Image: ©Alt-J

Gwil Sainsbury, Joe Newman, Gus Unger-Hamilton, and Thom Green met during their student days at Leeds University. They formed Alt-J in 2007 and have since taken deeper strides into the high ranks of Britain’s indie culture. The quartet released their debut album ‘An Awesome Wave’ in May 2012 and triumphantly accepted the British Barclaycard Mercury Prize for their efforts. From Australia to Belgium, France, Ireland and the USA ‘An Awesome Wave’ has put Alt-J at the forefront of indie rock and with nominations at the Brit Awards 2013 for Best British Group, Best British Album and British Breakthrough, the band has only teased us with a sample of their true potential.

Fresh from stops at Coachella, Glastonbury, Reading and Lollapalooza, Alt-J will head to Rocking the Daisies which takes place from the 3rd- 6th October 2013. Get all the info below before tickets run out.

Venue: Cloof Wine Estate in Darling, Western Cape
Tickets: webtickets.co.za
Info: www.rockingthedaisies.com

Alt J – Tessellate from Paul Newton on Vimeo.

Image: ©Alt-J

Image: ©Alt-J

Image: Voice Factory Communication

Father, Son, Holy Ghost

Girls‘ debut album, Album, released in 2009 showed a diverse style that seemed to draw influences from many different musical movements. It also resisted being classified, and never contained a dominant motif that would have helped to define it. Based on Album, I expected Father, Son, Holy Ghost – their third release after their 2010 Broken Dreams Club EP - would sometimes be noisy and lively, at times slow and introspective, but also retrospective. The album gets off to a running start with ‘Honey Bunny’, a song where Owen say’s that  ‘you don’t like my bony body, you don’t like my dirty hair or the stuff that I say, or the stuff that I’m on..

Girls – Alex

Second song ‘Alex’ is lively and in a smilar spirit as ‘Die’, which comes in with a cool riff and brilliant singing guitar. It’s a party song, from it’s rocking drums to the intent to ‘get fucked up tonight’. This is followed by ‘Saying I Love You‘, a romance-themed ballad that changes the mood of the album, while ‘My Ma’ is pained and moody, letting the guitar do some crying, an early indicator of an album made from diverse emotions. ‘Vomit‘ starts off very stripped down before the noise jumps out from behind a corner, then builds to a noisy crescendo by the end, in a very Antlers-ish way.

Girls – Just a Song

‘Just A Song’ is relaxed and acoustic, as is ‘Forgiveness‘. Both of these show a similarly grim disposition, with the former saying how ‘It feels like nobody’s happy now,’ and the latter saying that ‘nothings going to get any better.’ These sandwich a much happier tune, ‘Magic‘, which has a very ’60s feel to it.

Girls wrap the album up nicely with ‘Love Like A River,’ a lovely little song, before the equally good ‘Jamie Marie’ closes Father, Son, Holy Ghost, parhaps hinting that there may be a happy ending for Christopher Owens after all.

I’m sure that there are many people that have been waiting for the great indie-rock album of the year, an album with guitar solos, that doesn’t fanny about with synths and samples. This is that album.

It has an old school, guitar-based feel about it that will come across as familiar, featuring both riff-based awesomeness and acoustic beauty.

Not that long ago the Arctic Monkeys said that they felt that it was their ‘duty’ to keep guitar music alive, and you kind of knew what they meant. After the White Stripes dissolved and even The Kills have recently drifted away from their riff-heavy sound, the Sheffield band felt the need to promise not to let that style of music fade away. In Girls, they have allies in that cause.

Images:Courtesy of Girls

Signing with Frenchkiss Records in 2009, the three-piece band has since played at the 2010 Primavera Sound Festival in Barcelona, 2010’s Osheaga Festival in Montreal as well as Chicago’s famous Lollapalooza, also in 2010. The force behind the music is guitarist and lead vocalist Peter Silberman, Michael Lerner on drums and Darbi Cicci on keyboard, trumpet and banjo.

Burst Apart follows 2009’s Hospice, the album The Antlers are best known for. That album was at times quiet to the point of fading into the background, and at other times abrasively noisy, often during the same song. The songs were of a high quality, but you couldn’t help but feel that you might be missing something, either in an almost inaudible whisper or swallowed up by echoing lo-fi pollution. But while their style may have taken some getting used to, it was still a great album that was very warmly received.

I mention that Hospice was a bit rough around the edges because Burst Apart is a more polished album, easier on the ear. It contains some moments of brightness that were not found in the  bleak themes of fear, melancholy and loneliness of Hospice, but the new songs still aren’t exactly radio-friendly, catchy pop tunes.

The album opens with ‘I Don’t Want Love’, which shows the band’s new sound, with soft vocals and an orchestral feel to the instruments. Already we see the band making good on their intention to expand their sound, adding more colour to the grey despair of Hospice. Second song ‘French Exit’ follows suit, with lovely little snare drums and echoing softness that would have been out of place on Burst Apart’s predecessor.

Lead single ‘Parentheses’, with its howling vocals and background sirens; the sweeping instruments and falsetto of ‘No Windows’ and ‘Rolled Together’s haunting, floating ambiance,  as the background noises come closer, filling up the song as it builds to a climax, turn the album into a more soporific and somber affair. With ‘Every Night My Teeth Are Falling Out’ the album becomes lively again, before the next three songs, which are solemn and sparse, with a far-off beauty to them. The album then ends with ‘Putting the Dog to Sleep’, because what’s a bigger bummer than the euthanasia of a loyal pet? That’s the kind of theme The Antlers write their songs about.

It was always going to be difficult to please all fans with a follow-up to Hospice, reproducing what made those songs special but without trying to make the same album, which would surely have turned out be just a cheap impersonation. They have made some noticeable changes to their sound and there is no doubt that some fans will feel that Burst Apart doesn’t quite compare to its predecessor, but there’s no doubt that it too is a fine album which beautifully captures the angst of being a flawed person, which we all are. Here too are the dark themes, spooky quietness and surreal lyrics with which the Brooklyn-based trio established themselves, but on what is a more colourful album. I mentioned earlier that it isn’t a MTV or radio-friendly album, because that’s not their style. Their music doesn’t catch your attention and make you, as my sister would say, ‘crank it up’, but if you take the time to listen to their music, you will hear why The Antlers are such a treat.

Words by Adam Alexander

8/10