Tag: clock radio

Clock Radio Turf Out The Maniacs

The first full album by Wiltshire’s finest purveyors of psychedelic indie shenanigans, Clock Radio, was knocked out to an unsuspecting world last week. It’s called Turfin’ Out The Maniacs, which perhaps should be fact-checked as it sounds to me like they’re letting them all in, as they arrive on yellow submarines and check into Frank Zappa’s 200 five-rhombus rated motels…..

Self-described as “easily triggered, dishonest, cryptic yet flirty deluded jangle rockers,” Clock Radio have produced a string of catchy slacker pop wonders here, as they continuously reach inside the box, like they’re four elfish Rowan Atkinsons all cast as Paul Atreides. But one thing is for certain, Chris Genner, Oliver Daltrey, Gary Martin and Fraser Wilson will entertain you.

Turfin’ Out The Maniacs sound like the results of the Coral offering The Divine Comedy a hashpipe in a moulded teenage boy’s bedroom; that’s a compliment by the way.

The opening tune Blood on Chrome certainly reeks of that breezy retrospection of Merseyside garage bands or sixties surf-rock, with an added preliminary Quo guitar riffs. Stoned at the Dojo, which follows emphasises the mock lounge style of The Divine Comedy. It’s vaudeville throughout, all Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band’s twirling circus, and an accordion welcomes in the next song, yet the tempo is upbeat indie rock. Handsome Weeping Man might leave you questioning if it’s necessary to connote the narrative, but it will leave you amused.

Clock Radio knows precisely what buttons to press to evoke a mood, and press them with free will. To say it’s a tad bonkers, it’s only a tad, and Mountains Beyond the Sun kindles a gentle side, drifting surf-rock, sunny side of the street vibe.

There’s ten three minute heroes on this impressive debut album, recorded, mixed and mastered by Dominic Bailey-Clay at Nine Volt Leap Studios, with Fender Rhodes piano, percussion by Dominic and a triangle by Shoshi B. If we’re content with getting halfway through and assuming they’ve calmed slightly, No Death takes us back onto the weird and wonderfully expressed if questionable muses of the opening.

Turfin’ Out The Maniacs is a comfy yet nippy prank, like being stung in the bottom but launching away from it to splash into a chocolate lake. Not so unlike Noël Coward playing a Bond villain, with Bowie as Bond; something you couldn’t imagine happening, but being Marie-Georges Méliès directed it and it’s on FilmFour at 3am, you might as well grab a bag of cheesy puffs and thirty grams of Amber Leaf, stay up watch it in your pants. “Cactus is cooler, I’m no Ferris Bueller, I do as I’m told,” is just one line I’m cherry picking to illustrate my point, you’ll be amused and rocked in plentiful equal measure.

It has an acoustic ending called Complex 5 which will leave you incarcerated in the meandering yet meticulous peculiarly pulp portrayals of Clock Radio, as if you melted into a bubble sofa. It is available now on the streaming platforms, or buy the digital album from Bandcamp.

In Retrospect With Gary Martian

So yeah, not only has Cracked Machine and Clock Radio drummer Gary Martin added a letter A to his name to make it sound more extraterrestrial, he’s also fired a sonic blast back to planet Earth in the form of a whopper of a solo rock album! In Retrospect does what it says on the tin, taking inspiration from his most treasured rock bands of yore, and does it loud and proudly…..

Starter for ten, now Gary Martian, proves he’s a supernova of a multi-instrumentalist, taking the helm of every aspect from guitar to drum and the recording, mastering and distribution of this heavily-laced monster. If Cracked Machine are known for returning us to those heady days of space-rock, the intro to the opening track Lifeboats feels this is going the same direction, but in seconds we’re awash with slamming guitar and drum combos letting rip of a riff more akin to grunge. Whoa, it didn’t even wait for me to attach keychains to my flared cargo trozzers.

