Purling Hiss - Weirdon (Drag City)

Opening with a squeal of feedback, Purling Hiss' new release marks a change of direction for the band; from low-down Acid Rock sludge to high-flying Indie. Brought to centre stage, founding member Mike Polizze's bedroom song writing fuses a great many styles from the American alternative scene: the skuzzy guitar pop of Dinosaur Jr, the heavy, moody grunge of Nirvana and Mudhoney - even flashes of those upbeat college rockers Husker Du.

While I hesitate to say it, Weirdon could be described as 'more accessible', a phrase often met with disdain and, in worse cases, can result in the severing of an original and dedicated fan base. Stoned rockers and headbangers can rest at ease though, the band haven't abandoned their dishevelled class and love of face melting jams. Instead, they've found a satisfying balance between the structured and the loose, the familiar and the uneasy that will only be guilty of picking up more attention.

Tracks like 'Sundance Saloon Boogie' and 'Learning Slowly' slam through verse, chorus, verse, chorus, only to shift gears and take off into psychedelic trips of soaring guitar melodies over steady beats. They are what all jams should be: sweet and colourful and mixed thick and sticky. Sadly, the second half doesn't quite maintain this trajectory. After cooling down with the smoky Kinks-like 'Reptili-A-Gena' and the kicking 'Where's Sweetboy', it begins to deflate and sag. By the time 'I Don't Wanna Be A...' arrives, moping about not making the track selection for Nirvana's Nevermind, I lost interest. Fortunately 'Six Ways To Sunday', a baked ballad with a blinding guitar solo, brings the mood back and dispels all doubts that Weirdon is a truly fantastic ride.

In this algorithmic age of ambition, achievement and perfection, it's unsurprising the slacker ethos never really went away. Through music, Purling Hiss capture that old wisdom behind lazy resistance. If boredom is the catalyst of creativity, then let it all go. We're all just winging it. Weirder is better. Play it loud. Play it cool.

(© Copyright 2014 Brendan Morgan)

Tobacco - Maniac Meat (Anticon)

Every so often a record comes along that is so filthy, so depraved, it’s impossible to avert your attention. Tobacco’s newest venture, Maniac Meat is one of these. All sixteen tracks, arranged in a mosaic of derogation, drug nightmares and 80’s video nasties; told of course with a pinch of wit, could quite easily soundtrack Naked Lunch: The Videogame.

Ronaldo Fauntroy straddles his role as the front man for Black Moth Super Rainbow with the Tobacco solo project, sharing material between them both – his habit for vocoder vocals being one. The chubby grainy synths and tacky drum pads had always lent itself to a club atmosphere. But what club? Where would you hear something with such a dubious sexual subtext? It’s not S&M or bestiality being suggested; no, the halarious horror and revulsion one feels can only be compared to accidentally bursting in on someone performing cunning lingus on a sweaty bulbous monster.

*Cough* … or watching a zombie film. Don’t let my crass interpretation put you off. In all seriousness Maniac Meat is a great record elaborating on Tobacco’s taste for retro electronica and his love of the grotesque, as related two years ago in an interview with Kotori “There’s something seriously fucked about workout tapes from the mid 80s, and just about everything obscure on beta tape. They make me feel awful, but really good and curious at the same time. […] I’m trying to translate that feeling.”

Besides which, the release contains many, more family friendly moments. Two tracks featuring the familiar ramblings of Beck (‘Fresh Hex’ and ‘Grape Aerosmith’) are certainly two of the albums finest additions, even if they are too short. Elsewhere, the depraved imagery and slow groove in ‘Heavy Makeup’ twists and turns and slithers under your skin. There are times, mainly towards the end, when its unsettling tone is somewhat forced, verging on exhausting – a disjointed album structure doesn't help – but on such excellent tracks as ‘Sweatmother’ (an evil and infectious blaze of distortion bass and squealing pitch bends) and ‘New Juices From The Hot Tub Freaks’ (a prime example of his hip hop tendencies) it is flawlessly executed.

Compared with his other work, solo or otherwise, Maniac Meat’s nuances come at no surprise but they do seem to have taken on a higher class. No other artist can replicate Ronaldo’s particular analog fetishism and skuzzy beats as it crawls through your mind grinning its shit eating grin. In the words of an old friend of mine “How could it be wrong if it feels so right?”

(© Copyright 2010 Brendan Morgan)

Shabby Rogue - By Hook and By Crook

Being accommodating and hard working musicians, Shabby Rogue try and be all bands for everyone by lending their hand to a host of styles. Their second outing By Hook And By Crook spreads on a thicker layer of Romantic Folk cliché and ticks off every box on the rustic charm checklist: weathered wilds, Bohemian living, the wandering outsider and of course, hard liquor; which sounds good…

As track after track turns into tick after tock, Shabby Rogue become grey and inconsequential and the record, an impassionate assortment of oddity. The songs all reflect a hobo chic with foot stomping rhythms and classic 60’s guitar. During ‘Old Man’ the lead singer (they all share vocal spots) despairingly lurches into the bland heartache of American Rock and ‘Tales From the City’ is dangerously close to a ditched Kasabian number.

