And suddenly November is upon us, I’m thirty next week (how’d that happen? I mean, I’m on Myspace and stuff…Oh.), and I’ve got a cold and the dark S

cottish weather is starting t

o kick in.

So what could be more appropriate than Stuart Braithwaite and his merry men? Mogwai, for it is they, are the perfect soundtrack to these dark nights. Almost always instrumental, and the masters of the previously mentioned ‘Scottish indie aesthetic’, they include the mighty Cure amongst their influences, as well as Slayer, Sonic Youth and Slint. Sometimes DEATH DEFYINGLY LOUD, and sometimes so quiet you have to turn the record p

laye

r up very loud, then dash across the room as you realise you are just about to wreck your speakers. But always beautiful. They have collaborated with Aidan Moffat from Arab Strap, and at one time included Teenage Fanclub/BMX Bandits member Brendan O’Hare amongst their number, as ‘m

usician without portfolio.’ (sic)

Five albums in, trying to pick a favourite album depends on what you have heard. So go and buy the lot! If you have

never heard these stalwarts of the scottish music scene, try these for tasters, as well as visting their Myspace page and onetime label Chemikal Underground, where many tracks can be streamed, not to mention their own web page, where you can download tracks as Podcasts. See, generous with it too.

If you are strapped for cash, I would recommend you start with Young Team, their debut, it’s a very good place to start. They need a home in your record collection. Some tracks are short, some last longer than a Civil Wedding Service (2001 single My Father, My King – a cover of a Jewish prayer is twenty minutes long). My favourite track, which also features Gruff Rhys from Super Furry Animals fame has to be Dial:Revenge. This being a collaboration between two o

f the Celtic fringe’s finest, it’s sung in welsh. Onl

y a tennybopper could resist.

Try these for starters:

Mogwai -‘Tracy.’ mp3 from 1997’s Young Team

Mogwai -‘Dial: Revenge.’ mp3 from 2001’s Rock Action

Mogwai -‘Hunted By A Freak.’ mp3 from 2003’s Happy Songs For Happy People

Mogwai -‘Folk Death 95.’ mp3 from 2006’s Mr. Beast

As always, if you like what you hear, support the artists involved.

Buy Mogwai on Amazon

First of all, these guys have been around for a while, so I ca

nnot claim to be putting a new band your way. But if you haven’t heard The Gossip before, and I was a Johnny-come-lately too, now you must!

From the US, based in Portland, Oregon, three-piece the Gossip remind me of The Bellrays, The Slits and The Rapture (especially circa Out Of The Races And Onto The Tracks). This track has just been re-released in the UK – go get it!

The Gossip -‘Standin the way of control.’ mp3

Gossip Standing In The Way Of Control

Like what you hea

r? Their myspace page

has more tracks to stream, whilst more tracks can also be found at here at Insound and at the Kill Rockstars media page.

And, as always, if you like

what you hear, support the music, go and buy it!

Buy The Gossip at Am

azon

The Official Gossip website

The Official Gossip m

yspace

OK, you’re probably all aware that U2 and Green Day have teamed up to cover The Skids’ ‘The Saints Are Coming’ to raise funds for victims of Hurricane Katrina last year in New Orleans. The single is out next week and can be

bought here. However, this is the video, which satiris

es CNN and Bush’s attempt (ha!) to deal with the situation. I know it’s

easy to take shots at both bands, but I still like to feel that hearts are in the right place. Hope you’re all having a

good weekend.

U2 and Green Day

Gig review:

The Cooper Temple Clause/Battle

Liquid Rooms, Edinburgh October 30, 2006

This is, perhaps surprisingly, only The Cooper Temple’s Clause’s second visit to Edinburgh. The last time they played here, January 2002, they had just that day released the Double A-side single ‘Film-maker/Been Training Dogs’ wh

ich would take them into the UK Top 40 for the first time. Their debut, See This Through And Leave was raring to go. And go they did, with festival appearances, Top Of the Pops etc.. and then after the release of their second album, Kick Up The Fire And Let The Flames Burn Loose in 2003, after a few months…seemingly silence. Then earlier this year, the Dirty Pretty Things emerged, having taken Didz Hammond from the Coopers, and a number of mp3s started to appear on the Coopers’ website. So have they still got it it in 2006?

