Dear Lara – Cape North EP

Cape North follows on from Dear Lara (David Lan)’s first EP, Plans, which was issued on tape as part of cassette store day last month. While Plans’ charm comes from its simply recorded and intimate feel, Cape North adds xylophone, harmonica and a cello to support the the guitar and voice, which, in spite of being recorded in a caravan rather than the loch-side cabin of Plans, sounds far beyond its means. Both Steven Forrest’s recording and Lan’s have improved, allowing the songs, rather than the timbre, to set the tone.

Although the framework is much the same as Plans, the songs here have a slightly poppier tinge to them. The songwriting progresses in parallel with the EP, with each track slightly improving upon the last, Bookclub and One I Know shining in particular. The vocals sit longingly behind the beat as David slides between notes through more interesting chord progressions and melodies. The delivery, combined with the poppier sensibilities and hints of optimism, implies that, while the subject matter may stem from personal tales, nothing cuts to deep to hinder shrugging the matter off through the songs on display, and this is what gives the EP its inviting charm.

The Twilight Sad – Nobody Wants To Be Here and Nobody Wants To Leave

The opening notes of Nobody Wants To Be Here and Nobody Wants To Leave introduce the album perfectly. The reverberant guitar of Andy MacFarlane starts, followed by Mark Devine’s quick-delayed drums and a simple vocal from James Graham, You’re not coming back, you’re not coming back from this. At the end of this line Johnny Docherty’s bass enters with a similarly low-key manner, but its force is staggering. As the first verse progresses, piano and synth lines enter the fold, creating something that, on paper, could sound dense. Instead, the dynamics build up subtly, before cracking towards the end.

The album takes the most crucial element of change from No One Can Ever Know, the space. The band’s two albums are aggressively in your face. This huge and loud sound is the sonic identity the band became known for, and the huge shift from Forget The Night Ahead to No One Can Ever Know was not due to the keyboards replacing the guitars, it was the less dense, more spacious room that the keyboards gave the band. Nobody Wants To Be Here translates this back to the guitar, stripping the layers and toning down the distortion. The focus is on the quality of each individual part, and their place in the context of the production, creating a whole just as powerful as the first two albums.

With this more subtle dynamic, the band have the ability to impact even harder when necessary. In Nowheres opens remarkably heavy, before increasing levels during the first pre-chorus with a heavily distorted, prominent bass as James coos over the top. The title track begins indebted to My Bloody Valentine, with the guitars taking a more reverberant chordal approach, with very low-in-the-mix drums and a vocal sitting outwith the band. The drums pound in to climax, with counter melodies supporting James before a triumphant trumpet line, reminiscent of The Antlers, tails off.

Overall, Nobody Wants To Be Here is as close to straight indie as The Twilight Sad have come, particularly on I Could Give You All You That You Don’t Want, Drown So I Can Watch and Pills I Swallow, albeit their distinctive and loud take on the style. Despite track titles the album is more optimistic, musically, with James’ lyrics as unsettling as ever (I see you at night and I stare at you, you don’t care for me, move out of the light, still glare at you, look away from me) but at times slightly more direct.

The album is also more melodic, littered with melodies that complement the vocal lines. The aesthetic of No One Can Ever Know has blended with Andy’s guitar from Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters, presumably from touring the guitar-heavy debut back-to-back over the last year. Having already carved out their sound, The Twilight Sad do not need to assert themselves, giving the band a sound of being completely at ease which has created an album devoid of duds, one with an underlying sense of maturity and seamless composition.

Hidden Orchestra, Origami Biro & Poppy Ackroyd at Union Chapel

The Union Chapel is the perfect venue for tonight. Despite the fact it can hold 600 or so, the chapel, due to its layout, always feels intimate. Add to that the hot chocolate, tastefully placed candles, wooden roof and its acoustics and you have one of London’s finest venues. Certainly a huge improvement from Scala, where Hidden Orchestra played this time last year.

Poppy Ackroyd beging the evenings show geared with a Nord electric piano, sequencer and visuals from Lumen. Poppy’s emotive modern classical style is accessible and warm and the balance between her elegant performance and sepia tinged projections make the performance an engaging spectacle. The music, however, never strays too far from the recordings, due to the presence of backing tracks, the violin sounds nasal and cold, meaning the recording lacks the intimate characteristics of last year’s Escapement. We are told that her show on the 20th December at Cafe Oto will be live piano and violin and closer to the the original aesthetic of the recordings, rather than a reenactment of the album. In spite of this, Poppy’s music is always a delight to hear, and encouraging that the title track of new album, Feathers, hold up well against Glass Sea and Rain from Escapement.

