Posts Tagged ‘ soundboard ’

Earth: September 24, 2014 St Vitus – FLAC/MP3/Streaming Audio and Video

September 28, 2014
By


earth-9553
[photos courtesy of MaryAnne Ventrice]

According to frontman Dylan Carlson, Primitive and Deadly, the latest album from Seattle veterans Earth, is their best-selling album yet. That’s a big statement for a band that made its name in the 1990s, picking up some possibly-unwanted attention from Carlson’s connection to that other Seattle musician, Kurt Cobain. Or maybe the popularity comes from a hankering for music that is real, that is sweeping without being ostentatious, whose darkness matches the times in which it is made. Or maybe it’s just that good of an album — decide for yourself.

We last caught the band at ATP in 2011, with cellist Lori Goldston sitting in and a full theater to showcase their sound. St Vitus, Greenpoint’s already-legendary nexus for music of the heaviest kind, made for a different but maybe better fit, with the crowd packed in and the deep grooves shaking the walls. The band kicked off with Primitive tracks as expected, with Carlson rather politely introducing the name of most of the songs. This seventy-five minute set contained less than ten songs, in keeping with the band’s predilection toward drawn-out, slow dirge compositions that take their time unfolding. The band ended with a segue from new to old, with “Torn By the Fox of the Crescent Moon” from the new record segueing into their first-ever track, “Ourobouros Is Broken”. Earth continued their New York stand on the following night, and our only regret was not being able to join.

I recorded this set with Schoeps MK4V microphones and a soundboard feed. We are very pleased to also include a full video of the set, featuring my recording as audio, from our friends at unARTigNYC, who more than anyone have helped to document the proceedings going on up in Greenpoint. The sound quality is outstanding. Enjoy!

Direct download of full set: [MP3] | [FLAC]

Stream the full set:

Video of the full set courtesy of unARTigNYC:

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, and feel free to repost the Soundcloud links.

Earth
2014-09-24
St Vitus
Brooklyn, NY USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by acidjack

Schoeps MK4V (LOC, at SBD, PAS)>KC5>CMC6>Sound Devices USBPre2 + Soundboard>>Edirol R-44 [OCM]>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (mix down, adjust levels, compression, fades)>Izotope Ozone 5 (harmonic exciter)>Audacity 2.0.3 (track, amplify, balance, downsample, dither)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks [Total Time 1:15:55]
01 Badger’s Bane
02 Even Hell Has Its Heroes
03 [banter1]
04 Old Black
05 There Is A Serpent Coming
06 [banter2]
07 The Bees Made Honey In the Lion’s Skull
08 [banter3]
09 Torn By the Fox of the Crescent Moon>
10 Ourobouros Is Broken

Band
Dylan Carlson
Adrienne Davies
Don McGreevy

If you enjoyed this recording, please support Earth, visit their website, and buy Primitive and Deadly there.

earth-9562

Tony Conrad: September 5, 2014 Hopscotch Music Festival, Vintage 21, Raleigh, NC – Streaming Full Set

September 28, 2014
By


IMG_7692
[photo by acidjack]

The appearance of Tony Conrad at this year’s Hopscotch Music Festival was one of those once-in-a-lifetime opportunities that makes a festival unique. Conrad is a living legend in a number of out fields, having made his name as a filmmaker, artist, musician, composer, teacher and writer. As a member of the pre-Velvet Underground band Theatre of Eternal Music, Conrad was one of the earliest progenitors of improvisational noise and drone music, making him an influence on a huge number of acts who had the benefit of newer technologies than the gadgets that Conrad built from scratch.

At the Vintage 21 stage at Hopscotch, Conrad began seated with a cardboard box in front of him, onto which he drew a rough circle that he cut out with an Xacto knife. A violin bow, when inserted through that space, created a drone effect that became the centerpiece of Conrad’s first composition. Offering this as a live recording doesn’t really do it justice; to watch Conrad create his art was as much an experiential pleasure as an aural one, if not more so. Conrad then moved to a violin, face painted black, with extra strings hanging off of it, and in drawing the bow across it, created new cascades of noise.

