Music for a New Financial Year

Not much to say on the intro to this one. A lot of heavy beats, some future of music and equal parts indulgence/tributes to the past. Some middle of the road indie, not to mention a few tracks that are probably tearing a club up the very moment you read this. Lots of pop and love, also bass and testosterone. A few that benefit from no attention span and at least one that takes the length of an episode of Freakazoid to get into its swing. But fuck reading, just download and listen.

Dan Friel – Ghost Town (Pt. 1)
Circuit benders are a strange type, unscrewing the backs of keyboards and electronic toys to break and distort their tones makes for a fun science experiment, but then using those garbled, warped noises to make music again, well it seems a tad ironic.
Dan Friel is a member of that strange breed, a Parts & Labor contributor gone independent with his second album. Ghost Town is jammed with glitch noise, crying megaphones and reprogrammed Casios which he somehow expertly tunes into beautiful, shrieking melodies.
In an increasingly noisy world it seems appropriate Friel’s work can represent moments of digital peace and tranquillity in a bath of squealing noise, but he pulls it off stunningly. The man is a part of the future of music.

Ludachrist – Ghost Busta Rhymes
The mash-up revolution of 2006 is still bearing fruit, though it takes a special genius to produce whole albums of it. Ludachrist aspire to the genius tag and aim high with their electro-charged, Girl Talk style Bangfest mixtape. It’s an intense, crazy 42 minutes of party hip-hop madness layered over songs they shouldn’t be. It may posture as a rap megamix on the surface, but it’s really a nu-electro set in every way, stabbing synths and a few glitches plus predictable breakdown patterns not to mention some of the pastry supplied by Sebastian and Simian as well as Toto, Metallica and Dire Straits. The Justice/Lil Jon combo kicks all sorts of ass, as does their ability to not just mash-up songs but also their names, as featured on this single version of Dangerous over the Ghost Buster’s theme. Yes, this came out in late 2007 but it was totally underground.

Girl Talk – Here’s the Thing
But, while there’s imitators, here’s the real thing. Girl Talk dropped Feed the Animals in June and there’s no denying he’s the master of the mash-up craft. This is something you notice when you get a Girl Talk song stuck in your head and realise there’s the confetti of 40 years of popular music pulsing in your skull.
Feed steps up a notch over Night Ripper, which – when compared – was a little too full of plastic RnB and club screams. Now he explores much more of his influences, finding room for traditional vocal samples and way more rock. Here’s the Thing plays as a perfect example of Gregg Gillis’ unheralded ability to pick the best snippets of the world’s library of pop music and cram it all together. It starts with a 60s Motown beat preceding American Idol winners sing over early, industrial Nine Inch Nails before MC Hamer waltzes in over the chorus. And that’s just the first minutes, leading into injections of Elvis Costello and Blur, Chris Brown rapping over Rick Springfield (with a cheeky Prodigy scratch), the bass drum and massive snare of Maneater and just a dash of Veruca Salt, Peter Bjorn and John, 3 6 Mafia and George Harrison. What, you’re not coming to the party?

Daedelus – Fair Weathered Friends
The multi-instrumental Alfred Darlington - stage name Daedelus - inhabits the top drawer at Ninja Tune and that’s a tough drawer to get into. His delightfully titled 2008 LP Love to Make Music To is full of Hip Hop influenced IDM with a beat you can definitely move your body to. While the tunes vary from hulking, scattered beat patterns to more melodious synth-pop there’s always a darkness lurking beneath the surface, or evil bees buzzing under hums of harmony and hand claps. Touchtone throbs throughout in a threatening way, bubbling with raps from Taz and Paperboy as it’s bass spirals out of control.

