Posts Tagged ‘Post-Punk’

Disjecta Membra – Pearls Before Swine

Posted: 10 June 2024 in Albums, Reviews
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Christopher Nosnibor

Goths are the most knit-picking pedants and harshest critics of their favourite bands of any genre’s fans I know. Actually, that’s not quite true: fans of The Sisters of Mercy are the worst knit-picking pedants and harshest critics of their favourite bands. I preface this review with this observation as a Sisters fan first and foremost, and contestably as a goth second.

Y’see, most of the bands which emerged after that initial post-punk crop which included The Sisters, Siouxsie, The Cure, Bauhaus – disparate bands who have little in common sonically and stylistically beyond reverb, dyed hair, and studded belts – and sure, The March Violets, The Danse Society, UK Decay, and a handful of others, were toss. By the time ‘goth’ was formalised as a ‘genre’ it had gone to shit, mostly with every other band ripping off the guitar and bass for ‘Walk Away’ and diluting it to a pissweak rehash, and all too often with ghastly theatrical booming vocals. And they all started wearing waistcoats and frilly cuffs and appropriating ‘gothic’ imagery to boot. That was circa 86, by which time – that’s which time, not witch time – The Sisters and The Cure and Siouxsie had very much evolved, so we can probably as much blame The Mission for the start of the rather more naff second wave. By the 90s, derivative cack like Every New Dead Ghost was crawling out of the woodwork, amplifying the cliches on top of simply being laughably bad.

It so happens that Disjecta Membra have been going 30 years, emerging from that early 90s milieu of corny goth revivalism – presumably pining for 1985 and sobbing into their baggy sleeves when The Sisters went cock-rock with Vision Thing. This release is a career-spanning retrospective, which they’re giving away free on their Bandcamp. And this is the first I’ve heard of them.

I kinda wish it had stayed that way. It starts off with the single version of ‘Whakataurangi Ake’, which features Rob Thorne, and it’s a preposterous, pretentious semi-ambient new-age effort with over-the-top dramatic vocals. I mean, fair enough in that it draws on their New Zealand heritage, but it’s pretty obvious and cheesy as. And it’s all downhill from there.

‘Lilitu’ might actually be quite exciting if X-Mal Deutschland had never existed. But as it is, it might as well be a cover of ‘In Der Nacht.’ Talking of covers, there are a few here. And again, after The Sisters broke the ground of taking songs that didn’t obviously sit with the style – like ‘Jolene’, and disco faves ‘Gimme Gimme Gimme’, and Hot Chocolate’s ‘Emma’ and made it their schtick, every other goth band thereafter just had to toss in some quirky covers… and lo, we get a take on Boney M’s ‘Rasputin’ and covers of other goth bands, because they obviously add so much more. ‘Rasputin’ sounds like you’d imagine, of course: drum machine with a head-splitting snare and spindly guitars. It’s cack, but the worst thing is that it doesn’t really bring anything new and doesn’t even sound like it’s done vaguely ironically, meaning it’s neither cool nor funny.

And while we’re in the realms of cliche, what’s the obsession with marionettes in contemporary goth? ‘Antoinette Marionette’ is as obvious as it is lame as wordplay goes., and with its crashing snare and chilly synths and spindly guitars, the best that can be said for it is that it’s uptempo. I did kinda wish that ‘Skin Trade’ was a Duran Duran cover instead of the po-faced and predictable goth-by-numbers that it actually is.

Apparently, ‘Madeline! Madeline!’ and ‘Death by Discotheque’ are both good enough to warrant two versions on a thirteen-track compilation. They aren’t, and it suggests a lack of material of a quality to fill a single album over the course of thirty years. The latter, especially is a derivative disappointment, a stab at rambunctious goth-country in the vein of Fields of the Nephilim while attempting to create their own take on Suspiria’s ‘Allegedly, Dancefloor Tragedy’- one of the few decent songs to come out of the early 90s revival. This isn’t a patch on it, and just seems to think it’s amusing bashing cybergoths. I mean, they have a point, in that cybergoth was a ridiculous thing, but of all the audiences to alienate in their position.

The last track, ‘Walking in Light’ is quite interesting, marking a shift in tone towards droning guitar ambience, at least initially, but then it descends into a glam-infused rock stomp which turns out to be a cover anyway.

30 years, and this is the best they’ve got.

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Beak> – >>>>

Posted: 5 June 2024 in Albums
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Invada Records – 28th May 2024

Christopher Nosnibor

Well, this one landed out of the blue. A boon for fans, a shock to everyone, necessitating a reshuffle of review diaries for the likes of me.

It’s been six years since the last Beak> album. There are good reasons for this, as they explain: “After playing hundreds of gigs and festivals over the years we felt that touring had started to influence our writing to the point we weren’t sure who we were anymore. So we decided to go back to the origins of where we were at on our first album. With zero expectations and just playing together in a room.”

This is a remarkable slice of honesty about the effects of touring on the creative process, and band relationships. Most bands start at home – in some sense – with writing songs and the aspiration of touring those songs. But the dynamics change with success, and when touring relentlessly, time to write new material is squeezed. Over time, particularly with a pandemic interfering with, well, everything, many bands evolve their methods to operate over distance, and there’s always a risk that some of the dynamic is lost and stuff gets dialled in. It’s true that it’s now possible for bands to operate at distance, intercontinentally, even, but that’s not the Beak> way. They thrive on that instant interplay, the interaction, and without it, there’s simply no Beak>.

When they do come together they work fast. Single ‘Oh Know’ was ‘recorded on the only day the band could physically get together during the winter lockdown’ and released in October 2021. They really do make the most of their time, and their music – particularly this latest effort – froths with the urgency of pressured time. The urgency which has always permeated their music is banged up a couple of gears here, and as a result, >>>> is a frenzied explosion, with perhaps a desperate edge.

This being a Beak> album, it’s brimming with experimentalism, oddness, woozy psychedelia and persistent Krautrock pulsations, relentless beats. This being a Beak> album, it’s bloody great, and a lot of fun.

But that said, much of >>>> actually feels pretty bleak. Yes, Beak> turn bleak. It’s like a band having a blast while staring into the abyss, conscious that the end is near, but carrying on because at some point…

Of the album’s sudden and unexpected release, the band say in their statement, “At its core we always wanted it to be head music (music for the ‘heads’, not headphone music), listened to as an album, not as individual songs. This is why we are releasing this album with no singles or promo tracks.”

‘Oh Know’ isn’t included here, but the album does, however, include flipside ‘Ah Yeh’, and it does slot in nicely with its downtempo, lo-fi Pavement on sedatives vibe. It’s kinda loose, with rattling drums and drags out with a quivering organ drifting over a tense bassline, and it works something of a trance-inducing spell over the course of six minutes. You get the sense that however long and far part these guys are, they share a magical intuition, and whenever they do manage to get into a room together, creative sparks fly.

The band continues, “the recording and writing initially began in a house called Pen Y Bryn in Talsarnau, Wales in the fall out from the weirdness of the Covid days. Remote and with only ourselves and the view of Portmeirion in the distance we got to work.”

“With the opening track, ‘Strawberry Line’ (our tribute to our dear furry friend Alfie Barrow, who appears on the album’s cover) as the metronomic guide for the album, we then resumed recording, as before, at Invada studios in Bristol, whilst still touring around Europe and North/South America.”

‘Strawberry line’ makes for fairly a low-key opener, with a trilling organ and psychedelic reverby-drenched vocals rippling atop a bubbling bass before a shuffling beat enters the scene. But it stands as an eight-minute statement of intent, with that statement being that >>>> packs density to equal its melody. ‘The Seal’ delves into Krautrock, with a relentless groove centred around the rhythm section dominating. It grows dark. It grows tense. It’s sparse, minimal, but it persists, and four and a half minutes in, there’s a taut, jangling Joy Division guitar part.

Chilly synths and a robotic, rolling, repetitive bassline dominate the slow-melting ‘Denim’, a hazy psychedelic downer which delivers delayed gratification with the bursting of a monster riff. ‘Hungry Are We’ is delicate, reflective, post-rocky, with vocal harmonies which again allude to 60s pop and perhaps a bit of prog.

‘Bloody Miles’ marks a stylistic shift towards groovier territory, with a nagging bassline that borders on funk, but the tone remains doggedly downbeat, without getting depressing. With one foot firmly in the early 80s new wave sound, there’s no shortage of weirdness and warpy, brain-bending discord here, not least of all in the shadowy vintage-sounding electropop of ‘Secrets’, that brings together elements of Soft Cell and The Associates with the atmosphere and production of New Order’s Movement.

