Fresh works from D Rothon & Oliver Cherer and Stomatopod arrive alongside archival bundles from Heavenly and The Weather Prophets

Only halfway into January (at time of writing) and 2022 is already starting to feel as congested by life, art and geopolitical happenings as 2021. The music world is obviously part of this, which leads these ears to things that can self-create spaces in the hubbub. Like the below…

Co-created by the Clay Pipe Music ‘super-duo’ of David Rothon and Oliver Cherer, Estuary English is just the ticket to get out of the febrile fray. Inspired in part by the physical geography of the Severn Estuary, which the latter artist grew up next to, as well as feeding off the remotely-exchanged instrumental interplay between the twosome, this is an album that you can just surrender the senses to and be warmly washed by its transcendental tides.

Fusing Cherer’s guitar, synths, processed live drums and sparingly used vocals with Rothon’s pedal steel, Omnichord and theremin, the nine-track suite flows along, like the chosen title suggests, as if it were one near-continuous sonic landscaping exercise with bends, curves and shifting currents. Where one composition starts and ends matters little as a consequence, yet along the way there are certainly some recognisable musical influences cohesively absorbed and repurposed.

Thus, through the journey there are blended shades of Brian Eno’s conjoining with Daniel Lanois on Apollo (“Silver River” and “The Tide Turns”), Vini Reilly and Ennio Morricone (“Aust Ferry”), the more psych-drone elements of classic kosmische (“The Bore”), Doug McCombs’s ever-evolving Brokeback (“The Noose” and “Godwits”), ambient Americana chieftains Suss (“Bullo Pill”) and the hymnal radiance of Cherer’s own self-layered choral ululations (“Silver Haze Dusk”), submerged into one satisfying immersive whole.

Once under its spell, Estuary English is ripe for listening to on repeat for hours at time, as a comforting and cryptic act of escapism.

In complete contrast but likeably bracing in its own way is Competing with Hindsight, the self-released new mini-LP from Chicago’s Stomatopod. Constructed by the galvanised trio of John Huston (vocals/guitar), Sharon Maloy (bass/vocals) and Elliot Dicks (drums) and put to tape with help from no less than Steve Albini, this six-song selection satisfyingly ticks a lot of vintage ‘gimme indie rock’ boxes, albeit without slipping into lazy plagiarism.

Written and rehearsed in genuinely cold conditions before heading into Albini’s Electrical Audio studio, the half-dozen pieces have a spirited self-heating energy that is igniting and infectious. Rapidly speeding through the jack-knifing riffing of “Be the Hog!”, the tension-and-release churn of “Longer Division”, the stomping slide-guitar-topped nerviness of “Like the Breeze”, the bass-led chugging of “The Big Parade”, the thuggish yet co-ed vocal-coated “Out of your Hands” and the razor-sharp singalong finale of “Variatix” doesn’t allow for many pauses in breath and leaves you wanting more.

Those with a fondness for the most Kim Deal-bolstered moments of Doolittle, Eleventh Dream Day’s literally-recorded-in-a-barn Lived to Tell long player, Repeater-era Fugazi and early-Karate, should be more than satisfied by the compelling old-school yet coruscating Competing with Hindsight.

Delving back directly into the past, is the fledgling yet already formidable Precious Recordings of London label with four terrific releases. Curating choice BBC Radio sessions not previously anthologised elsewhere – featuring unreleased songs or significantly different versions of already known material from artists once signed to the likes of Sarah Records, 53rd & 3rd or pre-Oasis Creation between the mid-80s and late-90s – this is an archivist mission with a very convincing raison d’être.

The extra twist – besides celebrating sessions cut for the recently sadly departed Janice Long as much as the still much-missed John Peel – is putting things out as gatefold double-7” EPs engorged with sleeve notes, period photos and other printed matter, honouring the style of indie label operations in which the chosen creators once emerged.

The most immediately available two of the four latest Precious Recordings outings are separately bundled-up 1991 and 1994 Peel sessions from Sarah Records stalwarts Heavenly, which are especially revelatory and revitalising.

Led by DIY-indie-lifer Amelia Fletcher (previously of Talulah Gosh and subsequently of Marine Research, Tender Trap, The Catenary Wives et al.), the gathered excavated tracks spread over both packages are a real treat. Running from 60s garage-pop shimmies (“Escort Crash on Marston Street” and “Itchy Chin”) to utterly charming cleaned-up C86 jangle (“Dumpster” and “So Little Deserve”) to the quirkier end of Riot Grrrl (“Sperm Meets Egg, So What?”), these are arguably some of the best produced recordings the band ever cut, in places bettering the thinner or murkier official studio takes.

For extra value, to compensate for there only being three songs properly finished for the 1991 session – due to the veteran BBC producers steering the band to drop a fourth ill-formed reggae-flavoured number according to the sleeve notes – the respective EP adds in choice contemporaneous compilation rarities, in the shape of a really wonderful psych-pop take on The Beatles’ “It Won’t Be Long” and dreamy different version of onetime single A-side “She Says”.

Mixing rich melodies with Fletcher’s lyrical flair and propelled by Peter Momtchiloff’s dextrous Duane Eddy-meets-Johnny Marr guitar lines throughout (boosted by the rousing keyboards of later line-up arrival Cathy Rogers on the 1994 session), these lovingly-coordinated archive raids deserve to shine a new affectionate light on a group that has been too easily overlooked – beyond some still heavily-devoted followers of a certain record-buying age that is.

Following in scheduled sequence from the twin Heavenly packages are a pair of equally proportioned twofer 7” sets from The Weather Prophets, rounding-up sessions for Janice Long from 1985 and John Peel from 1986. As Pete Astor’s ‘in-between years’ outfit after The Loft and before his solo ventures, this is a band even more unfairly lost to history. The eight resurrected tracks are similarly invigorating as those of Heavenly – albeit from alternative aural angles.

Forging a charmingly chameleonic folk-rock sound, substantially cross-referencing Love’s Forever Changes (“24 Years” and “Lighthouse Room”), the eponymous third Velvet Underground LP (“I Almost Prayed” and “Hollow Heart”) and the most buoyant moments of Clarence White-era Byrds (“She Comes from the Rain” and “Swimming Pool Blue”), originally must have appeared somewhat out of sync with mid-80s British music scenes. In our more sonically omnivorous times however, here The Weather Prophets feel like astute fashion-dodging artisans thanks to some trusty future-proofing studio-engineers at the Beeb.

Adrian
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