“Sacramento” (Used 15 times)

"Combed Over Chrome" is an interstellar beat-blast to launch minds into warp.

California's Raleigh Moncrief grew up composing music on tracker software, transcribing guitar parts into digital sequence in the pre-mp3 era of the Commodore 64. Members of the tracker scene were music filesharing pioneers, and Raleigh naturally took to the web to release the Combed Over Chrome EP via his own Obstructive Vibrations netlabel.

OV also helped introduce us to some of the many talented musicians who run in Moncrief's Sacramento circle like Hexlove, Appetite and Pregnant. Alongside Death Grips, Moncrief seems to be leading the local beat-oriented scene, but he is a truly eclectic collaborator—playing with the likes of Zach Hill (Hella), The Advantage, and Marnie Stern—and a producer of albums by Ganglians and 'sound design' for Dirty Projectors' Bitte Orca.

Anticon recently released Raleigh's debut LP, Watered Lawn. Check out the "Lament For Morning" video, directly by Moncrief himself, after the jump. Raleigh Moncrief plays live on my WFMU program this Thursday May 10th at 10am.

Raleigh Moncrief @ WWW  |  Twitter  |  Facebook  |  Soundcloud  |  FMA

Fine Steps started out as a solo recording project from Julian Elorduy, drummer of the Mayyors and leader of the Standard Tribesmen.  We had the chance to witness Mayyors tear the roof off WFMU's SXSW showcase a couple years back (listen here).  Standard Tribesmen took a slightly more traditional approach to their blown-out garage-punk judging by the lone 7" on Mt St Mtn released before the group splintered.

The early Fine Steps home recordings sound a bit like John Dwyer's pre Oh Sees experiments, some sort of west coat OCS transitional moment on the porch.  I picked out a couple tracks below.  "Our Love is Strange" comes from Muff On Both Sides.  If it was in fact run through two Big Muff distortion pedals, those pedals must have had the gain knob turned down low.  "I Know This is Crazy" off Crutches echoes the Pacific Northwest sounds of Karl Blau.

Hopefully all of these sketches will get fleshed out more in future times.  For now, "Tomorrow for All of Today" hits that spot.  It's off a forthcoming LP (label TBA) recorded with a 5-piece Fine Steps band featuring two members of harmonizing phased-out garage melters Ganglians.  I haven't heard the rest of the album, but I have heard that it was mixed by Robbie Moncrieff, which bodes well; he's also collaborated with the likes of Marnie Stern, and his production for Dirty Projectors's Bitte Orca fueled some of his own fantastic releases as Raleigh Moncrief.

The great Sacramento CA label S.S. Records celebrates their 10th Anniversary this Friday, Saturday and Sunday, with three shows in San Francisco (details).

The title track from Raleigh Moncrief's Combed Over Chrome EP is one of my all-time favorite jams, and with this new Vitamins EP he dishes out an equally irresistible platter of abstract future funk.

The Sactown native (real name Robbie) is also a touring member of California's own internationally-renowned video-game covers band The Advantage (with whom he's currently touring out in Japan!). Moncrief also plays guitar in the band of fellow shred-virtuoso Marnie Stern. And he's got this awesome solo project called What's Up, which applies these experiences in The Advantage and with Marnie Stern to Moncrief's own compositions. Another source of inspiration (and source material) is Moncrief's engineering duties on the Dirty Projectors' latest album Bitte Orca

Over here on the East side, we just made it through quite a heat-wave: 90+ degree days, humidity through the roof, brownout rumors in Brooklyn, sweltering nights rendered sleepable only through the magical powers of A/C...

In this sort of heat-funk, I desire nothing but languid, pretty music that hangs in the air and feeds my inertia. Luckily, I discovered the Weird Forest Records Sampler One here on the FMA in time to complement this heat-stroke. The compilation is blanketed with a beautiful haze, spare songs with a few noisy bits here and there. Check out a few of my faves below.

Not only has the Weird Forest label put out great records by the likes of Emeralds, Ganglians, Starving Weirdos, and Dead Western, but they are now adding tunes to the FMA! And if you didn't already catch some hints from their artist lineup, Weird Forest hails from Sacramento. Can't wait for more!