Posts Tagged ‘ Rangda ’

Rangda: March 4, 2016 Saint Vitus

March 8, 2016
By

Rangda
[photos by PSquared Photography]

When the first Rangda record, False Flag, arrived in 2010, it was a transmission out of the multiverse—from an alternate reality where Corsano, Bishop, and Chasny wielded their instruments for evil instead of good. The roaring cacophonies bore titles like “Waldorf Hysteria,” “Bull Lore,” “Fist Family,” “Sarcophagi,” and “Serrated Edges” (to literally list in order the first five of the six songs on that record), ensuring that Rangda was not for the psych-tourist or those with pacemakers. At the time, who knew if these three could sustain this cosmic energy, or even find overlap in three busy touring schedules to make Rangda more than a one-off supergroup.

Two albums later, even if they aren’t the most prolific band out there, Rangda is sticking around. 2012’s Formerly Extinct softened their approach only slightly, trading in the instrumental clash for interlocking rhythms and something resembling rock songs. Their latest, The Heretics Bargain, continues on that trajectory, making Rangda downright palatable. Songs like “The Sin Eaters” and “Spiro Agnew” sound upbeat, anthemic even. But if the album itself isn’t proof Rangda is drawing the newly-initiated, last week saw the band play their largest yet NYC venue and crowd, with a set focused most-heavily on Formerly Extinct and the new material.

False Flag is here represented by the sole “Bull Lore.”  Formerly Extinct by “Majnun,” “Silver Nile,” “Idol’s Eye,” “The Vault,” and “Plugged Nickel.”  From The Heretic’s Bargain, it’s “The Sin Eaters,” “To Melt the Moon,” “Spiro Agnew,” and the song nearly as long as its title, “Mondays Are Free at the Hermetic Museum.” For opening night of their tour, the band is on fire. I can only imagine the many realities ahead.

Rangda may be coming to your very hometown! Full tour dates over at Drag City.

I recorded this set from our usual location at Saint Vitus, the room mics combined with a board feed from FOH Nick. I mixed those two sources, favoring the room sound. The quality is outstanding. Enjoy!

Download the complete show: [MP3/FLAC]

Stream the complete show:

Rangda

Rangda
2016-03-04
Saint Vitus
Brooklyn, NY

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by Eric PH

Soundboard (engineer: Nick) + AKG C480B/CK61 > Roland R-26 > 2xWAV (24/48) > Adobe Audition CC (align, mixdown, compression, normalize, fades) > Izotope Ozone 5 (EQ, exciter) > Audacity 2.0.5 (downsample, dither, tracking, tagging) > FLAC (16/44.1, level 8)

Tracks [56:36]
01. Majnun
02. The Sin Eaters
03. Bull Lore
04. [tuning]
05. To Melt the Moon
06. Silver Nile
07. [tuning]
08. Idol’s Eye
09. Spiro Agnew
10. [tuning]
11. The Vault
12. [tuning]
13. Plugged Nickel
14. [tuning]
15. Mondays Are Free at the Hermetic Museum

Support Rangda: Buy The Heretic’s Bargain and other records from Drag City

Sir Richard Bishop: April 10, 2015 Union Pool – FLAC/MP3/Streaming

April 28, 2015
By

Sir Richard Bishop
[Photo from Boston 2011 by Tim Bugbee/tinnitus photography]

To say Rick Bishop is peerless among contemporary guitarists is a bit of a half-truth. Along with his brother Alan Bishop (aka Alvarius B), they continue in the tradition of their long-running band Sun City Girls, who covered every genre of music imaginable. Rick Bishop’s solo music isn’t quite as wide-ranging but his body of work is massive, composed largely of solo guitar songs often steeped in the inflections of Indian and Middle Eastern music. And yet he always sounds like himself—his playing with Sun City Girls, as a solo guitarist, and as one-third of Rangda is inimitable. In a recent interview with Premier Guitar, he says of his craft: “My style is a mish-mash that comes out of improvisation, with mistakes and everything along the way. I never worry about what the style is, and whatever comes out, comes out.” Born of a love affair with a nineteenth-century guitar, his latest album for Drag City, Tangier Sessions, features seven improvised songs recorded in a room in the Moroccan city on a handheld Sony PCM D50 digital recorder. It’s a true collaboration, not between musicians but between a musician and the history of a truly singular instrument. The story of the album is the story of how Bishop was bewitched by this guitar and he’s spoken about it recently in interviews as well as in the appropriately titled “Guitar Talk” video promoting the album.

Bishop stopped by Brooklyn’s Union Pool on his ongoing tour for Tangier Sessions, bringing along the famed instrument. To see and hear Bishop play this guitar in person is simply jawdropping. His guitar musings, whether structured songs that have appeared on albums or in-the-moment improvisations, are brought to life in vivid detail by this guitar and his deft playing. Bishop improvises often, sometimes trading on a phrase or theme of a recorded song, and I’ve done my best to identify what I could. The most recognizable tracks are “Safe House” off Tangier Sessions and “Abydos” off Fingering the Devil. “Maqam” (if I hear him correctly) appears to be an improvisation named after a type of melody in Arabic music.

