Album Review: Rebelski - Stickers on Keys (Uncut)

4/5
Twisted Nerve and Badly Drawn Boy reveal hidden talents of Doves’ keyboard player

Despite his daytime job with Doves, Martin Rebelski’s debut for Heavenly remained largely undiscovered, but with Damon Gough’s patronage – he brought the record to Twisted Nerve personally – this album should fare deservedly better. Largely instrumental but bombast free, it’s tender and defiantly low key, at times reminiscent of The Blue Nile’s most intimate moments, as on “Play The School Piano”, and occasionally indebted to Harold Budd and Steve Reich – check “Remote Control”, also featuring Doves’ Jimi Goodwin on drums. Equally successful are forays into more traditional songwriting, featuring vocals by Roger Quigley (Montgolfier Brothers) and Mike TV (Beats For Beginners), with “Little White Lights” twinkling as gently as the title suggests.

Album Review: Rebelski - Stickers on Keys (Uncut)

Album Review: The Dears - No Cities Left (Uncut)

4/5

Britpop mixed with bombast to dramatic effect by Montreal visionaries

Who would have predicted that the most thrilling and inventive ‘British’ album of the year would in fact be delivered by a Montreal aesthete and his band? Had anyone in Britain actually known The Dears, would they have bet on the corpse of Britpop being reanimated and reconfigured by frontman Murray Lightburn, a cocksure Dickensian styled rogue who looks like he has gone ten rounds with life and been knocked down in each? Would they have even dared to suggest that this palest of white boy’s music could be (whisper it) hijacked by a black dilettante? (Name one black so-called Britpop band and maybe that last statement will carry less weight than it sadly does.)

The Dears are all about breaking conventions, and when you’re taking on the sacred cows of indie-pop, you’d better be as good as you think you are. The Dears take as their touchstones The Smiths and mid ‘90s Blur, a doubly dangerous thing to do when Lightburn’s vocals recall both Morrissey and Damon Albarn. Fortunately The Dears are frequently even better than they believe, for the most part able to outrun these ghosts and bust through the structural constraints their influences impose, seemingly fearless in their pursuit of music of true pathos, gravity and swagger. This is literate stuff, make no mistake, and it’s all the better for it.

From the outset it’s clear that Lightburn’s intentions are precocious, crediting himself here as sole writer, producer and director. It’s his role as “director” – in the cinematic sense – that sets No Cities Left apart, as he seeks to create a record that carries a narrative without becoming a turgid concept album. At times The Dears do suffer from the weight of their inspirations – “Lost In The Plot” sounds worryingly like Gene – and, were this album the film it dreams of, then it would benefit from an intermission. But at its finest – “Pinned Together, Falling Apart”’s blood curdling denials of lost love, “Never Destroy Us” hurtling towards its unexpected and desperate denouement, the spine-tingling dub of “Postcard From Purgatory” – No Cities Left is an exhilarating example of what happens when Britpop is unchained from the kitchen sink and given real drama to contend with.

Q&A
Murray Lightburn on The Dears’ plans for world domination…

UNCUT: Ever worry that you’re bringing coals to Newcastle?
LIGHTBURN: To be honest, that’s a little bit of a bullshit question. I’d like to think The Dears bring more to the table. Maybe we’re trying to lure the English in with something familiar. Once we’ve nabbed a few, they’ll go along with whatever we do in the future. Perhaps our next record will be our ‘Back To Africa’ phase and we’ll all be wearing dashikis and playing bongos like Damon fucking Albarn. We could do that everywhere until we dominate the world. Seriously, when it comes to rock music, what is English or American or Canadian? It all came from some niggers in the Southern US, anyway. Go back a little further and it was African slaves. It’s all fucked now, don’t you see?


Did you include the ‘a’ in Dears like the ‘a’ in Beatles?
Shoot us if we did.

Album Review: The Dears - No Cities Left (Uncut)

Album Review: William Shatner - Has Been (Uncut)

 
4/5

The stars come out for Captain Kirk

Largely written with Ben Folds – though Lemon Jelly also weigh in with the lovely “Together” – Shatner’s second album in 35 years will be remembered for its magnificent version of Pulp’s “Common People”. Initially absurd, the novelty of Shatner – also joined by Joe Jackson – declaiming Cocker’s brilliantly satirical lyrics is soon eclipsed by the genuine verve of the performance. Henry Rollins lends his anger to the furious “I Can’t Get Behind That”, Aimee Mann pops up on the touching “Trying”, and while Has Been refuses to take itself too seriously, going where few would ever go, it is definitely deserving of the cult status it will inevitably earn.

