The usual disclaimers apply: we can't pretend to have heard every single new album released in the UK between January 1 and December 31 of 2009, but of those we did, these were the best, and in this precise order.
1. SILENCE IS WILD - FRIDA HYVONEN 2. Fever Ray - Fever Ray 3. Bitte Orca - Dirty Projectors 4. I Had The Blues But I Shook Them Loose - Bombay Bicycle Club 5. Thunderheist - Thunderheist 6. Veckatimest - Grizzly Bear 7. The xx - The xx 8. Union - The Boxer Rebellion 9. Bird-Brains - Tune-Yards 10. It's Blitz! - Yeah Yeah Yeahs 11. Guns Don't Kill People, Lazers Do - Major Lazer 12. 'Em Are I - Jeffrey Lewis and the Junkyard 13. See Mystery Lights - YACHT 14. Logos - Atlas Sound 15. If You Were Fruit - The Lovely Eggs 16. Farm - Dinosaur Jr 17. Hospice - The Antlers 18. Post-Apocalyptic Love - The Very Sexuals 19. My Maudlin Career - Camera Obscura 20. Still Night Still Light - Au Revoir Simone 21. Blue Roses - Blue Roses 22. The Floodlight Collective - Lotus Plaza 23. Tear Ourselves Away - LoveLikeFire 24. Get Guilty - AC Newman 25. Face Control - Handsome Furs 26. Varshons - The Lemonheads 27. A Man, A Woman Walked By - PJ Harvey and John Parish 28. Survival Strategies In A Modern World - Liechtenstein 29. Me Oh My - Cate Le Bon 30. I'm Going Away - The Fiery Furnaces 31. Embryonic - The Flaming Lips 32. I Feel Cream - Peaches 33. Dance Mother - Telepathe 34. The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart - The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart 35. Julian Plenti is...Skyscraper - Julian Plenti 36. II - Desire 37. Fight Like Apes And The Mysteries Of The Golden Medallion - Fight Like Apes 38. Polly Scattergood - Polly Scattergood 39. Fine Fascination - Red Light Company 40. Fantasies - Metric
Use the comments box for any gripes, observations and linklove for your own year-end lists. Happy New Year to all our readers, hopefully this site will be slightly more active in 2010!
The new Name The Pet single is a bouncy pop choon more viral than YouTube embeds, while the promo admirably promotes the healthy benefits of physical exercise, although the sheer cheerleader chic of it makes it slightly dubious safety for work.
December is usually tragic in terms of PV updates, but hawk-eyed followers can expect a humongous gig review compendium, a long linkdump and the usual end-of-year lists before 2010 hits!
We know, we've been neglecting you. More content soon, including a review of the Saint Etienne-curated first day of the Moseley Folk Festival, but until then check out 'Dancing' by Sheffield's Standard Fare. It's a purdy, poignant choon that will appeal to fans of bands like Sky Larkin and The Dirty Mittens, and the promo resourcefully makes a virtue of the no-budget D-I-Y montage format.
Standard Fare are playing The Autumn Store in Birmingham in December. We should go dancing!
The first time we played Bombay Bicycle Club's debut album 'I Had The Blues But I Shook Them Loose' our initial reaction was of minor deflation, but it's a record which has built and built in our hearts as something treasurable. Central to the record's attraction is the other-wordly charms of 'Magnet', a song you can really get attached to, which is due for release in single format next month.
Indietracks Festival, Midland Butterly Railway nr. Ripley, Derbyshire, July 24-26 2009.
This was Parallax View's first visit to Indietracks, now in its third year of bringing the best of indiepop to the grounds of a vintage railway station at Midland Railway, Butterly, near Ripley in Derbyshire. It was a sign of the weekend to come that the person we end up sharing a taxi with from Alfreton train station was Ian who runs the How Does If Feel To Be Loved? disco in the marquee at the event. Everything, and indeed, everyone, seemed to be connected.
Even, to some degree, our good selves, as we make re-acquaintance with Dunc from The Autumn Store and badge-bestowing Simon of Sweeping The Nation fame in fairly quick order on entering the grounds, and bump into Liz from The School not long after. And who should we be following on our way to the bar but the unmistakeable derrieres of the girls from Au Revoir Simone? It was very much that kind of festival.
