Cullah - Cullah The Wild

Band / Artist: Cullah
Year: 2015
Genre: Blues Rock, Psych-Rock, Jam, Alternative rock, Jazz Rock, Hip-Hop

My Review:
Dammmmn.. I dig the hell out of this. It rolls with a great punchy rhythm, and when he pushes his voice, I swear I can hear some early Chris Cornell. Its pretty badass.

So this guy is a sleeper hit. Great quality, and I have NO idea how he never got a following. Its just too good to not see a lot of wonder in how the hell you don't hear something like this on the radio.

SO his name is Ian McCullough, and he's an artist out of Wisconsin (honestly, this guy and cheese seem like what Wisconsin has going for it.)

His website is here.

He's a talented youngin', and I hope I hear more about the guy, because its worth the listen.

Cullah - Cullah The Wild

Brain Pyramid - Magic Carpet Ride

Band / Artist: Brain Pyramid
Year: 2013
Genre: Psych-Rock, Stoner Rock, Jam

My Review:
Loud and raucus, Looping and dragging, Its a lot of different things, all of which I'd fairly describe as Stoner Rock the the fullest degree.

They bring out some really good twangy guitar in "Mary Jane Blues" which I was really enjoying the southerly sound of.  They are on the Acid Cosmonaut Records label, and as you'd imagine, its filled with more jam band rock goodness if that's your thing.

Alright, I've got to cut this one there, lots to do. FILE YOUR TAXES.

Brain Pyramid - Magic Carpet Ride

Harq al'ada - Heat Ritual

I posted things from Nick Vanderveldt before, and one of his projects' band name was Harq al'ada.

Its a kind of experimental Prog-Rock/ Psych-Rock sound without really a whole lot of lyrics. When I started up this album, I knew almost immediately that it is definitely a maturation of their sound. Nick described the new release like this;

The name itself came from when my wife and I first moved to St. Louis a few years ago. It was September of 2011, it was hot, I wasn't sure where my life was really going, so I would get up in the morning and record on the 3rd floor, before the heat of the day. I called it my heat ritual.

Heat Ritual took about 2 years to record, compared to our first EP which took around 3 months. So there's a bit of overlap between the two. 

In "A Puck", I was very focused on trying to imitate this Miles Davis funk sound, I think Alex and I talked for hours about improvisation, and how the performance was so important, yet "A Puck" could never really be performed. So when we got together for vocal sessions on Heat Ritual in February, we kept a line on the same tangent. The song "Boninosuccinea" is a perfect example, both the main vocal track and the lead guitar were done in a single take. Alex had scribbled some ideas down on a notepad, and just sort of riffed on these lyrical themes. It wasn't for a few weeks that we went back to it, and thought wow, that's pretty good, and Alex did some backing tracks. The song "Useless" was written a little differently, though I feel like it was following the same thread. Alex, Ryan and I wrote that tune somewhat whimsically before a rehearsal for "The Difference Engine", just the real simple riff, which I think started off at first as a rip-off of "Communication Breakdown". As we played it, this form just took shape, and I started to add effects, Ryan started in on this Chemical Brothers kind of percussion part. It all just sort of fit. The real beauty of it to me is how open ended it is, we could play a different version of the same song every night, with different people.

The last half of the EP is a little more prescribed as it were. "Lobster Fist" was a little bridge instrumental I wrote probably 4 or 5 years ago, and just got shelved, and then I heard the demo again when I was doing sessions for Heat Ritual, and thought about how well it fit, this odd little tune, with these odd chords, and this odd meter shift. Prunus on the other hand, began as an experiment in prescribed improvisation. I wrote out the head of the tune, and then left the bridge open for free improvisation. I had initially envisioned this sort of Eric Dolphy w/guitars and synths piece, but instead I just kept filling in counter melodies until it sounded right. Obviously it didn't wind up being anything at all like Eric Dolphy, but that's where I got the idea anyway.

This is totally worth a listen. It reminds me a lot of songs like "tomorrow never knows" from the Beatles and a mix of early and very late Pink Floyd. The vocal progressions and the rhythms are very interesting, and worth a good afternoon with headphones and a nice sunny place to lay back and listen. It's definitely worth checking out.

Harq al'ada - Heat Ritual

Guizado - Calavera

Band/Artist: Guizado
Year: 2010
Genre: Jazz, Jazz Rock, Psych-Rock, Brazilian, Electropop

My Review:

This album is so good. The way all the instrumentation comes together seems so fluid and effortless. Listening to this, I hear Kula Shaker, Black Moth Super Rainbow, Audioslave, Beck, Franz Ferdinand, and a bunch of other psych and indie rock blended with brass instruments and a heavy groove. SO MANY STYLES, and they really pull it off.

I've searched and tried hard to figure out any info that I can, but I know little about this band aside from the fact that they made this album and its awesome.

*UPDATE* I found out more. Yay! Okay so link first, talky after.

Link!

Guizado is the name of the trumpet player and beat programmer. So the band is kind of like Santana, in that Senor Guizado is the star, working with collaborators throughout the album. He is the premier trumpet player of Sao Paolo right now. His website is dead, but hopefully he's still making kickass music in Brazil.

Guizado - Calavera

Miscellaniac: Preservation Week 2012 Mix

Band / Artist: Wooden Shjips, Edward Avis and Howard R Garis, Spencer Owen, Oneida, Kreamy 'Lectric Santa, Scott Joplin, Boss Hog, Valentina Vuksic, Karpov Not Kasparov, The Paperhead, R. Stevie Moore, Newagehillbilly, Big Blood, Vermillion Sands, Roger McGuinn, Giraffe, Spade Cooley & the Western Swing Dance Gang Feat. Tex Williams, Sophie Tucker, Isidore Soucy
Year: 2012
Genre: Psych-Rock, Old-Time / Historic, Pop, Lo-fi, Indie-Rock, Krautrock, Post-Rock, Experimental, Punk, Glitch, Folk, International

My Review:
From recently digitized archive records. its a really nice little mixtape of old vaudeville, jazz, punk, rock, experimental, and hymnal sounds. I won't lie, some of these tracks aren't good, and they kill the flow of the mix. Either way, the tracks that are good, are worth enough to merit downloading this one.

Miscellaniac: Preservation Week 2012 Mix