The Terminals, Uncoffined (side A)

My favorite Terminals albums come slightly later than Uncoffined—1992's Touch and 1995's Little Things.  The New Zealand group's 1990 debut has a somewhat different line-up and distinctly brighter (if still lo-fi) sound than the albums that followed it.  Uncoffined also includes acoustic guitar, which would not turn up again until 2007's Last Days of the Sun.  It has more of a 1960s garage feel, with some almost gentle pop in places—the obvious Ian Curtis influence in Steven Cogle's lead vocal is somewhat less prominent.  Buried underneath these nice melodies remains the dark, fiery intensity that was present in The Victor Dimisich Band (out of which the Terminals evolved) and prominent on the group's later releases.  In addition to lyrics taken from 1920s American experimental poet Harry Crosby and a cover of New Zealand 1960s garage heroes the Avengers, Uncoffined also features "Frozen Car", which might be the closest thing the Terminals had to a "hit".  The amazing cover painting aligns more with the music's underlying hints of darkness than the more rock elements that are often in the foreground here.

F.S. Blumm, Zweite Meer (side A)

I first discovered German electronic musician F.S. Blumm from a 1999 Sack & Blumm 7".  Blumm has continued to collaboate with Harald "Sack" Ziegler, who makes a brief appearance on Zweite Meer, but he's also made many solo albums, including this one from 2005, where he exhibits his skill on an impressively diverse array of instruments.  The tracks here are all instrumental except for one David Grubbs cameo on vocals.  Zweite Meer consists of a series of short tracks, each of which is sparse, simple and repetitive.  The atmospheric sketches sometimes fade into the background, despite the individual parts within each having a lot of movement, and they generally maintain a light mood.  The somewhat primitive digital recording is impressively mastered with rich midrange, though I sometimes wish the high frequency transients were tamed a bit.  The packaging features a beautiful cover image, strong design around it, and really nice reverse-stock paper.

Dadamah, This is not a Dream (side A)

New Zealand's Dadamah released This is not a Dream in 1992—a CD of the same title but a different cover design (that's definitely more impressive but probably less appropriate), which compiled the band's entire output, followed a few years later.  Dadamah owed an obvious debt to the Velvet Underground, with simple, repetitive structures that still owe a debt to rock song form, deadpan vocals, and muffled drums.  This is not a Dream is far murkier than anything from the Velvet Underground, due in part to the low-budget nature of the home recordings and unimpressive mastering.  There are also vague references here to early-80s post-punk, in the guitar sounds, vocal style, and generally dark atmosphere.  The memorable melodies, abstract lyrics that are surprisingly engaging, and strong musicianship distinguish Dadamah from the many bands that borrowed from similar influences.

Repulse Kava, Flow Gently Sweet Alpha (side A)

Repulse Kava hailed from Chicago, and 1990's Flow Gently Sweet Alpha followed a pair of 7" singles.  The album combines many prominent influences of its era.  Wiry guitars recall Big Black, propulsive and intricate basslines reference the Minutemen, and the thin, vaguely lo-fi recording is typical of so many recordings from 1990.  The song structures are particularly complex and confusing, and the shout-y vocals also provide little context in this movement.  Abstract instrumentals without drums occasionally break up the more typical band arrangements.  The packaging obviously predates digital layout, with a simple font over a blurry and tinted abstract photo of a woman.

Graham Nash, Songs for Beginners (side A)

Where CSN songs at the time could quickly grow anthemic, Nash's solo debut, 1971's Songs for Beginners, is very slight and understated, and also quite pretty.  It includes a solo aside and sparing use of orchestral instruments, but the arrangements and sound are generally typical of songwriter rock in their era.  Guests include regular CSN collaborators like Johnny Barbata and Calvin Samuels alongside celebrities like Jerry Garcia, Phil Lesh, and Chris Ethridge.  My vinyl pressing is an impressively bright and loud copy.  The packaging includes an excellent self-portrait on the front, and an inner sleeve with printed lyrics that emphasizes their political content.

The Real Bahamas in Music & Song (side A)

By 1965, when The Real Bahamas in Music & Song was released, Joseph Spence was already identified in the liner notes as "A Legend In His Own Time".  Spence appears on 4 songs here—one is solo and the others are collaborations with his wife Louise and sister Jenny (along with her family, the Pindar Family).  The Pindar Family also contribute the album's closer, "I Bid You Goodnight", an earlier recording than any I've heard by the Incredible String Band, Grateful Dead, or Charalambides.  Most of the songs here have spiritual lyrics, and most feature unusual tonalities similar to those employed by Spence on his solo albums.  The primitive recordings are well mastered and preserved.  The cover is the old-fashioned style of paper glued on thick cardboard—the painting has aged better than the series-standard design around it.

Labradford, Labradford (side A)

1996's self-titled album was Labradford's third full-length, and their last with vocals.  It moves back away from the more overt melodies of A Stable Reference, and feels closer in many ways to their debut album Prazision LP.  Experimentation with subtle patterned rhythms, which would grow more prominent on later records, first shows up here.  The clarity of the musicianship also sometimes moves into the background here in favor of a more pure ambient palette.  Labradford is mastered somewhat murkily with thick low-mids and de-emphasized high-end.  The beautiful packaging includes a die-cut cover with the choice of two images to show through the opening.

