Thursday, November 29, 2007

The Great 2007 Round-Up Begins!

It's not often that I speak in praise of a British monthly magazine end of year poll, but Uncut's latest offering isn't all that bad. At least they polled their writers for the January rather than the December issue as in the previous two years, although the rush to get the end of year lists decided before the year is out again makes for some notable omissions (Yeasayer, Burial, plus you would surely have expected them to include Levon Helm's 'Dirt Farmer').

That being said, LCD Soundsystem's 'Sound Of Silver' is a real curveball choice of album of the year for this nominally conservative magazine. The decision is carefully justified in the synopsis (which I'm guessing was penned by John Mulvey, the man behind their excellent Wild Mercury Sound new music blog). I had expected either The Hold Steady or Rilo Kiley to top the list. Other interesting and bold choices in the list include PJ Harvey at 3, Robert Wyatt at 6, Radiohead at 9, Bjork at 11, Battles at 12 (well done!), Panda Bear at 15, Feist at 19, Tinariwen at 33, Iron and Wine at 40. There are numerous omissions of course, but a Top 50 is simply never going to be broad enough (no jazz or hip hop, no modern composition, very little electronic music).

The list reflects the moribund state of British guitar music in 2007 - only Arctic Monkeys, Klaxons, Super Furry Animals, Manic Street Preachers and Maps make the cut (and I would argue that only one of those albums really merits a place anywhere near a top 50 of 2007).
Aside from a handful of truly silly selections (The Cribs, Babyshambles, Neil Young's 'Chrome Dreams II' which is really one great song in search of several more), this is the best list they've compiled for some time. They've certainly thrown down the gauntlet to Mojo.

I'm working on a Top 100 and a tracks of the year list, so blogging activity may be limited for a while. Anything I've not managed to write about yet will be covered with a decent synopsis in the lists!

Monday, November 26, 2007

Gone But Not Forgotten

Django Bates and The BBC Big Band - Tribute To Joe Zawinul

Poor planning sadly left me unavailable for much of this year's London Jazz Festival. What inititally looked like a rather unpromising programme (at least in comparison with last year's stellar line-up) had mushroomed into something rather special - not least with an outstanding selection of smaller, home talent-focussed gigs at The Vortex and The Luminaire (I am kicking myself for yet again missing the chance of seeing Fraud). The concluding show at The Barbican last night had been arranged as something spectacular and unmissable - Joe Zawinul performing new arrangements of the cornerstones of his catalogue with the BBC big band. Sadly, his unexpected death earlier this year robbed London concertgoers of that treat - but with admirable gusto, BBC Radio 3 and The Barbican honoured the date with a tribute that was both reverent and exiciting in its own right.

Real care and thought went into the staging and planning of this concert. British talent Django Bates was an audacious but also shrewd choice of keyboardist to fill Zawinul's rather large shoes. He is undoubtedly quirkier and tetchier than Zawinul, but his dazzling technique and improvisational flair were consistently evident throughout, with a sheer insistence on covering the full geography of the keyboard. He kept his pranksterish sense of humour on a tight leash, but where that side of his musical personality did emerge, it seemed strangely appropriate. Bates' love for gonzo synth sounds, warm pads and clattering electronic noise echoed many of Zawinul's preoccupations with the musical potential of new technology. Similarly, his frequent vocoderised singing was both sutble and in the spirit of Zawinul's own live performances.

The choice of supporting musicians proved similarly judicious. Legendary bassist Victor Bailey seemed a little frail, but performed with feeling, expression and quiet dignity throughout. This contrasted neatly with the driving, powerful drumming of Martin France - dexterous without being pointlessly virtuosic, and full of energy and groove. His frantic urgency on a sterling version of 'Fast City', veering from cluttered dance rhythms to swashbuckling fast swing, neatly encapsulated the tendency of Zawinul's music to engage the feet as much as the brain. Together with adventurous percussionist Bosco D'Olivera, this was a rhythm section of real muscle, with as much feeling as technical prowess. Luckily, in the likes of Stan Sulzman and Henry Lowther, the BBC big band had soloists to more than match their credentials.

