hinterland for a while now, but this third album is possibly their most mainstream outing yet. thanks in part to the occasional lush female vocal courtesy of one ‘Crazy Jane'. The backdrop for much of Poltergeeks is a familiar blend of lackadaisical beats and Boards of Canada-style wobbliness. which. combined with letttield rapping and offbeat lyrical flow. brings to mind a slightly less inspired version of Clouddead. The quality of material here perhaps isn't quite up there with their best stuff. but Penpushers remain talented outside contenders for Scotland's hip hop crown.
(Doug Johnstone)
WORLD ESOTERIC KULTUR SHOCK We came to take Your Jobs
(Kool Arrow) 0...
NUL‘I’UI SHEEN ’ n.’
Insane Seattle-based collective Kultur Shock have been gathering Bosnian. Bulgarian. Japanese and American members for almost ten years now with the sole intention of mashing up the music of their homelands in hitherto unrealised perverse ways. A few albums down the line and collaborations With the mighty Jello Biafra and Joan Bae7 on their CV and this bunch of fiendishly inventive musicians are beginning to emerge as what The Pogues would be like if they were produced by Frank Zappa and had mentally unhinged primitive Yugoslav filmmaker Emir Kusterica as their front man. Needless to say this whole album is a punky. euphoric. feisty joy. Stand out tracks include God is Busy. ‘lstanbul' and 'Hashishi'.
(Paul Dale)
SOUL
VARIOUS
Henrik Schwarz: DJ- Kicks
(!K7) 0...
As anyone who owns a DJ-Kicks CD will tell you. the label is a hallmark of a certain rare quality. Maverick producer Henrik Schwarz doesn't diminish this fierce reputation in the slightest. His 23-track mix reflects the German's impeccable. diverse taste. not to mention passion for a good groove. with typical flair. favouring a list of forgotten classics over current floor- burners. Schwar/ has produced some of the more exciting dance music emerging over the past three years and his DJ sets are a similarly classy. unpredictable and cliche-free affair. He SOunds genuinely fresh. and with his roots in soul. ja7z. funk, house. techno and afrobeat unearthed here for everyone to enjoy. this DJ-Kicks shows exactly why.
(Andrew Richardson)
JAZZ
INGRID LAUBROCK & LIAM NOBLE Let's Call This . . . (Babel Label) 0...
Saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock and pianist Liam Noble convene for an duet session that mixes entirely improvised material with freely-treated interpretations of standards and classic jazz tunes like Monk's 'We See' and ‘Let's Call
This'. Mingus' ‘Duke Ellington's Sounds of Love'. Ellington's own ‘Angelica'. and Lee Konitz' ‘Subconscious- lee'.
Laubrock. best know for her involvement at the heart of the F-IRE Collective organisation. confines herself to soprano saxophone for this outing. and her sinuous. (farting lines interweave with Noble's strong and imaginative pianism in absorbing fashion. building a creative dialogue that they are able to Sustain across the whole session. Four tracks are — as the credits put it - 'genetically modified' by Seb Rochford. and his Subtle electronic manipulations add a touch of understated co|0ur to the music. (Kenny Mathieson)
AVANT CARDE FOLK A HAWK AND A HACKSAW
The Way the
Wind Blows
(The Leaf Label) 0000
Jeremy Barnes. late of Leicestershire and recently relocated back home to Albuquerque. New Mexico. former drummer in the influential American indie rock band Neutral Milk Hotel, is a weirdo. And possibly a genius. His third album of avant garde Romany gypsy traditional music inspired compositions. played on accordion. flute. violin and drums (plus the odd unintelligible vocal accompaniment) with the assistance of string SCratcher Heather Trost. is both bonkers and beautiful. Track titles like 'God Bless the Ottoman Empire' give you an idea of the kind of eccentric mind at play here. It's only a matter of time before Barnes scores a film for the mad Bosnian filmmaker Emir Kusturica. (Miles Fielder)
JAZZ
DON BYRON Do The Boomerang (Blue Note Records) 0..
