The resurgence of noise

I'm probably the last person in the world to blog about it, but this subject hasn't really touched the Midlands. If I had to pick a point where the resurgence of noise first started it would be when the likes of My Bloody Valentine and the Jesus and Mary Chain announced their respective reunions in 2007. I'd always been a fan of bands like Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr. who have taken elements of noise, but I had never really discovered straight out noise music. But when I did finally discover it in 2006-7 it really grabbed me by the balls. There was something so rebellious about the whole idea of not conforming to the expectations of melody which really (excuse the pun) struck a chord with me.

Noise music comes in many different shapes and sizes, with the No Wave scene around 1978 and Shoegaze of the late 80s being entirely distinct in character, with hardly anything in common but their use of noise to give texture. On the whole though it seemed like noise music really was past giving a fuck which as a 15 year old was pretty much the most coolest thing in the world. It wasn't a proactive punk scene even though it was DIY, instead it was totally lazy which suits me down to the ground. It was "forget the man he's not worth two shits, let's just screw things up" not "fuck the man."

As I was getting into noise, new noise bands started popping out of the woodwork, such as No Age, Wavves, Liars, Fuck Buttons, Japanther or Crystal Stilts. All of which shun the conventions of melody and live in their own dream like world with their own rules. If you have a spare five minutes it's definitely worth downloading a couple of tracks. I couldn't possibly pick a definitive new noise album for you to march out and buy, so I'm going to trump for the seemingly most popular one which is No Age - Nouns. An ill record which has managed to rack up the blog inches in 2008.