REVIEW: Album Of The Year: Grimes - Visions

*Originally published for the Oxford Music Blog (20/12/12) 

Certainly one to file in ‘other’, Grimes third and best album to date is a tricky old thing to define.

Critics have lazily described Claire Boucher’s music as having a ‘post-internet’ sound, but really she just has an incredible knack for marrying genres of the past with the present.

The result is a kind of ancient machine: established and contemporary. Boucher’s weightless, Cocteau Twins-like singing invariably meets with versatile synth patterns, an ambient sound that, unlike other modern electronic acts, doesn’t become repetitive.

Whether it’s the menacing pop of ‘Oblivion’, the video game glitches of ‘Genesis’, the classical-meets-digital brainwash of ‘Symphonia IX’ or the cataclysms of ‘Circumambient’, Visions is the kind of record that you will return to time and time again.

REVIEW: Rainbow Shark - Rainbow Shark EP

*Originally published for Spires Magazine (14/12/12)

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FEATURE: Dan Croll

*Originally published for The Generator's Tipping Point blog (13/12/12)

I’m honoured to at last reference a musician with (phonetically) the same strange surname as me, but only because the artist in question is breathtakingly good.

Dan Croll was first tipped by us in August when Toby Rogers praised his Flaws-era Bombay Bicycle Club balladry. A couple of months later, the Liverpool musician has come forward with a debut single sounding broader than all of his tracks put together (this is far from a discredit – check out the wonderful ‘Home’ and ‘Always Like This’) – so much so that the likes of Nick Grimshaw and Annie Mac have aired/interviewed him on their shows.

‘From Nowhere’ literally has arrived from another part of Croll’s mind, opening with a fairground organ that wouldn’t feel out of place on The English Riviera. It bursts forth with a statement bass-line, reggae rhythms and vacant jazz chords that, in all honesty, make you wiggle like a child in your desk chair. There’s a boyish, earnest tone to Croll’s singing, which nonchalantly glides over the track’s shimmering multicultural sound.

In essence, ‘From Nowhere’ does nothing less than hark to the kind of cool pop music that Santigold writes across the pond, but Dan Croll makes it in Britain. His debut album is out next year.

PREVIEW: Lewis Watson headlines BBC Introducing's Upstairs at the O2 Academy

*Originally published for BBC News Oxford (6/12/12)

Oxfordshire internet sensation Lewis Watson will be supported by four local singer-songwriters at December's Upstairs at the O2 Academy in association with BBC Introducing.

The gig on Saturday 8 December will see performances from Adam Barnes, Jasmine Hill, Gavroche and Alex Lanyon.

Lewis Watson, 20, was first played by BBC Introducing in 2010 and has received almost five million video views on YouTube.

He performed the lead single from new EP Another Four Sad Songs on Zane Lowe's BBC Radio 1 show after it charted on iTunes in November.

He said: "I've been to plenty of gigs at the O2 Academy, but now I'm headlining. It's great.

"Oxford is a great place to start out [as a musician]. I started doing open mics and it's fantastic for that."

Although not one to shrug off comparisons to artists like Ed Sheeran, Lewis likens himself to musicians a little further from the spotlight.

"It's a massive compliment to be compared to Ed Sheeran. I like to think that I draw more influence from Ed's workrate than his music though.

"I'd compare my music to City And Colour, or maybe Benjamin Francis Leftwich." 

The Oxford singer-songwriter is signed to Warner Bros and expanded much of his early fanbase through social media.

His success in the virtual world is now very much in the real, with the recent announcement that he is to support Birdy on her Australian tour in April 2013.

He added: "I'll be playing the Sydney Opera House before I'm 21. Mental."

Thriving scene

Adam Barnes will be playing a BBC Introducing gig for the second time Adam Barnes played an Upstairs gig in support of Glasgow's Admiral Fallow in May, but this month the event is completely bursting with local music.

Speaking of the "thriving" Oxford music scene, Adam said: "The best part is that there are always great bands to listen to who are currently doing well, not just in Oxford but across the UK."