>>>> is often stark and claustrophobic (and nowhere more so on the eight-minute closer), and it’s always intense and brilliant. Beak> have surpassed themselves – again.

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Listen: ‘They’ by Adios MF

Posted: 3 June 2024 in Recommended Streams and Videos, Singles and EPs
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Adios MF is a musical collective spearheaded by Nathan Keeble carving fresh dark wave and electronica sound the underground of Sheffield. Their latest single, ‘They,’ was recorded between Brooklyn and Brixton, serves as a sonic manifesto of what’s to come. Their music defies categorisation, blending elements of post-punk, electronica, and avant-garde into a sonic tapestry that’s uniquely their own.

With sleek production by Nathan Saoudi and Richard Wilson yet coursing with enough detail and character to set it apart, with this impish 80s beat, sinewy guitars, metallic dapping keyboards, and sample loops, it forges a uniquely futuristic sound that’s at once both familiar and yet mirrors the churn of the cityscape.

With a sound that hints at the influence of acts like Human League, Depeche Mode, Kraftwerk and Molly Nilsson, the vocals are addictive and almost mechanical, driven with hooky melodic ticks that sink their nails into and won’t let go, and yet the lyrics reside with a disquiet at the creeping gentrification of urban redevelopment “They built a Starbucks on my street” and reference to shadowy figures who might take you away. It hints at a dark underbelly and Sci-fi dystopia where your every action is being watched.

ADIOS MF say “’They’ is a Kitsch byproduct of existence amid the constant churn of urban development and the persistent buzz of drilling. It was written as a tonic to the realisation that resistance is futile; you must simply acquiesce to the world of urbanism and let it carry you along on its unpredictable journey, set to a naughty 80s beat.”

We dig it here at Aural Aggro, and you can get your lugs round it here…

Percy – New Phase

Posted: 24 May 2024 in Albums, Reviews
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10ft Records – 24th May 2024

Christopher Nosnibor

Percy have been going since the mid-90s, but didn’t get to release an album till 2013. They’ve maintained a steady flow since then, particularly since the solidification of their current lineup in 2017 with New Phase being their fifth album in and their fourth in six years.

‘Workmanlike’ isn’t a criticism when it comes to certain bands, when their solid and consistent output and regular gigging is central to their way of working and to their identity, and while it’s not an exclusively northern thing, The Fall and The Wedding Present are bands which immediately spring to mind as acts who deliver albums like it’s a job. Said albums may all share a certain commonality, but push those tight parameters each time, and if Percy can be guaranteed to sound like Percy, then it’s all to the good.

New Phase is an apt title for an album which sees them take a lunge into darker territory, both sonically and lyrically. A fair few of the songs have featured in their live setlist over the last year or two, giving a fair indication of the direction they were heading with the new material, but to hear these songs all together and as full-realised studio recordings has a different kind of impact. On New Phase, they sound invigorated, vivified, but also tense, paranoid, embattled. Colin Howard’s lyrics are less given to social critique and instead present scenes of horror, of personal torment and heightened anxiety. Whatever the fuck’s been going down in his life or neighbourhood, or whatever grim stuff he’s been streaming on Netflix, the resultant art is powerful. The musical accompaniment captures the same uneasy mood of high tension and darkness.

‘Sink Estate Agents Satanic Rites’ is – remarkably – their most Fall-like track to date, a jagged paranoid spasm that’s dragged from the space between Grotesque and Slates. It’s tense, uncomfortable, and there’s something weird about the production that pulls in different directions and renders it even more difficult, and vaguely gothic in the early post-punk sense, too.

‘Blackout’ has hints of early Arctic Monkeys lurking amidst its clanging mess of guitars and panic-filled lyrics which narrate a bleak tale of alcoholic excess ‘there’s bloodstains on the floor / there’s bloodstains on the wall / and someone’s banging on the door… and then it hit me’.

Narrative is a strong feature of the lyrics, as is nowhere more evident than on the nightmarish ‘I Can Hear Orgies’. Are these auditory hallucinations or is weird shit going down round Colin’s way? Or is it a side effects of the meds?

The title track is raw, ragged, angular, more Shellac or Bilge Pump or even Part Chimp than The Fall, bringing a new level of aggression and noise to Percy’s repertoire.

