Just short of a year on from their debut offering, Telegram's second single sees Tom and Joshua from current tourmates the Horrors manning the studio desk for the already signature glam take on that charging psych sound - spiky guitars diving and throwing up internalised mini-riffs, rhythmically kosmiche, racing towards the finish line. Also Matt Saunders' vocals appear to be slowly turning into Steve Harley's.
Tuesday, September 30, 2014
Black Rivers - Voyager 1
A band name you won't recognise but personnel you might, being Andy and Jez Williams of the currently "resting" Doves. There's a certain through-line from some of that band's more exploratory moments to this in the tumbling layered guitars, insistent arpeggiating glitterfalls of synths and kosmiche rhythm, all of which keeps holding back and running free when required.
Monday, September 29, 2014
Two White Cranes - Walls
Two White Cranes is Bristol-based Roxy Brennan, who is also one third of Grubs and one quarter of the current live Trust Fund. Seriously, we're going to need digrams before long to keep track of everyone's band-sharing. Her pay-what-you-like album, vocals and guitar either alone or forefronted, is a thing of quiet beauty and joy in the detail and of love in cold climates.
Wednesday, September 24, 2014
Chrissy Barnacle, HUGH, Allo Darlin', Boxed In
Chrissy Barnacle - Fawn Heart
Barnacle is a fingerpicking folkie from Glasgow who doesn't tend to play the usual fingerpicking folkie outlets - she's just recently been touring with Martha, for one example. From a pay-what-you-like EP of fleshed out earlier songs, Barnacle's impure crystalline voice almost but not quite belies her underlying personal panic and self-discovery.
HUGH - One Of These Days
They may claim to have formed over mutual appreciation of Beach House and Grizzly Bear but it's the spirit of Dan The Automator's misleadingly laidback productions which pervades through the rubbery bassline and jittering synths over which Izzy Brooks and Benin City's Joshua Idehen make like lovelorn backpacker rhymers.
Allo Darlin' - Bright Eyes
In which Elizabeth steps aside for a bit and allows Paul Rains to take co-lead vocals on a sub-dappled melody the lyrics of which might better fit the title of the other track we've heard from third album We Come From The Same Place, Romance And Adventure. Then again, much of the time that's pretty much Allo Darlin' in microcosm.
Boxed In - Foot Of The Hill
Oli Bayston's second single, following his first by a couple of weeks more than a year, is based on that motorik rhythm that the kids love these days, over which is laid an urban-leaning flow with touches of Jamie T without the braggadocio.
Barnacle is a fingerpicking folkie from Glasgow who doesn't tend to play the usual fingerpicking folkie outlets - she's just recently been touring with Martha, for one example. From a pay-what-you-like EP of fleshed out earlier songs, Barnacle's impure crystalline voice almost but not quite belies her underlying personal panic and self-discovery.
HUGH - One Of These Days
They may claim to have formed over mutual appreciation of Beach House and Grizzly Bear but it's the spirit of Dan The Automator's misleadingly laidback productions which pervades through the rubbery bassline and jittering synths over which Izzy Brooks and Benin City's Joshua Idehen make like lovelorn backpacker rhymers.
Allo Darlin' - Bright Eyes
In which Elizabeth steps aside for a bit and allows Paul Rains to take co-lead vocals on a sub-dappled melody the lyrics of which might better fit the title of the other track we've heard from third album We Come From The Same Place, Romance And Adventure. Then again, much of the time that's pretty much Allo Darlin' in microcosm.
Boxed In - Foot Of The Hill
Oli Bayston's second single, following his first by a couple of weeks more than a year, is based on that motorik rhythm that the kids love these days, over which is laid an urban-leaning flow with touches of Jamie T without the braggadocio.
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
Hookworms, H O R S E S, Slow Skies, Anguish Sandwich
Hookworms - On Leaving
Could we almost call the second track from The Him - still what feels from the excitement around these first two tastes like an age away at November 10th - poppy? You can hear what MJ's actually singing, the production is spacious enough for the usual panicked drones to take a back seat and the Monks/psych/Nuggets influences are more readily apparent so that when the gradually building rush appears about halfway through and turns the whole thing on its jet-powered, almost Suicidey head and ends up like Crime and Neu! simultaneously.
H O R S E S - Kephyläu
More motorik. Excellent. H O R S E S - yeah, I know - claim to have invented 'Gloom Wave', though the phrase gives 4,320 results on Google. Whatever, the duo form another notch on the burgeoning electronic kosmiche influence on the Welsh underground in the wake of the likes of R.Seiliog (whose first EP and this eponymous one out next week share the Peski label in common), shifting Glass-patterned patterns and metronomic beats beating an austere semi-groove.
Slow Skies - Bodies
Another taster of the upcoming EP Keepsake, out 29th in the UK, finds a delicate but unsteady point between the atmospheric iciness of a Daughter and the desire to crash deliberately against the rocks as a way out. The ending certainly sounds storm-tossed enough.
Anguish Sandwich - Carol
The shouty-slacker no-fi smartarse Northamptonites have finally got round to an album, which they've called An Actual Thing and is out November 9th. This track contains a reference to shoplifting spray paint from Wilkinson's and is thus top notch.
Could we almost call the second track from The Him - still what feels from the excitement around these first two tastes like an age away at November 10th - poppy? You can hear what MJ's actually singing, the production is spacious enough for the usual panicked drones to take a back seat and the Monks/psych/Nuggets influences are more readily apparent so that when the gradually building rush appears about halfway through and turns the whole thing on its jet-powered, almost Suicidey head and ends up like Crime and Neu! simultaneously.
H O R S E S - Kephyläu
More motorik. Excellent. H O R S E S - yeah, I know - claim to have invented 'Gloom Wave', though the phrase gives 4,320 results on Google. Whatever, the duo form another notch on the burgeoning electronic kosmiche influence on the Welsh underground in the wake of the likes of R.Seiliog (whose first EP and this eponymous one out next week share the Peski label in common), shifting Glass-patterned patterns and metronomic beats beating an austere semi-groove.
