Whatsapp in the Sahara

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The last album by Les Filles de Illighadad which came out in 2017 was something else. It was so engaging and hypnotic yet understated that I found myself addicted to it for a few months back in 2018. Amaria Hamadalher wasn’t in the group then, but she is now and based on this four song EP it totally makes sense. Based in Saharan desert of central Niger where the Tuareg guitar style is predominant and mostly dominated by men, Amaria Hamadalher and Les Filles de Illighadad are blazing their own trails.

The four songs of this EP were astonishingly recorded onto a cellphone, then transmitted up to the internet using WhatsApp and then made available for easy purchase on the old bandcamp via Portland, Oregon’s Sahel Sounds. You’d never know it. It sounds like they’re in a studio, or at least your living room. Hamadalher’s acoustic thump and soothing vocals are sublime. As all great EP’s it leaves you wanting more, and there’s more soon in the form of the next Les Filles de Illighadad album which can’t come soon enough.

For more about Portland’s Sahel Sounds and Amaria Hamadalher check out the Portland Mercury’s short interview with label honcho Christopher Kirkly.

Big Brain Rock

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When Baltimore shoegazers Wildhoney decided to up and relocate to the west coast, I guess that slightly upset the applecart. Sometimes a change of scenery can change your perspective on many things. In this case, for a few of the Wildhoney folks after mixing with some new blood they set their sites on extending their comfort zone and trading in some dreaminess for droniness. This new group go by the name Dummy and their social media bi-line states that “making music should not be fun.”

Could have fooled me. This five song EP certainly leaves the impression that they’re having fun. Wading into similar waters as the new Peel Dream Magazine LP, both Slacker Mask and Angel Gear deftly combine elements of My Bloody Valentine and Stereolab generating amazing results. Things take an interesting turn with Folk Song which does a really cool Nico/Electrelane thing and then for their final trick, Touch The Chimes takes an eight minute ambient exit into the beyond. Lots to like here. Can’t wait to see where Dummy go next.

Spanish Tops

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It’s good to see Pamplona, Spain’s Melenas returning with album number two. Their 2017 self-titled debut was a nice surprise that saw the band working in the realm of Flying Nun jangle with some additional guitar drone that brought to mind the Bats, Look Blue Go Purple and the Shop Assistants. It didn’t get much attention due to its Spanish-only release. Same for last year’s single Yo No Me Importa. Though both are out of print and going for semi-big bucks on discogs, so someone is paying attention. The new album Dias Raros which gets a US release courtesy of Trouble In Mind records should help get the group some more deserved attention and wider availability especially if you prefer hard copy music. 

Dias Raros features some new facets to their sound. Lead track Primer Tiempo features great droning keyboards that evoke classic kraut influenced stuff and bands like Electrelane and Stereolab.  Los Alemanes has similar hypnotic affects. The production and playing on this record sounds like it’s improved from their debut. The band feel more comfortable with different tempos and more space in their sound as is evident in songs like El Teimpo Ha Pasado and En Madrid and the guitar solo in 29 Grados. There are some great uptempo rockers here too. 3 Segundos, No Puedo Pensar and Ya No Es Verano are bonafide future jangle classics that even the most jaded indie rocker would find it hard not to nod along to.  If you haven’t noticed from the song titles that everything is sung in Spanish, it is. But even with my rudimentary Spanish skills I find myself singing along to some of the choruses (probably incorrectly). If you’re a fan of the jangly Dunedin sound of 80’s Flying Nun and your Spanish is better than mine, you will too.

BOAT Call It a Comeback

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boat

You probably don’t know this, but I was a member of BOAT for a very brief time. I showed up for one of their album release shows, I think it was for the Dress Like Your Idols album at the Tractor. To my surprise the show was sold out. D Crane spotted me in line and I told him I didn’t have a ticket. Immediately he grabbed M McKenzie, got his wristband and gave it to me and gave his own wristband to my buddy who was also without a ticket.  A little apprehensive about impersonating members of BOAT, D Crane told me not to worry because the opening band had about 12 members and there was no way the door guy would know if we were really in the band or not.It’s a great example of how down to earth this band is and how they don’t take themselves too seriously (Their Instagram is called Sloppypopstagram and they still book shows using their fictitious manager H. Fozzleberry).

