John Andrew Fredrick has written and released seventeen The Black Watch albums of quality indie rock since the Los Angeles band’s inception in 1988. For this record Fredrick had the idea of letting producer-friends Scott Campbell, Rob Campanella, and Andy Creighton be his band and record the album. “I have had, I think, too much control, musically speaking, in the past.’ Fredrick says, “And the thought of experimenting this way was really thrilling.” The result may have yielded TBW’s best album in years. The title track of the 18th album by the black watch from Los Angeles, this has all the ingredients of a hit single accompanied by the fantastic video made by Ian Holmes.
The song is released on Jan 28th 2020 and the album “Brilliant Failures” will see its release as limited vinyl editions, CD and digital on March 27th 2020.
John Andrew Fredrick writes the dreamiest pop songs this side of My Bloody Valentine–with just the right amount of six string freakout and Beatlesque harmony. An L.A. treasure!”–Pop Matters
“A band that melds shoegaze, post-punk and jangle-pop in a masterly way.”–LA Buzz Bands
“It’s astonishing that a band as concerned with quality control as California’s the black watch could go for this long with the following the size of a kitchen sponge. They are a literary/melodic marvel–a real treasure, for more than those who merely seek out obscure pop bands who started in the late 80s.”–Trouser Press
Band Members
john andrew fredrick–guitars, vocals; rick woodard–drums; chris rackard–bass; andy creighton–lead guitar
“Brilliant Failures” is the title of the new record and it is out this Friday, March 27th 2020 on A Turntable Friend Records. Highly recommend checking this one out!
The JASMINE MINKS, the first band to be signed to Alan McGee’s fledging Creation Records label back in 1984, they have announced their new 7” single on blue vinyl, to be released via A Turntable Friend Records. The line-up is the same as on the very first recordings with Jim Shepherd, Martin Keena, Walter ‘Wattie’ Duncan, Tom Reid and the former Television Personalities keyboardist Dave Musker and Tom Reid . The sound of this double A-side is as good as if the band had recorded them at the peak of their popularity some 30 years ago.
Back into mighty fine form, the legendary Jasmine Minks return to the scene with two new tracks, captured on vinyl as it should be. First one is “Step by Step”, it is backed with “Gravity”. Engineered and mixed by Pat Collier. The double A-side 7″ on very limited blue vinyl in a thick cardboard sleeve is released on March 22nd.
The Jasmine Minks have been strongholds in the British music scene since forming in 1983 in Aberdeen. Stereo Embers Magazine notes that they are “one of the most venerated indie rock bands of their era… their work is both timeless and canonical. Led by the positively ageless vocals of Jim Shepherd, the Jasmine Minks sound as vital as ever..
Wakefield’s musical history might be inextricably tied to a certain three Jarmans, but over the past year or so, a new page has started to be written in the still-sparse book of the city’s guitar bands.
Holed away in an uncharacteristically grand old Georgian house-cum-venue-cum-practice space on “one of about two nice streets in the whole city”, Drahla have been honing their dark, intense take on indie-punk. Through debut single ‘Faux Text’ to the supremely exciting ‘Fictional Decision’ and new EP ‘Third Article’, they’ve strode out as one of the country’s most exciting and uncompromising new bands.
Drahla began when bassist Luciel Brown and guitarist Rob Riggs hit a dead end of making music in their bedroom in South London’s Crystal Palace and moved back up north to reconnect with old friend Mike Ainsley (drums) and create a new base in Leeds and Wakefield.
“It got to a point [with the bedroom project] where we thought ‘where do we go with it now?’,” Rob offers, hunched away in a corner of London’s Old Blue Last, a few hours before starting their year at the first show of 2018. “We were under a lot of limitations. We made the quick decision to move back up to Leeds and got back in touch with Mike, and had a practice the week after. There’s so much more freedom out of the spotlight.”
Luciel agrees that a lot of the drive for Drahla’s early material came from a feeling of lost time, and not being able to achieve what they were capable of in the capital, and there’s an untameable urgency to the band’s output, all set behind the bassist/singer’s unorthodox but captivating vocals. Spitting out line after line and twisting words and syllables in each and every direction like they’re play-doh, it’s teamed perfectly with razor sharp guitar and Mike’s thundering power behind the kit.
It made perfect sense, then, for the band’s first tour to be alongside Sub Pop thrashers METZ. “For our first ever tour, to be able to go out and play in France and Spain and beyond, and with such a good band, was completely wild,” Rob reflects, and playing every night for multiple weeks has made the trio an impeccably tight, spiky live band – a few technical hitches derail the first song of tonight’s set, but they’re already a resilient bunch, and hammer through the rest of their half-hour with fervour and power.
As with so many DIY punk bands across the country, the band went to the scene’s go-to producer, MJ of Hookworms, at Suburban Home in Leeds, to mould their sound. “We can’t overstate how much of a help he’s been,” Luciel begins, before Mike admits that the band probably wouldn’t be where they are now, and looking forward with such confidence, if it weren’t for the help the producer has poured into the early stages of the band. “He totally gets us.”
‘Third Article’, released back in November, is a natural and satisfying progression for the trio, with lead track ‘Form of Luxury’ using restraint as its main weapon: Luciel’s vocals make far more noise in her spoken drawl than an untamed scream would. It also means no lyric is lost in the mix or misheard.
As if some sort of dream, the band’s next tour – which comes in between a series of studio sessions with MJ, working towards a one-off single and then, eventually, the band’s debut full-length – is alongside Montreal punks Ought, who just happen to be Luciel’s favourite band.
“It feels like a massive deal,” she says of the upcoming April run. “There’s a lot more pressure on this one [than the METZ tour] I feel. That one was mostly excitement, but we’re so influenced [by Ought] that the fact they’ve asked us to play is amazing and terrifying.”
Already slotting in perfectly alongside some of the biggest players in the punk game, Drahla are quickly becoming your favourite band’s favourite band, and with ideas coming thick and fast for the follow-up to ‘Third Article’, and a live show that’s fast becoming unstoppable, they’ll be yours before long too.
Drahla’s new EP ‘Third Article’ is out now via Blank Ad.
The Fat Angel Sings 