Album Review: William Shatner - Has Been (Uncut)

Album Review: Frank Black Francis - Black Francis Demo / Frank Black Francis (Uncut)

4/5
Blasphemy or reverence? Startling new interpretations of Pixies classics paired with earliest recordings

Frank Black Francis: the beginning and the end. One could treat these two dramatically different discs as bookends to Pixies history if the band hadn’t just completed a triumphant reunion tour, while talk of a new album continues. But the release of the first tapings of songs that ended up on Come On Pilgrim and Surfer Rosa, paired here with fundamentally new arrangements of familiar material, seems to represent both the first and final chapters of Volume 1.

It’s the “Black Francis Demo”, recorded by producer Gary Smith three days before the band entered Fort Apache studios, to which Pixies obsessives will be most drawn. Despite their existence purely as preparatory run-throughs, these acoustic readings of songs like “Isla De Encanta” and “Break My Body” are passionate, far from cursory performances that, stripped of complex arrangements, highlight memorably the peculiar melodies at their heart.

But it’s the generous inclusion of “Frank Black Francis” that makes this essential. Recorded in Hackney last year with Andy Diagram and Keith Molene (currently David Thomas’ Two Pale Boys), it sees Black and his revisionist crew take hold of some of the finest Pixies work and variously turn it inside out, strip it bare, dub it out or reduce it to brass rubbings, revealing how these bizarre tunes are capable of adapting to extreme surgery. The sweet but ghostly shell of “Caribou”, the eerie horns of “Nimrod’s Son”, the Colliery Brass Band take on “The Holiday Song”: it’s all uniquely mind expanding, as exciting as hearing Come On Pilgrim for the first time. If Black’s decision to experiment with his earliest work highlights the comparative banality of his recent solo material, one can only hope that the experience reinvigorates him in the future as much as it has here.

Alone, perhaps, each of these CDs might appear to be somewhat scraping the Pixies barrel. But to pair them is, frankly, an inspired piece of marketing. Beginning with the very genesis of The Pixies, and ending with nothing short of a revelation, Frank Black Francis may be, as he himself calls it, “messing with the gospel”, but somehow this revisiting of his roots seems paradoxically to have expanded his horizons.

Album Review: Frank Black Francis - Black Francis Demo / Frank Black Francis (Uncut)

Album Review: Nancy Sinatra - Nancy Sinatra (Uncut)

3/5
Is the Go Go Girl going going gone..?

When Nancy Sinatra performed in Oslo in 2002, national newspaper VG carried a front page photograph with the headline “Tragic”. An Edinburgh show around the same time was little better received. Yet when she performed this year at Morrissey’s Meltdown in London, a wander through the auditorium during the legendary ‘These Boots Were Made For Walking’ elicited scenes reminiscent of a walkabout by Robbie Williams. Style rules over substance, in the capital at least.

It’s undoubtedly style rather than content that’s on show on this quasi-comeback album, where she dresses herself in the musical equivalent of the finest threads. Here the songs are penned by veterans like Bono, Jon Spencer, Jarvis Cocker and Thurston Moore, and of course her unlikely neighbour Morrissey. Nancy has often rested on others’ laurels, whether her father’s or writers like Lee Hazlewood’s, and this time is no different.

It’s easy to forget, given how iconoclastic Nancy is these days, that her standing centres upon only a small amount of music. Certainly she made many records, but few are memorable. Here she’s once again dependent upon her collaborators, and the truth is that few can match the skills it took to draw the best out of her. Calexico and Jarvis Cocker fare best, simply by aping Lee Hazlewood, though Thurston Moore’s contribution is striking by sounding like nothing she has ever done (though like most of what he has done). But much of the album lacks cohesion and even seems lazy: Bono & The Edge’s tune was in fact originally written for Ole Blue Eyes himself. There’s no trading on Dad’s reputation here, then…

It’s left to the relatively unknown Reno to rescue things with ‘Bossman’, whose massive chorus finally allows Nancy to display some character, and ‘About A Fire’, which strangely echoes ? & The Mysterions’ ‘96 Tears’. That this is the only uncredited song on the promotional CD seems to emphasise that Nancy doesn’t know where her strengths lie.

