Ups and downs

(Morning Star, Friday 07 December 2007)

ALBUM: Khaya - Is/Are/Was
(SL Records)

IT'S a credit to Scotland's SL Records that, in this, its 10th anniversary year, it can draw on a back catalogue as strong as any. And it has done it as a ferociously independent label.

Khaya were the label's starter wheels and they were a band for whom erratic working and occasionally questionable output were not strange.

As such, this "best of" is an interesting listen. Of the 16 tracks, there are at least eight which hint at better things - I Hate Fucking is a riot of sound, a perfect rendering of 1980s indie and The Vampires seems like a screaming racket from some other band's session.

But, for every plus, there's a disastrous minus, with spoken-word Duet and We've Got Rhymes heading the "why bother?" bill.

There's more than a little Sons and Daughters to the rocky take on folk here and labelmates Ballboy were plainly a strong influence.

The biggest problem is, as a career retrospective, it's just really disjointed. There are moments of brilliance, but, sadly, they seem to be overshadowed by the mediocrity which one assumes drove the band their separate ways.