BLOGGER: shark batter records
LOCATION: scottish borders & brooklyn, new york
WEBSITE: sharkbatter.com
MYSPACE: myspace.com/sharkbatterrecords
The Stark Palace's debut album, The Stark Palace, featuring some creepy cover art by Cameron Jack, has been getting rather rave reviews verging on the rabid of late. Read a few of these below.
Here are four songs from the album free to download right here...
THE WEREWOLF SONG (simian)
A cheerful song about the compulsion to maim and kill whenever the moon rises and the Hombre Lobo curse kicks in.
ATTENTION SPAN (jack)
Some relationships are just trouble from the start.
HUNGARIAN MINOR (simian)
Named after the scale the tune's written in, rather than underage Eastern Europeans.
BRAKELIGHT CABERNET (words: jack music: simian)
An eventful trip Cameron once took to Avignon with friends.
THE SUNDAY HERALD (13/12/09)
What's the best Scottish album of the past 10 years? It's a question I was asked recently and it stumped me straight away: not just because it sometimes feels like 1999 was the day before yesterday, but also because, in this cold but hopeful dawn of the download revolution, it's more difficult than ever to visualise bands as being from anywhere other than a swirling digital vortex. Scottish? Belgian? Beamed on to your hard drive from somewhere to the left of Jupiter?
Actually, two of those would go a reasonable way towards describing The Stark Palace, a duo based in the Borders but sounding like ... well, what? From the scribbled notes I made on a first listen to this debut album - which brings together songs released in the past couple of years on three EPs - that would include Captain Beefheart, the Beta Band, 10cc, the Fall, an altered-state Dick Dale and (this last bit with several exclamation marks) Pop Will Eat Itself. In Jamaica.
You might have clocked "three EPs" and "Beta Band" there, and that's not a bad point from which to take our bearings: just as those east-coast oddities alchemised eclecticism into near-perfection, so The Stark Palace have a consuming passion for sound. There's a real wit at work here; an inventiveness that rewards you with constant surprises. Take Girl On Ghost: while the aforementioned PWEI-do-reggae thing would make it enough of a joy, it also has performance artist Hypnotique giving it an enchanting vocal about Egyptian curses and cunnilingus. And no sooner have you put your head (sorry) round that than we're into the sublime Your Face, which recalls The Fall with its cardboard-box beats and rudimentary fuzz for a bassline, yet boasts a melody that would make even Mark E Smith weep with joy.
Roger Simian - who, with Cameron Jack, makes up this beautiful little band - is also the guitarist with Dawn Of The Replicants, and a lot of that outfit's unabashed oddness is at play here. Yet what sets this apart is just how heartfelt - how poetic - it is. The exquisite Cybersonnet, which arrives half-way through, is the perfect example: unsure yet fascinated by the lyric, I Googled my way to Simian's blog, where the pieces fell into place and I realised that there's more art, heart and soul going into this stuff than ... well, far too many of the so-called classic Scottish albums of the past 10 years, put it that way.
My own choice of the decade, incidentally, is Aereogramme's Sleep And Release. But - with less than a month to go - The Stark Palace is already right up there. Simply outstanding.
by Simon Stuart
***
THE SKINNY (2/12/09)
4/5 stars
Thank God there are still people making albums like this. Straddling the divide between avant-garde lunacy and controlled madness in a way that would make Captain Beefheart proud, Roger Simian and Cameron Jack have produced a work of near-genius. Eschewing the received wisdom that a unifying theme is a good thing, the Borders-based duo veer stylistically from palette to palette to daub their way to a kaleidoscopic musical work of art. Influences are many and varied. The shadow of the aforementioned Captain looms large over opener CroMagnon Man with Simian doing a fine impression of his Delta growl as shrieking guitars and crunching beats bring up the rear. You can hear the influences of Can on the spacey jam Las Mujeres Perdidas while the vicious wit of Frank Zappa is detectable in the barbed couplets of Napoleon Does Dallas. While not every idea that is thrown at the wall sticks, the philosophy of gleeful abandon is only to be encouraged.
by Duncan Forgan
***
THE SCOTSMAN (28/12/09)
4/5 stars
If only 3Oh!3 had spent some time at college hanging out with the weird kids, they might have accessed the trippy pop hinterlands on which the Stark Palace is built. Roger Simian, Borders-based psychiatric nurse-turned-fanzine writer and independent record company mogul, has more or less dedicated his DIY musical career to the barking memory of Captain Beefheart. He is joined in this latest venture by professional grave-digger Cameron Jack. Their debut album collects 13 tracks from their three EPs to date, some little more than tantalising sketches, which exhibit an almost throwaway talent for off-kilter pop – and dramatic Romany instrumentals.
by Michael Church
***
THE LIST (9/12/09)
4/5 stars
It’s been a long time since we heard from Scottish Borders outfit, Dawn Of the Replicants. Former psychiatric nurse turned zine-scriber, Roger Simian (and co), seemed to have just fallen off the musical map. But here with gravedigger, Cameron Jack (and a few other ‘Replicants’ in tow), The Stark Palace arrive.
