Chimpomatic

Akron/Family

Set 'Em Wild, Set 'Em Free

Dead Oceans

‘Set ‘Em Wild, Set ‘Em Free’ is Akron/Family’s follow up to 2007’s well received ‘Love Is Simple’ and their first self produced album and as a three-piece, after the departure of founding member Ryan Vanderhoof.

In the past, whilst having their obvious strengths, they have been somewhat of a demanding listen, requiring a little time and patience. Not so, with ‘Set ‘Em Wild, Set ‘Em Free’, which is by far their most accessible and immediate collection of songs to date.

So what has changed? Well, they seem to have markedly extended their record collection but rather than being swamped by their influences, they have breathed new life and freshness into their sound. The most notable aspect is the Ali Farka Toure-like guitar parts on ‘They Will Appear’ and the beautiful ‘River’.

Meanwhile, the excellent ‘Creatures’ bizarrely sounds like it could have come off Massive Attack’s ‘Mezzanine’. Whilst the trippy ‘Many Ghosts’ could sit seamlessly on Radiohead’s ‘Amnesiac’. The title track falls back into more conventional Neil Young-style territory, but the trick they managed to pull off brilliantly, is that it all sits together seamlessly and coherently.

The only (very minor) gripe is that when they do rock out, on ‘Gravelly Mountains Of The Moon’ and ‘MBF’, rather than being rousing it simply jars the ear.

It’s turning into a good year already: another very, very good record.

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17th Apr 2009 - Add Comment - Tweet

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John Frusciante

The Empyrean

Record Collection

Since he escaped his tooth-consuming drug addiction and returned to the Red Hot Chili Peppers in 1998, guitar hero John Frusciante has released a remarkable 10+ records through his solo projects - while of course playing a major part in the rehabilitation of the Chili Peppers from punk-funkers to stadium-filling, serious rockers.

While the results of the experimentation on his 2001 and 2004 solo albums have had an obviously positive effect on the Chili Peppers (most notably through the mind-blowing guitar-theatrics of Stadium Arcadium), he still manages to hold plenty back for himself - and there are not many albums that kick off with a 9 minute space-jam. Frusciante's own notes recommend that the album is played "as loud as possible and it is suited to dark living rooms late at night" - and the opener re-affirms that point. Slowly building from a lone drum, it's a vocal-free track where the guitar does the singing (sorry), as we are slowly drawn into the album.

The roles are reversed on Song To The Siren - a cover of the Tim Buckley classic, which is notable here for it's lack of guitar, instead relying on Frusciante's haunting vocals to beautifully carry the song - with delicate keyboards providing much of the charm, both here and throughout the album as a whole. Once we're warmed up, Unreachable provides one of the many high-points of the record, seemingly using a two minute intro as an excuse to unleash the stunt guitars for a blistering 4 minute outro.

The David Axelrod-style production tricks are in full-effect through the album, with some of Frusciante's more eccentric moments adding a great deal of personality to the record, whether he's singing in a faux booming voice on One More Of Me, or looping choral-style samples on Dark Light - which again uses a haunting intro, before segueing into a seemingly separate song and building beautifully on a simple bassline to hypnotise you through another 8 minute epic.

The relatively lavish production quality of Shadows Collide With People is still absent here and would have benefitted the record greatly, although production is certainly a step up from the more lo-fi home-studio vibe of many of the solo projects. Although, when you're a rock star living in the Hollywood hills, the home studio is not what it used to be. The vocals are sometimes often over-effected, where they would perhaps be more effective raw - but don't worry, there's plenty of room for another epic before the end and Central provides another soaring high point to the album, winding samples and booming keyboards through a heavily layered guitar track that builds and builds.

As a complete record, this is certainly a more focused release than Frusciante's six-albums-in-six-months period, as while each of those records yielded several gems, there was a certain sense of in-cohesiveness, which is clearly absent here. While Frusciante describes The Empyrean as a "concept album", he acknowledges that it may not come accross as narrative in that sense, but there is certainly a running theme within the songs, which all hold the same mood and tone - echoing feelings of loss, death and spirituality. The result is an outstanding, thoroughly involving and innovative album - which provides a sometimes challenging listen, with many rewards.

