Articles
Rrrachel has written the following articles:
Belle And Sebastian - The Blues Are Still Blue
The usual traits are all present – a way with a chord change, an outside perspective, trousers a little too short with socks flashing at the ankle, a knowing wink here and there.»
Gotan Project - Diferente
The formula is simple, but skilled; elements of traditional tango laid out over the top of throbbing dance-floor bass-lines.»
King Alexander, Scarecrows, Ack Ack Ack, Fuck Buttons at The Junction, Bristol, Avon, Fri 24 Mar
If the audience were lacking attention at one point, everyone is harpooned back now – whether we like it or not. And, even though I’m no sucker for punishment, I can’t help enjoy the sounds of my mind being disassembled.»
Semifinalists - You Said
From the echo chambers of a gothic cathedral, distant choral voices ricochet through the cloisters, cluster in the crypt, swarm and swell before shooting out through the medieval stained glass windows. Setting off in a steep upward trajectory, ‘You Said’ is a flashlight beam into furthest outer-space.»
M. Craft - Silver and Fire
Martin Craft’s craft here is not so much in song writing, but rather draping tapestries of dust and mysticism over what are otherwise simple melodies.»
RachelAPP, Dirty Whites, The Girl From Headquarters, Das Wanderlust at The Junction, Bristol, Avon, Fri 17 Mar
Das Wanderlust dash from fluorescent pop, to the noisiest thrashings of Bearsuit to momentary glimpses of Trencher casiocore but never dwell too long.»
The Radar Brothers - The Fallen Leaf Pages
When the Radar Brothers solemnly strike into the opener of this album, singing of “The sunlight making sure of the hatred on their faces,” a tone is set for the rest of this stately affair. Where the Californian weather rules over all of the state’s inhabitants, human and animal; where the breadth of the horizon inspires only fatalism and lethargy... »
The Sequins - Patients
With patients there is no need to have patience – most bands are content to make you wait it out in the verses for the crowning choruses. The Sequins understand my music junkie needs: they stack up their choruses, one on top of the other, just a little precarious like the Jenga tower.»
King Creosote - Not One Bit Ashamed
Such a handsome song. Aristocratic, with its chin jutted out in stance of stoic solidarity. “It’s not good enough, it’s not good enough” he insists.»
The Shortwave Set, Sister Morphine, Winston at Bristol Louisiana, Wed 01 Mar
The Shortwave Set are off to a precarious start: the microphone stand refuses to be adjusted, sound levels are unstable, they nearly play the same song twice in a row. The rusty mechanism slowly shakes itself into optimum performance however: ‘Is It Any Wonder?’ is heady with wrong-speed psalmic vocal samples, looping romantisch piano and lily-white singing.»
Collapse - Stain Anxiety
Contradiction and confusion can be fun: this release has all the acerbic, acrid, and savoury qualities of the best salt and vinegar flavour crisps. Crinkle cut, not standard, because this sounds crunchy and brittle as it breaks into shards of feedback.»
My Latest Novel - The Reputation of Ross Francis
Most bands are storytellers of some kind or another. You have to understand: there’s a difference between telling a story (in the way that Jarvis Cocker could do admirably) and creating a lengthy tome, laced with mysteries, intrigues, plots and sub-plots. My Latest Novel are aiming for the latter.»
Envelopes - Free Jazz
Where the free jazz of musical definition has tried to wave off structures – compositional, harmonic and rhythmical - this Envelopian 'Free Jazz' is resplendently neon-soaked in all of them. Where John Coltrane and Envelopes might cross over is in attitude: loud, brash, joyous, inventive and unafraid to step right over the marked boundaries...»
Mazarin - We're Already There
"Who wants to be oblivious? / The new American apathy" sings Quentin Stoltzfus on the opening track of "We're Already There". Sounding like some echo of consumerist twenty-first century America, an advert offering blank anonymity to the lethargic disinterested American youth. And yet, in context of twenty-first century Britain, this is the kind of album that can be met with disinterested apathy itself. Neither a post-post-punk jagged edge skitter of pop, nor a freakily experimental folk troupe meander, worn at the heels American rock can slide away completely un-noticed. Despite the immediate appearance of standard-fare alt pop/rock simplicity, as is often the case, the interest lies in the detail, and there is plenty of it.»
The Madeleines - Trouble / Safety Net
The debut release from The Madeleines is a pair of neatly conceived, eloquently voiced and affirmatively poppy odes to staying out of danger and falling into traps.»
Night at the Circus at Bristol Seymours Family Club, Fri 20 Jan
There are gigs and there are gigs, this “Night at the Circus” being one of the latter. The programme for the night affirmatively disregards all conventions for a night of music, nay, this is meant to be a night of entertainment. Part variety show, part circus, part D.I.Y. punk gig, it’s a confusing array of spectacles.»
Jakokoyak - Flatyre
Slow-pulsing, sparse ambience, broken down in the middle of nowhere and not even trying to go anywhere fast. This is cinematic, hazy music, for those of us who too don’t have anywhere to be right this moment.»
Honeytrap - Andy the Freefaller
Debut single release from Coventry four-piece, Honeytrap, shows two very different sides of a coin: one barn-dance, Camper Van Beethoven style knees-up, and one shaky, uncertain ode to Hollywood failure.»