Origami Biro stand out tonight for using their own visuals, made with a camera on stage focused on film prints. Their music straddles a point between experimental, drone and post rock, with the use of looped sounds of scrunching plastic and clattering beads hinting at beats, while the music folds together and unwraps to understated moments of bliss. The guitar jumps between chords that are ambiently bowed and slowly strung out, much like Farewell Poetry, whilst the double bass glissandos between notes creating an expressive and powerful sound.

Up until now the visuals have been a pleasant addition to the music, but not much beyond a visual support. As Hidden Orchestra take the stage this seems to continue, but with the screen supported by 12 drum skins that are also projected upon. Throughout the first song the back wall of the chapel quietly lights up with perfectly mapped visuals enhancing the venue’s design. As the set progressed these visuals only improve with Lumen effortlessly lighting up the chapel’s most subtle elements. During Strange the rose window is replicated and kaleidoscopically circles around itself. Hidden Orchestra have always put focus on the visual aspect of their live show, and given the music, this seems wise to add a transformative dimension to their euphoric music. In the past, however, this has never quite met the peaks of the music and not added to their immersive sound. Tonight is different, though, and the audio and visual experiences are perfectly married, each complementing the other.

As for the music, the band feel full of an energy that has been missing over the last year or so, whether this is from the setting, the visuals or the sound is unclear, but in comparison to their last gigs here in London, at Canary Wharf Jazz Festival and Scala, the music shines through in a way that was lost earlier in the year. Whilst on record Joe Acheson is the key mover, live it has always been about Tim Lane and Jamie Graham. Tim’s rigid technique plays perfectly off Jamie’s more loose style, with the duo combining brushes, sticks and beaters and controlling the dynamics of themselves, as well as the band, so well to create a thrilling backdrop of percussion. Long time collaborator Phil Cardwell joins the band for most of the set, while Floex makes an appearance for Hushed, Hidden Orchestra’s remix of Clarinet Factory’s Five Steps and on Dust, where Tomáš Dvořák (aka Floex) replicates Joe’s more laid back playing, taking tonight’s performances away from the sound of the recorded versions, and towards a live identity of its own. The band play a set full of gems, from Spoken to Flight, and end on Strange, only to return for an encore of Antiphon, the energy is consistent and there is never a low point. It’s refreshing to hear a band play this well and interact with their surrounding, both visually and architecturally, as effective as this.

Emily Scott – Stray Light

Emily Scott is an unsung hero so Scottish music. Despite her debut, Longshore Drift, second album, abcdefg…etc…, and third album, I Write Letters I Never Send, coming 17th, 20th and 30th, respectively, in Avalanche’s All Time Best Selling Self Distributed Albums. Between this and her close ties with Fence (King Creosote features on two songs, Heavy Clouds and How The Moonlight), Emily has never quite gained the reception she deserves, which might, in this case, be a blessing in disguise, and allow her to make a bizarrely beautiful record like this.

Emily composed all the music for Stray Light without instruments, only armed with a pen and paper. The results are less immediate, but more rewarding than previous albums. Moments of sheer clarity and breathtaking beauty still preside, particularly on Did You Hear and Underwater, but these moments are disguised amongst string parts that gently meander and modulate their way through the pieces.

The string writing here is incredibly interesting, with the parts sitting truly in the foreground as opposed to the back seat of previous efforts. They form the backbone and at times, an unforgiving accompaniment to Emily’s voice. The body and depth behind this voice, however, pulls through, juxtaposing folk infused melodies with arrangements that have more in common with early twentieth century string quartet writing than they do with folk. This album pushes Emily outside of her comfort zone, creating a completely different album to her last, whilst maintaining the power of her voice and songwriting, which, at 37 minutes, never outstays its welcome.

Eagleowl – Life We Knew

Where It’s At Is Where You Are, or catchy anagram, Wiaiwya, release their 7th and final picture disc of their picture(disc) guide to releasing records, and it comes in the christmasy guise of Eagleowl, a band who’s wintery sound make this the ideal christmas release for the series.

Gone are Eagleowl’s trademark string arrangements and extremely low tempos, with the band instead opting for a more simple take using only guitars, bass, vocals and some low in the mix synth pads, however, the band’s usual beautiful melodies and harmonies shared between Bartholomew Owl and Clarissa Cheong. Life We Knew sits closest to MF from For The Thoughts You Never Had EP, due to its slightly more optimistic outlook than anything from This Silent Year, offering a nice counterpoint to the recently reissued debut.

