Young fellows blessed with admirable cheekbones and teeth, it would be easy – if somewhat churlish – to write Childhood off as the latest, rather empty, indie hope.

That is, until debut album ‘Lacuna’ sinks in. Sure, it’s blessed with its fair share of indie disco stompers – the delirious delights of ‘Blue Velvet’, say, or the seductive sibilance of ‘Solemn Skies’ – but there’s something else going on here.

The production, courtesy of Dan Carey, truly takes ‘Lacuna’ into a different place entirely. It’s oddly psychedelic, but in a disconcerting, probing way, rather than the wishy-washy chorus pedal fare we’ve become accustomed to.

Independently released, the cult success of ‘Lacuna’ has taken Childhood out of their Lambeth base and forced them to address the globe. Clash gets on the blower to singer Ben Romans-Hopcraft for a catch up…

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You’re a long way from home, is this the point where being a band starts to become a little more real?

Yeah, it’s cool. We’re still in the band that we were always in. But it’s great, it’s really exciting and everyday is cool.

It’s funny, because you drink in the same South London pub as the Clash team.

Oh yeah I heard that, it’s cool. Well we rehearse in Lambeth, but we’re kind of all from all over, really.

The band started when you were in Nottingham, but then you came back to South London. Is there something about South London that keeps you coming back? Do you just prefer it south of the river?

Yeah. I find it impossible to envisage my life not in South London. It’s one of those things that you put more emphasis on when you were growing up, representing the identity of it more, because you’re a bit more defensive of it. And also, it’s one of those places in London, like East is full of people that have moved there, whereas South, if you’re brought up around there, most people stay around there. There’s also a bit of a feeling of familiarity.

If we can talk about your debut album 'Lacuna', is that material that you had in place before you went into the studio? Or was the studio the point where the album came together?

It was a mixture. We had a lot of songs ready, all the songs pretty much, and it was just finishing them off. There were some songs we just recorded live and the production was within the playing, so we didn’t have to do much. There were other songs where we’d be playing an idea in the studio and (producer) Dan Carey just record it instantly, and then that would be the song. He’s pretty hands-on when he thought that he could add something and he really inspired us to just not really give a shit, which is quite a cool thing to feel when you’re in the studio. It frees you up a bit more, so that was great.

The songwriting is one thing , but what puts it above a standard indie debut is all these weird little elements that you can’t quite place.

My main memory of the studio is our drummer hitting champagne bottles with sticks. There was a lot of that, it was great! It was really percussive and he’s got a real knowledge of percussion sounds and how effective they can be.

Is that something as a band pay a lot of attention to anyway, do you look at the rhythm section and think, 'this is how we’re going to get people to dance at a show?'

It’s weird because we were more focused on melodies, initially, but then I think the studio process has made us more conscious of texture. More conscious of the heights you can achieve, the way you can transform something with the addition or lack of texture. He definitely inspired us to think about that a lot more. I think we’re thinking about that as a main focus for our next record.

Can you see yourself working with Dan on the second album?

I can’t really see myself working with anyone else. I’m always up for listening to ideas but he’s so versatile and such a mate it seems like a winner, constantly. I feel confident with him.

Do you feel like you have come away from the studio as a better band?

Oh totally.

Obviously you’ve learnt your trade, so what’s it like to be able to get to this stage and play festivals?

It’s great. It’s just one of those things when you realise what you’re doing once you’ve done it and you’re home again. You’re like: ‘what I did last week was awesome!’ and at the time you’re kind of just getting on with it. But I think that’s the way we deal with most things because if we actually start thinking of the significance of the stuff we do, then we get intimidated. So keep it simple.

When you go to other countries you might play for people who haven’t heard Childhood before. Is it refreshing to go to places that are unaware of what’s going on?

I love it. It’s like a challenge. There’s nothing better than when you feel like you’ve played to an audience that didn’t know you before, and by the end of the gig you’ve kind of turned them. You can kind of tell when that happens. I think that’s probably one of the most reward things about being in a band really, it’s like a real shared thing that music is designed for. It’s great, I love that.

There are all these weird sounds on the record, so are you tempted to re-create that live? Or do you think Childhood (live) and Childhood (in the studio) are different?

Well we do actually want to achieve some of the personality of the production live, definitely. We make efforts to do it, but we don’t try and copy the songs. The live shows we re-interpret them, keeping the energy of the live performance. But we have made efforts, and we’re still working on that now, how to incorporate a lot of the character that is recorded. It’s a struggle but it’s definitely worth working on.

Is writing something you find time for on the tour bus?

Yeah I try and do stuff on the tour bus... just because it’s so boring. All we have is Indiana Jones on DVD so I’m trying ways of entertaining myself. I just take my keyboard with me and try make something up.

You mentioned that you have already started thinking about your second album, how far down the line are you planning that?

Well we’ve started writing it already. We’re sort of in the middle of discussing what route we could go down. Everyone’s contributing in their own way and then we’re going to bring everything together. When we’ve finished these dates we’ve got a couple of weeks off, so we’re gonna use that time wisely and work out a direction that we feel we think about music now. We constantly want to evolve, I don’t think we’re ever going to stick and do the same thing. The whole point was to always evolve the sound. That’s what we’re trying to do, I don’t know if we’ll actually pull it off, (laughs) but that’s the intention.

From Childhood to adolescence.

Exactly! There you go. Everyone can guess what our second album is gonna be called. (laughs)

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Childhood have confirmed the following shows:

October
3 Sheffield Leadmill
4 Manchester Deaf Institute
7 Southampton Joiners
8 Brighton Audio
9 Birmingham Hare & Hounds
10 Norwich Sound & Vision
13* Lincoln Engine Shed
14* Westcliff-on-Sea Southends Cliffs Pavilion
15* Bexhill-on-Sea De La Warr Pavilion
17* Wolverhampton Civic Hall
18* Cardiff University Great Hall
20* Bournemouth O2 Academy
21* Cambridge Corn Exchange
23* London Brixton Academy
24* Bath Pavillion
25* Manchester O2 Apollo
27* Glasgow O2 Apollo
28* Newcastle O2 Academy
29* Leeds O2 Academy

* w/ Johnny Marr

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Prog! The very word seems like a curse, a swear even in these laissez faire, anything goes, iTunes shuffle times.

Yet prog remains one of the very few un-reconstructed music genres. It’s naff, for a start: conjuring up visions of wispy moustaches, socks worn with sandals and geography teacher blasting out Yes during their lunch break.

Perhaps this is to prog’s advantage, though. It means that the genre is free from sonic tourists, from those who only wish to skim the surface. Instead, prog attracts true devotees, aural worshippers such as Edinburgh’s own prog-influenced outfit North Atlantic Oscillation.

Indulging his dark side, North Atlantic Oscillation bass player Chris Howard pieced together this list – alight thy goblets to the sky and kneel down before the gods of prog!

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Focus – 'Hocus Pocus'
Introducing lunacy as an art-form, Dutch multi-instrumentalist Thijs van Leer decided marrying prog rock and yodeling would surely result in an assault on the pop charts. He was spot on. Soul diva Gladys Knight introducing the band in this clip only adds to the oddness. The audience show their stoned appreciation.

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Yes – 'Heart of the Sunrise' (from 'Fragile')
Drummer Bill Bruford's peerless skill and Chris Squires' broken-glass-in-a-tin-bath bass tone were the heartbeat of golden era Yes and they bubble and crack in this highly creative piece. Even Rick Wakeman manages to remain within the boundaries of taste. Imagine my surprise when this track cropped up in the Vincent Gallo movie Buffalo 66. Were Yes finally cool? Of course not. And that's the way we like it.

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Genesis – 'Supper's Ready' (from 'Foxtrot')
Genesis were different from other prog bands of the time in that they didn't take themselves too seriously, lyrically at least. This lengthy epic, made up of seven movements, nonsensically tells a tale of two young lovers and climaxes with the second coming of Christ (of course it does). In the clip, we join the track from the sixth movement 'Apocalyspe in 9/8'. The fact that Phil Collins will probably be remembered more for the Tarzan soundtrack than this is probably slightly completely tragic.

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Oceansize – 'Ornament, The Last Wrongs'
Of all the groups on this list, this sadly defunct Mancunian outfit are the ones NAO would probably regard as a very real influence. It's certainly not what would be regarded as classic prog rock but it's progressive nonetheless and more relevant musically than the majority of artists in a genre probably pigeon-holed as post progressive. This delight unfolds hypnotically into one of the most skin-tingling, buttock-clenching hymnal conclusions you could possibly wish for. This clip from the Feed to Feed box set shows a spellbound audience in the midst of something wonderful.

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Mahavishnu Orchestra – 'Inner Mounting Flame' and 'Birds of Fire'

Too rock for the jazz-beards, too jazz for the rock fraternity, supergroup Mahavishnu were labelled fusion but they were as progressive as anyone and the live shows of the early 70s are the stuff of legend. Guitarist John McLaughlin was an unusual figure on stage, with a smart short haircut belying the era, clad in white and armed with a double neck Gibson, his ability to solo was matched only by his ability to create warped arpeggios and never-quite resolving patterns. Pairing this with the violin of Jerry Goodman, Mahavishnu served up an almost sinister mix of inspired noodling and power-riffing that was swallowed up and barfed out by powerhouse drummer Billy Cobham. Certainly, the band liked a wig-out but there is a hidden beauty within their music, that only becomes apparent after repeated listens.

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Emerson Lake & Palmer - 'Hoedown'
E.L.P. were the epitome of prog rock. Classically trained Keith Emerson was a virtuoso and a showman, often stabbing or just generally kicking the shit out of his Hammond organ on stage. Their penchant for rocking up classical compositions was loved and loathed in equal measures by critics. They have recorded more intelligent tracks than 'Hoedown', but take it for what it is – brash, tasteless and great fun. Check out this frantic live performance. Chainmail and vintage red wine, together at last.

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Aphrodite's Child – 'The Four Horsemen'
So much body hair, so little time. Greek proggers Aphrodite's Child boasted future new-ageist Vangelis on keyboards and future teepee Demis Roussos on vocals. The album '666' has only recently been accepted as an important entry in the prog pantheon and I still regard it as a bit of a guilty pleasure. Beck track 'Chemtrails' certainly owes the bearded gurus a nod of acknowledgement.

"The leading Horse is white, the second Horse is red, the third one is a black, the last one is a green."

Yes!

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North Atlantic Oscillation's new album 'The Third Day' is out now.

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For a band so steeped in classic songwriting, Bear's Den were never going to approach their debut album lightly.

And so it proved. The group analysed their career with some caution, releasing a flurry of EPs, little self-contained documents as an introduction to their world.

Heading to the studio earlier this year with long term producer Ian Grimble, 'Islands' is a rich, expressive document. Lyrically, huge care and attention has been paid to each word, with Bear's Den seemingly able to construct an entire living, breathing universe with just a rhyming couplet.

Lead singer - and songwriter - Davie explains that he views each track as being like a mini-novel in its own right. "I’ve always been interested in the way Raymond Carver and Ernest Hemingway leave room for interpretation," he says. "It allows the listener to have their own individual relationship with the songs."

Due for release on October 20th (pre-order link), 'Islands' is an imposing introduction. With that in mind, Clash is able to premiere snippets of fresh material, much of it unheard.

Alongside this, Davie has pieced together a track by track guide to the forthcoming album.

Check out the audio below, and find Davie's insightful words after the jump.

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Agape
Agape is a word that has been taken and used by Christianity to mean something it didn't originally mean and I guess I kinda did the same. Agape, to me, is about being open with people and not hiding anything from the people you care about. As a word, strange as this sounds, Agape to me sounds like a book opening and we were looking for a song that had that kind of feel to it for the first song on the album. We were also listening to 'About Today' by The National a lot and lyrically I wanted this song to come from a similar place.

The Love We Stole
I wrote this song around the same time as I was writing 'Sahara Pts 1&2' and 'Writing On The Wall' from our last EP. Those three/four songs originally were all one giant song and I had to split them up for the sake of the band's sanity! There's a short story by Raymond Carver called Vitamins and the final line is "Things kept falling..." That line encapsulates how you feel when it seems your life is falling apart and to an extent I was in that place when I was writing this song.

Above The Clouds Of Pompeii
My Dad and I went on a trip to Pompeii together when I was a kid and it made a really big impression on me. It's a deeply personal song to me and to other people as well so talking about it too much will only ruin people's own interpretations. It was one of the first songs I wrote where I never actually wrote it down. I wrote it in my head over the course of a month and that process removed a lot of the pressure of staring at a blank page which I used to do a lot. I played it to Kev and Joey in the back of a van on our first tour and we've been playing it ever since.

