London 8 October 2014 Jex Thoth are one of the names heralded as part of the new occult rock boom that has spawned so many great bands like Blood Ceremony and Jess And The Ancient Ones. They have produced two amazing albums; the last, Blood Moon Rise, was released last year. So it’s quite odd that the band is back for their second series of UK dates with […]
live review
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Lillehammer 8 October 2014 My friends, ; forget longing for the days gone by — what we have right now is incredible. I’m spending a lot of time in Lillehammer these days — usually I go outside town for my musical fill, but last night, quite luckily, I got smacked for weeks by three utterly thrilling musical rides. The pictures do not at all express the level of […]
London 3 October 2014 I had forgotten what a large space The Roundhouse is — it really is quite big. For me it will always be the venue of psychedelic bands, The Pink Fairies, Man, Hawkwind and The Doors all played here and I always have the feeling that the venues walls are soaked with incense and patchouli oil. Those walls were certainly echoing tonight with the sound […]
Corsica Studios, London 23 September 2014 So we’re back again for round two — the second night in a row at London‘s tiny but perfectly-formed Corsica Studios, this time to see space-rock reprobates White Hills and One Unique Signal. And there will be volume. Oh yes, there will be volume. Lots and lots of lovely, lovely volume (say this in the voice of Neil Kinnock‘s Spitting Image puppet […]
Corsica Studios, London 22 September 2014 Despite its location, deep in the heart of Elephant and Castle, I really, really like Corsica Studios. It’s essentially a tiny concrete box with a wicked sound system, the combination of which tends . We’re here to see Bardo Pond, of whom more later
London 16 September 2014 Listen, For in each tiny sound, In the movement of the air, And in the song of the birds, Shall the voice of God Speak unto you, If only you chose to hear it. Johannes Dieterich, Prorsus Inventa, 1573
Newhaven Fort, East Sussex 13 September 2014 Wow! This place was superb!! A semi-ruin with a labyrinth of white-clad tunnels eating into the gloom, the natural reverb promoting plenty of pseudo monk fun. The weathered solidity and teasing signs of atrophy, the stonework full of weird apertures that once occupied armoury now harbouring a host of musical oddness.
London 16 September 2014 Mounting the stage with a promise of a different set to the previous night’s show at the same venue, Nik Void, Chris Carter and Cosey Fanni Tutti settle quickly into place behind a compact selection of effects boxes, mixers and other instruments. As the gig gets underway, the backdrop lit up by the slowly-cycling op-art imagery familiar from their début album projected overhead, the […]
London 7 August 2014 Probably the best way to imagine this gig is to picture the Newtonian Laws of Motion resolving themselves inside a packed Turkish sauna. If Car A is driving down a road at 100mph, whilst Car B is driving at 100mph in the opposite direction, if they collide, they will crash at 200mph. You get where I’m about to go with this, right? So, translated […]
Bristol 30 July 2014 Rock the Roberts(on)s plumbed an ad hoc and lo-fi angle spectacularly. A bizarre scrapbook of spurting poodle rock from a butchered karaoke machine injected with gargled indigestions that were grins-ville all the way. Irate spikes of feedback, ruler twangs, radio miss-tunes, things literally falling off the table and lord knows what else. This girl art school stoic mumbling dead pan, holding a sign up […]
London 7 July 2014 Kev Nickells went to see Japanese kawaii-rockers Babymetal live in London, and loved it. Barnabas Y, however, offers a riposte to the popularity of the genre-bending phenomenon. Pictures by James Sting. The review You should probably be aware of Babymetal by now. I first came across them when “the hard man of Harsh Noise Wall” Clive Henry put a link up to it. It […]
Corsica Studios, London 12 July 2014 It was the day of the flying ants. The humidity in London was building and it felt like a storm was about to break any minute. Before hitting the venue I went to the local pub to have a beer and cool down after the heat of London transport. People who sat outside were being assailed by ants and for a brief […]
London 18 June 2014 Acid King are one of the few US bands to tour the UK/Europe every year, even when there is no new product to promote. Lori S, Joey Osbourne and Mark Lamb seem to get off on being on the road bringing their own brand of biker/doom/sludge to the ears of their followers where ever they may be. The Underworld is its usual dank self, […]
Electrowerkz, London 21 June 2014 This was something I never dreamt I would ever see. I stare at the ticket in my hand and still can’t quite believe what the lettering says: “Chrome – doors open 7pm.” I would have been less surprised to have found myself standing atop the cliffs at Beachy Head with Chris Marker’s cat Guillaume-en-Egypt, looking out to sea whilst the Kraken rose from […]
London 13 June 14 It is summertime and in Britain the early morning mist drifts across fields and clings to the roots of trees. Tents are erected and the dowdy colours of winter are a thing of the past as the children of the rainbow appear from forests and their various hiding places to worship the sun, to enjoy the abundance of nature around them. And the music […]
Brixton Electric London 27 May 2014 Since reforming – or, perhaps more accurately, reincarnating – in 2010, Swans have rapidly become one of the most extraordinary musical entities of our age. Their comeback album, My Father Will Guide Me Up A Rope To The Sky, was a fine release, and they soon re-established themselves as a formidable live act. But with 2012’s The Seer – a vast, audacious, […]
London 4 June 2014 “In case of sonic attack,” warned Hawkwind, “follow these rules,” before advocating such crazy measures as “try to get as far from the sonic source as possible.” One assumes, therefore, that the combined onslaught of Loop and Godflesh doesn’t technically count as an “attack,” what with being consensual. More like sonic S/M play, maybe. Because the urge here definitely seems to tend towards getting […]
Bristol 6 June 2014 Really enjoyed those colour-blind psychedelics Ramleh were plying, being partial to a bit of nihilistic zeal. All that top-heavy primary and scuzzy nail-throwing does you no end of good, run through with copious amount of feedback roughage, a storm of grainy monotonies stabbing your ears and hitting the spot. Both Anthony di Franco and Gary Mundy looked in their element and seemed . Gary’s […]