What a super strong opener. 8 minute epic took me on a trip.
I gotta say I was not a huge fan of People Music and Cantelope Island on every playthrough. When I was in the right state of mind, these were great soundscapes to get lost in. When I wasn’t feeling them, they were kinda easy skips. Moreso Cantelope I think than People Music. I like what @lucid said about animal crossing though, that does make Cantelope Island a bit more endearing in my eyes (ears?).
Spider picks things up again a bit (again agree w/ @lucid on the tv sitcom take ). And then Gentle Thoughts is just a silky smooth space disco jazz number. A real pillar of the album here, maybe my favorite overall. Swamp rat is a slight come down/phase out and we finish with Sansho Shima … honestly it was a bit too chaotic for me especially when Swamp Rat just nailed a perfect ending to this album. Obviously Herbie knew best but I could take this album without Sanso Shimo as the closer.
Overall I absolutely loved this album. Such cool sounds throughout, something that is endlessly listenable front to (almost) back. This album will stay in my rotation forever! Thanks for the suggestion.
Week 8 Twisted Crystal by Guerilla Toss
(Neopsychedelia, Zolo, New Wave, Art Pop, Dance Punk, Noise Pop)
Last week, we experienced an array of innovative sounds from Herbie Handcock on his 1976 album, Secrets. Let’s fast forward to 2018 and listen to some wild explorative innovations in sound from Guerilla Toss on their album Twisted Crystal.
This week, I’m more than happy to announce this album as my first pick for the club. Guerilla Toss is definitely one of my favorite bands around at the time. Their work is underrated and deserves more attention. Guerilla Toss is a band people should be keeping their eyes on. They’re making moves out here!!! I feel like a lot of Gizzheads would appreciate their style. Like King Gizzard, Guerilla Toss aren’t afraid of being themselves and cultivate a very distinct sound resulting in highly expressive songs that really set them apart from the rest. They aren’t afraid of getting weird and embrace the absurdity of sound allowing them to create music freely however they like. I’ll let their music do the talking though. Buckle up for a wild magical ride.
It’s actually perfect timing for my pick this week because I get to see them live in Atlanta on Friday. They are on tour with Karina Rykman now. I highly recommend people to catch a show if you can in your city. I was lucky enough to catch them play before Phish at Bethel Woods in 2022. It was crazy because I had only discovered them a week prior. Even though, I didn’t know much of their discography at the time, I was still dancing around in the crowd with my friend, Sebastian. It was impossible not to. Their performance was so energetic and full of life. I had multiple people coming to me and asking me about them. The crowd loves them. I’m excited to see what this performance is going to be like on Friday.
Also, by the way, they are totally apart of the weirdo swarm. More than honored that they actually support our site kglw.net and followed our Instagram page since the early days. After I told them about my experience seeing them live, they actually invited us on the guest list because they really respect what we’re doing. It just makes me happy to see all kinds of people invested and supportive of the site
I would just love if the weirdo swarm could help support them, because they are really cool and some fans just like us !!! Let’s stop gate keeping and get Guerilla Toss to open up for King Gizzard!!! That would be legendary.
I really liked GT Ultra, so I’m excited to check this one out. (Also, I nearly submitted “Crystal Run” from GT Ultra for the Music League’s Future–I probably should have!)
@lucid, they’re touring with Rykman? That combo really surprises me for some reason.
Hell yeah dude. Glad you liked it. I really liked how you broke down each song haha, and the vibes they put in your head. Fun way of thinking about it, and kind of relatable.
YEAH DUDE. This is how i found this album, I got this song on a station at some point. Such a good, chill vibe. I REALLY like the quote “it makes you feel like a great thing is just moments away!” YES. that made me laugh and so happy to read haha.
So you introduced me to Guerilla Toss with Famously Alive, which I loved. I checked out a couple more of their albums and liked those too, but this was my first time with Twisted Crystal and I think its my favourite so far.
Like @RattleRattleRattle I’m thinking along the lines of the future round of the music league. The song he did end up submitting for that was from Deerhoof’s Breakup Song, which I regretted not choosing from at the time, and am getting strong vibes of with Twisted Crystal. So far it seems to have more of that brighter, fuzzier energy than their noisier stuff, so for first thing Monday morning I really enjoyed the euphoria that brings.
First three tracks and Walls of the Universe were the highlights straight up; and all I wished for was that it was longer!
An adjective I’ve used to describe certain types of music sometimes is “fucky”. I ASSUME it’s somewhat universal except people are just using another word, but it’s always a good thing for me. Stuff that’s weird and almost like, kinda BAD sounding (in a good way). Magic is Easy certainly fits in that catagory, and was a great intro song for this album. Reminded me of the band Palm a little bit. I was on a run while listening to it so I didn’t catch the track names aside from Come Up with Me, which I REALLY liked. Fucky new wave sounding track. Really enjoyed the rest of the album too, weird and fun. Thanks for sharing, looking forward to listening to more of their music, and seeing them open for King Gizz some day!
A great album, Jesus Rabbit and Meteorological are delights, and the syncopation on the chorus vocals for Hacking Machine are a really neat piece of songwriting. I had the chance to see them live this spring, they’re so much fun and put on a great show, I’ll post the setlist in the thread when I get home.
