GROUPER "Way Their Crept" --- CONTACT

Are you kidding me? $26 for a fucking download?

That's for two albums I assume, but still.

Don't hate Boomkat too much, the exchange rate is what makes it so high.

the albums are a fiver each on itunes fwiw

Or two pounds something each on emusic.

Do they have non-lossy formats?

No, just cheap and cheerful 256kbps vbr MP3s iirc

A copy of each just showed up on Discogs. $30 though.

And some here too... http://www.reckless.com

I can't get that one to work, after clicking buy it just freezes (in both Firefox and Safari). This record is cursed. Thanks anyway.

And some here too...

hey thank you
assuming my FE order is not happening also so trying these guys.

Gone from reckless.com now

ha, yeah, i got that e-mail also. there's something on their FB from like Monday saying they got them in, so i guess it makes sense. i am hunting these lps so hard i am going to mount them like a moose-head when i get them fwiw.

don't understanmd all this stress, they will be repressed for sure just like Dead Deer.

it is being excited to hear it, just. i am trying to be deliberate about the way i hear records first, because with leaks, sometimes things come out, and you hear them, and then the point at which you buy them - which shouldn't be the exciting thing about an album coming out, but which should be a thing that you do, if you like the record - becomes pretty much devoid of discovery or excitement and so laborious and unappealing, and then bam it's a record you've been playing around and around for two months but which actually buying is a drag, some perfunctory measure that you mean to get around to. with the smog record, i heard half of it when it leaked, and i'm still psyched to get the LP. with this, i'm excited for it; that i'll get the vinyl means i don't want to buy a download of it, and the idea of hearing it and then waiting just feels like it'll lead me into that zone where i don't get around to buying a thing or i just buy one of them and--. i don't know. it isn't possessiveness, it's just anticipation for her LP; that there is other music to listen to until it gets re-pressed doesn't diminish the excitement of a new record that people are enjoying.

like, i'm trying to avoid that record-buying paralysis i sometimes get, when you feel like you're materialistically compiling objects that you already in some sense have, or know, out of this semi-nebulous sense of propriety & investment, getting into a conflict about whether i should be buying something more adventurous (having heard this specific thing), or one of her other records, or food, or eroding my debts, or whatever, instead. you eventually get reminded that records are good, useful, worthwhile objects to own, when you're broke and only have them for entertainment and they display their worth by modifying your living space, but buying something i've heard always feels like it's me being sorta possessive. where as trying to get it and so tying together the part where i hear it, & it is good, with the part where i reward grouper for excellent record-making efforts, just feels more convenient.

Got my copies in the mail yesterday, and damn these are great. But I think the reason these records were self released and not pressed in a large quantity is because it seems that they aren't really a proper follow up to dragging a dead deer up a hill. These songs seem like kind of an experimental departure for her. I could be wrong, but thats just my impression after a couple listens.

i'd say that these most recent two fit easily into her catalog...really the only departure was Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill. That was the first exposure of Grouper for a lot of people (including myself), so it's easy to view that as the baseline, but that was actually quite an unusual release for her in terms of accessibility. and while that accessibility brought her a lot of accolades and most people intrinsically think of it as "better", she may have a totally different view. more power to her!

Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill is by far my fav Grouper release, btw! :) i'm just saying that this new one is kind of a return to her older , pre DDD up a hill sound.

the hold/sick 7" that was out a while ago felt like a step towards the more submersive old stuff, for sure

My Forced Exposure order was cancelled today. Does anyone know if Dead Deer is getting any more represses?

The two albums very much feel like one is considerably older and one is newer. In my car Dream Loss sounded so blown out I couldn't even tell that it had vocals, while Alien Observer feels like it has songs but that the vocals and the lyrics are nowhere near as crucial to the structures as they were on Dragging a Dead Deer. It sounds to me like she's shifted her melodic instrument from acoustic guitar to electric piano, and I think this is the first time I've ever actually missed the presence of an acoustic guitar on someone's record. But yeah, these seem way more in line with Wide / Way Their Crept / Cover The Windows and the Walls than with Dead Deer. Will likely grow to love it regardless.

i was a sucker and ordered from Volcanic Tongue as soon as I saw the post above, even though they were like a billion dollars each. And even then, I just received this message:

Apologies for the delay getting back to you, we've been overwhelmed with Grouper orders. Sorry but the Grouper LPs have sold out, the demand far outweighed what Grouper could supply, we’re very sorry you missed out.

