Sweaty, noisy, punk rock music has returned in the form of Calling All Monsters.
CALLING ALL MONSTERS
THE TRAPS THAT WORK BEST
Turn
These four lads from San Fransisco have stripped away a lot of the pomposity from guitar music and present it in a pure, molten form. This is how rock and roll should be played, with real (I’m searching for the right word here) “oomph”. The Traps That Work Best is by no means the most perfectly formed record that you will ever hear but it really blows away the cobwebs that have been formed by what seems like eons of listening to James Blunt. The opening line to album opener “We Are: Special Forces” say it all, “What we sez is what we sez/ What we needs is what we needs” no pretense, no messing about, just loud guitars with simple but catchy riffs and great tunes. Think 1970s British punk with splashes of the Wedding Present thrown in for good measure. It is difficult to pick a favorite from this bunch of tunes as they are pretty much all great but in addition to the above tune “Western Style Town” is a superb head bopping monster of a song that demands to be moshed to. Really, though there is not a dud on here. This is music to get all tired and sweaty to… an absolute breath of fresh air.
11 – 11 is about as perfect as one can get for a debut record. If guitar-based pop music is your thing, this should touch your buttons and get you on your feet. Only one of the 14 songs on this album is over the European legal limit for pop songs (Brussels finally ratified the “three-and-a-half-minute rule”). Voicst’s music erupts from your speakers full speed ahead, with a poptastic, guitar-heavy slab of — wait for it — songs. There are no fillers, no masturbatory guitar solos: just meaty, powerful, pop tunes. Drummer Joppe Molenaar describes their sound as being, “…somewhere between Beyonce and the Melvins,” and he really is right on the money.
VOICST
11-11
Intrigue Music
2006-08-01
“Porn”, with its refrain “…if you want to stick with me, you’d better like porn the way I do,” encapsulates their energy and attitude in just over three minutes. They have a “don’t give a f…” manner that percolates through the otherwise sunny, smiling demeanor of their music. Compared to the fluffy pop tunes that mainstream labels float our way, Voicst are porn. Indeed, if this album were a movie, there wouldn’t be much of a storyline, and no grand tracking shots or fancy camera angles. It would be straight to the “money shot” as soon as possible, and then on to another similarly successful set piece. They don’t waste time; they give us what we want and then move on and then give it again and again. Their music shows incredible staying power, and thankfully without a moustache or spotty behind in sight.
This Dutch trio is comprised of Tjeerd Bomhof (guitars and vocals), Joppe Molenaar (drums and samples), and Sven Woodside (bass and vocals). Musically, they are crazy horses from the same stable as Supergrass, who also shook up the pop world in the UK by writing staggeringly catchy, happy tunes when most of the bands around them were busy gazing in the direction of their navels. Like Supergrass, Voicst devote their own manic energy (Voicst means “manic energy” in South African slang) to bright and humorous tunes that make you glad to be alive, while also giving you something to think about.
This guitar-based outing has enough modern tinges to appeal to your discerning “noughties” kid. There are funky drum loops and samples that are effortlessly placed, strewn around the recording like scatter cushions. They don’t impact the overall décor, but add that certain “I don’t know what”… or as we say here in Holland, je ne sais quoi. So, while being succinct in their songwriting, these Amsterdammers also have a judicious ear for what sounds fit, without losing the desired impact by noodling off into silly-world. The album contains 13 great songs and one brief instrumental. Any record that contains proper songs played with such wanton enthusiasm is worth your hard-earned cash, whatever the currency.
It should come as no surprise that this stunning debut has won acclaim and awards for Voicst in their native Europe, the 3voor12 Award for “best Dutch album in the last twelve months” being only one of them. However, I cannot agree with this accolade. To limit the praise to only Dutch albums is just plain potty talk. 11 – 11 is the best album of 2006 so far, and will certainly be up there in my end-of-year top five. The bar has been raised and the gauntlet is down. I would love to hear a better collection of songs this year, but I won’t be holding my breath.
