nothing that obscure. I wanted to make a mix that followed how twee and c-86 style songs gradually elided into noise pop and shoegaze. I think it flows nicely.

1. Another Sunny Day - Anorak City
2. Shop Assistants - All That Ever Mattered
3. Black Tambourine - Throw Aggi Off the Bridge
4. Pop Will Eat Itself - Like an Angel
5. Jesus & Mary Chain - Upside Down
6. The Vaselines - Son of a Gun
7. The Loft - Up the Hill and Down the Slope
8. The Close Lobsters - Pathetique
9. Bubblegum Splash - Just Walked Away
10. 14 Iced Bears - Inside
11. Autoclave - Dr. Seuss
12. The Flatmates - Happy All the Time
13. My Favorite - Homeless Club Kids vs. Future Bible Heroes
14. The Magnetic Fields - I'm Sorry I Love You
15. Elf Power - Nothing's Going to Happen
16. Pixies - Alec Eiffel
17. Flaming Lips - Frogs
18. My Bloody Valentine - When You Sleep
19. The High Violets - 44 Down
20. The Field Mice - Star of David
21. Cocteau Twins - Carolyn's Fingers
22. Galaxie 500 - Tugboat

Sorry, I had to split the download into two parts to get to fit under mediafire's 100mb limit.

22 Bees part 1
22 Bees part 2