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Ohioan have featured sporadically on MM over the years, their brand of desert baked experimental Americana sitting somewhere between Giant Sand, Tinariwen and the expansive grandeur of Other Lives.
They will release a new album titled EMPTY / EVERY MT in early 2016 and you can stream / download the epic almost-seven minutes of Pissing At Will, the first taste (if that’s the appropriate expression) from it…
The sweeping grandeur of Ryne Warner’s Ohioan are back with a new split EP with fellow desert nomads Young Hunter that can be purchased from Bandcamp. It will also see a release on cassette in a limited edition run of 200.
You can listen to all four tracks of atmospheric psych-infused weird Americana below, or just check out the wonderfully titled Dogshit In Plastic Bags from it, that also appears on their East Coast Tour Taster release.
The EP precedes their planned full-length American Spirit Blues which is due for release in May.
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Our pal Ryne from expansive and experimental folkies Ohioan dropped us a line to say he was sending over a teaser track from their forthcoming American Spirit Blues record in the shape of Still Reeling.
Not only that, but he has also provided us with the first listen of a new version of an old Ohioan song, I Know I Am Home, which he tells us “may or may not make final cut for the record“. So, for now, consider it an “exclusive” track!
The album will get a ‘formal’ release via the Akron/Family’s Family Tree Records, which may be out in November in time for their (tentative) Europe tour with Raymond Byron & the White Freighter. Make sure you check out their previous releases up on their Bandcamp too.
There we have it, an update of sorts and two songs. Grab them below.
Download Ohioan – Still Reeling mp3 (from American Spirit Blues)
Download Ohioan – I Know I Am Home mp3 (from American Spirit Blues)
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Here is our final monthly Best Of mix of songs from 2011 – despite all the Christmas fayre on offer, there were still a whole plethora of cracking new tracks to enjoy, and as always we’ve gathered the best of our December posts into one lovely mix for you with a couple of new tracks to sample too. Don’t forget to check out all our previous monthly mixes in the sidebar on the left.
And off we go…
Download Horse’s Mouth – As I Climb mp3 (from Horse’s Mouth)
Opens with a plaintive vocal and soon develops into a classically harmonious folk-song with its gentle, repeated “Out of time” refrain and orchestrally tinged instrumentation.
Download Dan Mangan – Row Of Houses mp3 (from Oh Fortune)
A story told from the perspective of a character from folksinger Mangan’s favourite films, namely Gordie Lachance from Stand By Me.
Download Pop. 1280 – Bodies In The Dunes mp3 (from The Horror)
As raw and visceral as ever with their raw, junkyard freak-punk sound.
Download The Uncles – The Ballad Of Lehigh Valley mp3 (from M4W)
Taster from forthcoming sophomore album from expanded folk four-piece.
Download Sad Baby Wolf – Survival Guide mp3 (from 8th Level / Survival Guide)
Psychedelic, drone-rock inspired indie.
Download Palomino Drive – When We Were Only Friends mp3 (from Home EP)
Promising and softly strummed lo-fi folk.
Download Drunken Prayer – Always Sad mp3 (from Into The Missionfield)
Heavy on percussion, gut-bucket guitars are bluesy and psychedelic; the horn arrangements are loose and buoyant and best of all, the lyrics are as sweet as they are damning.
Download Ohioan – Sometimes mp3 (from Balls Deep In Babylon)
Mournful harmonica driven, down-at-heel traditional folk.
Download Terry Malts – Tumble Down mp3 (from Killing Time)
First taste of post-punk noiseniks new album Killing Time.
Download Cloud Nothings – Stay Useless mp3 (from Attack On Memory)
Just under three minutes of spiky garage-pop that is as catchy as anything they’ve ever done.
Download Dolfish – Your Love Is Bummin’ Me Out mp3 (from Your Love Is Bummin’ Me Out 7″)
Sad, bitter, humorous country song banged out in balls to the wall garage-rock fashion.
Download Waters – Stay Away mp3 (Nirvana Cover)
Helter-skelter cover of Nirvana’s Stay Away where the ramshackle intensity and angst of the original is joyously matched.
