All posts in Music Criticism

  • The Weekend Australian album review: The War On Drugs, March 2014

    An album review published in The Weekend Australian on March 15 – my first ever five-star album review, I believe.

    The War On Drugs – Lost In The Dream

    twod_dreamAbout 3 ½ minutes into the first track, ‘Under the Pressure’, is when it first becomes apparent that Lost in the Dream may be a masterpiece: a muscular brass melody seeps into the mix, mimicking the chord progression and adding a new urgency to an already brisk tune. Its final three minutes are free of percussion; instead, waves of shimmering guitar tones and bass harmonics slowly fade out, to stunning effect. It’s one hell of a mood-setter that summarises the album’s pervasive feel of hazy discontent tinged with brightness.

    Within moments of track two settling into its groove, all bets are off. This galloping indie rock number is an instant classic that captures The War on Drugs at its most vital: four players locked into one of the most remarkable and moving grooves I’ve heard. It’s a cop-out that one hates to defer to, but words don’t do it justice. ‘Red Eyes‘ — the album’s first single — is a towering musical achievement that will be studied decades hence, just as we still study Led Zeppelin, the Stones and the Beatles.

    The War on Drugs was formed in 2005 by singer-guitarist Adam Granduciel and Lost in the Dream is the band’s third album, yet as with its predecessor Slave Ambient (2011), many of its complex sounds were assembled piece by piece by the frontman. “I wanted to do something that showcased what the band had become without necessarily giving up control of the recording,” the 35-year-old recently told American website Grantland. “I feel like with this record, I wasn’t ready to do that yet.”

    A break-up left him alone in a big, empty house with the task of finishing this record, which sees the band teetering on the precipice between indie acclaim and mainstream acceptance. (The quartet visited Australia at the end of last year, playing day slots to modest crowds at Falls Festival and a handful of smaller headline shows.)

    Granduciel’s anxiety and depression during this period played their part in Lost in the Dream’s sonic footprint; despite the upbeat bravado of ‘Red Eyes’, many of the remaining nine tracks favour introspective, world-weary instrumentation and narratives.

    Sixth track ‘Eyes to the Wind’ is a fine example: at a key moment midway through the song, Granduciel sings “There’s just a stranger, living in me” in his sweet, distinctive accent, which sits perfectly amid strummed acoustic guitars and delicate piano runs. Album closer ‘In Reverse’ dwells in late-night self-examination — “Sometimes I wait for the cold wind blowing/ As I struggle with myself right now/ As I let the darkness in” — amid a buoyant chord progression and insistent backbeat.

    There is darkness on Lost in the Dream, as in life, but these moments ultimately are outweighed by hope. In sum, this is a striking statement from a visionary songwriter and his dedicated bandmates. It’s a masterful hour-long work whose strengths and charms are immediately evident yet whose secrets are buried deep.

    LABEL: Inertia/Secretly Canadian
    RATING: 5 stars

  • The Weekend Australian album reviews, February 2014: Warpaint, Halfway, Harmony

    Album reviews published in The Weekend Australian in February 2014.

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    Warpaint – Warpaint

    Warpaint - 'Warpaint' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, February 2014The music made by the four members of Los Angeles indie rock act Warpaint rarely contains hard edges.

    Usually, it’s the stuff of film dream sequences: ethereal, emotive and somewhat divorced from reality. This wistful aesthetic worked well on the band’s 2010 debut The Fool, and still does four years later.

    But it’s the seventh of 12 tracks here, ‘Disco//Very’, that’s most immediately striking. Powered by Jenny Lee Lindberg’s busy bassline and drummer Stella Mozgawa’s intricate cymbal-and-snare pattern, its opening lyric almost works as a band mission statement: “I’ve got a friend with a melody that will kill/ She’ll eat you alive.”

    These four are masters of mood and melody, and Warpaint is a fine document of that fact. Three years in the making, it’s an engrossing listen from the wordless opening track, ‘Intro’, right through to its plaintive closer, ‘Son’.

    First single ‘Love Is to Die’ is an instant earworm on par with The Fool single ‘Undertow’ in terms of sheer accessibility. As before, vocals are shared among Lindberg and guitarists Emily Kokal and Theresa Wayman. In Australian-born Mozgawa the band possesses one of rock’s finest drummers, yet they’re not above paring back the percussion, as evidenced on sparse penultimate track ‘Drive’.

    It is to Warpaint’s credit that their second album is full of interesting and accomplished experiments rather than the comparatively simple emulation of initial success. While it is well worth the four-year wait, here’s hoping the band’s work ethic speeds up a little before the next release. Warpaint comes highly recommended.

