Kruger Issue 16

ISSUE 16

T HE F ACTORY

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FRE

TAHNRTEI AC TSM P.10

C OMPETITION

S EBASTIEN T ELLIER P.28

B L AKCIKD S P.34 G

F TUTCOKN S BU

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P.66 T RUTH & S OUL R ECORDS P.48

P.6

P.16

T HAO P.18

N EON N EON P.38

STUEP NE NR I S P.22

N OTABLE F ORMER E MPLOYEES

G EPORRI NGGE L E

P.26

P.52

P.44

B ORN

R UFFIANS

D OES IT O FFEND YOU Y EAH

R OLO T OMASSI

P.12

“The factory of the future will have only two employees, a man and a dog. The man will be there to feed the dog.

The dog will be there to keep the man from touching the equipment.”

Warren G Bennis, American scholar.

At The Factory Moustache, there is a dog is called Colin and a man called Humphrey. Humphrey has a moustache, but this is a coincidence. Colin, a Daschund, is clever, lively and courageous to the point of rashness. This not being the future, there are other workers too, whose hard graft and labour produce the miracles for which The Factory Moustache has become famous.

These miracles I mention come in all shapes and sizes, and are pumped out of the guts of Process Whore, our most cherished machine, with the impressive regularity of Bloody Flux. Some of these you’ll see on this most special of days, as The Factory Moustache opens its door to the public, showing you the processes behind the products you know so well.

COLI N

Kruger Magazine Issue 16

Contributors

Editors: Mike Williams, Joe Howden, Mike Day Reviews Editor: Helia Phoenix Research: Helen Weatherhead

Words

Thanks to: Thanks to: Sam Hinde @ Freeman, Anna Mears @ Dogday, Natasha, Ruth & Beth @ Toast, Matt Hughes @ Hungry, Matt Tucker @ Sainted, Ben Harris @ Run, Will Skeaping @ Lex, Martina Conners @ Warp, Mandy Crompton @ Momentum, Richard Onslow @ XL, Will Lawerence @ Inhouse, Christine Crowther, Al Power, Ben Carter, Anna Rowlands, Queen Latifa, Christian Ashton, James Watts and all at Radio 1, all our contributers, all our advertisers and especially Helia, Susie, Dan, Emily, Ioan, and Helen.

Biscuit!

Printed by: MWL Print Group Ltd. Units 10 -13 Pontyfelin Industrial Estate, New Inn, Pontypool NP4 ODQ contact nathanw@mwl .co.uk Produced by Kruger in The Daley Thompson Suite, Cardiff and Little Wee Studio, London. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or in part without the kind permission of Kruger. The opinions expressed in this magazine are not necessarily the opinions of Kruger.

All work by Mike Day, Mike Williams & Joe Howden unless otherwise credited. All words, photography and illustrations are original and specific to Kruger. Kruger is a quarterly magazine and is distributed throughout the UK.

Advertising enquiries: mike@krugermagazine.com

Greg Cochrane, Huw Stephens, Kat Brown, Simon Roberts. Helia Phoenix, Jen Long, Betti Hunter, Alex Bean, Dan Tyte, Shannon Mahanty, DJ Moneyshot, Sophie Lawerence, Adam Corner, Chris Rogers, Brodie Lyon, Huw Thomas, Matt Bowring, Janne Oinonen, David George, Nat Davies, Jon Davies, Pete Hayman, Matt Bolton, Geoff Cubitt, James Anthony, Barney Sprague, Sophie Morgan.

Images Tim Cochrane, Kamil Janowski, Lee Goldup, Ben Ling, Mei Lewis, Louise Roberts, Jess Long, James Perou, Matthew Hodson, Lele Saveri.

Contact, Comment, Contribute mail@krugermagazine.com myspace.com/krugermagazine

Super Tennis North London’s athletes down tools to chat backhanded pop, Kerry Katona, DIY and their arch nemeses Mega Badminton. Fifteen love!

“You know those little pick ‘n’ mix cheeses?” beams Kev Perry, contented bassist with norfLondon champs Super Tennis, reflecting on his experience working in Waitrose’s cheese chiller. “Well, I used to stack up a barrier of boxes and sit there with my mate and we’d eat miniature Roquefort and Camembert.”

“I worked in a printing plant for one night,” continues willowy guitarist Tom McEnroe. “Everyone there was stacked, proper body builders. One of them was training for a Mr Britain competition but, I’m, um, quite skinny. The job was to push these massive, heavy rolls of paper onto reels. I went up to it and it didn’t move - pushing as hard as I could. I had to take a run up and shoulder-charge them… 12 hours of that was tough.”

“Its not really a factory story, but I took a piss at Laser Quest once,” blurts drummer Bob Becker. “On the top level, when I couldn’t find the toilet in the dark.

I waited until everyone went….” …And Kruger thought tennis was for noble, distinguished gentlemen with clean socks and respect for health ‘n’ safety in the workplace. The reason we ask about factories is because we’ve just been chased out of Welwyn Garden City’s soon-to-be-demolished Shredded Wheat plant, presumably for trespassing on “Mr Nabisco’s” property and flirting with his heavy machinery.

But, as everyone knows, factories = funtime, whether it’s your mate’s Nan making pink wafers or your Dad losing his wedding ring in a boiling vat of porridge.

Three-piece post-pop scamps Super Tennis have done their fair share of hardgrafting, especially during their summer breaks from Exeter University where in 2002 they formed original group Skip Tracer.

“Super Tennis came together about nine months ago over eggs, sausages, bacon and some discussion about Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi,” says Tom. “That signified the beginning. Me and Kev were playing music as Go! Swimchamp (Skip Tracer side project) but swimming really doesn’t have enough length… It’s all about racquet sports.”

Bob had been tempted by the “novelty factor” of playing in a band called Super Tennis for years, so they finally decided to make the dream a reality.

“We took ourselves a little more seriously then,” explains Tom shortly after our brush with The Law (otherwise known as Ted, the friendly security guard).

“Exeter provided a really good platform for local bands,” reminisces Kev. “We got a chance to play with some really great bands that we really wouldn’t have had a chance to in other places. These Arms Are Snakes, Stapleton…”

On the South Coast the gang cultivated a small but avid following and played a handful of national dates, but disbanded to go their separate ways as they graduated. “We played one last gig in our practise space which was fantastic,” smiles Bob. “That show was the impetus behind Super Tennis. We had so much fun at that gig, when we stopped taking ourselves so seriously. It’s about playing to make people smile.”

Having left and reluctantly taken up “proper jobs”, the trio, minus Skip Tracer frontman Imran (“we started as an instrumental band but now we all sing”), began playing again last March.

“Its not really a factory story, but I took a piss at Laser Quest once.” - Bob

“Now, as Super Tennis, all we’re trying to do is make great pop music,” says Bob. “We have been influenced by all the music we have ever listened to (Braid, American Football, REM) - which might get a bit messy, but mess is good – into something that’s just pop. We’re not trying to show anyone we can whammydive pinch from the 14th fret or anything – I mean we can but…”

“It’s basically an excuse to get lots of exercise and wear white,” simplifies Kev. “You can have a couple of beers and a dance to it.”

“Tennis is mano-o-mano like boxing,” explains Kev. “But it’s for people who appreciate handshakes and Robinson’s squash. It’s a noble sport. The name was inspired by the early Super Nintendo game.”

It’s an inter-band interest that goes back years. “I was a tennis champion when I

was nine,” reluctantly boasts Kev. “I was selected to be part of the Cliff Richard Road Show but I was ill the day it arrived.”

Bob: “Any more than that and it ends up in dub-territory. There’s a time and a place for dub, and it’s called Jamaica.”

“Once we’re there Kev usually comes up with a bassline, then we’ll tell him to make it simpler,” says Tom. “We’ll drink more but only after practice. We go to a pub called The Unicorn.”

Bob: “I remember your mum telling me about that. There’s a picture of you sat on a step looking really glum in tennis gear.”

“We have floated the idea of other sports,” admits Bob. “Super Soccer, Super Golf, Super Chess…”

“There we’ll hang out with Vincent,” adds Kev. “He wears loads of cuddly toys around his neck. We try to talk to him.

He doesn’t talk back though. He has a white beard. He’s Bad Santa.”

“We did talk about perhaps releasing one album as Super Tennis, splitting up and then releasing another as Super Golf playing a completely different set of songs and maybe go in a jazz direction,” grins Tom. “There’s longevity in Super Tennis though,” enthuses Bob. “It’s just a name, really, and we pun on it a little bit and take the piss.”

Player: Kev Perry Age: 24 Type o’ racket: Bass/vox By day: Teacher of English Favourite shot: Lob

With the breaktime tea, biscuits and sarnies snaffled we return to the subject of factories. Like any efficient production unit, Super Tennis’ way of creating their lo-tech tunesmithery is a considered, highly-detailed process.

“We have a cooked breakfast then get on the Tube,” nods Kev authoritatively.

“Then we have two beers. No more, no less. Nice prestige beers, really posh beers with preferably a laughing, jolly monk on the front. We have a two beer threshold - any more than that and things start to go a bit reggae.”

Player: Tom McEnroe Age: 25 Type o’ racket: Guitar/vox By day: Designer - mainly web related Favourite shot: Volley

It’s a well-oiled machine that’s served up one huge ace in the form of their self-titled EP. There’s also a seven-inch split single featuring possible TBC tracks Pushinsky and Yaphet Kotto (scheduled for April) with noise-trio An Emergency on Faux-Disc recordings to come. But the band is already thinking further than that.

“The Grand Slam, that’s the idea for our Greatest Hits,” bubbles Bob. “Or, Game, Set and Match. Actually, they sound like world tours don’t they? We should just call a song ATP…Motherfucker. That’s the tour not the festival.”

Speaking of tours, the ball-boys hit the road with their headbands at the end of March (“Easter holidays, I’m taking my marking on the road,” explains Kev) and then plan to put together their debut album. They already have a TV station.

Well…check their Myspace to see video clips of them mucking around on Super Tennis TV, including a dance-off with Vincent.

You’ll also find some plans to get very ungentlemanly with another band.

“There’s actually a rival band called Mega Badminton in Bristol,” grimaces Tom, “I think we’re supposed to be playing a house show with them.”

Kev: “We’re gonna make them eat shuttle-cock.”

Bob: “They are gonna end up with their fucking faces off.” Ouch.

Don’t think for one second all this banter is construct though, sure they like fun but Super Tennis aren’t a joke band bending over for press and record sales.

“I was thinking about this the other day. I read what people say about us but then I thought, ‘What’s the fucking point in that?’ It’s just a waste of time. Why take one persons opinion over someone else’s? I couldn’t give a fuck about what anyone thinks and that’s actually honest,” says a stern Bob. “The whole thing about the ‘music industry’ is such a massive pile of bullshit. Everyone can just do things on their own, y’know, like you’re doing this magazine, people just put on shows in their front room. They can release their own records by just recording it in their practise room and sticking it on a CDR. Do it yourself.”

It’s an ethos that’s served the band well so far.

“You’ve gotta look at the goals, what are the goals that you set yourself?” muses Bob. “If your goal is to look good in a photo or get in a magazine or get your

CD liked by loads of people you’re in trouble. Our goal is to have fun all the time. If it doesn’t work just don’t do it.

Don’t put yourself in a position where you feel like a prick.”

What then do you think about specifically designed pop music, does it have a place?

“I think elitist snobbery is really sad where you have people who think one person’s music is better than another person’s music. If someone reacts to Britney Spears in the same way I react to Michael Jackson – seriously I love MJ – who can say what’s bad and what’s good? You can’t. Six year olds aren’t going to listen to Do Make Say Think are they? They’re not gonna listen to Shellac or Converge, they’re going to listen to Britney Spears because its sounds nice to them. It speaks to them. There’s no room for Kerry Katona though, she can fuck off. She’s a dick.”

“Tennis is mano-o-mano, like boxing... but it’s for people who appreciate handshakes and Robinson’s squash.” - Kev Player: Bob Becker Age: 26 Type o’ racket: Drums/vox By day: Construction consultant Favourite shot: Sliced Backhand

Finally, given the choice would you play Wembley Stadium or the Ladies Final at Wimbledon?

For the first time today they’re almost lost for words. “Easy, ask us a real question,” says Bob. Chaps, see you on Centre Court.

Words by Greg Cochrane Photography by Tim Cochrane www.timothycochrane.com

Threatmantics (l-r Hedd, Huw & Ceri) photographed at The Daily Thompson Suite, Cardiff 2008

I

haven’t yet worked out what the name Threatmantics means. Some have wondered if it’s a good name for a band, but you have to look beyond a name.

Who cares if you like the name or not, it’s what the band chose for themselves, and when they’re this good, you can’t really query it.

When I first saw them play in a drinking den in Cardiff city centre, instantly it was clear this band were like no other. Their accents and weird wig outs on stage set them apart. Their energy, reaction to each other and effortless warmth endeared me to them massively.

Meet Heddwyn, Huw and Ceri. They are Threatmantics.

They rule, they break rules, they make a racket. How did they meet? Well, Heddwyn and Huw are brothers, that’s how. But Ceri?

“He’s not the first guitarist, we had one before”, says singer Hedd, in a warm pub with his newly shorn haircut. “He left to become a painter and teacher. A rigorous search was conducted to try and find another guitarist...... the only other taker we had was some guy who phoned me up at 3 o’clock in the morning, drunk, and said ‘I’ve not played guitar in about 20 years but I reckon I’m about ready for it now’…. never give out your phone number.’’

