MUSIC | Records
ALBUM OF THE ISSUE
AMBIENT COMEBACK BOARDS OF CANADA Tomorrow’s Harvest (Warp) ●●●●● Ok, so instead of a normal review I hid a cryptic code in this text that you must decipher. If you unlock the riddle, it leads to a public toilet in Gorgie where you'll find an 8-track recording of Brian Blessed drumming Morse code on his belly. That gives a unique login to access this
review, spelt out in flag semaphore on Instragram pictures.
Only joking! But hey, at least you got a flavour of what it’s like being
a Boards Of Canada fanboy/girl. The Edinburgh siblings engaged in a remarkable pre-release campaign that had fans listening to album streams in the Mojave Desert, foraging in shops on Record Store Day for vinyl releases, and watching video broadcasts on buildings in Japan. It all feeds the cult of personality the duo have curated over their 18-year career. Their back catalogue is a quasi-catechism of subliminal messaging, aural stimuli and opaque cryptograms that has kept fans intrigued despite their painstakingly slow rate of production, and given their work a ritualistic and near reverential appeal. Quixotic promo aside; eight years on from The Campfire Headphase, are we any closer to unravelling the mystery at the centre of Mike and Marcus Sandison’s sound? Happily no. It remains as enigmatic and bewitching as ever, the brothers using their own personal radiophonic workshop to make analogue astral projections a sonic reality. The title hints at growth and renewal, but perhaps one perpetually around the corner, never to arrive. Heavy with typically portentous synth swashes and an ambience pregnant with BoC’s benign yet creepy fatalism, there is hope, but it is fleeting. ‘Cold Earth’ and ‘Nothing Is Real’ entice and intoxicatie, while establishing the album’s mise en scene: the temporary beauty at the heart of modern existence. (Mark Keane)
METAL REUNION BLACK SABBATH 13 (Mercury) ●●●●●
‘Wow, a new Black Sabbath record: this should be really good!’ involuntarily blurts out your brain before it has time to digest the relevant information: just about everything Ozzy Osbourne has done with his career since the 1970s. Press play. Courtesy of Tony Iommi, there’s a strident slurry (we don’t mean flurry) of guitars that would have Alice Cooper punching the air, and then here he comes: ‘Is this the end of the beginning/Or the beginning of the end?’ he ponders, a sage for the ages. Written-on-a-fag-packet lyrics, 13 years too-late millennial angst and a delivery that rather ludicrously pronounces ‘beginning’ as ‘beh-gyin-yi-hng’: Ozzy’s back. That track’s actually one of the album’s best, both for the powering riff that
Iommi unleashes midway through and the baffling fact that it was premiered in America on CSI. It doesn’t last. Ozzy manages to shoehorn in a triple whammy of duff rhymes on ‘God is Dead’ (‘trust – lust – unjust’) and the truly comedy melodrama of a chorus that runs ‘Won’t someone tell me the answer: is god really dead?’ Is he expecting a one-word answer? Three of the eight tracks here are less than five minutes long but the rest are more than seven, and most of them really feel it. It’s an album which at almost every turn seems to slump back into the dated
80s routine of overdriven everything and pretentiously furrow-browed lyrics. The only slight respite arrives courtesy of the Led Zep-style psych-folk of ‘Zeitgeist’ (‘Astral engines in reverse/I’m falling through the universe again’ is one of the keener cod sci-fi couplets here) and every point on the album at which Iommi manages to finally wrest a song from Ozzy and deliver a riff with clarity and purpose, such as when ‘Damaged Soul’ finally gets exciting. Less a triumphant return, more a rehearsal for the tour. (David Pollock)
ELECTRONIC/DUB/TECHNO MAYA JANE COLES Comfort (I/AM/ME) ●●●●● WITCH-HOUSE oOoOO Without Your Love (Nihjgt Feelings) ●●●●●
It was 2010 single ‘What They Say’, that prompted the dance music community to take notice of Maya Jane Coles. The tune’s organ riff quickly became an earworm for many a clubber while earlier, more dub-influenced remixes for the likes of Massive Attack and Gorillaz under the She Is Danger guise, proved there was more to her sound. Despite the obvious affection for her largely instrumental house-driven sets, releases and remixes, both the lower tempo and introspective, contemplative mood of Comfort confirms that the 25-year-old producer’s musical ambitions reach beyond the dancefloor. Though best known for instrumental productions, this not only features her vocals but also those of an impressive range and calibre of other artists, each providing their own distinctive contribution. The haunting, tumbling synths, treated spoken lyrics and shuffling rhythms of the title track sets the mood nicely. Previous single ‘Easier to Hide’ then ups the BPMs to offer a laidback house groove featuring a chorus sung by Coles before Former Hercules and Love Affair member Kim Ann Foxman adds her voice to the compulsive melody of love song ’Burning Bright’. ‘Dreamer’ has Coles singing over echoing synths, organ and violin, while ‘Blame’ offers an eerie, drawn-out guitar line over a hypnotic, trip hop-like backdrop. The addition of Nadine Shah’s vocal gives it a Massive Attack-like feel and at various points across Comfort, the band’s sound seems an influence.
Elsewhere, highlights include ‘Fall from Grace’ featuring the yearning voice of Alpines' Catherine Pockson and Tricky adding his unique tones to the unsettling atmosphere of ‘Wait for You’. Even the album’s most pop-like moments don’t disappoint: Karin Park singing on ‘Everything’ while Thomas Knights provides his soulful croon to ‘When I’m Love’. This debut album (on MJC’s own label, I/AM/ ME) certainly feels like the arrival of an artist who’s set to gain a wider audience. (Colin Chapman) ■ Maya Jane Coles plays T in the Park on Sat 13 Jul. See feature, page 13.
76 THE LIST 13 Jun–11 Jul 2013
In oOoOO (pronounced ‘oh’), San Franciscan Chris Dexter joins ††† and !!! in selecting an artist alter ego that looks like it originated from accidentally leaning on a computer keyboard. But on listening to his debut album, that moniker begins to take on a more calculated appearance: a slow groan of pleasure, or pain, or fear perhaps? Predominantly fear, as it turns out: the more you drift uneasily among its crepuscular chorales, the more Without Your Love feels like it might turn around and batter you at any moment. If you’re familiar with the disparate tranche of artists bunched together under ‘witch house’ or ‘haunted house’ – Balam Acab, Salem, Stalker, that lot – then you’ll know the basics: eerily-distressed synths, grisly treated vocals, BPM counts not so much slow-jam as traffic-jam (‘drag’ is another name sometimes aptly given to the genre). But Dexter mixes it all up with plenty of his own flourishes, favouring a kind of zombie hip-hop flavour in his beats and basslines, and dropping in teasing flashes of melody that would be pretty if they didn’t sound like they were echoing from beyond the grave. He’s got pop songs down in his dank, dirty basement, but they’re sure as hell not getting out.
With kick drums like rumbles of distant thunder, opener ‘Sirens/Stay Here’ takes seven minutes to come alive. But when it does, it’s quite magnificent: all shimmering arpeggios and ice-cold female vocals. ‘3:51 AM’ gets to the point much quicker, before suddenly decaying after a couple of minutes, as if
someone’s pulled the plug. ‘The South’ is Dexter at his imposing best; a menacing collage of subby-bass, nightmarish synth stabs, skittering hi-hats and vocals like jungle animals. Beyond the stuff of his immediate peers, Without Your Love might remind you of the more experimental side of Deftones’ White Pony, or vintage Portishead’s capacity to spook you at a snail’s pace. Impressive stuff. And we’re not just saying that because we’re a bit intimidated. (Malcolm Jack)