    LABEL: Remote Control
    RATING: 4 stars

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    Halfway – Any Old Love

    Halfway - 'Any Old Love' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, February 2014Eight players make up Halfway, a rock band from Brisbane that injects banjo, pedal steel guitar, piano and mandolin into the genre’s usual instrumentation.

    The central lyrical theme on Any Old Love is evident in the title: almost all of the 13 tracks are love songs in one shape or another. Whether it’s the exploration of that emotion in its nascent stages (‘Honey I Like You’) or towards the end of a difficult relationship (‘Hard Life Loving You’), the prose is never less than honest and true.

    So, too, are the razor-sharp melodies conjured by these eight men, particularly album opener ‘Dropout’, a ludicrously catchy instant-classic that is at once familiar and unique. In a departure from the shared duties observed on 2010’s excellent An Outpost Of Promise, almost all of these songs are credited to John Busby, who shares vocals with fellow guitarist Chris Dale.

    Both possess soft, distinctive voices that sit snugly amid their bandmates’ driving groove. There is depth to the stories told here, too: “Bar stories and cautionary tales on the Central Western Line”, reads a subtitle in the liner notes, referring to the 780km Queensland railway system that runs from the state’s Emerald to Hughenden.

    There’s even a helpful glossary that lists 13 terms and names mentioned in the lyrics; clearly, a lot of thought has gone into this album, the band’s fourth. Any Old Love marks another accomplished entry into the growing catalogue of one of Australia’s best rock bands.

    LABEL: Plus One
    RATING: 4.5 stars

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    Harmony – Carpetbombing

    Harmony - 'Carpetbombing' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, February 2014“I know I smell like petrol; smell like I’ve been sleeping rough / Like I’ve got on everything I own, no matter what the heat.”

    An ominous spoken-word piece by Cold Chisel songwriter Don Walker, ‘The Closing of the Day’, is as memorable as album openers come. Accompanied by a lone guitar looping spectral notes, its function as calm-before-storm is perfectly executed.

    It leads right into ‘Water Runs Cold’, where the bass and drums make their first appearance and, within a minute, Harmony’s secret weapon cuts in: the stirring vocals of Amanda Roff, Quinn Veldhuis and Erica Dunn, which provide stark contrast to the full-throated roar favoured by guitarist and lead vocalist Tom Lyngcoln.

    It’s this juxtaposition of femininity and masculinity that first proved compelling on the Melbourne band’s self-titled debut album in 2011. On Carpetbombing, they’ve sharpened their songwriting. The result is a potent collection of bleak, beautiful songs that can be atonal at times, awash in dissonant chords and clattering cymbals. It’s in these moments that the gospel-style vocals are deployed like a floodlight into a pitch-black cavern. The effect is used sparingly, however; Harmony is far from a one-trick pony.

    Highlights include the peculiar, push-and-pull rhythm of ‘Diminishing Returns’, which concludes with a cutting guitar solo by Lyngcoln, and the six-minute epic ‘Unknown Hunter’, which may be the band’s most remarkable piece of work.

    Carpetbombing is not an easy listen. Its unique charm requires some immersion before being properly appreciated, and its unconventional song structures continue to surprise long after that uncertain first listen.

    LABEL: Poison City Records
    RATING: 4 stars

  • The Weekend Australian album reviews, Sept – Nov 2013: Wolf & Cub, Jae Laffer, Mick Turner, Greta Mob

    Album reviews published in The Weekend Australian between September and November 2013.

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    Wolf & Cub – Heavy Weight

    Wolf & Cub - 'Heavy Weight' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, September 2013While Perth act Tame Impala has been flying the flag for Australian psychedelic rock since 2010, playing on American talk shows and at nearly every festival in the world, Adelaide quartet Wolf & Cub have been quiet.

    Following an excellent debut in 2006’s Vessels, their second album, 2009’s Science and Sorcery, was a stark disappointment.

    Heavy Weight, then, marks a return from the musical wilderness — four years away is a long time for any band, especially a mid-tier independent — and a return to form that will have Tame Impala looking over its shoulder. Joel Byrne (guitar and vocals) and Joel Carey (drums) are the two original members, but with the change in line-up comes renewed focus: 11 songs deep and no missteps to speak of, only a meandering and characterless two-minute coda to eighth track ‘See the Light that’ we could have done without.

    Elsewhere, ‘All Through the Night’ is a sprawling, urgent cut in the vein of Canadian indie rock band the Besnard Lakes; ‘I Need More’ is as streamlined a pop song as the band has produced, and in ‘Got a Feeling’ Wolf & Cub end Heavy Weight on an uplifting note, similar to how Californian rock act Black Rebel Motorcycle Club closed its most recent album.

