Liverpool Sound City- Thursday

///Gigwise///

Liverpool is a city that can often be held back by its impressive but dated history, so it's great to see a festival like Sound City establishing itself with a roster full of exciting new bands playing in the city's myriad of venues. Now in it's second year Sound City 2009 was a well organised and exciting event which, for the two days this writer was present, provided a non-stop catalogue of treats and surprises.

The best LA and Brooklyn has to offer was on show at the Barfly on Thursday with the mouth wateringly cool 'Kings of US Underground' show. Everyone with a festival pass and, more importantly, a plaid shirt was in attendance to see Mika Miko and Titus Andronicus open the event however it was the much blogged about Soft Pack who were most noteworthy, if sadly for the wrong reasons. The band formerly known as The Muslims offered great potential on their single 'Parasites' earlier this year however their live show suffers the pit falls of repetition and worse still boredom. They do show some promise with the aforementioned single and the swaggering 'On My Time' however so many of the tracks blend into a mush and far outstay their welcome that you can't help begin to clock watch.

Luckily with fifteen minutes of Soft Pack time left Atlanta's rowdiest band Black Lips take to the stage in the venues main room. They instantly whip up a storm playing tracks from 'Good, Bad, Not Evil' and this years '200 Million Thousand' creating a swelteringly hot atmosphere in an already sweaty venue. 'O Katrina' proves an early highlight and sees the crowd gathered at the front of the stage twisting, turning and threatening to spill over. As the set progresses so does your love for the three piece, they genuinely do seem to play as if their life depends on it. Guitarist Cole Porter who, when not spittin' 'n' riffin', regularly leans into the crowd, never missing a beat. Meanwhile Jared Swilley is attacking his mic like it did him wrong many years ago. As the set reaches fever pitch with 'Bad Kids' the crowd begins to spill over the barriers and heavy handed security grab the revellers by the throats and force them outdoors- seriously unfair. Undeterred, Black Lips finish their set explosively, proving that in the face of youthful newcomers they are still sitting on the throne of the US subterranean.

Thursdays final act is Brighton pop Gods Metronomy in the footballers haunt Alma De Cuba. "How nice it is that somebody finally married traditional Greek orthodox religion with Cuban cuisine" jokes singer Joe Mount at the bar's confusing decor/ business contrasts. With the departure of Gabriel Stebbing to his own band Your Twenties Metronomy have evolved into a full band four piece. Having recruited drummer Anna Prior (Lightspeed Champion) and bassist Gbenga Adelekan (Akira, Jeremy Warmsley) the band dynamic has shifted somewhat and the new foursome are clearly not quite comfortable with it just yet. Having said that, with such genius tracks as 'Heartbreaker' and 'A Thing For You' in their arsenal Metronomy can't fail to get the crowd moving. As they bring the night to an end you can't help feeling that Metronomy have made more than a few heart rates rapid this evening.

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Black Lips- 200 Million Thousand.

Originally for Gigwise.com

2009 is evidently the year of the headache inducing record sleeve. First up there was Animal Collectives swirling magic eye piece for 'Merriweather Post Pavilion' and now comes the cover for '200 Million Thousand' the new album from flower punks Black Lips. If you squint hard enough you can make a face out of the black lines but don't stare too long however as you are likely to keel over and start frothing at the mouth. Perhaps it hypnotises you into buying the album?

Hypnotism may well be the only way to get into '200 Million Thousand' however as it is a challenging and unfocused piece of work. The 2007 album 'Good, Bad Not Evil' is a much underlooked effort and a good summation of Black Lips. They are good: making Stones esque garage 'n' blues acid fried pop seemingly held together by the very loosest of threads. They are bad: they play wild shows that see them getting naked, fighting and even getting deported but ultimately they are not evil, they just do their thing and care not one iota what anyone else thinks about it.

This attitude manifested itself in the past in a typically nihilistic punk style, but on '200 Million Suns' the loose threads have snapped and left the band who thrived on unprofessionalism exposed. Recorded in a disused Atlantan art gallery the fifteen tracks on the album are wildly varied in quality, from the experimental to the trippy by way of acid-fried jams and the occasional glimmer of hope. '200 Million Thousand' sounds as if it is at war with itself. Starting off in freefall with the woeful opening trio of 'Take My Heart', 'Drugs' and 'Starting Over' you would not be blamed for suspecting a rogue tribute band had snuck their demo tape into the box where your Black Lips CD should be. Worse is to come however on 'Let It Grow' and 'Trapped In A Basement', the latter of which pretty much sums up how the listener feels at the cat wailing and badly tuned instrumentation on display: trapped. Things do pick up however. 'Short Fuse' is poppy and upbeat with a charming, slick melody whilst 'I'l Be With You' passes a resemblance to The Kinks 'Waterloo Sunset'. 'Again and Again' is a call and response album highlight showing that when Black Lips are good they can be very good it's just that what they do can so easily veer into a muddy ditch when it needs to remain stylishly dirty at most.

As the album ends with two minutes of silence followed by five of shrieking, clattering and feedback you feel every right to be somewhat agrieved. In many ways a band like Black Lips have to be as controlled, if not more, than a band renowned for precision. Music as charmingly remshackle and lo-fi as this only works if it remains upright and cohesive. Far too often '200 Million Thousand' sounds like the work of a band content to rest on their laurels and experiment to the point of frustration. Hopefully this will be a small blip on an otherwise exemplary discography.

4/10

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I'm away, watch these videos and be quiet.

As you read this I will be on a train between Liverpool and Scarborough A) Trying to stay awake, B) Praying nobody sits next to me and C) Noting how crushingly depressing Warrington looks. Normal service will resume tomorrow with an interview with Flashguns and more to come as and when I think of it later in the week. Until then enjoy the new videos from Hockey, Black Lips and Cocknbullkid.

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Black Lips to record with Bin-Laden?!

According to Digital Spy-

Black Lips are planning to record a song with Osama Bin Laden's niece.

The group first met Wafah Dufour, the daughter of Bin Laden's half-brother Yeslam, at a concert in the US.

"Then she actually came to the UK to see us in London. She's a fan and has aspirations to be a musician. I'm not joking, she's even talked to our manager about collaborating. We're really honoured," guitarist Cole Alexander told NME.

"I read that Osama is a fan of Whitney Houston, so I'm thinking of sampling her on our hook-up to increase the likelihood of her playing it to him."

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