Animals on Wheels’ “Designs & Mistakes” is a jazzy drum’n'bass record (or “drill’n'bass” as it has been dubbed by some), created by electronist Andy Coleman who incidentally lives and records all his music on his boat. The music is reminiscent of Aphex Twin and similar projects, but is far from brilliant. At times it contains ambient and rather soothing instrumentals, other times it pulsates with loose jazz samples and mesmerising loops. It’s ok for those who enjoy the genre and want to hear everything it has to offer, but for all us others it’s just about average.
Laughter! This record rocks! Regardless of what you might think of the punk-”scene” in the last thirty or so years, there’s no denying that blazing pub-rock anthems in best Oi! tradition such as those found on “Best of Oi!” will provoke some ironic laughter in listeners anno 21st century. I’m sure that their creators were all serious and stuff about this music, but at some points I simply can’t contain myself: When Cock Sparrer blast off with oh-so-nationalistic “England Belongs to Me” I give a little chuckle. Yes, die-hardcorists, the true purists of punk will probably have a go at me for this, but how can you take this music too seriously? The very name of the genre is a sort of running joke between myself and friends, never mind the actual songs.
The 1990 release of “Hammerheart” saw Bathory shed themselves completely of their image as a “satanic” band, firmly establishing the Viking metal tendencies shown on “Blood, Fire, Death.” This, in my opinion, was a Good Move ™ by Quorthron and the boys. While their earlier works do have a certain immature charm about them, they can never really live up to the much more focused efforts put out later in the bands career.
Dan Swano, renaissance man and brain behind such bands as Edge of Sanity and Pan-Thy-Monium, reveals his more sensitive side in his Nightingale project. “I,” the “band’s” third offering, provides the listener with a good 11, mostly well written, rock songs with a clear seventies influence.
Norwegian black metallers Emperor serve up quite an album in “Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk.” This truly unique masterpiece was first released in 1997, 3 years after the release of the genre defining “In the Nightside Eclipse”, but only a few weeks ago did I first lay my hands on it. Since then, it’s been spinning in my CD player at least 3 times a day. It’s that good (so good in fact that it goes as far as justifying the somewhat ludicrous claim from the band that “Emperor performs sophisticated black metal art only.”)
Finally a Christmas record with some soul! Sick of hearing that same old tired rendition of “White Christmas” by Bing Crosby over and over, every damn year? In that case (and who isn’t!?) legendary 70s producer Phil Spector’s “A Christmas Gift For You” might be worth considering a listen. Combining the soulful black sound of Spector’s record label stars with the good old classics like “Frosty the Snowman” and “Winter Wonderland”, the album is a real do-whop-beep of a holiday disc and probably the greatest rock & roll Christmas album ever made.
After the less-than-average “Storytelling”, Belle and Sebastian are firmly back in the driver’s seat with “Dear Catastrophe Waitress”. There’s a bit of everything in here, but overall it’s just a good, solid pop album, nothing more, nothing less. It seems a natural place to go for the band after their past releases and evolves on their previous sound, but Stu Murdoch & Co. keep from losing any of their charm in the process. There are still the same tragic fates, quirky real-world narratives and silly feel-good songs which fans of the group have come to love through the years. That is of course not to say that there’s nothing new on here though. “Dear Catastrophe Waitress” represents an evolution not a revolution, true, but there are songs like “Step Into My Office, Baby”, “Piazza, New York Catcher” and “Lord Anthony” which sound more fresh and clean than your other average B&S songs.
“8 Soothing Songs for Rut” is just plain fun. Norwegian rockers Motorpsycho have since its release in 1992 moved to greener pastures, featuring a more pop-driven alternative rock sound, but on this album they retain their at-times eclectic rock style with touches of pop at all the right places. While a few of the songs drag on for a while and the smoked-out vocals of Bent S�ther get tedious a way into the record, there are good moments where Motorpsycho hint at what they would later become, namely one of the fieriest and most innovative bands on the Norwegian rock scene.
Casket Lottery’s “Moving Mountains” album is quite simply ‘meh’. It’s not that it’s poorly executed - it’s actually quite well done on the technical side of things, but there’s really no artistic excitement, no ‘wow’ moment(um) of any kind. The vocalist is plain and uninteresting, yes, one might even say ‘boring’, and entirely lacking in texture to set him apart from all other wannabe rock-stars. The guitars and drums are well-done, but seem to be more of a testament to the musical technical abilities of the band members than their ability to create something innovative or even remotely original. In my opinion the latter should be primary, the former secondary.
What the hell is this?! I’ll be the first to admit that I’m no electronica connosieur but the German quartet Jeans Team have even to my virgin ears unleashed a brilliantly simplistic four-track remix single entitled “Keine Melodien”. It features, in essence, the words “ein, zwei, drei, fier!” repeated over and over again against pulsing synthesiser sounds and thick drum beat loops. On the Peaches remix of the song, we get some thick bass-and-guitar loops backing up sweetly spoken “ein, zwei drei, fier!”, this time by Peaches vocalist (ah, love the poorly pronounced Deutsch!). Hypnotic Johannes Heil remix rocks off into the Amiga-synthesque final “Op. Bastards” remix. Beautiful electronic pulsation; absolutely ‘go crazy’.