Demob Happy

FIRST PUBLISHED AT THE LINE OF BEST FIT
Californian acid rockers Sleepy Sun follow up last year’s ‘Embrace’ with another serving of massive, sun-blasted riffs. On ‘Fever’, however,  they subvert the dynamics of ostentatious heaviosity by adding some infectious boy-girl folk pop ( ‘Ooh Boy’, ‘Rigamaroo’) and some compelling sonic curveballs that keep the listener guessing to the finish. [...]

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FIRST PUBLISHED AT THE LINE OF BEST FIT
At some point over the last decade David Holmes’ brand of retro mishmashery seemed to fade from the zeitgeist despite the fact that the Northern Irish producer was reaching a wider audience (and no doubt keeping his bank manager happy) with soundtrack work. His turn to the movie [...]

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Beak>- Beak>
6.5/10
FIRST PUBLISHED AT THE LINE OF BEST FIT
Subterranean bass throbs, some cod-ghostly wailing and vaguely arabesque improvisations on a rusty sounding organ … ’Backwell’ is the opener of the self-titled debut album by Beak>, a new band including Portishead’s Geoff Barrow. With its slighty nauseating retro synths fanning out mechanically over chugging motorik, ‘Blackwell’ signposts [...]

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I never thought it would happen to me but finally I’ve succumbed to external pressures and have been unable to update this blog with any regularity. Firstly, I’ve been concentrating efforts on a new English-language website for my new home town, Grenoble, in south-east France. Secondly, I’ve recently become a father for the first time. [...]

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FIRST PUBLISHED AT THE LINE OF BEST FIT
White Denim - Fits
8/10
Such is the strength and depth (to borrow a football cliché) of music Stateside at the moment that I find myself with three acts on heavy rotation at the moment from Austin, Texas, alone. OK, so Spoon haven’t done anything lately but they’re a band [...]

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BRAND NEU ! - Various artists
8/10
BRAND NEU! is a tribute to the influential German band (aka Klaus Dinger and Michael Rother) that brings together a respectable selection of artists inspired by the Krautrock innovators. There are one note chugging guitars and hypnotic motorik grooves aplenty in this beguiling compilation, which doesn’t suffer too much from [...]

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Album Review: Super Furry Animals - Dark Days/Light Years
8.5/10

In a recent Pitchfork review Animal Collective declared that it must be “weird to be in a band with good musicians”, referring to the fact that they basically view themselves as electronic collagists than a band in the strict (i.e., formally trained) sense. It is an interesting [...]

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Album Review: Crystal Antlers - Tentacles
7/10
FIRST PUBLISHED AT THE LINE OF BEST FIT
Among the many acts hyped in 2008 there was a proliferation of new bands called Crystal something. Crystal Castles, Crystal Stilts and Cystal Antlers all came out of the leftfield to get blog love last year. Having been totally confused by the similarity [...]

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You’re Welcome
7.5/10
FIRST PUBLISHED AT THE LINE OF BEST FIT
Extra Golden are a combination of Keynan and American musicians who marry political consciousness to a vibrant, funky take on rock informed by the Nairobi-born Benga style. According to the band’s MySpace, the member’s share a belief that “tight quarters = tight grooves”, and ‘Thank You Very [...]

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“Will it just be like they’re dreaming?”
9/10
It’s definitely a funny time of year to be reviewing what could likely be the best album of 2009, especially one with such sunshine-drenched atmospherics, but Animal Collective may just have rescued us from the seasonally adjusted black hole that is January. Subject to pre-release hype not seen since, [...]

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