Basel, Switzerland - a town of culture, the pharmaceutical industry and permanent frowns. No one smiles in the birthplace of LSD. Basel was pretty, but my holiday was like a trip to a mental asylum. Clinical, regulated and dull. We needed to escape. To Germany.
Freiberg, a beautiful town with great food and smiles, was worth the hour long train journey. Especially as we managed to squeeze in a Broadcast 2000 gig.
Joe Steer, the brains of Broadcast 2000, has been justifiably triumphed by my friends recently. His experimental acoustic jinks, backed by a rare mix of snare drum, violin and glockenspiel, are delightful.
The music of Broadcast 20000 feels more authentic than the similarly styled Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly. Perhaps the lack of electronic mumbo jumbo makesa more heart-warming and personal experience. Songwriters that don’t bombard me with all the crazy shit they find on their music software are in my good books - experimentalism can be all about moderation.
Broadcast 2000’s exposure has been, well, quite big. Get Up and Go is on an Orange advert and on Building Blocks, their tasty mini-album. To whet your appetite Joe has kindly offered my favourite song from the album to holeytonal for you to devour:
Is anyone else becoming addicted to Born Survivor with Bear Grylls? He eats caterpillars and cuts the heads off skunks. Double hard.
I’ll never be that adventurous, but I’m always up forNew Adventures. Especially ones destined to fill arenas around the world.
The four men of New Adventures began playing together at university, but a piece of the jigsaw was missing until vintage jeans brought Helen into the fold. Jez and Steve were selling vintage clothing - Helen bought some, and the rest is history.
The main obstacle New Adventures face is being lumped with Coldplay and Keane - but once you get over that you can enjoy some delicious stadium rock.
New Adventures will be releasing a second EP, Accidents, later this year featuring the stunning and drumless Never Get Caught, which can be heard on their MySpace. But I have fallen in love with this post’s MP3, try not to sing along:
Building the website for my opera group, operatique, was supposed to be a nice little project - but no. It took over my life. It’s not even properly finished yet. I’ve been sleeping with my html and css book for the last month. I know how to do it now, so I’ll never have to go through the pain again.
Before my love affair with my inner geek began, myself, Kaziu and Ellis went to see The Brute Chorus at 93 Feet East. Powered by a Brick Lane curry and armed with my new Sanyo Xacti HD camcorder - I captured their single, Lets Grow Fins, for your pleasure. Sadly its quite compressed, but I hope you enjoy it anyway. More videos and music on their way very soon.
“Why don’t you post about female artists?” my friend asks. Well I have actually, when I rung about the glorious Bell. Gender, two genders or no gender - I don’t care so long as their music rings true.
So, the fact that holeytonal features more male artists, or bands with male leads, is not the reason for posting about CHEW LiPS. I’m posting about CHEW LiPS because I look like a tit when I groove to their tunes on the tube.
Only 8 gigs old, CHEW LiPS’s 8-bit drone disco and indie fusion has already been featured by Steve Lamacq on Radio 1. Its especially refreshing after Pendulums’ shit but commercially successful dance-rock crossover - I’d even prefer Alphabeat.
Try your hardest not to tap your feet to this excellent tune courtesy of CHEW LiPS - only available to download at holeyontal:
Tour dates include 93 Feet East on Friday 12 September. But I can’t be bothered to go to the far east this week, so I’ll wait until Saturday 27 September and see them at the St. Moritz Club in the West End.
August 2007 was a long time ago, but I still have vivid memories watching Revere at the now defunct Spitz. Severely impressed, I departed expecting Revere to make it big in 2008.
But, despite being lauded by the Guardian as ‘one of the best bands you’ve never heard of’, they’re still largely unknown. Despite featuring on the Hotly Tipped for 2008 iTunes compilation, they’re still largely unknown. Despite being finalists in Q’s Glastonbury New Talent competition (they didn’t win it, which is probably a good thing), they’re still largely unknown.
You get the picture, but I’m going to paint a new one. The arty and epic Revere deserve to be known and, dare I say it, revered.
Fronted by Liverpudlian Stephen Ellis, the 9 piece from north London boast instrumental forces including violin, cello, harp and trumpet. They sight influences such as Bjork and Buckley, but I’d say if you cross-bred Muse and Sufjan Stevens, Revere would come out the mongrel. Its best though not to expect anything from Revere, they are quite unpredictable.
I’m looking forward to Revere’sdebut album, which is currently in the works and will be released on their own imprint, Albino Records.
This title track from their 2006 EP Learning to Breath is simply sublime:
Theres nothing like playing an impromptu gig. Especially after only one rehearsal. Last week I was drafted in by Alba Nova to add some cello love.
I heard of Alba Nova as they formed at Durham University (formerly the University of Durham which sounds much better) where I studied, but didn’t get the chance to watch them. In fact, thats a lie. I was just a lazy student bum.
I wish I hadn’t been such a sloth, as I’ve missed out on Alba Nova for the past 5 years. Who’d want to miss a band living in a ‘lost England full of chandeliers, fake fur coats, masquerades and mistresses’? Its nice to bring fantasy into music, without becoming a goth metal band. I respect Alba Nova for not being ashamed of their Englishness, which sadly so many bands from the green and pleasant land try to hide.
