Surkin (Twitter/SoundCloud), who’s French electro vibes we’ve been setting our groove for a good few years now, has a new album coming out on Marble in November – but to get everyone suitably excited we’ve first got his Ultralight EP out today.
Ultralight itself is a wonderful piece of classic French house, centred on that disco piano line and reverbed vocal line. Orbital Motorway, however, is quite a different beast with darker chaotic crescendos of beeps and squeaks hypnotising you as it builds the tension.
Cosmo Jarvis (facebook/twitter) is somewhat of an odd character. We had the joy of having his energetic and musically experimental set as part of our showcase in Dingwalls back in May, and now he’s followed up the wonderful Sure As Hell Not Jesus EP with a full length in Is The World Strange Or Am I Strange.
My favourites from his Jesus EP have made the moves onto the EP – Gay Pirates is an amusing cheery sing-a-long sea-shanty, and Sure As Hell Not Jesus is still on the money with its pop-swagger and strut.
The new material is more of a mixed bag – always musically interesting and provocative, but it doesn’t always quite come off. The slap-bass and funk rhythm of Dave’s House gets your foot tapping from the off and reminds me a little of The Cat Empire – never a bad thing, but the pseudo rap stylings of the title track don’t work as well. Indeed, experimentation is probably the best way to describe the album in general – it never lets up cutting a new path between otherwise disparate genres.
She Doesn’t Mind is probably my favourite of the new additions – almost ska in feel and rhythm, but Cosmo as ever adds his own lyrical ingenuity explaining to his parents the perfection of his latest girlfriend “Mum and Dad – she’s curing cancer” amongst her other attributes, but its clear that her appreciation of him is all that he really acres about. That “she doesn’t mind the…”, that she loves him for what he is the only real factor.
My favourite track from the EP, What’s Wrong With Betty, closes the album, but this time in its full 10+ minute form. In many ways, this track sums up the whole record – always musically diverse and inventive, and lyrically seductive – and at times rolled together into pop perfection, but at others baring the clash of sounds a little too starkly.
Ever since I first heard the Otis Redding soft-styled vocals of Michael Kiwanuka (facebook/twitter) on a City Sessions video he’s been on pretty much constant repeat around Walrus Towers. That makes me doubly excited in that this week saw both the release of his latest video for I’m Getting Ready and my first chance to catch him live.
At Bush Hall he was opened for by Rachel Sermanni, who was fantastic, but more on her another time. Live he is captivating – as you would imagine – with his vocals staying warm and smooth in front of a band that stayed free flowing and loose throughout. Kiwanuka had the audience in the palm of his hand, and the odd joke about (and a cover of) Bill Withers only added to the relaxed vibe of the night. A very impressive performance.
The video is shot like a super-8 home movie reflecting the uplifting warmth of the lullaby. A thing of beauty.
[BUY] Michael Kiwanuka – I’m Getting Reading EP on VINYL or MP3
