Winter Solstice IX Compilation

Presenting Ferrari Naptime's first seasonal compilation! This is a roundup of tracks from each of the artists featured on this blog from the previous season.  At my current rate of output, The vernal equinox compilation will be an EP.

For the uninitiated, simply click on the album title above the tracklisting, choose "free user," wait the required 95 seconds, and then click "download." Unzip and feel free to lambaste my musical tastes!

Winter Solstice IX
01 - Guillaume Dufay - J'ay Mis Mon Cuer
02 - Soil & Pimp Sessions - Crush!
03 - Jenny Lewis & The Watson Twins - Rise Up With Fists
04 - Grace Jones - Private Life
05 - Needle Sharing - Yellow Pages [task force mix]
06 - Old Crow Medicine Show - James River Blues
07 - Meg Lee Chin - Heavy Scene
08 - Kaki King - Close Your Eyes And You'll Burst Into Flames
09 - Trollfest - Der Jegermeister
10 - Screamin' Jay Hawkins - Little Demon
11 - Maruosa - Death Stretch
12 - Error - Nothing's Working
13 - Cubanate - Vortech I
14 - Carpathian Forest - Start Up The Incinerator (Here Comes Another Useless Fool)
15 - Blind Lemon Jefferson - Matchbox Blues
16 - Gridlock - Cramp
17 - The Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble - Munchen

Gridlock – Further [1999]

As the nineties drew to a close, a lot of electro-industrial acts headed for the greener pastures of IDM. This would eventually contribute to a glut of middling rhythmic noise projects, but a few gems were created in the flux of bands who remembered their Skinny Puppy roots while reaching for the erudition of Autechre. Of these gems, Gridlock’s Further might be the crown jewel. Some of the songs consist only of wintry synth washes that evoke a tone of desolation, while other tracks are obliterated by blasted, broken beats of sculpted white noise. Gridlock’s later work would emphasize this ambient aspect while using a more conventional midtempo rhythmic structure, but here the beats are ugly and extravagant.

It’s hard to believe this was released ten years ago. Unfortunately, the intervening years have seen Gridlock’s ambient/noisy duality contribute to the dumb powernoise cliché of alternating soft and loud tracks on an album. Parties guilty of following that trope should take another listen to this album and hear how it's done.

[YouTube] Gridlock – Sever

Gridlock – Further [1999]
01 - From Zero
02 - Ash
03 - [Untitled]
04 - Sever
05 - [Untitled]
06 - Cramp
07 - Without
08 - [Untitled]
09 - Here
10 - Further
11 - Egeszeges
12 - Scrape
13 - Under
14 - Ash [KSP remix]
15 - Enzyme [Dryft remix]