While improviser-in-residence was normally the influenced rather than influencer among the many acts he joined over the weekend, that was not the case when Moore and Conrad got together. The two created a dynamic noise piece that set yet another bar for the weekend. Conrad, almost giddy at his reception by the crowd, seemed almost as pleased to introduce Moore as Moore was to join the master. This was an experience that wouldn’t be repeated, in the weekend, or possibly ever.

I recorded this set with a soundboard feed and Schoeps MK41 microphones. The sound quality is excellent. At the artist’s request, this set is streaming only. Enjoy!

Stream the full set:

Tony Conrad
2014-09-05
Hopscotch Music Festival
Vintage 21
Raleigh, NC USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
recorded and produced by acidjack

Soundboard + Schoeps MK41 (at SBD, DINa)>KCY>Z-PFA>>Edirol R-44 [OCM]>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (align, levels, mix down, compression)>Izotope Ozone 5 (EQ, effects, imaging)>Audacity 2.0.3 (track, amplify, balance, fades, dither and downsample)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks
01 Improvisation 1
02 [banter]
03 Improvisation 2 [w/ Thurston Moore]

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Tony Conrad, learn more about him on Wikipedia, and buy his music on Discogs and iTunes.

The Sharp Things: September 11, 2014 Mercury Lounge – Flac/MP3/Streaming

September 27, 2014
By

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[photos by shootMEpeter]

Of all of the thousands reviews I’ve written for NYCTaper, the words needed to describe this performance by The Sharp Things at Mercury Lounge is certainly the most difficult. But these are just words. What the band did on this night was exponentially more difficult than anything I could imagine a musician would have to endure. On the morning of the performance Steve Gonzalez, the longtime and original Sharp Things drummer and multi-decade friend of the band’s protagonist Perry Serpa, passed away at the age of 49. I asked Perry to talk about the night:

He, Steve Gonzalez, was our drummer but also my best friend of almost 40 years, so he was very much a part of our family. We had found out about his passing during our soundcheck for this show and while I was ready to just walk away from it, my band, our bandmates, our family and friends insisted that we play, and so we did. And it was the best thing because the evening ended up being a wonderful, communal celebration of his life in a place that he loved playing.

The band is gearing up for the release of the third album in the four-album “Dogs Of Bushwick” series. Adventurer’s Inn will be released on Dive Records in November. This special Mercury set featured a mix of older numbers and included a few of the newer songs we’ll expect to hear on the new album soon.

I recorded this set with the Schoeps cardioids set up at the soundboard booth and mixed with an excellent feed provided by house FOH David. The sound quality is superb. Enjoy!

Stream “Daphne’s Coming Over”:

Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

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.

Sharp Things
2014-09-11
Mercury Lounge
New York NY

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard [Engineer: Dave Lefcourt] + Schoeps CCM4u Cardioids > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (level adjustments, mixdown, EQ, set fades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 46:50]
01 [intro for Steve]
02 There Will Be Violins
03 An Ocean Part Deux
04 Dogs Of Bushwick
05 Love Me Indigo
06 Silver Anniversary
07 Storm King
08 [banter – weird beard]
09 Lament-A Million Things
10 Union Chapel
11 Daphne’s Coming Over
12 [outro]

If you download this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT The Sharp Things, visit their website, and purchase their official releases from the band’s online Shop [HERE].