In essentially recreating Zawinul's recent 'Brown Street' big band project, the selection of music also proved thoughtful, covering as close to all bases of Zawinul's prolific career as might be expected. From some curveball choices from lesser known Weather Report projects ('Procession') to the inevitable, but carefully executed renditions of classics ('A Remark You Made', a colourful and adventourous recasting of 'In A Silent Way' and a terrifyingly funky 'Black Market'). The set also touched on material recorded by the syndicate and some solo Zawinul pieces with which I must confess to being completely unfamiliar. It also avoided the deeply obvious crowd-pleasers (no 'Birdland', and no encore!).

Whilst Julian Joseph's frequent interjections (largely for the purpose of the radio broadcast) could have been frustrating, they did not disrupt the flow of the performance too much, and somehow managed to be both reverent and celebratory. The interviews with Zawinul's biographer Brian Glasser were hardly necessary, but did serve to add a human touch to the proceedings from someone who had obviously had numerous encounters with the man himself. Best of all was a snippet of a recorded Zawinul radio interview which gave a real sense of the character, spirit and determined vision of this most crucial of jazz performers.

Whilst I feel deeply privileged to have caught Zawinul himself at his last London performance at the Jazz Cafe earlier this year, I also felt rather special to have been part of a sadly much-reduced audience at this dynamic and engaging spectacle. What emerged crystal clearly from this show was that Zawinul's music was not based so much on 'composition' or 'arrangement', but on living, breathing ideas that could be recreated comfortably in a number of different contexts, given the right combination of musicians. Zawinul's brand of fusion - merging the adventure of improvisation with the basic impulse and relentless energy of true dance music (incorporating numerous and intricate rhythms from all across the globe in the process) has been somewhat out of fashion, particularly in Britain, for some time. Is the tide starting to turn back in its favour?

Friday, November 23, 2007

Floating Without The Old Constraints

Paris Motel - In The Salpetriere

At long last! Amy May’s band of fluctuating musical conspirators have long been one of my favourite live acts in London. Unit, one of my now defunct musical projects, had the privilege of having the group join us for the launch of our debut album back in 2006. Whilst Unit suffered that clichéd fate of disintegration due to ‘musical differences’, Paris Motel have kept true to their remarkably pure and consistent musical vision, although it’s taken rather a long time for this debut album to emerge.

This is essentially British folk music with small group orchestral arrangements. It’s what is what is often casually referred to as ‘chamber pop’, for want of a more accurate term – equal parts Fairport Convention and JS Bach. It’s no longer an especially novel concept, but Amy May’s arrangements are considerably more ornate and expressive than those of, say, Arcade Fire (not to take anything away from that band – their sound is still brutally effective in a live context, as their Alexandra Palace shows last week demonstrated). These songs all have a character and elegance that is very much May's own.

Since their promising ‘071’ EP, the group have largely succeeded in making their sound a little more muscular and a little less twee, without losing any of their charm or subtlety in the process. There are some clear standout tracks on this carefully sequenced album – notably the rolling rhythmic drive of ‘City Of Ladies’, with its affectionately cooing backing vocals, or the lush, romantic and thoroughly beguiling ‘Catherine By The Sea’. The latter effectively closes the album with a warm rush of melody and charm, with some thoroughly enchanting lyrics (‘I have a map of your skin, I know the valleys within…’). The elaborate arrangements are controlled enough to allow Amy May’s delicate, understated vocals to breathe – what her voice lacks in power it makes up for in empathy and humanity. There’s also the shuffling, evocative ‘Three Steps’ and the epic love song ‘After Wanda’, which veers adroitly from the melancholy to the celebratory.

In between, there’s plenty of charm, but much of it is a little less immediate. ‘Coignet’s Trial’ is considerably more restrained and stripped back and whilst it initially seems a little directionless, repeated listens reveal its subtle, hypnotic qualities. Similarly, ‘My Demeta’ is based more on elusive mystery and implication than anything clearly stated, but it eventually draws you in to its spellbinding world. A cursory glance at the song titles will quickly reveal that we’re in ‘suspend your disbelief’ lyrical territory here – with all manner of devices more familiar from fairytale and folklore than contemporary popular song. There’s nothing wrong with that in the right hands though – and May’s imaginings hit the right side of the fine line more often than not.

