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Hellhound On His Trail

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This absorbing film, directed by Amos Poe (The Blank Generation), follows Earle criss-crossing the US in the troubled wake of 2002's Bush-slapping album Jerusalem?in particular, the appalling right-wing furore over his"John Walker Blues",an attempt to redress the demonisation of California's now-infamous 20-year-old Taliban fighter. With The New York Post screaming "Twisted Ballad Honours Tali-Rat",his empathy for the man George Bush Sr sneeringly refers to as "this poor misguided Marin County hot-tubber" is evidence not only of Earle's tireless upholding of the Constitution's true definition, but of a nation's impotent desire to lash out at the next best thing to Bin Laden.Elsewhere, this is Earle as ferocious anti-death penalty campaigner (inspired by Truman Capote's In Cold Blood), human rights activist and playwright (scribbling last-minute amendments to Karla, his life-and-death dramatisation of the first woman to be executed in Texas since the American Civil War, Karla Faye Tucker). But it's Earle's own story more than anything?reformed hellcat, heroin junkie and jailbird, with a conscience forever hollering at his ear. Like he candidly admits: "I'm not trying to save anybody on Death Row, I'm trying to keep me from going to hell."Musically, it's intercut with 16 live treats, including the fiery-bellied "Over Yonder" and "Christmas In Washington"'s rallying cry for more Woody Guthries in an apathetic age when rock as social protest is largely a bygone art. Then there's the bluegrass championing of Bill Monroe ("The Mountain"), blood-rushes from the past ("Guitar Town") and a stirring rewiring of late mentor Townes Van Zandt's "Rex's Blues". A rebel bristling with a multitude of causes, the revitalised Earle is an inspirational joy.

This absorbing film, directed by Amos Poe (The Blank Generation), follows Earle criss-crossing the US in the troubled wake of 2002’s Bush-slapping album Jerusalem?in particular, the appalling right-wing furore over his”John Walker Blues”,an attempt to redress the demonisation of California’s now-infamous 20-year-old Taliban fighter. With The New York Post screaming “Twisted Ballad Honours Tali-Rat”,his empathy for the man George Bush Sr sneeringly refers to as “this poor misguided Marin County hot-tubber” is evidence not only of Earle’s tireless upholding of the Constitution’s true definition, but of a nation’s impotent desire to lash out at the next best thing to Bin Laden.Elsewhere, this is Earle as ferocious anti-death penalty campaigner (inspired by Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood), human rights activist and playwright (scribbling last-minute amendments to Karla, his life-and-death dramatisation of the first woman to be executed in Texas since the American Civil War, Karla Faye Tucker).

But it’s Earle’s own story more than anything?reformed hellcat, heroin junkie and jailbird, with a conscience forever hollering at his ear. Like he candidly admits: “I’m not trying to save anybody on Death Row, I’m trying to keep me from going to hell.”Musically, it’s intercut with 16 live treats, including the fiery-bellied “Over Yonder” and “Christmas In Washington”‘s rallying cry for more Woody Guthries in an apathetic age when rock as social protest is largely a bygone art. Then there’s the bluegrass championing of Bill Monroe (“The Mountain”), blood-rushes from the past (“Guitar Town”) and a stirring rewiring of late mentor Townes Van Zandt’s “Rex’s Blues”. A rebel bristling with a multitude of causes, the revitalised Earle is an inspirational joy.

Blondie

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Only 40 minutes of old BBC footage but still an exhilarating glimpse of Blondie live in '79, as their commercial peak kicked in. Filmed at Glasgow's Apollo Theatre, it climaxes with a bagpipe quartet screeching through "SundayGirl". It's the band's raw energy, and La Harry's endearingly awkward presence, which radiate through "Atomic", "Union City Blue" et al. Novices should then graduate to the Eat To The Beat-era videos: a pinnacle for punk and pop.

Only 40 minutes of old BBC footage but still an exhilarating glimpse of Blondie live in ’79, as their commercial peak kicked in. Filmed at Glasgow’s Apollo Theatre, it climaxes with a bagpipe quartet screeching through “SundayGirl”. It’s the band’s raw energy, and La Harry’s endearingly awkward presence, which radiate through “Atomic”, “Union City Blue” et al. Novices should then graduate to the Eat To The Beat-era videos: a pinnacle for punk and pop.

Smile High Club

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Brian Wilson THE ROYAL FESTIVAL HALL, LONDON Thursday February 26, 2004 In June 1967, the beatles released Sgt Pepper, just a few weeks after Brian Wilson scrapped the music he and Van Dyke Parks had recorded for Smile. And so began one of the great "what ifs?" in rock history. It's incredible. Throughout 1966 and early '67, the world, including The Beatles, anxiously waited to see how Wilson was going to top Pet Sounds. Thirty-seven years later, the world?including Paul McCartney, looking about as excited tonight as he must have been when, carrot in hand, he joined Wilson and Parks for their fabled journey across America from Plymouth Rock to Diamond Head?is still waiting. That's either an indictment of today's scene and its lack of mythic trailblazers, or testament to Wilson's enduring ability to generate feverish conjecture. We can only guess what impact Smile would have had, although bootlegs of rock's most famous unreleased LP comprise tantalising fragments of those doomed yet thrillingly ambitious sessions. But we now know what it would sound like played live because that's what Wilson and his supporting cast, including The Wondermints, a substitute Carl Wilson called Jeffrey Foskett, and the Stockholm Strings And Horns, offer at the RFH:a full version of the album that never was, with arrangements courtesy of Parks, whose dense, elliptical lyrics and epic visions helped shape the concept in the first place. The Smile ensemble might not be gracing the next edition of Guy Peellaert's Rock Dreams, but they do have uncannily lovely voices, and their ability to keep pace with the dramatic shifts in Wilson's intricate melodies is phenomenal. "Heroes And Villains" is astonishingly faithful to the adaptation of the song that appeared on Smile surrogate Smiley Smile and is easily the most complex piece of music your reporter has ever heard performed on a stage in the name of rock'n'roll. But I'm getting ahead of myself. The concert opens when the curtain is raised to reveal Wilson, the confused yet charismatic focus, perched on a stool, cosseted by his singers, all of them shooting the breeze like it's a Beach Boys Iuau. Now, some reviewers found this a bit cute. They changed their minds when they launched into breathtaking a cappella versions of "Surfer Girl", "In My Room", "Please Let Me Wonder", "All Summer Long", even "Good Timin'", a late Wilson classic from 1979. Our damaged hero, the hippest of the first-generation rock legends because he went furthest out there in pursuit of his dreams, is in better voice than anyone dared hope. He hides behind a keyboard for full-band renditions of "Time To Get Alone," "God Only Knows", "Darlin'", "Sloop John B", "California Girls" and "Marcella". After the interval comes Smile, the music that precipitated Wilson's mental decline. Has his teenage symphony to God survived three decades of speculation and psychodrama? Yes. It's magnificent. Futuristic collage pop. Mosaic for a new society. The order was always going to invite controversy, but there's no arguing with a sequence that starts with "Our Prayer" and continues with "Heroes And Villains", "Do You Like Worms", "Barnyard", "The Old Master Painter"/"You Are My Sunshine","Cabinessence", "Wonderful", "Child Is Father Of The Man", "Surf's Up","Vegetables"/"I'm In Great Shape", "Wind Chimes" and "Mrs O'Leary's Cow", the track that killed Smile, for which everyone dons firemen's helmets. It ends with "Good Vibrations", the Wilson-Parks version, not the smash hit with Mike Love's words. And that's it. Forty minutes of startling invention and standing ovations. Finally, a medley including "Barbara Ann" and "Surfin' USA"that emphasises how much ground Wilson covered between those comic anthems and the Cosmic Americana of Smile. Uncut's Roy Carr, another living legend, is so moved he puts tonight in the all-time superleague alongside peak-era gigs by the Stones, The Who and Springsteen. Throw in Kraftwerk and Joy Division and he might be right.

Brian Wilson

THE ROYAL FESTIVAL HALL, LONDON

Thursday February 26, 2004

In June 1967, the beatles released Sgt Pepper, just a few weeks after Brian Wilson scrapped the music he and Van Dyke Parks had recorded for Smile. And so began one of the great “what ifs?” in rock history.

It’s incredible. Throughout 1966 and early ’67, the world, including The Beatles, anxiously waited to see how Wilson was going to top Pet Sounds. Thirty-seven years later, the world?including Paul McCartney, looking about as excited tonight as he must have been when, carrot in hand, he joined Wilson and Parks for their fabled journey across America from Plymouth Rock to Diamond Head?is still waiting. That’s either an indictment of today’s scene and its lack of mythic trailblazers, or testament to Wilson’s enduring ability to generate feverish conjecture.

We can only guess what impact Smile would have had, although bootlegs of rock’s most famous unreleased LP comprise tantalising fragments of those doomed yet thrillingly ambitious sessions. But we now know what it would sound like played live because that’s what Wilson and his supporting cast, including The Wondermints, a substitute Carl Wilson called Jeffrey Foskett, and the Stockholm Strings And Horns, offer at the RFH:a full version of the album that never was, with arrangements courtesy of Parks, whose dense, elliptical lyrics and epic visions helped shape the concept in the first place.

The Smile ensemble might not be gracing the next edition of Guy Peellaert’s Rock Dreams, but they do have uncannily lovely voices, and their ability to keep pace with the dramatic shifts in Wilson’s intricate melodies is phenomenal. “Heroes And Villains” is astonishingly faithful to the adaptation of the song that appeared on Smile surrogate Smiley Smile and is easily the most complex piece of music your reporter has ever heard performed on a stage in the name of rock’n’roll.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. The concert opens when the curtain is raised to reveal Wilson, the confused yet charismatic focus, perched on a stool, cosseted by his singers, all of them shooting the breeze like it’s a Beach Boys Iuau. Now, some reviewers found this a bit cute. They changed their minds when they launched into breathtaking a cappella versions of “Surfer Girl”, “In My Room”, “Please Let Me Wonder”, “All Summer Long”, even “Good Timin'”, a late Wilson classic from 1979.

Our damaged hero, the hippest of the first-generation rock legends because he went furthest out there in pursuit of his dreams, is in better voice than anyone dared hope. He hides behind a keyboard for full-band renditions of “Time To Get Alone,” “God Only Knows”, “Darlin'”, “Sloop John B”, “California Girls” and “Marcella”. After the interval comes Smile, the music that precipitated Wilson’s mental decline.

Has his teenage symphony to God survived three decades of speculation and psychodrama? Yes. It’s magnificent. Futuristic collage pop. Mosaic for a new society. The order was always going to invite controversy, but there’s no arguing with a sequence that starts with “Our Prayer” and continues with “Heroes And Villains”, “Do You Like Worms”, “Barnyard”, “The Old Master Painter”/”You Are My Sunshine”,”Cabinessence”, “Wonderful”, “Child Is Father Of The Man”, “Surf’s Up”,”Vegetables”/”I’m In Great Shape”, “Wind Chimes” and “Mrs O’Leary’s Cow”, the track that killed Smile, for which everyone dons firemen’s helmets. It ends with “Good Vibrations”, the Wilson-Parks version, not the smash hit with Mike Love’s words. And that’s it. Forty minutes of startling invention and standing ovations.

