Stoner rock legends Earthless have announced additional tour dates for the USA, supporting their excellent just released album Black Heaven via Nuclear Blast. The band also kicks off their extensive tour of Europe tomorrow, including their festival curation, the “San Diego Takeover” at Roadburn this year. All dates below are on sale now.Continue reading
When they come round to writing the definitive history of progressive rock music in the UK I hope they can find a nice spot, lovingly curated, for Mancunians Amplifier. Not that we should be consigning them to the annals of history anytime soon – anything but – but Amplifier seem to be one of those acts that are held dear to the heart of the already converted, but have yet to make the crossover to broader appeal. It’s hard to understand why as they have already delivered, from the sprawling masterpiece The Octopus (Independent) to the more introspective yet equally worthy Echo Street (KScope), some sublime, intelligent and inventive music.
Mystoria (Superball) doesn’t eschew all of the idea-conjuring that they are renowned for but it has a determined sense of purpose and an effervescent undercurrent that will certainly cement their reputation and should, if there is anything like justice in this tribal, social media dominated world of ours, see them reach audiences and corners of the globe yet to be converted to Mr Balamir and co.
Kicking off with the none-more-prog-rock instrumental of ‘Magic Carpet’, a blend of Focus meets Muse, it’s a gauntlet throwing statement of intent. Amplifier have rediscovered ROCK, kids, and we should all be grateful. ‘Black Rainbow’ continues in similar vein, all hard driven rhythms and evocative lyrics and you can feel yourself air drumming from about 28 seconds in (perhaps that was just me, then). ‘Named After Rocky’ sounds a bit what might happen if early Genesis had met Led Zep for a proper drink. This, for the avoidance of any doubt, is a very good thing.
‘Open Up’ is a seriously moody buzzy riffathon, akin to what would happen if Josh Homme had gotten his stoner rock hands on Matt Bellamy’s muse and, if you will, Matt Bellamy’s Muse. Highlight of the album is the brilliant ‘OMG’. It has a signature riff that Rush would kill for and a deep groove which echoes Led Zeppelin just at the point where they became their most stately and imperious. There’s a swirling pot of ideas being thrown around here, too. This is what Amplifier excel at, the musical plate spinning, often at precarious rates but with not one piece of porcelain being dropped.
Less obviously ambitious than The Octopus, Mystoria appears to be Amplifier’s attempt to distil their essence into manageable slices of aural pie. As Oliver Twist, would surely have said, please Mr Balamir , sir, can I have some more? Satisfying then, culinary friends.
7.5/10
MAT DAVIES
With new album ‘Mystoria’ showcasing a new direction for the eclectic Amplifier, frontman Sel Balamir fielded the Ghost Cult interrogation and emphatically told of how his band are more grunge than prog…
“For me Mystoria is like The Melvins meets Crosby,Stills & Nash” is how vocalist and guitarist Sel Balamir describes Manchester alt. masters Amplifier’s upcoming release, the band’s fifth full length, when talking about the album’s fuzziness married with harmony. It has to be said that Mystoria (Superball) is quite a departure from what we may expect of Amplifier, moving towards a more direct sound akin to grunge and the more typical echelons of rock music.
A lot of people will see the comment above and start running for the hills, but it is important to remember that Amplifier have never been a group to repeat themselves. From the sprawling prog journey of Octopus (self-released) to the more stripped down follow up Echo Street (KScope), Amplifier have always had a knack for trying out different styles and sounds.
As calculated as it appears, however, Balamir dismisses the notion of a preemptive plan behind it all. “It’s not conscious, it’s just more demonstrative of our powers of attention getting shorter and shorter” he says jestfully. “I think it’s just different kinds of people you hang around with, certainly for me, is the undercurrent of what changes sound and stuff. Because you take on board people’s opinions and what they find interesting and they make you interested and think about things and ways you may never have thought about before.”
Time and personal constraints also prove a factor. “The Octopus was a massive sprawling record because we wanted to make a record that no record company would ever put out. Echo Street was different again because we didn’t have four years to make a massive record, we decided we were going to make a record then made one the next week, we hadn’t written it or anything!
“Up until Mystoria all our records were quite complicated and with Mystoria we just wanted to make a record that wasn’t so emotionally complicated, it was just simple.”
Mystoria also differs from its predecessors in the methods of its recording, being rehearsed to perfection prior to a quick recording, which conversely has an effect on its outcome: “It’s basically a live album, there are hardly any overdubs on it, so it’s basically a live record. For me I can hear the difference, there’s a lot more space on the record. There’s my guitar, there’s Steve’s (Durose) guitar, drums and bass and that’s it, no layers of feedback and texture which featured deeply in other records, I think it’s a lot more in your face record because of that.”
The aforementioned Steve Durose (of Oceansize fame), along with Alex Redhead joined Amplifier since Echo Street’s recording as the band shifted to a four piece. This in itself also aided Mystoria’s final sound. “The other guys beefed out the harmonies, and certainly there are a lot of harmonies on Mystoria. It was designed to take advantage of those vibes.”
Previous album Echo Street was released under license by prog label KScope whilst Mystoria sees Amplifier associate with a different record company, Superball. “Echo Street fits on KScope’s roster. It wouldn’t fit on Superball’s roster and the kind of thing they do and conversely Mystoria wouldn’t fit on Kscope. They don’t really do straight-ahead rock bands and for me Mystoria is like a rock album, not a prog album, so Superball is much more suitable. And they are more piratical as well, a bit more dusty knuckles to me, than Kscope.”
A move away from being associated to a true champion of modern progressive rock to a label with little association with the genre whatsoever may seem a strange move to some, but Balamir has before been quick to dismiss his band as simply a prog band. “We are a mongrel band, we’re citizens of the world, we like all types of music. That element of listening to Pink Floyd is as strong in me as the element of listening to Yes and listening to Joan Baez. We live at a time of with a rich cultural heritage that has been recorded. I’ve got records that my parents bought because they were amazing records and they still are amazing, so it’s no wonder that we don’t fit into any pigeonhole because we have never pigeonholed our own tastes.”
In fact the “prog” tag that Amplifier have been lumped with in the past is clearly something that Balamir is disapproving of : ”As soon as you get that prog attachment, for people who don’t know, they think they are just going to get Yes or Rush, and I love both of those bands, but I wouldn’t say they are representative of what my band sounds like. My band sounds more like Nirvana to me than those bands. I don’t think we are prog at all, just an interesting rock band.” Interestingly however, despite Balamir’s issue with the prog tag, Amplifier by transforming throughout their history actually offer the most progressive of elements themselves. “And there’s the irony. Most prog bands aren’t progressive at all, they are conservative.”
Especially with recent ties with Kscope, it goes without saying that a large proportion of Amplifier’s fanbase will be more prog orientated so was Balamir concerned with what such fans would make of the new album? “As soon as you start trying to shape your records to what you think the fans will make of it then you are on a steep, slippery slope. We just do music as an expression, rather than just trying to impress people.”
This being said however, we can mostly expect fans of such music to have a diverse range of musical tastes shown in prog’s all-encompassing umbrella of sonic variants. For Amplifier this is reflected in their (especially recent) presence on festivals and bills of the eclectic variety; from Damnation festival, to Beyond The Redshift, the Kscope anniversary shows and others. “We were talking about this the other day, that all these festivals we play, we never seem to fit in to any of them…I think Amplifier are one of those bands that people who are into different musical styles there is a space for us in their taste.
“We play heavy music so its not weird for is to be on bills with heavy bands. We are there because we are a different colour to other bands that are there. We are an option if you want to take a break from speed metal.”
Speaking of bills, Amplifer have been announced as support for returning cult grungers Kerbdog. A move that only a few months ago would have seemed baffling now makes so much sense. “We are all about the grunge. It would be nice to play with a proper rock band. Nothing complicated.” And from this it seems Amplifier may have found a firm new home. A band renowned for transforming and shifting from album to album seems to have settled into a groove at least for the time being. “That’s where we want to be and stay. If there was one thing that would be our manifesto now it would be just lean and mean. That’s what its all about so playing with Kerbdog, will be good because it will be simple.”
Words by CHRIS TIPPELL
Amplifier and the music industry, it’s a stormy affair to say the least. Two years after the release of The Octopus Sel Balamir and co. are gearing up to release their latest effort, entitled Echo Street; it’s a very different affair with quite a story attached to it. Ghost Cult caught up with Sel to discuss the latest developments in the Amplifier camp…Continue reading
After years of struggling with record companies UK-based alternative/progressive rock outfit Amplifier managed to find their groove again by independently releasing The Octopus. It’s their most coveted and ambitious release to date. Coming up with a suitable follow up record is a tall order at the best of times, so let’s see what Sel Balamir and his musical friends came up with this time around..Continue reading