The Best EPs of 2012

Yeah, so, we drone on constantly about our love of the album format and how our unshakable desire for full length records is what drives this blog. But this year, finally, we woke up to the fact that not every release needs seven tracks or more.

In no particular order here are ten shorter releases that tickled our fancy this year. Each one is utterly splendid, and hopefully this whets your appetite for our full annual album countdown which is nearly ready…

The New Fabian Society – Exhibition of Love

Ok, we’ve said this is in no particular order but we wrote this one down first as it probably is the EP of the year. From Lost in Berlin’s slow, building intro, the downbeat anger of Necropolis to the pumped out Devious Minds and its bookending outro – this was an absolute belter and they’re not half bad live either.

Town Hall – Sticky Notes and Paper Scraps

This concise little release was a much better showcase for the NYC act’s potential than the patchy full album which followed. Five songs, all absolutely lovely.

Plastic Animals – Automaton

They really do get better on every viewing. Five tracks of atmospheric, noisy melodies, they’ve also a song on the upcoming Song, by Toad 12”. We’re thinking ‘big things’ and not just because we stuck them on this year.

Frightened Rabbit – State Hospital

The Selkirk boys have been productive since 2010’s The Winter of Mixed drinks with this, their second interim EP before next year’s Pedestrian Verse. If this is what they chucking out in advance (only the title track will feature on the album), then we’re VERY excited for February’s album.

The Cherry Wave – The Cherry Wave

We chatted up new Glasgow shoegaze specialists the Cherry Wave for Radar. Nice guys and this was an assured debut.

The Son(s) – Leviathan

It’s only six tracks but we rather cheekily slipped this in as an album of the week this year. Album or not, its lush melodies are another prime example of why the Son(s) are one of Scotland’s best bands.

The Last Battle – The Loudest Say the Least

Would be a stop-gap release, if the ‘gap’ wasn’t already on the verge of stopping. The ever-evolving Edinburgh troupe will release their second album in the New Year. This was the first of two EPs of demos that haven’t made the cut.

Public Service Broadcasting – The War Room

Jolly spiffing instrumental, sample-based from a couple of tweed-wearing musos. A hell of a lot louder live than what you’d think too.

Holy Esque – Holy Esque

Huge potential on here from a relatively new Glasgow band. A recent UK tour with the Raveonettes suggests their star is in the ascendant.

Various Artists – The Tidal Wave of Indifference Sessions

We couldn’t let this segment pass without mentioning our lovely little bargain charity “help the pussies and puppies” for, ahem. ‘Indifference Records’. Sales have been slow, so get the finger out, tightwads.

Schools, Societies, Sweethearts and Skies

Now that our relaxing (not-at-all-relaxing) summer is out of the way and the Tidal Wave of Indifference is back into a more regular blogging cycle, we can now find a home for a few things we’ve been sent over the last few months that we haven’t quite found a home for.

In amongst the chaff that lands in our inbox, something that gets instantly marked as wheat is new material by a band we’ve covered before or a name we were at least familiar with, so that’s what we’re looking at here with a handful of new(ish) EP releases from acts that regular readers should be more than familiar with by now. But don’t worry, our eyes are still peeled for new stuff and we hope to bring you a stack of features as soon as we can pull the finger out and write them!

Edinburgh School for the Deaf have managed to survive not only shedding a couple of members, but also a Tidal Wave of Indifference gig where the capital’s finest noisy shoegazers treated a full house to a carcaphonous wall of noise.

New EP In Dreams Lie Guilt feels like a step forward with a foot still in the past. New versions of old songs Of Scottish Blood and Sympathies (radically different from the original but perhaps not as good) and Love is Terminal (vitriolic, better) sit alongside three new songs that mix up vocals from Grant Campbell and new singer Agnieszcka Gryczkowska. They’re a little less lo-fi than what’s on their album but maintain enough howling feedback and hissing aggression to ensure that School for the Deaf sound is present and correct.

Further survivors of a Tidal Wave gig come in the shape of Glasgow’s The New Fabian Society who promised new material imminently as they left the building for the night. True to their word, Exhibition of Hate follows Exhibition of Love, consisting of four further tracks of discordant anger.