Their debut EP, The Beautiful Way to Fall generated quite a lot of industry interest. I’m sure you can hear why from this stunning track they’ve so kindly let me share with you:
The internet has smashed our attention spans to pieces. We spend less time focusing on one band and instead skim from one MySpace page to the next.
I picked up that habit, but still make sure to buy as many albums as Mr Mastercard can afford. They’re the only way for me to get under a band’s skin.
If you have something to say in popular music, you should do so with an album. Once you achieve that, then you’re sorted. And yes, I listened to OK Computer a lot!
Thats why I’m excited by the prospect of an upcoming concept album set during the Californian Gold Rush featuring money, love and murder by We Happy Few. I caught these guys a few months ago at the Half Moon Unplugged in Putney. Their old school Americana vibe has stuck with me ever since.
Its refreshing to find a band take on something so challenging. Especially when its so easy to screw a concept album up. Judging from the opening track, I hope we won’t be disappointed. In fact, We Happy Few were kind enough to give you a sneaky listen:
We Happy Few are playing at The Gallery near Turnham Green Tube this Thursday (29 May). I’ll be there, and you should come too. The new album is due for release in the next few months.
A record store is reaching for my wallet again. The new album, Arm’s Way by the Islands is out on 19 May. I’m going to have to buy it, along with their first album Return to the Sea. I wish I came across this band from Montreal sooner.
Islands are descendants of The Unicorns. I found some tracks from their ancestor’s 2003 album Who will Cut our Hair when we’re Gone at Covert Curiosity, its interesting to hear their pedigree.
I have to admit I initially wanted to hear Islands based on their photo. Stumbling on multi-ethnic bands is rare, but thankfully becoming more common; Bloc Party, Get Cape Wear Cape Fly, and Mala (hehe) come to mind. Its only a good thing. Naturally I don’t base my music on race, but I love musicians breaking racial stereotypes. Sadly I think there are still race problems in music.
You can hear in their music a range of international influences. They’re also chums with Arcade Fire and the raptastic Canadian Cadence Weapon. Islands’ songs are catchy and clever, what more could you want?
Can a passion for kit cars lead to assembling great music? Well it seemed to work with Leon Jean-Marie. The east Londoner, who’s family originate from St. Lucia is certainly starting to get a lot of attention. Island records plucked up the uber talented multi-instrumentalist and the world now waits in anticipation for his debut album Bent out of Shape to be released on 7 July.
For some reason Island are trying to genreise Leon Jean-Marie as Wonky Pop. He is better than that. Much better. Alphabeat is Wonky Pop, and they are awful.
His first single Scratchproves this man makes no ordinary music. I’m not sure how to define it, maybe Prince meets Skunk Anansie? Decide for yourself.
Bed of Nails, his latest single, produced by Mark Ronson, is completely different to Scratch, but also brilliant. Its more like the Beatles meet Blur. Check out the vid:
Do you like experimental? Well The Chap are about as wacky as you can get. They are about to release their third album, Mega Breakfast, at Hoxton Bar and Kitchen on 13 May. I reckon they might even be too cool for Hoxton. Some blogs, like Keytars and Violins are already hailing this as an album of the year.
Keys, cello, violin, computers and melodica are amongst the north Londoners’ instrumental forces. Lyrically, you won’t find many others singing “Come on, come on cloner; clone me another me, my generation needs another me”.
Is Brooklyn going to be the Brit School of America? Are we going to get bored? Not if you compare Vampire Weekend, MGMT or Beirut with Leona Lewis, The Feeling or The bloody Kooks.
Its all gone topsy-turvy. Brooklyn is producing great British music. The Brit School is churning out American dross.
They sound like a great British band, but Grizzly Bear come from, yes, Brooklyn. Radiohead love them and so do I. They have three EP/Albums out, with Yellow House and Friend both receiving critical acclaim.
Listen to He Hit Me (and it felt like a kiss), for interest, 60s girl group The Crystals made the original. Released in 2006, Knife is an older, but oh so fantastic, song. Super trippy video too:
At 19, Ben Garrett is creating massive music envy amongst bloggers. The Londoner is making seriously hot music as frYars. His silky voice and Morrissean melodies fit snuggly with catchy and thoughtful electro pop. Although not convinced with the quality of their youtube outing, frYars is pally with Esser, and their sound is quite comparable.
frYars has two EPs; The Ideswas received well and lead to a tour with Goldfrapp. His latest, thePerfidyshould continue to propel frYars to greater recognition still.
I ran into the frYars at The Blue Walrus. The Ides features in their excellent Snazzy No. 10 mix. I’m still looping this fantastic track. Check out the video with the weird lamps:
@njhamer have you unfollowed me? if you have, shame on you. 9 hours ago
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tesco pasta salad is not a good enough meal to last a whole day. my god i'm hungry. my macbook has never looked so much like a burger before 19 hours ago
Is Brooklyn going to be the Brit School of America? Are we going to get bored? Not if you compare Vampire Weekend, MGMT or Beirut with Leona Lewis, The Feeling or The bloody Kooks.
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