Predictable? TracksandGigs?
'Boobar' has to be single of the week because it is one of the best songs I've heard all year and I never, ever get tired of hearing it. A beautiful song about trying to find something you have lost, it builds from a slow, acoustic start to a massive Spector-esque ending that will make you fall in love with Tindersticks just a little bit more than you already had. Absolutely stunning, but I have said this many times already this year so...
The 'B Side' is 'Tout L'Amour', which is a re-recording of 'All The Love' from 'The Hungry Saw'...but sung in French....by drummer Thomas Belhom. It is very nice indeed.
This is a limited 7" single with only 600 copies available worldwide. You could of course buy it digitally on itunes but how soul-less would that make you? No, what you want to be doing is popping over to www.piccadillyrecords.com or www.normanrecords.com and giving them £4 in exchange for one of these little beauties. You'll feel so much better about life if you do.
You'll be ecstatic to see that we have now managed to have a 'Single of the Week' two weeks in a row and three weeks out of four!! Next week is well and truly up for grabs though because we had pencilled in 'Carpetbaggers' by Jenny Lewis but thats been put back to the 13th so if you have any suggestions, drop TracksandGigs a line.
['Boobar' is out Monday on 7" and download]
Friday, 26 September 2008
Thursday, 25 September 2008
Low 'The Black Session'
Not a cd this, or an LP, or an official release, but something so fantastic that I have to write about it anyway.
The frustrating thing about Low's last LP 'Drums and Guns' is that it is their weakest to date, not because of the quality of songwriting or performances from Alan, Mimi and BassistNotZak, but because of the god-awful and downright weird production by enemy of this blog, Dave Fridmann. See my rantings about this in my review of the 'You May Need A Murderer' dvd. If you've seen Low live lately, you'll know that played live, these songs are just as beautiful as those on the likes of 'Secret Name' and 'Things We Lost In The Fire'. I always wondered how the album might have sounded without the strange production.
To a certain extent, wonder no longer.
Go here:
http://www.archive.org/details/Low2007-04-23.Black_Session.FM.flac16
Last year, Low recorded a wonderful Black Session for the Frenchman with the impeccable taste, Bernard Lenoir. It is a remarkable recording. Songs like 'Sandinista' and 'Dragonfly' are transformed into brooding, slow, beautiful pieces with trademark harmonies from Alan and Mimi. It is the classic Low album that never was. And if that isn't enough, there are stunning versions of 'Sunflowers' and 'Laser Beam' too. How much better can it get?
Sunday, 21 September 2008
Jenny Lewis 'Acid Tongue'
Rilo Kiley singer and former child actress Jenny Lewis returns with her second solo album. The first, 2006's 'Rabbit Fur Coat' was a lovely country/soul affair complete with singalong version of Travelling Wilburys' 'Handle With Care'. This album is something else altogether.
There have been some great records released this year, but few can match the ambition and vision that is present here, or the songwriting and performances. 'Acid Tongue' was recorded in three weeks, live in the studio (no pro-tools) with friends and collaborators including M Ward, Zooey Deschanel and Elvis Costello.
In many ways the opening couple of tracks serve as an introduction for the amazing songs that are to come. 'Black Sand' and 'Pretty Bird' are simple and pretty, neither would have been out of place on 'Rabbit Fur Coat'. Things get interesting with 'The Next Messiah' a huge, 10 minute epic taking in four separate musical pieces and featuring some superb electric guitar from Blake Mills. After the soulful 'Bad Man's World' the album builds into a simply incredible sequence of songs.
The title track is almost entirely vocal driven, featuring confessional verses and a big, gospel sounding chorus. You'll be singing it all day. 'See Fernando', a wry song about a drug dealer, is a blast, guitar led and catchy. 'Godspeed' is a beautiful piano ballad with a touching lyric about a friend on the wrong path. 'Carpetbaggers' is an upbeat country romp with a thrilling vocal from Elvis Costello.
After another couple of songs that sound like soul standards...almost motown country, if that genre exists, the album ends with 'Sing A Song For Them' a kind of updated version of Dexys' 'I'll Show You'. Simply gorgeous.
This record is a revelation. I expected to like it but the sheer quality of the songwriting and performances and the scale of ambition make this one of the albums of the year so far. Superb.
9.0
['Acid Tongue' is out now on Rough Trade. Jenny Lewis tours UK in October]
Friday, 19 September 2008
Emiliana Torrini 'Me and Armini'
The only things I knew about Icelandic singer-songwriter Emiliana Torrini before listening to this album were:
1. She wrote 'Slow' for Kylie.
2. I was considering buying her last album, 'Fisherman's Woman', but my friend Jason bought it and texted me saying "don't buy this. it is really boring".
Not facts that would normally inspire me to buy a record but something about the blurb for this one and the reviews it got made me think it might have some of the edge of a Stina Nordenstam record.
'Fireheads' which opens and 'Gun' which comes near the end are not far off fulfilling this promise. Dark and tense, acoustic guitar mixed with beats, they make for engaging listens. In between, the album attempts a number of different styles rather like a poor cricketer so desperate to get in the team that he claims he can bat, bowl and keep wicket. We have upbeat electro-pop ('Me And Armini'), strange songs that remind me of 1990s Australian pop band Frente ('Big Jumps') and absolutely bizarre mish-mashes with vocal immitations of drums ('Jungle Drums').