    Embedded throughout these songs are smart basslines, tidy percussion and Byrne’s vocal hooks and impressive array of guitar effects. May their fine work here land them on US talk shows and global festival stages before too long.

    LABEL: MGM
    RATING: 4 stars

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    Jae Laffer – When The Iron Glows Red

    Jae Laffer - 'When The Iron Glows Red' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, October 2013As frontman of Perth-born pop act The Panics, Jae Laffer is well regarded for his songwriting quantity and quality.

    Best known for the ARIA award-winning third album, Cruel Guards, and its lead single, ‘Don’t Fight It’, the band has been firing since its 2003 debut album, A House on a Street in a Town I’m From.

    It’s unsurprising, then, that Laffer’s first solo release is just as accomplished as everything that came before. These are acoustic pop songs bolstered by warm instrumentation; the enterprising Laffer plays nearly every sound heard on the album besides drums and bass, the latter being handled by his Panics bandmate Paul Otway. It’s a potent chain of 10 tracks without a single weak link.

    The screaming saxophone in ‘Leaving on Time’ is a thrill, as is the lovely vocal duet with Angie Hart in ‘To Mention Her’. The best is saved for last, though: the chilling title track closes the album, and it’s right up there with the best songs that Laffer has had a hand in.

    Press materials suggest he was moved to write and record an album quickly; he desired spontaneity, to sing the words to the songs “while the ink was still wet on the page”. If the man can whip up 10 winning pop songs from scratch at speed, then other writers have reason to be quaking in their boots.

    That ability, coupled with his distinctive, laconic vocal style — long central to the Panics’ appeal — results in a truly rare bird. Highly recommended.

    LABEL: Dew Process
    RATING: 4.5 stars

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    Mick Turner – Don’t Tell The Driver

    Mick Turner - 'Don't Tell The Driver' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, November 2013New work by one of Australia’s most distinctive guitarists is always worth a listen, and usually worth dwelling on at some length.

    Don’t Tell the Driver slots neatly into the latter category. It’s the fourth album by Melbourne-based musician Mick Turner, who is one-third of the internationally acclaimed instrumental rock act Dirty Three. His laconic, meticulous style of playing is evocative no matter the context; a memorable quote by Bobby Gillespie, frontman of Scottish rock band Primal Scream, describes his six-string style as “the way that stars are spaced out across the sky”.

    Turner’s past solo releases have been tough to recommend due to their meandering, unfocused nature: his last album, 2003’s Moth, comprised 19 short, looped instrumental ideas. Here the guitarist has enlisted a diverse group of players to bolster the mix, and it works well: horns, piano, melodica, bass and drums drift in and out of focus but never overshadow the star of the show.

    Most notable is the addition of vocals on a few of the 11 tracks: Caroline Kennedy-McCracken’s softly sung words wrap nicely around the gentle rhythm of the title track, and opera singer Oliver Mann makes an unexpected appearance at the beginning of album standout ‘Over Waves’.

    That Turner has embraced a more traditional style of songwriting is to his credit. No one else plays guitar quite the way he does. Don’t Tell the Driver is recommended as his strongest and most accessible work to date.

    LABEL: Remote Control Records/King Crab
    RATING: 3.5 stars

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    Greta Mob – Let The Sunburnt Country Burn

    Greta Mob - 'Let The Sunburnt Country Burn' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, November 2013‘Yorta Yorta’, the opening track of this Sydney band’s debut album, is one of the most striking songs released this year.

    The narrator tells a story from his childhood of being caught trespassing while fishing in northern Victoria. When he pleads ignorance, stating his belief that the land belonged to the local indigenous clan – the Yorta Yorta people – he’s told that “There ain’t no more of them blacks alive / They started killing them back in 1835”. In his dream that night, the narrator witnesses a tribal elder’s brutal murder at the hands of a white farmer. The singer ends with an impassioned cry that echoes Midnight Oil’s ‘Beds are Burning’: “The truth be known, we don’t own this land / Let’s give it back to them”.

    This seven-minute tale is set to a rollicking rock backbeat; clashing guitars and mournful harmonica lines add to the atmosphere. Unfortunately, the seven tracks that follow don’t come close to the opener. Greta Mob was formed by singer Rhyece O’Neill – who plays nearly every instrument here – and drummer Luke Millar two years ago; Let the Sunburnt Country Burn was recorded in a warehouse in Berlin, in Sydney, and in a shearing shed south of Mudgee, NSW.

    The album sounds fantastic, thanks to the natural reverb of those open spaces. Although this is an uneven debut, there are some great ideas. Greta Mob may soon join the Drones and the Kill Devil Hills, two independent acts that continually strive to make intelligent, evocative Australian rock music.

