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Now that London Popfest is out of the way, it’s time to turn our attention to this year’s Indietracks festival, which will take place 23-25 July at the lovely Midland Railway Centre in Derbyshire. Last year we covered the event quite extensively, and this year will be no different. Previews of the bands in the run up to the event, followed by reports and a shit ton of photos of the weekend itself. I’m not exaggerating when I call Indietracks the highlight of my musical year. Where else can you get a non-stop indiepop while surrounded by (and sometimes on!) steam trains?
Rather excitingly, the first band announcements are now out, giving us our first 24 bands that will be playing the festival:
Highlights for myself amongst that lot include Allo Darlin’, Ballboy and Standard Fare, but there’s a lot there already that I’m looking forward to. A number that I’m not familiar with that I look forward to getting acquainted with too. No word on any headliners just yet, but announcements seem to be coming thick and fast now, so hopefully we’ll have more soon.
Update: Of course, mere hours after I post this, 8 new additions have revealed: Internet Forever, Pale Sunday, Burning Hearts, The Hillfields, La La Love You, Stars in Coma, Springfactory, Urbantramper.
Indietracks Website / Blog / Twitter
It was two and a half years ago that I first discovered Roadside Poppies, when they were release 001 on the Weepop! label. I really liked that release, particularly the title track from it, Cycling and Crying. Since that time though, I haven’t heard a great deal about the band at all. If I’m honest, I’d actually forgotten all about them.
This past weekend though I stumbled across their Bandcamp page, which had a new three song EP, Live at Chateau Blanc, available on it for free download. That said, this isn’t a full-band release though, as helpfully explained on the page itself:
How do you do a live EP in France with half the band in Denmark and the keyboard player in Cambridge? Easy- play all the instruments yourself and make it sound as Danish as possible
The funny thing is that it doesn’t seem to make much difference to the sound, so read what you will into the creation of indiepop from that. It hardly matters though, as I’ve Just Been Told That a Woman Fancies Me may be my favourite indiepop of the year so far. It’s literally what it sounds like, a joyous celebration of the fact that a woman seems to like him, despite the fact he knows absolutely nothing about her. Why let pesky details like that get in the way? That we end up with lines like “I can’t wait to tell my girlfriend” makes it all the more perfect.
All three songs from Live at Chateau Blanc can be downloaded for free from Bandcamp.
So much music, so little time. Which you means you get three songs at once. Lucky you.
Cop on the Edge are a band I could very easily hate depending on my mood when I discovered them. Their music is loud, rough, and if I’m honest, occasionally annoying. Summer Games II though is a pretty catchy little song. I’m not sure if I could stick a whole album of this, but as a short, sharp shock to a system that has spent a weekend listening to bands in cardigans, it kind of works.
Bad Veins don’t do anything spectacularly original on Gold and Warm. It’s almost straight up indie rock, with solid melodies, just the right amount of distortion and the odd musical flourish when it can get away with it. It’s all done incredibly well though that it doesn’t really matter if there’s not much new here. Bad Veins are a band precisely of the time and I wouldn’t be surprised to see them become rather popular.
I’ve been aware of Thao Nguyen for quite a while now, but it’s only really now that everything is clicking for me. With her awkwardly named three-piece band, Thao with the Get Down Stay Down, she now seems to be finding her sound in slightly off-kilter folk rock songs. The band’s new album has just been released, and I’m very much looking forward to hearing it all.
This past weekend was my first experience of London Popfest, an annual event that aims to bridge the gap between Indietracks’ for indiepop kids. Taking place over four days in deepest London, the world’s finest indiepop bands descend on tiny venues to “indiepop ’til we drop“. For various reasons I only made it to the Friday and Saturday days of the weekend, but the weekend still managed to be the highlight of the year so far.
Friday // Buffalo Bar
What a tiny, tiny venue. Little more than a square room with a stage on one wall and a bar on another, it’s amazing just how packed the place quickly became. I’ve been into some cramped venues before, but the torturous “trek to the toilet” that I endured here may have been the worst. Still, any negative feeling there was quickly countered by the music itself. The Sunny Street provided some decent melancholy pop to start. I wish I could say more about it but the sound was a bit crappy where I standing. Moving to a new spot for Horowitz massively turned me around on them. I’d been familiar with them for years but they’ve never done much for me. Their set was tight and punchy though, and I’ll definitely be exploring their album(s?) some more. Up next, The Garlands brought some Swedish flavour to the festival, including somehow even getting away with a Wham! cover. Headliners The Just Joans opened with their excellent Hey Boy…You’re Oh So Sensitive!, which was useful as it’s the only song theirs I really like and allowed me to duck out a bit before the end before the heat and volume in the Buffalo Bar finally destroyed my head completely.
