REVIEWED: Prince - 20Ten

This is Prince's best album since Diamonds and Pearls.

I was seriously dubious when a friend pressed a copy of "20Ten" into my hand. Let's be honest, Purple Yoda, His Royal Badness, The Purple One - whatever you want to call him, just simply went musically AWOL for so long that people just assumed that he would never do anything with any weight ever again. I think Prince fans (not the rabid ones) got a bit let down after album after album of absolute self-absorbed shite was rolled out. "Rave Un2 The Joy Fantastic" sounds like, Jesus it's too depressing to even bring up. Oh hang on, "Black Sweat" from 2006's "3121" was an amazing track, but the album was.........yeah.

Thankfully, Prince has finally got some semblance of his mojo back. This is largely due to the fact that, while sniffing sprigs of fresh lavender and playing with his pussy, he re-discovered his Linn Drums. Linn Drums are rather famous electronic drums that defined all of Prince's 80's catalogue, and which are present on all the massive hits that get bootys shaking the world over. They are his sound, the very engine of his being. Without them he's a spare purple prick at a wedding. As a musician, it's bordering on sacrilege to use the same sounds - it's like perving on someone else's girlfriend. I found there to be one or two annoyingly shit songs that if left off, could've made the album a far more pleasurable experience. But having said that, for this late in Prince's game, this is a damn good effort.

Oh and I'll just warn you - there's only 2 types of songs on this album - uptempo "Contraversy" type jams, and down tempo "Diamonds and Pearls" type numbers. Sounds good to me.

The album storms out of the blocks with "Compassion". The first time I heard those Linn Toms my world got a little better. The song isn't the most amazing thing you've ever heard, but you can dance around the room to it. My only advice to him would be to never mention Polar Ice Caps in a song ever again. Not the best start but the next track more than makes up for it....

"Beginning, Endlessly" is the SHIT. This is what I'm talking about. This is vintage purple. The slightly menacing in a sexy way synths; the dope drums; his phrasing is vintage - it's amazing that this guy is 52 yet can still sound like he's 25. No auto-tune here. The guy is still a freak. This song would slay a dance floor. There's not much more I can say about this tune - for me it's the best cut on the album. I'm ashamed to say that I don't even pay attention to what the hell the lyrics are, my arse is too busy doing things. Oh and when he busts in with his trademark clean guitar funk riff it's well wicked.

"Future Soul Song" shimmies up to you unnanounced in a real Diamonds and Pearl kinda way. It's like being gently slapped about the face with a velvet towelette. It's just got his brand of sex all over it - and that's why so much of this album works. He's got his sex back. I can't imagine anybody getting it on to any of his albums from the past god knows how long, but people will be laying it down under the sheets for sure to this LP. He's still not singing about Scarlet Pussies but this is almost as good. This is some new brand of Prince. I'm at 3:40 now and it breaks in like a beast with sub bass and smooth low backing vocals. It's purring at me. Alright, enough with the pussy jokes.

Shit me again and again "Sticky Like Glue" is fast becoming my fave Prince song, EVER. EVER? Yeah it's that good. It's "Head" for the noughties It's got that stuttering funk, classic hooks and the Linns to get me through. It's The Gap Band, The Dazz Band, Zapp and Morris Day all rolled into one. And more importantly, and I can't stress this enough, IT HAS REALLY WACK RAPPING IN IT TOO. I love it when Prince raps. He sounds so wack-ly cool. Perfect. Actually the sexual monster IS back - one of the lines is "I can't get to sleep unless you're sticky like glue." Ewwwww. I was wrong.

"Act Of God". This is a really dope tune in the only way that Prince can make a really stupid story sound interesting. Something about banking and tax - yeah I dig you man but just stick to, oh hang on a minute he just sang "I tell you man freedom ain't free." That's pretty wack.

"Lavaux". OK this is more like it. "Take me to the village of Lavaux". Alright. It's a World Heritage Site on the shores of Lake Geneva in Switzerland famous for it's vineyard terraces that can be traced back to the 11th Century. Holy shit, don't tell me he's on the piss now? I'm liking this new Prince. First off, that someone can be singing about some old vineyards and make it sound sexy deserves an immediate 50 points. I want to be there in a Ferrari with my girl, in a tux etc etc. Secondly, thank you, you mad bastard, for writing a song entirely about an old vineyard. WTF? It is actually refreshing to hear a song about such a stupid subject. It bounces too. One of my faves on the album.

"Walk In Sand". This song is shit.

"Sea Of Everything". This song redeems aforementioned puddle of poo. Listening to this song is like watching Prince undo a couture dress with his teeth. The bath has been running for a good 10 minutes. He's checking the temperature. It's not too hot, not too cold. He licks his fingers. Maybe some soft music on the stereo. Now he's popping a bottle of champagne (from Lavaux) with his teeth, but not drinking any of it, it's just dribbling down his arms onto the thighs of his lady who by now is reclined in the nude on some satin sheets. She dwarfs him by a good 3 feet but he makes up for it with 4 inch high purple stilettos. Now they are on the terrace and he has a Spanish guitar on and not much else. It has "Only for us 2" engraved on it oh shit the songs over........

"Everybody Loves Me". Dude. Purple dude, don't put this song last. It sounds so out of place after "Sea Of Everything". Put it at the beginning. You've just left me with such an enduring image of your nightly sexual exploits and then you shatter it. Following on from the night before, now the poor woman is in the control booth while you show off a song from your NEXT album, and she's yawning and trying to think of a way to get the fuck out of dodge. Actually no, I'm too harsh. This song isn't that bad. Indeed, it gets better with every listen and as dancefloor fodder it's better than a shitload of stuff out now.

Hmmmm. I love three quarters of this album. That piece is a beautifully funky return to form. I only wish he would exercise a bit of corn control. Just cut out those albums in between Diamonds and Pearls and now and we'd be all good. But those years are there, and I'm sure he saw them as profoundly important moments of his life. To us, they were profoundly boring, but I think he could be back. His next album will be the test. If it takes the next from this and moves on then hell yeah, I'll say proudly that he's back. If he suddenly veers back into the Dark Years then i'll be happy that he took the time out to return to his 80's roots if only for one album.

I'll be spinning this for a while i think.

I'm now on Bandcamp

So many choices now online for giving away free shit! I'll be posting free unreleased stuff as well as a couple of cheeky free tracks from The Black Book Of The Universe.

Yeah!

REVIEWED: Ariel Pink's "Before Today"

Just want to let you know that when I review a record, I REVIEW a record. Sorry if it's a major essay - I believe an album deserves a thorough analysis.

To begin let me put this in perspective:

Ariel Pink spent quite a few years in musical isolation living in an apartment next to his parents in Pico-Robertson, L.A. He was prolifically producing music on a 4 track cassette recorder that, in it's naive lo fidelity meanderings and 70's AM leanings created a mystique and enough of a jolt to the music industry for people to prick up their ears. Mouth drums. Say what? It was fresh, devoid of the usual pretention involved with indie bands and just damn outright weird. At the time, it felt like this little pocket-rocket would; could go no further than being an underground indie curio.

Embedded deep in those cassettes lay the genesis for one of the most startling debut albums I have ever encountered. Now, the butterfly emerges from the tape-hiss coccoon and is born; single handedly making most indie music made in the last 5 years predictable and just downright embarrassing. Actually I think it's about time we stopped calling this kid indie, it's a bit of an insult to him.

Hello "Before Today".

On first listen, the album is perhaps a tad disjointed in its freakiness - at some point during, I felt like it had the feeling of a kitchen sink record of someone desperately throwing shit at a wall to see if it will stick. It twists and turns more than a dying snake, some songs having a multitude of feels and changes, one minute he's warbling in falsetto, the next in a deep musky baritone. To put it mildly, it was bloody hard to grasp in one go. History tells me that all my favourite albums start out like this.

By the 4th time through, I was completely eating my words.

Skipping down a rough New York alleyway in a leather jacket, fake shiv in hand with a random conga line of sci-fi nerds, failed beat poets and almost-sexy women in Thriller jackets trailing behind the self confessed "half-man, half-woman, "Before Today" truly is an album out of place in 2010. Un-paralleled contemporarily in it's un-abashed thirst for musical exploration, the thing that is so goddamn amazing about this album is that for every off-kilter track, there is a pulsing pop gem lying in wait just around the corner.

Not just OK pop gems, REAL pop gems like "Can't Hear My Eyes" that should have a place in the top 10 of any album chart. The disgusting thing is, in 2010, up against dribbling tripe like Justin Beiber, Ariel Pink will just never get there. I feel like personally delivering a copy to every baby boomer in the world. They'd get it. If you got em' a glass of wine and put it on for them, the first thing they'd say is "Man, this is a great album, I think I have this on vinyl". It sounds timeless. This could have been released in any decade and blow people's minds.

Opener "Hot Body Rub" sounds like it has come direct from Bowie's "Diamond Dogs" phase. This is the alleyway and shiv bit. Listening to this track makes me feel cool. Like I'm in a club and some hot chick walks up to talk to me, and i'm like "Nah. Fuck off. Whatever lady. Hot Body Rub....." All the while dressed in the most ridiculous red leather get up ever concocted. I think it's ballsy to open with an instrumental track, however this sets up the album brilliantly.

It really could go anywhere from this song. It encapsulates the feel of the whole record. And then it drops into "Bright lit blue skies" a beautiful swinger of a track that (personally) is effortlessly better than anything Bon Iver, Fleet Foxes or Grizzly Bear have done (*runs for cover*), because it has beautiful backing vocals that have next to no reverb on them. He doesn't have to soak it; it's already all there, and all in 2:26? Are you kidding me? It has intent, it's restrained yet fierce and effortless. Sunny pop. It sits neatly somewhere between Mama Cass's thighs and now. Exactly where, I have no idea. It's there somewhere but i can't say it sounds definitely 60's, or definitely 90's etc etc.

"Le'estat (According to the widow's maid)" is what i'm talking about. It goes from an initial hooted intro that sounds like a twee indie pastoral band to a second intro riding a ring of saturn synths to a verse of 60's Yardbirds beat then into a chorus of pure Bolan with delicious "Yeahs" then..........early Genesis, Vangelis, Ha! It's a complete journey. However, never once does it sound forced, contrived or wrong. This is prog-pop. A contained musical journey that is seamless in execution. Liquid in it's transition. After 4 listens this track transforms from a confusing puzzle to a beautiful tapestry. *POP*.......CHEER OOOPP!

"Fright Night (Nevermore)" is a track that makes Empire Of The Sun sound like Justin Beiber. The start of the "Thriller" trilogy as I've coined the ensuing 3 tracks. In fact, it sounds like, yep, Ariel dancing down a dark alleyway with a walkman on, red leather pants, bubblegum popping; he gets stopped by a crew of leather dudes that jump out from behind some trash cans, knives in hand. They meet. It smells like violence. Just when you think poor Ariel is gonna get a shiv in the head, everyone starts dancing, chicks in silver stilettos abseil down the facade of the buildings either side, and the rest is.....awesome.

"Round and Round" sounds quite like the second part of "Fright Night". Restrained, it sounds like Boney M duetting with Todd Rundgren. And that's only up until 1:48 when Ariel answers the phone. Then it ballooooooooons into such a classic soft rock track that I'm ringing Timelife to check why it wasn't present on my "Best Of Soft Rock comps". I've been jipped. I particularly love the quick guitar solo.

The last of the "Thriller" trio of songs, "Beverly Kills" is a killer luminescent pop gem. The chorus was stuck in my head for a week. It would pop up in every type of circumstance. I'd be serving someone a latte at work and mutter "can't stop the press". This surely is what pop(ular) music is about? It has to wedge. if it doesn't wedge in your head it has failed. This doesn't. Ever. He's taken that 80's/70's sound and made it his own. My hat is doffed.

From here we enter the scuzzed out world of "Butt-House Blondies". Cool title. Cool track. I was about to say that it's musically the least adventurous but then while i'm listening to it now - who am I kidding? The apocalyptic intro completely doesn't fit with the rest of the record but then kinda does in a weird way. The verses would make Connan Mockasin think twice. Psych-Macheeky. Segues wickedly into.....

"Little Wig". A complete pysch nut-out which sounds simultaneously like a bunch of rough rednecks smashing cans of beer around a Dodge Charger then into a super-charged descending Supergrass vocal. Somehow he manages to make a descending piano motif work through this. How the hell he did so??????

I've already big-upped "Can't Hear My Eyes" so straight into "Reminiscences". Ariel sitting on Stevie Wonder's lap with a glass of wine. Bowie's "Low" synths hum and whir in the background. Aaron González's bass like a sexy elastic band rising and falling. Stefan González's drums like psuedo-reggae hotness. Somehow this track sounds fantastic when it could easily sound dead naff and the reason is the winding synth that holds the whole track together like glue, it's sinewy fingers writhing around and caressing the feel and timing of the other instruments.

"Menopause Man". The question is, what came first, "Steamworks" by The Presets, or this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqxco3QoWsc&feature=related. Eeerily similar. The key to this tracks heart is that it is so simple yet so complex. Listening to the feel of the verse is completely at odds with the chorus - especially after the time-changing refrain before and during the chorus, but again, Ariel makes it work, makes it interesting. I'm still hearing new shit in this song 14 listens on. The ending still sounds like he's grown bored of the whole track and is deliberately trying to sabotage it - on to the next! I wonder if Ariel has a short attention span? I mean, it would explain such a diverse record. But maybe he's just completely in tune with the shit that's going on in his head?

