This Week I've Been Mostly Listening To...

Ryley Walker – Primrose Green (2015)

Ryley Walker’s second album Primrose Green is set to be released at the end of March, less than 12 months after his debut, All Kinds Of You. For years beforehand, Walker had been involved in his local experimental free/noise music scene, but it’s as if this wonderful folk-rock just pours out of him. It feels effortless, unforced and – essentially – sincere.

It came as a slight surprise to me to find out that he was from Chicago, as many of his touchstones are British: the intricate finger-picking of Bert Jansch, the pastoral jazziness of John Martyn, the sympathetic piano trills of Nick Drake; Primrose Green’s sleeve seemingly nods to both Graham Nash’s Songs For Beginners and Van Morrison’s His Band and the Street Choir. Esteemed players from Chicago’s jazz and post-rock scenes provide backing on the album. Apparently, “primrose green” is a colloquial term for “a cocktail of whiskey and morning glory seeds that has a murky, dreamy, absinthian quality when imbibed, and a spirit-crushing aftereffect the morning after”. I find it wholly intoxicating.

Lower Dens – To Die In L.A. (2015)

Around the release of Lower Dens’ last album, Nootropics, lead singer Jana Hunter was referencing Kraftwerk’s Radioactivity, Fripp & Eno and Bowie’s production work for Iggy pop. These influences were detectable in electronic rock music that was admirably mean, moody and brainy, if often more interested in texture and atmosphere than tunes.

If the first single from their third full-length, Escape From Evil, is to be believed, Lower Dens have moved from the late 70s into the 80s in search of new inspiration and a different tone: “To Die In L.A.”, despite its title, is surprisingly light on its feet, with dancing synth lines and an ascending sing-along chorus (“Time will turn the tide!”). It's all-inclusive – as if they observed the commercial and critical love that greeted Future Islands’ open-hearted brand of art-pop and thought “we could do that”. It suits them.

Nev Cottee - If I Could Tell You (2015)

“If I Could Tell You”, with its mysterious extended intro, stopped me in my tracks when it came on the radio the other night. Nev Cottee has been affectionately described as the "Manc Lee Hazlewood" and there is undoubtedly something of the moustachioed master about his deep, warm voice. The backing (strummed acoustic guitar, hand drums, neighing horses, waves of massed vocals, piano and strings) and production here, however, more closely resemble that of a soft-rock re-edit such as you’d find on the ace AOR Disco blog site – with all the different elements stretched and spaced out, moving in and out of the mix. (Think also: Bill Callahan, if he ever swapped his wood cabin in the mountains for a trek through the desert with J Spaceman).

It makes sense that the 10-inch has just been released on Aficionado Recordings, who specialize in the kind of shimmering, Balearic sun-setters that waft out of tents in the early hours at Glastonbury. The lyrics, too, have a rueful, reflective, end-of-a-big-night feel about them: "Time will say nothing but 'I told you so'…we know the price that we’ll have to pay, but I want you more each and every day”.

Tropicalia – Ou Panis Et Circencis (1968)

 

Last month, I was down in Cottee's hometown of Manchester for the stag weekend of my future brother-in-law. It was an immensely enjoyable couple of days of bowling, bubble football, Phoenix Nights-style lounge acts, ludicrous waistcoats, and eating and drinking to excess. And while many of the guys were still in their beds recovering from the night before, I managed to fit in a Saturday morning scour of the record shops on Oldham Street. At the terrific Piccadilly Records, I picked up a reissue of Sleater Kinney’s Dig Me Out (an embarrassment of riches and hooks) and Tropicalia’s Ou Panis Et Circencis, a bonkers but brilliant collaborative album from 1968 with a cast-list that reads like a Who’s Who of Brazilian psychedelia: Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso, Tom Ze, Os Mutantes. Rolling Stone magazine in Brazil voted it No. 2 in their 100 Best Brazilian Albums of All-Time.

I bought an immaculate second-hand copy of Joan Baez’s Diamonds & Rust LP at Vinyl Revival and finally tracked down a copy of the album which pointed the way to the coked-up, world-humping supergroup that Fleetwood Mac would become: 1973’s Buckingham Nicks.

The Gospel Ayres – I Wanna Testify (1975) 

My find of the day, though, was a £3 bargain from Oxfam. The Gospel Ayres and their LP I Wanna Testify were new to me, but as soon as I saw the cover – name and title in bold coloured lettering; a mixed gender group with fantastically funky clothes and even funkier afros standing defiantly across a road (to the Promised Land?) – I knew I had to have it. Sometimes you just know a record is gonna sound great. And it does sound great: sure, certain tracks on the vinyl are pretty crackly, but, in some ways, you’d be disappointed if an old gospel record wasn't crackly - if it didn’t feel lived-in.

The Gospel Ayres' membership comprised United States Air Force personnel who were stationed at an RAF base in England in the mid-70s. Inspired by the secular success of gospel acts like the Edwin Hawkins Singers (of “Oh Happy Day” fame) and the Staple Singers, they built up a live following, performed on many TVs programmes and cut I Wanna Testify in 1975. The title track, currently the only one up on YouTube, features Sharon Hill on lead vocals and serves as a fine introduction to the album’s highly likeable gospel-soul-pop hybrid.

Monophonics – Strange Love (2015)

And now for some brand new soul… 2012’s In Your Brain by Monophonics is one of my favourite LPs of recent years. Its expert playing and production recall the soul and funk greats of the 60s and 70s, but it never feels like pastiche or like the band are going through the motions. It’s a fiery beast of a record. A diverse one, too - the James Brown-like yearning of tracks such as “Deception” rubbing up against phenomenal “I Wanna Take You Higher” highs like “All Together”.

The A-side of their new single, “Promises” shows that the ‘Phonics haven’t lost their touch – described by band members Kelly Finnigan and Ian McDonald as “a natural next step from our last record”, it “fits in the Psychedelic Soul pocket while also using elements of Reggae…kung-fu like horns, and a  shimmering 12-string acoustic guitar”. The B-side, “Strange Love”, meanwhile, feels like something new for Monophonics and might be even better – a take on the lavish Philly Soul productions of The Delfonics or The O’Jays, with a suitably melodramatic and romantic chorus: “my heart just won’t beat without your strange love”.

Sons Of Bill – Long Road To Canaan (2014)

Five-piece Sons Of Bill – hailing from Charlottesville, Virginia and including three brothers among their ranks – have been releasing records since 2006, but only very recently appeared on my radar when I noticed they had a song called “Lost In The Cosmos (Song for Chris Bell)”. Any act that makes reference to the Big Star legend and his I Am The Cosmos LP is gonna get my attention; that their latest and – by the looks of things – breakthrough album, Love And Logic, was produced by the former Uncle Tupelo and Wilco drummer Ken Coomer sealed the deal.

I’ve yet to hear the full album but “Long Road To Canaan”, featuring the dusty vocals of Leah Blevins, really moves me: a beautifully poised piece of alt-country, which resists the temptation to over-emote and over-complicate and comes up smelling of milk and honey.

Tame Impala – Expectation (2010)

New album imminent. Tickets for Barrowlands gig in September secured. “Expectation” most certainly in the air.

This Week I've Been Mostly Listening To...

Vashti Bunyan – Mother (2014)

In a Sunday lunchtime stupor – in no way brought on by the previous evening’s cocktail of gin, beer and red and white wine, you understand – I was catching up on Stuart Maconie’s Freak Zone radio show.

My guard was down, and “Mother” – in the most balletic, subtle way imaginable – glided in and knocked me for six. A song delicate of beauty, sparse but poetic of language, it speaks of Vashti Bunyan as a young girl, standing at an ajar door, catching the beautiful unaware lady who had brought her into the world in a rare off-duty moment: on one occasion, her mother is dancing, spinning, “briefly unbound”; on another, she is playing piano and singing “songs long learned, so long untuned”. “My applause should have been rapturous”, Bunyan whispers, but, instead – heartbreakingly – she closed the door and “turned, turned away”.