Enemy Waves: September 5, 2014 Vintage 21, Hopscotch Music Festival, Raleigh, NC (FLAC/MP3/Streaming)

September 25, 2014
By

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The hymnal joke you hear at the beginning of this recording relates to this show’s location, in a once-decommissioned church known as the Long View Center, recently recommissioned by one of those “hipster churches” that, well, I’ll just leave it to this article to debate. What needs to be known about this show is that Enemy Waves is brand-new, though its veteran members aren’t, and they make some seriously angular, jazz-inflected, improvisational music. Perhaps that’s one reason Hopscotch Music Festival improviser Thurston Moore chose to draw some much-deserved extra attention to this new group with an appearance on their final number, which felt like one of Moore’s strongest collaborative appearances of the entire festival. It may also have had to do with the deep and weirdly varied resumes of the four members, which includes everything from drummer Jason Aylward’s time in full-on 80s metal outfit Valient Thorr to guitarist Paul Siler’s ownership of the King’s rock club and work with Birds of Avalon, to saxophonist Dave Mueller’s work as Heads on Sticks and multi-instrumentalist Crowmeat Bob’s improvisational playing with Tatsuya Nakatani, Eugene Chadbourne, and others. Bob also played some bass clarinet for the North Carolina-sited HBO TV series Eastbound and Down. 

The band members gelled quickly for a set that was well-attended despite relative remoteness from some of the festival’s other offerings. Hopscotch does a great job of pairing like-minded artists, and the combination of Enemy Waves with Durham, NC guitarist Matt Northrup, ambient act Helm and the vintage noise artist Tony Conrad (who also played with Moore; that recording awaiting approval) gave fans of mind-bending, you-have-to-see-it-live style music a palette that couldn’t be denied. The Waves gave us four tunes total, each of extended length, with my highlights being the sax-focused “Stronach’s Allely / Bleechie” and “Radiant III”, the latter of which closed the show with Moore on guitar. While there isn’t much to hear from Enemy Waves other than the two-song single on their bandcamp page, our hope is that this diverse group of musicians gives us more to enjoy in the future.

I recorded this set with Schoeps MK41 microphones and a soundboard feed. While the design of the church building gives the music a bit of a boomy quality that is hard to avoid, I think it is a very enjoyable listen.

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.

Enemy Waves
2014-09-05
Hopscotch Music Festival
Vintage 21
Raleigh, NC USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
recorded and produced by acidjack

Schoeps MK41 (at SBD, DINa)>KCY>Z-PFA + Soundboard>>Edirol R-44 [OCM]>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (align, levels, mix down, compression)>Izotope Ozone 5 (EQ, effects, imaging)>Audacity 2.0.3 (track, amplify, balance, fades, dither and downsample)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks
01 [intro]
02 Bone Marrow Transplant
03 [tuning]
04 Warriors Tabooed
05 Stronach’s Alley / Bleechie
06 [tuning2]
07 Radiant III*

* with Thurston Moore

If you enjoyed this recording, please support Enemy Waves by visiting their bandcamp page.

The Growlers: September 18, 2014 Bowery Ballroom – Flac/MP3/Streaming

September 25, 2014
By

16_The-Growlers_Bowery-Ballroom
[photo by Daniel Topete – full set at We All Want Someone To Shout For]

This week the Growlers released their fifth studio album Chinese Fountain to universally positive reviews. The album represents the continued maturity of this Southern California “beach goth” outfit. While the earlier records went for a kind of lo-fi scuzz-rock production, the new album is a stylistic shift to a more refined sound. The result is that the songs benefit. The Growlers have ultimately always been about the songs — three minute nuggets of melody, surf guitar and clever lyrics — and Chinese Fountain is perhaps their strongest set of songs. The tour in support of the album reached Bowery Ballroom last week and what a show it was. Nevermind that the show was opened by a ten-minute set of tongue-in-cheek karaoke by drag queen “Tina”, or that that mid-set there was an authentic Chinese dragon parade, or that it seemed that the entire band, crew and front rows of the crowd stage-dived for over two hours straight, this show was a monster. The band’s set lasted over two hours and consisted of virtually the entire new album and twenty-nine songs in total, and while the craziness went on all around them the music virtually never stopped. This is a show not be missed, and for those out West the tour continues through October before moving the Europe for November.

