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Weird Dreams - Choreography (album)

Crocodiles - Sunday (Psychic Conversation #9) 7”

The Hairs - I’ve Been Working Out 7”

King Creosote and Jon Hopkins - Third Swan single

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Veronica Falls - My Heart Beats 7”

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Gig Review

Frankie Rose & The Outs/ Banjo or Freakout/ Hawnay Troof
London, Luminaire

Article written by Ged M - Dec 28, 2010

It’s our final visit to the Luminaire before it shuts, which is a real loss when you compare it with other London venues: a small room, committed staff, good bills and a disco ball over the stage. It seems that promoting gigs has become more competitive in London – some big sharks are in the pool – and for all of our good experiences at the Luminaire, it clearly doesn’t pay to put on gigs in Kilburn.

Hawnay Troof, who played here 5 times, says all this using many more expletives for emphasis. Vice Cooler has some hip Californian mates, and a terrible tailor, but is more style than substance; his laptop beats allow him to leap energetically in and out of the audience, encouraging participation in his set, but his music is less memorable than he is. I doubt he’ll find a future venue as sympathetic as the Luminaire is to his idiosyncratic performance art.

Banjo Or Freakout is Alessio Natalizia, an Italian in London, here playing with a band as well as on his laptop. There’s some electronica and much shoegazing as he builds waves of noise that he compresses and elongates, crafting walls of reverb-heavy sound that overhang the patterns played by the band. But at the heart of each song is a tune, some melody to hang on as he twists his controls, which makes the whole thing incredibly impressive.

If there has to be a last gig at the Luminaire for us, I’m happy it’s Frankie Rose and the Outs. As a founder of Vivian Girls and drummer for Crystal Stilts, Frankie Rose is the quintessence of cool. Now relocated to California, the sound of her band has broadened, lifted, lightened, still influenced by Spector, girl groups, garage rock and the JAMC, but also infused with a shot of sunshine pop. It sounds big and reverby on the garagey ‘Must Be Nice’ but also bubblegum sweet on ‘Candy’, while she also plays the agile pop of ‘Where Do You Run To’ as she’s perfectly entitled to do as she wrote it for the Vivian Girls. With her musical history, I thought she might be hardcore and sullen but she’s actually wide open, chatting amiably and casually imparting the information that she’d eaten her first pie on this tour (“I mean, my mom makes fruit pies, but savoury?” ). It’s another great gig for the memory box but we’ll miss the old Lumi - thank Christ for the Lexington.

Links:
http://www.myspace.com/saintoftherose/stream
http://www.myspace.com/hawnaytroof
http://www.myspace.com/banjoorfreakout