David Payne - Feedback 53

Middle James Company is/was one of the greatest ever tape labels. Period. I am so lucky to have been around and buying MJC over a decade ago. This isn't one that I own, it was gifted by a friend. Thirty brilliant minutes that only saw the light of day in an edition of 13 in 2009.

sometimes genius is hiding in plain sight

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Cremation Lily - It's OK To Say No

Controlled high end to the point where it feeds back, sampled drums and shouty business from the brilliant "Zen Zsigo".

Be Supportive.

Just Say No!

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Derek & the Ruins - Saisoro

 

First album by the legendary Derek Bailey on guitar and the Ruins' Masuda Ryuchi and Tatsuya Yoshida on bass and drums, a combination that seems inevitable and thankfully lives up to expectations. Released in 1995 on Tzadik.

Derek & the Ruins - Saisoro

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The Maytals - Never Grow Old

I assume that Trojan history left Funky Kingston out of the equation. If that's the case then this is the missing release of the previous box set. This is very early and you clearly get the Ska chops, there's Rocksteady, a hint of their Gospel roots and a bit of 50's R&B / doo-wop. Toots and the people that sailed with him coined the word and (arguably) created the style of Reggae. This is a key stepping stone in the evolution of Jamaican music.

Originally released as an LP on Clement "Coxsone" Dodd's Studio One in 1964, this is the Heartbeat Records CD reissue from 1997 that has four bonus tracks.

they never will

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Toots & The Maytals - Roots Reggae: The Classic Jamaican Albums

"The box set includes six of the seven Jamaican albums the group (as "The Maytals" and "Toots & The Maytals) released before signing with Island Records in 1975." Except that it doesn't. Pre-1976, neither of the two versions of Funky Kingston are here and there is one other key omission.

A box set I bought 15 years ago.

The Classic Jamaican Albums

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Toots & The Maytals - Funky Kingston

I choose not see much of my family. I seem to have escaped before the gene pool dried up and it seems pointless to bother. However, in a weak moment on Friday I got drunk with my brother (when will I ever learn) and at a certain point of the night I was playing this whilst he tried to impress me with his phone accessed conspiracy theories that Covid doesn't exist, BLM and Extinction Rebellion are terrorists (he is black btw ... just saying ... false consciousness in action) and all kinds of other bullshit. I woke up the next morning to find out that Toots had contracted Covid and ended up in an Intensive Care Unit where he died. I would rather it was my brother so that the global IQ could increase by a small percentile so that we all had a better chance.

This is basically a reworked compilation of a prior compilation ... Mango not Dragon. It's from 1975.

Funky Kingston

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Tear Ceremony - Film Decay

 

Lovely drone by Texan artist Todd Gautreau, who also records as Tapes and Topographies, Sonogram and Crushed Stars. Released as a CD on his own Simulacra label in 1998.

Tear Ceremony - Film Decay

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Suburbia Melting - Street After Street

 

Another CDR from 2008, this time released by Scarbox. The Italian label only existed for a couple of years, but they put out some good noise by Seed Mouth, Astro, Kylie Minoise, Bloody Letter, Fecalove, Kenji Siratori, Mutant Ape and others. 

Suburbia Melting - Street After Street

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Suburbia Melting - Self Defense

 

2008 CDR by Andrew Quitter (who also records as Regosphere, among other aliases), released on a German label called Soundo Maso Records in an edition of 78 copies. 

Suburbia Melting - Self Defense

 

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Seed Mouth - 99 Pieces

 

Double disc album by Seed Mouth/Hirohito Taneguchi, released by Scarbox in 2008.

Seed Mouth - 99 Pieces

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Saint Francis & the Christmas Donkey - How Saint Francis Tamed the Very Fierce Wolf of Gubbio

 

Much better than the silly title might suggest, this is the only available album (as far as I can tell) by psych/drone/noise artist Ben Collins, released as a CDR on Thor's Rubber Hammer in 2007. The label existed for five years and was run by American public radio personality Lars Gotrich. 

Saint Francis & the Christmas Donkey - How Saint Francis Tamed the Very Fierce Wolf of Gubbio

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Macronympha - Macronympha Vol. 1 - American Chaos

It's an appropriately prescient title for these end of days times. However. This marks the start (or end) of the most impressive collections of "American Noise" that I can currently conjure to mind. Classic 90s Macronympha that you probably haven't heard before unless you have the tapes or your first name is Joe and you used to work very closely with a bloke called Rodger (or vice versa ... see, nothing gets past me). When the second wave hits, do yourself a favour and play all 18 tapes back to back ... never mind drinking bleach or shoving fluorescent tubes up your fundament, this will sort it right out.

Another set of six C46s released on Mother Savage Noise Productions in 2015.

Fuck

Trumps

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va - Дичь Авангарда - A Cross-Cultural Compilation Vol. 1

 

Excellent Russian compilation CD released in 2002 by Insofar Vapor Bulk, featuring (as you might have guessed from the title) noise from Russia and elsewhere, sometimes in collaboration. Features The Haters, Roughage, Erinys, Streicher, De Fabriek, Cotton Ferrox, Nocturnal Emissions, Cisfinitum, Nomusic, Kallibris, Kapotte Muziek, Ultra Milkmaids, Leif Ellgren, Alexei Borisov and more. The album's design was very strange, and challenging to store on a shelf without damaging it. It came in a digipack, but the front cover was deliberately cut at an angle, as if it was attempting to fly away from the spine and tray. I don't think there was ever a volume 2. 

va - Дичь Авангарда - A Cross-Cultural Compilation Vol. 1

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Fossils - Four Cassette Box

Funnily enough, this is four cassettes. In a box. Another tape set that I posted nine years ago and have recently done some work on to improve the sound to the casual indifference of all.

Eight live recordings from 2008 released on Middle James Company in the same year.

Repeating History

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Dead Traveller - Plays the Ghost

 

Strange album of ghostly field recordings made in Greece at the end of a weekend carnival. Dead Traveller is Nicholas Malevitsis, who ran the Absurd, Harsh Dept, Noise-Below and A Question of Re-Entry labels. This CDR was released by Kururuku Records in 2008. 

Dead Traveller - Plays the Ghost

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Fossils - Black In Black BoxXx

I've been listening to a lot of Middle James Co. / Hermitage Tapes style loveliness recently and my mind lurched back to this post from over nine years ago. It's a collection of tapes released on MJC in 2007 in an edition of 11. I've gone back and made some tweaks to the original rip and it sounds so much better than before so if you got it then, get this instead. Casual observers of the blog ... walk away now.

Anyway, in anticipation of me reposting this in 2020, DP dropped the following descriptions into the comments just to save me the mental effort:

"middle james co. is proud to present...4 x cassette box set

mjc140-143 fossils "black in black boxXx" nonstop onslaught from this Hamilton collective can you dig it?

mjc140 c90 ~ home spun jams ghetto style to tape at mjc hq summer/fall 2007 ~

core trio of Payne, Johnson & Buchan shoot to thrill= tapes destroyed guitar crunching metal horn ripping decay~train garage garbage can vibes~ hiss and swirl of fire tornado

mjc141 c90 fossils family; mixed-up bag of cuts and bruisers ~ various incarnations from the dogs boneyard.~.

recorded to tape in various locations in Hamilton...\\duo to four-piece always wtf---fossils3 welcome Steve Smith (Thousand Year Frog), Johnny Scarr (Mantile),Darcy Atkinson (Autoerotic Asphyxiation) and/or Josh St. Denis(Ghostfood) ~~~ jungle junk & zoo drool~ storm of rambling roadside puzzles feedback flutes and fruits steeping time guts of trilobites casting stoned lost at sea lost in noise pollution swallowing wandering.

mjc142 slomo weirdoh back to black recycled tape. DJ Payne-cake remixx~

heavy icing drips can't hide what's inside~ undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined undefined underwaterwalking friends symbolize certain darkness rolls in rolls by blueroommachines and electricity a streets rain covered grey sky drainage with insects

mjc143 c20 ~ total akktion zombie--

takin out the trash complete mess mash crust breakthrus remix of mjc114 "zombie black" tape in Fag Tapes Action Mono style // seperate cuts in either speaker - listen simultaneously or seperate. 3 tapes in 1 ! dirty worms can crawl"

History

Repeating

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Macronympha - Macronympha Vol. 2 - Amplified Pittsburgh

It's those men again ...

Another set of six C46s courtesy of Mother Savage Noise Productions in 2015.

Amplified

Pittsburgh

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Reed : Rage - Rules

The aforementioned providing the best ten minutes that you will experience this month without having to pay a lot of money in advance ....

C10 released on !MONDO ANTHEM! in 2019 in an edition of fifteen.

Duck And Cover

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Nihilist Assault Group - Saturation Point X

My favourite assemblage of capricious minstrels!

If you look beneath the balaclavas (that no doubt come in very handy in our hazy Covid days) two of these tracks are Richard Rupenus (The New Blockaders etc ... obviously) with Stan Reed and William Rage (of the eternally brilliant Blue Sabbath Black Cheer). The other track is RR with Mike Gillham of Smell & Quim etc) and Allan Zane (who with Richard and Stan is part of the latest incarnation of Mixed Band Philanthropist but has his own shit sorted).

C40 released on Mr Rage's !MONDO ANTHEM! in 2019. There were 10 copies of this that came with a shortish dvdr ... nope, don't ask ... you'll make me cry.

Nihilist Assault Group Assemble!

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Macronympha - Macronympha Vol. 3 - Extreme Havoc

A broad selection of classic 1990's era Joseph Roemer and Rodger Stella. Previously released but impossible to find work sitting next to things that have never seen the light of day prior to this. Nuff said really.

A six tape box set released on Mother Savage Noise Productions in 2016.

Extreme

Havoc

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