If someone sees me, let me know...*

Flinging out skittering indie-pop goodness like their lives depended on it, Heart shackles is cracker no.5 this year from NY combo My Teenage Stride. Promising a track a month in '09, it comes hard on the heals of likes of the galloping Gallipoli now and the more typical Cast your own shadow, all well up to the calibre of last album, rr 2007 top tenner Ears like golden bats. Deny yourself no longer...
[my teenage stride]

In the curious way of things two acts whose albums have been hogging the player this past six weeks, one Swedish the other Canadian and hitherto quite unconnected, are right now touring North America in harness. Opening the shows is Gentleman Reg and his tidy band promoting new album Jet black, a record which if not quite scaling some of the individual pop peaks of predecessor Darby & Joan [see rr Nov04] collectively punches well above its weight. Even sounds great in the back of moving van!

That's the album opener Coastline which is followed hard by another four whipsmart belters: To some it comes easy's quick rimshot rhythm and urgent verse spilling into a great girl-enhanced chorus; the tumbling drums of You can't get it back; the lean bass 'n' drums beneath Reg's upclose double-tracked vocal on How we exit. It's pop the way we like it, and no mistaking.
The pace drops deliciously on things like the half-light questing of Oh my god and Rewind's lush, plaintive refrain (ace Katie Sketch counterpointing). Clipped and often kicking, that's Reg; light of voice, nimble of step and not shy of cutting reflection. The biggest sonic departure here is We're in a thunderstorm, wherein Vermue essays Pet Shop Boys' territory with all the expertise of the hardened gay clubber. It's another 'hit' that hardly anyone's going to hear...except you, right?
[buy jet black][gentleman reg]

Don't know about anybody else but this blog finds some records are just a bit too good for their own good. Confident of their ability to deliver the goods whenever you choose to listen you sort of..don't. They get taken for granted quite quickly instead of racking up the spins. The Weepies' records, they kind of fall into this limbo. But the album which prompted this recent realization has happily been reaping the benefits of self-revelation and been hammered almost daily this past month...

...Colonia by A Camp, should you ask. Heavens but this is gorgeous and a record running serious danger of giving superstar side-projects a good name. Nina 'Cardigans' Persson and friends have conjurred some classic then-but-somehow-now popsmithing given the sort of sterling production that a few bucks can buy you. Sixties- and Seventies-infused gems come thick and fast producing a whole which can hold its own in your collection, somewhere between your Jenny Lewis and your Dusty Springfields.
I signed the line is track 10 on Colonia. reallyrather just loves it when you get a tune as good as this so far down the running order and it denotes the confidence which flows through this whole set. Welcome to strength-in-depth city. Quite a few of these songs sound like the product of a fantasy Carole King/Chrissie Hynde collaboration; hook-laden and once-bitten.
Openers The crowning and Stronger than Jesus are a pair of swaying, stirring arm-wavers Jenny Lewis fans will surely swoon at. Amazon tells us that folks who bought Colonia have also bagged the new Camera Obscura, understandable but brandishing retro-classics the likes of Love has left the room, methinks Swedes trumps Scots. Chinatown summons the mellow spirit of '70s LA pop-rock - mmmmm - while My America is what Zooey Deschanel might've sounded like if she'd hooked up with Springsteen and not Matt Ward (now you don't ever have to do it, Zooey). And perhaps the biggest bonus of all is that the *lyrics are often as memorable as the quality tuneage: I will slip your mind, she sings. Wrong, Nina, double-wrong...

Due to an unfortunate clash with a pre-arranged date with Shearwater at the Union Chapel, reallyrather missed A Camp in London last month. But June 23 sees a rare UK visit for Kendall Meade aka long-time reallyrather favourite Mascott, now coincidentally signed to UK label Reveal who also put out..A Camp! Come what may this blog knows where its duty lies (specifically, the Slaughtered Lamb in Clerkenwell - be there...)
[mascott]

OK, they've had long enough, it looks like it just isn't going to happen. After years of being woefully off-the-pace reviews-wise, reallyrather has come to expect the UK national press not to miss much that's worthwhile (even if they do still generally wait 'til they've had a copy sent to them free). But it seems even the most extensive and eclectic sections - things like the Observer Music Monthly and The Sun's Something For the Weekend (yes, really) can still miss gold that's right under their nose. While the weary familiarity of dullards like Doves (Christ, even their photoshoots are hackneyed) have been hogging the column inches there's been not a single national notice for the Dananananaykroyd debut album...

