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May 15 2008
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Elly Roberts reviews
Lightspeed Champion: Falling Off The Lavender Bridge
Distributed by
Domino
- January 2008
- Rating: 10/10+
Ex-Test Icicle guitarist forms new band, with surprising results.
I say surprising because of some of his previous collaborations haven’t
exactly spawned great results.
Devonte Hynes’ seems to have found his mojo with new musical venture Lightspeed
Champion, which is far removed from his former band, the daft electro-punk
trio Test Icicles. This time around Hynes pushes the boundaries with an eclectic
set of songs.
Armed with new material, he set off to work in Omaha, Nebraska in early 2007,
where he recruited Bright Eyes’ Saddle Creek producer Mike Mogis who also
plays, along with local musicians Nate Walcott (Bright Eyes) guest vocalist
Emma Lee Moss aka Emmy The Great, a London based singer-songwriter, and a
few moonlighters.
Not really happy with TI’s music, he’s now freed himself to become a maverick
following his diverse musical tastes that take in Broadway musicals, Hip-Hop,
Thrash Punk, and Country, which he’s probably absorbed on his journey from Houston
(born) to Essex (raised) and now Dalston (based).
This is very much a freewheeling album beginning with the exquisite country-tinged
ballad and appropriately titled Number One, a 23-second instrumental
intro to Galaxy Of The Lost, released as a single last year, is adorned
with melancholic vocals, fiddle and dollops of divine pedal steel.
All To Shit has shades of Beatles Eleanor Rigby and classical overtones
crammed into just over a minute. Dropping back to his country template, the
cool and groovy epic Midnight Surprise is laced with more subtle pedal
steel, broken by Emmy’s stunning vocal drop-in midway only to change direction
for the run-in and back again to country shuffle, this time with considerably
more gusto, ending with a whopping crescendo right up to under 10 minutes.
Vocal and strings are enough for an intro to the witty Devil Tricks For A
Bitch but he couldn’t help a bit of bass and drums to conclude. If Hynes
is looking for a UK breakthrough single, it has to be the jaunty Dry Lips
or the equally perky Let The Bitches Die aided by Emmy once again.
File under: Great song writing.
The full list of tracks included are :
1. Number One
2. Galaxy Of The Lost
3. Tell Me What It’s Worth
4. All To Shit
5. Midnight Surprise
6. Devil Tricks For A Bitch
7. I Could Have Done This Myself
8. Salty Water
9. Dry Lips
10. Everyone I Know Is Listening To Crunk
11. Let The Bitches Die
12. No Surprise (For Wendela) / Midnight Surprise
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Review & concert pics copyright © Elly Roberts, 2004-2008.
For prints of any of Elly's concert pics online,
email Elly
or call 07765 862017.
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DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TXW32R4 32" widescreen TV
connected to either a Creative Dxr2 DVD-ROM player or Microsoft Xbox and
played through a Sony STR-DB930 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
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