Slow Skies - Bodies
Another taster of the upcoming EP Keepsake, out 29th in the UK, finds a delicate but unsteady point between the atmospheric iciness of a Daughter and the desire to crash deliberately against the rocks as a way out. The ending certainly sounds storm-tossed enough.
Anguish Sandwich - Carol
The shouty-slacker no-fi smartarse Northamptonites have finally got round to an album, which they've called An Actual Thing and is out November 9th. This track contains a reference to shoplifting spray paint from Wilkinson's and is thus top notch.
Wednesday, September 10, 2014
SOAK, Mega Emotion, Girlpool
SOAK - B a noBody
The already highly touted SOAK has signed to Rough Trade, as good a developmental home as any for the 18 year old Derryite whose up close and personal soul-scraping entreaties against textured backings recalls a less icy Daughter, a more grounded Cat Power or a British Isles Emiliana Torrini. There's certainly the feeling that maturity is both sneaking up on and becoming her as she works out what her life is about.
Mega Emotion - Uncomfortable
Norwich's synth-post-punk trio make a raid on the early 80s box for their new demo, patterns recalling early OMD popping around wiry basslines, half-hidden hooks and crossthreaded vocals. Retro-futuristic in the best way.
Girlpool - Jane
Girlpool are a teenage female LA duo who on this first release through Wichita exhibit twangy guitars and nothing else really showy musically, but it's all in the vocals - harmonied, proudly new-wave-feminist empowered, taking and demanding pride in your opinions sounding like breaking forcefully out of vulnerability, punctuated with proper screams, like if a Kathleen Hanna-backed K Records Smoke Fairies. A highly intriguing start.
The already highly touted SOAK has signed to Rough Trade, as good a developmental home as any for the 18 year old Derryite whose up close and personal soul-scraping entreaties against textured backings recalls a less icy Daughter, a more grounded Cat Power or a British Isles Emiliana Torrini. There's certainly the feeling that maturity is both sneaking up on and becoming her as she works out what her life is about.
Mega Emotion - Uncomfortable
Norwich's synth-post-punk trio make a raid on the early 80s box for their new demo, patterns recalling early OMD popping around wiry basslines, half-hidden hooks and crossthreaded vocals. Retro-futuristic in the best way.
Girlpool - Jane
Girlpool are a teenage female LA duo who on this first release through Wichita exhibit twangy guitars and nothing else really showy musically, but it's all in the vocals - harmonied, proudly new-wave-feminist empowered, taking and demanding pride in your opinions sounding like breaking forcefully out of vulnerability, punctuated with proper screams, like if a Kathleen Hanna-backed K Records Smoke Fairies. A highly intriguing start.
Sunday, September 07, 2014
Bears, bees and cats: Grawlix, She Keeps Bees, King Of Cats
Grawlix - Atlas Bear
This has been out since May but Haiku Salut tweeted about it the other day (and Louise is on the B-side), which is as fitting as any of being introduced to the delicate to the touch ambient soundscapes of Derby's James Machin, who may place voice and acoustic guitar front and centre but with the kind of emotional connection and backed by the kind of subtly reverberated and shifted atmospherics that those who have invested in Farewell J.R's couple of releases would get along fine with. There's an impending album entitled Good Grief, and he's supporting ver Salut at one of their semi-legendary lamp shows (of which they're playing a few around this date) at The Space @ Nottingham Contemporary on October 8th.
She Keeps Bees - Radiance
This has been around for a week and a half or so now, but slow and steady wins the race or whatever it is 'they' say. We've briefly covered She Keeps Bees before on here but this track from new album Eight Houses, out next week, sees Jessica Larrabee's smoky, aching vocal put against a delicately minimal backing that still shades in the gaps in a way Sharon Van Etten, who guests on the album, would approve of.
King Of Cats - Dead Lamb
Max Levy's distinctively tremulous take on lo-fi can take some getting into but this track from debut album Working Out, released 17th November on the Art Is Hard/Reeks Of Effort bastard child Art Reeks, has some heart behind it on a song he describes as being about "doing loads of exercise as a distraction, kids doing horrible things and preparing for a big fight".
This has been out since May but Haiku Salut tweeted about it the other day (and Louise is on the B-side), which is as fitting as any of being introduced to the delicate to the touch ambient soundscapes of Derby's James Machin, who may place voice and acoustic guitar front and centre but with the kind of emotional connection and backed by the kind of subtly reverberated and shifted atmospherics that those who have invested in Farewell J.R's couple of releases would get along fine with. There's an impending album entitled Good Grief, and he's supporting ver Salut at one of their semi-legendary lamp shows (of which they're playing a few around this date) at The Space @ Nottingham Contemporary on October 8th.
She Keeps Bees - Radiance
This has been around for a week and a half or so now, but slow and steady wins the race or whatever it is 'they' say. We've briefly covered She Keeps Bees before on here but this track from new album Eight Houses, out next week, sees Jessica Larrabee's smoky, aching vocal put against a delicately minimal backing that still shades in the gaps in a way Sharon Van Etten, who guests on the album, would approve of.
King Of Cats - Dead Lamb
Max Levy's distinctively tremulous take on lo-fi can take some getting into but this track from debut album Working Out, released 17th November on the Art Is Hard/Reeks Of Effort bastard child Art Reeks, has some heart behind it on a song he describes as being about "doing loads of exercise as a distraction, kids doing horrible things and preparing for a big fight".
Tuesday, September 02, 2014
Hilary Woods, Slow Skies, Primetime, Hallie & The Annies
Hilary Woods - Flames
Last year Woods was trading as The River Cry and made a tremendous but overlooked album; back trading under her proper name with Night EP, out September 18th, the sound has been fleshed out from that very atmospheric, minimal sound a little, bringing in an undulating rhythm while retaining the need to give everything space to breathe, all while still introspective and reverberating within its intimacy.
Slow Skies - Ice Field
From one icy Dubliner voice to another, and funnily enough we were just wondering the other day what had become of the duo since their last EP came out last May. The answer seems to be that they were making a new one, Keepsake, out at the end of the month, from which this delicate wander across audial floes comes, placing Karen Sheridan's fragile vocal at the centre of a shimmering waking dreamscape.
