Mondo Bungle

SPK - Zamia Lehmanni: Songs of Byzantine Flowers, 1986

Following the group's early harsh industrial music and sandwiched between two more pop oriented albums, already a drastic shift in itself, is this album. And it's almost like a miracle in many ways. It has a beauty about it that words really can't do justice, and while it combines subtle influences from their other material, it is a far cry from that and pretty much any other artist's work.

A fitting title, as the music here has a somehow Byzantine quality to it, as if you could really apply the term to sound. That aesthetic shines through in the neoclassical undercurrent that sweeps away the tribal/industrial ambient stylings, giving it a feel unlike anything else entirely.

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Mondo Bungle

Alpinist - minus.mensch, 2009

Among the greatest and most essential examples of neocrust (translation: false and melodically brutal artcore for posers). The whole scene is marked by Tragedy and His Hero is Gone plagiarism combined with screamo and dark crunchy post rock atmospheres. Extra poser credentials for the groups that incorporate strings (see: Oroku, Ekkaia, Nux Vomica, Fall of Efrafa, Downfall of Gaia, Cwill, Dead to a Dying World)

as is well known among ***s like me, false genre > true genre like 95% of the time, and you can't spell neocrust without at least two letters of the word epic.

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Mondo Bungle

Bassnectar - Mesmerizing the Ultra, 2005

Not sure to what is owed the injustice of this album's ratings but it's some of the most imaginative sounding breakbeat to ever be broke. It transcends breakbeat really, doesn't sound much like it at all, with an omnipresent sheen of chillness and bouncy sound carbonation. The production is completely distinct and spellbinding.

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Blarobbarg

This is good ****. I'm gonna save this to listen to later.

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Mondo Bungle

Usurp Synapse - Disinformation Fix, 2003

I explored the harshest sorts of screamo early on, and this album is such a vicious ripper.



Reversal of Man - This is Medicine, 2000

After Orchid and Circle Takes the Square, RoM was like my third screamo band. Another shredder but more riffy and erratic with the tempos.



Noisy Sins of the Insect - Discography, 2007

Totally random and Turkish screamo that puzzles me to think I've loved it for so long.

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Mondo Bungle

The Olivia Tremor Control - Black Foliage: Animation Music Volume One, 1999

Easily the best release from the Elephant 6 label, blows In the Aeroplane Over the Sea out of the water. The Olivia Tremor Control were perhaps the most experimental of the bunch aside from of Montreal, with a good emphasis on field recordings and other such collages of whimsy. The album goes all over the place but never ever loses its flow from neo psychedelia to bits of musique concrete and back.

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Mondo Bungle

NEU! - NEU!, 1972

I like NEU! better than Kraftwerk, the former is a more complete package. Kraftwerk's earliest pure krautrock material is great, and so is their electro oriented music to come, but NEU! do it all at the same time. It is amoebic.



Stereolab

Quite impossible to leave just one album here, so Stereolab gets a full spot. Their music emanates a bliss so retro-contemporary and loving and warm. They're like a drug (Sha La La). They make time stand still to bless upon the soul a euphoria unattainable in the passing of seconds inside daily life, and leave you rejuvenated and glowing, knowing that no time has been wasted in the meantime, and life moves on a bit longer.



Flying Saucer Attack - Flying Saucer Attack, 1993

A force of great insurgence of neo-psychedelia and an almost enlightened journey. How anyone could listen to this and not experience anything short of aural ecstasy is beyond me. A sonically sacred descendant of Spacemen 3 and the like, but this ritual has a deeper and organic message.

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Mondo Bungle

Plutocracy - Dankstahz, 1992

If ever a band should be revered, Plutocracy are a good way to go. Very old school deathgrind that manages to be off-kilter and unstoppable.

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Mondo Bungle

Nanuchka - A Carefully Planned Accident, 2006

Cuz this album means more to me than a tiny blurb in the other journal allows. Of course anything of this ilk is bound to be fantastic but Yula's voice is something of another world.



The World/Inferno Friendship Society - Red-Eyed Soul, 2006

Probably along with Devotchka as a top perennial cabaret punk group ever, and this is their most realized opus.



Mischief Brew - Smash the Windows, 2005

MB would get lumped into that whole edgy folk punk scene by way of association but they truly stand above the rest in pretty much every regard. Heavy assortment of eclectic instruments, virtuosic ability and songwriting, great voice, original. They work many styles into their brand but a gypsycore air remains constant. Erik Petersen's death came as such an immense shock to me, and had it's bit of impact because his music has played an important role in the development of my being.

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Mondo Bungle

time for some of the other Nick Cave albums



From Her to Eternity, 1984

I guess it could be natural that this debut album is unquestionably the most difficult in the catalog, hot of the madness of the late Birthday Party. A bunch of elements still remain, with no-wavey guitar skronkage and a general form of formlessness, but also incorporated now is some off kilter blues and long and meandering, harrowing minimalistic bouts of terror and catharsis.



The Firstborn is Dead, 1985

The blues is in full effect on this album now. Raw and downtrodden atmosphere and among the groups best tracks with the constantly rolling drums and frantic guitar of Tupelo



Your Funeral, My Trial, 1986

The first album where it became clear that branching out was indeed inevitable. Early in this transition more eclectic influences are surfaced, somewhat more of a gothic air, but still holding onto the early and menacing stylings. I think The Carny is my favorite track here, for whatever reason. It's more of a tale of a song, in the way of older brooding ballads like A Box for Black Paul. It goes strangely hard in a way I can't quite articulate. Gloom and crash.



Tender Prey, 1988

Logically the pinnacle of creativity thus far. This album of course expands their style to something quite original. It's got the gothic rock, the blues, the ballads, the intimidation, and now bundled together with art rock and industrial influences. All this makes for a very realized album. Plus it contains perhaps their best track, and one of the most badass and epic ever written by anyone, with The Mercy Seat.



Let Love In, 1994

After Tender Prey the band tried on a softer approach with the Good Son, then another thorough and succinct and all around rocking go with the previously mentioned Henry's Dream. Let Love In just continues the logical evolution and is regarded often as a definitive work. It's quite lovely, if you will. Very full of it. It lets it in. Hypnotic and deep.



Murder Ballads, 1996

Stylistically still in the vein of its predecessor, with heavy focus on atmosphere and story telling. Opens heavily with the immense and cavernous Song of Joy, it's deep from the start. A lyrical showcase here that demonstrates the versatility of the songwriting, from chilling and heartbreaking to humorous and ridiculous and generally vulgar, it all makes me happy. Stagger Lee and O'Malley's Bar are pretty much as gangster as it gets.



Abattoir Blues / The Lyre of Orpheus, 2004

No More Shall We Part is perfectly painful in all the best possible ways, another soft ballad oriented album with great writing all around. After that came Nocturama, which is good too, surely, but it was followed by perhaps the group's most eclectic release in their entire arsenal with this double doozie. Overall an artsy and folksy bit of coolness with satisfying noise rock elements coming through over vast arrangements of instruments both acoustic and electric, and even some gospel here and there with choirs for days.

I luv

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