Audio Journal: 22/09/2013 - Gary Numan, John Lennon McCullagh, FTSE, Metamono

FTSE (Sam Manville)

Last week I was asked if I wanted to contribute to this month's New Wave section for next month's Clash magazine. This basically involves writing a 350-word piece on some hot new up and coming band or artist. I wrote one a couple of months ago on the band Benin City so I thought I'd throw my hat in.

However, writing about new bands is, at least for me, a challenge. As this blog will attest, I spend most of my time listening to stuff that's, if not old, then something I'm passionate about in some way or know something about. For Clash this month I wrote a piece on the new Gary Numan album, which is a good case in point. I may not have followed Numan's career that closely, but 'Cars' is definitely a major influence on being in love with electronic music - as a five-year-old kid I distinctly recall watching him perform that on the Old Grey Whistle Test with my father, either when I was on my way to bed or because I couldn't sleep and had come back into the lounge. Irrespective, something about that song crept into my consciousness and the seed for my love of electronic music was planted. So with that prior impact in mind, I was really pleased to be writing about Splinters, his new, good, and very bleak album. I was less confident writing about ex-Creation Records svengali Alan McGee's new signing, the fifteen year old troubador (and audaciously-named) John Lennon McCullagh; however, McCullagh's debut album is massively inspired by Bob Dylan, right down to the protest themes, folksy guitars and harmonicas, and I know enough about Dylan to have nailed that review without breaking too much of a sweat.

But the New Wave piece did inspire a certain element of panic. After agreeing to do it, the editor sent through a list of bands and asked which I'd like to cover. I looked down the list and didn't recognise any of them. I had no press release to refer to, no music to listen to, and while I could have done a cursory Google search to find a YouTube clip or streamed track, I simply didn't have the time to do that. The deadline was keen and so I glanced at the list and picked the one name that grabbed me - FTSE. The reason I chose that, for those who really know me, was probably self-evident: I may act like what I do every day is listen to and write about music, but the reality is I work for a big bank in the City of London, and that's what pays the bills. So I saw the name FTSE, laughed inwardly at the cross-reference between my day job and this article and then found myself interviewing FTSE's Sam Manville for the piece.

FTSE make music that leans heavily into soul, R&B, hip-hop and drum 'n' bass - none of which are typical concerns of mine - but those influences are linked together by electronics that eschew the sheen and polish of most mainstream pop through Manville's interest in sounds that just aren't perfect, perhaps are a bit hissy or wonky, creating dark interstitial moments that disrupt his otherwise commercial sound. Though he was tight-lipped on his influences, one that crept out was David Byrne - you can imagine that any doubt I had about writing about some young gun dissipated at that point - who he singled out precisely because Byrne doesn't possess what anyone could describe as a 'perfect' voice. Manville is about to release his second EP and he's clearly going places. Here's 'St Tropez' from that EP. (Click here for those on email.)

Returning to electronic music, this week I've been listening to music created using analogue synths, those great beasts that were less instruments and more science kits, involving lots of knobs, filters, patch cables and a lab coat to make sounds from scratch. A lot of my listening has been taken up with the debut album from Metamono, which this trio will release in October. You can read a bit more here and you can listen to the track 'Linger Langour' from With The Compliments Of Nuclear Physics on that link.