This is a mixtape for a mighty fine Catalan fellow named Alfred, who truly understands the greatness of bratty, fratty, pissing, screaming, drinking, drugging, indecent exposure-ing Black Lips. For those who don't know who or what Black Lips are, they're a rowdy band of flower punks who never quite put their obnoxious adolescence behind them. If Jesus died for our sins, they're ignorant for our bliss.
This is not a Black Lips comp, however, but a collection of likewise fuzz-frazzled scum rock, shitgaze, etc. (Yes, we now officially have a genre called «shitgaze».) The sounds on this mixtape are the rock'n'roll created when glorious noise music smashes into catchy pop tunes. It's the warm voice of a lover, faintly heard in a freezing blizzard. The sweet delirium of endorphins in a mangled car crash. Catchier than noise music, but grittier than the sound of marketing. An unlistenable, yet anthemic mess is what it is! The sonic equivalent of playing in your own pooh.
Why such noise? In every music obsessive's life, there comes a time when he can't find solace in or even listen to music. Something so sickeningly irreversible has happened that any pathetic self-pity becomes, unfortunately, a bit justified. To then listen to balladeers and troubadours emoting and poking around in there with their useless pathos and pretentious empathy is out of the question. Suddenly an entire music collection seems irrelevant and inadequate, every song a bearer of memories reminding him of a world that not only no longer is, but can never be again.
What he needs at that point is a total retooling. Something noisy and idiotic, to drown out the squelching pus inside and to get it out of his system by making him dance and shout and jump and drink and smoke and fuck and snort and laugh and fall over. Buzzing static, screeching treble, rumbling hiss, hissing rumble, head(w)ringing feedback, shrieking cymbals, unhinged screams, disintegrating melodies and collapsing performances to wash the mind clean.
Hey, it worked wonders for me! When some guy introduced me to the wretched squall of Black Lips back when I was suffering from «shock» or «Post-traumatic Stress Disorder» or «depression» or some other diagnosis otherwise known as life, it was just what none of the doctors had thought to order. Touchy sentimentality is for when you're OK—when you're bored and can't find any other way in to the vicarious thrill of empathy. Silliness, however, is for when you're fucked—not for when you're already happy and smiling. So let's get stoopid.
Welcome, then, to the gutter of sound, where you'll be content to not even look at the stars. Enjoy the tinnitus racket for all its triumphant rejection of meaning, reason and innocent joy. It's a liberation, kids!
This is not a Black Lips comp, however, but a collection of likewise fuzz-frazzled scum rock, shitgaze, etc. (Yes, we now officially have a genre called «shitgaze».) The sounds on this mixtape are the rock'n'roll created when glorious noise music smashes into catchy pop tunes. It's the warm voice of a lover, faintly heard in a freezing blizzard. The sweet delirium of endorphins in a mangled car crash. Catchier than noise music, but grittier than the sound of marketing. An unlistenable, yet anthemic mess is what it is! The sonic equivalent of playing in your own pooh.
Why such noise? In every music obsessive's life, there comes a time when he can't find solace in or even listen to music. Something so sickeningly irreversible has happened that any pathetic self-pity becomes, unfortunately, a bit justified. To then listen to balladeers and troubadours emoting and poking around in there with their useless pathos and pretentious empathy is out of the question. Suddenly an entire music collection seems irrelevant and inadequate, every song a bearer of memories reminding him of a world that not only no longer is, but can never be again.
What he needs at that point is a total retooling. Something noisy and idiotic, to drown out the squelching pus inside and to get it out of his system by making him dance and shout and jump and drink and smoke and fuck and snort and laugh and fall over. Buzzing static, screeching treble, rumbling hiss, hissing rumble, head(w)ringing feedback, shrieking cymbals, unhinged screams, disintegrating melodies and collapsing performances to wash the mind clean.
Hey, it worked wonders for me! When some guy introduced me to the wretched squall of Black Lips back when I was suffering from «shock» or «Post-traumatic Stress Disorder» or «depression» or some other diagnosis otherwise known as life, it was just what none of the doctors had thought to order. Touchy sentimentality is for when you're OK—when you're bored and can't find any other way in to the vicarious thrill of empathy. Silliness, however, is for when you're fucked—not for when you're already happy and smiling. So let's get stoopid.
Welcome, then, to the gutter of sound, where you'll be content to not even look at the stars. Enjoy the tinnitus racket for all its triumphant rejection of meaning, reason and innocent joy. It's a liberation, kids!
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