Charalambides, Historic 6th Ward (side C)

The 2002 vinyl reissue of Historic 6th Ward includes liner notes with Tom Carter's honest and accurate description of the album.  It collects a series of styles and ideas from a 3 1/2 year period.  The albums from 1994 and 1995 that followed, Union and Market Square, established the sound with with Charlambides would be associated—dark, psychedelic, and woozy explorations, with Christina's vocals merging into folk-tinged guitar.  Historic 6th Ward, which was recorded between 1991 and 1994, includes seemingly everything else, from fairly straightforward indie-folk to some harsh sonic extremes reminiscent of Chrome.  The somewhat uniform mood that characterizes most Charlambides albums is thus missing here, but their vision and talent shine through the breadth of ideas.  The reissue nicely preserves the primitive source material, and the hand-assembled packaging looks great.