I’ve been getting so much mail from people going, you know, good to know about the latest in Indonesian Dubstep Dangdut, but what about proper rock bands from the USA? Well you’re welcome, and actually PACKS are the latest glittering expression in that storied lineage, unfurling Madeline Link‘s rich and slightly raspy vocals and banana boats of tunes that give you that tingle on Melt the Honey. I’m getting a 90s vibe here, like maybe The Breeders? I thought of mentioning Hole, but that would be mean. There’s an edge of psychedelia that brings Alex G to mind.
My favorite secret boyfriend is starting to come around again. Sensitive genius beauty Amen Dunes has a rambling, shambling new single called “Purple Land,” with a deceptively loping, around-the-campfire vibe and some quietly tasteful cover art.
The lyrics are like a long tracking shot, taking in a series of subtly poignant vignettes, with a sense of inevitable loss and a nod to Kurt Cobain. “You’ll be all grown / I’ll be long gone / You’ll be living on the sun […] Somewhere in the middle of it all / Softly, something slowly separating us all / I can’t write, my mind’s soft, Mama, I think I’m dumb […] Our scene begins / But you’re not in it / What’s up, man / Oh, nothing doing / We used to hang out / Why don’t we now […] Rhea Anne / She walks in / She goes talks all day like she don’t have a friend / She likes her man / But he’s not here / So turn up the music loud…”
So a lot of intelligent people see “Running Up That Hill” as the pinnacle of Kate Bush‘s ooh-vrah, and, you know, it’s a good to great song, but I’ve always been more about her first four albums, the increasingly abrasive edges, the in-your-face girliness. I spent the summer of ’78 in Italy and fell in love with “Wuthering Heights,” which was playing everywhere all the time. It didn’t seem particularly camp or over the top to my tender self. When I got back to So Cal, KLOS was asking people to call in with their requests, and I thought I’d be doing them a big favor by requesting the song since it wasn’t on the radio at all here. I was surprised and hurt when they never played it. I remember the video got shown on Don Kirschner’s Rock Concert, but Kate didn’t break in the US until much later. For me The Dreaming is without a doubt her best album, just a roaring, unhinged expression of her incredible talent.
All this to say I was thumbing through recent releases, with my ears, and came across a very gay, 80s flavored, falsettocore track by Max Tundra called “This Woman’s Work” and started really getting into it and then found out that it’s a Kate Bush cover, from Hounds of Love. How did I not remember it? I literally travelled around Europe for four months in ’85 with a Walkman and Hounds of Love and Boys and Girls by Bryan Ferry were my only pre-recorded cassette companions.* “This Woman’s Work” is such an interesting song — seemingly written from the point of view of an expectant father. Despite Kate‘s image as a frilly, arty weirdo with mime tendencies, her lyrics are emotionally naked, clear and direct, almost violently so: “I know you’ve got a little life in you left / I know you’ve got a lotta strength left / I should be cryin’ but I just can’t let it show…” I think I connect these lines with my own experience of still struggling to put my creative self and my vision out into the world relatively late in life.
*Aaand as it turns out, “This Woman’s Work” is actually from The Sensual World — so mystery solved! Thanks to the amazing Xaque for setting me straight!
On a slightly different note, I’ve been strutting around to a rather, shall we say, working class banger called “Give It to ‘Em” by unlikely Kazakh superstar producer Imanbeck (he was working at a train station in Aksu, Kazakhstan when he made an unauthorized remix of “Roses” by Saint Jhn that ended up going crazy viral and launched his career) and veteran rappers Busta Rhymes and Spliff Star, with Russian producer KDDK in there too for good measure. It’s a pumping, ego-fuelled playah fantasy — you can just about smell the sex: “Shawty body hot, yea, that beat fuego / Gimme kiss, mami, dame besos / Money be mucho, pocket full of pesos / She give me something then hasta luego.” Busta (I think) goes on to paint a vivid picture: “You see the way we tangle, and I mangle the pussy from every angle up and every pit down / Shawty exhausted like the end of a wresting match […] Freak shit, sorry your hair got messed up, ha ha…” Dead poe’ic, innit?
When I saw the name of his new one Two Star & The Dream Police I thought it might be neo-power-pop, but Mk.gee seems to be fully unaware of Cheap Trick. Pitched somewhere between the cosmonaut soul of Jai Paul and the buried treasures of the first Autre Ne Veut album, but also cruising into low-fi Lindsay Buckingham territory, he’s a buzzing live wire of inspiration, definitely one of the most exciting artists of the moment. He’s got a way with words too, as on break up song “Alesis,” in which he dresses down a soon to be ex: “You’re not a poet, you’re a liar / I’m not a liar, I’m just high / Why be me who’s caught inside / Two people I don’t even like…”
Eh, it’s true, I end up writing about a lot of what Schwartzenegger used to call guuuhly-men, and the truth is sometimes you just need to headbang with your bros. It’s called self-care. London’s Thee Alcoholics are the best band to scratch that itch at the moment — they’re heavy as metal and serve up a good Jesus and Mary Chain thrashing. “Baby I’m Your Man” crushes rocks like Bleach-era Nirvana: “So good / so divine / so rude / it’s a crime / so strong / so feline / so soft / cross the line…” “It’s So Easy” is a heavenly blast of bad boy joy that gives me a thrill similar to (though much more brutal than) my beloved Stereolab chestnut “John Cage Bubblegum.”
