It’s not as if they’ve got magician’s fingers, the five members of pathos weavers The National, they just tend to work in your blind-spot. It’s kind of like they’ve been round to your house daily, sneaking a shiny pound coin from your wallet while you weren’t looking, until one day they arrive on your doorstep with a high yield savings account you never knew you had, a return on the half-inched deposits and the monetary means to fulfil your life’s Continue Reading
There’s nothing wrong with a touch of nostalgia – hell, we don’t know where we’re going unless we know where we’ve been. Or some such. So go visit those old haunts, pull on that old t-shirt that really must have been less ripped-stretch-fit at some point, by all means, if it makes you feel better about yourself. Do what they do on the telly and call that girl who gave you her number 23 years ago. She’s happy and married Continue Reading
There’s an awful lot of noise being made around this album’s release about a return to form. We’re not so sure about that. A return perhaps to life before acoustic breakdowns (2005’s ‘Howl’, a not too unsuccessful foray off track into desert-baked Dylanisms), to club-sized riffs, tension, groaning, lump beats, sounding a little like the Jesus and Mary Chain from time to time and to the sense that leather-jackets are worn like uniform at all times, zipped at least the Continue Reading
A very interesting young man. An interesting young man with a thoroughly uninteresting fanfare by way of introduction but a fairly probing record in a genre dogged by a lack of exploration and true pioneering spirits. Born and raised in Toronto but ‘confirmed’ in New York City, this highly coveted producer has already worked with some fairly respected artists: The Bott Camp Click and Masta Ace to namecheck just a few. Port Authority though, is the Canadian’s first debut proper, Continue Reading
Savagely minimal stuff from the rephrasing, repitching, redrafting and realigning hands of Matt Edwards aka Radio Slave. Not the first Misch Masch collection, of course, first we had a bunch of stuff reheated by Tiefschwarz and then we had something reserved by the Freeform Five. Oh, and DJ Hell got in on the act too. But strangely enough, this might just be the most eclectic and surprising mixcake of them all. First coming to prominence for his unpredictable and absorbing Continue Reading