Lemon Kittens - 'We Buy a Hammer for Daddy' (United Dairies Produce)

The Lemon Kittens only made two records before disbanding, though Danielle Dax went on to a somewhat more renowned solo career. It's a shame, because their art-school outbursts feel remarkably prescient in 2019, and (to my ears, today) especially British. United Dairies released this, and there's certainly a feel that is closer to early Nurse With Wound than anything appearing on Rough Trade at the time, although it's far more song-based and rock in nature than Chance Meeting. I hear the undeniable influence of the Residents, at least in tone and instrumental interplay ('The American Cousin' and 'Rome Burning' could be featuring Snakefinger as a guest musician, though everything played on this record was either Blake or Dax), and there's an energy in the more madcap tracks that definitely is fuelled by some frustration, even there aren't overtly social-leaning tendencies in the lyrics. More reference points can be teased out (Beefheart, early electronic composition, probably Throbbing Gristle) but it's not necessary to place this into a lineage, even though that's my vestigial habit. Time has been extremely kind to We Buy a Hammer for Daddy, and this feels like a crucial piece in that wonderful, fertile period of British music where the avant-garde collapsed onto rock forms and a lot of weird stuff snuck through the cracks. Today's pop scene, at least the kind of pop that gets written about in publications such as The Quietus, surely has the same sense of freedom and juxtaposition, though I feel far closer to older material, personally. And there's just so much going on here, vocally especially ('Motet' is just magic, where Dax/Blake have a pretty great interplay that complemented each other well). Even the loose and exploratory parts (side two opens with 'Pain Topics', which flutters around under the shouted vocals and razorblade guitars, which eventually cascade into a wall of sound) feel like they have a vision, a pathway towards something that is never without consequence. Furthermore, it feels like a balanced duo – I don't know enough about either musician outside of this record, so I shouldn't make this declaration, but I feel like this is a pure 50/50 mix between their two personalities. There's a wonderful world envisioned here, and I want to explore it.

Joy Division - 'Unknown Pleasures' (Factory)

This is another one of those 'classics' that I'm almost embarrassed to have in the accumulation, if only because a) I rarely listen to it and b) I will certainly struggle to write original thoughts about it in 2017. Coming between the bootleg of Warsaw and the superior vision of Closer, it's interesting as a midpoint, or if you like to marvel at how far bands push themselves in a short period of time. I'm sure this is not an original observation, but Martin Hannett's production is just about everything to why this is a great record, and if you don't believe me, listen to Warsaw. I'm sure that Hannett and the band were working in synergy here, but regardless, the decision to strip out the middle of these songs, rather than filling them with crunchy guitar chords, is what makes Unknown Pleasures such a definitive turning point between punk and post. This introduction of emptiness of course amplifies the lyrical themes but it really opens up the songs and lets mood play a role, a gesture towards what is felt and not heard. Event underwritten songs like 'Candidate' gain so much from this expansion, and it still gets thick and meaty at times. 'Shadowplay' is attenuated towards a wall of sound feeling; 'New Dawn Fades' and 'Day of the Lords' are balanced, production-wise, against their baroque tendencies. It doesn't hurt that Curtis really starts to emerge as one of rock's iconic voices on this record, with the same menace as the Warsaw sound but an increased commitment to emotional delivery, meaning he's actually singing, and his 'When will it end?' is bone-chilling even if you don't consider his ultimate fate. It's a voice that is almost defiantly masculine after the 70s sounds of Bowie and glam, yet implying more than it lets on. This is still Factory rock music, made by cold men in dark warehouses, but it's inching towards a more cybernetic approach, the full-on embrace of synthesisers to come later in New Order but no doubt a concern this early on, already. Morris's drumming is more motorik, and a song like 'Insight' is far from computerised but looking at least in that direction. Synths are used more atmospherically here, swooping into the corners and occasionally roaring. There's a reason university students still walk around wearing t-shirts bearing this logo today, despite the fact that the only two songs even remotely close to being catchy/hook-based are 'Disorder' and 'She's Lost Control'. And there's a reason we still have scores of bands like Protomartyr essentially aping the sound of 'Wilderness', four decades later. 

Jackie-O Motherfucker - 'The Magick Fire Music' (Ecstatic Peace!)

