STACK #124 Feb 2016

MUSIC

NEWS

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A Quick Look at New Music,

All Different Kinds, All Different Places.

Get to Laneway and have your mind blown this year! Here are three STACK picks and releases to discover: Future Islands Synth-pop has made something of a triumphant return in the past decade (more dance, less angst than in the ’80s), and this Baltimore-based trio are at a peak right now with their fourth album Singles ending up in numerous ‘best of 2014’ lists. The lead-off track and single Seasons (Waiting OnYou) sets the tone for sweeping synth-pop. They’ll snuggle in neatly alongside Belle and Sebastian – and in your record collection alongside FineYoung Cannibals, if you have a long memory. Belle and Sebastian A decade ago, this band – whose clever and literate pop songs quietly insinuate themselves into your brain and music collection – were voted Scotland’s best band by their countrymen. And since then, they’ve just got better.You could start your listening as far back as The Boy with the Arab Strap (their third album earned them a Best Newcomer Award at the Brits in 1998), or come more up to date with the fine The Life Pursuit (2006). But they have a new album out – Girls in PeacetimeWant to Dance – a week before Laneway, and with its danceable songs, which nudge into electro-pop, expect quite a number from it on the day. FKA Twigs Debut albums don’t come much more impressive or consistent than LP1 by Tahliah Barnett (akaTwigs, and latterly FKA Twigs), who brings erotica, r’n’b soul and a choral sound (true) together with smart beats, electro-soul and some redefining of the possibilities of studio production. Music this clever and innovative doesn’t come along often, but you do wonder how it can be shaped on the day. That’s why we have Laneway! STACK ’S Laneway Picks

carl barat Lets it Reign

C arl Barat remains a Libertine at heart, and a key member of the now infamous English band who recently signed a new record deal and announced a third album to be released in 2015. But for the moment, he’s concentrating on his other grand passion: The Jackals, a grandly hard-rocking ensemble he formed to record a new album, Let It Reign. “I’ve pent up so much frustration throughout my previous solo album being so mellow,” he tells STACK outside a Soho restaurant in the depths of the English winter, “ I really wanted to get out there and pick up the guitar again. The album is kind of in your face; I did want the live sound and I did want that immediacy.” The mood to which Barat refers comes partially from one Joby J. Ford of The Bronx and Mariachi El Bronx, who helped produce the album. “Hardcore is as hardcore does in these sorts of situations,” laughs Barat. “I love Mariachi El Bronx as well and I saw them live. And without knowing all the songs, just what they did live was... I can totally see why they’d elicit that reaction.” The album’s lead single, Glory Days, has

certainly garnered some on-line attention, directed by Barat’s longtime friend Roger Barlow (and featuring a cameo from Baxter Dury), it depicts executions of supposed deserters in the British Army in the World War One trenches. “We read together through a good deal of cases of desertion in cowardice,” he says. “It was shell shock; dubious circumstances where people had been used as an example. And yeah, not one of them has been justified as actual cowardice, especially when the whole thing was based on superpowers and pride – bollocks really, nothing to do with the common man.” As for The Libertines, Barat has The Jackals, and bandmate Pete Doherty has Babyshambles. That said, the legend of The Libertines rumbles on with an album due by end of year. “We were never KISS. In some bands, the girls show you their tits. In other bands, they show you their poetry. We’ve always, absolutely, been the latter!”

Let It Reign by Carl Barat and the Jackals is out February 13 via Caroline/Universal

A biopic of the legendary guitarist was long overdue: unfortunately, unlike James Brown biopic Get On Up (out in March), Jimi: All Is By My Side does not feature any of Hendrix’s Jimi: All is by my side

original music, as the makers were unable to strike a deal with his estate (session man Waddy Wachtel instead handles the axe work). However, director John Ridley turns that into a positive, offering up instead a dreamy, impressionistic

account of a crucial year in Hendrix’s life which saw him move to London to launch his career. Outkast’s André Benjamin brilliantly captures the guitarist’s laid back charisma, and there are fine performances from the two British women in his life at the time: Imogen Poots as Keith Richards’ ex-girlfriend Linda Keith, and Hayley Atwell as Hendrix’s girlfriend Kathy Etchingham.

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