More conventional Percy territory is covered in ‘Thinking of Jacking It In Again’, ‘Do You Think I’m on the Spectrum?’ and ‘Last Train to Selby’, delving back into the world of work and sociopolitical matters and delivered with powerhouse drumming and choppy, clanging Gang of Four guitars – and of course a dash of Fall-like rockabilly, because it’s Percy. ‘Wah-wah-wah-wah’ Howard signs off. ‘Greedy People’ is a classic Percy swipe at an obvious target, but as Colin spits ‘It’s not about the money / it’s about the principle’, there’s a palpable anger, articulated as much though discordant guitar.

New Phase marks a step up for Percy, and in many ways. They sustain the tension across the duration of the album’s ten tracks, with only the six-minute closer, ‘Afterlife’ calming down and taking a more synth-led dimension, but still presenting a bleakness and heavy melancholy that fits with the album as a whole. The production is tight and solid, bringing to life the album’s sonic and lyrical tensions.

New Phase is a magnificently awkward, challenging, angular set, and perhaps Percy’s least commercial, least overtly ‘indie’ album to date. But for my money, it’s also their best-realised, most authentic, and most exhilarating album yet.

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Glitchers / Eville / The Strand / Averno – The Fulford Arms, York, 20th May 2024

Posted: 22 May 2024 in Live, Reviews
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Christopher Nosnibor

Just the other night I was talking with someone about how sad it is that so many venues only manage to keep afloat by packing their bookings out with tribute acts. I do appreciate and understand the popularity of tribute acts: people like to hear songs they know while having a drink and a dance, and more often than not, the original artist is either no more, or only plays stadiums every six years with tickets costing over a hundred quid. But the proliferation of tributes, especially to acts still touring, feels so, so wrong: sure, the quality of musicianship required to be a tribute is high, but these are acts who make more off the work of an established act than original artists – and how do the original artists reach an audience when they’re struggling to push their way into view? And as for the acts who are defunct or deceased? Get over it. You missed them – or were lucky and saw them – move on, go and discover some contemporary acts. So, the public gets what the public wants, but for fuck’s sake, if only the public would open its eyes and ears and broaden its horizons beyond all that sale nostalgia shit. There are SO many outstanding artists around right now in every field, every genre – artists who would likely get their own tribute acts in tent, twenty years time, if people even knew that they existed.

Glitchers are a band who really will go to the furthest extreme to make people aware that they exist. While I’ve slated a few busking bands in the past – and rightly so, because the likes of King No-One and the all-time apex of shitness, Glass Caves are the kind of ‘band’ who busk because no-one in their right mind would book them, at least until they’ve built a ‘following’ by their street gigs. Glitchers are a very different proposition. It’s all about intent, about purpose. Glitchers’ busks are an act of protest as much as they’re vehicles of promotion, and they tell us tonight that no number of viral videos of police moving in to suit down their street performances boost their sales. So, to many, police shutdown efforts are amusing evidence of heavy-handed law enforcement (or something to celebrate if you’re a right-wing tosser), but the music gets overlooked. It’s a shame, because right now, we need voices of dissent to be heard while the government tramples and silences the already downtrodden who dare to speak out. And Glitchers don’t just speak out but scream rabidly about issues.

They’ve got a nice – and diverse – bill of bands supporting them tonight, starting with a couple of local bands before current touring support Eville, who are no strangers to the pages of Aural Aggravation, the initial reason I clocked this event and decided I should get down. After all, it’s not every day a band hauls its way up from Brighton to play a support slot at a £5 entry gig in York on a Monday night.

Averno look young even for a university band, but you have to admire their commitment, prioritising playing tonight over revision. I’ve always maintained that the social education and opportunities university provides are worth as much as the degree, and while they’re a bit rough in places, with some fairy ramshackle guitar work throughout, they showcase some decent original songs and a grungy punk energy. ‘Need’ is slow and lugubrious and after a hesitant start builds into a heavy, sludgy beast of a tune, and ‘Make Room’ is a bona fide banger. Unexpectedly, things got more indie and poppy as the set went on, but while delving into more personal territory, their confidence seemed to grow and they were good to watch.