Isaac
There is a biblical story called The Binding of Isaac that I've always found really interesting. I was reading Wilfred Owen's war poetry and stumbled across a poem about the binding of Isaac in relation to war. After I read that and really thought about the story I found the whole thing very confusing. I started wondering what Isaac's life would have been like after his father nearly sacrificed him and how it would have felt from his perspective. Whether I could have understood it or not. The song is imagined from the perspective of a friend of Isaac's.

Think Of England
I was playing this game where you have to write a song and record it in an hour with two friends from other bands and I was told that my subject matter was 'England'. Just before I started my friend said... "you better hurry up and start thinking of England mate", which was pretty funny in itself but ended up inspiring this song. Kev and Joey seemed to really like it and had so many great ideas around it so we decided to record it properly for the album.

Magdalene
I was really shocked when I first heard about Magdalene laundries and the stories that have emerged about them. They were designed as institutions for "fallen" women who were sent there in order to repent for their sin in the pursuit of becoming pure again. In reality many of these institutions essentially practised slavery on these women. A lot of the reasons why women were sent there in the first place were ridiculous and were often through no fault of their own. I watched Philomena after writing this song and my feelings are similar to Steve Coogan's character in the movie. The song allowed me to vent my anger, frustration and sadness for all those who needlessly suffered.

When You Break
'When You Break' is essentially the breaking point of the album. Similar to 'Stubborn Beast', it's directed at "you" but really I feel more like I'm talking to myself in this song. It's probably the darkest song on the album but it still carries a lot of the same ideas and themes from the other songs. Kev and Joey's parts add so much intensity to the song as it grows - they really make it reach a whole new level.

Stubborn Beast
About four years ago I spent a month living on my own in Scotland at my uncle's mill cottage with the aim of writing some new songs. It was just white stone walls, wooden floorboards, a desk, a chair and a bathroom. I only ended up writing this song in the whole time I was there. I definitely went a little crazy whilst I was working there. This song came from a difficult place of realising how isolated I was making myself at that time in my life. I thought I was writing it about someone else until I finished it, when I realised it was a really accurate portrayal of where I was at that time.

Elysium
I wrote 'Elysium' a while ago and it's almost word for word taken from conversations with my friends and my stepbrother about religion. My stepbrother is a really funny guy and i always used to play him my new songs so he could tell me if they were terrible or not. He was at university when I had written this song and I sent it to him to see if he thought it was any good. He played it to a girl one night and told her it was written about him - the next day he called me and told me I was a genius as my new song had helped him get lucky!

Bad Blood
It's one of the first songs I wrote for Bear's Den and it was my way of dealing with some pretty ancient issues that we're haunting me. I needed to get rid of them or at least get them out in the light and see them for what they were. I'd come out of a relationship at the time and I put a lot of my thoughts and fears to bed when i wrote this song; it's kind of a "goodbye and I'm sorry". The closing lyrics were originally the chorus and they're now this final afterthought. Bad Blood felt immediately like the song to end the album and in the same way that 'Agape' feels like the opening of a book, 'Bad Blood' feels like the closing of a book to me.

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Bear's Den are set to release 'Islands' on October 20th - pre-order it HERE.

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Rae Morris is a bubbling, overflowing torrent of energy. Only recently turning 21, the songwriter is revelling in the freedom afforded to her by record label Atlantic. Able to spend three years working on her music, Rae has shifted and evolved in a very public manner.

“It’s a strange thing with music, that you kind of expect artists to be the finished article straight away,” she muses. “My parents are all about having work experience, getting a craft or a kind of skill-set. And this is a trade, one I’ve been learning in the past couple of years.”

The hours, weeks and months of graft certainly shine through. Piano driven pop as contagious as it is engrossing, Rae’s output has a warm, open charm. Youthful yet retaining a true sense of maturity, there’s a bravery, an honesty in her approach, which is uniquely endearing.

Recent single ‘Cold’ was a spectacular collaboration with producer Fryars, and found Rae Morris reaching a new level of sophistication in her work. “Fryars is an incredible artist and he’s now a really great friend of mine,” she beams. “I guess, for me, it felt like a step up. It was something I had never done before. It just felt really simple and easy to do.”

Seemingly one of the lessons Fryars took with him into the studio is the importance of being open-minded. “I think that’s the best way to be at all times,” the singer states, “just ready for anything to happen because one conversation could lead somewhere special. It’s the same as anything in life, because if you have an open mind you can be taken by surprise.”

As a result, Rae Morris is almost continually creating. “I do try to do something every single day,” she smiles. “I’m kind of a notorious demo recorder.”

Close to completing her debut album, Rae Morris is taking control of every aspect - right down to the all-important tracklisting. “It kind of feels crazy to say it’s almost finished, but I’m just putting the finishing touches to the artwork and finalising everything. I’d heard so many people say that finalising the tracklisting for your album is the hardest decision you’ll ever make apart from maybe naming your child. If naming your child is that hard,” she laughs, “then I don’t know if I could do it!”

At times deeply autobiographical, the material gathered on Rae’s debut album remains close to her heart. A warm, open performer, the Blackpool-born artist is eager to take her audience with her, to tell her story on a one-to-one basis. “I desperately want people to hear the music as I intended it to be set out,” she explains. “I want people to listen to it from start to finish and I want people to come on a journey through the way I wrote the songs, a journey that I’ve been on.”

“I think the whole essence of what I’ve been trying to do for the past three years is to just give people an insight into my life,” Rae says firmly. “I think there’s no better way to do that than let people sit down with a record and listen to it from start to finish.”

Words: Robin Murray
Photo Credit: Harry Crowder

Rae Morris is set to release her debut album 'Unguarded' on January 26th.

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"Regardless of tempo it's important that the music's got the funk."

Wise words from producer Craig Bratley, the latest artist to deliver an exclusive DJ mix for Clash. Bratley's is indeed a royally funky selection that dips heavily into nu-disco and the more colourful side of house, as well as a few dirtier and trippier moods.

All in all, it's a good indicator of the producer's own sonic leanings, also demonstrated by the inclusion of several tracks from Bratley's debut album, 'Buy the Ticket, Take the Ride'.

Daniel Avery, The Emperor Machine (remixed by Erol Alkan), Tiga and even brooding post-rock act Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra all feature in Bratley's wide-ranging mix. Here's the man himself to explain more:

"The mix is the sort of set you are likely to hear if you came to see me play at a club. Regardless of tempo it's important that the music's got the funk. There are tracks that have been out a while that never leave my bag and a few as-yet unreleased things. I hope it reflects the healthy state of today's music scene, as it includes tracks from established artists such as The Emperor Machine and Richard Norris, as well new artists that are currently producing some great music such as Tronik Youth, Peza and Pulp Disco & The Outcasts. I've also included a couple of tracks from the album that hopefully gives a taste of what's to come."

Listen to it now.

Tracklisting:
Italo Bruto - Velodrome (Days Of Being Wild)
Fruit Fly - Fiasco (Peza remix) (Itchy Pig Records)
Craig Bratley - The Curse (Tsuba)
Roisin Murphy - Ancora Tu (Daniele Baldeli and Marco Dionigi Wired Mix) (Vinyl Factory)
Tiga Vs. Audion - Fever (Turbo)
Tronik Youth - Edible Thoughts (Pulp Disco & The Outcasts Remix) (La Dame Noir)
Fairmont - Dysnomia (Areal Germany)Paresse - Nada (Magic Feet)
Craig Bratley - Black Swan Theory (Tsuba)Richard Norris - Yeah (Brioski Remix) (Throne Of Blood)
The Emperor Machine - All I Want (Erol Alkan remix) (Southern Fried)
Daniel Avery - Taste (Roman Flugel Remix) (Phantasy)
Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra - Hang On to Each Other (Constellation Canada)

Words: Tristan Parker

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'Buy the Ticket, Take the Ride' is scheduled for release on vinyl in November and on other formats in December, both through Tsuba.

Not-particularly-hot gossip this month begins with Riff Raff trying to start Instagram-related beef with hardcore thug Sam Smith, Billy Danze of well-known wallflowers MoP saying he’s sick of all the violence in hip-hop right now, Eminem suing the New Zealand National Party, and Kendrick Lamar finding himself in a bit of a sticky sample situation, possibly to the tune of a cool $1million.

A considerably hotter newsflash comes from Blak Twang, whose classic ‘Dettwork SouthEast’ album – an unquestionable UK hip-hop classic, considered lost for nearly 20 years – will get a proper reintroduction to the fold. Start raiding the piggy bank.

Once you’ve shaken the coppers from your coin jar, get Brian Coleman’s ‘Check The Technique 2’ on your shopping list as well. Another essential digest of inside stories and detailed analyses of all-time albums and iconic 80s/90s long players, career bests from Ice Cube, Mos Def& Talib Kweli, Company Flow, Stetsasonic and Jeru the Damaja are among the select band receiving Coleman’s prying ear and expert eye.

Capone N Noreaga are sure to spice up an autumnal Monday night at The Jazz Cafe on October 20^th, and fans of Fliptrix will be bundling towards the front row for 12 dates up and down the land between the 3^rd and 31st, starting in Camden and finishing in the Isle of Wight via Belgium. Mos Def already has November wrapped up, announcing a three-date, 15^th anniversary tour of ‘Black On Both Sides’ bound to adopt hot cakes status. Run The Jewels start Christmas shopping in these parts with two gigs in December.

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Single syllables: “Walls got so much plaques, I gotta call a dentist”

The return of G-Unit– yep, all four of ‘em, joined by latest recruit Kidd Kidd– celebrates ‘The Beauty Of Independence’. Six tracks of chest-beating, chain-swinging and generally swanning about like they own the place, is just like the crew in their prime. Flying Lotus plus Kendrick Lamar = match made in heaven? ‘Never Catch Me’ is a jazz ascendancy busting a gut towards enlightenment. Curren$y’s ‘Saturday Night Car Tunes’ EP is freebie low-rider music, at times fluffier than a pair of rear view dice.

G-Unit, ‘Watch Me’

‘We Need A War On War’ declares Secondson, and his tactics would be five fine instrumentals whose calm consideration hides an emotional bruising. Another mellow fellow is Stan Forebee, giving you half a dozen ‘Reflections’ and letting pianos pat you down as jazz vibes unknot your tensions. According to Urban Click, it’s ‘Weed Season’, and they’ve got six quick headshots to celebrate with.

The DA share love complications, not sponge recipes, on the classy palm tree breeze of ‘Caked Up’, while Diamond District’s action-packed banger ‘First Step’ has the get-up-and-go to turn lazybones into superheroes. The ‘Melding of the Minds’ between Deltron3030 and Zack de la Rocha travels through multiple dimensions thanks to an evolutionary remix from A-Plus. 

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ReaLPolitiks: autumn blossoms, classified exposure, and sacrilege

Homeboy Sandman’s ‘Hallways’ nominates itself as an underground classic for 2014. His pally chat and matter-of-fact decisiveness, stationed between slumping on the sofa and juggling the mic like it’s a hot potato, goes down a storm with the best offerings of Jonwayne, Oh No, DJ Spinna and a sound supporting cast.

Ras Kass sharpens his toothpick and works overtime on Apollo Brown’s street-saluting beats and soul stirred into boom bap. ‘Blasphemy’ features Pharoahe Monch, Rakaa, Xzibit and Royce 5’9”, and is an album speaking its mind and presenting the facts  - ’48 Laws’ is one of those classic, rules-of-the-game countdowns, including a brilliant Puff Daddy burn. A resilient hip-hop tutorial.

Apollo Brown & Ras Kass, ‘Humble Pi’  

OnCue’s ‘Angry Young Man’ vents its spleen. Overseen by Just Blaze, synthesized blockbusters (i.e., a lot of hot air looking for a pop transfer) and a plucky/foolish/on-trend sample of Thomas Bangalter courtesy of Hudson Mohawke, are tackled competently in a state of mild annoyance.  

With the guile of a gentle giant, the individual force that is DELS converts the abstract into plain English and vice versa on ‘Petals Have Fallen’ – sort of like he’s doing leftfield for the common man. Continuing to read the Roots Manuva rulebook, sometimes he forgoes the adventurous for what feels right with a sense of time and space – ‘RGB’ is the emphatic exception. The songwriting slyly makes him look further than the underground, on a mostly studious effort.

Interlude – Nas, Time Is Illmatic film trailer

Selling you a second selection of ‘Bone Marrow’, Ramson Badbonez is back to shake your skeleton. He’s successful as well, bearing down on beats that bash brains in, reeling off rhymes made to both rouse you and rub you up the wrong way, and pouring out fuel for the headphones that’s good and feisty. “My mind is highly controversial, by the way I’m non-commercial” – and so say all of us.

