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LP
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ALT 035LP
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Following on from The Lister, The Bomber Jackets' debut for Alter (ALT 014LP, 2013), Kudos To The Bomber Jackets has a restlessness that takes broader strokes. It finds and holds a register of meandering hope by setting the perverted detail of domestic minutiae against an acutely self-conscious melancholy that cynically daydreams its way into an awkward middle-ground between profundity and platitude. At times they give it a bit of a desaturated garage bump, other times there's the throb of marching mono-synth wave. "Deranged Sauce Mum" comes off as a chopped and screwed hardcore, though with Russell Walker's vocals, it's less gurning glee and more furrowed brow. There are very many disparate elements across Kudos To The Bomber Jackets that come to give the new album a kind of uneasy grace, which is perhaps the group's singular force, the unchaining of an ingenious familiarity that's dizzyingly bizarre and equally bleak. Lyrically and musically the album contains the traces of many surfaces, both interior and exterior. Its dream-like qualities are formed through a kind of musical frottage, always preserving the trace of the hand, arriving at its surreal heights through fidgety non-sequiturs of an aesthetically acerbic persuasion. In this way, it never quite replicates anything that you feel to be present in its parts.
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LP
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ALT 014LP
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The Bomber Jackets are the London-based trio of Russell Walker, Daniel Bolger, and Sian Dorrer. The former two names you may recognize from their roles in prolific post-punk nitwits the Pheromoans, while the latter has played in various groups in London's thriving DIY scene and opened the notorious London venue Power Lunches. Founded by Walker and Bolger after the death of an ill-fated trio with Nik Void who went on to find greater fame and fortune with Factory Floor, the group was originally augmented by the drumming skills of Wetdog member Sarah Datblygu. This line-up recorded and released their debut on the cassette imprint of the short-lived Sex Is Disgusting label, before misfortune hit Walker and Bolger for a second time with Datblygu upping sticks for the USA. Bowing out from her role, she gave permission for the two to continue under the condition that her replacement was female, so the two recruited former Plug drummer Sian Dorrer on electronic drums who gave the group a more defined electronic sound and an opportunity to seize some sort of stride with cassettes, lathes and 7"s for various labels like Night People and Night School. The Lister is their first full-length and the most focused statement of their singular and somewhat awkward aesthetic. Recorded primarily by Bolger and Dorrer at home in North-East London during a particularly rough time in Walker's life which involved frequent visits to his newborn son at the Lister hospital in Stevenage. A situation where sparse moments of creativity were reduced to writing lyrics in the form of text messages in mundane places such as Sainsbury's Café, the hospital restaurant and the Beefeater carvery at Corey's Mill. Walker's dry observations from the period give The Lister a slightly macabre atmosphere throughout its eight tracks and provide moments of black humor, self-deprecation and a perverse euphoria in misanthropy. Musical reference points could be directed towards early Legendary Pink Dots, Hype Williams, early European minimal synth and even Angelo Badalamenti's Twin Peaks score, while evoking a scenario that feels somewhat uneasy -- a hungover/slightly drunk train journey to somewhere you don't really want to be but at the same time can't avoid, trying to step outside of yourself to raise a wry and knowing smile at the misfortune along the way. Artwork by David Blanco and mastering by John Hannon at No. Dedicated to Hannah Walker.
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