Various Artists - Mad Mike Monsters Vol. 1-3

"Mad Mike" Metrovich was a Pittsburgh, PA disc jockey who blew mid-'60s Steeltown teens' minds with his wild selections. The "Mad Mike" aesthetic encompassed greasy instrumentals, not-quite-novelty exotica, pounding rock 'n 'roll, R&B, and obscuro ballads. No wonder 1400 kids showed up at Mike's dances!! The fine Norton folks have unearthed a potpourri of some of the wildest examples and are sharing them with us now in three equally great volumes available on LP or CD. I swear, "Gismo" is the greatest song of all time (with tongue planted firmly in cheek)!! This is the stuff the Cramps listen to. Weird, wild stuff.

Jimmy Hughes - Best of Jimmy Hughes

The inaugural release from the reactivated FAME label in Muscle Shoals, AL is this 18-track overview of Jimmy Hughes's '60s output that originally saw the light of day on the Guyden, Vee Jay, Atco, and Atlantic labels. FAME is legendary in the deep Southern soul circles, and this comp will demonstrate why. Emotion runs high throughout Jimmy's music, with "Steal Away," "I Worship the Ground You Walk On," and "Why Not Tonight" stealing the show for me. I've cherished his Vee Jay and Atco LPs for years and always wondered why there's never been a CD reissue of this material. Well, lucky for us, Rick Hall has opened the vaults and made this music available again. Thank you!! Also, make sure to check out Kent's wonderful 3-CD box set Take Me to the River: A Southern Soul Story 1961-1977, which contains 75 tracks of the finest Southern soul you'll ever hear, from the obvious to the obscure.

The Ettes - Look At Life Again Soon

I've been listening to this fine NYC garage trio quite a bit lately. This album, their second, was, like their first, recorded in London at Toe Rag Studios. I don't think I've yet heard anything recorded there that I don't like. Their music is super-catchy, tough-girl garage pop with tons'a fuzz. "Crown of Age" is a most memorable song. I think it plays in my head even while I'm asleep. Is that even possible? Think Runaways/Muffs/Headcoatees with maybe a touch of Elastica(?) thrown in. Also available on CD.

Various Artists - Funky L.A.

This album appeared at the Bay Area Amoeba stores on consignment recently, and I was curious enough to take a chance on it. I'm glad I did. There's some heavy-duty funk within these grooves. Is there a bottomless pit of great, obscure, local funk and soul? I believe there is.

Various Artists - Honorable mentions

And, as always, I have to sneak in the "honorable mentions" as my fifth choice:
Jimmy Radway & The Fe Me Time All-Stars Dub I (Pressure Sounds LP/CD), Paul Weller At the BBC (Universal UK 3 LP/4 CD box set), The Kinks Picture Book (Sanctuary 6 CD box set), Bee Gees Odessa (Rhino 3 CD deluxe edition), Rodriguez Cold Fact (Light In the Attic LP/CD), Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou The Vodoun Effect 1972-1975 (Analog Africa CD), The Vibrations Vibrating Vibrations: The Okeh & Epic Singles 1963-1968 (Kent CD), Vince Taylor Jet Black Leather Machine (Big Beat CD).

tip: Looking for a great music-oriented vacation this spring? Check out the Ponderosa Stomp in New Orleans April 28-29. It's a great two-day fest of unsung musical heroes and legends. The price is right, the accommodations are cheap and convenient, and you'll remember it forever!! Nuff said. See you there?

Cornelius Cardew - Treatise

Performed by The QUaX Ensemble, directed by Peter Kotik. This is a live recording from 1967 in Prague. A double live CD of English music that I consider better than the other double live album Frampton Comes Alive, by another Englishman.

Orphx - Rarities And Remixes

Double CD of tracks recorded between 1996 and 2005. A duo of Richard Oddie and Christina Sealey, they create both old school industrial and the more current beat oriented hypnotic dance music. This set is a nice introduction to the band, and, oh yeah, they're from Canada, so you know they're nice people, eh.