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#CSF

19th Jan 2009 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet

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Radiohead

In Rainbows

Radiohead's 7th album will forever be referred to as much for its content as the method by which it greeted our hungry ears. On 10th October we were literally 'given' the first morsels from this truly unique band since 2003's Hail To The Thief, but that wasn't the only great thing about that day. As a youngster I can remember the magical feeling that came with the arrival of a long awaited album. You would count down the days until it was released trapped in a glorious, internet-free vacuum of anticipation and speculation. Then when the day finally came the first thing on your mind was getting to that shop and claiming your copy, nothing else mattered in those days.

Fast forward to the present day and things have changed considerably. You rarely need to wait for anything now - leaks or promos arrive in your iTunes like it ain't no thang, and anyway even if you are waiting for something to be released by the time you get it your head is already littered with countless 'expert' opinions that it's hard to form your own. Well, last Wednesday we were all equal. Currently label-less, Radiohead took control of their property and gave it to everyone at the same time - no leaks, no promo copies and therefore no opinions. We were all free to make up our minds, not only on how valuable it was to us but what we thought of it. I felt a twinge of that magic return last week as I downloaded my copy and it's stayed with me throughout every play of In Rainbows.  I remember where I was on the release of pretty much every Radiohead album and Wednesday 10th of October was a special day indeed.

So, in the democratic spirit with which this record was released it seems fitting to apply such ideals to its scrutiny. So here are some Chimps early takes on the whole In Rainbows thing, and it ain't law it's just, like, their opinion man... - BC

People who have protested for years to me about Radiohead, have been approaching me recently saying; ‘Have you heard the new Radiohead album?  It’s Great!’

It is great indeed, a popularity that has not been the result of any concessions made by the band. ‘In Rainbows’ is beautiful, challenging and yes, repeat it, uplifting. It is the end of a sometimes lonely journey that has led them through the hinterland of ‘Kid A’, ‘Amnesiac’ and the not-to-be-ignored solo project by Thom Yorke last year; ‘The Eraser’. 

‘In Rainbows’ would not the subtle and lushly layered album it is without those earlier explorations, masterfully combining the art of melody (which the band claimed to forsake after ‘OK Computer) and laptop experimentation.  The ten songs are underpinned by Phil Selway’s tight framework of drumming and percussion, a structure which allows us to really appreciate the wonder of Yorke’s flying voice.

I heard that Muse were ‘the new Radiohead’.  That crown is still taken.  Indefinitely.  Enjoy the moment.

I paid 8 quid by the way.  A sum arrived at after several phonecalls, a lot of deleting,
re-entering and inner moral debate.

- LG - 5 Stars

Stand out tracks are Nude and All I Need. Yorke's vocals act as such a powerful instrument. Radiohead's best moments as a band come when they achieve the perfect balance between explosion and quiet - and this album isn't quite up on the explosive stuff. With these songs having being written and recorded over time, it feels the album lacks the cohesion of their finest releases.

The band should be commended for their release strategy, as the music industry certainly needs re-modelling. Having said that, it's any easy risk to take when you're seven albums deep on the back of millions in sales. Quite how it might work for new musicians I'm not so sure.

£3 and 3.5 stars - CJ

More than any other recording artist, one feels one should react to a new Radiohead album in the same manner one might to the unveiling of a controversial piece of contemporary art. One must try to connect with what one hears on a much deeper, esoteric level.
 
It is unquestionably, and unequivocally, a piece of Art. Beautifully challenging, not just to the individual listening, but on a far higher plane it is pointing the gun; the finger; the stick not only at the music industry, but society as a whole. In accessing the album the conch is passed to the world and is asked: What is music worth? What is art worth?
 
One parted with £4, as one is tight and would have bought it in the sales. (Though one wishes one had paid one pound as that would have made for a better punch line). - Locochimpo

The release of this album was an absolute bolt from the blue. Everyone knew album seven was past due, but no-one could have predicted a release this radical. As CJ mentions, it's a no-brainer when you're 70 millions albums deep in sales - and realistically it is not a suitable model for 99% of the bands out there. Why not just forget your worries about piracy and still release a CD? The labels don't have any problems knocking very recent releases by the likes of Kasabian or Kings of Leon down to £3 in HMV, so they're obviously covering their costs.

I've never had a problem either downloading music for free or paying for it if it's good. In fact I'm a conscientious thief, often stockpiling copies of albums I've downloaded, or shelling out £30 for a shoddy live box - as compensation for someone giving me a copy of a studio release.

The bottom line these days however is that CDs are fast becoming a thing of the past. I have shelves and shelves (or boxes under the bed these days) of CDs that have literally never been played on a CD player. They arrive, get ripped to digital and then filed away. Sleeve notes might get skimmed over on the way home. Radiohead have a always put great stock in their artwork, and I have a couple of the limited editions album's with Stanley Donwood's artwork. They're under the bed too.

I'd love to get the £40 discbox, but realistically it's not what I really want - as I'm not going to hang it on the wall like some sort of pseudo art collector. I want the music, and I'd most likely shell out the extra just to get the extra tracks. I plumped down £3 for the download and will pony up for the CD when it lands (hopefully) next year some time, just for the extra music. Promise.

And what of the music? I loved Hail To The Thief and saw it as a climax to their progressive work on Kid A and Amnesiac. I'm glad Thom Yorke's diverted his tinkering to his far-from-satisfactory solo record and put a bit of welly back into this, but it does feel some what incohesive in places, sagging a bit in the middle. Minor nit-picking though. It's a new Radiohead album and it's better than 90% of what's been around recently.  - CSF - 4.5 Stars

The start and finish of a Radiohead album have been a along fascination of mine. Having made some of the best music of this and the last century Radiohead have always had an annoying habit of chucking in the odd duff song towards the mid way point of an album then another at the end. OK Computer, Amnesiac and Hail To The Thief are definitely top heavy but I can't put the same claim on In Rainbows. This is one of the most consistent albums they've made.

Like Kid Amnesiac's wailing trumpets the new sound for this year is the blues guitar and its presence on 15 Steps is a great contrast to the stuttering electronics. Bodysnatchers was a stand-out powerhouse at last years live shows with the dirtiest riffs we've heard for years and Reckoner and House Of Cards have an excellent direction-less quality, maintaining the same beat and tempo throughout both songs in their own way suggest that they could go on for ever. Which leads me on to the main complaint, length. The album itself seems very short and many of the songs end way too abruptly.

But finally they get the ending right. Kid A could end so well if it wasn't for Motion Picture Soundtrack but a lot of the others start to tail off from about track 6. Jigsaw Falling Into Place is a future classic and one of the finest songs on this record but the spooked out lethargy of Videotape gives a powerful sense of finality to the album. All in all this one of the most complete pieces of work from Radiohead in years. You can hear every album they've made in this one including Pablo Honey and it still works. - BC - 4.5 Stars

The first listen of In Rainbows for me was an instant connection - it just sounded better than anything else I've heard for ages. There's an aura of confidence, of a band sitting back and enjoying playing together, the sound of people with something to say and the skills to say it.

Don't know if I've remembered this correctly, but I'm sure there was an episode of Later... once where Billy Corgan was on with Zwan (his post-Pumpkins project) and you could tell he really thought he'd changed the face of music etc again - and then you could see that vision crumbling while he watched Radiohead - who really had. (Almost as good as the time Dylan played Donovan one of his new songs.) The other thing I always remember about them was seeing them play Victoria Park in 2000, and just being amazed at how they'd managed to get so many people to listen to really out-there, avant-garde rock - and absolutely love it.

They just seem ahead of the game somehow - yes they've got record collections filled with Aphew Twin and Autechre - but it's translating that into rock and singalongable songs that makes them work so well. Love the ballads on this one - House Of Cards is as close as I think I've ever heard them get to a love song. Stormers like 15 Step and Bodysnatchers are huge. There's a real sense of them having taken the experiments of the past and learned how to incorporate them without trying so hard this time round, leaving it all feeling like complete, fully formed collection. You somehow want to inhabit this album - or maybe just hear it loud and live. Personally, I like the fact it's concise - it's one of the few albums this year where I've wanted to listen to it altogether, in order - and then go back to the beginning again.

To pull all this off, and then top it with the added "hey we know it's 2007" move of all the download/boxset options makes them feel connected to the world we've all found ourselves in. Totally agree with BC above - it does feel special to let everyone get it at the same time. As someone who grew up waiting months, sometimes a year for albums to be shipped out to the colonies from England, it's weird to click and instantly get stuff these days - does feel like this has somehow put some of the excitement and fun back into music. Would love to know how the experiment's done - real drag it's not chart eligible, but maybe that's all pointless and irrelevant now too... C71 - 4.5 Stars

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19th Oct 2007 - 3 comments - Add Comment - Tweet

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Editors

An End Has A Start

Sony BMG

If my record collection was a sinking ship (which before the days of promo cd's and hooky downloads it was) this new album by Editors would be one of the first to go overboard. That's not to say it's bad, it's just totally unnecessary if you have their excellent debut. Very little progress has been made from their soaring musical arrangements that on The Back Room combined to great effect with Tom Smith's baritone strength as frontman.

It's the same story here but the highs are nowhere near as lofty. It's a shame because in their own right these are really solid songs. The title track is a driving tour de force but if you've got All Sparks you don't need it. Bones is the slow, rumbling track that gently builds to a powerful climax but then so did The Back Room's Fall and Camera.

Smith's voice has a booming depth that commands real power but his band provide a sound that we hear all too much these days. The restraint he showed on The Back Room was the source of the tension that held it all together but it's just a bit tiresome here and I just wish he'd let rip now and again. He comes close on The Racing Rats but still frustratingly manages to keep it together. Songs like this and Escape The Nest make the best bids for the peak but by taking the same rout as their predecessors they will be forever shackled.

I like this band, they swim in the same pool as the other NME-loving new comers but don't subscribe to all the pretension that comes with such company. I like the way they're called Editors and not The Editors, I really liked The Back Room and all the b-sides that came with it and really wanted to like this. I was primed and ready, I was an easy target, but they missed, and I'm sure they couldn't give a monkey's that they missed me but I do and that's all that counts.

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21st Jun 2007 - 5 comments - Add Comment - Tweet

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Cut City

Exit Decades

Gold Standard Labora

Many people may have come across this record while searching the web for any news of Interpol's next move. Whether intentionally or not, Sweden's Cut City had their debut leaked under the name Interpol - Mammoth and the clever thing about this genius piece of marketing and internet manipulation is that once you've downloaded this it would probably take the average casual Interpol fan a few plays to realise that it isn't the New York wonder boys after all, but a band who sound exactly like them in nearly every way. This overwhelming similarity would normally turn me right off but the cunning strategy and the fact that it's a pretty good listen have endeared this beautiful pastiche to my ears.

With heavy drums, chiming guitars and Max J Hansson's monotone vocals songs like opener Like Ashes and Anticipation have all the driving force and deep penetration of the myriad of influences that present themselves with every note. You can't help thinking through albums like this how similar the whole retro music trend is to chinese whispers. Interpol were clearly influenced by Joy Division and while Cut City give more than just a passing nod to the Factory trailblazers it's Interpol from whom most of their sound has developed. So somewhere along this chain of inspiration the sound is diluted. Intepol's Paul Banks  is no where near as intense a vocalist as Ian Curtis and here we see Hansson to be a diluted version of Banks.

But if the forthcoming Interpol album sucks, and now that the new Editors album does suck, Exit Decades will more than fill the gap in your Joy Divisionesq, barritone post-punk slot and no record collection is complete these days without such a slot.

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19th Jun 2007 - 2 comments - Add Comment - Tweet

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Tortoise

A Lazarus Taxon

Some bands never put a foot wrong. Whether it's a perfectly pitched new album, a superb accompanying book, or a zeitgeist-defining DVD they get everything right.

Tortoise might well be one of those bands. With this 3 CD+DVD box set, the Chicago band collect together 12 years of rarities, b-sides, remixes and live material - as well as numerous promo videos and some live footage - all superbly presented in this box set with artwork by retired Swiss policeman Arnold Odermatt.

Where oddities and rarities often make for a patchy album at best, Tortoise manage to hold steady over three CDs without ever feeling like we're being fed scraps and left-overs.

The first two discs compile 25 tracks from Japanese issues, compilations, promotional 7" singles and more. The opening 12 minute Gamera is superb - a drastic reworking His Second Story Island from the debut Tortoise album. Gamera is then re-worked itself later on - now called Goiriri. David Pajo's composition Vaus also stands out, as does promo 7" track Madison Area - all using sublime instrumentals to creat a moody, atmospheric landscape.

For disc three this compilation manages to avoid the pitfalls of some compilations and keep even the remixes on-message. Following the release of their debut album, the band asked some friends to provide remixes - which became long-out-of-print album Rhythms, Resolutions & Clusters - included here in it's entirety. Generally avoiding the "Blah Blah (Ho Hum Remix)" path, most of these are re-built as completely new tracks - often with new titles. Steve Albini, Jim O'Rourke and Mike Watt are amongst the chefs - with Watt and Kira Roeseler adding some Dos bass to extra bonus track Cornpone Brunch.

Like the 4 sided double album ("let's play disc 2, side 1") before it, even a 3CD set is condensed into one, long digital playlist these days. Although 33 songs, 3CDs or 2.9 hours is certainly a lot to cover there's barely a moment to rest and like Fugazi, Wilco, Radiohead no record collection is complete without some Tortoise - and this might well be the place to start.

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17th Oct 2006 - Add Comment - Tweet

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The Black Angels

Passover

However you arrange your record collection these days, you will have no trouble fitting this lot in. Whether it's by mood, genre or simply alphabetical you'll find this Austin based group sits nicely between Black Sabbath, Black Mountain and The Black Keys. The only other reference that I didn't mention as it kinda ruins my theory is The Velvet Underground. This band take their name from a Velvet classic, "The Black Angels Death Song" and at times the spirit of Nico is summoned to great effect.

These guys aren't trying to rewrite musical history but Passover is a damn good listen none the less. Album opener Young Men Dead rolls in with a dirty piece of plodding, monotone guitar accompanied by the lyric, "Head for the hills, pick up steel on your way" and the mood is set for a gloomy, psychedelic and often heavy rock delight.

The Sniper At The Gates Of Heaven follows a structure that is employed throughout most of this album, it marches into view like the advancing armies of Mordor and builds the sense of impending doom magnificently with the help of Alex Maas' anxious and highly strung vocals while Bloodhounds On My Trail evokes The Velvets' world of drugged out, paranoid psychedelic but soon leaves it behind as the volume is notched up and off we plod to far rockier shores.

It's not all this satisfying though, The First Vietnamese War sounds like John Goodman's funeral speech to Donny in The Big Lebowski with it's simplistic and relentless "War Is Hell" subject matter. This sentiment is continued on the albums closing hidden acoustic track where we get the lyrics "He's fighting in the Iraq war, what for?" and it's a shame that this highly fulfilling album ends with the repetition of "Somebody please stop that war." But these complaints are few and far between and don't come close to ruining an album that satisfyingly ticks all the rock boxes.

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7th Aug 2006 - Add Comment - Tweet

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