Posts Tagged ‘Single Review’

Eric Angelo Bessel – Kindly Rewind

Posted: 24 March 2023 in Singles and EPs
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23rd March 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

It’s been a while since I’ve seen it, but the title of Eric Angelo Bessel’s new single reminded me of the Jack Black ‘buddy comedy-drama’ (as Wikipedia would have it) from 2008, which reminds us that nostalgia for VHS and film rentals hit pretty swiftly after their demise, in real terms. In fact, here in the UK, Blockbuster creaked on with DVD rentals and secondhand sales into 2013. But as an article in The Independent in January 2013 reported, ‘While the North Finchley store had a poor selection of DVDs, the big surprise was that it was charging £5 to £8 for second-hand films to buy, so I bought brand new ones at HMV instead.’ As such, it was clear that times had changed and the world had moved on long before the last rental stores closed their doors.

But the idea of rewinding – something intrinsically connected to the age of the cassette, be it audio or video – is one which is an instant cut to nostalgia, and one which reminds us that thee one thing you can’t rewind is life: there is no rewind on time, and the past is past.

‘Kindly Rewind’ is a slow-swelling deep ambient piece that isn’t about nostalgia for the 80s or 90s, but instead drills deeper, venturing back to prehistoric oceans as its backward surges evoking images of slow evolution and microcosmic growth beneath the oceans. Sedate and supple, this is delicate and spacious and slightly disorientating. It’s also measured, musically articulate, and resonates unexpectedly. It’s a work of quality.

AA

Eric Angelo Bessel - Visitation

The Martyr – My Friends Look Funny

Posted: 23 March 2023 in Singles and EPs
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21st February 2023

There’s some debate as to whether or not they really ‘get’ ‘goth’ Stateside, favouring more vampire / horror cliché stylings to anything that defined the disparate ‘movement’ as it emerged from the bleak urban sprawls of England in the early 80s as a darker strand of post-punk. Admittedly, the fans were always the ones with the greater shared affinity rather than the first wave of bands, none of whom recognised the ‘goth’ tag and the ones still going still don’t to this day, but still, quite how or when it morphed into genre let alone a stereotype is unclear.

The Martyr’s sound is certainly rooted more in the UK post-punk sound than anything else – brittle guitars and a thudding drum machine call to mind Alien Sex Fiend, and all crunched into just two minutes and thirty-eight seconds – but at the same draws on dark electropop and dance elements – a dash of Depeche Mode, a hint of dark disco – to create something that’s both spiky and danceable.

Lyrically, it’s serious but at the same time isn’t too serious, and it’s certainly not corny or cliché, and if ‘My Friends Look Funny’ employs a number of common stylistic trappings of the hi—NRG dance end of contemporary goth, it’s different enough to be worth a listen.

Silktape – Sink or Swim

Posted: 19 March 2023 in Singles and EPs
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25th February 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

There aren’t many singles that grab you with the opening bars, but silktape succeed with a tune that’s deeply rooted in both nineties and turn of the millennium alternative, spidery tripwire guitars spiralling around math-rock motifs against a hammering bass and sturdy drumming. They present all the angles with some shouty vocals atop guitars that some in from this side and that, with hints of Fugazi, …Trail of Dead, and Jacob’s Mouse cutting in alongside more recent reference points to make for a busy but solid and breath-catching sound, and they’re coming to the chorus now, and….

The chorus – well, it sounds like it belongs to a different song altogether. When they pitch it as being ‘’anthemic’, they’re absolutely right, but it’s from that vein of emo that renders it rather anticlimactic following the tense dynamics of the verse. It’s very much a cliché terrace-chanty ‘woah-hoah’ effort that would be more effective if it didn’t sound so template-drawn, down to the ‘ok not to be ok’, message, which is positive but somewhat uninspired and uninspiring.

The midsection, where they drop everything right down is brilliantly realised, and the song’s structure, paired with the contrasting guitar sounds, is outstanding. It’s early days for these guys – ‘Sink or Swim’ is only their second single, and they clearly have the songwriting skills and musical skills which demonstrate huge potential – and no doubt they’ll go far and almost certainly swim rather than sink once they decide for certain which audience they’re going for.

AA

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silktape by Will Fraser Creative

Metamorph – Witchlit

Posted: 15 March 2023 in Singles and EPs
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7th March 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

Having emerged in 2016, Metamorph are, in the grand scheme, relative newcomers to the goth scene, but the voice behind the name, Margot Day was an integral part of the 80’s NYC underground music scene while fronting the legendary Goth band The Plague with their album Naraka in 1987.

While goth tends to be associated with the early 80s, it was in 87/88 that the genre broke the mainstream, with The Sisters of Mercy’s Floodland and The Mission’s Children going massive on an international level. It was a boom time slightly below the mainstream radar, too, with Fields of the Nephilim releasing two major albums (Dawnrazor in ‘87 and The Nephilim in ’88), and Christian Death’s controversial landmark Sex and Drugs and Jesus Christ also being released in ’88. These were still dark times – the opening of Disneyland Paris provided only so much distraction from the fact this was the height of the cold war.

