Here is the second part of a series of posts where I have a think about a lot of the common complaints I hear from music fans, as they react to the massive change which the industry is undergoing at the moment. I’m just trying to think about it from a fan’s point of view at this point, trying to figure out if these laments actually have much merit, whether or not a normal fan really cares, or whether we’re just being silly.

Once again, here are the various articles that prompted this little festival of self-indulgence, so you have some idea what to expect:
A Penny For Your Thoughts by The Vinyl Villain (read the comments as well, because some of them are very thought-provoking.
Does the World Need Another Indie Band? by Tim Walker, writing in The Independent.
Why Has Modern Music Lost So Much Impact? by the Kings of A&R.
This comment, from a reader called Alex in the comment thread of my recent podcast – The Tribecast.

And here are the other posts in the series:
1. Fragmentation
2. Over Saturation
3. Hype Overload
4. Decreasing Quality

#2 Over Saturation

I am in real doubt as to whether or not over saturation really exists, but perhaps I have to concede that it does. There is a fuck of a lot of music out there to be listened to, but then there always has been.

Realistically, I think it is fair to say that there is probably more music being recorded and presented to the world as a whole for listening than there ever has been. Fair enough – cheaper technology and better access to distribution, even distribution as limited and basic as websites, blogs and MySpace all make this infinitely easier than it was before. So I can agree that perhaps the total quantity has increased, but I don’t think that makes a shred of difference.

If you think about it for even a moment, there has always been more music out there than you can listen to. What’s the difference now? More outlets? More outlets pushing more songs than before? Fewer filters between the musicians and the listener? I don’t know, but I think there are two things that have changed which influence people’s feelings of being overwhelmed by the quantity of music out there.

Firstly, we seem to be burndening ourselves with this odd sense of obligation to actually listen to more stuff. A lot of the time this complaint comes from bloggers and other enthusiasts – in other words, not the casual fan and not necessarily the deranged obsessive. The casual fan has always just listened to whatever comes along, sought out a little more of what really captures their imagination, and then drifted off to do something else and not thought about it. It may not be my attitude, but it is a healthy one. The really mental obsessive – the likes of John Peel and voracious vinyl accumulators – have always known and accepted that it was impossible to listen to everything anyway. Did Peel not say something that roughly paraphrases as: it would take me a month to listen to the amount of music I receive in a week. He knew it was fruitless to try, obviously.

I think the only people who worry about this are people like me, and probably you, if you’re a keen enough fan to be reading a niche page like this. The mid-level enthusiasts who are finding the explosion of availability exciting and yet overwhelming. We want to explore everything, leave no stone unturned, no bedroom talent unappreciated and we are starting to realise that it is just impossible. Without wishing to be brusque, there is only one solution to this: get over it, forget about it, it was never going to happen anyway. We can’t even listen to all the stuff we hear about, never mind all the stuff that no-one ever mentions. There’s too much for one brain to absorb or for one lifetime to even make time to listen to, there always has been, so get over it and stop worrying. Just enjoy the stuff you do listen to and stop whining.

Secondly, I think there is sometimes a little too much pressure to actually participate. In the old media model this stuff was delivered to you in a linear fashion. The radio was on, a band was playing or whatever it was – you listened, you absorbed it, or you didn’t. It was your choice and your only obligation was to engage or ignore, that was it – it was easy to be listener back then. Nowadays, with things like my comment section gazing pleadingly at you at the end of every post – two or three a day, remember – and the explosion of message boards, bands directly contacting you asking you what you think and all manner of other interactive media, there can seem to be a lot more to being a music fan than just sitting back and enjoying the tunes.

