Various Artists - Electronic Rock [12", LP]

I found this fantastic krautrock compilation in the second-hand crates of a shop in the middle of Sweden last year. For the rest it was all 70's and 80's mainstream music there; the kind that you'll find at flea markets. The good thing was that the price was accordingly: i paid only 2 euro or so for this, while on sites like Discogs it goes for no less than ten times as much. Great bargain! ELECTRONIC ROCK has some really good tunes like Rheinita by La Düsseldorf, Dance Macabre by VC-People and Metropolitan by Hydravion, but my favourite one is definitely Europium by Zeus (= Zeus B. Held). Classic stuff.

Label: Strand / Teldec
Cat.nr.: 6.24719
Year of release: 1981

SIDE A:
01. LA DÜSSELDORF - Rheinita
02. MOEBIUS - Mirror Of Inifinity
03. SPACE - Space Media
04. HYDRAVION - Metropolitan

SIDE B:
01. RICHARD WAHNFRIED featuring KLAUS SCHULZE - Druck
02. LUTZ RAHN - Solo Trip
03. ZEUS - Europium
04. WOLFGANG BOCK - Robsai Part I
05. VC-PEOPLE - Dance Macabre

Girls Names - The Next Life EP [12"]

GIRLS NAMES are working on a follow-up to their album The New Life from 2013 at the moment. Really looking forward to hear some new stuff by this awesome band from Belfast/Dublin. It will be the first on which my buddy Gib plays the drums, since he officially joined the band after their summer tour last year.
I bought THE NEXT LIFE EP about a year ago. It features a darn fine Brian Eno cover (Third Uncle) that ends with an endless groove on side A. Or better said: it doesn't end at all ;) The David Holmes remix of the album's title track is really good. It's a mellow version with French spoken words and pitched down vocals. Projektions (with an S at the end indeed) was remixed by Gabe Gurnsey of Factory Floor and has become an unrecognisable, yet very danceable tune. What i also really like about this EP is the witty artwork. They did with The New Life, what David Bowie did with Heroes for his album The Next Day. Pretty funny.

Label: Tough Love Records / Slumberland Records
Cat.nr.: TLV067 / SLR198
Year of release: 2013

SIDE A:
01. Third Uncle

SIDE B:
01. The New Life (David Holmes remix)
02. Projektions (Gabe Gurnsey Factory Floor remix)

Various Artists - A Psych Tribute To The Doors [12", LP]

Normally i'm not a really big fan of tribute albums, because for every good cover song on such a compilation there's usally at least five really bad ones, but every now and then there's one that's just too good to not to buy. Besides for example The Bridge (Neil Young), Psychedelic Sounds Of The Sonic Cathedral (Roky Erickson) and I'm Your Fan (Leonard Cohen), A PSYCH TRIBUTE to THE DOORS is one of those. When i heard about this release early this year and saw that there would be covers featured by The Black Angels, Dead Meadow and The Raveonettes to name but a few, i really had to check out online how their versions of classic Doors songs sounded and i liked it so much that i had to find this album. The artwork is pretty cool and the album is pressed on nice marbled green vinyl. Besides the three bands i already mentioned, i really like what Elephant Stone, Dark Horses, Dead Skeletons and Wall Of Death made out of it. But The End by The Raveonettes is my favourite track on this album, that's for sure. They really gave it their own sound and i just love it.

Label: Cleopatra Records
Cat.nr.: CLP1557
Year of release: 2014

SIDE A:
01. ELEPHANT STONE - L.A. Woman
02. THE BLACK ANGELS - Soul Kitchen
03. PSYCHIC ILLS - Love You Two Times
04. DARK HORSES - Hello, I Love You
05. CAMERA - People Are Strange
06. DEAD MEADOW - The Crystal Ship

SIDE B:
01. SONS OF HIPPIES - The Soft Parade
02. DEAD SKELETONS - Riders On The Storm
03. WALL OF DEATH - Light My Fire
04. CLINIC - Touch Me
05. VIETNAM - Roadhouse Blues
06. THE RAVEONETTES - The End

Spitfire - Superbaby [12"]

The song SUPERBABY by SPITFIRE was on a Indie Top 20 CD (Volume 13, to be precise) that i bought in 1991, and i never came across anything by them ever since. Of course there are many bands around with the same name, but this particular Spitfire never really got big outside the UK and Superbaby was their biggest hit. Just like the other two songs on this EP it's a groovy psychedelic garage rock tune with loads of wah pedals and guitar solos. The EP was produced by Steve Mack, the singer for That Petrol Emotion. Found it in a great indie store called Delicious Goldfish in Solna, Sweden some time ago.