No doubt the Metamorph story, whereby Margot ‘escaped temporarily to the jungle by the sea to conjure new witchy Metamorph songs… after she had a miracle healing and felt summoned to make more music’ will be repeated ad infinitum, so instead, I’ll skip straight to the new single, the first new material since the Kiss of the Witch concept / narrative album released in September 2022.

‘Witchlit’ may not belong to the same suite of songs as the album, but there are clear thematic connections, and it’s a corking slice of quintessential gothy electropop, dark, seductive, a driving beat and bass and a teasing twist of menace and aggression with an explosive chorus that speaks of obsessive tendencies and longing – and it’s all tightly packed into a concise two and a half minutes. ‘Witchlit’ is single perfection.

AA

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Weekend Recovery – No Guts, All the Glory

Posted: 7 March 2023 in Singles and EPs
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Criminal Records – 24th February 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

Strange sense of deja-vu? Whatchoo talkin’ about? Whatchoo talkin’ about? Lori wants to know on the lateest kick-ass single from Weekend Recovery.

Yes, ‘No Guts, All the Glory’ was released as ‘No Guts’, the lead track to the EP of the same name, almost a year ago to the week, but a year on it’s getting a reboot thanks to an arts council grant, and the nomadic power trio currently based in Sheffield are releasing a rerecorded radio edit version of this solid tune as the second single from their upcoming third album, Esoteric, ahead of more touring activity.

Perhaps the hardest thing about being a band nowadays is maintaining profile. Social media and Spotify has changed the model, and we’re back to the 1960s when artists are conveyor-belt release-machines. You don’t release anything for six months and it’s like starting over: people have forgotten you exist and you may as well be a new band climbing the mountain of audience-building. Well, perhaps not quite, but still. While the nostalgia market for the over forties for whom time stood still from their thirtieth birthday, for the rest, memories are short.

Weekend Recovery have done a pretty decent job of keeping a flow of activity and output and social media engagement, and recently signing to The Kut’s Criminal Records imprint certainly hasn’t done then any harm. This timely release won’t, either.

Rerecorded it may be, but it’s certainly not hyper-polished and sanitised ready for Radio 1. Smoothed out with some eddying synths and Lori’s vocals switched up in the mix and sounding a bit cleaner, and clearer, it is more radio friendly than the original version, but it’s not totally cleaned-up and sugary: the guitar, bass, and drums are still absolutely driving and the song feels urgent, as if they’re playing like they depend on killing it. And they do. It’s a storming tune, and I for one am revved for the album.

Ritual Cloak – Left Behind

Posted: 6 March 2023 in Singles and EPs
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Christopher Nosnibor

Bubblewrap Collective – 3rd March 2023

Ritual Clock may sound like some gloomy metal act, but is in fact a post-rock duo consisting of Daniel Barnett, formerly of Samoans and drummer/producer Andrew Sanders.

2021 saw them release two full-length albums, Divine Invasions and A Human Being Is The Best Disguise, a reworking of the debut album, with new lyrics and vocals by writer and comedian Autumn Juvenile, followed by a cover of R.E.M.’s Orange Crush, plus the meditative collaboration Witaj w Domu with Polish photographer, Michal Iwanowski.

They explain that “‘Left Behind’ wouldn’t exist without the influence of George Harrison and The Brian Jonestown Massacre. The song revolves around a sitar-like guitar line that we knew we wanted to have constantly looping to create a meditative drone. The lyrics are a collage of different lines and ideas that when brought together create a story of a long-forgotten ‘saviour’ that’s coming back but nobody needs them anymore.”

It is indeed an epically spacious drone-based compensation, and possesses a distinctly 90s feel – thankfully more the kind of stuff you’d hear on Joh Peel than Kula Shaker, despite its trippy eastern vibes. It drifts and meanders in a sedated fashion for its five-and-a-bit minute duration and it’s kinda mellow but kinda spaced and dreamy and vaguely disorientating. Not bad at all.

Argonaut – Move Fast

Posted: 28 February 2023 in Singles and EPs
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1st March 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

The title of their new single is a fitting one for a band that really doesn’t piss about when it comes to getting things done. Nathan and Lorna, who make up half of this London-based energetic indie-punk foursome cranked out lo-fi bedroom-recorded cuts at a remarkable rate during lockdown, and now, despite working dayjobs and all the rest, the band have not only reconvened but released a new EP Songs from the Black Hat on February 1st, for which they’ve been unveiling in instalments (a number of which have found exposure here, not least of all ‘Futoko’ a year ago) by way of promo.

‘Move Fast’ is pitched as ‘Channelling Gen X Silicon Valley sloganeering,1980s pop synths and nineties noise!’ – which is in many ways quintessential Argonaut – big on energy, some bright, breezy melodies, but a dark undercurrent and a degree of social unrest.

