Another Form of Relief

The Young Knives seem to be a band that want to have fun, something quite rare when it comes to bands these days. Their songs obviously have no desire to be serious, and their stage show is (or at least was) littered with random self-depreciating banter throughout. Although when you appear to have John Hodgman in your lineup, what else can you expect?

Of course, all of this could have changed for all I know. Being as up to date as I am, the last thing I heard from them was 2006’s Voices of Animals and Men. Maybe they have taken a turn for the serious since then, but it seems unlikely. The Young Knives as their whimsical selves fills a whole that isn’t already filled by every other “indie” band. This will never be music that forms a classic album, but it can certainly make a fun one.

Here we are at my first end of year listings as a blogger. It’s all very exciting and all, and I’d like to think I’m doing things a little differently. There will be absolutely no album list anywhere on this blog. This is because I don’t tend to listen to albums anymore. Yes, I know this makes me some kind of charlatan, but I may as well be honest about it. I’m all about the quick burst of the song these days. As such, over the next five days, we’ll be running down my favourite 49 songs of 2006. Now, I know this list isn’t perfect. There’s probably a bunch of songs from 2005 in here too, but if I only discovered them for whatever reason in 2006, they made the list anyway. Seeing as this is a lot of songs to write about, I’m only going to cover some of them. On others I will just use the original comments I posted earlier on in the year. Not that it really matters, as it’s the mp3s that people want, not my rambling comments. Anyway, I now present Another Form of Relief’s first annual Top 49 Songs of the year:

#49
The Victorian English Gentleman’s Club
‘My Son Spells Backwards’

Website
Myspace

“Cumbersome name aside, this three-piece from Cardiff are putting out hyperactive music that falls somewhere in between new wave, punk and electro pop. Their music jumps all over the place, and yet it’s still all alarmingly melodic and catchy, the kind of thing that wouldn’t be out of place on a number of Pixies albums. ‘My Son Spells Backwards’ is so catchy and cheerful you probably won’t catch on at first that it’s all about a special needs kid. Clocking in at under two minutes, it’s an incredibly efficient little ditty, not wasting even a second of the song. It jangles, it rocks, and it features that favourite of mine, duelling vocals. This was included as a b-side on their last single, given an indication of how solid their material already is if this can be spared as a secondary song.” – originally posted April 10.

#48
Odeon Beatclub
‘Take It Off’

Website
Myspace

Odeon Beatclub are another band to come off of the production line for great music that is Glasgow. Having spent time supporting the likes of Snow Patrol and Babyshambles, they are building quite a cult following in their native land, and if there’s any justice in this world, that will spread south of the border too. There’s nothing all that new to be heard here, but for solid, catchy songs, you don’t need to look any further than ‘Take It Off’, their single from earlier this year.

#47
The Foundry Field Recordings
‘Buried Beneath The Winter Frames’

Website
Myspace

Isn’t it perfect that in the same year as Grandaddy decide to call it a day, their natural successor seems to appear out of nowhere? Of course, that is a little unfair on The Foundry Field Recordings, but there is certainly a hell of a lot of Grandaddy in their sound. Their album was full of the kind of randomness that made that band a joy, and while ‘Buried Beneath The Winter Frames’ may tone down the eccentricities, it’s probably their most catchy and accessible song.

#46
Pants Yell!
‘Your Feelings Don’t Show’

Website
Myspace

I used the term “dorky charm” when I first wrote about Pants Yell!, and that term seems to sum the band up far more concisely than anything I’d be able to write in this paragraph. A delightfully simple tale about running into an ex-girlfriend and then wondering in the back of your mind whether the meeting was an accident or not, but being far too spineless to actually ask if that was the case. Pants Yell! have an entirely catalogue of songs like this, and singling one out for this list was pretty hard, but ‘Your Feelings Don’t Show’ just about manages to edge the others out.

#45
Beeches
‘Sin Nombre’

Website
Myspace

I discovered Beeches earlier on in the year when they sent me some of their music, but it only really clicked with me how great they are once I saw them live a little while later. These guys know how to put on a hell of a show, giving their songs even more life than they already have on the recorded versions. I even had the honour of having them play at Another Form of Relief’s first promoted gig in December, where they put on a fantastic set, even if not many people were there to watch. Like a lot of great songs, ‘Sin Nombre’ didn’t really grab me immediately, and it was only after several listens to their CD that it won me over. I still couldn’t really tell you what it’s about, but it certainly sounds good.

