STACK #143 Sept 2016

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MUSIC NEWS

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INTERVIEW

GLASS ANIMALS

A ‘60s-sophisticated siren, a lady in a muumuu with a walking frame, a devastated waitress, and a lost little boy in a bomber jacket: these are a few of the characters we’re introduced to through the videos accompanying Glass Animals’ new album HowTo Be A Human Being . Each of them has their own song, and each is a composite of real, “bizarre people” the band met during tour travels. “We started hearing all these amazing stories,” says frontman Dave Bayley. “My memory’s terrible – I have no memory. So I started recording them.” He found it a startlingly smooth way to write, both lyrically and musically. “You essentially write a theme song for this person,” he says. “The writing happened so quickly, like a week and a half, two weeks. This time around we were particularly keen to keep it quick – we didn’t let it get bogged down.” Bandmate Drew MacFarlane nods in agreement as Bayley adds, “I think there comes a point where you lose that initial spontaneity that you had, and that’s when it starts to degrade what you’re doing.”

Amongst the electric tribal feel that we adore about this Oxford four-piece, we also get a return to that very specific vocal style best typified by the chorus of Outkast’s Bowtie : the principal melody is sung by one main vocalist, while a whole lot of lower voices follow and eddy around the bottom like a circus assembly. “I got interested in doing that crowd vocal thing from, I think, live stuff – listening to live recordings with a full, massive crowd singing back to you, you get that effect,” Bayley says. “There’s like some beefcake in the front row, and a little kid as well… what we actually did is put everyone in the same booth around one microphone. We got Ed to sing as high-pitched as he could, Drew to sing like a crack addict, Joe to sing like a little kid.” Fitting, considering the character theme of the record. “Yeah! All characters, and they sing together, and you do that five times. You get this huge, raw stack of

vocals. It’s like people partying on a street. We were in New Orleans and there was that kind of atmosphere: parades going around and people singing together in these big groups.” There are several stand-outs on the album, but one favourite moment is Dave’s absolutely loopy guitar solo at the end of Take A Slice . It sounds like a sexbot freakout, and Drew likes that description. “Joe and I just told Dave to do it about ten times,” he says, laughing across at Bayley. “We said ‘Go more mental,’ every single time. It was brilliant.” “Me at my most shreddy,” Bayley wryly agrees.

How To Be A Human Being by Glass Animals is out now via Caroline.

FACTOID: Pumeza Matshikiza sang at the wedding of Prince Albert and Princess Charlene of Monaco, in 2011. The Princess grew up in South Africa, Matshikiza's home country.

S outh African soprano Pumeza Matshikiza remembers the specific terrors of the apartheid regime, and the demonstrations which contributed to its end in 1994 – tear gas and plastic bullets are part of her childhood memories. But the effervescent vocalist also remembers her joyfully supportive teachers and contemporaries; it was composer Kevin Volans who bought Matshikiza a plane ticket to London, so that the young singer could audition at the Royal College of Music – after which she was awarded a full scholarship. Her album Opera Arias is a collection of favourites from the many operatic productions in which she has bloomed. PUMEZA MATSHIKIZA

WHAT'S THE STORY? We have a look back at the fascinating tales behind some of our favourite album covers. This month: Merriweather Post Pavillion, Animal Collective (2009)

H ow does one visually communicate an innovative, metamorphic, beautifully eccentric sound? That’s the conundrum in front of Robert Carmichael in early 2009, as he puts on his Art Director hat for Animal Collective’s album M erriweather Post Pavillion . A long-time mate of the experimental Maryland four-piece, Carmichael looks to the work of Japanese psychologist Akiyoshi Kitaoka, whose studies in

Opera Arias by Pumeza Matshikiza is out now via Decca Classics/ Universal.

visual illusions and perception had won the scientist several international accolades. Inspired by Kitaoka’s pieces Rollers and Irrigation , Carmichael comes up with a pattern of cascading leaves which appear to undulate gently. Merriweather Post Pavillion becomes one of the top-selling independent albums of 2009.

© Simon Fowler

SEPTEMBER 2016

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