Sun City Girls - Flute and Mask
(Abduction)
Sun City Girls - Wah
(Abduction)
Leave it to the Sun City Girls to go on their first "tour" in the better part of decade and leave still leave around 45 states unvisited by their brand of madness. Further, it should be expected that they would have some exclusive material available on those scant dates. While loyal fans aren't terribly excited to see and hear about this sort of behavior, the band's decision to issue two separate full-length albums as tour-exclusive releases has to be seen as at least somewhat surprising. Unlike other bands who fill the "exclusives" area of their tour merchandise tables with outtakes and the like, the SUn City Girls have stepped up to the plate and delivered two substantial albums that no true fan will want to be without.
Flute and Mask stands as the slightly better of these simultaneous releases, though not by much. From start to finish, the sixteen minute opener entitled "Where's My Fuckin' Jesus?" seems to pick up on the most evil and twisted portions of the Girls' catalog. Reminiscent of the high-tempo portions of the band's classic "The Multiple Hallucinations of an Assassin," the boys are content to release all sorts of unearthly vocal sounds over a constantly shifting musical background. Goucher's drumming remains constant, but the rest is all chiming melodies and other approaches. It is perfect. "I Saw a Cigarette Breathing So I Smoked It" comes up next and is one of the band's standard gamelan tracks complete with ringing and vocals. "Lord Brown of Due South" and "Balcony Sampoerna" keeps the band in Asia sound-wise as they both slowly and calmly roll along. Vocals come back into the fray with the album's final two tracks. "Lord White of the North" and "Dukun Olympic Theater" are both fine additions and further demonstrate that this album should be placed firmly into that great section of the band's catalog with 330,003 Crossdressers from Beyond the Rig-Veda and High Asia.
Wah simply has a much different sound and has already been dubbed the "hippie" record by the band's fans. Titled after the wah pedal present on this entire album, the vocal-free disc is a wide-ranging and open collection of guitar-based noodling. The first four tracks on this disc are all relatively brief by recent Sun City Girls standards. Ranging from two to five minutes, each of these shorter tracks picks and flits around within various slower tempos and helps set up a somewhat mystical mindset. "The Color of Holy Water" is a personal favorite from this suite. "Distored Views" is the final track on the album, and a mighty one it is at thirty-five minutes. Everything that the band hinted at in the previous tracks on this disc is taken and massively expanded on this final cut. A very solid and entertaining album.
Now that it has been three months since the tour ended eBay remains just about the only place where these records will be found. It is a shame that these two quality releases will go unheard by a substantial subsection of the band's fans as both are quality installments in the Girls' ever-expanding discography. Start saving up some cash and track 'em both down.
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