Media

Here you will find a selection of quotes taken from music magazines from around the world and what they have to say about some of our distributed titles
(last updated Tuesday, 18 November 2003 )

Coolies turn hot, Grant Smithies (Sunday Star Times)

"This is the coolest, brightest, most chaotic and exciting local rock release I've heard in years. It deserves to sell by the truckload, not least because these three women are still paying off the recording costs and need the dosh. "

 

The Handsome Family by Lindsay Davis (The Dominion) 4 Stars

"Like the easy roll of undulating countryside passing you by The Handsome Family somehow effortlessly transport you to this other world where you are immersed in the tundra and given space to appreciate the mournful harmonica solo in the distance creeping up on you. Chicago’s Rennie and Brett Sparks only deal in the bizarre. This is post-Wuthering Heights gothic in all its jagged heart-wrenching glory. Part folk, part country but mostly a mystery Brett has this Johnny Cash baritone that booms out errie tales of toads and Armegeddon"

 

Zen Connection - Various by Colin Morris (The Dominion)

Greetings. If I may be so bold, you are looking a little stressed. Come, sit down in this comfortable chair and relax. Coffee? Tea? Perhaps you prefer something a little stronger: a glass of wine? Ah, good. How about a little music to really soothe away the stress? Certainly! May I recommend this new double CD entitled Zen Connection? ….. Not bad is it? Can you feel yourself unwinding? Great, mission accomplished. Now don’t think about work until Monday morning"

 

Your New Favourite Band 5 Stars, By Grant Smithies (Sunday Star Times)

"The instant the first song on the Pernice Brothers' Yours, Mine and Ours tumbles out of the speakers, you know you are going to love this record. Honestly, pop music gets no better. The guitars have that heavenly Byrds-Big Star jangle, Joe Pernice's multi-tracked vocal harmonies have the sunburnt warmth of The Raspberries or prime period Beach Boys, and no matter how dark and sour the lyrics, they're invariably attached to sweet and tangy sugar-rush melodies that make your extremities tingle with pure pleasure."

 

Sleepers Union: Giant Spheres

Sunday Star Times CD reviews
14 September 2003
By GRANT SMITHIES (4 Stars)

Surprising pop music is memorable pop music, as Auckland musician Simon Maclaren knows. "Sometimes you've just gotta set the controls for the heart of the sun," he says, quoting Pink Floyd like a shameless hippie. The Floyd reference is appropriate as Maclaren's new music, made under the Sleepers Union moniker, has a kind of relaxed pastoral trippiness lacking from his previous outings with Loves Ugly Children and Subliminals.

On Giant Spheres, aided by producer Dale Cotton and borrowed members of Spud, Hasselhoff Experiment and Stereobus, Maclaren has turned down his guitars, reduced his voice to a fragile near-whisper and spent more time crafting emotionally engaging songs, reeling you in with subtle changes in texture and mood rather than overwhelming your defences with monster riffs. "She Seems Fluorescent", "Collect My Particles", "Psilocybin Boy" and "Waking From the Dream" have a weightless, dreamy grace and represent his best work to date.

NZ Herald
13.09.2003 By RUSSELL BAILLIE
(Herald rating: * * * *)

Sleepers Union is a sort-of solo project from Simon Maclaren, the one-time yelping voice and coruscating guitar of Loves Ugly Children, who then became a part of the seemingly short-lived Subliminals, a quartet which delivered the last great art-rock album that Flying Nun is ever likely to release.

Now, with a little help from his friends, Maclaren takes an even bigger leap into psychedelic, on an album that captures something weird but quite wonderful in its imaginative mix of playful pop, drone-rock and sundry fiddly bits in between.

Some, like She Seems Fluorescent, seem neatly spooked by the spirit of Pink Floyd's Syd Barrett, while it's hard not to hear the likes of the The Acrobat Transcends, Now I Am Dead or the incandescent title track and not think: Flaming Lips.

While on the likes of Psilocybin Boy, it can remind of the Stereo Bus, some of whose past members are involved in the studio and live incarnations of the group.

Sleepers Union make some strange demands along the way, but their labours have made for an enchantingly offbeat debut.

