Drone Magazine E.P Review
Keeping the spirit of broody, dark, non-metallic drone alive are Spiral 25 - a mostly five, sometimes six-piece from Oxford who flaunt the undeniably catchy label bestowed on them by the local music press (theirs, that is): 'slowmotion narcotic groove rock.'
Careful. That might wind up a legitimate genre of music.
Reviews of the band compare their sound to the Jesus and Mary Chain, Spacemen 3 and The Doors. Clearly we are on a bridge over some sort of musical generation gap because when I threw on their EP... EP... and found myself besieged by the crushing guitar on 'Let The Light Shine On', the first name that ran across my mind was The Horrors. This was followed by The Warlocks. Then the Brian Jonestown Massacre. It would appear that I am at the 'new generation' end of the bridge.
The cross-generational comparisons are not inconsistent, of course. Spiral 25 channel the same dark reverberations that characterise the music of the bands mentioned. Except for the Jesus and Mary Chain whose influence strikes my ears as negligible. The songs on the EP are immensely dark. This is not a band you will, or should, catch rehearsing in your local park on a sunny day. They sound dark and ideal for echo-inducing acoustic-amplifying venues such as vampire-laden caves and dimly-lit taverns. Russell Denham has a voice reminiscent of the low grumble that personified the vocalist of almost every major post-punk act to have existed.
In fact Spiral 25 manage to make even the usually cheery harmonica come across as a thug. On 'Today's Future (Tomorrow's Past)' Chris Monger arms the instrument with a dagger and sics it at you while Russell gives the command 'Kill! Kill! Kill!' It's all rather intimidating. 'Shadows in Line' is possibly the strongest track on the EP, and further proof of the band's ability to hypnotise objects. 'Watch the shadows fall in line' boast the lyrics, as they stare down... shadows. Now that's cool.
You can easily imagine Spiral 25 striking dumb the few loyal patrons of a local pub (volume or talent, one of them will do it) and just as easily see them playing to a massive crowd of a few hundred darkly-clad types sporting perpendicular hairstyles. Whatever the setting, absence of light is essential.
by Radhika Takru
http://www.dronemagazine.com/
An E.P review from Drone Magazine, a blog which covers some pretty decent music.
We've also recently got most of the tracking done for a second E.P, hopefully release that around the same time next year as the last one. Will keep you all posted.
Careful. That might wind up a legitimate genre of music.
Reviews of the band compare their sound to the Jesus and Mary Chain, Spacemen 3 and The Doors. Clearly we are on a bridge over some sort of musical generation gap because when I threw on their EP... EP... and found myself besieged by the crushing guitar on 'Let The Light Shine On', the first name that ran across my mind was The Horrors. This was followed by The Warlocks. Then the Brian Jonestown Massacre. It would appear that I am at the 'new generation' end of the bridge.
The cross-generational comparisons are not inconsistent, of course. Spiral 25 channel the same dark reverberations that characterise the music of the bands mentioned. Except for the Jesus and Mary Chain whose influence strikes my ears as negligible. The songs on the EP are immensely dark. This is not a band you will, or should, catch rehearsing in your local park on a sunny day. They sound dark and ideal for echo-inducing acoustic-amplifying venues such as vampire-laden caves and dimly-lit taverns. Russell Denham has a voice reminiscent of the low grumble that personified the vocalist of almost every major post-punk act to have existed.
In fact Spiral 25 manage to make even the usually cheery harmonica come across as a thug. On 'Today's Future (Tomorrow's Past)' Chris Monger arms the instrument with a dagger and sics it at you while Russell gives the command 'Kill! Kill! Kill!' It's all rather intimidating. 'Shadows in Line' is possibly the strongest track on the EP, and further proof of the band's ability to hypnotise objects. 'Watch the shadows fall in line' boast the lyrics, as they stare down... shadows. Now that's cool.
You can easily imagine Spiral 25 striking dumb the few loyal patrons of a local pub (volume or talent, one of them will do it) and just as easily see them playing to a massive crowd of a few hundred darkly-clad types sporting perpendicular hairstyles. Whatever the setting, absence of light is essential.
by Radhika Takru
http://www.dronemagazine.com/
An E.P review from Drone Magazine, a blog which covers some pretty decent music.
We've also recently got most of the tracking done for a second E.P, hopefully release that around the same time next year as the last one. Will keep you all posted.
posted by Spiral 25 at
16:10:00
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