Led by the charismatic Yolanda Quartey and featuring Massive Attack collaborator Stew Jackson amongst their ranks, this Bristol five-piece have just released their second album, In The Pines, follow up to their self-titled 2008 debut. With Yolanda’s powerful, soulful, deeply impressionistic voice allied to some memorably melodic songs, Phantom Limb have developed a cult following here in the UK. Her voice is pitch-perfect, never fancy nor is there much in the way of show-off frills flair – just pure essence of soul…

Musically, In the Pines has an air of resignation, inspired by ideas of escape and life as a grinding making-ends-meet effort. It’s mix of gospel, country and soul though is deeply moving and rather contagious. “Country and gospel are the same,” says Yolanda, “but with different race singers.”

In the Pines was recorded in the oil capital of California, Signal Hill, with The Black Crowes producer Marc Ford. “That was awesome! Essentially, we went there because we needed a certain level of objectivity – and we didn’t want to spend years toiling over a stove. We knew we could trust him to take us in a direction that we wanted to go, but didn’t have the benefit of objectivity to get there or at the speed we wanted to get there,” laughs Yolanda. We wanted him to take us further on into our influences, into the things we love… We were looking to artists such as Neil Young, The Band, Delaney & Bonny, Mad Dogs and Englishmen…(the infamous Joe Cocker touring band name and live album of 1970). It was a real eye opener, that experience of being produced… We’re massive Crowes fan anyway!

“Stew was pretty much my co-writer for the first album, but for this album everyone in the room contributed, so it’s been more about a band in a room this time. Also, the first album was written when I was 21/22, the second album when I was 26/27 – I felt a lot different with the lyrics…

Over the years they have toured with the likes of Rumer and Will Young and Yolanda has been a guest vocalist with Massive Attack (I was with Massive Attack for only two and a half months – I did a handful of gigs and then it was all over – I spent longer at Butlins as a kid! Nobody seems to mention that Stew was working with them for three and a half years!!) and Nitin Sawnhey, as well as performing backing vocals for artists as diverse as Adele and Dizzee Rascal. Combining session work with a bit of voice training she does and the band means that Yolanda is these days fully immersed in music.

“I was curious when I was a kid – mostly through my friends, Stews family and friends, just naturally curious… I got Dolly Parton from my Mum’s collection, and sang along to it – my voice is Dolly like! I try to sing a song as it is, to prove you can sing a song.

“I worry about my voice, I had to find out more than what was available. Every time a cold turned up it would hit the things I missed (referring to the voice therapy she practices). Adele lost her voice when I did some backing vocals for her and I was nattering on about losing my voice… you need therapy whichever way you look at it. I’ve been looking for at all sorts of therapies to make my voice work. I try and perfect by any means necessary these vocal programmes when on tour when everyone is coughing and spluttering around me. The colds are trying to get at my voice so I get to test these theories out. A lot of cats are getting onto this stuff – a lot of people are getting pissed enough to want to find out for themselves… It’s ridiculous to accept that there is no cure for this sort of thing. (when on tour) I do have to choose what I say, and if you talk in the right way you get away with a lot more,” she says by way of explaining how she copes with the vocal rigors of touring.

Bristol is heavily associated with trip hop, reggae, dub, drum’n'bass and dubstep so how does the band’s sound fit in to the Bristol scene? “Since that Coen Brothers film came out, O Brother Where Art Thou, there has been a real resurgence of Americana… It hit Bristol so much so that someone coined the phrase Brashville – where Bristol meets Nashville… this magazine said there was a glut of people picking up a banjo.. I think it’s happening everywhere.. It’s also down in no small measure to Gillian Welch and David Rawlings; they are my heroes. Most of the people I know who went to their (recent) gig had a nice little cry… I blame them directly, it’s all their fault!

Saturday 3 March, Latest Music Bar, Brighton (and on tour in the UK) 8pm, £6.50

The original lead singer with Ultravox (they were initially known as Ultravox! but dropped the exclamation mark…) before being replaced by Midge Ure in 1979, John Foxx aka Dennis Leigh embarked on a solo career in 1979, whilst pursuing a parallel career in graphic design and education. A truly seminal figure in the pioneering musical fields of electronic synthesiser music, Foxx’s status is that of a bona fide cult artist, a musician who whilst never attaining much in the way of commercial success post-Ultravox, has nevertheless carved out a career as an impeccably uncompromising artist.

