Dispatch 51: Happy new Solar Maximum...*spacetime distortion

Dispatch 51: With the new year comes a new release from the ultimate drone lords.
(*Some witnesses report actual spacetime distortion) pt1 is the title of this slow, deep emotional soundtrack. True to form, the low bass plows onward allowing the soaring nature of the astrobass to come clear. The temporal beat seems to emanate from under water and merely hints at the rhythm, leaving only room for the feelings angst, the wanting for closure. In the end, no such relief. Pt 2? Maximalist. Purely.
 The track is only available as a stream on the bands Soundcloud page but will hit the MCL Bandcamp store upon release of the EP, sometime very soon. Look back here for details.

Dispatch 48: Digital Release for Thao's Sunday by DS Peligro (Vinyl Oct.15th)

Dispatch 48: The MCL Recording Co family is very excited to announce the digital release of the newest record by DS Peligro titled Thao's Sunday (MCL438) at Bandcamp. The album is 11 intellectual wanderings down heady side roads. Reflective and beautiful. From psyche to dub to noise and back around to guitar rock. Simply, purely premium experimentalism.
DS Peligro is a one man show, self composing, performing, producing and releasing his unique brand of experimental no-fi since the early 1970's on west side of L.A. and draws on that long pedigree to create some of the most unique and inspiring experimental music today.

The limited edition vinyl version comes with handprinted jackets and poster insert and will be available on about Oct.15th. This digital version is available at the label's bandcamp page.

Dispatch 47: Solar Maximum Releases New "Black Triagles/ExtraDimensional Love EP"

Dispatch 47: MCL Recording Co is happy to announce the release of the new EP by the ultimate drone lords, Solar Maximum. The EP features 2 heavy droning, yearning tracks. As Bill Boethius in England says about the EP, "what a beautiful contrast - the lightly skipping vocals over the deep lugubrious drones ... and yet the vocal is unsettling to .. opens out to a dark and immense dimension. This sets the mind to endlessly speculate on the black triangles on a subliminal level..."
Check it out for yourselves. Fortified with Poetry by pallasCatfight.

Dispatch 46: Solar Maximum Release Full Live Performance Video

Dispatch 46: On a warm summer evening in early September, Solar maximum did an intimately live in-store performance at Hercules Records in Berkeley, Ca. A single stationary camera documented their performance.

Dispatch 44: We are Now MCL Recording Co.

 Dispatch 44: Introducing our new name, MCL Recording Co. Same great bands, same great label, great new updated name. Contact us at mclrecordingco@gmail.com

Dispatch 42: Ronzo Calzone releases "Citizens of the United States" video

Dispatch 42: Ronzone Calzone guitarist, producer and collaborator with HMS has released a new single video on his Youtube channel via his wordpress site  titled "Citizens of the United States" The track seems to have only a little hint of current events, politics and the American electorate in this year 2016. Take a listen:

New collaboration and a partial explanation of how we work

Check it out...we just posted this new collaboration on Soundcloud between Solar Maximum and PallasCatfight, called 'I know this is all in my head.'

 'But wait,' you're thinking to yourself, 'isn't PallasCatfight Heather?'
  Why yes, it is (she is?).
  'Sooooo, wouldn't this just be a Solar Maximum track?' you're thinking to yourself.
  Weeeellllll, not really, and here's why...

Solar Maximum is a middle-of-the-night channeling of the sounds, songs, and signals of the cosmos. It is Sammy and Heather but beyond Sammy and Heather. It is beyond thought, beyond words...in a way, it's out of our hands. It has a purity that we don't. HA. It has balance - Sammy and Heather in equal proportions. And so, if the mood strikes to add anything to this cosmic collage, we call it a collaboration. Conveniently, we both have musical alter egos (Sammy is closetLames, Heather is PallasCatfight).

Yeah yuh!

Sunday Edition vol. 5: UFO's and EDM

[For your Sunday afternoon reading and/or viewing pleasure, we present vol. 5 of THE SUNDAY EDITION at Music for closetLames. A bit of this, a bit that, maybe art, whatev's. May include contributions from friends, associates, accomplices, not to exclude detractors, and maybe even us sometimes. So, kick back and dig in...]

