1 October 2008

by Simon T Diplock

Cats In Paris, Digitonal, Laura Marling, Old School Tie, Sash!, Senses Fail, Silverfall, The Drones, The Herbaliser, The Virgins, The Vortex

"While most of the music they mangle through is too atonal and harsh to trouble the singles chart (unless that trouble is beating the chart to the ground and stealing its big fat wallet) The Drones do make a most gloriously dark, discordant and dangerous noise."

The Drones – The Minotaur
These Australian oddballs are getting better and better. And while most of the music they mangle through here is too atonal and harsh to trouble the singles chart (unless that trouble is beating the chart to the ground and stealing its big fat wallet) ‘The Minotaur’ makes for the most exciting offering this week by miles.

Old School Tie – Mystery Sound Playground
The two pairs of brothers behind this appallingly-named outfit claim to be inspired by Oceansize and Explosions In The Sky but sound more like Minus The Bear embarking on a dance-rock jam session. They’re dirty rotten liars then, but we love it.

Senses Fail – Family Tradition
Gets top marks for effort this- featuring more high-pitched emoting and earnest grunting than an entire My Chemical Romance tour- but the score has to be set a little lower for riffs, lyrics, presentation, power and just about anything else important for a good rock song. Onwards.

Silverfall – Movies
It’s considered incredibly bad form to quote a band’s press release in a review but when they willingly allow lines like “songs that conjure up the intelligence and passion of KT Tunstall” into the world, they bloody well deserve it. Hell, after that you barely need to press play to find out how grey, soulless and dull Silverfall are.

The Vortex – Dirty Soul
Jesus is the world going faster and faster backwards in time? This sounds like something burped up when Britpop was a big deal.

Laura Marling – Night Terror
Laura Marling. Again. Sounding just like that last time. Which was probably a week ago.

Cats In Paris – Cold Products
A month back we called ‘Cold Products’ a rusty melange of strings and shouts that only irritates. We were right then and are only more so now.

Sash! feat. Stunt – Raindrops (Encore Une Fois)
Absolutely horrible eurotrash. This is almost certainly what hell sounds like.

The Virgins – One Week Of Danger
If this is a sign of the best that's to come from the New York quartet’s first full-length, The Virgins might have to remain satisfied with being the house band on Gossip Girl and nothing else.

The Herbaliser – Can’t Help This Feeling
Jake Wherry and Ollie Teeba, aka The Herbaliser, have been sloping out their neo-funk jams for over a decade now. And it shows. It’s not that this is a bad song, not at all, but perhaps worse than that, it’s just really dull. The wailing, jazzy remixes don’t help none either.

Digitonal – 93 Years On
It’s always good to finish on a high note and while Digitonal have been going for quite a while too, they provide a perfect closing crescendo here. This isn’t so much a single as it is slowly unfolding filmic ambience to stick on repeat and lose yourself in for days and days and days. And this time the remixes, a simultaneously stark and striking effort from 65 Days Of Static in particular, make perfect sense. Roll credits.

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