Swill Children split series

I stumbled across this new label Swill Children Records, who, ambitiously is starting out with a split series... the more I see splits, the more I think they make the most sense for the format. If you go to the trouble of pressing a vinyl 7", the best you could hope for it to at least get rid of them all and press another one...that's the best case scenario to make the whole enterprise self sustaining. The best chance of doing that is one kick ass artist, and hope there's enough interest, or get two, bet on the spread...not that there's any chance with the artists represented here that there's going to be any trouble, but in the whole scheme of things, let's say.
There's always a huge art element that goes into any single, or music for that matter really, the look, the whole aesthetic is hugely important to provide clues to where the artist or label is coming from but when a label itself has a point of view and then combines it with great music under that umbrella....well it's a new era of labels with this definitive aesthetic...you can easily name a slew of them: Hozac, Columbus Discount, In the Red, Tic Tac Totally, hell even Sub Pop, or Merge who started it all. But when a single combines one of a kind at objects with the unique music artifact, it's elevating the entire work, and let's face it, just plain giving into the fetish of getting this limited object.
Swill Children, led by founder and showing artist in his own right Jesse Hlebo recently started this Sorrow/Jubilence split series:

Three splits curated by Jesse Hlebo addressing the themes of sorrow and jubilance.
Each record is in an edition of 333, are all cyan colored vinyl with custom printed covers (each will be different in some manner)

With music by:
Lucky Dragons/Weekend
Okie Dokie/Nu Sensae
Ty Segall/Mikal Cronin

The first single with Lucky Dragons and Weekend is an insanely reasonable $7, direct from the Swill. Impose Magazine has a sample of the Lucky Dragons track here. I'm only vaguely familiar with them from a couple other singles, and it fits in nicely with Ducktails kicks I get on every once in a while. This would even fit alongside Gary War, for that meditative mix of sound collage, questionable time period view. I like this direction that Lucky Dragons is going...it's subtle and smart, so many times you get hit over the head with piles of noise, that adds up to a confused nightmare. He's deftly wielding little melodies and loops in a real journey, you don't exactly remember how it started or where you're going, but it's great. Weekend, however I haven't been able to actually track down their sound very easily, but I'm guessing it's similar based on this description:

THIS RECORD:
Lucky Dragons' track 'We Lost' is a hauntingly meditative piece that is at once nostalgic and fearful.
Weekend's 'Squawk' juxtaposes field recordings of birds with sharp, hypnotic beat, culminating in a manner one could almost consider Caribbean.

SC001
Edition of 333 cyan colored vinyl
All covers unique risograph prints

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Looking forward to the third split with Ty Segall which should be available soon...

Lucky Dragons on Atelier now at fusetron

Atelier Ciseaux records was kind enough to send me the files of this Lucky Dragons 7" after I mentioned it a couple weeks back, and I've been letting it sink in over the weekend. I realized I must have not heard much of them before, or the context has changed because immediately Ducktails comes to mind, it has that atmospheric lounge almost sampled delay pedal feel.

The A-Side 'The honeycomb house pt 1,2,3" starts out with maybe a mandolin, or probably a ukulele and acoustic with just a hint of animal collective-type indecipherable vocalizations, but it's definitely feeling tropical. The melodies work themselves throughout the three pieces, and when it comes back in the third part I realize I really missed it. It's that kind of long piece meant to be heard together like this where melodic phrases fade in and out of consciousness. They have an overall master plan that's unfolding. The rhythms subtly change, never leaning too hyptnotic...there's too much going on to be lulled asleep.
It's no surprise they are from LA really, it's exactly what I think of...I think what is a surprise on the other hand is that same Ducktails sound is coming out of NJ? That makes no sense. This EP is the perfect sound coming out of that west coast climate. I can hear the palm trees...everything is a slow motion dream, with the windows down, driving from desert to desert. I'm even going further and saying it goes way out pacific to Hawaii (where they issue a lot of fake birth certificates apparently). The beach, with a bonfire, life is pretty easy. They've never made it sound so good.
The B-Side is 6 tracks, a few of them no more than 30 seconds, these are definitely separate thoughts, coming from completely different places. I thought they were individual elements from the A-Side suite deconstructed, picked apart into something new, pushing the sounds...but that would be too easy and obvious. This whole single is clean sounding, there's no muddiness. There's more electronics in these fragments but it's not out of place. If these flute sounds are synth then they have me fooled. I imagine they work live instruments into the delicate samples. It's really optomistic sounding...it's weird because there's a hint of Pocahaunted in places but it never gets ominous.
Available direct from Atelier Ciseaux or locally from fusetron. The seriously screenprinted jacket and airmail jack this up a bit in price, but there is a lot going on in these 12 minutes, it's the perfect accompaniment to Ducktails, and I'm glad to have found another group working in this experimental sampled tropical way.

Fusetron says:
*Artist: LUCKY DRAGONS
Title: Vrais Noms/True Names Format: 7" Label: Atelier Ciseaux Country: France Price: $11.00 "Its still a bit too early in this big empty house. In the yard, an unsound choir seems to grin childishly and fishily to the neighbours around. Sarah Anderson and Luke Fischbeck, LUCKY DRAGONS, live in Los Angeles and have been recording for about 10 years albums (on Marriage Records, Upset the rhythm…) which are as extactic as well as precisous. Their new ep Vrais noms/ True names (limited to 350 copies + free mp3s) is available now on Atelier ciseaux records (Paris/ France). 9 tracks for less than 12 minutes, with an artwork by SUMI INK CLUB and screenprinted covers on recycled paper." - Atelier Ciseaux.

Lucky dragons on Atelier Ciseaux records

New Lucky Dragons single on a new french label, Atelier Ciseaux...crazy, I've been seeing more and more of this guy everywhere. I get a kind of Ducktails aesthetic from Lucky Dragons, one man programming electronic insanity, complex sampling, heavy on the vibes, the pressing of this looks real nice.
Not sure if you can order direct from the label or you'll have to track it down from the usual places...

lucky dragons

This is a sample crazy, relooped, manipulated piece of work. The lucky dragons myspace page is kind of making me sick...well done, the spinning rotating rainbows are driving me insane.
This is labeled trance?, but I associate that more with techno/house kind of things, this definitely has a dance-less spin. There's tons of videogame noises, and stuttered samples that don't loop. As opposed to most highly electronic composition, which is really clean sounding, lucky dragons sound more diy, I can almost hear the junk toys malfunctioning. This will challenge you.
I also heard that they are playing the Whitney museum July 20th.

On caff/flick records. (import)


Lucky dragons-Very-Picture disc. New material from us laptop psyche exponent luke fischbeck. The first in a series of collaborations with la based artist david horvitz whose photographs adorn each side of this extremely limited edition single.-7"-Caff/flick-?5.99