July Round-Up

The tragic thing about the new album by The Strokes is that it could have been something else. Like, really good. Even great. Instead, Julian Casablancas decided to drag his voice through autotune, and obviously the two songs that do not feature processed vocals are the best ("Dine N'Dash" and "Going To Babble On"). The rest has potential (instrumentally, Reality Awakes is excellent) but Julian turns it into a nightmare. I would like to know the honest opinion of his band members. 

Thank God for Luke Haines. Izzy Wizzy Let's Get Bizzy is yet another reliably eccentric concept album, this time about the occultism and the magic of British children's TV in the 70s. If you think that's niche, you haven't been exposed to Luke Haines' music over the last decade and a half. It is dark and it is catchy and it has a lot of recorder and sinister folk strumming. And also, in the short and sweet "Spiritualist Church at 7.30pm Every Other Wednesday", one of his trademark classic pop tunes. 

There was a time (circa 2012) when The Menzingers meant something to me. On The Impossible Past was on constant repeat and I even caught them performing unforgettable, high-octane punk classics like "Obituaries" and "Time-Tables" in a raucous pub in Dublin. Since then, they have been patchy (Rented World) and boring (Some Of It Was True). Their new album, Everything I Ever Saw, is both of those things. It feels laboured, and very predictable. 

The cover of Charli XCX's previous album was pure kitsch, but then so is the black and white photo of Music, Fashion, Film. The album itself is filled with 2 to 3 minute songs that feel both snappy and strangely underdeveloped. It is an album of reels and threads and tiktok videos in a music form - all catchy and irresistible and also a little empty.   

The Rolling Stones have released their latest 'best since Some Girls' album. Foreign Tongues is certainly an admirable effort from a band so past their prime it is not even funny. At this point, we are way beyond their lifetime and even their afterlife. It is a revived corpse that is still, somehow, able to produce good music. Foreign Tongues is full of energy and decent grooves and hooks and memorable choruses. If it all feels a little off, then it is not their fault. It's the age. Best since Some Girls it is not, of course, but their most substantial work released this century? I might just accept that. 

Alex Cameron has lost something. After the perfect four album run (no small thing), he has released Late To Set without the saxophonist and longtime collaborator Roy Molloy. It shows. The songs feel a little more hollow this time, the playfulness is nearly gone (despite the conspicuous title "Jesus Never Had No Porno") and the humour has become a little forced. He is still very good, though, and both the ballad "Ricochet" and the groovy single "Red Hook Rain" are worthy additions to his stellar catalogue. 

At this point in time, I know exactly what to expect from Robyn Hitchcock. And I'm fine with it. There is nothing confusing about The Confuser. It is a late period Robyn Hitchcock album, full of memorable (but not that memorable) and eccentric (but not that eccentric) songs that are perfectly fine but won't get him any new fans. I'm just happy to get back in the groove for a while, and even hear that Kimberley Rew guitar which appears here from time to time. No classics, just a lovely little collection of ten new songs. 

Finally, another reliable album came from Shearwater whose new album, The New World, features an Interstellar-styled cover (which gives it a somewhat sinister edge) and nine songs of excellent slow burning folk-rock that has real tension and urgency to it. The musicianship is terrific and the beautiful melodies seep through, eventually. Laurie Anderson guests on the dreamy, hypnotic closer "You And My Dog".

Songs of the month: 

"Spiritualist Church at 7.30pm Every Other Wednesday" by Luke Haines

"One By One" by Peter Gabriel

"Photos Of The Reenactment" by Kiwi jr.

"Ricochet" by Alex Cameron

"Daydream Unbeliever" by Shearwater

"Glamour Magick" by Arab Strap

"Rough And Twisted" by The Rolling Stones

"Cocaine Walking, Booze Talking" by Richard Thompson

"Monday For Me" by Robyn Hitchcock

"Going To Babble On" by The Strokes

"You're Gonna Need A Little Music" by Yard Act

Sam Neill's best performance

It is never right to reduce an actor to a single role, but for me Sam Neill (who died last week) will always be about one little known film from 2008 I saw a while ago, in terrible quality, on a small computer screen. And yet it remains one of the most special cinematic experiences in my life.  

Dean Spanley is that rare combination of charming and bizarre that, if done properly, will always leave a mark. The film is billed as "a surreal period comedic tale of canine reincarnation exploring the relationships between father and son and master and dog". And it is all that, too. Sam Neill plays a clergyman who has a weakness for Hungarian Imperial Tokay wine. Weakness, though, does not even begin to cover it. For when Dean Spanley drinks the wine (slowly, meditatively, with tiny sips), he starts to relive memories from his previous life. During which he was... a Welsh Spaniel. 

There are moments in the films where the plot gets so eccentric it really should fall apart. But it doesn't. Instead, it inhabits its own strange world so comfortably, with such disarming commitment, that you simply get lost in its atmosphere. And at the heart of it all is Sam Neill who is clearly relishing the wine and the canine memories (both funny and sad). Relishing the role. When he is saying that you can't commit a bigger crime than to drag your dog from a lamppost with its complex mixture of odours... As a dog owner, this goes right through my heart. 

As does this story, and this film. Dean Spanley is the epitome of 'special', like so many other brilliant but unflashy and obscure works of art I have discovered over the years (Good Things by Epic Soundtracks, Kafka Was The Rage by Anatole Broyard). It gets inside you and it stays there. It evokes something you never knew could be evoked. And it is all done through the absolutely magical performance of Sam Neill. The way he closes his eyes when he drinks Tokay... You wish you could taste just one sip of that, and God only knows what memories would follow.