(Tickets can be got here, and go on sale on the 11th at 9am... get in quick.)
Friday, February 8
SONIC HORROR//
It's been announced that The Horrors will be supporting none other than the 60s garage group, The Sonics, at The Forum in London on 23rd March as part of the Le Beat Bespoke 4 weekend. The weekend (three nights over the Easter Bank Holiday) is a celebration of the 60s underground movement, hosted by legendary garage DJ Rob Bailey. The Sonics will play two performances, having reformed in New York last year after splitting in 1968; the LBB4 gigs will be their first ever in Europe. The Horrors are supporting them on the Sunday night, and, having claimed the legendary punk forefathers as a major influence and covered their song 'The Witch', should be on top form. The first Sonics gig has already sold out; the second is not to be missed for anyone interested in garage punk.
Wednesday, January 30
Sunday, January 27
New N/C song montage//
Neils Children have posted an aural montage of some of their new songs onto their website. The 40-second clip features extracts from 'Reflective/Surface' and 'I'm Ill', as well as short snippets from a few other unknown songs. You can hear it here.
Friday, January 25
Band spotlight//FUTURISM VS. PASSEISM
We've been following their development and hanging on their every move for about a month now, and finally the enigmatic Futurism vs. Passeism have taken off their masks. We now know that the electronic group contains four members with a 3:1 gender ratio and at least one ex-member of Wretched Replica. We already know that their mixture of These New Puritansesque electronics, New York No Wave, and atmospheric noises is one of the most exciting things in London at the moment. And finally we know that you can and should experience and unwravel more mysterious layers this Sunday when they perform live for the first time at the first #NUMBERS# club. Go.
Thursday, January 24
Band spotlight//KASMS
The 'gothic' tag has been applied to some great music, but nowadays 98% of the general population will stick it on Marilyn Manson and Nine Inch Nails, and scratch their heads at the mention of the Virgin Prunes. So it's good to see some healthy cynicism on the part of KASMs, a London four-piece who describe their music as 'chaotic quasi-gothick shriekbeat'. They sound as fresh as a band who formed only four months ago should, and their demos (recorded live) echo Siouxsie Sioux and Poly Styrene through the tormented screeching vocals of Rachel-Mary Callaghan, and acts like These New Puritans or early Joy Division with their sparse, spontaneous drum and bass guitar noises. They're supporting Neils Children alongside S.C.U.M on the 13th February in Hoxton - those based in London should definitely pop along, since they sound like a fantastic live act. New Yorkers can also catch them in various venues from 16th-20th February.
Saturday, January 19
REVIEW// The Violets; The Lost Pages
Comparisons to Siouxsie and the Banshees have been pretty much constant throughout the three-year musical career of The Violets, and they don’t seem to like it much. So although they’ve recently added a bass player to their ranks (giving them the same touring line-up as the Banshees) and embraced a decidedly gothic look for the artwork of their new LP The Lost Pages and its accompanying singles, the music itself seems to have been composed as a deliberate two fingers to all the lazy journalistic Siouxsie comparisons.
So what does it sound like? Well, The Violets are still giving their old punk sound plenty of voice - it’s here in new track ‘Forget Me Not’, and in ‘Descend’, a new version of a 2006 single with the addition of well-placed stabs of guitar feedback from Joe Daniels. It’s also present in the Hitchcock-inspired ‘Foreo’, released as a single earlier in 2007 and still the band’s best-known tune.
But there are some drastic changes at work. The first thing that the newcomer to the album hears is the pop-punk of first track ‘Shade To Be’. I was actually about to check my disc to make sure I’d actually bought The Lost Pages instead of something by Paramore, before Alexis Mary’s glottal stops persuaded me that I hadn’t been cheated by my record store. Other Siouxsie-defying uncharacteristic tracks include ‘Half Light’ (which is more like country and western) or ‘Nature of Obsession’ (acoustic Latin pop?!). Sometimes this genre-bending approach works (latest single ‘Troubles of Keneat’, a foray into electronics and drum machines, is great), but usually, while they’re not actually bad, these tracks sound like a band pushing their own boundaries for the sake of it, rather than some kind of exciting new sound.