Disco Biscuits don’t play fair. They write songs, record them for posterity, and then never play them the same way again. Thus, if you fall in love with a recorded version of a song and then see them live, you will almost certainly be in for a shock. Your song, the object of your affection, is torn limb from limb and then put back together by someone who seemingly has no instruction book or familiarity with the original. Luckily, I had no such foreknowledge when I first heard this release. Familiarity with any of the tunes on this live recording would have sent me flying over the edge on to the jagged rocks below. The Wind at Four to Fly is one of those beasts that provoke an emotional response. It is a test of sorts. If you can listen to all two and a half hours (only 12 songs) without making an attempt on your own or anybody else’s life, then you are welcome to the inner “bisco” sanctum. And you are welcome to it.
DISCO BISCUITS
THE WIND AT FOUR TO FLY
Sci Fidelity
2006-04-18
“Bisco” is what Disco Biscuits and fans thereof call their musical style; it is essentially improvisations on a theme in the vein of, but not quite the same as, a jam session (I don’t have the time or the patience to explain; if you are interested check out their extensive entry on Wikipedia). Jam sessions are where musicians flex their musical muscle in the search for inspiration and that killer idea. A sort of melodic, brainstorming get-together. They should not be confused with performances. A performance [per·form·ance n] is “…a presentation of an artistic work to an audience, for example, a play or piece of music” (interestingly, a performance can also be “…a public display or behaviour that others find distasteful, for example, an angry outburst that causes embarrassment”). A jam session is more like practising. This is the stage before performance. With that in mind, think on how bands like Disco Biscuits can enforce a cover charge to their band practice and now it seems they are being allowed to release a double album of them rehearsing.
Great work if you can get it. I have a feeling that if you were to attend a Disco Biscuits gig, then a mixture of one part their grooves and four parts copious amounts of beer would equal one good night out. However, in the cold light of day the performance just doesn’t quite stand up to scrutiny. There are a number of bum notes and missed cues that rear their heads on this chronicle of their old drummer’s last performance with the band. So, for me it kind of misses the mark. However, had I been to this gig I would have a wonderful reminder, or perhaps my only memory, of the event. If you weren’t at the gig or are not already a fan of Disco Biscuits, there is little on The Wind at Four to Fly to grab you. In this respect I suggest that Disco Biscuits are preaching to the converted somewhat. This is how they can get away with the sheer length of the thing.
Furthermore, I would be derelict in my duty if I did not refer this release to the Society of Music Fans for the Elimination of Double-Disc Releases, for my colleague Jeff Vrabel to lock it forever into the vaults of the society’s own Room 101. Over to you, Mr. Vrabel.
When Billy Mackenzie committed suicide in 1997 at the age of 39, he left behind a wealth of unfinished material. Some of this material was more in the style of his electronic associations, and some were stark, brooding piano based compositions. This posthumous release falls firmly in the latter category. Transmission Impossible is a dark and haunting collection taken from Mackenzie’s personal archive recorded sometime between the demise of the Associates in 1990 and the singer’s own death. This 13-song set contains a mixed batch that showcases the transcendent quality of Mackenzie’s vocal capabilities.
BILLY MACKENZIE
TRANSMISSION IMPOSSIBLE
One Little Indian
2006-04-04
That there should be covers of songs by two artists who Mackenzie never made any secret of his affection for should shock no one. Moreover, the loving manner in which they are treated gives them such a charm that brings out the best in the performances. These two songs, “Wild is the Wind” (a Johnny Mathis tune made famous by David Bowie) and the Sparks classic “Never Turn Your Back on Mother Earth” are just perfect. Really, really lovely to listen to. Indeed, I would go as far as saying that only Mackenzie could have pulled off such a “in the style of Bowie” cover without it sounding like pastiche.
Transmission Impossible plays mostly like a version of Satie’s “Gymnopédies” with suitably cryptic lyrics. Nonetheless, like all works of art created by troubled genius, it has soaring highs and broken glass in gutter lows. Visitors to the Billy Mackenzie museum are led to ponder the sublime “Satellite Life” and “And This She Knows”, then as unwilling, but transfixed listeners, we are dragged to gape at the quite ludicrous “Liberty Lounge” and “At the Edge of the World” that frankly take the Berlin period Bowie template a little too far.
You have to ask yourself, if Billy Mackenzie were alive would he actually release this record? It is the record of a man freed of the record-making system and given the liberty to delve into unexplored emotions through the medium of song and tape. However, it is also the record of a man without a producer. Lest we forget that producers do not only prettify the sounds that artists produce, they also shape the songs and performances into the finished product. What we have here is something between demo and the deep blue CD.
That aside, it shows such promise to make you speculate what a wonderful album it might have been if it had been given that care and attention of say, a Scott Walker album. One can only hint at the greatness that might have been. But alas, this is not such an album. This album is a selection of not quite finished examples of the songcraft of a man who’s superlative voice defies proper description.
Transmission Impossible succeeds best as a platform for Mackenzie’s voice that was a powerful and sweet thing to behold. Whether in spooky falsetto or Bowie-esque mode, he rarely disappointed with a vocal performance. It will forever be a shame that the man’s brief brush with electro pop stardom in the 1980s never really took hold with the Associates. Sadder still, with this release we are left with hints that the man was capable of so much more, and left in his wake so much unfulfilled promise.
This review was originally posted on pop matters.com
For the uninitiated (colour me that shade of ignorant), klezmer music is a form of music that developed in Southeastern Europe and is also associated with Jewish celebrations. There are very particular instruments linked to this musical genre, such as the violin, clarinet, and trombone. One apparently does not usually tie this music in with synthetic dance beats, rub-a-dub reggae, and rap. That is, until now. The concept behind this release is to take a number of klezmer tunes as written and performed by the Amsterdam Klezmer Band and experiment with them until they have a very contemporary feel. Such luminaries as Shantel and DJ Yury Gurzhy (nope, me neither) have taken the reins and attempted bring this style into the 21st century. The result is Remixed!
AMSTERDAM KLEZMER BAND
REMIXED!
Essay
2006-04-18
The album feels a little disjointed. It is neither fish nor flesh nor good red herring. If you are looking for a collection of klezmer tunes, then I suggest you keep on hunting because there is nothing to fulfill your need here. The performances by the Amsterdam Klezmer Band (that are almost obscured by the remixers) give you some idea about how entertaining they almost certainly are as a live act. However, the original tunes are reworked and jazzed up for the MTV generation, often leaving little impression of the original. Yeah, well, that is what happens on remix albums, right?
Where it works best is ironically where the premise fails. The numbers that retain their intrinsic traditional feel are the ones that stand head and shoulders above the rest. For example, all that appears to have been added to “Terk” are some sequenced beats, and as a result we have quite a funky tune that still sounds connected to its roots, albeit somewhat beefed up. The same goes for “Constantinopel Babes” [sic]; it has a phat beat attached, but still it sounds like it could be coming out of the window of the window of a Jewish wedding.
“Ludacris” is a fine example of this teetering on the edge of being neither one thing nor the other. It begins as a 1970s cop show theme, blends into a Brechtian nightmare of a woodwind solo, and then invites us back to the streets of San Francisco once more. It is simultaneously unsettling and preposterous but strangely compelling. As a matter of fact, the previous sentence sums up the album quite nicely. As it is difficult to find a box to put it in, you are left feeling that you are missing something. Or perhaps that is indeed the problem; because this album cannot be easily categorised, I am left with the feeling that something is not quite right with it but in fact the problem lies within my own bias.
Actually, the fact remains that after repeated listens it really is the kind of record that you would play if you were hosting a house party or had a long drive and you wanted something to keep you awake. Nevertheless, you must stick with it for a while, as it can be a little bit of a confusing listen. Moreover, this recording can make one yearn for the un-re-mixed versions so that one can enjoy this band the way nature intended.
