School Of Seven Bells - Disconnect from desire (7/10)
My fingers are freezing slightly while I'm typing this, but I'm sure you'll forgive for keeping this entry non-verbose.
School Of Seven Bells hardly needs any more introduction, having been featured on this blog twice before with some excellent singles. I got a hold of their latest effort by this New York based poppy shoegaze-style band, and I can say I like most of it. It is a slight hit or miss record, the lesser tracks don't really annoy, they just drag on and nothing really happens. The good tracks however make up for it, and they'll all seem to draw inspiration from a different source. The echo in "Bye bye bye" has a slight Souvlaki Space Station -vibe, the elektronic sample in "Cammarilla" is Kraftwerk-esque, the vocals in "Babelonia" remind me of Cocteau Twins, and "I L U" draws heavily on the inescapable My Bloody Valentine influence. I was however disappointed by their performance at De Nachten (they played as a threesome, as twin sister and backing vocalist Claudia left/got kicked out of the band a couple weeks before); they started out real good, then the vocalist completely lost her voice, struggled through the rest of the set - that was subsequently cut short - and left the stage without anymore acknowledgement of the crowd. Plus, letting a drummer play along with a programmed drum track is always a little silly/unnecessary. Shame, because the setting was perfectly suited for them to make an impression. But I have a suspicion we'll hear from these guys in the future. Wasn't really non-verbose, now was it? I'll have to try harder.
The New Pornographers - Together (6.5/10)
I was a fan of Canadian ultrapoppy supergroup (a supergroup in Canada, apart from Neko Case maybe, none of the members is known in Europe except for the most diligent music fans) for three albums, as with many fans, they lost me a little on their slow and kind of boring "Challengers"-album, but luckily, fifth album "Together" again packs some punch. The band's weak spot is still the lyrics; both of the songwriters (A.C. Newman and Dan Bejar) both never seem to write personal stuff, but lose themselves in absurd writings (what about "Valkyrie at the roller disco") that never seem to go anywhere, which really decreases the recognisability and the singalong factor. Luckily, on about half of the tracks, the song structures and arrangements are that good that the lyrics don't even matter; this is true for the first five tracks and "Up in the dark". The rest of the material doesn't really cut it. Do hope to see these guys live again someday, especially now that Neko Case seem to tour along more often.
Random radio stuff
Laserkraft 3D is the maker of one of this moment's smash hits. "Nein, mann" is simply irrestible, a good advocate for the german language, and I especially like it because it's hard to believe that only in 2010 someone came up with the idea of using this theme for a song. The clicking beats kind of remind me of the classic "Answering machine" track by Green Velvet.
Another dance song I really like right now is Martin Solveig's new track. Sounds a little different (more dance, less groove) than his previous work, but still, good stuff. Dragonette seems to be a hip singer, she's also featured on a couple of other tracks right now.
Can't say the new Lykki Li track has completely won me over yet. Something in the drum rhythm reminds me of The Bangles.
Saying White Lies are into bombast is an understatement. They were the only band on the Pukkelpop festival that appeared in black and white on the stage-side screens, and their new video features a hospitalized boy singing the lyrics. Their previous album just nearly missed my skip-pile and I strongly fear the new album is going to be a miss. In this track, the chorus just does nothing and the vocals are way too overproduced for my taste.
Apart from the "Chasing pavement" single which I found decent at most, I never enjoyed any of Adele's work. Sure, voice is good, so what, if the songs are not. And I'm definitely not into her advocating/championing smoking every chance she gets. On this new single, she tries to do something bluesy/county, disregarding the fact that KT Tunstall did the same thing a lot better a couple years back.
This is my jam right now. Apparently, this is the first Asian American number one track in the US ever. Apart from the jumpy beats, the chorus really is what makes this track. It's actually a sample from the "Booty Bounce" track by Dev, who also features in the video. I've checked out some snippets of some other tracks by this band, looks like they're trying to be the Asian Black Eyed Peas (Will.I.Am, a "Time of my life"-cover? really?) or something.
The new Robyn track is pretty alright too. The melody/tempo in the verse really reminds me of another song, but I can't quite put the finger on it (yet).
Finishing off with some tracks by some compatriots, Sherman is the singer-songwriter project of Steven Bossuyt. He now resides in London and seems to be doing well, seeing that he got invited to do a session at the BBC. His new single "On your side" is pretty good, I prefer the more dynamic radio version to this acoustic performance however. A really well structured track, although I hope not all his writing is so dependent on lyrical clichés.
The new Goose album gets miscellaneous reviews. Not really into the new "Can't stop me now" -single, however, the title track of their new album is pretty cool. You could validly state this is their "Housewife".
Random nineties video
And closing off with another nineties video, Scott Weiland is such a mess right now, you could overlook the fact that Stone Temple Pilots used to be pretty cool. This is one of their first singles ever, the lyrics are somewhat controversial, it seems.
Male Bonding is a band based in London, they're on the quality-driven Sub Pop label, which makes a lot of sense, because the grunge sound of some bands that were on the label in the nineties is definitely present here, although it's mixed here with some surf and African influences, which makes for an enjoyable mix. Short songs, varied album, this will not be a boring listen, I can promise you that.
"Weird Feelings" is a signature song, with a propelling bassline. The word that comes to mind when I want to try to describe this video, would be 'smegma'.
"Year's not long" is the opening track of the album. I found a pretty cool video of kids skating around in LA/Hollywood on old school skateboards, that seems to fit the music well. This is the demo version of the song however, the album version does have a better sound and production.
Abe Vigoda - Crush (7/10)
I checked out Abe Vigoda because Best Coast namedropped them. Their African guitar riffs remind me a little of Vampire Weekend, although Abe Vigoda focuses more on danceable rhythms. I witnessed myself that it's pretty hard to stand still during their live shows. Singer's voice gets some Robert Smith comparisons.
"Sequins" is the opening track of their latest album, it has a nice synth break in the chorus.
"Hyacinth girls" is actually an older track of their album "Skeleton", which was more guitar and less synthesizer-oriented.
Wavves - King of the beach (8/10)
Wavves is Nathan Williams' band, and the album sounds as shizophrenic as the man himself, from what I've heard. Rock, grunge, surf, girl groups, everything gets thrown into the blender, but every track seems to work in it's own respect.
"Post acid" is one of the rock tracks on the album, slightly elated. The video features an alien mask and some skateboarding.
"When will you come" and "Baseball cards" are 2 examples of the melodic, less rock-oriented tracks (like 'em both so much, couldn't pick just one).
Delphic - Acolyte (6.5/10)
Delphic are an UK band from the Manchester area, that get some New Order comparisons because they too fabricate danceable synthpop that is more suited to listen to than to actually dance to. A lot of the tracks are a bit long and mid-tempo, so the album gets a little monotone, but there are no real misses. "Counterpoint" with the nice synth loop is probably my favourite album track.
Bombay Bicycle Club - I had the blues but I shook them loose (8/10)
I featured a Bombay Bicycle Track on a previous blog post a couple months back. Their last album "Flaws" focuses on their acoustic side, while this 2009 album is an electronic indierock album. And a very good one, I might add. The singer - as stated before - looks a little like Chris Martin, but with an outrageously silly haircut, be sure to check out the videos. And this might be just me, but something in his voice and phrasing reminds me of Conor Oberst at times. On this album, this London outfit strikes a good balance between harder and softer tracks, you will hardly find a weaker track on this disc, I picked the three singles that have an official video, but I could've just as easily picked "Lamplight" or "Dust on the ground". Recommended.
Of the three tracks, "Always like this" is the atypical one, with it's groovy bassline, "Magnet" has a slight Snow Patrol-feel with those background vocals in the chorus, and "Evening Morning" has a nice buildup in the intro.
Random stuff
Mucky Pup
Random nineties band of the week/month, I had owned a tape of their "Act of faith" album, but (just like Helmet), I never had a friend or someone I knew that was on the same page with me as far as this New Jersey band went. They put out a couple of albums, had tons of line-up changes, and they had some ties to the hardcore scene (back in the day, I always felt like they sounded like a softer and, well, more fun version of the hardcore bands I knew back then), and some members of this band actually went on to play in Dog Eat Dog.
Lyrically, their first and last albums apparently dealt with some serious issues ("Short Attention Span" made the Headbanger's ball playlist), but the "Act of faith"-album I had on tape, is musically and lyrically not too far away from what The Bloodhound Gang was doing in their early days. I mean, the first track is called "Freakin' at the peepshow", the second one is "Mr. Hand" (featured below, the sound quality is pretty horrible, but if there ever was an anthem written for all the lonely, frustrated dudes out there, this was probably it), I forgot what the third track "Understand" was about, but the fourth track was called "Please don't burn the Johnson", with the lyrics "My johnson's on fire/I smell smoke/understand that this is no joke", I'm guessing you kind of got the point I'm trying to make here by now.
School Of Seven Bells
I got a hold of the last album by this shoegaze outfit (some tracks were already featured a couple of blog posts back); needs a couple more spins before I can write a review of it, but cannot resist sharing this track with you, the fourth song on their "Disconnect from desire" album. Not original in any respect, but a pretty perfect mix of Amusement Parks On Fire, M83 and My Bloody Valentine if you ask me. If you're planning on making a mixtape for a significant other anytime soon, you have to check this pronto. I also featured a live version, because uh..well, the singer's really hot.
When I started with the whole review thing, my goal was to only review things I liked, and just ignore the bad stuff. I broke my own rule when I felt I had to warn everyone about the insanely bad Weezer record, so I'm giving birth to the Skip Pile, which is a pile of albums I'd advise you to skip and/or give a wide berth.
Adding to this pile today:
Porcupine Tree - Lightbulb sun
One thing about listening to music while playing World of Warcraft is that it usually takes you half an hour to realize you've been listening to the same album for three times in a row already. So basically, you will notice when a really good song comes along, mediocre songs just pass by unnoticed. In other words, it has got to be a really sucky album when you actually pick up on how bad it is sucking, and you decide to alt-tab out of the game just to switch cd's. This is one of those albums. I think these guys played the Werchter festival last summer, and it was on that basis that I decided to check it out, but this was horribly bad and boring.
Laura Marling - I speak because I can
Part of the London-based folk-scene and the partner of the singer in Mumford and Sons, Laura Marling is an acoustic singer-songwriter. I myself, have to admit I'm not the biggest fan of the genre (I only have a limited tolerance towards the Duyster program, after which I will stop listening and blast some Slayer or Metallica instead), and I'll admit "Rambling man" (the third UK single from the album) is actually quite good (it incidentally is musically very similar to Mumford and uses the same songwriting techniques), but all the rest is highly skippable.
Reviews
Best Coast - Crazy for you (8/10)
Best Coast is a fairly recent band from California. They recruited the drummer from Vivian Girls, there's a long-haired spastic Asian dude on guitar and then there's Bethany Cosentino. Lover of cats (she has her ginger cat's name Snacks tattooed on her arm), weed, Snookie (from Jersey Shore fame), hater of Katy Perry. This is their debut album, although they've released a lot of singles and EP's in their short existence. I'm a big fan, they remind of The Raveonettes in their 'Chain gang of love'-period, when they also sounded light, sunny, not too fuzzy and had short tracks. At 12 tracks, this album clocks in under half an hour, which is a good thing, because the songs always are done way before they would start to bore. Not the best lyrical record you'll ever hear, but the emotions come across and you can feel the honesty ("You say that we're just friends/but I want this 'till the end"). There's some influences from sixties girl groups, and expect a lot of woo-hoo background vocals. The more up-tempo tracks are like always my personal favourite (see below), but the slower tracks usually have some kind of twist that keeps them interesting. Recommended background music for daydreaming about love or the summer.
