I'm back! 'The Mire - Vol. 1' album review.

Hello dearies. Ex-Bossk and Centurion members new effort 'The Mire' have put their debut effort 'Volume 1' up for free download at www.eyesofsound.com so I figured this was the perfect opportunity to flex my analytical muscle once more.



I'm a big post-hardcore guy, and a big Eyesofsound fan, so as you can imagine this is a massive pleasure for me to write. Post-hardcore is a tricky genre to get right, it's all about building tension, whispering sweet nothings, gentle strokes, making promises of ecstacy; and then (most importantly) being able to deliver on those promises to the patient listener. So much 'post' is all front, falling flat when it comes down to the deed itself. Sadly in a lot of cases, dry humping a bass would probably have yielded more positive results...



I'm happy to say though that The Mire have delivered a stunning debut effort. They make the kind of epic, sweeping, soundscapey, brutal beauty that Bossk did and Rinoa still do so well, without sounding familiar. From the beginning the listener is immersed in the sweet lolling rhythm of 'Wheelwalker' and carried through a rich infinity of awe to 'Fears'; an expansive and layered pummelling of intimidation. Only two tracks, but it honestly feels like enough; there's no filler and no slacking. This is an exciting, compelling and God damned beautiful record; The Mire have done all of us such a big favour making this album available for free download, so get your copy here now!
Keep your eyes out for further releases from this band, or better yet just keep your eyes on Eyesofsound! They have so many great artists working their arses off at the moment.



I've just heard too that The Mire are doing a mini UK tour with Mouth of the Architect in the next few months, so if you do download the album show the band the same class they've shown us and try to make it to a show; it would mean the world to them I'm sure.



Thanks very much for reading, I had so much fun writing this again. More reviews on the way (hopefully!)

bigthinks

Date: 26th of September, Venue: The Bitterest Endest, Acts: The Library Suits, ChavTownBand & Mini.

So like, yeah. Yeah? ...Yeah.

This'll be my last post about Saturday night bands... for a while. Essentially the bands at ze Bitter End haven't been metal, which is what I kinda set out to review in the first place. So I'm giving myself a little holiday until the metal returns, and you won't care because you're not reading this are you? You selfish figment.
Except when the metal returns on the 31st of October however, I still won't be there to review it (which kinda sucks as Wreck of the Minotaur are playing and I love them). Instead I will be dressed as a bollard or something at a friends Halloween party, hell bent on ruining everyone Else's good time because I'm not good at enjoying parties. If you're going too, expect me taking a cue from Charlie Brooker; standing in a corner saying 'despair' with gradual increases in volume until I am removed from the 'fun'. Actually the night should be a laugh. You need to learn when I'm joking.

Anyway, enough of the selfish over sharing on my part, where's all these bands then ay??

The Library Suits. Catchy pop-alt-rock-post-morrisey-core-whateverihatevaguelabelsjustlistentothemyourself. With cowbell... Perhaps this will be a new Bitter End band night staple?
I enjoyed their guitar tone, and the discernible sound of their influences within their own signature sound. I wrote in my notebook that TLS sound like; "all the alt rock bands of the 90's had a gangbang and came all over the 00's face". And on further reflection, I stand by this analogy. I guess I liked them... They had good energy, but unfortunately at the time I did not. I approved, but at I knew I wouldn't buy a CD, even if it was a quid.
If TLS had just a little more passion in their sound I might have given a bigger shit, but as it was my more hench turds stayed with me. If they had a faster pace and a more powerful vocal delivery, TLS would have been more enjoyable for me. However crowd response was good, and ...ok yes I liked them.



http://www.myspace.com/thelibrarysuits



ChavTownBand. Shit name. Let's just get that out of the way. More indie. They reminded me a bit of Babyshambles & Dirty Pretty Things... A kind of combination of them. Hey, that should totally happen!
Jesting aside, CTB weren't a Libs clone at all; they actually sound like a combination of Babyshambles and DPT's that's not The Libertines... Hard to imagine I know, but you don't have to imagine it; it's happened. The Jam would be another useful sound-a-like if you really need one.
Lead singers have to work to not come across as pricks, it can take years to be able to fake it, but I genuinely liked the guy CTB thrust up there. He seemed like he wasn't taking his performance seriously at all; a wise tactic.
CTB make music that you would run around London, doing wacky, music video type shenanigans to; bothering the boring pedestrians who aren't in bands with strange behaviour, avoiding the inept security guard, dancing to music no one else can hear, stubbing out cigarettes on a kidnapped child's chest etc. I liked CTB, it's the kind of music I wanted to write a few years ago when I was primarily an indie kid, and the cover of Johnny Cash's 'Folsom Prison Blues' was a competent and well chosen.