Label: Eve Recordings
Cat.nr.: EVER5T
Year of release: 1991

SIDE A:
01. Superbaby
02. Sunflow

SIDE B:
01. Wombchild

Whirr - Sway [12", LP]

When i read somewhere that WHIRR was releasing a new album i was pretty psyched, because they're one of my favourite current shoegaze bands. And once again they deliver a great album with SWAY, that comes on coloured vinyl in a nice gatefold sleeve. I've got a copy that's described as "brown/bone/yellow" on the label's site, but as you can see on the picture it's closer to orange than yellow. Great colour though! There are four songs on each side which makes it a rather short album, but then again Pipe Dreams and Distressor both had more songs yet a similar or even shorter total playing time. Lines is my favourite track, at this point at least.
Some time ago a friend of mine asked me to describe how Whirr sounds like, and i thought it was hard to do so, but i told him what would come closest is a mix between Starflyer 59 and the laidback yet heavy songs by Deftones. Now that i listen to this new album these two bands come to mind again. Funny, because i normally never had associations with other bands while listening to them. This week it got announced that they'll be releasing a split EP with Nothing, so that's another piece of wax i need to score soon :)

Label: Graveface Records
Cat.nr.: GRAVE118
Year of release: 2014

SIDE A:
01. Press
02. Mumble
03. Dry
04. Clear

SIDE B:
01. Heavy
02. Sway
03. Lines
04. Feel

Cocteau Twins - Treasure [12", LP]

Last year i was in Athens, Greece for a few days. Not so many second-hand record shops there that had "my kind of music" in the crates, but in some alley in the old centre i came across a hidden shop that had this Greek pressing of TREASURE by the COCTEAU TWINS. The condition of the sleeve could've been better, but the vinyl itself is in good condition and the Greek letters on the sleeve make it extra special.
And i didn't only find this album, but also a 12" by My Bloody Valentine that was still missing in my collection at that point.

Treasure is a great album. It's not my favourite Cocteau Twins release (that has to be Heaven Or Las Vegas) but still it's one that i play pretty often these days. Lorelei is actually one of my favourite CT songs. Bought a reissue of this album on heavyweight vinyl earlier this year. Sounds better, but this Greek original copy from 1985 is more dear to me.

Label: 4AD / PolyGram Greece
Cat.nr.: 58017
Year of release: 1985

SIDE A:
01. Ivo
02. Lorelei
03. Beatrix
04. Persephone
05. Pandora

SIDE B:
01. Amelia
02. Aloysius
03. Cicely
04. Otterley
05. Donimo

Newmoon - Invitation To Hold [7"]

A couple of weeks ago i came across this band called NEWMOON. I can't remember where exactly but it was at some blog or online zine. There was a link to the song 'Aria' on Youtube and it just blew me away. So i did some further research, found their Bandcamp page where i saw that they had an EP out called INVITATION TO HOLD, and then i found out that it was released on 7" vinyl as well. Needless to say i had to have that! So i ordered it and today it arrived for me. By now i know the three songs by heart, but still i've been playing them over and over this evening. So good! Especially 'Dwell' on side B is a favourite. It's shoegaze-influenced post-punk, somewhat comparable with bands like Whirr or Nothing. And the good thing is: they're from Belgium! Means i'll hopefully have a chance to see them live on stage somewhere in the near future here in Holland. The artwork of this little gem is really cool by the way, and is done by Nick Steinhardt who also did Deafheaven's 'Sunbather'. As you can see on the picture, my copy is pink. There were 1000 copies made of that colour, and another 1000 on yellow.

Label: Secret Voice
Cat.nr.: SV08
Year of release: 2014

SIDE A:
01. Mask
02. Aria

SIDE B:
01. Dwell