Pavement - Quarantine the past (8.5/10)
A year and a half ago, I listened to the Wowee Zowee album by the same band. It was the first full album I ever checked out by this cultband (categorised as lo-fi alternative indie rock) from the nineties. I liked it but at the same time couldn't really get into it, because the album is abrasive at times, there's a lot of different styles, and Pavement were never the band to make it easy on their listeners. This best-of compilation came out to celebrate their reunion shows last year, and it's a lot more coherent that the respective albums the tracks come from. People will always complain that some particular songs are lacking, but this is a good overview, ranging from forgotten singles ("Gold soundz") to excellent album tracks (the slightly post-rockish "Grounded"), with a lot of variation. Makes me wonder if contemporary teenagers would still dig this, or if it's really a "you had to be there in the nineties"-kind of thing. It is only now that I got the lyrical brilliance of the "You're my fact-checking cous"-line in "Stereo" too.
Hairglow - S/T (8/10)
Hooverphonic was one of the most succesful Belgian bands in the late nineties and noughties, if you look from an international perspective. After the departure of their singer Geike (as far as I know, they're still looking for a new one), main man Alex Callier emerged with this poppy, eighties synthpop project, with Alex himself on vocals. I'm risking all my credibility as a music reviewer by rating this with an 8, because this album was gruesomely ignored by the whole media and overlooked by the audience. I picked it up for 2 euros expecting little more than a couple of good laughs, but it has promoted itself to endless repeat-status. Part of the appeal is the confusion whether this album is a tribute to or a pastiche of the genre. The production is excellent and really evokes the eighties sound, whereas the lyrics are as silly as their eighties counterparts. A couple of examples "Your solitude doesn't like intruders/Asking for your name", "They're something inside me/it wants to get out/it wants to love you" and "You are not a robot dear/You are made of premium flesh and blood". Top tracks are "Is it love?", "I do love you" (both of which are unfortunately not on youtube), and "A12", which features a singer that - oddly enough - sounds exactly like Geike.
Helmet - Monochrome (6.5/10)
Helmet is an alternative metal/rock band from the nineties with a distinctive sound, mixing groovy guitars with a lot of their typical start-stop riffs. Unlike others, I still liked their "Aftertaste" album, but like most fans, I prefer the earlier "Meantime" and "Betty" albums. They split up for a while after "Aftertaste", had their fair share of line-up changes, and returned somewhere in the mid-2000's with the "Size Matters", which I haven't heard. "Monochrome" is the successor to that album. Page Hamilton succeeds in reviving the old Helmet sound in a couple of tracks (well, the riff "Brand New" is a straight copy from the one in "Turned out" on the "Meantime"-album), so if you're a Helmet fan and you have the chance to pick this up for 2 euro's like I did, do not hesitate. Great intro line too, "Hanging out with all these dicks/still collecting tokens", Hamilton sneers on "Swallowing everything".
Dubstep
This genre has existed since the beginning of the millennium, but it has swiftly outgrown the underground since the beginning of the year (and probably before) and is even hitting the charts now. For a genre derived from grime and drum and bass, it first struck me as kind of slow, but then I realized that it's the jumpiness of the melody that creates the danceability. Let's see of this genre is a keeper, or if it will gracelessly will fade from popularity as fast as the late tectonic genre. The 2 biggest hits in this scene right now are:
Random tracks
While we're still on the subject of danceable stuff, I've been liking this radio track with the jungle-like sounds for the past couple of weeks.
Manic Street Preachers have got a new album out, and first single is - slightly dramatically - titled "It's not war, just the end of love". I'll let you decide if the guitar in the verse sounds more like "A design for life" or "Tonight, tonight".
The Wombats were one of the more fun bands from the last couple of years, they too are back with a new album, the new single however lacks a little energy, even though it has lines like "Astrophysics, you'll never be my closest friend" and "I wear a suitcase under each of my eyes".
Since the second album by MGMT was deemed terribly boring by pretty much everyone, the niche for psychedelic retro music in the rock spectrum was now again vacant. The new darlings of the music press is Australian band Tame Impala, and I'll admit this track sounds like it should and is catchy.
Title Fight
When 2 of our friends are wearing merch from the same band on the same day, you know you finally have to check out that other band you've been sleeping on. Title Fight is a poppunk/melodic hardcore band from Kingston, Pennsylvania, and combine the vocal intensity of the early The Get Up Kids with the fast poppunk of early Saves The Day and the whole early 2000's Drive-Thru records scene, or at least that's what I'm hearing. I checked out 2 tracks (both from the "Last thing you forget"-album) that were both excellent, checking out their albums is now a lot higher on my priority list.
Finally checked out some bands that some of my friends like but never bothered to check out personally.
Lemuria - Pants
Lemuria is a three-piece from Buffalo, NY with a female vocalist that's hard to pigeonhole. Basically came across this track on somebody's mixtape I downloaded. Rhythmically and lyrically interesting track. You'll have to do with this live version or the acoustic version below though.
Jawbreaker - Want
Jawbreaker is a cult band in the punk (rock) scene. "Want" is a song from their debut album and features a pretty nifty intro bassline, a catchy chorus and pretty indecipherable lyrics. Check below!
Jawbreaker - Bad scene, everyone's fault
Apparently, following (more punk rock-oriented) track from the final and more polished "Dear You"-album made the soundtrack of some sports videogame, endangering the cult-status of the band.
Jawbreaker - Do you still hate me?
Track from the "24 hour revenge therapy"-album, often considered as their finest piece of work. You can never lose with a title like that. "Are you happy? Do you hear me? Can I call you? Do you still hate me?". Such a good tempo change towards the middle part of the song, and supercool guitar solo to close things off.
