Chimpomatic

Busdriver

RoadKillOvercoat

Epitaph

The problem with being the hip hop reviewer for a white, middle class indie rock website is that you don't tend to get much work. Sure, I get paid the same as the other chimps, but you can often find me in the canteen here at Chimp Towers sippin' on a 40' with my feet up - waiting for a beep on my pager from CSF to tell me he's got something for me. Long days amble by and the odd thugged-out dick rap record comes and goes but in the words of Ice T " I don't play that shit." I took this job for the cause. Hip Hop has the potential to be the most exciting and creatively diverse genres of them all - it doesn't have the boundaries that others suffer from, it goes where it pleases or at least it should.

So one lazy afternoon after finishing my fourth brewski, I was thinking of popping out for some more cigar papers to escape the accusing glares of the dinner ladies (I had just been crunking furiously while shouting " Errr' body in the club gettin' tipsy,")  when my pager goes buck-wild. "Busdriver, WTF?" was all it said. At first I thought it was my editor wanting me to drive the Chimpmobile on another day trip - but then remembered the new album RoadKillOvercoat by the LA tongue twisting lyricist. Finally a real job. Busdriver's previous albums for Big Dada were like no other. He's the gatling gun of the hip hop world, delivering intricately constructed raps with rapid-fire dexterity. This was gonna be good - something proper to get my teeth into, but damn, I was hella' drunk.

From the outset the signs were all there that this was going to be a treat. Casting Agents And Cowgirls sees Busdriver fit his rhymes expertly round a a tight beat which prepares us well for the machine gun onslaught of Less Yes's, More No's. Rhyming "Soccer Moms" with " Carpet Bombs," this track is about lyrical muscle flexing, as is the next installment where we're told, "Recreational paranoia is the sport of now so kill your employer." You can almost imagine the speed of the little ball bouncing over these words at the bottom of a Karaoke screen.

And so it continues, but once you reach mid point you are thrilled but starting to map out the rest of the record. This is where this album becomes a great hip hop record. With Sun Shower, Busdriver plays his hip hop ace card - he reaches into his inside pocket and pulls out a fully credible license to do what the fuck he wants. All hip hop cats have this license, but few know it. After dazzling us with lyrical acrobatics the dude starts singing. Yes singing. His floaty vocals drift effortlessly over a minimal, deep techno beat and if you thought this was just an interlude, the next track sees Busdriver duet with Coco Rosie's Bianca Cassidy. My editors pager words echoed in my head "Busdriver, What The Fuck?" indeed. The Troglodyte Wins restores the hip hop factory settings but they sound fresher now. The beats are gloriously tight, the rhymes even more thrilling and they see us through to the end where we get yet more of that singing stuff, and there's even an acoustic guitar on blissful closer Dream Catcher's Mitt.

This kind of thing makes my days in the canteen gettin' tipsy worthwhile. It's clever, but not anally so and Busdriver has cultivated a refreshing blend of fiercely intelligent poetry with the playful humour of his earlier work. Since the demise of Blackalicious the cause needs rhymes of this agility - and Busdriver carries the torch to new heights, skillfully avoiding the pitfall of cliche with a style such as his. RoadKillOvercoat is an album that delights the same way anything by Buck 65 or Dose One would and it does what hip hop set out to do. What ever the fuck it wants.

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1st Mar 2007 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet

The Ponys

Turn The Lights Out

Matador Records

Flying in the face of Chinese Wisdom, 2007 could well turn out to be the Year of the Horse.  Chimp favourites Band of Horses are in the studio and on the European road, and now their equine-ly named contemporaries The Ponys release a strong album - that is setting the early pace for my Album Of The Year awards.  Recently signed to Matador, Turn the Lights Out is the 3rd album from the Chicago 4 piece and is assured and promising in equal measure.

Theirs is a confident, multi-layered guitar sound that recalls Goo-era Sonic Youth and the Jesus and Mary Chain, but The Ponys aren‘t simply a fawning tribute band, there are enough ideas across the whole album to ensure that no lame tracks appear.

Out of the gates strongly and I’ll tip ‘em to remain ahead of the pack for the year to come. Good stuff.

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#chimpovich

27th Feb 2007 - Add Comment - Tweet

Wires On Fire

Wires On Fire

Buddyhead

Ever since the mid-80's - when those two school buses carrying the Punks and the Metalheads crashed on the way to the high school - LA seems to have cornered the market on a certain genre of music. You could describe it as punk influenced metal, maybe with a touch of West Hollywood sleaze. Sure the genre is long out of high school now, probably driving it's own muscle car around town - but the agenda is still the same.

