albums

Rip It Up, Issue 218, 1 October 1995, Page 34

albums

Elvis Costello, who knows a thing or two, regards Dusty in Memphis as one of the two greatest albums ever recorded on Atlantic (the other being Aretha Franklin’s label debut). A Very Fine Love marks Dusty’s signing to Columbia by a director who ‘wanted to bring her into the 90s’. What this, in effect, means is we get an album of slushy MOR that assumes Dusty’s fans want to hear her exquisite voice in arrangements and production tailored for Radio i. No, thankyou. After all, a few years back the Pet Shop Boys proved she could be brought triumphantly up to date with such tracks as ‘Nothing Has Been Proved’, from the movie Scandal. Ironically, two recent movie soundtracks also highlight the Memphis/Nashville contrast. While ‘Son of a Preacher Man’ lent its timeless beauty to Pulp Fiction, the current album’s saccharine duet with Daryl Hall plays during the closing credits of While You Were Sleeping. Compare those movies

for an idea of the distance between

Dusty’s recordings in the two cities. PETER THOMSON THE GERALDINE FIBBERS Lost Somewhere Between The Earth And My Home (Virgin) This is an album I knew full well would be great before I heard a note. Not because every time I’ve seen this band live they’ve been exceptional, from sweet country tinged rock shows to some very dark and intense nights. Not because their various indie vinyl releases have proven they are probably the only band since the United States of America who can actually use a violinist in a rock context without sounding hokey. The reason being, this record features the vocal talents of ex-Ethyl

Meatplow vocalist Carla Bozulich, who possesses one of the finest throats this side of Polly Jean Harvey. Bozulich can shift effortlessly from a throaty purr to a full blown howl, while the rest of the

Fibbers pace her every step of the way. A double bass and the aforementioned viola/violinist give a strangely rootsy feel to the edgy guitar squall that is kicked up, and Ms Carla does her thing to make it all near perfect. She really throws herself into this stuff, and the great moments like ‘Dragon Lady’ or ‘Lilybelle’, are almost operatic in their intensity levels. A fine, fine album here, perhaps only marred because the band didn’t include their stomping version of ‘Jolene’ — but that gives you an excuse to go buy that old fashioned 10 inch vinyl stuff. KIRK GEE MORRISSEY Southpaw Grammar (RCA) The Queen Mum of indie is here again. Same band, same voice, with a different label and different style. Southpaw is far less poppy than we were becoming used to. All the rockabilly and glam is long gone, but it seems all the great tunes and lyrics that characterised Vauxhall and I have been thrown to the bulldogs as well. The lad seems to be after a bit of rock and stroll — which is the only way you could describe ‘Do Your Best And Don’t Worry’ (as awful as its title is defeatist). The 11-minute ‘Teachers Are Afraid of the Pupils’ is a muddled joke akin to ‘November Spawned a Monster’, and ‘The Operation’ starts out with a two minute drum solo! There sure is a lot of padding on this eight track album. Two tracks glitter out of the mud: ‘Best Friend on the Payroll’, that starts out: ‘I turn the music down, but I don’t know why — this is my house!’, and the latest single. But you only need to compare the spiteful ‘Dagenham Dave’ with his last single, the sad but hopeful ‘Boxers’, to see something has grassed poor old Moz up the wrong way. Either that or he’s just focussing on the States and he thought he needed to get a bit harder, or something equally ridiculous.

