My Bunny Valentine

Something bang up to date now, a review from this month, printed in the most recent copy of Nightshift.

THE ORIGINAL RABBIT’S FOOT SPASM BAND/ SPACE HEROES OF THE PEOPLE/ PICTURE BOOK, Klub Kakofanney, The Wheatsheaf, 6/2/09



At their best Leeds’ Picture Book are a cross between Lamb and Sade (as in “Smooth Operator”, not 120 Days Of Sodom), at their worst they’re a load of old balaerics. They do show plenty of rhythmic inventiveness in their sleek techno pop, and a nice line in flatulent 80s keyboards, but the vocals aren’t able to breathe life into the songs; if they had an Alison Goldfrapp or a Roisin Murphy hamming it up we might be talking. Having said this, the last two tracks blow the rest of the set out of the water, the finale pitching keening violin against the synth hum, and single “Strangers” is a fussy bustle of dubstep keys and exuberant syn-drums that are half Karl Bartos and half Tito Puente. More like that, please.

Space Heroes Of The People have always been about balance. Their music is live enough to feel organic, and programmed enough to seem inhuman; the sound is minimalist enough to be hypnotic, but compact enough to class them as an ace pop band. It’s a tough tightrope to walk, but tonight they nonchalantly saunter across, possibly stopping midway for a somersault or two. Perhaps it was the live vocals, perhaps it was the unexpectedly meaty Sabbathesque half time sections, perhaps it was the righteously hefty sound that the engineer coaxed from them, but this was a superb set. We just can’t shake the image of Maggie Philbin coming onstage halfway through “Barbie Is A Robot” to explain what a vocoder is.

The Original Rabbit’s Foot Spasm Band are not at all original, but everything else about them is fantastic. They play 30s jazz songs, but we feel as if we’re in a sordid sweaty speakeasy, not some horrific sanitised tea dance. These songs (“Mack The Knife”, “The Sheik Of Araby”) are about sex, narcotics and impossibly louche tailoring, and they should be treated with the dirt they deserve, not emasculated by legions of function jazzers. The Spasmers get to grips with the soul of the music through riotous trumpet, rasping sax, and by being heroically, Biblically, drunk. This, my friends is the authentic sound of New Orleans…possibly during the hurricane.

Greatest living Canterburian

Here's an ancient one, to start things off, from BBC Oxford back in the day.

LUKE SMITH/ THE FOLK ORCHESTRA/ A SCHOLAR AND A PHYSICIAN, Trailerpark, The Cellar, 11/02.

Barry, the first act, doesn't show up. I don't know whether Barry is man, band or beast, but Barry's not here. So, at the last minute Olly, vocalist from local synthpoppers Trademark is drafted in to do strange things to a laptop. Various slices of pop cheese old and new (cf Beddingfield, Daniel; Hammer, MC) are scrunched and mashed in realtime. The experience - something akin to Manchester noiseniks V/Vm at an office party - is, surprisingly, rather good fun.

Folk Orchestra. Now there's an oxymoron. Orchestra: Huge dinner-jacketed embodiment of 19th Century opulence and emotive Romanticism; Gustav Mahler; Leonard bloody Bernstein.

Folk: Libertarian tradition of populist comunion, eschewing complexity and the strictures of the musical salon; Harry Smith; Joan bloody Baez.

How can these diametric opposuites be reconciled? Answer: they can't, at least not tonight. We get a six-piece folk-pop combo, which is a little bigger than most folk-pop combos I'll grant you, but hardly deserving of orchestra status. And it's pretty standard folk-pop combo fare too, at times mercurial and immediate, and times earnest and dull. They aren't helped by a muddy sound mix that destroys any chance of intimacy - the accordionist reached levels of volume for which most metal guitarists would sell their leathery souls.

Luke Smith sings at the piano, with his Dad on drums. As if this weren't reason enough to love him, he tinkles out an hour of wry, funny, sincere songs about his quiet Canterbury life, all infused with a nervous charm. Musically it's not complex, with echoes of music hall singalongs and simple 70s pop, but it's performed with more than enough jazzy dexterity and aplomb.

It's hard to describe what makes Luke such a great prospect. Phrases like "catchy dittes", "homely honesty" and "subtle drum accompaniment" could be employed, but they call up such horrors as Chas 'n' Dave, or Richard Stillgoe. I suppose Luke is a little like that, but imagine a parallel universe where "Snooker Loopy" is an elegant and moving anthem.

Can't? You'd best attend the next Luke Smith gig, then.

Forming an isthmus to Novelty Island

This is a new blog in which I shall post some of the reviews that I have been producing over the years for Nightshift, Oxfordbands,The Oxford Home For Music, BBC Oxford, and anybody else I may have written for over the malt sodden years I have spent blowing desperately onto a biro at the back of dank Oxford cellars in an attempt to make it write on a damp beermat.

Some of the reviews shall be very old, some bang up to date; some will be glistening nuggets of critical gold, some of them will doubtless be a bit crap, in hindsight; some you'll agree with, whereas some will make you splutter with indignation; so long as you bear in mind that I'm always right, it should be no problem.

Right, see you later.