All regular priced NEW CDs and LPs are 20% off through end of day Monday. If you haven't had time to get over here lately, or if you've got a list of the latest records you've been meaning to pick up during these busy May release weeks, OR if you want to special order some items we don't have in the shop, now's the time! Just mention the sale at checkout and 20% savings is yours. This one's just for you, our loyal email readers. (Sale excludes sale items and other promotions.)
MEMORIAL DAY HOLIDAY HOURS:
Sunday 11AM-5PM
Monday 11AM-5PM
NEW THIS WEEK AT THE SHOP:
Now, about that new stuff!
Scottish synth-pop stalwarts Chvrches set loose their 3rd album this week. 'Love Is Dead' is another uncompromisingly gleaming affair that coats vocalist Lauren Mayberry's caustic lyricism in a laser beam of glittery pop. We've got this one on clear vinyl while it lasts. We've also got a very entrancing new album from Tracyanne and Danny, the songwriting team of Tracyanne Campbell of Camera Obscura and Daniel Coughlan of Crybaby, who venture a bit out of their customary territory on a rather timeless-sounding duet LP (Nancy and Lee, Isobel and Mark, Flo Morrissey and Matthew E White all spring to mind here). We've got this one on CD, LP, and limited 'Peak Vinyl' version with colored wax and a bonus 7".
Loud stuff this week rumbles through from Graveyard, Neurosis, and the long lost Jay Reatard/Eric Oblivian band Bad Times. We've also got a cool new disc from a band called Brownout, an El Michels Affair-adjacent group of dudes doing a heavy psych reinterpretation of Public Enemy's 'Fear of a Black Planet'. Trust us, it works! We've also got colored vinyl copies of the latest SLEEP album back in stock!
We've been eagerly anticipating these deluxe Wire reissues ever since they were announced at the beginning of the year, and man oh man, do they ever deliver. The legendary postpunk innovators had a direct hand in these thorough archival overviews of their world-shaking initial trio of albums, 'Pink Flag', 'Chairs Missing' and '154', and it shows. Each set includes the remastered album, plus extra discs of singles, b-sides, non-album tracks, demos, and other rarities. These are packaged in a hardback book full of essays, interviews, photos, and track-by-track analysis from all four members of the band. In a few weeks time, we'll see standalone LP reissues of these three crucial albums, but these deluxe sets are the only way to get the extra biz.
Some big rap releases in this week. Milwaukee's own (at one point) experimental rapper Milo sees his in-demand 2013 mixtape 'Things That Happen At Day/Things That Happen At Night' hit vinyl for the first time. We've got a killer new album from Blu and Nottz, a long overdue LP version of Ghostface and Apollo Brown's 'The Brown Tape', and a fresh pressing of Digable Planets' massive 1993 statement 'Reachin'.
Couple turn of the century classics are back on colored vinyl this week. Two early, impossible to find albums from Destroyer, 'Thief' and 'City of Daughters', plus the inimitable emo-songwriter Pedro the Lion's debut album, 'Its Hard To Find A Friend'.
Bjork delivers a fresh EP for her track 'Arisen My Senses', which includes remixes from hot producers Lanark Artefax, Jlin, and Kelly Lee Owens. Thomas Bartlett and Nico Muhly's 'Peter Pears' is very lovely, elegant pop that channels traditional Balinese gamelan. Estonian newcomers Holy Motors unveil their debut album, 'Slow Sundown' is a very heady take on a unique blend of shoegaze and old western noir (plus a little bit of Mazzy Star). Artsy crooner Agnes Obel brings her installment in the Late Night Tales mix series, a very cool potpourri of unreleased tracks and odd wonders from Yello and Lena Platonos.
Jazz delights of yore that never go out of style are back this week. We have two smoking archival live releases from the legendary guitarist Grant Green, 'Funk In France' and 'Slick!'. The Numero Group takes yet another left turn with 'Technicolor Paradise', a sprawling 3-disc compilation of obscure exotica from the 50s and 60s. Think Les Baxter, but much more Numero-ish. Nothing against Les, of course. We have a fresh, wonderful brick from the Sun Ra wall in the house this week. 'God Is More Than Love Can Ever Be' is a Saturn rarity from 1979 that showcases a more tender, contemplative side of Ra in a basic trio. Last up, a curiously strange live album from Jef Gilson collaborator Lloyd Miller, whose Persian-influenced take on post-bop jazz is so uniquely rad that originals of this LP go up into the four figures.
Two titans of the avant-garde have comprehensive collections hitting the racks this week. Can founder, mind expander, constant reinventor and Very Important German Holger Czukay (recently passed on to a better place) is honored with a massive vinyl boxset covering all of his significant non-Can projects. These were some of his most signature, ground breaking works, many of which are not easy to come by nowadays in any physical format: 1969's sound collage work as 'Canaxis', solo albums like 'Movies', 'Die Osten ist Rot' and 'On The Way To the Peak Of Normal', plus his many fruitful collaborations with folks like Jah Wobble, Jaki Liebezeit, Conny Plank and Karlheinz Stockhausen. The aptly named 'Budd Box' collects the seminal ambient composers classic albums 'The Serpent (In Quicksilver', 'Abandoned Cities', 'The White Arcades', 'By The Dawn's Early Light', 'Music For Three Pianos' and 'Luxa', across 6 discs plus a book compiling interviews, essays, poems and archival photos.
