Posts Tagged ‘Single Review’

SENSES – Drop Your Arms

Posted: 21 February 2021 in Singles and EPs
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12th February 2021

Christopher Nosnibor

Coventry quartet SENSES have had a stuttering journey to bring them here, with the release of ‘Drop Your Arms’ as a taster for their impending debit album – which has been a long time in coming. There is a classic tale of burgeoning progress being stalled and creativity stifled by label wranglings. Throw in a global pandemic and you’ve got the perfect recipe for a stalled career. It’s almost as if some labels are more concerned with contractual constrictions than the nurturing and promotion of creativity and new music.

But you can’t keep a good band down forever, and regrouping after a hiatus to embark in a multi-media project designed to take their music to the masses and to the next level, and ‘Drop Your Arms’ is the opening gambit that prefaces the debut album Little Pictures Without Sound.

Yes, it’s indie at heat, but it’s also so much more: it’s also big, bold and anthemic – and swings between the throbbing anthemic stylings of Doves with the darker post-punk currents of early Editors (whose producer Gavin Monaghan was involved in the early recording work) – I’m specifically thinking ‘Bullets’ here, particularly when it ratchets up around the mid-point. Then again, I’m equally reminded of The Psychedelic Furs’ debut album and their ‘wall of noise’ that really hit hard.

There’s a darkness and a seriousness about ‘Drop Your Arms’, a track that drives and bounces with an effervescence and energy that’s as infectious as it is undeniable. In short, it’s a cracking single, and if the rest of the album is half as good, it’ll be a corker.

AA

SENSES_Drop Your Arms_Single Artwork

to.do.list – Teetering

Posted: 16 February 2021 in Singles and EPs
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14th February 2021

Christopher Nosnibor

A Sunday is an unusual day to release a single but then, the ‘Teetering’ single release is can be considered a Valentine’s gift of sorts, from polyartist Carmina Budworth. It’s a love song, a song about falling in love, that point on the brink of uncertainty, the excitement and anticipation of something new, told vividly through hazy images of the kind of drunken night out with music and people that seem so very long ago. And as such, it’s not only a love song to an individual, a song about that moment, but can be taken as a love song to the time before everything stopped.

Recorded in between lockdowns back in June of last year, it’s a song of optimism, of new beginnings. It lands at a time when after what has been for many the longest, hardest winter, there is a growing sense of optimism for new shoots of life concurrent with the coming of spring, and ‘Teetering’ conveys that spirit of optimism tempered by trepidation.

There’s a timelessly old-fashioned or vintage feel to the song that goes beyond the traditional Argentinean tango and 60s pop vibe that’s laced with soul, and it stands in contrast with the swelling drum machine beats that eventually grow to lead the backing and propel the song to a blossoming flourish of a finish that’s entirely contemporary.

Carmina has a distinctive and unusual vocal style, which is at once soft and strong, delicate and powerful. That’s not to mention her impressive range, that spans a ponderous whisper to sky-soaring freedom, and it’s enthralling. Carmina carries the listener on a wave that builds and lifts and stops before the drop. It’s a wonderful experience.

The ‘Malica Surprise’ mix pins down a smooth electropop groove with a crisp, solid beat and bulbous bass that brings new dimensions to a song that’s already multi-dimensional, making this quite a package.

AA

Artwork

Arcade Fortress – Sabotage

Posted: 12 February 2021 in Singles and EPs
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19th February 2021

Christopher Nosnibor

After a few months out, Richard Fox (lead guitar, bass guitar, keys, producer) and Gavin Connolly (vocals, rhythm guitar, piano), aka Arcade Fortress return with the first taster for a new album in the form of ‘Sabotage’ – their first new material since the album Create More than You Destroy last September.

The first point of note is that this most definitely isn’t a cover of the Beastie Boys’ hit. This is a good thing, because you shouldn’t mess with perfection, and should always instead strive to create your own.

‘Sabotage’ is all about self-sabotage and self-doubt: the first verse is littered with images of war and combat, from naval battles to machine gun fire, before bringing things in closer to home, presenting an inner turmoil that melds domestic abuse with a n altogether more Fight Club themed feel, where all the torment and self-loathing coalesces into a harsh-inward facing nihilism and self-loathing:

‘In an abusive relationship with myself / It’s surprisingly hard to remove / This knife from my back / Stuck in my spine because of / My own frenzied attack’, sings Gavin over a sonic backdrop that builds nicely from a sparse picked guitar jangle to a fully-realised anthemic beast of a tune.