"Revolution's a lie". The end of the record. Shit. I love the way that "Before Today" continuously morphs, more so towards the end of the record. At about "Menopause Man" it really feels to me like a year later in Ariel's world. He could have easily made a whole album that sounds like "Beverly Kills" but the fact that he hasn't just adds to the three-dimensionality of this record. How do i describe this song? It sticks out but then it doesn't. It's a perfect point on the record where one takes stock on the 11 tracks that have come before. Am I listening to the same record? A bag of sweets. Pick your fave, but you know that all of them taste great. I feel excited to find out what the next 15 tracks are going to sound like, then am bitterly disappointed when I realise it's the last track. Love it when it starts to wig out at 3:00, kept together by a great bassline that just repeats repeats repeats. Has a great urgency. Tasty. Actually goes quite nicely back into "Hot Body Rub" if you loop the whole record.

While this record ain't gonna be for everybody, if you give this LP some love it will, in turn, love you back. Like I said before, it was only on the 4th listen that it started to come together and really hit me; really become apparent that what we have here is a spectacularly important record for 2010. In a time of cheeseburgers, here comes a lo-fi delicious degustation that everyone can afford; at the very least, if you hate the album after 4 listens at least credit the man with trying to push the scope of music from the inane to the cosmic.

Personally I can't wait to see where Ariel goes from here. The possibilities are plentiful. He could dive straight back into home recordings and 'cult curio' status, he could maintain this place and continue to create thought provoking material, or he could be picked up by a major label, made to churn out soft rock classics that will sell millions in the Mid West. Who knows?

I'm waiting with very pricked ears.

Prince - When Doves Cry

I'm sitting here listening to the most perfect pop song ever written. It's bringing back some serious memories - the pulsing simple drumbeat, the complete lack of a bassline and more importantly THAT melody.

When i was in year 3 at Flagstaff Hill Primary in the Adelaide hills, I remember a corridor next to our homeroom that we all hung out in during recess and lunch. It had a boombox that kids would come and put their fave tunes on. My parents bought me this wild double cassette best of 1980 whatever, and this song was doing me in. I would listen to it on repeat - rewind, listen, rewind, listen. That and "Pass the Dutchie" by Musical Youth.

It was so raunchy, if I even knew what that word meant then - I just knew that it was different and it made me feel really weird inside when he said "touching" and "kisses"............sexy. I sauntered up to the boombox and dropped this shit on this bunch of children.

Listen to it now. The crazy intro octave guitar sounds like it would break a child in half. i sat back and waited for the same adulation that usually accompanied kids putting on various Disney tracks and whatever goddawful pop hit was on the radio.

I remember everyone staring at me like I had a booger coming out of my nose. "Touch if you will my stomach"... they were completely dumbfounded. Touching? What the fuck is this song? i was always weird but after this, people stopped asking me to be on their soccer team. I remember a moment when everyone was going to play soccer the day after and i was resplendent in a horrible green and gold adidas tracksuit with glasses and dunlop volleys on, and the motherfuckers completely thwarted me. Sorry. There's too many people on the field, and you played that "touching song" yesterday.

This song changed my life. For real. I think it's my favourite song of all time.

Honesty videoclip

The lovely Tayte (Toddy's better-half) made us a videoclip. One day she just posted and said "Hey i made this hope you like it", and it blew my mind. It's very very good. Tayte also takes wonderful photos. An all-round very talented lassy. Enjoy!

Free demos from the vault

Ola!

I have quite a few demos collecting dust on my hard drive so I thought i'd keep slinging them up here. Most will probably never get a release, some might make it - who knows? I wish i could put out everything I have ever done as a way to satisfy the creative urges, and now with the technology of the world wyld webbb i can!

Lemme know what you think.

Breaking Myself (DEMO) by simonjcarter

Sun Rights (unreleased DEMO) by simonjcarter

FBI "Dusty Fingers" playlist

Ola!

I guest programmed Marty Doyle's "Dusty Fingers" on FBI last week and had an absolute ball. It's not often someone gives me free reign over a radio show and it was fun to bust out a selection of my fave stuff from my rekurd collection!

Thanks Marty!

Aegian Sea - Aphrodites Child
In The Wilderness I Wept - Simon Carter
Brooklyn Zoo - ODB
Strawberry Letter 23 - Brothers Johnson
Secret Life Of Arabia - David Bowie
You Dropped A Bomb On Me - Gap Band
Devil Eyes - Tim Buckley
Lost Due To Incompetance - Yesca
The Hunter's Moon - Simon Carter
Summer Hills - Japanther
I Zimbra - Talking Heads
So Ruff, So Tuff - Roger Troutman
I Get Lifted - George McCrae
ST Elmos Fire - Brian Eno
Abdulmajid - Bowie
Evening Shade - Dolly Parton
Cloudbusting - Kate Bush
Blue - The Verve
Christine - Siouxsie & The Banshees
House Of Flying Daggers - Raekwon