radar: in each hand a cutlass

“What’s there not to like about pirates?” asks more interesting trying to play off these strengths around,” Sassoon adds. Looks like it’s back to the LANA DEL REY Daniel Sassoon, as though the seafaring than finding tried-and-tested ground.” record collections for Sassoon and his merry men Born to Die scoundrels were universally loved. There’s little Sure enough, the sonic pirates find it more (and woman), to hunt down more hidden gems to Universal Music doubt the ex-Electrico guitarist is obsessed with comfortable relentlessly roaming, never anchoring capture and cobble into their aural kaleidoscopes. them, even naming his new band after the curved in one genre for longer than a few minutes. Each If you think that’s unscrupulous, don’t. After all, pirated blades they usually brandish. And if Johnny Depp of the album’s 11 songs careens from style to what’s there not to like about pirates? was right in calling pirates the rock stars of their style with gleeful abandon, and you can almost time, then In Each Hand A Cutlass is the Jack see the band playing with a little smirk, egging you Purchase a digital copy of the band’s album A Universe Made Sparrow of ours. “It’s a great image… being on to spot the myriad references they’ve snuck in. Of Strings, at ineachhandacutlass.bandcamp.com. armed with two cutlasses, charging into the fray,” That’s a tough job. The five-piece samples music Sassoon says of the band’s name. “That’s us. We anything from prog-rock supergroup Liquid How does Lana Del Rey make you feel? Hipsters a small, buccaneering band do that with our music. No boundaries – whatever Tension Experiment’s mercurial melodies to decry Elizabeth Grant’s self-styled “gangsta is raiding record collections as we feel like and want to do.” Mastodon’s metal odysseys to the brawny guitar Nancy Sinatra” persona, but cannot keep from Video Games. How could its brave minimalism ammunition for its swashbuckling The six-string hero started the band in 2008 rush of Boston indie rock acts from the 90s. emerge from those artificial lips? Pucker up brand of instrumental rock. hoping to play “unconventional-ish instrumental There’s even some Gregorian chanting thrown to her major label debut, though, and find frigidity. by iliyas ong music”, he explains. After numerous lineup in, as if the mix wasn’t schizophrenic enough. Sure, Grant can sing, as the addictive Born to Die demonstrates, but flourishing strings overwhelm changes, In Each Hand A Cutlass finally had When I tell Sassoon there’s a certain nu-metal the proceedings. Worse, her hopeless romantic all hands on deck with Amanda Ling (another riffing in one track, he disagrees with a very character is hopelessly one note. With lines like erstwhile Electrico member) on the synths, un-pirate-like graciousness. “I’m your national anthem / God, you’re so handsome”, Lana comes across not as Lolita, drummer Jordan Cheng, bassist Nelson Tan and “Funnily enough my inspiration for that was but a sex doll. Not until Radio, when she coos Sujin Thomas helping out for live shows. It wasn’t more Led Zeppelin and Jane’s Addiction, but “My body’s sweet like sugar venom” while long before pirates became a fitting mascot if you heard nu-metal, that’s great!” he says. dropping f-bombs, does she stir, barely. Listen without guilt: you won’t be listening long anyway. — and metaphor — for the quintet. “That’s the beauty of instrumental music: Dan Koh “Pirates are awesome,” Sassoon gushes. everyone can probably find something that jogs “Travelling on the high seas, always on the run their memory or reminds them of something.” ASPIDISTRAFLY from the law, brigands with their own code A Little Fable of honour, and with parrots! Treasure maps! WALKING THE PLANK Kitchen. Label Cool swords!” There’s no question In Each Hand A Cutlass But Sassoon and his four comrades-in-arms is an ambitious band and A Universe Made Of aren’t just brigands — they’re bricoleurs. Strings its first rallying cry. But it isn’t a perfect record. The danger of the ensemble’s piratic MOTLEY CREW pastiche is for its music to become a hotchpotch Just like the nautical bandits, the freewheeling of wry influences, that the flag hoisted up is not crew has no qualms plundering other musicians’ the stark skull-and-crossbones of intent but treasure chests of sounds. But what makes In a tepid patchwork quilt. Not that Sassoon Aspidistrafly, the dream pop duo, quietly comes Each Hand A Cutlass different from every other is worried. “We didn’t hold anything back and into its own on A Little Fable. Recorded in the autumn and winter of Japan, their sophomore band is the sheer size of the loot: the outfit has we write the songs as they are — let people make album traces nature’s cycle to