In addition to playing improvisations and a couple of his solo tracks, Bishop treats us to three Sun City Girls songs and each is indicative of that band’s irreverent humor: “Porno Shop” (from Horse Cock Phepner)  is about the closing of a porno shop for ostensibly moral reasons; in “Six Kids of Mine” (from Dante’s Disneyland Inferno) a father at the end of his rope resorts to infanticide; and in “Bitter Cold Countryside” (also from Dante’s Disneyland Inferno) a town bands together to murder a carpetbagging preacher. From Bishop’s “NPR shit” (his words!) to the absurdity of the Sun City Girls tracks, the crowd is with him all the way knowing full well that it’s not often you get to see a Sir Richard Bishop show like this.

I recorded this set with the AKGs mounted to the balcony and a board feed from Union Pool FOH Leah. Despite some ambient noise from the bar—inevitable for a quiet show like this—the sound is excellent and I only hope that it does justice to Bishop and his guitar. Enjoy!

Bishop is currently rounding out his US tour and will hit Europe next. Dates here.

Download the complete show: [MP3] | [FLAC]

Stream the complete show:

Note: All of the material on this site is offered with artist permission, free to fans, at our expense. The only thing we ask is that you download the material directly from this site, rather than re-posting the direct links or the files on other sites without our permission. Please respect our request.

Sir Richard Bishop
2015-04-10
Union Pool
Brooklyn, NY

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by Eric PH

Soundboard (engineer: Leah) + AKG C480B/CK61 (FOB, LOC, PAS) > Roland R-26 > 2xWAV (24/48) > Adobe Audition CC (align, balance, compression, mixdown) > Audacity 2.0.5 (amplify, fades, downsample, dither, tracking, tagging) > FLAC (16/44.1, level 8)

Tracks [55:10]
01. Zurvan
02. [banter/tuning]
03. Esoterica of Abyssynia
04. [tuning]
05. Mystic Minor 23
06. Porno Shop [Sun City Girls]
07. Six Kids of Mine [Sun City Girls]
08. Safe House
09. Nowhere Over the Rainbow
10. The Pillars of Baalbek
11. Bitter Cold Countryside [Sun City Girls]
12. Mekong
13. Abydos

Support Sir Richard Bishop: WebsiteFacebookBuy Tangier Sessions from Drag City

Rangda: January 9, 2015 Baby’s All Right – FLAC/MP3/Streaming

January 13, 2015
By

Rangda

Rangda is the dream team of psych, bringing together three titans, each with equally impressive credentials: Sir Richard Bishop, guitar (Sun City Girls, Brothers Unconnected); Ben Chasny, guitar (Six Organs of Admittance, Comets on Fire, 200 Years, New Bums); and Chris Corsano, drums (Flaherty-Corsano Duo, Flower-Corsano Duo, Thurston Moore, Sunburned Hand of the Man, and the list goes on indefinitely from there). Each is independently responsible for his own staggering discography and so their team-up conjures lofty expectations.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Rangda is more than the sum of its parts. Performing live, each member inhabits his own third of the stage, hardly looking up from his instrument; and yet there is a communion among them that is unseen, intangible—it’s spooky action at a distance. These live renditions are largely faithful to their studio counterparts, oscillating between wild frenzy and repetitive motifs drawn from eastern psych ragas. Bishop’s and Chasny’s guitars rage and duel, Corsano’s drums provide context and setting for that drama to unfold.

We caught up with Rangda playing an early Friday evening set at Baby’s All Right as part of a two-date jaunt to coincide with recording a new album. Here, they play songs from both proper Rangda albums, False Flag and Formerly Extinct, and add a longer song that’s either brand new or a modified take on “Gracilaria,” which appeared on a split 12″ with The Dead C. From False Flag, they do “Bull Lore” and the longform set-closer “Plain of Jars,” which builds to a noisy catharsis before resolving into a rhythmic, repetitive guitar jam. “Majnun” and “Night Porter,” both off Formerly Extinct, come off as riffs on some of Sun City Girls’ more accessible, song-oriented material.

We unfortunately weren’t able to get a feed from the room mics, but luckily the stereo house feed from Baby’s FOH Rubes is more than adequate. The sound is outstanding and allows you to hear each guitar in its own channel (that’s Chasny left, Bishop right), just as it sounded in the room. This one sounds great on headphones. Enjoy!

While there are no further Rangda dates scheduled for now, each have upcoming solo dates and/or releases. Chasny’s new record as Six Organs of Admittance, Hexadic, is out February 27 on Drag City and a tour in support of it is scheduled. Bishop’s new record, Tangier Sessions, is also due out February 27, and is also on Drag City. Corsano has a host of upcoming dates, with Ava Mendoza, Joe McPhee, and others.

Download the complete show: [MP3] | [FLAC]

Stream the complete show:

Note: All of the material on this site is offered with artist permission, free to fans, at our expense. The only thing we ask is that you download the material directly from this site, rather than re-posting the direct links or the files on other sites without our permission. Please respect our request.

Rangda
2015-01-09
Baby’s All Right
Brooklyn, NY

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded by Rubes Harman
Produced by Eric PH

Multitrack Soundboard (engineered and recorded by Rubes Harman) > 2 x Mono WAV(48/24) > Audacity 2.0.5 (fades, EQ, balance, amplify, downsample, dither, tracking, tagging) > FLAC (level 8)

Tracks [50:04]
01. Plugged Nickel
02. The Vault
03. Bull Lore
04. [New Song]
05. Majnun
06. Night Porter
07. Plain of Jars

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Rangda. Buy False Flag and Formerly Extinct from Drag City.

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