First, while I wait for the first TCTC gig since February 2004 (Glasgow Academy, co-headlining with Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, since you ask), openers Battle blaze their way through a crows that they warm up very quickly. If they are not capable of selling out the Liquid rooms in less than a year, then frankly, somethings gone wrong somewhere. They look great – always a bonus – and sound so cool and together. By the second song, Isabel, it’s clear this world could be theirs for th

e taking. How to describe their sound? Well, let’s just say, you have an idea how U2’s Boy might have sounded if they had made it having heard Bloc Party, The Futureheads and Franz Ferdinand. Moments of white noise, funkiness and epicness. By the time of the two final songs, Children and Easy To Listen to close the set, it is clear that Jason Bavanandan and the boys are destined for big things. Tell ’em 17 seconds told you about them.

And then the Coopers come on.

Bearded three of the five may be in 2006, and there’s been a hell of a lot happening in the UK’s indie scene since, but oh. Before they even play a note, it’s abundantly obvious that the energy and sheer joy they brought to a stagnant scene in 2001 is still there in spades. Kasabian must have been taking notes. As they tear into Promises, Promises it really is like they have never been away. When you haven’t seen a band for a few years, it’s easy to almost forget things – like their swapping of instruments effortlessly without appearing like musos- seem. The second song is Homo Sapiens, no.36 in this week’s chart (already higher than Blind Pilots and Let’s Kill Muisc got, then). As well as older songs that are greeted with sheer roars of joy, the Coope

rs also manage to play songs of the new album, due January, which go down extremely well with the crowd – always a risk playing stuff off an as yet unreleased album, even in the era of the internet, but Waiting Game and Connected sound like tracks strong enough to pre-order that album. Of the new songs, I am sounds like fantatsic, the essence of the Cooper

Temple Clause, being a ballad on some levels and white noise on others – at the same time. The aforementioned Connected is reminiscent of Depeche Mode circa Speak and Spell. Film-maker and this year’s download track Damage fasten their hold onto you, but perhaps the biggest surprise is the way Panzer Attack has evolved from a hard-as-nails rocker into a hard-as-nails techno stomper. 2006 suggests that beats will sake their claim on ‘indie’ territory in 2007, but remember who you should be paying respects to. They encore with Who needs enemies? and finally, their most sublime moment still, Blind Pilots.

Pity the fools who forgot. The Cooper Temple Clause have never sounded better or been more relevant.

Battle on Myspace

Battle’s official website

The Cooper Temple Clause on Myspace

The Cooper Temple Clause’s official site

Buy Battle on Amazon

Buy The Cooper Temple Clause on Amazon

Hello again, it’s been a busy time asusual, trying to balance work, social life and music, but here I am back again.

This post is for

three friends, Rob and Emma who had my girlfriend and I to stay with them in Oban over the weekend

, and my friend Gordon who came with me to

see the Cooper Temple Clause and Battle on Monday (review coming very, very soon.

Rob said he hadn’t heard Camera Obscura – so here, for Rob and Emma is Camera Obscura – still my favourite album of the year with ‘Let’s Get Out Of This Country.’

Camera Obscura -‘I Need All The Friends I Can Get.’ mp3

Meanwhile

, on Monday, inbetween ba

nds, Gordon and I were discussing how great British sea Power were and he admitted that he hadn’t heard The Brakes album, the offshoot project also involving The Electric Soft Parade and others, including the Pipettes. So, Gordon, here is The Brakes:

The Brakes -‘Heard About Your Band.’ mp3

And of course, because the above track name-checks Sleater-Kinney…how could I resist?

Sleater-Kinney – ‘Oh!’ mp3

Buy Camera Obscura on Amazon

Buy The Brakes on Amazon

Buy Sleater-Kinney on Amazon

(Picture taken by Sam Garnett.
Aberfeldy : the Bongo Club, Edinburgh, October 27, 2006)

The

se are truly strange times we all live in. Last week Aberfeldy were playing in Mexico to 7,000 people in a country where their record isn’t even out. Meanwhile, back in the UK, at Edinburgh’s Bongo Clu

b (admittedly a place with a much smaller capacity) the crowd are much smaller, but they are doing a hastily arranged gig for Oxjam, and they are back on home turf… it’s great to see them back here.

Just to put it in some kind of context, I have now seen Aberfeldy seven times. So, yes, I came to praise Aberfeldy, and dragging my friends along with me (my girlfriend, sam, who provided the photo at the top has seen them a mere three times. But I digress). And as I mentioned before, they have just grown so much. The band have become so tight on stage, and just look so goddamn cool. N

o Safari suits for Riley this evening, but from the minute ‘A Friend Like You’ starts, it’s like being greeted by an old friend, someone you’ve grown up with, and who is starting to seem to happy in themselves. It opens their first album, Young Forever, and I think, virtually every gig I have ever seen them play.

