Culturedeluxe June 2010 - The Comeback Issue

JUNE 2010 - THE COMEBACK ISSUE Editors

Mathew Parri Thomas (parri@culturedeluxe.com) Adam Gibby (adam@culturedeluxe.com)

Advertising Manager

Nick Foster (nick@culturedeluxe.com)

Publisher

Richie Brown (richie@culturedeluxe.com)

Cover Design Tinhead

Contributing writers

Bradley Poole, Chantelle Pattemore, Dean Coster, Dean Renphrey, Jack Richardson, James Threlfall, John Rain, Keith Haworth, Kevin Burgess, Matt Churchill, Mathew Britton, Phil Russell, Robert Miller, Ross Park, Salwa Azar

With thanks

All the PR companies and bands who’ve helped make our first issue a reality. All our friends and family who put up with us. Dan Tappin for hosting Copyright Culturedeluxe 2010 www.cuturedeluxe.com Culturedeluxe is published on 100% virtual paper. No trees were harmed.

Christopher Wright, aka Tinhead, is the artist behind the cover for our Comeback Issue of Culturedeluxe. Most famous for designing the cover for Foals’ Antidotes he chats to Mathew Parri Thomas about the image, his career and what his life could have been without art.

Tinhead, a lot of our readers will be most familiar with your work through the cover you did for Foals’ debut Antidotes. How did that gig come about?

The cover for Foals came about when I was going through a period in my life where I was drinking constantly. They were friends of mine and we grew together — their music and my art. It’s about how boring people you know can be when you’re at school and you can feel the inner-wolf flexing, but it isn’t nightime yet and then, when you get to night, the nightwolf steps out, unzips and gets his fucking shit on the road. Inside it all is just the commercial pain of being a fucking stereotype.

That’s why purple tears are hidden amongst the pills and buttons and hearts: purple being the colour of Chelsea and Man Utd fist-fucking each other.

Is the culture of film and music something you try to align yourself with? Are you looking to do more album artwork, or perhaps even some film posters if asked?

Not really that interested in music artwork; album artwork is dead. Compared to Jasper Goodall, George Hardie and John Pasche I ain’t never gonna dial in a Pink Floyd, Stones or Muse. Shit, that shit don’t go anymore. The format is dead. Then people download then complain of bad artwork! I never downloaded an album anyway. I buy it in the shop, but 80s metal ain’t coming so I have all the music I need. I do the Foals art ‘cos it’s not a job; it’s part of my life. We are together.

I’d do that shit even if I wasn’t paid.

What else have you done that those without their finger on the art pulse might have seen?

I was an international male model when I was 19 and I have an illustrious racing career, having won numerous titles including the British Kart Grand Prix and raced for England and came 3rd in the Britcar European Championship in 2008. I also have a big dick and a wicked sense of humour.

We absolutely love the artwork you’ve done for our first ever digital issue. A fair few ideas on what it represents have been flying about the CDX office. Care to shed any light on your inspiration behind the piece and what it represents?

The art I did for your issue is called the Flightback with Nightwolf. I coloured it and turned it into a nightwolf war symbol. It’s birds flying into war.

It looks to be something of a mixed media piece. The Foals artwork was more of an illustration and less abstract. Do you prefer one artistic medium over another?

I don’t mind any form of artwork or any medium.

It’s a very wonderful thing switching about and still making work. Make no mistake, I ain’t no hippy.

Although I look like a longhaired friend of Jesus I’m actually a left over Nazi war project. I’m a stationary expert.

Who would you say are the main influences for your work? Not necessarily artists either.

Rourke, Steve McQueen. My work is about wonderful, beautiful failure. For example, Steve McQueen could have been a formula one racer, he instead was an actor who was probably bitter so rode motorbikes through the desert and then advertised smoking only to die of lung cancer. His ghost must be pissed.

This month’s issue is focused on the recent fascination with comebacks. What do you make of the whole comeback culture at the moment? Is it a good idea or are people just looking for an easy pay cheque?

Well I dunno. I don’t think there’s much cash about at the moment, so I wouldn’t worry about some eighties comeback montage. I’m not a comeback, I’m a throwback to when men were men. A man who gets patronised about being an artist by his father at dinner and instead of being depressed and writing on Facebook about it he shits in his sheets.

Words: Mathew Parri Thomas

I’m not influenced by artists. I like real men, in a non gay way, like Oliver Reed, Clint, Mickey

Kevin Burgess dissects music’s latest phenomenon: The Comeback. Do we need them, are they a cash in, and should record company money be focused on new talent?

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t has recently been announced that noughties indie troubadours and guerrilla gigging trailblazers The Libertines will re-unite this summer to perform at the Reading & Leeds festivals and, astonishingly so, for a tabloid-reported £1.5 million. This will I’m sure arouse excitement amongst many but will at the same time raise more than a few eyebrows and probably lead a few cynical mouths to utter the phrase ‘another re-union!?’.

In the last decade we have seen a deluge of bands and artists from yesteryear set aside differences and grievances to reconvene, strap on the old guitars and play some old favourites in front of adoring fans old and new — so much so that it’s almost become the norm — and you can understand why.

A good majority of these re-unions have been majorly successful, you only have to look amongst the headliners from the previous two Glastonbury Festivals for proof of that. It wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if record companies across the land are focusing serious efforts on enticing older bands back from retirement in favour of searching for, and taking chances on, new young acts. It would certainly seem a more viable option. Why take a risk when you know you can work with an established act that has a ready made audience, often bolstered during their hiatus?

In a twisted and almost perverted way, and as great as it is to see the likes of the Pixies playing together, do we really want to get to a point in the future where half a record company’s efforts are used up promoting re-united bands and re-issuing “classic” albums when their efforts could be better spent investing in talent

creating tomorrow’s classics? Fortunately I don’t think we are quite at that stage yet, but its not something that should be taken lightly.

I think it’s a fair point to make, especially with regards to the indie world, that one of the first major players in this recent spate of comebacks would be the Pixies. Back in 2004 it was announced that they would unite to play together for the first time in 11 years. Tickets for four Brixton academy shows sold out in minutes and further dates around the world did the same. This is a band who lingered, somewhat contentedly, below the mainstream for their entire existence and who’s fortunes were bolstered by name drops from rock’s elite — not least Kurt Cobain, who would once declare he almost scrapped Smells Like Teen Spirit because he thought it sounded too much like a Pixies rip-off. To go from the indie scenes best kept secret, to selling out multiple dates at Brixton Academy in minutes, not to mention the Ally Pally gigs later on the tour (and this was just the London dates) must have sent ripples through the industry, ripples that gather momentum, pick up speed and hit back with a wave of bands surfing the comeback bandwagon. Well that’s what the cynic might think.

It’s this ideal that intrigues. What motivates these comebacks? We’re not naive enough to assume that money doesn’t play a part, of course it does, but it can’t be the sole factor in every case. We have recently seen some genuine, heartfelt and emotional comebacks, at times publicly televised, to prove this point.

It must be an emotional train wreck in some situations, some of the bands have notorious histories and split up with real animosity amongst each other.

Are we to believe that money is enough in these cases to re-unite warring parties? Or has it taken the passing of time and the calming aura as people mature into middle age for bridges that were once burned to be smelted and restructured into sturdy metal crossings?

An interesting case in point and one that I feel rings very true with at least three recently re-united bands – the previously mentioned Pixies, The Libertines and 90’s prodigal indie sons Pavement — is that they all returned to a larger baying audience. Now these three bands shared moderate success during their initial period, Pavement even eking out a critically prosperous ten year career, and all three bands have at the very least one era defining album in their cannons.

However, the key point here is that each band took on an almost mythical status once they called it a day and have grown in status, stature and, most importantly, in fan base; each of these bands has a far bigger audience now than when they were at their creative or commercial peak, for various reasons.

The Pixies and Pavement took on the mantle of 80’s & 90’s indie gods respectively and, with a generation of kids growing up with the internet and the ability to discover new music at the click of a mouse, their catalogues have become highly accessible and their stories and histories passed on and retold with whispered vigour amongst blog-ites and music sites around the world (Pavement in particular seem to be Pitchfork‘s consummate darlings).

The case with the Libertines takes a different slant, seeing as the British tabloid press seemed to jump all over Pete Doherty the minute he was kicked out of the band. Although this coverage brought about a fair amount of detractors and resentment it also introduced a generation of youngsters to the band who probably just missed out on seeing them when they were around. The Libertines were one of the first bands to really utilise the internet as a marketing tool

and would often interact with fans on forums and blogs. Last minute gigs would be promoted using these methods and the band found themselves attracting a tonne of people to their online community, without an actual band to go and see live anymore.

The main point here is that these three bands have a large fan base of people who have never seen them live; this doesn’t mean these people are any less of a fan, they just weren’t around the first time, so making a comeback could also seem like a new beginning — playing a bunch of old songs to a new audience thirsty to hear them live for the first time.

I’ve seen Stephen Malkmus live on a few occasions and each gig is littered with shouts from the crowd requesting Cut Your Hair or Shady Lane. As much as an artist like Malkmus is forward thinking and wants to progress musically, there must be an inkling, tingling inside somewhere to play all those songs again in the right setting amongst his old band mates.

It must have been a driving force in his decision to finally reconvene with his old cohorts and decide to tour around the world this year.

Last year’s Glastonbury festival saw one of England’s most successful bands of the modern era, Blur, finally settle their differences (most notably the fallout of guitarist Graham Coxon with the rest of the band due to his ongoing drinking problems and the fact they seemed to be pulling in different directions) after 10 years and get back together to play a series of gigs across the UK which, as well as the Sunday night headline slot at Worthy farm, included two sold-out nights at London’s Hyde Park.

Now Blur actually continued for one more album after Coxon left the band; 2003’s Think Tank was largely recorded with the three remaining members, recruiting ex-Verve guitarist Simon Tong to stand in on live guitar duties, but eventually went on indefinite hiatus after touring the album globally. Talk around the time of the reunion seemed to suggest that after the passing of time and much soul searching, the

band members just missed playing together. There had been long-term rumours and speculation for years suggesting a re-union but it was the freak meeting between Damon Albarn and Graham Coxon that eventually lead to the comeback, and recent documentary No Distance Left to Run shows a very heartfelt side to the whole comeback scenario — these guys seemed to just miss playing with each other.

The now infamous shot of Daman crouching in tears during The Universal at the end of their Glastonbury set will be a lasting image of the band. I think it was clear for all to see that this wasn’t a choice dictated by money; it’s not as if any of the band are really in need of it, particularly the warring parties of Damon and Graham who both have solo careers that will look after them financially.

This same motivation can be put forward for a band like Dinosaur Jr who also re-united a few years back.

Another notorious falling-out lead to the original band breaking apart, with chief songwriter and defacto leader J Mascis’ dictatorial approach eventually leading to bass player Lou Barlow being kicked out of the band (and freeing him up to concentrate on Sebadoh). Again, Dinosaur Jr carried on without him and eventually without original drummer Murph, essentially becoming a vehicle for Mascis to release music.

After more than 15 years of animosity, often thrown at each other through lyrics, the three original members put all history to one side and became friends again before they decided to re-unite as a band and, to be fair to them, they have gone on to release two strong albums of brand new material since and continue to tour with these new songs.

It must also be pointed out that its not just the indie world that has seen the notion of the comeback come into prominence. It would be unfair to write an article

on comebacks without mentioning that of established pop acts like Take That, who have clearly made a huge impact on their return, selling out stadiums and millions of records in the process. Their rise seems to have been driven with the energy, drive and force of a political juggernaut and has seen a number of other pop stars from the past jump onto this bandwagon (Boyzone, East 17, Spandau Balet...).

We’ve also seen in recent years rock music’s hierarchical elite reform for one-off gigs or tours; Led Zeppelin, Cream, and The Police spring to mind and, of course, their respective performances were lapped up by a wide spectrum of fans.

That brings things to us: the listener, the fan, the record buyer and the gig go-er. These reunions can’t really work without us, especially as so many of them seem to be just based on bands playing gigs, very few comebacks have so far provided us with new material, so what are our motivations for parting with our money to go and see these bands? A chance to finally get to see that band that you missed out on first time round? Perhaps you were too young back then? Or maybe you did see them back then and it’s a great chance to quench the nostalgic pining for the songs of your beloved youth? Either way it’s something that has proven mightily successful in recent years and it leads one to wonder who (as apposed to when) will be the next band to remember the past, remember how it defined them as a person and remember the great songs full of youthful exuberance and naivety that they used to play with their best mates.

With all this in mind, I leave you with a quote from the last paragraph of F Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby: ‘So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past’.

Words: Kevin Burgess

With its 70s-inspired soul and disco ‘grooves’, Music Go Music’s debut, Expressions, has been released to a raft of rave reviews. CDX’s Jack Richardson caught up with Meredith Metcalf (AKA Gala Bell) to talk about imaginary TV shows, mainstream soundtracking and, of course, ABBA.

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Where did the band name come from?

Somebody asked me that earlier and I hadn’t thought about it until then but it’s a little bit like when you put something into a Google translator from a different language. It’s not specifically that though. That’s not necessarily what we thought of but I think that’s the impression and that’s what I like about it, it feels really direct but through a translation.

When did you guys first meet and form the band?

As soon as we met, we recorded Light of Love and that was in 2006, then we were recording our music and songs over the next couple of years, just here and there at our houses. But we didn’t have time to really be a band, we were just making songs and putting them out on MySpace and giving them to our friends. It was more a kind of exercise for us; we weren’t really planning on anything else.

if people do that and get creative, it’ll resonate with people because your eyes start to glaze over with things that you’ve seen over and over again. It’s so hard to get people to actually listen to what you’re making, especially if you don’t have the support of a label or a bunch of money, so it’s important to be creative.

The first time that Culturedeluxe became aware of your band was when Light of Love was used in an episode of the American show ‘The Middleman’. How do you feel about your music being used in a TV show?

Well I think that’s the only time any of our songs have ever been played on anything like that so that’s amazing that you heard that! [laughs] I can’t believe that, I didn’t even see it when it aired! We didn’t really notice much difference in interest after the show was on, but I think it’s sad really that it’s one of the only ways that bands can make any money with music. Unless you’re totally huge and selling out stadiums, it’s pretty impossible to make a living doing music. It’s just a matter of making sure that if your music is used in advertising or TV shows, that it’s something you don’t object to or something that you support.

On your MySpace and your website you have videos of you playing on ‘Face Time TV’, was the show inspired by home-made TV like ‘Wayne’s World’?

It’s not inspired by that, but yeah, it’s the same concept where we can make something and put it on public access. I think public access doesn’t really exist anymore on TV and the internet is the new public access. You can just make something in your living room and you can put it online for anyone to watch.

It’s quite a unique approach to public access to your music, do you think with such a lot of ne w music and new artists at the moment, that it’s necessary for bands to think up ne w and different ways of getting noticed and heard?

When we did it, although it did turn out to be a good thing, it wasn’t a calculated way to promote our music. People usually do music videos and stuff but we thought it’s a lot more interesting watching the band actually play, rather than acting along to a pre-recorded track. Also, it’s just so expensive to go on tour [laughs] and I like the idea of being able to make a video of yourself playing because even though you’re not at a show, you still feel like you’re getting the live experience and getting an idea of who the band are. I think it’s important for bands to represent themselves in a way that they feel is the truest to the concept of their project. And I think

Speaking of bands filling out stadiums, your music has been compared to big stadium acts like Blondie, Electric Light Orchestra and ABBA. How do you feel about being compared to such huge acts?

I personally think those are good bands, so I’m flattered. It doesn’t make me think that we’re going to be selling out stadiums or anything like that [laughs], I would be shocked if anything like that were to happen. So yeah, I’m flattered but I don’t really feel any different than if someone had said we sound like a band that can only sell out a 25-person venue, if I liked them and thought they were doing good work.

So which of those bands would you most like to play a sold-out stadium gig with?

Oh, I guess whoever had the nicer fans and whoever the nicer band was! And I guess whoever puts on the best show. I don’t really have a preference, I’ve never really thought about it because I can’t imagine that happening!

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Monster Bobby is a vital member of The Pippettes’ all-male backing group. In keeping with the Comeback theme of our June issue he talks here to Culturedeluxe exclusively about his favourite historical comeback – that of Richard Wagner.

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n 1848, Richard Wagner was homeless, penniless, and on the run. A political refugee, exiled from Germany for his part in the failed Dresden uprising, he sought and eventually found asylum in Switzerland — thanks to the support and charity of Franz Liszt. His early operas, Rienzi, The Flying Dutchman and Tannhauser, had achieved a certain critical acclaim before the revolution, but now Wagner was shunned by the majority of the German establishment, considered persona non grata. It would be eleven years before he finished another opera, and a further six before it would be performed.

During this time Wagner gradually rebuilt his reputation, partly through the tireless patronage of Liszt, who personally conducted several of Wagner’s works in his new role as court conductor at Weimar, and partly through Wagner’s own peculiar talent for self-promotion. It was in this period that Wagner wrote his great theoretical texts Art and Revolution and The Artwork of the Future, in which he set out his theories of a union of all the arts in a grand gesamtkunstwerk, combining universal mythological subjects and the latest symphonic technique. Regrettably, it was also during this

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period that Wagner, rapt in bitterness, began to espouse the hideous anti-semitism that would stain his reputation for ever after. ‘Behind every fascism,’ to quote Walter Benjamin, ‘lies a failed revolution.’

In Wagner’s letters to Liszt from this time, he talks at length of his feelings of worthlessness and desperation, the enormous difficulties he finds in working under such precarious circumstances, and his thoughts, repeatedly, of suicide. He often mentions ‘the future’ during this period, but in general, it is with dread, and the ‘future’ he speaks of is of his own pecuniary position. Repeatedly he petitions Liszt to find him patronage from some consortium of princes, despite Liszt’s constant assurance that anything of the sort would be simply impossible.

For Wagner was caught in a difficult time for musicians, between two modes of subsistence: the old system of noble patronage which had sustained the composers of the classical era was dying out due to revolutions Wagner himself had been a part of, and yet the systems of copyright and royalties which would sustain composers for most of the twentieth century remained, as yet, underdeveloped.

Despite the acclaim garnered by Liszt’s successful performances in Weimar and the notoriety attracted

by Wagner’s published writings, his fortunes remained desperate, and his latest work, Tristan and Isolde, remained unperformed. Until, finally, “mad” King Ludwig II of Bavaria stepped in with the full weight of the Bavarian treasury.

The works that Ludwig would see premiered, in which Wagner finally put into practice the theories he had espoused in print, would change the world.

Beyond the confines of the Bayreuth Festspielhaus, built by Ludwig’s money to Wagner’s specifications, the most perfect expression of Wagner’s notion of a gesamtkunstwerk would come thirty years after the premiere of Tristan, when the Lumiere brothers held their first public screenings, or perhaps, more properly, another thirty-two years after that, with the release of The Jazz Singer, the first talking picture. Beyond the cinema, the influence of Wagner’s music is evident throughout contemporary popular music, in its relentless pulse, its privileging of the sonorous over the harmonic, and its sheer exultation in noise and passion and violence.

WORDS: Monster Bobby, The Pipettes

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You started out when you were still at school.

Did your age ever become a negative factor in any way?

Yes and No. I mean there were always things like touring with bands that didn’t like the fact you were younger and people give you “advice” on your song writing skills and all those types things but I guess it wasn’t something we thought about internally.

All of the “age” thing came from outside sources and it was a main focal point in us as a band – I think to some extend that did help as well but it wasn’t something we ourselves thought about.

To us we were just people making music.

Your sound has matured a lot since your debut with more synths and guitars added. Was that a conscious decision, just natural progression or a bit of both?

I think to be honest a natural progression.

I think

How did you get from that early Battle of the Bands to here?

A lot of work. I think some people are generally unaware of what kind of commitment it takes to be in a band. You have to put in the work to see results. For us it was a matter of just playing shows, we weren’t allowed to for such a long time but because we pushed within our local scene we started being able to play shows – we did a lot of street promo, online promo too and basically work from a DIY ethic. We’re not ones to sit and wait for things to happen because that just not an option.

Operator Please are one of the most p Australia. After hitting the big time w earned them an ARIA award, they’re Gloves. Displaying a more mature sou their blossoming reputation. Adam Gi to talk about the new album, battle of

You’ve already won an ARIA award, that’s a bit better than the box of doughnuts at stake at your first Battle of the Bands...?!

Yes...it is ha. Another unexpected surprise, was nerve wracking but good.

I read that you didn’t like ‘A Song About Ping Pong’ as much as some of the other tracks on that early EP. But will it now always have a special place in your heart because of the award?

Yes and No. It wasn’t that we didn’t like it as much, it was that we didn’t think of it as anything and it just so happened to be the song that everybody had heard first. I think I like playing it only for the crowd reaction because it’s the song that people predominantly know or know of but then again that is another disadvantage – if you think it’s nowhere near your best track. I mean I don’t regret writing it because that kind of energy and direct thing was what we were at that particular point in time and I believe music is like a documentation.

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somewhere at the back of your mind when you are beginning to make new music you have an idea of what you want but it changes and manifests throughout the writing process. I never used to write using programming and it’s something we learnt how to do. The instrumentation to the band hasn’t changed I think the way it’s used has. We’ve always had synths but instead of being the holding melody it was more like the “glue” between all the other separate parts and a lot of my guitar work on our previous album is single note stabs and now it’s

chords ha ha. So my guitar is kind of acting as the glue now.

Are you worried that the change in sound might alienate some of your fans?

I was in the beginning but I think it’s important to keep them in the loop with the process of recording.

I think it really helps them transition into the new record. Talking about and sharing your experiences with them so they have a small understanding of the process of making a record. Ultimately, you have to do what you want to do and make something that you believe in and want to share with people. You need to be ambitious with things, the last thing you want to do is make the 2nd part to your 1st album – that to me would be a back peddle.

What have been the highlights of your career so far?

Being in a position where you are able to continue to make music & having the opportunity to play outside of your country and at some amazing events because that’s where it’s taken you.

promising up and coming bands in with Just a Song About Ping Pong, which e back with their sophomore album und this could be the album that cements ibby caught up with lead singer Amandah f the bands, and what the future brings.

Where did the name for the new album come from?

It’s like a “little bit extra” – not completely changing something but rather and added dimension – if that makes sense to you? I don’t want to go into depth about it, let’s face it I’ll only sound like a cock.

Where do you go from here?

Hopefully upward and onward...

GAYYYYYYY ha ha ha ha ha.

Words: Adam Gibby

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B

ands have been using the new wave of social media to enhance their status for years now; its most famous child perhaps being Arctic Monkeys, who raced to the fastest sales for a British debut album back in 2006. Now, however, social media has a new Queen. Noush Skaugen is probably the most famous female solo artist that you’ve never heard of and, remarkably, despite her unsigned status she’s racked up a staggering 1.2million followers on Twitter (which is especially impressive when you consider that people like Stephen Fry have 1.3million).

Born in Sweden to a Swedish mother and Persian Father, music played a large part in her early life.

“My mum was tone deaf pretty much but, as with many Swedes, she loved to sing Swedish party songs at dinner parties. So from her I guess I got the passion and fun music can give. I actually got the musical gene from my dad’s side where all the family could play two or three instruments by ear, whether it be violin, piano, accordion, balalaika or sitar. At family get togethers we would all play after dinner and have a jam. I was thrown in at about 7 years old with my flute. I quickly learnt to listen and improvise.”

Noush has split her time between Sweden, France, the US and London, completing a law degree at Warwick University in the process. After gaining some musical success she decided not to follow a career in law and, having gathered more support through podcasting and MySpace, Noush released her debut EP ‘Palomino’ in 2007. MySpace was an integral part of getting her noticed and, in turn, getting the EP released so how did her love of social networking start? “It was inevitable really, as the barriers have been taken down with the internet and social networking sites are popping up everywhere.

It was the perfect opportunity for bands to communicate directly with people. I just embraced the change and went with it learning as I went along and I’m still learning; the fans teach me alot about what they want in this era from musicians. It is massively important to connect with them virtually but even more so in reality and concerts, that’s what it’s all about...” Noush takes this social networking with her fans very seriously and insists on doing all of her tweets and any other interaction herself with no input marketing teams or helpers. “I do all my tweeting and social networking, always have. It defeats the purpose of the whole reasoning behind

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Twitter to have a label or marketing intern doing it for an artist. People are alot more savvy now and smell the company doing it. They want the real connection and so do I. I am DIY and manage myself, but I’ve also been fortunate to have friends help me who believe in what I do.”

This EP, along with the increase in popularity linked to her increase in social networking led to prestigious prizes in the form of ‘Alternative Pop Artist of the Year’ at the 17th Annual LA Music Awards, and ‘National Independent Rock EP of the Year’ at The Hollywood Music Awards. She then followed this up with her first full length album, ‘Lost and Found’ in 2008. Her faith in Twitter was ultimately rewarded earlier this year as, after becoming the most popular unsigned artist on Twitter, she became the first unsigned artist to be invited to perform a live-streamed showcase from Twitter’s San Francisco HQ. “It was a surreal experience to finally meet the Twitter staff and the faces behind the twitter names...they have been amazing to me and it was an absolute pleasure to perform for them. I was asked to sign the Twitter Wall afterwards, and the other week BT had performed and signed the wall... that was mad!”

Despite the freedom that comes from being unsigned, Noush maintains that there are pros and cons to managing herself. “You never stop working; blackberry and laptop is on intravenous because if I don’t handle it I don’t have a manager or agent who will deal with it.

I am human and managing my time between those managerial functions and my music is tough. But on the flip side I am 100% aware of everything that is being

said and going on; the freedom is definitely liberating. It is bizarre being in meetings where I know folks are a bit uneasy talking to the artist themselves when they are used to talking to managers, add on top of that being a female in a very male dominated industry, I see they’re not quite sure how to talk to me. It’s good to be out of your comfort zone sometimes. I like to do things differently, constantly push myself and grow. When someone tells me I can’t do something, it makes me want to do it more and find a way.” She goes on to say that she feels that there is still a stigma that surrounds female rockers. “Perhaps there always will be but that is a challenge to us females. Ground has been broken by those who have gone before me, but the trick is to keep pushing the boundary.”

Pushing the boundaries tends to be harder to do these days where seemingly every avenue has been explored both musically and thematically so what kind of things does she tend to write about? “Things that motivate me at the time, stir an emotion inside me – normally originating from my life experience. I have written a collection of unreleased material about the system and how we are lured into a false

sense of comfort and security, when we need to be out there daring to live. You can hear an unplugged track from that collection ‘Run Baby Run’ on the Soho Sessions EP (free download from Noush’s site right now). Recently stemming from that I have also written some fun songs about being able to do what we want to do without the hang ups that society tends to like to label. I guess the common theme is breaking free to be yourself, express yourself and live life.”

With the success of artists like Justin Bieber who have taken the global market by storm on a shoestring budget thanks to nothing more than Youtube and a savvy marketing team, it is likely that social networking will take over as the future of the music industry. “I think it is the current future and we will probably see more and more of it developing into different more savvy ways of networking. As a musician you still need certain experienced people handling specific areas on your team but it may be a different sort of paradigm to what has gone before.” So, if the future is harder to read than we might think, is it likely that we will see Noush snapped up by a label any time soon?

The answer is a cryptic “who knows. Check back with me later.”

What we can be sure of is that 2010 will continue to be a busy year for Noush. “I’m releasing my Soho Sessions EP, which if you go to my official site www.noushskaugen. com you can see the trailer, download for free a track from the EP and the album artwork wallpaper. I will also be touring this summer in the UK, releasing more material, and I’m working on a cool clothing line with my best mate.”

Words: Adam Gibby

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Chris Holland is the keyboardist in Operator Please, the current darlings of Australia. Here he talks about his onscreen hero – Marlon Brando.

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s far as ‘comebacks’ in pop culture go, being a film buff I find it hard to go past Marlon Brando’s return to the spotlight in the classic 1972 film The Godfather.

Marlon Brando begun acting on Broadway in the mid 40s but it was his rise to success on the silver screen that earned him the reputation of being one of the greatest actors of all time. Brando enjoyed the initial summit of his career in the 1950s where he starred in moves such as A Street Car Named Desire and On The Waterfront among many others. He was seen as a sex symbol of his time which left many young girls swooning over him and many men wanting to be him!

As soon as the decade of the 1960s came to be, Brando made his way through a string of commercial failures which included his one and only directorial stint in One-Eyed Jacks. By this time, Brando was seen as a washed up actor and had developed the reputation of being difficult to work with.

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When all seemed lost, director Francis Ford Coppola insisted on using Brando in his 1972 film The Godfather. At the age of 47 and seemingly past his prime, Brando delivered an outstanding performance earning him an Oscar for Best Actor (which he declined) in what is seen by many as one of the greatest American films of all time.

Brando went on to appear in other films such as Superman and Apocolypse Now which was truly a testament to his talent and will to succeed. He passed away in 2004 and to this day is seen as one of the most influential actors of our time.

Culturedeluxe may have closed its figurative doors in October 2009, but here’s to a successful comeback just like Marlon Brando in 2010!

Words: Chris Holland, Operator Please

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n 1970 The Beatles split up. The world mourned and the internal war that raged between the members became public knowledge when Paul McCartney released his solo album, McCartney, with a press release announcing the split and his side of the story.

There was a mixture of horror and excitement, The Beatles were no more but McCartney had a solo album.

Was it the album everyone expected? Was it full of McCartney-style whimsy and wit? No. It was a bit of a disappointment. The stand out songs aside (Maybe I’m Amazed, Junk) it was a bit of a damp squib. An acoustic set of ideas and melodies. It almost sounds unfinished.

Thousands of miles away, at around the same time, a 20 year old pop star in America released his own debut solo album in exactly the same vein. He had written it himself, played every instrument and produced it in his own make-shift studio. The man, and the album, were called Emitt Rhodes and it is often referred to as the album McCartney should have released.

In 1970, Rhodes’ situation was no different to McCartney’s. Rhodes was better known as a member of moderately successful pop band Merry Go Round. The band split up in 1969, but the record company were owed another album. So, to honour the band’s commitment, Rhodes set about recording his own album. When he submitted it however, the record company (A&M Records) shelved it. Unperterbed, Rhodes then retired to his garage with his four-track recorder and set about making a classic album.

ABC/Dunhill Records heard this new solo album and loved it. He intended on calling it Home Cooking; the record company went with his name instead, but included a banner on the front cover advising that it was ‘Recorded at home!’ as, in 1970, this was a rarity.

The album reached number 29 in the Billboard chart.

Billboard were later to refer to the album as ‘One of the best albums of the decade’.

Each track has that same feeling of silky-slick songsmithery that McCartney had become synonymous for.

The gentle and assured craft is undeniably addictive on the ear, with this and subsequent albums.

On the next album, Mirror, Rhodes played all of the instruments once again. He opted for a slightly rockier feel on this album and although good, is now where near as good as the first.

In response to the success of Rhodes’ first two albums, his previous record label (A&M) released the previously shelved album recorded in 1969 entitled The American Dream. It is a placid album, mainly dealing with issues of loss (Someone Died, Till the Day After, The Man He Was) or love (Pardon Me, You’re a Very Lovely Woman, Mary Will You Take My Hand).

His last studio album, Farewell to Paradise, followed in 1973.This album is the most laid back of the four.

Very acoustic and emotionally charged, it really wears its heart on its sleeve and by the end you genuinely feel sorry for the author. It even included a protest song to the Vietnam War (Tame the Lion).

Sadly, after much hassle and meddling from record companies, Rhodes quit the business and he became a producer for Elektra Records and runs a recording studio. A great waste of a great talent, which leads me to ask, how many times have record companies put the brakes on a great career by being ignorant?

Emitt Rhodes turned 60 on the 25th February this year and rumours persist that he may be re-entering the recording studios with a new band and all new material.

Fingers crossed on that one.

In 2009 a documentary was made called The One Man Beatles all about Emitt. It was selected for the International Rome Film Festival 2009, and received standing ovations.

Happy 60th Emitt and thanks again for the music.

Words: John Rain

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lan Pownall has found the media furore surrounding him increasing month by month and is now a favourite on Radio 1. Since he picked up a guitar in 2004 he has found himself playing gigs with numerous rising stars including Florence and the Machine, Jack Penate, Laura Marling and Noah and the Whale. His music is very easy going and simplistic in style, which isn’t a criticism, and allows his voice to dominate the record. Adam Gibby caught up with him to discuss the album and life on the road.

You went on tour with Adele when you only had a few songs, what did that whole experience do for your confidence?

It was bitter/sweet in many ways. Being there was a great experience but i hadn’t been playing for very long so it was very daunting.

Your rise has been pretty meteoric considering you only really picked up a guitar in 2004. How do you handle that?

Six years! Isn’t that quite a long time? I don’t know, I’ve been lucky with a few breaks but I don’t take it for granted. I’ve still got a long way to go and that’s what keeps it fun and exciting.

You’ve said you don’t consider yourself to have any real ‘influences’ as such. Do you think that gives you more freedom to try different styles?

Of course I have influences, I just don’t consider them perhaps like other writers do. I could write a song and months later i’d notice the similarities to one or many artist I was listening to at the time.

But It’s subconscious, I’ve never sat down and tried to write with an idea in mind, I like it to be spontaneous. We are all influenced by our surroundings, I just don’t know where to start when I’m asked this question because I know not what influences me and why.

You’ve been labelled as a folk artist. Do you think that’s down to your links with Noah and the Whale and the fact that you fall in the singer-songwriter bracket?

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Yes, but I don’t really pay attention to all that. I don’t see myself as a folk artist at all, and if other people do, well there’s very little I can do about it.

How’ve you found recording the album? How is it sounding?

Making this album was the first time I went into the studio. Before I’d done everything with a mic, guitar and the most basic recording equipment. I learned so much making this record. I can’t wait to do it again with a second record. I’m very happy with how it’s turned out.

You went on tour with Marina and the Diamonds recently. How did that compare with your earlier touring experiences?

We only did three dates with Marina, and I never met her. The Marina tour doesn’t compare to other tours I’ve done, it was an in out job.

You quit your art course to pursue music. Is that something that you’d like to complete one day?

No, that’s behind me. I have no desire to relive that time. I loved it there, but I left for a good reason.

What’s next for Alan Pownall?

I’m releasing my debut Album in July.

