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A SUNNY DAY IN GL ASGOW Sea When Absent Lefse Records
Eternal slaves to the overblown, embittered paean to demon alcohol, Seattle vets Murder City Devils always imbued their garage gargle with an open-armed, almost gospel-like reverence to skid row depravity. Releasing three albums at the back end of the 90s, the clawing desperation which eked through every utterance from frontman/heartbeat Spencer Moody could never be forced. So between their 2001 break-up, their 2006 reformation, and this, their first record in 14 years, Moody must have plumbed a couple of depths to be able to step out and get blood on his hands, again. Emerging from the battered yet sturdy shelter of Sub Pop, this self-released album ticks all the boxes; the creeping organ, the stomping punch-drunk plundering, the unabashed melodynamics, the bloody scrawled diatribes. In fact, there are even unlikely chinks of light creeping through in the chiming guitars and bluegrass twang of Pale Disguise or the apologetic country sway of closer Don’t Worry. But at its heart, from the opening clatter ‘n’ mulch of I Don’t Wanna Work For Scum Anymore onwards, this is a record of turgid self-reflection and self-rejection. At points it sounds tired, hopeless, gasping for air; and that’s exactly the point.
EX AMPLE Live Life Living Epic “A get-bang-on-it party album built for summer zones” – Loaded Magazine
It’s difficult to describe A Sunny Day in Glasgow’s sound without making some hackneyed reference to shoegaze, which of course invariably summons hazy visions of the early 90s. Yet considering the band’s tumultuous personal circumstances, their fourth album is one that could only exist in the 21st century. The six group members now reside across two continents and thousands of miles, from New York and Philadelphia to Sydney, with usual bandleader Ben Daniels having to remove himself from day-to-day recording duties owing to the fact he was living in Oz. Perhaps by way of compensation, for the first time the sextet have a bona fide producer at the helm in Jeff Zeigler (The War on Drugs, Kurt Vile). Zeigler has shaped the album’s disjointed, transcontinental recording process to his advantage, expertly guiding fragmented soundscapes in and out of focus. Often it sounds as though The Avalanches have finally made a new album by sampling nothing but My Bloody Valentine and M83 songs. The duelling vocals of Jen Goma and Annie Freidrickson have been brought right to the fore, floating above the dreamlike reverie of songs like Never Nothing (It’s Alright [It’s Okay]) and In Love with Useless (The Timeless Geometry in the Tradition of Passing). Elsewhere things are altogether more aggressive, dissonant, even. Be warned, while they sound sugary on the surface, ASDIG are still a complex and challenging listen. They’re also an incredibly rewarding one.
! Rachel Mann
! Davy Reed
! James F. Thompson
MURDER CIT Y DEVILS The White Ghost Has Blood On Its Hands Again Self-Released
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SIMIAN MOBILE DISCO Whorl Anti-Records
The component parts of the dark arts of dub(step) never felt so ominous than when placed in the hands of Kevin Martin. The reverb, the colossal clatter and resonance of half-time drops, the vocalists and bleak rush of The Bug's 2008 album London Zoo brought the whole project above dubstep’s parapet and into a league of its own. As the genre finds itself in the mire of moving away from the dub blueprint as a result of the collective bastardisation by EDM clowns, The Bug returns. And fucking hell it feels good. Angels & Devils splits the consciousness of the music into two distinct halves. The first six tracks are brooding, chugging bass-weight laced, smoke-inducing trips, many of which could feel like Massive Attack instrumentals. The ghostly, Burial-esque Save Me, featuring the perfectly deployed Gonjasufi, is unnerving, and Mi Lost is the closest The Bug comes to making a pop track, with a sinister vocal that smiles at you while brandishing a knife. Then the nastiness really starts. What unfolds over the next six tracks is a gnarled exploration of some of the most lyrically visceral, raw themes and sounds ever committed to record. Flowdan’s signature delivery once again takes centre stage. Fat Mac is delivered remorselessly in spoken word with lyrics like “skin graft/skin burnt/I laugh/ they learnt”, underlined by the rumbling bass fracturing and crumbling underneath. Final track Dirty is a lyrical barbwire assault, the chorus of which contains the line “Funktion One, are you dumb?”, which has the potential for true underground notoriety. Death Grips collab Fuck A Bitch is a match made in heaven, with its warbling underbelly and dubstep structure, and Fuck You with Warrior Queen feels like Poison Dart’s ruder sister. No bad thing. Angels & Devils is a bass weight masterpiece, done nastier, colder and with more style than anyone else in the genre by a country mile.
Simian Mobile Disco’s onomatopoeically-titled new album Whorl was recorded live at the Joshua Tree National Park in California, then mixed back at their studio in London; James Ford and Jas Shaw, each armed with a synthesiser and sequencer, performed the album of new instrumentals in the saloon of an old movie set. If that doesn't whet the appetite, what will? The ‘back to basics’ approach finds them moving away from the floor fillers of yesteryear. Opening with the beatless, morphing Redshift and Dandelion Spheres, the undulating sounds and textures provide the warm-up. Heavy on atmosphere, SMD are moving further away from club culture into esoteric landscapes and the transcendental. Yet most tracks delicately unfold to reveal 4/4 at their core. Particularly, Sun Dogs and Hypnick Jerk hypnotise, care of their deep laid-back beats and colliding synths, while Dervish and Nazard take us deeper into techno territory. By challenging expectation and keeping their sound fresh, Whorl is a progressive and bold gesture, making a case for SMD to be considered for a place as pioneers in their field.
! Thomas Frost
! Phillip James Allen
THE BUG Angels & Devils Ninja Tune