If you feel gravel spluttering out of your speakers, it must mean Genesis Elijah is back in town. ‘Private Moments In Public’ is indisputable as ever in its fact-finding, husky wisdom and guttural blues rounded off with a monumental posse cut determining who’s ‘Underground King’. Pastor Dutchie handles the majority of production, getting fists pumped before going bare knuckled. Privacy that deserves respecting.

- - -

Tape measures

Confucius MC and Chris P Cuts start the week in full gear for the ‘Monday Morning Mixtape’ series, handily joining Evil Ed, J Dilla, some R&B shuffling and a clutch of personal specials. Raz Fresco aims to be Toronto’s new favourite son with ‘The Screwface Tape’. Full of freestyles and fresh stuff strictly under a solo spotlight, Raz sounds like Big L hacking down Canadian redwoods. Over in NYC, The Breed look for a decent shelf life ahead thanks to ‘Last Of A Dying Breed’, the crew being mostly concerned with chummy, weed-assisted mic swaps that can come out fighting if needs be.

Ace Hood’s ‘Body Bag 3’ does the original rhymes over others’ instrumentals thing for a pretty intense half hour of Floridian fire (sidestepping ‘Don’t Tell Em’ and its ‘Rhythm is a Dancer’ chorus). Problem’s ‘354 Liftoff’ follows a similar route, using Disclosure and Iggy Azalea as means of conveying a tiring workload of street networking. ‘Hardcore 2K14’ has Lil Kim trying to reclaim Queen Bee ranking, with Jadakiss, French Montana and Cassidy part of a crowded campaign trail that plays to her strengths of sex and power.

Stranger Day keep it tight-knit (1), FloFilz reflects (2), The Acorns go undercover (3), L’Orange reinterpret a familiar love story (4), and Verb T uses his loaf (5).

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Words: Matt Oliver

More Rapture & Verse columns

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Following Classic Clash Cover Features with Foo Fighters and Kanye West, now it’s the turn of a certain French duo. We spoke to Daft Punk around the time of their live LP, ‘Alive 2007’, as they graced the cover of issue 23.

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To me it’s the final year of the recording industry as we know it…

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As your fans are so hungry for more material, why was the focus of 2007 put on a live album instead of a new studio album?

Thomas Bangalter: I think the question for us was how can we innovate and how can we express ourselves in a new way and try to experiment with things. We thought at this time that there was an importance to experiment with the live show and the performances and we wanted to favour that form of expression rather than making new album. We thought with a live tour we would have more opportunity to experiment than with a new album.

2007 seemed to be very much about live music, as recorded music and album sales didn’t do that well. Why do you think there’s been such a shift?

Thomas: To me it’s the final year of the recording industry as we know it. It’s true that it’s the end and it is due to self-destruction. I think it’s an interesting thing that it’s not the record labels that control the live tours, it’s completely different – so it’s maybe proof of a more artist-controlled environment and approach to have more and more shows. At the same time I think it’s maybe a fine-tuning of a ‘redefinition’ of what the record industry will be both now and in the future.

There’s a lot of thinking to be done about the format of music in general and how the artist wants to bring music to the audience and how the audience want to listen to the music. Whether this is through doing shows or different ways of receiving albums or singles. The fact that there isn’t a ‘market’ anymore makes it much more significant and re-centres the music allowing an interesting initiative for artist and musicians to express themselves and be heard or do experiments and complete something that the older generation hasn’t done.

What do you think of Radiohead’s latest move of giving their latest album (‘In Rainbows’) away as a download for however much the listener wants to pay for it?

Thomas: I think it’s by far one of the most exciting and experimental approaches that an important artist has made in a long time. It’s great to see that artists like Radiohead are experimenting and not exactly knowing where it will take everybody – it’s very bold and very brave. At the same time I don’t think that it should overcast the record; it’s a great album – that’s what is important alongside bringing new ways to rethink of the music and rethink the relationship between the artist and the audience, and rethink a possibility for a small economy outside of the industry.

A good thing about the death of the music industry is that music is coming out of the industry. The live show we are doing now is not an industrial thing; it’s artistic, it has a level of work but it’s not industrial and I think what Radiohead has done isn’t industrial either – and that’s exciting because it’s the idea that musicians can live an important and artistic life how they want. I think that when Radiohead released the album was definitely a very important day for music history.

I know that you regard everything Daft Punk does as an ‘experiment’. Would you like to go down a similar path of downloads now that you are out of contract with your label (Virgin) and have freedom to release what you like?

Thomas: I think it’s an idea we’d explore and the freedom allows us to experiment more – this is definitely important. The good thing with experiments is that the process allows some conclusions to be drawn. We have no intention of doing exactly the same thing as Radiohead because there is a certain beauty to pioneering factors. The triggering and the dialogue that Radiohead have started definitely has encouraged us to think of similar ways and work in a very freeform way and reinvent the relationship between music and the people that want to hear it.

Also, we like the idea to reset the cost of music, so it isn’t set by the record company – and that’s a good thing. Ultimately music is more for free because the new generation are not used to paying for it anyway.

Would you say that the French music scene has experienced a big change this year? How much of a reinvention has occurred there?

Thomas: No, I wouldn’t say reinvented. I think that French music, and there’s a lot of great electronic acts coming out now, they haven’t reinvented anything. They have followed a genre, but it’s really hard to be innovative in electronic music today apart from just making great electronic music.

It’s a bit like rock, which is a genre itself now, and once in a while you get a really, really good band. I don’t think anyone is trying to reinvent rock but instead just follow a genre – which is great. To me the problem is that electronic music today is very hard to innovate as the music has been so accepted and so it’s not part of the counter concern anymore.

At the same time, I think there is a generation of producers today that are bringing a very high quality of music, in a very fresh way. But at the same time I don’t think I would be making electronic music if I was 20 years old because there’s a level of controversy of the destruction of an existing system and I don’t really find interest in this process of making music rather than really try to destabilise the previous order of things.

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Electronic music is the soundtrack to today’s generation…

- - -

What do you mean “destruction of an existing system”?

Thomas: The way we have tried to do things 10 or 15 years ago was very much at the margin of what could be considered music or not, which was sometimes like: ‘Oh techno is music for drug takers’ – to some people it’s just noise. When you are on the margin of what has been accepted socially or musically you are really trying to push the boundary in that sense. I think so much work has been done in that direction that this music has been accepted and now it’s a genre – so now the problem is that the music becomes less innovative, because you don’t need the same attitude of experimentation because it’s been really accepted. And as such electronic music is the soundtrack to today’s generation.

Do you feel privileged to have come through when you did and to have so much impact?

Thomas: I don’t know. We feel privileged and fortunate when it comes to a question of timing. But at the same time as an artist I always think there’s a way to experiment and do new things and really think that things have never been done. I think that every artist should try and do something that hasn’t been done before, and to that sense I think we are very lucky.

If you were an 18-year-old growing up now, what kind of music do you think you would be making?

Thomas: I don’t know. I don’t think it’s a question of age. And that is why we maybe haven’t put out five or six albums of sound in a certain genre of music, and for each record trying to restart from scratch or going against what we have done in the past or going into a different direction.

What we are doing now (with the ‘Alive 2007’ tour) are the things we think we can try to experiment with. The idea and the show that we have done, we think it’s something we couldn’t have done five years ago, both from a conceptual and technological point of view. Combining images, lights, film and music to this performance we felt is something exciting; I don’t know whether it’s just from a pure musical point of view or general approach of combining different art forms and working so conceptually, and working around such a larger aesthetic that we have tried to do that makes it a challenging. The main thing for sure would be that if I was an 18-year-old today I would to do something that hadn’t been done 10 years ago.

That’s very hard these days, surely?

Thomas: Yes it’s hard but it’s also getting easier because the world has changed so much technically in terms of the way people listen and make music. It’s not something so possible just musically, but every art form now tends to join themselves together whether you are a photographer today or a musician or a writer – you can use the same interfaces, which can be for example a laptop, and these things were not the same 10 years ago.

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‘Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger’ (‘Alive 2007’ version)

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Doing such a big live show is difficult. Do you think you achieved a new live experience with the tour?

Thomas: It’s not for us to judge, you know? To me it’s pretty close to the precedent which you questioned of how we can and try to do something different that hasn’t been done before, even in a very humble position; so we feel really humble and always try to make the smallest difference. There is an objective thing and a subjective thing. The subjective thing will always be: is it a good experience? Is it a good show? Do people enjoy it? We can’t answer that.

What happens if you need a piss during your show?

Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo: If I drink too much water there’s nowhere to go. But we didn’t have any ‘mishaps’ yet. Fortunately everything until now has been fine.

What’s the most challenging part of performing in robot outfits?

Guy-Man: Oh! Just even doing it is the big challenge, especially doing mostly summer tours and now we go to Australia in our winter it will be summer for them. So it’s really like being in Formula One as it’s really, really getting hot in there and we are losing so much fluid every night. It’s pretty sweaty when we come off stage.

We are really focused on what we have to do and we are so supported by the energy of the show we don’t have time to think about it. But it’s very, very hot.

So Thomas hasn’t fallen off the stage or accidentally unplugged the entire power supply?

Guy-Man: Not yet, no.

When you started using the masks it was about the facelessness of techno, yet do you feel that it has come now full circle and your robots are icons?

Guy-Man: Yeah maybe. Yeah, yeah. It’s not come full circle for us but it definitely has come full circle for the robots. It’s a great achievement because one of the biggest reasons that we do that was that it was to emphasise ‘creation’ and put emphasis on the robot look and have the excuse to create once more. Now they are in the spotlight, so for the facelessness of techno, it’s great for them and great for us. They still look great after 10 years. Though they don’t light up anymore. That’s a different era of the robot suits.

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Words: Matthew Bennett
Portraits: Jay Brooks

This is an edit of the cover interview from issue 23 of Clash magazine. If you’ve still got a copy of it, well done you – you can see the bits we’ve missed out here. (We assume, these days, you don’t need much on the back-story of Daft Punk.)

Daft Punk online

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When you get to October, it’s (sadly?) inevitable in this business to begin thinking about the best albums of the year. There’s plenty still to come, of course – great albums, which will warrant considerable acclaim. But some minds are already set: what’s been will factor in the year-end equation, and what’s to be is likely to miss out.

Luckily for those already shaping their lists, September saw some truly special LPs make it into the wild. Here are just six favourites from the month – but you can follow all of Clash’s album reviews here.

Click the cover art to scroll through album sleeves

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Shellac – ‘Dude Incredible’
(Touch & Go, released September 15^th)

“From the twisting opening of the title track onwards, anyone with previous experience of Shellac is in no doubt as to the makers of this racket – their primary characteristics are not front-page splashes, headline-generating wackiness, but expert musicianship honed over 22 years of togetherness, and more.”

Read the full review

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Leonard Cohen – ‘Popular Problems’
(Columbia, released September 22^nd)

“He’s 80, but still sounds incredible. You can hear his age; he takes his time and his band gives him space, making this album, lucky number 13 for the Canadian singer, cool and utterly enchanting.”

Read the full review

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Perfume Genius – ‘Too Bright’
(Caroline, released September 22^nd)

“While the mode of delivery has evolved, the vivid lyrical imagery of old and the soulful falsetto remain. The material more than matches the ambition on these 11 bewitching songs.”

Read the full review
Interview

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Aphex Twin – ‘Syro’
(Warp Records, released September 22^nd)

“It’s an effortless comeback that almost plays like a greatest hits set. Tighter than ‘Drukqs’ and a more immediately engaging collection than could have been predicted, this Big Deal is one that stands up to the amazing hype and comes away not too shabby at all.”

Read the full review

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Paul White – ‘Shaker Notes’
(R&S, released September 29^th)

“A continual presence in hip-hop’s leftfield, Paul White’s journey to prominence has been accompanied by some of the producer’s most direct, inviting music to date. Now working with R&S Records, ‘Shaker Notes’ finds White once more taking risks.”

Read the full review

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LV & Josh Idehen – ‘Islands’
(Keysound, released September 15^th)

“In muddy hi-def, LV beef up debut ‘Routes’ with a grass roots handle on tightly knitted futurism. Gritty gold is forged from cast-iron techniques and improvised mergers, entertaining brain cells and hip bones with doughty garage and dubstep, and drip­downs of broken beat and astral soul.”

Read the full review
Interview

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Read more round-ups of the best of the months-that-were

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More like My Cousin Shitty, amiright? Sorry.

- - -

That was the week in which…

Two seemingly unlikely icons from film and music announced their collaboration.

The unification of film and music is a road paved with good intentions but littered with landmines. Where to start? I’m always drawn to Joe Pesci’s 1998 single ‘Wise Guy’. Just one track from an entire album seemingly based on his character in My Cousin Vinny, ‘Wise Guy’ features a video loaded with the iconic supermodels of the day (http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2j96k_joe-pesci-wiseguy_music) as Pesci’s rhymes flow like quick-setting concrete: “Don’t do blow and I don’t sell crack / Stay alert! I got someone to whack.”

