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Friday 6th April 2012
All Day BBQ Festival

Sparrow and the Workshop
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The Nuns
Singing Adams
Y Niwl
Colours
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The Windmill
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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”

Latest Forum Posts

Single/Download Review

Crocodiles/ Strange Boys/ Woods/ The Fresh & Onlys/ Small Black/ Washed Out/ Best Coast
Singles roundup

Article written by Ged M - Feb 25, 2010

When John Peel was asked what his favourite year for music was, he always replied that it was the current year and, before that, it was the previous year. There’s wisdom in those words but if you know where to look you can find good evidence that there’s more good music in 2010 than ever. Here’s a sample of good American stuff you can find in the shops.

Crocodiles (label, 7”) cover Dylan’s ‘Outlaw Blues’ in spectacular style, turning it into a woozy, opiated epic but not losing all sight of the original’s melodic kick. If it had been around at the time it would have been perfect playing in the Red Room of Lynch’s Twin Peaks, its backwards-sounding psychedelia creating a weird time-dilation effect. Like Spacemen 3 at their most potent, it creates a brilliant narcotised effect, stoned and spectacular. Myspace

“Stoner blues” is also my first thought on hearing ‘Be Brave’, Strange Boys’ first 7” release on Rough Trade. They play a stripped down, elemental call and response blues, with Ryan Sambol’s indecipherable drawl suggesting he’s necked too much Night Nurse. But while I don’t know what he’s saying, I love the way the words slouch along. The flipside ‘Keys to the Kingdom’ backs this up; with touches of early Beefheart, this is by turns amphetamined and anesthetised blues, sounding giddy then drowsy then suddenly urgent again. After their excellent debut record, it’s great to have new material from them. Myspace

Woods is the house band of Woodsist Records and the work of label boss Jeremy Earl. ‘To Clean’ (Half Machine Records 7”), from their fourth album, is lovely summer pop bookended by snarling feedback, as if The Clean were guesting with Sonic Youth. ‘Rain On’ is closer to the psychedelic folk tag that Woods often receives: sweet, dark, mysterious, melodious, which gets more hypnotic the longer it runs. A gorgeous, doomed pairing. Myspace

Woodsist Records have also released ‘Second One To Know’ from The Fresh & Onlys (Woodsist 7”), one of a pair of songs taken from the rare Bomb Wombs cassette. And a fine pair they are: ‘Second One To Know’ is terrific pop, a little bit Blondie with a touch of early Who stirred in. The only downside is a weird whimper of a fade out, just at the point it should go *bang!* into the glorious final chorus. I flipped it over and the staccato guitar rhythms of ‘Hated or Loved’ made me want to join in singing: “you just gotta have faith!” but it’s not like George Michael, really. Good, fun, garage-infused rock’n’roll. Myspace

On their split single (Lovepump Unlimited 7”), Brooklyn’s Small Black and Georgians Washed Out remix each others’ songs. Small Black have tinny analogue synths and ghost-in-the-machine vocals but the remixed song (the originals of both are on the respective myspace pages) has an intense warmth where most ethereal electronic pop is cool. It reminded me of Radio Dept in a Swedish summer, where they’d thrown off their furs and were making songs in the nuddy. Washed Out’s effort is a more spacey synth-pop; when you start tracing out its wobbling electronic lines it feels like your head begun to throb with fever. Small Black is my preference but both take you interesting places you didn’t know you’d want to visit.

Small Black Myspace
Washed Out Myspace

Best Coast is Californian Bethany Cosentino (with Bobb Bruno), who lists as her influences the Beach Boys, Everly Brothers and Connie Francis. Her sunshine-powered songs are in a clear pop tradition but what she brings is a fuzzy, fundamentalist perspective. The simple beat and stripped back instrumentation of ‘Make You Mine’ (Group Tightener Records, four-song 7”) is primitive, reverb-strewn, garage rock with a flavour of early Blondie, while her take on Brian Wilson’s lovelorn classic ‘In My Room’ bakes the song in the sun until the whole thing becomes ultra-woozy and starts leaking its passion. The simplicity allows the melody to shine through, less being definitely more with Best Coast. Myspace

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