Friday night's fare was entirely on the outdoor stage, with the synths of Modular washing over us pleasantly before Rosay Pipette (hitherto to be referred to, of course, as Rose Elinor Dougall) strutted her new solo stuff to mostly impressive effect. There wasn't too much on show that screamed out 'hit record' but it was all engaging enough to foster the belief that if anyone can sell Stereolab-lite to the masses it's RED.
While waiting for ARS to get into gear, we managed to catch a few words with Alice Hubley from Arthur and Martha as she chatted to Dunc, consoling her on the rather snide NME review of A&M's new album which was excessively sniping with regards to her own vocal contributions. Heads turned immediately with the arrival of Au Revoir Simone, who put on a confident and mesmering show featuring the best from their three albums. There are those that bemoan their lack of stagecraft but with presence like theirs craft is made redundant and superflous, and latest album 'Still Night, Still Light' is arguably their most consistent disc to date.
Thus followed some dancing with Dunc, his gf Debbie, and the rest of the Autumn Store posse in the Lipstick On Your Collar! disco, during which Dead Kenny may or may not have been jumping up and down rather rigorously to The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart's 'Young Adult Friction' chanting 'don't check me out! don't check me out!' to anyone without an option but to listen. All in all, was a Good Friday, if not THE Good Friday, if you see what we mean.
Saturday sees our bleary blogging eyes facing the serious business of catching as many indiepop acts as possible while still remembering to cover the basics of eating, drinking and breathing. We catch the sun somewhat while waiting for Sucrette, who make up for their late appearance with some top-notch breathy J-Pop which would appeal in particular to fans of Annie's 'Anniemal'. We were less seduced by Tender Trap, whose harmonies only really tugged at our heartstrings during their newest number, but at least that means they're heading in the right direction. Also failed to be engaged by Friends on the Indoor Stage (otherwise known as The Loco Shed), while One Happy Island won us over with the sheer persistence of their energy and charm during their set in the same arena.
Danish troubadour Labrador was late finding the festival but provided soothing electro-folk to calm our savage breasts on a hot Saturday evening in The Church (a case of Pew! What A Scorcher! anyone?). This proved the calm before the storm of The Specific Heats at the same location, whose reverb mechanism blew up during the first song, amongst other technical mishaps, which did nothing but add to the feeling that this was one of the festival landmark events, with scorching surf guitar and sun-kissed melodies providing a perversely devilish good time in the 'sanctity' of The Church.
Some fresh air was certainly needed at that point, but a look at the long snaking queue of people waiting to see The Lovely Eggs suggested that we wouldn't be able to get back in a hurry. And so it proved, as we were left to paw at the Church window like poor little orphan boys on Christmas Day, to get a glimpse of the hotly-tipped popsters. From our disadvantaged vantage point, The Lovely Eggs looked and sounded un-beatable, before we whisked ourselves off to see The Frank And Walters, who were still playing mostly the same songs and (if memory serves us correctly) telling mostly the same jokes that they used to back in 1992. Pretty entertaining and endearing stuff, nevertheless.
We only really know one Speedmarket Avenue song, the pretty fantastic 'Way Better Now' so wasn't quite sure what to expect of the Stockholm collective. Perhaps the most surprising aspect was that the vocal duties were fairly evenly shared between the male and female singer, the latter's sheer blue tights certainly scorching themselves on our retinas. It was all rather lovely, much lovelier than the fact that the main toilets were in need of plumbing attention, which certainly challenged punters' temperaments in what was supposed to be the friendliest of festivals.
Our underpants tension was somewhat eased by the always comforting presence of Camera Obscura, with lead singer Tracyann Campbell looking never more glam as the band dispensed a crowd-pleasing set of gems like 'Let's Get Out Of This Country'; 'French Navy' and 'If Looks Could Kill', climaxing beautifully as usual with 'Razzle Dazzle Rose' as the sun set. Met back up with Dunc and Debbie at this stage who pass on the tidbit that Marisa from The Besties is about to do a debut solo set in the Marquee. Right on cue the lead singer from The Specific Heats then pops his head out of said tent and hollers to anything within earshot the very same headline news.