Finally, a medley including “Barbara Ann” and “Surfin’ USA”that emphasises how much ground Wilson covered between those comic anthems and the Cosmic Americana of Smile. Uncut’s Roy Carr, another living legend, is so moved he puts tonight in the all-time superleague alongside peak-era gigs by the Stones, The Who and Springsteen. Throw in Kraftwerk and Joy Division and he might be right.

We Will Post-Rock You

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Explosions In The Sky THE ICA, LONDON Monday February 16, 2004 The continued tendency towards post-rock, which in Explosions In The Sky's case means immense, instrumental, drifting guitarscapes, has brought in its wake its own peculiarities and difficulties. It's one thing to sit at home and let this music wash from eardrum to eardrum on your headphones, another to go along and see it physically performed, alongside presumably like-minded punters. Or maybe not so like-minded. For barely have Explosions set sail with the stately "Memorial" when it becomes clear that the room is divided. There are those who are filled with the sort of noisy agitation they feel licensed to exhibit at a rock venue, this being loud guitar music and all?and those who regard Explosions as aural cinema, and, this being cinema, feel entitled to "ssshhh!!" the handful of raucous, beer-soaked jabberers during the quieter passages. Surprisingly, it's the "ssshhh!!"-ers who carry the night, one of whom threatens actual violence towards a particularly squawky female ("Don't facking tell me to shat ap..."), until she slinks back to the bar. Also notable is a tendency towards beards. We're not, however, talking about wispy, well-kempt Bohemian chin shrubbery here. We're talking deliberately bushy, unapologetically misshapen, Will Oldham-type affairs which look like they haven't been grown so much as assembled by glueing thick, accumulated clumps of pubic hair to the face. One such bearded punter in particular encapsulates all of the raging contradictions in Post-Rock Man. A deep listener, he cannot help himself after each song, erupting like a geyser with the words, "Thank you very much!!" As for Explosions themselves, their keenness not to distract from the sound prompts them to dress as dully as four young men have ever dressed. Yet there is something visually arresting in the way they set about their work, even down to the absence of mic stands. Although the slower, receding passages of songs like "The Only Moment We Were Alone" stand up well and manage to retain their luminous grace even amid the murky background wash of a live venue, it's those moments when they yank up the tempo which are the best, unifying both the crowd and the principles of their music. So "Have You Passed Through This Night?" is really something to watch as Munaf Rayani and Mark T Smith bend almost double, wrenching huge, shrieking gobbets of cleansing noise from the recesses of their instruments. In the very best sense, it's as if they're scraping the bottom of rock's barrel, still delving for something fresh, electric, first-hand and alive in the genre. Thank you very much, indeed.

Explosions In The Sky

THE ICA, LONDON

Monday February 16, 2004

The continued tendency towards post-rock, which in Explosions In The Sky’s case means immense, instrumental, drifting guitarscapes, has brought in its wake its own peculiarities and difficulties. It’s one thing to sit at home and let this music wash from eardrum to eardrum on your headphones, another to go along and see it physically performed, alongside presumably like-minded punters. Or maybe not so like-minded. For barely have Explosions set sail with the stately “Memorial” when it becomes clear that the room is divided. There are those who are filled with the sort of noisy agitation they feel licensed to exhibit at a rock venue, this being loud guitar music and all?and those who regard Explosions as aural cinema, and, this being cinema, feel entitled to “ssshhh!!” the handful of raucous, beer-soaked jabberers during the quieter passages. Surprisingly, it’s the “ssshhh!!”-ers who carry the night, one of whom threatens actual violence towards a particularly squawky female (“Don’t facking tell me to shat ap…”), until she slinks back to the bar. Also notable is a tendency towards beards. We’re not, however, talking about wispy, well-kempt Bohemian chin shrubbery here. We’re talking deliberately bushy, unapologetically misshapen, Will Oldham-type affairs which look like they haven’t been grown so much as assembled by glueing thick, accumulated clumps of pubic hair to the face. One such bearded punter in particular encapsulates all of the raging contradictions in Post-Rock Man. A deep listener, he cannot help himself after each song, erupting like a geyser with the words, “Thank you very much!!”

As for Explosions themselves, their keenness not to distract from the sound prompts them to dress as dully as four young men have ever dressed. Yet there is something visually arresting in the way they set about their work, even down to the absence of mic stands. Although the slower, receding passages of songs like “The Only Moment We Were Alone” stand up well and manage to retain their luminous grace even amid the murky background wash of a live venue, it’s those moments when they yank up the tempo which are the best, unifying both the crowd and the principles of their music. So “Have You Passed Through This Night?” is really something to watch as Munaf Rayani and Mark T Smith bend almost double, wrenching huge, shrieking gobbets of cleansing noise from the recesses of their instruments. In the very best sense, it’s as if they’re scraping the bottom of rock’s barrel, still delving for something fresh, electric, first-hand and alive in the genre. Thank you very much, indeed.