SLEPT-ON BANDS: ACOUSTIC COVERS
While searching for the youtube links for the above tracks, I stumbled upon the acoustic version by this female performer. She does such a good job turning the "Want"-track into a Dashboard Confessional-esque version. The rendition of "Pants" is pretty good too, and the other 2 tracks aren't perfect but a good song choice nevertheless. She has versions up of a lot of other Jawbreaker and Lemuria tracks, and then some Descendents and other punkrock bands too. As an extra plus, the lyrics are usually much easier to make out in her versions too.
Jawbreaker - Want (acoustic cover)
Lemuria - Pants (acoustic cover)
Saves The Day - The Choke (acoustic cover)
New Found Glory - The story so far (acoustic cover)
POPULAR STUFF
Moving on the more mainstream stuff.
Yeasayer - Madder red
Yeasayer played the Werchter and the Pukkelpop festivals, and are playing another club show in the fall, so it's un understatement to say these New Yorkers are extensively touring Europe. This song is really catchy, and the video featuring Kristin Bell from Heroes/Veronica Mars-fame is actually quite touching.
Crookers ft. Yelle - Cooler Couleur
Hip Italo producer-duo featuring the queen of the now defunct Tectonic genre in a supercatchy track.
The Ting Tings - Hands
Brand new track from The Tings Tings, continuing their "Keep it simple, stupid"-strategy for making pop music, and it again proves to be highly effective. Watch some leg and see-through action from Katie in this video fast before it disappears from youtube again (although this link is from their official VEVO page, but you never know). Haven't researched which part of England Katie's from, but I love how she pronounces 'working' as 'wo-i-king'.
Hurts - Wonderful life
Their stylish videos prove that someone at their record company really believes in this London duo, bringing back the emotional synthpop from the eighties. They played a decent set at Pukkelpop, and seem to be gaining some popularity. This slow track succeeds in never really getting boring or overly corny.
RANDOM
Summer Camp - Ghost train
We already had Dum Dum Girls and Best Coast in the previous posts, but retro-influenced bands just keep coming. The retro videos are cool, but the production (especially on the "Round the moon"-track) is pretty extreme, you love it or you hate it, although I'm still a little undecided regarding this band.
Summercamp - Drawer
Summer camp reminds me of this forgotten band from the nineties that got played on Headbanger's Ball a couple of times back in the day, proving again that bands like Helmet, Hum and others fell victim to media that just didn't know how to place the whole landscape in between rock and heavy music in the nineties. Pretty cool track, too bad the original video isn't on youtube.
Spitalfield - I loved the way she said LA
This is still one of my favourite tracks from those glorious punkrock/emo days, I always figured they came up with the title themselves, big surprise when I got to page 79 of my sister's English copy of "On the Road" by Jack Kerouac; the title of this track is featured somewhere on page 79.
Warpaint is a moderate new hype, another one the west coast. They play long, meandering, slightly fuzzy tracks, not unlike Sonic Youth at time, and have a lot of females in their ranks, which you will see in the next videos. They play the AB 30th of October, I might be there if it doesn't sell out.
Warpaint - Elephants
Warpaint - Beetle
RETRO
The Raveonettes - I wanna be adored (The Stone Roses cover)
With all the new bands that have the girl band influences, people forget that The Raveonettes are the originators and have been doing this style for almost ten years now. Impossible to top the original version, they do a good job at this britpop classic by The Stone Roses, sticking very close to the original, using female vocals and some synths.
The Coral - Thousand years
Everybody forgot about The Coral after "Dreaming of you", but they're still making albums. The new single sounds so retro, you probably wouldn't distinguish this from tracks that are actually from the sixties.
The Like - Wishing he was dead
Here we are again, another modern girl group. Will this one do better than The Pipettes? They get slightly more credibility for at least playing some instruments themselves.
The Beach Boys - Help me, Rhonda
Never heard this track until a couple of weeks back. Good stuff.
Closing off with the truest cartoon that was ever drawn.
Just got back from the festival. Weather was optimal (well, (a little too hot for my liking, but 100% dry so I won't complain here). Didn't feel taking notes and taking pictures all the time, but here it is.
Day 1
Thrice got the opening spot at the main stage on the first day, I never cared for them, hadn't heard from them in a couple of years, and I highly doubt even their hardcore/punkrock fanbase cares much about them anymore. The only thing I'll remember is that they played a 'Helter Skelter' cover and the singer looks like Ronnie from Jersey Shore with a beard.
De Jeugd Van Tegenwoordig couldn't really convince. They messed around with vocoders too much and their set got boring pretty fast. They played their (repetitive) new 'Get Spanish' track and teached the audience a new dance move called 'Hengel at a bitch'. I'm too old for this.
Seasick Steve now hits the stage with a drummer, which gives his set some extra dynamic. He invited a girl on stage to sing a ballad to, his set was good but couldn't really grasp the attention all the way. And even with all his special custom made guitars with only a couple of strings, most of them sounded pretty much the same.
Darwin Deez played at the club stage. He had a couple of fresh pop songs under his belt and his peculiar look, but his set was most memorable when he and his musician friends ditched their instruments and did silly group dance choreographies to popular tracks like 'Automatic' by Pointer Sisters, 'Single Ladies' by Beyonce and 'Walk like an Egyptian' by The Bangles. Good performer, but not enough really good songs.
Also witnessed a small portion of the set by Teddy Drums on the Batakamp stage. Funny elektro stuff with Dijf Sanders on elektronic drums and some dude on a guitar that sounds like video game bleeps. Think Crystal Castles if they had a sense of humour. Pretty cool stuff.
