I've never really "got" GY!BE the way that some do. That's no reason not to dig our their one Peel Session though, so here it is. This track also made the Festive Fifty in 1999, at number 21.
Galleries have been beavering away of late, working on their debut album. Some new songs have been popping up on Soundcloud, so swing over there to have a wee listen. Oddly enough Galleries have also somehow managed to make their way into my dreams. I woke up on Monday morning having dreamt that the band had announced they were splitting up, and had to go and check they hadn't.
The band have also made one of those new songs, Young Wounds, available as a free download. That's good of them, isn't it?
You can grab the download from their website here, and preview it below.
Galleries also are on the hunt for a new guitar player. Hopefully unrelated to my splitting up dream Paul has left the band, and they are after a replacement. You can find out more about what they are looking for and how to put yourself forward here.
Well now, here's an album that will send those that like their music to fit into a category easily into conniptions. For the rest of us though, it is a wee belter.
Real Capital is the debut album by The Great I Am, AKA Graham Crossan, who called on a few of his friends, including members of Dirty Keys, Punch and The Apostles and Miaoux Miaoux to put it all together.
The presence of Julian Corrie (Miaoux Miaoux) is particularly noticeable, with him lending all sorts of electro bits and bobs to the odd numbered tracks. The even numbered tracks? Well, that's where things get really interesting. The beats and synths are left aside on these, on some occasions for a more full band treatment, on others for a stripped back guitar and vocals take.
Each style has it charms, and all are very well executed. Le Quark stands out as a highlight on the electro side, while Do Your Best, Pal is a good old fashioned rollicking, foot stomper, with fiddles adding a gorgeous folky feel. Vocally The Great I Am isn't the strongest, but enthusiasm, warmth and charisma comes across in spades, which is always more pleasing to my ears than being technically excellent.
Real Capital is all over the place musically, in the best way possible. The dramatic switch in styles from song to song works well and more importantly feels natural when it could have come across as gimmicky. Clocking in at around 20 minutes in length there's no risk of Real Capital outstaying its welcome either.
People who like their music to fit into a genre pigeonhole might be left scratching their head, but those of us who just like our music good, with a side helping of fun and a lack of pretensions, regardless of style are in for a bit of a treat.
Real Capital by The Great I Am is out now. Listen to and buy it on Bandcamp.
Bit short notice this, due to emails slipping between the cracks, sorry.
Glasgow band Gorman have been picked to represent Scotland at Japan Music Week, currently the only Scottish band to have been chosen to do so.
In order to pay their way the band have been doing a series of fund raising events, the latest taking place on Thursday October 27th.
Before Gorman head off to Japan they'll be playing an intimate gig in The Vale in Glasgow, where they will perform debut album Kairos in it's entirity, with the set featuring some material rarely, if ever performed live.
The gig kicks off at 7:30pm, entry is £6 and more details can be found over on Facebook.
Taking a wee break from the albums I've loved this year to talk about something else that's been a massive influence on both me and the blog. This time you can actually accuse me of writing nice stuff about my pals, but they deserve it.
In case you haven't heard of them, Glasgow PodcART are a team of Glasgow based music fanatics, who put together a weekly podcast laying music from both signed and unsigned artists and lots, lots more. So far, so simple. What makes the weekly podcasts must listens for me isn't just the music, but the people involved.
I was a bit of a late comer to the PodcART, only starting to listen at around episode 20 after seeing the name in Hinterland brochures. Within my first few weeks of listening I was introduced to the concept of Pooching the band, had Trapped in Kansas become forever known to me as Pumped in Venice, listened in on a conversation about porno boots for transvestites and heard something which - no matter how hard I try - I'll never be able to forget involving a glass Irn Bru bottle. Oh, and I heard an absolute ton of cracking music.
To say that listening to Glasgow PodcART has introduced me to new bands would be a massive understatement. Not every song or band is a winner with me, I'd be a bit worried if they were - but the good to bad ratio is heavily weighted in favour of the good. Without them I'd probably not have caught on to half the bands that have featured on Aye Tunes over the past six months, at least not nearly as quickly. I treat it as a good sign that I've upped my game when more of the bands featured now are ones I'm familiar with, but pretty much every week there's still something new to me, and for that I can't thank them PodcART team enough.
Aside from the music there's another thing I love about the PodcART, and that's the banter between whatever team members are taking part in any given week. I've had to stop listening when I'm on public transport, as there's almost always at least one moment every week where I'll uncontrollably laugh out loud. Often while thinking "that's just wrong" at the same time. Listening to the team in conversation their enthusiasm for music and what they are doing is obvious, and infectious.
Since I generally attend gigs on my own, none of my pals are really into the same things as me and I don't want to be responsible for them having a lousy night out seeing bands that only I want to see, the Podcart team have been handy there too, since they often provide someone for me to talk to when I'm out and about on my own. They really are a lovely bunch of people.
More recently they've been responsible for some of my favourite gigs of the year, from the New Artists Showcase gig in November to their monthly live session gigs in The 13th Note. I know I'm not the only one who counts last week's Christmas party as a highlight of my year either.
All in all, if you have ears I highly recommend listening to the PodcART. Thanks Ally, Halina, Louise, Nicola and Sean for excellent entertainment, long may it continue.
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.
Galleries have been beavering away of late, working on their debut album. Some new songs have been popping up on Soundcloud, so swing over there to have a wee listen. Oddly enough Galleries have also somehow managed to make their way into my dreams. I woke up on Monday morning having dreamt that the band had announced they were splitting up, and had to go and check they hadn't.
Well now, here's an album that will send those that like their music to fit into a category easily into conniptions. For the rest of us though, it is a wee belter.
