In the immortal words of Charles Dickens, “it was the best of times, it was the worst of time…” This can also be said about our recording here at Reise’s home studio. A catastrophic blizzard has forced us to barracade the doors and feast on the remains of the once Nameless Intern, now referred to as “Dinner”. Although it has been a struggle to maintain enough energy to play our insturments we muster the courage to press on, in hopes of one day emerging from our icy prison to live again. We often think fondly of the victims of the Dyatlov Pass Incident, coping with a winter alien invasion would not be far off from our experience here. In the muted distance of a coal-warmed basement I can hear Brady softly strumming a guitar accompanied by the dedicative shouts of Tim barking his artistic vision like a starving composer grasping for his opus. If anyone is reading this please send a team of sled dogs and a dozen kerosene lamps, its going to be a long night.

-co(bra)lin

I’ve just got in from our first day in the studio with Eek! working on their new LP which is as-yet-untitled. I am producing it and Spencer is engineering, so you know we’re taking care of business and basically making every other producer/engineer team look super lame. Today we tracked three songs and did the vocals for one. Very productive, considering we were only there for a few hours. More updates coming, including a few of Julian’s famous studio-update videos! Stay tuned.

-Tim

P.S. We were all saddened to hear of J.D. Salinger’s passing yesterday. As with everyone else ever, I was profoundly moved by Catcher In The Rye when I first read it, and it has remained a constant companion ever since.

The new Shiny Diamonds album, “A Histriony Of Violence” is being mastered this week by Kramer, a renown madman of odd music and godfather of slowcore, showgaze, and anti-folk.  If you don’t know what mastering is, well we can’t explain it. It’s a necessary step in record production that involves black magic. Here are some records Kramer has produced:

wow!

Yes it’s finally out! Download our new compilation right now because it’s totally free and even in high-quality 320 mp3s. CDs will soon be available as well, for those who enjoy physical music products and lossless audio (bless your little hearts!)

NO REVIVAL, Volume 1

Our first compilation featuring a bunch of great bands! Plus, it is free so download it and share it with your friends, your mom, your dental hygienist etc. Click on the album cover to download!

(BACK COVER ART HERE)

Tracklist:

1. The Shiny Diamonds – Cop Killer
2. Count Oak – Pulitzer
3. Eek! –Juice’s Lament No. 2
4. Born By Science – This Ain’t Good
5. The Lion in Love – Apocalypse, Please Sign The Release Form First
6. Pretty Eyes for Captain America – Elephant Wars
7. Gold and Shadow – On Pym Street
8. Plastic Chair Explosion – Shoplifter
9. Village – Claustrophobic Romance
10. Button Fields – Starstruck
11. Bashu – Song for Lazy Lover
12. Julian Bowers And Just Saying It’s Not Enough – Tell me the Time (And Then Tell Me You Love Me)
13. Sommer –Black Sunset
14. Teen Plaque – Fuck the Revolution!

Thanks for supporting Kingfisher Bluez!

Jandek

Scotiabank Dance Centre, Vancouver
December 7th, 2009

A review by Julian Bowers

Once, while I was travelling up to Whistler in the summer, I was at
the half-way point between dream state and awake state.  I had my iPod
on and I was listening to Johnny Guitar Watson’s Three Hours Past
Midnight.  I was trying to keep awake, then the chair in front of me
started morphing into Johnny Guitar Watson (70’s era, with the hat and
sunglasses).  It took about five seconds for me before I jolted awake
again and realize what happened.  That’s about the closest experience
I’ve had that could compare to Jandek.

For those that don’t know, Jandek (or, excuse me, A Representative of
Corwood Industries as he should be called (Corwood being a label he
runs) is an outsider guitarist and singer from Houston, Texas
(arguably a great place for breeding weirdo musicians such as Daniel
Johnston and Roky Erickson) who plays in an idiosyncratic, detuned
style as he quietly croons in a haunting voice.  Experimental?  Well,
to say the least, but they almost have structures of folk and
delta-blues songs.

Tim and I went to the Scotiabank Dance Centre, nearly freezing our
faces off in the night.  It felt like trekking through Siberia to us
pansy Vancouverites.  It was our first time at the Centre and it was
quite an intimate place, only holding 150 people.  The lights dimmed
soon after we sat down and a girl (the opener) came on and…surprised
us with some of her poems.  She was gesticulating and emoting all over
the place, yelling out her neo-beat poetry while Tim and I were
shifting uncomfortably and grimacing.  Thankfully this only lasted for
two and a half minutes.

