rescuing musical virtue in distress.
If her previous albums, Chaos Before Conformity and Queen of Nothing, showcased a young artist playing blues with a rocky edge, her latest release definitely flips the balance, Fast Paced & Freakish is an unabashed rock song. As a teaser for her third album, Out From Under, it makes an excellent calling card and to... Continue Reading →
All too often you hear a song and it sounds like the vocals and the tune are two different components, the former just thrown on top of the latter with little in common save for a common melody. It is great, therefore, to come across a song where the vocal delivery sits right in amongst... Continue Reading →
If Sabiine was looking to produce the perfect chilled pop song for the modern market then she has got as close as anyone else I have heard in a long time. And I think the secret is that although the overall sound is massively contemporary, it is built from older, more graceful components. Not so... Continue Reading →
I often find the influences which artists, or more likely their management, list as touchstones and reference points to be more usually a statement of what the artist sounds like in their own mind rather than how they actually do. I’m even more sceptical when I see an artist who I am particularly fond of.... Continue Reading →
Although it is quite a cool album title, in my opinion the only thing old school about Slang is his work rate. We find ourselves in an age when album releases, especially from bigger name artists seem to be getting further and further apart. Slang’s work ethic is more akin to that of a few decades... Continue Reading →
There is something immediately likeable about Kansas City rockers Pedaljets, there is a directness and punch that accompanies their music, and once heard, it’s difficult to ignore. On first listen you’re transported to another time, to another decade in another city where CBGB’s was the go-to place and bands like The Ramones, The Stooges, Blondie... Continue Reading →
If life is what happens when you are busy making plans, sometimes full on, full band country-rock albums are what happen when you are planning more understated acoustic affairs. That’s what happened to Ed Abbiati anyway. Beat the Night came about quickly following a dry songwriting spell but what was intended to be a restrained... Continue Reading →
Psych-Noir? That’s a phrase that I haven’t heard before but it sums up what is going on here perfectly. The first half of the phrase describes Mayflower Madame’s hazy and intense textures perfectly, the second part their dark sonic designs. I’m not sure who first thought of the label but they deserve a medal, probably... Continue Reading →
Imagine if House of Love had not been brought together in Camberwell via a Melody Maker advert but had instead formed across the North Sea in Sweden under a very different set of circumstances. What would that band sound like? Sort of different and sort of similar I guess. Sort of like Easy. Contemporaries of... Continue Reading →
I’m beginning to think that Michael Ciravolo’s little black book of contact numbers has voodoo powers. Every time he flicks through it and finds someone to collaborate with the end result is always as if he has conjured an already classic song from a parallel universe. Most people just have the phone number of their... Continue Reading →
If The Weeping Souls merged Beatlesque pop sounds with a more underground yet classic acoustic rock vibe, this latest single shows just how much ground Jonny Polonsky can cover from one song to the next. The former was built on jangling melodies and infectious lyrics, this time out he takes things in an altogether different... Continue Reading →
It’s quite often you hear a band claim that they want to “push the boundaries”, “blur the edges” and “take their music into a new direction”, sometimes it can be just idle chat to get the listening world to take notice but sometimes it does happen. David Bowie made a career of ripping up the... Continue Reading →
It is interesting that speaking of this song, taken from the forth-coming album Forge, vocalist Sarah Palmer described it as being, “About a Magpie-type lover and all that comes with it, luring us into the hope of a beautiful relationship. It’s as close as we could get to writing a pop song on this album!” Interesting... Continue Reading →
More people should take a leaf out of Take1’s book and adopt a similar positive attitude. Whilst a lot of rap and hip-hop seems to be about finding a quick fix to getting what you want out of life, On Ya Mark takes a more honest route and it is clear that he isn't scared... Continue Reading →
David J’s latest double album Missive to an Angel from the Halls of Infamy and Allure is an exciting and ambitious concept. It looks back at 36 years of his music through a cycle of songs which is at turns intensely personal, self-deprecating, confessional, profound, wry and beautiful. It is the last word of that... Continue Reading →
