Sort of forgot to mention this before now, but after a little prod I'm remembering now. I deliberatly didn't touch on this one until now, saving it as part of my mini "stuff that's happening over in Edinburgh" fest instead. (I don't think I'm going to get away with that...)
Anyway, Kid Canaveral are a two boy, two girl indie pop combo, with a nice little collection of 7" singles to their name so far. This weekend they play a launch gig for their new EP, Left & Right at The Bowery in Edinburgh. If you click on the wee picture up the top there it should open up at a readable size so you can get the info.
Support comes from Cancel The Astronauts and Popup, two other favourites round these parts - do a search and read what I've written about them before if you don't believe me - so it should be a splendid night of sheer indie joy. One I can't go to...
Get yourself along if you can and tell everyone Jim sent you. All but a few people will stare at you blankly, but that's alright, that's how my whole life feels.
I'll be reviewing Left & Right soon, but in the meantime whet your appetite with an interview Kid Canaveral did with Peenko and see what Glasgow PodcART had to say about the EP.
It seems every time I sat down to do this review something or other has cropped up to stop me finishing it. As a result it's been written in stages, so apologies in advance if that makes it a terrible read. Point out any huge flaws and I'll fix them.
The Gothenburg Address are a four piece from Edinburgh, comprising of Chris Bathgate (guitar), Rob Doig (bass) Luke Joyce (guitar) and David Jeans (drums). If any of those names are name to you, give yourself a point, in the past some of the members have played in other bands, including The Complete Stone Roses, Arab Strap and The Zephyrs. The band themselves first came to my attention back in May around the time of their release of A Lesser Coming Home as a single, mostly thanks to Ed over at 17 Seconds.
If you were paying attention a moment ago you'll have noticed that I didn't mention a vocalist. That's because there isn't one. That in itself maked The Gothenburg Address a bit of a hard sell for me right away. I enjoy an instrumental band, but sometimes it feels like you can't move for them. If a band has a charasmatic singer as a front man, if the songs aren't up to scratch and the band isn't on form, they can hide behind that front man. With an instrumental band there's no hiding place, and believe me, during some of those "can't move for them" bands that I've seen and heard, I've really wanted to hide. However, happily, any fears I initially had were blown out the water upon hearing that first single and from then on I've been keeping an eye and ear on The Gothenburg Address.
Which brings us along to this, their debut album. I'll almost never go out my way to ask a band to send me something - it's a confidence thing, I'm always convinced they'll say no - but when their Facebook page said they were inviting promo requests I couldn't hold myself back, and the album dropped through my door last week and has been getting played regularly since.
The album kick off with the grand sounding Leaving The Last Behind, which is lent further gravitas, as if it needed any, by Alan Barr, who pops up to lend cello. From there on, frankly, the album doesn't put a foot wrong. There's no need for a hiding place when your band sounds this tight and your songs are this well crafted. There's no sense of the songs being samey, another trap some instrumental bands can fall into, everything sounds different but distinctive.
You can invite comparisons to the likes of Mogwai, even Aereogramme in places, but although those bands are handy reference points, The Gothenburg Address don't really sound anything like them, they sound like The Gothenburg Address, which is just another reason why I'm so in love with this album.
Quite honestly, there's not a single bad thing I can say about this album. It's already pushed its way through the queue of other albums I've loved this year to announce itself as a likely candidate for one of the year's finest. With that in mind it is hard to pick highlights, but just shading it are the tracks that bookend the album, opener Leaving The Last Behind and finale I Am Made Of Hearts + Fire, along with Its Not A Fjord But A Lake just ever so slightly shade it as my favourite tracks.
The album doesn't just live up to the early promise of May's single release, it exceeds it. On the arbitrary, meaningless star scoring system, it gets a solid Five Stars out of five*.
You can find The Gothenburg Address at the following places - Website - MySpace - Twitter
The band have put together a trailer for the album, you can watch that below.
Also, for a bit more of a taster of the band, you can jump over to their website and download their Shimmer In The City EP, made up of a live recording of the band performing at Nice n Sleazys in Glasgow, for the bargain price of nothing.
*I was asked about the scoring system the other day, so I'll go ahead an explain. I don't put an awful lot of faith in stars/numbers to sum up an album and think it can lead to laziness in just looking to see how an album rated. I'm all about catering to everyone though, so I'll include an out of five stars system on a review to keep those that like them happy, I'll just point out that in the grand scheme of things they don't really matter.
If you wanted to be mean to me (and why would you want to do that? I'm quite nice really) you could point out that Aye Tunes always has a bit of a Glasgowcentric, West Coast bias. It's true, but it's not really my fault. I live hear, so I know more about what is going on at this side of Scotland than I do in Aberdeen, Dundee, Edinburgh or wherever. Anyway, just for you hypothetical mean people, let's swing the spotlight outside of Glasgow.
17 Seconds Records is, as the name might suggest, a record company. Run by Ed, who is also the brains behind the long running 17 Seconds blog, they are based over in Edinburgh. Already there's a fine roster of artists signed up to the 17 Seconds Records roster, a couple of whom I'll be talking about a bit today.
Aberfeldy were one of the first acts signed to 17 Seconds, and now one fifth of them, Chris Bradley, is signed up solo too. Chris already has one solo album to his name, Voices, which 17 Seconds will be re releasing next year. Before that though comes a single 'Bored Little Rosie'/'The Man I Love' out on October 5th and a second album, tentatively titled Go On, My Son to follow in November.
Another early signing to the label is Tony T, better known as X Lion Tamer. Described by himself as "Sounds like the ending credits of low budget 80s teen movies – played on your mate’s Amiga", X Lion Tamer is a world away from the other music on 17 Seconds Records, and from most artists generally featured by Aye Tunes for that matter. There's two download singles available by X Lion Tamer, both of which have now been combined and made available on CD as Neon Hearts EP. The following song Life Support Machine is available on the Neon Hearts CD and as the second track on the download single.
You can keep up with 17 Seconds, the blog and the label at these places - Blog - MySpace - Website
17 Second Records are available to download at the usual places, including iTunes and eMusic
Upcoming live dates include: 2 Oct 2009 X-Lion Tamer at Sneaky Pete’s, Edinburgh 8 Oct 2009 Chris Bradley supporting Dr. Robert at Water Rats, King’s Cross, London 9 Oct 2009 X-Lion Tamer at Devil Disco at The Bongo Club, Edinburgh 17 Oct 2009 Escape Act at Eamonn Dorans, Dublin 23 Oct 2009 Aberfeldy at Cupar Corn Exchange, Cupar 30 Oct 2009 17 Seconds night at the 13th Note,with the Dirty Cuts, Chris Bradley and X-Lion Tamer, Glasgow 27 Nov 2009 The Dirty Cuts @ Pin Up Club at The Flying Duck, Glasgow
Still working on all the catching up and reviewing I'm meant to be doing, but I've been meaning to do something on The Morgue Party Candidate, so let's get to that today shall we?
The Morgue Party Candidate are a three piece, two thirds from Cumbernauld, one third from Glasgow, who take their name from a Grand Theft Auto mission.
They've just stuck out their first EP, which contains three cracking songs. My favourite of the three, and the one that brought the band to my attention in the first place by it's inclusion on Glasgow Podcart a wee bit back - yeah Glasgow Podcart again - is the gorgeous Animal Dance Party. You can download it below. The very title puts all sorts of weird and freaky images in my head, which is always a good thing. Following the band on Twitter also puts some freaky pictures in your mind, which is maybe not such a good thing...
I can't say an awful lot about the band, I've not caught them live yet, something I aim to do soon and only have 4 songs to go on, but I've played the shit out of those songs now and find they've worked their way into my head, which seems as good a reason as any to swing the low powered, dim, barely noticable Aye Tunes spotlight on them. Plus now I can boast that I was in there early when everyone else starts loving The Morgue Party Candidate.
If you swing over to the band's MySpace you can listen to all of their new EP, Good Morning, Good Night. If you make friends with them they might even send you a link to download the whole thing for free too, if you ask nice.
Alright then, got a bit of time back on my own computer for a week or so (oh hard drive full of music how I missed you, let's never be parted again!), so I'll attempt to get caught up on the backlog of stuff I've got to get through over the next few days.
Won't get much done tomorrow (Thursday) though, I'm away to see The Darian Venture & Atlas Skye at The Mill. Give me a wave if you are going along.