Toshi Ichiyanagi - Obsure Tape Music Of Japan Vol. 5

Number 5 in an ongoing series of Japanese tape music. This CD has three pieces: 1) "Music For Tinguely 1963," 2) "Appearance 1967," and 3) "Music For Living Space 1969." This whole series is a must for all fans of academic electronic music, but this one stands out because of the compositional skill of Ichiyanagi.

Acid Birds - Acid Birds

Part of the new batch of Qbico LPs focusing on American performers. A trio of Andrew Barker (drums, percussion, jaw harp), Jaime Fennelly (electronics, harmonium) and Charles Waters (alto sax, clarinet, bass clarinet). Like most of the Qbico improv records I like the most, electronics take the music to new realms of enjoyment. The drone of the harmonium also adds new dimensions to an already solid improv session. The vinyl is a black and yellow splash design for optimum tripping.

Svarte Greiner - Man Bird Dress

Svarte Greiner is the group name used by Norwegian Erik K. Skodvin. He produces beautiful and haunting atmospheric landscapes. Also check out his previous album Knive on Type Records.

tip: Rodger Collins released Through My Eyes in September. A local and legendary performer famous for "She's Looking Good" and "Foxy Girls In Oakland."  This album is good and worth checking out.

Fred Hersch Pocket Orchestra - Live at the Jazz Standard

New York jazz pianist-composer Fred Hersch's Pocket Orchestra recorded live last year at the NYC jazz club as just a quartet (trumpeter Ralph Alessi, percussionist Richie Barshay, and the amazing young vocal improviser Jo Lawry) playing Hersch originals, all of them full of melodic brilliance and joy. One hopes that we were put on Earth to feel as happy as this music sounds.

Pete Seeger - At 89

Even the folk legend's oldest fans were probably surprised to find Seeger on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial at Barack Obama's Jan. 18 "We Are One" celebration, encouraging a "choir" of 400,000 to sing along to all the verses of "This Land Is Your Land," accompanied by Bruce Springsteen and grandson, Tao Rodriguez. On his new CD, Seeger is sometimes solo, and other times accompanied by a changing cast of musicians, with a few spoken intros on mostly new songs, including one inspired by Berkeley's Zero Waste Commission.

Los Cenzontles with David Hidalgo - Songs of Wood & Steel

San Pablo's young band Los Cenzontles has issued a series of regional folkloric albums over the past decade, but this one is something new as the group teams with Los Lobos guitarist David Hidalgo to create modern Latin folk and rock drenched in West Coast culture and tradition. They combine old elements and songs in new ways, including several extended rock guitar jams (accompanied by banda horns). Linda Ronstadt adds some vocal harmonies, but it is Los Cenzontles and Hidalgo that are blazing territory Los Lobos never got to.

Franco & Le T.P.O.K. Jazz - Francophonic

Amidst a cornucopia of recent new CDs and reissues of great African music, none is more significant than this 2-CD set. The first "Best of" Congo's great Franco to cover his entire recording career (1953-1989), beginning with his first recording when he was 15, with just acoustic guitar and a bit of percussion. As his T.P. O.K. Jazz band grew, he added horns, and his rumba-based rhythms and hypnotic electric guitar playing developed. He became one of the biggest influences on African music. This one's essential!

Will Bernard - Blue Plate Special

The Berkeley-reared electric guitarist has issued a number of East Bay jazz-funk albums, some heavily groove-oriented. This one emphasizes tunes and his inventive electric guitar playing. It doesn't hurt that he's playing in a dream band with John Medeski on keyboards, Andy Hess on bass, and Stanton Moore on drums. Today's jazz doesn't get much tighter.

Q-Tip - The Renaissance

It's Tip...

DJ Revolution - King Of The Decks

One of the best scratch DJs ever. A song with Tash and Sean Price is almost worth the whole album.

Sukiyaki Western Django

OK I'm breaking the rules a bit for this one, as it came out last year, but it was new to me and I thought it was great. It's like a Samurai western thing. Goes good with the volume way up.

Burn After Reading

I feel like this is a given, so...words words words.

Ludacris - Theater Of The Mind

Ludacris has always been an exception in my otherwise harsh opinion of mainstream rap music. Theater Of The Mind keeps that same pace. And, although a typical statement in my case, the 9th Wonder and Premier tracks are worth the price on their own.

