John Lennon had an uneasy relationship with religion. When at the height of his fame he suggested that the Beatles were bigger than Jesus he provoked uproar and public displays of record-burning in the American Bible Belt. Even the Vatican denounced him before eventually accepting his tortured apology.
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Blah blhablhja
Here is a lovely island. Oh, it looks a bit cold.
‘Better than heavy‘, the 11-track debut album of indie supergroup Mongrel will be given away with The Independent print edition on Saturday 7 March.
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On this week’s podcast we have the emperor of alt-folk, Bonnie Prince Billy. In advance of his latest album, Beware, he talks to Rosie Swash about his music, his life and, well, his antipathy towards Bon Iver. Is some beardy-folk battle about to kick off? Quite possibly.
Our second guests, Vivian Girls, continue our tour of the New York C86 revival. Again, it’s our Rosie with her finger on the question button as she looks to establish just how incestuous the whole scene is.
There’s a mighty lineup for Singles club too, with Tim Jonze and Laura Barton joining Paul MacInnes to muse on new music from Jeffrey (now Jeff) Lewis, Phoenix and Jonathan Jeremiah.
We’ve got your Faceback too, but no Feature With No Name, cos we forgot.
Soz.
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A survey claims Britons are emigrating to Australia in record numbers, and our gloomy weather and troubled economy are to blame. But Howling Bells, who left Sydney back in 2004 for England, are staying put. With their eponymous debut album of intoxicating folk-rock country and blues melodies they had no trouble establishing a dedicated fan base here; their upcoming tour has sold out faster than any of their previous shows. Not surprising, then, that their singer Juanita Stein does not regret the move. “Staying in Australia wasn’t an option for us. We had set our collective hearts on something. The artistic climate [of London] suited us at the time and still does.”
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A compilation showing Neu!’s musical influence is timely. But what are the Gallagher brothers, Kasabian and Primal Scream doing on there?
My favourite Oasis quote came from the time of Be Here Now’s hysterical media domination, when a magazine polled Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood on where he felt Oasis should go next. The avant-schmindie guitarist jokingly suggested a teamup with nascent tweesters Belle & Sebastian, before admitting that, though Noel Gallagher doesn’t do much more than run up and down the blues scale, neither does he really. It seemed pretty funny in 1997, but not nearly as funny as the idea of Oasis heading up a Neu! tribute album in 2009.
And yet that’s exactly what’s happened. An old Oasis b-side – the pseudo-mystical I Can See It Now – is being promoted as the main attraction of Brand Neu!, a new compilation examining the “influence on today’s artists” of the krautrock masters.
Neu! were a band relatively ignored during their original run of three classic albums in the early 1970s, but their influence is felt powerfully now, so a compilation like this is timely. I’m just not sure about the tracklisting.
Who else is on it? Well, there’s Kasabian. And, erm, Primal Scream. If the point of Brand Neu! is to bend your brain through the sheer anti-logic of its inclusions – in the same way perhaps that Neu!’s improbable music fired cerebellums – then I guess it’s worked, sort of.
In this decade, krautrock – the ultimate niche genre – finally seeped into the mainstream, via the dancefloor-friendly chug of motorik. The three pieces that defined motorik – Hallogallo, Für Immer and Isi – were all openers on Neu! albums. Motorik’s acceptance into mainstream indie was perhaps aided by the deceptive simplicity of its musical elements: Klaus Dinger’s drums maintained a comprehensible 4/4 beat with minimal flourishes, while simple, one-note guitar drones hand-glided over the surging rhythmic chassis. Neu!’s was a sound as elegant as classical music, but performed seemingly with the musical proficiency of punk.
But listening to the tracks on this tribute CD, it’s evident that something got lost in translation. There isn’t a single one of these bands that has an ounce of the swing that defined Neu! The sound of Neu! was unique precisely for its groove, its almost watery fluidity. It was dance music for the soul.
So, on this tribute, Oasis pare down their usual trebly, coke-fidgety guitar solo scree into a monolithic, graceless plod that flails at a mirage of psychedelia; Kasabian sound like a garage band version of Primal Scream, and Primal Scream themselves are just billowing rock star egotism and an affected nihilism completely at odds with the humble, hippyish philosophy of krautrock. Foals are merely an enthusiastic emulation of their postrock heroes – possibly the most funk-deprived of all avant-rock substrands – and Ciccone Youth’s Two Cool Rock Chicks Listening to Neu chokes on its own meta-textual smugness. Cornelius and Holy Fuck are awesome, but what should be on here are the shimmering loops of OOIOO, or the blissed-out-forever soul of Arthur Russell, Gang Gang Dance, Oneida or Excepter. Artists that don’t just fashion-accessorise the now-trendy motorik shuffle, but who actually engage with Neu!’s sonic agenda on a more meaningful level than Noel’s sleeve-note quote of “Proper tour bus music! Spiritual!”
Bringing you the most innovative music videos and short films that we have unearthed this week
Who knew live origami could be so funky? Well, de Crecy for one, who produced this stop-motion gem through the Partizan production company (from Video Static).
With help from the Old Trout Puppet Workshop from Calgary, Canada, Seck weaves a fantastic tale of a fisherman’s battle with a huge sea creature as Feist’s lyrics soar overhead. His website also hints at a future collaboration with Feist (from Promo News).
Beautiful, diagrammatical design work by Melis set to a moody electronic number from Danish post-poppers Efterklang.
• Send us your recommendations and keep up with all the films we like by subscribing to the Eye Candy RSS feed on Vimeo or checking out our YouTube channel.
The NME gave The Cure their “God-like Genius” Award this week. If the band’s Robert Smith really was God, he could hardly need it less. The Cure are among a tiny number of UK bands since punk to maintain a global mass cult far beyond fashion. Anchored by the gravity of albums such as Disintegration (1989) – intended as the “most desolate” record ever – and kept afloat by feather-light, sexy singles such as “The Lovecats”, nothing, it seems, can sink them.
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It was only a matter of time. In this case, surprisingly little time. Barely a third of the way into his first 100 days in office, Barack Obama is set to appear on the London stage – in a musical. OK, the man himself won’t actually tread the boards – nor will an actor have the impossible task of living up to the immensely popular President. Rather, Obama on My Mind, which will play in North London’s charming Hen and Chickens pub next month, is a political comedy about the determined individuals behind the campaign to get Obama into the White House, set to 14 pop, gospel, jazz and Motown tunes. Teddy Hayes, a Cleveland-born crime-writer and film-maker who has been living in London for 13 years was inspired to write the piece when he started canvassing overseas Americans in the run-up to the election.
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‘We started the UK Asian Music Awards because we sat at the Mobos eight years ago and thought, ‘Hold on, where are our awards? Who’s representing us?’ says Jay Shah, co-founder and creative director of the UK Asian Music Awards (Ukama).
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