With the ink on a publishing contract still wet, it came about after said publishers travelled from London, capital of England, to Ferndale, population 7000, to see them play a gig where Heddwyn was singing, playing his viola, and doing the sound at the same time. They’re obviously the real deal, refreshingly oblivious to trends and fads and keen to take this as far as they can.

And so Ceri joined the brothers from Ferndale’s band. According to him, it happened at a house party in Cardiff.

“We were at a party once and I told Hedd I could stab him. He said I couldn’t because he had a bodyguard, who was his brother Huw, down visiting him. I reached out to prove I could, and Huw pinned me down.”

Heddwyn claims the band are equal opportunities enthusiasts, and that Ceri was recruited after he tried hard to advertise the band vacancy in various musical instrument shops.

However he joined, right now, Threatmantics are a very exciting proposition. Viola-wielding, touring with excellent experimentalists Clinic, and with their debut album being given its final tweaks as you read, this year is the first they get to take their tunes to the masses.

Drummer Huw (- “Male nudity? I like it. Every drummer has Animal from the Muppets as a hero”) claims that Ceri was a natural successor to join the band, because “he had a car and a guitar”.

What’s clear is that they’re all friends and love playing in this band together. See them live and you get what all the fuss is about. They sound like no one else, sing songs in both English and Welsh, and are another brilliant band from the Cardiff indie scene to succeed in the outside world, following in the footsteps of Los Campesinos!, The Hot Puppies and Victorian English Gentlemens Club.

“We were at a party once and I told Hedd I could stab him...

I reached out to prove I could, and Huw pinned me down.” - Ceri.

I imagine Threatmantics headlining the Millennium Stadium in twenty years time, on their second sold out night, with the world’s press wanting to talk to Heddwyn the lead singer, and not Huw and Ceri.

Heddwyn ponders the scenario. ‘’So far a lot of the interviews have been done with Welsh language media, and Huw’s not that comfortable doing interviews in Welsh, Ceri can’t speak it and I do.’’ Inevitably then, Hedd has been the public face of the group. “Now though, we get everyone in, it’s more equal opportunities that way.”

With the upcoming Clinic tour, how will they feel when the bigger band draw larger crowds and better transport, have bigger dressing rooms and riders?

Heddwyn won’t get sucked in to such fickle debates. ‘It’s all about relativity” he calmly, sensibly says. “We travelled to London today, four of us and all our gear in a Fiat Hatchback. Anything better than that is a plus. They could turn up in a tourbus each so long as we get a Transit we’ll be fine”.

Words by Huw Stephens

George

Pringle

H

ow many times have you used the word ‘original’ in terms of art in the past 15 years and actually meant it? Britpop came and slashed great holes in The Kinks’ artistic tyres, electroclash took some staggering beats and added liberal dollops of Laurie Anderson-esque vocals, and – oh, that’s it bar inventing drum and bass which is only fun if you’re on a colossal amount of drugs and is rubbish for putting on the stereo of a Sunday.

So it makes sense that 21-year-old George Pringle is skulking around between floors in the Kruger building, ostensibly cleaning up but really nicking the instruments and flitting between departments with no particular affiliations or feuds. After Bat For Lashes, she’s the first truly interesting interviewee I’ve had in years and the ensuing chat is a) very very long and b) involves enough tea and hobnobs to be suitably, bizarrely twee for someone with quiet jungle playing in the background.

Having spent most of her teens playing guitar in bands with boys who “got pissed off at the fact that a girl was doing the writing and singing instead of them” and subsequently fed up of squeezing into music scenes to fit in, Pringle started purposefully doing challenging gigs.

Normally, challenging is a subtle analogy for “crock of old shit” but there’s little other way to describe the sight of a pretty girl with an iPod and a mic essentially singing karaoke to her own bedroom-built tracks. Particularly in a town - Oxford - where the Radiohead hangover still hasn’t gone and next-greathope Foals are still five boys with guitars.

It’s certainly not dinner party music: tongue in cheek it might be, but Pringle nicks all the obscurest MySpace genres on purpose. There’s no Japanese chamber music influence here but it’s certainly as strange, a complete loner and not always by choice. “There’s a problem with being middle-class and not lying about it, which is what most people do in music,” says Pringle, educated in a gothic multinational pile in Malvern which went bankrupt a few years later (“I don’t know why, they had so many crooks’ children”).

“People hide behind their instrument. I don’t see it as an issue. Joe Strummer: son of a diplomat. Pete Doherty, RAF brat. People pay attention to my voice and you have to break through that.”

It was at school that Pringle started her DIY recording ethic. In the ancient school hall by two grand pianos, she and a friend would sneak down after the bed bell with a guitar and an old French oral exam recorder and make demos, like some kind of Ed Banger Malory Towers.

“They were never locked actually, but we had this really odd pervy nightwatchman so it was a bit difficult. He used to come and watch you drinking hot chocolate which was a bit weird.”

and am unlikely to start now - is because it’s bewilderingly hard to describe. It’s like nothing I’ve heard - well, ever.

“Even though there were quite interesting bands coming out like Foals, they weren’t going ‘George Pringle’s ace, she’s going to play a gig with us.’ Never! I had to scrabble along getting bitched about by local zines.

The bands with reluctant egos followed, and then a year immersed in the rock scene listening to emo before Pringle decided to spend her art degree at Oxford carving out something more interesting.

Encouraged by her teacher to try free writing (stream of consciousness), Pringle got hooked. Most of her lyrics come from this now, with occasional rewrites.

Despite (and probably because of) her confidence and refusal to play unwanted games, Pringle spent her three years at university gigging through gritted teeth.

“When I was in Oxford I was never in with the Oxford scene, which was quite hard because it was quite back slappy and boys’ club and there weren’t many women doing stuff.

She describes the reaction as people sighing, ‘Meanwhile, back in communist Russia.’ “There were no guitars, no screaming. They were trying to compare it to someone they knew, but I didn’t fit.”

This is certainly true. One of the reasons I’ve yet to read anything about Pringle that says what her music sounds like -

“I get asked a lot ‘Who makes your beats?’ as if there was some guy behind it.”

This is all said with a cup of tea, a hobnob and a fag and is entirely without front.

The one time Pringle gets truly het up during our interview is over the insecurity and annoyance she feels at being a girl and “not allowed” to do certain things.

Irritation at periods and make-up sounds terribly riot grrl on paper (“LESBIAN!” growls the inner male), but in practise is certainly what I felt growing up.

“I get asked quite a lot ‘Who makes your backing beats?’ as if there were some guy behind it,” she says in between tea. “It doesn’t equate with how I look which is a myth as well, I’m just really good with Photoshop. I put up the pictures to spite them, which sounds horrible.”

She’s half-laughing this time, but there’s a wild annoyance in the eyes that says she certainly means it. She’s given herself ‘til September to get her album out - “It’s going to have lots of art with it. This, essentially, is my art project so I’d like stuff rather than just an MP3” - and start making more of an impact, which will be helped along by her forthcoming support

slots with Does It Offend You, Yeah?

“I’m going on tour with [them] because one of them I think quite likes it. It’s really nice to have someone go ‘We really like what you’re doing’ and try and incorporate you into some kind of a scene. I can do indie gigs and I can do dance nights so I can’t get really in on it.”

Sounds like Pringle’s been locked away for so long she’s missed the joys of crossover still eating up clubs. But she says, “You can say what you like, but in the end I’m going to win and say to those people: I’m so going to piss on you in a year’s time!”

George Pringle’s debut Poor EP, Poor EP Without a Name is out now.

Words by Kat Brown Photography by Kamil M. Janowski www.clikpic.com/kamil

O

BUTT FUCK NS

W

hether a clitoral reference, zip lover, or Cadburry’s antagonist, Fuck Buttons have just signed with ATP and the rest of us are still sat on our mouldy arses doing nothing, wishing we were shaking our mouldy arses in Butlins, Minehead, watching Fuck Buttons literally fuck buttons. And this is an image we shouldn’t really see. Man and Machine’s relationship has always flittered on the edge of combustion. You give HAL the horn and you know what happens: ‘I’m sorry Dave, I can’t let you back into this warm spaceship, you’ll have to freeze in the cold of space’; or in my case Womanby Street, Cardiff, Wales.

In theory, they’re that kind of band, the ones who seem to answer all life’s little grumbles, but will eventually kill everything apart from cockroaches, Pepperami and Welshmen. They’re like that chicken that lived for two years after its head was cut off and became a minor celebrity; they are manbots on the edge of a collective nervous breakdown. Fuck Buttons as a band exist through this binary opposition of Man and Machine, this collision of frequencies, juxtaposing warm, melodic circuitry with cold, atonal humanism, like being beaten to death with a sun-bed. I may well be painting the wrong picture here, and I am certainly not comparing them to the glue-headache in Topshop that is Crystal Castles, but they do use unbranded Fisher Price machinery, Ben does love a shout and they’re louder than a breakfast at borstal; so presumably, they will be categorised as an Electro/

be united. “The tour just keeps growing and it’s a long time (48 straight nights) to work together in such proximity, but we are really close friends and we have been for a long time, it’s just nice to be able to do what you really love…” - Ben. “Yeah, when we first signed to ATP we both said we were willing to jump head first into this, and that’s what’s happened and we’ve just been caught in the wave of it… (pauses) … but fuck man, it’s gonna be gruelling, and just like… I’m shitting it a bit.’ - Andrew.

Noise duo. “I think we stand on our own really, I don’t think our fans would call us noise…”. says Andrew, who is interrupted by Ben “… I don’t tend to pigeonhole, we’re just experimental, we got some nice bright sounds…” who is interrupted by Andrew, “…when we first started out, we weren’t interested in noise. We get enough ideas generated from our own musical processes without looking to other music…”.

So check your head, Shoreditch rudeboy, Ben has already played with Thurston Moore (Sonic Youth), Bob Weston (Shellac) has mastered their album and John Cummings (Mogwai) has recorded it. You should probably put your parts away now, Andrew is trying to speak: “Bob did our sound at ATP and it went from there and we asked for John Cummings and we got him, its pretty amazing really.” And that doesn’t come with just slamming your jack into your electrical Jill, that’s just sampling your kettle bleed a radiator. These are intelligent beings, a dialectical conflict of sound montage worthy of Eisenstein critique.

Andrew and Ben are about to do what the Soviets never could; destroy America.

And without Rocky IV to save them from Fuck Buttons’ manifestation, the yanks will see a 52 date tour with more venues confirming in tandem with the cigarettes being smoked by their support act, The Genius (my term) Alex Tucker.

When you’re going to war you need to

“I think we stand on our own really, I don’t think our fans would call us noise.”

Andrew

The sort of sounds they create and images they conjure may well be made on baby’s first tape player and battered Samsung camera phones (and I know before I even say it, you anti-media nodes will be correcting my reference just as Woody Allen does in Manhattan, but I’m using the popular misconception because I’m lazy and it fits), but the medium isn’t the message, Fuck Buttons are, and if ATP haven’t had a little trouser accident so far, I think they’ll all be fine. The nerves and stress will pass into hangovers (maybe not for tour manager Declan, who is still working full time), and there will always be a safety in the frozen hands of Alex Tucker. So a big shout to these four boys and Declan’s girlfriend who worked the Stall on Valentines Night. They are true purveyors of the arts of alfresco ysmygu.

Words by Simon Roberts Photography by Lee Goldup www.leegoldup.com

THAO

A

t the tail end of last year, unaware that my future might hold any kind of actual encounter with Thao, I spent days immersed in the world of her second album, We Brave Bee Stings and All. I was caught up in its intricate melodies: by turns lazy sepia summer and sad stillborn winter, spring break and autumn crush, a delicate exploration of relationships with friends and lovers; that horrible precipice you inhabit in between stages in your life, waving off innocent, unaware youth and facing the frightening but exhilarating prospect of a future unknown but bursting with possibility.

The lyrics - like dagger and doves - tell stories both introspective and inspired by the world around, enveloping you as smoke curls around a chimney. It’s an album curdled with optimism, crystallised into sugar and sucked lollipop-dry, and however sad it gets, rays of sunshine are always just about peeping through.

But there’s more to all this than meets the eye, of course, as is always the case.

On further investigation, I discover a few facts about Miss Thao Nguyen. The band she plays and records with is The Get Down, Stay Down (Willis Thompson, Frank Stewart and Adam Thompson).

She’s a great singer and even better guitarist, who wants to push herself as a musician more than just a frontwoman;

in fact, at time of press, improving her guitar playing is more important to her than songwriting (she cites Mississippi John Hurt, Lightnin John Hopkins, John Fahey and Elizabeth Cotton as guitar heros).

By all accounts, too, this is one guitarplaying frontwoman who knows her own mind when it comes to her music and the musical development process. When I speak to her, she’s mid-tour, having arrived in London, then played some dates in Europe and then got back to London today. She’s delirious, although, she smiles, “it’s a comfortable state when you get into the groove of things – we’re just grateful to shower, that’s the most we can ask for these days!”

The last time she toured the UK she played solo, but this time she is touring with Willis her drummer. “Playing solo is more of a challenge I guess, to garner and sustain audience attention. I try to play more intricate stuff on the guitar so that movement will catch their attention.

I stamp my foot at lot, I basically throw a tantrum,” she laughs. “I become a total diva, and demand things from the audience, like ‘Tell me my hair looks healthy!’”

That’s the thing with Thao. Lady got one seriously dry sense of humour that Kruger digs very much, but her off-thecuff comments – always sarcastic –are frequently misrepresented in the press.

“I play intricate stuff on the guitar so that movement will catch their attention. I stamp my foot a lot, I basically throw a tantrum.”

