In the UK...., bands often sheepishly follow scenes, usually in the wake of a seminal band and often lagging many years behind. John peel would moan about this phenomenon as he'd be flooded by torrents of demos from PJ Harvey replicants or Fall doppelgangers, for years after those acts had first broke. Bands lacking in originality and opinion skirt around that small if significant problem by reproducing the sentiment and sound of their heroes.
For example, ....London.... is currently under siege from a few hundred math rock acts. A good decade late facsimiles of Slint and Dianogah, and that is just the tip of the ice berg. The capital cities venue's are drowning under a fecal-tide of identi'core: multitudes of post-rock delay pedal posers build it up…then…quieten it down (repeat ad infinitum) sonically dressing up as Mogwai, polyester clad legions of piss-twee popsters redo belle and Sebastian, hordes of Hellcore noise kids unknowingly retread that Harry pussy (Truman's) Water, but most harrowing of all is the wagon loads of wealthy middle class kids dressing down to raggedy rip-off nu-gypsy folk'sters Beirut and Decemberists, themselves already pale imitations of Neutral milk hotel.…the list goes on …..but what of a band that sounds like no one else?
How would you market that? How do you get the kids to conceptualize an individual sound as opposed to just a slightly different brand of ubiquitous convenience music norm? It is akin to hearing someone talk at you in an alien tongue-it makes no sense at all, until that is, someone (i.e. a journalist) translates it for you. Ok, here goes.
This same problem faced many original, some might say difficult bands from Captain Beefheart to The Fall, The Velvet underground, to The Pixies and from Joy Division to Silkworm. These acts with their cerebral lyrics and difficult at first or even 50th listen music, invariably grow their own following by word of mouth and 20 or so years later…suddenly everyone else catches on. Formed in 1994 Lazarus Clamp only has another six years to wait until they make it. Phew!
'Death to Technicians!' is the 10 track, recorded live and direct to tape forth album by Lazarus Clamp. The first 500 copies are digipacked with a free copy of their also 10 track third album 'It ain't what you do, it's what it does to you'. That is a lot of bang for your buck but is it any good?
The answer is a resounding yes!
Fourteen years, five albums (the fifth is out later this year), four bassists, three marriages, two drummers later and one sophisticated, literate genre-hopping 5 piece. Formed in Leicester by left-handed, upside-down guitar playing North-easterner Michael L. Clamp, the band have a history of being ahead of the pack…having: played SXSW in 2000 (before it was fashionable), released an updated cover of a 200-year-old English folk ballad ('Some Rivals') in 2003, a good 3 years before Folk Britannia exploded and they math rocked harder than any of the current crop of hairy indolents, way back in the mid 90's-while those bands were actually in school studying math's!. Now, that is way ahead of the pack!.
Too flight of foot and intelligent to be aligned with any 'scene', these two new CDs see the band gear-shift through irascible math-rock, haunting country, quirky pop, ferocious post-punk, and irresistibly purty folky lo-fi. Pioneering a unique wonkilly-elaborate English sound coupled with deep songs of great substance delivers a hearty meal that you can mentally chew on like giant audio thought sandwich.
They play guitars! John the bassist plays a Travis Bean-the weighty guitar of choice for Shellac and Bottomless Pit. Andrew the 2nd Guitarist builds his own Valve amps, and shreds telecasters, Jazzmasters and…banjos. Tom the violinist also plays a tiny guitar shaped exactly like a…ah, hold on that is a violin, which he also whips out for Fortuna Pops' Go-betweens'esque 'Airport Girl' and GRATE Opti(mistic)Pop Icon 'Mj Hibbett and the Validators'. Huw the Cherubic 6.3' drummer also hams and hammers it up with Manchester's shambolic sea-shanty musketeers 'Last Harbour' and Michael plays a rare Tokai, a subsonic Jaguar baritone and Mandolin. If that isn't impressive enough each member is based in a different ....UK.... city and holds down full on, full time jobs. It is a miracle they even manage to rehearse!
Michael over these 2 albums has proves himself to be a uniquely articulate songwriter. 'Your song', for example, dispenses with the conventional 'boy meets girl' format lumping for 'boy hates girl' instead. His voice has a northern lilt and confidently ranges from soft falsetto to an incredible 'full Albini 'yell. Vocal comparisons rarely do a singer justice but in Michael you can hear Billy Bragg, Costello, Robert Forster, and all of the Mekons. His gaze fearlessly stares adult themes in the face-for example would you find the Foals, Scout Nibbler or The Battles dealing with matters as diverse and difficult as; torture (You need good tools), the bombing of Hiroshima (Edward Jenner's question), the inevitable downward trajectory of pornographic careers (No slapping, no spitting) or the way that the dead won't die (Black plumes for Hot Peas), and the injustice of the multinational patenting of GM crops (No life patent)? Umm…nope, there isn't a band in the country that would have the intellectual capacity, nerve or ability to tackle such serious subject matter. This is indeed music for thinking adults and all better for it.
'Liar' a trident missile of a song, like Shellac with a string section. An explosive launch hurls melody into air, where it hangs twisting round an intricate loop of ravenous guitars and cacophonous drums. Michael all the time roaring a blackly-humorous justification of deception and self-delusion.
'I lied, when I said, I was good in bed, I am bad, probably the baddest, you have ever had'
Target found, the track gathers momentum before slamming down to earth, detonating in a terrifying discordant distorto-climax. This track alone makes 'future of the left' sound as menacing as the 'Bobby McGee's'. KaBlam!
'Ricochet' is a lolloping cowboy rumble in the style of High Noon, with Michael reaching for his guns in a showdown he can't escape. All very reminiscent of the swaggering, worldly wise humour of 'A Cowboy in ....Sweden....' era Lee Hazelwood. Biff!
'Bad Capitalist' offers a wry, dry deconstruction of the relationships-as-economics metaphor. With its gentle, finger picked accompaniment, the effect is reminiscent of a less sprightly, more spikey (and a lot less dead) Noel Coward. Pow!
'It ain't what you do, it's what it does to you.' Isn't so warm and natural a recording as 'Death to technicians', sounding somewhat compressed in comparison, but the tracks are still positively rabid with invention and fiery conviction from the guttural 'Woke up drunk', show stopping 'Hope poisoned my life' to the affectingly poetic 'Calamity in Curse'. The track written and sung by X-bassist George Gargan (now Former Utopia) originally, hilariously entitled 'stop writing songs about me, Michael' is a loving ode to his friends habit of divining songs from the misfortunes of those around him
"like a magpie to fate, you collect and collate; render to tape, our lives to verse; calamity and curse"
It is sad to see a tight innovative band fronted by a gifted songwriter lost in relative obscurity while far lesser (albeit shitter haired and with baby food for lyrics) bands bask in the watery spermatozoonistic glory festooned upon them by drug addled child-minded music-hacks, breast fed opinion from the fatherly teat of the record corps and their army of fork-tongued, pointy shoed, ironically shit haired PR social chameleons.
Is music all about shit hair?
These are fine albums from one of the finest British bands, who have played with, and one the respect of Giant Sand, Cat Power, Chris Brokaw, The Mekons, Songs:Ohia, Richard Buckner, The New Year, Thee More Shallows, Laura Cantrell, Mice Parade, and Black Heart Procession. Perhaps it is about time they won yours.
'Death to Technicians!' is available direct from Bearos, or from an independent record shop, or the band themselves for £10.00....
Bearos Records - www.bearos.co.uk/
