Middle Boop Top Tips For 2011

Last year was the first time Middle Boop had ever run a 'Top Tips' article and I'm pretty happy to say we must be doing something right as the choices we made mostly went on to have a very successful year. For instance, First Aid Kit went from playing tiny pubs to melting the hearts of a large amount of people in pretty sizeable venues, Pantha Du Prince played pretty much every credible festival going and his debut album ended up on many end of year lists and Esben And The Witch signed to Matador, supported everyone from Foals to The XX and have just released one of the most hotly anticipated débuts this year.

So what does 2011 hold in store in the realm of alternative music? Well judging from our humble list below I hope you'll agree that the following list of bands are about to start causing a stir in certain scenes and even though none of these bands will exactly be tipped to play Wembley in the next year or so, they will be emphasizing just how amazing the alternative music scene is at the moment....Pray silence please for Middle Boop's 2011 Top Tips!

Anna Calvi

We get more musicality coming into the album with the track “Desire”. Furthermore, Calvi really opens up her voice and displays the vocal power and range that she possesses that fully justifies her nomination for the BBC’s ‘Sound of 2011’ poll. It also enthrals me further that Anna is a home-grown British talent. She sounds like what we have been crying out for; a female vocalist that has that ‘edge’ about her. This is something that I don’t think we have seen since the days of Blondie or Suzi Quatro. – Barclay Quarton


Braids

Signed to influential Canadian indie label Flemish Eye, which has produced the likes of Women and Chad Van Gaalen over the last few years, Braids music is soaked in echoey beeps and glitches. With strange time signatures and heartwarming vocals, hopefully we’ll see Braids playing this side of the pond sometime this year as they will go down so well over here at the moment.
Braids

Chad Valley

Being the charmingly astute music lovers that you are, you may have already heard of Hugo Manuel, the man behind Chad Valley singing in his other band Jonquil who have started to gain a great little following. If you have, good for you, chances are you'll enjoy Chad Valley, if not...Well, chances are you're going to enjoy it regardless as this sickeningly catchy retro synth driven pop is just what you need to get over the dark nights and freezing weather. – Gordon Reid


Grouplove

Big anthemic choruses, instantly lovable vocals and feelgood songs galore. Grouplove already sound like they’ve mastered the art of writing a decent pop tune. Their single colours is out now and chances are you will have heard it and loved it. – Gordon Reid



Iceage
The music sits somewhere between DC hardcore and British punk but filtered via weirdness. The songs are all velocity but skewed and prone to shoot off at unexpected angles. – Al English

Iceage - New Brigade from iceage on Vimeo.

Idiot Glee

James Friley, AKA Idiot Glee creates beautifully multi layered vocal harmonies using seemingly minimalistic instrumentation to create their haunting 50’s influenced pop. Début single ‘All Packed Up’ will have fans of Grizzly Bear going nuts and B-Side ‘Don’t Drink the Water’ just resonates greatness. I really hope we hear a lot more. – Gordon Reid

Idiot Glee

James Blake

In case you’ve been living in some form of cave / rock dwelling / panic room and haven’t heard the recent hype around James Blake, allow me to fill you in. He attended the prestigious Latymer School in London whilst recording compositions in his bedroom. After a successful launch of debut 12” ‘Air And Lack Thereof’, along with a cover of Leslie Feist’s ‘Limit To Your Love’, national radio coverage and a whole lot of blogging ensured that this was the beginning of a blossoming career for the young musician.

The music itself is a combination of minimalist, down tempo, electronic compositions fused with Blake’s delicate and often soulful voice. Frequent use of an auto tuner on Blake’s voice may cause a divided opinion amongst listeners but with a feature on just about every ones to watch list this year, we found it hard to resist putting him in ours as well. – Neil Phillips



MNDR

We could sense that a buzz was building around this New York City electro synth-pop duo from witnessing Amanda Warner undergo an eccentric and spell bounding performance at London’s Lexington last August. Having already toured and collaborated with Mark Ronson on his latest album we’re expecting MNDR to send waves crashing further, on a worldwide scale. – Freddy Rothman

Ringo Deathstarr

Any band with a name like Ringo Deathstarr is always going to grab my attention, and with music that sounds like My Bloody Valentine if Kevin Shields actually had a sense of humour, this Austin trio have certainly whet my appetite with their fuzzed up, noisy pop.

