Two posts in one day - what's going on!

Continuing with their series of archival NZ material (Axemen, Above Ground...), Siltbreeze have released a second 7" from Vacuum. This is 4 tracks of previously unreleased material taken from cassette recordings. As the SIltblog says "For the uninformed, Vacuum were the genesis, the ground zero, the guys that forged the ChCh "sound"...Before Flying Nun, before ANYTHING, there was Vacuum. " Limited to 300 copies, so may not be around for long...

For the time being, I've shut down the shopping cart on the site and am instead going to start using http://discogs.com to list items for sale. I have about 100 items listed now; more will be coming. You can see what I'm selling here: http://www.discogs.com/sell/list?seller=paul-c.

There's a new Dead C album out on Ba Da Bing - Patience, the band's first release in a couple of years. It's all instrumental, 4 tracks ranging from under 2 minutes to over 16, and one of their finest releases in a while. The sound harks back to "classic" Dead C releases like Trapdoor Fucking Exit or Harsh 70s Reality but taking it in new directions. The publicity blurb lays it out: "Patience captures a restless band who never settle into any form. The trio of Michael Morley, Bruce Russell and Robbie Yeats are able to make their improvised music sound like the most substantial thing ever recorded, no matter in what direction they go.

It's been a while—there's a new Gate LP out this August, on the Ba Da Bing! label.

After a few initial listens to a pre-release version, I'm kind of sold on it. It's a cleaner sound than a lot of the earlier releases, but the vocals might be the weak point here. Morley doesn't have the strongest of voices, and here, with his voice not as obscured/blended by the murkiness of the sound (as on say The Dew Line) you're a lot more aware of this. Still, some good sound construction at work here; if you've spent any time with his other music you should "get" it.