Review of Madness album, The Liberty of Norton Folgate

My review of The Liberty of Norton Folgate got posted at Punknews.org.

I also had my review of Misery Signals' gig at Corporation published on the same site last year.

Review of Hysterics by Rolo Tomassi

Here's an unpublished review for Rolo Tomassi's Hysterics album released in September 2008. I wrote this about a year ago but it never got used.

"I've seen Rolo Tomassi twice in their, and my hometown of Sheffield, UK, both times supporting HORSE the band on one of their wild gallops across the world. Maybe the fact that both bands have synth players landed Rolo Tomassi the support slot in the first place, but after witnessing them the first time around HORSE will have made sure to book Rolo Tomassi again - this band have an amazing live show. When you first see cute female vocalist Eva Spence tiptoe onto the stage you're not at all ready for the explosive screams and sounds that soon burst forth. At first you'll be shocked, then you'll be drawn in, as Rolo Tomassi tear through a set of dynamically diverse and unpredictable pieces, some long, some short, but entertaining throughout.

I once heard an interviewer describe this band as "Too metal for the indie kids, but too indie for the metal kids", and that's as good an indicator as any of where this band's sound lies. Part abrasive screaming, part complex and experimental, part Nintendo-styled synth, Rolo Tomassi have their own way of playing music. Thus the band have created quite a stir, at least in the UK scene, not at all hindered by the novelty of having a female vocalist who looks like someone out of a shampoo advert.

So their debut album, Hysterics begins with "Oh, Hello Ghost", a great first track, opening the album with an ominous electronic intro, then catching you off-guard, lunging early into a fierce and precise riff section, the band suddenly jolting into life. Things segue into tracks two and three, the band really starting to hit their stride as they lead into "Abraxas", the closest thing you'll find to a single on the album.

Next we hit the middle section of Hysterics, where Rolo Tomassi continue to mash up moods and styles you wouldn't necessarily put together, showing that that first few tracks weren't just some horrible production job gone wrong. By this point you'll have learned not to try and anticipate what's coming next, just accept and enjoy.

Aside from some of the synth sections and accompanying effects, Hysterics is a fairly simple sounding recording for the most part, the band themselves creating a great dynamic between quiet and loud throughout the album. Also, each member of Rolo Tomassi has their own distinct voice here, everyone showing some musicianship without sacrificing coherence.

However, while at points the album soars with big, repeating slabs of guitar and spiralling synth lines such as those in "Abraxas" and "Scabs", at other times things become slightly slow and unmemorable. Yes, while these sections are probably needed to contrast with and emphasise the more aggressive parts of this album, it's sometimes easy to lose interest, so Hysterics definitely loses a bit of steam towards the end, with a whole track of rather mundane noise in "Everything Went Grey". But we finish up with "Fantasia", which clocks in at over 14 minutes and showcases everything the band are good at. In some ways it feels like the whole album is building up to this final showpiece, which ends with a giant trademark Rolo Tomassi progression and wraps things up nicely.

All in all, Rolo Tomassi have managed to produce a very good first album which belies their youth, although the album does fall slightly flat in some parts, where things slow down just a bit too much, or where the jazzy experimentation starts to get a bit boring. I feel the band are best when spitting out sharp bursts of noise or throwing up massive, swirling riffs which you never really want to end. But it's hard to sustain such energy over the course of a entire album. Or maybe the interviewer's quote which I mentioned earlier is true, and the band are stretching themselves too far across a massive gap in the musical spectrum. But then again, that's what makes this band interesting, and will probably propel them to greater success and recognition in the future. Hysterics is highly original and does shine very brightly at times and is worth checking out if you like music that messes with your head a little bit."

Hearing a familiar song with completely different vocals

I just heard a track called There, Now I've Said It by Further Seems Forever. It's a track from the band's greatest hits album, Hope This Finds You Well and was originally an unreleased outtake from FSF's second album, How To Start A Fire. What's interesting is that the music is identical to a track called Bleed from the band's third album, Hide Nothing, but the vocals are completely different. In fact, the singer is different as well, as Further Seems Forever had a different vocalist on each of their three albums.

