LIVE: KENDAL CALLING 2010 – FRIDAY
– LOWTHER DEER PARK, PENRITH – Now I’m not one for moaning unnecessarily, alright that might not be totally true, but my start to this year Kendal Calling experience is not the best, and it is the same for some of the other folk that used the shuttle bus from Penrith train station to the festival. For some unknown reason the drop off point is not as near to the main entrance as we would have liked. As I get off the coach there is a queue of punters sat down waiting... Read More
LIVE: GRAND ARCHIVES – 03/08/2010
– THE DEAF INSTITUTE, MANCHESTER – There’s surely much been said about the irony of housing a musical venue within a former deaf institute (ad nauseam). However, upon telling someone recently that I was attending a gig at The Deaf Institute they seemed equally amazed and interested before earnestly enquiring whether the band would be using sign language. Really. The band in question is Seattle’s Grand Archives. It’s the third Sub Pop band I’ve seen in the city... Read More
LIVE: SHEARWATER – 01/08/2010
– THE DEAF INSTITUTE, MANCHESTER – So the summer is here at last, the festival season is under way and it usually means the best of the bands are off all over the world playing to sell out crowds of weekend camp stars. So you could imagine that the chance to see a quality acts would only happen at said events…You’d be wrong So as I fought my way through the glorious summer weather (it was pissing it down) to a venue that I’d never attended but heard such good... Read More
SINGLE: TERROR DANJAH – BRUZIN VIP/ HYSTERIA DOK (ft. TD)
Firing another round in the seemingly unstoppable force of the Hyperdub mega-weapon, Terror Danjah steps up with two powerful stabs of sound. Bruzin VIP sets the pace with a fuel injected shuddering rework of the original. Late 90s gaming sfx hang nicely in the design. Slowly warming then springing into action, energy bursts at the seams on this one. Pads ricochet around and out of the speakers, drums bounce into action, synth hooks rebound back and forth in the chorus, fuelling... Read More
ALBUM: Joe Pernice – It Feels So Good When I Stop (Novel Soundtrack)
The problem With It Feels So Good When I Stop is that it was recorded as an accompaniment to his novel of the same name, and though I know it would infinitely augment the quality of this review I can’t be bothered to read it.However, if I was to take a wild stab at the nature of this book, I would guess that it’s about some lost slacker looking back on his life and loves with the music setting the time and the place – it does have that magical tardis-like quality. It’s... Read More
ALBUM: Dan Mangan – Nice, Nice, Very Nice
Gracenotes only gives you one option – Nice, Nice, Very Nice is folk it solemnly declares. But don’t let that mislead you, as it most certainly isn’t. Acoustic singer-songwriter… OK, so those are misnomers too. Whatever it is or whatever it isn’t, Dan Mangan’s got an earnest voice, wrapping his vocals around decisive lyrics – these aren’t words written down in haste in his mobile phone via a quick google for the rhyming dictionary. This is deliberation, erasing,... Read More