Their new album, Do Wha

tever Turns You On, grows on playing. Back at home typing this up, and listening to the album, I realise just how these songs are starting to worm my way into my consciousness (maybe they just need time, rather than more singles off the album). ‘If-Then’ and ‘1970s’ certainly ra

te with the best songs on their debut. Yet, it’s also so good to hear ‘Surly Girl’ and debut single ‘Vegetarian Restaurant’ again. The backing vocals from Sarah and Ruth on ‘Surly’ could melt the hardest heart, no matter how many times I hear it. Vegetarian Restaurant is actually about Susie’s Diner in Edinburgh. Maybe edinburgh will one day have it’s own rock’n’roll tour and a plaque outside (then again, I remember thinking the Dublin one seemed to be clutching at straws, so perhaps not).

Four songs from the new album ‘Poetry,’ ‘All True Trendies’ ‘Whatever turns you on’ and ‘Uptight’ are played in succession, and you start to feel that it doesn’t matter if they’re not interspersed with songs off the debut,

you want to hear these new ones too. The chemistry between the band still seems strong, with Murray looking like he’s been the drummer here forever, and Ken looking pretty content with himself too.

The band finish the set with ‘love is an arrow’ and remind us that it was their big hit, reaching no.60 last year. If there is justice, this will be surpassed soon enough. They come on for an encore of Devo’s ‘Beautiful World’ which goes seemlessly into ‘Heliopolis by night.’ And as ever, we all do the radio ga-ga hand-claps.

The feldys continue to grow and delight. Let’s hope more records come, whether they’re out in Scotland or Mexico. My friends go off into the night, promising to buy the Cds and saying they want to see them again. You will be held to this, guys.

The Setlist (with thanks to Ken)
A Friend Like You
1970s
If-Then
Surly Girl
Vegetarian Restaurant
Hypnotised
Summer’s Gone
Tom Weir
Poetry
All True Trendies
Whatever Turns You On
Uptight
Love Is An Arrow

Beautiful World/Heliopolis By Night

OK

– I’m sure you probably knew this but next week sees the release of another Damon Albarn-related project The Good The Bad And The Queen. Of course, this time round, his collaborators are none other than bassist Paul Simonon from the Clash, guitarist Simon Tong from The Verve and Fela Kuti’s drummer Tony Allen. Truly Damon is a renaissance man – he’s forty next year, so watc

h out for a whole wealth of articles then that will be considering just how far he’s come since 1990 (why do I get the feeling that this is not going to happen to Noel Gallagher?). It’s hard to judge the project on the basis of just one track, but this is really very good, and l

et’s face it, with that list of collaborators, there is going to be no shortage of media and indeed public interest.

Their myspace page only has the aforementioned tune to stream, but there is a new album to follow in 2007. (Don’t bite my head off Damon, but do I take it that is going to mean no new studio album from Blur or Gorillaz next year then? Er, just wondering). The single

is out

now to download and will be released on Monday October 30 in the UK on CD and 7″ and deleted that day, so act quickly.

Buy The Good The Bad And The Queen on Amazon

Oxford Collapse‘s track Please Visit Your National Parks is the mp3 of the week at the mighty Subpop. Rather taken with its quirky charms, I thought I would post a link to it here, and also include the video which appears below. Something happening in Brooklyn, though I’m guessing all the sheep sheering didn’t take place there… Oh, and anybody think the title is rather reminiscent of Grandaddy (RIP)?

The Oxford Collapse -‘Please Visit Your National Parks.’ mp3

Please Visit Your National Parks – Oxford Collapse

If you like that there are more mp3s at the official site and also at their myspace page

Buy Remember The Night Parties album at Amazon

Flicking through YouTube I came across these two videos. I have to say I love the way Primal Scream have changed so much over the years, from fey indie pop to biker rockers to dance pioneers to stones influenced rockers…and so on. Country

Girl is one of my

favourite singl

es of the year, but as one of Scotland’s greatest bands, here is a video apiece from their first two albums, Sonic Flower Groove and Primal Scream, released in 1987

and 1989 respectively

. Not long before, Bobby Gillespie had been the drummer for the Jesus and Mary Chain. Enjoy these…

Gentle Tuesday

Buy Sonic Flower Groove

Ivy Ivy Ivy-Primal Scream

Buy The Primal Scream

Okay, I realise that I have now mentioned Luke Haines in three consecutive posts, but it is such a great single. Available on 7″ for those like me, who are ecstatic to see it flourishing (those of you mocking are seriously behind. 7″ sales are up 89% in the last few months. I now feel that CD singles are crap, and have bought one in

the past twelve months) or digital download. Let’s see if we can

get it into the charts…

Off My Rocker At The Ar

t School Bop

The album is out next week. Pre-order it here