A direct descendent of the first EP, it perhaps lacks its immediate impact and ‘whoa’ factor, but give it a few spins and you’ll realise that it’s every bit as good. This is a band maturing fast even if lines like The guy that you’re seeing is a cunt are clearing designed to shock. Our favourite band to emerge this year.

Human beatbox and guitar mangler Adam Stafford clearly likes to keep on his toes. From releasing his debut solo album a year ago, he’s played constantly, released a split 7″ on Gerry Loves and is now part of the Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo project. Whether the band will do anything more than the four track Welcome is unclear, but it’s an unexpected treat. Stafford takes a back seat, at least in the vocal sense and lets ‘D. King’ take the lead for some Scotified Americana, but the loops and distinct guitar sounds are a giveaway to his presence. It’s still a significant departure though.

Available on cassette, the EP is back with a four solo instrumental Stafford songs as a added incentive. We haven’t heard these yet but are salivating at the prospect.

Finalement, we have Warsaw-based classical artist Neil Milton who’s been quiet for a while. His new double EP Skies/Seas is out now on Valentine Records and it maintains his flawless record of making blissful ambient piano sounds.

Both sides are calm, relaxing and manage to capture the elemental feel of both the sea and sky. Milton is a fascinating artist and comfortably our favourite contemporary composer.

Tidal Wave on the Radio 2012… pt 1

Just a quickie, with some added tunage below.

The Tidal Wave of Indifference will be on Freshair as part of their festival finge programme every Thursday from 6-7pm. Our first bash was last night, we had the excellent Fuzzystar in session and lots more twiffic music. Link below, enjoy!!

We’ll try and get back to some proper blogging soon, promise!

The Tidal Wave of Indifference on Freshair 2012 – Pt 1 by Stu_Lewis on Mixcloud

Bandcrush: The Bad Books

Well, this one’s been a while coming. Chatter around the Bad Books kicked off shortly after Michael Morrison (guitar; ex-Come on Gang!) and Graeme Anderson (vocals, synths, guitar; ex-Kays Lavelle) signed up for a pub gig in Leith months ago, but have remained defiantly under the radar, even refusing to pop any music up online. Well, until now, but don’t worry we’ll get to that.

So we were delighted to see an advertised gig earlier this year surface through the usual channels with Cancel the Astronauts and Fuzzystar also on the bill. It was an absolutely blinding night, with the Bad Books the pick of the bunch. So much so that they were pretty much signed up to play Tidal Wave 3 on the spot.

Their punchy brand of melodic indie rock sounded much more polished than a band with only a handful of gigs under their belt had any right to. Time has clearly been spent on the songs, Anderson is a charismatic and charming frontman and despite their claims of consistently avoiding  practice, they’re tight as the proverbial insect’s sphincter muscle.

So then, to Tidal Wave 3, taking place at Edinburgh’s Wee Red Bar on the 23rd of this month (but you knew that because you’re already coming aren’t you?). The Bad Books play their first headline set with Loch Awe, The Spook School and The New Fabian Society completing an absolute beezer of a line-up.

Did we speak to them? Yes we did!

So who the hell are you?

Michael Morrison: We are Michael, Graeme, Andrew (Brodie – drums) and Scott (Finnigan – bass/vocals) – four music loving boys.

Describe your sound in ten words or less?

Graeme Anderson: Space Pop with a twist of anger!

MM: That’s a pretty good definition actually! Or ‘Anger Pop with a bit of space…’

How did you guys begin making music together?

GA: I had an offer from our pal Andy Tucker of performing a wee solo slot at Nobles and when writing some tunes for the evening, thought they would sound better with a full band. I managed to rope in Michael and Scott to play too, then Michael roped in Andrew and The Bad Books were born. We gelled surprisingly fast and had an absolute hoot at nobles that evening. We pushed on and have been writing, playing gigs and avoiding practises since.

MM: Graeme plied me with drink until it seemed like a good idea. He was right though, it was a good idea.

Are these fresh tunes or was anything brewing before Come on Gang! or the Kays Lavelle folded?

GA: A couple of tunes are ones that I have had tucked away for a bit but they needed a fresh input and a bit of inspiration, which the rest of the band have in bucketloads. Recently we have managed to get a few tunes written during practise. Michael and Scott are really creative and Andrew seems to add that bit of oomph with the drums that brings it all together.

MM: All fresh stuff. Graeme’s a really good songwriter and I’m more than happy to add to and help shape his ideas. Plus if I came into practise with an old cast-off Andrew ‘Show Me The Rock’ Brodie would probably batter me.

