Castle Face

Rincon, Dan

Spotlight City

Castle Face

Castle Face is proud to present Dan Rincon’s (OSEES, Wild Thing, Apache, Personal and the Pizzas) premier solo release Spotlight City. Artificial landscapes and melodies comprised of Moog Grandmother, Mellotron and a kinky Modular system span from beautiful and lilting to haunting and etherial. The album was a years long learning experience of getting all components and ingredients to link arms and blend comfortably. Wrangling was part of the process. Strings soaring and sines weaving. Sometimes in the atmosphere, sometimes in the Earth’s core, sometimes flanked by neon blur as it hums & weave patterns through a world imagined in vintage sci-fi pulp. “I was listening to a lot of solo Roedelius and Conrad Schnitzler records while writing this record and I’d say that both have been hugely inspirational on what I want to do as a solo recording artist. The way both of those of those artist pushed the early, chaotic electronic music into something more melodic is really inspiring to me, it’s not that dissimilar than trying to get melodies out of a modular synthesizer.” An absolute necessary slab for anyone a fan of CF, OSEES, Popol Vuh soundtracks , 8 bit video game accompaniment & 80s Tangerine Dream. Burn one and burn out.

Osees

(Reissue) Intercepted Message

Castle Face

NEW CASTLE FACE REISSUE EDITION!!! “A pop record for tired times. Sugared with bits of shatterproof glass to put more crack in your strap. At long last, verse / chorus. A weathered thesaurus. This is OSEES bookend sound. Early grade garage pop meets proto-synth punk suicide-repellant. Have a whack at the grass or listen while flat on your ass. Heaps of electronic whirling accelerants to gum up your cheapskate broadband. Social media toilet scrapers unite! Allow your 24-hour news cycle eyes to squint at this smiling abattoir doorman. You can find your place here at long last. All are welcome from the get go to the finale…a distant crackling transmission of 80s synth last-dance-of-the-night tune for your lost loves. Suffering from Politic amnesia? Bored of AI-generated pop slop? Then this one is for you, our friends. Wasteland wanderer, stick around. Love y’all. For fans of Teutonic synth punk and Thee Oh Sees (who the fuck are they?)" —John Dwyer

Dwyer, John + Heather Lockie, Thomas Dolas, Kyp Malone, Andres Renteria, Brad Caulkins & Archie Carey

RITUAL / HABIT / CEREMONY

Castle Face

The band is John Dwyer (synths, vocals), Heather Lockie (viola), Thomas Dolas (synths), Andres Renteria (hand percussion), Brad Caulkins (tenor saxophone), Kyp Malone (synths) and Archie Carey (bassoon). The singers are YoshimiO (Boredoms, OOIOO), Albert Wolski (EXEK), Gracie Jackson (GracieHorse), Ciriza (Artist Extraordinaire), Kyp Malone (Bent Arcana, TV On The Radio, Rain Machine etc.), Brigid Dawson (Thee Oh Sees, The Mothers Network), AZITA (Scissor Girls, Bride of NONO, AZITA) For fans of Steve Roach, Eno, Syrinx, Howard Shore, Current 93, Terry Riley, Tangerine Dream and a proper sage scrub. “An experiment in symphonic improvisation paired with synthesizer-scapes. Strings, reeds, synths and hand percussion all blend sweetly into an odd landscape indeed. The final touch was to bring aboard some singers I have loved over the years. I’m so pleased they were all willing to participate and I’m very tickled by the plane we navigate. Once YoshimiO agreed to be on board I knew we were going to be OK. Recorded and mixed at my home studio (Stu-Stu-Studio in Los Angeles) and remotely, this one was a slow burn to see the light of day. And here it is in its final crystal form. Celebrating the spaces between ritual, habit and ceremony. And all the parallels between. The line is blurred. This is occult adjacent strain of sound. At home in daily ritual, contemplation and meditation.” —John Dwyer

Flaccid Mojo

Flaccid Mojo

Castle Face

“Twin giant towers of amps grinding out minimal beat bloop, the transient sound molecules smell of burning gear and the floor of the pit—this is organic, electronic music at its finest. Dance? Why not. Freak out? For sure. Brothers from a different mother (Bjorn Copeland and Aaron Warren) à la two-thirds of Black Dice have come together with this fantastic debut [Flaccid Mojo] for us. These are mean beat vipers, spitting and tumescent on the abattoir floor.“I would call it drug music, but I’m not sure what drugs these humans consume. Stem cell and adrenal gland cocktails I’m guessing. Futuristic and primal it is, beats from the Thunder-Dome, fight music for fuckers. I’ve seen them on two separate occasions blow the power for an entire building. Baller move, boys. Produced perfectly by Chris Coady (look him up to be impressed). This record is a burning car in a field and I love it.“For fans of Black Dice, Container, Whitehouse, Negativland, Ralph Records, minimal beats à la Profan, vintage Japanese noise, Severed Heads, windburn and chapped lips.” —John Dwyer 

Bent Arcana

Live Zebulon

Castle Face

“Recorded at Zebulon in Los Angeles as a warm-up show for a show I had booked in Holland. What was meant to be a jumping point for the ‘first show’ ended up being a real burning set. A slightly more stripped-down version on the ten piece band [Bent Arcana] (for sake of ease) keeps it nice and concise. Nerves sometimes bring out these little lost jewels of which this recording is full of…gotta love improvisation for fleeting moments.  “Recorded super-hot by none other than our sound person Liza Boldyreva. Selections of songs from Bent Arcana and Moon-Drenched—cockpit stoned space jazz here you come. Mixed by John Dwyer and mastered by JJ Golden. This hunky double disk sports a zoetropic screen-printed animation of the Death’s Head moth circling on its D side that works with a strobe light off yer phone...fucking cool. Fucking hot. Dig in and be well. ” —John Dwyer 

Bent Arcana

(Color) Live Zebulon

Castle Face

***ON LIMITED PURPLE COLOR VINYL!!! “Recorded at Zebulon in Los Angeles as a warm-up show for a show I had booked in Holland. What was meant to be a jumping point for the ‘first show’ ended up being a real burning set. A slightly more stripped-down version on the ten piece band [Bent Arcana] (for sake of ease) keeps it nice and concise. Nerves sometimes bring out these little lost jewels of which this recording is full of…gotta love improvisation for fleeting moments. “Recorded super-hot by none other than our sound person Liza Boldyreva. Selections of songs from Bent Arcana and Moon-Drenched—cockpit stoned space jazz here you come. Mixed by John Dwyer and mastered by JJ Golden. This hunky double disk sports a zoetropic screen-printed animation of the Death’s Head moth circling on its D side that works with a strobe light off yer phone...fucking cool. Fucking hot. Dig in and be well. ” —John Dwyer

Osees

A Foul Form

Castle Face

“Brain stem cracking scum-punk recorded tersely in the basement of my home. After a notoriously frustrating eon, the knee-jerk song path was aggressive and hooky. This is an homage to the punk bands we grew up on—the weirdos and art freaks that piqued our interests and pointed us on the trail head to here / now. Bad times make for strong music is something I agree with. I would say that is evident by the past few years of output from the underground. Transmissions have been all over the map: scanning…searching...sweeping out in the darkness looking for a foot hold.“[OSEES] A Foul From represents some of our most savage and primal instincts. Fight or flight. And the importance of a sense of humor in the darkest hour. Nothing wrong with keeping it snappy in the meantime. For fans of Rudimentary Peni, Crass, Bad Brains, Black Flag, Screamers, Abwarts, Stooges and all things aggressively tilted towards your face. You can lean back but don’t flinch…it’s a brief foray into the exhausting pogo pit, so stiffen your back and jerk with your knees. Enjoy.” —John Dwyer 

Laddio Bolocko

Laddio Bolocko '97-'99

Castle Face

“The following story might be bullshit (drug use and memory enhancements): years ago I was sitting at home staring into the middle distance and the phone on the wall rang (that should denote how long ago this was). On the other end was the booker from The Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco, who had never called me before. She was excited about the show they had that night and was calling people to invite them. Apparently the night before a band called Laddio Bolocko had played and were so mesmerizing, so strong that they had offered them the next night, which was open. I was intrigued as no band had ever warranted this invite previously to my knowledge. This was new and exciting territory.“I had my ass and ears handed to me that evening. Scorching, pummeling, deep waters ran over me as I stood, beer in hand, mouth open. My memory may be embellishing but I remember a sax as big as me, drums that were physically hanging on by a thread, and twin electric strings that reeled sinister sprites over my head in outwardly circular patterns. Aggressive, far out fractals burned in my brain. I had never seen anything like this band, and never have again.“That’s why it’s so shocking to wait around all these years for someone to pick up the thread and re-release these three perfect recordings on LP for the first time…and still be waiting. So, I’m happy to announce, Castle Face is here...

Bronze

Absolute Compliance

Castle Face

The folks at Castle Face dig a good trance. Hypnosis, mesmerization, and brain trickery are some of their favorite results of deep listening and it is a suggestive, ritualistic and dreamlike vibe that Bronze ooze like pheromones all over their excellent new record. Absolute Compliance is a truly hypnogogic group of tunes from Bronze on their best and weirdest behavior and it hits all Castle Face’s favorite things about them immediately and repeatedly: insistently strange synth voicings emanating from Miles Friction’s mad scientist’s lab worth of equipment, controlled by a homemade-looking oversized knob; Brian Hock’s throbbing, woolly, hall-of-mirror grooves; and above it all Rob Spector’s thousand yard croon, the vaguely familiar touchstone amongst these Lynchian, mutated surroundings—these are songs of dreams and nightmares, hidden rituals observed, futuristic coliseum entertainments displaced in time, sci-fi jams of an uncertain future. Bronze are one-of-a kind great and if unfamiliar, go find their other records (including their great live record for Castle Face) and get caught up. They are real-deal weirdo kings of San Francisco and their spell is not easily dissipated once cast.

