of Montreal – False Priest

of Montreal - False Priest

After hearing the single ‘Coquet Coquette’, an early version of ‘Hydra Fancies’, and a televised performance of ‘Sex Karma’, we knew False Priest would be a great album. And after seeing the album artwork, we knew it would be a colourful and bizarre concoction of genius. Now that we’ve listened to False Priest in its entirety, we can safely say that this Athens, Georgia-based, modern-day glam band’s 10^th full-length studio album is worth all of the hype it’s been receiving. With cameos from Janelle Monae and Solange Knowles, a baffling hodgepodge of lyrics and the soulful falsetto of Kevin Barnes, this is one album we just can’t seem to turn off. … Continue Reading

Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse – Dark Night Of the Soul

Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse - Dark Night Of the Soul

It’s been a tumultuous journey for the release of Dark Night of the Soul, the second and final collaborative effort from Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse. After a lengthy legal battle with EMI and a deliberate Internet leak from the artists themselves, the album is finally available, more than one year after the initial release date. … Continue Reading

Lokai – Transition

Lokai - Transition

Don’t listen to this album if you are of a nervous disposition. Don’t put this on your IPod if you are walking alone down the street at night. For Transition is an unnerving jolt to the senses, I don’t think you can feel safe if you close your eyes and attempt to take in this record whilst blind to the world. This album is Sadako Yamamura coming to get you. This album tells me that I haven’t got a clue, but somehow if I can survive until the end, I will do.

Florian Kmet and Stefan Németh have decided to confront the listener; this is not so much an album to appreciate, but one that becomes an interrogation. Do you want to listen to our record? They ask. Can you handle this? The electromechanical instrumentation is so deftly orchestrated that one feels tested. You are disorientated and find yourself in a Josef K situation, unexpectedly on trial, hopelessly drowning in paranoia. … Continue Reading

Modern Skirts – All Of Us In Our Night

Modern Skirts - All Of Us In Our Night

Launching a new business is the dream of hundreds of thousands across the globe.

As any fule kno, and as Sirallun would attest, the most important measure of any new business is to isolate a gap in the market and squeeze yourself into that niche. That way, you become that “thing” that so many people thought they couldn’t live without but couldn’t quite verbalise.

Sadly, there is no such stringency around the forming of a band. You can pretty much make any old noise and there’s airplay offered, because that’s what individual “taste” is about. Good news for Modern Skirts.

All Of Us In Our Night is their second studio album and the Athens, Georgia four-piece are awash with confidence and swagger throughout. Opener ‘Chanel’, starts up like Lee Marvin before kicking into a strummy American college rock paean to heroin “chic”  featuring the line: “Cover up your tracks with a cardigan”.

The driving drums here hold the whole thing together, but the vocals fall on  the wimpy side of rock. ‘Soft Pedals’ is tuneful and inoffensive, but the wistfulness of the meandering vocal starts to grate, all outsider posturing and musical wallpaper.

The high point musically is ‘Astronauts’, a melodic ‘I’m Only Sleeping’-style chugger, all stripped back guitars and vocal, before easing its way into a dainty-played pop suite of choral singing and listless wonderings: “I miss you, hope you stay”, the refrain goes, before the drums pick up a mere 2 minutes 9 seconds in, and a spin around a Beatles-esque musical world is the reward for the faithful.

Throughout All Of Us In Our Night, Modern Skirts are trying their hardest to woo. From the radio-friendly pop of ‘Eveready’ to the veritable lyrical nonsense of ‘Conversational’, this is best face forward, all “this is what you want” temptation.

But, even with the involvement of R.E.M.’s Mike Mills, there is something missing – some soul or heart, something real that Modern Skirts are offering above and beyond the usual. The best you can say about All Of Us In Our Night is the poppiness of tracks like ‘Motorcade’ – style over substance, but singalong enough for commercial FM.

Good news for Modern Skirts. Bad news for fans of good music.

Data Select Party – Hanging Out With Humans

Data Select Party

The opening of Data Select Party‘s EP/mini-album Hanging Out With Humans puts one in mind of the fantastic Dirty Projectors.

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High Places – High Places

Brooklyn duo High Places are the product of a chance encounter that blossomed into a fruitful creative partnership. Mary Pearson’s sing-speak vocals meet Rob Barber’s mutating, otherworldly soundscapes in their music, which first came to wider attention with their 03/07-09/07 compilation. It collected the singles and individual tracks that had been their output so far, since the formation of the band in early 2006 when Pearson moved into Barber’s New York flat. Their self-titled debut album, recorded during the first few months of this year, sees them develop the themes and sounds into what feels like one pulsing, melodic whole.