I strongly suspect there’s much more still to come from Amy May – ‘City Of Ladies’ and ‘Catherine By The Sea’, with their cautious hints at Phil Spector and Motown arrangements, suggest a more exotic and ambitious future. Some of the tracks here are a little overlong and don’t build or grow quite as much as they could. For now, though, this is a wonderfully crafted and enchanting record that reveals more and more with every listen.

Thursday, November 22, 2007

Buried Tresure # 3: The Boo Radleys - C'Mon Kids

(I had intended to write many more of these columns than I’ve managed so far….)

Why has everyone now forgotten all about The Boo Radleys? Of all the 60s-inspired bands lumped together spuriously as ‘Britpop’ in the mid-90s, they were the most concerned with filtering those classic influences through a more radical and inventive prism. The most obvious selection here would be ‘Giant Steps’, the audaciously titled critical favourite, although nobody seems to remember just how adventurous and exciting even that album was. Perhaps it’s simply that we had to put up with months of Chris Evans starting off our days in the most horrific way imaginable with ‘Wake Up Boo!’, that incessantly chirpy and relentlessly upbeat freak hit. Yet the album from which it came contained plenty of inspiration, and some more melancholy and reflective moments too. The consensus appears to be that, afterwards, they fell into terminal decline.

Well, it’s true that ‘C’Mon Kids’ did not repeat its predecessor’s surprising sales figures. But there was no ‘Wake Up Boo’, or even an ‘It’s Lulu’ on this defiant and maverick collection. It veered all over the place in miscreant and deviant style, with no respect whatsoever for taste or decency, but it also retained the key juxtaposition of Martin Carr’s melodic sensibility and Sice’s rampant bellow that made the group so elemental and inspired. Neither has repeated this invention in their subsequent solo work, for the process of collaboration and combination was integral to the group’s success. Carr wrote the songs, Sice delivered and interpreted them.

Perhaps the epitome of this approach appeared with this album’s opening title, a screech of vicious noise accompanied by some thrilling, life-affirming lyrics (‘f*ck the ones, who tell you that life, is merely a time before dying’). It’s one of the best pop songs to crystallise that drive and hunger for something new which exists naturally in youth, but often seems to erode with the onset of jaded thought and cynicism. Sice’s voice never sounded more rampant, and Carr’s guitar squalls are both visceral and engaging.

The rest of the album proved increasingly unpredictable though, and any attempt to second-guess the groups’s preoccupations or modus operandi would always be thwarted. From the bass-directed groove of ‘Melodies For The Deaf’ and the hazy dub of ‘Fortunate Sons’ to the extrapolated psychedelia of ‘Ride The Tiger’ and effortless melodicism of ‘New Brighton Promenade’, the album may have had something for everyone, but it also had plenty to irritate less open-minded listeners.

It’s hard to imagine any of the Britpop also-rans producing a song as bizarre and disconcerting as ‘Meltin’s Worm’ or a song as deeply melancholy and affecting as the wonderful ‘Everything Is Sorrow’ (‘…and you know you shouldn’t have another cigarette/But nothing else makes much sense, nothing else can recompense’). The Boo Radleys were a group that could cover all bases, from the resonant and emotional to the surreal and adventurous. They could deploy the resources of the studio to their maximum potential, and indeed, ‘C’Mon Kids’ is a record in thrall to the joy of noise and confusion.

Rather shockingly, second hand copies of it now seem to be going on Amazon for a mere 25p (could an album be more undervalued?) and a greatest hits compilation seems to have slipped out earlier this year without any publicity or recognition whatsoever. What a great shame that this most unusual and inventive of bands seem to have been reduced to a mere footnote in a history of 90s pop written by the tiresome victors (The Verve, Oasis etc).

Tuesday, November 20, 2007

Sound Of Confusion

Burial - Untrue (Hyperdub)

Last year’s debut Burial album caused something of a word-of-mouth sensation, moving well beyond hardcore dubstep followers and earning itself a surprising place in even Uncut magazine’s albums of the year. Yet that album was really just a collection of individual pieces developed over a period of years and it may have only touched on what this elusive, anonymous producer can achieve. Its rapid fire follow-up, ‘Untrue’, is a more coherent and powerful statement.

