Peter Margasak,Reader staff writer
Various artists, Jazz Gems From Gennett-Champion One of the few good things about moving is stumbling across things you’d forgotten you owned. This week I rediscovered this entertaining compilation of early jazz cut between 1928 and 1934 for Indiana label Gennett and its imprint Champion, both owned by the Starr Piano Company. Most of the bandleaders were minor (though some of their sidemen, including Herman Chittison and Al Sears, would become well-known in jazz circles), but the music is vibrant and fun.
Cooper Crain, guitarist and keyboardist in Cave and Bitchin Bajas
BYM Records Blow Your Mind Records of Santiago, Chile, has been releasing psych/fuzz/pop/dub/rock for five years, fueled by avocados, pisco, San Pedro cactus, weed, and ceviche. One of the most truly DIY projects I’ve ever seen, BYM pumps out the best vinyl you can find, assuming you can find it—its HQ includes an office, several rooms where people live and make art, a lounge with a deep record collection, and an eight-track analog studio where most BYM releases are recorded. Studio and label owner Nes even cuts the vinyl himself. Bands: Follakzoid, Watchout!, La Hell Gang, Chicos de Nazca, the Ganjas, Holydrug Couple, Nueva Costa, La Golden Acapulco, A Full Cosmic Sound, Acid Call, Nairobi.
The Shout Based on a story by Robert Graves, this 1978 film brings nonstandard players to the Mysterious Stranger Tears Family Apart plot: glib experimental musician and devoted wife fall into slippery triangle with hunky black-magic sorcerer who’s learned the deadly “terror shout” in Australia. Time-travel editing makes this a puzzle that invites obsession. The soundtrack by Tony Banks and Mike Rutherford of Genesis hovers like a ghost and pounces at all the right moments, but the devil’s best details are in Rupert Hine’s microscopic, ear-shattering sound design.