    LABEL: Greta Mob Music
    RATING: 3.5 stars

     

  • The Weekend Australian album reviews, June 2013: QOTSA, Sigur Ros

    Two album reviews published in The Weekend Australian Review in June 2013.

    Queens Of The Stone Age – …Like Clockwork

    Queens of the Stone Age - '...Like Clockwork' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, June 2013The sixth album from this Californian hard rock band solidifies its reputation for consistency. Though founding singer-guitarist Josh Homme is the only ongoing member, he has become known for attracting a rotating cast of accomplished players since the band’s self-titled debut in 1998.

    This time he has re-enlisted master sticksman Dave Grohl (Nirvana, Foo Fighters) to keep time, after first trialling this experiment for 2002’s Songs for the Deaf, widely regarded as QOTSA’s finest album. (It helped that the pair hooked up with Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul Jones in 2009, too, as Them Crooked Vultures.)

    As expected, it’s an inspired decision, one that sets the tone for yet another compelling collection. Songs such as ‘If I Had a Tail’ and ‘Smooth Sailing’ swagger with a momentum that only Homme and his comrades can muster. First single ‘My God is the Sun’ is the weakest of these 10 tracks; the real gold is buried towards the back.

    ‘I Appear Missing’ and the closing, title track exceed five minutes and hark back to the expansive suites that featured on the band’s excellent second album, 2000’s Rated R. Homme has long since learned that rock music is all about contrasts: atmosphere is just as important as breakneck chord changes.

    “One thing that is clear / It’s all downhill from here,” he sings in the album’s final lyric; he must be taking the piss because six hits and no misses is as remarkable a scorecard as you’ll find among bands of any genre.

    LABEL: Matador/Remote Control
    RATING: 4 stars

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    Sigur Ros – Kveikur

    Sigur Ros - 'Kveikur' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, June 2013There are bands with distinctive sounds, and then there’s Sigur Ros. These Icelandic gentlemen have produced seven albums, including Kveikur (pronounced ‘quaker’, meaning candlewick in the mother tongue); and with each successive release they further distance themselves from any other act, past or present.

    Formed in 1994, Sigur Ros has long been associated with the post-rock genre that favours sprawling, intricate compositions eschewing traditional verse-chorus structures. Kveikur is the group’s strongest album yet. It’s certainly Sigur Ros’s most accessible collection. Nine tracks, 48 minutes in total; only the closer, ‘Var’ (Shelter), is forgettable: a wordless, aimless dead-end of sunken, delayed piano notes and sighing strings.

    The other eight tracks are thrilling, powerful and inspiring. The nature of the cinematic sound, coupled with the band members’ Icelandic heritage, inevitably conjures mental images of snow-capped mountains and glaciers. Its winter release is ideal. Here, the former quintet is reduced to a three-piece for the first time. Jon Por Birgisson’s incomparable falsetto and bowed guitar playing practically defines this band; even his solo album, 2010’s Go, was virtually indistinguishable from the Sigur Ros catalogue.

    Only Georg Holm (bass) and Orri Pall Dyrason (drums) accompany him here, yet you’d never guess that based on the complexity of the production. Layered strings, clattering percussion and soaring sampled effects run through these songs, as best exemplified on second single ‘Isjaki’ (Iceberg). This is excellent music, unlike anything else on earth. For the uninitiated, Kveikur is the ideal starting point.

    LABEL: XL Recordings
    RATING: 4.5 stars

  • Rolling Stone album review: Midnight Juggernauts – ‘Uncanny Valley’, June 2013

    Midnight Juggernauts - 'Uncanny Valley' album reviewed in Rolling Stone Australia by Andrew McMillen, June 2013An album review for the July 2013 issue of Rolling Stone Australia.

    Midnight Juggernauts
    Uncanny Valley

    Melbourne outfit hit the bullseye on third full-length

    Midnight Juggernauts’ first two albums suffered from inconsistency, but there are no such issues here: Uncanny Valley‘s 10 tracks is packed with hooks. If anything, they’ve streamlined their approach, cutting the fat and boning up on the pop smarts that’ve been central to the Juggernauts’ appeal since their excellent debut, 2007’s Dystopia. Distinctive, sinister first single “Ballad of the War Machine” isn’t the strongest song here: that’d be the masterful finale, “Melodiya”, a stunning summary of the trio’s ability to marry shadowy dance music with elements of electronica, rock and pop. A fine way to close their most accomplished set yet.

    Label: Remote Control
    Rating: 4 stars

  • The Weekend Australian album review, March 2013: Songs – ‘Malabar’

    An album review for The Weekend Australian, published 16 March 2013.

