Rip It Off and Start Again: Noise to Enjoy in 2008
December 5th, 2008 | 5:15 pm est |
Noise comes in many forms: the howling whine of feedbacked guitars, the truckstop cassette hiss of a cheaply recorded session, the outerwordly hum and drone of keyboards pushed beyond capacity. It can come bathed in reverb or completely overloaded. Unhinged and in the red or hushed and spooky. We picked some of our favorite albums of 2008 that bring the noise in all kinds of ways. Let us know what some of your favorites were!
Black Time -Double Negative
If a band ever deserved to be on a label named In the Red, it would be Black Time. They smack listeners upside the head with almost ridiculous amounts of distortion and cave-dwelling reverb — so much so that it can take a while to get to the snotty, witty garage-punk hiding with the din. (Read more)
Fuck Buttons - Street Horrrsing
Fuck Buttons’ collage of brittle electronics, post-rock epics, and blistering noise recalls more than a few other bands — they’re capable of raging like Wolf Eyes, conjuring Aa’s dead calm, echoing Mogwai’s majesty and mining similar territory to tourmates like Stars of the Lid — but they put these elements together in their own beautiful, and often unsettling, way. (Read more)
Grouper - Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill
On her third album, Grouper’s Liz Harris creates a quiet, fuzzy and enveloping world of sound that wraps around you like a slowly building fog. Her delicate vocal harmonies and simple acoustic guitar playing taken on their own would be quite nice but covered in reverb and hiss somehow turn out completely magical. And almost more melancholy than you’d think possible.
Indian Jewelry - Free Gold!
Out of all of Indian Jewelry’s albums, Free Gold! is actually the least noisy, but it’s still got plenty of super-saturated distortion and hiss decorating its warped drone-pop. Instead of abrasive blasts of noise, the relatively subdued and often lulling textures here give the songs a woozy, hallucinatory feel, even when the drum machines stiffen and the guitars and keyboards turn jagged and atonal. Ranging from suffocating to cavernous, from jangly psych-rock to industrial-tinged rants, Free Gold! is surprisingly subtle and eclectic, showing that Indian Jewelry are finding ever more sophisticated ways to evolve their noise.
Love is All - A Hundred Things Keep Me Up at Night
Love Is All’s second album, A Hundred Things Keep Me Up at Night, succeeds by doing two important things. First, they hew closely to the tinny and overloaded production of Nine Times That Same Song that worked so brilliantly, but introduce enough changes to keep the album from being a carbon copy. The production keeps the hissy clatter and the cavernous reverb, with Josephine Olausson’s vocals distorted and fuzzy. The drums and bass are relatively free of noise though, which gives the record a punch and power the debut didn’t have. (Read more)
No Age - Nouns
Nouns is an epic battle between melody and noise, between beauty and grunge, that gives the album a real sense of drama. Also adding to the sense that something is at stake on Nouns are the lyrics. There are no simple love songs here — mostly twisted fragments of isolation and ruin with the (very) occasional bit of tender hope thrown in to keep you from throwing in the towel. In the final count, melody and beauty, fractured as they may be, win the day. (Read more)
Parts & Labor - Receivers
Parts & Labor may still be stuck with a “noise” tag for some time to come, but whatever the intent of the group, and having once again switched drummers, the band hits an astonishing new high on Receivers. It’s not going too far to say that the group is one of the best exponents of the kind of epic turn underground rock & roll experienced in the ’80s, but refracted through later prisms — most notably, a strong willingness to engage with electronic options beyond feedback pedals. (Read more)
Ponytail - Ice Cream Spiritual!
