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Artist: AETHENOR Title: Betimes Black Cloudmasses
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF111CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 4/14/08
***Betimes Black Cloudmasses is the highly-anticipated second album from Vincent De Roguin (Shora), Stephen O'Malley (SUNN0))), KTL), and Daniel O'Sullivan (Guapo). Like their genre- and audience-confounding debut Deep In Ocean Sunk the Lamp of Light, Betimes is an atmospheric, constantly changing piece that encompasses a mind-boggling array of different performance and processing techniques. The deeply psychedelic and moving results present a soundstage that is continually evolving, with new elements entering and leaving the fray every couple of seconds.

Betimes includes significant contributions from free percussionists Nicolas Field and Alex Babel, who sprinkle the sound field with an almost FMP-style rush of splattering drum sound, raising the intensity of the music (without resorting to bashing). The album also features a brief but affecting vocal from Ulver mastermind Kristoffer Rygg, who made his first live appearance in over a decade when Aethenor played the Roadburn Festival in April 2008. Aethenor's third LP, featuring vocals and lyrics by David Tibet, will be released in Autumn 2008.

"Musically, Aethenor summon the most somnolent examples of Bernard Parmegiani, Organum, Nurse with Wound, Klaus Schulze, Igor Wakhevitch, Coil, Iancu Dumitrescu, and Charlemagne Palestine. Acousmatic drones ebb and flow into crackling and bubbling sonic clusters. Lulling piano motifs and lamenting chants shimmer into distant lunar horizons while oscillators spin and drove serenely into unchartered audial regions. Sometimes as calm as a silvery sea, so that every gentle cat's-paw and lapping wave is deafening. Sometimes as tempestuous as a fuming lava beach, spitting and popping at the surface." --Daniel O'Sullivan

30-second MP3 excerpts:

I
II
III

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for Aethenor "Betimes Black Cloudmasses"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music Service and emusic, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: AETHENOR Title: Betimes Black Cloudmasses
Format: LP Catalog
Number:		 VHF111
Price: $13.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 5/5/08
***Betimes Black Cloudmasses is the highly-anticipated second album from Vincent De Roguin (Shora), Stephen O'Malley (SUNN0))), KTL), and Daniel O'Sullivan (Guapo). Like their genre- and audience-confounding debut Deep In Ocean Sunk the Lamp of Light, Betimes is an atmospheric, constantly changing piece that encompasses a mind-boggling array of different performance and processing techniques. The deeply psychedelic and moving results present a soundstage that is continually evolving, with new elements entering and leaving the fray every couple of seconds.

Betimes includes significant contributions from free percussionists Nicolas Field and Alex Babel, who sprinkle the sound field with an almost FMP-style rush of splattering drum sound, raising the intensity of the music (without resorting to bashing). The album also features a brief but affecting vocal from Ulver mastermind Kristoffer Rygg, who made his first live appearance in over a decade when Aethenor played the Roadburn Festival in April 2008. Aethenor's third LP, featuring vocals and lyrics by David Tibet, will be released in Autumn 2008.

"Musically, Aethenor summon the most somnolent examples of Bernard Parmegiani, Organum, Nurse with Wound, Klaus Schulze, Igor Wakhevitch, Coil, Iancu Dumitrescu, and Charlemagne Palestine. Acousmatic drones ebb and flow into crackling and bubbling sonic clusters. Lulling piano motifs and lamenting chants shimmer into distant lunar horizons while oscillators spin and drove serenely into unchartered audial regions. Sometimes as calm as a silvery sea, so that every gentle cat's-paw and lapping wave is deafening. Sometimes as tempestuous as a fuming lava beach, spitting and popping at the surface." --Daniel O'Sullivan

30-second MP3 excerpts:

I
II
III

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for Aethenor "Betimes Black Cloudmasses"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music Service and emusic, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: AETHENOR Title: Deep In Ocean Sunk The Lamp Of Light
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF97CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 11/13/06
***Deep In Ocean Sunk The Lamp Of Light is the debut release from the trio of Stephen O'Malley (Sunn0))))), Daniel O'Sullivan (Guapo), and Vincent de Roguin (Shora). Taking its title from The Iliad, the music is deep, cosmic, and equally epic, completely unlike anything you'd expect from three such heavyweights. More in the tradition of Nurse With Wound's Spiral Insana or Klaus Schulze's Cyborg than any contemporary trend, the tracks float along in a masterful collage of activity, where careful scene changes highlight O'Sullivan's classic but artfully placed Rhodes bombs, de Roguin's organ, and O'Malley's guitar.

Extraordinary effort has gone into editing, mastering, and shaping these pieces--they are not tossed off improvisations or "side-project" orphans. The group recently completed a small European tour with Jackie-O-Motherfucker's Alexander Tucker, playing dates with with Ulan Bator, The No Neck Blues Band and Netwerk. Both CD and LP editions are housed in beautiful, custom jackets hand-printed by Alan Sherry of SIWA.

Artist: AETHENOR Title: Deep In Ocean Sunk The Lamp Of Light
Format: LP Catalog
Number:		 VHF97
Price: $17.50 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 12/11/06
***Deep In Ocean Sunk The Lamp Of Light is the debut release from the trio of Stephen O'Malley (Sunn0))))), Daniel O'Sullivan (Guapo), and Vincent de Roguin (Shora). Taking its title from The Iliad, the music is deep, cosmic, and equally epic, completely unlike anything you'd expect from three such heavyweights. More in the tradition of Nurse With Wound's Spiral Insana or Klaus Schulze's Cyborg than any contemporary trend, the tracks float along in a masterful collage of activity, where careful scene changes highlight O'Sullivan's classic but artfully placed Rhodes bombs, de Roguin's organ, and O'Malley's guitar.

Extraordinary effort has gone into editing, mastering, and shaping these pieces--they are not tossed off improvisations or "side-project" orphans. The group recently completed a small European tour with Jackie-O-Motherfucker's Alexander Tucker, playing dates with with Ulan Bator, The No Neck Blues Band and Netwerk. Both CD and LP editions are housed in beautiful, custom jackets hand-printed by Alan Sherry of SIWA.

Artist: AETHENOR Title: Faking Gold And Murder
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF113CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 1/26/09
***Faking Gold and Murder is the third Earth-shattering full-length by Vincent De Roguin (Shora), Stephen O'Malley (Sunn0))), KTL) and Daniel O'Sullivan (Guapo). This time, the core trio is joined by percussionists Nicolas Field and Alex Babel, as well as renowned guitarist Alexander Tucker and the inimitable David Tibet.

AEthenor's heaviest outing yes is driven by a weighty low-end and the full fury of Babel and Field's free-wheeling drums. The band's electronics, guitar, Rhodes, and organ ride waves of sound in a tightly-controlled blare, leaving plenty of space for Tibet's declarations of the mystical and supernatural. Tibet is in top form, rising out of the tempest at just the right moment, almost plain-spoken in places-- grounding the squall at times, voicing the apocalypse at others.

Faking Gold and Murder features another elegant cover by Vincent de Rougin and Nicola Todeschini, letterpressed by Stumptown Printers.

Brooding, primeval, dark, alchemical epics are full of a ferocious intensity, sounding more like a starlit night being ripped open by lightning than a musical group. Intelligent and primal, like a daemonic workshop, battering up Pandemoniums and dreaming of gold and murder, AEthenor are spectacular.
--David Tibet

30-second MP3 excerpts:

I
II
III
IV

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for AETHENOR "Faking Gold and Murder"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music Service and emusic, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.

v
Artist: AETHENOR Title: Faking Gold And Murder
Format: LP Catalog
Number:		 VHF113
Price: $20.25 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 2/2/09
***Faking Gold and Murder is the third Earth-shattering full-length by Vincent De Roguin (Shora), Stephen O'Malley (Sunn0))), KTL) and Daniel O'Sullivan (Guapo). This time, the core trio is joined by percussionists Nicolas Field and Alex Babel, as well as renowned guitarist Alexander Tucker and the inimitable David Tibet.

AEthenor's heaviest outing yes is driven by a weighty low-end and the full fury of Babel and Field's free-wheeling drums. The band's electronics, guitar, Rhodes, and organ ride waves of sound in a tightly-controlled blare, leaving plenty of space for Tibet's declarations of the mystical and supernatural. Tibet is in top form, rising out of the tempest at just the right moment, almost plain-spoken in places-- grounding the squall at times, voicing the apocalypse at others.

Faking Gold and Murder features another elegant cover by Vincent de Rougin and Nicola Todeschini, letterpressed by Stumptown Printers.

Brooding, primeval, dark, alchemical epics are full of a ferocious intensity, sounding more like a starlit night being ripped open by lightning than a musical group. Intelligent and primal, like a daemonic workshop, battering up Pandemoniums and dreaming of gold and murder, AEthenor are spectacular.
--David Tibet

30-second MP3 excerpts:

I
II
III
IV

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for AETHENOR "Faking Gold and Murder"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music Service and emusic, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: ASTRAL SOCIAL CLUB Title: Octuplex
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF114
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 1/26/09
***After a couple years in the underground wilderness, Neil Campbell's unique Astral Social Club returns to VHF with the squelching, restless ambience of Octuplex.

The CD is split roughly in half between Harmonia / Voigt-style chuggers and sweeping swirls of instantly recognizable dronage, familiar to fans of Campbell's extensive contributions to Vibracathedral Orchestra, Sunroof! and others. His interest in techno comes out on "Caustic Roe" and "Muscle Adductor," which neatly compile the influence of recent minimal jam innovations with piles of synth and effects noise, lending the beat-driven tracks a rough, unfussy style. Other cuts like "Muegik Churn" and "Pilgrim Sunburst" swell with twittering electric birdsong and synthetic rain, the trademark sound of many Astral titles.

Octuplex is full up with collaborator cameos, including the familiar (Richard Youngs, John Clyde-Evans), and the novel (Spider Stacy from The Pogues!).

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Caustic Roe
Muegik Churn
Aggro Vault
Pilgrim Sunburst
Sweet Spraint
Radial Hermaphrodite
Muscle Adductor
Hot Toxer

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for ASTRAL SOCIAL CLUB "Octuplex"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music Service and emusic, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: ASTRAL SOCIAL CLUB Title: S/T
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF100
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 10/23/06
***With this release the VHF catalog moves into triple digit territory and the label is celebrating with the first official album by Neil Campbell's (Vibracathedral Orchestra) genre-destroying Astral Social Club unit. Following a series of instantly sold-out limited edition CDRs, Campbell agreed to select, edit and remix a collection of tracks for wider release from the group's rather exclusive catalog.

VHF100 is a dense mega-mix of continually peaking sound-flow. Working a tricky hybrid ground between contemporary UK teams like Sunroof! and Vibracathedral Orchestra, and the influence of Kompakt-style pulsating electronic "techno," Astral Social Club's music shimmers and throbs in a truly psychedelic manner. Campbell and Tirath Singh Nirmala have radically re-worked these tracks to be unrecognizable from their original CDR issues, but they are instantly recognizable as part of the unrelenting Astral Social Club rainbow stream.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

track 1
track 2
track 3
track 4
track 5
track 6
track 7
track 8
track 9
track 10
track 11s

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Astral Social Club s/t

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

(Please note that, due to international licensing agreements, not all albums may be available in certain territories).