Virtually everything else is bland, mid tempo coffee shop music. It won't disturb you but it won't interest you enough to stop you reading your paper and drinking your coffee. Nothing wrong with coffee music of course, but you wouldn't want to buy it. I have nothing to add to this, except to say that before anyone accuses me of only listening to this once, I made several attempts to like it and that meant that I had to listen to 'Jungle Drums' on more than one occasion. Not easy.
3.0
Wednesday, 17 September 2008
Single Of The Week
yes, its once again time to pretend that we come up with a Single of The Week every week....but anyway....this week, by a country mile, it is...
Micah P Hinson 'We Won't Have To Be Lonesome'
Micah P Hinson's latest album '...Red Empire', is a stunning collection of country-noir ballads. If ever an album merited the description 'warm and beautiful' this is it. Hinson's deep, texan croon sits perfectly on top of sparse acoustic arrangements with the occasional orchestral flourish and burst of electric guitar. Needless to say, it is a fine album.
'We Won't Have to be Lonesome', the second single from it, is one of the more traditional sounding country songs on the record and given Hinson's trials and tribulations over the years, it is lovely to hear him singing a simple love song. Micah proposed to his girlfriend at a Union Chapel gig (attended by TracksandGigs) last Christmas, they are now married and this warm (sorry, i was trying to only use that word once in this review) guitar and organ led ballad pretty much tells the story. It soulds like a standard.
B Side 'You Ain't Calling The Shots' is spikier but equally good.
Hinson's music, intimate and lo-fi as it is, sounds better on vinyl so you should definitely be buying this on 7" vinyl, out on Monday 22nd, and available to pre-order from Norman Records and Piccadilly Records, TracksandGigs' recommended vendors.
Hinson tours the UK with Retribution Gospel Choir supporting (or thats the plan anyway) in November.
Micah P Hinson 'We Won't Have To Be Lonesome'
Micah P Hinson's latest album '...Red Empire', is a stunning collection of country-noir ballads. If ever an album merited the description 'warm and beautiful' this is it. Hinson's deep, texan croon sits perfectly on top of sparse acoustic arrangements with the occasional orchestral flourish and burst of electric guitar. Needless to say, it is a fine album.
'We Won't Have to be Lonesome', the second single from it, is one of the more traditional sounding country songs on the record and given Hinson's trials and tribulations over the years, it is lovely to hear him singing a simple love song. Micah proposed to his girlfriend at a Union Chapel gig (attended by TracksandGigs) last Christmas, they are now married and this warm (sorry, i was trying to only use that word once in this review) guitar and organ led ballad pretty much tells the story. It soulds like a standard.
B Side 'You Ain't Calling The Shots' is spikier but equally good.
Hinson's music, intimate and lo-fi as it is, sounds better on vinyl so you should definitely be buying this on 7" vinyl, out on Monday 22nd, and available to pre-order from Norman Records and Piccadilly Records, TracksandGigs' recommended vendors.
Hinson tours the UK with Retribution Gospel Choir supporting (or thats the plan anyway) in November.
Monday, 15 September 2008
tindersticks at brighton- setlist
for those of you who love setlists....here's tindersticks set at Brighton t'other night...
introduction
yesterday's tomorrows
flicker of a little girl
come feel the sun
e type
other side of the world
drunk tank
dying slowly
16 summers, 15 falls (townes van zandt cover)
say goodbye to the city
she's gone
sleepy song
the hungry saw
mother dear
boobar
the turns we took
her
my sister
the not knowing
introduction
yesterday's tomorrows
flicker of a little girl
come feel the sun
e type
other side of the world
drunk tank
dying slowly
16 summers, 15 falls (townes van zandt cover)
say goodbye to the city
she's gone
sleepy song
the hungry saw
mother dear
boobar
the turns we took
her
my sister
the not knowing
Sunday, 14 September 2008
Tindersticks at Brighton St George's Hall
Since the release of 'The Hungry Saw' in April, Tindersticks have played a small amount of live dates and festival appearances, including the Royal Festival Hall gig in May which was enthusiastically reviewed here. From now until the end of the year, they will tour as seven-piece, allowing them more diversity in setlists.
After an assured support set from Sara Lowes, they began their set at this beautiful church in Brighton with the first six songs from 'The Hungry Saw'. Stuart Staples and co immediately seemed very relaxed and at ease and the set flowed beautifully from the acoustic jangle of 'Flicker Of A Little Girl', through the brass-led powerful instrumental 'E-Type' to the superb ballad 'Other Side Of The World'.
Mid-set the band played a succession of older songs including some surprises. 'Drunk Tank' from Tindersticks 1 had not been played for some time but was perfectly suited to this stripped down line up, with the brass and David Boulter's superb keyboards to the fore, '16 Summers, 15 Falls' a Townes Van Zandt cover which Staples had previously played solo was another surprise, while 'Say Goodbye To The City', a pocket symphony from 'Waiting For the Moon' was stunning, Staples completely losing himself in the song at the finale.
The main set ended with the magnificent sequence of songs from the end of 'The Hungry Saw', minus 'All The Love'. 'Mother Dear' was a highlight, Staples stalking the stage while Neil Fraser performed his memorable and unique solo. It is a haunting song, one of their most beautiful pieces of music to date. 'Turns We Took' ended the set on a high and the band left the stage to a long standing ovation.
They couldn't really go wrong with the encores. 'My Sister' was as wonderful as ever but finishing with 'The Not Knowing', which had not been played for several years was a masterstroke.
If you saw Tindersticks earlier in the year, you knew you were going to get an assured set and a mix of old and new material. Now, the band are able to experiment more with their setlists and this gig saw them looking happier on stage than I can ever recall seeing them. This was a wonderful gig and I never wanted it to end.