The record is not without a few left field moments: The unexpected shift in gear towards the end of ‘Jack in a Box’, the complex song-in-song structure of ‘Reason’ serve as tantalising fragments of possibility. These happenings are few and far between.

Even the distorted Folk-Punk fusion – or hillbilly punk, I haven’t quite decided – of ‘My Life As A Secret Agent’, a feverish injection of The Troggs style Rock n’ Roll is forcibly jabbed into the middle of a comparatively demure and conventional album (Chosen as their debut single, ‘My Life…’ received some airtime on national radio, ushered in by an ever present demand for authentic retro.)

Alas, the dusty roads that Shabby Rogue walk along have been flattened by the feet of many before. A no-bollocks-approach to recording may have evolved in the studio but (they vaguely admit this themselves) constricting funds, time restrictions and “substance abuse” hindered their final product. The low fi violence and raw live realism they were aiming for is definitely missing and while some bands benefit from slap dash studio work, Shabby Rogue need a better starting point to capture their respected live set on tape.

(© Copyright 2010 Brendan Morgan)

The Black Angels (and Wolfmother) at Brixton Academy: 21/01/10

So how do you accurately recreate that 60’s vibe in an anal and corporate controlled society? Answer: You can’t. Even the hypnotic life affirming experience that is The Black Angels was not enough to shake off the cold and inhuman atmosphere of a gig in Hitler’s crows nest.

To get in and out of the O2 run Brixton Academy, even for a smoke, you have to get through a chain of SS goons, or ‘stewards’ as they call themselves. And they’re everywhere you turn, standing around like the miserable voyeurs they are; at every door, along the balconies, looking over your shoulder while you take a piss. The entire building is locked down like a military installation and with good reason, because Brixton is a tough side of town. Why not? Scrutinise and intimidate the kids until they feel low down and criminal. None of us can be trusted.

As press, I was given a pass to the VIP bar (a clever gimmick) reserved for the bands and their friends. Their plan: to coax the journalists into it and away from where all the real action is. From way up there with your four pound bottle of beer, looking out through the wide plastic windows, you can see just about everything and it transforms the gig into a spectator sport. The arena was packed and the floor bobbed and waved in a sea of human heads. There was beer flying overhead and baying for the headline, for Wolfmother’s arrival. I wasn’t fussed. I was there for The Black Angels after all.

On tour with the matriarch, all the way from Austin, Texas, The Black Angels caught my ear with their powerful 2006 album Passover. Pitchfork deemed the release “for the nostalgic […] and the monumentally stoned” which was apt, because at the time, I was both. An unholy union between Black Sabbath and The Velvet Underground, the band’s reverberating drones and mysticism are anchored to earth by the terrific weight of foot stomping Americana and echoing doom: “We can’t live, but we’re too afraid to die”.

On this evening, The Black Angels’ impenetrable sense of dread was shattered by a temperate reaction. The poor and heavily distorted mix didn’t help matters, being unable to give their layered style much needed space. Worst hit, were tracks such as ‘The First Vietnamese War’, a salute to time past and a parallel of our own hopeless war. What I gathered from overheard and one on one conversation displayed a similar frustration, though the residing opinion was one of nodding respect and interest and their subdued performance only heightened the intrigue. They had made an impression.

The O2 does controlled and organised fun like no one else. Its commodification of music seems to be in direct contradiction to Rock’s free spirit and left me with an empty gig experience. Irritably drunk, I left just as Wolfmother’s grip on the crowd was beginning to wane. I will be seeing The Black Angels again, most definitely, just not at any O2 arena. Among many other things we’ve lost, Brixton Academy should be returned to the people.

(© Copyright 2010 Brendan Morgan)

Fryars - Dark Young Hearts

Our interest in the past is getting pretty obsessive isn’t it? Think of some classic old band and there’ll be a contemporary equivalent for sure. Shit, the band you’re thinking of is probably imminently reforming due to their own retro addiction, an obsession with their own past. Fryars, a solo project by one Ben Garrett, has a specific intention: 80’s art electro. It achieves it too, spot on, but don’t worry. Dark Young Hearts is fortunately more than just market filler.

Straight off, Ben’s voice style is a dead ringer for Franz Ferdinand’s Alex Kapranos. Certain tracks, such as “The Ides” with its club indie rhythm, even sound like the group too. Ben is 19, self taught and has a fascination with the subconscious and the fictional. “A Last Result” feels very Syd Barrett with its silly song structure, particular English insanity and surreal, Louis Carroll-like imagery. No arguments, “when the mind is a mushroom, but the words come easily” is a damn good line and the track is definitely Ben’s best.