...Hey, everyone. Which is little short of an outrage since it's chuffin' fantastic. Pray be upstanding for the song of the year so far:



The little peak at 1:24, how smart is that? And the adrenalising splurge at 2:34 typifies most of the record; pace-wise it is more or less relentless - attack!, attack! - but this only means its relentlessly thrilling. The run of Black wax/Totally bone/Pink sabbath/Infinity milk at the album's core will take some beating. rr prefers the version of Totally bone given away a couple of years back on an Artrocker magazine freebie CD but still, at 3:30, orbit's launched.

Actually, many of these tunes have been around in various forms for quite a while and some listener readjustment is required but generally the fantastic shouty ferocity and the impact of monumental block chordage survives the grown-up 'let's record the album' process. Musically, there's always a lot going on and on record there's a chance to appreciate the more felicitous fretwork and arrangement detailing which tends to get, um, somewhat obliterated in the exuberantly chaotic live shows on which Dana.. have built their rep thus far. A Mercury Prize nomination surely lies ahead or I'm an obscure, infrequent music blogger. Oh...

While Hey, everyone sees Dana..'s sonic chaos brought to heal its still some way off the machine-tooled precision of Swoon, album no.2 from similarly guitar-heavy US melodic noiseniks Silversun Pickups. The debut Carnavas was mostly excellent with the one consistent flaw of each song being about a minute longer than necessary, 400,000+ selling breakout 'hit' Lazy eye included. Doing the maths on Swoon - ten tracks, 51+mins - suggested they hadn't learned; that rr doesn't mind at all this time round suggests that that they have.OK, the antecedents of the Pickups' music is inescapable but the Pumpkins meant nothing round these parts. It's a really a question of scale and ambition; 'small', please, and 'modest'. You get the feeling the Pickups aren't trying to make this any more than it is, ie. a satisfying, utilitarian loud noise. Theoretically epic but so controlled and neatly tooled it works in any space, even a little bunker like The Borderline off Charing Cross Road...


...not the most obvious venue for a band whose new record would debut at no.7 in the Billboard chart a couple of weeks later. But they're always happy to deliver in that no-nonsense, 'we're just this little band' kind of way of theirs; from the early slacker rock of Kissing families to the rocket-fuelled urgency of Panic switch, the hits just keep a-comin'. As they do on Swoon; rr doesn't agree that the album falls off after the first half. Sure, Draining gropes for the kind of gimlet-eyed atmospherics done more convincingly by the likes of, say, Gravenhurst in full-band mode. But with next up Sort of its once again visors down, jetpacks on; the simple leviatating guitar run at 3:40 is really what we're paying our money for. Next stop Heaven...
[silversun pickups]

Another reason to give the Pickups the benefit of the doubt is the fact they're out of Silver Lake, Los Angeles, whence sprung blog favourites like the The Tyde and Rilo Kiley. Speaking of the latter, news that J-Lew is set to release a DVD chronicling the the creation of her last belting offering, Acid tongue. Looks like Welcome to Van Nuys is all we'll have to look forward to since all UK festivals are so far inexplicably Jenny Lewis-free zones. The wrongness of this situation cannot be overstated- come on, Latitude, sort it out:

And it looks like Lewis' erstwhile harmonizin' collaborators The Watson Twins could have a bit of 'sister act' competition what with Willow Willow moving to town. First mentioned here exactly five years ago [!!], Miranda Zeiger and Jessica Vohs aren't really siblings at all merely best friends for the past 25 years. On their debut collection highlights like Beyond me, Follow the spring and I feel love showed them to be in unabashed thrall to the breezy, dreamy '60s SanFran folk-pop scene. Brilliantly, however, they now seem to have leapt on a couple of decades, melding their original inspirations with chiming '80s indie pop. And it's super-attractive stuff - check out Sorry for myself, My little cloud - and an evolutionary arc which is headed towards the effervescence if The Trolleyvox's criminally obscure debut Ephemera for the future...
[willow willow][that Trolleyvox album]

[Note to Miranda Lee Richards: When you get back to LA from Europe seek them out - reallyrather can hear it already!]

