Sun Ra - Of Abstract Dreams (Art Yard/Strut, 2018)

Strut and Art Yard have been doing the lord's work with these Sun Ra reissues. This one comes from a radio studio session in '74 or '75. The Arkestra is a 9-man unit this time featuring twin towers Marshall Allen and John Gilmore along with Eddie Thomas on drums, Atakatune on oboe and congas, and Akh Tal Ebah and James Jacson contributing vocals. Notably no bass player. Four tracks here - "Island in the Sun", "New Dawn", a great version of "Unmask the Batman" and the best of the bunch, "I'll Wait For You". Certainly not the most cosmic as the Arkestra has ever gotten and not an earmark but a good listen and another piece in the neverending Sun Ra puzzle.

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Nachtmystium/Leviathan - In the Valley of Death, Where Black Metal is King: An Homage to the Roots (Ascension Monuments Media, 2018)

What the fuck is that title. Okay I get the first part is a Judas Iscariot tribute, but did we really need "an homage to the roots" in there? Hey wouldn't it be funny if these were actually covers of the band The Roots? Anyway. This album was supposed to come out 10 years ago, but it was blocked by the bands' respective labels. Now I guess they've figured out a way, or Blake Judd needs money for drugs so he's figured out a way, to put this out. The Bandcamp version has 8 tracks, 5 from Nachtmystium and 3 from Leviathan, but I've seen a 10-track tracklisting elsewhere. On the version I have, we have Nachtmystium covering Judas Iscariot, Ildjarn (twice), Von and Burzum. Leviathan tackles Ildjarn (twice) and Von once. I seem to be missing Leviathan's Judas Iscariot cover ("Where the Winter Beats Incessant") and one of Nachtmystium's Von covers ("Von"). Weird. Wonder if there were some licensing issues or something. All four Ildjar...

Corrupted - Felicific Algorithim (Cold Spring, 2018)

For whatever it means, this is the beginning of Corrupted's "Hollow" series. Maybe the clue is in the music? Unlike Corrupted's traditional ultra-slowed down, Spanish-sung, Japanese doom metal this is instrumental harsh noise. Still filthy and angry and depressive but sans vox and also more or less sans metal. Both untitled sides are meant to be played at either speed. The result? Meh. I miss Corrupted's brand of doom, this relatively anonymous harsh noise is fine and all but if I'm listening to Corrupted...well I know what I want. Skippable.

Oneohtrix Point Never - Age Of (Warp, 2018)

The best word I can come up to describe this album - labyrinthine. From the album itself to the songs itself. This album is in some ways a severe corruption of pop music while maintaining all the gnarly-ness, of Daniel Lopatin's past efforts. His OPN project has moved past merely bizarre synth/ambient/electro/vaporwave/whatever and into whole new waters. "Babylon", "The Station" and "Black Snow" are almost undeniably poppy (albeit very twisted) while tracks like "Same" and "Still Stuff That Doesn't Happen" are among the weirdest and harshest that Lopatin has ever produced, here augmented by a sharp and smartly selected group of collaborators like Prurient, Anohni, James Blake and others. It's a real interesting album, one that will take a few more spins to get my head around, but I like it.

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