The Fat Angel Sings

The independent scene that emerged from Dunedin, New Zealand, in the early 1980s had all the strange qualities musical trainspotters around the world associate with isolation. Hamish Kilgour from the Clean describes the city as a cauldron, with the low-hanging sky its lid. It’s a creative pressure cooker from which artists must escape.

In the decades since, the bands that steamed from the top of that cauldron have gone global. Next to the Clean, the biggest name is Martin Phillipps, the legendary leader – of 21 different lineups – of the Chills. They were the definitive Dunedin band, with a strange, light, airy, eerie, breezy magic that both matched the city’s geography and transcended it.

But they were cursed. The subtitle of “The Chills: The Triumph and Tragedy of Martin Phillipps” – a new documentary by Julia Parnell and Rob Curry – tells you that this is, first and foremost, a portrait of the artist. A consummate songwriter, Phillipps appears as both a driven man and a lost boy, emotionally cut off from those drawn into his orbit to help him realise his vision.

The film opens in the interior of Phillipps’ home. Over the haunted opening notes of “Pink Frost” (“That’s fine art, according to me,” we hear Iggy Pop say, on a radio show), Phillipps pulls out his keyboard – then breaks into “Heavenly Pop Hit”, which wasn’t so much his biggest hit as his nearest miss.

Spliced amid scenes of festival crowds, ecstatic gigs and the video clip of the song, Phillipps climbs into a decrepit car and drives himself to hospital to receive the results of his liver function tests. Phillipps has hepatitis C. He is told, with medical precision, that he has a 31% chance of dying within 12 months.

Then he is given a guarantee: “If you do keep drinking, Martin, you will die,” the physician says.

There is so much about the Chills’ story that is, on the face of it, cliched. After a number of acclaimed singles and EPs, Phillipps, whose best songs are touched with a sense of wonder, signs his band to a multi-album deal with a US label, Slash. When the hits fail to materialise, he sinks into a fog of heroin addiction, alcoholism, depression and withdrawal.

But Parnell and Curry treat their subject with unusual sensitivity, helped by Phillipps’ extraordinary candour. He allows them access to every step of his treatment process, as well as to his archives (he is an obsessive collector). Around him, other band members, each of them individually numbered, step forward to speak.

What they have to say is just as unfiltered. The former drummer Caroline Easther (Chill No 12) says Phillipps made her feel anxious. The bassist Justin Harwood (Chill No 14) comments that he didn’t know if he was needed or expendable. He came to the latter conclusion after Phillipps told him he planned to write the bass parts on the band’s next album himself.

Another bassist, Terry Moore (No 6), who played in two stints with the band, wonders if he’s going to be next. The drummer Jimmy Stephenson (No 15) has been left traumatised. In tears, he pulls out a gold record of the band’s biggest album, “Submarine Bells”, the glass cracked after falling off his wall in an earthquake: to him it’s symbol of both “great success and shattered dreams”.

In between, we watch Phillipps going through piles of junk as he reassesses his life, sorting the detritus from the essentials. Preparing for an art exhibition – while spray-painting a mummified cat – he muses that “it’s much more fun working as a team on anything. But I’m not going to sacrifice the quality for just a bit of team spirit.” Phillipps remained Chill No 1.

It’s beautifully filmed, suffusing the documentary with an atmosphere to match the Chills’ glorious music, and we get to hear much of that, too. But it’s never allowed to get in the way of the story – there’s no recounting of the band’s discography and, other than Neil Finn and the aforementioned Iggy Pop, no higher luminaries are called on to affirm the band’s standing.

Phillipps’ story resonates because despite his self-involvement, it’s bigger than he is. It’s about artistic integrity, self-realisation, self-acceptance and a reflection on mortality. Towards the end of this sad, lovely film, the emotional rush is equivalent to the Dunedin surf washing on to the cold beaches – it finishes far more optimistically than it promises to.

As a fan, I wanted to punch the air. And of course, it will be fans of the Chills who queue up first to see this documentary. If you’ve not yet had the distinctive pleasure of hearing his band, the triumph and tragedy of Phillipps’ story will make you one for life.

Dunedin’s finest, The Chills follow their acclaimed seventh studio album ‘Scatterbrain’ with a special 7” vinyl “Scatterbrain-Storms: Outtakes“. This special release features three brand new tracks ‘The Dragon with the Sapphire Eyes’, ‘No One Knows Better Than Me’ and ‘Nowhere’.