Just before speaking to her, I read an interview she gave in which she (allegedly) claims “the entire album is written about my dad leaving my family when I was younger”: destroying all notions I’d built up about We Brave Bee Stings… and reducing it to one dimensional (and less interesting) status. “It really says that?” she asks, bemused. “To some extent, obviously everything in my life after that event was informed by it, but it’s not the sole focus of the album. It’s about friendship, love, so much more.” When asked how We Brave… differs from her first album, Like The Linen, Thao gives another of those answers that gets her misquoted. “In my first album I blamed other people, this one I blame myself. It’s a much more collaborative band effort.

More variation, energy, rhythm and groove - thank you to the Get Down Stay Down. Much more lyrically introspective and dark.”

Another little rumour that runs the mill – perpetuated no doubt by the album press release – is Thao’s control-freakery over her music and also her refusal to standdown in discussions with her band, called the Get Down Stay Down because they have to do what she tells them, when she tells them.

“I am aware of that rumour, only because I started it - I was joking, of course. But I’ve yet to register that humour in general and sarcasm in particular do not translate well in print. Did I accidentally say that? Shit,”

she shakes her head and smiles. “The fellas can do whatever they want, they can even go play for another songwriter.

I dare them!” she laughs.

Although it might not be a democracy with Thao and The Get Down Stay Down, it’s hardly a dictatorship either.

“Everyone is teeming with ideas and they are so tasteful in what they bring,” she says of the band’s contribution to her creative process. She’s very protective of the actual song writing process, insisting that is the only time she is actually ‘into control’, so she prefers to come to the band with the song fully formed. “Lyrically, melodically, most often arrangement of verses, choruses, are already set, but they write their own parts and bolster and realise the song in ways it could only wish for. And then in the studio we work with Tucker [Martine] to see what else we hear, like additional instruments, finger snaps, what have you, and maybe what should be pared down for the sake of the song.”

After we speak, Thao packs up that guitar and takes her stamping foot back over to the US to continue on her merry way, touring through the spring in 2008. When I ask her what the future holds, she thinks for a second before giving me an insight into her schedule. “I want a salad spinner, and one of those magnetic strips to hold kitchen knives. Which would imply I have a kitchen. Which would imply I have a home!” She laughs. “We will be on tour

for the foreseeable rest of our lives writing and working on the new album in our sleep - and back in to the studio in January to record the new one, assuming the songs exist.”

She’s making me tired and a bit seasick talking about all that movement, as well as rather nostalgic for a place to call home (all on her behalf). But before I have a chance to dwell with sadness on this self-governing oligarch’s nomadic dwelling, she hits me with an uppercut.

“Also I will be taking multi-vitamins and we will lift free weights in the tour van and do morning callisthenics in hotel rooms.” I smile and wonder if they’ll need a wellness advisor for that…

Thao’s next single, Swimming Pools, is out on May 19th via Kill Rock Stars. May tour dates are on www.myspace.com/ thaomusic Words by Helia Phoenix Photography by Ben Ling www.flickr.com/photos/bfjhling_lunar

Accident Record 1. About the person who had the accident

2 About the accident

T

he factory is a democratic place. Sometimes, the people working on the floor come cruising in on a Monday morning, still wearing Saturday night’s make-up and Sunday morning’s smile, and say “Sod this.” They pull off their hairnets, and jump on the conveyor belt themselves. They announce that they are pop stars, now.

They make a band. – Girls Aloud Mission Statement, Bebo.

The factory is a democratic, but also a dangerous place, where competence and procedure combine to create a recognisable product. Sometimes that product is a car or corn flakes, and sometimes it’s pop music. However, if the variables of this process are altered, concentration slips, machinery is tampered with, then accidents happen.

Does it Offend You, Yeah? were never meant to be a dance band, but tracks like Weird Science and Battle Royale have been filling dancefloors to a volatile capacity. And Sebastian Grainger’s screamed vocals were never expected to explode across previous single Let’s Make Out, but they do. Sometimes accidents are welcome. “All new music’s like a happy accident” begins Rob, drummer

it on, you have to put it on’ and then finally we put it on and...”

in the eight armed assault, before bassist and founding member James interrupts; “Bands that just sound like other bands, that’s contrived.”

New bands will always be compared to, or sound like other bands, but when an act can be compared to Daft Punk and Nirvana in the same breath, surely that’s an accident? Apparently not, as James explains; “We didn’t want to be like a dance band, people were like ‘so, you’re gonna get out some laptops and a light show?’ and it was like no, we don’t want to do that, it’s been done. So we decided we wanted to be a band sort of thing, and it always worked like that.”

With debut album You Have No Idea What You’re Getting Yourself Into hitting the shelves on March 24th, however you want to categorise DIOYY’s recorded offerings, on-stage the band take on a new force. James appears to be the worst offender. “One night he managed to knock Dan on the head, poke Morgan in the eye and then put the bass through the bass drum skin and into my shin. So he injured all of us with one bass” states Rob as James leaps to his own defence. “That was a protest though, against our management. They’d got us this front drum skin with the logo on it, and it looked so tacky and they were like ‘You have to put

“I’m like ‘Fuck!

What happened to your face?’ and he’s like ‘You twatted me in the head with your bass.” - James

“...you picked up my bass drum and then smacked it on the floor and it snapped in two” finishes Rob. When you begin to investigate the damage caused by this group, their effect on the company’s annual turnover becomes apparent.

“Three keyboards, six bass guitars, three cymbals, a bass drum, a fucking bass amp he’s fucked, a bass cabinet he’s fucked” lists tour manager Sweeny. “Probably about five to six hundred quid’s worth of leads, pedals, fucking you name it – he’s fucking smashed it up.”

It would seem this mindless destruction is less a rebellious blow to the industry and stems more from boredom with repetition. “When we play live, we’re there to entertain ourselves as much as we are the crowd” begins James. “If we enjoy it there’s gotta be something that rubs off.” Although, sometimes it’s just rebellion; “We were nominated for some best newcomer dance act, so we played a punk-rock set and then smashed it. We cleared the room.”

“I jumped off a speaker stack in Leeds and I was pretty drunk onstage so I didn’t really notice anything until I got back to the hotel” admits James. “It was one of those

2 About the accident things where I got up on the speaker stand and I thought, I’ll jump off this, and I started to jump and while you’re going through the air you’re thinking ‘I should have landed by now... I still haven’t landed.’”

“I’ve come off stage before and got to the dressing room and Dan’s walked in and he’s got like, blood coming down his face” James continues. “I’m like ‘Fuck!

What happened to your face?’ and he’s like ‘You twatted me in the head with your bass.’”

“I think we’ve had a couple of electrocutions” states Rob as if they were paper cuts. “Sometimes you get to a venue and it’s so badly wired up that if you put the microphone to your lip you get a little blue spark and if you touch the guitar to the microphone basically everything shorts out and you get electrocuted, collapse. It happened to a mate of mine.

Their band were playing in Germany and they touched a guitar to the mic stand and they all got electrocuted and all the power went off. It was in the last song so apparently it was amazing.”

Thankfully, it’s not always the band who come a cropper, as Rob admits; “We did a gig in Bedford and two ambulances had to come. One was a dislocated shoulder

and one was a broken ankle. And we played Manchester when that girl ran onstage to stage dive.” James begins to laugh; “She went to the back of the stage like this, and then ran, and the monitors were there, and she literally just hit the monitors and went BAAAF!” “There was another one where the guy tried to stage dive and he sort of went in the pit and he was sort of unconscious and the security guys were dragging him out” adds Rob, in a manner that makes you think while they don’t condone it, this recklessness is catching. “We saw Rachel our merchandise girl run over three people”, confesses James. “There were these people having problems reversing their car and she was really pissed and she said ‘Oh, I’m a professional driver’.

Got in, put it in reverse and then turned the key and run them all over.”

The factory is a democratic and a dangerous place, and while some may jump on the conveyor belt to stardom, some prefer to just take it out, accidentally or not.

Words by Jen Long Photography by Mei Lewis www.missionphotographic.com

Rolo Tomassi Something new is stirring in the UK underground. Generation Skins are taking music into their own hands and creating a genre-defying, blitzkrieg approach to song writing.

N

one more so than Rolo Tomassi, a band with an average age of 18, whose “four minute prog epics” are twisted with brutal screams, discordant riffs and some outstanding dancing.

Right this moment they’re working their way through crowds of various sizes across the UK with no respite, and their seemingly endless supply of energy shows no sign of running low yet…

Having heard their name dropped nonchalantly into various conversations with horribly cool hipsters, and after logging on to the ol’ MySpace to see just what I was missing out on, I’d painted a mental picture of them that was rather, well, terrifying, so I was relieved to be greeted warmly.

As soon as we kick off the interview, vocalist Eva, her brother James and guitarist Joe morph into a three-headed quote machine, finishing each others’ answers and filling in minute details of group anecdotes, all punctuated by

uproarious fits of the giggles. They’re buzzing with youthful exuberance and enthusiasm. I wonder aloud how they keep this high level of energy from fizzling out, especially considering they’re midway through a five-week tour with melodic/emotional types I Was A Cub Scout (who, incidentally, they sound nothing like).

“Well, we’ve only got to do that for half an hour a day, a lot of the time we’re just sitting around travelling and stuff, so your body clock kind of adjusts to it.” explains James “You know you’ve got to wake yourself up before you play, put everything into that half an hour, and then you’ve got a full 24 hours to feel better to do it all again!”

“Half an hours not really a long time, and considering most of the songs are really fast, the set just goes so quickly because you’re dancing around and using all your energy.” continues Eva. “It just seems to go faster when you’re constantly doing something.”

“It feels good to go mad every now and again” grins Joe, prompting nods of agreement from the others. I ask the question again in a more general sense – what does Rolo Tomassi as a band thrive on?

“Pro Evo, tea and my mums cakes” asserts Eva. “Well, that’s pretty much what’s powered the album so far.”

“I guess it’s a pretty pathetic thing to say, but a lack of better things to do.” Sighs James “It’s a bit of an outlet for pent up energy. It’s something creative to do when there isn’t anything else. It’s filling the void that a failed career in football left in my life…”

Notorious for their high voltage gigs, the band has won many over with their electrifying on-stage presence, not least because of the diminutive Eva’s antics, a kind of insane shuffle-step that lies somewhere between Ian Curtis’ on-stage epilepsy and Michael Flately discovering his tap shoes have been glued to the floor. It shouldn’t work, but it does - ever so well.

“We have some shows where people just stand and watch,” explains Eva. “Yeah, they don’t really know what to do” says Joe with a puzzled expression. “But when we were in York on this tour, the crowd just went crazy. It was incredible.

One person got chucked out for dancing too hard... it was awesome. And it works both ways. When we can see people getting into it so much it helps us get into it even more, and everyone’s having a good time because of it.”

Later on this evening they’ll play to a crowd in Cardiff who stare wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the maelstrom in front of them and are scarcely able to rouse a cheer, let alone any amount of rapturous applause. Once the band have played their final note though, there is a heavy silence, a collective look of disbelief around the room, and a rush of people declaring Rolo Tomassi to be their new favourite band.

Words by Betti Hunter Photography by Louise Roberts www.louiseroberts.co.uk

Sebastien Tellier The Mechanics of Electro

T

he foreman of the French electro scene cuts a large and intimidating figure. Offering me a tour of his factory floor, goggles ever present, he takes huge and foreboding strides and we send lesser workers running for cover. Only thing is, when Sebastien Tellier opens his mouth, a jovial stream of thickly accented consciousness bubbles forth from a very charming Parisian.

Yes, Tellier is back back back. There’s no denying the dominance and health of the current French electro scene over the past year, pounding out in clubs, adorning East Londoner’s tshirts and even sneaking on to the student radio playlist in Hollyoaks.

In the last Kruger, I spoke in garbled Franglais to agent provocateurs Justice on their youthful take of the French invasion, complete with whimsical crucifixes and 80s taches.

I soon realise that a passport cover is not the only thing these guys share.

The influence of the 80s synth soundtrack is ever present in current work of the Frenchies. I’m thinking DJ Mehdi sampling Stroking by Dynasty for his ‘Signature’, Justice sampling The Brothers Johnson on their album and even newcomers The Shoes building their debut single ‘Knock Out’ around ‘Eye Of The Tiger’ – to blinding effect.

Tellier is all too aware of this but has taken it one further by hitting the jugular of the 80s sound in focusing upon softporn soundtracks for his latest album, the follow up to 2005’s Politics.

By naming your album Sexuality, you’ve pretty much thrown any subtlety that you might enjoy the odd grubby thought out of the window. And guess what, Tellier really does enjoy a tumble in the stationary cupboard: “We live in a society full of sex, I mean I love sex, but the next stage of this is to realise that to really enjoy good sex you have to be tender. Even if you are that beast, you can be that beast but there must be tenderness, have an open mind and not be misogynistic. I have an enlightened vision of sex. That’s why this album is a very sweet album, its not aggressive and this is my vision of sex.”

Stating that he has recently realised that sex is the driving force of the world and therefore the only thing he deemed important enough to be making music about, he shows no qualms about being stereotyped as another French lothario, in fact, a label he’s fully embraced.

“I’m very aware that I don’t want to repeat myself when making music, I want to live many lives in my one life and for me that means changing everything and creating a new personality for each album. I even consciously make the decision to move house and location, my car, my dress to get a different artists headspace.

For Politics I became a dictator and for Sexuality I’ve fully become a grand seducer.”

For this album, Tellier chose to employ the skills of Daft Punk’s Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo (or Guy-Man to co-workers) for some hardcore collaboration action as he took on production duties and even co-wrote a couple of tracks. The relationship with Guy-Man wasn’t just one of musical fascination and mutual musical respect, in fact there were far more animal instinct at play, as he explains: “Because the album is very sexual it was not possible to make it alone, otherwise it would be too much like my ‘masturbation’ album. Therefore I needed to be in a couple with another artist to realise this album. And it helped that Guy-Man is cute too.”