Josh Rouse

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BUSH HALL, LONDON Monday March 1, 2004 Rouse closes the first of two nights here with a version of Neil Young's "For The Turnstiles" so intense and intimate that when he sings the line "though your confidence may be shattered" we all inwardly go "uh-oh",and when he adds "it doesn't matter" we all go "phew, what a relief". His crowd are rapt throughout, whooping at every intro like he's just won the Superbowl. They add the gospel responses on "Sparrows Over Birmingham" and hijack the "come and carry me away" refrain on "Rise". It's a memorable show, a glowing log fire on a frosty night, if not what you might've anticipated from the sunbaked 1972 album. That album saw Nashville's Rouse pitched as a blue-eyed soul boy, a man in thrall to period West Coast soft-rock. Reviewers compared it to Carole King or Steely Dan, knowing that to admit a (more accurate) fondness for Bread's "Guitar Man" or America's "Sister Golden Hair"would be tantamount to sporting a Magic FM car sticker. An album plump with mellow melodies, it boasted inner strength, daring you to embrace its laid-back sensuousness and soak up its, er, love vibrations. But though Rouse smartly begins by playing the LP in its entirety tonight, its perceived strong suit?its sound?is jettisoned. It's just Rouse and buddy Daniel with acoustic guitars, Daniel shifting to a small keyboard. It's "1972" unplugged. It's Gallagher & Lyle's "Breakaway". Which is simply fine. Two nu-folkies sitting on stools might not strike everyone as a must-see gig, but it's riveting. Rouse is in exquisite voice, the audience awed (do not cough!), and the guitars jingle like silvery rain. 1972 seduces 2004 with consummate ease, the standouts being the candid "Under Your Charms", the loping "Come Back" and the aforementioned "gospel" (his word) anthems. Then there's "Slaveship"?"Brimful Of Asha" for the over-45s. After that, with the on-stage pair visibly relaxing, it's pretty much request time. Among these: "Under Cold Blue Stars", "It's A Shame" and "Late Night Conversation". Rouse introduces the "Turnstiles" finale as "a country number", and finds this disproportionately funny, breaking into chuckles. "We've just come from Barcelona, where it snowed for the first time in 22 years," he announces. But everything about this is warm, molten gold, a long bath in the serenity of well-gauged bittersweet balladry. There's a depth, an awareness of Curtis Mayfield/Al Green spirituality which expresses itself through gentle vocal grace rather than any neon manifesto. You flow with it and, oh, what a sweet surrender.

BUSH HALL, LONDON

Monday March 1, 2004

Rouse closes the first of two nights here with a version of Neil Young’s “For The Turnstiles” so intense and intimate that when he sings the line “though your confidence may be shattered” we all inwardly go “uh-oh”,and when he adds “it doesn’t matter” we all go “phew, what a relief”. His crowd are rapt throughout, whooping at every intro like he’s just won the Superbowl. They add the gospel responses on “Sparrows Over Birmingham” and hijack the “come and carry me away” refrain on “Rise”. It’s a memorable show, a glowing log fire on a frosty night, if not what you might’ve anticipated from the sunbaked 1972 album.

That album saw Nashville’s Rouse pitched as a blue-eyed soul boy, a man in thrall to period West Coast soft-rock. Reviewers compared it to Carole King or Steely Dan, knowing that to admit a (more accurate) fondness for Bread’s “Guitar Man” or America’s “Sister Golden Hair”would be tantamount to sporting a Magic FM car sticker. An album plump with mellow melodies, it boasted inner strength, daring you to embrace its laid-back sensuousness and soak up its, er, love vibrations. But though Rouse smartly begins by playing the LP in its entirety tonight, its perceived strong suit?its sound?is jettisoned. It’s just Rouse and buddy Daniel with acoustic guitars, Daniel shifting to a small keyboard. It’s “1972” unplugged. It’s Gallagher & Lyle’s “Breakaway”.

Which is simply fine. Two nu-folkies sitting on stools might not strike everyone as a must-see gig, but it’s riveting. Rouse is in exquisite voice, the audience awed (do not cough!), and the guitars jingle like silvery rain. 1972 seduces 2004 with consummate ease, the standouts being the candid “Under Your Charms”, the loping “Come Back” and the aforementioned “gospel” (his word) anthems. Then there’s “Slaveship”?”Brimful Of Asha” for the over-45s. After that, with the on-stage pair visibly relaxing, it’s pretty much request time. Among these: “Under Cold Blue Stars”, “It’s A Shame” and “Late Night Conversation”. Rouse introduces the “Turnstiles” finale as “a country number”, and finds this disproportionately funny, breaking into chuckles.

“We’ve just come from Barcelona, where it snowed for the first time in 22 years,” he announces. But everything about this is warm, molten gold, a long bath in the serenity of well-gauged bittersweet balladry. There’s a depth, an awareness of Curtis Mayfield/Al Green spirituality which expresses itself through gentle vocal grace rather than any neon manifesto. You flow with it and, oh, what a sweet surrender.

The Beta Band – Heroes To Zeros

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It's been six years now since The Beta Band ended the brief first stage of their career (three bewitching EPs) and embarked on the second: proper albums, coherent gigs, and a prolonged sense of anti-climax. After 2001's slightly disappointing appropriation of R&B, Hot Shots II, Heroes To Zeros is, sadly, a slightly disappointing attempt to hammer their quirks into a more commercial rock shape. The way the songs lope around in circles hasn't materially changed, and there's still something appealing about Steve Mason's lackadaisical chants. But the bullish treatments (foul U2-style guitars on "Assessment", a characteristically prissy mix from Nigel Godrich) are too heavy-handed for such whimsical and fundamentally fragile songs. There's an air of desperation, finality: an indie label, a minuscule budget and a regression into semi-competence would suit The Beta Band much better.

It’s been six years now since The Beta Band ended the brief first stage of their career (three bewitching EPs) and embarked on the second: proper albums, coherent gigs, and a prolonged sense of anti-climax. After 2001’s slightly disappointing appropriation of R&B, Hot Shots II, Heroes To Zeros is, sadly, a slightly disappointing attempt to hammer their quirks into a more commercial rock shape.

