2007: The First Quarter In Review. Part Three - March

Apologies for the delay with this post but, hey, it's here now.

Each week in March saw the release of a notable new album from some part of the musical landscape or another, with impressive albums coming from the likes of Chigagoan power-punkers The Ponys, minimal techno wiz Gabriel Ananda, brain-damaged psych-pop combo The Aliens and ex-Shangri-La, Mary Weiss among others. It also ushered forth a few disappointments in the shape of Ted Leo's first really weak album, the pedestrian Tracey Thorn record and Air saying "Will this do?" with Pocket Symphony.

We're not going to focus on those though, so let's have another look at seven albums, all out in March that were either unsung, unfairly panned or justly praised from the heavens.


Easily the most talked-about and eagerly-anticipated album of the first three months of 2007 has to be Arcade Fire's Neon Bible. The follow-up to the nigh-on universally-adored Funeral, it's an album that shows a bit of a thematic volte-face on their part, but in the end just rings that little bit hollow in comparison. Sure, by any other band's yardstick, Neon Bible would be something approaching a triumph, but the fact that it follows arguably the best debut of the decade thus far is just something that I, for one, can't seem to overlook.

Lyrically, it deals in lighter sentiments than its death-obsessed predecessor, but as a result, it lacks that record's catharsis. In its great moments, and it has a few, Neon Bible is the sound of a band fully in charge of their own craft and hitting all the marks that they aim for. In the church organ-driven strum of 'Intervention' and its themes of shaken faith and everyday drudgery, Arcade Fire display a deftness with subjects that would seem tropey in the hands of lesser lights. Also, the re-recorded version of 'No Cars Go' from their debut EP achieves the heights of joyous unification that their first full-length had in spades.

Elsewhere though, there's a liberal sprinkling of filler. For every 'Black Wave/Bad Vibrations', there's a song like the non-descript title track and for every '(Antichrist Television Blues)', we've got the overblown and preposterous 'My Body Is A Cage'. I'm probably being a little harsh, but the Arcade Fire of Funeral just wouldn't have let a song as rote and as uninspired as 'Windowsill' slip through the net ("MTV what have you done to me?". Come on! You're better than that, Win!). That song pushes all the right buttons in that the strings sweep and the sound swells, but it does so in such a functional manner that it winds up frustratingly dull. I know some people are going to want my head on a pike for this, but hamstrung by previous success or not, Neon Bible is just not good enough.

Arcade Fire - Black Wave/Bad Vibrations (mp3)

Nick Cave returned this month with a fired-up, stripped-down version of The Bad Seeds as Grinderman. Alongside regular cohorts Warren Ellis, Jim Sclavunos and Martyn Casey, he set to making an album that was more in the spirit of his pre-Bad Seeds days with The Birthday Party and pretty much succeeded. A raw, gloriously unrefined riot, Grinderman is a menacing, fire-breathing, punchy, often hilarious record that works as a counterpoint to The Bad Seeds' wonderful bombast. Streamlined and effective, most of the songs here are like a kick to the throat, from the laugh-a-bar 'No Pussy Blues' to the 'Woman's Hour' and 'Gardener's Question Time' refs of 'Love Bomb', but Grinderman also has its more downtempo moments in the slink and moan of 'Electric Alice' or the short, sweet 'Man In The Moon'. In deconstructing the ornery of his day-job, Nick Cave has brought to bear a side of him many have thought was long lost.

Grinderman - Depth Charge Ethel (mp3)

NME buzz band, The Horrors released their debut album, Strange House in March to what could best be described as a mixed reception. In truth, when reading some of the reviews from both the negative and positive angles, the reasons some give to like it are exactly why others hated it and vice versa. For instance, The Guardian praised it for its clear credentials, while Stylus panned it for its slavish facsimile of better bands from the past. They're both kind of right though as Strange House is as derivative as it is fresh. The influences are sign-posted (The Cramps, The Fall, Jonathan Fire*Eater), but really, is there anyone making music like this anymore? At least in Britain there isn't and, pantomimic as it is, it's the closest that young Britain has to a band that might actually scare their parents and that's to be lauded, in my book.

