Sounds on the Ground #6: Banjo Or Freakout
By: Dan Monsell
What's the deal? London-based Italian, Banjo Or Freakout began as very much a one-man bedroom producer and composer. The story goes that Alessio (who for all intensive purposes is BOF) was bored in his girlfriend's bedroom in a flat in Hackney. Doing his best to avoid the other individuals who co-habited in said living space (Alessio seems like a nice guy, so we'll see it that his girlfriend's housemates must have been nasty), he started messing around on a music program on her computer. Banjo or Freakout was born at this very moment time - establishing a rule to only ever record everything once. No second chance. Since then he's gone from strength to strength to the extent that even we're now writing about him. Wow wee.
Anyway, it must be said that this recording rule initially led to some of the results being a little rough around the edges, and more recently they've certainly become more rounded and improved. Whether this means he's abandoned the original way of doing things, or has just become all kinds of good at the whole one-time thing, we just couldn't tell you.
So the music - well, it's really very wonderful and beautiful stuff. One listen to latest release 'Mr No' let's you know what it's all about: dreamy, lush swelling waves of atmospheric melody duck and dive over sketchy beats and looping rhythms. Occasionally it even just verges into even more sound-scaping territory leaving out percussive elements all together. Listening, one can't help but concoct dreamlike feelings of the type where your eyes fix in a glassed-over glare and your jaw juts out to one side because your mind's simply too busy skipping happily up in the clouds through a kaleidoscope of Technicolor only fit for a 60s B-movie. A rather pleasant experience.
Sometimes the layered melodies and almost tribal rhythms recall Animal Collective (in a similar way to last week's Sounds On The Ground's stars Gentle Friendly); otherwise some of the heavily textually electronic exploration on display takes a fine leaf from the book of Four Tet or the bedroom production of Burial. All in all, total radness - and we feel almost a little slow on the uptake here what with some of the love Alessio's been getting on the blogosphere. And press both here and across the pond. Get on that love train quick, rumours of him signing to a very interesting label means we'll hopefully be hearing a lot more BOF soon enough...
What can I listen to? Head on over to http://www.myspace.com/banjoorfreakout and you can hear a whole 6 tracks, which is basically like listening to a proper EP, or a very short album. Crikey, musicians are kind like that these days. Otherwise, feel the love and support the cause by purchasing the very excellent new single 'Mr. No' (out on No Pain In Pop) from the band's MySpace on 7 inch or digital. Go on - it's bleeding great.
When can I see them live? From Paris to Oslo, London to Nottingham, the world will be Banjo Or Freakout's soon! Often joined by an extra member live, his shows are famed for being well good. See here -
21 Feb 2009 LA FLECHE D'OR w/ Asobi Seksu PARIS
24 Feb 2009 GRRRND ZERO w/ Wavves LYON
25 Feb 2009 EAT YOUR OWN EARS @ ICA w/ Woodpigeon and The Miserable Rich --SOLD OUT-- LONDON
27 Feb 200 The Dome w/ Spectrum (Sonic Boom!), G/F and The jazz Butcher LONDON
29 Mar 2009 Upset The Rhythm/YES WAY @ Auto Italia LONDON
21 Apr 2009 Liars Club @ Chameleon w/ HEALTH NOTTINGHAM
22 Apr 2009 The Deaf Institute w/ HEALTH MANCHESTER
23 Apr 2009 tba OSLO
30 Apr 2009 Clwb Ifor Bach Plug 2 CARDIFF
1 May 200 CARGO w/ Souljazz Orchestra LONDON
3 May 2009 Sounds From The Other City Festival MANCHESTER
We all know music peaked in 1994, so give me a sound-bite about how we could compare them to some kind of obscure Britpop band - Bit tough this week we'll admit. Pluck half a member each from Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine and The Stone Roses, and instead of letting them lie all messed up in some field all sorted for Es and Whizz, make 'em read a few more books, get good at computer programming and listen to a bunch of American underground stuff. Hey presto! Banjo Or Freakout...(kinda)