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AUDIO Mike McGrath-Bryan Ian Lamont Gary Ibbotson
Vampire Weekend Father of the Bride [Columbia Records] Craic Boi Mental Diaries of a $quickhead [Sham Rebel] Ezra Koenig said he envisaged FOTB as being a double-album more akin to Springsteen’s The River than the Beatles’ White Album, by which he meant that the 18 songs within took place in the same dramatic universe, rather than being an accumulation of miscellanies accrued in the six years since the release of Modern Vampires of the City. But within that simple bifurcation, this feels like the VW album least bound to a place and time. Koenig defined the band’s first three albums as a trilogy of his/their 20s, firmly rooted in NYC, each progressively more weighted down by the realities of passing time. Cohering the space within which FOTB exists is much more tricky, as a result of the array of collaborators (shouts to Danielle Haim), the variety of voices Koenig inhabits, a more baffling contemporary political context, and the increasingly complicated biographical details of his actual life – moving west, fatherhood, etc. All of which neglects to say that this is a wonderful album, built around the craftsmanship of a songwriter who plays with signifiers like a virtuoso but never loses the heart. It’s all very well to draw comparisons to Paul Simon because you play some hi-life guitar lines, but it’s another thing entirely to write songs as pithy and succinct as the man himself about life, growth and change. IL Like this? Try these: Time Crisis with Ezra Koenig timecrisis-withezrakoenig.tumblr.com Paul Simon – Hearts and Bones David Byrne & Brian Eno – Everything That Happens Will Happen Today It’s been a long and hard grind for one-man multiverse Craic Boi Mental and his accomplice Whip Grl, but with this year’s mixtape Cork City Anthems, co-signed by Mango, Blindboy and many other Irish hip-hop figureheads, a layer of personal contentment is now evident in his usual commitment to unfettered nonsense. Having openly declared his intention to unite non-urban and otherwise fringe voices in Irish hip-hop under the ‘$quick’ movement (‘trans feens/gay feens/women feens’), Diaries… is a concise and decidedly wholesome overview of CBM’s raison d’être. MMGB Flying Lotus Flamagra [Warp] Finally fully embracing his cinematic tendencies, Flying Lotus’ sixth album is a free fall through a chasm of otherworldly imagery and twisted thematic concepts. The veteran producer has often delved into the cosmos but rarely before have his odysseys been so discombobulating. The scope of the album has to be admired but too many tracks offer little replay value and too often, the many featured guests distract from the message that FlyLo is trying to convey – be it blunt or esoteric. GI Defeater Defeater [Epitaph] Tim Hecker Anoyo [Kranky] After a touring hiatus and a change in personnel, it’s to be understood that Massachusetts lit-core lads Defeater’s self-titled effort would be a vehicle for energy and tension. Derek Archambault’s return to the world of his J.D. Salinger-inspired characters is suitably raw, bristling with the same tension that underlies their clash of gently serrating textures. Nowhere is this more evident than lead single Mothers’ Sons, but overall, this is a fine addition to a layered and under-appreciated canon. MMGB Less a standalone album than a companion piece to 2018 long-player Konoyo, Anoyo sees Canadian ambient trailblazer Tim Hecker extricate more gentle, almost natural, sounds from the Tokyo Gakuso ensemble, as otherworldly as the title’s translation (‘the world over there’) suggests. There is a crushing, exquisite beauty to the long and complementary strokes with which these sound-artists are painting collaboratively. As the piece wends toward its conclusion, the real joy is in its deconstruction of the tropes of both ambience and traditional music, faltering beeps and bitcrushes puncturing the soundscape. MMGB CLICK IT OUT… 80 We know it and so should you food, fashion, photography, film, books, magazines, music, design, drink and a curated section of events for you to consider www.totallydublin.ie