R I S K& C O NS E Q UE N C E

Issue 1 | March 2009 | Free

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ContentsIt’s been a long time coming, but we finally made it.Having put the deadline back by two months already, between us, we’ve managed to findthe right balance of encouragement and pro-creation, although there was definitelyprocrastination along the way (Flash Flash Revolution, anyone?). So here it is, in your hands, the first ‘Risk and Consequence’.

I hope you enjoy reading and exploring what we’ve been doing for the past few months, but I do apologise, for it’s not as brim-packed full of gig reviews, album reviews, et-cetera as I’d have liked. We’re completely D-I-Y and that includes paying for entry to gigs and purchasing albums (no, I haven’t quite mastered the art of blagging guestlist yet) - alongside this we work full time jobs AND attempt to have a social life - what can you do?

So if you read ahead, and think you’d like to contribute in someway or another, then don’t hesitate to email us at ‘riskandconsequence@gmail.com’ - we’d love to hear from you.

So, for now, we welcome you.

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T H E O P H I L U SL O N D O N

by sam white

Theophilus London is a New York City-based rapper (apparently he changes where he’s from often, but just for now, it’s Brooklyn) who’s playing anything but safe in this mixtape. It has quite an 80’s synth-driven sound throughout, coupled with a healthy dose of 90s R&B. The production brings it up to date, with a completely eclectic mix of songs that really throw the listener off-guard.

This particular mixtape initially took my interest due to the obvious reference to The Smiths in the title, but furthermore, the El-vis Costello-inspired cover art. The mix has

been making its way onto my daily listens ever since I downloaded it, and best of all, it was a completely free, legal download.

He takes Whitney Houston’s “I Will Al-ways Love You” and raps over the top like the songs were made for each other, and later on he throws in Bill Withers’ “Ain’t No Sunshine” and Lauryn Hill’s cover of “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You”. ‘Ultravio-lent’ uses a heavy post-punk track which I, (or even the internet, surprisingly) can’t place - which is what’s so great about the mix - although I’m writing this 3 months after its initial upload to the internet, it’s still causing ripples of excitement on the music blogosphere, creating interest and building hype that is sure to explode once he starts to produce and release more music.

T H E / 1 8 / C A R A T L O V E / A F F A I R

by kaylea mitchem

The 18 Carat Love Affair is a four piece pic-n-mix of a band, featuring Steve Horry (of 586 fame), Jim Rhesus (front-man of Subliminal Girls), Kate Dornan on the keyboard, (claims to fame include once backing Jarvis Cocker as part of an orchestra and playing at Alan Moore’s wedding), as well as former White Heat resident Dj Patrick Barrett on bass.‘Stop Me, Search Me’ has fun with vocal harmony and dramatic keyboard break-downs, whilst ‘Constructs’ is synth-heavy, and seems to sample ‘that’ noise from Justin Timberlake’s ‘My Love’ (unsure on the intent there, but it does work)! The band look forward to tentatively

out of London soon, with plans to do ashort tour of England in the summer, but for now they’re staying close to home:

In the meantime, you can sign up to the bands mailing list to receive free down-loads of ‘Constructs’ and ‘Ride The Blue Tiger’, and you can also catch Steve Djing at the collaborative launch of Fierce Panda and Cool For Cat’s new Clubnight ‘Sidewalk’ on 4th April at London’s Scala.What to expect? Erasure, Girls Aloud, Queen.... and a bit of The 18 Carat Love Affair and 586 for good measure, well, because he can.

introducing introducing

Tour Dates:Mar 26 | 93 Feet East | LondonApr 12 | Open All Hours Acoustic Show | Barfly | LondonApr 23 | The Last Days of Decadence | LondonApr 27 | Trash Arts | Havana Bar | Portsmouth

W I L D / B E A S T Sinterview by christian allen

Nearing the end of their UK tour, Wild Beasts settled down somewhere in New-castle, hopefully over a nice cold beer, and discussed Wild Beast-related things with Risk and Consequence’s Christian Allen. No ‘Brave Bulging Buoyant Clairvoy-ants’ to be seen anywhere, unfortunately.

