Singled Out - ‘put the needle on the f**king record’
Blimey is it that time again, it seems only two minutes since I was putting the last missive to bed - well that’s a lie really two minutes ago I was actually freezing my knackers off having a quick fag outside and am now in panic stricken mode, not because my knackers are frozen - though I must say its uncomfortable but because I foolishly promised to be a ’pack in smoking buddy’ for a colleague at work. Well it was a safe bet I thought making all the right noises like ’hey to help I’ll pack in to’, sharing the experience etc…..etc…he does after all smoke twice as many as me and no doubt in his sleep to - in fact I can rarely recall a time a time when I’ve seen him without a fag. When the smoking ban came into force he simply moved his desk and office space into the street outside. So now we are fretting big time - what do I do with my hands (solutions on a postcard and the obvious smutty replies - forget it we are ahead of you on that one), how will I - or more to the point - my work colleagues cope with the tetchy behaviour, the mood swings, the shortness of temper, the grumpiness - first one to say - will they notice the difference - will indeed feel the full force of my frowning glare burning holes in the back of your skull. Of course there are the plus points - like not having to stand outside in the bollock freezing outdoors in the middle of the night in just me pants - yes yes yes - I know there have been complaints in the local paper but when the nicotine demon calls there is no sense or reason. The money - good call - we worked out the other day that based on - let’s say a rough intake of 20 -30 smokes a day - that in a month the bill was in excess of a ton and a half - of course the shock and ensuing depression had us chain smoking three on the bounce (that’s approximately 72p worth). Then there’s the mortality angle - every single smoke they say takes of 15 minutes off your life which given that each smoke takes me less than three minutes to finish is hardly a good return (are they secretly bank managers I wonder). So based on say 25 a day that’s 75 minutes to smoke them - factor in the 300 minutes that’s just been taken off my life (15 minutes - 3 minutes = 12 minutes x 25 smokes) that means I’m already down 6 hours a day. Which if you apply on a weeks basis means I’m doing a five day week which means I’m losing a year in every three which by a quick calendar calculation by rights means I should have shaken of these mortal coils sometimes last April (the 23d to be precise at - give or take a minute or five - 3.37 am - no doubt while outside in me pants freezing off my knackers having a fag). Then there are the mishaps - combustible safety matches - we’ve all been there haven’t we - exploding matches - conspiracy theorists get weaving - man I feel so depressed think I need a fag……
…….tut tut - them singles then……
Johnny Foreigner ‘our bipolar friends’ (sunday best). Quite simply Johnny Foreigner are the cut of band that gave you the reason to get into music in the first place - that tingling feel good vibe, that warm fuzzy glow in the pit of your belly and that indescribable desire to bounce of the walls like a bad ’un. Cute, petulant, frenetic, cheeky, loveable and as addictive as hell ‘our bipolar friends’ is one of those button pressing cuts that once its blue paper is lit its off and speeding into the distance and no doubt your affections - all at once effervescent and chaotic, a skewif rollercoaster ride of abruptly frayed and abrasive riffmanship - damn well the best thing we’ve heard in our gaff since the Victorian English Gentlemens Club started to lay siege and terrorising our hi-fi with their pyrotechnic paint bombs. Think Dinosaur JNR in a head on collision with Pavement and Neds Atomic Dustbin, this babe is wired, wonky and wonderful - a serrated collage of power popping brazen bubblegum pop housing a jagged math rock dialect wrapped by the flirting and sparring intertwining of boy / girl vocals. Mental as f**k and gorgeous with it. Flip side features the slightly more tamed by comparison ’the houseparty scene is killing you’ - a sub three minute slice of tastiness that manages to shoehorn a stellar referencing of Bogshed, Red Lorry Yellow Lorry and er - Mascis (again) - replete with a stop / start punctuated persona and a sweetly radiating bitter sweet and twisted off centred melody that’s just begging for the sun to come and play. Joint single of the missive as though it could be anything else. www.bestbeforerecords.com