After an assured support set from Sara Lowes, they began their set at this beautiful church in Brighton with the first six songs from 'The Hungry Saw'. Stuart Staples and co immediately seemed very relaxed and at ease and the set flowed beautifully from the acoustic jangle of 'Flicker Of A Little Girl', through the brass-led powerful instrumental 'E-Type' to the superb ballad 'Other Side Of The World'.
Mid-set the band played a succession of older songs including some surprises. 'Drunk Tank' from Tindersticks 1 had not been played for some time but was perfectly suited to this stripped down line up, with the brass and David Boulter's superb keyboards to the fore, '16 Summers, 15 Falls' a Townes Van Zandt cover which Staples had previously played solo was another surprise, while 'Say Goodbye To The City', a pocket symphony from 'Waiting For the Moon' was stunning, Staples completely losing himself in the song at the finale.
The main set ended with the magnificent sequence of songs from the end of 'The Hungry Saw', minus 'All The Love'. 'Mother Dear' was a highlight, Staples stalking the stage while Neil Fraser performed his memorable and unique solo. It is a haunting song, one of their most beautiful pieces of music to date. 'Turns We Took' ended the set on a high and the band left the stage to a long standing ovation.
They couldn't really go wrong with the encores. 'My Sister' was as wonderful as ever but finishing with 'The Not Knowing', which had not been played for several years was a masterstroke.
If you saw Tindersticks earlier in the year, you knew you were going to get an assured set and a mix of old and new material. Now, the band are able to experiment more with their setlists and this gig saw them looking happier on stage than I can ever recall seeing them. This was a wonderful gig and I never wanted it to end.
Saturday, 13 September 2008
Belle and Sebastian- BBC Sessions
Just a quick update with the news that Belle & Sebastian, still to release a follow up to 2006's brilliant 'The Life Pursuit', issue a 2cd BBC Sessions/ live recording in November. The cd includes 2001's Peel session which featured the band's last recordings with Isobel Campbell. Track listing?
CD1 - Radio Sessions:
1. The State I Am In
2. Like Dylan In The Movies
3. Judy And The Dream Of Horses
4. The Stars Of Track And Field
5. I Could Be Dreaming
6. Seymour Stein
7. Lazy Line Painter Jane
8. Sleep The Clock Around
9. Slow Graffiti
10. Wrong Love
11. Shoot The Sexual Athlete - Previously Unreleased
12. The Magic Of A Kind Word - Previously Unreleased
13. Nothing In The Silence - Previously Unreleased
14. (My Girl's Got) Miraculous Technique - Previously Unreleased
CD 2 – Live In Belfast:
1. Here Comes The Sun
2. There's Too Much Love
3. The Magic Of A Kind Word
4. Me And The Major
5. Wandering Alone
6. The Model
7. I'm Waiting For The Man
8. The Boy With The Arab Strap
9. The Wrong Girl
10. Dirty Dream # 2
11. The Boys Are Back In Town
12. Legal Man
Thats all for now. Check back tomorrow for a review of Tindersticks in Brighton.
Friday, 12 September 2008
Okkervil River 'The Stand Ins'
Okkervil River return with 'The Stand Ins' which is an extension of last year's thrilling 'The Stage Names'. They have form for this kind of stuff, following up 'Black Sheep Boy' with the accurately named 'Black Sheep Boy Appendix' and releasing a few mini albums over the years. The story behind this one is that 'TSN' was originally intended to be a double album and this is the stuff that got left off when it wasn't....but also 'The Stand Ins' focuses mainly on music and musicians as a theme, whereas it's predecessor was mainly interested in films and actors.
The band have certainly embarked on a change of direction in recent years. The country noir of their first three albums is now largely gone and this new record continues the in-your-face indie rock of recent years, musically this is one of their more interesting releases though. Opener 'Lost Coastlines' starts quietly and acoustically before building into an expansive sound with a motown feel and a 'la la la' finish. 'Singer Songwriter' and 'Pop Lie', both condemnations of knowing rock singers writing cynical sing-along choruses that don't mean anything, enjoy rollicking guitar licks.
Elsewhere 'Calling and not calling my ex' relates a tale of an ex-girlfriend appearing on the cover of a magazine, which reminds me a little of J Geils Band's 'Centerfold', a favourite of mine when I was a child! This is nicely done. 'Bruce Wayne Campbell Interviewed...' is slow burning and bittersweet.
Its not a perfect record by any means. 'Starry Stairs' is an inferior update on 'Savannah Smiles' and 'Blue Tulip' is forgettable, save the stunning guitar break at the end. The instrumental interludes meanwhile are interesting but, y'know, not that interesting and sound like filler. Despite the fact that the themes are different, although similar', a mix of the best songs from here and 'The Stage Names' would have been quite some album. There is enough that is good to make this an essential buy for fans and anyone interested in some superb and very clever songwriting.
7.5
The band have certainly embarked on a change of direction in recent years. The country noir of their first three albums is now largely gone and this new record continues the in-your-face indie rock of recent years, musically this is one of their more interesting releases though. Opener 'Lost Coastlines' starts quietly and acoustically before building into an expansive sound with a motown feel and a 'la la la' finish. 'Singer Songwriter' and 'Pop Lie', both condemnations of knowing rock singers writing cynical sing-along choruses that don't mean anything, enjoy rollicking guitar licks.
Elsewhere 'Calling and not calling my ex' relates a tale of an ex-girlfriend appearing on the cover of a magazine, which reminds me a little of J Geils Band's 'Centerfold', a favourite of mine when I was a child! This is nicely done. 'Bruce Wayne Campbell Interviewed...' is slow burning and bittersweet.
