BRITISH SEA POWER

*Intimate UK concert dates.
*Fort Rox festival line-up confirmed.
*Contribute to Mr Clough’s lifelike memorial.

In the manner of excitable record-breakers cramming into a phone box,
British Sea Power would like to announce a tour of small venues in
August and September. We can also now announce the full line-up for the
BSP mini-festival at Newhaven Fort and announce a benefit show in
memory of the great Brian Clough. Oh, how we need him now.

The line-up for the Fort Rox event is as follows. This event will take
place from midday to 6pm at the 19th Century Newhaven Fort, high on the
cliffs at Newhaven in East Sussex.

Fort Rox
Sat 12 Aug
British Sea Power, The Duke Spirit, My Latest Novel, The Research,
Charlottefield and Jacobs Stories.

Tickets are £10 and are available from Rounder Records (01273 325440)
and Resident Records (01273 606312) or from www.ticketweb.co.uk

The Fort Rox show will be followed by a tour of small and interesting
venues, including a club for Poles and another 19th Century fort (this
time on the Wirral peninsula on Merseyside). These dates are intended
as intimate evenings at which BSP can road-test new material. These
dates follow on from the previously announced John Betjeman centenary
birthday-party event on Monday 28 Aug at Polzeath in Cornwall. The
dates are as follows.

Tues 29 Aug Exeter Cavern (box office: 01392 495370)
Thurs 31 Aug York Fibbers (box office: 0870 9070999)
Fri 1 Sept New Brighton, Merseyside, Fort Perch Rock  (box office: 0151
256 5555)
Mon 4 Sept Leicester The Musician (box office: 0116 251 0080)
Tues 5 Sept Aldershot Westend Centre (box office: 01252 408040)
Weds 6 Oxford Zodiac (box office: 01865 420042)
Thurs 7 Sept Leeds Brundenell Social (box office: 0113 245 5570)
Fri 8 Sept Glasgow King Tuts (box office: 0870 169 0100)
Sun 10 Sept London Prince of Wales Theatre (John Betjeman Gala)
Mon 11 Sept Bath Moles (box office: 01225 404445)
Tues 12 Sept Birmingham Barfly (box office: 0870 9070999)
Weds 13 Sept London Barfly (box office: 0870 9070999)
Thurs 14 Sept Bristol Polish Club (box office details TBC)
Fri 15 Sept Cardiff Barfly (box office: 0870 9070999)

Please note that the event at London’s Prince Of Wales Theatre on 10
September is the John Betjeman Gala. This event follows on from the
Betjeman event in Cornwall and will see British Sea Power celebrate the
poet’s memory alongside Barry Humphries, Joanna Lumley, Nick Cave, Judi
Dench, Terence Stamp and many more. Box office enquiries:  0870 850
0398.

British Sea Power would also like to announce a fund-raising event in
July. This concert will raise funds towards a memorial statue of the
late Brian Clough, to be erected in his home town of Middlesbrough. BSP
will play the show in the spirit of the immortal Clough - pink to the
gills on whisky and fiercely assaulting any stage invaders. Details are
as follows.

Fri 28 July Middlesbrough Empire (box office: 01642 253553

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Much has been made of the switch from the claustrophobic electonica of the Screams last two albums. Oooh, it sounds like Rolling Stones, Stooges, whatever. It’s not as if they have never ripped off tunes from Jagger and co n the past so why is it so surprising now?

So out with the industrial polemic and in with good time rock n roll with all their usual lyricisms in check, so you get yer junkies, speed, suicide, guns and of course plenty of mentions of having soul.

When you look at the missing personel from those two last two albums it is bound to leave a different sounding band. Mainstay guitarist Throb is on a ‘hiatus’, Kevin Shields is also gone and without the production team of Andy Weatherall, David Holmes and sonic genius Jagz Kooner all missing, yes, you do get a different sounding band.

They have always been unpredictable, it’s why we love them and this switch is no different from the euphoric classic ‘Screamadelica’ to ‘Give out but don’t give up’ or ‘Vanishing Point’ to ‘Xtrmntr’, though this switch almost seems as the last roll of the dice in a band appeasing their unhappy record label and for the first time ever there are parts of this their eighth album where the Scream seem bereft of ideas, at least ideas of their own.

It’s not all bad though, opening with the rip roaring mandolin led single ‘Country Girl’ and crash landing into the porno groove of ‘Nitty Gritty’ which is a must in titty bars the world over, it all seems business as usual in camp scream, however things rapidly go horribly wrong in the shape of ’Suicide Sally and Johnny Guitar’ which is an excrutiating excursion into New York Dolls territory with the dumbest lyrics possible.

Bobby Gillespie is one of the finest frontman of a band in the last twenty years but hearing a man in his mid forties signing "She got her wings, givin’ head to a priest , the fucker choked on his rosary beads" is somewhat undignified as is Bobby drawling ‘I feel like Christ on the cross with a loaded gun’ on the aforementioned ‘Nitty Gritty.

Elsewhere, ‘99th floor’ is mid 60’s Dylan and ‘Dolls’ is a brilliant glam rocker in the vein of ‘Cigarettes and alcohol’ but by far the finest tracks here are ‘Little Death’ and ‘When the bomb drops’, two sinister tracks of eery 13th Floor Elevators influenced pychadelia, the latter featuring great guitar work by WIll Sargent of Echo and the bunnymen.

