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Shit and Shine is a London-based group formed by both British and US musicians, notably Craig Clouse, who played guitar in Texas with Crown Roast, a hardcore band that released only A Nose Has Many Jobs (Unclean, 1994) and then in London in metal band Todd that released three albums: Purity Pledge (Southern, 2004), Comes To Your House (Southern, 2005), and Big Ripper (Riot Season, 2009).
Its typical line-up has multipled drummers and guitarists, which is somewhat reminiscent of the Crash Worship and other percussive-oriented post-psychedelic bands.
The limited-edition LP You're Lucky To Have Friends Like Us (Riot Season, 2004) concocted a seriously damaged nuclear fusion of garage-rock and heavy-metal music.
Ladybird (Latitudes, 2005) contained one 42-minute improvisation that defined their aesthetic at the border between the Velvet Underground's Sister Ray and a horde of headhunters. Other than a volcanic distortion, and vocals that occasionally swim through the intense heat, for more than half an hour there is only the incessant pounding of the drums. Then the noises become more prominent, threatening to derail the ceremony. Minimal and maximal at the same time, this suite is to psychedelic music what Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music was to progressive-rock: an abominable terminal point.
The (inferior) mini-album Toilet Door Tits/ The Biggest Cock In Christendom (Conspiracy, 2006) contained two lengthy tracks of the Ladybird kind. The 16-minute Biggest Cock In The Christendom is a concerto for looping beat and sound effects. The 15-minute Toilet Door Tits is another case of explosive distorted epileptic hyperdrumming dementia.
The double-CD Jealous of Shit and Shine (Riot Season, 2006) was slightly more focused on the music rather than the emotional impact. The result was another colossal nightmare, the 30-minute Practicing To Be A Doctor. This time the guitar distortion towers over the tribal beat, radiating a calm ferocity, and the vocals are to be heard only in the background, like ghosts from a distant hell. The similarity with the Velvet Underground's Sister Ray is much stronger. After 15 minutes a short pause lets the guitar downshift gear: it resumes as a mere counterpoint to the drums, while industrial noises invade the stage, and the voices join in a feeble choir.
By comparison, the massive distortion of Here Come The Vikings, the industrial chaos of When Extreme Dogs Go Wrong, the wall of noise of Unchained Ladies Shopper, the ghostly beats and alien voices of There Are Two Bakers Now, the electronic poem Hot Vodka, the electrical effervescence of Kitten Mask are merely snippets of a much bigger expressionist drama that remains shrouded in mystery. There is music for exactly one minute and 39 seconds: the ironic surf instrumental Seeing Life Through A Young Mans Eyes.
The second disc contained a revised version of You're Lucky To Have Friends Like Us.
Cunts With Roses (Noisestar Music, 2007) documents the first ever live improvisation by the band. It did not have any of the "subleties" of the third album, but it had the same visceral impact. In fact, it had only that: a colossal riff amid colossal drumming.
The single Cigarette Sequence (Skulltone, 2008) is an apocalyptic piece for multiple drummers and multiple bass players and multiple electronic noise makers.
Cherry (Riot Season, 2008) roamed wildly different territories, from the usual tribal drumming (ever less frequent) to dance-music. Despite the confusion, the class was still there: the sonata for epic swelling guitar distortion Cherry, the industrial-metal pounding cacophony of Cigarette Sequence, the avant-rock instrumental of the Neu! and Faust kind Charm And Counter Charm, the massive droning doom nightmare of the 15-minute High Brooms (probably the album's standout). The ambitious crescendo peaks with a pounding chaotic 20-minute psychedelic freak-out, The Rabbit Song, although not their best. Unfortunately, too much is just gratuitous fluff, barely-sketched fragments, and really bad ideas. Overall, the album sounded less spontaneous, more fragmented and certainly less original.
Küss Mich, Meine Liebe (Load, 2008) collects the two pieces of Toilet Door Tits/The Biggest Cock In Christendom and adds the ten-minute spoken-word kammerspiel Preventions Arise, the madly drilling drone of The Germans Call It A Swimming Head, the take-no-prisoners tribal bacchanal Küss Mich, Meine Liebe, and the heavily syncopated dub dance The Side Of The Road.
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(Translation by/Tradotto da Alessandro Lendaro)
Shit and Shine è un gruppo con base a Londra composto da musicisti sia britannici che statunitensi. La formazione prevalente ha molteplici batteristi e chitarristi, il che può ricordare in qualche modo i Crash Worship ed altre band post-psichedeliche orientate al percussionismo.
L'LP in edizione limitata You're Lucky To Have Friends Like Us (Riot Season, 2004) è una miscela devastante di garage-rock ed heavy-metal.
Ladybird (Latitudes, 2005) contiene un'improvvisazione di 42 minuti che definisce la loro estetica al confine tra la Sister Ray dei Velvet Underground ed un'orda di cacciatori di teste. Oltre ad una vulcanica distorsione, e vocalizzi che annaspano occasionalmente nella rovente atmosfera, per più di mezz'ora si sente solo l'incessante battito delle batterie. Finché i rumori diventano preponderanti, minacciando di deragliare la cerimonia. Minimalista e massimalista allo stesso tempo, questa suite è per la musica psichedelica ciò che
la Metal Machine Music di Lou Reed fu per il progressive-rock: un abominevole punto d'arresto.
Il mini-album Toilet Door Tits/The Biggest Cock In Christendom (Conspiracy, 2006) contiene due brani lunghi sul modello di Ladybird. I 16 minuti di Biggest Cock In The Christendom sono un concerto per effetti sonori e ritmo in loop. I 15 minuti di Toilet Door Tits sono un altro caso di demenza batteristica esplosiva, distorta ed epilettica.
Il doppio CD Jealous of Shit and Shine (Riot Season, 2006) è leggermente più focalizzato sulla musica piuttosto che sull'impatto emotivo. Il risultato è un altro incubo colossale, i 30 minuti di Practicing To Be A Doctor. Questa volta la distorsione delle chitarre torreggia sul ritmo tribale, irradiando calma e ferocia, mentre le voci rimangono in sottofondo, come fantasmi di un inferno lontano. La somiglianza con Sister Ray dei Velvet Underground è molto più accentuata. Dopo 15 minuti una breve pausa consente alla chitarra di scalare marcia: si riduce a mero contrappunto dei tamburi, mentre rumori industriali invadono la scena, a cui le voci si uniscono in un flebile coro.
A confronto, la spaventosa distorsione Here Come The Vikings, il caos industrial di When Extreme Dogs Go Wrong, il muro di suono di Unchained Ladies Shopper, i fantasmagorici ritmi e le voci aliene di There Are Two Bakers Now, il poema elettronico Hot Vodka, l'effervescenza elettronica di Kitten Mask sono soltanto frammenti di un più vasto dramma espressionista che rimane avvolto nel mistero. C'è musica soltanto per un minuto e 39 secondi, precisamente: l'ironico surf strumentale di Seeing Life Through A Young Mans Eyes.
Il secondo disco contiente una rivisitazione di You're Lucky To Have Friends Like Us.
Cunts With Roses (Noisestar Music, 2007) documenta la prima improvvisazione dal vivo in assoluto della band. Non ha nessuna delle "sottigliezze" del terzo album ma ha lo stesso impatto viscerale. In effetti, ha solo quello: un riff colossale immerso in un ritmo colossale.
Il singolo Cigarette Sequence (Skulltone, 2008) è un brano apocalittico per più batteristi e più suonatori di basso e più creatori di rumori elettronici.
Cherry (Riot Season, 2008) girovaga in territori ampiamente diversi, dal consueto ritmo tribale (anche meno frequente) alla dance. Nonostante la confusione, la classe era ancora lì: la sonata per epiche chitarre distorte di Cherry, la martellante cacofonia industrial metal di Cigarette Sequence, l'avant-rock strumentale à la Neu! e Faust di Charm And Counter Charm, i 15 minuti di doom droneggiante da incubo di High Brooms (probabile brano migliore dell'album). Il picco di quest'ambizioso crescendo è nei 20 minuti di martellante e caotico freak-out psichedelico, The Rabbit Song, non il loro brano migliore. Purtroppo, vi è molta fuffa gratuita, frammenti appena abbozzati e pessime idee. Insomma, l'album suona meno spontaneo, più frammentato e di certo meno originale.
Küss Mich, Meine Liebe (Load, 2008) raccoglie Toilet Door Tits, The Biggest Cock In Christendom e aggiunge i dieci minuti di kammerspiel parlato di Preventions Arise, il drone trapanante di The Germans Call It A Swimming Head, il baccanale tribale assassino di Küss Mich, Meine Liebe e il pesante dub sincopato di The Side Of The Road.
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229-2299 Girls Against Shit (Riot Season, 2009) was more psychological and grotesque than beastly, with a surface that harked back to Red Crayola and the Butthole Surfers but also a core that resembled an alien organism grown inside an unsuspecting animal. Their subhuman tribal art yields two new peaks of musical savagery: the dense and manic nine-minute onslaught of Have You Really Thought About Your Presentation?, and the apocalyptic avalanche of distorted guitars and frenzied drums of the eleven-minute Roberts Church Problems. On a smaller scale an equal fervor of psychotic contradictions is achieved in the chaotic android orgy of 20 Years of Caring for the Nations Eyes, in the epileptic hardcore of Pissing on a Shed, in the random acrobatic cacophony of Kolchak The Night Stalker, in the hellish turbulence of Hotel Denmark, and in the tribal dadaism of USA Mexico.
The distorted industrial-dub ballet Penthouse Is A Must is already from another planet, where violence is not the motive but the effect. The hypnotic pulsation of Friseur Nelson battles alienating electronic distortions, each one pulling the piece towards opposite meanings.
The ten-minute Girls Against Shit creates tension without any need for extreme sounds, but instead by constructing and setting in motion a discrete soundscape of tidal Hendrix-ian glissandoes and brief electronic emissions that is suddenly devastated by a horde of metal machines.
Their name was still the same, but their music had become a lot more sophisticated, incorporating ideas, techniques and stereotypes of a whole range of genres and schools.
The six side-long jams of the triple-LP Le Grand Larance Prix (Rock Is Hell, 2011) constitute an ambitious if superficial take on minimalist repetition. Flirtations At A Cocktail Party provides the link with the band's orgiastic sound, while the slow-motion Frankies Theme is its antithesis. The dadaistic collage of Switching 2 Nite Mode and the acid freakout of Klipp provide the counterpart to the glitchy dance jam How To Rattle A White Tailed Buck and to the lo-fi disco of Frenchys Automotive.
Jream Baby Jream (Riot Season, 2012) expanded on that concept, again leaving behind the percussive bacchanals of the early albums. It also continued to investigate the possibility of an electronic dance music that confounds dancers (Dinner With My Girlfriend and especially Rodeo Girls) and even attempted a lo-fi ballad from another dimension, Jream Baby Jream.
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(Translation by/Tradotto da Davide Carrozza)
229-2299 Girls Against Shit (Riot Season, 2009) era più psicologico e grottesco che bestiale, con una superficie che riportava ai Red Crayola e ai Butthole Surfers e un nucleo somigliante a un organismo alieno cresciuto dentro un ignaro animale. La loro arte tribale subumana consegna due nuovi picchi di barbarie musicale: i 9 minuti di carica densa e frenetica di Have You Really Thought About Your Presentation? e gli 11 minuti di chitarre distorte e batterie impazzite nella valanga apocalittica di Roberts Church Problems. Su una scala minore, la caotica orgia androide di 20 Years of Caring for the Nations Eyes, l'epilettico hardcore di Pissing on a Shed, la cacofonia acrobatica di Kolchak The Night Stalker, la turbolenza infernale di Hotel Denmark e il dadaismo tribale di USA Mexico raggiungono un eguale fervore di contraddizioni psicotiche.