Although your bluffing blogger is aware of The Besties' cult status in indiepop circles, Marisa seems more recently and vividly familiar to us, until it clicks she played keys for The Specific Heats earlier. We just have time to congratulate The Specific Heats singer on his set (he's philosophical about the equipment blowing up as it's the last day of their European tour) before he was required to act as a human mic stand for the slightly embarrassed but genuinely endearing Marisa, who ran through some old Besties tunes and other stuff even though at least one of her keys wasn't working. The whole shebang had so much impromptu charm and bonhomie we swear if we were any more full of ourselves at this point we'd have had to empty ourselves out just for the pleasure of filling ourselves back up again.
This also served to fill the gap while (reputedly) Emmy The Great had to be rescued from some sort of motorway-related fiasco before her set at The Indoor Stage. Better late than never, as we always say here on Parallax View, and while we can't quite re-create the flush of love at first sight we initially felt for Emmy, it's a bold and entertaining show with an impressive cover of The Pixies' 'Where Is My Mind?' thrown into the mix for good measure. Outside, La Casa Azul are in turns bemusing and bewitching with an undeniably odd combination of pigeon English, dancepop and balladry, to a visual backdrop of Mario Brothers, 'virtual backing band' and other random bytes and bobs. It's hit and miss for our tastes, but there's no doubt his version of John Paul Young's 'Love Is In The Air' provides one of the truly joyously unifying moments of the festival weekend.
Night-time saw Ian's 'How Does It Feel To be Loved?' pop-disco ramming the Marquee to its rafters, so we had our hearts and feet stolen by Barcelona's Bonnie & Clyde in the Loco Shed instead. TPOBPAH's 'Young Adult Friction' again gets a showing, and thus also does our crap dancing in a session of hot, sweaty fun. Rumours of ex-NME journo Tim Jonze being on site to do a piece for The Guardian permeated the night air as the contented crowds dispersed.
Sunday morning started with a call from our friend Keef to say he's coming up for the day to catch up with the evening's headliners Teenage Fanclub. After watching the entrancing (but startlingly young) Bonne Idee in the Loco Shed, we meet up with Keef on the steam train where we're completely out of earshot of the drum-and-bass from The Manhattan Love Suicides announcing the band's split. We're back on solid ground in time for The School's afternoon slot on The Outdoor Stage, where Simon from The Loves does his best to steal the show from a stunning set of stellar choons new and old, with his drunken wit and repartee and blatant-lack-of-socks appeal, but it's the impression of a band truly starting to find its feet live that's the lingering impression.
It then began to rain, which probably suited Denmark's Northern Portrait as their efficient Scandinavian remodelling of The Smiths would suggest they're more than comfortable with all things Northern Miserabilism. Happily they're not short of decent tunes and the material seems grounded and heartfelt enough to resonate more deeply than mere pastiche, and they appeared to go down well with a visibly impressed Emma from Pocketbooks who was stood next to us throughout. We wished her well with her set later that day, to which she summarily dismissed us to the merchandise stand. Still, as Confucious might have said, better a girl who only brings her business head to the party than one who doesn't bring any head at all.
Was well and truly chucking it down by this time, but it didn't stop us from heading to see Lucky Soul on the Outdoor Stage to gawp at the singer in her short little mini-dress and to remark on how one of the LS geezers is indecently rocking the Blake Fielder-Civil look, as well as sway about a bit and tap our feet to their pretty fetching pop-soul sound. Meanwhile, it wasn't just the rain that saw people scampering into the merchandise tent, as there was a bit of a Talulah Gosh reunion going on, which was nice, even though we found ourselves distracted by congratulating Liz on her set and introducing Dunc and Simon to each other (the indiepop equivalent of Frost:Nixon, we're sure you'll agree).
Sunday became a bit of a rainy blur from this point on, catching 20 minutes of the always-entertaining The Smittens here and 20 minutes of Hong Kong In The 60s ambient pop there, and a set by the aforementioned Pocketbooks that became increasingly compelling as the show went on, and we're sure Emma (who sports a haircut that makes her look a bit like Helen Marnie from Ladytron) would thank us for pointing out that their excellent album 'Flight Paths' is available for retail and download from all the usual outlets, now.
What else? Ah yes, Stereo Total were something of a rowdy revelation, featuring an impromptu performance from Birmingham's very own David Leach on harmonising, and a vaguely riotous stage invasion providing a feelgood finale. One-man NZ act Disasteradio gurned his way gloriously through a frenetic set of electronic gloopy loopiness, keeping Keef's son Joe suitably fascinated throughout. Some fishcake and chips in Johnson's Cafe later, Art Brut are their usual entertaining selves, even though their rockstar shapes and boisterous, slightly shambolic wit does lose its novelty value after a while. Nice of them to namecheck MJ Hibbett, though.