 

Real Groove September 2003

Sentimental Plastic

"Rolling Country is often distinctly pastoral, in that Flying Nun guitar pop style that we know and love. The Sentimental Plastic have a musical outlook and attitude evocative of journeys and landscapes and this disc has a relaxing, cruisy vibe with the band swinging along at a leisurely pace. Tune into the charms of Go, Fireworks and Surfer 1, to hook into the Plastic passion." Brent Cardy

Sleepers Union

"These are psychedelic pop songs, almost defining the genre. There’s backwards guitar, heavily filtered vocals, weirdly beautiful backing vocals, woozy keyboards, song titles such as Psilocybin Boy with lyrics to match and tons of gorgeous aural detailing that might suggest the implementation of headphones…. Mclaren is emerging as one of more valuable sources of musical substance. God knows in which genre he’ll pop up next. Meantime, find this and imbide at will. One sip makes you taller, one sip makes you small." Chris Knox

 

June /July

Rip It Up

Freaks – The Man Who Lived Underground (MFFCD005)
"Justin Harris and Luke Solomon just get better each time they step out under their Freaks moniker. No Boring old house fare here thank you, as the Freaks inject a good healthy dose of quirky experimentalism into proceedings." 4/5

Greenskeepers – The Ziggy Franklin Radio Show (CMCCD107)
"… this is an album with unusual, catchy twists that inspire even the slightly jaded house fans" 4/5

Smog – Supper (URA086)
"It’s somnambulant and lazy. It’s so minor, so not nearly there at all. And that is the charm of Smog." 3/5

V/A – Futurism 2 (CITYROCK5CD)
"..there’s lesser known gems from Slam… making this an album to get" 4/5

Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks – Pig Lib (URA091)

"There’s something special about Malkmus – an appealing off kilter pop sensibility." 3/5 RIU

Yo La Tengo – Summer Sun (OLE5482)
"It’s a gentle record; full of softly spoken pop, folk and experimental tracks." 3/5

Nick Warren – Reykjavik (GU24)
".. the latest Global Underground, the last from Nick Warren and quite possibly the best." 5/5

 

Real Groove – July

Calexico – Feast Of Wire (URA084)
"All up, Feast of Wire is an album of mood and atmosphere, at times unsettling and dark, yet often beautiful and gentle. It also proves there exists a world of music that doesn’t include layers of electric guitar, programmed beats and over-processed vocals"

Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks – Pig Lib

"Pig Lib is nonetheless the sound of Malkmus (and his band) in good fettle. He’s a useful citizen, and he can keep turning out records like this as long as he wants"

The Minus Five – Down With Wilco (URA089)
"Tension is the shimmer of a razorblade, smoke trails in dim splinters of light, reckless and sinister, guttingly beautiful"

 

Sunday Star Times

Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks – Pig Lib (URA091)

"There’s something special about Malkmus – an appealing off kilter pop sensibility." 3/5 RIU

"While nutty as a Peanut Slab and not as immediately accessible as Malkmus's self-titled debut, Pig Lib's brave attempt to blend primitive prog rock with goofy experimental pop is an unqualified success." 4 Stars, Grant Smithies

Bonnie Prince Billy – Master and Everyone (URA081)

" This record is damaged, wounded; it bleeds. But it bleeds so slowly and quietly it will probably take another decade to die. "Winter comes and snow/ I can't marry you, you know" Oldham mutters on opening track "The Way", barely expelling enough breath to disturb the gathering dust. Oldham's sparse and icy back-porch psalms are almost zen-like in their calm fatalism. Where Nick Cave rages and kicks against his earthly tribulations, Oldham capitulates with a gentle sigh. Such understated and quietly regretful music will not be everyone's cup of cold porridge. Indeed, my missus can't listen to this record without wanting to hurt herself. Why Oldham is such a dour, depressed character is hard to say. He looks thin and hungry too. Perhaps he was once an independent record distributor." Grant Smithies

Foreign Press

Nina Nastasia - Run To Ruin

(July Q Rating: * * * *)

Uncategorisable singer-songwriter, produced by Steve Albini. "Playing simple acoustic guitar, she sings slow, poetically oblique lyrics in a voice that’s barely raised" "Curiously compelling for something so minimal, its like nothing else around"