It’s been seven years since BOAT put themselves into storage. In the meantime they’ve collaborated with Math & Physics Club as Unlikely Friends for three albums and some shows. When a band with a low-profile like BOAT reforms, it doesn’t really bring with it the massive expectations concocted by fans and the media. This seems to have played in the band’s favor as D Crane and J Long traded demos back and forth. The songs for album came together in secret and with zero expectations from anyone except from the band themselves.

So what do we get with the new BOAT LP in 2020 as the band enter their 40’s (their golden years)? Believe it or not, we get the best BOAT LP yet. It’s not a concept record per se, but you could argue that it’s their mid-life crisis. Most folks have panic attacks and nervous breakdowns, BOAT writes a bunch of hits about it, infusing self-effacing humor, drum loops, bleeps and bloops, killer guitar riffs and chest thumping choruses. Metabolism, In the Water, the title track, So Many Reasons Your Turns Gray, I believe In the Principle, Loneliness Kills and the Ballad of Gaz Coombes all deserve to be considered as some of the best songs the band has written.  The guys are obviously rejuvenated and at the peak of their pop powers and make a good argument that older guys can still bring it.

 

The Big Takeover has D Crane giving a play by play for each track on Tread Lightly worth checking out.

Timeless Melodies

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MoTroper

When we last caught up with Portland, Oregon’s Mo Troper it was 2017 and his very good album Exposure and Response. He’s still writing top quality pop songs on album number three which is called Natural Beauty. Where Exposure employed the services of Richard Manning of Jellyfish fame for the horn and string arrangements, this album sees Troper handling most of them himself with now obvious quality degradation.

Natural Beauty is a solid batch of songs (Almost Full Control, Come and Get Me, and Jaz from Australia are all standouts). The obvious standout song here (and one of his best songs yet) is Your Boy. It’s two minutes of sheer pop brilliance in the vein of the La’s There She Goes. Maybe it’s the similarity the two songs share in their choruses (“There she goes” vs “There goes your boy”), or it could be the jangly guitar intro, or perhaps it’s the fleeting brevity of the song. Whatever the case, it was the reason the repeat button was created. I wouldn’t be surprised if I didn’t start hearing it used in many upcoming romantic comedy movies. Get it below before it’s discovered and killed by corporate America.

Singing Cowboys

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cowboys

The original singing cowboy was Gene Autry which has little to do with the Cowboys of this post. These Cowboys don’t come from Texas, instead they call the flatlands of Bloomington, Indiana home. The band seemed to start gaining some attention when Hozac released their 3rdLP in 2017 and those positive notes continued with last year’s the Bottom of a Rotten Flower which had elements of the Kinks, Who and Guided by Voices along with tight post punk riffs to keep it in the corral.

Continuing their prolific ways, Room of Clons was released by the band last month and has been really clicking with me. Wise Guy Algorithm is great midwest post punk featuring snotty similarities with Uranium Club, Devo and Pere Ubu. The Beige Collection has a great gothic feel to it. Days with its kazoo and Queen Bee Real Estate with it’s saloon piano and bounciness both sound like they could have been an outtake from Kinks Face to Face or maybe the Apples in Stereo. It doesn’t stop there either. The Human Puzzle channels some serious Television in it and Martian Childcare shows that the band can do straightforward pop and like some of the best feature a killer chorus shrouding much darker subject matter.

I can’t say that Room of Clons is their best album because I have yet to get them all. I can say that it’s a subtly great record that is very midwestern in style with nods at other eccentric mid west bands of past and present. Not flamboyant, but done with such a confidence that could be mistaken for flamboyance. Like most great records, it keeps you guessing.

So-Called Dangerous

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slum

Anyone out there remember Slum of Legs? They released a couple really good 7-inch singles back in 2014 and 2015, so you could be forgiven for scratching your head in wonder. The Brighton, UK band’s perseverance is our fortune, because they now have a shiny new self-titled debut album. In case you need a reminder, they come from the Velvet Underground, the Fall, and Comet Gain school of jangly drone that breaks any melodic rules you may have concocted for that sort of music. Featuring a violin prominently, the group play by a different set of rules. They can do anthem type rockers, but love to devolve into full-on raging cacophony.

Benetint & Malevolence starts the record, alluding to a Scottish highlands atmospheric feel and that slowly builds and builds until you find yourelf in the middle of a good old midwestern thunderguster. The band also smartly bring back their eponymous theme song that originally appeared on their first cassette, and get playful sounding on I Dream of Valves Exploding. I appreciate the breadth of topics that the group tackles, eschewing the overdone typical love song thing. A good example of this is the song Baader-Meinhof Always Look So Good In Photos. Pop terrorists taking on real life terrorists. It rightly gives the listener the impression that she really needs to be on her toes if she’s committing to this band. Who said pop music wasn’t dangerous?

