BRUM BEAT RECORD REVIEWS MAY 2021

 

MARK & THE CLOUDS

Waves (Gare du Nord)

From Bologna but based in London for some years, guitarist, singer and keyboardist Marco Magnani is patently in thrall to the psychedelic pop of 60s UK, here working as a trio with John O’Sullivan (on bass, vocals and guitar, and Shin Okajima on drums, augmented by Rachel Kashi on keys, violinist Maya Kasparova (and Tom Hammond and Joseph Hammond supplying brass. He has an appealing nasal tone to his delivery and the songs, anchored by his organ work, are melodic and hummable with some solid guitar flourishes.

The core influence is clearly Sgt Pepper era Beatles, Harrison especially, but you’ll also hear strong echoes of the era’s psychedelic underground more cult names such as The Idle Race, Simon Dupree & The Big Sound and The Pretty Things alongside hitmakers like Hendrix and the early Quo, working their way through American garage band (think Count Five, The Beau Brummels, styled rockers such as ‘You Wanna Put Me Down’, the spacy balladeering ‘Winter Song’, moody acoustic strum  ‘Free Me Now’ (definite hints of the UK’s Kaleidoscope) a riff heavy ‘No One Makes A Sound’, the brass bolstered ‘Heavy Drops of Rain’ and the jangly pop ‘In The Big Crowd’. Closing with the five minute cinematic work out of ‘Someday Else’ with its spaghetti Western guitars, they’re not perhaps among the first division of retro psych rock, but a very credible entry in the league playoffs.  Mike Davies

JOE CARDAMONE

Quarantina (Sonic Ritual)

The former Icarus Line frontman is now something of an independent filmmaker and this second solo album serves as a soundtrack to his latest project, a series of nineteen real life-based shorts exploring a couple’s relationship over the course of lockdown. Musically stripped right down with running times varying from 66 seconds at the shortest to three minutes 21 seconds at the longest, generally just his yearning, at times pleading voice and keyboard drone, it’s a brooding affair that works largely as a collection of tone landscapes variously evocative of Bowie, Cave and Scott Walker’s experimental later years.

There’s a minimalist beauty and emotional ache to things like Dead Sky, New Moon and Flowers, three of those that stretch barely over a minute, while Nine Of Swords is a more dramatic, more forcefully expressed number with stark cabaret colours, Nite Theme (Rock N Roll) set to an electronic pulse, Crushed Skull an appropriately disorienting listen, Yeshua a simple churchy organ vignette of a ballad and, another taking its title from the Tarot, The Tower a disquieting instrumental shrouded in storm clouds. Cluster B is another instrumental, this a late night neon and rain soaked number featuring saxophone by Taiwanese-Canadian actor-musician Alex Zhang Hungtai.

Baby Blue, with its Bowie inflections, drums and background harmonies is the closest it comes to what you might call radio friendly accessible, the 19 tracks ending with the dreamy cosmic drone of Ur So Cool 2, but, while doubtless having more impact when heard in tandem with viewing the films, it makes for an immersive experience. Mike Davies

MIKE DAVIES MAY 2021

 

KATHERINE PRIDDY makes her album debut in June, from whence comes the first single, the dreamily swaying fingerpicked, caressingly sung pastoral folk of ‘Indigo’ (Navigator). With its slow, steady drum beat and swooning strings, it addresses our relationship with nature in a story about a young child and a tree that unfolds to speak of loss, of innocence, friends, lovers and, perhaps, the eco-system as we grow older.

SICKY has been busy doing the lockdown, next month seeing yet another new album, Bowling Balls, one that inclines to his more commercial melodic pop sensibilities. Opening with a sample from the Apollo 8 Christmas message, ‘Same Thing In Reverse’ is a catchy staccato acoustic strum complete with whistling, followed by the all join in infectious ‘we love ya’ chorus of the glam-tinged ‘Back In The Room’ and a prowling rhythm groove ‘The Last Hello’ with paranoid guitar licks that perhaps hint at some Prince influences.

The ebb and flow title track, at just under two minutes, nods to 60s psychedelia, the acoustic ‘Birthday Song’ is firmly of a country folk persuasion, sounding at times like a slowed down ‘Tom Dooley’, while ‘Safe On Earth?’ with its falsetto notes rolls out a budget orchestral feel.

The Bowie strum styled ‘I’d Die’ begins the countdown, followed by the 60 second growly spoken ‘Problem’, rounding out with, first the yearning mid-tempo strut, acoustic guitar chugging and percussion clank slowly gathering Greenwich Village folk-blues anthemic balladeering of ‘Water’ that proves a particular standout, and finally, keyboards swirling, ‘Three Lovers’ with its chirping backdrop vocals pulse, swelling to a cathartic finale and close. It’s essentially a simple affair in terms of arrangements, but I reckon it’s the best thing he’s done in years and, were it not for the nature of the industry and getting the exposure it deserves, would be the one to really put him on the map.

Growly, grunge-inflected post-punk Birmingham four-piece THE NOVUS have their debut EP, Thaleia Standing (named for the Greek muse of comedy) lined up for June, but precede that with new single ‘I Serve Not’, a slow steamrollering, strobe-rhythm number ode to the nation’s dilapidated high streets, struggling small businesses and the gradual erosion of working-class community. Written around the 2019 General Election and attacking those who exploit others for self-gain, the line ‘it’s simple common sense’ is taken from a Jacob Rees-Mogg interview about the Grenfell tragedy, the title comes from the chorus hook “I serve not he who feeds me, but he who's sure I am fed." Definitely ones to keep a close eye on.