Both are great tracks, and There, Now I've Said It should have been included on How To Start A Fire in my opinion, but I guess the band thought it was too good a song to waste and Jon Bunch rewrote the vocals when he recorded Hide Nothing.

I can't decide which one's better, but they're both amazing, and makes me remember how great this band were. Glad I got to see them at Corporation with Bunch on vocals before they split up.

Chiptune Alliance Tour 2008

Last night, my band, Spheres of Chaos played at the Sheffield date of the Chiptune Alliance Tour 2008, and it was so much fun, probably the best gig we've played thus far as a band. The other artists on the bill were Firebrand Boy, syphus, Random and Sabrepulse, all of whom were top guys.

We had loads of people turn up, and it was just great to see so many quality chiptune acts in one place. Everyone was so into the music and there was such a great vibe going on. Things are really taking off with VGM and chiptune in the UK, changing from something that was just a load of people on the internet into awesome events like this. There were a couple of people filming the whole thing too, with one guy planning to put a documentary of the tour together, so I'm gonna try and put some video footage up in the Gamewave Podcast feed at some point.

Anamanaguchi were meant to be playing on the night too, but they ended up getting deported again! I hear their new album's nearly ready for release though, which should be very cool.

Again, I've uploaded some photos of the night (mainly SoC) up onto Facebook.

Rage Against the Machine at Leeds Festival

So yesterday I went to the 2nd day of Leeds Festival 2008. I'd been looking forward to this ever since I bought my ticket 3 months ago, mainly because because I would be seeing Rage Against the Machine!

We started off the day by catching a coach from Sheffield to Leeds at around 10am, passing the Tinsley cooling towers which would be knocked down at 3am the next morning. We arrived at the bus station in Leeds about an hour later and then caught a shuttle bus to the festival site, where we showed our tickets and got our wristbands before heading towards the main festival area. We had to get rid of all our drinks before we went in though, which sucked because water was £2.20 a bottle(!) and I got abnormally thirsty later on.

As we made our way over to the main stage I was surprised by the sheer scale of this event. There were so many people everywhere, but we managed to locate some of our other friends who were there all weekend while Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly was playing. Not my kinda thing really, but he was OK actually. Next up was Taking Back Sunday who I wanted to see, so we moved nearer to the stage. They were good, playing some of my favourite songs of theirs. After that was Dizzee Rascal, and the main stage suddenly got really busy. We didn't want to watch him though, so we moved back toward the food stands and made our plans for achieving the best possible position to watch Rage. After much debating we decided to go down to the front of the main stage fairly early on, but not before we'd had a bit of a wander. As I mentioned in my last post, I wanted to see Goldfinger and Tiger Army who were both playing on the punk stage, but we couldn't actually figure out where that was. So after grabbing some (very expensive) vegan fast food we headed back over towards the main stage just as Serj Tankian was finishing up. His music is even more ethnically-inspired than System of a Down, and it sounded kinda freaky to my ears, but cool nonetheless.

As Serj finished we made use of the temporary movement of the crowd, and followed a slipstream to the front of the stage. I was pretty pleased with how easy that had been, but now we had to stand through 4 bands we didn't necessarily want to see without needing to use the toilet or eat/drink.

But Biffy Clyro were good actually, even though I only knew one song. Next was The Enemy who were OK, but after that it was The Fratellis who weren't very good at all and I only knew one of their songs too - that one that goes "da, da da da, da da da, da da da da da da da". Apparently that was the last time they'll ever play that one live as well - they probably got tired of people only wanting to see them for that one song. But they didn't look very interested throughout their set, and neither did the crowd. In fact, I was surprised by the lack of crowd interaction from all the bands we saw, even Rage Against the Machine. It always makes things a bit more interesting and involving when bands say something in between songs.

Next up were Queens of the Stone Age, and up until this point it seemed like people had been moving in and out of the crowd just to see one band, but by now it was getting dark and the crowd was pretty much packed in, to the point where you couldn't really enter or leave.

There had been pits and crowd surfing up until now, but nothing too bad. But when QotSA came on they started with No One Knows and we all went crazy. But it's so weird when there are thousands of people in one area all trying to move or dance. The crowd swayed in waves, and you had no choice but to sway along, although at times it felt like you were about to fall over and get crushed by everyone. I'd been at shows in clubs where this had happened, but nothing quite on the scale of this before. Fortunately just about everyone managed to stay on their feet, although some people began to push their way out as it just got a bit too much.

To be honest, the rest of the QotSA's set bored me. I know they're meant to be stoner rock or whatever, but I didn't realise how monotonous they could be. And being crushed to the point of not being able to breath properly, as well as having endured the heat, being really thirsty and feeling kinda tired from standing up for hours on end sent me into a zoned-out state where I stopped paying attention. I think I might have concentrated and enjoyed it more if I'd been in a club and had some space and a drink in my hand.

Eventually QotSA finished and Rage were the next band up - we'd made it! As we waited for them to come on we moved back from the front a bit so that we'd have a more stable place to stand, and this proved to be a good idea.

Rage were scheduled to come on at 9:30, but they were about 20 minutes late coming out in the end. Everyone forgot that though as Tom Morello started with the opening riff to Testify, and when the drums kicked in everyone just went wild. After that was Bulls On Parade, and everyone was still going crazy. I'd personally been building up to this show for a while, and all the previous bands that day had been building up to this too - it was a really great feeling being part of this show.

After People Of The Sun things calmed down a bit, but then something weird happened. Halfway through Bombtrack the drums stopped, then someone came on stage and told the rest of the band to stop. Apparently things were looking kinda dangerous down at the front and Zach asked everyone to move back so that people weren't gonna get crushed. This was good to see and a lot of people applauded. The band then finished off Bombtrack though and played through the rest of their set - all classics. Again, it would have been nice to have a bit more crowd interaction, and every song was played at the same or slower speed than the recorded versions, which is odd for a live show, but nothing could spoil seeing this band live. It's just something I thought would never happen, but it did, and it was awesome. And that's all there is to it. They finished with Killing In The Name, applauded the crowd, linked arms and left the stage. Amazing.

The fun wasn't over yet though. Everybody started to leave the main stage, and I took out my phone to text people to find out where we were meeting (we'd lost each other in the crowd). However, halfway through writing the text message my phone ran out of battery! Now I had no way of getting in touch with everyone (although I probably should have used my head and looked for the massive flag we'd been waving all day). Anyway, I made my way back toward the shuttle buses hoping to catch the guys in that area, but after not finding them I decided to take the bus on my own rather than risk being stuck at the site overnight. After that I managed to get the last coach home to from the bus station and then get a taxi, arriving home at 2:45am.

It turns out the guys were all still waiting for me in front of the stage wondering what had happened to me. They managed to catch the last shuttle bus back, but there were no coaches from Leeds to Sheffield until about 5am. I felt pretty bad for them when I found out today, but it's good to know they were concerned over where I was!

So in the end I didn't get to see all the bands I wanted to, but seeing Rage Against the Machine was mind-blowing and something I'll always remember.

Here's the full setlist and an article about the Rage show from the NME website, and I've uploaded some photos I managed to take to Facebook.

Leeds Festival! Wooo!

I'm going to Leeds Festival on Saturday and it's gonna be awesome. I wanna see Goldfinger, Taking Back Sunday, Anti-Flag, Tiger Army and most importantly, Rage Against The Machine. I also wanna see Less Than Jake, but I think they're gonna be on at the same time as RATM. Can't wait though! I'll try and get some photos too.

