LFC005: Jake Mattison – “Sorrow” + Free Download
April 16th, 2012 • News • No comments
Photo by Clement Neveu
We’re delighted to this morning welcome Manchester’s Jake Mattison to the Laissez Faire Club Records family. Having been totally knocked out by Jake’s voice when we first him heard late last year, and also very impressed with his effortless way around a good tune, we decided we had to get involved in bringing this huge talent to a wider audience.
To that end: Jake’s debut single, “Sorrow”, will be out on limited edition 7″ vinyl (300 copies) and digital download from Monday 4 June.
Not one but two single launch parties have been arranged: The Castle Hotel in Manchester on Wednesday 6 June, and London’s Enterprise on Thursday 7 June. Support on both dates will be announced shortly, as will ticket details (so keep checking back).
In the meantime, you can exclusively stream the single below and we’re also offering a FREE DOWNLOAD of “Too The Old House (You Return)” (recorded during the same session as the single), which should get you all warmed up for what’s to come. In the first instance, that’s two support slots with Australia’s Matt Corby, one at Ballyhoo this Tuesday 17th and one at The Garage next Wednesday 25th. We’re excited.
London gigs diary: 16 April – 22 April
April 15th, 2012 • Gigs diary • No comments
Australia’s Matt Corby plays Ballyhoo (formerly The Bowery) on Tuesday 17th.
Monday 16 April
Noah & The Whale + Rae Morris @ Royal Albert Hall
Emeli Sande @ Shepherd’s Bush Empire
Brown Brogues @ Barfly
Ellen & The Escapades @ The Lexington (Communion)
Tuesday 17 April
Noah & The Whale + Rae Morris @ Shepherd’s Bush Empire
Matt Corby + Jake Mattison @ Ballyhoo (formerly The Bowery) (Communion)
Oberhofer @ Rough Trade East
Hatcham Social @ Cargo
Maps & Atlases @ The Garage
My Tiger My Timing @ Barfly
Wednesday 18 April
Oberhofer @ CAMP
Bastille @ Hoxton Hall
The Other Tribe + Swiss Lips @ Hoxton Bar & Kitchen (Gold Dust)
These Ghosts + Coves @ Notting Hill Arts Club (Death2Disco) FREE
Thursday 19 April
Bastille @ Hoxton Hall (2nd date)
Sam Airey + Saul Ashby @ Old Queens Head (Oh! Inverted World)
Good Dangers @ The Shacklewell Arms
Stealing Sheep @ Hoxton Bar & Kitchen
Friday 20 April
Vuvuvultures + The Kill Van Kulls + Physics House Band @ Old Blue Last FREE
Gaz Coombes @ Koko (Club NME)
The Hot Melts + Swiss Lips @ Purple Turtle (Clublad)
Anison + Ex Libras @ Tooting Tram & Social (The Remedy w/ John Kennedy) FREE
Sat 21 April
Johnny Flynn, Keane, Little Boots @ Rough Trade East (Record Store Day) FREE
Stealing Sheep, Allo Darlin’, Smoke Fairies @ Rough Trade West (Record Store Day) FREE
Mafia Lights @ Power Lunches FREE
Sun 22 April
Hella Better Dancer @ The Lock Tavern FREE
Introducing: Laura Welsh
April 10th, 2012 • Introducing • No comments
Twenty-something Laura Welsh has been on the London scene for a year or two now, under various guises: we first came across her as Laura And The Tears, and she also performed under the monicker of Hey Laura for a short while.
While strong, radio (2) friendly songs and her powerful and emotive voice have always been at the forefront, for some reason neither of these projects really catapulted her into the ether (and general public consciousness). This might well change now, however – Welsh has relaunched simply under her given names, and has posted, as well as some evocative black and white photography, two rather arresting tracks online: “45″ and “Ghosts”.
Pitched somewhere between Adele and Rachael Yamagata, both display solid production, an impressive set of pipes and a general feeling they won’t remain contained for too much longer: we’re currently envisaging A&R men donning their cloaks and daggers and preparing for battle.
Indeed, we won’t be surprised if “45″ ends up sound-tracking a tear-jerking scene in a US TV drama or an Olympic montage this year, and with its show-stopping “45 minutes to midnight” refrain, it would have been ideal for recent US flick “New Years Eve”, if only it came out sooner (this is the ballpark we’re in here). These are songs pitched unequivocally directed at the mass market, and with the legs to potentially go the whole hog.
MP3: Laura Welsh – 45
MP3: Laura Welsh – Ghosts
Q&A with Sean Moeller of Daytrotter
April 9th, 2012 • Interview • No comments
Sean Moeller is the founder of Daytrotter.com, a website based in the small town of Rock Island in Illinois, USA.
