[WATCH] UNIFORM | SHAME

From 'Shame,' out now: https://geni.us/Uniform_Shame Director + Producer: A.F. CORTES Cinematography: Diego Cordero Art Direction: Sonia Foltarz SFX Makeup Artist: Shannon Rae Mulligan Very special thanks: Camden Elizabeth + Nicolas Lopez A Neuplot Production. https://unifuckingform.bandcamp.com/ https://www.facebook.com/uniformnewyork/ https://twitter.com/uniform_nyc https://www.instagram.com/uniform_nyc/

[LISTEN] DELCO | UNIFORM

What if the antihero in your favorite film or book had no chance to repent, reconcile, or redeem himself? There’s no victim to rescue. There’s no evil to thwart. There’s no tyranny to turnover. Instead of saving the day against his better judgment, he just walks a Sisyphean circle of existential malaise doomed to repeat yesterday’s vices without the promise of a better tomorrow. Rather than tell this story on the screen or on the page, Uniform tell it on their fourth full-length album, Shame. The trio – Michael Berdan (vocals), Ben Greenberg (guitar, production), and Mike Sharp (drums) – strain struggle through an industrialized mill of grating guitars, warped electronics, war-torn percussion, and demonically catchy vocalizations. 

“Thematically, the album is like a classic hard-boiled paperback novel without a case,” says Berdan. “It focuses on the static state of an antihero as he mulls over his life in the interim between major events, just existing in the world. At the time we were making the record, I was reading books by Raymond Chandler, James Ellroy, and Dashiell Hammet and strangely found myself identifying with the internal dialogues of characters like Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe.” 

“I wanted my words to carry a degree of weight on this record,” he says. “Books and cinema have always been integral to my life, and that is often because of how I relate to the themes and characters therein. I am naturally shy and terrified of being misunderstood. This time around, I endeavored to trudge through those fears in order to explicitly articulate what goes on in a dreary corner of my inner life. To put it plainly: I was in a dark place. It was the culmination of years of thinking everyone in the world was wrong, but me. I realized that I couldn’t control the attitudes and behaviors of other people, but it was my responsibility to look inward and fix what was there. I had to articulate what was going on in my heart, my head, and my soul. As I set about the task of writing everything down, I experienced exorcism. If I wanted any kind of reprieve, I had to let go of the narrative that the demons in the back of my head had been constantly whispering to me. For years I held onto my lyrics like personal diary entries. Now is the time for a different approach.” 

This record marks the debut of Mike Sharp on drums, adding a natural fire to the engine. His presence grinds down their metallic industrial edge with a live percussive maelstrom. Once again, Greenberg assumed production duties behind the board at Strange Weather. Building on the approach from their last LP, the band perfected the powerful hybrid of digital and analog, electronic and acoustic, synthetic and actual that has become their hallmark. In another first, mixing duties were not handled by Greenberg, but rather handed off to the inimitable Randall Dunn at his studio Circular Ruin. Of this decision Greenberg says, “On ‘The Long Walk’ we took a big step in adding live drums and guitar amplifiers. It was a stylistic departure but it had actually been the plan for years, we were just waiting for the right time to execute. The next logical step with ‘Shame’ was to hand off the Mix phase of production. An alternate set of ears in the Mastering phase is crucial to gaining a wider perspective and creating a powerful end result, I wanted to find a similar constructive collaboration but earlier in the process. Randall was the obvious choice, he has long been a teacher and mentor to me; Berdan, Sharp, and I have some all-time favorite records bearing his name. Randall and I have also worked in the control room together many times before - the Mandy OST, and co-Producing the recent Algiers LP ‘There Is No Year’ for example - so we already had an established workflow and shared aesthetics.”

The opener “Delco” fuses guttural distortion to haunting chants buttressed by muscular percussion. Short for “Delaware County,” the track reflects on Berdan’s upbringing in a suburb west of Philadelphia and “how beatings and bullying by these local hellraisers taught (him) how to keep his guard up and navigate a violent world.” Elsewhere, the jagged thrashing of “Dispatches” nods to “Alan Moore’s Batman: The Killing Joke and how thin the margin between personal stability and total collapse is.” Neck-snapping riffs kick “Life in Remission” into high gear as a spiteful scream spirals towards oblivion. 

“The song is about people I’ve been close to who passed away and how I’ve become numb to death. A lot of these songs have to do with an internal dialogue and overwhelming sense of fear, uselessness, and dread constantly whispering at me, ‘You’re not good enough. Give up and join those you’ve seen disappear and die.’” 

