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February 2019 = |
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Teeth of the Sea |
Monteagle |
Pearls Before Swine |
Bell Lungs |
Rancho Relaxo |
Alex
Rex |
Mandrake
Paddle Steamer |
Lorrelle
meets the Obsolete |
Carrie
Martin |
The
Petards |
Old
Mexico |
Cosey
Fanni Tutti |
Kungens
Man |
Tengger |
Bert Sommer |
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TEETH OF THE SEA – WRAITH
(LP/CD/DL from Rocket Recordings)
It’s hard to believe that
Teeth Of The Sea have been going since 2006 and
are therefore no longer quite the Young Turks
championed by Terrascope pretty much from the
offset, thanks to McMullen’s uncanny knack of
spotting a good ‘un before it even turns up on
NASA’s radar. Along the way they’ve grown up and
we’ve grown old in tandem, our paths
occasionally crossing, such as when, fully three
years ago, they graced one of our events at The
Lexington together with White Hills (yes, THAT
poster) while guitarist Jimmy Martin did us the
honour of DJ-ing Terrascope’s Flowers Must Die
gig a couple of years back.
There again it’s not
without mild trepidation that a new release from
an old favourite finds its way into the reviews
pile. When all’s said and done this is TOTS’
first release since 2015’s crushingly good Highly
Deadly
Black Tarantula, since when they’ve
misplaced a band member (they are now a
three-piece of Sam Barton, Mike Bourne and the
aforementioned Martin).As hiatus’ go, that’s a
pretty lengthy one, besides which, following up…Tarantula
was always going to be a tall order. What if,
after all the anticipation, this turns out to be
a stinker?
‘I’d Rather Jack’,
mercifully, is not a re-tread of the Reynolds
Girls’ 80s manufactured rage against the pop
machine but a high octane electro-metallic big
dipper that owes as much to its production
values as musicianship. Oh and that’s metallic
as in “kling-klang” and not a nod to Martin’s
other night job as guitarist with inexplicably
enduring NWOBHM footnotes, Angelwitch, although
he does find room here to express himself avec
gusto. There’s brass, too, those bold blasts of
Morricone trumpet that have often punctuated the
TOTS sound since day one but are more up front
and to the fore here and throughout Wraith.
Angular,
dystopian, and blessed with a strange and
ethereal beauty, the shimmering, futuristic
little masterpiece known as ‘Fortean Steed’ also
gestures in a pagan, wyrd folk direction,
grounding us in a scrambled hex of vocal
courtesy of Kath Gifford of Stereolab and Wargs.
Album highlight? Possibly, but it’ll have to
fight off three, possibly four others for the
accolade. I love a good scrap, me.
The album’s outrider and
which has been softening us up for a few weeks
now is ‘Hiraeth’. It’s a word that we from West
of the Big Ditch maintain there is no literal
equivalent in English, but longing or yearning
for home pretty gets you there. Here the
somewhat muffled trumpet explores a dissolute
urban underbelly over which a plunking bass
seems determined to keep afloat. It’s also a
quite lovely, measured cinematic masterclass
which builds over a queasy backdrop to a
nagging, cloying conclusion that has you looking
over your shoulder. Companion piece, ‘Her
Wraith’ (can you see what they did there?) is
another one of those slivers of deceptively
simple insinuation. Again the muted trumpet
hangs on the freezing air while percussive taps
and the bittersweet plinking of keys provides an
irresistible undertow.
It’s on ‘VISITOR’ where
the Church of Hawkwind takes communion with the
cult of minimalism and which again layers up as
if for protection against the icy blasts of its
own making. But wait…hey, is that drumming,
like, proper drumming? Well anyone who can
co-opt Valentina Magaletti to do their bidding
is onto a sure fire winner as this proves, and
besides which, Jimmy gets to show us his chops,
so to speak. You might have expected them to end
with ‘Our Love Can Destroy This Whole Fucking
World’ another alluring slice of curiously retro
futurism and in its way a nod to positivity and
which would have made for soft, safe landing.
However the honour falls to ‘Gladiators Ready’
(look, that’s what it says here) which kicks off
pretty much as it reads, all hyped up tension
where Jan Hammer intersects with Josh Wink on
the life-affirming road to Danceville. An
unexpected if rather banging way to bow out, but
really, would we want it any other way?
All told Wraith appears less confrontational and a few shades of grey lighter
than the fittingly venomous Highly
Deadly
Black Tarantula and as much I love that
album (it made my personal top 3 of 2015) I’m
not going to mourn its passing into the realm of
back catalogue. Stinker? Well we reckon we have
a nose for that kind of thing so take our word
for it when we tell you that the air still
smells pure and sweet. Better still are the
soundwaves that travel upon it.
Ian Fraser
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MONTEAGLE
– MIDNIGHT NOON
(LP/CD/DL
on
Fire
Talk
Records)
Midnight
Noon
is the debut album from Monteagle, the recording
moniker of Justin Giles Wilcox, formerly of folk
duo Nassau. Wilcox
grew up in rural Tennessee, but has lived in
Brooklyn NY for the past five years.
Midnight Noon is an homage to his rural
upbringing, which Wilcox reflects upon from the
perch of life in the Big Apple.
He takes his moniker from a mountain area
in Tennessee near where he was raised, and
having spent some time there, I can attest it is
full of both pastoral beauty and a rich musical
landscape.
The
album
is a singer-songwriter collection of atmospheric
Americana. Wilcox’s
hushed vocals are treated with a smoky feel, and
the five-piece band helps to form the late
night, musky sound.
If he was aiming to wax both lyrically
and sonically poetic on the country from within
the city, he achieves that rather tricky
caramel-in-a-chocolate bar goal quite well.
Opener
“East
LA” perfectly encapsulates the noir-ish
Monteagle sound.
Awash in reverb (the album was recorded
in a 1700s church in upstate New York), East LA
is the sonic equivalent of your favorite adult
beverage going down nice and smoothly.
Title
track
“Midnight Noon” is another standout.
Featuring autobiographical lyrics, it
starts out sounding like it will just be an
acoustic number, which would’ve been fine, but
the full band comes in and envelops the listener
with moody, echoing swells.
“Hollow
Ground”
is just Wilcox with an acoustic guitar, while an
electric guitar provides tasteful adornment and
there are just the right amount of harmonies for
spice. It’s
a pretty melody, and the lyrics continue the
theme – “meanwhile, fallen leaves look like
people I’ve known/mothers bend like willows over
the southern child.”
“Cherry
Wine”
brims with melancholia, a lament of romantic
regret. Pounding
piano chords give way to a tender guitar solo.
“Black Dress” sheds the reverb, causing a
minor surprise in the listening experience.
Wilcox is accompanied by just piano and
acoustic guitar, and it’s another pretty,
sorrowful tale - almost a show tune melody
slowed down. Closer
“June” returns the full band (and the reverb).
The song is dreamy and drifting, dripping
with nocturnal vibes.
Monteagle
has
created an ethereal slice of misty Americana in
Midnight Noon. The
late-night mood piece eases you in its grip, and
it’s a comfortable place to get lost in for a
while.
(Mark
Feingold)
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PEARLS
BEFORE SWINE - BALAKLAVA
(LP from Drag City)
I'd be very surprised if any Terrascope readers
weren't already familiar with this masterpiece of
anti-war music as a folk artform from the late,
great Tom Rapp and his Pearls Before Swine - the
band's second album, dating from 1968. The majority
of you will I am sure already own a copy, either an
original LP on the ESP label or one of the
innumerable subsequent vinyl and digital
repressings. I mention it here primarily for two
reasons. Firstly, because this 50th anniversary
version is absolutely essential no matter how much
you think you know the album; the original engineer
Richard Alderson has undertaken some painstaking
remastering, including going right back to the
sources to get the album's graphics clean and clear,
and it both looks and sounds unbelievably good, a
masterpiece in every respect. Secondly because Drag
City are absolutely the right label to have
undertaken this project, treating both it and the
memory of our dear departed friend Tom Rapp with the
respect that it deserves.
Incidentally, those of you attending the Woolf II
festival this coming summer have a treat in store,
as it's been confirmed that Tom Rapp's widow, Lynn,
will be attending. "It will be an emotional roller
coaster for me seeing everyone we knew from the
Terrastock festivals. There are so many happy
memories. Tom was thrilled to know he had so many
fans, many of whom became friends"
Come along and meet Lynn, and rest assured this is
one album we'll definitely be playing between sets
and over the P.A.
(Phil McMullen)
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BELL
LUNGS – WOLVES BEHIND US
(Ltd Edition Lathe Cut EP/DL from
https://bell-lungs.bandcamp.com/)
One can’t be sure if there is such a genre as
post-folk but if there is then that’s where this
belongs if indeed it belongs anywhere. Because you
see nothing here is quite what it seems, and as
those of you who’ve patiently endured The Writer’s
subjective and ill-informed murdering of the Kween’s
English these past ten years (“hello mother, hello
social worker”) will readily attest, it doesn’t take
genius to pull the cloth over these old ears. Still,
at least I can spell dilettante.
Yet genius this may be, or as pretty damned close to
that elusive quality that you can get without yet
having passed the test of time. Step into the light
of Terrascope’s 40 watt energy bulb, then, Bell
Lungs. She’s an “experimental musician”, which as we
all know covers a big canvas and often requires a
long list of offences to be taken into
consideration. Thankfully her imaginative and
bitter-sweet fusing of electronic noise and textured
harmonies wrung through more mellotron effect
settings than there are currently what-if Brexit
scenarios, marinated in a sometimes disquieting yet
compelling psychedelic ambience puts her firmly on
the side of the angels. Mistype that and you get
angles. There are a few of those here too but
nothing sharp enough to cut yourselves on. These are
mostly subtle energies, after all.
A spectral, barely corporeal sliver of
experimentation tentatively touched from the off by
‘Cold Wind’, a haunting and layered acapella fading
to grey before the title track sweeps high and low,
a deceptive deep baritone cello which is in fact a
guitar played through a mellotron emulator pedal,
while the sweeps of high register as it so
transpires is Bell’s electric violin played through
the same pedal on a flute setting. Look I’m easily
confused and you’re probably sitting in my seat.
Wordless vocals flavouring an already scrambling mix
combine to offer something both enchanting and spine
tingling as Bell coos and screams before finding a
more becalmed resting place. Imagine if you will
those former Eighteenth Day of May bandmates Alison
Cotton and Allison Brice in their current guises
over-dubbed one on top of the other and this might
be the unlikely but mouth-watering outcome.
By contrast the beautiful and only mildly funereal
‘Falls Apart’ is relatively conventional. That’s
relatively in the same way that most of us are
apparently related to Genghis Khan. Hymnal and
stirring, by stripping away a lot of the
multi-tracking and more left-field sonic exploration
you appreciate what a fine voice and an impressively
warm vocal range Bell Lungs possesses, which leaves
a lingering aural aftertaste that brings to mind
Aldous Harding. Listen and weep with joy. Oh and the
guitar? This time it’s pushed through an organ
emulator. The question “why not just play an organ”
never once crossed my mind, guitars after all are
less expensive, more portable and anyway how much
fun can you have with a box with settings? It’s what
the question “what happens If I press this” was
designed for after all. Still, I digress. ‘Dead
Earth’, which sweeps the field, trills in the
direction of a less fussy Josephine Foster and
whisks us to a place of delightfully fondant
cookiness with underscores of early Kate Bush
putting the Third Ear Band through elvish boot camp.
You can work out for yourselves what the guitar is
doing this time, it’s beyond my comprehension and
most probably my bedtime.