Southpaw is darker, but not in the broody way that I guess he would have liked. It sounds as if someone has stolen all the light bulbs. JOHN TAITE

URGE OVERKILL Exit The Dragon (Geffen) A few heated arguments probably took place in the Geffen offices Record Company Man: “Put ‘Girl You’ll be a Woman’ on the album, you difficult bastards!” “But it’s just a dodgy old B-side made cool by Quentin Tarantino,” plead Urge. UO surprisingly beat The Man, which will mean less sales. As if they care. UO represent the new rock, the rock it’s OK to like, Teenage Fanclub and the Black Crowes live on either side. It takes a fine-tuned ear to sometimes tell the difference between these bands and AOR hell. Sometimes that fine line is crossed. Not so in the honeydripping single ‘Somebody Else’s Body’, with it’s fine, almost rockabilly, rhythm, and the lyrical skills of: ‘Education’s dead / I knew the answers / They had all the questions wrong.’ Nor is anything wrong in the Shihad versus Nirvana of ‘This Is No Place’, or the on the road ballad that is ‘The Mistake’, where Urge come close to tinglyness.

But sometimes things go wrong, and it’s like being stuck in Wairoa without tapes. The rock-by-numbers chorus of ‘Take Me’ — ‘Whoaaaa / T-t-take me / Take me back again...’ — and the horrible stadium rocker, ‘Need Some Air’, as 1000 arms punch the air. These low points are few though. The production is so rich and warm Nash Kato’s vocals sound like he’s dribbling honey straight into your ear, guitars chime, the big Aerosmith drum sound abounds — you know, all that classic stuff. The result makes Exit the Dragon unbearably listenable when you’re: A) in a good mood, or B) want to be. MITCHELL HAWKES LABRADFORD A Stable Reference (Flying Nun) Well, don’t play this if you’re hyper or happy. In fact, if you don’t feel like life is a gaping chasm of gloom, it’s probably best to just say ‘no’ to Labradford. Miserablism, that’s what it’s all about — no drums, just desolate guitars and

death croak vocals over slow-mo nuclear explosions and ambient mist (that is, ahem, keyboards). They’re one of Flying Nun’s first batch of signings outside New Zealand. Yup, the Nun is spreading her wings to include a handful of the US and UK’s weird progressive sound merchants. This is the second album from this American trio. Without going into specifics, they’re an ambi band. They’re into Can and stuff like that. Their sound makes you feel as if the walls are closing in, or like you’re stumbling around in a WWI mustard gassed trench. Needless to say, they don’t sing the ‘Happy Happy, Joy Joy’ song very often. JOHN TAITE SHAGGY Boombastic (Virgin) So, it’s two years since ‘Oh Carolina’, and the man who put the muff back into raggamuffin, the man who whipped the Polynesian clothing industry into a frenzy (they call him Mr Lava Lava, apparently), has got more raggafied hip-hop hits for us. And he still sounds like mid-dle-aged baritone who’s seen squillions of whisky mornings and ganja afternoons.

What have we got? ‘Boombastic’ doesn’t need mentioning, it’s already massive everywhere — people are even learning the dance! And you already know the fun version of ‘ln the Summertime’. ’Something Different’ has got a smooth groove, with vocalist Wayne Wonder sounding like Maxi Priest, - and Shaggy wiggling out: ‘She want a rub a dub a lover have a under cover.’ ‘Jenny’.'is a lounging lizard with a funny crooner chorus. And as if the Levis commercial wasn’t enough, he’s gone and covered the Just Juice song, ‘Day Oh’,* with an amusing explanation for some of Harry Belafonte’s ambiguous lyrics: ‘Make sure you got a girl or. a man gonna - mouth (tease) you.’

On the down side, some of Shaggy’s collaborators are a bit dodgy, namely on ‘Heartbreak Suzie’ (with Gold Mine) and ‘The Train Is Coming’ (with Ken Booth). You can’t always say he should stick to the solo stuff either, because ‘Forgive them Father’ and ‘Finger Smith’ are just monotone

