Red House Painters - Silly Love Songs (Island, 1996)

Extended, anaesthetised take on chirpy Wings classic.

This record has a strong risk of coming over as some sort of conceptual joke but this extended, jammed-out version of Paul McCartney & Wings' chirpy 70s pop song actually works. The 70s AM radio sheen is replaced by desolate distorted guitar and time is slowed to glacial pace with some massive reverb the drums.

Red House Painters' Mark Kozelek's trademark yelp isn't heard until we're over five minutes into the track but, surprisingly, his rendering of the chorus sounds sincere.

It's a track that could result in a fairly harrowing Valentines Day should someone be unlucky enough to pick the wrong version in itunes. That would be a pretty disastrous eleven minutes of awkwardness in an otherwise lovey-dovey mixtape.

Download Red House Painters 'Silly Love Songs' (slowcore mp3) (Divshare)

Tortoise 'Glass Museum (Live)' (1996)

Peerless poise and amazing elegance, Post-Rock style.

This is just a track of such elegance, it's silly. Perfectly formed, beautifully resolved, an edge of improvisation and freedom within a framework of perfect balance.

This recording is from Toronto in 1996.

Download Tortoise 'Glass Museum (Live 1996)' (Post Rock mp3) (Divshare)

Photography by Valerio Berdini

Red Snapper 'Crusoe Takes A Trip (John McEntire - Tortoise Mix)' (Warp, 1996)

Red Snapper's acoustic jazz-and-double-bass given a moody overhaul.

Tortoise's John McEntire, post rock music's producer-of-choice, adds layers of synth oboe, machine hums and a wickedly squirming sinewave bassline to Red Snapper's tune.

The original main riff is subdued beneath the layers. McEntire takes the track in a decidedly Ghost Box-y, Radiophonic Workshop direction, long before that came into vogue outside of Stereolab and Broadcast's rehearsal rooms.

The synthetic oboe is the main bearer of ooky spookiness, before the track is pared back to it's light-as-air jazzy drums. The Jazz Factor is heightened as a spare but sumptuous semi-acoustic guitar picks out a new melody, like George Benson contemplating Suicide.

The opposite effect to the typical remix of Tortoise, Luke Vibert's remix of 'The Taut and The Tame' for example. The rhythm is downplayed and the soup of jazzy intrigue is dialed-up. Gorgeous late night stuff in a Funki Porcini, Ninja Tunes-in-the-nineties kind of way.

Brown.

Download Red Snapper 'Crusoe Takes A Trip (John McEntire - Tortoise Mix)' (dub, jazz, postrock mp3 download) (Mediafire)

Super Furry Animals 'God! Show Me Magic' (Creation Records, 1996)

Helter-skelter power popping genius. From Wales. In the nineties.

Crikey, they knew how to bang out a single, didn't they. 1996's 'God! Show Me Magic' is an irresistable gem that features some of that nee-nee-neeeeeee guitar abuse that all Creation records had to have in the early 1990s. Makes you think that Alan McGee had patented it or something.

The song bursts into life, thrashes around gleefully for 110 seconds and then sods off.

And it's got a picture of Bill Hicks on the label.

The b-sides are a quirky bunch. 'Death By Melody' is a psychedelic, clunk-about with lyrics that seem like they're taking the piss out of Oasis' spoon-moon-June-doubloon-Martin Clune(s) rhyming style. 'Dim Bendith' is an epic, space odyssey style freak-out with heavy, multitracked vocals. Like Pink Floyd driving an ice cream van. In space. Coming through the medium wave. In Welsh.

Genius.

Tracklist:
1. God! Show Me Magic
2. Death By Melody
3. Dim Bendith

Download Super Furry Animals 'God! Show Me Magic' EP (indie alternative mp3s, zip) (Mediafire)

Boymerang 'Still' (Prototype, 1996)

Drum'n'bass excursion from Bark Psychosis main man.