Proving once more that it’s not just possible to
fall in love with music it’s probably harder not to,
the truly sad thing about Wolves Behind Us is that
unless some public spirited label comes along and
gives it a proper release it is likely to pass under
everyone’s radar. While music is a personal thing
(it’s mine I tell you, mine) it would be criminal if
this were to remain the preserve of a handful of
reviewers and close friends and family. Meanwhile if
I don’t listen to any other new music all year I
won’t care. 1st February and it may already be game
over as far as Album Of The Year is concerned. OK so
it’s an EP, so what? Split hairs all you like. Over
and out.
(Ian Fraser) |
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RANCHO
RELAXO
– SOFT LUXURY
(LP/DL
on Bandcamp)
Norway’s
Rancho Relaxo brings us Soft Luxury, their ninth
album since their founding in 2003.
It’s a crafty mélange of psych, sprinkled
with shoegaze. They
play loud and they play slow, and after you’ve
quickly settled in, you’ll relaxo with them.
Our
program commences with “No Shadow No Soul.”
Beginning with a slow guitar fade-in (a
pet peeve of mine:
how I wish artists wouldn’t do that on
album openers – it only results in the listener
turning up the volume in search of the right
level, only to be pummeled eventually and having
to readjust; but I digress).
Eventually the band comes crashing in for
an epic shoegaze extravaganza.
I like the employment of little bells to
help offset the sludge.
Spacy effects waft along the ceiling,
and, as with most shoegaze, the lyrics take a
back seat – but they’re there somewhere.
Next
up is the hypnotic “Igjen.”
Besides the anthemic chorus of “Igjen!”
the song is a drone, with dense layers of
guitars and keyboards.
As with “No Shadow No Soul” the song
rides out the repeating melodic figure
instrumentally.
“You Know Her Name” follows (with no
mention of looking up her number).
A mellotron-like wash (nowadays sometimes
you just can’t tell whether it’s the real thing,
so I’ll play it safe) sets the scene.
An eerie chorus sings of a mysterious
girl, before the song drifts off into the
atmosphere on wave upon wave of reverb-drenched
melody. If
anything, “You Know Her Name,” at close to nine
minutes, is Exhibit A of Rancho Relaxo’s system
of playing a simple theme – in this case F – C –
G, then lather, rinse, and repeat till they’re
blue in the face.
But admittedly, it can also be quite
comfort-inducing.
Later,
“Mouth” is an earworm.
It’s one of those tunes you swear you’ve
heard before, its hypnotic psych synth and
underlying organ lines getting into your
headspace and lodging themselves happily there.
“Mouth” also has the most audible lyrics
on the album, so audible in fact, that a cough
can be clearly heard at one point.
I love it.
“Det Sku Ikkje Skjedd” feature a loud,
slow, swirling eastern guitar and organ melody.
The earnest vocals complement the piece
nicely.
Closer
“Out the Door” rides a lengthy guitar and organ
groove with a Velvets-like vocal.
Eventually the groove gives way to organ
solos and variations on the theme, before coming
to a halt, the journey complete.
Soft
Luxury is slow-paced layered psychedelia, bent
on settling you into its catchy songs.
It’s full of breathing space, taking its
time to simmer in the crock pot for lasting
effect.
(Mark
Feingold)
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ALEX
REX - OTTERBURN
(LP/CD
from Tin
Angel Records)
The
news that Trembling Bells had called it a day at
the end of last year may not have registered on
too many peoples' minds, but taken in
perspective, should in reality been a much more
upsetting fact than it was. Purveyors of one of
the finer albums of 2018 in Dungeness, the
song-writing of Alex Neilson had reached an
absolute peak in turns of progressive psych. If
that was to be the end, then they certainly went
out on a career high.
The
titular place of Dungeness would not stay away
long though, and Alex finds himself revisiting
the place once again on his second solo album,
Otterburn. As a kind of memory, and he does
intone “and I remember Dungeness, collecting
skeletons”, it's a timely reminder of little
ticks and nuances that make his lyrics so much
fun to decipher. Unlike the previous albums
weird progressive folk, On Otterburn he finds a
path through a countrified landscape. Former
Trembling Bells Lavinia Blackwall and Mike
Hastings may return, but this album is a
completely different beast from the past.
There
is a melancholic sound to this album and as the
sound of the wonderful opening track, Lay Down
In Ashes usher's us in on a countrified riff,
Alex invites us in ever so deeply into his world
with a direct hit on your heart. It's the kind
of opener which is enough to make you stop
breathing as the
anticipation builds for what may come.
After
this rather lulled beginning, its something of a
shock when the rockabilly hurl of Amy, May I
bursts forth. Based on a simple hand-clap rhythm
the song is something of two parts separated by
a wildly over the top 50's guitar from Steve
Jackson (Belle and Sebastian). Somehow glueing
the seemingly disparate parts together, the song
turns into jubilant romp which provides first
inclination that Otterburn is not going to
follow any expected path.
Familiarity
through
the lyrics and vocal style are returned on
'Dildos, which features the aforementioned
Dungeness, and the wonderful The Cruel Rule
where Alex uses his key repetition of words
which make up his signature sound. It's a
welcome return to what we have come to expect,
but also becomes a little red herring for what
comes next.
The
title track is a weird, not quite there, folk
song imbued with an atmospheric ambience which
evokes fishing, the sea, and salty air. It's
lilting melody is drunk on itself giving it a
slight sea shanty feel. Always Ready surges
forth as Lavinia Blackwell's wonderful vocals
provide accompaniment to the keening lyrics,
whilst Master enters torch song territory in a
rather disconcerting turn into the darkness. The
latter jars at first, but on repeated plays you
start to appreciate it as one of the moments of
experimentation from the norm. That we end up
thinking of these songs as anywhere near the
norm is perhaps due to the off-kilter feel of
the album itself.
