Artrocker Magazine’s Single Reviews for the week commencing May 31st

Fiction
Curiosity
(Offset Recordings)

You've accidentally murdered your flatmate's cat. Do you (a) pretend you thought it was a giant furry woodlouse? (b) wear its corpse as a scarf and smile like a Studio 54 model? or (c) stand there gibbering "it's not my fault" while pee dribbles down your strangely guilty-looking leg?
For Fiction, a new London band who've based their debut single around such an incident, the answer appears to be (c). I've cunningly deducted this from lines such as "Who killed the cat?" and "It's not my fault" - lyrics which may seem trivial to MI5 detectives, but are all too obvious to music journalists who have too much time on their pitiful, CD analysing hands. Such as myself. Sob.
To the song then, and 'Curiosity' is a sparse but addictive debut for Fiction, who've already generated what you might call a "buzz" in the clubs without any help from PR companies, record labels or mysterious Swiss businessmen. Bands out there might well be thinking; "then how? How? HOW DID THEY DO IT?" and the answer is pretty simple: Fiction blend humour with tunes, ice-cold cool and some sort of zing which hasn't exactly had a language invented for it yet. Did you hear that, Unsigned Guide 2011?!
As you might expect, Offset Recordings are aligned with Offset The Holy Godness of Festivals (to give them their full, unofficial title) and they're not about to feed you any old marketed crap. Fiction are hip enough to zap your mind, but not so hip they'll give you a case of Shoreditch Twat-zania. And for that I think we can all be grateful.
Ric Rawlins


1,2,3
Going Away Party
(Chess Club)

It doesn’t take much for a leaving party to turn sour. Inevitably someone has a little too much to drink and ends up either sobbing uncontrollably, or doing something thoroughly regrettable with someone they shouldn’t have.
Thankfully, Pittsburgh duo 1, 2, 3 have come up with a way to avoid such situations: they’ve produced a track that’s guaranteed to keep you firmly rooted to the dance floor with a sizeable, Cheshire Cat grin on your face.
After a brief flutter of J-Pop guitars and one of the single wonkiest bass lines known to man, ‘Going Away Party’ settles in to an all-out astro-funk groove that meanders lazily through three-and-a-half minutes. Tingly percussion, wandering vocals and a spaced-out guitar line follow, before the middle eight goes all Club Tropicana on your eardrums. What more could you want from a single?
Rory Carroll


A Place To Bury Strangers
Ego Death
(Mute Records)

There are various theories regarding how you can experience ego death. Some people recommend eating hallucinogenic plants, others suggest transcendental meditation, while many more of us undergo a type of ego death every day while watching Over The Rainbow.
For A Place To Bury Strangers, the answer is simple: turn up the distortion until your brain melts. Easy! As you'd expect from the New York noise rockers, this single pulsates with reverb, oozes cool, and reaches the kind of climax last seen when the Ghostbusters crossed the streams in '85.
Ric Rawlins


Glass Diamond
Chase After Myself
(Glasstone Records)

If you’re a certain age, you should remember the arcade shoot ‘em up, House of the Dead 2. If you do, you’ll also remember the flying demon who sounded as if he’d huffed the contents of every helium cylinder the world has ever produced. Still with us? Excellent.
Well, now imagine that ‘thing’ singing in that voice while a thumping electro beat plays out in the background and you’ve basically got the first building blocks of ‘Chase After Myself’.
Distracting vocal aside, this is the sort of track that will have you questioning whether or not it’s awful before you inevitably decide that, actually, it’s quite cool. Not conventionally cool, mind: it’s that special East London brand of cool that may require you to have an asymmetric haircut to fully appreciate it on the first listen.
Rory Carroll


Don’t Wait Animate
6174
(Barhouse Records)

Apparently standard bearers for that most Shoreditch of musical genre collisions -  ‘strumstep’ – Don’t Wait Animate certainly know their way around a jerky guitar line. However, they don’t convince me that they can cut it with Benga or Herve in the wobbly bass department.
‘6174’ claims to be a “real credit crunch anthem” and the repeated refrain of “It can only get worse, before it gets better” makes you wonder if the young scoundrels got their grubby little mits on David Cameron’s speech transcripts.
The spaghetti western-twang of the guitar intro lends an air of drama to proceedings but for all the lip service paid to dubstep and underground sensibilities, b-side ‘Atlas Moans’ in particular does a good job of finding the middle ground between Foals and early Bloc Party.
Lewis Hingston


Dead Confederate
Start Me Laughing
(Kartel)

Just as I was about to scribble phrases like "massive tragedy" and "unbearable pain" all over this review, I happened to catch sight of the press notes; "It's supposed to be a happy song!" grins singer Hardy Morris.
Well Morris, you are either a weird individual or a terrible fibber. 'Start Me Laughing' does at least self harm in a melodic kind of way though, with cathartic monkeyman screeches, guitar strings pulled to snapping point and enough spit to wipe away your self loathing for... ooo, at least a good hour (looks nervously at watch).
Ric Rawlins


The Woe Betides
Sylvia
(Songs In The Dark)