How do you think the Bad Books differ from acts you’ve played in before?

GA: My previous bands have always had a bit more of a serious feel to them. The Bad Books are more fun! I also think that the songs that we have just now are much better than anything I’ve worked with before plus all my previous bands didn’t sound anything like this.

MM: Yeah there’s a healthy sense if fun to this. Though the music’s a bit darker, I think it comes across live that we’re just having fun doing our own thing. The Bad Books are louder than my old band, and this is the first time I’ve played music with men with beards. Plus I think both Graeme and I were keen to play very different stuff from our old bands, so the middle-ground seemed to be loud. I just want to be in a rock band…

What are the key influences that have been brought to the table?

GA: It’s strange because the bands that I love and that have made me want to get into music are ones that I don’t think we sound like – stuff like The Flaming Lips, Super Furry Animals and Grant Lee Buffalo. Each member of the band has different taste in music and think we each put that into our song pot.

MM: I agree. I always think it’s more fun to play off the influences that aren’t your favourite, as anyone can rip off a style they’re really into. So the stuff I bring to the band isn’t really my default, just what fits the tunes, the same as with Come on Gang! I’m aiming for messy, busy guitars – Dinosaur Jr, Television, Pavement, a bit 80s, mainly American indie I guess.

Bloggers turned promoters…… discuss!!!

GA: Ha ha! I can answer that properly after the 23rd. Edinburgh is in serious need of some good promoters though.

MM: Yeah let’s see how sweaty the 23^rdgets! Yeah Edinburgh gets a bad rep for not having enough venues but really the problem is a lack of promoters –after yourself, Nick at Sneaky’s and the Limbo guys (there are others of course – Ed), it’s pretty slim pickings.

Can we expect an official release anytime soon?

GA: Yeah! We’d love to have something out by the end of the year so we’re planning to record after the summer and release it in November or December time. A stocking filler for Crimbo.

MM: It’ll be dead festive.

Where do you think the Bad Books will ultimately take you?

GA: Not sure about this one. I’d love to get the chance to play some decent gigs and festivals with the band. I think playing live is what we’re all about. Would also love to get an album together.

MM: An album would be good once we fine tune a few more songs. It’s a nice feeling not being rushed to release anything we’re not happy with. Got a lot of time for bands like eagleowl who would rather do things well than rush them, so we’ll most likely be busy behind the scenes squirreling away.

And so to the music. With thanks to Mike from Manic Pop Thrills who did the original recording, the Tidal Wave of Indifference proudly presents Year of the Cat by the Bad Books, yours to download for free below. It’s from the Sneaky Pete’s gig mentioned above and is a bit rough and ready, but this is the only place you’re going to get to hear the Bad Books before June 23 and potentially some time after.

Enjoy! And do come along to Tidal Wave 3, it would be bloody lovely if you did. You can get tickets HERE.

The Year of The Cat (Live) [m4a]

Download problems? Email thetidalwaveofindifference@gmail.com if this isn’t working. I’ve probably bawsed it up.

Bandcrush: The Spook School

Despite releasing just one single and a short collection of home demos, the Spook School (Adam, Anna, Naomi and Niall) have created a few waves in their home town of Edinburgh.

Performing a brand of cheery lo-fi pop, they’ve attracted the attention of 17 Seconds and Edinburgh Man, and we’re delighted to add the Tidal Wave of Indifference to their list of fans.

So much so that we’ve asked them to play The Tidal Wave of Indifference Presents: Numero Trois later this month alongside the Bad Books, Loch Awe and the New Fabian Society at the Wee Red Bar. Their intelligent hooks and fine choruses are a perfect fit for what’s shaping up to be a very exciting night of guitar pop.

We decided to find out what makes them tick and caught a word with singer/guitarist Adam this week.

So who the hell are you?

We’re The Spook School, and there’s four of us.

Describe your sound in ten words or less!

Inept pop.

How did you guys get together?

Naomi and I are siblings and have been attempting to write songs ever since Naomi got a guitar. Then I went to uni and met Anna and Niall while attempting to do some silly student comedy. We thought it would be fun to try and make some noise together even though three quarters of us have no idea how to work these things. Miraculously some people seem to be enjoying it.