It's a remarkably flush week for fresh releases from the fringes of the world's esoteric electronic musicians. These all get the highest recommendations: an expanded version of Swedish chanteuse Virna Lindt's 1984 debut 'Shiver', early 80s spacious minimal synth from Montreal's Cham-Pang, a collection of unreleased work by Serbian-born, Brazil-inspired producer Rex Ilusivii, whose vivid if brief career covered all the ground between proto-industrial and ambient-samba, a stunning collection of rare trad/tribal/techno fusion from 80s Germany called, yep, 'Tropical Drums of Deutschland', unreleased music for dance from American composer (and Patrick Cowley bandmate) J.A. Deane that straddles the worlds of Jon Hassell and David Van Tieghem, and a very deep restoration of an obscure late 80s cassette by Australian synth explorer Ian MacFarlane called 'Planetarium'.
The continually impressive Seance Centre label blesses us with two seriously elevating archival releases. Joanne Forman's 'Cave Vaults of the Moon' comes from late 80s art installation music, and is bracingly pure new age folk. Much the same but very different is Sam McClellan's 1983 private press rarity 'Music of the Five Elements', a healing sound journey that expertly blends John Fahey's flk exploration with Tony Conrad's minimalism. We've also got beautiful new/old ambient albums from 7FO, Visible Cloaks, Ambienti Coassiali, CFCF, The Ivy Tree, Robert Haigh, and Lucrecia Dalt.
We cap it all off with some killer new techno EPs from SW & SVN and ANF, two duos with much more going on than their names imply. The B-Sides to Moby's seminal album 'Play' are in the house on LP. We've also got fresh restocks on essential Japanese experimental pop and avant from Hiroshi Yoshimura, Yasuaki Shimizu, and Mariah!
USED VINYL ALERT:
MONROE STREET CONSTRUCTION UPDATE:
MG&E has finally finished their electrical upgrade that severely limited our side street free parking. Most of those restrictions have now been lifted with the final no parking signs in the 1900 block of West Lawn expiring this Friday, May 25th. Hooray for free parking and thank you for making the trip to come and see us; we appreciate it!
DIRECTIONS FROM REGENT/EAST:
From Regent Street:
Continue on Regent through the Monroe St intersection
Turn Left on SPOONER ST
Turn Right on West Lawn or Keyes
Turn Left on Harrison St.
We are on the corner of Harrison & Monroe Streets (the street level parking lot outside of the Trader Joe's doors is a public City of Madison lot & the side streets all have FREE 2 hour parking.
MONROE STREET IS OPEN FROM THE WEST
SELL US YOUR CDS & LPS:
NEXT MUSIC TRIVIA TUESDAY JUNE 5TH:
Our next MUSIC TRIVIA at the High Noon Saloon is Tuesday, June 5th. Registration starts at 5:30 with the first question from Angie and Marty at 6PM. Save the date for July 10th!
OTHERS TALK BACK:
This isn't the spot to lay down odds on the third race. OTB is where Others Talk Back and give you the lowdown on what they've been feeling lately. This one's for the customers.
Tracyanne & Danny – “Tracyanne & Danny”Tracyanne is from the Scottish band Camera Obscura and Danny is from the English band Crybaby.Even if you have never heard any of the bands that Tracyanne and Danny are in before, you have to hear this album. The performers have returned back to the early and mid-sixties as the inspiration for this project.And the sound and style of those times is conjured up perfectly on this album.One would swear that you were in 1964 listening to some faraway AM station blasting the latest sounds for the UK.It certainly helps their situation that both Tracyanne and Danny are both masterful songwriters and have the knack for fitting those skills into the three minute sixties pop format.“Tracyanne and Danny” isn’t a pastiche of the past, but is done from love and a deep sincerity for the music of the sixties.
Quiet Slang – “Everything Matters But No One is Listening”Beach Slang is a punk band from Pennsylvania who have released two albums to date.What separates Beach Slang from their punky contemporaries is their strong songwriting.Quiet Slang is Beach Slang’s prime songwriter, singer and guitarist James Alex, along with a small ensemble consisting of a piano and a cello and, at times, a small choir.Mr. Alex takes songs from the two Beach Slang albums and recasts them with a chamber-pop sound.And thanks to the songwriting of the Beach Slang songs the project succeeds quite well.Not many songs can take the naked spotlight that sparse classical arrangements could shine on them.“Everything Matters But No One is Listening” is such a strong album, that one would want to hear the original Beach Slang records and compare the two.
Bombino – “Deran”Bombino is the name of the band and the nickname of the singer, main songwriter and guitarist of the band.Omara “Bombino”Moctar was born in Niger and the band has released five prior albums through several different record labels in this country.It appears that the band has finally found a stable label that could promote this wonderful music to the fullest.Bombino is one of the masters of the genre aptly called desert music.The music features sinewy and snaky electric guitars weaving themselves through the rhythms of traditional Niger percussion and drums.And the songs are sung in the Turag language.The electric guitars and the rhythms almost instantly draw the listener in, and after a time one would think that what is being heard is compelling and engaging and not as exotic as it really is. “Deran” is a master class in desert music and is a fitting introduction to this music for a novice.
Ron, Ryan, Angie, Marty, Evan, Matt, Michael, Ben, Will, Ed & Isaac
This website uses cookies to personalize content and analyse traffic in order to offer you a better experience.