Rambo and Leroy ‘Last one standing’ (vinyl revival). Okay we’ll be the first to admit that the name isn’t promising, in fact we bit heavily on our tongue and grinded our teeth making wincing expressions half expecting this to be some piss poor American r’n’b. How wrong we were. With an acclaimed debut EP already tucked under their belts in the shape of last years ‘itunes’ set which to much teeth gnashing we managed to somehow miss, ’last man standing’ the follow up is a serious slice of uber cool groove - in fact so cool is t that you‘d half expect it to have its own fashion label colection. Cultivating the North West’s rich musical heritage this killer thing draws from the best elements of the baggy era and beyond, a superb fusion of 90’s styled club land inspired chilled to perfection indie rock that houses within its mainframe a smokingly hazy cocktail of ice dripped electronic mirror balls, soft lysergically enhanced psyche rock washes and a cocksure sassy knowingness that you’d have to retread all the way back to Oasis’ ’supersonic’ to find an equal - try thinking of an all star collective featuring members of World of Twist, Paris Angels, 25th of May and latter era ACR concocting a wig flipping classic from old discarded Happy Monday’s riffs - well smart. Flip the disc for the aptly titled ’oceans’ - a bit of a treasure this one and perfect for the more mellowed and romantically inclined among you. A more tender and tingling variation of the Rambo and Leroy canon - frail and fragile maybe in terms of texture but magnificent in delivery - drift tides of acoustics that ebb and flow pull to softly erode at your defences amid morse coded messages of hope - numbing stuff that is quite frankly impossible to sit through twice in a row without finding yourself hopelessly blubbing like a baby. Perfect. Joint single of the missive. www.ramboandleroy.co.uk
The Electric City ‘Dark Skies’ (self released). Admittedly not as immediate as their hook laden three track debut ‘sleeping with the enemy’ from last summer (see missive 125), ‘dark skies’ nevertheless still provides evidence enough of this London based quartets increasing rising star. Indelibly coded on the right side of the rock track, the Electric City’s excel at nailing down slabs of desire laced sweat ridden radio humping boogie at the drop of a hat, pulsating with stadium attack riffs and to these ears sounding not a million miles from the much missed ‘wide open space’ era Mansun ’dark skies’ sees the band shifting in style away from the retro Steve Stevens styled American anthem accents to something more maturing and darker, the melodies are still wrapped massively though this time spiked with stalker driven needling riffs decorated deliciously with a pounding sinew seizing disco decimating underpin and torn from the core by a lust riddled anxiety. Quite possibly the horniest thing heard here since that scalding Suzerain debut via the mighty Jezus Factory imprint. www.myspace.com/electriccitymusic
NFD ‘When the sun dies’ (Jungle). Happy tunes corner - of course we are joshing with you, guardians of the grim NFD return to the fray with a new 8 track ‘mini’ album entitled ‘Deeper Visions’ (due to terrorise streets and record racks alike at the end of April). Preceding that and due early March ‘when the sun dies’ is a more than adequate taster of the doom to come. NFD of course feature various members of Fields of the Nephilim and Sensorium - the former of whom along with principally the Sisters and the Mission where the key torch bearers of the goth / dark wave scene and whose Western styled dust jacket get up pilfered straight out of Sergio Leone’s ‘spaghetti’ wardrobe wired intrinsically with their apocalyptic death rattles could be in all honesty lead to charges being laid at their feet of birthing Celtic Frost et al (only joking - seriously - so you know who to blame). With three acclaimed albums under their leather belts NFD stump up the towering black hole like light consuming ‘when the sun dies’ - comprising of the trademark retribution oozed frayed and grizzled bolted down grooves, this sore laden twisted slice of doom suffocating romance is a searing broadside from the shadows, White’s vocals in particular sounding like they’re possessed by a world weary death rattling drifter - overall though if there’s anything disappointing to be had here its that its formulaically generic in delivery. Personally though whatever lacks on the original mix is dragged out kicking and screaming to fruition on the far superior 8 minute ‘extreme beat mix’ of the same cut over on the flip. Prepare to wade yourself through the walls closing in disease ridden apocalyptic landscapes because this sickness laced baby is chillingly infected and abandoned amid a menacingly vanquished landscape, making full use and utilising with aplomb the given space the textures assume a bleached and Spartan wide screen cast that within harnesses a blood curdling industrial enhanced dread that literally bleeds the polar elements of brooding and brutality while sumptuous equipping it in a disturbing quiet fury - best filed somewhere near Killing Joke’s ’pandemonium’.