Saturday // 100 Club
I hate going to the 100 Club. Not because I have anything against the venue itself. Indeed, it’s actually a nicely laid out venue, everything being sideways with a stage in the middle meaning everyone gets a decent view. My problem with the 100 Club is it’s location. Being right in the centre of Oxford Street, there is literally nowhere to park anywhere near it (short of paying something ludicrous per hour in an underground horror movie set), particularly for an all-dayer. It’s fine for Londoners and their public transport and all, trying to get back to Kent at god knows when from central London without a car is an absolute bastard. That aside though, I did enjoy the fact that from Oxford Street itself, the most recognisable shopping street in the country for locals and tourists alike, you could hear indiepop blasting out of the doors for much of Saturday. Probably didn’t win any new fans, but the thought of random Japanese tourists being assaulted by the sounds of Allo, Darlin’ as they walked past amused me no end.
Walked into the place during Plouf!, had a quick drink and walked back out again in search of Forbidden Planet round the corner instead. Nothing against Plouf! in particular, but they just aren’t really my cup of tea. Arrived back somewhere toward the end of Red Shoe Diaries who seemed pretty good and made me regret disappearing for so long. Oh well.
After that began the perfect triple bill of Soda Fountain Rag, Standard Fare and Allo, Darlin’. Soda Fountain Rag was perhaps the most surprising of the three. I loved (and posted about) her brilliant Don’t Kill The Clowns back in 2008, but when I listened to some more songs, they didn’t seem to match up. Live though, it’s a different matter altogether, the end result being one of the most consistent sets of the weekend. Standard Fare seem to be on a meteoric indiepop rise at the moment. Seemingly coming out of nowhere over the past year, they managed to absolutely own their set, and seeing them headline such an event by next is by no means out of the question. Allo, Darlin’ are one of my favourite bands from the past year, and seeing them live was joyful. I’m convinced that they can’t make a song that isn’t catchy as hell, and rousing renditions of the superb Henry Rollins Don’t Dance and The Polaroid Song did nothing to argue with that view. Newer songs like Dreaming and Kiss Your Lips fit just as well, the latter even managing to sample Weezer’s El Scorcho, something that will instantly endear it to popkids the world over.
Not much was going to compete with that combination so it was time for a nice walk up and down Oxford Street after that, leading to an indulging in Burger King and trying to work out where the hell the light shining on Centre Point was coming from. Never did figure that one out. Wandered back into the 100 Club to see most of Shrag’s set, which was a pleasant surprise. I’ve never been much of a fan of their recorded output, but their live set was pretty damn fun. Following them were the wonderful Ballboy, taking their rightful place as headliners. Opening with the mighty Avant Garde Music, they ran through
a mixture of old classics and newer material. Sadly I missed the last bit of their set due to requiring a tube back to the car parked across the city. From the half I did see though, they were certainly one of the most professional bands of the festival. And I’m not just saying that because Gordon McIntyre told me to.
Please find below a lovely gallery of photos that are in black and white to look arty, and certainly not because I suck at taking decent pictures in low light.
MP3 Airport Girl – The Foolishness That We Create Through Love Is The Closest We Come To Greatness
With London Popfest coming up in just a few days, it seemed prudent to familiarise myself with some of the bands on the bill that I didn’t recognise. One of these was Rob Price, who is also the front man of Airport Girl, one of those bands that has been around for years yet I’ve never noticed. Thankfully that has been rectified now though, with the wonderfully awkwardly titled The Foolishness That We Create Through Love Is The Closest We Come To Greatness. It’s not just the title that’s long either. It’s a rare indiepop song that manages to run over six minutes and never outstay it’s welcome.
Myspace / Fortuna Pop!
