As I alluded to the other day when I churned out another entry on video game soundtracks, I haven’t really been going through my record collection as of late. I’ve wanted to but I think I’ve been turned off by the format I chose for the monthlies, the mindset that everything I listen to I must make notes about for the blog. It kind of kills the enjoyment in listening to music, that this is something I have to do rather than I want to do.
Basically, I think I need some time to psych myself back up. I’m going to have plenty of time to do it anyway, the summer hols are coming up after all. And I have a long list of things to try. In fact I may aswell tell you that the title of this monthly was originally going to be ‘Black Sheep, Beatles, and Beck’. So you can probably start working out what to expect come the end of this month, all being well.
In the meantime, I did listen to a few records. Maybe it was a good thing that I didn’t try anything beyond them because I did end up diving very deeply into a couple of things as you’ll see.
overpass, Elsewhere, Always
Here come the Brums!
Everywhere I’ve looked in the world of indie, I’ve seen overpass this and overpass that, people swearing blind that they are going to blow up. Proof of the pudding is in the eating though, so I held off until they released their debut album which had been due out a while and is now finally out.
They have a lot to thank the 2000s for, what with the poppy snare drums and white noise fuzz guitar riffs (particularly on “I Will” and the aptly named “Spinning”). But the performance by frontman Max Newbold as he dabbles in falsetto to sell you his raw emotion, that’s what really elevates this record as he sounds like a lost little boy on “Is This Real?” and “Heaven”.
It ain’t a bad way to kill a half hour. You’ll have a good enough time with it, try it.
The Coral, 388
A band I like surprise released a record? So this is how it feels!
You can always spare a minute for the Coral, they have been one of the most consistent bands of the 21st century. As of late they have been dabbling with concept albums, one of which was Coral Island and that was one I rather enjoyed in spite of its length. Can’t say I’ve kept up with the rest, save for “Wild Bird” and that one single they did with John Simm.
But after diving deeper and deeper into themes and new sounds, sooner or later you’re going to want to come up for air and get back to basics. That’s what the Coral do here with 388, named after the tape machine they recorded the whole shebang into. Everything about this album is simple, no frills, hence the surprise release. Just your standard guitars and drums and organs (and a fluttering of flute on “Yellow Moon”).
Instantly we’re set up for channeling the glory days with “Let the Music Play”, and “Leave It In The Past” is a firm warning-to-self to not let it get in the way of the future. There’s plenty of time for emotion and lamentations – ‘We’ll never be this young again’ in “You and Me (And the Beautiful Sea)” can touch a nerve. Oh, and if you need to get re-accustomed to the Coral’s sound then they have little treats in the mix for you. For a start there’s a fair share of dub on display, see “Here Come The Tears” and “Sad Girl”. And you may even be reminded of the Specials in “Yellow Moon”.
Nostalgia forms the backbone of 388 but it’s not an overwhelming desperation to relive the past – the Coral aren’t pulling a Gary King. It’s more of a toast to the old days, mourning and fondly remembering them like one would at the reception after a funeral. It’s a tribute to what made them successful in the first place without the stroking of egos and self-fellatio. The Coral are quietly looking back with fondness, a heavy heart and a bit of caution, and going forward with smiles on their faces.
Blur, Think Tank
For Blur, it’s dead easy to pick out their black sheep record. The one sans Graham.
And I’ll be honest, it’s what’s turned me away from trying it out in full. I’ve heard the singles, given some of the album tracks the time of day, but never the whole course. Tasted, but never consumed. Another thing that bothers me is the context, which draws parallels to White Album-era Beatles – I think it’s fair to say Damon was concentrating more on Gorillaz, a project with seemingly endless possibilities, rather than Blur, a band whose star still shone but now no longer as brightly as the others surrounding it. Inevitably, that’s going to overshadow proceedings and shape part of the sound.
Also shaping the sound are two things – Locale and producer. We have Norman Cook onboard to handle a few tracks which is certainly a choice. And upon remembering how well a change of scenery leant itself to Blur, the band paid a visit to Morrocco which means that we’re going to have more of an African flavouring for these songs. I’m happy to welcome that, I’ll try anything once.
And lo and behold we kick off with “Ambulance” which is built upon samples and synths and African-style drumbeats. It’s a slow yet subtle funk number rounded off by some brass, which I kind of dig. “Out of Time” keeps things moving gradually, starting with (something I only discovered a couple of years ago) 60s Cybermen noises. It’s an obvious hit, wrought with emotion at the millennium men closing themselves off from each other, and breakup hangups, something which Blur are all too good at by now (See “Yuko and Hiro” and most of 13). I can’t help but note the circumstances behind Graham’s departure and these lyrics from the chorus: ‘You haven’t had the time, to open up your mind’. Calling your estranged best mate a closed-minded philistine? Bit harsh.
Now at this point we’re ten minutes in and I’m waiting for this album to truly explode. I know we won’t have Graham around to command it with one of his signature riffs but surely the other three have something in the tank for us…
“Crazy Beat”: CrAZy BeAt CrAzY bEaT YEAH! YEAH! YEAH! W-A-R-P WARP WARP
Never mind, bring on the slow stuff again please.
Is “Good Song” a good song? Eh. It’s one of those ones borne by the conflict in the Middle East. Same goes for “Moroccan Peoples Revolutionary Bowls Club”, which isn’t half bad. Has Damon got any more of these lying around at the moment? “On the Way to the Club” is a nice little deep cut though, love the idea of setting yourself up for disappointment between the lights and the drinks. Besides the strangely inviting electronic tinges knitting everything together, Alex also sneaks in a juicy bit of bass once the verses wrap up. “Caravan” is a more exotic distillation of “Country Sad Ballad Man”. And speaking of throwbacks to the self-titled LP, “We’ve Got a File on You”. Too short to write about, really.
The further we go on though the more you start to realise this is not a Blur record. It’s a Gorillaz record disguised as a Damon solo record with the Blur name stamped on it. Without Graham around to keep things traditionally rocky to some degree, Damon is essentially off the leash and free to experiment with new instruments and add some electronica into the mix with the help of Norman Cook. For example, “Brothers and Sisters” is catchy but it sounds like 2D on the mic, not Damon. “Gene by Gene”’s lyrics had to have been made up on the fly, there’s no other way to justify the words ‘Fatboy and the barn is pumping’. Surprised Del the Funky Homosapien didn’t get flown to Morrocco to round things off. And as much as I enjoyed “…Revolutionary Bowls Club”, there is a lot going on in the production that it’s easy to forget that somewhere in there are Dave and Alex too.
Ironically, the most Blur-sounding track, and in turn perhaps the one to share pole position with “Out of Time”, is the one about how they’re coming apart. “Sweet Song”. What a performance by Damon, tugging at the heart strings and daring you not to cry. “Jets” gives the band as a whole a chance to spread their wings in a…6 minute throwaway. Great. It feels like a jam session that they tinkered with for a few minutes in the studio before getting bored and dropping it in the saxophonist’s lap. Luckily, “Battery in Your Leg” sees Graham return and not a moment too soon. It’s heavy and spacy and at least closes proceedings on a high note…
“Me, White Noise”: ME WHITE NOISE ME WHITE NOISE UNDERSTAND?!
Oh f*ck off, Phil.
Think Tank strikes me as an album Blur felt compelled to make, to excise a few demons and keep the crowd onside. In turn, it may also feel like an album Blur fans are compelled to listen to out of curiosity or dedication. The only trouble is no one on either side is left feeling the better for it. I respect it more than I like it. That’s as good as it’s going to get from me.
Suede, A New Morning b-sides
So the above Blur album only has two songs on it that I would happily come back to (“Out of Time” and “Sweet Song”). The same can be said for this album I reviewed a while back, Suede’s supposed new beginning which spelled a fatal end. It flopped then, and it flopped hard for me when I listened to it. An “Obsessions” does not an album make.
Yet I read this Britpop fan mag on TikTok at the beginning of May which tried to make the case for A New Morning. I didn’t agree, obviously, but I couldn’t help but notice it painted the album’s strengths as tracks that weren’t even on the actual record. The b-sides.
One of these b-sides was “Simon”. Initially I was under the impression it would be some sort of tribute to Simon Gilbert on the drums. Then I read it was about a friend of Brett’s who took their own life. But even before that bit of perspective you can immediately tell that compared to most of the songs recorded around this time, Brett has a fire lit under his arse as he wants to do Simon’s memory justice. ‘No one believed you when you said your heart was blue’. Dear God that is a brutally regretful line. The stripped-back sound may not have paid off for the whole album but here, it does in dividends. What a start.
“Cheap” is a return to form unfortunately. It’s a song that begs for a touch of the wry in the lyrics, something Neil Hannon could have tons of fun with. Alas, Suede play it straight and with a dash of sophisti-pop for good measure. But you know what did make me laugh? The opening to “Campfire Song”. ‘I f*cking hate the countryside’. That caught me off guard, I didn’t expect it to be recorded round an actual campfire. Suede do folk. Whatever next? Just a shame they kept the mic running for another minute and a half after they finished singing, the joke had well and truly run its course by then.
“One Love” is groovy enough but sounds a bit flat, and Brett’s worn voice from around this time rears its ugly head again. It threatens the clear weather in “Colours” too but I found that one to be pleasant if inoffensive. Where the lyrics are concerned, “Superstar” sounds like top 30 fodder for 1992, not 2002. It’s easy on the ears, almost too easy given that this is Suede. I do like Brett’s performance towards the end though, he hits those high notes quite nicely.
I think by the time I reached those latter two tracks though, I was finally adjusting to the sound of A New Morning. It was Suede trying something new, hence the title suggests. Lighter, softer. Why wait for the rough and tumble? Oh never mind, here’s “Cool Thing”. I played it on the radio once, can’t remember why. It could’ve found a spot on the final playlist, mind. So could “UFO” and “Rainy Day Girl”. The former’s literal alienation (‘Does anybody feel like me?’) makes it one of the better cuts, and the latter has a welcome touch of Coming Up about it, with Alex Lee finally getting a chance to elevate a song with his keyboard work. I’ll chuck “You Belong To Me” into the mix too, we’ve gone over the same subject matter ten times over by that point but with a bit more TLC it might genuinely have been single material.
“Instant Sunshine” is a misnomer, you instantly hate it for sounding Oasis-lite and those closing la-la-las will make you cringe. “Hard Candy” was touted as a good ‘un by the fan mag when really it’s a retread of “Elephant Man” (of all things) with a lackadaisical performance from Brett. “ABC Song” is worthy only of a ‘meh’. “Love The Way You Love” is the most-2000s track I’ve heard in a minute and…oh Christ, they opened their set at Glastonbury ’03 with it?! Scratch that, they played the Pyramid Stage and decided it was the best way to get the crowd onside?! Surprised that didn’t cause a mass exodus back to the tents.
While some of them do work and are worth a glance, these b-sides carry the same stink that plagued the album they were made to accompany. Even if we chose the absolute best of the best from here, and used them to replace the worst of the worst found on A New Morning, we would still have Suede’s weakest album bar none. There’s not enough substance here to redeem this era. It’s all so dismally vanilla.
A-Side Glance 