Wholly Other Mail Order Catalog

all postpaid prices are for US only. Please refer to the bottom of this page for overseas rates and other ordering instructions.

PLEASE write for availability before ordering. Thanks!

New terrestrial address (for the time being):

PLEASE NOTE: The Sarin Smoke 12" and Christina Carter's Electrice are both sold out!

ALSO NOTE: Ash Castles on the Ghost Coast and Artificial Subteranne Water Regions of the Southwest USA are both temporarily out of stock.

Available:

SARIN SMOKE - Smokescreen LP (comes with bonus live CD EP while supplies last) (three lobed recordings)
15$ POSTPAID (US media mail, add 3$ for US priority)
from the same sessions that produced the wholly other 12", this one piles heaps of modal yearning on top of the already substantial blurry haze of the earlier disk. more beautiful art by liz harris, this time on a beautiful 2 panel foldover letter press sleeve. bonus CD is a short set from sacramento in 2005 (i think). another classy three lobed production, numbered pressing of 657.

TOM CARTER/ ROBERT HORTON - Monsters of Felt CD (preservation, aus)
13$ POSTPAID
the 'proper' follow up to lunar eclipse, really. from the preservation catalog: "Their most developed work thus far, Monsters of Felt hits a mesmerising zone both urgent and lulling at once. The radiating undertow of Horton's sonic manipulations, including sound sources from cassettes, field recordings, computer, bass and the 'boot', accompanies Carter's re-routing of American guitar traditions into mantras of trance and white light. The set also features appearances from kindred spirits and free-folk favourites Brad and Eden Rose, along with Eastern instrument journeymen Henry Kuntz and Michael Shannon. It all adds up to Monsters of Felt being yet another exciting and compelling step for two most intrepid musicians."

TOM CARTER/ CHRISTIAN KIEFER - A Rather Solemn Promise CD (great pop supplement, UK)
13$ POSTPAID
Another T. Carter duo creeps down the pipeline. This time it's with Christian Kiefer, who some of you may recognize from his Tompkins Square CD with Sharon Krauss a couple of years back. This is an all-improvised set of threadbare-loose, (mostly) electrified folk blues- and it's almost normal enough to sneak onto the iPod of your average goateed tea sipper, but there's enough dense high-end steel rail shimmer to send the timid packing. Rambling, dusted, and deeply psyched out, sort of like The Hired Hand re-imagined by the Crosby-led Planet Earth Rock & Roll Orchestra (c. 1969). Covers designed, rendered, and hand-screened by Rob Fisk of Free Porcupine Society. Numbered edition of 500, from the label folks responsible for the now-defunct Earworm Records.

TURNSTONE - s/t CD (three lobed records)
13$ POSTPAID
A trio of Tom Carter, Robert Horton, and Michael Shannon- whom you might know from the Animist Orchestra, his solo LP on Anomalous, or his Jyrk- documented tenure with Horton in Plateau (Bay Area just-intonation drone marauders, c.1985-1988). Of all the Horton- related projects dropping recently, this is perhaps my favorite, and by far the most inward-gazing. Big tectonic heaps of electricity strata drifting atop Horton's molten sound river, with lap steel, dilruba, and bodhran colliding to produce razorback-jagged alpine highs, and looped percussive passages spraying shrapnel as haphazardly as a cave full of exploding snare drums. All the same, this disk is weirdly congruent with the near-eastern desert blues drift of the above mentioned Carter/ Kiefer disk. First of a series of T.C. related projects on Three Lobed... More soon! Numbered edition of 650, Stumptown Press Arigato-pack heavy cardstock sleeves with pasted on photo.

TOM CARTER/ ROBERT HORTON/ LISA CAMERON/ LEE ANN CAMERON - Sky City CD (important)
13$ POSTPAID
managed to score some advance copies of this one, the latest horton-related outing on important, due officially in september. the camerons are well known to certain shadowy texans as a chunk of jerry sighnfeldz astro feed shak (or something like that), and lisa has pounded skins for years with brave combo (pre-polka), st37, devil bat, and roky erickson. lately she has been splitting sonic hairs via contact microphone and vibrating snare head in venison whirled, and this is the trail she pursues here. joined by lee ann on vox/ percussion, tom on gtr/ electronics/ etc, and robert on ... whatever the hell robert happens to be playing. far and away the most ra-damaged load of glass buckshot to be blown out the front door of chez robert into the mean streets of el cerrito in some time. and for fuzz historians, there are plenty of dispatches from the land of wah.

