So, what’s new? Well, joining this year’s parade — Ghost, Weird War, the Galactic Zoo Dossier, Papa M, Will Oldham, Faun Fables, Akchoté, Auzet & Ferrari, Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Joanna Newsom, AZITA, The Howling Hex, White Magic, David Grubbs, The Red Krayola, Half Japanese, Noël Akchoté, The Fucking Am and Bill Callahan — is our fall lineup: RTX, Masaki Batoh, Sweet and Honey, On Fillmore, Neil Michael Hagerty and Plush, as well as sweet little enhanced CD-singles from Bonnie and Joanna.

Whee…let’s talk about it, why don’t we!

RT-MF’n-X!
We’ve been murmuring rumors into your rock and roll ear for some time. Now comes the moment of revelation: Jennifer Herrema is back! And she’s riding a black metallic stallion that answers only to the name RTX.

Let’s review: after a decade plus on the vanguard of both outside and inside rock and roll, Royal Trux broke up during the Pound for Pound tour of 2000. Two years later, the archival release Hand of Glory fluttered forth like a shroud into the marketplace. Yet even during these darkest of days, wheels were turning behind the scene, gears were grinding, doing the work that would lead to the reality of a new RTX.

Starting on September 21, we’ll all be living in that reality. The album is called Transmaniacon. For long-time Trux fans, it’s not only a fresh infusion of the elixir they need to survive, but also a view to a hitherto terrifying alternate reality: a Royal Trux without Neil Hagerty. As you will soon hear, there’s no need for concern Jennifer’s got enough of what it takes to go around. Besides, she recruited a couple natural rockers from the southwest coast to fill the ranks of RTX — Nadav Eisenman and Jaimo Welch. With Transmaniacon, their power trio has birthed a massive rock both brutal and beautiful. Check the mp3 on our front page to see for yourself! Jennifer’s deep feeling for the hard and the hazy has manifested itself in an album’s worth of funkily deep-fried tunes buzzing with wack mix tricks and all adorned with that sound we’ve missed these last five years — a multitude of Jennifers, grunting, howling, sneering and generally twisting our native tongue into something entirely their own.

The all-encompassing sound of rock n roll has made it into the latest millennium. It’s the sound of Transmaniacon, by the all-new RTX. You’re invited to get in on it. And before you ask, we’ll clue you: RTX live is gonna happen. First there’s going to be a homestand out in LA — more details as they emerge — and then, slowly, the face of the earth will be covered. Don’t bogart the word! Take one and pass it on — RTX is coming!

WORLDS WITHIN WORLDS
You’ve heard of Ghost’s Hypnotic Underworld? Get ready for Ghost’s Hypnotic World! This year, Ghost are above ground and in force worldwide. First came their glorious return to full length album-dom (their first in five years!), the epic Hypnotic Underworld album. It was released in January and acclaimed everywhere in all four known worlds with great press and steady sales since then...but now comes the monsoon!

September brings a second time around for two Ghost-related titles: Masaki Batoh’s Collected Works 1995-1996 and Sweet and Honey (featuring Masaki Batoh)’s Live at Your Cosmic Mind. This prodigal return features a first on both fronts — the first time Collected Works has been pressed on vinyl (as Collected Works — both “A Ghost from the Darkened Sea,” and “Kikaokubeshi,” which Collected Works collects, were pressed into vinyl); and the first time Live at Your Cosmic Mind has been pressed on CD. Sonic adventurers will be captivated by Collected Works, Batoh’s batch of home-grown cultivated during Ghost’s middle period. Shuffling an EP of earthy folk music with an EP of stellar ambience, Collected Works expands before your mind — fit it all in at your own peril! Live at Your Cosmic Mind is an ice-hot jam that may bring to the shattered remnants of your mind memories of distant Hawkwind and Blue Cheer jams. Sweet and Honey have a few different speeds and shift through them admirably, packing it all in in a non-stop forty minutes or so. Packaged in a colorful explosion of lysergic shapes and colors, Live at Your Cosmic Mind bangs the head that does not bang as well as blowing the mind that’s already gone.

Both these items will be along for the ride on Ghost’s Arthur-sponsored national tour which commences in New York on September 21st and rolls along for another two weeks across the northern hemisphere of America. We say this every time, but don’t miss them! They only make it over once every few years. Batoh, Kurihara and Co. have an extensive set to play — it promises to be a jam-packed evening out. West-coasters have it good: the show from Seattle to LA features a hydra of freaky Drag City acts: Ghost, White Magic and Six Organs of Admittance. So if you’re going to San Francisco, be sure to wear some flowers…you know the rest, right?

