All Time Top 100

Derren Brown - Worthing Pavillion

2008-03-27T18:15:00.000Z

"Psychological illusion, perceptual manipulation and persuasive technique”; devices Brown claims to use to allow him to (seemingly) memorise phonebooks, defeat nine chess Grandmasters at once and even sink 14” nails into Robbie Williams.

Whilst a repeat performance of the latter was sadly never on the cards (excuse the pun) on Wednesday, Brown still turned in a gripping performance; heart-stopping at times, relentlessly eerie and yet brimming with edgy wit and flair.

E9 was the rather ominous number on my ticket when I arrived. It seemed dangerously close to the front. Would I be the one drawn onstage and made to bark like a dog at passing cars for a week? Maybe he’d just erase the whole show from my memory instead?

Mercifully, none of his erratically dispatched Frisbees fell to me, but by the close of the 2 hour show I nevertheless remained rather hazy as to what had actually occurred. I think I saw floating tables, pendulums, Gorilla suits and Brown cold reading thirty plus random participants in quick succession with jaw-dropping accuracy. I was dazzled and light headed. And like most people, grasping at a zillion questions filling the air as we shuffled out. The general consensus seemed to be though, when illusion and theatrics are such sensational, good fun, why bother reasoning?

Neon Neon - Fabric

2008-03-20T18:08:00.000Z

As with Madchester in ‘89 or Big Beat in ‘99, every ten years or so Indie and Dance race towards each other like horny dogs in a park and get straight down to some spirited arse sniffing, only to get whistled apart apologetically by their respective owners after a just the briefest of exchanges. We’re in the thick of one of indie and dance’s most fertile unions in some time and tonight’s ‘Adventures in the Beetroot Field’ gathers a killer line up of bright young things all mining a singularly 2008 style take on this perennial hybrid.

The pairing of Boom Bip and Super Furries man Gruff Rhyss as Neon Neon - making their live UK debut at Fabric tonight - seems slightly at odds with the rest of the line-up. Where the majority of acts on this bill present a spiky, confrontational take on indie-dance, Neon Neon prefer a smoother, streamlined style. Where the young upstarts sing of alienation and urban ennui, Neon Neon deal in romance and humanity. Elsewhere there is grubby 80’s revisionism, with Neon Neon only loving tribute.

Unsurprisingly, the atmosphere in Room2 slightly more sedate than elsewhere as curious musos steadily fill the hall. Nobody’s quite sure what form Neon Neon live will take and with debut LP “Stainless Style”’s list of collaborators reading something like a super savvy Gorillaz cast (Yo Majesty, Spank Rock) you never know who could pitch up to perform.

Opening with “Neon Theme” - Bip on keys and synth drums, Rhyss on guitar alongside bassist Cate Le Bon and a loose limbed drummer in gigantic plane landing headphones - and immediately the atmosphere shifts from Fabric’s typical cold modernism to woozy nostalgia. It’s an incongruous image: a born and bred valley boy, cruising down the strip in convertible, palm trees flapping softly in the breeze but over the course of the first few numbers, to Miami Vice power drums and Kim Wilde style choruses, Rhyss makes it all palatable.

Cate Le Bon takes to the mic for a lush ‘I Lust you’ and remains both graceful and insouciant throughout. As to whether they convince as a unit, the four piece just about pull it off, looking more like the arch new-wave sixth form band than the product of some fated union. But Bip’s having a blast pounding away at his synth drums and though Gryff looks baffled from the start (hell doesn’t he always?) it only adds to the band’s breezy charm.

“Belfast” is delightful towards the end of the set, Gryff’s yearning vocal proving once again he may be one of most emotive vocalists of his generation and when Akira the Don appears for “Sweatshop” it’s humping dancehall rhythm finally gets everyone moving.

Unfortunately it all tails off when the Magic Numbers join on vocals for the last song. Of course, great to get the guests on for a turn but the Magic Numbers are the last band on earth you’d associate with ‘Star Quality’ and as they stand there, hands in pockets, awkwardly chinking beers together it’s a lacklustre finale to an otherwise thoroughly engaging show.

Team Waterpolo - Digital

2008-03-19T17:30:00.000Z

With funky breaks on their intro CD and set of decks and mixer not seen onstage with an indie band since the heady days of Skunk-rock (remember that?) nobody seemed quite sure what to expect as ‘Team Waterpolo’ took to the stage at Digital.

There’s ludicrous hype on the band following just one Moshi Moshi released single, various support tours and some heavy tipping from the big radio players. And after just a handful of songs it was pretty obvious why TW have such a frantic A&R scramble on their hands to boot.

Put simply, they boast an arsenal of outrageously functional pop tunes that it would probably take a team of 12 crack producers to compose. So compact and deadly catchy is each number, you can already hear a frothing Jo Whiley introducing them ahead of the vocal.

However, when this moment comes, I for one will be reaching for the ‘off’ switch rather than the volume knob. And so too will you if the V Festival friendly pap of Kaiser Chiefs, Hard-Fi et al isn’t your bag. For in truth, other than a smattering of dubious ‘dancey’ flourishes, TW offer little to no advance on this unfathomably tired and grindingly irritating strain of mainstream indie.

Chris Rea - Brighton Centre

2008-03-18T17:27:00.000Z

Chris Rea’s promoting his new music book, the story of 50’s band “The Delmonts” who later went on to become “The Hofner Bluenotes” and so divided Monday night’s set into three distinct sections to mirror this story arc.

The first part of the show wherein the band adopted the form of “The Delmonts” was quite frankly, appalling; Shadows-lite instrumentals as toe-curling pastiche replete with utterly tasteless titles displayed on a screen throughout.

There was palpable relief in the air when Rea eventually took to the mic for the straight up blues rock of “The Hofner Bluenotes” but he failed to convert with songs time and time again revisiting stock lyrical themes: God, Devil, Hell, roads, etc. The format did however free him to tear through some blistering slide guitar solos and Rea proved categorically that he still possesses a rich, gravelled voice perfectly suited to the blues.

Things picked up in the latter third of the set with a spirited run through his many hits, but a refusal to properly address or engage with his dedicated audience meant the atmosphere never properly ignited. The end product was a perfunctory performance - strangely soulless and almost stupefying in its relentless conservatism.

Square Roots - Volks Tavern

2008-03-13T17:32:00.000Z

Brighton’s a great breeding ground for would-be promoters. Fuck knows what the stats are but there must be what? 6.29 night clubs per student house? The upshot being: If you know your shit, have got a bit of time on your hands and are blessed with a legion of up-for-it mates you might as well have a crack at putting a night on.

Few young promoters though can compete with the runaway success of upstarts ‘Square Roots’ In 2006 when dubstep was in its infancy, they booked ‘Skream’ for £100; spin on to 2008 and they’ve got all the scene’s heavyweights on speed dial, a succession of packed out nights under their belts and whaddya know? The big boys are knocking. Audio, SE1 and the hyper cool Amersham Arms all, apparently, after a piece of this mouth watering square pie.

And how? Other than a knack for super savvy, forward thinking line-ups, they refuse to limit their programming to one genre. On any given night you’re gonna get grime, electro, ragga, B-more…Basically, anything with a sick bassline. And by God! There are plenty of those here tonight.

From the scene inside the Volks you wouldn’t guess it were a Thursday night, such is the sheer volume of people and hyped atmosphere. Downstairs the STDJs are peddling fierce gutter house and upstairs even though it’s not yet midnight, Hatcha’s rammed the dancefloor with a pulverising selection of re-tweaked 2 step and shuddering sub-sonics. The ludicrous Gramp’s Hifi soundsystem is rattling every rafter of the creaky old Volks and though it sounds like the club could conceivably collapse at any given moment, indeed Western Civilisation itself could be collapsing around us and it wouldn’t stop the party. This is utterly essential, future clubbing.

XX Teens / Hatcham Social / Maths Class – Audio

2008-03-05T22:45:00.000Z

Play it by Ear has had a cracking innings down at Brighton’s Audio, consistently delivering forward thinking line ups of local and national buzz bands that never fail to provoke and inspire. Last Friday’s line up was no exception.

When new rave and post-punk are finally put to rest, (please God – it can’t be long now) no one will remember bands like local lads Maths Class. Their light speed delivery and preposterous material that mashes together mongrel electro and spazzy post-rock marks them out as quite possibly the silliest band on the planet. They’re the musical equivalent of what’s going through your Dad’s mind when he says “You’re not seriously going out like that”. Of course, that’s not necessarily a bad thing if you’re dazzling and daft in equal measure like they are. When they’re not screeching vocals or splattering away at the fret boards and manage to straighten things out with a bit of taut disco to close their set, there’s a glimpse of a far greater band desperately trying to punch its way out a new rave paper bag.

As they’re currently sitting on something of a cult hit - “How to Reduce the Chances of Being a Terror Victim” - most of tonight’s crowd are turned out to see XX Teens who, having endured a recent line up change, turn out to be a beguiling six piece in shirts and ties and beset with an edgy mania. They’re clearly out to confound too and front man Rich Cash remains motionless, expressionless and closeted behind thick sunglasses throughout.

Coupled with their grubby avant garage and thick sludgy kraut rock the studied cool works up to a point. Unfortunately the mask slips when they close with the aforementioned “How to.….”; Cash unforgivably reading its hilarious admonition from a lyric sheet and thereby shattering the band’s precision engineered cool.

‘Band of the Night Award’ then goes to openers “Hatcham Social” an intriguing three piece in bad bowl cuts and cardigans with seemingly no interest whatsoever in the traditional practices of being in a band and, like, playing songs for people. Their material is simultaneously dirge-like, awkward and skewed but there’s something hugely alluring about their complete indifference. Though the solos are only just in key, instruments are abandoned mid song and it appears the last thing they want to be doing is standing on stage, you literally can’t take your eyes off them.

Blessed with a quivering baritone that recalls greats like Morrissey and Edwyn Collins singer Toby Kidd somehow weaves meandering melodies amongst the band’s brittle, skeletal sound and though few of their tunes register in memory, such is deeply peculiar aura projected by the ensemble and the eerie atmosphere their music creates they nevertheless leave a lasting impression like on the night’s proceedings like a deep, rich bruise.

MGMT - Oracular Spectacular

2008-03-05T17:23:00.000Z

MGMT – Oracular Spectacular, Jim Brackpool, 6 out of 10

It’s the dream start for a new band. Maybe you too have lost count of the number of people asking you “have you heard that MGMT single?” That single being “Time to Pretend” the Brooklyn duo’s debut and a strong contender for Single of the Year thus far. Suffice to say, it’s a remarkable opening gambit; instantly recognisable and arcing ever skywards on lift-off chords and an unforgettable screwy lead line. It leaps out the morning radio like some impish electro hippy, splashes about in your Cornflakes and sends you skipping out the front door in the crisp March sunshine like it’s the height of summer already.

You’d be right to expect even more great things then from the album proper and a cursory glance at the track list reveals ambitious galaxy gazing titles like “4th Dimensional Transition” and “Of Moons, Birds and Monsters”; Clearly MGMT themselves have got their sights set slightly higher than a Hard-Fi support tour.

In some respects ‘Oracular Spectacular’ meets their lofty promise. The overall feel of the album is that of a band making music joyfully uprooted from any temporal reference points. MGMT possess a unique ability to skip with ease between various chapters in rock history and the album weaves its way through shimmering psychedelia, noodly prog rock and shiny, radio friendly synth pop. There’s even a brief foray into 80s AOR by way of ‘Electric Feel’ which struts and shimmies like Hall & Oates covering the Stones.

Sadly, opener and aforementioned single ‘Time to Pretend’ is the highpoint and there really isn’t much else on the album to touch it. Though admirably they’ve opted for a sound that’s as stylistically kaleidoscopic as it is so soncially, the end product is a record too often incoherent and meandering.