ragga drones over repetitive backbeats. But Summer is just around the corner, so we’ll forgive him, because most of the time Boombastic goes ‘boom’. JOHN TAITE VARIOUS ARTISTS Disturbed (IMD) Well, here’s a journey through some of what’s happening in Dunedin at the moment. Here are 17 songs by some well-known and not so well-known faces. Chug, Jay Clarkson, Martin Phillipps and April Fools (David Kilgour et al), among others, represent some of the older stable; the likes of HDU, Suka, Cloudboy and company, some of the new. Highlights? Well, Martin Phillipps gets deranged with a Cook Island percussion group and produces the brilliant ‘Jungle Law’; HDU’s ‘Abstinence’ is mind-blowing; Kathy Bull’s ‘Starfish’ is the best pop song I’ve heard in ages; along with Sandra Bell’s crushing ‘Gilt’, Suka’s damaged epic ‘Rode with the Moths’, and Tane Griffin’s ‘Sepia Green’. Actually, there’s only two tracks here I’d classify as duds; April Fools’ ‘Under Your Face’ (David Kilgour’s not really doing much for me at present), and Graeme Downes’ ‘Front Row Centre’ (which is too over-orchestrated, too bland, to really shake things up). Nonetheless, Disturbed is a well balanced, well presented compilation, with plenty of great songs and a sexy cover layout to boot. Throughly recommended. SHAUN JURY PORTASTATIC Slow Note From A Sinking Ship (Merge) Portastatic is Mac from Super Chunk solo, aided and abetted by a few select friends on the occasional cut. A mixture of fourtrack and studio recordings, Slow Note From a Sinking Ship has an easygoing charm which recalls the Go Betweens (on ‘When You Crashed’), the 10-fi shenanigans of Guided By Voices (on ‘The Angels of Sleep’), and the pastoral side of Chris Knox. In fact, with its Casiotone keyboards and Samsonite vanity case and cardboard box rhythm tracks, there’s

more than a hint of the jandal-wear-ing one on these recordings. However the album lacks the inspired sense of melody and the lyrical twists Knox brings to the best of his work.

The undistinguished vocals ultimately count against the net result. However, with the album’s smattering of magical moments, Portastatic count as something more than just a solo folly. On ‘Pastime’, Mac asks: ‘Wasn’t that life changing for you?’ Slow Note From A Sinking Ship is unlikely to change your life, but that doesn’t mean it’s not worthwhile. MARTIN BELL

DIRTY THREE Dirty Three (Touch & Go)

There’s a ‘Saint Kilda boys make good in the big, wide world’ story here. Armed with a strange line-up (violin, guitar and drums) and some sweeping, dramatic songs, an instrumental band from Melbourne has got the US indie world listening. The musicians involved here have the capabilities of creating a truly noisy distortion-fest, which they happily do, but they can also create some very awesome soundscapes. When the Dirty Three really get moving, like on ‘lndian Love Song’ (and just about every other track here), they can best be described as finding the common ground between minimalist drone violinist Tony Conrad, Albert Ayler, on an improvisational bent, and noiseniks Big Black.

There’s a solid, visceral sound to this record, but violinist Warren Ellis is perfectly capable of taking you on a few very strange sonic trips. Dirty Three is one of those albums that really makes me wonder why anyone wants to listen to anything 10-fi. Its a bunch of great

songs, played beautifully by musicians who are willing to experiment and are capable of making those experiments work. I have a feeling they were the only thing worth seeing at Lollapalooza this year. . KIRK GEE REEF. Replenish (Sony) ' Coming at ya, straight outta Glastonbury are the youthful Reef. r’ — Ammmmbbmmt —■■ " ■■ Young, they may be, but their music is rooted in a different time, hw*-^»lM^^^'T«»w«|llCW»r"' J T“T--W«|««BU; + - -wr—a time of elves and fairies and hobgoblins and the Tommorrow People. Song after song lumbers along in a stodgy, good lovin’, good rockin’ way. The music is not a million light years from the sort of vibes peddled by American noise mechanics Kyuss, but the attitude and affected ‘Plantian’ singing are where Reef fall down. The worst excess of Zeppelinism is the appalling ‘Mellow’, which made this listener feel anything but. Luckily for Replenish, most songs are loud and pumpin’ enough to save you paying too much notice to the lyrics and vocal doo-doo. If Reef possessed a sense of humour, like those madcap sideboard cultivators Supergrass, this brand of retro might seem easier to wallow in. As it is, Reef come across as a sort of English Black Crowes, paying homage to Led Zep rather than the Stones. KEV LIST ' SWARM Forever Bled Hollow ‘ CIMD) - This here’s the long-awaited first offering by Dunedin’s Swarm; an often brutal, sometimes bizarre, but ultimately satisfying encounter in 15 parts. Recorded over the years 1993 and 1994, it’s more of

a compilation than an actual album, but don’t let that detail distract.

