My Night Out at Later... with Jools Holland

How much do you think it would cost to get into a Kings of Leon gig with a capacity of less than 300? And to be just a few metres from Caleb and the boys, how early do you think you’d have to get there? Oh, and you might want to factor into the equation that Eric Clapton’s going to do a few numbers, how does that change things?

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the world of Later… with Jools Holland. For the uninitiated, it’s a British television institution now in its 37th series. The premise is simple; a range of bands gather in a room and play a few of their tracks while the ex-Squeeze man compères. There’s the odd interview and maybe a smattering of archive footage, but the show really is all about the music. This may not sound special on paper, but seeing quality live bands on television isn’t that common. While new and exciting music is well-catered for on the radio (and, in particular, by the BBC’s stations), the screen is the airwaves’ forgotten cousin if you’re a music lover.

When Later… is in the middle of a run, it’s broadcast twice a week: a recorded show on a Friday night preceded by a live broadcast on Tuesday evenings. In the studio, the pre-record is done first before the tiny studio goes live to the homes of Britain at 10pm. And it really is tiny - despite being stood in a corner at the back (and invisible to the viewers; I’ve already checked), I was only 20ft away from both Kings of Leon and Eric Clapton.

So, to the line-up. Later… is known for having a diverse range of up-and-coming and established acts, and this week was no exception. As previously mentioned, Kings of Leon and Eric Clapton were in attendance, and they were joined by hotly-tipped rock outfit, The Vaccines, a début UK television appearance from M.I.A. (backed by The Specials), eleven-piece folk act, Bellowhead, and relatively unknown singer-songwriter, Jonathan Jeremiah.

There were few musical surprises when the cameras started rolling - these bands are tight. The Specials have an incredible sense of rhythm that it’s almost impossible not to move to, Jonathan Jeremiah has a marvellous voice and Bellowhead are an incredible live proposition. In fact, Bellowhead were a revelation - think of a 21st Century Pogues but with a brass section and you’re on the right lines. Eric Clapton was the act of the night though, he may be 65 but he showed the stadium-baiting, anaemic Kings of Leon how it’s done and blew away the stodgy, meat-and-potatoes rock of The Vaccines.

Not being particularly au fait with the world of television, the most interesting part was seeing how it was all put together. There’s a large number of people constantly running around and even when acts are playing, there’s more activity at the other end of the studio to prepare the next song. I also had the opportunity to observe how musicians react to other musicians. It’s not often any of these acts stand around in plain view while their contemporaries ply their trade, but that’s the kind of show Later… is. I even devised my own game, “What does Clapton think?” where I looked over to see his reaction as events unfolded throughout the recording. My conclusion is that, like me, he’s now a fan of Bellowhead, but that’s little more than conjecture on my part.

At this point, I’d love to include some startling celebrity revelation that would have publicists tearing their hair out, but unfortunately, no dice. I passed Bellowhead’s Jon Boden in a corridor and saw soul singer Adele having a cigarette outside, but that’s hardly going to keep Perez Hilton busy.

What I can say, however, is how much fun I had and how much I hope to be able to spend another evening with Later… in the future. The show is only as good as its acts but in an age where there’s little music programming on television to speak of, Later… is a show we should appreciate, cherish and enjoy.

Come On Over (Turn Me On)

The shuffle function built into most mp3 players is certainly a plus point for most. It may well irk the purists, and I can see why people would be resistant to the idea of splitting up albums into their constituent parts, but not enough is made of the serendipitous aspect of having your record collection available on random. From time to time, a track will pop up that you’d never have consciously chosen, but it seems to arrive at the right time and remind you of what a fantastic song it is.

This has happened to me twice today. Firstly it was Confetti by The Lemonheads: a wonderful slice of bittersweet power pop that led me to listening to its parent album, It’s a Shame About Ray, in its entirety only fifteen minutes later. The other was from Isobel Campbell and Mark Lanegan’s Sunday at Devil Dirt record: Come On Over (Turn Me On).

Often I’m a complete sucker for any song where the lyrics are completely at odds with the tone conveyed by the music. I’m a huge fan of both Belle & Sebastian and Tindersticks, two bands who specialise in beautiful tracks that have something sinister lurking beneath the core. However, Come On Over (Turn Me On) is a perfect example of when the tone of the music and the theme of the lyrics complement each other expertly.

