Tag: reviews

By My Tides – 12th August 2025

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 19 Comments

Correctly formatted above, text below

I am a poison sink,
– a salty stink;
All the garbage dumped on me,
deep inside, where you never see;

Here I lie, absorbing this,
– your smelly piss;
I’m warming up for bigger blows
and thunderous electric shows;

The spilling of your sticky glues
mixes in my lethal stews;
My life may soon abandon me
to strike your shores randomly;

Monsters roaming adrift,
– a seismic shift
wreaking havoc in your community,
a slip that comes deservedly;

Fed from the mountains high,
then forever multiply;
Your moonlit veins of cyanide
will bury your dead, petrified;

Pushing through a narrow strait,
– winds whipped to create
the rising of a hurricane,
gathering your toxic rain;

I will be the antidote,
– your footnote;
A wave to overcome the pests,
complete destruction manifests.

Charlie Zero The Poet Music picks & Reviews #23 and my quick thoughts:

Villaelvin – This was pretty cool to listen to while I was doing other things. Some nice glitchy electronics.

Stine Janvin – This is too art gallery for my liking. Fine in the appropriate location, and I can think of many in Sydney back in the day, but not for me in my room.

Macula Dog – I’m familiar with MD already but hadn’t heard this one before. Gonna check it out some more.

Wreck and Reference – What an interesting record. At times it’s like a black metal album but with the drums and guitars removed, screamo vocals over keyboards. Nothing much catches for me but I love the idea.

Venetian Snares – The difficulty that I have with VS is that while skipping through the tracks it all became just the one song. It felt like it would be very easy to clip out bits, mix them up and call it a new album.

Love Lies – 3rd May 2025

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 7 Comments

Venus is the odd one out,

rotates clockwise about its axis;

a western sky sunrise!

~ Hellish heat and truly toxic ~

Long, lazy days where

time tests with great temptations

and love lies in rebellion.

A Complex Alliterisen about Venus (planet and God) shared with dVerse MTB

Charlie Zero The Poet Music picks & Reviews #20 and my quick thoughts:

Mopcut – Pretty interesting glitchy electronica in places. Would’ve appealed to me about 20 years ago.

The Vegetable Orchestra – It feels a little like artists these days need some kind of angle. The results here don’t really float my boat but I can understand folks being into and appealing, ‘hey you gotta this album made with vegetables’

MADMADMAD – This is pretty cool and fun. Could definitely see myself enjoying this in a dingy warehouse on an industrial estate somewhere with plenty of neon and flashing lights.

CLD.RĀN – I like the glitch but the other stuff around doesn’t do it much for me. As I’ve said before for this style I usually defer back to Matmos.

PinioL – Ni and PoiL together. Jumped on this from the out. Could’ve been a mess but it’s freaking awesome.

Ninth Innings – 17th April 2025

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 2 Comments

In youth, as playful as expected
it was a pleasure to see you run,
panting for breath until collected;
the joys of a life just begun.

In the early years, you would settle
to be as we all had visualised;
then, one day, you suffered bad fettle
and your health would then be compromised.

Through eight lives, where you almost perished
to the ills of kidney and liver,
our love never wavered, we cherished
every moment as the caregiver.

Now here we are in the ninth innings,
to see you this way now brings us pain,
but the memory of your beginnings
from a lifetime ago will remain.

Shared with Momoetry April Poet Month challenge – ode

Charlie Zero The Poet Music picks & Reviews #17 and my quick thoughts:

PoiL – Long familiar with this awesome band. The video for Fionosphere is mesmerising: https://youtu.be/c6tbJDm40Pc?si=30WWUNu7hgZJX0Xk

I seem to end up watching it every few months. In fact, I’m going to watch it again now.

Zu – Zu were on my record label’s very first release so I’m familiar with them too: https://tenzenmen.bandcamp.com/album/eccentrics-vol-1
This is a good reminder for me to go check out some of their more recent stuff though.

Prairie WWWW – I came across this band about five years ago and some of the band members names are familiar to me though I’m not sure why. I never listened in depth before but it’s obvious that this style is right up my street!

Fulu Miziki – vaguely familiar with this band too, I think from stumbling across videos of theirs. Listening now brings back strong vibes of listening to John Peel late at night, waiting to hear the one or two punk tunes he might play and being subjected to what seemed like hours of the Bhundhu Boys (which, ironically, I find quite enjoyable now)

Sonora Tropical – the brief snippet here also brought back John Peel vibes and this one not enough for me to investigate further – these hips are too old to shake these days.