The lack of focus extends to the songwriting too. Tunes like “The Handshake” and “Of Moons and Monsters” open up and develop pleasantly enough before striking a groove or repetitive pattern and inexplicably clinging on to it. This would be the point at which point you’re preparing yourself to be blasted into this promised 4th Dimension, but disappointingly they wimp out and the tracks fade. It’s irritating because MGMT clearly aren’t short of ideas, they just seem to lack the discipline and judgement to distil them into coherent and rewarding songs rather than sprawling mood pieces.

“Oracular Spectacular” also suffers from a ludicrously over bearing production job courtesy of Flaming Lips man Dave Fridmann. His signature tricks are everywhere: overdriven cut-up drums, vintage delay effects and gratuitous panning dominate each track and whilst it works for the ‘Lips, here it sounds tinny and jarring. It’s almost like neither him nor the band could decide whether it’s an electronic or rock record and in dithering between the two just settled on this awkward middle ground. Overall, it’s a frustrating listen.

Metronomy - Digital

2008-03-03T22:49:00.000Z

Metronomy are shaping up to be one of Brighton’s finest musical exports in recent years. With home hewn records, inspired DIY videos and now a delightfully quirky stylised stage show – think Devo, a lo-fi Kraftwerk or Hot Chip if they could only crack a smile – their growing popularity’s proof that a little flair and plenty of talent can go a heck of a lot further than major label dollar.

Their sound will be familiar to anyone who’s been inside a young person’s nightclub in the last 3 years but there’s none of contemporary electro’s vacuous sensibilities here; just oodles of quality songwriting and tunes crammed with ace ideas like barmy, polka inspired synth lines, crisp R’n’B-esque micro melodies and lashings of party funk falsetto.

Monday’s never a great night for raving but Metronomy quickly won over a sluggish crowd with a witty, inventive and mischievous performance bolstered by some hilarious three man choreography.

3AM - Funky Buddha Lounge

2008-03-01T17:20:00.000Z

It’s fair to say Brighton’s clubbing community hasn’t quite got its collective head around late night raving. Unlike in say, Berlin or New York, even London for that matter, if you’re expecting to still be in a nightclub at 7AM, you generally leave the house a bit later. Not so in Brighton it would seem, where everyone’s in the pub at 8 as per and the late-doors/after party is invariably tacked sloppily onto the end of a normal night of bar and club hopping. It’s rarely a pretty sight…..

So it’s a peculiar atmosphere that greets you on arrival at the Funky Buddha around 3:30AM. An atmosphere certainly NOT enhanced either by the torturous queuing, the needlessly confrontational doormen or the super surly bar staff. Nor the fact that DJ and crowd are attempting an awkward transition from the Funky flavours of the earlier night into the shadier sounds of twilight zone electro.

Nevertheless, resident Ash Huntingdon makes a decent fist of this tricky crossfade, easing the night along with some vocal tracks whilst keeping it fairly bumpy and lady friendly. As the club begins to refill with dirty stop-outs from Audio and Captcha things start to look up. Finally, the scene is set for the Schtumm boys - currently Brighton’s hottest DJ tag team - to see us through till sun up. They don’t disappoint with two and a bit hours of impeccably cool tweaky electro and itchy future house.

By 5AM it’s looking, sounding and indeed, smelling like a proper after hours do and as the hours bleed into each other and the music gets ever freakier, all of a sudden it actually feels like you could be in Berlin or New York; 3AM has finally made good.

Operator Please - Pressure Point

2008-02-26T21:00:00.002Z

There’s no escaping it; Antipodean quintet “Operator Please” are young. Frighteningly young. Like 17-18 young! Yikes!

But whilst they possess power, musicianship and discipline belying their age, their sound is too frequently unfocused and incoherent with many of the songs crying out for some serious editing. Over the course of the set they flitted between charging power pop, string laden ballads and feisty electro pop and it was a slightly uneasy mixture.

Occasionally it all slotted beautifully into place though; 2007’s Single of the Year contender “Song about Ping Pong” crackled with ram-a-lama attitude and potential Bond theme “6/8” built around a gorgeous predatory chord sequence and deep soulful vocals was another standout.

Their youthful joie de vivre won out eventually and trading enthusiastic grins and winks throughout their complete lack of pretence was especially refreshing. Thankfully they’ve as much potential as they do time on their side and we can expect great things from them in the future.

Elle S'Appelle - Barfly

2008-02-20T21:07:00.000Z

Though they lacked the cocksure delivery of woeful headliners “Go Faster” (a band so derivative and contrived they blundered time and time again into outright mimicry) Elle S’Appelle are nonetheless a hugely refreshing young outfit: A boy/girl/boy trio who’ve swapped those jarringly omnipresent Telecasters for sweetly overdriven organ sounds and serve up a barrelling take on indie pop that’s quirky and sophisticated in equal measure.

Their tunes were stuffed with arresting rhythmic detail and blink-and-you’ll-miss-‘em hooks. And whilst the quick fire time changes and sprawling arrangements suggested a considered and methodical approach to their songcraft there was certainly nothing tricksy or clever-clever about its execution.

Jaunty and fizzing throughout they recalled Blondie, Stereolab and a host of classic 60s Girl Groups and ‘Little Flame’ and ‘Monkey Shine’, er, shone, as cracking future singles. Elle S’Appelle are simply irresistible and demand your further investigation.

Cut Copy - Digital

2008-02-20T20:55:00.002Z

Cut Copy are back with a follow up to their cult hit LP “Bright Like Neon Love”. In 2004 their energetic fusion of chugging indie and filtered Frenchy electro was relatively fresh. These days it’s the genre du jour so they’ll need to bring something new to this particular party to stay on the guestlist.

From the off it was evident their aspirations stretch further than the Digital-sized clubs they’ll inevitably be trawling for the next year or so. The new material swapped the incessant repetition of their back catalogue for festival sized choruses and anthemic, ravey production but sadly, to mixed results.

At their best they recalled the exquisite dancefloor driven melancholy of New Order and the bittersweet nostalgia of Phoenix or Daft Punk. At worst, “Pumping Big Room Commercial House” sprang to mind and their set occasionally evoked a cheesy chart dance PA from Bodyrockers or the like in some tacky provincial nitespot. Not cool!

Smashing Pumpkins - O2 Arena

2008-02-18T20:49:00.001Z

There’s consternation whenever a once credible band announces a reformation. Invariably, it’s nothing more than their now desperate leader grasping at the last of their muse or a ride on the cash cow about the festival circuit; concerns made more pertinent when the reformatted band contains just half of its original line up.

Do Smashing Pumpkins, bereft of original members James Iha and D’Arcy Wretzky stand a chance of matching their former incarnation? Visually these two players were integral: flanking towering, tyrannical frontman Billy Corgan like two stately guardian angels, ratifying the band’s otherworldly image and chiming sweetly with Corgan’s lyrical bent and vision of a band heavier than heaven and equally transcendental.

Well, the new line-up barely looks the part but sonically they’re an equal match for Pumpkins of yore. Love it or loathe it, Corgan’s voice remains one of the most distinctive in rock and pushed high in the mix, it dominates throughout. One moment he’s cooing and clucking, the next he’s guttural and rasping like some stroppy mutant toddler chucking sheet metal and lightning bolts out of the pram. Drummer Jimmy Chamberlain’s explosive ‘why hit it once when you can twat it 8 times?’ drumming is as captivating as ever and when the two of them combine to bring “United States” to a shuddering psyched out climax, sadly it proves to be the sole highlight in an otherwise crushingly dreary set.

Lord knows who Corgan thinks he’s playing to but this arena isn’t full of completists and die-hards. Rather, 20,000 old hands who saw the band peak creatively around double album “Mellon Collie…..” Why then, instead of sticking to the anthems and a handful off the new album, do they opt for a set list spanning 18 years of obscure album tracks, soundtrack numbers, B sides, and three covers (including Girls Aloud) thereby alienating the vast majority of the audience?

Half an hour in, everyone realises it’s gonna be a long haul and the atmosphere plummets, never to return. Over the course of 3 hours - save for a sublime acoustic version of “1979” - sludgy riff blurs into sludgy riff and the whole thing quickly becomes tedious and depressing. Even the more familiar numbers are inexplicably retooled, “Today”’s metronomic opening riff is stripped of its chiming music-box quality and “Bullet with Butterfly Wings” is delivered at an ungainly four times the tempo of its recorded cousin.

They encore with an utterly superfluous Echo and The Bunnymen cover (Lips Like Sugar) and by this point people are flooding out of the stalls like heartbroken home fans fleeing the shrill of the final whistle. As Corgan proffers a none more patronising dedication to British music it merely confirms suspicions: Here is a man deeply out of touch with his fans and his band’s heritage and that indeed, is a crying shame.

Stars - Concorde 2

2008-02-05T19:22:00.000Z

Canadian duo Stars stole their way into my record collection by way of 2004 single “Ageless Beauty” and despite checking the right boxes musically (Cocteaus and Prefab Sprout covering Pet Shop Boys in a fuzzy shoe-gaze style? Yes Please!) something about them just didn’t sit right.

I was hoping a live show might persuade otherwise but this wasn’t the case. In polo neck and sensible jeans, frontman Torquill Campbell though achingly sincere throughout, only grated with his jerky histrionics and their guitarist’s bolted on solos too frequently sat on the tasteless side of widdly-woo.

But although they may be hard to love, they are even harder to hate and the strength of most of the material was undeniable; “Elevator Love Song” positively glistened and “Take Me to the Riot” stood out with its thumping Smithsian chorus. A trio of softer numbers captivated in the middle of the set and with the intensity ramped up, the Concorde fell silent and even I had to succumb to their hypnotic charm.

Joe Lean & The Jing Jang Jong - Freebutt

2008-01-31T09:20:00.000Z

Perhaps in these dark days of plummeting sales and label redundancies, bands like JL&TJJJ are but one of only a few bankable options remaining. Every six months or so there’s a new one along with tunes hummable and spunky enough to grace the playlists of Capital and XFM, young and sartorially attuned enough to satisfy NME’s eye-candy quotas and invariably, proffering a sheen of authenticity trowelled on so thick as to dupe your Q guzzling, Tesco album buying 40-somethings into believing they are indeed the real deal. That they could actually be the new Stones, man.

JL&TJJJ, like every other band on this ceaseless carousel of mediocrity, reveal themselves to be a sham in the flesh. And like discovering that not only is the Emperor naked but he also has the word ‘berk’ tattooed across his big hairy arse, tonight’s gig is nothing more than a grim exposé of the gaping, irreconcilable chasm between the quintet’s style and that most elusive of qualities: substance.

Given the ludicrous hype surrounding them at present you could almost forgive them for carrying on like they’re already wrapping up 2008 with a 3 night stint at Brixton, but there can be no excuse for what followed: A 35 minute exercise in rampant egotism and ill-advised self aggrandisement containing therein, a succession of calamitous miscalculations that gave the entire set a toe-curling, watch-if-you-dare vibe set to their own weedy soundtrack of anaemic, characterless indie-garage.

For their opener the band set about a jaunty instrumental, gifting main man Joe Lean a full two minute build up to his entrance. Nothing wrong with a bit of showmanship you might say; but when you’re on your first headline tour playing to ‘please impress me’ crowds on a stage so small it can barely contain your five members the impact of such theatrics is deadened so much as to be laughable. Lean eventually appears centre stage looking rather more like he’s been trapped in the toilet as opposed to timing his entrance to the second from the wings. Across the set his put-on, shambolic between song patter weirdly recalls the twitchy socio-pathic manchild he so accurately portrayed in his recent stint in ‘Peep Show’ as opposed to the enigmatic, strung out Rock God for which he was clearly aiming. Later on, a deeply patronising attempt to stir an audience clap along intro draws all of two pairs of hands reluctantly into the air.