The Humanity ‘bass linear’ (Happy Release). Damn those kids at Happy Release records - if I didn’t know any better I’d say they were coming through fast on the blindside to storm their way into being one of our favourite imprints right now. Third outing (well fourth if you count Molloy’s superb ‘Tracy’). In a fairness another diamond mined gem in the making, the Humanity are a trio hailing from London town and this their debut twin-set could rightly be considered one of those rare but special moments in indie pop wherein once the stylus connects with the vinyl you instantly know you are in the company of something that will (or at least should) figure highly in the end of the year polls of the relevant kind (such as Dandelion Radio and not the type put out by AD men pleasing publications such as N*E and *rtr*cker). ’bass linear’ is a tear evoking slice of unworldly effervescent pop laced with sheens of shoe gazing dream casts. bitter sweet in personality its a lushly lysergic shower storm of hi-fi humping heavenly radiance that sumptuously coalesces between elements of early career Animal Collective, Moose’s ’Jack’, Ultra Vivid Scene, New Order, Kitchens of Distinction and a heavy side serving of Dinosaur JNR - quintessentially the dog’s knackers, failure to be swept along by the oncoming tides of feedback shimmying west coast hazes - the type of which makes for lumps in the back of throats and glazes of the vision - means frankly that either you are devoid of emotion or else wouldn’t know a killer tune if it crept up behind you introduced itself with a calling card and proceeded to t*at the hell out of you. Flip side features the fractured electro buzz bopping ’Hollywood’ - a deliciously decoded monochromatic moocher replete with blank generation styled death disco accents all craftily wrapped in a tight as a gnats backside slender and slinky futuro struts - does it for us. Joint single of the missive. www.myspace.com/happyrelease
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Epideme ‘ooo-o’ / ‘threatening’ (Jonson Family). We are gonna put our hands up in admitting that this killer two track and limited to just 300 outing via the ever crucial Jonson Family imprint has been getting a fair hammering on the hi-fi since it arrived in our gaff. Seems these blighters - who incidentally number in three and hail from Brighton have already spiked the turntables of the well heeled record buying minority with the ultra limited ‘the rancho Wilson’ EP and a by all account nifty - and sadly - long since sold out tour CD and demo cassette (that news being greeted with much howling here I can tell you). Anyhow these two track tearaways - if we didn’t know any better - sound suspiciously like those hard to find hardcore / freaked stateside 7’s that a certain Mr Peel used to litter his shows in the early 90’s with - much to the amused chagrin of independent retailers up and down the country who’d then have to painstakingly source these (usually) ridiculously limited DIY affairs. Not so much mental but manic, Epideme clearly identify with most of the mid 90’s Touch ‘n’ Go roster as well as cutely siding with the ever listenable and much loved here Gringo imprint output. Set ‘ooo-o’ upon the hi-fi apply the needle and what the sparks fly - it’s a big like setting the fuse wire to a badly made catherine wheel - a furiously skewif feast of discordant time signatures, crooked rhythmic junctures and scowling slabs of fractured blues is what you get for your troubles, stuttering aural assaults metered out with a savaged and buckled bastardised jazz rock hybrid ablaze with caustic math pyrotechnics that to these ears sound like some untamed Jon Spencer conceived tag fight between the Beastie Boys and Jesus Lizard. Our money though - for what its worth is laid squarely on the head of the flip cut ‘threatening’ a truly detached and unkempt slice of early career Fall-esque impishness that is if the Smith and Co had been raised, reared and cultured on East Coast hardcore while blissing out nightly on the scalding riff pyrotechnics of some of SST’s finest. Blisters like a bad ’un making you fear its going to spontaneous combust any second soon - essential of course. www.jonsonfamily.com