Words: Adam Gibby

With recent accolades including an Ivor Novello-nominated album about cricket and a new Divine Comedy album released to a raft of critical acclaim, Neil Hannon is further cementing his reputation as a pop troubadour. John Rain caught up with Neil to talk about the past, pop sensibilities and cricket.

Hi Neil, how does it feel to have a your Divine Comedy hat back on?

Well strangely enough I actually have different hats for different albums, literally, so I have put away my floppy white cricket hat and donned a slightly too tight bowler, so it feels constricting hat-wise.

Basically though, it’s great to be absolutely myself again.

Congratulations on the Ivor Novello nomination. Did you enjoy “The Duck worth Lewis Method” venture?

The Duckworth Lewis Method was one of the most delightful surprises of my career, both the fact it was successful and the fact I enjoyed working with someone else.

Bang goes the knighthood. What is the story behind this album?

How long have you got? I began writing it between writing the musical and the Duckworth Lewis Method and, when I felt i had enough songs, I popped into a small studio in Dublin with old band chums Tim and Simon. Once we had the basic tracks completed I nipped across St. John’s Wood in London to record the orchestra. Then there was a long break for the cricket nonsense and I came back to it in the autumn of ’09 and did a thousand more vocal takes and finally gave up on it and February of this year.

There seems to be a return to the pop sensibilities of preRegeneration on this one?

Well I don’t return to anything, I just do what feels natural at the time. I think this is just one more exploration but a reasonably tuneful one.

How do you feel about the Regeneration album now? The rumour was you didn’t enjoy revisiting it?

Regeneration is, as the name suggests, an important record in the evolution of my music. It is also to my delight many people’s favourite Divine Comedy album. As I said on my previous question, I can’t make a judgement, as they are a part of who I am.

There seems to be a touch of Scott Walker influence throughout your career, just who are your musical influences?

A touch!! Scott is my guiding light. Other lesserlights include, Cole Porter, Noel Coward, Randy Newman and Jarvis cocker.

What is your favourite album of all time?

Well it changes week to week but my current favourite is Sail Away by randy Newman

You have carved out your own niche, there is no one else making music like yours, is that something you enjoy?

It is not only enjoyable to have a niche, but essential in order to keep making albums.

Hitchhikers, IT Crowd, Father Ted. Any more plans to do music for film or TV? Yes but only if somebody offers me something to do.

What’s next on the agenda?

Well much touring and promotional activity stretching off to the distance. After that im pleased to say I haven’t a clue.

Words: John Rain

Apart from your latest, what is your favourite/least favourite Divine Comedy album? And why?

I refuse to answer that on the grounds I may incriminate myself.

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ith the news that Supertramp are to embark on a 40th Anniversary tour without founding member and principal singer/songwriter (at least in terms of popularity of the songs) Rodger Hodgson, seen by many to be the defining voice of the band, are they just the latest example of a group turning into their own cover band?

Supertramp were a mainstay of the British music scene in the seventies and eighties and were one of those rare British bands who achieved more success in the US than they did in the UK, to such an extent that a many people have mistaken them for an American group. Their songs have permeated in to the social consciousness and it was Roger Hodgson who penned their most successful and lasting songs; songs such as The Logical Song, Give A Little Bit, Dreamer and Breakfast in America. Add to this the agreement between Hodgson and Rick Davies, the other singer/ songwriter in the band that Supertramp would not play any of Hodgson’s songs during their tours then you could be forgiven for asking what then is the point of undergoing a huge, European tour celebrating forty years of the band without him?

Well, one persuasive argument would be that, considering Hodgson parted ways with Supertramp in 1983, he was only actively involved in a third of the group’s career and that the band for the majority of their existence have since been a vehicle for Rick Davies’ music. However, this argument would only really be appropriate if there was a debate as to whether Davies should be playing under the Supertramp name, which would obviously be ridiculous. It should also be noted that, despite being with the band for only thirteen years of their forty, those thirteen years produced seven studio albums including the ‘holy trinity’ of Crime of the

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Century, Even in the Quietest Moments and Breakfast in America, whereas the subsequent twenty-seven years have only produced four studio albums, none of which had any great impact on the charts on either side of the Atlantic.

Hodgson was the heart and soul within the band, earning him the nickname ‘Mr Supertramp’. It is his voice that defines the band and their music and his songs that have become the standard bearers for the group. Taking a band on the road when only half of the hits can be played is surely a futile exercise and, if as expected, Davies and co. take a casual approach to the agreement barring them from playing Hodgson’s songs then we’ll just be left with a show consisting of a string of second-rate covers of their own greatest hits. However, in having two vocalists and retaining the vocals of Davies, Supertramp are not the worst culprits of this; some bands battle on without their sole defining vocalist.

Perhaps the most high profile case would be that of Queen. Undoubtedly one of the biggest bands the world have ever seen with overall album sales of over 300 million, they have struggled to find a new identity since the death of Freddie Mercury in 1991. Queen are unusual in that every one of their members was capable of writing hit songs and even Roger Taylor, the least prolific in the song writing department, contributed with five of the group’s singles, but for the majority of fans Freddie Mercury is Queen and cannot be replaced. It was largely this feeling that led to John Deacon leaving the band after the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert in 1992, though he did return to perform on the band’s final proper single No-One But You (Only The Good Die Young) in 1997.

The decision of Brian May and Roger Taylor to continue to perform under the Queen name is noble in a way as it keeps the music and the memory of Freddie alive in a live environment but, at the same time, you have to question whether 50% of a band and a guest vocalist would really merit the Queen name.

Paul Rodgers by all accounts did a fine job on the Queen tours between 2004 and 2009 but the vocalist is the vital piece of the group. I’d argue that a band like Guns N’ Roses with Axl Rose the only surviving member have more of a right to perform under their name than Queen do without Freddie Mercury as it is the primarily the vocalist that becomes the defining quality of a group. You could listen to the latest Guns N’ Roses songs and it would be instantly apparent that it was Guns N’ Roses. Hearing a Queen without Freddie Mercury would be impossible to recognise as Queen.

Whilst I do not doubt the artistic integrity or morals of Brian May or Roger Taylor, I do think that it is perhaps too easy for them to make money (although I know that they give a lot of this to charities) from the Queen name and that it’s perhaps time for them to lay down their instruments.

Another band in a similar position to that of Queen are Journey, who have enjoyed a resurgence in popularity thanks to the Glee cast’s cover of Don’t Stop Believin’ (or perhaps simply an emergence considering the fact that they were relatively unknown in this country before Glee took the county by storm).

Journey are huge across America and it is down largely to the influence of Steve Perry who, although he was not a founding member, came to define the group both in a creative sense and in the distinctive vocals that he produced. He joined the band in 1977 after the band’s first three albums-worth of jazz

fusion material failed to set the charts alight, and moulded them in to a more straight rock pop band.

Their next album Infinity was their breakthrough and the next six albums recorded with Perry from Evolution to Trial By Fire all entered in to the US Top Twenty, with the final four entering at number one, two, four and three respectively.

However, since Perry officially quit Journey in 1998, the band have struggled to find a permanent replacement. They have enlisted the vocals of some truly talented singers in Steve Augeri and Jon Scott Soto before appearing to have settled more permanently on Arnel Pineda. However, due to Perry’s vocal range and the technique required on some of Journey’s hits, all of these singers, despite their talent, have ended up sounding like Steve Perry impersonators, which is natural but also leaves fans feeling that the group are trying to hang on to their glory days, although I suspect that this is entirely inaccurate. Saying that, I went to see Journey a few years ago and it did come across slightly as one of the best cover bands that you’re ever likely to see.

So when bands struggle on without their original singer do they really become just a cover band for themselves? Is the voice of the band truly what defines them, at least at a cosmetic level? Could the same be said of bands that reunite after such a long absence that the passage of time could be so great that it detracts from their original status and creates almost two versions of the same band? Led Zeppelin famously turned down the offer of a full reunion because they would feel as though they were just performing covers of their old hits.

Words: Adam Gibby

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John Rain takes a look at the career of Luke Haines and talks to the man himself about concept albums, naming and shaming and the future of Black Box Recorder and The Auteurs.

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good songwriter can transport you to another time or place; to a distant memory, theirs or your own.

Some can depress you to within yards of the carbon monoxide hose and the garage door, while others can make you dance down the street (or at least tap your toes inconspicuously while you listen to your iPod).

Luke Haines is something else though. He can conjure silent-movie-era Hollywood, the aftermath of the murder of a child, the Mitford sisters, a loveless marriage or a German militant group of the 1970s. Now that is a real neat trick. I can’t think of any other artist that inspired me to, after hearing their latest album, read up on historical events. Well, except for when I saw the video for Pipes of Peace by Paul McCartney.

Haines is capable of conjuring the sort of imagery that disenchanted intellectuals gravitate towards.

Whereas other artists of the nineties were singing about going out, drugs or being both straight and gay, Haines was directing you towards the kind of wonderland that Lewis Carroll would wish he had written. A land into which the teenage me (and others like me), were all too happy to venture, to bask within its cold unforgiving lights.

Singer/songwriter Luke Haines founded The Autuers in 1990, and later went on to release several solo albums (including Baader Meinhof which was released under the pseudonym Baader Meinhof). In the late nineties he formed Black Box Recorder along with John Moore (formerly of the Jesus and Mary Chain) and Sarah Nixey. Having split up several years before, the Auteurs reunited for a final album, How I Learned to Love the Bootboys in 1999, since which time Haines has pursued a solo career. His most recent album 21st Century Man/Achtung Mutha, was released in 2009. Also in 2009 Haines published a memoir: Bad Vibes: Britpop and My Part in its Downfall.

Listening to a Haines record is like being kidnapped by a masked hostile fiend only to find out they are taking you to the seaside for ice cream and tea. From the first moment you hear Haines’ growl, you are held captive. His has an almost angry vocal style that is loaded with a jagged hatred and knowing cynicism,

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but capable of beautiful melodies. His guitars match; they swipe at you with each strum and consolingly hug you on the down stroke.

I first became aware of Luke Haines in early 1993 when I got hold of the first Auteurs album New Wave.

I found it a very rewarding album and on which each side of the cassette (yes, cassette, ha!) was as good as the other (unlike the first Suede which pipped New Wave to the Mercury award that same year by one vote). Listening to Junk Shop Clothes, a warning that the clothes do not make the man, How Could I Be Wrong?, a lament of a life gone wrong, Starstruck, an autobiography of a tragic child in show business, and the beautiful Valet Parking, the tale of an embittered chauffeur, you live a life of tragedy side-by-side with the songwriter. But such is Haines’ songwriting craft that he is also able to elevate you with uplifting songs like Home Again, a reassuring ballad of a home sweet home (‘Safe there’s no prowler, no creeper in the lane’) and Don’t Trust The Stars, a warning to not put your faith in astrology (‘So how can it be prearranged? When there’s no order anyway? I found myself barefoot on stone; I don’t think it was destiny, it wasn’t in the stars that day’).

The second Auteurs album, Now I’m a Cowboy, came along in 1994 and the single Lenny Valentino met with success and acclaim. The album dealt with issues of class and social status long before Pulp and Blur had found commercial success with songs such as Common People and Parklife. Haines has a distinct and articulate way of telling it how it is, and this is very evident in Now I’m a Cowboy. With songs like Underground Movies (‘I lived in a flat without water running/Thought it was smart, thought it was funny’) and The Upper Classes (‘Some of your friends, from your other life just don’t belong/ they’re crude and they’re plain/It’s not their fault it’s the world they’re from’) he was able to skilfully put you in the shoes of the subjects. Whereas Cocker had you hiding in cupboards and wanking over Sheila down the road, Haines had you living and breathing with his targets and then bearing witness as he shot them down.

During the tour that followed this album, Haines, depressed with the touring life and in a fragile state of

mind (seeing ghosts in his hotel room), jumped from a 15ft wall in San Sebastian, Spain, broke both ankles and caused severe spinal damage. He was to spend months in a wheelchair and there were very real fears that he would never walk again. It was with these dark thoughts in mind that Haines went on to create the third Auteurs album After Murder Park.

Before the album was released, an E.P. entitled Back with the Killer Again was released which included the track Unsolved Child Murder (also released as a single and included on After Murder Park). While the title would lead you to believe it to be a gruesome song, it is actually one of the prettiest songs in The Autuers’ canon, although as dark in subject matter as the title would suggest.

After Murder Park arrived in 1996 and at first was a tough listen. It is full of brooding darkness and the production is very raw and almost live sounding.

It is undoubtedly a journey into a troubled psyche. However it is an album that gives you more every time you listen to it.

During his lengthy convalescence Haines had been busy. In the same year (1996) he also produced a side project concept album about and entitled Baader Meinhof. In retrospect, it’s easy to see what set this album apart from its more commercially successful peers. After all, this was 1996 and most bands were singing about how great it was to drink beer and live in Camden.

Conversely, Haines was telling the story of a 1970s German terrorist group. In 2010 the music of the Camden beer swillers sounds very much of its time but Baader Meinhof is still fresh, edgy and deserving of many a listen.

six albums including 2003’s Das Capital (a collection of previously released Haines material, rerecorded with an orchestra), a soundtrack (Christie Malry’s O wn Double Entry, 2001), three solo albums (The Oliver Twist Manifesto, Off My Rocker at the Art School Bop, and the recent 21st Century Man/Achtung Mutha) and Luke Haines is Dead, a three disc anthology drawn from Haines’ solo work and The Auteurs.

In 2009, Luke Haines’ memoir of the nineties music scene, Bad Vibes: Britpop and my part in its downfall, was published by William Heinemann Ltd. A fascinating read, the book covers the highs and lows of life as an Auteur in a world that just doesn’t seem to get it.

Haines’ absolute disgust at the arrival of the sights, smells and characters of Britpop is a source of dark and bitter humour throughout the book. It is fascinating to see behind the curtain of the music industry at that time.

There are also countless fantastic anecdotes, particularly the story of The Autuers appearing on the pilot of T.F.I. Friday and the aftermath of the 1993 Mercury awards. If you were around and into the indie music scene in the 1990s, this is the book for you. There is no holding back and if you annoyed or wronged Haines during this period, you have been remembered and recounted.

Haines returned in 1998 as part of Black Box Recorder with the accomplished album England Made Me, a collection of dark yet beautiful songs. The songs contained the usual Haines themes but with the added beauty of Sarah Nixey’s vocals. The stand out song would be Child Psychology, a schizophrenic monster that is half mad therapy session and half bitter mantra (‘Life is unfair/Kill yourself or get over it’) Black Box Recorder released two further albums, The Facts of Life and Passionoia.

Additionally, since the millennium, Luke Haines has released

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I recently had the opportunity to pose Haines with a few questions.

For the uninitiated, can you tell us how you would describe yourself?

Free thinking strummer.

What were your favourite bands growing up?

My parents were very conservative and had Perry Como and Mat Monroe records; rock music was very alien to our house. This I think left me very open to a lot of music from an early age. Also, through my teens I lived in Portsmouth, that makes you seek stuff out. I was 13 years old in 1980 – the period that has now become known as post punk, so: The Fall, The Birthday Party, The Pop Group, Swell Maps. My God, Swell Maps, they were the stuff, experimental and entirely “other”. They made Wire sound like The Brotherhood Of Man. Punk was still seeping into the provinces, so that was still exciting. From punk onto Iggy and Lou, then back to T.Rex. I also hung out with older kids who were into Sabbath and Alice Cooper un-ironically. I still don’t see a huge difference between Black Sabbath and Swell Maps; the vision on early Sabs records is just out there.

When did you start becoming interested in music?

Early seventies in front of TOTP.

What is the personal favourite piece of music you have written?

Baader Meinhof and England Made Me (Black Box Recorder) as whole albums are pretty consistent.

What is your

favourite Auteurs album?

New Wave. As a piece of fake rock it holds up well.

All rock after 1958 is fake, and fake is good.

Was touring an unhappy experience?

Well, when I toured a lot I was with the wrong people in the right situation. So, yes it wasn’t great.

But I take responsibility for that.

Do you feel that “fall from the wall” changed your life?

No, not any more. If I hadn’t jumped off a fucking wall I would not have made After Murder Park. Big deal. I still would have made Baader Meinhof, and that one had more bearing on stuff that followed.

Did you feel The Baader Meinhof album was a really brave step at the time? 14 years later it still feels very edgy and modern.

‘Bravery’ is not really an attribute that can be applied to artistic endeavour. Reckless and driven perhaps. It was just a bit of art – for better or worse. British people are terribly embarrassed about art. I was watching that programme about Goldsmiths the other night, and all these artists were running around pretending to be hard, you know, the legacy of old Hirsty, and I’m thinking, why are you all pretending to be hard, is it because you’re embarrassed about being an artist.

Was Baader Meinhof positively received?

Not really. I think it would be woefully received if it were to come out now. The media is far more conservative and careerist than it was 15 years ago.

How did Black Box Recorder come about?

John Moore and I were ‘helping out’ a friend in a band called Balloon. Balloon had already been ’round the block a few times, John had been in the Mary Chain many moons before and I was metaphorically receiving the bill for making After Murder Park and Baader Meinhof. Balloon was a fucked airship in a holding pattern destined for a crash landing outside the walls of the rock and roll city. John and I leapt out and persuaded Sarah Nixey – who had been singing backing vocals – to come and join us. Never ask John Moore or myself for help.

Are there to be more Black Box Recorder or Auteurs albums?

BBR are calling it quits on Election Day. We took a hiatus in 2004, but when a friend of ours – Nick Sanderson — died in 2008 we were involved in a benefit gig for his family. Afterwards we decided that we should make a fourth album, but, we couldn’t quite make it happen, we were all juggling stuff — solo albums, books, writing. So what better thing to do than to ‘officially’ split up. We’d done everything that a band needs to do, three albums, a hit single, TOTP, John and Sarah had even got

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married and divorced again. Conceptually, BBR splitting up is perfect. We will never reform.

After Bad Vibes came out I actually got offered a lot of money to put the Auteurs back together for a few shows. Can you imagine? Did they read the book?

The Auteurs – and I’m sure any ex members who chance upon this will be relieved to hear – will never reform. Iggy, Lou, Johanssan, et al, you have all pissed upon your considerable legacies. Shame.

How did Das Capital come about?

In 2002 Virgin records wanted to get rid of me.

They gave me a sack full of money with which to record an album, they told me I could keep the change. The one condition was that the album had to be a collection of old songs — preferably acoustic.

I decided to use an orchestra and added a few new songs. What can you do. I think it’s a good album, with a couple of exceptions; all the tracks are an improvement on the originals.

Is there to be a further volume of your book?

Yep.

Were you worried about mentioning so many people by name in your book?

No. I deliberately did not apply hindsight; the narrator is my 25 year old self. The reader is in there in the action. I also applied the logic of the secret diary; ie, that all diaries are written with the intention that one day they will be read… If nothing else I’m really glad that the Chris Evans chapter is in there. I want that information to be out there.

Why is the Cellist not named in the book?

He is the Cellist. That’s it.

Was the book hard to write?

It wrote its self, really.

Who is the best/worst person in music you have met?

Most people in music are harmless. In the main rock and roll is not the brains trust. There are of course many low-level pests and irritants, but they can be swotted or sprayed. Here’s the thing: you give someone a major record deal in their twenties, plus huge amounts of money, unlimited access to drugs and alcohol, and surround them with sycophants –- of course they’re gonna be an asshole. It would be almost foolish not to be an asshole, a waste of resources. All pop stars bar none are assholes. It’s their job. Pop stars I salute you.

On the latest album, you mention bringing back the Teddy boys with their Stanley knives.

What is your take on modern Britain?

As long as you don’t turn on the TV, don’t listen to the radio, don’t open a newspaper and don’t turn on a computer then ‘modern’ Britain is just fine.

Restoring the three tier class system where everyone

knew their place obviously wouldn’t go amiss, but joking aside, we live in a super accelerated culture and media that scatterguns duff info about like bullets at a high school massacre. I tend to think that most information disseminated through the media is untrue, not in a paranoid Thom Yorke ‘the government are out to kill us ’ kind of way, just in the constant trickle of inaccurate news and pointless opinion. The current recession wasn’t caused entirely by banks — it was caused by people wasting time at work, looking at the internet, writing inane comments about stuff they actually don’t care about.

Is the spoken word feature on the latest album (The Great Brain Robbery 1&2) something you have wanted to do for a while?

Not really, it’s just something I had lying around.

That said, I think any future recordings I do will be looser, more in the spirit of Achtung Mother. I’m thinking chanting and long wah wah guitar solos.

What inspired it?

Well it was inspired by a real incident – which is documented in the trepanation chapter in Bad Vibes.

What is your favourite album of all time?

Today, Swell Maps’ Jane from Occupied Europe, and Deep Purple - In Rock. I’m going through a big Deep Purple Mk2 phase. But I hate all that fucking listing of greatest films/greatest albums; Nick Hornby really has let the male species down. I’m a fucking man; I don’t go around making lists. A list is something you take to the supermarket.

Are there any modern bands you enjoy today?

None. I’m out of the loop and I like it. Also, I haven’t heard a good band name in years. It all starts with the name. If you can’t come up with a good name then I’m out of here.

Lastly, you once said that your epitaph would be “Sorely missed. Your unfaithful slave” What do you think it would be today?

Last words are for fools who haven’t said enough.

Luke Haines’ book Bad Vibes: Britpop and My Part in Its Downfall and his latest album 21st Century Man are in the shops now. Buy them immediately.

Words: John Rain

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Following the release of the single Billy, Get in the Meat Grinder!, Kevin Burgess’ debut album, Butterflies At The Axis, was released at the tail-end of May on independent label SoJam Records. Culturedeluxe caught up with Kevin to talk about concept albums, Neil Young and what lies head.

So Kevin, what’s the story/meaning behind Billy get in the meat grinder and what was your inspiration?

Well, first and foremost, the story of the song is part of a bigger story which extends across the album that ‘Billy’ comes from. As the opening song it tells the story of a young man, coming from a tough, maybe not so great upbringing and realising at a young age that he must escape his shackles and move away from his surroundings. The song is set upon Billy’s arrival in the “big city”, which would definitely be based on London.

Inspiration-wise, lyrically I tried to paint a darker side of London; Orwellian themes, set against a Dickensian backdrop, yet rooted firmly in the

modern day. I wanted it to reflect Billy’s darker side, as later in the story, things get a lot brighter for Billy and the aim with the overall narrative was to reflect this change from darkness to light in Billy’s character as apposed to the other protagonist of the story, who follows a different path. Musically, I wanted it to sound quite brash and chaotic and be a bigger opening statement, so there is plenty of louder guitars and feedback and conflicting rhythms amongst the instruments. One more point, the title of the song came from a quote I once heard a very drunken man shout in a nightclub lift and it stuck with me for years.

An Orwellian theme, a Dickensian backdrop but rooted in the modern day, this reads like a description of one of the later Pink Floyd albums, such as The Wall or The Final Cut. Both of these albums were a type of rock-opera, would you say that this is what you’ve set out to create with ‘Billy’ and the album?

Yes, the album has 10 songs that lyrically are thematically linked and tell the story of two young people, coming from different backgrounds, both moving to a new place and a new start in the big city, becoming great friends and eventually being inspired by the city and each other, and lead down completely different paths.

Billy was one of about four songs that were written at different times but all seemed to lend themselves to a stoy and had similar themes. They were the inspiration behind the rest of the album. I worked on the story using those songs as a basis and I then wrote the rest of the songs to fit the story.

Are there any similarities between you and the Billy character, or the other protagonist? Or are either of the characters based quite closely on you?

Not specifically. It’s more of a character-based story, though, I suppose, as with all writers there will be some elements of themselves somewhere in a character, maybe more in a philosophical sense personally.

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I would say there is probably more inspiration from my surroundings than inwardly in this case. The Billy character is somewhat of an outsider with a good heart and a good sense of who he is and quite comfortable as a person because of that (I would say there are elements of myself in that respect, but it’s not based on me).

The second character (a young girl named Millie) is loosely based on a real person, someone who I have never actually met, but was inspired by a story I heard about this person. Her character is someone who is not so comfortable within herself and a person who is easily led, but to the outisde world she masks it with a bubbly personality and a somewhat over zelous, but at the same time, quite faux happy attitude to life.

An interesting insight, thank you. Who are your musical heroes and influences, and of those, which would you most like to meet?

Tough question, I am a big music fan and would say I draw influences from many people across many types of music. I would say there is definitely a side to what I do that is influence by the lo-fi americana side of bands like Pavement, Sonic Youth, Sebedoh, Dinosaur Jr and yet, on the other, I have an appreciation of the art of the pop song so love bands like The Beatles, The Kinks, SFA, Eels...

I am a big fan of soul music and take great inspiration from the work of Motown (and its wonderful house band the Funk Brothers), Stevie Wonder, Prince, Funkadelic...

I think lyrics can be very important and often overlooked and I try to put a lot of effort and thoughts into my lyrics and take great inspiration from the likes of Ray Davies, Tom Waits, Nick Cave, Dylan and Mark Everrett.

But I suppose my one true musical inspiration, and an inspirational person in life in general would be Neil Young. His music is obviously great but he transends that alone, his attitude to his art and his way of life are something to be held up. He didn’t care about anything except the next song and what it would sounds like, whether it was ragged, raw and dirty or sweet and tender, he let the songs and the muse lead the way and has always carried himself with great integrity and unequalled grace. So if there was one person I would really love to sit down and chat with, it would be Neil Young. Anyone who has the balls to tour an extremely popular album like Harvest, with sets of brand new songs, and actually challenge his audience to move and change with him, is someone that is going to have a lot of interesting points to be made

So, if you could meet Neil Young and could ask him three questions (about anything) what would you ask?

Hmm, thats a tough one too, as I would rather just have a chat with him. But if I had to ask three then: 1) Out of all the work he has done throughout the years, in various incarnations, what is the one album that he is most proud of?

2) If he has too choose one line from any of his songs to be

his epitaph, what would it be?

3) Will he ever re-issue Time Fades Away in a modern format!?

So there’s you, Kevin Burgess the artist, singer/ songwriter, what can you tell me about your band, the guys that accompany you on stage when you play live? How much input did they have with Billy... and your other material In terms of writing and recording the band had no input into Billy. I write and record all songs myself. I play all the instruments on the album (barring a couple of guest appearances). I actually recorded the album before I got the band together, a couple of the songs date back to my previous band the DD Coys. The song An Audaciously Fleeting Affair is actually one of the last recordings I did with The DD Coys so that song features them.

Once I had recorded the album I then went about getting a band together to help me play it all live. My band consists of Nick Donohoe, who plays the drums and was previously in the DD Coys with me (he also plays the drums on one other song on the album), Roderick Kitson who was previously in a band called The China Dogs on guitar and Jim Collett on bass.

I’m very lucky. They are all competent musicians, and not just in a journey man session type way. I like to have a slightly ragged sound when I’m playing live and I play a bit loose and they all complement that ethic really well.

They are all good songwriters in there own right, so they have a good instinct and I can trust them to do their own thing if they feel the moment is right. Of course there are some elements I like to be as recorded, but in general I think the songs do and can sound different live. A lot of the songs kind of have a basic structure which we work around; we have a lot of free form and spontaneity we work around and its comforting to know you can trust your band mates to go with it when it needs to and snap back into the structure when its called for.

What are your aspirations for the year ahead?

Well I’ve got these singles coming out so with a bit of luck they can get some interest and we can push things on a little further. Ideally I want to keep on doing what i’m doing, i’ve spent the last 18 months constantly writing and recording. I have another album fully recorded and ready to go, I’m just working on artwork ideas and things like that, so would be nice to get that out there in the next couple of months and get a few more gigs under the belt in the coming months too, and then hopefully get into the studio by late summer to start work on some new stuff.

And finally, desert island question. If you were going to be stranded on a desert island, what three items would you choose, if you could, to have with you?

Hmmm... a guitar with unbreakable strings, a solar powered iPod and, um, something to read. Hmm... the complete works of F.Scott Fitzgerald.

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Before the release of Champ this July, Tokyo Police Club’s follow up to 2008’s Elephant Shell, Culturedeluxe’s Chantelle Pattemore caught up with keyboardist Graham Wright to talk about festivals, recording a new album and the women of Wisteria Lane.

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Starting from the very beginning... how did you form and how did you decide on your name?

We were friends in high school, and played in other bands together, and eventually it coalesced into the form we all know and love today. The band name just came out of the song Cheer It On when we were stuck for a name. Seemed like a good idea at the time.

Within two years of forming and before releasing your first record you were playing some of the biggest festivals in the world — Glastonbury, Coachella, Reading/Leeds. Was this massively intimidating for you or did you simply treat them all as fun learning experiences?

Fun learning experiences, definitely. When you play as many shows as we have, its hard to get intimidated by any of them. At the end of the day, you’re doing the same thing you do every night, except in front of way more people. It’s a really exciting opportunity to play any festival, especially the big, legendary UK ones. It’s been too long and I want to do it again!

It’s been just over two years since you released your debut LP. What have you all been up to in this period?

Touring and making a new record! It takes a lot of time to write songs and then record them, so we got the record out pretty much as quickly as possible. We tried to take a little vacation but we ended up just writing songs instead.

How has the band developed between this record and the last?

We had a busy two years so I’m sure we did develop, but its impossible for me to say how...

Your producer on ‘Champ’, Rob Schnapf, has worked with artists from Beck and The Vines to Powderfinger. What effect did he have on your work in the studio?

Rob had a huge effect on the way the record turned out. We went into the studio with songs that had been bouncing around in our heads for nearly a year, and he was instrumental in helping us get them out of our heads and into a place where they made sense. He’s dealt with pretty much every situation that could possibly arise in the studio, so he was always calm, which is huge in a studio setting.

Who are your biggest musical influences right now and how are they affecting your sound?

You know, when we started writing songs, we were really aware of our influences. We’d actively sit down and reverse engineer songs we liked to work on new stuff. These days it isn’t so obvious to us. I’m sure we

still have all kinds of serious influences that people on the internet will be only too happy to point out to us, but I really couldn’t say what they are.

What has been the biggest challenge the band has faced so far?

There are constantly challenges in a job like ours.

Putting four creative and opinionated people in a room together and trying to come to a consensus is impossible at the best of times, and of course everyone has their off days. Throughout the making of this record, just like our last record, there were days when it seemed like everything was going to fall apart. But then of course the next day we’d nail it and be on top of he world. That’s just the way it goes, I guess.

You’ve toured extensively pretty much all over the world. Where’s your favourite place you’ve played and why?

That’s the hardest question to answer. There are so many places that I love for such different reasons, it’s impossible and pointless to pick one. I love the rich history and cultural identity of the UK and Europe, but then I love the vibe in middle America, and the sunshine in LA, and the metropolitan insanity in New York, and so on and so forth. I try to appreciate everywhere I go equally.

You were written into an episode of Desperate Housewives. Did you accept this role in a bid to increase your profile or are you simply all big fans of the Wisteria Lane ladies?

Somehow I doubt that the prime audience of Desperate Housewives would be super into our band, though if we did win any fans I’m not complaining! But the reason for doing the show was the same reason we do most things: it’s fun to do stuff. I like to say yes and I like to have new experiences, and spending two days on set at Desperate Housewives is not something I’m likely to get the chance to do ever again.

You’re playing quite a few festivals this summer.

Who would be included in your dream festival line up?

Radiohead, The Hold Steady, The National, Leonard Cohen, Flaming Lips, The Strokes. I guess just every band I like (which is an extremely long list).

Finally, three songs you wish you’d written...

Elvis Perkins – 123 Goodbye Leonard Cohen – Sisters of Mercy The Hold Steady – Citrus

Words: Chantelle Pattemore

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P

owderfinger are one of the most successful Australian bands of the last couple of decades, selling millions of albums in their home country and picking up sixteen Australian Record Industry Association (ARIA) awards along the way. They had the eleventh best-selling album of the last decade in Australia, which was also the fourth best-selling by an Australian band but, despite this fact, there’s a very good chance that you have never heard of them or listened to their music. Now, unless you had tickets for their UK tour which took place in the first week of June this year, you’ll never get to see them live.

The band have revealed that their latest album, ‘Golden Rule’ will be their last. I caught up Jon ‘Cogsy’ Coghill, Powderfinger’s drummer since 1991, to discuss the split and the plans for their last ever Australian tour, the ‘Sunsets’ tour, which will also be their biggest to date.

Cracks in the fabric of the band have been appearing for the last few years (the band took a two year hiatus between 2005-2007 and were never truly satisfied with their comeback album, ‘Dream Days at the Hotel Existence’) and they toyed with the idea of carrying out their ‘Sunsets’ tour before announcing the break up.

Deciding that it would be unfair on the fans not to let them know that they

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were attending the last few gigs Powderfinger officially announced their break up on April 9th 2010. After keeping it to themselves for so long I asked Jon how it felt now that the split was all out in the open. ‘Good mate, good’ came the reply. ‘I mean it’s been twenty years so I’m pretty keen to move on and do something else. I don’t know; it’s going to be different I suppose but I’m looking forward to it really’.

‘Different’ is perhaps an understatement as, for Jon and the rest of the band, Powderfinger are all they have known since they were in their late teens, you’d think the band would be scared of the unknown that awaits them. ‘I’d like to say it is, but I’ve sort of been preparing for it for a while because you just know when things are changing. I’ve been studying at Uni for the last two years; I’ve been part time so I’m loving that. So I’m not scared at all, I’m actually really looking forward to it. I’m yet to know what it’s like not playing drums very often but we’ll see what happens.’

It seems that Jon is a man firmly in control of his future and relishing the opportunities that will be presented in a life without music, especially with regards to his education, though he jokes that he could start ‘a covers band down the local pub or something!’

That would be a world away from life in a band who, with the release of ‘Golden Rule’, their seventh album and a return to form after what many considered to be the slightly disappointing ‘Dream Days at the Hotel Existence’, have confirmed themselves as a mainstay of the Australian rock scene. After recording three albums with producer Nick DiDia (1998’s ‘Internationalist’, 2000’s ‘Odyssey Number Five’ and 2003’s ‘Vulture Street’) they switched to Rob Schnapf for 2007’s ‘Dream Days…’, a change that produced a notable change in style and one that wasn’t totally welcomed when it came to the writing of the songs. The songs on ‘Dream Days…’ were written ‘in the studio, whereas on [Golden Rule] we decided we were going to go into the band room, the practice room and write the songs there. We made sure all the songs worked as a live band before we recorded them, whereas the last album we had to learn the songs after we’d recorded them.’ For a band that prides themselves on their live performances the change in writing style must have had quite an effect on the touring. ‘It’s quite weird. I mean it’s a subtle difference but sometimes you can feel it when you’re trying to put something together, especially if you tour afterwards. These ones came together really easily because they’d already been written like that.’

