ato records Archives - Vinyl From The Vault

Mattiel “Satis Factory”

sfilzen — Fri, 11 Mar 2022 20:42:20 +0000

Mattiel “Satis Factory” 2019. ATO Records. “Nuclear green” vinyl. Indie garage rock with plenty of clever retro nods (rockabilly, Velvet Underground, 60’s Francopop, spaghetti westerns) via Atlanta. We saw Mattiel play last night at Cactus Club here in Milwaukee (kicking off concert season – yay!). The show was enjoyable and they played a mix of songs from Satis Factory, their second album, and material from their soon-to-be released record Georgia Gothic (due to be released March 18th). I really didn’t know what to expect so I was neither surprised nor disappointed that it was just singer Mattiel Brown and guitarist Jonah Swilley with the help of pre-programmed backtracks and a drum machine, their performance backdropped by a collage of weird movie clips. Mattiel is exotically gorgeous like Siouxsie Sioux with an icy yet somehow warm voice that is a blend of Siouxsie and Nico. Jonah Swilley played some great solos and totally rocked his all-red leather gear. We struck up a long conversation with a local Mattiel superfan at the bar before the show. He was planning to see them again tonight in Chicago. We chatted a bit after the concert and his comment was he was no longer heading down for the second show: he was disappointed that they didn’t have a full band and felt that their performance was lackluster. In fairness to Mattiel, they had just driven 8 or so hours from Cleveland and the crowd turn-out at Cactus wasn’t great.

(The lighting at Cactus Club sucked so my photos, even enhanced, kinda suck too.)

Satis Factory is definitely not lackluster. It’s a really excellent mix of garage-friendly styles and Mattiel’s voice keeps the record cohesive. My top track is for sure the slinky-grooved, VU-inspired “Populonia.” Also great are “Je Ne Me Connais Pas,” the rapid speak “Food For Thought,” the 60’s organ gone rollicking wild “Berlin Weekend” (the organ riff more than a nod to “California Sun” by The Rivieras) and the ass-shaking funky “Heck Fire.”

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Amyl and the Sniffers “Comfort to Me”

sfilzen — Mon, 13 Sep 2021 22:43:18 +0000

Amyl and the Sniffers “Comfort to Me” 2021. Limited edition colored vinyl, ATO Records. Released just a couple of days ago (September 10th), Australia’s Amyl and the Sniffers second LP is my most anticipated release of the year and it definitely does not disappoint. They are, hands-down, the BEST new punk group around. We were supposed to see them in May of 2020 (cancelled), then again in October (cancelled). Thankfully we got to see them back in July of 2019 in a super-small local club and it was pure awesome insanity.

Comfort to Me is hard, fast, balls-to-the-wall fury, full of snarl and speed-metal shredding. I can feel the sweat and swirl of the pit even as I sit alone at my computer. My top tracks are “Freaks to the Front” (I’m already anticipating the call-to-arms at the next Amyl show we go to), the angriest song about road tripping ever: “Hertz,” “Capital” (some serious Motorhead vibes on this one), the 200mph “Don’t Need a Cunt (Like You to Love Me)” and “Laughing.”

I’m not sure if all of the vinyl editions include it, but our gatefold limited edition release includes a 16-page “CTM Zine” full of notes, band photos, and an…interesting self-portrait by singer Amy Taylor. There’s even a couple of recipes, like one for Rock n Roll/Bachelor “Spag Bol” (spaghetti for one…Eat until ya munt ya dirty dog).

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Two Gallants “We Are Undone”

sfilzen — Mon, 22 Mar 2021 18:06:39 +0000

Two Gallants “We Are Undone” 2015. ATO Records. On orange and black marbled vinyl, We Are Undone is Two Gallants’ fifth album. Its punk-blues indie rock style skews lo-fi with a decent amount of crunchy guitars. However, there’s variety and texture beyond a typical alt-rock style. Melancholy and somewhat sinister bluesy piano is front-and-center on “Invitation to the Funeral” and the low key “My Man Go” is super-mellow and spacey, though a couple of the laid-back tracks veer into shoe-gaze blues (if that’s a thing? and if it is, it’s really not my thing). Some songs would find themselves right at home on some early Black Keys records (the title track “We Are Undone, “Some Trouble”), others nod back to the duo’s early toe-dips into grunge as a teenage metal/grunge cover band (like the loud-quiet-loud “Fools Like Us” or the “Age Nocturne” half of “Murder the Season/The Age Nocturne,” the “Murder” half is the above-mentioned shoe-gaze blues), while some sound like 80′s era jangly power pop/college rock (“Incidental”). Overall it’s a good record and part of it straddles several of the genres that I most listen to though the other part is really not my thing. We Are Undone has been in the should-it-stay-or-should-it-go pile for awhile now, I believe, and my mind isn’t totally made up. It’s one of those situations where if I saw the band live, I’d probably be definitively persuaded one way or the other.

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Amyl and the Sniffers “Live at the Croxton”

sfilzen — Wed, 20 May 2020 19:05:42 +0000

Amyl and the Sniffers “Live at the Croxton” 2020. ATO Records. 3-song 7″ recorded at The Croxton Bandroom in Melbourne, Australia on August 30th, 2019 by one of the most exciting new punk bands around. We saw Amyl and the Sniffers perform these three tracks from their 2019 s/t LP – “Control,” “Gacked on Anger,” and “Shake Ya” – a month earlier in late July 2019 at the Cactus Club in Milwaukee. I still can’t believe they played such a small club in our neighborhood (they are TOTAL rock stars; I think their glorious mullets might even have their own fan pages) – I have no idea what the capacity of Melbourne’s Croxton is but I’m guessing it’s a few hundred more at minimum than the Cactus Club’s and there certainly were zero beefy security guys up front, just my tiny friend Claire and her buddies using their bodies as shields from the whirling pit of bodies moshing and stage diving behind and over them. The Sniffers’ live shows are out of control – I haven’t experienced energy like that at a punk show since the 80′s – and I can’t wait to see them again. They were supposed to play earlier this month but of course, like everything, it was cancelled. We’ve got tickets to see them in Chicago in October (I think) and I’m hoping hoping hoping this show happens.

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