Its not a perfect record by any means. 'Starry Stairs' is an inferior update on 'Savannah Smiles' and 'Blue Tulip' is forgettable, save the stunning guitar break at the end. The instrumental interludes meanwhile are interesting but, y'know, not that interesting and sound like filler. Despite the fact that the themes are different, although similar', a mix of the best songs from here and 'The Stage Names' would have been quite some album. There is enough that is good to make this an essential buy for fans and anyone interested in some superb and very clever songwriting.
7.5
['The Stand Ins' is out now on import via Jagjaguwar. Out in the UK in October]
Tuesday, 9 September 2008
American Music Club 'All The Lost Souls Welcome You To San Francisco'
Singles. Back in the day, they were exciting previews of albums to come or a chance for collectors to pick up some unreleased b-sides. Now, any tracks that don't make the cut on albums seem to end up as bonus tracks on the record itself and rarely do bands release singles before the album itself is out. Its a shame.
Apparently, radio stations won't actually play songs sent to them as promos unless the track is released commercially in some form. AMC wanted some promotion for their UK tour and so, 'All The Lost Souls...' is releaed as a digital only single. The song itself is a good choice, being one of the more upbeat and memorable songs from 'The Golden Age', although not in the same classic league as 'Sleeping Beauty' or 'The Dance'. The 'b sides' (such as they are) are demos of 'Stars' and 'Who You Are'. Both are nice enough, just Eitzel singing and playing acoustic guitar. In the case of 'The Stars', it just leaves you wanting to listen again to the superb fuzzy distortion on the LP version, but 'Who You Are' is actually an improvement on the album version; delicate and sad whereas the 'Golden Age' offering is upbeat in a forced way and a touch repetitve. Probably the weakest track on a great album.
So, if you're a fan its probably worth a couple of quid as you'll probably listen to the demos a couple of times. Its sad though that singles have come to this point- fans buying mp3 files with a couple of clicks of the mouse just to hear a couple of demos, so that a radio station will give a song a few spins.
Single of the year so far incidentally, and a sign that the old days haven't gone completely, is Beck's 'Chemtrails'. A stunning single even out of the context of the album with a brand new unreleased song as the b side....and available on vinyl!
Apparently, radio stations won't actually play songs sent to them as promos unless the track is released commercially in some form. AMC wanted some promotion for their UK tour and so, 'All The Lost Souls...' is releaed as a digital only single. The song itself is a good choice, being one of the more upbeat and memorable songs from 'The Golden Age', although not in the same classic league as 'Sleeping Beauty' or 'The Dance'. The 'b sides' (such as they are) are demos of 'Stars' and 'Who You Are'. Both are nice enough, just Eitzel singing and playing acoustic guitar. In the case of 'The Stars', it just leaves you wanting to listen again to the superb fuzzy distortion on the LP version, but 'Who You Are' is actually an improvement on the album version; delicate and sad whereas the 'Golden Age' offering is upbeat in a forced way and a touch repetitve. Probably the weakest track on a great album.
So, if you're a fan its probably worth a couple of quid as you'll probably listen to the demos a couple of times. Its sad though that singles have come to this point- fans buying mp3 files with a couple of clicks of the mouse just to hear a couple of demos, so that a radio station will give a song a few spins.
Single of the year so far incidentally, and a sign that the old days haven't gone completely, is Beck's 'Chemtrails'. A stunning single even out of the context of the album with a brand new unreleased song as the b side....and available on vinyl!
Monday, 8 September 2008
two new Mountain Goats EPs..
John Darnielle has been busy. Not content with playing End of The Road this coming weekend and London ULU next week, he has recorded two brand new EPs!
The first, entitled 'Satanic Messiah', is a four track vinyl only affair with the following tracklisting...
A1 Satanic Messiah
A2 Wizard Buys a Hat
B1 Sarcofago Live
B2 Gojam Province
Its apparently a low-key solo recording rather than a full band sound. More 'Get Lonely' than 'Heretic Pride' by all accounts. Out soon.
The second EP is a recording with Kaki King, who added drums, glockenspiel and vocals to the songs. This is likely to be out in October and has the following track listing...
A1 Black Pear Tree
A2 Mosquito Repellent
A3 Bring our Curses Home
B1 Supergenesis
B2 Roger Patterson Van
B3 Thank You Mario but our Princess Is in Another Castle
Vinyl only too. The wonderfully named final track, which is a lovely piano ballad with some nice harmony vocals, can be listened to right here...
http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/download/145282-premiere-the-mountain-goats-and-kaki-king-thank-you-mario-but-our-princess
Thats all from me for today. I need to get ready for the best week of gigs I can remember for some time. Reviews....next weeekend.
The first, entitled 'Satanic Messiah', is a four track vinyl only affair with the following tracklisting...
A1 Satanic Messiah
A2 Wizard Buys a Hat
B1 Sarcofago Live
B2 Gojam Province
Its apparently a low-key solo recording rather than a full band sound. More 'Get Lonely' than 'Heretic Pride' by all accounts. Out soon.
The second EP is a recording with Kaki King, who added drums, glockenspiel and vocals to the songs. This is likely to be out in October and has the following track listing...