R&C: How has the tour been for you so far, do you sense people are enjoying the new songs? Wild Beasts: It is going better then we could possibly have dreamt of. been very open minded. It’s impor

tant for us to tour - realistically thethe album may not be out until September, but when you’re in a band and you make new music you want people to hear it straight away.

R&C: So you’ve finished re-cording the new album, that’s a pretty quick turnaround from last year’s ‘Limbo Panto’, pretty prolific. Wild Beasts: Well that’s our job; it’s easy to get embroiled in other things. But being in the studio recording new music is where we want to be.

R&C: For people who haven’t heard you before: can you try to sum up your sound?Wild Beasts: Fundamentally, it’s pop music. Four minute-long songs with verses and choruses. But at the same time we want to think ‘outside the box’, and sur-prise people. We, ourselves, are very bored of what we’re currently being force fed.

R&C: What can we be expect-ing from the new album then?Wild Beasts: It will be more accessible and less of an intense listen from the last album. I think it’s a little more ‘groovy’ and danceable than ‘Limbo, Panto’.

R&C: What new releases are you most looking forward to in 2009? Wild Beasts: Junior Boys are one of the most underrated bands around. They’re signed to Domino Records and are releasing a new album this year.

R&C: My first glimpse of the Wild Beasts live experience was when you were supporting Maximo Park at Gloucester Guildhall a year or so ago, and it seemed the crowd weren’t really sure how to take you – is this becoming less of a problem now?Wild Beasts: I remember that being a particularly difficult gig! But that’s part of what we want to do, to confront people.

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interviewinterview

A S / I N / R E B E K K A M A R I Aby kaylea mitchem

As In Rebekkamaria is the alter-musical project of RebekkaMaria Andersson, leading lady of Danish/Swedish band Lampshade.

The album, Queen of France, has abso-lutely blitzed its way through my Last.fm charts, hanging onto the top spot for quite some time now. Standout track She Lion is an absolute belter, at it’s best when cranked up to full volume in the car with no regards to who can hear you singing your face off. So far, the album has only been given a Swedish release, which was way back in October 29th, but She Lion is set to be released in the UK at a date to be confirmed

.

Fingers crossed she follows suit with the album, and then after what will be a painful wait on my part; a tour of the UK.

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M A R I N A / &T H E / D I A M O N D S

by kaylea mitchem

Marina Diamond, or her musical pseud-onym of Marina and the Diamonds,hasn’t done too badly with her first foray into the music world. Herdebut single ‘Obsessions’, released by Neon Gold/Warner on Valentine’sDay (only a couple left for grabs, pick it up whilst you can atwww.puregroove.com) has been remixed by the Lamacq-championed duo ofGold Panda and The Aspirins For My Children and has been picking uppraise from all corners of the industry.

She has a string of dates around the

UK coming up with appear-ances as far afield as Edinburghand the Isle of Wight in amongst various festival appearances at TheGreat Escape Festival (we’ll be see-ing her there!) Camden Crawl, andBestival to name a few.

I was lucky enough to catch her per-formance at Southampton’s, erm...Hamptons venue in February. It was refreshing to see a confidentfemale artist strutting around the stage whilst powering her waythrough the set with a voice so strong that it’ll make the hairs onthe back of your neck stand on end. Arena magazine hails her as ‘theEnglish Gwen Stefani, except she

can play an instrument’ and in almosta tribute to this comparison, she did play a fantastic cover versionof “What you waiting for?”.

She’s definitely a ‘diamond’ in the rough (you knew it was coming),but let’s face it - she needs to be in the vast sea of femalesinger/songwriters drowning the Brit-ish music scene at the moment. Herlyrics are simple and honest, with ‘Obsessions’ boasting a 30 secondlong confused question of whether or not to buy crackers in a panickedfrenzy. Comparisons have already been drawn left, right and centre toKate Bush, Regina Spektor, Nina Ha-gen and unfortunately... Kate Nash.

