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14/12/2011

Dive - Sometime


Ok, ok, so how I didn’t have time to work out just how I would write a post a day for 20 days, but the point is I’m trying to ramp em up and give your ears some consistent (aural) pleasure. Today’s band/post is Dive, a new band from the Beach Fossils guitarist Cole Smith, with their song 'Sometime'. Now I know what you’re thinking; how can someone SOOO well known not already be in my musical repertoire? Well, he’s not well known. Apparently. And I didn’t even know who he was till earlier this week so no harm done really, huh? This is a pretty cool dream pop type song, all echoey like the ‘hall’ setting on your thingy ma what, and it’s got this simple guitar lick most of the way through that’s awesome and sort of flicks up at the end as though it’s asking you a question.

‘Sometime’ was released in October, and you can check out its follow up ‘Human’ over on Pitchfork. Not quite sure if there’ll be an album coming out yet, but the label for these two singles was Captured Tracks, who also released Beach Fossils, so you can safely assume it’ll be on that.

P.S. If you can't find the song, hit the play button over the article you silly mare.

11/12/2011

George Harrison - All Things Must Pass

Approaching that time of year again- ‘best of’ lists- and as with last year’s attempt- I’m going to shun the idea and pursue something which will hopefully be far more interesting: 20 posts in 20 days. There’s no such thing as a best album. As a very good article for The Guardian blog re-iterated (although it was in fact also accompanied by a top 10 list), our habits are rooted in time and place, and not some surgical, disinterested dissection of merit. In that vein, my posts reflect thoughts and habits at the time, what I'm listening to, and similarly, what I think others might enjoy.

So, George Harrison. What’s there to say? ‘Third’ Beatle, the quiet Beatle, and the one who was often seen as stifled by the juggernauts of Lennon/ McCartney. When The Beatles began to fall apart in 1969, slowly Harrison came out of his shell. His debut solo effort All Things Must Pass is widely regarded as the best of the four’s solo debuts, and a mature, serious, full-on record. Its often gentle song structures and easy on the ear melodies belie the balance and strength that is now often seen as one of Harrison’s core personal strengths. His self-assuredness and quest for self-enrichment came through in this monster LP, and now it is a small part of pop history.

First, its length. A triple-LP of 23 songs, five of which are strung together as a big ‘Apple Jam’ is not exactly a marketer’s idea of a cautious entry into the solo sphere. All Things Must Pass is powerful; Harrison put himself into it, and he wasn’t going to compromise. He never did anything by halves: just watch Martin Scorsese’s documentary Living in the Material World. Second, religion. Harrison’s strong belief in Hindu spirituality, mediation and mantras, developed after The Beatles’ visit to India in 1967, and shaped this album, which is now regarded as one of the 500 greatest of all time (…or at least it is by Rolling Stone magazine.) (Interestingly, many of the extensions of his religious ideas still have resonance today.) See ‘My Sweet Lord’, see ‘Heard Me Lord’, see ‘Awaiting on You All’; arguably three of the most sensational songs of Harrison’s song-writing repertoire, and they all promulgate spiritual philosophies, but also, they are constructed and delivered with a lightness, peace and simplicity only imagined by those who feel truly enlightened and at one. ‘My Sweet Lord’ is a reassuring journey to spiritual well-being. As with his mantra from The Beatles' 'The Inner Light', “the farther one travels, the less one really knows”, it isn’t intimidating, over-the-top, sarcastic or ironic. It is direct and simple. Harrison hopes to exist in the moment, the aspiration of those following a path of meditation and zen. ‘Hear Me Lord’ is a similarly striving ode to self-embetterment.

His religious journey was not so all-consuming as to make All Things Must Pass a purely religious record, however. There are many shades of grey, and on a superficial level, you might be interested to know that Harrison doesn’t make much use of Eastern sitars on this record. Still, at the more familiar end of the scale is Apple Jam stuff/rambling ditty ‘It’s Johnny’s Birthday’. This juxtaposition makes it obvious how multi-faceted and complicated Harrison really was. Lennon went on marches and made bold political jibes; McCartney was a clean-cut pop king, and Harrison sat at the back taking notes, figuring out what it was all about. Did he let go? Well of course. ‘Apple Scruffs’ is one of my favourite pop songs, comprising a harmonica and acoustic sing-a-long, and I love it because it’s so whimsical and poignant at the same time.

All Things Must Pass carries itself with both a pride and an honesty that I don’t think any album today can. Can you talk about spirituality with a straight face? Can you put the words ‘Hare Krishna’ at the end of a song repeatedly and deliver a message that will resonate with the man in the street as well as a swami? Sounds hard, doesn’t it? Sure, our lack of interest in pondering things long and hard has much to do with our cultural shift, and being more closed off to sitting down and thinking, but it is also a great compliment to Harrison that he had the confidence and single-mindedness to straddle pop and spirituality, and he continues to be able to pry into us in such a marvellously subtle way even today. We might notice, but we are generally too impressed with the songwriting. ‘Isn’t It A Pity’ works for 7 minutes to achieve it; ‘Beware of Darkness’ tugs at your heart-strings with plain-as-day life advice. If it makes All Things Must Pass sound like a self-help manual, then it some respects it is. If it makes it sounds like one hell of an awesome record, it is certainly that too...

Lucky Number Music, Friends and the Independent Label Market, London

Hello pop pickers! Sorry it’s been so long since I last posted, but there so is a lot to talk about, so I’ll get right down to business. First post first: Independent Label Market. Now this was a…well…market in Spitalfields, London, put on today to hawk the wares of predominantly small independent record labels who had had stock destroyed at the Sony warehouse during the London rioting in August (did those rioters know they had caused such callous artistic destruction?! I should hope not.) Anyway, the fruits of their violent labour have clearly produced one good outcome.

The twist I so love about this event is that the stalls were manned by label bosses themselves. For my part, this gave me an opportunity to chat with one of my favourite labels, Lucky Number Music, who are behind Friends and Caged Animals (see below).

Now, I believe among all those stalls there, Lucky Number are onto something unique with their artists, and have a really special eye for detail. I discussed this with co-guru leader man, Michael Morley, and he said that within its sound, the label hopes to build a common thread among its artists, an identity if you will, that speaks for the label, or if you want to be more market-speak about it, a ‘brand’. This is evident in everything about them. The artists appear to stand for creativity above pop perfection; product above packaging. If those ideas sounds hoity-toity, consider Darwin Deez, Caged Animals, Friends and Sebastian Tellier; all esoteric, idiosyncratic, different from one another, although this, (and a noticeable zeal for music) is what they all have in common. I mentioned Friends’ September London gig: “Did you meet them afterwards?” Morley said, matter-of-factly. I had. The band were there after the gig, talking to everyone and were genuinely interested in what people had to say. They sold ‘I’m His Girl’ a month or so before its official release (review below), and guess who bought one based on their performance that night and a good chat about London? Two spare copies were brought along today apparently, and sold even before the stall had opened.