Interesting band name – how did you happen upon it?

It’s the name of Charles Mackintosh’s wee gang of artist pals. Well, people used to call them that to slag them off. We thought it would be quite cool to re-capture it and kind of change it a bit. Also, I really likes Mackintosh. To the point that I decided to study architecture for a bit at uni, but then they just kept going on about pyramids, and pyramids are boooorriiiing. They’re just big triangles.

Bloggers as gig promoters – discuss!!

Yes please! Some of the best gigs we’ve done have been for bloggers. They’re generally people who actually care about music and in turn want to put on a really good show while also supporting the bands they like. It’s really great. We’ve been lucky not to have any bad experiences with promoters (yet!), but it seems like a really good idea for bloggers to put on stuff just cause they really like music. That should be the only reason anyone puts on gigs really.

What can we expect from your live show?

We sound better live. More of a ramshackle punchy noise. A nice bit of feedback and some singing and shouting. Sometimes we dress up. Sometimes we cover ourselves in glitter. I have a bad habit of bleeding all over my guitar, and Niall will probably get naked. But you can ignore that if you like.

Can we expect to see a full length release soon?

Nope. We’re not ready really. We’re still learning a lot. We do have a very exciting release coming up though. We can’t really believe it’s happening.

If there was such a thing as an ACTUAL Spook School, which famous dead folk would make the best teachers?

Oh wow! Bert Jansch, Marc Bolan, John Lennon, Poly Styrene and Tchaikovsky could do music lessons. That seems like a good mix. Bolan could also teach fashion (cos it would be a hip school that did that kind of thing). Suppose The Four would have to do art & design since the school’s named after them. Picasso could help them out. He seemed like a cool guy. Einstein would do science. Kafka and Oscar Wilde literature classes. And Buster Keaton would do PE. There would be no sports, just falling over, running away from things. This sounds pretty good.

The Spook School play Edinburgh’s Wee Red Bar on June 23 alongside The Bad Books, Loch Awe and The New Fabian Society. You can get tickets HERE and there are Facebook-y things HERE. They probably have some other gigs too, but we’re sure you can forgive us for not being desperately interested in those at the minute. Head over to their website for more info if you’re so inclined, though!

The Tidal Wave of Indifference Presents: Numéro Trois

We’ve already been shamelessly hawking this round Facebook and Twitter, so here’s the slightly tardy actual blog puff piece.

The Tidal Wave of Indifference is back on the gig trail! After packing out the Wee Red Bar with PAWS, Edinburgh School for the Deaf and more in February, our third gig is right in the middle of summer, again at our favourite venue in the city. Sod the Euros, sod the beer garden, sod yer holidays, get yer butts down to this, it’ll be awesome!

So what have we got?

From the ashes of Come on Gang! and The Kays Lavelle have come The Bad Books. From low key beginnings, they’ve quickly established a reputation as one of the city’s most exciting live bands. Sounding nothing like Mikey Morrison (guitars) or Graeme Anderson’s (vocals/guitars/synths) previous acts, think of something more like Grandaddy or Modest Mouse. That good. Really.

We’d normally fill this space with a wee Bandcamp excerpt, but as yet, the Bad Books have nothing recorded. Tsk.

As good as Loch Awe’s debut album Artificial Life From a Digital Sea was, the band has changed beyond recognition since its releases, adding Brian (Trapped Mice/ex Last Battle) on guitars and multi-instrumentalist Oliver to the original line-up of Matthew, Joy and Jack. Now aiming for something louder and more expansive, they’ve been recording at Chem19, in preparation for a new release later this year. Expect to hear the results at the Wee Red Bar in June. Here’s a number from their first album, but as we said, they’ve moved on somewhat.

Edinburgh lo-fi indie-pop foursome the Spook School have attracted a gaggle of devoted followers in the short time they’ve been together and released two lovely EPs – they are, without question, the perfect fit for the Tidal Wave of Indifference.

Finally, we’ve also got Glasgow two-piece The New Fabian Society involved. We can’t believe their huge-sounding debut EP Exhibition of Love was created by just two people, but it’s awesome and fans of Bauhaus, Interpol and Echo and the Bunnymen will love these guys. Get down early and show them a lot of love!

