Nick Waterhouse has made it back onto my playlist this week. Also, My Toys Like Me.
From your other posts, it seems you're closer to London, where these guys are from. I got their first album shortly after it came out, but where I lived at the time didn't have a reliable postal system, so I opted for the Amazon mp3 download as it was the only other option. My search for a FLAC copy of either album or the various EPs have turned up nothing, but if you can get a hard copy or even one of their 12's and have a good system to play it on, I bet it'd be worth it.
They do have a really nice sound. And yeah, I'm in Ireland, so not too far from England. As for a worthy sound system - not at the moment, sadly.
I'm not sure. But at one point (circa thickfreakness? great record) the Black Keys cared about the blues more than they did the rock, in my opinion. Now they don't. This guy cares about the blues, but he leans to the jazzy soul side of things. It's much truer to 1955, either way.
Ah, I see your point. Although as musicians, the Black Keys and Nick Waterhouse are primarily concerned with creating new music, insofar as they're interested in creating their music. Sometimes I think of the progression of music as a sort of biological or evolutionary process. Blues is an ancestor of rock and roll, which is an ancestor of rock. Blues is also an ancestor of jazz, which is also an ancestor of rock and roll and of course rock. The Black Keys and Nick Waterhouse may make music that expresses recessive musical traits, but it's very much modern music. If Nick Waterhouse were to go back to 1955 people might not recognize what he does as being "true" to the music of the day. Others might clearly see the connection, but the difference would likely be apparent to them as well. The post-modern ideas of how art can be made includes these time travelling moments, that is, the ability to create new works by using elements of prior works. Though the works may be similar or close to works from other eras, the conscious choice in selecting the work's execution shape the intent behind the piece and that's something that defines the contemporary world of the arts.
I particularly like "recessive musical traits."The Black Keys and Nick Waterhouse may make music that expresses recessive musical traits, but it's very much modern music. If Nick Waterhouse were to go back to 1955 people might not recognize what he does as being "true" to the music of the day. Others might clearly see the connection, but the difference would likely be apparent to them as well.
This is interesting. I wonder just how well-received something like Waterhouse's style would be in '55, or maybe, in a different genre, how popular a modern Sinatra-style singer like Buble would be. There are, I'm sure, subtleties that would be picked up on.
Nick Waterhouse also puts on a hell of a show. I've seen him three times since his beginnings and have the fabled 7" he put out. The energy at his shows is just unmatched. He really knows his shit. Side note on that 7" inch: I bought it from his for 10 bucks. He's apparently so popular now that the damn thing is worth over 300.