Friends are arguably becoming the label’s biggest ever artist. Morley and co-founder Stephen Richards saw them at their sixth ever gig. Pretty incredible. It’s now widely known that Friends have been together only a year. The pair were immediately impressed by the band, and additionally, a rarity in live indie music, Urbani’s uncanny ability to bring girls to the front of the crowd. The band were signed up soon after, and debut ‘Friend Crush’ was released, now a 250-copy Ebay rarity, never to be pressed again if the label is true to its word.

While I don’t think a label can set the world alight, it's interesting to know that in an industry now bombarding us with new artists, information and ‘packaging’, someone is focusing on product and letting music speak for itself. Multi-linguist Sebastien Tellier’s 2008 album Sexuality was a great coup; a well-received record which included ‘Divine’, a song Tellier later sang when he entered 2008's Eurovision song-contest!

Tellier is typical of the independent-minded creatives Lucky Number seems to like. Reflecting now on Friends’ inclusion in the BBC Sound of 2012 poll, a veritable hype machine, Morley had mixed feelings about whether a top-5 finish is important considering it would produce expectation from the rest of the industry for Friends to sell loads of records: a mixed blessing. I didn’t raise the suggestion that a critical lift like that could be a self-fulfilling prophecy in the shops, even for a too-cool indie band like Friends, but I’m sure deep down, the duo would be completely chuffed if that were to happen.

Seventeen Evergreen are their newest project, but it's still early days for their other artists. Friends will have an album out in early 2012, a tentative, tentative, release date of April 23rd, preceded by two shows in London (Lexington- Feb 7th sold out, XOYO- Feb 8th) and Caged Animals have Vincent Cacchione’s astro orbit creativity and energy to harness in promoting their debut (check out recent single ‘Teflon Heart’ by the way).

Enough from me. There will be more posts to come.

09/11/2011

LIVE REVIEW: Hypnotic Brass Ensemble @ Jazz Cafe, London


Twirling care-free in a field of anonymity like Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music, Grapevine draws resolve from all your charming reading. You survive this tautological word racket, and hopefully gleam some new music in return. It’s for you that I tune in, turn on and drop out or whatever it’s called, and do this wacky nonsense after work when the laptop flickers and the world is but a husk of numbers on a computer. Yet, despite this, if a tree falls in woods and no one is there to hear it, it makes a seismic sound...because that tree will soon be on Grapevine, heralded as some brilliant new band and splayed like a drab strumpet for all her glory in the naked stocks of Soundcloud shame.

Could being covered on here really sound anyyy more saucy? Maybe...if there were pictures.

Today’s post is from a Hypnotic Brass Ensemble gig. The Chicago band who played London’s Jazz Café Monday night, but missed the pages of the national press (it soon transpired) are not your ordinary show-stoppers. Fans include Jude Law and Damon Albarn, the Blur liberal world arts genius. The band have tirelessly toured their back yard for 10 years, busking (check out some of their videos on youtube), ducking and diving, making self-released records- working their way towards these sorts of moments: gigs with roomfuls of warm, pre-disposed crowds. Their self-titled album- their first in the UK- was released by distinguished label Honest Jons in 2009 after the band were spotted busking near the record store in Ladbroke Grove. Sooner or later they were on Later…with Jools Holland. This, quite literally, is an urban hip-hop nine piece brass band, EIGHT of whom are brothers (awkward for the ninth member, eh?) and sons of jazz musician Tony Cohran. HBE smack you with something so direct and- as anyone who was there will testify- insanely loud, that you will be jolted to recall that brass is not only something heard in the grounds of Buckingham Palace or at the local arts centre. It has a historic place in music: the street, community life.

The nine are lively, spinning their four trumpets, two trombones, one sousaphone (yeeeaah, that’s this) and baritone in different directions to Gabriel Wallace’s drums. Their unified and determined symphony is great, aesthetically as well as sonically. It’s a powerful, raw image, these nine lads bopping to brass. They punctuate the drive with raps, each taking turns to draw in the uncertain crowd and re-assure them. You can see this is something they’ve honed. Whether due to their roots on Chicago’s south side, personal gigging experience or a wilful effort to integrate rap into their recordings (see this year’s EP Bulletproof Brass, which has vocals), heavy crowd interaction is necessary for things to fully come to life and break down a difficult fourth wall that haunts many a contradictory musician. HBE look different, even if they’re just another band. Cynics won’t know what to think when nine men with tattoos and bristling egos turn up and start pushing their trumpets on everyone and then take off their shirts. What’s English popular culture’s point of reference for this? None. Audience interaction is necessary for the uninitiated to understand what HBE are to them. Lots of cheesy call and response gets the crowd going. Chanting before ‘Touch the Sky’, ‘Kryptonite’ and ‘Party Started’ among other tracks warms them to dancing and trusting this lot of American orchestra men before the raps step aside for brass. It doesn’t take long for these gestures to become reciprocal and soon we're part of the mix. The crowd finally chant the band back down from the Jazz Café’s high restaurant balcony in appreciation. HBE get the crowd down on the floor. Everyone- (even closet killjoys…it’s hard to tell what proportion of the audience are engaging in this sort of act of obedience because they genuinely want to) was down, groovin, before rising to touch the sky. THAT sort of infectious enthusiasm is hard. HBE must have realised that certain audiences want to be led, and once they are, the atmosphere can just build.

HBE’s music is assertive. The Hypnotic in their name, derived from when the group were busking and a subway passenger missed many trains to hear them play, is certainly apt. Each song marches to a defined formula; a deep, jagged groove rather than the soft melodies often heard in jazz. Tycho Cohran- who to me seems like the leader of group for his massive sousaphone - settles into a bass groove that the rest of the band follow. Energy is then brought on by trumpets. On ‘War’, their trademark track that they must have played hundreds if not thousands of times, this formula is clearest. Rumbles blaze from Tycho, and his brothers swirl around him with repetitious horns.

Looking ahead, how will HBE avoid being labelled one-trick ponies? They deliver hip-hop’s rhythm, but songs from the UK debut didn’t allow much room to manoeuvre. Most importantly, the band ultimately have to do what they want to do. The moment Gabriel, Seba, Tarik, Gabriel, Uttama, Jafar, Saiph, Amal and Tycho’s love for their instruments and inquisitiveness dies out, so too will everyone else’s. They’re integral. This is the same with many bands I’ve seen live who come out of leftfield to mainstream tastes, particularly jazz and ‘world’ musicians. The moment the love and soul is lost between the artist and his music, uninitiated music aficionado get all aloof from it. Bulletproof Brass is a good indication of future direction. The rapping works well as an extension to their energy, live and on record, and the samples show an interesting change of style. I hope, personally, that we get something like a brass version of The Roots from HBE: a band that’s reflective, single-minded and soulful, to join a great collection of modern popular hip-hop artists. HBE certainly have the independence to do that, and the road-hardened experience to find their way. As we’re seeing fleetingly on the new EP, and most notably in the calmer ‘Black Boy’, Hypnotic’s awakening might yet be to come.


Hypnotic Brass Ensemble - War by ChoiceCuts

Hypnotic Brass Ensemble bit at Jazz Cafe by MiCloud

29/10/2011

Philco Fiction- Take It Personal


We join Philco Fiction at their international germination but over eight years into their career. The Norwegian trio (website) are warming us with ballads, but not ordinary ones. Stomachs do flips and journo brains get a bit sweaty. Take It Personal (stream it here) is a neon gas heater of sound, driving down artificial, impersonal warmth onto your head.

