Falling in love with a record is like falling in love with a beautiful woman. With some records, you’re instantly smitten within the first few bars. Others, they initially underwhelm before slowly taking hold in your soul, and before you know it, you’re constantly listening to them and (if you’re musically minded) trying to download tabs from the Interwebz so you can cack-handedly play along.

Laura Veirs’ “July Flame” has been the latter. First time I heard it, I was left thinking it was perfectly pleasant, and filed it on the “give it another try later” drawer before quickly forgetting all about it. Reminded of the record by seeing a flyer for her London gigs I decided to give it another go, and how glad am I now, eh? From the delicate, charming opener “I Can See Your Tracks”, through easygoing, pedal-steel touched marvels such as “Sun Is King”, this album is a gem. It sparkles like an unexpected shard of muscovite mica in a slab of gabbro¹. That chord progression in “When You Give Your Heart” is enough to make the hardest heart melt like a ball of ice dropped into a pool of lava.

What’s better is that reviews and comments about this album have mostly been along the lines of “Well, it’s good, but not as good as some of her previous records”. For the uninitiated, this is like finding a geode inside an otherwise unremarkable rock. Ok, enough of the geology metaphors. But the feeling still stands; for people like me for whom there just aren’t enough hours in the day to find and listen to new stuff, finally uncovering a musician’s work after years of ignoring them and realising they are fantastic is a wonder beyond mere words.

July Flame is out on the ever-reliable Bella Union records and is available for purchase here. If, like me, you’re unitiated in her dreamy world, I’d suggest you take a dip now.

¹ Which, as any geologist would tell you, would be very unexpected indeed.

MP3: I Can See Your Tracks by Laura Veirs

I was chatting to The Venerable Indie Dave in the boozer after this the other day, and we got chatting about our respective blogs, especially the whole “how the fuck are people going to make money now?” thing. He mentioned a post he did the other week, about Les Savy Fav. It’s a great read, pointing out how the band posted a note on their website here asking people who’d downloaded the album to donate some money to them to make up for lost cash¹. And:

Pay extra and your also forgiven for sex sins and stuff AND we’ll tell Jesus to send you cookies

Which raises a good point. There’s been a whole load of rubbish talked about “lost revenue” from downloading, totalling trillions of dollars, made by extrapolating the number of downloads to the number of lost purchases. These are, as any half-decent scientist will point out, absolute junk. Making a rough guess on how many downloads have occurred and saying each one is responsible for a lost sale is ridiculous; for example, many downloads are people just trying something out that they probably wouldn’t have bought (in the old days, they’d have copied it off a mate). Others are people replacing lost/broken/outmoded copies. Saying that every download is theft is crazy.

Form An Orderly Queue, Ladies and Gents

But on the other hand, this is the way these bands make a living. It takes time to be good; being a decent musician, except in odd cases, takes a huge amount of work and effort. I recall reading that Jeff Buckley used to spend about 12 hours a day playing guitar to get good enough to perform. So, for musicians to make the music you want to listen to, you have to pay for it, whether it’s through record sales, merchandising, seeing the band live etc. Now, being old fashioned, I still go and buy records that I’ve downloaded, but be honest, how many of you do?

Radiohead’s honour system only worked because they are properly enormous. They can easily sell out 40,000 seater venues in each major city in the world, and so have enough of a fanbase that even if only 5% give them $10, they would be making out like bandits (as they City phrase has it. They’d know). But do Les Savy Fav have enough fans out there willing to bung them $5 or $10? I’d love to think that they do, but people being people, I wouldn’t like to bet on it.

Still, if you like the MP3 below, then buy the record. That’s the way this should work. You like, you buy. Otherwise this whole thing is going to go, as the saying says, tits up.

¹ The link’s now been removed. Just buy the damn record.

MP3: Let’s Get Out of Here by Les Savy Fav

Pre-Order Root for Ruin from Amazon

I got an email last month. It read something along the lines of “Listen to this guy, Paul Thomas Saunders. I think he’s incredible”. The last song this friend sent me was Frightened Rabbit’s “Swim Until You Can’t See Land”, and since that was one of the best songs I’d heard in years, then it was definitely the time to start paying attention.

