Album Reviews: Friendly Fires - Friendly Fires

Some records tingle as they slip down your spine. Some records sound like every great summer of your youth squeezed into four minutes. Some records sound like quitting your job forever and moving to Spain. Mostly these records feature on an album called Friendly Fires by, you guessed it, St. Alban's hottest: Friendly Fires.

Album opener and first official single 'Jump In The Pool' defies words: take how gorgeous 'Paris' (previously out on Moshi Moshi as a limited release) sounds, add some sparkling Latino rhythms and literally submerge the whole thing in the pool from the opening scene of A Life Less Ordinary (Diaz optional) and you still haven't quite got some lush enough. It's the only track that isn't self-produced (Paul Epworth got in touch after hearing their earlier efforts) and as such you would be forgiven for thinking nothing else sounds as good. But you would be dead wrong...

If you are still reading this and you haven't actually heard 'Paris' (previuosly featured on BlackPlastic here) then, in all honesty, stop wasting your time because you should be checking it out on YouTube rather than reading BlackPlastic's futile attempts to describe how good this sounds. Retooled with vocals from Au Revoir Simone (yes, BlackPlastic loves you too girls) it is as unstoppably optimistically full of glamour and hope and lust as ever. And it proves something the is reconfirmed over and over during the 38 minutes of music here: not only can Friendly Fires write a good tune but they can work the spit and polish too. Despite the fact it was recorded on a laptop with an old microphone this album has a staggering amount of detail and shines even if you don't know of it's humble origins. Electronic warmth and techno stabs make this one of the most distinctive records you will hear this year. No other band captures dance music in it's rawest form quite like Friendly Fires.

The only criticism that can be levelled at this record is that, if you've been paying attention, you'll already know six of ten tracks. Trouble is, they're six of the best songs you've heard in ages and the others are just as good.

'On Board' still adds post-punk magic you the synth line from Jamie Principle's 'Your Love'. 'Lovesick' is an 80s catwalk of a record that switches from eyelinered vocals in the verse to to a minimal-inspired chorus and back again before a tech-house closer, whilst 'Ex Lover' oozes enough magic to finish things off on a high.

Friendly Fires have gone and put every good idea most bands have in their whole careers into one album and, staggeringly, it works. James Murphy had better watch out: not since LCD Soundsystem's Sound of Silver has a band quite so confidently pushed the envelope concerning what a band can be.

BP x

Album Review: The History of Science and How to Mend a Broken Heart - The Wonderland Project

"Traditional distribution and payment models for music are broken!"

We all hear it everyday, and yet the labels seem intent to do everything they can to repeatedly stab their customers in the eye and treat them like morons rather than give them the choices they want. The Wonderland Project neatly sidestep this issue with their album The History of Science and How to Mend a Broken Heart by, erm, not really distributing or charging for it. Sort of.

So whilst it may be available in iTunes and on Amazon (which is good for you as it means you might stand a better chance of hearing a copy) the 'primary' method of distribution is the listener. Imagine peer-to-peer constrained to the physical world: the idea is that there are a number of CD copies of the album out in the wild right now, waiting to be found in places, each accompanied with a note instructing the finder: You can listen to it and stick it on your iPod but then you must leave it somewhere else for someone to find and put the details on The Wonderland Project website so they can track the album's movements.

It's a captivating and magical idea and, frankly, the majors should be kicking themselves for not thinking of using this as a method of promotion for a major artist.

So how does it actually sound? The History of Science and How to Mend a Broken Heart is a blend of country-tinged electronic music that most closely resembles Nowergian alt-acoustic musician Magnet. There are also hints of The Postal Service / Dntel in the bleeps and clicks of the sparkly 'You Look Prettier When I'm Happy' and Radiohead on some of the darker tracks like 'A Sense of Community'.

For the most part it works: The History of Science... is an enchanting record that sounds like it was made to drag you through a dreary Monday morning and with such an innocent distribution model it's hard not to be charmed. It attempts to capture the magic of those moment in life that stay with you: helping a beautiful girl get fuel for her car, meeting a stranger on the train; and, just occasionally, it captures it.

BP x

Album Review: Cosmic Disco?! Cosmic Rock!!! - various mixed by Daneile Baldelli & Marco Dionig

Any long time readers will know that if there is one series of compilations that sets BlackPlastic's heart aflutter more than all others then N.E.W.S offshoot Eskimo Recordings' compilations would it. With a blatant disregard for anything other than the best, most obscure, dug-through-crates-to-get, rare-as-hens'-teeth records and extremely high levels of quality control BlackPlastic dares you to name one release that isn't superb, if not even game changing.