The Horrors - Draw Japan (mp3)


Most of the bands that emerged during the punk-funk resurgence a few years back were ineffably awkward, anaemic and alabaster-white. The emphasis for most of those bands (The Rapture, Moving Units, Erase Errata) lay on the punk aspect, but who'd have thought that the band with probably the punkest background (in bands like The Yah Mos and Popesmashers) would end up being the most likely to bring the funk?

Although they look like a bunch of geography teachers (albeit geography teachers you suspect would light up a jazz tab or two in their spare time), !!! know how to get on the good foot. Myth Takes, their best album yet (a fact I've only recently come around to having dug out Louden Up Now and finding it to be not as good as I remember), sees the band indulging in JBs-like tight jams, shot through with the frenetic pace of punk. Also, isn't 'Heart Of Hearts' just the most fun song to dance to of the last five years?

!!! - Heart Of Hearts (mp3)

It's easy to see why people completely lost their shit and indulged in some serious hype-mongering upon hearing Panda Bear's new album, Person Pitch, as it sounds tailor-made for us mp3 bloggers who like pop music, preferably prefaced with the word indie and experimental music that isn't, y'know, all that experimental. There's nothing on Person Pitch that is truly ground-breaking, but it does sound like it was recorded on a planet other than this one. The touchstones are evident on first contact - Phil Spector, Brian Wilson, Silver Apples - but it's distinctly idiosyncratic and further displays that Animal Collective are masters of their own craft and are, through their band albums and solo work like this, racking up a body of work that ranks among the strongest in modern music.

Panda Bear - I'm Not (mp3)

The most prominent hip-hop release, at least for people versed in the genre's underground, in March was El-P's I'll Sleep When You're Dead. Fine record it is, but in my opinion, the most enjoyable rap release this month was Devin The Dude's Waitin' To Inhale. Devin's been well respected on the underground scene for best part of a decade, but the dude cannot catch a break. This hasn't made him bitter, like it would with most MCs. Nah, Devin just rolls with it, rolls another and gets lit up. His only ambitions are to get fucked up and get fucked and they are the two major preoccupations on his latest record. Some of the lyrics may be a little tart for some people's tastes, but the guy is just one of the most likeable rhymers around, with his slow, THC-addled Texas drawl and hilarious way with smutty one-liners ("I tried to run, I tried to duck, but I couldn't get away she was wide as fuck" - 'She Useta Be'). An acidic, dumb/witty delight.

Devin The Dude - What A Job (feat. Snoop Dogg & Andre 3000) (mp3)

ALBUM OF THE MONTH: MARCH

LCD SOUNDSYSTEM - SOUND OF SILVER

Well, was it ever going to be anything else? I'll keep it short because I've sang this album's praises more than enough over the last few months. Put simply, Sound Of Silver is an astonishing pop record by one of the few people working today for whom it doesn't seem much of a stretch to call a genius. If you haven't heard it yet, what the hell are you doing reading this?

LCD Soundsystem - Sound Of Silver (mp3)

I'll probably do another one of these in July, you know.

2007: The First Quarter In Review. Part Two - February

So, it's now time to look at the month of February in our three-part mini-review of the year's album releases thus far.


After an understandably slow start to the year in January, February was the month that things started to really pick up in the BIG album release schedules. The most notable release this month was the 'difficult' second album from Bloc Party. A Weekend In The City was met with lukewarm reviews that were often a little unfairly harsh in tone. For me, this was the album that really solidified Bloc Party as one of, if not the best young band in Britain. It's ambitious, poignant, crunchy and frequently invigorating.

Most of the reviews tended to focus on the fact that Bloc Party were clearly trying too hard to make a different-sounding album than its predecessor, but who can blame them for wanting to branch out and show a little more initiative than their peers. A Weekend In The City is an excellent record that shows that a little bit of balls goes a long way, especially in the increasingly redundant and apathetic British indie-rock scene.