I recorded this set with the Schoeps mounted in our traditional Bowery balcony spot and mixed with an as-always outstanding board feed from FOH Kenny. The sound quality is quite excellent. Enjoy!

Stream “Chinese Fountain”:

Download The Complete Show [MP3] or [MP3] / [FLAC] / [FLAC]

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.

Growlers
2014-09-18
Bowery Ballroom
New York NY

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard [Engineer: Kenny] + Schoeps CCM4u Cardioids > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (level adjustments, mixdown, EQ, set fades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 1:56:00]
01 Gay Thoughts
02 Big Toe
03 Naked Kids
04 In Between
05 Acid Rain
06 Love Test
07 Black Memories
08 Hiding Under Covers
09 Row
10 Beach Rats
11 Wet Dreams
12 Dull Boy
13 Graveyard’s Full
14 Nosebleed Sun
15 What It Is
16 [Chinese Dragon Parade]
17 Chinese Fountain
18 Humdrum Blues
19 Tell It How It Is
20 Monotonía
21 Ol Rat Face
22 Good Advice
23 Wandering Eyes
24 Kick the Habit of Dredd
25 Sea Lion Goth Blues
26 Empty Bones
27 [encore break]
28 Drinkin’ The Juice Blues
29 Going Gets Tough
30 One Million Lovers
31 Someday

If you download this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT The Growlers, visit their website, and purchase Chinese Fountain from the Everloving Records website [HERE] or from the band’s online Store [HERE].

Phil Cook and Caitlin Rose: September 6, 2014 Trekky Records / Hometapes Day Show, Hopscotch Music Festival, Raleigh, NC (FLAC/MP3/Streaming)

September 24, 2014
By


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[photo by Dan Schram]

Continuing with our theme of one-off collaborations from the Hopscotch Music Festival, our final day show of the festival went down at Raleigh’s Pour House, where local Trekky Records teamed up with Hometapes (a recent transplant to Durham, NC) and one of the more unique performances came from a local-plus-out-of-town duo. Phil Cook and brother Brad, of Megafaun, have become mainstays of the scene around town, with their hands in all kinds of different aspects of the Triangle music world (including Phil’s current tour with Hiss Golden Messenger).  Caitlin Rose, of Nashville, is one of those nominally country singers whose work crosses over to the rock world. Fitting, then, that the two teamed up for a combination of Rose originals, old-time classics, and covers, along with some off-the-cuff and often-hilarious banter. The show gave off the feeling of a rowdy show in somebody’s dark living room on a sunny day, as the mingling crowd of people who seemed to all know each other socialized as the artists did their thing. The musicians’ vibe matched their crowd, with Caitlin and Phil keeping things loose and chatting with us as neighbors. If at times the clinking of glasses and the conversation got a little louder than it should, it didn’t rattle the musicians much, who rewarded us with a fun song selection as well as some impromptu contests and trivia. When Cook played Dylan’s “Only A Hobo”, it was hard not to imagine the song being played to the man’s original crowds, in Greenwich Village clubs as much a part of local social life as revered for the music going down. In its offhandedness, its at-times raggedness, its collaboration among old friends, this felt like the right kind of Saturday set.

As you may have guessed, the crowd was a little noisy during this one. I compensated for that by focusing heavily on a soundboard feed and mixing in just a little of my Schoeps MK41 microphones. So, despite the crowd, the recording is excellent, if you don’t mind hearing some bursts of chatter here and there. Enjoy!

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

Stream “Answer In One of These Bottles” [Caitlin Rose]

Stream “Only A Hobo” [Bob Dylan, as sung by Phil Cook]

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.

Phil Cook and Caitlin Rose
2014-09-06
Hometapes / Trekky Day Show
Hopscotch Music Festival
Raleigh, NC USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by acidjack

Soundboard + Schoeps MK41 (at SBD, DINa)>KCY>Z-PFA>Roland R-26>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (mix down, compression, adjust levels)>Izotope Ozone 5 (effects, EQ)>Audacity 2.0.3 (track, fade, amplify, balance)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks
01 [intro]
02 1922 Blues [Charlie Parr; sung by Phil Cook]
03 [banter1]
04 Sinful Wishing Well [Caitlin Rose]
05 [banter2]
06 I’m Sitting on a Fence Too Long [Phil Cook]
07 [banter3]
08 Answer In One of These Bottles [Caitlin Rose]
09 [banter4]
10 Only a Hobo [Bob Dylan, as sung by Phil Cook]
11 [banter5]
12 Learning to Ride [Caitlin Rose]

If you enjoyed this recording, please support these artists. Check out Phil Cook’s work at his website, and Caitlin Rose’s at her website.

Sunburned Hand of the Man: September 5, 2014 Three Lobed / WXDU Day Show, King’s, Raleigh, NC (FLAC/MP3/Streaming)

September 23, 2014
By


IMG_7651
[Photos by acidjack]

Review by David Schwentker.

If you’re not a denizen of noise/experimental circles you might not be aware of the legendary Sunburned Hand of the Man, the Massachusetts band who since 1994 have produced several fine albums and over 100 releases (mainly self-released CD-Rs and cassettes) in what it might be fair to call “random” fashion. The band has included any number of players over the years, but is anchored by John Moloney, who joined us at last year’s Three Lobed / WXDU Day Show during Hopscotch Music Festival for a collaboration with Thurston Moore (which is slated as an official release … keep your eyes peeled). This was the collective’s 20th anniversary as an entity, and it seemed like the right move for King’s, and a show sponsored by two organizations that respect experimental music, to be their showcase.

Eleven years after being featured on the cover of “The Wire” and touted as being leaders of the “New Weird America” genre, the band had been somewhat dormant in recent years, as releases slowed and band members focused on other projects.  In June, the band departed on their first U.S. tour in several years, a brief jaunt down the east coast as a 7  piece band, including newer, younger band members alongside seasoned vets.  On that trip, plans were solidified to take part in this years’ Three Lobed day show during Hopscotch.  Sunburned’s membership is always in flux; on tour, it has often been whoever was available to get in the van when the time came to hit the road.  For the brief September tour built around this Day Show performance, they were a tight, 5 piece unit and included Chad Cooper, who co-founded the band with John Moloney, but had not toured with the band in the United States since 1999.  Longtime guitarist, Paul Labrecque was along for the ride as well, giving us a look at a version of the band not seen in the U.S. in quite some time.  Talking to the band before their set, there was a palpable excitement from the players about the music they had been making each night of their tour, and what was to come during this afternoon set.

Like the band’s recorded work, this single piece, entitled “Blues For Richard”, was deeply outre, a melange of organic, found and electronic sounds that brooded and whistled. At its beginning, the piece felt unsettling, like a late-afternoon hike into an unfamiliar wood. Band members began the set on the floor, turning knobs that would anchor the piece’s future movements. What there were of lyrics came just over twelve minutes in, in the form of chants and spoken/read lyrics, supplied by Greta Svalberg.  As the guitars turned up and the drums kicked in, the atmospheric sounds turned to a slow burn, psychedelic groove, pushed and pulled by Moloney’s expressive drumming and Adam Langellotti’s elastic bass.  Labrecque’s guitar work becomes more and more frantic, while Cooper’s homemade electronics continue to ramp up the intensity.  The band threatens to collapse upon itself a couple of times, coming out on the other side heavier and insurgent each time, before finishing in a blazing, explosive three minute stomp that melted a few faces.  In short, this half hour set is an excellent summation of everything that makes this band great, unpredictable, and worthy of exploring their vast catalog of recorded music.

I recorded this set in the same manner as all of the recordings from this showcase, with Schoeps MK4V microphones onstage and a soundboard feed. The sound quality is phenomenal on this one, maybe the best of the entire day show (which is saying a lot). Enjoy!

