Sparklehorse front man and multi instrumentalist Mark Linkous committed suicide in Knoxville, Tennessee on Saturday.

Linkous shot himself in the heart in front of a friend’s house, in the early hours of the morning, he was 47.

He was on the verge of completing another studio album after his May 2009 release Dark Night of the Soul which included contributions from The Flaming Lips, Frank Black, Neutral Milk Hotel and David Lynch.

Sparklehorse rose to fame after touring their debut album Vivadixiesubmarinetransmissionplot supporting Radiohead in 1996. During the tour Linkous overdosed on a combination of Heroin, alcohol and anti-depressants causing his heart to stop and leaving him in a wheelchair for six months.

It is perhaps for the 1998 album Good Morning Spider that the band will be best remembered.

Colin Greenwood of Radiohead has been one of many to pay his respects to the singer, he told Pitchfork:

“I was very sad to hear the news that Mark Linkous has died. He and his band toured with us in Europe, at the start of OK Computer, and they were great every night. His first two records were very important to me, and I carried his music from the tour into my life, and my friends’ lives too… Mark wrote and played some beautiful music, and we’re lucky to have it. Rest in Peace.”

“If you gave The Postal Service a banjo they would become Freelance Whales.”

Formed as recently as late 2008 in Queens New York, Freelance Whales honed their “precariously arranged pop songs” busking in the streets and subways of the Big Apple. The band thrive under a gestalt idea of each simple instrument and sound combining to create a much more impressive, layered, interwoven body, like a synth-folk landscape painting combing simple individual forms into something beautiful and resonant as opposed to the usual cacophony of battling electrics, pedals and solo guitars each fighting the other for limelight. The peaceful idea of each member and instrument happy with its own easing simplicity and the combination of that simplicity into something greater and more moving is something that comes across strongly in this band.

Something that cannot be avoided (by my ears anyway) however is their similarity to The Postal Service, especially the vocal style, which sounds so like Ben Gibbard it seems feasible that he is simply working under a pseudonym or has single-handedly perfected cloning  in order to give himself more time with wife Zooey Deschanel, which would be an understandable move. Some tracks such as Generator^2ndFloor depart from The Postal Service sound in favour of a more choral gospel  feel and this may be the direction the band will take if they are to avoid hack writers spending more time describing the life of Ben Gibbard and co. than themselves.

With such a short history but a doubtlessly promising future little else remains to be said about Freelance Whales for the moment. If you like The Postal Service (and who doesn’t?) but are also a fan of slightly more folky, organic styles such as Animal Collective, you will like this band, they aren’t breaking boundaries but they are adding good material to under-populated ones. Their debut album Weathervanes was released on ITunes last August and actual physical CD’s (remember those?) were released on cdbaby.com in October. Freelance Whales are touring the U.S. until January.

IOHO recommends the tracks Generator^2ndFloor , Broken Horse and Starring

Broken Horse

Websites

http://www.myspace.com/freelancewhales

Modern + Folk = Oxymoron?    Jonquil prove otherwise.

Yet another band hailing from Oxford is the progressive folk sextet Jonquil. Despite being part of the same group of friends as YOUM and Foals, Jonquil have swapped party rhythms and spiky math beats for flowing acoustic melodies and sea shanty sing-alongs. This does not mean that they have been left in some archaic alternate reality inhabited by people wearing thick woolen jumpers however. Early tracks from the band certainly expose their influence from their Oxford brethren and they are never afraid to combine samples with a squeezebox. Whistle Low the title track from the band’s first EP contains a repeated guitar riff that if played on a Stratocaster through a variety of pedals and switches as opposed to an acoustic guitar would not sound so out of place on a Foals album. The modern influences melded with classic techniques do not end here, their first album, Lions, is beautifully crafted combining very subtle modern electronic sounds and uses a technique of linking tracks together by sampling voices and other recordings which is reminiscent of classic Pink Floyd albums. These modern inorganic techniques are used very subtly in Jonquil’s music just to polish off and modernise the beautiful flowing melodies and sea shanty-esque sing-alongs created by their huge range of acoustic instruments and vocal styles. The music Jonquil create and the skill with which they play it makes it ideal for live performance and they have gained a reputation for cozy sing along gigs, this trait is epitomized by the title track from Lions. A track that runs at under two minutes but creates such an instantaneous atmosphere that you feel compelled to join in before you even know the words. This instant creation of atmosphere can be said for most tracks on the album but each creation is very individual, the haunting sound of Subtle Strains is another great example, this ability is a product of having six band members and a huge range of instruments and vocal styles to call on. One of their new compositions not on the album is Pillow Quest again creating an original more modern, driven style and direction for the band.

In short Jonquil are advancing at an extraordinary rate and are dragging ‘modern folk’ along with them, the advancements and changes they are making seems natural and subtle and don’t at any point make their songs or music inaccessible in any way. Anyone could put Lions on tomorrow and get something from it, they have such a great variety of sounds and feelings that it would be impossible not to.

Jonquil are currently “working hard to create the best album imaginable’ and are playing upcoming dates in London, Birmingham and Leeds.

IOHO recommends the tracks:

Lions, Pillow Quest and Subtle Strains

Jonquil – Lions

IOHO would love to use content that does not have embedded advertising, if you know of a link for this or other Jonquil tracks we can post then please contact us.

Websites:

http://www.myspace.com/jonquiluk

A band that have been called more names than Gordon Ramsay’s sous chef and have a sound for every one of them.

YOUM (as they will be referred to for the rest of this exhortation but previously known as Youthmovies, YMSS and Youth Movie Soundtrack Strategies) hail from the eternally effervescent town of Oxford. (I am unsure what happens to the river Thames as it flows through Oxford but someone should study the process and do the same to all British rivers potentially making the biggest contribution to music since Leo Fender’s father said to his wife, ‘shall we have an early night?’.) Over the past few years YOUM have gained a reputation for incendiary live performances and a continuously developing sound. To define the magnificent din they make under any one, two or a dozen genres would not only be impossible but would also be an injustice. To understand who they are or where they are going would be a similar feat, but fortunately for us all we only need to listen to one song to understand the brilliance of YOUM, ‘If you’d seen a battlefield’.

This song is to post rock/Post Hardcore/Math what Bohemian Rhapsody was to 80s pop or Paranoid Android was to 90’s progression. It runs at almost 8 minutes, each minute a song in itself, and each different to the last, it surfs so close to the possibility of becoming noise that you have to step back every so often and realise that it is everything but. This is helped in part by, Andrew Mears’ Albarn-esque voice creating a bridge between music as we know it and whatever astral plane this song came from. Incidentally Mears was the original singer for fellow Oxfordites Foals but gave up the position in the band to work with YOUM. Those of you lucky enough to have heard Foals’ original 7” release Look at My Furrows of Worry/Try This on your Piano with Mears’ as lead singer will have noticed that these tracks further bridge the gap between these two bands.

It is rare that a band is called ‘brave’ with any real justification but it is a perfect and commonly used adjective to describe YOUM. Where Foals could perhaps be accused of prettying up the scene to soften the blow for the larger market YOUM do anything but. You really get a sense that this band are really doing things for their own reasons and personal motivations and this has got to be where great music comes from.

Regardless of whether this band spend the rest of their lives sampling the mating calls of dust mites or selling Coca-Cola to orphans they have a warm bed made up for them in rock heaven purchased by ‘If you’d seen a battlefield’.

If you are a fan of Foals or similar and would like to further your knowledge of this exploding and fascinating scene or even if you have no idea what I’m talking about IOHO strongly recommends the album Good Nature by YouthMovies.

YOUM are currently recording new material for release in 2010

IOHO recommends the tracks:

Soandso & Soandso and If you’d seen a battlefield

Websites:

http://www.myspace.com/whyyoum

If you’d seen a battlefield

Please Listen and Vote

After causing a stir in London, touring and recording with the likes of Crystal Castles and The Klaxons, winning NME’s best newcomer award and appearing at Glastonbury The Big Pink have finally released an Album.

The Big Pink are an Electro Rock/Folk duo hailing from London, they are comprised of Robbie Furze and Milo Cordell, lifelong friends who had previously released records for bands such as Crystal Castles and Titus Andronicus on their own record labels before signing to 4AD in February 2009. Their fourth single Dominoes and their first album A Brief History of Love was released in September this year.

The Big Pink are named after an album by The Band but upon listening to them for the first time you may think that is where the influence ends. The droning deep sounds and sharp tightened beats are more reminiscent of the Black Rebel Motorcycle Club or some tortured soul dragged from the gutters of 90’s Manchester and raised on a diet of Pins and Placebo than of 70’s country. But listen more closely and perhaps you can hear the folk melodies fighting for position amongst the phasing electronica. This is certainly not the only reference to past masters the band have made an effort to make; they have covered both Cocaine by Cream and Love Song by The Cure in the past couple of years.

The Big Pink are creating a certain amount of hype around them at them moment but this seems to be as much to do with the company they keep as it does with their music. I expect this band will end up in a pitched battle with their style fighting their content. Their first single from the album,  Dominoes, has certainly given content a good beating, a poor attempt at epic sound that just doesn’t work and sounds far too overproduced and glossy compared to the garage sounds of pre album releases like Too Young To Love. I recommend listening to them now in case they end up using shockwaves to make their heads resemble Daliesque nightmares ergonomically designed for wanking off The Klaxons on an NME cover coming to your local Costcutter soon.

The Big Pink are currently Touring Europe, the US and Japan until the end of the year, briefly interrupted by a number of dates supporting Muse on their UK arena tour this November.

IOHO recommends the tracks:

Too young to Love and She’s No Sense

Websites:

musicfromthebigpink.com

www.myspace.com/musicfromthebigpink

Too Young to Love

Fruit Bats

So after wanting to set up a blog championing brand new music for such a long time and finally doing it who better to start with than ‘Fruit Bats’, a band who formed a decade ago and released their fourth album this August.

Fruit Bats rose out of the ashes of Chicago based band I Rowboat in 1999 and released their first album Echolocation in 2001. Since signing to Sub Pop in 2002 the band has released three more albums; Mouthfuls (2003), Spelled in Bones (2005) and this Summer they released their fourth album The Ruminant Band.

Despite being around for 10 years Fruit Bats do possess a huge number of qualities that make them perfect for the first IOHO review. Despite their quality, ability and tours with bands such as Modest Mouse and Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci they remain relatively and unjustifiably unknown. They also scream of influence from classic 70’s folk rock as well as some more modern favourites. For their new album ‘The Ruminant Band’ Imagine Led Zeppelin III recorded by Fleetwood Mac and a host of 70’s superstars, covered by a band made up of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah and the Two Gallants.

Fruit Bats may lack the heart pounding drive of a strong rhythm section but they do possess a great collection of melodies, lyrical imagery and musical flourishes that make them a must listen for fans of 70′s and modern folk.

Fruit Bats are currently on a European tour promoting their new album ‘The Ruminant Band’ from which IOHO recommends the following tracks:

The Ruminant Band, Feather Bed, Buffalo and Deer and Seaweed.

Websites:

www.myspace.com/thefruitbats

www.subpop.com

www.fruitbatsmusic.com

The Ruminant Band Live