Now 63, “I’ve been around since the 60′s,” he laughs. “I started playing around with tape recorders and synthesisers even then (when he was at the Royal College of Art). It’s this love of ‘synthesised’ music that has informed most of his music, although during the 70s he did flirt with glam rock, punk and new wave music. His first proper band, Tiger Lily, featured future Ultravox member Billy Currie, before morphing into Ultravox! in the summer of ’76 just at the point when punk was ready to spill out out of both Manchester and London. But it was during this time as Ultravox that the use of synthesisers (and possibly the first recorded instance of the Roland TR-77) became prominent on their recordings. Their third album, Systems of Romance, and last with John Foxx, is regarded as the first ‘synth-pop’ album and was a huge influence on other bands who came in the wake including Gary Numan. “Drum machine, synths, distance, minimalism – we’d got to the next era while punk was burning itself out. This was what Joy Division’s Ian Curtis and many others picked up on. I guess it became a sort of blueprint for lots of bands,” says Foxx.

Foxx gave up performing in public in the early-80s, and whilst still making music, forged a career as a graphic artist – using his real name he produced book covers for the likes of Salman Rushdie and Jeanette Winterson – but the nascent sounds of Detroit techno gave him the inspiration to record again. “I was just totally bored with music in the 80s – I felt that there was nothing out there that inspired me…. but the sounds of Detroit and Europe techno re-awakened my love of music.”

Listening to the most recent Foxx offering, The Shape of Things, it seems everything has come full circle – within it’s generally minimalist grooves lies the heartbeats of Kraftwerk, Detroit techno, ambient music, early Ultravox, and touches of PiL. It’s still industrial in sound, and yet romantic and earthly. For the last two years Foxx has collaborated with Benge, with two albums under their belt, Interplay and soon-to be-released The Shape of Things, re-establishing Foxx amongst the artrocker fraternity as an musical pioneer of venerable status. Indeed Artrocker magazine named John Foxx & The Maths as Best Electro Act of 2011. “I really enjoy playing live these day, but it can be a headache bringing all that gear of Benge’s (he is an analogue synthesiser obsessive, with all its concurrent machinery and cabling). They’ll joined by Serafina Steer and Hannah Peel on stage, whilst Brighton’s Gazelle Twin (“the sound of someone going somewhere”) aka Elizabeth Walling is in support

John Foxx & The Maths, Friday 24 February, The Haunt, Brighton (and on tour generally)

The great thing about 70′s UK Soul pioneers Kokomo is that their reputation as one of the finest ‘groove’ units ever to come out of this country has remained largely intact. Unlike rather better known contemporaries and touring mates, Kokomo’s status hasn’t been devalued by playing endlessly as something of a tribute to themselves with increasingly suspect line-ups and nor have Kokomo suffered the pressures to remain relevant to changing musical trends and industry whims. No dodgy 80′s drum-machined, synthetic-horned, embarrassing ‘trend’ following albums in this particular back catalogue, thank you very much.

Instead, beset by internal conflicts and other problems, Kokomo simply imploded when all seemed set fair. One or two low key re-unions aside, the band – if certainly not the individual players – has been inactive ever since. So who are Kokomo? Well, they were – and still are, but we’ll come to that – one of the, if not the, finest ‘groove’ units that this country has ever produced. In keeping with many legendary American bands from that period, such as the The Band and Little Feat, Kokomo gained a reputation based not so much on their versatility or musical vocabulary, good as it was, but one based more on the band’s distinctive ‘sound’ and ‘feel’. A ‘sound’ and ‘feel’ which in their case owed much to, without being solely derivative of, ‘old school’ American r&b, soul, gospel and groove based rock.

Formed in May 1973, Kokomo’s first performance was at The Pheasantry, King’s Road, Chelsea where Franky Blackwell, the band’s roadie, coined the band’s name. Their reputation quickly spread and a major label deal was nailed. The band’s debut, Kokomo, released in 1975, was hailed by the NME as the best debut by a British band for several years. The original ten-piece line-up consisted of a trade mark vocal sound using four vocalists: Dyan Birch, Frank Collins, Paddy McHugh and Tony O’Malley (also keyboard duties), all from the band ‘Arrival’, two top ten hits to the good. A key axis of Alan Spenner (bass) and Neil Hubbard (guitar) were recruited from Joe Cocker’s Grease band; Mel Collins (saxophone) from King Crimson. Percussionist Jody Linscott (who went on to tour with The Who, Elton John, Dave Gilmour and more), Terry Stannard (drums) and Jim Mullen (guitar) completed the line up. Such was the unit’s skill and reputation that Bob Dylan recruited the band to help record his Desire album. Despite seemingly having it all in place – including being seen as a priority for their label (CBS) enjoying a top manager (Steve O’Rourke, who also managed Pink Floyd), and making increasing in-roads into the lucrative American market – by January 1977 the band’s meltdown was such that an indefinite hiatus was announced.

After an extended sabbatical, a further studio album was released in 1982, containing the single A Little Bit Further Away which peaked at Number 45 in the British chart. By and large, that was then that, further compounded by the tragic premature death of influential bassist Alan Spenner in August 1991. The band’s enduring pedigree is, however, evidenced by how many of the original members have gone on to enjoy considerable success in their subsequent careers. Jim Mullen is now a much feted award winning jazz guitarist, Hubbard a regular fixture with Bryan Ferry, Linscott continues to work with everyone from McCartney to Will Young and Mel Collins sax work has graced albums and gigs by Dire Straits, Eric Clapton, and the Rolling Stones, to name but a few.

To some extent the The Kokomo torch has continued to be carried by the solo career of co-founder Tony O’Malley (himself briefly a member of 10cc). Whilst O’Malley maintains his integrity as an originals artist, regularly releasing new work, a number of his former Kokomo bandmates have informed much of both his live and studio work, alongside other legendary sidemen such as Hamish Stuart (Average White Band, Chaka Khan, McCartney), Pino Pallidino (The Who, D’Angelo) and Andy Newmark (Sly Stone, John Lennon).

Indeed, it was some recent ‘Tony O’Malley and Friends’ gigs which brought the whole Kokomo experience back into the spotlight. Two back to back sold out gigs at London’s famed 606 club and The Chichester Inn, followed by a later gig at the prestigious Hideaway club, saw O’ Malley take to the stage, by turns, alongside not only regular sidemen Neil Hubbard and Mel Collins but also original singers Frank Collins, Paddy McHugh (over from France) and Dyan Birch. These six original Kokomo members were augmented by the revered engine room of bassist Steve Pearce (whose CV is like a ‘whos who’ of popular music, Stevie Wonder included), drummer Ralph Salmins (ditto) and guitarist Adam Phillips, all noted sidemen with Hamish Stuart’s much admired band. Emerging and highly rated young soul/blues singer, Jo Harman, augmented the line up at each gig which, whether by happy accident or design, collectively nailed both the spirit and sound of the original Kokomo vibe.

Mel Collins, Neil Hubbard at the 606 Club, 2011

Anyone who was there – and legendary drummer Steve Ferrone was one – will bear witness to these very special and extraordinary gigs indeed. Lead by O’Malley’s distinctive ‘down home’ piano style – not a thousand miles away from that of Ray Charles, at times – the ensemble joyously ploughed through an amazing two and half hours of uplifting and heartfelt music. O’Malley handled most of the lead vocal duties with due aplomb, his famous trademark growl ‘owning’ classics like ‘Lovely Day’ and ‘Tears in Heaven’ as much as his own compositions such as ‘Serious’, ‘Mr Operator’ and ‘For The Children’. At the 606 Dyan Birch’s took over lead vocals on ‘Yes We Can Can’ and Frank Collins impressed likewise on the joyous gospel romp that was ‘Gone At Last’.With the engine room of Pearce, Salmins and Hubbard (also excelling on co-lead guitar) creating a pillow of groove so satisfying and spacious that you could lie on it, this was ensemble playing of the highest quality. Mel Collins blew by turns, melodically and bluesely, and the four vocalists weaved and teased, occasionally joining together with full on gospel fuelled intensity.

The individual diary commitments and the fact that O’Malley, like McHugh, now resides in Europe, somewhat ensures these ‘reunions’ largely remain as rare as hens teeth. Which is a genuine shame because although there are many fine soulful musicians in this country, no one but no one grooves quite like how ‘Kokomo’ groove. These chaps are, collectively, somewhat akin to Motown’s ‘funk brothers’ in they have a definable, discernible sound unlike no other. Perhaps one day they’ll be equally revered and respected – are you watching BBC4?. In any event this is British r&b royalty in action, they really don’t make musicians like this anymore.

