Saturday 27 February 2016

Competition! - #hiapopDip


So here's the deal.

We have over 80 cds up for grabs.  Most of them promo's.  A mix between singles, EPs and albums.

You buy a 'ticket' for just £1 via PayPal to hiapopblog@gmail.com

Next weekend, a name will be picked at random and the collection will be on its way to a lucky winner.

If we don't receive enough sales to cover postage to a UK destination then your £1 will be returned.

Can't say fairer than that, eh?












Listen! - Radio KC LaTwitterview Soundtrack With Simon Tucker





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Friday 26 February 2016

Wednesday 24 February 2016

Review - The Pop Group – For How Much Longer Do We Tolerate Mass Murder?




The Pop Group – For How Much Longer Do We Tolerate Mass Murder? (Freaks R Us)

CD / DL

19 February 2016

9 / 10

English post-punk band re-release their second album.  Louder Than War’s Paul Scott-Bates reviews.

Whether you are aware of The Pop Group or not, it cannot be denied the influence that they undoubtedly had on British punk and street culture.  Mark Stewart and his band of not-so merry men have seen fit to crowdfund the re-release of their pivotal album For How Much Longer Do We Tolerate Mass Murder? on cd for the first time.  We salute you.

The album is a classic make no mistake.  Call it avant garde, call it post-punk, thirty-five years after its original release it is still as relevant and angry as it was then.  Often put into the bracket of punk it really isn’t, being more akin to the sound of Ian Dury and his jazz induced punk-pop - The Pop Group present their version in an anti-pop fashion.

Built on screeching saxophones, frenetic bass lines and Stewarts irreverent screaming, the overall sound is often off-key.  Indeed, the lack of uniformity and conformity adds to the charm of the songs and the manic nature is a humbling refreshment.

Album opener, Forces Of Oppression is near anthemic as it announces the arrival of the nine tracks with gusto and the now trademark shout of Stewart is given a severe airing.  Feed The Hungry is near hypnotic and Blind Faith cascades with noise and near hostility.

One Out Of Many featuring The Last Poets is replaced by the bands second single We Are All Prostitutes for the first time, a song as famous for its political commentary as it is for its imagery of Maggie Thatcher waving a two-fingered salute.  Nick Cave stated that “It had everything that I thought rock and roll should have. It was violent, paranoid music for a violent, paranoid time", and a young punk in the BBC series Ashes To Ashes was seen sporting a t-shirt with the song title emblazoned over his chest.

Even reggae gets a tickle with the brilliant There Are No Spectators as it fades away into a glorious reverb towards the end before Communicate provides what can only be described as improvised jazz-punk.

Closing with the dark humour of Rob A Bank as it parodies the original theme from Robin Hood you can’t help but feel that you have just invested thirty-seven minutes of your life into something completely marvellous.




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Published on Louder Than War 17/02/16 - here





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Review - Matmos – Ultimate Care II




Matmos – Ultimate Care II (Thrill Jockey Records)

LP / CD

19 February 2016

8.5 / 10

Experimental electronic duo release their new album.  

If listening to the sound of a washing machine cycle for thirty-eight minutes isn’t your thing, then maybe you don’ t have the imagination and curiosity to listen to the new Matmos album.  From the basement of their Baltimore home, Messrs Drew Daniel and M.C. Schmidt have shown their true creativity by taking the sounds made by a Whirlpool Ultimate Care II washing machine and creating a truly mind-blowing album.

If you’ve ever stood next to an electrical appliance, found yourself mesmerised by its sound and discovered that you are actually tapping a finger or shuffling a foot to its noises then you’ll completely understand where Matmos have borne their ideas.  Beginning with the trickle of running water into the machine drum and slowly building up to repetitive cacophony of noises the album is a refreshing delight.

No strangers to the unconventional, Daniel and Schmidt and have in their twenty-year existence played ‘music’ on the uterus and reproductive tract of a cow, a collection of conch shells belonging to John Cage and canisters of helium.

With guest appearances from members of Horse Lords, Half Japanese and Needle Gun popping along to help with the laundry and then proceeding to bang the machine like a drum or process sounds via samplers.  Spin cycle hums, rinse cycle splashes and any number of clunks and clanks are joined by manufactured blips and bleeps to make it all sound extremely palatable.

Sometimes sounding like drone, sometimes like krautrock, there are even movements that could have come straight from a traditional Malian background.  Segments which can be mistaken as horns, drums and xylophones are actually samples from the sound of the machine which have been manipulated and re-fed into the mix.

Some would argue that Ultimate Care II isn’t music, and some would be wrong.  What it is is a joining of two very imaginative minds into one very entertaining end result and whilst the concept of it will have its detractors, there will be an equal amount who find it absolutely compelling listening.





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Listen! - Fur Blend - Serontonin











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Listen! - Wet Nuns Spooky Glow (Part 2)





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News - Deux Furieuses Announce Debut Album And Stream New Track





The words ‘deux furieuses’ translate as ‘two furious’, female gender signified by the French spelling. Their fans in Russia fondly call them The Furies. ‘deux furieuses’ is an apt name for the impassioned duo (Ros Cairney - guitar and vocals, Vas Antoniadou - drums and vocals) whose music is fuelled by 21 Century hypocrisy, pro-democracy uprisings, fundamentalism and extremism, the denial of freedom of expression and rights for women. Their songs pull apart social injustice and cry out for change.

deux furieuses’ debut album Tracks of Wire draws inspiration from a wide range of artists who use their talents to explore and think: Hofesh Shechter’s thunderous dance/music performance ‘Political Mother’ about indoctrination, DV8’s uncomfortable, questioning physical theatre piece ‘Can We Talk About This?’ about multiculturalism, Aayan Hirsi Ali’s books on Islam and reformation, Yael Farber’s ‘fearless’ rape play ‘Nirbhaya’, PJ Harvey’s ‘Let England Shake’, Savages ‘Silence Yourself’. The duo’s riotous black-and-white hooded press shots a nod to the Parisian female activists of 1968, the original Sisters Of Perpetual Resistance.

Produced by Rob Ellis (PJ Harvey’s drummer and arranger), Tracks of Wire has moments of Harvey-esque raw exuberance. There’s the obvious riot girl influence, where seemingly rebellious abandonment meets an unstoppable desire to deliver a serious message. But whilst punk’s angry, visceral backbone is omnipresent, the songs are fleshed out with post-punk’s intelligence and articulation. 

It’s an album that is undoubtedly hard-hitting, but one with a positive, proactive message of fighting for change, wrapped in songs delivered in darker shades and rawer soundscapes.

Formed in 2013, the band have released three tracks:  Can We Talk About This?(2014), The Party of Shaitaan(2015) and Are We Sexy Enough?(2015) which collectively picked up coverage on Louder Than War, The Girls Are, Artrocker whilst at radio, John Kennedy [Radio X] has twice featured the duo as his Xposure Big One, more recently hailing them ‘Ones to Watch for 2016’ and asking them to play his club The Remedy; Tom Robinson selected them for his BBC Introducing Playlist in 2015 and Bella Union’s boss Simon Raymonde praised them on his Amazing Radio show.

Tracks of Wire was recorded at Bryn Derwen studio, Wales with producer Rob Ellis in August 2014 and was finally mixed in Nov 2015 by Mark Freegard [The Breeders] at Kyoti Studio, Glasgow. The album will be self-released digitally on 20 May. 






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Listen! - #hiapopRadio 20/02/2016






Monday 22 February 2016

Watch! - My Cruel Goro - Lost E





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Listen! - Ennio the Little Brother - Cacophony










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Listen! - Karo - Wolfbaby






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