THE SHIP-TONES – Indie Reggae Revolution

The-Ship-Tones-Indie-Reggae-RevolutionBringing together the disparate words of reggae and indie on their 2015 release ‘Indie Reggae Revolution’, Leeds ten piece collective The Ship-Tones bring the world some of the best mash-ups and re-imaginings since Mark Ronson dropped ‘Version’ to almost unanimous critical praise in 2007. Taking some classic sounding reggae sounds (mostly rooted in the 70s and 80s), the band rebuild a few familiar tunes from the ground up, with largely enjoyable results.

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VACATION Transmissions EP

vacation epFor their fourth EP, US lo-fi/anti-folk duo Vacation take on some familiar – and not-so-familiar – tunes by other artists.  As Tori Amos proved time and again, you can take the most rocking numbers and reduce them to a minimalist piano ballad with reasonable ease, almost to the point where the once unimaginable becomes predictable.  In some ways, Vacation play by a similar rule in that their chosen material gets stripped down and re-imagined in an echoing lo-fi acoustic fashion, but whereas Ms. Amos, Emm Gryner and countless other artists always ensure there was accessibility even within their most bizarre reimaginings, these guys just want to strip things back to their most stark.  This results in at least one tune that’s anything but predictable.

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