http://www.myspace.com/tvhomes




Local power-pop cum rock group Mini were the last to play, and let it not be said that The Bitter End doesn't hold itself to the credence 'save the best 'til last'.
If given the choice, I would rather actively seek out a sadistic bollock squashing dentist, who arbours right wing values, denies global warming is real and genuinely enjoys High School Musical, than willingly listen to anything with the label 'power-pop'.
However in a live setting, it's impossible to deny that Mini are very entertaining! It's cheery, shy, bitter sweet rock n' roll n' pop. i.e The Beach Boys, The Beatles... That's all I can really think of as examples. It's a genre out of my expertise really. Hence my surprise at liking it! To be honest I tried listening to a song on their Myspace and immediately decided to listen to Hunger for the Crash instead.
Fail.

Mini's great musicianship, catchy, cheery melodies, heavenly vocal harmonies and infectious onstage joy only works in a live capacity for me; but I implore you, if this is your cup of tea; you will absolutely bloody love it!



http://www.myspace.com/soundofmini



So that's it for another review, I'll be back soon ninjas. Until next time, wish me luck on my working holiday!

Martin

Date: 19th of September. Venue: The Bitter End. Acts: Holdfasthope, Art of Rebellion, Sans Wilfred and The Retrotones.

Welcome back to my blog page. Unless this is your first visit, in which case I say 'welcome' in general. So yeah after all my blustering and promising I didn't end up going to a band night last Wednesday to make up for missing last Saturday's as you may already be able to tell. Though I feel I have no obligation to explain myself, I will say this; some things are just more important.

Anyway now that that unpleasantness is out of the way I will proceed to dissecting this weeks offering, and examining the contents within.

The first band on the stage were local alternative rock group Holdfasthope. Citing bands like Muse, RATM, Nirvana and Foo Fighters in your list of influences is a sure fire way to make me automatically not care about your music. Before I could say 'unimaginative' or 'kerrang!' I would think it, and be prejudiced against said band; luckily however I hadn't visited their myspace before I watched them and had no idea what they were going to sound like. Although these influence are heavily prevalent in their song's (the 'Knight's of Cydonia' riff being played between 2 of their own songs being a not-so-subtle giveaway), I enjoyed Holdfasthope. They played well, had catchy songs and didn't make me want to vomit out my music loving heart; though that's hardly great praise. They were good, but they did nothing to really touch my G-spot.

http://www.myspace.com/holdfasthopetheband

Art of Rebellion were up next, and though I initially had trouble wrapping my head around the bass player's 12 string bass with Matt Groening's bunny from 'Life in Hell' on the fret board, I let that go and let AoR have a go at charming me. Another band who cite Muse as a main influence... I forsook this as they also cite Biffy Clyro, and the singer wore a BC shirt at the gig.
Once again these influences are apparent as soon as AoR began to play, as well as a love of classic rock and an ear for songwriting. An aspect that works very much in their favor too is an air of being ever-so-slightly odd... I love a bands with a bit of a weird factor, and who can write songs incorporating different elements and themes which doesn't ultimately sound cluttered; which AoR manage quite well. Not quite on the par of HORSE_the band but if I want a mountain brought to me I'll change my name to Muhammad.

http://www.myspace.com/artofrebellion

Sans Wilfred next! This band were a little different from the rest of the line up, but only in their primary influences; they were incredibly similar in the sense that they wore their influences on their sleeves like a charm bracelet of bands better than themselves. Radiohead IMMEDIATELY leap to mind, as does aspects of Muse (again??), Portishead, Hot Hot Heat, LCD Sound System and other dance-able electro-indy acts. The mix is pleasant; Sans Wilfred write spacey, atmospheric and deep songs which make you dance into the eternal and blissful void. (And any band that successfully uses a cowbell without coming across as redundant experimentation for experimentation's sake has my respect). Though at times the songs seem to differ greatly from each other, holding onto a common thread that's so frayed it could snap at any second! That being said, SW are the most ambitious band I have seen at the Bitter End so far, more should be willing to follow in their creative aspirations.

