"Been waiting multiple years for this mind-melting meeting-of-minds to finally manifest itself in physical form, and there’s actually a story behind it. Rewind to 2006: Heavy Winged is an active, Brooklyn-based psych-rock band who’ve yet to dissolve into the bi-coastal logistical tangle they exist as now; meanwhile, Eva/Inca Ore is on tour (for The Birds And The Bees maybe); meanwhile, Nick Bindeman happens to also be in NY hanging out. Since all are friends or friends-of-friends, Heavy Winged ask Nick and Eva to come jam with them at a show at Northsix for the heck of it. They do. The set is a charged, psychotropic cyclone of ragged electric weight and possessed pixie shriek, stomping up and down over several damaged mountains of riff-wreckage. Miraculously, someone thinks to record the performance. Jed Bindeman sends us a copy. Our speakers implode, we high five. Fast forward to Fall 2008: Heavy Winged record a new 20-minute epic (“Into The Fog”), send it to Eva, and she records her own hypno-bliss keyboard mirage over the top. Eureka. So goes the nearly three-year history of Ring Mining, a slow-burn triumph of long-distance collaborative patience and alchemy between two of our favorite creative institutions. Mine on, you crazy diamonds. Black vinyl LPs mastered by James Plotkin and housed in jackets with mountain-collage artwork by Eva Saelens, plus a photocopied insert. Edition of 500."

-not not fun

"Misery wears many masks, but Tulare, California fatalist Jon Borges has etched his mark on most of them. For at least half a decade he’s pursued increasingly suicidal tendencies under his Pedestrian Deposit guise (which is currently on hiatus), splicing subdued loops of morbid beauty against savage canyons of harsh noise histrionics. Lately, though, he’s been straying more and more from this aggressive exercise in contrasts in favor of his Emaciator alias, which draws from the same dark wellspring of bitter memories and bipolar rage but, instead of unleashing it in grand frenzies, bottles everything up inside until it seeps out the pores. Early efforts/cassettes retained a strain of buzzing nausea reminiscent of his PD days, but the last 12 months have witnessed a complete abandonment of any ties to the past. Times are still bleak, sure, but the grey prisms of brooding ambience Borges now conjures and slowly collapses convey a depth of mood and subtlety far surpassing simple signifiers like Indifference, Resentment, Remorse. Coveting collects together five exquisite Emaciator compositions (including two particularly riveting songs that were debuted live at Echo Curio last winter) for a harrowing 40 minutes of troubled solace, crisscrossing suicide guitar lines, and entranced self-reflection. Meditation is a myth; desire does not sleep. Black vinyl LPs in shrinkwrapped jackets with layout by Borges, cover photograph by Shannon Kennedy. Mastered by Pete Swanson, edition of 430. "

-not not fun

"The greater midwest 'hood is responsible for so much of the U.S.'s most living musics it seems like lately. Out here on the west we tend to get a bit blissed and burnt and, conversely, eastern seaboarders can fall into a condensed-consciousness that sometimes doesn't translate well to those outside their bubble. But in the middle country there's often a rawness that's honest and real and really clears the ears/mind, and for our tastes Ashland, Kentucky's Social Junk are champs at this direct, red-blooded approach. Somewhere between the Bible Belt brutality of Sword Heaven and Tusco Terror and the sticky southern electronics of Pax Titania or even recent Wet Hair, SJ navigate an interesting interzone, boiling together ominous loops, mangled sax, heavy riffs, various vocal moods (pissed, lost, aggro, angelic), militant tribal drumming, and a mess of electric atmospheres into something genuinely gripping and wholly their own. And right on the eve of both a behemoth bi-coastal tour (six weeks long!) and a brave re-location to CA's Bay Area, we are amped-as-shit to announce their vinyl debut after a million killer limited tapes and splits. Concussion Summer rumbles through noisy drum circles, hypnotic thrash, and even a couple creepy ballads, with Noah Anthony and Heather Young's co-dependent chemistry channeled into eight concise hybrid pieces of perfect/classic JUNK. High-time, and fully worth the wait. See them soon. Black vinyl LPs in jackets with artwork by Hair Police's Robert Beatty. Edition of 435."

-not not fun