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| singles - current and forthcoming releases... |
| Late December 2002 / early January 2003 |
| JET Dirty Sweet EP (Rubber Records)
Named after a hit by Paul McCartney’s awful 70’s pap rock band Wings, this good looking Melbourne four-piece have fortunately shown better taste in whom they choose to seek influence from than their moniker suggests. So we get AC/DC (Take it Or Leave It) and Led Zep (Cold Hard Bitch) on Side 1, both of which marry killer riffs with a strong rhythm section and keep to the point without slipping off into fretboard wankery. Above all, thankfully both tracks are sheer class. Side 2 has two takes on the Stones. Move On has gentle balladry reminiscent of You Can’t Always Get What You Want whilst Rollover DJ is more the 70s boogie of Hot Stuff. Whether they become the world conquering rock beasts that NME would have you believe, only time will tell but on this evidence at least, believe the hype. Review by Paul M BADLY
DRAWN BOY Born Again (XL Recordings) Besides this there’s also two pieces showing Gough’s more sensitive side. Golden Days is a haunting piano ballad built around the simplest of melodies, debuted at Glastonbury last year and played extensively on his last tour, and There’s A Storm contains a beautiful pump organ sound. So, nothing new, but still a damm sight better than most chart pap. Review by Robert B THE LATE
B.P. HELIUM Kumquat Mae (Hype City Records CD EP) A five-track EP on
Norway’s Hype City Records from sometime Great Laker Brian Poole a.k.a. The Late B.P.
Helium. The Weeping Soul is a
lipsmacking mash of frothy melodies and darker lyrics, propelled by great chunks of piano
bashing, horns and handclaps. It’s a
well-read pop song, with a fantastic fuselage of brilliant ideas holding it together. Cuban Sunrise (The Lost Side of Dawn) is a
salsified instrumental while Song for Marie is a smorgasbord of sound: bells,
banjo, pedal steel and strings accompany a sweet-natured vocal. I Won’t Break to You is the
EP’s epic: slow and wistful, with immense string sounds delivering a long and
mournful train whistle of a song. The whole
is rounded off with a cover of George Harrison’s Don’t Let Me Wait Too Long. We wait so long for intelligent pop to come
calling and then you’re inundated by great records and bands but don’t let this
one slip away. Review by Ged M OF MONTREAL Jennifer Louise (Track and Field) Jennifer Louise is a wonderfully chirpy psych pop classic from the Georgians that fair gambols along like a eight legged lamb. It’s a terrific tale of someone contacting their long lost cousin merely to see if they are now wealthy and has you eagerly awaiting the delivery of the next line. And when was the last time you appreciated a spot of yodelling? Buy this and you will. B-side There is Nothing Wrong With Hating Rock Critics is tongue in cheek art school punk. Review by Paul M HARPIES Deep
(Fortune and Glory) Their blurb
mentions Slipknot, and that’s obviously one of the musical reference points on this
debut single, out on Jan 27th. Vocal
duties are shared between Nicky Honey and Laura Westwood and veer between the screaming,
irreparable throat damage variety and Bjorkish pop vocals.
The music is as heavy as fuck, but this doesn’t strike me as single
material. The other track, Just Like You, is
more mainstream heavy with some dream-poppy acoustic sections and gives more of an
indication of the depth and variety the band is capable of.
Bags of promise. They’re
touring through January and a high point gig has to be playing with Little Hell at the
London Subterranea on the 25th. Review by Graham S THE LIBERTINES Time For Heroes (Rough Trade)
Review by Paul M JJ72 Always and
Forever (Lakota Records) As I predicted in
my review of the thoroughly excellent album ‘I To Sky’ (just call me Mystic
Smeg) this track turns up as the next single. It’s
great catchy, uplifting, indie pop and Mark Greaney’s voice is not as idiosyncratic
as it can be. The song has been given a remix
makeover by John Leckie. Deserves to go Top
20 at least but with the appalling tastes of the great British record-buying public it
probably won’t. Shame if it
doesn’t. Review by Graham S REPAIRMAN Smiling White Noise (Fierce Panda) This is gently melodic acoustic electronica from a pair of English mid-20 somethings. It quietly bubbles along in a manner similar to the Kings of Convenience Versus comp of mixes; charming and pleasant with sweet aural ripples to soothe your garage deafened lugholes. Review by Paul M |
THE
EIGHTIES MATCHBOX B-LINE DISASTER Psychosis Safari (No Death Records)
Review by Ged M THE
(INTERNATIONAL) NOISE CONSPIRACY Capitalism Stole My Virginity (Burning
Heart Records) This begs the
question that you can overthrow the system by working within a music industry that is the
most venal, manipulative, consumerist and commerce-driven element of that system (talk
about opiates for masses!), especially when The (I)NC’s music isn’t especially
revolutionary and their clothing could easily be sold as the latest in uniformity of
style, identity and thought. They take the
heavy polemical route championed by the Redskins (with quotes by Durruti, Billy Bragg and
Oscar Wilde plus reading lists!) and deliver it with a less clumsy musical touch. The title track is light and exciting,
though the way that the message is squeezed into the meter is sometimes odd. The other two tracks are previously unreleased. Ever Felt Cheated has a heavy garageband
