{"product_id":"gastr-del-sol-upgrade-and-afterlife-2025-reissue","title":"Gastr Del Sol - Upgrade And Afterlife (2025 Reissue)","description":"Way back when, ‘Upgrade \u0026amp; Afterlife’ was the umpteenth release\nfrom the individual and collective forces of David Grubbs (known then\nfor Bastro, The Red Krayola, Codeine, Squirrel Bait) and Jim\nO’Rourke, whose further history has since numbered at least another\numpteen or so essential listens. Opening at their most incandescently impressionistic, ‘Our Exquisite\nReplica of “Eternity”’ has no precedent in the Gastrlog, and few in\nmost others, either. ‘Rebecca Sylvester’ uses vocal harmonies to\nsharpen their singular, gamelan tone poem song form into something\nresembling a pop reverie at the finish. With undeniable (albeit\noblique) comedy, ‘The Sea Incertain’ comments upon Crookt, Crackt,\nor Fly’s ‘The C in Cake’, with the presence of cracked electronics\nhere and elsewhere taking a more forward position.\nThe stentorian chamber piano sound introduced on ‘Mirror Repair’ is\nstill in full effect throughout ‘Upgrade \u0026amp; Afterlife’, but the bluesy\nrattling of finger style acoustic has the last word, with a tranced-out\nreading of John Fahey’s version of ‘Dry Bones In The Valley’,\nweaving guitar, piano and Tony Conrad’s trademark droning violin\ntogether to close the proceedings with an ingenious, slow-acting\nbang. A delightful result, to our way of thinking, of the band’s ability to push\nat the far boundaries of their music while consolidating upon pleasure\npoints within sounds and songs. Gastr used these polarities to\ncompulsively draw the listener intimately close with sudden injections\nof g-force and an uncanny interpolation of space.","brand":"DRAG CITY","offers":[{"title":"LP","offer_id":53021456204118,"sku":"MRM-01239","price":43.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1000\/6088\/9430\/files\/7285a3b48c6219ab9d033bc69e4b372a.jpg?v=1775192568","url":"https:\/\/monorailmusic.com\/products\/gastr-del-sol-upgrade-and-afterlife-2025-reissue","provider":"Monorail Music","version":"1.0","type":"link"}