In the subsequent conversation with Maconie, Bunyan said that she wanted to acknowledge the sacrifices that her mother’s generation made – that the opportunities she enjoyed when pursuing her musical dreams weren't available to them. Her new album Heartleap, self-produced at her home in Edinburgh and only her second release since 1970’s evergreen Just Another Diamond Day, contains many more treasured memories and secret treasures.

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard – Cellophane (2014)

Come for the name (just wrap your tongue around those delicious syllables), stay for the tunes. The marvellously-monikered King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard have been incredibly prolific since forming in Melbourne in 2011, making a name (again, what a name!) for themselves in Australia’s vibrant psychedelic scene with several idiosyncratic LPs. They've recently been snapped up by Thee Oh Sees’ Castle Face label (a perfect fit) in the US and Heavenly Records in the UK, who’s nu-psych stable already includes Temples, TOY, The Voyeurs, and The Wytches. One listen through of “Cellophane”, and viewing of its accompanying 3D video, is enough to mark them out as a looser, loonier proposition than any of those bands.

Previous single “Hot Wax” suggested that King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard had befriended the “Drunk Girls” at LCD Soundsystem’s house party and led them out into the street for a spontaneous rendition of the “Monster Mash”. Their new album I'm In Your Mind Fuzz is to be let loose on Halloween on blood red and green splattered vinyl. Of course it is!

Viet Cong – Continental Shelf (2014)

Viet Cong - a four piece, featuring two former members of Calgary post-punkers Women - are another act likely to receive more attention now that they've signed to a prominent Indie (in their case the wonderful Jagjaguwar label). And rightly so - their Cassette EP, originally only available at their live shows and then pressed up as a 12", is one of the most promising things I've heard all year - a 7-track demonstration of how to do something fresh with your influences (garage pop, drone, post-punk), be adventurous, and fall with style.

“Check your anxiety, no need to suffer silently” dooms Matt Flegel, and Viet Cong certainly don’t suffer in silence here. "Continental Shelf”, set to feature on their self-titled LP out in January, is their most brooding, oppressively impressive creation yet, recalling Bauhaus (who's "Dark Entries" they covered on the Cassette EP) and The Scream-era Siouxsie & The Banshees. Their most angry too: the verses find Flegel tearing at his hair and not wanting to “face the world…it’s suffocating”; the chorus a resigned howl against the greedy and the selfish with their “fingertips in the fountain”, fondling “liquid gold” as the world falls apart around them.

Júníus Meyvant - Color Decay (2014)

There's something undoubtedly studied about Icelandic newcomer Júníus Meyrant's recreation of 60s baroque pop and 70s folk-soul. However, like Michael Kiwanuka's "Tell Me A Tale" or Ray Lamontagne's best work, "Color Decay" is so beautifully played and produced, its strings and horns so deftly orchestrated, that I can forgive him that. Plus, as I was listening to its autumnal sweep for the first time, Bob Lind's "Elusive Butterfly" came fluttering into my head. Which can only ever be a good thing.

Kevin Morby - Parade (2014)

"Slow Train", Kevin Morby's elegant collaboration with Cate Le Bon, was a real stand-out 2013 track for me, and the ex-Woods bassist clearly works faster than he plays guitar because he's back with another slice of unhurried, classic-sounding rock. On "Parade", the first track from his second solo album, his echoey vocal and diction and the universality of his melancholy lyrics (about coming to terms with the inevitability of death) are the right side of Dark Side Dave Gilmour; the "ba-ba-bahs", brass and "all my friends were there waiting on me" section straight out of a prime-Beatles McCartney piano number. Lovely stuff.

This Week I've Been Mostly Listening To...

Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band - I'm Glad (1967)

My Uncle Les recently presented me with an original vinyl copy of Safe As Milk (he knows me so well!) - an excuse, as if one were needed, to enjoy the debut by Don Van Vliet & his Magic Band. I've long heard of my uncle's mythical record collection, packed away in a crowded loft, but only in the last few months has he started to sort through it. There's a pretty incredible selection of mod, Motown and Stax singles up there, apparently; psychedelia and hard rock from the 60s and 70s. I look forward to one day having a good riffle through. He handed me a lovely pile of LPs (Exodus, The Jam, B.B. King, Joe Jackson) with Safe As Milk – the cream – on top.