TOM CARTER/ ROBERT HORTON - Steel Jaguar for Rocket CD (digitalis)
12$ POSTPAID
from the digitalis catalog: "Charalambides' Tom Carter and Robert Horton have become close collaborators over the past few years, appearing in a handful of projects together from Kyrgyz (w/ Jewelled Antler-ites Loren Chasse and Christine Boepple) to Mudsuckers (w/ D. Yellow Swans). But when they are stripped back to a duo, the sonic onslaught is just as dense and impressive. "Steeljaguar Rocket" is the second album, following-up "Lunar Eclipse" on Important Records. Horton again acts as the puppetmaster, pulling the strings to move each sound into its right place. Expansive improvisations and full-on psychedelic freakouts intermingle, creating a cosmic web of enchanted debris. Fiddler extraordinaire Hal Hughes adds exponentially to the dynamics at work with his marvellous playing on the title track. The strained violin notes whisk the listener away to the dirt-soaked alleys of Damascus. It's a hypnotic journey through jewel-encrusted foreign lands, like a solo flight to sun. Everything is not peaceful on "Steeljaguar Rocket," however. Digging further into the cataclysm finds Carter & Horton turning up the volume knobs and cranking out wailing solos on top of a bed of heavy drones and cacaphonic drums. Like Horton's Future Ears project, it's equal parts noise, free jazz, and fractured folk bliss. There is no stone unturned on "Steeljaguar Rocket," and just as it feels as though it will collapse in on itself, Carter & Horton bring everything back down to earth, ready to begin again."

MUDSUCKERS- S/T CD (important)
12$ POSTPAID
first release by this collaborative project of tom carter, robert horton, and yellow swans (gabriel mindel/ pete swanson). the most roaring and dense horton assemblage to date, with walls of sound verging on gravitational collapse. "feedback is layered like mud on the carcass of song structure... think creedence clearwater revival without the one chord they knew."- robert horton, from the important catalog description.

FRIDAY GROUP- S/T LP (beta lactam ring)
$13 POSTPAID (Media Mail, add 2.00 for Priority Shipping)
restocked a bunch of copies of the debut friday group release. this one has a pulsing serenity in place of the extreme wigginess of the live stuff, and remains the definitive friday group recording to date (just wait for the next LP, however). from the BLR records catalog: "From out of the Great Republic of Texas, and a new side project from Tom Carter (Charalambides) and Brian Smith (Iron Kite) rises a lone star called Friday Group. In a seemingly appropriate gesture, the opening scherzo of droney solo guitar twang blows dusty debris across the speakers, as if a small sand storm in a remote part of Amarillo. With wind wrestling loose gutters and flat chimes, the first movement is almost a weird paean to Ry Cooder's desolate Paris Texas score. Axe attacks hover thick and dragging in the hazy distance, strings sounding as if played a single wind at a time. Jittery, slithery, prepared warbled tremolos flutter warm in extended notes that drip like old paint. If you've never had the pleasure, the later addition of harmonium and the further devolution of the guitar into howling halos of rusty hinges is virtually the embodiment of a drive through western Texas. Slow motion, spacious landscapes of thirsty air and lazy lizards. Perhaps The Great Republic will rise again. In the mean time, Tom Carter's Friday Group will make mincemeat out of a month of Sundays."

TOM CARTER/ ROBERT HORTON - Lunar Eclipse CD (Important)
$12 POSTPAID
"Lunar Eclipse was culled from over 30 hours of recordings taking place, inedvertantly, on the equinox, lunar eclipse and winter solstice of 2004 .The duo of Tom Carter (Charalambides) and Robert Horton sound as if they are channeling the natural power of these significant calender days into the music. They both noticed something special was happening during the initial recording session when they looked at a clock and realised that they'd been playing for over 5 hours. Thoughout the album Carter slowly plays louder and more powerfully than usual over drone-master Robert Horton's organic & electronic chimes, drones, jangles, dangles and splendor. The result is a vast, expansive sound cavern full of hidden melody, slow drones, textured tribal gong and hidden mystic rhythm.From the very start, when Horton drones in and Tom Carter strikes a single sustained echoing electrified note Lunar Eclipse sounds like the music is infused with that shock and weird light of an eclipse. Track one, Lunar Eclipse, is a slow drone metal meets Neil Young psychedelic freakout with vocals that sound as is they’re recorded inside of a deep cave. On other tracks Horton’s homemade instruments such as the electric barometer, boot, and sex machine fuse with Carter's twisted lap steel ebow shimmerings, prepared guitar. At other moments Tom's guitar or lapsteel solo over the top of the swirling noise chasm. On the last track Robert and Tom both play Horton’s homemades welding a Harry Partch web of rhythm together untill it implodes in metal drone fragments of screeching fury. Lunar Eclipse demands to be listened to in it's entirety as one whole experience. It has an undeniable power that will return again and again much like the natural events that subconsciously inspired the recordings." (from Important catalog listing)

