NP188 Cellophane Spill "Season 2" C26

This is the second NP cassette release by Austin analog Sci Fi synth loner Cellophane Spill and its even weirder then before something we find quite appealing. Its not often that you get to hear something that pushes the boundaries as much as this release does. With strong connections to the amazing vintage electronics store Switched On it can be expected that these alien soundtracks were created on equally puzzling and amazing gear. Heavy use of vocal effects and vocoder take the vocal performances represented to other parts of the galaxy and back if not to to entirely separate realities. The results are truly alien. With the addition of the Season and Episode references in the titles we can't help but to think further into some distorted demented television series. This release stands on its own genre free quite far outside what we know of anyone else to be making with vintage electronics at the moment something that makes this release quite a bold statement. Headphones recommended for a truly unique listening experience.
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NP187 Some Ember "Asleep in the Ice Palace" C30

Some Ember are from the Bay/Oakland and with a prior cassette release on Crash Symbols and a first tour recently accomplished are just starting to create some buzz for their unique brand of highly developed elaborately composed new wave/synth pop/post punk hybrid of pop exuberance. The complexity of the song writing and composition is quite startling at first but once the variety and presentation sinks in and takes shape it is realized that this release is something you can sit with for a long time playing again and again and getting something new out of it every time. Like fellow Night-People band Featureless Ghost Some Ember are actively taking a vast template of ideas and influences from the past fusing it into the contemporary music moment and pushing forward without constraint or concern for safely fitting in to something more uniform. The results of this experiment or vision are highly considered and very well documented with excellent mixing of all elements firmly in place while breathing atmosphere into each other quite freely. If you liked the Featureless Ghost and Uncanny Valley release we did recently this will be right up your alley.
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NP186 Boy Friend "Secret City" C16

Austin trio Boyfriend follow up last years Egyptian Wrinkle LP with this very fine cassette of sultry atmospheric synth pop, They retain the link to their origins in Sleep Over but move beyond the early days of that band with Boyfriend and continue that evolution with this release further refining the compositions to something even more unique but not overtly stated . Secret City is an apt title as these four songs have a cool dark feeling that is much more revealing of something mysterious then something actually dark in subject or mood. A romantic sensibility subtly informs the feeling of the release while some sense of fantasy and still calming wonder is also revealed through the music. A great release a good marker for the direction the band is taking.
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NP185 Terror of the Deep "Permanent Weekend" C52

Terror of the Deep a criminally little known group of New Zealand chillers kick out the jams again on Night-People this time with even stronger songwriting, composition, and recording. Retained is all the shambling, ringing, fuzzy and jangly forward thinking Kiwi guitar pop and rock we love from these guys. Terror of the Deep aren't looking to emulate that rich history of underground rock music in New Zealand they just add to it. This is a full LP's worth of material and it doesn't disappoint. All the textures, sounds, effects, and details fit in just right with each other to create a disciplined distinct cohesive album that blows away what a lot of what other contemporary Indie Pop is doing. Rumors have been heard of a 12" Vinyl on the very fine Selection Records from Terror of the Deep coming up so pick up this cassette to get started if you missed out on the their first NP tape and get taste of that lush colorful sound that is Terror of the Deep.
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NP184 Dead Channel "Dead Space" C36

Dead Channel is a new Portland OR duo comprised of Jack Gilbert and Cody Brant. Jack former Iowa City resident of Welsh upbringing has done prior solo work under the Baronic Wall and Paul Balance projects. On this release Jack sticks to vocals while Cody supplies a thick syrup of analog synth, effects, drum machine etc. Retained and perhaps refined is Jack's distinct vocal delivery and descriptive dystopian lyrical style. The results as can be expected are quite unique, strange and potentially unsettling but quite enjoyable to those listeners interested in the darker subtle strains of outsider electronic and experimental music. Links could be drawn in sound comparison to early UK tape trade industrial and dark wave etc. This is menace that doesn't come out of the dark outright but hovers in a cold atmospheric miasma that is as clinical as it is grimy. Fitting music for rainy evenings near woods, vacant shopping malls or industrial wastelands.
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NP183 Ryan Garbes "Young Mona Lisa" C32

Ryan Garbes doesn't need a whole lot of introduction considering that his releases go pretty deep into the origins of the Night-People back catalog not including his contributions to Night-People house band Wet Hair. Young Mona Lisa sees Ryan operating in more of a synth mode then ever before while retaining some of the queasy psychedelic guitar and organ driven pop of recent releases. This release overall is a bit less centered on vocals instead digging into deeper instrumental territories. Some similarities could be plucked from experimental leaning Spectrum records like Forever Alien or even the Sky Records/Cluster related like Rasta Kraut Pasta, After the Heat, or Strange Music. Retained is the sense of groovy melody and rhythm that is done in a distinctly Garbes. Surely another great addition to the very fine body of work Ryan has built up over the years. Recommended driving tunes.
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NP182 Regional Curse "Natural Living" C36

Another release generated from international meetings of the heart and mind this time as the by product of a week spent in Adelaide AU at the residency of Stacey Wilson aka Rites Wild aka Regional Curse. With a recent Rites Wild LP finally giving Stacey some recognition beyond her very prolific residency in Australia this cassette under the Regional Curse project rides like the dark horse to Rites Wild's white knight. Regional Curse is a bit more centered in the pictured sound of lost highways, drifter blues, industrial menace, and that vast open expense of sun baked desert that is the majority of Australia. Regional Curse has a nice lineage in its industrial and electronic experimental leanings to the great wealth of similar sounds historically centered out of Australia via bands like Severed Heads and the like. Serious grit to this release the kind of sonic meditation that is much more about uneasiness then any sort of positive resolution.
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NP181 Unhappybirthday "Kraken" C26

One of our favorite discoveries in new music over the past year Unhappybirthday are a from Wismar Germany and offer something very nice in their approach to minimalist synth pop/melodic post punk. They have that upbeat sad song thing going that always feels so good. We can't help but think if Jeurgen Gleue and the 39 Clocks had made soundtracks for those early John Hughes films this is what it might sound like. Similarities to fellow German fronted post punkers Horrid Red could be made as well but Unhappybirthday totally stand on their own as well. This one has already gotten a lot of repeat listening here at the Night-People HQ so we don't want to overstate what this music is or it isn't, we just think its good in a simple well recorded ultra catchy way with all the right flourishes of sonic details when needed. Lead man Daniel Ja has one of those somber slightly baritone voices seemingly beyond his years. With a prior cassette on Crash Symbols and some Euro touring under their belts this trio is just getting started and we are sure they are capable of upcoming great things.
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NP179 D. Vassalotti "Live from Infinity" C36

Dave Vassalotti is the guitarist for the rising musical force that is Merchandise and it could be argued that his guitar playing is the secret weapon of that band, something that doesn't jump out right away to punch you in the face but truly gives the music the depth, dynamics and subtle beauty that renders it so listenable again again. Dave isn't new to releasing solo material a prior release of particular note being the very excellent Book of Ghosts LP. This cassette release is just as unique and imaginative as that very fine record and perhaps pushes the sound even further into a place free of any one aesthetic or genre idea yet retains something of distinction and specificity despite the variety. This is a unique personal vision a listening experience that it is subtle and organic, bold and startling, and very unique in that it approaches being experimental without thought towards that notion as something codified thus making the music so much more unique and personal then that word would imply. Another good lead into the Merchandise Totale Nite LP showing more of the atmosphere surrounding the band.
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NP166 Nicolas "Las Lomas II" C45

Nicolas aka Esteban Aldrete is an old friend from Mexico City and Las Lomas II is his first release on Night-People. This is a special release for Night-People in a way due to the random but nice meeting of the minds we found ourselves in with Esteban a few years ago crossing paths in Austin TX and the continued correspondence we have had over the last few years a nice reminder of the potential positives one chance meeting can have. Esteban spent time in Mexico City weirdo rockers El Resplendor but his solo material under the Nicolas premise is an entirely different beast. If you dig Martin Revs early solo material some good common ground can be found on this cassette. Repetitive slowly revolving dubby synths and vintage drum sounds slowly mutate into mechanical mantras as Esteban's baritone vocals guide the atmosphere in subtle organic ways that in feeling is both full of old world decay and modern sharp edged sheen. A recommended debut that fits in well with prior releases like Femminielli and Hot & Cold.
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NP178 Dylan Ettinger "Crucify Your Love" C20

Its strange that it took this long for Night-People to get around to working with our old friend Dylan Ettinger. Fellow Midwest inhabitant who has even more love for College Basketball then we do. Working from a continued template from his last LP Lifetime of Romance but taking the sound to a more weirdo slightly more abstract funky electronics space. This release also feels a bit more cynical a bit darker a bit more lost and angry and we can dig that. Crucify Your Love as a statement expressed through the music presented seems to take the Lifetime of Romance idea one step further putting it up there to die or be resurrected on the cross as to which result is implied that is not fully revealed but these jams do ride in a way where it feels like there is nothing to come back to. There are many Ettinger fans out there and you won't be disappointed with this one, keep this guy motivated to keep pushing that invisible wall and pick up this tape.
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NP177 Happy Jawbone Family Bands "The Silk Pistol" C52

Happy Jawbone are a loose collection of Brattleboro musicians who come out of the same Vermont weirdo scene as fellow Night-People bands Blanche Blanche Blanche and Son of Salami. Happy Jawbone also have close connections with the Feeding Tube record label with two prior LP's. Happy Jawbone ride a kaleidoscopic rainbow of influences stretching out from the loose jangly air of garage psych pop into country and freak folk with a bit of everything in between. Where as prior releases showed a bit more of a bent Beatles or Kinks vibe this one feels way more paisley underground (think early Rain Parade) meets Texas psych (think Easter Everywhere era Elevators) and maybe even a bit of 60s soundtrack style weirdness. Comparisons aside, this crew does their own thing in the saturated world of garage and psych pop revival. Something must be floating around the collective creative brain in Brattleboro to keep things unique and without pretension. Happy Jawbone seems so full of youthful sonic exuberance that there is plenty more room to grow even after three killer full lengths.
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NP176 Superstar "The Softest Urge" C32

Melbourne duo Superstar is related to a loose group of Aussie bands (Fabulous Diamonds, Geoffrey O'Connor, Montero etc.) that are not as fully represented in the States as their more rock n' roll or indie rock oriented friends. Digging into a kind of stretched out soft rock, Superstar keep things light and very airy. Subtle female vocals ride over deep drum machine grooves and psychedelic guitar wanderings. This is as dreamy as music gets not unlike something from the early days of 4AD. This is a live tape of exclusive songs but retains a high fidelity standard beyond most live documents. Work for a full LP by Superstar is in the works. Pick this up for deeper digging into all that contemporary Aussie underground music has to offer.
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NP174 Lazy Magnet " Crystal Cassette" C45

Lazy Magnet is long time Providence RI operator Jeremy Harris also of equally great project Meager Sunlight performed with Jeremy's partner Daryl Seaver. Things get going right off in the best way with opening track Obfuscate. Daryl provides some nice sultry lady vocals on Obfuscate backing up Jeremy's more solemn tough guy take on pop crooning. This is synth pop of the highest order not really looking to any one time period as a reference but taking it all in. This is a very structurally well-crafted complex full album. The mix of more spacey dance tracks, breakdowns and melodic pop bits are done with spot on production and movement. This results create a rich blend of midi driven synth pop. Lazy Magnet has been a project for a decade or more now, every style and sound has seemingly been explored. When this master showed up, even after years of hearing Lazy Magnet turn out great releases and live shows, we were floored instantly by how good this release is. Topping the highest of expectations. Check it out for yourself.
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NP173 Blonde God "s/t" C26

This is a reissue of a self-released CDR, which Carson Cox of Merchandise had on tour with him last spring. After playing a gig together and jamming choice deep records until the early morning hours a bond was made concrete after a couple years of short duration crossings on different tours and mail correspondence. A good warm up for the upcoming Merchandise LP on Night-People, Blonde God is Carson all by himself, or so it seems. Its hard keeping up with this Tampa crew with such a tight knit relationship to collaboration and backing up each others solo outlets that goes beyond Merchandise itself into all the bands surrounding and coming before or surely after. For those of you who have been paying attention to Night-People long term you know full well this is the kind of thing the label is all about: The end of the road destinations and cities without much of an outside identity where creation happens for its own sake. Blonde God plays good and loud, it is reflective of the overall output but has its own aesthetics at play. Carson's voice hovers in and out of a wash of electronics and dreamy guitar work, in parts influenced by classic shoegaze and also harsher noise sensibilities, all in all if feels sad, heavy, distant and lost. There is a landscape to the sound. Is this what living in Tampa Bay can feel like?
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NP172 Fancy Books "S/T" C20

Fancy Books are Tokyo duo Fumiko and Mitsuomi who even upon the release of this cassette are still a bit of a mystery to us. Seldom does Night-People release something via an email demo submission if it has ever happened we can't remember but something unique and special about this release got through to us instantly. Fancy Books are a strange mix of unique poppy electronic drone, weirdo dance, and a sort of dreamy synth driven psychedelic soft rock hybrid. Sharing some similarities with Blanche Blanche Blanche and other subtler softer sounding Night-People releases like the recent Superstar tape Fancy Books fit in nicely with the softer side of recent Night-People releases. Despite the chill nature of this release some moments and songs like track Sponge Boy stick like an anthem. Its easy to imagine driving around Tokyo at night soaking up all the atmosphere of neon and LCD screens letting the upbeat dreaminess of Fancy Books take you away into right where you are.
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NP169 The Outside World "Seaside Nowhere" C20

The Outside World is a new Chicago three-piece fronted by Ben Scott of now defunct Chicago indie rockers Brain Idea. In ways, Outside World picks up a bit where Brain Idea left off but offer a distinct move beyond, creating lush poppy indie rock with really great driving melodic bass provided by Hazel Rigby. Hazel's spot on backing vocals provide a really great foil for Ben's more up front vocals creating nice atmosphere and lots of depth. The guitar rides nicely into instrumental passages with colorful takes on psych pop flourishes. The whole listen rides really direct and punchy but with tons of subtlety to enjoy. I think some people will liken Outside World to a bit of the Flying Nun Catalog and we wouldn't disagree. They don't fall as much on the early 80's side of things as they do the later 80's or early 90's upbeat sounds of bands like Bird Nest Roys, or the 3d's.
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NP 168 Pop Singles "All Gone" C32

Night-People rarely issues a tape that is simultaneously coming out on LP but felt it worth the effort since Pop Singles first big statement "All Gone" (on LP through Vacant Valley in AU) would be hard to track down outside Australia. Pop Singles bring it full on in the distinctly Aussie way that is full of heart and hope while also capturing something both melancholic and fun all at once. It really is about this slacker looseness that is so perfected that it feels like a new force all of its own that is right there in your ear but never in a rush. Something about hanging out in Melbourne on a visit just makes the contemporary Aussie indie sound make so much sense; it feels like the social vibe there, which feels so good. Pop Singles are doing their own thing no doubt about it but can still be put in the rotation with The Twerps, Full Ugly, Bitch Prefect or any of the other chilled out Melbourne rockers and you can't go wrong. Always so much good stuff coming out of Australia as a whole that its impossible for us not to shed as much light on it as we can while sitting in Middle America USA.
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NP167 Uncanny Valley " Speaking In Prosthetic Tongues" C30

Oakland newcomers Uncanny Valley seem to be representative of a burgeoning scene (Body Glove, Some Ember etc.) of synth pop, dark trance and new wave bands cropping up out of the vacant post industrial landscape. This trio of Joey Casio, Kelsey McCurdy, and Natalee Decker create evocative dark psychedelic synth pop with Joey providing the backdrop of sequencing and drum machine, Kelsey on vocals, and Natalee on keys. Vocal centric cuts like "Rising" ring out in a full pop mode with anthemic hooks and driving, building momentum while more instrumental oriented tracks like "End Game" have more of a slow burn effect gently mutating into full on psychedelic synth repetition and minimalism. A great deep listen from a new band with tons of potential.
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NP165 Gem Jones " Exhaust" C20

Gem Jones lives in Iowa and lays real low and outside the normal fray of the underground music scene. An outsider even in small town scene terms, Gems music has evolved a lot over a few years of weirdo pop cassette releases and even more rare live shows. Exhaust shows Gem in a new stretched out mode making serious nods to jazzy outsider rock, reggae, and DIY pop. Playing all the instruments and tracking the release to sound like a live full band make this tape sound like something truly out of its time. Not often in contemporary times is a songwriter able to create something so unique and also specific from so many influences so successfully. If you dig the sound of a wild cross section of Larry Young, Prince Buster, and Eddy Detroit you will enjoy this. Artwork by Ryan Garbes and Shawn Reed.
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NP162 Femminielli "Carte Blanche Aux Desirs" C32

Montreal resident and Dirty Beaches collaborator Bernardino Femminielli makes electronic music of an epic order. Orchestrated disco, liquid drone, cosmic prog, and heavy synth pop that is as cosmic as it is sharp and robotic. This is accent music, words exist without proper place, time or context to create a sense of mysterious isolation and dissolve. "Carte Blanche" feels a bit like lost dance music never understood until a time when ambiguity and mystery could be accepted. Compositions in sonic and sound not meant for the end but for a transition or a new beginning. This shit is heavy and hits hard but long and drawn out so the presence lulls you into its violence and its peace all at once. Something strange lives in these songs, just out of reach but it feels good to hear them take over the space around you where everything else becomes secondary. This is music for whatever soundtrack you need. Artwork by Shawn Reed.
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NP163 Xiao Hong Yu Xiao Xiao Hong "Black Sheep" C45

Xiao Hong Yu Xiao Xiao Hong (Little Red Small Little Red) comprised of Zhao Cong and Zhu Wenbo are from the blossoming Beijing underground scene that fostered fellow Night-People band Hot and Cold that is focused around labels like Pangbianr, and Rose Mansion that is just starting to seep into the N. American underground consciousness perhaps due to Dirty Beaches and Hot and Cold's connection to the scene or Noisey's recent profile of some of the bands such as Soviet Pop etc. Wenbo is a prime mover of the younger generation of experimental musicians in Beijing and hosts a weekly noise night called "Zoomin". Black Sheep first appeared as a self released CD by the band but NP felt it necessary to reissue it for a bigger audience. Musically in debt to no wave, cold wave, kraut rock and industrial gestures Xiao Hong's noisy textures remind us a good deal of killer Japanese Vanity Record band Tolerance, Throbbing Gristle, Peace Trials era Kites and even fellow NP band Angels in America. The begining of a hopefully prolific relationship between the Beijing Underground and Night-People. Artwork by Shawn Reed.
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NP155 Miami Angels in America "A Public Ranking" C30

After a few years of deep USA underground dwelling and touring documented by a series of hard to find cult collected cassette releases, Angels in America began to surface a bit more with their excellent debut LP on Ehse Records. Recent tours saw them on the road with Mark Lord and Weyes Bluhd fitting touring mates who share much in common with Angels dark atmospheric industrial din and fuzzy science fiction synth explorations. Taking up residence across Eastern North American cities such as Baltimore, New York and Montreal, Angels are a bit hard to pin down in identity, aesthetics and location. As we type this they embark on their first European tour with a performance at the renowned Kraak Festival. Angels seem to take on variety of influences merging them all into their own distinct smear not overly representative of anything particular in terms of genre. Perhaps the easiest comparison is to the originators of their own unclassified sound which in term became its own genre...TG. In their own way Angels carry on the kind of amorphous, androgynous, but distinct sound that is hard to find so deep into history. Art by Shawn Reed.
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NP154 Featureless Ghost "Mindbody" C30

Its really rare to stumble onto a band or music with no prior connecting points to mutual friends, another label, a live show, a recommendation, a demo, but thus is the high point yield of living at least part of the life in cyber space and its possibility for randomness. It is there that we discovered the rich and impressive body of work present and future that is Atlanta's Featureless Ghost. Seeing a live video of a radio performance of their song Scanproof was a revelation of what could still be done in the contemporary saturated music environment with synth and electronic pop music. Not wearing any genre classifications or influences distinctly on their sleeves, but creating a rich connection to what came before (think Chris and Cosey, OMD etc) Featureless Ghost couple Matt Weiner (also records as Twins) and Elise Tippins are as critical as they are prolific bringing distinct song craft into composition while being very much a live band. With rich dual vocal sections, hi-fi home recording and mixing, Featureless Ghost is just getting started. An LP on NP is already in the works as well and we couldn't have more confidence in the possibilities and present creative momentum of this band. Artwork by Shawn Reed.
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