Download The Lower 48 – Into The Woods mp3 (from Where All Maps End)
Warm, organic folk with a good-natured acoustic strum.
Download Scott H. Biram – I Want My Mojo Back mp3 (from Bad Ingredients)
Classic one-man band blues and stomp holler.
Download Phantom Family Halo – White Hot Gun mp3 (from When I Fall Out)
Perfect mix of pummelling krautrock with raw, glam overtones.
Download Redanda – This Bed Is A Rock (via Soundcloud)
Bursting with a brashness and sneered vocals that has more attitude crammed into its two minutes and a few seconds of whiplash drumming and guitar that many bands manage in a career.
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Download Simone Felice – New York Times (via Soundcloud)
Spellbinding new single from forthcoming solo album.
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Download Damon Moon & The Whispering Drifters – Seasonal Suite No. 62 (via Soundcloud)
A real treat for all those who for all those who love the gritty, raw, unconventional and downright bitter and bruised side of country music.
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And the new…we have The XX with their demo of new track Open Eyes, the second single of sunburnt lo-fi pop from Inspired And The Sleep, a brand new slice of antiphonal guitar-gymnastics called Mortise And Tenon from London based math-punk trio Mayors Of Miyazaki and first on the list is another taste from Real Estate’s excellent album Days. Enjoy them all!
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Download The XX – Open Eyes mp3 (Demo)
Download Inspired And The Sleep – Running mp3 (from Teenager)
Download Mayors Of Miyazaki – Mortise And Tenon mp3 (from Mortise And Tenon)
Follow @madmackerelMAD MACKEREL’S TWELVE DAYS OF CHRISTMAS
For our first ever Festive Feature on Mad Mackerel, we asked twelve of our favourite bands and artists of 2011 to answer twelve questions and we will publish them over the next twelve days taking us up to Christmas Eve.
With the release this year of Balls Deep In Babylon, Ohioan delivered a dark, intense atmospheric album that drew on folk, country and even jazz to perfectly evoke the landscapes and vignettes of the desert and the mountains, and the people who call such places home. The record is almost old fashioned in being a complete, satisfying whole, rather than just a random collection of tracks, and brilliantly uses a range of tones, moods, timbres and ideas, as well as language to reveal its characters and tell their stories.
1) Three iconic clashes. Who would you vote for in each of these?
a) The Velvet Underground or The Doors?
The Doors. More genuine attitude, more fun, less NYC art posturing. Naked Indians. Better sense of humor. More real danger.
b) Bob Dylan or Neil Young?
Dylan. Neil is great, but he is kind of lazy. Some lyrics are pretty shameful. Basement tapes. Nuff said.
c) The Sex Pistols or the Clash?
Clash 100%. Tho they were somewhat fulla shit. I just have the best memory of listening to Spanish Bombs in Ft. Lauderdale when I was 19, smoking a joint in the back of some Panama hat tourist shop with a gorgeous 15 year old French girl named Julia and making out in the dressing rooms. I believe that got her fired. Sex Pistols = Vapid marketing ploy. Whatever. Can I choose Patti Smith over both?
2) What has been your personal highlight of 2011?
Getting married on a mountain, by a mountain. Leaving Portland. Merging with the desert.
3) What was your low point of the year?
Last Xmas I woke up and immediately cried harder than I had in maybe a decade. Maybe at 6 am? Completely confused by it, I drove to Starbucks and spent the morning flirting with the cashier.
4) You can give one single album from 2011 to just one person for Christmas. What would you buy and who for?
After Dark – by Fabio to cheer up my mom. She’s recovering from surgery and nothing says get well soon like Fabio’s panty-drenching monologues over smooth r&b. I will probably create her grandchildren to this record, its only fair.
5) Give us between two and five songs from 2011 that you’d recommend as the best of the year.
“Tiny Confessions” – Wooden Wand, best songwriter album of the year
“Kerasukan” – Arrington de Dionyso’s Malaikat dan Singa – the most fearless, singular motherfucker out there. Makes me feel like Jimmy Buffet.
“You Fucking People Make Me Sick” – Swans, as a friend pointed out: “that’s how you age with dignity”
“In the Morning” – Michael Hurley, jockos out there somewhere… singing this song right now.
