Holiday Gift Guide

Ok, December is here and it's alright to put out the wreath and spin our peanuts Christmas album. Seeing as there's still time to shop for those you love, or those your obligated to through some work party and us being the helpful folk we are, here's a little peek at some of the goodies we've sprinkled out like visions of sugarplums.

Even though Adam and Matt may differ over whether The Smiths are to be treasured or trashed, neither can deny these UK singles are in great shape and won't last long.

Tom Waits live double LP taken from the recent Glitter and Doom tour. Includes a digital download that includes the "Tom Talks" disc of all conversation. Amazing renditions of classic Waits songs that strike the buying itch in both regular and the rabid bootleg collecting Tom fans.

The perfect thing for the rabid fanboy you might be dating. A beautiful set of original Watchmen comics with extras. This hard to find set comes to us at a fraction of the price you'd see online and in very good shape.

When Fat Possum released Andrew Bird's Noble Beast, they also put out a hush hush live cd in small pressing. Taken from a 2007 live show in Montreal, Bird performs earlier songs that are often considered better than his new stuff.

Thinking about how to please that music dork on your list? How about some first pressing Sonic Youth albums? Wax that's clean enough for Howie Mandell to eat off of and hard to find, that's just how we like 'em.

OTHER STUFF...
Strap on your gypsy boots and drink while watching the 2 1/2 HOUR dvd that comes free with the new Live from Axis Mundi LP by Gogol Bordello. Digital download included means cds are going to end up like slap bracelets, so do us all a favor and buy vinyl.

Ghana Special!! Even though your friends are all buying the 5 lpset and making you look bad, show off your two cd set and tell em to take a hike while listening to Dr. K Gyasi and his Noble Kings.

AND SO...
That's all for now, we're setting up our list of the year's top picks (heavily debating whether re-issues are allowed, or their own category), feel free to chime in with yours as well. Feel free to stop by and get warm on the couch with Maynard, we'll be under the mistletoe.
Keep digging in the crates.
--Matt and Adam.

I wear black friday on the outside because black friday is how I feel on the inside.

Black Friday is upon us and here in sleepy Arcata, where commerce is seemingly immune to the frantic four a.m. shoppers. We have taken to making our own Black Friday by only playing bands with the word Black in their name or album title...no we do not have too much time on our hands. After a weekend of banjo laden hijinx, we've caught a full dose of old time fever and the store has too. This post is full of re-releases hitting the shelves, recent loot to swing onto the racks and some of the newer acts out there still making that classic sound.

Crow Quill Night Owls
Ah Port Townsend, the Washintonian equivalent of Arcata and home to Kit "Stymee" Stovepipe and Calliope Kane, former members of the Inkwell Rhythm Makers and Below the Salt. With a sound that reminds one of the Cheap Suit Serenaders, Stovepipe gravels out the kind of ragtime and rhythm that you'd normally hear at 78rpm. Click above for a download of their first release "Mechanical Unicorn."

Carolina Chocolate Drops
The Carolina Chocolate Drops are an African-American String band in the old-time tradition. Based in the Triangle area of North Carolina their music is rooted in the foothills and mountains of north and south Carolina. Learning their trade from master old-time fiddler Joe Thompson, they have been tearing up stages all over the world since 2005. Unlike other kinds of string band music the Chocolate Drops play in the Piedmont style, with roaring banjos out in front while the fiddle hangs and hums in the back.....beautiful stuff!

Sitting on Top of the World - ...

Pokey LaFarge
After tearing the roof off of 3 Foods Cafe yet again, The South City Three and their skinny frontman have smashed their way to the top of our daily playlist with their newest release, entitled "Riverboat Soul." Backed by some of the best hardworkin' musicians out there, including Old Crow Medicine Show fiddler Ketch Secor, this band brings the "A" game to every performance, often playing for four hours before breaking a sweat. Though Riverboat Soul isn't fully released yet, the band's website has some preview tracks, including our new favorite song, "Bag of Bones."

OM
Live Conference recently made its appearance onto wax and we here at the shop are willing to part with a few copies. Deluxe limited edition vinyl-only release packaged in heavy-duty tip-on style die cut jackets. Conference of the Birds played in its entirety and recorded on 24-track multi-track remote audio at their 2008 performance in New York.

