We've been enjoying Index for Working Musik a lot lately. So it got me to thinking about playing an easy game of "degrees". We'll start with Index for Working Musik and see how many degrees until we get to Penny Arcade:
Index for Working Musik has Max Oscarnold as one of its members (Nathalia Bruno is another significant member)
Max Oscarnold was in the Proper Ornaments with James Hoare (who was also in Ultimate Painting).
James Hoare is the main member of Penny Arcade (London, UK).
Not hard at all. While one can hear Penny Arcade on a few songs of Index for Working Musik, it's much easier to hear The Proper Ornaments and Ultimate Painting as the clear influence. Penny Arcade is languid - almost like The Clientele. AllMusic also mentioned the Canadian band Loving as a touchstone.
Tapete Records released Penny Arcade "Backwater Collage" in May 2024
Since the abrupt and somewhat mysterious end of Ultimate Painting in 2018, James Hoare has been recording sporadically as Proper Ornaments (with Max Oscarnold) but this is his first solo album under the name Penny Arcade. Fans of any of Hoare’s projects, from Veronica Falls on down, will find much that is familiar in this softly psychedelic set of songs, which engage gently but leave an indelible mark.
One can infer considerable tension for Hoare over the last several years, from the break-up so bitter that the last Ultimate Painting album was withdrawn after recording, mixing and sending out to likely reviewers. (I have a copy somewhere. It was good.) He left London for the West of England soon after, seeking whatever one seeks in wilder, less populated places, and shortly after that, COVID happened. It’s been a shitty time for everyone, and Hoare may have gotten an extra dollop. And yet, if you’re looking for strife in the music, you’ll have to probe well below the surface. The sun-dappled exteriors of these preternaturally pretty tunes are serene and calming, though there are some rough, cold currents underneath.
“Jona,” for instance, haunts its space weightlessly, a silvery electric keyboard piercing its hum while looping electric guitar licks lace through its quietude. And yet there’s an unease in its cool, well-lighted interior, a restlessness in the words. “Hey, hey, hands are by his side, hey, hey, counting alibis,” murmurs Hoare (with Nathalia Bruno shadowing him sweetly), and there’s something troubling in the works.
These songs feel wispy because of the vocals, which sigh and shush through languid melodies, but the instruments are often more emphatic. “Want You Around,” drifts and dreams, despite its hard, anchoring beat, lost in reverie, even as a carnival keyboard erupts in the break. “Prodigal Son,” slips the grinding friction of feedback into its fluid guitar lines, just enough to catch your ear, and “Don’t You Cry No Tears,” maybe the second best song after “Jona,” hides a searing guitar and keyboard break under the murmur and swoon. Yet other cuts hang like smoke unspooling, evanescent and hard to pin down. “Mister Softie” is like a Kinks song nodding off in the car, a strong melody wrapped in clouds and indefiniteness.
But let it all wash over you, waves and eddies of pretty sound, tinged with regret and inevitability, but still very, very sweet. Backwater Collage makes a gorgeous, still place for itself if you let it in, and why wouldn’t you?
We’ve written about Modern Nature, the new project from Jack Cooper‘s defunct duo, Ultimate Painting. We’d be remiss if we didn’t mention James Hoare’s long-running band The Proper Ornaments. Since the demise of the duo, both members have jumped headfirst into other projects, and Mission Bells is a fine new album of melancholy pop. The album often reminds us of John Lennon‘s underrated Walls &…
The Naive Set are from Amsterdam, Netherlands, but really do sound like they could be from the U.S. The S/T release will be out soon, and “So Far So Gone” is great on its own. But I went back and listened to the other releases (all on Subroutine Records) and I was instantly taken. The guitar and vocals are the most prominent instruments, and Naive Set clearly have a “sound”. They really sound like a cross between Ultimate Painting (there’s always a groove...and James Hoare produced the new album, and Mikey Young mixed it) and several 1980s guitar bands - Dire Straits, R.E.M. and even Camper van Beethoven. A contemporary band might be The War on Drugs.
But really Naive Set have their own sound. At times more quiet, at times shuffling, and sometimes rocking. There’s a lot here to dig (into).