Muscially though they’re not entirely awful, you can hear there’s a degree of craft about the songwriting; debut single “Lucio Starts Fires” zips by like a freshly minted indie floorfiller and follow up “Lonely Buoy” with its frantic stop/start dynamics does at least house a cracking chorus.

But it’s not enough. This is a band so contrived, so predictable and so devoid of any musical imagination they have rendered themselves utterly pointless. Next!

Kick out the Jams - Pav Tav

2008-01-30T21:17:00.001Z

We’re spoilt here in Brighton. Any given Friday you can go rave-crazy in some grotty basement, strut your funky stuff at a classic Soul night or even hit West St for some gruesome charty cheese fest if the mood takes you. Sometimes though, you want a night out that’s just familiar and comfy, like an old pair of socks, or in this case a battered old pair of Converse. You wanna go somewhere where every other record is your favourite and whether by day you’re a beaten down wage slave or a burnt out academic (yeah right!) tonight – you’re a Rock and Roll star. In short, you want an honest-to-goodness indie night, and for music and atmosphere they don’t get much better than KOTJ – back home to roost at Indie Mecca the Pav Tav.

The night follows the classic indie club trajectory. One minute the place is deserted and you’re freezing your nuts off wondering why you didn’t spam out on the couch and get stuck into that Mighty Boosh box set. The next, twenty of your best mates haved piled in, you’re crushed against the bar flapping two fresh tenners about, ‘Young Folks’ is tumbling from the speakers and suddenly, everything is alright in the world.

Long serving DJ Eddie’s teasing everyone onto the dancefloor with a succession of vibey classics and then, just at the right moment he drops a bit of Bloc Party and the whole place goes crackers. KOTJ’s happy mixing up floorfillers old and new - Foals and CSS nestle amongst perennials like Smiths and the Clash - And the flighty mix suits the hugely diverse crowd of lairy students, fancy dressers, mods, and new ravers – it’s a beautiful thing.

Explosions in the Sky - Concorde 2

2008-01-25T16:05:00.000Z

As honours bestowed from Indie Authority on high go, it doesn’t get better than being asked to curate one of ATP’s wildly successful Holiday Camp weekenders. This, coupled with the critical acclaim that met their 6th album, last years ‘All of a sudden I miss everybody’ and the fact they’re presently staring down the barrel of a world tour stretching well into June should give you some idea of the regard in which EITS are held.

It’s fair to say the Texan four piece don’t do subtle. Their sound is wholly instrumental and employs treated twinkling guitars, sweeping chord progressions, quiet/loud dynamics and washes of cavernous reverb to create what to these ears sounds like an overblown post-rock soundtrack to a Disney movie. Mogwai for your Mum, if you will.

Sound familiar? Well yes, there are plenty of bands out there working the same formula but few can compete with the majesty of EITS live. Whilst their records I find are all too frequently sterile and soulless affairs, their precision engineered live show and masterful musicianship was quite something to behold: Each instrument was distinct and purposeful, the material delivered with unerring conviction and concentration and the sound out the front glacial and pristine throughout.

Devoid of any audience interaction beyond a gushingly courteous intro, the show itself was clearly designed to be consumed as a whole. Individual tracks bled imperceptibly into each other, eliciting gasps of ‘Ooh’ and ‘Aaah’ from some quarters of the audience as if they were witness to the firework displays to which EITS sonically aspire. And though they painted from the same palette throughout it never became tiresome as musically there was much to enjoy. Each track developed like a mini symphony, crammed with diversions and explorative passages, its layers unfurling over time with increasing beauty and complexity like some exotic plant in bloom.

They wrapped up one of the latter tracks with some sensational choreography, the three guitarists to the front of the stage quite literally beating the life out of their instruments. As they limped offstage looking utterly drained both physically and mentally it seemed both rude and pointless to clamour for more: EITS it appeared, had already given us their all.

Vampire Weekend - Hoxton Bar & Grill

2008-01-22T15:57:00.000Z

The word in the bars around East London is that the Vampire Weekend gig at the Bar and Grill is the hottest ticket in town tonight. As it transpires, hot is very much the operative word: Such is the demand to catch the ascendant NYC four-piece, the promoters appear to have oversold the venue’s capacity by at least three times and as a result it’s sweltering inside; Literally rammed to the rafters with tipsters and industry all jostling for place.

There’s no easy way to put this: Vampire Weekend appear to be directly influenced by Afro-Beat. Not just Afro-Beat but Calypso, Soca and Ska and there’s more than a whiff of Stuart Copeland about their gangly, indispensable drummer Christopher Tomson. But don’t reach for your rifle or sick bag just yet, if you’re anticipating a Gracelands style cultural car crash you’re way off the mark. For like contemporaries Yeasayer and Dirty Projectors, Vampire Weekend have found a way to artfully channel these more exotic influences into a recognisable indie template, rough it up to give it a crisp post-punk edge and then deliver it live with the deep percussive punch of a carnival soundsystem.

They open with “Mansard Roof” and from the off easy to see why they got the hipsters in such a lather towards the end of last year. It’s like a blast on an especially potent mint, airy, arresting and utterly fresh in every sense of the word. Clattering, syncopated drums push up against a simple one note bassline, creaky organ parts drift about the mix and the whole thing is topped off with an irresistible nursery rhyme-like melody.

It takes them a couple of numbers to properly loosen up but from there on in, each number is characterised by a delightful rhythmic bounce and swing that sets them apart from every other indie band on the planet. Drummer Tomson, plays like he’s got six arms and eight legs and vocalist/guitarist Ezra Koenig wraps his charming yelp and croon about every note, simultaneously displaying a way with a melody that would have Macca grasping at the notepad and pen.

Sadly the set sags a little towards the end. A run of tunes stick to a now all too familiar arrangement and with brevity the order of the day, after a while, you do find yourself craving something a little meatier to chew on.

But things pick up again with “One” which, bolstered by an impossibly skippy drum break, were it not for the sardine-like conditions would surely have inspired all out freaky dancing. They close with “Walcot”, sadly not inspired by Erikson’s ill fated 2006 squad but nevertheless the closest this band will ever get to ‘anthemic’ and though not quite as distinctive as the remainder of their oeuvre, surely it will be inescapable a year from now.

Mum - Concorde2

2007-12-11T22:59:00.000Z

Some neat parallels can be drawn between Iceland’s unique geography and its three biggest musical exports: If Björk represents something of its otherworldly atmosphere and outsider status and Sigur Rós evoke the stately grace of its sweeping landscape; perhaps then Mum, with their deft blend of post-rock, electronica and pastoral instrumentation, recall its rich folk tradition and magical lore?

It must have been this and the C2’s proximity to the sea that gave this mesmerising gig its weirdly nautical feel. The majority of their melodies were delivered on melodica or violin and with a more organic feel about them than their characteristically electronic records, Mum’s synthetic sounds seemed to lap about their plaintive motifs like digital shingle or groan softly in the background like the creaking timber of some ancient vessel.

Swaddled in thick jumpers and hats throughout, the audience gifted the septet an atmosphere of hushed reverence; the band duly responded with an hour of exceptional dynamic control and bewitching, timeless music.

Crowded House - Brighton Centre

2007-12-08T23:03:00.000Z

Pale denim, chinos and practical fleeces abounded in the Brighton Centre on Friday night. The usual fiver-flapping, dog-eat-dog scrum at the bar was replaced by a sedate shuffle more akin to a country pub than a gig and once inside the arena, the most powerful stimulant you were likely to find yourself caught downwind of was an extra-strength Strepsil.

But you wouldn’t go to see Crowded House expecting sweat soaked walls and a life changing rock n roll experience. You’d go to hear some of the most beautifully crafted guitar pop of the last century, delivered by way of some faultless musicianship and lashings of on stage bonhomie. In this regard, Crowded House absolutely did not disappoint.

The subtle shifts in tone and ambiance that characterise the songs of Neil Finn so effortlessly evoke the complexities of modern love that even a soulless hangar like Brighton Centre soon enough feels warm and intimate like a cosy living room when commandeered by The 'House. Powerless to resist, a third of the way through, large sections of the audience trapped up in the stalls flooded down to the front not only to get closer to the band, but, you sensed, to get a little closer to each other too. And from there on in it was plain sailing for the reformed New Zealand 4 piece.

Initally Finn’s voice sounded a shade more weather-beaten than you might remember. And though this seemed to suit the lived-in feel of much of the older material, come the latter half of the set, it was virtually flawless with Finn wringing every workable nuance and subtle vocal flourish from songs he must have been singing for some 25 years now. The band went the distance with a six song encore, soliciting requests for obscurities from their back catalogue as they went, and by their curtain call even the most hardened of cynics (i.e. me) couldn’t deny the warm fuzzy feeling the band had left us all with.

Lethal Bizzle - Concorde2

2007-12-03T23:16:00.000Z

I’m looking around Brighton’s Concorde on a miserable Wednesday night and there appears not to be a soul in here below the age of 21. But if this is a snapshot of youth culture in 2007 then it would seem to be in rude health and fair play to Lethal Bizzle, for there can’t be many artists with - as the man himself might say - pulling p-p-power enough to unite this many youthful tribes under one roof. Seriously, they’re all here: Would-be gangstas in the staple cap’n’hoody combo trade handshakes with scary looking lads in cheap sportswear and John Terry crops, whilst dolled up R’n’B birds with massive hoop earrings rub shoulders with feral packs of nu-ravers minesweeping for unattended lagers in lurid day-glo T-Shirts. Truly, it’s a sight to behold.

So how has this happened? Well, there’s no cynical marketing ploy at work here and over the course of two albums, Bizzle (I hope no one minds me calling him ‘Bizzle) has effortlessly straddled Grime, UK Hip Hop, Indie, Grindie (remember that?) and mainstream R’n’B purely by BEING Bizzle: A spirited and gregarious, hulk of a man who’s clearly having the time of his life. Many are calling him the face of UK Hip Hop 2007 and after a summer of profile grabbing festival slots and some classic rock/rap crossover doings by way of recent collaboration with hardcore upstarts “Gallows”, these days you’re just as likely to find him in NME as you are on The Box or Radio 1.

Of course Bizzle knows all this and he’s totally at ease working a diverse crowd. In fact, he happily exploits it, referring to the melee before him throughout as a ‘mosh pit’; words, which let’s face it, you don’t hear at many Hip Hop shows.

Musically there’s not much going on beyond his DJ cutting out the backing tracks to let the crowd holler the words back and Bizzle, assistant MC, DJ and an onstage security goon / towel dispenser / camera phone operator stick rigidly to the classic Hip Hop show format. But no one seems to mind as they roll out all the tried and tested tricks; getting all the ladies to scream or splitting the crowd down the middle for a bit of call and response silliness. And Bizzle was obviously in his element displaying a unique warmth and likeability to his adopted strain of braggadocio.

They manage just over 35 minutes with breakthrough single POW! getting a second outing by way of an ‘encore’. But artists with nine times the repertoire and twelve times the talent have taken the atmosphere in the Concorde from rowdy anticipation to morgue-like sterility in just two numbers. Not so with Bizzle – his show’s just one huge, big hearted, party. And EVERYONE’s invited.

Dirty Projectors - The Hope

2007-11-27T22:56:00.000Z

Many bands claim to sound like ‘nothing else out there’ but usually they offer little more than a slight variation on staples like Razorlight / Strokes or whatever the genre du jour may be. Clearly, bands like this cannot have heard of Dirty Projectors, a Brooklyn based boy/girl quartet bursting with character, invention and sensational musicianship.

