Reviews – Singles
November 2006
SINGLE OF THE MONTH
Backini feat. Dr Oop Capone
Radio (Lumenessence)
The best song on this year’s ‘Re:Creation’ album from Brighton’s Rob Quickenden receives the remix treatment. The original is sufficiently impressive, a lacerating broadside delivered by Dr Oop Capone at the shallowness of much modern hip hop, it contains lines such as, “Even the women with their breasts augmented, is rented from a strip club, it ain’t authentic.” The fact that Capone’s rap is so articulate, the beats so funky and Viola Wills’ sweetly sung chorus so catchy seals the deal. Product 01 remix things into vicious fax-machine electro-pop, the Qemists rip into a drum & bass rocker and new Lumenessence signing Jay Bharadia wanders into Boards Of Canada-go-post-rock territory. A very tasty package, as smirking women used to say in British porn films.
Para One
Dudun-Dun (Naïve)
This is where nu-rave should head next – but only slowly or it will frighten off all the glow-stick-wielding indie kids. Daft Punk mates Para One, particularly when remixed by Death From Above 1979 alter-ego MSTRKRFT, are techno electro with a twist, gnarly dancefloor grittiness with just enough bouncy bass funk to keep the laydeez on the floor. ‘Dundun-Dun’, while probably not definitive, is very much the sound of hot clubland circa early 2007 so grab a slice while it’s hot.
Gotan Project
Mi Confession (XL)
The Gotan Project album ‘Lunatico’ received an underwhelming response earlier in the year, a shame because, although it was merely more of the same, it was as beautifully constructed as its predecessor. Still, it’s understandable that fans queried whether they needed a simulacrum of an album they already possessed. The same cannot be said of Edu K’s ‘Drop The Bass Remix’ which transforms the tango-rap of the original (featuring Buenos Aires hip hop crew Koxmoz) into squidgy stop-start Aphexian electro.
Wunmi
Talk Talk Talk (Danny Krivit Re-Edit)/S.O.S. (Documented)
There is more than a faint whiff of Young Disciples’ dead-souled London rare groove trendiness about this, as Wunmi is a very beautiful fashion designer and model who works with Masters At Work, but the rolling Afro-groovy soul-funk of ‘Talk Talk Talk’ is simply too classy to argue with in the end. Not sure about the Police cover, though…
The Weir
The Legend Of Kid Icarus EP (www.theweir.co.uk)
More a mini-album than EP, ‘The Legend Of Kid Icarus’ is the work of Andrew Weir from Southsea, UK, and contains six tracks of beat-tronica that occasionally veers onto the dancefloor (as on the ‘Funky Brother’ beats of ‘Above The Clouds’). Mostly it sticks to orchestral atmospherics, live vocals, organic percussion and even a driving Joy Division vibe on ‘Slipstreams’. It’s imaginative and lively yet has all the hallmarks of a bedroom studio obsessive. Someone should introduce Weir to a class songwriter and watch the sparks fly.
Adam Gnade
Shout The Rafters Down EP (Drowned In Sound)
There is lo-fi and there is really lo-fi. Things don’t come much more lo-fi than the acoustic strum-through of this EP’s title track, a single mic picking up everything with vocals lost somewhere in the background murk. So far, so intriguing, but the second track, ‘And On Bad Days We Were Sawn Asunder’, is moodily drawled poetry set to a lazy narcotic jangle, then ‘We Love Nowhere And Know No One’ reaches for squawling electric guitar. In the end Gnade sits promisingly between Devendra Banhart, Jack Kerouac and a smacked out Butthole Surfers, which is surely a fascinating proposition.
Twisted Charm
Boring Lifestyles/Happy Alone (Because)
Four-piece from Northampton with a lead singer going by the irresistible name of Nathan Doom. Based in London, they were signed to the Because label from France who also deal with The Klaxons and DJ Mehdi which bodes well. ‘Boring Lifestyles’ introduces a saxophone into a jagged new wave racket and shouts the title’s rancour at the world in no uncertain terms. ‘Happy Alone’ seems equally pissed off but ends with an unexpectedly melodic lament. Promising.
Xavier Lacoeur & Gower Ramsey
Dark Disco Place/Henry Goes To The Circus (Love Minus Zero)
And so to the dancefloor. Xavier Lacouer is Tom Neville and ‘Dark Disco Place’ is seven and a half minutes of sheerest foot-moving throb. There’s the odd bit of whispering but mainly it’s simply a heads-down techno-house roller that has a tough sexy central dynamic and the occasional sliver of ‘Gravitational Arc Of Ten ‘ synthesizer. The flip is similarly proportioned glitch-house which doesn’t quite muster the zap of the A-side.
Art Brut
Nag Nag Nag Nag (Mute)
However much one thinks one knows about pop music, it never ceases to deliver surprises and the unexpected. The dramatic success of Art Brut’s dry suburban British wit in the USA is a prime example. Quite how a band who sound as if they should be on Stiff Records circa 1979 have made the cover of the Rolling Stone in 2006 is a mystery. Which isn’t to say they’re not good – they’re cracking – miles away from the usual indie whining, and their latest single, the first off the new album, is an Ian Dury-meet-Alternative TV paean to stomping out of the house with your Walkman on when the parents start moaning.
Ooze feat. Tish K
Random Wondrous Things (Chillosophy Music)
Chillosophy Music? This quirky electronic gem almost deserves to be ignored on account of the terrible label name. What bloody hippy thought of that? It’s the kind of thinking that gives ambient electronica such a bad name. In any case, rant aside, this is a stately-paced elegant hunk of bleep-soul from someone called Sebastian Mullaert, a melancholy song echoing from the floor of a deserted robot factory. Andy Dragazis, AKA Blues States, has lately served mainly as Memphis Industries’ in house producer, but is here on hand to provide a luscious torch song remix.
Shitdisco
Reactor Party (Fierce Panda)
A messy tribute to gabba raves at deserted nuclear plants in Russia from an English group who derived their name from a degenerate club night they ran in Glasgow. Part of the nu-rave wave, a title we’ll keep using until someone thinks of a better one, Shitdisco have some of Happy Mondays’ scattershot disarray (particularly on the Luke Smith and Night Moves remixes) but a yelping punk vocal and underlying electro threat define the sound as utterly 2006. This could be the start of something good…
Singles for review should be sent to…
Thomas H Green, Beatmag, PO Box 4653, Worthing, BN11 9FG, UK
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