Finally, a multi-media futureclown who sings alternative James Bond theme tunes for a steampunk + LSD induced age of mayhem!
Our harlequin for the evening, Rachel Mason has a new album entitled Das Ram and what a world of glistening delights awaits us within its lustrous realms…
On the opening song, ‘Roses’ it’s as if Kate Bush is singing The Lord Of The Rings songbook in a corridor in Metal Gear Solid. You really have the sense of stepping into another world; the lyrics are folky and evocatively olde worlde building. Rachel’s voice grips you from the moment. The music pulls you in another direction though, as sweeping the T-Dream swoops are destroyed by skittering drum beats, like arachnoid legs on an ice floe. A swooping ballad meets a relentless dance classic. Fucking hell, this is how you start an album.
‘Heart Explodes’ makes good that James Bond promise with a ton of torchy tension. Look, lets imagine The Associates singing Octopussy. While we’re tripping that trip, it’s worth saying that Rachel’s voice is very Billy MacKenzie-ish. Indulgent and brilliantly so, this is a voice wrapped up in its own mag-nif-icence. She takes a chorus and blows it skywards.
The sidewinder guitar of ‘Sandstorm’ escorts our existential Rachel. The drums clatter like a punk thrown the stairs.
‘Tigers In The Dark’s dubby production and shrieking electro burns like an oil rig fire while Rachel goes off the deep end. A fractured and opulent dreamscape of rippling verdancy.
‘Marry Me’ nervoid twitching, gives way to chugging machine bass. The song spins around a relentless chorus in which Rachel threatens to take you up the aisle. It’s a gorgeous slow build electro track perfect for any neon coloured thriller trailer at your local multiplex. And then an amazing slow fade out with its New Order Movement. All the things in your life that go wrong…
‘Queen Bee’ flaunts Roxy Music opulence over clockwork beats and a guitar from a Michael Mann movie.
‘Cancer’ hits with a phalanx force of drum beats. A disorientating panorama of sounds come at you from 360 degrees, while Rachel stands in the middle of the melee, ripping up a breathless chorus.
‘Heaven’ ends with the funkiest track on the album, everything locking together to resemble The B-52s covering Zombies’ ‘The Time Of The Season’. It’s the last song of the night and the walls of the club are made from velour.
The guitars are taut and wired for your secret pleasure. The synths are set to sunrise. Yet the moodiness of the music is in direct odds with the sheer electricity of Rachel’s vocals which are off the grid. Two albums for the price of one.
Not only is Rachel Mason a true artist but she is an essential one.
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