It retains the mysterious, vaguely threatening sound that made the debut so compelling, but whilst that album conjured a truly urban vision, ‘Untrue’ seems more human and broadly appealing. Its greater reliance on cut-up snatches of ghostly vocals adds emotional depth to the crackling, edgy atmospheres. It also makes for a more accessible, but no less uncomfortable musical vision. Essentially, there is soul as well as intelligence in this music.

Somehow, ‘Untrue’ succeeds in being at once very approachable and profoundly disconcerting. It is bleak, occasionally even harrowing, but also richly moving rather than cold or detached. Time will tell, but I already get the sense that it is a genre classic to rival Goldie’s ‘Timeless’ or Tricky’s ‘Maxinquaye’. It has that alchemical balance of confrontation, poise and impact that made those albums so crucial. It captures a sense of disorientation and isolation amidst the roaring, non-stop city environment that is timely and insightful. It's actually rather similar to Thom Yorke's sense of alienation, but it captures this without recourse to anything as earthy as his rather limiting language.

The sound and mood is so consistently eerie that it makes little sense to highlight individual tracks, although ‘Archangel’ and ‘Ghost Hardware’ are immediately striking. The fragmentary approach to production not only creates plenty of space (a subtle quality often missing from the more relentless forms of dance music) but also makes for a very contemporary and refreshing statement of melodic craftsmanship. It’s an album that is very easy to become immersed in – strangely familiar in its dystopian spirit, yet so clearly original and innovative.

Saturday, November 03, 2007

Not Blogging for A While...

I'm spending the next couple of weeks away from dependable internet access - will be back in the frame around the weekend of the 17th November - no doubt there will be plenty for me to catch up on by then!

Friday, November 02, 2007

Get In The Sunrise

Yeasayer – All Hour Cymbals

There’s a similar buzz around this debut album from Brooklyn’s Yeasayer as surrounded Arcade Fire’s ‘Funeral’ on its initial release. That excitement seems already to have spread from blogs and webzines to the conventional music press who have, admirably, been much quicker to react on this occasion. I’ve already ranted at length about the NME’s description of Yeasayer as ‘world music that doesn’t make you want to puke’. I’m grateful to the anonymous reader who quite rightly corrected me on my own description of the group as White Americans (one member is Indian and another is Jewish), although I think my point about the NME and its astoundingly ignorant journalism still holds. The clear implication is that ‘world music’ is only OK if it is filtered through the prism of a Western based indie band. It was more an issue of territorial rather than racial prejudice.

I don’t want to focus on that now though, as the paper’s enthusiasm for Yeasayer is not, to my mind, misplaced. The band’s unison shouting vocals certainly recall the collective energy of Arcade Fire at their best, but, in what may be an unfair comparison, the sheer musical audacity of ‘All Hour Cymbals’ reveals that much lauded band’s increasingly transparent limitations. Whilst Arcade Fire prefer layering grandiose instrumentation upon what are really rather basic chugging rock templates, much of the music on ‘All Hour Cymbals’ is intricate, fascinating and rhythmically inventive. This band’s closest contemporaries may be the likes of Animal Collective or TV on the Radio, although it’s worth emphasising that their own blend of influences is uniquely diverse and impressively organic.

This is a genuinely remarkable record characterised by a questing ambition completely absent from our domestic rock scene in the UK. Just listen to the rhythm section alone, which is carefully orchestrated and technically adventurous, particularly the inventive bass lines. It seems as if every beat and every note is played to add depth or meaning. On top of this more than solid foundation comes striking and beautiful vocal harmony closely resembling those of The Byrds or Crosby, Stills and Nash.

Although the rather mean sleeve only lists nine tracks on ‘All Hour Cymbals’, there are in fact 11, with two quite lengthy untitled tracks rounding off the proceedings. The album begins in imaginative but accessible terrain with the groovy and spirited ‘Sunrise’, where bass and percussion immediately stand out as the most effective parts of the ensemble. ‘Wait For The Summer’ is more reflective in tone, but its dense vocal arrangements are entrancing. ‘2080’ offers signs of some seriously unfashionable influences, sounding not unlike that highly respected rock classic ‘Everybody Wants To Rule The World’ by Tears for Fears. It’s a remarkable track though, veering from mellifluous African-sounding guitar cadences though to tribal vocal assaults.

