Play Loud! This is my kind of record, each track dedicated to its own side, a satisfying slab of uninterrupted evolution to burrow into, to savour. A completely live recording (and film) that shimmers plenty, full of the essential Velcro that pulls you straight into that open-ended fray
Michael Rodham-Heaps
492 posts
Lower Floors Music This newbie from Wolf Eyes is taking the dark broodiness that defined 2006’s Human Animal to new claustrophobic highs. Gone are the headache-inducing colours of the past in favour of something more nefarious.
4AD The Serpent’s Egg (1988) The Serpent’s Egg was a solemn secular experience for the most part, seeking sanctuary in the monastically sparse, a warm cathedral backing to some prized vocal action, Lisa Gerrard‘s phonic phoenix of a voice glinting Byzantine.
Northern Spy The first track literally hammers through with blinding insistence, a powder keg of percussive energy and squally sax. This staggered vocal from Alyse Lamb magnetically drawn over it, pulling you deeper into the fray
12K In pursuit of an “acoustic” truth, Taylor Deupree has ditched his usual hi-tech shenanigans for a more hands-on, cut’n’splice approach, a back to basics attitude that has created a rewarding series of skeletals. A pearlescent cascade, the accompanying photographic book attempts to pin down and complement the stripped-backed intimacy on offer here.
Silver Mountain Media Group / London London Hot on the heels of Tecuciztecatl‘s rock operatics comes this new offering from Michigan’s finest, His Name is Alive. Another guitar-fuelled fandango, this time burning up on all that particle physics hysteria of a few years back when we all thought we’d be sucked into a dark matter vortex as science glimpses the momentarily flash of the God Particle.
Mottomotto Right from the electro-slapped rub of the opener to the insistent burn of guitar that seals the deal, this baby kicks winter grumpiness out into the far reaches like its predecessor Innard Listeningestion did. Its glinty beams and squelchy piranhas are the perfect panacea to the prevailing gloom, smoothed in plenty of harmonic warmth.
London 25 January 2017 Charles Bullen of This Heat fame was up first, ricocheting a rich stream of bubbling metallics from a specially adapted lap-steel contraption. A set of gamboling percussives and deep Balinese-like bounces drawn through a shanty town of effects. All very fragmented, his sparse trajectories sped off in doubling harmonics with the odd bit of accidental mobile phone surreally spluttering through.
Gizeh (CD) / Pleasance (Vinyl) The title track pins you early on in fuzzy cushions and muted percussion, this elastic line of rhythm stitching the goods as vaporous panthers prowl the collaterals. Claire Brentnall‘s vocals make a brilliant foil to Aidan Baker‘s shoegazery sensibilities and pedal prowess.
Second Language After twenty years of exploration, Glen Johnson (one of the tirade that first initiated the project and its lasting member) is closing the lid on and drawing a line under everything Piano Magic, and as the glissotronic swirls clear on the opening track, he’s straight in there voicing his opinion on the matter to lush orchestrated folds.
Echoic Memory This self-financed five-tracker from Stereocilia nails you to the spot cinematically. The sun-caught melodics of “River” holding you hostage with its Basho/Fahey sense of openness and fertile flourishes, as does that dissolving warmth in the loopage that emotionally flies off the handle at any given point.
Bureau B This is the second instalment of Bureau B‘s Con-struct series, with Schneider TM taking up the posthumous reins, grappling with Schnitzler‘s daunting archive. In direct contrast to Pyrolator‘s take on the subject (a few years back), this dwells on the more investigate side of Mr Conrad‘s oeuvre, something Mr Dresselhaus gets down’n’dirty with, eking out a host of abstract vitality, wrestling with sonic life-forms that defy your […]
Bristol 7 December 2016 St George’s Hall in Bristol is one of the city’s finest venues, a church set in a lofty position halfway up Park Street, this evening looking splendid in backlit winter gloom. Inside, the stage was lit in red, mysterious yet comforting. I half expected to see Laura Palmer come out to meet us.
The Alphabet Business Concern The first taste of this album (as you’d expect) is a salty one, buffered by a sea breeze, Sarah Smith‘s eerie delivery peeking through spidery fingerings of instrumentation. It’s a short atmospheric swell that ignites an introspective shiver, a curiosity that’s quickly burnished in light and airy intoxications.
Bristol Sunday 20 November 2016 Blimey, what an action-packed night, Bristol was heaving with musical busyness, Microdeform playing the Kino, Circuit des Yeux at The Anson Rooms and the Arnolfini hosting Les Diaboliques, all spinning out on same night — if I hadn’t have already committed to this Cube show, I’d be spoilt for alternatives. Anyways it was brilliant to be back at The Cube, haven’t been here since […]
4AD Within The Realm Of A Dying Sun (1987) This was the band’s third masterpiece, and a firm favourite of mine. The otherworldliness of Spleen And Ideal is here leaning towards the symphonic, a neo-classical oomph held on an animated skyline. As with Ideal, Brendan Perry is in fine fettle, dedicating a whole side to pondering life’s woes, drawing inspiration from the historical, mythical, going for the emotional jugular in […]
Bristol 8 November 2016 This was an intimate show, just Kristin Hersh laying herself bare – furnished with a few self-released books and a shiny electric guitar. Last time I saw her live was just as intimate, in a small, vaulted church off Park Street, where she delivered a stripped-down acoustic shindig full of wonder. That harrowing encore satisfaction of “Delicate Cutters” is still creeping the personal archives […]
Nomadic Island Musically, Olga Szymula‘s début LP is like a toothpaste tube of psilocybin rainbows and juttering dislocations. A sizzle of torn circuitries and bright petroleum blisters that spill haunt-o- delically from its instrumental start into the mysteriously entitled ‘Ø’.