Album Review: Carnivalesque - Rubens

Carnivalesque marks the debut for Rubens - a combined project from Mark Flanagan and Gordon MacDermid - that sees the duo construct uplifting ambient electronic landscapes.

Reminiscent of other artists such as Ulrich Schnauss, Carnivalesque feels very much like an experimental electronic album, combining the emotional resonance of a Sigur Ros track for example with the technical approach of Four Tet. On album opener 'Vertical Hold' for example, melodies plucked out on acoustic guitars twist in and out of each other whilst a tight electronic beat pushes through to create an icy yet warm sound.

Second track and second single, 'Breaking Into Smile' nicely encapsulates the feeling of listening to Rubens with synths wash over a mixture of live and synthetic percussion to create a smile inducing record.

Whilst the record as a whole has a consistent theme, and this being a pure electronica album there are no vocals, there is no doubt that there is some emotional variety. Try comparing the opening track to 'Giraffe' and you'll find a far more downbeat Rubens apparent.

The production on display seems almost effortless - textures and layer upon layer combine with such ease that it is all too easy to overlook the substantial effort that must have gone into the compositions on offer. It is also refreshing to note that a variety of live instruments have been used to give the sound more depth.

Carnivalesque is undoubtedly an enjoyable record and the delicate textures and soundscapes create the perfect soundtrack to a cold winter's day. As an album it is at its most enjoyable when it departs slightly from the norm - the sheer head nodding joy of 'Vertical Hold', the considered close to the ten-minute 'Ferris Wheel' or the spacious closer 'After Now Is Next' all provide definite highlights - and as such it will be interesting to hear what the future holds if Rubens develop a broader focus whilst maintaining their apparent attention to detail.

Without doubt Carnivalesque makes a delicate and beautiful introduction to the world of Rubens.

Album review: Our Ill Wills - Shout Out Louds

Something known only as life has kept BlackPlastic somewhat busy over the past weeks, but fear not sweet friend... Never throughout that period were you forgotten and now you are welcomed back with big wide open arms and a tall drink. And what better soundtrack to celebrate this than the Shout Out Louds, who follow up 2005's oft-overlooked gloriously sweet debut, Howl Howl Gaff Gaff with album number two, Our Ill Wills.

Starting with the swaggering, summery, string drenched 'Tonight I Have To Leave It' Our Ill Wills instantly lifts the production values beyond its predecessor's slightly. What remains are the glorious pop songs - sweet, touching, sad and yet still capable of making BlackPlastic play air drums like no-one's watching. Somehow, even without the lyrics, the Shout Out Louds manage to sound like you feel, and 'Tonight I Have To Leave It' sounds like a mixture between running to the park to meet your first girlfriend and breaking up with someone for the first time.

Such an analogy does much to convey the sound displayed here even more than the last album. Many of the songs on offer manage to sound sad and yet remain uplifting. 'You Are Dreaming' is thick with sprinting rhythms and strings that manages to sound like a midnight swim whilst 'Suit Yourself' utilises space, giving the vocals enough room to breath and therefore creating something much lighter in contrast.

At a time where the likes of Arcade Fire, Modest Mouse and The Shins are all achieving mainstream success there can be no doubt that the Shout Out Louds could score a hit. Our Ill Wills, peppered with flourishes that will enthrall the listener deserves every bit as much attention. Take 'Impossible' for example, with its muted guitar at the start that becomes enveloped in a wall of sound before everything dies down halfway through to let it all begin again. As the drums begin to kick back in beneath the strings around the five minute mark it becomes apparent the Shout Out Louds have created a near-seven-minute epic along the way. Or check out how 'South Africa' sounds just like a summer evening's bike ride. Want more power-pop ballads? 'Time Left For Love' has got pop by the bucket-full, with a clap-along rhythm section and a chorus distilled from MDMA.

Closing on the seven-and-a-half minute distortion heavy workout 'Hard Rain', which, unsurprisingly, sounds just like a rainy day that brings the floods, Our Ill Wills just might be the sweetest thing you hear this year. Don't let this pass you by.

News: Kanye loves getting introspective and emotionally strung out just like you...

Mark our words - it is at this point exactly that hip-hop twisted in on itself and died.