Ghana Special
A five lp box set for the afro-funk loving nerd in all of us. 900 grams of vinyl, two unreleased tracks, a twelve page booklet...are you drooling yet? With the overwhelming success of the previous Ghana sounds collections, these are sure to be the kind of thing your friends trade you naked pictures of their sister for.

Din Ya Sugri - Christy Azuma &...

OTHER BANDS TO CHECK OUT...
Sour Mash Hug Band
Chicago Stompers
The Krebsic Orkestar

Until next time everyone, keep diggin through the crates.

--Matt and Adam.

October & November

Halloween is almost here and gone & for the first year ever, we're not already bumping Halloween records and wearing our stormtrooper masks. Seems like this year their isn't much time for the Monster Mash as the record player is already overbooked with new lp's to blast down 8th street.

NEW RELEASES

The Mountain Goats

John Darnielle is back and apparently he plays the piano now. This new collection of 12 songs outlines "hard lessons" he learned from specific verses of the bible. Thankfully, as a lapsed Catholic and professed nonbeliever who chants the Hare Krishna, this is not Darnielle's version of the infamous "hey look I found religion" albums, instead this album is soft and contemplative. The one complaint Matt has about The Life of the World to Come is that it lacks the raw hollerin' type of songs found on earlier recordings but hey, isn't it always the cynical nerd who says, "it'll never be as good as that first demo 8 track I traded that guy with the lazy eye an ounce for."

Frank Fairfield

He plays in old bars, Churches, and at the L.A. Farmers Market with a coffee can at his feet. He has a radio show where he plays old 78s. He's a giant of a man whose banjo looks like a kid's toy in his hands. He is Frank Fairfield and we'd compare his music to other bands, except the kind of music he plays pre-dates the music you listen to! Recorded with just one man and three instruments, his self titled debut is a jaw dropping return to old timey music.

The King Khan and BBQ Show

The new upcoming album, Invisible Girl, from King Khan and BBQ is more of just what you'd expect from these two: toe tapping garage motown that almost sounds too energetic for just two men, even if one of them is in a sequin evening gown. After being disappointed with their collaboration with the Black Lips, these two nugget acolytes have totally redeemed themselves with this new and a bit more polished release.

NEW NEWS

Mississippi Records is stoking our fire as of late, their cache of affordable bluesy records have crawled up and nestled right in our left ventricles. Adam screamed like a woman after finding Abner Jay's album. The son and grandson of slaves in Washington County, Georgia, Jay started playing in medicine shows when he was 5 and is the one man blues equivalent of a punch to the gut.

Matt peed himself a little when he opened a box and pulled out Last Kind Word Blues. Along with a slew of murder-your-neighbor-for-a-copy blues tunes from 1926-53, it contains Geeshie Wiley's heartbreaking title track (that's a $120 78 if you can find it), wonderful music your granparents made your parents to.

Analogue Africa...sigh. We feel about Analogue Africa the way 15 yr old girls felt about Shaun Cassidy during the 70's, whenever one of these hits our record player you can be sure it stays on at least 2 or 3 times. These 2 lp sets are the stuff that makes any group of people begin shakin their booties to the hypnotic beat. Recently we tested this and we received a positive result on 13 out of 17 city buses (3 buses threw us off and 1 had a guy in a Tasmanian devil hat that had obviously already captured everyone's attention).

COMING SHOWS

November 14th Pokey LaFarge & The South City Three at 3 Foods Cafe
The Rvierboat Soul that is Pokey and the Souh City 3 return to Humboldt for another night of fun and debauchery with the No Good Redwood Ramblers, after some blue cheese nachos of course.

Quickpost this image to Myspace, Digg, Facebook, and others!

November 7th The Legendary Kawabata Makoto of Acid Mothers Temple will play the Jambalaya in Arcata! Backed by Humboldt's newest local band Radio Moscow, clear your schedule for this one because it promises to be one hell of a night!

Did You Miss Us?

Ok, Ok, so it's been a LOOONG time since we've blogged but we've been UBER BUSY getting ahold of new companies (including the AMAZING Numero Group) and discovering treasure troves of used up and down the coast. I guess it's paying off, as we've seen alot of new faces and had a nice writeup in thejournal calling us Humboldt's best spot for vinyl dessert!

