Tag Archives: Titus Andronicus

Mad Mackerel’s Best Of The Month: March 2012

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Mad Mackerel's Best Of The Month: March 2012. Here is our cherry picked selection of our favourite downloads from March for you, together with a few new tracks to create a perfect end-of-month mix. Enjoy.

Download Thee Exciters – Dinosaur Traffic mp3 (from Perpetual Happening)
Psychedelia meets proto-punk

Download The Lonesome Savages – All Outta Love mp3 (from All Outta Love 7″)
50s inflected rock’n’roll revamped and updated with elements of the current garage punk sound – oozes from the speakers in a way that is raw, primal and downright dangerous

Download Lera Lynn – Ring Of Fire mp3 (from Ring Of Fire EP)
Dark interpretation on an upbeat classic

Download Einar Lind – Brother Don’t Steal My Wife mp3 (from Introducing Einar Lind)
Perfect late-at-night soundtrack where you cannot sleep and settle in an armchair with a whiskey to wait out the darkness, while the house creaks and ticks amidst the silence around you

Roomrunner – Super Vague

Pulverising punk rock

Download The Stammer – Follow The Leader mp3 (from The Stammer EP)
A sinewy guitar lead and military percussion over which gloomy tones prevail, provides a two minute rush of monochrome tinged adrenalin

Download Justin Farren – Broken Shit mp3 (from Songs From Spare Rooms)
Comes across like a speed-fuelled Loudon Wainwright III duelling with Arol Guthrie

Download AU – Get Alive mp3 (from Both Lights)
Experimental indie-rock

Download Beast Make Bomb – It Snowed Last Night mp3 (from Skinny Legs)
Combines the distorted punk attitude of the late 1970s with some classic fuzzed out pop melodies to deliver a sweetly addictive tune

Download Violens – Der Microarc mp3 (from True)
Excellent slice of psych-pop

Download Mirel Wagner – The Road mp3 (from Mirel Wagner)
Another cheery tale of death, sparsely plucked and whispered, and coming across like a Strange Fruit for the modern day.

Download The Hussy – Stab Me mp3 (from Weed Seizure)
Like a flick-knife in a crowded flophouse, comes out of the darkness at you with a ferocity and a viciousness that is impossible to avoid and pointless to deflect

Download Dinosaur Feathers – Beatcha mp3 (from Whistle Tips)
Satisfyingly crunchy guitars with infectious groove and jangle

Download Josh & Mer – Mind Control mp3 (from Planet Music)
Unsettling and eerie electro-folk

Download Owsley Brothers – Hot Mess mp3 (from Cobalt)
Crackerjack of experimental blues and rock

Download Roadkill Ghost Choir – In The Lion’s Mouth mp3 (from In The Lion’s Mouth)
Spacey, folk rock

Download Ancient Whales – Everyone mp3 (from Birthing EP)
Insistently catchy, full of memorable guitar riffs, splashes of woozy reverb and hits a sweet spot or two with the cool doubled up vocals

Download Nu Sensae – Gumbo mp3 (from Tea Swamp Park EP)
Scrappy, tribal punk

Download Burnt Ones – Meet The Golden One mp3 (from Meet The Golden One 7″)
High octane garage glam

Download Wye Oak – Pocahontas mp3 (from Daytrotter Session, Neil Young Cover)
Top notch cover of classic

Download Guy Capecelatro III – Switch mp3 (from North For The Winter)
Tale of a killer who meets a woman who proves to be his undoing – with added pedal steel and Hammond organ

Download Titus Andronicus - Upon Viewing Oregon’s Landscape With the Flood of Detritus (from split 7″ with Diarrhea Planet)
Typically raucous, literately sharp punk rock

Download Screaming Females – It All Means Nothing mp3 (from Ugly)
Suitably coruscating and pummeling cut from NJ punks

Download Orpheum Bell – Daddy’s Crying mp3 (from The Old Sister’s Home)
Intimate, waltzy vignette is another example of their elegant and organic sound