There’s nothing particularly fancy about it: it’s not innovative or unusual, but it’s a big tune with a big feel. There is simply no substitute for a killer chorus and a strong hook, and that’s precisely what Arcade Fortress bring here.

AA

Sabotage artwork

Ghlow – Not Fit for This

Posted: 2 February 2021 in Singles and EPs
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PNKSLM Recordings – 2nd February 2021

Christopher Nosnibor

It seems like a long, long time ag now, when I’d listen to the top 40 singles chart on a Sunday evening and be enticed to buy an album on the strength of a single. I didn’t even realise it at the time, as a pre-teen, that this was exactly the point: singles sell albums, and in some respects are as much a promo tool as a video or a TV performance or an instore signing. Time was, of course, that album sales made money, or at least made the biggest dents in recouping advances, although a hit single was always, and remains, the route to royalties.

Despite the devaluation of both the album format and the single trailer in the digital age, the practise persists and sometimes is actually pays off, because you’ll hit on a single release that completely poleaxes you with its brilliance – a song that will grab you instantly and compel you to rush out and buy the album or otherwise leave you on the very edge of your seat for its release.

‘Not Fit For This’ is that single – released ahead of Ghlow’s debut album, ‘Slash and Burn’, due out in April – is a sharp, stabby new-wave attack that comes on full-throttle and packs some real adrenaline in its scratchy squall of trebly guitars that blister and buzz all over a drum machine that palpates frantically as it tries to make itself heard and keep up with the explosive sonic blast. It’s got that early 80s vibe absolutely down, and it’s not just about the songwriting, performance, or the hazy production that positively oozes that dank basement 8-track vibe – it’s about the attitude and the intangibles, too.

Emille de Blanche has all the dark energy of Siouxsie Soux, and she brings all the serrated edges in this gothy tour-de-force, and everything coalesces into a distillation of tension-filled gloom that’s pretty damn special.

AA

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Beauty in Chaos – The Delicate Balance of All Things (Rapid Reiteration Mix’ ft. Cinthya Hussey)

Posted: 29 January 2021 in Singles and EPs
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33.3 Music Collective – 27th January 2021

Christopher Nosnibor

Beauty in Chaos’ ever-shifting lineup sees more evolution for the fourth single of their latest album, Out of Chaos Comes… a set of remixes with even more guest artists contributing. Originally featured on The Storm Before the Calm in summer of 2020, the track, composed by Michael Ciravolo – who’s credited not as the core member but the curator of the Beauty in Chaos project – with The Mission’s Wayne Hussey.

The story goes that ‘Along with BIC producer Michael Rozon, Ciravolo set out to strip down the ominous tone of the original especially for this remix release. After hearing Wayne’s wife Cinthya’s rendition of The Smith’s ‘Everyday Is Like Sunday’, the idea emerged for her to sing this new version along with Wayne’. This is actually one of three versions of the song which feature on the album, and it very much does date the dark, brooding vibe out and replace it with something altogether more smoky and sultry.

And so we have six minutes of sedate – and sedated – seduction, stripped back and slowly blossoming into a melodic chorus. The accompanying video highlights the low-level lighting mod it evokes, and finds Mr and Mrs Hussey showing off some quality rugs as well as some nicely contrasting outfits.

Quippy comments aside, this is a subtle explorations of contrasts which also tips a nod to the lyrics, and very much highlights the light and dark and shadowy hues evoked by the song. Rendered as more of a pop ballad by the remixing, the chaos is very much calmed to emphasise the beauty, and it works well.

AA

Beauty in Chaos feat. Cinthya Hussey (single cover)

Deine Lakaien – The Walk

Posted: 24 January 2021 in Singles and EPs
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Christopher Nosnibor

Lifted from their forthcoming double album Duel, scheduled for release in April, Deine Lakaien have unveiled their cover of The Cure’s 1983 classic pop tune ‘The Walk’.

The duo, comprising pianist Ernst Horn and vocalist Alexander Veljanov, have over the course of ten albums attained a significant status in their native Germany, but haven’t quite the same reach further afield, but there’s a strong change that this could change with Duel, which pairs an album of original compositions with an album of paired covers, ‘The Walk’ being one of them.