EXEK

Advertise Here

Castle Face

“Gliding in on the twin engine discordant tones we’ve come to love from EXEK comes their new transmission Advertise Here. Beats bumping up thru a flapping spring reverb, gilded production choices, stripped bass bubbling in the cauldron. With each pass of the witch’s ladle, words float in the steam over the cacophonous concoction. The coven that croons together slays together, with every layer peeling back on our ear’s tongue we will exclaim ‘wicked’—perhaps their strongest effort yet. “The twin engines reappear now, tardy, guitar and synthesis, rounded edges, worn and ever so slightly fuzzed out—perfection. This LP strives for new lyrical highs in my opinion. Pop at an arm’s length, thru a greasy lens: A conversation. A conversation on drugs. A passing comment that sticks an utterance from the death bed. Reminiscent of Brian Eno, White Fence, PiL, Full Circle, ESG, all things Geoff Barrows, Eroc, Lard Free, and music of free weirdos everywhere. This one is the mossy titled deck of a half submerged shipwreck, a green light in a red room, a lump of clay, the end of the night when you think ‘perhaps I should have left ages ago,’ but it’s too late now…you’re in too deep…might as well have one more dance. “This LP is leaping even further out into the unknown for EXEK. A trip indeed, full of hits with zero diss and lots of hiss on no near miss.” —John Dwyer

System Exclusive

S/t

Castle Face

“Often when music is constructed with synths and other electronically generated sound makers, their level of exactitude and control is such that the vocalist will either wittingly or otherwise seek to emulate the relative artifice of the soundscape. This is often done to great effect, think Kraftwerk. But what if there was a unit whose music was synth-generated but the vocals were coming from a hot-blooded, singing-for-the-cheap-seats approach? If done well, it’s a case of two great tastes that taste great together, which brings me to System Exclusive.  “Their multi genre / time period collision is like a car accident where all parties walk away not only unscathed but sure they had a great time, like two different recording sessions sharing the same space and making it work. Vocalist Ari Blaisdell (previously of Lower Self, The Beat Offs) co-exists excellently amidst the driving beats and synth waves and her guitar further helps to jailbreak the tunes from the often sterile entrapments that synths provide. Matt Jones (previously of Male Gaze, Blasted Canyons, and continuing Castle Face behind-the-scenesman)’s smart use of live drums bring great juxtaposition against the machines. Ari’s irony-free sincere delivery is the perfect closer on this very cool record, recorded ably by Enrique Tena Padilla (Osees, Wand, Beach House) in their backyard studio mid-pandemic and adorned with original artwork by Miles Wintner (L.A. Takedown, Mr. Elevator, Devon Williams). If you don’t get this slab of goodness, well, that act of non-compliance will confirm you as the pain-in-the-ass that...

Dwyer, John, Ryan Sawyer, Greg Coates, Wilder Zoby, Andres Renteria

Gong Splat

Castle Face

***NOW AVAILABLE ON LP!!! What’s this? Today’s holiday gift? One final transmission from the core of the planet! Cresting slabs of concrete and powdered bone, rich soil—improvisation freak flag flitters atop a gutted highrise: Gong Splat. Featuring Ryan Sawyer on drums, Greg Coates on upright bass, Wilder Zoby on synth and mellotron, Andres Renteria on conga, bongos and hand percussion, and John Dwyer on guitar, synths, pan flute, cuíca, hand percussion, space drum and effects.  This one is spitting fat and neon night-light city drives, white in the corner of the pilot’s mouth. Furry, fuzzy and frenetic, motorik and full of blood-rich ticks…maggots unite! There’s a show tonight! Welcome back humans.

J.R.C.G.

Ajo Sunshine

Castle Face

Ajo Sunshine (pronounced “Ahh-Ho”) is heralded by an alarming horn ensemble, stabbing with the dramatic urgency of a killer’s theme in a midnight movie. It’s a jarring but appropriate entry point for this brilliantly blasted listen, an array of exquisitely sharp edges punctuated by kaleidoscopic respites of throbbing warmth and surprising tenderness. J.R.C.G. (Justin R. Cruz Gallego)’s previous work with Seattle’s excellent Dreamdecay may foreground the broad strokes here, but he’s pushed things way outward in terms of his sonic palette. Abutting field recordings captured from rodeos off Ajo Way, a stretch of highway that leads one westward out of Tucson Arizona directly into the sun, both acoustic instruments and gleaming walls of synthetic noise are framed in dour and dissonant chord shapes, crackling with overdriven drum mics and seasick waves of distortion. It’s homage that plays out like a collage, a dream switching from station to station, a series of dedications broadcast on late night radio. All pin-hole size images from scenes never seen whole, strung together in but one version of complete, all making for a dazzling listen.

Potter, Nolan

Music Is Dead

Castle Face

Nolan Potter is putting the home-recording freaks to shame. The world had a year of global pandemic to lay out its grand ideas and the sum total of most artists “quar-riffs” wouldn’t push the constraints of a normal band practice (gosh, remember those?). Nolan Potter, in the meantime, has quietly painted a beatific masterpiece that veers from the whimsical to the wigged out, deftly weaving an untamed tapestry of sound all the while archly commenting on the present musician’s predicament—and he did it alone. No drum machine clattering in the background amidst tape hiss and four-track grime here—this is a fully realized, insanely well played, full on rock record that might even one-up his first album, 2019’s excellent Nightmare Forever. The guy’s got more chops than a beauticians’ college, across a wide array of instruments—no small feat, and easily overlooked when leaving the lyric sheet and credits on the dining room table. That the songs travel far, wide, up, down, backwards, and gamely spill out over the five minute mark with exceptionally loose interludes and diversions is just another marvel in this carnival of aural delights—it’s a gem of a record and it’s out on Castle Face.