Soft as Snow but Super-Electric

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peeldream

If you haven’t heard, this new Peel Dream Magazine album is something else. If we’ve learned nothing in the last 10-15 years of the ongoing shoegaze revival it is that mimicking the shoegazy wall of sound is easy, but really it’s all a bout the tunes.That’s the hard part. Not for Peel Dream Magazine, they have a cart load of them on their new album Agitprop Alterna.

The band seem to have two primary references, My Bloody Valentine and Stereolab and songs bounce between those influences. For example Pill evokes early Isn’t Anything era MBV and in my on pinion surpasses it. Then the next song Emotional Devotion Creator switches on some Stereolab droning keyboards. It’s a good kind of whiplash that has you at first spotting the influence but you quickly move into head-shaking disbelief about how good it is. Every song creates a warm cocoon of buzzy vibrations, droning keyboards and sighing vocals that ping pong around each other and collide at that sweet spot somewhere in the inner ear.

It wasn’t always this way. That first Peel Dream Magazine album Modern Meta Physic from a couple years ago showed some promise, but took some effort to get through. Last year’s Up and Up EP saw the group adding members and a sharper pop sensibility. Bands grow up fast these days, and Peel Dream Magazine second LP sees them moving quickly from pimply adolescents to seasoned blissed-out, ecstasy-laden dream-pop beasts.

What Is There To Smile About?

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close

Scotland’s Close Lobsters never quite fit in with any scene. Sure, they were on the C-86 compilation put out by the New Musical Express, and they recorded their records at indiepop central Leamington Spa with John A. Rivers. I suppose all of those references might give you an idea of what they might sound like. Their guitars certainly jangle and they sound earnest, but I would never suggest that they’re indiepop or C-86 (whatever that is). Their records have an uplifting brightness to them and dare I say it they even rock out a bit. That juxtaposition sets them apart in my mind.

The band stopped being a band back in the late 80’s after the release of their second LP Headache Rhetoric. Fast forward 20 or so years, sometime after appearing at 2013’s New York City Popfest the band decided to start making records again. Eventually two 7-inch singles containing new songs appeared, one in 2014 and another in 2016. Now finally, a third album was released in February. The title is a mouthful, Post Neo Anti: Arte Povera In the Forest of Symbols. The cover might give the impression that they’re a metal band and the title suggests that they’re into prog rock. Neither is the case. In fact, the album picks up right where Headache Rhetoric left off. Songs like All Compasses Go Wild, Now Time, and New York City In Space sound like older and wiser brothers of classics like My days are Numbered, Nature Thing, and Foxheads. The band have John Rivers back in the producer’s chair and the album generally feels like they never broke up. I always thought that The Close Lobsters sounded timeless because they never really adhered to any scene or sound. They continue that streak and stick to their unique sunshine drenched jangle while stretching and bending it ever so slightly to keep it interesting.

Everyday I Get Up and Pray to Jah

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quivers
Working from home the past few weeks has allowed me the luxury of lying awake in bed after the clock radio goes off listening to whatever KEXP is playing that day. This morning I awoke from a deep slumber to the last 30 seconds of You’re Not Always On My Mind by Hobart, Australia’s Quivers. I didn’t realize I liked it at first as it was only 30 seconds of chiming guitars. The next song was Camper Van Beethoven’s Take the Skinheads Bowling so I actually started my day with “have big lanes, have big lanes” in my head. Later in the morning I pulled up the Quivers off the internet and discovered that this band had been missing from my life and if not for the virus enforced slowdown of my life I could have gone days, months years without them.

You’re Not Always on My Mind probably isn’t a dig at Willie Nelson’s You Were Always On My Mind, but it made me think of old Willie too. Quivers offer pop that is closer to the Catchers and the Go-Betweens. Jangling guitars, swell bass, and a contradictory chorus that is hard to forget. The song came out as single on Seattle’s Turntable Kitchen at the end of last year and is promised to be on an upcoming sophomore album. The single also contains a cover of REM’s Me In Honey which is also a preview of the band’s rendition of REM’s 1991 Out of Time LP due sometime soon as well.