Sunday 20 May 2007

soulsavers

Soulsavers - 'It's Not How Far You Fall, It's The Way You Land'
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'It's Not How Far You Fall, It's The Way You Land' is a collaboration between rich machin, ian glover and mark lanegan released by v2 in april of this year. the former supply the warm spacious loops, whilst arch collaborator mark lanegan adds his distinct vocal talents.

i've been a mark lanegan fan for a good couple of decades or more. hazily i can recall seeing a show of his (from screaming trees days) at the fulham greyhound, possibly at the end of the eighties - maybe later, maybe earlier. one thing i do recollect with a mild sense of disapointment is that there was about a dozen people at most in attendance. i loved the band and couldn't believe how few people had made the journey south of the river to see 'em. the show was brooding, the sound was huge and the band were too. i was 'blown away'.

however, my consort for the evening recalls the place being 'rammed', packed like he had never seen it before with sweat pouring from the ceiling. our memory of it shouldn't be focused - the majority of nights i can summon up fromthis era are the ones that were a let down - the good for the most part obliterated and left behind in a heady haze.

when the lanegan solo stuff had started rolling out in the early nineties i lived in a house with friends where we'd get up at 4:00pm and go to bed about three days later. at the end of those 72 hours we'd mix c-90s on the decks that included stuff off his whiskey for the holy ghost lp next to ninja tune 12"s, the tindersticks, spititualized, tricky, radioactive lamb, beatless sun electric tracks - never eating, smoking cheap fags and copious amounts of weed, coming down off psychedelics and drinking whiskey... and that, is what this soulsavers album takes me back too and manages to make sound crucial and contemporary. there are guest vocals on the majority of tracks from lanegan plus the odd appearance of will oldham. its laid over samples that recall the artists i mentioned before, and it should by all accounts be awful (spiritual grunge-hop?) but really, really is not. it leaves your veins feeling warm and your soul revived.

soulsavers are playing live, with lanegan in the uk in july '07

soulsavers - july UK dates:

15 - Latitude Festival, Suffolk
17 - Bush Hall, London
18 - Bush Hall, London
19 - Academy 3, Manchester