Euros Childs - Situation Comedy

Bad day at the office and then I get home to find this waiting for me a few days ahead of its release date. A new album by Euros Childs.

I'm pretty sure that every record that Euros has been involved in, from the early Gorky's Zygotic Mynci releases through to his most recent 'experimental' release At The Dance, has brought a smile to my face. 

This is no different.

Things that made me smile:
It's on vinyl.
The front cover, with a grumpy Euros in front of a picture of him as a child with (I presume) his dad.
The gatefold sleeve - a still from the Tête a Tete video (see below)
The song titles - Ooh La Oona, Brides in the Bath, Holiday From Myself.
Sample lyrics: "I'm not going to dress up like your mother anymore".
And that's all before I've even listened to the music.

On first listen - and I'm writing this as I listen to it for the first time - it puts forward a convincing case for being his finest solo album. Piano led, but featuring a full band (including Laura J Martin on flute), the album is overflowing with melodies to die for and sugar coated with Euros's vocals - still one of the sweetest voices there is. Things come to an impressive finale when the beautifully stunning (or is that stunningly beautiful) Trick of the Mind floats by for 14 minutes.

Oh, and whenever I buy music direct from his National Elf website, I get a personal note from Euros (I presume he does this for everyone and he's not just singled me out as his überfan). "Hello Tim. Thanks for buying Situation Comedy. Hope you like it! Euros" it said. It made me smile.

R.Seiliog - Doppler

After blowing us away with his closing set at this year's Green Man Festival, R.Seiliog releases a mini-LP of krautrock doodles, which is the perfect companion piece to the new Cavern of Anti-Matter album.

A promising sign of things to come - please make it a full length album next time though.

Cavern of Anti-Matter - Blood Drums

Heading towards the top of the album charts anytime soon... Oh, hang on, it's a vinyl only release that hardly any record stores seem to be selling? It was always likely to be a niche recording anyway, but I suppose those of you who don't have a turntable or the will power to track this down are just going to have to trust me on this one.  Because this is a great album! The ideal companion piece to R.Seiliog's recently released Doppler mini album.

Following on from the "You Are An Art-Soul" EP (different versions of all those tracks appear here), former Stereolab man Tim Gane 's latest venture involves the band taking you through 16 tracks of loose jams, broken analogue techno, and post-krautrock bliss - or, as the text on the gatefold sleeve brilliantly states, 'black and white psychedelia'.

"Movin' on Static" almost makes you want to dance and "Dystopian Shopping Mall" sounds just like the music you would expect in a dystopian shopping mall - The Love Unlimited Orchestra collaborating with Throbbing Gristle. The whole thing sounds very much as you would expect from a Stereolab-related record.

Anyway, have fun tracking this down. It's probably a limited edition too, just to enhance its obscurity rating. Destined to become a lost classic.

Beautiful Rewind

And out of nowhere (other than a warning a couple of months ago that an album would appear out of nowhere)  Four Tet's new album, Beautiful Rewind, arrives on my doorstep.

First impressions? Beautiful. Lots of sampled female vocals so far.