And it’s good. By which I mean, it’s an affectionate, even reverent cover that pays an overly sincere homage to the original – as it should, of course. Much of the appeal of the original is its rough edges, and the sound of those early 80s synths and drum machines, recorded to tape. Listening to it now, along with so many contemporaneous songs, reminds us for that for all we’ve gained with advancing technology in terms of fidelity and ease of recording, mixing, and so on, so much has been lost in terms of essence.

As Ernst Horn comments, “For an old-school synthesizer freak like me, ‘The Walk’ was of course a welcome opportunity to celebrate beautiful old sounds in simple tone sequences, although I really blunt my teeth on the hook… I guess I couldn’t get it to sound as dirty as in the original. ‘The Walk’ is really an acoustic advertisement for the original sound of a vintage synthesizer. The instrumental part was also a lot of fun, the increase to the last, ‘Take Me to the Walk‘, where I could let my equipment totally off the leash.”

It’s telling that the artist himself feels a certain sense of shortcoming, and in a way, it’s refreshing: instead of artistic ego, we get an insight into the anxiety of influence experienced by the influencee.

Horn’s comments demonstrate an unusual degree of self-awareness, and it’s true that Deine Lakaien’s efforts to recreate the spirit and sound of the original falls short: the playful exuberance is lost to a certain self-applied pressure to deliver, while the sound is close, but somehow artificial. But for all that, I’m not going to do this down one iota: it very much does capture the 80s vibe, especially wit the dominant crack of a processed snare sound that cuts through everything… everything… everything. The brooding, swampy break is nicely done and if for the most part it sounds like A-Ha covering The Cure, the play-out goes darker and sounds more like a post-First and Last and Always Sisters of Mercy demo. And from me, that’s a compliment, and this is a solid cover, for sure.

AA

Deine_Lakaien_04_by_Joerg_Grosse-Geldermann

Deine Lakaien by Jörg Grosse-Geldermann

The fin. – Deepest Ocean

Posted: 24 January 2021 in Singles and EPs
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22nd January 2021

Christopher Nosnibor

Penned in 2018 as a reaction to the effects of constant touring and international travel, and the sense of groundlessness it brought, ‘Deepest Ocean’ is the third single to be lifted from The fin.’s upcoming album. It finds the Japanese duo, consisting of Yuto Uchino and Kaoru Nakazawa in a reflective mood, and immersing themselves in some deep retro synth tones that truckle and weave over a slow grooving bassline.

It’s got a kind of vaguely funky vibe that’s a bit prog, a bit electrop, a bit 80s and a bit lounge. And even a bit disco: the clean guitar that nags away, coupled with the soft-focus production reminds me for some reason I can’t entirely pinpoint of Imagination (specifically ‘Body Talk’) and I really can’t decide if this is a good thing or not.

I mean, it’s certainly got a hook, and a strangely sultry atmosphere that’s not so much sleazy as semi-soporific in a smoky, opiate way, but it’s also a bit soft and wet, a shade limp in its smooth slickness. So where does this leave us? Clean, vibrant synths run ascending and descending runs, and things layer up deep, and fast over a metronomic key stab and backed-off beat.

I suppose it’s a matter of taste, and I’m flapping to and fro like a fish out f water wondering if I’ll get sold or left to rot, caring not one iota if I’m a British fish or not. It’s proficient musically, and on all technical levels from the composition, arrangement., performance and production, ‘Deepest Ocean’ is genuinely impressive, and conveys a sense of fuzziness, of being at all sea. But ultimately I feel the unsettling emptiness of transient entertainment and instant gratification which lies at the heart of the song’s inspiration becomes something of a self-made outcome, and that its success is also its failure: in embodying the sensation it’s intended to convey, it recreates the experience of that emptiness, that sense of hollowness and an absence of soul.

National Service – Last January

Posted: 20 January 2021 in Singles and EPs
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29th January 2021

Christopher Nosnibor

My wife detests The Twilight Sad. I love The Twilight Sad, and am prone to crying at their gigs. I’ve also been called a cunt online for suggesting the intensity of their shows may be akin to witnessing Joy Division at their peak (a suggestion I still stand by: James Graham is capable of conveying a rare emotional intensity in his performances that’s compelling, and at times, borders on the disturbing). They’re a band that are divisive beyond Marmite, but elicit a level of devotion from their fans that’s truly fervent.

When it comes to covering a band that inspire such passion, it’s a big, big challenge, and a huge risk – one of those moves that could be absolute fucking suicide, or inspire career-defining awe.