Dwyer, John, Ryan Sawyer, Peter Kerlin, Tom Dolas, Brad Caulkins, Kyp Malone, Marcos Rodriguez, Ben Boye, Joce Soubiran, Laena Myers-Ionita, & Andres Renteria

Moon-Drenched

Castle Face

The same crew as the boundary pulsing improvisation record Bent Arcana has made a trajectory shift and picked up Ben Boye along the path. The aptly-named Moon-Drenched is the second installment from these sessions and keeps a heavy-lidded late night perspective on things as it eases from the somewhat familiar liminal twilight of skittering hues of black-blue and snaking street groove, to fizzing off into the ether in pursuit of lunar prism beams heretofore unseen. The more rhythmically dialed bits here have a lysergic halo of strangeness to them, and the wispy bits between are spun of iridescent gossamer. It sounds like a frizzled message from a future just filthy with guitar hoots echoing off of neon-splattered high rises, oil-slicked waterways and skittering digital beasts. For Castle Face’s money this is the strangest slice of this last bunch of John Dwyer and his crew’s improvisations.

Grave Flowers Bongo Band

Strength Of Spring

Castle Face

Los Angeles’ Grave Flowers Bongo Band’s sophomore album Strength Of Spring is an inverted pyramid balanced on the headstock of an acoustic guitar, a rainbow painted in campfire smoke, an endless staircase circling into the clouds. That acoustic guitar, perfectly captured here by Ty Segall’s excellently sere and close mic’d production, plays skeleton to these conjurors woolly grooves, and singer Gabe Flores’ thousand-yard moan keeps the listener guessing as to exactly where this wildebeest is headed. He pinions these far out tunes, which burst generously with shit-hot guitar leads, Stoogeseque sax squalls, and a gaggle of great eight-armed drum fills, with a flinty wrist-flicking heartbeat as the band turns from whimsy to nimble riffery on a dime, following that pied-piper six-string jangling down many lovely rabbit-holes of melody and exploration. It’s obvious these guys play together a lot (the lineup shares two members with acclaimed space rockers Hoover III to boot) and the telepathy on display here is synapse-snappy. Coursing throughout is that note-pad filling, lighter raising, undefinable black magic that feels so rare these days.

EXEK

Biased Advice

Castle Face

***BACK IN STOCK!!! “A weird trip of a band…the second this was playing I was immediately hooked. I initially dove in because their name was attached to Mikey Young for mastering (I have a rule with Mikey…if he had his hands on it, it’s probably worth a listen). This band exceeds in all my trials. “Esoteric nature, but oddly poppy and ready to prick up any ears out there. Deconstructed, but full of hooks. If I were a lazy man, and I am, I would say its for fans of PiL, but they transcend that pigeon-hole. “Wonderful production lends its self to this unique LP. It seems as if the room expands and contracts throughout songs. Pulling away, then blocking your field of vision entirely. Wasteland funk. Dub from the depths. Punk from the pit. “Even the instrumentation is worth mentioning: saxophone, drums (and cut-up drums), guitar, synthesizer, vocals (poetry) and general fuckery all combine to make this a very interesting and worthwhile escape from the average. And thank the Gods for that right now. Inspired and desired by the active mind. A job well done by EXEK, and there’s new stuff brewing too...  “For fans of BEAK>, Phantom Band, PIL and general Jah Wobbleness, Magazine, short-wave radio, ESG and underground Kraut”.—John Dwyer

The Fall

Live At St. Helens Technical College 1981

Castle Face

***COLOR VINYL EDITION ON CLEAR VINYL!!! “I’ve had the pleasure of being a [The] Fall fan since I was a teen. I was lucky enough to have some guidance from my local record shop stoner-lords. They turned me on to many of my heroes, but once I heard my first slanted and barky Fall song, I was part of the army for life. The word prolific gets tossed around a lot. It almost seems like a slag-off in the press, as if they wish the artist would produce less so they wouldn’t have to do their self-imposed job of judging releases for the rabble. The Fall is subjected to this lazy word often.Yet I can honestly say that I am so thankful for any nugget of Fall that lands at my feet and in my brain. Live Fall performances are always a pleasure because they seem to take what already made the Fall great and push it even a bit more into the rough and bloody uncharted wasteland that is drug scorched proto-punk and heady political poetry.“So, it is with great pleasure that we introduce this Fall bootleg soundboard recording to you. Recorded during one of the many strong points in the bands vast and mighty history. They really burn bright here and bring every ounce of what you expect from this formidable force.“We have reached out to every surviving member of the band, the sound person, the bootlegger who recorded it and the photographer and received their blessings and...

Dwyer, John, Ted Byrnes, Brad Caulkins, Tom Dolas & Greg Coates

Endless Garbage

Castle Face

***BACK IN STOCK!!! “Walk the dog. Exercise. Make art.’The mind is happy when the body is.’ Things I can potentially fill my days with if I am stuck at home for months on end…Then, one day, I hear a frenetic, free drummer playing in his garage a few blocks from me. And I think ‘interesting’. I stand outside his garage staring at the wall, like a fool, for a minute, then decide to leave a note on the car parked there. This is how I ended up meeting and working with Ted Byrnes. He wasn’t creeped out, and he ended up sending me a pile of truly spontaneous drums recordings from the carport to work with. I decided to have every musician come in one at at time and just take a wild pass at their track over the drums. None of these people had ever met or played together. I was the connecting thread. I scratched the surface initially with electric bass, saxophone, guitars, cuica, synthesizers, flute and effects, but soon realized I would need heavy hitters to make this place habitable. “Greg Coates, upright bass expressionist extraordinaire, hacked through the dense weeds, vines and frayed cabling. He lays the map out and makes breathing room. Space to swing a cat. Tom Dolas (keys), my often foil, came in and began tip-toeing through the rubble and refuse. Dotting the layout with flecks of light, flights of fancy and potential tangential trajectories. Then the finisher, Brad Caulkins on horns. As...