lush, beguiling pillaged from progressive rock, marauded from of them what they will,” he says. “We don’t trouble effect. The first third couches their trademark metal, embezzled from emo — very often in the ourselves with thinking ‘what if it doesn’t sound found sounds in more song-oriented forms, with YO—HO—HO! 3—Nina Simone counterpoints of classical music. This concoction same song. like us’, or ‘what if it alienates our fans’. I think one Pirate Jenny segues into the atmospheric middle before The band launched its debut album, A Universe of the reasons why people like us is because In Each Hand A Cutlass Originally a song for a shadows give way, once again, on Twinkling Fall. Made Of Strings, in June last year. It is a magpie’s we’re unpredictable.” isn’t the only band German musical, the High What have always anchored Aspidistrafly are April fascinated with pirates. Priestess of Soul turns the Lee’s vocals. Her dulcet tone, recalling Vashti nest, as expansive as its title might suggest — “Some might see this lack of consistency NYLON scours the seven lyrics, about a black Bunyan, has over the years deepened into a nod to the all-encompassing String theory as a flaw, and it is what it is — we can’t help it.” seas for five of the best freighter full of pirates a Karen Dalton-like preciseness of phrasing. — and a result of the diverse musical palette songs about the massacring a town, into They are now rightly placed in the forefront, for freebooters; so feed a grim ode for the black these tone poems she sings, with the crowning of each member, including guitarist Roland Lim THAR SHE BLOWS! the parrot, get your eye- revolution of the 60s. glory of Homeward Waltz, are creatures of who has since left the band. The posse is busy readying an “in-betweener” patch on and hoist the absolute, gooseflesh beauty. Dan Koh “There’s a ridiculous span of influences,” record, hopefully a seven-inch, for release in a few Jolly Roger. 2—Beastie Boys Rhymin’ and Stealin’ Sassoon acknowledges, citing Russian Circles, months; and already, they’re looking to tinker with CLOUD NOTHINGS 5—Aidan Baker The Brooklyn boys rap Attack on Memory Mogwai and Jimmy Eat World as some of the acts their complex sound. With a new set of ears Davy Jones’ Locker about “terrorising suckers Carpark Records everyone in the band loves. “There’s lots of ideas at the mixing board, the eminent hardcore and You might get seasick on the seven seas” and listening to this roiling how they “drink and rob that float around. We like a bunch of things, and lo-fi producer Manny Nieto from Los Angeles, epic. In its 16 minutes, and rhyme and pillage” if we feel like doing something for the moment, Sassoon promises a “rougher, rawer and more the track journeys from — against a sample pilfered in it goes!” organic sound to reflect the energy of our live drone to shoegaze before from Black Sabbath’s cruising out on a dark Sweet Leaf. In Each Hand A Cutlass can be classified under shows”. Further into the future still, In Each Hand post-rock tenor. the post-rock umbrella, but it thankfully strays A Cutlass could very well jettison some influences 1—Adam and the Ants away from the admittedly passé crescendoing for its sophomore effort, which Sassoon admits 4—Neu! Jolly Roger Flying Dutchman “It’s your money that we formula, à la Explosions In The Sky. “I wouldn’t is still “a long way from now”. The band might The spectral ship of myth want and your money we mind delving into that a bit,” Sassoon says. even explore in greater depth its electronica side, gets a sonic companion shall have!” cries Adam Recent revivalism continues with Cloud Nothings’ mining of late Nirvana, early emo, and current lo-fi. “Used very sparingly it can still be effective. shades of which can be found on the debut, in Neu!’s haunting track, Ant, himself a dead ringer replete with crashing synth for Jack Sparrow, in this Importantly, multi-instrumentalist Dylan Baldi I think our strength is that we all have different courtesy of Ling’s DJ-ing experience. “We don’t waves and ghostly, spirited call-to-arms for adds something new. Attack on Memory is his ideas and backgrounds, and to me it’s infinitely want to try to replicate things a second time glossolalia vocals. pirates and booty haulers. concept album about time and its detriments. He nods to his musical past by having In Utero’s Steve Albini produce, then copes with adolescent days that are supposed to have gone by. Adult ennui would be screaming “I thought / I would / Be more / Than this” (Wasted Days), and, two songs later, cancelling it out with “I need time / To stay useless”. Even if it’s not as raucous as it imagines itself to be, Attack on Memory also understands that time, like life, is short. These eight tracks rock. Dan Koh