Speaking of gigs, it was interesting to discover that copying Frightened Rabbit tour dates out of the Sunday Mail magazine pushed me to around 4 times my normal visitor numbers. I almost think no one cares about what I write :P
If you've sent me a press release or anything in the last few days, sorry I've not gotten to it yet, I'll see what I can do, ideally before it's too late.
This pile of records I want to listen to and attempt to review take priority though.
Press release first, quick comments from me at the end.
THE PIN UP NIGHTS CIRCUS FRIDAY 25TH SEPTEMBER, 9PM - 3AM A SAWDUSTED AND SPOTLIT FLYING DUCK, 142 RENFIELD STREET, GLASGOW GUEST DJ: MIKE FIELDING, AKA NABOO OF THE MIGHTY BOOSH RINGMASTER: PAUL PUPPET (OF LEGENDARY GLASGOW BAND SCUNNER, AND THE MAN BEHIND THE RIO CAFE'S "SPANGLED CABARET") A SMORGASBORD OF CIRCUS PERFORMERS INCLUDING MAGICIANS, FIRE EATERS, JUGGLERS, STRONG-MEN AND MUCH MUCH MORE - BUT NO CLOWNS - BECAUSE THEY'RE TERRIFYING!! THE PIN UPS DJS PLAYING THEIR INIMITABLE MIX OF NEW AND CLASSIC INDIE, PUNK, SOUL ELECTROPOP PERFORMING LIVE: POOCH, SONNY MARVELLO, MITCHELL MUSEUM AND "QUICK, RUN" STALLS RUN BY MEMBERS OF THE GLASGOW CRAFT MAFIA AND FUNFAIR GAMES (DUCKS! COCONUTS!) A REAL LIVE GORILLA… A SPLENDID TIME IS GUARANTEED FOR ALL! TICKETS ARE £6 ON THE DOOR OR £5 IN ADVANCE FROM THE STORE AT WWW.PINUP-NIGHTS.CO.UK
Ladieeeeees and Gentlemen. Roll Up! Roll Up! The Circus is in town! Yes you lucky scallywags, its time to roll yourself up indeed and make haste to The Big Top! For one night only, Pin Up Nights is transforming into a good old fashioned circus! Marvel! - At the line up of terrific live bands – Pooch, Sonny Marvello, Mitchell Museum and “Quick, Run”! Delight! - In seeing The Flying Duck transformed into an actual circus Big Top! Wonder! - At the antics of Ringmaster Paul Puppet, and the feats performed before your very eyes by the Pin Ups Circus performers! Dance! - Till 3am to the usual fantastic mix of tunes you'd expect from Glasgow’s best and longest running indie night! Gape! - At celebrity guest DJ Naboo from The Mighty Boosh! Goggle! – At the stalls run by members of the Glasgow Craft Mafia (including Pistol Whip Vintage, We Are The Robots and more) and our Funfair games! And Gaze! – Longingly! - At dishy Pin Ups DJ James “Butcher” Cassidy! Mindboggling stuff I'm sure you'll agree! That’s not all too as we are planning a few more surprises if we can pull it off, including even a dramatic GORILLA!! If you fancy dressing up and entering the circus spirit then knock yourself out (not literally I mean, just feel free to dress up!) Those of you who are regulars will know we try our best to create terrific events at Pin Up Nights and always give value for money. This year amongst others we've had Florence and The Machine and Friendly Fires DJing in January, a star-studded Ladies Night 2 (Camera Obscura! Victoria Bergsman! Queens of Noize!) and even turned The Flying Duck into a Festival Site in June (complete with Wham Tent!) all at the cost of £5 entry. Despite the jam-packed bill above and obvious costs involved we've kept the price stupidly low. How stupidly low we'll probably only realise on Saturday afternoon when it becomes clear we’ve dropped a zero somewhere in our cost calculations (none of us were brilliant at maths...). Still, that’s for us to worry about and despite the barrel-load of action we've arranged, we're only charging £5 for advance tickets and £6 on the door. If you've been to any club night other than Pin Ups recently and paid for entry, hopefully you'll agree this is incredible value! You can get your advance tickets from the store section of http://www.pinup-nights.co.uk or in-store/online from Tickets Scotland. (Advance sales would be appreciated as we have 101 things to pay for..) All the pics from August are on the website as well so have a peek and spot yourself having a boogie. We had originally planned for the Circus to be in August but the bill was going to be better if we did September so we changed it close to last minute. This meant that August’s Pin Ups was a tad under-advertised but you lovely people still turned up in droves so thanks a million. That’s all for now folks, don't forget to Roll Up Roll Up on 25th! The Pin Ups chaps.xx ps we were originally going to write this invite in the style of a mocking run-down of the other events that are happening on Friday 25th September (there’s quite a lot of tacky Freshers Week things), but we decided that there was so much Circus chat to get though that we didn’t have room and it would get too confusing. A shame as I already had ideas noted down such as“Experiment with your sexuality at Karbon as you party hard with Duncan from Blue”, "Fear for 87 year old DJ Phil's life as he attempts his Mick Jagger dance at Strathclyde Union's TFI Friday", etc etc
Leaving aside my "I'm 30, I'm too old for clubs" thinking, the bands on offer alone make this worth a look for me. You'll know by know how I feel about Mitchell Museum of course (but in case you don't, I love them). I'm not very familiar with the others, but have heard nothing but good things about Pooch for one. All in all, if you are at a loose end in Glasgow next Friday, you could do much worse.
