Doves have sold over two million records worldwide and have reached the top of the British album charts on two occasions but you could be forgiven for not knowing too much about them. In an industry where subtle seems to be a dirty word Jim Goodwin, Jez Williams and Andy Williams have been happy to do things their own way, accepting success when it comes but not letting it change what they do or how they work.
Doves first emerged in 1998 with the release of the Cedar EP. Two further EPs followed before they signed to the London based label Heavenly Records. Debut album, Lost Souls, was released in 2000 and was subsequently nominated for the Mercury Prize. In 2002 they released their second album, The Last Broadcast, which reached number one in the U.K. albums charts. Some Cities repeated that success in 2005. Their fourth album, Kingdom of Rust, was released in April of last year. The band have now gathered their favourite tracks in the a new best of package titled The Places Between.
The Places Between comes in two formats. The first is a single CD featuring 14 of their best songs and one new track, Analucia. The second features the aforementioned CD, a second CD of rarities, B-Sides and alternative versions and a DVD featuring their music videos. The second disk and the DVD will mostly appeal to completists but if the price difference isn’t too steep then they are certainly worth a listen.
The short and sweet of it is that Doves are a fantastic band. Songs such as There Goes the Fear, Black and White Town, Sea Song and Kingdom of Rust are as good as anything released in the last ten years. They deal in the type of intelligent, anthemic rock that sounds like it is being played in black and white. It’s hard to listen to these songs without seeing rain soaked streets and moody young men standing in doorways smoking cigarettes. However the most comforting thing about this album is that while a large percentage of British (and Irish) musicians are busy disappearing up their own arses it’s good to know that at least one band has continued to produce great music, bullshit free for over a decade. As is inevitable with this type of collection some people will have gripes about what songs are included but if you aren’t already a fan then this is the perfect place to start. I can’t put it any more simply than this. Get this album, your record collection will be a healthier place for it.
Published on May 6, 2010 10:45 pm.
Filed under: Music Tags: doves, the place between
A week or two ago I had a discussion with someone who had the complete opposite reaction to me while listening to this album. He found the album to be boring and not a patch on the early work of Sigur Rós. I disagreed, my point being that the album had to be viewed on its own merits and not in comparison to any of Jónsi (Jon Thor Birgisson) previous work. Luckily for me I don’t suffer from the burden of knowledge as Sigur Rós are a band that has always existed just on the edge of my musical radar. I have heard a couple of their albums but I’ve probably never given them the time they deserve and as a result I have no real feelings about them either way.
This album on the other hand I have some fairly strong feelings about. Listening to “Go” is akin to sitting in the centre of a musical storm. The songs swirl around you, rising and falling, constantly shifting, changing shape, full of energy and enthusiasm. The layered strings, percussion and vocals give the feeling that this album should exist on a grand or operatic stage, with some of its finer moments verging on epic. There is a genuine sense of momentum driving these songs forward and while it may ease on some of the album’s quieter moments it never fails, demanding your attention throughout its full forty minutes.
Unfortunately this album is a hard sell. In fact I struggle dreadfully to sum it up. It’s pop music but it’s more ambitious or maybe it’s rock music but it’s more interesting or maybe it’s like Sigur Rós but it’s more colourful? None of these descriptions capture it adequately or make any sense other than inside my own head. It’s definitely an album you need to hear for yourself and it is definitely an album that not everybody will like. But if you are one of the people who like it then maybe you will be like me and love it. Maybe you will find things in it that are refreshing and uplifting and in short supply in most of the music you hear. In end maybe you won’t be too upset that you don’t know anything about Sigur Rós because you know about Jónsi and Jónsi fills all of your Icelandic rock needs just fine.
Published on April 23, 2010 3:34 pm.
Filed under: Music Tags: Go, Jonsi
Laura Marling was just 16 when she started making a name for herself on the London folk circuit. At 18 she was nominated for the Mercury Prize for her debut album, “Alas I Cannot Swim” and now at the grand old age of 20 she releases her second album, “I Speak Because I Can”.
In truth there is nothing ground breaking here. We’ve heard it all before. Whether it is Nick Drake, Joni Mitchell or even Beth Orton, you can make comparisons to dozens of artists that have treaded this ground before. But that’s not really the point with this album. Not everyone can push new boundaries and not everybody should. What Marling has created here is a coherent, consistent and charming set of songs, tied together by her often stunning vocals. Don’t waste your time picking over the influences, just enjoy it for what it is.
A product of the same scene that produced Mumford & Sons, Noah and the Whale and Johnny Flynn, Marling has produced an intimate album that rewards multiple listens. The twee tones of her debut have been replaced by a more confident and traditional folk sound. “Made by Maid” is a beautiful and gentle song, Marling’s smokey voice accompanied only by picked acoustic guitars. “Blackberry Stone” is another highlight, with guitar and vocals backed by sweeping strings. These more intricate arrangements are used sparingly so as to retain their impact, maintaining the pared down vocal/guitar dynamic that remains at the heart of all singer songwriter albums.
This is not an album that will grab you by the throat and shake you with it’s brilliance. Instead it will sneak up behind you and whisper in your ear, surreptitiously ingratiating itself until one day, somewhere far in the future you find yourself unshakably in love with it. The trick of course is giving an album enough time for this to happen.
Published on April 7, 2010 10:28 pm.
Filed under: Music Tags: Alas I Cannot Swim, Beth Orton, I Speak Because I Can, Joni Mitchell, Laura Marling, Nick Drake
I idolize Johnny Cash. So much so that I drink tea exclusively from a cup emblazoned with his image. This is the level my obsession has reached.
Despite being a country artist his life is the quintessential rock and roll story. Most people know the story from Walk The Line but where that film ends is where things get really interesting. The 70’s and 80’s were a lean period with critical and commercial success in short supply. By the dawn of the 90’s he was just another washed up country star, trading on past glories with little or no appeal to modern audiences.
Enter Rick Rubin.
Rubin was the founder of Def Jam Records. As a producer he had worked mostly with rap and rock acts such as LL Cool J, Run-DMC, Slayer, Beastie Boys, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Public Enemy. In 1993 Rubin renamed the label American Recordings and made a new album of the same name by Cash its first major release.
American Recordings marked a renaissance. Success, both critical and commercial followed. Cash was revitalized and three more albums were released before his death in 2003.
In 2006 “A Hundred Highways”, the fifth album of the American Recordings series was released posthumously. It contained songs he had been working on following the death of his wife, June Carter and leading up to his own death. Given his failing health and personnel loss the album understandably deals mostly with death, love and religion.
Last month another album of new material was released to coincide with what would have been Cash’s 78th birthday. The songs of “Ain’t No Grave” are taken from the same sessions as “A Hundred Highways” and continue in the same vein as the previous release.
It’s impossible for me to be impartial about this album given my love for his previous work. If you are not familiar with the American Recordings then start with Volume One and work your way through. If you’re not a fan by this, the sixth and final album, I will give you your money back. Please Note: I won’t actually give anyone their money back.
If you are a fan, chances are you will love this album. His music has always felt personal, more like a conversation than a performance and through it we felt we knew the man. Here we sit with Cash in his final weeks as he faces his own mortality and comes to terms with impending death. It is a sometimes haunting experience with songs like “Can’t Help But Wonder Where I’m Bound”, “Redemption Song” and “I Don’t Hurt Anymore” doing little to disguise the issues he was dealing with at the time. However even at the end of his life that old defiance still shines through, Cash boldly declaring “ain’t no grave can hold my body down” on the title track.
I don’t know if we will see more new material emerge in the coming years but a part of me hopes that we don’t. Releasing music after an artist’s death can be a tricky affair. Sometimes unfinished songs and albums are best left unfinished but inevitably when there is money to be made someone will look to take advantage. “Ain’t No Grave” feels like a fitting final chapter to the American Series and to Cash’s career, a fitting epitaph for the man in black.
Published on March 26, 2010 2:03 pm.
Filed under: Music Tags: A Hundred Highways, Ain't No Grave, American Recordings, johnny cash, Rick Rubin
So while we’re all in the shit the best Brian Cowen can come up with is renaming government departments. I suppose renaming the “Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment” to the “Department of Enterprise, Trade and Innovation” was a good idea. Better get rid of that pesky “Employment” incase people remember the government has a role to play in job creation and retention. Maybe i’m being too harsh, maybe the most obvious answer is the correct one. The cabinet were a bit bored on one of their many many days off and decideed to have a good old fashioned game of bullshit bingo. How many buzz words can you fit into department titles? Lets see… Enterprise, Trade, Innovation, Education, Skills, Community, Equality. Well done Brian, you managed to get 7, unfortunately there are no winners in this game just 4.5 million people with that losing feeling but you’ve got a nice long summer break coming up anyway, thats something for you to look forward to. You’re right of course, i’m not crediting Cowen with the ground breaking innovations he is introducing. I mean effeciency is the word they keep beating over our heads while they cut our pay. I know, lets make FAS more effecient by making three seperate departments responsible for it, while we’re at it why don’t we just fuck responsibilities up in the air and whatever department they land on its their job, come to think of it why not just blindfold all the minsiters spin them around 5 times on a chair and whichever department they stumble into that is their brief. Except Mary Harney of course, if she goes down she’s never coming back up again. In fairness she is doing everything she can to get herself removed from her post. Nobody could oversee that many fuck ups by accident, it must be a cohesive well thought out plan but it looks like until she starts going into hospitals and actually strangling patients to death with her bare hands she is stuck in the job. All in all it is another red letter day for Ireland, we’re still in the exact same mess we were in only now everyone in the cabinet is slightly more confused about what their jobs are and what they should call themselves.
Published on March 23, 2010 11:01 pm.
Filed under: Rants Tags: Brian Cowen, Rant, Reshuffle, Unnerving sense of doom
Itteh Bitteh Hipster Kitteh - Blogs About Bands You've Never Heard Of.
Published on August 17, 2009 2:56 pm.
Filed under: Itteh Bitteh Hipster Kitteh Tags: Itteh Bitteh Hipster Kitteh
Itteh Bitteh Hipster Kitteh - Owns More Vinyl Than You.
Published on August 11, 2009 3:54 pm.
Filed under: Itteh Bitteh Hipster Kitteh Tags: Itteh Bitteh Hipster Kitteh
Itteh Bitteh Hipster Kitteh - Judges You For Your Poor Taste In Music
Published on August 10, 2009 12:58 pm.
Filed under: Itteh Bitteh Hipster Kitteh Tags: Itteh Bitteh Hipster Kitteh
I want to live in Scandinavia. I want to be blonde and thin and smoke cigarettes and drink coffee and be effortlessly cool and make awesome pop music that sounds like it should be soundtracking some French film about people who are thin and who smoke cigarettes and drink coffee and are effortlessly cool. But i’m not. I’m Irish, I drink tea and eat too much and turn a bright shade of pink in the summer so I make do by listening to the Raveonettes and wondering if life would look cooler in black and white.
Published on June 22, 2009 3:01 pm.
Filed under: Uncategorized Tags: french films, raveonettes, scandanavia
So by now everyone knows that following a good public humping Eircom has donned it’s rubber mask, zipped up it’s assless chaps and assumed the position as IRMA’s own personal gimp. But like any self respecting sexual deviant IRMA aren’t happy until they have given everybody at the party a good dose of herpes and have shifted their unwanted attentions to fresh meat in the form of Ireland’s second largest ISP and largest cable provider, BT and UPC respectively.
So as IRMA grease up for round two of this clusterfuck I just wanted to point out a few things.
ATTACKING THE MUSIC BUYING PUBLIC WILL NOT HELP YOU MAKE MORE MONEY.
People who download music also buy music, they probably buy more music than people who don’t download at all because they have a passion for it. If you attack them they won’t stop downloading but they will probably stop buying music because who would want to give money to the people who had them cut off the internet or tried to sue them. These people are your customers and all you are doing is alienating them and driving them away.
THE WORLD HAS MOVED ON. YOU ARE THE DINOSAURS. EVOLVE OUR YOU WILL DIE.
The big record labels have completely failed to adapt to the internet age. Time is running out, if you don’t come up with something better than law suits in the near future you will die. It is not up to the government or the ISPs to prop up your failing business models. It is nobody else’s fault or responsibility other than yours. Napster was 10 years ago and what has been done in those 10 years? For Christ sake you are still suing people!
Admittedly I know very little about legal matters but legislation allowing for the disconnection of people from the internet has been struck down at the European level and also deemed unconstitutional most recently in France. There is no legislation for this in Irish law. Eircom gave in but when one of the ISPs take you on in court you will more than likely lose.
YOU ARE FIGHTING A BATTLE YOU CAN NOT WIN.
The pirates will always be one step ahead because piracy is built on a culture of innovation. The people who are downloading on a large scale, the people who are tech savvy will not be caught. The people you catch are the people who are doing it on a small scale using outdated technology. These are the people that you will get slaughtered for suing because these are the school children, the single mothers, the little old ladies that the tabloids love to feature. There is nothing they love more than stories about greedy corporations going after the defenseless, about a little girl who can’t do her homework because IRMA took away her internet connection.
Finally, what gives you the right? What makes you think that you have the right to disconnect someone from the internet? Who made you judge and jury? What makes you think that your monitory interests are so important that people should lose their right to access the internet?
And incase you don’t think this affects you please know that IRMA also want to ban access the websites that they deem damaging to their interests and that Eircom will not oppose this.
The story is covered over at the Irish Times so follow the link below for facts and quotes .
The Irish Times – Major music labels in court move to force internet providers to act on downloads
And here is some more coverage of the original IRMA conquest when they turned Ireland’s largest ISP into a submissive.
The Sunday Business Post – Music-swapping sites to be blocked by internet provider
Digital Rights Ireland – IRMA v. Eircom – Why ISP filtering for the music industry is a bad idea
Published on June 21, 2009 5:46 pm.
Filed under: Uncategorized Tags: bt, cluster fuck, eircom, irma, piracy, Pirates, upc
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