Their début album 'Colour Trip' will be out in February. We can't wait. - Adam Parker

Seams

Bedroom producer James Welch aka Seams has been recording countless EP’s, singles and remixes over the past year or so. His most recent available offering, ‘The Tourist EP’ shows you why we’ve not just got another Four Tet or Gold Panda on their hands. As much as we love those guys too, Seams will draw on atmospheric post-electronica that will just whisk you away to another world. A debut LP is expected before the end of the year. – Freddy Rothman


Trophy Wife

Oxford three piece, Trophy Wife. Both singles Microlite and The Quiet Earth show the signs of a band with true potential. The songs are softly built up around dancey drum beats and crisp delayed, jangly guitar lines with delicate vocals sounding very much like they’ve taken influence from their Oxford counterparts Foals, who they toured with last year.Trophy Wife are writing an EP due early next year so hopefully they will take this time to build upon the sound they are already creating and evolve it further. – Freddy Rothman

Veronica Falls

The London based 2 boy-2 girl quartet make blissful, pounding Dream-Pop music and have had tongues wagging all across the capital. Although they have been touring extensively since 2009 and have released 2 of the best singles of 2010 in ‘Beachy Head’ and ‘Found Love in a Graveyard’, we can expect more shows and hopefully their debut album in 2011 which we simply cannot wait for. - Freddy Rothman


Yuck

Less “Yuck!” and more like “Fuck!”. A solid debut from a young band with a lot of potential and a great future ahead of them. 2011 will be a good year for Yuck. – Neil Phillips

Middle Boop Top 25 Albums of 2010

It's been a pretty fantastic year for music and a very good year for the ever growing Middle Boop team, even if I do say so myself... Underneath is a showcase of just why this year has been so great musically.

A few weeks ago I asked each of the 20 or so wonderful and talented writers we have to send us over a small list of their favourite albums and from that I tallied up the results and came up with the list you will read below. Most of the results were very close calls with the winner literally getting to the top spot by one vote and there are so many I would have loved to include but hey, it's a democracy of some sorts.

Enjoy the list, have a great Christmas and we'll catch up with all of you in the new year.

GR.

25. Twin Shadow – Forget (4AD)


24. Sleepy Sun – Fever (ATP)


23. Liars Sisterworld (Mute)


22. Timber Timbre- Timber Timbre (Arts & Crafts)


21. Broken Records - Let Me Come Home (4AD)


20. Warpaint The Fool (Rough Trade)


19. Four Tet - There is Love In You (Domino)


18. Avi Buffalo – Avi Buffalo (Sub Pop)


17. Errors – Come Down With Me (Rock Action)


16. Caribou - Swim (City Slang)

Middle Boop Tron Artwork

Middle Boop's Gordon Reid was recently commissioned by Maxim to create some artwork for a full page article on the new Tron film. Above are the results. The article is featured in this month's magazine

Under A Week Until Dreamboat Exhibition

Anyone who reads this site regularly will know that Middle Boop's Gordon Reid is involved in an exhibition which opens this Friday 10 December at the Start Gallery / Start the Bus, 7-9 Baldwin Street Bristol BS1, 7pm-late. It features the work of other talented artists such as Colourbox, Darren John, Dave Bain, Lisa Hassell, Matt Saunders, Mister Millerchip, Muxxi, Sarah Dennis, Steve Rack & Toy Factory.

Hope to see you there!

The show runs until December 30, open daily 11am-4pm

Inkygoodness Exhibition Featuring works from Middle Boop

It's just over a week now until the opening night of the next Inkygoodness exhibition at Start The Bus in Bristol. Featuring original work from some amazing illustrators including Middle Boop's Gordon Reid, Stephen Chan, Carlos Garde-Martin, Ben Steers and many, many more. There will be all sorts of events featuring music from a whole host of acts signed to Dreamboat Records.

Doors open at 7pm on Friday the 10th. Come and say hi, it should be a great night

Torso Book

Gordon Reid, the man behind Middle Boop has had some of his T-Shirt designs featured in the fantastic new book Torso I was also interviewed for the book.

Middle Boop Interviews Thee Oh Sees

We at Middle Boop have been ever supporting of the influx of bands creating the fascinating new wave of Psychedelic/Lo-Fi sounds that has been gripping the underground scene over the past few months. None more so than San Francisco's Thee Oh Sees who with their ever expanding back catalogue including one of our favourite albums of this year so far 'Warm Slime' have gained a cult following across the world.

I, Freddy Rothman caught up with John Dwyer from the band before their sold out gig at London's Luminaire venue for a chat about their latest sound, junk food, The Fall and of course his current band.

Firstly, its nice to have you over in the UK.
Thank you.

How’s the European tour been so far? Any shows that have stood out at all?
God there has been a bunch of good ones. Playing All Tomorrows Parties was really fun, we got to meet a lot of cool people. Meeting James Chance was great. Matt Groening was awesome. There were a lot of great bands, that and the sound there was really good and really enjoyable. Just lots of great bands, Spiritualized who I’m not really a huge fan of were something else. Venice was great, we got to play on a boat in the Lagoon which was absolutely ridiculous, a really wasted night. Err…fuck, what else. Leeds was actually really great last night which was cool. It was like a million degrees but really fun.

You’ve just released your 11th LP ‘Warm Slime’ which I noticed the sound has evolved in a more Lo-fi and experimental direction during the last couple of records. How would you rank this alongside your previous work?
To be honest a lot of the rock records we don’t really listen to them because we play them live. It's more the softer stuff that I’ve gone back to a couple of times and listen to because it’s so different. I like how this one sounds, because we did it live. We did it in like 8 hours. Set up and played like if we would at a show, so we rented a club. We played on a stage mind you but we set up in the middle. We had an open bar, it was just really relaxed. We had our friends there. Mike from Sic Alps played on it with us, it was just really fun. So hopefully that comes across on the record. I feel I like a lot of the records more than the actual sound of them and the orchestration sort of reminds me of the moment they were recorded in my life, so ive got a little bit of a memory, so every one (album) is a little bit different. We try to move locations, like I’ll see a spot and if I like this spot I find the owner of the place and im like “Hey man, can I rent this for a day?” then he’ll be like (low voice) “why?”, then I’ll get freaked out and be like “it's just my band, I’ll bring everything at 10am then at 10 at night I will be ready to leave”, so I think we’ll be leaning in that live direction a little bit more.

I’ve noticed a surge recently of bands that have started experimenting in this whole Lo-fi/Psychedelic sound. Why do you think this fusion of sound has got more and more popular?
Well I think because it's accessible to everybody, like anybody can just sit down and record at home, whether it be digital or (analog). Like in San Francisco everybody has been buying these 3-88’s. This one particular machine, because it’s so user friendly. Im an idiot when it comes to that sort of stuff but I bought one of these and I cant stop recording. It's super fun to use, its like it was made by Play School or a toy company for adults that just wanna sit around, smoke weed and record songs. But yeah, I just think anybody can do it, regardless on whether you wanna gain a lo-fi aesthetic or not. The actual reality of lo-fi is that it means that its cheap and easily done. Anybody can do it, so its attractive to anybody who wants to write songs. Especially digital. Man I don’t really use digital myself, ‘cause I haven’t been able to make it sound good for me, but I can like check email and that’s about the extent of it. But it's cool, y‘know. It’s making more bands, and there’s a lot of people out there that wouldn’t normally be recording if it was otherwise.

Would you even say that the music scene in California has influenced your sound in any way, as well?
Yeah, California has always been great for music, man. Like I think the fact that its getting props now, is maybe the only fluke in the situation. When I moved out there, I loved so many of the bands I saw that never even made it out of the city, and broke up or whatever. But you know, the history of San Francisco and in particular LA is so incredible musically. San Francisco is just a weird and isolated place to live because it doesn’t have the money to hype up stuff so much. So the fact that its getting recognised is because its getting out into the world so much I think more than from home hyped up. Like these bands are all touring now and people want to do this suddenly

*Thee Oh See’s tour manager walks in*

Yeah definitely, the whole California thing has definitely kind of kicked on in the last few years hasn’t it? Especially in this country, bands such as Wavves and No Age etc have kinda transferred this Lo-Fi sound into the UK recently.
Yeah, I mean No Age is based on a club in Los Angeles which was a great spot to play for a long time. But, y’know, it's cool. It still definitely has a family vibe for a lot of it as well.