Bloc Party - Where Is Home? (mp3)

Speaking of which, Kaiser Chiefs chose this month to inflict the flat, listless Yours Truly, Angry Mob on the public. A Kaiser Chiefs fan I am not, but I have to admit that, prior to this record, they'd shown a canny way with pop hooks in singles such as 'Oh My God', 'Everyday I Love You Less And Less' and the ubiquitous 'I Predict A Riot', but it's clear after just one listen to the new album that they've got absolutely nothing to say.

This wouldn't be such a bad thing if they didn't actually purport to be some sort of mouthpiece for the common man. This contradiction is shockingly evident in the song, 'Everything Is Average Nowadays', in which the Kaisers take aim at the sheer level of complacency that we've settled for these days. The fact of the matter is that the song itself is completely indicative of the "Yeah, that's alright" mindset that they're trying to satirise. I'd like to think it's intentional but if there was one band who you can point the finger of blame at for the current state of British guitar music, it's Kaiser Chiefs. They've taken the template of a song that lives or dies on its chorus and made it into a production line ethos. For bands like The Kooks, The View or The Fratellis, it doesn't matter whether the verse is forgettable, as long as the chorus takes up residence in your brain and, for that, I blame Kaiser Chiefs.

Kaiser Chiefs - Everything Is Average Nowadays (mp3)

To call the release of a Deerhoof album a big event is overselling it somewhat, but for the small hardcore base of loyal fans they've built up over the last decade, each album is met with polite fervour. Always a hard band to pin down, Deerhoof often change tack with each record, but their latest, Friend Opportunity, expands on the ideas of its predecessor, The Runners Four and is yet another bracing, challenging play on standard pop form.

Apart from epic closer, 'Look Away', all the songs here clock in under the three-and-a-half minute mark and display the freshness and wonderment that we've come to expect from them. Deerhoof aren't built to write pop songs but that doesn't stop them trying and with songs like '+81', with its brilliant nonsense chorus, or the sweet, borderline twee 'Choco Fight', they've damn near managed it. Long may they struggle.

Deerhoof - Choco Fight (mp3)


February also saw the release of a handful of unexpectedly brilliant albums, either from artists who you'd already written off or those you hadn't heard of before. For instance, I didn't expect Busdriver's album, RoadKillOvercoat to grab me as hard as it did. His most accessible album to date, RoadKillOvercoat also manages to be his most tripped-out and psychedelic. Hooking up with producers Nobody and Boom Bip proved to be a masterstroke as the songs here are certainly the most outlandish the LA rapper has ever committed to tape.

From the lysergic, acid-soul of 'Secret Skin' or the new-wave-y 'Sun Showers' to the head-wrong party cut, 'Kill Your Employer' or slo-mo torch ballad, 'Dream Catcher's Mitt', there's not a bad song here. A record that should reach further than curious backpackers.

Busdriver - Secret Skin (mp3)

Tigersushi mainman, Joakim released his second solo album this month and it most certainly wasn't what people were expecting from him. In a good way, that is. Choosing to mostly eschew the restless dance-punk of lead-off single, 'I Wish You Were Gone', in favour of a dark, goth-y aesthetic for the main part, Monsters And Silly Songs is an album of dark majesty that, while it may take a few listens to get under your skin, rewards persistence in spades. Songs like 'Sleep In Hollow Tree' owe more to the likes of Bauhaus side-project Tones On Tail or Siouxsie & The Banshees' later work than it does to Liquid Liquid or ESG.

There are club tracks though, like the frantic 'Drumtrax' or the downbeat, but funky new romancer, 'Lonely Hearts', but its in the dark corners and shadows that Monsters And Silly Songs really excels.

Joakim - Everything Bright And Still (mp3)

One release that kind of disappeared under the radar for all but a few of us hardened garage rock enthusiasts was Black Lips' Los Valientes Del Mondo Nuevo. Recorded live in Tijuana last year, Los Valientes... perfectly conveys and embellishes on Black Lips' status as one of the most dangerous, exciting bands on the live circuit. Sure, some of the background sounds have been added in post to further dial up the blood-red ferocity of the band's live performances, but it's a trick that they pull off. Refusing to play it safe and always being ones to 'print the legend', Black Lips are to be commended for their commitment to mad, bad and dangerous to know garage punk.

Black Lips - Boone (mp3)

ALBUM OF THE MONTH: FEBRUARY

OF MONTREAL - HISSING FAUNA, ARE YOU THE DESTROYER?

Of Montreal's eighth and arguably best studio album, Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer? finally dropped in February after being leaked in its entirety back in September. By the time it was released, most people who wanted to hear it already had and had been given time to fully let this dense, multi-layered concept record sink in. On the surface, it's all psych-pop sheen, but the lyrics are sometimes intensely bleak (they speak of singer Kevin Barnes' breakdown in Norway after his marriage failed), thus giving the album a bi-polar edge that lends it a poignancy and a level of sonic schizophrenia that keeps bringing you back to it.

Catchy hooks and exotic arrangements aside, this is primarily a heartbreaking record that reaches a peak in the almost unbearably frenzied centrepiece, 'The Past Is A Grotesque Animal' - a twelve-minute drama that repeats its melody throughout, forcing you to listen to Barnes' lyrical meltdown. An astonishing achievement from a band working at the top of their game.

Of Montreal - Bunny Ain't No Kind Of Rider (mp3)

We'll do March over the weekend,

JMx

2007: The First Quarter In Review. Part One - January

Okay so the title might actually give the intention away somewhat, but let me give you some reasons as to why I'm doing this.

So far, 2007 has been an eventful year for music. If you view the passing of time in discrete yearly chunks that is. The music blogger's prerogative is to view the start of each year as a clean slate; to put the old year to bed with some lists that serve only to denigrate music by measuring it up against itself, therefore turning making music into some kind of contest. This cheapens both the music and the artists, but we do it anyway, because we're sad, lonely and ever so fucking anal. We also figure that if we throw the reader a bone or two in the form of mp3s, then maybe, just maybe, they'll want to know our reasoning behind why we like the new album by Modest Mouse more than we like Arcade Fire's new effort. So we're kidding ourselves and we're underestimating you.

Also, in our roles as bloggers, we subject ourselves to more music than we can compute. The incessant list-making therefore is a tool to help our brains remember which of those many records we actually liked and which ones we thought sucked. This helps absolutely no-one, but I guess they make for some kind of entertainment. I know I enjoy making them, as some of you would have guessed. Really though, if I hadn't done lists of my favourite songs and albums of the year in December, would anyone have been disappointed? The answer is that I don't know. I know that it gives me enjoyment and, I guess that, due to the response I got from them, quite a few of you guys enjoyed them too.

It's with this in mind that I present to you a brief rundown of albums I've liked, albums I haven't liked and albums I've listened to once and have no desire to ever hear again from the first three months of the year, with added commentary and, of course, free mp3s. It's more of an overview than a crummy old list though. I'm starting with January because that's as good a place to start as any.


Slow to start as always, January offered very little in the way of jaw-dropping releases. One thing we did get though, were a few high-profile (for the indie world, at least) disappointments. Probably the biggest of these was Clap Your Hands Say Yeah's second album, Some Loud Thunder. Before I begin to pick at its faults, let me make it clear that I don't think it's a bad album, far from it, it just wasn't anywhere near as good as the first. First of all, the opening title track, buried under a morass of fuzz and red-lining harder than Raw Power, seemed a strange move. It alienated people from the word go and also, it just didn't seem right to ugly up such a pretty, sweet melody with all that harshness. The more you listen to 'Some Loud Thunder', the more you 'get' it, but CYHSY really shouldn't have bothered trying to make it so hard for people to like.

The bloody-minded awkwardness didn't stop there either. Two songs that have been doing the rounds for a while in their live sets were conspicuous by their absence. The omission of 'Cigarettes' and 'Me & You Watson' threw the ineffectuality and inassuming nature of songs like 'Arm & Hammer' and 'Five Easy Pieces' into stark relief. Also, if someone can explain the point of the short instrumental interludes here, there's a fiver in it for you.

Like I said though, Some Loud Thunder is far from a huge disaster. 'Satan Said Dance' is a funky, nervy delight that David Byrne would have been proud of, while 'Underwater (You And Me)' is quite possibly the sweetest thing they've recorded in their short career. However, with repeated listens, the problems with Some Loud Thunder become harder to gloss over. I guess that's what the skip button's for, but I'd rather not have to resort to that.

