Secondsmile, the rock quintet from Bridport, Dorset, recently parted company with their original vocalist and with this, their sophomore full-length, are now attempting to reproduce the immense promise that their debut album, Walk Into The Light And Reach For The Sky, showed. Recorded in New York City with producer Andrew Schneider (Cave In, Daughters, Pelican) at the helm they certainly seem to have picked the right man to work with. With overdubs added in a studio in London they have produced something that shimmers from start to finish. Continue Reading

The standard second album review consists of many cliché comparisons of new and old, what’s different and whether we like that change. It can become monotonous and therefore I try to steer clear of such trends. However, put Carl Barat in someone’s mind and immediately you jump to his media-hyped relationship with wild rover Pete and all that it entails.

So lets get it over with and then look at the music. Firstly, Carl has a new band that are as close as family, Pete isn’t quite so committed. Carls’ band are producing some sharp music where as Babyshambles are a little rougher in their sound. Neither sound identical to The Libertines, but both are always going to have reminiscent links and produce songs that you would chop off your left ear to have both of them feature in (ironically, on this album- ‘Blood On My Shoes’). Continue Reading

Summer indeed, as the brass section on opening track ‘A Mirror Is Harder to Hold’ is surely a nod towards Gershwin’s ‘Summertime’. Once Jon Foreman’s strong American twang kicks in though, we’re away from Gershwin and off into inoffensive Americana, particularly evident on the slide guitar in ‘Resurrect Me’, which sounds not too dissimilar to Primal Scream’s ‘Country Girl’. A coincidence, no doubt. After discovering that Jon Foreman is in fact a purveyor of Christian Rock, this track has a decidedly different feel to it, but is non-the-less energetic, and the lyrics are still poignant no matter what your religious orientation.

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I’ve never visited Australia but I sometimes read travel books in my free time (go figure). When you come to one about Australia the author always boasts about the land down under and its diverse “biogeographic regions” - ranging from snow-capped mountains in Tasmania to large deserts and temperate forests. Makes sense though. It’s the world’s smallest continent and the sixth-largest country for crying out loud! That kind of unfettered topographical variety feels right at home in the swirling musical world of Australia’s Silver Ray. The watertight Melbourne trio is Julitha Ryan (keyboards), Brett Poliness (drums) and Cam Butler (guitar).

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Exit Ten are on of those up and coming bands that have been exciting folk in the industry left, right and centre. They’ve already earned themselves some big tour support slots (Avenged Sevenfold, Every Time I Die, 36 Crazyfists) and recently got to shake their buxom Brit-metalcore cleavage at this year’s Download Festival. The hype surrounding them is about to turn into value with the release of ‘Remember The Day’, their debut full-length effort.

From the opening notes of ‘Technically Alive’ it is instantly clear that Ryan Redman’s crisp, melodic vocal is the central focus around which this band revolves. Guitars interweave underneath it and drums rebound off it, but it refuses to be lost in the mix. It’s not a battering ram of a voice, but a pure ringing emotional thing that will not be ignored with every enunciated lyric reaching the listener. ‘Godspeed’ is a gigantic bag of tricks with battering Lamb Of God guitars collapsing into As I Lay Dying melodics whilst drum rolls cannon out of the breakdown and into gut-wrenching double-kicks. Continue Reading

Black Kids are Hyped. They have not for a second in the last a year that I have known about them, not been Hyped. Even before they started getting radio play and stuff, the Hype label was applied to them like some sort of almighty icon of contention- a direct challenge to anyone and everyone who maybe just wanted to enjoy them frivolously- no, here was a band with an amazing demo. A really quite stunning quadrant of pop songs, and then all of a sudden they were Hyped. I genuinely cannot remember a single piece of press about them that does not refer to this Hype as if it was some arbitrary label cast upon them, forcing them to justify it with every single little step they took. Now its debut album time- sink or swim guys, you’ve received the privilege (read: albatross) of our Hype- now you’d better fucking justify it or we’ll cast you out and laugh at you like we did at Gay Dad. Well, do they? EH?

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Wild Beasts are one of the many new bands tipped for the top by the people in the know. Signed to Domino Records and with established producer Tore Johnansson (The Cardigans, Franz Ferdinand) at the helm they must have something about them and Limbo, Panto, their debut offering, is certainly different to what other bands are producing at the moment, but does being different mean it’s any good? Well, in this case I think for the most part, yeah…it does.

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Post-rock bands follow such similar artistic paths that the outcomes have become almost funny. Windsor for the Derby doesn’t escape this formula. They started in the 1990s as a pure post-rock outfit with heady krautrock leanings. Over the course of Windsor’s discography, as post-rock groups are wont to do, they’ve whiddled down their palette. The irony comes in regard to the audience. Post-rock purists tend to detest the emasculation of “their music” for conventional melodies but new audiences can’t quite get their heads wrapped around bands like Windsor for the Derby. Their ceaseless waffling between genres is baffling. Continue Reading

As a child, I had Wagonwheel Blues. As all the other kids on my lunch table chowed down on their disgusting, plasticy, not-fit-for-human consumption ‘treats’, I was exiled for turning my nose up at said chocolate-covered biscuit, and not joining their ‘Wagonwheel Club’. Well, sod you, mean seven year-olds, cos I have my own Wagonwhell club now, with some handy advice on lifestyle choices to boot. And it’s a damn fine club too.