http://www.myspace.com/sanswilfred

Finally The Retrotones take the stage to close the night. I notice to my disdain that a drunk student-type (who looked like the lead douche from the Mystery Jets) who was irritating me all night with his embarrassing outbursts turns out to be their singer... Must... try... to disengage... prejudice!

For me The Retrotones were 'meh'. They sounded like a bluesier version of The Strokes. In fact I'm fairly certain they plagiarised the main riff from 'Juice Box' in one of their own songs... They left no lasting impression, other than 'God the lead singer was a dull cunt trying to be an interesting cunt wasn't he?'. As are most students. *clarification: I'm using the term 'student' as stereotypical. Regardless of if the man is studying or not, he came across like the classic student I have come to despise. The rest of the band might as well have been a laptop for all the presence they managed to conjure.
But anyway, check them out if they sound like the band for you!

http://www.myspace.com/theretrotonescom

I will be back next week fo' sure ma ninja's!

Martin

I'm such a cock.

I am, with no doubt, a cock. A cock of Jeremy Clarkson proportions. A cock so vast, that I could make small nations quake with fear in my veiny shadow. My cock-ness is all consuming, like some thick, lumpy phallic black hole swallowing me, and all I hope to be in just one gluttonous 'gulp!'.

Cock, cock, cock, cock, cock!

Some of you are wondering just what the bloody hell I'm on about, where I'm going with this; most of you are merely nodding along, like a car insurance providing dog and are simply wondering what took me so long to admit this... To 'come out' as it were about how much a part of me is cock oriented. Well I'll tell you just what I'm on about.

Essentially, I gave myself too little time to get in from work tonight, cook my dinner, eat said dinner, and then leave my house to get to the pub in time to watch my beloved band night from the very first chord. I know, I know! 'Cock' right?
It was around half past eight, when I, in an undisclosed location in Collier Row, was waiting for an undisclosed bus that was unaccountably late. This particular straw was the thing that snapped this camels back like a brittle twiglett under a sledgehammer of impatience. I decided I was too late to give it my all at reviewing this evening. I felt I had let myself down, and those who resolutely read this blog each week (few though you are). I resolved to attend band night at Schpunk this Wednesday, to make up for my lackadaisical behaviour tonight.

All clever word bollocks aside, this cock promises to get his act together for Wednesday. Sorry.

Martin

A special request from Greg(o)rian.

Doom, sludge, drone etc. is a genre that turns away all but the most serious of underground music lovers. Extremely niche, experimental and avant garde by definition; it's challenging to listen to. It's never casual, forgiving or easy; tourists are not welcome.

Greg(o)rian's bass player and fellow Romford pavement treader Tom Mullen asked me to review his bands first album; "Dormancy of Our Omniscient Masters", and this is what I have to say about it.


It is a rotten offering, carved from the blackened, fetid and weeping flesh of Greg(o)rian's collective body; a small piece of the tortured and imprisoned soul, lovingly donated to the listener. The guitar tone is pure filth scraped from beneath the fingernails of corpses found at the bottom of wells; the bass, heavy enough to shatter a concrete elephant, is a force holding your head beneath the waters of despair, denying you even the slightest breath of hope; it's almost simultaneously a lilting whisper which leads the listener, siren like, from sleep to death. Combined further still with distant screams of peril, mournfully blunt and unpolished vocals and pounding, relentless drumming the young bands first effort is one of great promise.


I feel that the band still has some way to go, this first album is no doom classic. More far reaching experimentation needs to be sought, an individual style must be forged; but for now seeds of a fan base have been sewn with 'Dormancy...' and time, patience, thought and work must be indulged in before the harvest can be enjoyed.




Greg(o)rian's debut is available for free download now, so what are you waiting for? Turn up your speakers, get your mates round, turn the lights down low... and have a doom party.

Martin


http://www.myspace.com/gregoriandoom