CORNERSHOP - 'ENGLAND IS A GARDEN'

Formats

• AMP129CD - CD

  5065001652356

• AMP129LPX - 2xLP (COLOURED)

  5065001652349

Details

**REPRESS ON CANDY COTTON COLOURED VINYL**In the latest of a series of albums that have mirrored the exceptional story of the band itself, Cornershop return with a new album ‘England Is A Garden’ on March 6th 2020 on Ample Play Records. It is an album that strides in an upbeat fashion, to deliver a full listening experience, bringing songs of experience, empire, protest and humour, steeped in the way only Tjinder Singh would come with. Listen to a first taste of the album now, ‘No Rock: Save In Roll’, that is to say that there is not one without the other, that rock, for all its focus on death is the saviour of life. The anvil here is music itself, and a celebration of Tjinder’s birth place - The Black Country, which also gave birth to heavy metal that has gone on to influence the world to dirty rock, whether the streets are lined with pylons or palm trees, the Black Country has allowed us to see things differently. So the sound here goes back to Englands’ Midlands with two thumbs up to the feeling of hearing heavy metal from the back of a stage, as we all ride on and await the female backing vocals of our song to come in.

Tracks

1. St Marie Under The Canon
2. Slingshot
3. No Rock: Save In Roll
4. Everywhere That Wog Army Roam
5. King Kongs
6. Highly Amplified
7. England Is A Garden
8. The Cash Money
9. Morning Ben
10. I'm A Wooden Soldier
11. One Uncareful Lady Owner
12. The Holy Name

Press

3 page Observer feat. 6 page Q magazine feature, **** MOJO, **** UNCUT. 5/5 Times, Metro, Sunday Times, NME, I, Telegraph, The Sun, Long Live Vinyl 6 page feat, Quietus, The Guardian, Record Collector AOM, Clash, Line of Best Fit, Loud & Quiet, Shindig 2 page feat. Louder Than War, Music OMH, Saturday Telegraph, The Independent and NME.

Audio & Video

CORNERSHOP FEAT. BUBBLEY KAUR - 'CORNERSHOP AND THE DOUBLE O GROOVE OF'

Formats

• AMP009LP - LP (COLOURED)

  5065001652394

• AMPLACD09 - CD

  5065001652035

Details

REPRESSED ON TRANSPARENT YELLOW VINYL. VERY LTD 100 COPIES UK ‘Indian Wedding Sweetmeat Celebrations’ transparent Yellow vinyl.**  Ten years on from its original release, Ample Play Records will release, the ground breaking ‘Cornershop And The Double ‘O’ Groove Of’ album by Cornershop feat. Bubbley Kaur on vinyl for the first time. The LP, pressed as a stunning limited edition of 500 copies on ‘Indian Wedding Sweetmeat Celebrations’ sticky transparent Yellow vinyl in a gatefold sleeve with poster insert, will be available via mail order direct from the group via ampleplay.co.uk and in all good independent record shops from 3rd December 2021. Cut for vinyl at optimum levels by Fluid Mastering, the same clever folk who mastered both the celebrated ‘England Is A Garden’ and ‘England Is A Garden Instrumentals’ albums. It’s a vinyl release that Rough Trade Shops have petitioned us for years to action and we’re pleased to report they consider the audio results to be “topknotch, an amazingly defined cut”. After many a time in the studio, under lab conditions Cornershop originally released the album in 2011 featuring the incredible double sugar-coated vocals of Bubbley Kaur. When Tjinder and Bubbley decided to work with each other, she had not recorded a note of music. They had met very fleetingly, years ago at a cellar gathering in Preston Lancashire, where Tjinder & Benedict studied. So it was much surprise when a taxi driver friend introduced him to a lady that liked singing, worked in a local launderette, and was the same lady he had met in a northern cellar bar. They then met a good many times at Tjinder’s house where they would listen to and discuss traditional Punjabi Folk Music, and slowly Bubbley came out writing her own original lyrics, which were set to a varied range of modern musics. ‘Natch’ was the first song she recorded, followed by ‘Topknot,’ and together they became the first double ‘A’ single on Rough Trade Records. The complete recordings were made in their own good time. Tjinder explains “There was no need to quickly put the album out, but there was a need to make it top rank and evergreen, especially as I have wanted to do an album like this for 20 years.” Benedict & Tjinder set up their own label, Ample Play in 2009 to release the highly acclaimed album ‘Judy Sucks A Lemon For Breakfast.’ The way Tjinder & Bubbley met was like a hindi movie script, and the outcome of the music is like an Asian version of The Kids From Fame – totally upbeat, giving rise to new ways of expressing yourself. Full Album Tracklisting on the next page:

Tracks

1 United Provinces Of India Full fat funk melds with the cream of Punjabi Folk, asking the question, why has such naturalness never been done before?

2 Topknot ?The band's now-classic 2004 single Topknot,? Spin magazine. A massive track for urban stations, turban stations, clubs as well as Indian weddings. So big that M.I.A. asked to do a rap on it.

3 The 911 Curry The A-team meet up for an afternoon meal ? a plan comes together, until Murdock has to flirt with country mouse.

4 Natch The other part of the double ?A? sided Topknot single, and often even more loved by the DJ for its simplicity and French Legion immediacy.

5 Double Decker Eyelashes Already being used by select USA bass clubs to get the party started, keep the party going, and ending the party. Being laidback & having the space is leading dancefloorers to improvise, and they take great joy in having the ability and scope to do it once more.

6 The Biro Pen A sharp pen in its day was prime currency, guaranteed to get you out of any tight spot. This lament lays it down heavy, even with its drum solo reprieve.

7 Supercomputed Kraftwerk meet Irene Cara in a dune buggie.

8 Once There Was A Wintertime Capturing the snow drenched wintry season with human warmth and Northern Brass.

9 Double Digit Military again, until its slow build boils over with bass funk, as if the Brontë sisters came from an Indian cowshed. This is maybe why Tjinder thinks Punjabi Folk Music was the first form of Hip-Hop, and has written a White Paper Report on it.

10 Don't Shake It Don?t play this one too loud, it will stay in your head for a week, and then move in with you after another week. All is well that ends well. So well that it has extended beats, ending an album that intends to live forever ? fame.

Press

'A genuinely beautiful take on Punjabi Folk Music' - The Observer

'Whatever sound they create, it's classic and it's Cornershop' - John Peel

Audio & Video

NILS FRAHM - 'DAY'

Formats

• LTR036 - LP

  4066004674636

Details

REPRESS ALERT 200 COPIES ONLY Nils Frahm has unexpectedly confirmed details of a new collection of solo piano music, his first album since 2022’s three-hour Music For Animals. Day will be released by LEITER on March 1st, 2024, and it will be available on limited edition vinyl as well as via all digital platforms. Recorded in the summer of 2022 in complete solitude and away from his studio at Berlin’s famed Funkhaus complex, it is preceded by a single, ‘Butter Notes’, out on January 19. Day may come as a surprise to those who, over the last decade, have watched Frahm shift slowly away from the piano compositions with which he first made his name in favour of a nonetheless still-distinctive approach that’s considerably more instrumentally complex and intricately arranged. In addition, in 2021, having spent the early part of the pandemic arranging his archives, he released the 80 minute, 23-track Old Friends New Friends, a compilation of previously unreleased piano music intended to enable him to ”start over” with a clean slate. Judging from the extended, ambient nature of Music For Animals, it proved a successful gambit, but Frahm has never been able to resist returning to his first love, and those who enjoyed earlier acclaimed albums like The Bells, Felt and Screws will once again revel in Day’s familiar, personal style. Day, which contains six tracks, three over the six-minute mark, is the first in a pair of albums Frahm has lined up for 2024. In keeping with their nature, however, he won’t be making a song and dance about the release. Instead, he’ll resume his ongoing world tour, which has already included fifteen sold-out dates at Berlin’s Funkhaus as well as a show at Athen’s Acropolis. It will continue with shows all over the world, among them several sold-out dates at London’s Barbican in July 2024, where he previously curated a weekend of music, film and art, Possibly Colliding, in 2016. The album is best enjoyed in the manner in which it was recorded, in the intimacy of a peaceful, cosy room. There are muffled pedal creaks on the cyclical, quietly jazzy ‘You Name It’ and, during the palliative ripples of ‘Butter Notes’’ arpeggios, the sound of dogs barking in the streets outside. The compassionate, hesitant ‘Tuesdays’ and emotionally ambiguous ‘Towards Zero’ linger with the poignant persistence of Harold Budd’s earliest work, while ‘Hands On’ is a sometimes brighter, airier tune that sets its own, deliberate pace, and, as he has on occasions before, ‘Changes’ sees Frahm employing elements of his instrument’s construction in a ‘prepared piano’ fashion. Characterised by its confidential mood, Day confirms that, while Frahm is arguably now best known for elaborate, celebratory concerts calling upon an arsenal of pianos, organs, keyboards, synths, even a glass harmonica, he’s still a prolific master of affecting simplicity, tenderness and romance.

