Charlottefield
How Long Are You Staying?
Jonson Family Records - UK CD
Fat Cat - ex. UK CD
Unlabel - 12" Vinyl (with artwork even more proper ace than the CD)

Twenty five hours into my modern day vision quest. I haven't eaten anything since the bowl of cereal I munched my way through twelve minutes after waking up, which was twenty four hours and forty eight minutes ago, although I haven't been timing it. I walked four and a half miles earlier, and I've had the debut Charlottefield album on repeat all day. This time we're going for the hallucinations sans mushrooms. It's for a different perspective on this review, y'see. I don't want to just come straight out and say "this band is awesome" even though it would save my time and yours too. It's just not post-modern enough. Where's the irony in a straightforward critique? You know it's against the law to do things that don't contain at least one type of irony these days. If somebody were to invent an Irony Olympics for reviewing music, then my modern day Charlottefield vision quest is going for the gold in at least three track events and two field events.

Twenty five hours and fifty eight minutes in: still nothing biting. This isn't how it was supposed to turn out. Maybe I shouldn’t have had those Shreddies. It could have fucked this whole experiment right up. I’m really annoyed with those Shreddies.

Twenty six hours and twenty eight minutes and we have a breakthrough. My eyes are closed yet I can see a swirling rope flying toward me through the fog that descended two hours minus present time. The rope: it’s a bass line. Holding onto the end of this rope is a man with nine tails thrashing about, making an incomprehensible commotion about one thing or another. He is probably making a commotion about the rope. Maybe it is trying to kill him. Or maybe he is trying to kill the rope. It is very hard to tell. Why would he be clutching so tightly to the rope if it were trying to kill him? It is very confusing when you haven’t slept for twenty six hours and twenty eight minutes and men with nine tails are clutching to bass line ropes with all of their might.

Twenty six hours and thirty seven minutes. I think it’s over for the moment. Just a second ago ten guitars flew at me – headstock first - whilst I was watching the man with nine tails wrestling the bass line rope, but then eight snare drums and two hi-hats got in the way of the guitars and it created a bearded sound wave who became a song and went by the name of ‘Again’.

Twenty six hours and forty five minutes. The man with nine tails lost his grip on the bass line rope and his nine tails turned into one microphone, into which he has been hollering and caterwauling ever since. The bass line rope is still weaving about in the fog with boisterous, wild and confident jerks. I can only see one guitar now, but it is loud enough to be ten guitars all turned to maximum volume and maximum disorder. The eight snare drums and two hi-hats are trembling with ungovernable agitation but they pause every few minutes because they have been talking too much and the ten guitars want to say something slowly to make sure we all hear just how it will go down.

Twenty seven hours and three minutes. I fall into a deep sleep with visions of giant guitars having a boxing match still haunting me. Semi-conscious, I see Jesus himself walk into my room and interrupt my wavering thoughts. Words and thoughts on ‘How Long Are You Staying’ distend from his mouth and into my head without making a sound. All I can do is reply...:




Sam: "But… Jesus! Can’t you see? Charlottefield… they’re… they’re MONSTERS. They’re disorderly like an unreliable, authority-hating drunk mouthing off to the security guards at Asda after they try and throw him out for smelling of piss, drinking cider in the toilets and scaring the kids. They ain’t respectable human beings!"

Jesus: "They are merely passionate; like a man who has dedicated his life to science and the greater good perhaps... You make them sound like vicious lunatics: like this record is some sort of obscene onslaught of noise. It really isn't. It does so much more! Sure, it's still intense when it drifts and it drones, but it's got heart!"

S: "Surely there's some mistake: they’re from Brighton!"

JC: "But Sam, you must have noticed... There’s something about this record... some unseen characteristic... that proves it beyond any Brighton-bashing. Besides, if you’re going to tar Brighton – and thus every Brighton band – with the same brush and still complain every time a band gets bundled into a category or scene in NME then you should be forced to never write about music again! ...Anyway, some of my favourite bands are Brighton bands."

S: "Well, um… the album is too short! It’s just too short!"

JC: "It’s half an hour long: you can’t mess with that! It just gets straight to the point!"

S: "You might be right, but another thing is that you can barely hear the vocals!"

JC: "Jesus Christ, you’re one stupid sonofabitch! You can still hear them well enough, and it shifts more well-deserved focus onto the music! A bit of ambiguity never did anyone any harm!"

S: "Maybe so, but overall the record lacks dimension!"

JC: "I thought you were smart but I can tell you’ve been covering up now! God knows you’ve just been waiting to pull a term like that out through this whole sorry facade, haven’t you? What does it even mean? Next you’ll be using a phrase like ‘post-punk’!"

S: "Uh... It means that there isn’t enough to it as a whole! There’s a lack of variation within the songs! They all sound the same after you’ve listened to the record a few times..."

JC: "Dude, that’s just because you’ve been listening to it for more than twenty seven hours straight in some pathetic attempt to start hallucinating naturally because a) you think people might start giving a shit what you write in your reviews on your shitty fanzine website if you do something wacky like half-killing yourself and b) you can’t afford magic mushrooms from that bearded guy in town anyway so you figured this was the cheap alternative!"

S: "All right! All right! Shut the fuck up! Honestly, dude, c’mon; that’s pretty low for the Son of God..."

JC: "Dude!"

S: "Dude... Okay, okay... you’re the champ, I’m the chump. Happy?"

JC: "Like Easter all over again."

S: "Great... So, back to Charlottefield, and... since you’re the Saviour and all... How would you describe this record in Modern Journalistic Terms, Jesus? I’m talkin’ New Testament here when I say Modern; don’t front with me, blood..."

JC: "Well, Sam, I would say that ‘How Long Are You Staying’ sits somewhere between their improvised Noisestar session (formulated of just one track: ‘No Hands’, which lingered and sustained itself for twice as long as any song found here whilst still maintaining a certain zeal) and the urgent, head-on battle hymn of ‘Firewood’ (the A-Side of their Jonson Family Records 7”, and one of the best songs known to mankind). There aren't any tracks that stand out quite as much, I don't think, but as an album it's grandiloquent."

S: "...And how does it sit, Jesus?"

JC: "Oh, it sits real good, Sam, it sits real good!"

S: "Pretty comfy, then?"

JC: "You didn’t listen to this record at all, did you? I’ll tell you how it sits: at times it sits chaotically and unbridled; uncontrolled and quarrelsome, and at times it merely sits pondering it's next move... actually, you know what I just realised? It sits like one of the best debut albums I've heard in a while, that’s what it sits like."

-Sam & Jesus