This is a very unusual record. Philco rush from Florence & The Machine esque soaring pop ballad to electro anthem, to orchestra-led avant garde experimentation. Throughout, The Knife’s off-kilter unpredictable bombast runs through the tracks. First there's the confident but dispassionate female vocal like Karin Dreijer Andersson and then there's the unnerving changes of atmosphere between sideways pop splashes (like The Knife's Deep Cuts), dark twists (like Silent Shout) and orchestras (like Tomorrow, In a Year). The confusing undertones of sophomore and potential breakthrough Take it Personal are endless.

Take It Personal won’t so much hit you, as lower you gently into a cauldron of bubbling stew. The introduction, ‘Help!’, uses dark, rumbling bass reminiscent of Fever Ray before breaking into a soaring electro anthem of safer pop chart climbs. Even then, Turid Alida Solberg’s voice belies the song's familiarity, keeping it tethered to a dark undercurrent. Slowly, Philco's air of definiteness comes apart. ‘The Youth’ opens with creepy synths and the soundtrack to a child tiptoeing in fairy-tale haunted woods. Violins, cellos (?) and whirring gadgetry in the bridge show that this record might indeed be one odd mother. Streaks of ‘One For You’ or ‘Rock Classics’ from Deep Cuts break out as ‘The City’ confirms our expectations: Gloomy, uncertain, dark…congratulations- you are into Philco Fiction's mad mad world.

The band navigate genres and styles like a croupier shuffling cards. From ‘Finally’ onwards, they let rip and open up into a plethora of directions that even the most able reviewer would find daunting. 'Finally' opens with XX-like guitars that join broad strokes of gentle piano chords part-way through. Into six minute number ‘Too Nice’, and the slow-burning sound starts to get asphyxiating; warped, almost, as it progresses. The section comes to a head with ‘I Want You’, an edgy track that pulsates with non sequitur lyrics a la that Swedish duo (once again):

"My intentions are no longer good. My intentions aren't acting like they should. I never decide what to eat. I never lose my sleep."

It builds to a gloriously melodic soulful climax, twirling to victory.

Now for the most surprising part. Seconds after the layered, triumphant climax, a delicate folk number eases into ear-shot. Pizzicato violins? Joanna Newsom? Almost. With Turid's soothing, swooning elegance, this particularly stunning juxtaposition of songs finally blows out. Snaking its path, calming you down, 'Too Close' ably steers you out of madness, towards sobriety and into the next section. The diversity on this album, but particularly, these four middle tracks, is amazing. Each one is boldly sonically independent. They stare you down with such confident directness that even on repeated listens you forget what you’ve just heard once the next track's begun. Take It Personal demands it. It demands all your focus. 'Take It Personal' is very apt indeed.

The final three tracks are no less unusual. ‘Horizon’, the most upbeat number on the album preens with sparkle. It's easy to see why lady vocalist led electro acts have had such blog exposure this year: with double-track recording, Turid's voice comes out in a way that I don't think a male vocalist's could.

Take It Personal is one of my favourite records of 2011 so far, and one of the most unclassifiable, deep, stunning albums broadly fitting within the parameters of popular alternative music I’ve ever heard. There isn’t a duffer, and even towards the end when you finally think you've consolidated the swathes of sonic territory there are to contend with, 80s pop inspired ‘Time is a Fly’ comes in and smashes the little picket-fence you think you've built to house it. If someone could tell me from where Philco Fiction draw their inspiration apart from ‘everywhere’ I would be interested to hear it. The way music can be in the self-referential, post-modern internet world is an incredible thing. And it’s not for the first time that I love it. Philco Fiction, I hope, will become one of the world's most popular new alternative bands.

Out Now on Brilliance Records (label here).


Philco Fiction - Finally by Brilliance Records


Philco Fiction - Help! by Brilliance Records

12/10/2011

Tennis- 'Tell Her No' (The Zombies cover)



Tell Her No by tennisinc


Ahhh it feels good to be back.

I had an email Q&A exchange with the awesome Lucky Number Music (home of Caged Animals and Friends), which was rudely botched by a website I occasionally do some writing for- but never mind: my musical mojo is still intact. I’m going to endeavour to bring you everything great and spongy that I’ve heard of late, for your great and spongy ears!

The first piece- saying that- is lifted from gorillavsbear.net- a recent post about husband and wife duo Tennis, who we featured earlier this year on the site.

They’ve covered (download here) The Zombies’ 1965 chart hit ‘Tell Her No’. It’s a classic Beatles-cum-Beach Boys-esque song but with a cruel anti-romance twist. The lyrics go: “And if she tempts you with her charms, Tell her no, no, no […] Don’t hurt me now for her love belongs to me.” It could have fitted pretty well on their debut LP Cape Dory if you ask me, due to all the 60s-style throwbacks.

A follow-up to 2011's debut is in the pipeline. Here’re some words:

We’ve spent the last several months writing and preparing for what we hope will keep us busy all winter. We will be announcing a Forest Family release in the next couple of weeks as well as tour dates to make up for the Vaccines tour cancellations. Also, we are excited to announce the existence of our next album (produced by our new friend Patrick Carney coming out early next year. In the meantime, we made this cover of the Zombies “Tell Her No.” It’s been a long time favorite of ours and is the best use of a lone-clap we’ve ever heard.”

21/09/2011

Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin- Tape Club

Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin- Tape Club

(2011, Polyvinyl Records)





For when there’s a lull with nothing to post about, I’ve kept this back in reserve. One of my favourite bands of the last 10 years who create music that occasionally hits me like a truck (‘House Fire’, ‘Some Constellation’) or takes a while to sink in (most of Broom), but always succeeds in wriggling inside my brain-box and building a nest for itself: Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin. I wrote about them earlier (see here) and as you may know, they were an "of the moment" band on US-based indie blogs around 2005 when recording Broom, their first album. This was a home-recorded, extremely lo-fi record and had very little to say for itself in the way of production, but stood out promisingly for its tunes. An internet following was born.

Since Polyvinyl picked Broom up and released it, the commercial fortunes of Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin- or SSLYBY for short, arguably waned slightly according to speculation from loyal adherents. Thankfully though, their music and passion didn’t. Two diverse, lively and enjoyable records followed in 2008 and 2010, Pershing and Let it Sway respectively, filled with shamelessly catchy pop tunes. Broom, re-released for Record Store Day in April this year with some new tracks- that first home-recorded record, now sits atop a small number of dreamy indie kids’ post-2000 lists as a cult pop classic. I give mine a listen quite regularly, and often wonder what in those loosely formed arrangements and hushed vocals keeps me coming back. But it does. And regularly.




Their honeyed sound and image isn't for everyone. However, if you’re a fan of good music without pretence; a follower of healthy tunes over fashion, SSLYBY are one of the best bands to draw into your listening arsenal. Cavorting with my ears through train journeys, helping while away 40 minutes in town or sound-tracking an evening with friends before heading out, SSLYBY can be taken anywhere (and will take you anywhere) with their infinite lightness.

I turn to the reason for this post: Tape Club, a 26-song compendium of b-sides that SSLYBY will release in October. How impossible to imagine that a band as lo-fi as SSLYBY would even have b-sides. How much more demo-like could they be, especially the b-sides from Broom?! Well in their seven-year fringe-of-the-public-zeitgeist tenure, and ten years as a band, their production values have wilfully soared and plummeted as much as a kite on the breeze. It makes SSLYBY sound like two different bands, one playing at Will Knauer’s house in a suburb of Springfield, Missouri, and one recording in a high-tech, gee whizz, sound-proofed studio. (In reality, even the uber-polished Pershing was recorded at Knauer’s aunt’s house).






So sound varies wildly. At the end of ‘What We’ll Do’, you can literally hear the tape stop; on ‘Song 1000’, the band just about hold things together while they muck around with (what sound like) kazoos. At the other end of the scale, Let It Sway’s lush mid-range pours out of the speakers on ‘Bended’ and ‘Letter Divine’, a richness and warmth, employed from Pershing onwards, to give singles like ‘Think I Wanna Die’, ‘Glue Girls’, ‘Banned (By The Man)’ and ‘Critical Drain’ their glamour and anthemic charm.




A few songs don’t really fit into either of these two categories and float innocuously between them: ‘Sweet Owl’ is the sort of tune I thought SSLYBY would never record, just because it’s so folksy, and ‘Yellow Missing Signs’ (the first song leaked from Tape Club) adopts an electro edge that makes you wonder what the band were up to when non-rock influences took hold in jamming sessions.

Diamonds in the rough tease themselves out, as is often the case with SSLYBY. Campfire ditty ‘Bigger Than Yr Yard’ could have made it onto Broom to close it with a late-night sing-a-long. Some of the newer, cleaner production stuff also grabs hold of you after a few listens: ‘New Day’ and ‘Coming Through’ are a class act placed by side by side. They’re probably my highlights of the album and shimmer with an innocent, harmonious glow. They're much like the flowering of confidence that seemed to resonate in Pershing: the realisation of the group's creative energy and pop prowess.

It's a great collection. There's no doubting that. I say it as a fan and as an advocate, but also because I think Tape Club shows quite clearly how enjoyable a band can be with a few chords running round their heads spontaneously knocked out on tape. Purveyors of lo-fi fun, nonsense and slivers of brilliance, SSLYBY are pop stalwarts.

Indie-blog praise hasn’t quite lived up to expectation: the objective 'standard' that artists are supposedly aiming for, but that is too crude. Even if ubiquity doesn't come calling, it doesn't need to, for many of us are just happy listening to SSLYBY….and occasionally writing about them.


Tape Club is in stores on 18th October and comes in all sorts of formats (see here). The band are currently touring the States, as always. Fingers crossed for European dates. See above to stream the album.

19/09/2011

death masks stares



Folk-rock with a slightly baroque feel is what my friend Jonny deftly described as ‘In the woods’ music. Fleet Foxes, Midlake, Woods, Dry The River, all that sort of stuff……basically any band that would play at End of the Road or Green Man festival if you want to be sweeping.

It feels like I haven’t heard something like this in ages. Merseysider Thom Tyrer’s project sounds like a track from Woods’ At Echo Lake from 2010, tumbling with carefree jangling guitars and the weary reflections of autumn.

‘Stares’ is part of a four track cassette tape & free digital EP called I Know A Short Cut that is available on Tyrer’s bandcamp. An LP will be released later this year.



Death Masks- Stares

17/09/2011

Neon Indian- Era Extraña

Neon Indian- Era Extraña

(2011, Static Tongues/ Mom+Pop)



Neon Indian: pioneer of 2009/10 phenomenon ‘chillwave’; talented young 23 year old from Texas; man who sellotaped together some random electronic flotsam and jetsam in 2009 and stood back to reveal a completed work called Psychic Chasms that stunned and excited listening hoards in equal measure. Neon Indian’s creator Alan Palomo has been treated kindly by the internet. His music is innovative, bright and colourful; he is also clearly serious about his machines and the way they are used so prominently and consistently in his work, which is I think part of his wide appeal.

For an album title, Era Extrana sounds like it was rejected as a wacky Coldplay concept name. Mixed by the guy who recorded Tame Impala’s Innerspeaker and both MGMT records, it picks up where Psychic Chasms left off. Fizzling with synthetic spark, beats and video game samples, it delves back in to the fun but delicate papier-mâché universe that Psychic Chasms created for itself to indulge in spaceship dreams and psychedelic story-telling.

Best start with the equivalent of the debut’s hit ‘Deadbeat Summer’ and look at ‘Polish Girl’: overall an incredible poppy stunner to rival Deadbeat’s breezy underplayed emotion and playful energy. There’s no doubt this will be a favourite for Neon Indian sets. The video is also representative of what it seems Palomo wanted to achieve: that eccentric Flaming Lips-esque abstraction. A world that wilfully will not be placed in space or time. Posing like the opening video for a Daft Punk gig, a futuristic astronaut-cum-welder DJ is teased away from his twiddly noise boxes by a young woman and goes on a journey to re-connect with her using what seems to be VHS, or Betamax, or some quasi-vintage equipment cobbled together in the year 2050 because all technology is sort of wiped out but we’ve invented this weird hybrid breed. It’s kitsch and textured. Computers rule in Palomo’s world, even in his videos.

The album is divided into three parts: ‘Attack’, ‘Decay’ and ‘Release’ but some bits struggle to find their voice. ‘Blindside Kiss’ (from ‘Attack’, it seems) tries this kind of detached, drug-infused drudgery that just seems a little aloof for my taste and sort of floats off into space. ‘Future Sick’ (mmm, lovely name) and ‘Suns Irrupt’ follow it into the dark-matter abyss. Feedback and hiss on this album threaten to stop Palomo in mid-song at every turn, even though many of them are strong, and drag him into the vacant dreaminess of his artistic universe. His feel for a good melody is in attendance on ‘Hex Girlfriend’ with its catchy backing vocal and ‘Heart: Decay’ is a classic 1980s Sci-Fi throwback, steeped in muffled effects. Indian acquired his chillwave credentials from the dimension of nostalgia that underlines his oddly apathetic party music, and that is clearly not lost. ‘Halogen (I Could Be A Shadow)’s indie pop structure and danceable tendencies are wrapped by echoic effects added to the vocal and the gentle thrum of high-end hiss.

The detachment of the latter half of the album is arguably annoying. It’s the result of Neon Indian’s insistence on delivering woozy futurism very persistently and deliberately. But you can’t begrudge him for that. The electronic, future….mash concept is clearly strong and sounds like Lucky Charms marshmallows might do if they scrapped cereal and did music instead. Sometimes that can be a little too riddled with synthesisers but the good bits make it worth it, (much like Lucky Charms themselves!) Luck Charms and Neon Indian are surely a marketing tie-in made in heaven when you think about it.

What Palomo does for his third album will really be interesting (not to diminish the obviously considerable effort he must have put in to making this one.) I guess when you’ve made an album as mad as this, what do you do next?!


The album is out now so you can buy it, or you can wait till 10th October for one of these deluxe synthesiser bundles that Rough Trade are doing. Up to you really, innit?

16/09/2011

a bit of a New Look fiend at present but...



...summary of recent New Look news:

1. New Look will be touring the UK and Europe from October onwards, including two nights in London. See their website for details.

2. On 7th October during the day they will be playing a special gig at Rough Trade East, London for those who purchased the album. Entry by wristband only: click here for details

3. The self-titled album will be released on 26th September. Click here to check out three of the tracks (Nap on the Bow, You & I and Drive You Home).

4. New Look got mainstream British attention by being The Guardian's New Band of the Day for 14th September. In it, the upcoming record was hailed as "one of the albums of the year."

Wow, all this New Look news in only three days! The internet works in mysterious ways.

14/09/2011

Friends- I'm His Girl

Friends- I'm His Girl
(2011, Lucky Number Music)





I noticed on twitter this morning that Friends will be releasing a new 7" single and thought it was worthy of a new blog post. Great song, very catchy and full of effervescent positivity. It is certainly getting better with every listen. The band are sounding like a cleaned up Best Coast; something that could have been on the three-piece's Crazy For You if not for the clearer production and neater presentation of their songs. Indeed if it was, it would have probably been one of its strongest tracks!

The song is a dictated lesson in the nature of a good relationship, which gives 'I'm His Girl' a sense of self-confidence and empowerment as clear and unapologetic as Beyonce's Single Ladies (albeit the message to young women is completely different and is about giving one other space, not marriage!) Samantha Urbani takes cues from her own satisfaction in the one line chorus: "When you see me walking around with him, I'm not just another chick, I'm.....his.....girl." It is masterful in reeling you in, and her cool self-confidence is sexy and finger-tingling. Then, when there's a bridge 2/3 of the way through and all you hear apart from Urbani is a cowbell/wooden block, she takes centre stage to deliver a blunt message in full, off-hand, and almost a little disinterested:

"If you love someone, let them be free. I know I don't want no one suffocating me. Don't settle for ownership, make a team. If you love someone, it should feel good to let them breathe."

It is corny, but in Urbani's deft delivery, 'I'm His Girl' manages to be deadly serious and flirtatious at the same time: a confusing, poker-faced flirt. It's out 31 October via Lucky Number Music (limited to 500 copies). Ooo you filthy dogs- keep your relationship safe.

Check it out above!

11/09/2011

just for the hell of it.....

Sweet Female Attitude- Flowers

(2000)






I don't why I'm posting this but to hell with it. (It's not the official video). Sort of coming from all the cool shit New Look reminds me of.

10/09/2011

New Look- Janet

New Look- Janet

(September 27th 2011)


New Look- Nap on the Bow

New Look- The Ballad


I’d like to thank a blog called WDPK 83.7 fm, which looks right up my alley according to a cursory viewing for they've revealed to me a band called New Look, who were featured on Jamie xx’s IMMENSE BBC Radio 1 mix broadcast 27th August. Somehow they passed me by.

Information on New Look proved hard to come by but I got hold of some in the end. An album is due on 26th September via !K7 Records- although I can't find a name- and the band, consisting of married couple Sarah Ruba and Adam Pavao hail from Canada. It won't be their first release. An EP called How's My Hair was out in 2008 (listen to it here).

Anyway, head over to WDPK 83.7 fm to download ‘The Ballad’ and ‘Nap on the Bow’, which show that New Look really have some special vibes, or check them out above. Haunting electro ballads with deep R&B hooks. 'Nap on the Bow' is my favourite. It's an absolute belter.

Their website is http://newlookmusic.com/

Also find Jamie xx mix containing other aural nuggets.

Jamie xx Essential Mix by Young Turks

Friends- Friend Crush

Friends- Friend Crush

(2011, Lucky Number Music)



Friends only formed in spring 2010, yet their debut 7” ‘Friend Crush’ set firm intentions about the sophistication Friends can channel into their jilted dance pop. Signed up by Lucky Number Music for this record (although not for an album), the band share the UK label with Caged Animals, another band practising droning, slurred music oozing listlessness. “That first practice went so incredibly well, we knew we had something going on”, songwriter Samantha Urbani told Stereogum this April. “After that we really threw ourselves into practising almost every day, and playing 2 or 3 shows a week, only because we loved what we were doing so much.”

Hailing from Bushwick, New York and constituting five stylish, good-looking boys and girls, there is a partial gloss of cool about Friends even before you’ve heard the music. However it is tunes driving their appeal. ‘Friend Crush’s 250 print run sold out fast (I bought one on Ebay) and no doubt their debut London show with Caged Animals on 27th September will be a big draw too.

The song is immediate. It is pressing, anxious and tense, as though always on the precipice of a lick that never comes. Consequently the band have been compared with great new-wave inspired, alternative 80s acts like ESG and Tom Tom Club. Another infectious number ‘Feeling Dank’ is on soundcloud.

29/08/2011

Bombay Bicycle Club- A Different Kind of Fix

Bombay Bicycle Club- A Different Kind of Fix

(2011, Island)





Bombay Bicycle Club are a band I’ve always wanted to see live but have never quite got round to. I watched their 2011 Reading and 2010 Glastonbury performances on the BBC, both of which looked really fun and impressive. Approaching my age, middle-class and from a nearby part of London, they also remind me of my own youth. They are still young (three years since completing their A-Levels and already three albums into their career is an astonishing achieving that almost brings to mind some kind of Chinese musical prodigy band) and yet they seem easygoing, unaffected by the fame so exceptional for people their age, just enjoying their touring and recording. If there’s one thing that’s obvious on an inspection of a Bombay Bicycle Club live performance, it’s that the band love doing it: their interaction with the crowd (usually a loyal following), cheery smiles and genuine exuberance bring out obvious good humour and level-headedness in their attitude to a typically (or typically portrayed) heady, glamorous and occasionally debauched profession: rock band.

Bombay Bicycle Club’s clean-cut image has not opened them up to jibes or cynicism, however, probably because their musical output continues to bear them out. Three albums in two years has sort of made a mockery of artists who labour over music, posturing over tone or production or management: it really does seem as though Bombay do what they want and realise they are just part of a stupid heady circus. Every album though (including A Different Kind of Fix it seems) has been received well, and has taken their career to a new, concrete level. To me Bombay will be around for a long time: slow-burner intelligent types, quietly hanging around until every indie kid in sight is gobbled up, spat out and sent on their way with a few CDs, loyal patriotism to the Bombay uncharacteristic of this flippant age and a cheery spring in their step. I thought this from the moment I heard I Had The Blues But I Shook Them Loose. Doing what you want is obvious, but for this band it seems to coincide with some kind of chink in the indie music zeitgeist which only Bombay Bicycle Club seem able to fill.

A Different Kind of Fix seems in many ways a coming of age LP- greater self-awareness, reflection and hardiness than the last. Flaws was acoustic, quiet and simple but it lacked depth at times. ‘Ivy & Gold’ and ‘Rinse Me Down’ were casual little ditties; though wonderfully formed and touching, they were not particularly penetrating. The opening riff of ‘How Can You Swallow So Much Sleep’, however- the first few minutes of the album- suggests a slightly more serious and sobering affair on A Different Kind of Fix. Trudging into the darker ‘Bad Timing’, a more staid demure is confirmed. Echo effects swirl around Suren’s drums as Jack Steadman tries to carry his voice over the atmospheric feedback. I Had The Blues But I Shook Them Loose would never have tolerated this grungy, heavy pondering, yet posing themselves a challenge, Bomaby Bicycle Club shed their image as loitering children. Reverberating guitars and vocals persist on ‘Your Eyes’ in which it sounds like Jack Steadman greets us from inside a cave. The production adds to the sense that Bombay Bicycle Club are less whimsical, less delicate and ready to carry themselves into a new, more mature phase. Animal Collective producer Ben Allen can be credited with producing this distinctly different feel that plays on the slightly more nuanced character of their music.

Other highlights include ‘Lights Out, Words Gone’ (see above Reading link), fun single ‘Shuffle’ and the haunting, melancholic ‘Still’. A Different Kind of Fix is a prime example of Bombay Bicycle Club blending the kind of catchy pop that was present on their debut with more unusual song structures, occasional moroseness (especially in the second half of the album) and a reverberating style of orchestration. In essence, the band still sound like they’re enjoying themselves, which remains the most obvious and important factor in delivering the quality that we have come to expect from Bombay Bicycle Club LPs. On ‘Beggars’ they indulge in a slight folksy stint; whooping harmonies and rich guitars suggest Steadman could even be developing the band as a new Fleet Foxes!

On the strength of this album, I don’t doubt that A Different Kind of Fix will be just as big a hit as its two predecessors and that Steadman & Co will quietly plod forward towards NME notoriety, positive reviews and even bigger shows with just as many loyal fans. One day when they split up we will turn back and look at how four teenagers from Crouch End managed to in their own unassuming way outlive the allure of cool bands like Foals and Klaxons, and puncture trends as completely irrelevant. There has been no sense of entitlement on which to hang their coats, just focus, dedication and songcraft. In the spirit of that sensibly steady-Eddy description, if there is one band your Mum might like you to like, Bombay Bicycle Club still could be it. However if this is the music they write, I don’t really care.

27/08/2011

how to dress well- decisions from 'just once' ep


In sort of self-congratulatory commemoration of approximately a year of TTG, here is 'Decisions' from the Just Once EP by How to Dress Well. It's rather fitting because 'Decisions' was the first song posted by this blog, back on 25th June 2010. Since then there have been a further 52 posts (this will now make it 54 overall), and How to Dress Well, the artist to whom this blog has probably been most closely allied with in its own petty insular way has, I'm pleased to say, risen to a reasonable measure of critical acclaim. 'Just Once' is a four-track limited edition orchestral EP released to commemorate the passing of a good friend of Tom Krell (HTDW) and part of the proceeds will go to charity.

Anyway- may post later today with more info/another review of some kind so stay tuned!

26/08/2011

Baxter Dury- Happy Soup


Baxter Dury- Happy Soup

(2011, Parlophone)

The problem, the paradox with children of popstars is that no matter to whom and to what they align themselves, it is nearly impossible for the public to stop seeing parents in them. These often more successful forerunners to their offspring loom large like menacing spirits in the room, dampening it must be said, the pursuits of their children. Where music is concerned, critics very often take aim with their metaphorical rotten fruit; yet when your Dad is a rock n roll icon, it isn’t easy to realise your own qualities at the best of times, let alone live up to the expectation that has been foisted upon you.

This is not Baxter Dury’s first album; however, in the two weeks since its release, Happy Soup has already proved to be his most widely publicised. The son of Ian Dury and the Blockheads singer Ian Dury, Baxter, now nearly 40, has had two previous LP- Len Parrot’s Memorial Lift in 2002 and Floor Show in 2005. The film Sex & Drugs & Roll revealed some of the tumultuous experiences he went through as a child under his Dad’s heady rock n roll influence.

That back-story though clearly did not get in the way of critics’ response to this latest Dury outing. No. You see Happy Soup­ is an odd, ramshackle, cockney Londoner’s album. It’s Baxter’s, not Ian’s, teasing out and celebrating as it does the idiosyncrasies of his own unusual persona. Dury’s voice is striking: strikingly plain, dour, direct and deadpan. Unsentimentally recalling personal events that really should warrant some kind of emotion or cracking of the mask, his style is like a male Lily Allen in middle-age, Alan Donohue from London band The Rakes in positively sombre form. With witty urban social commentary and pokerfaced delivery giving the impression that Dury is jaded, quietly brooding and disconnected from his own depictions, Happy Soup in many ways appears mildly cathartic. Indeed he apparently didn’t change the names of ‘Claire’ of ‘Isabel’, which describe former relationships. “I think my mate slept with you when you were in Portugal” is one such revelation, yet Dury delivers it like trying to get his words recognised on an automated booking line.

If Dury’s songs are about personal experience, he tries not to wallow in their sorry bog, both in terms of his disconnected delivery and the music itself. In the spirit of the English rock everyman, ‘Trellic’ delivers a simple riff and vocal that would put the best Rakes and Art Brut tracks to shame. Yet, even when trying to sound hopeful, the morose atmosphere usually wins. On ‘Leak at the Disco’ (a song closely resembling Maximo Park’s ‘Acrobat’ from 2005), he sings to a thudding bass drum and carefully chosen synth notes: “Love has all but broken you” goes the grim chorus line. In these moments, Dury finds tenderness and beauty. There is an implication somewhere in the music that sadness and reflection will one day bring redemption; that all is not lost, but we cannot find a way out just now. The song soars to its anxious close. Elsewhere, Dury uses sparse instrumentation to draw attention to his voice and lyrics.

Happy Soup is a great and unusual album. It is well-imagined, easy to listen to and while in betrayal of its title it is a little downhearted, excellent instrumentation and Dury’s sensitively summoned vocal transform its defeatism into a rich, human and vivid charm that belie its simplicity. For those who are interested, Happy Soup is one of Rough Trade's picks of the month. Baxter will also be touring the UK in October/November this year.

25/08/2011

The Antlers @ Screen on the Green

Live Review: The Antlers @ Screen on the Green, London 24/8/11

The scene was set for this most special of gigs. A small, unassuming cinema in North London, big comfy red sofas, an empty high street and lots of highly charged early twenty somethings trying to hide their anticipation by tweeting as the clock edged towards midnight.

The American indie band The Antlers have undergone something of a renaissance since the release of their album Burst Apart. Its predecessor Hospice, quite literally an album designed to mirror the process of grieving in response to someone with a terminal illness was a colossal, ghastly, tender, confusing record. It was bold and at the same time such a strong concept that it came to pretty much define the band since its 2009 release. Its album cover depicted a hospital patient’s hand, identified by a hospital wrist band, falling into the hand of someone else. It was unrelentingly bleak. Yet how could it be followed? Another critical and (within its niche) commercial success followed that attracted more interest, inviting fans into The Antlers’ wildly ambitious environs.