Download the full set: [MP3] | [FLAC]

Stream the full set: 

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. Feel free to re-post the Soundcloud links.

Sunburned Hand of the Man
2014-09-05
Three Lobed Recordings / WXDU Day Show
King’s
Raleigh, NC USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by acidjack

Soundboard + Schoeps MK4V (on stage pair)>KC5>CMC6>>Edirol R-44 [OCM]>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (mix down, compression)>Izotope Ozone 5 (effects, EQ)>Audacity 2.0.3 (track, fade, amplify, balance)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Track
01 Blues for Richard

Musicians
Chad Cooper – electronics / percussion
Paul Labrecque – guitar / electronics
Adam Langellotti – bass / electronics
John Moloney – drums
Greta Svalberg – vocals

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Sunburned Hand of the Man, visit their facebook page, and buy their records. A lengthy discography is here, and your best bet to buy all in one place is probably Discogs.

Ty Segall: September 17, 2014 Webster Hall – Flac/MP3/Streaming

September 22, 2014
By

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[photos by PSquared Photography – complete set at brooklynvegan]

I’m not sure there is a currently working musician who produces as consistently excellent music — live or on record — at does Ty Segall. His new album Manipulator is yet another Ty album that shines from start to finish and the tour in support has raged from city to city. Last week Ty Segall came to NYC for two shows at Webster Hall (alas no secret DBA show) and we were there for the first night on Wednesday. Ty’s fans always vociferously exhibit their love for his music and this night was no different. Five songs into the set the venue’s crew had to remove the metal photo pit barrier to avoid crushing people to death. After a quick break, the set continued in earnest and the new space permitted a neverending parade of stage divers and jumpers, including ultimately the artist himself. The setlist was similar to most recent tours in that the band played most of the new album (in this case 13 of 17 tracks) before the second half of the night was dedicated to the older material. But the crowd was with them all the way — old or new — for the full ninety minute set. We’re streaming one of our favorite tracks from the new album “Green Belly”. Ty Segall’s US tour is coming to a close in the next few days, but he’ll then spend six weeks touring through Europe.

I recorded this set from the soundboard perch in the front and center below the balcony with the Schoeps cards mixed with an excellent feed from house FOH Rafael. The sound quality is superb. Enjoy!

Stream “Green Belly”:

Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

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.

Ty Segall
2014-09-17
Webster Hall
New York NY

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard + Schoeps CCM4u Cardioids > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (level adjustments, mixdown, EQ, set fades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 1:20:11]
01 Manipulator
02 Its Over
03 The Connection Man
04 Tall Man Skinny Lady
05 Feel
06 [banter – barricade]
07 The Faker
08 The Singer
09 The Clock
10 Green Belly
11 [banter – carry me]
12 Don’t You Want to Know (Sue)
13 Susie Thumb
14 The Crawler
15 The Feels
16 You’re the Doctor
17 Slaughterhouse
18 [Sweater Song tease]
19 I Bought My Eyes
20 [band introductions]
21 Imaginary Person
22 Caesar
23 Wave Goodbye
24 [encore break]
25 Fire on the Mountain [Wand]
26 Thank God for Sinners
27 I Wear Black
28 Girlfriend

If you download this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT Ty Segall, visit his website, and purchase Manipulator from the Drag City Records website [HERE].

ty-segall-18

Hiss Golden Messenger: September 18, 2014 Rough Trade NYC (FLAC/MP3/Streaming)

September 19, 2014
By


IMG_7819
[photos by acidjack]

I have only seen Hiss Golden Messenger once before with a full band, a revelatory performance at the 2012 Hopscotch Music Festival. Since then, I have caught Mike Taylor several times in what one might call his de facto state, as the solo artist on his own, playing songs the way he did for his stripped-down, four-track album Bad Debt. In my time following Taylor’s work, I have come to see HGM as the embodiment of two different instincts — one, the band-leading artist drawing on his love of audience-pleasing, crowd-moving southern rock and gospel found in particular on Haw and Country Hai East Cotton; the other a man alone in a kitchen beside a sleeping baby, wrestling with his demons as the tape spools away like time. The challenge, and the reward, of Hiss Golden Messenger is the ability to reconcile those impulses.