The wild trill Molly Siegel lets loose at the beginning of “Beg Waves” lets listeners know that Ice Cream Spiritual! is unmistakably a Ponytail album, even if it’s more neatly groomed than their debut was. Kamehameha introduced the band’s highly concentrated, highly combustible noise-punk-pop in saturated outbursts; it sounded like someone threw a few mikes into the fray and then got out of the way of the band’s blazing onslaughts. (Read more)
Sic Alps - U.S. EZ
Noisily experimental San Francisco duo Sic Alps graduate to the comparatively mainstream Siltbreeze label for their fifth album, and the album title is not as ironic as those who have heard its predecessors might think: it’s not exactly easy listening, but this is by some distance the most immediately accessible album Sic Alps have so far released. (Read more)
Times New Viking - Rip It Off
Times New Viking have no time for subtle recording tricks like EQ, proper levels, or fidelity. No doubt their recording budget hovered around the low two figures with most of that going toward beverages. The resulting album is a 30-minute blast of over-driven organ, squawking guitars, rattling drums, and pushed-to-distortion vocals that sound painful when played loud, and like a far-off hum when played quietly. (Read more)
Vivian Girls - Vivian Girls
If you demand precision and timing from your pop music, you’ll be aghast at the trio’s lack of professionalism. But what Vivian Girls sacrifice in chops (oh, that ghastly term!), they gain back double in energy and immediacy. The sound of three people ripping through hooky tunes without regard for pleasantries and taste is one of the great joys of rock & roll….. (Read more)
Women - Women
Women sounds like it was recorded onto a cheap cassette found on a truck stop bathroom floor, and yet the melodic gifts the group possess are undeniable. Really, though, it puts listeners into a bind. If you are a noisenik, there might be too many tunes with hummable choruses. If you are a pop lover, the skronky waves of distorted guitar noise might be too much to handle. However, if you are the type of indie rocker who likes to have your pop delivered in a hissy, muffled bundle….(Read more)
Xela - In Bocca Al Lupo
“In bocca al lupo” (”in the wolf’s mouth”) is a traditional Italian phrase wishing someone luck in attempting a difficult undertaking or in the face of dire circumstances. It’s also a fitting title for this album, which is among Xela’s (aka John Twells) most ambitious, abstract, and yes, difficult music. In Bocca al Lupo is even darker and more conceptual than 2006’s magnificent zombies-at-sea epic The Dead Sea: where that album was inspired by Italian horror movie soundtracks, In Bocca al Lupo began as part of an art installation about fear…(Read more)
Noise Playlist 2008
Black Time - “I’m Gonna Haunt You When I’m Gone” 
Fuck Buttons - “Okay, Let’s Talk About Magic”
Grouper - “When We Fall”
Indian Jewelry - “Walking on the Water”
Love is All - Wishing Well
No Age - “Teen Creeps”
Parts & Labor - “Prefix Free”
Ponytail - “Beg Waves”
Sic Alps - “Bathtime”
Times New Viking - “Times New Viking vs. Yo La Tengo”
Vivian Girls - “Such a Joke”
Women - “Cameras”
Xela - “In Misercordia”
Random noise blasts:
Kap Bambino
Eat Skull
Tyvjk
Little Claw
Woods
good stuff, merry christmas everyone
Only critics like this kind of over-intellectualized, shame-filled, self-loathing crap. Come on. You know this is not music. Listen with your ears, not your “refined” tastes…
ouch, bro.
I really don’t understand why you guys have snubbed Distortion by the Magnetic Fields. That’s easily one of their best albums, if not one of the better noise rock albums released this year.
I remember seeing the video for ponytails beg waves and thinking it was pretty neat. No age are cool too.
Also, since this is like at least the third time you’ve plugged them on the front page, I checked out Times New Viking, they’re actually pretty hooky I think.
Also not bad is Past Lives, the non johnny non cody part of the blood brothers, beyond gone and strange symmetry are real ace tunes.
anyone reading this should look up Skare Krau Radio. they have played with almost all of these bands.
why are these albums considered noise? grouper? noise? really?
I’m sorry, as a musician, and a music fan, not a music critic, I am absolutely blown away by how much praise bands like No Age and The Vivian Girls are getting.
I saw No Age at the Sup Pop 20th Anniversary festival, and despite all the hype and expectation surrounding their performance that day, I can honestly say they were one of the worst live bands I have ever seen! I didn’t know too much about them and went into it with a completely open mind, but they were basically a couple of amateur hacks that could neither play their instruments, even on a basic level, or write a song that doesn’t sound like it was conceived by a couple of of 17 year olds in their mommy’s basement. As for the Vivian Girls, not only are they unable to play their instruments, but they are doing nothing even remotely original. It sounds like a bunch of teenage tarts at a local community center talent night.
I am not some music snob and I am not a pro musician either, but a basic level of competence and originality is kind of necessary. I think the music press has officially run out of bands that haven’t been taken over by the Urban Outfitters Hipster Elite, so now they are trying to pretend these bands are the next “maybe you just don’t get it” thing. Forget it, I’m not buying it.
most of my friends and i are always so anxious to share music that connects with us, that we somehow end up liking, i never understood how people could be so proud announce a few of the things they DON’T like, it’s an exercise in frivolity
that being said, it’s harder for me to get into noise, but the guitar No Age’s eraser brings memories of the Walkmen’s In the New Year (in the best way possible). I like the Vivan Girls for what they were able to make with what sounds like limited talent, big honesty/little talent always trumps the opposite. Grouper’s stuff sounds amazing, though I’ve only heard her tracks on her myspace, which i got hooked up to through City Center’s blog.