I point out that I couldn’t confirm that fact, what with the whole Daft Punk never showing their faces business.

“Oh beneath the helmet he is really really cute. He didn’t wear it when we were working together. It was a real pleasure to work with him. We drank lots of

champagne, would stay up and talk and then make music – it was simple and very natural, just like falling in love.”

“I’m very aware that I don’t want to repeat myself when making music, I want to live many lives in my one life.”

Incestuous Love. Last year Tellier took a break from his studio albums to collaborate with Mr Ozio and SebastiAn on the soundtrack to Steak (he even found himself with a role, although insists he’s not a natural actor) and also worked on the soundtrack to Daft Punk’s Electroma.

He’s done remixes for SebastiAn and Phoenix, has been remixed by Diplo and Vicarious Bliss, has produced Mr Ozio...

You get it, the list is endless.

“We are all good friends. With artists like Kavinsky, SebastiAn, Air and Daft Punk we are close because we work together so much that there is no time to socialise outside of the group. Only problem is, if you hang out together and work together constantly, eventually you find that the music doesn’t stay as intense. Like with Kavinksy, I found that after a while we were so intuned that we began to make the similar music, so we had to keep a distance to keep our own personalities.”

As we come to the end of our electro lesson, I couldn’t leave without mentioning La Ritournelle, a song of such devastating beauty that it’s fought its way into the public consciousness. You hear it at the end of club nights as people hug each other and grin manically. It illicits screams of joy when the first notes are played live. My good friend had it playing at his wedding while his bride walked down the aisle. It’s never even been

officially synced for a film or advert but lots of people have taken ‘inspiration’ from it and recently there’s been a whole bunch of artists releasing albums with a track that sounds more than a little familiar (ahem, Radiohead...)

“It’s bizarre because it’s an underground hit, very cult, but it’s a good underground hit. It has definitely taken on a life of it’s own. I’m not bored with it as I have such a real emotional connection with the song, although in French La Ritournelle means ‘Again and Again’, which is now very apt.”

Foreman Tellier indeed keeps a tight ship, keeping a watchful eye on his French peers, keeping them inline and working hard, but I wonder what will be the inspiration for his next album if he’s nailed the most important thing in the world: “I don’t know yet, after all what is more powerful in this world then sex? I think nothing. Humm. Oh wait; mental illness?!”

Words by Alex Bean Photography by Kamil M. Janowski www.clikpic.com/kamil

“What is more powerful in this world than sex?

Oh wait; mental illness?!”

Black Kids

I

t’s 2008. Isn’t all new music just a hotchpotch of what’s gone before? Aren’t we so weighed down by decades of shaking hips, dropped beats and guitar licks that to expect bands to come up with something that isn’t a cutand-paste job of the past is unrealistic and unreasonable?

And isn’t all art just a collage of past experiences, emotions, feelings, fears, smells, sounds and sights anyways?

In the 24 hour, wi fi, hi fi information age, we’re all big porous sponges soaking up popular culture. Our heads are full of countless useless facts we never studied; we just know them. We all hum tunes we’ve never knowingly made a choice to listen to; they just lodge themselves in our brain. To create something reference point-free is about as likely as a factoryfarmed chicken laying a golden egg. We don’t live in caves. And even those of us that do still seem to have enough of a connection to consumer culture to be able to post jihad videos on the internet and support Man United.

When a class of schoolchildren make a collage and they’re digging round in the arts and craft box, they’re all ripping up the same magazines and sticking the bits together with the same UPVC glue, but somehow one kid’s finished piece always stands head and shoulders above the rest, looking like a mini-Warhol instead of, well, some cut-out bits of Look-In

and glitter glue. It’s about how you stick the composite parts together to make something new that matters. It’s not plagiarism, it’s recycling. ‘Recycling; the possibilities are endless’, Eddie Izzard said on the advert. Sometimes that aluminium can you stick in the green bag will go on to become just another aluminium can, but sometimes it goes onto become a jet plane. And that’s what Black Kids do.

They make jet planes out of old Coke cans.

The key to making the perfect collage is getting all the raw materials right before you start. Black Kids pick up their safety scissors and cut-out around the edges of the best sassy call-and-response 60s Motown, PrittStick this onto some 80s synths and sprinkle over some 90s styled production polish to create something, like all the best collages, much greater than the sum of its parts.

All artists know that sometimes you have to rip it up and start again. In a Southern drawl which makes it sound like he’s started the next word before he’s quite finished the last, frontman Reggie tells me how he had to scrumple up his canvas and throw it in the bin quite a few times before conditions were just right: “I’ll go back a bit…me, Owen (bass) and Kevin (drums) had been playing in various bands together for the past ten years or so. Now I don’t think I’m particularly difficult to be with, but you know one day Kevin just got fed up with me. We’d been in like three bands together and

nothing was really developing so he took a break from me.

“We formed a group called Mata Hari, which was basically an exercise in seeing how many ways we could rip off New Order.” Reggie

“About three years ago, Owen then went to study abroad in Scotland and we started communicating via email about starting a new effort. We kept just writing back and forth on what really gets us off as far as music goes and just trying to see if we could cumulate those elements in a group. So he came home, and immediately we went to work and recruited two of our buddies and formed a group called Mata Hari. Which was basically an exercise in seeing how many ways we could rip off New Order. Turns out we found quite a few ways to rip New Order, and it was fun, but no-one really cared as they could just go and listen to New Order instead. We tried really hard and no-one cared.

“So after that there was a week of dejection and drink and we had to restrategise. Then it crossed my mind to work on a project with my sister Ali, because she’s absurdly talented and, best of all, very impressionable, so I could pretty much bully her into it. Then I discovered her best friend Dawn was a very talented pianist so I forced her to audition on my Casio keyboard. She was drunk, no surprise there, but she passed the audition. At this point Kevin had seen Mata Hari and, although he swears he doesn’t remember this, begged to be in the group, ‘Please let me back in, you’re right, you’re the best’ he said.

There were no grudges but we couldn’t let him in then, but when Mata Hari

disintegrated we welcomed him back into the fold. Owen and I had had lots of discussions about the different elements we would like to see in a group, same with Kevin and I, and we just decided to try and make it happen. So in late 2005 Black Kids was formed.”

Now the factory line had been assembled Black Kids started playing shows, supporting acts that passed through their home town of Jacksonville, Florida. After backing-up Tilly and the Wall, Elf Power and Gil Mantera’s Party Dream it was a performance at the Athens Popfest last summer (R.E.M.’s Athens, not Plato’s), that made the men in suits and the kids with blogs go into overdrive. And it’s not difficult to see why…on stage, Reggie joins a not-long-enough list of dancing guitarists, duelling with sister and synthesiser Ali and (non-sister) Dawn while Owen and Kevin run a tight rhythm section, to make the best melange of doo-wop-synth-pop, well, ever.

Not having enough money to press a record themselves, the band posted debut EP Wizard of Ahhhs online in August 2007 for free download. Word spread and Black Kids blew up. Stand-out track I’m Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You is a foot-tapper and arm-flapper of the highest order, happy but sad yet still happy. Imagine a downer-dulled Go! Team playing Scary Monsters-era Bowie to Fonzie and the guys and gals down at Arnold’s Drive-In. Well, then maybe you’re a tad closer to understanding how Black Kids are going

to win your hearts and feet. Actually cut through my pigeon-holing bullshit and go to www.blackkidsmusic.com and download it NOW.

“The main groups who have broken out of Jacksonville are Lynyrd Skynyrd and Limp Bizkit.

So that’s what we’re working with.” - Reggie

Following the release of the EP, chatrooms and music websites were up Black Kids’ arse, giving them the somewhat auspicious title of ‘the best band ever from Jacksonville’. Reggie filled me in on the musical heritage of the place they call home: “I guess the main groups who have broken out of Jacksonville are Lynyrd Skynyrd…who were pretty rude, and umm…Limp Bizkit. So that’s what we’re working with.”

Wondering what kind of place could be a breeding ground for Black Kids’ smorgasbord of musical titbits past and present, I turned to a reliable source to give me the lowdown on the Sunshine State town. According to the good people at Textperts, the best three things about Jacksonville, Florida are the urban park system (where you’re likely to get raped, says Reg), the Fort Caroline National Memorial and the Arnheuser Busch brewery. “We have a brewery?” says Reggie, revealing a shocking grasp of basic civic knowledge. “It’s where they make Budweiser” Owen helps out.

“Ah…but it’s not as good as Courage is it?” an enlightened Reggie replies. Having spent the last few months on our shores playing show after show, it seems Black Kids are anglicised already.

Having signed to Quest Management (who look after Paul McCartney, Arcade

Fire and Bjork no less) and with I’m Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You due for real-life release on Almost Gold recordings in April, Black Kids are sharpening their pencils ready to make a big tick in 2008. The five-piece now plan to spend some more time in London recording their can’t-wait-for-it debut album.

As they prepare to commit their own collage to canvas, Black Kids look for inspiration from some great artists who have gone before. Reggie tells me, “The Last Waltz (Scorsese documentary on The Band) really gets me. I love the bit in that when Robbie Robertson talks about how he first gets a gig with Ronnie the Hawk, and Ronnie’s like ‘You’re not gonna make any money, but you’ll get more pussy than Frank Sinatra’. That is just brilliant. Also I love the bit from No Direction Home when Johnny Cash and Bob Dylan are playing together and Johnny just really methodically touches the piano with one finger. Every time that bit comes up we just die. We’re always thinking like how can we capture that moment?”

Fast forward forty years and swap the piano for a synth, and Black Kids could have you dying.

Words by Dan Tyte Photography by Tim Cochrane www.timothycochrane.com

neon neon

B

oom Bip and Gruff Rhys have started a new band called Neon Neon, and made an album called Stainless Style. It’s an 80s synth pop descendant, based on the life of decadent entrepreneur John Delorean, and is as shiny and non-stick as the title suggests.

Featuring Spank Rock, Har Mar Superstar, Cate Le Bon, Fat Lip and Yo Majesty on vocal duties, the many hands make light work of Bip and Gruff’s big idea.

Kruger caught up with them at Maida Vale Studios in west London to get the lowdown on this well-staffed showpiece.

Maida Vale Studios is an impressive building in many ways. The fact that it takes up one side of an entire street says something of its physical stature, and that it looks like a whitewashed Stalag only adds to the imposing figure it cuts both through west London’s Mary Poppins town houses and the music industry it helps maintain.

That’s where the real stature of Maida Vales lies, in it’s reputation as the place to record a session; sessions made famous

by DJs like John Peel, Steve Lammacq and more recently Huw Stephens, by bands as low down the ladder as the brilliantly experimental pop band Kotki Dwa or bands scaling the heights of global ubiquity like the all conquering White Stripes.

It’s a well-tuned process, honed over the years and simplified into this easily digestible formula >> Band walks in.

Session gets recorded. Band walks out.

Session becomes iconic.

Neon Neon are down at Maida Vale on Kruger’s request. We’d been asked to do our debut Radio One show, and so we asked Bip and Gruff to record a session for us.

With casios on their laps and Cate Le Bon sat on stool number three, they

performed bontempi versions of three of their new tracks, Raquel, I Told Her On Alderon and the soon to be released single I Lust You. The tracks were pretty nude, and almost vacant, and really amazing, operating in a different era to the polished finish of the album, demonstrating that behind the new name, behind the Delorean concept, sit Gruff Rhys and Boom Bip, two uniquely talented musicians and songwriters, who alongside the workforce of contributors they’ve employed, have created a massive stab of conceptual pop that is not only one of the most interesting albums you’ll hear this year, but could well be one of the best.

Anyway, this is how it all started. Super Furry Animals, which is the band that Gruff is the lead singer of, were touring with electro pioneer Boom Bip in 2003.

They became friends and all that sort of stuff, and as is the way with experimental musicians, decided they should work together in the future.

So, Boom Bip [real name Bryan Hollon.

I’m going to call him Bryan from here on in] was asked to remix the Furries’ track Father Father for their remix album Phantom Force. Bryan gladly accepted, but on one condition: that Gruff donated his godly drawl to one of the electrowiz’s own numbers. Gruff said ‘Ie’, and the soft-lit chorale of Dos and Don’ts entered into the world.

Then one morning (thought it may have been evening over in LA, where Bryan is from), he decided that a revolving door he’d be no more. An end to the electro whore! For this new project that Bryan had in mind, he’d need a proper partner, a lead vocalist and ideas man who could help him take this idea as far as it could go.

“We were surrounded by Casio keyboards and shiny books about the 1980s and cars, and that kind of took over.” - Gruff Rhys

“I really wanted to take on a project that was me and a vocalist who were like a new band, not like me producing a solo record for them” says Bip, I mean Bryan. “I sort of had some tracks that I was working on, and I’d started compiling some of the skeletal beats and stuff that I’d done. It was pretty diverse and I knew that I wanted to be kind of a bigger sort of pop project with big hooks and not anything too moody. The term organic seems to constantly be thrown my way…I didn’t want it to sound like that. I wanted it to be synthetic and glossy and fun really, and with Gruff’s diversity in sound, and what he can do, and what he does with Super Furry Animals with writing, he just seemed absolutely perfect for what I was doing.”

Gruff was in right away, but it wasn’t until the summer of 2006 though that they got together to write. “It was just after the World Cup Final”, says Gruff, “and we’d just come up with the theme, and we just started writing, surround by Casio keyboards and shiny books about

the 1980s and cars, and that kind of took over really…We started researching John DeLorean’s chequered and eventful life, and every five minutes we’d find something outrageous about the man, and the songs kept flowing. We filled a massive book in a week. We were writing constantly.”