Just a wee heads up, there might not be an awful lot of updates around ere for the next week or so. My computer access is limited at the moment (and I can't get near my hard drive full of music *sob*) so I won't have a chance to do a lot.
No great shock that there's ages between posts I know, but this time I have a good excuse.
Go check out all my friends in the link section in the meantime and get yourself to the next available Bronto Skylift gig. Saw Bronto again the other night in the 13th Note (thanks Podcart!) and the were headfuckingly awesome.
As always, if there's anything I should be covering here when I get a chance send over an email, I can still get into that via my mobile.
I've been hearing about Bronto Skylift for a wee while now, but prior to Friday's instore gig at Avalnce in Glasgow had never managed to catch them play live. I was more than a little surprised to learn there's only two of them. Had I actually paid attention I'd have known this already of course, but I didn't. The make a hell of a lot of noise for a band comprising a singing guitar player and a drummer. A hell of a lot of noise. An instore gig isn't an ideal place to judge a band, but on Friday's evidence I'm totally sold on Bronto Skylift.
It isn't that gig that I'm reviewing here though, I'm talking about the reason for it, the release of The Bearded Fish and the Jackalope EP. Short version of the review - 4 tracks, five quid, worth every penny. Also has really pretty art.
Still here for the longer version of the review? Fantastic! Thanks for sticking around.
After starting off gently for all of around 22 seconds everything kicks off on Lioness, the first track. As soon as the guitar rips in at the 0.22 mark it's best just to hold on and go with it, because that guitar part has no intentions of letting go. There's some fantastic drumming going on there too. If Lioness was rough, second track Tiger is like being dragged up an alley and beaten, but secretly loving every second of it. Loud, raucous and brilliant. Hekla, the third track on offer, keeps up the noise levels at first, but changes things up a bit. As the longest song on the EP it takes the chance to offer some breathing space from unrelenting Bront Force Trauma by pulling out the old loud bit, quieter bit, LOUD BIT trick. When done well, I always love that. It's done well here. Cobblepot is the only song on the EP I had any familiarity with previously, and it is my favourite of the four tracks. Everything just clicks. That boot up the arse riff, the almost Jazz drumming and the pure bloody energy. It very nearly made me dance in my chair when listening to it again for this review.
The first 3 tracks are good, Cobblepot is really good.
What does it is score on the arbitrary and meaningless star system, I hear you fail to ask? Well, it's would only be a four out of five stars release, the reason being that it doesn't quite live up to the full fury of the band firing on all cylinders in a live setting. It comes really bloody close though. However, Cobblepot is good enough to nudge the EP over that extra hypothetical and meaningless star. Five Stars it is then.
No songs from the EP, go buy it. You can have Cobblepot, which appears on the EP, recorded live at The Mill though. Bronto Skylift - Cobblepot (live)
You can get hold of the EP here, at gigs and in the likes of Avalanche. It comes with a free sticker and everything. Try to pick up Bronto's first single too, it's also fantastic. Do yourself a favour though, see this band live.