Tracks

1. YOU NAME IT
2. TUESDAYS
3. BUTTER NOTES
4. HANDS ON
5. CHANGES
6. TOWARDS ZERO

Press

Audio & Video

EZRA FEINBERG - 'SOFT POWER'

Formats

• TU006LP - LP

  4251804182645

Details

*REPRESS ON BLACK VINYL* Ezra Feinberg’s third album Soft Power sees the composer-guitarist enlist an impressive array of fellow musicians including Mary Lattimore, David Moore (Bing & Ruth), Jefre Cantu-Ledesma, Robbie Lee and share the life affirming lead single ‘Future Sand’. Defined by its abundance of melodies, repeating figures and ecstatic improvisations, Soft Power exudes an enlightened and transformative spirit to empower the listener. Feinberg, a practising psychoanalyst and former founding member of the San Francisco psychedelic collective Citay (Dead Oceans / Important Records) resides in the artistic enclave of upstate New York's Hudson River valley. Initial recordings emerged in the late summer of 2020, before added synthesis with collaborator John Thayer (Arp, Sunwatchers) during early 2021. Soft Power follows previous albums ‘Recumbent Speech’ (2020) and ‘Pentimento and Others’ (2018) The compassionate, tender-hearted opener ‘Future Sand’ deftly interweaves flutes and steady arpeggios. The Reichian pulse beneath the soaring melody is played not on the customary analogue sequencer, but on finger-picked acoustic guitar, one of the lodestars of Feinberg’s compositional approach. ‘Soft Power’, the buoyant and mesmeric title track that follows builds over a rich bed of guitars and a reverb-y Rhodes melody reminiscent of a Strata East LP, its narrative arc bountiful in energy, optimism and future dreaming, a perfect accompaniment to long days of summertide. “The most unexpected, unpredictable, and spontaneous moments in life live in the realm of softness”, quotes Feinberg. ‘Pose Beams’ blends the chamber-jazz approach of Penguin Café Orchestra with a balletic kosmische, climaxing with a galvanising crescendo and “free improv” section performed by fellow New Yorkers - Robbie Lee (piano) and Jefre Cantu-Ledesma, whose granular and modular synths sprinkle particle dust over the expressive drumming of John Thayer. ‘Flutter Intensity’ evokes in part the music of Cluster as played on acoustic guitars, which ping-pong across the stereo field, providing the canvas for a plaintive vibraphone line reminiscent of TNT-era Tortoise. Instruments move in tandem, but also drift and glide allowing them the space to hang in the air, the variegated rhythms, textures, and tones all laced into the fabric of the album. At the centrefold of the albums 7-tracks is ‘The Big Clock’, a tryptic piece that evolves from pairs of stretched varying tones, creating fields of technicolour over an unabashed motorik beat, serving to offset the pastoral and ambient registers heard elsewhere. It features the first of two appearances from David Moore (Bing & Ruth) who plays lilting piano lines on the come-down. ‘There Was Somebody There’ returns to the album’s earlier wistfulness, a hard stereo-panned soundworld with lightly strummed, interlocking acoustic guitars combining to pigment a washy, painterly scene. David Moore and Jefre Cantu-Ledesma provide reviving synths, the underlying pulse that seems to simulate a life cycle; another day on Earth. The album closes with the reflective ‘Get Some Rest’ featuring Mary Lattimore, whose harp pluckings set a dreamlike tone against bare organic acoustics and flourishing flutes to create a sense of realignment and restoration. Feinberg artfully transcends the listener to an enriched place, his compositions distinguished by the deep humanity that lies at their core, plugging the listener into a state of wide eyed being, open and alive. Soft Power then is Ezra’s own mantra but also one of power giving - a colourful catharsis translated into music. Feinberg’s music always speaks to the listener, but Soft Power, in whispering, speaks loudest.

