Fantastic Japan-only CD from Hiragi Fukuda, who you might have spotted as a member of Doronco Gumo on their Old Punks LP. With this new album, Fukuda expands the Doronco Gumo line-up with *two* ex members of Les Rallizes Denudes, bassist Doronco and drummer Mimaki Toshirou alongside violinist Eriko Sato of Maher Shalal Hash Baz. The sound kind of takes off on Doronco Gumo’s weird amalgam of death-decadent balladeering, idiotically stupe destructo rock and Hiroshi Nar styled primitivism but overall the group rock harder and wilder than on their previous outing, even dropping into a classic mirrorshades La Dusseldorf/Suicide style groove on the blasted opener “TV Dinner”. Pretty impressive that Rallizes members are still involved in radical reformulations of the urge to ugh a whole bunch of decades later. More please. Recommended. 

Massively anticipated deluxe 5xLP reissue of one of the most legendary of samizdat recordings from mythic Japanese underground group Les Rallizes Denudes. Originally released on the mysterious Univive label, Phoenix have stepped into the breach and re-packaged it at an affordable price complete with a glossy box and an insert with liner notes from the Spanish author Moshe Idel. Name after the Dylan bootleg that launched the whole under-the-counter-culture industry, Great White Wonder is a career-spanning overview of primo Rallizes material, stretching from 1974-1980. Disk 1: Meiji Gakuin University, Tokyo, 13/7/74. Disk 2: Shibuya Adan, Tokyo, 1.10.75. Disk 3: Maison Franco-Japonaise, Tokyo, 22.7.77. Bonus Disk: Kanagawa University, 7.11.80. The ‘74 set is a real lip-curling/punk-primitive ride, with some metal-filing guitar cut with ginchy ballads and wild soloing that’s as wayward as Matthew Valentine culminating in a Sweet Sister Ray-style mind-meld version of “The Last One”. The ‘75 disc has a slightly stronger taste of acid, with a heavy delay-damaged sound, a classic track-listing and endless strung-out vocal/guitar forevers. Totally classic. As anyone with a mainline to the true sound of the underground will tell you, 1977 was of course *the* year of the Rallizes (forget The Pistols!) and the 77 set is pure nada-blues destructo-rock with a gorgeous ballroom-dissolving-in-space sound that is perfectly wasted and defined by euphoric solos from Mizutani. This set also includes the entirety of the ‘bonus’ CD that came with initial copies of the Univie release, a 1980 set that is pure Exploding Plastic Inevitable. The ultimate document of the ultimate Japanese underground group, but in an edition of 1000 copies it won’t be around forever. Highly recommended! 

Much-anticipated limited edition vinyl reissue of this legendary Rallizes compilation put together by guitarist/vocalist Mizutani himself, originally as the soundtrack source to the Rallizes movie. Previously very briefly available via the Japanese Univive label, it's the closest we'll ever come to Mizutani fully articulating his own particular vision for Rallizes and of course it is as gloriously fucked and impossible to fully grasp as you might have hoped. Coming across like something between Sonic Youth's Sonic Death cassette, the most fucked-up Grateful Dead boot and Dean Benedetti's recordings of Charlie Parker's improvised solos, the fidelity moves from sub-Dead C nada-fi through to truly sublime endless hi-fi jams. The material seems to have been chosen on the strength of Mizutani's soloing alone and as such some of his most mind-flaying six string moves are secreted in here as well as radical headcharges through all of the group's key material. Highly recommended!