Not content with rapping over the top of a old Daft Punk track (BlackPlastic thought he was supposed to be some uber-producer anyway, not P Diddy, where's the talent in bad rapping over someone else's good song, he's not even had to track down some unknown nugget...) Kanye now turns his hand to everybody's favourite manic depressive, Thom Yorke.

Taking the standout track from Yorke's Eraser (that is the title track, check BP's previous comment here) Kanye invites Pharrell and Lupe Fiasco round and they proceed to rap about fame and cash (in a derogatory sense of course, this is the noughties after all) over Thom's trippy warm electronic number. This isn't going to tear the fucking roof off, in fact it might make everybody want to call their mothers, and it is this fact that makes BlackPlastic really think. Think about it, the world's biggest hip-hop star is sampling (and we mean wholesale theft in reality) some winy white kid from Oxford. Where now? Sampling Cliff Richard? What do you mean someone's already done that?

Check it out over here.

Album Review: Places Like This - Architecture In Helsinki

Music that can make kids giggle and yet still sound emotional and vital is exactly the sort of thing that makes BlackPlastic go a big rubbery one and as such Architecture In Helsinki have long been a favourite.

Following up on 2005's 'five freaking stars without a doubt' debut, In Case We Die, Places Like This represents album numero duo.

At barely 30 minutes long some could argue why bother going to the effort of designing such a lovely album cover, but still, things kick off with 'Red Turned White' and the sound is noticeably snappier, with an increasing rock sound exposed in some places whilst at other times things sound decidedly more urban.

Places Like This' first single 'Heart It Races' still sounds like the version of The Lion King BlackPlastic once experienced after experimenting a little too hard with organic substances and when it reaches a natural climax two minutes in BlackPlastic can't help but make frankly ridiculous maraca movements to the screams of "heart it races some more!"

Whilst nothing else on the album is quite as immediate as 'Heart It Races', and indeed Places Like This lacks the overall cohesion of In Case We Die there is still so much to enjoy in the short thirty odd minutes on offer that BlackPlastic is sure to end up five staring a lot in iTunes in time. 'Hold Music' sounds far too rowdy to be used as hold music by anyone bar BlackPlastic, coming across like a drunken fall down a staircase that does nothing but inspire laughter.

Surely a future single, 'Like It Or Not' starts off in true Archictecture In Helsinki fashion with the first forty seconds spent repeating the lyrics "Singing 'Waa Waaa Waa Waaa Waaa Waaa Waaa Waa Waaa Waaa"... It's probably not not going to win a grammy but fuck it, it sounds lie the most exciting street party ever and makes BlackPlastic want to dance on the ceiling whilst singing "Her mom thinks she's in love with you and I'm not". BlackPlastic has no idea if it has the lyrics right and frankly doesn't care.

Closing on 'Same Old Innocence', a crisp electronic funk shout-along rocker there is no doubting that another 10 minutes would have only added to the joy but you can't fault Architecture In Helsinki for their sheer confidence. Places Like This sounds like a band total in command of their sound and who frankly don't much care about the fame or the money. In fact it is a little difficult to listen to Places Like This without BlackPlastic seeing a bunch of hippies banging out the tunes on a set of saucepans whilst simply doing their best to avoid getting a proper job. Frankly if BlackPlastic can do anything as grand as listening to Architecture In Helsinki and help someone avoid getting a proper job consider it done... Maybe you feel the same way?

If you still want convincing just how much fun you could be having right now check out the Paris street party rendition of 'Like It Or Not' in the video here. It's so good it makes BlackPlastic want to cry man-tears of joy.

Album Review: Mexico City - GU32 Mixed by Adam Freeland

Adam Freeland is not cool. No way. Maybe once... But certainly not these days.

Global Underground... Pfft. They are so lame. Stupid prog compilations churned out like the FIFA series of computer games, without any thought as to why they should even bother still existing.

Why then, is BlackPlastic even worrying its pretty little head about this release? It has something to do with the fact that the tracklist doesn't contain a single John Digweed track but instead reads like a who's who in the cool list of right now. Spank Rock are here with the Switch remix of 'Bump', Mr. Oizo turns up for 'Half An Edit' and yes, Justice are here too. What's more there is some sort of concept, be it a slightly wishy washy one.