Happily, there is such a sound running through the album. ‘In Your Statue’ is a piece of sweeping post-punk genius, and that thread is continued with the more sedate ‘Co-Plax’, which has even more cryptic lyrics than The Violets’ usual fare - ‘co-plax, co-plan / melts planet to hand’? Understanding what it’s about isn’t really necessary though, because it’s great. ‘Hush Away’, also a single in 2006, was an early example of this dramatic, cinematic sound, and the beginning of the version on The Lost Pages, with Mary’s haunting vocals emerging from a storm of noise, is nothing less than majestic; ‘Parting Glances’, with an extended instrumental outro, would have made the perfect album-closer, and is probably the best song here (rivalled only by ‘Hush Away’).
Yes, The Lost Pages could have benefited maybe from a little less ‘look, we can use acoustic guitars’, and a track reshuffle. But sections of it are evocative, atmospheric, and wonderfully crafted. Isn't saying it sounds like the Banshees recorded it a good thing?
So what does it sound like? Well, The Violets are still giving their old punk sound plenty of voice - it’s here in new track ‘Forget Me Not’, and in ‘Descend’, a new version of a 2006 single with the addition of well-placed stabs of guitar feedback from Joe Daniels. It’s also present in the Hitchcock-inspired ‘Foreo’, released as a single earlier in 2007 and still the band’s best-known tune.
But there are some drastic changes at work. The first thing that the newcomer to the album hears is the pop-punk of first track ‘Shade To Be’. I was actually about to check my disc to make sure I’d actually bought The Lost Pages instead of something by Paramore, before Alexis Mary’s glottal stops persuaded me that I hadn’t been cheated by my record store. Other Siouxsie-defying uncharacteristic tracks include ‘Half Light’ (which is more like country and western) or ‘Nature of Obsession’ (acoustic Latin pop?!). Sometimes this genre-bending approach works (latest single ‘Troubles of Keneat’, a foray into electronics and drum machines, is great), but usually, while they’re not actually bad, these tracks sound like a band pushing their own boundaries for the sake of it, rather than some kind of exciting new sound.
Happily, there is such a sound running through the album. ‘In Your Statue’ is a piece of sweeping post-punk genius, and that thread is continued with the more sedate ‘Co-Plax’, which has even more cryptic lyrics than The Violets’ usual fare - ‘co-plax, co-plan / melts planet to hand’? Understanding what it’s about isn’t really necessary though, because it’s great. ‘Hush Away’, also a single in 2006, was an early example of this dramatic, cinematic sound, and the beginning of the version on The Lost Pages, with Mary’s haunting vocals emerging from a storm of noise, is nothing less than majestic; ‘Parting Glances’, with an extended instrumental outro, would have made the perfect album-closer, and is probably the best song here (rivalled only by ‘Hush Away’).
Yes, The Lost Pages could have benefited maybe from a little less ‘look, we can use acoustic guitars’, and a track reshuffle. But sections of it are evocative, atmospheric, and wonderfully crafted. Isn't saying it sounds like the Banshees recorded it a good thing?
Monday, January 14
REViEW// Neils Children &c.; DICE CLUB
13th January 2008;; Despite the several new club nights that crop up every month to play the more interesting side of music, The Dice Club remains one of London's best for a wide range of music from the last fifty years, and also for its live lineups. This time it was Neils Children, playing their first major London show since October, who topped the bill with support from Silhouette (alias Helena Gee of Zoo Music), and up-and-coming four-piece I Am The Arm.
Silhouette opened, a solitary figure who took the stage forty minutes late. This was her first show with electric instead of acoustic guitar, but her folky singer-songwriter stylings were still a strange choice of support considering the other two acts. Her contemplative music doesn't lend itself that well to the live environment, especially when that environment is still less than half-full two hours after doors, and her lack of a backing band (something she's in the process of recruiting) didn't help as far as creating atmosphere went. But these stacked odds (appropriate for the Dice Club?) didn't impede too much with a set which peaked with a very nice cover of The Gun Club's 'Sexbeat'.
The next act on were Silhouette's polar opposites in everything except dress sense. I Am The Arm are fascinating to watch. Half of the band - vocalist/synth-masher Cyan and a one-man drumstorm called Twitchy the Ratbag - are all shrieks, Ian Curtis gyrations, and flailing; the remainder (bassist Kane and backing vox/synthesizer Aimee) are calm and collected. This tension, increased during a Barrett's-Floyd-in-1966 beginning, created a set which was electric in both senses, and got a fair bit of shoulder-banging going on down at the front. In fact my only minor gripe was the complete lack of any communication to the audience outside of the songs, but otherwise the Arm were brilliant - we predict a bright future.
Still, we can't imagine that many people were at Dice specifically to see either of the support acts. Neils Children's performance was an unusual - almost informal - one by their standards. For a start, they were out of their usual uniform, playing in civvies. Then there was the fact that the eternally-silent Keith Seymour was singing backing vox, and the backing tracks that have accompanied songs including 'Window Shopping' for recent performances weren't used.
All of these things were slightly surprising, but one thing that we were expecting (or rather hoping for) was new material, and we weren't disappointed. A new song (whose name we didn't catch) was first on the setlist, and another - announced as future single 'Exposure' - came towards the end. We're happy to say that these new songs were more than good enough to justify the expulsion of 'Communique' and 'The Night Is Over' from the setlist. Although the N/C performance was a short one, it was more energetic and tighter than their civvies let on, and must have got most of the crowd counting down the days to Pop:Aural.
Silhouette opened, a solitary figure who took the stage forty minutes late. This was her first show with electric instead of acoustic guitar, but her folky singer-songwriter stylings were still a strange choice of support considering the other two acts. Her contemplative music doesn't lend itself that well to the live environment, especially when that environment is still less than half-full two hours after doors, and her lack of a backing band (something she's in the process of recruiting) didn't help as far as creating atmosphere went. But these stacked odds (appropriate for the Dice Club?) didn't impede too much with a set which peaked with a very nice cover of The Gun Club's 'Sexbeat'.
The next act on were Silhouette's polar opposites in everything except dress sense. I Am The Arm are fascinating to watch. Half of the band - vocalist/synth-masher Cyan and a one-man drumstorm called Twitchy the Ratbag - are all shrieks, Ian Curtis gyrations, and flailing; the remainder (bassist Kane and backing vox/synthesizer Aimee) are calm and collected. This tension, increased during a Barrett's-Floyd-in-1966 beginning, created a set which was electric in both senses, and got a fair bit of shoulder-banging going on down at the front. In fact my only minor gripe was the complete lack of any communication to the audience outside of the songs, but otherwise the Arm were brilliant - we predict a bright future.
Still, we can't imagine that many people were at Dice specifically to see either of the support acts. Neils Children's performance was an unusual - almost informal - one by their standards. For a start, they were out of their usual uniform, playing in civvies. Then there was the fact that the eternally-silent Keith Seymour was singing backing vox, and the backing tracks that have accompanied songs including 'Window Shopping' for recent performances weren't used.
All of these things were slightly surprising, but one thing that we were expecting (or rather hoping for) was new material, and we weren't disappointed. A new song (whose name we didn't catch) was first on the setlist, and another - announced as future single 'Exposure' - came towards the end. We're happy to say that these new songs were more than good enough to justify the expulsion of 'Communique' and 'The Night Is Over' from the setlist. Although the N/C performance was a short one, it was more energetic and tighter than their civvies let on, and must have got most of the crowd counting down the days to Pop:Aural.
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