Recording ‘Dream Days at the Hotel Existence’ placed a strain on the band, taking them out of their comfort zone in terms of song writing and ensuring

that they didn’t enjoy much of the creative process, resulting in an album that none of them found truly satisfying. Keen to avoid a repeat of this they teamed up once more with Nick DiDia for ‘Golden Rule’, a decision that Jon enthuses over. ‘He’s just a really nice guy. He’s sort of like another member of the band and he’s just one of those guys who’s really funny, he’s got a really good sense of humour. You sit there half the time just cracking up. Everyone’s just being idiots because he inspires you to be like that you know? I don’t know if it helps the music that much but when you need to be serious he’s serious, but most of the time you just have a great time.’ Working with someone who they obviously all get on with really well must also help a lot with the spirit of the band. ‘Yeah it does, definitely, because we tend to get really serious about stuff and trying to get our music right and he livens it up a lot, gets us to enjoy ourselves.’

Enjoying themselves took on a whole new meaning when it came to writing and promoting ‘Golden Rule’ with the band performing a series of publicity stunts, which fans of UK bands could only dream of experiencing. During the writing of the album the band took to the streets of Byron Bay, a couple of hours south of their home town of Brisbane, and did some busking to test out the new material. ‘That was good fun actually. Different. We only did the busking because we were starved of any attention from the public. So we were like ‘come on, let’s get out there and get in front of some people and perform again’’ The band then followed this up with a string of low key gigs along the East Coast from Brisbane to Martin’s Place in Sydney and finally ending up in Federation Square in Melbourne, letting their fans know the time and place only hours before via Twitter. It was the busking in Byron Bay that gave them the idea of doing the three gigs in one day. ‘That was really fun

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too, but it was funny too because we didn’t have any PA, we were just playing acoustic and singing without a PA. So you’d get about 1,500 people in front of you who, as soon as we started playing, realised ‘Shit! We can’t hear’, so they just went completely quiet and bunched up as much as possible. So it was quite an interesting thing you know, to see people do that.’ It takes a special kind of band to draw impromptu crowds of 1,500 people and the potential appeal of such gigs is not lost on Jon who asks if any bands had done anything like that in England. When I tell him I couldn’t think of anyone who had done so he replies ‘well someone should do it, it’d be great. We’ll tell Coldplay next time we see them but they’ll probably start a riot.’

Comparisons with Coldplay may seem a bit over the top to people in the UK but, in Australia, Powderfinger are greeted with similar levels of mania, a reaction that hasn’t transferred itself to crowds in the UK or the US. The unbelievable career that they have enjoyed down under hasn’t really translated to success overseas, an issue that Jon puts down to the different way in which music is consumed here. ‘I don’t think we’re very good at writing songs that appeal to the radio instantly, I think people like us because they warm to us sort of.’ This, coupled with the fact that they have not toured as extensively as they perhaps could have, means their music has not filtered through to the masses, a problem that Jon readily acknowledges. ‘I don’t think that we ever toured enough in the UK or the US for people to get to know us and I just don’t think our music… it’s a bit weird, it’s not too Australian because it just doesn’t sound like anything really. You can’t pigeonhole it or anything like that but I think it appealed to Australians because it’s about things that Australian people were going through politically or, I don’t know. I don’t know what it is really, I suppose if we’d worked it out then we would have been more successful in the UK and the US.’ You get the sense that the band are more than happy with what they have achieved in their career and aren’t too concerned by their lack of international success, especially in the US, which is notoriously difficult to crack. ‘I’m a big Oasis fan’ Jon continues ‘but they didn’t really crack the states either. It’s weird isn’t it because you listen to that stuff and you’re like ‘fuck, this is awesome music’. Then you get a load of lowest common denominator bands making it on both sides like Nickelback and stuff like that, which is just fucking disgusting so it’s really weird that that happens.’ Poor Nickelback seem to bear the brunt of a lot of people’s musical resentment and I point this out to him. ‘Haha, yeah, well they’re just a good example. They write stuff that you don’t have to think about and everything’s pretty much in a package that is not challenging to you at all. And you can see why it works though, it’s easy to consume basically. I mean nothing against them, that’s their thing; it’s just funny that that happens.’

Although a partnership with Nickelback was never on the cards, they are no strangers to teaming up with other

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bands or artists, having collaborated with the likes of Missy Higgins and Silverchair (two Australian acts who have managed to surpass Powderfinger’s popularity down under) and most recently with legendary rock artist Storm Thorgerson who designed the cover for ‘Golden Rule’.

Thorgerson is of course most famous for creating Pink Floyd’s ‘Dark Side of the Moon’ cover, though younger music lovers may be aware of his work on Muse’s ‘Black Holes and Revelations’, amongst others. ‘Pretty amazing eh?’ says Jon when questioned about his involvement. ‘Him and his team are just the nicest people. I mean we didn’t meet him, we met his second in command, Peter Curzon his name was, and we got a lot of emails from Storm so...

He is a funny man, he’s the funniest guy. In his emails he’s got that wicked dry sense of humour and he’s always playing on himself in that kind of ‘of course the biggest rock artist in the world would know these types of things’.

That kind of attitude where he’s just really taking the piss so he’s just a great, funny guy. That was the best part about it. I mean the artwork’s great, but just to hear the way these guys talk and how he thinks; that was like a show in itself.’

Whilst interacting with Thorgerson may have been like a show to the band it’s the shows in their upcoming ‘Sunsets’ tour that will be the main focus for everyone else. The bittersweet announcement that their most extensive Australian tour ever would also be their last prompted mixed feelings from their legions of fans, so how are the band coping knowing that they’re heading towards their final run of shows? ‘I haven’t really thought about it too much to tell you the truth’ replies Jon. ‘I’ve been just enjoying more the fact that I’m going to have life at home from now on. I’ll probably think about that stuff when it actually finishes.’ The end of the tour was another aspect that ruffled a few feathers from fans with the Brisbane based band scheduling the last show to take place in Ballarat (about an hour’s drive west of Melbourne and over a thousand miles from their Brisbane homes), so fans are desperate to know if there will be a special one off finale in Brisbane. ‘I think there will be yeah, we’re looking in to that now. I don’t think it will be a very big one though; it’ll just be friends and a few fans.’ The band have since confirmed that a small, relatively low-key gig will act as the bookend to their illustrious career.

A finale in Brisbane will be a fitting end for a band that formed in the city back in 1989 and have maintained close links ever since. The band all have families in the city so will the members be looking forward to spending more time with their respective families once the tour is over?

‘Yeah, families and I think Bernard’s going to do another solo thing and Darren’s going to keep on doing his music, he does a bit of production work. I don’t know what the other guys are going to do; they haven’t expanded on what they’re going to do just yet. I think they’re still getting used to the idea that we’re finishing up.’ This would seem to suggest that not all of the members of the band wanted the split to go ahead so I asked Jon what the reasons actually were... ‘Well I think in a band it just works on

people being really passionate about what they’re doing’ came the reply ‘and it’s kind of tiring being like that, like to love something that much all the time. I don’t know, I think just some of us just fell out of love with that idea of doing what we’re doing. I mean we wanted to fall in love with something else and go and try something. It just seemed the right thing to do to say ‘Ok, this is how Powderfinger works and I don’t think it’s going to work like that again, so maybe we should say ok, that’s it’ so that’s how it happened.’ Despite the fact that Jon claims he’s not scared of going on to a life after the band there will undoubtedly be several aspects of being part of Powderfinger that he’ll miss once it’s gone. ‘I think I’m going to miss when you write a song that you think you like and you have this amazing feeling, sometimes you can get goose bumps. And I’ll miss playing to crowds and it actually working. When you put a set together and the crowd is reacting to it you’re sort of creating something together with the crowd and it’s a special feeling. So I’m going to miss those two things I think.’

Towards the end of my time with Jon I wanted to get him in a reflective mood and find out what aspects of his career with Powderfinger he was most proud of. With sixteen ARIA awards placing them fourth in the all time list behind Silverchair, John Farnham and Kylie, and a total of fourty-two ARIA nominations placing them second, again behind Silverchair and millions of album sales across their seven studio albums there’s plenty to choose from. I started off by asking Jon if there was a particular album that he was most proud of. ‘For me Vulture Street was the best album we had because, I mean I think Odyssey Number Five is a really great album that we did, but Vulture Street was good because we changed our sound and it actually worked. It resonated with people and for me that was a really hard thing to do and to pull it off, so I’m really proud of that.’ However, despite all of the awards and the album sales the achievement that Jon is most proud of is the one that many fans may overlook completely. ‘Probably just making it twenty years, that’s probably the best one. And actually breaking up and not being bitter about it. Being happy that we’ve done what we’ve done and then saying ‘OK, this is it we’re happy.

You know we don’t hate each other; we made it to where we did.’

So the final chapter of the Powderfinger story won’t be played out until late 2010, by which point they will have completed their final UK tour, travelled across the length and breadth of Australia on the final tour of their home country, probably have seen ‘Golden Rule’ go double platinum in Australia and will have performed their final show in Brisbane. Any band who has had the longevity that Powderfinger have achieved deserve plenty of respect and that, coupled with success on the scale of which they have achieved in their native country, is more than any band could hope for.

Words: Adam Gibby

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Culturedeluxe’s very own Time Lord, Keith Haworth, catches up with Richard Norris to talk about the time and space continuum, the magic of sound and how the Tarot cards can act as a creative tool.

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R

ichard Norris list’s his favourite musical artists as Can and Neu, along with all things psychedelic and electronic, which is why his music seamlessly combines the two. He also has an interest in magic and the tarot which means that it no surprise to read that he views his occupation as that of being a ‘mind bender’, which is both fitting and easy to understand when you realise that he is a man who has been following his own idiosyncratic past for over two decades now.

Norris is also a man who has continuously managed to have his thumb firmly pressed on the counter-cultural pulse, which has seen him starting his career at the legendary Bam Caruso record label before writing for the NME and Strange Things Are Happening. Later, Norris went on to co-produce the legendary Jack The Tab with Genesis P Orridge before forming The Grid and then recreating himself as one half of super DJ alchemists Beyond the Wizard’s Sleeve, along with Erol Alkan.

Hello Richard. You don’t seem to shy away from the big concepts in your music. You have always infused it with a degree of invention and playfulness while stimulatingly holding on to your psychedelic roots. How does Time and Space Machine fit into the previously eclectic Norris permutations? Do you see it as a musical space and time continuum of your earlier immersion in the acid house and the new psychedelic movements?

I’ve always been interested in music that’s about sensation and has it’s own ambience and landscape, like dub, the hypnotic outer reaches of cosmic music and psychedelia… music using effects and technology to create its own sense of time and space. Before I’ve only made a few references to this music of sensation, but I’ve used these influences very directly in this new project – it’s right up front.

It’s a distillation of the magic and feel of these past influences, colliding with some current recording techniques.

You seem to thrive on collaborations. Do you ever feel as if this prevents you from pursuing some of your more idiosyncratic musical interests? How did the collaborative nature of the new project infuse the creative spirit?

This is probably the least collaborative album I’ve ever done. I spent two days with ace beatnik drummer Wildcat Will, putting down about 20 different drum tracks, and did a couple of vocal sessions, but apart from that it was me on my own in a studio under a castle in Lewes, near Brighton. Certainly the more overtly psychedelic end of things came to the fore, in a more organic way as it wasn’t discussed or dissected,

it just grew in its own way. I do like collaborations though, you always learn something new and fresh when you work with other people.

What is your favourite track on the album?

Depends what day it is! Today it is Path Through The Cathedral, tomorrow it’ll be different.

Is that because you see it as an encapsulation of the record as a whole?

I think it’s because it was an unexpected experiment and turned out well. It’s almost prog rock, which is odd as I’m not a big fan of that, I’m more into psych.

You have been a long time champion of krautrock and the more esoteric side of the counter culture. Are you familiar with some of the new kraut rock influenced bands such as Henry Riton’s Eine Kleine Nacht Musik? How do these new bands stand up in comparison to Neu or Cluster say?

I think Henry’s stuff is great. Anyone that can use past influences and create something new and not just a straight copy is ok with me. These influences are as relevant today as at any time in the past, so as long as it’s not just a museum-like pastiche it’s okay with me.

As a man already familiar with the alchemical slight of hand that can occur beyond the wizard’s sleeve, how has magic influenced your creative life and do you have any plans to become a full time practising magician like Alan Moore? Maybe the Tarot is the new Oblique Strategies?

I can’t answer the first bit, but yes Oblique Strategies and Tarot are certainly related. Although I study Tarot I’ve never used it in the studio, but Oblique Strategies is always by the mixing desk. Anything that gives you more choice and options is going to help. I did meet Alan Moore and spent many hours at his house discussing magic over twenty years ago, which was mind opening to say the least!

Is there anybody who you would like to work with either within or without of the musical hemisphere?

Certainly more visual artists and filmmakers, and I’d like to do a fairly cinematic, electronic album with a singer too, having not done that for a while.

So if anyone wants to collaborate let me know! Plus an album with David Lynch and Brian Eno singing harmonies, kind of old-timey space age lullabies.

Words: Keith Haworth

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comes from my enjoyment of the music of Magazine and Gray.

HealeyIsland is the one-man electronica project from South West musicalist and composernaut Greg Healey.

HealeyIsland’s new album, Not Afternoon, But Evening, is described as being ‘Light Music meets Dark Electronica’.

After a favourable buzz earlier in the year and a rave review here at CDX, our man in the field Keith Haworth talks to the man and asks him a few (space) probing questions.

Hello Greg, tell me, what does a ‘composernaut’ actually do? How did you go about writing the album?

That’s quite a tough question. I suppose you could say a composernaut explores the outer limits of their musical imagination, not limited by genre, style or expectations.

Perhaps it is someone who writes music that plays about with different combinations, to see what happens. Or, it could describe music written by a space cadet for space cadets. When I recorded Not Afternoon, But Evening I didn’t embark with a set plan in mind, except that I wanted to make an album that was both cohesive and disparate. I was interested in the tensions I could create by combining a variety of differing styles on one album, and then twisting those styles to hopefully make something a little different — something distinctly HealeyIsland.

There is a feeling of Americana about this album that developed organically fairly early on in the process. I simply allowed myself to follow this line of enquiry and, as things progressed, the atmosphere of Not Afternoon, But Evening came into being.

It seems very eclectic in places. Was it difficult to distil all the tracks you had into a cohesive narrative?

In some ways it was pretty tricky. I had to dispense with three tracks that I particularly loved because they seemed to contradict the feel of the album. However, once I’d moved those tracks over to one side, the tracks slotted into place quite nicely. I spent a lot of time listening through, tweaking tracks; seeing how they would fit together; seeing what kind of vibe they created. However, I think that, despite the eclectic qualities, there is something distinctly HealeyIsland about all the tracks on the album that ties them together.

There are shades of the two Barry’s, both Adamson and Gray, on the album. Is this yet not simply another imaginary soundtrack?

This isn’t, by any means, an imaginary soundtrack.

I believe there is an unusualness and a tautness to the music that makes it distinct, that separates it from that genre. This isn’t some wobbly exercise in cinematic pastiche, nor is it an attempt to express a distinct, direct, or prescribed imaginary, filmic narrative to the listener. Each track on the album is capable of standing alone as an individual piece of music. Yes, undoubtedly, there are elements of the two Barrys in there, but this

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I love the big orchestral sounds found in Gray’s music, as well as the unusual electronic sounds he deployed. Because of this I suppose their ghosts can be seen at the margins of what I do. Frank Zappa has always been a favourite of mine, and I draw a lot of inspiration from the way, on an album like Lumpy Gravy, he was able to immerse the listener and create a space, or a set of rules, in which a particular reality can thrive. That is what I aim for.

You also have an alternate career as a DJ over at Dandelion Radio. Can you tell us a little about the station, as I suspect a few of our readers would be surprised to find out that it is now the official John Peel station.

Dandelion is a wonderful station and I feel honoured that I am able to be part of it. I was invited to join in 2009.

Started in 2006, it was established to carry on the work of John Peel, promoting new and interesting music. Since then its reputation as an uncompromising and independent platform for all kinds of independent music, regardless of genre, has grown across the world. The station was given the honour of becoming the official host of the John Peel’s Festive Fifty, soon after it began.

Now, some four years later, it has a varied selection of talented DJs, who each bring their own distinctive styles and tastes to their programmes. As Dandelion is funded by donations, to pay for the various licenses etc, it doesn’t have to answer to any paymasters and DJs can play what they like. The station plays music from artists and bands on independent labels, and also those who self release their material. Most months you get to hear sessions exclusively recorded for Dandelion, something that is very much in the tradition of John Peel’s shows. You can find Dandelion at http://www.dandelionradio.com .

And finally, what’s next for HealeyIsland?

I recently remixed a track by The Protagonist!, which will come out on a special limited edition CD to accompany the re-release of his album Pink Fuzz!. That should be out anytime soon.

I have begun playing with a few ideas for my next HealeyIsland album, but, as yet, it is early days. So far it looks as if it might be an album of protest polkas and love waltzes. Alongside this I am working on an audiovisual installation/performance project called Poxxicle, which makes use of, amongst other things, sound files and images from the internet. I am also continuing my work for the Miroslav Moesche Archive Trust, cataloguing and restoring tapes and other material. Moesche was an Austrian born composer whose works spanned six decades. He worked as an experimental composer and, in the 1950s and early 60’s, as a Hollywood film score writer. Virtually no public record exists of his work and his life, beyond that found in the Trust’s archives, so it is a fascinating project.

Words: Keith Haworth

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Their Sonic Youth guitars, driven bass and mix of electronics and effects of have left the music-blogging masses with wet pants and an appettite for more. Mathew Parri Thomas sat down for a chat with Civil Civic’s Ben Green to find out how things work in their filthy, fuzzed up world.

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So, Civil Civic, seeing as this is a “One to watch” article I guess you’d better fill us in on all that boring ‘How did you form?’ and ‘Where does the band name come from?’ stuff.

Right. Civil Civic is basically a blind-date gone right.

Aaron had been brooding over his concept of the band for some time, but when he finally had time to start putting his nasty scheme into action he had trouble finding an appropriate side-kick. Mutual friends recommended he contact me, because they’ve seen me drink and know I’m a band-whore who can’t say no.

Aaron sent me an awkward email with Less Unless in demo form, and I said yes.

With the handful of tracks you’ve made available so far it’s clear to see you’re carving a sound of your own, whilst making nods to the lo-fi guitar wizardry of the likes of Sonic Youth. How did you go about honing your sound? It manages to be an aural assault whilst still being heavily rooted in melody.

Well, you’ve actually answered some of the question yourself. Civil Civic is a band formed around a simple set of unbreakable rules: A) must have tough fuzz; B) must have sweet melody; C) must be a piece of piss to tour; and D) must sound a bit like early Midnight Oil, but not too much.

The no-singing isn’t actually in the rules, we just have awful, screeching voices. Like cockatoos. People don’t even like talking to us for more than five minutes. It hurts them.

You’ve released Run Overdrive / Fuck Youth as a double B side. Double B side? What’s that all about?

The double B side was arrived at pretty easily. We thought both of the tracks were strong in their own goofy ways, and wanted the listening public to decide which was the leading tune. But a double A side seemed like a wank. So we thought “Why not make it an even BIGGER wank! That’ll fuck ‘em.” Hey presto: double B side.

You’ve also “done a Radiohead” and released it as a donate-to-download via your Bandcamp site. How important do you think it is for emerging acts to forget about making money and concentrate on just getting the music out to as many people as possible?

Well, even an established indie act is not exactly a high-return profit machine. We need money to fund pressings and tours and the like, but the idea that we can screw that out of a tiny fan-base is just ridiculous. It’s much, much more important to get the music to more people than try and pump 12 obsessive music nerds for every cent. And to tell you the truth, most people pay something for the BandCamp downloads. One guy paid £20 for four tracks. I want to kiss him.

You’re a vocal-less band, which means you’re skirting dangerously close to the post-rock tag.

How do you feel about being pigeonholed into any one scene or genre?

Every non-mainstream band ever interviewed in the universe ever has responded to this question by whining in a high-pitched voice: “We hate being called (insert genre), because we have our own unique sound! Wah wah wah!” So I’m not going to say anything about that.

You can even call us Electro-Rock if you want.

From what we’ve heard so far your emphasis on electronics seems to be as important as fuzz drenched bass and schizophrenic guitar lines.

What should we expect from your full length debut?

We will probably go down a couple of sidestreets on the album, since we’ll have some space to do so. But at the moment we still want to make the bulk of it centred around the interplay of the guitar and bass, with brutally simple, punishing drum machine providing the framework. There is a huge amount of scope in that, and we have only scratched the surface.

The electronics are there if we need a little extra drama or atmosphere, but we still want to be able to play it all live without using fucking backing tracks and sequenced melodies. That may change in time, but for now, nuffsaid.

With just the two of you how do your live shows work?

Well, we have a big square road-case with big flashing lights on it in the middle of the stage. It is “The Box”.

I won’t say what’s in it, but Aaron uses a footswitch to change drum-machine patterns. All the samples and synth shit we play on keyboards that sit on top of the box. Then there’s just guitar, bass, lots of effects pedals on both, and our stunningly charismatic stage presence.

Oh, and we play kazoos in one song.

What’s on the Civil Civic stereo at the moment?

There is so much bewildering shit on the Civil Civic stereo that it makes me a bit queasy. We download zillions of tracks from blogs every week and it drives me nuts trying to keep up with who they all are.

Seriously, even the tracks I really love. Ask Aaron, he’s got a much better head for names. I’m just waiting for Modeselektors next full-length.

What’s next for Civil Civic?

Easy!

July/August – UK gigs October – New Single November – Euro-tour January – Go to Australia and get a tan.

March – ALBUM! You can get your digital or physical hands on Run Overdrive / Fuck Youth over at Civil Civic’s Bandcamp page ( http://shop.civilcivic.com/ ). Anyone that forks up more than £20 for the digital download wins a prize.

Words: Mathew Parri Thomas

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Moshi Moshi - Singles Club Volume II Released: 03.05.2010 Label: Moshi Moshi

Words: Chantelle Pattemore

With Bloc Party, The Rakes, Hot Chip and Friendly Fires all having records released by Moshi Moshi over the last few years, it’d be reasonable to assume that a compilation album comprised of their most current would be packed with the crème de la crème of upcoming talent. And after sampling the delights of Moshi Moshi Singles Club Volume II, we’ve been proven to have assumed correctly.

Everyone’s favourite ethereal redhead Florence and the Machine

kicks off proceedings with Kiss With A Fist; a track whose punchy drum beats most definitely helps the song live up to its name. James Yuill, a producer from Brighton is up next, with No Pins Allowed; four minutes of unadulterated pop pleasure backed by some ridiculously catchy electro riffs. Norwegian scamps Casiokids certainly make an impression with jumpy piano chords that give Gront lys I alle ledd a disco vibe and really get you in the mood for the remainder of the album. No, you may not be able to understand a word they’re singing but the tune alone will have you tapping your feet along in no time.

Still Flyin’ are an eight-piece from San Francisco, whose jovial

Californian indie pop will have you hooked in no time. You can’t help but smile when you listen and that’s certainly never a negative attribute for a band to possess.

Fanfarlo present the listener with a beautiful orchestral-indie sound, with vocals resonant to that of Arcade Fire’s frontman, and once they introduce the violins, there’s something almost hypnotic about them. Their upcoming inclusion on the latest Twilight movie soundtrack will deniably earn them significant recognition, but sadly for all the wrong reasons.

With the eighties revival still firmly holding it’s influential grip over the industry, it would almost be wrong for the album not to feature some electro power-pop and this is delivered to us in the form of the exquisite Mirrors with Into the Heart. However, with the

good comes the bad and there are a couple of tracks on here which shows them up to pale in comparison to their peers. Bless Beats’ Sex In The City is exactly what the name suggests it to be – a gaudy dance tune with ubiquitous mediocre female vocals and the obligatory RnB vocal sandwiched in the middle.

Somewhat surprisingly, the stand-out tracks on the album don’t come from the currently more well known acts featured such as Florence and The Drums.

Still Flyin’ and Mirrors steal the show here, but with the Moshi Moshi name behind them, it won’t be a matter of whether all of the featured musicians make it big, it’s simply waiting to find out when.

Tim and Sam’s Tim and The Sam Band With Tim and Sam - Life Stream Released: 03.05.2010 Label: Full Of Joy Words: Ross Park

the boy that one from Zombieland.

They meet, there’s a montage of them running in a park in Spring time with sprightly uplifting music behind them before sinking us into With instrumental music it’s often the melancholic second act of the a case of using it as the soundtrack film, probably now in the autumn, to an imaginary film and letting where a poignant moment pulls the the music conjure up the images in couple apart before finally reuniting your mind. If Life Stream opener in the park with a stirring and Sparks feels very much like the heartening backdrop. And that’s opening credits, second track just track two.

Summer Solstice feels like an entire Known only as an instrumental movie score in one song, bringing band previously, the fact that a to mind a slightly indie-ish couple, third of the tracks here have vocals probably in their early/mid 20s, the on will come as a nervy surprise to girl played by Zooey Deschanel, their fans. It’s ironic that the first

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lyrics ever to be heard on a Tim and Sam song are ‘Taken these steps many times before / I know these roads like the back of my hand’, when just to hear they have voices at all is a revelation to the listener.

Surprisingly, some tracks feel like they’re crying out for vocals, such as Reflections. It misses the cinematic, blossoming quality of other tracks and its slow, almost pedestrian pace suggests it should sit in the ‘need lyrics’ pile instead of the ‘beautiful instrumental’.

In its best moments Life Stream leaves you to float in the spaces between the lingering lines and is reminiscent of the airy beauty of Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks. Tim and Sam’s weakness however, is

over-complication.

Both Up The Stairs and The Yellow Hammer suffer from too many melodies in at once, which forces the listener away from the sensation of experiencing the music and into focusing and concentrating.

Word magazine damned it with praise when describing it as a: ‘terrific LP full of incidental music’. Incidental music is a harsh description. The overwhelming feeling is one of early morning beauty; fresh and inspiring. Life Stream glides over you leaving a warm comforting feeling behind which will take a while to wash off.

Charlotte Gainsbourg - Time of the Assassins (single) Released: 10.05.2010 Label: Because Music

Words: Chantelle Pattemore

Despite having a reputable family name and two previous album releases behind her, it has taken Charlotte Gainsbourg teaming up with an American virtuoso to get her music recognised by UK audiences. Beck has produced her latest album IRM and the evident influence he has had on her style and the subsequent recognition this has earnt has resulted in her gearing up for her first ever UK date at the end of the month, in

support of the release.

Time of the Assassins is the second single off the album and showcases a blend of both smooth French and melodramatic American sounds.

Anyone worried about not being able to understand Charlotte’s vocals due to her nationality will find their concerns unfounded, as she sings in perfectly fluent English -- and the slight accent that tinges her songs proves charming rather than incomprehensible.

The track opens with a simple guitar acoustic and Gainsbourg’s sultry, dreamy vocals. The simplicity of it all feels positively provincial, and it is easy to be

transported away to the depths of the French countryside as she sings tacitly to herself in a field. At some points the vocals are almost whispered, as if she doesn’t want to disturb the stillness around her, and at the same time remaining inconspicuous to the hunters she sings about.

The chorus sees the tone pick up slightly though, with more passionately driven vocals and the introduction of keys and drums.

Albeit, these additions are still relatively soft and in keeping with the ambience of the song, but the slight electro edge to the keys which continue into the subsequent verses are slightly resonant of Beck’s more kooky and versatile style.

The song finishes rather abruptly with a couple of notes plucked on

the guitar and doesn’t quite fit with the overall easy-flowing feel of the track. It seems as though the duo weren’t sure how to round off proceedings, and as a result the entire thing appears slightly incomplete; especially as the whole song’s run time only clocks in at two and a half minutes anyway.

It’s an undeniably beautiful track but the dream-like essence to it makes it feel slightly unsubstantial at times. The first single off IRM, Heaven Can Wait in comparison perfectly shows off the brilliance of the Beck/Gainsbourg pairing, but unfortunately Time of the Assassins doesn’t quite do them enough justice.

Tracy Thorne - Love and its Opposite Released: 17.05.2010 Label: Strange Feeling Words: Phil Russell troubled marriages of people around her (Oh, The Divorces) the album is full of the usual dance folk sound that any Thorn fan will love.

Continuing where her 2007 album While a lot of the album is Out Of The Woods left of, Love full of more down-tempo and and Its Opposites finds Tracy somber songs, Thorn does hint Thorn older and a little bit wiser. that she hasn’t forgotten her Whether musing on growing dance roots. The simple but older alone (Singles Bar) or the effective groove and melody on

Why Does the Wind? make it one of the highlights of the album.

Hormones has a mother and daughter discussing one coming into her sexuality just as the other starts to lose hers.

Love and Its Opposites closes with the sad but uplifting Swimming and Tracey gives us a parting piece of advice, ‘It’s all over, so lets go on’.

Letting go of the past, like her work with Everything But The Girl, is hard to do but if you move on you will see that there are

promising things ahead.

This is a deeply personal album, made by and for adults.

With themes of marriage, love and growing older you can almost feel the trails Throne has gone through and the advice she has to give. Like a fine wine, Tracey gets better with age. A must buy for fans and at least a must listen for those not familiar with Thorns earlier work.

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Band Of Horses - Infinite Arms Released: 18.05.2010 Label: Columbia

Words: Chantelle Pattemore

Anyone expecting to hear Band of Horses venture into a new direction on their third album will find themselves sorely disappointed. The recognisable higher pitched vocals, violins, soaring crescendos and slow tempos all remain in playing a significant role in the overall sound and structure of the record.

However, this doesn’t mean that what they have produced is lacklustre; Infinite Arms is far from it.

Opening track Factory is a great introductory piece, with haunting violins creating an orchestral feel to proceedings.

Slow, dreamy verses build into purposeful choruses, with drums and guitars meandering in and providing the song with a stronger resonance. Stripped down verses leading into more developed choruses are integral manifestations on this record and fans will recognise this style as one employed repeatedly over their past two releases. Evening Kitchen curtails the pace further as we are presented simply with lead singer Ben Bridwell’s exposed vocals and barely-present acoustic plucks which create the impression of a lullaby and duly relax the listener.

Those concerned about being bored by the calming nature of Band of Horses’ sound needn’t shun the album entirely, though.

Several songs interspersed throughout possess a more upbeat tempo and heavier percussion (well, by these guys’ standards at least), creating a slightly more tenacious sound. Dilly’s repetitive and hasty drumbeat soon has your foot tapping and Compliments showcases a far more energised, electric feel. NW Apt. features vigorous guitars throughout that take you slightly by surprise, as it seems an unexpected trajectory for the band to adopt.

Slightly dubious lyrics let some tracks down, as they seem to have been slotted in to fill space and rhyme, rather than because they actually make sense. For example, ‘I had a dream I was your

neighbour/about to give birth’ might be ok coming from a female vocalist, but even the higher pitch of Bridwell’s voice can’t distract from the fact he is a man and the whole idea is more than a bit bizarre.

The album certainly has promise and it’s admirable that Band of Horses attempted new and different approaches in their musical process. Dashes of country in some songs whilst hints of rock in others are testament to this, and definitely make for pleasurable enough listening. Unfortunately for the group however, it’s not quite explored enough to win over any new listeners this time around.

Operator Please - Gloves Released: 31.05.2010 Label: EMI Words: Adam Gibby

what Operator Please have achieved with Gloves.

Their debut offering Yes Yes Vindictive was a whirring maelstrom of love-it-or-hate-it’ bubblegum poppunk, encapsulated ‘Second Album Syndrome’ is in their ARIA award winning a disease that can strike at any breakthrough single Just A Song time and with no regards for About Ping Pong. The frantic reputation. History is littered with energy of this debut was in part examples from The Clash’s Give due to the members all being in ‘Em Enough Rope to The Stone their mid to late teens but the band Roses’ Second Coming and through have grown up and their sound has to more recent examples such as matured with them. With synths Kasabian’s Empire. It is always and guitars used only sparingly refreshing then to come across an on Yes Yes Vindictive to create a album that totally outclasses its sparse, punk sound, here they are predecessor and that is exactly thrust to the front and form the

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basis for all of the songs. Kicking off proceedings is Catapult and, while far from being the best song on the album, it does introduce the new sound nicely with a dirty bassline and pounding drums leading in to a synth laden chorus.

There are shades of their debut in the shouty chorus of Just Kiss before the first of the standout tracks arrives in the shape of Logic. Things are kept simple with a dirty, garage band feel, constructed of a fuzzy bassline and drum combination for the verses and then a few well placed chords are all that are added to produce a catchy, sing-along chorus. It’s not all stomping energy though with Oh My and Back and Forth showing that

Operator Please do have a softer side, with the former undoubtedly the most melodic track on the album. Volcano brings them storming back to the boil but the rest of the album is left to slowly simmer and bubble away without ever really grabbing your attention as much as the earlier tracks.

You’ve got to admire them for breaking away from the sound that made them popular and creating a second album is never easy. It seems as though they’re really starting to find their feet as a band and they’ve created a solid stepping stone with which to build on for their next album.

Infesticons - Bedford Park Released: 24.05.2010 Label: Big Dada

Words: James Threlfall have been hiding and find themselves in the middle of a battleground long gone, confused; unable to even remember which side their allegiance lies.

Among the Bedford Park introduces the final rubble they have managed to conclusion to underground hip hop recruit a few friends such as Saul regular Mike Ladd’s trilogy of Williams, Creature, Juice Aleem concept albums. These document and Seraphim (of No Surrender) the fictional war between the to assist. The result is an album invading Majesticons (a group that struts between (to name a of ‘Jiggy’ invaders) and the few) Hip Hop, Rock, Indie, Pop, Infesticons (a group of Brooklyn Punk, Electro and even anti-folk.

