Does the actual language that a song is sung in actually matter when assessing whether you like a piece of music or not? How would Bob Dylan seem if you didn’t speak English and couldn’t follow his beautifully twisted tales of the world? Would it miss a major part of what makes it so magic? What if Conor Oberst’s stories were just noise to a non-English-speaking listener, or is that his melodies are still powerful enough? The issue of language occurred to us recently, when our attention was brought upon this Danish quartet who sing in their native language. Of course when the words are so styled, as they can be with some Scandinavian pop, they can be undecipherable, or if the language is entirely made up, such as with Sigur Ros, then it’s of no consequence when judging the music. However, with Ulige Numre we’ve been reliably informed by a Danish speaker that the words are indeed pretty marvellous, causing us to perhaps miss out on some of the magic.

Its surely a statement of just how awesome their music is if they’ve still impressed us enough to earn a place on our very-English blog without even understanding a word of their lyrics. Even when you remove the mouth you’re still left with a body of melodies so attractive that you’ll be humming along whether you speak Danish or not. If you look back over recent weeks here on The Recommender you will have noticed that we’ve been running through a series of artists from Denmark, for no other reason that there seems to be a particularly awesome batch of them of recent, and all have been wafted under our noses in the last month or so. It’s a fantastic pool of talent, particularly in Copenhagen, and it’s brought us some truly special music, covering a relatively broad range of styles, albeit mostly what you might describe as alternative pop, a genre that you could argue is mastered more by Scandinavians than anywhere else in the world.

Ulige Numre, which apparently means “Odd Numbers“, are right up there with the others, producing immediate, smart, pop music. They have an Autumnal songsmith quality that is perhaps best on show with their tune, København, which you won’t be surprised to learn means Copenhagen – perhaps this whole Danish language thing isn’t that hard after all. They recently informed us that this song has caused them the most hype in Denmark. The buzz was strengthened when they did an apparently impressive live performance of the song on the television show, ‘The New Talkshow‘ (a sort of Scandinavian equivalent of The Jonathan Ross Show or The Late Show) back in November. It’s a wonderful lament to the city and although it often wonders close to collapse, threatening to go all middle-aged, it shifts its key and puts little lifts in all the right places. All songs are written by the talented singer Carl Emil Petersen, who just turned 21, but he’s already adept at turning over rich tunes, each one producing melodies as purest profit.

The track Hænder, which means “Hands” in English, (this language barrier is getting smaller and smaller all the time!), is another tidy turn. It contains elements of 90s REM, or that retro tone Razorlight once played, before they adorned stupid hats and annoyed everybody. It’s an altogether fuzzier concoction, but just as charming. They released their debut EP last year, which should be available digitally worldwide, on the independent label Auditorium. They’ve informed us that their full debut album is expected later on in 2012. They’re holding off touring the UK for the time being, as they’ve suggested the language could prove a barrier, but clearly it’s not stopped us from sinking comfortably into it. Whether something would be lost in their magic, should they try and write songs tailored to an English language, which would only really be known should they try it, but we quite like taking it in it’s purest musical form, following the vocals melody, rather than the words. What we lose in language we seem to gain with an anonymity to the story. Perhaps we’d hate it if we understood it all? Only one way to find out – we’re off to dig our noses into the Danish dictionary for the next few weeks.  (MB)

ULIGE NUMRE – KOBENHAVN

ULIGE NUMRE – HAENDER

Perhaps we should start by discussing a few time-honoured cliches, such as “you can’t teach an old dog new tricks“, or “if at first you don’t succeed“, or “a rose by any other name“, as this quartet from Denmark used to make up half of an older group, Le Fiasko. However, this new reformation has released a set of rather masterful tunes, making their previous incarnation seem something more akin to a prelude to the new, improved outfit. We don’t have anything against their previous incarnation, but listen to this new set of songs and you won’t give a shit about Le Fiasko anymore, it’ll all be about Pinkunoizu. It just goes to show that true artists have it bursting out of them, so no matter what moniker they have, or which group they’re in, they’ll carry on delivering exciting creations. They’ve clearly taken all the lessons from that previous band, but by introducing us to an excellent batch of new tunes you can pick a card, any card, as it turns out that this dog is more than capable of picking up some entertaining new tricks.

The four-piece has been together since the end of 2009, and is made up from Jeppe Brix (guitarist), Andreas Pallisgaard (guitarist, vocalist), Jakob Falgren (guitarist, keyboardist, bassist), and Jaleh Negari (drummer), and you can hear they have a history between them, as they combine beautifully. Like a lot of Danish musicians, they seem to spend their time between Copenhagen and Berlin, two of Europe’s most interesting and inspiring cities and it’s clearly good fuel for this quartet. We have been in contact with Andreas recently and it turns out that Pinkunoizu is actually the Japanese word for ‘pink noise’, which seems rather obvious now we re-look at it, although the reason they selected such a strange new title is beyond us. They play a style of music that has a range that could sit anywhere between the folk of Freelance Whales and Bon Iver, with touches of TV On The Radio and The Flaming Lips introduced for good measure. If that doesn’t whet your appetite then we’d suggest that you, well, quite frankly you need to check your appetite.

Like Freelance Whales they are a mesh of influences and instruments, although you can hear they’re craft is perhaps more patient and less likely to reach straight for the hurdy gurdy. That’s not to say they don’t wind it up, or build to a crescendo, they do, regularly, but it’s one delightfully plucked layer at a time. They’re not afraid to start in the crouch position, but by each song’s close they’re stood tall, arms outstretched, or even better they’re elatedly star-jumping in front of you. On occasion it’s loose seams can sometimes fray, leading to irrational compositions, even stopping mid-tune as if someone’s turned the analogue radio dial off the station you were listening to, but it never falls apart completely. This is indie folk delivered more like jazz, in that it can go anywhere. It’s free from constraint and as wide open as a child’s imagination.

The great thing about this style of music – and the same can be said of Fleet Foxes and Bon Iver – is that it’s so very grown up and earnest, but with Pinkunoizu we also get a lot more lift and swell from the layers. It’s tangible folk rock. It has grip and tension. Check out Death Is Not A Lover and you will find that real things seem to appear out of what initially just seems like a lot of mist or smoke. It’s form is just a shadow at first, but slowly it creeps ever closer, before it’s on top of you, towering like something so large you’re forced into a cowering submission. It’s sediment stacks up to what seems like a dozen voices to create an incredible effect that sounds like an argument between you and death himself, as they state, “Death is not a lover“, only to hear his retort, “Oh yes he is“. It’s as scary as it is hypnotic, as you realise Death has his way with all of us eventually, so by it’s close you too will find yourself dancing with him whether you like it or not.

Their debut EP, Peep, arrived in November 2011, on Full Time Hobby records, (home to Timber Timbre and Fujiya & Miyagi), and the debut album, Free Time, is due out on the same label on March 26th, although an older and sightly different version of that album has already been released in Denmark. You can expect their usual experimentation and plenty of melody, with highlights as special as any contemporaries from similar genres. Admittedly they occasionally wander off down strange avenues, perhaps finding the odd corner or dead end, but that’s also part of their experimental charm and they never fail to find their way out of the musical maze they’ve created, ultimately reaching the finish in a glorious, satisfying climax. This adventurousness is a trick they continue into their videos as you can see from the below film made for their tune, Parabolic Delusions, which aims more for a kind of Flaming Lips-scale of grandiose theatrics. This band could re-form a thousand times and still churn out stunning music, so consider any name for this rose that you wish, as it would definitely still sound as sweet. (MB)

PINKUNOIZU – DEATH IS NOT A LOVER

PINKUNOIZU – TIME IS LIKE A MELODY

Usually when an artist describes themselves as “ambient shoegaze” it would act more like a repellent for this blog, causing us to quickly immerse ourselves in something ass-kickingly rocking, like Led Zeppelin’s Good Times Bad Times, or Slayer’s Raining Blood, or we’d rush off to swag around with a turned-up-to-eleven blast of Ante Up, or any other musical equivalent to receiving a bucket of water facially. It’s not that we’re particularly against that style or genre of music, but most of it is so heart-stoppingly piss-poor that it mostly bores our souls into a coma and we find ourselves desperately reaching for something to plug ourselves back in. Bedroom producers both sides of the Atlantic have churned out the drifting, sloth-paced haze for years now and only on the very rare occasion does an artist actually hold our attention long enough to stop our fingers hovering over the delete buttons. Today we deliver to you a new group that’s successfully avoided the index finger of doom. These guy’s are doing it just right.

