New Noise: Thomas William, Fig., Ramps, Spartak

Improvisation, post-punk and one transformative slow-down make up this week’s roundup of new music.

[Historical image is withheld pending rights review.]

– Sydney producer Thomas William has just put up a new track called ‘No It Don’t’, which slows the Chief Keef track of the same name into something narcoleptic and cavernous. It doesn’t have the pinging complexity of ‘Boy Sauvage’ or some of his other work but, then again, it doesn’t aim to. It’s a slow-moving mood piece that’s happy just to distort the DNA of the original. Download it free below.

– Familiar with Eternal Soundcheck? It’s been a video blog, documentary film, late-night 4ZZZ radio show and a mail-order distro. Now it’s a label, and its first release is the 7” EP Fig. 1 by Brisbane trio Fig.. Comprised of Leighton Craig, Sandra Selig and Eugene Carchesio – whose CVs span The Deadnotes, Primitive Motion, Threads, DNE, The Holy Ghosts and The Lost Domain – the band could suitably be called “minimalist abstract punk,” says the presser. The EP’s three songs were all one-take recordings and totally improvised. Heard below, opener ‘Here Comes the Bird’ sounds like the house band of NES-era Ghosts & Goblins jamming into wobbly oblivion. The 7” is limited to 50 copies, hand-cut at Small Run in Melbourne. It’s not out until next Monday (Oct 14) but you can pre-order it now.

– Two-guitars-and-drums trio Ramps formed just last year, out of past and present members of Further, Sounds Like Sunset, Grand Fatal, Massappeal and Downtime. The Sydney band sound a lot like Fugazi on ‘City Hands’, the opener of three-song debut Joe. ‘70s Moustache’ has more of a sludgy stoner-rock thing, meanwhile, and ‘Full Hot Orator’ sits roughly in between the two. It was recorded with Tim Kevin (Knievel, La Huva) and launches Friday, November 8 at the Town Hall Hotel in Newtown with Yes I’m Leaving, Berkshire Club and Your Loving Tyrant. More info here. They’re also supporting on Milkmaids’ album launch next Friday (Oct 18) at Petersham Bowling Club, alongside Black Island.

– It’s been a while between physical releases for Canberra duo-turned-quartet Spartak, whose last album Nippon came out in 2011 through New Weird Australia. But now comes a flurry of activity, starting with the collection Fifth Edition: Selected Recordings 2010-2013. It documents new members Matt Lustri and Rory Stenning and traces Spartak’s evolution from – in their words – “free improvisers to a more studio-vs.-live songwriting outfit.” It’s out now on limited CDR plus download through hellosQuare, in advance of gigs in Kuala Lumpur, Singapore and Adelaide. The band’s next proper album, Five Points, is due in early 2014 through Feral Media. In the meantime, check out Fifth Edition starting with opener ‘Child Soldiers’, which forcibly tows rhythmic post-punk into weird and wordy places.

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To nominate new music for this column email us at news@messandnoise.com.