OLDTIMER [オールドタイマー] MY GIRL EP

Better late than never. It's a nice saying, especially for those who tend to do things later rather than sooner. Ahem.

A long time ago I came across a band from Japan called OLDTIMER - at that point all they had up on their SoundCloud page were a few live songs. But what was there sounded really good, brimmed with energy and all the like - just how GOOD live music should be. I liked it a lot, but there weren't any studio recordings. Then an EP appeared and they sent it over (air mail), for which I was really grateful. But then Yes/No Music tumbled and fell and lay there twitching...

... Fast forward a few months and here is OLDTIMER's My Girl EP in all its glory. It's full of promise and potential.

Starting at the start we have 'Caravan', an atmospheric and echoing track whose juddering guitars and clean drums wouldn't sound out of place at the end of the '80s, just outside Manchester. Spacey distorted guitars swoop in the background as the plucky bassline carries the song onwards and onwards. The break brings jangling distorted guitars back, sounding expertly 'Madchester'. Vocals are clean and unassuming, lending themselves to the aesthetic of the song.

The same vocals provide the hook in title track 'My Girl', with a lot of ooo-ooo-ooo'ing going on. This is a much poppier number - up-tempo, though still with the smack-you-in-the-face distorted guitars washing over everything. Just as with 'Caravan' the verses build to a peak where the chorus sits, providing the song with a rising/falling dynamic that feels nice on the old ears. There's a guitar solo in here that screams toward the end. It's a driving song, definitely. All you need is a road and some sunglasses.

Then, what a surprise this is. 'Slowly Decaying' is a veritable assault on the eardrums. Towering, endlessly clashing distorted guitar storms all around, almost like white noise. The vocals, soft and achingly plaintive, provide a huge contrast to the gigantic guitar. In the verse, though, guitars moan like low flying and jangle quietly off-balance. It's melancholy, slow, as shoegaze as you like. The drums crescendo towards the end, just what you want to hear: it's not a mad one till the drums are going mad too.

It's tantalising glimpse into what this band can do. Production-wise, they could go lo-fi - that's why I liked the live recordings so much, the raw nature of them suited the style perfectly. Other than that, it's a fine first EP - I look forward to the next.

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JAI PAUL JAI PAUL

It was more than two years ago when I first heard Jai Paul. I heard his song 'BTSTU' at this point - it was in fact released in 2007 - and it was a breath of fresh air.

Then there was nothing. A long void of nothing. And then like the old adage where you wait for one bus and then loads of buses arrive, he drops an album. Today, Sunday 14th April. How exciting! Maybe he saw the sunny (and warm!) weather outside and thought that it was just time to release it already.

Called nothing more than Jai Paul and with no songs with actual titles, aside from 'BTSTU' (Track 16), 'Jasmine' (Track 9) and a surprise cover of 'Crush' by Jennifer Paige (Track 7), it's a delightful foray into a mad and disjointed world of kooky electro pop.

At times it is muscle-bound and distorted, best heard in the clashing clatter of the synth in 'Track 10' and the heavier, more beefy parts of the magical 'Track 16' ('BTSTU' - such a tune; it even has its own Wikipedia page), as well as in the drippy waterfall blips of 'Track 2'; at other times, it is quite the opposite as in 'Track 9' ('Jasmine'), where the synth and beat create a conjugally gentle funk, in the smooth and rhythmic sounds of 'Track 3' with a great low, twisted horn-synth sound in there somewhere, and also in 'Track 7', which is a genius minimalist-funk cover of 'Crush'.

There's a guitar solo in that 'Crush' cover that reminds me so much of Prince that I can't help but think that Jai Paul might be a little bit influenced by him. There are yelps dotted around some of the songs that make me think much the same. But perhaps it's just wishful thinking. I got Prince on the brain.

The vocals, in fact, suit the at-times strange and off sounds of the album (like in 'Track 4', also in the weird samples - sounds like Ron Weasley - of the first song, and the monster attack of 'Track 8'), with a tone that's purposely unpolished, loaded with echo but filled with soul, too. Dreamy.

What else to say? It's a joy to listen to. It's all raw and exciting stuff. The man from Rayners Park, London has made a pulchritudinously squiffy and offbeat addition to the music world with his soft electro funk pop. So damn happy there's more than just a couple of songs floating around now - being signed to XL Recordings should mean only good things for Jai Paul.

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FIDLAR MAX CAN'T SURF // NO WAVES

Lots of nice music comes from where it's sunny and people can write songs about surfing and skateboarding and having fun on the beach. Have you ever noticed that? It's carefree and the same colour as the sun, kind of a white-yellow. Which is, like, the happiest ever colour. Cause it's the sun. There just seems to be an atmosphere of fairer weather, tanneder skin and funner lives in music that comes from these areas. Mainly I mean California. Los Angeles (sorry acronym fans) in particular. That's where FIDLAR are from.

