Music PREVIEWS
INDIE ROCK BLOC PARTY O2 Academy, Glasgow, Sun 14 Oct
Bloc Party paved the way for a resurgence in the popularity of simplistic, yet engaging rock music when they first emerged almost ten years ago. With their biting, post- punk aesthetic and potent hooks, the band enjoyed brief but major success with three albums and a string of now indie classics under their belt. After interest on both sides waned, the band called a hiatus in 2009, spawning several solo works and other ventures. They never split, but their collec- tive future seemed tough to predict.
However, despite rumours of upset, confusion and line- up changes in the Bloc Party camp – many of which were tongue-in-cheek products of the band themselves – the Londoners recently reappeared almost as quickly as they left, arguably stronger than ever, with a new album in hand. As drummer Matt Tong explains, the reality was much sim- pler (and friendlier) than the press would suggest. ‘We never had any intention to replace Kele with someone else; we’d already begun recording when that rumour came out. But yeah, what began as a private joke kind of got out of control,’ Tong jokes. ‘To be honest, I think we were a little bit sur- prised that people still gave a toss in the first place!’
After an intimate warm-up tour earlier this year, they are
back with a bang this autumn in support of new album Four. ‘It’s the first time we’ve communicated what we wanted to achieve, with any record,’ explains Tong. ‘I think we’ve always found it difficult in the past to sit down and talk about it. With that basic principle in place though, it became very easy to write the material that made up the majority of Four. If anything, the time away definitely added to the songwriting quality of the record.’ (Ryan Drever)
ALTERNATIVE ROCK JOHN CALE HMV Picture House, Edinburgh, Fri 5 Oct DRONE MEETS FOLKLORE DYLAN CARLSON Sneaky Pete’s, Edinburgh, Thu 11 Oct
Whatever you do, don’t dare ask 70-year-old ex-Velvet Underground member and renowned experimentalist John Cale if he’s ever thought about retiring. ‘No,’ he comes back with a bristling laugh, ‘that sounds like you’re asking me to drop dead. This [music] is what I get up in the morning thinking about. No. Never.’ While the release of his forthcoming fifteenth solo album Shifty Adventures in
Nookie Wood on Domino’s Double Six might seem like the validation of continued acceptance into an underground current he’s never been far from, to Cale it seems they’re just the next label delving into his prolific well of output. ‘I record constantly,’ he says, ‘aside from the year I took off after the Biennale [Venice 2009, where he represented his home country Wales; his voice lies clos- er to Valleys brogue than New York drawl]. But after that I got back in and when Domino got involved, there were about forty tunes we had to choose from.’ Aside from the input of Danger Mouse on a couple of tracks (Cale mysteriously
describes collaboration as ‘taking every expression of someone’s personality and using it in a song’), the sessions were low budget and he played everything at his home studio. So how will the music translate to the stage? ‘Straight rock’n’roll,’ he confirms. ‘I’ve got a full band, we’ve learned all these songs, but you have to build a set with some kind of dramatic form to it. So that affects how many older songs there are and where they go.’ (David Pollock)
Dylan Carlson, founder of drone giants Earth is embarking on his first solo tour under the moniker ‘Drcarlsonalbion’. Having moved Earth from their drone- metal beginnings on Extra-Capsular Extraction and Earth 2, they explored more countrified, clear tone leanings on Hex; or Printing in the Infernal Method. Recently, Dylan’s focus shifted to folk and traditional sounds, specifically from England and Scotland with Earth’s two volumes of Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light.
Heavily inspired by the fairies and pictish folklore of this very island, Dylan has compiled field recordings with ambient solo drones and spoken word – carrying on storytelling and mystic traditions from centuries past. The recordings were captured across the UK at various megalithic and mystical sites this summer, entwining this with Dylan’s fascination with Scottish folk balladry and his own Anglo-Scottish roots. Calling it a ‘labor of love/ obsession’, he aims to put out an illustrated pop-up book with limited-edition vinyl LP and DVD in May next year, titled Falling with a Thousand Stars and Other Wonders from the House of Albion. On the surface, it may sound like the frontman of one of the most seminal avant- garde metal bands of the last twenty years is embarking on the musical equivalent of the BBC’s Who Do You Think You Are? – but his pilgrimage has a far more occult and magical preoccupation, with a heavy emphasis on the forgotten nooks and crannies which make up the spiritual DNA of Albion. (Nick Herd) ■ Find out about backing his project at kickstarter.com.
78 THE LIST 20 Sep–18 Oct 2012