After being a key part of Bark Psychosis and before becoming a go-to-producer for the likes of British Sea Power, Jarvis Cocker and These New Puritans, Graham Sutton reinvented himself as a dubplate-toting drum'n'bass moodscaper. Not much evidence of his post-rock, indie past in here.

'Still' is a dark and powerful tune, mixing precise beats and omninous, rumbling layers of atmospheric noise. Darkstep, I believe it was called. For a couple of hours one Monday afternoon in 1996.

Anyway, labels aside, it's a great tune and worth hunting down the sole Boymerang album - 'The Balance Of The Force' - to hear.

Download Boymerang 'Still' (drum'n'bass mp3) (Mediafire)

My Life Story '17 Reasons Why I Love Her' (Parlophone, 1996)

My Life Story's finest moment - elongated.

The original version - '12 Reasons Why I Love Her' - is a towering, (melo)dramatic piece of orchestral pop that snuck into the charts in mid-nineties under cover of Britpop. Absolute full-on heart-on-sleeve stuff from Jake Shillingford and his ensemble.

Through the excellent 'Mornington Crescent' album and singles like 'Funny Ha Ha', My Life Story built up to this statement of intent. String section stabs, thunderous drum roll intro, dramatic cello undertow, trumpet stabs, yearning vocals, no real chorus because it's pretty much all chorus.

This extended version adds a baroque intro that ratchets up the tension for when the drum roll finally drops, announcing the track and leading us into five extra reasons.

Ravishing.

Download My Life Story '17 Reasons Why I Love Her' (Indie, Britpop, mp3) (Mediafire)

Ganger 'Guts And Bravoodoo' (Vesuvius, 1996) (mp3 download)

More magic from the mysterious Post Rock genii Ganger.

Another piece of hard-to-find rolling, post rock majesty from a 12" EP released on the label run by Pat Laureate of Melody Dog. The other two tracks on the EP were included on the 'Fore' compilation album (released on Domino in 1996 and highly recommended).

The lush 12" vinyl lets the sonorous magic of Ganger ring through. As ever, it's a gorgeous, swirling, inviting sound, a bit like Mogwai with the noisy bits, using tone and intensity rather than volume and distortion pedals to make their impact. File alongside the similarly bass-led genius of Tortoise's debut album.

Download Ganger 'Guts And Bravoodoo' (mp3 music download) (Box.net)

Rachel's 'Those Pearls...' (Touch & Go, 1996) (mp3)

A complex piece by the much-missed Rachel's, at times sun-dappled and beatific, at others overcast and moody.

Rachel's were a band from Louisville, Kentucky who established the intersesction between post-rock and modern classical. This track was from the 'Lounge Ax: Defence and Relocation' fundraiser to support the aforementioned Chicago venue.

'Those Pearls...' opens with an almost breezily positive piano section before strings and clarinet are added, creating moments of unease and building tension. Touches of percussion are added as the piece ascends to a plateau of calm, dissipating into brushed cymbals and then silence.

Gorgeous.

Download Rachel's 'Those Pearls...' (mp3) (Mediafire)

Kenickie 'Come Out 2 Nite' (Fierce Panda, 1996)

Punk-pop thrills and spills from the short-lived 90s self-styled punkas from Tyne and Wear.

Lauren Laverne, now a fully-fledged telly presented, author and BBC 6 Music presenter, was the driving force behind the band, a cartoon indie pop band that had some deceptively sharp songs. Personal faves were 'Punka' and 'People We Want' from the EMI debut album and 'Come Out 2 Nite' from this Fierce Panda 7-inch.

Opening with handclaps, a spunky buzz of guitar driving the song forward with Laverne's artfully sneery vocals and a driving Glitter-band drum beat, it's a rousing call-to-party and it's over and done in under two minutes. Which is very punk.

Download Kenickie 'Come Out 2 Nite' (indie mp3 download, Divshare)