‘Scatterbrain-Storms: Outtakes’ is a three-track release of bonus material from 2021’s ‘Scatterbrain’, the seventh studio album from Martin Phillipps’ The Chills. Consisting of material that actually predates its parent LP, written before the tone and themes were established, it was initially offered to fans on the Dunedin band’s recent tour.

“We felt these were too good not to be released and were actually the first three songs we wrote for ‘Scatterbrain’ before it’s lyrical tone and musical direction became established. It was important to us to offer fans something special on the tour” Martin Phillipps

Recorded at Port Chalmers Recordings Services, “Scatterbrain-Storms: Outtakes” was produced by Tom Healy with assistance from Tom Bell. The Chills are Martin Phillipps, Oli Wilson, Erica Scally, Callum Hampton and Todd Knudson.

“A worthy addition to a glorious canon” Uncut

‘Scatterbrain’ is a life passing before your ears as uncertainty increases and fake news rumbles on; during which aliens invade, Phillipps scales the walls beyond abandon as he probes the minutiae of worlds within worlds and the hourglass fills. ‘Scatterbrain’ is a landmark album from one of the great modern song writers, it’s pure pop music for the new normal and we can’t wait to see how it ends.

The Pale Fountains were formed in Liverpool in 1980 by Mick (as he was then known) Head with Chris McCaffery on bass, Thomas Whelan on drums, trumpeter Andy Diagram and guitarist Ken Moss.

Signing with Virgin Records in late 1982, this was the first time the music world became aware of the work of singer-songwriter Michael Head. Inspired by 1960s music such as Love, Burt Bacharach and The Beatles, the group released their debut single “(There’s Always) Something on My Mind” on Les Disques du Crépuscule before signing a major label deal in October 1982. Although the Pale Fountains failed to make much commercial headway, the band earned critical praise for the two albums released on the Virgin Label “Pacific Street” released in (1984) and …“From Across the Kitchen Table” the following year (1985), was produced by Ian Broudie, who later found fame with The Lightning Seeds

Melding the most forward-thinking aspects of Eighties pop to the lush, acoustic-based psychedelic rock of Love, 1984’s ‘Pacific Street’ was the debut album from Liverpudlian indie band The Pale Fountains. Fronted by Michael Head (later of perennially underrated Shack) the group cut against the grain of much Eighties indie in Britain with a mellow, bossa nova-influenced sound.

“Pacific Street”

The bounciness of the Pale Fountains went penalized in the days of Echo and the Bunnymen and the Smiths. “Optimism — yuck.” Michael Head’s stylistic hopscotch and wide-eyed sunnyness might have translated better in the late ‘90s, had he stuck with that program for his later band, Shack. If the band had set their sights on one or two areas of their record collections for inspiration instead of darn near everything, “Pacific Street” might not have been so out of place when it was released.

At the time of its release in February 1984, Head described “Pacific Street” as “like a greatest hits LP, except we haven’t had any hits!” It not only showcases the ambition of 80s pop in general, but the very specific singularity of the Liverpool scene, that seemed to add love and (Arthur Lee’s) Love to everything recorded. It reflects the swing away from the post-punk and funk of the early years of the decade, aiming for a mellower, bossa-nova influenced pop. It is difficult to understand how tracks such as “Unless” and “(Don’t Let Your Love) Start A War” were not big hits and are not viewed as standards.

Bold indeed, the expanded version of “Pacific Street” (issued by Virgin Records with four bonus tracks) veers from every angle of ‘70s AM soft rock, stylish soul pop à la Orange Juice (but not as effective), Bacharach/David, and Brazilian jazz. You can imagine Dionne Warwick singing the chorus of “Abergele Next Time”; the non-album single “Palm of My Hand” veers dangerously close to muzak, and the steel drum-and-trumpet combos were more than enough to incite gagging from the pop underground. Too bad. Like the following “From Across the Kitchen Table”, “Pacific Street” wasn’t able to succeed on the charts, so the too varied and too happy Pale Fountains were left in limbo. For all its faults, the band’s debut isn’t half bad, and it doesn’t sound horribly outdated decades later.