In many ways, it’s Beefheart’s most approachable album - the song structures are (relatively) conventional and the guitar work by a 20-year old Ry Cooder is fantastic throughout. Already, though, Van Vliet's take on the blues is a frazzled, twisted one (one listen of his first single "Diddy Wah Diddy" back-to-back with the Bo Diddley original confirms this); weirder and less reverential than that of the British blues-rock explosion.

I'm very much a fair-weather Beefheart fan: for every work of madcap mischief-making that I find thrilling and electrifying (The Spotlight Kid, Shiny Beast, "Big Eyed Beans From Venus"), there are others that remain impenetrable, no matter how much I persevere with them (the majority of Trout Mask Replica. "A squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag is soft and bulbous, got me?!" Erm, not really Capt'n, no).

I'm fond of the rare softer moments (“Observatory Crest”, “Her Eyes Are A Blue Million Miles”) which suggest that - like fellow "difficult" avant-gardists Lou Reed and Frank Zappa - Beefheart had an appreciation of classic R&B and doo-wop. “I'm Glad” being my favourite.

Quilt - Open Eyes (2013)

Held In Splendor, the second LP by Boston dreamers Quilt, was a constant companion during the miraculous run of sunny days in Glasgow we enjoyed for the first week of the Commonwealth Games. It's a delightful little album where "each song has its own voice", a patchwork of folk, soft psych, sunshine pop and indie-rock. The tracks with co-vocalist Anna Fox Rochinski on lead are particularly beguiling - when that sweet coo of a voice beckons you near, you heed its call.

"Open Eyes" is probably the band's finest moment to date: darker and, ironically, less clear-eyed than anything on Splendor, it was released last year on a split EP with fellow Bostonians MMOSS.

Ultimate Painting - Ultimate Painting (2014)

MMOSS front-man Doug Tuttle released his lovely Teenage Fanclub-subscribing solo album in early 2014 on Trouble In Mind records. (Factor in the incredible Morgan Delt and Klaus Johann Grobe records, and TIM stake a strong claim for being my Label Of The Year So Far. Good work, chaps!).

New kids on the Trouble In Mind block are Ultimate Painting, consisting of James Hoare and Jack Cooper. For the past five years, both have been providing vocals and guitar for two of the finest British indie acts around (Mazes and Veronica Falls, respectively), and they sound very much on the same page here, easy in each other's company.

"Who Loves the Sun?" the Velvet Underground once inquired. "Ultimate Painting" the track, with its gorgeous shiny guitar sound and loosey-goosey Loaded flow, suggests that Ultimate Painting the band do.

The Budos Band - The Sticks (2014)

Another label enjoying a strong year is Daptone Records: Sharon Jones gave the people what they wanted in January with her comeback album; Cold World by Naomi Shelton & The Gospel Queens has been justly well received; and the forthcoming fourth LP by The Budos Band looks set to be an absolute stonker.

The Budos backed Charles Bradley on his ace cover of "Changes", and, judging by The Wizard imperious on the new sleeve and teaser track "The Sticks", they have continued to flick through the little black book of Black Sabbath black magic. Down-tuned guitars and sustained bellows of brass bring a doomy gloominess not present in their funk before; the hyperactive interplay between drums, horns and organ hints at an exciting new prog influence.

Nude Beach - I Can't Keep The Tears From Falling (2014)

Take a quick look at the cover (tight jeans, checked shirts, leather jackets) and tracklisting ("Radio" "Walkin' Down The Street", "Some Kinda Love") of Nude Beach's 2012 album II and, without hearing a note of the music, you could probably have a good guess what it might sound like. Theirs is a 70s FM Rock dream world, where Tom Petty is God, lovers cruise around to The Cars, and Big Star rule the airwaves.