Live sessions, typically around 4-5 tracks, are recorded onto vintage 1/4 Inch tape at Daytrotter’s Horseshack Studios (also in Rock Island, but several more have sprung up across the US) as bands pass through the town on their national tours, and are posted up online alongside some analysis from Moeller and a unique illustration of the band / artist – something that’s become a real USP for the site.
Since its inception in 2006, Daytrotter has hosted sessions from bands like MGMT, Bon Iver, The National, Wilco, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Local Natives, Fleet Foxes, The Naked And Famous, Two Door Cinema Club, Anna Calvi, The Vaccines and Youth Lagoon, amongst countless others, leading to the site being featured in publications such The New York Times, Rolling Stone and Pitchfork. Recently, a Daytrotter studio has opened up here in London, which has enabled many UK artists to feature on the site – recent tapings this side of the pond have included the likes of Dry The River, Kyla La Grange, Bombay Bicycle Club, Metronomy, Bastille and Slow Club.
Quite often, bands feature on the site before they fully break into the public consciousness, and as such Daytrotter rightly declares itself as a place to discover your new favourite band.
We’ve been aware of the site for a little while, but have taken a larger interest of late due to two of our bands, The Static Jacks and Channel Cairo, being featured. With both their sessions appearing online in recent weeks, we thought it was high time to pose some questions to Sean about it all – his aims and motivations for doing it, as well as what’s to come from Daytrotter in the future.
LFC: What inspired you to start Daytrotter?
Sean: I started the site with a couple buddies really just to try and make something different and special – something that would allow me to give a platform to bands that I thought were better than most of the bands that I read about in magazines. I just thought that if there was a way for us to put bands in a most natural environment and recording them without much fanfare, with vintage equipment, straight to tape, the results would be good and people could easily appreciate them. There would be little to no bullshit. The music could just shine through.
LFC: To someone who hasn’t come across Daytrotter – what exactly is it, and what’s the site’s aim/ethos?
Sean: We’re a website that records bands passing through our main analog studio here in Rock Island, Ill. (and a few others out there in the world) and features those songs for people to listen to on our site. We hope we’re a place where people have open ears and are willing to discover things they’ve never heard of. We just like the idea of getting great music into as many ears as possible and letting people decide for themselves, rather than get caught up in any hype that is too easy to find out there these days.
LFC: Aside from bands passing through to record sessions for you, is there much of an independent music scene where you’re based on the Illinois / Iowa border?
Sean: No, not really. We’re trying to change that. We’ve got some things up our sleeves. We usually have to get to Iowa City to link up with great shows. Though, surprisingly, a couple nights a year, Maquoketa, Iowa is about as cool of a place as you can ever go to hear music.
LFC: Of all the bands who have recorded Daytrotter sessions over the years, who have been the most memorable?
Sean: Really, honestly and truly, they all stand out for different reasons. It’s a big ‘ol bag of memories, all of them. It’s damn near impossible to think about what we’re trying to do over here without thinking about it as a whole. These aren’t individual moments for me, but more a whole. That’s what means the most to me.
LFC: Apart from the original studio in Rock Island, where are the other Daytrotter sites?
Sean: We have studios that we currently use in London, San Francisco, Nashville, Austin, Montreal and Asheville, NC.
LFC: How did setting up the studio in London come about?
Sean: We got to become really good buddies with the killer people at Communion and our values and tastes align so well that we couldn’t keep our hands off of one another. We just had to work together and so this is just the start of a relationship that I think is going to continue to grow and become something really amazing. We’re looking forward to seeing where it goes. Our studio over there is gorgeous and the two engineers we’re working with – Ian Grimble and Rich Matthews – are wizards. It’s a wonderful extension of our team here in Rock Island and we couldn’t be happier about the results so far.
LFC: What’s your criteria when booking a band for a Daytrotter session?
Sean: It’s very simple: If I like it we’ll try to make something happen. If I don’t like it, the band doesn’t stand a chance. Ha.
LFC: Are there any big names you’d like to get on the site, or are you happy with focusing on emerging talent?
Sean: I want Willie Nelson, Jay-Z, Alabama and Radiohead to come visit us.
LFC: How do you search for new talent? Is it mainly on the internet, or word of mouth?
Sean: It’s about half and half. I get a lot of recommendations and tips from bands that we’ve recorded in the past and friends that I trust. Mostly it’s just me bouncing around Bandcamp and Soundcloud pages. It’s amazing what you can find.
