ALL TRACKS BY ROMAN BOLKS. Raw and immature, yes. Still brilliant. Inconsistent and unpolished, yes. Still beguiling. Imagine a teenager gripped with musical ideas learning to activate the resources around him: his younger brothers, aluminum sheets, some sort of horn, a mini cassette tape recorder, an acoustic guitar. One gets the feeling from the lyric "I don't know, don't say anything," that the young fledgling has oh-just-a-few pent up emotions and has found a secret space for release. Then the teenager grows up considerably, revisits the old work, finds himself at a friend's house (chez chubbyFlea) with a TASCAM 4-track recorder, and weaves the old antics into a new fabric with advanced guitar composition, recordings of speeches by artists and yogi, and insertions of music of interest (Sabalon Glitz, Tortoise). This is the result. Alternative title: BOLKS-ISH. Visual art by snuckdoodle.

Casiopeia

By the Side of your Nausea

ALL TRACKS BY ROMAN J. Raw and immature, yes. Still brilliant. Inconsistent and unpolished, yes. Still beguiling. Imagine a teenager gripped with musical ideas learning to activate the resources around him: his younger brothers, aluminum sheets, some sort of horn, a mini cassette tape recorder, an acoustic guitar. One gets the feeling from the lyric "I don't know, don't say anything," that the young fledgling has oh-just-a-few pent up emotions and has found a secret space for release. Then the teenager grows up considerably, revisits the old work, finds himself at a friend's house (chez chubbyFlea) with a TASCAM 4-track recorder, and weaves the old antics into a new fabric with advanced guitar composition, recordings of speeches by artists and yogi, and insertions of music of interest (Sabalon Glitz, Tortoise). This is the result. Visual art by snuckdoodle.

Backtracking

This was created in order to be played at Buckley's CELEBRATE BUCKLYN party at Main Drag in Williamsburg, BK.  Will it be played? We don't know?  Anyway happy birthday Buk!

BUKLYN shoulders chant 2

BUKLYN we go hard

BUKLYN chant

BUKLYN cool like that chant 3

Happy Birthday Buckley! 2024. This was created to be played between bands at CELEBRATE BUCKLYN at Main Drag Music.  

Intro BUKLYN we go hard

BUKLYN cool like that chant

Absolutely challenging sound collages woven together at the very edge of your consciousness.

11 Ring Of The Crash Symbol

10 The Noise Of Strangers

09 Jibun Dake Ja Nai

08 Vous N'acceptez Pas

The folks at WHPK must have regretted inviting Chicago natives Barrett Heaton and Levon Washington back from San Francisco to play with their new band.  Very rarely has this studio hosted such a mess of saxophone, sound samples, improved mumbles and conflict.  But here it is folks, here it is.

12 She Had A Rat

06 Forgotten Track Name 2

05 Forgotten Track Name 1

03 Disagreement

02 Introduction Pt 2

An assortment of tracks created on a PC computer with the Tuareg software program circa 2000.  Compiled and arranged for your enjoyment.  Compositions by chubbyFlea aka James Barrett Heaton

15 Dino Funk

12 IntaTacheelee

09 After The Let

08 O Mailbox On The Street How You Slam

07 Choon Choonga Chansulay

04 Chaquiez Song

03 I'm No Teenager

An absolutely confounding assemblage of radio snippets, guitar and ambient sounds into something somewhat resembling discrete works of art.  Not to be taken lightly.  Much credit due to Patrick Shanahan for various lyric contributions.  Original raw and refigured material dates from 1993-1998, compiled in suburban Chicago, San Francisco, and Aix-en-Provence.

06 The Orbal Influence

05 Put It Into Practice

04 Mario Castelnuovo Tedesco

03 Stay Awake

02 Smoked Emery Possibly

TASCAM DR-07X

01 Headless Horn Invasion

One reviewer noted that with a band name like "Kill" he expected a little economy in the presentation of the music (Benjamin Evans). However this presents as a sprawling mish mash of unleashed musical madness.  Starting with the looping compositions of founding guitarist Barrett Heaton, the band charged in to take each motif to new heights, and new lows.  Recorded with live takes in the now non-existent Dog Patch Studios near North Ave on Ashland in Chicago, it was engineered and mixed down by Stelios Valavanis with encouragement from the band hanging out in the console room.  From there the tracks were taken to Japan where Barrett arranged and interwove them with various sound collages and added vocal tracks.  This is one for the ages.  Roman Bolks on bass/guitar. LV Washington on drums.  Crusty Lawson on saxaphone/vocals. Spammy Jammy the Kill Maiden contributed lyrics and vocal delivery.  James Warden with cameo vocals. Chubbyflea hopes you enjoy.

19 The Color Of Water

01 She Had A Rat

This was something I mixed up in my last year living in Japan.  Roman says I sent it to him from Japan and I have to believe him.  Really it is just Japanese detective TV show audio mixed with various pieces of electronica, including Funkadelic, Mouse on Mars and songs from the light blue Lords of Svek CD.  Not my best work.  Mostly unlistenable perhaps.

2 Mou Shikashite

1 Koitsu

The vocals did not shine through in the original TASCAM live recording, so we have added some vocal parts. We hope you enjoy these.

01 Moods Detection

A few nuggets formed in the bowels of an iMac computer, using GarageBnnd.  May actually knock your sox off.

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