RARE LIVE 17 PYGMIES PERFORMANCE IN BOSTON!!

17 PYGMIES will be performing live for the first time in over 15 years at PA's Lounge, Somerville, MA on Friday May 25th.
345 Somerville Avenue
Somerville, MA 02143
8:30 p.m.
617-776-1557
For advance tickets go to:
www.paslounge.com

Sharing the bill is the talented, indie rocker Randi Russo and Amolvacy (from Volcano The Bear).

It should be a fun night and we are all looking forward to seeing Boston for the first time!

SEPIACHORD PICKS "Squadron Sighted" for Song of the Day

12:50 am
4/25/07

sepiachord
4/25 Song of the Day
"Squadron Sighted" by Del Rey & the Sun Kings is the Sepiachord song of the day.
Del Rey & the Sun Kings

http://sepiachord.livejournal.com/

MICK MERCER REVIEWS "FOREVER FREE"

THE SPIRIT GIRLS
FOREVER FREE
End Is Here

Some people are so out there you’re genuinely glad you’re not with them, and this is the case with these surreal harpies. Creating a record which is fascinating rather than enjoyable they present something of an experience, which will have you gawping at the lyrics and staring at the confusing images of circus folk and bears and cows, of girls with a deathly pallor, making sure you have all exists covered. These people could be anywhere, and you wouldn’t know it.

At first all seems calm enough with ‘Anthem For Ophelia’ with twittery, swirly synth, a strong hazy vocals sound and drifting cello, especially as it slowly gathers form, shunts forward rhythmically somewhat severely, while the vocals really press forward, like a resentful ghost. Vinegary Ethereal with bluster you might say, and I wouldn’t contradict you. ‘Milk Maid appears, as simple a bleary wilting folk song about a cow as can be imagined, with other sounds slopped in to fill up the spaces. ‘The Hunted Little Green Grass Girl’ makes you realise they’re not quite on the same territory as kitsch melodic terrorists Flaming Fire, but utilising wobblier sub-dance squiggles, with brash, blaring guitar and genuinely weird vocals, big and slow. A quiet, almost graceful farmyard sing-along. Why?!!

‘Comforting The Bears’ is even stranger, with sweeping lines coursing through a serious synth moan, tough splodges of drums splattering morose detached indie and an oddly demanding vocal drone. ‘Small Town’ is instrumental, from buzzy atmospherics to a collision of crumpled drums and angry, determined guitar which is suddenly all there is there. ‘Airstream Dream’ could be an ethereal grunge experiment by Patti Smith, except that it questions why you’d question a pig bottled-fed by a clown. (“You think you’ve lost your mind It was gone all the time.”)

‘Haunted Horse’ clomps away dowdy and cloudy, ‘Graveyard Song’ sets idle, twanging high guitar to a fog of distorted vocals; a convincingly bare artistic drama, and then ‘Song For The Spirit Girl’ is almost a conventional delight of mottled, brooding pop with yammering vocals., vibrant grubby guitar, captivating strings and strident drums. ‘The Ship Gong’ disappoints as a farewell song, being a bit drab, but by then you’ve withstood it all and feel pretty damn virtuous.

So if you’re concerned for the whereabouts of women capable of setting up a nativity scene in a miniature replica of the Bates Motel don’t worry. They’re here.

http://www.marnieweber.com/spiritgirls.html - great pics!

ITALIAN MAGAZINE BLOW UP REVIEWS "13 BLACKBIRDS" & "BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN"

If you can read Italian, enjoy!

Thank you Blow Up for your support...

17 Pygmies
13 Blackbirds / 13 Lotus • 2CD Trakwerx [www.trakwerx.com] •
30t-129:22
Del Rey & The Sun Kings
Battleship Potemkin • CD Trakwerx • 16t-70:33

È durata poco la pausa che si sono presi i 17 Pygmies: solo 19 anni. Ma dacché la ragione sociale non è altro che un moniker dietro cui si nasconde Jackson Del Rey (nome d'arte di Philip Drucker) è difficile definirla uno scioglimento a cui segue un'inaspettata reunion. Quindi oggi l'uomo che fu una delle colonne dei Savage Republic torna in pista col progetto personale e lo fa proprio mentre riemerge anche la band che fu di Bruce Licher, per giunta in arrivo dal vivo proprio qui da noi (occhio però che da quel che ho capito mancano sia Licher che Del Rey): che si torni a parlare ancora una volta di 'trance californiana'? Troppo lungo recuperarne la memoria nello spazio di una recensione (vi rimando a BU#58 per saperne di più), considerate solo che i 17 Pygmies ne erano la componente più folksy e delicata, a tratti quasi eterea. A quel tempo Del Rey s'accompagnava con Robert Loveless e Debbie Spinelli, oggi con un mucchio di vari ed eventuali tra cui spicca Tanya Haden (violoncello) ma il concetto, se non i risultati, sono molto simili: "13 Blackbirds / 13 Lotus" è un disco di canzoni folk cameristiche dalle punte classicheggianti e dagli arrangiamenti molto moderatamente elettronici. Il canovaggio si ripete con minime variazioni per tutte le tracce, arrivando a punte d'eccellenza quando la voce (sono tutte femminili ma musicisti non sono accreditati) è più corposa e negroide che par di ascoltare un gospel ultraterreno (accade con la splendida Precious Hearts On Fire) o se s'aggiunge una cauta batteria elettronica e quindi la metafisica è quella di un trip hop alla Dead Can Dance (Lotus). Tutto il CD, evanescente e impalpabile, è comunque estremamente suggestivo: quando rilascia un esangue, delicatissimo folk in punta di piano (Water Carry Me), quando s'abbandona sulle ali di un unico violoncello (923 History), quando scivola sulle acque di una limpidissima fonte barocca (Ubi sunt), quando una fisarmonica lo trasporta sulle rive del Danubio (Heavenly Creatures). E poi, visto che il tempo perduto è stato veramente molto, Del Rey ha voluto fare le cose veramente in grande e ha inserito un secondo CD titolato "13 Lotus" in cui sono stipati 70 minuti di Lotus in tredici differenti versioni remix con ospiti come Lea Reis (la mixer di Tupac) lachanteuse newyorkese Jo Gabriel. Facile immaginare come suonino: battute più o meno basse e ammenicoli elettronici ma anche notevole differenziazione. Si va dalle versioni etno-dub del Runch Mix e del Distressed Mix agli outer beats dello Squeezebox Mix e di Beloved Mind Glitch, dalle prove dance titolate Electropygmies LA Adventure e Broken Lotus Living Mix a quelle astratte e ambientali di Siren Lotus e dell'Electric Mermaid Mix, dalle scariche d'elettricità di A Lotus On New York Streams alla minimal techno del Floating Petals Mix. Nel complesso "13 Blackbirds / 13 Lotus" si dimostra quindi un ritorno di veramente grande spessore, forse riservato ai pochi che ricordano la scena di riferimento ma almeno per loro un immancabile scrigno di sorprese. E non finisce mica qui. Del Rey è così in forma che se ne esce anche con un altro disco titolato "Battleship Potemkin", nel quale omaggia il classico film muto di Eisenstein redigendone una personale soundtrack (ovviamente strumentale). Non è facile capire i titoli e i nomi dei musicisti che prendono parte al CD - le parole sono tutte traslitterate in caratteri cirillici - ma la musica, almeno quella sì: in larga misura sono suoni cameristici di vaga ascendenza etno-folk che starebbero benissimo in un disco dei Rachel's (The Men and The Maggots, The Odessa Staircase) e che, detta la funzione di soundtrack, talvolta si muovono come marce (Drama In The…, Join Us Brothers!) o commenti ambientali (A Happy Day In The City) o mastodonti in odore d'industrial (la formidabile The Ship Guns Roared, veramente troppo breve) o bozzetti chitarristici rinascimentali (Meeting With The…). La più bella musica strumentale ascoltata da molto tempo a questa parte e stupore per il rientro di Del Rey a questi livelli.
(8) secco a entrambi i dischi. Stefano I. Bianchi

Outsight Radio plays Trakwerx releases

3/11/2007 7-9:00 pm

17 Pygmies - "Lotus" Original Mix
The Spirit Girls - "Milk Maid"
The Spirit Girls - "anthem For Ophelia"
Del Rey & The Sun Kings - "The Men & The Maggots"
Del Rey & The Sun Kings - "Main Title"

Thanks OUTSIGHT RADIO!!!



http://www.outsight.mu/playlists/playlist_393_348.html

Rear Window Radio plays "LOTUS"

ON AIR!!!

