STACK #128 Jun 2016

RPM

MUSIC

R EVOLUTIONS P ER M ONTH

Belters, Must-Hears, Assorted Musical Wonders and Other Curiosities

I t’s tempting to lazily tag Jamie Smith (AKA Jamie xx) as the latest wunderkind. But both his production track record (Radiohead and Florence remixes, the honour of re-working Gil Scott-Heron’s final album) and the thrilling nature of new solo album In Colour mean the epithet fits. One third of UK band The xx, Jamie spent three years completing this love letter, of sorts, to the better elements of England’s dance scene of the last 25 years. By no means simply a disparate collection of strong ideas, In Colour is best experienced from start to finish – because it’s an energised, assured and compelling rush that should beguile, engage and exhilarate anybody with a genuinely curious ear and an eye on new directions in music. It’s also a quintessentially, and quite deliberately, British record. Jamie bathes proudly in fragmented strands of UK dance Jamie xx In Colour

culture, dipping into everything from post-jungle dissonance to urban soul, scattering disembodied samples of English street and club life throughout. But what makes In Colour really captivating is the ease with which it skates around clichés; it’s a skillfully- danced tightrope between the soulful and the melodic that avoids overloading the empty spaces, and talks to those who live the experiences of the culture it comes from. It’s a real music lovers record, about being who you want, if only for a night. Opener Gosh is all clamouring, scattershot, rhythmic clatters and threatening bass before a tide of over-arching keys (that may, gently, remind you of The Clash’s Straight to Hell) give way to Sleep Sound, a vaguely bucolic step and shuffle best heard on headphones. See Saw ups the rhythm and the ante with a tasteful house feel, as The

xx’s Romy Madley-Croft makes her first of two guest vocal turns. Just Saying is a perfect mid-point: it’s the drift in the ears at dawn after that big night – when next you wander deserted streets at sunrise, here’s a soundtrack. The dank bass textures and sirens of Hold Tight summon classic UK electro (a touch of Orbital), while Loud Places will be an anthem (Romy’s other guest spot is a star turn; the refrain is a rush, and an earworm). But it’s Oliver Sim’s beautiful vocal turn on Stranger in a Room that sums up In Colour, his voice hanging in the song’s delicate space:“You want to disappear in a crowd/ just a stranger in a room/ change your colour/ just for the night.” It’s got a digital heart and an analogue soul: a dance record few will move to, but a captivating journey through pure music to be enjoyed. Jonathan Alley

Nutshell Verdict Love letter to last 25 years of dance music, still sounds like now STACK Picks Stranger in a Room, Loud Places (Remote Control/Inertia)

Leon Bridges Coming Home

Rolling Stones Sticky Fingers (Deluxe)

Nu Yorica Culture Clash in New York City (reissue)

Bootleg bores have doubtless been smugly aware that the wrong version of Brown Sugar kicked off the Stones’ nastiest album in

New York has been a historically pivotal city for music, from jazz to folk, punk rock, hip hop, house and electro. The town’s sharp edges come from its taut urban geography and long-running cultural diversity. In 1995, London label Soul Jazz released this compilation of Latin-influenced music that had erupted in NY in the ’70s from the large communities of Cuban, Puerto Rican and Dominican musicians whose irresistable cross-cultural blend took inspiration from Africa, Brazil and the Caribbean. Criminally out of print for a decade, this must-own collection is an explosive look at genuine cultural phenomenon, and comes with a re-mastered audio and 35-page booklet of in- depth liner notes. (Soul Jazz/Inertia) Jonathan Alley Best Coast California Nights They’ve got close in the past, but on album three, this Cali duo have finally struck the perfect balance between the lo-fi jingle jangle of Brit popsters like The Primitives and Lush, and the glossier girl pop of compatriots such as The Bangles and The Go-Go’s. As with their previous Crazy For You (2010) and The Only Place (2012), California Nights is awash in ridiculous, catchy melodies and sun-kissed harmonies, but there is a joyous new confidence to Bethany Consentino’s vocals, and a gleam and swagger to multi- instrumentalist Bobb Bruno’s buzzsaw riffing. However their love of the original C86 bands still shines through, particularly on the bratty thrash of Heaven Sent and the bittersweet grandeur of the closing ballad Wasted Time. Some long time indie fans may cry ‘sell out’, but with pop hooks this good, who’s complaining? A most welcome ray of sunshine for winter months. (EMI/Universal) John Ferguson

1971. The live ‘Keef’s birthday’ studio take with Eric Clapton and Al Kooper tearing it up is one of the priceless nuggets unearthed in this third, non-chronological, Deluxe Stones reissue series (see recent doorstop editions of Some Girls and Exile …). A more ramshackle leer at Can’t You Hear Me Knocking is similarly electrifying and a ringing acoustic take of Wild Horses highlights Mick Taylor’s plucky harmonics and Jagger’s unembellished vocal. Much of the rest is live: two strung-out and filthy gigs from Camden and Leeds just ahead of the Stones’ legendary French exile catastrophe. As for the re-masterpiece itself, well, somewhere between the sinewy snarl of Bitch and the opiated drift of Moonlight Mile is an argument for their Best Ever Album that will probably rage over spilled drinks and

If the Harry Highpants slacks, patent leather loafers and non-ironic cardigan don’t tell you where Leon Bridges lives, check out the song titles. Yep, they’re on the front cover, which means we’re heading back to the classics. Percy Sledge and Sam Cooke are obvious touchstones within the first 30 seconds of Coming Home , an unapologetically vintage-styled immersion in the sweet spot where gospel dips its hip to soul. The kid from Fort Worth has all it takes, sliding his fine- grit tenor around soulful pleas to this lady or that while his band – skinny black ties and Ray-Bans almost visible though the reverb – echoe against the naked bricks. In Lisa Sawyer , the grandson of a preacher man bolsters conviction with a potted family tree harking back to ‘63 (mmmm, ‘63). The clincher is River , an almost acapella hymn clearly recorded around a single microphone. Kid can dance, too, they say. Watch out. (Sony) Michael Dwyer

blown amps for all time. (Universal) Michael Dwyer

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