Tracks

A1. Future Sand / A2. Soft Power / A3. Pose Beams / A4. Flutter Intensity / B1. The Big Clock / B2. There Was Somebody There / B3. Get Some Rest

Press

'Album of the year - DJ Deb Grant BBC6 Music' | Gently propulsive gems that evoke the kosmische sounds of Michael Rother, Brian Eno at his most sublime - Aquarium Drunkard
| #38 CRACK MAGAZINE'S AOTY 2024

Audio & Video

TRISTWCH Y FENYWOD - 'TRISTWCH Y FENYWOD'

Formats

• LSSN096 - LP

  5061041820526

• LSSN096CD - CD

  5061041820779

Details

Singing black-lit liturgies of bog bodies caked in mud, entranced by nocturnal landscapes flickering in the moon-glow and powered by queer enchantment, Tristwch y Fenywod are a Welsh-language gothic avant-rock power-coven. Exhumed from the depths of Leeds’ experimental underground, the trio consist of Gwretsien Ferch Lisbeth (Guttersnipe, The Ephemeron Loop), Leila Lygad (Hawthonn) and Sidni Sarffwraig (Slaylor Moon, The Courtneys). Stark, striking and bewitching, Tristwch y Fenywod’s self-titled album is their debut studio recording, following just 10 gigs and a live demo. Formed in 2022, Tristwch y Fenywod ("The Sadness of Women”) record exclusively in the Welsh language, conjuring an eldritch, subterranean, alien folk music played on dual zither, electronic drums and bass guitar. With towering, siren-like vocals curling around the Welsh consonants, accompanied by stark, martial rhythms and swirling claw-plucked strings, Tristwch y Fenywod feels like an early 4AD recording dredged from the waters of an Anglesey swamp. The effect is simultaneously chilling and stirring. The eight tracks on the record constitute what feels like a recently rediscovered, unholy grail of edgy, atmospheric, occult feminist goth emissions. Gwretsien’s dual-zither playing scatters melodic fragments and spirals of harmony around the decimated space opened up by the lugubrious bass playing and pounding, brooding drum pads. Coupled with the Welsh vocal, Tristwch y Fenywod embody a new, unique Celtic darkwave sound, equal parts Pornography-era The Cure, Svitlana Nianio’s haunted hammered string-work and the dark beauty of Dead Can Dance or This Mortal Coil. Opener Blodyn Gwyrdd feels like the last ride of Princess Ukok, with lumbering bass and 6/8 rhythms in procession to the event horizon with an entreating, impassioned vocal and surprising lyrical theme. The doomed dancing of the zither provides the mysterious melodic bedrock throughout the album, particularly on Ferch Gyda’r Llygaid Du’s heavy funereal sway and the slowly building, paroxysmal banshee breakdown of Awen: an astonishing swell of thrilling chaos. The album was recorded and produced by Ross Halden and the band at Hohm Studio, Bradford, Summer 2023.

Tracks

1. Blodyn Gwynedd
2. Ferch Gyda?r Llygaid Du
3. Y Trawsnewidiad
4. Llwydwyrdd
5. Byd Mewn Cysgod
6. Gelain G?rs
7. Awen
8. ?Nes I Ddawnsio Efo?r Lleuad

Press

#2 THE QUIETUS' AOTY 2024 |
#46 CRACK MAGAZINE'S AOTY 2024

Audio & Video

SONIC YOUTH - 'HOLD THAT TIGER'

Formats

• SV212CD - CD

  850051035038

• SV212LP - 2xLPs

  850051035007

• SV212 - 2xLP (COLOURED)

  850051035021

Details

In October 1987, four months after the release of their critically acclaimed Sister LP, Sonic Youth showcased their latest work in a blistering set at Cabaret Metro, Chicago. The concert was introduced by Big Black’s Steve Albini (who at the time was banned from the venue) and subsequently released as a semi-official bootleg under the title Hold That Tiger on writer/provocateur Byron Coley’s impishly Geffen-baiting label Goofin’ (years later the band would use this nom de guerre for their own imprint). Hold That Tiger’s sterling reputation among the Sonic Youth faithful is well deserved. In fact, it isn’t a stretch to suggest that the album is to the first handful of SY releases what It’s Alive is to the first three Ramones LPs—a feral and liberatory public snapshot of a band’s blossoming imperial phase. Indeed, HTT is the sound of a group at the peak of their powers, presenting new songs alongside a handful of older ones with the kind of wild, cathartic enthusiasm common to rock ’n’ roll’s most revered live albums. Taking nothing away from Sister—inarguably one of indie rock’s f irst true masterpieces—it is reasonable that many fans prefer the live versions heard on Hold That Tiger to their studio counterparts. On HTT, Sonic Youth is a spiky, pummeling and confident force, alternately mammoth and meditative. Sister and its predecessor EVOL notably added an airy, dreamlike reverie to the band’s turbulent doom-lurch, a stylistic evolution that seems to crystallize on HTT. Throughout, Kim Gordon’s sinewy, sumptuous bass and Steve Shelley’s propulsive, tom-heavy percussion provide the bedrock groove for Thurston Moore and Lee Ranaldo’s ferocious barrages of noise-guitar crunch. By 1987, the band was confidently articulating their dual lexicon of punk-noir dissonance and supernal, psychedelic sonic calligraphy—bending their jagged, streetwise gnarl into balloon animals of dazzling and beautiful songs. This collision of splendor and chaos would become a hallmark of the group’s singular alchemy as well as provide a blueprint for the post-SST American underground they would help invent and ultimately nurture. Hold That Tiger’s encore—four songs by the band’s beloved Ramones, which Thurston would later astutely compare to “the perfect pudding after a hearty meal”—serves as a reminder that, like any true punks, Sonic Youth never could resist a good, rousing anthem to send the kids home with their ears ringing, their hearts hot-wired. This first-time reissue comes with gatefold jacket. Mastered by Bob Weston from the orginal tapes. Recorded by Aadam Jacobs. Audio repair/editing by Aaron Mullan.

Tracks

1. Intro 2. Schizophrenia 3. Tom Violence 4. White Kross 5. Kotton Krown
6. Stereo Sanctity 7. Brother James 8. Pipeline/Kill Time 9. (I Got A) Catholic Block 10. Tuff Gnarl 11. Death Valley ?69 12. Beauty Lies In The Eye
13. Expressway To Yr. Skull 14. Pacific Coast Highway 15. Loudmouth
16. I Don?t Wanna Walk Around With You 17. Today Your Love, Tomorrow The World
18. Beat On The Brat

Press

Classic live album by Sonic Youth from 1987 Sister tour

Originally released in 1991 on Goofin?
Features encore of four Ramones covers
First-time reissue with speed-corrected master
Liner notes by Thurston Moore and Aaron Mullan

Audio & Video

JAD FAIR AND SAMUEL LOCKE WARD - 'PURE CANDY'

