Music For Robots

March 15, 2005 | Posted by Blair at 6:32 PM

Keeping it real

So this has just come across my desk, so to speak, and I can't stop listening to it. Tom Vek is another one of those young musical geniuses - it looks like he plays pretty much every instrument under the sun, and I believe he played all of them on this awesome track. This song should sit nicely next to some of the other awesome new dance-rock you've been listening to lately (Whitey, the Rapture and Bloc Party are my fav's), but there's definitely something different about Vek that is undeniable in not just the quality of the music, but the emotional content too, and that is that this guy is for real. These songs are funny and sad and sweet.

There's elements in Vek's songs that remind of me Beck - in his songwriting - and there's elements that remind me of early Elvis Costello and early Joe Jackson. Those guys were seriously tearing shit up in the late 70s. It wasn't really punk, but it was loud and fast, and I think this particular Vek song sits right beside them. You can buy the single for "I Ain't Saying..." next week here. It comes in three flavors: 12" with a Phones remix (which is AMAZING), 7" with a non-album B-side, and CD-single with two non-album tracks and the video (which you can see in lower quality here - watch it, its super-weird).

The rest of the album, called We Have Sound is full of more of this genius. The songs run the gamut of fast dance-y cuts to smoothed out, nearly jazzy stuff - he does a really great job of merging traditional-rock instruments with electronic elements, really better than most bands out there. I will go ahead and say that We Have Sound is going to be one of the best albums of the year - I know its early, and there's a lot to come, but honestly, its solid listening throughout. WHS is out on April 4th on Tummy Touch/Go Beat records, and will be available to buy here.

Tom Vek will be touring with a band he's assembled (Danny Nichols, Rich Harrison, and James Price), but I don't have US dates for you all yet, the exception being ONE SXSW date: he's playing at the Levi's/FADER Trading Post (708 East 6th Street, btw Red River & I-35), on Friday (March 18) in Austin, TX... For the lucky bastards that live in the UK, there's this awesome-sounding show in London on the 24th of March, with Electric Soft Parade, The Beat Up, Hot Chip, Deaf Stereo, Park Attack DJs - J.G Wilkes (Optimo), Richard X, Phones, Eat your Own Ears, Filthy Dukes, and Druzzis, at Koko Camden High Street, 8pm-4am (tickets £10 advance), plus he's hitting Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, Newcastle, and Glasgow (among others) in April - check his live page for more show info.

Phew.

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PS: The Hot Chip + Maximo Park show last night at Rothko was absolutely amazing - Hot Chip do some serious keyboard magic when they play. They really had the whole audience captivated, even from the very first song, which was new... and about love... and it built up so slowly then totally just exploded in to mayhem... and... I digress. Do whatever you can do to see them when they come to your city/town/whatever.
Maximo Park were also quite awesome - so tight! so on! The real deal, I thought. Gonna have to buy their CD too.

Comments

so amazing

Posted by: sorcerer at March 15, 2005 7:05 PM

Great track. Out of left field, love that.

Posted by: P Funk at March 16, 2005 1:12 AM

Love the Tom Vek... yeah.

I was a bit disappointed by Maximo Park last week. I thought the singer was great - really reminded me of Marc Almond. I could see him on Top of The Pops in the 80s. To be honest though apart from 'The Coast is Changing' and finale 'The Night I Lost my Head' I thought the set was a bit weak & the band a bit anonymous. I think if they were in a smaller venue it would have been great, but Koko seemed a bit big for them at this moment in time... they didn't manage to own it. Still, it's an unfortunate aspect of these times that a band is expected to sink or swim after just two singles & I'm not giving up on them yet.

That night at Koko next week looks awesome. Shame I won't be around. Will I EVER manage to see Hot Chip???

Posted by: jw at March 16, 2005 5:30 AM

Blair! This is John Seager. A bit of serendipity led me here a few months ago and I've been meaning to say hi. My email's john@evilemail.com if you feel like dropping me a line. Love the site!

Posted by: john at March 16, 2005 1:37 PM

Hey, remember almost three years ago when The Rapture came out with House of Jealous Lovers courtesy of the DFA? Uh-huh. This crazy new dance-rock thing. Well this sounds a hell of a lot like what we've been hearing since the inception of the genre; it's predictable and fairly boring. I like Tom Vek a lot, but this is the weakest I've heard from him. Hope it puts him on this week's it-list, because I think that's what it's supposed to do. Label pressure? Personal pressure? Who knows. Tom Vek struck me as a more danceable version of Dempsey, which was a good thing; this breaks from his tradition of releasing uncontrived dance music.

You want more follow-ups and wanna-bes? Try Cut Copy, VHS or Beta, the newer Two Lone Swordsmen stuff, The Bravery, etc. etc. etc. Some of the early proginators like LCD Soundsystem, Moving Units, !!!/Out Hud, Trevor Jackson/Playgroup and the Soulwax boys are finally getting their five minutes. Whitey finally gets a big 12" release and Hot Chip are recognized too. Good to see these guys fall under the gaze of the mainstream. Go find something by Zongamin as well...

Maximo Park are a piss-poor attempt by Warp Records to grab hold of the "post-punk" re-re-re-revolution. Please let this whole thing die before we get any more of this. At least a band like Art Brut doesn't take themselves seriously, AND says something interesting, lyrically. Maximo Park gives us nothing new at all.

You want more of this by-the-numbers post-punk? Just look at the latest copy of NME.

Posted by: Greg at March 22, 2005 1:12 PM

Tom played more than 1 gig at SXSW. I didn't see him at the FADER party because that was an invite-only party (I didn't have an invitation). I saw Tom on the 19th at the MTV2 UK showcase (with Hard Fi, Magic Numbers, Nine Black Alps, Idlewild, and The Music). MTV2 UK should be showing highlights in the next week or so.

Posted by: Jennifer at March 22, 2005 5:20 PM