Hatchback- ‘Zeus and Apollo’ from Lone Recordings record company CD review 

This album came to my attention in the most classic of ways ‘oh what’s this your playing mate?’ I said in a Manchester record shop. The soft muted electronic tones had grabbed my attention as I was in the middle of buying the new Low album (more of that later). I immediately picked up a copy and soon after found some time with headphones to listen to it. The 6 tracks are lengthy affairs with the shortish being just over 8 minuets. That’s not to say they are boring. The gentle warm bass and minimal electronic percussion lay a lovely bed for pianos to plonk, synths to blip blop and guitars to meander over. It sounds like how I would have imagined Mogwai to evolve without the loud crescendos that dictates their sound. It’s ambient but without the feeling of being washed away under clinks of wine glasses at middle class dinner parties. It reminds me of both Boards of Canada and also The Fireman in it’s early morning/ late night atmosphere. It will be interesting to hear more releases from Hatchback.  

8/10 

Yesterday’s meal is hugging the plates

In the past I found it hard ever to name my favourite album for fear of missing something or out or fear of something better coming along. However with Talk Talk ‘Spirit of Eden’ I  happily admit defeat. This album I picked up on CD for £5 from a now defunct Virgin Megastore and now thanks to a good friend I have it on sacred vinyl. It’s the album that is actually perfect. It’s the first album I ever put on any MP3 player I ever buy and at times I think it’s probably the only album I could ever need. 

The history behind the album is nearly as intriguing as the album itself. Talk Talk launched themselves as a synth pop band with rivals such as Duran Duran and had hits with songs such as ‘It’s my life’ which was then covered many years later on by Gwen Stefani. After having such success, their record company, EMI, gave them an open budget on recording and also set no deadline. They then recorded ‘Spirit of Eden’ and gave the final master to EMI who deemed it commercially a failure and asked for a re-record. Talk Talk’s singer and primary member Mark Hollis refused. This led to a contract dispute and ended with Talk Talk singing for Polydor after being freed from their contract with EMI. Talk Talk were not the only musicians to have issues with record companies in the 1980’s with Geffen offering Neil Young complete creative freedom and then disputing the album he produced as ‘not commercially acceptable’.

The album utilised a production technique of cutting and pasting improvised sections. This was achieved by using initiative digital production to create the songs. This creates an interesting structure to the songs and also giving strong dynamic shifts.  The songs blend into each other and it is hard to know when one starts and one ends.  ends. Also some of the instruments appear and then disappear never to be heard again such as subtle acoustic guitar. The instrumentation is organic and at times highly orchestral but there is nothing that dominates the album. It’s an album of implicit measures with each instrument given it’s own space. It never seems crowded which says a lot considering the amount of instruments that are on the album.

It was recorded by candlelight which gives it an early hours feeling similar to the sounds of John Martyn on ‘Small hours’ but it is broader than that. I can listen to this album in a train and be lost in speeding countryside or all alone. It has the feeling of being the walls around you. It makes you feel concious of your surroundings and how you releate to that. It’s the perfect soundtrack. 

The pelly and me. 

1. Read ‘Electric Eden’ by Rob Young (I need this as a portable paperback) 

2. Read more Sherlock Holmes (I need to read more)

3. Continue to take photo’s (I’m doing this one)

4. Learn how to play ‘Express Yourself” on bass (I need to stop being lazy) 

5. Stop making top 5’s and start doing things (finished this one) 

It takes a lot to laugh, it takes a train to cry. 

James Blake is one of the revelations of 2011. Not only did he score highly on Pitchfork but also has managed to gain access to a more of a mainstream audience as being one of the BBC’s Sound of 2011. This combination of elitist and populist press is a hard one to achieve and only recently, Vampire Weekend spring to mind as having secured this heady position. 

What James Blake reminds me of is the early days of Dizzie Rascal with incorporating an urban subculture with a nod to more populist edge. Dizzie launched himself with the single ‘I luv you’ which had many allusions to the grime/garage sound he had started with by being part of the 13 piece garage crew Roll Deep. ‘I luv you’ had the sub bass sound and also the clattering of the delayed electronic hi-hat’s that was odd to hear in 2002 with only other mass market garage sound being So Solid Crew or The Artful Dodger which were easily parodied as a form of Gangsta Rap. Dizzie appeared and then became to be more than this one dimensional representation by both appearing on Newsnight, where afterwards many asked for him to be Prime Minister, and also being in Band Aid 20 rapping his way through ‘Do they know it’s christmas?’ 

It’s not that I expect James Blake to do either but I can see his music being used on Top Gear or even possibly Spooks where he might gain a bigger audience than what might be expected of a dubstep producer. This of course is what The XX achieved with their debut album, soundtracking many a troubled teen in a BBC 3 documentary. However, I feel James Blake has a more overt urban sound than The XX who mixed their electronic sound with an early Joy Division minimalist approach. 

James Blake does tick a lot of boxes with his approach to his music and also can be seen as a Radiohead figure in incorporating unfamiliar sounds and technique into a more mainstream audience of which I give him credit for and feel is necessary for both pop music and more marginalised culture. For this it will be interesting to see what he does next? Will he escape his genre or will he want to retreat further from the populist spotlight? That creates intrigue and all good artist’s have intrigue. 

Having a gas.