Featured This Week

james brown syndrome - snakes of god
the strange - utah living
patrick shea - in
battle creek - the lion's tail
the ride theory - hey sugar
say ah! - call you name
jerry leger and the situation - winch the killer
raha - tick tock diner
aaron stout - the coronation
lokixximo - bundlemouth
gay for johnny depp - shhh, put the shiv to my throat
hermajesty - open up your arms
apes and androids - radio
nervous cabaret - grand palace of love
a place to bury strangers - ocean
kendra foord - bloody cabaret
alabaster theatre - average man
accepting silence - growing up
asado - endure
sam chown - untitled
17 pygmies - lotus
william campbell - regret school
stone foundation - coming up for air
pony da look - dirty nails
the unibrows - i'm lazy
windchimes - the mayor is dead
ian mcglynn - how did i get here
fisher kane - razor sharp claws
leviride - night of the drive-by
the postage stamps - to no one

Thanks for the music.

Enjoy the show and spread the word!

Ian & Mike
Rear Window Radio
not in london Productions
www.notinlondonproductions.com

EAR CANDY Reviews "Forever Free" & "Battleship Potemkin"

Music Reviews: March 2007
The Spirit Girls,"Forever Free"
(Trakwerx / End Is Here Records)

This album has one disturbingly freaky looking cover. I thought for sure I had a cd full of hardcore or nu metal songs by a female version of Slipknot or something. But, as the case may be, I was way off the mark. This gets a bit weird at times but it’s much mellower than Slipknot. This band project grew from a rock opera by noted L.A. artist Marnie Weber. The opera is about a group of ghost girls on a journey to find a place to perform their songs and tell their stories. The music is much more like the soundtrack to a surreal dream or nightmare. Favorite track: “Comforting The Bears”. _www.trakwerx.com _
Rating: 3 out of 5 (Moments of Brilliance)
Review by J.R. Oliver


Del Rey & The Sun Kings,"Battleship Potemkin" (Trakwerx)
Director Sergei Eisenstein was a man with a vision. He wanted a new score to be written every ten years for his silent film Battleship Potemkin. His thinking was that this would keep the film updated enough that subsequent generations would enjoy his work. Eighty three years later we have the latest score to hit the masses. Admittedly, I have not seen the film but the first thought I had after listening was that it sounded like the soundtrack to the raising of the Titanic. Well, if the raising of the Titanic had a soundtrack. This is intense. _www.trakwerx.com _
Rating: 3 out of 5 (Moments of Brilliance)
Review by J.R. Oliver

Amazing Sounds Reviews Trakwerx Releases!

THE SPIRIT GIRLS:
"FOREVER FREE"
Trakwerx
The Spirit Girls are an interesting band born thanks to a Rock opera created by the versatile artist Marnie Weber, about the ghosts of five girls. The band is constituted by Marnie Weber, Tamara Sussman, Debbie Spinelli, Tanya Hayden and Dani Tull. The image presiding the cover of the album, the first one by the band, where five girls appear in the image of corpses, fits perfectly well with the music, a kind of Gothic Pop-Rock, with mysterious female vocals and dark electronic textures.
ALEJANDRO HINOJOSA

http://www.trakwerx.com

DEL REY & THE SUN KINGS:
"BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN"
Trakwerx
In this interesting album, Jackson Del Rey pays homage to the director of mythic silent movie "Battleship Potemkin", as if it were the soundtrack for the movie. It is soon appreciated that this project has been given the best of creative energy, taking care of even the slightest details, all that in the spirit of this legendary film, and taking into account the artistic guidelines of Sergei Eisenstein. The result is no doubt impressive. The album is overflowing with very original instrumental music, with classical and industrial reminiscences merging in an absolutely natural manner, as well as a great power in all compositions.
EDUARDO FONTANA

http://www.trakwerx.com

17 PYGMIES:
"13 BLACKBIRDS / 13 LOTUS"
Trakwerx
The band 17 Pygmies, which became a thorough success in the 1980's, has returned after 17 years of silence, with this new double album. In the new stage of the band we find Jackson Del Rey, Jeff Brenneman, Louise Bialik, Meg Maryatt, Jean Sudbury, Tanya Haden and Jacquie James. The work, displaying a careful presentation which includes graphic art with an impressive effect of weathered photograph where only true mildew is missing, tends towards a Pop-Rock with Gothic trends, but we also find experimental touches, dark electronic textures and a suggestive orientation toward neofolk and romanticism.
ALEJANDRO HINOJOSA

http://www.trakwerx.com