They started to obsess about John Delorean, finding out everything they could about him. His early days at the Packard Motor Company, his relationship with owch she’s so hot Raquel Welch, his 1982 arrest and conviction for cocaine trafficking, his enormous chin…

“He redesigned his face y’know,” says Gruff. “It’s like, if you look at photos of him, he’s got this really weird plastic chin. It’s the most insane looking…”

“It’s massive!” interrupts Bryan. “And he stole a hundred million pounds from the Callaghan government,” adds Gruff.

He also designed the Pontiac GTO, was the youngest president of General Motors, set up his own power plant in Belfast, and was so obsessed with his celebrity and self image to the point of emotional instability. Or at least that’s what the boys say, and the bastion of knowledge Wikipedia (as well as a few of the song titles on the album) seems to back up their claims.

“He was a very flawed human I suppose,” says Gruff. “It’s like some kind of Greek

myth, his life. It’s not necessarily the right time to be writing about a car mogul in the age of eco-politics… we don’t even own cars! But in terms of inspiring the whole record, it kind of created an endless supply of ideas.”

What happened next was that the endless supply of ideas that were mentioned in the paragraph directly above this one became songs, some of them complete, others missing a teeny little element to make them what yout dem would call dope. And that’s how Stainless Style began to take shape and become the album that the intro got a little flustered about.

“As the songs were developing,” says Bryan, “there were just holes in some of the songs. It just seemed like the perfect opportunity for guests to come along and do something, whether it be a verse here, a verse there y’know. With Cate [Le Bon], Gruff had an idea for a celebrity couple, basically selling these baby photos for the highest price and thought y’know, we should definitely get another vocalist on this to do sort of like a Human League style.”

“We wanted to get a crap celebrity couple to sing [I Lust You], but it didn’t work out because we had a limited budget”, laughs Gruff.

“But I knew Cate was a good singer, and because of the name and the band

connection, I knew she would get the idea. We ran into The Magic Numbers by complete chance at the perfect time to sing angelic vocals for the final track of the record, a lot of it was very random.”

The other contributors to the album are Fab Moretti from The Strokes, Yo Majesty, Fat Lip, Spank Rock and Har Mar Superstar, the last two joining the party during a party in Bryan’s house. Party!

“It was after a Spank Rock show in my neighbourhood,” says Bryan. “Har Mar was hanging out so I was like, ‘come on back to the house’. It was really one of the first times I met him, and I was like, ‘hey this is the track that I had in mind for Naeem from Spank Rock’ and I played it and they were just like ‘ah man we should do something now, this is great, like you got a mic?’

“So, Sean [that’s Har Mar’s real name, keep up] and Naeem just lay down on my studio floor and were writing and as soon as we had something done, we were like, ‘alright I’m ready!’ We’d come in from partying and go into the studio and hit record, and then go back in and party for a little bit, write some more, go back in. Sean was amazing, as soon as he grabbed the mic, just really spontaneous, the whole track happened with him in like three or four hours.”

Band walks in. Session gets recorded.

Band walks out. Session becomes iconic.

The unknown quantities on the album are new Domino Records signings Yo Majesty, who take lead vocals on Sweatshop, the album’s seediest moment, subverting Gruff’s idea about labour and production lines and an army of people working hours on end to fulfil one man’s dream into the kind of routine that would make Paul Raymond blush.

“It’s kind of what I hoped they’d do”, laughs Gruff. “They’d keep phoning me up and asking ‘how’s this? What about this?’, adds Bryan. “And I’d keep encouraging them to make it even dirtier.”

It slots rightly onto the album. A concept album about a man of excess. A shiny, poppy album, so polished it’s a bit blinding, if you know what I mean.

Stainless Style is out on March 17th through Lex Records. Neon Neon play Fabric on March 20th.

Photography by Jess Long www.jessicalongphotography.com

Born Ruffians ing Com !

Soon

I

t’s 3 o’ clock in the afternoon and I’m strolling along Brick Lane wondering what a Canadian indie band has got to do with factories? Thanks a bunch Kruger. If only I’d pretended to have misheard Factories as “whatever-youplease” or even, “CANADIAN INDIE BANDS”, things would be simpler.

Had I been interviewing a band like the Horrors or Datarock, who in their own respective ways look like they’ve just stepped off a factory production line, then all would be fine, but this jeans and leather-clad trio, desperately searching for an entrance into 93 Feet East, and who I assume I’m here to meet, are about as manufactured as free range eggs, so I pray that they’re not who I think they are…

“You’re not..?”

“Yeah.”

Oh Shit. Allow me to unveil Born Ruffians, Canada’s latest gift. A product made, boxed, wrapped and delivered from the snowy shores of Ontario for our listening pleasure.

“Factories?! That’s pretty abstract” muses Mitch, while filling me in on the story so far, which goes something like this: Luke, Mitch and Steve, having already blazed

through Canada and America three times, and had their mini van stolen two times, are now back in the UK a fourth time.

“We met in high school five and a half years ago and started the band, moved to Toronto and we’ve been signed to Warp for about 2 years”. Sat on a bench outside the trendy East London club, amongst a sea of the previous nights’ empty pint glasses and cigarette butts (the search for an entrance failed), they’re making it sound incredibly easy for any unsigned band to get the oh so lucrative record deal, and with their formula for making sounds, it’s hardly surprising. “We don’t like that super clean, over produced sound, we wanted it to feel real and feel live too, compared to, say a really manufactured mainstream band that have like 15 guitars layered on top. That’s exhausting almost. It loses its feeling. We don’t want to sound like that.”

They don’t. Born Ruffians’ forthcoming album sounds more like it’s been recorded in a bedroom than in a studio.

I ask them to tell me a bit more about their writing process, and they indulge me with this lovely factory analogy: “‘Luke the conveyer belt’ brings in the raw materials, they go to the processing plant, which is our basement, and in the processing plant we process the raw materials into a song”. Amazing! And while I’m sure it’s not really a matter of

conveyer belts and processing plants, they’ve certainly discovered an uncanny ability to create ace music. Maybe Born Ruffians’ own experience of the plant aided them on their way too? “I worked in a factory!” remembers Mitch “It was a can factory and I checked cans for scratches and dents. Then, I’d crush them when they had scratches or dents, and if they didn’t I’d pack them.”

Luke chips in stealing the very thoughts from my head. “That can be a metaphor for how we write songs!” before being corrected that a factory line is more representative of their life on the road than the way they write: “Touring can get so routine it’s like ‘Arrive. Sound check. Wait. Eat. Play.’ That’s sort of like factory work, but at the same time, this and working in a factory are very different. I wanted to end my life working in a factory!” I worry that this regimented routine would become a dull experience, the lack of spontaneity and energy making it a far less worthy experience, but apparently there’s no need for me to fret: “We almost find it’s the opposite, with one off shows you kind of forget how to play sometimes, you feel weird up there, when you’ve gone months without playing live. In a tour you learn how to spend the energy each day.”

Which is a pretty mature way to look at things: “From every interview we’ve ever read and every experience we’ve ever had, no band enjoys writing on the road.

It’s not even possible for us, we don’t even try it.”

So how do a group seemingly on a permanent tour come up with new material, without writing on the road?

“There are periods where we’ll just write because we’re sick of playing songs. I think its better if you give yourself time, the last record was written over an entire year, but there’s definitely a few months where we kind of buckled down and said let’s bring all the songs together and get as many as we can. I think its better when you do that.”

Having filled me in on the process of touring and song writing, and the fact that their ideal factory would be in Japan (“they’re very efficient with factories in Japan”), Born Ruffians wander off in search of a Boots Chemist, and leave me, having unveiled Canada’s newest musical sensation, heading back to the Kruger factory where I came from.

Words by Shannon Mahanty Photography by Born Ruffians www.myspace.com/photosimian

TRUTH & SOUL RECORDS

New Millennium Funk Factory

I

n New York the musical pistons have crept into life, and a handful of blue-collar soul workmen are pushing brand spanking new products into the market place.

In much the same way the iconic Motown imprint was influenced by the car manufacturing landscape of its native Detroit in the sixties, the pound of the heavy machinery informing the step of the drums and the production line mentality steeping into label owner Berry Gordy’s business ethos. Brooklyn, NY’s Truth & Soul label consumed the drive of its city to mine the spirits of its occupants, and provide the soundtrack to their lives.

It’s fifty years later, but Truth & Soul’s output is resolutely old school. It’s like the ghost of Motown, Stax and the handful of other pioneering black-owned music labels that left such a legacy on the modern music landscape, has been resurrected. The economics that drove those US inner cities may have evolved, but you can still smell the sweat of the workers, timing of the in-house session musicians, and the honest and inner groove, in Truth & Souls every release

today, as they come from the floor of the contemporary funk factory they man in 2008.

Clocking in Truth & Soul was founded by Jeff Silverman and Leon Michels in 2004.

The name was taken from a movie called Putney Swope by Robert Downey Sr. “I won’t go into a synopsis of the film,” says Michels. “But we felt strongly about what the movie and especially the fictional firm within the movie stood for.”

Prior to starting the label Silverman and Michels had both been working closely with Phillip Lehman and Soul Fire Records. When Soul Fire came to an end, the work that had been accumulated over the years, as well as the studio they had been working out of, was passed on to them with the hope that they would keep this creative machine oiled and thriving.

“The idea behind Truth & Soul is simple,” says Silverman. “We wanted to create an outlet where we could release the kind of music we wanted to hear, as opposed to the music you are forced to hear today when you turn your radio on. We knew

“The idea behind truth and soul is simple. We wanted to create an outlet where we could release the kind of music we wanted to hear.” - Jeff Silverman

from the beginning that if we wanted to release the kind of records you are used to hearing, but we knew that we would have to create our own label and use our own channels to get our music out there.”

Silverman and Michels had begun to take a different approach to the music they were creating, and began to further differentiate themselves from what the other labels at the time were doing. They began recording music that was outside of the norm that was expected from a label like Soul Fire Records.

Music/business The first full-length release on the label was El Michels Affair’s Sounding Out The City, which set Truth & Soul’s stall out early. From the incarnation of that band to this day that project has always been held in high regards and brought a good amount of exposure to the label. “It is a great album and one we are definitely proud of,” says Michels. The album made waves, and put the band on the path to working with various members of Staton Island’s hip-hop outfit, Wu-Tang Clan.

“The PJs 12” we did, which was a cover of a Pete Rock/Raekwon collaboration,

was also interesting,” says Michels. “We weren’t sure how the release would come across to some people, but we weren’t going to pass on an opportunity like that to work with Raekwon in our own studio.”

Recently Truth & Soul has begun releasing a series of 7”s by Quincy Bright, a close family member of the label. “His sounds are a unique blend of underground hip-hop with electronic elements,” says Silverman. “The obvious dosage of soul and funk, and a certain something that only he can bring, definitely mean we’re putting out a different product.”

Like the legendary labels of the past, Truth & Soul is run as a business and record label, as well as being a close-knit collective of artists and musicians. “All the work on is produced by me and Jeff,” says Michels. “And the musicians that we work with have been the same stable since the days of Soul Fire Records. Most of the releases that come out on our label are the product of a few talented musicians.

For each project we may take a different approach, but the core musicians will always be there from one release to the other.”

In fact, most of the releases contain the same musicians, whether it be El Michels Affair, The Expressions, or Bronx River Parkway, “The elements may change from time to time, and there will be outside players brought in to the mix occasionally, but for the most part, it remains a small family of talent and

dedicated musicians who help bring our vision to life,” says Silverman.

we could record and release the kind of music we wanted to hear. Our music is such a blend of different styles that I see no relation between what we are doing and where commercial R&B has gone.

Not that we wouldn’t be happy to hear or see Lee Fields & The Expressions on Billboard’s R&B charts - it just never has been about commercialism.”

Soundtrack to the city All the talent on the label are either native New Yorkers or from North Jersey, which is a stones throw away from the Big Apple. ‘It is a certain way of life coming from this part of our country,” says Michels. “The influences surrounding you in this environment are endless. I suppose growing up here one is exposed to so many different cultures and ways of life that it is hard not to be influenced in some way or another by the inhabitants of this great city.”

Like Motown, and its beats pumping out a rhythm in tune with a generation’s heartbeat, Truth & Soul is the lifeblood of all concerned. “It began as all heart,” says Silverman. “The business side was something we had to teach ourselves as we went along. We were fortunate enough to have experienced what it takes to run an independent label from our past experiences with Phillip Lehman and Soul Fire Records. He gave us the basic knowledge to run the operation, but it was blood, sweat and tears that have gotten us to where we are now.” And it’s that you can hear in every record, from the moment the first note strikes down like an anvil on steel, ‘til the time you clock off, kick back and get down.

“The influences surrounding you in this environment are endless. I suppose growing up here one is exposed to so many cultures.” - Leon Michels

Truth & Soul, black-America’s legacy, this generation’s soulful metronome, and purveyors of vintage last a lifetime guaranteed funk, in a world overrun with cheap, imitation bio-degradable copies. www.truthandsoulrecords.com

Words by DJ Moneyshot

“We believe good music is timeless,” says Silverman. “And all we have really done at the end of the day is create an outlet were

Illustrations by Matt Hodson www.matthewthehorse.co.uk

Notable former employees I

f the burning question was What Happens When You Die?, this section couldn’t answer it. It might say stuff

like, Well, Nothing, Obviously, You’re Just Dead - but it surely wouldn’t be that bold. On the other hand, if the burning question was What Ever Happened to Tapes N Tapes, Los Campesinos!, Jim Noir and Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly After They Appeared in Kruger Magazine?, then this section has all the answers, as we catch up with four of our favourite former subjects to see what they’re up to now.