The fabulously titled Cosmic Disco?! Cosmic Rock!!! introduces new talent (for which read rather old, or rather vintage, talent) in the form of Daniele Baldelli and his cohort Marco Dionig. Baldelli made his name in Italy in the late 70s / early 80s by plying a trade in mainly black American and white European records, combining them to create the foundations of dance music. Whilst everyone whips themselves into a frenzy over Italo house and cosmic disco this compilation takes a neat sidestep to portray an alternative history.

Baldelli's talent is in combining records that have no real relationship with each other and, somehow, making it work. With plenty of re-edits to emphasize the bits he likes, Baldelli is able to create a coherent message through a diversity of sounds. There are moments of wonky techno, for example Torch Song's 'Prepare To Energize' or the political 'Ulster Defence' by Bronx Irish Catholics, but there are also moments of pop genius - just check out Fra Lippo Lippi's glorious 'Say Something', all mechanical robot-sex rhythms and a killer pop vocal.

And so that's what Cosmic Rock is. It's freaky techno tracks jostling with dirty guitar licks and a diva or two. It's The Thompson Twins getting evil on your ass with the stuttering beat and full-on Run DMC / Jason Nevins basslines of 'Beach Culture'. It's La Bionda's race-to-get-naked-first come-on of a record, 'I Got Your Number'. But most of all Cosmic Rock is the lighters-in-the-air pop perfection of Spyder's 'Better Be Good To Me', a pure sunshine-on-a-rainy-day of a record, a record that sounds like waking up with a supermodel that loves you more than you her, a record so good that frankly it deserves an album all to itself.

BP x

Album Review: FabricLive 41 - Various mixed by Simian Mobile Disco

What happens if you create a robotic version of your dead ex-lover with artificial intelligence? Yes, it's obvious, everybody knows it will end up snapping and killing you and only in death will you truly be reunited with your squeeze.

Yet this is what it sounds like Simian Mobile Disco have done for their FabricLive album (that'll be 41 for you number fiends). It starts out all robotic but gradually gets a little nasty on you before you emerge, blinking, the other the side of the pearly gates at The Walker Brother's 'Night Flights'.

The spooky Santiago remix of Hercules and Love Affair's 'Blind' eptimomises this mix perfectly. From a distance it might sound like it loves you but when you hear the spooky electronic echoes, whooshing ghost noises and masses of dead space you realize your phone was being tapped the whole time and a swat team are smashing through your bedroom windows.

BlackPlastic said that the recent Simian Mobile Disco Clocks EP was "alright-not-great-innit". Maybe it's the context of the album. Maybe it's the remanent dopamine still coursing through BlackPlastic's body post-SMD's Field Day performance. Hell, maybe BP was just on crack at the time because, here, 'Simple' sounds fucking awesome, fool. As does most of side one (hillarious throw back to tape, or vinyl, take your pick).

The first half of this album is like Space Invaders taking over your little brain and that'll do just fine, thanks very much. Check out Smith N Hack's 'Space Warrior' and Discodeine's 'Joystick', even the titles scream: "The Princess is in another castle!"

Where this drops the ball slightly is when it does things like relying on Metro Area's 'Miura', Paul Woolford's 'Erotic Discourse' and Green Velvet's 'Flash'. They were great once but they're just too well trodden these days. It's like your robot wife offering you missionary position: "That's great thanks, but I know it quite well... How about..."

Oh, and no matter how much Simian Mobile Disco love Simon Baker's remix of 'Sleep Deprivation' (apparently quite a lot) they need to stop being so coy. The original is probably the best pure club track they have ever done and to snub it is unnecessary.

It starts brilliantly. It isnt as good as their Bugged Out mix. It becomes slightly less exciting towards the end. It's still the best fabric album in a while. Go figure.

BP x

Album Review: V - Van She

It seems a lifetime ago that Van She's original five-track EP came out and as such a significant level of expectation potentially burdens this release. Things aren't made any easier by the fractured styles the band have meta-morphasised throughout this period and it is interesting to see how they address this point within an album strucuture.

The answer is actually straight forward, if slightly disappointing. V is a rock album, plain and simple, and so everything fits within the template of early singles 'The Cat & The Eye' and 'Strangers'. That disappointment isn't to suggest what is here isn't good, it is. Within the new context both of the aforementioned tracks shine, whilst 'Changes' sounds reminiscent of Zoot Woman's muted and monochromatic take on pop music and 'It Could Be The Same' and closer 'On The Edge' show a darker side.

Atmosphere abounds, V is just perhaps more sophisticated than we had come to expect. Even the gorgeous 80s cocaine ride of an anthem that is 'Kelly' has been revised and toned down slightly into something slightly more subtle.

V is a lush album and what it loses in excitement it gains in cohesiveness, accesibility and maturity. BlackPlastic may well be playing it all summer but you can be sure a little part of us is hoping for the next album to encapsulate the dayglo acid excessiveness of remix side project Van She Tech.

BP x