Someone else expanding their sound is Shelley Short, at least if very promising new tune Time machine/Submarine is any guide. An underappreciated member of the Portland indie-folk scene, Short's limited-release debut Oh' say little dogies, why remains one of this blog's all-time favourite discoveries. She's now involved with local pop experimentalist Alexis Gideon and it seems there's a little bit of cross-fertilizing a-goin' on. Nice!
[shelley short]

And double nice! Raphael Saadiq on Later with Jools Holland last week. How sweet it was. If you missed his London shows, watch and weep:

'Here comes the springtime again...'

A mere three years after this blog first caught them live, an album with the name My Sad Captains down the spine is finally within sight. Stolen Recordings will put out the quintet's debut Here & elsewhere this summer. Interesting to see which songs have made the cut - Building blocks is there, for instance, one of the oldest (and now least played live) but there's no place for another old favourite, Hide & seek. Which is a bit of shame but, happily, all is not lost...
[my sad captains][hide & seek mp3]

[Not that the Captains would be the first to toss away pearls. Anyone remember Gingersol? Similarly song-oriented if slightly more Americana-tinged, Steve Tagliere & Seth Rothschild put out one of the great lost debut albums in Nothing stops moving and quite a few more top tunes subsequently. Sticks and stones was one which never made a record but if you like what the Ed Wallis & his band are doing, you'll likely appreciate this.]

More minor miracles from other blog favourites of similar vintage:

:: Like Mascott finally getting a UK release! Reveal will be putting out Art project (see rr's top 10 for 2008) next month; it was perfect at 24mins but the UK release has been bulked out with bonus track Oh Peggy...
[mascott][on reveal]

:: And the new Gentleman Reg record being easily available over here, like in shops and everything! Jet black has yet to reach reallyrather Towers but no matter, the last one Darby & Joan stills sounds box-fresh...
[Gentleman Reg][buy Jet black]

Altogether less surprising but no less delightful for that, cracking new albums from M. Ward and Loney Dear. In turbulent times its good to have things you can rely on and Matt and Emil deliver the goods once again. It would be easy to crab both collections as merely 'more of the same' (as indeed they essentially are) but that would grieviously undersell the rarity of the melodic and compositional alchemy these guys bring to the party.
That said, Ward's is possibly the more completely satisfying effort this time round. Both Hold time and Loney's Dear John represent concerted exercises in beefing up, like their predecessor records had been spending time down at the gym. To this end, true to their origins, pop classicist Ward deploys electric guitar & rock 'n' roll drums whilst chilly North European Svaningen goes the synthesised electronica route.
At Bush Hall last month, Ward tossed Chuck Berry's Roll over Beethoven into the set. It was a completely straightforward take, uninspired and unnecessary, but it did suggest a likely point of reference for the more strident moments on Hold time (To save me, Never had nobody like you), ie. early '70s Roy Wood when he was merrily ransacking the Berry/Jerry Lee/Spector vaults fronting The Move and Wizzard. Or just under his own name; if, say, this were to turn up all Zooey-fied on She & Him Vol.2 would anyone be surprised or, indeed, disappointed?:



Something like Be-bop-a-lula would've been a more fertile live proposition than Roll over Beethoven but at least the '50s cover on the album, the shuffling Rave on, yields mellow gold, a standard also attained by Ward's own Epistemology. Ward can roll out the tumbling acoustic warmth of the likes of Shangri-La and For beginners seemingly effortlessly while the cracking atmospheric instrumental Outro gives Richard Hawley food for thought. But it's pretty much all great, really...

...as is the new Loney, dear. Emil throws in one or two new chord changes but the songs remain essentially the same; yes, we really have heard it all before. Yet the marvel is that it still works its magic, repeatedly ascending pop-tastic heights; Violent, Dear John, Summers, Harsh words, I was only going out, all can be added to the canon of motive, swooning ecstacy...

But deeply pleasing as these two releases are, for some unaccountable reason the most played record round these parts this past month-or-so is from a highly-derivative and seemingly rapidly disintigrating NZ band. Cut Off Your Hands lost their UK deal before their Bernard Butler/Stephen Street-produced debut You & I saw the light of day (and then only in the US), and the guitarist and drummer have both since separately quit. “The aim of the band wasn’t necessarily to create something brand-new or frighteningly original, which is obvious when you hear the songs," said singer Nick recently. Splendidly frank and, frankly, splendid:

Sometimes you just have to put your hands up and surrender. Caught by this blog in their raw, evolutionary form a few times back in '07, Scots mob Dananananaykroyd have since spent time in the US honing the first album. Black wax is first out of the traps: hole in one, back of the net, bullseye, etc. Dismemberment Plan-meets-Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah. Hopefully, there'll be a bit more like this on the rest of Hey, everyone but expect mostly a tumultuous aural assault. And talking of assault, the band tells The Fly of their producer's idiosyncratic approach: "He's not like a producer in the sense that he's behind a desk. We recorded most of our album live, and he was in between us shouting at us and slapping us about." This might make sense to Glaswegians but it's probably not an approach that would work with everyone, certainly not a sensitive soul like...