KYRGYZ - s/t CD (Foxy Digitalis)
$12 POSTPAID
"Kyrgyz is a name that will be unfamiliar to most, but the band's members read like an all-star team of Bay Area improvisers. This quartet consists of Tom Carter (Charalambides), Loren Chasse (The Blithe Sons, Thuja, etc), Christine Boepple (Skygreen Leopards Skyband), and Robert Horton (Broken Mask, Infinite Article, etc). Kyrgyz's debut album is 60 minutes of droned-out bliss. With its roots firmly planted in trance-inducing soil, the six songs here stretch their branches toward the sun. When four artists of this caliber come together in a single setting, the expectations are high. There is tension to spare. But Kyrgyz is such a perfect blend of all their talents that it never implodes beneath the pressure. Horton is the hand that guides this mix of heavy, hypnotic drones, a thicket of acoustic scrawl, and even free jazz skronk.. After preliminary mixes from Chasse created a thick organic atmosphere, Horton took that feeling and ran with it. Each sound is carefully chosen and blended together magically. There are equal elements of Charalambides and Jewelled Antler throughout Kyrgyz, but again it is Horton that upsets the balance to create something completely new. In the end, this is nothing short of brilliant." (from Digitalis catalog description)

TOM CARTER - Glyph CD (Foxy Digitalis)
$12 POSTPAID
Two acoustic tracks sandwiching one long lap steel track recorded in the smoke filled center hallway at bullbabe studios. One last stab at channeling the gnarly mystery of Texas angst-blues-ecstasy. No effects, just fingers, glass, steel, nylon, and space. Remastered reissue of a CDR from 2004, this is the second cover edition with a single pocket fluorescent silkscreened sleeve.

SPIDERWEBS/ TAMBURO + McDOWELL/ LAWLER - Strands Formerly Braided CD (Music Fellowship)
$12 POSTPAID
Features Spiderwebs (Tom Carter/Sandy Ewen), Mike Tamburo/ Matthew McDowell, and Keenan Lawler. Powerhouse tracks by all three (especially the under-documented Lawler). "The act of braiding the strands together affects the structure and fibers of hair, taking days or even weeks for the hair to relax back into its natural position. This relationship between strands in a braid is similar to relationships between people. Each interaction, especially ones with close friends, affects and influences the interactions you have later on. Thus, Strands Formerly Braided is a fitting title for this edition of the Music Fellowship's Triptych series because the three featured artists have a long history of improvisation and collaboration." (from Music Fellowship catalog description).

FURSAXA - Amulet CD (Last Visible Dog)
$12 POSTPAID
Not a Wholly Other family release per se, but close to our hearts nonetheless. Tara is instrumental in the continuing secession of the Psychic Nation Underground from consensus reality and remains a valued comrade (and unacknowledged legislator of the Line 6). Her Terrastock set was purely massive, enveloping, and generous; powerful without oppression, and by far the best thing I saw that weekend. I'm grateful to have a handful of copies to sell on behalf of my partner Natacha Robinson, whose fantastic cover art is well suited to the mystique within. "Fursaxa has never quite turned out a studio album that reflected the power and awe of her live shows. Instead, fans have had only a series of tour cd-rs as compensation for this deficiency in her output. Rectifying this problem (at least in part), comes the CD reissue of Amulet along with half of her previous tour cd-r, 'From the Cult of Moon Mountain'. This hour plus selection of live material captures Fursaxa at her very best, and will hopefully make believers of those who haven't yet had a chance to catch her during her tours. Two of the tracks feature extra fuzz and wah from Bardo Pond's Michael and John Gibbons! This is the Fursaxa that people need to hear, raw and intoxicating; beautiful and perhaps still a little bit dangerous." (from Last Visible Dog catalog).

Ordering Information:

Most items are very limited. PLEASE write for availability before ordering!

International orders please email for a postage quote.

Make checks and money orders payable to Tom Carter. Cash is discouraged, if you must send it, make sure it is well concealed. We also accept Paypal- payment ID is artercay(at)gmail.com. PLEASE ADDRESS ALL REGISTERED MAIL TO TOM CARTER C/O BRIAN SMITH. If you don't do this, it's likely your mail will be returned.

Please email for snail mail address.