The concept is simple; over the bassline from Nina Simone’s Feeling Good, a tale of sexual frustration is told where the protagonist is impatiently waiting for the object of their affections. Both Lanegan and Campbell sing the entire track together, so Lanegan’s yearning is conveyed through a menacing, throaty, rumbling growl, while Campbell is seemingly so overcome with desire, her voice is a barely-there, gossamer-thin whisper.

Crucially, the whole thing is incredibly sexy. Starting off brooding and slow, it slinks from line to line, with each chorus more powerful than the last. It teases too; some of the verses appear to be building up to some kind of payoff, before returning to the start of a new verse at the last possible moment. “How should I know what is right from wrong? Come on over, turn me on” they purr, as strings build, drums crash and just as you feel they’re about to let loose, we’re back where we started.

The strings are reminiscent of a James Bond theme that doesn’t actually exist, and as the song progresses, the drum fills become more robust, cymbal crashes more frequent and the guitar solos are less measured and more freeform. Just as it seems the song is about to reach its apex, it’s finished with just a sustained, bending guitar chord to keep you company.

Watch the video below and see for yourself. I’ll warn you though; you may well need a cold shower afterwards.

Oil City Confidential

Julien Temple - Oil City Confidential

released 26 July 2010 on Cadiz

Whilst watching Julien Temple’s biopic of pub-rock torchbearers Dr. Feelgood, one question keeps returning to the front of my mind: why aren’t Dr. Feelgood universally adored? At their zenith, the Feelgoods were a huge live draw on both sides of the Atlantic, scored a number one album, and were a major influence on the burgeoning punk scene. Yet they appear to have been airbrushed from history. How was this allowed to happen?

Oil City Confidential is a riveting documentary, at its most absorbing when analysing the fractious relationship between guitarist and principal songwriter (Wilko Johnson) and lead singer (Lee Brilleaux) in the glory years. Two remarkably different characters with a tempestuous inter-dependency, it’s extremely sad that the opportunity for both to tell their side of things has gone forever, with Brilleaux's passing away in 1994. It appears that the Feelgoods succumbed to the all-too-frequent tale of substance abuse - alcohol for Brilleaux and the rhythm section, harder stuff for Johnson - leading to Johnson leaving the band, the exact reason for which appears to have been lost in the mists of time.

If he weren’t already real, you couldn’t make Wilko Johnson up. He’s endlessly fascinating, speaks in a nasal, Estuary drawl, and has enough energy stored inside him to power a small village. His eyes dart as if constantly on the lookout for new points of interest, and the limited live footage of Dr. Feelgood is simply captivating: Brilleaux in his dirty white suit roaring with such ferocity you think he’s seconds away from an aneurysm, while Johnson bobs and weaves his way around the stage like a strutting rooster, his penetrating eyes focused on the middle-distance.

The story of the rise and fall of Dr. Feelgood is a spellbinding one, but unfortunately that doesn’t seem to be sufficient for director Julien Temple. Infuriatingly, he looks to “enhance” the interviews by splicing in scenes from old black and white films, sometimes with only the most tenuous connection to what’s being said. It occasionally threatens to spoil the film, and it’s lucky for Temple that the material he’s working with is so strong.

As well as the tales told, the music is also a revelation. Dr. Feelgood played an intoxicating brand of no-nonsense rhythm and blues; raw, gruff, sweaty and incredibly appealing. There’s no explanation for the original question posed, but, as a deserved postscript, Oil City Confidential has led to a renewed interest in Dr. Feelgood. Perhaps the world just needed a little reminder, and Oil City Confidential has provided.

The Wants

The Phantom Band - The Wants

released 18 October 2010 on Chemikal Underground

Employing a cornucopia of instruments on your record can be a dangerous game. There’s a danger of coming across like hyperactive children (see Architecture In Helsinki) or giving the impression of masking inferior quality songs (see Tunng). Luckily neither of those fates have befallen Glasgow’s The Phantom Band.

Following last year’s critically-acclaimed Checkmate Savage comes The Wants, recorded over a period of six months in Chemikal Underground’s South Lanarkshire studio. This record showcases how The Phantom Band combine the best of both worlds: simple yet strong writing, with an intrinsically curious invention that belies that this is only their second record. On the surface, this isn’t much to get excited about, but each of these songs are pushed to their limits, given appropriate time to build, mature, and conclude. With only nine tracks, its 48 minutes rush by with barely an ounce of spare fat on them, seldom threatening to spill over into prog-rock excess.

First track, A Glamour, opens with a sawing sound (the tuning of a baliphone, apparently) and skittering tuned percussion before breaking into a glam-rock stomp reminiscent of Super Furry Animals’ Golden Retriever. In fact, SFA are probably the group most analogous to this band, with their delightfully skewed pop and fondness for electronic flourishes.

The Phantom Band pull off a neat trick that few bands manage to execute convincingly: pulling in a barrel-load of influences whilst remaining more than the sum of their parts. Pastoral folk, stark industrial and disco funk all get an airing, and at various points throughout the record The Phantom Band sound like Roxy Music, Joy Division, Arab Strap and The Futureheads.

The Wants has a tendency to play the same card a little too often, but there is enough light and shade to stave off boredom. Vocalist Rick Anthony croons like a Caledonian Nick Cave on the tender Come Away In The Dark, while The None Of One has a genuinely thrilling change of pace halfway through. The highlight comes at the end of the record, as brutally distorted marching drums combine with Gregorian chant to provide an exhilarating climax to final track, Goodnight Arrow. It’s heartening to see a keen study of popular music alongside the confidence to try new things.

Write About Love

Belle and Sebastian - Write About Love

released 11 October 2010 on Rough Trade

A decade ago, if you’d described Belle and Sebastian as “swaggering”, you’d have been laughed out of town, and rightly so. But since the turn of the century, things have changed for the Glaswegians. Firstly, in 2002, Isobel Campbell left the group and has since made a name for herself as both a solo artist and playing “Beauty” to Mark Lanegan’s “Beast“. Secondly, they roped in Trevor Horn to produce their 2003 album, Dear Catastrophe Waitress. Horn is a former member of musical pioneers, Buggles, as well as being known for his work with some leading lights of the 1980s pop scene, including Frankie Goes To Hollywood.

Dear Catastrophe Waitress heralded a marked change in sound for Belle and Sebastian. However, though it may have seemed like an anomaly at the time, in retrospect it was simply the beginning of a new chapter of their career. Follow-up, The Life Pursuit, built on this new-found approach and the trend has continued with Write About Love. Belle and Sebastian have certainly developed since they first appeared onto the scene almost fifteen years ago: the percussion is more dynamic, the basslines are funkier and more solid, the guitars are choppier and more prominent, and the lyrics… well, they’re the same as they've always been; what were you expecting?

Belle and Sebastian trade in the music of confounding expectations and the interplay of opposites. While the casual listener may dismiss their songs as throwaway, repeated listens reveal much more at work beneath the surface. Lead singer Stuart Murdoch is one of the best character creators in music today, with his tales of boys and girls in love, being thwarted and finding it hard to fit in. The music of Belle and Sebastian is witty, dark, engrossing and - whisper it quietly - sexy.

Write About Love opens confidently with a strong drum pattern, simple piano chords and Sarah Martin gently cooing, “Make me dance, I want to surrender”. That track is I Didn’t See It Coming, and it sets the tone for the first half of the record with its synths, wandering bassline, airy feel and careful layering. The tracks begin fairly sparsely, but build into something fully immersive and represent some of the most professional and well-crafted work the group have produced. Even songs that don’t immediately jump out on first listen have plenty to recommend them, like the gorgeous chord change to introduce the chorus of the languid ballad, Calculating Bimbo.

Side One (Belle and Sebastian consciously divide their records into two halves, so it seems to make sense to do the same) concludes with Little Lou, Ugly Jack, Prophet John; a track most notable for its guest vocalist: Norah Jones. It may be the result of the meeting of two strong-willed parties, but the track doesn’t particularly sound like the work of either artist, instead falling halfway between Belle and Sebastian’s indie stylings and Jones’s easy jazz. It’s difficult to tell if the experiment works, but it does enough to justify its presence on the album and be seen as more than simply a curio.