B-Boys) who fired the first shots Many fans of artists such as TV with debut Gun Hill Road in on the Radio, The Roots and 2000. Eventual retaliation was at times Lightspeed Champion made by the Majesticons with will no doubt draw comparison. tongue-in-cheek, faux-gangsta However Infesticons have managed Beauty Party. Now the concluding to confidently straddle most of album has arrived. A whole these genres successfully. This ten years after the invasion, the creates a confident, accessible remaining Majesticons emerge album that despite being unlikely from their bunker where they to be immortalised in your record

collection, offers entertainment and importantly fun with immediate effect.

This confidence can be seen in the very track listing; each song name finishing with ‘anthem’, presumably an indication that each song should be worthy as an anthem can be seen as a little contrived. Either way, to dwell on this rather minor point would be a mistake. Bedford Park does demand your attention and makes it increasingly difficult not to tap your feet or vibe. There are many different flavours to enjoy; from the serene female vocals of Forever Anthem flanked by a cutesy synth and drum machine line, to the annoyingly catchy verse of Kick Anthem.

However some of the most enjoyable parts of this album are the simplest, such as Hang it Up Anthem. Starting off as a slow burner, initially delivering bar-by-

bar rhymes before it progresses comfortably towards a dramatic, intense crescendo. This simplicity can also be seen on Bombs Anthem which introduces an unavoidable headrocking beat and lazy flowing vocal, reinforced by a filthy synth line.

Overall, Bedford Park is an enjoyable and confident album which is happy to genre hop and indulges many of your demands. Making it difficult to find a place where this would not fit, be it a DJ’s record bag or scenesters satchel. This experimentalism is something to be admired and is an enjoyable listen, but if you are looking to be excited, or challenged, then maybe you should avoid the battlefield.

The Like - He’s Not a Boy Released: 31.05.2010 Label: Downtown / Polydor Words: Adam Gibby

The latest offering from this all girl Californian quartet has been produced by Mark Ronson which means that, although it will undoubtedly gain the ‘cool factor’ (whatever that means

these days), it also comes with a heavy air of predictability.

However even the most predictable of affairs can be hugely enjoyable and that’s the case here.

Sixties swing is brought crashing in to the 21st Century and this song will have girls digging out their mini skirts and guys searching for those skinny ties. With its jangly guitars, harmonies and

relentless, driving beat it’s a great throwback record and, for a Ronson produced track, it has a refreshingly low level of brass.

It’s not going to be one of the best songs that you hear this year but it could certainly end up being one of the most fun and will definitely get your feet itching.

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Kings Go Forth - The Outsiders Are Back Released: 31.05.2010 Label: Luaka Bop Words: Bradley Poole

To hear something described as a fizzer will almost instantly conjure images of hopeful beginnings spiralling into monotone disappointment but Whoah! Stop right there! The Outsiders Are Back, the debut album from Kings Go Forth is a fizzer of the most glorious kind. A rhythm and blues album that overflows with sparkling effervescence, rumbling and bursting through warm nostalgia.

Kings Go Forth are Andy

Noble and Black Wolf, both stalwarts of the Milwaukee music scene since the Seventies. KGF were formed after the pair met in Andy’s Milwaukee record shop in 2004, somewhat setting the tone of the album. The influences, the sounds, the craft, the joy, the passion, the ideas and hell, nearly even the smell of that shop sings from the content. The pair released a string of 7 inch singles before arriving here at the first LP proper, singles that grabbed the attention of some serious vinyl browsers, most notably DJ Shadow.

Opening track One Day is pure Spencer Davis Group, an

absolutely breathtaking, heart skipping four minutes of rhythm and blues. Not just soul but heart and soul. Sweet melodic vocals slipping over perfectly plumped bass all strung together with punching drums.

The musical history runs deep and rich from start to finish; each first listen would almost certainly fail the Pepsi challenge on whether this is actually some kind of brand new retro -- a glorious nod to the finest crafted soul or simply a genuine forgotten treasure in the loft?

As you would expect for any soul standard, the album is a journal of expressed love (High On Your Love, You’re The One), stormy relationships (Don’t Take My Shadow) and love lost (Now

We’re Gone) but the stand-outs come with the fiercely urgent opener, the pouty I Don’t Love You No More and the sweettoothed melancholy of Fight With Love.

Production is as slick as a Bob Monkhouse analogy about slickness, but when you consider that these two have spent many a day refining their craft at Curtis Mayfield’s Curtom Studios, it’s easy to see that this is just their musical bread and butter.

Kings Go Forth claim that The Outsiders Are Back; they seem to have taken 30 odd years to get here but it’s a rich, sweet delight that’ll have you swinging and rolling from the off.

We Are The World - Clay Stones Released: 24.05.2010 Label: Manimal Vinyl Words: Salwa Azar

If KMFDM and Jane’s Addiction had a baby 15 years after their peak, the first half of this album would be the result. This is an oddly mismatched record, the first four or so songs sounding like they are totally polarised between

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one style of beats and another of vocals -which drives you a bit nutty trying to marry the two in-between your ears.

If you have a bit of a fetish for Roman-era imagery whilst liking a female Pete Steele vocal above your techno, then Side A of Clay Stones is for you. Thankfully, a track like Lie Like A Forest comes along to save your eardrums from premature combustion. It’s a rhythmically interesting and

well-phrased piece with clear momentum. Following this is Afire, which follows suite. Then the ‘difficult’ songs return either giving too much from the world of Orbital/Leftfield or too much narcoleptic female vocal -- one minute shouty the next, pitchshifted down to sound like Nico.

The penultimate song on the album, Sweet Things Are So Hard, shows promise; a long, grinding intro that revs the listener up expectantly but things finish before it goes anywhere, leaving you disappointed. To read that the band

have performed with Fuck Buttons is something of a surprise.

I get the feeling this album is angled toward the cliquey crowd who frequent Slimelight and Cyberdog or like blue dreadlock extensions and New Rocks, and don’t mind the deranged and overly-wordy vocals amid the thumping techno because everything sounds like that when you’re down a K-Hole right?

Sleepy Sun - Fever

Released: 31.05.2010 Label: ATP Recordings

Words: Chantelle Pattemore

When Sleepy Sun decided to name themselves as such, it was probably in order to reflect their native California and the chilled,

electric guitar riffs creating a searing intro, somewhat reminiscent of Hendrix’s style and the corresponding era which their sound seems to be aiming towards. However, these soon give way to slow and torpid vocals, backed by a lethargic drum beat which completely takes the tone of the song in the opposite

five different genres over the course of the record, albeit some only for brief moments. African tribal beats and vocals provide a stark contrast to acute and jagged guitar riffs, whilst harmonicas and country twangs in Desert God really demonstrate the band’s willingness to experiment with and amalgamate different sounds.

Some songs, such as Rigamaroo, see the band make a complete u-turn, as the instrumentals that

proceedings later on in the album a bit of a kick, but by this point it’s not enough to fully re-engage attention.

As admirable as Sleepy Sun’s stylistic risks may be, their daring often works against them. The varying melodies and speedy tempo changes unfortunately only serve to work against each other rather than complement, because they are so unstructured and extravagant that ultimately all that is left is

yet somewhat psychedelic, nature of their music. Ironically, the Sleepy aspect of their title has proven all too real as despite their obvious homage to old-school rock and blues, a couple of tracks prove themselves to be so languid that it’s hard not to drift into a slumber yourself when listening.

Marina, the opening to the album, is very promising, with

direction to which it started. As the album progresses however, the frequent and swift changes between the two tempos becomes a prevailing occurrence, sometimes to the extent where the switchover happens so fast that it appears the band themselves barely even knew it was coming.

Their sound is undeniably daring, as they showcase at least

have played such a prominent role in other songs are cast aside completely for stripped-back vocals and barely-there acoustic guitar plucks. However, because the vocals are so slow and breezy, it’s not long before you’re lulled into a drowsy state and encouraging people to sleep is not meant to be the purpose of a record. Bluesy drum beats in Freedom Line gives

a confused melee of differing noises. The band’s ambition to create something unusual is overshadowing their evident talent, and this needs to be adjusted in order for their music to really shine through.

Ash - Binary

Released: 24.05.2010 Label: Atomic Heart Records Words: Matt Fearon

Ash smash out their seventeenth single in their A-Z singles series, or ‘Q’ -- aka electro groove Binary. Blazing electro-indie at it’s finest, this 4 minuter smacks

of 80’s cheese. Call and response shouts ‘Alright!’ are sure to ring out across student indie dance floors, this disco pop tune hand in hand with catchy chorus is bound for summer hit limelight.

Frontman Tim Wheeler’s elbows may sound as though they’re donning pastel roll up sleeves, but the melodies here aren’t a million miles away from the sun kissed

pop punk of the three-piece’s early days. Banshee like guitars lent from the likes of Editors or Bloc Party (perhaps borrowing from tour buddy Russell Lissack) highlight they are still a rock band, but kudos for following the aforementioned bands in suit and moving with the times in just the right way.

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Oh No Ono - Internet Warrior (Single) Released: 31.05.2010 Label: Leaf Words: Richie Brown web warlord: a bespectacled lardbucket with hair as greasy as his diet or some virgin valkyrie enshrined in a lurid cardigan and nursing a perpetual cold. But to do so would set you Here the delightfully idiosyncratic out as one of those nasty web bigots of the early noughties passing Oh No Ono offer the first three tracks from their second LP Eggs remarks of casual discrimination at the patrons of internet cafes. in so sweet a repackaging you’d forgive them for dipping them in It’s now not necessarily the norm chocolate and adding a superfluous for Warcraft characters to be ‘Easter’ prefix. Currently skipping inverse representations of their around Europe on tour, the “irl” creators and, as with so much Danish quintet have called on an these days, Internet Warrior is impressive roster of Transatlantic irrefutable proof of the joy that can remixers for this release and the be realised when a talented band results are often stunning. group together around a humble It’s a confusing content: an computer. But then you’ll know Internet Warrior. It’s easy to that already if you picked up Eggs conjure images of your archetypal earlier this year as you should have.

So, back to those remixes.The ever-popular Caribou brings sparse house grooves, throbbing tribe vibes and hyper-intelligent disco to Eleanor Speaks in a sparkling retro mix that actually eclipses much of his own Swim LP. Meanwhile, Oh No Ono’s very own Swim is driven to the woods and left to fend for itself as it tackles wild and atmospheric soundscapes courtesy of West Coast indie hip hop outfit Shlohmo before creeping surreptitiously in the back door as the Phenomenal Hand Clap Band tend a warm yet controlled fire. Neither could be described as particularly essential to anyone without a passing interest in either act, but they sit well in the complete package. The same cannot be said for the Zambri Remix of Eleanor Says which stomps angrily around, knocking pictures off the wall and

upsetting Grandma. Quite frankly we’re all glad when it finally clods off looking for some more buttons to press.

Joining the Caribou remix and the title track (of which it is a mix) in making this EP a worthwhile purchase is the Depreciation Guild’s many-layered psychedelic thrashabout which seems to pit the Pet Shop Boys against The Prodigy in a mix that sits mockingly between champagne pop and filthy thrash dance.

Lorn - Nothing Else Released: 07.06.2010 Label: Brainfeeder

Words: James Threlfall to not flow into each other, but feel simply like a collection to showcase Lorn’s talent as a producer and ability to create bite-size, dark electronica.

Nothing Else has Lorn is a deeply mysterious a dark, mysterious character, who when once atmosphere that, much like a questioned to described himself horror film, should contain the simply replied: ‘I was born 10,000 key concept of suspense; without years ago, the son of a tree and it you’re left with, well, Cannibal a knife’. No doubt Nothing Else - The Musical. However this is reflects this character -- a dark, what the album lacks, there is mysterious album. little suspense and each song all This album resembles more the too often instantly shows you all soundtrack to a horror film than its cards without teasing you with an album onto itself. Apart from progression. This makes the songs low BPM synth-scale-wanderer initially exciting, however very Void 1 and Void 2, most tracks tend quickly each tends to bleed into

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each other and soon sound all too familiar.

Nothing Else is at its best when Lorn experiments and steps away from his slightly repetitive song structuring. Take Army of Fear, one of the standouts; opening with a haunting string section, before being underpinned by a momentous gang drumline. Dark wails then provide an atmosphere to the track, making it feel eerie and importantly, attentiongrabbing.

Another track, the single Cherry Moon, is another example of Lorn successfully experimenting and stepping away from the low BPM tracks that tend to haunt the tracklist, providing a more progressive, interesting option. It leans

heavily on its optimistic, upscale string section which provides an attractive contradiction to the dark, gothic choir vocals.

Lorn is undoubtedly at his best when he is experimenting with his sound; striving for the interesting. Unfortunately these are not regular enough; Nothing Else tends to feel like a collection of detached beats that would be more suited being in the background than given direct attention. Creating an album that is initially enjoyable, but ultimately unsatisfying.

Rolo Tomassi - Cosmology Released: 24.05.2010 Label: Hassle

Words: James Threlfall rewarding.

For their second instalment they do not fail to delight and challenge all over again.

Working with producer Diplo (frequent flyer with MIA and Switch) Cosmology is an album Rolo Tomassi, with a refreshing with a different feel without losing youthful exuberance, exploded into any of its original vital components. the mathcore arena in 2005. This was They have shaved off their edges and the first insight into the hemisphere become more streamlined, allowing in which only Rolo Tomassi roam. them to explore and indulge both A world constructed of stuttering the most brutal and harmonic areas time signatures, scatter-gunning alike. synth and bipolar vocals that switch Most notably, the time signatures effortlessly between raw ferocity and have become less schizophrenic serenity. To some this may sound and are now spread throughout the like a nightmare, and to many it album with a new sense of patience, is. However the beauty is that it instead of confined to one song. doesn’t spare any punches and, to Illustrated from the short, intense, those who do enjoy it, it is a journey brutal 1min 40sec opening track that is thrilling, exciting and always Agamemnon leading into the starkly

different, 8 minute, slow-burning epic Cosmology. Other standouts such as Tongue-In-Chic initially strut ferociously through the opening minutes, before gliding off into the horizon on a wave of distorted guitars, escorted by Eva’s glistening vocals.

The vocals throughout Cosmology are no doubt continuing the fire and ice approach that fans of their debut are used to. However it soon becomes starkly clear on tracks such as centre piece Kasia, she flirts.

One moment she’s whispering sweet nothings, teasing, ruffling your hair, and just as you ease into any sense of security you’re being punched in the face towards an unwaveringly intense crescendo.

However Rolo Tomassi have not lost any of their ability to challenge and inspire the listener, occasionally veering the music off in a completely

different direction, barely resembling conventional musical arrangement.

Take French Motel, which soon dissolves mid way into complete confusion, randomly stabbing synth into the listener before withdrawing into the background and resuming the attack on all fronts, trail blazed by Eva’s barked vocals.

The title Cosmology itself indicates an influence from the heavens, perhaps a perfect illustration of an album that is floating way above the normal musical hemisphere. Often on the brink of madness, and barely anchored to musical tradition, Rolo Tomassi have equalled the passion, the intensity, the ferocity, the brilliance of their debut, and raised it skyward.

The Divine Comedy - Bang Goes The Knighthood Released: 31.05.2010 Label: Table of Contents Words: John Rain

tracks as the imaginary scenes play out.

The first single to be taken from the album is At the Indie Disco, a slice of nostalgia for anyone who spent their formative years With every new Divine Comedy frequenting dimly lit venues with album, you are always guaranteed floors stained by snakebite and black, an interesting listen. Bang Goes and air fogged with dry ice. the Knighthood is no different.

After a few listens, several tracks Recapturing the feel of the Divine really stand out, particularly the Comedy albums before 2001’s opener Down in the Street Below Regeneration, it is light, frothy which explores several styles and and filled to the brim with pop sets up the Broadway theme of sensibilities. As with many DC the album, The Complete Banker a albums, it chops and changes styles topical and humorous depiction of and genres (from pop, to overblown the irresponsible folk who have been epic ballad, to swing and back again) deemed accountable for the recent and could easily be a Broadway recession, Island Life a duet with musical. From the opening two Cathy Davey which can’t help but tracks (Down in the Street Below, remind you of a pop duet from the The Complete Banker) you can 1950s era, Assume The Perpendicular imagine scenery changes in-between a piece of very catchy silliness, When

a Man Cries an epic ballad that sounds like it has been drawn from the end titles of a Spaghetti Western and the aforementioned At the Indie Disco.

The variety of styles and genres give the album a something-foreveryone vibe, with Neil Hannon once again off-leash, exploring the many avenues of catchy pop melody, though sadly, the frenetic pace of change does give the album a slightly disjointed feel at times.

This album has many things in common with the last DC album (Victory for the Common Muse) in that it is 60% a great album and unfortunately has too many throw away songs that don’t command a second listen.

Songs such as Can You Stand upon One Leg, The Lost Art of Conversation, Have You Ever Been in Love and I like whilst not terrible, are just not very memorable.

However, an average Divine Comedy album is still worth two normal albums in my opinion. Neil Hannon is certainly a genius song-smith and with his collaborations with orchestrator Joby Talbot (The League of Gentlemen, Son of Rambow and The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy) he has carved out a niche of his own.

There is no one else currently working today, except perhaps Scott Walker (who is obviously a massive influence), who sounds like Hannon, and that is quite some achievement.

Hannon has the same Walker-like flair and Brian Wilson-esque ability to craft a distinctive song, which is an art in itself.

Whereas other DC albums such as Absent Friends and Regeneration are great from first to last track, Bang Goes the Knighthood is almost a great album, but still very much worth a listen.

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Wild Nothing - Gemini Released: 31.05.2010 Label: Captured Tracks Words: Dean Renphrey Heart’s debut as they do Technique era New Order and a young Johnny Marr; succeeding in updating these ‘influences’ the record becomes an audible metaphor for sun streaming through the curtains, The irony of summer 2010 yet it carries enough depth for soundtracked by a record you to believe that the previous that pines for 1989, a lack of night carried some sort of freak responsibility and general afternoon after the night before summer storm. Your head may be moping and skulking is surely in Ibiza or West Coast USA, but not lost on many in the latter your feet are still firmly planted in stages of life’s first half. And the unpredictability of your own should your summer be one to British summer. remember you will no doubt find This record has many faces but yourself returning to Gemini late fortunately for the lazier listener September pining for late July as if opener Live in Dreams is the it were itself a decade or two ago. perfect microcosm of everything Wild Nothing/Jack Tatum Gemini has to offer. Whilst appear to borrow as much offering plenty of upbeat melodies and jaunty pop this summer from Pains of Being Pure at

album is not all smiles with The Witching Hour fighting back with a darker feel, after its Passion Pit-esque opening eight; Bored Games mellows out nicely and would provide the perfect comedown from the albums euphoric heights had it not appeared bang in the middle like some sort of unwanted respite.

Summer Holiday could well be PoBPaH at their most radiofriendly, providing some of the album’s most audible lyrics and guitar — should they make the cross-over to the dreaded mainstream it will be this song that leads the way. In fact the record is unashamedly frontloaded with its most radio-friendly offerings but not in any way to its detriment; Confirmation fades-in, a technique obviously popular during production, and parades falling synths and grooving bass

The Horn & The Hunt - The Horn & The Hunt

Washed Out - Life Of Leisure EP

Label: White Label Music Words: Keith Haworth

The Horn The Hunt are Clare Carter and Joseph Osborne, two exploratory voyagers mapping the electro-pop interface between commercialism and experimentation. Their titular debut provides ample evidence of both, which is immediately evident on album opener Dirty Dogs. A statement of intent that becomes ever more apparent with The Valley and its frenetically crunchy beats and drone rock assault. Before There Were Knives shifts down a gear or two with its subtle drum patterns and laid back spook vibes, continuing to perpetuate the mood with Porcelain before amping up

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the energy for the cheeky sample stealing of Hit And Run. This is an album that will please both the electro-clash purists and the more experiential electronic aficionados, not to mention yet another strong release on a great label.

that could rival any of the White Isle’s favourites only with an admirable discretion and lack of bombast.

The lyrics throughout echo 90’s slackers syrupy approach, but they are never delivered with any sense of self-importance or self-pity.

Each word is wrapped around a melody or lost in a rising chord to the point where they are an added bonus to a record interesting enough without the lyrics.

On your first listen you will hear the influences, second you might pin them down, and by the third you will have agreed you are both good at spotting the ripples of the artist’s record collection but a fool for thinking this was just homage.

By the fourth you will have pressed repeat, the summery melodies blur into one and it may well be October before you know it.

over, as it makes you think of other times and places when things seemed a whole lot simpler.

Label: Mexican Summer Words: Phil Russell Highlights include New Theory and Feel It All Around.

While Ernest Greene, the voice The new EP from Washed Out and brains behind Washed Out, is full of exactly that... washed sounds like he’s still in the process out lo-fi bliss. The title of the EP, of finding himself as an artist, Life Of Leisure, is very fitting as I eagerly await the chance to to well since this will be on heavy listen to his growing pains along rotation as the soundtrack to many the way. summers. Mixing 80s synths, 90s shoegaze, often filtered vocals and the rough, raw sound of a demo, Life Of Leisure is full of promise.

The short, six track EP (clocking in around 20 minutes) goes by way too fast. It invites, and really needs, intimate listening — whether in your car for a Sunday drive or in your bedroom with the headphones on. This is one that you will get nostalgic

Mumford & Sons - Roll Away Your Stone (Single) Released: 06.06.2010 Label: Island Words: Matt Fearon

The fourth single into an album campaign can always be a struggle, particularly for bands that can get that little bit

instant spark as does its predecessor, Roll Away Your Stone is a pretty respectable follow up. A gentle, almost medieval beginning gets things off to a slow start, but Marcus Mumford, adopting an even gruffer growl than usual pushes the band into toe tapping bursts of frantic bluegrass, that you can’t help but

taps literally become foot stomps.

If The Cave is their bomb, then this is their hand grenade, not quite as big but it still packs a lot of damage to culminate in a sing along roar that the folk four piece will be glad to have up their sleeves at festival appearances this summer.

“samey”, and even more so for have your attention grabbed by.

Mumford & Sons having to follow Mumford & Sons really start to the brilliant The Cave. Though shine though, as the calm before admittedly it doesn’t have that the storm builds, and those toe

Pendulum - Immersion

Released: 24.10.2010 Label: Warner Music Group Words: Chantelle Pattemore

Pendulum tend to get a lot of bad press. Some tracks are undeniably tinged with a touch of cheese but what people seem to forget is that these guys pretty much introduced drum and bass into the mainstream consciousness and continue to reel in new listeners that might not otherwise be introduced to the genre. With their latest album Immersion heading back towards their original foundations, it could be just what they need to redeem themselves from the ‘sellout’ aspersions that haunted their last release.

Immersion opens in an instrumental style, which creates the impression that this record is going to see them venture back to their more traditional roots. A brief, space-like intro with building trumpets, rolling drums and computer bleeps aplenty creates the sense you’re about to go on a mission, and prepares you for the accelerated rollercoaster of electronic beats that is Salt In The Wounds.

The way this track builds is resonant of Slam, one of their better known and older tracks, and you’re left contemplating for a second the possibility that you might end up listening to a slightly re-mixed version of their widely-lauded debut work.

Alas, this grandeur is not to be repeated as we move on to

Watercolour and a flurry of distorted vocals that these guys seem to have grown accustomed to including. The vocals aren’t terrible, but simply serve to distract from the thumping bass, which is a shame as Pendulum are bloody good at concocting them. However, the group’s more intrepid attitude to vocal inclusions at points has some rather impassioned results. Self vs Self is a collaboration with Swedish heavy metal gurus In Flames, and demonstrates that some fast-paced D’n’B intertwined with raucous guitars and screaming vocals when done well, can actually be rather rousing, instead of simply a failed pairing of two musical genres.

The record overall is a pretty mixed bag, split between their more recent commercial and slightly toned-down style, and

the thick, grimy, pulsating poundings which got them recognised in the first place.

It’s understandable why they’d want to create a more universally appealing sound — record sales are falling, the industry is in turmoil and bands need to come up with methods to lure in as many punters and their cash as possible. Yet it is undeniable that the undisturbed, frenzied electronic bass thrashings simply walk all over the newer tracks which, let’s be honest, have vocals that sound like they’re a result of the hijacking of Cher’s voice distorter. Pendulum are so much better than a throwaway dance-electronic group, and they should really revert back to not being afraid to prove it.

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The Drums - The Drums

Released: 07.06.2010 Label: Moshi Moshi / Island Records Words: Adam Gibby

romanticism behind them that are all too often masked by joyful guitars and melodies, the wordsmanship of Jonathon Pierce is already being compared to that of Morrissey and there has been Since playing their first gig less much made of the Lancastrian’s than 18 months ago The Drums appearance at one of their gigs. have taken the music world by However, when the lyrical tone is storm, resulting in the frenetic allowed to match the musical tone, level of hype that surrounds this never more evident than on Down eponymous debut. Echoing the

By The Water, The Drums create bygone era of ‘80’s British indie music it is unsurprising to discover tender, emotional songs with Pierce’s pained vocals resonating that they have received greater over the top and on the more critical acclaim on this side of the upbeat songs there is clearly more pond, although you can’t ignore than passing thanks needed to be the waves that they’ve been given to Joy Division. Many bands making across the Atlantic. with no musical similarities are Lyrically adept with a compared to Joy Division purely poignancy and sense of

because they have a baritone singer but The Drums are one of the few bands whose musical style sits side by the side with the Mancunian giants with a high bass line and steady pounding of the snare drum instantly familiar, especially on tracks such as It Will All End in Tears and I’ll Never Drop My Sword.

The Drums are undoubtedly what Joy Division would have sounded like if they were brought up on the optimism of New York and they mix this musical style with Beach Boys-esque harmonies and choruses on their hits Let’s Go Surfing, Best Friend and Forever and Ever Amen to create an uplifting yet seemingly downbeat sound.

Those expecting the album to be as fresh and fun as their

Summertime EP will be in for a big surprise.

However, the album is not all full of wonders as this review has maybe made out it is so far. The second half of the album is largely uninspiring and, after ‘own By The Water the songs appear to fuse seamlessly and on more than one listening I’ve found myself drifting away until the familiar Joy Division style drum beat pulls me back in on I’ll Never Drop My Sword. It’s one of those albums that would be a perfect vinyl release with Side One jam packed with hits and Side Two offering up only a few gems. All in all it’s a mature debut from a band who are still finding their feet and it’s definitely worth a listen, but it’s not the earth shattering debut that we were promised. Then again, did we really ever expect it to be?

Joanna Chapman-Smith Released: 14.06.2010 Label: Wound Up Records Words: Salwa Azar

Contraries, the second album from Ms Smith, shows a maturity of songwriting as well as lovely jazzy folk vocals from the lady herself. There is a feeling of cohesion on this album, although the style swings from light French jazz to more

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folky musings. Her voice is the constant through the fairly straightforward storytelling. Before you realise it, the 13 songs are over and you’re left feeling like you’ve watched the American version of Chocolat.

The girlish lyrics trip thoughtfully over the up and down rhythms and lovely double bass. Harmonies on certain songs add a simplicity to what could have been an over-

complicated album.

It is no surprise to learn that Joanna Chapman-Smith studied composition, as each song is timed beautifully and flows seamlessly through the overall theme. The album is like listening to a movie soundtrack with each song playing over a different scene conjuring up different visuals using the same characters and scenery. She duets with her brothers, Tim and Dan Chapman-Smith, on Between The Minds, which is one of the strongest of the album. My one

complaint is that at times there seems to be a lack of modernism to the album. Some of the instrument choices, if one were to be critical, could sound a little dated which means the album doesn’t really stand out as a peerless, new take, but more of a homage to older jazz/folk genres.

However, simplicity and softness is the key to this album, not revolution. It doesn’t shout at you about how good it is, you just listen and enjoy it, but before long, you’re nodding a head or tapping a toe or feeling like you’re in a familiar warm blanket.

Pete Row - The Merry Go Round EP Released: 11.06.2010 Label: Communion Music Words: Ross Park

he would have sworn I’d borrowed it from him.

This is one of the first releases from the Communion label.

Started as a night at Notting Hill Arts Club its founders My dad would like this. That, I include members of Mumford promise, is a big compliment. My and Sons and Cherbourg, and dad has his little room where he it has showcased acts such as has a few records framed on the Mumford themselves, Noah and wall; Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, the Whale, Laura Marling and Santana etc. I managed to take Peggy Sue. Understandably a few of his less favoured ones they’ve been closely associated – Harry Nillson, The Eagles, with the ‘nu-folk’ movement of America, you get the idea. He’s which Pete Roe is also likely to be very into his late 60s/early 70’s included, particularly having just south California scene and if this come off tour as Marling’s multiEP hadn’t come on CD ( a most instrumentalist. wonderfully packaged one at that) It’s perhaps more by association

than sound that Roe will be grouped with them though. He is less folk than these acts and far more in the traditional singer songwriter mode. Not in the Paulo Nutini mode mind, more with the golden generation of LA singer songwriters mentioned already.

His soothing tone and gentle teasing of his guitar on Bellina and Oh Suzanna are hugely reminiscent of James Taylor. On Bellina, Roe entices us with a ‘fine day to go to the sea’ and the song suggests Venice beach as opposed to Brighton.

Underneath The Apple Tree demonstrates Roe’s mellow twisting and melodic guitar picking and lyrics such as ‘Out here in the country I’ll try to clear

my head’ continue to suggest a simple and sun-soaked existence.

The title track finds a different Roe. Almost whispering the words as if it’s too hard to let the thoughts out of his mouth over a gentle strummed guitar, it’s a beautiful piece, the music alone carrying such emotion. An ode to another horse on the merry go round, he’s unable to break free from the ‘unchanging course to which we are bound’ and stand alongside her. The lyrics, earnest and heartfelt, prove evocative of young love, (‘Often I’d prayed that you’d look around’) and confirms that while it doesn’t quite sit alongside your nu-folk collection, you’ll find room for it with the records you’ve stolen from your dad.

Fun - Aim & Ignite Released: 07.06.2010 Label: Nettwerk

Words: Chantelle Pattemore the fact that scattered throughout the track are the clanging sounds of steel drums.

Yes, steel drums. How many bands currently signed to an indie label do you know that readily feature this I don’t think I have ever been left Caribbean gem of an instrument? as confused by an album as I have Exactly. Next we move onto by fun.’s debut, Aim and Ignite. the fact that Nate Reuss’ lead Their name screams the fact that vocals are more than just slightly the music is hardly going to be resonant to those of sickly-sweet dark and dreary, yet I still didn’t pop connoisseur Mika. But wait! anticipate half the sounds to flood Don’t let that put you off, I can’t my ears that subsequently did over stand the man either but I made it through the whole of Aim and the following forty minutes.

At Least I’m Not As Sad (As I Ignite without wanting to rip my Used To Be) kicks off the record, ears off, which is clearly a good and it certainly makes you sit up sign about (and for) fun.. Reuss is and take notice. Let’s start with clearly having a great time singing

and his enthusiasm is infectious because however guilty you may feel about advocating such obvious power-pop, you ultimately find yourself humming along.

Swiftly changing time signatures play a prominent role, as the band flit between fast to slow tempos without a second thought. Be Calm features even more unexpected inclusions as we’re treated to accordions and a trusty penny whistle to name but a few, and I Wanna Be The One regales us with some lively trumpet fanfares. Benson Hedges meanwhile showcases four different genres in its four-minute duration, with varying amounts of vaudeville, pop, choral and soft rock all featured. Beat that, Mika. fun.’s sound will stay with

you but not necessarily for the reasons they were aiming for, as the sheer randomness of the entire record is the predominant lasting impression. The whole record has a very playful feel and the blatant rhyming lyrics work against them, but they manage to redeem themselves with the intrinsic layering of percussion that is more advanced than first impressions might suggest. Fun. may simply be happy to echo their boisterous name and cultivate an entertaining persona. However, if they desire to be recognised as enduring musicians, they’re going to have to take themselves more seriously before anyone else can.

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Jane Weaver - The Fallen By Watch Bird Released: 14.06.2010 Label: Bird Words: Salwa Azar

femininity and fables.

The collaborations share a dreamy interpretation of the mythological, romantic and interpretive idea behind the album, the inception of This is, apparently, a pop concept which started around 2007. Each song is different in style, but the album. Jane Weaver does not folk leanings always being the disappoint with her conceptual ability, although I would question outweighing style. Whilst the “pop” as chosen adjective. It seems coherency of the theme isn’t quite more made up of folk, gingerbread there, the album is interesting, houses and indeed Ginger Snaps soothing, pleasant and engaging.

Something that jars is that the mastering doesn’t always do its best to make the vocals sound strong in the mix which, for a vocally-heavy album, should be paramount. The themes are there but we rely on the vocals to tell the story and they are often lost in the echo and softness of the mix, so it has the effect of relegating the whole album to background music.

Indeed, the album has many songs that which could soundtrack the works of Gus Van Sant or a Lars Von Trier, yet on their own they have an almost soporific effect of

lulling you to sleep because of the vagaries of the vocal track, the water-nymph harp and lingering chord effect.

Repeat listens reveal The Fallen

By Watch Bird to be a charming and imaginative foray into a world of mythical interpretation and feminine emotion. Lovely too, if you’ve ever looked at a forest or the sea and thought about fairies, gods and monsters.

Apparatjik – We Are Here

Released: 15.06.2010 Label: Meta Merge Un Recordings Words: Chantelle Pattemore

Apparatjik are one of the best musical ‘supergroups’ out there at the minute, yet chances are you’ve never heard of them. Comprised of Guy Berryman of Coldplay, Magne Furuholmen of A-Ha, Jonas Bjerre of Mew and eminent producer Martin Terefe, these guys shy away from the publicity circuit and let their music do the talking – to the extent that their live performances are conducted behind opaque screens.

We Are Here was actually released rather discreetly via their website only back in February, but they’re only garnering more attention now that their record is being re-released on an

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international scale.

Those aware of the band back at the start of the year were in for a treat, and those only just discovering them now must surely be kicking themselves for not having their ears closer to the ground sooner.

With each member entering the band with their own distinct background sound and history, what has resulted is not a blatant amalgamation of these separate entities but an entirely different direction. Created instead is an array of electro-pop sounds which serve to inspire, enchant and rouse the senses.

Bursting, clashing and clanging electronics that sound like someone having a crazy time in a scrap yard ensures opening track Deadbeat makes for an imposing first impression. However, these jagged instrumentals are slightly dissipated by Bjerre’s immediately

recognizable intangible, higher pitched vocals, which add a transcendental ambience throughout. Add to the equation amorous lyrics buried beneath the gnarly rhythms and we have two opposing elements creating what should really be a dysfunctional sound; yet with Apparatjik they somehow complement each other and it all falls into place.