Faye Webster released her first album when she was 16; she’s 25 now and making fascinating baroque pop-rock with freewheeling flourishes and odd time signatures that sound a bit old-timey. On “But Not Kiss” she alternates unadorned, vulnerable vocals with great washes of Bacharaquesque piano in a lovely sketch of a romance that hasn’t quite become one yet: “I want to sleep in your arms, but not kiss / I long for your touch, but don’t miss / Don’t want to regret any of this / I want to see you in my dreams, but then forget / We’re meant to be, but not yet…”
She also has a real psychedelic one called “Lego Ring,” with fellow Atalantan Lil Yachty helping out on vocals, heavily autotuned. Kind of an “Itchycoo Park” vibe. Heavy on vibes.
While Young Thug‘s RICO trial drags on and Playboi Carti mostly lies low, Yeat has become the guy taking charge, leading the permanent freaky revolution in hip hop. His new one 2093 is as large as his life — 46 tracks spread across a two-parter that leans hard into experimentation. On “Breathe” he finds himself in the psychotic mind space of one-percenter ambition: “I was bored, bought a jet, made a billion / Nah, fuck that, bitch, I need a trillion / Nah, fuck that, bitch, I need to feel it / Made me so damn mad, made me feel it (Breathe) / I won’t ever give you time to (Breathe) / I won’t ever give a fuck if you (Breathe) / I don’t really give a fuck about you (Breathe)…”
It’s been complicated between me and Marnie Stern. I’ve admired her, like I get her and I like what she’s doing, and yet I could never find a track that quite got me there. But her new one “Sixteen” is a rock layer cake, it thrashes hard and raw like a party out of bounds, with multiple tracks of centrifugal vocals and a proggy little keyboard doodle in there just for kicks. So glad we finally swapped viscosity.
I tend to think of late career (Kan)Ye as like nothing but bloated, festering ego, and not the fun kind, but maybe VULTURES 1 is a return to form? I haven’t followed closely enough to know, but I’m digging the very largeness of “Carnival,” with Playboi Carti and Rich the Kid and blockbuster medieval choruses and chants — and lyrics that are both epic and hilariously juvenile: “Go, go, go, go / Head so good, she a honor roll / She ride the dick like a carnival / I done did the impossible…”
Xmal Deutschland have bobbed to the surface of my cobwebbed consciousness with a collection of early singles. I remembered loving that one song… I pulled out the “Sickle Moon” 12 inch from 1987 and played side 2 and was impressed but surprised to hear a male vocal. When I flipped it I realized I’d been playing it at 33rpm instead of 45. “Yellow feathers spell caressed,” caterwauls Anja Huwe, “Dull pearls cross the palm of hands / Still – they’ve gone away / Under cover of the night / Away under cover of the night / From afar longing calls / From afar lures the stream / Drawn by its mystery / Guided by a raven…” Xmal emerged in that sweet spot between Siouxsie and the Banshees and late 80s electronic/industrial. Have a listen and just try and not have Satan spawn inside of you.
Ooh and this 1997 one from Japanese proggy psychedelic hard rock band Ghost. The vocal confined to the right channel gives what’s already an amazing track a brutalist geometric style.
If you’re shopping for a groove please investigate Miami’s Jonny From Space and his new Back Then I Didn’t But Now I Do album. My hit single would be “Slip” which sounds like Air and Seefeel having a baby on Uranus. Equally banging is “Live,” which might actually get you up off the couch and to my ears sounds a bit Japanese.
The reviews have been sniffy at best for King Perry, the postumous Lee “Scratch” Perry album (if you enjoy hearing a dubious point get beaten to death, check out the Fork writeup), and honestly it’s all bollocks. Perry doesn’t do your non-profit potluck in the park with 3-bean salad kind of reggae — he’s from outer space. From the irresistible banana daiquiri beach party opener “100lbs of Summer” through collaborations with fellow genius Tricky, King Perry sounds brilliant and futuristic and playful and dark — nothing like the kind of reverential museum piece the Fork was hoping for. This octogenarian rocked hard right until the end.
You probably didn’t remember “This Woman’s Work” from Kate Bush’s “Hounds of Love” album (85) because it’s from her “The Sensual World “ album (89), which is an album well worth re-exploring. Great blog! Keep this going!
OMG thanks Xaque! I clearly need to brush up on my late Kate!!