Dieter Moebius – Kram

Dieter Moebius – Kram (Klangbad)

Dieter Moebius, having been a part of Harmonia and collaborated with Brian Eno, here takes us on the kind of journey one would imagine taking with a slightly grizzled experimenter. There is gentle menace alongside the blueprints of some of his former works, but he is more than capable of creating sick unease and atmospheric sophistication that leaps into a bizarre dystopia. Not nightmarish in the traditional sense, Kram (translating as Stuff) is comfortable in its unrest, even encouraging us to conjure our own nightmares to accompany these slowly sprawling works. The pace of the record, though it is itself constantly mobile, is key to its success. 

It seems a little backwards to attempt this, but the opening track from Dieter Moebius’ Kram must be viewed as a whole. The listener must perceive the piece to be one complete segment. When it starts with jarring Vangelis-derived synthesizer and aimless toying, Start is not so different to its own ending. The tonality hints at the major, but never lets it overrule the atmosphere of ponderous movement. Clanks and industry voice their opinions on the material. That there is a five minute period where rhythms are introduced and gently squeezed into being is irrelevant – it is the widescreen view that must be adhered to.

The album itself benefits from similar abstraction in consideration. Suites come to pass, taking in motorik propulsion and the occasional unfulfilled melodic potential. Treated licks of electric instruments are tantalisingly close to expanding into full-blown tunefulness, but Moebius has his sights set purely on atmospherics. At times, like on the haunted Womit, time appears to stand still. Textures refuse to progress at any pace unwanted by its creator, and Moebius expertly keeps things ticking along with just enough interest to capture the ear. Those melodic fragments swirl and want to be explored, but the nature of the compositions means that they must be sacrificed so as not to cloy the kinetics.

Though at times difficult to penetrate, quiet and reflective listening to Kram will reward massively. It’s heartening that such a sonic technician still exists, and relieving to discover that his music has not aged, but definitely progressed. Indeed, viewed as an entity as of itself, Kram will totally envelope, test and invigorate.

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This is out on the splendidly-named Klangbad records on September 14th TWOTHOUSANDANDNINE. Have a lil’ ear-gack.

Black Eyed Peas – I Gotta Feeling

… means ‘I Have Got To Feeling’.

Nice one, Will.I’m.

Also, get a hyphen in your name. What’s an Eyed Pea?

Sleeping States – In The Gardens Of The North

Sleeping States – In The Gardens Of The North (Bella Union)

Markland Starkie has taken his time with this Bella Union debut, and it’s been absolutely worth the wait. Rarely are listeners likely to hear a writer who gives such balance to the realms of pop and folk music and the trappings therein. It is at once atmospheric and direct. Rings Of Saturn creeps without menace but with luxuriating intensity. Starkie is not so much driven by his bookishness as he is by the musical ascents he cleverly creates. Showers In The Summer, for example, shimmers thanks to masterfully beaten toms and careful cymbal, his voice buoyant amongst it all along.

There is something of the spiritual about some of Starkie’s flightier works. Josh Pearson is evoked on the sweetly-cooed Breathing Space, a beautifully judged piece that implies deep consideration of its musical gestures – clearly, the nuance of performance is a trait heavily valued on In The Gardens Of The North. This makes it, above all, a naturalistic, instinctive record with wonder and seriousness equal players in its success.

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This came out on Monday. PM DID REVIEW IT IN TIME, THOUGH, FOR GOD’S SAKE STOP WORRYING. Proof? Buy Artrocker this month. Music (lovely, super music) here.

Dave Cloud & The Gospel Of Power – Fever

Dave Cloud & The Gospel Of Power – Fever (Fire)

With intimations this fiery, unfocused and sickly, it’s easy to find ample entertainment in Dave Cloud’s reasonably barmy incantations. Questions about this veteran Nashville Arthur Brown-alike might include the following for the uninitiated: Is he singing in tongues? Why does he have two voices? Does he have some sort of mental problem? The answers are unimportant when lines like “Did I say calypso? Well, shut my lips-o!” are peppered throughout this micro-masterpiece of tension and dirt.

Aside from the artful quirkiness on display throughout, it’s chilling to hear exactly how an elderly David Berman would sound on Try Just A Little – it’s uncanny. The freewheeling spoken-word final track, ‘In The Distance’ is brilliantly atmospheric, sounding almost like an after-thought, but with gravitas aplenty in the spooked tale of a courtship betwixt bugler and belle, providing a fine ending to this short (a shade over twenty minutes) but electrifying collection.

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This comes out via the inestimable Fire records on August 24th. Visit.

Japandroids Videos

Getting dangerously interested in Japandroids now. Head here for a total shed-load of interviews and performances. The interviews feature a blond man.

Here’s a funtime video that isn’t at that link:

Amazing. Myspace. Review. Review.

Hecuba – Paradise

Hecuba – Paradise (Manimal Vinyl)

Hecuba are, if nothing else, utter experts at conjuring a menace that seeps. The boy/girl duo of a filmmaker and an actress are more than competent at maintaining that menace and mutating it gently into serious unease – the buzzing free-form ending of ‘Even So’ is a scintillating climax. Intense darkness surrounds the early stages of the record, with the borderline horror film nursery rhyme of ‘Miles Away’ standing out as paranoia incarnate.

More than just pantomime villains, Hecuba reveal the subtleties of this debut very slowly, but very markedly. Gradually increasing the bombastic synths and widening the contrast between a light spooking and terrifying squelching horns very slowly makes itself apparent, and the listener is faultlessly drawn in. Relentlessly, ‘Paradise’ prangs from Laurie Anderson motorik monotone to joyful keyboard explosion and into the lowest registers of what sounds like a piano being breathed into life by Godzilla. In short: a mood masterclass with enough dramatic pop fun to stop it being relentlessly bleak.

