Trash kit are three young ladies: Rachel A,  Rachel H and  Ros M.  They were opening band at the Trinity Hall in Dalston last week when I went to see the Vivian Girls (disappointing, fact fans).   Trash Kit were anything but.   These three youngsters certainly made me take notice.  With their slapdash face paint make-up and fiery enthusiasm.  I think they remind me of Pens, maybe that’s because they seem so young.  Musicially – they all over the shop (in a good way) – from guitar thrashes to bass heavy jerkers.

To these ears there is also something of The Slits in their sound.  Maybe that’s just the way the bass booms in their songs.    They have three songs for streaming on My Space at the moment and all three songs are addictive.  This is the way pop music should sound.  Love them.  They’ve got a whole heap of shows coming up in the next week or so.   I’m going to catch at The Windmill in Brixton on 4th February.

Link:  My Space

I saw a young band last night at the Lexington.  I was there to see Real Estate (they were fab).   The rest of the bill wasn’t known to me before turning up.  I got there just as Yuck took to the stage.   The singers younger sister got up to sing on one song.  It was called ‘Georgia’.  It stuck with me.   It’s up on their my space as demo.  At the gig I was thinking their was something of a grunge feel to the sound that Yuck make.  Listening now to that song it’s the paw prints of J Mascis and his 80s slacker noiseniks Dinosaur Jr that loom the largest on this song. This is no bad thing.

The other song on their page is another demo.  This one is called ‘Automatic’.  A piano/keys led song.  Less to my liking.  As for their performance.  I liked them enough for them to be worth seeing again.   Luckily – the band have a whole bunch of supports slots coming up across London.  I’ll mark them as ones to watch.

Link:  My Space

Underused Records is a new label based in London.  Their motto is simply stated as ‘A home for good songs’ and ‘No Shouting’.  ‘Old Happiness’ by A Singer of Songs certainly meets both criteria with aplomb.  I first knew ‘A Singer Of Songs’ as a song that appeared as a song on the Unearthed boxset recorded by Johnny Cash. In my book any singer that takes this songs name is a brave man as that song is one of my favourite Johnny Cash moments.

The singer of these songs easily recalls the melancholy style of late singers St Thomas or Vic Chesnutt. There is also something of Johnny Cash himself at his most introspective.  The songs that make up ‘Old Happiness’ are sparse acoustic strums that are as enchanting as they are simple. But don’t let the simplicity detract from the power that these songs offer.  The words that bubble to the surface (‘gasps of air like cold rocks in my chest’)  on lead song ‘Old Happiness’ add weight to the recordings. This is beautiful music with a huge beating heart.

A number of guest back up vocal appearances from Tiny Ruins, Craven Canary and Ana Franco add a smidgen of light amongst the shade. But rest assured, this light, flickers just briefly before you return to the comforting shade.  The last record that I loved that sounded this bleak was Tompaulins master work ‘Into The Black’.

I think Johnny Cash would have been proud to hear this singer sing these songs.

Links:  A Singer of Songs | Underused Records

Golau Glau have come a long way in a short time.   Their first ‘release’ also happened to be the first free download that we put out under our ODD NET imprint back in July last year.  To say that since those humble beginnings that they got some notice is something of an understatement.  With mentions in Dazed and Confused magazine and countless plays across Radio 6 and Radio 1.  They also seem to be in demand as remixers at the moment.   Whilst ODD NET was not responsible for their continued rise, I like to think the early support from ODD BOX helped a little.

Over the past few months I’ve not been able to keep up with their ‘Arianna’ project.   This is simply a name given to a whole bunch of songs they have recorded and put up on the internet as free downloads.  Today has been a day for catching up with this and bizarrely their Christmas single ‘Fooltide’ and I am happy to report that the rush of excitement that I felt when hearing their first recordings ‘Soft Silver Young’ and ‘Heartland Half Seizure’ is still there.  As a band they give very few details away.   I think they are duo.  I think they’re from Wales but with connections to Yorkshire.  All of this curiosity is render irrelevant when you start listening to the wonderful sounds they make.  You are instantly transport to a world where their silverpop is all that matters. This is some of the best electronic pop being made at this moment in time.   It’s got a little edge and you sometimes wonder where the hell are they taking their sound, but at their very core Golau Glau make beautifully glitchy pop music.  The imperfections are what makes it human and not some dull electro reproduction.  This music has Soul.  Heart.  Feeling.