Page 1: One of our favorite true accounts of UFO's in our airspace. Cant get much more official disclosure than this!

Page 2: A fantastic artist we are having the pleasure of working with and together have a collaboration EP in the works. Trauma hails from Osterrönfeld, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany and does some interesting EDM/electronic music. take a listen.

Dispatch 33: New Solar Maximum single Devils Thrill (Moments1&2)

Dispatch 33: Devil's Thrill is the psychedelic and transcendental new single by Solar Maximum, our resident stoner jam-heads and their brand of minimalist riffage, once called a metal haiku. The track comes in at just under 14 min, so prepare yourself right, get comfortable, sit back and enjoy. The relaxing will come when you close your eyes and let the Devils Thrill fill ya. Come on, it won't hurt ya. It feels good to let the music flow right thru...anyway you dig it, we hope you do...

Dispatch 32: Solar Maximum interview on Bay Area Band Show podcast!

Dispatch 32: Solar Maximum is the featured interview this week on Steve O'Sullivan's podcast called Bay Area Band Show released at iTunes.  We went over to his place in San Mateo, sat in front of the mics and talk for a bit about what we do and kinda how we do it. He plays some music off the new album as well as the single Circular Logic. Thanks Steve, we had a blast.
 He's always interested in talking with musicians in and around the bay area, hit him up at www.thebayareabandshow.com

Dispatch 31: Bill Boethius with Solar Maximum on "Maxed Out"

Dispatch 31: Another astounding track has been produced using the set of tracks (Solar Selfies) we made available as a project for different artists to play too, with, for, about etc. to see what kinda unique music come out of each artists approach. We have been duly impressed ever time!
 This time we asked the "Dali of Guitar Noise," Mr Bill Boethius to take a stab. Maxed Out is the track he gave (and named)! Full of texture and screaming guitars, the track explodes...a few times!
Give it a listen and then maybe listen again! Have fun.

Here is a playlist of all the collaboration tracks we have made available thus far.

Sunday Edition vol.3 - Poems, Music and Orbs...thats a nice Sunday!

[For your Sunday afternoon reading and/or viewing pleasure, we present vol.3 of THE SUNDAY EDITION at Music for closetLames. A bit of this, a bit that, maybe art, whatev's. May include contributions from friends, associates, accomplices, not to exclude detractors, and maybe even us sometimes. So, kick back and dig in...]

(Page 1): More prose from the twisted mind and pen of John Middle.

  A precedent a funeral pyre. A lawyers recurring dream... A digital glitsch... Over driven in solid state... A march of skinny pennies... A sonnet sung in machine code... Sodomy and Victories made of ego and boredom. We are RIGHT They are WRONG Sad WORDS (STOLEN from poems and forced into hard labor by Matthew Bender TM) A rainbow scorched black and hideously crooked. Technicalities and leverage. Your child is starving. Mine is anorexic. A future unlimited Cast into irons. blinkered. Simplified. Lobotomized. and writhing. Justice cost an arm and a leg. Clapping now not an option.... hopping mad. That sound? (It's SUCTION>) HEX cast. TORT law. TOXIC MOLD "I OBJECT" perfect DIS-FUNKtion. Injunction. S and M SO HIP it hurts Love distracts RESTRAINT Brown shirt. A submarine became A SUNKEN BOAT. Harmonic distortion. An eye of GOAT.

(Page 2): Ramones Live New Years Eve 1977. (Ramones - Its Alive!) My favorite Ramones concert.

(Page 3): Her Majesty thee Spleen...We play for the orbs. Often times at jams we are accompanied by orbs who come out to dance to the hypnotic sounds of the Spleen. This is a fine example of the spectacle. Any thoughts?

Sunday Edition vol. 2: Flyer Art from the Archives

[For your Sunday afternoon reading and/or viewing pleasure, we present vol.2 of THE SUNDAY EDITION at Music for closetLames. A bit of this, a bit that, maybe art, whatev's. May include contributions from friends, associates, accomplices, not to exclude detractors, and maybe even us sometimes. So, kick back and dig in...]