He is also acutely aware of the important role that solo musicians play in the music industry.

"More have moved into the spotlight recently, but there are just as many as there ever were.

"You have to think that within every band there are one or two songwriters. The time period does change and different musical genres do steal the limelight, but songwriters have always been up there, from the Bob Dylans to the Springsteens to the Damien Rices."

Adam's music has taken more of a contemporary folk route of late, something that he is proud to exhibit at the Introducing gig.

"It's going to be a good show. It's always great to be involved with BBC Introducing in Oxford so I'm really looking forward to it.

"I'm also heading into the studio over Christmas and starting the recording of my debut album which is really exciting for me."

'Endlessly buzzing'

Jasmine Hill, 17, from Hook Norton, is another young act performing on the night.

She describes her music as "hook-based with pretty quirky productions... a mash up of Paloma Faith, Newton Faulkner, Adele, and Ed Sheeran".

While her covers of similar pop artists have garnered her attention on the internet, Jasmine is determined to share more of her original songs.

"I currently have a stash of originals in the bag and I'm now really focusing on adding to these as well as working and writing with top musicians and producers."

She has also found a way to get her music into a different medium.

"A song I wrote awhile back called 'Free' is being used in a film out early 2013 which is extremely exciting," she said.

Jasmine believes the support she has received from people in the local creative industries is down to their generally "open-minded" natures.

"The music scene [in Oxford] is endlessly buzzing with new talent and fresh music. The majority of people in Oxford are supportive of new artists and genres, so it's awesome for me to showcase my music."

The next couple of weeks are booked up with studio dates in London to record her material.

Also on the line up is Lucie Norton a.k.a. Gavroche who describes her music as "alternative angst folk with electronic tendencies". Singer-songwriter Alex Lanyon will open the night.

Every month a selection of local talent play the regular band nights at the O2 Academy, with highlights featured on BBC Introducing in Oxford.

REVIEW: Bos Angeles - Taking Out The Trash

*Originally published for The 405 (27/11/12)

It's mid-summer, the car windows are wound down, your friends are drinking in the back seat and the air stinks of West Coast hubris. You're not in Los Angeles, however, you're in Bos Angeles, UK and it's pissing it down with rain.

According to a local travel website, Boscombe is lovingly referred to as 'Bos Vegas' or 'Bos Angeles' (though we'll leave the level of irony to the opinions of those who've visited). Three lads from the area have also decided to name their band after it, and they're here to brighten things up a bit.

'Beach Slalom' catapulted Bos Angeles into buzz band territory in November last year, catching them the attention of many a tastemaker. Such a response was inevitable with the band scoffing the liquid hooks of Beach Fossils, WAVVES and Girls, yet sounding distinctly rawer. Lazy, pubescent vocals groan over prickly guitars on 'Beach Slalom', with distorted bass and kitchen pot drums thrashing in the background. It's an addictive sound.

A year later, Bos Angeles have decided to compile all their unreleased EPs onto a retro, yet of-the-moment 21-song cassette tape, Taking Out The Trash as their final parting shot (they disbanded this year). 'Beach Slalom' opens the thick onslaught of lo-fi surfer-rock tunes, followed closely by 'Days Of Youth' with its assured oohs and ahs and happy-go-lucky guitars. It's a strong start and adheres to the 'bedroom pop grunge lo-fi post-punk surf' that the boys have previously (and a little humorously) marketed themselves on.

The next ten minutes do not allow you to lose sight of these genres, so much so that the tracks merge into one another. 'Making Waves' plods in 4/4 like a tired indie filler, lacklustre lyrics grate rather than satiate, and 'Endelss Summer' makes of a double-mockery of its title. Perhaps it's the juxtaposition with the ferocious 'Beach Slalom' and 'Days Of Youth', but either way, it feels like you're looking up from the foot of the mountain.

You can wipe away the beads of sweat once you've pass the halfway mark where, at last, a good cluster of songs breathes life back into the record. 'Stone Washes' is a wonderful early noughties pop-punk with its jangling bass and classic three-chord guitar progression and 'Shallom Goy' boasts of a fresh identity with its battered vocals and anthemic punk-rock chorus. There's something all the more different in 'I Hate It When You Look At Me', which shuffles its shoegaze feet and lets guitars gnaw beneath an impossibly slow beat.