Which just left us with the minor details of your hustling hack falling flat on his back on the wet grass and a mighty, mighty closing performance from Teenage Fanclub which included a couple of new songs (one was called 'The Falls', we think) and plenty of the best from what we sometimes forget is a splendidly impressive back catalogue. Not only is everything and everybody connected, but, as TFC remind us to a cavalcade of chiming guitars, Everything Flows.
Here lies Parallax View's pick of the best albums released for the first time in the UK in the first six months of the year. While we can't pretend to have heard all of the qualifying records (in particular, we resisted The Horrors, because we can't bear to have to say anything nice about them), of those we did, these were the best, and in this precise order.
1. SILENCE IS WILD - FRIDA HYVONEN 2. Fever Ray - Fever Ray 3. Bitte Orca - The Dirty Projectors 4. Thunderheist - Thunderheist 5. Union - The Boxer Rebellion 6. Guns Don't Kill People, Lazers Do - Major Lazer 7. Veckatimest - Grizzly Bear 8. The Floodlight Collective - Lotus Plaza 9. Em Are I - Jeffrey Lewis And The Junkyard 10. Get Guilty - AC Newman 11. Face Control - Handsome Furs 12. It's Blitz! - Yeah Yeah Yeahs 13. Farm - Dinosaur Jr 14. Tear Ourselves Away - LoveLikeFire 15. My Maudlin Career - Camera Obscura 16. Post-Apocalyptic Love - The Very Sexuals 17. I Feel Cream - Peaches 18. A Man, A Woman Walked By - PJ Harvey & John Parish 19. Still Night, Still Light - Au Revoir Simone 20. Fantasies - Metric
Records by Experimental Dental School, The Lemonheads, Red Light Company, The Wind Whistles, Telepathe, Polly Scattergood and The Joy Formidable narrowly missed out but are all also worth exploring.
The Autumn Store Presents: Moofish Catfish/Waldo Jeffers/MJ Hibbert and the Validators, The Autumn Store, Sunflower Lounge, Birmingham, Saturday June 13 2009, 9pm. The Thermals, 02 Academy 3, Birmingham, Monday June 22nd, 9.30pm. The Warlocks/Wild Palms/Guile, The Rainbow, Digbeth, Birmingham, Sunday July 19 2009,8pm.
You'd have to be nuts to miss an Autumn Store gathering, even though we've contrived to do just that more than we'd like, but the lure of catching some Moofish Catfish at the beginning of their UK tour proved strong enough bait on this occasion. Like a slightly poppier Liechtenstein, but with enough pirhana bite in the guitars to supply a crunchy base to their witty lyrics and soaring harmonies, they were a real find so catch 'em if you can. Also on the bill were local band Waldo Jeffers, whose set was a mixed bag, but the singer has a distinctive, velvety voice, and if they can fix a matching musical voice in terms of a distinct direction they certainly have plenty potential. Headlining were London's MJ Hibbert And The Validators, whose wry, lo-fi take on modern pop culture provided a ramshackle but undeniably entertaining climax to the evening's entertainment.
Over at The Rainbow there was more overtly serious fare where The Warlocks were headlining on a recently-redesigned stage area to a black-clad crowd. Bobby Hensher and crew haven't exactly developed their sound as much as refined it: we came for a driven set of powerful, transcendent guitars, that's what we got, and we loved it. Not that everybody was as transfixed, however: some punter with a hot girlfriend is twittering 'The left guitar[sic] looks like a right miserable git'. Sheesh, everyone's a critic these days, right?
Of the supports, we continue to be impressed by Guile, despite them having to fight against the apathy from some of the early birds in the crowd, while London's Wild Palms provided some sharp relief from the storm und drang with their relatively chirpy, choppy, rappy-chappy take on mathsrock, their best two songs bookending an uneven but diverting set. Top marks to whoever was on the decks, too: The Telescopes' 'The Perfect Needle' and Bowie's 'Heroes' (the German language version, unless our ears deceived us), you really know how to spoil us.
Somewhere in between, we managed to shoehorn an express midsummer trip to the predictably humid Academy 3 to see Portland's The Thermals, our first chance to see them and typically it fell at a time where we for once hadn't gotten round to listening to their latest material. It mattered little, as we were too busy jumping up and down to their hilariously energetic fuzzpop/rock to be taking notes anyway. The Thermals, then: sweaty, but fun.