And then there’s the never-ending succession of biopics. You can forgive the ambitious misfires, such as I’m Not There, which sees Cate Blanchett and others making the life of Bob Dylan feel as about as exciting as a three-hour director’s cut of Loose Women. Yet there are dozens of examples of the exact opposite: a minimal budget and an uninspired story that relies entirely upon the name of the band to have any chance of attracting an audience.

A particularly heinous example of which is the inspirationally bad Hysteria: The Def Leppard Story. As the LA Weekly notes, “You're really just going to want to fast forward to the part where drummer Rick Allen loses his arm.” 

Joining this less-than-illustrious list will be the admittedly catchily described collaboration between “The Maestro (of Terror), Dario Argento, and The Godfather (of Punk) Iggy Pop” in the new horror film The Sandman, which has just been launched at IndieGoGo.

There are numerous reasons to be cynical. Last seen, on my screen at least, fronting an ad for car insurance, Iggy Pop’s acting sideline could be politely described as consistently inconsistent, as could the majority of Argento’s output since his late ’70s / early ’80s heyday. That they’ve resorted to crowd-funding to attract a relatively measly investment of $250,000 also doesn’t look encouraging.

Despite all this, there’s something resolutely romantic about the concept. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to see any longstanding hero deliver a fresh classic at the twilight of their career? Combining two seemingly disparate talents into that scenario only amplifies the feeling. And even if it fails miserably, who really cares? You surely can’t begrudge the creators of ‘Raw Power’ and Profondo Rosso a last crack at their own Expendables-styled mission.

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The Big Film: The Maze Runner

A young, talented cast aims to challenge The Hunger Games’ status as the Young Adult franchise du jour in the first adaptation of James Dashner’s successful line of novels.

Dylan O'Brien plays Thomas, a young man thrown into an environment known as The Glade where several young men are kept with no memory of how or why they've been sent there. The glade is surrounded by The Maze: a complex and deadly perimeter that few escape from. Against the wishes of many of his fellow Gladers, Thomas goes into The Maze in an attempt to find a way of escape, and the reasons why they are there.

Sound familiar? Admittedly, the film does follow the blueprint that made the adventures of Katniss and Co. such a success, but first-time director Wes Ball gives this franchise starter enough originality to make it more than just a hollow wannabe. 

With Ball’s background in visual effects, it’s no surprise that the film looks very impressive – both The Maze itself and the Grievers (monsters that roam the maze) are striking without being extravagant, and the action sequences push the envelope a little bit further (for this genre at least), keeping a sense of peril at all times.

The film’s ace up the sleeve, however, is the casting. While O’Brien rigidly sticks to the archetype YA male lead (boyishly handsome, earnest, troubled), the dual support of Thomas Brodie-Sangster and Will Poulter as veteran Gladers with opposing views gives the story some depth. Poulter in particular stands out as a Glader who has become institutionalised, and makes for a great antagonist.

Part prison escape movie, part Lord Of The Flies, The Maze Runner is nothing you haven’t seen before, but makes enough tweaks to the formula to make this instalment (and future ones) an interesting prospect. Words: James Luxford

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Also Out: ‘71

Imagine the tense stop-start dramatics of John Carpenter’s ’70s thrillers transplanted into the heart of Belfast during the peak of The Troubles and you’ll have a pretty strong idea of what to expect from director Yann Demange’s debut for Warp Films.

Jack O’Connell plays Private Gary Hook, a new recruit in a platoon dispatched to Belfast to tackle the city’s flourishing violence. His comrades appear to have little knowledge of what to expect and even their naive lieutenant underestimates the situation. His mistake, in part, results in a conflict which leaves Hook stranded in a strange and predominantly hostile environment. He’s left with little option but to stealthily work his way safely back to his barracks.

It’s the contrasting sense of dread during the quiet moments and the palpable sense of utter panic during the more chaotic scenes that works best here, as it focuses on Hook’s fear: even if he’s not in immediate danger, it lurks in menacing, unseen ways. The political context is secondary to the personal hell that Hook endures, and O’Connell masterfully captures another ferocious performance after the visceral Starred Up from earlier this year.

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Shorts

Unsurprisingly, Gone Girl failed to go missing at last weekend’s UK box office as it passed a gross of £4 million - making it the first 18-certificate film to top the list since The Wolf Of Wall Street back in January. Dracula Untold managed to avoid most of the usual jokes about sucking and also scored a very credible second place despite a comparatively limited profile. Other high entries included the Knight and Day-inspired Bollywood action movie Bang Bang (#5) and Dolphin Tale 2 (#6).

It was revealed that Shia LaBeouf cut his face with a knife during the filming of Fury to make his war wounds look more convincing. That’s 4 REAL commitment or really quite disturbing, depending on the state of his mental health.

Finally, soporific TV quiz Pointless took an odd detour into the world of film when old-school kids entertainers and famous pant-swingers Trevor and Simon were asked to find a pointless answer from the cast of The World’s End. And they won by naming Paddy Considine, whose reaction you can see below. At least Considine found himself in good company as woman-of-the-moment Rosamund Pike and retired 007 Pierce Brosnan were similarly pointless.

Name checked by @simonmhickson on Pointless, a grand finale by @TheFreds this is my favourite Saturday night in ages!

— Paddy Considine (@PaddyConsidine) October 4, 2014

Never mind the fact no fucker knew I was in The Worlds End!

— Paddy Considine (@PaddyConsidine) October 4, 2014

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Words: Ben Hopkinsexcept where indicated

More Clash Film content

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Not that you’d necessarily think it from a cursory listen to ‘A World Lit Only By Fire’, Godflesh’s first album since their surprise reformation in 2010, but Justin Broadrick is a remarkably mellow chap. Funny, enthusiastic and warm, he tells me that Godflesh is still completely misunderstood by many.

“The strange thing is that it can be appreciated by an audience that’s into very macho metal, hardcore – stuff that involves a lot of very aggressive violent posturing,” he says. “But that couldn’t be any further from what we’re about. Godflesh is like an internal battle externalised. We’re at odds with machismo – we’re at odds with ourselves!”

Being at odds with themselves was clearly a factor in their decision to end the band back in 2002. The collapse of Godflesh left friendships frayed for a time, and with bassist Ben Green no longer wishing to play music at all, Justin had to come to terms with what the band had become.

“The split was pretty implosive and a really uncomfortable way to end things really. For me, Godflesh really suffered in its last three to four years. There were so many contributing factors, but ultimately it was down to me wanting to explore so much other stuff. I was looking to do something far more sombre and melancholy.”

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‘Imperator’, from ‘A World Lit Only By Fire’

- - -

As many will know, Justin followed that particular creative path with Jesu – a band that still polarises opinion among Godflesh fans. In retrospect, Godflesh’s last album, 2001’s ‘Hymns’, was a signpost to where he was headed – as he is well aware.

“Quite clearly that’s almost a transitional record,” he says. “It's still very much Godflesh, but you can hear that it’s clawing at something a bit beyond, and it touches upon things that perhaps Godflesh shouldn’t have.”

Old-school fans will be pleased to hear that the new album doesn’t suffer from any such form of identity crisis. In fact, it might stand as the band’s most focused to date. Talking to Justin it becomes clear that despite his numerous projects, and almost unparalleled productivity rate, he’s deeply interested in developing very distinct styles. The idea that the new album is Jesu with Green on bass is swiftly put aside.

“I want to explore different sides of my personality – what I can be and what I can’t be,” he explains. “But I do like very singular sounding things. (Laughs) I like a wide range of extremely single-minded music.”

Going back just a few years, the notion of a new Godflesh album was something that nobody dared contemplate. Interviews with Justin made clear that, as a creative force, there was no place for the band to exist.  It was 2009’s ‘Disconnected’ LP by Greymachine – a collaboration with Isis/Old Man Gloom’s Aaron Turner and long-time Broadrick cohorts Dave Cochrane and Diarmuid Dalton – that reinstated his desire in joining together with Green as Godflesh once more.

“Greymachine was really confrontational, very f*cked up, horribly mutated, psychedelic – very bloated. By the time it came out I was already starting to write stuff that could be Godflesh.”

The writing of this material was somewhat different to what you might expect – the band unlikely to put out a treasure trove of unreleased songs any time soon.“All I did prior to the reformation was visualise and fantasise riffs. But I never once sat down with a guitar and recorded them. They were like dream states, which is really, really odd, but it’s something I often do.”

This hypnotic sensibility is something that comes through in a number of the songs on ‘A World Lit Only By Fire’. And always one to acknowledge his influences, Justin’s response to a suggestion that certain songs bring to mind ‘Revelations’/‘Fire Dances’-era Killing Joke is an enthusiastic one.

“Absolutely. We’ve always been influenced by early Killing Joke, but on this album even more so in some respects – and you've mentioned the absolute records there. ‘Fire Dances’ particularly is absolutely ridiculous. There are bits on that album where it’s obviously guitar, bass, vocals and the all-powerful drums – but you only hear rhythm.”

- - -

Not once did I sit down and play one of our old records to inspire me to write new stuff. It had to feel new, fresh and inspired…

- - -

This approach of everything converging to create a giant, singular groove is something that crops up time and again on the new album – to incredible effect.

“I spoke to someone the other day who said that the song ‘Carrion’ reminded them of the time they stood in front of a car-crushing machine,” Justin says. “That’s quite nice. I do get met with blank faces when I explain that a song was born from a rhythm, but often I’ll put down a rhythm, then try and translate it with guitar. I see Godflesh as body music, to me it’s full of grooves – it’s some odd form of mutational dance music.”

But for all the mechanism and automation, there are organic flaws and imperfections, too. “We intentionally leave little mistakes in,” he reveals, “because I like the frailty of that, juxtaposed with a rhythm machine that doesn’t lose time.”

Ah, the rhythm machine – something for which Godflesh were particularly noted during their initial run. Jump forward to today and anyone using Apple’s GarageBand software has a far more powerful level of music technology available to them than Godflesh ever had in the early ’90s. Does Justin feel modern technologies have influenced the new album much?

“It definitely makes things easier,” he says. “I guess that’s the nice thing, it affords the luxury of convenience – being able to abbreviate time.”

But as listening to the songs on the new album makes clear, if technology has done anything it’s given the band the opportunity to make the most of their heaviness. These tracks are as stripped-back and minimal as many of the pair’s earliest compositions, but they’re delivered with a weight and power that just couldn’t be translated by old drum machines and cassette 4-tracks.

Justin goes on to explain how the band prevented itself from going overboard with the technology on offer.

“I like limitation, I love it. I think limitations keep you disciplined. I don’t like to look at things as totally open-ended, because you just go up your own arse. And this new album was almost born out of those limitations, which is great because it goes back to the early Godflesh records, when we had f*ck all.”

When a band says something like, “this album really goes back to our roots,” it usually ends up in disappointment for them and fans alike. But as Justin is at pains to point out, there was no attempt on the band’s part to recapture any previous sound or feel with the new set.

“Trying to rekindle emotions or ‘capture’ something generally doesn’t work,” Justin explains. “For me, it had to be a rebirth. Not once did I sit down and play one of our old records to inspire me to write new stuff. It had to feel new, fresh and inspired.”

Justin’s desire to not repeat himself manifested itself in a number of ways, such as recording the new album with an eight-string guitar – a move that made it almost impossible to retread previous musical ideas. And as he points out, it helped the band go into uncharted waters.

“An eight-string as a guitar is just inspirational. I struggle with it, which is a good thing, and I find new discords too, which is another good thing. And on top of that I can downtune so f*cking far that I'm going into guttural levels, lower than you can even imagine.”

- - -

‘New Dark Ages’,from ‘A World Lit Only By Fire’

- - -

Justin recorded the new album in the small studio he’s set up in the family home he shares with his partner and young son in a remote part of the Welsh countryside. He described how the album was recorded around stints of childcare.

“When you become a parent you learn to be more concise with everything – which, again, is a fantastic limitation and a fantastic source of discipline. So I have to work in pockets of time. But as we all know, creativity doesn't work like that. It’s not a tap, unfortunately. More often than not, inspiration strikes me when I’m not in the f*cking studio. The studio for me now is where I commit, as I just don’t have that luxury any more of being able to sit there and piss about.”

When Justin talks about not having much time, I can’t help but ask why he’s decided to put this new album out on his own Avalanche imprint. Surely this just makes for more work?

“It’s to the point now where it’s just total overload,” he confirms. “I have no one working for me at this record label. I employ PR and I’ve got a distributor who manufactures the records – really, I don’t have to do a lot more than just oversee it, but that’s still a lot of work. I wouldn’t have it any other way though, I really wouldn’t.

“A lot of labels wanted this new Godflesh material, small labels, even touching upon corporates. But Ben and I always said that, after our early experiences, it’s time that we did this ourselves and entirely reap the benefits of it – instead of giving it out to some label that doesn’t give a shit or just misrepresents us.

“I need to have that complete control – quite clearly I’m a control-addict.”

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Words: James Barry

‘A World Lit Only By Fire’ is out now on Avalanche and reviewed here. Check out Avalanche here. 

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Arriving almost remarkably fully formed, Californian act Avi Buffalo’s eponymous debut charmed its way through 2010.

An infectious, bright and emboldened record, it matched folk-influenced tapestries against gilded power-pop to create something that felt like sunshine dappled across autumn leaves.

Then, there was nothing. New album ‘At Best Cuckold’ is the band’s first album in four years, a return that finds the project both refining its sound and moving beyond those early influences.

Clash caught up with Avi Buffalo frontman and creative core Avi Zahner-Isenberg to discuss their return.

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Avi Buffalo, ‘So What’, from ‘At Best Cuckold’

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How have you spent the past four years?

I’ve been working. I’ve been working on my music. I wrote a lot of songs, I played with a lot of people and studied a lot of different types of songwriting. It took me a long time to write and also to record, because I studied a lot of different types of recording as well.

Do you find it easy to write?

It depends. Sometimes I write real quickly and sometimes real slowly.

Were you able to home record?

A lot of the record was done in studios. I did it in Tiny Telephone, then a few other places – I used this studio in Westminster, and then a place in New York. A lot was done at home. I did a lot of basic tracking in studios and then overdubs would be done at home.

So it took a long time to complete?

Yeah. Totally. There were a lot of songs that took a long time to figure out how to record. There’s a lot of stuff that I did where I would do a lot of demos, and I couldn’t imagine what it would be until it was finished and figured out. It’s totally dependant on the song. Sometimes I’m playing different instruments on different demos, different ways of recording, until it was ready, until it sounded right.

I had to get the concept right, then we would go in to record it. I’d do it live with other musicians – drums and bass and stuff like that. We wanted to get a live take. A lot of the demoing was really informing the complete, actual recording of it. We’d overdub the recording and then see which one worked best. We’d work on it at home or in different studios, having the freedom to get really creative.

This album feels rather more nostalgic than the debut.

There’s definitely a lot of reflection. There’s a lot more looking through the experiences I’ve had, even since the last album. There’s a lot I had to remember, and then begin to put it into my writing as I was writing the songs.

Is this record to be taken autobiographically?

It was based on my life. Literally, emotionally, and all that.

Do you find yourself going back over material and making realisations you’d never had before?

Totally. It’s another reason why I like demoing, because you can record stuff and then listen to it later. You can hear things which you didn’t think about before. Stream of consciousness writing can be very helpful in that regard.

Stream of consciousness?

A lot of the time that’s where I start. Sometimes I won’t be thinking about it, I’ll just do it. I draw inspiration from that kind of writing in my lyrics. I feel like when you use that channel you won’t know immediately what it is you want to write about, but maybe a week or a year later you’ll hear it again or sing it again and think, ‘Oh, I was writing about that one time in my life.’ I didn’t even realise that I was saying it, but there it is.

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I wanted to really seek out tones… and get them right. Not abuse them, but use them in contexts that were tasteful…

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Who influences you?

Everybody from Brian Wilson, Burt Bacharach or modern people like Bill Callahan. A ton of different types of things. Also things that are non-musical. I grew up on a lot of folk music like Paul Simon or Joni Mitchell, who are intense lyricists. Some things that are not from music, but from films or books. Ideas that people are telling me about that struck a chord with me. Stuff like that.

This record feels a lot more diverse than ‘Avi Buffalo’ – right down to the songs’ lengths. Some are extremely long, others barely last for 60 seconds.

It’s just a happenstance of… that first song (‘So What’), I wrote really quickly and I first imagined it as an interlude, when I recorded a demo of it. It was extremely lo-fi. I just wanted to do it again, I realised it was just a good song. A lot of bands have done stuff like that. There are all sorts of extremes out there. It’s a good way to diversify a record, I think, to have both long songs and short songs.

I wanted to incorporate a lot of things in this record. For my debut, it was just such a rushed process that I didn’t really have the ability to do that. I wanted to really seek out tones and emulate a lot of different sounds I had heard. Seek out new tones and really get them right. Not abuse them, but use them in contexts that were tasteful and create climaxes and comedowns. Moments that were expressive.

Do you view yourself as a singer foremost, or a guitarist?

I mean, definitely, the thing I’ve had most formal training in is the guitar. When I started playing guitar that was my first serious, musical creative thing in general in my life. Also, when making this record, I wanted to get beyond that, so I started playing bass for a while so I could figure out what that’s about. I also play piano, keyboards and am getting more dexterity, familiarity with that instrument. I taught myself how to use drum sequencers, electronic instruments, in a different way to creating music than I did before. 

Do you view Avi Buffalo live and in the studio as being two distinct entities?

They’re kind of different, I guess, but in the end they’re very similar because when recording I like to get people playing on it who have their own creative vibe, who can add to what I do. And it’s the same thing with playing live: we can play a song and be respectful of each other, but at the same time incorporate something new. I feel it’s the best way to get out somebody’s potential. To figure out what they would really love to do best. Sharing influences, trading influences.

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Interview: Robin Murray
B&W photo: Eydie McConell

Avi Buffalo’s ‘At Best Cuckold’ is out now on Sub Pop. The band is online here. 

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Having just put out rarities collection ‘Lost Loves’, Seattle five-piece Minus The Bear have reminded us of their great knack for combining cunning melodies with rampant rhythms and just a little intelligence. Okay, quite a bit: this is whip-smart pop-rock with all phasers set to stunning, and it’s been that way since the band’s debut, ‘Highly Refined Pirates’, which came out back in 2002.

‘Lost Loves’ is out right now on Big Scary Monsters, and you can listen to ‘The Lucky Ones’ from said release below, right before band member Alex Rose’s take on this week’s new singles.

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Charli XCX – ‘Break The Rules’

“This made me a bit nauseous. It’s perfect, and I definitely shouldn’t be watching this video. It’s making me feel old. Works on a lot of levels, but I can’t shake the feeling that a bunch of old dudes concocted this in a laboratory. Sometimes I can get down with that sort of thing – like Katy Perry– but this just lacks a spark and feels like it’s preying on youth culture in a cynical way. That said, it sounds fantastic!”

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Ben Howard – ‘I Forget Where We Were’

“Very nice voice… standard, forlorn British-sounding bloke and a dark, intriguing backing track. Not sure this is the right song for this 70-degree weather. I’ll have to listen again when Seattle returns to its normal gloominess. It’s the sort of song that could hit you at the right time or be in the right movie and it would kill you.”

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The Black Keys – ‘Gotta Get Away’

“Seems like these guys are on autopilot making super sync-able filler. Love the sounds and Danger Mouse production, but the song is doing nothing for me.”

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Fall Out Boy – ‘Centuries’

“Oh wow. A Suzanne Vega sample? This isn’t my cup of tea at all. Another production by committee, but the song buried underneath the 100 Pro Tools tracks is admittedly catchy.”

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Meridian Dan – ‘One Two Drinks’

“This video seems pretty fun… partying around a bunch of shipping containers while the sun comes up? Sure, why not? I’m not sure exactly what he’s saying aside from talking about drinks and himself but it’s hard not to bounce to this.”

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Stevie Nicks – ‘The Dealer’

“I’d heard about Stevie’s new album of quickly-recorded lost songs from the classic years of Fleetwood Mac earlier, so I have been curious about this one. I wish the recording was from the era that the songs were written. It begins to approach that vibe, but leaves me wanting. I know our collection of songs on ‘Lost Loves’ is only from the last eight years, but even if we re-recorded them today they’d lose something. With this song, I just find myself imagining what could have been.”

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Words: Alex Rose

‘Lost Loves’ is out now on Big Scary Monsters. Find Minus The Bear online here. More singles round-ups right here. 

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Chuck D is quiet, pensive. Each word occupies a very deliberate space, with the rapper retaining a patient tone, as if to emphasise maximum impact for each phrase.

Of course, he could also be tired. Speaking to Clash in London, the rapper is near the end of a global tour that has seen Public Enemy play to more than 175,000 people. The night before, the hip-hop icons played a special set in a West London studio to just 100 fans, reaching through their influential back catalogue across a three-hour performance.

To Chuck D, though, each concert must be treated separately. “See, you got to detach yourself from the previous night’s show,” he states. “That wasn’t me. I can’t tell myself that I did three hours, my body might feel it. You have to say, ‘Well, today is the first gig of the tour.’”

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Chuck D, ‘Give We The Pride’ (2014)

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“Stage is stage,” he continues. “It takes a lot of confidence. This is not like mail order – this is like performance art. I think the epitome of recording, it should be like: can you actually record and then perform what you recorded? It’s like, everything is born – in our genre – out of the marriage of words and music, and then that marriage of words and music is produced into being a song. Then you have to be able to take this production of a song to a record, but too often it stops there in popular culture. Your performances should be greater than your recordings, no question.”

Probed on this, Chuck D admits the so much of what makes Public Enemy such a fantastic live act – the physical impact of their music, for one – lies outside rational terminology. “It doesn’t necessarily have a tangible explanation of why it is and why it might be better. Not everything in culture and music can be conveyed into the printed word. It is what it is. [The] three areas that I think culture is: sight, sound and story.”

For Public Enemy, that story so often involves London. The city was quick to embrace the rap group, who famously stormed British shores as part of a Def Jam package tour in 1987. “It’s really always been our base here,” he smiles. “And Philadelphia, to a certain extent. But London… I mean, London goes to the world. You talk to most Americans, they don’t acknowledge the world because they’re not taught to.”

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I’m an Earth-izen and a culturist. I am a citizen of no one spot on Earth…

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Seated in Shoreditch’s Ace Hotel, the ever-changing landscape of London rolls past the window as Chuck D talks. Asked about gentrification and the shifting nature of London life, he is keen to compare this to the class system.

“Well, the British Isles are exactly what they are: islands. Not a lot of space there, unlike a continent. So, the politics of arranging and re-arranging is going to happen at a quicker pace than if you have something vast. Although travelling the mainland, the British isle in the UK… there’s a lot of space. But that space has been appropriated, it’s been sold, it’s been owned for hundreds and hundreds of years by noble families or whatever the f*ck. You can’t own the planet Earth.”

“But here was a rule structure which came about,” he continues, “which came from this place, an ownership of mountains and rivers which are billions of years old. Aspects that are born out of the United Kingdom, dealing with continent space... My wife is clear on spatial politics and expansion of destinies and agendas. We have British, North America and down in Australia, the whole original monarchy, manifest destiny point of view takes on a different realm. The power is there, and they expand that philosophy until you have no resistance.”

Able to travel the globe with Public Enemy, Chuck D has witnessed at first hand the shifts caused by a globalised economy. “Every year, you got to keep your score card,” he states. “Every year. That’s why I say I’m an Earth-izen. I’m an Earth-izen and a culturist. I am a citizen of no one spot on Earth. The planet Earth is somewhere I can claim I’m from, I can dig it. I’m a culturist because deep down culture is a thing which unites human beings together and I’m able to speak to that spirituality. Religion is all under that one umbrella – although I never thought that God passed out religions like a poker game!”

He laughs, before adding: “It’s a dangerous mix when you have government, politics and religion all in a snowball of confusion, so I go beyond that.”

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One of the biggest problem areas of the last 10 years for hip-hop is that it’s reduced women’s participation and involvement down to a stereotype…

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Public Enemy were one of the first groups in hip-hop to embrace the internet. At the behest of ‘media assassin’ Harry Allen, the band began using the web both as a means to communicate directly with fans and distribute their music. Chuck D retains a love for the empowering possibilities of digital technology, recently launching the SheMovement.com website to encourage feminine identity within hip-hop.

“It’s a totally ignored area,” he frowns. “I just think, to bring the point of view home, one of the biggest problem areas of the last 10 years for hip-hop is that it’s reduced women’s participation and involvement down to a stereotype. And also it removes groups for individuals. We went from We to Me. My movement agenda idea in 2015 is how do we go from Me to We – and what best epitomises that is the arts and culture and music of groups and women. But women being led by nobody other than their own ideological autonomy – if that’s such a combination of words. I want to service that. I was to service them being them, at the top of their opinion and energy. As Nas said, hip hop is dead without women!”

