Mike has started this incredible Saturday Singles series with R. Stevie Moore, taking orders for these for only 24 hours and then hitting the lathe cutting machine to cut them just once. He's already up to the 5th installment (?!!!) and I'm sure once these are gone, that's it. Could be the only time these tracks ever end up on vinyl and as you can see from the pic above PIAPTK has gone the extra mile in packaging in hand numbering and letter pressing these cool sleeves. On top of this it is the undeniable genius of R. Stevie, and as overwhelming as his deicography is, this would be a nice place to start. The package here is as intimate and detailed as the material itself....a completely insane labor of love to this legend.
A-Side's "Advertising Agency of Fucking" is such a punchy uber-pop track. I was playing that double LP Hearing Aid for holiday visitors who were making comparisons to Todd Rundgren's Something/Anything? album which I had never heard of and a new link in the Moore universe. This track is another masterpiece with extra drum machine sounding percussion and a phasered effect on cymbal crashes and a fantastic chorus with a farther away stevie buried under handclaps. Full of abrupt starts and stops that make his brand of pop so unique and R. Stevie wastes no time in getting right to the heart of this one. Launching straight into the innuendo-less lyric, "I don't wanna give you head no more".
Pulling no punches in material and melodies.
The fact that Mike carves out such a limited supply of these bad boys gives it a special AM radio quality that could exist on the original...I mean the cut is great, it's clear, but the added alien surface noise really makes this sound like an alien transmission from the heavens. Driving at night, in the middle of the desert you can pick up ancient soviet broadcasts. This track is fast and furious, the muddy texture obscures everything but the important parts and what really keeps being pounded over and over into my skull is just how incredible he is with an insane amount of limitations. Those things make you better after all and R. is the posterboy for not sitting on your ass and making excuses... archivists will be excavating his material for decades after you're gone.
B-Side" Conflict of Interest" starts with a low disco beat, some belted on synth and a groove bassline starts alongside an echo snare. Stevie's a little distorted this time, in a darker tale with bleating synth horns. His talky, menacing vocal is buried under a piano bouncing in. Chiming guitars... there's no reference for this, except a lifetime of experimentation. Masterful self call and response, voices talking back and forth to each other about a conflict of interest. Almost new wave. No era of music or genre escapes him. But what does RSM listen to? What's on Stevie's record player? Part of me thinks nothing...ever... but then how would you arrive at these conclusions?
Works of the highest order...and this is hapening every Saturday or so?!!! Shit.
Pressed at 33, handmade as hell with handprinted center labels and lovingly cut into blanks by Mike at PIAPTK. Unbeliveable. I also got some found photos and an ACDC card, one mister Angus Young known for his 'delinquent schoolboy image'.
These are gone, but sign up for the email announcements when the next one is scheduled to go up for sale over here: http://eepurl.com/o2vLD
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