The cinema setting was perfect for this gig. The Antlers are not, by their own admission I’m sure, a band to get people dancing. Rather their music is reflective and emotional, a band to get people thinking and feeling rather than moving. As lead singer and guitarist Peter Silberman and co appeared (seemingly from the cinema’s toilets) and invited everyone forward, the front few rows shuffled to the stage. I hoped they would begin with a tongue-in-cheek reference to their setting by playing the ubiquitous theme from Pearl & Dean.

Opening into the first track from Burst Apart, the set led best foot forward. Clear, rolling guitars filled the room and with ‘I Don’t Want Love’ we were underway, Silberman’s unique high-pitched falsetto sounding more vivid and sweetly defined than I’ve ever heard it. Silberman doesn’t so much sing, as let his lungs give way and soar and swoon, as though he is about to take off. His head rolls and his eyes occasionally screw up, as though he is making an effort to re-live the inception of the song, or disappear into a gentler, more re-assuring world in which his fears and anguish are assuaged. The significance of ‘Parentheses’, the lead single, is somewhat lost in this melee as the full album is played through, the grand context of Burst Apart coming to life and finally realising itself.

In my opinion this album sounded better live than it does on record. The transition to the live arena was so clear that Burst Apart almost sounds like a different album, analogous with a polished, re-mastered film being stripped of everything, the re-workings dropped, and restored back to its former glory, brilliant and warm. ‘Rolled Together’ and ‘Corscicana’ were particularly poignant, both pained and tender laments in which Silberman emanates a gentle vocal melody into a swirling wind of effects. These songs lapped at the ears of the audience and brought us unexpectedly and quietly closer together. Some people around me glanced at each other, giving amazed looks that Silberman could sustain such impossibly high-pitched dulcet tones for so long.

The set closed on a song from Hospice, the second one of the night after the band decided to play an impromptu version of ‘Bear’ following some technical difficulties. Perhaps the most well known song from that album, ‘Sylvia’ rang out in this now tired but involved and fully immersed cinema audience. Delivering Burst Apart in a live setting was always going to be tough. I have been to gigs where slow-burner, emotive and occasionally exhausting indie music has felt like a drag when taken out of its specifically aural confines, and audiences stand around, achy, even ignoring the band sometimes for a chat that can drown out the music: but not here. The setting (cinemas, I think, should be used more often for gigs from a certain kind of band), and mostly the band’s personal dedication to make this event live up to its ‘special’ billing made it a unique and touching event. Silberman’s sorry, grand, mawkish, stimulating ensemble should do this again. Burst Apart did itself justice yesterday, as a complicated and engrossing record.

04/08/2011

new best coast- how they want me to be


Hey folks! Here's some new Best Coast for you. It's called 'How They Want Me To Be' and it is a typically laid back, unassuming affair. Here's a note that accompanied it:

"You guys have been some of the most wonderful fans this past year, and I want to thank each and every one of you for supporting Best Coast. When times are rough for me, and I am traveling and not sleeping, and am worried about daily life, it always makes me feel better to know that my fans are out there.

I know I've been talking a lot about our second album, but it's still very far away from being created. I wanted to share a bit of life from recent Best Coast with you guys, so I thought I would post this song for you all to hear as a little teaser for the album.

This song was recorded a few months ago at Black Iris, the same studio we recorded "Crazy For You." This song is not properly mixed, it's mostly a rough studio demo of a song I wrote and wanted to record. I am about 99% sure that this song will get re-recorded and changed up a bit and will end up on our second album. It's called "How They Want Me To Be."

It's just a small taste of what's to come, and I wanted to give you guys something to get excited about since you've been the best fans in the whole world!

I am off to New York to start a weekend of fly in dates, so wish me luck, and I hope you all love this song and I can't wait to record more."

Love,

Bethany

03/08/2011

lucy rose- middle of the bed


Lucy Rose is a good friend of the British band Bombay Bicycle Club and a rising star on the country’s indie scene. Featured in the ‘Shuffle’ video and lending her voice to ‘Flaws’, Rose is currently on a UK tour promoting debut single ‘Middle of the Bed’, a reflective, sombre song reminiscent of fellow country-woman Laura Marling.

It is for her writing though that comparisons with the 2010 Mercury-nominated Marling are made. ‘Middle of the Bed’s candid autobiographical style would feel right at home with any of Marling’s works. However, hoping to find a middle-ground between the female pop and folk genres, the music accompanying Rose’s despondent, jaded voice is occasionally more upbeat. Various live performances on the web testify to her ability as a performer as much as a songwriter. Quiet and introspective, Rose manages to remain the right side of mawkish and banal, infusing a delicate charm into her voice to retain your attention.

That is precious and easily scuppered in the saturated world of acoustic music. However when song-craft comes this good, it is a pleasure to be reminded that the humble acoustic pop song can be made as fresh, tingling and delightful as it ever was.

Middle Of The Bed - Single Version by Black Book Management

21/07/2011

guerre aka lavurn lee

‘Bedroom’ artist Guerre (aka Lavurn Lee) has produced a big musical catalogue in the past two years. His music is quietly enticing, like sand immediately after a wave has struck that gently gravitates towards the sea. It’s the after bits that Guerre deals in; the clicks, the slurs, the tiny cuts, to produce delicately emotional results.

Debut EP Darker My Love is available for digital download via new label Yes Please.

20/07/2011

disclosure- carnival


We all love that feeling of a limited release, don’t we listeners? Isn’t it a fetish when we rush to buy a song whose production run is in three figures, enjoy the triumph of ring-fencing one of those copies in our little pockets, and then gallop to the nearest listening facility and share it heartily with our friends? I think so.

Well Disclosure, comprising 19 and 16-year-old brothers Guy and Howard Lawrence, have released 'Carnival' in a seriously limited, 300-print run 7” double A-side single (that’s one copy for every member of Bruce Springsteen & The E-Street Band, probably). However, simultaneously, they have been good enough to accommodate the fact that most of us won’t be able to get our mits on one by releasing the song as part of a free 5-track EP in exchange for liking the Disclosure Facebook page. Aw, guys.

If light market whoring seems an effort, then release aside, 'Carnival' is a great song. Its 2-step rhythms bring to mind SBTRKT’s recently successful 'Wildfire', which crossed sparse dubstep and garage, and herald good things for a duo that are so incredibly young. The tight vocal loops and minimal instrumentation that have been popularised by James Blake in the past year help the song build to a crescendo: a lively ball of fidgety pop that is at once familiar and irresistibly danceable.

Disclosure- Carnival

19/07/2011

stevie nicks- white winged dove (secret panda society remix)


We don’t know each other very well reader, but if we did, you would know that I love Fleetwood Mac. It corses through my 1980s veins like a splendid glucose my love of the Mac, and provides an energy and sanctity in equal measure unmatched by many other pop bands.

Why do I love the Mac? Well one of the reasons is of course Stevie Nicks. That little ball of a fiery voice box pounds out every darn word of the song she’s singing like every second is a galactic All-Star American Idol that she must, must win.

