The Underground of Happiness

the search for new sounds does not have to be a treadmill enjoy x Playlist 1. CV Vision – R.T.B. (Bureau B) 2. Prolapse – The fall of cashline (Tapete Records) 3. claire rousay – somewhat burdensome (Thrill Jockey) 4. The Saxophones – Too big for California (Full Time Hobby) 5. Joasihno – Characo orb. (Alien Transistor) 6. Anushka Chkheidze + Robert Lippok – Rainbow road (Morr Music) 7. Kathryn Williams – Goodbye to summer (One Little Independent) ( playing The Folk House, Bristol, Oct 31 ) 8. Cian Nugent – I am asleep and do not wake me (Tompkins Square) (Imaginational Anthem XIV) 9. Ailbhe Reddy – Align (Don Giovanni Records) 10. Stereolab – Aerial Troubles (Duophonic/Warp) ( playing Cyprus Avenue, Cork, Feb 19 ) 11. Linda Smith – So long ago (Upset The Rhythm) 12. Cardiacs – Downup (The Alphabet Business Concern) 13. Me Lost Me – Ancient summer (Upset The Rhythm) 14. Chantal Acda – Hit the verge (Starman Records) 15. Clock DVA – Consent (Mute) 16. EERA...

Tracks from 16 albums I've enjoyed a lot this year so far. Enjoy x Playlist 1. Cool Ghouls – In Michoacan (Empty Cellar Records/Melodic) 2. The Chills – You’re immortal (Fire) 3. Buffet Lunch – Red apple happiness (Upset The Rhythm) 4. Cathal Coughlan – Falling out North Street (Dimple Discs) 5. St Vincent – Down and out (Loma Vista) 6. El Michels Affair feat Piya Malik – Murkit gem (Big Crown Records) 7. Shannon Lay – Wild (Sub Pop) actually released in 2019 but heard for the first time by me this year… 8. Craig Fortnam – Ark (Onomatopoeia Records) 9. Lucy Gooch – Rain’s break (Fire) 10. Mark Fry – Song for Wilde (Now-Again Reserve Records) (reissue) 11. Marina Allen – Belong here (Fire) 12. yumbo – A house (Morr Music) 13. Colleen – Implosion-Explosion (Thrill Jockey) 14. Adrian Crowley – Bread and wine (Chemikal Underground) 15. Lambchop – Chef’s kiss (Merge/City Slang) 16. Ann Scott - Sweetheart

******************************************************************************************************** Bill MacKay & Ryley Walker – Spider Beetlebee (Drag City) Beautiful album of bright and bracing guitar instrumentals from this Chicago duo collaboration. The range of styles spanned over the course of just half an hour is a clue to the open mindedness and sense of adventure of both musicians. There’s a real sense of the shared joy in playing about the whole piece. A gorgeous miniature body of work and in many ways perfect music for this time of year. SpiderBeetleBee by Bill MacKay & Ryley Walker Laura Cannell – Lines of copper gold (Brawl Records) Bracing is also a word to describe this blast of overbowed fiddle from Laura Cannell of East Anglia recorded in a semi ruined church from her current album Hunter Huntress Hawker . Call it early music. Improvised. Experimental. It is primal and it is stirring. It feels essential. HUNTER HUN...

From his 8th album another haunting number to add to his collection delivered in Crowley’s signature velvet voice which can make men as well as women weak at the knees. One particularly special moment here where the narrator sings of the funeral following his faked death. I heard the ceremony was poorly attended At least did they play my favourite song Born Free At which point a vocal chorus lifts proceedings out of the here and now into some higher space. It is the definition of transcendance. The fact that it achieves this with reference to a classic pop croon only makes it more profound. Track 8 in this playlist

A beautiful album of (mostly) chamber pop capable of swinging between noirish and swooning melancholy tones and sharp as a pin lyrically, from the co-founder of The Delgados. So you have string drenched French style torch songs like ‘Don’t make me wait’; spooky stalked atmospheres like ‘Alabaster’, a satisfyingly piquant slice of regret and betrayal; and intimate austere string quartet arrangements like ‘Intermission’, full of throbbing cello and sawing violins. The frantic buzzing backbeat of single ‘Parks and Recreation’ drags things out of the chamber and into the garage, a detour confirmed by the great thudding prog pop of ‘Vacant stare’. This mini run is closed with the very appealing ‘In the company of the damned’, a simple restless electric guitar strum, a faint drone and a wonderful clear-eyed lyric of sycophants and cheats. The album closes as it opened in a minor key with the sublime and spacious orchestral folk of ‘Dark skies’ and the deceptively cutting ‘Old gh...

