Music
SEE: Generation – ‘Suicidal Champagne’: first salvo from Liverpool’s new trashrock gods
JAMES and Dean Carne, the Liverpudlian ‘brothers sin’, grew up on a diet of fine funk and soul, but both had a eureka moment when they fell for the less subtle seductions of the brilliance and the sleaze and greatness of the rawk. They formed Generation in their late teens, building up a reputation by …
SEE: Johanna Burnheart – ‘Silence Is Golden’: where jazz meets tUnE-yArDs
JOHANNA BURNHEART is something of a rarity in the jazz sphere, as her aural device of choice is the violin. She is, you could perhaps say, sat inside a niche inside a niche, looking out. Of course, observing from such a vantage point can give you perspective, a way of seeing things anew; as you …
ALBUM REVIEWS: Lucifer – ‘Black Mass’; Ataraxia – ‘The Unexplained’: spooky Moog vibes from Mort Garson, reissued
SIXTIES’ and Seventies’ electronica is a weird and eccentric world, seemingly populated by mad genii and creative mavericks with clipboards and lab coats, observing banks of machinery at sonic play. Actually that conception isn’t too far from the truth: Raymond Scott and his Manhattan Research, Inc. while using the new musical technology to place interlude …
TRACK: Venetian Snares remixes Vincenzo Ramaglia’s ‘La parole 2’
VENETIAN SNARES, the Canadian percussive outrider who even gives Squarepusher a run for his hyperbreaks money, has dropped a remix of “La parole 2”, by Roman electronic composer Vincenzo Ramaglia, featuring the dark operatic tone of Igorrrr singer Laure Le Prunenec. Take a listen below: it takes the high drama of lamenting chanson and an …
Premiere: Marta Ren releases video for the deep funk of ’22:22′
PORTUGUESE soul sister Marta Ren released her new single, “22:22”, last week; and has followed it with visuals which we’re delighted to premiere right here today on Backseat Mafia. She’s been fashioning tastily deep grooves since the 1990s, when she was a member of The Bombazines, but she burst on the soul scene in her …
ALBUM REVIEW: Keep Dancing Inc – ‘Embrace’ – new wave synthpop is worth the wait
This euphoric, if occasionally generic debut album from Keep Dancing Inc comes after a five-year wait, a wait that has evidently been worth it. With bouncing synths, fuzzy guitars and endless 80s nostalgia, Embrace will get you shaking those shoulder pads in no time
LIVE REVIEW: Richard Dawson, The Barbican, London
YOU HAVE to take your hat off to everyone at the Barbican – and, as we were told by Erland Cooper in the very first of these sessions – a mystery benefactor, who made a substantial donation, allowing this autumn series of Live at the Barbican shows to take place – there’s a whole variety …
ALBUM REVIEW: Little Barrie and Malcolm Catto – ‘Quatermass Seven’: deep psych; turn on, compadre
IT’S FAIR to say that losing your drummer – the man who pins it down for you, keeps it ticking, grounded, makes sure the groove is strong – is a hell of a blow. And to lose your drummer to a sudden and untimely death, if you’re a psych power trio – well, that’s a …
See: Astari Nite release enigmatic video for Paint The Stars Tonight, plus tour news
‘Paint The Stars Tonight’ is a deliciously dark and gothic track with jangling frosty guitars and sweeping strings from US band Astari Nite. A video has just been released for the shimmering track which comes off the band’s album ‘Here Lies’, released earlier this year through Negative Gain. The track recalls the gothic pop of …
Track: Badgers – Why Am I Your Only Friend?
There’s nothing like a good dose of aural medicine to stimulate the system and the new single from Melbourne band Badgers does that and more. ‘Why Am I You Only Friend?’ is a veritable onslaught of jangling guitars, delicious layered harmonies with an epic swagger and joie de vivre bigger than the temporal world. Plowing …