Theirs is a complex, exotic sound that draws on Afro Beat’s clipped guitar lines and tricksy rhythms and mixes it with plunging dubwise basslines and intermittent blasts of furious, white-knuckle guitarring. They deftly mixed the soulful with the cerebral; the girls’ pitch perfect R’n’B eqsue backing vocals providing the perfect counterpoint to frontman Dave Longstreths’ strangulated croon.

Songs gradually knitted themselves together out of seemingly disparate scratches of guitar and the sprawling arrangements and restless shifts in tempo and dynamics meant the hour long set was akin to getting lost in some kind of musical Alladin’s cave; thoroughly disorientating but magical and hugely rewarding at every turn.

Hot Hot Heat - Pavilion Theatre

2007-11-22T22:52:00.000Z

Back in 2004, Hot Hot Heat were the only band on the planet capable of transporting me into the mind and body of a 16 year old girl. The faintest whiff of indie disco perennial ‘Bandages’ or indeed anything off their peerless debut “Make Up the Breakdown” and I’d be swooning, giggling and writhing in glee.

I arrived at the Pavilion Theatre on Wednesday in the foulest of moods (as anyone with but a passing interest in Our National Game can probably work out why) praying that Canadian five piece would deliver and whisk me back to simpler, happier times.

To their eternal credit, they succeeded. Each song crackled and fizzed with wired poppy energy and drenched in sweat from song two in, vocalist and consummate showman Steve Bays preened, posed and strutted about the stage, tossing his mic and substantial curly mop about like a distinguished graduate from Frontman Finishing School. Sighing, once again, I was in heaven.

Caribou - Audio

2007-11-16T22:51:00.000Z

With writer/producer Dan Snaith in control, on record Caribou are both majestic and magical, each track rich in atmosphere and heady melodies. But honestly, what is the point of re-rendering painstakingly crafted material like this live when the only enhancement seems to be playing it four times louder? Audio’s unforgiving, boxy acoustics are notoriously unkind to drummers and my heart sank at the sight of not one, but two drum kits set up at the front of the stage. Sure enough, virtually all Caribou’s nuance and swirling atmospherics were buried beneath a battery of rattling snares and sibilant cymbals.

Delivery of a record like this year’s “Milk of Human Kindness” with a full live band work when the songs - should there be any - are given centre stage as opposed to the sonics. But Thursday's set was largely instrumental and the weak vocals and songs themselves nowhere near the quality required to fully engage in this context. Each tune drew from the same sonic palette and with little variation in pace the whole thing became exceptionally dreary. Mid set, the majority of the audience could scarcely be bothered to remove their hands from their pockets to applaud and with the band also looking distinctly unmoved by their performance they certainly deserved the dreary reaction.

They almost redeemed themselves with a gorgeous ‘She’s the One’ its spectral harmonies and gentle chug providing some much needed respite from the relentless percussive attack. A wigged out kraut-esque encore eventually stirred the audience from their slumber, but it was too little too late. A massive, massive disappointment.

Digitalism - Concorde 2

2007-11-15T23:11:00.000Z

Unless you’re a jobbing DJ or die-hard enthusiast you could be forgiven for thinking Dance music had died on its all too bloated bottom in 2003. But something was stirring in Europe; A scuzzy, uncompromising sound fusing Daft Punk’s elementary future-funk, Soulwax’s smash and grab electroclash and the punk-disco dynamics of New York stable DFA. Among its premier exponents were Wednesday’s Concorde 2 headliners: Digitalism.

There wasn’t much to look at on stage and the young German duo were largely obliterated by their retro/futurist projections and retina scorching strobes. Furthermore, beyond the odd crack at an electric drum kit and a couple of turns on the mic there was little to stimulate or engage like a traditional live band set up would.

But what they lacked in showmanship they more than compensated for with their electrifying sonics, flaunting a total mastery of rich distortion, pummelling drums and searing analogue synths. The set was exceptionally well paced too, front loaded with the melancholia that defined their recent debut LP and rounded off with a punishing acid climax. Naturally, total pandemonium ensued.

Positive 15th Birthday

2007-11-15T22:17:00.000Z

It’s virtually impossible for anyone under a certain age (let’s say 33) to fully appreciate the seismic impact acid house had on British culture in the late 80s and early 90s. I’m quizzing Darren, Positive’s founder, anchor and man of 10,000 fascinating stories on this, Positive’s 15^th Birthday, about what it was really like back then.

“Jobs were shit, money was shit, TV was shit, music was shit, pubs were shit and the clubs even worse”, he states emphatically. “We had to make our own entertainment”

Darren cut his teeth on the free party scene at its very origins, but before too long the gangsters and dodgy dealers moved in on the nascent scene, everything got a bit too edgy and as a result, Darren bailed out. But the parties continued to thrive without him and eventually Darren’s mates persuaded him to get involved again and pick up where he left off.

This time around though he swore it would be different: Co-operation – as opposed to confrontation – with the police and local authorities was encouraged, party sites would be cleared and tidied the day after, fences would be repaired and participation, respect for your fellow raver and indeed, non-raver would keep out the unsavoury elements. Thus ‘Positive’ in both name and ideology was born.

Initially the club nights were just a means to raise funds for what Darren intended to be ‘the biggest soundsystem in the country’ but as dance music gradually seeped out of the fields, squats and warehouses into mainstream culture and clubs, Positive’s winning combination of free party vibes within the cosy and infinitely more convenient confines of the local nightclub meant punters just kept coming back for more.

Make no mistake – 15 years of partying and promoting in the turbulent, notoriously fickle and cut throat business of dance music is an incredible achievement so how have they lasted? Much of Positive’s appeal comes from its sense of history and place in the acid house pantheon. To boot, its legacy is the continual upholding of the principle tenets of acid house: Not for profit, inclusive parties for bass-loving hedonists.

By sticking doggedly to this simple manifesto Positive have created a kind of Rave Neverland where nobody really grows up and you can see it in the way the crowd interact tonight. Hugs, smiles and handshakes are exchanged left right and centre – the typical conversation running along the lines of “Mate haven’t seen you since Ovingdean 2004” or “Weren’t you at Black Rock in June?”; everyone greeting each other like Acid Alumni at some class of ‘89 reunion.

Of course another key factor in Positive’s longevity is their willingness to gradually tweak the formula and musically, over the years the Positive sound has taken in everything from Jungle (WAY back in day) to deep, soulful House. These days it’s mainly about the bumpy, trippy tech-house that soundtracks the naughty parties and the tough tech-funk sound they’ve helped popularise in the UK, regularly bringing scene heavyweights like Meat Katie and Elite Force to their bi-monthlies at Audio.

Tonight, Positive’s core residents take turns spinning their own readings of the Positive sound. Simon Atkinson is up first with the punchy, techy tackle that defined their legendary nights at Concorde 2 circa 2003/4 and Kooki follows with his hugely inventive and distinctive sound that somehow rolls steppy breaks, Switched-up house and tech-funk into one seamless bass heavy ride.

Their talismanic semi-resident Dave Mothersole closes proceedings with a typically dexterous blend of more international tech house sounds, throwing the occasional electro fourish into the mix.

The party moves on to Funky Buddha after Audio and once the stragglers from the Buddha’s early show have been replaced with the Positive faithful things REALLY get going. Suddenly, the sun’s up and eveyone’s spilling out onto the sea front. But the party doesn’t stop there with the truly hardcore heading off to a house party that, incredibly, is still rocking at 6AM the following morning.

But after all these years you’d expect nothing less from them. Positive Sounds – at it for ages but still going strong.

Holy Fuck - Pressure Point

2007-11-14T22:45:00.000Z

Really, you wouldn’t go see a band calling themselves Holy Fuck expecting choral recital or earnest folk strumming. And whilst there is more melody, colour and playful charm to Holy Fuck than their gung-ho name suggests, there’s not operational band with a moniker that so accurately transcribes one’s internal monologue when in thrall to their live sound.

They manned the stage with bassist, drummer and two hyperactive electronics operators who tweaked and hammered a succession of wonky Casios and FX pedals. And devoid of the omnipresent glow of a laptop it was immensely refreshing to hear synthetic sounds emanating from a stage where there was evidently more going on than someone perhaps updating their Facebook status.

Lord only knows how they kept it all together - but the organised chaos approach only enhanced the experience and HF treated a Pressure Point packed with grinning, wide-eyed hipsters and tipsters to an hour of trippy, motorik electronica and pulverising dance-rock that moved both the heart and the feet. Awesome in every sense.

Sons and Daughters - Pressure Point

2007-11-07T22:37:00.000Z

Alternating between old and new material, ‘Sons and Daughters’ showcased the more muscular, grandiose tones of their forthcoming second album with infinitely more confidence and commanding stage presence than I remember them having a couple of years back. Looking every bit like the coolest gang in town from some 50s B-Movie, they took to the stage with quiffs, braces, and vintage gear intact.

Theirs is an unashamedly retrogressive sound that draws on blues, rockabilly and wiry country and fuses it with the barrelling energy and foot-stomping righteousness of garage. And despite a few early tour technical hitches, each song was delivered with unerring conviction; driving, sultry and tourniquet tight.

Indeed they are an eminently watchable band, each of the four of them boasting distinct and compelling on stage personalities. I was captivated throughout by bassist Ailidh Lennon who tottered and swayed like some otherworldly porcelain figure on the cusp of fainting whilst simultaneously dispensing with snaking, sultry basslines so deep and resonant they utterly belied her slight frame and icy composure.

Battlejam - Audio

2007-11-05T22:29:00.000Z

In the beginning there was hip hop. And there were two turntables and a microphone. And with these most rudimentary of tools the pioneers created an entirely new form of music and with it, a lifestyle that to this day, endures as one of our most pervasive manifestations of popular culture.

That the basic decks/mixer/mic combo still forms the backbone of most hip hop shows should set a few alarm bells ringing. Where, you might ask, is the next generation of MCs and turntablists taking the template and twisting it into new and exciting forms? Well, it’s happening right here in Brighton at Battlejam.

A handful of MCs and DJs man the stage as you would expect but their interaction and on the spot improvisation is far from traditional. Cutting edge digital decknology allows UK DMC Champ JFB to sample up the MCs and instantly loop and scratch their vocals alongside his existing breaks, effectively creating fresh beats and tunes on the spot. Likewise, resident beatboxer Beardyman juggles a series of FX units at his feet, looping and layering crunching beats, belching B-lines giving the whole show the semblance of some hyped gig/club/block party combo.

The tempo is by no means limited to hip hop either. Skippy ragga, jump up and breakbeat all get a look in, even a blast of jacking electro house – albeit one concocted, on the spot by Beardy comin’ atcha like some rave Rory Bremner.

There’s so much to enjoy here – stonking atmosphere, bang-up-for-it crowd, and in its relentless innovation the distinct notion that there’s something very special and potentially enormous taking shape right here on our doorsteps.

Animal Collective - St. George's Church

2007-10-29T22:33:00.000Z

So called as their number is more a carousel of contributors than a fixed line-up, ‘Animal Collective’ have long reigned as one of the hottest tickets in experimental music. God only knows what Sunday night’s congregation would have made of their performance in St. George’s Church on Monday for it was pretty far removed from a conventional live show.

But the hallowed setting suited their sprawling, euphoric sound and as on record, their harmonised vocals evoked the redemptive, hymnal qualities of prime-time Brian Wilson. Beneath this, three of their personnel set about deconstructing their repertoire by way of banks of electronics and each song was reproduced as a spectre of its recorded cousin - crushed into a millions of tiny pieces and re-assembled on the fly as flickering, pulsating loops.

It was an intense and disorientating experience but as soon as I stopped thinking about how it was made, or what it all meant, one that I was more than happy to surrender myself to.