Dr. Dooom feat. Motion Man – Surgery
Keith Thornton - aka Kool Keith, Dr. Octagon, Dr. Dooom, Kutmasta Kurt – the most schizophrenic hip hop producer to ever exist lives in his own world. A self created, science-fiction-opera, fourth-wall lacking stage where his alter egos rap battle for supremacy over his own brand of heavy bass, haunted house beats.
In 2008 it’s the return of Dr. Dooom, who emerges for the sinister Dr. Octagon R.I.P EP. On it, Dooom also drops Surgery featuring Motion Man (not a Kool Keith persona) and they both drop equally verbose verses over waiting-room rattling bass.

Estelle feat. Kanye West – American Boy (Splice of Life vocal)
Estelle isn’t a manufactured, overnight pop sensation that has just burst onto the charts. Born in West London with Senegalese and Caribbean heritage, she has worked her RnB strengths into albums and appearances for years, and battled a few chips on her shoulder along the way, before reaching 2008’s Shine. Given that this, her first standout album, has a long, wealthy list of producers and collaborators it’s easy to get into a discussion about Shine’s true artistic merit and her overall sense of identity, but fuck that. Instead let’s enjoy the clubbed up remix of American Boy for what it is. It’s got the simplest of infectious beats and catchy house hooks to groove to; Kanye drops a rap that it sounds like he came up with on his approach from the other end of the bar and, God bless him, it still flows tight. And Estelle sounds lovely, her sweet voice managing to match Kanye’s testosterone the whole way through. Nothing left to complain about really.

The Wedding Present – Santa Ana Winds
Despite Leeds born, California obsessed indie rockers The Wedding Present having been incarnate in some form the past 20 years I’d never listened to them before El Ray. From its opening, Santa Ana Winds it’s easily likeable. Within all the heavy guitar work and reverb there’s a pleasant taste of Californian sun in their punky, Buzzcocks style of instrumentation that blends well into their rocky harmony.
Lead singer David Gedge’s voice sometimes sounds comparable to ska singers, belting out the surfing lifestyle blues while somehow classing it up with his 40 years of life experience to turn it into something more mature and captivating.

Mystery Jets feat. Laura Marling – Young Love
If there’s nothing else to do in London, start an indie rock band. This can be the only explanation as to why the UK is a land of so many outfits wanting to be the next Beatles or at least the next Arctic Monkeys. In 2006 Mystery Jets joined the long, faceless queue of average British bands with their album Making Dens. Well, it had enough face on its progressive sound to push it halfway up the charts for a while, but its few decent songs got greyed out amongst the forgettable ones.
Which is why it’s surprising that a shift into a much poppier direction comes off so well for them on sophomore Twenty One. Blaine Harrison – now that his voice has broken – still sounds light and free of responsibility across all of the album, matching the carefree style of Erol Alkan’s production work. On Young Love the duet with Laura Marling works particularly well. It’s a contemporary fairy tale of missed chances and Marling delivers pillowy lyrics against a backdrop of guitar twangs and the Mystery Jets choir. A snack sized morsel of delicious, well above-average indie pop.

dEUS – The Architect
There are a few things that Belgium specialises in: chocolate, waffles and beer. And the Belgians' fine taste in decadent treats carries over to rock music courtesy of the indulgence that is dEUS. Emanating from the early 90s they've shown a dedication to producing the finest sounding rock music with delicious flavours sourced from the finest jazz, metal and punk influences around. Sure, they have a scattered history, releasing three well received albums by 1999 at the cost of two band members, lost to arguments over creative differences. But hey, at least it proves they have some artistic passion.
The point is - beneath the razor sharp guitar riffs and Stéphane Misseghers' superb drumming - dEUS are a band that are constantly chasing new creative and artistic heights. On Vantage Point they work extremely hard to produce yet another solid and consistent album to add to their discography. It’s hard not to admire their creative worth ethic, possibly because it comes from the crushing weight of expectation from the distinguished people of Belgium, desperate to promote a Belgian song to higher popularity than the country’s previous most popular song: 2 Unlimited’s Ready for This.

Dr. Dog – The Old Days
The second medical professional in this week's collection is Philly psych-rockers Dr Dog, whose new album Fate is currently in surgery and will be entering post-op on July 22. They've been stuck with comparisons to The Band and the Beatles in their time too, but Fate shares a similar feel to another band they've toured with recently, Clap Your Hands, Say Yeah! The first single The Old Days is full of fuzzy warmth and unpolished vocals. All five instrumentalists are out to pull their weight, although this soundscape is dominated by heavy guitar work and the looping, pounding of an old saloon piano. By the end of The Old Days, as with the album, it’s evident Dr. Dog are starting to deliver strongly on their promised potential.

Shearwater – Rooks
Shearwater was originally an offshoot side project for Okkervil River members Will Shef and (until recently) Jonathan Meiburg. It was started as a project for the quieter, more ambient side of epic folky rock to come through those talented minds, but since their first release in 2001 Shearwater has evolved into its own distinct sound and ended up with a cracker of a new album in Rook. Beautiful and complicated, with complex instrumentation and intelligent lyrics, Rook oozes charm on lead single Rooks and all.

Clinic - Tomorrow
It's a hard job to review Clinic's relaxed, colourful eccentricities purely because they have a sound that doesn't compare to any other band. This their website once even claimed! Calling themselves the band "that sounds like no other band." But that's not them being up themselves, it's just bluntly realistic.
What Clinic do sound a lot like, though, is Clinic. Fans of their earlier work will attest that the fuzzy, psychedelic Clinic sound of Do It! doesn’t deviate from the feel of 2000's Internal Wrangler and anything in the discography thereafter. But there’s no reason to change, and even with the familiarity Do It!comes with freshness. There are noticeable moments of attention grabbing sonic, even on first listen. Like the exaggerated, slurpy lisp in the singing on Free Not Free, the harp that somehow pulls of stunted riffs like an electric guitar and of course, the opening of Tomorrow with its guitar strings plucked with clumsy heavy-handedness that still manages to create captivating melody.
Clinic may have not expanded much beyond their weird, experimental waltzes of the last decade on Do It!, but given that every album they release receives critical acclaim they deserve respect for just delivering once again.

A Mountain of One – Brown Piano (Remake by Studio)
Studio's Yearbook 1 went pretty underappreciated after it's early release last year, not even befitting of a Wikipedia entry apparently. But these two Swedish producers are notoriously slow movers as evident by the graceful, building masterpieces that took 6 years to fill the pages of Yearbook 1. Studio have never been afraid of taking 15 minutes to build tracks up from minimalistic beats and layers of loops, gentle synths and warm, champagne bass.
In some ways Studio remind me of a European Ratatat, they don't have the same rawness, or the ripping guitars or the splashing, stomping bass but they both have a talent to make a song a journey, and have both now released an awesome, progressive first album of instrumentals and followed it up with an album of remixes. And that's what Yearbook 2 is. All the style, cool and sophistication of Studio dragging out pop efforts from Love is All, Kylie and A Mountain of One's Brown Piano until they stretch into beautiful, steady voyages of sound.

The Bug – Murder We
UK producer The Bug has - depending on the diagnostician – a healthy obsession with bass. The symptoms are all present on new LP London Zoo, running a very high temperature and absolutely throbbing with a blend of heavy dubstep/ragga rhythms. As advertised, it all sounds very London with resident guest vocalists such as Warrior Queen and Murder We’s Ricking Ranking bringing their West Indies via UK accents to preach and command over the rumbling basslines.
Apart from pulsing bass, an attention grabbing fraction of the intro to Murder We is the introduction of Ranking as “King of the Dancefloor”. While he does lay his lines down heavy here, about the only thing I recall Ricky appearing on before this was as backing vocals on Roots Manuva’s Seat Yourself, and I’ll just take a moment to revel in how awesome the Diplo remix of that track still is. If you’re a fan of Roots Manuva you’ll definitely appreciate the dub styles of The Bug’s grimy beats. Bring a sub.