Head over to MySpace to sample songs, get gig dates and all the usual MySpacey type stuff.
Oh, and yet again, massive thanks go to Glasgow Podcart for introducing me to the band in the first place. If you aren't checking out the Podcart yet you are really missing out. One day I'll get round to a full post kissing Ally Sean and Halina's collective arses, but for now I'll stick with thanking them, again, and encouraging everyone with ears to listen to them.
The Wildhearts aren't Scottish at all, but no have a new album Chutzpah! out today. Ginger is one of my favourite songwriters in the World, so they get love from me despite the lack of country based qualifications.
Bronto Skylift don't technically release their new EP until next Monday, but you can order it online here now. Get yourself along to Avalance in Glasgow on Friday afternoon for an instore performance and buy the EP there too.
Time for a random single review! A Randan single review at that. See what I did there? This is an unusual one for me, as I'm actually reviewing something from listening to it on MySpace, rather than having a copy of my own. You don't care, I know, but it seemed worth pointing out.
Yet another song that came to my attention through Glasgow Podcart, part of their plan to use all my eMusic credits and make me spend all my money on music I think. That's alright though, I'm always happy to buy stuff that's good.
Daily Record May 18th 1993 is the new single from Randan Discotheque, and it's a fun little thing. Probably the easiest thing I've ever had to describe too, as it essentially headlines and mentions of stuff that appeared in - you guessed it - the May 18th 1993 Daily Record newspaper, half spoken, half sung over a drum machine, keyboard and guitar backdrop. There's nothing really complicated going on here and I dare say it'll fall into a love it/hate it category, but me, I love it. As further encouragement I'll put forward the tale of my friend. he doesn't know much about music, anything beyond The Doors and The Kinks and he's a bit lost, but he suffers through me playing new stuff at him when we are round his house for beers - I enjoy good music, he drinks himself silly, it's a plan that keeps us both happy. On Saturday I put on the Randan track and for the first time in ages he paid attention, enquired what it was and declared, slightly drunk, "I love this!". Maybe saying that my pal who doesn't like music likes this song isn't really such a good recommendation, but in my head it is a good thing. By the way, on May 18th 1993 I was closing in on the end of my second year at secondary school. I feel old again now.
B-side Time To Waste sounds entirely different, kicking off with an alarm clock, pounding bass then jagged guitars. It's a completely different beast to the A-Side, Magazine to Daily Record's Black Grape, but every bit as good. It also shows that dismissing Randan Discotheque as a novelty act on the basis of the A-Side would be a silly move indeed, they've got range.
Random fairly meaningless star system score - it's a full five out of five!
The single is out on Monday, August 31. You should be able to find it in Avalance and Mono, and buy it online too. (Update, you can get your hands on a copy of the 7" here.)
There's also a launch gig for the single tomorrow night (August 28th) in the Wee Red Bar in Edinburgh. Get yourself along to that if you are over that side of the country.
Not posting the song, for obvious reasons. You can head over to MySpace and listen to it there. Here's a wee video of the song played live though. Warning: shirtless man.
Randan Discotheque MySpace - Facebook - Twitter Also, if you skip over to Last.fm they've got two albums you can download for the bargain price of free.
Sometimes I complain that no one ever sends me stuff, other times people do send me stuff and it lurks in my inbox for a week before I get round to doing anything with it. This one falls into the latter category, so time to get to it now.
The Cinematics, a Glasgow based, Dingwall spawned four piece, put out their debut album A Strange Education a couple of years ago before heading off on a stream of tours as support acts. Now they are getting set to release their second album Love and Terror at the end of September.
The new album is preceeded by a single, available now through the usual download sites, the title track Love and Terror, which I've been asked to share with you.
It's a pretty decent song.
If you want to read the whole PR blurb you can do so here.
So, the new season of the Scottish Premier League kicks off tomorrow. That seems like something I can make into a post.
Plan A was to find a band that supported each team. That plan went right out the window as soon as I realised that I have no idea what bands support anyone but three or four clubs, so instead you are getting a band from the relevant town or city, or as close as I can get at least.
I still ended up struggling a bit, if you support any of the teams in the SPL and have a better suggestion let me know.
Aberdeen: Sorry Dons, right now the best I can offer you is Lily Allen, and I doubt her credentials.