Los Campesinos - Komedia

2007-10-24T22:10:00.000Z

Really, your love for Los Campesinos is going to depend entirely on where you sit on the Indie 1 to 10 scale. Say you’re a 1 - proud owner of Shine compilations 3 and 4 / went to see Oasis at Knebworth / regularly sport a Kooks T-Shirt – you’re probably going to find their twinkling glockenspiels, scratchy guitars and nagging synth lines pretty jarring.

If, however, you’re closer to a 7 or 8 - you know all the staff in Rough Trade by name / Jeffrey Lewis sleeps on your floor when he comes to town / you are in a band (extra point here if you release your own music on hand made 7”s) – Los Campesinos’ brand of righteous indie ire, raggedy arrangements and unabashedly twee stylings will probably appeal a little more.

The Cardiff Uni based septet know a thing or two about this here Indie 1 to 10 scale: ‘International Tweecore Underground’ namechecks a handful of alt.heroes it’s actually OK NOT to like (Black Flag’s Henry Rollins and Fugazi’s Ian Mackaye) and by turns their songs rail against mainstream, NME endorsed indie, misogyny in the music press, the affected keytar posturing of their so-called peers and self-obsessed stars both mirthless and excessively earnest in delivery. Easy targets you might think but there’s enough wit, invention and lyrical twists and turns here to keep you guessing and indeed, chuckling throughout.

Live, their’s is a messy, clattering sound that chucks about violins, keyboards and boy-girl vocals with all the slapdash glee and joyful abandon of a pre-school music group let loose in a guitar shop. And this is no bad thing, for what they lack in polished musicianship they more than make up for with infectious energy and barely concealed delight at finding themselves two weeks into the biggest national tour of their career - their first outing since graduating in June. Eye contact and joyful grins are exchanged across the stage throughout the show and frontman Gareth happily extends his lyrical thrust to the between song banter. Describing the progress of the tour so far, all fine apparently until they hit Birmingham that is when, gasp! a Hard-Fi T-Shirt is spotted amongst the front row!

They dispense with a succession of what sound like mini-anthems in waiting – ‘You and Me Dancing’ eliciting an especially rapturous response - and in a none-more Indie display of solidarity, support act You Say Party We Say Die! join them onstage at the encore for a bout of co-ordinated hand jiving. When 99% of bands can barely crack a smile on stage, let alone choreograph an inter-band boogie you - as Los Campesinos so often do – have to question their motivation. Perhaps they’ve all forgotten this being in a band lark is, like, supposed to be fun?

Gravenhurst - Freebutt

2007-10-16T22:25:00.000Z

Listening to their Warp released latest album ‘The Wasted Lands’, you’d be forgiven for thinking Gravenhurst may have stopped buying records in 1994, so heavily is it steeped in a pooling of styles from the more cerebral end of the indie spectrum; Shoe-gaze, post-rock and Smithsian melancholy all getting a look in. Really though this is no bad thing as Gravnehurst are currently sitting on one of the finest albums of the year; a bona fide future classic that positively oozes quality, class and craft.

Originally Gravenhurst was the experimental folk project of vocalist Nick Talbot, now they’re expanded to a four piece and the quartet’s flawless, measured playing and precise dynamic control brought the songs to life with arresting clarity. Relentlessly haunting and mournful, they combined circling riffs, slo-mo arpeggios and Talbot’s sombre, pillow soft vocals to great effect, punctuating songs with blasts of intense white noise and scorching feedback.

Talbot is far from your conventional frontman, songs are introduced with a matter of fact sneer and the set is delivered with all the pizzazz of an attended rehearsal. But when you’ve mastered music this moving and intense there really is no need for tacky showmanship.

Maps - Barfly

2007-10-16T22:11:00.000Z

Maps, then: Too synth-poppy for the Indie set, too Indie for your electronica types, way too twee for the hipsters and quite possibly too ‘out-there’ for the mainstream. It’s a tough one. And really, would they be here tonight without their shortlisting for this year’s Mercury? For sure it’s given them a sufficient boost in profile to embark on a nationwide tour of this scale. Not that “We Can Create” doesn’t deserve a bit of recognition - it’s a unique and occasionally innovative record. Unfortunately it’s just not a particularly tasteful one; sickly, cloying and all too often sounding like the drippy electronica that features on the demo pages of geek-tech magazines like Future Music.

Expanded to a four piece for live purposes Maps take to the stage to the strains of Surgeon’s seminal, drone-tastic remix of ‘Mogwai Fear Satan’ and it’s a neat summation of writer/producer/singer James Chapman’s various reference points - bit of shoe gaze here, a bit of electronica there, synth driven and densely layered like a compacted symphony. As an opening gambit it’s a pretty bold statement, but the band make a decent fist of replicating the album for live consumption. A live drummer gives the record’s sequenced breaks the requisite shuffle and Chapman’s otherwise weedy vocals are gifted a celestial sheen by way of some subtle digital trickery.

Kick drums and bass lines ride high in the mix and each number leaps from the system like a buffed and streamlined club track. Eventually, with a majestic “It will Find you” - its heartbreaking chord sequence and pulsating bass line simultaneously dark and dreamy like prime-time prog-house - things finally began to slot into place. Throughout the venue everyone’s gently nodding and swaying, couples are embracing and the hitherto soulless Barfly assumes the ambiance of a packed festival tent at THAT moment on the Saturday evening. You know, that point when everything starts to go a bit woozy and trippy? It’s a beautiful moment, man.

Head bowed and eyes shut tight throughout , Chapman displays all the showmanship of a remedial school child; ambling about the stage between songs and generally looking like he’d much rather be at home in front of the sequencer with a pot noodle than onstage facing a row of freakish superfans. But come the end of the set, this apparent indifference reveals itself to be nothing but honest to goodness humility and you have to consider what the alternative would be: A pompous, preening front man, relentlessly emoting and exhorting you to feel their pain coupled to music as stirring and cinematic as this? It would be like Bono fronting a trance version of Keane. And nobody wants that. This will do for now.

Tuung - Komedia

2007-10-10T22:20:00.000Z

Over the course of 3 acclaimed albums, Tunng have succeeded where many before them have failed, creating a distinctive and cohesive sound that combines both acoustic instruments and synthesised textures. On record these disparate sounds are skilfully and often imperceptibly merged. Live, however, this marriage wasn’t quite so successful.

Their whirring, skittering drums frequently felt disembodied and alien, clipped vocal samples sat too loudly in the mix - so often as to be downright intrusive - and some of the subtle sonics of the recorded versions were replicated with some fairly predictable preset synth sounds, destroying much of the character they gave the songs in the first place.

My attention wandered too during the more repetitive material which was tied to an all too formulaic pattern: Skeletal arpeggios were layered like pseudo-sampled loops whilst the four vocalists embellished in close harmony. The overall result little more than drab and sketchy folky mantras.

Their more uptempo material faired far better though. When underpinned by a gentle 4/4 chug, Tunng evoked the insistent thrum of a distant rave over the horizon – albeit one emanating from the Acoustic tent rather than the Dance tent. When this was blended with a bit with a dash of drama the results were startling; ‘Take’ off latest album ‘Good Arrows’ came at you all stalking and sinister, like some distant cousin of Orbital’s ‘The Box’.

Combining the plaintive, austere and celebratory across the set overall made for a satisfying, well rounded show and playing up to their strong Brighton ties, it didn’t take much to win over the partisan crowd who gamely clapped along with the band before whooping and hollering for more.

Jack Penate - Old Market Theatre

2007-10-07T22:12:00.000Z

Back in Jauary Jack Penate was just one of a clutch of bright young LDNnners swept up in Lilly Allen’s straight talking slipstream. Nine months later and Penate is enjoying a degree of mainstream success with a fistful of punchy singles sitting pretty in the upper end of the daytime radio charts.

It’s not difficult to see Penate’s appeal, blessed as he is with dashing looks and positively bristling with charisma on stage. To boot, his particular brand of hooky, stop-start guitar pop manages to straddle Rockabilly, Blue-eyed soul and honest to goodness Indie giving him genuine cross-generational appeal.

Apparently Penate’s not been to bed in the last 24 hours but other than some rambling between song banter you wouldn’t have guessed it as he bounded across the length and breadth of the Old Market’s ample stage, spanking the life out of a newly acquired Telecaster with some white-knuckle rhythm playing.

Sadly though the lack of solo instruments, characterless workaday style of his backing band, relentless jangling and frenetic pace at which the bulk of the material is delivered all become a little wearing.

There is some respite in a delicate reading of ‘My Yvonne’ during which Penate proved he possesses a voice of some depth and versatility. So why such a compelling performer and skilled songwriter is sticking so rigidly to one stylistic template is both a mystery and a shame.

Foals - Komedia

2007-10-02T22:32:00.000Z

If last night’s line up at the Komedia represents anything approaching a snapshot of Indie Brighton 2007 then the scene is indeed in rude health. Everyone knows that periodically, Brighton is capable of throwing up a pop phenomenon or crossover act to fly the flag, but can anyone recall a time when 3 home-grown bands, each one ‘export ready’ to use industry parlance and – whisper it – ‘cutting edge’ have occupied the same bill at one of the town’s premier venues?

OK, so Foals actually originate from Oxford but only on arrival in Brighton did they stabilise their line up and hone the sound that has had them touring the provinces, festivals and in some cases – house parties and kitchens of the UK for the last year. So last night was both a homecoming and a send off of sorts for both Metronomy and Foals who head out on a major nationwide tour together this week.

Maths Class were first on though and struggled with the early doors; their twin frontmen seemingly more interested in ruffling and restyling their preposterous hairstyles and writhing self-conscientiously than fully engaging the crowd. Metronomy faired much better and ignited the atmosphere with a deft mix of Krauty tick-tock techno, wonky wistfulness and seasick Cardiacs style synth lines.

Sensing there was something of a party on the cards Foals duly rose to the occasion and from the off the stage was a blur or whirling guitar necks and flailing limbs, each member twitching and convulsing to the band’s metronomic throb.

Their’s is a neat, wholly contemporary take on indie-dance that fuses the pulsating, dirty disco of !!! with the measured menace of Mogwai. Indeed, Foals have much in common with traditional post-rock, such is their mastery of desolate atmospherics and sparse, graceful interplay.

But last night they more than proved their ability to concoct live dance music for both the head and the feet, inspiring a disco mosh pit the traditionally stuffy Komedia will not see the likes of for some time yet. Things reach boiling point with a searing reading of ‘Mathletics’ and as the venue empties nobody doubts they’ve just witnessed a truly special band taking flight.

Robyn - Audio

2007-10-01T22:36:00.000Z

Robyn was a child star in her native Sweden at 13 and despite scoring an international hit in 1997 with ‘Show Me Love’ she’s never really converted, batted repeatedly between majors attempting to mould her into whichever unit shifting pop tart was hogging the charts at the time.

Things changed in 2003 when she fell in with fellow Swedes ‘The Knife’ and producer Klas Ahlund. Sensing her moment had arrived, she piled her life savings into her eponymous LP and set up her own ‘Konichiwa’ label to release it on. A bit of a gamble then, and one that despite a fistful of acclaimed festival appearances and the patronage of heavy hitters Rob Da Bank and Jo Wiley, a gamble that is yet to pay off - the mega stardom for which she was tipped in January apparently some way off yet.

It’s surely just a matter of time though and Robyn clearly felt she had a point to prove at Audio on Wednesday. She bounded onstage and from Go to O was ducking and weaving like a Vegas prize-fighter, tossing her perfectly coiffured mega fringe about and working the entire crowd from left to right. She looked every bit the platinum pop star and sung like one too, her vocals pitch perfect throughout. She’s blessed with a versatile and hugely expressive voice, kissing you off one minute with all the insouciance of the coolest kid in the playground nicking your lollipops and kicking sand in your face. Then the next, she’s got you sobbing into your pint pot with impassioned tearjerkers like “With Every Heartbeat.”

Her signature track ‘Konichiwa Bitches’ was the highlight of the set: a perfect synthesis of the cutesy, lithe and the deadly, and it packed a substantial lyrical punch with its torrent of biting put-downs and sensational bombast. Brutal in its high impact minimalism, her drummer deftly layered up its tight, precision-point percussion until the whole venue was writhing and grinding as one.

She wrapped up the set with a stripped down version of ‘With Every Heart Beat’ and had her adoring crowd wave their cameras and phones like they were in the presence of a solid gold pop legend. Not quite yet – but a year or so from now….just maybe.

Launch Night - Digital

2007-09-15T23:24:00.000Z

There’s nothing quite like the opening of a new venue to ruffle the feathers of Brighton’s clubland and God knows we need it. After a miserable summer of tumbleweed blowing across dancefloors large and small across Brighton, it’s gonna take a brand with Digital’s pedigree to stir things up a bit.

And there’s definitely a buzz outside the club come half nine with both guest list and punter queues stretching almost up to the two adjacent piers. Search lights scan the sky, camera crews scurry about and its all a bit like a glitzy movie premier gone scruffy Indie.

What a relief then to report that inside Digital is a revelation. Like Audio did with the ailing Escape, Digital have done with the Zap, gutting the main room and rewiring the lot from scratch. Shifting the bar from the left of the room to sit where once there was a clunky two tier stairway-cum-nightmarish bottleneck completely opens the main dancefloor, also now stripped of podiums, poxy stairs and pillars. Simple glass and wood panelling abound and in short it’s everything a contemporary night club should be – fluff free and brutally functional.

It must be pretty galling for the owners to not have thrown open the doors with a set from a living legend, but Miss Grace Jones won’t perform in a building site, apparently. However, Digital’s flagship Indie night ‘Stonelove’ amply fill her shoes, shrewdly booking the hugely popular and consistently brilliant Maximo Park to open the proceedings.

The dancefloor is packed from the off and the Stonelove residents gleefully put Digital’s pristine Funktion One soundsystem through it paces with a selection of Indie hits, pop classics and lashings of floppy-fringe friendly electro. The privelelged few who’ve braved the queues shimmy like they’re on Diddy’s yacht in Cannes and there’s a tangible sense in the air that there are some great nights to come in this gleaming addition to South Coast clubbing.

Bust the Box - Concorde 2

2007-08-17T23:20:00.000Z

Many clubs purport to inspire ‘unbridled hedonism’ but it usually just means someone once did a little sick in the toilets on a hen night. Bust the Box is different, inspiring hedonism on a scale which has no parallel. Don’t like nights where the atmosphere (and the heat) hit you like a blast from a furnace the moment you step through the doors? You’re advised to stay away - it’s not for the faint hearted.

There’s a manic intensity to BTB in full swing, somewhere in between the fall of the Roman Empire, a full on old-skool rave and a wedding disco gone very badly wrong. It’s a product of the friendliest, most colourful and most up-for-it crowd in Brighton and a music, ahem, ‘policy’ which lurches violently from caning D’n’B and tough Ragga to Motorhead and Classic soul within the space of just a few records.

BTB’s natural environment is some unsuspecting boozer at Bank Holiday. Invariably everyone’s still up from the party the night before and the only thing for it is to head to the pub, unload the big speakers and get right back on it. BTB can also be found at the Volks monthly, NYE-ly and at various one offs such as tonight’s do at the Concorde: a charity bash for Darfur cum-memorial for their late great spiritual leader Dennis ‘The Good Doctor’ Sherez.

There are very few nights brazen, or indeed popular enough to tackle the hangar like Concorde and there are even fewer selfless enough to donate their entire door take to charity and this kind of sums up the BTB ethos: Spirited, unpretentious and decadent events by good people, for good people. Long may they continue.

Glastonbury

2007-07-05T17:25:00.000Z

Originally published on the Brighton Argus Website

Brighton’s reputation as one of the UK’s most up for it cities precedes it. So it’s no surprise that come Thursday afternoon a fair cross section of our premier caners and party monsters are all present and incorrect at Glastonbury. The cop dodging free party/sound system pushers work the Green Fields and Lost Vagueness, representatives from Brighton’s many labels and club nights float around the Dance Village and our resident Indie promoters and scenesters lurk around the fringes of the smaller band tents and on site bars. It’s like a little bit of Brighton has decamped to Pilton for the weekend to keep things lively and truly, it’s a beautiful thing. There’s also a fair number of Brighton acts on the bill, The Kleptones, Brakes, The Pipettes, Kooks, Cakeboy, Longrange and inevitably Fatboy Slim all feature. As do the Maccabees who, playing second fiddle only to Hot Chip on Friday night in the John Peel tent, have evidently garnered legions of superfans. Whilst waiting for Super Furry Animals on Friday afternoon a large group of lads chance upon frontman Orlando stood just in front of us; back pats, handshakes and introductions are exchanged and Orlando, clearly already a master of the ‘grip and grin’ dutifully poses for some toe-curling mobile phone snaps, much to the amusement of his non-Maccabee mates who accompany him. Christ – I’m staring to sound like Jo Brooks already, huh? Well they told me this had to be Brighton related so I’m doing my best, alright?

Glastonbury is all about extremes. Polar extremes. At any given moment you could be watching a world class act like Arcade Fire whipping crowds of thousands into mass delirium with a wrought, hyper-intense scamper through their back catalogue. Whilst on the other side of the site, a man receiving an on stage enema is having much the same effect on a leaky tent of just a hundred. One moment you’re knackered, the next you’re euphoric, one moment you’re mind is drifting – desperately searching for something to occupy it - the next you’re arrested by the spectacle of a pack of twenty uniformed, kazoo toting scousers blasting out brass classics in unison. This constant oscillation between extremes is rammed home early on Saturday morning: Watching the Pipettes open the Main stage I experience the most peculiar of sensations finding myself getting sunburnt on my right cheek whilst simultaneously getting rained on on the other. It’s like this all weekend……

Eventually you adjust and surrender yourself to a sensory assault from all angles. Only then can you relax and properly enjoy yourself. Of course the seemingly relentless showers and ceaseless trudging through acres of brown filth erode a little bit of the atmos. But if us Brits are good at one thing – it’s getting royally spangled in spite of everything and this is always in evidence at Glastonbury. Plus, the discerning music fan can’t really go wrong with the stunning array of talent on offer. My personal highlights include The Hold Steady whose vile marriage of Bruces Hornsby and Springsteen would normally have me reaching for the valium, but in wowing a rammed tent of die-hards their power is undeniable. Patrick Wolf, The Gossip, The Cribs, Meat Katie and The Rakes also delight but the band of the Festival Award must go to !!! for dispensing with a classic ‘right time right place’ Saturday night second headliner. One day these nutty New Yorkers will stir a killer chorus into their druggy, gloopy tune soup and the world will have to contend with a monster groove machine of a band to rival prime time ‘Mondays or even Talking Heads at their most hypnotic. And I for one will be down the front at Glastonbury, pear cider in one hand, God knows what else in the other to witness it. Rain or shine.

It Came From the Sea - Komedia

2007-06-12T23:26:00.000Z

Ultra stylised graphics and flyers? Check! Ludicrous maxxed out PR campaign to rival Jade Goody on the comeback charm offensive? Gotcha. Club rammed to the rafters monthly with the cream of Brighton’s hipsters, tipsters and scenesters? In!

Ladies and Gentlemen – you’re in Nick and Kick’s hut now.

Their playlist reads like the line-up of some Inter Galactic phuture rave beamed back from titanium clad 4037 to dishwater dull 2007. And with righteous dedication to dropping only the freshest hip-hop, fashion pop and electro sleaze rock, you’re unlikely to hear the same song twice on the dance floor. Indeed, you may never hear it again until, inevitably, it crops up on an NME covermount 18 months later.

The Source checks in on a balmy summer’s evening and even by midnight the cavernous Komedia is heaving: Ravers old and new rub shoulders with trash fashionatas, curious electro heads and robot rockers and the whole thing feels not unlike some warped indie disco in heaven.

Lasers, strobes, LEDs, plastic flowers and ICFTS’s bespoke visuals dominate the clubscape and as the music and intensity shifts up another gear the dance floor takes on a chaotic, hyper-real swirl, light years away from the dank grot of your typical Brighton club.

There probably isn’t another night in the land that could fill a space as vast as the Komedia with this much character, attitude and electrifying atmosphere and for this reason alone, ICFTS has etched its name indelibly in the annals of Brighton’s clubbing history.

Midlake and New Toilets in the Concorde. Rivetting stuff.

2007-05-26T17:37:00.000Z

Oringally published on the Brighton Argus website.

Neil Tennant from the Pet Shop Boys doesn’t blog. ‘Blog is such an ugly word’ he recently said in an interview and I’m inclined to agree. To me ‘Blog’ sounds like a particularly feckless alien race, or much worse, something that wouldn’t flush first time……

Blogging took a while to appear on my miniscule cultural radar and even then it was instantly dismissed like every other internet phenomenae I encounter: “What does a blog do that a website doesn’t – I’ve already got myself one of those. MP3s on the Internet – er? Why? I’ve got a Minidisc player. Myspace? Pah! What’s wrong with Friendster?

Now I’ve got one because of course a blog basically takes all the hard work out of building a site if you’re just going to use it for spilling your brains to the world. Which is effectively what the Argus are allowing me to do here. The remit is pretty vague: promoting, music, out and about in Brighton or some toss like that. I’ll just have to muddle through…..

Ever wondered what Fleetwood Mac covering Radiohead as produced by Wings with the spectre of Neil Young looming large in the studio might sound like? I’ll tell you. It would sound like Midlake, a fantastic Texan four piece who rode into Brighton just the other week.

With 2006's ‘Trials of Van Occupanther’ topping many an end of year poll and plenty of heavyweight critics singing their praises you suspect MDLKE are just one well timed Glastonbury slot away from greatness. So on a balmy Spring evening it really feels like everyone packed into the Concorde is willing them to turn the stark, wintry tones of the album into something languid and hypnotic, and in the most part they succeed. The performance is pretty much faultless; Drummer McKenzie Smith fair nails Young Bride’s distinctive kick/tom tattoo and the whole ensemble breeze through some exquisite four part harmonies. Sadly the dreamy music can’t fill the onstage charisma vortex and singer Tim Smith attempts little to no audience interaction beyond complaining about his monitor mix. So as the makeshift backdrop cum projection screen slips off the back wall as the band close their set it seems like a fitting curtain call for a largely drab performance.

Couldn’t help but notice the smart new toilets in the Concorde 2 too the other week. Where ageing posters for reformed Ska bands and inevitably, The Bluetones, once adorned the walls, now it is mile upon mile of pristine white emulsion. Hitherto, a trip to the loos involved wading knee deep through spilt lager and urine, now before me - spotless easi-wipe flooring. Where there once stood three redundant hot taps and three drizzly cold ones there now stood a smart young man plying punters with after shave, lollipops and soap. OK – I made the very last bit up but one wouldn’t have seemed that out of place alongside C2’s relentless quest for beautification. As if to hammer the point home a notice had been pinned to the wall to the effect of “We’ve spent a lot of money getting these toilets nice and we want them to stay that way. If you feel the need to write your name or your band name, do not do it here. Anyone doing so will be banned from the venue for life.

How tempted was I to bust the magic marker and scrawl ‘Fatboy Slim’ across the tiles? But I resisted. Surely it’s only a matter of time though, let us know who cracks first. C2 Bogwatch continues right here all across the summer.

Piccadilly Records and those End of Year Charts.

2005-12-12T13:56:00.000Z

I know what you’re thinking. Lists, lists, lists! It’s all so blokey, it’s so trainspottery, it’s so bloody High Fidelity. And well, you may be right. I suppose there is a slight element of that in what we do. But there has to be really, we could hardly call it All Time Top 32. That would sound shit. We could hardly call it All Time Top However Many You Can Muster. That would also sound shit. And we could hardly call it All Time Top Just Keep Going Until You Can’t Think of Anymore. Cos that would sound REALLY shit.

More to the point the charts aren’t All Time Top 100 songs about ex-girlfriends, or songs that make you want to go out, they are what they say on the tins – All Time Top 100s. I don’t know about you but I don’t go through them going ‘Need, got, got, need, need, got, need’ like the songs are Panini Stickers. I try to think of them as a resource. So if I’m, ahem, ‘browsing’ the internet a quick peek at an esteemed Pop Picker’s chart is usually enough to spur some productive ’window shopping’. So it is with other lists around this time of year.

We at Top 100 love December. There’s Mince Pies, Christmas Shopping Lists, Getting Really Drunk with your colleagues, getting really drunk with your family, getting really drunk with everyone from school and generally getting really drunk.

We also love those inescapable End of Year Charts. Drab muso bible Uncut magazine love theirs so much they print them in November, the NME got into a scrape last week for rigging theirs (the MAN paid for Bloc Party to trump the Arcade Fire etc. allegedly) and the Q one was so sickeningly predictable it read like smashing your Citroen Picasso into the HMV chart wall at 120MPH, with Capital Radio going full tilt on the stereo.

Where is the discerning contemporary music lover to look for the definitive, pan genre, not too indie-than-thou (but a little bit anyway) end of year chart? Step forward Piccadilly Records.

Piccadilly is a Manchester based record shop. (Remember them? They have doors and roofs, these weird black plastic circles between bits of card, signs behind the counter that say things like: “You Don’t Have To Be Aloof To Work Here, But It Helps!”) As well as actually physically selling records from a physical location, they provide an INDISPENSABLE weekly mailout featuring the best of the week’s New Releases across genres of your choosing, complete with MP3 clips and everything. When I say INDISPENSABLE, I actually mean ESSENTIAL. Even if you don’t intend to buy any of their recommends, which of course you ought to, the mailout itself is pretty good way to get a grip on the very best of the weeks releases. You can get it for free at http://www.piccadillyrecords.co.uk/ where you can also peak at the Piccadilly Records Top 100 albums of the year. Of course the usual suspects appear Sufjan Stevens, LCD Soundsystem, MIA etc. but there’s plenty of other stuff to investigate: Espers, Jneiro Jarel, Felix Laband all feature PLUS one of ATT100’s Album of the Year the grossly underrated ‘Ambulance Ltd’.

Peace in our time y’all.

David McNamee: On Life and Love Songs.

2005-11-02T14:48:00.000Z

We had the wonderful David McNamee on the other week – and very good he was too, have a look at his chart on the site. David took the time to make and distribute on the night some lovingly constructed fanzines about his, and some of his friends’, fave tunes. And, being an experienced journo (for Careless Talk, Plan B, NME, Kerrang, The Fly) responded to our standard pre-chart prep questions with wit, eloquence and aplomb. So considered and impassioned was this particular response, it’s been replicated in its entirety here. Please leave us a comment if you would like a copy of David’s limited-edition-very-special-one-off-fanzine.

Is there a record in your All Time Top 100 that reminds you of a lover – past or present?

No, I’ve never been in love. However, the vast majority of songs in my ATT100 I would describe as being, in one form or another, love songs. “Love songs, and, therefore by definition, sad songs,” as Nick Cave said. My biggest unrealised project is to compile and write a book essaying different love songs. I don’t think the transmission is any less powerful or moving for not having experienced the root ingredient – that would be like saying you can’t understand the music of Acid Mothers Temple unless you’ve taken acid! What interests me about the form of the love song is that I think it often has more interesting and involved functions than either providing the soundtrack to wooing, or proffering a simulacrum of the experience. Love is the most ferocious, tangible instinct in the human psyche and falling in and out of love is probably the most dramatic, existential experience any of us can hope to comprehend as mere 9 to 5 mortals. As much as anger can be used in music as a source of extreme energy by dislocating it from a destructive intent, I’d argue that love songs can similarly be used to refocus the human perspective. Anger is an energy, but love is a drug.

In Stop Making Sense, David Byrne sings his most perfect ballad, ‘This Must Be The Place (Naïve Melody)’, to an electric lamp. For Byrne it was partly an academic game, constructing these abstract, non-sequiteur cut-up poems that had no real genuine or specific meaning and then imbibing them, in his emoting, with all the gushing, liquid delivery of the solid gold Heart FM standards he and Talking Heads were attempting to subvert. The result could be a love song to electricity, or a hymn to homeliness, but the song itself is so moving that what it could represent, whether you’re the singer or the listener, is a small pocket of safety in sound – a talismanic place to hide and heal yourself in. ‘This Must Be The Place’ wraps itself in all the cosiness and conventions of the love song – it’s ecstatic, comforting and wired to the tits on this weird, non-specified desperation or panickiness - or even paranoia - that mimics the early stages of becoming besotted but never surrenders to that obviousness. Instead it disconnects itself from the conventional love song – by not being, directly at least, about love at all – and rides the tension in its lines like a high, getting off on it and collapsing back in on itself, constantly seeking succour.

‘Are You The One (That I’ve Been Waiting For)?’ by Nick Cave and ‘Willing To Wait’ by Sebadoh are the most conventional love songs in my ATT100. They’re very masculine love songs: aggressive, narcissistic, bullying and incredibly handsome. ‘Willing To Wait’ was one of a suite of songs that Lou Barlow wrote, he confessed, to ‘bully’ his wife into getting back to him. There’s a hard edge of male competitiveness to ‘Willing To Wait’. The song urges his ex to reveal to her current beloved the details of what the singer and her have discussed privately, “Tell him everything that you told me,” the song urges, an angel-with-horns on her shoulder. “Tell him that I’m still your friend… and maybe you would like to see me again”. The entire song gestures extravagantly towards the new couple, ‘if I can make something this beautiful then what can he possibly ever give you to compare?’

‘Are You The One’ is Nick Cave doing what he does best, for him love is a suit and he wears it well. In this song though, this love is a suit of armour, and on Cave it radiates a shocking dignity – concealing, almost, the deeply fallible nature of its motives. From Cave’s most honest album, ‘The Boatman’s Call’, ‘Are You The One’ is the key cut – opulent, grand, searching, proud. You can imagine him singing it from the prow of a ship. The album was borne out of a series of poems and letters written to Polly Jean Harvey, a tangled, complicated and beautiful account of ruthlessly attempting to make someone fall in love, and then detailing in the same breath that relationship’s fractured fall-out. Here Cave has nothing to lose but everything - his dignity - and so the song has to be the most elaborate, fantastic vessel of sentiment that he’s ever crafted. The song has a life of its own, and a mission to complete, but it must also be strong enough to protect Cave, to shield him and to sail him back to refuge when the spell wears off. He didn’t have to make those bits of poems and letters into songs and release them, ‘The Boatman’s Call’, after everything had ended – exposing himself. But maybe he needed to. Maybe by then they were for him – both as an ego mirror in which he could better admire himself, and hard, cold comfort where whiskey and memories wouldn’t work.

Some of the other songs in my list are less obvious. ‘Nature’s Hated’ by Orlando doesn’t seem to be directed at anyone more than its author. It’s an accusing and morosely self-pitying song, that, perfectly, unfurls like the soundtrack to the last slow dance on a prom night in heaven: the best and worst night of your life, compounding every unrequited hope you’ve ever had and echoing bravely and sadly throughout you forever. Reading the lyrics between the lines, it could be expressing the loneliness and frustration of someone stranded in homosexuality – cruelly quarantined by nature into a unit of one. On a bigger and more general scale, it’s just epic loneliness made more beautiful and pathetic by charging it with hope and cynicism and casting it, a sullen and wretched child, into the twirling promenade of a thousand similar-sounding, better-looking, better-functioning love songs. Mostly, ‘Nature’s Hated’ is about hating yourself, but needing to love someone else, and feeling that paradox slice at your psyche like knives.

‘Be Mine!’ by Robyn and ‘Heartbeat’ by Annie are brilliant pop records. ‘Be Mine!’ is like a modern, Scandinavian Shangri-La’s – painful and pleading, but sanitised enough to wipe clean away all the decapitations, rape, illicit pregnancy, drag race death and domestic abuse that was implicit in Shadow Morton’s songs. ‘Heartbeat’ is glowing, gorgeous, understated and utterly fallinlovewithable – it feels like a first kiss, it shudders. But still, it’s effervescent with sadness. The song recounts just one night – dancing, a stranger, hearts beating. The words are simple and precise, but hovering in the heart of ‘Heartbeat’ is a void – it feels a bit like Annie isn’t telling us something, and that maybe it could be because the something is bad.

‘Heartbeats’ by The Knife, which was issued around the same time as ‘Heartbeat’, employs a similar thematic scenario. It perfectly summarises the rushing sounds and swoons of every perfect short-lived chemical romance: “Ten days of perfect tunes” starcrossed with “two heartbeats in one night.” It feels like falling in love on drugs, everything here is surface and tantalising texture. It’s utterly artificial. It completely emphasises the artificial, chemical nature of not only drugs, and love songs, but love itself.

Of the only two completely ‘happy’ love songs in the list, we know the context of David Lynch’s ‘Falling’ far too well to be fooled by it, but not nearly well enough to not break down a little each time we hear it. Of The Field Mice’s dance-pop classic ‘Missing The Moon’ I once wrote: “…seven minutes long, gliding and revolving for a small eternity in a swirl of sunset synths. It’s the closet cousin of New Order’s ‘The Perfect Kiss’, sleek, modern and borne upwards on a conveyor belt of machines lest the utter ache of humanity and fallibility that permeates the song cause it to crumble to the ground. Bobby sings almost entirely in sighs as he trades verses with Anne Marie, each gentle cadence of electric guitar underpinning the bold, understated chorus: “I do… I do believe this love’s to stay/I believe that/Love shall remain”. It made you want to fall in love, just so you could fall in love to that backdrop of foreverness. It was a perfect kiss, and it will last forever.”

Despite providing the soundtrack to a popular indie soap opera (the diarised relationship of The Field Mice’s Bob Wratten and Anne Marie Davis), in retrospect I often now find the wide-eyed superhuman hope in Wratten’s songs somewhat superficial. In his songs with The Field Mice, his overriding obsession with love as a concept almost feels like an autistic response to something necessary and abstract.

My obsession with love songs is probably similarly autistic, but I think my engagement with them is genuine. Love songs depict people at their most vulnerable and honest. Love itself can be ugly, but love songs provide a channel for the messy energies in our heads to unravel with grace, and for other heads to take comfort, or a kind of electric, from that. Genuinely, with no academic shirtiness intended, I love all of these songs.

But to answer your question properly, the only song here which even vaguely recalls any experience of my own is Hefner’s ‘The Hymn For The Alcohol’.

John Peel Day and A Quick Chat with DJ Lamp

2005-10-18T11:10:00.000Z

Last Thursday was ‘John Peel Day’ and there were gigs, happenings and whatnots up and down the country, simultaneously commemorating the day of his last Radio 1 broadcast and celebrating the Great Man’s unfathomable contribution to modern music. You don’t need to be reminded that Peel had very little interest in musical boundaries or genres and indeed delighted in provocation and wilfully diverse playlists. No surprises then that he’s a bit of a Top 100 hero, so an honour it was to be invited down to Hector’s House (that’s a pub/bar in Brighton, by the way) along with five or so other fans, to spin half an hour of Peel inspired classics.