LFC: What’s next for Daytrotter?
Sean: It’s actually just a lot of the same, but we should have some very big news coming in the fall. It’s not the right time to let the cat or cats out of the bag just yet. All in due time, my good friend.
Like Daytrotter on Facebook here and follow Sean on Twitter at @RealDaytrotter. Listen to The Static Jacks’ session, recorded in San Francisco, here. Channel Cairo’s session, recorded in London, is available here.
Channel Cairo – “A Year” (Free Download) + Daytrotter session
April 7th, 2012 • News • No comments
Photo by Maxime Imbert
Back in February, we alerted you to Channel Cairo‘s excellent new track “A Year”, which they posted online for a short period ahead of their appearance at the HMV Next Big Thing Festival.
Now, they’ve made the song available as a free download for a limited time ahead of its full release as their second official single in June – so be sure to grab it’s piping hot (and before the price goes up). Produced by Dave Bascombe (Doves, Ladyhawke, Placebo), it’s a more direct pop-rock number than its predecessor (and LFC Records release) “Elephant Room”, and we expect it to gain them many new admirers.
Earlier this week the band became the second Laissez Faire Club Records artist to be featured on Daytrotter.com (after The Static Jacks) – their 4 track session for the site, recorded at Crouch End’s Church Studios in February, features one-off, unique takes of “Elephant Room”, “A Year” and two brand new tracks (“Caterpillar” and “Halo”) which will undoubtedly feature in their new live set.
Speaking of which, a good one to get down to would be the launch party for the aforementioned new single, which takes place at Camden’s Barfly on Thursday 21 June.
Listen to the Daytrotter session here.
Buy tickets to the Barfly show here.
Buy “Elephant Room” on signed 7″ vinyl here.
Laissez Faire Club DJs at The Great Escape
March 29th, 2012 • News • No comments
Killing Moon Limited, Euphonios, The Recommender and Strongroom Alive are teaming up to put on this superb bill of new music at this year’s Great Escape festival, which takes place in Brighton from 10-12 May.
This particular event takes place at Life on Friday 11 May, and is free entry all day long. Alongside Bluebell, we’ve kindly been invited to spin some records in between the bands. As the lineup features some of our very favourite artists of the moment, some of whom have featured on this blog and/or appeared live at an LFC event, we would have been mad to have turned down the opportunity.
If you’re down by the seaside for the festival, pop along and say hello. We’ll be the ones with the iPod and mix CDs in hand, and (probably) playing tracks from our label catalogue.
Spring Offensive – “Worry Fill My Heart”
March 20th, 2012 • Comment, Introducing • No comments
Oxford’s earnest indie rockers Spring Offensive released a video this Saturday just gone for their new single “Worry Fill My Heart”.
Musically, we’re deciphering bits of Wild Beasts, Bombay Bicycle Club and fellow Oxfordites Foals in the jerky, stop-start guitars, and vocalist Lucas Whitworth’s confessional lyrics about having a shit job and not being able to stump up the rent (“I asked no one for the life I’m leading”; “I’m counting down the seconds until my shift is up”), as well as an allusion to the frightening inevitability of it all (“How dare I even think I could be any exception”), recall the likes of The Rakes and Hard-Fi, two bands who famously popularised songs about life’s banalities.
It’s an intense and captivating four minutes or so, that will certainly resonate with many of the current recession experiencing generation who might be seeking a creative outlet in the arts, and have yet to make it pay. In that sense – full marks for this lot for quite simply telling it how it is, a trait that, alongside their hard working nature, will help to build upon their already devoted fan base.
If you’d like to hear their tales of urban woe in a live setting, they’ll be on tour around the UK from the 29th March til 5th April. A short stint of German dates follows directly after. Be sure to pick up the “Worry Fill My Heart” single from iTunes too, which also includes B-side “Carrier” (below).
Introducing: The Maple Trail
March 19th, 2012 • Introducing • No comments
Sydney / Blue Mountains based The Maple Trail is the project of Aidan Roberts, who’s been writing and recording under this particular guise for a good few years it seems – TMT’s just released album, “Cable Mount Warning”, is the outfit’s third.
Much like fellow Aussies The Sleepy Jackson, for example, the dynamic in the group appears to be one with Roberts very much at its helm, playing most instruments on the recordings (everything from vocals to celtic drums to wine glasses, he declares) and appearing as a solitary figure in the press shots, with other musicians dipping in and out and contributing various parts on certain tracks.
We came across the band very recently, and one track off the aforementioned album, “Highwire”, jumped up like a high speed bowling delivery that pitches on a bit of rough, before hitting us hard on the proverbial helmet.