2 Hot 2 Sweat ‘Your space or mine’ (NRONE). Just can’t keep those NRONE dudes quiet, tomorrows hits just keep rolling along their crooked conveyor belt. We first came across 2 hot 2 sweat via their my space site (see missive 131), the boy / girl duo hailing from Norwich / London feature the combined talents of Mia Lane and a certain Matt Leuw who it seems is fast running out of pies to dip his fingers into and is currently to be found exorcising various generic demons through out recorded projects as Cortez and the Matthew Project while notwithstanding being a one time front man of 90’s band Crest (‘68 comeback’ - killer single). As per usual limited in quantity (how many exactly we aren’t readily sure 300 - 500) this baby comes pressed up on 7 inches of clear vinyl wax with lead cut ’your space or mine’ still sounding to these ears like a whole lot of teen tune thrills for the now generation - all at once inspired, infectious and indelibly impish this cute some candy pop bomb coasts across the turntable at an eye watering galloping gait and while we still firmly attest to it sounding to us like BiS coming off worse from a nocturnal street skirmish with the Shaggs we must admit that after several plays elements of early career B-52’s meet Xray Spex come to the fore - still what we can’t deny is this being a tasty slab of punctuated panic attacking pogo pop - need we say more? Flip the disc for the superior (both in terms of crookedness and delivery) ’bleach my bitch’ - we’re still sticking to our original assessment that its worrying, Mr Leuw applying some creepy falsettos leaving Miss Lane to filter in the warming rays of tingle some cutesy twee like sherbet summer pop accents - a bit like an undercooked St Etienne if you ask me. Go to their my space to rip the (still) corking ‘microscamp’ and new cut ‘hot arsed rom com’ - a dirtily buzz sawing club floor shape cutting electro honey if ever we heard one. www.nrone.co.uk
Computerclub ‘electrons and particles’ (split). Again another release not due out for a few weeks but judging by the speed at which last years debut ‘snobs’ flew off the racks it might be best securing your copy on pre-order without further delay. Now signed up to a five album major label deal in Japan where they’ve just released one full length while over here hooked up to the Split imprint who’ve graced these very pages with some nifty releases from Rosemary and the Author, Birmingham’s Computerclub up the ante with the bitterly sweet angular throb of ’electrons and particles’. A colossal radio wrecker this babe hits all the buttons running, a glorious emotion swept night time configuration of interweaving mirages of celestial chimes and jabbing see sawing riffs that glide elegantly in the stratosphere mark the initial sun burst opening of the passion hot beauty, sounding like a bruised and wounded early career Chameleons blissing out on the tail smoke streams of ‘power corruption’ era New Order while sumptuously threaded with a blood rushing sinew straining hybrid death disco underpin and ultimately cut with a striking cool as f**k tension laced kick back. Well smart. Ethereal pines and a jagged dislocated rhythmic assault make for the equally tasty flip cut ‘these bones’ - restlessly effervescent and numbingly romance laden - a bit of a pulsating candy twisted star crossed honey if you ask me. Deputy single of the missive. www.splitrecords.co.uk
Lonesome Fox ‘the first rule of comedy’ (bearos). We mentioned Lonesome Fox in passing last time out - the promise of a debut single had us peaking childlike at the wonders on offer via his my space page - and we weren’t let down - ‘Yarlington Mill’ proving to be a future classic waiting in the wings. Lonesome Fox is of course Simon Fox former Grover man who incidentally are presently the subject of an ultra limited 3” CD release via Bearos featuring cuts culled from the bands last ever gig including a by all accounts blistering Sabbath cover. As to ‘the first rule of comedy of comedy’ what can we say - words such as exquisite quite frankly don’t do it justice. The Lonesome (Fox) guise sees Fox in more intimate and introspective settings crafting out beautifully conceived softly stirred folk ramblers, the opening tranquilly inclined and sweetly harvested ’please take your time’ proves to be a demurring half brother to the impeccable aforementioned ‘yarlington mill’ - delta streamed rustics resonating with a gently tumbling lo-fi aspects tap deliciously into the warming pathways once trod lonesomely by a youthful John Fahey whereas ’grumpy man blues’ with its finger licking hillbilly banjo laced is a distilled and bottled prairie bourbon swinging beauty recliningly harks to a distant age of locomotives and untethered summers. The delicate acoustically shuffling ’Sunbeam’ offers a glinting moment of blush worthy tenderness though for us the sets best moment comes forth in the shape of the mellowing ’learning to pray again’ - a gorgeously sly eyed radiating gem lush with a exquisitely frail drawn song craft that’s been deliciously dipped in sweetly cantering piano motifs and brushed with a drifting swoon like persona that recalls a more shy eyed and retiring Kevin Tihista sparing with Ben Vaughn. A must for any well ordered record collection. www.bearos.co.uk
