The Godz, Contact High with the Godz (side A)

Not even Lester Bangs's effusive praise helps to provide a clear context for the Godz when they started in 1966.  Their acoustic music hints at folk, but folk tended to value professionalism and at least a bit of sterility.  The Godz brought the primitivism of punk rock, without the angst and energy.  Contact High with the Godz coincides with the Velvet Underground's earliest work—both groups were in New York but it's hard to know if they were aware of each other.  The Godz at times sang catchy, almost silly songs like "Lay in the Sun" and "Turn On", but these were juxtaposed against more abstract noise freak-outs that still rested on simple major-chord progressions.  By today's standards, this album, down to its lo-fi, if still quite great sounding simplicity, would make sense—in 1966, it must have fit a lot less.  The repeating and rotating cover image feels disorienting to stare at, and gives few hints to how to contextualize Contact High.

Grauzone, Grauzone (side A)

Swiss-German trio Grauzone are of course best remembered for their German club hit, "Eisbaer", which does not appear on their self-titled album.  Stephan Eicher is also remembered in France for his 90s pop albums that cross French cabaret traditions with Matthew Sweet-tinged power-pop.  Grauzone, from 1981, features a similar palette to Eisbaer but less overt melodies.  Some songs are more accessible and at times almost sentimental, while others feature a harshness and aggression that hints at early Cabaret Voltaire.  Everything uses a palette of analog electronics alongside muddy recordings of electric guitar and vocals.  The low-end is nicely defined and the general balances are great.  The distinctive and blurry cover images remain incredibly distinctive even as they reflect their age.

Dennis Duck, Dennis Duck Goes Disco (side C)

Dennis Duck is the stage name of the great drummer Dennis Mehaffey, known for his work with the Dream Syndicate, Human Hands, Airway, and the Doo-Dooettes.  Here, instead of drums, he plays either a single turntable or a pair.  The turntables are mangled to perform actions that bear little, if any, resemblance to how a person would normally listen to a record.  His most frequent trick, which is documented in the liner notes, is to adjust the anti-skating to play backwards or leap incoherently.  Records additionally spin at the wrong speeds, and are sometimes tilted on the turntable.  The resulting tracks are funny, percussive, and surprisingly propulsive (sometimes even rhythmic).  At one level, they're hard to listen to, and at another level they're remarkably friendly, funny, and engaging.  Occasionally the records used as sources can be perceived, with bits of speech peeking out.  Most of the time, the turntable itself takes center stage.  Dennis Duck Goes Disco is a carefully-restored reissue from 2009 of a limited cassette that was originally created in 1977—it sounds incredibly clear for such a brutal construction process, and the gatefold packaging is impressive too.  The bright colors in the blurry cover image leap out—the packaging gives no hint of the music inside, but it's equally as engaging, intriguing, and unreferential.

The Shadow Ring, City Lights (side A)

By the time of 1994's Put the Music in its Coffin, the Shadow Ring's distinctive sound had grown somewhat refined and recognizable.  1993's City Lights dates from a time when the group was still developing its sound, and the results seem a bit less focused as a result.  Simple, plodding guitar lines and beating drums appear in some places, but they feel a bit less structured.  The biggest difference might be the decreased emphasis on narrative vocals, as both a sonic and structural element.  Some songs are pure instrumentals, and one features vocals purely as sound source.  These ideas would re-emerge in a far more extreme form on Lindus and I'm Some Songs, but here they sound more like sketches for the vocal songs that appear alongside them.  While the primitive playing seems purposeful by Wax-Work Echoes, here it still feels incredibly rough.  City Lights is still a remarkable record—it moved in a very different direction from many of its contemporaries, in an era when the Dead C held a huge influence, and it foreshadows the group's many advances that would follow.  The sound is of course purposely rudimentary, and the glued-on black and white drawing of cats and mice at a dinner party fits the contents perfectly.

Units, A History of Units / The Early Years: 1977-1983 (side A)

The album title references a start in 1977, and the notes on the cover discuss ideas from 1978.  By the time the Units released their first single, "High Pressure Days" in 1979, the influence of Devo's debut LP was obvious.  With deadpan vocals, prominent use of ring modulation, and synthetic-sounding drums, the Units' early work captured on The History of The Units owes an obvious debt to Are We Not Men?  The Units were not mere sound-alikes—they have a voice of their own that extends beyond their outspoken rejection of guitars.  The lo-fi sound and heavy use of synthesizers has a bit in common with Philadelphia's Crash Course in Science.  This reissue collects tracks across their singles and Digital Stimulation album before they signed to Epic in 1983 and made the more sterile New Way to Move, with 9 songs on the LP and many more available digitally.  The mastering is generally good, though the extended high-end exaggerates the harsh high end on some recordings.  The chaotic cover collage is full of text providing something of a Units manifesto and history.

Cabaret Voltaire, Mix-Up (side A)

In 1979, when Cabaret Voltaire made their debut album Mix-Up, rock influences were still prominent in their dark, abrasive music.  Most songs were short with structure, and prominent vocals contributed to these structures.  Guitars and bass guitars often appear in the foreground (albeit usually with a lot of effects), and they even covered the Seeds' "No Escape".  While they recorded themselves, the mixes sound surprisingly clean and professional, in part because so many of the sounds are aggressively filtered to very narrow bandwidths.  It's the group's darkest and most offputting work, but the obvious references to rock music make it surprisingly accessible.  The blurry cover image aligns nicely with the cheap simplicity of the album's construction.

Clifford Thornton, Ketchaoua (side A)

1969's Ketchaoua leaps through many styles in a way that reminds me of the Art Ensemble of Chicago and also Archie Shepp in this era—Shepp appears on half of the album.  Side A contains two long tracks that feature large ensembles and a lot of simple, interweaving percussion.  Both tracks gradually evolve into brief periods of recognizable jazz styles before floating back into more abstract terrain.  The opening title track might be the least prominent appearance from drummer Sunny Murray, who blends into the massed percussion.  The two tracks on side B are opposite extremes, though both feature smaller groups.  "Brotherhood" draws from New York energy jazz, with Claude Delcloo's percussion prominent in the mix.  "Speak with Your Echo" ends the album with its sparsest arrangement, featuring only Thornton and two bassists.  The recording quality varies, with the large groups sounding better than "Brotherhood", where the explosive percussion reverberates awkwardly in a boxy room.  The simple packaging includes great photos of Thornton.