Neither deserving of epithets like “tragic” or mass hysteria, Nancy Sinatra instead leans as much upon her status as it does on the strength of her songwriters. Sadly, both seem here to be largely on the wane.

Q&A
Nancy Sinatra on London audiences, Morrissey and Mick Hucknall…

UNCUT: Is there anyone that you wish you could have collaborated with?
SINATRA: So many! We were hoping to have Elvis Costello. He had the multi-tracks of the song but sadly his schedule just didn’t allow for the recording of his vocal. We were sent a terrific song by Doves and as with Elvis, they couldn’t work out the recording of the track in time to include it. They are such a great band. Of course I have a long wish list: Debbie Harry, the Pixies, Mick Hucknall, Pink, Paul Weller, Joan Jett, and so on and so on…

UNCUT: How was it to play your first London show at the Royal Festival Hall?
SINATRA: The London audience is the most generous in the world. They don’t ever judge one on appearance or age. They only care about the music. Morrissey made it impossible for me to fail there. He is my mentor. It was a breathtaking experience.

Album Review: Nancy Sinatra - Nancy Sinatra (Uncut)

Album Review: Lazyboy - Penguin Rock (Uncut)

4/5
Kylie collaborator and Blue Room co-presenter’s long promised debut

With Lemon Jelly opening the commercial floodgates for a more light hearted form of downtempo electronica – see also Royksopp, Hint – Dan Carey, two time Ivor Novello nominee for co-writing and co-producing Kylie’s “Slow”, and Rob Da Bank, Sunday Best founder and Radio 1 chillout specialist, up the ante with an imaginative cast of collaborators. Roddy Frame steals the show with the uplifting “Western Skies”, Lee Scratch Perry spouts coded politics on the title track, while the up and coming Estelle’s melodic hip hop brings soul to the party. Blending styles playfully, the bizarrely titled Penguin Rock offers joyously frothy background beats for lazy boys and girls.

Album Review: Lazyboy - Penguin Rock (Uncut)

Album Review - Lou Rawls: I Can't Make It Alone (The Axelrod Years) (Uncut)

4/5
Near fatal 1958 car crash fails to prevent long term career resurrection

With a voice like childhood friend Sam Cooke’s, Lou Rawls’s career covered soul, gospel, jazz and finally Budweiser ads. But his 60’s work with DJ Shadow-endorsed producer David Axelrod is amongst his finest, a loose limbed soul captured here in all its raw glory. Interpretations of Donovan’s “Season Of The Witch” or Stephen Stills’ “For What It’s Worth” are perfect introductions to his versatile voice and sit snugly alongside the likes of Axelrod’s Grammy winning “Dead End Street”. Rawls’ laidback passion and Axelrod’s superlatively groovy production are invaluable additions to fans of both artists, as well as all of a soulful persuasion. Another immaculate collection to match Stateside’s Axelrod and Minnie Ripperton retrospectives.

Album Review - Lou Rawls: I Can't Make It Alone (The Axelrod Years) (Uncut)

Album Review: The Feminine Complex - Livin' Love (Uncut)

5/5
Legendary debut album plus stripped back demos from female pop pioneers that time nearly forgot.

When this debut album - originally released in 1969 - was first reissued on cult US indie Teenbeat complete with sleevenotes from Lambchop's Johnathon Marx, many thought it had to be an elaborate hoax. Could a Nashville girl group really be this good and remain undiscovered? Not for ever. A choir of Dusty Springfields produced by Phil Spector would struggle to be this wondrous. Like Lee & Nancy's Some Velvet Morning, The Feminine Complex, as the name suggests, deliver multilayered deceptively innocent, largely self penned psychedelic pop that swings gently from exuberant to spooky via forlorn and sentimental. Unknowingly groundbreaking and essential.

Album Review: The Feminine Complex - Livin' Love (Uncut)

Album Review: Micah P. Hinson - Micah P. Hinson & The Gospel Of Progress (Uncut)

 4/5

Southern Gothic tinged debut via Manchester

It’s a tried and tested fast track to success: talented young artist is taken under the wing of one older and wiser and groomed for the public. But Micah P Hinson’s story is a little different. Befriended at a young and vulnerable age by a Vogue cover model and rock star’s widow in his adopted home town of Abilene, Texas, Micah’s life spiralled out of control until, rather than riding into town on glamorous fur coattails, he was arrested for forging prescriptions on her behalf and jailed. By the age of 19 he was homeless, bankrupt and rejected by his fundamentalist Christian family.

Fortunately, financial destitution inspired creative wealth in the form of a raft of songs that Hinson – a bespectacled 22 year old with a cracked but lugubrious baritone – chose to record in Manchester with The Earlies (under their Names On Records pseudonym), two of whose members were childhood friends of his in Texas. Their lushly orchestrated arrangements steer Hinson away from a potentially oddball self pity without detracting from the genuine intimacy of his songs, cocooning their skeletal forms with inspired instrumentation and a full blooded, human warmth. Had Bill ‘Smog’ Callaghan woken up in bed on the right side, he might sound a little like this (as, in fact, he did occasionally on 1999’s Wild Love), though Hinson himself sees Leonard Cohen as a more likely influence.

It’s an ambitious but striking debut that also shows how the tradition of acoustic songwriting need not be frail to be authentic or enhanced with electronic glitches to be contemporary. Whilst his innate fragility remains intact on tracks like the eerie The Possibilities and You Lost Sight On Me, Don’t You Forget concludes in a positively intense fashion and by On Your Way Hinson is roaring. So successful is this collaboration that any initial thoughts of Hinson as yet another tortured troubadour are dismissed. Truly, a gospel of redemption to believe in.

Q&A
MICAH P. HINSON on drugs and UK immigration…

What happened to the ‘Black Widow’, as you now call your former ‘muse’?
She got impregnated by a grass dealer from Dallas, TX, and, last I heard, she was getting her child taken away from her due to her love affair with prescription drugs. She must have fallen off the end of the earth or was swallowed alive by her pill bottle.

Without her influence, would you have made music?
The hardships in my life have made most of my songs possible. I’m sure without the hard times I still would have made my music; it just wouldn’t be so downtrodden and accessible to the human race. People like to listen to others in pain. It makes us feel more comfortable to know that we are not the only ones suffering.

Did The Earlies transform your songs significantly?
We were only in the studio for about a dozen days. And with that, the songs never left my sight, except for the song As You Can See when I was spending a pleasant twelve hours being interrogated by British immigration.

Album Review: Micah P. Hinson - Micah P. Hinson & The Gospel Of Progress (Uncut)

Album Review: The Earlies - These Were The Earlies (Uncut)

3/5

Blissful vibes from Manchester / Texas quartet

That the four members of The Earlies had never been together in the same room together until the release of their third single is as good an indication of the unusual manner in which they write as the bizarre collision of sounds on this richly orchestrated debut album. It also doubtless helps to explain why it’s taken over five years since their debut 7” to find a label brave enough to fund it. But it’s a gamble that has paid off, even though the glut of similar material around at the moment will no doubt soon lead to a chillout compilation mountain in some European wasteland (something The Earlies almost seem to acknowledge with this seemingly posthumously titled collection).

Echoing the geographical divide that gave birth to their music – the four band members are divided between Texas and Manchester – their intricately arranged music spans the vocal innovation of The Beach Boys and the playful but organic soundscapes of, say, Lemon Jelly, but there’s no need to dismiss The Earlies as latecomers to the dinner party. The rich orchestration and lush sounds that underpin these eleven tracks are beautifully offset by a wealth of complex harmonies that repay return visits. True, there’s a lack of dynamic variation, with only one song – Morning Wonder – really picking up the pace, but the sense of wide-eyed wonder and innocence that runs throughout rarely becomes tiring. Bring It Back Again recalls the playful nature of last year’s Fourtet and Manitoba albums, while Song For #3 is a genuinely moving and perfectly intimate little gem that unapologetically draws upon ‘Pet Sounds’ for inspiration. One Of Us Is Dead, meanders through fertile pastoral territories, while 25 Easy Pieces blossoms into choral bliss.

It’s perhaps the human qualities of ‘These Were The Earlies’ that set it apart from many of its downtempo contemporaries (though The Big Chill crowd would undeniably welcome this into their bijou residences). With lavish use of strings, clarinet, trumpet, piano and more besides, it’s frequently and unapologetically sentimental, but never cloyingly so. A comforting blanket of sounds that swaddles and swathes, this is likely to outlive the summer sunsets and provide a warm glow well into winter.

Album Review: The Earlies - These Were The Earlies (Uncut)