In my profession as dutiful festival visitor, I checked out some bands I didn't know from the schedule on beforehand, and one of the bands I really liked right from the batch was this heavy postrock outfit from Northern Ireland called So I Watch You From Afar. They played a heavy set at the Chateau, and did not disappoint.
Time for Blink 182. Becasue they don't visit the beautiful country of Belgium very often, this is the first time I saw them live. Travis was the MVP with 2 drumsolos, Mark did ok, and Tom still looks like he does not wholeheartedly want this reunion, and constantly looked like he was mocking his old self on stage. Setlist was just a greatist hits set with some extra songs from their last album. Perfectly suited for the festival crowd, but I'd hoped for some more fast tracks. Anyway, here's the setlist: Dumpweed/Feeling this/The rock show/What's my age again?/I miss you/Violence/Stay together for the kids/Down/Always/First date/Man overboard/All the small things/Josie//Dammit
The singer from Minus The Bear is sporting the "Eddie Vedder 2010"-look. They had a couple of ok songs, but overall, like most of the crowd, I had an indifferent feeling towards this set.
Two hours of Iron Maiden is long if you're not a fan, but you have to admire their on-stage energy and musicianship. Ugliest shirts in existence. I also spotted a shirt in the same font that spelled "Ironic Maiden". Having your street team walk around in white overalls with white balloons to promote your new album = not so metal. Summing up all the countries where your new album is number one at the moment on stage = not so metal. But then again, I would never refer to them as metal. They didn't play 'The trooper' and 'Run to the hills' (or personal favourite 'Be quick or be dead'), but did play 'The number of the beast' and 'Fear of the dark'.
Goldfrapp was wearing her glitter vampire outfit and played a solid synthpop set that totally ignored her folk-influenced, more ambient 'Seventh tree'-album. Truthfully, she did really need her background singer to back her up, but 'Number one', 'Strict machine' and recent single 'Rocket' are solid gold hits in my book, and I think she deserves some more credit for doing the synthpop thing years before La Roux and her contemporaries came along.
Placebo opened their set very surprisingly with 'Nancy boy', followed by 'Ashtray heart'. Their set last year or the year before was slightly better, however. To play the intro to 'Black Eyed' only to morph it into 'Every you, every me' is just cruel. And not playing 'Special K' should be illegal. Brian Molko was wearing a bonnet instead of a wig, and some Elvis-esque glasses. They still have their mystery bass player that never appears on one of the screens on the side of the stage. They did a totally unnecessary 'All apologies'-cover.
Time for some avant garde rock! These New Puritans played the Chateau stage and did ok, even though some heavy bass parts were ear-numbingly loud, which does not fit well into their classical music-influenced musical style. Most of the instruments were on tape, and the singing wasn't always good. The epilepsy-inducing lightshow was slightly too much for me too. I highly doubt this music will ever reach big audiences.
Day 2
Started off the second day with the Henry Rollins spoken word performance. He started with a funny story on opening for Iron Maiden, and his struggle with the local authorities, but then he went on his travels and Nelson Mandela and started getting all humanitarian and Rick Ta Life-esque, and it got a little boring.
Checked out a small portion of the Harlem-set in the Chateau, but it was all energy and no melody, and I had to leave, so I also saw the last half of the Kate Nash, who apparently is as self-destructive about her personal life as she is about her career, seeing as she succeeded in breaking her wrist. Luckily, 'Foundations' can be played with one hand for the most part. The in-your-face songs of her second album didn't really go down well with the audience.
Matt & Kim are two New Yorkers that have so much fun on stage it's hard not to like them. He plays the keyboard and she plays the drums, they both really embraced to crowd to participate, and they played a fun, danceable set with some 'Better off alone' and some 'Final countdown'. Check out their nice (but not 100% representative) single below.
Pulled Apart By Horses is a heavy band from Leeds, I left halfway during their set because their singer's voice gets really repetitive after a while. Saying "There's some good bands playing today...Who's gonna see Limp Bizkit?" and then just laugh at all the people that respond is pretty cool though.
The Cribs (even with Johnny Marr) was mediocre as always.
I saw 2 songs of the Blood Red Shoes set, long enough to notice that the female singer had adopted the archetypical nineties grunge look with long hair and a (male) checkered lumberjack shirt. You go, Laura-Mary! Even without seeing the set, I'm going to guess they played an energetic set that went down well with the audience, seeing as they already did that last year AND the year before.
I went down all the way to the distant regions of the Dance Hall stage to check out whether We Have Band have more than 2 memorable songs in their arsenal. Answer: not really. 'Oh' (bassline sounds a lot like 'Papa's got a brand new pigbag') was pretty cool live, I'll give 'em that. The video for 'Divisive' is worth checking out too.
Really wanted to see White Lies, but the bass was up way too loud and this ruined the show for me completely. They appeared in black and white on the main stage screens. Played a couple of new tracks, which hint at a slightly new direction they might be moving towards.
Avi Buffalo played a nice, dreamy, summery set at the Club stage. Voice was a-ok and the singer was chill enough to respond with "It's so hot, I was gonna take a shower anyway, works for me" when a drink or something was thrown at him. They didn't have the organ with them that you hear in the 'What's in it for?'-single. Overall, their sound reminds me of the long-forgotten The Thrills in their early ('Big Sur') days.
eels rocked a pretty impressive biker-look on stage with a full beard, I'm going to guess he mainly played songs from his new album, because apart from 'Spectacular girl', there were no songs I had heard before. I guess he's just too stubborn to play a crowd-pleasing set, although he did play some singles ('The look you give that guy', 'Souljacker pt 1', 'I like birds') near the end of his set. Also played an unnecessary 'Summer in the city'-cover.
Foals played their set at the Marquee and I think they succeeded in winning a part of the crowd over for their music, although I personally prefer the rhythmic jumpy math-rock of their first album (they'll probably never beat 'Cassius').