Download Chelle Rose – Browder Holler Boy mp3 (from Ghost of Browder Holler)
Ripe with mystery and passion, and sounds like it was plucked from the kudzu-scented air of her native Loudon County in East Tennessee

Download Johnny Bertram & The Bicycles – Miracle mp3 (from Neon City)
Steeped in indie-rock and Americana and filtered through a Deep South lens

Download Ty Segall & White Fence – I Am Not A Game mp3 (from Hair)
Twisty, insistent garage-psych with junkyard vocals

Download Tyburn Saints – Broken Bottles mp3 (from You And I In Heaven EP)
Dark and foreboding indie that feels almost cinematic in its purpose and delivery

Pontiak – Highest Echo

Vintage organic stoner rock

And to finish off we have a breezy new track of indie rock from Maps & Atlases new album, we have the frenetic bank robbing fantasy of Baby Baby’s Nothing To Lose and a welcome return from veteran catchy psych-rockers The Dandy Warhols. Finally, two tracks from Field Report’s much acclaimed and anticipated self-titled debut of fragile, heartfelt folk.

Download Maps & Atlases – Fever mp3 (from Beware And Be Grateful)

Download The Dandy Warhols – Sad Vacation mp3 (from This Machine)

Download Field Report – Fergus Falls mp3 (from Field Report)

Download Field Report – I Am Not Waiting Anymore mp3 (from Field Report)

Baby Baby – Nothing To Lose

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Free Mixtape From Titus Andronicus

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Free Mixtape From Titus Andronicus.

Literate, histroy-loving, raucous New York punks, Titus Andronicus are probably in the top five bands we’d like to see live, having inexplicably foregone the opportunity when we were at SxSW in 2009. They have just made this new track available for your listening pleasure, the typically lengthily named Upon Viewing Oregon’s Landscape With the Flood of Detritus.

It comes from a new split single with recent tour mates Diarrhea Planet (who we’ve previously posted about here).

You can get a whole mixtape of Titus material featuring this as well as a host of early recordings, demos and covers for free from their Tumblr site here.

Download Titus Andronicus - Upon Viewing Oregon’s Landscape With the Flood of Detritus (from split 7″ with Diarrhea Planet)

MM’s 2011 Top Ten Series: No 8 Mad Mackerel

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Mad Mackerel's Best of 2011.So, the penultimate entry before Mrs Mackerel finishes off this year’s set of Top Ten postings tomorrow is my very own.

Without further ado…

10. Milk Music – Beyond Living

Although it was released early in the year, I only discovered it recently. A full on, no holds barred, nihilistic 70s punk attitude and the very best of the heavyweight riffs of the grunge era is a mighty powerful combination. One that makes me wish my car stereo went all the way up to eleven.

Download Milk Music – Beyond Living mp3 (from Beyond Living EP)

9. Yuck – Holing Out

Similarly, Yuck’s Holing Out effortlessly recalled the 90s with a crunchy distorted riff, reverb and a fuzz slathered hook. That it also had one of the best videos of the year was just another bonus.

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Download Yuck – Holing Out mp3 (from Yuck)

8. Wooden Wand - No Hayride

If there is one mystery to me in the world of music, then it is how James Jackson Toth aka Wooden Wand can be so damn prolific across so many genres and yet suffer no discernible dip in quality – not that I’m complaining. Another great year and too many tracks to choose from, but in the end it was this, seemingly an afterthought on his forthcoming boxset that makes up Volume 3 of his archives – a simple folk ballad that still managed to be head and shoulders above most things released this year.

Download Wooden Wand - No Hayride mp3 (from Archives Vol 3)

7. Kurt Vile – Peeping Tomboy

Top ten from the opening moments of this song; the hazy, shimmering guitar and the lazy drawled vocals intoning

“I don’t want to change, but I don’t want to stay the same
I don’t want to go but I’m running
I don’t want to work, but I don’t want to sit around all day frowning

I don’t want to give up, but I kinda want to lie down
But not sleep just rest
Give me a break how much does it really take?
Get my head outta here”

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6. Henry’s Funeral Shoe – Dog Scratched Ear

It made a lot of other MM guest top tens so no need to add anything new. Anthemic, swaggering blues boogie at its fiery best.

