Hadouken - Music For An Accelerated Culture

There is an inherent problem with many of the indie/dance bands coming out of the UK right now. Simply, they don’t seem to actually be especially skilled in fusing guitars and electro. While Does It Offend You, Yeah? recently offered a baffling album filled half with dance tracks and half with indie rock songs, Hadouken! have done the opposite in carelessly cramming a plethora of musical styles together in the doomed hope it will sound good.

Atop an ugly combination of indie, rave and grime, Music For An Accelerated Culture offers skinny jeans and Myspace as its typical subject-matter, yet isn’t half as clever as it thinks it is. While the likes of The Cribs and The Streets talk of the zeitgeist with wit and intelligence, when Hadouken! take a sideswipe at the scenesters during messy second track That Boy That Girl, it feels rather like they are throwing stones in glasshouses.

However, in amongst the mess there are a couple of positives. Declaration of War and Driving Nowhere demonstrate that Hadouken! are capable of crafting well-structured tracks, with frontman James Smith actually singing rather than offering the obnoxious spoken-word vocal that is generally all over their sound. Elsewhere, Liquid Lives is a good example of the few stirring moments, with Smith yelling “Drink, smoke, fuck, fight.” But, overall, Music For An Accelerated Culture is a big disappointment which, ultimately, will merely leave you longing for Klaxons to finally release another album and show everyone how this indie/dance thing should be done.

Albert Hammond Jr interview

 

ALBERT HAMMOND JR TALKS TO ROB TOWNSEND ABOUT HIS NEW ALBUM, HIS UPCOMING TOUR AND HIS OTHER BAND’S IMPACT ON THE MUSIC WORLD

Albert Hammond, Jr. is a talented guy. As well as being in one of the most lauded bands of the last decade, The Strokes’ guitarist is making a name for himself as a singer/songwriter, and this week releases his second solo album, ¿Cómo Te Llama?

However, far from his solo work being down to any long-standing desire to go it alone, Hammond, Jr. admits it came about almost by accident after he wrote a couple of songs he liked. “I felt I had reached a point where if I didn’t record them in a way that would let me let go of them, I would never move on. Friends started to really like what I was doing, so I kept doing more until I was like: ‘Oh, I have a record. Cool. Maybe I can put it out in England or something.’ I wasn’t planning on touring or doing any press but it kind of built up and before I knew it I was on the road and the album was out everywhere.”

That album was Yours To Keep and now, a couple of years on, ¿Cómo Te Llama? follows, showing growth and increased ambition to his sound. The guitar-led, perky pop melodies are still there, but this time they are bolder and more powerful. Another difference is that this album was more of a collaborative effort, with Hammond, Jr. including his band in the songwriting process at a much earlier stage. “I really like the concept of trying to explain what you hear in your head to someone else and seeing how they bring it back to you. People can add more by how they play it or by thinking of tones you might not have thought of. Even if the collaboration is as small as a tone, in my world that’s huge because it keeps everything fresh and exciting.”

The New York-based musician has long been iconic as a member of The Strokes, who changed the course of indie music for the better when they released their debut album in 2001. Having witnessed their seminal performance at that year’s Reading Festival, I ask Hammond, Jr. whether at the time he had any idea of the impact his band was having. While he says in retrospect it was an amazing experience, he admits that, back then, he wasn’t thinking about his role in altering how bands would sound and look. “When you’re doing it, you almost don’t realise that your dream is coming true. It’s all just day-by-day; you don’t really see an arc. We were happy and it’s awesome when you are a part of things changing, but if you’d have asked me that question back then, I don’t think I would have said anything about changing anything. I’d have probably asked you how I could meet a girl I liked or if you had any coke,” he laughs.

With The Strokes still going strong, Hammond, Jr. describes his dichotomous musical life as: “Positioning myself between two things that give me great joy,” and says it’s not difficult to balance his time and mindset between the two projects. Typical of the laid-back charm and appealing optimism he displays throughout our conversation, the American says: “I try to find the way it can be done as opposed to the way it can’t. I can still write songs for my third record and be playing with The Strokes. It’s like that Spinal Tap thing [where keyboardist Viv Savage is asked to deputise for an absent Nigel Tufnell]: ‘Oh yeah, I can do that. I've got two hands.’”

When I reviewed Hammond, Jr’s performance at England’s Latitude Festival last year, he seemed a very natural frontman, but he tells me he found it strange stepping up to the role. “The hardest part was probably to be on my third or fourth show and being reviewed as if I’d been around for years. Most people get a year or two, if not more, to find their way and I was already being looked at before I really even understood what I was doing.”

Having played live all over the world for much of last year, Albert Hammond, Jr. is now increasingly confident fronting his band. He begins a hectic worldwide gigging schedule in Australia in a few weeks and hints that he hopes to bookend months of touring by playing Big Day Out next January. “They didn’t ask me last year,” he frowns. When I enquire whether he is excited about his visit to Sydney in August, his enthusiasm is palpable. “Ah yeah. Are you kidding? I really wanted to come over with the first album but you guys are far away.”

Je Suis Animal - Self Taught Magic From A Book

JE SUIS ANIMAL
Self-Taught Magic From A Book

With a name like Je Suis Animal and a debut called Self-Taught Magic From A Book, which comes complete with beautifully weird inner-sleeve artwork and handwritten lyrics, it doesn’t take a genius to work out that this album is going to be the quintessence of indie.

The band formed at art school in the UK before settling down in Norway, and offers 80s nostalgia which itself was inspired by 60s psychedelia, with jangly guitars and pretty female vocals sitting atop a bed of shoegazey noise.

Self-Taught Magic… was recorded in an old community hall, deep within the woodland of central Norway and, because it took just seven days, feels almost live with a nice rough edge to it. Tracks like Fortune Map and Start The Night land Je Suis Animal’s sound not a million miles from The Velvet Underground and Nico. However, the album’s pretty harmonies, lovely melodies and general perkiness also point firmly in the direction of sunny Scandinavian indie-pop. Standout track The Mystery of Marie Roget is an example of this as well being a good indication of the somewhat whimsical lyrical content, which deals with murder mysteries, magic, art and sex.

While there is nothing about this album that suggests Je Suis Animal are going to set the world alight, there is an undeniable charm here, and anyone desperately searching for the missing link between My Bloody Valentine, Stereolab and The Concretes will find what they are looking for.

Albert Hammond, Jr. - ¿Cómo Te Llama?

ALBERT HAMMOND JR
¿Cómo Te Llama?

While Albert Hammond, Jr’s rather lovely debut solo album, Yours To Keep, proved – as if we needed it - that The Strokes guitarist has an ear for a perky pop melody, it also undeniably signposted its influences, not least in his Beach Boys harmonies. And it is here that his sophomore effort ¿Cómo Te Llama? differs slightly.

When Drum recently spoke to the American, he said that his major influences for this record were The Kinks, The Clash and Neil Young, yet none of these are especially obvious to reference within the 13 songs on offer here. Sure, there is some nice chunky riffage on The Boss Americana which nods to The Kinks but this record sees Hammond, Jr. clearly starting to find his own sound. ¿Cómo Te Llama? is bolder and more ambitious than its predecessor.

There are inevitably moments, like Gfc, that sound rather like The Strokes but there is also some interesting experimentation, most notably on the instrumentation of Spooky Couch and the intro to Lisa, which is reminiscent of Super Furry Animals. Although there is nothing especially distinctive or outstanding about Hammond, Jr’s vocal, the fact that it sounds a bit like his band-mate Julian Casablancas and sometimes like David Bowie means it is more than adequate to sit atop his guitar-lied compositions.

¿Cómo Te Llama? might not have quite the same sunny appeal of Hammond, Jr’s debut, but it is perhaps a more coherent album and certainly shows a continuing musical growth and maturity to his songwriting.

The Vines interview

THE VINES DRUMMER HAMISH ROSSER TELLS ROB TOWNSEND WHICH BAND MAKES HIM FEEL OLD

“It’s pretty hard to live up to being called The Beatles crossed with Nirvana and the coolest thing on the planet.”

It’s been six long years since The Vines were being hailed by the music press as the saviours of rock n roll. Having subsequently endured illness, meltdowns and changes in their line-up, there have been enough dramas in the Sydneysiders’ camp to have spelt the end for most bands, so it is pleasing to find drummer Hamish Rosser in buoyant spirits as he sits down to chat about this week’s release of their fourth long-player, Melodia. “We felt really confident going into this one. Recording [third album] Vision Valley was a bit of a strange one after [vocalist] Craig [Nicholls] got diagnosed with Aspergers, but now he’s really sure of himself and I think that shines through in the songwriting.”

As would be expected from a Vines album, its 14 powerful songs are squeezed into just over thirty minutes, and Rosser is ebullient about how the record sounds. “It’s just better songwriting than what we have done for quite a while; lots of catchy hooks, choruses and cool riffs,” he beams. “Most of the songs are just over two-minutes long. That’s Craig’s style; no need for an extra chorus or that repeated verse. Let’s hit them, get out and get to the next song.”

In capturing that distinctive Vines sound, the band travelled to America to once again work with Rob Schnapf, who produced their acclaimed debut Highly Evolved and its follow up, Winning Days. “It was really great to go to The States to record because LA has got some of the world’s best studios and equipment. Rob knows the band and understands our strengths and weaknesses. He’s got good results from us before and I think we’re much better players now than the last time he worked with us. He even said as much,” Rosser laughs.

The group was prolific in its output during this time, and ended up with so many songs for the album that at least ten had to be discarded. “All the band had our own favourites and what we thought ought to be on there, but Rob - with the fresh ears of a producer - cast the deciding vote on quite a few songs,” Rosser tells me when I ask him how they decided which ones wouldn’t make the cut. “He sees the album as a whole rather than picking which songs might be the coolest or catchiest, so that you get as many different sides of the band as possible. He had a vision of the bigger picture.”

The quartet will be supporting the album with a countrywide tour that will run over three weekends. While they have learnt from experience that extensive time on the road is not a possibility, their distinctive raw onstage energy levels remain as high as ever. Even songs from Highly Evolved are still delivered with the same venom as they were back in 2002. I ask Rosser how difficult it is to maintain such vitality. “Oh, they’re such short songs, you know,” he shrugs. “It’s a short burst - a sprint to the line. I have seen bands that are sick of playing their hit songs, but that hasn’t been the case for us. I still find new and different ways to play Get Free. You haven’t got to fake it when the crowd is jumping up and down. It’s real.”

It was this visceral energy that caused NME and Rolling Stone to wet themselves over The Vines in the first place, which leads me to ask whether they felt the need to almost re-prove themselves once the hype died down and the inevitable backlash kicked in. “Sometimes we couldn’t live up to the hype. With expectation that high, people did walk away disappointed in the early days, but we’re still around so I don’t know if it was detrimental to the band. If anything we were probably under-prepared for the attention because, while some of the gigs were brilliant, some of them weren’t so good,” Rosser admits with a chuckle. “Since then we have become a lot better as a band just through playing and experience rather than through dedication to prove someone wrong or to prove a point.”

Regardless of whether The Vines have been able to live up to the crazy media hype that weighed heavily on their shoulders, they’ve left a lasting impression, with The Killers, Lightspeed Champion and Arctic Monkeys all recently stating they are fans. “I’m glad we’ve cast a shadow long enough to have influenced other bands and it’s really flattering for a band like Arctic Monkeys to say they were influenced by us.” Rosser pauses for a second, before adding: “Well, actually, if anything it makes me feel old.”

Interview by Rob Townsend. Top photo by Cybele Malinowski.

Kimya Dawson at Manning Bar

KIMYA DAWSON
ANGELO SPENCER
AND THEN TO BED
Manning Bar, Sydney
20/06/08

Female singer/songwriter And Then To Bed opened proceedings by prettily warbling her way though some acoustic tunes with the occasional accompaniment of the piano-accordion or tambourine.

Next, one-man show Angelo Spencer raised the tempo with a ramshackle but fun set. With a basic kick-drum/high-hat set-up and switching between a bass and electric guitar, the Frenchman belted out punchy tracks which he sometimes stopped midway through in order to regale the crowd with quirky, semi-incomprehensible stories.

In front of a sold-out room, Kimya Dawson sat in a chair, strummed gently at her acoustic guitar and sang super-softly with her eyes tightly closed. Opening with It’s Been Raining and continuing with similarly slow songs, she explained that her downbeat set-list did not represent her mood, but that a nasty case of tendonitis was preventing her from playing anything particularly up-tempo or complicated. The genial American was in fact in great spirits on her debut visit to Australia, and had the crowd in stitches with her hilarious between-song banter about everything from Malcolm In The Middle to chimpanzees eating their own shit.

Predictable requests for Moldy Peaches songs were, of course, declined by Dawson, who went to great lengths to explain that playing them without band-mate Adam Green would be as hollow an experience as “singing a John Mayer song at karaoke.” Instead she played tracks from her extensive solo back-catalogue, as well as offerings from Alphabutt, her upcoming album for kids. Encouraging audience participation, and with lyrics like: “G is for gorilla fart/H is for huge gorilla fart,” these cheeky ditties went down an absolute storm.

Dawson went on to raise the roof with an A Capella version of The Greatest Love Of All as well as a love song written by her brother about professional wrestler Randy Savage. However, as well as being witty, she is also known to wear her heart on her sleeve, and light-hearted moments like these were counterbalanced by sobering true tales of melancholy in what was an always engaging atmosphere, regardless of whether the tone was light-hearted or sombre.

By the time a singalong of Loose Lips ended the night, there surely wasn’t a person in the room that hadn’t been wooed by Dawson’s warm nature and wonderful ditties. Unpretentious, entertaining, funny, touching and impossibly intimate, this was an experience that will live long in the memory of everyone lucky enough to be there. Gig of the year so far, no question.

Guillemots - Red

England’s Guillemots could never be accused of lacking ambition. Their lovely first album may have been filled with lush orchestration and sweeping strings, but it is made to feel almost lo-fi in comparison to their follow-up offering. As opening track Kriss Kross bursts from the speakers sounding a bit Bollywood, a bit Broadway, a bit disco and a bit glam rock all at the same time, it is abundantly clear this band doesn’t adhere to the idea of less being more.

Amid some chunky, Timbaland-style beats (seriously), Red immediately grabs its listener by the throat with its vitality. However, in spite of some great hooks and infectious choruses, particularly on standout track Get Over It, a problem soon becomes apparent. Simply, there is too much going on here. Tracks pull in so many different directions and are crammed with so many ideas that they are often chaotic and slightly overbearing, especially as the album progresses and leaps between big eighties-sounding pop, prog-rock, pounding beats and R & B. At times the production is rather cluttered and obtrusive, which is a real shame because at the heart of this record there are some genuinely great songs but they are suffocated by such an overtly grandiose approach.

There is enough happening on Red to fill about three albums, and trying to squeeze everything into these 11 tracks merely leaves them feeling fussy and over-egged. While there are some interesting and even breathtaking moments, Red is often baffling and incoherent. Still, full marks for ambition.