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You Me At Six – Take Off Your Colours

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It was a while ago I first came across You Me At Six. Disappointed with Funeral For A Friend’s Tales Don’t Tell Themselves, I went searching for some good old British emo-pop-rock. ‘Save It For The Bedroom’ is what I uncovered – played heavily until I got the next new “toy”.

Forward to today and I am sat here with Take Off Your Colours, You Me At Six’s debut. I will be honest, I had lost them from my radar after my initial fling with the Surrey based quintets musings on love and life and my interest was piqued again when I saw in my local music superstore that their album was due for release.

The fact that it was listed on the wall behind the till in said type of shop (normally reserved to tell the unfulfilled when the next manufactured chart superstar releases their labels new cash cow) was enough to make me take a second look.

Released on Slam Dunk Records (my previous knowledge of Slam Dunk was as a club night at The Cockpit in Leeds…ah, memories…!), You Me At Six have obviously built up a reputation and a dedicated following to get such advertisements.

As I listen to the CD for the first time (on my way to work – I’m a busy man!) I find my mind wandering. It’s pleasant enough, but sounds kind like it could have been done by any number of similar bands, both British and American – all chugging guitars, big breakdowns and genre-specific vocal stylings.

Then…Hark…What is that? The alarm call guitar that is the introduction to ‘Save It For The Bedroom’, that’s what it is. Now it may be familiarity that reeled me in, but, hell, it got my attention drew me inside for a further listen.

Next up is the albums title track. Slamming straight in with the line “Those eyes you bought have gone to my head / But they wont take you to my bed” adds to the building sense of sex and short-lived relationships.

This theme is kept up over the next couple of tracks, including ‘If You Run’, which features this rather damning assessment of a former acquaintance: “Run around, just running your mouth / You’re by the hotel / Who’s doing you now? / And you’re so cold, so cold”

Things get a bit heavier on ‘Tigers And Sharks’, conjuring a sense of pain and betrayal to go with the cutting put-downs, vocalist Josh Franceschi demanding to know why everyone he knows was faking it from the word go.

The album’s unrelenting pace slows up for the obligatory acoustic number, ‘Always Attract’. Guitarist, one of Max Heyler or Chris Miller, or perhaps both (no liner notes, no concrete info), do a good job providing an understated melody allowing Franceschi to emote – this time longing for his loved one to return, enlisting the help of an unknown female (see previous comment regarding liner notes) to add backing vocals. The guitarists get to revert to their electrics for the ending, as the rest of the band join in for the crescendo of a finale. As I said, ‘Always Attract’ breaks up the generally fast paced album – but not for long.

Reverting to type for the final two tracks, ‘Nasty Habits’ bemoans another girl who, while not wanting to be “bad news”, seems to be just that.

Live favourite and traditional set closer ‘The Rumour’ ends the album in anthemic style, inviting the listener to “Hold your hands in, into the air / Hold your hands up as if you care”, but not before admitting that “We try to show some love and / It’s a skill that we lack”.

You Me At Six are writing good pop-infused rock music, the press release likening them to Fall Out Boy and Paramore. If that’s what the band are aspiring to (certainly no bad thing…and, oh, haven’t You Me At Six just been added to Fall Out Boy’s UK tour…?) they are certainly going the right way about it.

The tales of girls and boys and love and hate that make up Take Off Your Colours are distinctly teenage in content. But they are full of energy, enthusiasm and, most importantly, tunes. Good tunes make a damn good listen. Let’s just hope they stay as unlucky with the ladies…

The Saturdays – Chasing Lights

In comparison to the 1990s, today’s pop scene is somewhat sparsely populated in terms of successful girl groups. Barring the two notable exceptions of Sugababes and Girls Aloud, it could well be said that there is a fair gap to be filled in the market. So then, here we have The Saturdays. … Continue Reading

Mercury Rev – Snowflake Midnight

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I’m probably not the only one approaching this latest album by Mercury Rev with a certain trepidation. After releasing Deserter’s Songs in 1998, one of the most beautiful records ever made, Mercury Rev have still churned out some gorgeous songs but the overall impression left by albums like Secret Migration and All is Dream is of a band playing it safe and becoming a cleaned up, stadium rock friendly version of their former self.

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Smashing Pumpkins – Adore

The music press have been cruel to Billy Corgan and the hostility between the man and the media is a product of 1998’s commercial disaster that was Adore.
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