For anyone still concerned about the Mercury Music Prize the nominations have been announced and can be found on the official site. A pretty uninspiring list by any standards, the Best British Album during an era when the best music is coming predominantly from Scandinavia and North America seems like eternal damnation by faint praise to these ears.
No strong feelings on the outcome, either, but depending on the odds, Speech Debelle or The Horrors might give you a decent run for your money.
Apologies yet again for the slight gap in transmission. As a consequence there's something of a content jam so expect a gig review ketchup and linkdump in the next few days, as well as our annual Half-Term Report on the best albums released in the UK from January to June 2009.
In the meantime, continuing a recent (accidental) animal theme, enjoy the promo video of 'Turtle' by The Wind Whistles. Like the nature that seemingly informs their lyrical content, there's a slightly sinister undertow to the band's apparently straightforward surface, making their appeal nearer to anti-folk than twee.
If you like this, you might want to try their second album 'Animals Are People Too' which can be downloaded in full, legally, and for free*, from here. There's also whispers of a UK tour soon.
Being popcult bloggers and wannabe hipsters, we're feeling a little sheepish about admitting that, yes, we too, love the Dirty Projectors' new album Bitte Orca, and that 'Stillness Is The Move' is quite possibly our favourite song of the year. The recently-released promo, featuring as it does caped girls dancing with wolves and a random llama farmer, emphatically seals the deal.
Bristol Dot-to-Dot Festival, various venues in Bristol, Saturday May 23 2009.
This was Parallax View's second visit to Bristol's Dot-to-Dot Festival, 2009 seeing some venue changes (converted prison and church respectively Fiddlers and Trinity making way for The Cooler and additional rooms at Thekla and Academy), two days now compressed into one, and much better weather (hello, sun!). Effectively the event is a glorified pub crawl with some of the globe's hottest-tipped new bands playing at every turn, so c'mon, what's not to like? Although all that relentless gigging and ligging was bound to take its toll on our critical faculties by the end of the evening (wasn't it ever thus, dear reader?).
And yet, in the beginning, there were false starts, with Official Secrets Act pulling out, and Marina and the Diamonds having the 24-carat excuse of being stuck in traffic. So it was Flashguns to the rescue to get things started with some welcome flair upstairs in the moored-boat venue that is Thekla. These four lads looked young enough to be found in your local underpass sniffin' glue, but put in a polished, professional performance that saw them search for the missing link between Arctic Monkeys, Interpol and, erm, Larrikin Love. Possibly not the most original band of all time, then, but they have enough dark energy and a knack for a tune to see them fire up the charts.
Did somebody mention fire? Because, some moopie and groovy later, we were back in the upstairs of Thekla to be suitably impressed by LoveLikeFire, fronted by the stunning Ann Yu, all blunt bangs, darkpool eyes and startling cheekbones, and an intelligent, compassionate vocal style that recalled Emily Haines. Metric are probably a good point of comparison to the San Francisco outfit, with their rock music comprising powerful surges of guitar noise complemented by fetching female vocals to tuneful, moving effect, particularly on the epic closing number which definitely had sea legs.
While waiting for friends, your confident correspondent caught sight of the delicious Ms Yu wearing a splendid pair of big sunglasses, and managed to grab a few minutes of her time outside the venue, during which she was as cool, polite and patient as anyone could hope an indie-superstar-in-waiting could be while being probed by a beaming blogger. She revealed that the new LoveLikeFire album is due for UK release in August, although our Stateside cousins may have to wait a while longer while a deal is hammered out. We predict great things for the band, and just hope Ann's pie and groovy didn't get too cool while we talked...
Having duly met up with friends, we headed over to Louisiana (the venue, not the state) to see Polly Scattergood, someone we've been following on Mitherspace for some time, but has attracted a fair amount of attention since the release of her eponymous debut in March. Polly looked terrific in a spangly dress but the set took a fair while to warm up during which some casual observers sloped off. Their loss, though, because she left her best 'til last with a devastating coda of 'Bunny Club' and 'Nitrogen Pink' snatching victory from the jaws of disaster. Downstairs, meanwhile, Liam Finn was winning over lots of friends with his feelgood folk with just enough spice in the gumbo to keep things interesting.