#44
Battle
‘Tendency’

Website
Myspace

“We may as well get the lame comparisons out of the way now, so yes, Battle do sound rather like Bloc Party, particularly on ‘Tendency’. Please don’t let that put you off though, as it sounds like one of those rare good Bloc Party songs. The guitars jerk all over the place, the bass drives and the drumming keeps it all in line. All this while Jason Bavanandan belts out words in such a manner that it sounds like it could actually be physically painful for him to do so. This adds to the urgency of the song though. As for the song itself, it’s a suitably downbeat tale about how crappy life can be at times. “I know I dance like a drunken arse / Every weekend, it’s my only vice / Let me drink myself to death / To forget about the rent” asks Bavanandan, sounding as if it’s what he really wants to do. Ultimately though it’s a love story about loving a girl, but knowing that it’s probably not going to work out as it only really goes one way. I like the whole realist point of view this gives the song, rather than the usual optimism or complete pessimism that usually appears in songs of this nature.” – originally posted June 27.

#43
Nathan Asher & The Infantry
‘Turn Up The Faders’

Website
Myspace

“‘Turn Up The Faders’ is hands down one of the best songs that I have heard this year. It also confirmed exactly what the comparisons had promised: somehow this young, unsigned band had a sound that evokes both Bright Eyes and Springsteen. Asher’s vocals are very similiar to Oberst’s, partly shaking yet also full of power. He drives through the song with such urgency that you’d think that lives depended on it. This is supported ably by some excellent instrumentation, including a fantastic piano breakdown toward the end of the song that could have come straight off of ‘Born To Run’.” – originally posted May 19.

#42
The Amateurs
‘Things You Only Know If You Don’t Drive’

Website
Myspace

Delightful twee pop from Edinburgh that would be far too easy to compare to Belle & Sebastian. With male-female vocals and a truckload of cute little references, it’s just a joy to see British bands actually trying this kind of thing. The song itself is exactly what it says in the title: all about how buses come in groups and what shoes to wear in the rain. It runs out of steam a little bit before the end, but it’s still so wonderfully catchy that it’s impossible to ignore.

#41
The Young Knives
‘She’s Attracted To’

Website
Myspace

The Young Knives seem to get a lot of flack, but I think they are one of the best of the current crop of “popular” British bands. Of course, me being the unaware person that I am was entirely oblivious to them until I was dragged to see them at a festival in August. They won me over very quickly though, putting on a great high energy performance, which included this song. It’s probably not their most developed song, but it’s the one that I enjoy the most. A simple tale about liking a girl but hating her parents, it’s just a hell of a lot of fun.

#40
Math & Physics Club
‘Darling, Please Come Home’

Website
Myspace

“‘Darling, Please Come Home’ builds on the promise of last year’s two EPs, bringing us a simple tale of a lost love. Nothing here will sound all that different if you’re already familiar with twee pop, but the point here is that MAPC are as good as, if not better, than any other band working in the genre at the moment. It’s percussion is steady, the guitar work gentle and Charles’ vocal manages to somehow be incredibly restrained and while still emotive. If this is an indication of the rest of the album, we could be looking at one of the best of the year.” – originally posted October 5.

Feel free to join me again in the coming days as we’ll be counting down ten songs each day with the final nine being revealed on December 30.

On sunday, I, along with a couple of friends, attended my first music festival. This may seem pretty strange for someone who writes a music blog, but things like festivals are in short supply in this corner of the country. Earlier on the year, I read about the Electric Gardens Festival. It’s a new event, a two day specialist festival covering dance and electronica on the first day and more traditional indie rock fare on the second day. It shouldn’t take a genius to figure out exactly which day we attended. As such, early on sunday morning, we set off on the short drive to Canterbury in an attempt to find the festival site. A bunch of random country lanes and a ton of dirt tracks that aren’t great for a car of my size later and we’d arrived at the festival.