As for a dubstep version of the Mac, you could do far worse than ditching the rest of them bearded buggers and concentrating on Nicks’ ‘Edge of Seventeen (Just Like the White Winged Dove)’ from Bella Donna, which Secret Panda Society have done. Because it’s so pert, upright and direct, the song works fantastically mashed into a snowball of dubstep breaks and effects.

If Nicks was in a Rocky film, then this is what the soundtrack to the training montage would sound like. If Nicks did dubstep, this would be her b-side remix. All angry and convincing and that. Brrr...get me an earphone.

Stevie Nicks- White Winged Dove (Secret Panda Society Remix)

17/07/2011

the vaccines- wreckin bar


Can a review for a song that lasts 82 seconds be written in 82 seconds? The Vaccines’ fast, fast ‘Wreckin Bar’ is making me type very very fast, and shooting endorphins into my brain. But I just don’t think it can be done, because with ‘Wreckin Bar’, you’ve got to allow the thought part of your noggin to take a bit of a battering, and then perhaps take a rest.

For all the criticism that has been piled The Vaccines' way by some critics, whose opposite numbers declared them a heroic third in the BBC’s Sound of 2011 poll in December, ‘Wreckin Bar’ is, surely, their most memorable pile-driver single, and their best musically. Firstly, for any song to achieve in 82 seconds what most take four minutes to do (or don’t do at all), namely jump your heart into eager alertness again, is impressive. Secondly, the song’s spinning Catherine wheel of a chorus speaks only to your heart, and ignores what pointless, silly little thoughts you may be having (who needs thoughts?) to deliver precisely the musical equivalent of a caffeine high. Lastly, ‘Wreckin Bar’ tears to tiny tinkerbells the idea still peddled by men with moustaches, bowler hats and monocles, that good music must be complex, must be clever, or must, in frank, be of itself original and unheard of.

Now, don’t get me wrong- the four London-based Vaccines did pen this with their own minds and such; however, so born out of meat and two veg, unpretentious, punchy rock is ‘Wreckin Bar’ that it may as well be a guidebook for anyone looking to create a thumping rock single with two guitars, a drum kit and a screaming urge to declare to the world 'pick me and you will be thankful!'

The Vaccines- Wreckin Bar

how to remove a festival wristband...

Festival wristbands have become silently ubiquitous. Now considered as much a memento of your experience as a sign of admission (and class- don’t forget a sign of class: access all areas, VIP, ordinary joe etc), people increasingly want to keep them, but don’t know how to take them off. How’s how, preserving your wristband for posterity and future outings…

NB. Don't use your wristband to try and sneak others into the venue. It's not cool. Just pay money for the ticket like everyone else.

05/07/2011

on the weeknd


Ok, so I should really have written about this ages ago, but I have been pretty busy: The Weeknd. The mixtape ‘House of Balloons’ has been around for about 3 months now, although as eponymous as it is, it feels like a year. Since then, a new track called ‘Rolling Stone’ has been dropped via twitter, and last month, a song called ‘The Birds (Part 1)’.

So, what’s the deal with The Weeknd? Who or what is it, and why the heck is he or she or it so popular? Well the answer to all these questions has been a source of great discussion from almost the first days of ‘House of Balloons’ going online, and a source of great publicity too. We now know that the The Weeknd is Abel Tesfaye. He is from Toronto, and he’s only 20. But that’s about all we know.

This has proved part of the allure in itself. However much we are aware that it is a very clever bit of marketing for an artist to cut himself off just after dropping a great record, (and a record with a musical tone that is itself enigmatic, jaded and disconnected), The Weeknd’s glow continues to mesmerise us like hip little flies. In this media age, that refusal to speak is worth a thousand double-page spreads. To not give anyone an interview when the entrenched presumption is that aural and public exposure rise in tandem, is frankly unheard of. Tesfaye probably knows it, and it is a very, very smart thing to do if you’re planning your career, and its successive releases, gigs and so on, for the long game. Right now in fact, Abel Tesfaye might well be the holy grail of music interviewees. And, others might say that is well above his station.

The British national newspaper The Guardian online published two features in response to the internet attention Tesfaye received. Both were rather cynical….or questioning at least of The Weeknd’s music and cleverly non-existent marketing, particular Alex Macpherson, who acknowledged how many cultural commentators have got carried away. On the Village Voice, he said:

“It probably counts as some sort of triple whammy of music-critic idiocy: a sweeping proclamation about an entire genre, a blundering dismissal of that same genre, and hyping up an unremarkable new act after being taken in by their marketing strategy.”

Macpherson also denounced the music hand-in-hand with the media attention in his article by saying that R&B today has far more to offer than the stripped out, emotionally shallow Weeknd. Now, of course, one’s pronouncements on ‘better’ or ‘worse’ or ‘great’ are subjective. Art is like that, as is music, as are all cultural creations, and I don’t think Macpherson was holding himself up as a beacon of the objectively Correct. However, if The Guardian's great music critic isn't seeing the talent of The Weeknd, then what is it that the rest of the net sees that he doesn't?

The Weeknd are interesting to me personally because they touch on new and old feelings at the same time. On a basic level, their samples are drawn from all over the place chronologically (e.g. Beach House- c. 2008 on 'Loft Music', Siouxsie and the Banshees c. 1980 on 'Glass Table Girls'). However, more importantly, like How to Dress Well, there is a strong theme of old R&B melodies being stripped down to their simple core and built up again around ambiguous, ambient noise, that brings to mind the lo-fi styles of current indie music. Therefore, 'House of Balloons' hits a strange middle ground chronologically, between familiarly rich soul melodies and the newer lo-res production of Tesfaye's contemporaries.

Secondly, the theme of The Weeknd is undoubtedly despondency and indifference. Yet, what is good about R&B for a lot of people is the artist's emotional investment. Whether pining after someone or getting it on, R&B is for the most part optimistic and uplifting. R Kelly either laments something he can’t have or he’s getting down n dirty. The Weeknd have done away with all that. All that remains is a sort of emotional bankruptcy and a void: one that Tesfaye is constantly drawing our attention to. The R Kelly, the TLC, the Aaliyah, Brandy and Bobby Brown that sit somewhere in the backs of our minds form the core of The Weeknd’s music, just as they do with HTDW, and make all the songs initially familiar. However, around it is a bleak description of a drug and sex-fuelled lifestyle that has gone wrong a left the writer empty. There is a malaise. That part, in my view, is what gives ‘House of Balloons’ its exoticism, its confusion and ultimately, its cool.

The Weeknd therefore take on many tenets of mainstream chart R&B and turn them on their head. One artist’s regret of the drugs, sex and material lifestyle may not be new in R&B lyricism, but I think it has never been conveyed through the music like this. 'House of Balloons' actual lyrics are pretty clumsy if you listen to them; however, subverting the positive feelings materialism brings into really cold, hard, lost, negative ones is alone an idea that has artistic traction in my opinion.

I hope that wasn’t too laboured to read reader! What The Weeknd will do next is a really exciting topic, and perhaps an even bigger one, is to whom Tesfaye will give his first interview (including the cynical question: 'why?')