Earlier this year Michael Kiwanuka was announced as number one in the prestigious BBC Sound Poll of 2012. The previous winners since its inception in 2003 have been 50 Cent, Keane, The Bravery, Corrine Bailey Rae, Mika, Adele, Little Boots, Ellie Goulding and Jessie J. So, as a guide for future success, the poll has been a good barometer. But will the man dubbed ‘A Bill Withers for 2012′ come through? In this fickle and fragmented musical environment, nothing is certain. But what is certain is that Kiwanuka has been winning plaudits and praise from critics and fans alike, for his mesmerising, gentle and soulful vocals and mellow demeanour – he’s a young man who seems at ease in the fast developing career that he is carving out.

Born and bred in London but of Uganda parentage (“I still have lots of aunties and cousins there”), Kiwanaku has quickly migrated from being an accomplished session guitarist to supporting act on tours with both Adele and Laura Marling last year, and of course number one in the BBC Sound poll. “I was playing a lot of music (as a session player) which was good but it wasn’t representing who I was,” says Michael. “So, I started writing songs in my spare time and doing open mics, and I started putting more emphasis on singer songwriting and things rolled from there…”

Citing influences as diverse as Nirvana, Miles Davis and Stevie Wonder, Kiwanuka’s sound is very retro in feel and in style. “Folk, rock’n'roll and jazz are my big influences,” he says. I like Hendrix too – he had a softer side to him (songs such as ‘Little Wing, ‘Angel’) which I was really into. Often compared to Bill Withers and Terry Callier, Kiwanuka has developed a unique, if obviously retro sound, thanks largely to the production work of Paul Butler, a member of The Bees, and whose studio is used by that band in capturing their heavily reverb, analogue-drenched sound. This can be heard on his first two EPs, The Isle of Wight Sessions (Tell A Tale Now) and I’m Getting Ready, with a debut album, Home Again, being released in March, Kiwanuka is concentrating on playing live this year. “Yeah, it’s all about being on the road in 2012.. I love being a musician and playing, and I’ve really only just put together a band, so I’m progressing and developing that.” He seems to have hit upon a soul-folk hybrid, although he readily admits that his songs aren’t topical. “I couldn’t sit down and write about the riots (of last summer) or topical things, but I can write about what I’m going through – my songs are autobiographical. It’s not nice to feel that naked sometimes, but I think music needs to be like that.

Michael Kiwanaku, Wednesday 15 February, Komedia, Brighton 7pm, £8 (and on tour in the UK)

Back in 2002, and still in their teens, Tom and Alex White released their debut album as Electric Soft Parade, Holes In The Wall. The album was an immediate success, making the Top 40, and included a
couple of hit singles in ‘Empty At The End’ and ‘Silent To The Dark II’.

It was subsequently nominated for the Mercury Music Prize and the band were named Best New Act by Q. Even more remarkably, Tom was only 17 and Alex 19 when it was released… “We started doing things for real back in 1997 when I was 12 or 13,”
says Tom White (including releasing an album under the name The Feltro Media) “We sent a demo to XFM Unsigned on the radio, and a label heard
it and signed us.”

But despite such promising beginnings, the band never quite fulfilled their potential – their second album The American Adventure didn’t do well enough for their label at the time and they were subsequently dropped. Soldiering on, they released The Human Body EP in 2006 before issuing their final album to date, 2007’s No Need To Be Downhearted. And in the summer of 2008 they played their last gig. “Off the back of that show with Sparkes we thought it was a good one to bow out on… But we’re not re-forming, Alex and I never stopped working. It was just a matter of having a conversation and saying, ‘Let’s do it’.”

After a series of low-key gigs in Brighton last year, and a couple of Noel Gallagher supports, the band have essentially reformed even though they never officially broke up, the brothers continuing to work independently but also together as members of the acclaimed Brakes. They even released an EP, A Quick One, which amply demonstrated their penchant for classic indie-pop, full of melody. “The industry keeps changing – all these new tools for people to use, but we’re not really interested in all that, we’re only interested in the songs… It’s probably not what record labels want to hear, but we’re very old school people… we make a slight concession to Facebook because such a huge proportion of people are on it… we’re still essentially just a bunch of guys hacking away at guitars in a bedroom… There’s a lot of love for the band, and things are snowballing again. Hopefully we’ll do another album this year.”

