Llama Farmers – More Salt
Woke up this morning, looked out the window, and sighed. I guess snow halfway through November is a little better than halfway through July. England has the craziest weather.
Anyway, seeings how it’s officially winter now, I can think of no better band than the most wintery sounding band I know; the Llama Farmers. I can’t tell you much about them as, as with all good bands, I only took notice once they were long gone. I do know they formed in the wake of the UK britpop meltdown, with a sound reflecting the past 5 odd years of grunge, rock and (brit)pop, and they were damn young. Ok, not 14 like, but still in high school. And by memory that’s about all I can tell you, other than the bassist was the lead singers little sister. No way you’d be finding my sister in any band of mine, so that guy must have some patience. Oh and they supported my favourite band The Crocketts on tour for ages. How many fine gigs I missed as a youngster, still, sitting at home watching Louise Wener et al on the Chart Show wasn’t so bad…
The only site they’ve ever seemed to have is one on their record lable’s, Beggars Banquet, now home to giants like Biffy Clyro, whoever they are (hey I’ll know when they split…). It’s not so bad, at least there’s a bio on there. Which informs me that yes, I was wrong, they *were* 14 when they formed. I said I didn’t know owt, didn’t I? Hell there’s even a couple movies still there, they ever still work (circa 98 though, don’t expect much). Here’s the link to the second one as it’s obviously gone missing over the past decade.
Ok ok, the music. I was gonna post the nice and wintery Snow White, or one of a million other tunes by them that mention winter, but there’s just too many other great songs and, to be honest, if I hear another person mention snow again I’m gonna scream.
So… the first quite acurately describes what will be making scruntching noises under my feet when I take a walk down the main road tomorrow morning. No, not heroin needles, I’ve moved out of Leeds a year ago. “And the clouds, got tangled and caught up in, the fingers of all of the trees…”. More Salt was taken from their second and final album, of which many an hour crouched in the hallways of a high-rise college tower in the center of town in the middle of winter were spent listening to. And everyone else had Greenday tops, oh how I sucked.
I don’t know if the catchy bass line or the suicidal leanings of the lyrics that made me chose Kill Will off the band’s original album Dead Letter Chorus which is altogether more gungier than the second, all I know is they can’t have been much more than 15 when they made it and it’s enough to make everyone hold their head above water for 40 odd minutes it lasts. Think Blur crossed with Elastica and you’re not far off.
Oh just one more thing – they’re not actually dead. They semi-reformed with the original members but a different name just last year. So if you like the Llamas, check out the Letters. And I better finish there cos I’ve not listened to em myself yet. See you on the myfaces.