i love this record. i dont want to be debate about it at all, it just rules to me. its like the magik markers have gotten all dreamy sludge blues on us, there are elements of almost every good movement in rock in the last thirty years. a continuation of boss really. drag city did the right thing signing them, because they really are embodying the spirit of royal trux (just less drugs).

Im not really digging Balf Quarry as much as Boss. Where boss had songs that had more structure to it while letting the chaos grow inside, this new one wanders indulgently and formlessly. Maybe it'll be a grower...

They kinda sound like Philemon Arthur and the Dung.

Honestly, Magik Markers are my favorite band.

I hate resurrecting threads, but I saw them last night and I gotta say I was unimpressed. I still dig them to an extent, but it sounds like they got someone else to play Elisa's parts on the record to make them "sound good." Yeah, I love noise and alla that, but Elisa just kind of spazzes out and presses her thumb down on a random fret and moans. That was the whole show. There were a few highlights, and i still like the new album, but Pete is the ONLY worthwhile asset they have live. Great drummer that guy is. This is REALLY un-punk but after seeing hordes of bands lately who suffer from this: if you're going to try and start writing songs with chord progressions and alla that, it might be wise to learn the actual chord placements for live performance.

Honestly, after a short fling, I got really bored with Boss.

i was away from here for a couple of months.

in all that time i read about the magik markers only once in my whole time away, and it was in the drag city newsletter announcing this album was in stores.

syg is the only place in the world where people actually listen to the magik markers.

They have one really good record, and that is Songs For Sada Jane. Balf Quarry bored me actually. Never listened to Boss. I can't pretend I've heard their whole discography though, but I've heard some of it and Songs For Sada Jane is the only one that stuck really.

their masterpiece is road pussy.
blues for randy sutherland is really good too.

the rest range from badly mediocre to stenchful ebola vomit.

Never heard those two. I maintain that Songs For Sada Jane is pretty good.

Can't we all just get along?

my favourites are

road pussy
songs for sada jane
in the east
randy sutherland
balf quarry
i trust my guitar, etc
boss
feel the crayon
don and phil
gucci rapidshare download
a pangyeric to things i dont understand
voldoror dance
danau blues
if its not a ford it sux
inverted belgium

ive omitted the ones i dont like......

i just saw Elisa with Six Organs the other day
and i must say she was fantastic - superb guitar player i must say
she blew up the place with her solos
bought the new album immediatly and i found it really good
i wonder where i can get all those cd-rs help me out guys!

Magik Markers Merch and new Spectre Folk record
 

write to petenolan@hotmail.com or magikikikik@gmail.com

or check arbitrarysigns.blogspot.com for info on new releases like:

Spectre Folk

Compass, blanket, lantern, mojo

As anxiety encroaches with the cold air of winter thank the stars for the whiskey/weed warmth of Compass, blanket, lantern, mojo --- it flows through you like a liquid howl of light.

Th u r st on Mo or e


For an out-of-it fogie like myself, it’s tough to keep up with the many musical hats our boy Peter Nolan sports. There’s of course The Magik Markers and then there’s Lil Dusty, Spectre Flux, Spectre Folk, Folk Spectre, Cops, etc. I gotta admit I sorta lost the thread on Petes’ musical output for awhile there due to the simple fact I couldn’t keep up with it all. My chrome dome would literally throb with all the names and phony catalogue numbers that must accompany all these sound whims that must fly off his ginger head like bats from a belfry.

Luckily, I put down the Brupenex long enough to catch up with “Compass, Blanket, Lantern, Mojo’, Nolans’ latest expulsion under his Spectre Folk moniker. As expected, the album reeks of the musty homespun psychedelic scent that would make both Al Simones and Uncle Neil Young red as a beet. The tunes are hazy with hope and bobbing audio to spare. Seagulls or rusty bedsprings sound off in the crackly distance on one track and I get a salty taste in my mouth like I licked the third pier boardwalk in Wildwood circa ’79. And check out the track ‘Burning Bridge’ where Petes’ voice soars and wavers like a wounded dove flying to the safety of a clean cage and the awaiting name of ’Walter’. The whole thing is a gorgeous, fully conscious stumble into a self made sunset and it just reminds me of something someone never said to me ‘It’s not over until you declare everyone a loser and paint yourself in a corner’.

Tony Rettman
Guidoville, New York
November 2009


I dig the home-made sounds of Spectre Folk's new 'Compass, Blanket, Lantern,
Mojo' long-player. Burning Bridge, for one, is sure to be the new late
night/early morning/coming down/post-trip/mellow'd out/sitting around a
campfire or by a lake or in a Williamsburg bedsit song. Pure and darkling
anthems for the onset of those long winter nights a-comin'...

Lee Ranaldo
NYC Oct 09