Audio Journal : 17/05/2010

I have spent most of the last week listening to the four beautiful new releases by Glaswegian experimental musician Alistair Crosbie. Alistair and I have been trading emails this week as part of an interview to accompany my reviews next week.

Where I haven't been listening to ethereal guitar works, I've been catching up on downloaded (legally) odds and ends that have been sat on my hard-drive for a while but just haven't made it into my iPod. Here's ten.

Interpol 'Lights' - stellar new track from the NYC's band upcoming fourth album. Expect more maudlin, Joy Division-esque tracks on the new LP.

Nels Cline 'Floored' - excellent jazz guitar track from the esteemed solo artist and sometime Wilco guitarist Cline, taken from new album Initiate.

LCD Soundsystem 'Drunk Girls (Holy Ghost! Remix)' - inappropriately, James Murphy's new single is one of my four-year-old Daughter#1's favourite songs of the moment, here given a shiny electronic respray by the consistently excellent Holy Ghost!

Cold Cave 'Life Magazine (Arthur Baker Remix)' - electro pioneer Arthur Baker gives band-du-jour Cold Cave an extended fuzzy dance workout, occasionally reminding you of his classic work with Freeez and New Order.



The Ponys 'Check The Door' - from Deathbed + 4, this is a gloomy piece of stentorian bluesy shoegazer rock, with some neat, slow-motion Fifties rock 'n roll riffery toward the end and a vocalist who pays a debt to Blancmange's Neil Arthur.

Goldfrapp 'Rocket (Richard X One Zero Remix)' - for a limited time sometime Sugababes producer Richard X's mix was available as a free Amazon download. The original track was sublime electronic disco-pop, which is given an inoffensive dancefloor reboot here.

Martin Küchen / Keith Rowe / Seymour Wright 'Leeds Extract' - a ten-minute extract from a trio improvisation recorded in Leeds, centred around reductive electronics and an inventive plethora of scratchy sounds. Check the Another Timbre website for more improv extracts from their back catalogue.

Andy Weatherall 'Walk Of Shame' - taken from A Pox On The Pioneers, legendary producer Weatherall's first album under his own name, this blends pleasant tinkly electronics with a subtle dub bass line and guitar reminiscent of the late Michael Karoli from Can.

Conor Oberst And The Mystic Valley Band 'Nikorette' - the new post-Bright Eyes country-rock band from Oberst evidences a more mainstream sound not a million miles from Ryan Adams And The Cardinals.

MGMT 'Destrokk' - an early cut from the Brooklyn duo taken from the Time To Dream EP which owes a debt to Suicide with its harsh motorik synth grind sound; a style which couldn't be further from their recent 'space opera', Congratulations.

Vinyl Corner

Secret Knowledge '2 Much Of Nuttin'' (Heavenly 7", 1994)

I never really liked this track when it was released, principally because I never found Kris Needs' approach to remixing (for the likes of Primal Scream or Nitzer Ebb) terribly thrilling. I'm honestly not sure why I even bought this.

This is an attempt to produce a sort of pop digital heavy dub, but sadly lacks any of the sonic depth of either original Jamaican dub a la King Tubby, or other digital protagonists like Mad Professor. The instrumental version on the B-side loses the annoying female vocals, and is mildly diverting.