The way the songs lope around in circles hasn’t materially changed, and there’s still something appealing about Steve Mason’s lackadaisical chants. But the bullish treatments (foul U2-style guitars on “Assessment”, a characteristically prissy mix from Nigel Godrich) are too heavy-handed for such whimsical and fundamentally fragile songs. There’s an air of desperation, finality: an indie label, a minuscule budget and a regression into semi-competence would suit The Beta Band much better.

Lali Puna – Faking The Books

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Showing markedly more musical muscle than on 2001's marvellous Scary World Theory album, here Lali Puna continue to astound the open-minded listener with their melodic rapture and their lyrical scythe. Singer Valerie Trebeljahr must be one of the most sensuous female vocalists since My Bloody Valentine's Bilinda Butcher; witness the opening, very MBV-ish title track where she breathes: "We've been done before and now we try to forge ourselves." Drums are far more to the fore?hear the amazing propulsion of "B-Movie" and the cataclysmic "Alienation." Throughout they continue to nibble against the suffocation of capitalism ("You've been told/Leave your dignity at home" from "Grin And Bear"), and by the final "Crawling By Numbers" they are truly fixing to die ("Can't you see six feet underground?"). Another truly wondrous record.

Showing markedly more musical muscle than on 2001’s marvellous Scary World Theory album, here Lali Puna continue to astound the open-minded listener with their melodic rapture and their lyrical scythe.

Singer Valerie Trebeljahr must be one of the most sensuous female vocalists since My Bloody Valentine’s Bilinda Butcher; witness the opening, very MBV-ish title track where she breathes: “We’ve been done before and now we try to forge ourselves.” Drums are far more to the fore?hear the amazing propulsion of “B-Movie” and the cataclysmic “Alienation.”

Throughout they continue to nibble against the suffocation of capitalism (“You’ve been told/Leave your dignity at home” from “Grin And Bear”), and by the final “Crawling By Numbers” they are truly fixing to die (“Can’t you see six feet underground?”). Another truly wondrous record.

Slaid Cleaves – Wishbones

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Four years on from the paradoxically titled breakthrough album Broke Down and Austin-based Cleaves is still ploughing familiar terrain?road songs and hard-luck tales for the lonely and dispossessed. With regular producer Gurf (Lucinda Williams) Morlix again on the mixing desk, there's an unmistakable impression of water being trodden here, but what he does, he does admirably: frayed-at-the-seams country-folk the slender side of Steve Earle, Springsteen blues without the pomp. The title track and fiddle/cello-coloured "Below" are exceptional.

Four years on from the paradoxically titled breakthrough album Broke Down and Austin-based Cleaves is still ploughing familiar terrain?road songs and hard-luck tales for the lonely and dispossessed. With regular producer Gurf (Lucinda Williams) Morlix again on the mixing desk, there’s an unmistakable impression of water being trodden here, but what he does, he does admirably: frayed-at-the-seams country-folk the slender side of Steve Earle, Springsteen blues without the pomp. The title track and fiddle/cello-coloured “Below” are exceptional.

This Month In Americana

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Finally, No Depression magazine co-editors Peter Blackstock and Grant Alden attempt to answer the big one: what is "alternative country"? A return to traditional roots? Soul music for hillbillies? Country stripped of Nashville gloss? Mountain-folk with punk phlegm? The truth probably lies in its scuppering of lazy stereotype. Far from being a repository for mawkish sentiment and conservatism, true country music is dark, heroic and often unnervingly acute. Not to mention beautiful. In those terms, it's hard to fault this awesome collection, bookended by Johnny Cash's blood'n'granite take on Willie Nelson's "Time Of The Preacher"?aided by Nirvana's Krist Novoselic and Soundgarden's Kim Thayil?and The Carter Family's "No Depression In Heaven". In between, Doug Sahm's "Cowboy Peyton Place" tips a wink to honky-tonk swing; early Whiskeytown nugget "Faithless Street" points the ruinous way to future days; Buddy Miller offers up the driving old-time fare of "Does My Ring Burn Your Finger?" and Allison Moorer bathes in the soft steel of "Is Heaven Good Enough For You?" The collaborations are curiously evocative, too?Lucinda Williams adding bluesy moan to Kevin Gordon's "Down To The Well", Robbie Fulks and Kelly Willis' playful "Parallel Bars", Emmylou Harris adding porcelain to Hayseed's "Farther Along" and Hole Dozen (Mark Olson and Victoria Williams, plus various Gourds and Silos) barrelling through Mickey Newbury's "How I Love Them Old Songs". Brilliant.

Finally, No Depression magazine co-editors Peter Blackstock and Grant Alden attempt to answer the big one: what is “alternative country”? A return to traditional roots? Soul music for hillbillies? Country stripped of Nashville gloss? Mountain-folk with punk phlegm? The truth probably lies in its scuppering of lazy stereotype. Far from being a repository for mawkish sentiment and conservatism, true country music is dark, heroic and often unnervingly acute. Not to mention beautiful. In those terms, it’s hard to fault this awesome collection, bookended by Johnny Cash’s blood’n’granite take on Willie Nelson’s “Time Of The Preacher”?aided by Nirvana’s Krist Novoselic and Soundgarden’s Kim Thayil?and The Carter Family’s “No Depression In Heaven”. In between, Doug Sahm’s “Cowboy Peyton Place” tips a wink to honky-tonk swing; early Whiskeytown nugget “Faithless Street” points the ruinous way to future days; Buddy Miller offers up the driving old-time fare of “Does My Ring Burn Your Finger?” and Allison Moorer bathes in the soft steel of “Is Heaven Good Enough For You?” The collaborations are curiously evocative, too?Lucinda Williams adding bluesy moan to Kevin Gordon’s “Down To The Well”, Robbie Fulks and Kelly Willis’ playful “Parallel Bars”, Emmylou Harris adding porcelain to Hayseed’s “Farther Along” and Hole Dozen (Mark Olson and Victoria Williams, plus various Gourds and Silos) barrelling through Mickey Newbury’s “How I Love Them Old Songs”. Brilliant.