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    Songs – Malabar

    Songs - 'Malabar' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, March 2013The second album by one of the least Google-friendly bands is short in duration – 39 minutes all up – but long on quality ideas.

    A quartet based in Sydney, Songs were impressive on their self-titled 2009 debut: an eclectic set that centred on taut, jangle-pop numbers, but also found room for a couple of sprawling noise-rock epics. Malabar is a more focused collection than the first that favours the former style over the latter.

    The duelling male-female vocals of songwriters Max Doyle and Ela Stiles are just as complementary as before. If anything, this is their defining trait, and the band uses it to stunning effect on this album’s sixth track, ‘Ringing Bells’. Late in the piece,

    Stiles’s wordless melody weaves between sparkling guitar notes and the driving rhythm section: the result is one of the finest songs in their young career. Fans of veteran American indie trio Yo La Tengo will enjoy Songs’ approach, as the two bands have a few stylistic tropes in common.

    Never is the mix any more complicated than a handful of instruments working together; all in all, Malabar represents a remarkable command of songwriting dynamics and sonics. ‘Looking Without Seeing’ is another highlight, built on a hypnotic bassline, featuring Stiles’s soaring vocals and the unexpected appearance of a flute.

    The core duo clearly made the right decision in introducing Cameron Emerson-Elliot (guitar, formerly Youth Group) and Ben James (drums, Talons) into the fold, as the eight ideas here, plus the abbreviated ninth track, ‘Reprise’, a return to the haunting melody of ‘Ringing Bells’, are all winners.

    LABEL: Popfrenzy
    RATING: 4 stars

  • Rolling Stone album review: The Drones – ‘I See Seaweed’, March 2013

    An album review for the April 2013 issue of Rolling Stone Australia. Click the below image for a closer look, or read the review text underneath.

    The Drones
    I See Seaweed

    The Drones explore cracks of beauty and humour amid the darkness on sixth LP

    The Drones - 'I See Seaweed' album reviewed in March 2013 issue of Rolling Stone by Andrew McMillenThis album’s greatest surprise is saved for the penultimate track, ‘Laika’: an orchestral upswing suddenly blooms from nowhere, and it’s later paired with a harmonising female choir. Neither stylistic decision sits well with The Drones’ reputation for misanthropic, noisy rock ‘n’ roll, but the result is beautiful.

    This Melbourne band’s sixth studio album sees keyboardist Steve Hesketh expanding the quartet to a five-piece. His contributions here work well, often providing another layer of rhythmic bedrock to keep these eight tracks grounded; on ‘How To See Through Fog’, though, Hesketh’s tinkering accounts for a memorable lead melody.

    Singer Gareth Liddiard is well-known for penning some of the most original rhyming couplets in Australian music; I See Seaweed is no exception. The eight-minute title track alludes to rising seas and overpopulation: “We’re locksteppin’ in our billions,” he sings, “Locksteppin’ in our swarms / Locksteppin’ in the certainty that more need to be born”. It’s the heaviest song – lyrically and musically – that The Drones have released since ‘Jezebel’, the devastating opener to 2006’s Gala Mill.

    But it’s not all dark. ‘Nine Eyes’ sees Liddiard using Google Street View to visit his childhood home – accompanied by a sinister groove – and wondering “what kind of asshole drives this lime green Commodore” parked out front; ‘A Moat You Can Stand In’ matches a hilarious skewering of modern religious practices to a taut, thrash-rock tempo that nods at their early material.

    I See Seaweed captures a singular band in scintillating form, delivering yet another astounding collection of songs.

    Label: MGM
    Rating: 4.5 stars

    Key tracks: ‘I See Seaweed’, ‘Laika’, ‘Nine Eyes’

    Elsewhere: I interviewed Gareth Liddiard for The Vine a fortnight before the album’s release

  • The Weekend Australian album reviews, February 2013: PVT, Foals, My Bloody Valentine, Hungry Kids of Hungary

    Four album reviews for The Weekend Australian, published in February 2013.

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    PVT – Homosapien

    PVT - 'Homosapien' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, February 2013Three stylistic decisions have shifted Sydney act PVT – formerly known as Pivot – from a great band to a good one.

    Church with No Magic, from 2010, saw the trio add lyrics for the first time, largely abandoning guitar and bass in favour of synthesisers, and downplaying live drums in favour of electronic beats.

    Their fourth album, Homosapien, extends these three traits even further: the majority of the album is arranged and played electronically. Richard Pike retains the vocal duties he assumed on Church. His voice is powerful and well-suited to this music, but the content is dubious: many choruses consist only of one phrase, repeated.

