Don’t Miss A Beat is here to recommend five tracks a week. Rather than being a standard ‘five new tracks you must hear’ it will comprise a selection of music that fall into five categories.
There will be a new track and older track in some way related to the new track, a track from a recently released album, a track somewhat related to the week just past, and a track by an artist playing in Manchester in the coming week.
New Track: The Babe Rainbow – Aloe Vera
Melbourne-based independent label Flightless, run by Eric Moore of King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, specialises in putting out the best of Australian psychedelic music.
The Babe Rainbow are one of the bands on the label that have albums due out either in late 2015 or early 2016, and Aloe Vera is the first single to be released from their forthcoming debut LP.
Elastic bass lines and woozy guitar, accompanied by the occasional presence of a sitar, make up the band’s signature sound.
Fantastic for fans of King Gizzard and psychedelic bands found on the Heavenly label in the UK.
Old Track: The Murlocs – Control Freak
The Babe Rainbow’s label-mates The Murlocs share some members with Flightless founders King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, and are another staple in the Australian underground psychedelic music scene.
Singer and harmonica player Ambrose Kenny-Smith’s blues harp ensures that this band stick out. Control Freak is the opening track from the band’s 2014 album Loopholes.
It’s great from start to finish.
Track from album out this week: Alex G – Kicker
Philadelphian Alex G released his album DSU in 2014 to critical acclaim.
This week he followed it up with Beach Music, his first to be released on Domino.
This album sees a similar, home-spun approach to songwriting with his usual recording quirks and interesting song-structures.
Kicker is the latest single from the album, and shows Alex G at his best.
The end of the song, where things start to settle into a groove, is a particular highlight.
Track relevant to this week: John Cooper Clarke – Beasley Street
October 8 was World Poetry Day. What better way to celebrate it with Manchester’s very own, much celebrated bard, John Cooper Clarke?
Beasley Street is one of his most celebrated works, and featured on the album Snap, Crackle and Bop, produced by the legendary Martin Hannett and released on CBS in 1980.
The poem is about poverty in the streets of Salford, and the depiction of marginalised families struggling to make ends meet makes the song relevant to this week in more ways than one, with the Tory Party Conferences having taken place this week.
Gig to see: Du Blonde – Black Flag
Having shed the old moniker of Beth Jeans Houghton & The Hooves of Destiny after releasing just one LP, Newcastle-born Houghton has since returned with a new sound.
Adopting a more aggressive approach to her music, Black Flag owes more to hard rock than the psychedelic folksiness of her old material.
The album Welcome Back to Milk was released in May this year on Mute records.
She plays the Deaf Institute on October the 11, and her charismatic live performances really are something worth seeing.
Tickets here: http://www.seetickets.com/event/du-blonde/the-deaf-institute/863410