Not to be confused with The Soft Boys, or Soft Cell, or The Soft Pack, or anyone else guiseing up as something cushion-esque, this is The Soft, an un-signed trio from Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, consisting of Henry Morris, Zander Fletcher and William Glass. They seemed to drift in and out of a handful of music sites early last year, after Cave Chorus Records put out a digital copy of their tune, Mind Fuck. And what a mind fuck it was! It showed off the kind of stop-you-in-your-tracks beauty that they’re capable of, although inexplicably it’s no longer on their Soundcloud. It’s worth hunting out though, as it’s cruising groove and middle-class, Mirrors-like vocals have charm and grace poured all over them like smoke from a dry ice machine. Sure you could attach the usual descriptors, such as “ambient” and “shoegaze” to it, as they enjoy their music to wave up to the beach like liquid and there’s perhaps an over-use of the echo button on samples, but like The Weeknd, or before them Washed Out, they always place their mostly-gentle riffs and well-considered hooks and breaks in the perfect positions. The vocals also give the music a welcomed focus.

Take their song, Tropisms, which starts out like a broken robot’s alarm that’s trying to get its owner’s attention, before they introduce a bassline that’s as smooth as a (Lemon) jelly mould expands in the background. The calming, English voice, sung by Henry Morris, then rounds off the tune like a Hot Chip ballad. Synths and samples break up the gossamer in sharp stabs, but it never comes apart at the seams. It’s a difficult set of plates to spin in one song, but they manage it masterfully, as he calls to a close the words, “I wish I was your tessellation“. Half Breath is also of a minimal design, utilising what sounds like a ping pong game in slow motion as a rhythm, developing a slightly more melancholic colour palette, as Zander Fletcher sings of taking the blame. It soon drops in a pulsating beat, once again puncturing the mist with gorgeous details. It’s a tune that’s also had an enjoyable remix completed by recent Recommendees, Sundae Club, (who we think have just given us the exclusive first listen below). Like all decent remixes, they’ve created something fresh from the broth of the original, introducing an almost Visage-esque, 1980s Fade To Grey backdrop.

There are other tracks available to hear on their Soundcloud, mostly taken from their six-track Hot Summer EP, which was released at the end of 2011. It has many other highlights, such Venus Breath, which confirm to us that they have an understanding, well beyond their young ages, of how to marry melodic electronics with an otherwise ambient buffet. You see, rather remarkably, this trio got in touch with The Recommender recently and explained to us that they’re all only 18 years of age and just coming to the end of their last year at Sixth form! Once they get through school they plan a full touring assault on the UK, assuming they can continue to garner enough coverage and traction in the music media. We think they have enough talent to earn lots more plaudits and with a group that is this inspired with ideas we can expect plenty of new productions from them throughout 2012. “Ambient shoegaze” may well be their choice of genre, but take it from us when we tell you that there are more complex depths and intricate skills on offer with this trio than the pigeon hole suggests. It’s more likely to wake you up rather than put you to sleep, so you can definitely put that bucket of water down. (MB)

THE SOFT – TROPISMS

THE SOFT – VENUS BREATH

THE SOFT – HALF BREATH (SUNDAE CLUB REMIX)

When you’re discovering new music is there one over-riding element that makes you fall in love with it? Is it the melody? Is it the style? Is it the beat? Is it the vocals? Does it have to make you cry? Does it have to make you want to dance? What do you look for? For us it’s often a whole host of different elements to the music that allows us to connect to it – in truth we imagine it’s perhaps the same for you – but time and time again there’s one particular feature that gets our internal smile going – originality. It’s something that’s sadly all too rare in music, but perhaps that’s not surprising, with us now approaching nearly one hundred years since contemporary music was born, through the genres of blues and jazz, which kicked off a century that eventually evolved into rock n roll, pop, and all the rest. If you think about all the artists that truly stood out over those years, the best ones are original, although taking inspiration from what’s gone before, they undeniably sounded fresh and it’s that element of newness that gets our tails wagging above all else.

Today is perhaps a tougher environment in which to discover authentically original music, as in spite of such a broad range of genres and styles now on offer, plus an array of new technologies that allow boundless limits to creativity, it is a rather saturated marketplace and so much has actually now been attempted. However, music is art when considered at it’s most basic level, so in truth the only real limits are on the human imagination, and let’s fact it, that’s pretty limitless. At this junction in the discussion we’d like to bring in Rangleklods, a male solo artist who has recently returned home to his native country, Denmark, having spent time studying and working in Berlin. The discovery can be credited to Uncle Al, an old family friend of The Recommender, who’s always been something of a raconteur – also from Denmark –  who’s passion for music discovery has never waned. He’s recently connected us with a few new Danish artists that we will be bringing to these online pages over the coming posts, but today’s is a particularly special find. Upon hitting play on the three or four songs currently available on Rangleklods’ websites we were immediately hit by that one essential ingredient we hunt so hard for – originality. Bing!

