BROADCAST
The Future Crayon
Warp
director's cut, Observer Music Monthly, August 13, 2006
by Simon Reynolds
There’s an invented word in Alfie that fits the music of Broadcast like a glove: “ghostified”. Remember the scene where Michael Caine's character complains about how Jane Asher's northern runaway turned live-in lover gets this faraway, 'ghostified' look, indicating she's thinking mournfully of the lover who dumped her even when flesh-and-blood Alfie's between her legs? Not only does Trish Keenan’s voice sounds as cool and pale as a ghost, but she and Broadcast partner James Cargill are haunted by a never-never vision of Sixties pop and have chased that will o’ the wisp for nigh on a decade now.
The Birmingham duo’s touchstone is the obscure psychedelic outfit United States of America, who pioneered of the use of synthesizers and whose singer, Dorothy Moskowitz, had one of those classic Sixties female voices: emotive but devoid of R&B grit and fire, “white” without being overtly folky. Channeling this purity and poise, Keenan gives songs like “Illumination” and “Unchanging Window” the characteristic Broadcast mood-blend of blithe and ominous; Cargill frames her songs with crisply detailed orchestrations and jazzily swinging beats that betray deep immersion in movie scores, library music and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. Along with proper pop tunes, there’s a bunch of splendid mood-piece instrumentals, like “Minus Two”, a bleepy idyll that’s like nap-time muzak for a crèche full of robot tots.
Broadcast avoid the pitfall of retro-pastiche, of coming across either scholarly or campy, because there’s real emotion in these songs: “Distant Call”, for instance, is a lovely and loving song of pained empathy addressed to a friend mired in sorrow.
Not so much a “best of” as a miscellany that shuns their three full-lengths in favour of early EP tracks and rarities from other compilations, The Future Crayon isn’t the “new Broadcast album”, but it might actually be their best record, if you get me.
RIP Trish Keenan
Friday, January 14, 2011
Monday, January 3, 2011
ARCTIC MONKEYS
Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not
Domino
Blender, 2006
by Simon Reynolds
Late last year, Arctic Monkeys rode internet buzz to become the biggest UK guitar-band since Oasis. There are plenty of parallels--cocky-as-hell lads
from the industrial North of England instantly embraced as saviours of Brit-rock--but Arctic Monkey are actually by far the superior band. Their melodies are indelible without inducing Beatles flashbacks, the lyrics actually make sense and are about something, and, crucially, they've got a rhythm section that actually makes the music move. For all of Jamie Cook's abrasive, jagged guitar riffs, the Monkeys don't really sound "indie," and that's got everything to do with the agility of drummer Matt Helders and bassist Andy Nicholson, who can switch from punk relentlessness to Sabbath-style "heavy" dynamics to zippy punk-funk in the blink of a hi-hat. Showcasing this nimbleness to the max, Monkeys songs are crammed with thrilling swerves, jolts, and false endings.
What really elevates the Monkeys into a class of their own, though, is frontman Alex Turner. His insolent rasp sweetly tinged with plaintiveness and poignancy, Turner is shaping up to be one of the all-time great English singers. His delivery is full of delicious moments where his classic rock'n'roll snarl slips into a thick regional accent: "alright" becomes "al-reet," "up" becomes "oop", and you simply have to hear the twangy lasciviousness with which Turner sings lines like "you sexy little swine" or "dreams of naughtiness." Spiced with regional slang ("you've got the face on" = "in a bad mood"), his lyrics couple the invincible confidence of youth with a sense of pathos and fatalism of someone older, wiser, and sadder.
The band's hometown Sheffield is a famously bleak city once synonomous with the steel industry, and accordingly Turner's prime terrain is young people grabbing for fun and sparkle in the face of all the forces that would crush their spirit, whether it's psycho bouncers, limited funds, or simply England's wet winters and grey summer skies. Turner's observational flair is at its most acute and original on "Red Light Indicates Doors Are Secured," probably the first song ever about getting a cab home after a drunken night out. Turner sketches it all with keen-eyed economy: the driver who refuses to let six in the cab ("especially with the food"), watching the meter anxiously while contemplating doing a runner, and reliving the night's highlights, like the fight that broke out in the taxi line and the "beyond belief" babe in the pub that evaded his clutches.
Whatever People Say is front-loaded with hell-for-leather instant classics about chatting up and copping off, like "I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor" and "Still Take You Home." Even better, though, are the slower songs, which allow the tenderness in Turner's voice to bloom and encourage
empathy to triumph over sarcasm in the lyrics. In 'Mardy Bum," Turner struggles to smooth things over with his pissed-off girlfriend (her scowl as fearsome as "looking down the barrel of a gun"), evoking memories of "cuddles in the kitchen" in a desperate attempt to dissipate the sour mood.
"Riot Van" is a wry ballad about watching bored youth expertly bait the town police but avoid actually getting arrested--most of the time, anyway. At 20, Turner is close enough to these lads to remember feeling that same mix of restlessness and cheek, but he also knows they're gonna get burned sooner rather than later. This delicate poise of intimacy and distance permeates the album, making the Monkeys vignettes of teenage wildlife resonate far beyond the local world they so vividly and vigorously document.
Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not
Domino
Blender, 2006
by Simon Reynolds
Late last year, Arctic Monkeys rode internet buzz to become the biggest UK guitar-band since Oasis. There are plenty of parallels--cocky-as-hell lads
from the industrial North of England instantly embraced as saviours of Brit-rock--but Arctic Monkey are actually by far the superior band. Their melodies are indelible without inducing Beatles flashbacks, the lyrics actually make sense and are about something, and, crucially, they've got a rhythm section that actually makes the music move. For all of Jamie Cook's abrasive, jagged guitar riffs, the Monkeys don't really sound "indie," and that's got everything to do with the agility of drummer Matt Helders and bassist Andy Nicholson, who can switch from punk relentlessness to Sabbath-style "heavy" dynamics to zippy punk-funk in the blink of a hi-hat. Showcasing this nimbleness to the max, Monkeys songs are crammed with thrilling swerves, jolts, and false endings.
What really elevates the Monkeys into a class of their own, though, is frontman Alex Turner. His insolent rasp sweetly tinged with plaintiveness and poignancy, Turner is shaping up to be one of the all-time great English singers. His delivery is full of delicious moments where his classic rock'n'roll snarl slips into a thick regional accent: "alright" becomes "al-reet," "up" becomes "oop", and you simply have to hear the twangy lasciviousness with which Turner sings lines like "you sexy little swine" or "dreams of naughtiness." Spiced with regional slang ("you've got the face on" = "in a bad mood"), his lyrics couple the invincible confidence of youth with a sense of pathos and fatalism of someone older, wiser, and sadder.
The band's hometown Sheffield is a famously bleak city once synonomous with the steel industry, and accordingly Turner's prime terrain is young people grabbing for fun and sparkle in the face of all the forces that would crush their spirit, whether it's psycho bouncers, limited funds, or simply England's wet winters and grey summer skies. Turner's observational flair is at its most acute and original on "Red Light Indicates Doors Are Secured," probably the first song ever about getting a cab home after a drunken night out. Turner sketches it all with keen-eyed economy: the driver who refuses to let six in the cab ("especially with the food"), watching the meter anxiously while contemplating doing a runner, and reliving the night's highlights, like the fight that broke out in the taxi line and the "beyond belief" babe in the pub that evaded his clutches.
Whatever People Say is front-loaded with hell-for-leather instant classics about chatting up and copping off, like "I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor" and "Still Take You Home." Even better, though, are the slower songs, which allow the tenderness in Turner's voice to bloom and encourage
empathy to triumph over sarcasm in the lyrics. In 'Mardy Bum," Turner struggles to smooth things over with his pissed-off girlfriend (her scowl as fearsome as "looking down the barrel of a gun"), evoking memories of "cuddles in the kitchen" in a desperate attempt to dissipate the sour mood.
"Riot Van" is a wry ballad about watching bored youth expertly bait the town police but avoid actually getting arrested--most of the time, anyway. At 20, Turner is close enough to these lads to remember feeling that same mix of restlessness and cheek, but he also knows they're gonna get burned sooner rather than later. This delicate poise of intimacy and distance permeates the album, making the Monkeys vignettes of teenage wildlife resonate far beyond the local world they so vividly and vigorously document.
HOT CHIP
Coming On Strong
Astralwerks
Blender, 2005
By Simon Reynolds
The title Coming On Strong is ironic. This music can barely look you in the eye. Imagine a bunch of Brits striving for the sass 'n' sheen of modern R&B and rap, but just too diffident to match the swaggering ebullience of Beyonce and 50 Cent. N.E.R.D., by real nerds, in other words. The Hot Chip vibe is distilled in “Playboy”, which sees the song’s lovelorn protagonist cheering himself up by cruising London with the top down, gangsta-style: “Driving in my Peugeot/20-inch rims with the chrome now/Blazin’ out Yo La Tengo” But the group’s two singer/songwriters, Alexis Taylor and Joe Goddard, aren’t mocking black music
so much as conveying the pathos of the unbridgeable gap between pop’s fantasy world and the hum-drum reality most of us must inhabit. Bling on a budget, Hot Chip’s music is woven from the sort of burbling ‘n’ twinkling analog synth sounds you’d associate with a group like Stereolab, but the reference points are all from the last thirty years of black pop: Stevie Wonder, S.O.S. Band, Prince, Dr. Dre. Tracks like “You Ride, We Ride, In My Ride” and “Shining Escalade” have a translucent faintness, as if they’re diagrams of R&B songs that have yet to be colored in. Insidiously melodic and, in its subdued way, genuinely soulful, Coming On Strong is the best record of its ilk since The Streets’ debut.
Coming On Strong
Astralwerks
Blender, 2005
By Simon Reynolds
The title Coming On Strong is ironic. This music can barely look you in the eye. Imagine a bunch of Brits striving for the sass 'n' sheen of modern R&B and rap, but just too diffident to match the swaggering ebullience of Beyonce and 50 Cent. N.E.R.D., by real nerds, in other words. The Hot Chip vibe is distilled in “Playboy”, which sees the song’s lovelorn protagonist cheering himself up by cruising London with the top down, gangsta-style: “Driving in my Peugeot/20-inch rims with the chrome now/Blazin’ out Yo La Tengo” But the group’s two singer/songwriters, Alexis Taylor and Joe Goddard, aren’t mocking black music
so much as conveying the pathos of the unbridgeable gap between pop’s fantasy world and the hum-drum reality most of us must inhabit. Bling on a budget, Hot Chip’s music is woven from the sort of burbling ‘n’ twinkling analog synth sounds you’d associate with a group like Stereolab, but the reference points are all from the last thirty years of black pop: Stevie Wonder, S.O.S. Band, Prince, Dr. Dre. Tracks like “You Ride, We Ride, In My Ride” and “Shining Escalade” have a translucent faintness, as if they’re diagrams of R&B songs that have yet to be colored in. Insidiously melodic and, in its subdued way, genuinely soulful, Coming On Strong is the best record of its ilk since The Streets’ debut.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)