Castagnetto, M. Caye

Leap Second

Castle Face

Influenced by a life split between Lima, London, and Twentynine Palms, Peru-born M. Caye Castagnetto’s Leap Second is an intriguingly personal and hard to classify debut album.  The album is a thick collage of samples Caye recorded with different artists and musicians, including Beatrice Dillon and the late Aileen Bryant, that spans five years in the making. There is something in Leap Second that tracks the speed of bodies, how they approach and retreat. The ten tracks are speedy and languid, thick ruffles, and dirges. In parts it feels like one’s stumbled upon a forgotten incredible ’70s folk record but that feeling gets broken quickly by clever sleights of hand. Caye’s balladry is angular, time is elastic. Each song is a fresh cape. How dandies really mean it, so masc- that it’s fay, how the only moment is this one and it’s just passed, etcetera.  “While it doesn’t really sound like anything else, there are moments that feel like a Latin-flavored Nico, that’s edging its way towards some of the outings of the Sun City Girls. In my opinion it checks all the boxes, by checking none of them.” —Bjorn Copeland, Black Dice   “A truly interesting conglomeration of loose inspirations and conjurings. A hard to decipher sound all together which makes it worth every moment...a sprinkling of Catherine Ribeiro, Dr. John, Terje Rypdal and Nico. Far-out sun-soaked odysseys and moon-dappled woodland night creepers...” —John Dwyer

Osees

Weirdo Hairdo

Castle Face

Osees

Panther Rotate

Castle Face

***BACK IN STOCK!!! “In the swirling and undulant warm mud of jettisoned reels of magnetic tape, blurps up the fog of reinvention. Every night I would parley with my pilots and run and rerun the recordings. Right up until the moment sleep slips its veil over eyes and ears and you drift back without a sound. Protean Threat dream haze becomes Panther Rotate in the other dimension. A companion LP of remixes, field recordings, and sonic experiments using all sounds generated by the him and crackle of the desert farm. “A second version of our Protean Threat if you will, but barely conspicuous in its relation. Forward, never straight! Sunrise, sunset. Two lives connected by a cosmic thread, One for your feet and one for your head. For fans of Thee Oh Sees, Oh Sees, OCS, The Oh Sees, Osees...etc etc etcetcetc…be well.”—John Dwyer

Population II

A La O Terre

Castle Face

***BACK IN STOCK!!! “Introducing Population II—blazing through the stratosphere, boiling up from beneath the sea, hanging in the air like smoke…These elemental tunes drift and fluctuate, at one with the air, over extreme heat. Population II has beamed out of Quebec with a mind-melting debut [À La Ô Terre] of hard psych, freckled with punk sentiment. Both old school and timeless, these young humans rip. They are impressive in their live actions and this album captures this raw energy on wax. Produced by Manu from the great band Chocolat, a very high bar has been set, indeed. Fluid, tough, and over-saturated, this album is bound to please fans of the label and new-comers alike. Reminiscent of Amon Düül, early Pink Floyd, Kollektiv, Laurence Vanay, Les Olivensteins, early Kraftwerk, even a touch of the Kinks. “—John Dwyer

Osees

Protean Threat

Castle Face

***BACK IN STOCK!!! Witness the ever-changing, ever-mutating threat that is reality. Perception is under duress; sensibility is bending everyday under the barrage of nonsense. One must make note of whom one is and what one has become: look into the mirror of the planet-killers—psychic cannibals infiltrate and contaminate once familiar and seemingly secure territories… formidable foes indeed! What powers these beasts? What fuels discord and hatred? The behemoth of a “civil” society? What are the weapons at one’s disposal? Generosity is the aegis against greed, empathy is the armor to deflect apathy, love is the club to abate hate…the fog is lifting and humans are opening their eyes.  And so Castle Face offers this field recording, the Osees Protean Threat, from the pits as a quick booster between protein pills and recycled sweat beverage anthems to assist the listener to not worship at the altar of violence and greed, to not offer oneself up for free, to stand up and be vigilant! Truth will not be found in the speeches and photo ops of the overlords— stand strong and together under the gaze of the oppressors. Stand vigilant, united with those who don’t have the same privileges. Demand respect and a peaceful life for all.  This recording is at the apogee of scuzz—punk anthem amulets for the ears and heart, a battery for one’s core. Be strong. Be human. Be love.

Dwyer, John, Ryan Sawyer, Peter Kerlin, Tom Dolas, Brad Caulkins, Kyp Malone & Marcos Rodriguez

Bent Arcana

Castle Face

“This is the first interstellar transmission from five days of electrified and improvised sessions recorded at Stu-Stu-Studio, edited down to forty minutes for your earballs. Bent Arcana is the inceptive chapter in what I hope to be several releases showcasing these types of off-the-cuff musical compositions. So you can try your fry on and turn off. This one is very much on the ECM / ’70s hard fusion / prog-kraut tip. It is a many pronged weapon, swung by the spontaneous sentinel.”—John Dwyer. Received a 7.1 rating from Pitchfork.