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Public Enemy, ‘Fight The Power’ (1989)

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“My only goals in rap music and hip-hop is how much service can I provide,” he continues. “When people start asking me whether am I going to be part of the Free Gaza movement and this thing going over with Kurds and this thing going over with the water in Detroit, I’m like, yeah, as a public figure I can lend voice to that. But I want to be part of an energy – I don’t want to be the spokesperson only for that agenda, I want to add something to it. I want to see your effort in it! I learn from the Bob to the Bob to the Bob, and that’s Bob Marley, Bob Dylan and Bobby Womack. That’s where I make my combinations at. Wise man once said, y’know, let them write the laws, I’ll write the songs.”

But Chuck D’s passion, his involvement with liberal, left-of-centre, non-mainstream causes is increasingly at odds with pop culture. The recent crisis in Gaza, for example, was marked by an incredible lack of commitment from the music world – even at a non-partisan level.

Asked why that is, Chuck D is unrelenting: “Because they’re under the financial security nutsack of their managers and agents who want to brand them,” he snaps. “And they don’t want to be branded as the bad person. They don’t mind being the bad person if they’re self-destructive or if they’re destructive to things that can’t really defend themselves – like black legacy. But they don’t want to tick off any financial avenue. Usually that insecurity is based on something which is real – but that reality needs to be examined.”

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Words: Robin Murray
Hoodie photo: Peter Anderson

Chuck D/Public Enemy online. Chuck’s new solo album, ‘The Black In Man’, is out now.

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The musical landscape of the mid-1990s wasn’t so different from today, in so much as the singles chart was a mix of pop, rock and dance music, mainly. The dominant genres of that time have remained so through to now. What was different, or at least what felt different to someone buying records at the time, was that albums didn’t tend to be made by dance acts – at least not to the critically celebrated standards that rock music enjoyed.

Leftfield’s debut of 1995, ‘Leftism’, played a substantial role in changing that. Alongside The Chemical Brothers’ ‘Exit Planet Dust’ and The Prodigy’s ‘Music For The Jilted Generation’– and, to a slightly lesser extent, the genre-mash-up sounds of Portishead’s ‘Dummy’, Moby’s ‘Everything Is Wrong’ and Tricky’s ‘Maxinquaye’ – the first album from production pair Neil Barnes and Paul Daley popularised the dance long-player like never before.

Released on January 30^th 1995, ‘Leftism’ was received as a new dawn for British house, and recognised as one of the albums of the year by the Mercury Prize panel, shortlisted beside both ‘Dummy’ and ‘Maxinquaye’. Tracks like ‘Open Up’, featuring John Lydon, and the Earl Sixteen-starring ‘Release The Pressure’, were radio staples, and commonplace additions to indie compilations of the time. It was a period of change documented in series like ‘The Best… Album In The World… Ever’, the third volume of which (I still have it) placed ‘Open Up’ and The Prodigy’s ‘Firestarter’ on the same disc as ‘Stupid Girl’, ‘Going Out’ and ‘Don’t Look Back In Anger’. Genre lines were blurring. Dance was no longer just a club concern.

Come 1999, Leftfield had their first number one album. ‘Rhythm And Stealth’, with the hit single ‘Afrika Shox’ and Guinness ad-featured ‘Phat Planet’, earned another Mercury nomination, although for the second album in a row Leftfield didn’t walk away with the top prize. In 2002, though, everything went quiet: Barnes and Daley put Leftfield on hiatus. Their return in 2010 produced the live LP ‘Tourism’, but Daley subsequently elected to go solo, leaving the Leftfield reins to Barnes alone.

Which is where we pick all things Leftfield up: on the phone to Barnes to see what exactly the situation is, now that he’s the sole custodian of the project.

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‘Afrika Shox’, featuring Afrika Bambaataa (1999)

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What is the state of play with all things Leftfield?

The state of play is that I’m finishing a new album. You might even have an exclusive here, but you asked what I was doing – and what I’ve been doing, over the past six months, is finishing a new Leftfield album. I’m still doing that, and fitting a bit of DJing in. I don’t know if I’m allowed to say when the new album is coming out. I’ve rather let the cat out of the… box? Bush? What is it they say?

The bag.

Yeah, the cat’s out the bag. But why not let someone know. It’s no secret that I have been working on a Leftfield album. The Facebook page is full of it. I’ve got deadlines now, which is a horrible thing to think about. So most of my time right now is being spent on brushing up on the new album. And I’m not going to say anything else about it, obviously. Because that would be revealing too much. And I couldn’t tell you much more anyway!

But presumably you’re very happy with it, as it’s not something that is being rushed out?

Oh, I’m f*cking very happy with it.

And is it going to be very vocalists heavy?

Ooooh, y’see, there you go. I’m not going to tell you. But yeah, it’s a Leftfield album, and that’s all I will say. So expect a bit of madness, expect the unexpected. It’s been going for three years, and it’s very… I don’t know. At the moment, I’m still finishing it up, so I’m finessing it over the next couple of months. Y’know, finishing and mixing, filling in things that I think are missing. There have been parts that I’ve dismissed, but then come back to and realised were good. And now I have to put it all together on a record. It’ll have no resemblance whatsoever to the past, put it that way.

You say that, but presumably a new Leftfield album will be identifiable as a Leftfield album, rather than anything else?

Oh yeah. I think so. It doesn’t sound like a remake of ‘Leftism’, or ‘Rhythm And Stealth’, put it that way. There’s some great electronic music being made today, and I have to compete with that.

Some of those musicians will have grown up listening to you.

I suppose some of them will have. A lot, maybe. But there’s some pretty stunning stuff coming out of Europe over the last few years, like Moderat and Modeselektor, and Caribou’s new album. I’m into all of that, and they’re making albums that work really well – like, Gesaffelstein too. Somehow I have to be up there with them. And then there’s people like Hudson Mohawke, and Aphex Twin has just come back – I love his new album. There’s some brilliant, fresh music coming out of Bristol at the moment, too. Really powerful tracks. People don’t realise just how much amazing music is being made by young artists in this country.

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‘Open Up’, featuring John Lydon (1993)

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You’ve got people like Rustie and Hudson Mohawke really making their names with album work – both on their own and through contributions to other LPs. Do you think that you played a significant part in ‘legitimising’ the dance music LP, with ‘Leftism’?

Definitely, we did. It was the time of The Chemical Brothers and the second Prodigy album, too. Before these albums, people thought dance was a disposable form. We grew up on great albums, though – albums that told a story. And I suppose we had so much stuff that we wanted to express, that we had to make an album. And when we did, we thought we’d sell 20,000 copies or something. We had no idea it’d become a classic – we just made a record that we’d want to sit down and listen to.

Generally, nowadays, it’s hard to make an album that’s 10 good tracks. That’s something Moderat have achieved with their latest one – and I’m looking forward to hearing what HudMo does next. Young people now are buying things track by track – I’m not sure they’re listening to albums as we used to anymore.

I suppose you have artists like Disclosure, who have the single track hits, but also put together a generally well-received album, that hangs together in an older-school sense.

Yeah, I really like their album. They get the pop thing, they’re really good – they know what they’re doing. And they’re really young!

I don’t think that they were both born when ‘Leftism’ came out. I’m pretty sure one of the brothers is still terrifically young. (Not quite, says the internet: 1991 and 1994 for Guy and Howard, respectively.)

Good luck to him!

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I’m happy working on the new material, but I’m not against doing something with ‘Leftism’...

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Do you have any plans to mark the 20^th anniversary of ‘Leftism’ next year?

I’ve no idea. At the moment, nobody’s said anything to me about it. Someone would have to come to me with an idea for it. I’m happy working on the new material, but I’m not against doing something with ‘Leftism’. I think if I wasn’t also doing the new album, I’d be less interested to revisit it. To be honest, in my head at the moment, I’m just trying to make a new album that’s as good as the people I just mentioned. I don’t want to look like an old twat, wasting his time.

Do you think that electronic music gives you a greater freedom as you get older, to experiment and advance your material, compared to a more ‘classic’ rock set up? Because you think of electronic music as being less physical than banging a drum, or running around a stage with a guitar…

Well, I think there’s a great deal of originality still to be found in just bass, drums and guitar – it all depends on how you put it together. I mean, these days for electronic music, you can just get a program, press play and it’ll give you a techno rhythm. It’s all about new ideas – the process, or the type of music you’re making, almost doesn’t matter. I still believe that there’s great new music to be made from what you know. Look at The xx – that’s great, minimal music, with just a great voice, bass and drums. It’s like Talking Heads – go and listen to that, and it’s minimal and brilliant, because of all the ideas in there.

I’m really into Sleaford Mods right now. What they do is brilliant. And if you listen to what they’re doing, you’ll see what I’m talking about: it’s really simple music, really minimal. But the thing about electronic music – well, all music now, because most of it is made in computers – is that everyone can find their way around it. We all have massive memories in our computers, and the scope is almost endless. The problem, the danger I suppose, is how much of it can sound fake. That’s the criticism I’d put towards a lot of mainstream dance, compared to the more underground stuff – a lot of the mainstream stuff is made to requests. Like: ‘That’s popular, can you make me more of that.’ That’s why house rhythms are all the same today – everybody is doing the same thing. For me, that’s sad.

People do see success that some acts have had, and then they set out to copy it to try to get some for themselves. And I have no problem with that, in dance music or electro. That is how a scene forms. What’s important then, though, is to push that scene forward. As long as there are people looking to push things on, we’ll be okay. If you don’t have those people, you get a blanket blandness.

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Interview: Mike Diver
Photos: Marot and Sons

Neil Barnes performs a Leftfield DJ set at London’s KOKO on October 18^th– full details here. Find Leftfield online here. 

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It’s a fortnight before Justin Clarke kicks off his first national tour at The Deaf Institute in Manchester, and preparations have hit a buffer.

“I’m a bit nervous, because my voice has gone.”

Clarke – or Ghetts to the thousands of fans acquired across a career that has spanned over a decade – is tapping the dashboard of his ink-black Mercedes, parked by the rusting iron gates of a Hackney industrial unit. Streets away and markedly less busy than the nearby Kingsland Road, Ghetts has at last escaped the ticket wardens found stalking the streets whenever he pays a visit to the office of his publicist.

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Ghetts, ‘Rebel’ (2014)

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“I had a mixtape ready, it was meant to be released right this second,” he says, again tapping on the dashboard. “I’m behind schedule and I just had the finishing touches to do, so that’s upset me.”

First chancing his trade as an MC back in 2003, Ghetts is somewhat a veteran in a grime scene that is still deceptively young. Remaining relevant in a culture that, despite its promise, has not always paid well and in an age where music is consumed and then thrown to the side faster than ever has proved difficult for many. It’s this double-edged sword that Ghetts feels has been of detriment to the careers of handfuls of his peers: those whose sound succumbed to the allure of chart success, only for the artists to find themselves struggling to reconnect with their original fans once the commercial circuit had ran its course.

“You can get rich today, but you might not be able to make music eight, 10 years from now based on the music that you are making,” he says. “It’s being very careful and making sure that your brand is always authentic. I’ve made certain mistakes in my career that I shouldn’t have. I had to understand not every collab’ is worth doing, even if it’s worth a bit of change.”

- - -

We’re just the outcasts, the kids that weren’t meant to be, but made it happen…

- - -

“Some of us made the mistake of making music…” he continues, pausing to mull that thought over. “I’m not even going to say making ‘other’ music – I’m just going to say ‘not good music’. And what’s happened is they’re finding it hard now, because that commercial crowd switches so quickly, you know?”

Travelling the independent road at first proved problematic for MCs contained in a DIY genre that has notoriously lacked wider support – something Clarke feels ultimately sharpened his business acumen on the strategic side of things. It’s a turn of events that he feels aligns grime artists with a handful of Hip Hop acts from across the Atlantic, the most notable being Jay Z and Dame Dash who, in their earlier years, fended for themselves having been turned down by nearly every major label.

“We’re just the outcasts, the kids that weren’t meant to be, but made it happen,” he says. “That’s the way it’s going to be, but I thank God for those hardships.”

“I’m different from other artists that are signed to a label,” he says, before correcting himself. “Actually, I shouldn’t just say ‘me’. I should say ‘grime artists’. These experiences will ensure that we’re here 15 years from now. It’s like that saying, you know? Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.”

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I feel like doing a show without incorporating the earlier days is kind of a disappointment to a fan…

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It’s these career experiences that Ghetts intends to package when he hits the road later this month. The idea for the three-date ‘Rebel’ tour, he explains, is to provide the fans with a near complete run-down of his career to date, incorporating anthems like ‘Top 3 Selected’, ‘Don’t Phone Me’, and ‘Ina Di Ghetto’ – the latter his collaboration with Wretch 32, who along with Kano, Giggs and Devlin, is one of the many guests on the tour.