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Averno

The Strand are another uni band, but honed and with a strong style and identity. Their sound is rooted in original 70s punk but with a modern spin and an arty edge, a bit Wire, a bit Adverts, a bit Iggy Pop – although their song about being bored isn’t an Iggy cover. It is, however, a top tune. Front man Evan Greaves bounces around on the spot a lot as they crank out three and four-chord stomps, and I find myself unexpectedly moved by their cover of Nirvana’s ‘Aneurysm’, even though they mangled the start rather – it so happens to be a favourite song of mine and they really give it some. It’s also quite heartening to witness bands playing the songs I was into when I was their age. It’s also impressive to witness their stand-in drummer – an immensely hard-hitter, she powers through the set with finesse, and everything just gels in this confident performance.

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The Strand

Talking of confidence, Eville simply ooze it. It’s clear from the second they take the stage that they’re going to perform like they’re headlining an O2 arena, whether they’re playing to 25 people of 2,500. They’ve got the tunes and the chops for the latter, that’s for sure.

Recent single ‘Monster’ lands as the second track and is the perfect showcase of their sound, blending monumentally weighty riffage, melody, and cross-genre details, with drum ‘b’ bass drums reminiscent of Pitch Shifter paired with a hefty chug of guitar and five-string bass in unison.

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Eville

Ditching the guitar after a few songs, Eva stalks and prowls the stage, and she’s got real presence, strong, assertive. And fuck me, they actually did it: they called for a moshpit and got the entire room going nuts. Blasting is with ‘Leech’, they sustain the intensity, with one fan crashing over the monitors and onto the stage not once but twice. They close with ‘Messy’, and it’s fair to say that they’ve delivered a set that’s all killer here, and there can be no doubt that they’ve won some new fans tonight.

Glitchers bring manic energy and a ton of gaffer tape. And knee pads. Even the knee pads have tape on. This is a band who simply cannot be contained. They don’t just play songs: they’re a full-on spectacle. Few bands go this all-out, and even fewer manage to pull it off: Arrows of Love and Baby Godzilla are the only names which make it to my extremely short list of bands this deranged, this wild, this intense in bringing unbridled mania to songs which explode in howls of feedback. I say songs, but they’re perhaps more accurately described as screaming sonic whirlwinds, industrial-strength punk with a dash of Butthole Surfers mania. This guy is all over the stage and everywhere all at once.

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Glitchers

They blitz their cover of ‘Helter Skelter’, and follow it with new single ‘Grow Up’, a song about toxic masculinity. It would be easy to poke fun at their being ‘right on’, but they’re on point and on topic every time, and they’re on the right side. Their anti-capitalist stance extends to their costs-only ticket pricing policy, and it’s obvious that they mean it, man. They also come across as being decent human beings. They’re a rare breed, it seems. And they’re simply a great band and wholly unforgettable live.

First and foremost, you go to see bands play life to be entertained. Tonight brought entertainment to the MAX. And all for a fiver. Grassroots forever! But also, don’t be surprised to see any of these guys in bigger venues in time.

Listen: ‘I’ll be your doctor’ by Argonaut

Posted: 18 May 2024 in Recommended Streams and Videos, Singles and EPs
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The thing about Argonaut is that they’re continually evolving, continually pushing themselves, striving to do something different, and to create something new, constantly. No sooner had they completed their track-a-month ‘open-ended album’ project, Songs from the Black Hat, which saw them try out a range of styles, than they’re back to banging out new tunes at a remarkable rate.

Having deadlines or other set parameters doesn’t work for a lot of artists, but Argonaut seem to thrive on targets and goals, and ‘I’ll be your doctor’ is testament to that.

They describe it as ‘A song for the companions and for everyone courted and wooed with promises of excitement and adventure. A reminder to those making such vows to continuously reinvent, strive for greatness and never grow complacent. Musical nods to Depeche Mode, Nine inch Nails and Pink Floyd, lyrically inspired by Dr Who and the Velvet Underground. Delivering on our promise.’

It certainly incorporates an array of elements in its four and a half minutes, with some dark, stark post-punk electro vibes paired with some driving chords and some exploratory guitar work, all brought together with, of course, a strong hook.

Listen here:

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Listen: ‘How I Need You’ by SUPERNOVA 1006

Posted: 11 May 2024 in Recommended Streams and Videos, Singles and EPs
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Post-Punk duo, SUPERNOVA 1006 recently unveiled their latest single, ‘How I Need You’ via Negative Gain Productions.