..., say, Emil Svanangen. Play a gig in a church and you'd better pack some divine tunes. Luckily, that's not a problem for Loney, Dear though a problem for reallyrather was that he/they didn't play half of them at St. Giles just off Charing Cross Road. Wanting to base half your set on numbers from a new record is artistically understandable but Dear John's release was still six weeks away so much was new. Mostly promising, though (apart from one song which did have a distinct 'auto-pilot' feel about it). And atmospheric as the setting was, the music's characteristic motion, the softly pulsing throb of stuff like I am John and Airport surroundings only emphasised the straitjacketing effect of sitting in pews.
The quieter, calmer stuff like In with the arms fared best in the context, Emil taking to the isle and stripping things right down to his quirky Scando-croon and one or two strings on his acoustic; Hold me and A band would surely have held us similarly but they didn't get played. Nor, sadly, did belters like Take it back, Ignorant boy ignorant girl, The city the airport, Hard days, et al. But Emil owes this blog nothing having thrilled on at least half-a-dozen previous ocassions, foremost amongst them a glorious night at the Water Rats 18 months ago, Carrying a stone's ecstatic peak being closer to a religious experience than anything on this night...

A power outtage at The Enterprise in Camden prompted another memorable Loney night a couple of years back; impromptu unplugged. It's a good little space though and seemingly popular with Swedes. Teenage folk-pop duo First Aid Kit are there Feb 23 and arrive streaming comparisons to the likes of The Be Good Tanyas - if only, if only...
[first aid kit]

And Suburban Kids With Biblical Names have also entertained this blog royally there. After what not only seems but actually is absolute ages, the boys are back with new tunes - what's the Swedish for 'Hurrah!', anyone?
[skwbn]

It's a bit like the first cuckoo of spring. No sooner does the new calendar get pinned to the wall than here it is, the album that 'raises the bar for 2009'; 'if there are many better released it's going to be a great, great year'; 'certain to be a 'Top 10' staple come December', etc etc. This time it's that Animal Collective album which is doubtless very cosmic and transporting in a Mercury Lips-with-bangin-beats kind of a way (tho' these days this blog tends to give albums which come trailing reviews citing the likes Van Dykes Parks and the Beach Boys' Smile as 'obvious touchstones' a pretty wide berth; less is more.) This time last year Black Mountain's In the future was being slavvered over everywhere as a potential-realizing must-have yet come the big-hitting year-end lists it was almost completely forgotten...

The latest J. Tillman record is another one. A couple of years back Josh opened a little London show featuring Denison Witmer and Califone. Hardly anyone noticed not least because his previous two albums had appeared via the now sadly-defunct but rr championed boutique label Keep Recordings. Now of course it's post-Fleet Foxes ('the Americana of..Van Dyke Parks', 'a glorious descendant of “Smile”, etc) and Vacilando Territory Blues is another '09 pacesetter. No, reallyrather is happy to dodge the tidal waves of hype and continue pottering about in the rockpools where early finds seem likely to include:

:: Gentleman Reg Vermue. If reallyrather was a label this guy's Darby & Joan (see rr Nov 04) would've been on it. Dapper, personal guitar band pop, shamefully it never escaped Canada. Happily, his belated follow-up Jet black has been picked up by Arts & Crafts (Feist, Stars, BSS, etc) and so guaranteed a wider hearing, if only by association. Out Feb 24; go, Reg...
[gentleman reg][jet black on arts&crafts]

:: Miranda Lee Richards. An even longer wait for willowy, LA-based folk-popster's follow up to slightly over-egged debut The herethereafter (2001!), expect Light of X to positively brim over with shimmering wistful restraint...
[miranda lee richards]

:: The Boy Least Likely To. 'I'm not a boy I'm a big fat balloon'. Indeed, indeed. Pedalling their own brand of wide-eyed stompy twee, Pete, Jof & co. put out album no.2 in March. The retail sites all expect it to be called Fight the power but this blog seems to recall Jof saying at their pre-Christmas bash it's The law of the playground. In the meantime, and fed up with the interminable delays, keyboard player 'Amanda Applewood' [!] has been having a go on her own; Song for Kent is apparently 'a love song for Kent' though presumably not the Maidstone/Gravesend-y bits...
[tbllt][amanda applewood]

:: And could it be water pistols at dawn for twee supremacy as Scots slackers Aberfeldy are also re-entering the fray. A vinyl 7-inch (natch) of new-ish song Come on Claire on 17 Seconds Records sets down an early marker but no word of an album - come on yersel', Mr Briggs!
[aberfeldy]

:: low-key UK folk-pop softie James William Hindle promises another album in '09 and if its anywhere near as good as, say, Prospect Park (ranked at 6 for the year hereabouts back in '03) you'll want it...
[james william hindle]

:: hardly a rockpool dweller these days but a new M. Ward record can't go unmarked. Hold time is due 17 Feb but, hey, the whole thing's available to hear here...

:: The little London band that could, My Sad Captains have finally strung together some of their wonky little alt-pop charmers for a debut release. Hopefully, they've used their studio time to slightly more imaginative effect than obvious tour support couplings...
[my sad captains]

:: The Magic Numbers, themselves busy preparing album no. 3. An acoustic fund-raiser night at the Water Rats sold out briskly and they're fairly obvious candidates for something like The End of the Road festival in September...

:: ...but even more desirable would be.. Wheat! There seems every chance that next record White ink, black ink could surface sometime this year; My warning song is typically tantalizing...
[wheat]

:: The odds against a new matt pond PA album this year are even greater but then they did offer up an all-new 9-track EP for free late last year half of which is stronger than most of the last one we had to pay for. mpPA were, of course, ...
[that mppa freep]

:: ...champions here in 2005 and formerly heroes of Polyvinyl Records. This label is now trumpeting their newest roster addition (and rr champion for 2007): 'With his first four albums, Emil has always aspired to perfection; he has always promised a masterpiece. 'Dear John' is that record'. Crikey, etc. So then, Loney, dear sounding dangerously like they'll be, er, raising the bar for 2009...
[loney,dear]

Music for pleasure...

Ten for 2008, pop bliss ahoy! Not ranked but if there's a common thread its good editing - lots of sub-40min running times with artists boiling things right down to just the good stuff. Filler-free, just how we likes it...

Kensington Prairie / Captured in still life
Maybe its the time of year which makes this billowy, pillowy debut collection from Rebecca Rowan's latest band seem so perfect, like footsteps in the snow. And if you like this...
[kensington prairie]

The Weepies / Hideaway
...you'll do backflips over this. Elevating mere loveliness with an injection of superior songcraft and hand-in-glove boy-girl harmonies, Deb & Steve continue their blindside ascendency
[the weepies]

Unwed Sailor / Little wars
Quite appallingly, circumstances forced reallyrather to miss two chances to catch Johnathan Ford & co. on their recent European jaunt. Hopefully they were decently supported; Little wars revisits the wordless songs glory of first album The faithful anchor. Top tunes awash with sparkle and drive...
[unwed sailor]

Haley Bonar / Big star
Go Hales! If this blog had imposed a ranking order how close would this have gone? Close, dammed close even; top three for sure. Admittedly, an element of this regard is born out of relief. After the last album she could have gone the whole hog with the gloomy fragility thing which seems to be her default wiring. BUT, brilliantly, she didn't. The shutters are gradually opening on her brand of indie-country-pop and, melodically if not lyrically, the sun's a comin' in...
[haley bonar]

She & Him / Vol. 1
...tho' to nowhere near the dazzling extent as on Zooey Deschanel's debut project in harness with Matt Ward. Glowing with the catchy sentimentality of the best of AM radio gold, its like Linda Ronstadt joined the Beach Boys, or the Mamas & the Papas if they'd made it into the '70s and found their own Buckingham & Nicks in Richard and Karen Carpenter. Fabulous freshly-minted familiarity...
[she & him]