Because we’re nice we’re also offering up some nice cheap early bird tickets at £4 over at Brown Paper Tickets. But once these are gone, they’re gone and the standard price will be £6 – still a bargain, I’m sure you’ll agree! It’ll be £7 on the door.

For more information, please email Stu at thetidalwaveofindifference@gmail.com or tweet @stu_lewis.

Bandcrush: The New Fabian Society

So, with thanks to Wikipedia, we present the Fabian Society:

‘a British socialist movement, whose purpose is to advance the principles of democratic socialism via gradualist and reformist, rather than revolutionary, means. It is best known for its initial ground-breaking work beginning late in the 19th century and continuing up to World War I. The society laid many of the foundations of the Labour Party and subsequently affected the policies of states emerging from the decolonisation of the British Empire, especially India‘.

Wow. Serious stuff and and otherwise-inoccuous email from a band has led us to this fascinating history lesson. The name of the ‘New’ Fabian Society instantly registered some recognition with us, but if it had come up in a pub quiz we’d have been struggling to define quite what it was.

So thanks then to this Glasgow two-piece for leading us to this info, but more importantly, thanks also for their awesome debut EP, Exhibition of Love.

We’ve streamed the whole thing below – it’s three tracks and just over seventeen minutes of predictably dark, gloomy and powerful guitars and drums, reminiscent of Bauhaus, Echo and the Bunnymen and their more modern acolytes Interpol (before they lost their way after two exciting albums, of course).

Lost in Berlin after four minutes of distorted effects slips into a thunderous rock song with singer Michael, aahhh, ‘Fabian’ doing his best Pete Murphy howl; Devious Minds is of a similar vein but goes for the jugular much quicker before fizzing out on the same whirring sounds that opened the EP in the first place.

There aren’t many bands in Scotland playing this kind of music to any kind of competency or quality so hearing this was a blast of fresh, yet polluted and post-industrial air. We absolutely love, and fully expect to be hearing much more from, these guys. We spoke to drummer Nick about the EP and what’s next.

So who the hell are you?

We are a two-piece band hailing from Glasgow who formed in late 2011.

Describe your sound in ten words or less!

Shadow ridden post-industrial punk with a psychedelic slant.

A minimalist EP cover - there are no 'press' shots of the band ready yet!

The band name seems very carefully chosen; care to tell us about what’s behind it?

Yes, it was carefully chosen and one which we almost never went ahead with. We’re not attempting to be political troubadours or anything like that. It was more an attempt to capture or emulate the spirit of what was once a powerful and romantic sentiment that slowly became corrupted, distorted, anarchic and tainted. I think that we wanted to convey that sense of fallibility, aggression, failure and industrialism to the current musical landscape.

How did you guys get together to make music?

We have known each other the best part of fifteen years and both grew up together but we only really joined musical forces when we ran into each other at a Horrors gig. We formed through an appreciation of the same music, excess, self loathing, misery, marginalism and disorientation with the current social environment. We wanted to make a lot of noise to the point where live it was almost unpalatable to those witnessing it.

What’s influenced the EP?

The EP was influenced by early Brian Jonestown Massacre, No Age, Mogwai, The Eighties Matchbox B-line Disaster, My Bloody Valentine, early Joy Division and The Idiot by Iggy Pop.

How did you come by such a huge sound with just two of you?

We use a lot of reverb through the mics on the drum kit and a classic fender reverb amp for the guitar. We also love our effects which is generated through trusty dream machine and boss DD-7 – we have also recently became infatuated with the limitless capabilities of the e-bow. All of this helps to create a pretty loud violent industrial sound.

Is there a full length release in the pipeline?

We’ve literally just started showcasing our debut EP and we’ve been quite fortunate to have been offered some good gigs already. At this point we’re just looking to develop and expand our sound further and a generate as much noise as we can. Yeah, we would love to put an album out sometime in the near future but we have a bit to go before we’re ready.

Any live shows on the horizon? Quite a few at the moment, looking forward to supporting London band Foreign Office at King Tuts Fri 18th May. There’s a full listing of shows on our Bandcamp page, or follow us on Twitter.

Excluding yours, what’s your favourite society?

There are far too many to mention but I guess for us it would be the Oliver Reed Appreciation Society. He was a fine actor and would have been good company in Rab Ha’s* with a beer!!

*We’re assuming this is some kind of west coast wine bar.

We hope to bring you some exciting news about this band shortly – stay tuned!