Electric Eye transports you to the other world that the band envisage themselves from, with vocals distorted to sound like the extra-terrestrial and building synths battling each other to be the first to flood over and propel you to a different dimension entirely. As the album progresses, early intensity gives way to lighter, more luminous melodies, with In A Quiet Corner featuring exposed, slower vocals and for a brief second it feels as though the façade they have so intricately constructed is going to be slowly dismantled.

Alas, before even the top layer can be fully peeled away, the pulsating beats soon reappear with just as much gusto as they demonstrated before.

The general perception at the end of the thirteen tracks is that there is nothing spectacularly new about their music, but what is there are genuinely fine examples of previously established sounds. The experimentation aspect of the record is its most appealing element and you feel compelled to listen on, as you’re never entirely sure what tangent they’re going to veer off to next.

Team this with the mysterious and captivating persona they present and what’s left is a valiant effort possessing some exciting ideas and galvanizing potential. Apparatjik are most definitely here and I cannot wait to see what they have planned next.

The Amazing - Waiting For A Light To Come Released: 14.06.2010 Label: Subliminal Sounds Words: Matt Fearon

to fulfil, and despite listeners potentially feeling robbed from the offset with what suggests only half an album, the band don’t sound like they’re in any rush to justify so many genres in such little time.

Before even playing this album, Listening back on previous the back cover reads a sparse list of six tracks. Clocking in at less than efforts, the band seem to have 27 minutes, can this really even be patented a shoegaze-esque,

another instrument, just as significantly insignificant as the other, everything melting together into one and lulling you to sleep far from boredom. Head Beaches pulls this off to a tee, the soaring guitar licks and washy suds of percussion surrounding Christoffer Gunrup’s vocals.

Another exciting moment is Defect. Borrowing largely from Radiohead, the first riff screams Just, and Reine Fiske advertises

and title track of the album, is quaint and downright lovely, albeit an ambient repetition of the title under luscious acoustics and tinkling ivory tones. However it cuts shortly after the two and a half minute mark, why? Were The Amazing to review their folk-rockpsych-blah tag and stick to what they do best, then the track could have been an ambient epic, and surely pushing the thrifty album length up a little wouldn’t do any

classed as an album? Describing themselves as “Swedish folk-rockpsych-pop”, The Amazing have set themselves a fair few quota

himself as a guitar maverick a la Greenwood.

Other than that, there’s not much else to note. The closer,

harm either, would it?

dreamy haze which works brilliantly. The Amazing lean towards exactly what their name suggests when the vocal becomes

Roky Erickson & Okkervil River - True Love Cast Our All Evil Released: 07.06.2010 Label: Chemikal Underground Words: Nick Foster

with this scene (as his band were one of the only ones to have any real commercial success). The 13th Floor Elevators split up after a handful of albums (debut The Psychedelic Sound Of With the Dum Dum Girls and The 13th Floor Elevators and the their ilk getting praise from the classic Easter Everywhere being music press for mimicking the particular albums of note) and glorious scuzzed sounds of midErickson was diagnosed with sixties garage rock bands, there paranoid schizophrenia and sent is probably no better time for one to a psychiatric hospital. of its original leading lights to Now, teaming up with new release a new LP. backing band Okkervil River, Roky Erickson, lead singer Roky is back with True Love from Texan punk psychedelics Cast Out All Evil.

13th Floor Elevators, is one of There are no You’re Gonna probably only a handful of iconic Miss Me or Slip Inside Your names that you may associate House to be found here but, on

the plus side, the first and last tracks would make a mainstream producer delete their Pro Logic software in disgust due to their no-fi-lo-fi sound. Unfortunately, the rest of the album doesn’t quite live up to the, “In your face, I don’t give a shit how you think this sounds, it’s all about the songs maaan”, of these book ends and the album quickly descends into the realm of the worthy but not particularly memorable fair.

Highlights are few and far between (bar the first and last songs) but Goodbye Sweet Dreams, Bring Back The Past and Birds Crash stand out as good, if not remarkable examples of the Roky Erickson new alt country sound.

True Love Cast Out All Evil is not a bad album and by no means either a sell out or disgrace however, really, the best thing I can say about it is that is made me listen to The Psychedelic Sound Of The 13th Floor Elevators again — and for that I will be forever grateful.

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Johnny Flynn - Been Listening Released: 07.06.2010 Label: Transgressive Records Words: Chantelle Pattemore

Folk is currently having somewhat of a shining moment in the mainstream, and Johnny Flynn is the latest artist to be pushed into its glare, with The Times going so far as to declare him ‘the next poster boy of the nu-folk scene.’

Returning to our attentions with his second album Been Listening, his heartfelt and sincere lyrics lure us in to a world where love is simply told how it is, but is it really anything different to what we’ve been offered more readily by bands such as Noah and the

Whale and Mumford and Sons over the past year?

Flynn relates a more traditional style of folk, rather than the pop-infused style that has been recently been gathering momentum. Songs such as Barnacled Worship are so ingrained with traditional sounds that at times I feel like I’ve been transported back a hundred years to the rural countryside of Ireland.

Trumpets play a significant role in the composition of songs on this record, and make for a rather obtrusive inclusion in comparison to the daintily plucked acoustic strings that appear alongside them. As the album progresses, electric guitars and drums become more abundant, and add a more

blues-y touch to proceedings which integrate better with the brass we’ve seen interjected from the beginning.

The vocals are generally very stripped back and raw, which significantly aids in creating his earthy and established folk sound. Impassioned but deliberate, Flynn sings with conviction whilst maintaining a sense of innocence and spontaneity which adds to his charm. This innocuous tone is also conveyed through the lyrics, which set the scene of broken hearts and yearning love amongst the dew and the harvest of which he describes in rather an idealistic manner. Somewhat unsurprisingly this record features The Water a duet with current folk sweetheart Laura Marling, but despite there being such potential in this pairing, the result is rather

lacklustre. Granted, their voices compliment each other well, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t Flynn’s intention to invite an artist onto his record who would ultimately serve to highlight all the weaker points in his vocals with her almost flawless, ethereal ones.

The album may not be life-changing material but it’s an honourable effort from an artist attempting to encapsulate all the finer points of the folk genre. With the majority of songs clocking in at nearly five minutes, the problem is that they are often too prolonged and as a result fail to hold one’s attention.

There has been much hype about this man, but realistically his sound is currently too prosaic to garner him the attention that his contemporaries have enjoyed.

Perfume Genius - Learning Released: 21.06.2010 Label: Organs / Turnstyle Words: Matthew Britten

Everybody deals with trouble in different ways. Some like to chat about their problems, others prefer to keep quiet, whilst other focus outwards their energy outwards on the world, either positively or negatively. Mike Hadreas has dealt with his strife by making an album. Under the name Perfume Genius, he’s taken on his own kind of therapy whilst committing to record some of the year’s most

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touching and involving songs.

The tragedies are many, counterbalanced only by the undeniable beauty of Mike’s work.

Mister Peterson is the most obvious example – a chronicle of an older man that ‘let me smoke weed at his truck’ and ‘made me a tape of Joy Division’ who, later would jump off a building. Channelled through his fragile, crystalline voice, it’s a poignant, earnest ode to a friendship lost, almost crushing in its honesty. The same theme is one that runs through the album, remaining harrowing and frank, but never being less than utterly enthralling.

A lot of the album’s success has to be given to the production of the record.

The demos were arresting thanks to their stripped back voice and piano simplicity, feeling like the unearthing of a prodigy and stumbling across a confessional in equal measure. There surely must’ve been a temptation to go fully orchestral, but to have done so would’ve robbed Learning of the majestic isolation that it inhabits.

As it is, the fragile nature of the lyrics is mirrored throughout the record, with only the deftest of alterations made to the original composition of the tracks.

It’s almost impossible to imagine the amount of emotional energy that must’ve gone into make these

ten tracks as it can be an exhausting listen, in the best possible way. The chances of hearing this at a club night or on an advert are slim to none, and though the slender 30 minute play time may hint at pop, this is a collection of stark, subtle entries.

Already, it is easy to tell that this has all the hallmarks of a timeless piece, and for the sake of Perfume Genius’ health, we can only hope that he is unable to follow this up with another album just as heartfelt and traumatic. But for Mike Hadreas, this has always been about more than the music itself.

Eddy Current Suppression Ring - Rush To Relax Released: 17.05.2010 Label: Melodic Words: Bradley Poole

Melbourne quartet Eddy Current Suppression Ring release their third album Rush to Relax after enjoying some notable domestic

curiosity then maybe being ticketed as the finest proto-punk band south of the equator is. Although perhaps, therein lies the rub. The ‘finest proto-punk and south of the equator’ is an admirable title but not one that really translates any relevance to this northern hemisphere resident.

In any case, there is no discernable

manages to pull off amateurish naivety. Don’t get me wrong ECSR are in fact amateurs, they don’t operate as a full time band but rather create and produce for the love of playing music.

Undeniably a noble position but seemingly only one step more entrepreneurial than countless bedroom musicians and guitar shop jammers.

Considering the manner of its recording, I would at least expect

a collection of individual tracks you might expect a pulsating series of short stories but this is an expressionless monotony, the only signpost of emotion lying in the song titles (Anxiety, Gentleman, I Can Be A Jerk & Second Guessing).

It’s rather mean spirited to knock what is obviously a love of the musical craft but even with a favour to constructive criticism, it’s difficult to find much here if you’re not already aware of the

success and international critical acclaim off of their first two discs Eddie Current Suppression Ring and Primary Colours, both released in the UK on a double disc set last summer.

If raising influences to The Pixies, Violent Femmes and The Fall is not enough to swell some

comparison to any of the bands mentioned above, who no doubt play heavily on ECSR’s car stereo.

The method behind the madness was to record the album in a matter of hours in the band’s practice room in an attempt to capture a primal spirit and love of improvisation but that only

a satisfyingly complete body of work, the half hour of power in which the punk seed is rooted, but if you happened to ‘zone out’ every four minutes (not entirely inconceivable) you might question whether you’d ever advanced from the first track. That being the case, if you were to take this as

band. Having said that after three albums and international activity what do I know? It could well be that I just don’t get it.

A local record? For local people?

There’s nothing for me here.

Anathema - We’re Here Because We’re Here Released: 31.05.2010 label: Kscope Words: Robert Miller led by Porcupine Tree’s Steve Wilson, promised an album which would prove at the very least interesting. Despite the warning signs of HIM’s Ville Vallo providing guest vocals Since moving away from their for a track, I was still expecting original Doom Metal sound in the something more from We’re Here mid 90’s into the atmospheric rock Because We’re Here. arena, Anathema have managed The opening track Thin Air to draw numerous comparisons starts off with an encouragingly to the likes of Pink Floyd and hypnotic introduction, which Radiohead as well as garner gradually builds momentum, but increasingly positive reviews. never fully develops any further After a seven year gap since than this. This is followed by 2003’s A Natural Disaster, these the generic alternative rock of encouraging progressions, coupled Summer Night Horizon and the with the albums production being

excessively melancholic Dreaming Light, a synth and piano laden track that unfortunately falls flat in what can only be described as a sub-par attempt at Sigur Ros. From this point on the album relies too heavily on layered harmonies and mournful lyrics in songs that really have no need to meander for as long as they do, and eventually seem to blend together and become indistinguishable from the last.

It takes until the final third of the album before anything of interest breaks through, namely the stand out track Get Off, Get Out, which, despite still crossing the five minute mark, is a distinctly more concise and

structured track with a decent punchy rock melody.

We’re Here Because We’re Here isn’t a terrible album, just one extremely far removed from what I was expecting. This effort won’t earn Anathema any new fans, but should keep the ones they already have more than happy.

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Mother Mother - O My Heart Label: Last Gang Released: 31.05.2010

Words: Mathew Parri Thomas Hailing from Canada (admit it, you’re already more interested), Mother Mother are all about pop. It’s not the teen-pleasing, guitar-wielding bubblegum of Busted; it’s not the worryingly flamboyant ‘Pop’ is something of a dirtyword technicolour hell of Mika; it’s these days. Those who consider brass, it’s strings, it’s clever shifts their taste in music to be more in tempo and beds of tight, warm discerning than the produced-towithin-an-inch-of-its-life disposable harmonies. The Vancouver quintet’s chart hits might shirk at the idea second effort, O My Heart, was of a pop album — even more released at the tail end of last year so a pop/rock album. Images of across the Atlantic and finally, just Scouting For Girls, McFly and in time for summer, it reaches these stadiums filled with screaming shores. youngsters clad in fuzzy, blinking Driving bass from the school head-wear and a stage show of Kim Deal opens the album that contains 100% too much with a dark, brooding and driven pyrotechnics spring to mind. But, atmosphere finished off by snare what’s wrong with a bit of pop? accents, four-to-the-floor kick drum and distant, atmospheric Music which is heavy on melodies; tight with its harmonies; polished in vocals. In the three and half its production. Surely these musical minutes that follow the track rises and falls as thick guitars are offset ideals haven’t been relegated to with warm harmonies, rhythms airwaves of Radio 1 on a Sunday night (do they still do the chart on a which won’t settle, and Ryan Guldemond’s vocals which punch Sunday night?)

through urgent and focused. And that’s just the opener.

Giving a home to all the pop hooks and sensibilities is O My Heart’s production, handled deftly by Howard Reedkopp (New Pornographers, Tegan & Sara). With the newfound love of all things lo-fi dominating at the moment, the well executed, perfectly pitched production here is a breath of fresh air. Drums sound tight and thick, guitars crunch and push though, vocals sit high and soft. The use of mute trumpet and simple stings is dappled across the record to great effect.

Speaking of pop hooks and sensibilities, On O My Heart Mother Mother bought the book and added a few pages of their own. Hey Loft, a tale of love in a barn gone wrong (‘My Daddy’s got a gun, you better run’) spits its vocals over a schizophrenic riff — it’s like Dirty Projectors with less pretence and more balls. Ghosting is a delicately finger picked,

harmony-led tale of unrequited love (‘You don’t need treats, you don’t need tricks and you don’t need me’), complete with gorgeous beds of strings, wordless harmonies and a middle eight breakdown adding the ebb and flow of the dynamics.

Body Of Years opens with Pixiesaping bass and drums backbone.

Wrecking Ball is built around a toe-tapping banjo riff. Each track on offer has its own twists, turns and tricks that add constant flavour and interest. It’s all far too much to take in on one or two listens, which is handy because giving this repeat spins is far from a chore.

With O My Heart Mother Mother have created a record which takes all the constituent bits of pop music and deploys them with deadly accuracy. At no point does anything become crass, saccharine or trite — musically or lyrically.

If you’re looking for a break from chin-stroking bleeps and pieces, lo-fi chic, and hipster noise then look no further. O My Heart doesn’t take itself too seriously, but you should.

Blitzen Trapper - Destroyer Of The Void Released: 14.06.2010 Label: Sub Pop Words: Richie Brown

When I first received this album a few weeks back I found myself gleefullytweeting that “if the first track was anything to go by then Blitzen Trapper have made the album of the year.” That’s a big

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if, of course, and if the track were a basket, it’d be a shiny, highly-polished basket literally stuffed with eggs. That’s not to say the rest of Destroyer of the Void fails to live up to the marvellous opening title track, there’s plenty more to go round. Plenty of eggs.

Since last year’s retrospective EP (Black River Killer) the band have been on tour with both Wilco

and Fleet Foxes and, once again, the quality of this new disc will appeal greatly to fans of both acts. Absorbing stories of Southern love and loss, murder on midnight trains and the intriguing tale of a wandering tailor combine with the relatively straighter rock of Laughing Lover and Heaven and Earth which points a finger in the direction that the Arctic Monkeys appeared to be heading, rather less successfully, on Humbug.

But instinct returns us to the title track when summing up the album. During six minutes of sonic madness this chameleonic, chaotic canvas brings to mind Rubber Soul-era Beatles, Bob Dylan, Bowie and, believe it or not, even the operatic histrionics of early Queen. What’s more, it gets away with it, making it a must-download nestling among a strong group of healthy hatchlings.

Light Pollution - Apparitions Released: 21.06.2010 Label: Carpark Words: Salwa Azar

Take the Americana element of Modest Mouse, the most upbeat Bon Iver and Grizzly Bear,instrumental Arcade Fire,

A very apt name for a band, as the visual mix of industrial and natural fits the whimsical oldschool/new-school nature exhibited on this album, creating worlds of emotion as you move with the the band. As far as openers go, Good Feelings doesn’t get much better. You can

drool in an opium haze, conjuring Jeff Buckley in their dreamy quiltyness and offcentre rhythm.

The quality of this debut fulllength is surprising and nothing seems too heavy or out of place.

Indeed, it’s a carefully considered album full of different elements that come together in a layered but beautifully gelled whole, whilst each song makes another

interesting to see a few unexpected interjections to provide a real palettecleansing before the next dreamy, evocative piece.

Apparitions is an album of importance for space cadets, explorers and the urban adventurer hipster in all of us.

Especially whilst travelling in planes, trains and automobiles looking out the window or looking up at the sky and

synth New Order and bung it all in an audio layer cake, add what goes in ‘special brownies’ to taste, and you have Apparitions.

With songs lengths regularly over 4 minutes, there is a sense of scale and awe even that seeps out of the soundscape of this endeavor.

almost see the urban skyline, surrounded by industrial towers, the wilderness sweeping, just waiting for the inevitable night driving road trip.

It’s not all swooping sounds and purposeful forward-motion though. There are some moments that provide space to think, feel,

emotion pop to the surface, dreaming. undulating in rousing highs and contemplative lows in a wonderful package.

If someone twisted my arm to formulate a negative, it would only be that the phrasing of the songs throughout is similar.

On its follow up it would be

Richard James - We Went Riding Released: 28.06.2010 Label: Gwymon Words: Bradley Poole Mynci, presented his first solo album The Seven Sleeper’s Den as a collection of simmering love songs and, while there are similar emotions here, the attention to the more complex Some things in life are quite simply layering is evident, giving a a pleasure: bank holiday weekends, more wholesome, honest result. grilled halloumi, the cool side Although strictly a solo record, of a pillow on a hot night — to there’s a generous input from name but a few . Richard James’ old bandmate Euros Child and latest offering We Went Riding singer/song writer Cate Le Bon. is one of those effortless, breezy, Recorded in a house in Pontcanna, unexpected pleasures that just Cardiff, overdubbed in various happened to come wisping into my Welsh locations and polished off in ears and into my life.

Carmarthen, his home town, it’s a Mr James, a founding member quite the local affair. of the now defunct Gorky’s Zygotic My first listen of this album

came about while I was walking along London’s Regents canal with the sun on my face and this could be why I have an ingrained association with this LP and a gentle, uplifting positivity.

Or perhaps it’s a purposeful determination of Richard and his band of fellow Welshmen and women to express the warmer, gentler side of humanity through a perfectly placed strum, occasional piano chord and delicious harmony. I suspect, however, that always having been the softer side of GZM, that this is just the kind of guy he is and this is just the kind of music that flows.

And flow it does. The title suggests an undertaking of a journey and there’s a definite

direction of travel throughout.

Tracks meander freely from one to the next, a perfect ebb and flow, almost tidal. There’s just enough gusto and gumph dotted about to keep up adequate momentum to hold the algae off.

Maybe I was just lucky in hearing this on a day full of this year’s first real sunshine? Maybe I’d slept soundly the night before and was already enjoying a spring in my step? Or maybe Richard James has made an album that I just want to say lovely things about? Who knows? Although, I did find the cool side of the pillow.

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Paul Weller - Find The Torch, Burn The Plans

Tobacco - Maniac Meat Released: 28.06.2010 Label: Anticon

Released: 14.06.2010 Label: Island

Words: Phil Russell

Maniac Meat is the sophomore effort from Tobacco, the solo project of Black Moth Super Rainbow front man Tom Fec. While the album ventures into the “Experimental” realm for most part, it is surprisingly catchy and danceable. From the first track, Constellation Dirtbike Head, you know you are in for one hell of a ride. The album grabs you and dives full on into the insane.

The use of vintage synths, pitched vocals and drum machines help give the album a very quirky sound without feeling dated.

Having Beck sing on two of the tracks, Fresh Hex and Grape Aerosmith, just adds street cred to the already hipster avant-garde vibe of the album. Tom also continues musically where Beck left

Words: Keith Haworth

off on some of his earlier albums (think Mellow Gold but with more acid) so it’s fitting that he and Beck would work together. thought that his first album, Fucked Up Friends, was interesting but this is a case of the sequel being better than the original. It’s a wild and crazy album that is a joy to listen to.

This year’s Weller renaissance effortlessly continues apace with a double A-sidednew single, ‘Find The Torch, Burn The Plans’ / ‘Aim High’ , these tracks being two of the highlights on recent album ‘Wake Up The Nation’. ‘Find The Torch, Burn The Plans’ is Weller’s psychedelic anthem, a rallying call to arms for all the disaffected. An adrenalised howl of primal ro ck and roll. If ‘Find The Torch...’ is all set to be a new Weller anthem, then ‘Aim High’ is a return to the soulful Weller of The Style Council, recalling to mind the sadly underrated ‘Cost Of Loving’ album. This is a Stax-like soul number, an undisguised love song with Weller in falsetto mode, his voice gliding over the

gorgeous string arrangements and sending a shiver of excitement through your body as only the very best songs ever do, and this is arguably one of the best songs that Weller has ever written.

People Like Us & Wobbly – Music For The Fire Released: 14.06.2010 Label: Illegal Art Words: Bradley Poole presumably by themselves, the idea here is to express a narrative through the sampling of otherwise unrelated sounds, music and speech. This encourages each listener to interpret what they’re hearing in Music For The Fire is the brainchild their own way. of British artist Vicki Bennettt As a musical record it fails, these and American artist Jon Leidecker aren’t a collection of songs but both well established in their field of audio collages. An insight into in creating and exhibiting audio art the birth, duration and finality of projects. With a raft of respected relationships through the stitching and renowned international venues together of samples from golden commissioning and hosting such oldies, movies and well just about projects their latest expression comes anything. The Avalanches ‘Since I in the form of a full LP. left You’ and 2ManyDJ’s ‘As Heard Described absurdly as a On Radio Soulwax’ bootleg series ‘plunderphonic concept album’, are shining examples of creativity

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through sampling, but they are solid gold musical records designed to create song, this is not. Music For The Fire is as musically pleasing as scanning the radio for your favourite station while trying to have a conversation on a telephone with a crossed line, a ridiculous analogy but with an essence of truth.

If you approach this as a piece of art, a deliberate act of intellectual provocation then it does just fine.

Not out of place in a contemporary audio visual installation, which is a world from which it’s creators stem. On this approach the project is somewhat successful but this is offered in the framework of a conventional record, albeit unconventionally in a pay-what-youwant model made most famous by

Radiohead for their ‘In Rainbows’ release. In fact all releases in the last four years by their label ‘Illegal Art’ have been done so under this arrangement, which further emphasises the unique interactivity with the listener – ‘Pay what you want, Hear what you want’.

It can only be this arrangement that has allowed earlier works to garner some 25,000 downloads, unless the plunderphonic concept has a much stronger following than imagined, all with each listener devising their own interpretation.

My experience of this album is already written – a ridiculous analogy, with an essence of truth.

LCD Soundsystem Where: Brixton Academy When: 24th April 2010

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aking to the stage to rapturous applause for the second of a two night stint at London’s Brixton Academy, LCD Soundsystem, minus front man and de-facto leader James Murphy for the first few minutes, groove into town, hot on the heels of soon to be released new (and rumoured last) album This Is Happening. Not even a volcanic ash cloud could swamp the adulation and relief from both fans and band alike, at the fact they actually managed to make it to London having had to already cancel a show in Dublin earlier in the week due to said volcanic eruption. Opening with Sound of Silvers’ Get Innocuous, Murphy seemed in good and humble spirits informing the crowd that it was the first time they had played it on the tour, before the band rushed straight into Us v Them with bells chiming and beats pumping to a pulsing rhythm that had large parts of the crowd dancing all evening.

We were not actually treated to too much from the new album, only four songs from This Is Happening made the set, with Murphy telling the audience that he didn’t want to drown everyone in new stuff. However, the new songs sounded vibrant as ever and injected with the usual mix of intensity and charm that has personified LCD Soundsystem’s career so far. Pow Pow with its dance orientated beat, and the guitar driven All I Want being particular standouts from the new batch.

Highlights of the night were fan favourites All My Friends, its layered piano intro had the crowd in a frenzy as the song built and built to a climatic end,

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and the more laid back tones of debut single Losing My Edge with its monotone vocal delivery and nostalgiadriven lyrics. The real star of the band in the live arena however is drummer Pat Mahoney who manages to keep tight intricate and interesting rhythms flowing all night long, often on songs of 10 plus minutes in length. But all members play a part and each player has their own piece of the puzzle to bring to the table, much like the basis of Latin music where the song is made up equally of its parts, this band wouldn’t work if the focus was just on one or two people.

Sure Murphy is the singer, writer and the star in the studio, but as a live beast, they really do become LCD Soundsystem the band, rather than LCS Soundsystem the project.

As I leave the venue in floods of white balloons that were dropped from the sky during final song New York I Love You, But You’re Bringing Me Down, I ponder if the recent comments from Murphy about this possibly being their last album are in fact true.

He has made similar comments in the past. I hope not, this is a band that do cross genre music a whole lot better than many of the pseudo indie-dance bands we have seen a spate of in the last few years and they have managed to bring together a whole mêlée of fans from different backgrounds, and have successfully and most importantly, soulfully incorporated so many different styles into making good, thought-provoking dancebased music. And to top it all off they have a cracking live show to back it all up.

They are booked to play at London’s Wireless festival later in the year, sharing a bill with 2Many DJ’s, DJ Shadow and Unkle amongst others and hopefully they will tour again following the release of the new album.

It’ll be well worth catching them live, not least because it may be the last chance you get.

Words: Kevin Burgess

Holy Fuck Where: Digital, Brighton When: 21.05.2010

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fter a warm up from the man in the iron mask/ MF Doom with a beard, Holy Fuck soon graced the intimate confines of the seaside club.

Holy Fuck are a band who naturally blur the line between DJ and band, electro and rock. With barely a word said to the crowd the live experience feels like you’re having a fortunate glance into an early jam session. They face each other, tightly packed often exchanging glances of excitement and smiles, reflecting an intimacy that is shared with the room.

They break in early with some of their new tracks; the funk-fuelled guitar piece Red Lights. Soon followed by epic Latin America, which fills the room with sound, progressing from the clicking snare rim shots and Black Rebel bassline to the spaced out synth line. The crowd react well, giving a great introduction to Holy Fucks’ new album Latin.

Holy Fuck have a knack of not just making music, but creating an atmosphere. This is especially clear when

they play tracks from their last, critically acclaimed album LP. Tracks such as the frantic Super Inuit encourage even the most statuesque members of the audience to move while The Pules bumps up the BPM, delivering hammering drums and a strutting bassline, increasing heart rates throughout the room.

However it must be said, the crowd pleaser of the night was without doubt Lovely Allen. A piece that builds from the ground level with an effects line that simply screams optimism, to the progression that builds into a pounding epic, raising the crowd to the highest corners of the room.

The beauty of Holy Fuck is that they do not just play as a band, but create an atmosphere, a sensation that can’t help but move you. Working tightly together, like a group of witches around a caldron, they create music that has a sense of intimacy and nostalgia, creating a mood that envelopes the room, and all within it.

Words: James Threlfall

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Johnny Flynn Where: Electric Ballroom, Camden When: 26th May 2010

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o what did I know of Johnny Flynn before this gig? That he’s part of the Noah and The Whale/ Mumford and Sons/Laura Marling posse; The Times called him ‘the next poster boy of the nu-folk scene’ and that the CDX editor described him as ‘so hot right now’.

Before the sweats of “Flynn Fever” was the pleasure, the uplifting joy, of support band Dry The River.

Melodic and moving, they’re a band enjoying their music and their opportunity, with frontman Peter Liddle delivering lyrics like a preacher spreading the good word, and the gruffest looking bassist I’ve ever seen playing a glockenspiel.

The approved method for judging the folkyness of a gig is the check shirt/beard count and there was enough on show here for someone behind me to say, ‘I see he got the memo’ when Flynn walked on stage flannelled up (for stat fans, the check shirt count was moderate to high and the beard count was disappointingly low – you don’t get double points for sporting the combo). Surprisingly, the teenage girl factor was pretty high which backs up the description of Flynn being the latest ‘hot’ folky.

Opening with the thumping driving rhythm of The Box, Flynn seemed genuinely touched at the crowds reaction to him. Perhaps more used to spit and sawdust clubs than a venue of this size, he commented that he wasn’t used to having barriers separating him from the audience and it made him feel lonely. There were plenty of offers from the teenage girls to help him

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overcome this.

For his second song Flynn switches to mandolin and by the third song he’s onto violin, putting him with Seth Lakeman as the only person I’ve seen play violin and sing at the same time. It’s two thirds of the way through the set before he keeps an instrument for two songs in a row and when he does it’s for the slow building blues jam of Howl – even then he can’t help himself and whips out a trumpet. It almost seems like showing off how effortlessly he switches between instruments.

Flynn’s set is a combination of barndance style stompalongs and softly twisting guitar ballads, but it’s certainly the barndances that get the crowd going.

On songs like Tickle Me Pink and closer Eyeless in Holloway he’s contending with the crowd singing the lyrics back to him while their footstomping forces the rhythm home.

There’s a tender encore of The Water, before an energetic version of Leftovers left the audience feeling like a fly trapped in a lampshade — het up and nowhere to go. So how hot is Johnny Flynn? Well he ticks the boxes: multi-instrumentalist, good songs and yes, he’s very good looking, but tonight he never quite captures the ramshackle energy of his nu-folk compatriots to get his poster up on my wall.

Words: Ross Park Photo credit: Jubirubas

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Futureheads, Dutch Uncles, Love Bites and Bruises Where: Manchester Academy 3 When: 09.05.2010

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ither I was given the wrong information or this is a bad sign of the times. I thought this gig was supposed to be at the much larger Academy 2? That venue can hold around 700 – 1000. This one can barely hold 300. Were sales that slow? Or did the fact that part of the gig would be filmed mean that an artistic decision was made to perform the show in a place with more atmosphere? Or is this ticket a misprint?

I choose to believe the later. I’m a fool.

First, let’s talk about the support bands. Each band shows the two sides of the Futureheads. Love Bites and Bruises come from the Northeast (Newcastle, if I have to be precise) and they play power-filled pop songs on guitars. They are Futureheads without the artistic pretensions. One guitarist is wearing an Omar t-shirt, so I like him already. One guitarist looks forty. At least he does from a certain angle. I think it’s the hair.

The drummer has lots of hair. He is the obligatory speed and smash rhythm provider to the guitar-led assault. He is heavy mental. Good. The singer, well, he’s fine. He sings the songs and has the friendly patter. All boxes ticked, all songs decent and hook filled. There are not that many people here to listen to them.

That all sounds like I wasn’t impressed. I was, you should go and hunt out more stuff by them. Maybe they’ll catch a following from

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ever increasing 6Music listenership. Maybe. They deserve a break.

As do Dutch Uncles, who are doing a gig on local turf tonight, but without one of their guitarists. Stuck with a university geology group in the Lowlands due to volcanic ash. I’m sure there is some sort of irony happening there, but I’m too slow on the uptake to spot it.

Dutch Uncles reflect the less successful artistic side to Futureheads, the bit they tried to express more on their second album and nobody bought into. Dutch Uncles mix seventies prog of the King Crimson kinds with elements of Wedding Present, C86, Talking Heads and effeteness Again, this introduction doesn’t promise much of a positive review does it?

Wrong. Dutch Uncles have two things going for them: decent songs and a fantastic guitarist. Lurking within their band they have a potential indie-guitar god in the making. He can do riffs and delicate phrasing within milliseconds of each other. Songs such as Love Bone get an extra kick to their funk base because of the guitar structures. They can even rise above the vocalist’s occasionally weak performance. He has a falsetto voice somewhere between Hot Chip and The Associates.

Now, that’s a style that has to be perfect in every detail when you do it or it can draw audiences back, and it noticeably did on a couple of occasions. Still, his gentle manner and polite style manages to bring in an audience that were initially sceptical.

And so to the main act, a carnival of sorts. No, hang on, that’s REM. No, it’s The Futureheads. Tonight we get: ● ● ● ● ● ● ●

● ● ●

●

Flowers in lapels Sing-a-long-a-Bush The wit and wisdom of Sunderland No slow moments, just slower moments Most of the first album (greatly appreciated by the crowd) A lot from the new album (not as well known but strong enough to get the crowd going) A fat man, with a purple face, in a tight t-shirt being described as the sexiest man in the building.

“Was it a Futureheads t-shirt bought at the gig?” I hear you cry? You may be right.

A couple of songs from the second album (both sounding better live than on record) A bit from the third album – not enough, in my opinion A drummer with more affectations than a string of heavy metal drummers. There’s something adorable about the boy, but you do worry about him Fun

Everything was in its right place. You would not be able to leave the show tonight with anything other than a smile on your face. The problem, and you knew that there was going to be a problem, lies elsewhere.

They’ve made a great new album that expands upon their sound while still keeping the essential elements that were missing from that damn second album.

There’s power and energy in each new song. I read a favourable review that compared them to the Foo Fighters. It pointed out how the Foo’s made intimate songs that can fill stadiums. Pop for people who like to pogo. Both bands, it said, have an element of experimentation but it’s a slow process. People who deride the bands may not here it, but it is definitely there.

The thing is, the Foo Fighters are huge. If they want to do an entire album of mainly acoustic songs they can get away with it. If the Futureheads did that they’d be dead. People don’t want them to experiment.

They want the new Ramones. No changes, play the first album again. If that happens it’s hard to say who’ll die first – the band or the audience. And that would be a shame, because The Futureheads are still one of the best bands out there. We just need more people to believe it, that’s all.

Words: Dean Coster

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eane seem to have slowly, almost invisibly, elevated themselves to giants of the British music scene.