Worriedaboutsatan ‘EP02’ (self released). Well to much gnashing of teeth it seems ‘EP01’ escaped our critical hi-fi hammering and as though that wasn’t bad enough in itself to set us in fits of miserablism then we’ve also discovered that we are a little light with the debut outing ‘an infinity of oncoming lights’ to which we are mortified at having missed. A little bit more digging around and we discover that they’ve also appeared on compilations issued by On the Bone (who you may recall are responsible for putting out that rather superb Benjamin Wetherill single ‘the derby ram’) and Mono which is apparently a fanzine of some kind that has so far escaped our greedy gaze. Ah well at least we have ’EP02’ to console us. Woriedaboutsatan are duo Gavin and Tom who self describe their affecting aural additives as techno with the added proviso that the sounds sit somewhere between rock and dance. There’s a wonderfully becalming effect forged within six nimble cuts that meld glazes of chattering beats to coil with post rock drawn ambience figurines. Sedate and sumptuous, these elegant nocturnal emissions are a delicate echo to the Stars of the Lid and Fontanelle, glinting reservoirs of down tempo blip chatter caressed by slender pining guitar montages that dissipate into glorious hazes of fuzz fuelled Math induced feedback driven lithe dream pop - well that’s how ’the butterfly effect’ sounded to us. ’noise 1 (reprise)’ - don’t be fooled by the title as aside being far from the initial premise this cutie - once into its groove - exudes a warming seductive appeal. Achingly stammering glitch funk with washes of melancholic after lights fade amber in the initial stages dreamily unfurl to flower into something that glides in the porcelain pools of tail smoke left by d_rradio after a lunar summit meeting with Minotaur Shock, gorgeous stuff which to these ears sounds like a demurring Clangers playing lulling chimes using the stars as some sort of cosmic glockenspiel. That said WAS really come into their own with the guest appearance of the hushed vocals of Paul Marshall on ’relative minors’ - the addition of vocals giving their fragile enigmas depth, ambition, presence and an inescapable sophisticated allure. Mind you ’Morwenna (part 2)’ takes some beating - the cross woven interweaving of impatient beats, casualised guitar dialects and reclining electronics endow a strangely distractive rhythmic flux that restlessly ebbs and flows in sheens of frailly lonesome idyllic exotica while the sugar rush of drip fed cavernous chimes impart a stately demeanour to the proceedings that in the main recall Manuel’s outings for Static Caravan. The aptly titled ’the last song (first song remix)’ wraps things up ensuring you’re suitably attired with a lulling fuzzy glow with its lullaby-esque twinkles before sneakily going left of radar and decorating the what was the lunatic lilts with a crunching crescendo styled wide screened majesty that soon shakes you of your slumber to think maybe one more play ought to do it. Tasty indeed. www.myspace.com/worriedaboutsatan
What would Jesus drive? ‘we made this’ EP (Split). Second release on Split featured in this missive is the rather fetching three track debut from the curious and memorably named What would Jesus drive? - an Anglo / Aussie husband and wife combo (he -Tim / she - Amy) who’ve had previous stump up three short sharp neatly frazzled barbs of caustic candy pop beat box pop. With commentaries on love, confusion and street crime ‘we made this’ could easily be the wonky and wired bastard offspring of Bis and Cater the Unstoppable Sex Machine, a threadbare bonkers as hell smorgasbord of rudimentary row pop - infectious, audacious and damn near impossible to prize off the hi-fi. the cutely named spitefully spiked ‘boomtown twats’ opens the set - an agenda setting sub 2 minute snotty tirade against street gangs and in general inner city life that sounds like it was dragged kicking and screaming from an old and forgotten Partisans / Expelled recording session and laced up tightly with sparring boy / girl vocals and yelps, spidery riffs galore and more sly struts than an indie band Camden lock in - top class ear gear and a rough as f**k which is how we like it here. Elsewhere there’s the feisty sugar rushing ‘I think we rushed into this’ - a nifty slice of rampaging electro swirling twee popping cuteness (they’ll hate that I’m sure) that’s