Dex Romwember Duo "Is That You in the Blue?"

(Bloodshot) Even at the heart of his Flat Duo Jets glory days there was always something kind of worn and weary about Dex...like I seem to remember that after every furious song he would look kinda spent and older than he shoulda look, like he had gone beyond what his body wanted him to. He gave it all for rock 'n' roll, Dex was willing to die for us! Well, somehow, decades later, he's more furious, more powerful, and more lively! This heaping helping of vaguely rockabilly/spy rock/torch music has some amazing components...including a sax solo of X-Ray Spex "quality"! But note the spare, solo resonating guitar and the spooky, eerie songs that haunt corners of this record. Don't they seem kinda...ghostly? Maybe he did give it all in the 90s!

Razorcake #62, #63, #64, #65, #66

(www.razorcake.org) The highlight of #62: Obviously having Rev Norb make fun of post-princess-pummeling Ben Weasel is like having a Navy Seal sniper shoot fish in a barrel, but it sure is fun to read! #64 features a genuinely awesome photo of Shannon and the Clams rocking – if Shannon isn’t your current rock n roll crush you need to get your wiring checked. And #65 has them celebrate a decade in publishing the best way anyone could…risking Canadian Ragnarok by putting Nardwuar and Geddy Lee together! And #63 is awesome because Roctober is all over it! They rave about our new book and Roctober contributors put together an amazing history of Tutu and the Pirates! If there’s one thing I love about other magazines it’s being sort of like this magazine! Which points out something interesting about issue #66. In addition to presenting a bushel of contemporary band interviews with better layout and graphics than MRR has set precedent for, they also slyly let us know that they are five times better than us by putting out five issues to every one that we put out in the last 10 months!

Werewolf's "Sobering Up the Wolfman"

(Cassette Deck) Ugly-angle rock 'n' roll that features pelvic-born lupine howling so harrowing and powerful it would make Teen Wolf miss his free throws.

The Listener by David Lester

 (Arbeiter Ring Publishing,) GUEST REVIEW BY ROBERT DAYTON

If you don’t think that art and politics should mix, then vamoose with you. Wait! Come back! Sit down and listen…I mean, read this new graphic novel called The Listener. Yeahhh edutainment! David Lester is known in music circles as  the guitarist in the longtime legendary Vancouver intense avant rock duo Mecca Normal , he is also an artist and graphic designer, The Listener is his first graphic novel, eight years in the making, it is 300 pages long! Black and white and heavy washes ranging all over the grey scale taking stylistic risks that borrow from German Expressionist cinema- often this works, occasionally the odd visual element can be difficult to discern.

This is the Personal as Political. The central character is an artist named Louise. After one of her art pieces spurs a man to take a political action that accidentally causes his death, she leaves Canada and heads to Europe. There she meets numerous people, some of a romantic nature, as they muse and discuss the meaning of art and the power it has. Most impacting is her chance meeting with an elderly couple who saw Hitler’s rise to power firsthand via the 1933 German Elections. At this point flashbacks entwine with present day probings. These rarely told details of the 1933 elections (which David Lester extensively researched) tellingly correspond with the current Canadian political climate showing how certain figures can rise to power, when less than forty percent of the populace vote for them, due to flawed political voting structures and party take-overs. This connection is never made explicit, of course, Lester is too smart for that because nowadays everything gets compared to Hitler, including my delicious breakfast.

It is this encounter that helps Louise work through her guilt. The Listener can cause one to use what personal power they have to try and create a difference. Of course, this graphic novel is realistic enough to show that there will always be naysayers and those who simply just do not get it (nor try to get it). Through acknowledging that fact, it makes utilizing the power of creativity a little easier.

Hellberta by M Comeau

 (Koyama Press) (Guest Review by Robert Dayton) There’s something to be said for residing in the public domain, a certain freedom. Take super heroes for example. These are figures of modern myth . The new gods! And now that copyright law no longer exists one can get rather gnostic and explore the inner light within. Take the mutant Wolverine. He’s been given a sweeping batch of origin stories that are supposed to fit together like a jigsaw puzzle. In the so-called ‘official continuity,’ he might not even be Canadian anymore. He most certainly is in Hellberta! From Alberta! Hellberta. If you are from Alberta and had the urge to escape its’ maw then you would call this frozen redneck prairie ‘Hellberta’. Comeau certainly comes from there, it shows. This distinctly Canadian comic book fractures the narrative in several places below the belt whilst the nastiest of all Prime Ministers, the Neo-Con and Neo-Citran Stephen Harper, is cast as perpetually charmless villain. Nasty representatives of the big C church fight Wolverine as he avenges the death of his best friend, a sweet deer named Mertle, from an exploding gas line.

Red and green scrawled linework is silk screened on yellow paper as Comeau attacks the story with a child-like abandon. The contrasting colour imagery causes mad play on one’s eyes as the story is resolved in a way–gone time flash-forward (Wolverine can live on long time).

Mad Anthony "...I Spent All My Money on Speed Metal"

(Phratry) Mad love for Danzig-esque howls and crunchy Middle Earth ghetto rock assaults!

The Black Widows "Live on KXLU"

(www.theblackwidows.net) This masked guitar band plays ominous, yet mirthful, instrumentals, sorta like a vile Ventures. Or like 1001 Strings, minus 85 strings, plus one awesome cowbell. My fave thing about this band is that Tony Fate uses a cool pseudonym (he's either Dr. Vibe or Count Funkula), even though I assume Tony Fate is already a cool pseudonym.

Ty Segall "Goodbye Bread"

(Drag City) Spare, slightly off-kilter psyche-adjacent pop that's seductive, but the kinda seduction where you wake up in a tub of ice with  a missing kidney.

Big Trouble "The Very Best of Big Trouble - 20 Years and a Million Beers Ago"

(Retrospect) Big Trouble apparently was a 90s hair band that sounds like a milder Poison. You know, a Poison that won't kill you, but might give you stomach troubles. Not to compare this music with diarrhea, as this is pretty fun stuff...way funner than diarrhea! "Circus" sounds exactly like the kinda song that would have a video in heavy rotation on pre-Nirvana MTV. The fact that this band came out at the same time as Nirvana when it was too late to sound like this is probably why they didn't get into as big a trouble as they should have. Includes, out of left field, a country ballad amusingly titled "Popcorn, Whiskey, and Beer."

Stacian "Pul" EP

(Moniker) A powerful synth-psyche spell that turn princes in the kind of toads that make you trip if you lick them.