Get Cape.

Wear Cape.

Fly Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly is a chap from Brighton called Sam Duckworth. He’s signed to Atlantic Records, and released his debut album in September 2006. Since then he’s assembled a band and become one of the most influential artists in Britain today; his blend of folk, post emo and electronica earning him a flock of followers and inspiring a whole movement of music.

When you appeared in Kruger, you’d just released The Chronicles of a Bohemian Teenager. How would you describe your rise in popularity since then?

It’s been quite surreal. Its been great fun touring and playing bigger shows, getting to play with some of my favourite bands and getting to do things I wouldn’t have otherwise. Although the journey has been far from smooth, the real test has been coming back after a 10 month absence and seeing how the crowds would react to new songs. To see how many people have stuck around and aren’t just there because I’m a new band with a stupid name is amazing.

You’ve got a new album about to come out. Tell us about it and how it differs from your debut.

The first record was a culmination of songs and ideas that were written in the first 2/3 years of Get Cape. As a result, most were shaped by the laptop and myself and lyrically shaped by being a teenager who works in Halfords and tours to get out of working there.

Obviously a lot of that has changed since then but I didn’t want to go and make a record that moaned about how hard being in a band is (mainly because it’s not,) so I searched for universal themes that we can all relate to regardless of circumstance. The electronics and weird synths are still there, but are a lot more controlled and groove more. I wanted to make a record that was a culmination of everything that I loved musically, from drum and bass, to afrobeat to punk rock, but still retain the identity of Get cape.

Wear cape. Fly. Kruger thinks that you’re one of the most influential artists of the last couple of years, in terms of the sound and style you’ve created and the support platform you’ve given to other artists.

That’s a really kind thing to say. Thanks!

I know this sounds like what most artists will say but I just do my thing and try not to think about what else is going on around. I think the moment you start

there seems to be such a quick turnover of bands these days - especially with internet success stories - but luckily for us, some people still seem to care!

looking at convention for appraisal, you start losing focus on what makes your music unique.

When I was starting out, Big Scary Monsters and guys like Dave House and Pylon reached out to me and were able to help me out and its nice to do the same, whether that be Kate Nash, Gideon Conn or the Xcerts, it’s been a real pleasure sharing time with them and watching them grow into incredible artists.

Do you think you’ll always see Get Cape as a band thing from here on in, or is there still a place for just you, your guitar and your laptop?

I think the beauty is that it can change and evolve according to circumstance. I would love to do a set that is live percussion and laptop, playing the dancier songs with fuller beats in a club context.

What’s the best thing you’ve done since we first spoke to you?

I’ve recently come back from the Congo and it blew my mind. Their passion for music is astounding. They throw their all into the music, the polyrhythms and instruments grow and consume you til you can’t stop dancing. You would be hard pushed to find talent and passion in our charts.

Searching For The hows And Whys is out on March 10th.

Tell us the best story that has happened to Los Camp since we first spoke to you

Los Campesinos!

We don’t have to make predictions anymore, we have a band Google Calender.

We got to go to Japan before Christmas which was such a highlight. We played to a crowd of around 2000 and they were so enthusiastic and supportive. It’s such a humbling experience when you fly halfway across the world to a place with a completely different cultural heritage and get a reception like that. Some fans made us Christmas cards and gifts, it was mental.

Los Campesinos! is a seven limbed super hero that fights the formula with special moves that include post rock, twee and duelling vocals. After sending blogland spastic with their early demos, the band signed to Wichita at the start of 2007.

The eponymously surnamed Aleks Campesinos! answers the questions you all wanted to ask.

Has being in Kruger changed your life?

Do you get recognised in Cardiff now?

Are you today where you hoped you’d be when we first spoke to you?

Ha, no that never happens. Well, only if I bump into people I already know, which tends to happen in Cardiff.

Well we’re in Newcastle today, and I doubt I could have predicted that exactly.

But I guess we always hoped to be touring and traveling so, yeah, so far so good.

Your questions seem to keep returning to this theme of predictions/hopes etc, are you going for a Los Camp! psychic connection??! We’re actually all experts in mind control/telepathy/premonitions and have orchestrated any success we’ve achieved as a band through exercising these abilities…

Way back then, Gareth predicted that your album would come out in early 2008, and lo and behold it has. Has he made any other predictions that have come true?

When you appeared in Kruger, there was a huge internet buzz about you.

How has all of that worked out?

I think we’re all pretty happy with the way things are! It’s amazing to think how lucky we’ve been and that being in the band is our ‘full time job’…it still sounds a bit crazy to me. Personally I expected things to die down after that initial buzz,

Tell us what we should expect from your album It’s going to change your life… definitely!

Erm, jokes aside I think it’s a pretty good reflection of how we’ve developed as a band over the past 2 years. It has a real range of songs in the sense of featuring the very early songs like Death to Los Campesinos! which was the first song Tom ever wrote, and then much newer tracks. I’m wary of expectations though… I reckon, don’t expect too much, and then you’re more likely to be pleasantly surprised! We’re all pleased with the way it has turned out, which I guess is the most important thing.

Los Camp’s debut Hold On Now Youngster is out now.

Your new album is out soon. What’s it called, and what should we expect from it?

properly after a few days and went back to my old primary school My First Violin book. But I could play it better then than I can now for some reason. I’ve taken to just plucking it sadly in the corner of the room at parties.

Our new album is called Walk if Off. I’m really excited about how it turned out.

It still sounds like us... there’s a good amount of “rocking”.

Tapes & Tapes!

Tapes N Tapes first made a name for themselves in the UK at the start of 2006 with the bluesy country-pop singles Insistor and Cowbell from their amazing album The Loon. Then they disappeared for a bit. Now they’re back, lead singer Josh Grier fills us in on what’s been going on.

When you appeared in Kruger, you’d just released The Loon. Were you surprised how well it was received in the UK? Yes. I didn’t have any expectations when we released the Loon that any body would like it, let alone hear it. So I was definitely surprised with how well it was received the UK.

Having been a SXSW sensation yourselves, who should people look out for at this year’s festival, and why?

That’s a good question. I’m not really sure. There are so many bands, it’s pretty insane. I’m excited that we get to go back down there this year. I think that this time we won’t be playing so many shows, and I’ll actually be able to check out some bands.

Erik recorded, engineered and mixed The Loon. Has he done the same with Walk it Off? Nope. Dave Fridmann recorded, engineered, mixed, and produced Walk it Off. I bet you don’t remember being in Kruger. To prove me wrong, what is the 146th word in the article?

Unless I miscounted the 146th word in the previous Kruger article is “rushed”.

However, I was counting pretty quickly, so I might be a little off.

Walk It Off is out on April 7th.

You also told us that computer music was your first love. Can we expect any 808 State on the new album?

Jim Noir Jim Noir’s real name isn’t Jim, but these days he does answer to it. He makes summery psyche pop and rocks a suit and a bowler hat better than most old gents could ever hope to. With his self-titled second album out in April, he fills us in on where he is now.

When you appeared in Kruger, you’d just released Tower Of Love. What has been happening since, and do you have anything in the pipeline?

Well that’s a very rude question, but yes it’s on its way. As for the recent past, I’ve just been busy writing and recording the follow up.

When you were last in Kruger you told us you’d just bought a violin. How is it going?

It’s not really. I managed to tune it

Ha yeah, there is a little bit more elecy bollocks on the new one. I’ve not gone all full on rave yet, but its on the cards, maybe on album 3 I’ll start rinsing those analog beasties to their full potential.

What the best thing that’s happened since we first spoke to you ?

Its gotta be The Furries asking me to sing a harmony on stage with them at a few gigs. Granted I did beg them at first, but they came round after a while probably in the hope that i’d leave them alone for 5 minutes. Me and the band also went bumper car racing / bumping and I got whiplash from the bass player ‘cos he was playing dirty. I got him back by pissing on his bass.

Are you today where you hoped you’d be when we first spoke to you?

What, sat on my yacht of the coast of Jamaica? Fuck yeah!

Jim’s self titled second album is out April 7th.

debut single I’m Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You out 07 April

Hot Pink Vinyl 7” includes extra track Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover CD includes You Turn Me On and Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover Itunes exclusive bundle includes remix by The Twelves Go to www.blackkidsmusic.com and sign up for latest news and exclusives www.myspace.com/blackkidsrock

Antidotes Transgressive I know Foals. You know Foals. They’ve been on the front pages of fanzines, webzines and magazines for the last 12 months. You hear them on adverts, the radio and pounding through the speakers of a thousand indie discos. They’ve played festivals, concerts, tours, house parties. Everyone knows Foals... so it’s time for a change.

You see, the Foals you know are the raw act. Live, they’re fast and frantic. They’re a flash of arm, a guitar sweeping above your head, a force moving you with an intense urgency. So I put my headphones on, adjust the volume, press play and get ready to be smacked in the face. And there’s silence. Then quietly in fades – are they horns?

And then the drums, this is it... and nothing explodes. Live favourite The French Open marks the start taking well over a minute to kick in, but it sounds nothing like the track I know.

That’s because Antidotes is an album, the realisation of the freedom being in the studio gives a band. Foals replace their live energy with a carefully thought and beautifully produced mixture of sounds. A centrally rooted bass holds everything in place as brass builds around echoing guitar riffs. It begs to be listened to in headphones with every click of plectrum on string audible, the drums roll from ear to ear and you almost feel like you can see songs expanding. The sheer space in this album is breathtaking.

Produced by TV on the Radio’s David Sitek, you can’t help feeling his influence hasn’t been stamped on this. Apparently the record was actually mixed by Foals in London after they weren’t happy with the first mixes Sitek sent them, and while it’s by no means a straight pop record it’s surprisingly accessible, albeit in an alienating manner. It feels as though Foals knew what fans were expecting, and decided to make something for another audience.

They always said they want to piss people off when it came to the release of their album, and this record is likely to disappoint a large number of listeners who’ve been attracted to the band through their raucous shows. It’s a snobbish but satisfying thought to have, that Antidotes may be too subtle for the Skins generation, but it’s also likely to surprise anyone who had them down as a hyped one-trick pony.

They’ve succeeded in making an album that works both on the dancefloor and on headphones and while on first listen it’s not an instantaneous shot of adrenaline, the further you fall into the record, the more infectious it becomes.

Foals are an example of a band who’ve ignored their hype and taken time to produce a record, not just a collection of singles. It’s clear that time has been spent over every detail and the decision to omit both Hummer and Mathletics works in the album’s favour as it flows across one level with no standout track to pull away your attention away from the overall piece. There’s no track on this album that would make you skip through the others to hear it first. Cassius and Balloons don’t feel like singles, partly because of the number of times I’ve heard other tracks like Red Socks Pugie and Two Steps Twice live, but also because they fit so well into the movement of the album. Of course it peaks and dips, quickens and slows, but the standard never slips.

Listening is a journey, with songs like Electric Bloom pulling you back with clever production after Olympic Airways has carried you off on expansive soundscapes.

Everything from the guitar tone to the placement of swelling brass, from the panning shakers to the tracklisting has been considered, and it’s the intelligence behind it which makes this record stand out. Antidotes brings back the forgotten art of making an album and proves that compared to Foals, modern music knows nothing.

Words by Jen Long

WS REVIEWS REVIEWS REVIEWS REVIEWS REVIEWS REVIEWS REVIEWS R

Foals

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The Death Set

Keyboard Choir

Truckers of Husk

Moi Et Mon Camion

Worldwide

Mizen Head to Gascanane Sound

Physical Education EP

Gronland Records

Counter Records

Brainlove

If you’re after some major chords and unintrusive listening, then hurry along – Moi Et Mon Camion is an album that exudes the feeling of constant displacement, physical and mental. Clearly, Conrad Lambert has experienced unsettled years; a fact that is echoed distinctively throughout Moi…. Cynics might think this is a recipie you’ve heard before, but ain’t no typical acoustic album. Meandering between folk, chillout and indie, the finished product is a beautifully produced, genre-defying winner. Kick off those dodgy Christmas slippers, pick up a mag (I suggest a back copy of Kruger) and slap this record on. It won’t disappoint. SL

The Death Set’s debut album, Worldwide, is a whirlwind of punk-rock guitars, deafening screams and electronic beats, this tempest has the momentum to engulf dance floors world-over, including those in New York and Australia – two places where The Death Set’s Johnny Siera had previously tried his luck as a musician.

The name keyboard choir makes me think of Au revoir Simone. It conjures images of fey, swirling harmonies and crafted electronic soundscapes. I press play, lie back and that’s exactly what I get. Opener ‘The Drone of the Hearse’ eases you in as dub drums, cascading synthetic peaks and ambient noise follow their course. Until track four, ‘In This Situation, Thinking Won’t Help’ hits. “As soon as we find our drummer we’ll play” breaks a voice in an American accent. Yo yo yo homies; that’s what people say when they rap. They say homies, sometimes they say dog, they say g. I say all of the above.”

Merz

DiskJokke Staying In Smalltown Supersound DiskJokke is a Norwegian producer, whose debut album sits between the spacey, discofied funk of Lindstrom and Prins Thomas and the ambitious orchestration of Gui Boratto’s 2007 masterpiece Chromophobia. Staying In covers an impressive stretch of musical ground, making songs rather than collections of sounds, which so many electronic albums ultimately amount to. It’s playful, like Mylo at his best, veering from coy, glittery brass-led disco to Get Physcial-esque plinky-plonky bass driven tech house. There’s an immediate level on which you can enjoy its purpose-made pop melodies, and then another level where you find the substance of the album: in the twists and turns of the production. Staying In displays an artist operating well within his limits (even though the range on display is impressive). If he wasn’t making strange, cinematic, electronic funk for the Oslo massive to slowly gyrate to, he might well be scoring a film or working on an orchestral production. What a bastard. The whole album sounds as if its been coated in a layer of analogue sparkle.