Once one cuts through the duct tape, one can start working through The Magick Fire Music. Four sides is a lotta Jackie-O, and they use this larger canvas to take their time, spreading out, at least compared to their Road Cone releases from around this time (2000-2001), Fig. 5 and Liberation, which I'm somehow more familiar with despite never owning. Jackie-O Motherfucker are actually a lot more Apollonian their the name and reputation may suggest, as these lengthy pieces (about two per side) mostly improvise around groove-based indie rock instrumentation – a jam band! It's hardly Medeski Martin & Wood, but the foundations are easy to feel, and even when they bring in squealing saxophones, keyboards/synths and tape loops, it's only dressing on the surface of a harmonious path. Mostly, this is music of meandering, and it strikes a nice Morricone-esque vibe sometimes ('The Cage', 'Quaker') which never threatens to really challenge the omphalos. Yes, The Magick Fire Music takes awhile to get anywhere, and maybe once it does, if it does, you aren't sure if you're back where you started. For a band that's been just "Tom Greenwood + collaborators" for a long time, it's interesting to listen back here to when they were somewhat more collectively a group, or at least that's my impression. There's no personnel listed so it's hard to know who's actually on this recording - hell, it could just all be Greenwood solo - but it feels like more, albeit surely live studio jams, offered with some restraint and a surprising amount of polish. Maybe "meander as philosophy" is a lot more difficult than it sounds; the I-IV-V chord progressions reached here feel a bit too easy, in which case we should turn to mood/texture/atmosphere for our pleasure. Departures from this deliver the most joy: '2nd Ave 2 M' is a twisting maelstrom that veers into space-jazz territory; 'Lost Stone' goes for tremolo-driven sky paintings and eschews rock instrumentation the most, and is a beautiful moment. It all comes to a summation on 'Black Squirrels', the jam with the most energy, the most psychedelic use of layered sound, and the presence of a banjo to tie the band to the 'Americana' influence they expressed more strongly on other releases. I had no idea that these guys are still together (in some form) and have been putting out a steady stream of records ever since this; I'm not sure how this stacks up against their whole oeuvre but someone out there's gotta be a completist.

The Fall - 'The Wonderful and Frightening World...' (PVC/Beggars Banquet)

This is as far as I go, or maybe to This Nation's Saving Grace - I always forget which one came out later and I'm too lazy to look it up. So my only Fall on vinyl is the first and last, at least within the era that I know. And 5-6 years later, only a bit has changed. Karl Burns is the sole survivor from the Witch Trials band and he's moved to bass (I think; the credits are CONFUSING!). Craig Scanlon is on guitar and it's generally his acidic slashing that makes this era great (arriving for Dragnet and defining a style of post-punk shredding that is timeless, like so much great art, because it's simultaneously of it's era and also completely transcendent, like This Heat or Godard or, I dunno, Animal Collective or something...). You're thrown for a loop by the opening moments of 'Lay of the Land', which begins with some austere intonation about the apocalypse or something - hey, the Fall invented the Current 93 sound too! But it's just a ruse, cause the band comes crashing in and it's the Fall as we know it, with yet another great song. Catchy, but the hooks are all in the instrumentation, and the vocals are just fenceposts to build around. The production on this record is a bit weird, making the band sound distant and lo-fi but with a bright rhythm section. Smith's voice (both his and his wife's) has some reverb glow, and, hey, I like it! It gets quite muddy on 'Copped It', especially with the digital synth sheen and a snarling Beefheartian turn, building to one of the more vocally abstract (and I daresay adventurous) songs in the early Fall catalogue. 'Craigness' rises and falls through varying levels of plateaus but ultimately gets nowhere; it's the 'frightening' part of the album title, for sure. The 'wonderful' follows, actually at the end of both sides, in both 'Disney Dream Debased' and the strange 'C.R.E.E.P.', where the harmonic clouds around the band seem strangely benevolent, and oddly in-sync with 1980s pop. The keyboards here lift the songs, for once, instead of oppressing them, and Brix's feminine voice cuts the bile somewhat. It's still a strange trip, but one that sees a way out of the endless circles of concrete and muck. We're in the darkest period of Thatcher's assault on Britain here, yet somehow the Fall are able to make sense of it, true artists that they are.

Cocteau Twins - 'Heaven or Las Vegas' (4AD)

I don't know a lot about this band -- just this album, and I used to have a cassette of Blue Bell Knoll that I wish I still had, cause it was great! But this is a pretty masterful collection of songs, of this band doing what they do... strangely mutated vocals (actually singing English, just with weird phrasing), thick semi-ambient guitars that sound like synths, and a drum machine to push it all along. It's pure pop abstraction, made evident by how infectious these songs are even though I haven't listened to this album in probably a decade, I remember almost every song. Side one is just a feelgood suite of winners. 'Iceblink Luck' jumps out as particularly memorable - it's sentiments are so human despite an aesthetic that is alien. Inviting indeed, I still love the title track and the way it soars. The maxim "a pop hook can be genius without literal meaning'" is sure in effect here. Side two takes things down a notch, opening with the relatively somber (and somewhat world music-like) 'I wear your ring'. And as much as I enjoy listening to it (particularly this scratchy, beat-up old LP, which has enough surface noise to add another layer of strange on proceedings), I don't really know how to write about this music. I know this band has a massive cult following but I just casually like this one record. I'm almost afraid to write any interpretations here just in case I get angry comments from Cocteau diehards (see, I still delude myself into thinking that people actually read this blog). I know they're Scottish, but this feels pretty far away from the Close Lobsters record just under review here, despite being really rather contemporary of them. I can hear a Kate Bush influence in 'Road, river and rail' but maybe I'm just looking for something easy to say. There's evidence of the times - the bassline gets pretty plucky on 'Pitch the baby', and the overall sound has a very 80s aesthetic (though I think this is actually 1990). 'Frou-frou foxes in midsummer fires', the closing cut, is dark and brooding, and one that I didn't actually remember. When it kicks in, it's an epic liftup, and it's almost like scat singing, yet so serious. When you look up 4AD in the dictionary, this should be what you get. I guess this band influenced artists like Sigur Ros and maybe even the shitgaze stuff of more recent times. And all this from just outside of Falkirk too!

Bugskull - 'Distracted Snowflake Volume One' (Pop Secret/Darla)

I think this is probably Bugskull's finest moment. It's not quite as messy (sonically) as the last few albums, but boasts a pop confidence not heard ever before. There's a more emphatic approach to the instrumental work as well, as the opening track 'Icecream Daydream' sets the stage, sounding like a looser Yo La Tengo circa Painful. The electronica aspects are much more personal than before; field recordings, affected keyboards and weird synth sequences create songs that are some of the most mystically odd electronic music I've ever heard. 'Goodbye' is like a bizarro Boards of Canada track, every bit as detailed and perfectionist. But it's also got the most song-based side of Bügsküll that we've heard to date. 'Grand Canyon' is a straight-up folk song, somewhat improvised lyrically, with the sound of wind (perhaps recorded at the Canyon itself?) that is deceptively simple; it's nuanced and honest, and a far cry from Crock's soup-maelstrom. And 'Winky's Wild Ride (The Quest)' is the best Bügsküll song ever - with probably the most forward vocal part, and also some magically ascending toneclouds - it's the essence of the sublime. The closer, 'Sun', starts like Charlemagne Palestine on a hot air balloon - warm to the touch, and occasionally flaring up before plateauing into a sophisticated mid-level psych workout. The percussion is Eastern-tinged hand drumming, a nice complement to the hard electro-beats that pepper the other parts of the record. The recording quality is stunning, letting the instruments breathe and find their own space -- but it could also be that over the years, Mr. Byrne has upgraded his equipment somewhat. The liner notes contain a silly/nonsensical story about a garden gnome that I could live without, but it sets a mood I guess, and the album more than delivers. All of these Bugskull records offer something to enjoy, but this one seems to take every aspect of what he does and do it better than the rest.

David Bowie - 'Lodger' (RCA)

Lodger's a weird one because it's not actually that weird; it's considered part of a trilogy with Low and "Heroes" but it's not as dense and avoids the extended synth instrumentals. But there's something simultaneously wooly and rusty about Lodger which is why I've always had a soft spot for it. None of the songs are really catchy enough to be hit singles, and I guess the charts felt this way too. There's a turn towards multiculturalism, such as 'Yassassin' and 'African Night Flight', so this feels nothing like the concrete Berlin walls of Low. Maybe more like a Peter Kubelka film! But motion is the name of the game - 'Move On' and 'Red Sails' grip onto the way the world was becoming smaller at the end of the century. There's something very temporary about the whole thing - the band never gels, the lyrics suggest there's not going to be much happening tomorrow and the album is called Lodger, after all. The post-apocalypticism is most evident on the opener, 'Fantastic Voyage', but I think this track is brilliant because it sounds like it could be on John Cale's Paris 1919 album. So even though we're talking about bombs dropping, time unraveling backwards, etc. it's still has that feeling of sipping a cup of tea and staring out the window at the English countryside. I think Lodger is also interesting because even though it's the most pop-oriented of the trilogy in terms of construction, it's really hard to interface with. Adrian Belew plays guitar all over it and there's a few laser beams poking through the ozone layer, but generally George Murray's farty bass and Carlos Alomar's rhythm guitar keep things relatively contained. There's a lot of creaking in the edges; Eno's presence is so well-integrated that it's possible to ignore him. 'Red Money' is a great closing track that still escapes my brain as soon as it's heard; this is the detached, difficult Bowie, the one from The Man Who Fell to Earth. I've always felt like I never dedicated myself enough to Lodger, merely proclaiming it as "great" and then filing it away before I really could creep into the cracks. The distinct feeling that maybe there's nothing on the other side of the artifice should be troubling, but instead it's where the pleasure lies.