Experimenting clone-like via numerous avant/glam-rock idols (think Eno for ‘The Void Replied’, Beefheart for ‘Saw What Your Momma Did’, Ayers for ‘Cybersonnet’, Roxy for ‘The Werewolf Song’, Wire for ‘Brakelight Cabernet’, etc.), their schizoid sentiment for everything 70s and beyond is more than commendable.
by Martin C Strong
***
UNCUT (march 2010)
3/5 stars
Iain Banks-endorsed Scottish oddballs
The lo-fi, DIY likes of the young Beck, Jeffrey Lewis and Baby Bird have a lot to answer for. Skewed, beats-driven pop, punky surrealism and fractured psychedelia are often seen as an easy route to cultish acclaim, but it takes talent to make real eccentricity shine. Former Dawn Of The Replicants player Roger Simian is no stranger to weirdness, and this entertaining debut sees him team up with fellow freak Cameron Jack. The pair are clearly fans of Beefheart and The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band, but they try Bolan's glam funk on for size with the half-speed "Cybersonnet".
by Sharon O'Connell
***
CLASH (16/12/09)
6/10 stars
The Stark Palace consists of Roger Simian (Dawn Of The Replicants) and Scottish underground musician Cameron Jack, who fondly embrace experimental noise with abstract poems, blended with spacerock synths and distorted guitars.
So, it’s fair to say if you are looking for an easy ride of an album, this isn’t for you with its offbeat tunes, clashing guitars, and dada lyrics Simian could well have scribbled during his stint as a psychotic nurse. But in a world of The X Factor, music needs The Stark Palace to challenge and inspire, and boy can these boys play. You will keep coming back to this, if only to decipher Simian’s cryptic lyrics.
by Stephen Maughan
LOCATION: scottish borders & brooklyn, new york
WEBSITE: sharkbatter.com
MYSPACE: myspace.com/sharkbatterrecords
The Stark Palace's debut album, The Stark Palace, featuring some creepy cover art by Cameron Jack, has been getting rather rave reviews verging on the rabid of late. Read a few of these below.
Here are four songs from the album free to download right here...
THE WEREWOLF SONG (simian)
A cheerful song about the compulsion to maim and kill whenever the moon rises and the Hombre Lobo curse kicks in.
ATTENTION SPAN (jack)
Some relationships are just trouble from the start.
HUNGARIAN MINOR (simian)
Named after the scale the tune's written in, rather than underage Eastern Europeans.
BRAKELIGHT CABERNET (words: jack music: simian)
An eventful trip Cameron once took to Avignon with friends.
THE SUNDAY HERALD (13/12/09)
What's the best Scottish album of the past 10 years? It's a question I was asked recently and it stumped me straight away: not just because it sometimes feels like 1999 was the day before yesterday, but also because, in this cold but hopeful dawn of the download revolution, it's more difficult than ever to visualise bands as being from anywhere other than a swirling digital vortex. Scottish? Belgian? Beamed on to your hard drive from somewhere to the left of Jupiter?
Actually, two of those would go a reasonable way towards describing The Stark Palace, a duo based in the Borders but sounding like ... well, what? From the scribbled notes I made on a first listen to this debut album - which brings together songs released in the past couple of years on three EPs - that would include Captain Beefheart, the Beta Band, 10cc, the Fall, an altered-state Dick Dale and (this last bit with several exclamation marks) Pop Will Eat Itself. In Jamaica.
You might have clocked "three EPs" and "Beta Band" there, and that's not a bad point from which to take our bearings: just as those east-coast oddities alchemised eclecticism into near-perfection, so The Stark Palace have a consuming passion for sound. There's a real wit at work here; an inventiveness that rewards you with constant surprises. Take Girl On Ghost: while the aforementioned PWEI-do-reggae thing would make it enough of a joy, it also has performance artist Hypnotique giving it an enchanting vocal about Egyptian curses and cunnilingus. And no sooner have you put your head (sorry) round that than we're into the sublime Your Face, which recalls The Fall with its cardboard-box beats and rudimentary fuzz for a bassline, yet boasts a melody that would make even Mark E Smith weep with joy.