The production hangs together beautifully, and there isn’t a duff track in sight. Running the gauntlet between emotional and over-emotional, DiskJokke has produced something new and tried-and-tested.

Which is a very good thing indeed. AC

The source of this raging storm is the grimy abandoned warehouses that lurk amidst the industrial estates of Baltimore. Here, The Death Set conducted their musical experiments upon the moshing crowds that were drawn by their hunt for an underground fix. The Death Set outright refuse any notion of having ‘stage presence’ by playing their sets on the dance floor, earning their reputation for immense ‘floor presence’.

Sounding like a Gameboy plugged into an excessively large amplifier, accompanied by violent guitars and swirling screams, Worldwide is an 18 track epic.

It must be noted, however, that none of the tracks exceed two and a half minutes. Do not think that this means that you are allowed space to breath, because each song starts where the pervious one left off, meaning that your ear drums, and subsequently, your limbs, are forced to remain alert and active throughout the perpetual torrent of noise that forms the album as a whole.

The most impressive aspect of Worldwide is its originality. Songs Had A Bird and Selective Memories fuse lofi, nu-rave and punk, and somehow come out sounding tuneful and melodic. The song MFDS, on the other hand, with its constant repetition of the line “Mother Fucking Death Set” creates something more punky, with a slight hip hop edge. Each song embodies various samples, intricate time signatures and an amalgamation of chaotic beeps, bops and other noises that simply cannot be conveyed through the medium of onomatopoeic language.

Worldwide is an altogether delightful and refreshing melting pot in which violent bubbles cannot be contained. It will no doubt be hitting a dance floor near you. CR

Suddenly it’s sounding like something from anticon punching Aphex Twin in the face. This isn’t what I expected from the Oxford six piece, but it does have the intelligence and originality we’ve recently seen fall from that scene, or the scene around it.

The record twists, glitches and claws at your ears, immersing you in haunting echoes before smacking you head on with the drop of a drum beat. This is no choir but an army loaded with synths and samples, and all you can do is wave a white flag of appreciation. JL

The Most Serene Republic Population Arts and Crafts Starting with the warming up of the instruments The Most Serene Republic of noise then descends into ambient psych of Battles variety. Plenty of layers and meanderings make for a cosy Arran (Canadian) jumper of alt. indie (see Battle Hymn of The Republic) – perfect for escape, pleasure seeking and cerebral warmth. This really is a mind bending, fuzzy place to get lost in and to explore the possibilities of waking up in Sweden – be warned it has happened.

As the prog/acid flecked jazz fusions emerge towards the later half (specifically A Mix of Sun and Cloud), the whole thing takes an underwater nightmarish tinge. Drown the heathens and see if they float, but bless them for the odd bout of brilliance. BL

My Kung Fu While watching Truckers at Cardiff’s Swn Festival last year, I turned to a friend and asked him what he thought. “They’re good,” he replied. “Just as long as you’re ready to accept that they’re prog.” Same goes. With the aid of some tremendous King Crimson flavoured guitars and brooding cello, they twist the post-rock template into some interesting new shapes. Happily steering clear of the quiet, louder, louder, LOUD! dynamics so beloved of many Mogwai-bumming instrumentalists, the Truckers chart a far more winding path. There’s a playful melody to go along with some pummelling grooves and impressively tricksy time signatures, the renaissance fair curlicues of Salad Ballad being a particular highlight.

Clearly inhabiting the same postcode as Battles, while simultaneously sounding absolutely nothing like them, Truckers of Husk are headed in the right direction. HT

Martina Topley Bird The Blue God Independiente The old idiom of don’t judge a book by its cover holds some weight – except when said about books from the public library, when that wipe clean cover is definitely a bad sign. Records however, are a different matter – I’m as judgemental as they come. Sell it to me, convince the discerning public, but this ain’t the best cover I’ve ever seen. But this is a fine album on the whole (fine start, followed by slump, a bit chaotic but a fantastic Portishead sound throughout), and in no way the Corinne Bailey Rae knock off I was expecting. Kudos to the lady. She’s worked with Tricky before they fell out. Her debut was a Mercury Prize finalist (though post-Klaxons who pays much attention to what that means) and when on form this is a fine album. The Blue God has the desperate, fuzzy quality of Portishead. Sounding like she’s been recorded in windswept shed on Dartmoor: she’s got this gutsy defiance that feels like she’s tripping over her own heels like the fourteen year old jail bait that knows just how seductive tripping over her heels can be. The single Carnies goes even further and is an all out sex fest for prim ears with hints of Discofrapp. BL

Soulphiction

VA / $olal presents

Various Artists

The Reach Around

Do You Overstand?!

The Moonshine Sessions

You Don’t Know: Ninja Cuts

Magnetic

Sonar Kollektiv

Filter Music

Ninja Tune

When he’s not presenting radio shows, cutting beats for underground producers, or fighting hiphop crime Cardiff’s answer to Yoda likes to use the force to cram as many tracks as he possibly can into the mixtape blender. The result is seventy-odd minutes of unadulterated eclecticoid madness, from techno to country to rock to hip hop and more acapellas than you can shake a Polaroid picture at. His live DJ shows are - if you could believe it - even funkier. Order your copy today from www.catapult.co.uk. HP

With his last record State of Euphoria verging on the exquisite Michel Baumann (aka Jackman/ Soulphiction) is back, but this time it’s not the bedroom that he is heading for. Fusing jazz with deep house, smooth basslines an unobtrusive samples this is strictly basement musak. Within this delicious soundscape, of hip hop, soul and jazz influence lies beautiful vocals, latin influences, western movie samples - Soul Print, and minimal, sparse, clean licks verging on the soporific. While Cargo is straightnochaser jazz, the rest of the album builds into deep, dark low tempo house: Dark Berry following this formula to almost experimental capacity, and just when you thought it was going to get all sinister a beautiful, honey coated nugget comes out at you, the silky Reminisce All Over You reminds us that Michel’s previous incarnation – Jackmate came from the dancefloor with slices of Detroit flavoured techno, follow this with a dose of Whizzdom and Understanding. Impossible to pigeonhole, the album covers many different styles and influences, the production is restrained, the sound has a roughness, not sandpaper, more sea urchin, round and a bit spiky and never afraid to throw in a surprise or two. Do you Overstand?! encompasses an eclecticism of different genres and throws them in your face like a child who was told that they can’t mix blue paint and orange paint to make a masterpiece and then they come up with something to rival Dali and throw it back at you. It’s really fucking good. MB

MC $olal, co-founder of the Gotan Project and general purveyor of world muzak, doesn’t at first glance seem like the type of guy who can pull of a country album. Indeed, certain aspects of this album seem designed to irritate – not least the front cover’s boast that it was ‘performed in Nashville, Tennessee’, as if that had any bearing upon the quality of the music therein. But, fair play, for a blind foray into the indigenous folk music of a completely different nation, this isn’t bad at all. Covers of ABBA and the Sex Pistols are actually not unsuccessful, but they add a veneer of ironic smugness that isn’t necessary given the surprisingly idiomatic feel of the original compositions. Particularly good is Fade Away, a song which builds up slowly to a very well-handled gospel finale which reveals $olal to have the soul to match his imitative ear. DG

Following hot on the heels of Big Dada’s most excellent label retrospective which was released late last year, comes You Don’t Know: Ninja Cuts, a triple CD of cuts from the holy trinity of Ninja Tune, Big Dada and Counter Records. As if that wasn’t enough, these are mostly tracks that we won’t know either, being unreleased and forthcoming material, rare or overlooked tapes from the vaults, or simply remixes that never turned up anywhere else.

James Lidell Jim Warp

Having already broken the freaky, experimentalelectronica buzz he created with Christian Vogel as Super Collider ten years ago, our Jamie’s come a long way. Demonstrating his skills as a bona fide soul star in his debut solo album (2005’s most awesome Multiply), Jim takes this theme and runs with it. Tracks like Green Light, Hurricane and Figured Me Out pay homage to the common tropes of that sweet soul music, and although Jim might not be as immediately arresting as Multiply, give it time, and you’ll come to love it even more. Make sure to catch Jim’s big voice on tour in April and May. HP

Moshi Moshi Singles Club

Singles 2006 - 2008 Moshi Moshi

VA / Mixed by Robert

Usually I hate compilations, a few great tracks dragged down by a plethora of averageness. Rather delightfully (and as expected) this is not true of the Moshi Moshi compilation. Known for its high standard of releases and ear for new talent this goody bag of recent A-sides by top new artists is, like the singles club itself, aimed at the music lover, rather than strung together to please the mainstream audience that just want to hear ‘that song off the radio’.

A mix of electronic based, folky, and pop gems with indie as the central theme. Too many top tunes to mention. SM

Fabric 39: Robert Hood Fabric

“As the future evolves, we’re going to get more and more minimal.” Pioneer Robert Hood – who helped define the genre almost 15 years ago – knew he was onto a winner, even when others dismissed it as passing trend. Fabric39 is a testament to the innovativeness and the progression of the genre.

Dark, destructive, spooky, but also bright, optimistic and even funky in places, this is 30+ tracks of techno executed with perfection. When visions of the future are accompanied by such an awesome soundtrack, resistance is surely futile. HP

Various Artists

African Scream Contest: Raw & Psychedelic Afro Sounds from Benin & Togo 70’s Analog Africa As traditional resources for untapped killer grooves have become severely depleted, crate-diggers are moving to more exotic locations in search of a fresh fix. The astounding outcome of Analog Africa chief Samy Ben Redjeb’s extensive vintage vinyl-hogging excursions across the continent, the impossibly rare 70’s cuts compiled here join last year’s jaw-dropping Best of Ethiopiques and Soundway’s even more superlative Nigeria Special in proving that apart from being the home of the blues, Africa must take the lead in funk ratings also. Many might struggle to locate Benin and Togo on the map, nevermind naming the countries’ leading floor-fillers. The likes of Volcans De La Capital (salsa-hued horizontality on tap), Tidjani Kone & Orchestre Poly-Rythmo specialising in epic bouts of Afrobeat dazzle - and Roger Damawuzan – captured frantically out-James Browning J.B. himself – should promptly correct this oversight. JO

On hearing the plans for releasing this album I tried to remain calm, but really, it’s pretty fucking exciting news, because, as everybody knows, Ninja Tune are an absolute tour de force of musical innovation; full of depth, vitality and passion.

Where to start? Well, there’s brand new bits from Pop Levi and Quantic. There’s blazing (Solid Groove’s take on Pest), beautiful (Susumu Yokata fiddling with the Cinematic Orchestra) and brilliant (Roots Manuva’s re-jiggle of his own Chin High) remixes galore. There are also rarities from none other than King Geedorah, Mike Ladd and RJD2 that would have been occupied centre stage on any other imprint. The scraps from Ninja Tune’s table are after all this time still better than an a la carte meal from anywhere else.

Apart from a couple of distortion-by-numbers DnB offerings from The Qemists (ruining Coldcut’s Atomic Moog), there isn’t a weak track in sight.

And as a measure of the diversity of the compilation, my nomination for best track is split between the roaring cacophony of the Cinematic Orchestra performing Rites of Spring live at the Barbican (simply a juggernaut of skewed melody), and new boy NMS resurrecting the ghost of Dead Prez for the bass heavy schizophrenia of Brave New World.

Label retrospectives are so often an excuse to trade on old glories, but not this one. Ninja Tune: still got it. AC

UM REVIEWS ALBUM REVIEWS ALBUM REVIEWS ALBUM REVIEWS ALBU

DJ Moneyshot

WS LIVE REVIEWS LIVE REVIEWS LIVE REVIEWS LIVE REVIEWS LIVE REV

Metronomy

2ManyDJs

Ulrich Schnauss / Asobi Seksu

Crystal Castles

Academy, Oxford

Fabric, London

ULU, London

Digital, Brighton

21/02/08

22/02/08

15/02/08

After the death of Canvas and the imminent closure of Turnmills, all signs are pointing to the death of London’s super club. If this is the case, someone really needs to tell the people at Fabric. This place shows no signs of slowing down: tonight, no exception. Although there were over a dozen acts spread across three rooms the main attraction of the night was clearly the return of 2 Many DJ’s. The Belgian duo had the sweaty masses in the palm of their hands and did not disappoint. While the head spinning Simian Mobile Disco and Beyond The Wizards Sleeve’s downright weird mix of psych also proved their worth, tonight was all about Ghent’s finest export. I say this not knowing anything else that comes from Ghent, but I’m pretty sure I’m right. JD

15/02/08

It can’t be easy being a slow burning success. Just as you can’t face playing that damn album through ever again, everyone else finally ‘gets it’ and you’re stuck in the touring loop for yet another six months, playing the same songs over and over to people who could have heard them the first time, if they’d only listened.

I anticipated tonight to be a pretty special adventure into the new school trashy electro of the insatiable Crystal Castles. They did not disappoint. Huge rib shaking bass, a variety of sharp, infectious, sometimes 80s video game sonic rhythms, added to penetrating electro beats with screaming or whispering from a disconnected, exuberant Alice. This probably goes someway to describing the alternate universe Crystal Castles take you to while thrashing through their set.