Download Henry’s Funeral Shoe – Dog Scratched Ear mp3 (from Donkey Jacket)

5. The Royal Sea – This Summer

I’ve mentioned this two or three times recently and posted it earlier today so not much more needs to be said about this either. Simply that it is pure, sugar-coated garage pop with just the right amount of surf inspired twang that in a parallel world would have been the woozy, feel-good hit of the summer.

Download The Royal Sea – This Summer mp3 (from The Royal Sea)

4. Deer Tick – Chevy Express

Deer Tick’s Divine Providence was, mostly, a rowdy, rambunctious good time rock’n'roll record that was meant for late nights of whiskey drinking and bar-room brawls. But tucked away in the middle of all the heady intoxication was this track: sombre, reflective, and undeniably sobering. It was the soundtrack to a heavy heart and lonely regret washed by the first light of an early morning dawn and may well be the best thing they’ve ever done.

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3. Felice Brothers – Fire At The Pageant

Voodoo, zombies, sinister nursery rhyme chants, classic Felice Brothers lyrics and a woozy, old-timey, back porch rhythm means this song should have been an utter mess. That it was the complete opposite stands tribute to this bunch of ramshackle mavericks of increasingly experimental Americana.

Download The Felice Brothers – Fire At The Pageant mp3 (from Celebration, Florida)

2. Tom Williams & The Boat – Get Older

The most bitterly caustic song I heard all year meant it was a shoe-in for my top ten. I originally said “it drips venom over a heavy, single drumbeat, a vicious guitar strum, and spits lyrics like physical bullets”, and this still sounds a pretty fair summation to me.

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1. Middle Brother – Daydreaming

From the simple picked guitar line and weary, melancholy opening lyric, the scene is set for a raw, unflinching excursion courtesy of McCauley’s craggy vocals and beer-soaked romanticism. Loneliness never sounded so…well, lonely.

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Almost Made It

The Wooden Shjips pulverising Lazy Bones, Tom Williams & The Boat’s observationally wry and off kilter Wouldn’t Women Be Sweet, the blistering euphoria of Wye Oak’s Civilian, and LONG’s criminally ignored and under-rated Shoot Your Dog. If there was a better example of dark, claustrophobic psych-rock this year than the Ganglian’s Jungle then I didn’t hear it, while A.A. Bondy’s dark-hearted The Twist and Twilight Hotel’s epic road trip Mahogany Veneer were both superb examples of modern Americana. Back home, Metronomy’s ultra catchy The Look, and Male Bonding’s fuzzed up, yet still sugary What’s That Scene? flew the flag for the UK - on another day, in another year, all could so easily have been in the final shake up.

Download Wooden Shjips – Lazy Bones mp3 (from West)

Download The Ganglians – Jungle mp3 (from Still Living)

Download Metronomy – The Look mp3 (from The English Riviera)

Favourite Covers

Hurray for the Riff Raff’s mesmerising My Sweet Lord and Phosphorescent’s reverent take on Neil Young’s Are You Ready For The Country? were both outstanding, but just pipped by Siskiyou’s own Young cover, the skeletally menacing Revolution Blues. Titus Andronicus payed due homage to Nirvana’s classic Breed, but best of all was Middle Brother’s version of the Replacement’s Portland.

Download Phosphorescent – Are You Ready For The Country? mp3

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Best Tunes First Heard This Year But Not 2011

How on earth had Okkervil River escaped me for so long, particularly John Allyn Smith Sails and the superb For Real. Likewise with Wilco’s Misunderstood – I’d heard it, but this year I actually listened to it. Shellac’s Prayer To God is the most vicious song I’ve ever heard and one of the best, and so too Fugazi’s Waiting Room. Richard Buckner’s heartbreaking Emma was a revelation and James McMurty’s rollicking live version of Choctaw Bingo was eight minutes of pure, adrenalin fuelled Americana.

Download Shellac – Prayer To God mp3 (from 1000 Hurts)

Download Richard Buckner – Emma (Devotion & Doubt Outtake) mp3

Happy Christmas and Happy New Year. Here’s to 2012 when it all starts again!