“From Across the Kitchen Table”

The Pale Fountains’ second record produced by Ian Broudie ditches a couple of the scatter-brained influences of the debut, so it makes for a slightly more consistent listen. Not all of the odd wrinkles are abandoned, though; they still sound as if they are trying too hard to distinguish themselves from the rest of the flock. The Pale Fountains’ strength lies in folksy pop, but on a few too many occasions, the incessant smoothness and inability to latch onto one style holds them back. Surprisingly, the title track is almost synth-pop, but a smattering of horns makes sure it isn’t completely such. On “September Sting,” they try their hands at Laurel Canyon country-rock and fall flat on their jumpers. When they want to, they can write finely tuned, sophisticated pop songs that are quite pleasant. Instrumentally, “Stole the Love” doesn’t sound a great deal different from the Smiths. “Shelter” and “Jean’s Not Happening” are fine strummers.

1985’s . . . “From Across The Kitchen Table” was produced by Ian Broudie, soon to form and redefine sugar-pop with The Lightning Seeds. The album is more unified than its predecessor as it was recorded over a shorter period of time. Lead single “Jean’s Not Happening” is one of the great lost indie gems of the 80s, complete with a powerful string arrangement. The closing song, “September Sting”, is a joyous slice of scouse-a-billy that points the way clearly to later groups such as The Las.

Near four decades later, Michael Head is adored by his hardcore following and the wider world freshly discovers him as each of his new releases achieves widescale acclaim, whether it be his subsequent band, Shack, or his current outfit, the Red Elastic Band. But The Pale Fountains was where it all began.

Though a decent record and an improvement over the debut, “Kitchen Table” frustrates. They were too anxious to zig or zag when they could have stayed the course. After establishing themselves as a cult band, the Pale Fountains eventually broke up, with Michael Head forming the similarly cultish band Shack.

Two compilations have been issued: “Longshot For Your Love” (Marina, 1998) and “Something On My Mind” (Crépuscule, 2013), the latter with a bonus live CD recorded in 1982.

H. Hawkline (aka Huw Evans) is releasing a new album, “Milk For Flowers”, which was produced by Cate Le Bon, on March 10th via Heavenly. Now he has shared another single from it, “Plastic Man,”.

Evans had this to say about the song in a press release: “The last song written for the album, need more than must, twirling cane and top hat gliding down a molten stairway in the middle of summer. Tim Presley wrote that opening guitar line—I watched him piece it together like a scribble, animating itself into a Muybridge off-cut.”

Amusingly, the video for “Plastic Man” is almost exactly the same as the one for the album’s title track, “Milk For Flowers,” which was shared last year. If you watch both videos, some of the vocals from “Plastic Man” match up with Evans’ mouth movements and at other parts in the video the vocals are synched to “Milk For Flowers.” Evans explains: “‘I’m going to make one video and just change the music.’ I laughed to myself, thinking about it, and then I thought about it and it made sense. Sometimes your song changes but everything else stays the same; it causes previously dormant plates of emotion to grind against the familiar and mundane, new monuments jut up from your earth, empty buildings, a landscape rearranged.”

“Milk For Flowers” Due Out March 10th via Heavenly Records

Chicago duo Whitney (Julien Ehlrich and Max Kakacek) have shared a new song, “For a While,” and announced some new U.S. tour dates for March.

“For a While” is actually an earlier song, it’s been a live favourite from the era of their 2016-released debut album, “Light Upon the Lake”, and was a live favorite back when it was titled “Rolling Blackouts.” The song was finally recorded in 2022. Whitney produced the song with Brad Cuook, Jonathan Rado, and Ziyad Asrar, It features contributions from Macie Stewart (violin), Will Miller (horns), Lia Kohl (cello), Malcom Brown (keys), Rado (organ), and Asrar (synth).

Ehrlich had this to say about the song in a press release: “The lyrics of ‘For a While’ were inspired by a time Max and I drove past a burning car on the side of the highway in Northern Illinois. From what we could see everyone made it out safely, but in that moment we were both struck by the ubiquity of anonymous tragedy.

Over the course of writing ‘For A While’ that experience evolved into a feeling of gratitude and love for all the people who aren’t able to be with us today. We’ve been working on this song for a few years and a few different phases of our lives. It’s seen some people come and go. We love you all.”

Frankie Rose are releasing her first new album in six years, “Love As Projection”, on March 10th via Slumberland Records. Now she has shared its second single, “Sixteen Ways,” via a music video. Scott Kiernan directed the video, which was choreographed by Neil Schwartz and features dancers Dainique Jones, Misato Obana, Youlmae Kim, and Shion Uesaka.