You're just about getting somewhere until a couple of dreary numbers ('Friendzoned', 'All I Do Is Dream') take pole position once more. But the Boscombe boys are clever and draw the compilation to its close with some stellar tracks in 'You're The One That I Want' and 'Pretend With You.'

'You're The One That I Want', unfortunately, isn't a Grease cover, but it is fortunately two minutes of scorching post-punk. 'Pretend With You' is where you can't help but scream "more of this" into your speakers, with its stunning guitar stumbling over calypso drums and ghoulish vocals. Seriously, more of this please.

In all its giant, aggregated glory, Taking Out The Trash is more of a curse than a blessing. Chop it up into bits and it's perfect for easy listening, but swallow it whole and you'll choke before you reach the end. There are some great tracks hidden in its spools – you'll just have to play cassette roulette to find them.

6/10

FEATURE: SOAK

*Originally published for The Generator's Tipping Point blog (19/11/12)

Hello there again, girl + guitar. You’ve been defying the music industry of late with your Marlings, Roses and Daughters and you’ve been doing a fine job of it. Is it beginning to wear a bit thin, though? Aren’t we beginning to tire of all the cute acoustics and breathy vocals? No, not just yet, because 16 year old Bridie Monds-Watson a.k.a. SOAK is here to shake things up a bit.

Originally from Belfast but now based in Derry/Londonderry, the unsigned singer-songwriter has already released two EPs, supported bands like The Undertones and Villagers and even leapt onto the Radio 1 playlist. It’s not so much the complexity of her music that has stirred such attention, but its simplicity. Listen the components of her latest single, ‘Sea Creatures’ (taken from her recent EP of the same title) and you’ll see why. There are no interweaving guitars, just a gently plucked acoustic. There isn’t a full-sized drum kit pelting in the background, just a gently rumbling cajon drum. Dust those elements with the most untouched vocals imaginable, and you’ve got a perfect little nugget of acoustic pop.

Far beyond musical analysis of ‘Sea Creatures’ is the importance of SOAK’s lyrics: lyrics that tell of innocence and experience. “They don’t know what love is, throw it around like it’s worthless,” her precocious head cries, but we also hear her cursing the juvenile “Sea Creatures” that inhabit her world. She’s at once older than her years, yet too young to be ahead of them. That’s her charm.

The ‘Juno’-isms and the twee nature of her music might not suit everyone, but there’s no denying that SOAK has penned a contagious number in ‘Sea Creatures.’ It’s bound to stick in more heads to come.

*Tip comes courtesy of Damian Baetens

FEATURE: KHUSHI

*Originally published for The Generator's Tipping Point blog (7/11/12)

Unsigned London songwriter and producer KHUSHI should be one self-assured fella. He’s received substantial attention on the blog circuit and repeated airplay on Huw Stephens' In Huw Music We Trust – yet just a handful of songs make up his back catalogue. Some stellar tracks must be at his disposal, then.

As stated on his Facebook page, KHUSHI is influenced by the likes of Bon Iver, The National and Alt-J. It would be superfluous and exhausting to pinpoint these sounds out however, for KHUSHI actually acts on his own territory. There may be the odd nod to Justin Vernon-like falsettos, but these are few and far between and there isn’t really one artist to attach him to (alright, I lied, there are a some stirring similarities to Colorado bedroom musician, Mesita).
 

On KHUSHI’s recent track, ‘Magpie’, an assured vocal tone and cutting lyrics tumble from lips, muted guitars mimic violins and careering drums drag root notes behind them. The entire song has a minimalist structure – starting small and ending big – and a brooding pulse that picks dirt up as it rolls. It does nothing less than entices you to explore more.

With an exciting career ahead of him, here’s to everyone doing the same.

Today's tip comes courtesy of Jeremy Lloyd from Laissez Faire Club.