An album I'm loving a lot lately is the new Cool Ghouls , a San Fran band with a great line in fresh-faced psych pop (find a review of the album under December 2014 posts). And Twerps are another very endearing group from Melbourne - in another age they might have been called twee pop, although they give off a bit more gusto than that tag usually implies. The new Adrian Crowley album is another superb set of songs adorned with his velvet croon. Olof Arnalds' latest is another triumph, putting the likeable back into quirky, and ageless folk music to boot. And the drifting dream music of Chloe March , another wonderful magic carpet ride. Benjamin Schoos w/ April March channels Serge & Jane , both some kind of lovelorn adult romance with heart-leaping string sections. The new Elastic Sleep single, a thundering bass and other nice things, Brother Earth & Circus Devils , two lovely psych weirdness miniatures. And Silver Apples , bringing a great bounce to pil...

The Underground of Happiness uplifting pop music of every creed www.theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com www.facebook.com/theundergroundofhappiness Playlist 221 Tues May 15 2012 11.00am-12.00pm (repeated on Tuesdays 8.30pm) UCC 98.3FM listen live on the web at www.ucc.ie/983fm *listen back to this show here https://rapidshare.com/files/3658032182/The_Underground_Of_Happiness_May_15_2012.m4a Playlist Bill Wells & Aidan Moffat - The copper top ( playing Bowerbird, Triskel Christchurch, June 30 ) Kathryn Williams - Circle round a tree (edit) M Ward - Clean slate Naim Amor - Creole THEESatisfaction - QueenS ( playing The Pavilion, Cork, June 7 ) Justice - On'n'on ( playing The Marquee, Cork, June 7 ) Polica - Dark star Laura Sheeran - Forever love ( playing Whelan's, Dublin, May 19 ) Slow Place Like Home - Shady Jane Transcendentalists Tour Hauschka - Cube Dustin O'Halloran - Opus 28 ( Transcendentalists Tour feat. Hauschka, Johann Johan...

One of the best albums of this year was the collaboration between the veteran Scottish pianist Bill Wells and ex-Arab Strap man Aidan Moffat , Everything's getting older on Chemikal Underground (go here to refresh your memory). Wells has a new album coming out on Double 6 next week, Lemondale , for which he recruited a host of Japanese musicians for one day's recording in Tokyo , as well as Jim O'Rourke , who lives there now I believe. The press release has this nice detail - Musicians that had never met and had come from different sides of the tracks suddenly found themselves together in the same recording booth. Tori Kudo, self proclaimed Japanese 'King Of Error' was coupled with virtuoso pianist Satoko Fuji, a classically trained graduate of Berkley Music College in Boston. The recording also brought together instruments as seemingly incongruent and unrelated as a modified electric fan played by Tetsuya Umeda and the entirely unique and heavenly voices of Sa...

Bill Wells & Aidan Moffat - Everything's getting older (Chemikal Underground) Grand Snr's a big fan of this and it's grown on me like something you'd look forward to wearing. We already spoke last month about the brilliant single The copper top , a plaintiff meditation on mortality. Among other things worthy of your attention on the album, check the shopping list monologue of Cages with its handclap jazz beat backing; the raw, and very Arab Strap -ish, confessional of Ballad of the Bastard ; the scuzzy Scottish street funk of Glasgow Jubilee , all back-alleys and blow jobs; the great Runyonesque noir gone wrong of Dinner time . The arrangements of legendary jazzman Wells, anchored by sombre piano, are pitch-perfect all the way, sincere or playful as needs be. And Moffat's writing jumps off the page, characters fully formed, a dirty-realist page-turner. It's a great piece of work, this album.

I'm feeling a bit random, so get a load. Umpire - Supply chins (Hidden Shoal, from the album Now we're active ) Beautiful, chiming guitar pop with layered, soaring vocals from the Perth band's upcoming new album. Comes on like The Shins with more gumption. "Widescreen" (always a description that gets my attention), it says here, and I concur. In addition, there is brass involved and the lyric rhymes "oasis" with "stasis". Top notch. Supply Chins by Umpire And here's the video to the first single from the album, Green light district : Neville Skelly - Poet & the dreamer (Setanta/PIAS) Sumptuous country swing (think Nesmith / Campbell) with a handsome croon at the centre. Title track from the Liverpool artist's upcoming new album. Here's another track from the album, the swooningly beautiful He looks a lot like me . Bill Wells & Aidan Moffat - The copper top (Chemikal Underground, from the album Everything...