PUPPET WIPES  Live at Pompeii II lathe 45/DL
Puppet Wipes, who at one point were an amorphously daffy anti-musical, two-woman studio project, are now an actual band who play live rock concerts in front of screaming audiences. Everything they’ve touched to date has been damaged gold, and this new live-in-the-studio thing gives the rest of us what’s been wowing the small corners of Calgary for a couple years now. Two tracks are sparse & noisy and sonically reminiscent of Yankee Cowboy, a great related “Alpaca Brothers tribute band” that at least one Puppet Wipe has found herself in, while the others are gnarled, loopy, spiderweb punk songs with a very heightened sense of knowing when to go too far with the concept or with the vocal register – then going there with extreme prejudice. I used to regularly stream Arielle from this band’s Calgary radio show, not only for her stellar music taste but because she was such a comedic nutball, the rare DJ you wished talked more rather than stayed off the mic as much as possible. No question she’d eventually have helped to sire a band this absurdist and raw, and she has. (NO Label; nolabelnz.bandcamp.com)

MONOCOT  Leave To Cool LP
Some really meaty freedom drone from the duo of Jayson Gerycz (drums) and Rosali Middleman (guitar), comfortably living halfway between the wandering improv of Elkhorn and the all-out sonic assault of Water Damage. This isn’t their first instrumental record together but it’s the first of the two I’ve heard. Leave To Cool and its six long-ish tracks are made for solo contemplation and study, with the cranium-rattling breakthrough track being the searing “The Voice Came”, with a voice that thankfully never does. Somehow these “lines upon lines intertwining” were recorded live in front of an audience, though honestly you’d never know. (Astral Editions; astraleditions.bandcamp.com)

CHEATER SLICKS  I Am Low / Rock and Roll 45
It’d be trite to revel in the ongoing glory of new, high-quality Cheater Slicks material 35+ years after we first heard them, so then just enjoying their latest single for its own sake is where I’ll go instead. But man, I’m just delighted to know you and I can still see this band live, easily one of the twenty or so finest live acts I’ve ever witnessed. Their new 45’s true to form as well: confrontationally dirty garage pounding on the A-side (written around lyrics by Phil Milstein!), leavened with backing vocals that bring in a hint of conviviality & light. There’s a totally preposterous and wild alto sax solo from Bobb Hatt in the instrumental break, just because. The flip is a raucous Bo Diddley cover that provides one with the golden opportunity to enjoy some Tom Shannon “scatting”, something which I’ve never had the pleasure. Top-drawer entertainment all around. (Morbid Web)