There are only 77 of these, and are £7 with postage. Snap them up quick!

Casual Sex at Sebright Arms

Glaswegians Casual Sex stop off at the Sebright Arms to promote their new double A side, A Perfect Storm / Pissing Neon. The band hit the stage without supports, which seems to affect the size of the crowd, but the band don’t let this slow them down.

The band’s post punk ethics go beyond the music, which sounds almost like rerecorded Postcard Records sessions (even their label’s name is a reference to an inscription on Orange Juice’s 1980 45, Falling and Laughing, or from a Vic Godard lyric, depending on how you want to look at it). Sam Smith’s chatter, charisma and dance moves are perfected to a tee and complimented by the hodge podge nature of the rest of the band. Guitarist, Ed Wood is like a polite Frankie Boyle, Bassist Peter Masson looks like he’s just washed up on a beach and drummer Chris McCrory seems to be making an appearance from a day job in TOY. In true style the music pulls similarly far flung influences, from punk to disco to pop to dub and never taking itself too seriously, epitmoised by Smith’s tongue in cheek guitar tapping solo.

The set is relatively quick as they rip through the AA, National Unity, Soft School and tracks from The Bastard Beat, but with enough time for an encore of Stroh 80. Especially given the band’s hype, its a shame not to see more people here, but judging by tonight’s performance their audience will only grow.

The Twilight Sad + Errors at Boston Music Rooms

Errors play a brief set to open for The Twilight Sad and are an extremely well chosen support. They share similarities in terms of density of their material and through, in recent years for The Twilight Sad, their use of synths in a guitar dominated post rock field. Errors, however, have a slightly more Krautrock side to them, and tonight, similarly to The Twilight Sad, is an opportunity to test new material from their upcoming album. After opening with Magna Carta, which packs its punch the band try two new songs, one, which is poppier than previous material, and one which is sparsely darker before closing the set with Pleasure Palaces. Errors sound unique and their three-man band make much more noise than most five-man outfits. Not an easy band to follow, unless you are The Twilight Sad that is.

After two sold out shows performing Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters at Hoxton Square Bar & Kitchen, an acoustic matinee at Northampton Square Bandstand and a Drowned In Sound night at The Lexington, The Twilight Sad triumphantly return to London to play their fifth show in a year at Boston Music Rooms. The gig is part of a four date mini tour in anticipation of Nobody Wants To Be Here And Nobody Wants To Leave, which is released via FatCat on the 27th October. The tour is relatively low key and an audience tester for new material, which doesn’t stop the show selling out far ahead of the date.

The set is compromised of six new tracks alongside as many from their back catalogue and opens with the double hitter of the first two singles, There’s A Girl In The Corner and Last January. Despite only being online for a number of weeks the tracks are lapped up and welcomed with as open arms as debut album anthem, That Summer, At Home I Had Become The Invisible Boy. The remaining tracks off the new album hit just as heavily, the dense title track matched by the high volume wouldn’t sound out of place at a My Bloody Valentine gig, Leave The House taking a nod to No One Can Ever Know with its hauntingly spacey synth and the instantly anthemic I Could Give You All That.

James Graham consistently battles the two sides of his character, switching seamlessly between singing delicately and remorsefully to staggeringly powerful and impulsive, looking almost possessed as his eyes roll back into his head. James’ performance and delivery makes him a captivating front man with huge amounts of passion.

What is always impressive about The Twilight Sad is their ability to make such consistently powerful songs that don’t tire considering their relatively constrained palette. Andy MacFarlane almost exclusively employs an overdriven, reverb drenched guitar sound where the chords are bent in and out of tune with his tremolo arm, Mark Devine’s drum parts usually pound different takes on a similar beat as well as the eerie synth sounds and simple bass lines from Craig Orzel Structurally the songs are a balancing act between the soft and the heavy, and you can normally anticipate the change in feel. The band’s true talent is through utilising these trademarks, which work so well live, to make their own sound which they can sculpt, and doing so with such strong song writing. The band could have played for twice as long without boring the audience.