Primetime - Tied Down
Right, that's more than enough glaciality. Primetime are from the Raincoats/Kleenex school of all-female post-punk effort-over-technique angularity, a sound and approach we're starting to hear spread again of late (Ravioli Me Away, No Ditching, Colour Me Wednesday) so much so that it'll officially become a scene soon. From a self-titled 7" EP that came out in July comes a scratchy, unrepentantly direct strut with hidden hooks to spare.
Hallie & The Annies - Anytime
H&tA's, as nobody will ever call them, is a name that's been bandied about in indiepop circles over the summer months still with some confusion about who's actually in them. Ellis who is Trust Fund is one, it turns out, appropriate as the Bristol-based outfit's latest recording is as on the verge of falling apart as much of his work, a soft shoe shimmering jangle that in its luscious twang and dark-hued harmonies betrays an influence from the Dunedin Sound.
Last year Woods was trading as The River Cry and made a tremendous but overlooked album; back trading under her proper name with Night EP, out September 18th, the sound has been fleshed out from that very atmospheric, minimal sound a little, bringing in an undulating rhythm while retaining the need to give everything space to breathe, all while still introspective and reverberating within its intimacy.
Slow Skies - Ice Field
From one icy Dubliner voice to another, and funnily enough we were just wondering the other day what had become of the duo since their last EP came out last May. The answer seems to be that they were making a new one, Keepsake, out at the end of the month, from which this delicate wander across audial floes comes, placing Karen Sheridan's fragile vocal at the centre of a shimmering waking dreamscape.
Primetime - Tied Down
Right, that's more than enough glaciality. Primetime are from the Raincoats/Kleenex school of all-female post-punk effort-over-technique angularity, a sound and approach we're starting to hear spread again of late (Ravioli Me Away, No Ditching, Colour Me Wednesday) so much so that it'll officially become a scene soon. From a self-titled 7" EP that came out in July comes a scratchy, unrepentantly direct strut with hidden hooks to spare.
Hallie & The Annies - Anytime
H&tA's, as nobody will ever call them, is a name that's been bandied about in indiepop circles over the summer months still with some confusion about who's actually in them. Ellis who is Trust Fund is one, it turns out, appropriate as the Bristol-based outfit's latest recording is as on the verge of falling apart as much of his work, a soft shoe shimmering jangle that in its luscious twang and dark-hued harmonies betrays an influence from the Dunedin Sound.
Monday, September 01, 2014
Tigercats, Golden Fable, Ex Comets, yr friends
Tigercats - Junior Champion
First confirmed release for 2015! East London's infectious dreamers have signed to home of the hits Fortuna Pop! and will have second record Mysteries out in January. Well ahead of that, notice is served that they've grown up a bit, recruiting Paul Rains of Allo Darlin' as extra guitarist and bringing in a flute melody and triumphant sax parts from Terry Edwards (bringing his number of guest collaborations further into the low thousands) on a sophisticated shuffle that's still identifiably them, namechecking Bobby Fischer en route.
Golden Fable - Armour
A second album that will be out this year is Ancient Blue, out 10th November, which on this evidence sees the north Walians develop a bit of muscle behind Rebecca Palin's familiarly, enchantingly sprite-like vocals, electronics dialled back in favour of uneasily vibrating guitars, flirting in the process with darkwave or Low at their most jagged.
Ex Comets - Old Cool Red
Remember We Three And The Death Rattle? Among our tips for the year this January, they've already put that identity aside, doubled their numbers, claimed to be from Groom Lake (Area 51 to you) and emerged with a debut single, out on the 22nd, that reminds us of lost mid-00s art-rock conceptualists The Be Be See. In terms that other people might understand that means sci-fi synths, surf guitars, harmonies and underlying menace and dreaminess alike.
yr friends - Malibu
Yep, Alexei Berrow's got rent arrears/an overdraft/a council tax bill/all of the above and more* so he's got a new solo EP out. And yep, it's a Linkousesque Hole cover. Of course.
* based on previous assertions
First confirmed release for 2015! East London's infectious dreamers have signed to home of the hits Fortuna Pop! and will have second record Mysteries out in January. Well ahead of that, notice is served that they've grown up a bit, recruiting Paul Rains of Allo Darlin' as extra guitarist and bringing in a flute melody and triumphant sax parts from Terry Edwards (bringing his number of guest collaborations further into the low thousands) on a sophisticated shuffle that's still identifiably them, namechecking Bobby Fischer en route.
Golden Fable - Armour
A second album that will be out this year is Ancient Blue, out 10th November, which on this evidence sees the north Walians develop a bit of muscle behind Rebecca Palin's familiarly, enchantingly sprite-like vocals, electronics dialled back in favour of uneasily vibrating guitars, flirting in the process with darkwave or Low at their most jagged.
Ex Comets - Old Cool Red
Remember We Three And The Death Rattle? Among our tips for the year this January, they've already put that identity aside, doubled their numbers, claimed to be from Groom Lake (Area 51 to you) and emerged with a debut single, out on the 22nd, that reminds us of lost mid-00s art-rock conceptualists The Be Be See. In terms that other people might understand that means sci-fi synths, surf guitars, harmonies and underlying menace and dreaminess alike.
yr friends - Malibu
Yep, Alexei Berrow's got rent arrears/an overdraft/a council tax bill/all of the above and more* so he's got a new solo EP out. And yep, it's a Linkousesque Hole cover. Of course.
* based on previous assertions
Wednesday, August 27, 2014
Hookworms, Zola Blood, Casual Sex, Everything By Electricity
Hookworms - The Impasse
Regular readers will know how much of a possibly certifiable weakness we have for tracks 'recorded by MJ' at his Suburban Home studios in Leeds, but we haven't written so much about those tracks he records with MB, JN, SS and JW. Altering that state of affairs is this monster from second album The Hum, out 10th November, a wall of aggressively focused noise that with MJ's familiarly roaring over-reverbed vocals sounds tailor made for blasting the paint off venue walls.
Zola Blood - Meridian
We now have faces and names for the once-anonymous band, but in a musical sense their second track remains elusive. Possibly illusive too, given the way its beats push on and attempt to keep it perky as the synths tune downwards and the guitar plucks its way to the depths.
Casual Sex - A Perfect Storm
OOH, CAREFUL GOOGLING THAT NAME, SIR! We'd put 'Glasgow band' on the end, that'd help. After a year spent touring with Franz Ferdinand and playing SXSW comes a 7" on the Sandberg brothers (of Wake The President fame)' We Can Still Picnic label that has the poise of playful art-rock with the riffs of a touring monster and the beat of a Casio.
Everything By Electricity - Abyss
Straight out of the synth-dreampop handbook, if held upside down, comes a London trio sporting a wash of plangent synths, pulsating beats, a rush of treated guitar and a vocal that's not too distance from Jonas of Mew's awkward falsetto. It doesn't shimmer as much as flood.
Regular readers will know how much of a possibly certifiable weakness we have for tracks 'recorded by MJ' at his Suburban Home studios in Leeds, but we haven't written so much about those tracks he records with MB, JN, SS and JW. Altering that state of affairs is this monster from second album The Hum, out 10th November, a wall of aggressively focused noise that with MJ's familiarly roaring over-reverbed vocals sounds tailor made for blasting the paint off venue walls.
Zola Blood - Meridian
We now have faces and names for the once-anonymous band, but in a musical sense their second track remains elusive. Possibly illusive too, given the way its beats push on and attempt to keep it perky as the synths tune downwards and the guitar plucks its way to the depths.
Casual Sex - A Perfect Storm
OOH, CAREFUL GOOGLING THAT NAME, SIR! We'd put 'Glasgow band' on the end, that'd help. After a year spent touring with Franz Ferdinand and playing SXSW comes a 7" on the Sandberg brothers (of Wake The President fame)' We Can Still Picnic label that has the poise of playful art-rock with the riffs of a touring monster and the beat of a Casio.
Everything By Electricity - Abyss
Straight out of the synth-dreampop handbook, if held upside down, comes a London trio sporting a wash of plangent synths, pulsating beats, a rush of treated guitar and a vocal that's not too distance from Jonas of Mew's awkward falsetto. It doesn't shimmer as much as flood.
Thursday, August 21, 2014
Joanna Gruesome, Interpol, Tyrannosaurus Dead, Broken Arm
Joanna Gruesome - Psykick Espionage
Starting to suspect JoGru aren't going to release any more albums, just loads of new tracks on split singles. This one is with Perfect Pussy, and while no release date has yet been confirmed it'll feature a new track and cover by each on 7" plus a 24 page comic book. It's another reliving of their sweetness in the melee crossed with bug-eyed anger with subtlety, beginning like a runaway freight train with Alanna clinging on like here and now it means everything to her, and it probably does.
Interpol - Ancient Ways
Haven't heard them in this form for a while ahead of new album El Pintor, out 8th September. Paul Banks' lyrics are as inscrutable as ever, the noise around him focused, vaguely throbbing and pleasingly itchy driven by a rolling bassline gathering plenty of moss.
Tyrannosaurus Dead - Local Bullies
T-Dead have already been down the JoGru split route and have progressed onto an album, Flying Ant Day, out 3rd November via Odd Box. Produced by the usually reliable Rory Attwell, this switches from quiet wistful verses borrowing from the early 90s US underground to huge loud messy chorus, all while retaining misleadingly sweetened boy-girl harmonies. And it namechecks the RSPB.
Broken Arm - Guilty Conscience
Speaking of much-admired knob twiddlers, seriously, can MJ* consider putting us on commission at least if we're going to write about so many records he's recorded? From Leeds - the city they're all calling "the new Cardiff, at least as far as the number of new bands from there STN are featuring goes" - Broken Arm's debut album Life Is Short is coming out on 15th September via natural home of noisy dissonance Gringo Records, lashing on the power chord riff and then after a Mudhoney fashion slathering it in sludge, distortion, outbreaks of noise and short temperament.
(* Who of course also produced Joanna Gruesome's Weird Sister. See, everything's connected. Except Interpol. Bastards.)
Starting to suspect JoGru aren't going to release any more albums, just loads of new tracks on split singles. This one is with Perfect Pussy, and while no release date has yet been confirmed it'll feature a new track and cover by each on 7" plus a 24 page comic book. It's another reliving of their sweetness in the melee crossed with bug-eyed anger with subtlety, beginning like a runaway freight train with Alanna clinging on like here and now it means everything to her, and it probably does.
Interpol - Ancient Ways
Haven't heard them in this form for a while ahead of new album El Pintor, out 8th September. Paul Banks' lyrics are as inscrutable as ever, the noise around him focused, vaguely throbbing and pleasingly itchy driven by a rolling bassline gathering plenty of moss.
Tyrannosaurus Dead - Local Bullies
T-Dead have already been down the JoGru split route and have progressed onto an album, Flying Ant Day, out 3rd November via Odd Box. Produced by the usually reliable Rory Attwell, this switches from quiet wistful verses borrowing from the early 90s US underground to huge loud messy chorus, all while retaining misleadingly sweetened boy-girl harmonies. And it namechecks the RSPB.
Broken Arm - Guilty Conscience
Speaking of much-admired knob twiddlers, seriously, can MJ* consider putting us on commission at least if we're going to write about so many records he's recorded? From Leeds - the city they're all calling "the new Cardiff, at least as far as the number of new bands from there STN are featuring goes" - Broken Arm's debut album Life Is Short is coming out on 15th September via natural home of noisy dissonance Gringo Records, lashing on the power chord riff and then after a Mudhoney fashion slathering it in sludge, distortion, outbreaks of noise and short temperament.
(* Who of course also produced Joanna Gruesome's Weird Sister. See, everything's connected. Except Interpol. Bastards.)