“I had to look at it from the fans’ perspective,” he says. “It’s my first tour, and what I want to do is really give people the experience of my career. Obviously the album’s sick, but I feel like doing a show on my first tour without incorporating the earlier days is kind of a disappointment to a fan.”

Clarke’s first album, ‘Rebel With A Cause’, was released in March via Disrupt, an independent label that Ghetts is eager to praise, quick to point out the relentless work ethic that they all share. That’s why the partnership, though only one album in, has proved successful. In cooperation with the UK Trade and Investment body, the BPI selected Ghetts as one of 15 emerging British acts to receive funding for the purpose of cultivating an audience overseas.

Domestically, the plaudits have also been forthcoming. Later this month Clarke will discover whether his three MOBO nominations progress into anything more, and in September he was crowned 2014’s ‘Hardest Working Artist’ at this year’s AIM Independent Music Awards. 

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Wretch 32 feat. Badness and Ghetts, ‘Ina Di Ghetto’ (2008)

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“That’s been crazy,” he starts. “Disrupt are the only people that who embrace and trust my crazy ideas. Creatively, I do what I want then I take the ideas to them and we sit down and see how we can bring it to life, how we can make it a possibility. That’s important for me, because we’re just doing what we want to do, not what he’s doing over there or what made him a success.”

‘Rebel With A Cause’ peaked at number 23 on the official album chart, the culmination of a decade’s worth of singles, EPs and mixtapes. And though he is quick to remind that chart success is not something he particularly chases – he’s more comfortable creating music than developing marketing strategies after that process is finished – Clarke refuses to downplay the importance of fans engaging and ultimately investing in the music.

“The album kind of changed my life, put me in a better position,” he says, “But with that being said, from here on out it’s just about me keeping it consistent.”

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Words: Aniefiok Ekpoudom

Ghetts online. See him live as follows:

October
22^nd– Deaf Institute, Manchester
23^rd– o2 Academy, Birmingham
26^th– Borderline, London

Tickets here. 

More grime on Clash

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“It was incredible. We’ve grown up listening to the band, and it felt surreal seeing our name next to theirs.”

Circa Waves frontman Kieran Shudall is positively incandescent with joy having seen his band support The Libertines at London’s Alexandra Palace. At the time of our conversation he’s in Berlin, about to again take the stage before Doherty and company. “We have a similar vibe to some of our songs,” he continues, “so I think the crowd liked it.”

Having already played a huge handful of prestigious shows, this year, including sets at Reading and Leeds, Latitude and Glastonbury Festival, the Liverpool quartet has managed to present their catchy, guitar-led alternative rock gems to the masses. And in-between their rapturous live performances, they’ve found time to travel down to London to work on their debut album at the capital’s RAK Studios.

“We recorded 18 tracks in five weeks,” reveals Shudall. “We mainly set up in a big room and played the tracks live. We wanted to capture the vibe of our live shows on record.”

It was from these sessions that new single ‘So Long’ materialised. “It’s a tune about unrequited love from the perspective of someone looking in. I think everyone can relate to seeing a mate going after someone they are never going to get.”

He continues, explaining the songwriting process: “Generally I hear the whole song in my head, a bit like a track that’s already recorded. Imagining the drums, guitars and vocals. The melody comes first and then I piece in the vocals. For me, melody is most important.

“[The album is] essentially a tribute to my youth. The things I did and things I didn’t do. I wanted to paint a picture of what its like in the transition from your teens to your 20s.”

Following on from the single release, November sees the band embark on its biggest UK tour to date, including 11 shows across England and Scotland. And if the sudden wave of publicity surrounding Circa Waves is anything to go by, a live music environment is most definitely the best way to experience the band.

“To have people come to our shows around the UK is such a pleasure for us,” the enigmatic frontman concludes. “We put everything into our shows and play every night as if it’s our last gig. If you’re in the first few rows, expect to be in the firing line for sweat, guitars and maybe a member or two in there with you.”

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WHERE: Liverpool

WHAT: Early 2000s indie-rock bliss

GET 3 SONGS:‘So Long’ (video above), ‘Young Chasers’, ‘Stuck In My Teeth’

FACT: Kieran was born on the landing of his house and was delivered by his dad.

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Words: Jonathan Hatchman
Photo

Circa Waves online

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“Sometimes the most simple things are the best,” says Jammer of Lord Of The Mics, the iconic DVD battle series that’s provided the setting for some of grime’s pivotal moments over the last 10 years. “And if things aren’t broken, they don’t need fixing.”

Two emcees, a beat and a camera was the original format that the series adopted back in 2004 – and little has changed since, although the exponential growth of the LOTM brand over the last three years belies just how raw and undiluted those early exchanges were.

“We were just doing what we love and filming it,” explains LOTM’s Ratty of the first two volumes, “but they sent the benchmark for the rest.” As much a proving ground as an unofficial rite of passage for young, hungry emcees, facing off in Jammer’s basement has become a defining symbol of grime’s existence over the years, a place where the culture could thrive on its own terms and for its own purposes.

It’s not done any of the scene’s big hitters any harm either. Back in 2004, a then up-and-coming Kano took on Wiley in one of the series’ most memorable clashes. Further appearances from Skepta, Ghetts, Footsie, Scratchy and Bashy across the first two volumes all serve as excellent reference points for anyone wanting to understand a true cornerstone of grime culture.

Now run as a more commercially minded brand, the later volumes have seen the concept taken to the stage, and LOTM has even drafted in professional footballers to make it more than just a DVD series. But for all the added pomp and bravado, the magic has always lain in the art of the clash.

Following the release of LOTM volume six last month, we caught up with both Jammer and Ratty, the two brains behind the series since 2004, to talk shop and get their thoughts on the continued evolution of LOTM.

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There came a time where I just felt we needed to bring it back. People were making music for record deals, and grime really felt like it was missing something…

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You’ve now presided over six volumes in the Lord Of The Mics series. Could you pick your favourite?

Ratty: My favourite volume is still probably number three because it was a comeback and it set the levels high again – it brought it back to the raw essence of what LOTM is. The Kozzie & Sox and Lay Z & Marger clashes were obviously talking points but the whole thing had so many different elements to it.

Jammer (pictured, above): For classic’s sake it would have to be LOTM one, as it was the start of the journey.

Could you whittle the whole thing down to your favourite clash?

R: My favourite clash out of all six has to be Bradley Wright-Phillips and Yannick Bolasie – they’re not emcees by trade but they still set the bar really high and the football banter was new for us. We had an idea of what they were capable of beforehand, but stepping up to the plate in the basement was a big thing.

J: Skepta and Devilman for me, probably. The way they used each other’s lyrics and flows against each other was legendary and made it really entertaining to watch.

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Skepta vs Devilman, 2013

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How do you think LOTM has evolved since the first volume?

R: Obviously the visuals have evolved and improved but as far as emcees, it’s more about bringing in people from up and down the country, instead of just concentrating on London. We’ve spread our wings and now everyone is welcome, whether you’re from Wales or Manchester or wherever – we’ve opened doors, you know? The scene’s much bigger than just London now and even those who say that the artists involved aren’t as big as some of the original series, it’s worth remembering that Kano hadn’t been around long when he clashed Wiley.

J: I think it’s evolved primarily because of the people getting involved. We’ve got footballers on board, we’ve got our own merchandise, we’ve got the collaborations with platforms like Boiler Room. Treating it more as a brand than just a DVD compilation has really helped it grow.

Why was there such a gap between volumes two and three? What made you decide to re-launch the series when you did?

R: Basically, we were just working on other things at the time. Jammer had the ‘Are You Dumb?’ CDs and stuff and grime had gone a bit commercial, but the biggest thing was YouTube – we were massively affected by that. It just wasn’t about when we released LOTM 1, so it affected everything because people wanted everything for free. I didn’t move with the times and there was no way of selling it digitally then. People forget it costs an arm and a leg to put together too, so it just didn’t make sense to be doing it.

J: To be real, like Ratty says, I was dedicating a lot of time to LOTM and I was a solo artist in my own right so needed some time to focus on myself. Me and Ratty felt everything had become a bit distant too, because people were concentrating on different things. But there came a time where I just felt we needed to bring it back. People were making music for record deals, and grime really felt like it was missing something.

In that sense, it was a conscious decision to bring it back because I wanted to embed the brand in the culture. Don’t forget we’d already gone from Lord Of The Decks to Lord Of The Beats to LOTM, but I never foresaw it being as big as it is now. I knew there was something special about it though, because people thrived off the culture and the energy.

Clashing has been the bedrock of grime culture for years. Do you still think it carries the same resonance now?

R: It’s always going to be important because grime is all about clashing and competitiveness. Some artists feel like they can represent grime without clashing, but the bottom line is you can’t. You’ve gotta be able go defined yourself in that sort of arena and LOTM gives people that platform.

J: Yeah, definitely. A lot of the big names were wary when we brought it back because they didn’t want to make any mistakes or get shown up. The thing is though, all the greats have done it already – if you wanna be a great, you’ve got to compete on LOTM.

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P Money and Big H, LOTM 6

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It’s provided plenty of memorable moments but also vital snapshots of the moments in time that have helped define the culture, too. How would you describe what it represents?

R: I think it’s a way for emcees to prove they can do this and, essentially, it’s a place to showcase your skills. There’s still naturally that competitive edge, but if you turn up and show that you can hold your own, that says a lot – whether you win or lose, you’ll gain fans and respect.

In terms of the memorable moments, as we did it, we didn’t realise the importance – we were just doing what we loved and filming it. Time’s proven that these were key moments, though – Skepta, Kano, Devilman, they set the benchmark for what LOTM has gone on to become.

J: I think LOTM just gives MCs the opportunity to show that they’ve got the heart, without anything else considered. No fancy productions, no mix downs – you, the camera, the beat and your opponent. It’s a test of how good are you with just the core materials.

Why do you think the concept has proved to be so popular?

R: People were just missing what grime was – that raw element, that energy you can’t get anywhere else. We’ve always shot it in a way that makes the artists the focal point, too. When you’re at home watching it, it’s just you, your mates and the two emcees. That’s a key part of the concept that works for us.

J: It’s never been forced either – it has a natural vibe to it. Sometimes the most simple things are the best and if things aren’t broken, they don’t need fixing. It worked for us and we stuck with it.

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The main thing is it makes people laugh, and if you can do that then you’re on your way to winning in life…

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We touched on this before, but the more recent volumes have seen you take LOTM to the stage, connect with platforms like Boiler Room and even draft in professional footballers. Is this all part of helping to keep it fresh? Or do you think the magic still lies in the simplicity of the clash format?

R: It’s all about growth and we’ve got to move with the times. If it means bringing in professional footballers or flying people in to clash, as long as it stays true to grime and the essence is there, then that’s what we’re about. Bradley and Yanick actually did Hype Sessions verses for each other just messing about on their camera phones at the time we were filming the fifth LOTM, and that made us think they might be interested. For us, it was nice to know they were interested in the culture.

J: We needed to market it around different ideas, too, just to introduce different people to the concept. It’s all about collaborating with new people and new thinking, whether that’s through reaching out to different genres, or even the worlds of art and design or football and sport.

Would you say that LOTM has a timeless quality, in the sense that no matter what is happening in a wider context, there is always a demand from both emcees and fans to be a part of the LOTM brand?

R: Yeah, I think so. Essentially it’s just us bringing new talent to the table and the brand is strong enough now to make everyone notice. Funnily enough, our fanbase has changed over the years, too – we’ve got the people like yourself who used to watch it when they were kids, but now we’ve also got people only just discovering LOTM. Ten years from now, they’ll be 26 or 27, looking back at the clashes they used to watch, like you probably do with the first LOTM now.

J: It brings people together, too. I know people on the street, I know middle-class people, and even big musicians who will get together with their friends and watch it. It’s communal in that sense, because people discuss the clashes and debate who’s good and who isn’t. But the main thing is it makes people laugh, and if you can do that then you’re on your way to winning in life.

What does the future hold for the series? Where does it go from here?

R: We’re planning to run a battle league called Big Mic Man, that’ll be open to everybody. There’s so many people out there with talent who we don’t always have space for on the DVD, and they deserve a chance. We’re also looking into a LOTM UK Hip Hop edition because the music is popping off and we think it’ll work within a similar format.

J: Next year, I’m hoping to get some astronauts clashing…

(Laughs) Really?

J: Anything’s possible, bruv.

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Words: Tomas Fraser

LOTM online. 

Related: Smack Talk: P Money and Big H On Clashing

More Life At 140 columns

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More minor chord than minor threat, Unwound ploughed a lonely musical furrow. While the band’s unwavering pursuit of their own cryptic, intense and macabre sound may not have made much of a ripple in the UK, the final instalment of an impressive reissue campaign from Numero Group, ‘No Energy’, should finally cement their legacy as one of more deliriously original and dark American rock bands of the post-Nirvana years.