This set at Rough Trade NYC, sponsored by Aquarium Drunkard, began with one of my all-time favorite HGM numbers, “Red Rose Nantahala” from Haw. As that song segued into the upbeat “Saturday’s Song” from Taylor’s Merge debut, Lateness of Dancers, it almost told the story of the latter-day band in two songs. The first finds Taylor pleading “Oh Lord, let me be happy” and “let me be the one I want”. The next, from an album that by all rights should take HGM to the “next level“, is a grown-up father’s song, about wanting to cut loose on the weekend, drink some whiskey, Sunday hangover be damned. The character in that song seems resolutely himself. Content at last, hangover be damned.

After that second song, Taylor slapped his guitar and noted that a Hiss Golden Messenger tour used to just be him and that single instrument (that’d be as recently as March, when he played a tour de force performance at Mercury Lounge). Today the band is a five-piece that features longtime collaborator Scott Hirsch on bass, Matt Douglas on saxophone, vocals and guitars, Megafaun‘s Phil Cook on keys, banjo and vocals, and Matt McCaughan (Rosebuds, Portastatic, Bon Iver) on drums. In some ways, the band reflects Mike’s changing circumstances, not only as a more known musician, but as an ever-more-firmly entrenched member of the Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill, North Carolina music scene whose players pop up as regularly on each other’s records as they do at one another’s shows. Lateness feels less like a purely Mike Taylor album and more like a Triangle music album circa 2014, at a time when the scene is flourishing in all sorts of ways, but also ever-more-mindful of its roots. It leans, then, more toward Mike’s country-rock and gospel impulses, and that’s a fine thing.

So when we heard the Poor Moon classics “Blue Country Mystic” and “Call Him Daylight” in this new configuration, they were part of the “dance portion” of the set, an entire concept new to HGM sets that I’ve seen. “Daylight”, in particular, became a twangier, country-funk number, and as Douglas’ sax breakdown hit, the most striking thing of all was that people actually did dance. I shook my head a tad at a reckoning with god inspiring that reaction in people, but when Taylor hit the song’s final, climactic verse, the chills were there. As far as southern rock-via-HGM goes, it’s hard to beat “Lucia” from Lateness, or the equally compelling “Raven (Snake Children” that followed. This was my first time hearing both of these songs live, and they seemed to benefit most from the band and this setup (which isn’t surprising, since these players recorded them). Similarly, the Lateness material I had heard live before — “Southern Grammar” and “Chapter & Verse” — sounded better-realized than ever.

In another sign that today’s HGM is a more collaborative effort these days, the show’s final song was played on the floor, unamplified, with Taylor and the band pressed in on all sides by fans, performing “Drum” as the crowd added its own percussion and sang along. “Take the good news / and carry it away”, the crowd sang, rendering Mike’s voice just one among many. Hiss Golden Messenger has grown from one man and one instrument to a true band, and the good news for us is, they’ve got many miles left to travel. “We’re going to play a lot of shows this year. I guess everybody up here needs to get ready for that,” Taylor told us earlier in the set. That goes for you fans out there, too — here are the current tour dates.

I recorded this set with Schoeps MK4V microphones at the soundboard and a stereo feed from house engineer Cameron. The sound quality is outstanding, though of course note that “Drum” was sung on the floor unamplified, so it sounds like that. Enjoy!

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.