Raphael Saadiq / The way I see it
...just like this one. In which ex-Tony Toni Tone pop-soul classicist pays his respects to his forebears with a brilliantly executed set of originals. 'What's the point?' some cry. Who cares, says reallyrather, this one hasn't strayed from the 'recently played' pile since it came in. Spoiled only by a Jay-Z guest spot, exposing just how little he brings to the party...
[raphael saadiq]

Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin / Pershing
Pete & the Pirates / Little death
Indie-guitar-pop-lite, hook-heavy and eager-to-please, that's Missouri's SSLYBY. To some, the very definition of what's wrong with this genre. reallyrather, however, applauds their twisty melodics, fleet-footed production and confident brevity, all of which also to applies to P&tPs, Boris's direct Brit counterparts (heck, one Pirate has an actual cousin in SSLYBY!). Similarly anonymous pale white boys in tee-shirts with possibly more guitars than friends, the Pirates advertise their origins in packing a deal more shouty wallop. Stiff with jangly gems...
[sslyby][pete & the pirates]

Jenny Lewis / Acid tongue
Brilliant title, terrific music. Goodbye Silver Lake, hello...some dusty, desert-bound Cali highway. Soulful frazzled country rock oozing with the kind of quality we've almost begun to take for granted...
[jenny lewis]

Mascott / Art project
A loveable thing, basically. Barely 25 mins long but rr has found that this is rarely a demerit if it all delivers, like this. Soft pop often succumbs to lush orchestration and banks of harmonies but Kendall Meade & co. keep it all pocket-sized and portable. It's a small-band, natural-sounding record, brimming with breezy but definitely not throwaway tunes. 'I want to feel light', she sings; she succeeded...
[mascott]

Plants and Animals / Parc Avenue
This kind of sprawling, widescreen, kitchen-sink indie-rock (see also Annuals, Broken Social Scene et al) sorely needs a handy genre tag. Veering from taut grooving to blissed-out folksy reverie, Plants & Animals are a festival-ready proposition. The End of the Road, to be sure...
[plants and animals]

If you were there you'd know...

For reasons beyond this blog's control, reallyrather wasn't there back in 1965 when the Motor Town Revue was tearing up the dancehalls of England. Happily, a contemporary take was available for two delirious nights last week at the Jazz Cafe in Camden courtesy of Oakland's Raphael Saadiq and a sizzlin' nine-piece band. Trailing his startling faithful Tamla homage release The way I see it, sharp-suited Saadiq , a playful, engaging performer replete with skinny tie and Poindexter glasses, threw all those classic Temps shapes in unison with his two dynamic, harmonizin' sidekicks...
The effect was a bit like one of those jukebox West End musicals, minus the lame interlinking storybook but with some fantastic, freshly-minted original tunes and generous lashings of the man's extensive pop-soul pedigree. And lest anyone should regard this is as mere vogue-ish neo-soul bandwagon jumping, it should be remembered that Saadiq was old-skool when the current slew of protagonists were still at playschool...





Oh yeah, that Tony Toni Tone album Sons of soul (their third), now fifteen years old, was such a sweet, funkalicious rnb stew and still stands up. Saadiq drops a couple of medleys from those days into a 90-minute set and a few choice post-TTT cuts (like Still ray, and Dance tonight from his Lucy Pearl days) but songs from the new record comprised at least half the show and they all hit the ground running...

Marvin, Curtis, Sam, Smokey, Eddie Kendricks, they're all at the party often in the same song. On The way I see it Saadiq melds their individual and collective essence quite miraculously. Opener Sure hope you mean it hits like Marvin Gaye circa How sweet it is; 100 yard dash tips a hat to the late Norman Whitfield's influence at Tamla; Keep marchin' is exactly what a Smokey Robinson and Impressions-era Curtis Mayfield co-write would've sounded like while Big easy is a box-fresh Nothern Soul floor-filler.
And so it goes on, back into the '50s with the gorgeous Daddys home doowop of Calling, forwards into the '70s and the sorely overlooked sweet soul genius of The ChiLites' Eugene Record on Sometimes and Oh girl, and the Jackson Five on Staying in love. Blimey, even Joss Stone is employed to good effect (tho' she did cut a suitably sheepish presence in a 'surprise' guest appearance on the second of the Jazz Cafe nights).
In playing it so straight and with such obvious respectful feel Saadiq succeeds in raising the project above and beyond plain Rutles-style pastiche. Should this blog be concerned that such an ostensibly backwards-looking exercise can yield such an unfeasible amount of pleasure? Maybe, but heck, judging by the scores on the doors reallyrather is certainly not alone...
[raphael saadiq][it's showtime!]