    There are flashes of lyrical brilliance, as in the evocative first lines of ‘Electric’: “I left my heart on the railroad track, it’s still waiting for the next train/ I didn’t clock into work today, now all my work is in vain”). Pike’s brother, Laurence, is one of the most distinctive drummers in this country, yet his stick work here is either restrained or replaced by a drum machine.

    The band’s strength is in its electronic backbone, arranged by Dave Miller. The songs are clear, without many overdubs, and there are a handful of great moments: ‘Love & Defeat’, with wall-to-wall bass synths offset by a glorious, cutting melody, and the title track, which is the album’s only guitar-led track.

    The 2008 instrumental album O Soundtrack My Heart remains the band’s crowning achievement, a thrilling combination of rock muscle and electronic beauty. Homosapien is the sound of these three men running in the opposite direction, with mixed results.

    Label: Create Control
    Rating: 3 stars

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    Foals – Holy Fire

    Foals - 'Holy Fire' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, February 2013By merging dance-floor beats with finicky guitar theatrics on their 2008 debut album, Antidotes, this British band emerged with a singular vision.

    The result was one of the most compelling recent contributions to the math-rock subgenre. Total Life Forever (2010) saw the quintet leaning more towards indie pop, experimenting with atmospheric tricks, and pushing Yannis Philippakis’s voice higher into the mix; handy, as he has both striking tone and unique phrasing.

    Holy Fire finds the band consolidating this new-found pop aesthetic while accentuating the intricate percussive and guitar interplay that first set them apart. Still in their mid-20s, Foals are almost old hands at this game. Production by British duo Flood (U2, Smashing Pumpkins) and Alan Moulder (Nine Inch Nails, the Killers) certainly works in the band’s favour, as the album sounds a million bucks.

    There’s plenty to like about the first two singles – the metallic chorus riffs of ‘Inhaler’ and the sheer joy of ‘My Number’, their poppiest song yet – but, like Total Life Forever, this is a collection to be enjoyed as a whole.

    Some of the band’s finest work appears on the second half: notably the stirring strings that run through ‘Milk & Black Spiders’ and the staccato bombast of ‘Providence’. Even long-favoured studio techniques, such as double-tracking and adding reverb to Philippakis’s vocals, continue to sound fresh against the innovative ideas laid down by his bandmates.

    Holy Fire opens with a storming, four-minute instrumental, ‘Prelude’, that works well as a statement of intent; the following 10 tracks do nothing to erode that mood. At a touch under 50 minutes, that’s quite an achievement.

    Label: Warner
    Rating: 4 stars

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    my bloody valentine – m b v

    my bloody valentine - 'm b v' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, February 2013It takes a long time to make music sound as good as m b v does. About 22 years, in fact.

    The last time my bloody valentine released new music was in 1991 and Loveless, the Irish quartet’s second album, remains the high-water mark of the “shoegaze” alternative rock movement.

    A thrilling listen from top to tail, Loveless contained some of the most unbelievable guitar sounds heard then or since. It’s had all sorts of adjectives thrown at it through the years but the most appropriate is “peerless”.

    And so, m b v, a nine-track album sneak-released online in early February, took by surprise many of the band’s fans.

    Topping the last effort is a practically insurmountable feat, yet this collection must inevitably be compared with the band’s last. So, in short: no, m b v isn’t quite as earth-shattering as Loveless, but it’s still very good, and well worth your attention.

    The guitar tone and phrasing are phenomenal: the second track ‘only tomorrow’ (the band insists that their name, album and song titles are all to be written in lower case) is one of the band’s finest creations, a real marvel of layering and repetition.

    As with Loveless, the drums, bass and vocals are all secondary in importance to the guitars, which sound so sharp they might cut you in half if you turn the sound up loud enough. And you should. The band’s entire existence is practically an exercise in volume control. ‘in another way’ is the best song here; a modern update to Loveless‘s classic final track, ‘Soon’, if you will.

    There’s only one disposable track, the synth-led ‘is this and yes’. The rest? Peerless, still.

    Label: Independent
    Rating: 4.5 stars

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    Hungry Kids Of Hungary – You’re A Shadow

    Hungry Kids Of Hungary - 'You're A Shadow' album cover, reviewed in The Weekend Australian by Andrew McMillen, February 2013Hungry Kids of Hungary’s 2010 debut, Escapades, gave a strong portent of the songwriting and musical ability lurking within.

    To its credit, You’re a Shadow supersedes the Brisbane pop quartet’s debut in every way. The band’s greatest asset is that each member is a master of their instrument. There’s no weak link; no bassist playing tired lines, no drummer tapping out predictable beats. Every note is chosen for the purpose of serving the song.

    That may sound banal but in the context of indie pop it’s rare and remarkable to encounter such consistent innovation in the musicianship. For most bands, it’s enough to hit on a memorable vocal melody or guitar riff, and ride the hook out for three or four minutes. Not Hungry Kids.