Wagonwheel Blues is the debut release from The War On Drugs, and certainly sets the bar at almost sky-scraper level for their future releases. They don’t have a cute female singer, they don’t sing about dancing or re-hash failed relationships, and I’m pretty sure they don’t wear skinny jeans or T-shirts that are splattered in fluro-vomit. They are, however, very proficient at their instruments, write cracking songs, and are some of the very few musicians who can be compared to Bob Dylan in a good way. Continue Reading

‘Como te llama’ actually translates as ‘what is your name?’, or literally as ‘how do you call yourself?’, which is perhaps the more deep and probing question Albert Hammond Jr is asking with this album. The point is though that it’s nothing to do with a llama, rather disappointingly.

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Texas-based trio White Denim have been riding high on the hype machine for a few months now and with anticipation reaching fever pitch the time has come to see what all the fuss has been about with the release of the album, Workout Holiday.

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The Watson Twins return for their second full length album, this time without being augmented by cute-as-a-button indie popsicle Jenny Lewis of Rilo Kiley. Luckily, the Twins are still pretty cute without her.

Fire Songs meanders through tales of happiness and heartbreak, all with the Watson Twin’s distinctive countrified brand. The star of the show is most definitely the Twins’ voices, as their gentle, lilting tones set the mood in every track. Never over-powering or too brash, their vocals have a syrupy, warm feel that is a pleasure to listen to for the entire length of the album.

Sounding distinctly like Rilo Kiley circa More Adventurous (before they went all LA on us), with clean off-beat guitar, soft drums, and a laid-back blues feel.

Fire Songs seems to be a bit of a slow starter with earlier tracks such as ‘Lady Love Me’ and ‘Just Like Heaven’ sounding rather dull and rather samey. However, the album starts to perk up by ‘Map To Where You Are’, a more up-tempo number with a menacing feel to the verses contrasted with a somewhat happier chorus. There’s also much more happening in the background - trumpets, shakers, with a breakdown in the middle that shows just how good those vocals are.

Their lyrics are perhaps a little obvious at times (Well you’ve got angel eyes but you’ve got devil’s blood) and seem to stick the black and white rather than exploring anything in between. However, the use of the elements as a theme throughout pins the album together nicely.

Rabbit Fur Coat, the album that brought the Twins to the attention of the indie masses, sadly eclipses their latest offering. More variation, more harmonies, and altogether more interesting. Fire Songs just sounds a little lacklustre, which is all the more frustrating when there’s evidence showing what the Watson Twins are really capable of. Perhaps they’re more comfortable and happier making this kind of wishy-washy country pop, that doesn’t particularly offend or excite, or hold interest.

The Twins’ vocals are perfect but sadly the songs aren’t enough to give them the attention they deserve.
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Links
The Watson Twins [myspace]

Sigur Ros, everyone’s favourite Icelanders, have returned. Their tried and tested “quiet/loud” combinations have garnered them universal appeal, but there’s been a sense of the band wanting to break free of their regular style, challenging their musical make-up. The problem is, they haven’t quite managed it with Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust. The album cover features band members, naked, running across a road - maybe a playful comment on the contents within or, if you’re feeling harsher, a bare arsed (sorry) cheek comment on the quality of the material within.

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Jesus H. Christ! Here’s a voice and a half that means the name of Eli ‘Paperboy’ Reed can be uttered in the same sentence as Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett and Sam Cook without fear of embarrassment. With his electrifying live act (”I rip a lot of pants.”), he’s on his own ‘mission from God’ to pick up the mantle of Jake and Elwood as flag bearer for the Stax/Chess/Motown legacy. There’s been a lot of retro sounds around lately of course, from the ladies mainly, but this is so immediately authentic that, just as with the original soul classics, critical analysis really isn’t relevant. It either mainlines to the gut and throws you around or it doesn’t. Simple as. Continue Reading

For some reason, I was under the impression that My Morning Jacket were Austrailian. If anyone can guess who I was thinking off, I will award some kind of prize, as it’s now irritating me no end.

Pointless anecdotes aside, My Morning Jacket are American, and Evil Urges is the band’s third album with the current line-up, which does appear to change on almost an annual basis. Repetitively named singer Jim James has been present from the outset, and it’s his ethereal, sometimes falsetto, always unusual vocals that underpins MMJ’s sound.

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Jason Pierce has said in interviews that his sixth album is “the work of the Devil… with a little guidance from me.” He even went as far as nicknaming the 1929 Gibson L/00 he wrote many of Songs in A&E on as “The Devil” in the liner notes. After all of the daemons Pierce has escaped he is one fortunate chap, but not as lucky as us - the listeners of his sixth disc as the frontman of Spiritualized. Continue Reading

This album arrived on my desk (okay, on my laptop, if we’re being literal) as a completely unknown quantity. They have a name very similar to a Cambridge band of my acquaintance (The Tupolev Ghost – recommended!), and this was really all that piqued my interest in them enough to make me want to review this, their debut full length album.

