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PLAYLIST (DECEMBER 2004)

Komorebi – Yuichiro Fujimoto (Smalltown Supersound)
Very beautiful, lonesome, minimalist, naïve, acoustic, home-recorded music from Japan. Guitar, piano, thumb-harp, field-recordings, amongst other things. There’s so much space and ambience here, you feel you could actually be in the room with Yuichiro. Comes in wonderfully evocative artwork by Kim Hiorthoy, one of the best sleeve designers around.
Contact : yuichiro819@hotmail.com or info@smalltownsupersound.com

Women & Children – Women & Children (Attacknine Records)
A prime example of the music industry being blind, deaf and dumb, this record came out over two years ago and still didn’t get a release outside of America. Worse still, the band are sitting around with an album’s worth of new demos whilst the gutless, tasteless A&R vultures swoop on anything that remotely resembles the next Franz Ferdinand. Women & Children are American and Canadian exiles respectively, living on the outskirts of Paris, where they thoughtfully write and record this organic, lush, dusty music that’s as gentle as a money spider running up your arm. If I were to cite lazy comparisons, I would go somewhere near Nico or Hope Sandoval’s “Bavarian Fruit Bread.” That this band look as much like born stars as Royal Trux should, of course, be neither here nor there but it’s there. Cat Power’s favourite band. Chan’s had them propping up her dire live show in Australia and America this past year. You should start a label to sign music like this. What else are you doing?
Information : www.attacknine.com or www.darla.com

The English Cold – July Skies (Make Mine Music)
One of the few artists Piano Magic would consider as peers and there’s a definite nod (at least thematically) to our own ‘Artists’ Rifles’ on this record, dealing as it does with life on a Lancaster bomber base, 1939 – 1945. (We are also kindly regarded in the credits). July Skies kindle a Jarmanesque Super 8mm olde Englande of golden harvests, spires in twilight, twittering hedgerows and doorstep conversations with the neighbours as you puff on a pipe. There’s a somnolent nostalgia to the guitars that indicates a lineage to Maurice Deebank of Felt’s “Inner Thought Zone” as well as an undoubted love of The Durutti Column on songs like “The Mighty 8th.” A worrying yearning in the vocals suggests Antony Harding to be a sensitive soul afflicted with a romanticism you (sadly) only feel wisps of these days.
Wonderful artwork by Martin Andersen that made us so sickly jealous, we employed him.
Contact : ALTONBARNS@aol.com
Website : http://members.aol.com/julyskies1/menu.htm

Chelsea Girl – Nico (Polydor)
No-one has sounded this glacial and yet warm at the same time. ‘Chelsea Girl’ sounds like it was made by ghosts in a secret room behind the walls.

Il Fait Tout Gris – The Konki Duet (Active Suspension)
Active Suspension is a quietly brilliant little French label with a fondness for maverick electronica music. Though probably the most gentle record AS have released, it’s also the deepest, most inspired. The Konki Duet appear to be a French/Japanese hybrid and the title is a play on the cover version within – Visage’s “Fade To Grey.” Barely off my stereo these past 2 months, it’s an intriguing quilt of smallbeat electronica, real strings, drums and exquisite vocal harmonies that puts me in mind of an eerier Mùm. ‘A Sigmund Freud Odissey’ features the broken souled vocal of one Orval Carlus Silelios – his name, a recommendation in itself to check this record out. My other favourite, ‘Cindy,’ is a surprising foot-to-the-floor, mangled-Bangles.
Lovely illustrations/knitting on the sleeve by Marie Daubert bring to mind Edward Gorey’s books.
Information : www.thekonkiduet.com and www.activesuspension.org

Fisherman’s Woman – Emiliana Torrini (Rough Trade)
Shows up her debut album, ‘Love In The Time Of Science’ for what it was – much Orzaballed pomp and fancy rescued only by one of the most beautifully personable female voices around. ‘Fisherman’s Woman’ does not need rescuing. Spare, acoustic, unobtrusive arrangements allow Torrini to float, princessly (yes, it’s a word) about an inch from your ear. I particularly like the inspired creaks and knitting (?) touches of ‘Lifesaver,’ which not only allow a wonderful song to breathe but set it in some otherwordly context.
All the reviews are gonna say “it’s like a less-mad Björk” – inevitable (and tiresome) as they’re both Icelandic and female but credit where it’s due : Torrini has obviously taken her time to weave a delicate, warm, quilt of a record. Anyone with a liking for ‘Five Leaves Left’-era Nick Drake, sitting on a porch in no shoes, circling the moon with their fingers, would be well-advised to buy this when it comes out next year.
Information : www.roughtraderecords.com

Gästhamnar – Patrik Torsson (Häpna)
You could buy Häpna records for the sleeves and never have to play the CD. They’re that good. This Swedish independent label specialises in nothing of common theme but I do advise you should also check out the magical Sagor & Swing if foot-pumped organs are your thing. Patrik Torsson’s 3” CD is a melodic amalgamation of ticktock beats, stuttering keyboards and maritime radio transmissions. Never falling into the contemporary laptop trap of being too clever for it’s own good, Torsson simply presents 7 perfectly formed head-nodders which touch elbows with Ulrich Schnauss and Thomas Brinkmann. If you like this, there’s an album wafting around too.
Contact : info@hapna.com or www.hapna.com

The Best Of The Durutti Column – The Durutti Column (Warner Music)
If you’re as big a fan as I am, this is the sort of record you dread. Two CDs of what someone else thinks are the golden moments of your favourite band. And yet, my preconceptions trip me up again. This is a great collection, carefully handpicked by Phil ‘Kooky’ Cleaver (sorry, me neither) that pretty much mirrors my own choices (had I been consulted). If you’re completely oblivious to Vini Reilly, start here. You’ve got nothing to lose. If you’re an old school fan that gave up on him when London Records started bleeding the back catalogue dry, remind yourself what you’ve you’ve been missing and catch up on the story since then. If the thought of a man playing very echoed guitar to a minimal drum-machine backing repels you, it’s your (great) loss.
Though I’ve not been too impressed by Vini’s last few albums – ok, nothing since 1990’s “Obey The Time,” I do think Cleaver’s highlighted a few recent gems that show the old dog’s not lost his touch. Not that Vini is a dog but if he was, he’d be an Afghan Hound judging by the sleeve photo.
I felt a little let down by Vini’s self-effacing sleevenotes though – particularly his dismissal of ‘Without Mercy’ as “Self-indulgent rubbish” and ‘Tomorrow’ as an “Awful Song.” Call me precious but those records are precisely what reeled me in wayback.
Information : www.thedurutticolumn.com