Wednesday, August 20, 2014
Before it's too late: Post War Glamour Girls, Heavy Petting Zoo
Post War Glamour Girls - Lolong
The other half of a double A side for the Too Pure Singles Club - we covered Gustave back here - finds PWGG going full goth, or at least a point somewhere between Bauhaus and the Gun Club. Billy Mason-Wood of Blacklisters takes up co-vocals, the band explaining the concept of the 7" thus: "Billy plays the part of 'Lolong' who is the largest crocodile in captivity and he's having a conversation through the bars of his cage/prison cell with 'Gustave' who is the suspected largest crocodile in the wild and trying to convince him that he should help him escape and they should work as a team." Right you are, then. PWGG are touring in mid-September, including on the 23rd a date for our promotional arm at Leicester Firebug.
Heavy Petting Zoo - Inherent Vice
Their Too Pure Singles Club 7" has been out for weeks but we've just realised we never wrote about the B-side, and given Nemone played it on 6 Music today and we've just seen them slay at Green Man ahead of a BBC Introducing stage slot at Reading (Sunday) and Leeds (Friday) - says here they clash with You Me At Six, The Kooks and Boys Noize, so it's not like you'd be missing anything - better late than never. Waltz tempo, spy guitars, Amy coming on with menaces, a cocksure swagger with a sharpened switchblade behind the back.
The other half of a double A side for the Too Pure Singles Club - we covered Gustave back here - finds PWGG going full goth, or at least a point somewhere between Bauhaus and the Gun Club. Billy Mason-Wood of Blacklisters takes up co-vocals, the band explaining the concept of the 7" thus: "Billy plays the part of 'Lolong' who is the largest crocodile in captivity and he's having a conversation through the bars of his cage/prison cell with 'Gustave' who is the suspected largest crocodile in the wild and trying to convince him that he should help him escape and they should work as a team." Right you are, then. PWGG are touring in mid-September, including on the 23rd a date for our promotional arm at Leicester Firebug.
Heavy Petting Zoo - Inherent Vice
Their Too Pure Singles Club 7" has been out for weeks but we've just realised we never wrote about the B-side, and given Nemone played it on 6 Music today and we've just seen them slay at Green Man ahead of a BBC Introducing stage slot at Reading (Sunday) and Leeds (Friday) - says here they clash with You Me At Six, The Kooks and Boys Noize, so it's not like you'd be missing anything - better late than never. Waltz tempo, spy guitars, Amy coming on with menaces, a cocksure swagger with a sharpened switchblade behind the back.
Tuesday, August 12, 2014
Allo Darlin', David Thomas Broughton, The School, DELS
Allo Darlin' - Romance And Adventure
The first single from third album We Come From The Same Place, out 3rd October, shares a title with a Josie Long show, which may not be a coincidence, not just because of a mutual admiration but Elizabeth Morris' lyrical worldview sharing a certain faux-naive belief in the restorative power of companionship through adventure. The song chimes effervescently like something assured in its essential indiepop timelessness, just like their songs tend to.
David Thomas Broughton & Juice Vocal Ensemble - In Service
The second taster for Sliding The Same Way, out 22nd September, the collaboration between Otley's sonorously beauteous surrealist and the experimental acapella trio is as uneasy, in a good way, as you might expect as Broughton gets involved in a tragic pub brawl and Juice dissonantly ululate.
The School - Just Let Me Be Here
The B-side, actually, of the Cardiff post-retro octet's contribution to WIAIWYA's 7777777 singles club, but it's the side we prefer so there, as there's something that suits the season about their not actually girl group but melodically inclined that way sweetness and light that isn't that sweet or light.
DELS - RGB
Man the lifeboats, STN's going to write about some rap! Kieren Gallear has been trading as DELS since 2010; second album Petals Have Fallen, out 3rd November, showcases his peculiarly urgent yet laidback style and headspinning lyrical Mobius strips. Michacu and Kwes are at the production desk for this track which essentially means the beat stops, starts and turns off into a different road type and the bassline sounds like a malfunctioning carburettor.
The first single from third album We Come From The Same Place, out 3rd October, shares a title with a Josie Long show, which may not be a coincidence, not just because of a mutual admiration but Elizabeth Morris' lyrical worldview sharing a certain faux-naive belief in the restorative power of companionship through adventure. The song chimes effervescently like something assured in its essential indiepop timelessness, just like their songs tend to.
David Thomas Broughton & Juice Vocal Ensemble - In Service
The second taster for Sliding The Same Way, out 22nd September, the collaboration between Otley's sonorously beauteous surrealist and the experimental acapella trio is as uneasy, in a good way, as you might expect as Broughton gets involved in a tragic pub brawl and Juice dissonantly ululate.
The School - Just Let Me Be Here
The B-side, actually, of the Cardiff post-retro octet's contribution to WIAIWYA's 7777777 singles club, but it's the side we prefer so there, as there's something that suits the season about their not actually girl group but melodically inclined that way sweetness and light that isn't that sweet or light.
DELS - RGB
Man the lifeboats, STN's going to write about some rap! Kieren Gallear has been trading as DELS since 2010; second album Petals Have Fallen, out 3rd November, showcases his peculiarly urgent yet laidback style and headspinning lyrical Mobius strips. Michacu and Kwes are at the production desk for this track which essentially means the beat stops, starts and turns off into a different road type and the bassline sounds like a malfunctioning carburettor.
Thursday, August 07, 2014
Worth the wait: Maybeshewill, Slum Of Legs, Wyldest, Flowers
Maybeshewill - Fair Youth
The title track of their fourth album out August 28th finds them in less brooding, almost bouncy mood by their usual standards. There's still the gradual post-rock build, twinkly breakdowns and big anthemic explosions, but in between come brass fanfares, stuttering electronics and politi-folkie who we don't think we've somehow ever mentioned on here before Grace Petrie on the very un-Grace Petrie-seeming instrument of accordion. They're touring China next month. Stitch that, Wham!
Slum Of Legs - Begin To Dissolve
We're tempted to think that the Brighton sextet are the Desperate Bicycles of post-riot grrrl or somesuch, DIY righteousness held together by audio string, but inevitably that's the trojan horse under which everything - metronomic drums, violin solos, lo-fi fuzz, lyrics based on curiosity and questioning - gets thrown in until it sounds like the Fall with a female singer deliberately smashed up and pieced back together skew-wiff, at which it collapses in on itself. A fascinating, singular debut single.
