Music Record Reviews
JAPANESE GARAGE ROCK AFRIRAMPO We Are Uchu No Ko (Rock Action) ●●●●● When even the press release refers to them as a ‘lunatic girl duo’, it’s safe to assume we’re not in 4Music territory, and so it transpires on
this double-disc release from the recently disbanded Japanese pair. There is an unhinged quality to much of We Are. . ., from the guttural howls to the shambolic guitar rampages and back again, but shorn of their undoubted live
SINGLES & DOWNLOADS
What would growing older be without nostalgia? Kids of the 80s/teens of the 90s receive a double fix with Björk’s ‘Comet Chase Song’ (One Little Indian) ●●●●● recorded for the 3D animated film Moomins and the Comet Chase. Iceland’s first lady of bonkers is gearing up for a return to the stage in 2011 and this is a decent taster, even if it doesn’t really work without the Moomins doing their funny little dance in the video (see http://tinyurl.com/bjorkandmoomins).
The View’s moody mouthpiece Kyle Falconer is a surprisingly good match for Mark Ronson’s latest project ‘The Bike Song’ (Sony) ●●●●●, a jaunty 60s-flecked slice of psych-pop written by Dave McCabe of the Zutons. It’s a song about a bike that doesn’t really go anywhere (the song, not the bike) but Falconer’s sanguine vocal style is the perfect foil to Ronson’s zippy production.
This is the Kit is Paris-based, English-born folk chanteuse Kate Stables, an elegant songwriter whose new single ‘Moon’ (Need No Water) ●●●●● is a dreamy, hypnotic roll around in the autumn leaves. Basque folk-ravers Crystal Fighters show a keen understanding of drama and dynamics on double A-side ‘Follow/Swallow’ (Zirkulo) ●●●●●. Meanwhile, young kats with old heads, Glasgow jazz fusion outfit dBass are delightfully loose-limbed, languid and lovely on ‘Garden’ (self-release) ●●●●●.
Silver Columns wake us up with ‘Always On’ (Moshi Moshi) ●●●●●, a whimsical, dance- inducing and instantly gratifying squall of Euro- pop electro. Alloa rockers Must be Something manage something similar with a different approach on the thunderingly earnest ‘A Breath in a Heartbeat’ (Targe Music) ●●●●●.
The return of Dunfermline quartet The Scottish Enlightenment with their ‘Little Sleep’ EP (Armellodie) ●●●●● is a triumphant one that runs a close second for the fortnight’s top plaudits, although this is almost entirely down to the heartbreaking, meandering genius of second track ‘Get My Limousine’, an epic lament about the horror show that is television talent contests.
But for sheer energy, heart, drive and swagger, Ramona grabs Single of the Fortnight with ‘How Long’ (Bullitt) ●●●●●. Looking every inch a young Deborah Harry, Sussex-born Karen Anne rattles through a proto-punk tale of the ups and downs of being a twenty-something who hasn’t quite fulfilled that teenage dream. OK, so it’s not exactly original – but somehow it works. (Rachel Devine)
70 THE LIST 9–23 Sep 2010
International Big Band is on one level an extension of his work with the Glasgow Improvisers Orchestra, the musicians involved give the project its own distinctive stamp within the soundscape of a large free ensemble.