‘How I Need You’ is a semantic continuation of SUPERNOVA 1006’s Chains album. It was planned to release it as a bonus initially. However, it looked isolated and self-sufficient. Therefore, it was decided to make the song an independent work. Its distinctive feature was a return to the old sound, characterized by the “stringiness” and buoyancy of a cold sound.

‘How I Need You’ gives the feeling of being immersed in a big cold black lake in which no one lives with the silence and comfort of a lonely existence. It is a sonic journey through a cyberpunk landscape, filled with pulsating rhythms and melancholic melodies.

The single release also features remixes from artists such as Casket Cassette, Giirls, CULTTASTIC & Blind Seagull.

Listen here:

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Mayflower Madame – A Foretold Ecstasy

Posted: 11 May 2024 in Reviews, Singles and EPs
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10th May 2024

Christopher Nosnibor

Back in April 2020, writing on the release of their second album, Prepared for a Nightmare, I remarked that it had been four years since their debut, Observed in a Dream, and it had felt like an eternity. And here we are, a further four years on, and ‘A Foretold Ecstasy’ has landed as the prelude to album number three, due in the autumn.

Here, they’re straight in with that tight, solid rhythm section – a chunky bass with a hint of chorus to fatten it out while also giving it that classic spectral goth sound, melded to a relentless four-four metronomic thump, minimal cymbals, no flamboyant fills, just taut, a tense, rigid spine around which the body of the song grows. This, of course, is the foundation of that vintage gothy / post punk sound which originated with The Sisters of Mercy and, thanks largely to Craig Adams – who is arguably one of the greatest bassists of all time by virtue of his simple style of nailing a groove and just holding it down for the duration – carried on in The Mission. The Mish may lack some of the style and certainly the atmosphere and lyrical prowess of The Sisters, but the musical ingredients – and in particular that unflinching rhythm section – are fundamentally the same. And so it is that while the dominance of that thunking bass and bash-bash-bash snare may have become something of a formula, it’s hard to beat and absolutely defines the genre.

Mayflower Madame have always sat more toward The Mission end of the spectrum, whipping up songs which owe a certain debt to Wayne Hussey’s layered, cadent guitar style. But what they bring that’s unique is a swirly, psychedelic / shoegaze hue, a fuzzy swirl of texture and light. There’s a dark decadence, a lascivious richness to Mayflower Madame that accentuates the dramatic aspects of the gothiness: theatrical, flamboyant, but without being hammy or campy. And of course, Trond Fagernes’ vocals drift in an ocean of reverb, and the cumulative effect isn’t simply atmospheric: it carries you away on a sea of mesmeric sound.

With layers of synth which drift like mist across a production that balances dreaminess with a driving urgency, ‘A Foretold Ecstasy’ floats between haunting verses and surging choruses – and it’s hinting at their best work to date.

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PHOTO CREDIT: MIRIAM BRENNE

Monta At Odds – Forget About You

Posted: 9 May 2024 in Reviews, Singles and EPs
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The Record Machine – 12th April 2024

Christopher Nosnibor

The latest single, ‘Forget About You’, from ‘nouveau post-punk troubadours’ Monta At Odds’ is pitched as ‘a dark-natured opus about resisting attraction, especially when the bound proves hazardous.’

The trio, consisting of Mikal on vocals, Krysztof wielding the baritone guitar, and founding member Dedric polymathing on all other sonics are aiming for a ‘danceable mixture of eras past and present to match this raw but crisp sound.’

It’s very much of the school of neo-new wave / post-punk from circa 2004-2006 – think of Editors breaking through, Interpol’s Antics, and the likes of The Organ, and The Cinematics – particularly The Cinematics, in fact – with the electro element of She Wants Revenge’s debut. It’s post-punk with that clear contemporary slant, and a heavy dose of New Order’s buoyancy and accessibility. There’s shade around ‘Forget About You’, but a lot of sunlight and vibrancy, too: the crisp, clean, vaguely brittle guitars positively jangle against a thumping disco beat, and the melancholy is cut through with eyes cast to bright blue skies and a forward-facing optimism.

