C/D Charalambides

For a band that didn't used to tour or play out much at all, Charalambides certainly has been all over the shop this year. Christina and Tom are now apparently divorced? Her wikipedia entry redirects to "Christina Madonia".

They sound like psychedelic drone music with a rock pedigree. Some folk elements, but they're secondary. Electric guitars, dreamy female vocals and organs - other sounds for color, almost no percussion or groove. It's simple music: spare, haunting and nocturnal, but with a rough-hewn, hands-on quality that prevents it from ever getting too "pretty". They go for long, amorphous, drifting whooshes more than discrete songs, and sometimes get quite spooky, even downright creepy, in acid-by-candlelight kinda way. (That's true of most of the catalog, anyway, the new one is def folkier and prettier.)

Of the stuff I've heard, I'm most fond of IN CR EA SE.

their merch table is beginning to rival AMT's. where'd all these early (Tom-Christina-Jason-era) compilations come from?!

still tingling all over from the Zaïmph set. that was a hard act to follow. utterly unreal what Marcia can do with a table full of junk, her voice, and a guitar. she's a force of nature. would have been a hard act for anyone to follow - even the mighty Charalambides.

/drunktalk

Latest update from Tom C:

wholly other will soon be pulling up stakes and leaving california. i've had a blast being here but it's time to move on. i'll be hitting the road for a while and don't know where i'll settle yet, but label operations will continue as usual, via our friends at twilight flight sound in austin TX. i will post a new wholly other address here and on wholly-other.com as soon as plans are finalized.

on that note, there will be a big charalambides US tour in november. a couple of surprises are in the works for this one that will be disclosed in the next update. after that, we're looking at another charalambides european tour in the spring of 08... again, a lot more is pending that will become clear as everything finalizes. stay tuned.

also, from an interview i did with Tom & Christina, about a month ago

Christina Carter: "We have a new album finished and in production. It's called _Likeness_ , and will be out on Kranky on October 29th of this year. It's based around the idea of protest songs and songs of outsiders and folk songs. I took lyrics from songbooks, traditional and public domain stuff, and rearranged and edited the words and put them to the music that Tom and I had recorded. It was all done pretty quickly. The music was recorded in about 5 days and the vocals were overdubbed in one long session. It sounds maybe more on the order of earlier Charalambides with more of a four-track recorder kind of
feel...But the whole point is that it's traditional/folk material that
doesn't sound like we're making a folk album. There's no reverence, trying to recapture a time or a style. We're very much into being in the present...The next album after that, all i can say is it's going to be our 'modern' album; present tense in every way."

I've been listening to Likeness a lot today, it's fucking gorgeous. Anyone else dig?

??????

:-(

i kinda like it... not as much as A Vintage Burden. It is definitely darker than their previous effort, it actually reminds me of the second espers album at times.

it feels a lot like a winter album. my favorites as of now are figs and oranges, saddle up my pony, and what you do for money.

I very much dig.

they've played providence 3 times in the past 2 years and I've missed them every time. including the time above when I said "oh yeah I'm going."

nice, the new LP Rose/Thorn is really good. More focused on drone rather than songs/psych guitar

sweet

yeah I picked that up also! Supposedly from the INCREASE sessions, I think.

also:

somebody could do the world a fucking favor and reissue market square and union already. and i don't mean fucking useless time-lag.

i'm pretty sure i read that the masters were lost for the Siltbreeze records. but by god are they amazing.

ysi Union, ian?

they should master that shit from clean vinyl and release it as cheap CDRs on Wholly Other. I would buy one!

my vinyl is pretty clean on union.
maybe sometime when i have energy i will rip it and YSI for ya; i am notoriously slow about this though.

christina carter has a pretty good website. it mentions new solo (on kranky), bastard wing and scorces records, recording, loads of cd-rs and a book. no touring, for a while.

there was some interview a while ago, pre likeness, where she was talking about the next (after likeness) charalambides record, as being totally modern, as opposed to the last one being steeped in traditional stuff. so that sounds pretty interesting.

oh, how embarrassing, posting vague recollections of an interview quoted upthread.

i want to hear that new scorces. i only have the first one, but it's soooo good.

man, i still haven't heard scorces. i was all ready for the tour until they cancelled.

did anyone hear masque femine? one of a deluge of christina cd-rs, almost all solo voice, songs, old standards, really beautiful. it was an edition of eighty so is ridiculously sold out now.

i'm pretty sure i read that the masters were lost for the Siltbreeze records.

;_;

My copy of the Scorces LP on eclipse has a big scratch in it from being really drunk once a few years ago. Bugs me all the time. I can only listen to one side of it. New one should be great, I can't wait to hear it either.

I was really into the C Carter/Pocahaunted split on Not Not Fun. And the recent "Electrice" LP on Wholly Other that she did.

been really obsessed lately, more than usual. I think this was spurred by Christina's excellent solo run (Masque Femine, Texas Working Blues, split on NNF). Got the split on NNF and my Pocahaunted side was absolutely fucked with gunk, I tried to clean it but all I did was spread it around and turn the whole record into a crackly mess as opposed to a rhythmic swoosh every 2 seconds. I need to rent a record cleaner from someone.

also picked up Glowing Raw and Emerald Message. even though I read somewhere else on ILM that someone was less than pleased with the latest CDR batch I think they're fab. Emerald Message in particular holds up better than I expected given the Carter's "one of our wiggiest" description. I could listen to Tom's guitar tone all day long.

I just got the new Scorces double LP in the mail from NNF...really great. Still never heard anything else by them (Scorces that is. I have a bunch of Charalambides), but I really want to. This is so quiet and beautiful.

Tom's new solo CD on Important Records is fantastic. It has a companion LP, haven't heard it yet.

I've only heard the LP! Its really good. Recommended, definitely.

Nice, I'll have to check it out soon.