Going back to the new album. ‘Warm Slime’ is a very interesting title. Tell us a bit about that. How did that name come about?
I honestly don’t remember how that come about. The song is obviously just a repetition of summertime. We wanted to do a pretty summery, fun record that’s not so like, I’ll put a boom box on my bike when I ride to the beach, which is often. For me a summertime record is a poppy thing that makes me feel good on a sunny day, like the most recent thing ive been digging out is ‘Every Picture Tells a Story’ by Rod Stewart. I’ve been loving that record so much, but I don’t know why. My mom always loved it when I was a kid but I hated it, but now it's suddenly come into the light. So now im trying to do something… not LIKE that, but sort of has that same vibe. Light hearted and catchy, y’know.

Yeah, its funny how you see things in a different light when you get older isn’t it?
Haha, yeah. I didn’t like hamburgers when I was a kid, and now I’m like ‘what the fuck have I been missing out on?’

Yeah yeah, I didn’t like Pizza until the age of about 15 (both in agreement with this discussion).
Yeah I also wanted to talk about the cover art for your records. The graphic design in your album artwork is fascinating, but seems to rapidly vary with each release. Would you say that Artwork is an important part of Thee Oh Sees aesthetic?
Absolutely. I hate nothing more than when a great band does a great record and then they have shit artwork. I feel like sometimes people are like “ok, that’s good”, and then they stop focussing. You know, because it's so much work to get a record together. Not us in particular because we’re like *click click*. Like im lazy and impatient when it comes to recording. Im just like “its done! Its good!” And I’ll do a couple of final touches. But some people spend so much time on their records. The Fresh and Onlys (fellow San Franciscan band) in particular spend so much time recording and getting it right, and they’ll re-record the whole record, which frankly I would never do unless it really sucked.
To me when you see a record on the wall, like there’s been a few records that I’ve bought based on the cover. I have no idea what it is. You see it and your like ‘wow what the fuck is this?’ and you asked the guy at the store “is this good?” he’s like “ah, it's fucking great!”. Also a lot of stuff is us showcasing friends of ours. The new record ‘Warm Slime’ was done by my roommate. He’s a painter and he’s amazing and I really liked that painting in particular, so I asked if I could use it and he was like “yeah I guess”, so its often people we know.

'Warm Slime' cover art.

It's like that with me also. If there’s an album im thinking about buying, and if the artwork is awesome that just swings it for me.
Yeah, especially on a 12” vinyl, and also a pretty record y’know. All the way deep into the heart of the actual product, its nice. The underground of vinyl is even making a comeback as well. We work with a company called Pirates Press in San Francisco that I love, that does anything. They get excited if you throw something at them that they can’t do, because then they’ll ask themselves ‘lets figure out how to make this work’, with the etchings, centre pressed stuff, holograms and weird shit. They love trying to do something weird. So, it's mighty fun.

Awesome. You have the habit of constantly releasing new material. What is it that inspires you to continuously record new music?
Everything around us. Other bands. Music. Art. I don’t really have too much to do outside that either, so I’m constantly writing and if the band latches onto something, then we’ll record it. I dunno, I don’t have any problems with releasing. Plus we move really quickly as a band. Our set turns over live so much, that if I were to pace myself more like somebody who was actually spending a lot of time on stuff then we’d be far behind in a live situation. Like the record would be coming out and there will be so much we haven’t played in 2 years, you know. So I always try and work with companies that have a quick turnover, who say they can get it out in a month, instead of saying it may take half a year and they will want to do some promo. That just wont work for me. And by then I’ll have another record out. I am trying to slow down a bit now.

That’s cool though, I like that. I like it when bands keep releasing stuff. I mean, a lot of bands just fuck around, spending years and years trying to perfect things, although in a way that can be good.
Exactly. We’re not My Bloody Valentine. We wont spend 5 solid years in a studio, that’s not what where we’re at. I respect that as well but it’s a very different aesthetic to what we have personally.

Yeah, I do like it when there is more stuff and you can constantly get into and keep listening to it. Where as some bands release an album, and you listen to it continuously for about 2 years, then you’re just waiting for the next record to come out. But with Thee Oh See’s I like that you release a new record and you don’t get stuck with it for too long.
Yeah. Plus, go get that money!

Haha. Yeah that’s another thing too. Ok, my last question for the readers of Middle Boop. What have you guys been listening to at the moment. What should we be listening to based on your current tastes?
This band Bare Wires. They’re great. They’re from our town and I don’t just want to talk about our town, but Bare Wires’ new record is phenomenal. It's not out yet but it will be soon. They’re just a really really great pop band. What else we been listening to? Mostly older stuff, honestly. It’s been a lot of Jay Reatard. (Turns and asks their tour manager) Kristen, What else have we been listening to a lot of? It’s been a varied selection.

