Babe Rainbow
There’s a new phrase that has rapidly become a fact of life in the for anyone trying to “make it” in music: if you don’t like doing self promotion, don’t become a musician. To some, self-promo is a necessary evil. To others, namely Vancouver’s Cameron Reed (aka Babe Rainbow), it’s a built in feature. While his music itself has managed to impress enough people to get him signed to the prestigious Warp Records and land him a European tour, what may be more impressive about Reed’s music is his ability to get the right people to listen to it—to stand out in a massive ocean of so called “bedroom producers” and internet-era electronic artists. Reed has an incredible ability to blend the modern concepts of musician, artist, internet personality and PR mastermind into one seamless entity. He is the blueprint for any artist trying to make a name for themselves.
08 Nov 2011
New Bands: The Lovely Eggs, Tall Stories, Sacred Harp
The Lovely Eggs
When legendary music hack Everett True (an early champion of Nirvana and Daniel Johnson) calls your band ‘fucking brilliant’, you’re allowed to feel quietly confident. Not ones to rest on their laurels, Lancaster duo The Lovely Eggs have since then put in the graft. Having just toured with Art Brut and Ganglians, they’re on the road again this month, before hitting the Lexington in London on December 1st with cult hero Jad Fair. Fraternising with indie colonies seems to be a habit of theirs: following their recent single and ode to OCD ‘Panic Plants’, the Eggs release ‘Allergies’, produced by Gruff Rhys of Super Furry Animals, which comes out via the Too Pure Singles Club next month; they even roped in punk veteran and comedy genius John Shuttleworth to appear in the video for last single ‘Don’t Look At Me, (I Don’t Like It) – as the man with the sausage roll thumb. For anyone not yet turned on to the Eggs madcap artrock-punk-riot grrl-pop, both their records and live shows (rife with northern working man’s club anecdotal humour), can’t be recommended enough. www.thelovelyeggs.co.uk
Don’t Look At Me (I Don’t Like It) by thelovelyeggs
Tall Stories
Tall Stories are a new London-based outfit making a fizzing, joyous racket that sets whirring loads of little cogs and joins and gems of music history, but manages to sound as fresh as a daisy; albeit a daisy that has been brought up a steady diet of high-powered plant food, as per the chorus of their soon-to-be-a-live-favourite “Miracle Grow”. Band leader Rob McCabe’s masterful pop songs are short, hyper-catchy blasts of sardonic but warmly human urban indie-rock ‘n’ roll, underscored by bleeping keyboards and crossed through with scrawls of guitar. The lyrics are about everyday life—East London tales of excess and distress told with one eyebrow archly raised. Think Hefner if Hayman had put away his seven inch collection, split up with his tweecore girlfriend, boshed a wrap of mysterious powder and gone down to band practice with a cob on.
These are punchy, perfect pop songs that bands like Buzzcocks, Violent Femmes and, more recently, The Wave Pictures would be proud to have written. Get in early on this one – look up their next show at www.tallstoriesband.co.uk.
Sacred Harp
Sometimes you put a CD in the stereo and hear something so strange, new and surprising that it just knocks you for six. It’s the moment that keeps music journalists and music lovers going, amidst the rising tide of shoddy demos, unjustly hyped and commercially motivated landfill indie bands, and unfinished but already-signed East London acts that are thrust into the limelight mid-germination. Something well constructed, artistically balanced and generally fully fledged landing in your lap is something to look forward to.
So it is with Sacred Harp. They started out as an improv trio in Oslo, but felt the project subtly tugging in another direction, and yielded to the natural progression of bringing in a drummer to apply firmer structure to their dizzyingly inventive compositions. The result mutated into something brilliant – hard to pin down, with elements of indie-rock, drone, jazz, prog-rock and proto-feminist poetry from vocalist Jessica Sligter; Sacred Harp’s sound is like everything and nothing, full of precise atonality and opposed jarring and dreamy melodies. The debut album, “Window’s A Fall”, is out on December 5th, and UK dates are promised. www.brainloverecords.com/sacredharp
Sacred Harp – Found In The Open Country (The Underlying Deep Structure) by brainlove
08 Nov 2011
Yann Tiersen: Ask the dust
Yann Tiersen, the reserved (not shy), musician (not composer) and enigmatic Breton (not Frenchman), appears to be back ‘en-scene’, and as it transpires, available for a chat to discuss ‘Skyline’ – the ‘quick-and-easy’ apparent sister album to last year’s acclaimed Dust Lane.
As I find out during our laid back telephone chat, despite the album not being released until October 17, almost exactly a year after its predecessor, the tireless Tiersen is already on the road showcasing new songs. Albeit, minus the company of his charming VIP pooch Voltaire, whom I had the pleasure of meeting when Tiersen played the La Route Da Rock festival in his home town of Brittany last summer. Did he take the delightful creature with him this time round?
08 Nov 2011
Dad Rocks: the pro-Internet, anti-Disney Icelander fights for free expression in music
Dad Rocks! is the nom-de-plume of one Snævar Njáll Albertsson, a Denmark-based Icelander who has quickly risen to fame in the European indie scene this year with his affectingly humane, witty and melodic music.
Mount Modern is his first album as Dad Rocks!, and it’s a strikingly complete release for such a young project. Nestled inside its eleven beautiful songs is a sense of kindness and innocence, but also a sense of being embattled by modern life. “Yeah, I think that’s accurate,” says Albertsson. “Since becoming a dad I’ve seen the world from a totally different perspective. The innocence probably comes from that – not just looking as yourself, but also at challenges your children are going to face.”
08 Nov 2011
Don't Let Me Be Denied by Pinemarten
Chesterfield producer and remix champ (Jewellers, Museum of Bellas Artes) Pinemarten releases his debut album, If You Thought There Was Any Doubt, November 28th via his Bandcamp page. Expect him to follow the likes of Chad Valley into the arena marked crisp, dreamy synth pop imbibed with a chillwave (whoops, a dirty word) bent. There’s more than a hint of Cut Copy thrown into the mix too. Excellent stuff.
08 Nov 2011
Listen to our John Rogers talk about Iceland on 6 Music
Snipe music editor John Rogers, aka John Brainlove, was a guest on Bethan Elfyn’s 6 Music radio show yesterday. Listen here for the Roger’s opinion on the Nordic sound.
08 Nov 2011
Buy Tony Millionaire's new book
Tony Millionaire, writer-artist of Maakies, published in every edition of Snipe, has a new book out, featuring 500 of his amazing illustrations.
From Fantatgraphics
500 Portraits collects for the first time over two decades of portrait work by the beloved and award-winning creator of Drinky Crow’s Maakies, Sock Monkey and Billy Hazelnuts. Tony Millionaire’s gorgeous fountain pen illustrations, which mingle naturalistic detail with strong doses of the fanciful and grotesque, include the famous (Bob Dylan), the infamous (Abu Ghraib soldier/model Lynndie England), the fictional (Yoda), the animal kingdom (a cockroach), and everything in between. Literary figures (Hemingway), literary characters (Don Quixote & Sancho Panza), Hollywood legends (Steven Spielberg), comics icons (Hergé) and historical figures (Hitler) also figure prominently.
This book should be purchased immediately.
08 Nov 2011
Future Islands To Tour Current Islands
After their one-off London show on Dec 8th (at Rhythm Factory) and an ATP festival appearance on the Dec 9th, Future Islands have announced an epic European tour in Feb/March 2012 in support of their excellent new album “On The Water”. Known as much for the deranged theatrics of singer Samuel T Herring (pictured) as they are for their catchy, pulsing synthpop, Future Islands live show is not to be missed. You hear that, you naughty Future Islands live show missers? Get down there!
They’ve also given away a remix of the album’s bonus track, “Crish”.
Future Islands – Crish (Javelin Remixxx) by thrilljockey
The band say of the remix: “Crish is a song that was recorded for On the Water but the lyrics weren’t completed in time to make the cut.We asked Javelin if they would do a remix of it for a bonus track.At this point, we’re not sure if our version of ‘Crish’ will ever see the light of day, but we really love what Javelin did with it… I feel like it’s more of a collaboration than a remix.”
See the full list of tour dates after the jump.
08 Nov 2011
They gilt this City: In the City of London, business really does control the mayor and council. By law.
City of London’s dragons mark the border of a part of the capital that’s resisted change for centuries. Businesses have more say than residents, and the City of London Corporation retains special privileges under law.
But what the City does best revolves around money. Some 450 international banks are based in the Square Mile, and the City speaks up for the UK’s financial industry. The corporation has a fair bit of money itself. About a third of its wealth is in a private fund – City’s Cash – which is thought to be worth about £1 billion, built up over centuries from property holdings across the capital and across the globe.
08 Nov 2011
London agenda for Tuesday 8 November
1. View bio-chemist-cum-artist Kelsey Brookes’ great spreads of canvas and sculpture at the Outsider Gallery [Le Cool]
2. Talk about dance with Siobhan Davies and Mathieu Copeland [Run Riot]
3. Listen to classical music played on instruments made of ice at ‘The Idea of North [Time Out]
4. Hear Jeremy Rifkin declare a third industrial revolution [Ian Visits]
5. See St John the Baptist, Eltham
London Agenda is Snipe’s daily compilation of what to do in London as suggested by everyone else. Send additions to listings@snipelondon.com
08 Nov 2011
Snipe Highlights
Some popular articles from past years
- Margaret Thatcher statue rejected by public
- Peter Bayley has worked for 50 years as a cinema projectionist in East Finchley
- Punk brewery just as sexist and homophobic as the industry they rail against
- An interview with Desiree Akhavan
- Silencing the Brick Lane curry touts could be fatal for the city's self-esteem
- Hope and despair in Woolwich town centre
- Only 16 commuters touch in to Emirates Air Line, figures reveal
- Could red kites be London's next big nature success story?
- Summer Camp: Roll out those lazy, hazy, crazy days
- 9 poems about London: one for each of your moods
© 2009-2026 Snipe London.