(July Uncut Rating: * * * *)

Brilliant, ghostly alt.folk from New York. "Spare, beautiful, outstanding"

 

April/May Album reviews:

Yo La Tengo: Summer Sun
26.04.2003 By RUSSELL BAILLIE
(Herald rating: * * *)
"Summer Sun is an extension of And Then Nothing's considered minimalism with the trio adding jazzy and dubby flavourings around the edges and a sweet cover of Big Stars Take Care in the middle. Generally hazy and open-ended in mood, its tunes take their own good time to work"

"A beautiful, fragile record." Mojo

UNCUT May rating****
From the edge of the sea, back to the fringes of sleep, Summer Sun is uncommonly lovely.

 

Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks: Pig Lib
26.04.2003 By RUSSELL BAILLIE
(Herald rating:*****)
"The second solo album for the former frontman of American indie heroes Pavement is, like its immediate predecessor, wacky, wiry, witty and wordy. But it's also a more spirited, bendy rock'n'roll affair that doesn't rely as much on Malkmus' surreal lyrical humour to get its kicks.
Musically, it manages to be both gently melodic (on the pretty Ramp of Death and Vanessa From Queens) as well as loose and adventurous."

 

Pavement - Slanted and Enchanted - Luxe and Redux
April 6th 2003
SLANTED, ENCHANTING AND BRILLIANT
Grant Smithies
(Sunday Star Times rating: *****)
"Slanted and Enchanted - Luxe and Redux re-presents this landmark recording in extended form, with a second CD containing EPs, live recordings, two UK Peel Sessions, previously unreleased demos from the original Slanted recording sessions and a 50-page booklet.
What can I say? It is the best re-issue package I have ever heard."

 

The Kills ****
Mojo May 6, 2003

 

Smog – Supper ****
Mojo May 6, 2003
"It’s his most striking shift since 1999’s watershed Knock Knock, and while the music is a combination of old Smog and new, country laments sitting alongside experimental collages and velvet Underground chugging, there’s a freshness here, a sense of change, and most remarkable, a real empathy on display."

 

M Ward **** Transfiguration Of Vincent
Mojo May 6, 2003
"Songs alive in a metaphor and imagery in the spirit of Tom Waits and the late John Fahey..the antidote to commercial country"

The Times
"faultless country-pop melodicism…enchanting"

 

Plaid Parts In The Post
Mojo Rating ****May 6, 2003

 

Misty Dixon – Iced To Mode -Twisted Nerve
Mojo Rating ****
"Sad songs about relationships and cats by hitherto luckless Jane Waver. Was about to give up until label honcho and boyfriend Andy Votel ordered her to make a record."

UNCUT May rating****
"Mancunian girl group deliver spellbinding debut fusing gorgeous melodies, hypnotic vocal harmonies and nostalgic production with generous measure of Farfisa organ, melodica, piano and sleigh bells."

 

The New Pornographers – Electric Version – Matador
Mojo Rating ***
"Follow-up to the leftfeild, power pop stunner Mass Romantic"

 

NRK – Various Singles 5 - NRK Sound Division
Mojo Rating ****
"This months essential compilations. NRK Singles 5 showcases all that is still great in deep house, with remixes from Francois Kevorkian, Peter Heller and King Britt gilding some seductive grooves."

 

UNCUT RECOMMENDS 
The best new music released in the last three months

Calexico – Feast Of Wire
City Slang
"The fine fourth album from these novel purveyors of American-Hispanic music blends a broad range of styles from the heartbreaker pop to the deadpan surrealism of Morricone, mariachi-influenced border ballads and jazz."

 

Cat Power - You Are Free
Matador
"The Charismatic New York songtress’ latest has a hypnotic power and an unsettling beauty, space and tension being used to devastating effect on these 14 complex and involving and involving songs."

 

Bonnie Prince Billy – The Master And Everyone
Domino
"A beautiful album about the puzzles of love, the literate hillbilly Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy aka Will Oldham has excelled himself with a balanced blend of candour and sweetness. Produced by Lambchop associate Mark Nevers."