 Byline: Sammy Salazar

 I have been doing gig flyers and posters for my bands (including but not limited to Decembers Child, Bigger Than God, Anonymous Beef, closetLames, Leather Pills, Solar Maximum...) since i began gigging in H-Town in the mid 1980's and straight thru my continued years in the SF bay area. I uploaded a bunch of them to gigposters.com some years ago and just found the link recently. I will be uploading more soon to fill out the collection, but in the mean time, take a look at these gems...

Sunday Edition, Vol. 1: Conversation on the subject of The Fall

[For your Sunday afternoon reading pleasure, we present the first volume of THE SUNDAY EDITION at Music for closetLames. A bit of this, a bit that, may include writing from friends, associates, accomplices, not to exclude detractors, and maybe even us sometimes. So, kick back and dig in...]

CONVERSATION on the subject of THE FALL.
Byline: John Middle, Oakland, CALIFORNIA

My old friend Tim Ascough recently regaled me with a dense and expectorant sodden missive on the subject of his intense loathing of THE FALL. As a long time FALL fan I have been made aware of such feeling many times before by many people from many different walks of life. Particularly in the early 80's (when I was initially developing my appreciation of their music) I found myself on the receiving end of negative feedback ranging in tone from incredulous and disbelieving to hostile and annoyed upon playing THE FALL or bringing them up in conversation. Certainly I was never taken aback as THE FALL have a sound and musical angle that can only be described as difficult, abtruse, challenging, ramshackle, cacaphonic and so on ... and so on. Mark E Smith, THE FALL's only permanent fixture at this juncture has a vocal style that de-emphasizes range and key by way of skewing more in the direction of squeaks, mumbles, hard consonants and hard-talk. I generally assumed that I would be alone in my affinity with their din. Back then THE FALL as a band were not considered "cool" at any level. Mark E Smith was considered an annoying but persistent fixture on the "scene" by most. The band dressed "wrong". Their Link Wray/Beefheart/Van Der Graaf Generator/Iggy Pop/CAN/FAUST/Velvet Underground/Country and "Northern" influences were over most peoples heads. They slagged off your favorite band without hesitation in the media...etc etc. When you met folks who were into THE FALL back then you came across a certain type of music fan. 'Committed' in a word. The type of music fan who understood that great music is oftentimes only revealed as such by way of repeated listening. You have to 'earn' the privilege. FALL fans loved the 'differences' they heard....Wrong notes over right 'business as usual' notes. THE FALL are about uncompromising vision in combination with committed creative execution. THE FALL for a huge portion of their career pursued these qualities in the face of overwhelming commercial disdain and public disinterest. Mark E Smith is certainly a known and respected cultural renegade THESE days. The dogged persistence that has characterized his 'career' in its entirety has paid off ultimately. The last 5 years have been good to him at a public level. Vindication... Lets not forget though that THE FALL have been in business since 1977. They have completed 25 original albums. They have released 50 singles. They have issued 50 live and compilation albums. Mark was a dock worker prior to being in the band. He believes in hard graft and testicular fortitude. '' Nothing has happened since 1977 to STOP Mark from 'doing his thing'.....Of course the truth is that his experience in the biz has been rife with the typical (and at times uber-typical) challenging situations and problems. He has endured thirty years worth of such moments to state the obvious. Throughout, he has kept rolling ever onwards. We are after all talking about the music business....SHOW BUSINESS. Mark has evidently faced down the type of 'shit' that stops most bands in their tracks by album 3 if they are lucky AND determined. THE FALL are of Mancunian stock and represent the grit and "no mithering please" nature of the place to the core. Personally, I am into the idea of having a strong 'work ethic', be it in music, art, sport or whatever. Hard work is tough to ignore or downplay ... It can't be "bullshitted" if you know what I mean. It