Posts Tagged ‘PLacebo’

Listen: ‘Creep’ by Midas Fall

Posted: 12 February 2023 in Recommended Streams and Videos
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As anyone who ever listened to the legendary BBC radio DJ John Peel will know, hearing a favourite artist re-interpret a familiar song by another artist can bring new insights into both, as well as being a lot of fun.

During a break from writing Midas Fall’s fifth album, Elizabeth Heaton took some ideas that had been incubating for a while and, along with bandmate Michael Hamilton, applied their own unique perspective to three well-loved songs by Bruce Springsteen (Dancing in the Dark), Radiohead (Creep) and Placebo (Every You Every Me).

Covers EP sees Springsteen’s driving rock anthem reimagined as a quieter, more introspective narrative, imbued with ‘80s synths and Heaton’s softly hopeful but uncertain vocals. Radiohead’s Creep is a dreamy, kaleidoscopic waltz that slowly builds to a raging climax. On Every You Every Me, the icy undertones of Placebo’s original version are magnified even further, evoking a bleak landscape cloaked in dark, haunting sounds.

For first single ‘Creep’ Liz from the band states,  “Creep, along with the other tracks on the upcoming EP were created during lockdown. We took some of our favourite tracks from growing up and gave them a different feel. As a teenager Radiohead were the first band to make me feel that music could be something more, so have been a massive influence to me musically, especially when I first started writing. I was listening to Creep and imagined it played in a waltz style time signature. With the aid of my keyboard and a glass of wine the vocals seemed to flow very easily and were captured in a single take. From there it grew arms and legs."

Listen here:

Covers EP will be released digitally worldwide by Monotreme Records on 7th April.

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GLDN – Suicide Machine

Posted: 11 September 2022 in Singles and EPs
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9th September 2022

Christopher Nosnibor

Brooklyn-based blood and gore and dark-fixated industrial metal act GLDN keep on mixing things up with their singular and innovative take on industrial / metal / electronica, and the first single released ahead of the upcoming album Hemophilia, released early October, is another genre-smashing blast of excitement.

At the start of the video, front man Nicholas Golden is wearing a minidress on a mock-up of a slightly fuzzy-looking VHS clip, and while in itself it’s not edgy, it’s both resourceful (can’t afford actors for your promo? Do it yourself) and parodic in setting a dystopian tone n a retro setting. The trouble with retro dystopias is that, as we’ve come to find the hard way, is that the projected future which is now the present is actually worse. 1984 no longer reads like fiction, but reportage. What do you actually do with that knowledge? How do you live with that grim realisation? You too could be the owner of an obelisk…

The lyrics pick at social media and Instagram perfection, and on reading the lyrics, I remember with a slow sinking feeling how I read on a daily basis in the tabloid media how professionals – nurses, teachers, name it – are taking to OnlyFans to make ends meet and in no time they’re quitting their stressful, shittily-paid dayjobs in favour of coining it in to pay off their mortgages:

Got no flaws, no imperfections

The unachievable is my new obsession

Can’t get enough, I’m never satisfied

I’ve got to whore myself out just to feel alive

‘I’d rather be dead than be irrelevant’, Golden concludes, and it’s a stark yet fair reflection: people crave the attention as much as the money, and the bottom line is that the system is fucked and society and culture is fucked.

Coming on like an electro-infused black metal cross between Placebo and Marilyn Manson and Nine Inch Nails, ‘Suicide Machine’ finds GLDN in darkly abrasive form, peaking with a blistering climactic finale that’s utterly punishing. Bring the album.

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The Slow Cooked Bears – We’ll Never Be Apart

Posted: 23 August 2022 in Singles and EPs
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2nd September 2022

James Wells

The last time we encountered Slow Cooked Bears here was back in December 2020, on the release of their single ‘The Grand Scheme’, the follow up to the stark, tense-sounding ‘Space Odyssey’.

They’ve been hard at it back on the live circuit since then, and these things change bands, harden them, shape them, give them focus, and a reforged sense of identity. Well it can, or it can crush them. The London trio have followed the former path, and rather than becoming crushed by the wheels of industry, have been building themselves nicely.

Pitched as being for fans of The Smashing Pumpkins, Queens of the Stone Age, Placebo and Pixies, ‘We’ll Never Be Apart’ was produced with Michael Smith whose former clients include Wolf Alice and Anteros, and promises ‘a giant leap’ – and yes, it delivers.

With a rolling bass and chiming guitar by way of an intro, it breaks into a big bridge that becomes a surging chorus. You don’t get many songs where the hook is the guitar section after the vocals, but with ‘We’ll Never Be Apart’, they bring it. And, while in places it hints at the kind of early 00s arena indie, the songs packs in drive and edge that’s emotionally rich and owes more to the likes of The Twilight Sad than it does to Keane or Coldplay back in the day.

On other words, it really is a huge evolution that sees the band straddling boundaries. It’s got enough heft to not be a complete sell-out, but it’s certainly not as dark or edgy as ‘Space Oddysey’, being a whole lot less Joy Division / Editors / Interpol / Cinematics, and less Placebo in collision with Royal Blood and Black Keys than ‘The Grand Scheme’, and hinting at ambitions of broader horizons.

Objectively, it’s a great tune, and could well mark a turning point for the band. Is it too early for me to say I preferred their earlier stuff without sounding like a hipster cockend? Guess that depends on the next single, right?

Artwork - Slow Cooked Bears

The Palpitations – Denial

Posted: 8 April 2022 in Singles and EPs
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15th April 2022

Christopher Nosnibor

It may sound a bit screwy, but then, we’re here on the Internet and I’m sure you’ll have read far screwier things presented in more enticing ways that are far more dangerous than my theory that individuals are somehow psychologically and biologically attuned to certain kinds of music. It’s a complex issue, and one I’m yet to fully unravel, but it feels like something that slots into the nature / nurture debate: are people born predisposed to appreciate darker music, or is it triggered by life events – or a combination of the two?

In 1983, at the age of seven or eight, I saw Killing Joke on Top of the Pops performing ‘Love Like Blood’. I was, in hindsight, enjoying a mundane middle-class upbringing, but this moment – and it was one of several – went a long way to cementing my appreciation of darker music. I’d never suffered any kind of trauma and hardship beyond maybe some kids taking the piss out of my coat or whatever, but still something drew me towards this kind of thing.

Nearly forty years on, and ultimately, nothing’s changed: the turn of the millennium brought a new wave of post-punk influenced acts, with the likes of Interpol and Editors setting the grounds of darker territory. And, in turn, we’re seeing bands emerging now that very much echo the sound and style of post-millennial wave of post-punk, or new millennium new wave if you will (there doesn’t really seem to be a label for it, but if that one ever gets used, I’m claiming it).

This is the long and meandering route to the arrival the new single from London-based alt-rockers The Palpitations who – like so many acts – emerged during lockdown out of a need to so something, and the foursome – Tom Talbot on vocals, Brett Rieser on guitar, Nishant Joshi on bass, Florin Pascu on drums – set out their agenda with the ‘Feed The Poor! Eat The Rich!’ EP.

But there’s a nugget in the Palpitations bio that shows they’re not just another bunch of musicians who were loafing around listlessly and decided to bung some tunes together to fill the time whole on furlough or unable to play live. Talbot and Joshi were, in actual fact, working as frontline doctors, and both were instrumental in protecting NHS staff with upgraded PPE, and also took part in protests that gained international attention. Joshi later took the government to court over their PPE failures, winning a landmark case.

It’s out of this passion and a sense of frustration that the music of The Palpitations comes, and ‘Denial’ is a belter, smashing together a spindly, soaring lead guitar, with cool, meandering synths and a thumping solid rhythm section; if Interpol collided with Bivouac and Eight Storey Window, you’d probably have a handle on their post-punk grunge crossover, although there’s perhaps more than a hint of Placebo in the blend, and ‘Denial’ packs some darkly melodic angst and significant tension into its four-minute duration. It resonates not just on an emotional or sonic level, but on  a cerebral and biological level – and it’s an instant grab.

Neverlanded – F.u.U.

Posted: 29 May 2019 in Singles and EPs
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1st April 2019

Christopher Nosnibor

I can’t recall if my rants about infantilism as the latest tool of oppression in the arsenal of late-to-the-point-of-crumbling capitalism have made it to any reviews or commentary pieces, or if they’ve been contained to nights down the pub with old friends, after which ideas for delivering incisive critiques have evaporated with the fumes of alcohol the following morning. The greatest likelihood is the latter. Anyway. In summary, the term ‘adulting’ is indicative of the millennial inability to deal with life in general (which I get, because we all struggle, but part of being an adult is stepping up and enabling the next generation instead of cowering in the face of responsibility and running to one’s parents for help in filling out forms for car finance or doing a spot of DIY), and the fact that I find myself surrounded by people in their late 20s accessorising with the same all-things-unicorn my seven-year-old daughter is already growing tired of is a clear symptom of a deeper societal issue. Is the unicorn the symbol of the snowflake (a term I abhor, for the record)?

I write from a position which is both central to, and exempt from, the gender wars which are raging all around right now, and will be open in saying that I don’t write from a position of relating. I’ve suffered prejudice simply for that, too, but we’ll not revisit that here. The key point is that inclusivity isn’t about where you’re from, but how you treat others. Irrespective of gender, I’ve always been an outsider, and know that outsiderism from wherever you’re standing is hard.

Maybe I should just shut up with the commentary and stick to the fact that Neverlanded are giving away their debut EP, F.u.U. (that’s Fluffy Unicorns United) in exchange for a donation to Mermaids UK, a charity which ‘offers support to transgender and gender variant children and young people, their families and supporting professionals’. And regardless of the music, I can only give total backing for a band who are willing to launch their recording career with a view to promoting something other than themselves. Alongside Modern Technology (link) who are donating the proceeds of their debut to Mind and Shelter, Neverlanded seem to be leading a new generation of socially-conscious philanthropic artists who are more concerned with making a difference in whatever small way they can than fame and wealth.

It’s a double bonus that the EP’s four tracks, ‘Brainsane’, ‘MesS.O.S.’, ‘This Friend Of Mine’, and ‘Scream 4 Ice Cream’ are more than just solid, but remarkably strong.

They pitch themselves as being for fans of Placebo, L7, Silverchair, Garbage, Nirvana, Cranberries, Pixies, and Refused, which lands them right in the heart of the melee of 90s alternative, and it’s precisely what they deliver.

‘Brainsane’ pounds in with a riff that’s as beefy as hell, the drawling vocals and loud / quiet dynamic straight out of 1993 in the best possible way, because it balances rawness and emotional sincerity with a full gutsy sound. If ‘MesS.O.S.’ is poppier, it’s poppier in the way that Nirvana’s ‘Been a Son’ is poppier. The slower, almost dream ‘This Friend of Mine’ is well-placed, and the lack of angst is no detractor, not least of all with it being followed by the lo-fi grunge-out of ‘Scream 4 Ice Cream’ that drives the EP to a lurching, overdriven close.

Not only is F.u.U total quality from beginning to end, but it succeeds in contributing to a well-explored genre without sounding remotely generic: in fact, it’s exhilarating in its passion and purity.

AA

Neverlanded - FUU

Watch: Preview of Pure Phase Ensemble feat. Anton Newcombe Documentary

Posted: 2 February 2017 in Recommended Streams and Videos
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SpaceFest presents a brief documentary about the latest experience with Pure Phase Ensemble. In its current incarnation, the collective is led by a true legend: Anton Newcombe of The Brian Jonestown Massacre, along with with Emil Nikolaisen of Scandinavian rock band Serena Maneesh.

Filmed by RSU / Agencja Vizualna, this film presents a sneak preview of what is to come on the ‘Live at SpaceFest!’ album and the story behind Pure Phase Ensemble 6. Every December during Gdansk’s illustrious SpaceFest!, an eclectic group of musicians from across Poland are joined by a guest curator from abroad to form Pure Phase Ensemble. The group’s makeup constantly changes, guided by the artistic vision of a new curator every year and directed by Karol Schwarz of Nasiono Records who has been responsible for its musical cohesion from the very outset.

Through improvisation at a workshop organized by Nasiono Records and SpaceFest!, the musicians produce a set of unique songs during a week-long workshop ahead of the festival at the Laznia 2 Centre for Contemporary Art in the city’s Nowy Port district, seeking inspiration amidst its post-industrial atmosphere. The festival then culminates in this music being performed and recorded in real time for the inevitable album release.

Anton Newcombe espoused one rule for this experiment – that there are no rules when making music… and one standard… “get weirder… be heavy. and dreamy. but not pointless”.
Pure Phase Ensemble 6 is comprised of 8 musicians, including six from emerging Polish alternative bands: 
Karol Schwarz (7faz, KSAS) – guitar, vocals
Olga Myslowska (Polpo Motel) – vocals, keyboard
Maciej Karminski (Jesien) – drums
Marcin Lewandowski (Judy’s Funeral, Castlings, Soon) – bass guitar
Jakub Zwirello (Oslo Kill City, Szezlong) – guitar
Kacper Graczyk (Aiodine, coding) – electronic beats, synths, backing vocals

“I prefer to hear the sound bouncing off the walls and most festivals are outside and have time limits and various handicaps…I am more or less a jazz folk guy, I’m not an entertainer there to jump up and down and get you pumped…I just do as I feel…,”says Anton Newcombe. “I see myself as an idea person. I play like 80 instruments in as many ways as I can reinvent them because I am not a virtuoso… I want to contribute to Polish culture by writing at least one song that is worth listening to.”

In past incarnations of Pure Phase Ensemble, the group was curated by Mark Gardener (Ride), Laetitia Sadier (Stereolab), Ray Dickaty (Spiritualized), Steve Hewitt (Placebo), Jaime Harding (Marion), Chris Olley (Six By Seven), and Hugo Race (The Bad Seeds, The True Spirit). Nasiono Records’ very own Karol Schwarz (7faz, KSAS) has been responsible for the Ensemble’s musical cohesion from the very outset.

You can watch a preview of the forthcoming documentry here: