Young Marble Giants

December 5, 2003 8:25 PM

To quote their #2 and eponymous fan site, Young Marble Giants' music has been described as "haunting," "enchanting," "dark and strange". It is unusual in that it relies on precise, sparse textures to create tension. Few rock bands have expressed a sense of disquiet with such elegance. Long live Young Marble Giants!

They recorded but one album and yet a vastly influential album it was... Cardiffians: the Young Marble Giants Web archive is, of course, the #1 fan site, and not just for the video. And a very nice commercial-free lyrics page has been provided by Always on the run. (Do check out the pin up!)
posted by y2karl (7 comments total)

Alison Statton's later work with Weekend is also worth hearing.

I saw Toronto band Tetrezene the other night. Live, they have a vibe similar to YMG at times.
posted by todd at 9:07 PM on December 5, 2003

From the moment I heard the first few minimal notes on Colossal Youth, I was in love. The fact that they recorded it in a store front while on the dole makes it all the more romantic.

The album was re-re-released in 2003. The review at Pitchfork is quite good. Kurt Cobain was a huge fan. Ms. Love covered "Credit in the straight world" (to the chagrin of many). Stephin Merritt's cover of The Man Amplifier is quite good and worth tracking down if you are a Magnetic Fields/YMG fan.
posted by shoepal at 9:25 AM on December 6, 2003

I love YMG -- thanks for the links. Another interesting cover of a YMG song is Belle and Sebastian's new version of "Final Day" -- which they turn into something sounding like the Chemical Brothers. No, really. (I like it, though according to some recent reviews I may be alone.) It's on the new Rough Trade covers compilation Stop Me If You Think You've Heard This One Before, which has current RT artists covering songs from earlier in the label's history. (It also has the Moldy Peaches' Adam Green doing YMG's "Eating Noddemix.")
posted by lisa g at 11:08 AM on December 6, 2003

They were one of my favourite bands too. I was actually living in Cardiff at the time, but I never got to see them, much to my regret.
posted by carter at 12:36 PM on December 6, 2003

Fantastic band, Weekend were also one of my favourites, and the Devine and Statton album Prince of wales is now almost played to death (sounds like weekend meets The The's uncertain smile at times).

I heard a rumour that Ms Statton is now a chiropodist. Anyone else heard this?
posted by ciderwoman at 3:44 PM on December 7, 2003

Neat-o, If you want to read some great stuff on other indie bands like The Spinanes, Stuart Moxham, Tiger Trap, Spiral Jetty, Miracle Legion, etc. check out the Caught in flux and Writer's Block pages.

and some random trivia, the creator of this site also is in the credits of the TV show Pete and Pete
for helping them with their groovy music.

(full disclosure - I used to help out with this mag, way back in the mists of time)
posted by milovoo at 4:17 PM on December 7, 2003

Thanks for the nice links, y2karl.

Is Alison lip-synching in that video, or is that just an artifact of the video compression?
posted by cobra libre at 3:28 PM on December 8, 2003