Kaputt – Carnage Hall

Upset The Rhythm

Upset The Rhythm really seems to be cornering the market in literate if slightly eccentric indie pop these days. It takes me back to the halcyon days of C86 in the way that each new band that releases something on the label is bringing their own skewed vision of what passes for post-punk or indie guitar (for want of a better term).

Carnage Hall from Kaputt, who hail from Glasgow, is a perfect case in point. A storming six-piece which includes a saxophonist alongside the usual suspects of guitars, singers, bass, percussion, etc, they also have a wonderfully evocative vocalist in Cal Donnelly, who brings to mind a slightly more urbane version of the much missed Mick Lynch from Stump; and it is that Ron Johnson Records sound that Kaputt seem to have updated so well.

With its offset drums and playful bass, opener “Rats” rumbles wildly as the singers Cal and Simone Wilson warble in a deranged manner, “it’s so much darker now”. It is a stop-start thing, with the baritone sax lending a low swinging assistance to the bass, although it leaps up like it is heading a ball as the song progresses. It is huge fun, with Simone’s more subtle vocal style lending counterpoint to Cal’s less measured rambling; call it deranged, call it exuberant, either way it is most appealing and is just about able to keep up with the itchy about-turns and volte-faces that the band insist on throwing at us.

I remember listening to the first couple of Throwing Muses albums and remarking on the way that Kristin Hersh‘s songs seemed to be binary constructions, with each composed of two seemingly different parts somehow hanging together. Well, Kaputt take this idea and push it even further in to the distance, with the band unable to control the songs and watching them veer wildly from one section to another as they chase them down the road.

Horns sound in an insanely repetitive manner on “Carnage Hall” itself, but they are welcoming as it is it grinds to a queasy halt and then slithers off in another direction. I figure rehearsals must either be a nightmare or a dream, as somehow the six share some pathological connection that enables them to pull one another off the beaten track without batting eyelids. The use of the saxophone is one of their magic powers, and here brings to mind the way Psychedelic Furs used it on their first couple of albums; it has a way of kind unsettling the tracks or lending them a queer edge that is most unlike the way we usually hear it. And there seems to be no jazz influence at all.

Kaputt’s inability to allow a song to go in a straight line for long can’t be laid at the feet of any one band member, but bassist Tobias Carmichael and drummer Rikki Will certainly do not allow things to run smoothly; they are fantastic players but all over the place, particularly on the haphazard “Highlight!” with its fantastic vocal refrain: “They all say you are the highlight of my career”. There is a kind of yearning romanticism to the vocals that are reminiscent of The B52s but with Chrissy Barnacle‘s sax framing them perfectly.

“Are you ready for my examination?”, Cal enquires on the irresistible breakneck indie rollercoaster “Parsonage Square”. Here, the rhythm section are tight like a tiger and Rikki is all over the kit, smashing cymbals and toms all over the joint. It is exhausting and only brings you to the end of side one, yet it feels as though you’ve sat through about three albums’ worth of material. Side two starts with the overwhelming and unexpected sound collage “Drinking Problems Continue Part One” with part two’s scattershot bass and swooping sax following hot on its heels. There is no way that these happy, purposeful accidents could ever have been produced by a band that wasn’t completely in control of its musical faculties, such is the woozy precision required. “Think About Your Face (While You’re Doing It)” has the most joyful refrain, but the sleazy fairground gloom of the first section is replaced by a perky, madcap bass- and drum-led ramble.

The instrumentalists are hot and they know it, and like to push one another. It must be scream live. I like bands with six members; somehow it feels more democratic: think of early Tindersticks or early Mercury Rev, or The Final Age or Broken Social Scene. It means expansive yet together, a little claustrophobic yet yearning. It is all there in Kaputt’s sound; the impatient tempo changes, playful derails, smile-inducing vocals and the desire for experimentation. Carnage Hall is a real treat that needs repeated listening.

-Mr Olivetti-