Blue Cadet-3: A Music Blog by Josh R.

  Dreamend - Maybe We’re Making God Sad And Lonely (2005) My copy: 2010 reissue on peach with blue haze vinyl by Graveface Records. Dreamend is the work primarily of Ryan Manon (AKA Ryan Graveface) who is known both for running the Georgia based record label Graveface records and for contributing guitar to indie/electronic band Black Moth Super Rainbow. Manon’s 2005 record is slow and haunting, borrowing mostly from modern sects of post-rock and slowcore. While some production and writing choices create a few bumps in the road, Maybe We’re Making God Sad And Lonely is impressively both frail and full with ghostly melodies and crescendos.  Mysterious delayed guitar trips over a 3 / 4 drum pattern on opener “A Place In Thy Memory.” Glockenspiel is added early on, but it is doused in enough reverb that its inclusion is mostly inoffensive here. The tender waltz of guitar continues until the song falls and reinvents itself several times, with each soft reboot ripping away at th...

  Madlib - Shades Of Blue (2003) My copy: 2023 remastered reissue by Blue Note and UMe. Cult hip-hop icon Otis Jackson Jr. (AKA Madlib, Beat Konducta, Quasimoto, etc.) owes much of his career to his love of jazz music. Building his name by fusing obscure jazz samples into snappy beats, Madlib struck a deal with legendary jazz outpost Blue Note Records to release a collection of remixes of anything he desired from the label’s back catalog. The resulting album - Shades Of Blue - is a quaint playground of subtle melody, elevated by additional instrumentation and hypnotic mixing techniques.  Interspersed throughout the record are interludes and shoutouts, giving Shades Of Blue a special late-night radio program vibe that pairs well with Madlib’s rearrangements. Swinging bass and quiet vibraphone adorn “Slim’s Return,” with low end being bumped up just enough to match the pace set by the hip-hop record scratching and vocal ad-libs. Madlib highlights the original sentiments of t...

  Built To Spill - Keep It Like A Secret (1999) My copy: 2014 reissue by Music On Vinyl.  Doug Martsch’s second record for Warner Bros. saw the band attempting to streamline the grandiose melodic weaves of Perfect From Now On, focusing more on rapid-fire indie-psych jams with punchy hooks and brighter tones. While Keep It Like A Secret feels less patient and perhaps less elegant, it is arguably the more meticulous album for cramming many prog-like structural changes into shorter songs.  “The Plan” rockets up and crashes down like an extreme see-saw, shedding cleaner tones for splintering effects that shift the mood away from its initial light-heartedness. The split-second attitude changes are an integral feature here, as they give the album a unique personality compared to the longer, more calculated songs of the previous album. “Center Of The Universe” is a bending and irresistible groove with a perfectly snarky vocal performance from Martsch, whose voice suits both ...

  Slowdive - Slowdive  (2017) My copy: 2017 press by Dead Oceans. Whether it be the result of pop culture growing more interested in dreamy melodies or merely coincidental whims, the modern shoegaze revival has lured a number of notable 90s acts out of hibernation. Slowdive and Ride both reappeared in 2017, though dazed and half-awake with the fangs of their youth filed down into a more marketable smile. That’s not to say that there is nothing of value in these projects, and Slowdive itself manages to be deeply impressive in its early moments - it unfortunately stumbles from there, but proves that the band does still have an ear for enrapturing production.  The echoing fields of synth and guitar that spiral all across “Slomo” lift the listener into a gentle high, like the brief moments of euphoria that coincide with the onset of dizziness. The production of the drums and bass are warm and engrossing, with overlying soundscapes that befit the gentle yet careening motio...

  The Pop Group - Citizen Zombie (2015) My copy: 2015 press by Freaks R Us. Over 30 years had passed since The Pop Group’s dark, primitive and engrossing debut - a record so bold and distinctly paranoid that it still stands as a beacon of influence in the realm of post-punk music to this very day. Then 2015 came, and with it new material from Mark Setwart and company. Citizen Zombie : a record that conversely basks in lavish pop arrangements, shoving dissonance and syncopation to the backseat. Citizen Zombie does have highlights, for catchy melodies and skeletal guitar compositions, but this is mostly a vexing and poorly produced venture into strange territory.  The title track kicks off with echoed wailing and booming drums; its bright chorus made all the more obvious by a gaggle of background singers. The movement and energy is good - transforming between ballad and pop-meets-industrial shuffling, though the actual production is jarringly clean and lifeless. “Mad Truth” ...

  Oneohtrix Point Never - Garden Of Delete (2015) My copy: 2015 press by Warp Records. Daniel Lopatin’s popular back catalog often focused on slow, meticulous cultivation of atmosphere - occasionally weaving in distorted samples of TV ads or warped speaking. Garden Of Delete pushes the production side of Lopatin’s work to the core focus, with maximalist IDM jigsaw puzzles that twist samples into stilted, restless arrangements of glitched out melody. “Chopped and screwed” is perhaps too light for what Lopatin has done to the handful of pop music samples across Garden Of Delete, perhaps “warped and fucked” would better fit this strange and dystopian reimagining of popular culture.  The album immediately opens with uncanny vocal samples that have been shifted in pitch and stretched into demonic mutterings - then “Ezra” whisks us off into OPN’s new world of sample-based projections of rhythm. “Ezra” is mostly stunted with unintelligible singing that has been affected to sound ...

  Animal Collective - Animal Crack Box (2009) My copy: 2009 box set by Catsup Plate. Standing as a holy grail of sorts for diehard Animal Collective fans, the Animal Crack Box is a vinyl-only collection of rare live recordings and demos from the band's early years, limited to a single pressing in an edition of 1,000. The recordings are mostly lo-fi MiniDisc captures of live shows or practice space rehearsals, and yet exciting moments are strewn all across this 3LP expanse.  The first LP focuses on noisy and chaotic tracks from the Danse Manatee and Hollinndagain eras, featuring early performances with Geologist. The recordings are crude and barebones, but the vibrating textures of “Jimmy Raven (The Living Toys)” create a hypnotic momentum along with compelling falsetto howls. The bass drone of Danse Manatee’s “Ahhh Good Country” balances out the pulsating alien waves of pseudo melody, with drums that stumble and crash about before building impressively. “Iko Ovo” is a rare...