Los Angeles - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee [CD]

The three-way 'Los Angeles' collaboration was born out of a curiosity which just wouldn't die. Made up of two of the most illustrious and inventive drummers of the post-punk era, The Cure's Lol Tolhurst, and Budgie from Siouxsie & The Banshees and The Creatures, along with stellar producer and multi-instrumentalist Garret 'Jacknife' Lee, this unlikely alt-supergroup have spent the last four years spiriting up one of the most extraordinary albums to appear in 2023. Perusing the tracklist, with its guest credits for, amongst others, LCD Soundsystem's James Murphy, Bobby Gillespie, Civil Rights avant-gardist Lonnie Holley, Starcrawler wildchild Arrow de Wilde and The Edge from U2, you may rightly wonder just what the 13-track long-player holds in store. The answer: a hard-hitting and compulsively exploratory 55-minute electronic mindscrew, founded on unrivalled rhythmic expertise, fleshed out with an armoury of synths, guitars (Jacknife's forte) and supplementary percussion, often overlaid with elite-class strings and brass, then universally twisted, manipulated and quite masterfully sculpted by Lee, with his super-producer's hat on.

Disc 1
1. This Is What It Is (To Be Free) (With Bobby Gillespie) - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee
2. Los Angeles (With James Murphy) - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee
3. Uh Oh (With Arrow De Wilde and Mark Bowen) - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee
4. Ghosted at Home (With Bobby Gillespie) - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee
5. Train With No Station (With the Edge) - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee
6. Bodies (With Lonnie Holley and Mary Lattimore) - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee
7. Everything and Nothing - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee
8. Travel Channel (With Pan Amsterdam) - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee
9. Country of the Blind (With Bobby Gillespie) - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee
10. The Past (Being Eaten) - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee
11. We Got to Move (With Isaac Brock) - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee
12. Noche Oscura (With the Edge) - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee
13. Skins (With James Murphy) - Lol Tolhurst/Budgie/Jacknife Lee