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This is out on 31st August via Manimal. That’ll be nice. You can also read this review in the latest issue of Artrocker. Which you should get.

Telekinesis – Telekinesis!

Telekinesis – Telekinesis! (Morr Music)

The best summer records are more than just simple, jolly songs played on acoustics with a little bit of fuzz – you have to capture all elements of the season. The sitting down, the water, the sweat of activity, maybe some romance if you haven’t already cracked a bottle. This is why Teenage Fanclub can be said to produce some summery material, but have not recorded a summer album. The Lemonheads’ ‘It’s A Shame About Ray’, on the other hand, nails it with a blend of exuberance and Evan Dando’s slackerisms. Telekinesis have at the summer album and pretty much nail it too.

The opening sketch ‘Rust’ is the perfect entrée, wistful, homespun and excellently lo-fi, and the following set seeks to gently tweak and rummage its way through your Jun-Sep (if we’re lucky). Main man Michael Benjamin Learner is clearly someone to whom lightness has little adjoining shade, preferring instead the jamboree-pop favoured on all those classic records from nineteen-seventy-whatever. Which means that this is not a record dripping with invention, but it is one that understands the multifarious nature of summer, its stickiness and its sweetness, its sensations and its silliness.

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This is out BLOODY TODAY. I don’t care if it’s raining, get it and enjoy the summer. Have a listen. This review is in this month’s Artrocker, which you should buy and stuff. I don’t mean buy and then stuff it, I was being flippant.

Why Did No-One Tell Me About How Amazing Grizzly Bear Are?

Seriously, I mean, PM prides itself on being pretty clued up on “what’s happening”, but for some reason we totally ignored Grizzly Bear. We even saw them at ATP for about twenty nice-enough minutes, but obviously not the bit of the set where they did THIS:

Which is obviously tremendous. Been sent this single to review and it’s unstoppable. Been listening to it on repeat for some hours now…  also doing some back-catalogue exploring, and thoroughly enjoying it. Mostly, it has to be said, we keep going back to this one performance. It’s the restraint, the accuracy, the poise and the final moments when the climactic “whoo-aaa-ooooh…” arrives circa 3:31. Try that on.

MySpace.

Blindfold – Faking Dreams

Blindfold – Faking Dreams (Cinepop)

Four Icelandic friends set out to create an emotional brand of guitar expressiveness that resonates, above all, emotionally. They’re characterised by their slowly-progressing, rarely-digressing soundscapes and the high-register vocals of their front-man, Biggi. Remind you of anyone? DOES IT?

That’s not fair. Though there are a few too many similarities between Blindfold and their fellow countrymen Sigur Ros, it’s not right to take that into consideration when Faking Dreams can sully itself without comparison to others. It’s not that it’s incompetent, or even dishonest. It’s that it’s monumental in its dullness, and dull in its monuments. Each song strives to grow, to progress and to flourish, leaving Blindfold utterly crippled by their own refusal to find direction. Each chord progression limps without purpose, unable to project further than the next repetition of its sorry cycle, and certainly less able of setting the tiniest body hair a-tremble.

The final stab, Reverse seems to take an hour to get going and then a mere second to set itself out. Building, slowly, to absolutely nothing. Then, shockingly, it does it for a second time. There’s only so much one can endure and this has, everything, been done before, and better.

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Here some of this guff, if you can be bothered, here. It’s out sometime this month, checking… oh. The 3rd. Whoops! Buy Artrocker magazine this month and this review will totally be in it!

The Heavy – The House That Dirt Built

The Heavy – The House That Dirt Built (Counter)

With a Ronseal title like The House That Dirt Built, the listener would expect some serious scuzz, some dusty, taut rock ‘n’ roll, an erring on the side of well-greased punk. We get that, with bells on, we get that. But we also get a confusing amount of genre-hopping. So confusing and, in fact, wilful is that hopping that it goes some way to undermining the potential impact of the album in general. If you’re not sure that your navigator’s got the map the right way up, can you expect a pleasant voyage?

So. When The Heavy tackle their natural targets, it’s a bracing and involving listen, like being shaken awake. The album itself kicks off a house-of-horror-ish excerpt from some old film or other, all portentous, campy warnings not to tread any further… then, with reasonable aplomb, the band launch Oh No! Not You Again!, the lead single. It’s a refined, soulful punk-blues meld of vocals shrieked into a bean tin and guitars jostling for supremacy with squelching sax – a sonic triumph and a little exhilaration to be going on with. Elsewhere, similar set-ups provide similar results – the overlong No Time in particular a high-concept smash-along.

But the blues mutates on this album. It slows down and funks up on How You Like Me Now?, it waltzes on Sixteen, and it totally softens into 50s pastiche on Love Like That. By no means is it a bad thing to stretch your legs on an album, but The Heavy try too much to appear multi-headed. Excelling in some areas while falling down in others gives the impression that our guides through the record are not at all comfortable. Tellingly, they are at their most comfortable when they do very little. That single, Oh No! Not You Again! is by a very long way the strongest song here, and they would have done better to omit the more far-reaching elements. The closing track, named Stuck, is a perfect metaphor for the album and displays The Heavy’s need to contextualise, to minimise. It’s fine to be ambitious, it honestly and truly and nobly is, but the results have to prove worthy of the time spent producing them.

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This is out via Counter (excellent job, folks, your parcels are fast beoming my favourites) in early August or something, I left the press release at home… more here.