Hood, Jega, Tiger, Surgeon, Mogwai, Helen Love and Los Paranoias – inevitably - (Peel played ‘The Coolest Monkey’ our Soundclash debut single TWICE) featured in my set, and the likes of Stereolab, Eddie Cochran, Steel Pulse, Killing Joke, Roy Orbison, Leatherface, Ministry, Senseless Things and 2 seconds of Napalm Death cropped up over the course of the rest of the evening.

Much like his shows, there was ‘dead air’ every now and again, lots of buzzing and clicking as different decks got wired in and Bangers played his last record at the wrong speed. So if you weren’t a Peel fan or perhaps hadn’t ever caught any of his shows you were in the wrong bar, to be honest. There were plenty of confused students in there to say the least. One young upstart requested some drum ‘n’ bass and I took great delight in presenting him with Panacea’s ‘Day After Reality’ from German Darkcore label ‘Chrome’ circa 1997:

‘This was made when filthy scary drum ‘n’ bass was REALLY FILTHY AND SCARY’ I frothed, waving the sleeve above my head, spilling beer and spitting bits of roll up across the DJ box: ‘Dare me to play it!’.

‘Chill out Grandad’ read his withering expression and he ambled back to a pool game.

Nevertheless, WE had a great time and how refreshing it was to get to play some really gruesome, antagonistic records; knowing that maybe, just maybe, there was someone out there in the ether, really fucking digging them. Perhaps that’s how Peel felt?

The night was organised by seasoned jock and future Top100er DJ Lamp so I asked him some questions about Peel and his legacy.

Q - When and how did you first come to hear Peel on the Radio?

A - I first heard about Peel from a friend at school when I first started getting into punk in 1978. As I was only 11 or 12 at the time I had to listen under the bed covers or tape it (I still have a big box of tapes from around that time). You always imagine that you're the only one listening in this way! I just loved his style & his passion for music. His columns for Sounds at the time were unmissable too.

Q - Was there a particular period when you were most fervently listening to his shows and what sort of stuff was he playing around that time?

A - I think, for me, the time I never missed a show was between about 78 and 81- 2 when he was playing a lot of punk & new wave and also loads of reggae. From that time I discovered Joy Division, The Ruts, Killing Joke, Steel Pulse, Mikey Dread, The Cure, Captain Beefheart & loads more stuff that really blew me away.

Q - Out of all the stuff that he must have turned you onto, are there any particular artists or records that have radically changed the way you listen to / consume music?

A - It must be a lot of the punk records. You'd hear a record that wasn't fantastically played and when you bought it very often the sleeve would be just a photocopied bit of paper. This instilled the idea that anyone can do anything in me at a very early age and gave me the confidence to get involved with various things over the years.

Q - Didn’t he play one of your records once? What was it and did you actually hear it coming, like, out of the radio? How did it feel?

A - Probably the proudest moment of my musical career was winning the Festive Fifty in 1992 with my band, Bang Bang Machine's debut single 'Geek Love'. Hearing someone that you'd admired and listened to for years & years really enthusing about something you've done is a fantastic, but at the same time surreal, experience. Hearing him play it on the NME stage at Glastonbury was a big thrill too as well as doing a Peel session.

Q - You got to meet him too, didn’t you? Tell us a bit about that. What was he like in person?

A - I met John quite a few times, mainly at festivals, and he always remembered who I was, which I found staggering considering how many people he must meet in the course of a year. I spent a great afternoon with him one year at the Phoenix Festival just wandering around the site listening to his hilarious anecdotes. I found him to be a very passionate, humble, honest and intelligent man and the most genuine person I've ever met in the music business. He even bought me something to eat but refused my many offers to buy him a drink as he said he got a bit pissed after a couple of glasses of wine. I must admit the festivals did seem very empty without him this year.

Q - All Time Top 100 feels that Peel’s legacy is likely to be hijacked by the mainstream do you agree? How can we best remember him and honour his contribution without blundering into the kind of nostalgia or retrogressive sentiment he would have so hated?

A - I think the main thing is to just enjoy and play the music that you enjoy, unapologetically, but don't forget that he invented the mainstream that we know today by going out on a limb and sticking to his guns. That, for me, is John's legacy.

Catch DJ Lamp’s All Time Top 100 at The Sidewinder on December 16th

A Quick Chat with Nikon Driver

2005-10-05T08:35:00.000Z

Prior to his Top 100 we had a quick chat with Nikon Driver about his pioneering club night 'It Came From the Sea'. It Came from the Sea' is the 1st Saturday of every month at Sussex Arts Club. www.voodilily.co.uk for more.

Q. ICFTHS has rapidly become one of the most talked about nights in the Brighton clubbing calendar. To what do you attribute this runaway success?

A. We’ve been doing it for nearly 3 years so I’d hardly call it runaway. But I think this year has been ridiculous rollercoaster ride of success. Lol. Basically, we had a break for a couple of months late last year and we changed venue and took time to think about and refine everything we were doing. It was obviously the right move as it’s paid off and the club is stronger than ever.

Q. Tell us a little about your music policy...

A. In our most recent press release kicking_k described our current music policy like this: It Came fro the Sea take conceptual scissors to the music world, cutting and pasting together an all-nite soundtrack that shifts drunkenly from wipe-clean synth to mongrel guitar snarl, dancefloor beatbox to shiny pop hooks. It' s more fun than heaven, and you don't have to die to go there! GET IN THE QUEUE! I can’t put it any better than that.

Q. You and your DJ partner Kicking_K play exclusively off laptops is this correct? Why so and have you taken any flak off any so called purists?

A. We originally started ICFTHS with a decommissioned office PC that we paid £30 for and upgraded with a decent soundcard. We called her D.A.I.S.Y and kick was still using her until she blew up recently. So now we both use laptops. And we’ve only had a couple of occasions where some purist dick has made a comment or two. Ultimately, it’s a different mindset - I’ve never deejayed from records and although I have nothing against them personally don’t think I ever will.

Q. Do you buy your music via traditional methods (you know - record shops) and then transfer it to the laptop for convenience? I hope they're not all naughty downloads?

A. The music we play is a mixture of downloads (legal and otherwise), cd rips, and promos. We try to play the best new music we can find by any means possible. A really good source for music is the growing community of MP3 bloggers including our personal faves, the brighton based www.20jazzfunkgreats.blogspot.com

Q. You've quickly outgrown the Sussex Arts Club it would appear - any plans to find a bigger venue?

A. We could fill a larger venue, and it is annoying that everyone can’t always get in but we have no plans to move as we feel we’ve found a home with the Sussex Arts Club. It’s important to be in a place that attracts the right crowd and creates a certain atmosphere.

Q. You seem to be quite busy doing other gigs as ICFTS? Is there any worry that you're diluting the formula at all?

A. It is quite frustrating working other gigs using the ICFTHS club name when we don’t consider those events to be the same because ICFTHS is so much more than the music and that’s all we take with us. We’ve tried to encourage promoters to use Nikon Driver and Kickin_k on posters but they obviously wanna use the name they feel will attract the crowds. However, we only regularly play one other slot which is at the Ocean Rooms. We wanted to take on that gig as the venue is trying to establish itself with a different audience and is committed to it’s new live band capabilities. For me that doesn’t dilute our club in any way as I see it as providing a different experience for both us and those that have come on the strength of our club. I mean, we’ve never really deejayed with bands or other deejays. Now we get to play alongside the likes of Optimo – and that can’t be bad.

Nikon Driver's All Time Top 100 will be published on the site just as soon as we have it off him.

Why We Quit B'Lo

2005-09-22T19:21:00.000Z

There were cracks appearing the week before the 'incident' when the venue owners told us we were to sack one of our residents or we would lose the night. In spite of the fact that he had rocked it for us, like, four / five times already. They objected to his use of a laptop, claiming records were better and that his music was 'dead' - he was playing The Clash at the time so that might give you an idea of the people we were dealing with here.

As well as being one of my best friends and a LONG time Top 100 partner and confidant he's an awesome DJ, so to threaten us with losing the night or sacking him left us in a bit of a quandry, to say the least. Even though we were confused and fuming we let it go for the night - knowing that he wasn't playing again for a couple of weeks and that maybe by then everything would have blown over or at least we could talk it through with the club owners during the week / in light of day.

A week later and we were back in the club again for what was to be our last night. Again the owners approached me complaining about the DJ and his choice of music, only this time they said we had to get him off immeadiately. Furthermore, they had their own DJ from the bar upstairs who was going to play instead. I explained - No - he's on for another half an hour and then one of our residents, Rosie, was going to play. This wasn't enough for them and they told me that if I didn't eject our DJ from the booth - they would.

By this time a minor scene was developing, me negotiating with couple of the club owners (there are three of them in total) and some close friends, but before I knew what was going on, one of the owners has crossed the club to the DJ booth with two 'heavies' off the door upstairs to physically remove our DJ. Aside from the fundamental lack of respect for DJ or promoter (more on this later) quite why the Security staff had to be involved I don't know. Our DJ's justifiable reaction to this confusing scenario was, shall we say, defensive. He had no idea what was going on, he hadn't been smoking weed, wasn't pissed up and being abusive, doing none of the things that would typically warrant ejection from a club. IN FACT the opposite - he was playing records for the GOOD of the people in the club. In the ensuing melee the door staff adopted an obscenely heavey handed approach (whether they were doing their job or not / just following orders is another matter) and eventually dragged our DJ - literally kicking and screaming up the feted spiral staircase and threw him out into the street, leaving him tattered and torn and his right arm covered in the most horrific of bruises.

Needless to say we were aghast. I had NEVER seen anything like it. After neutralising the scene in the street I spent a bit of time explaining the situation to our crowd then we collected our things and left.

What was the possible justification for this unprecedented, grotesque scene?

Perhaps they objected to our music policy and felt it we weren't gettting enough people in? Well why not just wait till the end of the night and say 'Sorry Folks - it's not working, don't come back next week?' We had done our research and sent a few people out on missions and as it turned out, proportional to venue capacity, we were actually out performing most other Friday nights in town. Our numbers were averaging 100 - 130 every week but I don't think they saw the bigger picture.

But that aside - the way that we were all treated on that final night simply beggars belief. It was a total breech of promoter / club owner relationships. Why should we work solidly for 2 months building a reputation for ourselves as a club as which plays good music just for you to force us to have DJs on that play The Bodyrockers? Why should we be out postering and flyering our line ups across town only for you to choose the DJs and the music? More to the point: Why are we paying YOU to RENT the club and not getting to play whatever the fuck we want????? Simply unbelievable.

So in a way probably best we left when we did. It became obvious that none of these people had any understanding of night clubs or any interest in contemporary music whatsoever. None of them have ever worked at a venue or run a club before. None of them had even been in a club (other than B'Lo) since May! They've been at that venue for almost a year now and nothing is improving. None of the nights they've had there have stayed, other than deTournement which is arguably something of an institution anyway. Other nights (who shall remain nameless - but I'm sure you can work out which ones they are) have left because of the sleazy or disrespectful conduct of the owners and most of the others have been sacked because they failed to reap substantial enough rewards after a short amount of time.

Their booker (the man between promoter and venue) left as a result of all this and as far as we can tell the venue can't be more than a month away from closing. I think their desperation to stay afloat was at the heart of all this. They'd seen people leave whilst our DJ was on and obviously being so desperate just to get a few more beers bought from the bar somehow decided the only thing to do was put a 'better' DJ on. Obviously this twisted logic failed since the music went off for nearly two minutes, there were ugly scenes in front of everyone in the club killing the atmosphere and I went round and got about 40 people to leave in protest!

So there you go. There's more I could say but I think you get the gist!