Retribution Gospel Choir is a rock trio founded in 2007. The group features Alan Sparhawk on guitar and vocals, Steve Garrington on bass and Eric Pollard on drums and vocals. Alan also fronts the band Low with his wife, Mimi Parker, and Steve also plays bass in Low. 2 is Retribution Gospel Choir's second full-length and their Sub Pop debut. It's a record of sharp hooks and slick production, with several anthemic and instantly memorable choruses, all evident from the very first track. "Hide It Away" blends chest-beating harmonies and moments of quieter guitar jangle with the band's familiar surging 4/4 rock. It's as sweetly melodic as anything Sparhawk has written, but with unfettered, audacious confidence and a guitar solo gliding on heavy reverb-- more stumping on their campaign to become a current-day Crazy Horse.
Over 14s only, under 16s must be accompanied by an adult
Moniker-crazed one-man-band Dayve Hawk splits the difference between his Weird Tapes project (dancey, electro) and his Memory Cassette project (hazy, wistful) with Memory Tapes (dancey, yet wistful!). After the incredible, New Order-style single "Bicycle", debut Memory Tapes LP, dubbed Seek Magic was released in September 2009 via Acephale.
Over 14s only, under 16s must be accompanied by an adult
To an extent, Temporary Residence band Mono resist critical analysis. The Japanese instrumental quartet has no lyrics to parse. It has little pop culture impact. The group has many imitators, but it remains superior. For 10 years, it has unfurled long songs with quiet beginnings and stormy climaxes. Mono albums are different in the way AC/DC and Motörhead ones are: they contain new combinations of old ingredients. Once a band establishes itself in music's canon-- and Mono has, next to post-rock colleagues Mogwai and Explosions in the Sky-- one either accepts or rejects its formula. The formula then replaces the canon as the critical yardstick. Now we compare Mono against itself.
Gift of Gab (Blackalicious) *PLEASE NOTE CHANGE OF VENUE*
Captains Rest, Glasgow
Over 18s only
The Gift of Gab is a Hip-Hop institution. From the breakout success of Blackalicious in the late 1990s, as well as an impressive and lauded solo debut, he has built one of the most enduring coalitions of discerning music fans in the world of thinking man's Hip-Hop. Escape 2 Mars is Gab's second fully realised solo record in an already illustrious career. Guests include Brother Ali and Del the Funky Homosapien. Escape 2 Mars, the latest release from The Gift Of Gab, is another progressive step in ground-breaking lyrical delivery.
The Besnard Lakes + Wolf People + Olympic Swimmers
Captains Rest, Glasgow
Over 18s only
The Besnard Lakes, the Montreal collective fronted by husband-and-wife duo Olga Goreas and Jace Lasek, has returned, crafting a majestic, sprawling vision of guitar bombast and captivating pop experiments
On March 9th of 2010 (March 8th in the UK), Jagjaguwar will release The Besnard Lakes Are the Roaring Night, a twisting chronicle of spies, double agents, novelists and aspiring rock gods turned violent. Loyalty, dishonor, love, and hatred are all seen through the eyes of two spies, communicating through short wave in code and fighting a war that may or may not be real
When Jamie Thompson and Nick Diamonds started their second post-Unicorns collaboration-- the first was Th' Corn Gangg, remember?-- it made perfect sense that they should call it Islands. With breezy calypso rhythms, honeyed country-acoustic guitars, bubbly/silly synthesizer effects, and summery melodies, their debut, Return to the Sea, was a wonderful getaway soundtrack, obscuring its death-haunted lyrics with bright arrangements and rich, coconut-scented production. On Islands' second album, however, storm clouds descended: Arm's Way found the band down a member-- Thompson amicably departed before its recording-- yet ballooned into a six-piece, and the bloat was audible. Melodies (previously the shivery highlight of their songs) were buried in meandering guitar solos, baroque, melodramatic strings, and gloomy, silvery keyboards for a dark, proggy effect that bled the band of much of its fun and levity.
The good news is that the clouds seem to have parted; on their third album, Islands are sunny once more. Perhaps it's due to the return of Thompson, back in the fold after his one-album hiatus, or just a product of stripping the instrumentation down to its most basic structure (in many cases, just synths, drums, and guitar) in service of memorable tunes, but Islands have made a welcome return to form. While those hoping for Return to the Sea's Afro-Caribbean flourishes and guest rappers will be disappointed, Vapours' comparably spare synth-pop is replete with the juicy hooks and major-key bounce that were so lacking from their last effort.
