SINGLES APOCALYPSE: Part # whatever

I’m really sorry about the recent lack of posting. A few weeks of non-stop drinking, carousing and musicing have taken their toll on my regular, boredom-based writing schedule.

Any attempt to keep reviewing new singles in alphabetical order is completely out of the window by now I’m afraid, but here are a couple I wrote before the deluge, and more random grabs from the pile around the hi-fi, and other top notch ‘content’ will hopefully be with you shortly…


LA Vampires & Zola Jesus –
LA Vampires Meets Zola Jesus 12”
(Not Not Fun)

Consciously modelled on one of those classic “so-and-so meets so-and-so” dub platters from the ‘70s, what we essentially have here is the sound of two spooky, stoned 21st century rich girls making a kinda temporally disconnected, neon-midnight stab at a dub record.

I don’t mean that to sound dismissive; after long years in which the thoughts and doings of spooky, stoned rich girls in the USA were nowt but a cruel mystery to me, I feel happy and privileged to live in a world where awesome things like this can exist and filter their way into culture so casually.

LA Vampires is ex-Pocahaunted (and seriously, who’d have guessed THEY’D prove such a rich jumping off point for inspired side/successor projects when they were busy making lmtd-to-50 tapes full of garbled guff for Byron Coley to drool on a few years back?); Zola Jesus you already know, I hope.

The former does the stabbing synth-bass riffs, sliced up ‘80s electro rhythm tracks and cosmic horror echo webs here, while the latter gets to hear some of her distinctive vocal melodies and operatic reveries stretched and laced up across the music, left to float alone in distant wells of mega-delay. Songs are present, and they are cool, but structure swiftly fades in favour of, well, y’know… dubbing it up. Imagine if, god… I don’t know; imagine if Scientist had done a score to ‘The Hunger’ or something. Sounds good? Hop in!

LA and Zola’s reinvention of Dawn Penn’s “No No No” is playing right now, and it’s as sweet and terrifying as you’d expect. You don’t love me, yes I know now (creeping up, knife in teeth.)

It’s easy to wax lyrical on a record like this, but let’s put it plainly – these ladies are so fucking talented they’re making GOTH-DUB sound like a brilliant idea. Think on that for a minute, and then pay whatever Rough Trade are asking for a copy of this.

http://www.myspace.com/zolajesus
http://www.last.fm/music/LA+Vampires
http://www.notnotfun.com/now.html

Pens –
You Only Like Me When I Tell You I’m Wrong
(DeStijl)

I haven’t managed to see Pens play as often as I probably shoulda done, given that I live in the same city as them, so whilst it was probably old news by the time I saw them play a Ladyfest do in Goldsmiths cafeteria earlier this year, I was still astonished by the progress they’ve made as a band.

In both sound and appearance, they seem to have undergone an almost total transformation from the Pens who recorded their supremely obnoxious noise-bomb of an LP last year, the one I saw few times way back when, filling shithole venues with their cheap, sickening fuzz and fuck-you amateur stomp. Don’t get me wrong, I loved that band, but Pens Mk.2 are soundin’ real convincin’ too - still not following the rules, still doing what comes naturally, but with greater experience leading away from chaos toward a land of pummelling, bass-heavy rhythm shit and alternate world musicality, inevitably touching upon the same Raincoats-birthed femme-rock trajectory as contemporaries like Trash Kit, Wet Dog, Grass Widow et al. Full of GREAT new material (they old played one or two numbers off the album), their set went down a storm with friends of mine whom I’d imagine woulda spit feathers if confronted by the old Pens. Particularly noteworthy was an absolutely astounding closing song, which conveniently turns up here, entitled “You Only Like Me When I Tell You I’m Wrong”.

Though still comfortably grounded in the home-recorded clatter of yore, this is probably the best composition Pens have put on record to date, as violin-toned keyboard sounds scrape out the riff and exuberant, cymbal heavy drumming hold down the centre against relatively restrained guitar fuzz as the girls harmonise their way through the title-repeating chorus in just the most… brilliant fashion. A great song, plain and simple, and “Love Rules” on the B is no slouch either, mixing a Grass Widow-ish surf guitar line with thrumming bass feedback and a desperately foreboding descending melody line… I know it’s an unspeakable cliche to go around comparing every vaguely idiosyncratic female group to The Raincoats, but the influence of their first album hangs heavy over these tunes in the best possible way – rough-hewn, self-created, furious, awkward fun. Fairytale in the Old Blue Last, anyone?

http://www.myspace.com/penspenspenis
http://destijlrecs.com/

Labels: LA Vampires, Pens, singles reviews, Zola Jesus