Video of the Month #2 The Go! Team - Doing It Right [dir Good Times]

Who really needs a summer when you've got a band like the Go! Team coming out with retro pop nuggets like 'Doing it Right'? The video, directed by the aptly named Good Times, merely enhances the joy of the record and broadens the grin on your face...

Gravenhurst - The Western Lands [Warp album]

As all us amateur cosmologists know, the Big Bang theory states that the universe originated from something somewhat smaller and has been expanding ever since. This same principle could apply just as well to Nick Talbot’s Gravenhurst. Having gone about things in a rather modest fashion in the early parts of a career that saw sparse folk records released on tiny indie label Silent Age (beginning with 2001’s debut ‘Internal Travels’), everything about Gravenhurst has grown outwards since – signing to Warp (the universe, too, becomes cooler as it expands), gaining more members and admirers, and intensifying the band’s sound considerably.

‘The Western Lands’ continues where 2005’s much-lauded ‘Fires In Distant Buildings’ left off, with broody, elongated ‘post-folk’ songs with more than a nod to shoegaze that somehow end up sounding like electronica without the electronics. The likes of ‘Trust’, ‘Hourglass’ and the closing ‘The Collector’ are perfect examples of this, while the gloriously epic instrumental title track leads the album into shimmering post-rock territory. The comparatively brief four minute ‘Hollow Men’ is probably the real highlight, though, with feedback and rocked out guitars providing a jagged contrast to Talbot’s trademark mournful voice and boasting a breakdown that sounds like ten jumbo jets taking off.

Talbot and Gravenhurst continue to make quite stunning records, utilising both song structure and instrumentation to achieve the ultimate atmospheric effect. Best listened to late at night while contemplating life by candlelight, ‘The Western Lands’ is a dark and intense record that at least matches its predecessor.


First published in Notion magazine.

The Fiery Furnaces - Widow City [Thrill Jockey album]

Possibly music’s most intriguing sibling collaboration, The Fiery Furnaces’ Matthew and Eleanor Friedberger continue their astonishing journey through the world of twisted pop with their sixth full-length release. The album’s opening opus ‘The Philadelphia Grand Jury’ acts like a mission statement, showcasing the fundamental elements of diversity and experimentation that have increasingly become the duo’s trademark. A carefully constructed mash-up, the song (and album) is a cut and paste musical collage with snippets of lyrics strewn over a variety of musical styles, from 70s pop to garage rock.

The expected is constantly twisted on ‘Widow City’ – when you think a song might be following a traditional structure, rhythm, melody even, either Matthew’s instrumentation or Eleanor’s intonation take it somewhere entirely different. This is more successful in some places than others, treading a fine line between the emotive and the unnecessary. Having succeeded with seven minutes of rhythmic variations on the first track, for example, a similar barrage on ‘Clear Signal From Cairo’ is just too much, and the whole album provides a lot to take. Once through the initial jolt of this constant assault, though, much of it is quite brilliant and staring you in the face are more catchy pop melodies than you might think.

If you like your ‘pop’ music challenging then ‘Widow City’ is definitely for you. The songs held within possess a great deal of depth, texture and interest. If, however, you prefer something a little more traditional and appreciate consistent song structure, you might want to give this one a miss.


First published in Notion magazine.

Simon Bookish - Trainwreck/Raincheck [Teeth Records album]

I can hardly ever remember my dreams. It’s kind of frustrating sometimes, but I’m resigned to the fact that that’s the way it’s meant to be, right? As a result of this, I am more than a little distrustful of Leo Chadburn and his alter ego Simon Bookish. For not only does he remember his dreams, but they also have a recurring motif (transport), and he remembers them so well that he has managed to re-create them in the form of ‘Trainwreck/Raincheck’, an album of avant-garde, mostly electronic, spoken word-littered soundscapes.

And when I say avant-garde, I mean avant-garde. I haven’t listened to such a dense and far-out album as this for a long time (not that I have really set out to). It is unsurprising that a classically trained composer, actor, performance artist, vocalist and remixer for hire and multi-instrumentalist, recently returned from touring with the National Theatre, who references Euripides and experimental French composer Erik Satie in his press release, has produced a challenging record, but any thoughts of a quirky Patrick Wolf-a-like are way off as far as ‘Trainwreck/Raincheck’ is concerned. It is, in fact, a barely quasi-pop experiment of startling content.

The artwork for the album, which sees Bookish dressed in futuristic pyjamas, high above a cartoon city dreaming of ships and aeroplanes is a successful depiction of how the album sounds, but is hugely more romantic than the clinical coldness of much of what is held inside. Beginning with future-experimental wobbly noises akin to the alarm system on the Starship Enterprise on ‘Theme (Mercator Projection)’ and moving swiftly into an electronic backing track that sounds like you have a crossed telephone line with a conversation between robot rats, it is an opinion polarizer from the outset. Many more will be put off the moment Bookish opens his mouth with the first stream-of-consciousness dream-tale of ‘Crab Lawn’. This sci-fi psycho-babble continues on the subsequent ‘Invasion’ and ‘Dwarf Documentary’ as his voice meanders through bizarre tales of the dreams he has had. It works adequately enough on the Philip K Dick-esque ‘Crab Lawn’, but the slightly fey, knowing tone of ‘Invasion’s “And so… It might have been Berlin I suppose” is rather off-putting.

The question with these spoken word compositions, is – eccentric experiment aside – whether the stories themselves are interesting, engaging or well written/delivered enough to make for appealing listening. The answer is probably a ‘no’. There are moments of wit, most notably when Bookish is explaining to Bush and Rumsfeld how ducks stand on one foot to avoid getting shit on both feet (‘A Deception (Municipal Mix)’) but rarely is there anything that begs for a repeat listen, a story to really enjoy. It is actually the ‘songs’ where Bookish moves away from the straightforward spoken word that are the most successful. The closing ‘Long Haul’ is sparse and calming, the drone-based ‘Arborescences’ is a triumph of bleakness (if something of an acquired taste…), while on ‘Interview’ he actually strings together something of a melody and his Bowie-esque intonations support what is closest to a traditional song structure. A record like this neither warrants nor benefits from comparisons, though. At a push you could see Bookish as a kind of future-Beefheart or a precocious English David Byrne, but these associations are as misleading as they are useful.

‘Trainwreck/Raincheck’ is a success in that as intended it sounds totally otherworldly and as close to the reality of dreams as one could get. Not in the usual way that fluffy, ethereal music is described as dreamlike, but instead in a coldly psychological portrayal of the confusion and stream-of-consciousness nonsense that dreams actually are. It is densely layered, unsettling and uncomfortable, occasionally warm and fuzzy, but always surprising and generally just plain strange. Like most dreams though, it is the negative moments that that stay in my head after the event – the deliberately read, forced monologues of ‘Invasion’ and ‘Dwarf Documentary’ in particular. As an avant-garde pop music experiment it’s intriguing and often brilliant, as a pleasurable listening experience, well… it isn’t really. Not for me anyway. I strongly recommend anyone remotely interested to give this record a listen and make up your own mind, though, because for as many that will undoubtedly hate it there will likely be the same number who think it’s a work of genius. The problem is, I have reached my final sentence and still have no idea how many stars it deserves. I shall sleep tonight dreaming of a fence to sit on…

***

First published on rockfeedback.com. See it here.

Kate Nash - Made Of Bricks [Polydor album]

We all know Kate Nash, even those of us who would rather not. Myspace, Lilly Allen, the fact that the release of this, her debut album, was brought forward by two months due to popular demand and all the rest. And of course we all know ‘Foundations’: with its ubiquity, its repetitive melody and its whiny estuary accent it has been the love/hate song of the summer. For those that care, the worst fears for ‘Made Of Bricks’ will be that it is an album built entirely on the ‘Foundations’ of a single that makes pun-avoidance nigh on impossible.

The main surprise on ‘Made Of Bricks’ is the amount of classical piano-playing there is (something clearly present on ‘Foundations’ but that managed to pass at least me by un-noticed under that overpowering vocal melody), making Nash sound more like a mockney Regina Spektor or Dresden Dolls parody than a Lilly Allen wannabe (see in particular the bouncy melodrama of ‘Skeleton Song’). The songs are rooted in the same quotidian teenage language as Allen or Jamie T, though, with several following the same ‘girl-at-boy’ rant pattern as ‘Foundations’. While probably perfect material for teenage girls (at times you wonder how close she is to having her own kids TV show a la S Club), it quickly becomes tired for anyone else. This is largely because she doesn’t have the lyrical depth or trickery of a Jamie T, with songs like ‘We Get On’ reading like direct out-takes from a diary hidden under her bed as opposed to the cutting social commentary of much of ‘Panic Prevention’. Also, clearly swearing is an integral part of modern society, but the oft-used argument that it shows a lack of vocabulary or creativity is an undoubtedly valid one. What then, Ms Nash, are we to think when the third track of your album opens thus: “Why you being a dickhead for? Stop being a dickhead / Why you being a dickhead for? You’re just fucking up situations / Why you being a dickhead for? Stop being a dickhead / Why you being a dickhead for? You’re just fucking up situations”.

Perhaps she deserves the benefit of the doubt with this, for the following ‘Birds’ is a genuinely poignant chav-ballad that touchingly explores the difficulties of inarticulacy. Beautifully constructed and drenched in slide guitar it is a fine moment and there are others on what is in reality a far from offensive album. The ‘loved and lost’ lyrics of ‘Merry Happy’, for example, are excellent in places: “Sitting in restaurants, thought we were so grown up / But I know now that we were not the people that we turned out to be… Can’t take back these hours but I won’t regret / cos you can grow flowers from where dirt used to be”. ‘Pumpkin Soup’s chorus is pure timeless pop with some great harmonies, ‘Skeleton Song’ is great in parts and next single ‘Mouthwash’ is a simple but effective assertion of the virtues of normality.

On the other hand, these positives are just about outweighed by negatives and in context the previously annoying ‘Foundations’ is actually one of the highlights. ‘Dickhead’ and ‘Shit Song’ are both poor, the latter being unfortunately named for this very reason. The entertaining ‘Mariella’ is let down by the awkward phrasing and the fact that at times Nash sounds like Catherine Tate’s foulmouthed ‘Nan’ character. And at its most pronounced, that estuary accent and its intonations can be grating at the very least, something exacerbated by Nash’s continual insistence on multiplying the number of syllables in any given word by about fifty.

Criticisms aside, Nash has a short-term career secured by the hype and undoubted initial success of this album. The long-term will be decided on her ability alone – hype can only last so long (or am I being naïve…). There certainly seems enough song-writing talent here that, given a bit of time, could come up with a genuinely good album, especially if she branched out more from the teenage girl ‘dear diary’ stuff. But one wonders whether by the time that happens things will have moved on too much for sustained success (probably why the record company rushed this release through). There are some decent moments, and despite some accusations to the contrary the girl can definitely sing, but ‘Made Of Bricks’ comes up short in too many places to be considered anything better than average.

**

First published on rockfeedback.com. See it here.