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August 31, 2009

Paper
+ Plastic

Magpie, in this instance solo trackster CJ Stankewich, delivers a twelve song canon swirling in psychedelic sonik intensity. Paper + Plastic is the intriguingly raw period after CJ's work in the Skimbleshanks, just prior to the more majestic full-throttle four-piece version of Magpie.

Several of the tracks were conceived, but never finished, in the Skimbleshanks and Irwin Project (w/Martin & Tarbox), several are proto versions of later Magpie standards, and several of these excursions exist only on this cassette. The cover art, by Jen Wolcin, and the design of the cassette, by Rich Martin, are classic album art, ideally conveying the music within.

Please enjoy this solo LP from CJ Stankewich!

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July 20, 2009

Safe Heat
single

This new single from Sodium Lights contains three new versions of "Safe Heat," featuring IPG vocalist Julia Farrar, plus five additional tracks.

As always, you can listen to the full-quality, full-length versions for free here at MMA.

We decided to include several b-sides that did not make it onto the Post Signal LP, and a few demo versions of songs that did make it onto the LP - we thought you might get a kick out of the rough edges.

Closing the single, "Road Church" is an instrumental that hints at the direction of the next Sodium Lights LP, anticipated by the end of 2009. We hope you enjoy this eclectic mix of new remixes and older songs!

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June 23, 2009
rogerhumanbeing Goes It Alone Roger Peffley was the epitome of what the music scene in Mystic was supposed to be about. As a teenager, he encountered the existing scene and was inspired enough to learn the drums and begin writing and playing original music before he had even graduated from high school. Finding a niche musically with the Alexander Field, he became increasingly curious as to how far his inspiration could take him. That desire led him to learn both guitar and bass, testing the waters by fronting his own ensemble, the Ambertones throughout the mid-nineties, and playing bass along-side scene stalwart Charley Eastman in the vital Mona Gritch, which then led him to relocate to NYC alongside Charley’s latest group onDasher. This move found Roger firmly ensconced in the NYC lifestyle, where he even worked at the same rehearsal studio that the reformed Portersville rented space at during their long NYC rehearsals from 1998 to 2000.
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April 22, 2009

17 Relics Emerge From Presence

17 Relics entered Presence Studios for the first time in 1986 to record their first proper demo. The bulk of this material was re-recordings of their debut cassette release, Aix Sanctuary, as well as new songs written in the following year. The force that steered them to Jon Russel and Presence was Paisley Jungle lead bassist Steve Swan, who had worked at Presence previously and had taken a liking to the young Relics sound. Steve co-produced with Russel those sessions, which yielded the 17 Relics submission to the Towers of New London vol. 2 LP compilation, as well as a batch of unreleased songs that should appear here at the Archive sometime this summer.

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April 15, 2009

delta of venus nyc debut

In the summer of 1995, Delta of Venus spent a sweltering weekend in NYC recording their debut single for nascent Connecticut indie label Strumalicious. They would spend a two-night stay in cozy Carlton Arms, and two day-long sessions recording "Cold Spring" and "All Star" with Greg Talenfeld at Waterworks Studios in the meatpacking district.

Waterworks was chosen for the brilliant guitar recording found on Jon Spencer Blues Explosion's extra wide LP, which was necessary to get every bit out of guitarist Rich Freitas' unique stylings. It was a complete success, defined most effectively on the guitar break from "All Star", where Talenfeld fed the live guitar into a secondary recorder that he manipulated in real time. Other bits of fine engineering came about when Talenfeld talked them out of using the bulk of their own larger stage amps for tiny vintage amps from the studio's arsenal. By reconstructing their "live" sound, he brought out the essence that was at the core of their music: the voices and rhythm.

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April 08, 2009

$3 Depth Charge Surfaces!

Recently, we transferred the 7" vinyl of on dasher up to here, and it is a blast - we are now very excited to bring you an extraordinary 7" single, scratches and all, from the band $3 Depth Charge. Built and fronted by songsmith Zach Johnson, 3$ was one of the first bands, along with Grand Passion, to successfully transition from Mystic to New London. After leaving the band doug, Zach began to craft the first handful of 3$ songs with GinaMarie on bass, hoping to get a song into the forthcoming Trapezium local mystic music compilation. Roger Peffley joined and played drums, while Matt McClosky produced several of these new songs, including "the wobbler" which was smartly selected for Trapezium.

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March 31, 2009

learning it from on dasher

Charley Eastman is one of the most interesting figures in the Mystic music scene: as one of the two main songwriters in Lotus, the titanic hard rock group, (which also featured Paul Twing sharing songwriting and vocal duties, with Nick Toscano and Tom Lateweic's massive rhythm section) Charley helped create a most unique band that stood on the mountaintop for years while touring nationally.

He left Lotus at the height of their popularity, to follow his muse which led him to start indie rock outfit Mona Gritch - with Doug Hodges on drums, and Roger Peffley tackling bass while leaving his own drum kit behind. Their legacy will be explored more here at the MMA in the future, but when Hodges decided to relocate to NYC, Eastman scrapped the whole Mona Gritch concept and rebuilt the idea as on dasher, which saw Peffley head back behind the drums and former Latex Voodoo guitarist Greg Svetz joining on bass. (Interestingly, Eastman was unknowingly instrumental to the beginning of Delta of Venus, who bought his sequencer keyboard at their start, and relied heavily upon it).