Even the name Rangleklods is an original word, which we incorrectly assumed was Danish, but it turns out that he made the word up, so it didn’t allow people any misconceptions about the music prior to hearing it. He has one debut EP, Home, currently available, with a new single, Clouds, due out on February 20th, entirely self-produced by the man behind this project, Esben Andersen. To try and describe his music would prove somewhat folly, as it grows in different directions, often shifting lanes entirely at the centre of a song. Essentially it’s a blend of melodic, left-field pop and computer-blended electronics, with Anderson’s vocals laid softly over the top of them, but it’s not quite like anything else you’ve heard. His voice reminds us of a young Chris Martin, but rather than allow that to put us off it actually seems rather endearing, as this is the kind of music that Chris Martin would never write, so it acts as a sweet juxtaposition that fucks with your head, initially at least. The voice takes on a more Sting-like quality on the track, Behaviour, but instead of some horrible Police-esque, new wave/reggae/rock/pop hybrid, we instead have behind him a heavier, sinister sound and a rather dark story of seducing women, as he instructs us that, “she’ll give you everything you want“.

Elsewhere the EP’s title track, Home, is another lengthy pop song – his tunes often average over five minutes per song – that arrives in hypnotic pulses. Simple claps are over-laid with his vocals in a patient start which never really lets you know where its going, but although it’s drop is creeping ever-closer it changes key when it comes, providing the first unexpected switch in gear that seems to be his trademark. The pulses get heavier and the whole tune goes through warps, almost sampling itself as it twists and grows, but it never suffocates under it’s own self-indulgence; it just doesn’t feel like anything else out there. After four minutes it eventually finds the light at the end of the tunnel he’s created for you, as he brings it back to the song’s foundations. The finest moment on the EP arrives with Young & Dumb, which has his familiar throb throughout, as he paints a descriptive picture with words of foolishly falling in love too easily as a young man. He brings things to an abrupt close mid-song with the line “that’s why I only do girls I barely just like“, but it’s not over. It then picks up the warped pulse again and sets about delivering another two minutes of utterly astonishing hooks and breaks. A pretend ending? Now that’s adventurous! This is Scandinavian experimentalism at it’s brightest and best. The full debut album, Beekeeper, is due out March 12th but they’re still looking for distribution outside of Denmark. With Rangleklos we have someone who is able to bridge the ambitious and the accessible, but most importantly we’ve learned to understand the unique, admirable quality that is required to unlock originality – bravery – and this guy has it in spades. (MB)

RANGLEKLODS – YOUNG & DUMB

RANGLEKLODS – BEHAVIOUR

RANGLEKLODS – HOME

Only last week we were ranting on about a northern band, called Citi Petts, that in parts reminded us of The Gossip, with oversized guitar riffs and lots of punched-with-a-run-up beats. Today we are fishing in the same pond, as we’ve recently had contact from another northern band who’s new single can have it’s genetics traced back to that same American band, giving us a case of blog ditto inside of just a few days, (Ed – perhaps that should be Beth Ditto). If you like your guitar music to drive like Ryan Gosling and to hark back to the Siouxsie Sioux days when guitar grit was mixed with alternative rock diesel then you will find plenty of fuel in this new band from Leeds.

Alvin Purple are a quartet, led wonderfully by female singer, Carly Humphries, that actually launched their first double A-sided single, The Look/Stare to Declare, back in 2010. It earned them some blog coverage and a sprinkling of radio airplay on BBC 6music and Radio One. The Look introduced Humphries’ signature burnt vocals that came in repetitions over Ralph Sayers’ grinding bass riff, whilst Luke Barnfather blasted Rapture-styled guitar riffs in chopped bursts. Stare To Declare brought in more synths and a smoother, more sophisticated expansion to their sound. The first listens had us concluding that here was yet another re-hashed, post-punk sound, or perhaps at best they were seven years too late for a guitar scene that once gave us The Gossip, or even lesser-known fellow-Leeds bands such as The Hair, or The Sunshine Underground, but inside both tracks there were a few key signs that there was life beyond their obvious influences.

It was tough getting over their garage sound, which felt a little irrelevant to today’s computer-based, self-produced, Internet crowd of savvy, often electronic pioneers. But herein lies what also makes them interesting. Firstly, they followed that initial single by spending most of last year playing only sporadic shows, selecting to focus on recording a string of singles with producers, James Kenosha and Lee Smith (Middleman / Mi Mye), that are now set for releases through 2012. Secondly, this gap has allowed a slightly tweaked sound to emerge, proving that they now have the potential to transcend any current, temporary trends, much in the same way the obviously comparative band The Yeah Yeah‘s do. Just like Karen O‘s American outfit they will find more favourable responses by highlighting an intelligent depth to their music, as much as rocking it out in their productions. They need to get out of the garage and into people’s heads. Just look at the breadth in craft shown between The Yeah Yeah Yeah’s tunes Maps and Zero for example.