Then there’s the DVD called Metamorphosis: Ghost Chronicles 1984-2004. Duplicating the length of an actual Ghost show (yet drawing from live appearances over the last two decades), this disc will include almost three hours of live Ghost! There will also be a disc of sonic rarities as well. We can’t say more at this time — the Chronicles are still in production. They’ll be there to greet you in the New Year.

Enjoy these worlds while you can — as the poet says, in the next world, you’re on your own.

THE NMH REPORT
The Howling Hex's 3rd opus is SOA: Sold-out On Arrival! The Return of the Third Tower completes the set of limited-edition vinyl-only audio diaries issued over the course of the last year. And now that they’re all bought and sold, Neil Michael Hagerty is returning to the world of non-limited-edition, non-vinyl-only, non-audio-diary rock and roll. That’s right, sometime in the late winter/early spring of next year, you can expect the official follow-up to The Howling Hex opus of May 2003. He’ll have an all-new Howling Hex band backing him, too as live dates will prove to you as they occur.

But before that happens, we cordially invite you to take a detour into Neil's third excursion into the mad, mad, mad, mad world of publishing. In November, we’ll be releasing his second book, entitled Public Works. In past Neil Hagerty writings, different literary traditions have been cut-and-pasted together to form such elusive works as Victory Chimp (a Joycian sci-fi detective narrative) and The Adventures of Royal Trux (the definitive rock-n-roll comic book!). This time, different traditions are observed and subverted in a series of short pieces shuffling fiction with essays on a diversity of topics (ranging from pop-culture critiques to sociological treatises). Always standing on unique ground, Public Works is in a spirit of the times that you may not be aware of until you read it.

We wish you a fruitful harvest season this fall — you’ll need all your mental reserves to deal with the various hands Neil Michael Hagerty has in store for you in the months ahead.

THE QOMING OF QUAKEBASKET
Drag City welcomes to the fold Tim Barnes’s Quakebasket label! Home to such sonic beauty merchants as Schumaker, Minimao, Bassara and the Barnes-Kotche Duo, Quakebasket will now be released selected titles through good ol’ Drag City. And in return, we’ll start to offer catalog pieces through our mailorder service. But first…

This fall, we’re proud to present the third release from On Fillmore, Sleeps With Fishes. This is the work of Glenn Kotche and Darin Gray, two men whose combined pedigree is long and lustrous (names of the most famous collaborators? Jim O’Rourke, Grand Ulena, Loren Mazzacane-Connors and Wilco!) and whose talents run deep as their pedigree does long. Glenn’s one of the top drummers in the world today, his questing imagination grabbing at everything in the room but the kitchen sink (and he’ll be playing that on the next On Fillmore release!). Darin is equally adept and totally progressive as hell on both electric and acoustic bass, finding spaces both rhythmic and melodic and relating to his partner with an extra-sensory tenderness recalling the collaborations of Jim Hall and Ron Carter but with freer, more unpredictive textures. Elsewhere, they may remind you of Kenny Wheeler; elsewhere, Thelonious Monk. When the music’s over however, you will know that you’ve been listening to the highly original work of On Fillmore.

Look for Sleeps With Fishes on September 21st, along with the RTX, Masaki Batoh and Sweet and Honey releases.

PLUSH LIFE
Think time passes slowly here? In the decade since the debut 7” single from Plush in 1994, the world has seen a mere two Plush albums (and a pair of swinging singles from the albums, to be completely accurate). Ah, but good things do take time and we’re always willing to wait the time it takes Plush to get it together (even when we aren’t releasing the good things ourselves). So imagine our pleasure in announcing a new full-length release, courtesy of Sea Note, this November! There’s only one hitch — it’s actually only a partially new release. You want us to come right out and say it? It’s called Underfed — and it’s an “official bootleg” of 2002’s Fed CD (on Afterhours/P-Vine)! You’ll have to wait until next year for genuinely new Plush music — but in the meantime, we think that getting Underfed is just what you’ll need. See, in case you hadn’t heard, Fed is one of the world’s most elaborate pop music recordings, with layers of overdubs atop further layers, not to mention the original tracks. Then there’s Underfed. This version of the album is composed of earlier versions of the songs. Overdubbed not quite so extensively with Plush’s signature collection of Chamberlin and Mellotron sounds, Underfed has “Recorded at Home” scratched into the play-out groove (figuratively, that is — it’s a CD only release, okay people?). It also features the unhindered joy and psychedelic madness that didn’t always make it into the mix of Fed. We’re always pleased to offer up an alternative reality — with Underfed, you get two for the price of one: the alternate reality show that is Plush, and the alternate reality soundtrack (to the unreleased film) called Underfed.