Following in the steps of the likes of The Bronx and The Warlocks, Wires On Fire are a pretty incendiary bunch - and it's no surprise to find out they are on tough talking and generally entertaining website/label Buddyhead. Hard and heavy, this is punk sensibilities with a penchant for guitar solos. You know they're going to rock live, but for this debut they've just laid down a sold album with some promise.

C+ (2.5 stars in chimp terms). Has potential, but could try harder.

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#CSF

24th Feb 2007 - Add Comment - Tweet

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah

Untitled New Album

First impression of the new (as yet untitled) CYHSY album suggests it's going to be a 2007 Chimp fave; more Violent Femmes vocals, a little bit bleepier in parts, v good.

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8th Nov 2006 - Add Comment - Tweet

Casino Royale

(dir. Martin Campbell)

Had real misgivings about this James Blonde reboot when i saw the first trailer, started to think it might be alright when the second one came out, and actually really enjoyed most of it when i actually got to see the whole thing.

Won't go into too much detail here, as (unless you've read the book) the plot hasn't come out too much, and it's fun watching it unfold. suffice to say, for once, it's not about foiling some daft plan to TAKE OVER THE WORLD, more a small-scale operation (well, relatively - it's still Bond) involving terrorist funding, hitmen, slick boats, glammed-up women, men in tuxedos, guns, bombs, and lots of Texas hold 'em (007's caught on to the poker boom).

It's all pretty crunchy action, with a brutal couple of kills to get things rolling. Much less emphasis on the arched-eyebrows "hey, i'm delivering a line in a BOND FILM NOW" wink-wink lines that made the Brosnan era so uneven.

Daniel Craig steps into the tux with a thuggish style that seems to fit; he's not the suavest dude in town, but there's a weight to the way he flips between cold killer, and icy charmer working his "emotions? me?" lines on Eva Green.

Judi Dench is back as M, but moneypenny's only referenced in a throwaway line, and there's no Q, which works - there are some gadgets, but they're not really there to save the day as much as before - no "if only i had my magnetic belt on right now i could totally save this hot chick" moments.

Cameos to watch include Richard Branson and some VIRGIN planes, producer Michael G Wilson as a corrupt police official, and Jeffrey Wright in what could be a recurring role if he plays his cards right (ho ho). He's also recently found himself on the "him again?!" list at Chimp Towers, after popping up in The Manchurian Candidate (pretty lame really), Syriana, and Broken Flowers.

There's also a lot of product placement going on - not quite as much as the last few maybe, but still lots of totally unnecessary screen time looking at brand names. I'd like to thank VIRGIN, ROLEX, FORD, VERSACE, ASTON MARTIN, SONY ERICSSON etc for annoying me in this film.

BIt of an odd moment where some misc African guys manage to smuggle machetes into Montenegro; yup, that's what they all do…

The only other major downer is a truly awful nu-rock theme tune from Chris "Soundgarden" Cornell and David Arnold, which totally ruins a great animated opening sequence full of playing cards melting into each other with Daniel Craig looking generally louche. What a waste. Think the themes have been the worst things about the recent films; this one makes you think Madonna's effort was ok. It would be so easy to find something classy that would fit, rather than trying to get all modern and do that terrible processed rock sound.

film: ***.5 - solid effort, James Blond = Royale without the cheese, like to see more
soundtrack: * silence would be goldeneye next time
product placement: * we know you can afford some expensive toys James, stop showing us them all the time

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#chimp71

3rd Nov 2006 - Add Comment - Tweet

Band Of Horses

Everything All The Time

Sub Pop

First up, comparisons with My Morning Jacket are inevitable. On the first few listens, I had to check that Jim James himself wasn't providing the vocals on a couple of tracks. With that in mind, the chase cut to as it were, let's base the review around that knowledge. Let's suppose that MMJ had a younger brother, who hung around the practice sessions and was witness to their particular brand of genius. He's maybe thinking to himself, yeah that's pretty good - but those extended, distorted solos are a bit distracting, at times they get in the way of a nice, clean, imaginative pop song. I like the reverb on the vocals, I'll have that (It's possible that a couple of tracks were actually lifted straight from the outtakes of a MMJ session - Part One and I Go To The Barn Because I Like The could well be from At Dawn). The result is a charming, dreamy album with enough emotional weight to demand full attention. Comparable to MMJ and completely comfortable with that comparison.

Apologies, if you've never heard of My Morning Jacket. If this is the case, I can only presume it is your first visit to Chimpomatic - welcome.

Update: With the Chimp team seemingly in approval, it looks like this is going to stay the distance. I'm prepared to admit it when i'm wrong: This is not just a good album, it looks like it's going to be a classic.

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#chimpovich

2nd Oct 2006 - 4 comments - Add Comment - Tweet

High School Musical

Kenny Ortega

Demented combination of every guilty pleasure ever: Grease, Saved By The Bell, Bring It On, Karate Kid etc etc, HSM is a worldwide phenomenon. Not standard chimp fare, but strangely enjoyable

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29th Aug 2006 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet

Pearl Jam

The Point, Dublin

Having seen Radiohead earlier this year, and with My Morning Jacket coming up in September and MC Hammer in done 1990 only Pearl Jam and Wilco remained as the pillars of my music taste yet to be seen live. Now, after one memorable night in Dublin, Wilco stand alone.

This could have gone either way, as I have been into this band since I was a kid and although I love the new album it rarely gets played when a Pearl Jam mood grips me - often losing out to such classics as Vitalogy or No Code. I was quite surprised to find myself at the front of a seething mass of frenzied fans as I thought it was just me, CSF and a few other Chimp affiliates that still followed this band. Apparently not. Even though the Dire Straits sounding Inside Job is far from being my favourite track on the new album I was very grateful to hear its slow steady build up as the opening track. Had a more anthemic opener been chosen I fear my rib cage would have collapsed under the pressure of 7000 foaming, sweaty fans. This calm intro didn't last long as the band began to race through a string of the best of the new stuff, with the mighty World Wide Suicide being a crowd favourite.

From then on the order of the day was 'hands-in-the-air-platoon-moment-classics,' and it was simply dazzling. Given To Fly had the fans in a blissful state of euphoria and the wonderfully extended version of Daughter was followed by the live favourite Better Man which saw Vedder's voice being drowned out by the swell of a 7000 strong sing along which couldn't help to send shivers down the spine. As if this wasn't enough the first act was brought to a climactic finish with the phenomenal Rear View Mirror, Pearl Jam's finest moment in my opinion. It's a pretty epic song at the best of times, the bands Bohemian Rhapsody if you will, but tonight it was extended beyond my wildest dreams. It dipped and soared and seemed as if it would never end until finally it burst into a climactic crescendo with every light in the house being called upon.

Two encores later and just about every classic you could possibly wish for (including a cover of Dublin favourite The Boys Are Back In Town by Thin Lizzy) and I was truly exhausted. Every time I was fortunate enough to catch a glimpse of Eddie Vedder through sweaty bodies and other peoples wet hair plastered across my face he looked to be having a really good time. Lots of banter with the crowd made us feel that this was an important night for him and the band as well as us, and after a lengthy rendition of Neil Young's Fuckin' Up Vedder thanked the crowd for welcoming them back after six years and humbly departed the stage.

It was clear to see the bands unity after 15 years of playing together as they often huddled together and jammed furiously, as if alone in this great hall. In true Donnington Monsters of Rock style they all stepped aside during Even Flow for a five minute Matt Cameron drum solo which was simply ossum. My only criticism was the shear size of the venue. I gave up fighting for my life while straining to see anything along time ago and even though it beats sitting it's far from ideal. Apart from that it was everything I expected and much, much more.

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#BC

25th Aug 2006 - 9 comments - Add Comment - Tweet

M. Ward

Post-War

Post-War is a warm, lovely record. Determinedly low key and melancholic from the outset, it is however never less than immediate and grabs your attention throughout. M. Ward's song writing is as strong as ever; the opening Poison Cup is a quietly stunning masterpiece and Requiem is another early highlight.

As an album it feels altogether more polished and coherent than its predecessor Transistor Radio. The sound is slightly bigger and warmer without Ward loosing his slightly loose and ramshackle quality. The excellent first single Chinese Translation is majestic, with it's shuffling guitars and drums. Later, Chimp favourite Jim James guests on the excellent Magic Trick - a rousing bar room sing-a-long. Great.

Bush Hall gig review.
Click here for pictures.

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#marmot

18th Aug 2006 - Add Comment - Tweet

Foo Fighters

In Your Honor

Everybody loves Dave Grohl, including me, so the idea of a rock/accoustic double CD from the Foo Fighters certainly has appeal. The first (rock) disc is pretty thundering, with a great opener In Your Honor sounding like an angry, heavier Pink Floyd, followed by a handful of great, powerful numbers (No Way Back, Best of You, DOA). After that however, a couple of average tracks with fairly whack lyrics make you realise what an unfaltering pace the album has, and that's actually a problem. Things pick up towards the end of disc one with Resolve sounding like fairly classic Foo, and The Deepest Blues Are Black is pretty good, but moving onto the acoustic disc and things flatten out again...

There are a lot of good tracks on disc two, but without the juxtoposition of heavier tracks, there's no real yardstick for what stands out and what doesn't. Don't get me wrong, you get a lot for your money and there's more than a CD's worth of really top tracks, but you might be advised to edit and sequence your own version of this album.

Nice idea, but an unsuccesful one.

UPDATE: A hot tip from chimp jnr: organise a playlist by track number (1,1,2,2,3,3 etc) and things even out a lot better.

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#CSF

17th Aug 2006 - Add Comment - Tweet

Zappa Plays Zappa

Manchester Apollo

finally getting to hear zappa's music live is a pretty special thing if you've grown up with it, and I assumed it wasn't going to be possible after the great man smoked his last cigarette. wasn't quite sure what to expect with this dweezil zappa-fronted band - mawkish nostalgia? natalie cole plays nat king cole style weirdness? slightly embarrassing outing from someone who can't actually play as well as frank?

the set starts with some live footage of zappa and the mothers from the 1973 live at the roxy set - montana and another one i hadn't heard before (there's always the odd fifty albums or so to catch up with in the zappa archives)... then as frank retunes his guitar, dweezil and the band walk out, and kick into a storming version of hungry freaks, daddy followed by help i'm a rock - tracks i really thought i'd never hear live.

things just kept getting better from there - great sound, the band have been seriously drilled by dweezil (who's also nailed the style of frank's solos - inca roads was truly awesome - not a note-for-note transcription, but like he's absorbed the sensibility of the zappa tone and is channeling him on that trademark SG) - he's got them to the point that zappa had with his bands where he can direct them to change time signature, feel, who's soloing etc etc with a hand signal - jumping from bass to sax mid-bar - really impressive musicianship, but also highly entertaining (yes, humour DOES belong in music when the jokes are this good). having napoleon murphy brock who sang on loads of the 70s classics made it even more authentic - he's the voice of that great era, and is a real performer, as well as a great sax player.

the only downer came when the power on dweezil's mega guitar rig disappeared. rather than throwing a strop about it, he kept the audience in the loop, looked visibly disappointed and apologised profusely - you could tell he just wanted to put on the best show possible for his dad's fans, and the fact that the ability to switch from one cool sound to another was going to throw him off his game. the band launched into pound for a brown which they hadn't tried before, but eventually they had to power down the whole venue to sort it out.

bar time.

this could have been a drag, but the fact that they then came back with steve vai for some extra insanity on the solos front made it all ok. having someone who can literally do anything on a guitar is sometimes too much, but in this context, where the rest of the band are up to the challenge of making zappa's avant garde rock work, it's what you want. squeezing crazy notes out of his signature ibanez jem guitars, he's a joy to watch, freaking out, noodling at 100 miles an hour, then trading licks with dweezil in a real guitar-fest showdown. actually prefer dweezil's solos, but it's pretty cool to see someone going that far out. as chimp north points out, vai's the devil to dweezil's ralph macchio in crossroads.

the time lost meant that we missed out some other highlights that they had planned like city of tiny lights which we would have loved to see. also no terry bozio who has been playing trying to grow a chin, i'm so cute etc from the sheik yerbouti era.

but we did get to see them trying something they hadn't before - the screen dropped down, to let frank back on stage, filmed in a nutty 80s jumpsuit - soloing with dweezil's band playing. bit elvis, but still cool.

giving it 4.5 due to the lost time etc, but we're not holding it against them. if you love zappa, this band are kiling ugly radio.

other trivia facts from chimp north:

he's playing an SG because that's what he thinks of when he thinks of frank playing and it gets him in the frank zone
they're not frank's actual guitars though - didn't want to risk losing them on tour
they're in talks with gibson to produce a signature zappa model.

ps pic from manchester coming soon…

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#chimp71

2nd Jun 2006 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet