Not a lot of time this week due to work so hopefully a couple of mini-reviews to tide me over.

First up E.P. 2 by Vladimir the launch for which I went to months ago, yet I’ve not managed to squeeze many listens to the actual record since. So a mention at least is well overdue.

‘E.P. 2′ is a set of mainly up tempo tunes and seems like a step forward for Vlad as the sound is less claustrophobic than on the earlier releases. There’s a definite feel of horizons opening up.

Early Joy Division are perhaps the obvious touchstones this time around although ‘Drenched’ perhaps catches the same sort of lightning as early Interpol did.

Perhaps the only slightly adverse comment is that the E.P. doesn’t capture the full power of these songs live but that’s actually more of a testament to the live show than a criticism of the record. Certainly ‘E.P. 2′ confirms Vladimir the new(-ish) Dundee band to watch.

Here’s probably my favourite track from the record:

The E.P. is available on CD and limited edition cassette.

Upcoming dates

Cellar 35, Aberdeen – 13th July

Tramlines Festival, Sheffield -21st July

The twentieth anniversary of the Breeders’ ‘Last Splash’ is being marked in some style with a tour by the line-up that recorded the album and the re-issue of a deluxe version of the LP itself as ‘LSXX’.

Sadly, an outbreak of work related common sense means that I’m not going to be at tomorrow’s O2 ABC show (Monday 17th June) in Glasgow (where the Breeders will be supported by local heroes PAWS), but I have the recent re-issue to console myself.

When it came to choosing the version of the re-issue to purchase, common sense also prevailed. Tempting though the multiple vinyl package was, its price of a minimum of £70 was more than off-putting. So, I settled for the 3 CD reissue instead.

Let’s start with the main album itself. ‘Last Splash’ is not only the Breeders’ best selling LP but it’s also, without question, the best post Pixies album by any of its members.

It’s the best Breeders LP or two reasons. That’s down in large part to the strength of the record but also, importantly, it’s the one album that hasn’t been stifled by Kim’s favoured lo-fi production, lending it a scope that the likes of ‘Pod’ and ‘Mountain Battles’ lack.

For all that there are 7 or 8 classics on here, I feel that it stops a little short of being a complete classic. The reason for that is the more variable second side. But whilst the record undoubtedly bears some indications of being influenced by grunge it also retains a lightness of touch that grunge couldn’t deliver.

Disc 2 collects contemporary non-LP material in the shape of the E.P.s and a bundle of often prototype demos. This is where the vinyl package really comes into its own as the E.P.s are available on separate 10”s. Listening to them all gathered together on the CD however, the over-riding impression is that there’s a lot of variety but equally that the quality is very much up and down.

The final disc is a decent, if occasionally slightly scrappy, live recording from a Stockholm show which is bolstered by the addition of a BBC session (with 3 of the 4 songs not included in the live set). The inclusion of some ‘Pod’ material in the set is welcome but some slightly puzzling omissions lend it an incomplete feel. And some of the between song chat could happily have been discarded…

All things considered, ‘LSXX’ is a more than welcome reissue with the level of extras that should be standard for these releases. If it’s not quite true to say that this is all the Breeders you’d ever need, it’s certainly the best place to start.

Footnote

The other day, Pixies announced that Kim has officially left the band. For my tuppenceworth, the band will be losing an essential element but many bands have continued without a key member without necessarily losing their entire character.

Presumably also this clears the way for a new Pixies record. However I have very mixed feelings about this. Ever since the last two LPs in the early 90′s I can’t say that I’ve been anticipating a sixth Pixies LP with any sort of excitement. I’m certain that any such record would do well commercially but creatively how likely is it that it will be anything better than the sort of retread that  ‘m b v’ turned into?

Birdhead / Hagana – ‘Pleasure Centre’ LP Launch – Sneaky Pete’s, Edinburgh – 9th June 2013

So at long last I managed to catch up with Birdhead live again at Sunday night’s launch for their excellent debut LP ‘Pleasure Centre’. It proved to be the perfect place to reacquaint myself with the ‘Heid live experience, even if it was very much an LP launch a la mode (e.g. the records hadn’t actually escaped from the pressing plant in time for the show).

There’s a visceral edge to the Birdhead live sound that hasn’t, yet, quite translated to record. Perhaps it’s just down to the Sneaky’s sound but the whole thing sounds a little unruly and Stephen’s guitar, so central to the records, is less dominant live. But Dave’s drumming really comes to the fore, undoubtedly the pounding heart at the centre of the Birdhead maelstrom. The show certainly threw a slightly different light on the LP material but in a good way – and I’ve listened to nothing else since.

