in conversation with Married To The Sea

Early last month we reviewed the brand new EP from Liverpudlian four piece Married To The Sea, and to celebrate it's release today we got the band to answer a few questions for us...

Ok, let's get the most obvious interview question out of the way first, who are the musical influences that have shaped the group's sound?

Theres quite a range of influences throughout the band but some of the crossovers are Death Cab for Cutie, The Weakerthans, The Shins, Wave Machines, LCD Soundsystem, Wilco, Fugazi and anything that's poppy and from Sweden - Those guys really know how to write a banger.

When I was poking around the internet and doing my research I was greeted by a daily web-comic website after googling 'Married To The Sea', is this where you've taken your name from?

We also stumbled across that comic - its actually really good, but the name comes from the Wes Anderson film 'Rushmore'. We were trying to come up with band names for ages before settling on Married to the Sea - it seemed to be the one that caused the least tears.

I first got my hands on your EP for reviewing purposes in early February, how long have you been living with these songs for?

We have to admit we are quite slow in writing songs - we tend to have sketches of ideas bouncing around the practice room for a while before we settle into a definite shape.

With this set of songs, we had them for about a year or so, but it was only after getting together with mega producer Carl Brown, from Liverpool band Wave Machines, that the songs really started to come together. He helped us realise that you can't fiddle with a song forever, sometimes you have to just make sure the feeling and approach is right and then just make sure you're on fire in the studio. 

And presumably you're gearing up for future releases? What does your schedule for the remaining year ahead look like?

One of our favourite places to visit is Germany - they treat you so well over there and the audiences are so receptive to bands from the UK, plus they have a drink called 'Mezzo Mix' that is 50% Coke, 50% Fanta, so we'll be heading back over the channel later on in the year to top up our supplies.

Then later on in the year we'll be playing some dates in the UK as part of a rescheduled tour that was meant for March. We also have exciting plans afoot with the regular night we run in Liverpool called '10 Bands 10 Minutes' so watch out....

In my review I bandied around the name 'Snow Patrol', sometimes sneered at in musical circles.... Personally I think it's unjust, but what are your opinions? Have I slighted the band in any way?

Not at all - in fact i heard 'Spitting Games' when i was in a shop the other day and had forgotten how great that song is. I guess bands mean different things to different people - so if you think they're great, we'll take that.

Along with Cold War Love EP, March also sees the release of Batman vs Superman, are we now facing too many superhero movies year on year?  And where would you rather play on tour, Gotham or Metropolis?

As a band we are big fans of superhero films, but the idea of playing in those cities sounds a bit daunting. We'd probably get the tyres stolen from the van.... 

Unless we could convince Batman and Superman to join us on stage in a kind of superhero-supergroup? Then we could put both of them on the merch stand - they'd deffo make it hard to say no to a t-shirt...

Cold War Love EP by Married To The Sea is out now

Daniel Haaksman - African Fabrics, album review

previously published on glasswerk.co.uk


While we've made it through January but now seem living through February prepared to cower from the next potential mega-storm to batter British shores, there is light at the end of the tunnel... or at least a soundtrack to the journey through this meteorologically challenged tunnel that will help take your mind off broken fence panels, lost weather vanes and embarrassing battles in public with your umbrella.

This is a public service announcement, for your own safety and sanity, please bunker down in a secure holding and tune into the latest sunshine-blessed offering from Daniel Haaksman.

The Berlin based label-owner and DJ was brought to my attention with a high-tempo debut album helmed and released in 2011, previous to this Haaksman had been exporting some of the finest Baile Funk to the wider partying public, and it is reassuring to know that his musical flirtations with cultural diversity are still going strong, and that it is this passion for spreading 'world-music' to the world that forms the thematic backbone of this album.

It is possible to simply play this album from start to finish and only hear the music, to become lost in the rich musical textures that feel delightfully foreign to the common-or-garden Englishman, to feel compelled to move to the beats and the rhythms emanating from the stereo, but this is to only scratch the surface of the full ’African Fabrics' experience.

More than just an album to brighten up dark days and lively up your party playlists, Daniel Haaksman borrows from and translates South African pop music, Ugandan rap, Columbian guitars, Angolan kudora and Zimbabwean marimba into electronically paired productions fit for European consumption, and this is the driving factor that brings together all these richly diverse sounds that straddle a continent, yet to uneducated ears simply sound 'African'.

Five years ago the British-Nigerian artist Yinka Shonibare referenced the famous René Magritte painting “Ceçi n´est pas une pipe” when he declared that “A picture of a pipe isn´t necessarily a pipe, an image of “African Fabric” isn´t necessarily authentically African”, and it is with this mindset that Haaksman wove his own music.

Just as fabric or art that echoes a particular culture may have its manufacturing and distribution methods far removed from the geographical location that spawned it, so has the interconnection of the World Wide Web created a false approximation of what even enlightened souls would consider as authentically African music, homogenised and filtered as accessibility to diversity, Daniel Haaksman has created a new tapestry that pays homage to the originators, yet is self-aware in its own knowledge and strongly alludes to the fact that these new 'African Fabrics' carry a “Made In Berlin” label.

