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SINGLES & DOWNLOADS InMe
Virtually no one releases good singles in August. The charts are full of summer pap while decent acts are up to their knees in festival mud. So hello, Dolores ‘The Cranberries’ O’Riordan, whose ‘The Journey’ (Cooking Vinyl) ●●●●● is utterly anaemic, dreary soft rock, like The Corrs with a charisma bypass, if you can imagine anything so vacuous.
At least Mariachi El Bronx have something original about them, being a mariachi punk band. Actually, ‘Cell Mates’ (Wichita) ●●●●● is all mariachi and no punk, the latter being the LA outfit’s day job as The Bronx. Confused? You might be. Entertained? Not really.
And so to Glasgow indie-dom, with The
Cinematics. ‘Love and Terror’ (The Orchard) ●●●●● has its sights set firmly on the stadiums, a mood nicked from Editors, guitars pinched from U2, bombast appropriated from The Killers, all of which adds up to approximately fuck all of any interest. Better is ‘I Became a Prostitute’ (Fat Cat)
●●●●● by everyone’s favourite indie noiseniks The Twilight Sad. Even then, it’s a bit Twilight Sad-by-numbers, all the requisite shouty bits, poignant bits, My Bloody Valentine guitars and moody angst. Which leads us to Single of the Week, the
appropriately named ‘Single of the Weak’ (Graphite) ●●●●● by InMe. ‘What’s that shit on the radio?’ they scream in a decent nu-metally romp, jagged prog riffs and whooshy disco beats fighting it out behind. Indeed. (Doug Johnstone)
the most high profile champion of drum & bass since it exploded over 15 years ago, and this album puts him in cahoots with old partner in crime Heist for a cunning blend or two under the Rufige Kru moniker. Memoirs . . . shows
how D&B has evolved to embrace its dubstep offspring as its own, the two feed off the same doom and fury, and when ‘Babylon 2012’ or ‘AI’ kick in, they harnesses the weight of dubstep but never lose D&B’s itchy rhythmical twitch. This is an expansive album, showing a breadth of scope and ambition, without straying too far away from those core bass tremors. (Mark Robertson)
JAZZ/FOLK COLIN STEELE Stramash (Gadgemo Records) ●●●●●
ROCK LOW SONIC DRIFT Shadows of the Titan (Theoretical Records) ●●●●●
Never ones to be criticised for false advertising, this mighty trio from Glasgow eschew the frippery and foppery of modern music for something bigger, deeper and darker than most. Steeped in mysticism
and old school metal lore, LSD (geddit?) build some mean, but inventive passages of post-Sabbath death blues from familiar detuned riffage.
Ramo’s vocals are more wannabe Cornell than would-be Crowley, but that gives their barrage greater definition and a welcome sheen.
Twisting and turning through five long(ish) tracks, Shadows . . . grooves, wanders, staggers, stomps around, but still finds the way back in time to bludgeon you with the punchline. (Mark Robertson)
DRUM & BASS RUFIGE KRU Memoirs of an Afterlife (Metalheadz) ●●●●●
To your nan, he may be that nice lad with the funny teeth that did quite well on that conducting gameshow on BBC2, but to us, Goldie remains an unquenchable source of energy when it comes to music. He has been
Colin Steele’s ambitious jazz-meets-folk project made a striking impression when first heard live back in 2006 and retains much of its adventure and imagination in this excellent studio recording. His genre- crossing line-up features his jazz quintet with saxophonist Phil Bancroft, pianist Dave Milligan, bassist Aidan O’Donnell and drummer Stu Ritchie, four top folk musicians in piper Rory Campbell and fiddlers Aidan O’Rourke, Mairi Campbell and Catriona MacDonald, and the eclectic classical cellist Su-a Lee.
All are allowed to make their own creative contributions to the lyrical, rhythmically energised music.
Record Reviews Music
20TH ANNIVERSARY REISSUE THE STONE ROSES The Stone Roses (Sony) ●●●●●
Here’s a thought no one who bought The Stone Roses’ debut album on the morning it was released 20 years ago will want to be alerted to – The Album That Changed Your Life is as old today as Abbey Road was in 1989 on the day you shelled out your pocket money for that pristine cassette tape by the Manchester baggy masters. Feeling old yet? Why not stick on The Stone Roses once more to forget? There you go . . . feels like you never grew up, doesn’t it?
It’s comforting to think this album, born of the unassailable confidence of youth tempered by the social conscience of four men who grew up in and around the working-class Manchester of the 1980s, has so far avoided the slide towards the Heritage Rock dumper. There’s so much to love in every track – the spine-tingling bass intro to ‘She Bangs the Drums’, Ian Brown’s commanding funeral march for British imperialism, ‘Waterfall’, the tide of Biblical imagery his lyrics conjure during the heart- cracking ‘Made of Stone’, John Squire’s unashamed Led Zep riffing at the close of ‘I Am the Resurrection’. Unlike, say, Definitely Maybe, each new listen feels fonder and more welcome than the last.
This collection in one sense does the original a disservice, a triple CD reissue overstuffed with unnecessary extras, although CD2 is essentially a rejigged version of the second best album this band ever released, the singles and B-sides compilation Turns into Stone, which includes the definitive ‘Fool’s Gold’ and ‘Elephant Stone’, and the under-rated ‘Standing Here’. CD3 comprises a bunch of demos that offer an inessential Wizard of Oz ‘behind the curtain’ view of the album, although the until-now-unreleased ‘Pearl Bastard’ is certainly better than previously revealed early recordings, plus there’s a bonus DVD of their now legendary Empress Ballroom set from the same era. (David Pollock)
INDIE THE TEMPER TRAP Conditions (Infectious Records) ●●●●● As indie rock grows more splintered and contrived with every new self-consciously
Inspired by a stay on Islay to write the commission, the 11 compositions (augmented by three arrangements of earlier tunes for the band) integrate their jazz, folk and a touch of classical influences in coherent, genuinely integrated fashion. Steele extends and manipulates genre conventions in absorbing fashion, and the musicians cope superbly with the real challenges he sets. (Kenny Mathieson)
slick act to strap on a Strat too high on their chests and ponce about in front of their mate’s Super 8, it’s refreshing to hear a debut packed with, well, just bloody good songs. The standout track for the Melbourne quartet is ‘Sweet Disposition’, a song that’s more than its constituent U2, Grizzly Bear and Vampire Weekend parts. It sits here in a collection imbued with the same driving forcefulness that makes Kings of Leon such an unstoppable force. There’s also a quaintness – mostly due to singer Dougy’s sweet intonation – and while some moments fail to completely ignite, there’s plenty to draw repeat listens. (Mark Robertson)
HIP HOP BUSTA RYHMES Back on My BS (Island) ●●●●●
In a sea of pouting, posturing wannabe players, Busta Rhymes has always stood out as a true rap individual. Never afraid to play for laughs, he broke through in the early 90s as an affiliate of De La Soul and A Tribe Called Quest. Solo, he’s been one of the most charismatic figures in rap music but, despite platinum global sales, has been inconsistent on the album front. This self-declared return to form reinforces the sentiment that Busta is a singular lyrical talent with a delivery sharper than Gillette, but he just isn’t sure what he wants to be anymore. Collaborating with everyone from Estelle and Lil Wayne to T-Pain and Pharrell Williams, he lurches from cotton wool soul shimmies to grungy crunk growls with no thought for consistency or rhythm. At the heart of this mess remains one of the game’s most innovative deliveries, but after nearly two decades, he should be firing on all cylinders. (Mark Robertson)
6–13 Aug 2009 THE LIST 35