Where were we? Doesn’t matter, after a fractured three or four weeks, we’re kind of back now though and never mind nothing, on with the music and what we said last time or last week or last year, you’ve read all this already, never mind the damn editorial, never mind the biscuits or the dogfish, just jump down past this editorial, who needs an editorial? Jump past and let the actual music do the actual walking and the actual talking. Exact same thing again, another five (or so) slices of musical things that have passed our way recently and however you like to slice it and of course it was the price of apples and here comes the intro, Don’t be flippant she said, how could it ever be flippant?
Five? There’s something rather compelling about five. Cross-pollination? Five more? Do we need to do the editorial bit again? Is there another way? A better way? A cure for pulling flying rabbits out of the clouds? Is there a rhyme? Is there a reason? Was there ever a reason? What do reasons make? Five more? Snake oil? Everything must go and same as last time (and the time before that) five, and no, we never do and the proof of the pudding is in that proof reading. When we started this thing, oh never mind, it doesn’t matter why we started this damn thing and like we asked last time, does anyone bother reading the editorial? Does anyone ever actually look down the rabbit hole or is it all just method acting? We do really try to listen to everything that comes in, we do it so you don’t have to, we are very (very) very very picky about what we actually post on these fractured pages or about what gets played on the radio or indeed what we hang in a gallery. Cut to the chase, never mind the editorial, there’s loads of music further down the page, well five or so pieces of music that have come our way in the last few days and cut cut slash and cut it, who needs an editorial or words or worms in general? What’s Wordsworth? Just facts and links and sounds then. Here you go, play the music, grab your five, eat your greens, go eat some art, go eat some fresh music and don’t forget whatever it was we said last time…
Here we go again, same as last time, in no particular order, starting somewhere out there in France this time
1: Corridor – Mon Argent, another slice of beauty from the French band’s gorgeous new album Mimi that in turn is out later this month on Sub Pop. More from us on the album in a minute or two, or maybe a day or two. They just keep on coming up with these delicious riffs…
Corridor have three UK dates coming up…
Wed. May 15 – Leeds – Hyde Park Book Club
Thu. May 16 – London – Shacklewell Arms (Free Show – RSVP here)
Sat, May 18 – Brighton – The Great Escape Festival (Patterns)
2: Hollow Ship – a track taken from their Animated Music EP, out May 31st 2024. here come a bag of links, the music can do the talking.
3: HAAL – I kind of like their rather positive lack of dimension and the way they talk their way through it all, the semi bleakness of those riffs and yes, it does sound rather like quite a few caustic bands who like to talk their way through heavy riffs in a post-something-or-other kind of way
“Four-piece Bristol outfit HAAL have shared a new single titled “Vinculum”. The track follows the announcement of the band’s debut EP Back To Shilmarine, which is due out 10th May via Babka Records”.
Their gritty elements of post-rock, industrial metal machine music and big riffs keeps on working, that raw edge they have, that deliberately limited palette, not sure I could eat a whole one but hey, one small bite at a time
“Coming on the heels of their recent singles Janus and Judy (and subsequent remixes by Water From My Eyes and Crimewave), the new EP Back To Shilmarine arrives as a blistering snapshot of the band’s protean dynamism. The band celebrate their late-90s / early-00s influences in a caustic yet melodic blend of tracks that nod as much to the output of labels such as Dischord, Touch & Go, and Nothing Records, as they do their contemporaries in the UK scene such as SCALER, Famous, deathcrash, and LICE. The EP sees them bring all these touchstones together to create a unique and uninhibited maelstrom of sound that spans everything from intricate math-inflected guitar lines and pensive vocals to propulsive drumming, totemic riffing, and warped synths”.
Last month, the band gave fans a first taste of the EP with what was arguably their heaviest song to date, Platform 1, 18:19. Today, HAAL share a dark new single titled Vinculum, which they say showcases a different facet of the band’s sound (does it?). Far more stripped back than the prior single so they say, the track cycles in an almost jam-like fashion, whilst the vocals twist and corrupt around glitchy guitar lines.
The lyrics to the track were written by a longtime friend of the band – writer and illustrator Nathan Richards and were then narrated by synth player Ethan Jones. The producer with long-time collaborator Alfie Tyson Brown (Katy J Pearson, SCALER, LICE) then re-sampled Jones’ narration, cutting and re-recorded them into the final track, resulting in a liminal, almost robotic sound.
Speaking on the singles themes, Nathan Richards summarise the story as a tale of “A boy who is left shunned from his village, due to his disfigured body. He travels alone in a forgotten part of the world, looking for a cure. He comes across a place where he has the ability to rewrite the natural law of the universe. Being stuck between, hatred, rejection and fear, he is unable to focus his thoughts into anything coherent, only wishing for the vapid idea of him, and everyone else being one in the same. The culmination being the birth of a plague, where everyone suffered equally.”
Fine the new EP via Bandcamp
4: Squid Pisser – we’ve gone on about them quite a bit in recent times, kind of fallen through the cracks in terms of what SkinGraft Records are doing in recent times though, apparently there’s a Squid Pisser album on the way and this is a first taste of the second full length album…
“In the wake of Sqid Pisser’s “Vaporize A Neighbor” EP and Comic Book Set and “Vaporize A Tadpole” collection comes “Dreams of Puke”, the band’s second full length album. Weighing in at a meaty 12 songs and cut at a lean 45 revolutions per minute, Dreams of Puke refuses to let up or let down – emitting climax after scintillating climax – a bounteous bouquet of dayglow viscera and tumor-filled sonic snot” – We shall see of the labum lives up to al lthat if and when we get out filthy mitts on a copy…
5: Louvado Abismo – Portugal’s Louvado Abismo offer us a taste of what threatens to be a rather excellent self-titled debut album – “delving into the depths of the abyss through the intricate layers of schizophrenia and psychological disturbance. The album is set for vinyl and digital release on 31st May via Half Beast Records, with a CD release to follow”.
Musically, Louvado Abismo’s debut is said to be “a melting pot, blending Christian Death with Siouxsie and the Banshees, or even Godflesh with Killing Joke, Swans and Ministry. Throughout the album, the quartet redefines the ‘80s aesthetic, weaving it into their own distinct and modern approach”, we’ve only heard this one track so far…
More detaisl via Bandcamp
While we’re here…
THE ORGAN 