Rachael Sage – Painting Of A Painting Label: Mpress Format: CD I think Rachael Sage is on the verge of becoming something great. I don’t think that she’s necessarily reached that “great” point with this album, but you can already tell that she’s growing into something here. There’s just not enough confidence or strength in her voice at this point, though, and for the subject matter and the […]
Tarentel – Mort Aux Vaches Label: Staalplaat Format: CD This is a ‘live’ recording of a U.S. guitar based outfit and consists of four fairly long workouts. “Adonai” covers some of the territory of Fripp and Eno and is a somewhat somnolent affair with rippling guitars creating a lazy ambience. “Steede Bonnet” has the kick of drums mingling with the still quite restrained guitar which, at times, sounds […]
Ui – The Iron Apple Label: Southern Format: 12″,CDS Named in respect of the vitality of the 103-year old owner of the cider house in Pennsylvania where Ui rehearsed for many years, The Iron Apple shows the band in further abstracted territory from their “post-Rock” roots. As ever, the combination of tightly-controlled energy in Clem Waldmann‘s drums, Sasha Frere-Jones‘s guitar and keyboards, and the beautifully-restriced bass rhythms (synthetic […]
Van Delta – EP No. 1 Label: Groove Attack Format: 12″ Sometimes better known as Drum & Bass duo Monophace, Hannes Wenner and Christopher Klos have taken on the Van Delta monniker to experiement beyond the genre. Their first simply-titled EP takes an excursion into diverse territory, making the HipHop break of “Enlargen” move through some distinctly Ambient areas before settling into a mellow groove for the duration, […]
Ka – Terrarium Label: Jazzassin Format: 2×7″ The exquisite paper, smelling of the tire it represents on the cover – “Superior 2000”. Confidence. The vinyl is clear – the speed at which it is to be played is not. So, this re view comes at you from 33 rpm. It is as if one is standing at the roadside – the drone and grinding Dopplers past. And now […]
Miriam de Waard – Voor Elise (an electronic welcome) Label: Staalplaat Format: 3″ CD Rhythmic ratcheting enters from the fog and brings it along besides. Fuer Elise – but only the most familiar of the notes. Plinky bells tinker along, as if trying to catch up with its larger, more melodious brother. More of those notes, only with more air in them. A kitty! – and a music […]
Xinli Supreme – All You Need Is Love Was Not True Label: Fat-Cat Format: 7″ Short description: Xinli Supreme sound something like the Japanese Flying Saucer Attack. Longer review: Xinli Supreme sound from time to time like Flying Saucer Attack when they were so much more lo-fi than recently. Monospaced drum machine beats borrowed from the Jesus And Mary Chain or just set to full speed ahead and […]
Akira Yamamichi – Sémiologie Label: Fire Inc. Format: CD The word to sum up Sémiologie is pure. Akira Yamamichi has produced on of the purest expressions of sub bass. This is the kind of album you can really share with your neighbours. He does this by working with pulse beats, constructing his music from very basic and pure sounds. The comparison with Pan Sonic is obvious, but this […]
Zorn – Bits For Breakfast/Gloomy Sunday Label: Expanding Format: 7″ Pressed up on translucent tangerine vinyl, Zorn‘s contribution to Expanding Records‘ EVS series opens with a rather pleasant synth line rising over a mechanistic yet melodic rhythm. Sparks of staticky percussion sound cleave themselves to the slowly chiming beat; the bass is warm and unobtrusive. Warbles of genial synthery make their presence felt without saying much other than […]
Label: Sonic360 Format: CD;CDS/12″/Digital Download Mockery is the breathtaking début album from Littl Shyning Man, a.k.a. Christopher Haworth, which was originally released in 2005. To me it struck a chord with Mothlite‘s The Flax of Reverie – a huge symphonic sweeping spectrum of style: a mixture of electronics and instruments, frantic modernist string pieces, vocal harmonies, spoken word, raw buzzing noise, drum and bass joins folk in a […]
Concrete And Glass Hoxton Bar & Kitchen, London 2 October 2008 When you go to a show by a shirtless, rabble-rousing mob like O’Death, you really expect to see the band set up on the floor, separated from their sweaty audience by little more than a few blobs of spit and sawdust. That’s how I imagined it anyway, so it is with some apprehension that I view the […]
Label: Rise Above Format: CD,LP Flute-tinged witch rock debut from Toronto’s Blood Ceremony. These days a lot of metal bands head straight for the big Black Sabbath riff, slow it down, and just stay there. However, I don’t think Blood Ceremony are too interested in what lots of metal bands are doing these days. They look back to the era of bands such as Coven, Affinity, and Black […]
Label: City Slang (Europe)/ Ernest Jenning Record Co (USA) Format: CD O‘Death’s stated intention with Broken Hymns, Limbs and Skin was to capture the energy of their live sets on record, and anyone who has seen one of O’Death’s riotous shows will know that this is a hell of a tall order. The resulting album is a gypsy stomp barn burner, a chaotic celebratory oom-pah punk sea shanty set to […]
Label: Decay/Target Video Format: DVD,VHS Originally released on VHS in 1987, this collection of the Dead Kennedys live in concert and the studio finds them in fine Punk Rock form. As is to be expected, the sound quality of the gig footage (mostly recorded at Mabuhay Gardens 1979-80) is less than optimal, but at least it’s in stereo and captures the band’s tightly-whipped performances in the lo-fi essentials. […]
Label: 4AD Format: DVD+3xCD There is an air of finality about the title and contents of 1981-1998. With the dissolution of their musical partnership into separate solo careers, Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry are no longer Dead Can Dance, but as the extensive essay on the group included in the luxurious slip-cased hardbacked book (jam-packed with landscape photos) which makes up the packaging of the set observes, the […]
Label: Cleopatra Format: DVD Yet again, it’s a Goth revival. Only a couple of weeks ago, one of the broadsheets began proclaiming black as the new black. The old black obviously not having been quite black enough. So here’s Cleopatra, with a bunch of nostalgia and some newer stuff too. Companion to their immense Goth Box, the DVD opens promisingly enough with Switchblade Symphony‘s “Clown”- some Goth chicks […]
Label: Ignite Music Format: DVD+CD I‘m never really sure how to review live DVDs. This is partly because I don’t buy them often myself, except as records of gigs or tours I’ve seen in person. But also it’s because they don’t really fit with my music listening habits. Thankfully, although I wasn’t at this gig, I saw them around this time on the most recent reunion, so the DVD’s […]
Label: Freeborn John Theatre Company Format: CD+DVD (PAL) Originally released in 1996, Freeborn John was Rev Hammer‘s folk rock opera about the life of English radical “Freeborn” John Lilburne, who fought in the Civil War and dedicated his life to liberty and freedom. A natural subject for Hammer, who’s carved out a niche of his own by being a folk musician not afraid to cross the boundaries into […]