Which brings me to City Center, it’s (yet another) moniker for Fred Thomas and I might be more forgiving of the jams cuz it’s him, but he’s doing a lot of great stuff, he posts a lot of what he’s working on on his blog. because of that, he throws out a lot of hurried and rushed jams to hear, but I was able to get one of his EPs (True Waste EP) and it’s been seeing good rotation over round these parts (’these parts’ being my house), and a lot of his tracks a worth a listen for fans of the genre, he even came out with a two-track under another name, Everyone, but it’s less full-on noise, and more, i dunno weird, trippy-sad stuff. so there, i’ve tossed my coin into the hat, and i’m just glad that it’s not in the hue of haterish.
Vessels debut, White Fields And Open Devices, should be right up there too!
I like this music. No Age and Times New Viking made my top 10 albums of ‘08 list, as well as the list of at least two of my fellow coworkers. We sold a copy of Nouns in the store yesterday as soon as we put it on.
I agree with the post right before mine. The No Age and Times New Viking albums were great. I think what many people don’t understand about this type of music is that there are often great melodies and structures beneath the surface of the noise. The noise creates a sonic texture but the good stuff is just as melodic and hooky as any great rock n roll. It’s easy to miss it, though, if you’re used to very polished and produced music. I used hate Sonic Youth and all their imitators when I was younger, but now it’s some of my favorite.
all of these i’ve heard i’ve liked, but it’s absolutely criminal not to mention food for animals -belly. lid-blowing noise jam hip hop. also, dalek’s abandoned languages. it shows something that this rapper has collabed with Faust-he’s got his own vision working. a little more subdued but very spooky and noisy in its own way.
what Glacial Pace said. theres nothing more effective than the msot epic songs surrounded by noise. in fact i would go as far as to say that id rather listen to the exact same song WITH lo-fi noise than with a clean production.
how shitty would My Bloody Valentine sound without the pedals and static?
then again, there is a certain truth to some bands being “you just dont get it” good. theres art, and then theres performance art.
Eat Skull’s debut “Sick to Death” on Siltbreeze Records should definitely be on this list as well.
I admit that I haven’t heard many of these bands apart from no age (meh) and Times New Viking (wow!), thanks for helping me compile a Christmas wish list!
I’ve never thought about Black Time as a band playing noise for the sake of noise. More like the most talented band of the everlasting garage scene that brought us Black lips, Cheater Slicks, Oblivians and the like.
Yes, there is noise (galore) but not on purpose and it doesn’t distract from the great rock’n'roll songs (you wouldn’t call the Cramps a noise band would you ? Oh yeah, and they are a blast live which can’t be said of some of the other noiZZzzzzz bands you mention…
this is all crap. indie rock blows.
Thanks for this article, love noise and didn’t listen to much new stuff this year and now I’ve got a nice little list of bands to check out. Loved that Fuck Buttons album this year, saw them perform the whole thing live opening for Mogwai and it was just incredible… tend to agree with “Clino” on No Age and Vivian Girls- TNV as well for me.
Sticky Antlers, an amazing noise-rock band from South Africa!
Weird discussion. I still think that the Fuck Buttons and the No Age albums are, above it all, very beautiful.
lo-fi is an excuse to make crappy music sound crappier to avoid calling it crap. When you have to distort the vocals so much to make it clear that you want no one to understand what your saying you might as well save some $ and not record a vocal track, else get a singer that can stay in pitch. This is the most un-creative art crap rock I have heard in years. You wish you were punks but really end up being tree loving hippies in the end. Go home and freak out to the static on your TV, instead of encourging this genre.
I quite like the sound of TV static, maybe it’s the Merzbow in me.
Weird list, I never in a million years thought I’d see Love Is All described as “noise”, they sound sweeter than sweet to my ears. Perhaps it’s a sign of how creepingly prevalent that tinny sub-shoegaze production muffle has been this year that bands so diverse can be retrospectively grouped under the same banner. I’m all for music being less shiny but it’s not enough to throw a load of distortion over your album just to be “current”. Having said that, Fuck Buttons are my favourite new band of the year.