Great selections this time, Charlie.

Love’s Limits – 26th March 2025

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 2 Comments
AI image

The girl at the window,
– behind those haunted eyes

She understands everything

(There’s so much more in her than she lets us see)

It’s discomforting to think
– that love can’t conquer all

Charlie Zero The Poet Music picks & Reviews #16 and my quick thoughts:

Wax Chattels – A cool new find for me – thanks – will be checking out more! Even though there’s no guitar, it sounds like there is.

The Killing Popes – This is cool stuff. Gives me a glitchy Matmos vibe mixed up with some less avant out-there jazz. A scan of my computer finds that I already have this, so must’ve been impressed on a previous listen too.

Thank – Another familiar band and a nice expansion of the noise rock genre.

Darth Vegas – Very familiar with Darth Vegas as Mikey is a friend of mine. There was a time when we discussed releasing this together on vinyl, but with no sign of there being any shows to help push it, it didn’t make sense to go ahead, unfortunately.

kavv – Nice end of the night vibes and inoffensive enough to be enjoyed anywhere else. I’d never choose to put this on myself, but also wouldn’t turn it off if it popped up somewhere.

Bucket Lists – 13th March 2025

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ Leave a comment

I got bored with my dream, so made another
I realised too late that I didn’t need to bother
Why are we always happy yet never satisfied?
Chasing a bucket list of things never tried

Charlie Zero The Poet Music picks & Reviews #15 and my quick thoughts:

isyouisorisyouaint – Tubeway Army 2019. No guitars!

Sleep Sigil – I dig this because it is ‘out there’. I’ll never listen to it again myself but I appreciate the fact that someone went to the trouble of making this.

vovaOMYT – Kinda cool and interesting. I think I best like the track featuring some dude with the same name as you – haha! Again, appreciate the effort but not for me.

Bent Knee – I thought that I was familiar with Bent Knee but maybe I was confusing them with beNt – who you should check out. You know, I think I have checked this band out before and despite the fact that the girl can sing I really don’t like the style. The music is great in places. Just wish it was a different singer.
Damn – I really do like the music (I’m listening to their first album) so I’m going to give this stuff more of a chance.

Tub Ring – Familiar with already. I dug them back in the day, revisited them a few years ago and didn’t like it so much but then a year or two ago, I listened again and realised I’d made a mistake. Great stuff.

The Present Tense – 9th March 2025

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 4 Comments

To understand the past
That can’t be changed
That’s a freedom
That has been arranged

Forgotten liberation
That always made sense
The past sensation
Brought to the present tense

Charlie Zero The Poet Music picks & Reviews #14 and my quick thoughts:

The Backseat Lovers – Very pretty tunes, mathy and twinkly in places. How does this style get classified these days? It goes from Ed Sheeran and Coldplay softness to more upbeat Math Rock Times style bands. I think this style is kinda popular, or so it seems to me. I guess I come across it often in my musical searching. One thing I really don’t like about this style, though, is the super-clean production. It’s very sterile. Overall, it’s OK, but it’s no Tubelord or the better parts of Johnny Foreigner.

King Geedorah – I have no connection to hip-hop, really, and this won’t convince me either. Weirdly, the ‘beats’ or ‘samples’ are pretty interesting,g and the ‘rap’ detracts from the song for me. Makes me think that I’m listening to the radio in Grand Theft Auto.

Los Bitchos – This is cool. I went through a strong phase of listening to Eastern and Eastern-influenced music, thanks to Secret Chiefs 3. I still dig it, and this is fine and all, but it’s not going to set the world on fire. The reggae and surfy tracks don’t really grab me as much. I’ll give this another go in the future.

Blowfly – Already familiar and I like the juxtaposition of the wild, fun funk and the over-the-top gross lyrics. It’s like euphemism-free Funkadelic.

Cuco – big nope. I don’t know who or how anyone listens to this type of music. It’s nothing music.

A River Of Cliches – 5th March 2025

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 4 Comments

A young man, resting here weary
Ruminating possibilities and theory
With age, cliches come to mind
Once revelations, destined to find

Endless the water’s progression
Manifesting yesterday’s lesson
Never stepping in the same river twice
The path of least resistance, best advice

So pull yourself up by the bootstraps
Certainty has no time for perhaps
The cliche becomes the best insight
Rolling down the river, a delight

Shared with No Theme Thursday picture prompt, which brought to mind many cliches but then got me thinking about how when we are young those cliches are realisations and it is only in time that they become cliches. We have to discover them for ourselves first.