We have the masterful Steven Hague (producer of The Pet Shop Boys and New Order) to blame for its electro-glam tendencies. “Lakehouse” and “Visitors” sees Hague slap on the emotion: Casio synthesiser leads over rolling electro drum pads. Trouble is, it reeks of sweaty shoulder pads, pot noodle and Tears For Fears. The cracks do give way thankfully, and we catch glimpses of substance behind the yuppie disco fest. The final track “Morning” is a warm and sumptuous, symphonic anthem that leaves you on a reassuring farewell.

While on the support circuit, Ben had received seductive winks from the top labels. Yes, the big guys in the big suits had got down from their big, spinney chairs to extend him a hand. Don’t do it Ben! Give the Music Industry the finger and stay independent. Admittedly, this is all too easy to say and, like so many others before him, it’ll be hard to hold against them forever. Fryars’ catchy, naturally cool idiom and breezy energy could see the dark ones returning again and again.

(© Copyright 2009 Brendan Morgan)

Sleepy Sun - "Embrace"

The country still drives on; only now, perhaps, with nervous caution. Maybe it's time we sunk back into dreamy escapism or, better yet, some self confidence. The debut album Embrace by Sleepy Sun invites us do just that. It oozes Americana cool from every pore conjuring images of dusty plains and roads disappearing over the horizon. In Britain, this is the USA we love.

Originating from Santa Cruz and then onto San Francisco, they pay homage to a wild, strange and eccentric part of America with a vibrant history. Rachael Williams and Bret Constantino’s swaggering voices demand your attention. They growl and moan with expressive breaths over some of the filthiest blues-rock and herb induced jams around. I continually have to remind myself that this is their debut. The opener, New Age, blasts like a motorbike exhaust; it's then you realise the road trip has started. Lord is an expertly handled lazy rock ballad and, later on, the early days of black metal rip through the moshingly good White Dove.

Of course they don't always get it right. Slow motion drums and comically über-compressed bass nearly topple the effect. Vast, layered guitar solos slip into a kind of navel-gazing competition between one another leaving the listener behind. And duet lyrics such as "Baby don't worry/ don't be silly" are... questionable. Sure, it's not a flawless release, but the short, compact length and blaring confidence mark them tailors among fools. This is drifting and heavy, trippy and twisted, effortlessly cool rock. It gives you the fuel you need to put aviator shades on and take it easy.

(© Copyright 2009 Brendan Morgan)

Let's finally say 'Fuck Off' to self perscribed Retro

Do you ever feel like you're living in reverse, or in a remake of an old film? We live in an age of permanent denial. It's an age of... what? What is it that will define us? Well, I sincerely hope isn't apathy, blissful ignorance and an incredible lust for hyper-reality. It's become increasingly difficult to view music videos or band photos and guess when, in what year or decade, they were produced. I ask you, why listen to a current artist attempting to emulate a specific sound of the past when you can just go and listen to the bands of the past? It's because some poor fools can't let the past be the past. They slouch around wishing it was like it was in the old days, or, if they happen to be younger, feel alienated from the world around them. They see the freedom that once was and seek out music representative of this. The Music Industry is more than happy to respond. Welcome to the world of google-search shopping, databases and advertisements that know you better than your own mother. And if you've got an original idea, there's probably already a niche market and a demographic for it. Enough is enough! I want to feel alive in the unpredictable 'now', in my own god-damn decade and part of my own generation. I refuse to be constantly nostalgic of eras long gone that I didn't grow up in.

In The Guardian today, a live review written by Kitty Empire of a budding pop starlett called La Roux brought all this to my attention. More than often The Guardian is guilty of fanning the flames of hype. Before a music scene has the chance to achieve maturity or greatness the newspaper is all over it like a walrus in a swimming pool. I can't say I've read anything from Ms Empire that exceeds empty drivel. This review, however, topped it. In the opening paragraph she tries to describe the music to the reader but with no success "[La Roux] cites early Eurythmics as guiding lights. She borrows shamelessly from Prince's 'When Doves Cry'". It's boring, and what's worse, completely uninformative. Later on Kitty meanders about appearence, as all morons do, to convay at least something to us. "La Roux's other touchstone is her hair [...] It is a hairdo that speaks a thousand words". So why didn't the hairdo write the article then? At this point, I'd filed La Roux under forget-and-move-on.

In Kitty Empire's own words "the 20-year-old La Roux is perhaps the most obsessed with a decade she is too young to remember". She's not alone in this regard. Like Lily Allen and Adele, these over privilaged, born-into-fame-spawns write music like they live on the moon, looking down on the earth through their hazy telescope. Never thought I'd say it but even Kate Nash is better than this. These icons are given the 'voice of a generation' garland, but they are false prophets.

Instead, give us a new form of Bob Dylan, a down and out, someone who makes mistakes, an everyman with understanding and wisdom. That's the kind of Retro For Recession we need. Not, to quote Kitty, "an Eighties revival so vivid it classes as a re-run". Haven't we already seen plenty of eighties comebacks? If not, someone should tell Sissor Sisters, Interpol or Late of the Pier. I'm sure these artists, and many others, would like to know they'd been screwed. Are we going to be spinning our wheels for eternity? Maybe, because all this has happened before, over and over and over again.