That
“normality” returns on the grief ridden Brother
which sees Alex revisit the loss of his brother
who suddenly passed away whilst sleeping on a
canal boat in 2017. It's pay-off, as the strains
of My Pony Boy see the song out, is an emotional
point embodying that sense of brotherhood
friends from childhood. By the time the soaring
chorus of Latest Regret hits, you may find the
waterworks are well and truly switched on.
That
might have been enough for any other artist, but
for Alex Nielsen, he leaves us with the
devastating Smoke & Memory, sang acapella
and allowing us to focus entirely on the lyrics,
it has the impact of an old folk song, passed on
down the ages, both comforting and strangely
eerie. After all the album delivers, and
musically its a stunning tapestry of country
rock and folk, it is on Alex Nielsen that
emotional impact hinges. Although melancholic
and grief-stricken, we should also find cause to
celebrate one of the best
songwriter's/lyricist's around at the moment,
and in Otterburn, an album to help us with our
own grief over the split of Trembling Bells.
(Martyn
Coppack)
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MANDRAKE
PADDLE STEAMER - PANDEMONIUM SHADOW SHOW
(LP/CD from http://www.guerssen.com
)
For
most of us, I suspect, the only song by this
band that you can name/have ever heard is
“Strange Walking Man” a bona fide psych classic
that always hits the spot. This is a shame as
the collection I hold in my hands is a mighty
fine example of some stellar tunes written in
1968 (mainly) just on that cusp between sweet
psychedelia and more heavy progressive sounds
and fitting the period perfectly.
Signed by Parlophone but hoping to be
on Harvest, there were high hopes for the band’s
first single but it sank without a ripple and
the band never recovered, splitting up in 1970
and that was that. Not quite though as these
demos will only enhance the band's legacy with
their invention and the way they perfectly
encapsulate the times.
Opening in sprightly fashion,
“Pandemonium Shadow Show2 has a nice meaty riff,
swirling organ and suitably trippy lyrics,
luring you in with a smile and a sugar lump
before “Solitair Husk” detonates your mind an
epic rocker that starts in moody fashion before
exploding in psychedelic joy, reminding me of
The Greatest Show On Earth at their finest,
everyone playing their heart out. Seemingly
stepping back to 1967 although recorded in 1970,
“Stella Mermaid” tells the tale of a drunken
encounter with a mermaid and would sit
beautifully on any Rubbles compilation. Equally
entertaining is the wonderful “The World
Whistles By” a heavy riff worming its way into
your skull as the band tell their tale of
madness and incarceration.
So, four song in and not a single wrong
move, this is generally where the cynical
reviewer starts to think things will go awry,
however in this case the second half of the
collection is equally as strong with “Upminster
Windows” sounding like it could be the perfect
inspiration for that well known XTC alter – ego,
makes you wonder if they ever heard the tune,
whilst “Doris The Piper” is another classy,
swirling rocker that deserves volume and
repeated listening.
I guess the only problem with this
collection is that it sounds so retro in 2019,
that is until you realise it is, they were there
and then it all makes sense and you can carry on
enjoying the sounds as “The Doorway To January”
slows things down with a mellow vibe mixed with
some doomy riffing, strange but it works, one of
those songs that takes a while to filter
through, something also true of “Simple Song”
with its dramatic opening sequence and a guitar
twiddle that will have Diamond Head fans
pricking their ears up before the whole piece
becomes more jaunty and definitely heading
towards the valley of prog, all good stuff.
Finally “The October Song” drifts and
floats on a cloud of reverb filled mellotron,
another song that is stranger than it first
seems, something this album is very good at
meaning there is plenty to discover every time
you give it a spin. (Simon Lewis)
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LORELLE
MEETS
THE OBSOLETE – DE FACTO
Vinyl/CD/DL from Sonic Cathedral www.soniccathedral.co.uk
Mexican duo Lorelle Meets The Obsolete released their
fifth album last month, it was recorded at their
home studio in Ensanada, Baja California and is
a bit of a sea change as it’s the first to be
released with a few extra members, the first
albums were purely as a duo. The core members of
Lorena Quintanilla and Alberto González have been joined by
their touring band Fernando Nuti-bass, Andrea
Davi-drums (both of Mamuthones) and José
Orozco-synths.
In 2011 the band released their debut album ‘On
Welfare’ via Chicago based Captcha records
before being signed by Sonic Cathedral after
their second album 2013’s ‘Corruptible Faces’,
who put out the ‘Psych For Sore Eyes’ EP on
which they featured. Third album ‘Chambers’ was
released jointly in 2014 with Captcha and Sonic
Cathedral. Picking
up fans like Henry Rollins and Mani along the
way, their fourth album 2016’s ‘Balance’ was
even featured in Mojo magazine who ran a feature
on them.
And so to this latest album ‘De-Facto’ an album which
sees them ripping up their own rule book. This
time out they started rehearsing and recording
in their own newly built studio, as a five piece
band, the results of which sees the band located
somewhere between ‘Tender Buttons’ era Broadcast
and Low’s recent ‘Double Negative’. They also
decided that Lorena would sing these new songs
entirely in Spanish.
Opener ‘Ana’, is a slow feedback laden song, a little
like ‘O Superman’ by Laurie Anderson in the
vocals. ‘Linéas En Hojas’, has the feel of a
lost 60’s garage nugget. ‘Unificado’, is a
lengthy guitar led song that just gets heavier
and heavier as it progresses and is one of the
albums highlights, shifting gear a few minutes
in, it ends in a blizzard of white noise some
nine minutes later. ‘Lux,Lumina’, is a classy
sci-fi shuffle, which also shifts gears a few
times throughout its duration. ‘Resistir’, is
altogether grungier, big dirty rifferama with
clanking drums. ‘El Derrumbe’, brings in a bit
of light and shade, synths and droning feedback
laden sustained guitar weave together, but it
doesn’t really go anywhere, before it bleeds
into the albums final song the lengthy,
meditative ‘La Maga’, this is another album
highlight, dubby and trippy, with the synth
lines working to great effect, it has the feel
of the eighties but with a modern twist, as the
song progresses so the guitar begins to figure
more prominently, laying out some long loping
melodies, ending with the sound of waves
crashing on the shore. This album is a fine
addition to the bands catalogue and one which is
a definite sea change.