Yes that's the one, FIDLAR - a four-piece band. What would you call them? Post-punk? Everything's post-punk though, isn't it? What a stupid genre name. My cat is post-punk. My kitchen sink is post-punk. Jesus.

Let's just say they're rocky and abrasive and if you like lo-fi distorted guitars and just as distorted whelping-yelping-shouting vocals, then you're in for a treat. Huw Stephens actually had them as his nice music of the week this week on BBC Radio 1, so I thought now would be as good a time as any - to be precise it was their 2011 song 'Max Can't Surf' that pricked his ears. Mine too. Probably yours also. If y'ain't'eardit yet, listen B.Lowe to the video for 'Max Can't Surf':

Betcha thinkin' "Whoa all the members of the four-piece FIDLAR look well the same!" But whoa there, don't worry, relax, it's Max, from the band, dressed as everyone else. It's good cause it's the title of the song, but also because it's just one FIDLAR on the roof. References.

As for the song itself, ain't it just peachy? What I like most about it is the complete contrast between the rip-roaring shouts of the verse and the relative melodiosity of the sing-song chorus, always with the scratchscreech of the guitars, which sound like they're being battered. The lazy rhythm of the whole song, in fact, and the don't-care-whatever guitar stabs in the verse - and a lyrical treatment of weed - give it this beach bum quality that you can't help but dig undoubtedly.

Then there's this, Summer 2012's 'No Waves'.

Whew. Fun stuff. At least, the video looks like it was jokes to make. It totally captures the vibes that they seem to be going for. Yeah that's right, vibes captured. Done. Just like a Pokémon.

I suppose you could call this the flipside to what I mentioned at the beginning, the not-so-fun side of surfy-beach living. Namely that when there's no fun to be had it isn't fun anymore. Hence 'No Waves' I suppose (no waves no surf). It's very different to 'Max Can't Surf', yet it has all the same elements: jagged guitars, unintelligible serrated vocals and... that's it. A pogo-sticking sugar rush of a song, contrasting the high-velocity-fun-meets-crushing-boredom message of the lyrics (where you can hear them). But I like it. I like it a lot.

Their debut album, FIDLAR, is out noooww.

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DAFT PUNK FT PHARRELL WILLIAMS GET LUCKY [TEASER @ COACHELLA]

Thanks to the world being like totally modern these days, an exclusive shown at Coachella (trendy in-the-desert type festival if you don't know) no longer has to be exclusive to just the people at Coachella. Which I'm sure is - or was - the point of showing it exclusively at Coachella.

Saw one clip of it on YouTube and thought well, if that exists, surely the song itself is somewhere. So I searched for it and all I found was about 20 different videos from different angles of the same teaser video that was shown at Coachella. Well exclusive innit.

In any case, it's a teaser for a new song from electro grandmasters Daft Punk's upcoming new album Random Access Memories. As you can tell it's called 'Get Lucky' and it also features Pharrell Williams - as far as I can tell, the new album is going to be a collaborative affair. Check the list of names out. There's a lot on the bill, including Nile Rodgers and Julian Casablancas, to pluck those fruits from my memory.

As for the song itself, wooee it's an instant classic. It's catchy with a catchy vocal hook, it's funky with funky guitars, and... well, what more do you want from a Daft Punk song? Danceable excellence. And with Pharrell singing, it's a silky smooth number that melts in the mouth - the aural equivalent, anyway. Mmmm.

You can pre-order Random Access Memories from the indefatigable Daft Punk by clicking on any of the words in this sentence. Excited.

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STRFKR BEACH MONSTER

This lovely ditty comes from STRFKR or Starfucker, if you like, and it's called 'Beach Monster'. Now that we have the obvious out of the way: what is Starfucker? can we ever know the true nature of Starfucker?

It's a band. From Oregon (USA, duh). And no, we cannot know the true nature of STRFKR. But why not? Well, like all good 'electronica' bands, they instantly have a varied and suits-all kind of sound. Like, your sister will love to sing along to them but you will rave to them. As interchangeable as their own shock-factor name and the capitalised, vowelless version of it (and their brief moniker of PYRAMID). And it's a distinct luxury only at the disposal of indie/pop/electro bands who surfaced in the later days of the 2000s - take MGMT for instance and compare Oracular Spectacular and Congratulations: WELL different.

Anyway that's all theory and conjecture and whatever. Better than me just writing omg heres strfkr with a new song copypastepressrelease. Well, maybe it isn't. Who knows? Let's just listen to the song, shall we?

It's from their 3rd album, out now, called Miracle Mile. I like it, in all its psychedelia-tinged pop loveliness. The whole Buddy Holly thing that's going on the video never gets old for me (I adore Weezer's 'Buddy Holly', what a great video) but as for the song itself, it's fab. The yearning faraway lo-fi vocals and that sitting-on-a-beach acoustic guitar lend themselves to a summery aesthetic that I'm either imagining (due to lack of sun in England) or that is inherent in this song. Probably the latter because it is called 'Beach Monster' after all.

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