Rare it is to get lost in both the sound and atmosphere of a gig, but CC achieved this with ultracool ease. As soon as they kicked off with their mix of the Klaxons Atlantis to Interzone all sense of an outside world is lost in the intensity of sound and the relentless strobe, through which the band and crowd becomes an incoherent blur. You’re left with the urge to bump along to the beats and ride out the rhythms. Air War is melodic and disjointed electronica with incomprehensible vocals and heavy effects. CC’s mix of Crimewave by Health is an unstable but infectious slower track and massive underground hit Alice Practice is a real treat of screaming electro with a rhythm that takes you straight to Pixelated buzz bass heaven. If you can, catch these guys live. If you can’t, make do on myspace and with their debut album, due out in April. GCu

Metronomy. It’s one of those band names you wish you had the power to add to the dictionary, because spell-checker will never stop underlining it to tell you that you mean something you actually don’t. In this case, I apparently mean “metronome”. If only a computer could understood that a “Metronome” is a device that keeps music painfully regulated and in time, whereas “Metronomy” chucks conventional rules of making music out of the window, and is something a whole lot different…

“We were discussing how to throw a party with Sandi Thom, she said we should cover her song but we said we’d play Let’s have a Party” declares Oscar, one third of Metronomy, before they do just that, launching into a crazed onslaught of digital pop perfection which frankly, shits all over anything a wannabe punk rocker could ever produce.

Continuing the party with the church-organ-meetscircus sounds of Black Eye/Burnt Thumb, our favourite new digital pioneers continue to serve up cool as fuck electronic dance mayhem, culminating in achingly addictive signature track, You Could Easily Have Me; the fiery and infectious noise of a band making music and having a hell of a good time.

It’s refreshing to watch them dismiss common preconceptions that to be in an uber cool electro band it’s necessary to refrain from smiling throughout the whole set, in preference to some subtle head nodding and staring at the floor through thick rimmed glasses which are blatantly not needed for visual purposes.

Instead, Metronomy talk about Sandi Thom, perform (clearly rehearsed, but who cares) psychedelic dance routines and wear mini battery powered lights across their chests despite its scary resemblance to the teletubbies. Tonight 200 Oxfordians experienced this very exciting live decision to overtly embrace fun over fashion. With a few more gigs like this one: maybe it really is time to add “Metronomy” to the dictionary. ShM

Lightspeed Champion Barfly, Cardiff 7/02/08 There must be a right buzz surrounding Lightspeed Champion to make this night a sell-out. It’s perhaps no coincidence that this was the same week that began with lead singer, ex-Test Icicle Dev Hynes being bestowed the honour (!) of an NME cover. And this being in the wake of the debut album release at the end of January. But there’s no need for the cynicism. Any hype that has been directed at the band is soundly placed. There is a full band backing for the show, ensuring the awesome facets and lush ballads off Falling off the Lavender Bridge are really allowed to shine. But even if it had been a solo acoustic set, the man Hynes sure knows how to work his way around an acoustic guitar with such poise and grace it’d be hard not to be impressed. And how everyone loves a rarity, no? Apparently Stay the Fuck Away from Me hasn’t seen the light for a while, and that is the treat on offer. Devoid of irony, you wonder where such anger has come from in such a seemingly modest, becalmed man. Whoever she was, she must’ve pissed him right off! Not that it spoils the atmosphere in the slightest; it seems both audience and band were as pleased as each other to be a part of it. PH

Nearly two years after the release of Citrus, there’s a sense tonight that Asobi Seksu will be glad to see the back of it. This is their biggest UK headlining show to date, but singer Yuki Chikudate is quick to let the ULU crowd know that it will be their last predominantly made up of material from their glorious breakthrough album.

They follow a good set by electrogaze pioneer Ulrich Schnauss, but it’s a bit of a slow start to the evening (but then, the sight of a man at a laptop nodding his head is rarely terribly exciting, even if he is occassionally joined by a VERY SERIOUS young man singing about Jesus).

Asobi, too, get off to a slow start. Versions of New Years and Pink Cloud Tracing Paper are hindered by dreadful sound problems. But, once the soundman has pulled his finger out, it soon becomes obvious how Asobi Seksu have reached the borderline of popularity, however long it took them to get there.

Thursday’s gorgeous melancholia sends a shiver of nostalgic longing through the crowd, matched only

by Lions and Tigers’ beautifully fuzzed waves of warm noise. A suitably hazy cover of Phil Spector’s And Then He Kissed Me follows, all distorted shimmer and sugar-sweet melody. It’s a delight. Chikudate is an alluring presence throughout, iridescent behind her keyboard, her slight frame and artfully swept fringe belying a passion and commitment hitherto unsuspected.

There is a noticeable lack of new material - an odd omission considering their obvious desire to move on from past, but only now truly appreciated, glories. But it’s a minor complaint. Asobi Seksu may be getting bored of themselves, but they’ll have to bear with the rest of us a little longer. It’s not time to let go yet. MBo

The Anomalies 100 Club, London 21/02/2008 Mourn not the death of grime. Forget ye thy bassline house. Soon, people will be saying a small town in the West Midlands where fuck all has happened since Richard de Bello drew the Mappa Mundi in 1300AD is at the bleeding edge of urban music. Transforming musical genres like toxic waste in a Stan Lee comic, Hereford’s Anomalies are the future of UK hip-hop.

Purloining indie, folk, breakbeat and whatever else they can lay their hands on, they bounce the urban genre out of its surly screwfaced dark age. Not only is every single tune blindingly catchy, but each one has “credible pop chart-success” written through it like Blackpool rock. And alongside great content, The Anomalies’ impromptu-party approach to playing live makes the finished product nothing short of joyous. JA

Gallows

My Ex-Boyfriend’s Records

Blood Red Shoes

Koko, London

Great Hall, Cardiff University

Old Blue Last, London

Clwb Ifor Bach , Cardiff

21/02/08 As an added bonus to tonight’s NME-sponsored shin-dig, Ed Harcourt is the last-minute support. All of a sudden this is something of a blockbuster bill.

Pity then that his set has bizarrely awful sound for such a great amphitheatre, his piano playing reduced to the jarring ‘ping-ping’ of something bought in Toys R Us. Some burlesque fairy music heralds The Gutter Twins’ arrival, much as you’d expect. Being the very embodiment of alternative rock’s dark poetic soul, Mark Lanegan and Greg Dulli could make The Archers theme sound like heroin withdrawal. Oops I’ve mentioned heroin – they would surely hate me for it...

Immediately striking is how The Gutter Twins resemble more the crisp chords of The Afghan Whigs than Lanegan’s more grungy discography. It’s all very epic stuff. Initially All Misery Flowers might sound like we’ve heard it before, what with its stadium-wooing chorus and keyboards-for-strings, but it never strays from the jangling sophistication that Dulli has trademarked for the last 20 years. Idle Hands, too, is brilliantly anthemic, bearing the angular Seattle sound that we will never, ever get enough of.

After a few years busying himself with folk and gospel-blues it’s invigorating seeing Lanegan delivering full-on rock n roll. Motionless and formidable as ever in head-to-toe black denim, there’s a definite swagger along with the craggy-voiced sincerity of Who Will Lead Us and The Stations.

Marooned in a dark corner for much of the gig, the intricacies of many songs were lost to my ears. But it’s enough to be bludgeoned by duelling guitars and shoved around by an audience basking in the sound of an alt rock supergroup in full swing. The obligatory encore of old Lanegan favourites – including No Easy Action and the rarely-heard River Rise from Whiskey for the Holy Ghost - is so effortlessly beautiful it almost hurts.

Emphatically more than a mere warm-up for the album’s release in March, The Gutter Twins are already the living breathing rock behemoth you dreamt they would be. That is, a behemoth of a highly evolved, transcendent kind. BS

18/02/08 Frank Gallows would have you believe he’s a horrible ginger cunt. But he’s not. What he is is he’s the most self effacing, engaging and angst ridden front man ever to bare his tattoos. He loves his crowd, he loves you and he loves his mum. I love him (not like that) because he doesn’t give a fuck and he fronts the best live punk band ever. Tighter than a ducks arse, more rawkus than Company Flow, simply awe inspiring. Tenacious, intense, tearing up guitars and drum skins, yelling in unison. Dedicating their first song to Newport “this is a song about living in a shitty town!!” it’s certain that they are destined for punk greatness, maybe legendary like Black Flag. That’s a big promise, and they are big shoes, but as small as Frank is he can fill them. MB

Islands Thekla Bristol 21/02/08

Islands didn’t appear on stage for quite a while, so during the wait my gig buddy decided to teach me the art of ‘minesweeping’; the process of finding and consuming - abandoned drinks that are still almost full. Perhaps we were a little wreckless, but it helped pass the time and save us a bit of dollar.

Consequently, drinks had been flowing all night but where were the band? My fellow minesweeper and I were increasingly thirsting for some Islands’ action.

The band bustled onto stage at 1am, violins and keys akimbo. With a bounce in their step, Islands pressed their way through a set switching between extreme styles of calypso and reggae one minute to progressive and indie the next. With an Arcade Fireesque tinge Islands proved they could be haunting to spine-tingling effect. The violinists are just adorable, jumping up and down together in a jovial manner?

As a result, I spent most of the set saying ‘ahhhhhh how cute’ in a high-pitched girly voice.

When Islands finished their set the resident DJ immediately began to play. The crowd were left wanting more, and we were damn well going to get it too. Eventually, we got our wishes and Islands allowed us to bum-shake for one more track. Bootylicious. SL

14/02/08

It was billed as a night for sweethearts and cheated hearts- the cynical unvalentine’s activity for those who weren’t shacked up in some drossy Italian eatery making eyes across the breadsticks. For the recently single or terminally realistic it’s part of the natural order of life. Girl meets boy, boy impresses girl with rare b-sides, they fall in love until it all ends in tears- blah blah blah. The silver-lining voice inside your head rationalises the trade-off. In exchange for a Gang of Four box set you sacrifice your faith in humanity. Small price, really.

Our hostesses - DJ duo My Ex-Boyfriends Records - set the tone playing a selection of their sonic booty from old flames. The crimson walls were decked with old vinyl painted with slogans (“This isn’t really working” ... “It’s not you, it’s me”) in blood red nailvarnish. It spread a feeling of camaraderie amongst the packed crowd; an unspoken understanding that being single in London is an ideal state of affairs and we wouldn’t swap this sticky room for anywhere else.

The first band on were Londoner’s Stricken City, a group riding the new-wave into the ground with jerk-pop songs about love and obsession. The Glamazon on lead vocals, Rebekah Raa, didn’t look like she was hung up on any drippy ex as she squawked and folded like Kate Bush on a dub trip.

The Strange Death of Liberal England were beguiling-holding up signs with messages between songsall tortured howls and rich, textured guitar. On Oh Solitude a New Order riff gave way gracefully to distortion, a xylophone solo and girl/boy calls. Lead singer Adam Woolway led the band through complicated, constructed arrangements on songs like A Day Another Day and still found the energy and timing to yelp like a young Robert Plant at its whirling finish.

The orchestral layering of their instruments, off-kilter melodies and other-worldliness made for compelling listening. I’ve found a new love this Valentine’s Day- and it’s a 5 piece from Portsmouth that writes music like a rough and ready Arcade Fire. ND

02/02/08 The room is filled to the rafters with an eclectic crowd, the only thing missing is perhaps the cigarette smoke that once clogged the lungs of the young and was an emotional crux for many an indie kid with nothing better to talk about than his/her pain and the benefits of a proper album cover over that of the CD format. Blood Red Shoes came screaming from Brighton’s indie scene in 2005, and are touring relentlessly, pushing their brand of gorecore primal pop to the nation. I try and catch the eye of Laura-Mary when they take the stage, and all I get for my trouble is a moment of temporary blindness as a spotlight hits my retina: god punishing me for looking at another woman with lust. Let that be a lesson to you all. They open with the brilliant It’s Getting Boring By The Sea but it’s clear that they maybe a problem with Laura-Mary’s voice. They still play with the primal urgency that has made them such a name for them. They are strident, raucous and raw and Steven while playing the drums shouts both parts and more than fills in for Laura-Mary, who is trying to scream but it isn’t happening. I make a mental note to bring honey and lemon Soothers to the next gig I go to. MB

Hot Chip Academy, Oxford 19/02/08

London’s finest didn’t need to play The Warning to remind Oxford of their ability to fracture bones.

Shake a Fist riles the crowd into insane levels of excitement; the juxtaposition of raw pulsing beats and Alexis’ choir boy vocals: sheer pop perfection.

Over & Over excites us to the point of spontaneous combustion, pints are spilled, there’s an influx of crowdsurfers and the crowd becomes a mob of pogoing maniacs as Hot Chip launch into Ready for the Floor. Only seconds after this euphoric explosion, the mood changes and it’s all slow waving arms and the odd lighter for blissful tear jerker, In the Privacy of Our Love. Hot Chip may look like they belong in a science lab, but ain’t no scientist who could break our legs and then our hearts in the way they did tonight. ShM

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The Gutter Twins

Competition!

Rock Ness 2008 will be held on the weekend of the 7th and 8th of June on the banks of Loch Ness which, of course you know, is in Scotland. Amongst the many acts so far confirmed to play are the very ace Simian Mobile Disco, Digitalism, CSS and The Cuban Brothers.

Sadly, there are a few rubbish ones too, which you’ll see when you head over to www.rockness.co.uk to get more details, but by the time summer approaches and the bill is fully firmed up, they’ll be peanuts in the poo of this lovely festival.

To win a pair of tickets for this year’s Rock Ness, answer this simple question: What was the name of the little yellow bird in the comic strip Peanuts?

a) Woodstock b) The London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival c) Big Bird

Send your answer, along with your name and contact details to woodstock@krugermagazine.com by 12noon on April the 30th. You’ve gotto be 18 to enter this one.