Tag: Noise Rock

Categories
Vinyl

Vinyl love: Cults “Cults”

(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)

Artist: Cults
Album Title: Cults
Year released: 2011
Year reissued: 2022
Details: Limited edition, 10th anniversary, gold foil, signed

The skinny: Here’s a recent record purchase that illustrates the current state of our vinyl collecting woes. Dream pop duo Cults announced the special edition 10th anniversary pressings of their incredible self-titled debut back in June 2021. I remember thinking the price a bit steep and the projected December delivery date a bit far out but I jumped on it anyways. I had fallen in love with this album back in 2011 and its retro sounding wall of sound escapades. It had been on my vinyl collection wish list for a while and I couldn’t remember the last time I had seen a whiff of it at any of my local record shops. I opted for a the gold foil version and of course, I went for the signed option, given that it wouldn’t cost me anything more. I had nearly forgotten about ordering it when last Christmas rolled around but then, I saw an update on their Instagram account explaining how it was wildly delayed. I completely understood and went on with my holidays. Later news was that it would be delivered in February but then that month sailed by without further updates. I checked in with the online shop in April and was told it was pressed but no shipping date had yet been provided. The band finally received them in June, nearly a year after the reissues were initially announced, and I got mine near the end of July. No harm, no foul, because as you can see, it’s lovely. But between you and me, with the rising costs of these things, the delays, and delivery charges, my purchasing has slowed to a crawl this year.

Standout track: “Go outside”

Categories
Tunes

Best tunes of 2020: #25 Gateway Drugs “Wait (medication)”

<< #26    |    #24>>

Back on Cinco de Mayo, 2015, I went to see Swervedriver perform at the now defunct Zaphod Beeblebrox in Ottawa’s Byward Market. I had been excited to see yet another re-formed shoegaze legend, but as much as I enjoyed their set, I found myself quite surprised to leave the show even more impressed by the opening act.

Los Angeles-based four-piece, Gateway Drugs, had only just released their debut album, “Magick spells” the month before, and they had already toured as support for noise rock and shoegaze icons Ride and The Jesus and Mary Chain. They were led by a trio of siblings – Noa (guitars), Liv (guitars), and Gabriel (drums) Niles – each sharing vocal duties, while the fourth member, Blues Williams, simply looked cool and accompanied them on guitars and bass. The quartet were all in black, leather, furs, and sunglasses and were playing a garage rock infused shoegaze that sounded at different points like early Dum Dum Girls, Brian Jonestown Massacre, and Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. I left the show with a copy of the aforementioned debut album on CD and duly fell in love with it. Its accomplished sound and the pop sensibility that lies just beneath the surface of all those roaring and screeching guitars could easily be traced back to the music surging through the veins of the Niles siblings (children of The Knack’s Prescott Niles).

I was convinced they were going to be huge.

But then, there was nothing but relative silence from the group for almost five years.

Fast forward to 2020, just a few short days after the WHO declared COVID-19 to be an honest-to-goodness pandemic and things started to shut down in earnest, a new Gateway Drugs single appeared, seemingly plucked out of the ether and there finally came the news of the long-awaited sophomore release. I say this last bit with my tongue firmly planted in cheek because perhaps I was one out of only a small handful whose interest hadn’t waned in the interim. This first single really got me excited and that was only multiplied by fifty or so when I learned that “PSA” was produced by The Raveonettes’ Sune Rose Wagner.

“Put myself on a leash, I’d stay
Kill myself just to hear you call my name”

Of course, that first single was none other than “Wait (medication)”, our song of focus today. I’ve read that Liv Niles has called it a reflection on excess, madness, addiction, and how “extreme highs give way to extreme lows.” It’s an apt Coles Notes for the jackhammer drum beat, crunchy bass line, clanging and twangy guitar screams, and the dual vocal assault by Liv and her brother Noa. It is a four-minute salacious stroll down the chaotic and messy trail blazed by the JAMC and the BRMC.

For the rest of the Best tunes of 2020 list, click here.

Categories
Vinyl

Vinyl love: Iceage “Seek shelter”

(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)

Artist: Iceage
Album Title: Seek shelter
Year released: 2021
Details: Limited edition, Indies only, translucent orange

The skinny: I had somehow never heard of Danish rockers Iceage nor listened to any of their music before 2021. However, their fifth album, “Seek shelter”, really grabbed me when I first heard it and after many repeat listens over the year, it wound up at number 9 as part of my 10 favourite albums list when I counted them down in December. Produced by Pete “Sonic Boom” Kember, the nine tracks are reminiscent of the psych rock and the more guitar-heavy side of Britpop that was I big on in the latter part of the 90s. It is massive and eventful music, with a groove that just cannot be ignored. It’s no wonder, then, that early on I decided it was a must for my record shelves and tracked down a copy of this limited edition, translucent orange pressing online. A purchase I do not regret in the least, especially while spinning it and getting lost in the noise.

Standout track: “Shelter song”