MP3 Operator Please – Logic
I really enjoyed Operator Please’s single Get What You Want a few years ago. It was a fun, punchy little number that got straight to the pop. Logic doesn’t seem to work quite as well. There’s nothing really wrong with it, it’s just a little too plodding for my tastes. A lot of other people seem to be liking it though, so maybe it’s just me.
Myspace
MP3 Pale Sunday – Shooting Star
If I was asked to tell you what country Pale Sunday came from, I’d probably get it wrong. I’d likely lean toward the US, the UK, or for an outside bet, somewhere like Sweden. Somewhere like Brazil wouldn’t even cross my mind. I’ve never really considered South America as somewhere indiepop would come out of, but Pale Sunday are seemingly doing their best to change that. Jangly guitars and harmonies are the order of the day here. If you’re familiar with other bands from the Matinée stable (Northern Portrait, Cats on Fire etc.), you know exactly what you’re getting here.
Myspace / Matinée Recordings
I’ve been listening to Flamboyant Bella for a few days now and really can’t make up my mind on it. The fact that the first impression I got was “this is what Kate Nash fronting a full band would sound like” didn’t really help matters. I like Nash and all, but her songwriting certainly appeals over her voice. Anyway, Flamboyant Bella have a nice, airy sound to their music that does ultimately work, so I think I’m coming down on the side of like. It’s actually kind of perfect as summer music. Shame that it’s January.
Us Kids is out now directly from the band’s website.
It was only a few months after I discovered And What Will Be Left Of Them?, a very noisy yet very good band from Worcester, that they decided to break up. I didn’t really expect to hear much more from them after that. Suddenly this gem dropped into the inbox though, and in the course of a couple of minutes manages to run rings round the mighty AWWBLOT.
Lost Boy Scout is the one-man band of Peter Adams, who was the “chief shouter, song writer and guitar hitter” in the previous band. He apparently intends to release four albums this year (the result of a drunken bet naturally) and if this is anything to go by, it’s going to be a hell of a journey.
The first of the four albums, Stag, is out now on PopArt London.
I largely missed the Sambassadeur bandwagon up until now. I was vaguely aware of them and discovered a few songs in my music library, so I must have stumbled across them to at least some degree. By and large they went right over my head though, which is slightly odd as they seem to be my kind of band.
Days is the lead single from the band’s upcoming third album, entitled European. It’s a wonderfully orchestral journey that evokes the same kind of Swedish indie pop joy that one gets from bands like Irene, or even more local contemporaries like Camera Obscura. It has a big sound to it, which can easily be too much for this kind of music, but it’s self-assured enough to know how to make it work.
It’s about time I head back through those previous Sambassadeur albums I think.
European will be released on February 24 via Labrador Records.
Nirvana may be one of the laziest bands I’ve ever heard. Releasing a bunch of material between 1989 and 1994, they then started falling back on easy releases. Live acoustic shows, a singles collection, a box of rarities, a live set at Reading have all appeared in the years since. I’m sure it’s great for fans, but it seems to be taking the piss a bit to put out this same stuff over and again. You’d think after fifteen years they’d finally have that fabled fifth album ready, but it doesn’t seem to be anywhere in sight. Guns N’ Roses will put out another album before these guys at this rate.
Continuing to dredge out old material, we have a reissue of the band’s debut album, Bleach, which is somehow twenty years old at this point. It’s never done a great deal for me if I’m honest, but nor has much of Nirvana’s output. I think that maybe I’m a couple of years too young to fully “get” the band. It’s the same reason the Pixies are largely lost on me. Don’t get me wrong, I like both bands, but they’ll never be held in the same regard as Weezer or Pavement and the such. All that said, I do like About A Girl, mostly because I was won over my the MTV Unplugged version of it, but the original is pretty damn good too.
Great British Hopes features the very best bands that make us party like it’s 2011. Oh yes.
Now this is my cup of tea. You play sceptically through tons and tons of mp3s by bands that don’t do very much, and then one will make you sit up and go ‘wow’. Granted, my standards for that aren’t that high. Sound vaguely like Pavement (or a bunch of other 90s bands) and you’re already halfway there. Sir Yes Sir are far better than one lazy comparison.
This is guitar rock just the way I like it. Sloppy sounding through the verses, laced with distortion through the choruses. It jumps about all over the place, in both time and sound, and it’s all the better for it. A wonderfully punchy two minutes from a band I expect to hear a lot more of this year.
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