resonates. What about the music? Well .... you develop your craft thru repetition right? THE FALL have gone thru a lot of repetition. The craft is accordingly in good shape. Its not the typical 'craft' mind you. It is born of a contrary nature. It is about the advantages of making music while NOT being a musician. I DON'T SING I JUST SHOUT .....ALL ON ONE NOTE....SING SING SING SING.....LOOK AT ME I JUST STING......YOUR HEART OUT. Mark is in his 50's these days. Listen to his last three albums and see if you can pick up on a softening of his approach to creating music. NO NOSTALGIA resides therein. Instead you will find odd and unique sounds and noises. Techno synths in rockabilly shirts. Industrial grind in cod-cabaret sequins. Punk meets APHEX TWIN by way of a detour through a ROCHDALE working mans club. FOOTBALL HOOLIGAN ANTHEMS and freestyle crap-raps. His hips may have proven fragile but his ears are those of an athletic elephant, greedily filtering the RIGHT frequencies for the NEW sounds to add to the OLD new sounds. Head music with energy. VALUES and having an ANGLE. No love songs..... Mark like myself would rather read a HORROR STORY. The Mills and Boones preoccupation of modern pop music is somewhat narrow right???? RIGHT? What if we make the atmospheric presence of a song its HOOK? BAD DRUGS and PARANOIA. BACK STABBING and RIP-OFFERY. Y'know life....... Thats without going into the BAD stuff. The 'wirey' out of tune guitars that chicken scratch at your psyche. The "drums being kicked down the staircase" BIG BEAT.....Gary Glitter meets JAMES BROWN uptown. The purposefuly anemic but HUGE and turgid bass undulations. ONE NOTE SOLOS. Mark scratching on the microphone so that it sounds like someone or something is trying to scrape its way OUT OF YOUR SPEAKERS upon playback. LO FI NO FI .....RIGHT FI.....FEE FI thumbed noses. "TURN THOSE BLOODY SPACE INVADERS OFF - UHHH" ... keyboard tone setting. And to top it off......from my perspective at least the funniest and most interesting lyrics in modern music. BOB DYLAN FANS TAKE ELEVATOR TO 13th floor AND EXIT THIS DIATRIBE BY WAY OF WINDOW PLEASE.... An example of this lyrical prowess......I could pick any of a thousand. Check this one out for example..... It's about methedrine related insomnia....squalid ciity living...creeping paranoia and worry. Such that you cannot....WALK THE FLOOR AT NIGHT IN PEACE. Pacing the floor y'gedditt? Such conditions must be the fault of another.....CITY HOBGOBLINS perchance??? CITY HOBGOBLINS Spiders know these things Gremlins know these things Tap, tap, tap, tap You think it's the pipes But who turns on the lights? Our city hobgoblins Ubu le Roi is a home hobgoblin at night always ready. City hobgoblins Infest my home at night They are not alright Ten times my age One-tenth my height Our city hobgoblins Buzz of the all-night mill Ah but evil Emigres from old green glades Pretentious eh? Our city hobgoblins They'll get yer I saw Queen Victoria on the back of a large black slug Where? in Piccadilly, Manchester Our city hobgoblins They stay I say We cannot walk the floor at night in peace At night in peace At night in peace ME NOW.....So in closing I leave you with this thought. Tim knows his music. He perhaps makes several good points about MARK. He is undoubtedly a man with a strong sense of self. He may well have a large ego. He is unruly, disagreeable and contrarian in nature it would seem. I have never properly met the man so can't really be the judge of such matters. His empirical history provides us with one obvious elemental truth about Mr. Smith. He is a survivor. Plain and simple. In my view.... He is a working class success story from Manchester who succeeded through bloody minded persistence and self-belief. Begrudge him or commend him...Your choice. MARK COULD NOT CARE LESS either way I imagine. A genius ????? God knows. HIP PRIEST? (stolen from Burroughs...notebooks out plagiarists) No such thing. A haggard "speedy" snaggle toothed POET LAUREATE for the terminally disenfranchised. YES... I believe so. and a lot more besides when you really get into it....

Dispatch 14: SOLAR MAX band shot and fact sheet!

Dispatch 14: A new band shot by B. Salazar and the Uranian Fire fact sheet. These are part of our digital kit, including bio, links and some blog/ radio mentions and plays. Tues Dec.8th is the street date for Uranian Fire and we are stoked!