Same here, tried it at two places now (FE, Reckless) as in actually placing an order and a while later hearing the demand was too high. Does it even exist on vinyl?

Tried FE, VT and Weird Forest, no luck. So i bought the ones on Discogs. Thankfully the exchange rate is in my favour...

just fyi this is gone-gone, i think, now: sold out on fusetron, & at boomkat too, boomkat who were charging twenty-pounds-each for the lps.

I want to buy these records. Please make more of these records.

Yeah, vinyl unavailability aside, Dream Loss is killing me. Haven't even spent any time with Alien Observer yet.

I prefer 'Alien Observer'..had a bit of an epiphany with the title track, on a still, sunny evening waiting for a train with blossom in the air. Need to spend more time with 'Dream Loss' tbh.

Here's a little bit/interview with Liz. Her part starts around the 4:15 mark
http://www.wk.com/wke/show/dont_move_here/episode/3

Norman Records had some yesterday but all gone now:
http://twitter.com/#!/normanrecords/status/65078711191470080

Listened to Alien Observer last night and it's astonishingly beautiful.

^^yeah, no kidding. I still haven't listened to dream loss yet, but wow, alien observer is a stunner.

and man, the gauzy, low-fi thing just works so well for her sound. the electric piano (is that what it is?) on here sounds gorgeous.

I think it's a wurlitzer

ah, that does sound like a better fit.

i kinda think alien obsrvr is formless garbage honestly /no whiney

^Been waiting for someone to say that, really.
I don't think it's garbage, necessarily, but there isn't much for me to hold onto.

sure, I can see that. not necessarily a negative on a grouper record, tho. (imo)

hahaha, that's what everybody I have played any Grouper at all for says. "what is this crap? that's not even music."

Just play them some Stars Of The Lid and tell them to STFU

I was similarly somewhat disappointed. It's not like she screwed up or anything, either. She just wasn't aiming for the same kind of sound as on dragging a dead deer up a hill. But that for me is her standout release, so while I enjoy this new material for what it is, i've ended up listening through these about as much as I listened to her earliest releases - 3-4 times each - rather than the many dozens of timed I've listened to DDD.

I love SotL more than just about anything on this shitty planet, btw!

i can't decide whether it's crap or beautiful. there's something about 'dead deer' that's really moving.

i think with the excess of shitwavegazebrochillwitchhouse or whatever the fuck it is you kids do these days, its hard to tell whether stuff in this circle of drone music has been well crafted, or is just plain no-effort-let-the-pedals-do-the-work garbage

actually no it's not hard to tell at all, it's either shit or not, but uh, it's changed the way people approach and appreciate stuff.

The early stuff esp 'Wide' and 'Way Their Crept' is still awesome to me.. 'DDD' was shocking to hear at first, and is less of a straight ambient record than the others.. 'AIA' seems halfway, but less dense than the pre-'DDD' material.

think with the excess of shitwavegazebrochillwitchhouse or whatever the fuck it is you kids do these days, its hard to tell whether stuff in this circle of drone music has been well crafted, or is just plain no-effort-let-the-pedals-do-the-work garbage

It doesn't matter if it sounds good

The early stuff esp 'Wide' and 'Way Their Crept' is still awesome to me.. 'DDD' was shocking to hear at first, and is less of a straight ambient record than the others.. 'AIA' seems halfway, but less dense than the pre-'DDD' material.

think with the excess of shitwavegazebrochillwitchhouse or whatever the fuck it is you kids do these days, its hard to tell whether stuff in this circle of drone music has been well crafted, or is just plain no-effort-let-the-pedals-do-the-work garbage

It doesn't matter if it sounds good

'dead deer' is ok, ive never been all that impressed w/ her music but im really not sure what the point of her 'music' even is, it seem p bereft of any ideas, also its not really enjoyable to listen to so

That's a shame

you can post that twice

I think the idea here is taking a lo-fi, indie sound as a starting point and then blur the edges and stretch everything out (in some cases more radically than others). not exactly novel but I think she pulls it off and I wouldn't say the music is bereft of ideas even if it isn't heavily conceptual.