Mad Mackerel’s Albums of the Year

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So after much deliberation, head scratching, discussion, and more head scratching, we have MM’s favourite albums of 2010. And we choose our words very carefully here, because we would not presume them to be the best, only those that have given us the most pleasure and enjoyment, records that we have returned to again and again, and for whatever reason have captured a moment or special place in our hearts.

And while we have limited our selection to 25 albums there were many, many more that could have, and maybe should have, featured. But there that’s the beauty of music, entirely subjective and based on individual opinions not fact.

So without further ado, here are our 25 favourite albums of 2010.

25 Sharon Van Etten – Epic


Haunting, ethereal and stunning album from a modern day siren. Sad prairie folk music indeed.

Download Sharon Van Etten – Love More mp3

24 Haunted Windchimes – Honey Moonshine


Traditional, old-timey backwoods, backporch music that burrowed its way into your head and then refused to budge.

Download The Haunted Windchimes – Don’t Take My Baby Away (Baby Back) mp3

23 The Streets On Fire – This Is Fancy


High voltage, good time, bad boy rock ‘n’ roll that was as good and as unashamedly fun as it was simple. Garage rock reclaimed.

Download The Streets On Fire – That’s Hard To Find mp3

22 Justin Townes Earle – Harlem River Blues


The son of the peerless Steve Earle comes of age with a perfectly judged set of tales that in their honesty and unashamed frankness are worthy of Townes himself.

Listen to Harlem River Blues.

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21 Titus Andronicus – The Monitor


With repeated listens the sheer power and passion of The Monitor becomes overwhelming. So what if it is a concept album about the American Civil War, its ambitious, rebellious, and rousing. Just play it loud!

Download Titus Andronicus – A More Perfect Union mp3

20 Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan – Hawk


Another perfectly judged record from the perfectly matched duo. Campbell’s lovely whispering tones offset by Mr Lanagan’s threatening growl.

Listen to Snake Song.

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19 Lower Dens – Twin Hand Movement

An album of dreamy, unsettling rock melded with freak-folk to provide one of the year’s most unusual and most rewarding listens. At times it sounds like an evil Beach House and at others spare and caustic where hope is slowly, but firmly drowned in a swirling, atmospheric mix of twinkling guitars and alluring voices.

Download Lower Dens – Hospice Gates mp3

18 The Tallest Man On Earth – The Wild Hunt


A fine follow up to the outstanding Shallow Grave, the trademark Dylanesque vocals allied to a set of cracking tales from the bible to bullfighting.

Download The Tallest Man On Earth – The King Of Spain mp3

17 The Migrant – Travels In Lowland


With its dreamlike journey into psych-indie, the debut album from The Migrant was one of the most surprising and engaging folk records of the year.

Download The Migrant – The Organ Grinder mp3

16 Tweak Bird – Tweak Bird


In the vein of the much lauded and genuinely good Tame Impala, Tweak Bird were louder, faster, and simply rocked harder. A superb mix of motorcycle rock riffs with dirty fingernail blues and even a hint of jazz. This was stoner rock for the 21st century and it was brilliant.

Download Tweak Bird – A Sun Ahh Ahh mp3

15 Deer Tick – The Black Dirt Sessions


In Christ Jesus from the Black Dirt Sessions, Deer Tick delivered one of the truly primal and affecting moments of musical recording in 2010, and the rest of the album wasn’t half bad either.

Download Deer Tick – Twenty Miles mp3

14 Delta Spirit – History From Below


Indie rock with a country inflection, Delta Spirit packed History From Below full of dusty, rural Americana and bar room blues boogie. With the impassioned and distinctive voice of Matt Vasquez backed by a rumbling juggernaut of percussion and rhythms, the album was a welcome addition to the long tradition of classic American rock.

Download Delta Spirit – Bushwick Blues mp3

13 Arcade Fire – The Suburbs


Indie gods manage to live up to, and then surpass the hype with The Suburbs, an album full of outstanding tracks that demand they be listened to as a whole – a proper music album.