Then right after the girl left the stage, the lights changed, and the
band went to their places.  Jandek , looking like an extraterrestrial
in a black suit and hat sauntered across the stage to his guitar.  No
one applauded or made any noise of any kind.  It was like seeing some
mystical animal in the woods and not daring to scare it off.

Then the music started, and it was as if I had a concussion.  Jandek’s
detuned guitar and vocals with the band providing noises, drones and
random battering sent me into a trance.  I had many mini-dreams (I
even had the feeling of doing a backflip right in my seat once) and
when I would wake up, the music was so free-form and persistent that
it was hard to associate with anything.  They were like discordant
lullabies.

The other musicians had an unusual array of instruments. The bass
player would make her bass feedback and drone the entire time and she
would sometimes play it with knives (bad-ass), the EMS synth player
would huddle over his device making high pitch noises, a girl playing
with a modified zither would make it screech to high heaven and the
drummer, bassist and zither player would all treat their instruments
periodically with large bows.  I wouldn’t have been surprised if the
synth player used a bow on his synth, too.

However, this was not without interruption.  About ten people got up
to leave.  I assume those people had no knowledge of what they were in
for.  There was also a moment halfway through the set where the sound
guy yelled from the back to the band, “Hold on, stop playing you guys,
I just have to fix this.”  The audience looked around and laughed
quietly while Jandek stared at the floor waiting.  What the sound guy
could’ve been talking about is that usually every event of Jandek’s is
being recorded and released by Corwood (probably as Vancouver Monday),
so there was probably a problem with the machine.  After a very
strange minute, the guy said, “Okay, you guys can just go ahead and
play.”  And the band started up again, sending me right back into that
trance.

Even though there were breaks signifying that these were 11 individual
songs, and I caught great snippets of lyrics like, “I’m think about
food…what do I eat?…I’m thinking about work…Do I really have to do
that?” the whole thing seemed to blend.  The band ended their set and
walked off, with Jandek leaving last through the curtains while the
audience sustained their applause.  Afterwards, we got to take an
up-close look at the instruments.

I’ve been to experimental shows before, such as Ornette Coleman
blasting out harmolodics with three bass players behind him and Koichi
Magikami playing a solo set with vocals, theremin and Jew’s harp, but
I don’t think any of them have ever felt this alien before.  I would
compare Jandek to the freer work of Sun Ra or Harry Partch.  All of
them are very clearly humans and just clearly playing objects that
make noises, but what is about them playing with those little
noisemakers that catches something so otherworldly?

-Julian “Microtonal Lovers Unite!” Bowers

Jandek and the band playing

A close look at where Jandek played

–

–

Julian will be performing at the Kingfisher Bluez Christmas parties, this Friday and Saturday.

Here is Julian’s latest Shiny Diamonds Studio video! Watch Julian abuse our intern, Spencer hate on hippies, and Jamie claim that we aren’t the greatest shame of his career and life. If anyone from pitchfork.com is reading this, please don’t send hordes of sweater-wearing, ironically-moustachioed 17 year olds to kill us.

We cuddled up:

and here’s a picture of the whole band!

5:30 AM. I am home. Spencer and Jamie sleeping upstairs. WE ARE DONE.

DONE

DONE

DONE

Stay tuned for more info on our newly completed album, “A Histriony Of Violence”.

Good night! Truly tired.

-Tim

Hey, everyone. Well, it’s the last day. We’re all basically skeletons now, and Tim has started speaking in tongues. The atmosphere here is one I can only describe as “Lord Of The Flies-ish”.

But mixing is well underway, and we’re just about done here. A new video featuring interviews with Spencer, the nameless intern, Jamie and the whole band will be up soon enough. Hopefully, we won’t be crying during it.

Below are photos of yesterday. Enjoy!

-Julian

Tim’s drawing of Jamie

Quinn’s the first to go

Sucking up to the producer

We killed Miles

3am blog update. All done recording! We start mixing in the morning so wish us luck!

Here is Julian’s newest video!

Hey, everyone. Once again in the studio. Miles and Calen have disappeared into the warp zone under the sink in the bathroom, but we’re continuing on without them. If you’ve heard anything from them, please let us know. However, the album’s really coming together now, as most of the guitars, bass, drums and vocals are done. All we need now are effects and mixing. Hey, maybe we don’t need Miles and Calen anymore. Guys, if you are reading this in some parallel universe, thanks a bunch!

Below is a heartwarming photo of the band using Calen as a footrest.

-Julian

Loyal servant Calen providing comfort