Spectrals/Fair Ohs Split 7″

Spectrals/Fair Ohs

The current D.I.Y scene in East London seems to be producing quality bands and recordings at an incredible rate, with a range and depth of sounds that means if one of these bands aren’t for you, then the chances are two or three others will be. A few of these artists have recently been brought together on the Italian Beach Babes/Paradise Vendors Inc compilation available here, which serves as both a summation of and introduction to what has been going on. While the scene’s most prominent band and driving force behind Paradise Vendors Inc, Male Bonding, are off to tour the U.S. with Vivian Girls before the release of their debut album on Sub Pop, back in the UK Fairs Ohs and Spectrals are busy building up their own followings with limited releases like this split 7”. … Continue Reading

Joanna Newsom – Have One On Me

Joanna Newsom - Have One On Me

Reviewing the new Joanna Newsom record mere days after its release feels like a self-defeating task.  While all music writing is essentially various attempts to express the inherently inexpressible (and you can either fail well or badly), the sheer size, scope and intricacy of Have One On Me guarantees failure – at this stage, fans, musicians and critics are still just listening; there should be no writing – I should probably stop here. This is an album that unwittingly acts as a retort to the people who bemoan the speed at which music is consumed nowadays – it’s a triple album, composed largely on a harp, and the second track is an eleven minute song about a daddy long legs. You can’t blog Have One On Me; you can’t cherry-pick the singles and delete the rest. Welcome back, Joanna Newsom. … Continue Reading

Bestival 2010 line up expanded

Hot Chip confirmed for Bestival 2010

January is only just over and already we’re gearing up for the festival season – Glastonbury rumours were rife yesterday, but today’s announcement on Bestival’s line up reveals a host of impressive acts. Dizzee Rascal, The Flaming Lips, Hot Chip, LCD Soundsystem and, er, Rolf Harris are all on the bill.

The full line up can be found over at the Bestival website, but there’s a strong mix of the old (Marc Almond, Gil Scott Heron, Echo and the Bunnymen), the leftfield (Four Tet, Flying Lotus, Here We Go Magic) and the hotly-tipped (Joy Orbison, The Antlers). There’s also dan le sac v. Scroobius Pip, but you can’t have everything. … Continue Reading

Male Bonding LP due in May

Male Bonding

Dalston’s very own Male Bonding will release their much-anticipated debut album on May 11th. Entitled Nothing Hurts, it will be released on the legendary Sub Pop Records.

New York band Vivian Girls appear on the album’s final track ‘Worst To Come’. The full tracklist is below. The band will embark on a U.S. tour in March and April in the lead up to the album’s release. They also have a compilation coming out on their own Paradise Vendors Inc label at the end of this month, featuring the likes of Teen Sheikhs, Fair Ohs, Spectrals and Cold Pumas – Alan McGee likes this.

… Continue Reading

New High Places record in April

High Places vs Mankind

Mary Pearson and Rob Barber, also known as High Places, are gearing up to release their second full length album this spring. It’ll be called High Places vs. Mankind and will be released on April 6th on Thrill Jockey.

High Places vs. Mankind certainly looks to be a progression from their early singles and their debut album, with more standard instrumentation and vocals higher in the mix. The old High Places mix of sounds and influences still remain, however. The press release sez:

“Mary and Rob are tackling the complex, gigantic subject of being human and what it’s like to interact with other human beings. The album’s subject matter covers a wide range; from romantic relationships to overcoming addiction, aging, and finally death in the closing track ‘When It Comes’.”

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Yeasayer offer O.N.E. as a free download

Yeasayer - O.N.E.

Brooklyn’s post-everything mavericks, Yeasayer, are gearing up to release their much-anticipated second album Odd Blood at the beginning of February. They’re offering new single O.N.E. as a free download from their website at the moment – all you have to do is give them your email address.

… Continue Reading

Vivian Girls, Male Bonding, Trash Kit – London, Dalston Trinity Centre

Vivian Girls

January 25th 2010

Dalston Trinity Centre isn’t your average gig venue. Attached to a church and more accustomed to holding scout groups and nurseries (according to their website), it’s pretty much just a church hall. Intimacy was going to be the order of the evening then, rather than sound quality for instance, which was fine, as the three bands on the bill specialise in lo-fi, noisy pop songs that sound at home in small venues like this. Once gig-goers had worked out how to get into the venue (you had to ring a bell) and come to terms with the fact that there was no bar (the local off license probably did a roaring trade), the venue filled up quickly. The stage was lit by just two lamps – a fitting precursor to the simple, effective music that was going to be on show.

Trash Kit are an East London trio that formed in early 2009. Faces painted and full of nervous energy, the band take a few songs to fall into their stride but once they do, with songs like ‘Cadets’ in particular, they become easy to love. They’re a curious mix of The Raincoats (a violin appears at one point), Sung Tongs-era Animal Collective and DNA, but their songs do more than revel in twee, primitive nosie-makingand address subjects like personal identity. They’re one of a number of bands emerging from the creative DIY scene in East London at the moment, and an album is imminent.

If Trash Kit are just starting to distinguish themselves from the DIY herd, then Male Bonding are on the verge of completely transcending it. Signed to Sub Pop, and also with an LP on the way, 2010 could be a big year for them. Fittingly, I first saw them this time last year, supporting Vivian Girls, and since then constant touring has honed their grunge-surf-rock songs into tight, powerful pop entities. Powered by Robin Silas Christian’s powerful drumming and the close interplay between John Arthur Webb and Kevin Hendrik on guitar and bass, the band seem to effortlessly throw out these unavoidable melodies amid the controlled chaos. ‘Pumpkin’ and ‘Year’s Not Long’ remain highlights, but new songs continue to creep into their sets, suggesting that the promise of their early singles could be about to be realised.

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2009: fragments of genre-confounding greatness; a parallel overview

HEALTH - Die Slow

With all the best of the decade lists being flung about at the moment, 2009 is in danger of getting overlooked. You can kind of forgive a few people for wanting to get the ’00s out of the way with to start a fresh in the next decade – in terms of world events it’s been a particularly shocking ten years – but this is a music website (usually) and we must avert our gaze, stick our headphones on and enter the parallel universe that is popular music.

New York cast a long shadow over the independent music world in 2009, just as it had done way back in 2001 – the internet and, more surprisingly, large sections of the mainstream fell for albums by The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, Dirty Projectors, Animal Collective and (Jay-Z’s new favourite) Grizzly Bear. These bands made sonically unique albums that still retain a certain amount of insularity – these are carefully-crafted other worlds on record, and they were a little too careful and too crafted for some.

… Continue Reading

Beyoncé – I Am… Sasha Fierce

Beyonce

I Am… Sasha Fierce originally came out this time last year. Beyoncé announced that she had made a double album about her onstage/offstage personae and people went out and bought it, and now, to celebrate the fact that lots of people bought it, we’ve got a new platinum edition to buy (different cover art, shuffled tracklist, omg Kanye West!) and then if we all buy this one maybe she’ll make a new album, or maybe the whole process will just go on and on into infinity for ever and ever. There may be a recession on, but no, Beyonce, take my housing benefit. I’ve decided to live in a huge Beyoncé replica filled with multiple copies of I Am… Sasha Fierce anyway. I shall entertain guests in her left thigh. … Continue Reading

Beach House offer a new song as a free download

Beach House

Dream-pop duo Beach House have announced details of the first track to be taken from their new album. ‘Norway’ will be made available to download for free on Tuesday. … Continue Reading