Golau Glau have a host of songs to download from their website.  Including the cracking ‘Virtual Boy’.   Dive in and when you are deep in the world of Golau Glau remember to come up for air, occasionally.

Links:  Golau Glau |  My Space

‘Magick Carcass Ride’ is a woozy yet perfectly formed nine song LP by Land of Blood and Sunshine, a duo from Marshalltown, Iowa.  Over the course of the nine songs you are taken on a trip through all that is exciting about good pop music.  Songs swhirl and flutter and a darkness seems to hover just beneath the surface on many of the songs here.  All this swhirling and fluttering  is propelled by proper songs that you could hum along too.

I’ve only had ‘Magick Carcass Ride’  for a little less than a day and it’s one of those records that starts off in a rather low key manner.  The songs seem to be floating by, in the background, and only just pricking the surface of your attention.  But somewhere in that first listen a spell is cast and ‘Magick Carcass Ride’ is one of those records you want to play again the second it comes to an end. These repeated listens are what reveals the pop treasures within.   If I was forced to offer a glib description of the sound that LOBAS make  – I’d call it off kilter pop music. Moods swing from serene to panicked.  Beats mingle with delicate guitars and fuzzed up vocals to delicate vocals with fuzzed guitars and gentle electronic sounds.  The closest recent find that I could compare LOBAS too would be Jumbling Towers.  This LP stands up all on it’s own.   The magick that the band manage to conjure on songs like ‘Tale of a Tapeworm’ and  ‘Depth of Charm’ is that of purest kind.  This is a captivating album.

Links: Land of Blood and Sunshine |  Very Nice Dementia Records

Ok – no in depth ramblings this time around.  This is all about quality bands that I’ve recently found over on My Space.  To say this is a fertile time for kick arse guitar music is an absolute understatement:

Deserters Deserve Death (Edinburgh, Scotland)
They call the sound they make ‘death jangle’.  Think female fronted lo-fi take on The Jesus and Mary Chain.  Or Skywave.  Or a less abrasive Manhattan Love Suicides.

Helicon (East Kilbride, Scotland)
Talking of the Mary Chain – here are another pair of brothers from East Kilbride.  This time we have shimmering drone rock a-la The Warlocks or Lovelust.

French Kissing (London, England)
More of that wonderful garage lo-fi beat pop.  They’ve got a 7″ out on Sleep All Day Records.  ‘Oh Suzanne’ is a mighty fine pop moment.

Outdoor Miners (Edmonton, Canada)
They’ve a 7″ single out on Pop Echo records.  With a shimmering guitar sound that is sometimes fast and furious, other times a little more gentle.  Good stuff either way.

One Fathom Down (London, England)
Think Man or Astroman.  That’s top quality instrumental surf meets metal.  I saw them a few weeks ago.  They were very good.  Their cover of Judas Priests’ ‘Breaking The Law’ is a mighty fine thing.

The Magic Words are easy to remember.   They have big bright songs.  They have bigger and brighter melodies and they have guitars that crash along like all your favourite bands.   I was taught one magic word as a kid.  It was ‘Please’.   And if I can use it just one more time today – it would be simply put at the start of sentence begging for these Magic Words to release something.  As it stands they have 3 ‘demos’ on their My Space and a song on a compilation that is no longer available and split cassette with The Vignettes which I can’t seem to find a link that works to buy it!

Enough of my pop frustrations at not being able to get my paws on their stuff – we should really concentrate on glorious pop tunes -  ‘Babe Don’t Be Blue’ is a poppy take on lo-fi garage rock.   It’s also one of the best songs I’ve heard in ages.    The other two songs for streaming  thrill me in much the same way.  This is some of the finest and freshest guitar goodness you are likely to feast upon any time soon.   There are so many good bands hitting their stride at the moment – but I rank The Magic Words up there with the best of the best new bands doing the rounds.  Think Spectrals, The Brilliant Colors, Crystal Stilts and Dum Dum Girls.   On three short songs the band have managed to capture my heart.

Link:  My Space

Edit: The compilation that I could not find to buy is not released until February 2010.  Silly me.  And the split cassette is not yet released yet.  Phew!

Monkey vs Robot are a new band from South Carolina in the USA.   They have got an 8 song ‘demo’ for download over on Punkrockers.com.  No, I’d never heard of the site before. It seems to be a My Space type site for punk rockers.  I think I might have to dig around over there some more if it manages to throw up stuff as good as this.

Monkey vs Robot are a lovely blend of lo-fi punkyness and catchy tunes.   Take references like The Ramones through to current upstarts No Bunny and add a dash of charisma into the mix with some fine melodies and you are onto a winner from the off with this duo (or are they just a one band – it’s hard to tell from My Space and Punk Rockers).   Influences are said to be alcohol, cigs, midgets, happy pills, 80’s toys, go go dancers, B movies and mind control.  So if you can follow where that leads you’re probably thinking they’re worth hearing.   And yeah, they are.  And yeah, they’re fun.  And yeah they a little dumb.   But sometimes punk rock just has to be that way.

Links:  My Space | Punk Rockers

Cloud Nothings is for recording purposes one man.  That man is Dylan Baldi.   ‘Turning On’ is the first release by Cloud Nothings that I have stumbled upon and it’s released on the rather wonderful CDr/Tape label, Bridgetown Records. Cloud Nothings are a quintessential lo-fi bedroom recording dream.   Super sharp songs are given a woozy lo-fi treatment.  Everything about the record is just out of focus.  I can similarities with another lo-fi charmer, So Cow, in these recordings.  I am sure Cloud Nothings have probably never heard So Cow before.  But both ‘projects’ are shooting from the same place – armed with killer songs and a headful of great ideas.

This whole CD comes in at a little over 25 minutes.  And the 8 songs veer from the uber catchy ‘Can’t Stay Awake’ to the slightly trippy ‘Hey Cool Kid’ – but the whole thing is under pinned by some rather fine songs. Bridgetown Records releases tend to be very limited so it’s worth snapping up a copy before they’re all gone.  I think this release comes on Cassette as well as CD.

Links:  Cloud Nothings | Bridgetown Records

2009 was a funny year for me.  Indiepop wasn’t  hooking me in as often as it had during the previous few years.  Instead, I was falling for the raw and rawkus garage fuelled pop nuggets that seemed to be bursting out every other week from America.   In the midst of all this I got to hear (and later see) Standard Fare for the first time.   And despite my renewed love for those 60’s driven beat groups from the  USA,  Standard Fare were my POP HIT of last year and their split single with Slow Down Tallahassee has had it’s grooves seriously warn down over the course of the year.

This new single ‘Fifteen’, again on Thee SPC, is set to lay a marker down early doors for single of 2010.  ‘Fifteen’ the song, is pop perfection.   Emma Kupa’s voice is one of those beguiling things – powerful, fragile and totally mesmerising and yet it still manages to be one of the catchiest songs you are likely to stumble upon, this or any year.  Hiding within the grooves is a darker song about wanting someone who is under-age.

Standard Fare have a sound that could loosely be described as a cross between old school British indie and US college radio indie from the 80s.   That’s not to say that they sound American, the don’t.   But if you were to meld together indiepop with sounds that American bands like  Throwing Muses and early REM made you could well be a bit closer to fathoming how Standard Fare make sounds so deceptively simple sound so damn infectious.   The B side ‘Understand’ is a gentler number and it shows that the band have more than one string to their bow.   I can not wait for their début LP to be released – lucky for me (and you) that ‘The Noyelle Beat’ will be out in March.   Good times.

This 7″ single is out now on Thee SPC and it comes pressed on beautiful blue vinyl, too.  You really want to get one of these.

Links:  Standard Fare | Thee SPC