Off I toddle to the Myspace page and have a quick listen. For all the talk of new ways to listen to music, unique paradigm shifts and all that guff, I’m an old-fashioned sort, and I struggle to sit there listening to music on my computer. Still, it seemed intriguing, and a short email chat later, I had a couple of bright shiny mp3’s to listen to on my way to work the next day. A journey that was spent by me, the next day, standing in a crowded District Line train with my mouth agape (I don’t think there was any drool, but you never can tell).

Paul Thomas Saunders can do that to you. He has that rare gift of pulling you into his world. Gently strummed guitars reverbing like they’re being played in a cathedral. Paul’s high, keening voice, filled with warmth, soars. A backing band that chuntle away in the background, like you’ve just walked into a group of hugely talented friends just chilling out on a warm summer’s evening in someone’s basement (not unlike Lambchop’s early days before they went studio-crazy¹.

The track I’ve provided here – “Dementia, Depression, Psychosis, Blues” showcases his talents beautifully. This is a song to get lost in; put it on when you’re on your evening commute and you’ll find yourself drifting off in a little daydream, only to wake five or so minutes later wondering where you are and whether you’ve had that stupid smile on your face the whole time. Then you play it again. This is a similarity he shares with the likes of Elliott Smith, or M Ward, or Laura Viers; the ability to take you from your own, mundane life into someone else’s, cocooning you in their sound until you can barely remember anything else.

Unlike Bright Spark Destroyer, Paul’s on a record label, Leed’s Dead Young Records, and features on their new compilation Dead Young Club II. Ordering details are available at their online shop here. The compilation’s definitely worth a fiver so get ordering.

In the meantime, have a listen to the track below. Absolutely wonderful. I think we’ve got a real talent on our hands here.

MP3: Dementia, Depression, Psychosis, Blues by Paul Thomas Saunders

¹ Not that this was a bad move in any way – Nixon was an incredible record, superbly produced. But their early material just felt so together. I can’t think of a better way of putting that right now.

Getting recommendations is a double-edged sword. For every fantastic new unsung and unsigned band there’s a hundred who would give Keane a run for their money in the 3:15 from Mediocrity Racecourse, Tedioustown. And what do you say to a friend who’s given you a hot tip, only to find out they make you want to tear your ears off, and theirs too, for suggesting such unwashed tripe?

Thankfully, in the last couple of weeks, I’ve been introduced to some supremely good bands. Two of them are so good they make my eyes water at the thought that they aren’t household names yet, and the third are a great example of how to get your name out to that seething mass of blogs out there.

So, to start off with, here’s Bright Spark Destroyer. Now that rock music is approaching a pensionable age, making a sound that is clearly and distinctly yours is tough¹. Listen to any new band and your brain immediately goes “Ooh, that’s The Beatles mixed with Beastie Boys with a bit of Faithless thrown in”. So it is with Bright Spark Destroyer; comparisons with Radiohead, Jeff Buckley and other choirboy-voiced anthemic indie-rock bands leap into view and jump about waving their arms frantically. But another thought strikes you.

And that thought is “Fucking hell, they are good”. Then after a few more listens you think “Holy sweet mother of Jebus, they really are very, very good”. Yes, there’s more than a tinge of Radiohead, but combining their earlier The Bends/Ok Computer phase with the later “We’re Autechre! But not as good!” phase with far more grace and style than Radiohead themselves manage. The singer’s choirboy antics are mannered and measured, and never seem forced; they are pleasingly reminiscent of the long lost Andrew Montgomery’s band Geneva (and whilst they never reach these heights, there’s no harm in trying, eh?). There’s chunks of Grizzly Bear and Doves in there too; an intricacy of interweaving guitar lines and little hooks that keep you coming back for just one more listen.

Don't Unplug Anything!

