Category: Reviews (Page 35 of 200)

SALLY SHAPIRO Sad Cities

16 February 2022 /

Although they announced a retirement of sorts in 2016 and released a final single ‘If You Ever Wanna Change Your Mind’, Swedish duo SALLY SHAPIRO joined the Italian Do It Better family in 2021 to make an unexpected return.

Comprising of the enigmatic anonymous songstress Sally Shapiro and producer Johan Agebjörn, they became cult favourites with their dreamy pop albums ‘Disco Romance’ ‘My Guilty Pleasure’ and ‘Somewhere Else’. In parallel, Agebjörn also had a solo career with 2011’s ‘Casablanca Nights’ album featuring LE PRIX, LAKE HEARTBEAT and QUEEN OF HEARTS attracting acclaim.

During the hiatus, Agebjörn has also worked on two collaborative records with Mikael Ögren as well as soundtrack work for the Swedish comedy thriller ‘Videomannen’ including the songs ‘Hot Boy’ with one-time Page3 stunna Samantha Fox and ‘Love On Ice’ with Italian star Ryan Paris in a duet with Shapiro. As if they had never been away, the fourth SALLY SHAPIRO album ‘Sad Cities’ is mixed by both Agebjörn and Italian Do It Better head honcho Johnny Jewel.

Originally recorded as a duet with Ryan Paris but with his backing vocals remaining in this Sally solo version, the wispy opener ‘Forget About You’ provides a wonderful wintery disco tune, as does the gorgeously airy ‘Believe In Me’ which follows. But the elegiac ‘Down This Road’ could be a theme to a French Nouvelle Vague movie but throws in an unexpected guitar solo from Alex Karlinsky aka HIGHWAY SUPERSTAR to throw off the scent before vibing up and adding slinky sax from Jorja Chalmers.

Like an electronic version of yacht rock, the ‘Sad City’ title track exudes a drifting oceanic mood while ‘Dulcinea’ is a pretty midtempo synthwave ballad with a slight West European bent. With some Nordic flight, ‘Falling Clouds’ bounces delightfully skywards with a shuffling but danceable beat while despite having previously collaborated with ELECTRIC YOUTH on ‘Starman’ in 2013, ‘Love in Slow Motion’ is unsurprisingly more laid back in nature.

Offering an Italo housey stance, ‘Million Ways’ twists expectations with cosmic synth solos, jazzy electric Rhodes and filmic orchestrations. Shyness is nice as ‘Tell Me How’ with TOMMY ’86 offers more typical synthwave atmospheres that bubble into an absorbing odyssey.

As the title suggests, ‘Christmas Escape’ is a drifting mood piece that reflects the crystalline air of the winter holiday season before the mighty dance laden ‘Fading Away’ features a glorious plethora of trancey electronics and thumping rhythms over seven minutes to provide a satisfying closer.

Five years has allowed time for SALLY SHAPIRO to be missed and this new collection of songs is a gift to their fans. ’Sad Cities’ doesn’t stray too much from past formulas, right down to the collaborators but that doesn’t matter. This is blissful breezy electronic pop despite its inherent melancholy and sadness.

‘Sad Cities’ is released by Italians Do It Better on 18th February 2022, available from https://sallyshapiro.bandcamp.com/

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Text by Chi Ming Lai
15th February 2022

I SPEAK MACHINE The Metal of My Hell

13 February 2022 /


With the Western Powers is a rather tense and scary stand-off with Russia over Ukraine as if The Cold War had never ended, I SPEAK MACHINE’s ‘The Metal of My Hell’ from the upcoming album ‘War’ is rather on point.

A fierce aural assault of frantic heavy metal machine music using synths, Busch declares in a raging if tongue-in-cheek manner: “burn the witch / burn the bitch… you had it coming for a long time!”.

I SPEAK MACHINE is the audio visual project of Tara Busch and Maf Lewis; their album ‘Zombies 1985’ was ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK’s favourite album of 2017. While that collection made use of Busch’s impressive vocal range from high soprano to deep contralto and a previous 2011 single ‘Rocket Woman’ came over like Doris Day in outer space, her voice takes on an aggressive devilish tone for ‘The Metal of My Hell’.

Angry and claustrophobic with screeching horror flick strings, ‘The Metal of My Hell’ is appropriately complimented by the Maf Lewis directed video filmed in the dusty, sweltering fire roads of Griffith Park in Los Angeles. Using an iPhone 13 Pro Max in 4K with Filmic Pro, it captures Busch adopting some dishevelled symbolism like Libertas gone goth…

While Tara Busch has previously worked with the likes of Benge, John Foxx and John Fryer, as well toured with Gary Numan and Hannah Peel, ‘War’ has been co-produced by Dean Honer of I MONSTER, THE ECCENTRONIC RESEARCH COUNCIL and INTERNATIONAL TEACHERS OF POP fame; the album was constructed remotely between LA and Sheffield over a three year period.

While ‘Zombies 1985’ was the soundtrack to a short horror sci-fi film about a self-obsessed man who fails to notice the Zombie Apocalypse happening around him, ‘War’ is a much more personal album dealing with themes of addiction and mental illness.

As I SPEAK MACHINE prepares to go out on tour soon supporting Gary Numan on his US ‘Intruder’ dates beginning on 23rd February at The Fonda Theater in Los Angeles, war is coming…

‘The Metal of My Hell’ is from the new album ‘War’ out on 22nd April 2022 in double red vinyl LP, CD and digital formats, pre-order via https://singinglight.link/ispeakmachine-war

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Text by Chi Ming Lai
Photoby Maf Lewis
13th February 2022

SEA CHANGE Mutual Dreaming

10 February 2022 /


SEA CHANGE is the nom de théâtre of Norwegian producer and vocalist Ellen A. W. Sunde who self-released her debut album ‘Breakage’ back in 2015. Her interest in music began with a fascination for ambient noise, tiny acoustic instruments and synths.

Following up 2019’s FEVER RAY-inspired ‘Inside’, her third album ‘Mutual Dreaming’ is a product of moving back to Norway after living in Los Angeles and Berlin to immerse herself into their noted club scenes. Settling in the southern coastal town of Kristiansand, the quiet location has undoubtedly coloured proceedings with a mysterious serene air focussed onto the music.

With enigmatic air of Stina Nordenstam, ‘I Put My Hand Into A Fist’ states its intentions like a musical Nordic Noir mystery with a gently percussive transience. Building on that introduction, ‘Is There Anybody?’ offers subtle electronic signals and haunting vocal treatments that slowly gain in presence as a whole.

Vocally like an abstract Dot Allison, ‘That’s Us’ is sparse and swathed in echo, recalling the Andrew Weatherall-helmed dub experiments of ONE DOVE. In a backdrop of reverse Norse code, ‘OK’ is more whispery Alison Goldfrapp and begins as an angelic mood piece before snapping rhythmically.

‘Never Felt’ moves away from metronomic beat structures and enters eerier territory with ghostly manipulated voice colouring while without almost noticing, the rumbling backdrop becomes central to the work. Comparatively uptempo but minimal, ‘Night Eyes’ captures a darkness falling but then the aural cavern expands to create a hypnotic sinking feeling.

Adding distortion into the mix, ‘Mirages’ acts as a soft environmental interlude into the home straight leading straight into the ‘Mutual Dreaming’ title track with its absorbing percussive mantra and breathy Björk-like interventions in place of a conventional lead vocal. And with a heartbeat, ‘Rituals’ hits FEVER RAY territory with deep pitch shifting to close.

Like a more accessible Stina Nordenstam but with all the characteristic Nordic idiosyncrasies, ‘Mutual Dreaming’ is a panoramic record with an abstract mindset.

With a dreamy impressionistic quality, it acts as relaxed escapism from the tensions of civilisation with an intriguing avant pop aura. File under “Visceral and very introspective”.

‘Mutual Dreaming’ is released on 11th February 2022 by Shapes Recordings, pre-save at https://ingrv.es/mutual-dreaming-tda-4

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Text by Chi Ming Lai
11th February 2022

DOLVA SANA Hard-boiled Wonderland

6 February 2022 /

Anglo-Belgian duo DOLVA SANA are a new duo featuring Jake Harding on vocals and Frederic Caure on electronics with devotion to the usual suspected darker influences such as DEPECHE MODE and DE/VISION.

Jake Harding has adopted a number of vocal stylings including punk, folk, blues and heavy metal for his baritone before settling into doomy goth band GRAVE LINES.

Meanwhile Caure is a seasoned multi-instrumentalist with a background in psychedelic and stoner rock proficient in guitar and synthesizer, with the latter being the dominant presence in the stark overtures of DOLVA SANA.

The opening track ‘Tell A Lie’ is vibrant downbeat darkwave with the expected boxed vocals embroiled in anguish, but it’s the bleak closer ‘Home’ with its sparse electronic backdrop that is the highlight; as it steadily progresses, it presents some wonderfully vocal harmonies in the manner of Messrs Gahan and Gore as heard on ‘Waiting For The Night’ while the haunting hooks, synth texturing and sequencing take their place in the aural kaleidoscope.

With a strident pulse, ‘Without Help’ is better than most Dave Gahan solo offerings and is at least superior to the DEPECHE MODE front man’s dreary Charlie Chaplin covers. However, the instrumental ‘Midnight in K-Town’ offers pacier soundtrack potential but is missing a more dynamic rhythmic presence… a bit like the album version of ‘Behind The Wheel’, it is far too held back and suffers for it.

Meanwhile, ‘Drangst’ is very mournful and perhaps the least essential of the five in the ‘Hard-boiled Wonderland’ set. But it’s a start and with one standout track on a debut EP, ‘Hard-boiled Wonderland’ shows some flashes of promise and potential for the future.

‘Hard-boiled Wonderland’ is available digitally via https://dolvasana.bandcamp.com/

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Text by Chi Ming Lai
6th February 2022

DUBSTAR Token

2 February 2022 /

Photo by Andy Earl

It is not long before the new DUBSTAR album is released. Entitled ‘Two’, it will be out on 6th May 2022. But until then, a fabulous new song ‘Token’ has been premiered as an enticing trailer.

Co-produced by Stephen Hague, ‘Token’ sounds like DUBSTAR doing ERASURE, while others have remarked that it sounds like PET SHOP BOYS. Whatever, it is possibly Sarah Blackwood and Chris Wilkie’s most overt synthpop statement yet.

Chris Wilkie said “Most often it’s the song itself which informs the style and sound of a track, but sometimes, once an album is underway, it becomes clearer what is working or what is lacking”. And it was the necessary social distancing due to lockdown that played a part in dictating the instrumentation: “We found ourselves naturally gravitating to our electronic side over the pandemic, because it lends itself more practically to remote production. We couldn’t sit around jamming with guitars or experimenting together in real time, for instance”.

Working from home remotely, “I can program MIDI parts in Tyneside, and if not 100% happy with the way it’s sounding, the program is easily pinged over to Haguey down in Sussex who can use the same program to trigger different gear. It’s a protracted way of working but more versatile than you’d think. After ‘Hygiene’ and ‘Outside’, we were already some of the way down a particular road. Having Hague involved certainly got us thinking about those kind of artists, but there wasn’t a conscious decision to channel them. Some artists just become part of your DNA when you grow up with them.”

Very much a collaborative effort with the Portland-born producer, Wilkie remembered: “Stephen played me a very symphonic piano riff, and I was challenged to write a song which might incorporate it in some way. I wrote the chorus straight away to fit chords which would hopefully accommodate the piano intro at some point, and then the bridge. I only had placeholder lyrics which I wasn’t confident about for the verses, so I asked Sarah and Hague to muck in with those. It felt like writing in reverse. I usually start at the start and keep going”.

But is the ‘Token’ referring to a prize or representation or a minor gesture? “It’s both!!!!” revealed Sarah Blackwood, “I’m singing about how the tormentor can help themselves to the things we shared together; inviting them to take a “tender token”. ‘Tender’ is simultaneously sentimental and weak. And ‘token’ is both a material trophy and a minor gesture. It was only after the whole song was finished that it seemed that the word ‘token’ seemed to be the centre of gravity, hence the title.

“Chris got the idea from Haguey after talking about NEW ORDER” the DUBSTAR singer added, “The word ‘regret’ is incidental and floats-by unnoticed in that song, you would never spend long contemplating it, but the word ‘Regret’ is monolithic and meaningful when isolated as a title. In our song, the word ‘Token’ almost raises psychological alarms as a title, but it’s appearance in the song defuses it, which hopefully encourages people to consider what the word really means to them”.

The video was filmed in Manchester and it was also the first time Blackwood and Wilkie had actually seen each other in person since 2019 – “We couldn’t even hug but we still managed to be over-emotional.” she remembered, “Mancunians are too cool to stare but I did clock bewildered glances as some wondered who the hell we were and why we were filming, especially in the middle of a storm (Barra). The irony was, we had prayed for rain as it can look very cinematic. Classic case of beware of what you wish for…… Dom F, our resident George Lucas, was having to negotiate Market Street backwards to film, Chris and Paul B our helper clearing the way forward for him, whilst loudly and helpfully pointing out people for me to avoid with the very large brolly……”

The weather conditions naturally presented a number of dramas; “I was trying to look serene whilst wrestling the wind vs brolly and avoid a Mary Poppins moment, sing to the camera at double speed (aloud with headphones in, no wonder they were staring ?) and try to not to look cold…” said Blackwood, “All whilst avoiding puddles, uneven paving slabs, frantic Christmas shoppers and the driving blooming rain……marketing man Matt D kept the seats warm in Night and Day where we thawed our toes between takes, looked through the rushes and realised the umbrella was undoubtedly the star of the show. We dried out in my friend Claire’s jazz bar Matt & Phred’s and shared a pizza with Adrian Dunbar from ‘Line of Duty’…… Chris’s mum was so terribly impressed……”

‘Token’ is released as a digital single via Northern Writes, stream at https://dubstar.fanlink.to/token

The new album ‘Two’ is released on 6th May 2022

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Text and Interview by Chi Ming Lai
2nd February 2022

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