Disco Uno is party central... But Adam, dear Adam, has fucked with things a little bit. This means the lovely Thomas Bangalter mix of DJ Mehdi's 'Signatune' gets further tweaked and twisted to fulfill Adam's evil plans before getting entirely decimated by Phones' 'Sharpen The Knives', a track so evil BlackPlastic expects Bush to launch a war on Paul Epworth once the old war on terror has died down. The Para One remix of the crazy Icelandic Queen-wannabes, Trabant, on 'The One' sounds so divorced from the original that you wonder why Trabant bothered to pay the bill. Still, these French guys know what they're doing, right? Even Adam's own exclusive track, 'Silverlake Pills' is pretty enjoyable with similar synth washes to 'Signatune', a freaking rediculous bassline and some nice snappy drums.

CD one is finished off in a suitably fashion with Evil 9's 'Happy Ending', a post-punk breakbeat shakedown and as a mix it is very enjoyable and accessible if in danger of being a little formulaic.

Concept two and disc two then is Drone. Or e-Drone. Taking cues from shoegazing bands such as My Bloody Valentine this 'new genre' is Adam's attempt to fuse the wall of sound approach of these bands to electronic music. It's an interesting idea and in places works well, generally when it veers as close rock music as possible.

CD two starts with Spacemen 3 (who went on the become Spiritulized) and 'Ecstasy Symphony', but at two minutes long this is little more than a blissed out intro. Several deep electronic cuts follow, My My's 'Butterflies & Zebras' introduces a warm melodic bassline and Justus Kohncke strips things back to a piano and the odd brief stab of distortion for 'Advance'. It is track five and 120 Days' 'Come Out, Come Down, Fade Out, Be Gone' before the concept is really fleshed out beyond its bones. A chugging techno track with flat but live sounding drums, 'Come Out...' manages to capture the feeling aimed for, even if the singer does sound a little too like Grant Nicholas from Feeder.

Things really hit their stride just over three minutes into 120 Days, when synths encircle the throbbing basslines and everything descends into a hiss. It is apparent that what makes this new 'sound', if you can bare to believe in such a thing, is the contrast. Nice and nasty distortion arrives in the forms of Gui Boratto's 'Terminal' and Holden's 'Lump' respectively before things head back towards the more rock tinged sound in the form of Cobblestone Jazz with 'Dump Truck' and Silversun Pickups 'Lazy Eye'.

In its conventional form 'Lazy Eye' sounds a little like the Pixies covering a Foo Fighters song but here Freeland effectively throws in a guitar-based muted pop-song into his mix before letting it hit a self destruct button two minutes in that drowns the singer in a wall of post-rock noise. As a DJ tool it works quite well as a completely unexpected left turn. What a dancefloor's reaction to this would be is anyone's guess but BlackPlastic would love to see.

'Lazy Eye' eventually dissolves into Substance & Vainqueur's 'Immersion', which in turn gets sliced into by Fujiya & Miyagi's enjoyable 'Ankle Injuries', used here in a way that neatly counteracts the somewhat clinical introduction to the sunnier feel of the main song proper.

By the time Andrew Weatherall's 'Feathers' rolls around Freeland's intentions are a little clearer, and BlackPlastic can't help but think that Weatherall's track was perhaps a major inspiration for this project. A post-punk electronic machine of a track that sounds closer to its source material than many other so called 'new-post-punk' bands whilst also sounding thoroughly modern itself. It is Freeland's own mix of 80s band B-Movie's 'Nowhere Girl' that provides the album highlight however... A throbbing, chugging slab of melting rock that demands the listener to turn it up just one more notch. Drums crash and vocals roll in and out but it is the bassline slicing in and out of the mix and the distorted melody that provide the real excitement. It was already used to great effect on Evil Nine's Fabric Live mix but here is makes even more sense - another clear inspiration for this mix as a whole.

It seems unlikely that Freeland has truly invented a new genre, what is certain whoever is that he has created the most exciting Global Underground CD in ages and as a New Order style bassline carries the second CD out on a mix of Mylo's 'Paris 400' it feels like a real journey that the listening will want to repeat.