A1 Black Pear Tree
A2 Mosquito Repellent
A3 Bring our Curses Home
B1 Supergenesis
B2 Roger Patterson Van
B3 Thank You Mario but our Princess Is in Another Castle
Vinyl only too. The wonderfully named final track, which is a lovely piano ballad with some nice harmony vocals, can be listened to right here...
http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/download/145282-premiere-the-mountain-goats-and-kaki-king-thank-you-mario-but-our-princess
Thats all from me for today. I need to get ready for the best week of gigs I can remember for some time. Reviews....next weeekend.
Friday, 5 September 2008
Bonnie Prince Billy 'Is It The Sea'
Tracks and Gigs has acquired a promo of the new Bonnie 'Prince' Billy album. Yes, another one! Not content with releasing a live album and a covers album last year and a new studio album this year, here he is with another live album. This is a very different concert recording though. 'Is It The Sea' documents a 2006 gig in Edinburgh where BPB was joined by Scottish drummer Alex Neilson and the (also Scottish) folk group Harem Scarem. I have never heard of this group before, but they clearly contain female singers and all manner of flute, banjo, accordian and fiddle players. It adds a Celtic flavour to the Bonnie Prince's songs and completely changes the feel of some of them.
Will Oldham, like Dylan, seems to regard his songs as ever-changing living things that don't necessarily, on any given night, have to sound anything like they originally did on record. This is why his live albums are rarely dull and why this record reminds me an awful lot of Dylan's incredible Rolling Thunder tour recordings.
The set features songs from throughout Oldham's career as well as a couple of traditional numbers. Highlights include an epic version of 'Cursed Sleep' and a harmony rich reading of 'Ain't You Wealthy, Ain't You Wise'. A take on the traditional Irish folk ballad 'Molly Bawn' steals the show though, building from a waltz into a frenzied finish, it is both haunting and rousing and like nothing else you've heard on a Bonnie 'Prince' Billy album before.
The best live albums always make you wish you had been at the gig and this one does. Its even worse for me because I was in Edinburgh about a week after the show took place! This serves as a wonderful document of the music Oldham and his guests were making on this particular night. He sounds so full of energy and enjoyment from performing the songs in this way, but it wouldn't surprise me if his next gig after this one was a solo acoustic performance. He is one of the great talents in music today and this is an innovative and enjoyable exploration of some of his songs.
8.3
['Is It The Sea' is out in October on Domino on cd/2LP]
Will Oldham, like Dylan, seems to regard his songs as ever-changing living things that don't necessarily, on any given night, have to sound anything like they originally did on record. This is why his live albums are rarely dull and why this record reminds me an awful lot of Dylan's incredible Rolling Thunder tour recordings.
The set features songs from throughout Oldham's career as well as a couple of traditional numbers. Highlights include an epic version of 'Cursed Sleep' and a harmony rich reading of 'Ain't You Wealthy, Ain't You Wise'. A take on the traditional Irish folk ballad 'Molly Bawn' steals the show though, building from a waltz into a frenzied finish, it is both haunting and rousing and like nothing else you've heard on a Bonnie 'Prince' Billy album before.
The best live albums always make you wish you had been at the gig and this one does. Its even worse for me because I was in Edinburgh about a week after the show took place! This serves as a wonderful document of the music Oldham and his guests were making on this particular night. He sounds so full of energy and enjoyment from performing the songs in this way, but it wouldn't surprise me if his next gig after this one was a solo acoustic performance. He is one of the great talents in music today and this is an innovative and enjoyable exploration of some of his songs.
8.3
['Is It The Sea' is out in October on Domino on cd/2LP]
Tuesday, 2 September 2008
interview: The Sleeping Years
I'm going to attempt to do some interviews with some of the artists who have made the best albums of the year so far. First up is Dale Grundle from The Sleeping Years. 'We're Becoming Islands One By One' is a TracksandGigs favourite (I'm also really enjoying the EPs, especially a beautiful song called 'Untroubled'), I asked Dale some questions and he gave some really interesting answers so they are reproduced here in full....
T&G- - Catchers were one of TracksandGigs' favourite bands of the 90s. In the days pre-internet, I discovered them by hearing 'Cotton Dress'playing in an indie record shop and asking the staff who it was. Would never happen these days. What are your best memories of Catchers and why did the split happen?
DG- Well, I started Catchers while I was at school so we managed to go from sending crudely recorded demos out to record companies to moving to London, to recording our first singles, right up to touring with well-known bands. We were very young - Alice was about 17 or 18! So at the beginning even just being able to play in London was such a huge thing for us.
One of the moments that stand out for me is the 2nd La Route du Rock Festival that we played in St Malo (in '98). We had played there about 3 or 4 years before just after recording our debut album 'Mute'.In 1998 we had been playing at the Water Rats in London and got a call from our agents in France asking if we would be available to appear at the La Route du Rock as Cornershop had pulled out at the last moment. The line up that year was incredible - Portishead, PJ Harvey, Spiritualized, Yann Tiersen, etc. The only problem for us was that our drummer Peter could not come with us. We decided in the end to gamble and phoned a drummer that our guitarist knew and got him to drive down from Derby to London that night. He had never heard our music before so he spent the journey to France sitting listening to both our albums on a walkman. We ended up being able to sound check just three songs with him and went on to play 9 songs for the very first time with him live to about 7 or 8,000 people. I'm not sure if I would be brave enough to try that now but we did ok!
Catchers had a lot of amazing experiences - we moved to New York and toured from coast to coast, played with people like Dr John, recorded with Robert Kirby. In the end however, as with a lot of bands, priorities began to change for people. We had problems with our label and didn't feel the support was there as much as it had been. Also I had been in a relationship with Alice for a few years which had broken down. Everyone seemed a little exhausted by Catchers and as future plans were being made I looked around and felt it was not right to continue like that.
T&G- - Pretty much everyone I played Catchers songs to liked them but hadnever heard of them until then. 'Beauty Number 3' used to go on all of my 1990s mix-tapes! You seemed to get great press in the UK but never got all that well known. Was that frustrating?
DG- I think it's more frustrating now than it was to us at the time. We had people like Mark Radcliffe playing us on BBC Radio 1 and the music magazines seemed to be behind the records but there were lots of other elements not in place for us. We never had management and we did not have a booking agent for the UK until the 2nd album. So even though we would get good press and radio it was hard to follow it up in the UK. They are good records that I am very proud of. I love the fact that they have have a bit of a cult following but of course it would have been better to sell more copies. The thing I love about Catchers is that we managed to exist within the Brit-pop era but made music that was very out of line with what was happening around us. We came from somewhere very small and quite removed and I think that had a very important influence as to how we saw what we were doing. I am sure our label would have been happier if we had hung out with NME-adored bands but it was never what we were about.
T&G- - I had pretty much given up on hearing music from you again with such a long gap after 'Stooping To Fit'. What did you do post-Catchers and what made you return to music with Sleeping Years?
DG- I kept on writing music but just never released anything or tried to look for another deal. I think I needed time to reassess everything as I had been working as Catchers for about 6 years and didn't really know what else to do. 'Stooping to Fit' was a very difficult album for us to record - the band were not in a very good place at that point. So we all needed a little time to heal. I got a job, read a lot of books and kept my head low. I had some health problems as well which delayed things but really I just needed to step back and figure out what I wanted to do. Eventually my fingers itched to the point where I needed to be playing and everything slowly made sense again.
T&G- - The songs on the EPs and 'We're Becoming Islands...' seem to focus a lot on home and family. Was that a major theme when you wrote the songs?
DG- When I started writing the songs for The Sleeping Years I kept thinking of the line in 'Clocks and clones' - 'old souls all rapt in wonder for the arc of them'. I liked that idea of looking back at a life's journey - about how random the starting point could be. I looked at where I had been born and what my homeland was like and my language and culture.
I am originally from a small village in the country so nature has always featured in some way in my work. I wrote 'Broken Homes' and tried to tie in a sense of the physical to the geographical - 'brittle maps of my ribs bowing...'. I also sent a dictaphone back to my parents and asked them to record themselves talking about their lives and wrote 'Dressed for rain' and 'The lockkeeper's cottage' based on their stories. I felt like I was starting again from the beginning and because of that I needed to try and understand where I came from. 'Macosquin, Coleraine', 'Strays', 'Human Blues', etc all contain elements of the language that I grew up with. Up until this point I had tried to stay away from writing too directly about Northern Ireland. Unlike some of my friends I never read Irish writers as I grew up because I didn't want to be influenced by them. I needed to find my own voice first before I could talk about my home.
T&G- - The two Catchers albums ('Mute' and 'Stooping To Fit') sound quite different to each other and 'We're Becoming Islands...' has more of a folk feel to it. What music are you listening to these days and who are your influences?
DG- I think the Catchers' albums sound differently also because of how the songs were written. I started teaching myself piano around the 2nd album so the songs grew in new ways. The TSY songs were demoed at home on my studio so for the first time I was able to arrange everything myself. The Catchers records could have sounded a lot different though. We had Dave Fridmann lined up to record 'Stooping to fit'. This was before 'Deserters Songs' as I really liked 'See you on the other side' at the time. I was even speaking to him on the phone but then the label ran out of money and could not afford to send us to the states to record with him. Mike Hedges was suggested by Setanta for 'Mute'. I had wanted to go a little more left-field withg our choice of producer.
The last bands that have genuinely excited me have been Grizzly Bear and Animal Collective. I also discovered the Alan Lomax Southern Journey series and Harry Smith's American Folk Anthology while I started writing The Sleeping Years' songs. I listen to a lot of different genres though - I grew up listening to soul music on my mother's side and folk/country on my father's. Vocally I am influenced by people like Mark Hollis - the last two Talk Talk records and his solo album are all stunning. I love Moondog, Ivor Cutler, Can, Captain Beefheart, Low, some of the Anticon artists, Davy Graham, etc.
T&G- - So far, TSY live dates have been mainly one-off gigs. Are there any plans for a tour? I am absolutely devastated that I missed you playingThe Union Chapel, which is my favourite venue. Did you enjoy playing there....and any plans to return?
DG- Yes, I have actually played the Union Chapel three times so far. Once with Catchers (supporting Edwyn Collins), once on my own and once with Michelle. I love playing there - it's such a beautiful venue. I have had a connection with that venue since I came to London. I will be appearing there again this year but it will be for the Arctic Circle Xmas show which will feature me singing to music written by Ted Barnes. It's going to be included on a forthcoming Arctic Circle Xmas EP which will be arranged by Harry Escott and feature a choir and some other artists. Pika Pika (who have created all the TSY artwork) will be involved as well.
T&G- Whats next for TSY? Are you working on new songs at the moment?
DG- We have a lot of shows coming up right until the end of the year (all listed on our myspace page). We will be travelling to Austria and Italy for the very first time and we have a rescheduled trip to Beirut in November.Aside from that I have been recording demos at home for the next album which will hopefully be out some time next year.
Thanks to Dale for taking the time to answer the questions. Sleeping Years play The Social in London on 5th November and TracksandGigs will be in attendance!
T&G- - Catchers were one of TracksandGigs' favourite bands of the 90s. In the days pre-internet, I discovered them by hearing 'Cotton Dress'playing in an indie record shop and asking the staff who it was. Would never happen these days. What are your best memories of Catchers and why did the split happen?
DG- Well, I started Catchers while I was at school so we managed to go from sending crudely recorded demos out to record companies to moving to London, to recording our first singles, right up to touring with well-known bands. We were very young - Alice was about 17 or 18! So at the beginning even just being able to play in London was such a huge thing for us.
One of the moments that stand out for me is the 2nd La Route du Rock Festival that we played in St Malo (in '98). We had played there about 3 or 4 years before just after recording our debut album 'Mute'.In 1998 we had been playing at the Water Rats in London and got a call from our agents in France asking if we would be available to appear at the La Route du Rock as Cornershop had pulled out at the last moment. The line up that year was incredible - Portishead, PJ Harvey, Spiritualized, Yann Tiersen, etc. The only problem for us was that our drummer Peter could not come with us. We decided in the end to gamble and phoned a drummer that our guitarist knew and got him to drive down from Derby to London that night. He had never heard our music before so he spent the journey to France sitting listening to both our albums on a walkman. We ended up being able to sound check just three songs with him and went on to play 9 songs for the very first time with him live to about 7 or 8,000 people. I'm not sure if I would be brave enough to try that now but we did ok!
Catchers had a lot of amazing experiences - we moved to New York and toured from coast to coast, played with people like Dr John, recorded with Robert Kirby. In the end however, as with a lot of bands, priorities began to change for people. We had problems with our label and didn't feel the support was there as much as it had been. Also I had been in a relationship with Alice for a few years which had broken down. Everyone seemed a little exhausted by Catchers and as future plans were being made I looked around and felt it was not right to continue like that.
T&G- - Pretty much everyone I played Catchers songs to liked them but hadnever heard of them until then. 'Beauty Number 3' used to go on all of my 1990s mix-tapes! You seemed to get great press in the UK but never got all that well known. Was that frustrating?
DG- I think it's more frustrating now than it was to us at the time. We had people like Mark Radcliffe playing us on BBC Radio 1 and the music magazines seemed to be behind the records but there were lots of other elements not in place for us. We never had management and we did not have a booking agent for the UK until the 2nd album. So even though we would get good press and radio it was hard to follow it up in the UK. They are good records that I am very proud of. I love the fact that they have have a bit of a cult following but of course it would have been better to sell more copies. The thing I love about Catchers is that we managed to exist within the Brit-pop era but made music that was very out of line with what was happening around us. We came from somewhere very small and quite removed and I think that had a very important influence as to how we saw what we were doing. I am sure our label would have been happier if we had hung out with NME-adored bands but it was never what we were about.
T&G- - I had pretty much given up on hearing music from you again with such a long gap after 'Stooping To Fit'. What did you do post-Catchers and what made you return to music with Sleeping Years?
DG- I kept on writing music but just never released anything or tried to look for another deal. I think I needed time to reassess everything as I had been working as Catchers for about 6 years and didn't really know what else to do. 'Stooping to Fit' was a very difficult album for us to record - the band were not in a very good place at that point. So we all needed a little time to heal. I got a job, read a lot of books and kept my head low. I had some health problems as well which delayed things but really I just needed to step back and figure out what I wanted to do. Eventually my fingers itched to the point where I needed to be playing and everything slowly made sense again.
T&G- - The songs on the EPs and 'We're Becoming Islands...' seem to focus a lot on home and family. Was that a major theme when you wrote the songs?
DG- When I started writing the songs for The Sleeping Years I kept thinking of the line in 'Clocks and clones' - 'old souls all rapt in wonder for the arc of them'. I liked that idea of looking back at a life's journey - about how random the starting point could be. I looked at where I had been born and what my homeland was like and my language and culture.
I am originally from a small village in the country so nature has always featured in some way in my work. I wrote 'Broken Homes' and tried to tie in a sense of the physical to the geographical - 'brittle maps of my ribs bowing...'. I also sent a dictaphone back to my parents and asked them to record themselves talking about their lives and wrote 'Dressed for rain' and 'The lockkeeper's cottage' based on their stories. I felt like I was starting again from the beginning and because of that I needed to try and understand where I came from. 'Macosquin, Coleraine', 'Strays', 'Human Blues', etc all contain elements of the language that I grew up with. Up until this point I had tried to stay away from writing too directly about Northern Ireland. Unlike some of my friends I never read Irish writers as I grew up because I didn't want to be influenced by them. I needed to find my own voice first before I could talk about my home.
T&G- - The two Catchers albums ('Mute' and 'Stooping To Fit') sound quite different to each other and 'We're Becoming Islands...' has more of a folk feel to it. What music are you listening to these days and who are your influences?
DG- I think the Catchers' albums sound differently also because of how the songs were written. I started teaching myself piano around the 2nd album so the songs grew in new ways. The TSY songs were demoed at home on my studio so for the first time I was able to arrange everything myself. The Catchers records could have sounded a lot different though. We had Dave Fridmann lined up to record 'Stooping to fit'. This was before 'Deserters Songs' as I really liked 'See you on the other side' at the time. I was even speaking to him on the phone but then the label ran out of money and could not afford to send us to the states to record with him. Mike Hedges was suggested by Setanta for 'Mute'. I had wanted to go a little more left-field withg our choice of producer.