Song-wise there was a surprising amount of new material for an LP launch with the balance was 60/40 in favour of the new record. Within thge main set most of the first side of the album got played, as well as ‘Inertia’ from the second, although (unless I’m much mistaken) the show was opened by a tease of the intro from ‘Trojan’ before heading instead into ‘Tourist’.

The new material ranged from the rocky ‘Tesseract’ to an untitled instrumental which sounded like a perkier cousin of ‘Time Lag Accumulator’.

The end to the main set was rather sheepish with Dave not even bothering to get off his drum seat. Whilst Stephen did manage to escape from the stage it didn’t take too much persuasion for him to return for a searing ‘Seamus Notdog’. It was the perfect way to round things off in time for the Sneaky’s curfew.

I’m a bit puzzled by the lack of attention that the album seems to be getting. Too often for me electro-rock is disappointing, just stadium rock with bleeps, but Birdhead have managed to carve out their own thrilling identity by incorporating the best elements of both rock and electronic music. If I may be so bold, you need to check these guys out.

The show had been opened by hard rocking power trio Hagana. I must confess that a couple of minutes into their set, I was pretty much expecting them to be the sort of rock band that I can watch for half an hour or so without any great desire to explore their records.

That judgement proved to be premature. Whilst Hagana are heavier than a lot of stuff I listen to, there were some great songs in there too. I didn’t catch its title but the fifth song blended melody and riffs in the way that Bob Mould occasionally does and was my favourite of their tunes. Some of the other up tempo stuff worked nearly as well but the “slowest” tune of the night (all things are relative) ‘Ryan Seaquest’ was pretty bloody good too. So all in all a good way to start the show.

‘Pleasure Centre’ is available on Gamma Proforma Records – hopefully from a record store near you, very, very soon.

More photos from the show here.

Adam Stafford

Adam Stafford / Billy Letford / Sonny Carntyne / Robbie Lesiuk – Wiseblood Industries Showcase – Non-Zeros, Dundee – 7th June 2013

So another quality Dundee show and another poor turn-out. Sometimes I despair.

Opening act was Robbie Lesiuk whose solo acoustic performance reminded me a fair bit of Beerjacket. Nice, friendly stage persona too.

Sonny Carntnye

Next up were Sonny Carntyne, whom I’d quite enjoyed the first time I saw them. On Friday though they seemed to have grown as a band and were much stronger. The full band dynamic in particular seemed to have been developed since last time giving them an extra dimension.

There was poetry next with a short set from Billy Letford. I’m in no way a connoisseur of spoken word performances but his material switched from short and sweet to longer and more inventive.

Billy Letford

Talking about invention takes us to the headliner. Adam Stafford has completely changed his set since the last time I saw him to concentrate on material from the upcoming LP ‘Imaginary Walls Collapse’.

If anything it’s a stronger set than last year’s even if the basic elements of voice, guitar and loops are largely the same. But the final number is his most ambitious live performance so far, building up a wall of sound from more than a dozen different vocal loops.

It’s a performance that confirms Stafford as one of Scotland’s unique talents. And almost guarantees that the new LP is going to be another fantastic 2013 record.

Robbie Lesiuk

Finally a word about the venue that used to be Dexter’s. Friday was, shamefully, my first visit since the venue had changed hands and I confess that I hadn’t really expected to find that anything was different.

In fact, new owner Dave has made a significant improvement to the visibility by increasing the height of the stage to the same level as the old lip on which the monitor sat. Additionally it feels like there’s a wider view of the stage all of which is to the good. The end result is to make Dundee’s best small venue, even better.

Photos from the show here.

When it comes to reading, I owe Iain Banks a hell of a lot.

Difficult though it is to believe now, there was a spell in my 20s when I’d got out of the habit of reading. Iain Banks was my route back into contemporary fiction.

Staying at a friend’s after a wedding and waking early, I picked up a copy of ‘The Bridge’ from the bookshelf the morning after, before anyone was up. I didn’t get very far but was sufficiently intrigued to get the book myself shortly afterwards.

It seems unlikely today but there didn’t seem to be much in the way of contemporary Scottish fiction at the time. Other, of course, than Iain Banks. Suffice to say that I bought every one of his novels in fairly short order.

When I finished the ‘literary’ novels, with nothing else to buy, I turned, with a little trepidation, to the Iain M Banks SF books. And enjoyed them just as much.

So having got me back into the reading habit, Banks was also my route back into written SF for the first time in over a decade.

Over the years, we went to a good number of his book events and were always struck by his larger than life persona. The last event we saw him at took place at Dundee Central Library last year. The abiding memory of that night was hearing him getting micced up beforehand, blissfully unaware that the mic was live and that his commentary on how much he disliked the mics was being broadcast to the gathering audience!

I also had the pleasure of a couple of brief chats with the man in recent years at events that my wife had organised, most recently when he launched the Sci-Fife series of events in Glenrothes.

That night I asked him which of his SF novels he thought would be most appropriate for the then 14 year old MPK1.

“None!” was his quick response before reconsidering on the basis of the materials that teenagers are exposed to through games. (If you’re interested, ‘The Player of Games’ was his eventual recommendation.)

Others will write far more eloquently and more knowledgeably than I can about his novels and the impact that they have had. However, on a personal basis, a new Banks every year or two was an event to look forward to.

The news in April that he had terminal cancer was a terrible shock. He seemed to be one of these cultural icons you imagined would be around forever. His statement announcing the grim news though seemed typical of the man, facing the worst of situations the only way he knew how – with humour.

His last statement, a couple of weeks ago, tapped the same vein. He announced that he had returned to driving gas guzzling cars to zip around the Highlands for the sheer joy of speed on the grounds that he was saving 20-30 years on his expected carbon footprint.

It turns out his carbon footprint was to be cut short sooner than we could have imagined.The news that he had died this morning was nevertheless still a shock.

The world truly is a poorer place for his loss and my thoughts tonight are with his family and friends.

There seem to have been a lot of reissues recently, which isn’t helping me kick the record buying habit. I’m going to look at some of what I’ve been buying over the next wee while and thought I’d start with ‘Before, During, After’ – a reissue of the Woodentops back catalogue.

A three CD set, the first is based around debut LP ‘Giant’, the second features second album ‘Woodenfoot Cops on the Highway’ whilst the last collects together various non-LP tracks including tracks from the early singles.

In terms of the substantive releases ‘Giant’ has aged well. After the energy of the early singles its pop sheen was something of a surprise back in the day but there’s little doubt that, with the benefit of hindsight, it was the correct approach. It works particularly well on the slower material such as ‘Everything Breaks’, Give It Time’ and ‘So Good Today’ whilst the likes of ‘Good Thing’ proves that they could still bring the noise when necessary.

Despite including none of the early singles, it is a really strong collection of songs. If there’s a criticism of the record it is that the production tends to smooth out the differences between some of the tunes. But overall ‘Giant’ is probably a bit better than I remember it.

The extra tracks include several remixes and in general these are amongst the better examples of 80s remixes. Arguably ‘Good Thing’ is the best of these even if it amounts to little more than an extended version. There’s a slightly annoying breakdown in the middle of the song but the extended crescendo at the back end of the song is wonderful.

Initially I was thinking that ‘Woodenfoot Cops On The Highway’ was going to be better than the inconsistent LP that I remembered. The first side is pretty good, even if it’s not quite as good as ‘Giant’, and the second gets off to a great start with ‘Stop This Car’.

But thereafter it dips significantly in quality, perhaps not surprisingly since the sleeve notes state that the whole thing was written in a few short weeks. Again the remixes fare well particularly the beautifully constructed extended version of ‘Stop This Car’ which makes the LP version sound unnecessarily truncated.

There’s also a handful of songs for what would have been the third Woodentops album. Not unexpectedly they’re a mixed bag – ‘Surely’ would have made a terrific single (surely) but the rest are not nearly of the same standard.

The rarities CD is all over the shop. It starts with the absolute brilliance of the early singles, all four of which are included here (albeit one or two in slightly different mixes). I can never make my mind up which is my favourite – they all have a claim. There’s the bonus addition of three B-sides including the just as good as the A-sides ‘Have You Seen The Lights’.

Inevitably the rest of the CD doesn’t live up to the same standard. Indeed it ends up with some frankly quite ropey techno with assorted (good) remixes and live tracks in between.

Ultimately ‘Before, During, After’ provides plenty of proof that the Woodentops were creatively restless and constantly on the move. Even if their artistic  decisions were not necessarily always the best.

Given the price though this is a fascinating document of one of the 80s most underrated acts which is well worth investigating.

Not really a video …

It’s nearly two years since I first saw Birdhead  live, so the arrival of debut LP ‘Pleasure Centre’ seems to have been a long time coming. But its arrival this week (on vinyl and download on Gamma Proforma) proves that good things are worth waiting for.

For those unfamiliar with the band they are a 2 piece electro rock outfit from Edinburgh and, despite the lack of numbers, ‘Pleasure Centre’ has a reassuringly beefy sound.

For all that the basic instrumentation is guitar, keyboards and drums, the record still touches many bases. Lead single and lead track here ‘Tourist’ probably captures Birdhead at their best. The electronic backing is prominent and whilst the guitars crunch satisfyingly there’s still obvious melodies in the song.

That’s true of pretty much the whole record, although at times ‘Pleasure Centre’ relies on repetition to make its point, ‘Seamus Notdog’ and ‘Inertia’ being good cases in point where the keyboards provide a framework for the guitar to do splendid things.

And it’s probably the guitars that stand out the most on the record. They crunch (‘Silent Is The Crow’), they wail (‘Seamus Notdog’), they riff metallically (Drone Bone’) -  in fact they pretty much do everything you’d want from a rock guitar, sometimes in the same tune (‘Trojan’).

You can also catch such diverse influences as early Simple Minds, on the entirely instrumental ‘Time Lag Accumulator’, and Jimi Hendrix (‘Inertia’). And that Scars influence that I’d picked up live is unmistakable on‘Trojan’ and occasionally elsewhere.

The only song that is something a disappointment for me is final tune ‘Belt’ which is workmanlike without the spark that pretty much every other tune on the record possesses.

‘Pleasure Centre’ is a towering beast of a record. There’s been so many good records this year, it’s getting ridiculous. But ‘Pleasure Centre’ is up there with the best of them. Seek it out.

Birdhead launch the album with a show at Sneaky Pete’s this coming Sunday (9th June). More info here.

I’m going to admit defeat with the new Sparrow and the Workshop LP ‘Murderopolis’.

Let’s make it clear from the off. This is not because I don’t like it. Far from it, it’s an excellent record and the second side is particularly fine.

Yet, I’ve given up on being able to write anything halfway decent about ‘Murderopolis’. I’m honestly thinking that if I publish what I’ve written, if it makes any difference at all, it will do more harm than good.

So, get ‘Murderopolis’, it’s great. As is the fantastic video for second single ‘’The Faster You Spin’:

All publicity is good publicity, right? In which case the stooshie in the last couple of days over “elitism” and “inverted snobbery” is good news for the Scottish Album of the Year award.

Maybe. It may have resulted in a discussion on STV and an article in the Daily Recod but the last thing that the fledgling award needs is to be dismissed as a closed shop white indie boy award at this early stage in its development.

However before discussing the row that’s broken out over this year’s shortlist, let’s first rewind for some context.

The SAY Award was started last year as an attempt to boost the profile of Scottish music. The model adopted by the Scottish Music Industry Association was similar to that of the Mercury Music Prize – an attempt to pick a ‘best Scottish album’ from a cross genre field. The album part is important – this is explicitly an attempt to recognise that particular art form.

Now it’s fair to say that the first award last year lacked any commercial big hitters which will undoubtedly have lessened the impact it made. However this wasn’t down to snobbery so much as the fact that few Scottish acts of any commercial significance released LPs in 2011.

In large part, the dearth of big (or even medium sized) Scottish bands reflects the current state of the music industry – labels no longer seem to sign a middle strata of bands that once upon a time would have got a deal and a profile. And these are arguably the bands who could benefit most from something like the SAY Award.

The divide between major acts and those on the indies was therefore thrown into particularly sharp contrast with the announcement of this year’s SAY award longlist. In amongst the smaller independent acts were two massive sellers, Calvin Harris and Emilie Sande.

Doubtless the SMIA was hoping that their presence would result in increased coverage for the award – and it has. But not perhaps in the way that was hoped.

When the 10 album shortlist was announced on Thursday (one as a result of an online public vote last Monday and nine others picked by the judging panel), the absence of both Harris and Sande led to the afore-mentioned accusations of elitism and inverted snobbery.

Michael MacLennan’s piece seems to be in the vanguard of the argument. I’m not going to respond to most of this in any detail (Scottish Fiction did a nice response here) but the comparison with the industry back slapping Brits seems hopelessly misplaced.

The criteria for Best British album at the Brits is entirely different from the SAY Award. It’s a recognition of commercial success more than anything else (and may even be based on some sort of algorithm involving sales, costs and profiles). So to say that Sande deserves recognition in a critical award such as SAY because her album won a Brit is simply nonsense.

A much fairer comparison would be with nominations for the Mercury – were Harris or Sande nominated for the Mercury Prize or will they be this year? Almost certainly not.

Yet one LP on the SAY shortlist for 2013, ‘Django Django’ WAS nominated for the Mercury last year, and another from last year’s shortlist, the Jon Hopkins and King Creosote album, was nominated for the Mercury in 2012.

I don’t want to dismiss MacLennan’s piece because it does contain a number of valid points such as the under-representation of dance and the lack of women on the shortlist. But, equally, I think that even the shortlist is not quite as lacking in diversity as he alleges. In any case the diversity of a critical award is always going to depend on its judging panel.

I’d also imagine that, even allowing for the row, there would be some dismay at SMIA HQ on the fact that neither Harris or Sande made it the shortlist. The whole concept of the public vote seems intended to introduce an element of populism to the process and the expectation was surely that Sande or Harris would have won the public vote. Yet it seems that neither even acknowledged the fact that their fans had the opportunity to vote for them allowing the far less popular Twilight Sad to unexpectedly win the public vote.

I was slightly critical of the public vote last year, but I think the SMIA has got it spot on this year – even if it hasn’t delivered what the SMIA hoped. However I’d lay odds on a major label act making the shortlist next year through the public vote since Biffy Clyro, Primal Scream and Frightened Rabbit have all released LPs this year and I’m sure at some point that a public vote winner will win the award.

It would be sad if the detractors managed to harm the SAY Award. Scotland currently has a vital and creative musical scene and anything that can help promote that (and potentially fill the gap that the majors have left behind) has to be a good thing.

The winner of the SAY Award 2013 will be announced at Barrowlands in Glasgow on Thursday 20th June.

Turning what was originally going to be the substance of the post, four nominees from the shortlist featured in my top 25 albums of 2012. The nominees that finished the highest up the MPT end of year list are Meursault and they must be strong contenders. Also in the running from my list are the Twilight Sad, Karine Polwart and Human Don’t Be Angry. Of the others Django Django and R.M. Hubbert will carry a lot of support.

A prediction from MPT?

Well, the Djangos and Hubby look to be good bets but I’m going to stick my neck out for Karine and ‘Traces’ this time.

“My heart’s not in it.” sang Charlie Mooney on the last track of the second Desert Hearts LP ‘Hotsy Totsy Nagasaki’ back in 2006.

And as time passed from that record without a further substantial release, it was starting to look as if, maybe, he meant it.

A couple of slightly odd sounding instrumental demos on Myspace (yes, that long ago) suggested that there was still life in the band. But it wasn’t until the release of ‘Wolf Down’ as a download single last year and the inclusion of a new track on the Gargleblast Christmas E.P. that tangible evidence of their continuing existence emerged.

A further download single a few weeks back heralded the imminent arrival of third LP “Enturbulation = No Challenge”, finally released on Monday on No Dancing Records. And repeated listens to ‘E=NC’ proves that it is a worthy addition to an increasingly long list of excellent 2013 LPs.

One thing is clear from the record – Desert Hearts have moved on. ‘E=NC’ is recognisably them yet it’s undoubtedly a progression. In fact listening to all three albums back to week this week the shift from the at times claustrophobic sound of ‘Let’s Get Worse’ through ‘Hotsy Totsy Nagaski’ to the new one is quite stark.

You see, ‘E=NC’ opens out Desert Hearts’ horizons considerably. They’ve always had additional instrumentation in their sound but the use of strings and brass is more pronounced this time around widening their sonic palette.

Its most accessible moment is probably ballad ‘Tell The King’, which almost sounds like a lush Ash ballad with its strings over the chorus and guitar solo. And somewhere in the middle of side one, there’s a striking similarity to Big Dipper.

Yet for all that this is undoubtely the most accessible Desert Hearts record, it’s still not THAT obvious. Rather, songs like ‘Wolf Down’ and ‘Powertrash’ sucker you in over several plays then plant their hooks irretrievably inside your head.

There’s still an adventurous air to the songs. The best example is ‘Liberators’ which starts off as the heaviest track on the album yet, after its first (and only) chorus, it takes off for the stratosphere. And then there’s ‘Oak Mot’, perhaps the most up tempo tune on the record with its sparky brass. Yet it packs a real emotional punch behind its pop exterior with its lyrics of loss at odds to the carefree music.

Desert Hearts’ track record suggested that “Enturbulation = No Challenge” would be worth the wait. It most certainly is but it’s also a record which repays repeated listens. Another essential 2013 album.

“Enturbulation = No Challenge” is available from No Dancing Records. The band launch the album with a show at Belfast, Voodoo tomorrow evening (Friday 31st May).

The opening track from the album: