Zoviet France: Classic or Dud?

decriminalisation of country music - c/d?

C

Decriminalisation of country music is fantastic!

I dunno, it's soooo front loaded - nothing approaches the awesome peak of Something Spooked the Horses. It's the only track which really takes on the country music conceit, and I wish they'd carried it forward more. I do like the other tracks but after that dominating slide guitar they all seem kind of hollow.

Decriminalisation of Country Music is pretty damned classic, but I'd agree that it's a bit front-loaded.

Album reminds me of when I lived in Chicago and would walk around in the winter down by the lake.

DoCM is classic classic classic

There is another thread somewhere where I debate a bit with Mark Spybey concerning the merits of post-Storey Zoviet France. I could swear I read some interview ages ago where there was a reference to the band members having made some sort of lifetime pact to never break up or do solo stuff, which obviously didn't last and might be my imagination. I think later ZF work like Digilogue and DoCM and (ESPECIALLY) Mort Aux Vaches are really high quality, if a bit different in focus than the earlier classics. Less "ethnic music made by aliens" type stuff and more drone-bliss is just fine with me.

decriminalisation of country music - c/d?

this was commissioned for the opening of a big arts space in glasgow called the tramway. they then performed an interpretation of it at the opening. it was wonderful.

They will do a live performance again, opening for Lustmord http://incubate.org/2011/artist/72/Zoviet+France

Live performances these days are rare but not unheard of, they played in London earlier this year. I say "they" but aside from Ben I have no idea who is in the line-up these days or even if it's more or less his solo project.

The string of albums from 1987 (A flock of Roations, Loh Land, Assault and Mirage) is one hell of a run. I cannot get enough of that stuff.

don't forget Gesture Signal Threat! Misfits/Loony Tunes always seemed a little less amazing to me though.

going through youtubes of the early albums I hadn't heard (I'd heard Garista, Gris, Oestre) and... this band sure was good

pretty much everything they did after the Hessian/burlap record is essential imo. sucks that all of it is OOP and insanely expensive.

only heard DoCM but a great album.

How the fuck did I miss that Zoviet France has been podcasting. For awhile too!
http://zovietfrance.podbean.com

tremendous show in SF on Saturday. maybe just rationalizing, but sorta glad that I'm not familiar with their recorded output, had no expectations going in. i was surprised by the hi-def sound palette (think I heard a peaceful forest at one point), less surprised by the droning overlay of dooooom.

their record output (the stuff i know anyway) covers a pretty broad sound palette tbf

I was at that show and "tremendous" was not the adjective I would use to describe my experience

shouting @ the ground

what'd you think of it sarahell?

i missed the openers btw, just caught last hour of ZF's set.

I am a pretty big fan, and I thought the set was outstanding. They could put it out without an edit. Doesn't sound like the 80's, but still has that aesthetic of muddying the line between acoustic sounds you can't quite identify and electronics.

Two nord racks, effects, field recording playback, and a table of tiny flutes / harps / noisemakers next to a microphone. Obviously totally improvised, but fantastic pacing with great builds & shifts & turning of corners. Great to get to see which sounds were being mixed, and which generated live, after years of listening to records where you often did not have a clue what was going on.

who's in the z.f. lineup this month

Discogs lists Ponton and a Mr. Mark Warren as the current memebrs

I wish I could have seen this

Genuinely upset that I missed this.

If it makes you feel any better ... a friend of mine had a ticket and completely missed the show because he figured "oh, doors at 8, headliners won't go on until 10 at the earliest ... " nope.

Discogs lists Ponton and a Mr. Mark Warren as the current memebrs

in that case not really zoviet france imo

u think that w/o Robin Storey it isn't ZF? this band has basically been Ponton & accomplices since the mid-90's.

Guys in 85 or 86 I had a ZF cassette release that came in a kind of rectangular porcelain jug and included a dirty seagull feather. I can't remember what it was called, anyone know?

ew

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popular_Soviet_Songs_and_Youth_Music

dammit xp

http://www.discogs.com/zoviet-france-Popular-Soviet-Songs-And-Youth-Music/release/100568

"Feathers collected from the shores of the Irish Sea, the most radioactive area of seawater on Earth."

i think that wd be it, i've never owned a proper copy, fucken great record tho

it really is, I have a 3CD reissue on Staalplaat

Yeah that's it. I chose to be skeptical abt the feather's provenance at the time

Things I wish I still owned chapter 9064

the reissue has a great package, brown felt with a soviet-era pin. It looks like it's still available from staalplaat

u think that w/o Robin Storey it isn't ZF? this band has basically been Ponton & accomplices since the mid-90's.

feel like the sound changed at that point from classic zf to ponton solo project. decriminalization of country music was good but can't bother with the rest of it

Mort Aux Vaches and especially Digilogue are favorites of mine, but I see yr point

these days all they put out is like 50-copy 8" lathe cut editions

feel like the sound changed at that point from classic zf to ponton solo project. decriminalization of country music was good but can't bother with the rest of it

