Nils Frahm - Solo - ★★★★★★★★☆☆
Offered as a free download on Frahm's website, Solo is mothballed material finally shown the light of day as part of World Piano Day. It can be argued that Frahm's strength lies in unfussy textured piano work such as this - opening piece Ode is pretty as a picture and will no doubt form the soundtrack to TV documentaries about lonely landscapes sometime soon. In fact the general mood of Solo is somewhat sombre yet beguiling to boot with shades of Eno (both Brian and Roger), Mertens and Hopkins ever-present. The album's most challenging listens conclude the set - Immerse! spends its eleven minutes gallivanting around treated piano signatures without breaking sweat, while the cyclical layered curtain-call Four Hands spirals sweetly into the distance. A gift that keeps on giving, the artist urges you to check out the vinyl format of the album as it 'sounds great'. Who could argue with that?
Nuria Graham - Bird Eyes - ★★★★★★★☆☆☆
Barcelona's Nuria Graham is the latest intriguing artist to sign for local label El Segell Del Primavera and certainly the most hypnotic since Oso Leone and Joana Serrat's recent recordings. Bird Eyes is languid, cosmopolitan, eccentric pop that ropes in David Lynch atmosphere (I Worry Too Much), swoon-some summer grooves (Bad Luck) and trippy mournful dubbed-out Durutti Column-esque hooks (Ages), all gently topped off with Graham's honeyed tonsils. Suffice to say that while Bird Eyes won't change the world, it's an accomplished 40 minutes with some very pretty tunes.
Camouflage - Greyscale - ★★★★★☆☆☆☆☆
I have a sneaking suspicion that Camouflage have been cocking an ear in the direction of Depeche Mode's more-recent period if Greyscale is anything to do by. With typically Teutonic precision, the German synth-wave trio have nailed retro pop down to a tee on tracks like Shine (which sounds like '90s-era Third Mind/Play It Again Sam summarized in four minutes), while In The Cloud adopts a more mournful tone that befits more recent Nine Inch Nails (minus the angst) releases. Or perhaps, that last Maps album. Or indeed, Depeche Mode's Exciter album. Not that there's much wrong with all this homage - much of Greyscale is pleasant and presentable dressed up in anthemic synth hooks and pulsating basslines. And don't forget that Camouflage have been knocking around for a good few years so lazily levelling comparisons with moody darkwave should stop. That is until you hear the track Still, drenched in sad-face strings and emotional lyrics. This fine song is in total contrast to the rather irksome Misery which is probably the most 'up' on the album.
The Late Call - Golden - ★★★★★★☆☆☆☆
Johannes Mayer sounds very much like a songwriter's songwriter who probably won't break the mould anytime soon yet follows in the footsteps of many understated folk-pop troubadours. Here he's joined by a full band who colour in the outlines and smooth over the cracks, creating warming ditties like Carry, Ghost World and Pickpocket, pausing occasionally to kick back with some milder acoustic pop such as the reflective Come Alive. As the album progresses through similar territory, it's hard to figure out just how many people will buy into The Late Call - there's an overkill situation, currently, with downtrodden melodic bedroom songs everywhere, though admittedly many are way less appealing then the first half of Golden.
The Elwins - Play For Keeps - ★★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆
Ontario's twee jangle-pop outfit return with an album of bouncy feel-good High School anthems that will either have you skipping insanely down your nearest High School or machine-gunning your own colon with a staple gun. The Elwins give you Bubble ("you get me high like a bubble"), Show Me How To Move (jammed full of twiddly little keyboard hooks), Sexual Intellectual ("you're making a fire inside my inside") and all manner of wall-to-wall happy-go-lucky ditties that make Maroon 5 and Magic sound like the next Napalm Death.
Smile Down Upon Us - Smile Down Upon Us - ★★★★★★★☆☆☆
Littlebow's multi-instrumentalist Kieran Phelan and Japanese singer and programmer Moomloo are the crux of this upcoming RSD release. Vinyl only and set to be issued on the micro-label Wiaiwya, Smile Down Upon Us is by turns pretty and elegiac, charming yet challenging and blissfully soft-focussed in its approach. Found sounds, spoken passages, drifting melodies and simple beats culminate in an organic journey through art-folk and anti-pop that is both enlightening and appealing to anyone who got a bit moist at the last Littlebow project. It doesn't all gel perfectly but there's still plenty to admire and reason enough to spend hours queuing outside a record store for on April 18th.