Kemialliset Ystävät, Kellari Juniversumi (side A)

The earliest work I've heard of Finland's Kemialliset Ystävät is a 7" from 2000—they'd amazingly already been releasing work for 4 years, but still employed a more aggressive, Swell Maps-like approach.  By 2002, when they made Kellari Juniversumi, the folk-electronic approach had moved to the foreground.  Kemialliset Ystävät utilize odd tonalities and acoustic instruments that seem to come from Finnish traditional music, and it differentiates the results from their American counterparts in the Tower Recordings and Jeweled Antler axes.  The music is surprisingly light and sometimes even extroverted, both of which seem atypical in the folk-psych underground.  The tracks on Kellari Juniversumi are short, and some even have melodies.  In subtle ways, the post-punk influence has not completely disappeared.  The vinyl mastering of this 2005 reissue has emphasized bright high-end, but the vocals often retain the recognizable proximity effect from the recordings—it's an odd creative approach to mastering a fairly lo-fi recording.  The excellent packaging has a nice glossy inner sleeve with patterned abstract paintings that match the style of the front cover.

The Flying Burrito Brothers, The Gilded Palace of Sin (side A)

1969's The Gilded Palace of Sin is, of course, considered a country-rock classic.  It's also a surprisingly odd record.  After the opening two Parsons-Hillman classics, the album becomes more varied, with everything from two soul covers to the spoken narrative on the closing "Hippie Boy".  It also sounds a bit strange, as it's recorded on very early solid-state equipment.  The soft but pronounced compression on the acoustic guitar would become something of a cliché in the '70s, while the odd vocal equalization heard here may never have been repeated.  The cover images of Nudie suits are iconic, but the band font/logo has not aged well, and the white bar at the bottom of the back cover does not flatter the surrounding design.  I have an '80s budget copy that is surprisingly well pressed and mastered.

The Residents, Fingerprince (side A)

The divisions between sides on 1977's Fingerprince is in some ways clearly delineated.  The liner notes describe the short tracks on side A as songs, and side B as a continuous ballet.  The ballet is in fact broken into movements, which are somewhat song-like.  They remind me at times of Raymond Scott and gamelan music.  The songs on side A do have vocals and what seem like lyrics, and they're also propulsive.  While the structures do sometimes use repetition, the results still don't end up seeming much like other songs.  In both its songs and ballet, Fingerprince emphasizes the act of creation perhaps more than the music itself.  The sounds exist inside of structures, but their very existence as strangely recorded sounds seems like their most important quality.  They're often primitive and far removed from the source, even when it is clearly a vocal, and this approach is more important than the music comprising the sounds.  An excellent mastering job helps bring a bit of cleanliness and clarity to the weird textures.  The cover design manages to be both primitive and iconic at the same time—it fits the music nicely.

Au Pairs, Playing with a Different Sex (side A)

Au Pairs' classic 1981 debut Playing with a Different Sex successfully stays raw enough to maintain its punk rock directness without becoming so awkward to be distracting.  The obvious force of energy comes from Lesley Woods's amazingly powerful vocals—she's clearly aware of the lyrics' blunt content as she's delivering them.  The band was obviously recorded playing live—the tempos vary a bit and the band sometimes pushes and pulls against them.  It's especially obvious at the beginning of "Headache for Michelle", where they're straining to keep the slow tempo before the song speeds up.  "Headache" is also interesting because the drum sound diverges from everything before it, likely because most of the song is played with the snares turned off.  Even the bass drum sounds rounder and deeper here with less beater.  All of the mixes are very simple and straightforward, which draws attention to the drastic, dub-influenced effects frequently employed on the guitars.  The front cover image of women from an unknown culture wearing bright colors and carrying guns is as jarring as Woods's consistently pointed lyrics, and the accompanying text matches perfectly.

Liquid Liquid, Liquid Liquid 2xLP (side C)

The 1997 Liquid Liquid reissue follows the slightly unusual strategy of starting with the band's final 12" from 1983 and working backwards chronologically.  This approach is logical, in that "Cavern" and "Optimo" are the group's catchy hits, where the earlier EPs were more abstract (Successive Reflexes) and more primitive (Liquid Liquid).  The mastering and die-cut packaging of this reissue are particularly impressive—it looks and sounds great.  Even the unreleased live recording on the final side was well-preserved and restored.  The group's influential dance-punk approach receives far more acclaim than when this reissue came out in 1997, or during their existence in the early-'80s.  I was surprised to find Bruce Tovsky's name among the back credits, as I usually associate him with New York's avant-composers rather than the Mudd Club.

Renaldo & the Loaf, Songs for Swinging Larvae (side A)

After many years' experience making music, I still have trouble figuring out how Renaldo & the Loaf made Songs for Swinging Larvae in 1981.  Some of the repetition must have been achieved with tape loops, and I think the vocals are sped up or slowed down using varispeed on a multi-track deck (it sounds like they were using an 8-track).  There seem to be electric guitars recorded direct and compressed/processed on the way in, though they often end up sounding almost like double-reed instruments as a result.  The percussion might involve banging on kitchen utensils or other house-hold objects.  The other amazing thing about Songs for Swinging Larvae is that the abstract soundscapes that fit the instrumentation and arrangements alternate with memorable and catchy pop songs that feel somewhat incongruous with the sound.  The album is also impressively mastered to preserve all of the weird sounds that the duo created.  The iconic cover design is printed on thick, textured paper.