One night in Manchester

Last night was pretty fun - me and my mate went to Manchester to see Big D and the Kids Table, Sonic Boom Six and Random Hand at the Manchester Academy.

We caught the train from Sheffield at around 6pm and arrived in Manchester about an hour later. I didn't realise until I arrived, but I'd never actually been to Manchester before, which is kinda strange considering how big a city it is and how close it is to Sheffield. I'd also forgotten that the Champions League final was on, and Manchester United were playing in it.

We left the train station and kinda just guessed our way towards the Academy. It took about half an hour to get there, and the streets were pretty busy because of the football.

Manchester is quite a nice place, or at least the parts we went through, and everything's bigger than Sheffield.

The academy was inside the Manchester University students' union, and it felt a bit odd being in another university's union, but again, it was a nice place. We found the room where the gig was and met up with a couple of friends who go to Manchester uni.

I'd seen all the bands before, but it was a good show. Random Hand were really energetic and fun, and Sonic Boom Six were pretty lively as well, but Big D were the best band of the night for me. They didn't play some of my favourite songs though, sticking to their more recent stuff.

While we were inside we discovered Manchester United had actually won the match, which we were glad about, and as we left the gig the roads were full of people driving along, beeping their horns and waving flags.

On the way to the gig someone had handed us a flyer for an after-party, and our friends and the bands were going so we decided to go too and catch a later train. It was like a pop punk night and the drinks were cheap, so we ended up having a good time.

Just as we were leaving we had a quick chat with the bassist and drummer from Big D. I told them to play some of their older stuff at shows, and that they should come to Sheffield next time, but the bassist said they had got in a fight or something last time they did. I also asked where the band name had originally come from, as I'd heard one theory before, but wasn't sure how true it was.

If I remember right, the bassist said that one of the singer's friends had suggested it as a name after hearing the phrase on a TV advert (although the bassist wasn't sure how true that was). Then when the band formed and couldn't think of another name, they went with Big D and the Kids Table. So now you know!

After that we walked back to the train station, but had an hour to wait before our 3:30 train, so we went and got some food at a nearby chip shop that was still open. There were some drunk Man Utd fans there who had obviously had a sauce fight, as they and the walls were covered in brown sauce and ketchup, and the owner got quite annoyed and tried to throw them out. It was pretty funny.

After eating we went and waited at the train station. Our train came, and I tried to get some sleep on the way back, but this other passenger was being noisy and kept waking me up. The seats were really uncomfortable too.

There was a bit of a delay at one of the stops, and so we got back to Sheffield at about 5am and walked home.

All in all, although at times kinda odd, it was a really fun night. I'd probably go back to Manchester too - I really like the place.

Libraries and horses

Just finished a 10 hour stint at the library working on my website for Web Journalism. Life is pretty sucky right now. My last week at uni starts tomorrow, then I have exams to revise for. But everything should be over in under a month.

I think the best part of this week was going to see HORSE the band at Corporation. They're really fun live, and I got to speak with the synth player, Eric afterwards (pictured below). I gave him my band's demo. Maybe he'll listen to it. Also, a band called rolo tomassi were supporting. I saw them last time I went to see HORSE too, but they'd improved since then, and I really enjoyed their set. Spoke to the guitarist a bit after.

Tuesday

It was my second day back at uni today. Already I have to start writing an essay, which sucks. Also, I'm trying to get my application for Kobe University sorted at the moment. Fortunately, the deadline for that is the end of May, which is later than for all the rest of my classmates.

It's the second Steel City derby of the season tonight between Sheffield Wednesday and Sheffield United. I was reading today that Wednesday haven't beaten United twice in the same season for over 90 years now, so it'd be nice if we could pull that off, especially as the three points might help us stay up!

I haven't mentioned on here yet, but I got tickets last week to go and see Rage Against The Machine at Leeds Festival! I knew they were rumoured to be playing at Leeds/Reading, although I thought tickets always went really quickly, so I didn't plan on going. But then we discovered that they were playing for definite and that day tickets aren't too hard to get hold of, so me and my friends bought some. RATM - live! Can't wait!