As for the noisiest thing I’ve heard all year, My Bloody Valentine at the Roundhouse. They were PAINFUL.
You noise “purists” (”It’s this and not that, blah blah blah”) should get jobs, bathe, stop eating macaroni and cheese three meals a day, quit sweating around with each other over oscillators and feedback and try growing up and meeting girls. It will work wonders for you. Oh yeah, buy some Clearasil.
None of these beat Boris with Merzbow - Rock Dream from last year, I’d probably put A Place To Bury Strangers over all of these too. It had the perfect balance. Times New Viking was really good, No Age was ok, Fuck Buttons is horrible. Magnetic Fields - Distortion is missing… why?
So yeah not as good a year for noise, at least this kind of stuff. Mostly acoustic indie this year like Bon Iver, Fleet Foxes…
Whoa, don’t bring mac and cheese into this.
What about Jucifer?
Indian jewelry is the only good band on that list.
noise is cool!
I think as with everything anyone does in music, it’s what you do with it that matters. A lot of musicians wank away their little bit of talent because they don’t know how to listen to music, so they make music that people don’t really want to listen to. This applies to people who do noise, whether it’s rock or pop, or neo-psychedelia, or space rock or whatever. Noise is fun, man.
And I think just like with Jesus and Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine would be just as pleasant, even without all the effects. It’s the pop sensibilities that the distortion rides alongside that makes it so appealing. If it were just dull indie, noise or not, people wouldn’t like it and it wouldn’t be as recognised as it is. But they do, and the bands are. So these guys must be doing something right.
Sonic Youth RULE!
Weird how personal some of the comments are. IF YOU LIKE THIS YOU ARE EITHER FAKING IT OR THERE IS SOMETHING HORRIBLY WRONG WITH YOU OR BOTH.
The Boris + Merzbow album was great.
As far as other noise music goes I loved the last Hair Police record and Skullflower’s “Desire For A Holy War” was orgiastically pummelling, as was their amazing set at Colour Out Of Space (beaten only by Thurston Moore/ Bill Nace/ Chris Corsano’s hour of noise intercourse, all scrapes and bends and climaxes and I got to push Thurston in the back when he waded into the crowd). I’ve enjoyed exploring the hinterlands of cd-r’s and cassettes, a refreshingly healthy scene when recorded music as a physical object is repeatedly killed off by the relentless march of technological progress.
Here’s to the next Sonic Youth record being a thing of great beauty.
People who have tastes other than mine must justify their tastes to me. You cannot like music that I don’t like without being horribly wrong. Explain yourself.
Y’all said the F-word.That’s naughty.Can I buy that at Mal-Wart?
Fuck Buttons are standard tannoy fare at Wal-Mart, as are Aids Wolf and Grotesque Hysterectomy.
Jaime Okada, I doubt you know anything about the noise scene. It’s not made up of angsty, lonely teenagers. But God forbid you go past your own insecurities towards things you don’t understand and actually try to see what it’s about.
Whatever, you can’t fight ignorance. Some of these albums are puzzling. Why so much low-fi? No Age, Vivian Girls, and Women may get noisy, but never actually become noise. Hair Police’s Certainty of Swarms was my favorite noise album this year, but Prurient had a pretty good output as well. Rough, but rewarding listens.
Anybody who has preconceptions about the noise scene would do themselves a lot of good by attending a noise-friendly festival and discovering the crowd are not predominantly hairy-palmed teengers with bedroom tans and acne but are in fact an even mix of gender and age. What’s more, they are often to be seen talking to each other and (unbelievably) smiling and laughing!
Colour Out Of Space at Brighton this year was one of my highlights, a great crowd of both young and old and diverse performers with a common thread of open-minded adventurousness towards music. Refreshingly, it had no security or bear-clawed bouncers which made for a friendly and relaxed atmosphere. That’s right, a friendly and relaxed atmosphere. In public. Outside. Amongst people.
that’s not what happens at noise festivals. here’s what happens: douchebags with funny hair and tight clothes stand like statues and stare with their hands tucked under their armpits. sound like fun? it ain’t.
thin lizzy rules!
Here’s a compromise! For bands that use healthy elements of fuzz and noise, but write actual songs and don’t stare at their shoes acting like hipster dopes, check out Cheap Time (noisy hard rock) or Von Hayes (noisy power pop) or Jay Reatard (noisy pop punk).
Also, Ariel Pink.