We got there about an hour before the first performances so we decided to explore the festival site, discovering that there wasn’t a great deal to it. A small area held the second stage and the tiny Myspace tent as well as the overpriced food and drink areas, and a short walk led us to the hill where the main stage was located. Not many people seemed to make it in time for the start of the event, meaning we were able to sit pretty much where we liked to view the main stage, awaiting the opening performance from The Boy Least Likely To.

The Boy Least Likely To played to an initially pretty dead crowd, but as the performance went on, people moved closer to the stage and began to warm to them. They actually seem genuinely happy to be there too (the band, not the crowd), joyfully babbling away between songs and talking about how they don’t really know Kent. This led to one of the band members (Peter) announcing he was actually from a town nearby leading to the band asking if anyone happened to know him, but sadly no one did. They played a few songs I wasn’t familiar with, but also the standards like ‘Be Gentle With Me’ and their now obligatory cover of George Michael’s ‘Faith’.

MP3 The Boy Least Likely To – Be Gentle With Me (expired)

During their performance I spotted Kate Nash in the crowd, so once they finished playing, we headed over and had a little chat with her. Annoyingly, she was playing the festival, but she played on the day before, meaning that once again any attempt to see her play had been thwarted. Anyway, she was very polite and apologetic about missing the Beacon Court show a couple of months ago, and even gave us free badges. Which was pretty awesome and the only thing that was free at this festival. Which leads us to the food situation. We were starting to want some food by this stage, so headed up to the food tent, and discovered that each “meal” was £5 (though reduced from £7!). When I say “meal”, in reality I mean a crudely put together burger or some slop in a tray. You could also wash this down with a £2 bottle of Sprite from the Ukraine, or some other foreign country that I couldn’t quite identify. Now this may all be standard for those who regularly attend festivals, but it was a bit of a shock to the system for me.

Following our food we wandered over to the second stage (in reality, a circus tent) to catch the peformance by Absentee. We were a little early so ended up catching the end of a set by Findlay Brown. I hadn’t heard of him or his music before, but I quite enjoyed what I heard, even if he was a little too Ryan Adams at times. It was perfect music to sit and relax to out of the sun though, and enough to make him look in to him a little more. Once he finished, Absentee arrived on stage, and spent an absolute age setting up. This wasn’t their fault, nothing seemed to go right for them, and they eventually ended up starting over halfway into their allotted time. Even when they did, the set was still plagued with technical problems. The vocals were too low, and the bass was so strong that it actually made the ground shake. They tried their best, but combined with a non-responsive crowd, it was hardly the perfect performance.

MP3 Absentee – Something To Bang (expired)

After this, it was time to head back to the main stage to see The Young Knives. Neither me or Joe were familiar with them, but Hiren kept talking about how good they were, so we made our way to the front of what was quite a large crowd to see them. I didn’t know what to think when three guys who looked even dorkier than me hit the stage, but they quickly won me over with a bunch of catchy songs and impromptu joking between the songs. They gave it their all and seemed heartened by the number of people that had turned out to see them. I don’t really keep up with what’s popular these days (I sound so old like this), but I can see these guys becoming another of the current crop of successful British bands very quickly.

MP3 The Young Knives – She’s Attracted To (expired)

Wandering around the site, we then spotted Melinda and (I think) Laurie from Absentee, so we proceeded to harass them as well. They also turned out to be very polite and down to earth, happily chatting about the festival in general, which bands to see and, somehow, university courses. It was after this that everything decided to go a little pearshaped. We headed back to the circus tent to see Adem, although I’m still not entirely sure why. Anyway, I started to feel a little ill a bit into their set and quickly progressed into full blown asthma attack mode, which I guess is the result of a day of sitting on grass, baking to death and being surrounded by smokers. Either way, it meant my festival day was over, meaning we left before we got to see the final run of the Electric Soft Parade, Battle and Brakes in the Myspace tent. Which was incredibly annoying as I particularly wanted to see the last two. I guess if I do though, it’s going to have to be indoors or something.

So what did I learn from this weekend? Mostly, that festivals don’t do me a great deal of good. While seeing a bunch of good bands in one place was awesome, the disorganisation of it, the overpriced and crappy food combined with the fun medical issues outweigh that by a hell of a lot. Which kind of sucks, but it’s something I’ll have to deal with. Looks like it’s back to my once a year indoor show or something now then, yay!

Edit: More Electric Gardens coverage can be found at Delete as Appropriate and Jukebox.