“The Golden Hour” – Marisa Anderson, best solo guitar player around, taught me “Fishin Blues” for $20 a few years back
6) Do you have a favourite Christmas Carol – why?
Silent Night – I played it at my piano recital.
Are the lyrics really “round young virgin”?
7) Imagine you are snowed in and stuck in an isolated house in the woods for Christmas with no way out. Wolves and bears are prowling outside.You need to recommend the following:
A classic song to impress an ultra cool, know-it-all, teenager
Carmelita – GG Allin (Zevon cover)
A song to terrify Grandma
Watch Me Kill the Boston Bitch – GG Allin
A traditional song to help send Grandad to sleep
Hills of Mexico – Roscoe Holcomb
A song for someone just waking from a five-year coma
Black Woman – Sonny Sharrock
A book to frighten the children
Cujo
An unforgettable film to watch
Dead Man
8) What is top of your Christmas list this year? Why?
Drill bits, always drill bits. Building all the furniture for our new place.
9) What is the worst Christmas present you’ve ever given and/or ever received?
I’d rather not.
10) Will you be making a New Year Resolution? If so can you share it and will you keep it? What is the stupidest New Year resolution you’ve ever made?
Resolution: To never lose my enthusiasm for eating p*s*y.
Worst one? “Get my shit together”?
11) Imagine you’re headlining a Christmas Concert at your favourite venue. You can share the stage with three other artists or bands (past or present) for the final encore of the night. Who would they be and what would you play?
Cex Fucx
Fela Kuti
Danzig
I’d cover “Slaughter of the Soul” by At the Gates in its entirety.
12) Can you write us a Christmas themed limerick (go on please have a go)?
I can’t remember what a limerick is, like a haiku with marshmallows?
Buy Ohioan releases here.
Download Ohioan – In Gold & Crushing mp3 (from Balls Deep In Babylon)
Download Ohioan – On The Horizon mp3 (from Balls Deep In Babylon)
Download Ohioan – Sometimes mp3 (from Balls Deep In Babylon)
Download Ohioan – In The Shoes Of A Dead Cop mp3 (from High Country)
Tomorrow: Wooden Wand
Previously: Lovely Eggs (here), Twilight Hotel (here), Grass House (here), Hurray For The Riff Raff (here), Lonesome Wyatt & The Holy Spooks (here).
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We have posted about Ryne Warner’s band Ohioan a couple of times in the lifetime of Mad Mackerel and so it was good news indeed to receive an e-mail from him with news of an album provocatively titled Balls Deep In Babylon.
Having listened to it a few times, it is one of those records that slowly but surely grips you and then begins to squeeze – it is intense, powerful, sometimes bitter and always compelling. Featuring guest vocals from Karl Blau and Ray Raposa (of The Castanets) check our two taster tracks which switch from the almost drone-folk feel of the stunning Dios Mio to the mournful harmonica driven, down-at-heel traditional folk of Sometimes with its plaintive plea of “sometimes doing right just feels so wrong“.
He is also working on a tape EP called American Spirit Blues, which, on this evidence, will be well worth hearing too.
No details yet on where to get the album, but get other Get Ohioan releases here.
Download Ohioan – Sometimes mp3 (from Balls Deep In Babylon)
Download Ohioan – Dios Mio mp3 (from Balls Deep In Babylon)
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A good while ago, while we were still on Google’s crappy Blogspot, and before we were unfairly, ridiculously and arbitrarily removed (not that we’re bitter you understand) we introduced Ohioan, a band whose blend of country and folk music evoked the wide, sweeping vistas of their homeland and whose songs spoke with a quite grandeur and majesty.
Now they are back after too long a hiatus, and we have got rough mixes of two new tracks from the upcoming album In Gold & Crushing and On The Horizon for your listening pleasure. They will shortly be hitting the road with the Castanets for a few weeks so be sure to check them out if they head to your town.
Visit their MySpace here.
Download Ohioan – In Gold & Crushing mp3 (demo)
Download Ohioan – On The Horizon mp3 (demo)