All in all it’s an unashamedly cliched album with its influences firmly on its sleeve. It mostly hits the right spots but doesn’t challenge the listener in any way, not what we expect of them. 7/10

Chris Todd

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Commandments of Dub, Chapter 8: Imperial Dub by Jah Shaka (Jah Shaka Music)

I worked the counter of Record Village in sunny Scunthorpe for a while, and as well as hoovering up, making brews and surreptitiously pressuring kids into buying my fanzine, I also ordered indie records from Red Rhino distribution in York. I was only hired in the first place because I was buying all that stuff anyway, as a punter, and geeky enough to fit the bill.
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Commandments of Dub, Chapter 8: Imperial Dub by Jah Shaka (Jah Shaka Music)
I worked the counter of Record Village in sunny Scunthorpe for a while, and as well as hoovering up, making brews and surreptitiously pressuring kids into buying my fanzine, I also ordered indie records from Red Rhino distribution in York. I was only hired in the first place because I was buying all that stuff anyway, as a punter, and geeky enough to fit the bill.

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News and Tributes (679 Recordings)

• The time - the day the Futureheads handed their second in at the label
• The place - Record executives office
• The stars - THE RECORD EXECUTIVE and er…band

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As far back as Divine Comedy’s debut, ‘Liberation’, Neil Hannon has always been an aristocratic 60 year old in a 15 year old indie kids body. Half deliberate self perpetuated imagery and half intellectual snobbery, Hannon forged a very individual style throughout the boisterously cocky brit pop era and the beer soaked thuggery of Oasis-mania. He didn’t fit in anywhere, yet strangely succeeded. The reason being was simple…. He was just too damn talented. He had an ear for a good tune and a sharp witty pen and by 1998’s ‘Fin de Siecle’, the entire nation was singing, in unison, an ode to our much hated form of public Transport, ‘The National Express’.

Commercially however it did start to go wrong after 2001’s Regeneration. The band split, only for Hannnon to announce that he was continuing to record under the same name and although his grand return in 2004 with the very personally angled ‘Absent Friends’, it was clear that his love affair with appealing to the youth market was over. The cool music press deserted in their droves and he seemed content performing in more artistic, dare I say, ‘pretentious’ surroundings.

2006 and I’m frankly surprised Divine Comedy are still signed to a major. It’s refreshing in a way to see talent has triumphed over record sales, but there has been a noticeable decline in interest. The witty irony’s that brought a wry smile to the face have in main been replaced by sombre elitist subject matter that are often too self indulgent to be appreciated.

Although, ‘Victory For The Comic Muse’, is melodically a little more user friendly, there are moments where it leaps from the beaten track, veering dangerously into nowhere land, dragging a kicking and screaming orchestra with it. As always he provides us with an impressive beginning, ‘To Die a Virgin’, is classic Hannon, lyrically clever and musically exciting,

Other moments of Hannon grandeur are, ‘A Lady Of  Certain Age’, a Parisian sounding Sacha Distel-esque ballad about a once wealthy ageing widow and the song ‘Arthur C Clarke’s Mysterious World’, which if a bit cheesy and with a knowing nod and a wink to the male population, shares a joke about the complexity of the female mind. These are Divine Comedy gems that you would once find on classic albums such as, ‘Casanova’, and ‘A Short Album About Love’……

…. but all too quickly we are reminded of the scrappy lyrical waywardness and melodic confusion that Hannon is ever more attracted to. Songs such as ‘Count Grassi’s Passage Over Piedmont’ and ‘Snowball In Negative’, see Hannon disappear firmly up his own arse. A slightly bewildering cover of The Associates, ‘Party Thrills Two’, complete with full orchestra hamming it up to the limit does break the album down nicely but what could have been a triumphant return to form has been let down somewhat by some persistent niggles. Having said that I wait with bated breath for his next release…..as always.

7/10

James Heward

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The Sleepy Jackson have announced their return with the release of their new single ‘God Lead Your Soul’ on July 10th on Virgin Records.

The single is taken from the Sleepy Jackson’s forthcoming new album ‘Personality’ .

‘God Lead Your Soul will be released as two 7" singles and a CD with bonus non album tracks.

7" No. 1          DINS 278
7" No. 2          DINSX 278
CD              DINSDX 278

The Sleepy Jackson will tour the UK in July.

Wed 12-Jul  Leeds,   Cockpit
Thur 13-Jul  Manchester  University 3
Fri 14-Jul  Glasgow   King Tuts
Sat 15-Jul  Nottingham  Rescue Rooms
Mon 17-Jul  Oxford   Zodiac
Tue 18-Jul  London,  Scala

www.thesleepyjackson.com

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1. Dirty Pretty Things - Doctors and dealers 

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Bounding onto the stage looking like a car crash involving Rikki Lake and Divine with the booty (a considerable one at that) shaking moves of Tina Turner, Beth Ditto the belching lead singer with this Arkansas three piece commences preceedings by dedicating "this one to all the faggits", the faggits and everybody else is then delighted with the brilliantly shambolic and highly sexed gritty funky punk set.

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‘We Are The Pipettes’