It’s only while writing this that the fact 2004 was twenty years ago has begun to register. What goes around comes around, of course, but twenty years is a generation, broadly – it seems, in my ever-lengthening experience – and the time it takes for kids to start picking up their parents’ record (or CD or whatever) collections and start drawing influence and inspiration. I say ‘or whatever’ because I do worry about the future. I worry less about styles rolling round in a repetitive cycle than what music will be coming through another twenty years from now. How is it going to go when it comes to teens raiding their parents’ Spotify playlists and finding nothing but Ed Sheeran, Taylor Swift, and, er, does anyone listen to anyone else? Of course I’m dramatizing slightly, but the point is that so much of the mainstream has become focused on quite literally a handful of artists – and what will be their legacy? Does Sam Smith capture an element of the zeitgeist beyond his identity? What does Dua Lipa speak of, and who does she speak to? A part of the problem is that where we used to have shows like Top of The Pops, The Tube, The Roxy, The Chart Show (with its alternative charts and other segments) and the Top 40 on Radio 1 (followed by something rather more alternative), the charts were pretty open and it was possible for stuff that wasn’t slick major-label sonic wallpaper to chart. This meant that it was possible to encounter something different without having to go to great lengths to seek it out. Now what do you do? Where do you go? How do people source music beyond the endless pumping of algorithms?

‘Forget About You’ hits me with a sense of nostalgia I had not anticipated, and which isn’t welcome: for some, nostalgia brings golden-tinged fuzziness and a warmth, an uplifting sensation. For me, it’s more like the sand tricking down in a sand timer, a slow-sapping pull in the guts, a seeping sadness. 2004 was twenty years ago. Less ‘yay, good times’ and more ‘fuck, I’m that much closer to death and twenty years have evaporated with depressingly little to show.’

Nostalgia isn’t a defining element of ‘Forget About You’: that’s simply something I bring to the table, highlighting the way that reception and perception colour the way an individual responds to music. It’s uptempo and catchy, bouncy even, and ultimately danceable, and neatly balances darkness and pop.

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Reviser – Burn It Out / Assassins

Posted: 30 April 2024 in Reviews, Singles and EPs
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15th March 2024

Christopher Nosnibor

While releasing a double-A-sided single is one option, in the digital age, releasing two singles simultaneously is also a viable option. It doesn’t coast any more, but does probably double the likelihood of scoring hits, and double hits equals double download potential. It’s the 2024 equivalent of releasing a single on multiple formats, only not nearly the pain in the arse collectors had to suffer in the 90s, heading down to the local record shop to bag the regular release on 7” and 12”, cassette and CD, and then again the following week for a limited edition format. Because back then, these strategies would have an impact on chart placings, and chart placings mattered, receiving airplay on the UK Top 40 on Radio 1on a Sunday evening, and the chance of further exposure on Top of the Pops. Now, if any fucker downloads your release, you’re doing well, because infinite streams may be something to plug but the revenue is not. Yay, fifty thousand streams… we earned 10p.

As usual, I digress.

Reviser are pitched as sitting alongside ‘classic 80’s bands such as Sisters of Mercy, The Cure, and Killing Joke, REVISER sounds complimentary to such contemporaries as Actors, Soft Kill, and Drab Majesty.’

So many contemporary acts align themselves to The Sisters of Mercy while offering but pale ghosts of imitation, and I find myself feeling deflated on a constant basis. Reviser do at least offer something, in the deep, grooves which likely come from baritone guitarist and vocalist Krysztof Nemeth, which shares some commonality without being a lame tribute-style rip-off. The baritone guitar is a rare and underrated instrument, showcased to strong effect by Leeds duo That Fucking Tank. Here, with its thicker tones, it manifests as a foot-to-the-floor low-end groove that clearly takes its cues from ‘Alice’ and choice cuts from First and Last and Always.

‘Burn it Out’ is synthy, but there are flickers of fractal guitar which float across a thunderous drum machine. Krysztof Nemeth – while not remotely ‘gothic’ in his vocal delivery, eschewing melodramatic baritone in favour of singing ‘straight’ brings further layers to the band’s evolving atmosphere. ‘Assassins’ again brings that solid 4/4 groove melded to relentless drum machine, reminiscent of ‘Lucretia, My Reflection’ (I’m thinking this is no accident), combining reverby guitar and wispy synths, finishing it all off with some processed vocals. It’s a bit post-Depeche Mode electrogoth, but the guitars provide texture and the songwriting and the delivery is on point, hitting the balance between that mechanised detachment and a the twitch of human heart.

This takes you back to the spirit of 83/84, when their forbears were knocking out black gold, and a single, at its best, was a tightly-packed statement of dark intent. These singles – taken together – deserve your attention.

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