Autumn technically doesn't start for another few weeks, but screw it - it's September, this unpleasantly hot 'n' sticky summer is almsot over, and it's time to dig out your favourite jumper and fall in love with music again. This playlist, featuring ten of the songs I listened to most last month, is as good a place as any to start:
1. Red by Okkervil River
(from Don't Fall in Love with Everyone You See)
An exercise in elegant melancholy. The off-key organ solo is...somewhat less elegant, but as a whole, this track about an estranged mother and daughter thinking sadly of one another is very lovely indeed. Read my thoughts on its parent album here.
What were you doing back in 2013? I mostly remember it as the year that I, flush with unspoken thoughts about my favourite music, started this blog; who'd have guessed that I would still be updating The Album Wall three times a week almost three years later? Had you asked me back in June '13, I probably would have bet against it.
Of the many albums I listened to in those early days, one of the most enjoyable was Furniture by Aberystwyth's Race Horses, which came to my attention after it was nominated for the 2013 Welsh Music Prize (in spite of the fact that it was actually released in 2012). You can read my thoughts on that album here.
Of course, by the time I first wrapped my ears around Furntiure, its creators had already called it a day. As I was belatedly discovering fantastic tracks like Mates and My Year Abroad, Race Horses singer Meilyr Jones was living in Rome, discovering Italian culture and percolating ideas for his solo album.
That album, titled simply 2013, came out last month, and you can really hear the notes Jones took during his stay in Italy. The album's overall sound is like the sonic lovechild of Gruff Rhys and Ennio Morricone, conceived while Neil Hannon watched through a peephole and quietly jerked off. No expense has been spared on the orchestration here: string and brass instruments mingle with harpsichords and recorders*, and Jones's bright-eyed pop sensibilites are smushed up against more classical influences to create something very fresh indeed.
The nominees for the 2013 Welsh Music Prize were announced back in September, and since I'd only heard one of the albums on the shortlist, I resolved that I would listen to all of them before the award ceremony in mid-October. And I did - you can see the blogs I wrote for each album by clicking here.
Exactly three months have passed since (SPOILER ALERT!) Georgia Ruth took home the prize for her album, Week of Pines. I thought that today would be a good opportunity to look back on those twelve albums, and to see if my feelings towards them have changed. Let's go:
Fist of the First Man by Fist of the First Man
I'm still not overly keen on this, with one important exception: once I'd listened to all twelve albums on the shortlist, I made a playlist of the best songs from each one, and Volta Regulat made an excellent opener. The rest, well...I can take it or leave it. See them live if you can, but don't shed too many tears if you can't get your hands on their CD.
The winner of the 2013 Welsh Music Prize will be announced this Thursday. Not familiar with the nominees? Neither was I, until this happened. I've still got two albums to cover, mind, so we'd better crack on...
Reviewing albums in haste - as I have been doing over the last few weeks - doesn't always make for good reading. I downloaded Wild Wishes first thing on Monday morning, and while I did manage to squeeze in a fair few listens before I started blogging about it, my impression of the album is still rather, uh, impressionistic. I don't really know anything about Little Arrow yet, and I haven't had a chance to look into the story behind this LP, if in fact there is one. I do know that The State of You and Me was (sort of) the lead single, but that's only because I reviewed the damn thing when it came out.
So, having spent but a morning with Wild Wishes, what impression am I left with? A rather post-apocalyptic one, actually, but don't worry. These songs don't form some terrifying, fiery vision of things to come; instead, they show us a world in which technology and modern civilisation have more or less disappeared, and humanity has reverted to a much simpler, much lovelier state. It's more Swiss Family Robinson than The Road.
Little Arrow sound like they've wandered away from the end of the world, bumped into each other on some secluded, windswept beach, and decided to sing a few songs together. Lead Us Now (perhaps the best closing track on the shortlist) is the only song on this album that really goes all-out on the instrumentation, letting rip with brass instruments and electric guitars that are absent elsewhere as far as I can tell. Pretty much everything else is acoustic, and this gives the album a pure, 'round-the-campfire honesty that's really quite nice. A lot of the vocals are sung as a group, and even though I complained about this technique in my Februaryreview, I think it actually fits quite well here.
My favourite track is probably Wash (and no, of course it's not on YouTube). It starts out in The Diary of Meterritory, once again bringing Bagpuss to mind, but then it starts to pick up steam. And thenit calms down again for a lovely little rockpool of a chorus ("You were buried in the wash"), and then it seems like the band aren't sure what to do next, but fortunately they find their way back to that nimble little verse thing before bringing it back for another chorus. It's all quite understated, actually, but it's a great example of this album's strengths.
As I said, though, it isn't on YouTube, so instead here's a live version of the one that comes after it:
So...is it better than Furniture?
No, but I will concede that Wild Wishes beats Furniture hands down in the nooks and crannies department. The Race Horses album is like a rollercoaster, taking the listener on a thrilling, twisty-turny ride that's great fun but over all too quickly.Little Arrow simply place us on a path and tell us to find our own way through the album, and while it's not as instantly gratifying as the rollercoaster route - with loose structures and varying tempos, a lot of these songs sound disjointed and a little all-over-the-place to begin with - it does afford a lot more opportunity for exploration. As I mentioned before, I've still only the faintest idea of what this album really is, and I suspect that I'll still be hearing new things in Wild Wishes long after the head-rush effect of Furniture has worn off.
Only one album left, guys! Come back on Wednesday for Week of Pines.
Hold your (race) horses! If you're not already up-to-date with my ongoing yomp through the Welsh Music Prize shortlist, you'd do well to check out this page first.
I had high hopes for this one. I saw Race Horses live a couple of times before they split up, and while I don't recall anything as specific as how the songs went or what they sounded like, I do distinctly remember having a jolly good time on both occasions. And then there's Lisa Magic a Porfa, a song that Race Horses released when they were still called Radio Luxembourg - I'm rather fond of that particular track (which I heard on a Welsh language compilation called Rwy'n Caru Ciwdod or something like that), and I expected more of the same from Furniture.
And it delivered...sort of. This album is never quite as carefree and childlike as Lisa Magic a Porfa was, but Racy O'Luxemhorses still have a way with great, arresting tunes. At first it seemed like there were only a couple of standouts; it was immediately clear that Mates and Sisters would be right up there with Sure Fire Bet and Between Destinations on the 'Best of the WMP 2013 Shortlist' playlistI'll inevitably end up making when I'm done with all this, but the other tracks weren't so obviously awesome.
But a few spins later and I'm loving the whole darn thing. In a way, I'm actually glad of the differences between this band and the one that recorded Lisa Magic a Porfa; while that song, a sunny burst of fun if ever I heard one, was great on its own, that wide-eyed approach might have grown a little tedious over the course of an entire LP. By contrast, the songs that make up Furniture are more grown-up, more apprehensive, more doubtful, and they hit all the harder for it.
What sounds slightly messy at first soon reveals itself to be an album full of direct hits, serving up track after track of punch, poppy pleasantness. Nobody's Son is insistent and large-sounding, My Year Aroad throbs alluringly, and What Am I To Do seems like a quieter one but then explodes out of the traps when it reaches its chorus. Special mention should go to both the keys player and whoever was in charge of percussion, because as good as the basic tunes are, it's these ear-catching instrumental embellishments that keep me coming back for more. Kudos.
In many ways, Furniture is the album that I wanted Shipsto be: jam-packed with different instruments and fun little frills, but underpinned by a slightly more serious atmosphere. Perhaps I had the wrong idea of Sweet Baboo's sound, but either way, it's nice to have old expectations belatedly fulfilled by something completely different.
So...is it better than Praxis Makes Perfect?
Yes! There are a couple of tracks I'm not that keen on (namely Bad Blood and See No Green), but as my Praxis Makes Perfectpost made clear, that's also true of the Neon Neon album (hello Hoops with Fidel and Listen to the Rainbow). The weird thing about Furniture - and this is one thing that is has in common with the Zervas & Pepper album - is that, while the doubt and the melancholy that I keep mentioning are undeniable, it's kind of difficult to pin down exactly what any of these doubtful and melancholic (but still pretty catchy) songs are about. Perhaps I just need to listen harder, or longer, but if anything, this lack of clarity just makes Furniture's superiority to Praxis... all the more amazing.
Allow me to break it down for you. I first heard Praxis Makes Perfect in April, and since then I've read into its subject matter, been to see a theatrical performance based on the album, and obviously listened to those songs any number of times. I first heard Furniture this morning, and in the space of a day I've gone from not being especially bothered about all but a couple of choice cuts...to singing the album's praises and being more or less content to hand the Welsh Music Prize to Race Horses right here and now. The remaining four nominees - Little Arrow, Metabeats, Georgia Ruth and Trwbador - have a real mountain to climb now.
In the meantime, congratulations to Furniture, which has shown me that a big, noisy smorgasbord of sounds can sometimes be even better than Gruff Rhys and his cold, crisp synthesisers. It has also impressed me sufficiently to grab that 'current favourite album' slot on the right-hand side of my blog (and a good thing, too, because A Short Album About Lovehas been sat on that particular throne for far too long now).
I'm still in love with Praxis Makes Perfect, and I would still be thrilled if Neon Neon won the WMP, but what we now have is an album that seems even more deserving of the crown. Come on back on Wednesday to see if Metabeats can beat our new champeens.