Cotton Claw - Volutes - ★★★★★★★☆☆☆
Lovers of Lone and Model 500 (see below) might want to check out this French outfit's latest foray into recorded sound - Volutes represents the more melodic side of minimal electronica. With one foot on the dance-floor and another raised in defiance, Cotton Claw's approach is to make full use of the four pairs of producer's hands on duty here. Lead single Grainy marries blurred synth hooks with a Carl Craig-esque tech-beat, while Hornets resembles '90s R&S powerhouse Ken Ishii's less intense moments. Things get laid-back on nu-funker Sunset Glow before Time Trial returns us to the subsonic minimalism of earlier tracks - I can predict the latter filling a few discerning dance-floors sometime soon. If Volutes suffers from anything, it's overkill. The same James Blake motif of swollen 'wow-wow' keyboards and wilful use of trippy Dam-Funk style rhythms wears thin in places but quibbles aside, I'm rather fond of at least two-thirds of the dozen pieces on offer.
Model 500 - Digital Solutions - ★★★★★★★☆☆☆
Juan Atkins' first full-length album from his Model 500 nom-de-plume hasn't quite had the fanfare that a release on, say, his spiritual home R&S might have provided. No matter - Digital Solutions may sport a shonky moniker but it's replete with the usual trademarks of sparse electro-beats, burbling synths and spacey effects to sink a starship. Digital Solutions has more in common with 1995's debut Deep Space than the disappointing follow-up Mind and Body - this is a good thing. Electric Night is a killer track in the traditions of Huesca or I Wanna Be There, although perhaps not as anthemic, while both Storm, The Groove and the title-track have enough minerals to demand repeated intake. Occasionally Atkins oversimplifies matters with too much drudgery (Station - too much guitar widdling) but overall, Digital Solutions is a deft jam.
Blancmange - Semi Detached - ★★★★★★★☆☆☆
In the absence of musical lynchpin Stephen Luscombe due to illness, the enviable legacy of one of the UK's quirkiest and likeable synth-duos from the '80s is now a sole platform for Neil Arthur. What could have been a hit-and-miss affair like his only 'proper' solo outing in the '90s (the album Suitcase) turns out to be a bit of a belter. The epic The Fall is an ambitious introduction to what is essentially a straightforward synth-pop album straight off the bat - at eight minutes long, it threatens to deter casual listeners but ends up being the foundation for the rest of the album to rest on. Arthur's ear for a natty cover conjures up the magical take on Can's I Want More, while humour abounds on Bloody Hell Fire, Acid and Useless. For a toe-tapping head-nodders, you could do worse than check out Paddington or head to the second disc of extras for a whole feast of extended mixes done in the style of the eighties - Silk Sea is a bit special and ought to have been on the main album. Perhaps the only disappointments here are the rather tame downbeat reading of Chic's I Want Your Love, which demands hip-wiggling rather than a hip operation, and a couple of the mid-album stragglers. Otherwise and mercifully, Blancmange haven't got set in their ways.
Death - N.E.W. - ★★★★★★☆☆☆☆
Within ten seconds of opener Relief riffing into earshot, I'm reminded of Living Color and Dinosaur Jr jamming together in a dark, dank basement club in New York. In truth, sludge-punk bruisers Death hail from the home of techno and soul Detroit and have been knocking around for the best part of forty years delivering genre-bending angst-rock in sporadic bursts. Following on from the recent reissue of their coveted self-titled third album, the remaining Hackney brothers have chosen to reignite old values and even older riffs to form the wryly-titled N.E.W.. But what else can a band call their first album since 1976? Back in their day, Death were a Drenge or a Royal Blood of sorts, always on the cusp of something cult but never quite the unit-shifters they should have been. Much of N.E.W. sounds like a band rediscovering its roots with a sense of purpose and fun with Look At Your Life and At The Station being highlights, Who Am I and Story Of The World less so.
