Owatonna Orchestra

Two hours of psych folk, americana, post-punk, private press oddities, exotic and esoterica, krautrock, drone and everything in between. Some brand new stuff and ancient, moldy crap from the bottom of my hard drive.

It was time again to compile all the odds and ends of the last months of music finding into one big blob of audio data. I this was a radioshow you would listen to a guy who describes the music, connects the dots and sounds like Werner Herzog. All Germans sound like Werner Herzog when they speak english.

Instead I’ll write down my comments below – you can skip it and go straight to the music.

Starting off with “Oh, Death” by British band The Apostles that was filed under “Anarcho Punk” because they were leftist activists and used a similar imagery like Crass. But what I read is that they were more into activism and less into being punk scene figures. The reason I researched The Apostles was that I remembered a CD by Academy 23, that someone sent me in the mid nineties. In pre-internet times I had no clue about the background of Academy 23. I just liked the odd post punk, homerecording, experimental vibe with the thick british accent. It was like nothing I’ve ever heard before – and I already heard a lot in my late teenage years (I thought). So a bit later in the mix you hear Academy 23 with a post-apocalyptic song about BBC world service is broadcasting into the void. It’s really cool driving song, with Andy Martins high vocals, the melodic guitars and some eastern influence. Read the whole story of the song on youtube, where you can find a lot more music that is related to Andy Martin, Academy 23, The Apostles and now Unit. It’s quite a rabbit hole worth to go down.

Next comes a brand new song by China (the band), the music project of Michael Tappscott of Odawas fame. The promo soundcloud link lead to an impuls purchase of the vinyl, because again it’s such a phantastic mix of cosmic Americana with a highly cinematic quality. Best roadtrip soundtrack!

From the golden blogspot/rapidshare days I had two songs by Lucky Luke that was a 7″ I believe (see #dfbm 101 SOWN Pt. 10). After looking it up I found out that this was a psych folk collective from Glasgow that didn’t exist anymore. I tracked down a download of “Patrick the Survivor” and the most intense song was The Rivers Edge. Their last album came out 2009. There is not so much information online.

With Kohier and Chrome and a dope Swell Maps song I move from folk rock over some thick drones and ancient outer space, basement-punk.

The Counts is from a private press polka, rock a billy, country, dance kind of band from the 70s, out of Minnesota. I’m fascinated by the rough minimalism and the energy. Would love to hear more of them, but chances are, this is the only interesting song on the lp.

I discovered David Peel & the Lower East Side pretty late. I knew he was an advocate for Marijuana, slacker culture and civil disobedience, but I never looked too close. But around christmas last year I just listened through his whole back catalog and it was fun imagining this guy strumming 3 chords on an acoustic guitar yelling about all kinds of social issues and getting high. I think he was part of the occupy wallstreet protests until he died a few years ago.