GOOD THINGS COME IN SMALL PACKAGES
Jeez, that’s a bit of a loaded statement, isn’t it? In our case, it’s also a true one. Case in point: these cool little enhanced CD5s we’re putting out this year. Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s first one is already out. The “Agnes, Queen of Sorrow” enhanced CD5 contains one cut from his Greatest Palace Music album of earlier this year, two cuts not previously released anywhere, and enhancement allowing the lucky owner of the disc to view the video for “Agnes.” It’s not a holygram or anything — you view it on your television machine. God, getting straight with the current technology fucking rules.

Inspired by how cool this is, we’ve already got two more enhanced CD5s in production. First is another Bonny CD single, this one for “No More Workhorse Blues” — the video of which is currently on the front page of the website (update: check back again Nov 2nd!)! Again, two more non-LP cuts will be added to the album track and video version one of which is stellar cover of a Judee Sill song (title to be revealed in the next newsletter! In the meantime, we expect and encourage lots of speculation). The video is a truly creepy offering from none other than Bonny buddy Harmony Korine — who also doubles as a filmmaker, poet and starfucker when not palling around with our boy and making a video for one of his great new songs.

And if that isn’t enough for your small screen wish list, dig this — our all-American sensation of 2004, Joanna Newsom, is also coming out with a little single of her own. This one features “The Sprout and the Bean” from the runaway hit The Milk-Eyed Mender, as well as the video for the same. The non-LP track is called “What We Have Known,” and it measures at a whopping six minutes plus! A live favorite whenever it’s played, this bonus track is now a bonus for you, the listener.

Good things — get ‘em when they come in small packages.

THE RETURN OF THE RED KRAYOLA
Last release date, we took pride in doing something we hadn’t done for years — selling a new Red Krayola title into the marketplace! That’s not a completely true statement, actually...first of all, it was two Red Krayola titles and secondly, neither one was strictly new — Singles being a compilation of released and unreleased sides from ’68 to the present; Japan In Paris In L.A. being an unreleased soundtrack album from 1998. Suffice to say, neither was previously available in the form we offered it up. This was exciting, but now comes the great news of three Red Krayola dates scheduled for this fall! And none of them in LA! Chicago, New York and Philadelphia are where the sightings are planned. Citizens of these metropolii are advised to 'people, get ready' for Mayo Thompson’s semi-free form semi-freak out, 2004-style!

GET ME TO THE WORLD ON TIME!
That’s the utterance heard every time a Drag City artist enters their customized stretch-limo, -SUV, or chopper (with optional sidecar), en route to their latest live appearance. And these days, that utterance is becoming a downright catchphrase! Just take a look at the Tours page to see all the artists on tour and the dates they intend to play. At the end of August, AZITA’s playing gigs up the Eastern seaboard, in the mid-East and in the near mid-west, concluding in Chicago, natch. If you haven’t seen her piano rock, come to see the show! Faun Fables is hitting the rest of the UK and the continent to visit favored old haunts, then heading south, to the mythical world of New Zealand. There’s that fortnight plus of Ghost dates in these United States (which we’ve already hyped you on) that will include selected dates with Six Organs of Admittance and White Magic (who’ve also got dates with Fiery Furnaces!)! (Smog)’s off to Europe, to play a bunch of shows with Joanna Newsom over there. And Joanna will be playing shows on her own both before and after the (Smog) days are done. Also way over there is Six Organs of Admittance, who’ll be making it happen in Lisbon in early-mid-September (and yeah, putting out a record or three with us eventually, we promise!). Weird War also have a European landing planned more on which below. Meanwhile, on the road that never ends, you’ll find plenty of Hamburger — Neil Hamburger, that is! He’ll be found in the general whereabouts of the Pacific Coast Highway in late September and early October, avoiding the sun at all costs (he doesn’t tan, he burns!) and playing shows everywhere they’ll have him. And then there’s the return of The Red Krayola, the amazing facts of which we just laid on ya.

It’s not liver than we’ve ever been — but it’s pretty damn live, wouldn’t you say?

FROST IN OCTOBER
While on the topic of live, Edith Frost lives again! It’s a small thing, really — Edith opening a gig for Jolie Holland at Schuba’s on October 8th — but read between the lines, if you would. This is the start of something fine — the return of Edith Frost to full-time musical status. Later this year, she’ll embark upon a tour of the western states (dates will be posted soon) and early next year, for the first time in several years, she’ll be recording a new album. Edith, welcome back!

