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Friday 6th April 2012
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On Our iPod

Golden Grrrls - New Pop 7”

Chris Devotion & The Expectations - Amalgamation & Capital (album)

Trailer Trash Tracys - Ester (album)

Throwing Up - Mother Knows Best 7”

Howling Wolf - Complete Chess Masters 1951-60

The Ketamines - A Rotten Bond/1 Yr (from Oddbox Singles Club Pt 2)

Cardinal - Hymns (album)

Proper Ornaments - Taking the Gamble Out of Buying 12”

Darren Hayman - January Songs (album)

Various: Marshall Teller EP 12”

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Album Review

The Tamborines
Camera & Tremor Beat-Mo Records

Article written by Ged M - Aug 12, 2010

The Tamborines: Camera & Tremor

It’s taken some time for Henrique Laurindo and Lulu Grave to produce their debut album – we first reviewed them live in February 2006 and gave a rave review to their debut single ‘Sally O’Gannon’ in September that year - though much of that time is accounted for by them building their own studio and self-producing this record. If you’ve seen them live or heard the singles, you’ll know their dense noir sound, building on the fuzz and drone of the JAMC, the Velvet Underground and My Bloody Valentine but which they sweeten with the most blissful melodies. They’ve got this talent for writing cracking 3 minute pop songs – ‘31st Floor’, ‘Come Together’, the wonderful ‘Sally O’Gannon’ – that they then scald with guitar noise and drench in fuzz. These re-recorded dark stars are worth the price of admission alone but there are more; it might be bible-black and threatening but ‘Falling Slowly’ simple explodes in pop glory just at the point that you’re worrying about the effect of all that noise on your ears.

So it’s a fine record, an album well worth hearing – my only quibble is that it’s not loud enough in places. There’s fuzz aplenty on ‘Looking Glass House’ but it drops out to allow Henrique’s words to be heard – good enough but not sufficiently memorable to justify taming the guitars. There are times too when they may have over-polished a couple of tunes. The reference points increasingly switch to the Dandy Warhols and the VU circa Loaded – pop-chasing and fine in their own right but they leave you desperate for the intoxicating drone-pop that we’ve enjoyed so much over the last 4 years. As a fan, I’m sorry to say it’s not quite the fuzzpop masterpiece we were all hoping for.

Links:
http://www.thetamborines.com/
http://www.myspace.com/beatmouk
http://www.myspace.com/thetamborines