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Run Aground
Loose Lips Sink Ships
666/10
Despite having a name that leaves us sniggering like a puerile schoolboy, wacked-out uber-lo-fi drone rock duo Bender peddle a fine line in demonic ambient noise. This intriguing London duo’s cinematic folk noise is magnificently evil, like the orgasmic groans of Lucifer himself. Spooky and monolithic, yet shambling and fragile, ‘Run Aground’ sounds like vengeful ghosts communicating from beyond the grave via the medium of beat-up electric guitars and malfunctioning FX pedals. And while it’s true that the only time you could imagine enjoying these strange, strange sounds is while digging up graves and smoking the bones of stillborn babies, NME is both rigidly terrified of such depraved noise, and inspired by Bender’s challenging sonic exploration.
JAMES JAM/ NME
…bender
‘Run Aground’
Loose Lips Sink Ships
Dark, brooding venture featuring Uncut photographer Steve Gullick and Gallon Drunk’s James Johnston
Recorded live on a reel-to-reel in a disused school, the debut from this London art noise project pivots around a wickedly potent take on the blues. There are echoes of Nick Cave’s From Her To Eternity, but ...Bender’s third member, film-maker/curator Geraldine Swayne, navigates them towards eerie folk. Despite the improvised conception, there’s a sinewy discipline about these cloud-rumbling vistas.
NEIL DAVENPORT/ UNCUT
…bender
Run Aground
Loose Lips Sink Ships
WHO? A collaboration between artist/ musician Geraldine Swayne, legendary rock photographer Steve Gullick and Bad Seed James Johnston.
SOUNDS LIKE? Nick Cave, ‘Third’-era Big Star, Dirty Three.
STANDOUT TRACK? The closing title track, a feedback-strewn but tender instrumental lament.
VERDICT? Gullick & co turn out a truly affecting whisky-soaked seaside suite.
JOHN STANNARD/ ROCK SOUND
Run Aground
Loose Lips Sink Ships
A live to 2-track three-way involving photographer Steve Gullick, Gallon Drunk linchpin James Johnston and artist Geraldine Swayne, Run Aground’s largely improvised dislocated blues floats on jagged guitars and damaged dissonance. Like a spaced-out Royal Trux or Jandek if his uber-primitive laments were scoring for Super 8, we like this
a lot.
ANDREW CARDEN/ MOJO
…bender
Run Aground
Loose Lips Sink Ships
Among the …bender ranks is a super 8 moviemaker, the editor of uber-indie ‘zine ‘Loose Lips Sink Ships’ and a Bad Seed. This, their latest album, was recorded live on a reel-to-reel 2-track tape machine. It’s pretty safe to say that collaboration with Chris Martin is a long way off. Surely this whole ‘making music for films that don’t exist yet’ thing is growing a tad weary now though don’t you think? Normally this is an excuse to meander through 20-minute instrumentals where little or nothing happens. This thankfully proves to be an exception. Largely improvised over two months, ‘Run Aground’ recalls the Dirty Three and some of PJ Harvey’s darker moments. Hard going at times, the album rewards repeated listening when sparks of beauty - in particular, ‘Listing’ – peer’s out through the gloom.
SHANE HORAN/ ALTERNATIVE ULSTER
…bender
Run Aground
Loose Lips Sink Ships
Steve Gullick, one third or Bender, was co-editor of Careless Talk Costs Lives, a magazine that attempted to redraw the line in the sand between ‘indie’ and ‘corporate’. The music on Run Aground reinforces the same cultural stance, managing to be both inward looking and vaguely antagonistic. Together with Brick Lane based artist Geraldine Swayne and Gallon Drunk’s James Johnston, Gullick explores a kind of murky, semi-abstract, bluesy hinterland, like Nick Cave on downers. But Gullick sounds dour and stroppy rather than deep and menacing when he sings ‘still riding/fuck knows which way/fuck knows why’, and his role-playing doesn’t extend much beyond attitude. Still, the music’s a fine mixture of menacing Ambient gloom and misshapen blues and soul inflections. If you can get past Gullick’s ‘man in black’ caricature there’s some compelling stuff to be found here.
TOM RIDGE/ THE WIRE