If you read this site every few weeks, which is how often I read a lot of websites, then the sheer volume of music and interaction you are missing can seem like an accusation, I would imagine. If a band drops a friend request into your MySpace inbox, ignoring it can feel like ignoring a specific question addressed to you in a conversation at a party. You feel you have to answer, and of course you don’t. Web 2.0 is an opportunity, not an obligation. If you want to come here, read a couple of posts, not bother commenting and then not come back for a month then no-one minds! If you want to ignore a hundred borderline-spam friend requests from MySpace bands, then so what? If you listen to a song, kind of enjoy it, but have nothing to say about it then so fucking what? You are the audience, not the artist and there is no obligation to anything, not even listen.

You can tell where I’m going with this, can’t you? It’s such a false lament: there’s too much music. There always has been, stop burdening yourselves with non-existent expectations and just enjoy the stuff however the fuck you please. It’s supposed to be fun!

(The Real) Tuesday Weld – It’s a Dirty Job but Someone’s Got to Do It
Silversun Pickups – Lazy Eye
Bob Geldof & the Vegetarians of Love – The Great Song of Indifference

I have been slow to review this because it moves slowly, like honey. It’s rich and strong, equal parts old time American folk, and deep gothic country. Williams uses his music to deliver one dark narrative after another, the tales evoking Johnny Cash and Nick Cave’s fatalistic denouements*.

It never strays into twangy country territory, this, preferring a spare, somewhat desolate tone, with an air of old-fashioned forebearance in the face of grief.  The musical landscape is in many ways familiar, but it is the subtle swaying between genres, and the judicious variation of pace that keep things interesting.  Instead of wearing you down with misery, Williams seems adept at letting things ebb and flow just enough to keep you engaged.

This is another one of these albums that didn’t blow me off my feet to begin with – I basically thought ‘ah, more decent country-folk-noir’.  This may not be far from the truth, but it is nevertheless extremely well done, and the album as a whole is a very nurturing – satisfying in some enigmatic way that I can’t quite pin down.  I like this.

Christian Williams – The Sad Song of Sequin Island
Christian Williams – Upstairs

Website | MySpace | More mp3s | Buy from CDBaby

*Yes, I know, a bit wanky, but it really seemed like the right word.  I do apologise.

Hmm, nothing like a really depressing news story to start the day, even one that has been in the pipeline for some time. From the Guardian:

Illegal downloaders to get warning letter in government clampdown

Ah, splendid, just what we needed. This is, I think it is fair to say, a bit of a disaster. I am not a fundamentalist freeloader though, so my opposition to this particular approach is not entirely based upon opposition to the principle itself – not entirely.

Anyone with any sense will surely agree that the idea of government essentially mandating the eavesdropping on personal communications is pretty dubious to begin with. The fact that they are mandating it without the recourse to warrants or whatever the UK equivalent of probable cause might be is downright disturbing. And amazingly, this is the least of my objections to this deal, because with the rise in encrypted torrent traffic, the spying can be overcome with relative ease, so fuck them and their snooping.  But the internet is not just about communication, it is also a marketplace, so the argument doesn’t apply entirely that neatly.

No, the bit that really, really worries me is what amounts to the outsourcing of law enforcement to unaccountable bodies. When I objected to the privatisation of healthcare and education it was on a fairly straightforward basis: these services are supposed to be run entirely for the benefit of the ‘customer’. They are crucial and their presence and their health benefits the nation as a whole, so they should fall under the umbrella of government, it’s that simple. If you want to push it further than that, I think there is something fucking sinister about introducing the profit motive to the healing process. Do you want your doctor to have his commission in mind when he decides whether to prescribe you a massive run of anti-depressants or just tell you to get a little exercise, try and take your work less seriously and spend more time with your family? Or how about when teaching your little rugrats about something contentious like, say, political history?

Well this one goes a step further. In the Iraq war one of the most appaling developments was the massive use of ‘private defence contractors’, which is an obvious euphemism for mercenaries, who were completely rogue. Not only were they not subject to the laws of the nation they had invaded, but they have also been entirely excused from having to obey the laws of the United States, the people holding their chain. It’s fucking unbelievable – they are completely and utterly unaccountable. If you want to read more about this particular disgrace, pick any of the following articles.