The album becomes more mysterious, wispy and elusive as it progresses and, as such, requires a few listens to leave its complete impression. It is music to inhabit rather than pass through though, and it casts a cumulatively powerful spell. ‘No Need To Worry’ is both complex and compelling, whilst the more atmospheric tracks towards the album’s conclusion, particularly ‘Worms/Waves’ are mesmerising in their range of sounds and styles. ‘Worms/Waves’ appears to draw from traditional Indian folk music in its non-Western sounding guitar lines, and perhaps also from Middle Eastern or African music in its unconventional percussion.

It’s tempting to conclude on a resoundingly negative note by again emphasising the point about the lack of comparable ambition in British rock music. Aside from Radiohead, where are the bands striving to make such inventive use of the studio and of production? Where are the bands working to mould rock music into a vital and thoroughly contemporary form of composition and arrangement that is both elaborate and viscerally exciting in this way? If there are any out there, they are not being effectively marketed, and the British music scene is depressingly stagnant as a result.

Ultimately, I’d like to conclude more positively though. Yeasayer are a band unafraid to express idealistic sentiment, both in their use of natural world imagery and futurist preoccupations. The sounds of summer and sunrise persist throughout, whilst ‘2080’ argues that ‘by 2080, only enlightenment can prevent terror everywhere’. This is not, in itself, a very encouraging thought about our global future. We don’t seem to be moving much closer to enlightenment at the moment (and, historically, ‘enlightenment’ is a rather tricky and misleading concept anyway). Yet, it’s comforting in these times to find a band with the clarity and spirit to express ideals. Again, comparison is unfavourable to Arcade Fire – an ungenerous assessment of ‘The Neon Bible’ would describe it as a rather vague extended apocalyptic whinge. ‘All Hour Cymbals’ seems like so much more than that. It is positively charged.

Thursday, November 01, 2007

Creeping Menace

Supersilent - 8

Norwegian improv group Supersilent allegedly only meet in order to make music. Their albums are the result of spontaneous sessions, sometimes left intact, sometimes spliced and edited by their inventive producer Deathprod, who has also worked with a number of other Rune Grammofon artists including the intoxicating Susanna. With trumpeter Arve Henriksen also releasing some beguiling material in his own right, this is fast becoming one of the most furtive and inspired collectives in contemporary music and '8' is a satisfying and worthy addition to the Supersilent canon.

Commentators have accurately observed that, whilst speaking of career progression in terms of this band is no doubt missing the point, their music has gradually shifted away from the provocative, abrasive assault of their triple CD debut towards something more melancholy and cinematic. Whilst much of '8' is similarly contemplative, it also hits something of a midpoint between these approaches, restoring a sense of impending doom and sinister malice to their experiments in sound.

Supersilent are, above all, a group of musicians keen to find new ways of creating and manipulating sound. Henriksen's trumpet is often processed in such a way as to make it sound like a radically different instrument, and the synthesisers are rarely used to provide conventional harmony, but rather offer fragmented and mood-altering interjections. Most interesting of all on '8' is the increased dependence on percussion, which is often asymmetrical and provocative.

There is a consistent approach that gives shape and coherence to these unplanned group performances. All seem to be very intelligent and dynamic extrapolations of a key idea or texture. For example, 8.1 and 8.5, the longest of the pieces, focus heavily on bristling production and distorted textures, whilst 8.4 is more reductionist - stapled down by a consistent heartbeat pulse and making much more liberal use of Henriksen's long, mournful trumpet melodies.

8.2 and 8.3 are the most synth-heavy of the pieces, and are a long way from anything that might be described as conventional. The synth phrases are desultory, occasionally even aggressive, and don't sound particularly crisp or technical. Yet they help form peculiar and hypnotic soundscapes that, whilst minimal, are also deeply compelling. The use of sweeping, rustling cymbals instead of more attacking drum sounds on '8.2' is particularly effective.

'8.5' may be among the strongest tracks in Supersilent's catalogue so far, veering as it does across a wide range of moods, themes and ideas. It begins with a manipulated voice, which increasingly (and peturbingly) sounds like an attack of the Daleks from an episode of Dr. Who. By the track's vivid conclusion, it has metamorphosed into a liberated, angular, polyrhythmic assault on the senses that is both fascinating and visceral. It provides a superb summary of this outstanding group's very raison d'etre.