Over 14s only, under 16s must be accompanied by an adult
The exotic, spare and preposterously deluxe post-prog post-ancient alien rock cosmic chamber pop of These New Puritans, as presented on their deeply delightful second album Hidden, could slip quite easily into a few top ten lists of great 1970 music, which is a good thing, because it also exists as a great soundtrack to some of the madness and exhilaration of living at this point in the 21st century. It will exist on any sensible top ten of 2010 lists. As a sort of salty, quietly insane, whimsical Anglo-psychedelic masterpiece it exists inside the same island mist and mystery as Spontaneous Music Ensemble, Bowie, Evan Parker, Kinks, Syd Barratt, Drake, Peter Green, Shirley Collins, T. Rex - TNP edge more to the sombre, ornamental Tyrannosaurus Rex side of Bolan - Pentangle, Soft Machine, Wyatt... and, if you'll forgive the inflation, propel into a giddying other dimension the very idea of say Van Der Graaf Generator being produced by peak period Dre, which is somewhere between the comic and the breathtaking, or of the skittish early period Britney Spears construct performing Nico's Desertshore, which is somewhere between the radiant and the entirely improbable. - The Guardian
While it may seem as if there's not a new release without a hyphenated genre to give it birth, Brooklyn-based epic synth-rockers Bear in Heaven's second LP feels fresh simply because it resists easy categorization or comparison. This isn't to say it's sonically groundbreaking, though-- fitting for an album whose title references the four main navigational directions, Beast Rest Forth Mouth is as familiar-feeling as it is difficult to pinpoint. Mostly made up of textural, spacious three- to four-minute pop anthems with towering choruses, BRFM is a welcome reminder that an album doesn't have to be bombastic to feel huge and important. Take out the earbuds and let it fill a space: This is music that's bigger than your iPod-- music you'll want to feel all around you
Calgary's WOODPIGEON's chamber-folk concoctions of banjo, glockenspiel, choir and Mark Hamilton's diffident vocals make for thoughtful melodious moments and joyous rock-outs. Combining the mystical comic-book fantasies of Mark's lyrics with the sparkling music of the band, comparisons to Sufjan Stevens and his delightful ilk aren't far wrong, setting Woodpigeon up to be the next great Canadian breakout band.
"**** It's bloody marvelous." -SUNDAY TIMES
"**** An inspiring meditation on exile and return." -THE GUARDIAN
"**** Seductive." -MOJO
"**** Melodic and affecting." -Q
Johnny Flynn is crafting songs well beyond what you'd usually find capable for a man of such a young age. With his band The Sussex Wit, Flynn & Co became one of only a small handful of British acts to sign to the Legendary Alt Country label Lost Highway in 2008, the label home of Johnny Cash, Ryan Adams, Morrissey, and Elvis Costello. A Larum debuted Flynn's multi-instrumental English Folk Rock sensibilities. With his latest release, EP Sweet William, The title track, 'Sweet William' narrates the wanderings and adventures of William: his various rites-of-passage, his growth from boy to man, a tale that really reaches back to the story-telling roots of the kind of centuries-old folk culture that this new wave of traditionally inspired nu-folk is entirely indebted to. 'Sweet William' is a display of the direction that Flynn sees himself moving in: an exploration into the deep roots of the culture that he and his folksy piers, Mumford and Sons, Laura Marling, Peggy Sue, Mariner's Children etc, have so brilliantly brought into the limelight of late.
We should really praise Isaac Brock of Modest Mouse for bringing Wolf Parade to the masses. Brock signed Wolf Parade to Seattle's Sub Pop Records when the singer was an A&R man with the label back in 2004. Evidently, their Sub Pop debut in 2005 Apologies To The Queen Mary the Modest Mouse influence is apparent, but in no way detrimental to Wolf Parade's sound. Their debut was riddled with allusions to sleeplessness, and its follow-up in 2008 At Mount Zoomer, is no less restless-- it's a fraught, expansive ode to being way too awake. Now after a break of two years, the band are due to release their third and as yet untitled album, in April 2010.
Featuring The Antlers, Chapel Club, Divorce, Esben And The Witch, Frankie And The Heartstrings, Joker, Kid Adrift, Male Bonding, My Latest Novel, A Place To Bury Strangers, Sparrow And The Workshop, Unwinding Hours, We Were Promised Jetpacks, and Wild Beasts, plus many more still to be announced