coiled through a mental as hell zig zagging thrift store delivered melody that once inside your headspace sets up a party commune which organises impromptu guerrilla gigs at half 4 in the morning. ’the one that I want’ rounds up the set -yep the immortal summer romance classic as done by John And Liv and butchered beyond repair by Arthur and Hilda (see pop kids you think things are bad now with Keane and Embrace - only joking lads - really looking forward to those new records - zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz - what you have some new ones - you‘ll send them over - tell you what I‘ll pick up myself just leaving now…) - not the acidically comedic appraisal you’d expect but a rather faithful re-working etched through with sharply shocked suited and booted struts - damn fine - though we always preferred ‘summer nights’ ourselves and ‘beauty school dropout’ - brrrr still makes us queasy. Buy - like er - right now. www.splitrecords.co.uk
An on Bast ’Words are Dead’ (Rednetic). We must admit to being a tad miffed at missing the self released ’welcome scissors’ and more than a little mortified at having had the second full length ’happy go lucky’ via the Polish net imprint Etalabel pass us by (safe to say we are on the case and will nail these babies). An On Bast or Anna Suda as she’s better known to kith and kin hails from Poland (Poznan to be precise), who since 2003 has been crafting - what she prefers to call - ’delicate synthetic music’ and really who are we to argue. Her debut outing for Rednetic (whose past releases have seen delicate digital disturbances from the likes of Hybernation, Shreber Harber Mole Flying Wheel and Patscan to name but three) comprises of a seven part suite. Shunning the extrovert nature of the club scene, Suda’s shyly amorphous textures usher in a one to one intimacy, the IDM structures curvature amid lunatic climes steadily building in texture, poise and vibrancy with each oncoming cut in many ways the landscapes are ones you’d imagine lurking in some secret inner space a bit like a magnified chill out party being hosted by the diodes and chips found under the casing of your PC / Laptop. Crafting and creating her own hermetically sealed IDM playground Suda’s application for spatial compositions is breathtaking, minimalist in structure - sometimes statuesque at others measured and innately classical in appreciation (’foible’) - looming at times to immerse themselves to incorporate the lighter elements of musique concrete, ’words are dead’ once into its groove is an accessible spectacle of sound evolvement from the incubated wandering binary blips of the timid opener ‘permission sulum’ - an aural circuit board of whirrs, whistles and pulsing clicks that could easily pass for a retiring early career Radiophonic Workshop obsessed Add N to X, the thoughtfully evocative and playfully tip toe like lunar flurries on the stuttering ’undertone’ to the seductive off the centred cosmic funk wraps on ‘monsiso’. However it’s on the psycho-tronic ‘sth important’ where the process to discovery finally achieves its peak, with the glitch beats kept on a firm leash Suda daubs the canvas with lysergic trippy montages and a temptingly oozing down tempo vibe into which vague cosmic dialects sourced from the early Kraut pioneers - Harmonia, Cluster and Tangerine Dream are delicately fed into the melodic matrix with a smidgeon of Laurie Anderson for safe measure. Think we need to hear more - the hunt for those full length releases has begun in earnest www.rednetic.com
The Futureheads ‘the beginning of the twist’ (Nul). The welcome return of the much missed Futureheads - blimey it seems like an age now since we first had these dudes sparring wickedly with our hi-fi on their low key debut ‘nul book standard’ EP. The whip lashing ‘the beginning of the twist’ is a furiously blistering slice of speaker punching pulsating pop frenzy, the trademark angular hooks as usual ever present though this time melded and partially fused with a certifiable 60’s styled hip hugging accent, for those among you whose balls haven’t dropped just yet then we suggest a seriously sharp intake of breath because this nailed to the spot and coiling bastard sounds like a harmony driven cavalry charging over the hill. Replete with a seizure inducing panic attacking throb and a menacing frontal line hook laden aural artillery this beauty rattles and rampages to literally lift itself from its confined CD grooves to throttle the crap out of you. Yet why does it remind me of early House of Love in a face off with the Stranglers - strange but it does. Immense stuff. Joint single of the Missive.
