Narcotic Junk Food Revolution
Joey Eyebank VS the chartfriendlytune-churning machine
Delphic - Counterpoint
The latest from Belgiums electronica central: R&S Records.
Counterpoint begins like a beefed-up version of the Skins
theme tune and marches along with broken snappy beats and ascending
electronic trills which pulsate erratically.
The outcome is digital heaven, but the vocals make the song limp. Which
sort of spoils the general effect.
..something great lies beneath the chirpy vox
7/10
Also, why with electronic music do the band or artist always have a
variety of pedantic engineers and production-whatthefucks?
Does it take that much mixing and production to create computer
based music?
www.myspace.com/delphic
Lady GaGa - Pokerface
What the Fuck?
Youll forget about this by next year anyway.
So it feels like a waste of time.
Not-worth-judging/10
www.dont-go-on-it-why-would-you-even-want-to.com
Tortuga Bar- Narcotic JunkFood Revolution
Although Narcotic JunkFood Revolution has a ferocious concoction
of noise which in theory, to your garage loving fan, should be good,
I feel like Ive heard this before.
And I think I have. Likely To Be Dropped is a Golden
age of grotesque era Marilyn Manson sounding, dirty rock song
with a QOTSA slack jaw-hallucinogenic tone. And the other songs are
different variations of this style, taking other droopy-jawed influences
such as (blue album days) Weezer and even a guest appearance
from Evan Dando on the song Storm which, by
the way, is better than any of the other songs on the album; generally,
however, the album feels weak and it's almost as if all your garage
rock - childhood heroes have been thrown into a slightly less exciting
modern day version.
Tortuga Bar have the potential to reach beautifully-sleazy rock n
roll heights that could capture and enthuse, but sadly, this doesnt
really.
4/10
Ps: there is no lasting point getting Evan Dando to feature on your
album when his voice is clearly way better than that of your own singer.
www.myspace.com/tortugabar1
The Maccabees- Wall Of Arms
After being left with a mediocre but bad aftertaste in my mouth from
the plain Colour It In I am frankly blown away by the shear
creativity and beauty thats embedded in Wall Of Arms.
Wall Of Arms is not only an album of fluid excellence but
it also has substance, which the Maccabees previously lacked. Each song
is personal and huge at the same time, imagine playing Bon Iver
through a stereo the size of the Winsconsin Woods with Beirut
accompanying it. Love You Better cries out with a soulful
yell and a stadium quality similar to Arcade Fire and stomps
and bounces of the walls in a similar way that Kings Of Leon did with
Only By The Night (except not shit).This quality continues
throughout most of the album. Young Lions has a strong driving
force and a folksy vocal sound which moves through you like a choir
of reverbed yelling owls. The title track emulates the feel of a Fionn
Regan esq. tune with a suave style and romantic sound much like Belle
and Sebastian. Kiss and Resolve is definitely one
of the most significant tracks from the album and should be considered
as the next single. Its provocative and wondrous in its wooing melody
that picks you up and causes your mind to drift over lakes of imagination.
William Powers possesses weaker lyrics than the other tracks
but is captivating and sounds like a melody that Jose Gonzalez
couldve written.Instead of the tame-indie sound that The
Maccabees employed with Colour It In, Wall Of
Arms does not just capture you but it screams out with passion
and soul through textures of emotions that make the songs sound like
towering seaside anthems.
This album, despite how under-hyped it is, shows that The Maccabees
have progressed and moved away from the cute indie scene they delved
into.
10/10
www.themaccabees.co.uk
Alberto Veto- Afraid Of Thieves
Alberto Veto are good.
But their songs are almost lacking something, theres an empty
space in their soulful music.
Alberto Veto have that gritty quality that grabs your attention, a trio
that produce fluttery noises with an added emotive tinge to their modest
folk. Except its too modest. Theres a missing passion or vibe
to their music - whether the vocals need to be turned up - could be
the reason.
Without the analysis Alberto Vetos songs feel like a model band
for a how to start a folk band kit, lacking the sound that
has the potential to fill your ears or an individual quality.
4/10
www.myspace.com/albertoveto
The Legends- Over and Over
The Legends made me feel what it was like to fall into the abyss.
The Legends make me sick. The sweet little candyfloss melodies encased
my trachea with so much sugar that I threw up a better melody!
Most of the songs on here are repulsively shite Jesus and Mary Chain
remixes which, if you dont cringe with disgust at them, then you
are on prozac.
A lot of the above is a lie - the legends music does not have
enough power to actively make me do anything
. apart from
maybe - snap their cd in half
The Scaramanga Six- Songs Of Prey
Cabin Fever (the sixes previous album) featured
songs with spark and emotion. A very tame spark: like a sparkler thats
slightly damp and therefore- flickering, and very mellow emotion: like
a shrug of the shoulders or a tired sigh. But nethertheless it featured
more creativity, wisdom and MUCH better songs than any sound on Songs
Of Prey. Songs Of Prey is the older more embarrassing
version of Cabin Fever, with songs that are the mid-life
crisis equivalent of Kaiser Chiefs featuring hilariously pathetic lyrics
like you dont make a cake, you dont make a cake without
breaking some eggs.
I didnt get where I am today is whimsical and awful
in equal measures and sounds like the creation of a band of fleecy geography
teachers at a secondary school in Leeds.It may be that The Scaramanga
Six are not being serious, the after effect still lingers with
bad odour though.
Hahahah/10
www.myspace.com/thescaramangasix
Sparrow and the Workshop- Devil Song / The Cold-Hearted Twist
Sparrow and the Workshop have done the coy little thing of recording
Devil Song so that it does not just sound, but it also feels
like, it's actually from the 60s alt/folk analogue recording-era.
Which in a way is a bit pretentious, but when a song like Devil
Song captivates you in the way that Sparrow and the Workshop have
done, I feel you should ignore the sounding old cos we can; due
to our modern day electrical beasts that swallow up demands
and spit them back at you: all neat and how you wanted them. Sparrow
and the Workshop are the caveman equivalent of Fairport Convention,
a satanic folk version of Led Zeppelin and well, they just sound similar
to Last of the Shadow puppets.
Devil Song is a driving ballad with a rolling snare-orientated
drum beat and misty tone with a dark devil-worshipping edge. The male
and female voices harmonise through heavily reverbed mics, working together
to give a Stonehenge Festival in the 60s sound, its
both mesmerising and magical.The cold-hearted twist has
been recorded with less effects but still has the eerie anti-folk sound
that Sparrow and the Workshop seem to be at ease with.
Pic Courtesy Markus Thorsen
Sparrow and the Workshop are a breath of foggy fresh air. And also
slightly odd.
7/10
www.myspace.com/sparrowandtheworkshop
Metric- Fantasies
Usually when a press release says that a band, who are not that well
known, have recorded songs which are made for stadiums,
the band doesnt manage to make it to the stadium. And therefore
the music layouts confuse mixing desks in tiny bars and pisses off the
tender ears of the public - who are crammed in a close proximity listening
to music that should have specifically measured sound levels.
Sadly Metric have that tight little compact formulae that pie-chart
faced suit men like:
1. They have made music which could be considered as electro,
and the electro scene is quite big and also probably generating a lot
of sales at the moment.
2. Metric have a female singer, so that articles can emphasise that
they have a female singer as if theres a difference- and how come
when some female-fronted music gets big, do articles start publicising
that there is this whole femi-rock scene going on. Get over
it, if your werent so insecure about sexuality in rock music then
you wouldnt need to emphasise the girl who - due to your perceptions
- happens to have balls.
3. Metric have that boring chunky guitar sound that tries to sound original
with a hell of a load of effects - like the edge being grated
with Bono's ego into a variety of tiny little delayed howling sounds
- put through an amp
4. Metric have squashed every pop hook and cadence ever
written by a chartfriendlytune-churning machine, into a
bubblegum keyboard sound that pours hot treacle into your neurons so
that they become unable to react to any nerves in your body.
5. They use come on baby too much
6. They have a song called Stadium Love- yuk.
Roll up major labels (only the fickle ones)
2/10
www.myspace.com/metricband
Patrick Wolf- Vulture
After the heart-warming pop songs from Magic Position it
seems almost inconceivable that Patrick Wolf could then go on to write
a song as bad as Vulture. The Baroque-pop poet days of Patrick
Wolf, it seems, are long gone and he has resorted to making music that
almost sounds as if its pretending to be the dance music of Atari
Teenage Riot (funnily enough this track is in fact a collaboration
between Patrick Wolf and Alec Empire- the Atari pioneer),
There is no meaning or life to this song, it feels dull and compact
and disgustingly plain- but also forced. The sound is so forced that
it fails miserably to penetrate through anything, like a Plasticine
rod trying to drill through steel.The verse drags at mid-tempo with
a shockingly boring beat, clicking behind Pats tune-less voice
and then the chorus enters with a breakdown thats meant to bring
the song up to climax but instead hangs like a bag of slate. Patrick
has also traded, as well as the music, his signature hippy mish-mash
style for an uber-camp, bleached hair look, with a deliberately kitch-electro
style to fit his electro dullness, like a Bassets Allsort
pretending to be a Sherbet Fountain.
This single is essentially an identity-failure. The once loved rugged-dandy
eccentric Patrick Wolf has been compacted into a neat formulae and failed-
trading the acoustic instruments that once groomed his voice for some
early-learning keyboard fisher-price wank.Lets hope Patrick
that this oh so experimental wonderful, genre
collaboration is not going to be the layout for your album: The
Bachelor.
1/10
www.myspace.com/officialpatrickwolf
Lissy Trullie - Boy Boy
So often do I hear this clean channel, jingle-jangle style power-chord
guitar playing next to a bouncy straight-jacket beat, that your ears
become immune to the general anti-climax.But thats not to say
that these songs dont erupt with ear-pleasure. It may have that
fuddy-duddy indie rock boogie that is frequently perfected
by so many fringey, skinny cardigans but Boy Boy also has
a positive quality, in a way abit like the only ones managed
to do, by making simple music: have soul. With Lissy Trullie however
you also feel that this short outburst of good music may not be able
to prolong the length of an l.p without making the genre commit suicide.
Boy Boy is equally as feel-good as it is primitive but it's
primitive with a bonus factor - it's pop but its exciting; much like
the warm tunes of Born Ruffians or Bears Repeating.
The b-side You Bleed You is the more reflective song, with
moaning vocals over a caveman beat; thats still dressed in the
style of Lissy Trullie. I think this is more a temporary bliss, and
while shes around for the summer (whether you discover her or
not) it's worth a listen.
7/10
www.myspace.com/lissytrullie
Morrissey- Something Is Squeezing My Skull
I wonder whats squeezing Morrisseys skull? Could it be the
reels of tape hes produced over the past two decades flooding
his house? The latest release from Years Of Refusal is not
the strongest track on the album but still shows that Morrissey is capable
of generating contagious pop lyrics, twinned with operatic-hooks, in
huge amounts. The song skids along like a ramones-bop with a new poppy
overtone that wasnt present on say; Vauxhall and I.
As the song collides to a halt, Morrisseys voice turns into a
tongue-twisting mix as he rolls the words so gimme more
(or something like that) with ease and transforms into a crossover of
Anthony Keidz, in Give It Away and Joey Ramone.
7/10
I just cant wait to see him live (hopefully winks towards the
R*E*P*E*A*T Guest list, *thumbs up*?)
www.itsmorriseysworld.com
Yeah Yeah Yeahs- It's Blitz!
The new single Zero which opens its blitz
does have a huge sound, but I was disappointed when I found that Yeah
Yeah Yeahs had gone for a pumping disco sound, missing that grimey dark
NY edge. After the made for the charts song supernovas,
the dark NY edge erupts into the many reflections of a disco-ball: each
glimmer fizzing into spacious spectrums and pulsating like fear; as
your ears (no matter how much they refuse) cant help but get sucked
into the black hole.Its still a YYY album; the junky garage sound is
just encased in a layer of stardust - my pre-conceived opinion thought
this would be a thin layer of shiny glitter-sprinkled cloth, but as
usual the Yeah Yeah Yeahs dont conform. They said
no no no
..
(and yeah yeah yeah I know its not funny)
8/10
Listen to: (and then buy)Dull Life, Skeletons, Shame And Fortune and
Little Shadow
www.yeahyeahyeahs.com
Joe Eyebank
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