The website of their label (Valeot ) tells me that they come from Vienna, and are made up of Peter Holy on piano, Alexandr Vatagin on bass and cello, Lukas Scholler on electronics and David Schweighart on drums. What my ears tell me, is that together they make experimental, avant-garde music.

The album is nearly all instrumental (the exception being a short bit of male vocal which appears towards the end of ‘Nothing’s Gonna Happen’ and snatches of half-heard dialogue, in a foreign language that I was not able to place, on ‘Reaset’), and sounds as if a significant proportion of it is being improvised as it is being recorded. Snatches of gorgeous wind (clarinet?) and string (cello?) instrumentation drift in and out, (‘Garlic 07’, ‘Mohavedi’) but the main musical thrust, on nearly every track, comprises sounds made on the piano: be it chords, individual keys, or arpeggios; and drumming of an unsettlingly irregular rhythm and technique. Occasional weird rumblings and shrill piercing notes (these, in particular are found on ‘Garlic 07’) are produced by indeterminate electronic means; and a static crackle from time to time adds a strangely old-fashioned atmosphere, as if you are listening to the music on a beat-up old ’78.

In general terms a lot of the music sounds like something between free jazz (particularly ‘Rnd 2’) and a film soundtrack. It is generally more successful when the strings add a richer sound than when it is just the piano tinkling along. The closest comparison to other contemporary music that I’ve come across is The Drift, but having only seen them live, at last month’s EIxplosions In The Sky ATP, I don’t know how comparable what they do is to Tupolev, on record.

The problem with Memories of Bjorn Bolssen as an overall album, is that after a while the apparent “randomness” of the sounds begins to grate. Not many examples of a genuine melody or deliberate harmony, for example, are to be found. I was left wondering whether the combining of, say, a drum beat, with a piano chord, with a note on the violin was just stumbled upon by happy accident and pure chance in the middle of the musicians’ jamming/improv sessions. And further: if so, does this actually matter? Does the fact that they may not have been produced deliberately mean that the sounds produced are any more or less interesting, or worthy, or pleasing to listen to? Or, more accurately, the fact of knowing (or presuming) that this is how they have been made? For me, I think it does. With the lack of coherence comes a lack of structure for your ears and mind to latch onto and start to appreciate, so I found that both my mind and my ears rather quickly tired of it. Does this make me a philistine? Maybe so, and I would be genuinely interested to hear the thoughts of others who have listened to the album – perhaps there is a “way in” to this kind of music, that I have just not managed to find.

For now though, until I work out some kind of “way in”, I’m going to score it a quite-possibly-unfair:
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Links
Tupolev [myspace ]

For a band who’s album Z saw critics claim they were ‘doing a Radiohead’ (in a time when that meant departing from their set sound and exploring other musical avenues, not giving away your album for free), it seems perhaps fitting that My Morning Jacket’s new release Evil Urges has seen their old record label RCA, through their ATO imprint, re-release their back catalogue now the band have moved on to Rough Trade. It seems to be a similar move to EMI’s repackaging of the aforementioned Radiohead back catalogue: a cynical move by a record label to squeeze the last they can out of the band and cash in on the excitement generated by the bands new album. It would be interesting to know if the records have been re-released in the US, where the band remain on ATO. Unlike many of the re-issues coming out at the moment, which often have bonus tracks, demos or in some cases DVD’s to make the items more appealing to the fans, this series of releases remains the same as it was the day they first hit the shelves. Still, that isn’t to detract from the music made by the Louisville space rockers, nor the releases themselves. Continue Reading

Remember the story of the goose that laid the golden eggs? Eventually when it stopped laying, the farmer cut it open to get to the gold inside and see if he could make a final quid or two. It didn’t work, he just ended up with a mess. The goose wasn’t too happy about it either. Never has such an amazing collection of songs disappointed me so much.

There are probably very few people reading this that haven’t heard a Radiohead album. There are probably not even that many who don’t own three, four or all of them plus a CD-R that a mate copied for them with ‘Radiohead rare stuff’ scrawled across it in felt-tip. So we all know what’s going on here. Continue Reading

The young, gifted guitarist returns. After the revelation that was The Cloud of Unknowing , the 12-string bandit James Blackshaw has delivered a startlingly beautiful record with his follow-up, Litany of Echoes .

Much has been made about the addition of a piano to his repertoire, and it makes a welcome, yet sparse, appearance on the songs that bookend the album, ‘Gate of Ivory’ and ‘Gate of Horn’. Simple and repetitive piano echoes around your mind, forever hinting at deeper and darker music hidden in its depths. It adds an extra dimension to the music. Where The Cloud of Unknowing played on the repetitive nature of his simple guitar pieces, Litany is much more expansive record. The playing is pitch perfect (as you’d expect), exploring various rhythms and ideas, never outstaying it’s development but always unfurling these ideas to their natural conclusion. Continue Reading