I went to see Stars, supported by Apostle of Hustle, at the Thekla last night. It took a little while for the sound desk to sort out the vocal levels, but once they had, Stars rocked - Take Me To The Riot (hear it here) was fantastic. Most of the set was recent material but it was really great to hear them do Elevator Love Letter - one of my favourite tracks.

I’d never heard of Apostle of Hustle (left) before but they were excellent - check out My Sword Hand’s Anger on their MySpace page. Their last couple of songs featured the drummer playing (very nicely) what appeared to be a vintage hifi speaker.

This double album is full of very strange stuff. ‘Ricreazione Divertita’ (from 1988’s ‘Cuore Di Mamma’) moves from a music box lullabye into staccato chanting into a 60’s surf soundtrack into a march into lush strings like a John Zorn composition - which is fitting as Zorn helped Mike Patton with the compilation and contributed the sleeve notes. ‘Seguita’ (from 1971’s ‘Gli Occhi Freddi Della Paura’) features squeaky trumpets across skitting drums. ‘Ninna Nanna Per Adulteri’ (from ‘Cuore Di Mamma’) hints at ‘The Mission’ theme.

‘Esplicamento Sospeso’ (from 1973’s ‘Il Serpente’ which starred Yul Brynner, Henry Fonda and Dirk Bogarde) features a menacing mix of echoing noises - cymbals, what sounds like a piano string being scraped, muted feedback, signal noise and knives being sharpened. The longest track (nearly 12 minutes) is ‘Un Uomo Da Rispettare’ (from the 1972 film of the same name starring Kirk Douglas) is a really beautiful piece - after a slow build up, echoing sleazy trumpets mourn over a plodding beat, built up with a bassline reminiscent of ‘The Sicilian Clan’.

The Dead Texan are Adam Wiltzie (from Stars of the Lid) and Christina Vantzou.

I really like this album - very understated and laid back. The standout track so far is the first track - ‘The 6 million dollar sandwich’ - which is a beautiful mix of long, overlapping strings resonating almost to the point of distortion and reminds me of Brian Eno’s ‘An Ending (Ascent)’.