GOURMET — STONE COLD STEVE AUSTIN

⌾ LISTEN TO GOURMET, STONE COLD STEVE AUSTIN ⌾

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Self-proclaimed maker of "spaghetti pop", the Cape Town-based Gourmet inducts us into a syrupy and psychedelic tribute to WWE star, Stone Cold Steve Austin. Well, tribute or not, much of the song — also named 'Stone Cold Steve Austin' — is spent with a vocal refrain that begins "Stone Cold Steve Austin..." It's wrestler-heavy, but it's not about wrestling.

It's just part of the idiosyncratic nature of Gourmet's music. A lyrical mosaic, stream of consciousness in style, the spoken word lines are unaffected, unpolished, and remain a refreshing strolling vernacular of a vocal.

Similarly, while decidedly modern in its undertaking, with its minimalist appeal and spacious production, 'Stone Cold Steve Austin' dips heavily into the hunny pot of the past, Gourmet also namechecking Michael Jackson as the track gloops onward in a groove, in a galaxy of its own.

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• 🔔 'Stone Cold Steve Austin' by (who calls it "intercontinental left-field pop music") is taken from his Peace Forever Seaside Senegal Castle EP, released by Baketown Records. You can get it on Apple Music among other places.
• 🔔 Update: There is also now a 'Stone Cold Steve Austin' video.

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📠
☟ Gourmet Internet Presence ☟
facebook ⚘ soundcloud ⚘ instagram ⚘

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🐣 GOURMET — YELLOW

How so few elements can create such a luscious soundscape, yet here we are, a cradle of minimalism becomes this lavish tapestry of sound. The drums tumble thud and shimmy shuffle with kicks and clacking handclaps seesawing beneath sprinkling shakers, the whole roly-poly of it organic and breathy on the background of silence, a stark and basic binary where each percussive gambol is a 1 to absence-of-sound's 0. These are the wonderful foundations of 'Yellow' by Cape Town's very own Gourmet—atop these buttresses sit turrets and towers painted with wonky wah-wah synth chords that ring out with hollow iridality in patterns of innocence and playfulness.

In the midst of these half-triumphal quasi-brass hits, the vocals of Gourmet seem to spill out in a profound procession of detail and cryptic mentions that make this quite an abstracted stream of consciousness, the dry matter-of-fact tone in the voice adding to the humour and oddball hat-tips as they accrue collage-esque (much like the track artwork) throughout the track, snippets such as "you're blonde, that's unlikely" and specificities like "small hands, gluten-free spaghetti lad" as well as the hook that speaks of "cyan, magenta, yellow's such a boring word"—high on wordplay.

By the end it's a sudden sultry list of alliterative allusions to sex, "fingertips unzip clitoris lips and flickering anxiousness…" as synth bass pulses like a heavy heartbeat, disappears, gives way to more soft percussion as the vocals continue breathless, descending peals of synth like the jubilation of wedding bells, the scattered mutterings of nervous youth leading up to this crescendo of cloistered coupling that all awkwardness dreams of.

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• 🔔 'Yellow' by self-proclaimed "Spaghetti Boy" and musical entity Gourmet is out now courtesy of Cape Town record label, 1991.

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📠
☟ Gourmet Internet Presence ☟
facebook ⚘ soundcloud ⚘ instagram ⚘ spotify

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CLUBFEET ACAPULCO & LA [FREE DOWNLOAD]

Hello hi. Apple juice is not often purchased by me but when it is purchased it is rapidly consumed. Do you also find that? But this is neither here nor there. Sorry, it's music time isn't it. Here is something new. It's called 'Acapulco & LA' and it's by a band called Clubfeet.

They are from both Australia and South Africa at the same time - I'm not sure how that works out. As in, which members of the band are from which countries I don't know, so I apologise for that. Their first album, Gold on Gold, released in 2010, caused quite a stir and they've been kinda popular ever since. Perhaps not on such a global level but certainly in their respective mother countries, sure. Oh I just looked at the press release. Yeah, I was right. They're a "critical and commercial hit" in Australia. Too right as well. They have some nice tunes.

One such is this one, which they are offering to fans and non-fans alike on their SoundCloud page - 'Acapulco & LA'. As soon as I saw the title of this one I just thought of sub-tropical party fun and, listening to it, I wasn't wrong. It's a damn party song. It sounds already like an indie-dance classic. Yep, with that intro of ambient synth roaring like distant waves, jungle noises, and a gently calming, simplistic guitar melody set to a driving beat, you know what you're getting into.

Soon there are some truly delicious sounds - hollow synth melodies and the undeniable jolly cool that comes with a xylophone exposure. Xylophone chords, as well. Truly chilling yet heartwarming on the most basic level ever. Surely the xylophone is like one of the oldest instruments. Always is like someone playing bones or something.

It's a dancefloor number that should find its way into many indie-wired clubs in the future. It just oozes that beach party sound, with the added personable appeal of knowing that a five-piece band has created the track - somehow, it just is more personable. As with this kind of music, it's emotional, too, often going with the easy heartbreak that can occur in the darkness of a club environment - lover's tiffs and rifts in relationships haunt these places like the scent of alcohol-soaked carpets itself. As such, there's emotional lyrics, such as, "You broke my heart and now I'm lost forever" and the catchy pop-hook of "I lost another beat of my heart" with the support of ahh-ing backing vocals.

Nice. Keeping that indie-disco flame alive with a nearly 90s-dance twist, 'Acapulco & LA' can be downloaded for free and comes from Clubfeet's second album, Heirs & Graces, which is out now.

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