Almost as a response to the cautious, uncertain ending of Side One, Side Two really gets off to a flying start. Current single, Write About Love, is an irresistible slice of sunshine pop featuring vocals from BAFTA-winning actress, Carey Mulligan. In typical Belle and Sebastian style, everything is not quite as it first seems, and the track centres around a girl trapped in a dull office job who writes as a means to escape her dreary existence. This theme is further explored on next track and album highlight, I’m Not Living In The Real World. Over an abundance of drum fills and keyboards that sound like steel drums, Stevie Jackson sings of a boy who grows up on the periphery, never accepted by his peers and never really participating fully in everyday life. It may not seem the chirpiest subject matter for a song, but Belle and Sebastian pack so much joie de vivre into its three minutes, social alienation’s never sounded so fun. The track also features a brilliantly wrong-footing key change, and a repeated “ooh” melody so catchy you’ll need to be vaccinated to resist it.

Write About Love may not be a great leap forward for Belle and Sebastian, but it’s such an enjoyable record it’s difficult to hold it against them. Plus, there are signs they’re honing their craft and growing into the band they’ve always been capable of being. Trevor Horn may have produced perhaps the definitive pop record of the 1980s with ABC’s The Lexicon of Love, but on Write About Love, Belle and Sebastian display more than enough to suggest that one day they’ll be able to eclipse their former colleague, and they’ll do so with a swagger.

The Trip

Laetitia Sadier - The Trip

released 4 October 2010 on Drag City

If your career shows no sign of progression over time, is that necessarily a bad thing? If you’re in full-time employment, your boss will answer with a definite, “yes”, and haul you in for a review before you can say, “rhetorical question”. But in music, it’s not quite that black and white. For example, Status Quo have been writing the same song since 1967 and are regularly scoffed at by critics, but it’s apparently completely fine for AC/DC to have had the exact same shtick since they appeared on the scene.

Which brings us to Stereolab, the cult act who are praised by journalists and adored by hardcore fans. They’ve only got one trick too, but perhaps they’re immune to biting criticism because it’s a damn good trick, and one that no-one else seems capable of replicating. Between 1990 and 2009, Stereolab combined lounge pop, Krautrock, analogue electronica and avant-garde to create a sound quite unlike that of any other band. Like the best artists, they existed on the periphery in their own private world, penetrable only to those prepared to invest the necessary time. Their songs lasted anything from one minute to ten, were often built up carefully layer by layer, and their albums had brilliantly bonkers titles like Transient Random-Noise Bursts With Announcements and, career-highlight, Emperor Tomato Ketchup.

Throughout much of Stereolab’s life, singer Laetitia Sadier has been part of side-project group, Monade, whose most recent album, Monstre Cosmic, was a superb exercise in lilting, restrained pop. Sadier has broken free from the shadow of both groups in releasing The Trip, her first solo album.

For someone so associated with formulaic music and repetition, The Trip was never going to be surprising, but it’s still hard not to see it as a let down. Say what you like about Stereolab, but there was always a playfulness and European glamour to their music which is sadly lacking here. What Sadier has left us with, is effectively an inferior version of a Monade record.

The Trip opens with the emotionally distant and hollow One Million Year Trip: a song built around a simple, grating bassline, and an odd selection to begin any record. The opening track is so important for any album, and The Trip immediately gets off on the wrong foot. It’s true the album vastly improves after the dull and metallic One Million Year Trip, but it’s difficult not to feel like the bulk of the damage has already been done.

Perhaps it’s ok to re-hash the same ideas when there’s some wit, panache or passion behind it, but Sadier seems genuinely disinterested throughout most of the record. Her vocals have always sailed dangerously close to the line that separates Gallic insouciance and boredom, but here she plants herself firmly the wrong side of that line. Dream-pop is often difficult to get excited about, but The Trip is ultimately unmemorable, bereft of any fills or flourishes as a respite.

There are glimmers of hope, however. Sadier’s cover of By The Sea is probably the only thing on show here to hold a candle to the glory days of The ‘Lab with its urgency, purpose and motorik beat. Statues Can Bend and Another Monster are all well and good, but sound passive, unfinished and in desperate need of another couple of elements to get going.

If you want to hear this sort of thing done properly, you’ll find happiness in the more sedate moments of the peerless Saint Etienne, but there’s little to recommend The Trip. It’s not much more than a Christmas bauble: shiny and polished on the surface, but with little of substance on the inside. The Trip finishes with a woeful cover of Gershwin’s Summertime, the unpalatable icing on the inedible cake that is this particularly disappointing record.

Penny Sparkle

Blonde Redhead - Penny Sparkle

released 13 September 2010 on 4AD

After some reading, a bit of research and lots of listening, it’s still near impossible to work out where exactly Blonde Redhead fit in. They seem to be on the margins of scenes or one of those bands that, because their music isn’t easily definable, crop up in new and obscure genres to which only about four other artists belong. “No-wave” and “dream-pop” are the two pigeonholes that get thrown around the most but it’s no easy task; Blonde Redhead are a little bit of lots of things all at once. The dream pop label is the easiest to comprehend: Blonde Redhead take many influences from the shoegaze movement of the early ‘90s and the marriage of these pockets of inspiration with the indecipherable lyrics/female voice as instrument ethos of the Cocteau Twins make Blonde Redhead a more intriguing proposition than they may seem in theory.

This characteristic of being hard to define probably suits Blonde Redhead down to the ground. Graduates of the New York underground, the band members’ history draws in places as diverse as Milan, Montréal, Boston and Japan. Listening to Penny Sparkle, the band’s eighth full-length album and third for 4AD, you do get the impression of a band without fixed roots. There’s a feeling of unease and restlessness, a brooding hard-to-define sensation, like a deeper, more intense version of the displacement and jetlag alluded to in Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation. Penny Sparkle straddles the line between comfort and tension, the woozy synths bleed into one another, the music is warm and enveloping but frequent, unexpected minor chords and bass rumbles mean you can never be as comfortable as you’d wish to be.

Penny Sparkle isn’t a particularly easy listen at first, but this needn’t be seen as disparaging. Blonde Redhead’s use of textures and layers is very subtle, and means that what could easily be dismissed as background music becomes more rewarding the more time and attention you give it. Think of yourself as a squirrel and Penny Sparkle as your store of acorns for the winter months. While most album’s charms are immediate and obvious, Penny Sparkle reveals its gifts gradually, meaning that there should be more the enough to keep you fulfilled during the hibernation period.

What’s most striking - and refreshing - about Penny Sparkle is that it’s more than the sum of its parts. It’s an album that works better as a whole, and moreover, a whole that’s listened to in sequence; each track is the natural choice to follow its predecessor.

The guitars, electronics and vocals Blonde Redhead employ melt into an embracing mélange of sound. Opener, Here Sometimes, is understated and gentle, and the keyboards have a human-like, analogue feel to them. The transition after the chorus isn’t smooth, and the wonkiness of it adds to the human aspect of the track. It feels like the more sedate moments of Portishead’s Third (most notably, The Rip) and is just as immersive.

Subsequent tracks mostly build on the theme established from the first moment. Not Getting There utilises a low-level buzzing to build a sense of growing urgency, an undercurrent of burbling synths transforms Love or Prison, and Everything is Wrong relates its feeling of yearning and desperation through heartbeat drums and 12/8 time.

While the high points of Penny Sparkle are numerous, the sparseness and the re-treading of familiar ground can become slightly wearing occasionally. On more than one occasion, songs are prone to extended periods of lulling, and only the curios of odd sound effects or a daring chord change sustain your interest.

To some extent, Penny Sparkle feels more like a novel than an album. The cinematic sound and creating of instability means that you genuinely want to find out what happens next. Throughout its ten tracks, the off-kilter anxiety is ratcheted up and truly deserves a fitting climax that resolves all that has gone before. However, it doesn’t get it, as final track Spain is just more of the same. Perhaps mindful of the role this track could play, Blonde Redhead try their damnedest: there’s more atmosphere, more drama, more dynamics, but unfortunately it’s just more of the same. Penny Sparkle is certainly an interesting album, but more an album to appreciate rather than enjoy. It’s just such a shame it promises so much before lamely petering out.