Anyone walking up Camden’s Parkway while these guys were gracing the stage/three feet of backroom floor space of The Spread Eagle during May’s Camden Crawl could be forgiven for thinking they were witnessing Weezer in full flow, and promptly destroying their sweater.
‘Sylvia’ sounds like prime Rivers Cuomo output and would fit nicely onto ‘The Blue Album’, due to the interplay between the heavy grunge fuzz of the guitars, gnarled bass and sweet, little-boy lost vocals.
The chorus repeats “Sylvia, you’re a terrible person but I’ll never love anyone else” and promptly embeds itself within your psyche before the backing vocals pop up and reaffirm the pitch-perfect catchiness of the song. Originality may not be The Woe Betides’ bag, but there’s no denying their formula has come up trumps here.
Lewis Hingston


Chapel Club
Five Trees
(A&M Records)

At heart, this is a simple indie pop song, owing a wee bit to The Smiths. But rather like Tony Stark in Iron Man, it's had its limbs welded to ultra-futuristic body armour... it's muscles boosted by nuclear fuel... and perhaps more realistically, it's atmosphere propelled skywards by a few decent pedals and a top producer. Nonetheless, this is the sound of Chapel Club mutating into something bigger, and it sounds OK!
Ric Rawlins


Jacob Yates and the Pearly Gate Lock Pickers
When You Left Me/ You Started At The Bottom
(Lucky Number Nine Records) 

This bunch are currently one of the hottest live acts around the Glasgow circuit, and this debut release highlights two very different sides to the band.  
Opening track ‘When You Left Me’ is described as a “Seven minute Doom Wop epic” (wish I’d thought that one up) and is a portrayal of the night singer Yates’ father died. His voice is really emotive as it woozily drapes over the keyboards and given the subject matter, it’s no surprise that the delivery is so melancholic at the outset.
In stark contrast, ‘You Started At The Bottom’ is half the length and twice the speed of the preceding track. It features some outrageous Glasgow Rock ‘n’ Roll teleported from the Fifties dance-halls and replete with the colourful language and humour of the city.
Colin Jackson


Active Child
Curtis Lane EP
(Merok)

Active child is an intellectual young musician from LA otherwise known as Pat Grossi. He produces undisturbed music that feels like it has never been touched by human kind.
This EP makes for a spiritually peaceful listen, spiraling into tranquillity with no end in sight. There's no better way to describe Grossi's sound than angelic: the vocals have been twisted with sensuality, with an touch of darkness caging in on the periphery. Beautiful.
Holly Eels


Stornoway
Zorbing

(4AD)

Sounding something like Fleet Foxes, ‘Zorbing’ tells a silly and pleasingly surreal little story that is very nearly ruined by inane and lazy lyrics. They have that odd, disjointed quality that typifies a ten year old’s school work.
It’s mostly the choruses that are unforgivable, featuring crackers such as “so electrifying / I feel I’m flying". But the harmonies are nice, and a brass section is almost always appreciated, and works rather well here.
I get the feeling that were I listening to Stornoway play an afternoon slot at a festival, I would thoroughly enjoy it – and the lyrics would become an irrelevance. Alas, they are all too prominent in this context. One to save for the sunshine, I think.
Shan Vahidy


Oh No Ono
Internet Warrior
(The Leaf Label)

Oh No Ono’s first album was terrible, fact-fans. Reports indicate that their second is a marked improvement, seeing them suddenly shed the embarrassing cliches of before and embracing a rich new musical well from which to draw. ‘Internet Warrior’ makes one inclined to totally agree with said reports, for it is a bracing, effortless rush of ballsy shoegaze pop that somehow manages to shoehorn in some janglepop references and the odd soaring string part.
It’s not usual for a band to be able to balance so many music disparities this easily, and in this case it’s even more incredible. So much so that it wouldn’t be out of the question to assume that this is, in fact, not by Oh No Ono at all, and they’ve been killed and had their identities stolen by a much better band. Either way, it’s an entertaining old situation.
Daniel Ross


The Tumbledryer Babies
Tell Me What Do
(Self-released)

The heartbreak of literate, Thames Estuary-dwelling folk has always been a popular draw in the alternative world (see Darren Hayman for further details), but few artists manage to dash it off quite so innocently, or by making it sound like ‘Grease’ could have happened in Southend.
Nor do others often court the affections of the American underground in the process, but The Tumbledryer Babies have somehow managed to get Kramer of The Butthole Surfers to lend some serious echo to the final mix, and it’s all the better for it.
The Ivor Cutler-esque lyrics even speak of banging one’s needy head against a wall of sound, the cheek of the reference ably balanced by the innate correctness of the song itself. Unabashedly low-key, brilliantly realised and strangely moving all at once.
Daniel Ross


The Magic Numbers
The Pulse
(Heavenly)

The Magic Numbers – is it still OK to like them? Are they a bit wimpy? Perchance a bit too chirpy and lovestruck? Can you trust a band that is always in love (at least in their singles)?
Well, the credentials of their new material certainly suggest that something of a renaissance is about to occur – they’re still lovestruck and poppy, but they’ve been fortunate enough to get the last ever string arrangements out of (Nick Drake arranger) Robert Kirby before he died in October last year.
Indeed, Drake’s solemnity seems to haunt this first single from their third LP, even though it is at times lush and fully harmonised. It’s not often that the general public would hear The Magic Numbers like this and, thankfully, they’ve haven’t ballsed it up by being overly saccharine. No, they’ve matured, and rather nicely at that. So, until we hear anything different, it’s probably OK to carry on liking The Magic Numbers for now.
Daniel Ross