'Tin' from Permo by Spinning Coin
I have been looking forward to a full-length from Glasgow’s Spinning Coin ever since I heard the exquisite ‘Albany’ on their debut cassette back in April 2015. Actually, I am sure that Brogues had alerted me to them prior to this, but it was Stephen Pastel who added the tape to a bag of records in Monorail during that particular Easter trip Up North. Two years. Where does the time go to, eh? Well in Spinning Coin’s case it was a couple of delicious 7”s, one of which was an updated version of ‘Albany’ and the other ‘Raining On Hope Street’. ‘Hope Street’ if anything was even finer that Albany; all East Village minor chords and feathery Big Star vocals, it was like Teenage Fanclub serenading from the mist.
Now I believe that Spinning Coin played shows with Girl Ray this year, and that is entirely appropriate for both feel like groups who delight in being informed by sounds that are slightly out of whack, by an aesthetic that whilst eclectic remains clearly and cleverly defined. Yes, yes, for the poor old souls like me and my generation the touchstones are Postcard and The Pastels (Permo is on the Pastels curated Geographic subsidiary of Domino and much of it was produced by Saint Edwyn at his Helmsdale studio) but so what? Paint me some more contemporary references and I’ll willingly turn them into my own in desperate attempts to appear With It. Whatever It happens to be.
Clearly substantial parts of those last two sentences are lies.
Let’s be clear though, Spinning Coin might sound sometimes slight and fey yet they can also be slyly seedy and careless. As in, they couldn’t care less what you think, not that notes are tossed around without a thought (though they manage to pull off that tough conjuring trick too). ‘Tin’ is a case in point, where they come on like Yummy Fur in a blender with Urusei Yatsura (the band, not the manga series. Though come to think of it…). Again, this probably shows my age and those of another age are going all ‘WTF?’ and other assorted acronyms. Plus, yeah yeah, yeah, I promise I will stop with the alliteration the day that Pop stops being all about the repetition of sound and feeling.
‘Tin’ makes me grin and bear it. Permo helps me luxuriate in the pleasures of the past today whilst looking forward to their even brighter tomorrows. Spin on. Spin on.
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