This album was originally reviewed on popmatters.com
Unlike its cousins reggae and ska, which exude summertime and sunglasses, dub music is deeply redolent of dark smoky nightclubs, sometimes-dodgy backstreet purveyors of comic books, and blacklit, ganja-soaked “coffee shops.” It is typified by colossal amounts of echo and bass at the kind of frequency that makes your teeth hurt. Of the many exponents of this genre, the Dub Syndicate is the closest thing there can be to a dub supergroup. This is because practically anyone who is anyone in the world of dub has worked with this loose association of reggae musicians. Also, in the 20 or so years since their inception they have produced music of a consistent quality and are still going strong. Dub Syndicate is the brainchild of former Roots Radics drummer Lincoln Valentine “Style” Scott and On-U-Sound supremo Adrian Sherwood.
DUB SYNDICATE
THE RASTA FAR I
Collision
2006-05-30
The retrospective collection The Rasta Far I features the vocal talents of such reggae luminaries as Big Youth, Junior Reid, and Gregory Isaacs (incidentally, it was Isaacs who first brought Scott to the UK and introduced him to Adrian Sherwood). Moreover, the chin-scratching music trainspotters amongst us are also treated to the bass-work of Bill Laswell (Material, Golden Palominos, and the producer and co-writer of the seminal “Rockit” by Herbie Hancock) and the electric sitar-playing (that’s right, sitar on a dub record!) of erstwhile Golden Palomino Nicky Skopelitis. The tracks are all recorded at the Tuff Gong studios in Jamaica, set up by one Robert Marley (and his Wailers), and mixed by Arian Sherwood and Scientist. The whole CD just reeks of quality and authenticity.
However, faithfulness to style does not make originality a victim. Style Scott prides himself on the forward-looking attitude of his band, and there is no resting on the laurels of dub here. Dub Syndicate is again looking to push the boundaries of what is acceptable in this musical approach. In this collection you can hear the use of all of the regular instruments associated with reggae, but also a few unfamiliar faces, such as the aforementioned sitar and the violin. Okay, in actuality this is not ground-breaking stuff, but it is a slightly different take on the genre, which is refreshing to hear.
This particular Dub Syndicate album is a retrospective of the last 10 years of the band on Style Scott’s own Lion & Roots label. It gives an overview, but also adds something new, as it’s not merely a “best of.” The Rasta Far I is a two-CD set: CD 1 is 17 of the best tracks from the decade, hand-picked and reworked into a megamix by Rob Smith, one half of those kings of the UK jungle scene, Smith & Mighty. The resulting sounds are non-stop versions of versions. It feels a little like you are actually at a dub party somewhere, with Mr Smith spinning the “wheels of steel,” adding his own style to the already rub-a-dub sound of the DS.
CD two features 16 rare and unreleased versions of Dub Syndicate material. Some of these bits and pieces appear in different version on CD 1, but they are different enough to warrant inclusion. There are many tracks that are worth a mention, but the most striking are CD 1’s “Jamaican Proverb” and “Hard & Tuff”, both featuring the vocal talents of dub poet Yasus Afari. His sing-song/softly spoken style is charming and strangely beautiful, worth the admission price alone.
If you’ve never heard anything by the Dub Syndicate, this will serve as a good primer. If you are a fan already, waiting patiently until summer 2007 for the new album, then this might sate your appetite until then.
This review was originally posted on pop matters.com
Apparently Black 47 are recognised as the premier Irish-American rock group who “paved the way for the current Irish-American explosion” and their new album is a retrospective of their 16 years of recording. This is what you glean from their website and the accompanying press release. From that information alone you might expect the same kind of irreverence and grit that you got from the Pogues in their Shane MacGowan heyday. Black 47 have carved out a little niche for themselves as Irish-American protest singers and I guess in the USA and the republic of Ireland they are well-known, but from Bittersweet Sixteen it is a little difficult to determine exactly why.
BLACK 47
BITTERSWEET SIXTEEN
Gadfly
2006-03-21
Larry Kirwan is the politically uncompromising Irishman that leads Black 47. The music is full of swagger and a chin-forward stance that should stir the shackles at the back of your neck. There is a certain aggression and force that lives in the songs somewhere. This force is aching to get out. However, it gets lost in the production and/or the execution. Consequently, what you get are protest songs that are somewhat limp and don’t really, well… protest. They kind of whine, but more on that later.
Politically, Black 47’s hearts are firmly in the right place. Of this there is no doubt, but the material doesn’t seem to cut the mustard. The well meaning content of Mr Kirwan’s lyrics does not cancel that musically they are somewhere between the Alarm and “Big Music”-period Waterboys. Now, I’m willing to ride the retro peace train with the rest of you, but this is not really retro. Okay, it is a “best of” album, but even the more recently recorded tracks sound old. That is the crux of the problem here. The quality of most of the recordings is awful, really poor live demos or abandoned studio tapes fill the gaps that the old record companies have made by deleting their back catalogue.
Not just that… this 16-track retrospective (one song for every long year of this band’s existence) shows how it is in fact possible for a group to not progress over nearly two decades. Probable exceptions to this sweeping statement are the cod-reggae disaster of “Voodoo City” and the really dreadful Glenn Miller with uilleann pipes fiasco that is “Staten Island Baby”.
From these examples we come to “Downtown Baghdad Blues” (hmm… I wonder what that one could be about), which is a revolutionary anti-war song. One almost wants to paraphrase Bono from his famous introduction to “Sunday Bloody Sunday”, but “one” won’t. Their attempts at revolutionary rock fall flat due to lack of musical originality, but mainly as a result of Kirwan’s voice. Rather than making powerful statements it just feels like he is whining in an altogether atonal way. Sure, this was done by the Clash and the Sex Pistols but really Black 47 are no punk band.
However, if Black 47 formed part of your musical upbringing you may have a soft spot for them in your heart. You may put them up there with the likes of the Pogues as one of the great punky Celtic rock bands. Perhaps if I had been exposed to the band in their prime then I would be able to listen to a lot of these substandard recordings with a wry smile on my face. On the strength of these recordings I am not incited to rummage through second hand stores to listen to the glory of their deleted back catalogue.
This album was originally reviewed on pop matters.com
I’ve had a relationship with Ani DiFranco since around 1993.
ANI DIFRANCO
CARNEGIE HALL – 4.6.02
Righteous Babe
2006-04-04
This is not a conventional relationship, shall we say. It is somewhat of a long-distance one, but no less fulfilling for that. She and I don’t always agree, and she rarely listens to what I have to say. It is like she just doesn’t hear me sometimes, and we don’t see each other as much as we used to.
Before I get written off as some crazy stalker dude, I’ll cut to the chase – the reason I feel the way I do is that Ani is one of the few artists I’ve discovered who hasn’t later become fat and complacent on a major label (are you listening, Mr. Stipe?). Instead, she has built an empire of her own, on her terms. One of those terms is the way her music expresses an unflinching stare at American society, with all of its flaws and glory. On her records this lyrical gaze is sometimes smothered by her musical experimentation, as with her recent foray into funk. However, where she always succeeds is her live performance. The thing about Ani’s (I hope she doesn’t mind that I call her Ani) live performance is that you are left feeling that you have been really intimate with this lady. Hence the fact that I feel a connection.
Her previous general-release live albums, Living In Clip andSo Much Shouting So Much Laughter, shows this, but not as well as this new live album Carnegie Hall – 4.6.02 does. Here Ani is stripped from her touring band, playing alone to a Carnegie Hall audience seven short months after the events of September 11, 2001. She appears totally comfortable playing to a large audience and talking to them as if they were just friends in a bar. Equipped with only an acoustic guitar, a voice, and her arsenal of words, DiFranco wholly disarms the audience, not only with the performance of her songs but also with her between-song chitchat. In both aspects she appears honest; with every new line and every new chord you feel like you just get to know her better. Her (by now) trademark percussive style of guitar-playing is on full display, with nothing to obscure it. Her voice skips and soars at the same time, matching and counter-pointing the staccato of her finger-picking. Boy, can she play the guitar.
The selection of songs for this official bootleg CD (Note to Righteous Babe: “official” and “bootleg” are two words that rarely belong to each other) covers her career nicely. She raids the archives for older tunes “Names and Dates and Times”, and treats the audience to songs that are not quite finished, like “Serpentine” and the poem “Self Evident”. When I saw the latter two songs performed live with a full band, later on in 2002, they were more musical but by no means as emotionally executed.