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Underwater (You And Me) (mp3)

Damon Albarn's new side-project, The Good, The Bad & The Queen released an album in January to a pretty favourable critical reaction. This surprised me because, personally, it bored me to tears. A dreary, beige dirge-fest which served only to highlight Albarn's ever-growing ego, it was a complete missed opportunity. Fancy having a bassist as lithe and rhythmic as Paul Simonon or a percussion god like Tony Allen at your disposal and not using them! Damon's passionless, droney vocals were pushed to the fore on every track, each of them lyrically concerned with how shit Britain is. Well, Damon, maybe you're right, but would it kill you to find some humour or some light in the drudgery? Go back to making decent pop music with Gorillaz, please.

The Good, The Bad & The Queen - '80s Life (mp3)

The Shins finally got around to releasing a follow-up to the peerless Chutes Too Narrow in January. Entitled Wincing The Night Away, it just wasn't the great pop record that we know they're capable of. They occasionally hit the heights of old on the breezy likes of 'Australia', 'Turn On Me' and the single, 'Phantom Limb', but too often the songs tend to meander aimlessly. Some of the band's effervescent zip was gone and thus, Wincing The Night Away was a bit of a disappointment.

The Shins - Australia (mp3)


January wasn't all doom and gloom though. In fact, in the very first week of the month, we were treated to Candylion, the second solo album by Super Furry Animals frontman, Gruff Rhys. Folk-tinged pop music was the order of the day and this is a man who can knock out a good pop song or two in his sleep. There are still traces of the psychedelia he plies in his day job, but Candylion is an altogether softer beast. Even when the percussion is borderline furious, as in 'Lonesome Words', Rhys' lilting voice and finger-plucked acoustic give the whole album a deliciously floaty air. Also, in the twee-but-not-sickeningly-so title track, the driving, in more than one sense, 'Gyrru, Gyrru, Gyrru' and the groovy sprawl of closing track, 'Skylon!' he produced three songs that were better than anything on the last SFA album. Not just a vanity project then.

Gruff Rhys - The Court Of King Arthur (mp3)

Elsewhere, two of Britain's bright young things threw out thoroughly decent debuts. Whether Klaxons's debut Myths Of The Near Future (full review here) was actually any cop was rendered irrelevant by the relentless hype and backlash that surrounded its release. Therefore, most people who wanted to like it did and those who wanted to see them fall on their arse hated it. Personally, I think its a debut that shows more promise than it actually delivers on, but they're definitely a band moving in the right direction and, despite what the band and the press try to tell us, they're not rave, nu or old.

Klaxons - Two Receivers (mp3)

Wimbledon's own Jamie T offered forth his debut in the month of January too and it was a bullish, confident, slightly messy, often brilliant record. Panic Prevention, once you get past Jamie's marble-mouthed delivery is a largely enjoyable listen and one that marks his card both as a shrewd chronicler of everyday British life in the vein of Mike Skinner before he lost it and a canny writer of hummable, joyous pop tunes. Its release kind of came and went without much fanfare but you'll be doing yourself a disservice if you didn't give it at least a cursory listen.

Jamie T - Brand New Bass Guitar (mp3)

ALBUM OF THE MONTH: JANUARY

FIELD MUSIC - TONES OF TOWN

Sunderland's Field Music are one of those bands who you think should be bigger and more respected than they actually are. Tones Of Town is their second album of perfectly realised, immaculately constructed pop songs. Taking the stop-start rhythms of the British post-punkers and melding it to beautiful soft-pop melodies, they make music that hits on both an immediate level and a more cerebral, architectural level. The way that Field Music's songs are fashioned is meticulous, not a sound or a note is out of place, but they're never dry or overly tricksy. Above all else, Tones Of Town is eleven catchy songs, but its the intricacy of the arrangements and the care and attention on display that keeps you coming back for more.

Field Music - Working To Work (mp3)

Tomorrow, it's February's turn to be assessed with a cold, methodical eye. Stay tuned.

JMx