    These 11 songs crackle with verve. It’s clear these four have thrown everything they have into You’re a Shadow and the results speak for themselves. There’s not a weak track here. At a touch under 40 minutes, it’s a lean collection but the ideas on display never outlast their welcome. This is another sign of the band’s maturity: don’t overplay, don’t overwrite, don’t oversing. Guitarist Dean McGrath and keyboardist Kane Mazlin share vocals and writing duties. Their first co-write, ‘When Yesterday’s Gone’, is the finest song here: a simply beautiful four-minute jam about mourning lost time. ‘Memo’ is a close runner-up; the way it segues flawlessly from the previous track ‘Colours’ is a nice touch, but the interplay between Ben Dalton’s bassline and Mazlin’s delicate key phrasing is spectacular. Indie pop music doesn’t get much better than this. Highly recommended.

    Label: Stop Start
    Rating: 4.5 stars

  • The Weekend Australian album reviews, November 2012: Spencer P. Jones, Crystal Castles

    Two album reviews for The Weekend Australian, published in November.

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    Spencer P. Jones and The Nothing Butts – Spencer P. Jones and The Nothing Butts

    For Australian rock fans, this supergroup is a match made in heaven: two members from Beasts of Bourbon and two from The Drones combining to make a beautiful racket.

    On the group’s self-titled debut, the best of both bands can be heard: smart lyricism, enviable energy, finely tuned ears for melody and fantastic guitar sounds.

    Drones leader Gareth Liddiard doesn’t sing here, but his sonic fingerprints are all over these nine tracks: spiralling natural harmonics, whammy-bar flexes and overwhelming klaxon-call effects in the coda of ‘Freak Out’. Removed from the context of his masterful songwriting – Jones is the only lyricist here – it’s apparent exactly how exceptional and valuable Liddiard’s guitar playing is: no other rock guitarist in the world sounds like he does. The noise is enthralling.

    ‘When He Finds Out’ is the centrepiece, filled with unsubtle innuendo and stretched across eight gripping minutes: “Blood is thicker than water, your father screams and shouts / I shudder to think what he’ll do when he finds out,” sings Jones, while James Baker’s hi-hat bounces out an uneasy rhythm and Fiona Kitschin’s sparse bass notes add to the mystique. There’s no humour here, just unresolved tension: the extended guitar freak-out is effectively a stand-in for a violent confrontation. Fearsome stuff.

    Elsewhere, titles such as ‘When Friends Turn’ and ‘Duplicity’ hint at the headspace Jones was in while writing. Not a second is wasted: at 39 minutes, the album feels tantalisingly brief and demands repeated listens. This is an absorbing and cathartic collection of songs performed by four accomplished musicians. Not to be missed.

    Label: Shock
    Rating: 4.5 stars

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    Crystal Castles – III

    The third full-length album released by this young Canadian electronic duo lacks the immediate sonic punch that made their first two albums such compelling listens.

    It’s their darkest set yet, but that isn’t such a bad thing. It shows that producer Ethan Kath and vocalist Alice Glass seek artistic growth, and that they’re not content to stay within their comfort zone.

    With their 2008 self-titled debut, Crystal Castles emerged with a fully formed sound that merged synth-led pop ideals with ugly, distorted chiptune sounds, born from Kath’s experimentation with bending circuitry. The music they produced was unique four years ago and remains so.

    As with previous releases, the vocals on III often take on an eerie quality, as Glass rarely sings without the aid of pitch-shifting effects. Those few phrases that are allowed to penetrate through the wash of sound are stark and blunt: “Catch a moth, hold it in my hand / Crush it casually,” she sings sweetly on ‘Affection’, yet the song ends with a cold, cyborg-like voice stating: “We drown in pneumonia, not rivers and streams.”

    This merging of man and machine seems to be one of Crystal Castles’ main goals and they’re bloody good at it; most of the time there’s little sense that human beings had a hand in creating this work. They did, of course, and they undoubtedly worked hard, yet III gives off no sense of struggle. This isn’t their most accessible release – that is 2010’s II – but it’s still a fine extension of their effortless sound, at once beautiful and ugly; intentionally flawed, yet polished to near-perfection.

    Label: Shock
    Rating: 3.5 stars

  • The Weekend Australian album reviews, October 2012: Collarbones, Tame Impala, The Key Of Sea

    Three album reviews for The Weekend Australian, published in October.

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    Collarbones – Die Young

    What we have here is an original and compelling take on pop music viewed through the lenses of electronica, R&B and hip-hop.