Also, had the first practice for a new band I'm in last night. I'm playing drums again, and we're going for a hardcore sound, with a bit of metal thrown in there. We need some more members, and a bigger practice space though. Also, one of the neighbours came round and complained. Not a good start. Or is it?

The Beat

It's only been five months since I last went to see Neville Staple of The Specials, but I went to see him again at Corporation last night, this time supporting another two-tone ska band from the Midlands, The Beat.

I didn't actually know any of The Beat's songs up until a few days ago, but I enjoyed their set, especially Mirror In The Bathroom. One thing that comes across about their music is that it's so feel-good. Even when their songs were dealing with some of the social problems of the 80s it was still always upbeat and positive.

I think there are actually two versions of The Beat around now. One is officially called The New English Beat (the band I went to see last night) and has two of the original members, and the other is called The English Beat and is based in the US with one original member.

And what's with all the snow lately? It's been snowing loads, which is kinda weird for this time of year. It's meant to be spring now.

Also, Happy Easter!

The New English Beat MySpace page

Sheffield Carling Academy

So it seems that a new Carling Academy is opening in Sheffield, and I think this is great news. Sheffield has an abundance of smaller music venues and a few mid-sized ones like Corporation and The Leadmill, but the city sometimes misses out on some of the bigger bands who play at the Carling Academies elsewhere in the UK. It looks like the first gig is Reverend And The Makers on the 11th April, which I'm not too interested in, but hopefully there'll be some good gigs coming up in the near future.

Also, I think it's a great use of the former Roxy Nightclub building, which has been derelict for as long as I can remember, but is in a great location. I hear that bands such as The Jam and The Police used to play there, so it's cool that the venue is being resurrected in this way.

Carling Academy Sheffield

Music

Reel Big Fish/Streetlight Manifesto/Sonic Boom Six was great last night. Most fun I've had at a gig in ages, and it reminded me how awesome an art form ska is (one day I'm gonna start a ska band).

I can't stop listening to Jimmy Eat World on their MySpace player at www.myspace.com/jimmyeatworld. Especially check out Always Be and Big Casino.

Live-action Akira?

This could either be really cool or really stupid. Probably the latter. One part of me thinks it could be a good movie, but then another part of me gets annoyed that things like this can't be left alone, and that the film's going to be set in New Manhattan and the actors are gonna be all white guys.

Reel Big Fish, Streetlight Manifesto and Sonic Boom Six tonight at Corporation. Should be sweet, mainly Streetlight Manifesto (they are awesome).

The Dillinger Escape Plan

On Tuesday night I went to see The Dillinger Escape Plan at Corporation.

I remember hearing TDEP for the first time a few years ago and being really intrigued by their style. I think I was drawn to the band's intensity, and the fact that I hadn't heard music like this before (was it even music?). But I couldn't properly get into them back then.

The intrigue remained though, and more recently I downloaded some of their songs and got hold of Calculating Infinity - an apparently seminal mathcore album. And once I got a feel for the songs and started to memorise them I began to enjoy them. Also, the musicianship, especially the drumming, is pretty insane. But I still couldn't listen to TDEP as I would other music. I preferred their more melodic tracks, and always felt they should extend their progressions, rather than just jumping from one riff to the next.

A few months ago I read that they were coming to Sheffield, and I'd heard that their live shows were pretty special so I intended to go. I bought their latest album, Ire Works, and it's a bit different from their previous stuff, having, for me, a good balance of technicality and melody. The band also changed drummers for this album, and the new guy plays much more groove-based stuff, definitely developing the band's sound.

At the gig the venue was quite full, and the whole thing looked great with a well co-ordinated light system and loads of smoke. I'd heard the band were well known for their violent shows, but apart from the guitarist knocking over a light/amp stack nothing too crazy happened. I knew most of the tracks they played, and after seeing the band live they now make more sense. It's hard to appreciate TDEP fully on CD, but live they just sound really intense and awesome.

There's a good selection of tracks on the band's MySpace page, as well as a couple to download, and if you haven't checked out TDEP or mathcore before you'll probably find it quite interesting.

Chocolate

I just ate this KitKat (not actually Nestlé, some supermarket brand), but instead of there being wafer and stuff in the middle like there's meant to be it was solid chocolate. Score!

The Dillinger Escape Plan at Corporation tomorrow night. Looking forward to it.

忙しさ

The past few days have been pretty crazy. Rather than just relaxing for a while before starting university again tomorrow I've had a load of things to do.

For a variety of reasons I didn't get to see MxPx the other night, which sucked. I did get to see the new version of Blade Runner at the Showroom though, which was wholly awesome. I hadn't seen any other versions of Blade Runner previously, and it was quite cryptic, but very interesting. I think I'm gonna try and now read the novel it was based on - Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick.

Exams

Exams are now over! I had my last yesterday, but I only really have four days off before starting again on Monday. The fun never ends.

I was quite pleased with how the exams went though. I think I revised quite well and hopefully the results will reflect that; and this is one of the only two years of my four year course where exam results count towards my final classification.

As well as Japanese language and a module on contemporary Japanese society I'm doing a module in web journalism next semester, which I'm looking forward to. But as I've never done journalism before I have to read this book over the weekend about writing journalism articles.

Also, tomorrow I'm gonna see MxPx, basically my favourite band. Should be fun.

Autumn

It's properly autumn now. There's loads of trees near me, so you really notice it when all the leaves change colour and stuff.

Not been up to that much lately. Went to this big communal bonfire thing for Bonfire Night last night. Watched fireworks and ate a toffee apple. Good fireworks are actually quite cool, one of those things which make you happy for some unknown reason. Quite life-affirming.

Going to see Bedouin Soundclash tomorrow. That should be cool.

Neville Staple

I went to see Neville Staple at the weekend at Corporation.

Staple was one of the vocalists for The Specials back in the 70s and 80s but now he performs Specials songs with his own backing band. The audience were mostly old skinheads who were obviously into The Specials over 20 years ago. It was cool to see all these guys there, as the two-tone ska movement is one of my favourite parts of British history/culture.

I really enjoyed Gangsters and Ghost Town, and most of the songs were played at a faster tempo than the originals, which I think makes them even better.

I've been really into ska/reggae stuff recently. I just love the feeling and the raw funkiness you find in that type of music.

Snow and stuff

Finally, I looked out of my window this morning and the ground was covered. It's the first day of proper snow we've had this winter. But now the initial surprise has worn off I'm left wondering why snow makes people so happy. Obviously there's now the possibility for snowball fights or building snowmen or snow dens, but I have stuff to do and don't have all day to spend playing in the snow. Maybe there'll be the odd snowball fight at university today.

I just received an album in the mail, the self-titled release from a band called Maylene & The Sons Of Disaster. They're a really cool combination of hard rock and southern rock, so it ends up sounding like some hillbillys playing metal. But it's really cool, the two styles work well together. I recently saw them at a show supporting Norma Jean and was pretty impressed. I would have bought an album at the show if they hadn't been £15! They put on a good show, and there was one especially cool band member - this guy wore a Hawaiian shirt (in a metal band) and performed some pretty out-of-fashion dancing for most of the set, but I've never laughed so much at a show before.

I watched The Breakfast Club last night. My friend had told me it was really good and I really like 80s films so I made a point to tune in. It was pretty strange. The whole film took place in one location and much of the communication between characters was largely pointless arguments. But by the end of the film these 5 wildly different characters had all changed and become good friends. In one way it was quite simple and trivial, but on the other hand it was quite realistic and true to life. I've never really seen a film like it before, but I enjoyed it.

Further reading: The Breakfast Club IMDb page