With Marina retorting on the latter comparison in her typically outspokenmanner, “Oops I have a vagina and a keyboard. We’re so similar!”

Tour Dates:Apr 1 | Lancaster Library | LancasterApr 12 | Limbo | EdinburghApr 16 | Twisted Wheel | GlasgowApr 18 | Moshulu | AberdeenApr 19 | Homegame-Anstruther | ScotlandApr 24/25 | Camden Crawl | LondonApr 30 | Deaf Institute | ManchesterMay 1 | Paradiso | AmsterdamMay 2 | Live @ Leeds | LeedsMay 3 | Sounds from the Other City | SalfordMay 16 | Great Escape | BrightonMay 21 | Stag & Dagger | LondonMay 25 | Evolution Festival | NewcastleJune 7 | Sellindge Music Festival | KentJune 13 | University Ball | CambridgeJuly 12 | Wakestock Festival | North WalesJuly 26 | Camp Bestival | Dorset

introducing introducing

“Many thanks to Simon Cummings (http://5-against-4.blogspot.com/) for the recommendation ofAs In Rebekkamaria.”

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E S S E Rinterview by christian allen

R&C: How are you finding the jump from the venues that you’re used to playing to the arena dates that you’re playing on your current tour with The Kaiser Chiefs? Esser: We’ve never played to so many people before. The first couple of shows were nerve-wracking but I think we’ve re-ally learnt to adapt to the huge venues, and have been able to put our sound across well.

R&C: Who would you cite asyour main artistic influences?Esser: Someone I find myself mention-ing a lot in terms of influence is Joe Meek (Gloucestershire born music producer from the 50s/60s). He has really influenced me in terms of what he was

doing with sounds. I’m mainly inspired by someone who dares to be innovative.

R&C: With the debut album recorded and mastered, when can we expect a release date?Esser: The debut, ‘Brave Face’ is due to be released in May. It’s weird because it’s been sitting there for a while, so we’ve been working on a new E.P, writing and doing some production with other people, you know, keeping busy. I’m really pleased with the album but also want to keep things moving and show the world what I can do.

R&C: Many artists who have been touted for 2009 have a heavy 80s synth-sound…where do you think you fit in? Esser: When I started writing I wasn’t thinking about how to fit in. I just wanted to write pop music. It just seems at the moment there are more artists who are proud to be writing pop tunes, which wasn’t the case a few years ago.

R&C: Who do you suggest people listen to, other than yourself of course!Esser: I really like what Fryars and Micachu are doing at the moment. There’s also another guy who plays under the name Danimal Kingdom (ex Bolt Action Five) who’s coming with us on our headline tour, I’d definitely recom-mend you give him a listen. They’re all acts who haven’t been hugely hyped but are doing interesting and important things.

R&C: It’s important to see that there are exciting bands outside of top 10 ‘ones to watch out for’ lists. Esser: This is it; you think, ‘surely, not all these bands can be huge?’ People just get excited about something new, regardless of whether it’s good or terrible. It takes a number of albums for bands to really produce their best material; it’s not always

R&C: Are there any bands you aspire to tour with in the future?Esser: I’d love to support Blur!

R&C: Complete this sentence:‘Readers of Risk and Consequence should get involved in music because…’Esser: It’s fun. I think too many people cre-ate bands because they want to be famous and be the biggest band in the world. They forget to enjoy themselves along the way.

Tour Dates:Apr 16 | Cockpit | LeedsApr 17 | King Tuts | GlasgowApr 18 | Empire | MiddlesbroughApr 19 | Duchess | YorkApr 21 | Deaf Institute | ManchesterApr 23 | Thekla | BristolApr 24 | Joiners | SouthamptonApr 25 | Cavern | ExeterApr 27 | Komedia | BrightonApr 28 | Arts Centre | ColchesterApr 29 | Arts Centre | Norwich Apr 30 | London ULU | London

interview interview

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T H E / F A L Ldirected by tarsem singh

by carl howard

The Fall is one of those films that don’t come around too often, it’sto be watched with an open mind and with a fair bit of imagination.

