Young Turks

A Brief Internet Journey26 May 2008by Caius Pawson

The following details a brief musical trip I made tonight, starting at a Sian Alice Group gig and ending with a Theo Parrish Adidas advert. This is why I love the internet:

A friend of mine, (Stuart Hammond) dragged me along to see Sian Alice Group at the Old Blue Last tonight. I had been promised great things and wasn’t disappointed in the slightest.

Hailing from London, the 6 piece comprise Rupert Clervaux, Ben Crook, Sian Ahern, Sasha Vine, John Webster Johns and Douglas Hart, of Jesus & Mary Chain fame. They’ve just released their debut album ’59.59’ (available here,)on the ever wonderful The Social Registry. I haven’t heard the album yet, so I’ll have to wait before subjecting you to my judgment on it, but I can say that the live show was thoroughly engaging. Built on a solid, and in the drummer’s case, very emotive (can you even get emotive drummers???) rhythm section, the band swirl up from stretched out earthy drones to places of psychedelic euphoria. Alice Sian (the lead singer) has a pleasant voice but the band really come into their own when she steps back slightly and the instrumentalists are left to do their thing.
The following shows the band’s brilliant cover of the Jeff Mills song “Motionless.” It made for a great set closer:

When I got home after the gig I went to find the original and while I found the MP3, I had no luck on Youtube. I would post up the MP3 but I’m sure you can find it yourself. Much more interesting were these clips from Mills’ 2004 DVD ‘Blue Potential.’ It shows Jeff playing to a large crowd in France, backed by the Montpellier Philharmonic Orchestra. I hope you enjoy this wonderful rendition of his classic track ‘Bells’:

Jeff Mills being the Detroit legend he is, reminded me of how much I love Theo Parrish’s latest album, Sound Sculptures Volume 1, (released April 2007.) The album is a massive triple vinyl epic that takes you on a journey from soulful sounding jazz to deep house and back to some of the techno I’m more accustomed to hearing him create. You can buy ‘Sound Sculptures Volume 1’ HERE.

Finally, just before I was ready for bed, I remembered a video Theo Parrish made with Adidas, several months back. The video is a wonderfully filmed documentary/advert which follows Theo around Detroit as he records the sounds of the city whilst philosophizing on music, djing, Detroit and life in general. I think he speaks not only with incredible eloquence and passion about music but also comes across as a pretty inspiring/nice guy:

I think I’ll finish here, it’s late and I need to sleep. I’d like to continue nattering about how amazing Detroit is (musically and historically) but I think I’ll leave that for another time.

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