Like a fine wine spillage between Herbie Hancock (Mwandishi), Keith Emerson (Nice era), Dangermouse and Kraftwerk (Radioactivity), Odd Nosdam raises the bar of electronic profundity while remaining inexplicably below the radar. Pretty Swell Explode is a two-disc collection of remixes, b-sides, new tracks and oddities featuring Boards Of Canada, Black Moth Super Rainbow, Serena Maneesh, Bracken, Jessica Bailiff, and the proverbial “others.”

If you enjoy crazy sound collage, do enter here. If simple, pimply power pop or little girls dreaming of littler boys is more your thing, please cease and desist. Compiled from Odd Nosdam’s 2005 release, Burner, and last year’s Level Live Wires, Pretty Swell Explodes acts as plug-in sound tapestry for world weary minds, travelogue fodder for below the border mystery trips = generally damaged listening to cast your mind adrift in that ethereal sea of holes.

Highlights:

Odd’s version of Serena-Maneesh’s “Don’t Come Down Here,” where Jimmy Page by way of John Renbourn guitar slashes over a stomping, bog heavy beat.

Thee More Shallows’ “Freshman Remix” (with vocals from Why? frontman Yoni Wolf): silly putty drum beats and tender boy-girl vocals singing of weak knees and Brian Wilson’s drug store dementia.  

The deep space dub of “Ligaya,” originally recorded by Anticon boy-girl electro duo Alias & Tarsier, here twisted to recall bucolic country lanes and sweet cream daydreams.  

“(Growin’ Up In The Hood) Four Thousand Style” is Nosdam’s tribute to Leeds’ cult heroes Hood, and it sounds like a hangover experienced in a stained glass adorned cathedral.

“Forever Heavy (Shoegangster/JB Remix)” finds Nosdam “actually recreating a Black Moth Super Rainbow original from scratch,” peals the PR blather. Drum machine operator Jel (Subtle/Themselves) spins readily collapsible beats as Flying Saucer Attack’s Jessica Bailiff sings ghostly yarns over top, the song all at once recalling the disconnected, cold, alien and warmly foreboding Tortoise classic, “Hello Grandpa And Grandma.”

"Forever Heavy"

The Chap’s Mega Breakfast Satisfies

XTC? The Specials? Chic and Harmonia? London’s the Chap covers this musical ground and then some with a tight fisted, melodically refreshing approach. The Chap are renowned for their incomparable “pop improv disco rock with strings” sound and a “rocking live show,” complete with dance routines. Mega Breakfast deals with sex, depression and Keynesian economics. It just makes me want to dance. Though I don’t dance. But I could learn. If the right girl came my way. Contact me for dancing lessons at BetterKen@Yahoo.com.

The Chap
"They Have A Name" (mp3)
from "Mega Breakfast"
(Ghostly International)

More On This Album

The Chap
"Carlos Walter Wendy Stanley" (mp3)
from "Mega Breakfast"
(Ghostly International)

More On This Album

Modern Times?: Heard Beck’s forthcoming Modern Thoughts today, produced by Beck and everyone’s hip producer, Dangermouse. In a word or two, Dangermouse casts Beck’s sad eyed melodies and morose vocals in his now typical production currency of ‘60s twist beats (shake those tassles!), bleeping and blipping Moogs, reverberant Duane Eddy guitar, buzzing bass riffs and flower power handclaps. For all its melancholically attractive sheen, Modern Thoughts is like so much music these days, seemingly unable to summon any joy for the life at hand. It confirms everything you already know. Though Dangermouse loves to propel everything with his happy shakey ‘60s dance beats, he can’t resist slathering the music in a nauseous caramel coating. Irony as endgame.