A labour of love for Tarsem Singh (The Cell), the story behind how thefilm came to be made is almost as interesting as the film itself.Taking around four years to com-plete and using minimal specialeffects, all locations in the film are real and were only facilitatedby Tarsem simultaneously carry-ing out his day job of directing

television commercials and music videos. He funded the film almostentirely himself, and you can re-ally tell that he put his heart andsoul in to it. Set in 1920’s Los Angeles, it centers around the unlikely friendshipbetween recently paralysed stunt-man Roy Walker (Lee Pace), who wasinjured in the literal sense of the title just prior to the openingsequence, and six year old Alex-andria (Catinca Untaru) who isrecovering from a broken arm.To pass the time and to make con-versation, Walker begins to tell theyoung girl a story, which is where The Fall really starts to come intoit’s own. All of the story sequences are shown through Alexandria’s

point of view. Thus begins the extraordinarily vivid and improvisedtale of six heroes, introduced one by one with their own back storiesbut united by one common goal; to seek revenge and to bring the evilGovernor Odius (Dan-iel Caltagirone) to justice.They are The Indian (Jeetu Verma) - an unnamed warrior seeking toavenge the death of his wife, Otta Benga (Marcus Wesley) - an escapedAfrican slave seeking revenge for the death of his brother, Luigi(Robin Smith) - an explosive ex-pert banished from his homeland,Charles Darwin (Leo Bill) - aveng-ing the death of an extremely rarebutterfly, and their leader The Masked Bandit, who’s brother had beenkidnapped, tortured and hung by

Odius. They are then joined by aMystic (Julian Bleach) who de-cides to help them on their quest.

Filmed on location in eighteen coun-tries including South Africa, Indiaand Fiji, the story sequences flit between vast deserts to lushgardens to grand temples but man-age to fit together seamlessly in avisually stunning collage of scenery, all held together by Walker’s narrative.

As time goes by, Walker struggles to come to terms with his conditionand realises that he can use the story to manipulate Alexandria in tohelping him commit suicide. The film and story sequences then take adark twist and I won’t give any more away but say that what happensafter that really wrenches at the heart strings.

Ultimately, it’s the relation-ship and interaction between thecharacter of Alexandria and Walker that holds the whole thing togetherand is dealt with in a very delicate and touching way. Pace and Untaruwere kept apart prior to and in-be-tween filming and all of the hospitalscenes are shot in sequence so all of the reactions from the characterof Alexandria are genuine. In fact, whilst filming the hospitalscenes, the entire cast and crew were led to believe that Pace was actually wheelchair bound.

As I mentioned in the introduc-tion, if you watch the film with an openmind then you’ll be rewarded with a visually incredible and heartwarming story, a must see and can-not be recommended highly enough.

film review film review

E M M Y / T H EG R E A T

album review by gareth harper

It always worries me a fair old bit when a band gain an impressive andsubstantial following off of the back of a few EP’s and Demos alone,before any thoughts of putting out an L.P have even reached anembryonic stage, as this is one of the reasons that so many brilliantbands have fallen prey to something resembling the ‘difficult second al-bum’ syndrome before the process of releasing their first has even begun.

Fans build up their own preconcep-tions of what the album should sound

like, and it means for example that if someone like Emmy The Greatdecides to change anything about one of the five previously releasedtracks that were re-recorded for her debut album First Love, in eventhe teeny tiniest of ways, then a sense of underwhelming anddisappointment may well en-sue, if not a sense of uproar, amongst the aforementioned fans

So, when I finally got my hands on First Love I must confess that Ihad braced myself slightly for an anticlimax. I was taking a “Hey, ifI don’t get my hopes up then I won’t be too disappointed when it’spants” approach to listening to

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this album, and as such I think thismay well be a contributing factor to my highly objective opinion thatTHIS ALBUM IS AMAAAAAAAZING!