Roberts has cited Bryter Later by the late Nick Drake as an inspiration, and there’s certainly something of him here in this slice of dreamy, summery and uplifting folk, and we can also hear bits of more contemporary artists such as Kings Of Convenience, Bon Iver and Broken Social Scene – the horns that kick in initially on 00:37 (before coming back triumphantly later) take us back to the BSS’ glorious 7/4 Shoreline. If it’s up your alley, check out the rest of the album here.
Q&A with Teppei Miki of The Stone Records
March 11th, 2012 • Interview • No comments
Continuing our series of music industry interviews is Teppei Miki, founder of one of Japan’s most diverse and eclectic vinyl import shops The Stone Records. Not an actual bricks and mortar premises, TSR is run lovingly from Teppei’s house in Kawasaki, and appears to be constantly on the pulse and one step ahead of the game when it comes to brand new vinyl releases from all over the world.
The shop carries vinyl (as well as CDs and cassettes) from a huge selection of labels, from behemoths like Columbia and XL/Young Turks to US indies like Captured Tracks, Group Tightener, Fat Possum, White Iris and Third Man, to the output of London singles labels like Young & Lost Club, Chess Club, Killing Moon Limited and ourselves. Safe to say that if it’s hot, they’ve probably got some copies in at The Stone Records.
People like Teppei – and shops like TSR – represent Japan’s fanatical niche for independent music from the USA, the UK and beyond (and the much publicised upturn in vinyl’s commercial fortunes), something that’s also manifested at its Western themed rock festivals Fuji Rocks and Summer Sonic, which take place annually in July and August respectively. In a country where domestic music rules the charts, the desire to seek out different genres of music has created a thriving underground scene. We thought we’d pose a few questions to a man at the forefront of it all.
LFC: How long has The Stone Records been going?
Teppei: I started the store in 2008.
LFC: Is The Stone Records well known amongst indie music fans / vinyl collectors in Japan?
Teppei: I would like to answer yes. But there are many import indie shops in Japan, and I don’t think it’s quite as well known as some of the other indie stores.
LFC: Do you participate in Record Store Day?
Teppei: Yes, I’m participating in it. But I’ve never done something special on that day. Every year I think I should do something but I’ve always had no idea!
LFC: What type of releases do you specialise in?
Teppei: I stock vinyls and cassettes mainly, and some CDs. I’m not particular about genre of music especially, because I like any indie music.
LFC: How do you find new bands / releases?
Teppei: Basically I don’t find new bands and new releases so much by myself because good labels and some good people tell me about good releases. I just choose from them. I feel I’m always supported by many people.
LFC: Which are some of your favourite record labels?
Teppei: This is difficult question because I like all labels which distribute to me. But if I had to choose, now I like Portuguese Lebensstrasse and Czech label AMDISCS. Both are not born in major indie music countries. I’m very interested in each of their releases because I can feel they’re always looking for any music and bands from any country.
LFC: What is the market like in Japan for new indie bands from places like the UK, US and Australia, and what genres of indie are popular in Japan right now?
Teppei: I think Japanese indie music fans may be the most fanatical in the world. Here there are many import indie record shops and I feel that limited edition vinyl might amount to fifty percent of their sales (though this is just my expectation). I think some people like guitar pop influenced from the 80s/90s like Captured Tracks or Slumberland, and LA’s Not Not Fun/100% Silk’s electro/dance music is loved especially by some people. But I always feel many Japanese people like UK rock like LFC releases.
LFC: Do you have any plans to release records yourself at any point?
Teppei: I don’t have any plans to release. Now I’m satisfied enough to only sell and listen to the records.
LFC: Who are your hot tips for 2012?
Teppei: I like so much now Sheffield’s garage rock band Best Friends! They’ll release new EP soon on the amazing label Art Is Hard Records.
Check out The Stone Records blog here, and like the shop’s Facebook page here.
The Static Jacks on Daytrotter
March 11th, 2012 • News • No comments
Whilst on their tour of the US and Canada in November last year, The Static Jacks recorded a session for the legendary Daytrotter in San Francisco.
The LFC 7″ single tracks, “Into The Sun” and “Mercy, Hallelujah”, are both included, the latter an alternative take “played like The Smashing Pumpkins would”. Honouring their New Jersey roots, short covers The Misfits and Bruce Springsteen also made the cut, as did a couple of other tracks from their debut full-length “If You’re Young”.
Listen to the session in full here, and watch out for one from Channel Cairo coming soon, which was recorded at Daytrotter’s new studio in London’s Crouch End last month.