So the next Alvin Purple release is their new single, Huh Her, which immediately shows us something relatively new. Humphries’ kicks things off with an excellent vocal refrain, before the machine begins to pump behind her. There’s still the industrial energy – this band is unlikely to try and show us their Soft Shock – with a bass-led groove throughout. It continues to prove that they can wind it up to the louder levels that they’ve always been capable of, but it also seems they’re now able to rumble without losing touch of what is required in the design of a single, as hooks and bounce are at the centre of their craft this time around. They excitedly mentioned to us that they had the chance to use the mixing desk from Bjork’s studio and utilised a tape machine that was owned by Paul McCartney, showing us just how much they adore the legends from our rich history, but if it’s success they want then we believe they’d be better off spending time looking forwards not backwards. However, what they lack in positive invention, they make up for with other key elements, such as energy and style, so we think this is a band in the process of evolution, and if they hunt for new, original elements to add their arsenal then it will be the future that will most excite them, not the past. (MB)

ALVIN PURPLE – STARE TO DECLARE

ALVIN PURPLE – THE LOOK

ALVIN PURPLE – PLEASE PLEASE

A recent brief debate cropped up in a comment thread on our recent post about the band IO. You can see that post here and all it’s reader’s musings, but the main complaint was the lack of a distinct chorus within the tracks. Now for our tuppence worth we suggested that music doesn’t actually need a chorus, no more than every film needs a twist, but amongst certain genres or types of music it is perhaps expected, and particularly if you are discussing the brand of indie that IO create. Personally we didn’t think the lack of a connection between verses was a huge issue and it certainly didn’t detract from the experience, but with today’s recommendation the song structures, or a lack of them, are taken one step further. With this group from Cheltenham and their latest EP you not only have choruses removed, they’ve pretty much removed the vocals entirely! Admittedly, that in itself is not completely remarkable, as there’s plenty of instrumental music out there, especially with electronic genres like this, but the creations on offer here are so sublime they’re going to get every remark we can muster.

On a recent discovery hunt we found ourselves rummaging through the demos and promos we’d been sent, well, virtually rummaging anyway, which we guess is the modern equivalent. We were getting absolutely nowhere, having discovered not one band that we thought we loved enough to punt on these online pages. In fairness this is actually a rarity, as something always crops up during one of these spells, albeit sometimes after filtering through a mountain of absolute trash, but on this particular evening we were running into an endless number of dead ends. Generic, bland, cliche-ridden pulp made our hunt drag like we were back in a school detention, so we hit up our favourite 140-letter world, Twitter, and moaned to our 4500+ followers that there must be something better out there! As half-expected this cued a dozen or so tweeted responses from bands asking us to “check them out“, and claiming to be anything but bland. One of those tweets was from Hamstall Ridware, one third of the outfit better known as Sundae Club. To suggest our hunt for the evening was over was an understatement – this was a prize so awesome that it didn’t just feel like our patience had paid off, it felt like it had won the lottery.

For the second time this year, we’re having to break with a minor Recommender rule, (in which we prefer to cover emerging artists only), yet this trio have two albums already available, so you can rightly call that emerged, however our coverage is still likely to be an introduction to plenty of new ears, so we think it still worthwhile. What you’re going to get is a library of songs so fantastically fit for mining that you may well not see light for some time. No worries though as this trio create music with so much sunshine squeezed into it that this is one mine shaft where you’ll return with a tan. The three-piece seemed to have begun the project a decade or so ago, playing regular live sets on Sunday’s above a Pizza shop in Cheltenham, where they “larked about with synthesizers and old tat“, which goes some way to explaining their sound. Alongside the music they’ve created fictional characters behind the music, calling themselves Ray Cathode, Hamstall Ridware and Dr C D Mille. Theirs is a unique world all their own, but the doors are wide open and the warm, welcoming sounds drift out to entice all those wandering by.