(Andrew Young)
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CARRIE
MARTIN – SEDUCTIVE SKY
LP from Psychotron Records www.psychotronrecords.com
Acoustic guitar playing singer songwriter Carrie from
Hull has been playing with mentor Gordon Giltrap
for a few years and has been bought by him to
the attention of Pete and Linda Bonner’s
Psychotron records, who have just released her
debut album, in an edition of 300 purple vinyl
copies all with signed poster.
Other notable guests apart from Gordon include Oliver
Wakeman, Elliot Randall and Daniel Cassidy.
Touchstones for the album would be Janis Ian,
Kate Bush and Joni Mitchell. Carrie is an
excellent acoustic guitarist and also a fine
singer.
The album begins with a harrowing tale of child abuse
‘Maria in the Moon’, a song inspired by the
novel of the same name. This is followed by the
short but sweet acoustic guitar instrumental
‘The Flight of the Dragonfly’, before the Celtic
flavour of ‘The Dancing Dragonfly’, hoves into
view, enlivened by some fine violin playing. It
works well and is an early album highlight.
‘Paper Thin’, sees Carrie discoursing on the
fragility of life. Side one closer ‘Purple
Heart’ features some excellent electric guitar
from Elliot and proves to be quite a catchy
folk-rock song.
‘Time’, features some pretty, finger picked acoustic
guitar and stately piano, it is a fairly sad
affair dealing with the loss of a loved one and
a dream of turning back time. ‘Holly Blue’, is a
fairly sparse delicate ballad about one of my
favourite butterflies, it has some nice cello,
double tracked backing vocals and some very
pretty acoustic guitars. ‘Heartbeat (Make
Everyday Last), is a wintery song with some nice
harmonics, it progresses intoa catchy mid paced
rocker, again some nice piano but for me the
drums are a tad too insistent. ‘No Return to
Yesterday’, is a beautifully orchestrated
acoustic folk-rock song about looking forward,
acoustic guitar and violin weave and mesh
together to fine effect, plenty of space for the
instruments to shine out. Which brings us to the
album closer ‘The Women in Me’, a wistful
yearning song which in turns becomes more
expansive with a few percussive passages, but
it’s mainly informed by Carrie’s acoustic guitar
figures. All the songs on the album have been
written by Carrie, and I hope she does well with
this release thereby enabling her to release
further recordings which I look forward to
hearing should any materialize.
(Andrew
Young)
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THE
PETARDS – PET ARTS
Double Vinyl LP from www.bear-family.com
German record label Bear Family, have been raiding
the archives of Liberty records and have just
released the fourth album by German band The
Petards. A band who started out in the sixties
playing a typical kind of sixties rock similar
to The Tages and progressed to Hendrix style
pyrotechnics with the addition of a guitar
player Bernd Wippich, who was certainly in
thrall to Jimi and was picked after 60 guitar
players auditioned for the position. The album
was originally released in early 1971 and is
generally considered to be the best album they
made, it now sees a re-release almost fifty
years later; it was also the last record the
band made before splitting up. A further album
Burning Rainbows appeared in 1981 but it dated
from recordings also made in 1971 prior to the
split.
Consisting of brothers Klaus and Horst Ebert both
guitar and vocals, with Roger Waldmann and Arno
Dittrich, the album was recorded in the famous
Dierks-Studio in Stommeln.
Highlights for me are the rather groovy Spirit like
‘Rainy Day’, with its Randy California guitar
styling. The fairly fuzz tastic ‘Cowboy’ all
choogling piano and furious guitar bursts. The
medley of ‘Willies Gun/Windy’s Nevermore’, is a
pairing of heavy rock songs with hints of cream
or maybe the Groundhogs. ‘Long Way Back Home’,
has some flute and fluid electric guitars
running throughout it. ‘Big Boom’, sees some
fine double tracked guitars bursting out all
over the shop with some excellent driving
drumming and as it develops it drops in some
clever nods to King Crimson’s 21st
Century Schizoid Man, nice.
‘Too Many Heavens’, is a winner, a groover of the
first order, wah wah, roto toms, piano and mad
bass and percussion being the order of the day,
as it stops and starts throughout its duration,
going through plenty of changes. ‘Flame Missing
Light’, sees the band in thrall to Led Zeppelin;
as were many bands of the time, such a seismic
impact did they make on the scene with the
release of their debut album. ‘On the Road
Drinking Wine’, is another little gem, plenty of
electric piano and some lovely fluid electric
guitars on the bounce. ‘Baby Man’, is imbued
with some tasty riffs, hints of Quicksilver in
the duelling guitars of Klaus and Horst.
‘Spectrum’, follows this and the less said about
it the better, it’s basically a seven minute
drum solo. The album ends with ‘Hello, My
Friend’, a fine end to this pretty decent album,
swirling keyboards, driving rhythms, mad piano
and some great guitar lines.
(Andrew
Young)
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OLD
MEXICO – OLD MEXICO
(LP on Cardinal
Fuzz Records)
Old Mexico is the name given by Jason Simon of Dead
Meadow fame to his assembled ‘band of merry
pranksters’ (as tagged by SF Weekly) which he
leads on a journey through the sonic landscape
between Americana and improvisation on this self
titled release. The merry pranksters in
question, Dave Mihaly and Trans Van Santos,
bring a range of influence and musical colour to
a loose and impressionistic album which combines
fine songwriting grounded in Americana of both
the old and new weird west whilst straying off
the beaten path to explore new frontiers.
