reallyrather


February 2002 March 2002 April 2002 May 2002 June 2002 July 2002 August 2002 September 2002 October 2002 November 2002 December 2002 January 2003 February 2003 March 2003 April 2003 May 2003 June 2003 July 2003 August 2003 September 2003 October 2003 November 2003 December 2003 January 2004 February 2004 March 2004 April 2004 May 2004 June 2004 July 2004 August 2004 September 2004 October 2004 November 2004 December 2004 January 2005 February 2005 March 2005 April 2005 May 2005 June 2005 July 2005 August 2005 September 2005 October 2005 November 2005 December 2005 January 2006 February 2006 March 2006 April 2006 May 2006 June 2006 July 2006 August 2006 September 2006 October 2006 November 2006 December 2006 January 2007 February 2007 March 2007 April 2007 May 2007 June 2007 July 2007 August 2007 September 2007 October 2007 November 2007 December 2007 January 2008 March 2008 April 2008 May 2008 June 2008 July 2008 September 2008 October 2008 November 2008 December 2008 January 2009 February 2009 March 2009 May 2009 June 2009 July 2009 August 2009 September 2009 October 2009 November 2009 December 2009 January 2010 March 2010 April 2010

email

Powered by Blogger


   Friday, November 24, 2006  
Slightly bizarrely, the NME has a specifically designated New Music Editor, with a silly name and an even sillier mugshot. Reporting breathlessly last week from the CMJ Music Marathon in New York, he tipped an awed readership to acts like
:: Loney,dear - 'the best indie folk band nobody's heard of' - except, of course, all those who thronged The Enterprise in Chalk Farm recently where the Swedish 5-piece entertained heroically despite a partial power-out. Things like the gently rolling swoon of I love you (in with the arms) sounded just great in the streetlamp glow and the album Sologne fairly heaves with similar pastoral pop delights (Le fever, A band, etc)...
:: Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin - see rr back in, er, Feb...
:: and Annuals from North Carolina, 'who might just be the new Arcade Fire'. Not that there's any real need for that since there's still the perfectly good old Arcade Fire about the place, but this blog dropped into Water Rats last night anyway to check. And Win & co. can rest easy, this six-piece are some way off connecting on anything like the same level. Band leader Adam Baker does the fashionable yelping thing and bangs his own drum quite literally at times, doubling up on a spare snare and galvanizing matters considerably. If anything though, on first hearing, they're a bit too ambitious musically with some slightly-too-chewy chord changes and arrangements...
[annuals]

Meanwhile, the same venue was packed out one night last week for a show by some homegrown talents just launching their debut ep but who have yet to register on the NME New Music Editor's finely-tuned radar. Who knew there was this much of an audience for the sort of epic instrumental indie sculpted by emergent Canterbury quintet Yndi Halda? Certainly not this blog. Just where were all these people when the mighty Unwed Sailor hit town last month?!
The five-song set demonstrated their fairly orthodox, classicist approach to the rock that we must call 'Post-', a kind of boiled-down Godspeed You Black Emperor if you will. Each opus follows a similar trajectory with the four frontline musicians busying themselves with filagreed variations on a slow-burn emotional theme before the pressure valve is released in a double-time explosion of kinetic energy. Some will doubtless crab at the predictability of it all but for this blog its a bit like going out for a good pizza: knowing precisely whats coming doesn't in any way diminish the pleasure of consumption...
[yndi halda]

Seems the Water Rats is fast becoming reallyrather's home-from-home of late what with Suburban Kids With Biblical Names [go] returning with their springy pop delights Dec 15 following the same Stockholm-to-Kings Cross route Hello Saferide took last week. Having been vaguely expecting just Annika Norlin and her guitar rr was super-happy to see a seven-strong line-up take the stage; horns, harmonies and handclaps-a-gogo! A diminutive presence - black rollneck and blonde ponytail behind an ever-present acoustic - Annika & co. strung together a fairly irresistible daisy chain of her major-chord ditties with their off-centre girls-world wordplay. Last bitter song, Get sick soon, Long lost penpal, the effervescent Highschool stalker [hear] had the place humming with pleasure which the notional headliners, female synth trio Au Revoir Simone, singularly failed to capitalise upon...
[hello saferide]

'Chiming guitar pop - strongly recommended for fans of jangly guitars, hardwood floors, sunlit rooms, and natural fibres,' is how retailer CDBaby sums Ephemera for the future [go], the eternally attractive (round here at least) debut set from sporadically active Philiadelphian outfit The Trolleyvox. Getting it so right so early doesn't do subsequent efforts any favours, however, and rr found follow-up Leap of folly didn't always play to their strengths and felt a bit over-considered (despite highs like One day, Fleur de Lys and Chesterman).
The bafflingly grandiose title of album #3, The Trolleyvox Presents the Karaoke Meltdown, doesn't bode too well but happily its pretty much a return to form. Unlike Ephemera there are a few tracks here which this don't hit this blog's spot (Twilight hotel, I am Annabelle, Deep blue central) where moodier chord changes and pacing prevail. But these moments are comfortably offset by more deeply pleasurable lashings of their highly distinctive combination of thick, Vox-powered electric jangle, tumbling percussion and chalky vocal harmonies.
Just you wait's urgent, Bush-beating protest pop is an exhilarating opening, the message hitting as hard as music. Great stuff. Later on, Baby you were lied to also gets political. It's less spiked with aggression but still kicks on with purpose, closing out with great shards of electric guitar. I know that you're high gets back to more (blissfully) familiar mid-tempo territory featuring singer Beth Filla at her best and a levitating chorus line. Joyride and Stoplight roses are similarly fine, Filla's dry, clear enunciation cutting cleanly through the clatter of drums and songwriter Andrew Chalfen's sparking, sparkling guitar while the whole lot of them are caught time and again in a summer shower of tambourines. Definitely reallyrather's kind of weather...
[the trolleyvox]

Recording devices at the ready December 1 for Later with Jools Holland on BBC2 when young hopefuls Keane and the Red Hot Chili Peppers are to be put quietly in their place by The Be Good Tanyas...
   posted by SMc at 1:13 AM |