Released February 26th via Man Recordings

Married To The Sea - Cold War Love, EP review

previously published on glasswerk.co.uk

A trill synth relentlessly breaks down my defences as it thunders harmoniously through the title track, the first of three songs that make up Married To The Sea's forthcoming Cold War Love EP. Sprightly rhyming couplets pack a poppy punch reminiscent of early Phoenix, signalling that these lively Liverpudlian lads clearly know their way around a tune, and they have been paving the way to their fourth EP release with support slots for The Maccabees and the hotly-tipped Hinds and Gengahr, making for fine musical company to keep.

The wares on display are slim, but brilliantly concise. Two tunes that pop in the indie-est sense of the word, and one song to pull at the heart strings. Some people see mention of Snow Patrol as a dirty word, I for one am not one of them, and Save It For The Field has more than a passing resemblance to the output of Gary Lightbody's clan, a band that grew from independent roots on Jeepster to conquer arenas around the globe, and if that serves as a comparison in terms of musical quality then surely it is not a comparison to be sniffed at.

Save It For The Field is heartfelt, it is sparse, yet lushly orchestrated, it is both simple yet aspiring in its nature. It is certainly deserving in gaining Married To The Sea some welcome attention.

And with every listen, the two musical touchstones that I keep coming back to are Phoenix and Snow Patrol. Both bands that came up under the radar, putting out music long before the commercial and critical acclaim came their way, bringing along with it bundles of new fans. Both bands that knock out a rousing tune and can find their way around the more electronic elements of the musical spectrum. 

The first taste I had of Married To The Sea was closing track I Dreamed I Was Disappearing, and it perfectly embodies the career defining aesthetics of the two bands I choose to compare them to melded into one joyful indie-pop stormer, that even sat listening to alone I can already envision the infectious bounce of an audience, I can see the fists-pumping and feel the euphoric wave that suggests a perfect crowd-surfing soundtrack.

I'm keen to see where their ambitions progress from here and hope that fortune sees fit for these guys to emulate a heady climb up the musical career ladder.

Released 11th March 2016

Bang Gang - The Wolves Are Whispering, album review

The effortless Icelandic cool drips from the opening bars of The Sin Is Near as it shuffles with a glacial downbeat electro rhythm that, with the help of fellow countrymen Bloodgroup, shares more than a passing resemblance to the darkly majestic and almost undanceable music of The Knife. Setting this out as the standard-bearer of new album, The Wolves Are Whispering, seems a slight mis-step as proceedings unfold and rather than the chilling electronica that was first hinted at, Bang Gang instead is gingerly revealed to be something akin to Coldplay's cousin from Reykjavik as the following tracks, Out Of Horizon and My Special One, pile on the MOR guitars built for driving anthems and the familiar form of the piano ballad, creating a stark contrast with these well-worn FM radio staples.

 

The vocals lent to Silent Bite by Ladytron's Helen Marnie fail to inject any reasonable amount of interest to a plodding and uninspired rocker, but thankfully the album then commits another about turn with the concurrent trio of songs stating with Lonely Bird that sets a much sparser tone that reintroduces the atmospherics that had been trampled over by excessive instrumentation that feels unnecessary in these particular circumstances and are best left to those bands with ambitions of bounding across stages with enthusiastic energy.

As the album closes out with Wait By The Lake and the rousing We Will Never get along it feels that a far healthier balance has been struck between stereotypical indie bands and painting a hauntingly beautiful scene with all the aloofness and eruption of creative uniqueness that Iceland has been musically renowned for, and the strength of the songs themselves is glimpsed as reflections on the album are considered. At just nine tracks long, The Wolves Are Whispering is brief in comparison to most albums and yet I still find an entire third of it's running time to be ill fitting and jarring against what could have been a startlingly svelte and moving collection of songs, nothing that cannot be remedied by skipping ahead or the reshaping of a playlist, but when viewed as a whole it is a shame that I look upon this album and am moved to mourn its weaknesses rather than firmly stand by it and shout about its subtle strengths.

an appreciation of Justin Bieber like no other....

when posting my first video review last year I have had every intention of making it a regular occurrence...

unfortunately time constraints and the logistics of recording and editing were stretching my capabilities somewhat, I had the ideas but the limitations I bumped up against were outstripping my power to push ahead with vlogging projects.

then 4music's Vlogstar competition came along, a competition that would land the winner a whole new bunch of hi-tech equipment, why not have a crack at it?

in a video of 30 seconds or less you had to deliver upon your full potential, I checked out the other entrants to see the what I'd be up against... and time and time again I found I'd be up against the same things... straight to camera, blah blah blah, thank you...

my first crazy thought was to deliver a metal style review in a slipknot style mask, of course I left the whole thing to the last minute.... no time to make said mask, but i instead went with making a little extra effort, composing an accapella ode to Justin Bieber to be delivered in my best metal voice...

face paints, bare chest, screaming.... all captured through the lense of my smartphone.  It may not win me the prize, it may not even be picked as a finalist, but I'm sure it will stand out against the rest and I had a hell of a lot of fun doing it

Justin Timberlake - The 20/20 Experience Part 2, album review video

yes readers, we are now going multi-platform

here is a review of the brand new Justin Timberlake album, the follow-up to March's The 20/20 Experience part 1, for you to watch with your eyes and hear with your ears

it is our first attempt at this form of review, so please be kind



i'm planning for these video reviews to be a regular feature that sit alongside the writing, more likely to cover some of the higher profile releases that shall be coming our way over the next few months

any feedback is welcome, but like i said, please be gentle with me

Rizzle Kicks: and their part in the world of media's new slave labour

Hey you, youngsters!! You wanna join the shiny exciting world of 'Media'??