Celtic: Loads to choose from for this one and one of the few Scottish clubs that seem to have musicians happy to admit to supporting. I won't risk pissing off a chunk of my visitors by suggesting that this is because Celtic are brilliant. Oops... Anyway, our band of choice for Celtic are Mogwai, since they seem to especially enjoy annoying Rangers supporters on their website. In the interest of fairness - see the Rangers entry - we've got some rubbish fans too, Martine McCutcheon for example.
Dundee United: About half of Deacon Blue are Dundee United fans, so that's who you are stuck with.
Falkirk: You've got Arab Strap in the "I don't know who supports you, here's a band from the town" draw.
Hamilton Academical: Right about now I'm thinking this was a terrible idea. You have been randomly selected Teenage Fanclub since Bellshill is near Hamilton, even though at least some of them are Celts.
Hearts: You've got Cicero, you lucky people.
Hibernian: Easy, The Proclaimers.
Kilmarnock: Oooh not a clue. The closest I can get you is Biffy Clyro, since they are Ayrshire
Motherwell: The Delgados. Yay, an easy one. The Delgados even had Dougie Arnott on the cover of their The Weaker Argument Defeats The Stronger single.
Rangers: Sorry Rangers supporters, most of the folk I can think of that support the Gers are rubbish. Wet Wet Wet, Leon Jackson, some of Travis, David Sneddon, Lulu, Amy McDonald... You can have AC/DC.
St. Johnstone: Stuart Cosgrove used to write for the NME, that's as good as I can think of, sorry!
St. Mirren: Struggling again. Well, there's Paulo Nutini, who supports Celtic. Dougie Vipond? I'll just put a band from Paisley for this one I reckon, so St Mirren fans, you get Marvel Heights.
Well, that was a lot less successful than I'd hoped, yet I'm still posting it. Now lets see how many people yell at me (I suspect none, since that would involve people reading me...)
As I mentioned the other day, the Twisted Wheel in Glasgow has shut down, meaning any upcoming gigs in there are having to be rescheduled. As promised, here's another update.
I'll stop just posting stuff people have stuck on the internet for free and get back to something more intresting at some point I'm sure, but in the meantime if people keeping letting me know about free downloads, I'll keep spreading the word.
This time round it's Aidan Moffat & the Best-Ofs who treat us to a freebie. This is a live version of Lover's Song from the How To Get To Heaven From Scotland album, recorded earlier this year at Stereo in Glasgow. You can download it here.
In other Aidan news Lullaby For Unborn Child from the album has been overhauled and renamed Knock On The Wall Of Your Womb for an upcoming single release, the B-side of which will feature The Lavender Blue Dress, a children's story written by and narrated by Aidan.
If you are planning on going to see The Gothenburg Address, Airship and I See Shapes at the Twisted Wheel in Glasgow on Friday then update your plans a wee bit. The show has been moved to Capitol, as the Twisted Wheel has seemingly closed down.
There's a few other Twisted Wheel gigs coming up that need to find a new home, I'll try and keep you posted on those.
The Second Hand Marching Band are spoiling us these days. After putting their debut EP up on their website for free download last week, today they've put up the BBC session they did for Vic Galloway. You can grab it at their website over here. They covered One Armed Scissor by At The Drive-In, go get it!
Saturday marked my first time seeing the band incidentally. They were very good. Berrjacket was brilliant. That's as close as you'll get to a live review from me though, I'm even worse at reviewing gigs than I am at records.
The Second Hand Marching Band play the 13th Note in Glasgow on Saturday.
The Second Hand Marching Band are a band from Glasgow, Edinburgh, Stirling, Ayr, Kincardine, Cumbernauld, Neilston, Canada, Airdrie and elsewhere. They have about a million members.
Their first EP - A Dance To Half Death - was released as a limited edition of 150. It has now sold out, so they've made it available through their website, the terribly kind people.
Go here to download the EP and visit them at MySpace for more information.
The Second Hand Marching Band are one of the support acts for the Aye Tunes attending Berrjacket gig on Saturday at King Tut's. As usual if you are going along you'll win the cheapest beverage of your choice if you can find me and say hello. Or in other words, say hi and I'll buy you a pint.
-2.jpg)