The last bands that have genuinely excited me have been Grizzly Bear and Animal Collective. I also discovered the Alan Lomax Southern Journey series and Harry Smith's American Folk Anthology while I started writing The Sleeping Years' songs. I listen to a lot of different genres though - I grew up listening to soul music on my mother's side and folk/country on my father's. Vocally I am influenced by people like Mark Hollis - the last two Talk Talk records and his solo album are all stunning. I love Moondog, Ivor Cutler, Can, Captain Beefheart, Low, some of the Anticon artists, Davy Graham, etc.
T&G- - So far, TSY live dates have been mainly one-off gigs. Are there any plans for a tour? I am absolutely devastated that I missed you playingThe Union Chapel, which is my favourite venue. Did you enjoy playing there....and any plans to return?
DG- Yes, I have actually played the Union Chapel three times so far. Once with Catchers (supporting Edwyn Collins), once on my own and once with Michelle. I love playing there - it's such a beautiful venue. I have had a connection with that venue since I came to London. I will be appearing there again this year but it will be for the Arctic Circle Xmas show which will feature me singing to music written by Ted Barnes. It's going to be included on a forthcoming Arctic Circle Xmas EP which will be arranged by Harry Escott and feature a choir and some other artists. Pika Pika (who have created all the TSY artwork) will be involved as well.
T&G- Whats next for TSY? Are you working on new songs at the moment?
DG- We have a lot of shows coming up right until the end of the year (all listed on our myspace page). We will be travelling to Austria and Italy for the very first time and we have a rescheduled trip to Beirut in November.Aside from that I have been recording demos at home for the next album which will hopefully be out some time next year.
Thanks to Dale for taking the time to answer the questions. Sleeping Years play The Social in London on 5th November and TracksandGigs will be in attendance!
Monday, 1 September 2008
Bowerbirds 'Hymns For A Dark Horse'
TracksandGigs is now adopting a policy of 'spending a significant amount of time' with an album before writing about it. We have probably over-rated the Mountain Goats and Bon Iver albums this year and under-rated Fleet Foxes. Of the records I gave 9.0+ reviews to, Tindersticks, Beck and Sleeping Years records have shown themselves to be well worthy of this as time has moved on. These would be the records of the year so far.
This policy has suited Bowerbirds well, because here is an album that simply requires perseverance. Bowerbirds are a folk trio from North Carolina who have recently supported both Mountain Goats and Bon Iver, this is their debut album, finally released in the UK with a couple of bonus tracks.
After the first couple of listens their songs, full of accordion, guitar and violin, sound pretty but unremarkable. It takes time for the melodies and the feel of the songs to shine through. The arrangements are delicate and sparse, but it is the harmonies and the insistant melodies that will pull you in to this album, 'Human Hands' in particular is ridiculously catchy and hummable. Not surprisingly, given the band's name, the themes explored are largely focused on the natural world and man's influence on it. Its hard to think of another album that does this so well. Frequently joyous sounding harmonies are juxtaposed with damning lyrics, most notably in the aforementioned 'Human Hands', where a line like "there is hate all around" is sung with such love.
In many ways this album sometimes comes across as a lament for the lack of spirituality in modern life, as well as our lack of thought for the natural world. Certainly listening to 'Slow Down' on the tube is a thought provoking experience. 'In Our Talons' is a condemnation of what Man has done to the environment, with the killer line "we're only human, at least thats what we've learned".
You may, however, decide you want to ignore all the themes and messages and just enjoy the music, in which case this is a lovely, relaxing record which is very pleasing on the ears. The harmonies and delicate arrangements do indeed make the songs sound like hymns and while the songs take a while to 'click', long-term this is a rewarding album. I suggest you buy this, switch off your computer and TV, relax and enjoy it.
7.9
['Hymns for a Dark Horse' is out now on Dead Oceans on cd and vinyl. Bowerbirds tour and support Bon Iver in September and if you are in Ireland, you're very lucky because they play Belfast and Dublin at the end of September with Sleeping Years supporting]
This policy has suited Bowerbirds well, because here is an album that simply requires perseverance. Bowerbirds are a folk trio from North Carolina who have recently supported both Mountain Goats and Bon Iver, this is their debut album, finally released in the UK with a couple of bonus tracks.
After the first couple of listens their songs, full of accordion, guitar and violin, sound pretty but unremarkable. It takes time for the melodies and the feel of the songs to shine through. The arrangements are delicate and sparse, but it is the harmonies and the insistant melodies that will pull you in to this album, 'Human Hands' in particular is ridiculously catchy and hummable. Not surprisingly, given the band's name, the themes explored are largely focused on the natural world and man's influence on it. Its hard to think of another album that does this so well. Frequently joyous sounding harmonies are juxtaposed with damning lyrics, most notably in the aforementioned 'Human Hands', where a line like "there is hate all around" is sung with such love.
In many ways this album sometimes comes across as a lament for the lack of spirituality in modern life, as well as our lack of thought for the natural world. Certainly listening to 'Slow Down' on the tube is a thought provoking experience. 'In Our Talons' is a condemnation of what Man has done to the environment, with the killer line "we're only human, at least thats what we've learned".
You may, however, decide you want to ignore all the themes and messages and just enjoy the music, in which case this is a lovely, relaxing record which is very pleasing on the ears. The harmonies and delicate arrangements do indeed make the songs sound like hymns and while the songs take a while to 'click', long-term this is a rewarding album. I suggest you buy this, switch off your computer and TV, relax and enjoy it.
7.9
['Hymns for a Dark Horse' is out now on Dead Oceans on cd and vinyl. Bowerbirds tour and support Bon Iver in September and if you are in Ireland, you're very lucky because they play Belfast and Dublin at the end of September with Sleeping Years supporting]
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