When you find yourself listening to a song which was written to sate a “desire to 'reconsecrate' 16th Century Hungarian countess and noblewoman Elisabeth Bathory,” then you know that you have stumbled across something a bit more interesting that most of the things doing the rounds at the moment. Not all songs have to be... Continue Reading →
I’m not quite sure how it happened but I seem to get sent a strangely disproportionate amount of music with a Minneapolis connection come my way. I say disproportionate because I write from a small room in a medium sized railway town an ocean away. Not that geography or distance is really a factor in... Continue Reading →
So much music these days uses technology to hide its failings, compensate for things that are lacking in the artist's own musical repertoire. It is both the blessing and the curse of the modern world. It means that almost anyone can make music, which is as much a good thing as it is bad. If... Continue Reading →
Anyone who writes a song in homage to a Werner Herzog film is okay in my book. It shows not only obvious good taste but a desire to write about something other than the same old shallow topics which seem to clog up the charts these days, someone who thinks outside the box, someone looking... Continue Reading →
With a title of Dirty Little Thing, you sort of know what to expect going into this song. Old school rock and roll, cheeky lyrics, low-slung guitars, crashing riffs…a good time song about a good time girl. And that is exactly what you get. What you don’t expect though, given that this isn’t exactly new... Continue Reading →
Compromise takes a slice of old-school soul and a whole bunch of modern beats, dance floor grooves and no small amount of confidence and attitude to create its sound. But that is just the starting point. Throw in a neat rap break and a lyrical message about making sure that you are the equal in... Continue Reading →
I probably made this point the last time I wrote about Sky Orchid but there is a real art to using space effectively in music. I shall probably keep making the point when I write about them in the future. It’s just that they seem to be the perfect example of how well it can... Continue Reading →
Every so often an album comes along that stands a few inches taller than the others. You spend a few months trawling through the new releases, the rehashes, the debuts and the bands daring to challenge the norm by going in a slightly different direction until suddenly an album appears in your cd player that... Continue Reading →
If 4AD were launched today as a dance label, this would be their signature release. It’s a simple as that. Ballad of JC Quinn runs along on pulsing dance grooves, the sort of thing that Bristol’s underground scene revelled in during the 90’s, but then swathes itself in layers of shimmering sonics. The background beats... Continue Reading →
Whilst I have always used a few very obvious handles to try to convey Joe Mayk’s sound -Americana, alt-rock, alt-country, indie - you know the usual shorthand of the lazy journo’, A Century Entirely seems to defy even those broad literary brush strokes. I guess all of those sounds and styles are in there somewhere... Continue Reading →
I’m always harking on about how important the opening track to an album is, I like the song to not only act as an introduction to the songs to follow but to also grab the listener and make them want to carry on listening. Track one on Dubliner Steo Wall’s debut album is a ruse,... Continue Reading →
With the novel King of The Sea now released and two albums of music, The King of The Sea and The Divine Flaw also available to enhance the story, I sat down with the man behind this multi-media, meta-physical tale for a chat for The Big Takeover. You have just released the novel, The King... Continue Reading →
Pop-Hop, that’s what the man behind the music calls his sonic creations and to be honest, as far as genres go, it sums things up perfectly. Blending the flow and lyrical dexterity of the latter with the infectiousness and dance-floor groove of the former, if ever there was a more succinct or more apt musical... Continue Reading →
Tired of looking for indie/pop artists who are genuinely doing something new with their chosen genre, who are moving beyond the usual chart template and who are looking elsewhere for inspiration? Look no further, Jubilee is definitely one to listen to for some outside the box musical thinking. With a childhood which wandered between Bahia,... Continue Reading →
Hip-hop and all the genres that it spawned might have travelled a long way from the South Bronx street corners since it first found its feet, but it is good to know that there are still artists working with the same stark lyricism and honest, down to earth expressions which the genre was first founded... Continue Reading →