Nude Beach have a knack for writing infectious, irresistible power-pop - tunes that stay with you even as they rush by you. "I Can't Keep The Tears From Falling" is the latest example and first taster of new LP, 77. The drums hit hard, the guitar solos sting, and that chorus just wont take no for an answer. I hope it reaches the size of audience it deserves.

King Creosote - My Favourite Girl (2005)

"My Favourite Girl", a long-time favourite of mine, originally appeared on 2005's KC Rules OK. A rerecorded version features on King Creosote's beautiful new From Scotland With Love LP, a soundtrack to archive Scottish film footage and a future Sunday Morning Vinyl staple, for sure. Written about his daughter Beth, "My Favourite Girl"'s simplicity and beauty breaks my heart every time I hear it: "I guess that I have not got long / Promise you'll tell her / She's my favourite girl / In all the world".

This idea of family and time passing is a recurring theme in much of Kenny Anderson's best work - "Your Young Voice", another favourite, repeats the phrase "it's your young voice that's keeping me holding on to my dull life" over and over until I'm reduced to a blubbering wreck.

This Week I've Been Mostly Listening To...

Zig Zags – Brainded Warrior (2014)

“Hey punk! You’re coming with me…don’t believe everything you see.”

“Brainded Warrior” is my current first-track-of-the-day of choice, ideal for brushing away those early morning cobwebs. Produced – though perhaps “captured” better describes the no-frills treatment – by San Francisco punk protagonist, one-man (no)Hit Factory and AOIBTW hero Ty Segall, it’s a crunching, Sabbath-shaped heavy nugget. Zig Zags’ self-titled album was released at the start of the month on the often ear-bleeding, always excellent In The Red Records. Seek it out with the urgency that its music demands.

White Fence – Like That (2014)

Ty Segall and White Fence released the Hair LP in 2012. It was a collaboration, though it also wasn't difficult to work out who had brought which song to the table: the simple, frantic punk thrills of “Crybaby” and “Scissor People” – that’ll be yer man, Ty; the shambling psych rambles of “I Am Not a Game” and “(I Can’t) Get Around You” – almost certainly Mr. Fence. “Like That”, the first taster of a new Segall-produced LP, finds White Fence – real name Tim Presley – again playing to his strengths.

At risk of turning this into a Guardian think piece, we must be close to reaching “peak psych” – countless bands, Temples perhaps being the most commercially successful, are keen to adopt the aesthetic (the tripping Revolver drums and phased guitars; the bright, best-viewed-on-vinyl artwork; the frizzy hair and washed-out denim) but are seemingly against (incapable of?) embracing the spirit of discovery and adventure of those original 60s recordings; every month, new Psych Fests are popping up, the genre’s definition stretched increasingly to breaking point by the acts being booked for the bills; just last week, Yves Saint Laurent unveiled a new Psych Rock Collection.

What fences Presley off from the crowd, for me, is his infectious sense of fun and appealingly dashed-off execution.

Bon Iver – Heavenly Father (2014)

Although his solo work is much maligned by rock critics, Phil Collins has long been revered by the hip-hop and R&B community. The man’s a genius, they’ll say. Listen to that alien, lost soul voice – he means it, man. The production is so super smooth and atmospheric production – who wouldn't want to sample those pounding drums? And just look at all those Grammys! In 2001, a full tribute album entitled Urban Renewal was recorded with contemporary urban acts tackling their favourite Collins songs.

I can only assume that Kanye, Jay-Z & co see similar qualities in Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon, their go-to man when it comes to creating lighters-aloft stadium moments about how insignificant money is and all that really matters is being a good dad. Getting Vernon in to emote over a bombastic soft-rock backing track is the modern day equivalent of lifting the yearning vocals of “Another Day In Paradise” or dry drums of “In The Air Tonight” (Mr. Hudson is the Sting to Vernon’s Collins).

There are many people who wish that Bon Iver would return to the spooked cabin folk of his For Emma, Forever Ago LP, who felt that the second album was a little too produced, a little too, well, *Phil Collins*. But I personally loved the way he expanded his sound, the way the tracks built - instruments slowly emerging and focusing, like silhouettes from a snowstorm.

