Friday, October 27, 2017
Interview with Jamie Cameron – The Last Dinosaur
Article for www.nomoreworkhorse.com
https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2017/10/27/interview-with-jamie-cameron-the-last-dinosaur/
Out Lines – Conflats – Album Review
Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com
https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2017/10/27/out-lines-conflats-album-review/
Thursday, October 26, 2017
Wednesday, October 25, 2017
Monday, October 23, 2017
Friday, October 20, 2017
Thursday, October 19, 2017
Wednesday, October 18, 2017
Tuesday, October 17, 2017
Monday, October 9, 2017
The Stars of Heaven - Sacred Heart Hotel
CD versions of this feature the Holyhead EP which is just as good. Opening with the heavily acoustic country-rocker Never Saw You we get similar variations on the palette established by the album. After the brief, guitar picking instrumental Before Holyhead, they get a bit more rocking on Widow's Walk and Someone's Getting Tired of You. But such sharp, crisp guitars, this band definitely deserves more acclaim. Beg, borrow or steal this one, it seems to be impossible to find.
Sunday, October 8, 2017
The Go-Betweens - Liberty Belle and the Black Diamond Express
The Go-Betweens released their fourth album in 1986. At that time, arguably their finest album to date, it begins with Robert Forster's clarion call Spring Rain. A perfect jangly guitar part introduces Forster's lyric of being "dressed in my white shirt with my hair combed straight", over a beat that can only be described as bouncy, until he gets to the chorus: "falling down like sheets... just like spring rain". Accordion opens The Ghost and the Black Hat, leading nicely into the slow interlocking guitars of Grant McLennan's The Wrong Road with him lamenting over lyrics like "what was that phase, grace under pressure". To Reach Me has a very mid-eighties chord progression, one that could almost feature in a John Hughes movie but for Forster's idiosyncratic voice. Which is not meant in any way to denigrate the track, it has a fine melody and guitar work.
Forster is on fine form on this album and the centrepiece is probably the tense, late night Twin Layers of Lightning. The song is almost like a reflection of Forster's doomed dramatic on stage persona in those days, with keyboards creating suspense and cool, understated but incredibly intricate guitars over Forster's detached singing. It's an almost Smiths-like slowburner. The mood dispelled by McLennan's dramatic In The Core of the Flame, all sweeping violins and swooping basslines and a cracking and yes, jangly guitar solo midway through. It really is guitar heaven on this album with the likes of Head Full of Steam and Bow Down featuring not a note more than necessary, the latter featuring a particularly lovely violin part.
Final song is Apology Accepted. Generally simpler and more direct than what precedes it, again the guitars here are just pristine with a simple plea from McLennan ("I gotta wait to see is my apology accepted"). Nobody really cared at the time. Perhaps their tunes were 'too melodic'? Anyway this is a great one for fans of intelligent guitar pop.
Saturday, October 7, 2017
Friday, October 6, 2017
Thursday, October 5, 2017
Wednesday, October 4, 2017
The Horrors – V – Album Review
Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com
https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2017/10/04/the-horrors-v-album-review/
Tuesday, October 3, 2017
Monday, October 2, 2017
Mark Kozelek with Ben Boye and Jim White
Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com
https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2017/10/02/mark-kozelek-with-ben-boye-and-jim-white-album-review/
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