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Akin to Nirvana, Unwound was a trio hailing from Washington State. With the same humble roots and mission, singer/guitarist Justin Trosper, bassist Vern Rumsey and second-and-final drummer Sara Lund made their fraught living by crafting an incredible degree of ugliness from their instruments, right down to the brutalist cover art adorning their LPs. And if three is a crowd, the trio always sounded more like a braying mob.

So when the Chicago-based archival label Numero Group improbably turned its attention to the group, it did what it’s done so well for other neglected bands and scenes. Ranging from the recreation of the eccentric 1960s soul scene in Wichita, Kansas, to the revival of Codeine's glorious slowcore, Numero has yet again turned water into wine by resurrecting Unwound.  

Revisiting their murky world was a similarly eclectic choice, as the band never truly made it out of the American underground. Their recorded output has certainly never shined as brightly as it does now after the much-needed remastering saw more than 100 studio and live tracks forged into four lavish, yet suitably stark, box sets spanning their early high school days as Giant Henry to Unwound’s artistic zenith in 1996. The band went on to make two more superb records before their quiet dissolution in 2002, but those efforts remain untouched, perhaps left for another day.

However, few fans would have expected a fraction of this much love for the moody cult rockers. So the offering – which ranges from the Giant Henry years as goofy self-portrait-festooned Record Store Day 7-inches, to the awkward early years of the ‘Kid Is Gone’ three-LP box, through to the burgeoning power of the ‘Rat Conspiracy’ three-LP set and the concluding three records of the ‘No Energy’ collection – is a wonderfully exhaustive examination of their music from 1991 to 1996.

In those five short years, you can hear the band take its first steps out of their parents’ basements in Tumwater, Washington, arriving onto the national stage just a few years later. Whatever. It’s the past and so be it, right? The members of Unwound certainly thought the band had run its course, playing a gloriously redundant final show in their home state to bury themselves, pretty suits and ties and all. Good riddance, they said. Or in typical that gallows humour that always placed them in good stead, Trosper summed it all up: “Like, I'm done.”

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I think Unwound built something more, of more value: an idiosyncratic and instantly identifiable musical language…

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But from beginning to end, the music very clearly displays the extended bloody-mindedness that coloured their entire career. From the funereal ‘Corpse Pose’ dirge (listen, above) recorded for their roughly polished 1996 Echoplex-laden album ‘Repetition’ to the martyr-strewn ‘All Souls Day’ from 1994’s breakout, ‘New Plastic Ideas’, it seemed death, failure, contradiction, humiliation, conflict and transience were states of mind to be embraced, not shirked for the Pacific Northwesters. The group eventually toured themselves – and their interpersonal relationships – into the ground. Die, die, die, my darlings.

Looking at the first half of their career, the Giant Henry days are best left to completists only. But as archival documents go, it at least has a sense of humour as the band members’ cheesy school yearbook photos adorn the sleeve art. The music feels much more substantial on the first three-LP box set, compiling the high school and beyond era of the band in small-town Tumwater. Even this is fairly obscure stuff.

But helpfully, the band’s original (and largely forgotten) drummer Brandt Sandeno sheds light on their early ethos, was preserved throughout Unwound’s tenure, when he reflects: “The process was this: meet other freaks at school and become friends; practise relentlessly; perform with energy and volume; tour and make records. But I think Unwound built something more, of more value: an idiosyncratic and instantly identifiable musical language.”

While Unwound’s most loyal fans will have heard this music, most will have failed to fully understand the role that Sandeno played in Unwound’s trajectory. In retrospect, he turns out to be important as their first recordings were made in his parents’ basement in 1987 as drummer for Giant Henry. And as a footnote (and the Numero Group is very good at footnotes), Brandt and Trosper have since worked on other projects, from the acerbic Young Ginns to their current Sub Pop rock project, Survival Knife. 

Giant Henry played its last show in 1991, sharing the bill with Bikini Kill after a no-show from Nirvana as Krist Novoselic was unable to make the gig. The same year, Unwound was born and the guys hit the road on their inaugural tour. Which is where the recordings kick in on the first collection, ‘Kid Is Gone’, culminating in Trosper’s blistering singing and Rumsey’s rumbling bass of the Kill Rock Stars-released ‘Kandy Korn Rituals’ 7” (listen, below).

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By the time the band reached the junction of 1993 and their ‘Fake Train’ album – the precise moment where ‘Rat Conspiracy’, the second Numero Group reissue, resumes with the band – Unwound had practised itself into a whole new league, thanks to the sharpening of its tools by extensive playing with Kathleen Hanna and company, and Washington DC pranksters, Nation Of Ulysses. And the rats? Named after the smell of Steve Fisk’s Avast! Studio in Seattle, apparently, and its rotting vermin stuck within the cheap plasterboard walls. Suitably, this second bundle contains music from Unwound that is suffocating and oppressive.

The high point of ‘Rat Conspiracy’ is the opening juggernaut of a tune, ‘Dragnalus’. “I… FEEL… STRANGE,” implores a squirming Trosper as the trio grinds its way through a deceptively simple yet thoroughly catchy tune. With Sandeno replaced by the band’s only other drummer, Lund, the group was finally gelling with frightening consequences. Jump to ‘Valentine Card’ (listen, below) and hear the future of Unwound’s sound unfold through Rumsey's punishingly effective bassline and the varied dynamics of the band, morphing from a gentle murmur to a full-on and visceral assault. “On stage, we combined punishment and transcendence,” Lund reflected.

In 1994, the band found itself at its next jumping off point when the ever-loyal Washington state label Kill Rock Stars released their next album, ‘New Plastic Ideas’. Marking another huge stylistic leap, Unwound had again redefined its sound by developing a Cure-like creep on the epic and eerie ‘Abstraktions’ or thrashing through the haunted hurt of ‘Usual Dosage’.       

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So how could it be that a band in the midst of an impressive maturation could also be in the middle of such a profound rot? Looking back, Unwound appears to have always been in a state of decay by remaining staunchly opposed to everything grandiose or flash, merciless in their frankness and strictly punk as f*ck.

Or, as Trosper fondly remembers of this era: “I was into the idea of punishing the audience. If people are standing there, and it’s loud, if they really want to be there, they’ll stay. And yeah, you want people to like you, but there were times when I was like, tonight is about: Punish them.”

When asked what possessed Numero Group to revisit the Washington state rockers’ music, the label’s co-founder Ken Shipley (a former A&R manager at Rykodisc) replied: “After we finished Codeine, I started thinking of how we could follow it up. I pulled a stack of records from the 1990s out and started re-listening to them with my mid-30-year-old ears. Unwound still sounded fresh – they held up in a way that most stuff from that era doesn't.

“Later, when we started working on the sets, I figured out that their sound was the sound of a band that didn’t give a shit about following any current trend. And that's pretty much our motto, too.”

But the best from Unwound was still to come. 1995 and 1996 were the culmination of countless hours of practising, touring and, yes, punishment. And you can almost feel how those energies forced the music to evolve into something more clinical and distant, far stranger and certainly more compelling.

Sticking with producer Steve Fisk and Kill Rock Stars, they released two albums in 1995, ‘The Future Of What’ and ‘Unwound’ – the latter recorded in 1992 – and ‘Repetition’ followed in 1996, their sixth studio album. Both ‘Future’ and ‘Repetition’ showcased the band’s newfound ability to create fresh textures nestled deep within their edgy music.

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There were humans on the other side of those instruments, and with humanity comes fallibility…

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Lend an ear to the shrill guitar solo bridge on ‘Lowest Common Denominator’ as it pops up repeatedly as an ear-splitting moment of punctuation, allowing the rest of the song to stretch out. Or the unlikely dubby jam of ‘Sensible’, itself a ballsy exercise in getting out of their comfort zone to show just how far Rumsey’s bass playing had evolved. ‘Murder Movies’ and the majestic ‘Corpse Pose’ are his other four-string masterpieces from the ‘Repetition’ album, cementing him as the cornerstone of the band’s increasingly propulsive and angular sound.

Meanwhile, Lund’s improved and impressively complex drumming also deserves mention, especially on the tricky rhythmic shifts of ‘Devoid’. The deft runs allow her and Rumsey to sit back and stoke the engine, freeing Trosper to let the songs loose rather than take sole responsibility for their propulsion. So he sits back in the pocket of the groove and just gets weird. Thus, the blazing staccato riffs of ‘Go To Dallas And Take A Left’, with their faster/slower Joy Division type feel, complete with a sax and organ freak-out before it gets shut down.

The band’s Numero Group rediscovery comes to a stunning conclusion on a live version of ‘Swan’, where the song just feels exhausted before it finally runs out of steam, disintegrating into an extended fuzz of dreary, weary feedback. Summing up the chaos. Lund said poetically: “The universe Unwound created was not sustainable. Something had to give, and that something ended up being the band itself. Ironically, as our personal bonds dissipated, the music only got stronger.

“There were humans on the other side of those instruments, and with humanity comes fallibility. Communication was never our strong suit; things left unsaid for too long grew too big to ignore. Unwound was a beautiful, terrible, defining thing. The years have harboured bitterness and regret, at times overshadowing the value of our creation. But as we work on these reissues, it’s become possible to listen without bias, to appreciate without judgment.”

Hear, hear.

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Words: Geoff Cowart

Photos: Facebook (rotator image by Ben Clark)

Find these Unwound reissue sets on the Numero Group website. 

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He mightn’t be a founding father of space boogie, but Flying Lotus is a favourite son of sounds beamed in from distant stars. His music, a frenetic fusion of explorative jazz and excitable beats, has only ever been unique to him – so we’re diving into his new ‘You’re Dead!’ set, taken on a personal tour by one of 21st century music’s most creative souls.

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Buy Clash issue 99 online, now

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Two musical legends also take us onto a journey this issue: Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page and Motown sensation Smokey Robinson look back across their eminent careers in their exclusive and illuminating interviews.

The month in music is further represented by Kindness, Caribou, Ty Dolla $ign, Kwabs, Sivu, Marianne Faithfull, Suzi Quatro, Kele Okereke, Thurtson Moore, Viv Albertine, Ameriie, Years & Years, Little Simz, Rosie Lowe and many more.

In Clash Film, we meet Peaky Blinders’ Joe Cole and rising screen star Jack O’Connell, while 20 pages of Clash Fashion glues everything together in the middle.

Pick up your copy of Clash today, at all good newsagents and direct from us – our online shop is right here. 

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Photography: Janneke Van Der Hagen

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Top UK techno pairing Forward Strategy Group provide an unashamedly full-on, fired-up exclusive DJ mix for the latest in the Clash mix series.

The mix comes as a salute to progressive techno-focused label Perc Trax (founded by UK techno boss Perc), which is shortly to release a compilation celebrating a decade of tough tunes. The album, ‘Slowly Exploding’, features new material from a cast of new blood and established Perc family, including one Forward Strategy Group.

Emerging in 2009, FSG have already made a huge impact on the crowded techno landscape, picking up praise and plenty of club airplay from scene stalwarts such as Marcel Dettmann, Peter Van Hoesen and Ben Sims. The dark, mechanical but ultimately danceable cuts on their debut full-length album, ‘Labour Division’, solidified the duo’s reputation as a force in modern techno, demonstrating that the forward-thinking approach suggested in their moniker was surely no accident.

Here’s FSG’s Al Matthews (better known in musical circles as Bleaching Agent) on the duo’s mix for Clash:

“This mix is a representation of the label’s history, influences and influence as we see it (which is inevitably going to be inaccurate). There’s some tracks from artists affiliated with the label over the years, some old ‘classics’ which have inspired at least Patrick and I in our work, and some new music arguably inspired by the label.”

Listen to it now.

Tracklisting:

Plastikman - Sickness
Sandman - Machines Like This
Avus - Fancy Arse
Underworld - Born Slippy
$990 – Gatito (Diegors & The Don Gata Negra remix)
Hugo Moya - Move
Forward Strategy Group - Code #02
Blake Baxter - Sexuality
C Mantle - Kindly Ones (Bleaching Agent remix)
Furfriend - Endless September
Patrick Walker - Entry Point
Manni Dee - Sister Nobody (Manic remix)
Bintus - Warwick Castle
Chen Yi - Rug
Perc - BCG
Severed Heads - Dead Eyes Opened
Alfabet - Hell of Samba
Daniel Avery – Reception (Perc remix)
Vokhinne – Battery (Ben Sims remix)
Manse - Slacker
Bleaching Agent - Colo
Low Jack - Sweet Cheater
Blacknecks - Spudgun! Dave Hedgehog!
Bruce Gilbert - Children

Words: Tristan Parker

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‘Slowly Exploding’ is released on November 10th.

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