Went to check out Hurts in the Chateau, the band that's trying to bring the undanceable emotional synthpop from the eighties back. The singer had the support of a academic-looking background singer, the set was short and never really got boring, but I'm highly sceptic whether they'll make it to big crowds with this song material. During the quiet parts of their gig, I heard some snippets of the greatest hits-set Limp Bizkit was rocking on the Main Stage, with 'Rollin' and 'My generation' early on in the set, and 'Behind blue eyes' and 'Break stuff' near the end. Sounded ok, but I wasn't in a nostalgic mood so I have no regrets about missing this.
Mumford and Sons played the equivalent of a home match in soccer at the Marquee stage right after. Big parts of the crowd singing along to every word right from the start of the set. A lot of people I know don't like them, and it's almost cool not to like them, but I think they're a good live band and they have a good frontman that has no rockstar attitude at all and performs with vigour. Could've watched the whole set, but I opted to check out the last part of the Marina and the Diamonds set at the Club stage. Looking eccentric as always (sporting bright pink lipstick and nail polish), I caught some ballads she played at the piano, followed by the hit 'Hollywood' and another up-tempo track. I can't quite put the finger on why I didn't dig her stage presence and attitude, but she annoyed me, and the song material isn't that spectacular too. Maybe some critics are right and she actually IS a poor man's Florence Welsh.
The Prodigy kicked off their set 20 minutes late. 'Breathe' as second or third song in the set. Then I left to check out Radical Slave, a new project with Mauro and Buscemi. Sounds pretty interesting, no? The set sounded like a long jam session by Belgian guitar hero Mauro, accompanied by a drummer and Buscemi for some extra touches. Weird or no song structures and distorted vocals. Some reference points: a less commercial The Black Box Revelation meets The Kills meets Primus? This one song, Mauro repeated the next line like a mantra: 'Everything I do is going to be funky'. When he says it, that's a self fulfilling prophecy, if you ask me. I was back at the Main Stage to see The Prodigy close their set off with 'Smack my bitch up'. I didn't have to be there to know this was probably the best dance-band (when you measure the crowd response) on the main stage during the whole weekend.
Next up, Beach House at the club. I like the 'Teen Dream'-album, but the live set was even better, with very nice, dreamy, almost hypnotic versions of the songs on that album, magnificently sung by confident frontwoman Victoria Legrand, I will never mock her vocals as 'she sounds like a man' again. I think this may have been my favourite set of the festival, although it was probably monotone if you're not into this genre.
The XX drew a huge crowd in and outside the Marquee, and they started off really well with the 'Intro' and 'Crystallized' in quick succession. Unlike 80% of the other bands, here the sound was crystal clear; the hushed vocals were perfectly distinguisable over the instruments, so thank god for that. The setlist could've been more balanced, they scored a hattrick with the 'VCR'/'Islands'/'Night time' combo, then their set caved in just a little. But overall, amazing concert by an exceptional band, although I wonder what they'll ever come up with to top their debut album.
I was hopeful at the start of the NOFX concert, first 3 tracks were 'Dinosaurs will die'/'Leave it alone'/'Bob', but then the set totally collapsed and even the jokes ("that's blink 182 humour") weren't funny this time around. Even punk-rock classic 'Linoleum' at the end of the set couldn't save the day anymore. Check out these videos from the 1998 pinkpop festival. I watched this same video on VCR at least a hundred times. Love those silly dance moves.
Headliner at the Main Stage on the second day was the Italian super-dj-duo Bloody Beetroots, I caught the last 20 minutes of their set. Not a lot of people stayed for them, but those that did had ample space to dance on, which was a luxury on this sold out 25th edition. The short Refused part in their set was a pleasant surprise, and when they spinned their already classic dance anthem 'Warp 1.9', crowd mayhem ensued, even though pretty much any dj in the boiler room had probably already played that track earlier in the day.
Day 3
First 2 acts on the main stage on day three failed to draw a big crowd.
OK go! proved that they really only have one memorable song, and in fact they were lucky some dudes in the audience in the crowd were doing the choreography from their video (not 'Here it goes again') so they could ask them on stage and replay the song, because that's the only thing I'll remember from their set. And nobody really cares about Ash anymore, even though they now have the guitar player from Bloc Party in their ranks and played a couple of old radio hits like 'Kung fu', 'Girl from Mars' and 'Burn baby burn'.
Missed Selah Sue to get some water bottles (that were allowed on-site on the third day) from the camping. But sounded ok from far away.
I'm a big fan of the 'Astro Coast'-album by Surfer Blood, live they sounded a little too hard and heavy, but still a good band and ideally suited music to accompany/endure the steamingly hot third day. Played the whole album except for instrumental track 'Neighbour Riffs'. They did have the coolest shirts on the festival, I now own this one in blue.
Third day was so busy, the indoor stages Chateau and Wablief started getting crowded, mostly with people looking for shelter from the burning sun. Which is why I couldn't go and check out Caribou. So I went to check the beginning of the Rise and Fall set, the sound at The Shelter stage was ok (for once), and tracks 'Soul Slayer'/'Failure is as failure does'/'Into Oblivion' populated the beginning of their set. Then I went on to check out their Ghent-based buddies Drums Are For Parades (forgive them for their slightly silly bandname, they're only the best current (+ in years to come) Belgian stonerrock band right now)at the Wablief stage. They played a 'take no prisoners' all-out heavy set that quickly scared away all the people that were hoping to catch a nap on the benches inside. Full album is coming out soon, I hope these guys are going places.
Last year's edition had Bon Iver, this year's had The Low Anthem. Excellent band, but music so quiet it's hard to get a good listen, because there's always noise from another tent, or people next to you that wouldn't be able to shut the f*** up if their life depended on it. The parts I did hear however, I liked a lot, didn't expect so much variation (band members switch instruments virtually after every song), maybe more bluesy/country/americana at times than I had expected.
The Drums played a decent set, sadly the sound wasn't always optimal. Didn't play 'Saddest summer' or 'Skippin town'. The singer called all the people that left after they played 'Let's go surfing' "non-believers".
The National proved to be worthy of their Main Stage slot, and played an entertaining one-hour set that couldn't have started better with the 'Anyone's ghost'/'Mistaken for strangers'/'Blood buzz ohio' threesome. Pretty sure they made a couple of new fans.
Wanted to check out Au Revoir Simone at the Club stage (who can resist 3 women singing and playing keyboards way up front on stage), but ended up only hearing their synthesizer cover of 'Boys of summer'. Maybe some other time.
Queens Of The Stone Age did not disappoint and played a set with the necessary hits, but also with room for some album and older tracks. Don't think they really played a lot from their last, less-stoner rock 'Era Vulgaris'-album. They started off vigorously with 'Feelgood hit of the summer', and continued with (among others) 'Lost art of keeping a secret'/'Sick sick sick'/'Monsters in the parasol'/'Little sister'/'Burn the witch' and finally closed off with blistering track 'Song for the dead'. I was secretly hoping for 'Regular John', but no dice. Come to think of it, they didn't play 'Make it with you' either.
Josh Homme also had some quotable one-liners like "Am I on LSD or are there lights in the trees?" and this nice reflection on festival crowds: "We didn't came to hurt each other, we came to fuck each other. And I don't want to get in the way of that. Maybe I'll try to get in the middle of that, but I sure don't want to get in the way of that." Dude rules.
2manydj's had the honour to close off the festival (bar the boiler room). They didn't really deliver, couldn't fully distinguish themselves from the million other dj's playing the festival. They could've at least played their The Human League/Slayer mashup. Enjoyable parts were the Roxy Music-medley and the money-medley. Most other parts were recent or past hits coupled with heavy beats, got boring and predictable pretty fast. Plus, they were mixing and twitching the songs a little too much, the tracks couldn't breathe and it was kind of hard to dance to. The whole album cover visual aspect of their set was just a distraction, rather than an addition. Crowd did go wild at certain points ('Zombie nation') and at the end of their set ('Blue Monday'/'Out of space'/'Love will tear us apart').
Special thanks go out to Dries&Lindsey for getting me there, and Peter&Veerle for getting me home. And keeping me company. Extra-special thanks for the dudes with the recognisable party tent that made it easy to find my tent at nighttime.
Let's start off with some 'urban music' (silly term), a genre that is often going to be overlooked on this blog.
Big Boi - Shutterbug
The new single by the one half of Outkast definitely has an eighties feel. Some part really reminds me of an existing track, but for once, I can't put my finger on it. Big Boi struggled with a writer's block a couple years back, but he's back with a full album now and it's getting rave reviews everywhere.
Janelle Monae - Tightrope
One of the contemporary hypes in the genre, this 25-year old artist tries to cover up her underaverage body length by going for the cartoon-ish look and some silly dance moves. I'm not completely blown away by this track, however, I did see a live performance on of the big late night shows, and she does put on a good show.
N.E.R.D. - Hot and fun
I never really connected with N.E.R.D., and this new single isn't changing my mind. The bassline here is just a rehash from "She wants to move". Weak.
I also checked out the pitchfork site again after months of absence, and found these 2 gems right here.
The Pipettes - Our Love Was Saved By Spacemen
The Pipettes is a girl group formed in Brighton in 2003. They had a hit with "Pull shapes" and emulated the girl group sound from the sixties. They could've been the right band at the right place, they released their album in the same year as the "Back to Black"-album, the catalyst for the whole retro-revival that is still going strong as we speak/type. Unfortunately, they never had the song material to back it up, and it seemed like more thought went into the little on-stage dance moves than the songs.
After the tour in 2008, the two remaining original members left the band. The group now comprises of Gwenno Saunders and her little sister Ani. A new album "Earth vs. The Pipettes" was just released. You probably should forget about it as soon as possible, HOWEVER this little song (Blondie meets Kylie meets Vampire Weekend on a hawaian trip?) here is quite amazing. You might have to sit through it a couple of times for the brilliance to take effect. The whole space theme is a cheap gimmick, I know. But you have to love the corny lyrics, the camp-y video and the supercatchy chorus. Guilty pleasure of the week.
Carissa's Wierd - Die
I guess in the late nineties, Carissa's Wierd had their share of fans, although I don't think a lot of people heard about them in Europe at the time. Now, they're mostly referenced as the previous band the singer from Band of Horses was in. Note that, however, he was not the main vocalist in this band. I like this track a lot, I'm not really sure whether it is really representative for their back catalogue, but this track can be filed under emo.
Putting some songs in the mix I'm hearing frequently on the radiowaves right about now.
Ginger Ninja - Sunshine
A couple of years after Alphabeat, another Danish band (silly band name though, guys) comes around and penetrates the European radiowaves. Catchy and hard-to-resist track with a cool video, musically, it could've been a track by Phoenix.
I Blame Coco - Self machine
Sting's son had a moderate radiohit a couple years back with Fiction Plane, and now Sting's daughter Coco Sumner mounts the stage for her 15 minutes of fame, sounding distinctly more synthpop than her older brother. And yes, that's actually her singing.
MNDR - I go away
Not a song that you'll actually hear on the radio, but I'm a biiig fan of the "Bang Bang Bang"-track by Mark Ronson, so I decided to check out MNDR, whose singer is featured on the Ronson track. They're a pretty unknown elektro duo that has yet to release an album, but they're getting a lot of buzz due to the Ronson collaboration. I recommend this track (intro almost sounds like Joy Division), hard to describe, sound a bit like Robyn in slow motion or something.
Because we just can't get enough of those fuzzy tracks that emote the whole summer feeling, 2 more albums in the genre just got released, so here we go.
