Album Review: Adventure - Lesser Known (Uncut)

3/5
Dan Deacon protégé trawls synthpop classics

Benny Boeldt was only three when the ‘80s ended but seems to have lived there since. His second album adds vocals to flesh out earlier ‘chiptunes’, its first half ransacking the racks in a Panda Pop-fuelled fashion: ‘Fool’s Paradise’ recalls Technique-era New Order, ‘Smoke & Mirrors’ joins The Human League, while ‘Feels Like Heaven’ could be a remix from OMD’s Junk Culture. Its garish roots are occasionally too obvious, but the album’s later tracks are darker: ‘Rio’ throws in a little M83 grit, while album closers ‘Another World’ and ‘Meadows’ offer a more expansive, psychedelic twist on his sound.

Album Review: Adventure - Lesser Known (Uncut)

Feature: "The Story Of ThIs Is The Sea - Mike Scott of The Waterboys Interviewed" (The Quietus)

I spent long hours as a teenager under the bedsheets with The Waterboys' third album on my headphones, and I still return regularly to it today, so I was arguably well qualified to discuss its genesis with the band's Mike Scott for The Quietus some 25 years after its release.

In this interview he talks about The Big Music and about how "I keep alert for what the music is saying to me and it always, always, always tells me what to do. And I fucking do it!"

Feature: "The Story Of ThIs Is The Sea - Mike Scott of The Waterboys Interviewed" (The Quietus)

Album Review: Moddi's 'Floriography' (The Quietus)

Winner of a massive grant from A-ha in 2010 designed to help promote Norwegian artists to the world, Moddi finally released his debut album in April 2011, some months after it saw the light of day in his homeland. "It's possibly not a timeless debut, but it's full of timeless music that ebbs and flows like the tide." Read my review here.

Album Review: Moddi's 'Floriography' (The Quietus)

Feature: The Q&A: Fred Cornog, Musician (The Economist / More Intelligent Life)

In case it's not already clear, I'm a huge fan of East River Pipe, so the release of We Live In Rented Rooms sent me scuttling to find out any place I could offer coverage. Lo and behold, The Economist wanted the man on their pages and the story also ran on More Intelligent Life here. And with wise words like these, who can blame them:

"Making a living solely from music nearly always involves a list of compromises that I’m unwilling to make. And, ultimately, the commerce side of things kills the artistic side."

Feature: The Q&A: Fred Cornog, Musician (The Economist / More Intelligent Life)

Feature: "Hicks And Drugs And Rock And Roll" (Triple J)

"Not only were the gods not such big fans, but nor were feminists, right wingers, the media, anti-drugs campaigners, non-smokers and a whole host of others who, in Hicks’ eyes, proved that 'people suck'." Did I ever mention that Bill Hicks is my God? It's all in the words above for Triple J...

Feature: "Hicks And Drugs And Rock And Roll" (Triple J)