Music, Rock, Issue 694

Simple Minds - Barrowlands, Glasgow Sat 25 Feb 2012

Revisit to first five albums a reminder of their potency

In these recessionary times, it’s easy to suppose the manufacturers of dry ice are thanking their lucky stars for 1980s art-rock bands on the comeback and reunion trail. Clouds of the stuff create precisely the proper atmosphere in which men with…

Eat, sleep and breathe: Bwani Junction

The Edinburgh indie-afrobeat group's frontman, Rory Fairweather, tells us of his touring habits

What time is breakfast? Meal times become irrelevant, just food time. Tea or coffee? Always tea. Smoking or non-smoking? Absolutely no smoking, our bodies are temples. Sweet or savoury snacks? Jack ate soap last time... what does that…

French Wives, Sneaky Pete’s, Edinburgh, Tue 28 Feb

Successful performance from band on the cusp of greatness

‘We’re kind of shitting it’, French Wives frontman Stuart Dougan declares with a semi self-conscious shrug, a statement referencing the thirty gigs his band will embark on over the next month (including a stint at SXSW) and succeeding ‘two great…

RM Hubbert, Stereo, Glasgow, Fri 27 Jan

The launch RM Hubbert's second album, 13 Lost and Found, is both a celebratory and elegiac affair. A punk and post-rock veteran, Hubbert turned to the classical guitar as a way of dealing with bereavement and depression. To perform his latest album with…

Butcher Boy - Berkeley Suite, Glasgow, Fri 10 Feb, part of the Glasgow Short Film Festival

Profound and nostalgic home movie soundtrack session

The intimate basement bar that constitutes the Berkeley Suite, with its original 60s dancehall décor and faded ‘groovy’ vibes, mirrors the classy, nostalgic theme offered by this evening of film and music. Local eight-piece Butcher Boy frame a screen…

Human Don’t Be Angry - The Arches, Glasgow, Sat 25 Feb

Malcolm Middleton's side project gets a satisfying full-band outing

For those who knew Malcolm Middleton only from his days as one half of the funniest band ever to be famous for misery, or even as the alt folk jangler behind ‘A Brighter Beat’ and one-time Christmas No 1 outsider ‘We’re All Going to Die’, this, the…

Tom McClung of Wu Lyf - interview

The Manchester epic indie rockers eschew traditional approaches to getting their music heard

Manchester quartet Wu Lyf’s unwillingness to play the conventional pop game has been a breath of fresh air. Now they’re preparing to stop talking and start delivering. ‘At the start we didn’t want to be a band for the sake of it,’ says Tom McClung of…

Kindness - World, You Need A Change Of Mind

Superb spellbinding pop which pulls of a mulititude of hipsterism sins

(Female Energy/Polydor) You could be forgiven for thinking Kindness is little more than hipster ‘lolz’. Tracks have trickled out sporadically accompanied by cryptic soundbites and moody black and white shots of a recording studio in Paris and New…

Summer Camp set for UK tour

Bitter-hearted take girl groups of 50s and 60s

Summer Camp: a duo so in tune with one another they respond to The List’s email questions as one entity. ‘How did you get together’, we ask them. ‘We’d known each other for ages,’ Jeremy Warmsley and Elizabeth Sankey tell us in stereo. Then Elizabeth…

Profile: Cass McCombs

Californian alt-country nomad set for UK tour

Name McCombs. Cass McCombs. Or ‘Combs’, as his close friends call him (we like to think). He’s that Californian alt-country nomad, right? Correct. The harmonious, folk-rocking ‘Combs’ has spent most of his adulthood travelling America, writing…

Dean Owens - New York Hummingbird

Release from Edinburgh-based tunesmith a mixed bag

(Songboy Records) Could it be that Dean Owens suffers from Ron Sexsmith Syndrome? RSS is that little-publicised but extremely frustrating affliction which strikes talented singer-songwriters who are perfectly capable of crafting a gloriously melodic…

Randolph’s Leap - The Curse of the Haunted Headphones

Homespun showcase from stripped-back Glasgow indie-folk rabble

(Peenko Records) Do not be misled by this bedroom recording, or its cassette-hissing, lo-fi aesthetic. While Glasgow indie-folk rabble Randolph’s Leap are known and loved for their elaborate arrangements and philharmonic live shows, this homespun…

The Wedding Present - Valentina

Well-worn template mixes with stabs at hummability

(Scopitones) The last time this reviewer looked, which wasn’t yesterday admittedly, The Wedding Present were a bracing proposition, the musical equivalent of being dragged along a cobbled street in Halifax with one leg tied to a Raleigh Chopper. Flat…