
- Artist/Title: Holly Hunt - Year One
- 19
- Format: 2LP
- Label: Other Electricities (USA)
- Price: $22
- Catalog ID: CarbonDist_OE032
"Year One is the debut full-length album from Holly Hunt, South Florida's acclaimed two-piece instru-metal behemoth.
Recorded by Jonathan Nuņez (Torche), mixed by Ryan Haft (Capsule) and mastered by Nick Zampiello and Rob Gonnella at New Alliance East, this 39 minute-long, 10-song suite is constructed upon sonic architecture ornate as a royal catacomb and stunningly epic, like an ancient city frozen in time under a heavy sheet of black, hardened lava.
In their first 365 days as a band, drummer Beatriz Monteavaro (Floor, Cavity) and guitarist Gavin Perry became the undeniable sweethearts of Miami's disparate music scenes. To paraphrase a description of 80s movie hero Ferris Bueller, "The punks, the metalheads, the art-rockers: they all think he's a righteous dude."
In the grand tradition of Monteavaro's previous musical endeavors, Holly Hunt champions heavy metal's potential to transcend genre and become a physical experience. Though stripped down to the most bare essentials, the duo's innate technical chops, strong dialogue, and incredibly deep relationship to their gear produces a sound and style far beyond rudimentary tags like "heavy," "hard," or "brutal."
Year One captures the band's brilliant signatures - the meditative power of repetition; the ecstatic joy of tempered variation; infinitely undulating riffage; psychedelic drone paired with rock n' roll rhythm - in full splendor.
Year One is a co-release with our friends at Roofless Records. It's available on double, 150g vinyl "
Note: All Carbon Mailorder copies have a slight bent corner.

- Artist/Title: Mammal - Lonesome Drifter
- 20
- Format: 2LP
- Label: Animal Disguise (USA)
- Price: $12
- Catalog ID: CarbonDist_ADR100
"THIS IS BOTH THE END AND THE BEGINNING."
"Mammal's 2007 album Lonesome Drifter is a study in nihilism. It conjures up the classic themes of alienation, of "souls in isolation," of a misanthropic artist hunched over a guitar, drum machine and four-track recorder in a rustic cabin in the barren wilderness, both metaphorically and literally. Which is not to say it isn't fun. It's a work of serious outsider art, but if you look closely between the psychotic breaks you'll find smart, if stinging, doses of dark humor. How funny is the over the top ridiculousness of the opening track "Repulsion" with its minimal beat, overdriven to the point of crackling distortion, and half-step monster guitar riff repeated ad infinitum with only minor variations for over ten minutes?! But its effectiveness is undeniable -- it will have you banging your head while it sucks you deep into the world of Mammal. The second track, "Fatherlands," is just as minimal but in different terms: the guitar is muffled, quiet and drenched in reverb, the drums are absent, and this track has lyrics, albeit oblique ones seemingly thanking a mother and father before death...a suicide note perhaps? The rest of the album basically oscillates between these two extremes, with subtle variations on the theme, perfectly capturing the very essence of bipolarity and manic depression. This music reflects the psyche of an individual for whom "pissed off at the world" barely scratches the surface. These are the songs that should be playing in the iPods of Columbine kids and mall shooters everywhere, rather than lame corporate hip-hop. However, it would be hypocritical to say that none of us on the listening end have never experienced black moods such as the one Mammal resides in perpetually, so this music essentially provides a potential catharsis, and hopefully an exorcism of the demons within us all." - All Music

- Artist/Title: Rats with Wings - Aide-Memoire
- 12
- Format: 2LP
- Label: Rats with Wings (Australia)
- Price: $28
- Catalog ID: CarbonDist_RWW_2LP
double LP of material taken from CD-R releases: The Fish Rots From The Head (unreleased), Southern Oscillation Index (HoLR) CDR-RWW (MIR), Ratified Loopholes (AEN), Ashtray Cabbage (Fiend), Get And Put (Deadline), Out Vile Jelly! (Gold Soundz), Night Science and Underground Australia compilations (Cipher Productions). [package has a damaged CD glued to the cover]

- Artist/Title: Various Artists - Touch 30 Years and Counting
- 32
- Format: 2LP
- Label: Touch
- Price: $23
- Catalog ID: CarbonDIst_TONE033
Gatefold double LP version. Released to coincide with Touch's 30th anniversary celebrations at Beaconsfield, London, on December 5th and 6th, 2012. All tracks are exclusive and original to this release. Music by Touch 33, Fennesz, Bruce Gilbert, Rosy Parlane, Oren Ambarchi, The Book Depository, Eleh, BJNilsen, Nana April Jun, Chris Watson, Mika Vainio, Carl Michael von Hausswolff, Jana Winderen, Philip Jeck, Z'EV, Hildur Gudnadottir, Senescent, and Biosphere. "30 Years and Counting is an echo of a time when the world was in a critical condition, and potentially about to blow itself into oblivion. As such it is a wry reflection on the situation we find ourselves in today, where the final curtain is less likely to close, but the stakes somehow seem to be more extreme and polarized than ever. As far as Touch is concerned, it is an expression of our youthful relationship to the work. Mike Harding and Jon Wozencroft invited each of the Touch artists to contribute a glimpse of their current practice to what is effectively a group show rather than a compilation. The brief was not only to celebrate a situation, but to remind each other why we are doing it, and make a kind of documentary realism. Some artists responded quickly with significant twists and returns to their signature sound and others left it to the last minute. The net result was that Mike and Jon mastered the LP/CD more or less as live performance in the cutting room, Transition, as an expression of the vitality of the project rather than some pre-ordained historical item. The history is built into the cover with two images of the first computer, the 'Colossus', built in Bletchley Park during the early 1940s as a means of cracking the Enigma codes? Here the pressure of time is at its most compressed. Two contrapuntal images were shot only recently, backstage moments of Touch 30 situations which as historical events, pale in comparison -- they are just personal, memory. Duration becomes a key aspect, which might explain why there is no recording by Phill Niblock, but nonetheless a filmic/time-based response from a collective of artists who have made a distinct impression on contemporary music and the way things go. We started with cassettes; this project commenced as a dedication to vinyl rather than digital. 30 Years and Counting is a manifesto after all these years. The vinyl flares with the crackle of the present." --Jon Wozencroft, November 2012

- Artist/Title: Various Artists - Crossed Wires: abstract perspectives from Atlanta's underground
- 14
- Format: 2LP
- Label: USED
- Price: $2
- Catalog ID: CarbonUSED_CROSSEDWIRES
- (This is a USED item)
on Clockwise Records. 1997. The Elementals, Copland, Osaga, Ness, Gnosis, Parts Unknown, J. Stroke, Fascia, AS Octopussy, Rishi Kumar, Love Pheotus, Justone, Alphanumeric, DJ Damn featuing Henok, Johnny Ether, J. Square featuring Divine

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