Something - Honey Lung

My girlfriend recently described someone she had just met by saying that he is "stuck in 2002: he wears converse, got kinda long hair and listens to guitar music". It made me chuckle. Ha! 2002, good one. I then thought, is guitar music (what I call a couple of dudes or dudettes rocking out with guitars) really something of a throw back or something that isn't popular music now? 

It reminded me of a guy I met in a queue once. He told me that despite what folks say about music being "dead" and that Bieber and his lot have placed the last log onto music's funeral pyre, just waiting for Gaga or Rebecca Black to do the deed and light a match, this geezer told me that now is the best age music has ever had. Bye bye 1969, roll over 1976, let yourself out 1984 because it is now, 2016, that is the best of times and probably, the worst of times. What with your Soundcloud, your Youtubes, ya iTunes and Spotify, hell, even The Irregular Riff, now you can find any obscure genre, 1970s hidden psychedelic gem or any band with a single released from their home studio in some woods in Sweden or indeed, a combination of all of those. All that from some throw away joke my girlfriend made. 

Honey Lung tick two of the boxes. Band with one single that you can stumble across on the internet - tick. A guitar band rockin' it large in 2016 - tick it. Another box they tick is the like one. The trio are about to release their debut single, Something through RYP Recordings. It's a good ol' swirling freak out at times; with loud wailing guitar swarming around you, held together by some solid, slamming drums. There are quieter moments which have some sweet Smiths like guitar but what hooks me in are the slurring, distant vocals that give everything a slouched, psychedelic feel and remind me of some of the heavier Shoegaze bands such as My Bloody Valentine, The Rain Parade or Splashh. Check out the video below and give them a follow over at their Facebook page. There's a single launch in London tomorrow on the 26th so get down for what'll probably be a sweaty gig full of people wearing converse with kinda long hair and listening to some pretty damn good guitar music. 

Honey Lung

Something

RYP Recordings

Download out: 29/07/2016 at iTunes   

Phantoms of Dreamland - Michal Turtle

I was first introduced to the record label Music from Memory by the sound of the track Caravan Revisited by Workdub coming through the speakers at a local record shop. Check it out below but be aware that it sounds so much better and deeper on a proper speaker system. It's an unusual track of graceful synths and off-kilter percussion which seems ethereal and timeless. It is actually from 1989 and was created by two musicians, Virgil Work Jnr. and Nicholas Georgieff, messing about in their basement home studio. They released an LP and a CD and then faded into obscurity.



Music from Memory's brief is to re-release songs to a wider and more deserved audience than the original release may have received, or to finally get unreleased material onto wax. I can't think of much more honourable than that and Music from Memory pull out some gems that would have otherwise remained hidden to the majority of people. Along with other excellent reissue labels such as Now-Again Records, Light in the Attic and Soundway, Music from Memory are at the top of their game in my humble opinion. The label also has a strong aesthetic and style and it's one to follow for sure.

Their latest release is a double LP of music by Michal Turtle. Phantoms of Dreamland expands on a 12" release of Turtle's work that Music on Memory issued in 2015 with more strange, hypnotic electronica from 1983-85. The release is made up of mainly unreleased tracks that were created by the 22 year old Turtle in his living room in South London. He'd invite musicians over and mess about with synths, recording everything to tape or to cassette.

The music itself is a collection of strange experimentation, often with soothing, layered synths and clunking percussion. It can be comforting and fuzzy or alien and cold but there's something new with every listen. It could easily be a modern electro LP but there's a certain naivety in the tracks which makes the album endearing and engaging. My favourite tracks include the glittering Spooky Boogie, shimmering Ball of Fire and El Teb, which brings Eastern inspirations to synth experimentation. 
Check it out below and let me know what you think and be sure to take a look at Music from Memory too. 

Michal Turtle
Phantoms of Dreamland
Music from Memory
Double Vinyl LP out: 15/07/2016 at Music from Memory
 

     

Elafonissi Blue - GUM

- Hey dude.
- Oh hey, thanks for checking out the blog, needs all the help it can get these days.
- Ye sure. You know that the single Elafonissi Blue was released on GUM's album Glamorous Damage, in like, November of last year!
- Um, ye I did, ye.
- But, I'm pretty sure that this whole "Irregular Rift" thing...
- It's The Irregular Riff actually...
- I'm pretty sure you said it's only to look at upcoming releases?
- I might have said...
- Ye, here it is, "All the releases must be not available at the time of writing".
- Oh lord, you've gone back to the archives.
- Dude, you've got like 3 blog posts, just scroll down and read it! 
- Ye, so I can see how this might look like I'm breaking my own rules, but actually GUM and the super cool label he's on, Spinning Top Music, released a music video for Elafonissi Blue only recently on the 28th of June. Check it out, it's pretty funky: 

- But that's still in the past you idiot! Not upcoming in the slightest. Why you calling GUM a "he" anyway?
- GUM's the name for Jay Watson's solo project. He's a regular member with the awesome, mental psych band POND and he's a live member with Tame Impala. He's a pretty cool dude I think. I've seen him live with Tame Impala and Pond and he can rip it up on guitar or bust some sweet keyboard grooves and I'm pretty sure I saw a video of him wacking a drum, so a solo project makes sense.
- Oooh, get you being all relevant and seeing Tame Impala live! GUM's a stupid name. Does he just blow raspberries and put it onto vinyl or something. What a joke.
- Actually there's a lot going on with Elafonissi Blue. There are huge '80s vibes - I'm talking Pet Shop Boys, Prince and that sort of disco-funk from the likes of Cameo.
- Oh God, is this some sort of gay propaganda? 
- I'm going to ignore that. There's also hints of Dam Funk, Boards of Canada, College and lo-fi synth rock. It's got a banging chorus and it's just funky man, with some sweet swooshing synths and a driving bass line - it reminds me a bit of the College soundtrack to the film Drive but with a bit more mental fun attached.
- So it's a good song which came out ages ago. Why do you not write about Yellow Submarine then? Ey? This blog has gone to the dogs already. Is it even getting a physical release? I thought that was one of the blog criteria too?
- Well, it's already out on the excellent Glamorous Damage LP...
- From November last year? Did you create your silly little "word-art" thing and then realise it was already out? You did didn't you.
- No, I just thought that with the recent release of the music video I could share this really good...
- That's it isn't it! You know nobody actually cares about those word things anyway? They think it's weird. 
- Well, I...
- You're a joke mate. 
- Cheers, bye then.

GUM
Elafonissi Blue
Spinning Top Music
Vinyl LP out: NOW at Spinning Top Music  

Holy Day/ Mirror - Motorama

Motorama are a Russian group and for my money, you don't hear enough from Russia. The country has actually got a pretty awesome history of psychedelic rock from the '70s with this tune from Yuri Morozov being a particularly sexy number with a bass line to jiggle ya bits along to. The '80s, as is so often the case in the so-called Eastern Block, was dubbed a Golden Age and Kino were pretty prolific. I annoy my girlfriend no end by nattering incessantly the choppy guitar line from this track. Other than that, Russian music for me boils down to Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf, which still has me scrambling for behind the sofa after being tormented by a sinister animation as a child. I can still see the scraggly wolf creeping through the twisted trees to those violins and the deep bass. 



None of that here, however as Motorama create relaxing, slouch-inducing indie pop on their 7" single, Holy Day backed with Mirror. It's the kind of tune to soundtrack the end of a house party, crushed cans and fags all around, a bloke nobody knows asleep in the bath and the sun just melting through the curtains. It's just you and your proper mates by this point, collapsed on one another in a glorious, sweaty heap. Holy Day tingles along in lo-fi electronic fun and the vocals are indifferent, slurred, as if sleepy but still partying over the driving bass line. Grab ya mates, a bottle of something and let Motorama be the soundtrack to the 5:30am last dance.  

Motorama
Holy Day/Mirror
Talitres
7" vinyl out: 8/07/2016 at Talitres