Charlie Zero The Poet Music picks & Reviews #13 and my quick thoughts:

William Basinski – Musically not my cup of proverbial. It seems there some story behind this work but I wasn’t inspired enough to find out more.

Helm – I like parts of this and overall it’s pretty interesting. With everything else available to listen to this won’t be making it to the try again pile though.

Matmos – I like Matmos. I like their vibe and style…. but in that cliched way “i like their old stuff better than their new stuff’

b e g o t t e n 自杀 – this intrigued me a little bit even though I’m not really into it. There’s definitely not enough guitars in today’s selection! 😄

Samiyam – definitely the most interesting to me out of this selection. In a different mood I might like this one.

Always keep an open mind – 22nd August 2005

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ Leave a comment

Here’s a short online interview with a cool webzine, foxy digitalis + there’s a few things in the pipeline release wise so be patient.

Who started the label and why?

I, Shaun, started the label around the end of 2003.

I was working with Jochen as a part of Hinterlandt, which was essentially an anything goes live improv unit of between 3 and 23 musicians (and on recordings just as Jochen solo!). Jochen and I shared some similar musical interests and we were both European immigrants, he from Germany me from England, to Sydney. He was on his way back to Germany and I felt that I couldn’t really contribute much to anything else here not being a particularly talented musician in any shape or form but I still wanted to be involved with music somehow.

Being a big fan of file sharing and always on the lookout for new, interesting and exciting music I decided I could give something back myself and hopefully expose others to some of the music I was discovering.

What’s the story behind the name?

Hmmm…it came about a long time ago – I used to write a lot of lyrics and would enjoy playing with language – it’s really just a by-product of that. tenzenmen also released an extremely rare and sort after piece of vinyl back in the early 90’s.

Unbelievably someone else had come up with this name for an album later in the 90’s too – the way I found this out was that the domain name http://www.tenzenmen.com was already taken, hence my website being http://www.ten-zen-men.com

What keeps you inspired to continue doing the label?

Simply – music. The internet has made it so easy to discover fantastic new exciting underground music from people just strumming guitars in their garages in the USA to whacked out craziness in the colds of Finland and through the usual bizarreness that comes to be expected from Japan.

I wish I had more money and time to get this music that is so exciting to me out to the rest of the world. I know there are people out there craving more than the mainstream provides, even when the mainstream claims to be providing the alternative as well.

What’s the hardest thing about running an independent label these days?

Distribution is my biggest concern at the moment. I’ve been trying to counter this with the Eccentrics series which is basically a 3 band split CD and trying to get bands from different scenes and parts of the world to be involved so that they each get exposed to the others.

I also offer extra discs to the artists at my cost price because I feel that live shows is where a band will sell more CDs these days and they can control the price and distribution themselves. This has had some success but I would still like to get my CDs to more outlets just so people have different options.

If you could work with any one artist, who would it be and why?

Hmm…no – I don’t think there’s an artist in particular that fits this criteria…probably it would be any new musician or group that strikes me as totally original and interesting and to be able to expose them to a wider audience. I’d love to be able to pioneer music in much the same way John Peel did in his time.

What’s your demo policy?

No policy – people should send me their music! You would do well to check out some of the previous tenzenmen releases so see if you might fit the criteria of music that moves me – I mean I’m not into straight forward straight up music. I’ll check out any genre so long as boundaries are being pushed and I don’t expect everyone to enjoy every band that I work with.

What do you have planned for the future?

I’m continuing on with the Eccentrics series and always approaching bands to contribute to that. I have a few other possibilities on the boil too. Not trying to be vague here but plans are always changing. I’m a very patient person and I know good things will come when they’re ready.

What’s the best record you’ve heard in the past year?

There’s just so much! I mean I’m still discovering bands dating back to the sixties. For new-ish bands there seems to be this kinda odd scene on the west coast (I think) of the US with bands like the Mae Shi, Rapider Than Horsepower, Alarmist and 400 Blows.

I’ve been amazed by some of the music on a Japanese label called Usagi-Chang, especially Plus-Tech Squeeze Box and Eel – it’s a perfect example of what I was talking about before about musicians pushing boundaries within a genre. The genre here is electro-pop I guess and these guys are just going nuts with it!

I also actually listened to all my own releases recently (by choice!) which showed me the power of the music that it could still appeal to me even after hearing it so many times in preparation for release.

Any closing advice?

Always keep an open mind whatever you’re doing. Thanks for your time and this opportunity – it’s really appreciated.

Conquered all – 28th November 2004

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ Leave a comment

builders arms with grey daturas, young prfessionals, bug girl

we get very little sleep as we have to get up early to make an apperance on the japanese program on 3zzz – the host koji being a recent convert to the wonders of the special show time – the band feel very comfortable being able to talk in japanese and all goes well with many laughs.

we split up later as jj and koji go to the city to buy some bits and pieces and yukari heads up to 3cr for a radio interview on the ‘girl’ show (sorry – forgot the name of the show) with another recent convert, larissa. yukari gets to introduce limited express (has gone?) and her other band ni hao! to the listeners and does well for a solo interview in English.

we all converge back at robert’s place and fall asleep for a few hours.

we make our way to the builders arms around 7pm and pretty soon bug girl are up the front bashing out some nifty rock – the small room makes for a nice atmosphere and i have a good feeling about the show tonight (as each band plays the room fills more and more).

next is young professionals who were fantastically amateurish and entertained us all no end – my kind of music!

grey daturas crank the volume with some huge slabs of noise and big pounding beats and most everyone has their fingers in their ears but enjoying it nonetheless.

the room packs full as limited express (has gone?) set up and with a gambatte, break into a familiar start of ‘free style riding’ and ‘aloha’ which has the audience boogying with big smiles. tonight is the culmination of an exciting few days and the band excel themselves (yet again!) with a lot of guitars held high, jazzy craziness and bouncing bass players (‘4-7-3-5-8-1-0-tiger rock!’ (or something!).

the crowd refuse to let them leave after ‘talk to me, all right’ and they rip through one of their high energy, high intensity tracks from the new album with such a ferocity it’s impossible not to just laugh at the absurdity of the amount of pleasure that is being connected and interlinked between everyone in the room. even the landlady and door guy come back with favourable comments and surprise at the size of the crowd for a sunday show.

limited express (has gone?) conquered all tonight and the merchandise box is favourably lighter for the trip to new zealand. we make lots of new friends and contacts yet koji can’t overcome his shyness around pretty girls! packed up and home – the excitement keeps us up until 2am despite having to get up again at 6.30am.


yukari – “i promised myself i will come back to melbourne because so many people enjoyed with us – that was my pleasure too”
koji – “i was happy for many people coming and i could do my best. i appreciate melbourne people”
jj – “thank you melbourne! thank you melbourne’s punk rock! we are rock and roll!”

Good Day! – 21st November 2004

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ Leave a comment

good day! green square hotel with terrapin, triangle, vincent over the sink, faux furs, kiosk

after getting to sleep at 4.30am it was difficult to get up at midday and we were running a bit late but still managed to be first to arrive at the show only half an hour before it started!

luckily everyone turned up soon and kiosk blasted out 15 minutes of superb sonic chaos to a small but enthralled audience.

faux furs were up next – they play a cool minimal fall-type music that made me happy – again quite chaotic and fun. i think these young bands are great – they seem to have a complete disregard for any normal rock conventions and the attitude of ‘fuck it if you don’t like it’. and then…

vincent over the sink! boy, these guys were amazing! and just their 3rd show – this two-piece take structure from ruins, sounds from indie types yummy fur and quirk out like the minutemen – bands which they’ve never even heard of!

triangle psyched us all out with distortion-drenched rhythmics and swirling acid patterns.

at this stage i went in search of the missing yukari to find her curled up asleep under a table at the side of the stage – how she slept through the noise i don’t know – but she seems to fall asleep anywhere (as did jj and koji at various stages of the day) – samurai-koala is becoming an ever more appropriate name for this tour.

terrapin, now a 5 piece, threw out a quick set of their ever-improving rock and tonight some quieter and poppier moments – very nice and jj liked them a lot.

anticipation mounted and temperatures rose as limited express took the stage and once again amazed a reasonable-sized crowd – i don’t know how they do it but they seem to be getting better each show, jj’s stage theatrics playing a bigger part tonight with yukari bouncing around as usual and eventually, during tiger rock, into the audience and with jj breaking a string yet again – that was it, to much rapturous applause and the sale of many CDs.

big thanks must go out to all the bands, especially those prepared to lend equipment and to toby who did the sound for the cost of two beers. good day? it was a fucking great day!

koji “this show had a great sound and was easy to play”

jj “i loved terrapin – i was excited”

yukari “i couldn’t see the audience faces because of the lights but i could feel their vibrations – so nice”