Hiss Golden Messenger
2014-09-18
Rough Trade NYC
Brooklyn, NY USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by acidjack

Schoeps MK4V (inside SBD cage, PAS)>KC5>CMC6>Sound Devices USBPre2 + Soundboard (engineer: Cameron)>Edirol R-44 [OCM]>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (align, mix down, adjust levels, limiter)>Izotope Ozone 5 (light EQ, imaging, effects)>Audacity 2.0.3 (fades, tracking, amplify, balance, downsample, dither)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks:
01 Red Rose Nantahala
02 Saturday’s Song
03 [banter]
04 Mahogany Dread
05 Day O Day (A Love So Free)
06 [banter2]
07 Busted Note
08 [banter3]
09 Blue Country Mystic
10 [banter4]
11 Call Him Daylight
12 [banter5]
13 I’ve Got A Name for the Newborn Child
14 [banter6]
15 Lucia
16 I’m A Raven (Snake Children)
17 [banter7]
18 Southern Grammar
19 [encore break]
20 Chapter & Verse (Ione’s Song)
21 [banter8]
22 Drum [played on the floor]

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Hiss Golden Messenger, visit his website, and buy Lateness of Dancers from Merge Records and his other records from his shop. And see the band on tour.

IMG_7821

Spacin’ & Purling Hiss: September 5, 2014 Hopscotch Music Festival, Tir na Nog, Raleigh, NC (FLAC/MP3/Streaming)

September 17, 2014
By


IMG_7703
[photos by acidjack]

Day two of the Hopscotch Music Festival was one filled with surprises. I started the day with the Three Lobed / WXDU Day Show and its many one-off collaborations, and ended with this last-minute collision between Philadelphia’s twin scuzz-rock juggernauts. Purling Hiss and Spacin‘ are the best kind of kindred spirits, both being offshoots of the band Birds of Maya. That, and each of them crank their amps to eleven and check any and all pretension at the door. The combined band played three of each others’ songs each, including Spacin’s classic cover of MC5’s “American Ruse”. The six songs stretched for a total of forty-five minutes, offering ample opportunities for guitar pyrotechnics from all. If minds hadn’t been blown enough already, the band was joined for the final number, Hiss’ “Almost Washed My Hair”, by Philadelphia harpist Mary Lattimore (fresh from her Three Lobed/WXDU collab with Thurston Moore) and Steve Gunn (similarly on deck after an epic performance with William Tyler and members of Yo La Tengo, which is posted here). If you doubt how a harpist can make her presence felt with four blaring guitars already on stage, well, you ought to get to know Lattimore, who added a layer of musical complexity to the roaring proceedings. If today was the day of collaborations, there couldn’t have been a better way to end it.

I recorded this set with a soundboard feed from Tir Na Nog engineer Brandon plus Audio Technica 3031 microphones back by the board. Unfortunately, my request to place the mics onstage was denied, meaning they were fairly far back in an echo-y room. As our recordings go on this site, the quality is not the best, but the vibe comes through loud and clear. As the band’s own albums hew to a “lo-fi” aesthetic, perhaps in some ways the recording is true to that. With that caveat, enjoy this exceptional performance!

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.

Spacin’/Purling Hiss
2014-09-05
Hopscotch Music Festival
Tir na Nog
Raleigh, NC USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
recorded and produced by acidjack

Audio Technica 3031 (at SBD, ROC)+Soundboard (engineer: Brandon)>Roland R-26>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (align, levels, mix down, compression)>Izotope Ozone 5 (EQ, effects, imaging)>Audacity 2.0.3 (track, amplify, balance, fades, dither and downsample)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks [Total Time 45:49]
01 Sunshine No Shoes [Spacin’]
02 Titchy [Spacin’]>American Ruse [MC5]
03 Learning Slowly [Purling Hiss]
04 Run From the City [Purling Hiss]
05 [tuning]
06 Almost Washed My Hair [Purling Hiss]*

* with Mary Lattimore on harp and Steve Gunn on guitar

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT these musicians. You can pick up Spacin’s records at their bandcamp page, and Purling Hiss’s records at their bandcamp page and their latest Weirdon over at Drag City.

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