Don Byron has a reputation for embarking on eclectic and occasionally rather eccentric musical projects. This latest Outing is a tribute to the music of the Motown sax star Junior Walker. a choice that also provided the perfect excuse for the clarinettist to record ten of the twelve selections on an instrument he has rarely been heard on. tenor saxophone.
l . 5; ,-....... Both experiments work very well. This is not an occasion where a group of sophisticated jax/ers take the music of a popular icon and transform it in complex Or abstract fashion. It is a funky. soulful. party album that hits the groove running and stays there. with some impressive ja/7 sol0ing thrown in for good meaSure. Tracks include 'Shotgun' and ‘(l'in a) Roadrunner‘, as well as James Brown's 'There It Is. (Kenny Mathiesonl S‘ilfiiéfiis Yourcodenameis:Mi|o Presents: Print is
Dead Vol. 1 (V2) 000
Cypress Hill producer and general mastermind (he was obwously the one who (lid the skinning up rather than smoking) DJ Muggs released a series of albums in the early 905 where he enlisted
collaborations from his favourite rappers. The reth was Soul Assassins. an inspired. hit and miss affair which, when it worked. was the perfect axis of inspiration, imagination and impatient energy. Much underrated English alt.rock squonks YOurcodenameis:Milo have done the same for the contemporary UK indie scene. as Bloc Party. Futureheads. Lethal Bizzle. Maximo Park. Tom Vek and The Automatic limber up to tussle. They swing from bruising. sprawling metal with Martin Grech to metronomic. harmonic quirk pop with Field Music. An illustration of not only YCleM's imagination but a suggestion that there are still some willing to think outside the box.
(Mark Robertson)
METAL UP YOUR ASS VARIOUS Butchering the Beafles
(Restless) CO
If you're the kind of sick fuck who's always wondered what a heavy metal Beatles would've sounded like. wonder no more. Here. a host of metal luminaries massacre the fab foursome's back- catalogue. with surprisingly entertaining results. Don't get me wrong, there's some frightening dross here. especially when things are taken too seriously. The more irreverence on display the better it works. and the old hands clock in the best results. with Lemmy tearing 'Back in the USSR' a new arsehole. Billy Idol burying a hatchet in the skull of 'Tomorrow Never Knows' and Alice Cooper chewing up ‘Hey Bulldog'. Mostly shit. sure. but funny shit. (Doug Johnstone)
ALL CDS WERE REVIEWED ON A SYSTEM SUPPLIED AND INSTALLED BY LOUD 8: CLEAR
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ALSO RELEASED 5 MUSIC BOOKS
Gorilla: Rise of the Ogre (Penguin Michael Joseph) The actual autobiography of a fictional band should be pretty hot stuff. but despite the claims. Murdoc and pals end up duetting with Madge. sipping champagne and generally being bling in a canoony way. A visually stimulating read anyway.
Nik Cohn Triksta (Vintage) Subtitled ‘Life and Death and New Orleans Rap' Cohn throws himself into the virulent world of Southern hip hop with tragic. poignant re8u|ts. Martin Kielty Big Noise: The Sound of Scotland (Black 8. White) An enthusiastic. blunt. straight from the horse's mouth history of Scot's music. shying away from the oft-lauded indie kids and focussing on horne- grown rock like Alex Harvey and beyond. Alex Kapranos Sound Bites (Penguin/ Fig Tree) Franz frontman pontificates over music and food in this. the collecting of his columns for the Guardian.
Jeremy Simmonds Number One in Heaven (Penguin) A truly weird one this. an encyclopaedia of rock'n'roll's dead. from Hendrix and Cass to Wendy Williams of the Plasmatics and Tommy Bolin of Deep Purple. Odd but compelling on- the-toilet kind of read.
3 30 No\. 13006 THE LIST 67