The record starts with ‘Past the Western Wall’ which
is in many respects its centrepiece. At nearly
fourteen minutes it covers an awful lot of
ground in terms of mood and music. It begins
with an ‘on the porch’ or American pastoral feel
of sparse laid back guitars, gentle harmonies
and sax laden melodies on a summer’s night, but
the storm clouds soon gather and an extended
improvisation takes over with yelps of guitar,
skittering drums and a rumble of free jazz
squall. There’s a looseness of feel but equally
a sense of order and direction to the
instrumental passage which is grounded in
Grateful Dead style adventures in sound with
added Coltrane like bursts of rising and falling
intensity and a touch of post rock shredding and
experimentation. The final section of the piece
returns to the opening melody and is an
appropriately calm conclusion after quite a
trip.
‘Stellar Jay’ follows and is a lovely melodic and
quite gentle country rock song but elevated from
mere ordinariness by subtle sax, guitar soli and
percussive colourings. Next up ‘Black Matador’
at nearly seven minutes in length. It has a laid
back smoky jazz and blues feel in its plucked
electric guitar melody and sax with a touch of
Morphine and The Dream Syndicate/Steve Wynn also
evident in the overall sound to these ears which
is a very good thing indeed. ‘The Old Ones’
takes us on another change of direction with a
1950’s touch of echo to the underlying guitar
melody and something a little more Floydian in
the guitar and sax interplay mid song. The
vocal, also drenched in echo, has a slightly
detached post punk edge which all adds up to a
fine head nodding tune. With the next track
‘Neon Tree’ the theme is firmly old country
blues which slowly ramps up the intensity into a
nice little stomper. The finale is ‘Madeleine
Kahn’ a beautiful impressionistic piece with
sparse electric guitar and jangling percussion
which touches on desert blues and guitar soli
and evokes a lonely, windswept desolate beauty.
It’s a very fine way to conclude this record.
Old Mexico is an absolute joy to listen to and
inhabits the space between composed Americana
and improvisation very comfortably. There is
fine songcraft, invention and imagination at
play here and whilst it covers a lot of
influences it does so with style. Whilst todays
Mexican narrative may be around ridiculous ideas
to build a wall, Old Mexico are quietly getting
on with dismantling borders to great effect and
long may that continue.
(Francis
Comyn)
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COSEY
FANNI TUTTI – TUTTI
(LP/CD on Conspiracy
International Records)
Outside of the Throbbing Gristle years, Cosey Fanni
Tutti has been prolific in the worlds of art and
music and in 2017 her autobiography ‘ART SEX
MUSIC’ was published to no little acclaim.
Although Cosey has released a wealth of music in
collaborations such as Chris and Cosey or Carter
Tutti Void, ‘Tutti’ is only her second solo
record following on from 1982’s recently
reissued ‘Time To Tell’.
‘Tutti’ started life as a soundtrack to the
autobiographical film ‘Harmonic Coumaction’
which was performed as part of the Hull UK City
of Culture programme in 2017. The eight
soundscapes originally forming that soundtrack
have now been updated at Cosey’s Norfolk studio
as this free standing release.
‘Tutti’ starts with the title track, all swirling
atmosphere and lonesome jazzy cornet which soon
develops an urgent repeating synthesised riff
propelled by a dance beat over which sporadic
bursts of cornet and ambient colours
occasionally float. If ECM records did dance
music it could sound like this.
‘Drone’ changes the mood and has a more
techno informed beat with darker, denser washes
of sound and what could easily be the midnight
sounds of jungle undergrowth coming to life.
‘Moe’ introduces sound treatments with a hint of
exotica and indeed kosmische over a tribal style
rhythm. ‘Sophic Ripple’ has a more spacey
ambience with rhythmic bursts of rippling
electric shards and waves of woozy drones and
pulses which straddle the cosmic and the
industrial. The darker, more experimental edges
of kosmische and ambient industrial soundscapes
are explored in ‘Split’ where the urgency of
previous tracks is taken down a notch and sound
colours and textures come more to the fore.
Tangerine Dream was one band that came to mind
when I first heard ‘Heliy’ which carries on the
more textural ambience of the previous track but
with a kind of disembodied dance quality to the
ghostly almost gothic vocal incantation and
fractured melody and beat weaving into the mix.
‘En’ is quite beautiful in a faintly sinister,
lonesome, lost in deep space kind of way with
its cosmic pulses and drones, distant beats, and
wailing waves of distorted sound combining to
great effect and elegance. The final piece
‘Orenda’ takes this mood to a glacial almost
celestial finale with lush waves of kosmische
beauty, stately minimalistic beats and
occasional percussive shards like falling ice or
distant chimes. It’s a beautiful piece of music
to finish with and a perfect sound painting for
the mind.
This is a wonderful album where references to Cosey’s
musical life and influences clearly inform these
soundscapes which in turn evoke a whole range of
moods, emotions and imaginings for the listener.
You could try to think about the
autobiographical self portrait and feelings that
Cosey has imbued the individual tracks with or
simply take this as an album to immerse yourself
in for its listening pleasures and create your
own soundworld to enjoy.
(Francis
Comyn)
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KUNGENS
MÄN – CHEF
(LP on Riot
Season Records)
Kungens Män are a six piece band hailing from
Stockholm who have been together since 2012.
Whilst being firmly grounded in heavy
psychedelic space rock territory their albums to
date have shown they are not averse to touching
base with other influences including free jazz,
drone and krautrock to experiment with their
sound.
‘Chef’ is their first record for Riot Season and it
may or may not disappoint readers to know that
these are not songs about food and cookery.
‘Chef’ is in fact Swedish for boss or chief but
it’s fair to say that although we are not
talking food here, Kungens Män have brought a
hearty stew of sound to the table.