Formats

• SHR218 - LP

  657628449911

Details

Samuel Locke Ward and Jad Fair are two of the most prolific musicians working today. Fair is a founding member of the band Half Japanese, and has released over 200 albums, including albums with Yo La Tengo, Daniel Johnston, Moe Tucker, Kramer, Teenage Fanclub, The Pastels, R. Stevie Moore, DQE, Tenniscoats, The Tinklers, Naomi Ishimaru, Jason Willett, Mosquito, and Strobe Talbot. Samuel Locke Ward has released over sixty solo albums as well as a myriad of collaborations with Bob Bucko Jr, Miracles Of God, SLW cc Watt (with Mike Watt) and the cult new age noise group Boundless Relaxation (with Joe Jack Talcum and The Bassturd). He is a cartoonist for Little Village magazine and like Jad Fair, his style musically and visually is wholly his own Pure Candy is the pair’s third album together following 2023’s Happy Hearts and Destroy All Monsters, both issued by Kill Rock Stars. Pure Candy is an album of love songs and is the feel good album of the Summer, Winter, Spring and Fall. The music was composed and performed by Ward who’s love of pop music and avant stylings offer seventeen unexpected turns over the course of a three minute song. The vocals and lyrics are by Fair, lyrics overflowing with words of love, joy, happiness, tenderness, hope and inspiration. Uplifting words for a time dearly in need of some upliftings. As with the previous two albums by Fair and Ward, this album was mixed and mastered by Jonathan Hansen and is being co-released on LP by Shrimper Records (who last worked with Fair on his collaborative three cassette box set Wonderful World) and Chicago’s Stationary (Hearts) Recordings.

Tracks

1. This Love Of Ours
2. Back On Top 3. I Have A Feeling
4. Geniuses Of Love 5. A Powerful Heart
6. A Better Day 7. That Is That
8. A Time For Love 9. Lucky Ones
10. The Love Bee 11. Right All Wrong
12. The Good Stuff 13. Oh Gee
14. Wonderful 15. Angel You
16. Let?s Talk 17. My Poem
18. The Prettiest

Press

Audio & Video

BHAJAN BHOY - 'BHOY ON THE WIRE'

Formats

• CFUL0322 - LP

Details

Ajay Saggar is BHAJAN BHOY. "With BHAJAN BHOY, Saggar synthesizes all of the stylistic approaches he’s explored over the years, swirling them into an intoxicating musical blend, with an earthy spirituality. Even the project’s name reflects the dual aspects of Saggar’s upbringing coming together in harmony. In Hindi, a “bhajan” is a devotional song, sung in the mandir, or temple, while “bhoy” is a Scottish and Irish derivation for a young man. There’s a searching quality to Bhajan Bhoy, as if Saggar is still hunting for transcendence with each track, whether through an expansive drone, an orchestral facility on the piano, or an electronics-augmented raga that threatens to dip into noise” (Erick Bradshaw / writer and WFMU DJ). This album presents a rich and varied set of compositions that showcase Saggar’s skills as an incredibly talented and accomplished composer and musician. With each and every Bhajan Bhoy LP, you are are carried to a higher place. With ‘Bhoy On The Wire’, the 35 minutes laid out unfolds like a cosmic tapestry, an extraordinary exploration that shimmers and reverberates with newfound vibrancy. The songs were broadcast as part of a session on Steve Barker’s “On The Wire” radio show in April 2024. They were a gift to Steve and his team for 40 years of broadcasting. “On The Wire” is simply the greatest radio show in the world. As Ajay explains in his own words : “In September 1984, I started a degree course at the University of Lancaster. On a wet and soggy Sunday afternoon towards the end of September, I sat in my room staring out at the grey Lancashire landscape, and decided to alleviate the boredom by seeing if there was anything to listen to on the radio. Most of the stations I tuned into were as dull as the weather outside. However, as I neared the end of the FM dial (and was about to give up hope), I chanced upon a station where I was taken by the music being played. That show was “On The Wire”, introduced by Steve Barker. From there on in, every Sunday, between 2-5pm, I tuned into Radio Lancashire to listen. Steve’s shows had an incredible and wide reaching selection of music and genres, that thrilled your ears and left you wanting more. Tied to that, his deep knowledge of the material he played helped the listener dig into the sounds even more, and also left you in admiration of this trait. In 1985, I started putting on DIY shows in Lancaster (inviting the likes of Bog-Shed, bIG fLAME, The Membranes, The Wedding Present, etc etc) and Steve was kind enough to mention the shows on-air, which helped in getting people from different parts of the county to come to the shows. At the tail-end of 1985, he invited me to the studio to come and hang out. When in 1988, the group I was in, Dandelion Adventure, released our first (demo) cassette, it was Steve, who not only played tracks off it, but invited the group to the studio for an interview. Now if you’re a young band, that is a massive thrill! And in 1990, when Dandelion Adventure did a John Peel session, I actually used “On The Wire” jingles (that Steve had put on a cassette and given to me a few years before) on the track “All the World’s A Lounge”. Since then, the show has been a mainstay for me, and so many others around the world, to get turned onto incredible sounds from around the world. And over the course of 40 years, Steve has always supported my music. These six tracks are a 40th birthday gift to the “On The Wire” team (Steve, Michael “Fenny” Fenton (an absolutely critical part of the show), and Jim Ingham (engineer who keeps the technical side of things going)) for sharing so much amazing music, and making the world a better place. They were originally broadcast as an exclusive session in April 2024 on “On The Wire", and are here for your listening pleasure. Music like shower”. Artwork by Jake Blanchard

Tracks

1) The Milkman (Blackburn)
2) Campus Blues (Lancaster)
3) Castle Bandstand (Clitheroe)
SIDE B
1) What Lurks Behind Those Illuminations? (Blackpool)
2) Pass The Sushi Pon The Lef? Hand Side (Burnley)
3) Caribbean Club (Preston

Press

Audio & Video

BILL ORCUTT - 'ODDS AGAINST TOMORROW'

Formats

• PAL056 - LP

  843563119617

Details

"After two LPs and over half a decade spent toiling in the margins of the American Songbook, Bill Orcutt returns to original composition and the blues with his latest LP, Odds Against Tomorrow. Taking its title from Robert Wise’s 1959 film noir, Odds Against Tomorrow retrofits familiar folk/blues forms to the unique sound of Orcutt’s guitar and the result crackles with a freshness and authority that nostalgic retreads cannot deliver. Odds Against Tomorrow is more than an expansion of the territory charted by Bill Orcutt, his eponymous 2017 studio electric debut, although it’s certainly that. With its nods to existing musics, half- step fluctuations, and near-songwriterly manipulations of tension/release, Odds Against Tomorrow is a rock record — almost. Clearly and simply recorded through a clattering Fender Twin in Orcutt’s living room and lovingly mixed by Bay Area neighbor and pedal-steel savant Chuck Johnson, no one would mistake it for any era’s radio fodder, yet the precision of its technique and the swaying Child-ballad logic of its gentler improvisations comfortably seats it between John Mayall and Richard Thompson in your Ikea Kallax. Three songs (“Odds Against Tomorrow,” “The Writhing Jar,” “Already Old”) are multi-tracked, an innovation that, for guitar buffs familiar with Orcutt’s stripped-down vernacular, jumps out of the grooves like a Les Paul sound-on-sound excursion in 1948, or a Jandek blues rave-up in 1987. Specifically evoking John Lee Hooker’s double-track experiments on 1952’s “Walking the Boogie,” the steady chord vamps of “Odds Against Tomorrow” and “Already Old” form a harmonic turf on which Orcutt solos with lyrical abandon — and while his playing has always earned begrudging respect from any hardened shredders willing to pluck the foam out of their ear canals, even the most strident neck- strangler will steam over his lubricated runs. For the more “contemporary-minded,” “The Writhing Jar”’s crashing overdubs recall the brassy six-string voicings of This Heat or Illitch. With the exception of the unreconstructed Elmore James-isms of “Stray Dog” and the “Layla”-finale-like haze of “All Your Buried Corpses Begin To Speak,” the remaining non-overdubbed tracks dovetail snugly with Orcutt’s previous solo output, reeling gently in a Mazzacane-oid mode (“The Sun and its Horizon,” “The Conversion Experience,” “Judith Reconsidered,” “Man Dies”) or vibing up the standards (“Moon River”). On their own, these tracks would still be an important contribution to Orcutt’s canon. As part of Odds Against Tomorrow’s greater whole, they provide a through line, connecting the idiosyncrasies of Orcutt’s past explorations with the scrambled tropes of his present work. Odds Against Tomorrow challenges contemporary solo guitar practice in a way that simultaneously nullifies hazy dreams of folk purity and establishes a new high-water mark for blues-rock reconstruction. Put simply, in our current era of mannered revisionism, it is a joy to listen to." — TOM CARTER 

Tracks

Press

Audio & Video