Thing of the Day
Mike Scott new album, and an EP from In Bear Country
MAY
23rd 2011
Today we have Mike Scott’s new
album as a Thing of The Day, some sketchbook acoustic punk and something a
little less disposable and not just chirping
like a bird and making money from fourteen year old girls…
MIKE SCOTT – Saturation Point
(Fond Of Life) – There’s some beautiful honestly here, some stripped back words
and some heartfelt tunes. Short songs, very personal songs, almost sketchbooks,
ideas left bare for all to feel; some of them almost feel like unfinished bits
of songs. They sound right though, they don’t sound unresolved, just there,
bare…. Just a man and an acoustic guitar most of the time, with an occasional bit of
acoustic instrumentation and female backing voice, but mostly just a man with a
guitar. Bit of a Billy Bragg in terms of southern English Essex-voiced
delivery, yet more of a personal agenda than Mr Bragg, more in tune with
Frank Turner’s personal journeys.
Mike Scott was one time bass player with melodic hardcore punk outfit Phinius Gage: seems he left them in 2007 to concentrate on his acoustic punk rock songs. There’s been a few singles and things, and this is Mike’s debut album – and these are very much punk rock songs, bare honest open simple punk songs, clever songs, extremely likeable songs (had this album on repeat for most of the day here, never gets boring, little bit more revealed each time..), Seventeen songs, all short, all sounding like ideas, one verse, the bare bones of a chorus – stripped back to basic or work in progress, daring or cop-out?,
Most of Saturation Point is very personal –
relationships, mess ups, hope, anger -
some of it crusading, some of it blunt, some of it cynical, a lot of it
positive... some of it familiar punk rock ground – state of the scene, the
people, state of the world, state of his tabloid 
town, could be any town, he
does sounds like he’s from the southern counties of England, one of those towns where those
Polish immigrants have taken all of our jobs, the ones none of us wanted to do
anyway.. Simple songs, basic songs,
angry songs, personal songs, modern folk songs, constructive things left in the
air, unifying songs, King Blues, Levellers, lots of reasons to wake up, lots of
regard for things like human space.
Saturation Point is a simple thing, an uncomplicated uncluttered album,
a very very likeable album made by a clearly very agreeable person. An honest
open album, and despite some of the subject matter and money being tight right
now and the favours we’re all having to call in in these hopeless times when
were not all in it together and their big society doesn’t really include most
of us... despite all, this is a hopeful album. Maybe we are at a saturation point
and there may be thousands and thousands of albums and bands coming at you, it
might be a hopeless thing to even be in a band? No, never hopeless... worth taking the
time to search this one out, and then when you have, worth giving it a little
time and space to breath before it really reveals itself as a beautifully
honest album…
I hadn’t read the notes on the
cover (like to avoid them until the music has done the talking), and I see it says in his
liner notes: “Music is disposable right now, a million
artists after your attention. This is my reaction to it, our first full-length
album. It’s a scrapbook of ideas done at low budget.”
mikescottacoustic.bandcamp.com
Mike Scott also has another new
album called (ALMOST)
EVERYTHING ELSE out on AAAHH!!! Real
Records at the moment, a collection of those singles, EPs and such he’s already
put out
Meanwhile, also out this month
on Fond Of Life:
IN BEAR COUNTRY – In Bear
Country EP (Fond Of Life) - That earnestly emotional gruff throat, that raw
roar of commitment that comes with these punk pop bands. This is a universal
sound, they could be from anywhere, but In Bear Country are actually from
Vancouver, Canada and this is a debut five track EP out on respected German
punk label Fond Of Life. The members of the band have more than served their
time in other Canadian punk bands, names like Daggermouth,