So I checked out their album GT Ultra earlier this summer. I think they posted a pic with Trey, right? Whenever that happens, I check out the band. I liked GT Ultra but I didn’t love it, although one track went straight to my main playlist, “Crystal Run.”
I was really hoping that Twisted Crystal was going to be more along the lines of “Crystal Run” (titles are similar!) and I wasn’t disappointed. Twisted Crystal is GREAT. I really appreciate the length. Sometimes, albums go on for tooooo long. This was something that occurred to me when listening to earlier picks in this thread. Lots of bands in the 90s/00s seemed hellbent on filling every second of the CD, one of my own picks included. None of that here. This is tight and focused avant synth pop. A concise and powerful group of tunes. I’m officially convinced that GT would make for perfect KGWL warm-up tunes, but I hope to see them no matter who they’re playing with next time they swing through my neck of the woods. Awesome choice!!
I’m so glad to see that everyone has enjoyed the album so far. I didn’t really get the new wave comparison until I listened to this song off Gary Numan’s album Replicas today . This shit sounds like a Guerilla Toss song! Like spot on haha
Looks like I got picked for this week so here we go!
Modern Vampires of the City - Vampire Weekend
This is one of my favorite albums. Rostam’s production is fantastic as always and the Songwriting is great as well. Hannah Hunt is a stand out track that is widely regarded as one of their best songs.
I got really into Vampire Weekend in college and have caught them live a few times. They always put on a great show but they’ve gone through an interesting evolution over the years. They started as a 4 piece band and were making some (very popular) east-coast indie music. Rostam, who is a very accomplished producer as well as a singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist, produced their first 3 albums, including this one, after which he departed from the band.
One of the reasons I picked this band and this album is because after this point, the band had a significant shift in sound and style. Notable, they very intentionally ventured into the “Jam” arena on their fourth album. I think this is an interesting especially since this is a King Gizzard community, who have also been leaning more into jams and improvisation lately.
This album, however, is not that. The longest tracks are just over 4 minutes, and at the time their live shows were all pretty straightforward, by which I mean their setlists were all pretty much identical, and they played the songs as they were on the album. (I’m not saying this is a bad thing) It’s a really tight album, and it experiments a little bit but stays within the realm of Indie Rock.
I bring up this band because I think it’s a band with a significantly different style to King Gizzard, yet some surprising similarities. This is my favorite album of theirs and I think the production and songwriting is fantastic. Hope yall enjoy it!
I’m going to cheat a little and link to a song off their most recent album as well:
Finally got through Twisted Crystal a second time. Jesus Rabbit and Come Up With Me are favs so far, but I’m sure that will expand as I get to know the album. It all sounds great and they were an outstanding opener for Pavement in SF last year. I’m most looking forward to seeing them live again as the headliner this time.
I also am late with my feedback… crazy week, sorry! but I really enjoyed this one. listened twice, once when I was running errands during the day and one later at night and it’s definitely a later at night album for me. It can be a bit abrasive and almost chaotic at times (felt like I was in an arcade at times) but ultimately it works for them as those edges frame a quite delightful collection of sounds on this album. Lots of different guitar tones scattered throughout that I really enjoyed.
I think I liked Meterological and Retreat as personal faves thus far. Thanks for the recommendation.
Re: Modern Vampires… one of my faves looking forward to revisiting!
This album to me is like the final nail in the coffin of ‘indie’ music (unless its Tame Impala - Currents ).
Not that there is anything necessarily wrong with that, all round really solid album.
Been a long time since I was compelled to listen to it all the way through and I was surprised out how much Unbelievers, Step, and Diane Young are still burned into my brain from radio play, they’ve always had a very strong ability for ear-worms.
I’ve never followed them that closely and I’m shocked they ventured into jamming after this!
Agreed on Rostam’s production, he worked on Frank Ocean - Blonde after leaving the band, which is another good example of this kind of perfect clean sound; knowing that now makes me appreciate it more revisiting this.
2013 was my first year having moved out of home, though Vampire Weekend was never at the forefront of my taste, those radio singles still take me right back to that time which is a nice feeling.
It was really surprising to me too. Apparently Ezra got really into Dead and Phish and the drummer is in a jam band called Taper’s Choice. It was kinda wild to hear them jam out an extended version of Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa at a show. “8 minute cape cod” has turned into a bit of a meme/inside joke within the VW fanbase. They’ve also started encouraging tape trading and bootleg merch.
). And then Gentle Thoughts is just a silky smooth space disco jazz number. A real pillar of the album here, maybe my favorite overall. Swamp rat is a slight come down/phase out and we finish with Sansho Shima … honestly it was a bit too chaotic for me especially when Swamp Rat just nailed a perfect ending to this album. Obviously Herbie knew best but I could take this album without Sanso Shimo as the closer.
Twisted Crystal by Guerilla Toss 
but I really enjoyed this one. listened twice, once when I was running errands during the day and one later at night and it’s definitely a later at night album for me. It can be a bit abrasive and almost chaotic at times (felt like I was in an arcade at times) but ultimately it works for them as those edges frame a quite delightful collection of sounds on this album. Lots of different guitar tones scattered throughout that I really enjoyed.
looking forward to revisiting!
).