Damaged Bug

Bug On Yonkers

Castle Face

***BACK IN PRINT ON NEW HALF-AND-HALF BLUE / MAGENTA VINYL!!! “I first heard Michael Yonkers via the Microminature Love reissue (Sub Pop) and was immediately hooked. I started collecting any piece of his legend that I could…some true, some likely not. He had hand-built all of his gear. He had broken his back. He was part of experimental surgery that left him in lifelong pain. “He was a dancer. He was still kicking around making some of the oddest and most contrary-to-contemporary-popular-norms type of music. (A man after my own heart.) And then I heard Goodby Sunball, recorded and released in 1974, the year I was born. I had and have a very deep connection with this set of songs. I wasn’t sure why, but when I finally met Michael, I understood. He was kind and seemingly a pretty regular guy. But he was also a weirdo. A rare bird, waving the true freak music flag, and it didn’t matter what kind of music he made, I loved it all.  “So, this record was recorded as a way to reboot and reconnect with some songs that have heavily inspired me over the years. It was hard to pick from his vast catalog, so I just sort of jumped in, with Tom Dolas, Nick Murray, and Brigid Dawson as my band (along with a bevy of others along the way) and these are the tunes that stuck to the wall. I will forever be grateful to Mr Yonkers for bringing me a...

Dawson, Brigid & The Mother's Network

Ballet Of Apes

Castle Face

Tip-top of Castle Face’s osmosis list is the first quiver of tunes from Brigid Dawson and her newly minted Mothers Network: wise warnings dyed in dark hues, knotted and hard-won torch songs from the edge of a turbulent sea, bittersweet balladry spun in defense against evils familiar and unknown. Lovely though it may seem from a distance, the striation of loss quicksilvered throughout provides weighty balance to her contralto lilt. Those familiar with her harmonic counterpoint from her time in Thee Oh Sees or in OCS know she can belt as well as lullaby but there’s a fresh and smolderingly heavy swing in her step on display here that Castle Face mightily digs. Ballet Of Apes tapestries together sessions that read like a who’s who from outside the label’s castle walls—in Australia with Mikey Young (Total Control / Eddy Current Suppression Ring), in San Francisco with Mike Donovan (ex-Sic Alps), Shayde Sartin (ex-Fresh & Onlys / lifetime ringer) and Mike Shoun (ex-Oh Sees / Peacers), and in Brooklyn with instrumental heavy-weights Sunwatchers—and the results are spellbinding. At the focal point of this maelstrom, the lady, as if illumed by candlelight, intones, pleads, consoles—white magic perhaps, but it carries with it the anodized tang of blood.

Once And Future Band

Deleted Scenes

Castle Face

"We are very proud to announce a new full length LP from Oakland’s Once & Future Band—Deleted Scenes. The space-age songsmiths of Once & Future Band have been ting-tinging away on the truly heavy anvil of hominid perspective and emotion again to bring you this singing scape of songs. Annealing for over a year now, until it was cool enough to hold in your ears, nested in the pinnae, the time has finally come. Dew drops pop and hiss as they settle on the gliding guitarmonies. Once & Future Band have outdone themselves this time around, in my opinion. If songs could stop heated exchanges by mere presence, these are the ones, and more needed than ever. As I tuned in to each new transmission, each step closer to this perfect platter, I had to stop and do nothing else, and merely absorb how wonderful this album is. Each tune exists in the company it was born to live with. There are haunting chorale escorts here... long trains of room warmth... the belting of the machine heart... lofty guitar and bass melange... and just beautifully laid to magnetic tape with a sure hand by the throbbing brains that are Once & Future Band. For fans of  Roy Wood, Idle Race, ELO, Roxy Music, Head Hunters, Stevie Wonder, Paul McCartney, The Lord Bowie, The Band, and the soundtrack from every movie that ever pierced your cold, cold heart” —John Dwyer

Dwyer, John

Vinegar Mirror

Castle Face

Presented for the public’s perusal, a coffee table collection of film photos from 2009-2013 by Oh Sees frontman, Castle Face co-conspirator, and all around restless artistic presence John Dwyer. Dwyer seemed to always be pulling out a camera around then and these flicks function as a technicolor joyride through his universe in San Francisco and beyond, with his jackal’s smirk from behind the lens all but palpable in these pages. Tour snaps, blackmail fodder, candid camaraderie, and the ringing echo of maniacal laughter await one within. Originally printed in a limited quantity by San Francisco clothing shop and live music incubator Vacation, Castle Face has dusted it off for a wider release for those that never got the chance.

LA Takedown

Our Feeling Of Natural High

Castle Face

When L.A. Takedown hovers over one’s ear hairs for the first time, so much is communicated without a word—there are patient, capable hands at the wheel as one phantoms through a neon Los Angeles of the mind, a Los Angeles that only three harmonized electric guitars can conjure, with a sunset so infinitely variegated in color that only synthetic washes of synth could serve as a fainting couch. Studio magic dust seems to drip off these android dreams projected against the wall—in person it defies logic that such a sound is coming from humans, but, watching their hands, it’s unmistakable—these are calm warriors sallying forth these sweeping, swooning epics, crowned with triumphant tripartite thunderbolts of wail. For a few fleeting moments, things seem right with the world; a hero has prevailed, the race was won by a hair, the unmanned drones levitate and strafe the coast, rending the coral sky with a psychic boom, shaking loose a few palm fronds and setting off some car alarms but otherwise leaving the sprawl unchanged and teeming. While produced and performed by Aaron M. Olson, Our Feeling Of Natural High was engineered and mixed to glossy perfection by Jason Quever and it benefits greatly from the seamless contributions of John Herndon, Jason Quever, Marcus Savino, Miles Wintner, Mose Wintner, Nicholas Krgovich and The Musical Tracing Ensemble. We’re even treated to a city-hum lullaby to humanity as a nightcap, with Nedelle Torrisi and Yellow Magic Orchestra’s Yukihiro Takahashi on vocals, truly a mint on...

Kedama

The Complete Collection

Castle Face

“Three thick LPs of hot jellied kraut-prog heavies coming at you from 1970s Swiss-German based Kedama: three LPs of ‘live’ in-the-studio and actual live recordings—unbelievably telekinetic drums, keys and guitar. Vision quest soundscapes, a total gem lost to the ages here, y’all. The first LP was reissued by Guerrsen Records a while back, the other two LPs are unreleased on wax as of yet: rarities and live oddities. It’s been a real pleasure to work with these guys, as they were as excited as we were and provided us with a plethora of recordings and photos and press clippings to sort through, to pull together this nice little set.  “It’s raw, like you like it after a few. It’s heavy, so you can nod as you sway along the path. It’s beautiful, so you can reminisce. It’s winding, so your imagination is blindfolded. It’s far-flung space jams so you can fry out. It’s screwed-down genius so you can be inspired. This shit is far out and a real-deal old school fuse lighter and its limited to 1000 copies. Nice, never seen before photos of the gurus, so come and get it nerds! “For fans of Le Orme, Yes, Birth Control, Camel, Edgar Froese, ELP, King Crimson.” —John Dwyer

Mr. Elevator

Goodbye, Blue Sky

Castle Face

“The drum clock is docking and the night tide washes up synthesized environments, woozy and recorded perfectly. In my humble opinion, Mr. Elevator has risen and ascended and risen again, top floor, time and space, he hath bended, and brain cells have been rent and spent, on the wing aloft and buoyant, a perfect rapid eye movement enhancer and neuromancer. “A capsule garden soundtrack, a killer live band, Leslie spinning a yarn through the melodious afternoon. Now its twilight, all is well: the most overweight bass sounds abound, the crystalline organs blanket breaks and backs, the whip crack of the snare is your guide here, its pretty fried and boundless in its approach.  “For fans of Tangerine Dream, Air, Donovan (think the Hurdy Gurdy Man LP), The Troggs, Irmin Schmidt, Egg, Stereolab, and even early Mute records.” —John Dwyer

Eddy Current Suppression Ring

All In Good Time

Castle Face

***BACK IN STOCK!!! “It is impossible to deny no one sounds like Eddy Current. I was hooked from riff one and I was lucky enough to do a full tour of Australia with them years ago—good fucking boys, simple as beer and chips, and that satisfying live. But that’s not to say there aren’t odd complexities to their definitive sound. “You can smell Mikey Young’s guitar approach like Sasquatch rustling the bushes, every time you think you see the bend ahead, you go into a tunnel or backtrack for a moment, then back to a nice place you can call home. Rob [Solid]’s bass is pub-fuzz groove. It’s shells-on-the-floor and leaning-against-the wall-with-one-hand-while-you-have-a-piss thinking: maybe you can take that guy? Only one way to find out— oh wait, he’s smiling…nice bloke! Danny [Young]’s drums are a clinic in reservedness: 4-on-the-floor. This guy’s Charlie Watts in the looking glass, every hit a necessity—solid, not flashy, like the lead street tough in a ‘70s flick. He don’t say much, but it counts. And then there is Brendan [Huntley], be-gloved lead mensch in this quartet. Singing with earnest street poet confidence, his message coming in on the weird-wire, hard to describe, best to just listen and see: a pub-punk-priest.  “We are very pleased to have these boys back on the streets. It had been far too long.” —John Dwyer

Osees

The 12" Synth

Castle Face

The pilot took a tab of acid in the control room and reclined back in his chair, mouth open It was his birthday A fly buzzed through....zzzz.... It was twilight April 20th on the nut farm and we had one reel of tape left The rhythm section was in stasis As was the still & purple desert night The door open a crack, a slice, a breach, a fissure  Unmasking a landscape of dust Mr. Elevator and I set up a cockpit with synthesizers and keyboards galore and fried out two improvised long jam sandwiches They are here on gluten-free wax for your holiday pleasure Oh shit, here comes the cat Recommended for: Driving into a nuclear blizzard Slo-mo airport human hunting Staring at the ceiling(s) Living through today and what comes next Healing pod time-kill Cloud lifting For fans of Zanov Syrinx Bruce Haack Bleeps bloops & Neo-maxi zoom dweebies Better luck next year Earth!  Love,  OSEES

Nolan Potter's Nightmare Band

Nightmare Forever

Castle Face

“Nightmare in name only, the inspiration runs white-hot with this one—the wizard’s gaze cast over a distant landscape, bits of ash and motes of incinerated earth float in the air, the smell of ozone and fried metal sting the villager’s noses... “But hope’s bell rings eternal! A flower of beauty is standing up in the sole ray of sun, the clouds are withering away, retreating back to dark cloaks behind crusted-over frost-fractal windows. Darkness cannot usurp the crown, light is king and will eliminate the darkness, chase it out of the unfathomable corners and brush away the webs of evil...remnant factions will always remain but they will be hunted with pure magical riffage. “These are the peaks and valleys of the mighty Nolan Potter’s Nightmare Band, conceptual in feel and flow, a lovely lilting ride and then, up through the floor boards, a warrior incants into the frothing night a huge band, heavy and tumultuous like a war machine rumbling thru the ash, clearing the way for folks to continue their idyll. Dreamy and lucid keys, strings, drum corps, slippery guitar and buff bass, ripe flutes and breezy vocals. For fans of Embryo, the Mothers, Pink Floyd, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Moody Blues, the Stark Reality, and Placebo. They’re from Austin, Texas, but you’d swear it’s from 1972 Europa-Mothership. Like their vodka, it surpasses expectations and fucking crushes.” —John Dwyer