Offered as a free download on Frahm's website, Solo is mothballed material finally shown the light of day as part of World Piano Day. It can be argued that Frahm's strength lies in unfussy textured piano work such as this - opening piece Ode is pretty as a picture and will no doubt form the soundtrack to TV documentaries about lonely landscapes sometime soon. In fact the general mood of Solo is somewhat sombre yet beguiling to boot with shades of Eno (both Brian and Roger), Mertens and Hopkins ever-present. The album's most challenging listens conclude the set - Immerse! spends its eleven minutes gallivanting around treated piano signatures without breaking sweat, while the cyclical layered curtain-call Four Hands spirals sweetly into the distance. A gift that keeps on giving, the artist urges you to check out the vinyl format of the album as it 'sounds great'. Who could argue with that?
Nuria Graham - Bird Eyes - ★★★★★★★☆☆☆
Barcelona's Nuria Graham is the latest intriguing artist to sign for local label El Segell Del Primavera and certainly the most hypnotic since Oso Leone and Joana Serrat's recent recordings. Bird Eyes is languid, cosmopolitan, eccentric pop that ropes in David Lynch atmosphere (I Worry Too Much), swoon-some summer grooves (Bad Luck) and trippy mournful dubbed-out Durutti Column-esque hooks (Ages), all gently topped off with Graham's honeyed tonsils. Suffice to say that while Bird Eyes won't change the world, it's an accomplished 40 minutes with some very pretty tunes.
Camouflage - Greyscale - ★★★★★☆☆☆☆☆
I have a sneaking suspicion that Camouflage have been cocking an ear in the direction of Depeche Mode's more-recent period if Greyscale is anything to do by. With typically Teutonic precision, the German synth-wave trio have nailed retro pop down to a tee on tracks like Shine (which sounds like '90s-era Third Mind/Play It Again Sam summarized in four minutes), while In The Cloud adopts a more mournful tone that befits more recent Nine Inch Nails (minus the angst) releases. Or perhaps, that last Maps album. Or indeed, Depeche Mode's Exciter album. Not that there's much wrong with all this homage - much of Greyscale is pleasant and presentable dressed up in anthemic synth hooks and pulsating basslines. And don't forget that Camouflage have been knocking around for a good few years so lazily levelling comparisons with moody darkwave should stop. That is until you hear the track Still, drenched in sad-face strings and emotional lyrics. This fine song is in total contrast to the rather irksome Misery which is probably the most 'up' on the album.
The Late Call - Golden - ★★★★★★☆☆☆☆
Johannes Mayer sounds very much like a songwriter's songwriter who probably won't break the mould anytime soon yet follows in the footsteps of many understated folk-pop troubadours. Here he's joined by a full band who colour in the outlines and smooth over the cracks, creating warming ditties like Carry, Ghost World and Pickpocket, pausing occasionally to kick back with some milder acoustic pop such as the reflective Come Alive. As the album progresses through similar territory, it's hard to figure out just how many people will buy into The Late Call - there's an overkill situation, currently, with downtrodden melodic bedroom songs everywhere, though admittedly many are way less appealing then the first half of Golden.
The Elwins - Play For Keeps - ★★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆
Ontario's twee jangle-pop outfit return with an album of bouncy feel-good High School anthems that will either have you skipping insanely down your nearest High School or machine-gunning your own colon with a staple gun. The Elwins give you Bubble ("you get me high like a bubble"), Show Me How To Move (jammed full of twiddly little keyboard hooks), Sexual Intellectual ("you're making a fire inside my inside") and all manner of wall-to-wall happy-go-lucky ditties that make Maroon 5 and Magic sound like the next Napalm Death.
Smile Down Upon Us - Smile Down Upon Us - ★★★★★★★☆☆☆
Littlebow's multi-instrumentalist Kieran Phelan and Japanese singer and programmer Moomloo are the crux of this upcoming RSD release. Vinyl only and set to be issued on the micro-label Wiaiwya, Smile Down Upon Us is by turns pretty and elegiac, charming yet challenging and blissfully soft-focussed in its approach. Found sounds, spoken passages, drifting melodies and simple beats culminate in an organic journey through art-folk and anti-pop that is both enlightening and appealing to anyone who got a bit moist at the last Littlebow project. It doesn't all gel perfectly but there's still plenty to admire and reason enough to spend hours queuing outside a record store for on April 18th.