The near eight-minute “I Am The Cancer” closes the record, as Berdan adopts the perspective of “The Judge” from Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian, going so far as to crib his proclamation, “God is war; war endures”. In many ways, the title track “Shame” cements the core of the album with unhinged instrumentation and a brutal bark. 

“It’s about self-medication not working anymore,” he admits. “This person is so tortured by internal ghosts from the past. He winds up pouring alcohol on his grief and guilt until he’s drowning. It was partially inspired by a Twilight Zone episode called Night of the Meek about a drunk, helpless department store Santa Claus who wants to make a difference, but feels incapable of doing so. That story has a happy ending. We’ll see about this one.” 

It may not be pretty, but Uniform’s story is most definitely real. “All I can say is, I’m glad this exists,” Berdan leaves off. “It felt like something we needed to create. Just completing it is enough for me.”  

credits

Releases September 11, 2020 on Sacred Bones Records

[WATCH] Caleb Landry Jones - The Mother Stone short film by Jacqueline Castel

Created around the Caleb Landy Jones album The Mother Stone

Available here

Statement from Director Jacqueline Castel: 

"I got a call from Caleb at two in the morning back in January and flew to Los Angeles a few days later with no plan and nothing but a 16mm film camera tucked beneath my arm when I arrived at the front steps of Valentine Studios. What resulted is a dreamlike portrait of Caleb's creative process, a collage of surrealist poetry, impromptu performance, and childhood recordings that reveal an intimate, fleeting glimpse into his strange and beautiful world." 

Directed, Shot, & Edited by Jacqueline Castel 

Music by Caleb Landry Jones 

Art by Katya Zvereva 

Produced by Nic Jodoin at Valentine Recording Studios 

Thanks to Caleb Braaten & Aldona Watt

RUIN RADIO X SACRED BONES RECORDS JUNE MIXTAPE 2020

RUIN RADIO X SACRED BONES RECORDS JUNE MIXTAPE 2020

Tracking listing below:

Black Magic - Possessed 

Wings of Hate - Blanck Mass 

Spit It Out - Pharmakon 

Supernaut - Thou 

Soak - Zola Jesus 

No Where’s Where Nothing’s Died - Caleb Landry Jones 

Hungry For Love - Marching Church 

Estranged - Marissa Nadler 

The Mouth - Hilary Woods 

Destructive Field (featuring John Carpenter) - Daniel Davies 

The Pain (instrumental) - The Soft Moon 

Snake Eyes - Trouble 

Dark Matter - Jozef Van Wissem & Jim Jarmusch

Marissa Nadler & Stephen Brodsky // Droneflower

Droneflower is in bloom. The new collaboration between Marissa Nadler and Stephen Brodsky (Cave In, Mutoid Man), is a sprawling and expansive exercise in contrasts. It is the sound of the war between the brutal and the ethereal, the dark and the light, the past and the present, and the real and imagined.  

Brodsky met Nadler for the first time in 2014 at Brooklyn’s Saint Vitus Bar when he came to see her play on her July tour, and they quickly became friends. Both of them had been wanting to explore songwriting that didn’t fit into their existing projects, and they soon became energized by the prospect of working together. One of the first ideas they discussed was a horror movie soundtrack, and while Droneflower isn’t that, it is a richly cinematic album. It’s easy to imagine much of the record set to images, though it wasn’t composed that way. 

The first song that came together was “Dead West,” based around a beautiful acoustic guitar piece Brodsky wrote while living on Spy Pond, just outside of Nadler’s home base in Boston. By the time they started working on the song earnest, Brodsky had moved to Brooklyn. Nadler added lyrics and vocal melodies remotely, and even from a distance it was obvious there was real kismet in the collaboration. 

All the songs on Droneflower were recorded in home studios, and they throb with the frisson of that intimate environment. For much of the recording process, Brodsky would stop by the ramshackle studio that Nadler set up in Boston whenever he was in town visiting family. Songs like “For the Sun” were written on the spot there, lyrics and all. The lush ambient pieces “Space Ghost I” and “Space Ghost II” began as Brodsky piano compositions and were later fleshed out by additional instrumentation and Nadler’s inimitable vocals. 