Oh Sees, Thee

Sucks Blood

Castle Face

***BACK IN STOCK!!! JOHN DWYER and his OH SEES reissue the Sucks Blood album on his own Castle Face imprint. Produced by KELLEY STOLTZ using all green energy (no joke), the album serves as a half-way point between the band’s Cool Death of the Island Raiders album and their most recent material.

Oh Sees, Thee

Dog Poison

Castle Face

***REISSUED!!! The beloved Dog Poison full-length record by THEE OH SEES, and boy, is this one a monster. More layered and textural than the previous Oh Sees releases while keeping all the typical JOHN DWYER punch, oomph and weirdness. Ten fantastic songs originally released by Captured Tracks in 2009.  "If it were approached from a different angle, a song like album opener "The River Rushes (To Screw MD Over)" might not have sounded out of place on Dog Poison's predecessor. But by switching to an acoustic guitar and letting the flute player channel Ian Anderson, Thee Oh Sees give their sound a new wrinkle. Indeed, with Dwyer copping a few vocal moves from Mark E. Smith, "River" ends up sounding a little like the Fall covering the Kinks. There's another, purer, Kinks-like turn on Dog Poison, with the loping high-pitched tra-la-las of "The Sun Goes All Around" sounding like something left on the cutting room floor from Village Green Preservation Society. Elsewhere on the album, the group emulates the cavernous, smoky gait of Deerhunter ("Head of State"), shambles in a folkier fashion ("Fake Song"), spaces out a bit ("Dead Energy"), and mostly just lets it all hang out over the course of this LP's 24 minutes."—Pitchfork

Oh Sees

Face Stabber

Castle Face

***Hey there, human kids, lift your face out of the feed trough and pluck that feculence from your ears. Hark! A sonar blip from beneath the pile of bodies—the latest Oh Sees, Face Stabber! Boop, blip, ughhh….people churning like a boiling swamp. Man, this din is nauseating. The screen flickers for the first time this year with a transmission from two months in the future: “the internet has deemed guitar music dead and you are free to do whatever the fuck you like ….long live the new flesh!” This album is Soundcloud hip-hop reversed, a far flung nemesis of contemporary country and flaccid algorithmic pop-barf. No songs about money or love are floating in the ether. Just memories, echoes, foggy blurs, blip-blop goes the scope, heavy funk, dystopia-punk canons, long jams, bloated solos dribbling down your caved-in chest. Human cattle like a beef avalanche, right on your burned out face hole. Spider-legs fuzz crawling in your brain. Lots of curse words for your mom. You’ve gotten the over-population blues, so let’s have some art for art’s sake. What else are you gonna do? Stare at the sky? Please…fifty carbon copies of you look back at you as you walk the streets. Take a breath, you’re going to need it. Take drugs, you’re going to need those just to stand in line at the air and water reclamation center soon enough. There’s no fruit, buddy. You’re at the bleak-peak. They will squeeze you till you’re all squeezed out. For fans of fried prog...

Young, Mikey

You Feelin' Me?

Castle Face

The path is finally revealed by a splash of light, and it is dazzling. You cover your eye-bones with a claw and can make out a reflection of the perfect being—there is a whiff of you in there. There is a bit of everyone in there. There are cars and bells and birds and fruits and water and night skies and laughter and heavy woe…motioning for you to dive in. All things are in this ethos swirling in its core. This album is the armored nucleus of sound and vision; it carries you along on its lumbering back, it tosses you through space and pulls you down a hole…a trip indeed! Mikey Young (Total Control, Eddy Current Suppression Ring) can do no wrong in our eyes and he has held the door open for you again (a gentleman, as always). Listen up, the higher power music hour has cracked their mighty knuckles and laid down some deep trips for you to view the city swaying and swarming like a field of grass flecked with insect transport.

Oceans Of The Moon

S/t

Castle Face

“A dusty plain, a red sky, sand in your teeth— ‘I don’t feel so great’—a post-apocalyptic hooptie jeep-jammer. ‘Why is everything in ruins? There must be others like us out here somewhere…’ “This fine sizzling grease pit of cyber punk comes to us from psychic veteran Rick Pelletier (of Six Finger Satellite, Landed, La Machine), always bringing an interesting, bent and lurid account of visions to wax for the hungry ear bone. This time around the equipment scavenged is guitar, drums, synth and vocals. The beat goes full lotus climbing out of the goo, like men with sap gloves slapping the hulls of the remaining clubs, keeping the peace during live actions, gorgeous nauseating synthesized harmonies blowing through the ceiling vents, frickle-fried guitar belly slish and vocals delivered over the P.A. at Barter Town (sometimes from the workers in the pit, in unison). “Picture a bucket of molten metal with gobs of scalp sizzling and sinking away—dance music for the infected. Be sure to double up on your dose before driving around on this one so you can wipe the chum smear off your wind screen.” —John Dwyer