Girl Talk

Pittsburgh mixmaster Girl Talk has been floating near the top of The Hype Machine and today was awarded a unit-shifting 8.0 on Pitchfork for Feed The Animals. So when I hit play I hoped for something wondrous, possibly a distillation of the past 50 odd years of pop music. Mr Girl Talk's schtick is mashing up the mash-up by condensing approximately one million poptacular samples into each track. (Well, maybe not a million, but you know what I mean.) There's a Hot Chip with The Cardigans' Lovefool, then a moment of Jay-Z with Paranoid Android. It feels like no moment of sublime pop is untouched, from Ace of Base's All That She Wants to Beastie Boys' Bodymovin'. Busta Rhymes. Metallica. Lil Wayne. Procul Haram. Et-bloody-cetera.
2005 just called. It wants its bastard pop back.
I realise it's supposed to be oh so clever by putting familiar sounds into new contexts, but it's so artless. Oh Pitchfork, what were you thinking? Feed The Animals is an extended megamix dependent on the pop musical genius of other people and the fact that most pop songs stick to a 4/4 beat. And pitch-shifting, lots of pitch-shifting. It's Strawberry Jam for people who find Animal Collective a bit, you know, weird.
It sounds like that daily Jo Whiley competition (The Shuffle?) dragged out for over 50 minutes. People who say they like this are just congratulating themselves because they feel clever for recognising the samples. Er, well done, you've listened to a lot of music.

Couples by the Long Blondes

Some albums need time to settle in. Couples, second album from The Long Blondes, has been out in the UK since 7 April, but my mind is only just made up on it. What is my mind saying? 'Meh...'
Lead single Century was alright, and new single Guilt sounds like it could sit comfortably amongst the tunes of Someone To Drive You Home. But overall it just tries to hard to be cool, and sadly fails. Erol Alkan? Good DJ, remixer and club promoter... but a producer? Not sure. He adds a lot of "electro" noises, but it's such a messy, lumpen album.
Even the cover (designed by singer Kate Jackson) doesn't do it for me. I like zebras. I like a well-upholstered chaise longues. But the Long Blondes are a self-proclaimed stylish band and this little collage isn't going to cut it. Look at all the white space in the middle!
I really didn't want to feel this way. I loved the Long Blondes when I lived in Sheffield, went to lots of their early pub gigs and felt jealous of Kate's apparently endless supply of pencil skirts and colourful scarves. Well, she was working in a vintage clothing shop at the time. Second albums are often difficult because bands are out on the road, promoting the first album and don't have time to write decent songs. But Dorian could have channelled some more Shadow Morton, couldn't he?

The Last Tycoon by Peter Moren

Here's another album review for This Is Fake DIY. What a lovely chap that Peter is etc:

Taking a sabbatical from his day job as part of Swedish spook-pop superstars Peter, Bjorn and John, Peter Morén releases a solo album of intimate, folk-influenced songs. Largely written and recorded over several years while touring with PB&J, The Last Tycoon is a glimpse into Peter’s individual talents as a songwriter. The title is lifted from Elia Kazan’s 1976 film, itself an adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s final, unfinished novel. Nobel laureate Harold Pinter wrote the screenplay, so we must conclude that Peter knows all about culture. Tempting though it may be to draw comparisons between Peter’s songwriting and the film’s plot of an executive losing the, ahem, plot, any hypothesising would be tenuous. The Last Tycoon (film) is about the impossibility of the American dream; The Last Tycoon (album) is about failing love affairs and working as a music supply teacher (on Social Competence: ‘when I do my best to get a minute’s rest there’s always someone trying to exhaust me completely’).
There is less variation than PB&J’s genre-hopping Writer’s Block, as Peter relies on domesticated folk. Mainly backed by an acoustic guitar, a medley of instrumentation adds a homemade quality throughout the album, including handclaps, theremin, piano and violin. Surrounded by a warm crackling, Old Love is like a near forgotten memory rediscovered in an attic. Missing Link is a summer afternoon daydream, while Twisted spins out over a music box piano riff. Single Reel to Real begins like a jaunty round the campfire song which briefly hits a dark interlude of tolling tubular bells (‘who wants to be real? Nobody I know’). All charming stuff.
Over ten tracks, Peter’s vocals become tiring as they strain to reach the higher notes: 40 minutes is a long time to spend in the company of one closely microphoned Swede. He seems like such a lovely gent, always well turned out, that you just want him to succeed. And however appealing it is to speak of Peter Morén as on the same level as Leonard Cohen or Robyn Hitchcock, the comparison simply isn’t true. The songs are gentle reflections on his life, composed in snatched moments between band commitments. The Last Tycoon does confirm what anybody who fell head over heels with Young Folks already knows (so that’s just about everybody, then): Peter is a talented and versatile young man. The Last Tycoon is a pleasing diversion until the PB&J follow-up to Writer’s Block.

Replica Sun Machine by The Shortwave Set

I have been busy for This is Fake DIY. This time, an album review:

Psychedelic indie poppers The Shortwave Set return from the wilderness of being dropped by their label with their second album, Replica Sun Machine. Although their debut album The Debt Collection (2005) received awed reviews and high star ratings, it did not shift units. The south London trio found without a record deal and back to the hustle of being an unsigned band. Fortunately, one of the few people to buy their debut was neo-funkster Danger Mouse (Gnarls Barkley), who produced their sophomore effort.
Replica Sun Machine could have been unearthed from a time capsule alongside The White Album, as crisp guitars and psychedelic instrumentation support mellifluous vocal lines. Throughout, there is a portentous preoccupation with the sinister machinery of the album’s title. Such pre-apocalyptic conspiracy theorising might be expected on, say, a Kula Shaker album, and here it is no less affected. But it unifies the album with one concept, especially as many of the tracks are mixed together.
This 11-track album opens with sitar-flecked Harmonia, a song so understated it almost urges the listener to go elsewhere. Beyond this, the fun begins. Lead single No Social is the stand out: a sassy brush-off to arrogant scenesters who look down their noses. ‘Everyone knows that a dog dressed in clothes is still a dog,’ muses Ulrika Bjorsne. Elsewhere, Replica Sun Machine includes luscious string arrangements (Yesterday To Come), David Bowie circa Aladdin Sane pomp (Now Til 69) and a round the piano singsong Hey Jude moment about our impending doom (The Downer Song). In an age where Beth Ditto’s raucous bellowing equals emotion, the singing of Andrew Pettitt and Ulrika sounds flat and occasionally androgynous, as their harmonies slide against each other. Of course, this is to keep the band as equals, drawing attention to music overall.
You have to admire the man-hours Danger Mouse has put into arranging and producing Replica Sun Machine, presumably on free afternoons somewhere between his duties with Gnarls Barkley and generally being one of the coolest men in pop. Barely a phrase passes without a delicate tweak of reverb. At times, Replica Sun Machine is a ménage a trois between Mr Mouse, John Cale (experimental pop pioneer formerly of the Velvet Underground, who provides ‘atmospherics’: a catch-all term for the swooshes and added value instrumentation) and Van Dyke Parks (a string arranger notable for his work with the Beach Boys). The imaginations and skill of the three experienced musicians sometimes engulf the Shortwave Set, leading to the question: is this simply a CV boost for Danger Mouse? Short of hiring an orchestra, Replica Sun Machine is near impossible to recreate live. Without all the production, the Shortwave Set are simply two boys and a girl with inventive melodies and an exhaustive knowledge of late 60s psychedelic pop. Probably best to enjoy Replica Sun Machine for what it is: a glorious trip through climate change anxieties and glistening pop.