Rock’n’roll comes in all different shapes and sizes, and this week’s selection is no exception. We’ve got old bands, new bands, and bands who’ve been around for long enough that they aren’t new but still don’t feel like old. It’s all very confusing.
Motorhead - Electricity Next year Motorhead celebrate 40 years in the rock’n’roll game, but Electricity is imbued with the kind of vim and vigour you more normally associate with whipper-snappers taking their first steps in the tawdry business of show. It races along like an electric cheetah in a studded leather catsuit, and is LOUD. Marvellous times.
Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats - S.O.B. Not quite sure how this happened. One minute Nathaniel Rateliff is a low-key, folkie singer-songwriter. Next thing you know he’s grown a big beard and assembled the seven-piece The Night Sweats, and now he’s retuned with S.O.B – a belting handclap and brass laden bruiser, compete with barber-shop harmonies and a Van Morrison vocal. More of this, please…
Clutch - X-Ray Visions Yeah! Clutch! They’ve got a new album, and it’s fucking ace! Get a lip-smacking taste of what’s to come with this groovy whopper – frontman Neil Fallon roaring like a giant bear that’s just had its foot stomped on. Fab.
Joe Satriani - Shockwave Supernova He’s played colossal stages across the world, and now Satch is playing IN SPACE! Well, not literally, but this graphics-laden video strikes that sort of tone. No aliens on surfboards, alas, but it’s still a cool track.
The Darkness - Last Of Our Kind While this might not benefit from the glorious silliness of Barbarian, it does a great job of conjuring up the sweeping delirium of epic early 80s AOR anthems like Jefferson Starship’s Jane. We enjoyed the video, which features 15 fans having a great time and Rufus Taylor in an Indian headdress. We also enjoyed the pre-roll advert, which featured a recipe for a well-known brand wholegrain rice served with quinoa with chicken.
Rockin1000 - Learn To Fly Whatever you think of the Foo Fighters, this footage — in which 1000 musicians congregate in the Italian town of Cesena to film a musical appeal — cannot fail to move you. And if it does fail, what’s wrong with you? Are you entirely without empathy? Are you incapable of appreciating the joy in others you surely once felt yourself? Why so bitter, so blinkered? Have you considered seeing a counsellor? Or buying an ice cream?
Glen Hansard - Winning Streak Yes, it’s him off The Frames (and going much further back, him off The Commitments). Glen’s been knocking on mainstream success’s door for a while without anyone answering, but Winning Streak might find whoever’s home at least checking the letterbox. It’s a lovely bit of acoustic poignancy, with echoes of Dylan and Morrisson and those types of fella.
The Grubby Mitts - Home At Last Home At Last is little bit Kinks, a little bit XTC, and a little bit Bowie. So yes, it’s kind of an art-rock thing, but then Grubby Mitts did a tour of “art spaces” last year, so they’re clearly not run-of-the-mill, spit-and-sawdust rockers. But good songs are good songs, and this is a good song.
