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The mystery of Jacula / Antonius Rex

I written here a complete overview of Jacula/ Antonius Rex that I thought was sorely lacking on the internet, the band seems to be full of self perpetuated myths. If you like scary pipe organ playing, castles, churches, graveyards and the myth of Transylvania, I urge you to get the first three albums...

Jacula- In Cauda Semper Stat Venenum

 Jacula- Tardo Pede In Magiam Versus (the version without the newly created track "Absolution" spoiling it)

 Antonius Rex- Neque Semper Arcum Tendit Rex

...they are three of my favorite albums ever. Their later stuff is extremely patchy and usually lacking in the qualities that make these three albums great.

 Here is the first track of the first album to get you started...

More music links to come

Rise And Fall Of A Decade are my favourite French band of all. They did immensely elegant ethereal music with synthesized classical sounds and had a very light gothic touch. For great ethereal/dreampop sounds they deserve to be spoken of in the same breath as Cocteau Twins, Slowdive, This Mortal Coil, Chapterhouse, Cranes, Alison’s Halo, Lycia and Trance To The Sun. Sadly the singer died several years ago.
The first 3 albums are pure gold. Not a very great selection of their works on youtube but this is the best thing I could find to represent them...



My favourite King Of Fighters tune, from KOF2001.



My favourite Tiny Tim song.



I just discovered Vajra, a Keiji Haino band with a fascinating vocalist called Kan Mikami.



Ruins made a series of medleys. Firstly this their Prog Rock Medley which contains distinctive parts of 39 prog songs, including some slightly obscure stuff. Check the original page for details on each song referenced.



This is their Classical Medley.

...They also did medleys for Hard Rock, Black Sabbath and Mahavishnu Orchestra.

The first time I ever heard of Art Zoyd is when they did a soundtrack to Nosferatu on the first and only version of the film I have seen. It sounded almost too bizarre but the more I watched, the more the madness started to make sense. They did one for Faust that I have not heard. They are prog/rock in opposition.
I think the song below is one of the most irresistible things I’ve ever heard, gorgeous video but it has been cut short, it looks like it was made for something bigger than a regular music video.



It pleases me to see that people have been kinder to Yes in recent years, I’ve heard nice words from Battles(who have an obvious influence in their first album), Sonic Youth, Mark Eitzel (American Music Club), Keith Levene (Public Image Limited), Todd Rundgren, Ariel Pink and Nobuo Uematsu. Mark Kozelek did a cover in his Red House Painters days.

Stephen Thrower did a really lovely defence of them in an issue of Wire and on his blog he posts a slightly longer version. Some may know him as an alternative film journalist, others may know him from his Cyclobe and Coil music...
Thrower's short Yes tribute

Weird album covers

I've been doing loads of music searching lately and found quite a lot of great covers. I cant remember what all of them were from...

I'm sure this was a jazz singer called Gal


This looks like a cd i would buy, but I'm sure the music didnt suit me when I listened.




i'm sure this music wasnt as cool as the cover either...


This would appear to me as a great dreampop album but it is actually hard rock.


Yamashita Yosuke Trio- Arashi. This is supposed to be a really scary free jazz record, legendary but obscure and rare too somehow.




Jneiro Jarel. I think this is a hiphop record.


Klavido- Vidov


Kuroyurishimai- Fukasa. One of the legions of bands that sounds like Dead Can Dance, but I listen to a lot of that, it sounds nice enough.


Locrian- Crystal World


Mahojin- Babylonia Suite. I adore this cover by Remedios Varo, I hoped this would sound as weird as the cover, but it is supposed to be a modestly pleasant mellotron driven album, but I like to pretend dream that this album is one one of the weirdest and greatest things ever made. I often like to look at album covers and be inspired/get ideas for what I think it "should" have sounded like and then do art based on that, just like any other type of cover, poster, advert/trailer/screenshot or name/title that inspires me, it is good to take the expectations and base art on it( however pleasing or different the actual artwork ends up being when you experience it for real).


No Mercy. I hope it sounds as exciting as it looks.


Has anyone heard this? Great cover.


I like covers like this despite some people might find it cheesy and artificial, it still gets my imagination going.




I hope this is good as the cover.


I really want this Aghast album, I'm not sure this is really a cover. But this is some of my preferred type of Black Metal imagery, although I could give countless more types of BM imagery I like, there is a lot of stuff I dont connect with.






Thees Oh Sees. Ayone heard it?


Yoshiko Sai- Taiji No Yume. I think this is one of the best covers ever, she sings slightly moody ballads but nothing as odd and spooky as I would have liked.
You can hear it here


Premiata Forneria Marconi- Storia. I listened to this recently, one of the more famous italian prog albums and I liked it fine, but I wished it sounded more like the cover, some people think it is ugly but I love it.


Don Bradshaw Leather- Distance Between Us. This is a crazy dark prog album with one of the best album covers of all time. It suggests a new level of outsiderness which most proggers and punks never get near. There are a lot of rumors about this band. I can only find half of this, so if anyone can find the whole album please call me.

Incredible Prog videos

This is where I discovered Devil Doll, on this great series of videos, also containing Goblin, Renaissance, Comus and an incredible piece of Vangelis. These videos really filled up my already overly long music wants list. Each video goes from the late 60s to present time,, and they really tend to divide opinion when it gets to the 80s and onward. Annoyingly, the first video was not allowed on Youtube for long because of the big label obvious prog bands. The sidebars on the actual youtube pages for the second and third videos tell you what each album is if you cant work it out from the covers, unfotunately the first video has none of that on its page, so I have no idea who a lot of those bands are.
In some years to come I want to eventually do a similar series of videos on dreampop/etherial music. The only similar thing I've seen to these was an impressive guide to Dark Ambient music. These really get me wanting to explore and search for more epic eargasms. If anyone knows of any other video compilations like this, please do share,, I dont care what genre,, just as long as it is not your standard "my favorite bands" videos you get alot of.