Yet while there’s rising and falling influences from nineties grunge like Nirvana and Therapy? I also taste nods not only to pioneers of the Seattle sound like Alice in Chains, but a broader spectrum of alt-rock too, and even rooted at the few tender moments, with electric blues and the soundscapes of Floyd, such as the closing of a few tracks, one called Bang in particular. Thing is, this value for your dollar, twelve dynamite tracks perpetually exploding at an average full four minutes each, and an epilogue song, Red Handed running into the twenty-minute margin, sublimely. Time enough then to input a carrossel of nods to every influence which has inspired Gary over time.

And there are Syd Barrett moments of whimsical psychedelia, something about Your Coffee Table, there’s metal grinding like Pearl Jam, breezy moments of The Smashing Pumpkins, such as Summer in the Autumn, and brief commercially viable moments like Jane’s Addiction. “It’s a big-ol’ rock album,” Gary told me, “inspired by the bands I love.”

I’m not in my comfort zone connoting such heavy rock and nailing its influences, I confess. I just say what I like, and like recent outfits coming out of Swindon, I See Orange and Liddington Hill, this is the kind of thing which causes me to regret my ignorance to harder rock subgenres, particularly during the ravey nineties. I guess it was all that slushy “soft metal” previously, for it was an impermanent trend which put me off track; still time for me to catch up, isn’t there?!

This album erodes the Muppet’s Animal stereotype of drummers just being drummers and bit bonkers, as Gary excels in mastering not only all the instruments required to stage an entire rock band, but also in the composition of them. In Retrospect was released across all streaming platforms and is downloadable from Bandcamp, at the beginning of the month, apologies for the delay, but this will rock your cosy Christmas foozies off!

Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, Deezer, etc…. https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/garymartian/in-retrospect

Youtube Music: https://music.youtube.com/playlist…

Amazon Music: https://amazon.co.uk/music/player/albums/B0DPHGW1MT…

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Burning the Midday Oil at The Muck

Highest season of goodwill praises must go to Chrissy Chapman today, who raised over £500 (at the last count) for His Grace Children’s Centre in…

For Now, Anyway; Gus White’s Debut Album

Featured Image: Barbora Mrazkova My apologies, for Marlborough’s singer-songwriter Gus White’s debut album For Now, Anyway has been sitting on the backburner, and it’s more…

Virtuous Violence of a Clock Radio

If the name Clock Radio suggests an irritating box by your bed you simply want to lunge at in the morning, the casual “Talking Heads” fashion of local purveyors of self-proclaimed “deluded jangle rock,” entice no such violent action; they’re smooth and arty. Though, ironically describe themselves as “easily triggered, dishonest, cryptic yet flirty,” and violence is likely the disingenuous subject of a new tune, virtuously. Talking Heads though, Psycho Killer, qu’est-ce que c’est?

Idiosyncratic irony and intellectual self-satire, isn’t it? Regulars at Devizes Southgate, Clock Radio threw their retrospective namesake to the wind a year ago, and joined the download generation, as far as distributing their wares. “Throw out your vinyl grandad,” they call ageistly called to order, “Clock Radio just went digital!”

Their enigmatic sound though is much the same proficient “new wave” formula you’ll hear live; if it ain’t broke. They brand themselves through posters using snippets from cringeworthy seventies catalogues or Gilliam’s Python animation-styled images; all very pop art. Their sound reflects such an epoch, so such ageist jests can be nothing more than the elemental tongue-in-cheek bravura which will aptly see them billed alongside Calne’s Real Cheesemakers.

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Out this week,“Virtuous Violence” is their fifth virtual release, following two singles and two EPs. With a spooky clocktower chime introduction, a gothic guitar riff flows through this otherwise poetic and smooth tune. It’s melodic retrospective post-punk goodness, would be avant-garde if appropriated its era. Yet if that Brian-Eno-slipping-on-The-Pixies kind of causal and breezy ambience is the fashion Clock Radio seek through their previously releases, they’ve nailed it with this one.

For while I’ll flitter with the genre, a tune has to “pop,” for me to take hold of it, and Virtuous Violence transcends the boundaries of their previous releases for catchiness and in capturing the imagination. Don’t run away with the notion they achieved this with the ease of synth-pop, for that’s an element of new wave they steer away from, keeping it traditionally analogue. No, this is just, well, nice on the ears. Another one for post-lockdown “must do” hitlist.

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