Eagle Nebula - Cosmic Headphones

Super good production, crazy rhymes. I likeded it.

Fennesz - Black Sea

A richly textured ambient haze of deep and incandescent beauty...subtle yet powerful stuff from this laptop maestro. Feels a bit like the winter companion piece to the equally excellent Endless Summer and every bit as good if not even better!

Aidan Baker & Tim Hecker - Fantasma Parastasie

Speaking of "kind of heavy"...this head-to-head collaboration between these two distinctly accomplished musicians yields some excellent heavy ambient dronescapes.

Mountains - Mountains Mountains Mountains

More lovely ambience from this NYC duo who sculpt fine art out of using only guitar, keyboards, and some electronics. This one is a little more edgy than their previous work, but still wonderfully warm and shimmery. Limited to 500 copies on LP only and now out of print, but look for their new full-length to drop on Thrill Jockey sometime in February. It's definitely going to be solid... can't wait to hear it!

Philip Jeck - Suite : Live in Liverpool

This UK-based manipulator of turntables has made another fine record of dreamy soundscapes using old records and some electronics. Recorded live, this one shows how adept he is at doing this stuff without the aid of studio trickery. Masterful technique and otherwordly results. Sounds a bit like a haunted wooden ship traveling across an ocean of steam and smoke.

Emeralds - What Happened

This Ohio trio has been making some of the nicest ambient/electronic/drone music around for the last couple of years. They've mostly slipped under the radar due to releasing most of their stuff on CD-Rs and cassettes in minute quantities (generally less than 100 copies of each!), but they get a proper CD release here on Carlos Giffoni's No Fun label. Their music is very reminiscent of early Kosmische music á la Tangerine Dream, Cluster/Harmonia, Manuel Gottsching/Ash Ra Tempel, and Popol Vuh. Each of the three members all have various solo and collaborative projects too, which makes it nearly impossible to track down everything they've done. Start with this one (perhaps their best based on what I've heard of their immense catalog) and let the magical power in these glittering green stones show you the way from there.

Yui Onodera - Suisei

Blissful washes of minimalist drone from this skilled Japanese soundcrafter. Simple, lovely, and limited to 300 copies... get it while it lasts!

Tricorn & Queue - Hidden Entrances

The cassette is coming back! Seriously, there are tons of small labels releasing limited runs of amazing music on this supposedly "outdated" format. This gem (on the always excellent Stunned label out of Long Beach, CA) is an incredibly warm blueish green lagoon of mellow, blissed-out tropical vibrations...

Xiphiidae - Used Parts Galaxy

Yet another fine label (Housecraft) that has put out a consistently amazing string of releases on cassette and CD-R. This one is indeed a galaxy, an entire interstellar spacescape filled with glistening molecules of delicate wonder. Xiphiidae is the project of Jeff Astin, the head of the Housecraft label, and also one of the two gentlemen responsible for the Tricorn & Queue stuff. I can't get enough of the lovely synthesizer tones he summons and the gentle moods that pervade his material, making each of the several titles in his growing discography something special...

Wave and Particle - Wave and Particle

Two different CD-R releases from this local Oakland duo. Both contain some of the most amazing futuristic electronic music I've heard. Sounds unlike anything else out there, while still remaining somehow accessible. Totally fascinating, and especially nice with headphones.

The Present - World I See

NYC trio based around producer Rusty Santos, who has worked with Panda Bear, among others. Nice long jams that blend diverse instrumentation and eclectic stylistic elements together into a cohesive whole. Seriously epic and soulful in a post modern kind of way.

Anything and everything put out by Mississippi Records - Yeah, all of them!

Mississippi Records is a small record store from Portland, Oregon which has been releasing a growing catalog of collections featuring early blues and gospel music, classic African pop music, and other random goodies (old soul music, Temple Orchestras from Thailand, etc). These are wonderful gems, lovingly compiled into coherent artifacts which are well worth investigating... here's to their continued success and a long-running series of amazing archival material!

tip: This is what I do with most of my spare time when I'm not at Amoeba: www.myspace.com/thewhybecause.

Emmet Otter's Jug-Band Christmas

It's got jug music, rodents, and surrealism. Also, classic Hensonness.

Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson

It has all the same archival footage and '60s rock classics as the other HST docs, and of course it contains its share of Johnny Depp.  But this one is comprehensive and wraps everything together nicely, especially with Thompson's egomaniacal fantasy funeral.

Baby Mama

If you're put off by Lorne Michaels productions and/or maternity comedies, or baby momedies as I like to call them, I totally understand. I am too. But do not let your aversion make you miss out on the Steve Martin appearances in this film. They are golden gems of comedy. Gems. Just fast forward to his parts, it is well worth it.

Druid Perfume - Druid Perfume

A good chunk of the (sadly deceased) Piranhas lay down a gonzoid jazz-punk of a platter. Imagine Beefheart and Screamin' Jay collaborating on a swampy acid rock meltdown. Hard to explain in a sentence or two.

Hunches - Exit Dreams

Face melting fury with added distorto-crush. Heart achingly beautiful and ungodly ugly at the same damn time. A mutt grown of indie rock despair and Electric Eels-style nihilism. Epic production of a mid-period Flaming Lips scale. Great way for these kids to go out. You will be missed. Like to see somebody try to top this'n in 2009. Eat your teeth...

Pieces

(Grindhouse Releasing) - The label that gave you I Drink Your Blood and Make Them Die Slowly pulls another bad-ass maneuver with this sick puppy. Christopher George is on the hunt for a madman on campus who's building a life-size rag doll out of lady parts. Actual chainsaw hits to the flesh, again and again. Kung-Fu for no reason. Gratuitous leg warmers and garden tool deaths. The guy who played Bluto in Altman's Popeye! It's never looked so good. Or worse. Awesome trash. "You don't have to go to Texas…"

Lee Moses - Time & Place

Holy Grail? Some say...I don't know about that, but it was my fave soul score since the Baby Huey & Betty Davis re-ishes a while back. All the singles & the LP in one place. One of two CDs I paid for this year (vinyl, on the other hand, can cause bankruptcy...) "Bad Girl" is in my top ten songs, so it's nice to have a physical copy in possession. There's an LP version out there? Greasy.

In The Folds Of The Flesh

(Severin DVD) - A garbage can of Euro-sleaze delights. Even for a Giallo, it makes little sense...but who cares with this much incest, decapitations,Nazisploitation, and garish color caked on. A deliriously good time. Nice to finally chuck that "import" copy I've had on VHS for ten odd years.

Death Raid - Death Raid

14 song gatefold LP. Blistering crust that features ex members of (and sounds like) Disrupt, State of Fear, Consume, Shitlist, etc. They destroyed at Burnt Ramen and gave me a week long bangover.

Nachtmystium - Assassins: Black Meddle Part 1

This album makes a departure from their more traditional black metal assault and mixes in some experimental and psychedelic sounds.

Disrupt - Disrupt

Seven songs from old recording sessions that never saw the light of day till now. Gatefold cover with color vinyl.

Abrupt - Abrupt

Ripping Bay Area hardcore with female vocals. Features members of Born/Dead, Desolation, and Scurvy Dogs. "Hey Beltloops, where's the Kool Aid?"

Nux Vomica / Wake Up On Fire - Nux Vomica / Wake Up On Fire (split)

An awesome release by these two metal edged epicrust bands.

Massgrave / Stormcrow - Massgrave / Stormcrow (split)

Vancouver Grindcore vs. Oakland Stenchcore.

Elk / Carrion - Elk / Carrion Demo (split)

Split Demo of Oakland's black metal party boys Elk and noise aficionados Carrion.

Withered - Folie Circulaire

Raging dark black metal from Georgia that fuses elements of black, death, doom, and prog. Features guest vocals by Barney from Napalm Death. Check them out live if you get the chance.

WolfBrigade - Comalive

Hail Sweden!

Samothrace - Life's Trade

Epic soulful doom from Lawrence, Kansas. Double LP on 45 with a gatefold cover and poster. LP comes with a free download of the album.

tip: "Under the spell of spirits, miracles will occur."
"I can see that we're playing poker now, and let me tell you I'm all jacked up for it."
"I'm not afraid of what I can't do. I'm afraid of what I will do, and you KNOW what I'm talking about."
- McQuown Manifesto