Keltica ‘the purple edit’ EP (self released). Damn well near knocked us off our favourite listening pedestal and straight into next week. Debut six track Boz Boorer produced outing from unsigned Irish trio Keltica is a party packing pop treasure - make no bones about it. Those much missing a more sentimental and drifting melodic curvature to their listening experiences will do well to hook into this, led from the fore by Keslyn whose softly lingering vocal has the ability to all at once seduce and crush, Keltica excel at crafting sweetly gilded honey combed melodies that drift in washes of hazy West coast accents and soft 60’s hues. Blissfully faraway in moods these little gems idly glide bitter sweetly amid terrains more readily associated with the Strawberry Switchblade - that is if McDowall and Bryson had consorted to collaborate with the Bangles, the Heartthrobs and Lush (best viewed by casting an ear to the closing ‘nixer‘). From the hurting acoustic pinches of the reflectively resigned and hollowed ’set me free’ to the softly sheen radiating ’bonafide’ with its snaring crisply sly prickling infectious daytime radio friendly hooks its quite blindingly obvious that a mercurial chemistry flows cherry picking pristine pop motifs and fluffing its fringe with lazy eyed country swirls and silken MOR strokes destined one would imagine for a hungry American market. The subtly psychedelic ’Naked brunch’ sees Keslyn standing down momentarily while the distinct early career Marr-esque accents filter through though our money and indeed affection is snaffled by the adoring shimmering cast of the lilting spangle dashes of the decidedly understated 60’s threads of ’gatecrashed’ which unless the ears are deceiving had us fondly transported to witness a secret embrace between the Adult Net and ’kid’ era Pretenders replete with the impeccable trademark craft of fulsomely lingering Honeymoon-Scott styled overtures breezing through as were like sun kissed spectres. Ones to watch for. www.kelticaonline.com
Wooden Shjips ‘loose lips’ / ‘start to dreaming’ (sub pop). Admittedly we’ve arrived late with these dudes but not that we’ve managed to nail their self titled debut full length via Holy Mountain we suggest you get your arses into gear and do likewise paying particular attention to seek out the limited edition two disc set which includes a whole CD’s worth of gear that featured on their ultra limited early career releases. Heading out of the same San Fran primordial psychedelic soup as the much loved Lumerians (see missive #149) the Wooden Shjips are unique to a certain extent in that they don’t trek the same well trodden psyche paths as most bands in re-assessing Barrett et al, instead they are the love children of Jim Morrison - ‘loose lips’ is indelibly cast with the whoozy head tripping mantra matrix of the Doors, all at once super chilled and out there, this vintage sourced 60’s throwback shimmers with a happening lysergic lilt, both exotically delirious and mind expanding the heady looping dialects lending themselves specifically to early career Suicide all the time inviting the listener to loosen up on an exploratory trip to other worldly bliss out pastures. Things get more slinky with the key drenched ’start to dreaming’ over on the flip, amid the softly sensual stoned 60’s hazes - kind of Cream meets Jefferson Airplane - this seductive gem pulses with a deeply intoxicating hypnotic groove underpin that’s lysergically iced upon with head warping enhanced florescent flower / paisley pop motifs - quite essential for shade wearing psych heads if you ask me. www.subpop.com
And that’s it for - well shall we settle for three days or so - okay agreed, wherein we’ll be back with an extended my space special followed next weekend by a short and abruptly turned out records only Singled Out inside of which there will be a few choice cuts from the Filthy Little Angels imprint (sorry Woon forgot this time of asking), Let’s Wrestle (again - apologies to Stolen we lost your email with the mp3 links - in fact we are still trying to salvage the Pete and the Pirates links…..), as mortified as we are to admit it - My Electric Love Affair which we thought in all honesty we’d reviewed previously and have since been ignoring the bands emails thinking they were drunk - o dear - killer single all the same - but will they ever forgive us……and a killer thing from the Beat Maras who dropped off appearing on this particular missive because we stupidly mislaid the review somewhere (and the CD if truth be known) - between now and then keep abreast with impromptu updates via www.myspace.com/thesundayexzperience where you can pop in have a comfy sit, nip of whatever takes your fancy and be entertained by a few Cult related vids and - er - other stuff. As usual thanks to all those who’ve made these ramblings possible - no names - you know who you are - till mid week - Ta-Ra and take care of yourselves……
Mark
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