After spending nearly two decades establishing herself across New York and Los Angeles independent music circles, Frankie Rose returns with a fresh form, aesthetic, and purpose embodied in her new album “Love As Projection.” Celebrated by countless critical and cultural outlets over the years for her expansive approach to songwriting, lush atmospherics, and transcendent vocal melodies and harmonies, “Love As Projection” is a reintroduction of her iconic style through the new lens of contemporary electronic pop. Featuring beautiful, ethereal songs like lead-off single “Anything,” “Sixteen Ways” and “Come Back,” this album is more than a rebirth, a refinement, a resurgence – it’s a culmination of influence and the most personal and accessible collection of art-pop that Frankie has delivered yet.

Rose had this to say in a press release: “I wanted to make a dance video choreographed by 80s Baby (Neil Shwartz) but with the ESPTV (Scott Kiernan) aesthetic. I trusted them completely and just let them create a world for me. The result is a video that feels like a fever dream in the black lodge complete with my very own machine elves.”

Schwartz had this to add: “I wanted to make sure that the movement matched the aesthetic and wanted to create clean lines focusing more toward the upper body. We focused on the arms to create flowing pictures that would match and complement the synths, beats, and Vocals, and overall musicality of the track. I wanted to give individuality movement to each dancer while still including a cohesive sea of flowing colors that complimented each dancer to bring about a visual harmony of pictures and shapes.”

Previously Frankie Rose shared the album’s first single, “Anything,”

A previous press release described the album in more detail: “Painstakingly written, recorded, and engineered through some of the most tumultuous times in history, this new collection of songs harnesses the power and propulsion of Frankie’s early DIY-centric punk days without losing sight of the immersive, dreamlike world-building she’s been known for in recent years. Her love of new wave hooks and post-punk drive remain omnipresent, elevated by her utilization of modern production and an improved, polished palate of state-of-the-art instrumentation.”

Rose’s last regular album was the sci-fi themed “Cage Tropical”, released in 2017 via Slumberland/Grey Market. Although in 2019 she did release an album in which she covered The Cure’s 1980-released album “Seventeen Seconds” in its entirety as part of Turntable Kitchen’s Sounds Delicious series.

“Love As Projection” Due Out March 10th via Slumberland Records

Brooklyn post-punk five-piece Geese have shared a new song, “Cowboy Nudes,” via a music video. Andy Swartz and Cameron Winter directed the video. Geese frontman Cameron Winter had this to say about “Cowboy Nudes” in a press release:

“The song is about life getting better, and more fun, after the end of the world.

“When we were doing overdubs I wanted to add something Eastern-sounding on the second verse, so I had our drummer Max bring over this busted up sitar we’d had lying around since high school. I went to buy some new strings at a world music store, and the guy told me one pack was $80. I thought he was kidding so I bought two. He was not; sitar strings aren’t cheap. I didn’t even end up fully restringing it, I just played the one not-broken string. So you better appreciate that goddamn sitar on the second verse.

“I’m also proud of the line about falling in love with a tumbleweed.”

“Cowboy Nudes” follows the band’s debut album, “Projector”, released in 2021 via Partisan/Play It Again Sam. News about their follow up album is promised soon.

Single Out Now via Partisan/Play It Again Sam

London trio Girl Ray have shared a new song, “Everybody’s Saying That,” via a music video. Ben H Allen (Gnarls Barkley, Animal Collective, MIA, Belle & Sebastian) produced the song, which finds the band embracing ’70s disco, as filtered through modern indie-pop. Alice Harding directed the video, which fittingly takes place at a club, complete with a rollerskating dancer. .

“The lyrics on this single were inspired by the straight-to-the-heart simplicity of the disco greats,” says singer/guitarist Poppy Hankin in a press release. “I wrote it while missing my partner while on tour in 2020, and it plays on themes of new love and self-doubt. Musically we took reference from the nu-disco resurgence that seemed to be taking off in 2020, in particular from the likes of Kylie Minogue (Disco), Jessie Ware (What’s Your Pleasure?), Dua Lipa (Future Nostalgia), and Róisín Murphy (Róisín Machine). We were really inspired by all of these women re-imagining disco.”