MacDonald employs free improvisation, conduction, graphic scores, textual instruction and response to visual stimuli in the course of the eight pieces that make up the album, recorded at Live House Buddy in Tokyo in August 2008. The band includes
several Japanese musicians, ex-Sonic Youth guitarist Jim O’Rourke, Australian keyboard player Alister Spence and bassist Lloyd Swanton of The Necks. If the opening flourish sounds almost like a conventional big band, don’t be lured into expecting much more in that vein. Thereafter, the music diverges into the kind of abstract, occasionally anarchic experiments with sound and texture associated with free improv. Adventurous, challenging music for adventurous listeners, ‘The Big Toe’ is plain good fun for anyone. (Kenny Mathieson)
JAZZ MICHAEL FORMANEK The Rub And Spare Change (ECM Records) ●●●●●
Bass player Michael Formanek will be familiar to anyone who has followed the New York downtown scene, and his wide-ranging CV goes all the way back to his time in jazz-rock fusion group, Tony Williams’s Lifetime, as an 18-year-old. Albums
under his leadership have been rare of late (this is the first in over a decade), and for his ECM debut he has surrounded himself with musicians he knows very well – saxophonist Tim Berne, pianist Craig Taborn and drummer Gerald Cleaver. The musicians are all
heavy hitters among the progressive music community in New York, and Formanek’s rhythmically complex compositions offer them ample scope to explore a rich tapestry of ideas and responses. The music oscillates between structured and free, while three of the six tunes are actually multi-part compositions, including the title track itself and the extended ‘Tonal Suite’, which has three parts. (Kenny Mathieson)
AMERICANA LLOYD COLE Broken Record (Tapete) ●●●●●
He’s been Scottish rock’s adopted son for over a quarter of a century, and we’re damned if two decades in the States or lines like ‘I look like a million bucks’ will change that. Americana is Cole’s
bag on Broken Record – warm, authentic country music, as backed by a cast of US greats (including an ace vocal foil in Joan Wasser, aka Joan as Policewoman) – and fellow Commotion Blair Cowan.
It’s imbued with the bygone Glasgow pop pin-up’s enduring dandyism (‘Oh Genevieve’), deadpan wordplay (‘Rhinestones’), and characteristic knack of ensuring the rhythm section clings to his every word (‘Writers Retreat!’). (Nicola Meighan) WORLD VARIOUS El Boom Boom (Tumi) ●●●●●
Cuban music fêted off the island is old style
‘son’, light years away from what Cubans themselves dance to. Tumi, the label mapping the Cuban scene since the 1980s, has recently released this compilation, which won the 2010 Cuban music industry prize in the ‘reggaeton’ category.
This is 100% Cuban back-to-front booty- focused ‘reggaeton’, spliced here with other pan-Latin styles from bachata, salsa and kisomba to R&B, as with stand-out highlight, El Green’s ‘Díselo’.
OK, cutting edge
‘reggaeton’ is bedroom studio-produced and this is a more ‘official’ recording, but still it captures the essential wit and vitality of the only music that matters to most young people on the island today. (Jan Fairley)
WORLD CHEIKH LO Jamm (World Circuit) ●●●●●
Cheik Lô’s label as a ‘Senegalese Sufi troubadour’ is good yet it by no means gets over just how sublime the music this funky genius creates. True, he seems to hold a spliff a lot of the time and maybe it’s the way that laidback edge to life permeates this recording (made in his backyard) that makes it so irresistible. From the seductive
‘Conia’ about the corrosiveness of jealousy to the surf guitars of ‘Il N’est Jamais Trop Tard’, this soulful synthesis of diverse African and Cuban styles is an album of the year. (Jan Fairley)
charisma, the endless freeform arrangements smack somewhat of self-indulgence. There is a lot of invention buried in here, and more than their fair share of subversive musical ideas, but at times it’s buried very deep indeed. (Doug Johnstone) BASQUE-LONDON DANCE HYBRID CRYSTAL FIGHTERS Star Of Love (Zirkulo Records) ●●●●●
Think Gaga’s a tad eccentric? Then try Crystal Fighters for size. This East London quintet named themselves after an unfinished opera written by singer Laure’s grandfather during his descent into insanity, and now pride themselves on mixing thumping electro, euphoric pop and scuzzy punk with traditional Basque folk. Thankfully they have an abundance of killer tunes to back up a career conjured from oddities and myth- making. Star Of Love’s 11 tracks are as warm, sumptuously produced and thought-provoking as they are super infectious; as traditional wooden txalapartas, tabor drums and txistu flutes combine with synths, beats, scuzzy riffs and existential subject matter. It’s dance music, yes, but not as we know it . . . (Camilla Pia) JAZZ RAYMOND MACDONALD INTERNATIONAL BIG BAND Buddy (Textile Records) ●●●●●
While saxophonist Raymond MacDonald’s