Aftermath Apocalypse Photography

Yes! Might have some kick-ass news coming soon – if nothing else a future post regarding the phenomena “synchronicity” – but up until then make sure you check out UK photographer Robert Boud‘s video project Aftermath Apocalypse Photography on YouTube. It’s pretty stark imagery but still oddly beautiful.

Criticism

Now how can you not be flattered by criticism like that? I ask you. Dare you even. I’m excited to say that The Norliss Tapes video for Groovy is sure starting to climb in amount of views on YouTube. I’m stoked as hell and thank everyone involved for agreeing to do this. Keep sharing!

Groovy (and then some!)

You know the phrase “stoked”? Well, I’m no bitter old man (although I do unleash The Angry Old Fart every once in a while) and I consider myself to have most of my childhood enthusiasm intact, but I still think words like “stoked” or “awesome” have become a bit overused. A bowl of corn flakes is nice for breakfast but calling it “awesome” might be taking it a bit too far. That said I am stoked and thrilled to announce the premiere of The Norliss Tapes video for Groovy featuring the cast of The Adventures of Superseven and Sandra West! Yes! Yes! Yes!

The second installment of what I call The Trilogy of Awesomeness, this idea was born early on as I am a fan of the series, but it took some time for me to finally muster up the courage to email Robert and Jerry that produce the series asking if this was doable. To my surprise they said yes and a short while later I had all the footage needed to edit the video. How cool is that of them? I know there’s still a couple of weeks left, but so far this video is the most fun I’ve had in 2012. Awesome!

Anyway, as an added bonus we decided to make this a free download for fans of the band as well as the series. It’s roughly 335 MBs and you can get it here. Please share the link. If you have YouTube both Norliss and the S7 crew would appreciate you sharing the video and don’t forget to check out the Herz und Liebe EP on Bandcamp here.

UPDATE: Director Robert Griffith created an event on Facebook for the video, so please join up here and share among your friends etc. We’ll all appreciate it. Thanks!

Twins of Evil

Whoof, enough with the bad yet Halloween-themed puns right? Anyway, I figured we made two versions of Bad Robot off The Norliss Tapes third EP so there should be two videos right? Right. Check ‘em out and feel free to share.

New Artwork!

Yeah, well I know, I know. It was just a matter of hours since my post about the video for The Norliss Tapes Bad Robot and now I’m finished with the sleeve I mentioned as well. Call me a workaholic. Anyway, this came out pretty cool. It’s actually an example of when you’re having an idea but that kinda turns out to be so-so and in the middle of it all you have the “happy accident” and the next thing you know creativity kicks in and you end up with something much, much better than initially planned. Yay for serendipity!

The compilation itself is just hours away from being finished now. The tracks are pretty much done (unless I have one of those “well, you’ve gotten so far so you might as well go the whole nine yards and make everything 100% perfect”), and I’ve assembled (and cleaned!) the audio FX as well during the evening so it’s just a matter of putting it all together, master it and then convert to MP3. I’m convinced that I’ll be done by the end of this weekend.

Anyway, I busted my ass on this and am now just enjoying the pride of a job well done. ‘Til next time…

Coming soon!

Well, I’ve been posting news about this a couple of times so far, but The Norliss Tapes debut EP just isn’t finished yet. It takes some time to finish up the material, but now it looks like we’re finally coming ’round to actually have the songs ready. Until then, I decided to finish up the sleeve for this (so far) digital release. With the music being somewhat weird amalgam of 60s lounge and modern “dance” music, I tried to go with artwork with the similar feel.

Again, this was the most unusual way I’ve produced music so far. Editing samples and rythms from various forms of exotica, lounge jazz and other types of vintage schmaltz and then sending them to another musician for him to add, deduct, edit etc, was fun and always made me pleasantly surprised! I’m looking forward to see it released and then start working on a second release. Again, a little teaser video that’s making its rounds on YouTube:

Fidlar

More cool US retro-hardcore is offered up by Los Angeles’ four-piece Fidlar on their debut 7″ EP DIYDUI released in 2011. Way more garage than other outfits like OFF! or Cerebral Ballzy, they bring to mind a mix of FEAR and The Spider Babies, with maybe some early Dwarves (circa Horror Stories-era) thrown in. The opening track Wake Bake Skate is a future classic – check ‘em out!

Norliss Tapes 2!

Well, more songs are coming together in the project, so I spent an hour editing a second teaser. Six songs in total now, and I’m actually contemplating if we should try to make it a full length album.

Opposite Sex

Well, I wrote about this New Zealand discovery on TapeMix – Best of Bandcamp yesterday, but if you don’t follow it (why not?)  The Opposite Sex is a pretty odd trio blending French ye-ye pop with classic ’77 artpunk, sugary sweet vocal delivery and tons of waltz. Truly a unique band with a sound completely their own, their self titled debut album was released in late 2011 and you should definitely check them out! Visit their Bandcamp at: http://oppositesex.bandcamp.com/

New artwork!

Well, this isn’t “work” per se, but I’ve been hassling this guy that re-releases cool ol’ splatter/horror gems etc on DVD about letting me do art for him (just because it’d be SO damn cool!), but he’s been kinda indecisive. So I finally put this together in order to show him what I could do, used an old movie poster as a reference and mailed it to him. The day after he sent me an email telling me he loved it and that we’re beginning work in January. Just to be clear – this is NOT an actual release!

It might not be high art (like anybody who’s not confused would ever want to be!), but The Toolbox Murders is just classic kinetic sleaze and one of my personal faves. The trailer (as well as the movie!) is not for sensitive people (18+ kiddies!), but if you can stomach it – check it out: