14 Tracks: Not Not Not Not Fun

1 Maria Minerva – Unchain My Heart
2 High Wolf – Dream Is Good
3 Peaking Lights – All The Sun That Shines
4 Psychic Reality – Elle / Elle Beat
5 Cuticle – Flair
6 Pocahaunted – Riddim Queen
7 Ensemble Economique – Red For The Sun
8 Xander Harris – Tanned Skin Dress
9 Pedro Magina – Shout In Your Face
10 Swanox – Cross The Water
11 Gypsy Treasures – Tadpole Walks Home
12 Holy Strays – Waves
13 Sex Worker – Without You (Couldn’T Be Alone)
14 Deeep, The – Mudd (Grand Am Version)

LA's Not Not Fun is an incredibly prolific label dealing in all manner of outré psych, synth and noise music. Both NNF and their 100% Silk sublabel are lovingly curated by Amanda Brown (LA Vampires/Pocahaunted) and Britt Brown (Robedoor) whose tastes run the gamut of esoteric underground sounds from a rhizome of artists across the globe. With over 250 releases (and counting) on vinyl, cassette, and digital, they've shaped a parallel hypnagogic reality where masticated memes from Dub, '70s psychedelic rock, Kosmische, '80s MOR pop and '90s dance music converge under the protection of gauzy tape noise and distortion. The label's resolutely Lo-fi stance is commendable, but never feels forced. It's more that they represent this scene as it should be, with dilated ears, a sincere sense of psychedelia and implacable intent. In our selection we've largely drawn from their recent diversions into Pseudo-Pop and soundtrack-y themes, featuring many taken from their super-limited cassette releases. OK, yeah, we're a bit jealous of their eternal optimism and über-cool LA disposition, but when the music's this good, we'll get over it...www.boomkat.com

Baikonour - Your Ear Knows Future

1. Intro
2. Shikharettes & Кhukuris
3. Chiru
4. Fly Tiger
5. Double Happiness Wholesale
6. Ye Ama Piooo!
7. Tombahead
8. Summer Grass / Winter Worm
9. Look...Wa!

The second long-player from Brighton's Jean-Emmanuel Krieger, Your Ear Knows Future marks a sharpening of his skills at whittling prog and krautrock influenced instrumentals. For this album, Krieger handles all instrumentation bar the drums, which are deftly helmed by Fujiya & Miyagi's Lee Adams - undoubtedly a sympathetic ear to the Baikonour cause. So many artists have a stab at appropriating the unique sound palettes of bands like My Bloody Valentine and Cocteau Twins, but there are points on this album that come closer than most: 'Chiru' seems to meld the sonic hallmarks of these two touchstones of '90s indie sound sculpting, revealing a blissfully textural onslaught of effects-drenched guitars. Elsewhere 'Tombahead' has a close run-in with the sound of early Air, while the chorused twang of 'Double Happiness Wholesale' drifts off into the horizon via a swathe of glistening arpeggio passages. Lovely...www.boomkat.com

The Rakes - Klang

1. You’re In It

2. That’s The Reason
3. The Loneliness Of The Outdoor Smoker 
4. Bitchin’ In The Kitchen 
5. The Woes Of The Working Woman
6. 1989 
7. Shackleton 
8. The Light From Your Mac
9. Muller’s Ratchet 
10. The Final Hill 

Not, perhaps, the sort of thing that I write about here very often, but The Rakes always sounded round these parts as one of the best bands to emerge from the whole post-Libertines/post-punk/Britpop Nouveau thing of a few years ago. They seemed to have a fair bit more wit and interesting angles than most of their contemporaries, and maybe a healthy affinity to Elastica.

Continued...

That said, I can’t pretend to remember much about The Rakes’ second album, so the arrival of their third didn’t initially cause that much fuss. It’s really good, though: it’s called “Klang!”, possibly due to it being recorded in the band’s new hometown of Berlin. “Klang!”, however, is not much like Krautrock, being instead a lean and determined reiteration of the Rakes’ skills: choppy riffs; bug-eyed social observation; very short songs.

“Klang!” has ten songs, the longest of which comes in at less than three and a half minutes. The titles are pretty good value in themselves: “The Loneliness Of The Outdoor Smoker”, “Shackleton”, “Mullers Ratchet”, the last of which apparently refers to a genetic disorder which manifests itself in asexual populations and is not the sort of thing you get dealed with so catchily in, say, a song by The View.

And as something like “That’s The Reason” belts past, the infectious bristling economy comes across as a neat rejoinder to the new Franz Ferdinand album, where their schtick seems so tired and needy. The price of success, maybe: if “Tonight: Franz Ferdinand” finds a band so anxiously trying to cling on to fame and overcompensating as a result, “Klang!” showcases one unburdened by any such expectations.

Frankly, The Rakes’ time of hipness may have past, but the quality of these clipped dispatches – and the unglossy punch bestowed on them by Les Savy Fav producer Chris Zane – suggest a longevity uncommon in British bands of their generation. The best thing of many good things here is a song called “1989”, a roisteringly nostalgic knees-up which may have something to do with the fall of the Berlin Wall, which faintly resembles “Hong Kong Garden” with its gothic portent replaced by something at once blokey and somehow cerebral.

Everything flies past in a blur, but occasionally you catch Alan Donohue’s blurry narratives through those precisely ringing and strutting guitars, that mathematically chundering bassline. In “Shackleton”, he seems to be comparing himself to “Harry Hill on happy pills”, and though I’m fairly sure there’s more erudite references in here, that one sticks out this morning. Good record...www.uncut.co.uk

Faust - C'est Com... Com... Compliqué

01. Kundalini Tremolos
02. Accroch‚ Tes Levres
03. Ce Chemin Est le Bon
04. Stimmen
05. Petits Sons Appetissants
06. Bonjour Gioacchino
07. En Veux-Tu des Effets, en Voila
08. Lass Mich, Version Originale
09. C’est… Com… Com…. Compliqué

The Bureau B label breaks into new territory and presents a newly-recorded album by Krautrock legends, Faust. "There is no group more mythical than Faust." Thus wrote English musician and eccentric Julian Cope in his classic of the genre, Krautrocksampler. Which says it all really -- neither the habitus nor the music of the six-piece Hamburg group is easy to grasp. Formed in Hamburg in 1970, some lauded Faust as the best thing that ever happened to rock, others dismissed them as shameless dilettantes. Their collage of Dadaism, avant-garde rock and free improvisation radically divided opinion. Their legend was built on the fact that, in the early days, they addressed the media through their producer and manager Uwe Nettelbeck. Precious little was known about the musicians themselves. When the first LP was unleashed on the world in 1971, Faust were very much the prophets in their own land, as the saying goes: few were interested in listening to their music -- in Germany. Not so across the Channel: this is where Faust's career really kick-started. These monoliths of avant-garde rock sold a phenomenal 100,000 copies of their third album The Faust Tapes, one of the first releases on the Virgin label, then in its infancy. Now that Krautrock has been revived, Faust have become one of the biggest names to drop, worldwide. Their concerts in the USA, Middle East, Japan and Europe invariably sell out. Almost 40 years since they began, Faust are issuing a brand new studio album. Original members Jean-Hervé Peron and Werner "Zappi" Diermaier were joined in the Electric Avenue studio by Amaury Cambuzat (from the French post-rock combo Ulan Bator). Star indie producer Tobias Levin recorded. The results sound fantastic! Typically Dadaist lyrics (mostly in French) accompany repetitive, sporadically overflowing patterns. Faust's music combines seemingly contradictory elements: it rages, yet is gentle; it is monotonous yet melodic, earthy and still ethereal. Safe to say, it is unique. The Bureau B label have previously concentrated on re-releases and compilations, but presented with the opportunity of releasing new works by Krautrock gods Faust, the only possible outcome was to say YES....www.ear-rational.com