Without much of the fanfare and furore that have surrounded lesser bands they have seen each of their four albums go to number one (becoming one of only a handful of artists to score four number one albums this century) and have shifted over ten million albums. They arrived in the picturesque setting of Bedgebury Pinetum in Kent for as close to a homecoming gig as they are likely to get in support of the Forestry Commission. The crowd was exceedingly middle class, which explains the picnics, with many coming up with ingenious ways of getting their food and drink safely inside; the couple next to me with white wine cunningly concealed in a Robinsons squash bottle were my personal favourites. Classy. For an awareness gig however, there was remarkably little awareness being spread and the majority of fans seemed to be more interested in their picnics than heading to one of the charity stalls set up around the perimeter of the outdoor arena, which is a shame but perhaps to be expected.

After surviving the treacherous obstacle course of picnic rugs, picnic chairs, picnic tables, picnic food, picnic…well you get the idea, it was time for Keane to take to the stage.

Launching straight in to Back in Time, one of the less inspiring offerings from their recent Night Train EP, they nevertheless exuded a confidence that comes from over a decade of live shows. Although each of their three albums have been hugely successful in spite of their continuous evolution, the songs from their debut ‘Hopes and Fears’ are still their best and, with a few exceptions, brought the largest cheers of the night. Bend and Break, This Is the Last Time, Everybody’s Changing, Somewhere Only We Know and Bedshaped were spread through a setlist that showcased an even spread of their material, the latter of these being two of the highlights of the evening.

If Keane were overwhelmed by the nature of the gig and by the reception that they were given by the crowd, as was frequently suggested by Tom in his crowd interactions, they didn’t show it in their performance, injecting energy and vigour in to tracks such as Spiralling, Stop For a Minute and Is It Any Wonder (the couple next to me nearly spilled their Robinsons wine) and pouring feeling and passion in to the likes of Try Again which was wonderfully stripped down in to an acoustic form, and set closer My Shadow, which was my pick of the Night Train EP tracks.

It’s clear that the band have a great time on stage and the inclusion of guitars, synths and other electronic wizardry has resulted in a more unpredictable and varied set that has a bit more of a zing to it than their earlier shows may have had.

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Once the lights had gone down for the final time and Keane had left the stage to rapturous applause I trudged back through the hordes of picnickers listening to the views of those around me. The general consensus was that this was one of the best Keane performances they had seen and I would have to agree.

Words: Adam Gibby

Black Soul Strangers Where: Camden Barfly When: 20th June 2010

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lack Soul Strangers are a band who have been getting much press attention recently, London gigs ago-go meant ample opportunity to get to see and hear the band in action for the first time.

The Barfly can be a chilling venue – the sort where a not switched on crowd can bring an event to its knees, or a where a lively crowd can humble the biggest of bands – this means there is an ideal chance to be grabbed by both hands for an emerging band looking to make the next step up. The Editors-esque sound that the band have borrowed and twisted into their own suits this sort of venue.

Dark but not melancholy, guitars don’t crash but cut through, drums play a key role in delivering the angularised rock/indie/pop which is a welcome change in the current musical climate.

Latest single, The Haunting, was a dominant feature of the set and a highlight. A glimmering vocal performance and melody that seeps into the music without dominating it, sits apart in the collection of songs the band play. Rock-less but soul-full, it is worth getting hold of by any means necessary.

There are very few British bands at the moment that seem capable of hitting the heights of their peers.

Who will be the next Interpol, Libertines or Franz Ferdinand and influence the next group of indie bands? Black Soul Strangers just could be in that bracket – the songs really are there. But, what sets apart most bands that break through from those that don’t, is captivating stage presence. BSS are nearly at a point where this is the case, and with a few more big gigs playing to unfamiliar audiences, that knack of getting into the minds of their crowd visually will come naturally.

Songs like Leave and Lies are brilliant on record (we’ll have that review for you in the next week, folks) and come across really well live. However, they need a little more than ‘well’ to push BSS up to the next notch. The song writing talent is evident and that is of course the hardest element to harness, so BSS have a leg up on the opposition in that regard, something that shouldn’t be underestimated.

If BSS can harness their obvious skill for writing immersive indie anthems and mix it up with a little more from their stage show, they could be on to something that is influential for a generation of bands to come.

Words: Matt Churchill

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The Drums Where: Heaven When: 19.06.2010

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ype can be a very dangerous tag to carry for any young new band and in our current information obsessed climate, it’s a notion that is tagged onto so many new up and coming young artists that more often than not, the hype will rarely amount to anything more than a damp squid in the back pages of the NME. Brooklyn’s The Drums arrive in the UK for two gigs at London’s Heaven having recently adorned the hallowed cover of the NME, who have tipped them as one of their ‘top up and coming acts’, ironically probably the 253rd ‘next big thing’ to be given similar treatment from the magazine since the emergence of the Strokes, a tough billing to live up to for the best of bands.

Support on the night came from London based band Veronica Falls, a four piece consisting of two males and two females, similar in tone and style to the recent trend of lo-fi, fuzzy indie pop and C86 inspired bands from across the Atlantic like Vivian Girls, Dum Dum Girls and Best Coast. Fusing punchy chords and pounding drums (with not one cymbal on show!) with pop melodies and tight hooks. It took a couple of songs into the short set for the band to find their feet, but by the time they reached the third song they hit a good stride and proved ample support for the night, spending the remainder of the set churning out catchy and jaunty songs that had more than a strong nod towards the Vaselines but nevertheless performed in good spirit and delivered with a youthful and ramshackling determination, having released a couple of singles so far, their debut album is expected soon.

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The Drums enter the stage minus front man Jonathan Pierce to an expectant and raucous crowd and, a slightly worryingly large amount of screams from pubescent girls who I can only imagine had been let of the leash for the first time in the vague hope that this band could be ‘their band’, not the best of markers for the gig I must say.

I suppose I must admit straight off the bat that, this gig and this band didn’t really do it for me on the night, I went in with an open mind having only heard a couple of songs from the debut EP, but it would be unfair to beat around the bush for two paragraphs without mentioning that, I just didn’t feel it. Pierce joined the band after a minute of the opener , which was a touch promising and remarkably fuller sounding than on record, but the performance didn’t get any better from then on for me, two songs in and the guitarist drops his guitar to spend the song hopping around the stage with a tambourine in his hand looking like nothing more than a wildly drunk Kate Bush trying to river dance, whilst singer Pierce, trying his best not to seem too much like a young Morrissey clone just doesn’t have the charm, charisma or wit to pull off the prancing behaviour on show tonight.

I don’t know if pretentious is the right word to use in this instance, I think every cocky young artist has the born right to be a bit pretentious, its kind of what partly drives the creative process when you’re young and have an overreaching and naive mind, but you can only really get away with it if you have something to back it up, if you have enough raw and untapped talent

and enough charm and integrity to get away with it, but I just don’t think the songs are there, nothing was catching my attention all night, influences were worn Throughout, and with obvious nods to the likes of The Smiths and the Cure you would think it would be pretty hard to miss, but for me these songs were not coming from anywhere believable, it felt like the songs were a calculated and contrived concoction of ideas primarily to get the band into a scene and into a record deal, ultimately, all pretentions and preconceptions aside, I just didn’t believe them.

Maybe I’m being a tad harsh, having listened to the album since, there are one or two decent songs but nothing more, hype is a tough cookie to escape from and there is nothing to say these boys will not go on to become successful or break from those shackles, but from the evidence on show tonight, it would have to be a mighty turnaround in my ears and I came away from the gig being disappointed once again with a band being touted as the next big thing, I don’t know why we fall for it every time.

“Every cocky young artist has the born right to be a bit pretentious”

Words: Kevin Burgess Photo: Rosie Lord

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“With no power, comes no responsibility�

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aking a movie of a comic book is a minefield at the best of times. On the one hand you have to present the film in a believable modern world and, on the other hand, you have to include the stupid parts to keep the fan-boys happy.

Sometimes it works (Superman the Movie, Batman Begins, X2, Iron-Man) and sometimes it doesn’t (Daredevil, Ghost Rider, Punisher: War Zone, Spiderman 3, Batman Forever, Batman & Robin, Catwoman, Fantasic Four, Hulk, Superman 3, Superman 4, X3, Superman Returns). It is a hard job.

It’s all about approach. In 1978, Richard Donner famously approached Superman the Movie with one word in mind: verisimilitude. This meant that no matter what was happening on screen, it had to have the appearance of being true or real. We had to be shown that a man could fly and, more importantly, how he got here and who he is. We had to witness the foundations of the house being laid before we were allowed venture inside. The movie then adapted that principal as its tag line, which was: “You will believe a man can fly?”

Before Superman the Movie, any attempt at making a comic book film adaptation was tongue in cheek and camp. The Batman series from the 1960s and the 70s Spiderman TV series were prime examples of this.

Comic book films were just not considered to be something adults would be interested in. Three further Superman films followed throughout the early to mid 80s and the returns diminished further each time.

It wasn’t until 1989 that Hollywood really took notice.

Batman opened on June 23rd 1989 and earned 400 million dollars worldwide. This was a real eye-opener and reminded the studios that if you made an effort and hired the right guys, you could get a half decent film, make lots of money, and, more importantly, a shit-load of merchandise (Jack Nicholson took a cut of the merchandise as part of his contract, I can only begin to imagine how rich he got from that deal).

A flurry of comic book movies followed (Dick Tracy, The Phantom, The Shadow, and The Punisher) and no one really remembers them. The approach was all wrong. They all wanted to be another Batman -- dark, brooding, unique -- and, unfortunately, they weren’t.

Three more Batman films followed and, much like Superman before it, they diminished in quality culminating in a terrible fourth film.

Once again, it seemed that the world was sick of low quality, half-arsed comic book adaptations and the genre took yet another nose dive when Spawn came out in 1997.

In 2000, Bryan Singer revived the corpse once again when he made X-Men. By no means a master piece, it stopped the runaway train of shit that comic book films were becoming. Once again, Signer grounded the project in reality and did a great job with this and the superior sequel.

Another deluge of average adaptations followed, (Spider-Man, Hellboy, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, From Hell and Blade: Trinity) until finally in 2005, Christopher Nolan (Memento, Insomnia) made Batman Begins.

Batman Begins once again built its foundations on verisimilitude and showed you every step of the way how we arrived at our destination. It answered all questions all of the smart arses ever had about Batman: Where did he get his car? Solved. Where did

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he get his costume? Sorted. First and foremost though, Nolan took it as read that viewers were not stupid and would need to really see what motivates someone to dress up as a bat and be a vigilante. By the end credits he had achieved exactly that. Not only did you believe it, you wanted to see more and more of it.

Post-Batman Begins, we had another slew, but this time, on the whole, they were made under the same banner of verisimilitude. Iron Man and The Dark Knight are great examples of this. Iron Man really worked. It all felt entirely plausible, which is some achievement as Iron Man itself as a concept just lends itself to fantasy. The Dark Knight was such a successful example of verisimilitude that it even got recognition from the Oscars. The fact remains that if you approach a comic book film with verisimilitude, you will not fail. Kick-Ass is a great example of this and, coincidentally, it is also a fantastic film.

Kick-Ass is the story of a teenager who sets out to become a real life superhero. His actions are publicized on the internet and inspire others. He gets caught up with other vigilantes who are on a mission to take down a gangster. Sounds simple doesn’t it? Well, that could be easy to mess up; after all, we’re dealing with a teenager – he could be all whiney and bitchy like Tobey Maguire or Hayden Christensen and spend most of the film dealing with his problems by making us feel bad for him. You know, teens have problems.

This film, hmm, it could be rubbish? Relax. It isn’t. In fact, it’s a fucking masterpiece.

The teenager in question (Dave Lizewski) is played

by English actor Aaron Johnson. He is anything but annoying. He is extremely likeable, funny and cool. You would never know that he is English and he carries the film effortlessly. Nicholas Cage puts in his best performance in eight years (since Adaptation) as one of the other vigilantes “Big Daddy”.

In any other film, you would say that Cage would steal every scene that he is in, however, every scene in which Cage appears he is accompanied by Chloe Grace Moretz as “Hit Girl”. She gives what can only described as a ‘junior powerhouse’ performance. She swears and kills in almost every scene and you find yourself marvelling at a twelve year old girl dishing out pain. This is by no means a normal film.

Christopher Mintz-Plasse (McLovin from Superbad) plays another vigilante who goes by the name “Red Mist” and he is his usual funny and effortlessly likeable self (see Role Models for another example).

Mark Strong plays the baddie of the piece. A role he seems to play a lot recently (the recent Sherlock Holmes) and plays with real aplomb. Suitably menacing and a real hard bastard who is not to be messed with.

There are shades of parody running throughout. The street Dave Lizewski lives in looks, to me, like the

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same street from Spider-Man. There is even a dig at Spider-Man at one point with the main protagonist announcing via narration that “With no power, comes no responsibility”. At one point Dave and his friends go to the cinema and “The Sprit 3” is playing (the joke being that the recent film adaptation of The Spirit was a bomb critically and commercially). But, this feeling of parody is not an over whelming one.

This film grabs you by the lapels and plants you on a rollercoaster of hilarity, violence and awesome action.

Kudos must go to Matthew Vaughn. He has really put together a fantastic action/comedy film. The action is outrageously hardcore and the humour is at times hilarious. To think, he was originally attached to make X-Men 3. Vaughn understands that if you are to attempt something that is overly violent by nature, then you must go all the way or not at all. For action movie lovers like me, there are wonderful examples of fantastically choreographed “gun-fu” and awesomely precise knife work.

There is a real feeling that the people behind this film knew what they were doing and how to do it. The outcome is like watching the Red Arrows at work.

Precise, considered and making the complicated look very simple. Vaughn even found time to give cameos regulars such as Dexter Fletcher and Jason Flemyng, who nearly always appear in Vaughn or Guy Ritchie films.

There are parts of this film that just feel like the artist adding brush flairs to an already wonderful piece of art that just confound the senses and actually make you (and everyone near you in the cinema) chuckle with an almost palpable sense of disbelief and wonder.

One scene in particular mimics a first person shooter game with perfect precision, unlike in the film version of Doom which just came across as clumsy and lazy.

Personally speaking, as I left the cinema, only one throught ran through my mind. “This is how you do it”.

If only all comic book adaptations could be like this.

Words: John Rain

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There’s life in the old dog yet? John Rain looks at the cash-in of the comeback movie and some of the disasters spawned.

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f there is one thing in Hollywood that you can always be sure of, money talks. If something makes money, it will always be revisited – no matter how diluted it becomes. If it makes more than it cost to produce, they will flog that horse until it resembles a tube of Pritt Stick.

Take the example of the slasher movies of the 1980s.

How many Friday the 13th movies were there? Well, up until 1990, there had been eight (to date there have been 12, including the recent remake). Bear in mind that although these films cost very little to make, they made lots of money. They were date movies. Couples would go and see these movies so they could hide and hold hands during the scares and slashes. Never mind the fact that by Part 3 they had exhausted every possible avenue, they still did a further nine films. This was a fat cash cow that just kept making milk. And with the remake they have set up the possibility of a further 11 movies if they so desire. After all, this is playing to a new audience who don’t know what happens every time the power is cut or there is a noise in the basement. It is the same principle as modern pop stars covering old songs, they worked 30 years ago, they will work now.

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Hollywood is not ashamed when it comes to money.

Therefore, by association, neither are actors. Many actors depend on a franchise to make money.

Charles Bronson for instance, in the autumn of his acting career, was he making character driven Oscar contender movies? No, he was running (well, ambling) around with a giant gun and killing creeps as Paul Kersey in the Death Wish movies -- of which there were five.

Some sequels should be made. Some continue a story that was enjoyable and had the leg room to continue to be told. Empire Strikes Back springs to mind.

The Godfather Part 2 is another fine example. Even recently, The Dark Knight really showed that with love and care and (yes, with perhaps an over-long and needlessly complicated ending) you can develop a winning and intelligent franchise that people will really want to come back to see. However, there are always franchises that over stay their welcome and should have never returned. And here are just a few of them that spring to mind.

Lethal Weapon 3 and Lethal Weapon 4

Did we really need to see these films? At the end of the wonderful Lethal Weapon 2, Riggs has been shot so many times that he could actually drink a glass of water and it squirt out of him cartoon style, like a over-active garden sprinkler. The ending suggested that Riggs, although heavily wounded, would be OK. But, after the George Harrison song faded and the end credits died, the studio wanted another.

So, in 1992, Lethal Weapon 3 appeared. Baggy, flabby and full of clichés, limp set pieces and a forced romance that just didn’t work. Not to mention the haircut that Mel Gibson sported in this one. It was a mullet of biblical proportions.

The point of crow barring Leo Getz (Joe Pesci) back into the franchise is something that was unnecessary as well. In Lethal Weapon 2, Leo is an accountant that embezzles the South African drug money, Riggs and Murtaugh are sent to protect him and then, at the end, save him from the South Africans. He is a pain in the arse and they seem to not like him very much.

In LW3, he is suddenly an estate agent, for no reason other than to make the scene in which people come and look at buying Roger’s house amusing. Leo can make a joke about the house being repaired after a drug dealer’s car had driven into it and the upstairs being bomb damaged. The other thing that is supposed to be funny about Leo is that he is now a “yuppie” – replete with blonde hair, earring, filofax and mobile phone. It is just so painful every time he is on screen. In Lethal Weapon 2, it just all worked, but, there is just no need for Leo Getz to be in Lethal Weapon 3. No reason at all. There is also no reason that Riggs and Muratugh would now be best pals with him. Again, let me say that, no reason at all (other than having three big names on the poster and putting some rubbish jokes in the film).

It was hoped that as Lethal Weapon 3 ended, so did the franchise. After all, although it was shoddy it didn’t do too much damage... apart from changing Riggs into a mildly eccentric dog biscuit eater instead of a suicidal Vietnam vet (I mean veteran not doggy

doctor) and Murtaugh into a man that can seemingly only say, “Riggs! You crazy son of a bitch!!” over and over again like some sort of gun-toting parrot. But, in 1998, Lethal Weapon 4 arrived. When they started filming, the script wasn’t finished and they didn’t know how it was to end. Surely, that is a sure sign that it shouldn’t be made.

It is a terrible film. Clunky, tired and it has one of the worst endings to a franchise ever. With the group photo of the cast all saying they are family. It actually made me want to throw up. And still does.

The bloated cast is bloated further with the addition of Chris Rock and it from then on feels like a fight for screen time and comedy shtick sessions for the cast.

Remember, this franchise started off as an action film. Yes, it had fun moments, thanks to Shane Black’s (The Long Kiss Goodnight, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, The Last Boy Scout) superb screen play, but it wasn’t Rush Hour, which Lethal Weapon 4 really wanted to be.

At least the bad guy in this film (Jet Li) is mildly menacing (in LW3 you actually forget who the bad guy is and by the end you don’t care). Sadly, he is little more than scenery, as he gets in the way of highly important scenes with Joe Pesci and Chris Rock talking about the cell phone companies being rubbish.

A piece of obvious observational comedy Michael McIntyre would be proud of. By the end of the film you mourn for the passing of another great franchise and for the £6 you have paid to attend the funeral.

Ghostbusters 2

Now, this was classic cash-in and ostensibly the same film. It is highly irritating to watch, even now. It is a cookie cutter script that treats the audience like complete morons. We are expected to believe that the people of New York believe that the Ghostbusters tricked them all into believing ghosts existed. The film also makes no mention of the giant marshmallow man that attacked the city just five years before. I suppose we are supposed to believe that this was also conjured by the Ghostbusters. A trick David Copperfield would be really impressed by.

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This is effectively “Ghostbusters Again” as it is pretty much a carbon copy of the first film. We have the Ghostbusters establish themselves, have a musical montage of various “busts”, they are sent to a mental asylum instead of prison and we also have another “convincing the mayor” scene. It all feels just so lazy and cynical.

The only reason this film came about at all is because of the success of the cartoon. The mistake this film made, other than amazing self plagiarism, is attempting to incorporate elements of the cartoon.For instance, in the first film the

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Ghostbusters encounter a ghost in a hotel that “slimes” Venkman (Bill Murray). We don’t see this ghost again until the end credits, and this was merely an afterthought. However, in the cartoon, he is one of the cast, christened Slimer. He is the character you often get in cartoons, the annoying side kick with the annoying voice (Frank Welker, 80s cartoon voice ever present) who contributes nothing of any note. In Ghostbusters 2 he makes a couple of appearances. It doesn’t work.

This is how the film got off of the ground; the cartoon (The Real Ghostbusters) was doing big business and Hollywood being the old reactionary it is, wanted to cash in. Bill Murray said after making the film: ‘We did a sequel, and it was sort of rather unsatisfying for me, because the first one to me was the goods. It was the real thing. And the sequel, you know, it was a few years later. There was an idea pitched. And it was like, well, they got us all together in a room. We just laughed for a couple of hours.

And then they said, ‘What if

we did another one? Here’s an idea.’ So they had this idea, but it didn’t turn out to be the idea when I arrived on the set. They’d written a whole different movie than the one [initially discussed]. And the special-effects guys got it and got their hands on it.

And it was just not the same movie. There were a few great scenes in it, but it wasn’t the same movie. So there’s never been an interest in a third Ghostbusters.’

Which is funny as the only bright moments in the film is watching just how uninterested and uncomfortable Bill Murray appears all the way through. If you watch closely, you will notice that he is not involved in any kind of action until the final few scenes. He clearly just

wanted to do funny scenes and everyone else just wanted to get in baths of slime. The less said about the end the better really. It’s a shame they are making a third one.

Rocky Balboa & Rambo

Sylvester Stallone has had an up and down career.

He has definitely made some odd choices in his time.

Rhinestone is proof of this.

He was dead and buried and doing such films as Oscar, Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot and Rocky 5 until, in 1993, Cliffhanger was a surprise hit. Though god knows why, it is terrible. And then Demolition Man followed and was also a big hit. Stallone was born again. And much like John Travolta would a couple of years later, Stallone took this opportunity to, again, make terrible film choices such as Judge Dread, Daylight and Driven. He even almost turned a corner. In the midst of these terrible movies he made the critically acclaimed Cop Land in which he put on weight and played an everyman. But, he just couldn’t

help himself and followed that with a terrible remake of Get Carter.

So, come 2006, with no artistic credit in the bank, he returned to old ground and wrote and directed Rocky Balboa (Rocky 6). This film was interminable.

It was the very definition of pointless and felt like you were being taken on a guided tour of “the old neighbourhood from Rocky” by a Stallone impersonator. You know a film is bad when Talia Shire (Adrian) doesn’t want to come back. For God’s sake, she was in The Godfather 3 – but more on that later.

So, at the end of the film, we learn nothing apart from the fact that Rocky, since he lost his millions in Rocky 5, still only owns that same hat and jacket and is very boring. Wandering around his old neighbourhood boring anyone that will listen about how great he was.I don’t know about you, but I was happy at the end of Rocky 3. I didn’t need to see any more. For some reason, Rocky Balboa did well and Stallone was given dangerous encouragement. So, what did he do next? His long promised biopic about Edgar Allan Poe? No, Rambo 4.

How does the title work? You have First Blood.

Then, you have Rambo: First Blood Part 2. Then, you have Rambo 3. Ok. So, then you get Rambo again? Shouldn’t it be First Blood Part 4?Anyway.

So, Stallone wrote and directed this as well. And it is, once again, pointless. It adds nothing to an already dead franchise. You couldn’t say for a minute that it revitalised it, as there was nothing to revitalise. It was just a retread and a film with nothing to say, other than peace sucks. And I could have told you that.

Die Hard 4.0

It is certainly easy to forget that Die Hard changed things. After Die Hard, for many years, every action

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film was a Die Hard clone. Under Siege was “Die Hard on a boat”. Speed “Die Hard on a bus” and so on. But Die Hard may not of happened. It was originally intended as a sequel for the Schwarzenegger film Commando. I really can’t imagine that it would have been even half as good.

If Parts 1 and 2 are a wonderful two course meal, Part 3 is like being served a dead loved one for desert. It is as unnecessary a film as you can get and a film that surely heads that list of sequels you pretend weren’t made like Robocop 2 and 3 and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

It could be argued that Die Hard 2 and Die Hard with a Vengeance shouldn’t have been made. But they had their own merits. Yes, Die Hard 2 is evil; it was guilty of the classic sequel syndrome of same film, different location. This was a great way to justify a sequel; the audience thinks: ‘Well, it feels like the same film, but they are in a different place, therefore it must be a different movie.’ But, I am sorry, it still works. Even though, much like Paul Kersey in Death Wish, John McClaine must have pissed off someone in a former life as he is really cursed. Die Hard with a Vengeance is perceived as the best sequel, and for good reason, as it has many fine performances and set pieces which save it from being the ordinary film the premise deserves it to be (the script was not originally a Die Hard film, it was tailored to be one later). It works. But that really should have been that. Sadly not. Len Wiseman (the terrible Underworld films) was approached to take on the fourth McClane adventure. This time it was to be “Die Hard in a computer”.

The reason Part 2 is so good is that you see that Michael Corleone has become a monster. But he never shows it in his face. As in the last few scenes of the first film, he is a cold, calculated snake in the grass who would kill his own brother and not bat an eye lid. Sadly, by Part 3, Al Pacino had moved into his “shouty” persona and is therefore no fun to watch at all. Michael in Part 3 is a total wet fart. He wanders through the film seemingly unable to cope with his lot in life and unable to exert any kind of authority or menace. Andy Garcia steals the show away from him as Michael’s sort-of-nephew.

Bruce Willis returned, even though he was forever saying that there would never be another (and a Part 5 has been mentioned recently). He looked bored. The action set pieces in this film are just plain moronic.

Purposely blowing up a helicopter with a car?

Ramming a woman with a truck, plummeting down an elevator shaft and both being unharmed?

The John McClane of the first film was a man of necessity. He adapted to his situation and reacted to save the day (and his wife). The John McClane of Die Hard 4.0 is basically a superhero who is able to second guess everything (including the bad guys), fly a helicopter and take out a fighter jet all on his own.

Not to mention, getting shot, shooting himself and not really being in any pain. I guess Willis got confused and thought he was making “Unbreakable 2”.

This film was clearly a money maker for all involved, even down to the fact that it was cut to be a PG-13 when it came out in the states. So more kids can see it.

Clever huh? Bruce Willis even defended the movie on Aint It Cool News in 2007. He said: ‘It’s unbelievable.

I just saw it last week. I personally think, it’s better than the first one.’ Does he mean better paid?

The Godfather Part 3

Remember earlier when I mentioned perfect sequels?

The Godfather Part 2, is an exceptional film that pushes and pulls you from side to side and time to time with an elegant ease. You can’t help but be drawn into this wonderful world.Unfortunately, or should I say tragically, Part 3 has none of these qualities.

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The reason this film is so famous is that Francis Ford-Coppola took the unfortunate step of casting his own inexperienced daughter (Sophia, now a director) in a major role (Wynona Ryder was due to play the part but dropped out). She is pretty terrible. She is woefully wooden and woefully out of her depth.

For those who managed to stick around until the end (spoiler alert), you get the ultimate insult. You may recall, at the end of Part 2, you see Michael, sat in the grounds of his majestic home, master of all he surveys but painfully alone. At the end of the third one, you get Michael, sat on a chair, in Italy, looking like an extra from Last of the Summer Wine, suddenly slump over on to the ground and just lay there. Such dignity for an amazing character that you have spent almost six hours building up in the first and second film.

Frankly, it’s ridiculous. So, well done all involved.

Beverley Hills Cop 3

Eddie Murphy is another funny one – no pun intended. He seems to just do anything for money these days. It does make you wonder whether the string of hits and good films he was involved with in his early career were by accident rather than by design. After all, he did go on to make the most expensive flop ever made in The Adventures of Pluto Nash, which cost 100 million and made just 7 million at the box office worldwide.

Much like Sylvester Stallone (who was originally attached to Beverly Hills Cop), Murphy had his own fall from grace in the late 80s/early 90s. After many poor choices (Harlem Nights, Another 48 Hrs, A Distinguished Gentleman) he made his comeback with Boomerang and was again hot property. However, much like Stallone, he didn’t take advantage of this and made more bad choices. The first of which was Beverley Hills Cop 3.

The odd thing is, it should have worked. John Landis was in the directing chair (Trading Places, Blues

Brothers, An American Werewolf in London) and Eddie Murphy back to his best. But no, it didn’t.

Landis later said about the movie: “It was a very strange experience. The script was not any good, but I figured, ‘So what? I will make it funny with Eddie.’ I mean, one of the worst scripts I ever read was [the original] Beverly Hills Cop. It was a piece of shit, that script. But the movie is very funny because Eddie Murphy and Martin Brest made it funny. And with Bronson Pinchot...that was all improvised.

Everything funny in that movie is not in the screenplay, so I thought, ‘Well, we will do that.’

Movie, Date Movie, Meet The Spartans and Disaster Movie continuingly get made, they cost nothing to make and millions of idiots go and see them. It is a no brainer, which is a coincidence.

“But then I discovered on the first day when I started giving Eddie some shtick, he said, ‘You know, John...

Axel Foley is an adult now. He is not a wise ass anymore.’ I believe he was very jealous of Denzel Washington and Wesley Snipes doing these straight roles. So, with Beverly Hills Cop 3, I had this strange experience where he was very professional, but he just was not funny. I would try to put him in funny situations, and he would find a way to step around them. It is an odd movie. There are things in it I like, but it is an odd movie.”

In the 1990s, prequels were the in thing, now, just shake the etch-a-sketch and start again, but don’t make it too original, or you will alienate your box office. You will still find actors returning to franchises but, this time, in cameos.

And I think that perfectly sums it up. In this film, instead of being a wise-cracking chancer, Foley is almost a super-hero. Saving kids from malfunctioning rides and taking on a whole army on his own. There was also the fact that some of the actors from the previous films that made them so special didn’t return.

So in actual fact it felt nothing like a Beverly Hills Cop movie at all.

As with most of the other films mentioned there is another Beverly Hills Cop in the pipeline that will be directed by the king of mediocre: Brett Ratner (Rush Hour 1-3, X Men 3). So, we all have that to look forward to.

So, remember kids, money talks and Hollywood will always react to big numbers.

This is why these Godawful films like Epic

Just think, sequels may be a thing of the past soon.

Reboot is the new buzzword in Hollywood. Franchises are now 100% disposable. Look at the recent Spiderman trilogy. The third part is flabby and doesn’t work.

Hell, let’s “Reboot”! Just as with Bond and Batman, but you could argue that was to great effect. We will wait to see how the new Spider-Man turns out.

Perhaps the sleeping dogs will still have their day.

Words: John Rain

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n September 5th, 1921, world famous silent movie clown, Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle, threw a lavish party in San Francisco. He and two other friends rented three extravagant suites at the St. Francis Hotel.

Several women were invited to intend and the party began in earnest.

Later that night one woman, Virginia Rappe, was found seriously ill. A doctor was called and examined Rappe. He concluded that she was just drunk and gave her some Morphine to calm her down.

In actuality, Rappe was suffering from undiagnosed chronic Cystitus. The condition was made worse whenever she drank. After many botched abortions, her internal organs probably resembled a boxer in the last round of a fight.

Two days later she was hospitalised. One day later she died of Peritonitis, caused by a ruptured bladder.

Rumours began to circulate that Arbuckle had been responsible for her death. A friend of Rappe’s who had attended the party told the police that Arbuckle had raped her friend and the weight of his body caused her bladder to rupture. The doctor attending to Rappe examined her and found no evidence of sexual assault.

When the story eventually appeared in the papers, they were reporting that Arbuckle had sexually assaulted Rappe with a selection of different implements such as Coke bottles, Champagne Bottles and pieces of ice. This, according to the papers, was apparently the cause of her internal injuries. I must say, it is unlike newspapers to lie about such things. So it is probably true.

Whatever the reason for Rappe’s death, Arbuckle was guilty in the eyes of the public and media.

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After three manslaughter trials, Arbuckle was found not guilty. However, his career was over. He turned to drink and apart from working for his friend Buster Keaton on a few occasions, he was a pariah in Hollywood.

Arbuckle died in 1932 at the age of 46. A veritable nobody when he was once as big as Chaplin or Keaton.

Throughout the years that followed, many a movie star was caught up in many a scandal, and fell out of view.

But, some came back.

Robert Downey Jr. for instance. A chronic drug addict, wasting his talent, wasting his life, and well, just wasted all the time. From 1996 until 2001, Downey Jr. was seemingly arrested every week for possession and sometimes handgun charges. He said to the judge at one of his many trials, ‘It’s like I have a loaded gun in my mouth and my finger’s on the trigger, and I like the taste of the gunmetal.’ At one point, obviously extremely off of his face, he broke into a neighbour’s house and got into one of the beds.

It would seem he was making a film of Goldilocks in his own head.

In 1999 he was sent to jail for 3 years. He was eventually released in 2000 after the judge added up all the jail time he had done since 1996 (he must have had quite some calculator) and determined that Downey Jr. had basically served 3 years already.

So, once he was free, was his career over? No. Was he a Hollywood pariah? No. In fact, he came back bigger and better than ever and is today one of the biggest stars in the world. In fact, he has been the lead actor in three of the big blockbusters, three years out of the last four.

Hugh Grant is another example. Police catch him in a back alley off of Sunset Strip getting blown by a prostitute. The world laughs (the hilarious joke being that he was going out with Liz Hurley), he goes on Jay Leno and is very “British” and, the next minute, no one cares anymore. He is free to make basically the same film over and over again. Good for him.

Rob Lowe filmed himself with underage girls in a hotel room. He was universally condemned, finished in the business. Next moment he is in Waynes World and Austin Powers 2, seemingly best pals with Mike Myers (a crime in itself) and funny to boot. Next stop The West Wing and international amnesia.

Wynona Ryder, convicted of shop lifting, was last seen in the new Star Trek movie. And the list goes on…

All of the above incidents would have finished every one of them in 1921. No question. But today, we are more relaxed as a society and such petty matters only go to show that stars are as human as we are. You only have to look at magazines such as Hello! or websites such as TMZ to see just how immense public interest in celebrity dirty laundry is these days.

In 1921 movie stars were untouchable and like gods.

They were a new commodity. They could make three films a day that each made hundreds of thousands of dollars for their respective studios. The studio would protect them and cover up any scandals that would inevitably arise.

These days, they are on their own. For every mis-step they make, there is a photographer recording it. The resulting bad/good press that follows is lapped up and the star’s reputation is usually completely unharmed in the process.