So how is this relevant to this particular situation? Well basically the British government is outsourcing law enforcement within the British Isles to companies who have no accountability to the electorate. ISPs have already shown excessive enthusiasm to clamp down on people who actually use their networks. This is the ultimate free lunch argument, one more often employed by insurance companies: we are happy for you to pay for a service, however if there is any chance of you actually needing to use it, then we will be very unhappy indeed. Basically, they want rid of large data transfers, like movie and music sharing, because it burdens their networks and they can no longer get away with short-changing their consumers.

Add to that the fact that major media conglomerates hate it because it is an interaction that they do not own an can be abused in a manner that costs them money, and you can see where we are heading with this. The problem is that I have no faith whatsoever in anyone’s willing to tell the difference between legitimate, legal sharing and illegal sharing, which I will happily admit is bad and needs to be dealt with. Not like this though. Increasingly, small media outlets, and even some of the bigger ones, like record labels and DIY filmmakers are using filesharing as a method of distributing their work – of trying to gain a popular foothold without having to go through the onerous process of seeking approval from more traditional media.

Are Virgin fucking Media going to bother differentiating? I would put money on the answer being no. I would also put money on them basically threatening the living daylights out of anyone who seeds multiple torrents, irrespective of content and that is a big problem. I personally anticipate an attack, not on illegal activity, but on the whole bloody kit ‘n’ caboodle. ISPs hate it because it makes them work for their money, Big Media hate it because it excludes them, and the government has just given these two odious entities carte fucking blanche to do their level best to get rid of the whole shooting match.

Basically, in the worst case, which it is not entirely unrealistic to expect, the ISPs will simply be so trigger happy at shutting down filesharers of all stripes that it gradually undermines the whole enterprise. More annoyingly, and more likely, is that large companies will simply wave about legal threats, much the same way they are starting to do on YouTube, and simply have anything turned off which they don’t like, and this is the crux of the problem. All that will be needed will be an allegation, and there will be no way to challenge it, no right of appeal, not because people don’t want to or don’t have grounds, but because very few individuals would have the courage to take on a massive corporation in court.  Basically, as far as I can see, this brings an end to the concept of due process in this area, despite how many times the RIAA have been humiliated in court, when their complaints have actually been required to cut the legal mustard.

Now that requirement will vanish. Bank charges are a classic example of unaccountable corporate entities acting outside the law with almost total impunity – it tooks years of crazy fees before enough momentum was built to finally challenge the banks in court. Their only downfall was that their greed eventually got the better of them. But with the RIAA in some cases extorting $222,000 for sharing 24 files people will, as with the banks, simply obey. Why wouldn’t you when it could cost you your house? No right of independent adjudication, no right of appeal, no capacity to resist, no due fucking process.

I am reminded of America’s laughably empty government catchphrase: “by the people, for the people”. If things like law enforcement are not in any way accountable to ‘the people’ what chance is there of their ever acting ‘for the people’?

Billy Bragg – NPWA
Calexico – The Guns of Brixton

I have been reading a few things recently about the state of music in the 21st Century. Not the state of the music industry exactly, but the state of music itself and its relationship with its fans. There are a lot of things I want to write about in response to this, so rather than one massive great big monster post, I think I’ll break it down into a small series of things which I’ll write over the course of the next day or so.

Firstly, here are the various articles that prompted this little festival of self-indulgence, so you have some idea what to expect:
A Penny For Your Thoughts by The Vinyl Villain (read the comments as well, because some of them are very thought-provoking.
Does the World Need Another Indie Band? by Tim Walker, writing in The Independent.
Why Has Modern Music Lost So Much Impact? by the Kings of A&R.
This comment, from a reader called Alex in the comment thread of my recent podcast – The Tribecast.