This layering of sound continues on “Heavenly Father”, taken for the soundtrack to the forthcoming Zach Braff movie, Wish I Was Here. Influences from hip-hop and his Volcano Choir project are evident too – a manipulated and looped sample of Vernon’s voice (which at first briefly and scarily sounds like bagpipes) acts as the track’s bedrock, while little electronic details are squiggled throughout. It’s beautiful, and bodes very well for whatever the bearded one chooses to do next. 

High Ends – The Weight (2014)

I must confess to knowing nothing about Canadian indie rockers Yukon Blonde, other than that they're an indie rock band and they're from Canada. And that their chief songwriter Jeffrey Innes has now started a new project, High Ends. "The Weight" had me at it's first chorus - a perfectly judged slice of gorgeous, glistening synth-pop. I don't get to listen to the radio as often as I'd like, so I can only assume that this is getting some serious airplay. This is the sound of a Hit, right?

Endless Boogie – Taking Out The Trash (2013)

Few bands are more aptly named than Endless Boogie: they boogie – though, crucially, never woogie – and once they hit upon a riff or lock into a groove, they get it on the highway and stretch it on out….for eight, ten, sometimes even 14 minutes.

With their leather jackets, questionable facial hair and bourbon-soaked vocals, The Boogers (?) display many of the biker rock clichés. However, by the time that one big circling riff of “Taking Out The Trash”, cranked up to the max, reaches its sixth hypnotic minute, it shares more in common with Neu! or Hawkwind than your typical dive-bar blues band. The album from which this is taken, last year’s Long Island, is still on suitably heavy rotation round these parts.

Dolly Parton - Don't Let It Trouble Your Mind (1969)

In the run-up to this year's Glastonbury, much of the talk was about whether or not bear-hunting, Napster-suing metal-heads Metallica would be embraced by the hippies, and about how Kasabian's closing headline set on Sunday was gonna be beazer, the greatest spectacle witnessed by a man ever (talk, admittedly, predominately from Kasabian themselves).

[For anyone catching up with Metallica's pommelling set on iPlayer, that person standing bolt upright sound asleep just a few rows from the front is my sister, Ruth. Very proud.]

As it turned out, the real star of Glasto 2014 performed on the Pyramid Stage just a few hours before Kasabian were due to ‘ave it. In front of the largest crowd of the weekend, Dolly Parton went on a finely-honed hour-long charm offensive, where her juggling of instruments and self-deprecating anecdotes were as important as the songs themselves, and the songs just happened to be classics like “Jolene”, “Coat Of Many Colors” and “I Will Always Love You”.

Some killjoys took to Twitter to (almost certainly correctly) accuse her of miming along to certain tracks, but did it really matter? For the hundreds of thousands watching in the field and on their TVs at home, this was sold-gold Sunday afternoon entertainment and a reminder of what an under-appreciated songwriter Parton is.

"Don't Let It Trouble Your Mind" is one of my Dolly fixtures. The studio version can be found on the essential Soul Jazz compilation, Country Soul Sisters. 

Bobby Womack – Deep River (2012)

I was deeply saddened to hear of the death of Bobby Womack on 27th June 2014 at the age of 70, but have since taken great joy in listening to some of his extraordinary life's work. "It's All Over Now" which Bobby co-wrote for The Valentinos, and The Stones had a hit with. The majestic, one-two knock-out of his Communication and Understanding LPs. His super-fly soundtrack work and, more recently, his collaborations with Damon Albarn.

The Bravest Man In The Universe, his big comeback record and - as it turned out - his last, if anything sounds better now than it did two years ago. "Deep River" is the one I keep coming back to - not just for that line "I ain't got long to stay here", now with added poignancy, but for the vocal ticks of great hero and mentor Sam Cooke which trace a line right back to the start of Womack's long, miraculous career. And also for the deep, defiant soulfulness of it.

Apparently, in the lead up to his death, Womack was working on a new album, typically titled The Best Is Yet To Come, featuring contributions from Stevie Wonder, Rod Stewart and Snoop Dogg. These recordings may well see the light of day, but this performance of "Deep River" is how I'll remember him.