Starring
Camera Obscura, Candidate, Li Yilei, Master Peace, Stuart Moxham, Tot Taylor
Under Starter's Orders
Fabstract : Stuart Moxham
Take an enjoyable trip back to the world of acoustic 80s indie with Stuart Moxham.
This is newly released, but not exactly new. Stuart Moxham was a founding member of Young Marble Giants, a minimalist electronic trio from the early 80s. Since then he’s been a member of The Gist who should be much better known. He’s also released occasional low key but charming solo albums and worked in collaboration with others to the same ends. This album is a collection of unheard songs and snippets from his personal archive, going back to the days of Young Marble Giants and strolling along to 2007.
First, as he’s a man of the 80s his influences are everywhere. There are strong echoes of Orange Juice, The Field Mice, Everything But The Girl, Prefab Sprout, Cherry Red Records, Sarah Records - the list could go on and on.
Those influences are reason enough to settle down with this album, but this is more than a collection of almost heard demos and retakes because the songs and tunes are very good. Inevitably, there are some throwaway moments (‘Various Organs’) and songs such as ‘Crow Crow’ that have a Playschool simplicity that may not have enhanced pop star credibility at the time. But even those possess an innocent charm and sincerity that warms the heart. The feeling is like your favourite child smashing their solo spot at the school concert.
If you were to classify the album it would probably be under ‘Quirky Indie Pop Folk’. It’s full of hidden gems such as ‘Night By Night - Version 3’, ‘Shark Attacks’ and ‘Blue Looped’. ‘Immaculate Mistake’ is just three notes or so away from being acoustic magic. It’s fun filling in the gaps though. It’s an album that takes you back to a time when you could enjoy stumbling across and sharing a band no one else knew.
This may be the ultimate under the radar 80s indie album. It’s full of likeable moments well worth resurrecting.
Taster Track : Night By Night - Version 3
The Front Runners
Look To The East, Look To The West : Camera Obscura
This is a very special album that holds true to the Camera Obscura sound and appeal and also acts as a fitting and emotional memorial to former band member Carey Lander.
Lander was their keyboard player from their second album. She died in 2015 from bone cancer. Her loss derailed the band for nine years and this is their first new music since then. Without it, Camera Obscura could have remained Camera Obscured.
It’s a beautiful, heartfelt album infused with country flavours. Whether that was deliberate or not, it’s a masterstroke because country is the genre to go to find the spirit that brings you through desperate and hopeless times. It’s a license to be completely honest about how you feel.
The song ‘Sugar Almond’ is the band’s tribute to Lander. Its heartbreaking and heartfelt tones make for a brave song. I’m guessing that there were tears along the way in writing and recording this and it feels like a perfect farewell.
This is by no means a maudlin and self pitying album though. It pulls off the difficult trick of sounding as if it was made in a parallel universe where Lander is still part of the band. Her spirit feels ever present, as if she’s part of the conversation in the studio. It’s a ‘Truly Madly Deeply’ feeling. That’s the other thing that’s special here. The album is full of music that carries you with it, out of your life and into theirs.
From the opening track this is a giddily, breathtaking collection of songs. That’s breathtaking in the sense of being unable to breath and on the cusp of happy and sad tears. The cascading music of ‘Liberty Print’ captures that moment on a swing as a child when you feel weightless. There’s aching, bittersweet melancholy in most of the songs, particularly ‘Only A Dream’. ‘We’re Going To Make It In A Man’s World’ is so lovely it’s quite emotional, full of quiet determination in a rose petal dressing.
This is the complete record. Tracey Anne Campbell is the sweetest and coolest girl next door since Kirsty MacColl. Her voice is unforced and natural. The band complement her perfectly. The songs are the most important thing. Changing any element would only weaken them.
Beyond all shadow of doubt, this is an album of the year, an album for a lifetime
Taster Track : We’re Going To Make It In A Man’s World
How To Make A Master Peace : Master Peace
Prepare to be knocked for six by this compendium of all that’s brash, in your face and exhilarating about modern indie rock.
Master Peace is clear about one thing. In an interview with Rolling Stone he was emphatic that he’s not a rapper. He’s tired of black artists with attitude being typecast like that. Inspired by Bloc Party’s Kele Okerke, Lightning Champion and the sounds of 2010, he’s an indie rocker and proud of it.
This is a punchy debut. It’s energetic, loud and a lot of fun. It bursts on the scene with the force of an unseen slice of lemon unexpectedly consumed with a lettuce leaf. He gives it everything, holding nothing back and coming quite close to attaining Spinal Tap’s mythical ‘11’. It’s one for 2024, full of street slang attitude.
There are so many influences here, tossed into a blender and marinaded into something spicy that’s all his own. ‘Los Narcos’ brings back the Beastie Boys along with surprising outbursts of melody that are worth the price of admission on their own. Maybe ‘Lodge’ is tongue in cheek with its camp exclamation of “What about your last disaster?” at odds with the rest of the song but it’s well worth its p;ace on the album.. ‘Panic 101’ is Robbie Williams guesting with Bloc Party. ‘Get Naughty’ has a mountainous rock riff; ‘Loo Song’ is just one of several songs with the anthemic chorus for a recklessly good time. ‘Shangaladang’ has a rebel rousing reggae feel to it.
Above all this is a record to reconnect us with the vibrant feel of rock and roll, and how it makes us who we are. This record shows us Master Peace. Is it too early to say this is his masterpiece?
Taster Track : Panic 101
The Chasing Pack
Point Clear : Candidate
Here’s a treasure that sounds as if it has come straight from the folk rock vaults of a golden age.
They open this album with “ Here we go again, by God’s mercy and a thousand bars”. They’re back in the saddle after sixteen years and it sounds as if they’ve never been away.
In the last few weeks I’ve reviewed artists such as Uh, Masal, Hinako Minori, Hauschka and PMXPER. They’re all artists who ply their trade in the margins away from the mainstream. All credit to them for that but it’s refreshing to come across a lesser known band such as Candidate who stick to the mainstream and do so very well. The mainstream is how most of us fell in love with music.
Their strength lies in the small, low key moments. They operate as a band of brothers, supporting each part of the song as best they can. Their harmonies, especially, are from a golden melodic age.
It’s fair to say that the fuller the songs become, the less distinctive is their sound. That means that a couple of songs are a little too vanilla, bordering on anonymous. For me, those songs include ‘Bigger Than Us’ (although the chanted refrain is good) and ‘Newfoundland.
There are more than enough good moments though to overcome that deficit. The strummed guitar of ‘Pepper’s Ghost’ is sublime, as comfortably English as it gets and helped me to feel that all was right with the world. There’s something about ‘Jonathan’ too that takes me back to less stressful times. Folk influences abound. ‘Come On’ sounds as if the Teenage Fanclub were a folk influenced band.
Candidate are a band that sound mainstream, but avoid motorways to concentrate on the musical byways that have been left behind.
Taster Track : Pepper’s Ghost
Nonage : Li Yilei
Make what you will of Li Yilei’s ambient Chinese electronica. There’s no denying that its cumulative effects can be truly appealing.
Don’t listen to this album. That won’t work. You’ll likely react against what you hear as abstract noodling, art for art’s sake.
Instead, experience it. Absorb it. Sense it. Have it on in the background while you’re unloading the dishwasher. It’s music to switch you to calm rumination and wonder. When you don’t have time to listen to music, play this to yourself. You’ll soon relax, slow down and begin to savour its unique appeal.
Initially, listening to this is like observing a scene where you don’t have a clue what’s going on. The ambient noodling with a Chinese conversation overlay of ‘Go, Little Book’ is likely to irritate, just as the brusque break to ‘OOOO’ uses sound to perturb.
I dismissed this album on hearing the first few tracks as “not for me”. I let it run though as my thoughts fast forwarded to the day ahead. Later I listened to it again on shuffle, frazzled by the stubborn will of a two year old and a five year old on the last day of the Summer holidays. Each time, after a few tracks I realised I’d relaxed down a level.
Tracks such as ‘Sandalwood, Ivory and Summit’, ‘Nomad, Shelter and Creed’ and several more that sounded like grid references from the What Three Words app, reveal that they can enrich daily lives. Listen to ‘Yip Yip Yip’ if you want to hear a truly sensory sound experience.
Ideally you’d listen to this surrounded by 64 speakers in an acoustic space with the lights off for a truly immersive experience. In the real world, be kind to yourself and simply enjoy it at home.
Taster Track : Yip Yip Yip
Studio Sounds : Tot Taylor
Tot Taylor is a pop maestro who most people won’t know. That’s wrong because his brand of sophisticated pop deserves a wide audience.
Everything about this album oozes magical pop moments. Pop seeps out of every particle and there’s melody in every molecule. Somehow though it’s not and never would have been chart material.
Why is that? Perhaps it’s the defiantly retro feel. Maybe back in the mid 70s day that these songs appear to reference they would have been album tracks that delight rather than singles that sell a million records.
Taylor is as English as they come - born in Cambridge, working in London, breathing Tin Pan Alley. He’s as pop as Deaf School and 10CC. His bigger influences though come from America, not artists or genres but individual songs. Try Randy Newman’s ‘Short People, ‘Life’s Been Good’ by Joe Walsh, the quirky ‘Me and My Arrow’ from Nilsson or Father John Misty’s ‘Mr Tillman’.
These are songs that campaign to be liked. You may resist at first, but you will eventually succumb. They’re repetitive in a good way, building to a climax through adding layers that introduce subtle variations.
There’s a show time feel - not surprising since Taylor has composed the soundtrack to a number of films, plays and other artistic ventures. There’s a little whimsy too in songs like ‘Formula’. The piano led songs are straight from Trumpton’s marching band. (I know, no marching band incorporates a piano.! I’m talking about the rhythm.)
If I’m creating the impression that this is a selection of saccharine sweet songs then think again. These are knowing songs. The surface light tunefulness conceals more acidic and satirical subjects.
Tot Taylor - the saviour of articulate and intelligent pop.
Taster Track : Now You’re Talking
Playlists
As ever this week's Taster Track playlists can be accessed at https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7cSveL7NpVp1xgrKxPe4av?si=SkFlSnvySeuYFpgG0WJFmA or via the Spotify link on the Home Page.
The link to the Youtube playlist is https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwV-OogHy7Eh_sy55y6i18Qj7w_Z3CQft
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