Il balletto industrial-dub distorto di Penthouse Is A Must è già da un altro pianeta, dove la violenza non ` il motivo, ma l'effetto. La pulsazione ipnotica di Friseur Nelson lotta contro distorsioni elettroniche alienanti che spingono il pezzo verso significati opposti.
I 10 minuti di Girls Against Shit creano tensione senza il bisogno di suoni estremi, ma costruendo e mettendo in moto onde di glissati à la Hendrix e brevi emissioni elettroniche devastate all'improvviso da un'orda di macchine di metallo.
Il nome era lo stesso, ma la musica era diventata più sofisticata e incorporava idee, tecniche e stereotipi di una vasta gamma di generi e scuole.
Il triplo LP Le Grand Larance Prix (Rock Is Hell, 2011), con una jam per lato, affronta in modo ambizioso e superficiale la ripetizione minimalista. Flirtations At A Cocktail Party si ricollega al sound orgiastico della band, mentre il ralenti di Frankies Theme è la sua antitesi. Il collage dadaista di Switching 2 Nite Mode e il freakout acido di Klipp sono la controparte della jam glitch da ballo di How To Rattle A White Tailed Buck e della disco lo-fi di Frenchys Automotive.
Jream Baby Jream (Riot Season, 2012) approfondisce il concetto, lasciandosi dietro i baccanali percussivi dei primi album. Continuava a indagare sulle possibilità di una dance che confondesse i ballerini (Dinner With My Girlfriend e soprattutto Rodeo Girls) e tentava persino una ballata lo-fi da un'altra dimensione, Jream Baby Jream.
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Craig Clouse converted progressively to the dancefloor on
the five-song EP Find Out What Happens When People Start Being Polite For A Fucking Change (Gangsigns, 2013), which contains the funk-jazz jam Panther Piss and other funky instrumentals,
and on the six-song EP Tropical (Gangsigns, 2014), that aped the
dance-pop style of the 1980s, and finally to a sophisticated
form of android funk on the album Powder Horn (Diagonal, 2014) via
the industrial psychedelic vignette Astro's Hat, the
retro-futuristic lounge ballad Who's Your Waitress
and purely rhythmic experiments such as Pearl Drop.
Everybody's A Fuckin Expert (Editions Mego, 2015) had too much
filler next to the syncopated cacophony of Signal Failure and the
rhythmic novelties Upside Down Cheeseburger and Picnic Table.
54 Synth-Brass, 38 Metal Guitar, 65 Cathedral (Rocket, 2015) fares
a little better, although its lengthy pieces don't achieve much more than
repeating simple ideas.
There are three ten-minute pieces: the
acid tribal dance Electric Pony 2,
C2-6, a sort of sonata for electric shortcircuits over a mechanical drumming pattern, and
Egg MM - Muffin_Pimp Different, the most elaborate and convoluted.
Generally more effective are the shorter pieces: the
lively noise-funk jam Love Your Hair and the
liquid, jazzy Writing Poetry On Your Forehead With The Tip Of A Hunting Knife.
Suddenly Clouse decided to record an album of improvised jazz jams,
Chakin' (Astral Spirits, 2015), mostly recorded live in the studio,
featuring
bassist Ingebrigt Haker-Flaten (The Thing, Atomic, Icepick),
vocalist Pete Simonelli,
drummer King Coffey (Butthole Surfers) and keyboardist Nate Cross.
The 17-minute Denim Do's And Don'ts is a spoken-word piece with
discreet accompaniment by the (under-utilized) combo.
The 25-minute mini-album Teardrops (Riot Season, 2016), instead,
marks a return to the golden days of at least
229-2299 Girls Against Shit: a dozen brief eruptions of
epileptic and noisy industrial-metal that mix
Ministry,
the Butthole Surfers and
Napalm Death.
Schecter Omen Extreme 6
(which also comes with a Schecter Omen Extreme 6 Reverse),
Kramer Baretta,
and especially
BC Rich Celtic Virgo (with relentless disturbing screams)
are blasts of abrasive noise and pummeling grindcore.
The slower, magniloquent
Aria Pro 2 ZZ Deluxe is the album's tribute to doom-metal.
The EP Good White Good Green (Heated Heads, 2016) announced
a new phase with the alien disco music of
Good White Good Green and the
digital cubism of Penalty Fare.
Then Clouse (obviously a musical polymath) crafted a purely electronic album,
Some People Really Know How To Live (Editions Mego, 2017),
of avantgarde dance-music in glacial glitch-scapes.
Part of it feels like extraterrestrial hip-hop (Dish 2 Dish), replete with
old-fashioned rapping and scratching (Lil Wannabe Gangsta).
The music implodes in subliminal minimal techno (South Padre Low Life),
assembles cubistic polyrhythms (Notified),
indulges in bouncing African syncopation (Girl Close Your Eyes),
and sinks with underwater musique concrete (The Crocodile).
Total $hit (Diagonal, 2017) returned to the dancefloor with the
techno locomotive defaced by a loud distortion Chklt Shk
and the sampledelic funk jam Dodge Pot while crafting witty
futuristic vignettes such as the
industrial alien ballet I Hate This Fucking Machine
and the zombie tribal dance of Hot Shovel.
It sounds like the lightweight version of
Some People Really Know How To Live.
That's Enough (Rocket, 2017) continues to mine the same territory
of digital dance music with the 19-minute juggernaut That's Enough
that repeats relentlessly the same ugly beat and derails it with various
forms of dissonance. Harsher sounds are found in the
ten-minute I Like You Betty, while
The Worst is a tedious nine-minute spoken-word piece.
But it's all very repetitive.
The mini-album Hamburger (Gang Of Ducks, 2017) has eight more of
these digital plunderphonic glitch-techno experiments,
this time all of them brief, notably the cartoonish percussive vignette
Angelforce00 and the spectral and quasi jazz 4no.
The highlight of the mini-album Very High (2018) is the
12-minute mid-tempo funk-soul Afro-pop chant and Funkadelic-esque jam You Were Very High,
where the electronic arrangements are still creative enough,
next to two lengthy lounge ballads,
where the electronic arrangements are as trivial as possible.
By the time the album Bad Vibes (Rocket, 2018) came out, Clouse's
dance-music had mostly lost any sinister or avantgarde quality.
The album seems to be a sort of tribute to
James Brown and to drug culture, notably with
Yeah I'm On Acid, and
to the the acid house movement, notably with 7896.
The only noisy piece, Bad Vibes, has the right intuition for a psychedelic industrial jam but doesn't find a way to develop it.
The other pieces, especially the ones using samples, are neither original nor entertaining, just tedious and predictable.
The sounds are more rarified on No No No No (OOH-sounds, 2019), but
that makes the dance even less exciting. Among the pieces for the dancefloor,
Tecvo Ooh boasts the most inventive rhythm, whereas
the sinister, dilated, musique concrete of 3axa3 stands out among the more abstract pieces.
Doing Drugs Selling Drugs (Riot Season, 2019) too have very few tracks
of interest, but at least it's getting out of the disco swamp: the distorted industrial metal of Salty Tomato and
the stoned doom-metal of Hammerlock Through Shattering Glass.
Kentucky Cellphone stands out for distortion, effects and rhythmic experiment.
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(Translation by/ Tradotto da xxx)
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