Comparisons to The Avalanches and particularly to Lemon Jelly filter throughout their back catalogue, with a similar nostalgic mixture of ultra-British, witty and often eccentric, using a down right capricious set of samples and chocolate-smooth beats. Their music is too multi-faceted and their library of songs too plentiful to review on these pages in detail, but rest assured there are more ideas packed into ten seconds of a Sundae Club tune than most artists fit into an album. Their latest window into their world, with the Eclectic Electric EP, that arrived in the second half of last year, takes things slightly away from the usual big beats and finds them evolved into something more intricate and detailed. Synths take on a more Orbital-esque experimentation, particularly on opening track Picasso, with rain-dropped beats that skit over a wonderful shuffle, something they repeat on What About Martian?, which sounds like the discovery that Jean Michel Jarre was indeed from outer space after all, but where there’s a new darkness, such as on the sinister Spy Fly, we find it balanced with their usual lighter touches, as in the patient Or A Mix. It’s another remarkable example of their consistent skills and is a must for your most ponderous of afternoons. As we slide off back to the underground to re-kindle our search for (properly) emerging music, we couldn’t have come up for a more oxygenated blast of air. Thank you Sundae Club. (MB)

SUNDAE CLUB – PICASSO

SUNDAE CLUB – PEARLOID No5

SUNDAE CLUB – WHAT ABOUT MARTIAN?

Just like Lawrence Tierney’s character, Joe Cabot, in the final scene in Reservoir Dogs, we have a niggling fear of regret that could kick in as soon as we upload this post. Once that ‘publish’ button is clicked we’re committed to our article and to be honest for the first time in nearly four years of posting, we’re going ahead when we’re not 100% sure about the band. The reason is that with today’s recommendation there’s a mixed feeling in Camp Recommender. On the one hand, this band have a striking brilliance that hooks you early on, but once you inspect it in more detail the tunes start to fray at the edges. Thankfully it never completely falls apart and the highlights are blindingly bright, so call it our sunny disposition, or a piece of luck on the band’s behalf, but today we’re going ahead, and although we’re backing this horse we still wish to add in a few caveats. Only time will tell if we find our selection an unsatisfying blot on our blog’s landscape, or whether the positives and obvious promise held by the band go on to prove us right all along. Just like Joe, we’re going on a bit of instinct here, so let’s hope we’re not left quoting his immortal line, “I shoulda had my fuckin’ head examined, goin’ ahead when I wasn’t 100%“.

Today’s selection is The Phantom Runners and on the band’s side from the outset is that we’re known to be a very picky bunch on this blog, so they’re already ahead of many rejected bands that sadly never made the grade. Another added factor is that they call Brighton home, as do we, so there’s a favourable tinge to our generosity, as we will obviously get a little more satisfaction from supporting local bands. This particular quartet got together at the end of 2010 and have one self-produced debut EP recorded to date. The early signs are showing promise, with two of their tunes attracting the likes of BBC Introducing, who have listed both of them as ‘Tracks Of The Week‘ on Radio One. They occupy a kind of middle ground that should prove to be broadly radio-friendly, conjuring up thoughts of those popular guitar bands that were all-pervasive during the middle of the last decade – the ones that enjoyed a popular style of big hook guitars and distinct choruses. It’s the kind of music that will always have a market, albeit one at the centre ground, rather than at the boundary-pushed edges of one’s tastes, but that never did The Killers or The Wombats any harm.

We believe they have a hit-in-waiting with the anthemic Goddess Of War, which seems born to fill spaces the size of stadiums. It channels the kind of timelessness that bands used to aim for when writing hit tunes in the 70s and 80s. It’s not necessarily transcending those in a contemporary way either, rather they’re simply collecting together many of that period’s oversized ambitions, in the same manner that Ultravox used to, singing songs about being “wild and free“. The big chord changes and pop dramatics owe much to an Ultravox tune like Hymn, but there’s also a grand design, that has flecks of rocking pomp that only the British can write, particularly bringing to mind bands like Pulp and more recently King Charles. That element is most obviously found inside Adam Al-Hilali’s gentlemanly vocals, but also in the excellent sonic guitar riffs that race through you from the outset. In fact, it’s the driving musicianship behind the voice that lends most of the tune it’s credibility, but Adam’s vocals lift it up in sweeping chord changes which are totally irresistible.