Roger Simian - who, with Cameron Jack, makes up this beautiful little band - is also the guitarist with Dawn Of The Replicants, and a lot of that outfit's unabashed oddness is at play here. Yet what sets this apart is just how heartfelt - how poetic - it is. The exquisite Cybersonnet, which arrives half-way through, is the perfect example: unsure yet fascinated by the lyric, I Googled my way to Simian's blog, where the pieces fell into place and I realised that there's more art, heart and soul going into this stuff than ... well, far too many of the so-called classic Scottish albums of the past 10 years, put it that way.
My own choice of the decade, incidentally, is Aereogramme's Sleep And Release. But - with less than a month to go - The Stark Palace is already right up there. Simply outstanding.
by Simon Stuart
***
THE SKINNY (2/12/09)
4/5 stars
Thank God there are still people making albums like this. Straddling the divide between avant-garde lunacy and controlled madness in a way that would make Captain Beefheart proud, Roger Simian and Cameron Jack have produced a work of near-genius. Eschewing the received wisdom that a unifying theme is a good thing, the Borders-based duo veer stylistically from palette to palette to daub their way to a kaleidoscopic musical work of art. Influences are many and varied. The shadow of the aforementioned Captain looms large over opener CroMagnon Man with Simian doing a fine impression of his Delta growl as shrieking guitars and crunching beats bring up the rear. You can hear the influences of Can on the spacey jam Las Mujeres Perdidas while the vicious wit of Frank Zappa is detectable in the barbed couplets of Napoleon Does Dallas. While not every idea that is thrown at the wall sticks, the philosophy of gleeful abandon is only to be encouraged.
by Duncan Forgan
***
THE SCOTSMAN (28/12/09)
4/5 stars
If only 3Oh!3 had spent some time at college hanging out with the weird kids, they might have accessed the trippy pop hinterlands on which the Stark Palace is built. Roger Simian, Borders-based psychiatric nurse-turned-fanzine writer and independent record company mogul, has more or less dedicated his DIY musical career to the barking memory of Captain Beefheart. He is joined in this latest venture by professional grave-digger Cameron Jack. Their debut album collects 13 tracks from their three EPs to date, some little more than tantalising sketches, which exhibit an almost throwaway talent for off-kilter pop – and dramatic Romany instrumentals.
by Michael Church
***
THE LIST (9/12/09)
4/5 stars
It’s been a long time since we heard from Scottish Borders outfit, Dawn Of the Replicants. Former psychiatric nurse turned zine-scriber, Roger Simian (and co), seemed to have just fallen off the musical map. But here with gravedigger, Cameron Jack (and a few other ‘Replicants’ in tow), The Stark Palace arrive.
Experimenting clone-like via numerous avant/glam-rock idols (think Eno for ‘The Void Replied’, Beefheart for ‘Saw What Your Momma Did’, Ayers for ‘Cybersonnet’, Roxy for ‘The Werewolf Song’, Wire for ‘Brakelight Cabernet’, etc.), their schizoid sentiment for everything 70s and beyond is more than commendable.
by Martin C Strong
***
UNCUT (march 2010)
3/5 stars
Iain Banks-endorsed Scottish oddballs
The lo-fi, DIY likes of the young Beck, Jeffrey Lewis and Baby Bird have a lot to answer for. Skewed, beats-driven pop, punky surrealism and fractured psychedelia are often seen as an easy route to cultish acclaim, but it takes talent to make real eccentricity shine. Former Dawn Of The Replicants player Roger Simian is no stranger to weirdness, and this entertaining debut sees him team up with fellow freak Cameron Jack. The pair are clearly fans of Beefheart and The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band, but they try Bolan's glam funk on for size with the half-speed "Cybersonnet".
by Sharon O'Connell
***
CLASH (16/12/09)
6/10 stars
The Stark Palace consists of Roger Simian (Dawn Of The Replicants) and Scottish underground musician Cameron Jack, who fondly embrace experimental noise with abstract poems, blended with spacerock synths and distorted guitars.
So, it’s fair to say if you are looking for an easy ride of an album, this isn’t for you with its offbeat tunes, clashing guitars, and dada lyrics Simian could well have scribbled during his stint as a psychotic nurse. But in a world of The X Factor, music needs The Stark Palace to challenge and inspire, and boy can these boys play. You will keep coming back to this, if only to decipher Simian’s cryptic lyrics.
by Stephen Maughan