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service and emusic.com, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: BELL, SANDRA Title: City Of Sorrows
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF039CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 3/22/99
***Sandra recorded this stark and sultry collection of melancholy and exhilarating material after temporarily relocating from her native New Zealand to Berlin. Fans of her previous material on the IMD, Turbulence and Xpressway labels will find this new release (her first full-length material since 1995) engrossing. Sandrais lyrics and alternately deadpan and harrowing delivery potently convey an atmosphere of dissolution and decay. These beautifully bleak songscapes will attract fans of Graeme and Peter Jefferies, early Opal, and the Renderers.

Artist: BLACK TWIG PICKERS Title: Hobo Handshake
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF108
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 3/17/08
***Hobo Handshake, the fourth full-length from the Black Twig Pickers, finds a slightly reshuffled lineup and a renewed emphasis on kicking out raw, percussive takes on both traditional Appalachian and original material. With Ralph Berrier Jr.'s retirement from the group, Mike Gangloff has added fiddle to his already considerable arsenal, and along with stalwart guitarist Isak Howell, brought in Nathan Bowles (Pelt, Spiral Joy Band) on percussion and several guests who make substantial contributions to the party.

The Twigs work the fine line between the Friday night old-time dance party and the wellspring of grim and evocative tragedy that runs through the tradition, delivering these laments, travelogues, and wild whoops with sawing, rocking joy. This is a sprawling collection, with visceral group takes on "Crossing the James," "Cherry River Line," and "Old Joe Clark." Charlie Parr and Lane Prekker join the crew on "Last Kind Word Blues," "Train 45" and "Twin Sisters" (first essayed by Pelt way back in '98) with Parr's amazing, ragged voice leading the charge over Bowles and Prekker's driving percussion. Along with the full group material, the Twigs throw in other welcome oddities such as Howell's Fahey-like "At the Head of Every Creek," "P.E.A. Vine Blues," an arrangement of a tune from Portuguese Africa, and a book-ending solo version of "Crossing the James," with Gangloff on baritone banjo.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Intro
Crossing The James
Rattletrap
Cherry River Line
Last Kind Word Blues
Glory In The Meeting House
At The Head Of Every Creek
Stay All Night
Boatsman
Paint Bank
Walking In The Parlor
Callahan
Train 45
Never Miss Your Mamma
Twin Sisters
Sally Coming Through The Rye
Old-Time Fire On The Mountain
Old Joe Clark
Old Joe Bone
Frosty Morning
P.E.A.
Vine Blues
Crossing The James

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for Black Twig Pickers "Hobo Handshake"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music Service and emusic, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: BLACK TWIG PICKERS Title: North Fork Flyer
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF61
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 6/4/01
***North Fork Flyer represents the continued persistence of a type of Appalachian folk music that has come and gone from the popular radar over the years, but has never completely disappeared from the Black Twig Pickers' Southwest Virginia home. The songs on North Fork Flyer are mostly traditional numbers (with a few originals sprinkled in) that form the backbone of a century-old tradition - the music of bonfires, front porches, coal miner's festivals, and informal gatherings. These "mountain ragas," as the group calls them, have been recorded, performed, and revised continually by a who's who of true American artistry - luminaries such as Bukka White, Mississippi John Hurt, John Fahey, Bob Wills, Holy Modal Rounders, New Lost City Ramblers, etc., etc.

Recorded live to DAT on front porches and in family rooms, North Fork Flyer blends the fiddle blues of Ralph Berrier Jr., Isak Howell's sinewy guitar and the drone and twitch of Pelt's Mike Gangloff's fretless clawhammer banjo with the trio's rough-around-the-edges but warm vocal harmonies. Played to the accompaniment of night insects, passing trains, and the noise of wandering children, the music retains the charm of tradition but is free of fake antiquarianism and nostalgia. Regardless of age, the music is just as relevant today as it was 100 years ago and the band plays it as though they mean it. And they obviously do.

The name of the band comes from the oldest, most crotchety apple variety in the orchard that fiddler Ralph Berrier's family maintains along the musically fertile Virginia-North Carolina line. Black Twig plays regularly in Southwest Virginia.

Artist: BLACK TWIG PICKERS Title: Soon One Morning
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF73
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 2/24/03
***The second CD by this SW Virginia area trio is firmly planted in Old-Time Appalachian tradition, but concentrates mostly on original material. Standing out in particular is "Floyd Allen," Ralph Berrier Jr.'s masterful retelling of an area tragedy with a sweet and unexpected major/minor chorus change-up. Mike Gangloff's lengthy and elegiac instrumental "This War Is Killing Me" glides along on a sad melody passed around between resonator guitar, cello and fiddle. Many tracks are anchored by Gangloff's unusual gut-string baritone banjo. Two solo instrumentals on the CD add balance between the vocal numbers-- Isak Howell's "Have You Been To Alabama?" is a subtle fingerpicked workout, while Gangloff's "Ironto Special" is a considerably more exotic-sounding modal construction on the big banjo. Elsewhere, there's an upbeat essay of "Pallet On The Floor," a relation to "Poor Boy Long Ways From Home," which appeared on the group's debut North Fork Flyer CD. Among the traditional numbers, none is more striking than the group's charging and rough treatment of "Oh Death," with Gangloff and Berrier spitting out the call-and-response vocal which gives the album its title.

Isak Howell: Guitar, Vocal
Ralph Berrier Jr: Fiddle, Vocal
Mike Gangloff: Banjo, Resonator, Vocal

Artist: BLACK TWIGS Title: Midnight Has Come And Gone
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF86
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 4/25/05
***Midnight has Come and Gone, the third CD by this Southwest Virginia group, is another set of classic bluegrass, country blues, and Appalachian folk. Since 200's Soon One Morning, The Black Twigs (also known as the Black Twig Pickers, the trio of Mike Gangloff, Ralph Berrier, and Isak Howell) have expanded to a quartet with the addition of bassist Mike Gayheart. Midnight Has Come and Gone is made up of mostly of original material, roadtested at gigs and festivals along the Blue Ridge. Topical stormers like "Fire in the Stove" and "Blood Red Clay" are live staples, belted out here in a virtuoso hail of guitar, fiddle, banjo, and rough harmony. In contrast to the more trad-sounding fare, the grungy and twisting "Bent Mountain Drag" recalls Begga's Banquet-era Rolling Stones. Continuing the Black Twig tradition of beautiful instrumentals, "Twilight on the Radford Army Ammunition Plant" is another hymn-like meditation outside the showy-offy bluegrass tradition. "Original Natural Bridge Blues" is a song from 1941, which has been recorded in an incomplete fashion by many groups over the years. Berrier's discovery of the original 1940s sheet music in a family photo album (detailed in the liner notes) revealed a lost verse, presented here for the first time.
Artist: DOLDRUMS Title: Feng Shui
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF32CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 4/13/98
***Recorded at the same time as the band's Kranky release, "Acupuncture," "Feng Shui" represents the more ambient and contemplative side of the duo. Raga, solo percussion, post-astral jamming, mutilated beats and karmically correct mic placement all join forces to take you to subliminal interior design showrooms you never dreamed could exist.

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Doldrums "Feng Shui" (VHF)

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks here.

[please note that, due to international licensing agreements, not all Midheaven titles may be available for download in all territories].

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service and emusic.com, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: DOLDRUMS Title: S/T (Secret Life Of)
Format: CDEP Catalog
Number:		 VHF21
Price: $9.75 Label: Vhf
***They spell Kluster with a K and Kraftwerk with a pylon, and F/i stands for fuehrers incognito.

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Doldrums "s/t - Secret Life Of Plants"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks here.

[please note that, due to international licensing agreements, not all Midheaven titles may be available for download in all territories].

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service and emusic.com, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: DOUBLE U & GLANDS OF EXTERNAL SECRETION Title: S/T
Format: 2xCD Catalog
Number:		 VHF31
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 11/10/97
***San Francisco's fjord-rocking art-void trio gets into a fetid bunk with canned Bananafish editor Seymour Glass The first disc sports a courageous assemblage 'U songs, while the second is a track-by-track demix of the first. Two discs for the price of one. We all win.

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to the iTunes Music Service page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Double U/Glands of External Secretion "s/t" (VHF)

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: FERN KNIGHT Title: Music For Witches And Alchemists
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF101
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 11/13/06
***Music for Witches and Alchemists is a dark and beguiling collection of songs by Fern Knight, the primary cover for Margaret Wienk's singing and songwriting. Beautifully recorded by Greg Weeks, the songs are cast in rich, detailed arrangements with Alec K. Redfearn (The Eyesores), Greg Weeks and Meg Baird (Espers), and several other Philadelphia-area luminaries contributing to the sweeping sound. At the heart is Wienk's strong voice, cello, and guitar, leading the tunes with feeling and subtlety. Following in the footsteps of of electric-trad legends such as Pentangle and Trees, Wienk's music rings of the intensely personal and is delivered with crystal clarity, not the hipster-fuzz obfuscation of some contempo "folk." Music for Witches and Alchemists is Fern Knight's first domestic release, following their barely available debut on the German Normal label.
Artist: FERN KNIGHT Title: S/T
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF110
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 5/5/08
***This is the third CD of beautiful music from Philadelphia quartet Fern Knight, led by the crystal voice, guitar, and cello of Margaret Wienk. Drawing from diverse influences such as '70s Krautrock, UK folk, and baroque and renaissance music, the band's eponymous recording juxtaposes the calm surface of harp, cello, and violin against the perfectly timed distorted squalls of a Flying V and a dark undercurrent of lyrical and vocal mystery. The overall effect is a lush, pastoral, and warm ode to all things green and living, a running theme that winds through the songs' post-apocalyptic landscape: "All is lost / And all will run / Over graying ground / To the rays of the sun," sings Wienk in the album's closing track, "Magpie Suite: Part III."

The album's cohesion rests upon the core quartet's combination of acoustic and electronic instruments-- the perfect vehicle for Wienk's unique songwriting and string arrangements. Since the 2006 release of Music for Witches and Alchemists, Fern Knight has toured extensively in the US and Europe, as well touring and recording as members of The Valerie Project (Drag City Records).

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Bemused
Silver Fox
Sundew
Loch Na Fooey
Hawk Mountain
Synge's Chair
Magpie Suite: Prelude
Magpie Suite: Part II
Magpie Suite: Part III

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for Fern Knight s/t

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music Service and emusic, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: FLOWER-CORSANO DUO Title: Four Aims
Format: 2xLP Catalog
Number:		 VHF115
Price: $17.50 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 5/18/09
***LP has tracks not on the CD and not available via download.

The Four Aims is the much-anticipated second full-length by the long-running duo of Mick Flower (Vibracathedral Orchestra, Sunroof, Michael Flower Band) and Chris Corsano (Flaherty/Corsano, Jandek, Bjork, Sunburned). In the couple years since their debut, The Radiant Mirror (Textile), the two have toured and recorded frequently, expanding their range to include a mind-boggling array of free sound.

"I, Brute Force" kicks off the record with their signature-- one of the most original in rock/free/whatever music-- the electrifying sound of Flower's virtuosic, heavily amplified Japan Banjo (also known as a Shaahi Baaja) over Corsano's free-wheeling percussion. Other tracks show off subtle improv moves, with both players using extended techniques to generate a wide range of unusual sounds. Corsano's technical mastery is almost without peer in his generation (Alex Neilson, maybe)-- his ability to take the lessons of nearly five decades of free playing and extend them into new ranges is startling and exciting. Rather than play backup, Corsano meets Flower's strings and organ head-on with his own drum-bowing, cello, and circular-breathing-fired melodica.

