Album Review: Late Night Tales presents After Dark - Bill Brewster

Bill Brewster is a bit of a legend amongst more discerning dance music fans. He's known for playing things a little bit leftfield and was playing disco (along with everything else) some time before it's current return to favour. Crucially, together with Frank Broughton, he wrote what is pretty much the definitive book on the history of DJing - Last Night A DJ Saved My Life (on Amazon.co.uk here - note this link is affiliated and earns the blog money if used).

Between them Broughton and Brewster put a big focus on 'programming' (I.e. the selection of tracks and the sequencing of those tracks into a meaningful order) over technical wizardry or, in some instances, technical capability.

In other words it's what you play that counts, not how you play it. I got into a conversation today about the old 'Super Clubs' of the late 90s and was struck by how things have moved on. Most of them no longer exist (replaced by supper clubs perhaps?!) and yet the nightlife of many towns seems better, if anything. There's less of a focus on superstar DJs and six-hour sets and more of a focus on the tunes. And in my mind, that's what it's all about.

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​Late Night Tales presents After Dark - Bill Brewster

Brewster's latest work is a mix album in the Late Night Tales series. Following on from Tom Findlay's excellent Music For Pleasure release of last year this new one sees Bill add his own concept: After Dark. In his own words, that means it's a compilation of "dance music for people who know how to make love". In other words, it's slow and classy.

Brewster plays to form, and as always it's what he plays that matters most. From the opening track - Marti Caine's seductive disco number Love The Way You Love Me (a track here on CD and digital for the first time) - this is a set of music with little concern for genre or era. Linus Loves' 2004 disco-house track flows from the opening track into the theme from the BBC's 70s TV show Quiller, originally released on the BBC Records and here in an unreleased edit form. It's probably most recognisable for having been sampled extensively by The Avalanches and it's an avant garde slice of disco-jazz insanity.

Rare remixes of tracks from the Doves and Twin Sister are woven into the mix yet don't interrupt the flow, which varies across the mix but retains a dubby disco and funk edge. Phillipe Zdar provides a mix of Machistador, a track by the mysteriously named -M- (he's actually Mathieu Chedid, son of French singer Louis) - it's gloriously funky but manages to be so without loosing a slightly grimey edge, only adding to the appeal. Sleazy guitar solos freak to a thick disco beat that transports you to a dirty basement after-party in New York.

There's plenty hidden away in this mix and it's a densely packed journey that will take a while to fully consume. I:Cube's mix of Beach Towel by Karma is a distorted, mechanical epic, soaring ambient melodies rising up from soft bouncing bass lines and François K's mix of Herbert Moon's Blow Your Body is a deep and cosmic space-jazz track, full of ambience and vibes.

It's occasionally off the wall but it's impossible to resist the pure passion and sheer DJ geekery that Brewster has crowbarred into After Dark. He's made an experimental, sensual and sophisticated dance record for lovers of quality dance music.

Late Night Tales presents After Dark is out now, available from Amazon.co.uk on CD and MP3 [affiliate links]. Listen on Spotify below:

The Obligatory Best of 2010 List - Part Two

Following on from Part One, here they are... Our favourite nine albums of 2010:

9. Crooks & Lovers - Mount Kimbie

This year saw dub step evolve. Having previously felt like an excuse for people who should know better to listen to garage some of the genre's pioneers began to, well, actually pioneer. And the innovation really came from combining the music with other genres. Mount Kimbie's debut is a perfect example - tempered with a bit of intelligent soul you suddenly had a classic on your hands, particularly on the standout 'Before I Move Off'.

8. Total Life Forever - Foals

It shouldn't really have worked... Following their acclaimed status prior to the release of their debut album (and subsequent fall from grace when it disappointed some), Foals returned with a more melodic, accessible and populist album. And it was also the best thing they have produced yet.

Criticism has been levelled at Total Life Forever on the basis that it contains too many songs to appeal to summer festival goers. Which basically means it has too many songs people will actually like. Go figure.

By stripping back the math-rock and building some actual songs Foals made an album containing several of this year's best songs. And it isn't just the sings that shine - the production work from Luke Smith is sublime - a gorgeous, melancholic, sun-bleached feeling runs through the record from the dip-in-the-pool-refreshment of 'Blue Blood' through to the desperate 'What Remains'. With not just one but two completely killer tracks ('Spanish Sahara' and '2 Trees') Total Life Forever is already shaping up to be one of 2010's most overlooked albums in the end of year roundups.

7. InnerSpeaker - Tame Imapala

Whatever you think of Tame Impala - little more than plunderers of the past or innovators kick starting a new genre - it's difficult not to get caught up in it all. Sure, the production is epic - thick basslines, rhythms punched out of solid steel and guitars that encircle the listener in proggy bliss - but it is the songs that will keep you coming back, particularly the apathetic bluesy closer 'I Don't Mind'... It's the stoner equivalent of La Roux's 'Bulletproof' and the weird rave bit halfway through never fails to surprise. Genius.

6. Black City - Matthew Dear

Potentially Dear's magnum-opus, Black City builds on everything that has come before and turns it into something original. Darker than ever, it straddles a variety of emotions, at turns alienated, sexually depraved and wounded and needy. 'You Put A Smell On Me' is like Nine Inch Nail's 'Closer' re-made for 2010 - pure, unadulterated filth of the sort that will have you singing things you really shouldn't in public.

5. The Suburbs - Arcade Fire

BlackPlastic still isn't sure if The Suburbs is as good as either of the last two Arcade Fire albums but the fact that the question even lingers means this is an album that deserves a place on the list. A cleaner and sparser record, but potentially all the more weighty for it. On first listen it seemed to lack stand out moments but repeated listens just demonstrate that this is simply because every track is a highlight.  

4. Klavierwerke - James Blake

Not an album but still one of this year's most significant releases, James Blake seems to be making it his personal mission to upset hardcore dub step fans by tearing up the rule book, taking the genre's best ideas and running off to make something entirely new with them. 'I Only Know (What I Know Now)' is the sound of a man learning from his past mistakes. It is also this year's most emotive five minutes.

3. Vampires With Dreaming Kids / Color Your Life - Twin Sister

Not an album but really a double pack EP, this nonetheless was the sound of one of 2010's most promising bands. With the stripped back aesthetic of the XX, the rawness of early Yeah Yeah Yeahs and what sounds like sterling taste in 1980s pop music at their best the influences combine to make something marvellous, as on the slow burning 'The Other Side of Your Face'. Twin Sister will be ones to watch in 2011.

2. This Is Happening - LCD Soundsystem

If albums were judged on artwork alone This Is Happening would have owned this year. With its minimal type combined with that picture of James Murphy flying through the air in his suit it really felt like a statement of intent.

Whatever. This Is Happening is regardless one of the best things to come out of any stereo this year. With greater focus than Sound of Silver LCD's latest release felt more like a proper album. And with the monstrous bass of 'Dance Yrself Clean', the middle-aged-guy-having-an-epiphany gut-wrencher that is 'All I Want' and the subtly epic 'Home' it also had the tunes. It may not have another 'Someone Great' but it's the sound of one of our times' best bands all grown up.

1. Cosmogramma - Flying Lotus

It says a lot when a record has increasing amounts of praise heaped on it the longer it has been out. He may not have won a Grammy but he has made 2010's best album - a record that fuses genres like they don't even matter. The J Dilla comparisons are perhaps inevitable but Cosmogramma is no mere re-tread - it demonstrates that Flying Lots is one of the most innovative producers of our time.

So what are your thoughts? What did we miss?

EP Review: Vampires With Dreaming Kids / Color Your Life - Twin Sister

Twin Sister released their debut EP, Vampires With Dreaming Kids, earlier this year. Now re-released on additional formats (previously it was only available digitally) together with their second EP Color Your Life, Twin Sister should probably be your brand new favourite band.

Here's why...

Tackled one at a time:

Vampires With Dreaming Kids slides sideways into rooms like dead girls in horror films before singer Andrea Estella seductively purrs "If you're all alone / bring over your bones / and pay me / anyway you want to..."

As an opening track 'Dry Hump' is a wonderfully spellbinding introduction to a band that manage to keep you guessing. It melds into 'Ginger', a track which features the same raw female vocals but ups the Jesus and Mary Chain quota. The resulting soaring, fragile majesty sounds like the Yeah Yeah Yeahs before they got confused about what that should mean.

'Nectarine' is more whimsical and folky with male vocals (presumably from guitarist Eric Cardona). Perhaps best of all, Vampires With Dreaming Kids closes on the soulful 'I Want A House'. It's refreshingly honest and a fittingly lo-fi end to a lo-fi EP.

But if Vampires With Dreaming Kids is pleasurably simple, Color Your Life is anything but. Opening on the seven-minute sprawl of 'The Other Side Of Your Face' it takes longer to get going, but the shimmering guitars that welcome in the 90th second prove this is considered evolution rather than revolution. There is an unmistakable 80s influence at work here.

As mentioned, whereas their first EP undeniably recalls the Jesus and Mary Chain and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Color Your Life feels more like Echo and the Bunnymen and Tears for Fears. As the opening track swells to its conclusion it really does take your breath away - this is the sound of a band who have stripped everything back to the essentials. Every note and sound feels undeniable vital.

'Lady Daydream' is similarly minimalistic, boasting a staggeringly simple yet catchy bassline. What separatesColor Your Life from the first EP is a warm and dreamlike quality to the music. It feels like drowning in honey.

In comparison to the first two tracks 'Milk And Honey' feels psychedelic and disorientating to the point where when the R&B influenced gentle strut of 'All Around And Away We Go' turns up it is a relief. Color Your Life's six tracks are rounded out by the atmospheric instrumental 'Galaxy Plateau' and the 80s groove of final track and ballad 'Phenomenons'. It's another gorgeous end to a thrilling set of song

Understated, beautiful and effortlessly cool, Twin Sister could have stuck these ten songs together and made one of 2010's best albums. That they didn't makes the prospect of their debut album all the more enticing.

BP x

Color Your Life was released today, available from Amazon.co.uk on CD and Vinyl. Color Your Life and Vampires With Dreaming Kids are released as a double pack on 20 September, available to pre-order from Amazon.co.uk on double CD. Both are released through Double Six [affiliate links].