    Duo Collarbones – Adelaide-based Travis Cook, and Sydney local Marcus Whale – don’t care much for genre constraints. It’s the best thing they’ve got going for them. Musical innovation is truly rare; there’s no one in Australia writing material like this. Their point of difference is technology-enabled: each track is built on intricate collages of instrumental samples cut, copied and pasted on laptops. Whale’s voice, by turns soulful and ethereal, narrates these stark soundscapes.

    It’s a concept album, of sorts: the lyrics focus on adolescent love and fallen pop idols. The title track is a fine example of the unconventional Collarbones songwriting style: over a lazy backbeat, what sounds like stringed instruments are sped up, slowed down and mashed together to beguiling effect. A verbose verse by Melburnian rapper HTML Flowers contrasts well against Whale’s clear voice.

    The following track, ‘Too Much’, is backed by Cook’s booming, bass-heavy beat; Whale unironically embraces a big, melodic, 1990s-era boy band-style chorus. It could easily be a radio hit. The approach would be a gimmick if the songs weren’t so good.

    The duo’s debut album, last year’s Iconography, was an intriguing introduction but an unsatisfying collection in whole: too many half-sketched ideas, too few proper songs. Die Young is a fully realised follow-up, one that sees the pair living up to their potential. It may be one of the stranger pop albums you’ll hear this year, but you won’t regret your time spent with these 10 fine tracks.

    Label: Two Bright Lakes

    Rating: 4 stars

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    Tame Impala – Lonerism

    The trouble with releasing a killer debut album is that it’s much harder to impress with the follow-up.

    This is the situation in which Perth-based quartet Tame Impala finds itself, two years after Innerspeaker, a standout collection of retro-tinged rock songs written and produced almost entirely by singer Kevin Parker.

    That formula hasn’t changed on Lonerism: the young maestro again handles vocals and all instrumentation (in concert, he’s assisted by three bandmates). The main point of difference is that these 12 tracks were recorded in several locations while the band toured the world. And it shows: compared with Innerspeaker‘s lush, enveloping production, there’s much less cohesion between ideas here.

    Stylistically, Parker has added swaths of synthesisers to Tame Impala’s celebrated psychedelic rock tones. These sounds fill out the space between intricate basslines, clattering percussion, psychedelic guitars and Parker’s spaced-out, aloof voice. Heavy piano chords form the basis of first single ‘Apocalypse Dreams’, while follow-up ‘Elephant’ is built on a pulsating rhythm that leads into a glorious, snaking guitar solo.

    Although Innerspeaker was stacked with stand-out tracks, the same can’t be said for Lonerism, which contains just a handful; ‘Mind Mischief’ and ‘Keep on Trying’ are among the best here.

    There’s the aforementioned trouble again: once a reputation for strong songwriting has been established, anything less than great is disappointing. Lonerism doesn’t elicit that particular emotion — it’s a good record, after all — but it does hint at better things to come. With Parker’s brilliant imagination, musical abilities and resourcefulness, it seems that anything’s possible.

    Label: Modular

    Rating: 3.5 stars

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    Various Artists – The Key Of Sea Volume 2

    Some might say rock musicians are more readily associated with egotism than altruism, yet this collection is the second in a series that seeks to buck that stereotype.

    By pairing well-known Australian artists with refugee musicians, the project’s organisers, civil rights advocate Hugh Crosthwaite and Nick O’Byrne from the Australian Independent Record Labels Association, hit on a winning idea with the release of Key of Sea Volume 1 in 2010.

    Like its predecessor, Volume 2 is a fine snapshot of contemporary Australian music. Pop, rock, hip-hop, jazz and folk musicians rub up against one another; disparate musical ideals working in tandem towards a common goal of sharing untold stories.

    The Australian collaborators are names Triple J listeners will recognise, with a handful of elder statesmen (Paul Kelly, Kim Salmon, David Bridie) thrown in. The refugee collaborators add their cultural influences to each composition: traditional Kurdish stringed instruments, bouzouki and Filipino choir masters all make delightful appearances.

    Darwin-based electronic soul duo Sietta teams with Pacific Island group Sunameke on ‘Open Hands’, which explores the concept of mixed races and cultural diversity; at the other end of the musical and thematic spectrum, Salmon pairs with radio presenter Waleed Aly to write ‘No One Cares’, a noisy rock tune with sardonic lyrics featuring the bureaucratic doubletalk associated with seeking asylum in this country.

    All 11 songs work well: there are a couple of bona fide pop hits in ‘Silence of the Guns’ (led by Jinja Safari) and Clubfeet’s ‘Islands’. The diversity of sounds and stories is reason enough to lend your ears to The Key of Sea. That the songs are compelling and polished is a bonus.

    Label: MGM
    Rating: 3.5 stars