There is a certain rawness and integrity to this recording. It is a snapshot of a performer coming to terms with a world that has been changed forever. With each song her show becomes more stripped, more frantic, and in places more out of key. Refusing to make any glib remarks about the demise of the people that worked in the Twin Towers and the landmark buildings themselves, Ani covers the thorny subject in her recital of “Self Evident”. In the liner notes she covers the self-doubt that she felt before performing the poem, and you can hear the hesitation in her voice. No review will ever do this recital justice.
For me this recording is most reminiscent of her early recordings (if you haven’t yet, check out Puddle Dive), which captured my interest so long ago. Its raw, stripped-down quality gets rid of some of her more recent funk pretensions and delivers her brand of folk/punk as she originally presented it. Ani DiFranco is always political. Whether it’s the politics of personal relationships or those of the public political sphere, she has a way of finding the raw nerve and poking it with a toothpick. Moreover, she does this with a cute smile and a giggle. She is the most dangerous sort of protest singer: an angelic figure with a large axe hidden behind her back, ready to hack away at conspiracy and political complacency. While some of her more recent recordings have been musically experimental, with Carnegie Hall – 4.6.02 she shows that despite her success she still has her feet firmly on the ground and is every bit the travelling little folk singer with a punk twist.
The review was originally posted on popmatters.com
Bass is a prominent character in the theatre of the Thievery Corporation. Their “original” albums are inundated with it. The same is clearly true when they helm a remix effort. They take a tune, add lounge or Latin rhythms to it, then put the listener’s head right into the bass bin and stand well back. The result as exemplified here in Versions is a delightful Sunday morning workout of the capabilities of your Hi-Fi equipment. It matters not that they have chosen to rework some obscure tunes that probably would not otherwise grace your record collection. Indeed, it would be almost cheap of them to even consider using mainstream tunes. You want them to pan for lost nuggets of musical gold and then beat them into a beautiful shape so that you and your friends can rub your chins thoughtfully as you listen while slumped in your IKEA furniture. In this respect, Thievery Corporation do not disappoint.
THIEVERY CORPORATION
VERSIONS
Eighteenth Street Lounge Music
2006-05-16
Thievery Corporation have taken their lead from the Jamaican dub style by accentuating the bass and the drums; they remove the vocals for the most part and let the spaces in between carry the rhythm and swaddle the result in modern digital reverb and other effects. Due to this, on the proper equipment this recording has the capacity to really piss off your neighbours or parents, so play with extreme caution. I suggest a rainy weekend, using a decent sub-woofer set to the kind of frequencies that only your lungs can hear.
Among the luxurious tunes that Thievery Corporation have cast their leisurely gaze over is a version of Public Image Ltd.’s “This is Not a Love Song”, but John Lydon’s vocal is nowhere to be heard. It would be too obvious and not tasteful enough to remix that song. Instead we are treated to a cover version by Nouvelle Vague, a French project dedicated to updating 1980s hits using female vocalists that have never heard the originals. Nice. They also direct their beady eyes at the Doors’ “Strange Days” and come up with something quite charming, if a little unsettling. Jim Morrison to a dance beat… not sure about it (think of how you felt when you first heard the David Holmes remix of Elvis Presley’s “A Little Less Conversation”; disconcerting but cool). All that receives the TC dub treatment comes out the other end much the better for it. There is no other way that I would like to listen to Norah Jones or Sarah McLachlan.
This is the sort of music that Steven Soderbergh would use in his Ocean’s series of film if he did not already use David Holmes. It supersedes hip and has a recognizable cinematic quality. If you are listening to this album on whatever music device you favour while travelling in a city, you cannot help but feel that you are in a movie and what you hear is the soundtrack. This works particularly well at night if you are on a full metro or other public train service.
Versions is a damn fine remix record. Also, because Thievery Corporation have a sound and trendy following all of their own; it also works as well as an original release. Although saying that, the original tunes are not as stand-out as the remixes. If you find yourself in the market for a record to put on in the background while you chat to your mates, or if you have a particularly awesome sound system that you would like to put through its paces, then you could do a lot worse than buying this album.