The album is a beautifully craft-ed musical odyssey, coalescingelements of indie-pop and anti-folk with an underlying presence ofstorytelling. Indeed, much has been changed by Emma-Lee Moss and herco-producers slash bandmates, ‘The Hypnotist’s Son’ has been lent anew lease of life with a quicker tem-po, whilst ‘We Almost Had A Baby’benefits simply from a good old-fashioned polish in production. New elements are applied astutely, including extra instrumental elements

in ‘Easter Parade’ and ‘MIA’ for example, however this affirms their status as fan favourites -after all, if it isn’t broke.....

Emmy’s charmingly delicate, con-sistently stunning vocals possess theability to break one’s heart and then stitch it back together within the space of a verse; a feeling characteristic to the listeningexperience of the album as a whole. The album deals well with fairlyearnest issues, portraying them through a storytelling perspective, and bonding them in an eloquent yet childish observation, evincing the band’s unmistakable anti-folk influence (despite their best efforts to avoid it).

album review album review

flickr.com/photos/fishplums/ - Jonathon Fisher

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This is perhaps most evident on the title track and lead single,‘First Love’. Inspired by Samuel Beckett’s “First Love’, the storydescribes how she was seduced by a boy with ‘a room’ and ‘music toplay’ - more importantly, Leonard Cohen’s ‘Hallelujah’. It lures youinto a wistful state with its insight-ful lyricism, menacing bass-lineand eerie synths; making the shift into the realms of the major keyall the more glorious each and every time the chorus returns.

Despite Emmy claiming, with a clear double entendre, ‘I wish that i’dnever come’, the shift to the major key for ‘Now that I have, I woulddo it again’ says that, even though she says she didn’t enjoy her

one night stand, she can only remember the ‘Hallelujah’, in otherwords, she did enjoy it really!

It is perhaps all to easy for this ‘writer’ to get carried away withthe beautifully crafted nuggets of folksy-pop that this album consistsof and ignore the blemishes that lie therein. There is of course roomfor improvement: the inclusion of a reprise to Easter Parade (theimaginatively entitled Easter Parade Pt.2) could be deemed as slightlyfruitless and verging slightly too far on the wrong side of the borderbetween killer and filler, as does the entirely forgetful Dylan whichhas the dubious honour of be-ing the only track on the album thatyou’ll find yourself continually skip-

ping (although this skipping isrewarded as you’ll reach the blissful On The Museum Island when you doso). [“Dylan is a sentiment that noone else will ever understand” - it’s one of my favourites from the debut; so I guess that there’s a little something for everybody, and not everything is to all tastes! - Lea]Negative points (or lack of) aside, thisoffering of songs should be enough to convince those skepti-cal of Emmy’s ability to createa consistently excellent full-length-that she has in fact done that,whilst those who weren’t skepti-cal in the first place will probablyjust fall completely in love with what lies within the packaging and lyricism of First Love.

Now, about that difficult second album...

T H E / J O Y / F O R M I D A B L Ealbum review by kaylea mitchem

There’s something about train journeys that make me feel really odd, out of sync. It’s not often that I catch a train; unfortunately I have a rather large carbon footprint that is formed from the tail-end of my car. However there’s nothing that could possibly beat a train journey on a beautiful day, apart from a finding a debut album for download, completely free and legal, that I’ve been waiting to hear for months, that is downloaded and on my mp3 player within ten minutes just in time to catch said train on said beautiful day.

