Sack: Adventura Majestica (Jetset Junta)
Dublin band Sack have a new bag, and it's apparent from the house beat on the title track, a trundling dance rhythm which drives the song along a dirt track. But don't worry: Sack haven't gone all dancey on us; their new mini-album - the follow-up to the critically acclaimed Butterfly Effect - features a half-dozen rock tunes which wander from expansive to inward-looking, sometimes in the same verse. In Flight is a guitar-charged paean to the pleasures of fleeing, while Sugar Free is a glissando-laced love song which avoids getting too syrupy. Bivouac pitches its sound somewhere between Dubcore and Swingin' Sixties MOR, while Get Up is a Smiths-style lament for the shallow state of modern life in Dublin. Sadly, Sack may always be left in the shadows, but they're still a band to treasure.
Kevin Courtney
Violent Femmes: (Cooking Vinyl)
This is the Milwaukee trio's "lost album", recorded in 1995, but only released in Australia until now. Rock!!!!! started off as a five-track EP, but Gordon Gano, Brian Richie and Guy Hoffman were obviously having such a good time they ended up with a dozen dirty, low-down tunes. Fans of early Femmes anthems like Add It Up and Blister In The Sun will love the punky, hip-shooting immediacy of Living A Lie, Dahmer Is Dead and Tonight ("Tonight I wanna get high/ Tonight I wanna get drunk/Tonight I wanna get laid/ Tonight I wanna get f***ed"). Like The Ramones before them, Violent Femmes do the cretin hop very well, but by the time we get to the downright silly Didgeriblues, we're starting to get a touch of the no-brainer blues.
Kevin Courtney
Attica Blues: Test. Don't Test (Higher Ground)
One of the first Mo Wax acts to make an impact in clubland (thanks in part to Charlie Dark's DJ-ing credentials), Attica Blues have made quiet - if somewhat unspectacular - strides since then. Test. Don't Test sees them doing a spot of reinvention as they bring Egyptian singer Roba El-Essawy to the fold. For some parts, it does work (Just An Avenue and The Man both possess a dramatic thump) but there is a feeling that the set-up is more comfortable with beats than rhymes. Certainly, some of the songs are overwhelmed by the collectives emphasis on atmospheric reach and scope. A Morcheeba with more muscle but a Portishead without the dark touch, Attica Blues may have to do a bit more searching.
Jim Carroll
Lewis Taylor: Lewis II (Island)
Lewis Taylor's debut album was one for those who wanted more than a disposable shimmy when they went looking for soul. One of those rare delights which gained slow, steady momentum thanks to word-of-mouth recommendations, it has presented the follow-up with quite a lot to equal and surpass. Many may find Lewis II a disappointing dilemma on first listen but, like its predecessor, it doesn't deserve immediate abandonment; Taylor's craft and intricately layered soul can only be appreciated with time. From Sly And The Family Stone boogie to Marvin Gaye intensity, the grading on Lewis II is not easily mastered. Like his cover version of Jeff Buckley's Everybody Here Wants You, Taylor's version of soul music and magic is not about what is on the surface but what is buried deep beneath.
Jim Carroll