Alan Bishop (aka Alvarius B.) is a founding member of Seattle's avant-garde and genre-defying Sun City Girls, whose career spans 27 years and over 50 releases. His work in Sun City Girls, with Richard Bishop and Charles Gocher, alone stands as a testament to his fearless exploration of the outer reaches of improvisation and composition. From their telepathic free jazz/post rock psychedelic trio roots, to sprawling radio broadcasts incorporating noise, Italian pop, and sound collage, to gorgeous outer-national Arabic and Asian-inspired folk music, the group maintained their singular and uncompromising path from inception. Their musical restlessness continues to resonate in the wake of the passing of Charles Gocher and their subsequent disbanding.
As founder of the Sublime Frequencies record label, Bishop has released over 100 records, introducing previously ignored musical genres from Syria, Burma, Indonesia, Pakistan, Vietnam, Niger, Thailand, India, Morocco, Egypt, Western Sahara, Cambodia, Algeria, and Turkey.
And as Alvarius B., Bishop has penned hundreds of his own original folk songs in a primitive "out" style that is unlike anything that anyone else is doing now. This body of work is informed by an obsessive love of psychedelic rock, free jazz, exotic music from beyond borders, Italian film soundtracks, and an extraordinary sense of humor. Since 2011, Bishop has been living in Cairo, composing & recording new Alvarius B. material while simultaneously establishing his own Egyptian-based band, The Invisible Hands.
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LP
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UNROCK 025LP
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Trolling The De-Enlightenment is a solo live recording from Alan Bishop under his well-known Alvarius B. alias. It was recorded on various occasions throughout western Europe during and after the period he was recording his 2017 trilogy release With A Beaker On The Burner and An Otter In The Oven (ABDT 059CD, 2017). Bishop's presence and charisma, alongside his distinctive voice and the twisted characters he has to offer, filled the rooms he played in, and these recordings transport his unique performance vibe to this vinyl edition. The album contains some tracks you're possibly familiar with, and some which have never been played before. There's not only a re-written Bob Dylan song and two interpretations of Burt-Bacharach-lounge as it could be called, but many of Bishop's original songs are present on this first ever Alvarius B. live album release. Photos by Hans Van Der Linden. Recorded by Peter Koerfer. Master by Kubbara in Cairo. Sleeve design by Philip Lethen. Produced by Alan Bishop and Michael Stahl. Edition of 400.
Alan Bishop is perhaps best known as a founding member of the legendary Phoenix/Seattle underground band Sun City Girls, in which he played alongside his brother Richard Bishop and the late Charles Gocher. During the early 1980s he recorded with his brother Richard and Velvet Underground percussionist Maureen Tucker under the name Paris 1942. Currently Bishop is working under his Alvarius B. moniker, and is a founding member of Cairo's Invisible Hands and The Dwarfs Of East Agouza where he plays together with Sam Shalabi and Maurice Louca.
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7"
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UNROCK 030-1EP
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If you ever witnessed an Alvarius B. show you are probably aware that there are a few things only in underground music matching this level. If you haven't, don't miss him when he's coming close next. Karaoke shows one of the many characters you could explore during his shows. As his brother Richard, the other keyholder of Sun City Girls legacy, Alan Bishop played a lot of shows not only under the Alvarius B. moniker on various Unrock stages through the years. "Solo Nostalgia" (E. Morricone) and "Tiba Tiba Tu Menangis" (T. Koeswoyo) are songs which Alan rarely performed and they show off his alter-ego as a cosmopolite solo-entertainer. Unrock's 30th anniversary as an entity seems to be a good reason to release those tracks at that point. Sound wizardry by Peter Koerfer, photography by Hans van der Linden, and realization by Philip Lethen. Limited, one-time run on black vinyl.
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2CD
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ABDT 059CD
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Alvarius B. on the two-CD version of With a Beaker on the Burner and an Otter in the Oven: "This is my brand new 35 song, two-CD set which is also being released via three single LPs. If you really want to know more about the music, search for the LP version descriptions online (I'm sure they were copy/pasted across many websites) where you'll discover a treasure of valuable assessments contained within. This two-CD edition is primarily being made available to facilitate 41 of my 133 'fans' who will be thrilled that it comes out on Compact Disc -- and at an affordable price in comparison to what buying all three LPs would cost. I think I pressed at least 172 copies of this two-CD so there is room for another 39 'fans' to climb aboard my champion ship. I keep hearing that many of the CDs you've acquired in the past don't work anymore. CDs are supposed to rot, scratch and die after a few years and have therefore become a flawed medium. Sounds more like a pragmatic description of humanity to me. But I have thousands of CDs. Some are commercially manufactured discs and the rest are CDRs and every single one of them works. Yep, I hired a bearded guy from New Hampshire to check them all and many are 10, 15, or 20 years old. But my mother always told me I was blessed. Or perhaps I have a magic CD player? But people used to say the same about cassettes and now tapes are the cat's fuckin meow. In fact, I know a record store owner who recently sold an entire car full of cassettes. So don't bring your CDs when you jump aboard Julijonas Urbonas' suicide roller coaster (which hopefully gets built soon in order to facilitate plenty of you imbeciles) -- leave them behind for others to enjoy. Getting back to my new album, go find my sampler on YouTube if you want to know what it sounds like. It's better than your new album, that's for sure. Maybe I'll have to do a cassette version of this record in the future so that I can write another one of these fuckin' promotional sheets." Two-CD version comes in a digipak and collects all 35 tracks on the three LP volumes; Includes a 24-page booklet with artwork and with all lyrics and credits.
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ABDT 059A-LP
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Alvarius B. on With a Beaker on the Burner and an Otter in the Oven - Vol. 1 Natural Wonder: "Volume One of three new LPs I am releasing simultaneously called Natural Wonder, this is the more melodic, savvy one and you might like it. Maybe I'm lying and it's the innocent, straight record so maybe you should get Vol 3 (ABDT 059C-LP) instead if you're in a darker mood. But that's not really true either. Or maybe it's one of those records that grows on you the more you continue playing it... like a cancer. The musicians who played on all three albums don't deserve to be involved in these kamikaze promotional descriptions so don't blame them for any of this. They played so well on these records, in fact they play much better than you do, and their performances deserve a 'Whammy,' which is the awards show where I'm in charge and the winners get to shoot members of the music industry academy dead in their seats. That's where it's all headed you know. . . . The modern world of record making has become so fucking dull and obedient that someone has to ram a poison dagger up your asses and since you're all under hypnosis, I promise you won't feel a thing. I could pay Dougie Jones to write this piece to match your intellect or hire a publicity company to promote it but who really gives a fuck? I'm still making records for myself and the rest of humanity doesn't speak my language anyway. By deciding to write my own album promos, I can perform some market research. For example, this album description text will undoubtedly be copy/pasted by most online retailers onto their respective sites because they don't write their own new album reviews or get too excited about music, they simply want to create the illusion that they're in business to sell records. So I could put something like: Fuck all website retailers that copy/paste this description onto their site because they are too fucking cheap, lazy or chicken shit to have an opinion to write individual album reviews -- and they probably wouldn't even notice while doing it. Anyway, back to my new album. These songs are pretty good, most likely way better than your songs, and I don't even have time to be a real songwriter, so what does that say about you? It says that you suck. And most of you do. But you should buy my new three album set because it's probably as good or better than any other LPs that will be released this year. But if you aren't ready to go all-in with confidence, then forget it. I don't want any mudskipper sub-species of the crayfish to buy my records. There are always a few speculators who'll pick up the extra copies you won't buy anyway." One-time pressing; Includes printed inner sleeve with lyrics and credits.
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LP
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ABDT 059B-LP
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Alvarius B. on With a Beaker on the Burner and an Otter in the Oven - Vol. 2 A Mark Twain August: "This is Volume Two of my new three LP set, and it's called A Mark Twain August. Now don't go asking me what the fuck that title means but I will say that it may be my favorite of the three. My 'fans', all 133 of them, are pretty smart. I used to think only 67 people mattered on earth, now it could be far less, but it's beginning to trouble me how I've actually accumulated 133 fans. So if you're not a moron, I don't mind if you buy this record. I made more copies than I have fans so I need to expand on the audience a bit but I don't want fucking idiots buying my albums. A brand new car loses value the moment you drive it home, but my records will always go up in value (like my Dodge Ram Van which tripled in value when I drove it off the lot) so this is also an investment opportunity. If you were to walk slowly on a hot bed of coals you may discover that Don McLean never actually drove his Chevy to the levy and that the singer-songwriter is dead, just like all the poets. What do contemporary poets and the entire Indonesian population have in common? Most of you cannot name even one of them. Homo Sapiens now love to complain and act as if they know how the world works by 'expressing' themselves on their social media networks -- that's become the new poetry. And I think there are only nine people writing songs today that I respect, I'd have to check to make sure. And the Thinking Fellars were a great band -- I could name a dozen more from the past 30 years that I'd call contemporaries, but that's about it. . . . And I almost forgot to mention that Mark Twain's old banjo appears on this record. Oh and this is better than that Wolf King of LA album by Papa John Phillips, for all those who got mesmerized by it 30 years after it came out. There's only three or four good tracks on that and A Mark Twain August has six great tracks on it, at least. One-time pressing; Includes printed inner sleeve with lyrics and credits.
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LP
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ABDT 059C-LP
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Alvarius B. on With a Beaker on the Burner and an Otter in the Oven - Vol. 3 Heathen Folklore: "Serial killing was one of history's greatest art forms. Now it's becoming almost impossible to get a skull-drilling startup off the ground unless you murder for the corporations or governments where you have highly organized protection from any enforceable law but at the expense of sacrificing all the glory for the anonymity required to maintain employment. So, unfortunately, the days of any zit topography random commoner being able to string together a few killings to hit the big time before being caught has almost come to an end. Sad. This record, the third and final volume of my new three-LP set called Heathen Folklore, could serve as somewhat of a manual of inspiration on how one could start such a career, as risky and unpopular as it is. It gets much more fucked-up than the previous two LPs, and sometimes I think it's the best one due to that aspect. I'd have to give it one more listen but I also think this is the LP with coded messages that could trigger an unsuspecting listener to start his/her career in extreme behavior. But killing isn't everything you know. There are many more ways to express yourself and reach the top of the charts these days. In fact, I saw Burt Bacharach three weeks ago gripping a huge fucking machete while chasing modern dance music architects off his champion ship and into deep water where they hopefully became shark bait. And to set the record straight, Jimi Hendrix did not fake his death and become Morgan Freeman nor was Hunter S. Thompson directing snuff films. But most of that other weird shit you hear about these days is probably true. And I'm working on a film called 'Being Alvarius B.' where all of you loser fucks crawl into my brain and see yourselves from my perspective and then commit collective suicide because you finally realize I was right all along. And I am. Can't wait to make more albums so I can write these album descriptions. Cocksuckers." One-time pressing; Includes printed inner sleeve with lyrics and credits.
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10"
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UNROCK 003EP
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Unrock's Saraswati series continues with a trip into the spiritual wonderland of Alvarius B. aka Alan Bishop (Sun City Girls, Invisible Hands). Deep down, heavy, Sun-City-Girls-flavored Dada deluxe. Crackling midgets, purist psychedelia. A cocoon of seven colorful, shiny monoliths of essential nonsense, each dirty pearl standing by itself. Limited edition one-time pressing.
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2CD
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ABDT 011CD
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Originally released in 1998 as a limited edition vinyl 2LP -- the second Alvarius B. (Alan Bishop/Sun City Girls) full-length release. Perhaps the most deranged collection of original folk songs ever cut to wax. Dark, twisted & apocalyptic with razor twang acoustic guitar & vocal delivery, this epic lo-fi cassette deconstruction/demolition of everything "folk-singer-songwriter" slipped under the radar to a few lucky souls who grabbed the original pressing of this when it showed up 14 years ago. Here is your chance to get it again as a 2CD reissue. The tri-fold digipak includes six bonus tracks, a booklet with lyrics to all 45 songs, and liner notes by Trey Spruance. "I think it's fair to say that in AB we have the most inspiring and wholesome, cussing, violent and truthful musical interpenetrator of the psychic Realities that has probably ever graced this fair and fucked land." --Trey Spruance
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CD
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ABDT 032CD
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Originally released in 2005 as a limited edition vinyl LP -- the first Alvarius B. (Alan Bishop/Sun City Girls) full-length release in 7 years. Blood Operatives Of The Barium Sunset is a collection of songs seemingly based on actual, but unnamed, shady characters of the global underworld past and present, according to the brief statement on the insert. Regardless of intent, this is cryptic folk music of the highest order, with several tracks employing folk/rock/psych orchestrations featuring the talents of Eyvind Kang, Tim Young, Richard Bishop, Andrew McGinnis and Randall Dunn. Hailed as a masterpiece by a fair number of the few who've actually heard it, Blood Operatives... sounds as fresh, challenging, and separated from everything else today, as it did six years ago upon initial release. Twisted Americana folklore breeding with baroque Italian cinematic pop, dark ballads, and vagrant story lines, these 11 unique tracks compile the most "produced" Alvarius B. record to date. CD tri-fold digipak comes with a booklet of song lyrics.
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CD/BOOK
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ABDT 046CD
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Repressed! "A much-needed CD issue of an LP, released this last February in microquantities. The dastardly minds behind this project, a first spurt from the reactivated Poon Village label, have collaborated on the new package as well. And it is a deluxe eye-swim through various forms of feminine beauty, its 32-page booklet displaying images that look as though they were found in a smoky catacomb carved into the hills of Charlestown. By my count, Baroque Primitiva is the sixth album by Alvarius B. and is, like its predecessors, a deep dive through mysterious waters. The 11 tracks here were recorded at various sessions over the course of several years and range from 'Humor Police' (a track imagining what Syd Barrett might have sounded like had he been a devotee of Rembetika) to a trippily Beatles-damaged version of 'You Only Live Twice' (the sole surviving shard of the aborted Alvarius B. Plays The Bond Songbook project). Baroque Primitiva is the first long-format telegram from Alvarius B. since he lost his mothership (the Sun City Girls, with whom he employed his slave name, Alan Bishop) and it also feels like his most consistently non-acerbic -- perhaps even most beauty-oriented -- work. The songs often have a meditative pace, filled with gorgeous lo-fi blends of vocals, guitar, bass and keys. Eyvind Kang guests on several tracks, but the bulk of the material was broadcast direct from the naked soul of Alvarius B., which turns out to be a warmer, sweeter place than you might imagine. And while this CD will be available for a tad longer than the 30 seconds the LP lasted, a set as thoroughly gorgeous as this will not linger. Take a deep breath of its magic and go for it. Why deny yourself such bountiful pleasures?" --Byron Coley
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