And there's lots more Californian analog goodness to be had on Acid tongue, Jenny Lewis' second solo outing. Since the earliest days of Rilo Kiley Lewis has been a 'buy it blind' act for this blog (one of very few come to think of it) and once again doesn't disappoint. And its pleasingly fitting to see those Warner Bros. palm trees embossing this very satisfying collection of soulful Cali-roots-rock. The back-to-back volley of See Fernando and Godspeed neatly encaspulate what's on offer this time round - the former's roughhouse gee-tar tumble followed by the mellow lamentations of a piano-led arm-waver...

...not, of course, that there were any such cheesy goings-on at her show at Koko a few weeks back, oh no. Very respectful we were in our broadsheet-music-section-readers' way. The feel of the record was always going to be easy to achieve given the relatively immediate way Acid tongue came together. The set peaked with the title track itself, just Lewis and her acoustic beneath a yellow spot and framed by a shaggy boys chorus; tinglesome, indeed. This blog's album highlight could well be the sinuous scratch of Pretty bird but segmental epic rocker The next Messiah (which visits Creedence and the Black Keys along its course) and the rollickingly efficient Carpetbaggers kick up some mighty fine dust...

Not that everybody's happy, mind. In particular, some have bemoaned a perceived departure from the quirky indie-girl perspective they have loved Lewis for hitherto. Sounds to me like a simple case of artist maturation but for anyone who does feel this way reallyrather, helpful as ever, has THE VERY RECORD for you...

Sliding this disc into the laptop, all the media player comes up with is 'Unknown Artist - Unknown Album' which, quite scandalously, is a state of affairs not that far removed from the reality. But Haley Bonar's Big star deserves a much wider hearing and if this blog had the remotest sense of how these things are done it would sign up the European licensing rights, you've guessed it, pronto.
Her third album proper, Big star is Bonar's most accessible and cohesive set to date and scores some early points for concision, most of the songs here coming in under three minutes. This brevity doesn't betoken lack of ideas but focus and keener editing. There's a couple of numbers on here, Little maiden gin and Mayday, which wear the some of the clothes we're familiar with (a watery, pensive reflectiveness) and which Bonar is gradually beginning to shed. But the bolder, more open melodies coming in their stead are no empty vessels, carrying some personal, distinctly wary lyrical freight.

When you exhale do you still smell smoke, when you laugh now is it still at a joke or are you so full of fire that you feel yourself choke, on your better half.

This song, Better half, sits at the heart of the set and exemplifies its best qualities - jaundiced music biz observations (possibly informed by Bonar's dalliances with the likes of VirginAmerica), a strong confident vocal and ace production mix (Tchad Blake). But, strong as it is, reallyrather ranks it only about third or fourth best track on the album. Top of the pile, and shaping as outright Song of the Year, is Arms of harm, a beautifully executed piece which constantly evolves and builds with some great musical detailing from the band.
Another standout is Something great - indeed, indeed. Shaken tambo and more great just-so drumming (Dave King) help propel a highly attractive tight-lipped, multi-tracked vocal melody. And ping!, its gone before you know it; 1min59 and nothing to add. Queen of everything wouldn't sound out of place on the Jenny Lewis record with its roots-rock heft and restrained rock guitar. And the album glides out on a pair of achingly lovely slices of indie-girl melancholy, Along and Tiger boy.
Haley Bonar seems to be reversing into the (lime)light. On her website are some dazzlingly attractive promo shots yet the portrait chosen for the record cover is of a somewhat reluctant mien framed in the refuge of a fur hood. Thing is, if you have a problem with fame putting out a record as appealing as Big star isn't gonna do you any favours. Spread the word: Haley Bonar is no longer an acquired taste. If you're ready for Jenny Lewis you're more than ready for Haley. Whether or not she's ready for you is a whole other question...
[haley bonar][buy big star..like, now]

So, what are you doing for Christmas? No idea? Why not start by releasing your inner six-year-old at The Boy Least Likely To's last show of '08 (OK, so there's only been about three all told - hardest working band in showbiz), Hoxton Square Bar & Kitchen Dec 15...
[tbllt]

And if anyone's Most Likely to appreciate this little animation to accompany the release of the new Mascott album Art project [got mine, get yours] it's Pete, Jof & co...