The band, and James in particular, are visibly touched by the reception they generate, particularly for the fifth time this year. Maybe after a string of dates playing Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters back-to-back, playing new material has re-energised the band, and seeing the crowd as enthusiastic as they are to the tracks from the new album is encouraging for fans and band alike. The band have not lost pace, vigour or sight of their goals and it shows. Let’s hope this is translated as effectively to Nobody Wants To Be Here.

Casual Sex – A Perfect Storm

Get this super infectious slice of post punk down your throat. It comes from AA side complemented with Pissing Neon, out on 7″ Monday. From the percussively phased white noise to the ambient synths, guitar lines to harmonies, this is a brilliantly put together song that can’t help evoke the 80s, but without being naff about it. Even the fade out is executed amazingly.

Phantom Band at Oslo, October 1st

“London… our beloved capital!” Rick Anthony gibes. On the surface the band seem to be indifferent to playing, whether it’s here or just in general. They don’t look pleased or proud to be here, just indifferent. Rick does say thank you to the audience for turning up, and that they are grateful to be here. It does sound genuine, and even actually slightly humble. This is, after all, one of the charms of The Phantom Band. However hard they are trying, they manage to pull it off effortlessly. The songs seem to slip out of them, almost by mistake. You know it can’t be as painless as they make it out to be though, nobody can make music this good this easily, can they?

This is really a band who have put in years of effort, whose last album was quite probably their best yet, no mean feat given its competitors, Checkmate Salvage and the mysteriously under-performing follow up (as Rick is keen to point out), The Wants. The set draws mostly from Checkmate Salvage and Strange Friend, opening with energetic The Wind That Cried The World followed by the ridiculously heavy Doom Patrol. The new material holds its own against the old, and is lapped up just as rigorously by the crowd (who are, of course, mostly stagnant, as always in London). Women of Ghent, For you and Clapshot are highlights, with Mr Natural and A Glamour providing the only two additions from The Wants. The setlist does miss the quieter moments, Islands, No Shoes Blues or Atacama would all have made welcome moments of relief and Crocodile feels more like a set opener than the encore closer, the climax leaving you wanting more rather than drained and satisfied. There isn’t a weak song in the set though, and their back catalogue is such that you’d always feel some tracks were left out.

Iain Stewart’s drumming is on top form, switching from disjointed percussive accompaniments to simple, hefty and powerful beats with ease. Duncan Marquiss’ guitar playing also comes to life through fiddling with pedals, playing crushing Rage Against The Machine style riffs and even a few solos thrown in. Both Andy Wake on keyboards and Greg Sinclair feel slightly outside of the core four made of Iain, Rick, Duncan and Gerry Hart on bass. Andy because he is hidden in the dark behind a speaker stack, and Greg because he is behind Gerry, lacks the charisma of the other members, and goes mostly inaudible throughout the gig. The sound does let the band down, not just in the case of Greg’s guitar, but the first half of the gig sounds dry, lacking in a sonic glue to match the band’s onstage chemistry and the bass also sounds inconsistent and at times flappy. The band take these problems in their stride and don’t really seem to bothered by it all, and why should they, the problems don’t detract much from the gig, which feels like a band on the top of their game.

Support came in the form of singer songwriter, Jack Cheshire. His material lacked the band that back him on record, but this is accented by the soundman. As Jack starts the set there is no guitar, which is intermittent throughout and sounds cold and screechy. As the audience starts to fill up Jack is missing intimacy leaving his harmonically jazz inspired songs sounding distant rather than interesting. Even a cover of The Killing Moon by Echo and The Bunnymen  can’t save. It’s a shame, because on a good day in the right venue Jack would have been really nice.

Upcoming Releases

Vashti Bunyan – Heartleap (FatCat) – 6th October

Casual Sex – Perfect Storm/Pissing Neon (We Can Still Picnic) – 6th October

North Atlantic Oscillation – The Third Day (K Scope) – 6th October

RM Hubbert – Ampersand Extras (Chemikal Underground) – 13th October

Insect Heroes – Apocalypto (Lost Map) – 13th October

John Knox Sex Club – TBA (Instinctive Racoon) – 20th October

The Twilight Sad – Nobody Wants to Be Here & Nobody Wants To Leave (FatCat) – 27th October

Jonnie Common – Trapped in Amber (Song, By Toad) – 31st October

Poppy Ackroyd – Feathers (Denovali) – 14th November

Mogwai – Music Industry 3. Fitness Industry 1. (Chemikal Underground) – 1st December

Eagleowl – Clean The Night 7″ (Where It’s At Is Where You Are) – 4th December

Adam Stafford – TBA – Early 2015