MK ULTRA

With a broken foot Nick Huffman climbed 3 flights of stairs to Studio Diablo for talk and rock. Loads of un PC talk.

AC/DC‘s latest album, “Power Up”, has topped the U.K. chart with the biggest first-week tally of 2020 so far.

Notching up 62,000 chart sales, the legendary hard rockers have comfortably taken their place at the top of the 2020 leaderboard of fastest-selling albums, overtaking Kylie Minogue, who racked up 55,000 chart sales of “Disco” just last week, and is this week’s No. 5.

Celebrating the band’s chart victory, AC/DC‘s Angus Young tells OfficialCharts.com: “A very big thank you to everyone who put in their time, effort and creativity to get ‘Power Up’ to No. 1! Also a big shoutout to all our fans, old and new. You are, and always have been, our guiding inspiration.”

“Power Up” is AC/DC‘s first U.K. No. 1 since the 2010 soundtrack album “Iron Man 2”. The legendary hard rockers also topped the chart with 1980’s “Back In Black” and 2008’s “Black Ice”.

In the U.S., “Power Up”, is expected to shift between 105,000 and 115,000 equivalent album units in its first week of release. Of that sum, between 100,000 and 110,000 are projected to be in traditional album sales.

Back in December 2014, AC/DC‘s previous album, “Rock Or Bust”, sold around 172,000 copies in the United States in its first week of release to debut at position No. 3 on The Billboard 200 chart. This marked a huge drop from the opening number of AC/DC‘s 2008 CD, “Black Ice”, which topped sales charts in 29 countries, including the U.S., where it sold an incredible 784,288 in its first week — making it the band’s first-ever No. 1 debut on the U.S. album chart. “Black Ice” went on to sell another 270,923 units in its second week, bringing the first two weeks’ sales in the U.S. to over 1 million copies. Sold exclusively at Walmart, Sam’s Club and ACDC.com in the U.S., “Black Ice” quickly became the biggest-selling rock record of 2008.

“Power Up” features AC/DC‘s 2020 lineup of Brian Johnson (vocals), Phil Rudd (drums), Cliff Williams (bass), Angus Young (guitar) and Stevie Young (guitar).

The LP was recorded over a six-week period in August and September 2018 at Warehouse Studios in Vancouver with producer Brendan O’Brien, who also worked 2008’s “Black Ice” and 2014’s “Rock Or Bust”.

“Power Up” is available in multiple configurations, including digital, CD, and deluxe versions. The limited edition, one-of-a-kind deluxe “Power Up” box is the ultimate fan package. Hit the button on the side of the box and watch the flashing neon AC/DC logo light up while the opening bars of “Shot In The Dark” blast out of the built-in speaker. Inside the box is the full CD package in a soft-pack with a 20-page booklet that features exclusive photos and USB charging cable allowing the box to remain powered up and on display. The vinyl LP was pressed on 180-gram vinyl and housed in a gatefold jacket. Limited-edition variants of the LP are available at select retailers nationwide, as well as the band’s online store.

“Neither punk nor metal, Motörhead played rock & roll nastier, grittier, and snarlier than their forebears on Ace of Spades.”- Rolling Stone magazine, November 2020 

“As great as the original 1980 studio album is – and fuck, man, it is, with hit ‘Ace Of Spades,’ ‘(We Are) The Road Crew,’ ‘Jailbait’ and all – you ain’t lived until you’ve heard this box set’s two double live albums taken from the Ace Up Your Sleeve tour.” – Everett True – Loudersound, November 2020. 

“‘Ace of Spades” 40th anniversary set [is] another must-purchase for any diehard MOTÖRHEAD fan. So far, the opening of the vaults shows the evident love and care put into these efforts upon first cracking open the boxes, and that same love and care results in archival efforts that are worth revisiting in the years to come. 9/10.” – Blabbermouth, October 2020 

“Whoa, there it is! This is gorgeous. Ohhh, the weight! There’s a lot of vinyl in this box set. Aren’t you stoked? We are getting unreleased MOTÖRHEAD on vinyl. Are you kidding?!?” – Henry Rollins, unboxing video, October 2020 

MOTÖRHEAD’s Ace of Spades 40th Anniversary celebration releases have taken the world by storm once more, establishing this landmark album as being of eternal importance to music culture. With a centerpiece deluxe edition box-set, comprising the original album, two previously unreleased live albums from the Ace Up Your Sleeve tour, a DVD compilation, 40-page book, poker dice, tour program and other treasures, Ace of Spades has landed on the US NACC charts at #1, crashed the German charts at #10 (the same position it hit on initial release in 1980), #4 in Sweden and stormed into the UK rock & metal chart at #4, while in the US sales charts, …Spades has hit the top 100.  

