British Sea Power

Also, if they're generic, who else is in their genre? What genre are they generic of?

It's the Big And Important, Standing On A Cliff Top Looking Windswept And Earnest genre: Bombasto-Indie!

The most striking reference point on DYLRM? is Arcade Fire, which is understandable given that the initial sessions took place over two or three months in Montreal, working with AF drummer Howard Bilerman (and Efrim Menuck from Godspeed You! Black Emperor). But we could also loosely lump them in with Doves, Editors, Electric Soft Parade, Brakes, Bloc Party, the rockier stuff from the last Athlete album, etc...

See I don't get the "big and important" vibe off them AT ALL; maybe it's cos I liked the second album best, and that was "small and insignificant in the face of gazing at the sea from the clifftop" (literally how Im listened to it a lot).

(I actually really like the second album for what its worth, its this one that I found dull)

I didn't get on with this one as well as I'd thought I would when I got home last night, actually - this may just be that I had a fucking mental busy weekend and was too tired to really take it in, however. The second one took ages to grow on me, apart from the two Sutton produced tracks.

I think a lot of the reaction to this record, all the "oh my gosh they're totally gonna get a top ten single off this" hype talk indie blog nonsense, is the fact that it's January and there's fuck-all else to get excited about. The single got to 31.

Whereas I've suddenly started coming round to it! It's taken a good half a dozen plays, though.

disclaimer: i love this band with an undying and unquestionable passion.

interesting that some people would regard them with a "big and important" viewpoint (which i assume is meant negatively). like nick i don't get this at all--in fact it's that they write songs about such inconsequentialities that gives a sense of huge scale; as weird as this sounds i think of the scale of BSPs songs as being a lateral "you can see for miles" landscape than a more upwards, spacelike/cosmic scale you'd more commonly get.

the songs are taking the mundane and making them sound fantastical; i.e. there's no pretension of "big and important"--the songs themselves are bigger than the band.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7209121.stm

http://i30.tinypic.com/2hg48c9.jpg

I was trying to figure out where I'd heard the name Phil Sumner before. Then I was "watching" (i.e. half asleep on the couch) Hetty Wainthropp Investigates on TV over Christmas and it turns out that he plays the cornet on the theme tune. So he should know better than to indulge in tired old stage diving antics!

The Great Skua, the instrumental track off the new album, REALLY REMINDS ME of something; it's almost identical at points but I can't quite place it. Any ideas?

PULP / roadkill

Yeah? Thats not setting alarm bells off. What album's it from? It's something in the guitar progression on The Great Skua, I think.

intro sounds for all the world like roadkill (last pulp album WE LOVE LIFE) but yeah also very generic-y sounding arcade fire type guitar sound. or something shoegazey.

Nothing that I can place, but can I just point out the similarity between "Atom" and Buzzcocks' "Everybody's Happy Nowadays"....

N.B. Weirdly considering my usual antipathy to This Kind Of Thing, DYLRM? has become my second favourite album of the year to date.

Yeah? I'm still not feeling it much, certainly not compared to the previous record, which I still love a lot.

I totally cained it for a few weeks in January but haven't listened much since. It is very good though, certainly better than Open Season for my money. Still tremendous live too.

I am quite enjoying MAN OF ARAN!

I heard The Great Skua in a trailer on Sky Sports last night. Epic. Haven't heard Man Of Aran - what's it like?

They have this annoying habit of releasing b-sides on vinyl-only. I had no idea they did an unironic cover of "I Am A Cider Drinker" and a nifty 10" for "No Lucifer". Their latest is a cover of The Cure's "A Forest" which is solid.

I heckled them in concert requesting "I Am A Cider Drinker" and they glared at me. Wankers.

Anyway, I am enjoying their new EP which apparently is their offcuts from the next album.

They glare at everyone. It's ace, especially "hidden" track 8, Returning.

It's really different, isn't it? "Zeus" doesn't exactly feel cohesive but it's full of interesting aural excursions, not all of which work but all of which make you think, and are ultimately enjoyable. Frankly it reminded me alot of The Fall in terms of sheer experimentation and mixing brilliance with driving-off-the-cliff oddness.

It's what we call a "fun romp". Especially with a song like 'kW-h', which sounds atypical of them but is good!

They're at their best when they're pretending to be icelandicbandmum though, aren't they?

Ok, "Zeus" just keeps getting better and better with each play. Any lucky soul already heard the forthcoming "Valhalla Dancehall"? I'd hate to think these are the more interesting bits that didn't fit, leaving us with a more cohesive, safe, ultimately uninteresting record.

Ok, how is it that "Valhalla Dancehall" hasn't leaked yet?

^^^

british sea power: by white ppl, 4 white ppl

And that's a problem?

Can someone *explain* British Sea Power?

Sometimes quite like them - indeed, like the Man of Aran soundtrack a lot - but have a sense that I'm missing something.

Is there a socio-political angle that I'm missing aside from one of them birdwatches and they've appeared on Country File?

british sea power: by white ppl, 4 white ppl

white haters gonna hate white people

ghostface h8r, 4real

is it true that british sea power is basically drownedinsound indie but with extra references to the hebrides, obscure fauna, naval history etc?

It is not true.

is it true that british sea power is basically drownedinsound indie but with extra references to the hebrides, obscure fauna, naval history etc?

Oh, fuck off.

true ime

there needs to be a bsp vs iliketrains poll amirite

actually quite looking forward to hearing this new stuff. y'all have gotten me interested. only really 'carrion' and 'lately' have really caught my attention of the bsp i've heard

is it true that british sea power is basically drownedinsound indie but with extra references to the hebrides, obscure fauna, naval history etc?

Yes this is exactly what they are. They're occasionally pretty good at it (Carrion, most of the second album) and often ropey (the whole third album by and large). Their music isn't as distinctive as the rest of their aesthetic.

I guess if you're determined to be cloth eared then that's your call but DiS and BSP don't really see eye to eye given that DiS has an American/P4k garage rock/lo fi/Williamsburg leaning aesthetic.

yeah DiS is basically P4k-in-Englande-but-with-more-dubstep if we're being reductive

although British indie still does pretty well on the messageboards (wouldn't have thought BSP are a band everyone would bang on about though - they're a bit too austere and subtle)

2nd track of the EP is really good :)

Maybe I'm working on an outdated definition of Drownedinsound indie. They were very Brit-centric around 02-05, ie the period encompassing the first few BSP records.

Indie has kinda fragmented since then. Yer xxes and James Blakes and whatnot are the hot new electronic sound and guitar-rock while fondly regarded in some quarters has been marginalised by its own dissipation from that (tiresome) 00's centrality

hence, I predict some pretty exciting things coming out of British guitar rock in the early part of this decade, possibly by re-integrating electronic sounds and textures into something more progressive and wild (he hopes)

Like...BSP have survived through their period of trend conformity, which is why I expect them to get much more interesting now - they're on their own now, in a way

Brighton buddies ESP meanwhile have realised their time is up as ESP, and Thomas White is now free to make the music he wants to make, which is miles better than ESP ever was (yeah, really) although there's still Brakes, hovering, somewhere (I don't suppose they've got too much left in the tank although perhaps they will evolve!)

'Bear' is awwwwwwesome

like, if that's an outtake...

but then all of Suede's best songs were b-sides

ok this EP is by a *country mile* the best thing BSP have ever done, beyond any scintilla of doubt

is there some way SNA can say after a thread title "22 New Answers (but it's acoleuthic and nakhchivan so don't bother)"?

would significantly improve my ilx experience. thx.

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