The record consists of four lengthy tracks, each
displaying a different aspect of the Kungens Män
sound. Opening track ‘Fyrkantig Böjelse’ is very
much rooted in krautrock with a classic motorik
beat and insistent bassline underpinning eleven
minutes of guitar explorations that build from
wispy flurries of eastern influenced notes and
harmonics into a meatier space rock workout with
dense guitar interplay consisting of clouds of
high flying notes and squalls of intense pedal
powered riffing. It builds up a fine head of
steam and whilst getting looser and wilder as
the track progresses it always manages to stay
just on the right side of chaos. After this
opening onslaught, ‘Öppen För Stängda Dörrar’
takes the pace down a little but keeps the
electricity levels high. It’s slower, swampier
bass fuelled vibe provides the foundation for a
dense mix of heavy cymbal driven percussion,
ominous electronic screams and drones and an
exploratory heavy psychedelic guitar ambience
combining a jangly melody and spacey solo
beautifully. ‘Män Med Medel’ is ten minutes of
heavyweight rhythm and riff bound to get the
head nodding and toe tapping furiously – or you
could even dance! As if this wasn’t enough,
topping off this brain frying beast of a track
is some fairly unhinged guitar work which sounds
like Hawkwind fighting through a blizzard led by
Keiji Haino as guide. After this righteous
assault on the senses, the album concludes
sensibly with ‘Eftertankens Blanka Krankhet’,
another lengthy eleven minute piece which brings
calm to the proceedings with a meditative, more
hypnotic psychedelic exploration not without its
own intensity but with plenty of space to
breathe and perfect to calmly and satisfyingly
bring this fine album to a gentle end.
Kungens Män are fairly new to me but on this form
I’ll be watching out with great interest for
their next recordings and also exploring
previous records. ‘Chef’ has provided a Michelin
starred meal deal indeed and as Phil Collins
might say ‘No Jacket Potato Required’.
(Francis
Comyn)
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TENGGER
– SEGYE
(LP/CD on Cardinal
Fuzz Records)
The evolution of Tengger can be traced through
notable events. The story begins in Seoul, South
Korea in 2005 as ‘10’ followed by the subtle
renaming to (((10))) to mark the huge earthquake
hitting Japan in 2011. A rebranding to Tengger
followed for what was now a travelling, touring
family unit consisting of core band members itta
and Marqido with son RAAI. ‘Segye’ or ‘world’
began to take shape in Seoul in the midst of
demonstrations against President Geun-hye Park
in 2016. It was originally released on cassette
by Gurugur Brain but has now been mastered for a
lovely red vinyl release by Cardinal Fuzz
Records.
‘Segye’ opens with ‘Donggrami’ which features a
vibrant, jaunty pulse at its core and a drone
not unlike Charlemagne Palestine with perhaps a
subtle hint of Autobahn in its sound and feel.
There’s a recurring wordless vocal phrase
punctuating the tune and a more hymnal vocal
briefly fights its way through the electro haze
a little later in the piece. It’s an arresting
opening track that grabs your attention and very
good things are expected to follow which they
most certainly do. ‘Haeoragi’ is essentially
minimal and an audio flashback to the German
electronic pioneers of the seventies in its
‘vintage’ analogue feel. The sound of older
technology gives it a stark, icy, monochrome but
stately grandeur and a simple elegance in the
way it slowly introduces layers of sparse and
unfussy overlapping sounds to make the sum of
its parts a very good thing indeed over nearly
eight minutes. I would happily listen to a
complete side of this music and its simple,
hypnotic joy. ‘Ollim’ raises the tempo again
with a pulsing melody and a vocal with ethereal
echoes of Liz Fraser or Lisa Gerrard in a dense
soup of beats, drones and static teetering on
the edge of chaos. It’s the musical soundtrack
to sensory overload in a new city which keeps
building until a sudden stop. A short interlude
of dark rhythmic electronic ambience simmers in
‘Eeeum’, followed by more austere minimalist
beauty in ‘Gubigubi Badabada’ which never seems
to develop a clear forward momentum but
nonetheless satisfies itself and this listeners
ears with a recurring, slightly woozy dreamscape
with harmonium drones, raga like themes and
simple repeating melodies and distant almost
ghostly vocals blending beautifully. Again,
minimal composers such as Terry Riley came to
mind when listening to this and that can only be
a good thing.
Another short interlude follows with ‘Gogae’, a
simple, stark blend of overlapping drones
creating dark textures before ‘Neoulneoul’ takes
us to a land of deep reverberating pulses and
delicate waves and washes of sound which has a
gorgeous, minimal and
dreamy kosmische and dare I say it
Eno-esque quality, strangely both calming and
brooding at once. The finale is ‘Geuglag
Wansaeng’ which begins with a much more
prominent electronic beat than elsewhere on the
record. Waves of treated and distorting
electronics, ghostly vocals and pulsing
synthesised melodies combine an industrial core
with gothic folk melodies and drama. It’s stormy
and elemental at times, an effect emphasised
perhaps by the sound of lapping water which
permeates the track and it’s a stunning ending
to this fine record.
Tengger were new to me until very recently but it’s
fair to say I’ve been completely enchanted by
this wonderful record. There are lots of
influences at play and I hear respectful and
intelligent nods to Cluster, Eno, Kraftwerk,
minimalist composers, industrial electronica,
gothic folk and the 4AD sound to name but some.
There is also an individuality at work here too
where Tengger are informed and inspired by their
travels, environment and life experiences and
that helps elevate this record from being simply
pleasant and clever pastiche to a personalised
soundtrack to a life journey. I’m eagerly
awaiting the next steps of the Tengger journey
but in the meantime seek out and explore the
pleasures of this record and you won’t be
disappointed.
(Francis
Comyn)
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BERT
SOMMER – THE ROAD TO TRAVEL and INSIDE BERT
SOMMER
(LP/CD)
This
year is the 50th anniversary of
Woodstock. The
festival continues to inspire countless books,
record and film releases.
There’s even an online project called
Woodstock Complete, which, over the span of
several years, has compiled about 32 CDs worth
of every last bit and piece of known recordings,
from both official and unofficial sources, in
the original festival sequence, including local
news reports and interviews.
We’ve
been looking at artists who didn’t hit the big
time after playing Woodstock.
Last month we discussed Stillwater.
Now, here’s Bert Sommer.
Sommer got his start around 1967 when he
joined baroque popsters The Left Banke.
He was brought in by friend and main
Bankester Michael Brown to replace Steve Martin,
who sang “Walk Away Renee.”
Sommer would record a few songs with The
Left Banke, earning high praise from Brown.
He also wrote songs for The Vagrants,
Leslie West’s band which would evolve into
Mountain. Mountain
would play the Sommer-penned “Beyond the Sea” at
Woodstock. In
November 1967, Sommer would get two other breaks
in the same week:
a role in the West Coast version of the
musical “HAIR” (which he’d continue on Broadway
in 1968) and an album deal.
Indeed,
it would be Sommer’s hair which graced the
playbill of the show.
One look at the fellow and you can see
why. He
had a magnificent, stupendous mane of frizz.
It makes me think of the line in Warren
Zevon’s “Werewolves of London” about the
werewolf drinking a pina colada at Trader Vic’s
– “and his hair was perfect!”
With typical humility, Sommer would later
say “I was involved in the two most famous
counterculture events of the 60s – HAIR and
Woodstock. That
and a token will get you on the New York
Subway.”
That
album deal would be 1968’s “The Road to Travel.”
Released on Capitol Records, it was
produced by Artie Kornfeld.
In 1969, as one of the organizers of
Woodstock, Kornfeld would bring Sommer into the
lineup for a slot on Friday evening.
The album is not unlike Tim Buckley’s
1966 debut; full of sensitive folky
singer-songwriter fare with plenty of
orchestration, folk-rock full band tracks, or
solo tracks with just him on guitar with vocals.
Sommer had a great voice, and his singing
can range from gentle to strongly authoritative,
with the Broadway experience no doubt providing
fertile training.
Opener
“And When It’s Over” is one of those
orchestrated tracks, and is dated in both
production and lyrics, in a likeable, kitschy,
romantic 60s movie sort of way.
“And when it’s over/And as you light your
cigarette/…Touching your shoulder/Feeling the
joy in what we’ve done.”
Just feel the syrup oozing.
Sommer
would perform the next song, “Jennifer,” at
Woodstock. The
album track features just Sommer singing and
playing guitar.
It’s a lovely song, and for trivia’s
sake, it’s written about Jennifer Warnes, a
fellow HAIR cast member who’d later score a huge
hit herself with “The Right Time of the Night.”
He
also has a predilection for sing-songy twee
songs like “Things Are Going My Way,” which
sounds like a cross between Simon and
Garfunkel’s “Feelin’ Groovy” and a Petula
Clark/Tony Hatch production.
Several
tracks are about the generation gap, such as the
title song “The Road to Travel” and “A Note That
Read,” both about ongoing fights with a father
who’s ashamed of his hippy son.
One wonders how autobiographical they may
have been.
Folk-Rocker
“A Simple Man” shows off Sommer’s impressive
vocal range. The
penultimate track “Brink of Death,” another
orchestrated affair, is about a man’s final
thoughts as he lay dying.
The album ends with “A Note That Read,”
about a suicide note from a young man to his
parents about no longer being an eternal
disappointment to them.
The juxtaposition of “Brink of Death” and
“A Note That Read” is interesting, as the former
makes no mention of suicide or motive, while the
latter is all angst.
If they were meant to be a set, it’s an
interesting pair, if a real downer way to end
the album.
By
all accounts, Sommer gave a strong performance
at Woodstock, even receiving a standing ovation,
as the announcer bade farewell to “the rather
magnificent Mr. Bert Sommers (sic).”
Sommers (aargh – now I did it!) – SOMMER
- would
later joke “Yeah, I got the standing ovation…on
their way to the bathrooms.”
The rap on why he didn’t make the movie
or the albums - and subsequent fame and fortune
- is supposedly that he was on Capitol Records,
and Warner Brothers, who held the rights to the
film and albums, didn’t want to help the
competition. In
2009, with the release of the Rhino 6-disk
“Woodstock 40” collection, three songs from
Sommer’s set would finally see the light of day:
“Jennifer,” “And When It’s Over” and
“Smile.”
In
1970, Sommer released his follow-up LP, “Inside
Bert Sommer.” If
you’ve seen or heard of The Coen Brothers’ movie
“Inside Llewyn Davis” about a struggling
Greenwich Village folkie in the early ‘60s, it
elicits a chuckle that there really is an
“Inside Bert Sommer” album title.
But the album’s no joke.
Featuring a greatly stripped-down
production from the debut, this one mainly has a
smaller, tighter studio band.
It’s an improvement over “The Road to
Travel.”
The
album includes the very catchy upbeat tracks
“Smile,” (performed at Woodstock) and “We’re All
Playin’ in the Same Band” (written at
Woodstock). If
“The Road to Travel” had Daddy issues, “Inside
Bert Sommer” has junkie issues.
Both “Uncle Charlie,” about a drug
dealer, and “I’ve Got to Try/Zip Zap,” about a
junkie trying to survive, are about the demon
drugs.
Bert
Sommer would never hit it big, and passed away
in 1990 of respiratory illness, only 41.
He did go back to acting for a spell,
appearing in the children’s TV show “The Krofft
Supershow” in 1976.
He deserved better.
His first two albums are good slices of
late 60s/early 70s singer-songwriter music,
though not without flaws, certainly worth
hearing.
(Mark
Feingold)
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