The media has not been shy in singing its praises either, with publications from Rolling Stone to Classic Rock extolling it’s virtues (and volume), and cover stories on 11 publications throughout the UK/Europe, including Classic Rock, Metal Hammer, Rock Hard and Sweden Rock magazines. Sirius XM held a special MOTÖRHEAD celebration, with WWE super-star Triple H hosting a show which included the likes of Slash and Duff from Guns N’ Roses, Ozzy Osbourne and of course Phil Campbell and Mikkey Dee explaining why Ace of Spades remains one of the greatest rock albums of all-time. 

The box-set, deluxe box-set, 2 CD edition and 3 LP editions are still available in very limited quantities at certain retailers and outlets, and reinforcements are being manufactured to hopefully arrive and meet the demand in late January 2021.

Cleopatra Records presents The Unquiet Grave 2020 featuring 31 international Post Punk, Goth, Industrial, Synthwave and Experimental artists from across the dark music spectrum. Cleopatra, the home of The Goth Box, The Black Bible and many other well-known compilations, began The Unquiet Grave series in 1999 as a way to showcase some of the newer acts from around the globe. The series was resurrected to mark the 20th Anniversary with The Unquiet Grave 2019, prompting such a tremendous response that it led to The Unquiet Grave 2020. This volume features the talents of Ships in the Night, A Cloud of Ravens, The Mystic Underground, I Ya Toyah, The Kentucky Vampires, Red This Ever and Sonsombre side-project Shadow Assembly, just to name a few. Mastered by the impresario DJ Xris Smack at Mindswerve Studios in NYC and compiled by Athan Maroulis, The Unquiet Grave 2020 will be released on December 3rd as a Bandcamp exclusive that is now available for pre-order. For a limited time, Cleopatra has made The Unquiet Grave 2019 a name your price title on Bandcamp as an introduction to the series, while plans for a 2021 edition are already in the works.

https://theunquietgrave2020.bandcamp.com/album/the-unquiet-grave-2020

I recently purchased The Gay Man’s Guide to Safer Sex + 2 by Coil.  I mentioned it to Alex Zander and he asked me to share my thoughts on it as a retrospective review. The Gay Man’s Guide to Safer Sex by Coil was originally written for an instructional documentary (of the same name) on VHS in 1992 for Pride Video. It was recently re-issued by Danny Hyde and licensed to Musique Pour La Danse in 2019 (France and Switzerland). The track listing is as follows:

A1. Alernative Theme From the Gay Man’s Guide To Safer Sex

A2. Exploding Frogs

A3. Nasa-Arab 2

B1. Nasa-Arab

B2. Omlagus Garfungiloops

B3. Theme From The Gay Man’s Guide to Safer Sex

To sum up this release, it’s a nice addition to your Coil collection or as a mellow loungey Twin Peaks-esque album for whatever activities you might encourage. It’s a soundtrack that’s as intriguing as it is relaxed. It has a style that easily alternates from ambient to loungey house. If left to the theatre of the mind, it evokes a myriad of scenarios and settings that all encourage relaxation. 

The Theme and Alternative Theme From The Gay Man’s Guide to Safer Sex are exclusive to this album. Omlagus Garfugilops and Nasa-Arab were originally on Stolen and Contaminated Songs, which was composed of outtakes and remixes of songs from their album Love’s Secret Domain.  Exploding Frogs is a remix of Omlagus Garfugilops. 

On a side note, Wax Trax records released Love’s Secret Domain in 1991 and Panic in 1994. While living in Chicago in 1998, I had the pleasure of visiting Dannie Flesher at WaxTrax headquarters. While talking with Dannie, I noticed the original cover and layout materials for Panic were fastened to a foam core board behind him. The visit in and of itself was overwhelming but to also see the cover for a single that I had listened to endlessly sitting right there left me speechless. 

• Mark Williams Baton Rouge, Louisiana, USA for MK ULTRA MAGAZINE