I do hear what you're saying about the mid-90's run, it wasn't bad but zf went from full spectrum anything-can-happen-next music to solid ambient, precisely at the moment in history where there was so much ambient music coming out that you just needed a break. I thought it was interesting that after they had their first strong well-received post-classic-lineup album decriminalization, instead of flooring it they mostly stopped releasing CDs. Ben said they've been busy the last 10-15 years doing scores for dance performance, and choosing not to put those out. in any case this duo has been stable / playing for almost 20 years and I didn't think that concert embarrassed anyone by being called a zf show.

must admit though, last few days, loaded up my phone with gris / mohnomishe / garista. even on my phone, that music shouldn't exist

what's a good place to start with these guys?

shouting @ the ground

― evangelos (am0n), Monday, September 15, 2014 12:58 PM

ripe for a Vinyl on Demand box set of the 80s run

i don't think it will happen. former members don't want it. i tried to reissue mohnomishe and that was the reason i was given why it wasn't possible.

bummer! some of the most sui generis psychedelic music i've ever heard.

xp: yeah Ponton and Storey are not really on speaking terms or so I've heard

really wish these folks could come to terms on some reissues, it's such a shame that all of the old stuff is $100 or more for like a single CD.

also, has anyone heard this new-ish release?

https://www.discogs.com/zovietfrance-The-Tables-Are-Turning/master/625120

Châsse 3

<3 <3 <3

Most beautiful and integrated package so far, no oddball 7"s or blank sides, just eight gorgeous double albums

I had not actually caught up with 7.10.12 or Tables Are Turning so I am enjoying those a lot

unreleased 2LP "A Long Walk" is good as well

lots and lots of perfectly executed lock grooves this time around

yeah the fact that they had done a Motorhead cover was an interesting discovery.

lol wait what? I missed that somehow

Bomber, it's on the Third Collusion album that mops up various tracks originally released on singles, compilations etc.

Somebody on Discogs has uploaded pictures of this release which have me salivating. Way out of my price range unfortunately but looks magnificent

Bomber, it's on the Third Collusion album that mops up various tracks originally released on singles, compilations etc.

my brain is exploding that they covered it, though listening now on YT and of course they "cover" it as only ZF could.

waiting for this still, but very, very happy that "The Decriminalisation Of Country Music - Themes For Tramway" is finally on vinyl. i was at the live performance they did of it in Glasgow.

i was hoping they would include "Patina Pooling" in this box so i could offload my copy as it is flaking bits of rust all over the place.

xp the albums are being released as individual 2LP standalone as well, 24 euros + shipping via VOD website

Their podcast, "A Duck in a Tree," is worth a listen.

absolutely

lotta cool stuff on their Soundcloud as well

I loved Popular Soviet Songs and Youth Music from 1985, and the 2004 cd edition was fantastic, bound between two round gray felt pieces cut from black market Red Army caps, and held together with a Soviet military pin

lotta cool stuff on their Soundcloud as well

Yes, including a 2018 live recording from Kyiv which they've made available free but are requesting donations for Ukraine disaster relief.

this is blowing my mind still, from the Rapoon thread:

Some of the late 80's - early 90's ZF records were Robin Storey solo with other members just contributing artwork... A Flock of Rotations, Assault and Mirage, Shouting at the Ground, Just an Illusion and Shadow, Thief of the Sun, at the very least.

really? is this confirmed anywhere? so ben ponton only contributed artwork to these???

― stirmonster, Wednesday, March 16, 2022 5:25 PM (six days ago) bookmarkflaglink

Info was on the now-dead unofficial ZF website which had detailed music/production/artwork credits for the whole discography.

― atonar, Thursday, March 17, 2022 5:40 AM (five days ago) bookmarkflaglink

Found it on archive.org:

https://web.archive.org/web/20120320095815/http://www.the-edge.ws/zoviet/disc.html

― atonar, Thursday, March 17, 2022 5:45 AM (five days ago) bookmarkflaglink

Had also heard this at the time from the person who ran DOVe who released 'Shadow...' - arguments around credit and attribution were largely the cause of the fracturing of the group. In any case you can hear the pretty sharp change in sound from 1992 on.

― atonar, Thursday, March 17, 2022 5:50 AM (five days ago) bookmarkflaglink

thanks for the link - fascinating!

93's What Is Not True is one of my very favourite ZF releases but it's undeniable that it is a radical change of sound.

― stirmonster, Thursday, March 17, 2022 6:13 AM (five days ago)

Storey talks a bit more about it in this interview:

https://web.archive.org/web/20010218131126/http://www.pretentious.net/Rapoon/articles/tdr.htm

lol what

I will prob never hear these, but it's a cool idea

via their FB:

Our first NFT (non-fungible tape)
By speeding them up by a factor of several hundred and using extreme audio compression, we've discovered that the entirety of our unreleased recordings will fit onto this 3-minute loop cassette. This will be made available as a one-off exclusive release of its own that will be sold in a private auction tomorrow. The cassette will come with details on the the speed factor used and an explanation of how to decompress the audio. Once sold, these recordings will never be made available again.
To register your interest in participating in the auction, please add your name as a comment on this post.

dude, check the date

ahahaha got me