oh thanks! really looking forward to hear it...

how does one play a rar file?

it's an archive format, like zip files.

http://www.rarlab.com/download.htm
it's not officially "free" but you can use the trial version for an unlimited time.

thank you

i didn't read all of these posts, so this may already be old news, but i see midheaven has dead c future artists release date as may 21 2007, i'm fucking excited, you should be too! the hi god people split was intense! i was fortunate enough to witness this dead c experience in 2002 on this exact record

http://www.dustedmagazine.com/reviews/3546

Dusted Reviews


Artist: The Dead C
Album: Future Artists
Label: Ba Da Bing!
Review date: May. 3, 2007

It's been four long years since New Zealand's merchants of grimy noise-rock released The Damned. In that time we've seen bands like Wolf Eyes and Sightings (to name just a couple) rise to, if not fame, certainly some reasonable recognition for plying similar waters. The title of this album's first track may contain some indication that The Dead C know their place: "The AMM of Punk Rock," while self-referentially winking, isn't far off. The Dead C have, for the past 20 years, been toiling on the sidelines showing how to improv your way through territory that isn't quite rock, isn't quite punk, isn't quite noise, isn't quite anything but what it is. Whether it's something you will enjoy is quite another question, of course, and it's certainly unclear how The Dead C feel about your answer.

That first track is 13 minutes of desultory drum hits, mildly buzzing static and squeaky scrapes. That buzzing static may be the one constant throughout the album's five songs, all of which flaunt a distinct layer of audio crud. For 10 minutes, "The AMM of Punk Rock" remains a formless, meandering sound field, with occasional irritating high-pitched bleeps, before it coheres into a vague chug, powered by feedbackish noises. It's followed by "The Magicians," unique here both for its brevity (just under four minutes) and its song-like form, complete with laid-back vocals (it's the only one here that's got 'em). Despite the singing and strumming guitar, the drums remain simple thumps hidden behind a curtain of clanging guitar scree, and the whole contraption rattles along like an old truck, threatening at any moment to fall to pieces.

That feeling of impending collapse lingers over the whole album. The glitchiness of "Macoute" often resembles a motor in need of a tuneup. Its stereo field of whooshes and buzzes is interrupted by stop-start noises, odd breaks in the flow of time. "Eternity" is thick with atmosphere, a dark, dank guitar strum with ringing drums that over time becomes filled with jagged guitar textures until a crude, driving riff begins to poke through the rough, Skullflower'd noise. "Garage" closes things with angular, awkward guitar plucks and strums over muttering static and occasional interjections of electronic bleep. It eventually breaks down into vaporous waves of hiss and crunch, with sporadic guitar strums, until it comes to an end with a lethargically wavering buzz which abruptly cuts off.

Future Artists raises many questions, from its title - are they themselves the artists of the future, or are they waiting for some future in which to become artists? - to its intent. For every moment of intrigue, there are moments of aggravation; for each recognizable string pluck, there are abstract fields of sound to be plumbed. On first listen, the seemingly purposeful and self-conscious lack of focus was more annoying than interesting, but subsequent airings began to reveal rewarding details. It's an album that doesn't allow for early conclusions. Only time will tell whether Future Artists receives further listens or is relegated to the status of not-fully-baked. The jury is still out.


By Mason Jones

maybe hE SHOulD HAVE LIstened to it more than once before he reviewed it then?

Ah, I was planning to bump this thread one of these days after I've listened to it. Found the new album on soulseek last week, but haven't listened to it all the way through yet.

It's not out yet though, is it? That review says May 3rd, but last time I checked it was May 22nd or something like that... and now CD Universe is even saying June 19th... :confused:
http://www.cduniverse.com/productinf...=7419853&BAB=M

It appears to be available on the Ba Da Bing! website:
http://badabingrecords.com/catalog.html

And at an impressively reasonable price too - US$10 in the US, US$12 elsewhere.

Yeah, that review is pretty rubbish. Too much time taken describing the sounds. I find that pretty pointless to be honest, I hate reading more than a couple of lines on what it sounds like.

whoa, only $12 including shipping. I'm on it, thanks.

so what do you like to read in a record review?!

More context, less describey stuff. I like to have an idea of what it sounds like but you can generally sum it up quicker. That's why I like Byron Coley's writing I think. He'll usually write one sentence about what it sounds like and it's usually sort of nonsense sounding but it usually captures what things sound like well.

I'm probably being a bit harsh...I think it's more to do with the way the guy in that review describes stuff, a style that a lot of journos share, that annoys me.

actually i kind of agree with you, i think most record reviews are far too long. they only really need to be about 5 sentences.

Yeah, I was specifically thinking of that round-up column that Coley sometimes writes in the Wire with a few sentences on each. They get right to the point and make me keen to hear stuff more than the lengthier reviews.

they should just have byron coley write all the reviews, with additional assistance from dave tompkins

I only can support this sort of mindset so far because you reach a certain point where the reality of the music media relies heavily within the digital format of CD... and i still alot of releases only exist in cd and not both LP and CD, so in many cases (more than some i have to say) if you only buy LPs you are missing out on potentially a lot of great music, whether you like the format or not...

its rare for me to get warped records in the mail, sure its happened but its rare and i've bought alot of records via snailmail... hint on unwarping warped records from a friend who owned a record store for over 15 years: heat them with a hair dryer and then gently flex while its in a vertical position and then put it in its respective jacket smack in the center of a whole slew of records that are stored vertically. i haven't tried it but i trust it works...

thanks for making the live recording available pokkeherrie.

Dead C interview in Mountain Fold music journal:

http://www.mountainfold.com.au/image...LD_ISSUE_2.pdf

BTW, has anyone read the book collecting Bruce Russell's writings? Splendid to look at, but I understood very little of what I was reading. (Which is definitely more a reflection on me than on the writings)