Kristen: The Fall… oh and The Tear Garden.

Fuck yeah. The Tear Garden who are Edward Ka-Spel and Skinny Puppy’s band, The Tear Garden are fucking great, but theres been a lot of stuff like country music too.

The Fall you can never get tired of. They just peoduce so much stuff don't they?
Yeah! I almost hate that guy for being so easy to listen to.

Yeah, the whole of your life you can constantly discover a new album. Another band actually like yourselves in that respect.
Curious Oranj. His middle era has been really kicking in for us lately…

*The conversation develops into a frank and fruitful discussion of various Fall albums, including current LP ‘Your Future Our Clutter’. As well as the amazing essence of Mark E.Smith for several minutes before the interview closes. Then John and the rest of the band go off to get some food.*

Words & Questions: Freddy Rothman

Toe Fluff Exhibition

Middle Boop's Gordon Reid will be exhibiting some new work for the Toe Fluff Exhibition which takes place from this Friday at the Post Modern Gallery, Swindon. All of the proceeds will go to Great Ormond Street Hospital. Other artists to exhibit work include:

Simon Wild
Jam Factory
Stephen Chan

More info here

Middle Boop Computer Arts interview

Middle Boop's Gordon Reid was interviewed in this month's Computer Arts for the article 89 Tips to Freelance Success. Also featuring work from Boop favourites Brand Nu and Ben Thomas, this one not to be missed

Torso Book, Celebrating T-Shirt Graphics

Middle Boop's Gordon Reid has had a number of his T-Shirt illustrations included in a new book celebrating the best T-Shirt graphics from around the world.
Torso features interviews and illustrations from companies such as Threadless and Design By Humans as well as top designers from all over the planet such as Jeremyville, Steven Bonner and Gordon Reid to name but a few.



Torso is out in August and priced at £32.50

Middle Boop web update

On the back of the most exciting year yet,
it's been a busy few months in the world of Middle Boop, with
awesome projects including gracing the cover of South African magazine 'Chew'
as well as commissions from Digital Artist, Maxim and Blanket magazine.

Gordon Reid also has articles in the recent IDN magazine and the upcoming Advanced Photoshop.

Have a look here to see what diverse projects Reid has been sinking his teeth into.

http://www.middleboop.com/

Middle Boop Digital Artist Feature

The lovely people over at Digital Artist interviewed Middle Boop's Gordon Reid for the latest issue out this week. As well as the interview they also featured the Middle Boop blog in the reviews section.

Middle Boop prints for sale

Resident Records in Brighton are selling of Middle Boop's recent prints for Oneida.
Resident is one of my favourite shops ever so its awesome to see my own stuff in there. The Rough Trade stores are also selling the Deerhunter Print here

Middle Boop at ATP

As a big fan of general All Tomorrows Parties events we all had pretty high hopes for release the bats before it had happened I was a little concerned about the time it finished and the lineup in general. Finishing at one it made it almost impossible for anyone living outside of the circle line to get home without paying stupid amounts for a cab or an arguos journey back on a night bus. We took the latter option taking the best part of three and a half hours to get home also with delays on the way up it meant in total we spent about six hours travelling meaning it would have been easier to drive to Minehead from London. Also starting so early again meant that anyone not living close to Kentish town missed at least one band. After Shellac had finished the venue cleared of all but a few hundred people ready to watch Om who's sludgy lo-fi sound was enough for me to walk out. Don't get me wrong, I like Om but it just wasn't the time.
It was a shame they didn't get someone a little more upbeat to fill that last slot to get the few people left really motivated. The performances of all that we saw were great, first up were Wooden Shjips with their spacey indie-rock going down a treat. Next were Les Savy Fav. A band who always put on a decent show, the highlight was turning round to see the lead singer hanging off of the balcony screaming his lungs out. But of course the highlight were Shellac coming out dressed as a mummy, a vampire and Frankenstiens monster, playing through their hits with intensity.
Lets be honest anyone who has been to an ATP gig knows they know how to put on a good showand it was a good night you can't deny that. I'll just have to befriend someone who lives in Camden next year

Middle Boop New Art Work ode to CRASS

Bit of Vector fun by Simon:

ode to CRASS PEACE LOVE AN.O.K.: