Entertainment For Lively Minds
Hooray! There's a new High Llamas LP out
...in all good record stores right now.
I don't recall them getting much 'press' on these pages but I'd be surprised if I were the only fan of these among the Massive?
During the Britpop years I was mostly ignoring Oasis and Blur and listening to the curious Steely Dan/Brian Wilson/Van Dyke Parks/Krautrock/Exotica mash-up of 'Gideon Gaye' and 'Hawaii'.
They keep a very low profile but they still pop up every so often with another truly delightful record and this new one is no exception. Undertstated as ever, and existing in its own sound world but with plenty of melodic twists and turns and lyrics about architecture, buses and beaches.
The record sounds exactly as it looks:
Here's a clip:
The High Llamas Fly Baby, Fly by seekmagic
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Big fan here also
Two favourites of mine:
Also worth a listen if you can get it is Sean O'Hagan's first album, 'High Llamas'
Spooky...
...for some reason in the last week I have been listening to Hawaii for the first time in a while. Never dreamt that new stuff was imminent!
Always partial to a bit of the Llamas.
Snowbug's a particular favourite. Just right for a Sunday night.
love The High Llamas
thanks for the info
Love them
Was also a huge fan of Microdisney. Once supported the Llamas in Camden in the early 90s. Was a grand little night.
Hawaii & Gideon Gaye
I'm sure I read somewhere these two are currently out of print? Does Sean O'Hagan own the masters?
mflow - gideon gaye
part of the mflow easter egg offer (most of which seems to be finished now). Along with Hawaii
good
I would recommend these to anyone who likes melodic pop with a 60s Beach Boys vibe, especially Hawaii.
Fantastic
Mere hours ago, as most of the rest of you slept, I was tootling along the streets of Perth enjoying the wonderful High Llamas, having just loaded the old Pod with their entire ouevre (or so I thought). Hadn't listened to them for a long while. They seem to touch a certain set of musical receptors of my brain that no others do.
Hawaii is the perfect double album.
Love 'em
Also a Microdisney fan (any others?). Agree that Hawaii is a perfect double - one of those albums you can listen to from start to finish as a perfect continuum.
Any Fatima Mansions fans out there...?
Cathal Coughlan
is one of my favourite lyricists of all time. Hugely underrated, almost forgotten really. Which is a damn shame.
I'm a big fan
of all things Coughlan.
the mansions versus the llamas
I liked quite a lot of the Fatima Mansions output, but it all got a bit too shouty in the end. I don't know what Cathal was trying to do. It seemed at times that he was in denial of the fact that he had a great voice. Sad to say that much of his solo work (the odd gem apart) has also been largely tune-free.
The Llamas also had some great moments, but I think a lot of their output has the air of a rather quaint museum piece. Much as I like 'Gideon Gaye', 'Hawai' and -to a lesser extent- 'Snowbug', when I saw them live I was pretty bored by what appeared to be a kind of earnest rigidity to their performance.
Listening to the post-split output of the two main driving forces behind Microdisney, it's easy to see that there must have been (to say the least) some 'musical differences' within the band.
Perhaps, had they stayed together, we might have been spared some of Cathal's plodding shouty-teenager rock and also some of Sean's whimsical and pedantic Brian Wilson parodies.
Bring back the 'disney!
That contrast
Between the two of them was what made Microdisney; the later Virgin albums when they were slick in that almost Steely Dan late 80s thing but topped with Cathal's croon that sounded like it was about to hit you really hard any moment for spilling his drink. I always thought The Beautiful South owed a lot to the 'Disney. There's that same sense of MoR turned ugly.
The first couple of Fatima Mansions albums were bloody great too.
I forgot to mention they are touring soon
They're doing an in store at Rough Trade East tonight (12th April) and then
Davids Music, Letchworth 16 April 2011 Brighton, Komedia 04 May 2011 Birmingham, Hare & Hounds 06 May 2011 Glasgow, Captains Rest 12 May 2011 Gateshead, Sage 13 May 2011 Liverpool, Williamson Tunnels 14 May 2011 Manchester, Deaf Institut 15 May 2011 Cardiff Globe 21 May 2011 London, Purcell Room 22 May 2011
Wholeheartedly approve
...of all these sentiments.
I can report that, having obtained my copy of the album plus requisite wristband a full 24 hours in advance of tonight's in-store, at no point was said wristband checked by anyone. Sadly it seems unlikely that the Llamas are destined for mega-stardom.
But who cares about that as long as they keep doing what they're doing?
This might appeal too
Llamas fans might also enjoy this fellow from hereabouts. Sean O'Hagan seems to like him too.
http://www.themanfromanotherplace.com/
and...
if they haven't already, check out the mighty Pugwash. This is their HL homage:
Pugwash are great
The recent compilation album Giddy is well worth a punt for fans of the HLs.
Oooooh, I love a Llama lots.
Thanks for the tip off; I've got most of the back catalogue, but hadn't even seen that there was more out. That's the soundtrack to the weekend sorted.
Only ever heard Gideon Gaye
but it's a perennial favourite, always on my phone/music player of choice.
Will investigate the others - recommendations please, Doc, when we meet on Friday in Manchester!