The whole of their debut EP “Holy Yell” is excellent; picking out a favourite track becomes a close-your-eyes-and-throw-a-dart exercise. But for me it’s “They Already Know”. Just the other day, I was lazing around in what passes for English summer sunshine, and found myself tapping out a rhythm. After a couple of moments, I realised it was the drumbeat to this song, which had ensconced itself into my brain in true earworm style. If you, like me, like your music challenging yet tuneful, emotional without overwrought histrionics, and, in plain speaking, ace, this is a song for you.

More songs are available for a listen on the band’s website here, and the EP’s available to download. Personally, if I were you, I’d download it like a shot. This record has, in the few weeks I’ve had it, become one of my favourites of the year so far. This lot will go far. Or at least, they’d better do, or there’s truly no justice in this world.

¹ Ok, making a sound that is clearly and distinctly yours and making it good at the same time is tough. It’s pretty easy to make something original and shit.

MP3: They Already Know by Bright Spark Destroyer

Here’s a little question for you. How many copies of Parallel Lines do you think Blondie sold? 1 million? Sure, that’s a pretty decent number for a post-punk-pop band, but not even close. 5 million? That would keep any decently managed band in drainpipe jeans and guitars for life. But no.

10 million? Getting closer, but still no cigar.

They sold, depending on who you listen to, between 20 and 40 million copies.

Let that sink in a minute. Those sort of numbers make you a global star. Once you sell that many records, you can do whatever you like the rest of your life. You are seriously, properly, yacht-buying, helicopter-flying rich. Of course, things didn’t quite work out that well for the band, what with Chris Stein suffering from an horrific auto-immune disease called Pemphigus, causing him to be seriously ill for many years (he’s better now, thankfully).

Anyway, that was just a little thought for today. The days of a band like Blondie selling even a tenth of that number of records is long, long gone. Whilst I’ve railed against the waste and extravagance of the record industry in the past, you can’t help but admire the way it could turn a bunch of hugely talented musicians into global superstars, and making them, and some pretty obscure songwriters, very, very, very rich. Not that money makes you happy, of course, but it can buy you a better class of misery.

As a little tribute to the record, the band, and one of the obscure musicians who wrote some of the songs on the album, here’s “Hanging On The Telephone”, the opener to Parallel Lines. Enjoy your Saturday.

MP3: Hanging On The Telephone by Blondie

Buy “Parallel Lines: Remastered” (CD/MP3)

The brain works in mysterious ways. Last night, idly flicking through “Guitarist” magazine (the finest Guitar magazine known to man, I’ll have you know), I was overcome by an urge to listen to Radiohead’s “The Bends”. First the song, which I picked up on You Tube:

Then the album, on the way to work today. What a track. What an album. From a band whose previous sole success had been the Nirvana-meets-The Pixies whine of “Creep”, The Bends was a bolt from the blue. Sure, they’d made a statement of intent with “My Iron Lung” the previous year, which had at least shown their willingness to turn the QuietLoudQuiet dynamic of The Pixies (and “Creep” itself) into a beautifully deranged noise, but you’d still happily say that this record was a shock.

I’ll bet it’s been a while since you listened to “The Bends”. Treat yourself now. Misery and the pain of the modern world’s tendency to isolate people has never sounded so gloriously celebratory. So “Ok Computer” may be a better album, and more of a musical step forward, but as a pure Rock record, “The Bends” must stand as one of the best ever. And if for some reason, you’ve never listened to it – maybe put off by the dreary Kid A or the general impression that they are a bunch of miseryguts¹ – just listen to it.

And it’s 15 years old this year. I can’t imagine many records from 1995 have aged quite as well. Sometimes, reaching back to a record you’ve not listened to for years helps you appreciate just how good they were. Anyway, enough of my yakking. Let’s Misery Rock!

¹ And they do tend to being a bit miserable, but sod it. Miserable music gets me happy. And they’re hardly the Tindersticks.

MP3: The Bends by Radiohead

Treat Yourself To The Deluxe “The Bends [2CD & DVD]”