Ben Weaver – Stories Under Nails

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After 2002's storming Hollerin' At A Woodpecker, Minnesota-based Weaver's latest compounds his promise. The song, essentially, remains the same?chilly steel, sparse banjo, stroked acoustic?but these vignettes sound like gutter-pulpit sermons in a disturbed netherworld. Weaver's voice?which makes Lee Marvin sound like Aled Jones?lends biblical portent to the most mundane detail. Standout track "John Martin"?its protagonist duped by a sinister drifter?is claustrophobic as hell. A one-man Brothers Grimm with no happy endings. Enjoy.

After 2002’s storming Hollerin’ At A Woodpecker, Minnesota-based Weaver’s latest compounds his promise. The song, essentially, remains the same?chilly steel, sparse banjo, stroked acoustic?but these vignettes sound like gutter-pulpit sermons in a disturbed netherworld. Weaver’s voice?which makes Lee Marvin sound like Aled Jones?lends biblical portent to the most mundane detail. Standout track “John Martin”?its protagonist duped by a sinister drifter?is claustrophobic as hell. A one-man Brothers Grimm with no happy endings. Enjoy.

Josh Ritter – Hello Starling

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Already touted as the next big thing, this 26-year-old Idaho native retains the folk-country purr of first album Golden Age Of Radio, and there's an obvious debt to Dylan in the subtle phrasing. Mostly set to quietly rolling acoustic guitar?with Sam Kassirer's Hammond adding an Al Kooper-like undertow?Hello Starling casts Ritter in the same wry glow as early Jackson Browne or James Taylor. Celtic ballad "Kathleen" proves he's fully assimilated the traditional, and the lovely "Wings" was recently covered by Joan Baez. There are hints, too, that he's a kind of David Gray for the roots crowd ("Snow Is Gone"). But don't let that put you off.

Already touted as the next big thing, this 26-year-old Idaho native retains the folk-country purr of first album Golden Age Of Radio, and there’s an obvious debt to Dylan in the subtle phrasing. Mostly set to quietly rolling acoustic guitar?with Sam Kassirer’s Hammond adding an Al Kooper-like undertow?Hello Starling casts Ritter in the same wry glow as early Jackson Browne or James Taylor. Celtic ballad “Kathleen” proves he’s fully assimilated the traditional, and the lovely “Wings” was recently covered by Joan Baez. There are hints, too, that he’s a kind of David Gray for the roots crowd (“Snow Is Gone”). But don’t let that put you off.

Deadstring Brothers

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Emerging in 2001, these Detroit brothers lash the hard-livin' loucheness to traditional country ache. Frontman/songwriter Kurt Marschke's wail is Jaggeresque and there's lonesome balladry aplenty ("27 Hours", "Such A Crime") plus enough "Happy"-like fretwork to suggest what might have been had Gram'n'Keef really got it on. "Entitled" pits the sideways chug of The Breeders' "Cannonball" against early Replacements sneer, and dobro/pedal steel player Peter Ballard tints the big skies with a yearning airiness. Seriously impressive.

Emerging in 2001, these Detroit brothers lash the hard-livin’ loucheness to traditional country ache. Frontman/songwriter Kurt Marschke’s wail is Jaggeresque and there’s lonesome balladry aplenty (“27 Hours”, “Such A Crime”) plus enough “Happy”-like fretwork to suggest what might have been had Gram’n’Keef really got it on. “Entitled” pits the sideways chug of The Breeders’ “Cannonball” against early Replacements sneer, and dobro/pedal steel player Peter Ballard tints the big skies with a yearning airiness. Seriously impressive.

Malcolm Holcombe – Another Wisdom

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Cut from classic troubadour cloth, North Carolinan Holcombe has been recording for 20 years, though dogged by bad luck (dropped by Geffen, his previous album, A Hundred Lies, was only released after fans Steve Earle and Lucinda Williams found him a label). His husk of a voice and country-blues finger-picking is reminiscent of Eric Andersen and Tim Hardin, but closest to JJ Cale. The 48-year-old's stream-of-consciousness lyricism is unique, though, bearing the scars of a troubled past. The tender "Love Abides" carries the line: "My past is old and black as Gunga Din/Her mem'ry's sweet and young as Magdalene."

Cut from classic troubadour cloth, North Carolinan Holcombe has been recording for 20 years, though dogged by bad luck (dropped by Geffen, his previous album, A Hundred Lies, was only released after fans Steve Earle and Lucinda Williams found him a label). His husk of a voice and country-blues finger-picking is reminiscent of Eric Andersen and Tim Hardin, but closest to JJ Cale. The 48-year-old’s stream-of-consciousness lyricism is unique, though, bearing the scars of a troubled past. The tender “Love Abides” carries the line: “My past is old and black as Gunga Din/Her mem’ry’s sweet and young as Magdalene.”

Hommage Frais

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A decade ago, Neil Hannon engineered a reputation for himself as a bookish young fogey on the periphery of Britpop. An awkward dandy whose self-consciousness heightened his appeal, it also helped that much of his music?romantic orchestral fantasias, mainly?measured up to his lofty pretensions. By 19...

