WAS IT SOMETHING I SAID? D.O.C RECORDS R.I.P

Well this was always going to happen.

Yet I still feel moved enough to say a few words. When was the last time you came across a genuine second hand record shop on a suburban side-street? Yes I know it wasn't very good and that they had some kind of basement infestation that suggested death behind the walls but it was still a record shop. Still somewhere to go when that clawing urge comes a calling, that nameless day-terror that urges you to sacrifice potentially fruitful day-light hours in favor of the endless and pointless search. Now it is gone.

Hopefully Mr D.O.C's decision to close his doors forever was to do with spiraling rent, internet based competition and downloading rather than a less than the less than luke-warm review I found myself writing after a fruitless visit sometime last year.

Either way, farewell D.O.C Records and god-speed.

....I wonder if they had a closing down sale? Hope I didn't miss anything.

BEACH HOUSE - TEEN DREAM

So it looks like that particular 'peak in interest' is over.

Mental note to self. Don't say the words 'Animal' and or 'Collective' in succession again unless you want a million angry post-folk rave fans descending on you like one of the saucier plagues of Egypt.

Anyway, moving swiftly along.

Last night saw me back on the ravioli (walnut and gorgonzola if you are interested), as I chewed away I channel surfed until I found something that wasn't reality TV or a talent show. I came in about half way through what I think was the first Tomb Raider film. It's pretty fucking terrible.

So why didn't I while away the evening listening to something wonderful? Thin walls, baby downstairs, a stereo that despite my best efforts refuses to perform at low volumes. That and Angelina Jolie's cod 'English' accent hypnotized me into wondering just how bad it and indeed the rest of the film could get. Answer: Very.

I did manage to give this a spin this morning though and decided that in the absence of anything more interesting passing my fair ears I should share my thoughts.

So Beach House. I was turned onto the first album a few years back by a friend in Portland OR. when they had more of an overt Goth/Folk thing going on. That mood seemed to continue through to their second effort 'Devotion': Bleak, late night, Diazepam music. On 'Teen Dream' that slow and steady temperament is still there, Victoria Legrand sings like she is on the verge of falling asleep and it's a delivery that wears well, adding to the dreaminess (dare I say 'Dreampopiness') of it all. 'Teen Dream' is lazy sex music with the added bonus of improved song writing and tunes.

The backing for the most part hides behind a synth-wash of some sort or another that and cymbal heavy percussion. It's a good if not at times fulffy sound. That said it's obviously very deliberate and anything more clinical might drain away some of the band's magic.

Despite being quite partial to the sound of Beach House they don't get off that easily, even if one half of the band is the granddaughter of score composer legend Michel Legrand ('Umbrellas of Cherbourg' may well be the creative pinnacle of mankind). I've already touched on her at times questionable delivery. She sounds like she is from Hartlepool or one of the less glamorous areas of the North of England. Why such an odd affectation? Then it struck me, is it a misfired attempt at trying to channel some of Siouxie Sioux's dark energy? After all her's has become a popular voice to imitate/emulate of late.

Gripe number two with a bullet would be the album sleeve. It's bollocks. The albums predecessor saw the duo huddled around a candle-lit table, it was a good visual clue to the sound within. What is your man on the street going to think if he picks this up? Tapioca? Semolina? Rice Pudding? Bread Sauce?

Anyway, I would suggest that you listen to this but given the amount of mad propz it received toward the end of last year landing in pretty much every year end list I read, my guess is that you already have... Which in retrospect makes the above exercise, with the exception of the Tomb Raider opening a bit pointless.

SALEM - KING NIGHT

I'm a bit late to the party with this one but given it's been on what can only be described as 'heavy rotation' for the past couple of months I felt I should do it the justice of at least a few column inches. I narrowly missed seeing them play at the weekend (sold out) and I was so gutted that the fine mexican food and cans of PBR at the Motor City Lounge that took a poor second place lost all of their taste.

I asked a few people what would make the top album's of 2010 list and aside of the long drawn out bouts of silence peppered with 'fuck me it was a shit year for music' the only other common denominator was this 'King Night' by Salem.

Personally I had managed to avoid all of the fuss surrounding this, mainly because I thought it was by Z-list metal band Salem but also because the people telling me to go listen to it couldn't really explain why I should or what it sounded like.

In time cool monikers for the genre apparently championed by Salem came along.

'It's Witch House'

'It's Rape-gaze'

Well what to say other than 'You had me at hello'.

I wasn't exactly sure what to expect other than some really dense, mid-fi beat based music and the first couple of times I played it that's exactly what I got. Kind of like sorry for it's self trip-hop (ugh) fed through the Kevin Shields machine. Then I started using it to calm number one son when he wouldn't stop crying, well okay mostly it was to calm me but as I did I started to get into it.

To say the sound is dense is an understatement, Salem have succeeded in packing so much into their sound it plays like the needle is being dragged through a dirty old suitcase stuffed with shit-stained clothes salvaged from a hospital incinerator and I mean that in the nicest way possible. Its music that's so dirty that it smells. Really though, it does, of beer, of sex, of heroin shit on stone-washed denim.

High pitched keyboard squeals layered over budget drum machines with a voice at the back of the mix so smacked out and slowed down that if the singer needed a Black Metal name he would be called Mogadon. There's some orchestration in there as well and surprisingly, the entire thing managed in part at least to come across as anthemic. Something that despite of itself you could imagine a room full of people dancing to.

I now find myself in the same position that my much hipper friends found themselves in last year: Trying to recommend something to people without really being able to label the sound or explain the musical motive, but that's okay because it's about fucking time.