Wyldest - Wanders
Known as Wildest Dreams until... well, this upload, the duo recently won the Green Man Rising competition to open the main stage next Friday, following the great Haiku Salut's triumph in the same competition last year. Wyldest deal in tingling dreampop of a Beach House/I Break Horses stripe with a hint of Warpaint, drifting guitar lines and woozy synth effects sustaining a floating vocal in mid-air.
Flowers - Joanna
The first single from the trio's debut album Do What You Want To, It's What You Should Do (out 8th September on Fortuna POP!) sheds the fuzz and feedback of their earlier recordings and gigs - no doubt producer Bernard Butler's doing - to emerge as a more earthbound Sundays, lifted by the emotive upper register of Rachel Kenedy.
The title track of their fourth album out August 28th finds them in less brooding, almost bouncy mood by their usual standards. There's still the gradual post-rock build, twinkly breakdowns and big anthemic explosions, but in between come brass fanfares, stuttering electronics and politi-folkie who we don't think we've somehow ever mentioned on here before Grace Petrie on the very un-Grace Petrie-seeming instrument of accordion. They're touring China next month. Stitch that, Wham!
Slum Of Legs - Begin To Dissolve
We're tempted to think that the Brighton sextet are the Desperate Bicycles of post-riot grrrl or somesuch, DIY righteousness held together by audio string, but inevitably that's the trojan horse under which everything - metronomic drums, violin solos, lo-fi fuzz, lyrics based on curiosity and questioning - gets thrown in until it sounds like the Fall with a female singer deliberately smashed up and pieced back together skew-wiff, at which it collapses in on itself. A fascinating, singular debut single.
Wyldest - Wanders
Known as Wildest Dreams until... well, this upload, the duo recently won the Green Man Rising competition to open the main stage next Friday, following the great Haiku Salut's triumph in the same competition last year. Wyldest deal in tingling dreampop of a Beach House/I Break Horses stripe with a hint of Warpaint, drifting guitar lines and woozy synth effects sustaining a floating vocal in mid-air.
Flowers - Joanna
The first single from the trio's debut album Do What You Want To, It's What You Should Do (out 8th September on Fortuna POP!) sheds the fuzz and feedback of their earlier recordings and gigs - no doubt producer Bernard Butler's doing - to emerge as a more earthbound Sundays, lifted by the emotive upper register of Rachel Kenedy.
Thursday, July 24, 2014
This just in: Joanna Gruesome, Maybeshewill
Joanna Gruesome - Jerome (liar)
We're off to Indietracks this weekend, as you might have reasonably imagined, where one of the big draws is going to be JoGru's increasingly manaically ferocious presence. They and Trust Fund - he/they are there too - are releasing a split 12", three new tracks each, on 22nd September, this first taste of which harks back to their earlier EPs as Alanna and Owen sort of harmonise over elasticated fuzzbomb pop-post-punk which occasionally breaks free and surges like a sudden mini-typhoon.
Maybeshewill - In Amber
Stratospheric post-rockish guitars and stately electronics have served Maybeshewill well enough for three albums, by and large, but the first track to escape from fourth full-length Fair Youth, due 25th August, feels like a further step upwards in ambition, all peaks and troughs, minimal piano and subtly heroic strings and brass aid the slowest of builds to something that in refusing to quite become enormous just for the sake of it might resemble synesthesia of ice floes. Maybeshewill are playing out too this weekend, at Tramlines.
We're off to Indietracks this weekend, as you might have reasonably imagined, where one of the big draws is going to be JoGru's increasingly manaically ferocious presence. They and Trust Fund - he/they are there too - are releasing a split 12", three new tracks each, on 22nd September, this first taste of which harks back to their earlier EPs as Alanna and Owen sort of harmonise over elasticated fuzzbomb pop-post-punk which occasionally breaks free and surges like a sudden mini-typhoon.
Maybeshewill - In Amber
Stratospheric post-rockish guitars and stately electronics have served Maybeshewill well enough for three albums, by and large, but the first track to escape from fourth full-length Fair Youth, due 25th August, feels like a further step upwards in ambition, all peaks and troughs, minimal piano and subtly heroic strings and brass aid the slowest of builds to something that in refusing to quite become enormous just for the sake of it might resemble synesthesia of ice floes. Maybeshewill are playing out too this weekend, at Tramlines.
Wednesday, July 23, 2014
Menace Beach, The Rentals, Martin Carr, Echo Lake
Menace Beach - Lowtalkin'
Ah, where would we be without shouty lo-fi? A fuzzed out 103 seconds half of which seems to be a clanging solo that dissolves into appropriate chaos, it's half of a double A side out 1st September, and that'll be Alanna McArdle off of Joanna Gruesome on backing yelling.
The Rentals - 1000 Seasons
Matt Sharp left Weezer in 1998 but seems destined to be defined by having been in that band rather than the angularity of the band he on-off leads - indeed the story of Blur's post-Britpop transformation neglects how much Damon hung out with Sharp and guested with the band around that time. They're back with third album Lost In Alphaville, out 8th September, from which comes this typically fuzzpop bomb.
Martin Carr - The Santa Fe Skyway
We first wrote about this song nearly three years ago when it was in demo form. Not the most protestant of work ethics, is it? Anyway, here's the version that'll be on album The Breaks come September 26th, now swelled into a huge sunshine pop arrangement with a hint of 1980s US TV theme.
Echo Lake - This Year
Echo Lake emerged with an intriguing dreampop album, Wild Peace, in 2002, though the sudden death of their drummer stymied its promotion and prospects. This first release since then, which will appear on Marshall Teller Records label sampler Broken Record Vol. 1 on 18th August, breezes by with stabs of shoegaze guitar to disrupt the Slowdiveish mood, less droney than before but still liable to plunge down a psychedelically patterned sinkhole.
Ah, where would we be without shouty lo-fi? A fuzzed out 103 seconds half of which seems to be a clanging solo that dissolves into appropriate chaos, it's half of a double A side out 1st September, and that'll be Alanna McArdle off of Joanna Gruesome on backing yelling.
The Rentals - 1000 Seasons
Matt Sharp left Weezer in 1998 but seems destined to be defined by having been in that band rather than the angularity of the band he on-off leads - indeed the story of Blur's post-Britpop transformation neglects how much Damon hung out with Sharp and guested with the band around that time. They're back with third album Lost In Alphaville, out 8th September, from which comes this typically fuzzpop bomb.
Martin Carr - The Santa Fe Skyway
We first wrote about this song nearly three years ago when it was in demo form. Not the most protestant of work ethics, is it? Anyway, here's the version that'll be on album The Breaks come September 26th, now swelled into a huge sunshine pop arrangement with a hint of 1980s US TV theme.
Echo Lake - This Year
Echo Lake emerged with an intriguing dreampop album, Wild Peace, in 2002, though the sudden death of their drummer stymied its promotion and prospects. This first release since then, which will appear on Marshall Teller Records label sampler Broken Record Vol. 1 on 18th August, breezes by with stabs of shoegaze guitar to disrupt the Slowdiveish mood, less droney than before but still liable to plunge down a psychedelically patterned sinkhole.
Sunday, July 20, 2014
Spearmint - Tony Wright
Ahead of the festival this weekend, this year's Indietracks compilation is out with its usual remarkable value for money, 56 tracks for a minimum £2 with all proceeds to the Midlands Railway Trust. On there is this track, not one we recognised... until we found out it's from an album, News From Nowhere, that came out in May. There's communication at work - the very band whose song we named the blog after and we didn't know they'd released their first album in eight years until chancing across this two months later. Certainly sounds like a band on their usual form, Shirley Lee's treatise on growing up and leaving behind the certainties of youth through the value of the meaning of music framed through what appears to be a student love of Terrorvision. Each to their own.
Tuesday, July 15, 2014
Perfume Genius, Shy And The Fight, Sun Machine, You Are Number Six
Perfume Genius - Queen
Mike Hadreas' songs used to be spare things, a lot of the time just his falsetto and minimal piano arrangement, so for this to open with a huge bass synth throb is akin to his hiring a chamber orchestra. It's later joined by Flaming Lips-like effects and drones plus a keyboard figure that recalls Ryuichi Sakamoto's Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence score, yet in Hadreas' delivery and its almost teasing deconstruction of/challenge to gay panic it still manages to seem personal. Third album Too Bright, out 22nd September, is produced by Portishead's Adrian Utley and features John Parish.
Shy And The Fight - Stop Motion
Once again enacting our anti-Midas touch, as they were among our tips for 2013, Chester's driving folk-pop septet have gone the way of all flesh with a valedictory pay-what-you-like EP, First The Bird Fell. Clattering and rousing are both in evidence, this track picked out by us for reminding us of Fanfarlo's early way with subtle primary coloured sunshine pop with dark patches underneath.
Sun Machine - Tamaho Hitman pt. 1
The August (25th) offering from the Too Pure Singles Club is a kaleidoscopically shifting percussive-heavy stew that brings together sunshine psychedelia, washed out tropicalia and the kind of all-in-together post-AnCo melange that leaves the head spinning, with demonic incantation sloganeering to close. "Space Honey Jams destined for Japan" says their Facebook self-description. Well, yeah.
You Are Number Six - Magic
Inevitable someone was going to call their project that eventually. In this case it's one Theo Lefebvre of Montpellier, who on recent EP Weird Tales explores the point at which dark wave's gothic post-punk introspection meets the flamboyance of retro synthpop by way of latter day Patrick Wolf's joy in machinery.
Mike Hadreas' songs used to be spare things, a lot of the time just his falsetto and minimal piano arrangement, so for this to open with a huge bass synth throb is akin to his hiring a chamber orchestra. It's later joined by Flaming Lips-like effects and drones plus a keyboard figure that recalls Ryuichi Sakamoto's Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence score, yet in Hadreas' delivery and its almost teasing deconstruction of/challenge to gay panic it still manages to seem personal. Third album Too Bright, out 22nd September, is produced by Portishead's Adrian Utley and features John Parish.
Shy And The Fight - Stop Motion
Once again enacting our anti-Midas touch, as they were among our tips for 2013, Chester's driving folk-pop septet have gone the way of all flesh with a valedictory pay-what-you-like EP, First The Bird Fell. Clattering and rousing are both in evidence, this track picked out by us for reminding us of Fanfarlo's early way with subtle primary coloured sunshine pop with dark patches underneath.
Sun Machine - Tamaho Hitman pt. 1
The August (25th) offering from the Too Pure Singles Club is a kaleidoscopically shifting percussive-heavy stew that brings together sunshine psychedelia, washed out tropicalia and the kind of all-in-together post-AnCo melange that leaves the head spinning, with demonic incantation sloganeering to close. "Space Honey Jams destined for Japan" says their Facebook self-description. Well, yeah.
You Are Number Six - Magic
Inevitable someone was going to call their project that eventually. In this case it's one Theo Lefebvre of Montpellier, who on recent EP Weird Tales explores the point at which dark wave's gothic post-punk introspection meets the flamboyance of retro synthpop by way of latter day Patrick Wolf's joy in machinery.
Thursday, July 10, 2014
First mention Thursday: Zola Blood, Grubs, Cast And Crew, Childhood
Zola Blood - Grace
In these pages we've already declared a moritorium on the spread of both anonymous new bands and bands with names punning on famous people's names. So obviously here's a band who are both. Given it's doubtless going to turn out to be someone who was once in a failed major label landfill indie band it had to be special, then, and this has a way of subtly, uncomfortably forcing its way under your skin with pizzicato downtempo beats, subtly refractive guitar parts and falsetto vocals, not too far from Thom Yorke's solo material , especially when a phalanx of whirring synths arrive towards the end, or a more bass-heavy Cloud Boat, making glaciers across the landscape.
Grubs - Dec 15th/Gym Shame
Grubs are Owen from Joanna Gruesome, Roxy from Two White Cranes and Jake from, erm, Twitter. We've kind of covered the first of these tracks before over on Tumblr but they're both together on a new double A-sided flexidisc which comes to a total of 2 minutes 44. Dec 15th is lackadasical in the best way, Gym Shame lo-fi and fuzzy, both clatter with semi-shouty slacker pop cool.
Cast And Crew - Rory
Sometimes you just want to make noise. Cast And Crew are a Birmingham duo, half of whom are Paul from the late Ace Bushy Striptease, whose name-your-price EP is straight-up awkward noisepop, one eye on Distophia and their errant children, nothing at all indebted to that whole blues duo thing. Good.
Childhood - As I Am
Childhood have been much talked about in big brother music press 'new Britpop OMG' terms but, like fellow Midlanders Superfood, that's not entirely helpful when covering what they do. Sure, this single from Dan Carey-produced debut album Lacuna (out August 11th) sounds ready for prime-time with its old-school-pop ambition and stabs of Eighties effect synth, but where the big chorus should be is drifting vocals coated in self-doubt, luminous twinkling guitar sounds and an awkward groove that wouldn't fill the floor at an indie disco but is distinctive enough to demonstrate where a lot of those not dissimilar 2004 records fell down.
In these pages we've already declared a moritorium on the spread of both anonymous new bands and bands with names punning on famous people's names. So obviously here's a band who are both. Given it's doubtless going to turn out to be someone who was once in a failed major label landfill indie band it had to be special, then, and this has a way of subtly, uncomfortably forcing its way under your skin with pizzicato downtempo beats, subtly refractive guitar parts and falsetto vocals, not too far from Thom Yorke's solo material , especially when a phalanx of whirring synths arrive towards the end, or a more bass-heavy Cloud Boat, making glaciers across the landscape.
Grubs - Dec 15th/Gym Shame
Grubs are Owen from Joanna Gruesome, Roxy from Two White Cranes and Jake from, erm, Twitter. We've kind of covered the first of these tracks before over on Tumblr but they're both together on a new double A-sided flexidisc which comes to a total of 2 minutes 44. Dec 15th is lackadasical in the best way, Gym Shame lo-fi and fuzzy, both clatter with semi-shouty slacker pop cool.
Cast And Crew - Rory
Sometimes you just want to make noise. Cast And Crew are a Birmingham duo, half of whom are Paul from the late Ace Bushy Striptease, whose name-your-price EP is straight-up awkward noisepop, one eye on Distophia and their errant children, nothing at all indebted to that whole blues duo thing. Good.
Childhood - As I Am
Childhood have been much talked about in big brother music press 'new Britpop OMG' terms but, like fellow Midlanders Superfood, that's not entirely helpful when covering what they do. Sure, this single from Dan Carey-produced debut album Lacuna (out August 11th) sounds ready for prime-time with its old-school-pop ambition and stabs of Eighties effect synth, but where the big chorus should be is drifting vocals coated in self-doubt, luminous twinkling guitar sounds and an awkward groove that wouldn't fill the floor at an indie disco but is distinctive enough to demonstrate where a lot of those not dissimilar 2004 records fell down.
Wednesday, July 09, 2014
Christian Fitness, DFA79, Blonde Redhead, Froth
Christian Fitness - Soft Power Itches
One more time, because people are always joining in - Christian Fitness is Andrew Falkous, and from that you're not too far away from guessing what it'll sound like, and also that it'll be of the highest, most caustic, most abrasive quality. The album is out... soon. Falco note: "when the album is released the button that allows you to pay more than the regular price is just for people who contributed to that potato salad kickstarter. You should also probably apologise to your parents."
Death From Above 1979 - Trainwreck 1979
They're back, just when you didn't really expect it. The Physical World, out over here September 8th, is still only their second album and if it does sometimes drift back towards the dance-punk settings that were around when they first emerged - there's some underlying synths here that Jesse could well have borrowed from the drawer marked 'MSTRKRFT' - they still sound like they ever did, that is to say frustrated vocals, rumbling bass and drums of danceable death.
Blonde Redhead - Dripping
It's about time the multinational, multiskilling New Yorkers put out something new; that new thing is Barragan, out 1st September, and a track that resembles the last Caribou record in the shade on a sweltering day, synths dipping in and out all over the place.
Froth - When We Get In
Still playing at the bottom of hometown four-band bills, which is about where all the underdog bands we really love hang out, maybe it's their shared Glasgow surroundings but the five youths of Froth are reminiscent of the idiosyncratically indiepop world of The Yummy Fur - scrappily endearing in a way that belies their writing, infectious pop-leaning hooks twisted beyond their means, prone to gang shouty vocals, keen on hanging out in the darker corners of the indie disco. There's a whole EP released back in February, The Girl Who Fell To Space. What happens next might be even more interesting.
One more time, because people are always joining in - Christian Fitness is Andrew Falkous, and from that you're not too far away from guessing what it'll sound like, and also that it'll be of the highest, most caustic, most abrasive quality. The album is out... soon. Falco note: "when the album is released the button that allows you to pay more than the regular price is just for people who contributed to that potato salad kickstarter. You should also probably apologise to your parents."
Death From Above 1979 - Trainwreck 1979
They're back, just when you didn't really expect it. The Physical World, out over here September 8th, is still only their second album and if it does sometimes drift back towards the dance-punk settings that were around when they first emerged - there's some underlying synths here that Jesse could well have borrowed from the drawer marked 'MSTRKRFT' - they still sound like they ever did, that is to say frustrated vocals, rumbling bass and drums of danceable death.
Blonde Redhead - Dripping
It's about time the multinational, multiskilling New Yorkers put out something new; that new thing is Barragan, out 1st September, and a track that resembles the last Caribou record in the shade on a sweltering day, synths dipping in and out all over the place.
Froth - When We Get In
Still playing at the bottom of hometown four-band bills, which is about where all the underdog bands we really love hang out, maybe it's their shared Glasgow surroundings but the five youths of Froth are reminiscent of the idiosyncratically indiepop world of The Yummy Fur - scrappily endearing in a way that belies their writing, infectious pop-leaning hooks twisted beyond their means, prone to gang shouty vocals, keen on hanging out in the darker corners of the indie disco. There's a whole EP released back in February, The Girl Who Fell To Space. What happens next might be even more interesting.
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