Hankin had this to say about the video: “We met Alice, the director, while we were all working in a coffee truck on film sets over the pandemic. Alice is the special kind of person you can put total faith in and know she’ll make something amazing, so when she agreed to direct our video we were beyond excited. We wanted the video to have an emphasis on atmosphere and colour rather than narrative to fit in with the feel of the song, which Alice achieved wonderfully. Lyrically the song is about longing, and even though it was filmed in Slough, the video has pure Hollywood vibes thanks to a hugely talented cast and crew, and countless favours that Alice managed to pull in. We hope you enjoy it.”

Harding adds: “It was such a pleasure to direct this video for Girl Ray. We forayed into the underground to a party harking back to the halcyon days of Studio 54—in a boy-meets-boy story of love, lust, music and pure ’70s disco joy.”

Girl Ray, the three-piece comprising Poppy Hankin, Iris McConnell and Sophie Moss, announce new single ‘Everybody’s Saying That’

The Tallest Man on Earth (aka Swedish musician Kristian Matsson) has announced a new album, “Henry St”., and shared its first single, “Every Little Heart,” via a music video. “Henry St”. is due out April 14th via ANTI-Records. Jeroen Dankers directed the video for “Every Little Heart.”

“Henry St”. is Matsson’s first album of original songs in four years, although last September he released the covers album, “Too Late For Edelweiss”, via ANTI-Records. His last regular album was 2019’s “I Love You, It’s a Fever Dream”.

In 2020, Matsson left New York City to return to his farm in Sweden. It was only after he returned to touring in 2021 that the inspiration to write and record new music struck.

“When I’m in motion, I can focus on my instinct, have my daydreams again. When I was finally able to tour again, I started writing like a madman,” Matsson says in a press release.

The album features Ryan Gustafson (guitar, lap steel, ukulele), TJ Maiani (drums), CJ Camerieri of Bon Iver (trumpet , French horn), Phil Cook (piano, organ), Rob Moose of Bon Iver, yMusic (strings), and Adam Schatz (saxophone).

“They opened everything up, and understood what the songs that I’d written needed: sounds that I couldn’t ever have thought of or created myself,” says Matsson of the band of players. “We recorded so many of the songs live in the studio, playing, having fun and being really open with each other.”

Of “Every Little Heart,” Matsson says: “But of course I still have little demons inside of me. I wrote some key changes in the song that came natural to me, but I worried they might sound unnatural to others. When TJ Maiani heard it, he straightaway went into this drumbeat that shocked me a little at first, but came completely natural to him. It fit’s the song perfectly.”

Dankers shot the video on 16mm Kodak film and it’s the first part of a trilogy. Dankers says that the video “portrays a conflict you can have with your inner child, which you sometimes still have inside you and you want to let go, but that isn’t always easy.”

Summing up the new album, Matsson says: “Henry St“. is the most playful, most me album yet, because it covers so many of the different noises in my head. When you overthink things, you get further away from your original ideas. And God knows I overthink things when I’m by myself.”

Vocal, Acoustic Guitar – Kristian Matsson Electric Guitar – Ryan Gustafson Drums – TJ Maiani Bass – Nick Sanborn

“Henry St”. Due Out April 14th via ANTI-Records

Unknown Mortal Orchestra (mainly the project of New Zealand-born Ruban Nielson) have announced a new album, “V”, and shared a new song from it, “Layla,” via a music video. “V” is due out March 17th via Jagjaguwar Records.

VIRA-LATA directed the “Layla” video, which stars Mia Bueno and Fernanda Peyerl. The album includes “I Killed Captain Hook,” a single shared last November, and “Weekend Run,” a single from 2021.

“V “was recorded in Palm Springs with Nielson’s brother, Kody Nielson, alongside their father, Chris Nielson (saxophone/flute), and longstanding Unknown Mortal Orchestra member Jake Portrait. At the start of the pandemic, Nielson took a break from recording and spent some time in Hawaii to be there for a sick uncle and to help his mother and another uncle move to Hawaii from New Zealand and Portland. There was also a family wedding in Hawaii. The Nielson brothers then returned to Palm Springs to finish the album.

“In Hawaii, everything shifted off of me and my music,” Ruban Nielson says in a press release. “Suddenly, I was spending more time figuring out what others need and what my role is within my family. I also learned that things I thought were true of myself are bigger than I thought. My way of making mischief—that’s not just me—that’s my whole Polynesian side. I thought I was walking away from music to focus on family, but the two ended up connecting.”

In 2018, Unknown Mortal Ochestra released two albums: “Sex & Food” and “IC-01 Hanoi”.