From this strong start a few issues begin to creep into their craft, albeit mostly minor ones that can easily be addressed. There’s too many “ooh’s” and “ahh’s“, which sometimes work well on a tune such as Not The Same Without You, reflecting the likes of The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart, but elsewhere on tracks like Anna, which aims for a Cure-inspired ballad, they sadly seem more like they’ve run out of lyrics. The truth is they struggle when it comes to writing about love. Anna is still a sweet song, with a ballad that cranks up nicely, but the lyrics could have been stolen from the inside cover of a thirteen year old’s textbook. Sure the heartache is melancholy, but unfortunately, with lines like ”I’ll be there to break your fall“, or ”because you’re always there in my heart“, we have a pretty criminal level of saccharine averageness. That’s the worry at the centre of our niggling doubts, because the best songwriters usually know the difference between what looks good on paper and what sounds good to the audience. If they reached a little deeper and sung lines with a bit more soulful integrity then the words might match the excellent instrumentation. You won’t win us, (or Anna!), over with lines like that, but as we said these are mostly minor hiccups in a band that packs plenty of style and thought elsewhere. It makes us conclude that the peaks are worth the troughs, and this relatively new band still have plenty of time to hopefully realise that they’re in fact at their best when pushing it, rather than when they’re treading water safely in the cliche-packed middle ground. Overall we still think our reputation remains intact with this selection, and as Joe said, “you don’t need proof, when you got instinct“. (MB)

THE PHANTOM RUNNERS – GODDESS OF WAR

THE PHANTOM RUNNERS – ON THE RUN

THE PHANTOM RUNNERS – ANNA

We cannot for the life of us recall who it was that tipped us off in a past conversation about the band Money. It was some time last year. We were managing a gig involving the band Binary and discussing prospects for 2012, (perhaps it was with their manager?), so the tip was kindly passed to us and once we got a few spare minutes when back at home we set about searching the band out. We’ve written plenty about the issue of SEO and terribly unhelpful band names at length, (particularly on this post here), which is an issue that we’re sure you can imagine reared it’s ugly head once again with a band called Money. For fuck’s sake. The initial hunt online delivered no music what so ever, although our finances improved with all the ‘advice sites’ we came across instead. Proper help finally arrived as more and more coverage started to filter through about the band in the usual corners of the emerging music world, as we noticed NME recently tipping them for 2012 and we saw that The Guardian featured them earlier this week also.

The quartet call Manchester home, only fuelling the comparisons to fellow Mancs, Wu Lyf, but there’s a broader comparison, not only with their music but also in their ethos it seems. Wu Lyf shunned the media and a long line of enquiring journalists, hiding their image and refusing interviews for much of their emergence, and although we’re not suggesting Money are equally as unwelcoming, they do seem to share an ideology. They talk of music being “sacred“, with a focus on creativity and the ‘art’ in music. It’s something that’s often dismissed as pretentious, but if you think about it in it’s most simple terms, music is an art form, with the medium of notes and using instruments as their tools. Why should an artist care for the media, or looking the part, or acting a certain way, or giving interviews, they just wish to create and you can understand why they resist compromise or dancing to the media’s tunes. Why should a band get a haircut, or add in a beat for commercial appeal, just to meet aesthetic demands that a record deal signature demands? Let them be artists, let them tell the journos to fuck off. Their music is sacred to them and that’s just fine. In fairness they’re not aggressive about it in the same way Wu Lyf were, but they take their music very seriously and wish for the audience to patiently follow along.

The intelligent seriousness continues into the sounds they make. On tracks like Goodnight London a single piano leads the way as singer Jamie Lee delivers a melancholy tale about change and separation. To say it’s stripped down is like stating a pole dancer isn’t very shy, but inside it’s bared bones is a beating heart. It’s dark and stirring, but a touching moment nonetheless, as we awkwardly observe and share the private dialogue. We imagine that this tune was quite a remarkable experience for those that witnessed it when they recently selected to perform live inside Manchester’s Sacred Trinity Church. The echo and the sombre atmosphere suits them. They consider themselves something of a bunch of modern missionaries trying to restore something meaningful and revered about music. There’s a sense why they – and indeed Wu Lyf – select religion as a the backdrop when trying to find a dedicated following. To consecrate a solemn purpose, to purify music, to worship at, not their alter, but music’s alter, should be something that’s cherished, but in a society where religion is a dwindling power, perhaps it’s an image that’s never going to stop the tides of change, no matter how authentic their sermons.

The single, Who’s Going To Love You Now, introduces more from the other band members, allowing their sermons to preach in an elevated atmosphere. The guitars and keys are played in glints and the vocals arrive in gorgeous waves. It’s still resolutely intense but has bliss at it’s centre. They’re trying to push boundaries and stretch over edges, but it seems like its being driven by their own dissatisfaction, which actually bleeds exclusion rather than inclusion into their aesthetic, but they won’t care. What will be interesting to observe is how a band can hone their sound, or deliver a satisfying album if they’re so unsettled with themselves. But that’s the key here. It’s one thing to reject an industry like Wu Lfy did, or to stick to your creative art, no matter whether it satisfies the record companies or not, but will the audience like them when they’re not actually able to like themselves? Improvement comes from wanting to change, but surely you should still try to find satisfaction in the present, even though you can later improve upon it? Who knows what their future holds, particularly if they never look up from any self-absorbed introspection, but you have to honour the challenge they’ve set themselves up for. How else are we going to push the boundaries if true creatives aren’t allowed to flourish because the industry needs to package them up? At a time when the industry is so pervasive and Lana Del Rey had surgery to make her face more attractive, we think it’s actually a positive thing to see a band that aren’t all about the money. (MB)

MONEY – WHO’S GOING TO LOVE YOU NOW

As soon as this post is complete and we’ve uploaded it online we’re off to flagellate ourselves repeatedly in the hope of some atonement. We’re supposed to be recommending emerging, new music, so if any of you lovely readers have come across this band before then we can only apologise and serve up our intention to repent for hours on end following this article. You see, this band have been floating around for some time, so there’s a danger you know them. We don’t like to recommend bands that are established in the public domain, it’s kind of pointless. Not that we care to be first to stuff either, but we feel like our intentions are to act as an introductory service, which is a muted point when the band being served up has two EPs and a debut album already on offer. The truth is, the debut full length only came out last Autumn and in reality not much coverage has been awarded to them on UK blogs. This if of course an absolute total fucking tragedy, as the band in question are utterly remarkable, but perhaps we can help their UK presence in some small way. Have you met Loyal Divide? No? Good, let us introduce you then. Take a deep breath.

The Chicago four-piece are classed as some kind of slightly warped, synthesized experimentalists, or more criminally described as psyche rock, which is pretty unforgivable, but their work skips through the genres like a five year old school girl on crack, so a bit of misguided pigeon-holing is perhaps forgivable. They first appeared with their self-titled EP way back in 2007, when there were like seven blogs in existence or something, but they write off that work as “a horrible EP” because they had “no real idea of what we were doing“. Another EP, Labrador, appeared in 2008, attracting mainly a US and in fact mostly a Chicago-based selection of press and blog coverage. It only contained four tracks, two of which re-appeared on the eventual debut album, barely making it much more than a single, but one of those was the tune Vision Vision, which is so exceptionally exceptional that we will let them off. It was definitely a sign of things to come, but the wait was lengthy, as the full debut album didn’t come over the horizon until the second half of 2011. Bodice Ripper eventually arrived in October last year and any impatience rapidly melted away.

There’s a wonderful depth and richness to the album, surely achieved through a painstakingly lengthy writing process. How do you even imagine an opening song like Young Blades to begin with!? The album feels like a billion ideas being reigned in, something that’s perhaps typical of the Internet generation making music on limitless computers, but Adam Johnson, the band’s main songwriter, eventually harnesses his ideas well. It’s perhaps over-crowded with his imagination, but never impenetrable. It’s erudite, but never swollen with it’s own intelligence, in fact rather than be restricted by choice he’s found lots of original ideas and gone swimming in them. Highlights like the aforementioned Vision Vision is as grooved as it is crunchy, as it layers up over it’s confident beat. The track’s video, (see below), was filmed using gaffa tape with no animation at all, and is yet another fascinating experience from a band bursting with invention. Then you get to tunes like DDF, which have more meat on the bone, aiming to move your feet just as much as it aims to stimulate your mind. Just like almost every track on the album, the samples and riffs are placed in the perfect position. Anybody else trying to create this would make an absolute mess of the composition.

There’s evidence that their unique production line has continued to deliver moments of magic, as a new song that was never on the album, Otto, emerged online this week. It’s absolutely nothing like the history of tunes to date, perhaps something that should be expected with a band fuelled by so much creativity. It takes the air out from the beginning, introducing the vocals of Rachel Sarah Thomas, of the band Automata, over a delicate acoustic guitar. It’s more steeped in folk fairytales than industrial electronics, but the machine is switched on well over two minutes into the track to wonderful effect. Rachel temporarily leaves the room and it moves through the gears over slightly more familiar terrain. It’s extraordinary. Stunning in fact. We’re confident enough to state that it’s one of the tracks of the year and we’re not even out of January yet! We don’t care if we have to wait another two or three years for the next album, if the direction their ideas are headed can create songs this striking. If they can keep producing music to this high standard then the next album would be well worth our extended patience. Whether you’ve had the good fortune of coming across them before today or not, we still think our self-flagellation was well worth trying to find them some new British fans. (MB)

LOYAL DIVIDE – DDF

LOYAL DIVIDE – OTTO

LOYAL DIVIDE – DEATH BREATH