Both busy players and collaborators, Flower and Corsano will tour extensively as a duo in 2009.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

I, Brute Force?
The Three Degrees Of Temptation
The Drifter's Miracles
The Beginning Of The End
The Main Ingredient

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for FLOWER-CORSANO DUO "Four Aims"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music Service and emusic, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: FLOWER-CORSANO DUO Title: Four Aims
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF115CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 3/9/09
***The Four Aims is the much-anticipated second full-length by the long-running duo of Mick Flower (Vibracathedral Orchestra, Sunroof, Michael Flower Band) and Chris Corsano (Flaherty/Corsano, Jandek, Bjork, Sunburned). In the couple years since their debut, The Radiant Mirror (Textile), the two have toured and recorded frequently, expanding their range to include a mind-boggling array of free sound.

"I, Brute Force" kicks off the record with their signature-- one of the most original in rock/free/whatever music-- the electrifying sound of Flower's virtuosic, heavily amplified Japan Banjo (also known as a Shaahi Baaja) over Corsano's free-wheeling percussion. Other tracks show off subtle improv moves, with both players using extended techniques to generate a wide range of unusual sounds. Corsano's technical mastery is almost without peer in his generation (Alex Neilson, maybe)-- his ability to take the lessons of nearly five decades of free playing and extend them into new ranges is startling and exciting. Rather than play backup, Corsano meets Flower's strings and organ head-on with his own drum-bowing, cello, and circular-breathing-fired melodica.

Both busy players and collaborators, Flower and Corsano will tour extensively as a duo in 2009.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

I, Brute Force?
The Three Degrees Of Temptation
The Drifter's Miracles
The Beginning Of The End
The Main Ingredient

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for FLOWER-CORSANO DUO "Four Aims"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music Service and emusic, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: FLYING SAUCER ATTACK Title: Distance
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF14
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
***Faint praise, revisited: those twiddly bits between the songs on "Loveless," lo-fi, wake and bake and other lifestyle choices before they became de rigeur. The domino effect never sounded this good.

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to the iTunes Music Service page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Flying Saucer Attack "Distance" (VHF)

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: FLYING SAUCER ATTACK Title: S/T
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF11
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to the iTunes Music Service page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Flying Saucer Attack "s/t" (VHF)

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: FLYING SAUCER ATTACK & ROY MONTGOMERY Title: Goodbye
Format: 12" Catalog
Number:		 VHF26
Price: $8.25 Label: Vhf
Artist: FLYING SAUCER ATTACK & ROY MONTGOMERY Title: Goodbye
Format: CDEP Catalog
Number:		 VHF26CD
Price: $9.75 Label: Vhf
***The legendary, the legend, the real thing. Why bliss out when you can sleep in?

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to the iTunes Music Service page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Flying Saucer Attack and Roy Montgomery "And Goodbye" (VHF)

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: FROM QUAGMIRE Title: Caught In Unknowing
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF71
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 11/18/02
***Working from Dorothy Geller's assured finger-picked and plucked nylon-string guitar, and James Wolf's elegant violin lines, From Quagmire explores a kind of hushed, terse chamber song that is so unlike anything else it's hard to draw comparisons. V2G2's unorthodox interruptions of sawing bowed guitar, free-"jazz" drumming, and other unlikely audio splatter is the wild card that keeps things from getting too austere. Usually it's totally beside the point, but it's worth mentioning that unlike most underground folk/outsider weirdness, the music here is superbly recorded in close-up detail.

The Tropic of Barren [presents] slowly unfolding songs that are full of mystery and suspense. "Suite of Windmill and Sycamore" open things with raw and bluesy guitar work played as if every note would be the last one ever played. In the distance a drone starts building up and unorthodox percussion jumps in and out of the speakers.... Dorothy Geller [known, along with From Quagmire violinist James Wolf, for work with chamber rock ensemble Laconic Chamber] plays the nylon string guitar throughout the whole record and it's truly spectacular in the sadly flowing "Suite of Atoms and Media." This drifts right into the aptly titled "Fragment of Watching," which veers off into a slightly more experimental neighborhood, but the nylon guitar just keeps on floating in profoundly sad sound structures as if nothing would have happened. On all six of The Tropic of Barren's tracks, there's space for every tone to breathe and every instrument to speak, resulting in a detailed sonic conversation that'll keep you going well into the endless night. --Mats Gustafsson, Broken Face

Artist: FROM QUAGMIRE Title: Habitats In The Wound
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF088
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 2/28/05
***Enigmatic trio From Quagmire's third release of startling art-song works in an area completely devoid of identifiable US / Anglo "folk" influence. The 'Quag's mix of collage and roughly styled human performance is full of dramatic contrast. Most tracks house Dorothy Geller's voice and pointillistic, nylon-string guitar in a thick embrace of droning sound. Much of the CD was recorded in the UK, where guests Helena Espvall-Santoleri (cello), Sharon Krauss (whistle and clarinet) and Simon Wickham-Smith (electronics) added their substantial input to the record. Touches such as Wickham- Smith's understated electronics on "A Father's Vision" and Espvall- Santoleri's dark bowing on most cuts redefine From Quagmire's signature sound-- away from the percussive and jarring avant explosions heard on Tropic of Barren and Caught In Unknowing and toward a more subtle, refined brand of expression.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Ingrate
Habitats In The Wound
Holiday Song
Between The Chores
A Fathers Vision/Story Of Knife
Mocking Faces/Wilderness Song
Against The Real

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for From Quagmire "Habitats In The Wound"

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: FROM QUAGMIRE Title: The Tropic Of Barren
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF59
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 4/30/01
***The Tropic of Barren is the debut release from Virginia's From Quagmire. A trio of Dorothy Geller, James Wolf, and Rake guitarist Vincent Van Go-Gogh, FQ's beautiful, mysterious and just plain weird art-song drift is a look into a rather under-explored corner of the underground universe. The slowly unfolding songs are based on Dorothy's nylon-string guitar and hushed-but-pointed vocals, punctuated by Wolf's expertly sawed violin and Van Go-Gogh's unpredictable percussion, electronics and guitar interjections. The music is highly detailed and performed with significant individual personality, rather than the predictable loud-soft-repeat bombast of other contemporary post-whatever ensembles. Geller and Wolf have done time in Camera Obscura recording artists Laconic Chamber and the Library of Congress (the federal institution, not the band). Van Go-Gogh is straight out of DC's long-running freakazoid ensemble Rake (as we stated). The Quag plans to tour both coasts during 2001.

"All songs and sounds imagined and written in exile." -FQ

Artist: ILK Title: Canticle
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF87
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 7/11/05
***Outrageous CD of prog rock from Richard Youngs's and Andrew Paine's Ilk, Canticle is a long promised follow-up to the group's 1998 CD Zenith, which was released on Youngs's No Fans label. Unlike Youngs's more "minimalist" solo records, Ilk drapes his songs and voice in thick layers of heavy jams, and then piles on the production tricks, vocal layers, Steve Howe-style leads, synth bleeps, and other racket in beautifully intricate arrangements. Canticle is clearly influenced by the classic UK progressives but unmistakably contemporary. "A Guiding Principle" and "Landsong" marry Youngs' and Paine's multi-tracked voices with overthe- top full rock-band arrangements. "Honour's Prospect" mixes mystical narration with some searing fuzz-guitar, and is followed by the bass-heavy march of "The Weight of Stars." "Tilling" shimmers and echoes, leading into the spacey and cosmic "Outward & Homeward." The folky "Of Souls" serves as a fittingly simple epilogue to the suite. Veronica Rennie's cover art completes the package in highly appropriate style.
Artist: KANG TAE HWAN TRIO Title: Love Time
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF079
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 3/8/04
***Love Time is under-documented Korean alto player Kang Tae Hwan's debut release; his trio includes Makoto Kawabata and percussionist Ichiraku Yoshimitsu, the latter well-traveled in both improv and rock circles, having been a member of Omoide Hatoba and a frequent collaborator with heavyweights like Otomo Yoshide and Haco. The inescapable Makoto Kawabata is best known for his Deep Purple-style rock as a member of Acid Mothers Temple, but on his own has produced a string of subtle, elegiac solo CDs, performing on guitar, organ, electronics, etc.

More minimalist than free jazz, Love Time centers on Hwan's long circular tones, avoiding common free-alto styles in favor of a roughly hewn clarion approach. Kawabata and Yoshimitsu shadow Hwan subtly on sarangi and bowed percussion. The music gradually builds to a crescendo, with Kawabata switching to guitar and Yoshimitsu moving to the drum kit. An atmospheric and understated work. In letterpress gatefold. One track, fifty minutes. We'll see you when you get back.

Active since the '70s, Hwan has recorded for Japanese Victor and DIW labels, played at Moers, toured Japan a few times, and collaborated with Gerry Hemingway and Otomo Yoshihide, among others. His discography includes several CDs of solo alto improvisations and a duo CD with Tuvan vocalist Sainkho Namtchylak. More recently he has collaborated with Alfred Harth during Harth's residency in Seoul.

    If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

    [please note that, due to international licensing agreements, not all Midheaven titles may be available for download in all territories].

Artist: KAWABATA / YOUNGS Title: S/T
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF064
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 3/14/05
***REISSUE. This untitled CD of duets by Kawabata Makoto, the leader of Acid Mothers Temple, and the slightly less available Glasgow librarian Richard Youngs shows the pair in a relaxed yet psychedelic mood where it is immediately apparent that the two are really listening to one another instead of merely adding to their already vast discographies. Throughout the five untitled tracks, simple modal melodies are performed on acoustic guitar, autoharp, organ, voice and other instruments rubbing against the swirling production and layers of shifting haze. Young's identifiable voice, guitar and autoharp greet Kawabata's echo treatments on the first track, while track three reverses the process with Young's minor key picking cutting against Kawabata's thick, visceral drones. Tracks two, four and five all use a base of beautiful fingerpicked guitar melodies, layering organ, synth, tape effects and echo until a mellow cosmic vibe is achieved. In all, some of the most beautiful sounds ever issued by either of these two gentlemen, both known for their edgy experimental work, is on this CD.

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Makoto Kawabata & Richard Youngs "s/t"

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: KAWABATA, MAKOTO Title: Inui 1
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF95
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 5/1/06
***Long-planned reissue of Makoto Kawabata's first solo LP, from way back in 2000 (or roughly 100 releases ago, in Kawabata terms). Originally released by the mighty SIWA label in a tiny, hand-printed edition of 300, this has long been the most sought-after Kawabata item, pretty much impossible to track down without a wallet full of eBay slush funds.

The music, as on all the releases in Kawabata's Inui series, is intensely personal and introspective, with long, softly focused tracks featuring acoustic stringed instruments from around the globe (including violin, sarangi, oud, sitar, bouzouki, lyra, shou, and nei). French filmmaker, musician and longtime Acid Mothers Temple collaborator Audrey Ginestet lends her crystal voice to the album opener, "Shin." This new, limited reissue is packaged in a fabulous multi-color, hand-screened mini-gatefold printed by Alan Sherry of SIWA.

