VIRGIL CAINE LP/1971 US Backwoods Minimal Lo-Fi American Gothic Folk Masterpiece

$

40

VIRGIL CAINE 's/t' LP (US, Time-Lag, Catalogue #Time-Lag 054) Brand new/unplayed copy of superior and limited (edition of 500 copies only) Time-Lag label edition of this strangely haunting, minimal lo-fi backwoods American Gothic folk music masterpiece album by Virginia area trio Virgil Caine (originally released as a private pressing in 1971.)

(NOTE: LIMITED, SUPERIOR TIME-LAG LABEL EDITION OF 500 COPIES ONLY!) 

'First ever reissue of this hopelessly rare & obscure 1971 rural Virginia private press folk masterpiece. A true anomaly in the seemingly botomless world of self released albums, this one charts a truly unique realm all its own. While the sound itself may draw some clear influence from classics of the day, even lifting the band name from a song by The Band, the mood & vibe here is ponderously uncharted territory, seemingly birthed complete from some parallel sonic reality. Crude lo-fi metaphysical basement folkrock filtered through a deeply Southern gothic/appalachian/americana band aesthetic and executed in the purest, most sincere, spontaneous, vibe-thick sense possible. The atmosphere trapped in these grooves is truly as strong as it gets and is sure to engulf any open-minded listener given half a chance. The near magical power of the album seems to lay in its extreme polarization; on the one hand there is a fully developed lyrical depth and intellect that's profoundly poetic, even novelistic, yet the music & recording is shockingly raw, unhinged, completely unselfconscious, and downright weird. It's a dusty, creaky, ebb & flow of clackity percussion, acoustic strum, shaky low-watt electric guitar licks, occasional floorboard rattling bass, and thick southern drawl. Even the recording quality has a bizarre lo-fi character of its own, with some sounds seeming to barely hit the tape at all, while others are wildly overblown, wrapping the whole deal in a gauzy tape hiss fog, with hints of garagy distortion. The album progresses with a casual but surprisingly purposeful intent, hitting an intimately mystical, visionary, dream-like arc through the entire second side of the record and ending in complete dissipation. All taken together it's a seriously teleportive trip to a flicker in time & place that is really quite special. The scratchy textless black & white band photo cover suits the album perfectly: striking yet vague, timeless yet ancient, simple yet mysterious. Pressed on the highest quality 180gm virgin vinyl and packaged in an exact reproduction heavy old-style cover, with exact repro labels. Also includes a double-sided heavy stock insert with new liner notes from main songwriter and vocalist Roger Mannon, as well as introductory notes from band scholar and devoted fan Jack D. Fleischer. One time vinyl only pressing of 500 copies.'

'These guys took their name from the Band, and sound kind of like an 18th generation descendent of them, like the toothless spawn of several generations of inbreeding. The instrumentation sounds as if was recorded 50 years prior, and the singer attempts a Bob Dylan imitation, that is, if Dylan had been wasted on moonshine for the past ten years. When he sings about swamp-witches and home cooking laced with rum he sounds like he hasn't left his shack in the woods since he was a child. I don't mean to pick on these guys. I'm saying they sound this way, not they necessarily are - indeed, these aesthetics were at least partly deliberate. Anyway, this is a perversely fascinating slice of backwoods Americana, surprisingly tuneful and memorable. And while the lead guitarist plays like he has only one string on his guitar and the rhythms aren't always exactly steady, they still give the impression that they've been playing this stuff forever. The closest comparison, I suppose, is the Holy Modal Rounders, but without the Modals' blatent attempts at humor or the knowledge that the last 30 years or so actually happened. In fact, by the end it is hopelessly sad and bleak. Amazing.' - Aaron Milenski/Acid Archives

High-quality 180-gram vinyl pressing.

Tracks on this LP are as follows:

• The Great Lunar Oil Strike, 1976
• There's An X In The Middle Of Nixon
• Biscuit High
• Swamp Witch
• Blackfoot Boojy
• Honey Don't Believe
• The Symbol
• Plains
• Pilgrims Progress
• Hope

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