For 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.
Tag Archives: covers album
New Melvins album due in April
Everybody’s favourite noisemakers (the) Melvins will release a new album in April 2013.
Released via Mike Patton’s Ipecac label, the thirteen track effort finds Buzz ‘King Buzzo’ Osborne and co putting their stamp on works originally by David Bowie, The Jam, Roxy Music, Queen and The Kinks. Each cover is a collaboration with a guest artist and those roped in to help include Mudhoney’s Mark Arm, Jello Biafra and cult film maker John Waters.
BRYAN FERRY – These Foolish Things
By the summer of 1973, Roxy Music had released two fantastic, groundbreaking albums mixing pop and glam rock with a heavy dose of experimentation to produce an art-rock sound which sounded quite unlike anything heard before. The second of those albums, ‘For Your Pleasure’ – released in March 1973 – captured the early Roxy’s most avant-garde side at its peak. With Roxy’s career barely out of the starting blocks, frontman Bryan Ferry began work on a solo career. His first album, ‘These Foolish Things’ – a covers record – was released in June of that year.
MICKEY THOMAS – Marauder
After Mickey Thomas joined Jefferson Starship in 1979, they entered the most commercial phase of their career, with Thomas always seen as a key figure in pushing the band in a more pop direction (culminating in its Starship incarnation). It’s not entirely fair to blame Mickey Thomas for that, since he joined the band on the cusp of the new decade, and lots of bands turned rather more poppy in the 80s, so it likely would have happened to Jefferson Starship too, with or without the help of Mickey Thomas. Although all of a very 80s persuasion, some of his work with that band is great, however, with ‘Freedom at Point Zero (1979), ‘Knee Deep In The Hoopla (1985) and ‘No Protection’ (1987) all worth investigating.