  • Limited to 800 copies only
  • CD-reissue of the nearly impossible-to-find solo debut from Acid Mothers Temple's illuminated guitar guru
  • Packaged in a beautifully designed, multi-color hand-screened folio by Alan Sherry / SIWA

    30-second MP3 excerpts:

    Shin
    Tai
    Son

    If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

    go to iTunes to browse downloads for Kawabata Makoto "Inui 1"

    If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks here.w

    [please note that, due to international licensing agreements, not all Midheaven titles may be available for download in all territories].

    For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service and emusic.com, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: KAWABATA, MAKOTO Title: Inui 2
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF51
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 10/2/00
***Inui 2 is the first widely available solo CD by this prolific Japanese guitarist/composer/bearded guru. Known primarily for his recent work with oddballs Acid Mothers Temple, Kawabata's career actually goes back to the late '70s and spans many styles, including solo guitar improv, electronics, folk, and, of course, the deranged acid mayhem associated with the PSF scene.

Performed entirely solo on violin, kemenje, zurna, electronics, sarangi, taiko, gong, water, bouzouki, cello, vibes, organ, and sitar, the four tracks that make up Inui 2 are perfectly executed dream-music, equal parts delicately floating and heavily droning. There's also one all-too-short modal essay for bouzouki that is amazingly beautiful.

After years of obscurity, there has been a recent avalanche of Acid Mothers and Kawabata releases, most of them of the impossibly limited variety, all of them snapped up by the internet and by real people, too.

  • Acid Mothers Temple will undertake an extensive US tour in November 2000 in support of new LPs on Eclipse and Detector.
  • Contains an unequaled dream-drone-float quotient, which equals serious, heavy appeal to serious bakers of many stripes

    If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

    go to iTunes to browse downloads for Kawabata Makoto "Inui 2"

    If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks here.

    [please note that, due to international licensing agreements, not all Midheaven titles may be available for download in all territories].

    For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service and emusic.com, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: KAWABATA, MAKOTO Title: Inui 4
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF106CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 9/10/07
***INUI 4 is the fourth volume in Makoto Kawabata's series of solo releases for VHF. While widely and rightly known for earsplitting Deep Purple-style guitar demolition with Acid Mother's Temple, Gong, etc., Kawabata's INUI works are highly personal and introspective, with lots of room given to cosmic atmosphere and acoustic instruments.

INUI 4 is a single 68 minute track, a slow-building and evolving multi-layered swath of acoustic and electric guitars, electronics, and hurdy gurdy. The final 20 minutes feature prominent "glissando" guitar, a la Daevid Allen-- a very fine sound to be lost in. Like the other INUI volumes, this includes great photos and design by Makoto and Sachiko Kawabata.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Ryo

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for Makoto Kawabata "Inui 4"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: KAWABATA, MAKOTO Title: Inui.3
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF089
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 2/28/05
***The third volume in an acclaimed series by the Acid Mothers Temple leader, INUI.3 focuses on Makoto Kawabata's highly personal brand of epic instrumental drone. Performing on bouzouki, sarangi, electric guitar, viola, and ECS-101, Kawabata emphasizes the gradual build of monumental sound structures. Running twelve minutes each, "Sui" and "Ken" are darkly spun tales, with wisps of sound keening over a distant backdrop. Recalling the Speed Guru's lovely 2001 collaboration with Richard Youngs, the 47-minute "Fuku" is based on a hypnotic arpeggio plucked out on the bouzouki over which Gong-style glissando guitar and other zonked sounds are carefully layered.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Sui
Ken
Fuku

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Kawabata Makoto "INUI3"

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: L Title: Holy Letters
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF084CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 11/1/04
***Recorded in 1989 and 1990, Hiroyuki Usui's barely circulated masterpiece of deeply felt self-expression beautifully captures the spirit and substance of a half-dozen key sub-underground pillars of sound. Working with guitar, vocals, vibes, harmonium, bass, drums, cello, field recordings, digeridoo, and more, Usui blends delicate folk, psychedelia, and experimental sounds into a mostly subdued but undeniably glowing suite. The layered but careful instrumentation on the epic title track and "Troll" backs the alternately plain-spoken and crooning vocals perfectly. Odd touches like snatches of throat singing and bowed vibraphone leap out of the mix at just the right time. There are overt references to the blues (the first track is an oblique cover of "Cold Was The Ground") -- but other than the occasional slide guitar touch, the connection is overwhelmingly in the timeless feeling and atmosphere. For anyone who's into Richard Youngs, Popol Vuh, Six Organs of Admittance, Tim Buckley, acid-folk, or Japanese underground, this is an essential purchase. Holy Letters was self-released by Usui in the early '90s and primarily given away to friends, while a handful made it into shops in Tokyo and the U.S. before it disappeared completely. VHF's reissue includes the entire CD and seven-inch from the original package, plus a tenminute bonus track from the original sessions. The gatefold folio with 20-page booklet includes previously unpublished photos and new liner notes by Usui and Ben Chasny (in both Japanese and English).

Usui's name pops up in several intriguing places in the apparently still under-documented Japanese underground lexicon: as drummer for Fushitsusha in the late '70s and early '80s); in A-Musik (with legendary vocalist Phew); in Marble Sheep; and several other true underground outfits. Usui's brilliant collaboration with Six Organs Of Admittance will be released in 2005 in Drag City.

Artist: MONTGOMERY, ROY Title: Silver Wheel Of Prayer
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF49
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 2/12/01
***With so much outward-bound free action these days, it's oddly comforting to hear someone's - well, Roy Montgomery's - version of the journey to the heart of the inner cosmos. A sister record to Montgomery's Drunken Fish CD The Allegory of Hearing, Silver Wheel Of Prayer has seven complementary instrumental tracks, played mostly on Tiesco six-string and recorded mostly on four-track. A couple of tracks are dominated by a new Farfisa organ, which provides a gliding drone and waver on which to hang titles like "for the disoriented" and "for the mortified." The longest track here is "for a small blue orb," a simple strum that builds into a hypnotic pattern over 16 minutes.

"The album," says Roy, "is dedicated to Geoff Davies and Annie Leadbetter and their son Jess, who, without seeming to worry about what they were in for, welcomed me into their house and their lives at 12 Buckingham Ave, Liverpool in 1982. The longest track on this recording was first sketched out in their front room on a black Korean acoustic guitar which I christened "Rosebud." It has taken way too long to finish the sketch and to say thanks, but they really did feed my soul and I am grateful for it."

Artist: NEILSON, ALEXANDER & RICHARD YOUNGS Title: Partick Raindance
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF93CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 10/31/05
***Follow-up to 2003is Ourselves by this Glasgow duo extends the already broad range of sound heard on that stunner into new worlds. These two prolific players are at the top of their game, pairing some immediately identifiable elements-- Alex Neilsonis superb jazz-influenced drumming, Richard Youngs' unmistakable voice-- with a thick layer of truly psychedelic clamor.

The brief iChamberi rips out a noise like a i60s Sun Ra / Pat Patrick duo, segueing into the also Ra-ish masterpiece iMusic of the Lost Sun.i The point in iLost Suni where Youngis voice and guitar emerge from the polyglot sound for a beautiful melodic interlude is just too much. The second half of the record has a less layered feel, beginning with the a capella iNoatak Beacon,i then moving into more aggro territory where Neilsonis bowed cymbals taking on Youngsis guitar on iMountain.i The short cut-up iBig Aeroplanesi ends the record on a final note of mystery.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Chamber
Music of the Last Sun
Noatak Beacon
Mountain
Big Aeroplanes

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Richard Youngs and Alex Neilson "Partick Rain Dance"

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: NEILSON, ALEXANDER, AND YOUNGS, RICHARD Title: Ourselves
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF082
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 3/8/04
***Ourselves was originally recorded in Glasgow 2003 as a one-hour special for broadcast on London's Resonance FM but turned out too good to leave to the ether. It is the first collaboration between VHF mainstay Richard Youngs and octopus-armed percussionist Alexander Neilson (currently working with the Glasgow big-band Scatter, whose debut is due soon on Cenotaph). The music here represents something of a return to the extended psychedelic mania of mid-'90-s R!!! outings such as Asthma and Diabetes and Enedkeg. "Beam" kicks off the CD with Youngs ripping it up on electric guitar over a thick blanket of hand percussion, plucked strings, and backwards scraping noises. The 36- minute "Mexico" follows with more string mangling, segueing into an atmospheric interlude for voices, bowed cymbals, and bells. The final track is an unusual rendering of the traditional "God Bless The Master," with Youngs's unmistakable voice carrying the original melody over the cloud of bric-a-brac and swells of electricity swirling in the background.
  • Youngs knows the ins and outs of extended psychedelic whoosh better than most
  • Performed live on the air in Glasgow, 2003

    30-second MP3 excerpts:

    Beam
    Mexico
    God Bless the Master

    If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

    go to iTunes to browse downloads for mu-Ziq "Bilious Paths"

    If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

    For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.

Artist: PELT Title: Brown Cyclopaedia
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF25
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
***1995 album (previously vinyl-only) from Virginia ensemble. "Blending improvisation with composisition, lo-fi detail, and the brute force of white noise with sullen beauty." --Bill "Me Later" Kellum

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Pelt "Brown Cyclopaedia" (VHF)

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: PELT Title: Dauphin Elegies
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF112
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 6/16/08
***The first new studio recordings from Pelt in three years picks up where 2005's Untitled CD leaves off-- delivering massive slabs of heavy, all-acoustic drone action.

"Waning Crescent" is an ominous workout for three large gongs, rich with overtones and subsonic rumble. "Fire Signs Along the Field" offers a slightly jarring quartet of spare string noise, with Nathan Bowles (Black Twigs, Spiral Joy Band) sitting in on double bass. "Cast Out to Deep Waters" is an immense 30-minute epic in the vein of Empty Bell Ringing in the Sky and Untitled's "I" that fits into the archetypical classics in the Pelt canon. The all-too-brief "Crown of Comets" closes the CD with the chiming, overlapping ring of bells recorded in Virginia's Falls Ridge caves.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Waning Crescent
Fire Signs On The Edge Of The Field
Cast Out To Deep Waters
Crown Of Comets

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for Pelt "Dauphin Elegies"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music Service and emusic, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: PELT Title: Empty Bell
Format: 2xLP Catalog
Number:		 VHF043
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 5/24/99
Artist: PELT Title: Empty Bell
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF043CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 5/24/99
***Another chapter in this mid-Atlantic ensembleis existence finds them transforming their one- word moniker from a noun to a verb. And what a verb it is: Empty Bell Ringing In The Sky includes a 12-minute surprise (eek!) collaboration with Drunken Fish artists rhBand, Peltis complete 35-minute set at Terrastock II (nominated by many as the highlight of the entire goddamn festival and nicknamed iThe Hillbilly Theater of Eternal Musici), a magically resonating 17-minute slice from a typical East coast hippie warehouse party, and a new 18-minute home recording (heavy on the Tibetan bowls, Chester). The home recordings are of the digital ilk and finally capture Peltis forceful, multi-layered sound accurately and appropriately. Recent dates with the Sonic Youth Band, a West coast tour this Fall, appearances at Transmissions (NC) and Terrastock III (London), and continued releases on the bandis own Klang label demonstrate that Pelt can promote themselves like no oneis business. If Entertainment Weekly doesn't return Bill Kellum's calls, it's their loss.

Artist: PELT Title: Max Meadows
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF28
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
***Third full-length release from Virginia trio. Studio/live/rehearsal recordings; combines the jaw-droppingly downer songcraft heard on "Brown Cyclopaedia" with the free-formist trappings displayed on the followup "Burning/Filiment/Rockets."

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Pelt "Max Meadows"

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: PELT Title: Pearls From The River
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF76
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 10/6/03
***First new music in a couple of years from the trio, focusing entirely on their acoustic side-- a single session recorded in Virginia by Mikel Dimmick. "Up the North Fork" is a trio for banjo, baritone banjo, and cello-- after the snaky bowed introduction, the fast thwacking of the banjos and forcefully strummed cello take over and whip up a storm. The other two tracks are lengthy ragas (one in C, one in D) with the virtuoso modal guitar of Jack Rose front and center. "Pearls From The River" features Rose on 12-string, dueling with Mike Gangloff on esraj. Pat Best's thick, sonorous double bass bowing anchors the duet between the lightning thrumming and plucking of Rose's guitar and Gangloff's arcing, sharply bowed half-time melody. "Road To Catawba" has Rose on 6-string, with Gangloff moving to tamboura, for a full exploration of the D Lydian mode. Mmmm, D Lydian mode... Best's bass is again the foundation, with whistling overtones rising from his bow over the low drone.

30-second RealAudio excerpts:

Up the North Fork
Pearls from the River
Road to Catawba

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Pelt "Pearls From the River"

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: PELT Title: Skullfuck / Bestio Tergum Degero
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF98
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 5/1/06
***Now available to all, a new pressing of the extremely limited edition live CD previously attainable only on the band's 2006 European tour. Contrary to the Grateful Dead reference in the title, Skullfuck is a tight recording of a single, intense November 2005 performance from NYC's Knitting Factory. The set begins with an epic group arrangement of Jack Roseis "Calais To Dover," with Rose's 12-string shadowed by Mike Gangloff's fiddle, and the thick drone of Mikel Dimmick and Pat Best's harmonium and srutis. The three-part "Bestio" suite follows, with the group moving to Tibetan bowls and gongs, building up a huge sheet of sound which peaks in a brief "encore" of wild gong smashing. This new edition is packaged in a gatefold "eco-wallet" with cover art designed by fabric and fiber-artist Emily Keown.
Artist: PELT Title: Techeod
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF36CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 3/30/98
***Washington DC guys go three-for-three for VHF. Contemporary and traditional musics collide and spatter the attentive listener with tamboura, violin, guitar, tabla, flute, banjo,lap steel, oscillator, voice, organ, and a variety of other instruments, both conventional and homemade.

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Pelt "Techeod"

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: PELT Title: Untitled
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF90
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 7/11/05
***(untitled) is devastating set of almost pure white light from the newly upgraded Pelt lineup. The album's intense drone music represents a return to "sonic-ism" for the quartet of Jack Rose, Mike Gangloff, Patrick Best, and Mikel Dimmick. Like 2003's effort Pearls from the River, (untitled) is an all-acoustic affair. The group concentrates on producing dense clouds of overtones from guitar, cello, tibetan bowls, gongs, sruti, and esraj. Track one is an overpowering straight line a la the Theatre of Eternal Music, an atmosphere of stasis with gong and bowl flickering subtly over the massive track bed. Track two is a 32-minute epic that begins with the soft strains of Jack Rose's 12 string, picks up dueling cello and esraj and gradually builds in intensity with the sounds of gongs and other unusual percussion. Track three is the live staple "Sundogs," where Rose's Weissenborn lap guitar and Gangloff's resonator guitar produce a stream of unearthly high, singing overtones in an uncanny acoustic impression of electric feedback. The final track is an epilogue of Best's keening cello, again ignoring the usual technique associated with the instrument in the pursuit of pure weirdness.
Artist: RAKE Title: Ginsing Nights
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF 69CDR
Price: $10.25 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 12/9/02
***"Recordings made on a portable DAT recorder in the Autumn of 1996. These tapes are from a period where the trio of V, SKB!, and C were renting a space in Barco Rebar, a practice facility in Farifax, VA. Housed in an industrial park in the shadow of giagntic satellite receivers, the space was equipped with the kind of amplifiers favored by metal groups and other grunge rockerz who practiced thereosuffice to say that the availability of Ampeg SVTs and Mesa 4x12s inspired the group to throw out the saxes and moogs for a while and TURN IT UP. The music here is delivered mostly in full-on rock/smash mode, played with a bracing enthusiasm that gives an unusual "free-rock" vibe rather than the kind of hard-assed crud you might expect. The fully worked-out structures of "Black Crowes" and "Love Rock" give sharp relief to the long improvised sections in the middles, where the outrE ambient drones kick back in before heading back to the heavy action. In a couple of spots, you can hear the vintage Emulator keyboard on loan from Dr. Malcolm Riviera crackling through the (un-mic'd) PA, its grainy 8-bit string and explosion samples blurred to the abstract by the whorl of sound. Shortly after these tapes were made, I listened to them all while riding an exercise bike in my office. The band forgot about them, having moved on to studio based "cosmic" experimentation with water bottles and ethnic percussion. Revisiting them years later, I missed the sound that the bike added to the mix, but even absent the constantly changing rattle-loop, I thought they were still worth hearing, so I've made this personal selection. Almost as good as "Space Truckin'!" - BK. Three tracks, sixty-four minutes. Packaged in a gatefold wallet.

30-second RealAudio excerpts:

Black Crowes
Love Rock
Classic Rock Improvisors
[Bonus 3" CD track]
Artist: RAKE Title: Omniverse...Frequency
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF 70CDR
Price: $10.25 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 12/9/02
***"Studio recordings made in 2000, I think. This is a quiet, intimate session which follows the arc begun during the sessions that yielded the band's touchstone Resume The Cosmos (released by Camera Obscura, 1998). There is a lot of close-mic rustling of various objects alongside the expected drones, and some of the tracks have been modified upon mixdown by V . One track, forty-one minutes.

30-second RealAudio excerpts:

Omniverse.:.Frequency
Artist: RAKE Title: Tell Tale Moog
Format: 2xCD Catalog
Number:		 VHF18
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
***If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

[please note that, due to international licensing agreements, not all Midheaven titles may be available for download in all territories].

Artist: ROSE, JACK Title: Kensignton Blues
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF92
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 8/22/05
***Kensington Blues, the fourth full-length release from Jack Rose, is an inspired mix of styles and sounds that brings his in-person steel string guitar mastery down to CD scale. This is Rose's most diverse outing by far, with straight ragtime, heavy 12-string, and that sweet, sweet Weissenborn lap guitar all checking in. Honed during endless touring in 2004, the repertoire here is delivered with maximum authority in a series of first-take performances recorded in early 2005.

"Cathedral et Chartres" and "Calais to Dover" are dense, brooding 12-string numbers, recalling the key tracks on 2004's Raag Manifestos. "Calais" features a sequence of right hand picking furious enough to evoke a dream state-- la Charlemagne Palestine's "Stumming Music." "Rappahanock River Rag" and "Flirtin' With the Undertaker" are pure syncopated ragtime, while "Kensington Blues" offers an almost regal take on the intersection of Anglo and American folk traditions. The epic "Now That I'm A Man Full Grown" was the signature piece of many of 2004's live shows, a display of mindboggling slide invention that straddles the line of East and West a la "Yaman Blues" from the Opium Musick LP. In something of a surprise inclusion, Jack's take on John Fahey's "Sunflower River Blues" (long a staple of Pelt and solo gigs but never included on a record) is subtle and expressive, with a wonderful rise and fall that perfectly accentuates Fahey's beautiful melody.

Artist: ROSE, JACK Title: Kensington Blues
Format: LP Catalog
Number:		 VHF92LP
Price: $13.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 4/14/08
***Available now for the first time on vinyl, Kensington Blues is the fourth full-length release from Jack Rose and his most diverse outing by far. The album is an inspired mix of styles and sounds, with straight ragtime, heavy 12-string, and that sweet, sweet Weissenborn lap guitar all checking in. Honed during endless touring in 2004, the repertoire here is delivered with maximum authority in a series of first-take performances recorded in early 2005.

"While the new century's novel folk has already seen significant definition, Rose is largely alone in talking new century ideas with the old language.... Kensington Blues is derivative and at the same time nearly brilliant. 8.0." --Pitchfork
Artist: ROSE, JACK Title: Raag Manifestos
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF85
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 5/15/06
***Reissued!! Originally this limited edition CD was released in conjunction with Jack Rose's first major European and West Coast U.S. tours. Compiled from a variety of sources, Raag Manifestos cuts across various acoustic styles much like Rose's Opium Musick LP, but with a more aggressive attack. "Black Pearls from the River" and "Hart Crane's Old Boyfriends" are dense, serious assaults on the 12-string, with the intensity of the latter enhanced by Ian Nagoski's roaring electronic backdrop. With subtle tabla accompaniment by Eric Carbonara, "Crossing The Great Waters," is another epic modal journey in the style of Pelt's "Road To Catawba" and Rose's own "Red Horse." The traditional "Blessed Be the Name of the Lord" finishes off the CD on a calming note.

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Jack Rose "Raag Manifestos"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks here

[please note that, due to international licensing agreements, not all Midheaven titles may be available for download in all territories].

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service and emusic.com, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: ROSE, JACK Title: Two Originals Of
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF081
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 3/8/04
***The debut solo CD by Jack Rose combines his much-lauded Eclipse LPs Red Horse, White Mule and Opium Musick. While the former is generally recognized as inspired by the Takoma tradition, Rose adds his own exotic influences and recognizable touch-- whether abstracting on the modal epic "Red Horse" or the rough slide stylings of "The Colonel's Blues." The latter is an eclectic collection with pieces for 12-string (the percussive and dark "Black Pearls"), 6-string, and lap guitar. The two tracks featuring the lap guitar are duets. The lovely raga-ish "Yaman Blues" features Pelt's Mike Gangloff on tanpura, and the near-ragtime of "Linden Ave Stomp" features Glenn Jones of Cul de Sac on his vintage Gibson. The 12-page booklet reproduces the liner notes from both LPs and adds a few snaps.

Blues scholar Kisan Nagai said about Red Horse, White Mule: Rose's personalized and disparate criteria awaken feelings of both rapture and tragedy on the scale of that which must have been felt by the newly-wed anthropologist who drove Kiowa Indian guests out of his Oklahoma residence with Victrola discs of Amelita Galli-Curci in order to go to bed with his bride, or the child who, on hearing Bugs Bunny sing Queen Liluokalani's dirge "Aloha Oe," quarantined himself in the clothes hamper until such time that the United States withdraws from Hawai'i.

Blues scholar Joe R. Sack said about Opium Musick: In the year and half between Red Horse, White Mule and Opium Musick, Mr. Rose spent the majority of his time honing his ragtime and jass skills. He met Dr. Chattanooga Red soon after recording his first LP, who revealed the secrets of ragtime and jass to Jack in ancient ceremony.... On his deathbed he told Jack not to let the ragtime die and to bring it into the 21st century. And now we have Opium Musick ... a lovely tribute to Jack's beloved teacher.

  • Member of drone collective Pelt ventures out solo in full-on Fahey / Basho mode
  • Collects two sought-after vinyl-only releases

    If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

    Jack Rose "Two Originals Of..."

    For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: ROSE, JACK & THE BLACK TWIG PICKERS Title: S/T
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF116
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 7/6/09
***This raw and rocking collaboration between Jack Rose and The Black Twigs features some of the most swinging, hard-hitting string music waxed in many a decade. Rose's solo playing has always had a tough edge, with his prodigious technique often employed to drop right-hand bombs. His use of a thumbpick originates from years of duets with Twig Mike Gangloff, struggling to make his guitar heard over Gangloff's crashing banjo. The front line of Rose and Gangloff's strings are joined by Isak Howell's no-nonsense guitar and harmonica and Nate Bowles' variety of expert percussion. The four lock together with a sure-footedness honed by frequent touring and a singularity of intent to rock. Gangloff takes the vocals, howling out standards like "Little Sadie" firmly in the old-time tradition--without reserve.

A few of the tracks here are updates of Rose & Family classics, with the group turning the stately "Kensington Blues" upbeat and issuing an assured take on "Bright Sunny South," first recorded by Pelt (with Rose and Gangloff) back in 2001 on their gonzo classic double-disc Ayahuasca.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Little Sadie
Sail Away Ladies - I Shall Not Be Moved
Hand Me Down My Walking Cane
Soft Steel Piston
Some Happy Day
Ride Old Buck
Revolt
Kensington Blues
Special Rider
Bright Sunny South
Goodbye Booze
Artist: SKULLFLOWER Title: This Is Skullflower
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF23
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
*** THIS TITLE IS OUT OF PRINT ON CD and ONLY AVAILABLE DIGITALLY FOR DOWNLOAD AT THE LINKS BELOW. Thnanks!

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Skullflower "This Is"

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: SPIRAL JOY BAND Title: Little Sparrow
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF117
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 5/4/09
***Little Sparrow is the third VHF release for this Southwestern Virginia ensemble that specializes in transportational sound sheets. Derived from the extended Pelt / Jack Rose / Black Twigs family, Spiral Joy Band traffics in lengthy microtonal explorations rooted in the expansive tradition of such beards as Taj Mahal Travellers, Henry Flynt, Theatre of Eternal Music, etc.

The four tracks here are an evolution from the trance-like gong and percussion sounds of recent Joy Band releases, with the quartet putting more of an emphasis on heavily bowed string sounds. Mike Gangloff's fiddle, which plays it relatively straight in the Black Twigs (and occasionally Pelt), cuts loose here with some of the gnarliest string scratching this side of Tony Conrad's Four Violins, giving the music a searing, visceral edge. The final track finds the band literally standing in the Atlantic Ocean, with their gongs and Tibetan bowls shimmering out a gentle lullaby. "No overdubs, no amplification, no effects."

Little Sparrow has been printed in a very limited edition, with an elegant heavy card wallet featuring illustrations by Emily Keown.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Ridgeline Currents
Flowers In The Dooryard
Little Sparrow
Tolling Over The Rocks

Purchase the download:

iTunes

emusic

AmazonMP3

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive titles available for download from the iTunes Music Service, emusic, and AmazonMP3, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: SPIRAL JOY BAND Title: Lullabies For Jeff Dean
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF94CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 10/31/05
*** This long running but until-now-undocumented Virginia group was founded in 2001 by Pelt members Mikel Dimmick and Mike Gangloff with Karl Precoda (Last Days of May, The Dream Syndicate). Their debut CD concentrates on live performances featuring marathon, unorthodox drone treatises for acoustic instruments, including Tibetan singing bowl, gong, sruti, and esraj. The bowed, rolled, and (usually) gently struck metal percussion anchors the sound with rich, resonating tones. The music is a cousin to Peltis explorations on (Untitled), and Keyhole and Keyhole II (Eclipse). iLullaby 1i is built almost entirely on the gongs and bowls, a slowly building narcoleptic trip. The forty-one-minute epic iLullaby 2i begins with Gangloff on esraj, building up a trance before the shenais and sharply struck gongs take over at the climax of the piece. iLullaby 3i throws some surprisingly melodic and active piano into the mix, evoking a long-form version of Popol Vuhis iDie Nacht Der Seele.i

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Everything Must Coincide
Supa Nigga
Energy Harvester (Swollow the Sun)

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Spiral Joy Band "Lullabies For Jeff Dean"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: SPIRAL JOY BAND Title: Wake Of The Dying Sun King
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF104CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 9/10/07
*** Wake of the Dying Sun King is the second full-length of epic meditative drone from this Southwestern Virginia collective. Like Pelt (with whom it shares several members), Spiral Joy Band uses mostly acoustic instruments to create slow, building pieces rich with human detail.

The steady rolling of multiple Tibetan bowls, bowed and struck gongs, hypnotic fiddle, sruti box, and other instruments are recorded live in continuous performances that frequently stretch beyond an hour per piece.

The performance aspect is key to Spiral Joy Band's aura-- the variations in approach, force, etc. with which each tone is played, and the clear, open recording (mostly in Blacksburg's Glade Baptist Church) highlight the subtleties of the music. Wake is a much more percussive set of music than Spiral Joy Band's previous Lullabies for Jeff Dean CD (VHF#94), with Nathan Bowles' expert percussion lending a lot more clang to the mix. Cover paintings by Emily Keown.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

The Wake Of The Dying Sun King
A Fading Trail Of Sparks
A Spiral Dance
Long Shadows Beneath The Moon If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for Spiral Joy Band "Wake Of The Dying Sun"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: SUNROOF Title: Bliss
Format: 2xCD Catalog
Number:		 VHF60
Price: $13.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 10/22/01
***The atmosphere of this somewhat delayed yet unstoppable annual collection from long-in-the-tooth UK vibe maestro Matthew Bower and friends (who include Neil Campbell, Rosalie Bower, and maybe some other people - honestly, who can tell?) is mostly spaced and buzzing instruments and voices hovering and floating in the dense mix, all running together like some sort of alien shortwave broadcast. Disc 1 takes off from where last year's Found Star Sound left us - a mix of fuzzy guitar and organ rhythms jousting with voice, bowed strings, and unidentifiable percussion in a compressed fog. Disc 2 is a headlong rush into newish territory, with analog synth vs. birdsong, child's voice vs. sawing violin, chug vs. fizz, etc. There are many tracks on both discs that have subtle (and overt) melodic and rhythmic undercurrents suggesting a fuzz/hiss-dominated alternate-universe version of say, Harmonia or Richter Band. Probably a coincidence, but very, very appealing.

There is always at least one guitar involved; at least one is droning at all times, but sometimes actual notes are plucked while an atonal echo is buried deep. Matthew Bower overlays hand percussion, sometimes to the point of drowning out whatever the guitar(s) are doing. Structure isn't a question here. It may sound like Gamelan or it may sound like Whitehouse.-www.worshipguitars.org

Artist: SUNROOF Title: Cloudz
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF75
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 10/6/03
***Bi-annual collection of pillow sound from Matthew Bower & Co. Fairly mellow and spacey, à la the "Embroidered Birdsong Nearly Meadows" disc from Sunroof's 2001 Bliss double-CD. Layers of twinkling keyboard, guitar, unidentified fuzz, short wave, etc. Very much in the style of Harmonia and Cluster in spots. There are a couple of amped-up moments here and there, including surprise lead guitar action on "Tornado Rose Canoe," and the excellent fuzz-grilled rock of "Primavera" (aka "AC/DC" - a staple of recent live sets). According to no less of an authority than Neil Campbell, Cloudz is "the best Sunroof ever."

30-second RealAudio excerpts:

Machine
Grasshopper
Viva
Zero
Universal Acceleration
Tornado Rose Canoe
Silver Nazi Suicide
Primavera
Silver Zero

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

[please note that, due to international licensing agreements, not all Midheaven titles may be available for download in all territories].

Artist: SUNROOF Title: Delicate Autobahns Under Construction
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF041CD
Price: $13.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 6/14/04
***BACK IN PRINT!!! The debut album release from MATTHEW BOWER's new trio, following the retirement of SKULLFLOWER and TOTAL, mines territory similar to Total, but with a more group-oriented communal trance arrangement. Taking cues from minimalist composers, Indian music and assorted folk musics, Sunroof uses guitar, violin, hand percussion and reeds to build up layer upon layer of stratospheric bliss, creating the perfect cloud for Bower's sometimes gentle, sometimes excoriating electric guitar to float on.

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Sunroof "Delicate Autobahn Under Construction"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: SUNROOF Title: Found Star Sound
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF46
Price: $13.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 5/8/00
***Found Star Sound is the annual dispatch for 2000 from Matthew Bower and friends, continuing their long legacy of outward-bound audio veritE. Recorded mostly at Bower's Cumbrian home in the rainy and windy UK "Lake" district, the group's droning guitars, organs, voices, and violins blend with twinkling percussion to evoke an atmosphere perfectly suited to such an environment. Following a brief living-room organ-with-built-in rhythm-section-gone-haywire introduction on "Pink Stream 1," the CD builds a vibe around Bower's thickly buzzing - but mellow 'n' casual - guitar. Steadily picking up momentum, the record peaks with the chugging sound-of-trains epic "Pink Stream 2," calms briefly, and then goes out strong with a rousing blast of guitar and violin scrape on "Silvera." Another scuff from the UK's biggest scuffmakers!

Artist: SUNROOF Title: Silver Bear Mist
Format: 2xCD Catalog
Number:		 VHF 91
Price: $16.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 9/26/05
***Silver Bear Mist, Sunroof!'s first release in over two years, is an epic double-CD of inimitable buzz. Recorded during a period when guitarist Matt Bower (Skullflower) was also concentrating on writing material with Marcia Bassett of Double Lepoards for their duo, Hototogisu, Silver Bear Mist diverges from recent releases like the collagy USSA, Splat, Wings Over America, and the last major Sunroof! release-- the krautrock-ish Cloudz-- to revel in thick, billowing fuzz bombs. Aided by Vibracathedral Orchestra's Mick Flower and US duo The Skaters, Bower lets rip on rockers like the Tibetan-oriented "Buried in the Sky" and the immense "Sky Blue Sword." Disc two mixes it up a bit, with the unexpectedly docile "Stacked Diamonds" featuring The Skaters, alongside the scouring surge of Bower leads on "Be Sure to Boogie" and "Luminous Kite."
Artist: SUNROOF / VIBRACATHEDRAL ORCHESTRA Title: Tour
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF078
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 9/29/03
***Limited edition full-length CD produced to commemorate first ever US tour by this wing of the VHF family. Sunroof's 8 tracks are a mix of archetypical Sunroof! drone and shimmer and wild/jarring sampler-analog-bloop driven action. Confusing, to say the least. VCO weigh in with an eclectic mix, including the delicate "Let A Thousand Flowers Bloom," a clip from a gig at the Royal Festival Hall, and most importantly, Bridgit Hayden blowing up a storm on the flute. In letterpress mini-gatefold printed by Jen Farrell at Starshaped Press. Limited. 14 tracks, 74 mins.

30-second RealAudio excerpts:

Frogs
Dharma Gin
Free Wild Samples
Justy
Flutter
The Sea is Maine S. S.
Snow Covered Hills
Ornamental Lake of Death
City's Sirens Off
Festival Hall
I Fell Asleep
Put Yr Arm Around Me
Spectre's Honesty Tongue
Let a Thousand Flowers Bloom
Artist: SUNROOF! Title: Panzer Division Lou Reed
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF105CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 8/20/07
***Beneath the usual lovely psychedelic artwork on the cover of Panzer Division Lou Reed lurks Sunroofis most explosive and assaultive record ever. The key track here in the Sunroof! evolution is the opener iSlew Plateaus #1,i with Mick Flower (Vibracathedral Orchestra) on guitar and John Moloney (Sunburned Hand of the Man) on drums. This live shot of electricity gradually ramps up from Flower and Matt Boweris dueling guitars to the point where Moloneyis drums come crashing in after about six minutes, leading to a furious crescendo that lasts for the remainder of the 19-minute track. iSlew Plateaus #2i is a lengthy collaboration with underground gadabout Mattin, whose previous collabs with Tony Conrad, Bruce Russell, Eddie Prevost, et al. hopefully prepared him for the Bower wrecking ball delivered here. The other two cuts are absolutely blistering demolition work, which, in spite of their visceral impact, reach a state of zen-like stasis after a couple of minutes, * la the best of Boweris work with Hototogisu.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Slow Plateaus #1
Etoile Sauvage
Slow Plateaus #2
Stairways And Terraces Descending One Beyond Another In A Stupefying State Of Exhaustion

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for Sunroof! "Panzer Division Lou Reed"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: TREIOPS TREYFID Title: Worry Machine
Format: 7" Catalog
Number:		 VHF24
Price: $3.50 Label: Vhf
Artist: TURNQUIST, ALEXANDER Title: As The Twilight Crane Dreams In Color
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF118
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 7/6/09
***As the Twilight Crane Dreams in Color is the second full-length from New York-based guitarist Alexander Turnquist, who defies expectations with a set of hypnotic epics that owe more to classic minimalism than current notions of solo guitar.

Forgoing most of the extended techniques of his debut, Turnquist lays down a thick blanket of 12-string that sets up persistent, loop-like patterns in the music. Simple and lovely strings, piano, and percussion provide the melody, carrying most of the movement in the pieces. Turnquist uses extraordinary control and restraint--the orchestrations are as reductionist as possible, with no cringe-inducing "string drama" or unnecessary virtuosity. An almost-monomaniacal tremolo thrum of the guitar dominates the album, but there is a lengthy ambient breakdown that occurs mid-way through the 18-minute "The REM Cycle - Dream Phase" that is a thing of elliptical and drifting beauty.

As the Twilight Crane Dreams in Color is a bold statement even in the context of the frequent micro-parsing of styles in the sub-underground--there's really not much else out there like it.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

The REM Cycle - Dream Phase
Statues In The Dark - Shadows Collide
Dancing In Borealis - Ribbons Of Vivacity
Artist: TURNQUIST, ALEXANDER Title: Faint At The Loudest Hour
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF107CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 9/10/07
***Faint at the Loudest Hour is the astonishing solo debut by guitarist Alexander Turnquist, part of a young generation of guitar players who have taken their incredible virtuosity and turned it into something actually worth listening to. Like James Blackshaw, Jack Rose, Glenn Jones, et al., this could roughly be described as "raga" guitar, with its long, modal compositions and hypnotic overtone play.

Unlike most of his peers, however, Turnquist employs a variety of extended techniques a la Hans Reichel, grappling the strings with both hands and using a variety of approaches and attacks on both the steel and wood. There's also a distinct lack of audible "roots" influence here, with Turnquist sidestepping the Fahey-isms that dominate so much current acoustic guitar music. Along with the six- and twelve-string acoustics, Turnquist makes subtle use of electronic textures, such as the surprising Fennesz-like dissolve that occurs midway through "Amongst a Swarm of Hummingbirds."

Faint at the Loudest Hour was recorded by Scott Solter (Mountain Goats, Liam Singer, many others) with cinematic depth and detail.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Amongst A Swarm Of Hummingbirds
In The Vein Of Bedlam
Water Spots Upon My Mind
White Out
Mime Fight
As The Sun Sets, We Think Of Days To Come... If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for Alexander Turnquist "Faint At The Loudest Hour"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: VIBRACATHEDRAL ORCHESRA Title: Versatile Arab Chord Chart
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF48
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 7/17/00
***The second full-length outing from the quintet of NEIL CAMPBELL, MICHAEL FLOWER, JULIAN BRADLEY, BRIDGET HAYDEN, and ADAM DAVENPORT. Like their UK cousins and fellow VHF recording artists Sunroof!, VIBRACATHEDRAL ORCHESTRA usually works from a base of modal improvisation. Led by Campbell's sawing violin, the group builds up arcs of lingering overtones beneath an undercurrent of melody. They cut the drones in their life with extremely effective bursts of near rock, in a style reminiscent of the pre-Nico Velvet Underground (circa 1966 or so). The band's combination of clattering percussion, droning strings, and considerable sense of where to put the "groove" makes them unique among their peers.

    If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

    [please note that, due to international licensing agreements, not all Midheaven titles may be available for download in all territories].

Artist: VIBRACATHEDRAL ORCHESTRA Title: Dabbling With Gravity And Who You Are
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF66
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 2/11/02
***The latest and current pinnacle from the quintet of Neil Campbell, Bridgit Riley, Julian Bradley, Michael Flower, and Adam Davenport was assembled from recordings of their weekly sessions in Flower's kitchen. The tracks here represent the joyous, celebratory side of VCO - all forward motion, massed strings, percussion, horns, and little instruments rocketing forward in a swirl of sound. Compared to the more austere sounds of recent CDs like Lino Hi and Versatile Arab Chord Chart, the tracks here take off from the spot where the loose hippie-chant-and-drum action of collectives like Amon Düül intersects with the polyglot instrumental approach of mid-'60s Sun Ra (ref. "Exotic Forest," "Shadow World," etc). "There is no chord formation that can be planned," says Bridget Hayden, "which creates elation or sadness, or any art which is profound enough to change anything fundamental about a person. There is just a resonance around us which musicians and artists are using or not using."
Artist: VIBRACATHEDRAL ORCHESTRA Title: The Queen Of Guess
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF77
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 10/6/03
***While certainly VCO's most upbeat and percussive music, the nine tracks on this immense, visceral slab of rackety action run through a wide range of styles. "Ramshackle Sunrise" has a gamelan-like, five-note melody overlaid with a hovering drone. "The Silent Socket" rocks with "Sister Ray"-style guitar careening along side actual drums. The two 20-minute epics that bookend the record are a study in contrasts: "Your Head Shone Like A Stone" has a heavy, excited buzz, while the closing "Goodnight Stars Goodnight Air" is a gentler acoustic epilogue, gliding into the rosy future.

30-second RealAudio excerpts:

Your Head Shone Like a Stone
Ramshackle Sunrise
The Silent Socket
Magnetic Burn
Visit/Forgive > Either
Green Ears
You're Hard to Get
Immobiliser
Goodnight Stars Goodnight Air

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Vibracathedral Orchestra "The Queen of Guess"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: VIBRACATHEDRAL ORCHESTRA Title: Wisdom Thunderbolt
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF102CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 4/16/07
***Wisdom Thunderbolt marks the triumphant return of Vibracathedral Orchestra after more than three years in the wilderness of intermittent performance, tangential projects, and unfindable limited editions.

The seven tracks on Wisdom are thee VCO's most rocking dispatch ever, neatly combining the Ra-like collage of tracks like "Wisdom Thunderbolt" with the insistent pulsing jams of "A Natural Fact" and "Order of the Broad Eraser." "Ochre Dust" and "Rainbow Whirlwind" are more in the old-school VCO thick-blanket of sound, with tuned-percussion melody peeking out from the fog. After a surprise opening, "Sway-Sage" heaves with raucous drumming (courtesy of Magik Marker Pete Nolan) under the swells of sound.

Hard to imagine, but this is the first widely available music (except for the Tuning to the Rooster comp) from the VCO since 2003's acclaimed The Queen of Guess.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

Wisdom Thunderbolt
A Natural Fact
Order Of The Broad Eraser
Ochre Dust
Rainbow Whirlwind
Sway-Sage
What!!!

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Vibracathedral Orchestra "Wisdom Thunderbolt"

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3.

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service and emusic.com, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: WICKHAM-SMITH, SIMON Title: Butterfly Dust
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF44CD
Price: $13.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 11/8/99
***The first solo CD by Simon Wickham-Smith follows a long and prolific 10-year recording partnership with Richard Youngs. Recorded during a temporary relocation to Australia, Butterfly Dust is a strikingly intimate solo performance on organ, voice, Peruvian reed, and Dijeridu.

The performances here are informed by a rare combination of virtuosity and exploratory improvisation. In comparison with some prior performances (e.g. Simon's startlingly skilled assault on a grand piano on Knish), Butterfly Dust is in a more minimal style, where sounds are given room to build up and establish a mood over the long term. This is particularly true of the long organ solo "Objects Appearing," where notes are slowly added to a drone over a period of several minutes, giving each newly introduced note a significant impact. "Qamutiik" is a short workout for Peruvian recorder captured in close-up you-are-there fidelity. Rounding out the record is "Foralicem," a 21-minute piece for Dijeridu that builds up a huge and powerful wall of sound, helping restore respect to an instrument that has been much abused by new-agers.

"If you need proof that visionaries still live in this land, here it is."
-The Wire

Artist: WICKHAM-SMITH, SIMON Title: Extreme Bukake
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF65
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 2/11/02
***In contrast to the live performance-based pieces on Simon Wickham-Smith's 1999 CD Butterfly Dust, the perversely titled follow-up Extreme Bukake is a dissection of religious music, realized on laptop computer. Traditional components like Catholic hymns and Wickham-Smith's vocal on a Hare Krsna prayer get fragmented, splintered, and reassembled into a rich blob of sound. According to his notes on the tracks, "The Self-Immolation of Thich Quang Duc" is a programmatic work based around the death of the titular Viêtnamese monk who set himself alight to protest about the activity of the Viêtnamese government in the early 1960s. He was a friend of Thich Nhat Hanh, whom Martin Luther King Jr. nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1965. The music sounds like the insanity of the situation, the external noise of cars and people and the internal noise of the heart and the soul of this man. "Sri Guru Vandana" is a song from the Hare Krsna (ISKCON) tradition of Krisna Vaisnavitism, a nod in the direction of Wickham-Smith's pre-Buddhist, teenager self, the young man who got into ISKCON and then freaked out at the evangelical nature of the organization. This track acknowledges the positive side of his experience. "Ave Regina Celorum" is based on a Catholic hymn to Mary, an attempt to create a piece which could perhaps be used for meditation, either formal or informal.
    Track listing:

    1. Sri Guru-Vandana
    2. The Self Immolation Of Thich Quang Duc
    3. Ave Regina Celorum, Part I
    4. Ave Regina Celorum, Part II

  • Another inventive solo work from the laptop half of R!! & S!!
  • Bob Ostertag would sell his sampler to the devil for a CD like this

    If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

    go to iTunes to browse downloads for Simon Wickham-Smith "Extreme Bukake"

    If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

    For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: WINGTIP SLOAT Title: Add This To Rhetoric
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF57CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 6/18/07
***Long planned (and frequently delayed) restoration of this Virginia trio's rare and out of print singles and compilation tracks from the early 90's. All 30 tracks make their first appearance on CD here, restoring two of the earliest VHF titles to print, along with a wealth of other impossible to find gems.

Covering their most active years, Add This to Rhetoric captures Sloat at their baffling, fragmentary best, dealing out slashing rock sides that bristle with hooks and ear-catching weirdness. Sloat's superbly packaged, handmade/homemade singles were among the finest of their era, and although they appear here on a plain ol' CD, the music still sounds as revelatory as it did 15 years ago. Rifling through ideas with Wire-like efficiency, Pat Foster's trebly, jabbing guitar, Ange Dubuc's rumbling bass, and Dave Bishop's unpredictable drum splatter carried the charge that pretty much invented the VHF label itself.

Wearing their influences on their sleeves, the CD includes smashing covers of key tracks by the Clean, Tall Dwarfs, Sun City Girls, and World of Pooh. Booklet includes liner notes from the band and VHF HQ along with period ephemera for a full immersion experience.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

M31
Turbine Mother
Aspermicle
Blessed Nimbus, Churning
Teapot Dome
Mass Fucking In The Haystacks
They Came With Margarine And In-Laws
It Reminds Me
Nada Dry Lemo
I Wish I'd Been There To Make It A Cliche
Kill The Klansmen
Full Vamka
Um Ba Winga (Um Ba Go)
You're Happier Than You Realize
Purple Martini
Pit Caple Castle
Black Motorist
Infectious Sharps Only
Beauty
The Bed Pot
Left Leaning
Ashcan School
Salt Rising Bread
Holding, Waiting
Waxing Neurotic And So On And On
Bob Howe
I'm On The Wrong Side
Leap Into My Velvet Arms
Read About Seymour
Anything Could Happen

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for Wingtip Sloat "Add This To Rhetoric"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

This title is also available for download at AmazonMP3.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: WINGTIP SLOAT Title: Chewy Foot
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF17CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
***Michael Bull at Caroline Records New York wins the Too Much Time On His Hands Anagram Invitational with "pilot wasting." We're sure that's not a Pavement rip, or anything, nuh-uh, no way. "The voices and guitars. . .surge as if these self-conscious suburban Virginia eclecticists are actually worked up about something." --Mark Jenkins, DC City Paper

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Wingtip Sloat "Chewyfoot"

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: WINGTIP SLOAT Title: Chewy Foot
Format: LP Catalog
Number:		 VHF17
Price: $8.25 Label: Vhf
Artist: WINGTIP SLOAT Title: If Only For The Hatchery
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF30CD
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 2/2/98
***This first new work in nearly three years furthers the Fairfax, Virginia trio's blend of highly fragmented rock and cryptic experimentation. In the wake of fellow over-intellectualizers Wire, Swell Maps, Tall Dwarfs, etc, the 'Sloat mix the familiar and strange in equal parts-- to charming and disarming effect.

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Wingtip Sloat "If Only For The Hatchery"

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: WINGTIP SLOAT Title: If Only For The Hatchery
Format: LP Catalog
Number:		 VHF30
Price: $8.25 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 2/2/98
Artist: YOUNGS / WICKHAM-SMITH Title: Lake
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF52
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 10/2/00
***Originally issued in an edition of 300 on their No Fans label and for all intents and purposes unavailable and unheard for a decade, the 10th anniversary CD-ification of their classic debut double-LP still sounds as revelatory and alien as it did when it was released. Tracks like the immortal collage freak-out "Dance: Help The Aged (Give Them A Heart Attack)," the minimal pulse epic "Chord" and the psych-fuzz rock mania of "Goat" have been undiluted in their majesty by the unbearable decade that has elapsed between then and now. Deep breath, keep the eyes from rolling back in the head, focus, focus, highest rating.

"We're listening to Lake close on a decade since we recorded it. Just as it sounds odd now, what we do today would've sounded bizarre then. We couldn't make this record now. It's like a ghost - so long ago. We've moved on. Our label name, No Fans, was a statement of fact; the record was a dare to ourselves - who in their right mind would ever release anything like this? With No Fans, No Distribution and No Prospect of either, spending over 1,000 pounds on a vanity project when most of our peers were doing sensible things smacked of arrogance. In an ironic bid to launch Lake, a Goat Evening was held in Nottingham at the home of Neil Campbell and Jim Plaistow. Though everyone had a good time, by the end of the evening no-one had bought the album, so we gave away copies to the three people who had shown any interest. Which left 297 copies. The situation was more ridiculous than ever."

--Simon Wickham-Smith
Artist: YOUNGS / TODD Title: Georgians
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF22
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
***Mmmmmm. . .lovely Calgon-time/killing floor compendium of bubbly moods and moderately intense interludes. Equally suitable for 1) being too shagged out to even lift the remote, or 2) drifting into oncoming traffic. No disruptive vocals to spoil the moment, either.

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks: go to iTunes to browse downloads for Richard Youngs/Steven Todd "Georgians"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: YOUNGS / WICKHAM-SMITH Title: Lammergeier
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF58
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 4/30/01
***LAmmERGEIER is the first new recording by Simon Wickham-Smith and Richard Youngs since Metallic Sonatas, recorded way back in the spring of 1998. Following closely on the heels of the VHF reissue of the their classic 1990 debut LAKE, LAmmerGEIER finds the duo continuing to pursue the head-scratching assortment and range of outer sound in a somewhat more contemporary style. LAmmERGEIR makes use of all sorts of exotic instruments, but like Metallic Sonatas, many of the pieces have undergone electronic transformation, adding an extra layer of unsettling aural alchemedia to the tunes. Some of the sounds show the influence of Simon's laptop work over the last couple of years, as heard on his limited edition Adelaide Audio release and some forthcoming titles (which should establish him as a major laptop sound arrangement force, if there's any goddamn justice in the world). Laptops aside, the layers of microscopic detail on LAmmERGEIER should give listeners plenty of practice in differentiating sounds that are produced by complicated software and sounds that are produced by a guy whacking a baking tray with a stick.

Artist: YOUNGS / WICKHAM-SMITH Title: Metallic Sonatas
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF040CD
Price: $13.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 2/22/99
***15 short, searing slices of electronic mayhem on this, the prolific duois latest and last for awhile (Simon Wickham-Smith is moving to Australia) contrast the song-oriented action of their previous release Pulse of the Rooster. Performed on electric sitar, voice, glass harmonica, drum machine, electric cifteli, electric banjolin, violin, cello, cardboard boxes, Casio, electric shirt-reinforcer, electric bass, guitar, bowed cymbals, electric thai harp, clock-chimes, reed organ, and bagpipes, the sounds have been mutated into towering alien sculptures evoking the itexturesi of metals. Each piece is short and novel enough not to slip into dreary repetition. iMetallic Sonatas,i like most R!!! & S!!! releases, somehow makes the most unusual music accessible.

Artist: YOUNGS / WICKHAM-SMITH Title: Red & Blue Bear
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF27
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
***Another enigmatic release from the dashing Scottish duo-- includes an 18-page, full-color liner/booklet. Alluringly bizarre short instrumentals share space with some lovely, folky numbers. Stylistically diverse, sonically wondrous and aesthetically unmatched.

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Simon Wickham-Smith and Richard Youngs "Red and Blue Bear"

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: YOUNGS, RICHARD & SIMON WICKHAM SMITH Title: 5 Years
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF99
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 5/22/06
***5 Years is the venerable duo's first release since 2001's Lammergeier. After recording and releasing nearly twenty albums between 1990 and 2001, Richard Youngs and Simon Wickham-Smith attempt an opposite approach to music making-- an annual meeting to record a solitary ten-minute track. The resulting songs, each named for an intervening year, show the duo remarkably unaffected by the elapsed half-decade. Their signature mix of electronically treated percussion, ululating noise, and hand-on-the-knob tweaking continues to adapt "real human" instrumental expression to musique concrete sensibilities.

30-second MP3 excerpts:

2002
2003
2004
2005
2006

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

go to iTunes to browse downloads for Richard Youngs & Simon Wickham-Smith "5 Years"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here.

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service and emusic.com, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.
Artist: YOUNGS, RICHARD, AND ALEX NEILSON Title: Electric Lotus
Format: LP+CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF103LP
Price: $16.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 6/4/07
***This epic double set combines an LP of all-electric rock mayhem with a CD of subtle drum/shakuhachi tracks. Electric Lotus is the Youngs and Neilson's self-proclaimed "rock" album, and it is a mind-boggling clutch of guitar/bass/drums demolition. Coming off like an amphetamine-fueled Guru Guru, the music tumbles out in a crazy quilt of stun-level attack zonage, especially on the side-long "Electric Lotus." Neilson's staggering free-drumming hits a new peak here, stepping beyond his laudable work with Jandek, Bonnie Prince Billy, etc., into new realms. Youngs lights it up with raging guitar and bass action, including some deeply psychedelic leads, and on "Kickin' The Glass," some killer "heavy" riffing.

Lotus Edition is a companion CD of restrained and completely live duos for drums and shakuhachi. Youngs had previously issued a disc of shakuhachi solos with dense delay and layering effects, but here his untrained but highly musical output on the ancient instrument is in deep conversation with Neilson's drum set. A couple of the tracks feature the kind of long notes, bowed cymbals, and other droneage heard on previous releases like Partick Rain Dance, but in a stripped down live setting.

If you have a recent version of iTunes software on your computer, clicking on the link immediately below should open the iTunes application and take you to that album's iTunes page-- where you can listen to samples and buy this album, or individual tracks:

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for Alex Neilson & Richard Youngs "Electric Lotus"

Go to iTunes to browse downloads for Alex Neilson & Richard Youngs "Lotus Edition"

If you have a subscription account at emusic.com, you can download tracks for purchase here and here.

This title is also available for download at

AmazonMP3 (Electric Lotus).

AmazonMP3 (Lotus Edition).

For a complete listing of Midheaven exclusive albums available for download from the iTunes Music service, please visit the Midheaven Mailorder/Revolver USA Downloadables page.

I

Artist: YOUNGSBOWER Title: Relayer
Format: CD Catalog
Number:		 VHF72
Price: $12.00 Label: Vhf
Release
Date:		 11/18/02
***The second collaboration between these two stalwart titans of the true UK underground comes eight years after their first pairing on the Site/Realm LP. The title no doubt a nod to the odd resemblance of seven-year-old Rosalie Bower's cover art to another LP of the same title, this Relayer throws out the live methodology of the earlier LP for a dense set of layered studio recordings. Like the music of Matthew Bower's Sunroof! group, the tracks are rainbows of colors and textures with string drone, percussion, bleeps, and the unidentifiable, competing in a mix devoid of the traditional "lead with backing" schema. Many tracks have the kind of welcoming electronic bed seldom heard since the demise of Harmonia, with ring-modulated fuzz bleeping away over a chugging, but non-oppressive beat. Elsewhere, there's Richard Youngs' Riley-style organ ping-pong, a little virtuoso Kalimba, thick wads of analog synth... you know where this is going. So tightly edited and accessible that this would be the perfect summer top-down CD, but what with it being released in November, you'll have to keep it safe until the thaw. Or cruise Australia for Thanksgiving.

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