So, how am I going to break this down into relatively digestible chunks, so this post doesn’t just ramble on forever? Like so:
1. Fragmentation
2. Over Saturation
3. Hype Overload
4. Decreasing Quality

#1 Fragmentation

I may quibble with either the existence or the seriousness of some of the other things I am going to discuss in this series, but I don’t think I can honestly argue against the fact that there is severe fragmentation in the music market. Whether it’s a bad thing or a good thing, however, I couldn’t rightly say, although I don’t think it is great for the vast majority of music fans.

If you think about it, no-one really knows where or what the mainstream is anymore. Jay-Z headlines Glastonbury, the NME left relevance behind years ago, Top of the Pops is dead, radio stations are struggling and internet ones are actually under attack from the music industry itself, so where do we all find out about the next big thing together?

Well for the fanatics like myself and probably, given you’re here reading this, you too, the fragmentation is actually a bonus most of the time. It is what allows us to be here, examining some of the more obscure
corners of the indiesphere, whilst still keeping half an eye on the wider mainstream acts at the same time. It also helps us build communities of people, even ones who have never met, nor are ever likely to.

For the more balanced music fan, however, it can be a problem. I mentioned during the Tribecast that pop music, particuarly mainstream pop music is not particularly about the music itself from an artistic standpoint. I mean, there’s a reasonably rigid formula for pop hits, and they have to be catchy as hell for some reason, so it’s not like the music can get away with being entirely inept (vapid is another question), but for the listener the social aspect is often equally important.

Culture is a crucial part of group bonding – basic tribal behaviour – and the act of sharing cultural entities is an important way of binding a community together. So it really doesn’t matter what you think of a song, what matters is its capacity to appeal to a large number of people and enough awareness that it has the chance to become something shared by as many people as possible.

In the Tribecast I mentioned Mr. Brightside by the Killers as a perfect example of a song and an album that was so ubiquitous that it is now completely attached to the Summer of 2005 and in five or six years time, any of us who hear that song again will instantly associate it with whatever was going on in our life at the time. We’ll have that ‘Aaa, remember this!‘ conversation with a random person in a pub, and this will allow us to instantly bond that little bit more, and that little bit more easily.

At the moment there seems to be no shared mass market for this stuff, in fact Top of the Pops’ very breadth was probably what killed it. Looking at the Top Ten Albums lists for 2007, we see the Billboard Charts – the barometer of major label sales – giving us obviously ludicrous hits such as Hannah Montana and Now Fifty-Whatever. Even the superficial magazines were writing out lists full of LCD Soundsytem and TV on the Radio – a bloggers’ delight perhaps, but is it that representative of mainstream tastes? Bloggers are prominent at the moment because we are very easy to find, and there is a definite style of indie rock that seems to be very popular amongst bloggers. So we’re one of the most coherent, available voices out there, but I really have my doubts that we are representative of mainstream tastes.

All this results in the fragmentation we are talking about. As Alex said, in his comment on the Tribecast thread:

“I think songs like ‘All These Things That I’ve Done’ and bands like Arctic Monkeys – that really capture the imagination of the mainstream, but that can also be looked back on a few months down the line without any hint of embarrassment – are so important. They’re the only point of cultural bonding (and drunken singalong) I can expect to have with anyone of my age in 10 years time.”

He’s right, but in other ways this fragmentation is a good thing. It allows, for example, smaller, more close-knit communities to form, often locally centred. Imagine if you find someone in ten years with a Toad Session recording in their music collection, for example. Or imagine, on a larger scale, meeting a fan of King Creosote and realising that you both talked on the Fence Beefboard at the same time. Or even just meeting someone who also reads The Vinyl Villain or, more likely, Said the Gramophone. That bond will be a hell of a lot stronger than a wishy-washy, generic ‘Oh yeah, I liked that Killers song’.

But remember that it isn’t just radio and television that forges these shared bonds. ASDA radio plays more and better indie music in an hour that pretty much any major radio station, and they probably have more listeners too, albeit not by choice. But this seeps in everywhere – in every pub and bar that plays music. If you’re in the same pubs as someone, you’re listening to the same music, and if it happens a lot you remember it, however subconsciously, so this process really hasn’t been stopped. Think about the ubiquity of cutting edge music in advertising and television as well – if we’re all watching Big Brother, we’re all listening to the same music.

Ultimately though, I think these things will consolidate. That’s what Capitalism does: builds bigger and bigger and shitter and shitter companies until there is an explosion and it all tumbles down and starts over. You can already see the growth of things like The Hype Machine and Drowned in Sound and to some extent The Guardian as well, all starting to point the way to the kinds of large entities that could easily grow out of the current sea of tiny enterprises. So for anyone worrying about the fragmentation in the actual music industry itself, I honestly doubt it will last that long.

It’s also worth bearing in mind that we often don’t know what is going to define a period of time until afterwards. What’s going to define 2008? Well we don’t know, do we – Vampire Weekend? It’s not unlikely.

The Killers – Mr. Brightside
Vampire Weekend – A-Punk
Nirvana – Smells Like Teen Spirit

Fear not, this isn’t quite as horribly overbearing as it could have been. The ranting is actually fairly under control, and the self-important pontificating not quite as reckless as it could so easily have been, partly because I wasn’t quite as liberal with the gin as I have been in the past.

The reason it’s called the Popecast is because of this amazing little story about Catholics in the States issuing death threats to a kid who took a communion wafer out of the church with him.  The hilarious PZ Myers then got involved, threatening to show them what real desecration would look like, and the pandemonium reached all new levels of shrillness.

The thing that really got my goat about all this was not so much that Catholics took offence, but more the level of the hysteria and the language of persecution.  It was honestly described as kidnapping and as a hate crime by various loonies, and there was nothing like enough ‘Oh fucking grow up and get the fuck over it’ being said.  People seem to be seeking all sorts of odd legal protections for their crazy superstitions these days, and I am flabberghasted that a particular kind of idea is being so fucking mollycoddled as to be deemed immune from criticism and contempt.  Come on, people, fuck your religious convictions and learn to deal with the fact that most of the planet thinks they’re crazy – and that applies to atheists as well.

Anyhow, I promise this doesn’t take over too much of the podcast, and that the music is given plenty of space to breathe.

Toadcast #33 – The Popecast

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01. Half Man Half Biscuit – Vatican Broadside (00.07)
02. Beck – Profanity Prayers (02.27)
03. Punch & the Apostles – Nouveau Gypsy (10.20)
04. I Said Yes – The Town Crier (15.07)
05. Albert Hammond Jr. – GFC (20.47)
06. Bonnie Prince Billy – So Everyone (23.51)
07. Tom Lehrer – Vatican Rag (33.53)
08. The Savings & Loan – Catholic Boys in the Rain (37.12)
09. Derek Meins – The Gin Song (42.57)
10. Holly Golightly & the Broke-Offs – Devil Do (48.47)
11. Ghostkeeper – Solid Gold (56.02)
12. Forest Fire – Fortune Teller (60.44)
13. Silver Jews – Strange Victory, Strange Defeat (70.22)
14. Sparrow & the Workshop – Magic Tricks (77.55)
15. The Just Joans – Hey Boy, You’re Oh So Sensitive (79.43)
16. Roy Zimmerman – Ted Haggard is Completely Heterosexual (85.41)
17. Willard Grant Conspiracy – Evening Mass (97.16)

And just for the fun, here are the two silly songs for you to download:
Tom Lehrer – Vatican Rag[audio http://www.matthewjamesyoung.com/sbt/TheVaticanRag.mp3]
Roy Zimmerman – Ted Haggard is Completely Heterosexual[audio http://www.matthewjamesyoung.com/sbt/RoyZimmerman-TedHaggardIsCompletelyHeterosexual.mp3]

Here’s a bit of 7″ pleasure that no-one with any vaguely folky inclinations should permit to pass them by. The Left Outsides were born in the fallout of the demise of brilliant London psych-folksters The 18th Day of May. Alison and Mark played viola and guitar respectively in that much-lamented band, and have since continued to play together, forming The Left Outsides fairly hot on the heels of the breakup.

There are times when their music is a little glacial of pace for my liking, but they are capable of doing some really brilliant things at times too. Their new single is out on Hi Beat Records, a small London imprint from the looks of it, and contains two sides of genuine brilliance.

I really, really want to play you the song, but even an internet fundamentalist like myself knows it would be a bit self-defeating to ask you to go and pay £3.50 for a single I’ve just allowed you to download for nothing. It’s frustrating though. I can be previewed here, at their MySpace page, however and I recommend you do so because it’s an excellent track. The b-side is a Found remix of Deep Rivers Move In Silence; Shallow Brooks Are Noisy; Found’s trademark glitchery is very subtly applied, and as remixes go this is about as effective as I’ve heard.

All in all then, a bag of boyish enthusiasm from this amphibian. I have ordered one myself and I bloody well expect you lot to as well.

The Left Outsides – Fallen by the Wayside (from And Colours in Between)
The Left Outsides – The Ballad of Jim Jones(from Leave the Frozen Butterflies Behind)

I don’t like to just trot things out like some sort of parrot-powered news service if I can avoid it, but this news is very fine news indeed.

Calexico, who are one of my very favourite bands, have released a teaser mp3 for their new album, which will be called Carried to Dust and will be available on September 9th of this year. I am not sure if there are different release dates for the UK, but given the idiocy of international distributors it wouldn’t surprise me. Anyhow, the song is called Two Silver Trees, is downloadable from their MySpace page, and is bloody excellent. Has the pre-release mp3 leak become the new, revenue-less single these days? It looks like it I guess, and I suppose it makes a degree of sense if you treat a single as being there to drum up excitement and anticipation for the album.  Less so if you think of it as a revenue-generator in its own right, of course.

Anyhow, yes, there’s a new album. And they’re playing here. Yes, instead of the more habitual trail to Glasgow that bands visit Scotland tend to beat, we are getting Calexico at the Queen’s Hall on Thursday 11th September.

In terms of my favourite bands, I think it is safe to say that Calexico are right up there with the best. I bought and sort of liked Spoke, before somewhat losing track of them for a while. Then with Feast of Wire I was hooked, and have since explored forwards and backwards through their back catalogue with what I suppose can be described as gleeful abandon. When Mrs. Toad and I get a little tipsy of an evening, and the stereo is on just that little bit too loud, the chances of Calexico coming on the Toad Hall PA system are very, very high indeed.

Calexico – Two Silver Trees

Does the title of that song remind anyone else slightly of Dr. Seuss? “Through three cheese trees, three free fleas flew. Through these cheese trees, freezy breeze blew.” Or something vaguely like that!

It’s a bit crowded with interesting things this week, with everything kind of happening at once, making it a little difficult to decide what to go to. Then there’s always Mrs. Toad of course, who has the selfish habit of complaining when I spent every night of the week out doing musicky things, the unreasonable old bag.

We’re off on a big holiday shortly too, so there is a fair bit of organising to be done and so far I am not proving particularly adept. Ah well, organisation was never a strong suit, but I guess we’ll be just fine. Going away is hardly a tricky business, especially if jabs aren’t involved. So what will I probably be skipping this week, in preparation for my parents’ visit on Friday?

Wednesday 23rd July 2008: Lanterns on the Lake, Lipsync For a Lullaby & Laura Lewis & the Tea Dance Orchestra at the Voodoo Rooms.
I don’t know much about these chaps, but Lipsync were highly recommended to me quite recently, although by whom I can’t remember. It was probably Bart “There is No Such Thing as a Shit Band” Owl I should imagine, but I’m not sure. Lanterns on the Lake are a Newcastle bunch who play rather dreamy pop, Laura Lewis is a local concern, who sounds quite breathless and just a little twee, and Lipsync deal in guitar soundscapes, so it sounds like a really diverse bill and a very decent night out indeed.
Lanterns on the Lake – This Year

Thursday 24th July 2008: Meursault & The Kays Lavelle play Duty Free at Cabaret Voltaire.
I like these Duty Free gigs – they’ve put together some pretty good lineups, despite the freeness, and this week sees a couple of very good Toadpals Meursault and The Kays Lavelle on the bill, along with a couple of other bands I don’t really know: Barnowl and Ross Clark.
The Kays Lavelle – The Chemistry Between

Thursday 24th July 2008: Sara & the Snakes & Black Diamond Express play Limbo at the Voodoo Rooms.
I’ve wanted to see Black Diamond Express for a while, but they don’t play that often and when they do I have an annoying habit of being otherwise engaged, which may well happen again this time, which is really frustrating. Sara & the Snakes likewise, really. I’ve seen their guitarist Andy do a solo set and he was absolutely outstanding but I’ve never seen the full band which is a little bit frustrating.
Black Diamond Express – Jack

Well what a rotten album this is, then.  Really, just not very good at all – what the hell was all the fuss about?

I sort of skipped the hype surrounding these guys, but I do remember reading one rather thoughtful argument, although where I read it I can’t remember, that made a very good point.  If a group can be hyped to the rafters based on their first couple of home recordings on MySpace, then there is a massive danger that they will still be finding their feet and just won’t be ready.  They’ll get chewed up, evaluated, measured, loved or dismissed, all on the basis of a few home demos that basically represent no more than their first, tentative steps into the world of recorded music.  They might barely even be a band yet.

Has this happened to Black Kids?  Well I’ve no idea, of course, but it is a massive danger with getting too excited about a band before they’ve had time to find their feet.  I mean, for fuck’s sake, even the great Tom Waits’ early recordings, whilst pretty good, gave little indication of the three decades of genius that were to come.  Just listen to The Early Years Vol. 1 and see what I mean – it’s okay, but it would have been easy enough to dismiss him on that basis.

So with this I think the only song I’d heard before was the only decent song on the album: I’m Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend etc etc…  This is a good, catchy track, the rest is bobbins, and really I am left feeling a little sullied by the experience.  Have I expected too much from a group I would normally approach with a bit more skepticism because of all the hype?  Have they been dealt something of a raw deal because of everyone being so desperate to find a sure thing in an era when all labels are seriously running scared?  Are they appealing to other people?  Or are they just a very limited group, dragged out of their natural environment by human beings’ rather unedifying herd instinct?  Who knows, but this album has nothing that I would recommend to people who like the stuff that normally appears on this site, and I feel a little guilty for expecting that it might.

Black Kids – I’m Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance With You
Black Kids – Hurricane Jane (Fucking awful.)

Website | More mp3s | Buy from Amazon

Well, after the genius of The Letting Go, I’ll admit that my hopes were very high for this album.  I wouldn’t say they’ve exactly been fulfilled though, and it might be possible that Mr. Oldham has gone just a little bit too pop.  The Letting Go, from 2006, took earlier ultra-hushed work like Master & Everyone and gave it a looser, more melodic, hook-laden working over.

This time around the jauntiness seems to slightly derail the beauty of Oldham’s usual songwriting.  There’s nothing wrong with any of it exactly, just that as the songs take off and start to flit and dance around, playing with muted brass and careful harmonies, they tend to forget to take the listener with them.

I don’t know how else to put it – it’s all there and all in the right places, but somehow I am constantly finding myself left behind as the song pulls off into the distance.  Some of it is just plain gorgeous of course – with Will Oldham how could it not be – with So Everyone my personal favourite, highlighted by a wonderfully equivocal duet that rises to a question and then disappears before furnishing an answer.  There are plenty more moments like this as well, and I would never say that there aren’t any great bits to be found, it’s just that generally I don’t seem to be following where it is leading.

Bonnie Prince Billy – So Everyone
Bonnie Prince Billy – For Every Field There’s a Mole

Website | More mp3s | Buy from Amazon