Had Thekla actually set sail or were the beers kicking in by this point? Or maybe it was Duchess Says rockin' the boat with their uproarious electro-funk that resembles Crystal Castles buccaneered by the anarchic spirit of The Mae Shi, the lead singer climbing the ceiling of the boat from the stage to the bar with the helping hands of a sweaty crowd to the visible jawdropping of the beer vendors.
The beers were definitely kicking in now, so where better to head than The Cooler where The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart were kings for the day? The Cooler is a pretty big venue but it was ridiculously packed, and 'Young Adult Friction' was the order of the day both on-stage and off during a lively and tuneful set. Things then descended into a bit of a blur as we rushed to The Fleece to catch the second-half of AC Newman's performance which was strong on good humour (Newman threatens to fire just about every band member at some point) and belting tunes ('The Heartbreak Rides' track of the year to date? Discuss). Then it was a swift swagger back to Thekla to see a fierce, bracing set from Baddies that supplied a needed caffeine jolt for your woozy writer at that point.
Our zigzagging path continued with a stroll back to Fleece to see The Soft Pack who we were very impressed by without the wherewithal at that point to illustrate these vibes with wise words. We think we just liked the hard, clanging sound of their guitars, and at the end of a long session of drinking/gigging, what more do you want? Nineties indie sorts My Vitriol were the following act, but we weren't really paying that much attention at this point, and we'll let you, dear reader, decide whether this was our fault, theirs, or a mutual deficiency of sorts. As for The Hold Steady, let me tell you by this point we were doing nothing of the kind...
Parallax View Health Warning: Binge Drinking is neither big nor clever, and makes clear nonsense of any aspirations towards serious rock music journalism.
PS. Thanks to VV Brown who patiently waited for your clumsy cameraman to take a picture of friends Ray and Deb either side of the stunning singer (fuck, she's tall).
PPS. Just two sightings of Big Jeff - at the front (but of course!) to The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart and Flashguns (the centre-stage Flashgun's double-take when he first saw him was priceless).
Who said you can't rely on Banks in a recession? Interpol vox Paul Banks's solo project Julien Plenti sees fruition with the release of debut album 'Skyscraper' on August 4, so this sneak peak of 'Cellophane' (complete with unofficial DIY montage) should ensure things are kept nice and fresh in the meantime.
The Dot-to-Dot review is undeniably late, but will be imminent. In the meantime, Katie Stelmanis supplies Single Of The Week with 'Believe Me' (out to buy on June 22 but the mp3 can be downloaded from NME), coming on like an electropop Frida Hyvonen to credible effect.
This week's Single Of The Week is on a totally topical tip, so as Britain swelters away in a welcome heatwave, Swedish stunner Name The Pet offers a hymn to sunshine, shimmering pop loveliness given suntan motion by some delightful disco propulsion.
While Parallax View unscrambles its brains sufficiently to write up a review of Bristol Dot-to-Dot, please entertain yourselves by watching the promo for 'Young Adult Friction' the highlight of The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart's set at The Cooler.
Single Of The Week, and you'd be a numbskull to disagree...
Experimental Dental School/Even Atlas/Dream Dreams The Dreamer, It's Just Noise @The Rainbow, Digbeth, Birmingham, Tuesday May 12 2009, 9pm.
An ominous start to the evening when on arrival at the venue there appeared to be no-one about other than the extremely pleasant girl on boffo duties. A quiet start, then, soon to be interrupted by Dream Dreams The Dreamer the new project by Matt Snowden (ex-Esquilax, Doom Patrol), that has developed into a 'sonic orchestra' specialising in experimental, droning post-rock of some portent. When it worked it was pretty terrific, but there was also a few longeurs where your chin-stroking correspondent didn't seem to be the only one shifting about a bit uncomfortably. And while we more than welcome the re-introduction of the trombone into the modern rock canon, we struggled to discern the point if it could rarely be heard above the squalling guitars?
Even Atlas represented something of a shift towards more conventional rock tropes, although with enough of a healthy whiff of pretension (not to mention some discernible Radiohead and Fugazi influences) to keep the serious-minded music fan from frothing in their pint at the hint of a tune. Was an interesting and enjoyable set, but perhaps a bit too eclectic for their own good in terms of a particular style or song really sticking in the mind on first listen. A work in progress, then, but worth keeping an eye on.
Capping these two local noiseniks were Portland, Oregon's Experimental Dental School here on touring duties to promote their second album 'Forest Field', which can be downloaded in total for free from their official site. This is probably a good a way as any of getting a grip on their sound, which is reassuringly difficult to define in these subgenre-heavy times, although their own LastFM blurb as 'really nerdy, dirty jazz punk' is probably as good a stab at it as we could muster, with bruising riffs and gentle noodling establishing an uneasy but eventually pleasing friction.
Something had to give sooner or later, though, and eventually it proved to be Jesse's bass string. He asked for any comedians to make themselves known (a dangerous call in Brum pubs, in our experience) to plug the gap, and right on cue a rogueish-looking gent lurched on stage who just happened to have reams of his own poetry stuffed in his back pocket. Things soon went went back from bard to verse, however, with bass string fixed and the experimental tooth doc tutors resuming their rumbling brilliance to a stirring conclusion. Leaving the only gripe from tonight that such a fine band and a well-drilled bill by It's Just Noise didn't tempt more second-citizens out on an otherwise humdrum Tuesday evening.
To compensate for the promo for last week's Single Of The Week being pulled by the YouTube user, we offer a bonus video for your perusal and entertainment, a tight, moving little toon to accompany the rather fine 'Hotblack' single from Oceanship. Let's see how long this one stays up...
We haven't done a Parallax Jukebox for a while, which as good a reason as to do one now as any, headed this time round by our favourite new band, from Portland Oregon, it's The Dirty Mittens, who produce the most delicious sound since someone last said they loved us.
1. The Small Things - The Dirty Mittens 2. Young Adult Friction - The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart 3. Bugs and Flowers - Jeffrey Lewis and the Junkyard 4. 18 Wheels - Evening Magazine 5. Beeline - Sky Larkin 6. April - John Parish and P J Harvey 7. A Song For Our City - We Are The Storm 8. Yours To Share - Moofish Catfish 9. Jazz Serenade - The Artisans 10. The Sweetest Thing - Camera Obscura 11. Dull Life - Yeah Yeah Yeahs 12. Doubtful Comforts - Blue Roses
Dirty Mittens, then: who knew fun without fingers was so easy?
Here at Parallax View we're not totally convinced yet by the hype surrounding the new St Vincent album, but we are suitably impressed by the spookily brilliant video for 'Actor Out Of Work' to promote it as our Single Of The Week.
Missed the chance to see Polly Scattergood live a few weeks back due to an unfortunate set of circumstances (she's playing Bristol's Dot-to-Dot, though, so we should catch up with her then). 'Please Don't Touch' isn't our favourite cut from her really rather good debut album (that'd be a toss-up between Bunny Club and Nitrogen Pink), but it is perhaps the catchiest, and is thus a pretty astute choice for single, and gives this Bank Holiday week the bouncy kickstart it needs.
First up, Parallax View is a personal site, and the views expressed herein (unless stated otherwise) solely belong to the webmaster (see below) and do not represent the views of past, present or future employers, or that of the web hosting company.
This site shares nothing but its title with the 1974 paranoid thriller The Parallax View. This is NOT the official site for that film and the views expressed herein do not represent the views of Warren Beatty or anyone involved in producing the film. Neither does this site have any connection with the electronic group The Parallax Corporation.
What Parallax View is:
It's a weblog, updated invariably daily, with links and references to music; film; pop culture; pub culture; football (or soccer, if you will); sports; TV/Radio; modern art; sex and gossip. Preferably, all of them at the same time.
That list isn't exclusive though. This is a personal site, so I reserve the right to talk shit about anything/everything I want. Just try stop me.
This page refers on an occasional basis to adult material, and contains some use of strong language. I don't set out to offend but if you don't like it, I won't be offended if you don't come back.
About the boy
Although this is a personal site, the point of the project isn't me, it's to refer you to sites/stories/pictures/games etc. of interest. Occasionally, there will be references to my private life but this isn't a diary page. I can't stop you making assumptions about me based on the content of this page, as long as you don't mistake those assumptions for anything remotely resembling fact.
Parallax View is the work of a shadowy, mysterious character by the name of Dead Kenny. That's me. Am I really dead? Take a guess. Why use a pseudonym? I have my reasons. Let's just say that using a doppelganger allows me optimum flexibility in expressing myself.