With its clean, chorus-tinged guitar sound, there’s a Cure-esque post-punk element to the track, with a cute, almost bouncy vocal, there are classic indie-pop / shoegaze aspects dominant here, and then of course, the chorus breaks out the big fizzy guitars and busy, dizzy synths. It all comes together to give us an energetic tune which comes on like a lo-fi Blondie, and it’s a winning formula.

AA

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Kill, The Icon! – Protect the Brand

Posted: 24 February 2023 in Singles and EPs
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Blaggers Records – 24th February 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

Having recently signed to Blaggers Records, Kill, The Icon! Unveil the first taste of their debut EP in the form of single cut ‘Protect the Brand’ – a song they describe as being ‘loosely based on David Fincher’s Fight Club’.

As Chuck Palahniuk wrote in the novel on which the film is based, ‘You are not your job, you’re not how much money you have in the bank. You are not the car you drive. You’re not the contents of your wallet. You are not your fucking khakis.’ This is capitalism laid bare: the workers defining themselves by brand allegiance, working all hours to eke out a living and make themselves feel better by buying shit they don’t need with money they don’t have. It’s a fucking con, and it’s never been more transparent as energy companies rake in record profits while people struggle to afford to stay warm and feed themselves, blaming the so-called cost of living crisis on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and mass strikes taking place across the UK while rail companies siphon off millions to pay execs and shareholders while claiming there’s no money for staff wages, and the NHS coffers are bare for paying their staff because they’ve haemorrhaged billions on redundant PPE provided by companies owned by government chums like Michelle Mone.

The trouble is, it’s taken too, too long for the general populace to twig that they’re being shafted, and the government has been quietly bolstering its powers to dismantle protest and limit rights – not just workers’ rights but human rights since Brexit – that pushing back against it all is incredibly difficult. And many still don’t even see corporate brainwashing for what it is as they obediently trudge back to their offices at their own expense for two or three days a week for the ‘hybrid office experience’ corporations are insistent is essential for both productivity and wellbeing.

This realisation is the narrative of ‘Protect the Brand’, a song which the band explain is ‘viewed through the lens of an overworked and underpaid office worker who is tasked with mind-numbing, repetitive jobs until he finally engineers his own sacking. The Worker stumbles through a crisis of realization, as he starts to question the purpose of work within a capitalist framework.’

It’s driven by a mega-dense bass, and the vocal is a perfect counterpoint, a monotone that chops between corporate inanities and anti-corporate vitriol. It absolutely works, and creates a tension that doesn’t entirely resolve. Once again, Kill, The Icon! are on the money and nail the zeitgeist. Listen up, and listen good.

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JW Paris – Wicked Game

Posted: 16 February 2023 in Singles and EPs
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14th February 2023

Christopher Nosnibor

The prospect of another cover of ‘Wicked Game’ did, I’ll admit, give cause for an eye roll. It’s a great song – a seriously song – that arguably can’t be improved upon, and yet countless have tried, or at least felt compelled to pay homage, to the point that it’s been done to death.

Even the PR point out that ‘Wicked Game’ has been released over 800 times in different versions – 800! Imagine! Although HIM’s version is perhaps one of the best known, it’s always irritated me because it simply felt so obvious. The same can’t really be said of JW Paris’ rendition – after all, as they also point out, ‘nobody ever attempted to turn it into a sleazy Brit pop/indie anthem!’ adding ‘There is more Iggy Pop than Roy Orbison in it!’.

And I can only agree. JW Paris, who last graced our pages about a year ago, have packed some punk attitude into this effort. It’s certainly a lot less dark, a lot less broody than the original, and driven by a chunky bass, and the verse builds nicely into a rip-roaring rendition of the chorus that’s strong on energy, but succeeds in preserving the essence of the original – albeit with the kind of twisted anguish you’d associate with Kurt Cobain. ‘Fiery’ isn’t an adjective one would commonly associate with the song, but that’s exactly what this version is, and it comes as a pleasant surprise. Kudos.

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Pic: c24photography

Honeybadger – Cold Wind

Posted: 30 January 2023 in Singles and EPs
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28th January 2023

James Wells

Honeybadger’s bio describes the Brighton trio as ‘spiky’ purveyors of ‘gutter psychedelia/grunge’, and ‘Cold Wind’ certainly delivers on that. Fast and gritty, lo-fi and fuzzed out, the guitars are all the grunge – but then the break brings a full-on tremelo-happy wig-out that’s out of this world!

But if the song is carried by an energy that invites comparisons with early Arctic Monkeys, the bassline runs away in a completely different direction, with one of those wild grooves that runs here, there, and everywhere: Luca – age just twenty-one – is possessed of magic fingers. Or perhaps he’s just possessed. Either way, these guys pack in so much dynamic and raw talent into three-and-a-half minutes that it’s dizzying, and it’s a proper rush.

AA

Honeybadger Artwork

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