No limit to our love

Oh my God, it's only a bloody album review...


Feist - The Reminder

Lock a woman in a room with some emotions and some instruments and you’re only ever going to get the sort of utter dross churned out by the likes of Katie Melua, right?

WRONG!

One woman with lots of emotions is Feist (her real name is Leslie). She’s got lots of instruments too. Alarm bells should be ringing already but fret not - the good news is that Feist has somehow managed to combine the instruments with the emotions (and the name Leslie) to create what must be one of 2007’s best albums, ‘The Reminder’.

Quite frankly we’ve been known to throw albums out of the window if they have the temerity to dip below 100bpm, but this one is totally different. Like Patrick Wolf’s ‘The Magic Position’ before it, ‘The Reminder’ burns with passion (and sounds like it), even in it’s slowest and most stripped-back moments.

And like ‘The Magic Position’, there are enough Pop Moments to keep you hooked with an interest bordering on devotion. Witness ’Sealion’ suddenly ignite after two minutes; ’1234’s sweeter-than-Prozac chorus or the whole of last single ’My Moon My Man’ and it’s obvious you’re listening to what is basically one of the year’s best pop albums, despite the fact it contains no pop music whatsoever.

Crazy Foals

Remember the disappointing moment on Patrick Wolf’s last album when, during the intro to ‘Bluebells’, it turned out that instead of “Lucy, remember the smell of that foal”, Patrick was actually saying “the smell of that FALL”?

Well everyone can stop crying because now there is a band ACTUALLY CALLED Foals.

Here they are:



Naming your band after the word for an animal’s young is nothing new - who can forget Shoat - but Foals bring something different to the table of mammalian nomenclature.

Let’s have a look at some of the ‘things’ they ‘bring’ to the ‘table’, shall we?

> Jerky rhythms that take a few seconds to sound right.
> Different people singing different things at the SAME time.
> Bleeps (don’t worry parents, they’re not swearing - the bleeps are ‘electro‘!)
> Choruses.
> Varying haircut success.

Foals are a bit like labelmates The Young Knives in that they make Indie Music You Can Dance To; however, they are quite unlike The Young Knives in the sense that they’re actually a bit interesting, and don’t dress like primary school teachers or look like Timmy Mallet.

They list ‘techno’, ‘Nelly Furtado’ and ‘cycles and structures and loops’ among their influences. We’re not sure what they’re getting at with that last one but it is safe to say that it probably doesn’t have anything to do with building a stunt run for your BMX.

Foals are playing gigs all summer and are probably worth seeing if you feel like spending the first minute of each song working out how best to dance to it. If that’s not your bag, the least you can do is get over to MySpace and listen to some of their songs. They are very good.

Further information about foals can be found here.

Further information about Foals can be found here.

Spinning Around

Unklejam - What Am I Fighting For?
Unklejam’s last single was horrible, but this - the latest in 2007’s trend for songs that sound like they’re from the past and the future at the same time - is sublime. If there was any justice this would be a definite top-five single, despite the ridiculously brisk fade out.

Q Lazzarus - Goodbye Horses
Age-old melancholy electro of the sort that most resembles an icecap melting inside your heart. It’s fair to say this is quite beautiful, if a little hammy.

Tiesto - Adagio For Strings
PUT YOUR FUCKING HANDS IN THE AIR, etc.

Goldfrapp
Were quite good, weren’t they?

Mika - Love Today (Patrick Wolf Remix)
Or the simple act of turning the worst record of the year so far into something quite considerably better. This is completely bonkers, just like Patrick himself.

Groove Armada - Out Of Control (Song For Mutya)
This week we are especially enjoying how the bridge basically consists of Mutya having a conversation with herself about how she should probably calm down and drive safely.

Better late than never...

Patrick Wolf - The Magic Position

Regular readers will know that we love Patrick Wolf, but did you know that Patrick Wolf loves love?

At least that’s the impression he gives on new album, ‘The Magic Position’, a collection so bursting with romantic optimism it makes you want to reach into the speakers and take it out dancing.

It opens, appropriately enough, with ’Overture’, which is basically what the London Philharmonic would sound like if they employed podium dancers as part of their setup. The gleeful genre-mashing continues on former single ’Accident & Emergency’, where Patrick treats us to some R&Bindie of the highest order.

The songs here are littered with references to love lost and found, not least the title track, a romantic ditty which breezes along like ’Come On Eileen’ doing cartwheels at a sports day. Similarly, ’Get Lost’ (“darling these days my favourite view is you”) is so cheerful and hook-filled it might just be the truly amazing song that The Polyphonic Spree never actually got round to writing.

With this album, Patrick has crafted a genuine yet modern-sounding take on the subject of love, building on the poppier moments of his previous work. “Let me put you in the magic position”, he sings on the title track. Rest assured that by the end of the album you’ll very much be there. If ‘the magic position’ means ‘the mood to go and skip through meadows with the girl or boy of your dreams’, that is. Brilliant.