RECORD REVIEWS MUSIC
V ALBUMS
I Meat Beat Manifesto: Satyricon (Play It Again Sam) Computers or guitars- it‘s all the same these days. It‘s all about how you use your resources and how you assemble your musical heritage. Meat Beat Manifesto are sampling vultures— when they‘ve targeted their quarry, they‘re swift on the swoop and assiduous on the attack. Satyricon is as much of a trainspotter’s paradise as Ride’s Going Blank Again. Where did they lift all those niggly samples from? The wider picture is disappointingly unengaging. Potentially challenging lyrics descend all too often into impersonal cyberspeak sloganeering and there‘s precious little else to get your ears round. MBM fail to imbue their standard rhythm tracks with anything that would translate off the dancefloor. (Fiona Shepherd)
I Alice Donut: The Untidy Suicides Of Your Degenerate Children (Alternative Tentacles) On Alice Donut‘s sick and terrific Mule, their heavy- jawed drag artist did himself up as a housewife in curlers. This time, his iinage is more akin to the killer in The Silence Of The Lambs. Significant? Apparently so. I missed the one that came in between (Revenge Fantasies Of The lmpotent), but, somewhere along the line, singer Tomas Antona‘s wit has shrivelled in the face of life’s awfulness. These are the songs of a man who‘s been doing a lot of thinking about what‘s going on and doesn‘t like it. His stoned gallows humour occasionally raises its severed head. but these days it‘s a tired. uncommitted routine. Not surprisingly, the music is harder. more one- dimcnsional and less approachable than in the past. Look out for Male instead. (Alastair Mabbott)
I The Frank & Walters: Trains. Boats 8. Planes (Setanta/Go! Discs) Just like that big teasey preamble before the mighty chorus (another one!) on ‘This ls Not A Song‘, The Frank & Walters' debut album is an album that giddin ascends. Giddin ascends to ever more triumphal pop peaks, building upon familiar, already-scaled single foothills. Tracks from The Franks' three EPs feature heavily (almost halfly), but with Trains, Boats & Planes the whole is considerably greater than the sum of its parts. There's nowt so
l i i
l
‘ queer as folk, say The
Franks, and they dot their in-the-pink, perky tunes with case histories of all manner of oddballs: trainspotters, fashion victims, happy busmen. John and Sue. In between, when the dramatis personae are having their teabreak, the likes of ‘After All‘ and ‘Bake Us A Cake‘ are coddling ditties. Rich and varied with the vagaries oflife, Trains, Boats & Planes lifts the spirits like only The Frank & Walters can. (Craig McLean)
V SINGLES
I Wait Mink: Chowder Town (Caroline) lt‘s Black Sabbath! lt‘s Rush! It‘s Walt Mink! They‘re from Minneapolis, play muggy rock. cover Nick Drake‘s ‘Pink Moon‘, recently supported Lemonhcads. and sound decidedly sinister. ‘Chowder Town‘ is hellish, which I mean as a compliment. (CMcL)
I Frog: Stay, Calm (Tittln) Cloyingly cool approximation of the rare groove funk fever that‘s gripping Edinburgh‘s clubs. Local boys Frog touch upon Flowered Up‘s
- loping danccloutishncss,
then shy off, preferring the clean and dancefloor-friendly 70s formula. A bit dirtier equals a bit better. (CMcL)
I Hyperhead: Teenage Mind (Devotion) Mary Mary was once senior Gaye Biker. but we won‘t bear grudges. ‘Teenage Mind‘ is scathing and seedy, a wound down industrial grind. For true head-ruck. though, soak in the black hole ambient techno remixes. At the Millennium‘s End Death
3 Disco. they‘ll be playing
this. (CMcL)
I Bjorn Again: Erasure-ish (M&G) Great idea that was
never gonna be as great as it sounded. High angelic
harmoniesand
undcmandingbacking
; tracks— yeah, just like
ABBA—failtocapture
' thesexythrillofthe
originals. Still. it's kinda funny when ‘war‘ becomes ‘vor‘; and ‘A Little Respect‘ and ‘Stop!‘
would be classics even if ‘ Happy Mondays covered
them. (CMcL)
I Rejuvenation: Work In Progress EP (Some) Following last year‘s inspirational ‘Seduced’ by 0-7, Soma, the label co-owned by Rejuvenation and DJ/remixers Slam, notch up their fourth release. Neatly side-stepping the ‘progressive‘ tag that‘s often bandied about in Soma‘s general direction, ‘Work In Progress‘ isa New York-style funky
House thing, complete with yelping vocals and a firmly fruity bassline. Hip, hup and happening (CB)
I Pulp: Babies (Gift) Imagine if you will the cool, camp arrogance of Suede cross-dressed in an early tacky Eno/Ferry collaboration strutting up the catwalk of pop credibility while crooning about overhearing your older sister indulging in ‘frank and open discussions‘ with her boyfriends through your bedroom wall. Sounds wild, eh? It is. ‘Babies‘ is wonderful and Pulp are poptastic par excellence. (C B)
I Various: The Fred EP (Heavenly) The Rockingbirds play
' ‘Deeply Dippy' narrowly
straightly. Flowered Up give ‘Don‘t Talk, Just Kiss' a right gawp-eyed Cockernee buggering and pop profs St Etienne transmutate ‘l‘m Too Sexy‘ into a hysterical heavy acid house cum Motown soul thang. All this, a must-see video and the profits to the Terence Higgins Trust to boot. Frcdtastic! (CB)
I Espiritu: Francisco (Heavenly) It‘s deepest autumn, so it must be carnival time. And what better record to play at your next street carnival than Espiritu? Messrs Heller and Farley have done a fine job withthis cheeky little samba jaunt around the clubfloor. Just let the rhythm take you, and ifyou meet agirl called Francisca who vocally undresses you down to your Calvin Klein boxers, all the better. (PD)
I Urban Jungle: Bad Man (Underworld) The Underworld mandate:
release music that blows
apart pro-conceptions of what people dance to. Hmmm, well, ragga dub/techno fusion is hardly novel. lt‘s originality therefore
: comes fromthe sheer anger and overt seediness
with which it‘s been put together. Remind me not to speak to these boys after ten pints. (PD)
. I The Reese Project: I I Believe (Network) While
British House artistes can consistently turn up the
. bass.it seemsthat only 1 America can produce monster club records that
will never die. Take, for example, Kevin Saunderson's The Reese Project; not content with the best dance record of the summer, they‘re set to rampage through the long winter months as well. ‘I Believe' is first class techno with hugely soulful overtones, the end result being so funky it simply ain‘t true. (PD)
‘i 3 "4219“
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The List 23 October- 5 November 1992 29