Shall we write a new editorial? Oh the endless demand and who needs a damn editorial? We were busy with Frieze Week fallout, that and the catch up and, no time for editorials, 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 lemons and here comes the intro, Don’t be flippant she said, how could it ever be flippant? I can’t remember why she said that now, in one ear, out the other, we have a bad attitude here apparently, no respect for those who work in the music industry, well no poop Sherlock, have you only just worked that one out? We’ve been showing (and getting) zero respect since the last century, zero flips given…

Five? There’s something rather compelling about five. Cross-pollination? Five more? 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 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, skip this bit, 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 what’s Wordsworth? Just the basic facts and links and those sounds (and visuals), that’s surely all you need from us?

Here we go, five more slices of music that have recently come our way, this time we start somewhere in London with more from Man/Woman/Chainsaw…

1: Man/Woman/Chainsaw – More from the teenage London band who are threatening to be potentially thrilliant. Early days yet, the signs are good, the hype might be a tiny bit over the top right now by they do have something, The Boss does bite in the right way (although he does sound like a pain in the butt), they are biting back well, they have a got a bit of chemisty going on. The Boss is the third track to land from their anticipated debut EP, Eazy Peazy, out on November 8th on Fat Possum. Here’s the Bandcamp

“The Boss is the heaviest of the songs on the EP and definitely a live favourite of ours. We wanted to express our frustration with imbalanced power dynamics in our everyday lives with a big supermassive rant of a rock song. In the writing process it began as a more standard punk tune until Emmie and Clio spontaneously improvised their interlocking violin/synth line that totally changed the direction of the song. Working in the studio with Dan Fox of Gilla Band was fun and allowed us to experiment with getting the song to sound as spacey as we could get it – we particularly enjoyed recording the electric violin through guitar amps cranked to 10 while simultaneously manipulating a tape delay unit.”

2: Snooper – more of that stabby springy going off and things thing they do, more from Nashville’s finest, a new track sneaked out, a home recording made this month. They’re off on tour again at the start of November, US dates, this sounds as urgent as they always do. And avaiable as a pay what you want thing from their Bandcamp page. Did you catch that Devo cover they did early this year? We did mention it at the time.

3: Avalanche Party – Something new from Yorkshire garage punk rock’n roll band Avalanche Party. “Today they announce their forthcoming album Der Traum Uber Alles released 7th February via AMK. It’s produced by Dave Catching and recorded at the hallowed Rancho De La Luna studio in California’s Joshua Tree, whose previous clientele include the likes of Queens Of The Stone Age, Arctic Monkeys, Iggy Pop. Alongside the album announcement, they today release brilliant new single John Coltrane’s Moscow Skyscraper“

Avalance Party Vocalist Jordan Bell said of the single.“This is full of that caged spirit of wanting to be let off the leash. Take half the strings off your guitar, tune the ones remaining to the same note, play them one after the other, rhythmically. You have a song. There was an effort to make music that was more minimal, how simple can you make something that still works? Hold back the noise”.

4: Kim Gordon, Bangin’ on the Freeway, as you do when you don’t let the train take the strain. More here, More is the game, capiltal M, do like where Ms. Gordon is going these days. Here’s your Bandcamp link, there’s some kind of deluxe edition of the album that came out earlier this year…

5: Ben Lukas Boysen shares “monolithic new single Fama, taken from his forthcoming studio album ‘Alta Ripa’ via Erased Tapes” so it says here while we try to catch up in a post Frieze kind of way.

“Berlin’s critically acclaimed composer, producer and sound designer Ben Lukas Boysen is thrilled to share his monolithic new single ‘Fama’, released today, taken from his forthcoming album ‘Alta Ripa’, released November 29th on Erased Tapes.  On ‘Fama’, Boysen states, “Fama was the last track I wrote for the album, and it combines the various energies and dynamics I felt during the writing process. It’s almost a coda to the album concept, and at the same time the igniting spark of things to come.“
 
In addition to today’s release, Boysen has announced two release shows – at Berlin’s Ritter Butzke on November 23rd and at London’s legendary night club Fabric on November 28th, as part of the ‘Erased Tapes Seventeen’ label takeover.  Boysen’s fourth studio album under his own name, ‘Alta Ripa’, signifies a seismic shift in his artistic journey, and is a nod to his beginnings as much as a hint to his future. As a work, it’s almost contradictory in its boldness and humility. The album’s title is the original Roman name of Altrip, the town Boysen grew up in.
 
His 2020 album ‘Mirage’ involved working closely with other musicians, including cellist Anne Müller, flugelhorn player Steffen Zimmer, and drummer Achim Färber. However, inspired in part by a recent return to live performance, ‘Alta Ripa’ sees Boysen circling back to his passion for pure computer music. He invites the listener on a journey of self-discovery; describing the music as “something the 15-year-old in me would have liked to hear but only the grown-up version of myself can write.”
 
As he explains; “After nearly 20 years in Berlin, I’ve had plenty encounters with wonderful artists about the core values and inspirations for being a composer, that made me reflect on my work. But this little town Altrip with its distant memories, that I in some ways have never really left, kept moving to the front of my mind and encouraged me to take everything that I’ve learned “back home” so to speak. I wanted to artistically return to the place that formed and inspired me before life got too complicated and tap back into that world with today’s experiences. Somehow going back and starting from scratch at the same time, to write an album that is simultaneously my oldest and newest record.”

He recently announced that he’ll be appearing as the special guest of label peers Kiasmos on both their European and North American tours this autumn, which will allow him to showcase his new album ‘Alta Ripa’ live – dates/details

There’s another taste to be had on his Bandcamp page… other links

And while we’re here, who on earth is this? Something from 1980 that passed our way today…

And…