Cotton Claw - Volutes - ★★★★★★★☆☆☆
Lovers of Lone and Model 500 (see below) might want to check out this French outfit's latest foray into recorded sound - Volutes represents the more melodic side of minimal electronica. With one foot on the dance-floor and another raised in defiance, Cotton Claw's approach is to make full use of the four pairs of producer's hands on duty here. Lead single Grainy marries blurred synth hooks with a Carl Craig-esque tech-beat, while Hornets resembles '90s R&S powerhouse Ken Ishii's less intense moments. Things get laid-back on nu-funker Sunset Glow before Time Trial returns us to the subsonic minimalism of earlier tracks - I can predict the latter filling a few discerning dance-floors sometime soon. If Volutes suffers from anything, it's overkill. The same James Blake motif of swollen 'wow-wow' keyboards and wilful use of trippy Dam-Funk style rhythms wears thin in places but quibbles aside, I'm rather fond of at least two-thirds of the dozen pieces on offer.
Model 500 - Digital Solutions - ★★★★★★★☆☆☆
Juan Atkins' first full-length album from his Model 500 nom-de-plume hasn't quite had the fanfare that a release on, say, his spiritual home R&S might have provided. No matter - Digital Solutions may sport a shonky moniker but it's replete with the usual trademarks of sparse electro-beats, burbling synths and spacey effects to sink a starship. Digital Solutions has more in common with 1995's debut Deep Space than the disappointing follow-up Mind and Body - this is a good thing. Electric Night is a killer track in the traditions of Huesca or I Wanna Be There, although perhaps not as anthemic, while both Storm, The Groove and the title-track have enough minerals to demand repeated intake. Occasionally Atkins oversimplifies matters with too much drudgery (Station - too much guitar widdling) but overall, Digital Solutions is a deft jam.
Blancmange - Semi Detached - ★★★★★★★☆☆☆
In the absence of musical lynchpin Stephen Luscombe due to illness, the enviable legacy of one of the UK's quirkiest and likeable synth-duos from the '80s is now a sole platform for Neil Arthur. What could have been a hit-and-miss affair like his only 'proper' solo outing in the '90s (the album Suitcase) turns out to be a bit of a belter. The epic The Fall is an ambitious introduction to what is essentially a straightforward synth-pop album straight off the bat - at eight minutes long, it threatens to deter casual listeners but ends up being the foundation for the rest of the album to rest on. Arthur's ear for a natty cover conjures up the magical take on Can's I Want More, while humour abounds on Bloody Hell Fire, Acid and Useless. For a toe-tapping head-nodders, you could do worse than check out Paddington or head to the second disc of extras for a whole feast of extended mixes done in the style of the eighties - Silk Sea is a bit special and ought to have been on the main album. Perhaps the only disappointments here are the rather tame downbeat reading of Chic's I Want Your Love, which demands hip-wiggling rather than a hip operation, and a couple of the mid-album stragglers. Otherwise and mercifully, Blancmange haven't got set in their ways.
Death - N.E.W. - ★★★★★★☆☆☆☆
Within ten seconds of opener Relief riffing into earshot, I'm reminded of Living Color and Dinosaur Jr jamming together in a dark, dank basement club in New York. In truth, sludge-punk bruisers Death hail from the home of techno and soul Detroit and have been knocking around for the best part of forty years delivering genre-bending angst-rock in sporadic bursts. Following on from the recent reissue of their coveted self-titled third album, the remaining Hackney brothers have chosen to reignite old values and even older riffs to form the wryly-titled N.E.W.. But what else can a band call their first album since 1976? Back in their day, Death were a Drenge or a Royal Blood of sorts, always on the cusp of something cult but never quite the unit-shifters they should have been. Much of N.E.W. sounds like a band rediscovering its roots with a sense of purpose and fun with Look At Your Life and At The Station being highlights, Who Am I and Story Of The World less so.