The last time I wrote about National Service, a four-piece band consisting of Fintan Campbell (vocals/guitar), Daniel Hipkin (bass/vocals), Iain Kelly (guitar/vocals) and Matthew Alston (drums) back in November on the release of ‘Caving’, I actually compared them to The Twilight Sad, so this feels like a much a test of my skills as theirs – and it’s perhaps worth noting that this is the last in a series of cover releases from Fierce Panda, which has also featured Moon Panda, Desperate Journalist, and China |Bears.

Now, you should never mess with perfection, but with their glacial, stripped-back, minimalist take on the song, National Service really capture the wintery melancholy of the original. The dark beauty of the lyrics, which blend sadness with a certain distanced, twisted psychopathy is conveyed with a sincerity that transcends the ethereal atmosphere.

The absence of the soaring finale may come as something of an anticlimax, but this is a well-conceived and magnificently-executed cover, and the distinctive, even slightly unusual vocals delivery, with a certain twang on the higher notes, are well-suited to the song, stamping a unique marker on it while accentuating the multifaceted layers embedded within the song’s dark spirit.

AA

Single cover

Yur Mum – Black Rainbow

Posted: 18 January 2021 in Singles and EPs
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18th January 2021

Yur Mum’s reputation as a hard-gigging and particularly outstanding live act is one that’s been key to their building the fanbase they have. However, the question of how they will continue to deliver live since being reduced to a two-piece is somewhat moot under the present circumstances. That said, on the strength of this outing, being stripped back to a bass / drum combo suits them remarkably well.

The third Monday in January is widely believed to be the most depressing day of the year, and has come to be known as Blue Monday – and it’s for this reason the pair elected to unveil the release today, rather than on Friday, the day that’s come to be established as the ‘standard’ day for releases. Your Mum is rebellious and unconventional like that.

It’s the heavy-duty, gut-punching bass that dominates and drives this mid-tempo goth-tinged hard rock lurcher of a single that comes as a preface to their forthcoming album, Tropical Fuzz. It’s not depressing per se – there’s far too much energy and dynamic action going on here for that – but make no mistake., it is pretty heavy and pretty dark, and certainly a departure from their usual riff-churning grungy bangers, although the trajectory from ‘What Do You Want From Me’ and the rest of the Ellipsis EP is an easy one to chart.

There’s an almost mystical / occult vibe to this dense brooder of a tune, which feels far more expansive and epic than its four-and-a-half-minute running time. More Sabbath than Nirvana, it might not lighten the mood much, but it is the perfect soundtrack by which to channel that bleak angst and the hard, slow emptiness of cold, heavy days without light. It’s no vitamin D booster, but it is exactly what you need right now.

AA

Promo image

IsoPHeX – Doppelgänger

Posted: 5 January 2021 in Singles and EPs
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Cae Gwyn Records – 22nd January 2021

Christopher Nosnibor

It’s dark. It’s winter. We’re in lockdown – again / still. Whatever cheer Christmas and the prospect of new year brought – and let’s face it more than cheer, it was a flicker of false hope, or worse still, a diminutive moment of delusional hope – has faded with the return to work (from home) and (home) schooling and the prospect of socialising, pubs, and gigs but a snuffed candle for the foreseeable, meaning that the jaunty Christmas tunes that assailed us last month can well and truly delete themselves while we get back to reality.

‘Doppelgänger’, the debut single from IsoPHeX, aka 19-year-old Cian Owen from Anglesey, it pitched as ‘brooding electronica of the highest order’, and it fits the bill and no mistake.

If you’re expecting – or wanting – more dark ambient, you’ll likely be disappointed, although ‘Doppelgänger’ brings atmosphere in spades, and one that’s cold and dark.

It may only be three minutes an eighteen seconds in duration, but ‘Doppelgänger’ melds an array of styles, incorporating hip-hop and sparse electro to create something that’s simultaneously bleak and dynamic, as chilly synths wrapped like mist around a hectic beat: uptempo hip-hop or downtempo drum ‘n’ bass? Who cares? Despite the urgent pace of the stammering rhythm, ‘Doppelgänger’ is sparse, minimal, and edgy, a twitchy trip through dark alleyways at night, tense and paranoid. Is there something there? Or is it all in your head? Keep one eye over your shoulder. Keep moving. Trust no-one. Apart from me, of course, when I tell you this is a killer tune.

bAF3hL-z

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