indie
Kieron Tyler
Various Artists: 94 Baker Street RevisitedAlthough the label is the only aspect of The Beatles’ Apple venture to endure, there was more to it than half-baked or ephemeral concerns like Apple Electronics, the Apple Boutique and the almost still-born Apple Studio. Although sporadic, Apple Films lasted. The launch of Apple Corps Ltd in early 1968 was preceded in June 1967 by the formation of Apple Publishing, a concern designed to foster songwriting talent and propagate bands which The Fabs thought had potential. 94 Baker Street Revisited - the fifth in a series - compiles 22 tracks from Apple Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
The last proper Ulrich Schnauss album – there have been collaborations and pseudonymous outings since – was going to be hard to top. Goodbye, released in 2007, breathtakingly took shoegazing further out than ever before: although gossamer, its sonic depth inexorably pulled you in. Now, with A Long Way to Fall, the Berlin producer and remixer has finally returned, solo, under his own name. He’s moved on, but is as assured as before.Some of the collaborations between then and now took Schnauss into techno and drum & bass, elements of which cross over into A Long Way to Fall. Initially, the Read more ...
Lisa-Marie Ferla
A confession: for much of this debut album from London fuzz-pop fivesome The History of Apple Pie, I have little to no idea what vocalist Stephanie Min is on about. Sweet and half-whispered, floating above crunchy bass and tuneful guitar riffage, it’s almost as if her vocals are there for effect rather than having something to say.But it’s not like contemporary pop is underrepresented by sloganeering and cheesy rhyming couplets, and when the music is this good who cares? Ten giddy teenage anthems thudding to earth packed with lust, heartache and the need to dance all night, Out of View is a Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Hawkwind: Space RitualAlthough it was released 40 years ago, Space Ritual sounds contemporary. Hawkwind’s repetition, simplicity and single-minded focus effectively created trance-inducing mantras. Now, they cast a shadow over Six Organs of Admittance, Om and other voyagers into inner space. Space Ritual was a statement of intent and there’s no excuse not to get this reissue should your life lack one of British art-rock’s supreme achievements.In its original form, Space Ritual was a double album with a spectacular fold-out sleeve designed by the late Barney Bubbles. It was recorded live – it Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Marianne Faithfull: Broken EnglishIn 1979, there was no obvious place for Marianne Faithfull. Identified with the Sixties and the baggage which came from her relationship with Mick Jagger, she had spent part of the decade living on a wall in Soho, a drug addict with few prospects, a period harrowingly detailed in her autobiography. There was an album in 1976, the humdrum, country flavoured Dreamin’ my Dreams, but punk, surprisingly, offered a life line. She appeared on stage with pop-punkers The Boys and, in 1979, issued the extraordinary Broken English, which sounded of its time yet Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
With David Bowie’s return prompting thoughts on British art rock, it’s apt that Dutch Uncles’ third album is hitting the streets now. A through-and-through example of smartly constructed pop, this would in another era have been called prog rock.From Marple near Stockport and formed in 2004 as Headlines, Dutch Uncles haven’t made it easy for themselves. Their first album snuck out on the Hamburg label Tapete. Their second – like this – was issued by British indie Memphis Industries. Although that was nominally inclined to math rock, with the de rigueur jagged song structures, it also had a Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Santa has returned home, but he wasn’t the season’s only visitor from the Nordic lands. The crop of recent music in from the region embraces genre-crossing jazz, vintage-style rock, the expected electropop, cross-border collaborations and a seven-year-old Finn. Exploring all corners of Scandinavia’s music, theartsdesk journeys where no one else does, landing in Norway first for some finely formed jazz.The debut album from Trondheim's Moskus ought to straightforward. And it is, to a point. A jazz piano trio, their line-up conforms to the known. Yet, as Salmesykkel unfolds, it’s increasingly Read more ...
Russ Coffey
Along with bands like Belle and Sebastian and The Beta Band, Yo La Tengo represent a kind of lo-fi vibe indie-aficionados can get a little smug about. To be found in the section marked “cult", they have been going forever, never broken into the mainstream, and exude an effortless superiority. YLT's cred, however, doesn’t always guarantee a thumbs-up. Not from me anyway. Previously I've gone both ways on them.It’s hard to argue with Fade, however, their thirteenth studio album. This is, quite simply, a very pretty record. Gone are the unnecessary jazz diversions or rummaging through blues and Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Broadcast: Berberian Sound Studio Original SoundtrackMore than the soundtrack to one of last year's most impactful films, the release of the music for Berberian Sound Studio is a tribute to the memory of Trish Keenan. With her Broadcast partner James Cargill, Keenan had begun working on Peter Strickland’s film before her death in January 2011. Cargill found sound files of her voice on her computer and began from there – a task that must have been both eerie and poignant.Broadcast had long drawn inspiration from Italian soundtrack music and their 2009 album collaboration with The Focus Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Up to this point it’s all gone swimmingly for Manchester-based quartet Everything Everything. Their debut album Man Alive charted high in the summer of 2010, but follow-up Arc is the test of whether they’re in for the long haul. Although the answer is largely in the hands of their strong fan base, the unfocused Arc suggests the band themselves aren’t sure of who they are.It’s difficult to stand still while paddling furiously, but that’s what Arc sounds like – a band with a million-and-one ideas and no overriding sense of unity. Not only does it fail to take them beyond Man Alive, it dilutes Read more ...
Tom Birchenough
Who ever said making a movie was a glamorous business? Shooting the climactic scene of his most recent film Boxing Day, British-born director Bernard Rose (pictured below right) found himself in the freezing Colorado mountains - so cold you couldn’t even see your breath - with just his two stars, Danny Huston and Matthew Jacobs, and a sound-recordist for company. Rose was his own cameraman, as well as editor, and a major inspiration behind the redemptive musical score.Rose may live in Los Angeles, and have made plenty of films on a much larger scale, but his ongoing series of adaptations of Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Can’s The Lost Tapes towers over any of the other reissues theartsdesk has covered this year. Although not strictly a reissue – it collected unheard recordings from tapes which had lain in the band’s archive – it rewrote the story of the seminal German band, offering a new perspective on their creative process and what they had issued. More than any of this, its three discs were a great listen and as essential as any of their albums - Soundtracks, Tago Mago and Future Days.Re-reviewing The Lost Tapes is unnecessary, but taking it as a yardstick for the year’s other reissues is, by turns, Read more ...