Thom Yorke has ditched the eponymous approach, and his solo side-project is now called Atoms For Peace [not this band]. Comprising long-time Radiohead producer and Basement orchestrator Nigel Godrich, Chilis bassist Flea, Joey Waronker (who plays with Beck) and Mauro Refosco of Forro In The Dark. They’ve already played their debut gig in LA, and now they’re going touring… well, playing a few dates in the US anyway:
New York Roseland Ballroom April 5th & 6th
Boston Citi Wang Theatre April 8th
Chicago Aragon Ballroom April 10th & 11th
Oakland Fox Theatre April 14th & 15th
Santa Barbara Bowl April 17th
For details on tickets, click here – they’re being routed through Radiohead’s site.
Memotone is somewhere between Lemon Jelly and the Cinematic Orchestra, which for a one man act, recording on an 8 track and a laptop is a pretty incredible achievement. William Yates has put together a bewilderingly large array of instruments into a really crystal clear, deep and textured soundscape, blending live instruments, samples, glitchy computer noises and sound effects like air raid sirens, lairy kids arguing in corridors and canned laughter. There are odd moments of humour and unease, drifting clouds of sound, sharp beats that bring you back to your senses and then drop away again to let warm, live double bass lines pour into your ears and build into complex little sonic poems that wrap back to the beats. I really like it. If I wasn’t already listening to it, I would buy a copy. In fact, petition him to get vinyl pressed, so I can buy a copy.
There’s a lot of music on this album. Not just in the sense that there are 14 meaty tracks on it, but in that each one has been painstakingly written and composed. The album would feel uncomfortable being limited by a single genre, so I’ll just slop it into ‘Rock’, and then qualify it with a lot of competing styles: Coup d’Etat is soaked in drawling Country and Western guitars, with a shuffling drumbeat and a simple guitar riff riding over and under the backing and vocals. There are thumping, stadium rock beats, trashy, crashy indie guitar riffs and stabs, bluesy organs, aching prog rock dissonances and breaks, and a whole gamut of influences competing for space and attention in this music. The twin Ariadne’s threads of the album are front-man Ryan Jones’ allusive writing style, liberally peppered with literary references, and his voice, which is very mobile and fluid, and usually backed up with complex overdubbed harmonics. A fast paced, stomping, pop-tastic, sing-along chorus-fest of an album.
Thom Yorke has ditched the eponymous approach, and his solo side-project is now called Atoms For Peace [not this band]. Comprising long-time Radiohead producer and Basement orchestrator Nigel Godrich, Chilis bassist Flea, Joey Waronker (who plays with Beck) and Mauro Refosco of Forro In The Dark. They’ve already played their debut gig in LA, and now they’re going touring… well, playing a few dates in the US anyway:
<–buy it on iTunes
<– Buy it on iTunes