The Joy Formidable released ‘A Balloon Called Moaning’ on February 16th as a free

download from NME.com. Opening track, ‘The Greatest Light Is The Greatest Shade’ is a wise choice for an opener; I recognise it instantly from when I saw them support-ing White Lies a couple of months back, however it seems to fall downhill from here. Predictably, ‘Cradle’, ‘Austere’ and ‘The Last Drop’ all feature on the debut. I doubt the album will surprise or excite an established fan, as it all seemed to wear off for me post-’Austere’, having exhausted the initial three tracks pre-al-bum release. The remaining tracks aren’t enough to convince me that the album is a strong first-release, and I’m honestly very disappointed, Luckily, my mood is rarely dampened when I’m traveling by train.

album review album review

P A T R I C K / W O L Flive review by kaylea mitchem

Cheltenham and Gloucester have seen very little action in the way of music since the demise of Pop Goes The Weasel, Coughing Colours, and more recently, The Super Salon (God bless their souls). Then along came iDLE HANDS and the music enthusiasts of Gloucester-shire exhaled a collective sigh of relief.Run by a small group of promoters from Hereford, iDLE HANDS pre-sented Patrick Wolf to the Glouces-ter Guildhall on Monday 9th March.

Having seen Patrick numerous times in various packed out venues around the country (including Shepherds Bush

Empire in December 2007, where it was a struggle to breathe, never mind move) it was quite a shock to see the 380-capacity venue less than half full (or empty - depending on your outlook)!As Patrick took to the stage he ap-peared to be wearing a black leather chastity belt..... on his face (insert long-shot at a metaphor of sexual repres-sion and restraint here)..... Always a pleasure to see your costume, Patrick!

Patrick’s set showcased a great variety of songs from the upcoming album, The Bachelor, including Damaris, Hard Times, and Back Down, mixed in with old-time favourites Tristan, Accident and Emer-gency and a newly-altered Teignmouth, which sounded definitively different,

happier perhaps. He also performed a tweaked and produced Theseus, which has previously only been played acoustically. I was initially worried that Patrick was going to be a little shy, as he kept any conversation with the audience to a minimum in the first half of the show - I reasoned with myself that perhaps it was because he hadn’t toured for so long and wasn’t sure what to talk about. However he soon warmed to the stage as though he’d never left, and spoke of how pleased he was to be performing again -

“I’m here and I’m happy”,despite going through a particularly bad patch at the end of 2007, where it was

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live review live review

Steve Bateman/Big Machine Media

Steve Bateman/Big Machine Media

With ThanksEditor: Kaylea MitchemDesigner: Cain GillCo-Editor: Carl Howard

Contributors:Sam WhiteChristian AllenGareth Harper

Special Thanks: Rob Kimber

Artwork:Anneka LangeAmy Ellis

Photography:Steve Bateman/Big Machine MediaJonathon FisherCaroline Nordin

rumoured he wanted to quit musicaltogether. It looks like the new album is set to feature an eclectic mixture of songs, some heavily influenced by rock music (which is a direction I am, and others I’m sure, are surprised that Patrick is taking). He finished the set by going back to ba-sics with a song named ‘Back Down’, featuring just an electric organ and drums, which Patrick wrote shortly after he learnt that his father was ill - saying that it was a return to nature after finishing The Magic Position & the promotional tour, what he summed up as “a year of excess”.

Next came the inevitable; what cos-tume change would be better precedented

by than an encore? Patrick returned to the stage in a cape designed by Ada Zanditon (created for the self-directed video for the first single taken from The Bachelor, Vulture), who has been busy backstage creating costumes for the tour. Adorned with an animal skull encrusted with pink jewels, Patrick bid the excitable crowd of Gloucester farewell by dedicat-ing ‘The Magic Position’ to the parents of a long-time fan Gemma, who passed away last year. He described it as a “celebra-tion of life”, a song that has opened many doors and opportunities for him - and cer-tainly gained him a legion of adoring fans.

live review

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Expect Issue Two to land late Spring!Want to get involved?You can contact us at riskandconsequence@gmail.comRead our blog at riskandconsequence.blogspot.comAlternatively follow us at twitter.com/riskconsequence

Thank you for taking the time to pick up and read the first copy of Risk and Consequence. If you enjoy it even a fraction of the amount that Ross enjoys camping, we’ll be a very happy boy and girl.

“We should put ribbons on it and everything!” - Cain

W W W . R I S K & C O N S E Q U E N C E . B L O G S P O T . C O M