verse before opening out into the sweetest Rolling Stones chorus and United By Haircuts
is slow burning and soulfully sung. All good
stuff but hasn’t corporate rock always sold us safe parcels of revolutionary rhetoric
(think Red Brigade t-shirts)? Sadly, I
don’t think that The (I)NC kick over many statues after all. Review by Ged M On So Good,
Melys are the frothiest, most melodic and the most pop-soaked that they’re been to
date. If there are comparisons to be made
it’s to The Lightning Seeds perhaps, or The Cure at their lightest and most
commercial. It’s confident enough to
drop in a Sgt Pepper psychedelic moment for a breather before renewing its race to the
close. We Had Our Chances is an
acoustic lament while Buwch Sanctaidd is rocky in a Teardrop Explodes way with
keyboards fizzing like a match dropped in a box of fireworks. THE FALL The
Fall Vs 2003 (Action Records) Unmistakably The
Fall and the best thing they’ve done for a very long time. Susan Vs Youthclub harks back to vintage
80s 90s Fall, like ‘Popcorn Double Feature’ and ‘Hi Tension Line’. It’s big and boomy, propelled along by an
evil synth chunter and a Hanley-esque bass sound. It
has an odd, staccato and drunken seaman arrangement but works perfectly. On Janet Vs Johnny, Mark sings! Possibly the best ‘song’ since
‘Bill Is Dead’, it takes a repeated Love-sounding guitar riff and applies blips
and blings onto it as Mark sings the verse as affectionately as he can. Effortlessly contemporary, they’ll still
represent the standard to reach long after Coldplay are cold in the ground. Review by Ged M It’s the season of
goodwill and all that, but fortunately I don’t need excuses to spread good words
about London-based trio the Revenge. Neatly dressed up in a glam packaging and
featuring songs about, amongst other things, the trouble with boys, their guitar-pop
nevertheless has a spiky, dark grunge edge, with a good dose of US attitude. And the
melodies are much more early PJ Harvey than bouncy girly-pop, particularly on the
stand-outs Meet me on TV and Camden high. This is music that
doesn’t need to be lightweight to be fun, and doesn’t need to be po-faced to be
good. Well worth a listen. Review by Matt H OUTRAGEOUS
CHERRY Stay Right Here For A Little While (Rainbow Quartz) The title track is the Standells or the Creation, a beaty, zesty 60s number, all harmonies and big bass drum. It’s short but such perfectly weighted pop that you expect them to appear on the sleeve wearing cravats and reefer jackets. The Cherry stay in the same decade for inspiration on Paradox Fiends, an unnerving, mildly psychedelic Pink Floyd track, from the same washing line as ‘Arnold Lane’, that goes seriously backward sounding, mysterious and Eastern at the close. There are four tracks but the pick is Time Illuminates You. It’s slow and echoey and hopelessly melodic, sung in gruff yet romantic tones. In mood it’s like one of the House of Love’s best, breathless slow burners. Perfect for a blissed out haze. Review by Ged M A curio rather
than an essential purchase but one that’s being snapped up because of the limited
quantities (1000) it was pressed in. Candy
Cane Children on the A side is one of Jack’s contemporary urban blues, which adds
a somber note to the festive season: “it’s Christmas once again,
girl/that’s 364 tears, girl”. The
B-side has Jack giving a straight reading from the Gospel of Saint Matthew and Meg singing
Silent Night. The latter seems to
reveal their sense of humour in releasing it; Meg would get nowt if she came round our
house carol-singing, especially as she forgets the words!
Cute but not crucial. Review by Ged M THE CLIENTELE
Haunted Melody (Pointy 7”) This is a sweet
Sunday morning comedown record, with delicate melodies and echoey vocals, evoking August
rain evaporating on hot pavements. No
artifice, just pure emotion. The other side, Fear
of Falling, is mildly psychedelic in a early Jefferson Airplane sort of way, a softly
strummed, dreamy pop record. It’s too
laid back to grab you by the throat but it’ll linger in the memory long after the
needle rises. Review by Ged M DANIEL
JOHNSON Mountain Top (For Us 7”) A limited edition
single on Rough Trade’s in-house label. Mountain
Top marries Daniel Johnson’s plain, naïve singing to Mark Linkous’
sophisticated production and arrangements. The
result is an uplifting gem of a single, with shiny melody in best Sparklehorse tradition,
plus wonderful string arrangements and moving vocals.
Heartwarming. The AA-side is Living
It for the Moment, a more discordant song with shouty vocals and wailing guitars but
at the heart of it a lovely melody makes it palatable.
Review by Ged M PINK
GREASE Working All Day (Pink Grease 7”) The A side is a
punky little fella, based on one incredible recurring guitar riff and sounds like it
belongs in that Artrocker collection of bands. It’s
fun but the style is a little well used, whereas…Manhattan On Fire has a weird
genius. It’s an insane cacophony of buzzsaw synth, honking saxophones and oddly
chanted vocals, like a mashed together Suicide and the B-52s. Definitely one to hear. As ever, Rough Trade will have it. Review by Ged M
|
|
It’s tempting to dismiss Jet if
only to prick the NME’s bubble of a claim that they discovered them.
Time
for Heroes is the Libertines dothing their cap most clearly to the pre-pipe and slippers
era Weller.