Mind you, the above examples didn’t actually kill anyone.

One person who has something in common with Arbuckle is O.J. Simpson. Though, O.J. Simpson was eventually found guilty, sort of. One minute he is exchanging jokes with Leslie Neilson, the next he is accused of slaughtering his ex-wife and her lover.

Rather than handing himself in and explaining his alibi, O.J. decides it is best to drive along at 6 miles an hour with a gun to his head in a white Ford Bronco being chased by 100 police cars. But, he got away with it, sort of. As the expression goes, “If the glove don’t fit, you must acquit”. And, they did.

Off O.J. went into a happy retirement, seemingly with a care in the world. He even had the brass balls to write a book called If I Did It in which he detailed how, if he had killed his wife, he would have done it. I suspect it is the crime equivalent of Van Gogh releasing a dot-to-dot book of all of his paintings.

If only he could of held out for that inevitable cameo in one of those “Epic Movie” style films. But, as I write this, he is in jail, for armed robbery. Who saw that coming?

It would seem that Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle stands alone as the only movie star finished by bad press.

If it had happened today, he would have had the best lawyers and gotten away with it. He could have also sued the papers for libel and most probably would have been given his own reality TV show in which he organised parties for ladies of low self esteem. I can imagine his defence lawyers now, ‘If the bottle don’t fit, you must acquit’.

Words: John Rain

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After success in the 80s isn’t it about time that Ethan Hawke broke out of the angst-ridden pigeon hole?

Salwa Azar find out.

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ay, way back in the day, in 1994, Ethan Hawke, whom I have loved since I saw him and River Phoenix in Explorers in the 80s, starred in a film that reached out to the grungified generation of the 90s and spoke to their angsty inner children saying: ‘We’re spoilt and lucky but hey, we have issues, man. Issues.

We’re, like, totally lost. Who are we?’ And with that, a generational gem of a film was born.

Reality Bites, when watched back now, shows the main characters to be entirely self-absorbed little shits that you just wish would stop whining about their hard, hard lives. An early directorial outing for Ben Stiller, this film at the time spoke to millions of whiny children of the baby boom generation who’d lived in comfortable middle-class homes only to find that the economy wasn’t quite as cozy as their parents’ houses or that somehow more was expected of them than their art and poetry coffee trips.

Hawke’s character, the greasy “bastard” that finally gives in to love with Winona Ryder, made a generation of women suddenly decide they actually liked the inner-conflicted-child bastard type. Yes, yes ok, I was one of them and the film helped me into thinking that a dramatic life full of ups and downs and “like, totally!”s constituted the essential elements of reality.

Luckily, I stopped being a pillock and grew up.

However, after over a decade of on-and-off success, it pains me to see one of my favourite actors still struggles with that basic human progression.

For transparency purposes, I must declare I have harboured a massive crush on Ethan Hawke for as long as I can remember. I love intelligent men who are creative but not necessarily all happy and clappy.

Byronesque, poetic and with a wiry pithiness, these

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sorts of men are heroes to me; I would love to find myself in their company where witty banter and gritty sarcasm accompany black coffee to some gentle jazz and... God I am getting old. Ahem.

There comes a time after so many years, when if you’re still playing angsty conflicted characters at 40 you’re really taking the piss. Yes they’re fun to play, but there’s something pathetic about a grown man not having gotten his shit together after all this time.

What, so at 70 you’ll play the granddad pissing in the corner of his old folk’s home and knocking over his stroller just to find a way to rebel?

As much as the 90s provided Hawke with the means to fly to the stratosphere of his emotional turmoil in films, the naughties and beyond have seen it, done it and written the manual. There is no joy left for film purists to see a character all torn up unless the context is new and stimulating too.

Hawke’s big 2009 comeback film, Daybreakers, was a damp squib in an already murky genre. His conflicted vampire (yes, apparently most of them are now) was wanting to find an amicable resolution to the human feeding frenzy. However the film didn’t break any new ground other than to mix an I Am Legend setting with modern technology and retro visual stylings.

Why on God’s green earth would ex-humans have a fetish for the 1940s over and above any other time period? This disturbing nod to Hawke’s character in Gattaca was annoying as I adore that film as a science fiction piece of intelligence and grace so to nod to it in this appalling mess of a film was jarring to me.

Hollywood doesn’t need Hawke to fling himself at the nearest action film or big budget flick in a misguided attempt to join the mainstream. Hollywood needs him to calm down and realise that he can make a truly phenomenal movie with emotional heart and intelligence without selling out, to either an inner child or the establishment.

It’s ok to be cool and popular, you don’t have to fight it anymore, Ethan. Make a proper comeback with ageappropriate roles and breakout of this angsty pigeonhole you’ve gotten yourself into. Please, because I have to believe that even the troubled bastards eventually grow up.

Words: Salwa Azar

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With a film’s score often bolstering actors’ performances and provoking an emotional connection with the audience many a movie can be saved or slaughtered by its accompanying score. John Rain looks at the work of the Mick Jagger of the movie score: Jerry Goldsmith.

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here is no question, that in terms of productivity and memorable film scores, John Williams is the person that everyone would immediately think of. He has been responsible for some of the greatest scores every produced. From the E.T. Theme to the Raiders March, from the Superman theme to Jaws, from Harry Potter to the whole of the Star Wars saga. The man is undeniably a genius.

But, there was another genius scoring films who was just as prolific, and produced scores that were just as memorable: Jerry Goldsmith. If Williams is The Beatles, Goldsmith was The Rolling Stones.

He began scoring for the CBS radio shows of the 1950s and then graduated to TV and worked on a few CBS shows (such as The Twilight Zone). In the early 60s he began to really start to show his talents. Working on Dr. Kildare and The Man From U.N.C.L.E. The film studios began to take notice and eventually Goldsmith became ubiquitous with major films of the 1960s, such as Planet of the Apes (for which he apparently wore an ape mask while composing) Patton, Our Man Flint and Logan’s Run. In the 1970s however, Goldsmith hit a dry patch with big screen projects. Unperturbed, he started composing for TV again with such classic works as The Waltons and QBVII (the first TV mini series).

This got things going again in the movie world and

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Goldsmith once again showed how good we was with such classic works as Chinatown, The Wild Rovers and Papillion. The 1970s finished with Goldsmith riding the crest of a genius wave with some of his finest work on the films Alien and Star Trek: The Motion Picture.

Throughout the 80s he showed no signs of stopping or going stale. If anything he got better and better, producing such classics as the Rambo trilogy, The Twilight Zone Movie, Poltergeist, Gremlins, Supergirl, King Solomon’s Mines and The Secret of the Nimh. He even found time to score the Ridley Scott film Legend, but had his score chopped Stateside in favour of a tepid Tangerine Dream synth driven alternative.

The 90s started with Total Recall and he followed that with The Russia House (a theme originally composed for the film Wall Street, but rejected) Star Trek: First Contact and Insurrection, Air Force One, The Mummy and rounding off the decade, perhaps his finest work since Total Recall, the sublime score for L.A. Confidential.

Whilst there were many great composers around at the time, Goldsmith somehow felt different to the rest, his music always felt just right, never out of place and almost never clunky or derivative. In many cases made a really terrible film feel like a masterpiece (Supergirl, King Solomon’s Mines) with the grandiose bombastic compositions he would produce.

Most composers leave their signature in their work, Goldsmith’s signature was the sense of love, magic and wonder he embedded in his scores. I defy anyone to watch one of the ten below listed films and not be moved (in one way or another) by the wonderful scores.

As the man himself once said: ‘I would have burned out a long time ago if I just took a job, the money and ran with it. There’s still a challenge for me in scoring films. I’m willing to tackle an interesting project if it offers me a chance to do something I haven’t done before. When I’m excited about something, the creativity just flows. I like a good creative fight. The soundtrack will always get done. But I’m not happy until it gets done well.’

In 2004 Goldsmith died, but he leaves behind a cannon of beautiful and unique music. Here are 10 examples of great Jerry Goldsmith scores (in no order).

L.A Confidential Brooding and packed with foreboding. This score really sums up the film and gives you the same film noir feel that is playing out on the screen. Beautiful work. It also has shades of his previous Chinatown score.

Poltergeist A really haunting main theme (pardon the pun), that really captures the innocence of the young character.

It will stick in your head forever.

Total Recall No one does sci-fi scores like Goldsmith. He really nails this one and captures the whole feel of the film.

This is a score that is often used on TV and in trailers.

You can hear why. Put simply, it is awesome.

King Solomon’s Mines The ultimate example of what I referred to earlier.

This film is a total piece of shit but this score is great.

You do get the feeling however that the filmmakers Goldsmith was asked to try and get a Raiders of the Lost Ark feel. Done, pay the man.

Gremlins Musical anarchy from start to finish. One moment soft and caressing, the next violent and schizophrenic.

The Gremlin Rag is a real highlight.

First Blood A score that almost walks beside Rambo, rain-soaked and depressed as he walks on the long road into town during the film’s opening. Much like Rambo, it is also ready and willing to shift a gear and kick ass. Really nice and a perfect match.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture One of Goldsmith’s most accomplished scores and it had to be; Star Trek was returning after a thirteen year absence. Goldsmith batted this score right out of the park and almost scored each star in the deep black gulf of space. Sadly, the filmmakers didn’t follow suit and delivered a obese Spruce Goose of a film.

The track Ilia’s Theme makes the hair on the back of your neck stand to attention. Every time I hear it I am reminded that it is another example of Goldsmith outclassing the film.

Chinatown One of the ultimate examples of film noir. This score really puts you in the movie and doesn’t let you go until you hear the words, “Forget it Jake. It’s Chinatown”.

Alien Alien is a “haunted house in space” film. This score evokes the feeling of doom and loneliness that inevitably comes with it. A really haunting piece of music.

The Omen If there is another piece of music that perfectly sums up the Devil I would like to hear it. This is, put simply, musical evil and should never be played on Halloween, lest you want to shit your pants.

Words: John Rain This article sound better at www.culturedeluxe.com

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There have been many attempts to bring Sherlock Holmes to the big screen. Many have tried, many have failed.

John Rain takes a magnifying glass to those that stand out -- for better or worse.

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he first examples of a moderately successful attempts to commit Holmes to celluloid were the Basil Rathbone films of the 1940s. These were set in both modern day (1940s) and filmed in the US, so they contained lots of American actors doing their best ‘Ello Misder Oooomes’ voices. They had their moments but on the whole, they are not very good.

Which is a shame as Rathbone made for an excellent Holmes.

Next, there were the Peter Cushing Hammer films of the 1960s. Again, Cushing made a good Holmes, they just lacked any real charm and felt quite cold and sterile.

There were many made-for-TV movies from the States that are always worth a watch as they are, on the most part, unintentionally hilarious. The best example of this is the 1991 TV movie Sherlock Holmes and the Crucifer of Blood in which Charlton Heston plays Holmes. You cannot help but laugh every time he is on screen and it all culminates with the last frame of the movie in which Heston pops on a hat and utters the immortal line, ‘Watson, the game’s a foot’ with a terrible freeze frame.

The pinnacle of all the mis-cast actors to play Holmes surely has to be Roger Moore, in Sherlock Holmes in New York from 1976. There were a few successful attempts however, Christopher Plummer played Holmes in the excellent 1979 film Murder by Decree in which Holmes attempts to solve the Jack the Ripper murders. I thoroughly recommend this film, it is a real find. Both gripping and at times funny. James Mason as Dr. Watson was a glorious piece of casting and the chemistry between Mason and Plummer is wonderful.

Young Sherlock Holmes came along in 1985. It is a fine children’s adventure film romp (of the sort the 1980s seemed to be able to produce every week) and serves as a lovely bit of fan fiction as to showing how Holmes and Watson may have met at school. Upon its release it was given the awkward moniker of Young Sherlock Holmes and the Pyramid of Fear in an attempt to sex it up and

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attract moviegoers as with Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom from the previous year. It also features the first screen example of an actual CGI character. So, it will live long in the memory for that at least.

Whilst it isn’t a serious attempt, Without a Clue (1988) works. Whilst it is a curious Sherlock Holmes film, it is a very clever piece of comedy and is faithful in tone. The story is that Sherlock Holmes is a fictional character created by Dr. Watson (Ben Kingsley) to enable him to solve crimes incognito. To satisfy public demand to see Holmes in person, he hires alcoholic unemployed actor Reginald Kincaid (Michael Caine) to play him. But when “Holmes” begins believing his own hype and speaking out of turn to the press (claiming a case is closed when it isn’t), Watson sacks him, only to have to call him back when the British Government wants Holmes and no one else to solve a mystery. It is actually pretty funny in places and serves another reminder that Caine is actually very adept when it comes to comic performances.

On a side note, if a comedy Sherlock Holmes film interests you, you may like to check out The Adventure of Sherlock Holmes’ Smarter Brother. The 1975 Gene Wilder (written and directed) comedy is very hit and miss, but does have its moments and contains some very funny ideas and scenes. Wilder plays Siggerson Holmes, Sherlock’s (or Sheer-luck, as Wilder describes him in one scene) younger and indeed, smarter brother, who takes over a case in which Sherlock is unavailable. As you would expect, with any Gene Wilder film, there is plenty of shouting and waving of hands, but it does contain some gems.

Despite all of the above, the most successful attempts to bring Holmes to the screen have been on the small screen with the Jeremy Brett series of the 80s and 90s. They are very faithful to the books and the tone and feel, although sometimes a little hammy, is on the whole, perfect.

So, how does the recent Guy Ritchie version compare?

I went into this film (well, when I put the disc in the DVD player) with a heavy heart. Whilst Sherlock Holmes is not like Star Wars to me, I still grew up interested in the stories and various adaptations. The thought of Guy Ritchie directing a Sherlock Holmes film is almost as scary as the thought of Guy Ritchie writing and directing a Sherlock Holmes film.

The story is also very good, with the always excellent Mark Strong delivering the goods as the deliciously evil Lord Blackwood and his attempts to take over the world via dark evil and black magic. It’s all here, from the secret societies to the shipyards, there are lots of mysteries to solve and and lots of sights to see of Victorian London, which all looks really great (including a half built Tower Bridge).

Well, I am happy to say, it all works. Robert Downey Jr. plays Holmes in his usual machine gun mumble and verbal swagger and you just simply cannot help but enjoy him in every scene. Again delivering a perfect English accent (as with when he played Chaplin) and exuding charm and great screen presence like a classic film star of old. There is certainly a touch of the Cary Grant or Errol Flynn about Downey Jr. He is definitely a born leading man and seems just as adept at blockbuster action films as he does at Oscar worthy drama. The only reservation I still have is that at times his accent/mumble can leak into a very odd dialect that can distract. But, apart from that, he is simply perfect for the role.

The direction is very good and highly polished. But that isn’t really a surprise, one thing that you could never say about Ritchie is that he is a bad director.

His films always look fantastic, it’s just the words that emanate from the mouths of his actors that always clunked. But this time, he didn’t write it, which perhaps afforded him more freedom and was obviously a good idea. The Ritchie “style” is present in the film though, the slo-mo, the slick title sequences and the jump cuts, but, it really works here. It allows you to really see the wheels turn in Holmes’ head and really shows you how he makes his decisions and what the outcome will be. This is important and shows a side to the character that we haven’t seen on screen before.

I was apoplectic when I heard that Jude Law was to play Watson, I am happy to say my fears were misguided. Whilst in the past I have had my issues with Law, he is very good as Watson and the chemistry between he and Downey Jr. is there immediately. You feel that they have known each other for a long time and his Watson is exactly the kind of partner Holmes should have. A brawler. In every other version of Watson put on the screen, he has been played as a bumbler, a fuddy-duddy and basically useless for anything other than a comic relief. In the books however, there is reference made to Watson serving in the Crimean war and knowing his way around a pistol and handy with his fists. Not the kind of man that gets confused easily and looks as though he may wet himself any moment.

The soundtrack (Hans Zimmer) is also a force to be reckoned with. The main theme is belted out on what can only be described as a knackered pub piano. It works perfectly and really adds to the almost bohemian feel of the film and more accurately the protagonist. At times it feels like you are listening to a jam session in a gypsy encampment circa 1894. For soundtrack collectors, I recommend for background madness (not the band) music.

So, in conclusion, Sherlock Holmes is back and there is talk of a sequel. So, in my best Charlton Heston voice, ‘The game’s a foot!’

Words: John Rain

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Robin Hood

Released: 14.05.2010 Directed by: Ridley Scott Starring: Russell Crowe, Cate Blanchett , William Hurt, Mark Strong, Oscar Issac

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hen he’s not making music or fighting ‘round the world, Russell Crowe likes making the occasional movie. So here he is back with his ol’ mucker, director Ridley Scott hoping to repeat the success of the pair’s sword and sandal actioner Gladiator. And how do they attempt to do it? Well by virtually transplanting Maximus Whateverhisnamewas from Rome and resettling him in Nottingham, England (via an opening French segment), renaming him Robert Loxley (nee Longstride), swapping his sword for a longbow and saddling him with an accent that falls somewhere between Irish brogue and scouse.

The films are so closely matched in style that you could almost call this “Gladiator 2: Men In Tights”. Both main characters have flashback issues with family members being brutally murdered by the powers that be, thus giving us a glimpse into their troubled state of mind (therefore making them more anti than hero, which by default makes a plump Aussie actor more attractive to the ladies) and, in a more direct directorial move, there is one scene where Robin (Loxley) Hood rides behind his bowmen -- almost an homage of Gladiator’s opening, Celtic battle scene.

Is it any good? Well if you are expecting the usual Robin Hood type romp (and there has been hundreds

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brought to celluloid over the years) then you may be a tad disappointed. This is the Robin Hood back story, a tale of how a serving bowman in King Richards’s army becomes a legendary enemy of the state. So there is not a great deal of robbing from the rich and giving it to the poor in this reimagining of the famous story. Instead you get a French plot to overthrow the thrown; an insecure, mad Prince John (possibly the best character in the film ably played by Oscar Issac); an evil double agent (Mark Strong’s Godfrey); impersonations of dead people; and a predictably feisty leading lady in Cate Blanchett’s Maid Marian.

The convoluted plot is handled well but the overall film lacks any ooompf. Sure the merry men are, well, merry enough and Mark Addy makes for a convincing Friar Tuck. But with only three real action set pieces, the films does seem to drag a little over the two and a half hours viewing time.

On the plus side it does set itself up well for the sequel (of the planned trilogy) with brief appearances from the Sheriff Of Nottingham and a gloriously 80’s TV moment where Robin wanders through the forest being joined by various members of the Merry Men, one by one. Hopefully the sequel will be a little more fun and actioned packed than this opener. After all, what’s better? Brooding anti hero or mulleted, green tight-wearing protector of the poor?

Words: Nick Foster

Sex and the city 2

Released: 27.05.2010 Directed by: Michael Patrick King Starring: Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Cattrall, Kristin Davis, Cynthia Nixon

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aking the four modern day heroines out of their familiar New York surroundings and into the sunshine of the conservative Abu Dhabi desert, the widely anticipated Sex and the City 2 ultimately disappoints as it presents very little city and even less sex.

After an extravagantly tacky start sprinkled with elements of sheer brilliance (Liza Minnelli performing Beyonce’s Single Ladies, anyone?) the plot begins to show promise as we discover Samantha has blagged herself and the rest of the girls an all expenses paid holiday to the Arab state under the premise of a PR reward. Anyone who watched the series will know that the four girls together minus the men usually results in some deliciously scandalous scenarios and an excursion to the other side of the world laid forth the potential for an unlimited amount of hilarity.

Unfortunately, this potential could not have been more overlooked if it tried and instead of wild sex in sand dunes and Cosmo’s on the beach, we’re left with afternoon camel rides and tearful confessions at the private bar in their suite.

It’s understandable that the characters have changed over the years from being carefree and single to settled and married (apart from Samantha) and the writers have had to accommodate these developments

accordingly into the script. However, in the process they seem to have lost the show’s true essence and the fun that previously emanated through it. Granted, there were a couple of strong comedic moments, but the belly-laughs have been dispersed and in their place is flustered angst and marital woes. Gone are the days where conversations between the girls at a bar used to involve lascivious tales from the previous evening, as we are now instead presented with tense discussions over making your own rules in a marriage.

The main problem is that very little actually happens in the 146 minute duration. At least in the first film there were some significant plot revelations with Carrie and Big’s wedding, Charlotte’s pregnancy and Steve’s infidelity. In the follow up however, we are treated to what at times, feels like a two hour reality show tracking four women on holiday whilst they ponder their own existences. Even the re-introduction of Carrie’s long lost ex Aiden feels somewhat contrived and the scenes that play out as a result are rather predictable. The real world is something that everyone has to cope with, but to the film’s detriment the writers have portrayed this all too realistically because sadly, not even some truly fabulous outfits can rescue this pity party from itself.

Words: Chantelle Pattemore

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The Wolfman

Released: 07.06.2010 (DVD & Blu-ray) Directed by: Joe Johnston Starring: Benicio del Toro, Anthony Hopkins, Emily Blunt, Hugo Weaving

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hen it comes to classic horror titles, Universal owns the rights to the lot. Which is why when anyone else attempts to make a Dracula or Frankenstein movie, they have to place the author’s name before the title to avoid legal action (Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein).

The only problem is, Universal haven’t done anything with their properties in a long time. In fact, the last Universal horror that came anywhere close, was 1981’s An American Werewolf in London, which John Landis wrote as a pure homage to the 1941 Universal classic, The Wolfman.

So, in 2007, when it was announced that Universal were to remake The Wolfman with Mark Romaneck (One Hour Photo) directing, Benicio Del Toro (Traffic, The Usual Suspects, Che) starring and the make-up effects performed by the legendary Rick Baker (An American Werewolf in London), the world messed its pants. Another Baker practical transformation scene was promised and with today’s technology and make-up possibilities, it could even top An American Werewolf in London.

Baker actively pursued the project; The Wolfman was his favourite film as a child and was keen to get the look of a remake right (he even sent the producers screen tests of make up applied to himself to get the gig). Soon after this announcement, early pictures of Del Toro (also a massive Wolfman fan and also producing the film) posing for Rick Baker were posted on Aintitcoolnews along with assurances from Romaneck that the film was to be a hard “R” (meaning R rated, full of blood, gore and guts). There looked to be nothing stopping this film from becoming the dawn of a new age of good werewolf films. The world smiled and relaxed.

Pinewood [Studios], some of the work they were doing – and I wasn’t crazy about some of the direction it was going in,” he said, citing an example. “They had things right in front of me that they weren’t seeing. For example, we have between our canine teeth four teeth; dogs have six teeth, and The Wolf Man has six teeth between his canine teeth. They had some illustrations they did, scans of the makeup and some transformation things, and they had the actual canine teeth drawn [in the wrong stage of the transformation].”

The world sighed and rolled its eyes. Further problems with the film followed. The release date was postponed many times. Originally scheduled to be released on November 12th 2008, it was then moved to February 2009, then April 2009, then November 2009, until, after a few more moves, it finally arrived February 10th 2010. This was the biggest indication yet that things were not going well with the film.So, how is it?

Is it a howl or a whimper?

Soon after filming was complete, alarming stories began to circulate about Rick Baker’s involvement. It seemed that Baker was now only on board for the post transformation make up. New director Johnston had decided to go fully CGI on the werewolf transformation scenes.

The Film Lawrence Talbot (Benicio Del Toro) is performing Hamlet on the London stage, when his brother Ben’s fiancé Gwen (Emily Blunt) comes back stage to inform him that his brother is missing and pleads with him to return to the family home in Blackmoor. Lawrence returns and reunites with his estranged father Sir John Talbot (Sir Anthony Hopkins) who tells him that his brother’s mutilated body has been found and the funeral is already planned. Lawrence visits the body and sees the mutilation for himself. He then travels to a gypsy camp and is attacked by a wild beast. While he is recovering, Inspector Aberline (Hugo Weaving) of Scotland Yard arrives to investigate the Ben Talbot murder. Aberline uncovers more than he had bargained for and Lawrence is forced to reconcile his fate and confront his own demons.

Baker was said to be very unhappy about this and commented afterwards: “I saw, on my last day at

There are many things that are right with this film.

Firstly, the look of the film feels right; the dark, gothic

Then, in 2008, Mark Romaneck announced he was leaving the project due to ‘creative differences’. Joe Johnston (Rocketeer, Jumanji, Jurassic Park 3) took over directing duties and maintained that the hard “R” promise was still in place, despite his track record of family friendly films. Filming commenced in the UK.

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feel works very well, the direction is solid and the level of gore is what you would expect from a horror film — lots of juicy entrails and arms flying all over the screen. There are a few nice set pieces and the “werewolf” cam is always an entertaining watch. The music is also a return to form for Danny Elfman, though I couldn’t helping feeling that at times it was an almost note for note copy of the Wojciech Kilar score from Francis Ford Coppola’s 1992 version of Dracula. However, when compared to Elfman’s output for the last ten years, it is a really good score.

There are also sadly many things that are bad. The script is all over the place with too much going on at once. You simply don’t get a chance to stop and look around. The love story between Lawrence and Gwen just doesn’t work for me and feels crowbarred in at the last minute. I realise that it is an essential element of the plot (and of the original) but since they ignored most parts of the original, why not ignore that too?

The cast, whilst fine, just don’t bring anything interesting to the table (with the rare exception of one scene in the pub with Hugo Weaving showing his class) and Sir Anthony Hopkins is just absolutely terrible in this film.

He doesn’t seem to be able to decide what accent he is doing from scene to scene. One moment he is Irish, the next he is a Yorkshire man until finally coming to rest in his native Welsh. If there is one example of phoning in a performance, this it it.

It seems Hopkins is well aware these days that he has Hollywood fooled into thinking he is some sort of acting genius and therefore just has to turn up to impress.

The idea of having Hugo Weaving play Inspector Aberline is also a mystery. Why have the inspector arriving from Scotland Yard be the same one who investigated the Jack the Ripper murders a few years previously? As far as I know, they never caught Jack the Ripper, so, if you were looking to solve a mysterious murder case up north, he is the last person I would send. While we are talking about the Victorian police force, in this film, they all seem to be armed and if not, only seconds away from being so in an emergency. At one point Aberline tells an officer in the middle of London to telegraph the yard to get armed officers to help. By the next scene there are about ten in attendance all armed with rifles.

The CGI in this film is also quite bad. It is yet another example of pointless CGI being used. Many films now utilise this method of film making. From the CGI boat on the CGI water in Superman Returns, the CGI dear in I Am Legend to the CGI ants in the last Indiana Jones movie. In this film we have a CGI bear and dear. I know, they are quite hard to get hold of I suppose. They have never appeared in films before.

The transformations just don’t work in CGI either. As soon as they begin, the subject just becomes all wet and leathery (like most CGI creations) and no longer looks real. Just imagine for a moment what Rick Baker could have done with these scenes. Instead, they are actually boring to watch, and I never thought I would ever say that about a Universal monster movie.

As Rick Baker also said at the time: “[CGI] can be really great, and I think it’s a great tool. But I think we should have been more involved with makeup in the transformation,” he sighed. “Because, basically, we aren’t involved with the transformation at this point.

Which is one of the more fun things to do in a movie.”

And he kind of did it well in 1981 didn’t he?

Another odd thing about this film is that as well as paying homage to the original, it seems to want to pay homage to An American Werewolf in London (AWIL) too with three major elements. 1. David Schofield being cast as a policeman in the village. Eagle eyed viewers may know him from AWIL as the “you made me miss” man from the Slaughtered Lamb. His casting surely cannot be a coincidence. 2. There is one scene in which Lawrence awakes from one nightmare into seeming reality, only to then get the “double scare” again, much like the famous scene in AWIL. 3. The bus attack from AWIL is also repeated, even down to the bus running over an unlucky pedestrian’s back with a loud crunch.

I don’t think a reimagining of a classic film should then pay homage to a film that was paying homage to it in the first place. That just seems kind of lazy to me.

Over all it just feels like a huge missed opportunity and a real shame. Whilst not a terrible film, it is just a highly average one that would kind of get your attention when on TV one night, which is obviously not what the world expected in 2006.

Blu-ray special features In terms of special features, Universal have wheeled out some big guns. First off, you get a choice between the Theatrical cut or the Unrated cut (an extra 17 mins of “plot development”). You also get a streaming copy of the original Wolfman film, which is a great touch. The usual deleted and extended scenes you would expect and two alternative endings, both add nothing new but are interesting none the less.

There are also a few “Making of” features and behind the scenes shorts about the make up effects (or lack of) and the CGI transformation process (or lack thereof). You also get the usual Universal “My scenes” function and the fantastic “U-Control” feature in which you can watch the movie with the “Legacy, Legend, and Lore” mix. This is a very entertaining mix of pop-up trivia with history and lore of the lycanthrope mythology. There is also the chance to compare the 1941 classic to this remake as well as a look at the series of films that followed.

Words: John Rain

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Iron Man 2

Released: 07.05.2010 Directed by: Jon Favreau Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Scarlett Johansson, Mickey Rourke

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he problem with most comic book movies almost always lies in the sequel. Film makers often try and lay too many cards on the table at once and then leave no room for the desert of subsequent films. The sequels are then usually fatted calves with too many bad guys (in an attempt to top the last one) and not enough story. Quite often, more attention is paid to the stars rather than to the content.

Thankfully, Marvel have formed their own studio and therefore are able to direct where their cards are to be laid. Starting with the first Iron Man film, Marvel have been embroidering a nice back story into each film regarding the “S.H.E.I.L.D. Avenger Initiative” or in other words, the Avengers, a merry band of super heroes, which include the Hulk, Iron Man and Captain America, to name just a few. So far, each of these films (with Captain America filming now) has carried these strands and will eventually culminate in an Avengers movie once the main players have had their own filmic enterprise.

This is the beauty of Marvel “holding the lead” of these projects, they can afford subtlety and afford to reward the patience of viewers and readers alike, you will get your epic movies and a giant fat one when they are all done. You can only imagine that if DC had a similar venture that Watchmen may have been a Lord of the Rings style trilogy, rather than a very long film, albeit a very good one.

Iron Man 2 has arrived and it is every bit as good as the first one. We begin as we ended the first movie, with Tony Stark (the effortlessly likeable Robert

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Downey Jr) holding a press conference to announce that he is Iron Man, except, we see it from the perspective of Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke) in his Russian home. He is nursing his ailing father who informs Vanko that the Stark fortune should be his, as Vanko Sr. was involved in the original design of the Ark reactor that powers both Stark and Iron Man. Vanko Sr. buys the farm and Vanko Jr. sets out on his inevitable mission of revenge, utilizing his father’s designs and blueprints. Combine this with a sub plot about the US Government trying to get their hands on the Iron Man suit, and rival weapon manufacturer Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell) trying to help them get their way and you have a very enjoyable movie.

As with the last film, this isn’t just a rock-em-sock-em robot fest, there is real humor and enough to keep you going to the last minute. It is obviously formulaic, as most comic book films are, but the material and set pieces (particularly the Monaco GP sequence) is good enough for you not to care.

The supporting cast are great; Gwyneth Paltrow has great chemistry with Downey Jr. and Rourke is great to watch as the maverick Russian villain. Don Cheedle takes over as Jim “Rhodey” Rhodes, the role vacated (not voluntarily) by Terrence Howard. Sam Rockwell owns the screen every time he appears and is fast becoming a real star and Gary Shandling (The Larry Sanders Show) is very good in an unusual turn as a slimy congressman who wants that suit to be used as a US weapon. Jon Favreau seems to be proving that he is a good action director as well as adept at appearing in shit Vince Vaughn rom-coms.

We await the inevitable Iron Man 3 with baited breathe and salute Marvel for getting it right and more importantly, doing it the right way.

Words: John Rain

The Crazies

Released: 29.06.2010 (DVD & Blu-ray) Directed by: Breck Eisner Starring: Timothy Olyphant, Radha Mitchell, Joe Anderson, Danielle Panabaker

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saw the trailer for The Crazies and I immediately thought, wow, this is going to b e a stupid mix of Dawn of the Dead meets The Faculty. In a way, I was right. The Crazies takes the b est bits of both and squelches them into a surprisingly nuanced take on the survival horror genre. Not surprising really since it’s actually a remake of a George A. Romero film of the same name. I won’t comment much on the original, suffice it to say, this remake is a million times b etter and is more coherent story-wise and less shouty schlo ck horror. I use the term horror loosely b ecause its not scary, it’s more like playing Resident Evil instead of Silent Hill but it’s still a valid re-working of an overdone genre.

I adore the pairing of Timothy Olyphant and Rhada Mitchell for this, they give credible performances to what would b e traditionally hysterical macho or wimpy scream-queen roles (see the original film). Somehow — despite b eing a remake — The Crazies feels original. The main points of tension are kept up really well and there is plenty of character acting to entertain. The story moves on nicely allowing you to immerse yourself in the plot despite it not really taking you anywhere new. There are a few Scream moments where you break from the tension and wonder why they insist on walking into darkened shadowy corners but I guess it was created b efore the genre b ecame a paro dy. All in all, it is handled quite well and the quality of performances sees this through.

The visuals are well-shot; it’s a glossy splat-fest at times with just the right amount of goo and gore — it’s not as slick as say, I Am Legend but it’s up there.

The general rule is once you’ve seen one zombie/ vampire/virus survival horror movie, you’ve seen them all, but like rollercoaster rides, they’re still bloo dy goo d fun, and the Crazies is no exception.

If you want a great character-based survival horror film with tension a-plenty but not so much that you’ll b e having nightmares, this is the film for you. It’s even b etter when you realise it was written by the undisputed king of the genre, alb eit two decades earlier.

Words: Salwa Azar

The Road

Released: 17.05.2010 (DVD & Blu-ray) Directed by: John Hillcoat Starring: Viggo Mortensen, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Michael K. Williams, Robert Duvall, Guy Pearce, Charlize Theron

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ales of the apocalypse reach our screens with alarming regularity these days but few have the guts to approach it with a gritty, hard-hitting sense of realism. In the past year we have seen 2012, an over the top, popcorn blockbuster with more emphasis on special effects than a decent story, The Book of Eli, with comic book style silliness surrounding a blind protagonist who can somehow dodge bullets, sword fight and be an accomplished archer and Zombieland, a comical look at an America that’s become overrun with zombies.

The Road, based on the Pulitzer Prize winning novel

by Cormac McCarthy and directed by John Hillcoat, is a refreshing, if harrowing take on life in a postapocalyptic America. Set in an unspecified time, after an unspecified disaster that has wiped out most of the human race and left the landscape scarred and grey with little vegetation and animal life a rarity, it follows the struggles of a father (Viggo Mortensen) and his son (Kodi Smit-McPhee), who are trekking south in search of the coast and the hope of a better life. Their most precious possession is a pistol loaded with only two bullets, one of which is used to kill a roaming cannibal early in the film who threatens the boy. Part of the strength of the film comes from the fact that Hillcoat, like McCarthy in the novel, refuses to justify the horrors that this world contains with an explanation of the events that have preceded them, instead allowing the actions of the people that the father and son encounter to speak for themselves.

By refusing to be drawn in to the back story Hillcoat is allowed to delve deeper in to the relationship between father and son and we discover a man who is willing to do anything to protect his son and a boy who, having known no other world, can be confused by his father’s cynicism and distrust of the rest of the human race. The son can never understand why they can’t help the lone people they encounter (two great turns from Robert Duvall and Michael K. Williams) and, in his father’s treatment of these people, he begins to wonder if they are turning in to the bad guys that his father so often assures him that they are not. It is a heart breaking stand-off between a man who

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wants to shelter his son from the evils that remain in mankind and a boy who sees the best in the people they meet.

With suicide a real and often preferable, choice in this world, two of the most harrowing scenes come when the father, desperate to spare his son the horrors of being killed by cannibals who roam in gangs across the land, teaches him how to commit suicide successfully and the boy is clearly distressed when he sees his father

demonstrate by putting a loaded pistol in to his mouth.

This threat of cannibalism is never more evident than when they chance upon a seemingly deserted house where there is a cellar full of naked, emaciated and dismembered men and women all of whom are terrified of being the next meal for the cannibal family that have kept them locked in the dark.

When this family return there is a touching moment where the father,

certain that they will be discovered prepares to use the one remaining bullet to shoot his son, the boy crying in desperation ‘Will I see you again?’ It makes for uncomfortable viewing and while many may not think that killing your son is the ultimate sacrifice and act of kindness, the fact that he is willing to sacrifice the one bullet they have left to give his son a quick death knowing that he would be subjected to the conditions suffered by those in the cellar and eventually meet his end at the hands of the cannibals, shows his unswerving dedication to his son and reveals the warped sense of morality that this post-apocalyptic world has produced.

Interspersed with these scenes are flashbacks, often in the dreams of the man, which show him and his wife in happier times. These then spiral downwards and we see her distraught when she finds out she is going in to labour, unravelling when the boy is about six years old and finally walking calmly in to the night to die. ‘The coldness of it’ the father in his narrative voice notes ‘was her final gift’. The father’s steely determination to protect his child comes in part from a sense of duty that his wife so calmly walked away from.

Despite the macabre content and scenes that are undoubtedly difficult to watch, which means that many people may only view it once, The Road is a triumph of film-making with two perfect performances from Mortensen and Smit-McPhee and stunning scenes of devastated landscapes (filmed on the slopes of Mt. St. Helens and parts of America that remain destroyed from Hurricane Katrina).

The poignancy of the relationship between the father and son is offset effectively against the real horrors that lie in wait for them and their refusal to give in despite the overwhelming negativity that surrounds them adds up to an ultimately life-affirming story of love and dedication. Though many may struggle with the uncomfortable viewing it is definitely a film that everyone should watch, even if it’s only once.

Words: Adam Gibby

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MacGruber

Released: 18.06.2010 Directed by: Jorma Taccone Starring: Will Forte, Kristen Wiig, Ryan Phillippe, Val Kilmer, Maya Rudolph

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NL (that’s Saturday Night Live to you) has spawned many famous sketches and reoccurring characters over the years. Sadly, when they transfer them to film, the results are usually hit or miss. For every Wayne’s World there’s an It’s Pat. For every Blues Brothers there’s a Coneheads (though, to be fair, The Blues Brothers was a flop when it first came out).

Now, we have MacGruber.

As the name suggests, it is a parody of MacGyver, 1980s action man/handy man who was able to get out of any situation by utilizing his surroundings. Think The A Team crossed with Handy Andy.

MacGruber is written by and stars SNL alumni Will Forte (who UK audiences may be more familiar with as the dry cleaner/actor Ben from Flight of the Conchords season one) and is the story of a one man killing machine brought out of retirement to stop super villain Dieter Von Cunth (played with seemingly great joy by a rather rotund Val Kilmer) from destroying the world with a giant warhead he steals pre-credits.

MacGruber puts his team together (eventually) and sets out to stop Cunth (Kilmer) and also avenge the death of his wife, also killed by Cunth on their wedding day.

It is a wonderful poke and thumbs up to action films from the 1980s and, if you have seen your fair share,

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you will laugh at all the right places. For instance, MacGruber’s team consists of men with such names as “Vernon Freedom” “Brick Hughes” “Tanker Lutz” and “Tug Phelps”. There are some wonderful scenes and set pieces in this film and it will live on as one of those quotable pieces that students and office monkeys will spout out when the right situations arise.

The cast is fantastic; from the brilliant Forte, to the ever present (and that is a polite way of saying that she is in everything right now) Kristen Wiig as long suffering Vicky St.Elmo, unwitting master of disguise. Ryan Phillippe continues his career re-deployment as Dixon Piper, rookie with much to learn and newest member of MacGruber’s team.

The wonderful Powers Boothe (Southern Comfort, Deadwood) also appears as Colonel Faith and continues to show his class. Val Kilmer is also lots of fun, he seems to be really having a ball in this and is obviously enjoying the freedom of not being the leading man anymore.

I have seen snotty reviews of this film and all I can say is that it made me laugh from start to finish. Yes, it is puerile, yes it is silly, but it is lots of fun. Just remember to pack your celery.

Words: John Rain

Invictus

Released: 14.06.2010 (DVD & Blu-ray) Directed by: Clint Eastwood Starring: Morgan Freeman, Matt Damon

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nvictus tells the true story of how Nelson Mandela teamed up with the South African Rugby Union team ahead of the 1995 Rugby World Cup with the hopes of uniting the country and is perhaps an unusual choice of subject matter for Clint Eastwood to explore. In its opening scene we see a group of black children playing football on one side of the road before the camera pans across to show a group of white Afrikaner children playing rugby on the other side. The segregation of these sports serves as a microcosm of the racial tensions that still lingered after the election of Mandela as president and it soon becomes clear that rugby was one of the great dividers in apartheid and post-apartheid South Africa.

Recognising that rugby had the potential to bring the country together during the 1995 Rugby World Cup, of which South Africa was the host nation, Mandela (Morgan Freeman) strove to unite his nation while retaining the heritage of each racial group. As a result he begs the South African Sports Committee not to remove the Springbok’s name and colours for fear that it would incense the white Afrikaners who were already opposed to his leadership. In a meeting with the Springbok’s captain, Francois Piennar (Matt Damon) he implies that if the team can get the support of the black Africans and secure victory in the World Cup then the country will be finally be united.

Freeman steps in to his role with aplomb and succeeds in portraying Mandela as a wise and endearing character, although he doesn’t have quite a good enough grasp on the South African accent to mask his famous tones. Damon also delivers a convincing performance as Piennar with

both a credible accent and a sense of authority. However, seemingly keen to portray Mandela with the respect that the revered leader deserves Eastwood avoids many of the more contentious issues that Mandela faced, instead showing him with unwavering self belief and dedication to his cause. While I’m not trying to suggest that Mandela didn’t have these characteristics, the way that Eastwood compiles an almost ‘greatest hits’ like timeline of Mandela’s tenure during the World Cup paints a rose-tinted picture of events. There is a strange moment where Mandela is found lying outside of his house after collapsing and is ordered to rest; in the very next scene he is back to work and the whole episode is forgotten. Likewise, Francois Piennar seems to be the man responsible for every part of the South African rugby team’s preparation with Kitch Christie their coach, unbeaten in his two-year tenure, absent from the screen entirely.

While the film succeeds in conveying the sense of stoicism in the events and actions of its two protagonists it can seem at times to be over-emotional. A casual viewer would come away from the film thinking that, with the World Cup success, Mandela and Piennar were solely responsible for the unification of South Africa and that it was sport and not politics that had the greatest impact on the nation.

More could also be made of other specifics that are largely ignored. You would be forgiven for thinking that the one black player in the Springbok’s team would be worthy of a lot of screen time as they deal with his emotions and perspective on the unfolding events but he is very peripheral, which is a missed opportunity. However, it is definitely worth watching; the performances of Freeman and Damon are exceptional and it does deal with some important issues in South Africa’s history as well as providing the feel-good factor for casual viewers.

Words: Adam Gibby

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Edge of Darkness

Released: 14.06.2010 (DVD & Blu-ray) Directed by: Martin Campbell Starring: Mel Gibson, Ray Winstone, Danny Huston, Bojana Novakovic, Jay O. Sanders

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n 1985, the BBC broadcast the ground breaking mini series Edge of Darkness.

It starred the late, majestic actor Bob Peck (who you may know from Jurassic Park as the Raptor game warden) as Ronald Craven. A Yorkshire detective who witnesses his daughter’s murder. Craven then begins to uncover the dark forces at work within the government and unravel a conspiracy.

The supporting cast were also amazing, from the bombastic Joe Don Baker, to John Woodvine (An American Werewolf in London), Joanne Whalley (Willow) Ian McNeice (Ace Ventura 2 – looking almost thin by his standards today) and Tim McInnerny (Percy, Blackadder 2). Directed

by Martin Campbell, who has since made his name by directing Goldeneye, The Mask of Zorro and the recent Casino Royale remake, thus being the man that revitalised Bond twice, the feel of the series is gritty and very much of its time. It was scored by Eric Clapton and Michael Kamen (who would later also combine to score the Lethal Weapon films).

This was a TV series that gripped the nation for the six weeks of its broadcast. It was written

by Troy Kennedy-Martin (The Italian Job) and inspired by the political climate of the time (fear of Nuclear power and radiation).

It had an eccentric feel to it. With the lead character having varied discussions with the hallucination of his daughter (at various ages) and often entering into heated discussions with her. From start to finish, you really felt his pain and anger and would often want to jump into the screen and assist in his journey of truth and to help him right all of the wrongs.

This was without doubt the role of Bob Peck’s life, and boy did he nail it.

Joe Don Baker also shone in the role of Jedburgh, CIA intelligence (a role which obviously inspired the role of CIA operative Jack Wade that he would later play in Goldeneye) operative that helps Craven along the way. DonBaker was so interested in playing this part that he took a low fee, by his standards, just to be involved.

Last year, the Hollywood remake emerged, with Mel Gibson taking over the Bob Peck role, and

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Ray Winstone taking the Joe Don Baker part. The film would be directed by Martin Campbell, the same director as the TV show. It seemed to have lots of potential. So, what is it like?

Well, first of all, it is hard to get past the fact that in attempting a Boston accent, Mel Gibson sounds like he is channelling Moe from The Three Stooges.

Also, Ray Winstone’s cockney accent is becoming unintelligible. These two factors are a mild stumbling block, but I persevered.

Gibson plays Thomas Craven (obviously didn’t want to be called Ronald) and the film progresses in the much the same way with Craven’s daughter being murdered in front of him and Craven then going on a mission to find out who is responsible and why it happened. The background theme does seem mildly out of place in 2010, but the plot ticks along nicely.

Edge of Darkness is a perfectly serviceable thriller.

If you haven’t seen the original TV series, I am sure you will enjoy it, but for me, much like the recent State of Play movie remake of the excellent TV series, it feels like exactly what it is: cramming six episodes worth of suspense, intrigue, action and investigations into ninety minutes. The result is mixed. Many shortcuts are taken to make the story fit the smaller running time and as a consequence, many interesting plot points from the TV series get left out. The whole process feels mildly harried and in places, inconsistent.

Gibson is actually pretty good and does convey the character’s pain and loss very well. His emotional journey is perfectly believable (once you get over the

voice) and you are willing to go with him all the way to the end. Gibson has made a career out of these kind of characters. Martin Riggs and Max Rockatansky were similar victims of “loved-one loss” and were very effective at getting revenge on their behalf. Gibson is the perfect man for the role and always seems more than capable delivering memorable performances of men on the verge of a nervous breakdown. This is after all, what made him famous.

As you would expect from Martin Campbell, the action scenes are very good and very punchy with the emphasis being on “trailer-iffic” set pieces.

The main problem with the film was with the last twenty minutes. The film just seemed to dissolve very quickly into a bit of a mess. This again could be explained by having to cram three episodes worth of story into twenty minutes, but never the less, it feels slightly messy. It is a shame, as before the last twenty minutes, the pace of the film was very consistent. It just seemed to hit a wall and then struggle to recover.

It is worth noting that the TV series also does this, but over a much longer time and with differing results.

Ray Winstone is also a bit of a problem, he seems to sleepwalk his way through the film and at no stage seems believable. This is a shame as he is always is a good screen presence. There are good performances in Ray Winstone (Scum, Sexy Beast), but since he went to Hollywood, we are yet to see them on screen.

Overall, I would again repeat that this is a perfectly good action thriller, and one to watch if it happens to be on TV one night. I would however, highly recommend the TV series.

Words: John Rain

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Hard Rain

Format: PS3 Developer: Quantic Dream Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment

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have been playing Heavy Rain for two hours solid and am yet to “frag” any aliens, discover a forbidden world or go postal in an airport in the guise of a terrorist. I have, however, dressed one of the many characters you play in this narrativedriven game, taken him to the bathroom for a wee and helped him shave. I’ve aided him while he looked for his lost son in a busy shopping mall, eventually witnessing his slow descent into depression and possible madness. I’ve collaborated with a rather rotund private dick as he protects the dignity of a prostitute and saves a Jewish shopkeeper from a hold up, whilst also following an honest cop desperately trying to tie up all the leads to bring the ‘Origami Killer’ to justice, battling his corrupt partner all the way so he can uphold the word of the law.

You see, Heavy Rain is not quite like your usual, modern video game, deciding to put away the first/third person move, jump or shoot mechanics for something more akin to the early nineties point and click adventures.

The game unfolds more like an interactive movie with your contribution left to occasional button sequence interaction to move from one cut scene to another (the choices you make designate how the story plays out) or sometimes moving the characters around to look for clues.

On paper this may sound quite dull, so the fact the game (after a rather slow start) becomes so compelling is testament to French developer Quantic Dreams sensible decision to put most of the focus on the story rather than action scene after action scene. It also helps that the game has a cinematic feel with both the soundtrack and visuals taking full advantage of the PS3’s power.

I can’t go into too much detail as it might ‘spoil the plot’ but as you delve deeper into Heavy Rain and its very dark themes you will find a video experience quite like no other. Although it does demand patience, I would say that other video franchises (Silent Hill would be a good example) could do worse than follow its lead away from button bashing and into a more immersive gaming experience.

Words: Nick Foster

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Alan Wake

Format: Xbox 360 Developer: Remedy Publisher: Microsoft

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he survival horror waters are ones that have been tread many times before. Arguably starting way back with the likes of the Doom series, the genre is most widely remembered for its flagship title, the game-changer of survival horror games: Resident Evil. The mechanics which were set in that groundbreaking title of 1996 have acted as a template ever since for not only its own multiple sequels but all approaching imitators. Little to no health, a worryingly sparse supply of ammo, a limited inventory, mood lighting, cinematic camera angles... Resident Evil nailed them all. But, they say that through familiarity is bred contempt and when it comes to the survival horror genre the more you play, the harder they have to work to bring the scares.

Alan Wake, developed by Remedy and published by Microsoft, is an altogether different beast of survial horror game: it’s self aware.

You play the titular Alan Wake, a superstar thriller author who, after a gruelling PR tour to promote his latest book, decides to get away from it all with his wife Alice. The idyllic surrounds of Bright Falls is their holiday destination of choice and you can see why; the stunning vistas of lakes and mountain ranges that surround this small, sleepy town are wonderfully rendered. However, shortly after arriving things (you’ve guessed it) aren’t quite what they seem. After Alice is mysteriously kidnapped /

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The Comeback Issue

disappears you wake up in what might be a dream, might be reality but one thing’s for certain: your wife is missing the things just got real fucked up.

The bulk of Alan Wake is spend in the dark -- both literally and metaphorically. As you make your way around the moonlit landscapes of Bright Falls you’ll have to fend off the Taken: dark and ghostly apparitions of Bright Falls residents who’s only weakness is light. Using a combination of light and your more traditional fire arm is the only way to take these suckers down. It’s a clever mechanic which only further adds to the story’s emphasis on light and darkness. To keep things interesting as you progress through the game your guns range from a hand gun through to rifles and sawn offs but the real fun comes when you get to add flash bangs, flares and the oh-so-fun flare gun to the ‘light’ side of your armoury. And then, well, that’s about it really. Most of your time will be spend getting from point A to point B taking out Taken of varying sizes along the way -- with a few flocks of possessed birds and poltergeist scrap metal thrown in for good measure.

Ordinarily this would be the point where you decide this game isn’t worth your hard earned coppers.

That’s all you do? For the whole game? To think that would be missing the point; the jewel in Alan Wake’s crown is its presentation.

The art of story telling isn’t something that games have ever been too good at really, if we’re honest with ourselves. Apart from a minority of games (Mass Effect, Batman Arkham Asylum are recent examples that spring to mind) for the most part we’re presented with a story wrapped around a game (does anyone really know, or in fact care, what’s going on in the Halo series?) Alan Wake flips this equilibrium and takes a story and wraps a game around it.

The narrative takes very deliberate cues from the world of trashy horror literature.

Metatextual homages to Stephen King et al are layered on thick and there are more than a hand full of comparisons to the weird and very wonderful world of Twin Peaks; the Bright’s Diner is almost a carbon copy of the Double R, you come across a multitude of ‘kooky’ characters who provide ample light relief and the town is even built around a logging industry. There’s even an in game achievement called “That’s a damn fine cup of coffee”.

Split into six chapters, the narrative unfolds via in game narration (the cut scenes are thankfully few and far between) from the game’s cast, from Alan’s film noir style narration and, most interestingly, via pages of an Alan Wake manuscript you find dotted around town

-- which you don’t remember writing (dun dun duuuun!!!). The start of each new episode is neatly preceded with a suitably cheap and tacky TV-aping “Previously on Alan Wake...” segment to really hammer home the idea that we’re dissecting a genre as much as we’re playing through one. It works brilliantly.

As much fun as it is to play through this story it could present a little more of a challenge.

Even taking on the game on Hard difficultly (the highest available when first starting the game) Alan Wake is a fairly straight-forward endeavour.

You can work your way through all six chapters in around 15 hours and there’s little to go back for unless you fancy re-running the fun on the newly opened Nightmare difficulty or

picking up all the odd collectibles you missed along the way.

That said, with a new and interesting gameplay/ combat mechanic and a style which both pokes fun at and appreciates the horror genre Alan Wake hits the mark on more than one level.

It’s full of as many laughs as it is frights and although it may be a touch short and not overly challenging that shouldn’t detract from what feels like a complete package of a game. It’s rare that a game gets the blend of story and game play on such a level playing field that your enjoyment of the story, the whole experience, is more important than how much fun your have mashing buttons and nailing head shots.

With an ending which sets up a sequel nicely Remedy have managed to create a game with a story which is so enjoyable that part two can’t come soon enough.

Words: Mathew Parri Thomas

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Split Second: Velocity

Format: PS3, Xbox360, Windows Developer: Black Rock Studio Publisher: Disney Interactive Studios

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ichael Bay has got a lot to answer for. The man is responsible for the all style, no substance special effects porn that is Armageddon, that is Pearl Harbour, that is the continuing Transformers franchise. The man must think only in set pieces. I imagine a simple trip to the corner shop to buy a pint involves a milk float careening across the road, a cow tip-toeing through a mine field and some tension music to ramp up the drama as he sees if he has the right change. But, seeing as those films make a whole tonne of money, massively over-blown, emotionally empty, special effects-laden blockbusters tick a lot of people’s boxes.

On the plus side Michael Bay is also indirectly responsible for Split/Second: Velocity, the latest arcade racer from Black Rock and Disney (don’t see the word Disney and write this one off, anyone out there that lost large portions of their life to the highly addictive off-road ATV stunt racer Pure will attest that Disney know their shit when it comes to arcade racers). Like an adrenaline shot straight to the face, this arcade racer is all about speed, slip streams and set-pieces.

You take part in the imaginary TV racing show Split/Second. Racing against other seven other drivers, the aim is as simple as it gets: finish first.

The game is broken up into 12 episodes, with a total of 72 events to be completed. And that’s about it for the TV aspect of things really. As a presentation idea it feels like a massive afterthought; not that it’s really

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to the game’s detriment, they could have done a lot more to hammer home the idea that you’re competing on a TV show.

Sitting at the centre of Split/Second is the Power Play or, as I like to think of it, the Michael Bay button.

By drafting, jumping and drifting you fill your power play meter. Fill to level one and you can wreak some serious damage on your opponents; hit that Michael Bay button and the next thing you know attack helicopters are raining down fire, parked cars will be exploding and buildings are collapsing, all with the effort of taking your opponents (or you if you’re not careful) off the road.

Build up three bars of Power Play and your Michael Bay button turns in to a game changer — literally.

By firing off a Level 2 Power Play at certain points you’re able to cause catastrophic damage (cruise liner crashes, collapsing air craft carriers, land jumbo jets) which can re-route the track for the remainder of the race. Fire of a couple of these in the course of one circuit and lap three is nothing like lap one. Add to this a litter of debris on the road from previous explosions and the idea that “no two races are the same” becomes a very real possibility.

With the on-screen display being ditched completely — no speedometer, an ever-changing course making a map redundant — simple details like your Power Play meter, lap count and race position all sit on the bumper of your car, leaving as much room as

possible for the stunning carnage which takes place around you. The camera, sitting low behind your car, leans as you drift round corners; dirt flecks the screen as carnage rains down upon you; scenery flies by in bold, bright and blurred colours. Split/Second feels fast — really fast. Fire rains down, rail bridges collapse, caves explode; the Michael Bay-inspired visuals are stunning and, at times, can even get a little too much. With power plays being triggered all over the place it’s not uncommon that your vision is filled with nothing but fire, smoke and debris leading to an almost inevitable crash.

As well as your ‘standard’ race mode there is also a time trail challenge, in which you have to complete a circuit in the quickest time while power plays are automatically triggered ahead of you; Survival, in which you have to dodge exploding barrels falling from a lorry whilst driving down a storm drain (it’s very Terminator 2); and Air Attack in which you have to avoid the onslaught of missiles from an attack helicopter. So, Sunday driving this ain’t.

time trial stages. It can feel a little unfair that, when going flat out on a straight, an opponent in the same vehicle seems to have 10mph more than you, but that’s nothing an exploding building can’t remedy around the next corner.

Split/Second may have a few foibles when it comes to too much on-screen carnage and a difficulty curve which could afford a little tweaking however, when a racer is this much flat out fun you soon forgive them.

Standing up like an adult Mario Kart, finishing first is as much about causing some well-timed damage and destruction as it is about finding the perfect racing line.

Any game attached to the Transformers franchise will undoubtedly suck balls, if you’re looking for a full on Michael Bay experience look no further than Split/Second: Velocity.

Words: Mathew Parri Thomas

Being an arcade racer Split/Second is high on fun and low on realism. There isn’t an impressive roster of real-world vehicles to drive, there aren’t inch by inch renderings of real-world locations, the physics are fun and forgiving. With no difficulty setting, the learning curve can be a little steep; getting on the podium isn’t too taxing but if you want to be wearing the gold medal you’re going to have to work for it — especially on the criminally challenging

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Red Dead Redemption Format: Xbox360, PS3 Developer: Rockstar Publisher: Rockstar

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andbox games are the new rock and roll and Rockstar Games are the, well, the rock stars. It is an empire built on sandbox.

also had a wonderful plot that nodded heavily to a couple of the best Brian DePalma gangster films ever made in Carlito’s Way and Scarface.

It all began in 1997 with Grand Theft Auto. This was a one-of-a-kind game. A bird’s eye view of carnage, destruction and hilarity. Totally addictive and highly engrossing, though probably not morally appropriate, it was un-put-down able. There followed a add ons (60s London) and a sequel in 1999 which was more of the same, but not nearly as good as the first one.

The world took notice and laid in wait with baited breathe for the next GTA game.

Rockstar once again blew everyone’s mind and once again improved on the seemingly perfect. In 2004 they released Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. This time the 90s “LA gang” movies such as Boyz n the Hood and Menace to Society seemed to be the theme. You were now able to dress your man, keep him trim in the gym, or let him get fat, give him haircuts, woo ladies and swim in the water (where as previously you died). San Andreas was the perfect combination of clever sandbox and very clever writing. The visuals also pushed the Playstation 2 to its peak performance.

Then, in 2001, some genius at Rockstar Games decided to revitalize GTA for a third official sequel and have it in all in the third person. This was not new however, there had been the Driver games a few years before, which were all very well when driving the car, but when you got out of the car to run around, your pixilated character resembled a charcoal stick man with suffering in the advanced stages of rickets. This made the experience of getting out of the car, frankly, embarrassing and quite worrying.

GTA3 was a game you simply had to own. It had everything for everyone. If you like mission-based linear games, you were happy; if you liked to wander round a big city shooting, punching and winding up policemen, you were happy; if you liked driving around and enjoying pixel vistas, you were happy too. This game changed things. Whether in or out of the car, you were the bees knees. It became the “Die Hard” of games. Everyone tried to copy it (Saints Row, Crackdown and True Crime:Streets of LA) and were never nearly as good. Driver even returned in 2004 to attempt to reclaim it’s mantle with Driv3r.

Which frankly, sucked balls, seemed dated and had missed the boat.

Rockstar changed things once and for all.Sandbox games had really arrived and just when you thought they couldn’t top things, they bloody well did.

Grand Theft Auto 3 was followed by Grand Theft Auto: Vice City in 2002, a wonderful 1980s Miami Vice pastiche (even with the voice of Tubbs from Miami Vice, Philip Michael Thomas, cameoing) which upped the anti even further. Now your character was voiced

by Ray Liotta (Goodfellas)and had a wide variety of motor cycles to ride within your pretend Miami. It

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Also in 2004, Rockstar released a very interesting game called Red Dead Revolver. A tale of revenge set in the wild west. It contained a look, sound and feel that Sergio Leone would have been proud of. The soundtrack alone was enough to make it a classic (a wonderful Ennio Morricone homage). While it wasn’t entirely sandbox, it had a wonderful feel to it. I guess the only word that would best describe it would be “cool”. You were able to get into gun fights and upon drawing your gun, switch on a kind of “wild west bullet time” that would enable you to pick your shots and take out your opponent with deadly precision. It was like being in your own walking, talking spaghetti western, even down to the grainy visuals.

In 2008, Rockstar unleashed Grand Theft Auto 4. A tale of Eastern European gangsters at large in a giant New York clone. It was undoubtedly a masterpiece in terms of what it achieves, but ultimately far too interactive, with friends calling you every five minutes. It gets so bad that you actually have to sacrifice playing the game to take your pretend friends bowling. If you were a people person, surely you wouldn’t own GTA4? This was perhaps “too sandbox”. But still very fun to play.

Last year it was announced that Rockstar were working on a new Red Dead game which would be a sandbox western, combining the best of Red Dead Revolver and the GTA franchise. It has now arrived and it does exactly that.

Red Dead Redemption is the tale of John Marston, a retired former outlaw who is forced by the government (who have his wife and child) to hunt down and kill his former gang and all of its leaders.

Your task is to explore the giant map and try and recruit help to take down the villainous bandits and save your family.

Much like GTA, your own actions determine a great deal; shoot innocent people and your bounty goes up and you become a wanted man, continue your killing spree and sheriffs and bounty hunters will hunt you down where ever you go. You can nip it in the bud however by popping to the telegraph office and wiring money to pay off your debt to society, thus making you no longer a wanted man or, you can be brought in by a posse and risk losing money and getting jail time. If you decide to start blowing away anyone you meet, you will notice that your “honor” meter will go down, conversely, if you stop and help anyone in trouble you meet out of the range, your honor meter goes up. It is entirely up to you.

You are able to earn money by taking various jobs (night watch man, bounty hunter) or by playing poker or by playing the very fun game of “Five Finger Fillet”, a knife game that you may recognize from a scene in Aliens.

You can also loot the bodies of the nogood varmints you blow away, not to mention skinning wild animals and selling it to traders. You progress in the game by performing missions for various contacts you meet along the way, much like in GTA.

The “wild west bullet time” from Red Dead Revolver also returns for when you get into scrapes and duels.

There is simply nothing as satisfying than freezing the action and filling four or five dudes with lead at once. Bored gamers on the trail can also improve their sharp shooting by taking pot shots at the various birds in the sky. After a few direct hits you will notice your skills will improve.

The game will always provide you with a horse for your extensive travels (that you can even whistle to get it to come to you, where ever you are) but you have the option to buy, find or even tame better ones in the wild.

Having a horse is highly recommended, as the map is truly massive, though no load times as you traverse this wide world is a welcome bonus (as with GTA 4, the disc installs itself to your hard drive) and can sometimes make you forget you are playing a game.

There are various save points available in the game in the form of safe houses or, in another unique innovation, you can set up a campfire in the wilderness and save from there, this can also be used as a warping point to previous destinations, much like the taxi cab in GTA4.

There is everything in this game to keep you interested and like most GTA games, the completion time is about 20 hours, which is amazing value enough, but it could be double that if you intend to complete every single challenge or side mission.

There is also the multi player function, with a maximum of 16 players playing at once. You are able to compete in death matches or team based activities, form posses or just free roam looking for trouble. Each game begins with a Mexican stand off, which is very cool.

This really is a masterful piece of game craft and could very well be considered showing off. It would seem that with all the previous experience of the GTA games under their belt, Rockstar really know what they are doing now and at many points (as with GTA4) you find yourself stopping to enjoy the sights and sunsets as well as the wonderful soundtrack that again apes Morricone.

This really is one of the best games of the year so far. Miss it at your peril, after all, you may get a posse on your bottom.

Words: John Rain

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Demon’s Souls

Format: PS3 Developer: From Software / SCE Japan Studio Publisher: Namco Bandai

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et’s face it, games these days are easy. When I was growing up, games were utter heartless bastards.

What’s that? You got all the way to the last level of Ghosts and Goblins? You died? Well fuck off. Back to the start with you! You know what though? We were happy.

We knew our place. We were slaves to the machine.

However, with the dawn of the console and something called save points, we began to get curious of life away from these cruel masters. Yes, there were actually games out there that would let you die as much as you like. You could just continually regenerate in exactly the same spot.

These days, games will “auto save” meaning that you don’t even have to worry about it anymore. You died?

Fine, I saved it for you just before the Spotty Blatterlast Monster ripped off your skin. Ah, thanks console, you are so kind to me, unlike my last master, the evil ZX Spectrum or Commodore Amiga. We have even got to the point in games (since Halo) that if you lose health, you can simply run and hide and get it back again.

But our old masters were not beaten, no, they were simply biding their time and it was only a matter of time then that the masters would return to show us once again what shit gamers we really are.

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Now, in 2010, they bring us, the legendary RPG, Demon’s Souls. Less of a throw back, more of a “I’ll throw it, you go and fucking get it”. This game takes no prisoners.

The story is set in the medieval kingdom of Boletaria, which one day is covered in a “Deep Fog” which cuts off the kingdom from the outside world. Neighboring kingdoms send scouts to investigate but none of them returned after entering the fog. You take control of one such warrior who breaches the fog and enters the lost kingdom.

I began the game in ernest, created my avatar of a Barbarian (which quickly resembled Dolph Lundgren crossed with The Elephant Man). I made my way through a couple of training exercises in which the game shows you how to get your arse whipped by the undead, under the pretense of defending yourself. I then went through a door only to be greeted by a giant monster with a giant club which made me into a blob of jam within seconds. After dying, I was now in soul form, in the “Nexus” (a sort of chill out area that acts as a hub where players can exchange souls). In the Nexus, I was greeted by a mysterious blind guy and given a quest to travel to each region of Boletaria and retrieve the demon’s souls to gain power and eventually free

the corrupted kingdom of Boletaria from the Old One. Sound easy? Just wait.

You can only actually save the game once you have defeated the end of level bosses (Demons), some of whom take up the whole screen and wield weapons three times the size of you. This is where the game begins to feel impossible. Not to mention the big guards, little guards and giant dragon who’ll kill you over and over again. But, eventually, you learn how to progress and once the demons are killed, you can re-spawn where they were and further into the level than before. If you aren’t killing bosses, you can relax in the Nexus, store items and travel between regions.

This is probably where you will spend most of your time, crying and rocking back and forth.

The combat is very cumbersome, and there are often collision issues; every time I attempted a parry I was sliced to pieces – but I am told it gets better after 300 hours or so.

There are some nice touches, such as seeing the actions of other players as ghosts in the same area that may show thing that aren’t immediately obvious like hidden rooms or switches. When another player dies, a bloodstain is often left in your game world that, when activated, can show a ghost playing out their last moments, indicating how that person died, which could be helpful, though most of the ones I have seen look like they killed themselves. Players can also leave messages on the floor that can also help others, though you can’t call anyone a rude name or anything, they

mostly just indicate safe or hostile positions, trap locations and tactics against enemies or bosses. So no instances of “Your mum was here”.

Demon’s Souls is very Japanese. By which I mean, it looks and sounds amazing. The soundtrack by Shunsuke Kida is an amazing opus of hammer horror proportions and worth the price of the game alone.

So, in conclusion, while I respect Demon’s Souls for the return to old values of gaming, I also can’t help but feel that I am part of a generation that is used the easy life and spent most of the game yearning for save points and some sort of clarity. This game can feel very daunting and (quite rightly) has a reputation for being one of the hardest games ever programmed in anger. However, fans of the old school of gaming will definitely love it. It ticks every box and is certainly a hard friend to get to know and definitely a big challenge. True fans of RPG masochism need only apply and anyone who masters this game should be given the keys to their town, city or province.

I have been wondering if maybe the generation I am from will hate me for saying so, but, I didn’t enjoy Demon’s Souls, I am sure that I would have enjoyed it more had I devoted a further 70 hours to it, but I just plain didn’t want to, if that makes me a fool, so be it.

Now, I must ring the council about these blood stains in my local Nexus.

Words: John Rain

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