New music is coming down the pike from all over right now. Being behind the Redwood Curtain means we're often next to the last to hear new bands but at therisk of sounding redundant to those who scour the music blogs, here's some great new bands...

Woods

Our friend Carlos is a music junkie whose tastes don't always match ours so when he said "you HAVE to come see Woods," we didn't know what to expect. What we got was perhaps our new favorite indie band. Mix 1 part pysch guitar 1 indie beard guy with high vocals and 1 part noise distortion and you have Woods. I could go on and make some comparisons but I'll go the local route and say, if Mark Shikuma and Ian from the Alibi both like an album...you should buy two copies.

Le Loup

So I heard the first album these guys put out and it didn't do it for me, however! this new stuff seems to have a panda bear kind of feel that makes everything from driving to doing the dishes and much more pleasant task. A little echo and fuzz over a heavy beat and indie sceaming refrains and I'm sold. Some of the tracks can make you look for the next track button but you gotta allow for a few of those nowadays.

Le Loup - Forgive Me from Old Chum on Vimeo.

Family Portrait>

A lo-fi mix of garage and pop, perfect for when the sun is shining. Like the Ruby Suns, Family Portrait combines the folk and indie aspects with a fuzzy lo-fi coating and reverberating refrains that, at times, can remind you of TV on the Radio.

Spindrift

A re-issue that has Adam's nose wide open, Spindrift's soundtrack to movie The Legend of God's Gun" is what happens when a spaghetti western and stone rock have an illegitimate child. Available on golden vinyl and under 20 bucks, what a steal.

Well, that's all for now, we're heading to Hardly Strictly Bluegrass next week and may just return with some new goodies if you've all been good. Don't forget that Hawk and a Hacksaw are coming to town October 10th at Nocturnum, no tix so get there early. That's all Folks!

Post Oyster Fest Jubilation

Ok, we know, we've been lazy. Having not done an entry in awhile, we feel like there's alot to catch you up on. Our soul order hit the shelves with El Michels tribute to both Isaac Hayes and the Wu-Tang Clan! While drooling over the copies, we wiped our mouths with what turned out to be our new favorite soul records! Lefties Soul Connection is raw funk delivered from the heart of Amsterdam, while Soul Messages from Dimona is Numero's answer to that age old question, what happens when soul goes kosher?

But don't think we've forgotten the world of rock, Earth has, what we consider to be one of the best live recorded albums and we've only got a handful of copies of the 3000 that were made. Check out "Radio Earth."

We haven't heard from A Hawk and A Hacksaw since they released their limited dvd/cd with the Hun Hangar Orchestra, this new album has more guest players, old gypsy tunes and, unfortunately, no download with the lp.

Now back to the soul, ever heard of the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble? One of Sun Ra's former bandmates breeds a herd of 9 children and ties them down to music instead of baseball, the result is sock-knocking good brass soul you cannot ignore.

Radio Moscow is coming to Arcata! On tour for their latest release "Brain Cycles," catch them at Auntie Moe's Friday June 26th or Monday June 29th at Jambalaya with DJ Paul Maul.

Friday In Store!

New loot has come in to the store this week! Adam has gone fully deaf listening to Moss, Nachmystium and Bloodhag, I have been a hip-shakin' slave to the sounds of Pisces, Orgone and the El Michels Affair and Maynard only emerges from the back for Charlie Feathers as of late.

Regardless of your poison though, there's something for us all this week. Sonic Youth releases their newest album "The Eternal", The Budos Band throws us a collection of unreleased tracks in preparation for their 3rd album, Nachmystium puts out their homage to Pink Floyd on "Assassins: Black Meddle Part 1." Also, a whole slew of new comics are on the rack, most importantly the wonderful classics illustrated series, where top artists ave their take on the great works of literature.

This Friday, join us for Arts Alive and the music of Papa Houli & The Fleas. Bob Doran has his photos up on the walls and is offering a prize for whomever can guess the most defunct Humboldt bands from his 16 photo "mantle" collection. Believe it or not, we twitter now, when the occasion demands, the link is listed on the links column to the right or by clicking here.