HAPPENINGS IN THE WAR ROOM
Like any really good conflagrations, Weird War just don’t quit! The gigs just keep on a-comin’, with a couple scattered dates in the USA setting the scene for a full-scale invasion of Europe in the later shades of the fall (more details when we have more details). Even more exciting is their preparation of new material for (yes!) another Weird War album in 2005. If you can’t wait until then for a fresh blast of Weird-ness, head down to the newsstand and ask for a copy of Las Historias Mas Sexy Del Mundo. This work of graphic art features stills of Weird War alter-ego Scene Creamers performing in the film of the same name. In case you don’t “get” Spanish, the translation is, roughly, “Sexiest Stories in the World.” Which makes sense — you’re talking about a Scene Creamers performance! The rest of the film keeps the faith as well, with a series of soft-core vignettes in the style of European late night television. Coming soon on DVD, this extremely moving picture captures Scene Creamers in action, playing their music in appropriately rhythmic style shortly before heading off to (Weird) War. The movie sounds like a universal language to us, but if you really want to understand the comic, you better sharpen up your Spanish — in tribute to the red-shirted martyrs of the Revolution, the dialog balloons are all in Spanish. Ay — no bueno!

BANDWIDTH ON THE RUN
Hey, are you paying attention? Like, for instance, did you notice about a month ago when we abruptly dropped the videos off our front page? Did you see that they’re back there now? The news behind the headlines is this: we had so many people logging on to see the Bonnie and Joanna videos available there for downloading, the damn thing was giving us no end of trouble. Crashing had nothing to do with it — but it was costing us millions! It’s nothing a new Silver Jews record won’t make back in a jiffy, but that means squeezing David Berman. And he screams like a girl whenever we ask for a new record. Long story short, we went out and got us some more bandwidth. Plus, we’re releasing the videos on enhanced singles, as we mentioned above. Didn’t you say you were paying attention?

BONNIE, SWEENEY AND THE ‘WOLF
The world is rife with rumors, and none more pervasive than the swirl of rumors which surround Bonnie “Prince” Billy. That’s why you got your Drag City Newsletter, to set things straight when you don’t know who to believe. And so, here’s news of a love you can count on — a new album from the Bonnie “Prince.” This time, he’s working in collaboration with that grime-streaked NYC music-ho’ Matt Sweeney. Together, they’ve put together a record to be known as Superwolf. So the next time somebody asks you what’s up with Bonny Billy and the Wolfman, set ‘em straight, would you? Christ, where do these rumors get started?

NEXT YEAR IN REVIEW
If we seem distracted, it’s because we’re already working on next year! There’s that Superwolf album mentioned above, but there’s also just-finished works from Alasdair Roberts, Neil Michael Hagerty, and the Howling Hex and newest stable member Six Organs of Admittance. The Six Organs record is the only one we’ve heard any of, and it’s chock-ful of acoustical breakdowns, ethereal tunes and a jam to end all jams. Look forward to it! In the land beyond Six Organs of Admittance, there’s the records as yet unmade: Weird War, Edith Frost, (Smog), and who knows?

SUMMER STOCK
The future, in a word, looks goddamn good but don’t look past the recent past! In other words, don’t forget to invest in our many incredible releases of this past summer. Faun Fables’ full discography, three records strong, is now available even to Joe Casual Fan with the reissues of Early Song and Mother Twilight. David Grubbs’ latest release, A Guess at the Riddle is on many of our best-of lists for 2004! The Red Krayola Singles is a long-overdue anthologizing of the singles and rarities from their 30-year history. And Bill “(Smog)” Callahan is now a full-fledged artist with the issue of three comic-book sized (and priced) selections from his sketchbooks (picture something a bit more adult even than an issue of Cherry Pop-Tart — but without those filthy word-balloons) — and don’t forget, he’s got a book coming before too long as well! Then there’s the new chapter of rock that just opened up when The Fucking Am shipped GOLD.

It’s a great summer. Enjoy it while you still can...with all these great new Drag City releases.

SHE’LL BURY US ALL
It’s about time to put this newsletter to bed. And no matter where you are, perhaps you too could stand another few minutes in the sack. It’s tiring, this world of ours. But however tired we get, we can always rest assured that no matter how busy our day was, it was busier for AZITA. Her Life on the Fly campaign remains in full flight, with dates scheduled everywhere she can get ‘em. Chances are, she’s playing live right now — why aren’t you there? Don’t say you’re reading this newsletter, because that’s obvious. The question is, why aren’t you reading this newsletter on your laptop, while watching AZITA with the other eye and downloading videos, buying Special Offers and generally living your Drag City life to the fullest?

Don’t answer that — there’s too much to do! We’ll tell you more about it — soon…

Rian Murphy
Drag City Inc.
August 2004