Well saddle up for what may well and truly be a slippery slope down shit creek without a paddle, or a paycheck!

I hope that others are likely to find an easier time of things than I have so far, and that everyone can land their dream job in a highly competitive market, but let's face it, a lot of people won't.

For too long I've meandered on the outskirts, quite content to do what I wanna do in my free time, and perhaps my life has happened at the wrong time, but it has given me a unique perspective on an industry that I wish would swallow me whole.

And perhaps the looming shadow of that nasty recession is still hanging over us and clouding our judgements, but even at the tender age of sixteen, when I was considering enrolling at uni in a course on journalism, I was first aware of the hard slog to 'make it' and the fact that you would have to put in a lot of time and effort, getting paid peanuts, just to gain the relevant experience, yet, now more than ever, I see the term 'internship' slung about.

This has always been the favoured route into 'the life you want to lead' and I know people that have travelled this route, and things are looking ok for them, but my life is different, I'm no longer at home with parents, I am reliant on an income to keep a roof over my head and the travel into London alone would be crippling before you double team it with the lack of pay.

I refuse to let this be the end of my dream tho, I want it too much and have let it slide for too long, but among the fiasco in the news about zero hours contracts that is cluttering up headlines recently I can't help but see the proliferation of internships across multiple job sites as taking advantage of this country's rather dire employment situation.

And amongst all this going on, my favourite pop-scamps, Rizzle Kicks have kicked off the campaign ahead of their second album by debuting a new video, proudly proclaiming that it was made by interns!!

The news made my blood boil, I bet it was bloody good fun, and a bloody good experience, but if the economic climate is gonna change for the better then I think we need to start providing opportunities and not just experience to those thirsty for breaking into the glamorous world of after show parties, powdered noses and overzealous exploitation...

Noel Gallagher, and the decline of the b-side

for the first time in a very very long time, I bought a CD single.

in fact I bought five of them.

all housed within a rather splendid little case, as part of the Noel Gallagher and his Flying Birds boxset.

Having laid my hands on practically everything Oasis have graced the world with since those glorious brit-pop years, I am keen to hear the b-sides that Gallagher senior has delivered with each of his releases to date.

I listen to The Death of You and Me and The Good Rebel, and then take the CD out, and then listen to AKA What a Life and Let The Lord Shine a Light on Me, and then take the CD out... and the process is repeated again and again.

With just the a-side and one sole b-side to each CD single, it is a far cry from the glory days when Oasis singles carried 3 additional tracks, usually of startlingly good quality, making every release an event in itself when such bounteous goods were handed down to us mere fans that were eagerly awaiting a new fix.

even when the media hyperbole died down after the critically derided Be Here Now, Oasis were still churning out tracks on the flipside that would give most band's singles a run for their money.

but as time marched ever forward, this tradition slowly sank into decline, as singles from 2000's Standing on the Shoulder of Giants had its accompanying tracks whittled down to 2 per single, and the unthinkable happened when tracks released from 2008's Dig Out Your Soul were packaged with remixes, an act that was unheard of in the band's long and rich history, save for a small number of hard to find rarities.

and there it is, the sad truth that as the digital age has fully flourished, less value is being placed on the now disposable pop single, and crafting extra material for releases or culling the best of the left-over album sessions is being left far behind us, consigned to the past along with the memory of physical singles stocked in actual record shops and being sought after by collectors and completists.

Even Noel doesn't escape unscathed from the remix syndrome, with two of the five b-sides in fact taking the form of psychedelic reinterpretations by the Gallagher approved Amorphous Androgynous.

Those that have followed Noel's post Oasis career will remember talk of an album made in collaboration with Amorphous Androgynous, an album that now seems destined for the scrap heap after Noel admitted that his touring schedule had kept him too busy to complete the reportedly 'far out' long player that was originally announced in July 2011 and was due to follow his own solo release.

and a pity it is too, since the reworkings of If I Had A Gun and AKA What a Life, following on from the 22 minute remix of Oasis's Falling Down, show a side of The Chief that is far removed from the usual Dad-rock misgivings that he has earned over the past decade and a half.

Yet, despite the pitfalls of these modern times derided earlier, the presence of iTunes playlists in most of our lives means we can neatly collate the three Amorphous Androgynous reproductions into 46 minutes worth of aural bliss that can be played without keep changing CDs, as we wonder just what might have been.

R.I.P Gil Scott Heron

Gil Scott Heron is an inspirational voice that i shall miss, and a voice that will live on forever

may he rest in peace






Giles Babel - go crazy (a tribute to Gil Scott-Heron)