Melters

Blades Of Joy

S/t

Melters

Blades of Joy’s debut LP is a stunning and seamless distillation of waiting for the nighttime; waiting for the sun to go dim enough to stare at, for the surreal and perplexing MUNI-OWL schedule to take over the bus routes, for finally feeling lost and lonely at home in a city that insists on exposing your private world. Pop for poets, rock for reality. How good this music is remains one of San Francisco’s most closely-guarded secrets, but talk to the right people and you’ll find out what’s been causing murmurs of adoration and envy at secretive live appearances from 3am electrified freakouts on Ocean Beach to intimate sessions in the backroom of the Tenderloin’s famous Aunt Charlie’s Lounge. In this recording, captured in a few 2016-2017 dips into Oakland’s Secret Bathroom studios, we can hear Blades of Joy (which include members of expansive San Francisco groups such as SWANOX and DISSOLVE) in their traditional four piece lineup, though the seven songs herein belie a group of songwriters willing to stretch out and breathe in any configuration or style.  In contemporary Bay Area fashion, the Blades do wear some influences on their sleeves: listen for guitar lines that pull threads from the spooky and spectral coats of the DURUTTI COLUMN and FELT, pull reels of tape from the wistful Tascam of ROY MONTGOMERY in his East Village years, pull a gin-soaked paper towel out of the Levi’s jacket of the RED HOUSE [CHILI] PAINTERS. Vocals that channel the sublime clarity...

Marbled Eye

Ep II

Melters

Presenting the 2nd EP and vinyl debut from the Bay Area's resident masters of staccato guitar music. After an amazingly assured cassette only EP, Marbled Eye have gone and polished their already finely faceted sound, coming out the gates with 4 new razor sharp tracks designed to slash their way into our battered minds. This band rules, and we couldn't be prouder to be co-releasing this essential record with our buds across the Bay at Digital Regress!

Violent Change

Vc3

Melters

***"VC3 is—you guessed it—the third LP from San Francisco’s VIOLENT CHANGE, a brand new collection of hazy pop channeled through submarine-fidelity noise. If you were among the fans of their previous records, this remains heavily dissociative music; if it helps to paint the picture, the live band now includes members of Bay Area favorites RAYS and LIFE STINKS, though these recordings here are a whole different grade of barbiturate. Still, take note: from the opening notes of the second track, 'Unit A,' it’s immediately apparent that bandleader GLADYS BIEYLE has learned to let his melodic brilliance shine. This is Violent Change’s real pop moment, an album of lonesome romanticism on par with Shoes’ One In Versailles and Chris Bell’s I Am The Cosmos. I kid you not, this record is that good. A co-release of Melters and It Take Two."

Marbled Eye

Ep

Melters

Ace debut from Oakland's Marbled Eye. Don't believe the hype - Bay Area guitar music is alive and well.

Smiles

S/t

Melters

***The new 7-inch from San Francisco's SMILES continues the Melters cult of Gerard Love worship, but you can listen closely and catch some nods to Primal Scream, the Paisley Underground or even Elliott Smith's later electric work. And as absurd as making guitar music may seem in this setting—are we fiddling while Rome burns?—there is a sense of awareness that keeps it out of the depths of self-pity. We like to think of Smiles’ MANI CHOCANO as a piper out of frame in one of those Danse Macabre renaissance paintings, spinning a sad song that is catchy enough to pull each estate into the breach. You might think that's a stretch; we'll see you at the bottom. Four tracks.

Swiftumz

Everybody Loves Chris

Melters

***Swiftumz's best work to date. This is saying a lot considering how amazing his AMAZING 2011 debut, Don't Trip (Holy Mountain) was -- seriously the best pop album you've never heard. Unless of course you heard it, or the two masterful singles that followed it up; then you know what you're in for. The eleven tracks on "Everybody Loves Chris" are as gorgeous, eclectic, catchy, and stoned as they come. Recorded in various studios, beds, and hotel rooms around the Bay Area, this LP magnifies Chris McVicker's beautifully fucked pop vision into clear focus, letting the rest of us unworthy souls bask in the glow of truly weird indie-pop euphoria. Taste the grey and get it before it's gone. Includes two-sided insert and download code.

Ovens

Ovens

Melters

***Archival release of TONY MOLINA’s pre-solo work. recorded in 2005 by KURT BLOCH of The Fastbacks and mastered by PAUL OLDHAM. Features the tracks “Feel Like Shit,” “Hash Sesh,” “Bored and Ashamed,” and “Inside Your Head.” Edition of 300 copies.

Violent Change

A Celebration Of Taste

Melters

***We here at Melters are beyond excited to bring to your attention VIOLENT CHANGE’s amazing new long-player, A Celebration of Taste. On this record, GLADYS BLEYLE and fellow noise maker/kindred spirit STERLING MACKINNON have crafted a seriously weird, strangely beautiful sound. In Celebration, they still observe the rites of their devout GBV worship, while bringing in experimental, abstract= sounds à la Flying Saucer Attack or the Dead C. Though there are certainly fantastic standalone tracks, this is a record that is meant to be digested as a whole, and was thoughtfully sequenced with this in mind. The record washes over you with an eerily effective combination of true pop song craft and studied excursions into otherworldly noise. When it all comes to a close after a brief twenty-two minutes, you will have awoken from a baffling dream. Moments of beauty and sincerity float alongside harsh noise and submerged words—it’s up to you what to make of it. Bleyle and Mackinnon have crafted a rare thing: a record of unpretentious, unfussy significance, and we couldn’t be prouder to present it. Edition of 500 copies.

Hoarders

Basement Chain

Melters

Violent Change

Suck On The Gun - EP

Melters