electronica
mark.kidel
Jon Hopkins is on a journey, and we’re fortunate that he feels he can share the trip with us. His latest offering takes the listener beyond the paths opened up in Singularity (2018) and Music for Psychedelic Therapy (2021).There's a coherence in the new album that builds on the explorations of the previous two. A reflection, no doubt, of the clarity he's feeling inside, an increased mastery of the electronic and acoustic means (from synths to strings) at his disposal and brought to the studio by his gifted collaborators, including regulars such as Leo Abrahams (guitar) and Cherif Hashizume ( Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
The music of Brit alt-rocker Cassy Brooking, AKA Cassyette, comes from the emo school of pop-metal. Her 2021 debut single was, appropriately, called “Dear Goth”, she’s much-hyped by Kerrang, and has been tour support for both Bring Me the Horizon and My Chemical Romance. All these are apt reference points for the music on her debut album which is feisty, occasionally spicy, and – contradictorily – very precisely produced to suggest a gnarly aesthetic.The songs flip about between crunchy sampledelic wodges of metal riffage, Prodigy-ish electronic hammering, and howled, but polished vocal angst Read more ...
joe.muggs
Trip hop is everywhere these days. From Billie Eilish and Lana Del Rey on down, some of the biggest artists in the world channel a smoky, bluesy, late 90s mood – and in the UK something even more interesting is happening that taps into a longer, deeper continuum.In the burgeoning soul/jazz underground (and mainstream!) the likes of Jorja Smith, Dave Okumu, Yazmin Lacey are all tapping into a wellspring of uniquely British introspective groove that runs not just through Massive Attack and Nightmares On Wax but back through Sade, Soul II Soul to the years of lovers rock and Cymande.Squarely in Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
Aside from their musical output, the fame – or notoriety – of Californian rockers Osees derives from two main factors. First, their consistently changing the spelling of their name on different releases (eg, Thee Oh Sees, OCS, etc). Second, their gushing prolificness of output. They’ve been releasing music for 21 years and Sorcs 80 is their 29th album. That’s going some.The short version of this review is that it’s a spirited electro-garage splurge but its sameyness occasionally grows annoying. Although Osees is a band it mostly represents the artistic vision of one person, frontman John Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
An Electric Storm opens with “Love Without Sound.” Once heard, it’s unforgettable. A disembodied voice which could be either female or male sings about making love without sound. There are female-sounding squawks and yelps. Revolving percussion sounds like drain pipes being hit by toffee hammers. The other instrumentation is clearly electronically generated. And, it has a tune.It also sounds remarkably similar to what US musical experimentalists The United States of America had come up with on their self-titled March 1968 album. An Electric Storm, credited to White Noise, was British, and was Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
VINYL OF THE MONTHMike Lindsay Supershapes: Volume 1 (Moshi Moshi)Solo debut from Mike Lindsay, a founder member of tunng and also half of psychedelic duo LUMP. It’s a good thing when music is hard to describe. Opener “Lie Down” sets up the stall, a catchy but weird slice of poet-pop, wherein wonky dance rhythms, abstract jazz, lyrics about mundanity and shouts of the title phrase, including contributions from singer-songwriter Anna B Savage, add up to a wild frolic. With plenty of woodwind, lyrics about toast and Sunday roast, an inability to musically settle down anywhere “normal”, the Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
The conundrum central to library music is that it was not meant to be listened to in any normal way. Yet, in time, this is what happened. What ended up on the albums pressed by companies like Bruton, Chappell, De Wolfe and others was heard by subscribers – the records did not end up for sale in shops or on the record players sitting in the nation’s homes.Those receiving this music were from the advertising, film and television industries. They were looking for material which could feature in their productions without the need to book a recording studio and employ an arranger, composer, Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
Dave Clarke (b. 1968) is, arguably, Britain’s greatest techno DJ. Although, in fact, he has lived in Amsterdam since 2009. He is also a producer of repute. His Red singles of the mid-Nineties are regarded as groundbreaking productions.He followed these with the albums Archive One in 1996, Devil’s Advocate in 2003, and The Desecration of Desire in 2017. The Red Series and Archive One have recently been reissued.Clarke was born and raised in Brighton, the offspring of a technology-loving father and a disco-loving mother. He would not characterise his childhood as especially happy. He ran away Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
As Dust we Rise ends with “Quilt,” a percussion-driven lamentation bringing to mind the New Orleans stylings of Dr. John. The album begins with “Hem,” where stabbing piano and strings interweave with a pulsing, wordless chorale. After a while, a muted trumpet and pattering wood blocks fill it out.In between, odd suggestions of The Rolling Stones’ “Sympathy For the Devil" (“Here Comes the Flood”), a spectral, twinkling ballad (“The Sea”), a sharp, skip-along, clockwork-toy of a track (“Ammonite,” one of the album's most electronica-inclined cuts) which could fit snugly into the soundtrack of Read more ...
Tom Carr
For a band as creative as St Albans’ own electronic-hardcore-rock fusion pioneers, Enter Shikari, the last thing you would expect them to do is sit on their hands.And that’s exactly what’s come to pass, as only a year after achieving their first UK number one with A Kiss For The Whole World, they follow up with companion album Dancing On The Frontline.There is always a risk with remix albums that they either end up feeling superfluous. Or, they go too far down the rabbit hole away from the original. Here, Enter Shikari thread the needle somewhat and limit the remixes, and include live Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
In 1974, two albums by German kosmiche musicians working with electronics became the first from the seedbed of what’d been dubbed Krautrock to explicitly embrace – and merge – melody and rhythmic structure. One was Kraftwerk’s Autobahn. The other was Cluster’s Zuckerzeit. Once on the record player, each LP instantly made its presence felt more directly than anything either had released previously.For Kraftwerk, this resulted in an unlikely international hit with a single edit of Autobahn’s title track. For Cluster, there were no singles and, consequently, no chance to fluke any chart action. Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
US electronic perennial Moby has had a good run. He was a rave culture phenomenon from 1991 onwards. He blew that with a vegan punk album. He released Play at the decade’s end and sold millions. He then had decadent superstar years, a run of huge, often juicy albums. He quit booze’n’drugs in 2008. His music blossomed again, culminating in a trio of albums raging at the state of his nation. Following the last of these in 2018, not much has held the attention. Always Centered at Night has moments that do.Those wanting energy and urgency should look elsewhere. This is mostly a downtempo Read more ...