Dynasty At Ghost Town - Bathetic Records

Surely if you're someone who takes a look at this page every so often, then you're aware of this. Massive 11 tape set from Bathetic Records, compiled under the name Dynasty At Ghost Town. I'm about half way through this haul and have yet to find something I don't love, and I assume the rest will follow suit. Plenty of names you'll recognize; William Cody Watson, Planning For Burial, Lee Noble, High Aura'd, Panabrite, Aquarelle, Zac Nelson, Ekin Fil, Padang Food Tigers, M. Geddes Gengras, and my favorite thus far an achingly beautiful drone take on Primitive Americana from Scott Tuma.

Art from Simon Fowler that runs in vertical line connecting all 11 in order (an order I failed to capture in my photo). Beautiful design throughout, from the stock to the font choices to the shell colors. It's a pretty stunning achievement, and at 50 bucks for the set, it's less than 5 dollars a tape. You might be able to find a few individual copies floating around on artist pages and Bandcamp, but I highly recommend you grab the whole thing direct from Bathetic.

Lee Noble - Ruiner

You know what this is. I'm guessing you don't need me to tell you either. But of course I will. New (relatively) Bathetic vinyl, and it happens to be Ruiner, the anticipated Lee Noble follow up to 2011's Horrorism. Sad, beautiful, damaged pop noise. The direction of the record is exceptional. Everything I like about Noble's work, the grit, the delicacy of the soundscape, the vulnerability of the vocal. At times, a less obtuse and more accessable sound and structure emerge. Pieces that seem to tempt your innate desire for pop song structure, but never fully succumb to that temptation. Always challenging, always obscuring. It's an evolutionary and differentiated record, but done without sacrificing the comfortable, honest feel of his prior work. Melancholy and joyous all together, this is a massive record that will wear you out emotionally.

Black vinyl, neon orange liner insert, simple and clean. Grab a copy, as I did from the excellent Tomentosa, or directly via Bathetic.

Lee Noble - Persona + Zine 04

Second pressing of Persona from Lee Noble on No Kings. Originally released on the exceptional Bridgetown records, Persona is six tracks of incredible outsider pop swimming lazily among fragmented bits of vocal and warm ambient sound collage. Meloncholic, depressed, nostalgic, and somehow sill hopeful and even at times joyful. Sounds like your favorite Sparklehorse track played backwards at half speed in a haunted farmhouse, or something like that.

Snatch this up along with one of the incredible collaborative zines on offer at No Kings. Zine 04 is an absolutely stunning 68 pages of art from names such as Felicia Atkinson, Frank Baugh, Grant and Rachel Evans, Geoffrey Sexton, and of course Lee Noble and many others.

If you cherish your j-cards as much as your tapes, these will melt your mind until it runs out your ear.