The live favourites — ‘Broken Spine’, ‘Migration’, ‘Disciples for the Sky’ et cetera — are of a more metallic/industrial variety, delivered in a furious manner, while the likes of ‘1853 Longspur’, a strange, Primus-esque instrumental, add an experimental element. ‘Still From the Trial’ is a more delicate piece — a simple vocal/piano arrangement, sounding almost pretty at times.

In essence, Swarm have delivered a CD that's diverse but not disjointed, strange but still likeable, and always full of suprises. SHAUN JURY

WRETCHED SKINNY Happy Jesus Teenage World (Far-Q)

It is a dark day when RipltUp music reviewer Kevin List is afraid to attempt the task of enlightening this proud country to the tempting taste sensation that is Wretched Skinny. So I, Matt, am going to attempt a Wretched Skinny review, bearing in mind that I am possessed by hellfire and slightly biased towards the land of aural carnage that WS (that’s Wretched skinny, not White Snake) inhabit. With song titles like ‘Bitch Slaughter on the Farm’ and ‘The Big Sleaze’, you know these three young men didn’t attend a good Catholic school. This is gutter hardcore, made for people with a penchant for strong ale and loud guitars. WS are not talentless hardcore morons, however. This debut tape contains enough twists and turns to break the kneecaps of even the most experienced slam dancing speed freak. The weak point among all the pounding drums, throbbing bass

and buzzsaw guitars is the vocals, which at times fail to convey all the " —• - —'ii'ubmuji nTirti i ---—i- ..t —f- ■ —i—mw" _. Ar hardcore sarcasm within the lyrics. Still, given the amount of songs WS have squeezed on here, there’s plenty to pick and choose from. The kids are a little drunk, but they’re all right MATT JOHNSTONE BONEPONY Stomp Revival (Capitol) . From Nashville, Tenessee, Bonepony are Scott Johnson, Kenny Mims and Bryan Ward, three ‘good ol’ boys' whose Capitol debut utilises a plethora of unusual sounds and instruments. These include the now fashionable mandoun (REM’s Green perhaps launching this trend), with the more obscure mandola, dulcimer, aisro, guiro, buckets and Wurutzer piano. Throw the flat-top accoustic guitar, hand-claps and foot-stomps into the mix, and the product is an engagingly southern flavoured folk record, with definite AOR appeal. ‘Where the Water's Deep’ should be the single, marred only by a slack bridge over its middleeight. It’s a common problem, recurring again on - ‘Soap’ and ‘Bleeker St’, but Bonepony’s refreshing honesty and cliche-free lyrics transcend these minor quibbles. Best ‘stomp’ record of the year, no question. MARK DONOVAN VARIOUS ARTISTS Rebirth Of Cool Phive (Mercury) While the. rest of the pack are now jumping on the jazzy bizz trying to inject new life into hip-hop, the Rebirth Of Cool team have widened their scope. Rebirth Phive would be better titled The New Wave Of Cool, because this isn’t just a jazz thing anymore.

There’s the trip-hop trinity from Bristol — Tricky, Massive Attack and Portishead (with there hard-to-find remix of ‘Karmacoma’) — doing their thing, brilliantly as always. There's the acid jazz contingent from Jheslisa and Norman Cook’s Freak Power. There are remixes that warp the originals completely: the prodigy mix of Method Man, LA Funk Mob’s jazzy mix of ‘Bug Powder Dust’, and ‘Kosmos’ by Paul Weller is whipped, beaten and obliterated by

th 6 Lynch Mob.

It’s the new wave of cool, mostly from the UK side of things, because that’s where things are finally hotting up and evolving, rather than moving sideways. But you do get the Beastie Boys, MC Solar, United Future Organisation and Kruder and Dorfmeister in there. Although the one flaw is most of the tracks are a few months old, this is a strong compilation that will dominate your summer nights. JOHN TAITE ANTISEEN Noise For The Sake Of Noise (Dog Meat) This record contains antisocial messages projected from Antiseen towards the youth of today. Antiseen play loud, dirty, outta tune punk rock (or should that be drunk rawk?). Instead of the usual cropped, bleached, skater hair, Antiseen drape themselves .in the apparel of the auto mechanic — dishevelled leather, unkempt, torn denim and steel capped boots. Not only do Antiseen hate society and use rude words,' but they look as if they do as well (pretty important).

The music on Noise for the Sake of Noise is noise for the sake of noise, in the loudest and nicest (nastiest?) way possible. Amidst the jewels that are Antiseen's originals there lurk a whole heap of raucous smelly covers of bands like the Ramones, Trashmen, Roky Erikson and the immortal Mr GG Allin. On top of all this you get 11 bonus songs, eight of which are from the LP We are Going to Eat You. To prove their heart’s in the right place, I'll leave you with some of Antiseen's wise words: ‘Keep America clean... kill a hippy.’ Go, Antiseen, go. MATT JOHNSTONE GAVIN FRIDAY Shag Tobacco (Mercury) Gavin Friday is Bono’s old mucker, whom we last heard from on the title track to In The Name Of The Father (his was the ‘ln the name of whisky / In the name of he11...’ bit). Produced by Bomb the Bass' Tim Simenon, Shag Tobacco is dripping with a snake-eye cool and the type of lounge lizard lyricism that Bryan Ferry lost long ago. His vocals have a Leonard Cohen sense of haunting

gloom about them, as they wander through the twisted, weird format of electro-cabaret. ‘Little Black Dress' is the stand out, with diving synths and baritone sax: ‘Here she comes, like a child with a gun,’ it starts, and then proceeds to blow you away.

Gavin Friday lives in a world similar to the smacked-out, Dixieland nightclub in Killing Zoe — it’s dark and seedy, permeated by weird and wonderful sounds. Maybe it's the sleaze that makes me think that. There’s sleaze aplenty, like when he breaks into sniping German on the street-walking transvestite tale, ‘Dolls’ (‘Mother-fisting friends say romance is cheap / So it’s time for Eve to put Adam to sleep’). Shag Tobacco is a brooding, late night, down the darkest streets in town. JOHN TAITE

DEMONIAC Prepare For War (Evil Omen)

‘Lay down your souls for the gods / Rock and roll metal takes hold in the deadly black hole / Riding hell’s stallions, bareback and free / Taking our chances with raw energy!' This classic line pretty damn well sums up the mighty destructive force that is Wellington’s Demoniac. It’s a crying, devil worshipping shame a band of this calibre has to look overseas for a record deal, because this dynamite ” of a CD is perhaps the best piece of metal fury that has ever crawled forth from New Zealand. The songs range from the anthemic (‘Return of Darkness and Evil’) to the nuncrushing (‘Birth of Diabolic Blood'), with enough unholy screams and atom bomb drumming to shame even the most hardened death metal fiend. This doesn’t mean Prepare for War is a typical death metal record — Odin forbid. What we have here is unholy war metal. Raise an iron clad fist, clutch a broadsword, and let forth the blood curdling cry: ‘Death to false metal!' As an afterthought, I have decided to include the band members’ names, so they can be carved into ‘rock’, to be worshipped and venerated by metal youth for all time. Prepare the fire, mighty Andramolech, Heimdall and Magus. May your raid on Heaven's gate prove successful. MATT JOHNSTONE