Nadler and Brodsky also recorded two cover songs for the album — the epic Guns n’ Roses power ballad “Estranged” and Morphine’s beguiling “In Spite of Me.” Since childhood, Nadler had been transfixed by the “Estranged” video where Axl Rose swam with dolphins, and she and Brodsky breathe new life into the song here. Their take on “In Spite of Me” is invigorated by a guest appearance from Morphine saxophonist Dana Colley, who ironically didn’t play on the original recording but is indispensable on Nadler and Brodsky’s version.  

credits

Releases April 26, 2019

https://marissanadler.bandcamp.com/

[LISTEN] An Attempt to Draw Aside the Veil // Jozef Van Wissem and Jim Jarmusch

The latest collaboration between the experimental lute player and acclaimed director is another thematically heavy work of powerful minimalism. Van Wissem’s lute traces the outlines of subdued electronics and ominous guitar drones laid down by Jarmusch. It’s an album that sees two formidable collaborators complement each other brilliantly. Listen to the first single, “Concerning the White Horse,” and preorder the album. It’s out February 8.

'An Attempt to Draw Aside the Veil,' out Feb. 8. Preorder: https://www.sacredbonesrecords.com/pr... The 'Only Lovers Left Alive' director and composer reunite for their fourth collaborative studio album together. Jozef Van Wissem: http://www.jozefvanwissem.com/ https://www.facebook.com/jozef-van-wi... https://www.instagram.com/jozefvanwis... Jim Jarmusch: https://twitter.com/jimjarmusch

[WATCH] MARISSA NADLER // Said Goodbye To That Car

Said Goodbye To That Car 

From the album For My Crimes 

To buy or streaming, http://hyperurl.co/formycrimes 

Released September, 2018 on: Sacred Bones Records, Bella Union Records 

Video directed and animated by Marissa Nadler Song 

Produced by Lawrence Rothman, Justin Raisin, Marissa Nadler 

Song written by Marissa Nadler 

Guitar, vocals, background vocals- Marissa Nadler 

String arrangements Janel Leppin Mastered by Heba Kadry

Exploded View // “Dark Stains”

"Born with the baggage of our forefathers or alternatively, the blessings of our ancestors, we are the sum of our parts, of our experience; results of our birthing. Nature and nurture; we were slid down a shoot, to end in a mystery realm, gifted or burdened, chance will decide. 

Dark stains is a song about a body who sees in themselves the errors of the past, yet flaunting behind the veils of inheritance, fails to take full responsibility for the present; that which they are, the movement of their own hand, in the here and now. "But we can break this..." 

To what extent can we break the cycles, repetitive patterns deep engrained, that we were born with? Can we trust to be protected by the cotton beds that we were blessed with? Or restricted forever more by the ceilings that we came to earth beneath? Nothing is permanent. This too shall pass."

Dark Stains by Exploded View From 'Obey,' out September 28 on Sacred Bones Records.

Preorder: http://hyperurl.co/ExplodedViewObey

John Carpenter, Cody Carpenter, and Daniel Davies // Halloween: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

When the new Halloween movie hits theaters in October 2018, it will have the distinction of being the first film in the canon with creator John Carpenter’s direct involvement since 1982’s Halloween III: Season of the Witch. Carpenter serves on the new David Gordon Green-directed installment as an executive producer, a creative consultant, and, thrillingly, as a soundtrack composer, alongside his collaborators from his three recent solo albums, Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies.

The new soundtrack pays homage to the classic Halloween score that Carpenter composed and recorded in 1978, when he forever changed the course of horror cinema and synthesizer music with his low-budget masterpiece. Several new versions of the iconic main theme serve as the pulse of Green’s film, its familiar 5/4 refrain stabbing through the soundtrack like the Shape’s knife. 

The rest of the soundtrack is just as enthralling, incorporating everything from atmospheric synth whooshes to eerie piano-driven pieces to skittering electronic percussion. While the new score was made with a few more resources than Carpenter’s famously shoestring original, its musical spirit was preserved.

PRE-ORDER ONLINE HERE

Zola Jesus // Exhumed

From 'Okovi,' out September 8 on Sacred Bones Records.

Preorder and download "Exhumed" instantly

Bandcamp: https://zolajesus.bandcamp.com/album/...

iTunes: http://hyperurl.co/Okovi_iTunes

http://zolajesus.com/

https://www.facebook.com/zolajesusoff...

https://twitter.com/ZOLAJESUS

Ihttps://www.instagram.com/zolajesus

Video glitch by Corey Johnson (http://artoftheglitch.com)