Amps For Christ

Amps For Christ

Plains Of Alluvial

Water Wing

***"The alluvial fans on the south side of the San Gabriel mountains are some of the biggest anywhere. I ended a twelve year relationship and moved into my friend's house in east Claremont only about 100 yards from the San Antonio River, on the center of that giant alluvial plain. I made instruments in a falling down garage and in the front of the house built a studio. It was the end of me in MAN IS THE BASTARD and the birth of me returning to folk, but bringing hardcore and noise back with me. I started calling it Folk-core meaning folk and hardcore mixed together and Musnic meaning musical noise. I had at that studio a Hammond S-6 chord organ, pure tube electronics. with no mechanical tone wheel to derive the sounds. I circuit bent it to produce the sounds of bodrahns and bagpipes, sounds I have always loved. It has 60-80 vacuum tubes in it! A small little organ designed by John Hannert for Hammond; and one was used on Magical Mystery Tour. I had been writing AMPS FOR CHRIST on all the amps and oscillators I made, so it ended up being my new name. The Plains of Alluvial felt meant to be, everything, the name, the recordings just seemed to fall in place. I took the tape to Dennis of Shrimper Records and he agreed to release it."—HENRY BARNES. Now reissued for the first time ever. The Amps For Christ debut cassette as a full-length LP...

Amps For Christ

Canyons Cars And Crows

Shrimper

Coming seven years after the release of the previous full-length record, Every Eleven Seconds (5 Rue Christine), and two since the their split LP with Woods (Shrimper), Canyons Cars and Crows is a proper resurrection for Amps for Christ. Recorded at Equation Road in the beautiful Pomona Valley, the record upholds the band’s traditions of mixing folk with hardcore and noise with music—known as folkcore and musnik, respectively—and covers familiar sonic territories from ragas and Basho folk to dirges and jigs. The songs, dire but hopeful, examine man’s relationship to nature. Henry Barnes, the force behind Amps for Christ, was a founding member of Man Is the Bastard. The group’s first release was the cassette-only album The Plains of Alluvial, released by Shrimper in 1997; since then there have been many full-length and split albums on a number of labels. Outside of Amps for Christ, Barnes has collaborated recently with Man Is the Bastard’s Eric Wood on a Bastard Noise / Brutal Truth split LP on Relapse Records, a split with Bizarre Uproar, and a pair of splits with Japanese artists Outermost and Government Alpha. Look for live shows across one or two oceans following the release of Canyons Cars and Crows.

Amps For Christ

Circuits

Water Wing / Turned Word

***Circuits was originally released in 1999 on the Vermiform label. It was well received, even charting on CMJ. This reissue puts Circuits on vinyl for the first time as a deluxe double LP with a gatefold cover and a full bonus side of unreleased material. Circuits includes AMPS FOR CHRIST collaborator TARA TAVI (ex-BLUE SILK SUTURES, BASTARD NOISE, SAVAGE REPUBLIC, currently of AUTO DA FE), who plays yangqin (Chinese hammer dulcimer) and sings. Former MAN IS THE BASTARD drummer JOEL CONNELL plays tablas and percussion. Remastered for vinyl by TIM STOLLENWERK (Mississippi Records, Sublime Frequencies, Fat Possum). Co-released by Turned Word Records. Features a four-song bonue side of unreleased material—"Empire," a song recorded for a compilation that was supposed to be released by L.A. venue, The Smell; the original track "Yamasuka;" and the folk standards “Knight On The Road” and “Bonny Greenwoodside,” the latter recorded live at the Claremont Forum in 2001. 

Amps For Christ

Oak In The Ashes

Shrimper

***On the third full-length AMPS FOR CHRIST release for Shrimper, HENRY BARNES (ex-MAN IS THE BASTARD) further explores the marriage of avant skree and folk twee. Steeped in influences ranging from the Incredible String Band to the Minutemen, and sprinkled with the debut recordings of Henry's jug band, The Oak in the Ashes reads like a ripe mix tape by Alan Lomax on muscle relaxants. Innovative and delightful as always.

Amps For Christ

Electrosphere

Shrimper

***MAN IS THE BASTARD noise-maker HENRY BARNES & posse (ENID SNARB, CONNELL, TARA T. TAVI, P.G. ROBERTS and TOGARAMA) return and veer across a musical map bearing places named Moondog, Tudor, Partch and Page. A strange brew of layered sounds and hypnotic melodies created with a menagerie of exotic and homemade musical instruments (including tabla, Chinese piano, and caveman electronics), Electrosphere is a meticulously sequenced two-hour double-fuck-you to those idiots the neighbors, outboard MIDI-abusing scoundrels, and Becker Bros. clones. Harsh, creepy, weird and beautiful, all at the same time.

Amps For Christ

Beggar's Garden

Shrimper

*Man Is The Bastard's Henry Barnes poots forth stuff that has noise/folk apologists frothing from the ears.