Best Coast - Goodbye
The album by Best Coast is getting good reviews. They like to promote the image of being slackers that hang around in their couch getting high. Their sound isn't too far from The Raveonettes spectrum, less noisy, more heavy. Great, supersimple lyrics too: "I can't get myself off the couch", "I lost my job, I miss my mom, I wish my cat could talk" and "And nothing makes me happy, not even tv or a bunch of weed".
Wavves - Super soaker
Sounding distinctly more up-tempo than Best Coast, this track will hopefully (if necessary) cheer you up.
And another track by a pretty new band to close this post off.
Dinosaur Pile-Up - Birds and planes
I know it's almost a sacrilege to even the type the words "the song Nirvana forgot to write", but these guys are nailing the sound.
This band mixes indie with African influences. They sing in Hebrew a lot, but just like Matisyahu, it never outgrows the 'gimmick'-stage. I'm not even gonna rate this, the only song that could capture my attention is the opening track, which does have an infectious guitar riff. As for the rest, don't even bother and give "Cape kod kwassa kwassa" another spin.
Holly Miranda - The magician's private library (7/10)
Produced by Dave Sitek and with guest appearances from TV on the Radio, you're bound to hear some echoes of the previous work by these artists on this album (especially the Scarlett Johanssen album produced by Sitek). Some tracks remind me of Mercury Rev, and maybe some Portishead. Zero 7 without the dance aspect might also be a reference point. This is a pretty varied album, most of it consisting of 4-5 minute long, meandering, dreamy material, "Waves" being my personal favourite amongst them. Some songs sound a little more poppy, due to the instrumentation, "Forest green oh forest green" and "Everytime I go to sleep" nudge towards playful songs for children, "Sweet dreams" is a little more upbeat and has a catchy trumpet riff. Only track that fails to work, is "No one just is", where the triphoppy rhythm feels a little forced. Personal favourite "Canvas" has a definite "The XX" feel to it. I also appreciate the lyrical side of this record, which seems to focus heavily on relationships. I'd state this album definitely could work as a chill-out record. For the gym, not so much.
She & Him - Volume Two (6/10)
I'm gonna admit to having never heard Volume 1, so I can't compare this record to the previous one. In the second coming of the M. Ward and Zooey Deschanel collaboration, I think I can say the main influences here are country music and The Ronettes-style girl groups, although there are also some pop-moments. This disc contains a couple of winners and some fillers, so I'm a little torn about this. M. Ward does what he can to get the most out of the song material (like the unexpected guitar solo that closes off 'In the sun'), but overall, Zooey's writing isn't always great and -at times- a little bland and unimaginative, especially in the lyrical department (ignored is going to rhyme with bored, blame with ashamed, shoes with blues,... the list goes on), so good for her she's an actress and not a screenwriter. I won't say bad things about her singing, she's definitely trumping Scarlett in that department. For a pop record, I personally feel it's lacking in the singalong department. There's also 2 covers here: one ("Ridin' in my car") does nothing for me, the other ("Gonna get along without you now") is definitely among the best tracks on this album. The slow tracks tend to bore, so the highlights on this album are the more upbeat, emotional tracks: opener "Thieves" goes all-out country and hits the bullseye (intro riff sounds a lot like this though), "Don't look back" has a Greek mythology reference and a really long bridge to the chorus and "Over it over again" has a catchy chorus and offers a nice mix of the country and girl group influences. For those of you that were going to buy this for the Zooey pics in the booklet, tough luck for you, my friend! But you can always take another look at the scrumptious - college video's are always cool in my book - video for "In the sun" or the retro video for "Thieves".
Surfer Blood - Astro Coast (8/10)
In short, a more upbeat and joyous The Shins, coupled with some Weezer powerpop chords, seasoned with some Vampire Weekend-ish african guitar riffs here and there to really get the ultimate summer feel. Maybe a little Sonic Youth too. I have a strong feeling this album is gonna age well and you will be able to enjoy it during summer drives for years to come. Since you can find killer track "Swim" in one of my previous posts already, I'll serve you with 2 other tracks today: opening track "Floating vibes" and the very The Shins-esque "Twin peaks". Some meaningless snippet of trivia to close this off: apparently, these guys don't like surfing at all.
I also got some nice tracks from new(er) bands that you might want to check out.
School Of Seven Bells - Windstorm
The one and only Hendrik Reigarts got me into this band. Fitting right into the stream of dreamy pop songs we've had over the last couple of blog posts, here we have an ex-guitarist from Secret Machines and a lovely pair of twin sisters. "Windstorm" from the new "Disconnect from desire" album has some pretty cool vocal melodies and rhythms, whereas "My Cabal" is a more standard song but with a pretty cool video. I'm not really sure whether I'd be able to listen to this for a whole album, but as far as individual tracks go, I'm liking this a lot.
Sleigh Bells - Tell 'em
While we're on the subjects of ex-guitar players, one guitar player from Poison The Well now has this 2-man project. While the other tracks I checked have some elements in common with The Ting Tings or The Kills (and thus, fail to really surprise or spark interest), this track sounds simply sounds like Aaliyah singing over some loud guitar solo and mean elektro. Pretty awesome.
The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart - Say no to love
Keyboard player Peggy Wang stars in the video for this new track by these modern day The Cure adepts (well, the extrovert, poppy side of The Cure anyway). This track is by no means a great departure from their previous efforts, and... I'm not complaining. Are you?
Bombay Bicycle Club - Ivy & Gold
The previous album by these lads from London was more generic indie-rock, on their most recent album however, they're jumping the whole (more acoustic sounding) folk-rock bandwagon a little, and this track more particularly sounds like a track by Mumford and Sons, albeit slightly more relaxed maybe. The singer looks a little like Chris Martin, not sure if that's going to convince you to check it out, but I'm mentioning it anyway.