This one-off gig celebrates the tenth anniversary of the release of Holes In The Wall. It’s original brew of psyche-pop, epic rock, experimentation and more downbeat acoustic songs is nothing short of brilliant. The NME gave it 9/10 at the time, and deservedly so.

Electric Soft Parade, Saturday 4 February, The Haunt, Brighton
electricsoftparade.co.uk

This is Brighton from Caleb Yule on Vimeo.

Rarely has an artist been the brunt of so much opinion and controversy; oscillating between exalted status to that of gutter trash, Amy Winehouse must be one of the most mis-understood artists of recent times – her ‘problems’ revealing a worryingly high degree of castigation and lack of tolerance amongst mere mortals…. Her popularity and sales on the back of Back to Black (and before her ‘troubles’) though testify to a large segment of the music-loving populace appreciating her all round talent; as a songwriter, as a performer, and, above all, as a singer. That, combined with her idiosyncratic and quite startling personality, made for a proper star of the old school variety.

So, it is with heightened interest that the first posthumous release from Winehouse arrives albeit, with expectations low as we know that that the so-called ‘third’ album was still very much in its early planning stages… Perhaps not surprisingly what we get is a selection of alternative takes, cover versions, demos and the odd what-might-have-beens…

Hidden Treasures opens promisingly with the dreamy and harmony-drenched 60s style ska of Our Day Will Come and the simple (yet acerbic and grim) 50s doo-wop high school prom stylings of Between the Cheats, one of only two tracks here that were mooted to appear on her long-delayed third album proper.

Winehouse then tackles Carol King’s Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow, and succeeds – the extra urgency that her voice imparts lends the song and the Spectoresque production a greater spectacle, particularly when compared to King’s own, rather melancholic, version. However, the jazz-scat cover of The Girl From Ipanema, as heard in this 2002 demo version, hasn’t stood up well compared to her later work – although it apparently was the inspiration for long-time producer Salaam Remi to get involved with her in the first place.

Rapper and friend Nas contributes to Like Smoke, and it doesn’t work; his rap doesn’t sit easily with the smoother Mark Ronson-like production… A track that feels half finished… but perhaps a pointer to the direction Winehouse was feeling for.

The 2003 outtake Half Time is an unusually gentle workout, but again demonstrating the high standards that she imparted to anything that was released in her name. A shoo-in for almost any other artist, this was deemed excess to requirements for her first album, the jazz-heavy, Frank.

the original demo version Wake Up Alone is perhaps an indication of where Winehouse could also have moved – stripped back, featuring her another outstanding vocal, along with another set of underrated lyrics – she really did have a knack for telling stories and providing memorable metaphors and images to the words, albeit through seemingly sad and troubled eyes.

Best Friends is a catchy number, while the cliqued lounge-jazz string laden 50s sounds of Body and Soul (co-sung with ageing crooner Tony Bennett) is a fun workout (in fact representing the last track she worked on). Her voice, more jazzed up and richer in tone than ever, shows Winehouse to be in perfect vocal fettle… When not drunk or out-of-it, her voice remained a thing of rare beauty – an impressively natural instrument that she seemed to be able to use effortlessly, and yet with due constraint when the occasion demanded.

Last song, Song For You (a Leon Russell composition), has a grand finale feel about it (it was recorded in 2009, and is one of the very few tracks here from after the Back to Black album). A love song, it’s a poignant reminder that AW wasn’t the devil in disguise – she was, just like most of us, en emotional and often troubled soul who, given the leeway and freedom that rock’n'roll success can unwittingly provide, had plenty of ammunition at her disposal to make her life difficult and confusing. Thankfully, this demo version is given only a little discreet production sugar by producer Remi.

The album’s coda features a short snippet of Winehouse talking about Donny Hathaway as someone who ‘couldn’t contain himself. He had something in him, you know’ – an implicit acknowledgment, that Winehouse herself had an inner turmoil, that at never managed to resolve itself….

With the addition of alternative takes of The Zuton’s Valkyrie and Tears Dry, Lioness: Hidden Treasures only serves to underline the paucity of material since Back to Black. This perhaps is the sum of what was left… Unless there is a surprise to be had (she apparently did write plenty of lyrics), it seems that we may have a full stop here. And, if there really isn’t hardly anything left to be aired, let’s hope Island Records, her record company, leaves it at that.

Amy Winehouse – Lioness: Hidden Treasures is out now