A decade ago, Neil Hannon engineered a reputation for himself as a bookish young fogey on the periphery of Britpop. An awkward dandy whose self-consciousness heightened his appeal, it also helped that much of his music?romantic orchestral fantasias, mainly?measured up to his lofty pretensions. By 1998’s Fin De Si

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Ian McLagan is one of the Blokes?quite literally, having spent the last couple of years in Billy Bragg's band. He excels as a sideman, as a list of employers from Dylan to the Stones testifies. As the frontman with his own band, the Bumps, he's less convincing, due to an anonymous voice and derivative songs. That said, Rise & Shine! is an enjoyable effort that revives the spirit of '70s pub rock?Brinsley Schwarz with an added touch of Dave Edmunds rock pastiche, maybe. You'd be damn lucky to have Mac next to you in the lifeboat if the ship was sinking. But that doesn't mean you'd want him on the bridge giving the orders.

Ian McLagan is one of the Blokes?quite literally, having spent the last couple of years in Billy Bragg’s band. He excels as a sideman, as a list of employers from Dylan to the Stones testifies. As the frontman with his own band, the Bumps, he’s less convincing, due to an anonymous voice and derivative songs. That said, Rise & Shine! is an enjoyable effort that revives the spirit of ’70s pub rock?Brinsley Schwarz with an added touch of Dave Edmunds rock pastiche, maybe. You’d be damn lucky to have Mac next to you in the lifeboat if the ship was sinking. But that doesn’t mean you’d want him on the bridge giving the orders.

To Rococo Rot – Hotel Morgen

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Berlin-based To Rococo Rot have been steering a neat course around micro-house, ambient techno and post-rock for nine years, turning out beautifully tailored electronic instrumentals as light and playful as their palindromic name. Hotel Morgen adds percussion, Wurlitzer, grand piano, bass and vibraphone to the usual overheated laptops, synths and samplers to sensuously melodic effect. "Feld"?connecting the dots between Pink Floyd and Orbital?and the languidly grooving "Miss You" are highlights, and Luddites still unconvinced that digital technology is capable of emotional expression should make this their first stop on the road to enlightenment.

Berlin-based To Rococo Rot have been steering a neat course around micro-house, ambient techno and post-rock for nine years, turning out beautifully tailored electronic instrumentals as light and playful as their palindromic name. Hotel Morgen adds percussion, Wurlitzer, grand piano, bass and vibraphone to the usual overheated laptops, synths and samplers to sensuously melodic effect. “Feld”?connecting the dots between Pink Floyd and Orbital?and the languidly grooving “Miss You” are highlights, and Luddites still unconvinced that digital technology is capable of emotional expression should make this their first stop on the road to enlightenment.

Pietra – Montecorvino

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Italian singer Montecorvino has been around for some time, but this should be her international breakthrough. With a nicotine-stained voice like an Italian Marianne Faithfull, and in conjunction with producer Eugenio Bennato, she revives ancient Neapolitan standards like "Guaglione" and "O Sole Mio"...

Italian singer Montecorvino has been around for some time, but this should be her international breakthrough. With a nicotine-stained voice like an Italian Marianne Faithfull, and in conjunction with producer Eugenio Bennato, she revives ancient Neapolitan standards like “Guaglione” and “O Sole Mio”, but marries them with Algerian and Tunisian musicians and arrangements to produce something genuinely new and startling; a real picture of the bustling international port which Naples once was. She can tantalise (“Dove sta Zaz

Coco Rosie – La Maison De Mon Rêve

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They sound like they're singing each other to sleep, weaving glinting strands of remarkable imagery ("If blue-eyed babes/Raised as Hitler's little brides and sons/They got angelic tendencies/Like some boys tend to act like queens"?"Terrible Angels") into a drowsy, intoxicating reverie. A writer more prone to hyperbole might imagine a post-digital Karen Dalton possessing the bodies of conjoined twins raised in the crumbling decadence depicted in Kennedy-scion documentary Grey Gardens. Self-produced, La Maison... is an eerie, sparse, haunted record; instrumentation that sounds like field recordings, or sounds transferred from well-worn 78s, threaded around unfussy synthetic clicks and glitchy backing and delicate harp runs, lovely as unexpected pools of sunlight. Then there are the voices:a lilting, jazzy rasp (very Karen Dalton), oddly child-like sighs, a soaring but never overbearing operatic trill, like the return of an echo. They sing words that twist and turn, resisting interpretation but operating, surely, by their own internal logic, dipped in a kind of Southern gothic both sensual and ominous. Their own lines, "A mumble so dreamy/A soft sound so creamy", go a little of the way towards capturing the magic of this curious, bewitching record; a kiss in the dreamhouse, indeed.

They sound like they’re singing each other to sleep, weaving glinting strands of remarkable imagery (“If blue-eyed babes/Raised as Hitler’s little brides and sons/They got angelic tendencies/Like some boys tend to act like queens”?”Terrible Angels”) into a drowsy, intoxicating reverie. A writer more prone to hyperbole might imagine a post-digital Karen Dalton possessing the bodies of conjoined twins raised in the crumbling decadence depicted in Kennedy-scion documentary Grey Gardens. Self-produced, La Maison… is an eerie, sparse, haunted record; instrumentation that sounds like field recordings, or sounds transferred from well-worn 78s, threaded around unfussy synthetic clicks and glitchy backing and delicate harp runs, lovely as unexpected pools of sunlight. Then there are the voices:a lilting, jazzy rasp (very Karen Dalton), oddly child-like sighs, a soaring but never overbearing operatic trill, like the return of an echo. They sing words that twist and turn, resisting interpretation but operating, surely, by their own internal logic, dipped in a kind of Southern gothic both sensual and ominous. Their own lines, “A mumble so dreamy/A soft sound so creamy”, go a little of the way towards capturing the magic of this curious, bewitching record; a kiss in the dreamhouse, indeed.

Worth The Wait…

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You won't have ordered these bewitching noises; in fact, you won't even have seen them on the menu. In a world of stodgily male indie rock un-surprises, the debut album from early-twentysomething Southamptonites Delays swoops in like a trilling, shimmering, frankly feminised confection of the angelically unexpected and the marketplace defying. Even if you've a notional grasp of what The Cocteau Twins covering The La's might sound like?probably still the best thumbnail sketch of this lot on offer?it hardly prepares you for the startling swoon of fearlessly Liz Fraser-voiced singer Greg Gilbert and a portfolio of sweet, melancholically jangling vignettes. Viewed in the sober light of rock history, of course, Delays' musical touchstones are as easy to plot as they are difficult to reproduce?should anyone be so inclined, and on the evidence these are the only four English boys presently thus driven-with such starry-eyed charm. Gilbert's harmony-festooned vocals summon up Fraser's helium arabesques and David McAlmont's Thieves-era testosterone defiance, underpinned with a delicious sugar-and-grit echo of Lee Mavers. Musically, the band's chiming, shyly pristine three-minute pop sweeps past the twin peaks of "California Dreaming" and "Hazy Shade Of Winter"; Teenage Fanclub at their blessed, blissful best; The Stone Roses at their least laddish and most gossamer (album closer "On" is a tumblingly instinctive hymn to "Waterfall") and The Bangles' imaginary-Merseyside yearnings. From lump-throated start to regretful finish, it's all shot through with a dreamy, nostalgia-soaked vulnerability peculiar, perhaps, to the young and stubbornly out of step. Ultimately, it's that out-of-time devotion?along with soaring choruses to put most contemporaries to shame?which makes this a debut record to cherish. From the first eye?wideningly girlish falsetto of opener "Wanderlust" through the irrepressible uplift of singles "Nearer Than Heaven" and "Long Time Coming", all the way to a giddily sunshine-soaked "Hey Girl" that's patently and brilliantly a "There She Goes" about sweethearts other than smack, Faded Seaside Glamour is an of-the-moment event of its own unlikely making.

You won’t have ordered these bewitching noises; in fact, you won’t even have seen them on the menu. In a world of stodgily male indie rock un-surprises, the debut album from early-twentysomething Southamptonites Delays swoops in like a trilling, shimmering, frankly feminised confection of the angelically unexpected and the marketplace defying. Even if you’ve a notional grasp of what The Cocteau Twins covering The La’s might sound like?probably still the best thumbnail sketch of this lot on offer?it hardly prepares you for the startling swoon of fearlessly Liz Fraser-voiced singer Greg Gilbert and a portfolio of sweet, melancholically jangling vignettes.

Viewed in the sober light of rock history, of course, Delays’ musical touchstones are as easy to plot as they are difficult to reproduce?should anyone be so inclined, and on the evidence these are the only four English boys presently thus driven-with such starry-eyed charm. Gilbert’s harmony-festooned vocals summon up Fraser’s helium arabesques and David McAlmont’s Thieves-era testosterone defiance, underpinned with a delicious sugar-and-grit echo of Lee Mavers.

Musically, the band’s chiming, shyly pristine three-minute pop sweeps past the twin peaks of “California Dreaming” and “Hazy Shade Of Winter”; Teenage Fanclub at their blessed, blissful best; The Stone Roses at their least laddish and most gossamer (album closer “On” is a tumblingly instinctive hymn to “Waterfall”) and The Bangles’ imaginary-Merseyside yearnings.

From lump-throated start to regretful finish, it’s all shot through with a dreamy, nostalgia-soaked vulnerability peculiar, perhaps, to the young and stubbornly out of step.

Ultimately, it’s that out-of-time devotion?along with soaring choruses to put most contemporaries to shame?which makes this a debut record to cherish. From the first eye?wideningly girlish falsetto of opener “Wanderlust” through the irrepressible uplift of singles “Nearer Than Heaven” and “Long Time Coming”, all the way to a giddily sunshine-soaked “Hey Girl” that’s patently and brilliantly a “There She Goes” about sweethearts other than smack, Faded Seaside Glamour is an of-the-moment event of its own unlikely making.

Mekons – Punk Rock

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The Yorkie Mekons celebrated their 25th anniversary two years ago with a heady reconstructed blast at their considerable back catalogue of hit tunes like "Never Been In A Riot", "Fight The Cuts" and associated agit prop revelry recorded in Chicago and Amsterdam. Always ahead of the game but slightly too left-field to clean up, Clash-style, the Mekons were doing socialist folk and country punk long before most of the competition, so the combination of fiddles, banjos, accordions and lean rock'n'roll sound just right. They remain funny, fly and fit for the future. Dan Dare would approve.

The Yorkie Mekons celebrated their 25th anniversary two years ago with a heady reconstructed blast at their considerable back catalogue of hit tunes like “Never Been In A Riot”, “Fight The Cuts” and associated agit prop revelry recorded in Chicago and Amsterdam. Always ahead of the game but slightly too left-field to clean up, Clash-style, the Mekons were doing socialist folk and country punk long before most of the competition, so the combination of fiddles, banjos, accordions and lean rock’n’roll sound just right. They remain funny, fly and fit for the future. Dan Dare would approve.

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