Watch Ready To Start.

12 Band Of Horses – Infinite Arms


Despite some occasional iffy AOR moments, Infinite Arms was like the girl with the curl, and when it was good (which it mostly was), it was brilliant.

Watch Laredo.

11 Black Keys – Brothers


Authentic blues duo cranked out their best yet and in tracks like Sinister Kid and Howlin’ For You added some more classic cuts to their catalogue.

Watch Tighten Up.

10 Laura Marling – I Speak Because I Can


Showcasing her incredible natural talent despite such tender years, I Speak Because I Can truly marked Laura Marling out as a worthy heiress to Joni, Emmy Lou and the like. Darker, stronger, and more confident than her debut, she is surely poised for great things.

Watch Rambling Man.

9 Liars – Sisterworld


A brilliant collection of crushing guitars, machine gun percussion and soaring vocals that retained its experimental art-noise edge but became much more accessible and much more listenable – welcome to the big league time?

Listen to the superb Proud Evolution.

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8 The National – High Violet


Overcoming the music blogger’s ‘big band’ prejudice with ease, High Violet was bigger, better and more affecting than anything the National have done to date.

Listen to Conversation 16.

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7 Strand Of Oaks – Pope Killdragon


Having caught our attention with their wonderful Springsteen cover on Hear Ya, Strand of Oaks more than lived up to our expectations with Pope Killdragon. Sparse folk tunes mixed with occasional and abstract guitar wigouts and also showcased Tim Showalter’s ability to grab the attention with some of the best lyrical couplets of the year. Stand out track Alex Kona a case in point, starting “Alex Kona was twelve feet tall, his mother was killed by a bowling ball” – what’s not to like?

Download Strand of Oaks – Bonfire mp3

6 Mathew Sawyer & The Ghosts – How Snakes Eat


Spare, beautiful, mournful and melancholic, the fragile folk of Mathew Sawyer hid whiplash lyrics and biting black humour that revealed and revelled in a bittersweet world where daydreams and nightmares fought to the death for supremacy.

Download Mathew Sawyer & The Ghosts – Mynah Birds Call mp3

5 Black Mountain – Wilderness Heart

Backwards-looking it maybe, but that’s to miss the point of Black Mountain. This was an album bursting with rock riffs that were so good you thought they must have been invented in the classic age of rock, and in Let Spirits Ride, the band provided the headbanging anthem of the year.

Download Black Mountain – Old Fangs mp3

4 Dr Dog – Shame, Shame


Another wonderful record of rousing, country infused tunes. Each listen revealed more of its anthemic charms and spirited, rugged rock on an album full of top notch tunes from start to finish.

Watch Shadow People.

3 Blitzen Trapper – Destroyer Of The Void

A brilliant and worthy follow-up to the exceptional Furr, and in songs like The Man Who Would Speak True, Blitzen Trapper showed they had worthy successors to classics like Black River Killer and the like. Full of prog-folk, dusty rural ballads, sci-fi synths and more, Destroyer of the Void was a stunning record.

Download Blitzen Trapper – Heaven And Earth mp3

2 Phosphorescent – Here’s To Taking It Easy

After the sublime To Willie tribute last year came the originals. From the loose, ramshackle rock of It’s Hard to Be Humble (When You’re From Alabama) to cowboy ballads, transcendental homages, and the climactic, Neil Young like, epic album closer L.A.

Download Phosphorescent – The Mermaid Parade mp3

1 Wooden Wand – Wither Thou Goest, Cretin

Despite Wither Thous Goest, Cretin only receiving an initially limited release, and despite it being overshadowed by the subsequent release of (the also excellent) The Death Seat on Michael Gira’s label, Wooden Wand delivered an album of stunning simplicity, in equal parts poignant, heartbreaking, and redemptive.

With lyrics that are the match of any songwriter we know (“He had just enough rope in his trunk to make her nervous”) allied to sparse, plucked folk on the one hand and footstomping barnyard rhythms on the other, there is not a wasted moment, nor a false step on the entire album.

Download Wooden Wand – The Fly mp3