Vice v7n1 Record Reviews

The Chuck Dukowski Sextet
Reverse Of The Polarity
Nice & Friendly

1 I have this friend who is a really big Arsenal fan. I don’t get football but he was trying to explain to me the other day that no matter what he does Ian Wright is basically infallible as far as your average Gooner is concerned due to past services rendered. Well I do understand Black Flag and if Ian Wright ever made something like this I’d call him out on it no matter how much I was into The Arse. Or whatever it is they call themselves.

Taake
Taake
Dark Essence Records

9 Maybe if he wasn’t constantly running around Germany with a Swastika casually daubed on his chest or getting locked up for violent assault then Hoest might get around to averaging more than one album every four years. Or maybe without all that stuff he wouldn’t only ever make near-classics that anyone who likes black metal should have already pre-purchased.

Earthless
Live At Roadburn
Tee Pee

8 If you are a person who still listens to music on actual real life vinyl records then once you get to the third side of this double disc set you would still only be halfway through the second song of the show captured here in all of its ragged, raging, psyched-out-of-its eyeballs splendour. It almost makes you want to go “meh” in the face of that Sleep reunion show. Almost.

Broken Arm
Shields Mystical
Sea Records

7 First Rot In Hell, then Mob Rules, and now Broken Arm. What’s going on? Last time I checked Leeds was brimming with pointy shoed, pork-pie hat festooned kids who hung out at Pigs or gurning bassline house guys with names like MC Wicksy and Charma D. When did it go and become great hardcore central overnight?

The Nightingales
Insult To Injury
Klangbad

8 The Nightingales played more Peel Sessions than any band whose name doesn’t rhyme with Ball or have Mark E Smith on vocals. I kind of didn’t pay much attention when they got back together a few years back but this one is produced by Jochen Irmler from Faust and is the best thing Robert Lloyd has put his name to since The Prefects single.

Secret Machines
Secret Machines
World’s Fair/Cooperative Music

2 Does anyone still care? Remember these guys? Floppy fringes and faux-prog? Yep, them. I bet floppy fringe guy one is hella pissed that his floppier fringed brother went off to do that School Of Seven Bells thing with those cute twins which approximately three more people seem to be into than this mess. You really need to start to worry when your biggest champion is The Edge.
Wavves
Wavvves
De Stjil

8 Yikes, this one is like someone took a blender to all the good bits of slacker punk, surf rock and girl group harmony then spat it all out under a heady fug of hiss and static that makes it all sound like it was recorded on a melting 8-track tape. Annoyingly as good, if not better, than everyone says it is.

Zero Boys
Vicious Circle
Secretly Canadian

10 If, by 1982, every town in the US had at least one hardcore band it still shocked many that one of the first and best LP’s the movement produced came out of Indianapolis. The History Of comp. is great and everything but this is the definitive article. Awesome sleeve to boot. What happened to Secretly Canadian putting out mumbly singer songwriters? More punk re-issues yes please.

The Hunches
Exit Dreams
In The Red

7 Making a truly awful garage rock record would be way more impressive than making a really great one. How do you fuck up ripping of The Velvet Underground and The Wipers? It’s pretty tough but some have succeeded in the past. The Hunches will have to get waaay shitier if they want that crown though ‘cos this one is a more than adequate approximation of the template.

Phosporescent
To Willie
Dead Oceans

5 On his last one he cribbed the Will Oldham schtick wholesale and on this one he’s nicked the concept of Willie Nelson’s great Lefty Frizell covers record For Lefty. You might not get a whole lot of originality from Mathew Houck but if you like earnest guys with gravel-strewn voices covering Willie ‘I really like weed and should quite possibly think about getting a mans haircut at the sprightly age of 98’ Nelson songs then there’s eleven of them right here just for you.

Gore
Hart Gore/Mean Mans Dream
Southern Lord

10 I never got why people slept on Gore. They had it all. A thick, sludgy, terrifyingly loud sound that made you feel a bit like you were the guy on the receiving end of the Vulgar Display Of Power sleeve, artwork that your parents would definitely not approve of at 12 years old and lyrics to instrumental songs that made Carcass sound like Dr Seuss.

Fauna
Rain
Aurora Borealis

8 One track. 64 minutes. Aurora Borealis. What part of this is still not screaming, “yes please!” at this point?